《Tensei Shitara Slime Datta Ken (LN)》


 Volume 1 - Prologue

    PROLOGUE: DEATH AND REINCARNATION

    It was just your typical kind of life. I graduated from college,nded a job at a sort-of-big general contractor outfit, and with my older brother taking care of our parents for me, I was currently enjoying all the myriad benefits of the bachelor-pad life. Age thirty-seven. No significant other.

    I wasnt exactly short or frumpy or hideous or anything. But when it came to the opposite sex, apparently I had nothing to offer. Id made efforts along those lines, with varying degrees of dedication, but by the third rejection, something fizzled out within me. Besidesreally, at this age, I was kinda past the point where a girlfriend needed to be my main focus. Work kept me busy enough. Plus, it wasnt like I was gonna die without one.

    Im not making excuses, all right? Its just that I started thinking

    Oh, hello, sir! Sorry werete!

    There he was, walking toward me, bursting with all that youthful energy of his. He and the beautiful woman next to him. His name was Tamura, one of the guys who worked under me, and she was Sawatari, the front-deskdy and pretty much the it girl around the office.

    These bums asked to see me because they were getting married and wanted my advice. In other words, this meeting was the whole reason I was brooding over why I was such a failure at personal rtionships. I was leaning against a telephone pole at the intersection where wed agreed to meet after work, thinking to myself.

    Nah. I nodded a greeting at Sawatari and asked, Whatd you want to talk about?

    Oh, good to meet you. My names Miho Sawatari. Ive seen you at work a lot, butum, I guess this is the first time Ive spoken to you, huh? It makes me kind of nervous, somehow.

    Im the one who should be nervous,dy! my mind griped to itself. Its not like Im any good at speaking to women. How about a little sympathy here?

    Any way you looked at it, I was the wrong person to ask. I knew nothing about love. They were doing this just to spite meI was sure of it. Pretty sure, anyway.

    Oh, theres nothing to be nervous about, I replied. Satoru Mikami. Its good to meet you, Ms. Sawatarialthough youre famous enough around the office that you hardly need to even introduce yourself, huh? Tamura and I went to the same college, and we kinda hit it off during his training period, so thats how we know each other.

    Famous? Oof! Not famous in a weird way, I hope?

    Oh, yknow. I hear stories about you dating Kameyama or messin around with Mr. Kihara in management

    Somehow, I decided that picking on her would be a good idea. I just meant it as a passing joke, but it made Sawataris face turn a bright shade of red, her eyes watering up a bit. It was cute, in a way. People were always telling me to tone that stuff downthat I needed to consider peoples feelings more or, if not that, at least make it funnierbut I couldnt help myself. So mark that down as another failure. Maybe I really do have a crap personality.

    Tamura took that chance to intervene, giving Sawatari a pat on the shoulder. Dammit, Tamura! So blessed with the natural charm you need to live a decent life I wish people like you would just explode!

    Aw, stop being mean to her, he admonished with an effortless smile. And dont worry, Miho, hes just having a little fun with you.

    Cool, refreshing, andpletely guilelessTamura was impossible to hate. He was still just twenty-eight, quite a bit younger than I was, but we got on well nheless. I probably owed him at least a few congrattions

    Hah, sorry, I said, figuring there was no reason to let my jealousy devour me. I cant help but needle people like that sometimes. But no point standing here on the sidewalk. Wanna get something to eat while we talk?

    Aaaahhh!!

    Screams. Chaos. What isWhats going on?!

    Move! Ill kill you!!

    I turned around to find a man sprinting toward me, a backpack in one hand and a kitchen knife in the other. I could hear shrieking. He wasing my way. With a knife. A knife? And at the other end of it

    Tamuraaaa!

    The moment I shoved Tamura aside, I felt a burning pain run across my back. My body balled up as it copsed to the ground, trying to withstand the shock. I couldnt tell what had happened. I wanted to move, but I couldnt.

    Get the hell outta my way! the man shouted as he ran off. I watched him go and then checked to see how mypanions were. The suddenness of it all had reduced Tamura to a stupor, but he was unhurt. That was good. But, man, was my back burning. So hot. Beyond anything Id describe as pain.

    Whats up with that? Its too hot Gimme a break.

    Confirmed. Resist Heatsessfully acquired.

    Did I Did I just get stabbed?

    So Im gonna die from a stabbing? Holy crap

    Confirmed. Resist Piercing Weaponsessfully acquired. Following up with Resist Melee Attack Sessfully acquired.

    M-Mr. Mikami, youre bleeding You wont stop bleeding!

    I really didnt need to hear that right now. Was that Tamura? I thought I heard some kind of weird voice. If it was Tamura, then so be it.

    Im bleeding? Well, duh. Im only human. If you stab me, Ill probably bleed all over you, yes.

    Damn, this was starting to hurt, though

    Confirmed. Cancel Painsessfully acquired.

    Um Well, shit. All this pain and panic was starting to screw around with my consciousness.

    T-Tamura Shut up. It Its nothing big, all right? Quit worrying

    Mr. Mikami, youre The blood Tamura tried to hold me up, face drained of color and looking about ready to break into sobs. So much for that bravado from two minutes ago. I tried to see how Sawatari was doing, but my vision was too fogged up to manage it.

    Now the burning feeling on my back was starting to fizzle out. Instead, an intense, frigid cold was attacking me from head to toe. That Thats probably bad People die once they bleed too much, dont they?

    Confirmed. Constructing a blood-free body Sessful.

    Hey, whatre you talking about? I cant hear you too well

    I tried to speak. And failed.

    Shit. I think this might really be it Like, the pain and the heat were pretty well gone by now. It was just cold. Cold as hell. I felt as if I was gonna freeze in ce.

    Who knew dying could keep you so damn busy?

    Confirmed. Resist Coldsessfully acquired. Combined with the previously acquired Resist Heat, the skill has progressed to Resist Temperature.

    Just then, what remained of my increasingly oxygen-deprived brain cells chanced upon a sh of brilliance.

    Oh, craaaaap, the files on my hard drive!

    I summoned up my remaining wells of strength, striving to ry the final regret I had left in life.

    Tamuraaa! If If anything bad happens to metake myputer, okay? Put it in the bathtub, turn it on, and just fry everything on the disk for me, man

    Confirmed. Electricity-based deletion of data Cannot execute. More information required. Substituting with Resist Electricity Sessfully acquired.

    It took a moment for my plea to register with Tamura. He gave me a nk stare. Then he snickered.

    Ha-ha! Thats just like you, isnt it?

    Even if it was just a snicker, it beat having to depart this ne of existence with a grown man blubbering on top of me. Id take it.

    All I wanted was to show Sawatari off to you, too, he continued.

    Pfft

    Hah. I knew it. That bastard.

    Its fine, okay? Make her a happy woman.

    I wrung out thest bit of strength my body had to offer.

    Just kill my PC for me

    It was just your typical kind of life. I graduated from college,nded a job at a sort-of-big general contractor outfit, and with my older brother taking care of our parents for me, I was currently enjoying all the myriad benefits of the bachelor-pad life.

    And I was a virgin.

    Imagine that. Floating off to meet my maker inpletely unused condition My manhood was probably crying its single eye out right then. Sorry I couldnt make you a real grown-up. If theres such a thing as reincarnation, Im gonna go on the attack next timeI promise. Ill hit up everyone I see, stalking my prey before I go in for the kill Okay, not like that, but

    Confirmed. Unique skill Predatorsessfully acquired.

    I mean, here I was, lookin at forty without ever losing my virginity. Like an old sage meditating in the mountains. Another few years, and I probably couldve been the great sage of celibacy. Not the road I wanted to take in life, but there you go.

    Confirmed. Extra skill Sagesessfully acquired. Evolving extra skill Sage into unique skill Great Sage Sessful.

    Hey, someone mind telling me whos talking? What do you mean, unique skill Great Sage? Someone tryin to start something with me? Theres nothing unique about that! If you think Im finding that funny, Im not! Thats just mean, man

    Before I could continue down that train of thought, however, I fell asleep.

    Weird how deaths nowhere near as lonely as I thought itd be.

    That was thest thought I had on the mortal ne.

 Volume 1 - Ch 1

    MY FIRST FRIEND

    It was dark. Too dark to see anything. Where was I? What even happened, for that matter? Someone was picking on me for being a celibate sage or something, and then

    That was enough to jump-start my mind again.

    My name was Satoru Mikami. Just another thirty-seven-year-old in a suit. And when I shoved my coworker aside on the street, some random maniac stabbed me. Good. I remembered all of that. Which meant I must be fine. No need for panic. That wasnt like me anyway. I was known for having a cool head. Thest time I panicked, it was grade school and all I did was wet my pants, just a little bit.

    I tried looking at my surroundings. Then I noticedI couldnt open my eyes. Odd, I thought as I tried to rub them and my arms didnt respond. And more to the point, Wheres my head, anyway?

    This was getting confusing. Like, whoa. Wait a sec. I needed some time to deal with this.

    Whenever I start freaking out, I always find it helpful to sit still and start counting prime numbers until I calm down. Lets try that. One, two, three

    Wait, one doesnt count as a prime number, does it?

    Ugh Now wasnt the time for this. I couldnt let myself think about this stupid crap. This was bad, wasnt it? Like, whats going on, here?! Was Ilike, past the point of no return, unless I did something?

    Panicking, I checked to see whether I was hurt anywhere. I didnt seem to be. Physically, I felt terrific. No cold, no heatperfectlyfortable. That, at least, came as a relief. Now for my hands and legs Oop. Not so hot there. No response from any of my limbs. Whats up with that? Getting stabbed in the back wouldnt force the doctors to amputate all my extremities, would it? Id kind of like those back.

    Then there was the whole cant open my eyes thing. I was in a world of darkness, where I couldnt see a thing. An anxiety like none Id ever felt before began welling up in my mind.

    Am Iin aa or something?

    I was conscious, certainly, but had I gotten detached from my central nervous system, maybe?

    Oh, man, anything but that! I mean, think about it. When you throw a guy into a dark, enclosed space, it takes practically no time at all for him to go insane. And that was exactly where I wasand I couldnt even die in peace any longer, it looked like. If insanity was all that waited for me here, that was enough to take the wind out of anybodys sails.

    Just then, I felt something brush against my body. Hmm? Whats that? I focused all of my senses on this unknown sensation. It felt like grass against what might have been the side of my stomach. Concentrating on the sensations, I slowly began sussing out what was around me. I could feel the pointy edges of some nearby leaves prick against my body.

    It made me a little happy, really. I was in total darkness a moment ago, but now I had my sense of touch back, at least. It made me so overjoyed that I made a beeline for the grass, and

    Creep.

    I could feel my body sliding t against the ground. I I moved?!

    This, at least, was clear evidence that I was not on any kind of hospital bed. The feeling beneath my stomach (?) took the form of hard, jagged rock. Hmm. It still didnt make much sense to me, but I appeared to be outdoors.

    So I headed toward the grass, keeping my senses keen against what I touched, although I still wasnt quite clear on where my head was. There was nothing to smell; I wasnt sure whether I had that sense or not.

    Really, I had no idea what I was shaped like. I feltflowing. Jellylike. Kind of like a certain fantasy monster I was well familiar with. In fact, the idea had been running through my head for a while now.

    No. Come on. Thats just silly. Anything but that. I decided to leave that anxiety-inducing prospect behind for the time being and instead try out the final, untested one of my five human senses. Not that I knew where my mouth was. Sonow what?

    Suddenly, a voice ran across my mind.

    Use unique skill Predator?

    Yes

    No

    Huh? Wh-what? Unique skill Predator?

    And what was up with that voice? I thought I heard something weird when I was talking with Tamura earlier. That wasnt just me imagining things? Was someone there? Something didnt seem quite right with it. It wasnt that I thought I had a visitor, so much aswell, as I just had words floating into my mind. Cold, unfeeling words, like aputer-generated voice.

    Lets go with no for now.

    No response. I waited a while for one, but no further voices came. It appeared there wouldnt be a second question. Did I make the wrong choice? Was this the kind of game where you got stuck if you didnt start giving yes answers? I was assuming the question would just repeat forever until I said yes, like any normal RPG. Guess not.

    Kind of rude of that voice, though. Showing up, asking a simple question, then disappearing forever. It was nice hearing someone for a change, butthe hell, man?

    Oh well. Lets go on with what I was trying before. My sense of taste.

    I moved toward the grass I felt earlier. As it brushed up against me, I leaned forward, feeling the whole of my weight settle over the field. It was definitely grass of some sort.

    Once I was sure of that, I suddenly realized that the area where the nts met my body was starting to melt. I thought it was myself melting at first, but apparently it was only the grass. And with that, I could now tell that theponents of the nt life beneath me were being taken into my body.

    So that was how it worked? Instead of having a mouth to eat with, I just ingested nt matter with my whole body? It sure didnt taste like anything.

    From this, there were a few conclusions I could sensibly make.

    First, I was no longer human. That was a given by now. So did I really get stabbed to death? It didnt seem like much of an open question at this point. Itd also exin why I was resting on a rocky patch of grass instead of in a hospital room.

    What happened to Tamura? To Sawatari? Did he scramble my hard drive for me, like he promised? I was full of questionsbut also a suspicion that, by this point, none of them really mattered anymore. I had to think about what came next.

    Sois this it? Am I really a You know With the kind of tactile feedback Im getting at the moment

    I trained my senses back inside my body. It responded with a rhythmic motion. Boing. Sproing. Slowly, inside the total darkness, I took the time to ascertain the exact boundaries of my form.

    Heavens! I used to be such a handsome, attractive man, and now Im sofluid! So aerodynamic!

    Yeah, right! You think Id ept this just like that?!

    As far as I could feel, there was no longer any doubting it. I could picture it in my mind.

    I meanwhat else could it be? Not like I had a prejudice against it. Hell, it was kinda cute, if anything!

    But was it for me, though? If you took a poll, I think at least nine out of ten people would have the same answer.

    I would just have to ept it, though. ept the fact that my soul, or whatever you want to call it, had been reborn inside a monster from another world. The odds of such a thing seemed astronomically low to me, but

    But Id been reborn. As a slime.

    Munch, munch.

    Munch, munch, munch, munch.

    I just snacked on some grass.

    Why did I do that? Well, why not?

    Not like I had anything else to do!

    It had been a few days or so since I was pretty much forced to ept the fact that I was now a slime. How many, I wasnt exactly clear on. The passage of time is tough to pick up on when all you can see is total darkness.

    One discovery I had stumbled upon over the past few days was that a slimes body could be way more useful than at first sniff. I never got hungry, for one, nor did I get tired. Food and sleep, for me, were wholly unnecessary. And I had divined something else, too. I couldnt bepletely sure, but there didnt seem to be anything else living around here. In terms of danger, I wasnt sure there was any to speak of. My days were blissfully free of worry.

    Or anything else, really.

    The whole time, I never heard that voice again. By this point, I wouldnt have minded a littlepanionship. But no. It was just me, the grass, and me eating it forck of much else to do. It was simply a way to kill time. And by this point, I could sense the entire processmy body absorbing the des, dismantling them internally, sorting through all theponents, and storing them away.

    What it all meant, I couldnt say. It was starting to frighten me a bit. I needed to do something, or Id lose my mind. So I kept going through the cycleabsorb, break down, store up. But there was something odd about the process. Elimination never factored into it, somehow. Not even once. Maybe slimes didnt need to do that. Hell, not like Id know either way. But where was all this stuff I was ingesting going, then? My senses told me that my form hadnt changed in any appreciable manner from when I first arrived.

    So what the hell?

    Received. It is being stored in the stomach of the unique skill Predator. Current physical space usage is less than one percent.

    What? Whoa! It speaks!

    But since when was I using any skills? I thought I answered no back there.

    Received. The unique skill Predator is not being used. The matter being ingested into your body is set to automatically be stored in your stomach. This can be changed as needed.

    Oh? Well, nice to see were having a real back-and-forth, finally. But back to business. If I use this skill, what happens then?

    Received. The unique skill Predator chieflyprises the following five effects:

    Predation:

    Takes the target into your body. Lesser chance of sess if the target has its own consciousness. Can be targeted on organic and inorganic objects, as well as skills and magic.

    Analysis:

    Analyzes and researches targets taken into your body. Lets you create craftable items. If the required materials are present, allows you to make a copy of the item. Sessful Analysis of the casting method allows you to learn the targets skills and magic.

    Stomach:

    Stores the Predated target. Can also store materials created via Analysis. Items stored in your stomach are unaffected by time.

    Mimicry:

    Reproduces the form and skills of absorbed targets. Only avable once the target has been Analyzed.

    Iste:

    Stores harmful effects incapable of being analyzed, neutralizing them and breaking them down into magical force.

    Um What?

    For the first time in a while, I was thrown. That sounded like kind of an incredible ability. Not exactly the kind of thing slimes were known for. At least not the ones I knew.

    Andhang on. Who was this voice answering my questions, anyway? Was someone there?

    Received. This is the effect of the unique skill Great Sage. The skill has taken effect, making it more immediately avable.

    A sage, huh? And here I thought that voice was just screwing with me. Now it was the best partner I had. Hope that keeps up.

    Hell, anything would have been fine at that point. As long as it helped smooth out the endless solitude I was preparing myself for. For all I knew, this voice was something my mind had crafted to keep my marbles intact. It was fine by me. For the first time in ages, I could feel a burden lifting from my heart.

    By my count, it had been ny days since I was reincarnated as a slime.

    To be more precise, ny days, seven hours, thirty-four minutes, and fifty-two seconds. How was I so sure about this? Turned out that was one of the many side effects of evoking that Great Sage skill.

    Holy cats, was that thing helpful. Talk about your best friend in a pinch. Any question that popped to mind, it instantly provided the answer.

    ording to this Sage, it took ny days for the skill to fully fuse itself with my soul. Normally, it would be unable to provide responses in the form of conversation, but in order to answer my questions, it apparently revamped itself, diverting part of its World Language powers to assist me. Thats how it was exined to me, at least.

    This useful abilityrying words into my mindisnt normally possible. As it exined to me, this World Language was heard only when there were great changes to the world or when you either earned or upgraded a skillsomething that normally didnt happen all that often. These skills were obtained only rarely, when the world recognized that you had grown in one way or another.

    Evolution, meanwhile, was something most people never got to experience in their lives. It was all Greek to me, but if that was how it was, I was willing to ept it.

    So the Great Sage was answering my questions at the moment, but otherwise it was this totally passive thing. No real sentience or anything. Unless I spoke up, it would never talk to me of its own volition. That was the only real drawback, but tossing words around with someone again was a wonderful feeling, even if it was a one-way street.

    Although, back in my home world, having a conversation with my own skill might have been considered strange

    So there I was, still locked in darkness, asking a barrage of questions.

    One thing the replies confirmed was that yes, I was a slime now. I also found out why I never got hungry or sleepy. The slimes in this world, it turned out, never had to eat if they could keep absorbing the magic particles, or magicules, in the air. In less magically abundant regions, I would be obliged to fill up by absorbing monsters or small creatures.

    Most slimes shied away from areas with low magic presences, but the ones that didnt were apparently both quite strong and madly vicious. Usually it was the other way around, where a wealth of local magic meant especially strong monsters.

    In other words, the area I took up residence in was soden with magic that I didnt even have to eat.

    As for the sleep question:

    Received. The body of a slime consists of a mass ofpletely identical cells. Each individual cell may function as a brain cell, a nerve cell, or a muscle cell. Since the operational cells used for thought are rotated in and out at regr intervals, there is no need for you to sleep.

    This raised the question of where my memories were being held, exactly. Maybe it was kind of like a RAID setup on aputer?

    That would be close enough, came the response. Considering itsck of personality, the Sage certainly came up with some snappy replies.

    Speaking of which, the Great Sage skill consisted of five effects:

    Hasten Thought:

    Boosts perception speed by a thousand times.

    Analyze and Assess:

    Analyzes and assesses the target.

    Parallel Operation:

    Operates on any matter you wish to analyze, separating it from the regr thought process.

    Cast Cancel:

    Annuls the casting period required when using magic, et cetera.

    All of Creation:

    Provides full coverage of all unsuppressed matter and phenomena in this world.

    All of Creation? So I know about everything, everywhere, with no effort on my part? Score! Or so I thought.

    It turned out that I could only be told information rted to things Id already heard aboutin other words, I needed to recognize and understand a concept before I could grab a full Analysis of it.

    And the spell thingdid that mean I could instantly use any magic once I learned it? And, like, there was magic in this world and stuff?!

    The Great Sage replied with a big Yes.

    Well, once I knew that, I just had to try to learn a few spells myself.

    I checked with the Sage to see if it could help me cast magic, but that was a no-go. Eh, it was worth a shot.

    Still, I had another great idea: Could I link the Predator Analysis skill with Great Sage Parallel Operation?

    Received. It is possible to link Predator Analysis with Great Sage Parallel Operation. Do you wish to link them?

    Yes

    No

    Uh, yeah? Not that I had anything to analyze yet Wait. Or did I? That grass in my stomach. The stuff I had been eating to pass the time. What was that? Not like I had anything else to do. Lets give it a try.

    Off you go, Sage.

    Analysisplete.

    Hipokute herbs:

    A type of ingredient used in healing medication. Only thrives in areas blessed with high local magic densities. Fusing its juice with magicules produces recovery medicine. Grinding the des and fusing them with magicules produces a salve that closes wounds.

    Wow! That was what Id been snacking on? Talk about an unexpected windfall. I immediately set out to create some medicine of my very own. The process took ce inside my body, so it didnt really feel much like crafting, but the Analysis took less than a second, and within another three-ish, I had my very first potion. Five minutes, and I couldve had a hundred. And while I didnt have anything else topare it to, using my Great Sage skills to assess them resulted in a high quality rating.

    So there you go. I was happy enough with it, at least. It all went so fast, too. I asked the Sage about it, and it said the process usually took more time than that. Linking it with Parallel Operation mustve been the right idea, I suppose.

    To test that theory out, I unlinked it long enough to create a single potion. It took fifty minutes. Damn, that was slow. Looks like I had the foresight to stumble across some megapatible skills tobine. Not that I knew what I was doing at all.

    Some of your garden-variety weeds were also sprouting here and there, but most of the local grasses were hipokute. How bout that? So I decided, as a little insurance, to Predate all the herbs I could in the area and turn my stomach into a little recovery-potion factory. I didnt have much else to upy my time. It was still pitch ck in here.

    There was no doubt about it. I had put my guard down. I had a partner who granted me skills and the ability to engage in (kind of passive) conversation, and I let it get to my head.

    I suppose that had a lot to do with how for ny days in a row, I never ran into any other creatures. No danger to my life whatsoever. But either way, I had let my guard down.

    For an instant, I was like, Huh?

    I felt a sudden sensation that I had grown lighter or heavier or, likeunstable.

    Did Ifall in some water?

    In the past ny days, I hadnt felt so much as a drop of water hit my body. Id assumed I was in a rain-free cave or some other kind of shelter, so I had never even entertained the possibility before.

    I had probably slipped into a river or something. Rivers dont exist indoors, so maybe it was some kind of underground creek in this cave I was in? Up to now, I had been careful with every step I took, making sure everything remained steady in the darkness. But after learning about my skills, getting full of myself, and using Predation to eat a pastures worth of grass, I had stopped paying attention to what was under me.

    I was always like that. Getting cocky, then screwing it all up in the end. Id proim to a customer, Oh, absolutely! That wont be any problem at all! and then have hell to pay. It had happened over and over. I still remember the spiteful looks the rest of my team gave me for it.

    Too bad I didnt think to stop myself in time. What kind of idiot runs off into parts unknown when they cant even see? If I survived this, I was gonna give myself what for. Of course, given my personality, I doubted Id learn anything from it.

    It was funny how serenely I was handling this whole thing, though. Not like I had much in the form of arms or legs I could il about in horrified panic

    Guess its over, then. Pretty short lifetimeeven by slime standards, maybe. I said my final prayers, awaiting my inevitable suffocation.

    Suffocation never came.

    Why not? Did I not fall in the water? Time to call on the Sage, maybe.

    Received. A slimes body operates exclusively on magicules. Oxygen is unnecessary, and therefore, so is breathing. That is why you have not been engaging in that behavior.

    Oh Right. I wasnt paying attention, but I guess there wasnt any breathing, was there? Made sense. Even after ny days, I was still learning something new!

    But now wasnt the time to celebrate. I had fallen into water, and even if I wouldnt die, it did still put me in kind of a bind. What now? I couldnt really tell whether I was floating or sinking. Myck of limbs precluded any attempt at swimming. Would I wind up at the bottom sooner orter and be able to creep my way back to the surface? Or was I doomed to bob around in the middle of the current, never reaching much of anywhere?

    Though, if anything, it felt less like a violent torrent and more like I was being rocked in a cradle. Very gently rocked. It felt pretty good, even

    Something told me this wasnt flowing water after all. Maybe it was ake, not a river. I didnt feel as though I was being taken anywhere. I was just kind of bobbing up and down, like a stic bag, and it didnt feel as if Id ever hit bottom. If things stayed this way, I was in big trouble.

    What now?

    Just then, my brain cellsor my slime body, I guesscame up with an ingenious n. Maybe I could go all Predator on this water and then spit it out for some water-jet propulsion. Would that work? Only one way to find out. Not like I could do anything else.

    So I started drinking, filling my Predator stomach up to approximately 10 percent of its capacity. Then, I expelled it like I was wringing out my stomach.

    The sense of release was exhrating.

    Suddenly, I heard a voice in my mind:

    Water Pressure Propulsion skill acquired.

    It was the first time I recognized it. This had to be the so-called World Language. There was no mistaking it, since the Sage spoke only when spoken to, but the two voices did sound exactly the same.

    But I didnt have a moment to ponder over this. The more pressure I applied on the water, the more pressure I felt on myself, and I was rocketing forward at astonishing speed, as if I was about tounch myself into the sky. The eleration was intense. Honestly, maybe it was a good thing I couldnt see. Instead, I just basked in the sensation of my body zipping along through the darkness.

    Well, let me rify. If I couldve seen my surroundings, Im sure the fear wouldve been intensebut not being able to see was just as terrifying.

    If youve ever been on a roller coaster in an amusement park in total darkness, perhaps youd understand the feeling. My mind shed back to my previous life and the single day I spent visiting a certain paradise under the rule of a certain rodent. At least his magical dreand offered safety harnesses.

    By this point, I wanted to punch myself foring up with the idea. And trying it out right after thinking it up? Come on, man! What happened to some kind of, you know, preliminary safety check?

    The terror was starting to affect my train of thought. How long would I keep elerating? How much water did I spit out, anyway?

    As that thought urred to me, I felt my body crash headlong into something and bounce off it. I braced myself for a wave of paralyzing pain. Which never came.

    Huh? Shouldnt that have, like, damaged me? Or did it damage me, and I just didnt feel it or whatever?

    Received. You have acquired Cancel Pain, which interrupts the creation of pain. Your Resist Melee Attack has reduced the amount of damage taken. The amount of damage your body has incurred is ten percent. The intrinsic slime skill Self-Regeneration has taken effect. Would you like to support it with your Predator unique skill?

    Yes

    No

    Oh, so I was hurt a little, then? Made sense. I wasnt sure whether this was a good or bad thing, but as long as I knew something was up, then maybe I didnt need to feel pain after all. Itd make certain things easier.

    Predator support, though, huh? I dont really get it, but sure. Yes.

    At that moment, I was greeted with the feeling that I had suddenly lost some of my body mass. After a while, I felt it return. My damaged parts had been Predated, analyzed, and repaired. Talk about a useful body to have. I should try testingter to see how much of it I can afford to lose before Im KOd. It was way too dangerous to mess with in detail, but I guess I could afford to go without at least a bit of it at a time, so

    Something told me I was getting a little too careful, anyway. I had a stockpile of recovery potions, which I didnt even have to use. And I wouldve figured losing a tenth of my body would be a pretty serious issue, but now I knew I could just regenerate it in the space of ten seconds. Next time I was damaged, Id try using those potions.

    So where am I, I wonder? Making sure my body was back to normal, I checked out my surroundings. No telling what kind of dangerous monsters might be nearby. I was out of the water, but maybe there were scary, scaly things waiting for me on the other side.

    Slowly, carefully, I started taking action.

    It kind of seemed as if whenever I did something carefully, it meant I was about to be exposed to a heap of danger. I was sure it was just my mind ying tricks on me, though.

    And that thought probably did me no favors, because

    Can you hear me, little one?

    I heard something.

    Little one? Its probably not anyone besides me, is it?

    It wasnt a voice, exactly, but something I could recognize more directly and instinctually in my mind. I didnt have any ears to listen with anyway.

    Hello! You can hear me, can you not? Respond to me!

    Well, no shit! But how was I supposed to reply without any mouth? As an experiment, I tried thinking Shut up, baldy! in my mindnot like this guy could hear it or anything. But how was I gonna get anywhere here if I couldnt even give a

    Oh-ho! You dare to call me bald, do you? Rather a lot of nerve packed into such a little body, no? I had hoped to give my first guest in quite a while a little kindness, but it would seem you are in rather a hurry to die!

    Uh-oh. Geez, couldve warned me that would work first. And I had no idea who I was dealing with, either. Well, that was it. My loss. Time for an apology.

    Im sorry! I didnt know how to reply to you, so I just tried saying the first thing that came to mind! Im really sorry about that! I cant see anything right now, so I have no idea what you even look like!

    Did thate across? Kind of rude to call this guy bald when I couldnt even see him, I supposed. If he was, Id probably just pushed some very delicate buttons.

    Heh-heh-heh Eh-ha-ha. Ahh-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha!

    The resultingugh came in three distinct levels. A masterpiece. So were we cool now, or?

    How fascinating. I had assumed you reacted as such upon seeing me, but you cannot, eh? Most slimes are low-level monsters, incapable of conscious thought as they run through the cycle of absorption, division, and regeneration. It is the rare one, indeed, that ever leaves its habitat.

    Now what was he talking about? Was he more curious than angry, then, or? Either way, this was my first contact with another intelligent being. The first conversation in my new, oozy life. I wanted to keep it a friendly one.

    You had aroused my curiosity, slime, by the way you so eagerly mmed into my body. The regenerative powers you just showed astonish me. Are you a named monster, perhaps, or a unique?

    A what? And a what? Say again? Im sorry, I dont get what you mean. Ive only been alive here for ny days

    Hmm. I suppose, with your sentience, you were never destined to be merely a slime. Named monsters are those who have been assigned an exclusive name. But only ny days? Ridiculous. Are you a unique, then?

    Unique meaning?

    A unique monster is an individual who has suddenly attained unusual abilities, akin to mutation. They are asionally born in areas with high magical concentrations Perhaps you were born from the mass of magicules that leaked out from me, then?

    Muh? What the heck?

    Lets try using my previous-world knowledge to suss this out. This guy (Ill call him a guy for conveniences sake) had been leaking magic all over the local area. It was so thick, in fact, that it gave birth to a monster. A slime. Me. Was that it?

    Hmm. No monster has evere close to approaching my domain in the past three hundred years. If you were born from my magical force, then perhaps, indeed, that gave you the power to touch me and live to tell the tale!

    Oh So youre kind of, like, my dad, then?

    No, not your parent by blood. I have no reproductive ability to speak of. Some monsters do, and some do not, you see.

    Really? Cause I thought that kind of came with the package by default. But if I just spontaneously burst out from magic or whatever, maybe you dont need it, huh?

    Your intellectual abilities surprise me. Very few, indeed, are the monsters that possess anything of the sort. Among all the monsters, only magic-born have sentience in the way you or I would understand it.

    Thementary went on for a while. But the most important thing to learn from it was that apparently humans existed in this world, too. Then there were nonhumans, species very close to mankind in nature and simrly gifted with reproductive abilities. These included races like elves, hobbits, dwarves, and other fairy types, and generally they were allied with the humans.

    Alongside that, you had races like goblins, orcs, lizardmen, and so on, which were hostile toward mankind and treated like monsters as a result. This animosity wasnt inherent to their biology, however, so crossbreeding was entirely possible.

    Next were the magic-born peoplethe catchall term for those who came into being from magic itself, monsters who experienced sudden mutation, and sentient beings evolved from animals or magical beasts. They had both intelligence and reproductive ability, but only within their own subspecies. In their upper social castes existed titans, vampires, devils, and other longer-lived speciesall equally capable of having offspring, although they rarely did so, since their overwhelming magic force caused them to be nigh immortal, obviating the need to leave descendants.

    These diverse intelligent, reproducing species were hostile to mankind and collectively referred to as the magic-born race. And reading between the lines, the impression I got was that the magic-born werent so much overtly hostile toward humans as the humans feared and coveted their powers. It remained true, though, that both sides were fighting for their own living spaces.

    These sundry monsters had been ssified by levels of danger. The upper ranks of the magic-born were packed with some pretty powerful buggersall capable of leveling a human town solo if they felt like it. Not the kinds of guys youd want to hang around.

    So my newpanion kept going for a whileabout how hed fought against the upper-level magic-born in the past and so on. Finally, the subject turned back to me.

    As I told you, then, Ick the ability to produce offspring. The reason is simple Because I do not need to. I am of the dragon raceone of only four in the world, both unique and the most perfect of my kind. You will hereby know me as Veldora, the Storm Dragon! My life span is infinite, my flesh unfathomable! As long as my will remains intact, I shall be ever alive! Ahhhhh-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha!!

    He couldve skipped theughter. I got it. So he didnt need to have kids, because he was gonna live forever, right?

    And while this guy took a while to get to the point, he did mention something I didnt want to overlook.

    Veldora was the StormDragon?

    Plus, if he liked taking a good-natured swipe at upper-level magic-born now and then, he waslike, pretty tough, wasnt he?

    Using my knowledge of Earth stuff, I tried to picture Veldora the Storm Dragon, no doubt seated in front of me right now. I didnt like what my mind came up with. He seemed to be acting polite with me, and that made it all the creepier.

    So what now?

    W-wow, really? Well, thanks for all that handy guidance, sir! Guess I better be on my way, then!

    I tried my best to flee.

    Halt. I have told you all about myself. It is your turn now, would you not agree?

    I probably shouldnt have expected any other treatment. Hmmmm. He wanted to know about me? If I told him about my miraculous journey from an alien, would he believe me? He seemed to marvel at how smart I was for a slimeif I tried to make something up, I doubted hed fall for it. Such an attempt seemed like a good way to dig my own grave.

    Well, whatever. If he didnt believe me, Id deal with it then. Summoning my resolve, I told Veldora everything that had happened to me so far.

    So Yeah. Here I am, I guess! Its been super rough, yknow?

    While prudently keeping the topic of my skills unexplored, I regaled the dragon with my tale of being stabbed, waking up as a slime, and everything else that happened on the way to his domain.

    It was a bit weird howwell, non-rough it all sounded when I put it into words. But it was rough for me all the same. And the worst part was how I was literally operating blind the entire way. If some cutedy passed me on the roadter on, would I ever get to see her? The thought saddened me a little.

    Hmm. So a transmigrant, then? Your origins are quite rare, indeed.

    Huh? Are they? And you Transmigrant? This isnt any big surprise to you?

    Whats with that reaction? So these transmigrants weremon enough that he had a name for them? What was so rare about it, then?

    Hmph. You do see transmigrants, on asion. Their memories from the past are burned into their souls, due to a powerful will. There are some, indeed, who retain every memory of their past lives. But a transmigrant from another world That is quite umon. A regr soul, by itself, would have no hope of surviving a journey across realms. It would dissolve midway, taking its memories with it. Someone retaining their full mind and bing reborn as a monster out of pure magic I cannot recall any past example of that. Quitepeculiar, indeed.

    Transmigrants from other worlds, it seemed, kept only part of their memories at best. Someone like me, who still had them all, was pretty well unheard ofnot that I cared too much.

    He had just told me something I couldnt afford to ignore. A soul, by itself? So you could travel to this world without getting reincarnated or anything?

    Huh. Am I that unusual? Cause it sure doesnt feel that way Are there people, then, whoe here from other worlds without being trans-whatevered?

    There are. None have seeded in traveling to another world from here, but there are more than a few that havepleted their travels here from elsewhere. They are known as visitors, or otherworlders, and they bear knowledge of things that do not exist in this world. They acquire, as I hear it, some manner of special power when they make the journey here. Beyond that, there are records of transmigrants, whoas I saidbear knowledge of other worlds. Not all of them choose to openly identify themselves as such, though, I imagine.

    Interesting. I didnt know whether they came from the same I did, but it might be good to chat with them a bit. There might even be some from Japan, for all I knew. It was probably best for my sanity to have a goal while I was here, besides.

    I see, I see! In that case, I think Ill try and track down some of these otherworlders, as you called them. Maybe Ill find someone from my ownnd!

    Well, one moment. You said you cannot see, yes?

    Oh, uh, yeah. And? It was a pain in the ass, yes, but as long as I took my time and kept from getting myself killed, I was sure Id run into some fellow visitors. Probably.

    Let me help you see, then.

    Um, what? Damn. This guy I mean, Veldora the Storm Dragon He was acting way too nice to me, wasnt he? Could I really trust him?

    Uh, really?

    Indeed. On one condition, however. What do you say?

    I didnt like the sound of that, butah, what the hell.

    What kind of condition?

    A simple one. When I grant you the ability of sight, I beg of you not to fear me. That, and I bid youe visit and speak to me again. That is all. I trust my terms are agreeable to you?

    Thats all? Was he sure? What a lonely dragon. Guess there was no one else around at the top. No wonder he couldnt stop talking to meI mustve been his first conversational partner in ages.

    If Id had my druthers, I would have said this dragon was a total pushover. He mightve been feeding me a line this whole time, even, saying he was a dragon. Maybe the dragons in this world werent even all that powerful in the first ce.

    Heh. This was a pretty good deal.

    Is that really all you need?

    Yes. To be honest with you, I was sealed away in here three hundred years ago. Ever since then, I have had so much free time on my hands, I was practically out of my mind with boredom. What do you think?

    Well, if thats all you need, you got yourself a deal!

    Good. It is a promise, thenand I trust you will hold up your end of the bargain.

    Of course! Maybe I dont look it, but you can count on me, man! Just ask anybody on Earth! Theyll vouch for me!

    Hopefully he wouldnt try to. That would be bad.

    Very well. There is a skill known as Magic Sense. Can you use it?

    Oh, here we go again. More walls for me to deal with. So unfair.

    No, I cant. What kind of skill is that?

    It allows you to perceive the particles of magic floating around you. It is not a very powerful skill, and all it offers is a visual reference, so it is not difficult to acquire.

    Oh Sounds easy enough.

    Indeed. I can wield it as easily as I can breathe. I hardly even bother to think about it.

    Really? So once I learn that, Ill be able to see again?

    Precisely. This world is covered in sheer magic, although it is not spread evenly across its entire surface. Did you know, also, that light and sound both have the properties of a wave?

    Yeah, Ive heard about that. Light waves and sound waves.

    Ah. How intelligent of you. Did you learn of that in your past world? You must have, I wager. But, indeed, you will be able to observe how these waves disturb the nearby particles of magic, then use that information to calcte how the area around you looks and sounds. Simple, yes?

    Um? Not really? What kind of BS was that? I, um, Im not really sure whether that sounds simple or not, actually

    No? But that is what allows one to continue fighting even after losing both their sight and hearing! It protects you from surprise attacks, and that is all but a requirement for survival here, is it not?

    Y-yeah, butcan we skip all that fighting talk and just get me seeing again, maybe?

    Mmm Very well. Allow me to help you acquire this skill, then. This is the only method I am aware of.

    W-wait, can you do that? Im kind of a newborn here

    Worry not. You do have your memories from your past life, yes? And there, you gained knowledge about the nature of light and sound. Without that, not even I could help you, I wager. Luck is on your side, truly.

    True. I supposed it would be hard to exin sight to someone who cant see at all. I certainly couldnt manage it. I read somewhere that Helen Keller learned how to speak only by following cues she learned before going deaf at age two. Maybe I could use my knowledge of Earth to harness this Magic Sense thing to figure out what the world around me was like

    Worth a shot, I guessed. This blindness was getting to be a massive pain. Plus, I had the Sage on my side. It could work this out.

    Im ready to learn, sir!

    Now, now, no need for such ardor. It is quite simple. First, try moving the magic around you with the force in your body.

    I had an inkling of what he meant. It was the skill Id probably adapted to blow myself out of the water a moment ago.

    Like this?

    I tensed up, trying to imagine the strength circting through my body. I could feel something moving withinthe magicules mypanion was talking about. I hadnt been conscious of it in the water, but it looked as though I could adjust the force by how much I tensed up. Before, I hadnt been controlling the water so much as I was controlling the magic dancing around in it. I was exercising my magical muscles, and the particles around me were reacting. It came to me surprisingly quickly.

    Mmm. You are more gifted in this than I thought. Now, do you see the difference between the magic moving within you and that outside of your body?

    Whoa. Maybe this actually was easy. Maybe I was more sensitive to the magic I absorbed now that I was conscious of the way I lived off it.

    Well, sure! Like, thats the stuff Ive been eating all along, right?

    Heh-heh-heh! If you understand that much, the rest is childs y. All it takes is feeling the movements of the particles outside of you.

    Yeah, that I didnt get. But I gave it a shot, doing as I was told and feeling out the particles surrounding me. And I found I could.

    I could sense them hanging in the air, riding air currents, moving aroundall sorts of sensations.

    Lets ask the Sage about this.

    Confirmed. Extra skill Magic Sensesessfully acquired. Use the extra skill Magic Sense?

    Yes

    No

    Huh? It was that easy?

    Well, sureyes, then Man, talk about a rock I can rely on!

    The moment I invoked Magic Sense, my brain was filled with new information. A massive amount, something my human brain never couldve processedthe waves of light and sound pushing every single tiny particle aroundand I processed it all, converting it into perceptible data.

    The thing about human eyesight is that it doesnt give you even a 180-degree view of whats in front of you. Now, all of a sudden, I could see a full 360 degrees around myself. The shadows of the rocks around me, the views hundreds of meters awaythe moment I turned my attention to it, I could figure out what it was. If I were still human, all this perception data probably wouldve fried my brain circuits. But now I was a slime. My cells could provide muscle just as easily as brain power.

    So somehow or other, I withstood the torrent of information. Then

    Synchronizing extra skill Magic Sense with unique skill Great Sage Sessful. All information will now be managed by Great Sage.

    Suddenly, my vision opened up. The brain-searing sensation from before was gone, and then I could seeso clearly that it was a wonder I wasnt able to do it before. Something told me that having the Sage at my side was almost cheating. It wouldnt be going too far to put it that way. If someone else had it, Id probably bitch that it was against the rules. Since I had it, though No problem.

    Oh, I think Ive got it. Thank you very much! I said, turning my attention to the creature in front of me.

    Holy crap. He really was a dragon. He was covered in scales that shone a dark shade of ck, tougher looking than steel itself but supple and flexible. A big, evil-looking

    Gahh! Youre a dragon!!

    He looked positively demonic, towering far higher than I anticipated. My internal scream welled up, pouring out of me, and I dont think I could really be med for it.

    What a surprise. I feel bad for ever thinking this guy was pet sized. This wasfor real. Absolutely no doubt.

    The body, startlingly simr to a Western-style dragons, shone like obsidian. There were six fingers on each hand, equipped with ws that looked ready to tear through whatever they found. The two pairs of wings on his backonerger than the othercame to a point at their respective ends, like swords honed to perfection and ready to dice.

    Upon closer observation, the ominous scales covering his entire body actually radiated a dark purplish lighta mixture, perhaps, of their natural color and the unearthly force that made its way through the surface. There was something strangely beautiful about his vast shape, the picture of majestic dignity. I began regretting being so rude back when I couldnt take it all in, but that was all water under the bridge.

    Turned out, by the way, that I was indeed oval shaped. Like a little bun. Kind of alight turquoise, maybe? Lighter than the daylight sky, but not by a lot. A rather elegant color, I thought. Shame about the whole being-a-slime thing.

    You do remember your promise, yes? And considering your previousints, you learned rather quickly, no?

    Oh, of course! I was just joking a little, is all. I can see just fine, and plus I can hear now, too. I really appreciate this!

    Hmph. You could have taken your time

    So he was fine after all. A little scary looking, but he was awfully kind to me, for no good reason. He really was lonely, I imagined. It was unfortunate that he looked the way he did. Kind of like that little story about the poor red demon who wanted to befriend the humans.

    So what do you intend to do next?

    Well, for starters, I figure I might as well look for some otherworlders from my home country. Not that I care too much if I dont, butyou know.

    Finding some would be better, but its not as if were guaranteed to be fast friends. Plus, with my brand-new eyesight, scoping out the world could do wonders for me. Harvesting the light and sound around me had just expanded my world a thousandfold. Now, finally, I could say good-bye to my days of literally chewing the cud in my tiny cave or whatever.

    That dragon, though.

    The more I stared at him, the more sinister and terrifying he seemed. And yet he didnt move a single inch. He mentioned a three-hundred-year-old seal, right?

    By the way, Veldora, you said something about beingsealed away?

    Mm? Ah. Yes, I perhaps underestimated my opponent slightly. I eventually began fighting with, shall we say, more urgency, butwell, it was rather toote by then!

    The dragon sounded almost proud of his losing performance. Magic was one thing, but I doubted there was a sword ornce in this or any other world that could scratch him. It wasnt as if I knew that much of this world yetmaybe it was crawling with horrifying monsters even more powerful than him, or something?

    Was your opponent that tough?

    She wasquite strong. She was what the humans call a hero, one blessed with so-called divine protection.

    A hero? My days in front of a game console had made me well familiar with that term. Simply doing hero stuff didnt make you dragon-ying material, though. A lot of recent games had turned their so-called heroes into foils or parodies of themselves, besides. Maybe things were still a bit more traditional around here.

    Now that I recall, Veldora continued, the hero also said she was summoned. Perhaps she hails from the same area as you.

    Oh? I dunno Where Ie from, nobodys that strong, you know?

    Perhaps, but many otherworlderse here bearing special powers. Powers that are chiseled into their souls in the midst of their journey. The summoned will always bear one such ski unique skill, one exclusive to them and them alone. Unlike the otherworlders whoe here by sheer ident, these people bear a soul strong enough to withstand the stress of the summoning process. The fact that said summoning process so rarely seeds in this world otherwise proves as much.

    When you say summoning process, do you meanmagic, or whatever?

    Precisely. A process requiring at least thirty magicians conducting a ceremony that takes ce over three days. It is rarely sessful, but it is seen as a powerful weapon to have in ones arsenal, should the need arise.

    A weapon?

    Mm. Those summoned in such a manner are bound by a magical curse upon their soul, unable to resist the orders of their masters.

    Whoa, really? No human rights or anything?

    Human rights? What rights would one possibly expect in this, of all worlds? Do not entertain such fantasies in this realm, little one. The onlyw that reigns here is survival of the fittest. Might, as they say, makes right.

    Well, huh. If you got summoned to this world, no point hoping that your old values applied over here, I guessed. Bit hard to ept that.

    So are you saying that otherworlders pretty much get treated like ves here?

    No. It depends. There is no Domination Stamp applied to them. If society epts them, they are free to live their lives as they please. They can be adventurers or the like. Many otherworlder adventurers have sought my head They learned the error of their ways soon enough! Hyaaa-ha-ha-ha-ha!!

    So youre only forced into servitude if you were summoned here, huh?

    Not servitude, exactly, but I suppose so, yes. I like to believe I know a great deal about the humans, but a great deal is not everything.

    No Youre a dragon, besides.

    In way, he knew almost too much as a dragon. At least conversing together put me on his good sideenough that he answered all my questions. So we kept talkingVeldora and I, dragon and slime, about all sorts of things.

    How had the fight gone with this hero?

    How strong was she?

    Her skin was pale in color, the dragon told me; her lips were bright red and small. Her long hair was a dark shade of silver, kept back in a single ponytail. She was slim, not that tall, rather small for a human.

    Her face was apparently covered by a mask, but there was no doubting her beauty. I asked him whether this beauty was enough to distract him, whether he was too enrapt to defend himself properly. Enough of your nonsense! he bellowed back at me.

    Apparently she carried a long, curved sword. A katana, it was called. She didnt bother with a shield. Taking advantage of two unique skillsAbsolute Severance and Unlimited Imprisonmentand a wealth of other magic, she, as Veldora put it, overwhelmed him. There was more than a trace of nostalgic contentment in his voice, or so it seemed to me.

    Something I picked up on as we spoke was that this dragon I think he really liked humans. He kept calling them wimps and garbage and such, but from the way he put it, he never deliberately killed anyone who attacked him. Not unless they went out of their way to rile him. One time, three centuries agojust one time, he emphasizeda certain chain of events made him reduce an entire city to embers. That was what made the people send a hero his way, and nowthanks to that heros Unlimited Imprisonmenthe was in his current predicament.

    I had trouble enough figuring out my own feelings about a lot of things. Other peoples, I could only guess at. But I was starting to get the impression that, well, maybe this wasnt such a bad dragon at all. I mean, I liked him. And he wasnt anywhere near as scary as before.

    All right! Well, um What do you think? Friends, then?

    It was kind ofno, really embarrassing to put it like that. Id have been blushing right then, if I could.

    Wh-what? A mere slime, daring to seek the friendship of the mighty beast feared worldwide as Veldora the Storm Dragon?!

    Oh, um, you dont have to if you dont want, but

    You fool! You foolish fool!! Who said anything about not wishing it?!

    Oh, no? Okay, so, umnow what?

    Mmm, indeed If you insistI suppose I could consider it

    I could feel him sneaking furtive nces at me. It would have been one thing if it had been a cute girl sitting next to me at the movie theater, but it was quite another when it was a death-dealing mythical beast. Not fun. Pretty funny, though.

    Yep. I insist. Its settled! And if you dont like it, then watch out, cause Ill nevere back!

    No!Ah, so be it. I will be yourfriend. I do hope you appreciate the gesture!

    Heh. I wondered whether I could manipte the other three dragons he mentioned like this. I was made to exploit people, and he was made to be exploited. A perfect match.

    Well, to future times, then!

    Indeed! To future times! Ah, yes, allow me to give you a name. In exchange, you will give one to us both.

    Huh? Why? Whered thate from?

    It shall chisel into our souls the fact that we are of the same rank. Something simr to the family names the humans useexcept my name, for you, will also provide a kind of divine blessing. You are still nameless now, but through this, you will be a full-fledged named monster.

    Mmmm.

    So he wanted me toe up with amon name for us to share? And in exchange, Id get my own name and all the benefits of named-monster status? Better think up something good. Im terrible at this stuff

    Well, you said you were a storm dragon, so I dunno, Tempest or something?

    Ugh. Kind of on the nose, I know, but it sounded cool to me, so

    Perfect! So be it! A wonderful timbre to that title, yes.

    He liked it?!

    From this day forward, they will call me Veldora Tempest! And you You will be called Rimuru. Proim to the world that your name is Rimuru Tempest!

    Thus the name was carved into my soul. Not that it did too much to me. Or my abilities. But somewhere, deep inside my soul, something did change a bit. I suppose the same could be said of Veldora. And thats how we became friends.

    Well, it was time to get going, I supposed. But before that:

    Hey, so I had something I wanted to ask before I left, butcant you do anything about that seal on you?

    Not with my powers, no. Someone with a unique skill on the same level as the heros would be necessary for there to be even a chance.

    You dont have any, Veldora?

    I do, but now that I am sealed off, I can ess none of them. Telepathy is about all I can manage at the moment.

    The heros Unlimited Imprisonment could hold its target captive in an infinite number of imaginary spaces for all of time. It wasnt some weak barrier that would allow casual interference with the real world. Looking back, it should have struck me as strange that Telepathy was possible, even. It wasnt the sort of thing that would break down over timebut given that he could have any contact with the real world, and even exchange messages, perhaps it said more about Veldora. Neither of us noticed this at the time, though.

    Well, here, lemme try something

    I rolled over to Veldora and tapped my body against him.

    Invoking unique skill Predator to consume unique skill Unlimited Imprisonment Failed.

    I figured as much, but no, I certainly wasnt hero caliber. With a dazzling light, my unique skill tried to do its work but weakly bounced off without any furtherment. I thought it might have made a small rip, but that was all. The barrier would repair itself shortly, no doubt. I was hoping that unique skill on unique skill would result in something, but it didnt.

    Was there anything I could do, though? Something

    Received. Partial Analysis of unique skill Unlimited Imprisonmentplete. Reporting a potential escape route.

    Any escape involving a physical body is not possible. The chance of destroying the prison by physically damaging it is zero. Cannot analyze an escape route involving the annulment of imaginary space. One would need to be caught within the same Unlimited Imprisonment situation in order to analyze it from the inside. This is currently impossible.

    The chance of escaping in spiritual form is one percent.

    If a spiritual receptacle is prepared for the target on the outside to aid in the transition, the sess rate is three percent. This process is equivalent to transmigration. If the target is poorlypatible with the receptacle, he will lose all memories and abilities.

    This concludes the report on potential escape routes.

    Hmm. Kind of low numbers, it sounds like. Unlimited Imprisonment looked like nothing more than a transparent membrane from my perspectivebut physical damage did nothing against it? Maybe it had some kind of insurmountable defense attached to it, for all I knew.

    Hey, did youy any damage on this hero at all? Or vice versa?

    Ah, I am d you asked! Most of my attacks were evaded, but I didnd several direct hitswhich, I regret, had no effect on her. Death-Calling Wind, Dark Lightning, even Storm of Destruction had no effect, despite beingpletely unavoidable. A total loss All I could do wasugh!

    Veldora then entuated the point with a loud, hearty guffaw.

    It sounded as though you could also use this Unlimited Imprisonment skill to cover your own body, making a shield to protect from external attack. Pretty handy thing to have around. This hero was starting to sound downright omnipotent. Between that and Absolute Severance, she was all but invincible, wasnt she? I really wouldnt want to run into herbut then, I wouldnt have to. I would have liked to assume she had died in the ensuing three hundred years, at least. Either way, she was one tough character.

    So if I was going to get him out of here, it would be through transferring his consciousness into a new body, huh?

    I guess I need some kind of receptacle to get you out of here. Even if its in spirit form only, it sounds like it oughta be possible

    No point telling him what kind of odds he had to go on. Id just be hurting Veldora further if I dampened his spirits.

    Mm? There is a way out of here?! Indeed I feel my magical force will exhaust itself by noter than a hundred years from now. My magic continues to flow out of me, even now.

    Yeah? So thats why theres such a concentration of it around here

    Indeed. Even high-ss monsters would not dare approach. You saw how there were no weeds on the ground? The sort of nts that can thrive in this area are very rare indeed!

    Right. I recalled all the hipokute herbs Id churned through over my short life. It was that valuable, huh?

    Yeah, soyou wanna try escaping, maybe? If I had the right receptacle, I think thatd help our chances a fair amount Do you know what Id need, though?

    Indeed, even if I escaped in spiritual form only, it would be quite difficult to regather magic and form my core once more. Your creating a small tear in the prison helped my chances immensely, no doubt. As for that receptaclethe new core, if you willif you can bring one to me, all Id have to do is traverse myself over to it. Transmigration, I suppose

    Yow! And here I thought he was a little slow. He knew exactly what I was getting at, didnt he? The exact same conclusion the Sage had made.

    Pretty much, yeah. If its something I can get on this side, I could look for it for you.

    Hmm To tell the truth, I do not need any core at all You can keep a secret, I trust? As I said, I am both unique and the most perfect of my kind. A fully unique creation, one that takes purely spiritual form. I have no particr attachment to this body. It is merely the faith of those who live around me that forms the shape you see.

    There he went again. Spouting offplete nonsense.

    As far as I could piece together in the ensuing conversation, the basic idea went like this:

    Using his consciousness alone, he could gather magicules toward him to form a physical body. Said body was currently being held in this prison, but that prison also prevented his will from collecting the magic he needed. Could he escape in consciousness form alone? No, because he needed some kind of receptacle.

    If he simply burst out in spirit form, his essence would scatter to the winds like the magic itself, erasing his very existence. This would result in the birth of a new storm dragon, somehow, somewhereI didnt care about the details by this point. But to sum up, maybe he could escape, but if he did, hed wind up being something else. It wouldnt matter to him.

    So much for that. But what if I used Predator to consume Veldora himself? I could either analyze him inside my stomach, or iste him and annul the effect of Unlimited Imprisonment, and hed be out. Would that work?

    Received: It is possible to store the target Veldora in your stomach via the unique skill Predator.

    Really? In that case, if I could convince him of it, we could get going. If I couldnt, hed have another century of istion before he was reduced to nonexistence. So I spent a few moments exining the Predator skill to Veldora, and what I wanted to do with it. Itd be impossible from the get-go without the Sages help, but

    Mwah-hah-hah-hah-hah! Fascinating! Please, go ahead. I leave myself at your mercy!

    Youre that ready to believe me?

    But of course! Itd be far more fun to break through this prison with you than sit around and await your return! With the two of us together, this Unlimited Imprisonment could fall quicker than we thought!

    Now I got it. He was one, but now we were two. I liked his outlook.

    So the n was Id use Great Sage and Predator to analyze this beast, and Veldora would try to destroy it from the inside. No worries about Veldora dissipating away in my stomach. I was starting to think this could actually work.

    All right. So Im gonna consume you, all right? Hurry up and get outta there.

    Heh-heh-heh! Right away! You shall make me wait no longer! Let us finally join together!

    Right! I summoned up my stores of resolve, touching him for a momentthen activated my Predation skill. In a moment, Veldoras massive form disappeared from sight.

    It happened almost too fast. We were talking just a moment ago. Seeing him gone suddenly made me feel very small and very solitary. Using the skill on my first target created too much resistance to work at all, but with the help of a fully cooperative Veldora in all his hugeness, it couldnt have gone more smoothly. He and Unlimited Imprisonment itself were sucked in at once.

    Kind of a surprise it all fit in me, though. Checking my stomach usage Geez, 25 percent? How big was that thing, anyway?

    Then:

    Conduct Analysis of unique skill Unlimited Imprisonment?

    Yes

    No

    This better work, I prayed as I thought Yes to myself.

    A cataclysm shook the world on that day.

    It was the only way to describe the reaction when the disappearance of the storm dragon Veldora was confirmed. It wasnt every day that a Special S-ranked monster simply vanished without a trace.

    Monsters, as well as adventurers, were ranked on a system of six grades, from A to F. Pluses and minuses could be attached to these grades for extra precision. This system was first put into ce by a man named Yuuki Kagurazaka, a rumored otherworlder and one of the few to assume the topmost rank of grand master in the Free Guild. It was quickly adopted, thanks to being much easier to understand than the previous, somewhat arbitrary four-tier system of novice ? beginner ? intermediate ? advanced.

    The Special S rankbined the S rank, whichprised demon lordss foes that deserved more than simply an A, with the Special tag reserved for those above even that ssmonsters capable of single-handedly engineering cmities or natural disasters. A scale-breaking rank, existing wholly outside the six traditional ones. Normally, an A-ranked monster alone would be dreadful enough to threaten the existence of a nationsomeone like Veldora was dangerous enough to plunge it into despair.

    Three hundred years of penance had done nothing to affect the dragons rank as a natural disasterlevel threat. Just because he had disappeared didnt mean he couldnt be reborn somewhere, posing a new menace before long.

    But twenty days after the initial report of his disappearance, the Western Holy Church issued a report that, as far as its investigations could tell, Veldora the Storm Dragon both no longer existed and showed no sign of existing anytime soon.

    Word spread first in the area around the Forest of Jura, a broad in dotted with arge number of minor countries. Once Veldoras fate had been broadly reported, each one of them sprang to their feet, the proverbial hos nest stimted to action. Every king and every minister of every nation held day after day of emergency meetings, gathering information and debating what to do next.

    It was a trying time for the Baron of Veryard, minister of the small kingdom of Blumund, but not half as trying as it was for the man Veryard had called into his private chamber that day. This was Fuze, a man just as renowned for his sharp, unrelenting eyes as he was for his small stature. He was the guild master for this kingdom, a position affording him a hefty amount of authority even in such a tiny nation.

    I believe you know why I summoned you here, the baron began the moment Fuze walked through the archway. You have heard about the storm dragon by now, have you not?

    Fuze nodded. Of course, my baron, he said in his low, hoarse voice.

    Hmph, Veryard spat out in response. I suppose I should expect nothing less of you, my good guild master. Now, may I ask about how the guild intends to respond?

    We have no particr ns at this time, sir.

    Im sorry, did I hear you correctly? You have no intention to take action?

    Yes, sir, Fuze replied with a voice devoid of emotion, silently asking the baron what he was so perturbed about. I do not feel any action is necessary.

    The baron, not a great fan of this response, chose to keep those feelings hidden. Rather a strange thing to say, is it not? Not necessary? The disappearance of Veldora the Storm Dragon may portend further monster activity in the space of days, even hours! And you are taking no measure at all against it?

    It would strike me as rather strange to do so, sir, for taking such measures is the job of the state. I am responsible for the Free Guild, not for providing volunteer work when bidden.

    This was the truth, as far as Fuze was concerned. The Free Guild was an independent, nongovernmental agency. Its members were afforded no special guarantees of security orfortunlike the assorted workers and craftsmen on the government ledgerbut the basic rights that all citizens were entitled to. Their only official debt to the kingdom came in the form of taxes.

    That was the system in Blumund, as it was in nearly all the nations that surrounded it. To put it another way, the Free Guild was a group that operated outside the framework of any nationand one far more unified than a single government as well. It was a fact that some of their operations urred without the knowledge or consent of these nations, whether the guild intended it to be seen that way or not.

    Is it not the responsibility of the state, the guild master meekly continued, to protect the assets of its people? In the same way, it is the guilds responsibility to protect the lives of its members. We both have a lot on our tes, I suppose.

    Fuze wasnt sure whether he had imagined the blue vein that had just popped up on Veryards forehead or not.

    He hadnt. The baron knew his position was being probed.

    Enough pretense, Guild Master! How many mercenaries can you provide us? How many adventurers withbat experience? What is the size of the defense force you can provide in service? I need numbers!

    The guild master gave a roll of his eyes and sighed. I do hope we are on the same page when I say this, sir, but I will remind you, we are not an army of volunteers. If we are talking about a mobilization based on the terms of our agreement, I can provide you the equivalent of one-tenth of our members. If you wish ess to anything beyond that, well, that would all depend on ourpensation.

    The poption of Blumund was almost exactly one million. The membership log of the local Free Guild totaled around seven thousand, family members not included. Thus, if the kingdom decided to invoke its agreement with the guild and muster 10 percent of its membersseven hundred in allthese fighters would officially join themand of the national army.

    Such an order, of course, would apply only to guild members who belonged to Blumund and no other nation. All Free Guild members fell under the same banner, but their home nations were also clearly stated in the logs for this reason. Whats more, while a nation had the right to define its own mobilization period under this agreement, it was also obliged to give the guild a one-fifth discount on taxes collected during the entire period. This allowed governments to rapidly summon a powerful force, and the guild to make sure its men would not be obligated to the state for too much of their time. For a group like the guild, which was required to pay sries to all deployed members in advance, it was the obvious approach to take.

    Besides, even if a government asked for every man the local Free Guild had, there would be no way to handle them. After all, only about half of any guilds membership had any fighting skill.

    The Blumund nobles were fully aware of this. Normally, they wouldnt have their top minister attempt to bully the guild master into better termsbut the times demanded otherwise. The monsters were stirring, for onebut even beyond that, they had more pressing motivations.

    Very well. Enough of this. Are you trying to wring the truth out of me, Fuze?

    Fuzes eyebrows raised a little at the mention of his name. Veryard rarely, if ever, called him by it. He turned his eyes toward the baron for the first time.

    The area near Veldoras prison was meant to be absolutely imprable, he said. Now that route may potentially be open to direct navigationand that means we must consider the possibility of the Eastern Empire taking action.

    Ah, certainly so! the baron replied. Whether they were letting Veldora be or were simply afraid of the seal being broken, we have been detecting sudden new movements in the Empire after a long period of silence. Do you understand what that means? If they can navigate that forest, this kingdom will be swallowed up instantly. And we can forget about the Western Holy Church providing us any meaningful support! The countries around the Forest of Jura have no meaningful alliance with each other. We will all be Empire vassals in the blink of an eye!

    No support from the Church? I fear not, no. They never were terribly interested in wars between mere mortals in the first ce. Annihting the monsters is what their doctrine calls for.

    Quite so. If we could have them deploy even one of their pdins, the Empire wouldnt be so quick to move Not needing to prepare for monster attacks would buy us some time, at least.

    I doubt anything could stir the Church to action, Fuze said. The destruction of a nation or two does nothing to affect their own finances. They cannot help everyone, nor even their own flock. He took a moment to gauge the barons face. Veryard looked exhausted, as if he had aged rapidly in just the past few days. It was understandable.

    The two of them were childhood friends. And even though Veryard was merely a baron, if the public knew of Fuzes close contact with a member of the nobility, it would create assorted difficulties for the both of them. They both had to pretend to use each other for their own personal gain, which was why they usually portrayed their rtionship as surly and resentful.

    It would take more than the power of a small kingdom to ovee this thorny obstacle they now faced. But perhaps, Fuze thought, his friend was being overly anxious. The Empire was on the move, it was true, but that didnt mean they should expect an attack before sunset.

    But how do we know the Empire will take action against us? he offered. I will dly conduct my own personal inquiries into the matter. Id advise you not to expect much, but I can at least gauge the situation in the Forest of Jura and around the Empire.

    I would appreciate that.

    Yes. There was no guarantee the Empire would act against them. If it was going to, it would undoubtedly be with arge force. It was never a nation to waste its time with small skirmishes. No, it would casually send over a force of a million or so and trample over every nation in the area, one by one. Assembling such an army would take time, at least three years or so. Which was not a generous amount, but it created some wiggle room to work with.

    I had best begin gathering information, then, Fuze said to close the conversation. There is little time. I am off!

    Thank you

    The two of them nodded and went their separate ways. There was much to do.

    Thirty days had passed since I swallowed Veldora. What had I been up to? Well, think about it. If you were being attacked by a monster, what would you do?

    I mean, I was a slime now. It would be hard for me to zip away from a vering attacker, much less defend myself. So Id been spending my time thinking about how to fight back.

    Along the way, Id also been consuming any particrly odd-looking herbs or glowing rocks I stumbled across. There was a fair amount. I was still in the region Veldora described as teeming with local magic, and nearly everything I found there was hipokute herbs. Which was about what I figured. More healing potions for me, I suppose.

    I also found that most of the glowing stones and such around here were what was called magic ore, which could supposedly be refined into a metal harder than iron or steel and highlypatible with magic. I was kinda hoping for something a little lessmon, but I didnt even know whether orichalcum or crimson ore existed here, even if they were famous back on Earth. I shouldnt be too greedy.

    So as I was chowing down on all these yummy herbs and rock, an idea came to mind!

    If I could spit out water fast enough to give me powers of flight, maybe I could slice right through foes, too, like a high-pressure water jet cutter?

    No, no, I know what youre thinking. Youre thinking I was about to screw it up again, arent you? You really shouldnt look down on people like that. I was good in a pinch, you know. They always wrote that in my report cards at school and stuffexcellent work when he applies himself.

    So yeah, I think itd work.

    Back I went to the undergroundke from before. Just as I had imagined, the pool was pretty big. The air felt supremely tranquil to me. There were no creatures aroundnot even in the water, I assumed, what with all the magic soaked up inside itwhich made it all the quieter. Pure, unadulterated nature! Truly a sight to see.

    But back to business. I moved right into the action phasest time without testing a single thing, which was fairly ill-advised. That, and I ejected too much water at once, propelling myself far quicker than intended. No game n whatsoever. This time, Id keep it at water-pistol level, expelling just a bit at a time. Just taking a mouthful of water andthpbbtspitting it out.

    Here I go.

    Hmm. Not much watering out. Too small of an exit hole? I expanded it a bit. Water shot out with a little more energy this time, dousing a nearby boulder I was targeting. A promising sign.

    After a few more minutes spent adjusting my water levels, I decided to boost the pressure just a tad more before opening wide. Launch. Then again. Then again, gradually upping the output as I kept my water-gun practice going.

    It was starting to take form, yes. But, okay, while a shot of water might sting a bit, I didnt think itd deliver a particrly decisive attack.

    So now what? I thought to myself as I took a dip into theke to gather my thoughts. Whenever I was tired, that was my cue to hit the bath for a bit. I wasnt just sshing around for kicks, all right? Besides, it also gave me a chance to use Magic Sense and observe myself floating and sinking in the water. I reminded myself of a jellyfish, kind of.

    Maybe I could vibrate my bodys surface to create currents or something? I gave it a shot, running magical force across my skin to control the particles around me. The vibration ran across my entire body, so I tried to point it in a single directionand that was all it took to get me moving.

    Nice! I spent a little while whizzing around the water like that, enjoying the experience. A nice change of pace, to be sure, but I totally wasnt just messing around, all right? Lets keep that straight.

    Skill Current Movement acquired.

    I thought it was the Sage for a moment, but it turned out to be the World Language instead. That bit of ying around just earned me a new skill. Oh, but it wasnt ying around, okay? I was just rxing a bit.

    Thanks to that, though, I could now flit around in or on the water at a pretty decent clip. If need be, I could use Water Pressure Propulsion to speed things up, too. Considering I didnt need to breathe, fighting in the water might actually give me an advantage, for all I knew. Good for fleeing into, at least.

    That and other matters like it were on my mind as I left theke. Break time was over, and it had certainly borne fruit for me. As I was rxing, I hade up with a few new concepts.

    If I was going to keep pursuing the water-gun approach, Id have to apply constant pressure to my jet output for an extended period of time. Instead, I decided to picture the cylinder of a car engine, applying pressure to my inside while releasing aparatively small amount of water per go. Adjusting the pressure and the diameter of my output hole allowed me to adjust the force of expulsion, just like before.

    And thankfully, just as Id hoped, it worked. A small jet, ejected sharply out of my body, pped itself against the boulderand it actually broke the rock slightly where it hit.

    SessI think. Better keep practicing before I forget the knack. Adjust output diameter, adjust pressureand try putting a bit of spin on the water as you eject it, too. There was a lot to think about as I kept rehearsing it.

    But that was it! That was the mental picture I had to keep in mind. Slicing through with water. I had to make the jets as thin and t as possible, applying just the right spin to them.

    So I gave it a whirl. And it worked! The cylindrical shot of water fought through the air resistance fast enough to leave afterimages, just like a dethen shed its way right through the rock. With enough force to astound even me.

    It was the pinnacle of my efforts, the best results of my week of practice.

    Skill Water de acquired.

    Skills Water Pressure Propulsion, Current Movement, and Water de acquired. Combining and upgrading to extra skill Control Water.

    Whoa! It really did work. Extra skills were supposed to offer apletely different level of force than regr ones. Now I had a way of defending myself. It was just about time to head off.

    Well. Finally.

    One hundred and twenty days had passed since I got reincarnated at the banks of this cavernke. Was I nervous? Yes. I still couldnt talk, exactly. I had no vocal cords, and Id been poking around my body for something I could use as a substitute, but no dice yet. Staying here until I had more sess was one option, but unlike with the water des, I really had nothing to go on. For now, itd have to be Telepathy or nothingand if my would-be conversational partner couldnt use that, then so be it. Not the greatest of situations, but there you go.

    Either way, I couldnt goof around in here forever. I wanted to see the outside world, and if I could, Id love to run into some fellow Japanese otherworlder castaways. Learning some magic could be fun, too!

    It was time to get started. No time like the present, and all that.

    Veldora wasnt giving me any particr responses or signs inside me. It almost felt as though Id lost him, but I knew that wasnt the case. We had a promise, besides. Next time we meet, I better have some funny stories I can share with him.

    With an internal sigh, I traveled down the lone path upward from the broad underground cavern I had grown used to, my mind on the wide world toe. Who knew what would be awaiting me? I hardly knew what to expect, but I knew I wanted it.

    THE GIRL AND THE DEMON LORD

    The main thing I remember is the fire raining down.

    The grip of my mothers hand against mine felt so light, fleeting, and I was too terrified to see the way ahead.

    An incendiary bomb went off nearby, turning our surroundings into a sea of me. Where were we supposed to go? It was burning all around us

    IShizue Izawafelt myself teetering on the brink of desperation.

    Ahh Is this where Im going to die?

    Even at the age of eight, I understood that well enough. I had no rtives I could rely on; I lived alone with my mother. My father had been drafted into the war so long ago that I didnt even remember what he looked like. I was never quite sure whether I should be happy or sad about that, but either way, it had be my normal life, and I had to ept it for what it was. Me, and my life, and my fate to die in the mes.

    And then

    You want to live? If you want to live, heed my voice!

    a voice echoed in my head.

    Did I want to live? How should I know? I was too young to answer that question.

    Still, though

    Looking at my mother, now just a pair of hands after she had shielded me with her body, I couldnt stop the tears froming.

    And I thought to myself

    I want to live!

    Confirmed. Responding to summoners request Sessful.

    I cant take it anymore. Its too scary; its too hot. Help me, Mom

    Iy there and cried, no longer fearful of the me, as I wished life for myself.

    Confirmed. Extra skills Control me and Cancel me Attacksessfully acquired.

    Then my wish came true.

    Justnot exactly the way Id hoped for.

    When I next awoke, I was inside their of a monster, a lone man in front of me. He had blue eyes, long blond hair, a well-defined face, and long, slitted eyes. His skin was so pale, I thought I could almost see through it. His sheer beauty would make nearly anyone mistake him for a woman.

    His name was Leon Cromwellone of the most powerful figures of this world, a so-called demon lord ascended from the human race. Also known as the tinum Devil. He sized me up.

    Another failure, he whispered, seemingly disappointed at the sight of me, and he showed no further interest in me after that.

    Perhaps that was why he never bothered killing me, not even with the serious burns I had all over my body. I was close to death, and I didnt even matter to him. Just a frail little girl clinging to life and no doubt dying soon enough if left alone.

    I couldnt stand that thought. I was still alive. I didnt want to be abandoned. And I never forgot that experience. That moment of frustrated desperation as he sized me up and tossed me away. That memory wound up following me for the rest of my lifes journey.

    At the time, I had nobody to turn to, none of the strength I needed to survive. The only chance I had to keep going was Leon, my demon lord. He symbolized power to me, and being abandoned by him literally meant death.

    I suppose I must have instinctually understood that, because without even thinking about it, I had extended a hand out toward Leon.

    Help Help me

    But the longing arm I stretched out to the demon failed to reach him. I gave up on myself, and with that came the anger.

    Ahh I really am going to die here

    The sheer selfishness of rescuing me and then leaving me to die was something I just couldnt let go of.

    You liar, I said, summoning what little strength I had left. You asked me if I wanted to live.

    I couldnt stop the tears as I red straight up at the demon. I was no longer capable of forming a coherent sentence, but if I had to summarize my thoughts, I suppose theyd be along the lines of this:

    You called for me, you gave up on me I cant believe you ignored me! Thats cruel!

    In the end, it was another demonic whim that saved me. His eyes eerily lit up once more. Heh. A liar, eh? he whispered. One moment

    The ominous reply filled me with anxietybut my near-fatal burns left me with nothing else to do. All I could do was prostrate myself before the will of this monster, this Leon.

    I had thought you were merely garbage, he said, but maybe youre suited for me after all. Then he activated the summoning spell for Ifrit, the fire titan. It was easy for him. No casting required at all. And when the giant appeared, he tossed him a casual order:

    Im giving you a body. Use it well.

    It was all the evidence anyone needed to show that Leon treated me as less than human. My frustration began evolving into hatred. The trauma was etched into my mind at such a tender age.

    You want to live? If you want to live, show me your will!

    It must have been my imagination. There was no way the demon lord could have ever said anything like that to me. No way he could have extended a hand out to me just before I sumbed to my burns.

    But it was true: thanks to having my body possessed, I lived because of him.

    The summoned Ifrit followed his orders, attempting to merge himself with my young frame. I immediately felt my limbs grow numb. It felt as if Ifrit was trying to snatch my body away from me. Just as Leon ordered, he was attempting tomandeer my body for his own use.

    Confirming. Do you wish to be possessed by Ifrit in order to live?

    Yes

    No

    As I cowered at the ghastly force flowing into me, I silently prayed to myself.

    I dont want to die! Not yet! ButI cant I cant let my old self disappear!

    Confirmed. Possession by Ifritsessful. Ifrits possession is stabilizing Shizue Izawas magicules Sessful. Furthermore, unique skill Deviantsessfully acquired.

    Thus, thanks to a wild serious of coincidences, I managed to survive.

 Volume 1 - Ch 2

    BATTLE OF THE GOBLIN VILLAGE

    The path from the undergroundke to the surface took the form of a single long cavern path, which I was currently bouncing and oozing my way along. I was moving quite a bit better than Id originally pictured. Even in the dank darkness, harnessing Magic Sense made it look as bright as a sunny day to me.

    Back when I was blind, I was too focused on my footing to notice, but slimes can actually truck along pretty quickly when they want to. I never got particrly fatigued, but there was no real reason to hurry either, so I tended to keep it at a regr walking rate by human standards. (This was definitely not because myst flirtation with exuberant lotionnded me square in the water.)

    As I plodded on, I found that the path was blocked by arge gatethe first man-made object I had seen in this cave. Very suspicious, but it didnt throw me off much. It was just like any of the dozens I had seen before in RPGs. Every boss room usually had a gate in front of it.

    So how to get it open? Water de my way through the bars? It seemed like a decent idea, but as I thought it over, the door opened by itself with a creak. Flustered, I scurried over to one side of the path and watched.

    Whew! Finally got this thing open. The whole lockin mechanism mustve rusted out, someone said.

    Yeah, Ill bet. Nobodys even tried going in for three hundred years or whatever, right? replied a second voice.

    There is no record of anyone attempting an entry. Are you sure were safe? We are not leaving ourselves open to sudden attack?mented a third.

    Gah-hah-hah-hah!ughed the second one. Come on. Maybe this guy was invincible a few centuries back, but its just a big overgrown lizard, yknow? I told you guys bout how I bagged a basilisk solo once, didnt I? Itll be fine!

    I was wondering about that, actually, the third replied. Are you sure thats the truth, Kabal? A basilisk is a B-plus-ranked monster. You truly handled that by yourself?

    Quit ying dumb! Im B ranked, yknow! Some huge reptile aint gonna faze me!

    All right, all right. Just keep your guard up, if you could. And remember, we can always use my Escape skill if things turn sour

    Can we save the friendly chitchat forter? the first interjected. I need some quiet. Its just about time for me to activate Concealing Arts!

    Three of them, it sounded like, none of them making much of an effort at stealth. And I understood everything they said, too. Odd.

    Received. Your Magic Sense skill can be adapted to decipher sound waves that have willful meaning stored inside them.

    Okay. So I couldnt speak to them, but I could get what they were saying. That was good. I was never too gifted at foreignnguages. I was always one of those kids in the back of the ss, bitching all like, Why do I need this? Im never gonna live outside of Japan, anyway! Save it for somebody who will!

    Now that I was actually in that position, something told me that excuse wouldnt work for much longer. Time to hit the books, I guess.

    But that wasnt important. What should I do? That was a tougher question than opening the door, for sure. I didnt know what they wanted, but if I had to guess, they were adventurers. Treasure hunters, maybe? These were the first humans Id encountered in this worldI had an urge to tail them to see what they were up to. Butooh, if a slime who couldnt speak theirnguage showed up, what would they do? Slice me up with impunity, Id bet. Better save it for next time. Safety first. I could save the human stuff for when I could talk to them.

    The slim man leading the trio did something, and the three of them suddenly began fading from sight. Not entirely, mind you. He did mention a concealing something or othersome kind of skill, presumably. I wonder what he learned that for. Not for sneaking into peoples bedrooms, hopefully. How scandalous. Ill have to make friends with himter.

    Once the trio went out of sight down the path, I sprang back into action. No need to rush this. It wasnt as if this would be myst chance to meet people. Slow and steady wins the race, as the ancients said, and I believe them.

    Through the door I went, and before any of them coulde back to check on things, I was gone.

    Proceeding a fair distance from the door, I arrived at an intersection with several paths branching out from it. Which one would bring me to the surface? Thinking about it wouldnt help much, so I chose a path and headed on down the cavern path.

    Flick! Flick!

    Our eyes met.

    Slowly, I averted mine. There was a gigantic, ominous-looking serpent in front of me, a jet-ck one with thorned scales, tough skin, and an appearance that made the snakes of Earth look positively cuddly. This creature in my path made me feel like a deeror a slimein the headlights.

    My mind went nk. Maybe Id be okay if it didnt notice me? Slowly, I tried to slide myself back. No luck. The ck snake reared its head upward, matching my movements. It flicked its tongue at me as it silently menaced me with its eyes. Damn it. Its not letting me off the hook! We didnt need to exchange any words for that much to be clear.

    Should I fight it? I had this killer finisher that Id spent thest week training for, didnt I? Its just thatyou know, fighting a monster like this would take a bit of anextra oomph. In other words, I was crapping my pants.

    But hang on. Get a hold of yourself. Thinking about it, Ive been through scarier stuff before. Remember Veldora? Compared to that dragon, this guy Hell, maybe its not so scary after all. Maybe this is all gonna work out!

    With a somewhat calmer mental state, I took a moment to size up the dark snake. It must have been thinking that it had stunned me into silence, that I was unable to move. Probablying up with ways tond the final strike on me. Maybe it found the concept of swallowing me whole to be too nd or something.

    Well, no point holding back. Without another moments hesitation, I squared up toward the snakes neck and unleashed a Water de. With a lethal-sounding fwissh, the de pierced through the air and struck the monster.

    It all happened in an instantso quick, I doubted my eyes. Without a single bit of resistance, the Water de lopped the ck snakes head off. A snake so huge, so ominous looking, I was sure Id be nothing but a midafternoon snack to it.

    This skillmight have been a tad stronger than I thought. If Id used it on that adventuring trio, things mightve gone all sher film pretty fast. Good thing Id had the foresight to try it on a monster first.

    Before I go on, lets do a quick recap of what was upying my stomach at the moment. Veldora, 15 percent. Water, 10 percent. Medicinal herbs, recovery potions, and the like, 2 percent. Ore and other materials, 3 percent. Grand total, about 30 percent in use. Each Water de strike used not even a regr cups worth of water, sosheesh, I could probably spit out thousands of these before I even began worrying about running out.

    Hell of a lot more efficient than some stupid magic spell. I think Ill be relying on this against monsters for a while toe.

    So about this snake. Would it have any abilities I could steal by absorbing and analyzing it? No time to waste. Lets give it a shot.

    The results werenot bad. In addition to the ability to disguise myself as a ck snake, I gained the following two skills:

    Sense Heat Source:

    Intrinsic skill. Identifies any heat reactions in the local area. Not affected by any concealing effects.

    Poisonous Breath:

    Intrinsic skill. A powerful breath-type poison (corrosion) attack. Affects an area seven meters in front of the user in a 120-degree radius.

    It looked as if this poison had a corrosive effect on its target, damaging whatever equipment or flesh it touched. A normal adventurer would probably have a lot of trouble against this guy, wouldnt they? Though who could say, really, given the kind of magic avable in this world.

    I spent a little while analyzing the skills of this snake Id just vanquished. The more cards in my hand, the better, I figured.

    The results:

    1. Mimicking the ck snake increased my bodily volume.

    2. The skills Id just earned could be invoked without having to mimic the snakes form, although their performance could suffer as a result.

    To go into further detail:

    1. I could break down and store the monsters I consumed with Predator in my stomach. Id used Predator on my own body in order to repair damage, and this provided some spare cells to help with that, in other words.

    2. Intrinsic skills appeared to be skills that were exclusive to a certain type of monster. My Absorb, Self-Regeneration, and Dissolve skills were intrinsic to me as a slime. However, to use intrinsics, I needed to take the form of the monster in question, or else I couldnt bust them out all the way. I could still use them in part, though, and some skillslike Sense Heat Sourceseemed to work just fine either way.

    Putting it all together: Predator freakin rocked. I couldnt wait to track down some other useful skills with this thing.

    Three days had passed after my snake battle. I was still in the cave. I couldnt feel heat or cold or anything, but for all I knew, it was pretty chilly in here.

    I had yet to see a single ray of sunshine, but my vision still worked just fine in the dark. However, a certain anxiety was starting to work its way into my head I mean, I technically knew it wasnt possible, but I couldnt help but consider it.

    Im not lost, am I?

    No. I couldnt be. What kind of idiot gets himself lost in the very first cave? That first easy-peasy caves supposed to be a springboard that helps you dive into the experience, isnt it? It looked as if that adventuring trio knew where the hell they were going, didnt it?

    Id be fine. It was probably just a really long path. Not knowing the exact way did make me a little nervous, though. Was there any way to get some help with that?

    Received. Disy the paths youve currently taken in your brain?

    Yes

    No

    Pfft. Iughed at myself. Are you kidding me?! I thought, unable to resist a little whining. If I had something like that, why didnt you tell me sooner?!

    Of course I immediately picked Yes. I used to think automapping was cheating once, too, but now I knew the error of my ways. With older games, you were expected to bring your own pencil and graph paper, filling in the squares with every step you took in the dungeon. That was what made them funmaking sure you were on the right track with every single step you took. As time passed, though, people became more reliant on strategy guides, and games started to be shipped with their own built-in mapping features. It sucked all the real fun out of the genre, you could saybut once you got used to the convenience, there was no turning back.

    What Im trying to say isyou know, if youve got such a powerful feature at your fingertips, you might as well use it, right? Besides, this wasnt a game. It was real life.

    I scoped out the map that shed into my mind.

    Am I reading this right? It looks like Ive been circling through the same area over and over again

    Following the map in my brain, I delved into a branch of the cave Id never bothered trying before. There, I was greeted by a sight that had wholly eluded me for the past three days.

    Heh-heh-heh. Guess Im lost after all. Flustering me like this This must be one hell of a cave. I gotta hand it to the thing.

    (And myck of direction was not the issue, all right?!)

    I must have been getting close to the entranceto the great outdoors. Moss and weeds were starting to appear on the walls and ground. And I didnt know where the sun was, but the light, dim as it was, was starting to make its way inside. Which meant it was daytime.

    Along the way, I had a few more monster encounters. To be exact:

    A centipede monster (evil centipede, rank B-plus)

    A big spider (ck spider, rank B)

    A vampire bat (giant bat, rank C-plus)

    A big shelled lizard (armorsaurus, rank B-minus)

    No more of those ck snakes, though. Maybe that was the only one.

    They were all pretty strong. Not that Im one to talk, given that Water de was still enough to end a battle all by itself. But the bat guy did dodge my des long enough to get a few bites in, and my attacks just bounced off the lizard guys body if I didnt hit it at the right angle.

    They wouldnt all go down easy. The centipede concealed itself long enough to attack me from behind, but between Magic Sense and Sense Heat Source, I had enough of a bead on my surroundings that I was fully prepared. One Water de tossed behind me was all it took to end that encounter.

    The spider, on the other hand. Oof.

    I always had a hang-up when it came to bugs in the first ce. It was as if I was physically repulsed by them. Just one look was enough for me, thanks. Transforming into a slime mustve powered up my mental fortitude as well, thoughenough that I fought that guy without running away screaming.

    Sorry, dude, youre getting full st! Five Water des at once, thrust deep into its thorax. I didnt want it in my sight for another moment.

    Not that it stopped me from consuming it afterward, though, nor any of the other guys. Survival of the fittest and all. The spider and centipede gave me a little pause, yes, but I soldiered on.

    If any cockroach monsters showed up, though, I was definitely making a sprint for it. It wasnt a matter of winning or losing. Just because I could didnt mean I always should.

    Between this and that, I managed to absorb quite a few monsters in this cave. Lets go over the skills I acquired.

    ck snake: Poisonous Breath, Sense Heat Source

    Centipede: Paralyzing Breath

    Big spider: Sticky Thread, Steel Thread

    Vampire bat: Drain, Ultrasonic Wave

    Shelled lizard: Body Armor

    Whenever you get a new toy, you want to use it, right? Same here. So I harnessed the Great Sage to research all the skills I picked up.

    Basically, I didnt use Poisonous Breath from the snake. I actually transformed so I could try it out against the lizard, andlike, whoa. All that armor didnt do jack for the armorsaurus. It literally melted into a puddle of goo before my eyes. Grossest thing Id ever seen in my life, all those organs and bits of flesh all over the ce. I had to spray another salvo of mist to break down the rest of the chewy bits. Last time Id have to see that, hopefully.

    Really, this breath was almost too much of a force to be reckoned with. I didnt want to use it much, if possible. Sense Heat Source, though, was awesome. Pretty much every living creature emits heat. Combining this with Magic Sense meant that I was all but impossible to ambush. There was no telling what kind of magic or special skills Id run into once I started dealing with humans or intelligent high-level monsters, so I couldnt afford to let my guard down.

    Next up, the centipede. I hardly wanted to mimic that guy, what with how it looked and all. Its breath had about the same range as the ck snakes, and its form was about the same size as well. As I figured, trying to use it in slime form limited the range to only about a meter. It coulde in handy for a surprise attack, I supposed, but if a foe was already within that radius, Id be sunk unless I transformed or ran, so

    The lizards armor, as I mentioned, put up zero resistance whatsoever to Poisonous Breath. I couldnt expect much from it. Besides, I already had Resist Melee Attack, so there wasnt much point. Using it in slime form just made my external surface a bit tougher, kind of like the metallic slimes that show up in that one RPG series and give you lots of EXP. It gave a nice metal sheen to my light-turquoise body; whatever it did to me mustve changed the way the light reacted to my surface. I didnt want to test how I took damage with that on, though, so its effect remained a bit of a mystery. That little extra tint might help scare my foes into submission, though.

    That about wrapped up those three. The real meat, so to speak,y in the other two. They were pretty darn fascinating.

    First, the spider. Who wouldnt want to imitate that famous superhero who does all the spidery stuff? Firing webs from his hands powerful enough to let him swing around skyscrapers, and all that?

    Sticky Thread, it seemed, was originally meant to let the user encase their prey in webs, rendering them immobile. But could I use it to do some fancy web-rope slinging of my own? Lets try it. Point it at that tree branch, and

    Whoosh! Swiiiiiiing

    So, uh, on to Steel Thread.

    What? Sticky Thread? Never heard of it. Just some skill that leaves you hanging around motionless in the air. Pass. On to Steel Thread.

    I guess this is meant to block your foes attack. The spider uses it to help it create an effective (i.e.,byrinthine) web, the Sage told me. So I busted a thread out and whipped it against a tree.

    Whoosh! Snap!

    And lopped the trunk right off.

    With Magic Sense, I could tell that this Steel Thread would be extremely difficult for the naked eye of a human to detect. If I worked with it a little, I bet it could be a decent weapon. I spent a little time doing just that in case it woulde in handyter.

    Finally, the bat. To be honest, out of this entire zoo, I had the greatest expectations for the bat.

    ButI mean, geez, Drain. If it hits, you could use 70 percent of your targets skills for a limited period of time. Big whoop! Predator was far more effective. Talk about a precipitous drop in quality. And whats the point of sucking someones blood when you can just analyze their data instead? Ill just toss that one aside.

    Ultrasonic Wave, on the other hand, piqued my interest. This skill had the effect of confusing your foes or making them lose consciousness, but it was originally used for echolocation. Just like bats back on my home, you could use these sound waves to suss out exactly where you and other objects were positioned.

    But the skill didnt matter to me. The sonic waves it emitted did. This slime was about to get his voice back. Talk about a stroke of luck. Instead of having to reinvent the wheel from the cells I had, I could just absorb a relevant monster and take the skill for myself.

    Can I form it into a voice, though? Thats the tricky part. So I continued my research. Restlessly, forgoing all sleep (not that I needed it), I walked around for three days and three nights, testing it out.

    The end result:

    I COME FROM OUTER SPACE!

    Perfect!

    It was still a bit distorted, like someone tapping at their throat while yelling through a box fan, but it was definitely a voice! Now all I had to do was fine-tune it!

    Trying my best to calm my excitement, I began the long, arduous voice-adjustment process.

    These supersonic waves were so useful. I thought I remembered reading something about a weapon that used sound waves. A sonic buster or sonic ster or something like that? Could I do that?

    Received. There is a chance that the skill Super Vibration may be derived from Ultrasonic Wave. This cannot be acquired at this time.

    So I need to derive it or change the skill somehow? Not much to go on, but nothing doing for now, I guess. Not like everythings gonna be handed to me on a silver tter. Maybe Im getting too greedy, but the more cards in your hand, right?

    No need to push things along too fast, though. Obtaining vocal cords is a huge coup by itself. I should be happy with it.

    Looking back, Id obtained a ton of skills in pretty short order as I wandered around, continuing with my research as I aimed for the exit.

    And while it took some time, I eventually made it. The outside. The first time I got to bask in the sunlight of this world.

    Feels as if its been a while, going outside like this. It has been several months,e to think of it. Hopefully the light wouldnt burn or melt me like a vampirealthough as a monster, I would reportedly have an instinctual knowledge of what would be dangerous to my continued existence.

    People do things they know are bad for them all the time, right? No joke. We could learn something from these monsters.

    The cave, it turned out, was in a forest. The exit was just a hole at the foot of a mountainmore of a small hill, really, which stood out against the vast trees that surrounded it. In fact, thanks to the dense foliage, this hill was the only point you could see the sun from. Take a step into the forest, and all appeared to be dim darkness again.

    Climbing to the top of the hill, I saw some kind of strange pattern carved into it. A magical pentacle or something? Sure seemed like it. Maybe those adventurers I bumped into were responsible? Guess it doesnt matter much. A wise man keeps away from danger, as they say.

    I sidled off.

    A fair amount of time had passed since I left the cave. The sun was starting to set, which indicated that I must have reached the cave exit right around midday. I had a surprisingly urate internal clock, and it wouldve been nice if it couldve aligned itself with a standardized sense of time.

    And the moment I thought about it, it happened. Sheesh. Is it this easy to do stuff like that? This Sage is one heck of a personal assistant to have around.

    Anyway, it was now past four in the afternoon. About time to prep for dinner, but sadly, I no longer had to eat. I could, but the meaninglessness of the gesture would probably just make me feel empty inside.

    So I kept messing around with the new skills Id obtained from the monsters Id consumed in the cave. How to use them, neat ways tobine them, whatever else I could do with them, et cetera. Speech was a particr focus.

    That was what upied my time as I continued down the path Id found. No particr destination. It wouldve been nice if there was a town or vige with someone nice I couldve talked tobut everything had been incredibly quiet over the past few days. After getting attacked so frequently in the cave, I hardly got any attention at all outdoors. Just once, while practicing my elocution, a pack of wolves started stalking me. I tried to threaten themAh? I saidand that was all it took.

    Yipe! With pathetic yelps, they scampered away. Were talking multiple enormous canines, each easily two meters or so in length, and the sight of a slime freaked them out. Pathetic.

    Not that I minded being left alone. Getting a wolfs sense of smell would be neat, though.

    The reaction surprised me enough that I began paying closer attention to my surroundings. Turned out it wasnt just the wolvesnot a single monster out there dared get within several meters of me. Were they really that scared? It sure seemed that way, butlike, why?

    As I thought over that, my Magic Sense skill spotted a group of monsters approaching.

    Nothing like a good crisis toe at you out of nowhere, huh?

    They were small in size, their equipment in and crude. Their faces were dirty and devoid of intelligence, but with their swords, their shields, their stone axes, and their bows, they werent entirely bestial. It took a mere instant for my gray matter to figure out who they weregoblins, those infamous marauders of many a would-be adventuring party.

    Talk about sticking to the script. No doubt they were here to attack the weakest of would-be heroeswhich meant me, I guess. But, really, thirty of them against a single slime? Kind of a lot at once, wasnt it?

    And yet, I didnt feel so much as a whiff of terror. My instincts told me I had absolutely nothing to fear. Their swords had rust on them, and their armor was thin and torn at the edges. Some of them were dressed in nothing but stained rags. Compared to the hard-scaled lizards and the spiders with massive serrated des on their feet I had dealt with before, I couldnt imagine their gear inflicting any damage at all on me. Besides, if things got hairy, I could just go into ck-snake mode and Poisonous Breath them all into puddles of goo

    As I sized them up, the goblins apparent leader opened his mouth.

    Grah! Strong one Have you business here?

    Huh. Goblins talk. Or maybe Magic Sense is helping me decipher their grunting.

    Ane on, strong one? First theyre surrounding me with their weapons; then theyre rolling out the red carpet for me What do they want?

    It got me curious. They didnt look ready to descend upon me immediately. It might be a good chance to test out my speaking abilities. No better time to start than now.

    I gave the goblins a quick look-over.

    To them, this must have been one of the most frantic moments in their lives. Their eyes, as well as their weapons, were trained on me, although at least a few of them were ready to flee at the least provocation. The leader, meanwhile, was every bit up to the post, his steely eyes practically drilling holes in my gtinous form.

    Hmm. They seem intelligent enough. Maybe this conversation thing could work out after all. But will they understand me?

    I focused my thoughts on my still-newborn voice and gingerly tried a few words.

    Good to meet you, I guess? My name is Rimuru. Im a slime.

    The goblins murmured among themselves. Does a talking slime surprise them, maybe? I thoughtonly to find a few of them already prostrating themselves before me, weapons tossed away. Weird.

    G-garrh! Strong one! We, we see mighty power of you. Please! Quiet the voice of you!

    Mm? Did I put too much force into it? Maybe making myself understood wasnt such a big deal after all. inly, I was freaking them out.

    I figured an apology was in order. Sorry, I dont have this fine-tuned too well yet

    We, we need no apology from such great form of you!

    Guess that worked. This is turning into some decent practice. I was impressed that in old Japanese worked on these guys. With all the politeness they gave me, I figured I should return the favorbut given how terrified some of them were, I might as well show off the confidence they thought I had.

    So what did you need from me? I dont have any business around here.

    I see. Vige of us is ahead. We felt strong monster nearby, so we came to patrol.

    A strong monster? I didnt spot anything like that?

    G-gaah! Grah-gah-gah! Such joking! You cannot trick us, even with form of you!

    These guys totally have the wrong idea. Apparently they thought their powerful intruder had disguised himself as a slime. These were goblins, the world-famous lower caste of the monster totem pole. I shouldnt have expected much.

    The goblins and I spoke for a while longer, and before long, I wound up receiving an invitation to their vige. They were willing to put me up for a bit, even. Pretty nice guys, given how scraggly they all looked. So I epted. I had no need to sleep, but a little rest never hurt a guy.

    Along the way, I got to hear a bit of the local gossip. It turned out the god they worshiped had recently disappeared. Without it, the local monsters had started acting up a lot more than before. At the same time, more human adventurerspowerful ones, as they put itwere starting to invade the forest. And so on.

    And funnily enough, the more we spoke to each other, the more clearly I began to understand them. It must have been my Magic Sense skills getting more ustomed to however the goblinnguage was wending its way through the particles in the air. Maybe getting in some practice with goblins before my big human debut was a good idea after all, I thought as I followed along.

    The vige was shockingly dingy. Maybe I shouldnt have expected much from a goblins den. They guided me to what I supposed was the most structurally sound of the buildings. It had a thatched, pitted roof that was rotting away in areas, the walls bearing nothing but a few pieces of t wood nailed to them. No slum Id ever seen in my world could out-filth this one.

    I am sorry to keep you waiting, honored guest, one of the goblins said as he entered. The leader of the expeditionary force I ran into earlier apanied him.

    Oh, no need for that, I said, shing my salesmans smileor in this case, my slime smile. Dont worry about me. I havent been waiting for that long.

    Something about smiling at your conversational partner always did wonders to keep negotiations moving your way. Once you were aware of it, it was scary how well it worked. Not that I knew what we were negotiating yet.

    I apologize we cannot provide you more hospitality, the goblin said as he brought out something resembling tea for me. I am the elder of this vige.

    Even goblins must have this stuff, I thought as I took a sip (well, technically, slid my way over the teacup, but same difference). I couldnt detect any taste from it, which made sense, since I didnt have that sense. That might have been for the better, for all I knew. My Analysis skills didnt detect any poison, but reportedly it bore a bitter, acrid vor.

    It was good to see the goblins trying to y nice with me, though, so I made sure to politely drink it up.

    Then I decided to get to the point. So to what do I owe the favor? I asked. What made you decide to invite me over to your vige? This had to be more than monsters acting buddy-buddy with each other.

    The vige elder shivered a bit. Then, firming up his resolve, he turned to me.

    You have heard, I trust, that the monsters have been more active around here as ofte?

    I had, on the way here.

    Our god has protected the peace in thisnd for generations, but about a month ago, he hid himself from us. That has allowed the nearby monsters to start meddling with ournds once more. We do not wish to let this continue, so we have fought backbut from a raw-power perspective, we face an uphill climb.

    Hmmm. Was he talking about Veldora? It would match time-wise. But if the goblins wanted my help

    I understand you well enough, but Im just a slime, so Im not exactly sure I can provide the help you need

    Grah-ha-ha! Trust me, no need for modesty! It is no mere slime who can emit the mystical force you do! I cannot imagine why you are taking that formbut you have a name bestowed upon you, yes?

    Mysticalwhat? Whats that? I dont remember busting anything like that out. I focused my Magic Sense on myself instead of my environs. Then I realized it. There was, in fact, some kind of ominous-looking aura covering my whole body. Youd think I wouldve noticed that in the midst of all the monster transformation and Body Armor mrkey, but it was toote now.

    Whew. Talk about embarrassing. Here I am, exuding all this mystical stuff, and I didnt even bother to say excuse me. I felt as if I were walking down the middle of Main Street, baring everything I had to the world. With all the magicules in the air over in the cave, Id beenpletely oblivious.

    This is bad! Really bad! But at least it exined how the monsters in the forest reacted to me before now. Not too many of them would have wanted to take on this hombre. No one was stupid enough to be fooled by appearances.

    Well, might as well run with it.

    Hee-hee-hee Impressive, elder. You noticed?

    Of course, my friend! Even in the shape that you are, there is certainly no hiding the strength inside you!

    Ah. Well, if you spotted me, then I guess you guys have a lot of promise!

    Now Im diggin this! Lets just pull the elders strings for a bit and talk my way out of trouble. At the same time, I tried to find a way to extinguish the mystical aura around me, futzing around with the surrounding magic to try to push it back in.

    Ohh Were we being tested, perhaps? Then I certainly hope we are worthy. Many would be cowed to submission by such a force.

    By this time, my mystical whatever was mostly hidden. I was back to being just a regr old slime. Funny to think, thoughearlier, if I had looked like any old slime on the street, would the entire forest have tried to kill me? That wouldve been a bummer.

    Youre right. Anyone willing to speak to me without being frightened by my mystic powers must be worthy indeed.

    Worthy how? I wondered to myself silently.

    Ha-ha! Thank you very much. I will refrain from asking you why you hide your true formbut I do have a request of you. Would you be willing to listen to it?

    About what I figured. Nobody would go up to a fearsome, hideous monster for no reason at all.

    It depends on what it is, I said, trying to keep my swagger going. But go ahead. State your business.

    Heres the rundown.

    It turned out some neer monsters from thends to the east had been pushing into the area, hoping to seize it for themselves. The area was home to several goblin viges, including this one, and even the small shes so far had resulted in arge number of goblin deathsincluding some named goblins.

    One of these named creatures was the sort-of guardian of this vige, and with his death, the value of keeping this vige intact had declined dramatically.

    The other goblinmunities hadrgely abandoned thisnd. Their reasoning was that they could coerce the neers to attack this vige, buying them time toe up with countermeasures of their own. The vige elder and the leader of the expedition who greeted me had tried to reason with them but were coldly brushed away. The frustration was clear in their voices as the two of them exined.

    I see, I replied. So how many of you live in this vige? And how many are battle ready?

    We have approximately one hundred residents. Counting our womenfolk, about sixty of them are ready to fight.

    Doesnt sound like much. Pretty smart goblins, though, if theyre keeping track that closely.

    All right. And what types and numbers are we talking about with the enemy?

    They are direwolves, we believecertainly wolflike in appearance. Under normal circumstances, it would have to be ten of us against one of them for us to have a fighting chancebut they appear to number around a hundred themselves.

    Huh? What kind of impossible game is this? I turned my eyes toward the vige elder. He didnt seem to be joking; his eyes were as sincere and dedicated as a goblins could get.

    So these goblin fighters took them on in such small numbers, even though they knew they couldnt win?

    No. This information I told you Those fighters risked their lives to obtain it.

    Oh. Mightve been a rude question, there.

    Upon further questioning, the named goblin theyd lost turned out to be both the elders son and the older brother of the scouting party. I spent a moment weighing the options, the elder falling silent as he awaited my decision. It might have been my imagination, but I could have sworn there were tears in his eyes I was probably just imagining it, though. Tears dont go too well with monsters.

    Better pump up the swagger, I figured. Thats how a feared monster should rightly act!

    Lets get something straight, elder. If I help this vige, what do I get in return? Do you even have anything to give?

    Not that I minded helping them out on a whim. But it took ten goblins to maybe beat one big dog or whatever, and theyd be facing a pack of a hundred. It wouldnt be simple. I think a little ck-snake action could take care of thembut I cant just snap up this job without thinking a bit.

    We shall give you our allegiance! Please, grant us your guardianship. If you do, I promise we will swear our loyalty to you!

    Honestly, as gifts go, thats not much. But after experiencing ny days of silent solitude, even talking to goblins was kind of fun. The thought of saving this dive probably wouldve disgusted me back in my human days, but right now, I was a monster. No need to worry about falling in a puddle and picking up some infectious disease any longer.

    Plus, those eyes on the elder. I could tell that he was truly relying on me to say the right thing.

    I reflected on my past life. When someone asked me to do something, I always did it. Even if I bitched and moaned about it at first, even if the guys at the office yelled at me about it, I was never able to say no to my manager or clients.

    All right. Your request is granted!

    I nodded sagely. And thats how I became the guardian of a goblin vige.

    The direwolves ruled the roost over at the ins to the east, enough to give endless headaches to the merchants who plied their trade between the Eastern Empire and the kingdoms around the Forest of Jura. Each one of them was the equivalent of a C-ranked monster, hardy enough that an adventurer could find his leg bitten off if he wasnt paying attention.

    The real threat, however, came when they roamed in packs. Only when a talented alpha was leading the horde did the direwolves show their real worth. The entire pack would act as a single mind, a single creature, every member acting in lockstep. Such a pack, in full motion, could easily be rated a B.

    The eastern ins were located next to a wide grain-producing region, a vital lifeline for the Eastern Empire and one kept very well secured. No matter how cunning the direwolves were, no matter how advanced their skills, prating the Empires defensive lines remained a difficult task. Even if they made it through, doing so would rouse the full fury of the Empire, putting the direwolf races very future into question.

    The packs leader was fully aware of this. It was something he had learned through hard-fought experience, amid the many skirmishes he had witnessed against the Empire over several decades. Targeting the smaller-scale merchants who passed by wasnt enough to make the Empire take full actionbut the moment wolves stepped into its grain fields, it would truly retaliate.

    After so many failures, no more would the direwolves repeat the mistakes of theirrades. That was the alphas way of thinking. But his monsters instincts also told him that, under the status quo, there would be no progress, nothing to push their pack forward.

    As a rule, the direwolf race did not require food to survive. Attacking and consuming humans provided them with a nice little snack, but those didnt hold much in the way of magic.

    To the pack, their real sustenancey in the worlds magicules. They would need to attack stronger monsters or ughter humans in droves to evolve into cmity-level creatures. None of these options were particrly essible to them. The Empire was just too powerful. But merely picking off passing merchants would never do anything for their dreams of evolution.

    Then they heard tales of the soutnds. A fertile territory, one with a forest that offered all its blessingsa vast store of magic. A paradise for monsters, so it was said. In order to reach it, though, they would have to traverse the vast Forest of Jura.

    The monsters of this wood were, in and of themselves, no great foes. Their past experience hunting the stragglers wandering out of it proved as much. So why had they shied away from entering it themselves?

    Simple: Veldora the Storm Dragon. He was the one and only reason. Even when he was within his prison, the waves of dreadful magical force shook their very hearts. The creatures in the forest, they believed, enjoyed the dragons divine guardianshipwhich was why they could survive under those scorching waves. That was what they had to believe. Otherwise, the truth would drive them mad.

    So despite how it pained them daily, the direwolves had given up on infiltrating the forest. Until now.

    The alpha turned his bloodred eyes toward the forest. That evil, horrid dragon could no longer be felt. Now is the time, he thought, to hunt the forest clean of monstersand then we may be the lords of the forest. The idea made him lick his lips and sound the howlmanding his pack to advance.

    Okay. So now Im a guardian. What should I do next? To me, it just felt like bodyguard duty, despite the grandiose terms the elder used to describe me.

    To start out, I had all the goblins capable of fighting gathered around me. It wasnt a pretty sight. They were in awful shape. No way could I count on them on the battlefield. And from afar, the remainder of the vige looked likenothing but children and the elderly to me. Reinforcements, in other words, were out of the question.

    The vige elder must have been shaking at the knees. Even if they fled the vige right now, theyd practically starve before the day was through.

    Meanwhile, the goblins around me were all staring with an almost religious faith in their eyes. This was heavy, man. To someone like me, who lived a fairly easy-breezy life, those gazes added a lot of pressure.

    Right, I said, do all of you know what kind of situation were in?

    I wasnt trying to make a joke. I just couldnt think of anything inspirational I could say.

    Yes, sir! the goblin leader instantly replied. We are preparing for a battle to decide whether we live or die!

    The other goblins around him must have felt the same way. Some of them were visibly shaking, which I couldnt chide them for. A persons mind can think one thing and their body do something very different.

    All right, I replied, trying to act like the best general I could. No need to get all worked up. Keep it chill, all right? Whether youre revved up or not, if were gonna lose, were gonna lose. Just focus on giving this everything youve got!

    That helped lighten my mood, at least. Maybe it worked better than I thought.

    Might as well get started, then. If I screw up, that might be it for these goblins. But I gotta stick to my guns. I wanted to bring some swagger into this, and now Im gonna!

    With a moment to collect my thoughts, I gave my first order to the goblinsan order I would give many times toe.

    Night. The direwolves alpha had his eyes open. It was a full moonthe perfect night for a battle. Slowly, he rose, surveying the area, the rest of his pack looking on with bated breath.

    Just the right amount of intensity, the alpha thought.

    Tonight, they would level the goblin vige, establishing a foothold for themselves within the Forest of Jura. Then, slowly but surely, they would hunt the monsters around the area, expanding their territory until they ruled the woods. Soon, when the time was right, they would turn their eyes toward the south, invading it for the power it held.

    They had the strength to make it happen. Their ws could rend the flesh of any monster; their fangs could pierce any armor.

    Awooooooooooo!

    The alpha gave the signal.

    It was time to let the carnage begin.

    There was, however, one concern.

    The alpha had sent a scout a few days ago who hade back with some perplexing newsnews of a small monster that let off a strange, mystical force. Enough to surpass that of even their alpha.

    He had shrugged off this report at first. It was too preposterous to entertain. He himself had detected nothing of the sort in the forest. Every monster theyd encountered was aparative weakling. Up to this point, nothing even resembling resistance to their advance had appearedand they were almost in the dead center of the wood. A dozen or so goblins had picked off one or two members of their pack, but nothing else.

    The scout must have been too excited about the uing hunt to think straight. That was the alphas conclusion as he kept his eyes forward.

    Aheady a vige. It was situated exactly where the scout said it was. He had followed the trail of a wounded goblin straight to it. Nothing about his report suggested it to be a threat.

    This was not the alphas first battle. He was cunning, and he never let his guard down. However, even he had to admit that the strangething around the vige was a tad unusual.

    It wasa fence, like one would see in a human vige. The homes that onceposed the settlement had been disassembled, formed into a defense that neatly covered all of the vige grounds.

    And there, in front of the single opening in the barrier, was a lone slime.

    All right, stop where you are, okay? the slime said to them. If you turn back now, I promise I wont do anything to you. Move away from here at once!

    Impertinent little bastard. Leaving just one entryway open to block a mass attack? Just the kind of shallow thinking one should expect from a garbage monster like this. Our ws and fangs would make mincemeat out of that rickety old thing.

    It was time to show this slime their true power. The alpha gave the order. As if they were his own right hand, about a dozen direwolves immediately set off to attack the fencethe picture of coordination, the exact reason the pack essentially functioned as a single monster.

    The Thought Communication skill enabled their collective behavior. It was far faster than giving verbal orders, letting the pack work in perfect tandem.

    The first wave should have been all it took to destroy the fence. Instead the alpha, already picturing a screaming rabble of goblins struggling to flee after the miserable failure of their stratagem, let out a surprised yelp. The force he had sent toward the fence had been blown straight backward, some of them bleeding profusely as they writhed on the ground.

    What could this be? The alpha kept his mind sharp as he surveyed the area. The slime by the entryway had not moved an inch. Did it do something?

    One of his men sidled up to him to report. It was him, boss! The thing with the mystical force that outssed yours!

    Nonsense, the alpha thought as he looked at the slime. It was a small monster. They would asionally be born here and there along the ins. Even calling them monsters at all seemed absurdtheir whole existence was petty. That thing, holding more force than me?

    The alpha fumed.

    Impossible!

    Few, indeed, were the monsters more sly and crafty than the alpha. He had years of experience to draw upon, and he could summon it on the fly to calmly, nimbly formte a new n. And his years of experience told him that this monster could not possibly be stronger than he was.

    Right there, for the first time, the alphamitted a fatal mistakeone that would ultimately decide his fate.

    You wretched little worm of a monsterI shall crush you to pieces!

    Yeesh. That was a shock.

    I didnt think theyd go lunging at the joint straight out. I even gave them that heroic little speech about how I wouldnt do anything if they turned back, but they totally ignored it.

    Instead, the direwolves all started moving at once, attacking the fence from pretty much every angle they had. I was hoping we could talk things over a little first, but they forced me to throw out my entire script. And after all that rehearsing I did while the fence was being built.

    The first order Id given the goblins was to show me where the wounded were. Adding a dozen or so survivors to the sixty fighters we had wouldnt make the work go much more efficiently, but given their devotion for me, I wanted to do what I could for them.

    They were all lying down on the floor of arge, fairly unhygienic-seeming building. Looking over them, I started to think. Apparently, theyre using some herbs to treat thembut left to themselves, theyll die before long. They were all in rougher shape than Id thoughtskin shed by teeth and ws, and some were sporting nasty-looking gashes with God-knows-what growing out of them.

    Better splurge a little bit, I figured as I took action. Consuming the wounded goblin closest to me, I sprayed some recovery potion on him, then hawked him back up. The elder prepared to say something to me, but he thought better of it as I worked my way down the rowswallowing, sttering, spitting out.

    After Id finished up with a few of them, I took a look behind me.

    There they were again, kowtowing to me.

    What is with these guys?

    They mustve assumed Id resurrected them with my powers or something. To avoid future misunderstanding, I opted to just spit the potions out directly from there on, healing the goblins wounds out in the real world.

    The healing process took a little time, but it worked. Once I was done with everyone, I gave the remaining goblins a new orderthe fence.

    A simple wooden affair would have been fine, I thought, but we didnt have much time or material to work with. We had to go with what we had, so that was what I didwithout a moments pause, I had them tear down their homes and use the wood and otherponents to fortify the wholemunity.

    In the meantime, I ordered the goblins who were decent with a bow to go on scout duty. I warned them not to wander too far afieldwolves were bound to have good noses. I could tell by their eyes that they were willing to sacrifice themselves for the cause. They were ready to shout out By my very life! at any moment. A lot more bravado than I really needed right now, but I doubted there was any quick fix for it.

    As night fell, around a day after I arrived at the vige, the final nks were on the fence. The finishing touches were minespider silk to strengthen and solidify the paling and a few Steel Thread traps here and there. Anyone touching the fence without knowing the secret would be carved up before they knew what hit them. Ill have to remember to go fetch a body or twoter.

    I made sure the fence had a single entryway on one side. Once it was lined with Sticky Thread, my job here was done. All that remained was to wait for the scouts toe back.

    By this time, the wounded goblins were starting to wake up, healed from their wounds. They furtively poked their bodies, staring curiously down at themselves. Looks like that stuff packs a wallop. Id assumed Id need to apply several doses to the graver-looking of the patients, but it worked a hell of a lot better than Id thought. I had noints about that mistake.

    After that, I had the goblins collect the extra material, pile it up in the center of the vige grounds, and set it on fire. It reminded me of more than one camping trip, but now was no time for marshmallows. We would need to keep watch the whole night through. I offered to handle it alone but was sharply refused.

    Nothing doing, Sir Rimuru! We could never allow you to shoulder such a heavy burden!

    She is right! We will handle watch duty for you. Please, Sir Rimuru, take the time to rest a little!

    The rabble around us echoed their approval. I appreciated the thought. They had to be far more exhausted than I was by now, but I agreed to handle the watch in shifts and rest when I wasnt on duty.

    Just before midnight, the scouts returnedsome wounded, but all safe. The direwolves had begun to move, they said. Funny how I thought they were these ugly, filth-ridden monsters two days ago. Now I was starting to feel actual affection for them. If I had my way, I thought as I applied the final Sticky Thread to the entryway, Id like to get them through this without losing a single one.

    So that was our prep process, more or less. Hostilities were under way, so there wasnt much else I could do. At this point, we had to stick to the n.

    I wasnt convinced the fence was strong enough to hold, but fortunately, the direwolves couldnt grab hold of it long enough to do much. The traps mostly sprang just as Id nned. That was a relief.

    Anticipating this, I had ordered small slits built into the fence at regr intervals. Those openings were for arrows so the goblins could attack from the inside and interfere with the enemys movements. They opened fire, and even with their crappy aim, they made more than a few direwolves scream theirst. A few of the enemy force tried to pry the spaces open and break in that wayonly to have their heads caved in by the stone-ax-wielding goblins on either side of each hole.

    Two hours wasnt nearly enough practice time, but this vige was ying for keeps. They listened to everything I said, understood it, and took action. And we were reaping the rewards. The wolves were strong, yes, capable of taking on a gaggle of goblins at once, and maybe they were even stronger as a pack. But if they were powerful solo, we could just strike em all together. If they were powerful as a team, wed make sure they couldnt team up. Use your head, and you can make it work. The strongest creature in the world, after all, is a human being with a little intelligence!

    Your luck just ran out, I thought to myself as I stared into the cold eyes of the direwolf boss. Some stupid animal beating me? How conceited can you get?

    The confused direwolf alpha was shocked at how far awry his ns had gone.

    His pack was beginning to fall into disarray. That couldnt be allowed to continue. The direwolf tribe shone its brightest only when grouped together. Mistrust in the alpha would lead to fatal results. He understood that, tooand that was why he then made his greatest mistake of all. He was enraged at the weakness of his pack, unable to ovee a simple fence, but he was even more afraid that his teams frustration would soon be directed at him.

    I need to disy my strength to them, he thought. I am the strongest of my pack. I am more than strong enough, even by myself!

    That was the moment when everything was decided.

    My eyes were still firmly upon the direwolf boss. To the goblins, he had disappeared, I assumed, but to me, he was ambling along at a yawn-worthy pace.

    Everything was going to n. I had considered a few possible oues, and now one of them was ying out in front of me. These were animals, after all. Not ex-humans like me.

    The Sticky Thread over the entryway immediately captured the boss. For all I knew, the silk wouldnt be enough to keep a direwolf leader stuck tight. Thered been no way to test it beforehand, but that didnt matter anymore. The Sticky Thread was there just so we could keep the boss in ce for a single moment.

    If I didnt hold him in ce and he dodged the ensuing Water de attack, that would look superme. Or worse, I could catch my team in friendly fire. In the midst of a battle, that was entirely possible.

    That was why I devised the trap. But maybe I over-engineered it a little. These guys hadnt even gotten the fence down yet. Id considered lining the entrance with Steel Thread instead but opted against it, worried that it wouldnt be enough of a final blow.

    In situations like these, it was my job to y the ultimate strongman, the ruler of the roost. That was what all this was forand thats why, without another moment of self-doubt, Iunched a Water de at the bosss head.

    It hit home. The headunched upward, and then gravity took it. I had killed the bossand more importantly, I made it look like augh.

    Listen, direwolves! Your leader is dead! I will grant you one final choice. Submit to me or die!

    So how will they deal with that? Will their bosss death drive them into such a frenzy that theyll bum-rush me? Id like to avoid that, if I could.

    The remaining direwolves showed no sign of moving. Uh-oh. This isnt gonna be one of those Id sooner die than submit to the likes of you! things, is it? Cause if it is, its gonna be all-out war. We were still losing numbers-wise, and wed definitely take some casualties. We made it this far without any goblin bloodI doubted wed lose at this point, but Id prefer it ended without a struggle.

    It was oddly quiet,pared to the pitched battle of a moment ago. I could feel the gazes of the direwolves upon me. Amid their stares, I gradually started glooping forward. I couldnt tell how theyd interpret this, but I wanted to hammer it home that their boss was dead.

    In a moment, I was at the alphas limp body. Nobody offered any objection. One of their pack, which had taken up position nearby, retreated a step.

    Then I swallowed the corpse. As was my right as victor, yeah?

    The Sages voice rang in my mind.

    Analysisplete. Mimic: Direwolf ability obtained. Direwolf intrinsic skills Keen Smell, Thought Communication, and Coercion acquired.

    Sounds like a win to me. But despite seeing their own boss eaten in front of them, the rest of the direwolves still showed no sign of movement. Hmmm At this point, they were either gonna freak out and run, or freak out ande for me.

    Oh, right! I told them submit or die, didnt I? Ah, shit. That mightve been throwing the baby out with the bathwater. Better give em an escape route, I thought as I transformed myself into one of them.

    Activating Coercion, I spoke to them in a loud, guttural scream. Arh-arh-arh! Listen to me! I dered to them. Once, and only once, I will let this go unpunished. If you refuse to obey me, I bid you to leave here at once!!

    I figured thatd be enough to make these dogs scamper off. I was wrong.

    We pledge our allegiance to you!

    Now they were kowtowing to me, although it looked more as if they were having a lie-down for a nap. But regardless, they had apparently chosen submit anyway. Maybe theyd been having a little Thought Communication conference about it while they were standing there like statues.

    It beats having to fight them, anyway.

    That, more or less, marked the official end of the battle at this goblin vige.

    Thats always the thing, though, isnt it? Its not the fight thats the hard part; its all the goddamn cleanup afterward.

    Whos the idiot that ordered them to destroy their own homes? Whatre we gonna do about those? And wherere all these goblins gonna sleep tonight? And what am I supposed to do with all these dogs? I mean, sure, we killed off a fair number of them, but thats still, like, eighty more mouths to feed.

    I, um Ah, screw it. Thats all for today, people! Ill think about it tomorrow, once everyone wakes up.

    For the time being, I ordered the goblins to camp out next to the fire, told the dogs to go on standby around the vige, and called it a night.

    Morning came.

    I had spent the previous night thinking, mostly. The conclusion I came up with: Let the goblins take care of the direwolves! Perfect!

    We had a total of seventy-two goblins left in fighting shape. No casualties from yesterday. At most, a few scratches. Meanwhile, we had eighty-one surviving direwolves parked outside the town fencesome wounded, but none so badly that a little recovery potion didnt prop them right back up. They couldve recovered themselves, I reckoned, with their intrinsic healing skills.

    The morning began with me lining up the goblins who were awake. The children and elderly watched from the side. They couldnt help but stick out, given theck of any homes to hang out in.

    Next to me was the vige elder. He wanted to help me out somehow, I guess, but there wasnt much an old goblin geezer could do for me. My personal aesthetic tastes remained unchanged from my human years.

    That would never change, even though I was transmogrified into a slime. There would be no charming vige princess I could ride off into the sunset with. Id probably have to wait a while for that.

    In front of this line of goblins, I summoned the direwolves. Um, okay, I began, from now on, Im gonna have you all form pairs and live with each other, all right?

    Then I gauged the response. I didnt get much of one. They were waiting for me to continue, I guessed, not making a single sound as they stared at me. Nobody seemed to openly grimace at the idea of pairing up, at least, so I assumed I was on decent enough ground.

    Uh, do you understand what I mean? Like, groups of two, okay? Get to it!

    The moment I finished speaking, the goblins and the direwolves began exchanging nces with whoever was in front of them. Slowly and meekly, they followed my order. Yesterdays enemy is todays friend, and all that. They had to learn that the hard way, but at least everyone was on board.

    Then I noticed something. Hang on, do any of these guys have names at all? How are they supposed to call for each other and stuff? What a pain in the ass.

    Elder, I said as I watched the pairing process unfold to my side, its too inconvenient for me to refer to you and your people. Id like to give names to you all. Would that be all right?

    Everyone must have heard me somehow. Right at the word names, every single one of them was locked on to meeven the nonfighting goblins, clearly thrown by this turn of events.

    Areare you sure? the elder timidly asked.

    Whats the big deal, huh?

    Y-yeah, um If its not a problem, Id like to give out some names?

    It was as if Id simultaneously blown the minds of every goblin on the premises. Each one erupted into enthusiastic cheering. What the hell? Its as if they all just hit the lottery or something. If getting a name makes you that happy, why dont you just do it yourselves? It all seemed so simple to me back then.

    I started with the elder, asking him what his sons name was. He had been the sole named goblin in the vige, now sadly passed. It was Rigur, apparently.

    So I added a d on the end and named the elder Rigurd. No particr reason for itit just sounded nice. If your son was here, I joked, you could have him state his name and just kinda add d to the end of it, ysee?

    No oneughed. They thought I was serious. I I cannot express my gratitude enough, he blubbered, for being granted permission to take on my sons name! Yeah, great. Im just shooting from the hip here, you know. It was starting to make me feel a bit guiltybut ah, what the hell!

    The goblin scout leader, meanwhile, I named Rigur. I couldve added a II to the end of it, I suppose, but why make this moreplicated than it had to be? Rigur was fine. Fine enough that it made him kneel before me in prayer, as if this was the most emotional moment in his life. Cripes. The apple doesnt fall far from the tree.

    So on I went, down the whole line. I also did the rest of the onlookers while I was at it, having families figure out their names together anding up with whatever for the orphans and singles in the vige.

    They arent expecting to, like, keep recycling these names for generations toe, are they? If Rigurd has a grandson, maybe he could start calling himself Rigurdd. Or if he has a great-grandson, he could be Rigurddd and Rigurd then gets passed on to the youngest generation. Something like that? Pretty random, maybe, but how else do family traditions ever get started?

    Sir Rimuru, the newly christened Rigurd intively asked, we are so, so appreciative of this, butare Are you sure?

    About what?

    I mean, I am fully aware of the extent of your magical powers, Sir Rimuru, butproviding all of these names in one go Will you be all right?

    Whats he talking about? Im just handing out names to folks.

    Mm? I replied. No, no problem, I dont think. Then I went back to it. Rigurd raised his eyebrows for a moment, but I paid him no further mind.

    Once I was done with the goblins, it was time to move on to the direwolves. Their new leader would be the son of the old onejust as strong (and strong willed) as his father, and already looking every bit as stately.

    Peering into his gold-colored eyes, I thought for a moment. Hmm. How about Ranga? Thatbines the Japanese characters for storm and fang into one peppy little word. Perfect! Cheap, maybe, but I rolled with it. Im the Tempest; hes got fangs

    Whatever came to mind first was best, I figured. This wasnt my forte.

    The moment I named him Ranga, I began to feel as if practically all the magicules flowing through my body were draining out of it. The sense of hollownessof the violent emptying of my innardswas mind blowing. What Whats going on? It was a fatigue like none Id felt before.

    Reporting. Your bodys remaining store of magic has gone below its eptable threshold. Entering sleep mode. Expected to fully recover in three days.

    I was still conscious. I didnt need to sleepexactly, and I could hear the Sages voice.

    Slowly but surely, it began to dawn on me. Id used too much of mymagic? Like hitting zero MP, sort of? Whatd I do to manage that? Had I been wearing myself out this whole time without realizing it? It sure didnt feel that way.

    I tried moving. No response. Sleep mode must be something like hibernation. I wasnt asleep, but I couldnt move at all. All I could do was sit aroundwhich was fine, because the goblins had prepared a seat of honor for me by the fire, so I might as well bask in it. Nothing else to do, or that I could do.

    I took the opportunity to reflect on what just happened. Why did I run out of magic after I started naming people? Did doing that consume magicules somehow? Come to think of it, it really started to flow out once I named the direwolves leader, didnt it?

    It was still just a theory, but it seemed clear to me that naming monsters actually required magic. That conclusion took around two days to reach.

    It sure exined why Rigurd was so aghast at what I was doing, among other things.

    This Oh, crap, this isntmon knowledge among monsters, is it?

    Guyyyys, I wanted to shout, you gotta tell me these things!! But there was no pointshing out at others. Not that itd stop me once I could move again, I imagined.

    Initially, the goblins seemed kind of worried about how I fell stone silent, butsomewhere along the line, the question of who had the right to wipe my surface and take care of me almost erupted into violent conflict. What are they doing? This is one harem I seriously wish I werent involved in. I was starting to feel like a magicmp people could rub for three wishes.

    Finally, the third day passed.

    R E C O V E R E D !

    Despite depleting my magic earlier, I felt stronger and more magic-rich than I had before my little ident. Magic was the power to exert force upon the world, and the particles around me were the energy driving it. That seemed to be about the extent of it.

    Is it one of those that which does not kill me makes me stronger types of things? I pondered experimenting with it further but decided against it. There didnt seem to be much need, and if I died in the process, Id look like an idiot. Yet another case of me going overboard too soon.

    Anyway.

    The worker goblins, realizing I was awake, began congregating around me. They were joined by the direwolves, who were streaming in from their outside base. Which was fine, but

    Um Hey, guys? Have you all, like, gotten bigger?

    They had. Goblins averaged a little under five feet tall. Now they were all nearly a full foot taller. The guy next to me looked as if he was pushing six and a half, even.

    Theseare goblins, right? And check out the wolves. I remembered them being a lot browner. Now their fur was straight-on ck, with a lustrous sheen. They had grown, too, with the bigger ones now pushing nine or ten feet in length. I didnt remember any of them being much longer than six feet before.

    The one that really caught my eye was the wolf at their forefront, walking silently forward. I swear he had to be at least fifteen feet. I could feel the mystic forceshing out of every pore. This was nothing like the boss I beat a few days backbetween his looks and his sheer force of presence, he had to be some higher-level monster. The star-shaped birthmark on his forehead and the magnificent-looking horn also raised a few red gs.

    Kiiiinda scary.

    My master! this beast of my worst nightmares bellowed in a fluent human tongue. How it tes me to see you well once more!

    Holy Is this Ranga? What happened over the past three days? I was left to wonder that for myself as the cheering, howling monsters surrounded me.

    All right

    So in the three days I was checked out, all the monsters around me grew. That was freaky. The only thing that could produce something like that wasevolution, I suppose. So does naming a monster evolve them?

    And didnt Veldora go on about something like that for a while? The difference between nameless and named monsters?

    Oh, right! Something about how earning a name provides a sort of divine blessing that helps boost your ability as a monster. Hence the evolution.

    Well, hell, no wonder everyone was so happy. And no wonder it tapped all my magic reserves at once.

    Monster evolution happens fast. Id say they didnt grow so much as bepletely different creatures. The tepid, void-like eyes of the goblins now shone brightly with the pale light of intelligence. And the females Yow! They actually kind of look like women now!

    I was so shocked, I could barely even speak.

    Huh? Huh?!

    It made me literally do a double take. These guys were like little imps a moment ago, maybe closer to baboons than humans, and nowwell, to use their official terminologythe males were hobgoblins and the females goblinas, although thetter sounded pretty stupid to me. They had both evolved, and ording to Rigurd, they had heard the so-called World Language when they didsomething that all evolved creatures experienced. A very rare urrence, and one that excited Rigurd to no end, judging by how he couldnt shut up about it.

    This wasnt entirely a happy thing for me, though. The female goblins had covered their entire bodies in rags before. Now, thanks to their evolution, the skimpy clothing allowed one to see certainthings. There would be no brushing them off now. The males certainly seemed happy about it. Even though they were wearing nothing but loincloths themselves

    The vige was in desperate need of food, clothing, and shelter. Better start with clothing first, I figured.

    Another issue I had to deal with was Ranga. He was so delighted that I was back to full consciousness that he wouldnt stop following me around and bothering me. If you like those fuzzballs, I assume youd be in paradise, but I was always more of a cat person. It wasnt the worst thing, but still.

    So, Ranga, I said, Im pretty sure I only named you out of the pack, sohowe all the other direwolves evolved, too?

    It was true. My magic stores conked out the moment I named this thing.

    My master! We, the direwolves, are both one and all. My brethren and I are connected togethermy name is the name of our tribe!

    Huh. So the whole gang evolved together.

    The one and all thing was something the previous boss never quite fully believed in, as Ranga exined. If he had, that battle mightve gone in a different direction. Ranga, meanwhile, had already gained full control over his pack, it seemed, allowing them all to evolve from direwolf to tempest wolf. More power for everyone is the way he put it.

    Nice work! I said, since he seemed to be desperately fishing for praise. He whipped his tail back and forth, a disy that was adorable on such an enormous beast. On the other hand, a happy five-yard wolf could produce nearly enough wind tounch me right out of the vige.

    Hey, watch what youre doing with that thing! I warned him. The downtrodden look he gave in response made me chuckleand the way he then shrank his body down to around three meters long made me stop. His race could adjust their sizes, apparently. How useful, I thought as I instructed him to stick to the small side from now on.

    The biggest issue of all, however, was where the heck we were gonna keep all these guys. The wolf-hobgob pairs seemed to be sharing households with each other by nownot that they had houses, so it was really more the hobs using the wolves as nkets. Theck of clothing was killing me, but housing also needed some attention.

    So. What now?

    I saw a mountain of food piled up before me. That solved one of our problems, at least.

    Once I used up all my magic, the rest of them began the evolutionary process. It took about a day toplete, and they wanted to celebrate with both that and the end of battle with a feast. The elder refused to allow it until I recovered, however, so instead they spent their time gathering the food first.

    I had noticed them sparring with one another over who got to shine me up during my departure but not the evolution or food-gathering efforts. This sleep mode made me well-nigh defenseless, it looked like. Id need to be careful with it.

    The way they began taking action without waiting for orders, at least, was much appreciated. The evolution process mustve done wonders for their intelligence. It mightve impacted their mental strength even more than the physical.

    And the food! Back in their regr goblin days, theyd eked out a living off fruits, nuts, edible nts, and whatever monsters and animals they could hunt down. Now, with the aid of their tempest wolves, they could cover a lot more terrain.

    The pairs had, much to my surprise, gained the ability to use Thought Communication with each othergoblins who could guide their wolves more surely than the best of jockeys. I couldnt guess how much this improved theirbat ability, but previously unbeatable foes were now simply a warm-up for them. This entire mountain of food was the results from the past two days alone.

    But relying on hunting and gathering would leave them in danger if something happened to their environment. Theyd have to start thinking about agriculture pretty soon. A steady food supply is the key to a life of plenty. Id need to figure out what kind of produce grew well here, as well as what sort of grain crops (assuming there were different types at all on this). Always something new to explore, at least.

    Today, though, I just wanted to shut off my brain and enjoy the feast. And I did.

    Well into the night, we celebrated our evolution, the end of war, andmost important to memy recovery.

    The next day, I gathered the entire poption around me. We had a heap of issues to tackle, but I had something even more important to tell them.

    We needed to hammer out the rules of this vige.

    Rules, as everyone knew in Japan, were a must to maintain amunal society. Because I said so! was only gonna go so far around here, no matter how many times I used that phrase in my old life.

    At the core, I had three rules in mindthree guiding principles I wanted to be sure to have them follow. Everything else, I imagined they could figure out.

    Everyone here? All right! I have some rules to give to you! Three, to be exact. The bare minimum I want all of you to follow.

    And so Iid out my standards:

    1. Do not attack human beings.

    2. Do not fight among your friends.

    3. Do not look down upon other species.

    I couldve gone with more if I kept thinking about it, but I couldnt expect them to follow too many from the start. Instead, I just stuck to the basics. But how would they take it?

    Could I ask a question? Rigur shouted. Why are we not allowed to attack humans?

    Rigurd gave his son the dirtiest look Ive ever seen from a hobgoblin. Was he afraid I was offended? I wish we could keep things a little more informal, but

    Simple: Because I like humans! That is all.

    Ah! Very good! I understand!

    Youdo? Well, geez, that was easy. But I couldnt read a single hint of dissent on any of their faces. I was expecting a little more debate on the issue. Talk about a letdown.

    Human beings live in groups, I continued, giving my full exnation whether they needed it or not. If youy hands on them, they may retaliate in forceand if they throw everything they have at you, I doubt you would be able to defend yourselves. Thats why I prohibit interfering with them. Itd help you all if you were friendly with them, besides

    Really, though, it just came down to me liking humans, seeing as I used to be one.

    Ranga nodded deeply at this. It seemed to make sense to him. He must have had his own reasons to think challenging mankind was a bad idea. The hobgobs, meanwhile, appeared even more convinced than before, so I didnt bother thinking about them much.

    Is there anything else?

    What do you mean by Do not look down upon other species?

    Well, all you guys are freshly evolved, right? Im just saying, dont let that get to your head and start lording it over all the weaker species! Just because youre all a little sturdier doesnt mean youre some high-and-mighty race now. Sooner orter, your rivals will get just as strongor even strongerand theyll want to get back at you. Thatd suck, wouldnt it?

    I had the ears of everyone in the audience. Looks like that worked well enough. I was sure some of them wouldnt listen to reason, but its best to try to nip these things in the bud, anyway.

    Thats pretty much it. Stick to those rules as much as you can, all right?

    The first rules the vige ever had were set in stone. Everyone nodded their approval, and with that, the curtain rose on a new life for them all.

    With localws out of the way, it was time to start divvying up roles. The vige watch, the food-prep team, the group collecting materials for the vige to make things with, the ones building homes and tools and such

    I decided to assign police duty to the extra Thought Communicationwielding tempest wolves. There were seven left after all the hobgobs were paired off, and with Ranga practically glued to my ass, that made six I could send on patrol.

    Beyond that, I figured Id leave the assignment details to Rigurd.

    Rigurd, I hereby appoint you goblin lord! It will be your job to keep this vige well run and well governed.

    In other words, I tossed everything onto hisp. As hard as possible.

    But think about it. I worked for a general contractor back on Earth. Im no ruler. And if I got too wedded to this vige, Id never get a chance to visit a human town. Even if it meant being a tad pushy, Id have to hand it off to him someday.

    I was expecting some blowback, but

    Y-yes, Sir Rimuru!! I promise you that I, Rigurd, will devote myself body and soul to this vital post!!

    He was sobbing tears of joy again.

    Fair enough. Let the king reign, not govern. Or at least let him bark out orders now and then, and leave him alone otherwise.

    You know, I seem to remember Rigurd being this doddering, wrinkled mess of a goblin when we first met. Now hes a hobgoblin in the prime of his lifefit, muscr, and bursting with energy. He might even be stronger than Rigur. How did that happen? The more I mess with this magic stuff, the crazier it all seems to me.

    Very well, I crowed. It is in your hands now, Rigurd! Now, I was watching the construction work. Its terrible, isnt it?

    One could barely call the structures houses. These were stronger, smarter goblins now, but I suppose asking them to suddenly develop technical skills was asking a bit much.

    It pains me to admit so, Sir Rimuru. We never had a need for veryrge buildings in the past

    Yeah. You guys are bigger now, after all. As for clothing You guys are all exposing way too much flesh. Could you maybe pass some clothes around?

    Ah! Yes! There are some people I know that weve had dealings with several times. Perhaps they could supply clothing that could fit our needs. In fact, with their skills, they might know how to build homes as well!

    Hmm.

    Having worked for a contractor, I had an eye for decent building quality. In terms of what I could actually construct, however, my skill was limited to your basic Sunday afternoon DIY projects. Not enough to serve as a building foreman. If these businessmen could help with that, perhaps itd be worth paying them a visit.

    I see, I replied. It wouldnt hurt to talk to them. What did you pay them with, though? Money?

    No, Sir Rimuru. We do have some currency that we confiscated from adventurers, but that remains in storage. Instead, we have obtained the materials we need via either barter or short-term work.

    Oh. So who are these guys?

    They are known as dwarves.

    Dwarves! The infamous smithing race! I gotta check em out! And while the loincloth crisis had captured most of my attention, something had to be done about their defensive capabilities. Their armor provided no more protection than tattersand they couldnt even use it, because it didnt fit anymore. It was certainly an issue, and tackling it right now would be killing two birds with one stone.

    Just one problem. Almost nothing they had seized from passing adventurers was of much use any longer, and whatever money they had stored up couldnt be very much. What could we trade? Another problem to shelve forter, perhaps

    Ill try visiting them. Can you make the arrangements for me, Rigurd?

    Ah! Ah, of course, Sir Rimuru! Ill have everything for your journey by tomorrow afternoon!

    He sounded enthusiastic enough about it that I felt safe in his hands. Hed probably give me whatever money was left, too, not that I should expect much.

    Currency, though, huh? Itd be funny if it was paper.

    Thinking about it, though, I didnt have much money to my name, either. The fact that currency existed at all in this world was a nice surprise, at least. Id figured it did, but Id had no idea how it was circted at all.

    Once I reach a human town, Ill have to go around and check out prices. But that can wait until after the dwarves. After all the hard work getting this town in shape, a leisurely visit would do wonders for me. Ill be with my own humankind soon enoughchecking out one of the other races could help me learn a little more about this wacky world.

    Although technically a subrace of people, the dwarves apparently lived inrge towns of their own. They had a king as well, although no goblin was ever permitted even a nce. Just being allowed into their towns was considered an all-time achievement for goblinkind.

    I started to wonder about the state of goblin discrimination around here. I was a slime, after all. Would I be treated fairly? There were lots of anxieties to entertain, but I still couldnt wait to meet some of those little guys. The excitement remained fresh in my mind all throughout the rest of the night.

    A+A-

    THE GIRL AND THE TITAN

    Being possessed by Ifrit saved my life. That, I could never hope to deny. If Id been left there alone, the burns from the air raid wouldve killed me. No matter what Leon the demon lord intended for me, I had to ept the fact that I owed my life to him.

    As a high-ranked me elemental, Ifrit had powers that were far beyond anything I could have imagined. He miraculously tamed the magic teeming inside me, ready to explode, as he took over my body. Thanks to my being stabilized beforehandif you want to phrase it that wayI managed to gain an ability. The unique skill Deviant.

    Normally, being absorbed by Ifrit would have erased my consciousness from existence. It was Deviant that protected me. Ifrit may have held the right to rule my body, but I still managed to retain my sense of self despite the assimtion.

    The demon lord always kept me near him.

    Though Ifrit and I had be one, my body was still young and immature. The one who had summoned me towered over me, even seated in a chair. Ifrit held ownership over my body, so there was precious little to upy my time. All I could do was stare at the things that came into view through my eyes. I never tired, but the long periods of boredom were a little painful to endure. I epted it, though. It was all part of being assimted.

    Then, one day

    Lord Leon! We have intruders!

    one of the knights in the demons service burst into his office.

    I was standing next to him, as always. I had nothing else to do, and I couldnt do anything anyway.

    A knight in ck armor, standing at the demons right side, took his sword in his hand.

    Suddenly, a mysterious figurea sort of mix between bird and manshot into the room, cackling in his rasping voice.

    Kehhhh-keh-keh-keh! Greetings from Knig the Magic-Born! When I defeat you, Leon, I will be a demon lord for all time. An ex-human like you, dering himself to be a demon lord? Know your ce, fiend! Ill be happy to take yours once your body is firmly buried in the ground!

    Nothing the man blurted out did anything to change Leons facial expression. Hmph, the knight in ck calmly said to him, I see leaving me, at least, to guard you was a wise choice. It looks like one of the rank and filers sniffed this ce out.

    Bah, the demon replied just as the knight was about to unsheathe his sword. Another would-be meddler from the gallery. Very well. He looked at me. It is time, Ifrit.

    What did he mean? I was confused.

    Hmm? What is it, Ifrit? he asked, an inscrutable look on his face. My bewilderment must have shown in my bodys eyes.

    Ignore me, will you, the one known as Kniga high-level magic-born, as it turned outsaid as he spread his winglike arms out and crossed them in front of his face. For a moment, I could see his hands glow.

    Confirmed. Extra skill Magic Sensesessfully acquired.

    Ignoring the unfamiliar voice booming in my head, I unconsciously began to walk. One step. Two steps. Then, before I knew it, I was standing in front of the demon lord Leonface-to-face with Knig.

    Are you in such a hurry to die, brat? he rasped out. Something about that voice rankled me to the core. You will perish by my hand sooner orter. But once I kill that demon lord pretender

    I could see that the wings extended in front of him held a decent amount of magical force.

    Die, bastard!!

    Before he finished speaking, he fired a volley of feathers. I could tell he had aimed them straight at me. Each one had an ample amount of force behind ittouching one would make it explode, which looked a tad painful.

    The moment that urred to me, I was suddenly taken by a violent rage, my head heating up until I thought it was going to boil. I think it was the wrath of Ifrit inside me.

    What happened next took ce in the blink of an eye. In a single moment, all the feathers turned to ash, and mes were dancing around Knigs body. Looking closely, I could see a plume of fire, like a whip, extending from the palm of my outstretched right hand.

    Ah, ahhhh! S-stop! Burning, stop, stop it

    Whatever Knig was attempting to shout, he never quite managed to piece together a full sentence. My mes consumed him.

    My heart filled with fear. I knew that right here, by my own hand, I had killed a magic-born person. Yet I could feel my whole body lightening with a sense of strangely deep satisfaction. It was hard to exinas if I had justpleted something I was meant to do. It felt as though my mind belonged to someone else. The terror was unbearable.

    But In another moment, it all fixed itself. Ifrits consciousness filled my soul anew, bottling up my anxieties and my fear.

    It did, in the end, keep me from going mad inside. It helped shelter me from the guilt I should have felt at killing. Not that I was incapable of that emotionIfrit just exercised hisplete control over me to ensure I never felt it. To ensure that I, his host, never lost my mind and died on him.

    So began my strange symbiotic rtionship with Ifrit, something I neither wanted nor hoped for. The same thing happened again, numerous timesand again, I killed the intruders for Leon, never feeling a thing.

    I had no regrets. I was young; I still didnt know right from wrong, and I left everything to Ifrit. I simply acted, unfeelingly, dragged along by the creatures will to dispatch those in his way.

    One day, the demon lord spoke to me. Heh-heh. Ha-ha-ha-ha! I love it, he said. Youve shown your will to me, havent you? Youve shown you can survive. Im impressed.

    For some reason, this observation didnt difort me at all. In fact, I almost felt proud.

    Whats your name?

    Shizue.

    Shizu-eh? All right. Your name is Shizu. You will call yourself Shizu from now on!

    I meekly epted it. I am Shizu. Not Shizue Izawa. The name I live with is Shizu.

    That was how I came to stay at the demon lords castle, serving as his me titanan upper-level magic-born. His close assistant.

    Several years passed after I gained the name Shizu. After a while, I was able to move around somewhat under my own volition. I was perfectly at ease with my symbiosis with Ifrit.

    The demon lord Leons castle included a training facility.

    There, the ck knight served as an instructor, providing guidance for the titan and nonhuman children therealthough there were some adults as well. It was a grueling process, and those who failed to keep up would often find themselves with nothing to eat. We all struggled to keep up, with everything we had.

    It was there that I learned how to fight with a sword, without borrowing Ifrits power. I didnt want to lose out to any of my fellow students, and I hated being treated like someone special. That was what drove me to improve.

    One day, I befriended a young girl named Pirino, a gentle, quiet girl just a tad older than I was. We were in the forest, on a hunt as part of our practical battle training, and we struck up a conversation. Pirino would always go off on her own, which struck me as odd, so I decided to follow her.

    Fwee!

    There, I spotted her ying with a baby wind fox. She had been giving it food, taking care of it on the sly. It was a monster, a magical beast, but also cute and still too small to go hunting by itself. It was alone, separated from its parents, but it was alive and thriving.

    Ah! Pirino hid the wind fox behind her as she whirled around, shocked by my presence. II was caring for this, she stammered, realizing I had seen it. Itd just be mean to leave it to die Dont tell anyone, okay?!

    Her eyes wavered with anxiety. I could tell her aims were noble. This was a small life in her hands; she wanted to protect it. Maybe I was jealous of that wind fox. It wasnt alone anymore, I felt, but I was.

    All right, I bashfully said, butcan I take care of it with you?

    Pirino stared nkly for a moment, then shed a serene smile. Of course! In fact, I hope you can. My name is Pirino!

    I gave her my name, and we exchanged a few pleasantries. She was the first friend I ever had in my life.

    What did you name it? I asked her.

    Pirino gave me another look. Name it? Monsters dont have names. They canmunicate with each other through their minds.

    But Id feel bad if this guy didnt have a name, though. Hey, is it okay if Ie up with one?

    Really? But they said we arent allowed to name monsters

    Please? Come on, just once?

    I didnt quite understand what Pirino meant. No matter what it took, I believed the wind fox deserved a name. After a few more moments, she grudgingly nodded at meand in another moment, we were both having funing up with names.

    Ultimately, we settled on Pizu, a mixture of Pirino and Shizu. It seemed to symbolize our newfound friendship, in a way. I was happy with it.

    Fweee!!

    It would always cry with glee like that whenever Pirino or I used its name. It must have liked what we chose, and I enjoyed the reaction. Pirino would smile, too.

    This is so much fun!

    I had been so alone, but Pirino and Pizu were there to soothe my heart.

    We came to visit Pizu on regr asions.

    A few days after we named it, the wind fox grew from something we could keep on our palms to a creature about the size of our heads. It surprised us, but considering how attached it was to us, we didnt mind. If anything, we were d it wasrge enough to hunt for itself. Sometimes, itd even have a bird or wild hare for us when we visited.

    Do you think we could take it to the castle, Shizu? Its really smart, and maybe it could help out around the ce

    Huh?

    Frankly, I wanted it to remain our little secret. But faced with Pirinos pleading eyes, I couldnt bear to say it. I didnt want my selfishness to sadden her.

    There were other assorted magical creatures being kept in the castle. A wind fox this intelligent and this friendly to peoplePirino insistedcould easily be recognized as a servant beast.

    That was the start of the tragedy.

    Fweeeeee!!

    I suppose you could say it was just bad luck that we passed by the demon lord Leon in a castle hallway. But it wasnt. It was our fault for assuming we had the strength to watch over anything in life.

    Run Run, Pizu!!

    Coming across Leon spooked Pizu beyond all consoling. It leaped right out of Pirinos sped hands, hackles raised at Leon in a show of intimidation.

    The act made my titan awaken. The moment it did, I lost all autonomy. Pirino was so close, but she sounded so far away. Ifrit didnt care how I felt andshed out at the snarling Pizu. There was no stopping my body, no matter how hard I struggled, as it grabbed Pizu and incinerated it. With my very own hand.

    That wasnt the end of it. The mes from my hand formed a white, swirling vortex, attacking the girl that had brought Pizu to Leon. Without so much as a sound, it rendered her into a pile of ash that disappeared in moments. As if there were never anyone there at all.

    The me elemental, finally satisfied at a job well done, gave a loving salute to his demon master before quieting down.

    What was that? I stood there nkly, unable to parse my new reality. My hand Mymy body It moved byitself? Why diddid the me Did I?

    It took several more hours to realize that Ifrit had determined not only Pizu but also its keeper Pirino to be enemies of the state. By my own hand, I had in my friend.

    It made me sick. For hours on end, until nothing came out any longer. He should have just killed me, too, while he was at it. My entire body surged with maddening regret and sadnessand then, like nothing had happened, I was serene. No tears spilled from my eyes, even though I wanted to cry. No madness overtook me, even though I wanted to lose myself in it. No voice escaped my throat, even though I wanted to scream.

    Did the magic-born titan take over my mind, too? My heart was buried in a swell of terror, and then instantly, the calmness came back. I was no longer even a person. No matter how much I wanted it, I would never attain the kind of happiness others were entitled to.

    From that day forward, I stopped crying. I had already cried all my tears out anyway. There was nothing left to shed. I had lost something far too important to myself on that day.

    And Leon, my demon lord, simply looked on coldly. Quietly. Never punishing me.

 Volume 1 - Ch 3

    THROUGH THE DWARVEN KINGDOM

    As hed so boldly proimed a day earlier, Rigurd had everything I needed that afternoon. He had even chosen the team members for my expedition into the Dwarven Kingdom already.

    By the way, did Rigur really have to be our expedition leader, too? I was a little concerned about that, but he seemed to be all for it.

    Well, his father did recover his youthful looks and the enthusiasm to go with it. Maybe I was worrying too much.

    Once I picked up my luggage, Ranga eagerly allowed me onto his back. I boinged myself up and nestled into his fur. There was a lot more fuzz than Id thought, and it sure did wonders forfort.

    I braced my body with Sticky Thread to keep from falling. Not having any arms or legs was a real pain at times like these, but at least I had the skills to do something about it. Gotta use the tools you have on hand.

    I had actually been practicing a bit with my silk during the off-hours. What red-blooded hero hasnt wanted to p his enemies down with a lightning-quick whip strike? I didnt know if I could yet, exactly, but I had time. Practice makes perfect.

    My luggage primarily consisted of money and food, three days worth. If we took longer than that, wed have to forage a bit. We couldve brought along some hardier rations thatd keep over longer periods of time, but I wanted to travel light, if I could.

    Not that I couldnt just swallow whatever up and bring it alongbut I didnt want to get soft. I didnt need food anyway.

    On the mary side, we had seven silver pieces and twenty-four bronze pieces. Even I could tell that wasnt much. My expectations werent high, though, so that was fine. Wed just figure out what to do once we showed up.

    For a goblin on foot, it would apparently take around two months to walk to the Dwarven Kingdom. We would bergely following the Great Ameld River, which flowed through the forest, up to its source in a mountain range that held the settlement we sought.

    These were the Canaat Mountains, which neatly separated the Empire to the east and the small litter of nations here and there around the Forest of Jura. There were, by andrge, three trade routes that ran between the two pockets of civilization. One put you right through the forest; another was a more treacherous route through the mountains; the third was by sea. The Jura route would normally be the shortest and safest, but for some reason, it was only rarely taken advantage ofmost travelers challenged the mountains instead, what with the travel costs and potential sea-monster interference a ship route presented.

    In addition to these three routes, there were a handful of other ways to reach the Dwarven Kingdom, but they all charged tolls. This was mandatory, supposedly to keep people from transporting dangerous goods along the paths. It was a decent enough option for small bands, but therger caravans avoided them for the costs and time involved. They were safe, no doubt, and wed have to consider one of themter, depending on how our finances held out.

    We had no business with the Empire, so there was no point traveling east to leave the woods. It was straight north to the Canaats. We wouldnt have to go up to any peaks, at leastthe kingdom was situated at the base of the mountains, in the upper reaches of the Great Ameld. A beautiful hub of civilization, by the sound of it, built into a gigantic natural cavern.

    That was the Dwarven Kingdom.

    So we followed the n, tracing the Great Ameld Rivers route northward. It certainly kept us from getting lost. I had a map in my brain anyway, just in case. We had a guide with usGobta, who apparently ran a trip of his own to the kingdom onceso we followed his lead, and I took up the rear.

    These ck wolves are fast! And they never seemed to tire at all. We had been going for about three hours without a single break, and we had to be averaging nearly fifty miles per hour the whole way. We had a few rocky outcroppings to navigate now and then, but they sure didnt care. And this was all while making sure we stayed bnced on their backs! It made the trip a breeze for us.

    At this pace, we might not even need a week for the whole trip. Not that I was in a hurry. I wanted to work out the housing and clothing situation back at the vige, but that wasnt a problem we could solve in a night and a day regardless.

    Hey! I shouted. Dont wear yourself out, now!

    Ranga, for some reason, upped his speed a little.

    I had spent the past three or so hours enjoying the wind and the motorcycle-like sense of speed, but I was starting to get a little bored. Trying to converse in these conditions would normally be impossible, but not with the Thought Communication skill I stole from the direwolf boss. Maybe itd be fun to chat up the gang while I took in the journey.

    In my mind, I formed the requiredwork of thought. Right, what to talk about

    Hey, um, Rigur? By the waywho was it that named your brother, anyway?

    Ah, thank you for recalling my name, Sir Rimuru! My brother was named by a passing member of the magic-born races.

    Oh? One of them visited a random goblin vige?

    Indeed, Sir Rimuru, about a decade ago. I was still a child. He spent several days in my vigeand he imed to see something in my brother, in his words.

    Huh. Mustve been a nice brother.

    Oh, absolutely! He was my pride and joy. Sir Gelmud, the one who bestowed the name, said it himself. I would love to have you among my men, he said!

    But he didnt take him along on his journey?

    No, Sir Rimuru. He was still young at the time. Sir Gelmud said he would return in several years, once he was stronger, and then he set off.

    Ohh. Bet hell be pretty surprised at how much everythings changed when he gets back!

    I imagine so, yes. Now, though, we serve you, Sir Rimuru. We may not be able to follow Sir Gelmud to his honorable demon horde, but

    Demon horde? Wow, hes got one of those, huh? You sure he wouldve been willing to invite the rest of you guys, too?

    I am rather positive, actually. My brother evolved himself as a named monster, but the changes that wrought were nothingpared to what you provided us. Clearly, this evolution was on a different caliber. Heavens, I thought I would never hear the World Language once in my life. Such an honor!

    The hobgobs listening in on us all nodded their earnest agreement. That kind of thing, huh? Naming someone evolves them, but how it turns out depends on the namer? Id love to recruit someone to help me experiment on that a bit. We could have a name-off.

    Butdang. A real-life demon horde. I knew there had to be one of those around here! Is the king of all demons going to attack us sooner orter? Actually, which side should we be on if that happens? Maybe I should save that question for when it actuallyes up, if it ever does.

    I already know theres at least one hero out there, besides, so Im sure that king or whatevers gonna be mostly focused on whoever that is. Not too sure the one Veldora told me about is alive after three centuries of retirement, but given how easy it apparently is to transmigrate and revive and so on around here, something tells me shes still up in some mountain shack right now, training away.

    Better make a mental note of that Gelmud guy, at least. Now, next question.

    Ranga! I called out to the ck wolf that was suddenly my biggest fan in the universe. Im kind of the guy who killed your father, arent I? You dont have any lingering, you know, resentment about that?

    I do have thoughts about it, my master. But to a monster, victory or defeat in battle is the only absolute in life. No matter how it turns out, we are aware of the fact that might makes right. Win, and the day is yours! Lose, and nothing shall remain! Butnot only did my master forgive; he even gave me my once and future name for all time! I am filled with thankfulness, not resentment!

    Hmm Well, if you want a rematch, Im open any time.

    Heh-heh-heh But, indeed, my evolution has made it all the clearer in my mind! If you had unleashed your full force in our previous battle, the whole of the pack would have been wiped out. We would have been lost to the winds of time, never able to realize our dreams of evolution! Our loyalty, our devotion, belongs to our one true master alone!

    Allright?

    Certainly, in ck snake form, I mightve been able to do em all in with one breath. But I didnt want to have to try anything so risky. Hes really thinking way too highly of me.

    Not that I mind him having the wrong idea, but

    You realized that, eh? Guess you really have grown a little!

    Ah-hah-hah! It pleases me to hear such words!

    I nodded to myself. I mean, I killed his dad. Theres no way hes not at least a little miffed about that. If Ranga wanted to exact his revenge someday, Id dly hold up my end of the bargain. He could definitely give a ck snake a run for his money, at least.

    We chatted a bit more as the road wore on. All of us were moving far, far ahead of schedule.

    Hey, you guys arent going too fast for your own good, are you? I asked.

    Not a problem, Sir Rimuru! Rigur shot back. Thanks to our evolution, perhaps! We are not terribly fatigued at all!

    Do not worry, my master! added Ranga. We are not wholly freed from the bonds of sleep as you are, but we do not require an extended period of rest! Nor do we need frequent stops for food. It will be no obstacle, even if we fast for several days!

    I scoped out the rest of the crew. They all looked just as gung ho as when we set off. Sheesh, Im probably the least enthused out of them all. And why shouldnt I be? Ive got nothing to do up here.

    We wound up running, running, and running some more for around half the day. Talk about tough.

    As the group took their evening meal at the end of the second day, I decided to ask Gobta about the Dwarven Kingdom we were headed toward.

    Y-yes, sir! Umm, it is officially known as the Armed Nation of Dwargon! Their leader is known as the Heroic King, and

    Something about his shouty reply indicated that my speaking to him made him terribly nervous. I was afraid hed bite his tongue in his panic.

    ording to Gobtas ount, the current king was Gazel Dwargo, third in his line from the original. A great hero, one whose might and presence made the elder dwarves recall his grandfather in his younger years, but also an intelligent one who ruled his realm with a steady, even hand. A living hero, in a way.

    It had been a thousand years since Guran Dwargo, the first Heroic King of the dwarves, established this kingdom. Since then, his descendants had carried on his will, preserving and developing his peoples history, culture, and technical skill.

    In a nutshell, that was Dwargon. Given how long its kings apparently lived, it must have been a hell of a ce. Hearing about it got me excited.

    In that case, I asked, how much longer will it take, Gobta?

    If I had to guess, we should arrive by the morrow, sir! The mountains are starting to loom high!

    He was right. The peaks werent even visible until yesterday. We were advancing at an astounding clip.

    Ive just thought of something, Gobtawhat errand brought you there in the first ce? I thought you had merchants visiting the vige regrly.

    As far as I had heard from Rigurd, there were bands of kobolds who stopped by on regr asions. Why would a goblin want to take the two-month journey over here, then?

    Y-yes, sir! The dwarves pay high prices for magical weapons and armor, you see. They paid us with tools and such, but the merchants helped me carry them back, thankfully! None of the monsters around the vige could use that magical gear anyway

    Aha. So they sold the weapons and stuff they found off passing adventurers? No wonder there was nothing decent left at the vige. He mustve carted it all to the Dwarven Kingdom because the kobolds didnt have any way of appraising it on-site. Of course, any adventurers whod lose to a bunch of goblins almost certainly mustve been utter beginners, so inexperienced that they couldnt even use apass to keep from stumbling into monster viges. I doubted any of their gear couldve been worth much.

    Plus, Rigur added to Gobtas roundabout reply, all the goods the dwarves makethe weapons, mainlyits top-notch. Even the humans recognize it as the best make in thend, and they gather at the kingdom to seek out thetest works, along with the subraces and intelligent monsters. Its been tradition for years now, and all conflict between races is prohibited there, in the name of the king.

    So we were traveling there less to sell some junk and more to buy the tools they needed. The fact that they could do so on neutral turf, without gettingughed at by the other monsters, mustve been another attraction.

    Such an arrangement, Rigur continued, is made possible by the Armed Nations astonishing military might. As far as the kobold merchants told me, the dwarven armies have not tasted defeat in a full millennium

    The kingdom enjoyed the defenses of a massive, powerful, magic-driven army corps and a wall of heavily armed infantry. Any would-be attackers would find themselves first blocked by the infantry, then turned into dust by a rain of offensive magic.

    The equipment that backed up such an offensive juggernaut must have been very high-tech indeed, for this world. As Rigur put it, it was overwhelmingly superior to any human-made weapons or armor. I doubted anyone had the guts to mess with them at this point. Itd be the intelligent thing for a nearby nation to try to stay on their friendly side. No wonder none of their visitors were stupid enough to squabble with any other monsters within their territory.

    Still, dealing with any species, regardless of what they look like? The dwarves must be pretty chill dudes. Maybe I could make a few connections myself. In fact, Id better.

    This was a realm where people intermingled freely with monsters. And that began with the surface city and extended down, down, down. A kingdom armed to the hilt that walked the path of peace. No ce in the world boasted as many weaponsmiths and merchants, and yet it sounded like the farthest point in the universe from any kind of conflict. A bit ironic, maybe.

    The way the Dwarven Kingdom was starting to sound from these conversations, I couldnt wait to arrive.

    Exactly three days after we began our journey, we reached the grasnds at the foot of the Canaats. The city truly was beautifulchiseled into the vast mountain cavern, a natural fortress created by nature.

    It was the Armed Nation of Dwargon in all its mighty glory.

    And, of course, there was a line to get in.

    The front gate was enormous, built to block free entry into the vast cave opening.

    This gate opened only whenever the army went inside or out, and that, I heard, happened just once a month. Today it was firmly closed, but at the bottom of the great doors were two small entryways meant for regr traffic. The right-hand one had nobody in front of itprobably meant for the nobility or any other lofty figures who showed up. The door we were waiting for was on the left, and while some people bore passes that allowed them free entry, others had to undergo luggage checks in a separate chamber. All of this, of course, was guarded by a security detail whose equipment certainly reminded you that this was the Armed Nation. They werent clowning around.

    Once you were through security, you were pretty free to do what you wanted around the city, it seemedbut man, what a line. We were bound to spend more time waiting than traveling at this rate.

    Guess were really here, huh? a nearby traveler ventured as I scanned the line of people down the corridor. Thats a fancy gate.

    Look at the armor on that soldier! hispanion eximed. We probably couldnt afford gear like that after ten years on my sry.

    Yeah, Ill bet! Even the Eastern Empire tries to keep things peaceful with these guysin public, at least. With that kind of equipment, I see why.

    You said it. They sure aint gonna give you a second chance if you try anything. The blowback would be one hell of a headache for any nation that tried it!

    Maybe the dwarves of this world werent the kind, gentle, almost lovable beings I was picturing. They could be a lot more violent than that, for all I knew. Still, as a free city and a hub of trade across races and species, it maintained at least a public face of neutrality. The fact that the Heroic King never allowedbat inside the city was fairlymon knowledge among adventurers. I supposed that even in this world, you could afford to be neutral only if you had the muscle to back it up.

    As I mused over this, I began hearing some more sinister voices.

    Hey! Hey, check it out, therere monsters out here! We can kill em, right? We arent inside yet.

    Yeah, what the hellre you guys standing in line for? You think were gonna letcha do that, you little runts? Gimme your spot before we kill you! And leave your crap there, too, all right? Then well letcha go!

    I figured they had to be out of their minds, but then again, it was just me and Gobta.

    A bunch of loinclothed goblins riding gigantic wolves would have been bound to stir up at least a little attention, and not the good kind, so Id decided to go in solo with my guide. Rigur had wanted to join me, but Id turned him down.

    They were all camped out at the forest entrance now, waiting for our return. Which left the two of us. Im sure we looked as if we had giant targets painted on our asses. Now this pair of adventurers was osting us, whining about not liking our faces or whatever.

    Hey, did you hear something, Gobta?

    Yes, I did

    Did you run into any troublest time you were here?

    Of course I did, sir! Ooh, they beat me silly! The kobold merchants had to pick me up off the ground! Mightve died if they didnt, eh?

    They did, huh? So we cant avoid this?

    It is, uhh, the fate of the weak?

    Hed all but expected it. Sheesh, couldve told me beforehand. Gobta hung his head, realizing what was in store for him. He was finally gettingfortable talking to me. I was a bit worried this threat would make him flee back into his shell again.

    Yo! You think you runts got a right to ignore us?!

    Hey, isnt a talking slime pretty rare? Maybe we could get some money outta selling it.

    The adventurers kept yapping at us. People (maybe could have) said I had the patience of a saint back home, but this was starting to irk me.

    Gobta You remember the rules I gave you all before?

    Y-yes, sir! Absolutely!

    Good. In that case, could you close your eyes and cover your ears for me? No peeking!

    Um? All right, but!

    Right. Laying out some simple rules for my people, then promptly viting every single one of them three dayster wouldnt exactly make me a role model. But with Gobta out of my hair, I was free once more to take out the garbage.

    Just then, the hostile adventurer on the right shifted his gaze, and I followed it. It led to another group, a trio, grinning as they watched the spectacle unfold.

    One of my adversaries carried a sword; the other was d in light armor. Bandits, I figured. The other three consisted of two robed figureswizards or monks or somethingand a big, brawny fighter. If I had to guess, they were all in the same party, and these two were sent over to chase us out and nab our position in line while the other three finished us off and joined the others as if nothing had happened. That kind of thing.

    A neat and easy way to pick off the weaker monsters and take their possessions. Nicely nned. Too bad they picked the wrong target!

    Whoa, whoa, back of the line! I said to rile them up. Im feeling generous today, so Ill let all that slide if you line up out back!

    The duo looked stupefied for a moment. Then their faces turned bright red.

    Didnt take much to tick them off.

    What the hellre you talking about, you little pissant? one of them bellowed in his best evil-underling voice. You wanna start something with us?!

    Youre dead! I promised youd live if you just left all your stuff there, but you know what? Now that youve pissed me off, thats off the table.

    Heh. Back in my contractor gig, I pushed people around that looked a hell of a lot scarier than these guys. I had to if I wanted to get any work done. Some of the old rascals even had tattoos all over them. Compared to that, this barely made me break a sweat.

    Little pissant, huh? You mean me?

    Who the hell else am I talkin to? A slimes the pissiest out of em all, man!

    Get over here! If youre so eloquent, well make you into our ve instead!

    A monster ve? Do those even exist? Lets look into thatter. The merchants and apparent adventurers around us had started to notice the shouting. Better keep their eyes on me, for starters. I dont know if the concept of justified self-defense exists in this worldbut it wouldnt hurt to have as much eyewitness testimony as possible.

    Too bad it didnt look as if any of the humans were interested in lending me a hand. Really? If I were a little girl, I bet itd be a different story.

    Think you can call me a pissant and get away with it, huh? And you just called me a slime, too?

    Well, duh! What else are you?

    Piece of shit You think Im gonna let you treat me like an idiot? Youre dead! Toote to beg for your life now, man!

    The two of them drew their weapons. Oop! Off they go.

    Man. Talk about a stroke of bad luck, having these guys be the first humans to ever talk to me. Cant believe how much friendlier the monsters were.

    The people around us began edging away to safety. I supposed they wanted to keep from getting involved. The gate guards must have noticed as well, because they were starting to hurry over.

    Keeping my eye on them, I casually rolled myself forward.

    Heh-heh-heh A piece of shit, huh? A slime? Whered you get the idea that I was a slime, huh?

    I let them fill in the rest themselves.

    Of course I was a slime. Anyone wouldve said so.

    What? Cut the crap, man!

    Yeah! If you aint a slime, show me what you really are! Its gonna be tough to make excuses once youre dead!

    They were practically waiting for me to transform. Just like Id hoped! I was sure I could win as a slime, but it was kind of hard to hold back my skills. Id be liable to slice each of them into two neat pieces with my Water des. Toning it down and just knocking them out was harder.

    All right! I shouted, keeping up the performance. Allow me to show you my true form! Then I released the mystical aura I had been covering up. Just a little, of course.

    I looked around, seeing whether the audience had picked up on it. A few among the handful of people around us had. The two idiots in front of me, meanwhile, seemed oblivious.

    All bark and no bite, I suppose. Enough sizing them up. Now, what to transform into?

    A ck mist sprayed out from my body, shrouding itpletely. When it cleared, a different monster stood there instead. A ck wolf.

    Um, hang on, wasnt I a direwolf when I absorbed the boss and transformed right after? Now I was just as dark as Ranga and his pack. If anything, I was actuallyrger than Ranga.

    That, and I had two horns on my head.

    Form: Tempest Starwolf.

    Well. I guessed if a monster type I consumed evolved, my mimic form evolved with it. I was one level ahead of the evolved Ranga, even. After all, he had only one horn.

    Less trivially, I felt a terrific amount of power well within me. I was sure the sight would make these fools drop their swords and instantly run away.

    But they didnt.

    Hah! I dont care how badass you look! Youre still a runty goddamn piss-slime to me!

    You think that was enough to freak us out? Come on, man!

    They arent picking up on this at all! Youre really supposed to by now, guys I mean, dont I look threatening enough? And even if you think its just an illusion, shouldnt a shape-shifting slime give you at least a little pause?

    And yet it didnt faze them at all. Maybe they figured they still had their three friends for backup.

    I had a few more skills on hand, too. Five, ording to the Sage. Keen Smell, Thought Communication, Coercion, Shadow Motion, and Dark Lightning.

    Shadow Motion was something Ranga and his pack were actually practicing at the moment. They could hide inside the shadow of their partner, then reappear on the spot whenever they were called. They were still getting the hang of the get inside a shadow bit, so itd likely be a while toe.

    Dark Lightning, meanwhile That, I didnt even have to test. If I tried it out now, my adversaries would be charbroiled, I was sure. I had underestimated the stupidity of them both, so things could get ugly around here. Either way, Dark Lightning was out of the question.

    Sure would have been nice if Coercion actually worked on them! Talk about being too stupid to find your ass on the bottom of you. The audience, meanwhile, were clearly quaking in their boots. Some had already lost their footing.

    Sheesh Well, whatever. Ive had enough of this. Take me on!

    I gave them a free swipe to start.

    Speaking of, what would happen to the form I was mimicking if I was damaged? I did actually test that onceI deliberately kept getting myself attacked in armorsaurus lizard form. What I found was that once I took enough damage, I automatically reverted back to slime formalthough the damage would be applied only to the mimic, not to my slime body. I supposed the magicules forming the mimicry also protected my body from the blows.

    The restrictions I had to work with were the three-ish minutes I had to wait before switching to another form, and the magic I had to consume for each mimic type. But the magic wasnt a problem, really, considering the amount I could work with.

    In other words, I could let these guys il at me all they wanted. Even if they were a hell of a lot stronger than they appeared, Id just revert to slime form and scoot off. Simple.

    Hah! Prepare to die!

    Answering my call, the swordsman lunged at me with a shout.

    Hrahh! Windbreaker sh!

    Is that a swordsman skill? The de of his sword started glowing green. But it didnt hurt me, sad to say My hide snapped his mighty de cleanly in half.

    As he attacked, his partner threw a set of three daggers at me. I appreciated the gesturethree at once had to be tricky to pull offbut none of them had enough force to even split a tempest starwolfs hair.

    What was that? I sneered at them, trying my best to y the viin figure. Really, though, what was that? I waspletely undamaged. Was that skill name just for show?

    N-no! That pelt of yours Its too tough!

    It cant be II It cant be! My sword is crafted from silver! Its supposed to hurt monsters more!

    Silvers a rtively weak metal, isnt it? Brother.

    H-hey! Help me, you guys!

    Apparently the swordsman didnt care about saving face any longer. I guessed that other trio was with him after all.

    Hah! Its over for you now!

    Oh, man I really didnt think wed have to wade into this, man.

    A transforming slime, huh? Interesting. Think Ill dissect it once its dead.

    You havent moved this whole battle, have you? Bet that magic fades away the moment you do, huh? Am I right, or what?

    The three of them prattled on as they joined their friends, making for a total of five surrounding me, and went on the attack. The swordsman summoned magic des of wind, hispanion producing a shortsword to swipe at me with. Their heavy fighter shouted Grandbreaker sh! as he hefted up a great ax and mmed it down. The wizard tossed a few fireballs my way, and his monk friend built a magical defense for himself, expecting me to target him first.

    As parties went, it was rather well bnced. The only problem they had was that none of their attacks did a thing against me.

    Once the dust settled, the group lifted their eyes, daring to take a look at me. They were too shocked to speak. Maybe Coercion would work now.

    With an earth-shaking roar, I invoked itbut, s, I screwed it up. I didnt mean for the audience to faint to the ground, too, with assorted substances welling up around their pants.

    What a disaster. Now what? Thisll be such a pain to deal with. Hmm? The party? Well, they had just taken a Coercion blow at point-nk range. I doubt I need to go into detail on what happened to them.

    My Magic Sense skill started picking up on the dwarven security force running our way.

    Its over, I whispered. Over, indeed. I looked down at them, wondering how they were ever going to clean up their undergarments after thistrying to keep my new reality at bay for just a few more moments.

    Im really sorry about this!!

    I bowed deeplyor intended to, anywayinside the guardroom.

    After the ruckus we had caused, there was no way security was going to let the lot of us off with a p on the wrist. After only a few moments, a squadron of guards was surrounding us. Well, me, really, given how unconscious the other five were.

    I know! I thought. Ill just turn into a slime and slink off! And I tried to. But before I could move, they grabbed me en masse andsquishlifted me up. So much for that.

    The soldiers shed me their best no struggling, now smiles. The sweat running down their foreheads, however, indicated the effort they had to expend to make this arrest.

    W-wait! I shouted, doing my best frenzied-Gobta impression. We didnt do anything! Were the victims here!

    All right, all right, came the smiling reply. Well hear you out in the guardroom. Cant expect to run off after that, now can you?

    Not much else I can do, I guess. Whats Gobta doing? I nced back, only to find he still had his eyes closed and his hands over his ears. Oh, for What is he thinking? Hes not, clearly. Hes too stupid to. At least he takes orders well.

    Luckily, I managed to shout loudly enough to attract his attention. Before long, we were all on our merry way to the security guards office.

    So heres what happened!

    1. I got osted!

    2. I turned into a wolf!

    3. I kind of howled a little.

    Whatcha think? Not my fault, right? I thought as I nced at the soldier standing above me.

    He was still smiling at methe expression suited this gruff, friendly-looking dwarf and his long, bushy beard. Except for those unfortunate veins popping out of his forehead.

    Umm, why did you take me along with you, officer?

    You damned fool! What do you think youre saying? Our chiefs are yelling at us because you were osted.

    What?! Really? Im sorry Ive messed up again, havent I?

    Well, theres nothing to be done about it this time, but try to be a bit more careful, all right?

    Whew. Guess they finally saw the light. Good thing my me Everyone Else skill from my human years was still going strong. It was an advanced ability, earned only after years of life experience. The key was to never give your foe a single moment to doubt you. It was hard!

    And maybe I phrased it a bit jokily, but my ount pretty well summarized the whole thing. It sounded as though the witnesses they talked to said the same thing.

    So what was that wolf, then? the soldier watching over me asked. Whats he mean, What is it?

    Um, the species, you mean? Its a

    No, not the name. What I mean is, why did that kind of monster show up around here? Whered ite from, whered it go I wanna hear everything you know!

    Mmm? Id told him that was just mimicry. He didnt believe me? I thought I was pretty open with him. I knew it was standard procedure for a hero to hide his secret identity, but I wasnt exactly a hero anyway.

    Well, I told you That was just me transformed!

    Huh? Look, its already rare for a slime to talk, and you want me to add shape-shifting to the package, too?

    No, I mean Look, would you like me to show you?

    Hmph. Nah, its fine. But if you can shape-shift, how is that possible? Youre a slime, arent you?

    That Wait. How should I answer that? I dont think hed buy it if I just said Its an intrinsic! or whatever. Thatd just put me on the same level as Gobta. Think, man. You gottae up with a decent excuse, now!

    Well I was actually cursed. My talents must have sparked some jealously, I guess Im capable of wielding illusory magic.

    Oh, really? A curse, is it? Then what?

    Then, um Well, I know a few illusory spells, but I was still just a student at the time, so this evil mage turned me into a slime Im on a journey to find a way to undo the curse, and, um, thats pretty much it!

    Whyd you run into an evil wizard, then? Whyd he curse you instead of just killing you?

    Nnngh This would go a lot easier if youd just believe me, man. You dont have to be so obstinate about it. Though I guess Id be, too. If he actually bought my story, thatd make him more gullible than a goblin.

    This little back-and-forth between me and the soldier went on for another two hours or so.

    By the end of our intensive debate, I had just about an entire novels worth of backstory. A story about a forlorn young (and beautiful) girl, brutally transformed into a slime by an evil mage.

    In the midst of our tit for tat, if you want to call it that, the soldiers questions helped me weave a grand story of heroic tragedy in my mind. I was a young prodigy, a girl inherently gifted in the arts of transformation and illusory magic. A cruel witch had cast a terrible spell on me, and I was traveling to rid myself of the curse.

    Why did this have to happen? And why did I turn myself into a magical girl along the way?! And the worst part of it was, whenever I said something that wandered off-script, the soldiers next question would help me fix the mistake. Oh, right! Id say to myself as the tale meandered its merry way down the path.

    By the end of it, both myself and the soldier were enthralled, hoping against hope that the girl would somehow seed on her quest. Our eyes burned with passionat least, his did. Truly, we had a connection that went beyond mere words.

    All right! Thats it for the report. Thank you for your cooperation! But were going to need to

    m!

    Before the soldier could finish, therge door behind him opened. Another soldier rushed in.

    S-sir! An armorsaurus just showed up in the mines! Its already injured several miners at their posts!

    What?! Well, did you defeat it?

    Were good there! A suppression force is on its way. But some of the miners are fairly roughed up. I dont know if theres a war under way or something, but the city shops are out of medicine, and the castle wont let us ess their stockpile

    What about our healers?

    Thats the thing, sir The injured were deep inside, mining magic ore. The healers at the guardhouse are all out handling other calls, so all we have left is a single novice!

    Ah, damn it all!

    Sounds rough. Not that I care. Just take some from the castle, if its that important! I thought, but

    I do have a few potions on me, though. What should I do?

    It wasnt as if I expected the gesture to testify to my character and get me off the hook. We just need to make the world a better ce is all. I know it sounds fishying from me, but Compassion is its own best reward, and all that. Ill get karma back for it someday.

    Um, sir! Sir!

    What? Im busy. Im done with you for now, but I cant let you go yet. Stay in this room until things calm down a little!

    No, not that, um Ive got this.

    I took a recovery potion out. Or spat it out, is the way he probably saw it.

    Um, whats that?

    A recovery potion. Drink it, rub it inits high quality!

    Eh? Whats a slime like you doing with that?

    Oh,e on. What happened to my story? Whys he treating me like a slime again? He was egging me on during that entire interrogation, wasnt he? Not that I wasnt an eager participant, but

    That kind of doesnt matter right now, does it? Go ahead, try it. How many do you need?

    Weve got six men downbut are you sure?

    The soldier whod just stormed in gave me a quizzical stare. If I were him, I probably wouldnt take a potion from a monster, either.

    Tch Stay here, all right? Lets go!

    Um? But, Captain, thats a monster?

    Enough from you! Just take me over to them!

    The bushy-bearded captain snatched up the six recovery potions I provided and ran off. What with the grand fantasy tale wed just woven, I supposed I had gained his trust somewhat. Maybe he was a nice guy after all. Didnt expect him to be a full-fledged captain, though.

    Is it over? Gobta asked after silently nodding at everything Id said before now.

    No, but I guess well sit here and see what happens.

    Got it, sir!

    Then we stared into space. The soldiers who peeked in on asion would give us confused looks, but otherwise, not much happened for an hour. I was practicing my Sticky Thread moves a bit when I heard the captains heavy footsteps. The silken whip zipped back into my body as I waited for him toe in. Gobta was asleep, proving that maybe he was smarter than I was all along.

    Thank you, sir! the bearded captain thundered as he stormed into the room, head bowed. The miners filed in behind him.

    Youre the one with the potions? Thanks a ton!

    My arm was pretty torn up. I didnt think Id ever work again, even if I survived Thank you!

    Thest guy didnt say anything before they all left, but I was fairly sure he was thankful, too. d to see the potions worked.

    By this time, it was past sunset. It was almost fully dark outside when the captain started talking with me againseriously, this time.

    It turned out the quintet whod tried taking me on were members of this nations Free Guild. They had talent, but they also had a prior reputation as rabble-rousers. That oughta teach em a lesson! the captain said with a roaringugh.

    The guard was already certain that we were guilty of nothing, but I was still being detained out of respect for the other victims I had inadvertently inconvenienced with my actions. Nobody was pressing charges, thoughI suppose they figured asking restitution for crapping their pants wasnt the shrewdest of social moves.

    So I told him the truth. I was helping rebuild a goblin vige, and we needed arms and clothing, as well as someone who could provide a little on-site guidance. The captain listened intently, some of his men chiming in on asion. They even asked Gobta a few questions, despite his darting eyes and bewildered expression.

    The next day

    We were still in the guardroom. Gobta had borrowed another cell to sleep in, which I assumed he was still using. Having nothing better to do, I was watching some dwarven personnel run through morning training in the field behind the guardhouse. Swinging heavy wooden swords around to work on their speed, sparring a bit in simtedbat, running a fewps, the usual.

    I sat there, taking it all in and imagining how theyd fare against the assorted creatures I had Predated by this point. It was a bit like a game to mebut would the Sage mind if I used it like this? Seems like kind of a waste of talentbut what the hell? Itll be fun.

    Turned out, the guards barely stood a chance. Even if I gave myself a handicap, there were only just a few of them who could beat the bat and the lizard.

    In a one-on-one matchup, the scales tipped pretty heavily toward the monsters, but since the dwarves always seemed to operate in teams of four to six, a few of thebined parties could take on the spider fairly well. Even all twenty of them out in the field couldnt take on the centipede, though. I wasnt expecting these guys to be Special Forces types, of course, so the results made sense to me.

    They were just about wrapped up by the time Gobta awoke. The captain checked in at around the same time.

    All right, he said, youre free to go. Sorry I kept you in here for so longI was beholden to keep you overnight, at least. Apologies!

    Oh, no, no. It saved me one nights hotel cost, at least.

    d you see it that way. Here, let me make it up to you. I can introduce you to a talented cksmith I know!

    That would be perfect. Thank you!

    Things were looking up, finally. We just got priority entry, oneinspection, schminspectionand we had some extra money to spend. I thought finding a weaponsmith who wouldnt rip me off at first sight would be a chore, too, but a military referral was about the best I could ask for! Maybe I can afford to be a bit optimistic after all!

    In exchange for that

    Mmm? A catch? The only catches I ever liked were the ones on porn sites.

    If you have any of those recovery potions left, would you be interested in letting go of them?

    Aha. They must really be short on them, huh? That soldier mentioned that yesterday. Well, Ive got a ton I could sell you guysbut I dont really know the going rate.

    Now what?

    Ah, why not? I had a manufacturing cost of exactly zero on those things anyway. If he wanted some, he could have some.

    All right, I replied. Itll depend on how many, though. I need to keep a few for myself, too.

    Any extras youre willing to part with are fine by me. Even if its just one.

    Mm? Rather odd way of putting it, isnt it? I thought he was trying to rebuild the guards stockpile. Ones not going to be enough in a pinch, is it? Well, whatever. Maybe times were just that tough.

    Okay, um, well, how about five, then?

    Five! Ah, thatd be wonderful!

    Sure. Oh, also, Im pretty sure theyll still work even if you dilute them a little bit, all right? If its just a regr sh wound, ten parts water to one part potion oughta do the trick.

    The captain nodded eagerly, fully convinced. I spat out my five potions, and he responded by giving me a small pouch. Inside I could see a selection of gold coins. I know its not much, he exined, but I hope youll ept this. Ill give you five gold pieces for each one of these!

    Twenty-five gold, then? Fine by me. I dont know if Im undercutting myself or not, but Im not in a position to haggle. Better figure out how much that is, though, exactly.

    Uhmm, if I could

    Not enough? Im doing my best here, sir

    No, no, the price is perfectly fine, but I needed to ask you

    Huh? It is? So So what did you need?

    Ooh. Mmmm, thats not a good reaction. So Im being ripped off after all? I knew I shouldve started higher. Oh well. The captain seems like a nice enough guy. I doubt hes fleecing me that badly.

    Im sorry to admit it, but Im not exactly sure what this money is worth, or what prices are even like around here If you could give me some guidance, that would really help! Im just a slime, besides!

    Way to contradict yesterdays magical-girl saga, man. Good thing he apparently never bought it in the first ce.

    We wound up having a long conversation before Gobta and I set off. Soon, I was out in the fresh air of freedom againbut not before lunch. The captain insisted. I couldnt taste anything, but the appreciation was sweet, I guess.

    For the first time in a while, I enjoyed a meal.

    Ugh Why do I have to be so busy? Kaijin the dwarf grumbled to himself. What do they mean, the Eastern Empire might be on the move? Thats the most ridiculous thing Ive ever heard!

    He had reason to doubt it. Peace had reigned over the kingdom for three hundred years. The Empire had all the riches it could ever wantwhat motivation could it possibly have to stage an invasion? That was what he didnt understand.

    Of course, Kaijin added to himself, I doubt the weaponsmiths of this city would mind a good war to fill their coffers. Butarrgh, why is my work so busy all of a sudden?!

    And that wasnt his only problem.

    He scowled. Curse that damned minister! He rubbed his forehead as he imagined himself taking a hammer to the man and sighed. A lot of sighingtely.

    There wasnt much time left. A refusal would damage his reputation. I cant do it wouldnt be an excuse. He was waiting for some of his friends to get back to him, and depending on their reports, all could be lost.

    He had built a decent name for himself as a weaponsmith, but he wasnt omnipotent. What kind of smith could craft weapons without any raw materials to work with?

    Finally, he heard the news he had been waiting for.

    Sorry, one said as he came through the door. We wanted to contact you yesterday, but we ran into one heck of a distraction

    They were three mendwarves, all brothers, the trio Kaijin had assigned mining duties to. The eldest was Garm, an armor crafter with long, muscr arms. The middle child was Dold, who was known around the kingdom for his intricate handiwork. The youngest, Mildo, rarely spoke but was skillful at almost anything he didarchitecture, art, you name it. A sort of savant.

    Any one of them couldve been talented enough to run a sessful business by himselfbut they all had a critical disadvantage. Outside of their individual God-given talents, they were utterly hopeless, barely capable of dressing themselves without an instruction manual. None of them had a head for business orying the groundwork for a sessful career. They seemed to prefer letting other people use them instead.

    That was how they wound up entrusting their shop to someone who stole it from them, falling into the trap of an apprentice jealous of their natural talent, getting bullied by the government after they botched a ministerial request In the end, with nowhere else to go, they turned to Kaijin, an old friend and practically a fourth brother to them in their youth. He wished they had called on him sooner, but that was neither here nor therethey needed somece to lie low, and he could use some help around the shop.

    The only problem was that Kaijin had no work for them. He was a merchant dealing in battle gear, and he already had steady connections for all his merchandise except the weapons. Those he made himself, and he figured he could keep the trio busy making the rest of his lineupbut he couldnt have them start immediately. Telling his armor and essory contacts out of the blue that their services were no longer needed would lead to easily avoidable trouble. Until things settled down a little, he would have to continue with business as usual.

    Instead, with few other options avable, Kaijin was having them direct a team ofborers as they mined for ore and other materials.

    The brothers had arrived in Kaijins shop with a wild story about a monster. It was thest thing he wanted to hear. He rubbed his forehead.

    Well, at least youre all fine, he told them. d you got away before you were hurt at all!

    And he was. If they werent injured, they could go right back to ore collecting. His friends safety was naturally important, butstill.

    The three bothers gave each other awkward looks.

    Wellwe didnt get away, exactly.

    No. In fact, we can still hardly believe what happened to us yesterday!

    They moved on with the storya tale of a mysterious slime who provided them life-saving medicine. It seemed like a bunch of ridiculous ravings, but these people werent ones to make up stories. They didnt have the talent for it.

    So did the whole affair really happen? Perhaps it didnt matter. It was true enough, he knew, that people had been attacked in the mines. And that meant no mining for a while. The workmen he had hired all quit yesterday and headed for the hills the moment the monster news broke. And why wouldnt they? Their brethren were injured, no doubt.

    Now would be the perfect time to call on the services of the Free Guild, but that was probably equally impossible. He had filed a mining request long ago, to deafening silence. He knew he wasnt the only one, either. A shortage was starting to rear its ugly head.

    Hiring guild members as mine guards wouldnt aplish much, either. They werent cheap, and even then, they didnt lift a finger beyond what the guild paid them for. Guild guards did just thatguardand nothing else. And if this was the kind of monster that could take out a B-minus-graded adventurer

    It was hopeless! There was no way to turn a profit. In fact, this would bankrupt him. Bah! Why did such a powerful monster have to show up in such a damned shallow part of the mine?!

    Kaijin let out a deep sigh. Now what? There wasnt much time left. Maybe hed have to just go down there and grab the ore himself. No better ideas were springing to mind. All that filled it right now was the passing ticktock of his destiny.

    The four of them exchanged nces, all at aplete loss. That was right about when a set of rather odd-looking customers showed up.

    Yo! You in there?! shouted the captainKaido, as it happened.

    As we had conversed, wed grown friendlier and friendlier with each other. We were on a first-name basis now, and it turned out his older brother was in charge of the shop we were visiting.

    It was a cozy ce, the kind where youd expect the owner to be a gruff old man behind the counter.

    Hello!

    Excuse us, I said as I followed Kaido in. The moment we entered, we felt several dubious gazes upon us.

    Ah!!

    The three miners who had thanked me for saving them yesterday lifted their eyebrows high. They looked right as rain, but their expressions werent exactly jubnt.

    Just as expected, the man behind them was a perfect image of the grizzled, grouchy old civil-works guys I once had to deal with. He was the proprietor, no doubt. Didnt look much like Kaido.

    Whadda you want? You know these guys?

    Kaijin, this is it! The slime! The one who saved us

    Yeah! It sure is! And youre our bosss brother, arent you, Captain?

    Oh-ho! The slime, you say? We were just talking about you! Thanks for getting these guys out of a bad way yesterday.

    Oh, no, it was nothing Okay, it was something, but, ah, you know. Ha-ha-ha-ha!

    It should be against thew topliment me. I always let it go to my head, until I finally float up into outer space. I probably wouldnt being back down for a while.

    So, the old guy said, rearing back a bit, what brings you here today?

    I decided to go into full detail. We all piled into seats situated deeper inside, and Kaido was kind enough to provide a quick recap for me. I added a few choice details, and things moved along at a good pace.

    That younger one, though Mildo, was it? I wish hed say something. Like, hows he managed to stay in conversations by saying nothing at all? It floored me.

    All right, the old guy answered. I understand. But what do you want? I cant do anything for you. Ive got a job from a certain country I gotta deal with, too. None of this leaves the room, but

    Then it was his turn to talk, deliberately leaving out some of the finer details, as it was all ssified. Basically, a number of countries were sending out orders for weapons and armor, spooked that a certain idiot nation might be trying to hatch a war on them all. It connected to why the guard was out of medicine yesterday, as well as theck of raw materials guing the shops.

    So, he continued, tapping at his head, I managed to pull an all-nighter to get an order for two hundred steel spears squared awaybut I gottae up with twenty swords, too, and I aint even got one yet. Theres just no material!

    Why dont you just say you cant fill the order? Kaido asked.

    Fool! You think I didnt, at first? But that damned minister Vester told me, So youre saying the great Kaijin, renowned across the entire kingdom, cant even fill a simple order like this one? Is that it? In front of the king himself, no less! Can you believe that damned idiot?!

    In between the cursing and the screaming, I learned that Mildo, the taciturn third brother, had denied a request from Vester to build a house for him. The minister had taken it personally, badgering him about it to the point that Mildo had had to go into exile with Kaijin. Sounded like a stupid grudge to have.

    So is this guy maybe buying up all the kingdoms raw materials so the shops cant sell anything? It sounds usible to me.

    Whats the difference betweennces and swords? I asked.

    I need special ore for the swords, the old guy spat out. Magic ore. The spears are just simple steel spikes.

    Without the right materials to work with, even a master artisan is merely a man. It must have been incredibly frustrating. The minister mustve been waiting for him to show up, hat in hand, begging for mercy.

    And thats not the half of it. It takes a full day toplete even one of those swords. Even if I built an assembly line and streamlined everything I could, itd still take me two weeks to make twenty

    I thought to ask about the deadline but stopped. I could read the answer in his face anyway.

    I have until the end of this week. He groaned. First thing next week, Im charged with delivering them to the king. Its a task for the kingdom, and every shop has been asked to do the same. If I cant, they could strip my artisans license from me

    So five days left, it sounded like. And it seemed doubtful that much work would happen today, so four, basically? What a tough situation Wait, why am I here? None of this has anything to do with me.

    Andum, hang on, did he say magic ore? I have some of that, dont I? Not that it matters

    The next time I looked up, I realized that everyone was looking at me. I dont like all these dudes staring at me, you know! Who do they think a slime is, anyway?

    Whatever. Time to fling a few serious favors around. They better help me get that goblin vige goingter!

    Heh-heh-heh Ha-ha-ha-ha! Haaaaaaah-hah-hah-hah!! What a trivial issue! Old man You think you could use this?

    Then, with a small thud, I hand-delivered a quantity of extracted ore on top of the work desk in front of me. Then I hopped on the sofa,y back, and put my legs up (or felt like I did).

    Wait. Whoaaa! Thats magic ore!! And, my God, look at how pure it is!!

    Heh. Not magic ore, man. Already processed it for ya. Thats a hunk of pure magisteel! Cmon, old man, your eyes giving out on you? I asked. If they couldnt even see what this metal was, they couldnt have been worth much.

    Ill sell the materials to you, but thats it. Im running a business here, sort of.

    What? No It cant be! This entire piece is magisteel?!

    He finally noticed. His shock surprised me a bit.

    You Youll let me have this? I mean, Ill pay the going price for it, of course!

    Heh-heh-heh. Gotcha!

    Oooh, about that

    Nggh, what do you want? Ill do anything I can for this!

    Now thats what I wanted to hear! You heard what me and my team are up to, right? I need your help finding someone wholl travel to the vige and give us some technical guidance.

    What? Is that all you need?

    Pfft. I need some connections to clothing and weapon suppliers, too. And armor.

    If thats all it is, then of course!

    And so old man Kaijin and I forged a verbal contract for the hunk of magisteel. We agreed to iron out the details after his work was done. Judging by his reaction, I probably couldve wrung him for a little more, but no point being too greedy. Whenever I tried that, it always blew up in my face. Even I learn from my mistakes sometimes.

    Kaido took his leave after we all finished with dinner. Guess the captain of the border guard can afford to skip work all afternoon. Nice of him to bring me here, though.

    The three dwarf brothers took turns thanking me profusely yet again. They felt a bit out of ce, no doubt, and at fault for the governments toying around with Kaijin.

    So why note along with us? I asked. Their jaws dropped. Then they started discussing it with each other. To me, that sounded like the best thing for their predicament.

    The next day

    Even though he had all the materials he needed, that deadline still looked impossible to me. Time toe out with it.

    Youve got four days left, Kaijin. You think you can finish it up?

    No, to be honest. But I gotta!

    I didnt think a can-do attitude was going to help much. What I did know was that if something was impossible, it was simply impossible. It didnt be doable until all the right elements were in ce.

    Sheesh. I already got my foot in the door. Might as well go all in.

    Well, I think Ive got an idea. For starters, could you make just one sword for me? The best quality you can manage.

    What? But youre aplete amateur. What could you do?

    I cant tell you. But you gotta believe me! If you dont, then go ahead. Keep going. Youll probably lose your license, but

    So I can trust you? Because if I cant, you better not expect payment for that magisteel. I wont be able to take care of myself, much less cover you You keep your promise, though, I swear Ill keep mine. Ill give you the best swordsmith this kingdom has!

    We have a deal. And promises are made to be kept.

    Off we went into the workshop. I owed Kaijin one for letting me rest in his spare apprentices chamber anyway, so I wanted to hold up my end of the bargain.

    When we entered, we found the three brothers staring at the hunk of magisteel on the table, sighing to themselves as they turned it over in their hands, scrutinizing every surface. The chunk Id spat out was about the size of a fist. Was it that rare? They sure acted that way.

    What are you talking about? Kaijin eximed when I asked about it.

    And ording to his exnation

    Magic ore was a raw material that was refined to make magisteel. Even the base ore could rival gold in value, for a simple reason: It was both rare and useful for a variety of applications.

    It all came down to the magicules that seemed to form nearly everything in this worldsomething that Earth seemed to do just fine without but that yed a huge role over here.

    On rare asions, when a monster was defeated, it would drop an entire chunk of magicules, referred to as magic stone. This was a sort of portable energy source, and it served as the fuel for something called spirit engineering, an invention exclusive to this world. Magic stones came in levels of purity, and the purer ones were used as cores inside assorted products. Even ornaments could harness this energy for special effects. The resulting clothing and essories could boost the wearers abilities, grant them additional effects, and do any number of other things.

    Now, the main difference between in old ore and magical ore was that thetter could be obtained only in areas where higher-level monsters lurked. It required thebination of regr ore, arge concentration of magicules, and eons of time for the ore to absorb the magic and make the transformationa sort of geological mutation.

    Of course, any ce with a lot of magic also tended to have a lot of monsters. Not the run-of-the-mill kind adventurers could kill for pocket changeyou wouldnt find any magic ore around them. Youd have to travel to ces with at least B-ranked monsters in them.

    As a tangent, Kaijin finally gave me a full description of how the ranking system worked for monsters.

    Ohhh! I said. So Id be, like, a B or so, maybe?

    I imagined everyone was thinking the same thing. Except for Gobta, who was a little slow. Lets leave him alone for now.

    Regardless, the point was that magic ore didnt just pop up out of nowhere. Whats more, the magisteel extracted from it took up 3, maybe 5 percent of its total mass. Even a fist-sized chunk of that steel was worth at least twenty times its weight in gold.

    It also appeared that prices, in general, averaged out to near the same as they did in my old world. Gold was used as currency because it was worth a lot, just like back home. As a result, all the countries had adopted gold as a currency standard.

    I kept the fact that I had a huge store of these magisteel hunks in my stomach a secret. Honestly, it was getting a little frightening. No way they couldve known, butwhat if they had? Or was that just my paranoid, lower-middle-ss upbringinging out?

    Now, on to the real issue.

    Magisteel was rare, certainly, but that wasnt what made it so valuable. Thaty in how readily adaptable it was to serving as a conduit for magical force.

    One could control magicules through the power of imagination, to some extent. My Magic Sense skill worked that way, but even Control Water worked by manipting the ambient magic around me. Most monster skills harnessed it one way or another as well. I didnt know that much about magic spells, really, but I figured they worked on the same premise.

    So what happened if a weapon was made of material infused with vast amounts of magic? Amazingly, it became a weapon that could mature!

    How ssic! Aw, man, now I want one! I almost said so out loud before stopping myself just in time. I mean, think about ita sword that gradually molded itself to your ideal shape based on what you wanted from it. Depending on your own magical force, you might even be able to transform it midbattle! And since it was sopatible with magic, itd help boost your skills, too.

    Basically, unless you were really handy with a weapon, you were always going to be better off with a magically infused one. But what ifalthough this would take a lot of skill and moneyyou made a de of pure magisteel and inserted a magic stone into it? Could you make, like, me swords and blizzard swords and stuff?

    My creative juices started flowing. My heart sang, demanding Kaijin make one right this minute. But I would have to be patient. The next magic stone I get my hand on, though For sure.

    After that quick lesson, Kaijin buckled down and went to work. I watched him as his would-be young apprentice. Gobta was probably sleeping somewhere, besides

    Swords, of course, came in a wide array of shapes and sizes. I, of course, pictured a Japanese-style katana as the strongest one out therebut even katanas came in all kinds of shapes. That was what made me so curious about the kind of sword hed make.

    Ten hourster, he was finished.

    It looked, to me, like a in old longsword. Andwhoa, that was a lot of magisteel left. And here I was worried whether a fist-sized lump would be enough for even one. Turned out Kaijin couldnt even guess how much itd cost to use 100 percent magisteel on everything. I suppose not. No wonder nobodyse up with a me sword or a blizzard sword or even a thunder sword. Itd cost too much. Makes sense.

    Instead, magisteel formed only the core of the weapon, and the rest of the de was crafted from regr steel instead. That core was all it needed for its magic to work its way into the steel, eventually merging itself with the whole sword. That, he said, was why a weapon grew stronger as it was used over time. The de would never rust or lose its shapeit could just use ambient magicules to regenerate itself.

    Oddly enough, though, even these magic swords had their life spans. If they were bent too far or otherwise warped beyond recognition, the magic would leak out, leading to rapid weathering.

    Kaijin showed me his freshly forged sword as he spoke. It was all so interesting to me. I took the weapon in hand as I marveled over itall right, not in hand, but close enough. It was simple in make, straight as an arrow. No bells or whistles. It wasnt meant strictly for slicing like a katana, but the de seemed suited to shing.

    But this was just a base. Over time, I supposed, the sword would adapt itself to whatever its user wanted from it. No wonder the forger kept things simple.

    Okay.

    So Kaijin and his team had crafted this lovely sword for me, as promised. Now it was my turn.

    Right! I said. Time for me to pull a little secret work for you. Im sorry, but would you all mind leaving me alone here for now?

    There was no way I could let them see this. It would be too hard to exin, for one thing.

    Well, you have everything you need here, I suppose. But are you sure? I would be d to help.

    Ill be fine, thank you! Just promise me you wont peek into this room for the next three days. Swear it!

    All right. Ill trust you and wait

    With that, Kaijin and his men left. Gobta, too, for some stupid reason. What goes through his mind, day in and day out, that keeps him alive? Ive got to wring it out of him someday.

    So our recipe todays for a longsword. Couldnt be simpler! First, take thispleted sampleand swallow it up! Next, take the rest of the ingredients lined up hereand swallow them up, too! Munch, munchgulp! Mix well in your stomach, and

    Notice. Analysis target: longsword. Sessful. Creating copy Sessful.

    Repeat neen times. Bon apptit!

    Easy, wasnt it?

    Kids, dont try this at home!

    And with that ridiculous mentalmentary, I set to work.

    Yikes Each copy was taking, like, ten seconds.

    190 secondsthree minutes and changeand I had neen swords scattered around the room. It had been maybe five minutes since I shooed Kaijin and the rest out of the room.

    I mean, I figured I could do it, but it was just so easy! And people spent entire lifetimes crafting stuff like this. I started to feel as if I had done something shamelessly rude to them. This Predator is such a cheat code.

    So now what? I told them not to open the door for three days. Am I supposed to just hole up in here until then? No I cant just sit here like the blob that I am. Maybe I shoulde clean

    So I did. I threw the door open and stepped outside. The four dwarves immediately stood up, giving me worried looks. Gobta wassleeping.

    God, five minutes? Yep. That was when I decided I had to do something about him.

    Wh-what is it? Did something happen?

    Are you short on something?

    Oror it didnt work, then?

    Yeah, umwell, actually I sized up the dwarves, whose eyes wereden with self-torment. They hurt to look at.

    But I just couldnt resist. I had to put on an act.

    Why did I have to be so mean to people all the time? Not even my death and rebirth had cured me of that habit.

    Ha-ha! Just kidding! Theyre all done, actually!

    Whaaaa?!

    Guess I cant me them.

    Cheers!!

    We were at a kind of dwarven nightclub, holding a rather anticlimactic wrap-up party. The weapons were safely in the kings hands, and it was time to celebrate. I mean, I told them they didnt have to

    Aw,e on! Theres lots of beautifuldies in there!

    Yeah, yeah! Young ones, and older, too, if you like a little weathering on em! Its the perfect ce for any gentleman!

    !!

    Cmon, Rimuru! We cant go out without the big guy himself!

    It was four against one, so I had no choice.

    Never a dull moment, huh?

    The ce was called the Night Butterfly.

    Were the hosts really butterflies, then? Theyd better not turn out to be moths!

    Not that I really cared. I was a gentleman. Id try anything once, I thought as we strolled in.

    Ooh, wee!

    Wee, sirs!

    Phwoaarrrr!! The ce was lined up and down with babes!! Whoaaa! Their ears were so long, too! Is it hot in here, or is it just those elves? Dang!

    Ohhhh my Godddddd, and their clothes are so thin!! Its like I can almost see throughbut I cant Dammit, and I got Magic Sense going at max force, too! Theyve got the boundaries of their clothing down pat, dont they? Is this meant to be some kind ofchallenge? Nnnngh!!

    Oooh, look at you, cutie!

    Aww, I saw him first!!

    Eeep! Boing! Boiiing!

    Th-there it is!!

    My entire body is jiggling! And I can feel something soft jiggling against my back, too! Is this paradise, or what?!

    Umm I guess all that squirming means youre enjoying this, huh?

    Agh! Oh, no. I didnt mean to

    Huh? Nno, not that much.

    Guess I shouldnt have expected the world, then. Nobody believes in me after all. But so be it. What do I care? Im perched in thep of a real-life elf! I cant believe this is actually happening!!

    Ahh, I feel so bad for my dear, departed friend down there! If only he were still around! Id be bouncing off the walls!

    However, while we were enjoying ourselves

    Well! If it isnt Kaijin! Goodness me, what are you doing, bringing this vulgar monster into a high-ss establishment like this?

    Whos that guy? Looking to start a fight, it sounded like. Things quickly fell silent around us. Even the girls sneered at this visitorthey must not have liked him too much, although they were polite enough to keep the scoffs very discreet.

    By dwarf standards, this one was quite tall and thin in stature, making himwell, an average human in size.

    Hey! Boss! You guys allowin monsters in here these days?

    N-no, an older female manager called out, but its just a little slime, so

    Uhh? Its still a monster! Aint it? You sayin a slimes not a monster anymore?!

    I No, sir, but The manager stuttered nomittally, trying to calm the man down, but the boor wasnt even paying attention. Clearly, he was after us.

    Oh, great, one of the girls sighed. Thats Vester, the minister.

    Speak of the devil! Well, Ill be He did seem like the kinda guy who refuses to let go of a grudge. I could see it on his face.

    Yknow what best suits a monster? Vester bellowed. This! Then he emptied the contents of his water ss over me.

    I wasnt exactly a fan of that kind of provocation, but I kept myself in check. This was a government ministerI couldnt let my short temper get Kaijin or the manager of this ce in trouble. Wouldnt want them banned from the premises. Just sit tight, let it pass, and

    Hey You think you can just pick on us all you want?!

    With an audible kick at the table, Kaijin stood up.

    You think you can run around and make fun of my guest, Vester? You think Im not gonna mind that? You think?!

    Um? Hey, Kaijin, this is a top government official and stuff, isnt it? You sure youre on good footing here?

    Vester, to his credit, was just as startled and stepped back.

    I boinged back a bit in surprise, too, cushioned amply by the chest of the elf behind me.

    Not on purpose! I swear!

    Howhow dare you speak to me like that, you! Vester sputtered, still in shock.

    Will you shut up already?! Kaijin shouted, entuating his point byunching a punch at the ministers face. A few momentster, he asked me, Hey, Rimuru, you were lookin for someone to help you, right? Would I be good enough, maybe?

    Good enough? More than. Butreally? I supposed hed quite literally just punched a one-way ticket out of the Dwarven Kingdom. Now he was making a verbal request.

    Thats what Ive been wanting to hear. Itll be great working with you, Kaijin!

    It would be. We could hammer out the detailster. If Kaijin was willing toe over, I was more than willing to invite him. We didnt need no fancy contract! We do what we want, when we want!

    Kaijin and I sealed the deal with an emphatic nod.

    Just one thing How were we gonna book it out of here? Maybe a little prudence wasnt such a bad idea after all. You create a lot of problems for yourself otherwise. All the bravado in the world wasnt going to solve them, was it?

    So.

    As anyone could imagine, punching a government minister in the face presented a number of issues.

    My brother, my brother, muttered Kaido, a few security officers behind him. What did you do this time?

    He was on duty todaynot even he could get away with skipping shifts all the time. Kaijin had given him an invite, but hed refusedonly toe to the nightclub anyway thanks to his brothers boorishness. Simply running would have been an easy enough n for us, but chances were itd be doomed from the start.

    Hmph! That fool! As four knights dragged Kaijin away, he shouted and pointed a wild finger at the minister. He practically spat in the face of Rimuru, my client and the best patron Ive ever had! Whats so bad about putting him in his ce a little, huh?!

    Vester, for his part, hadnt ovee the shock yet. He was simply staring at us, blood still dribbling from his nose. It looked both pathetic and a littleical. Never saw iting, I guess. The surprise probably kept it from even hurting.

    Brother, Kaido whispered with a sigh, you dont put a government minister in his ce like that Either way, youre alling with me! He nodded to his men, then took me aside for a moment. Just stay calm, all right? I promise well treat you well.

    I wasnt nning to do anything else, of course. Before I left, though, I sidled up to the manager of the ce and tossed five gold pieces into her hand. Theres some for your trouble in there, too! I said to the surprised matron. Well be back!

    It seemed like a decent ce, after all. Wouldnt be nice if I never got to see the inside of it again.

    So went my second arrest here in the Dwarven Kingdombut Im forgetting someone.

    Gobta! He wasnt with us at the club. Instead, he was atoning for his sundry idiotic behavior by undergoing what I liked to call bagworm hell. Id thought about hanging him by his feet at first, but that just seemed like cruelty for crueltys sake, so instead Id tied him up with Sticky Thread and let him hang from the ceiling.

    Wait! hed whined. This is so mean, sir! I want toe with you!

    Id showed him no mercy this time. Enough, you fool! I cant take any more of your blockheaded behavior! If you dont like it, summon your tempest wolf buddy and have him help you out!

    Not that he could do it, I figured as I shut the door behind me.

    A goblin was one thing, but a hobgoblin could probably go without food or drink for about a week straight.

    Still, if we were going to be held for a while, Id have to break out and get him down sooner orter. For now, though, I filed it in the back of my mind.

    Was I being mean to him, maybe? I thought I was, for a moment. But it was all right. He could deal.

    The five us of were taken to the royal pce. Not that we were under very heavy guard. If anything, it seemed entirely voluntary.

    We wound up having to spend around two days in the castle jail room. It wasnt so badthe food looked decent, and we had all theforts we needed in the ce. It was less like a jail cell and more like an urban apartment shared by the five of us. We werent treated too terribly, either.

    I just had to lose my temper, and now Ive got all of you in here with me Im so sorry, guys! Kaijin apologized.

    But none of his dwarven friends minded too much, either.

    Its fine, Kaijin! No problem at all!

    Yeah, dont worry about it, boss!

    Besides, once were released, we want toe with you, Kaijin!

    Yeah, can wee with you, Rimuru?

    ?

    I wasnt observant enough to tell what the third one wanted from me, but I got the gist well enough.

    Hah! Sure, well take care of all of you! You better be ready, though Once we reach the vige, you guysre gonna work!

    Got it!

    We were already talking about life outside the big house. As prison terms went, it was pretty chill.

    It was the night of our second day.

    By the way, it urred to me to ask, why did that minister have it in so badly for you, Kaijin? Was there some reason for it?

    Kaijins expression immediately soured. With a sigh, he began to exin. It turned out he used to be a captain in the pces royal knight corpsa leader of one of the seven armies making up the whole system. Three corps were devoted to behind-the-scenes work like engineering, supply, and emergency aid. Three moreheavy strikers, magic strikers, and magic supportyed more of a starring role. Thest one, and the most important, was the kings personal guard. Kaijin had been head of the engineering corps, and Vester had been his second-inmand.

    He was the son of a marquis, the dwarf moaned. A noble title he bought with money. I think he mustve been jealous of amoner like me taking the head role. It wasplicated, you know? It mustve been humiliating to him, taking orders from someone below him. And Ill admit that I didnt care much about what other people thought about me. I was too busy trying to stay on the kings good side. Thats when it happened.

    The magic-armor affair.

    At the time, the engineering corps was seen as the lowest of the armys seven departmentsbarely producing any new technology for itself. Vester believed a kingdom rich in technology should have an appropriately famous corps of engineers, while Kaijin was more of a status-quo man when it came to research and development. Despite how intense their arguments got, they never managed to reach an agreement during their countless garrison meetings.

    Along the way, the corpsunched a so-called magic-armor soldier project with a team of elf engineers. Vester was hell-bent on making this project a sess and boosting the corpss position in the military pecking order. Kaijin warned him that he was proceeding too quickly with it, but even then, Vester had little time for the advice of amon-born man.

    In the end, thanks to Vesters arbitrary whims, an experiment went awry and led to a spirit-magic core running out of contr very public failure and a bad setback for the project at an early stage.

    Thus, despite some of the greatest minds of the world working on it, the magic-armor project ground to a halt. As head of the engineering corps, Kaijin wound up taking the heat for it, resigning from his position in the army. Not only did Vester make Kaijin the scapegoat; he even convinced his friends among the higher-ranked leaders to give false testimony against him. That, ording to Kaijin at least, was the truth.

    Once he finished, Kaijin let out a tired sigh.

    I could understand his perspective. There mustve been a lot of resentment built up over the years from that.

    Stillman, Vesters just a total storybook viin, isnt he? They donte easier to spot than that. As far as the minister was concerned, Kaijin could make aeback in the military and threaten his position at any time. That kind of thing.

    Didnt he deserve the death penalty, really? Maybe not, but

    So, Kaijin concluded, maybe hell settle down a bit if I leave the country for a while.

    He sounded a bit forlorn about it, but at least he had backup. The three brothers with us were just as aware of the truth, and there was no love lost for Vester among them, either. Hell, even I hated him now.

    Still, Kaijin did sock a noble, so I kind of wondered whether they were just gonna release us and wave good-bye.

    I wouldnt worry about it, Kaijin reassured me. Im out of the army now, but I did make it up to the corps leader. As far as my social position goes, Im just below baron. If it were strictlymoner versus nobleman in the courts, well, hanging mightve entered the picture.

    He entuated that morbid fact with a heartyugh.

    Meanwhile, I just sat there. If things got rough, Id hightail it outta herebut otherwise, I was happy being a good little slime until cooler heads prevailed.

    Our day in court arrived soon after, and the entire lot of us were brought in front of the monarch.

    The Heroic King of the dwarves.

    Now that I was seeing him in person, his stately aura was almost awe inspiring.

    His Majesty Gazel Dwargo closed his eyes and sat deeply upon his throne. He was stocky, dwarflike in appearance, and his exposed armor-like muscles positively radiated energy. His skin was a deep, dark brown, and his ck hair was pulled back on his head.

    He exuded pure strength. My fight-or-flight instincts kicked in all the way for the first time in ages.

    Two knights were stationed near him, one on each side. They were equally muscle-bound, no doubt, but they still looked wispypared to their ruler. Seriously, this guy was a monster. Id been nning to beat a hasty retreat if I needed to, but now Not so much. The moment I was ced in front of him, my every nerve was wound taut.

    It might have been the first time in this world that I actually sensed a clear danger to myself.

    A man knelt in front of the king, checking over something with him. After receiving permission, he stood up and read the affidavit.

    We will now begin the trial! Silence, everyone!

    For the next hour, both sides presented their cases. As criminal suspects, we werent allowed to speakin the royal court, that right was reserved for those with a rank of earl or greater. Otherwise, you needed the kings express permission. If you did speak out of turn, that apparently proved your guilt on the spot and earned you a bonus contempt-of-court charge.

    Whether you were innocent or not, that was the way this ce worked. We were stuck having our representative speak for us. He had paid us a few visits during our two days in custody, discussing the nature of our case. Our kind-ofwyer, basically.

    Could we trust him, though? Anxieties like that had a tendency to crop up for a reason

    So there Sir Vester was, he continued, sitting back at this club and enjoying an alcoholic beverage, when this gang pushed their way into the ce and exposed him to dreadful violence! This is not the kind of behavior that should ever be forgiven!

    Is that the truth?

    It is, my liege! I heard it from Kaijin himself, and I also have written testimony from the owners of the club. There can be no mistaking the course of events that night!

    Um, what? What did he just say? I thought he was on our side, and it took all of five minutes for him to go turncoat. That cant be good, can it?

    I shot a look at Kaijinhis face turned bright red, then slowly began draining of color.

    Ill bet. Ourwyer wasnt even bothering to make excuses for us.

    It went without saying that representatives for the used werent allowed to lie in court. If they were found out, that would be another hanging. It was impossible to think any would-bewyer would attempt it, barring extreme circumstances, and yet ours was doing it right in front of us.

    My liege! Vester eximed, egging him on. You have heard it for yourself! I beg of you to deal with these miscreants harshly!

    He shed us a smile of supreme confidence.

    Bastard. Maybe I shouldve hit him after all.

    The king remained motionless, eyes closed. In his ce, one of the guards beside him spoke.

    Order! I will now give the verdict! Kaijin, the mastermind behind this crime, is sentenced to twenty years ofbor in the mines. His aplices are sentenced to ten years ofbor in the mines. With that, this court is hereby

    Wait, a deep, quiet voice interrupted.

    The king opened his eyes and looked at Kaijin.

    It has been a while, Kaijin. Do you remain in good health?

    Yes, my liege! came the instant reply. Presumably he had the right to speak now. It ddens me that you remain so as well!

    Yes. Now, do you and your friendslooking at ushave any desire to return to us?

    The audience in the royal court murmured among themselves. It must have been an unusual development. Vester immediately nched. Our traitorous representative, meanwhile, had developed a deathly pallor.

    I beg your forgiveness, my liege, but I have already found a master to serve! I have made my vow, and it has be my treasure. A treasure so fine that, indeed, not even the direct order of my liege could make me part with it!

    This clearly angered the audience. I could see the guards staring daggers into Kaijins forehead. But he stood strongchest puffed out, the picture of dignity.

    The king, seeing this, closed his eyes again. Isee.

    Silence ruled for another moment.

    I have made my decision. Listen well to my sentence! Kaijin and his friends are hereby exiled from the kingdom. After midnight tonight, when the new dayes, they are officially no longer wee in mynds. That is all. Begone at once! Opening his eyes, the king made his promation in a loud voice.

    Ah, the dignity of a born leader! His overwhelming presence sent shivers through my body. Although, being king around here seemed like a terribly lonely job to have.

    So there we were, after the trial, back at Kaijins shop. That little celebratory drink we wanted to get sure broke bad, didnt it? Now we had to pack up and leave for good.

    Oh, wait, is Gobta all right? Were still only at day three with him, right? I was a tad nervous about that as I opened the door to his punishment room.

    Ooh! Wee back, sir! Did you have fun? Gee, sure hope you take me with you next time!

    There he was, leaping up off the sofa to greet me! How did that happen? He couldnt have gotten out of my spider silk that easy!

    Taking another look, I realized that the cushion Gobta had been using on the sofa was actually a tempest wolf. Wait, seriously? He actually summoned the guy?

    Uh, Gobta, howd you get that wolf in here?

    Oh! Right! That! I just thought to myself, Hey, can youe on over, please? And he did, sir!

    He made it sound so easy, the bastard. None of the other hobgoblins had managed the feat from such a long range before. Maybe his brain cells were all devoted to his natural talents instead of, you know, actual intelligence. It seemed crazy to me. I concluded that it mustve been a coincidence.

    I then realized that the sight of the tempest wolf had frozen the dwarves in their tracks. Whats wrong? I asked. We need to start packing, dont we?

    W-wait a second! the panicked Kaijin replied. What on earth is a ck direwolf doing in here?!

    Yeah! You need to run! Thats a B-ranked monster!

    And now they were panicking.

    They looked so ridiculous, I was actually amused.

    Oh, hes fine! Really! No problem! Hes like a big dog, really! We keep him indoors and everything!

    My attempts at calming everyones nerves met stony silence.

    ck direwolves, by the way, were a somewhat advanced version of regr direwolves. If they evolved in a more magic-oriented fashion, their fur would turn ck. The coats of the tempest direwolves were ck as well but with a uniquely colored sheen.

    Direwolves werent really supposed to evolve toward the storm element in the first cethat was just a side effect of the name I gave out.

    In volcanic regions, direwolves would evolve with a fire element and be red direwolves. Near bodies of water, you would find blue direwolves. In the forests would be green direwolves. In other words, adopting elements was a fairlymon evolutionary pattern for these guys. The magic-infused ck ones, meanwhile, were apparently a notorious threat to any nearby humans and humanoids. The tempest element gave our wolf pack an ever-so-slight purplish shine to their ck color, something you wouldnt notice if you werent paying attention.

    Sorry I spooked the dwarves, I guess. We didnt have the time for me to exin the whole story. Ill just call him Gobtas pet for now and move on.

    After hurriedly pressing the dwarves to put on their best travelers outfits, I pushed them out of the shop, went back in by myself, and proceeded to swallow up the entire contents of the building. Capacity-wise, I was still A-okay, but swallowing the building whole would probably have drawn a little too much attention, so I kept it at that.

    Once our preparations for the journey wereplete, we made our way to where Rigur and the other goblins were waiting.

    The space was silent, a far cry from the loud arguing of a moment ago.

    After the five used had all but fled from the court, nobody in attendance dared move an inch. Vester nervously swallowed. The persistent silence of the king put both him and everyone else on edge.

    Then Gazel shattered the stillness.

    Now, Vester. Do you have anything you wish to say?

    Aa thousand pardons, my liege, but this is all a misunderstanding! It simply must be a mistake!

    Vesters voice was a nervous warble as he pleaded his case. The king regarded him coldly, betraying none of his emotions.

    A misunderstanding? If it is, then it has cost me one of my most faithful servants.

    How can you say such a thing, my liege?! You call what he offered to you faithfulness? Why, he is simply a man off the street

    Vester. I see you are mistaken. Kaijin left my corps on his own volition. When I speak of a faithful servant I have lostI refer to you.

    The ministers heart raced. I need to find an excuse But his mind was nk. The words refused toe to his lips. His thoughts were slow to form. What did he just say? He referred to me? Then

    Let me ask you once again, Vester. Do you have anything you wish to say?

    Fear, pure fear, dominated Vesters head. The king had asked him a question. He needed to reply. But all his speech had abandoned him.

    I My liege, I am afraidI

    I had great expectations for you, Vester. I have been waiting for so long. Even during the magic-armor affair, I waited for you to finally speak the truth. And now I find that, yet again

    The expression Gazel showed Vester could almost be described as one of kindness. The kings words pierced through the minister like the sharpest of swords.

    Look at these.

    The king pointed out two items one of his attendants had produced. Vester, eyes hollow, looked at them. One was a sphere filled with a liquid that he had never seen before; the other was a single longsword.

    Do you know what these are?

    The liquid remained a mystery to Vester, but the longsword he remembered. Kaijin had brought it in.

    You may exin to him, the king ordered his attendant. The following speech took a fairly long time for Vester to fully understand.

    The liquid was a life-regenerating elixir, a near-perfect extract of the juices of the hipokute herbs. A so-called full potion, named for its miraculous recovery properties.

    Even with the best technology the dwarves had at their fingertips, the purest extract they could produce topped off at 98 percent. That made it only as potent as a high potion. This liquid, meanwhile, was at 99 percent!

    Vesters face twisted in shock. He had to know! What did they do to produce such a level of? But before he could ask, the attendant had even more shocking news for him. The longsword had a core of magisteel that was already working its way through the rest of the de.

    Impossible. That process began only after a ten-year adaptation procedure! The shock set Vesters mind reeling. If this was true!

    Both of these wonders were brought about by that slime, the king said. And thanks to your behavior, we have lost our connection to such a creature. Do you have anything you wish to say?

    Now Vester realized the full extent of his kings rage. There was truly nothing he could say.

    I I do not, my liege.

    Tears began welling in his eyes. He knew it all too well nowhis lord had abandoned him. All he wanted was to serve his king. To win his approval. That was it. When did I go wrong? When I grew jealous of Kaijin, or before? He didnt know. All he knew was that he had betrayed the kings trust.

    Isee. In that case Vester! I hereby forbid you from entering the pce. Do not let me see you before me again. I shall leave you with this: I have tired of you!

    Hearing his words, Vester stood up and bowed deeply to his lord. Then he left, setting off to pay his penance for his foolishness.

    As he did, a guard ran forward and arrested the representative serving as Vesters aplice.

    The king watched them out of the corner of his eye. My dark agent! he shouted with some urgency. Track the movements of that slime! Do not let it escape your notice. Ever!

    The emphatic order of the normally taciturn king gave pause to everyone in the chamber.

    By my life, my liege! the dark agent said before disappearing.

    The king thought to himself.

    Who was that slime?

    A type of monster, no doubt. Was that the level of monster being released, then?

    His heros instincts were giving him a feeling he couldnt ignore. Trusting it, he began to take action.

    Rigur and gang were all safe at the edge of the forest.

    Between this and that, we had spent a total of five days in the citypretty much what we expected. Things didnt quite go ording to n, but wergely aplished what wed set out to do.

    Too bad we didnt get to hit the Free Guild in town. It sounded kind of like an adventurers club to me, the exact kind of ce where an otherworlder or two might hang out. It wouldve been nice to check out all the gilt and armor the dwarves were known for, too. But oh well. We had a bunch of master craftsmen with us here. That was enough of a find. That, and I still had twenty gold pieces. Score.

    I took the time to introduce Kaijin and his hapless friends to the goblins. Wed all be working together for a while toe, so I wanted to get off on the right foot. Come to think of it, I didnt see much in the way of casual racism from the dwarvesmost of them, anyway. Given the demi-magical origins we all shared, I suppose it made sense. I could imagine us crossing their paths again someday.

    We were now more or less ready to roll. The only problem was transport. Ranga, of course, was wagging his tail, as if me hopping on him was the pinnacle of his life. I exined to him that I needed his full fifteen-foot size for a bit so we could fit two out of the three brothers on his back.

    Ranga was not a fan of this idea. His face instantly turned sullen as he wobbled backward and plopped his ass on the ground. He glowered at the neers as if to suggest he could just eat them instead and save everyone a lot of trouble.

    The dwarves almost jumped out of their skin. Even when they first saw him, theyd wailed in perfect unison. Gaahh! How could you ever?! and so forth.

    Either this was a well-practiced routine of theirs, or Ranga really did scare them that much. There had to be something I could do.

    Hang on, Ranga, I said. I tried transforming into one of you guys earlier, and Id like to test out how it works a bit. Thats why I want you to let these dwarves on, all right?

    His head immediately shot up. I understand, my master!

    Kaijin and Garm, eldest of the three brothers, would go on my back; Ranga would take Dold and Mildo. Once they were on, Id spin some Sticky Thread to make sure they stayed on. These guys did nearly fifty at their peak. In this motorcycle-free world, the experience would probably make them pass out. Not that I knew whether I could handle that speed or whether I wanted to.

    Now for me.

    Mimic: Tempest Starwolf.

    Astounding! Your dazzling strength knows no bounds, my master!

    Hah-hah-hah! Yeah, Ill bet! And youll look like this someday soon, if you keep it up!

    We will do our best to live up to your lofty expectations, my master!

    Rangas eyes sparkled at this new mission in life. The rest of the tempest wolves grew equally excited. Always a good idea to motivate the troops a bit.

    So I turned to Kaijin and Gharm to get them to hop on, and

    Well, thats weird. Theyre all unconscious and foaming at the mouth. Whatre these guys doing, anyway? Oh well. I knew that practice woulde in handy! A little Sticky Thread off my back, and everyone was pulled up and put firmly in ce. Sess!

    Fainted dwarves wouldnt make great travelingpanions, but either way, we were off.

    By the way, I intended to start off at a leisurely trot, only to find myself going over sixty miles per hour or so. Maybe it was for the better that my passengers werent awake to see this. If they were, our eleration wouldve made them lose their lunches.

    I looked back at Dold and Mildo on Rangas back. They had a little more backboneor I thought they did. Then I realized they were just unconscious with their eyes open. My condolences.

    Putting the dwarves in the back of my mind, I proceeded down the path back home. At least they wouldnt bite their tongues or whatnot if they were unconscious. If I were them, I wouldnt want to wake up in the middle of this scream machine anyway. Itd be better for everyone if they stayed asleep until it was all over. Ill feed em, of course, but

    I really am mean to people, arent I? And speaking of which

    Rigur! Have you ever sessfully summoned one of the ck wolves before?

    I have not, Sir Rimuru, it embarrasses me to admit.

    Hmm. He hadnt, and it was a point of frustration for the other goblins, too, not to mention their wolf partners. So why just Gobta?

    Really? Because I guess Gobta managed to.

    What? Gobta, is that true?

    Y-yes! I gave the call, and he came over for me!

    There was a fighting spirit in everyones (and every dogs) eyes now.

    Its not impossible, Rigur reflected. Gobta is strong enough to have done the Dwarven Kingdom journey round-trip on foot once!

    Oh, right I thought he was a slobbering idiot, but apparently he was good in a pinch. He was an idiot, of course, but not useless. Surviving a four-month journey through the wilderness and foraging off thend wasnt something any old guy could do. Hed had to deal with monsters along the way, too, weak though they might have been.

    I ced Gobta a few rungs higher in my internal totem pole. Hed probably tumble right back down soon enough.

    We decided to make camp once night fell. I wasnt tired at all, but everyone else needed restI could test out my abilities in the meantime.

    A tempest starwolf, to say the least, was physically gifted. I could practically feel the power pulsing inside me. Just a light jump, and I was way up in the sky; onnd, I tore up any path I found with my rapid sprint. Add on some quick reflexes, and it looked like I had what it took to make good use of this form.

    Most of my battles so far had involved me busting out a few Water des and ending it just like that. I hadnt thought about it much, but strengthand reflexeswere going to be a lot more important to me if things got hairy. On that front, the tempest starwolf seemed to have nearly everything I could want.

    With the Sages support, this wolf could probably insta-kill the ck snake from back in that caveno skills required. Id learned in town that the lizard rated a B-minus in rank, and from there, I used the Sages simtion skills to figure out how the rest stacked up against it.

    It told me that the ck snake wasnt even an A, and I could win against ten of those centipedes at once, so Id be an A-minus or so? Sounds about right.

    A tempest starwolf not under my control would be stronger than a ck snake, though it probably couldnt take ten at once. Although there was that weird Dark Lightning skill to think about

    My instincts told me that one would pack a punch, so Id test it out in slime form first. That ought to temper it a little bit so I can observe it.

    The Dark Lightning I unleashed was Lets call it beyond belief. There was a sh, followed by a deafening roar of thunder. Therge riverside boulder I chose as a target was gone, crumbled to pebbles. I could see the bolt crashing down faster than lightbut witnessing its dreadful force for myself simply amazed me. Way beyond expectations.

    Heh-heh-heh Lets pretend that didnt happen! I made my decision instantly.

    Right! I wasnt doing anything! Just a little lightning storm.

    Lets leave it at that. Seal it away forter, like the snakes Poisonous Breath. Itd be better if I saved it until I knew how to temper the strength of my attacks a little. Besides, with all the internal magic that cost me, Id better learn how to adjust things soon. No tossing that around willy-nilly. I could wind up running out of magic in the middle of battle.

    Given the range of that lightning strike, though, it could make a good ace in the hole someday. The entire twenty-yard radius around the disintegrated boulder was now zing hot and ssy. Something to think about.

    Rigur, of course, had a few hobgobs there in short order to find out what was going on. I told them it was just a rogue thunderbolt. Sorry for interrupting your sleep, guys. Id need to save the more dangerous experimentation for somece where I could work in peace. Some soundproofing would be nice, too. Otherwise, itd be hard to really flex my muscle.

    Still, there was some more data to work with. I reyed the simtion in my mind. ording to the results, a tempest starwolf out of my control could use Dark Lightning and probably kill ten ck snakes at once. Which meant the attack was probably past A rank.

    The guidepost for an A rating was being able to destroy a small towndisaster level, in other words. Better avoid that transformation around urban areas.

    My experiments continued, albeit a lot more quietly, until morning.

    The next day

    I let Rigur and his people handle breakfast. Goblin food was, well, pretty simple. Just heat and eat. Haute cuisine it wasnt, not that I could taste it. If I ever pick up that sense again, Ill have to teach them the finer points, I guess. Food one can look forward to is one of the first steps toward an advanced culture.

    Could these goblins really limatize to culture, though? I thought so. I had no idea how, but I wanted to test out everything I could. If we got tripped up over cooking, that would be a bad start.

    The dwarves were up, still white as sheets.

    You all right?

    Yyes Where are we?

    As they slowly shook out the cobwebs, they realized they were in unfamiliar territory. It unnerved them. I exined we were on our way to the vige these goblins called home.

    Wh-what?! That would be a journey of some two months, normally! We wont have enough food unless we procure a cart at some nearby town!

    Its a littlete to be surprised about that, isnt it? I wanted to say, butthinking about itI hadnt really exined much to them, had I? Things like how we got here and how fast we were going. We werent in a hurry today, so I decided to take the time to exin in detail about what we were doing.

    Breakfast happened to be served right then. It was just a few wild hares roasted whole, but it was more than enough stimulus for the dwarves stomachs to start rumbling. Guess they can keep food down, at least.

    As they ate, I reviewed our future ns. We would be at the vige in another two days or so, I exined.

    No

    They whispered in unison, realizing exactly how fast those wolves were taking them.

    Hey, dont worry! I replied. Once you get used to it, its a breeze!

    Itd be nice if they could get used to it, but I figured wed probably reach the end of the journey before then.

    We set off back down the road.

    Time to build a Thought Communication space for us. Now that Id done it a few times, it came naturally to me. The dwarves picked up on it, too, which was a relief.

    Thought Communication was a sort of high-level version of Telepathy, letting you build links and talk with multiple people at once. It also made things like strategy meetings easier for us. It remained effective across a range of half a mile or so, which was more than enough for my purposes.

    On the second day, the dwarves seemedrgely capable of remaining on their rides without passing out. The force of the wind kept them from opening their eyes, so I built a sort of visor for them all from silk. Kind of like a helmet recement, I suppose, and it seemed to do the trick.

    I also started noticing that I could control my Sticky Thread to some extent via Telepathy. Once you got used to controlling magicules, it was amazing what you could do with them. Sticky Thread probably wasnt the only thing I could apply that to, either. These little particles were the essence of magic.

    Either way, the dwarves were getting into the swing of things, and their makeshift helmets were having the effect I wanted. I could talk with them now, and they were kind enough to teach me a thing or two about life in their kingdom as we rode on. The goblins were listening in as well, chiming in about their own experiences, and we had a nice, friendly confab for much of the day. This should keep up in the vige, too, I hoped.

    Dwarves, being partially sprites, were extraordinarily long-lived. Goblins, being partially magic-born, were notoriously short-lived. Evolutionor perhaps living conditionshad created a fairlyrge difference between the two.

    I sometimes wondered if goblins were actually a step down the evolutionarydder.

    Hobgoblins, the next step up, seemed a bit like the monster equivalent of dwarves to me. Like they had gone back to their ancestral roots, in a way, with a lot more magic force at their disposal. I wouldnt know for sure, but I imagined the evolution did wonders for their life spans as well.

    They still werent the handiest, though, and there was a stark difference between monsters and fairies, but still

    Dwarves, for their part, were probably more closely rted to monsters than, say, elves, another sprite race. Maybe that would help these two species get along, too.

    As I suddenly remembered something else, I decided to bring it up.

    Kaijin. I know Im a littlete asking, but are you okay with this? You really respected that king, didnt you?

    Oh, that? I did, yes. There isnt a dwarf alive who doesnt respect him. Imagine having the hero of your nightly fairy tales serving as your actual king!

    It was an interesting thing to considerthe mythical heroes of the past, still alive and kicking and protecting their people as king. That would help me build a pretty healthy respect, yeah. Id want to support himthis ideal king, one who always did the right thing and never allowed room for mistakes.

    I wondered how much he had to sacrifice to maintain that ideal in reality.

    In a way, it was frightening. It took a lot of spirit, Im sure, to be a leader like that. That was what made people believe in him.

    Was I ready for that? I had be, more or less, the master of this goblin vige. But whates after that?

    Well, let me ask you this, then, Kaijin. Why did youe with me? Wouldnt it have been the best thing for your life if you rejoined the king?

    Gah-hah-hah-hah! Well! A lot more sensitive than I thought, eh, Rimuru? I did it because it looked like fun. It was just instinct, you know? Like, Hey, this guys gonna go out and do something! Thats all the reason I needed, yknow?

    Yeah. Maybe. Fair enough. Hes right!

    Heh, I retorted. Well, donte crying to meter if it turns sour. Im pretty well-known for being mean to people!

    It was true. I did practically nothing by myself. I entrusted everything to others. But I did want to help. To be relied on. I wanted to be the sort of person who could manage that.

    Oh, I know! Kaijin replied.

    I nodded, satisfied.

    Two dayster, we arrived at the vige on time. Mission aplished.

    A+A-

    THE GIRL AND THE HERO

    Tap, tap, tap

    Quiet steps echoed across the castle.

    The demon lord had already fled, leaving his bastion behind him. I was the rear guard. A sacrificialmb. He used me like a tool right up to the end, showing me not a sliver of emotion along the way. The only kindness he ever showed me, I think, was when he called me by name.

    Did I hate him for that? I honestly wasnt sure. Was it the will of Ifrit, the high-level me elemental, that made me serve him, or was it mine?

    I still dont know. And I didnt mind being a sacrifice very much. Nothing seemed to matter anymore.

    It appeared that this castle was some kind of experimental facility. Abandoning it, however, didnt seem to be any great loss in the demon lords eyes. What confused me was his goal in leaving me here. I could have just withdrawn instead of engaging anyone who came, but he ordered me to stay.

    Maybe he had some n in mind, but his thoughts remained a mystery to me.

    The one who arrived was a so-called hero.

    She had long dark-silver hair tied behind her head, and her light equipment was colored a uniform shade of ck. Her beauty rivaled the demon lords. The only difference was that she was a woman. A young one.

    The moment Iid eyes upon her, I knew it. I had no chance of winning. But I wanted to fight her to the endnot as a person, but as a magic-born with powers of me. Its the least I can do, I thought, to make up for the sin of living all this time.

    My sword of concentrated me was easily caught by the heros own. My weapon burned with intense heat, capable of ripping through anything, and her simple curved de stopped it. It made me doubt my eyes. No doubt it was the power of the wielder more than her sword itself.

    Thanks to the training I took under the demon lords trusted ck knight, I had gained some mastery of swordsmanship. It was nothing Ifrit ever learned. I remembered how the knight praised me, told me it was all my own talent at work.

    As a magic-born, I was physically strong enough to be in the upper ranks of Leons guard. Plus, I had mastered sword skills under the ck knights guidance. It was far more than Ifrits power that made me such a close confidant of the demon lord.

    And yetnothing I did affected the hero. The strikes and shes I had worked so endlessly to perfect were all effortlessly parried away. Gently turned aside before our des could even sh in earnest.

    Even when Ifrits searing mes enveloped my entire body, the hero remained calm, shedding not a single drop of sweat. Just as Id first thought, she was on apletely different ne of existence.

    Then I felt Ifrit falling asleep in my body, a side effect of consuming too many magicules. It was impossible to keep fighting. I lost, incapable ofnding a single blow. I copsed to the floor, confident that I had returned the favor to the demon lord. I sort of wished I could live a while longer, but I doubted a hero would ever show mercy to a magic-born like me.

    Are you done? I heard her say. Why are you here? It was a bit surprising. I was expecting death toe the next second. My head turned up to her. The hero was a hunter of evil, and I was her foe, a magic-born. If she cut me down right now, I would have nothing toin about.

    What whim of hers prompted these questions? Timidly, I opened my mouth. Then I told her about how I was summoned to this world, how I had lived up to now What I had done.

    It was selfish of me. I was a magic-born now. I had no right, no expectation, to be believed at all. But it was truehaving someone take an interest in me and listen to my story made me happy. It left incontrovertible evidence that I had been alive all this time. I could throw out my chest and proim to the world that I had lived, even if it was just in someones memory. Thats what I wanted to do.

    I doubted the hero would ever believe a magic-borns tale. But that was fine. If I just created a nook in her memory to upy, that would work. And yet:

    Its all right now. Youve been through so much.

    She believed me.

    Her words brought tears to my eyes. The next thing I knew, I was clinging to her, crying. For the first time since I came to this world, relief embraced me as I expressed my true feelings to someone.

    I wound uping under the heros care.

    Her face darkened at the sight of my burn scars. I was used to them; the way they spread across half my body was proof that I was alive.

    The hero tried to use healing magic to do something about them. It didnt appear to work. Merging with Ifrit had stabilized my body to its current state, scars and all. She thought for a moment and then took a pretty mask out from a bag.

    You know, she said, this mask helps boost your resistance to magic. You might be able to use it to keep Ifrit at bay inside you. She gave it a loving caress, then handed it to me.

    The instant I put the Mask of Magic Resistance on, it immobilized Ifrit inside me and hid the burn scars across my body. And that wasnt all. With the will of Ifrit no longer dominating mine, all the oppressed emotions I felt over the years immediately welled out of me. The pangs of loneliness, the fear of bing a magic-born. The deep shame of killing the first friend I ever made. The intense hatred I held for this unfair world. Putting on that mask helped me regain the emotions I had thought I had forsaken with my childhood.

    The hero held me tight until I was able to calm down. I remember how scared I was after that for a whileso scared that I couldnt even talk to anyone except the hero. But she neverined. She treated me warmly. And little by little, she loosened the ropes around my heart, teaching me how to converse with others once more.

    I apanied the hero wherever she went, hiding myself in a full-body robe. I was always following her, scared shed leave me behind. That was about when I was introduced to the Society of Adventurers. I was, as other people at the time put it, a silent girl, one who always covered her face in a mask. One who never ventured out past the heros shadow. A useless piece of baggage.

    One day, something happened to me at the society, which I had visited alongside the hero several times. A man, concerned after seeing how I joined her on all of her monster-ying work, spoke up. Is that child in the mask a girl? he asked. Dont you think she should stay here this time? Thisll be a dangerous one.

    All I could do was shiver at the idea. At the time, the hero was the only person on the I could muster the courage to trust. The hero meant everything to me, and I couldnt bear the thought of being separated from her. I was sure the grown-ups would kill me if they found out I was a magic-born. I had that muchmon sense, at least.

    The hero gave me a thin smile. Itll be all right, she said in a reassuring tone. Everyone heres really nice, all right? Youre a strong girl, too. Itll be fine.

    I think thats what made me do it. I wanted to live up to the heros expectations, and I knew this couldnt go on forever. Something about the way she spoke always seemed brimming with confidence, too. It made me believe whatever she said was true.

    It was with a strange sense of calm, then, that I separated from her on that day.

    In the waiting room next to the societys front desk, I began studying.

    That was around when I learned that I was in the kingdom of Blumund. There were several other nations nearby, I found out, around the Forest of Jura. And that wasnt all. When they werent handling society issues, the workers there taught me arithmetic, as well as several different writing systems.

    I listened intently to the passing adventurers as they spoke about the neighboring nations. My knowledge of these other states and the bnce of power between them was faint at first, but I still gained a working understanding. To someone like me, who had hardly seen the inside of a school, the society became my ce of learning.

    I studied magic, as well. The society yed home to sorcerers, shamans, magicians, and enchanters, as well as many others who were versed in magic ways. I was lucky enough to build friendships with them, and they, in turn, taught me about the mysteries of the world.

    There was much about what they said that seemed unfathomable me. But what I needed most of all was to learn how to deal with elemental spirits. Ifrit, a high-level elemental, was merged with me. Apparently, this allowed me to harness his abilities without the formality of forging a pact with him. But rememberI still had my Mask of Magic Resistance on.

    Carefully, I attempted to find an inroad to Ifrit. Soon I discovered ways to manipte his skills without exacting a burden upon my own body.

    Somewhere along the line, I came to be known as the Conqueror of mes. I was an elementalist, gifted in the arts of fire and explosive magic, and I had grown to the point that no one worried about me joining the hero on adventures. In fact, she had fully epted me nownot as a travelingpanion, but as a full-fledged partner.

    It made me so happy. I had worked hard for so long to help her out, to have the woman whod saved my life recognize me for who I was. All the effort had paid off. Life was good.

    Several yearster, though, the hero went off on a journey. Without me.

    I didnt know why. The hero must have had her motivations, much like I had mine. I intended to set off myself someday, so I had no right toin about it.

    Did she want to y the demon lord I served? No, the truth was

    She had saved me, then left me. I needed to find out why, perhaps, and I wanted her to ept me once more. I wanted to show that I was alive, that I was human. It was exactly that kind of selfish hope that proved I had no right to stop her in her tracks.

    I was already grown up, not some child naive in the ways of the world. The droplets slipping down from behind the mask must have been my imagination. I made myself believe it was true as I watched her leave.

    Because I know Ill see you again

    The thought made me want to grow stronger than ever before.

    I continued traveling after she left me, across many countries. I wanted to help people in their times of need, as she did.

    Whether it was Ifrits influence on me or not, my body had stopped growing at the age of sixteen or seventeen. One of the demon lords curses, I thought, but it nheless served me well on the road.

    Arge number of adventurers were in the business of handling other peoples dirty worksearching for rare nts in the forest, ying monsters and harvesting them for useful materials, and so on. It was a line of work that stereotypically involved huge, lumbering frames and equally bulging muscles. Sheer strength bred respect and trust from others, since it meant one could hold ones own in a job that flirted with the line between life and death.

    The Society of Adventurers attracted the kind of people who lived free lives and were never tied down by any one nation. If they were injured fighting a monster, they could expect no assistance from one government or another. Nations already had their armies of knights to protect them. They didnt need the aid of some dirty adventurer.

    Sometimes a local lord would ask for their help rooting a monster out from theirnds or viges, but there was no formal system in ce for encouraging cooperation between nations and adventurers. It meant that nations could expand only into the range their armies could physically defendsmall pockets of civilization in an otherwise wildnd.

    There would be times when towns fell under attack from powerful monsters. Three-headed snakes, winged lions, and such. Whenever these so-called cmities appeared near a settlement, they would cause as much consternation as a full-scale war.

    Of course, one might expect governments to cooperate and create support systems that extended beyond national borders. And such agreements did exist, but such support always came after things were stable. In the meantime, it was seen as a countrys own responsibility to defeat the monster in question.

    This was why those with full rights as city-dwellers were granted special treatment, while the others had to make do with life in neighborhoods built in the hazardous areas around the walls. Such people eventually limated to a life of being piged and exploited. The stronger among them saw an adventurers career as a way to protect themselves.

    The wealth gap quickly grew between rich and poor. It was a dog-eat-dog world, one where the weak had no recourse. I wanted to protect them. Just like the hero, whod offered me the salvation Id so deeply hoped for. If I abandoned them, I would be no different from my demon lord.

    So I worked as hard as I could to be an ally to the weak. And somewhere along the line, people started relying on me. Calling me a hero.

    A dragon attacked the town, with enough force to equal an entire army. A cmity-level foe, absolutely. Blumund immediately dered a state of emergency and ced the nation on high alert. I was one of the many people they enlisted.

    A cmity-ss monster was usually discovered once every several years, but this one was different. No halfhearted strike would ever faze a dragon, and the nations knight corps was too offensively weak to provide any support at all. I myself provided all the offense I could for the effort, but my sword could do little against such a foe, and I was hardly much of a threat.

    If something wasnt done, it would ultimately lead to thousands of deaths. So I decided to call upon Ifrit, sleeping within my body this whole time.

    The dragons stone-melting breath enveloped my bodybut because Id merged with Ifrit, it felt like nothing more than a passing breeze. By the time it realized I was impervious to its breaththat I was a force to be fearedit was already toote. Waves of white-hot me whipped out of my hands, binding the dragon before it could flee. In another few moments, it was burned alive.

    I, on the other hand, was left in aa for a week afterward. The effort had sapped my magical force. I was aging now, and I couldnt focus my spirit as well as I could in earlier years. As my spirit gged, so did my magic. Ifrit, and my rtionship with him, gave me more than enough magical energy to work with, but the vitality I needed to harness it was dying on me. I had failed to notice it draining, thanks to my bodysck of aging. Id had Ifrit held down that whole timeno wonder Id been using up so much of it.

    Alls well that ends wellthe dragon was defeated, after allbut if I had taken one step further, I might have released an enraged Ifrit, a concept far more terrifying than any dragon. I recalled the past, my face tensed and pale. If I wasnt careful, I could very well incinerate the people I swore to protect.

    It might be time, I thought, to call it a day. If I let myself grow any weaker, Ifrit could go berserk on me. Retirement was something I had to consider, sooner orter.

    I talked the matter over with Heinz, one of the managers who ran things around the Society of Adventurers. If thats what it is, he said, Id advise you to travel to the kingdom of Englesia. Theyre looking for teachers in basic battle techniques over there. Theres lots of ex-adventurers out there, but if you can teach your skills to people, youll never be hurting for a job.

    He handed me a reference letter I could use.

    Thank you, I replied. Youve done so much for me.

    Ah, forget about it, he protested. Were the ones who should be thanking you, Shizu! Youve been a rock for all of us. He blushed. Well, have a nice trip, I suppose. If you get some free time,e back and visit.

    They all saw me off before I left for good. It made me feel as if I belonged to this ce. As if I had for years. I couldnt believe how happy it made me.

    So it was that, toward the end of my career, I made the switch from adventurer to instructor.

 Volume 1 - Ch 4

    THE CONQUEROR OF FLAMES

    So there we were. Back at the goblin vige. It had been only about two weeks, but I was seriously starting to miss it a little. Assuming you wanted to call it a vige at all. It was more of an empty space with a fence around it.

    While we were gone, a few simple tents had been pitched around the area. There were signs of progress, at least. I spotted arge iron pot situated over the remains of the central campfire. Goblin cuisine used to be all about spit-roastingbut now theyd added simmering to the mix!

    This was a truly remarkable development. Whered they get that thing? Taking a closer look, I realized it was fashioned from the shell of a big turtle. Man, how much did they expand their hunting grounds while I was gone? I was d theyd kept their home base safe, at least.

    The resident hobgoblins spotted our returning party quickly, greeting us with cheers and apuse. I had rudely forgotten to bring souvenirs, but given the monster pelts and such I spotted drying here and thereproceeds from their hunting, no doubtI was sure the dwarves would have everyone kitted up and clothed before long. Id like the goblins to make that stuff themselvester, but lets take it one step at a time.

    I tried looking around for Rigurd so I could introduce the dwarves to him. I didnt need to. He ran right up to me. I thought he was just excited to see us, but he had something bothering him instead.

    Wee back! he said before I could ask. I hate to bother you so soon after returning, Sir Rimuru, but we have visitors

    Visitors? But I dont remember having any friends.

    I decided to let the dwarves show themselves around. Theyd be living here for a while, and I was sure they were curious to see what it was like. I also stowed the tools Id brought along in an empty tent, figuring the covering would at least offer some protection against the elements.

    Leaving our new residents to Rigur, I had the elder guide me to our guests. He took me to one of therger tents, which had been converted into a sort of meeting room. Who could it be? I guess Ill find out, I thought as I bounced in.

    Once I passed under the p, I stopped. Inside were a bunch of goblinsthe regr kind. Several of them were well dressed, each one apanied by a handful of servants. Some elders and their guards, maybe? Nobody was armed. Not that I minded that.

    Before I could ask what was up, the goblins prostrated themselves on the floor.

    It is an honor to meet you, O great master! they all shouted in unison. Please, listen to our most earnest of hopes!

    Great master? I guess they mean me, but really, thats going too far. They sure believed it, though. Their eyes couldnt have been more longing or resolute. There was no telling what they wanted, but I figured Id hear them out.

    All right. Go ahead.

    Oh, thank you for your generosity! one of the elders shouted. All of us here wish to join your throngs of followers, sir!

    Please, grant us your magnanimous kindness!! the others said as they remained on the floor, eyes turned to me, before bowing low.

    Honestly, I didnt want to deal with this.

    Were just getting started with the rebuilding process here, guys. I dont have time to waste on you!

    I wouldve loved to simply shoo them off. But we did have ack of manpower around here. And I could already picture the turf wars these guys would want to spring upon us sooner orter. Maybe it was best to take them in while we still could.

    If they stab us in the back after that, we can just kill em all.

    I wouldnt take kindly to traitors. Rose-colored sses would just get in the way when you were leading a pack of monsters. You had to keep a cool head around them. That was part of the reason I was willing to take these goblins inbecause I wanted to prove to myself that I meant business.

    Once again, I reminded myself, If these guys turn out to be traitors, I will personally kill every one of them. It was amazing how I could think about killing people as if I were wondering where to go for lunch, though. It came as a surprise, buthellit beat hemming and hawing over every life decision I made. Kept it simple.

    By the way, if these were just the envoys, how many goblins were we talking overall? I sighed. I might have a hell of a lot of names to think up soon.

    The guards apanying the goblin elders had gone back to their respective viges to report the news. So what did they have to say?

    To sum up, their story went a bit like this

    It all began with the recent disruptions to the order around the forest. The other viges had de facto abandoned Rigurds during the direwolf attack in part because they simply had nobat resources left to assign to the ce.

    All the intelligent races in this forestthe orcs, the lizardmen, and the ogres, toowere starting to step up and stake their ims on this wood. There had been smaller arguments along those lines before, but there was also a sort of silent agreement that nobody would let it get to armed conflict. With the forests one and true overseer out of the picture, however, there were more than a few races out there ready to vent some steam.

    Monsters, in general, had a tendency to puff up and engage in regr disys of power. Now every vige in the forest was rapidly preparing itself to kick some ass. It was only a matter of time before something got the ball rolling. And goblins, the wimpiest kids on the block, were doomed to let most of these other racesy total waste to them.

    This, naturally, rmed most of the other goblin elders. The moment they got involved in this cross-forest turf war, itd be over for them. So they held a conference, talked it over for several days, and were all too blockheaded toe up with any decent ideas.

    Not that I would have expected them to

    News of the impending direwolf attack came in the midst of this, but their attention was focused elsewhere. Rigurds vige was left for dead and all but forgotten. Their talks continued, with no miracles in sight.

    Just as the viges food stocks were starting to run low, they heard word of yet another new forest menacerumors of massive, dark beasts, piloted by people riding on their backs. They sped through the trees, as if traversing t ins, and they utterly vanquished the more powerful monsters of the forest. Who were they? The concept made the goblins tremble with fear and surprise.

    They were apparentlyex-goblins.

    Opinions were split on how to handle this. Some suggested to travel to them immediately and beg for protection. Others found the tale too extraordinary to swallow, concerned that it might be a trap and refusing to believe that the ex-goblins would have no reason to trick them.

    Trap or not, though, there was no guarantee this new race would ept them. Especially since theyd abandoned Rigurds vige. Forgiveness appeared a futile hope for many of the elders. Even goblins were capable of shame, it turned out.

    In the end, realizing they had reached the far end of their intellect, the conference ended with a totalck of any concrete conclusion. So the side that sought our protection decided to travel over here.

    Now it all made sense. Still, pretty selfish of them, wasnt it? Were talking about weak, stupid, helpless goblins, though, so I should have known better. Id already agreed to take them in, besides.

    Anyone who wants toe over, have at it, I told the goblin representatives. That was enough to send them back home for now.

    That was where my problems began.

    As I looked over the teeming crowds of goblins, I thought to myself, This iskind of too many, isnt it? Far too many to house within the viges space.

    Why did this have to be my problem, anyway?

    Over the past few days, wed been stuck building axes, using them to chop down trees for wood, and so on. We hadnt even started on houses yet. There was just too much to work on.

    Kaijin was handling wood duties, while the three dwarven brothers worked on processing the animal pelts into hobgoblin clothing. The looks they had been giving the females were less than savory. I figured it was best to set them on that job before anything else.

    We were in the midst of this when the goblins showed up. Four tribes, about five hundred of em in total. The rest were still in the viges with the elders who opted to stay put.

    Well, time for a move. It wouldnt make much difference work-wise, assuming we did it right now. I checked my mental map of the area. Preferably Id have liked something with nearby water and some clearednd suitable for farming. As I walked around, I realized that the most ideal location wasthe area right nearby the cave Id popped out of. Hmm.

    I decided to ask Rigurd about the state of things over there. It was regarded as a forbidden zone, he reported. Unlike the forest, it was a veritable den of powerful monsters

    No problem there, then. I mean, I lived there.

    Y-you what?!

    Like, I guess I was born around there, soit oughta be fine.

    You constantly impress me, Sir Rimuru. I am astounded.

    Funny thing for him to say. Whats so astounding about being born in a cave? If he was cool with it, then fine.

    I then called for Mildo, youngest of the three brothers, and told him as much as I could about how architecture worked in the world I came from. Surveying and measurement in this world were actually fairly urate, thanks to magic. That, plus the amateur-hour knowledge I brought to the table, helped us decide to hatch a surveying project for the local area.

    The wolves didnt need it much, but for the goblins and dwarves a waste-management facility would be a necessity. I thought itd be nice if we could set up a pseudoseptic system that could store waste and turn it into fertilizer. Wed need something to keep infectious diseases at bay, besides. That was another thing I added to Mildos list.

    Do goblins get sick, though? I wondered. The answer was yesthey were susceptible to disease like anyone else. Pretty wimpy monsters, if you asked me. Though given the kind of filth they lived in before I showed up, no wonder

    They lost a lot of people but made up for it with an abundance of babies. Simple math. Although that wasnt so much the case with hobgoblinsthey gave birth to fewer offspring at a time, which was another reason I assumed their life spans were longer.

    Either way, if we lost too many to illness, we wouldnt be able to keep our numbers up. I had zero knowledge of medicine; anything a potion couldnt handle was beyond me, and we didnt have any magic healers.

    So while we were in a building frenzy, I decided we might as well go all the way with hygiene. Mildo, for his part, actually had considerable knowledge about waste systems like this. I must not have been the only otherworlder to talk about this with people.

    This world, for its part, had something called spirit engineering, a unique field of study that led to all sorts of weird discoveries. What it didnt offer, however, was a way to make fertilizer out of peoples dumps. Mildo was amazed to hear the idea from me.

    Regardless, though, after some deliberation, I named him head of building operations for our vige and left everything up to him.

    Another ssic tossing-off of responsibility, if I do say so myself.

    After having Rigurd assign a few people to Mildos detail, I sent them all off to survey our potential new home. Ranga joined them, just in case. I didnt think monsters would go swarming out of the cave at them, but you never know. Ranga ought to have been able to handle whatever popped up, so better safe than sorry.

    That took care of one issue, but I had something bigger on my tenaming. Just thinking about it depressed me. I had the sinking feeling that by the time I got halfway through the five hundred or so goblins, Id just be running through the alphabet. Abcdef would be a little hard to pronounce, though.

    Still, I had to get started. It took around four days to get through them all, with a quick bit of sleep mode in between, and I really had to hand it to myselfI stuck it out to the end. Not quite as exhausting asst time, but not a process I wanted to repeat anytime soon.

    I called the tribal elders over. They knelt down in their stately hobgob way. Rigurd was there, and following in his footsteps were three others I had just named: Rugurd, Regurd, and Rogurd.

    Put all the leaders together, and yep! Youve got all five vowels!

    Ranga being the a was a coincidence.

    So maybe it wasnt my best, but it was okay! Theyd never know. Dont forget how much work I put into this.

    Ive always been very good at making that excuse.

    That left one unnamed elder, and she was a woman. Something feminine sounding was best, I thought, so I picked Lilina. One advantage of everyone being hobgobs was that I could actually tell em apart by gender. Magic Sense could help me do that with the regr gobs, but to the naked eye, it was a challenge.

    Could I turn Lilina into another name series, maybe? I thought about it but decided not to worry about the future too much. No time for it.

    So here we were. A few hundred hobgobs. Maybe it was time we built a ss system for them? With these numbers, I couldnt tell them Lets all be pals and get along and expect them to follow that. There needed to be a clear chain ofmand, especially given how much monsters valued strength.

    All right, I dered, Im giving all of you ranks!

    Rigurd received a nice upgrade to goblin king; the other four elders became goblin lords. The rest of the goblins in the vige immediately bowed to them, which was a spine-tingling sight to see.

    Y-yes, our lord!! the elders parroted. The ensuing cheers were deafening. I had just inadvertently penned a new chapter in goblin history.

    Kaijin was kind enough to bring along all the carpentry tools he needed. Garm and Dold were proving to be ablemanders on the clothing-production front. We were building a miniature tower of wood lumber in an empty space in the vige. Preparations were going along smoothly.

    By the time I had evolved all the goblins and made sure I hadnt missed anyone, Mildo came back to the vige. The surveying work was done without a hitch. All systems go. I looked over the different blocks in the vige hed nned out. It was really more of a town than a simple vige. A new home for all of us.

    After making sure everything was in ce, we set off. It was our first step toward a newnd. Toward a new nation for us!

    The mans name was Fuze, and he was the guild master at the Free Guild branch in the kingdom of Blumund.

    Hispetence at his post was unquestioned, and even before then, his prowess as an adventurer had brought him all the way to the rank of A-minus.

    And as hed promised the Baron of Veryard, he quickly set off to conduct an investigation of his own. What his assorted intelligence contacts told him, however, was that the Empire was currently making no moves at all. It might stay that way, of coursethat was Fuzes hunchbut there was no room for error.

    He continued to have his people watch the Empire. It wasnt his usual line of work, but for now, at least, he was willing to make an exception.

    One day, he received word that another investigation team had made its return to his city. He went to his chambers and sat down very slowly and deliberately on the sofa in the reception room he always used for ssified meetings. Across from him sat three peopletwo men and a woman, all B-ranked adventurers.

    This group, he already knew well. There was Gido, a thief who excelled at reconnaissance. Kabal, meanwhile, was a master of defense. Being fighter ss, he willingly served as a wall for the rest of his party, and he did his job well. He tended to crack jokes a lot, but he was no slouch. Finally, there was Elen, a sorceress whose skill set was geared toward the more unique types of magic. She had a wide variety of spells at her disposal, but her true skilly in supernaturally enhanced movement. It was also worth noting that her careful nning always did wonders to boost her partys chance at survival.

    That was the team Fuze had sent to examine the cave Veldora had once been sealed in. His first reaction upon seeing them was slight amazement that they were safe. That cave was more suited for people with B-plus ranks or higher, and if you took its master into ount, tracking down an A-minus traveler or two was usually your safest bet. Even if Fuze himself ventured innot that his guild responsibilities would ever let him these daysit would likely be quite a slog if he took it solo.

    Regardless of their ranks, these were the people Fuze had sent to find out what was up with Veldora at the moment. Hed made the decision because of their uncanny knack for staying alive. The ability to avoid battle while gathering intelligence, in this case, was worth far more to him than employing a B-plus powerhouse.

    If something had happened to them, though, Fuze would have had to take the heat as guild master. Sending people into areas they were unqualified for by rank was a clear vition of guild regtions. A branch head daring to try that would create controversy if the incident became public knowledge.

    But this was the group Fuze had wanted, and nobody was happier to see them back now than him.

    Lets hear the report, he said, ever careful not to betray his emotions. No matter how appreciative he was inside, he made it a point not to offer them any reassuring words. The trio was used to this.

    It was awful, man! Kabal blurted.

    I so need to take a bath, Elen agreed.

    Yeah, the hardest part was tryin to keep this pair from ripping each other apart, Id say, Gidomented.

    Their debriefings almost always started like this. Their eyes, however, were deadly serious. It probably was indeed awful, Fuze thought.

    The report began with a description of the monsters theyd found in the cave. After bluffing their way past the tempest serpent that served as the areas guardian, theyd proceeded past the sealing door. It had been clear early on that Veldora was gone, but theyd spent another week or so exploring the cave, just in case. The end result: definitely no guardian, or leader, to speak of inside.

    But one thing had caught their attention the most.

    Heres the thing, though, Kabal said. Once we were done with our examination and went out the doorthe tempest serpent was gone.

    Right, yeah! Elen eximed. I couldnt activate Escape inside the door, so I spent all that time figuring out how wed get away from it I feel like such an idiot!

    Yeah, said Gido. I brought along an illusion and heat-generating trap, and I didnt even use em. At least it saved us some time, though. Gettin past it on the way in was one thing, but gettin out woulda been another.

    What was the meaning of this? This tempest serpent had a tentative rating of A-minus. It was absolutely the strongest presence in the cave. Not even Fuze liked his chances much against it. It was the whole reason why he had fretted over this trios chances of a sessful trip.

    Something had definitely happened over there. Fuze could tell that much. And he needed to know what.

    All right, guys. Ill let you rest for three days or so, but after that, Ill need you back in the forest again. Not inside the cave this timeyoull be examining the area around it instead. I want you to leave no stone unturned out there, all right? Be thorough. That is all.

    Thats all, he says!

    Three days? Thats it?! Give us a week, at least!

    Yeah, yeah You know hes not gonna listen to us, guys.

    Fuze didnt let the protests bother him. He had some new information to stew over. What could be going on in that forest? He lost himself in thought for a momentthen opened his eyes, only to find three pairs of spiteful eyes staring at him. These guys He sighed, then yelled at them as he always did.

    Why are you still here? Get out! Now!

    The trio hurriedly excused themselves.

    Three dayster, Kabal, Elen, and Gido were preparing for their forest trip.

    That was barely any time off, Elen moaned.

    You said it, girl, Gido replied.

    Could you stopining for a moment, guys? Kabal, the more-or-less leader, admonished with ack of conviction that indicated his agreement. Youre just depressing me now.

    They had few routes into the forest to choose from. The monsters had been growing incredibly active in recent days, to the point that not even the merchants were willing to send wagons into the forest. Hiring bodyguards was out of the questiontheyd lose money on this job if they did. If they wanted to visit the forest, itd have to be on foot for the time being. They would have had to walk at least a little, since the path to the Sealed Cave was too treacherous to navigate in a horse cart.

    As a result, preparation would be key. Procuring several weeks worth of preserved food was a challenge in itself, but without it, they stood every chance of starving to death before they even reached their destination. Elens magic, at least, guaranteed them potable water whenever they needed.

    When they werergely done and it was time to head off, a person approached them, speaking in a voice that was somewhere between young and old, male and female.

    Excuse me. If you are headed for the forest, would I be able to join you along the way?

    The mask the figure was wearing prevented any guess at the face behind it. It was an ornate, beautiful mask, but it bore no expression at all. There was something vaguely unsettling about the whole package, but

    Fine by me.

    Wh-whoa! Im the leader here, Elen! Whats your problem?!

    Ahh, you know her. Once she decides on something, theres no changin her mind.

    Thank you.

    Those words of gratitude were all the masked figure said before silently following behind them. Thus Kabal and his band found themselves with anotherpanion as they ventured into the forest.

    The sound of chopping trees and hammering echoed throughout the forest. Slowly, the new town and its houses were beginning to take shape. In our minds, at least. We were still busyying out the water and septic system, so for now, it was still just a clearing.

    This system took the direction of its flow from the river we were adjacent to. We nned to have a water-processing building eventually, although it was still under construction. Thatd be where the river water was purified and distributed to peoples houses.

    On the septic end of things, we built arge chamber out of wood that we nned to bury in the ground. The woods inside surfaces would be treated to improve their resistance to rotting, then reinforced with cement. That was what we were working on now. Wed lucked out and found some quicklime-type material off a nearby hill.

    Meanwhile, another building outside of town would be our waste-processing facility, where we nned to make the fertilizer we wanted.

    In addition to this, I was having the crew build arge temporary building, a sort of gymnasium they could sleep in during construction. It was rather slipshod since we had no intention of making it permanent, but it would do the job.

    Outlining the assorted neighborhood divisions was going along well. The upper-ss houses, including the one Id stay in, would be built near the cave mouth. Wed have a line of homes meant for the tribal elders, with the other residences spread out around them.

    We were doing this before anything else, so it was easy toy out the town n without getting things cluttered and mixed up. It was basically built in the shape of a cross, with a wide main street, making it easy for townspeople to work as a group if the need arose. Wed have to be careful not to create long lines of identical roadsthatd make it easy to get lostbut it wasnt too much of a concern.

    The only real disadvantage to this setup was that it could be easy for enemies to move around in case of invasionbut if they actually made it to the center of town, itd mean a dozen other things would have failed by then.

    No point dwelling on that scenario. If we got wrecked, we could always just rebuild.

    It was absolutely a good idea to name all the goblins and upgrade them into hobgoblins, though. It did wonders for their intelligence levels, and they were all astonishingly quick studies. Their strength was upgraded, too. The dwarves described regr goblins as straight-on F-ranked monsters, while hobgobs hovered between C and D for the most part. They felt more like people than they did before, to be sure. Depending on their weapons and armor, not to mention their sses and magical arts, there was a lot of room for growth.

    On that note, I was seeing substantial variation in the hobgobs sizes and strengths. The four goblin lords Id just named, for one, all seemed more talented in life than the rank and file did. Rigurd the Goblin King, meanwhile

    Oh, is that where you were, Sir Rimuru? I was searching for you!

    Who was this guy? He was practically a muscle-bound freak of nature at this point, huge in frame and almost the size of an ogre. Hell,rger, even! as Kaijin put it. That mustve been the result of giving him a ss in addition to a name, I supposed.

    I swear, the biology of these monsters was a total mystery to me. Id have to try assigning a few more titles to see what happened.

    What is it?

    Ivee to report to you, sir. Weve captured a few suspicious individuals.

    Suspicious? A bunch of monsters, or?

    No, sir, humans. We did not engage them, as you ordered.

    Humans? Why here?

    Whoa! Sweet! Better get on their good sides, fast! If it was those three idiots from the dwarven gate, Id be happy to chop them up and feed them to our work crews, but

    They were engaged in battle with a group of giant ants, it seems. Rigur and his security detail rescued them and took them here, butapparently he suspects they are conducting an investigation of the local area. I thought I woulde to you for advice

    Hmm. Some countrys checking out this ce? I already knew from the dwarves that the Forest of Jura was considered neutral territory, unimed by any nation. It seemed usible that this was an expeditionary force, trying to find some new territory to take for its own. This could be trouble, but there was no point fretting over it without hearing them out. I could think about what to do after that.

    All right. Take me to them! I said as I hopped on Rigurds shoulder.

    Ranga being out on patrol made transport around our new town a bit of a pain. I could walk easily enough, but when I was by myself, myck of height was an issue. I always resented the feeling of being looked down upon whenever I met anyone. Having people kneel to greet me just got in the way of actual work. I had a reputation to uphold, besides, and I didnt want to be under people all the time. Perhaps I worried about it too much, but I always thought it was better to avoid trouble before it started.

    That was why I tended to travel around on a lot of shoulders these days.

    So aboard Rigurds shoulders, I made my way to see these adventurers. Who are they? I wondered before a conversation entered my (figurative) ears.

    Wh-whoa! Hey! I wanted that!

    Thats just mean, isnt it? I raised this meat myself!

    Sir, I regret to inform you that I am not giving up this food!

    Munch, munch.

    Certainly seemed like some excitement.

    Rigurd replied to my silent question. M-my apologies, Sir Rimuru. It would seem the ants made off with most of their luggageand even before then, they had not had a decent meal in some time, so I had some brought to them.

    Hmm. That was kind of the goblin king, to be sure. Oh, thats no problem, I replied. In fact, good job noticing. Helping out someone in need is a nice thing, you know?

    I felt it was appropriate enough to praise him. He was gradually bing more and more of a leader, no longer asking me about every little thing that cropped up. A good thing, I thought.

    Ha-ha! I will do my best to improve my rule and be less of a burden upon you, Sir Rimuru!

    But I wish he wouldnt be so formal with me all the time, I thought as we approached a simple tent. The hobgob guarding it opened the p for us.

    The moment we stepped in, I felt all eyes upon me. Four adventurers sat on the ground, their mouths full of assorted meats and vegetables. Their eyes were wide open as they gawked at me. It was a hrious sight to see, although they probably didnt realize it.

    Hmm? Have I seen them somewhere before? Oh, right. They were the adventurers I passed by in the cave, although one of them was new to me. I wondered how any kind of food got through the mask this figure had on.

    Munch, munch

    They sat there for a moment, chewing. They sure were taking their time.

    Fresh roasted meatmmm. If only I had a sense of taste. Argh Does anyone have some spare taste buds?

    Whoops, got a little distracted there. I turned my focus to the matter at hand.

    Rigurd walked up to a tall seat on one side and ced me upon it. My guests, he bellowed as he sat next to me, I do hope you arefortable here. Allow me to introduce you to our master, Sir Rimuru!

    I could hear them swallowing down their food. Then, in unison:

    Huh? A slime?!

    Munch, munch.

    All of them reacted with shock.

    Well, Im not sure about thest one, actually. Whatever.

    It is good to meet you. I am Rimuru, a slime. Not a bad slime, you know!

    I heard a sputtering sound from under the mask. With all the food that guy was chewing, the results probably werent pretty.

    Rude jerk.

    Mustve been a surprise to hear a slime speak. The other three looked equally surprised, but at least they didnt have their mouths full at the time.

    So. Who were these visitors? Good guys, hopefully.

    Well, pardon us, I guess. I just didnt expect wed be saved by a monster tribe.

    Oh! Were human adventurers, by the way, and this meat is really good! Weve been running for the past three days, I think, so its been hard to eat much of anything Thank you so much!

    Yeah, thanks. I sure didnt expect some hobgoblins to be building a vige around here.

    Urrp Koff! Glug glug.

    Well, I said, please, feel free to enjoy your meal, all of you. We can talk afterward.

    I sort of wished the hobgobs had called me over after the humans were done stuffing themselves, but they were stillcking in politeness here and there. Im sure they were surprised, but something told me Id need to hold a workshop on manners shortly anyway.

    So I left the tent, not too interested in watching them eat on the floor, wondering about my good luck at obtaining these human guests (or prisoners, depending). On the way out, I told their guard to take them to my personal gate near the cave once mealtime was over.

    Dont worry about it, I reassured the crestfallen-looking Rigurd as we walked. We can work on mannerster. They were, after all, growing by leaps and bounds. I wasnt expecting every diplomatic effort to go perfectly with these hobgobs.

    Settling down back in my tent, I began patiently waiting. Rigurd had one of his female assistants prepare some tea for us. It looked more ptable than thest beverage Id tried from them, but I could only guess at the taste. Neat how evolution even affected areas like that.

    Slowly, we were settling down into a truly cultured society. Something about that tea convinced me.

    After a few more moments, the four adventurers popped in, immediately giving a hearty Sorry bout that! as they entered. The tent was a little cramped with all of them inside.

    Once their goblin guide was gone, another one brought out some fresh tea for the group. There, see? Real service, out of nowhere. They mustve picked it up from the dwarvesI knew they had been spending nights drinking with them, learning about their society and culture.

    Ah, good to see you again. My name is Rimuru, and Im the leader of this little group. What brings you guys over here?

    I figured it was a valid enough question. They nodded at each othermustve expected thisand began to speak.

    I am d to meet you, Rimuru. My name is Kabal, the leader of this bandmore or less. This is Elen, and thats Gido over there. Were adventurers, all ranked Byou know what that means, I imagine?

    Hi! Elen here!

    Gido, sir. A pleasure.

    So they were a party. Being ranked B put them in the upper echelons, to be sure, but they wouldve faced a rough time in the cave, no? Maybe they were masters at hiding from monsters or something. And what about the other one in their ranks? I was sure there were only three of them in the cave.

    This, meanwhile, is Shizu, a temporary addition to our team for this mission.

    Shizu. Charmed.

    It was hard to tell her gender or age strictly from her voice. But after honing my talents trying to differentiate goblins, I could tell right offshe was a woman. And, if my hunch was correct, maybe even Japanese? That was the impression I had.

    The way she carried her teacup and the way she knelt just so, tops of her feet t against the floor. That position, I thought, had to be rare in this realm, and her threepanions certainly didnt botherthe men just sat cross-legged on the wolf-pelt rug over the ground, and Elen chose to keep her legs to one side instead.

    Ah, well. It wouldnt be strange to have a culture somewhere on this that resembled Japans. Id pursue that train of thoughtter.

    Although, it urred to mewas it me, or were these adventurers being way too cavalier with their own safety right now? So far, they seemed to be enjoying their stay immenselyeating, drinking, andughing with each other. This was a monsters den theyd wandered into. They knew that, right? Maybe they just had a screw loose, I dunno.

    Oops. Got sidetracked. Time to continue the conversation.

    You too, thanks. So

    They were exceedingly forthright with their story, apparently not wary of my motives in the least. Their guild master had sent them to examine the area around the cave and check to see whether anything suspicious had taken cebut this mission was proving to stymie them.

    Yeah, thats the thing! Kabal continued. Were here looking for suspicious things, but what the heck is suspicious supposed to mean? Were clueless here!

    Totally! Elen chimed in. I wish he couldve said, like, Look for this or that or the other thing instead of leaving it so vague!

    We might be good scouts and all that, but we cant do everything, yknow? Gido added.

    And so they bad-mouthed their guild master without a care in the world. I almost felt sorry for the guy.

    Along the way, this group had run smack into arge, suspicious-looking boulder with a hole in it. This is it! they mustve thought, because they drew their swords and stabbed it a little bitonly to wake up an entire nest of giant ants. Brother. I didnt know what to say.

    It was a miracle they were alivetheyd spent the next three days constantly on the run, losing all their possessions on the way, before making it here. I had to hand it to them for managing that, really.

    Well, I reflected, I wouldnt say theres much suspicious going on around here, no. The cave, mainly, I guess?

    Elen shook her head. But we didnt find anything in there, no. Did you know the story behind that cave? Theres supposed to be this big, evil dragon sealed inside, but we spent two weeks running up and down that cave, and nothing! Two weeks without a bath, and we got practically nothing for it

    Whoa, cmon! an unnerved Kabal barked back. We cant go around revealing that much to them!

    What do you care? Gido countered. Shes the one who did it! It dont matter to me!

    The menpletely panicked at Elens unwitting revtion.

    I already knew, of course, thanks to myst encounter with them. And these people liked a dip now and then, huh? Maybe Id have to get a bathhouse built around here.

    Moving on.

    So what were you looking for in that cave, exactly?

    It couldnt have been treasure, after all.

    Kabal somberly shook his head in response. Well, if shes said that much, no point hiding it. Like she said, rumors been going around that the dragon in theres stopped responding

    Hmm. Not that I couldve known, but Veldoras disappearance mustve put the humans in a tizzy. That vanishing act, despite his being safely sealed away, was huge newsI guess this was some crazy powerful dragon after all, although to me hed just seemed like a nice guy who liked to chat sometimes.

    Mustve been a big deal, though, if people were sending out search parties. Was building this town near the cave mouth a mistake?

    We brought along a Reaction Stone, too, because they said the cave was practically bursting at the seams with magiculesbut it wasnt anything near what we thought itd be. I mean, the concentrations a little heavier than your typical cave, but nothing outside whats normal now. And that is pretty unusual, so at least weve got that to go back home with, but

    Its still packed with strong monsters, though, so I dont really wanna go back in again if I have the choice, Elen said. No treasure to speak of, either, and no magic ore. All that monster hacking you gotta do, and theres no payoff for it at all!

    Yeah, Gido added, you might find some bandit gear if you look a bit, but nothin worth goin out of your way for.

    Oops. No ore, huh? Well, what if I told you that there used to be loads of itand I swallowed it all up? And what if I told you the magic had declined in there because I swallowed up Veldora, the guy generating all of it? Thats all basically my fault, isnt it?

    Oh well. What they didnt know couldnt hurt them.

    We continued talking for a while. They had said too much anyway, as Kabal put it, so they might as well go all the way. These guys were a lot more good-natured than I gave them credit for at first.

    And if the cave was no longer a location of interest, maybe we wouldnt be the center of attention after all. I was considering having the town moved as a worst-case scenario, but now I doubted itd be necessary. No country had any legal right to thisnd, so it wasnt as if anyone could force us out.

    Just in case, I decided to ask whether the guild would have any problems with us building a town here.

    Itoughta be fine, right? Kabal said.

    Yeah, Elen agreed. Its not the guilds problem in the first ce. What about the local governments, though?

    Ooh, that aint for me to say, was Gidos opinion.

    Of course, the guild wouldnt know what their host nations were thinking. Plus, if any of them took action, theyd have to prove their im to the other nearby nations. It wouldnt be worth it.

    Then, as I thought over this, I noticed that something was going on with Shizu, whod been sitting there listening the whole time. Suddenly, she slumped to the floor, unconscious. We all immediately came up to her, trying to hold her up, when

    Nhh Nraaaaahhhhhh!!

    Things progressed quickly after that.

    Once Shizus extended groan ended, the tent was visited by absolute silence.

    Cracks were now appearing over her mask, mystical force wafting out from beneath. All of us could tell that something bad was happening.

    Summon magic?! Elen shouted in surprise.

    Whoa, for real? Where the helld thate from? What rank is it?

    Umm, judging by the size of the magic circle, Id have to guess B-plus or higher.

    Well, we cant just sit here, boss. We gotta stop it!

    So they were seasoned adventurers after all, when they needed to be. A few words exchanged, and they immediately leaped into action.

    Great Earth, ce thy bonds over her! Mud Hand!

    Urrrrrraaahhh! Knockdown!!

    First, Elen tied her down. Then Kabalnded a full-body blow. Gido yed backup, ready to act the moment trouble appeared. Hmm. For B ranks, their teamwork was top-notch. Not a single wasted movement.

    But all Shizu had to do was lift the top of her index finger up a bit, and that was enough to trigger a small explosion around her. So much for my tentwhich I didnt mind that much, but what about those three? Were they hurt? There was a bit of a shock wave, but I was unscathed.

    Kabal, who hadnded a Knockdown on Shizu after Elen bound her, had sadly taken the full brunt of the explosion with his body. It had sent him flying. Gido was fine, however, and hed sensed danger early enough that hed pushed Elen aside to safety as well.

    You all right?

    Were just fine, yeah!

    Um, Im kinda aching all over! Elen protested. They better give us some hazard pay for this!

    Kabal, for his part, was already on his feet. O Guys, could you worry about your leader at least a little? He mustve been made of some sturdy stuff.

    I knew Shizu was a magic user, but summoning, too?

    Whatd she summon, anyway?

    No, no, Gido cut in, that aint even the half of it. As far as I know, you cantunch magic without a chant during a summoning

    Before he could finish, he stopped, looking at Shizu as if he couldnt believe his eyes. He had just hit upon an idea.

    Wait No way The Conqueror of mes?

    Shizu was still casting a spell. Her entire body was glowing bright red, hovering in the air a little. Her mask remained prominent on her face as her long ck hair spilled out of her robe. Whats she trying to do? She seemed strange to me a moment before all this happened

    Rigurd, get everyone out of town! Dont let anyone near here! I shouted.

    But

    Thats an order! Once theyre evacuated, get Ranga here for me!

    Yes, Sir Rimuru!

    The goblin king sped off.

    I could tell neither he nor his race could do much against this. Itd be a waste of countless lives. And I didnt want Ranga as a fightingpanion. Id called for him simply because Id considered the possibility that this was all an act on the adventurers part to divert our attention. Their oddly loose lips made a lot more sense to me if theyd never intended to let us live from the start. That, or they really could have been that stupid, but

    If this was an act, they might try to stab me in the back while I was struggling with Shizu. That was what Ranga would be for. Maybe I was overthinking things, but you can never be too careful.

    Yo, Gido! Whats that Conqueror of mes thing?

    Wasnt that a hero or something? Elen chimed in first. I think she was active around fifty or so years ago?

    Famous, then? I thought to myself. Then Shizus mask fell off her face.

    mes shot upward.

    Up in the sky, three me smanders appeared. It was a hell of a way for Shizu to reveal her face to us. Her ck hair fanned outward with the shock wave, shining brilliantly against the inferno. She had a fleeting, transient beauty to herbut her eyes emitted a wicked shine, and the edges of her lips were twisted upward in what seemed to be an expression of utter joy at the carnage she had seen.

    Something about it struck me aspletely unnatural, in a way I couldnt describe very well. Then

    Launching unique skill Deviant.

    The voice of the world echoed around us. As it did, the beautiful young girl transformed into a giant of pure fire.

    No mistakin it, Gido shouted. Thats the Conqueror of mes, the master of Ifrit the titan The strongest elementalist in the world!

    Ifrit, the fire titan. The lord of fire, capable of burning anything in his path. A level above any royalty, mortal or divine.

    Gahh! Ifrit? Isnt that spirit, like, above A rank and stuff?! Kabal yelped.

    Oof Thats my first time seeing it, Elen said. Buthow could we ever beat that?!

    Yeah, we cant, retorted Gido. Were all gonna die here Sure was a short life, I guess.

    With his three me smanders by his side, the Conqueror of mes surveyed his domain. No wonder the three of them were in such a panic. Even a single smander boasted B-plus strength. But What was the deal with Shizu? To me, it didnt seem as if she was controlling all thismore like Ifrit was controlling Shizu.

    There was a shock wave as Shizuor Ifritunleashed a torrent of magic force.

    That was weird. It wasnt aimed at anyone, not meant to killjust a little show of violence, although there was nothing little about it. It didnt seem like the work of a free mind; the attack looked more as if it was preprogrammed by someone. Now there was no doubting it. This wasnt Shizus will at work. Ifrit was supposed to be hers to handle, but now he was out of control.

    Whether that theory was right or not didnt matter right now. The problem was the force behind those attacks. It was beyond lethal. Pale red shock waves rolled across thendscape, hot enough to instantly burn all the buildings we had under construction.

    God dammit! We just got started, too!

    The three adventurers tried using a Magic Barrier to block the attack, I guess, but it didnt evenst a single shock wave. They werent dead, but they werent doing too well, eitherconscious, but probably immobile by now.

    Guys, dont move! I yelled at them. Youll wind up getting targeted!

    They responded by bunching up together,unching both Magic Barrier and Aura Shield. Guess this isnt an act. They were seriously defending themselves. So much for the lets kill all the monsters theory.

    Talk about force, though. The magic power Ifrit was releasingwith no casting time at allwas blowing searing-hot wind a good hundred feet in every direction around us. If I didnt fight these guysIfrit and those three me smanderswe were all going down. What a pain.

    But it was strange.

    Even in this predicament, I wasnt trembling with fear or anything. Maybe it was because I was a monster now. I mean, Veldora and that ck snake kinda freaked me out at first, but both wound up being good experiences in the end.

    Hey. Whatre you trying to do?

    Pop!

    An explosion went off behind me. I was guessing trying to talk this out with Ifrit wasnt going to work. He just answered my question with another white-hot strike in my direction.

    This time, unlike that untargeted shock wave from before, he was clearly trying to kill me, and his beams of pure heat were vaporizing anything they touched on the way. The force behind them far outssed that first release of magic powerbut, hey, if they didnt hit me, no worries. I had already dodged those beams, and with my quick senses, I could see thingsing at the speed of sound.

    In a way, I was d we werent finished with the town yet. I probably shouldve been more concerned about the me titan in front of me, but that was the thought that popped up anyway. Our tents and temporary outhouses were gone, but that wasnt any disaster.

    We had already cut down the surrounding trees to expand the clearing; if wed been in the forest, there probably would have been a massive wildfire by now. Theres a silver lining for you. I was a bit concerned about the wood and other supplies we had piled up, but there wasnt much I could do for it now.

    This giant had a hell of a lot of nerve, though! With that attitude of his, I was sure he saw me as nothing but an annoying little bug in his way. He was dissing me, and that was more than enough to get on my bad side. Ifrit was my enemy, and I decided now was the time for a counterattack. I had my qualms about Shizu, the person Ifrit was probably feeding off of for all this, but if I didnt strike, this would never end.

    Suppressing Ifrit was priority one; I could check up on Shizuter. For all I knew, maybe Shizu wasnt being controlled at all.

    I shot a Water de at Ifrits stomach. It evaporated right before reaching the me giant; a spiraling plume of fire cut it off. Hmm. Guess that wont work. But I didnt have time to ponder it, because the smanders had just reacted to my attack.

    Icicle Lance!!

    Elens ice magic stabbed its way through one of them. As I took a peek at her, she was already fleeing back into her corner of the Magic Barrier.

    It was a clever attempt. It looked as if the barrier was holding up well enough without much concentration on the casters part. But itd take more than an Icicle Lance to shoot down those smanders.

    One of them lunged straight toward the adventuring trio.

    You all right?!

    I can do this! Elen said. Risking our lives is nothing new to us!

    Oh,e on, Kabal groaned, I thought I was the leader! Well, so be it. Ill take one of em down!

    Yeah? Gido retorted. I aint heard of a bandit fightin an elemental spirit before. Guess were all in this together, huh?

    It was hard to tell whether they really counted on each other or not.

    If Kabal was that eager to take one down, I might as well let him. If he died, though, that was gonna weigh on me.

    All right, I said. You take him. But dont push it! If you get hurt, use these.

    Skipping the exnation, I spat out a few recovery potions and threw them their way. Gido managed to scoop them up.

    Um Rimuru? What are these?

    Recovery potions! Pretty good ones, too, so if youre hurt, use em!

    We didnt have time for details. I went back on the move, and the three of them were too busy dealing with the me smander to talk. Even one would be a tough opponent for them. Hope they hang on okay.

    The other two smanders, meanwhile, had started making their way toward me. Ifrit himself was calmly advancing, too.

    Now what?

    Just as the thought urred to me, Ranga finally arrived. Id expected to have him keep watch over the adventurers, but no longer. Hed be serving as my mount instead.

    You called for me, my master!

    I hopped right on his back. At least I had some speed now. The smanders were pretty quick up there, but not as quick as Ranga.

    I want you to focus on dodging them, I ordered. You dont need to attack at all. Ill take care of that!

    Understood!

    We had almost a wordless connection with each other. Ranga instantly understood what I wanted to do. Then we were off.

    The two smanders fired off straight jets of Fire Breath at us, like two methrowers in the sky. It was light work for Ranga to avoid them, rearing back and out of range of the heat. The fire looked powerful, and I didnt want to try my luck. If Id still been a human, they probably wouldve turned me into a ck divot on the ground.

    Id better take care of those two guys first before tackling Ifrit. So I tried out some Water des. Unlike the fire giant, the smanders couldnt cut off the attack before it hit home. I managed to slice off a limbbut, ridiculously enough, the guy grew it right back again. It mustve been made of fire like everything else. Just cutting it off wouldnt aplish much. The ck snake probably exuded more raw strength than these guys, but the smanders special powers would make them a tad trickier to defeat.

    My master, physical attacks will not work against spiritual foes. Striking their elemental weakness or using magic will, Ranga exined.

    Oh. Right. Hitting an elemental spirit with a sword wouldnt do much, would it?

    What aboutunching a ton of water at it, then? My stomach had about that much in storage from the undergroundke. Would that be enough to put the brakes on this guy?

    Understood. It is possible to release arge amount of water. This will cause a steam explosion upon contact with the smander, but is this all right?

    Yes

    No

    Huh? A steamexplosion? What?

    Understood. A me smander is formed from collected heat energy. Being doused in water will cause it to immediately vaporize, creating steam that envelops the smanders body. It will also trigger a high-temperature, highlypressed wave of pressure, creating a series of explosions.

    And? Will that beat the smander?

    Understood. Pressure times volume equals water released times vapor constant

    Stoppppp! Give it to me in a way I can understand!

    Understood. It will trigger arge explosion, and it is possible that the smander will be knocked out without a trace. However, the results will likely turn the local area into a vacant plot ofnd.

    Oh,e on! Whats the point, then? Im not suicidal, man!

    But if not that, then what? Water des do nothing practical against it

    Icicle Lance!!

    I spotted the trio once more, doing their best to survive, with Elen casting magic in the center.

    Wait a sec. Water des dont work, because they arent magic, I suppose. So is magic all I need?

    Elen! Hit me with an Icicle Lance! Just ones fine!

    Hahh?! Umm, thats kind of

    Just do it!

    The request gave her some pause, but after a second, she began chanting. After another moment, the freeze-magic Icicle Lance wasunched.

    Dontin about this to meter! Icicle Lance!!

    As she shouted out the spell, a pir of ice shot my way. I could probably capture that magic with my Predator skill.

    And if I could

    Report. Launching unique skill Predator. Icicle Lance Predation and Analysis sessful.

    Great! Just as I thought.

    Really, I half doubted it while it was being exined to me, but this Predator had to be some kind of rule-breaking skill. That magic probably packed a punch, but Predator absorbed it all, leaving me undamaged, and I even learned it to boot.

    Hehh?! What happened to my magic?!

    Sorry, Elen. Cant exin.

    The Analysis wrapped up in an instant, and now I could cast the spell just by thinking about it. No chanting requiredthat was another nice side effect of Predator.

    Icicle Lance!

    Omitting the casting time, I fired some magic off toward the smander. Then, at that moment, I understoodthe theory behind magic, and how it all worked. My Water des didnt damage a smander at all, even if they managed to slice right through the guy, but Elens magic did the trick.

    The reason was surprisingly simple. Casting magic wasnt about acting upon your surroundings with a phenomenonit was more like picturing something, then creating it in real life.

    I was, in a way,unching a bolt of energy that had the effect of robbing the target of its heat. That bolt happened to take the form of an energy-sapping ice pir, but it wasnt the ice that made it work. It was the energy inside. Thus, it applied damage to a smander, whose own energy took the form of heat and me.

    And the multiple ice pirs Id justunchedtoo big, really, to be callednceshad just skewered the two me smanders. That, apparently, was all it took to rid them of all their magical force. They instantly vaporized, like a puff of smoke, and were no more.

    Yes! All done here. Let me help you guys

    I figured I would help them out, since Id had Elen waste a magic bolt on mebut I was toote.

    Ah, crap, Kabal said, its gonna blow itself up! As the first line of defense, heunched an Aura Shield, but the smanders self-sacrificing explosion was more than enough to blow it away. The three of them were all exposed to the intense heat as they soared backward into the air.

    Flustered, I had Ranga run up to them. They were more badly burned than Id thought. Conscious, yes, but no longer capable of movingand Kabal, up in front, had taken the worst of it. If it hadnt been for his shield, the rtively defenseless Elen and Gido easily couldve died.

    Dammit Ranga, protect these guys. Get them somewhere safe!

    But

    The order gave him pause for a moment, but he fell silent, perhaps sensing the mystical force I was letting off. His wild instincts told him that no back talk would be permitted, no doubt.

    This is an order! Do it! Theyve got recovery potions on them, so get them to a safe ce and heal them.

    As you say. May you fight well!

    Dont worry. Ifrits all mine!

    That must have convinced Ranga well enough. He nodded, gathered all three of them up in his mouth, andgiving me one more look of respectsped off. He might have had the wrong idea about my intentions, but either way, all I had left was Ifrit. Now I could fight without reservation. Forget about getting anyone else involved in this.

    Lets get this farce over with, I thought as I stared the fire giant down.

    The mes whirled violently in the air. Ifrit, before my eyes, had split himself up. Now I had multiple giants blocking my escape routes. He had some tricky talents, but I wasnt too concerned.

    My detection skills could urately tell where the fire was going. Even if the multiple Ifrits allunched attacks at the same time, I could easily determine their fires danger level from the temperature and take suitable action. I already knew that they werent all at the same level.

    I sincerely doubted that Ifrit could hit me with any kind of effective attack. But at the same time, nothing I had was sessful against Ifrit. Those mes were rough. The ground was turning into magma amid the ridiculously high temperatures. No way I could just walk across that, not unless I wanted a ss change to burnt slime.

    Now what?

    Paralyzing Breath and Poisonous Breath were effective only up to thirty feet away. My breath attacks needed to beunched within that distance of Ifrit himself, which wasnt gonna happen. I needed an attack that kept me at a safe distance while dealing a decisive blow to him. The only thing that came to mind was my new toy, Icicle Lance.

    Take this! Icicle Lance!!

    Iunched several icicles worth at the Ifrit clones and sessfully vaporized a few of them. Vaporizing with ice sounds a bit odd, but with the clouds of water vapor after the attacks struck home, that was the best way to describe it. I started getting into this little target-shooting game, knocking down the clones one by one with mynces.

    But

    By the time I thought Oh, crap! it was already toote. The moment I felt it, I was already surrounded. A wide-range barrier to trap me? One of Ifrits intrinsics?

    In an instant, there was a magic circle painted on the ground, no chanting required to cast it. I forgot I wasnt the only one who could do that. He had transformed his own body into gas and turned a hundred-yard radius into a searing-hot ocean of me. Probably one of Ifrits high-level ranged attacks, and even worse, the area was brimming with energy from the Ifrit clones I had defeated.

    re Circle!

    I heard a voice that I couldnt quite decipher. Man, woman, young, old? Hard to tell.

    There wasno escape. I was at the mercy of my enemys spell. Ifrit made me attack those clones on purpose. They were both a distraction and a way to charge up his energy.

    I mentally prepared myself for death.

    Dahh I didnt think I had let my guard down, but I couldve handled that better. And I yed right into the enemys hands, too! Totally awful.

    Maybe I shouldnt have been so self-centered. We shouldve all taken him on at once. Or maybe I couldve taken my ck wolf form, confused him with my speed, and then lunged at him, taking whatever burns I got. Or maybe a round of Dark Lightning wouldve done the trick. Sitting tight and seeing how things turned out? Not good.

    Certain other regrets also entered my mind

    Still, I knew my senses were ultrafast, but it sure was taking a while for the damage to arrive. Not that I minded a painless death, if it had to be that way

    Seriously, wasnt this going kind of slowly?

    Was he just screwing with me?

    Weird I shouldve been swallowed up by the mes a while ago.

    Hmmm?

    Understood. The effects of Resist Temperature have sessfully canceled me-based attacks automatically.

    I detected at least a bit of You forgot all about Resist Temperature, didnt you? sarcasm to the voice.

    Who asked you to speak up right now, you pile of junk?!

    Yeah. I thought I got a  in response to that little outburst.

    Hopefully that was just my imagination. The Sage had beenpletely faithful to me before now. It wasnt even self-aware. Itd be stupid to think otherwise.

    Ha-ha-ha. Im just being silly. Im sure of it!

    Now, then.

    Wait. It cancels me-based attacks? So

    Dude, I have this in the bag, dont I? Like, this is all part of the n. I pretend that Im on the ropes, then I turn the tables. Lets go with that.

    Right. Time to finish up, then.

    What was that? I shouted as I silently unraveled my Sticky Thread across Ifrits body. He was done for. My Analysis already showed that he was using Shizu for his bodys core. I couldnt have tied up a pure spirit beast like the smanders with this string, but one with a physical core was a different story.

    Next, Idbine the Sticky Thread with some Steel Thread to get the benefits of both. Another product of my experimentationand as a bonus, it adopted the same immunities I had, so it wouldnt get burned up.

    Checkmate. I know I sneered at you earlier, but you were probably sneering at me, too. Lets call it even. Youre free to hate me for this if you like.

    Im up next, right?

    Ifrit, in a panic, struggled to free himself. I expected that. But my Sticky Steel Thread was never going to let him. I took my sweet time, casually approaching.

    It was time tond the final strike. On Ifrit, the monster that had probably taken Shizus body over.

    No need for too much haste. I walked up to this iling creature, who was trying to throw every attack he could to stop me. Sadly for him, mes didnt work on me.

    Then

    Use unique skill Predator?

    Yes

    No

    Thatll be a big ol yes, please.

    A sh of bright light covered the area, then suddenly vanished.

    All that was left was a lone old woman and me.

    Was this a dream?

    My mothers hand, cold.

    Her cold eyes, gazing at me.

    A warm smile and a pile of pure white ash.

    All these memories did was torment me. I didnt want to remember them

    But that was the path I walked.

    If I hadnt run into the hero, I doubt my soul could ever have been saved But I was too awkward, too unskilled, to wind up like her. With so many people relying on me, too

    It was just that

    It had been several years since Id retired from the adventurer life. I was a full-fledged teacher, leading the next generation of our trade as I helped out the society with its work.

    The Society of Adventurers, a group that crossed borders and had grown beyond the control of any single government, had built its headquarters in the kingdom of Englesia. I was no longer an adventurer, but if there was anything I could do for them, I wanted to help them with it. It had been the society, after all, that had given me a home of sorts when I had nowhere else to go.

    There, I had a chance to teach a number of talented students. A young man with eyes that beamed withplete purity. A girl, her gaze tinged with hopelessness. More otherworlders, I assumed, just like me.

    The two of them were exact opposites in so many ways. Yuuki was a bright, optimistic boy, while Hinata was insr and reserved, as if she carried all the darkness in the world with her.

    Bandits had attacked her when she came here. At the time, I had thought that she would warm up ande around as the days passed. The bandits met their fates at the hands of some other assant, which saved Hinatas life, but Im sure the incident must have scarred her.

    I saw a bit of myself in the girl, after all. I had an affinity for her. It was apparently one-sided.

    Thank you for everything youve taught me, she said. There is nothing else I can learn from you. I doubt we will meet again. Then she turned around and left.

    I thought it might have been best to chase after her, but I couldnt will myself to leave town. The society was building a new shared-assistance program with Englesia, a new organizational structure originally proposed by Yuuki. As a former hero, I was put in the position of representing the society in the requisite negotiations. It was something I wanted to see seed, considering how it would define the societys future direction.

    So in the end, all I could do was see her off. If you ever get lost, I called to her, I want you to rely on me.

    After agonizing over it, I decided to support Yuuki over Hinata. The girl had walked a simr path to mine, but she was always far more strong willed than I was. I figured that I should believe in her. That her iron will could clear the darkness in her soul and transform her into a great woman.

    It was no great surprise when I learned, a mere few yearster, that she had risen to an important position in the Church. I felt a little proud, a little lonelyand just a tad anxious.

    Hinata isnt feeling lonesome, is she? Is she doing all right with her life?

    The questions overwhelmed me, but I figured I had no right to ask them. I once had the chance to grasp her hand, and I had refused it.

    All I could do was pray for Hinatas continued safety.

    Yuuki, on the other hand, was far more dynamic.

    It was Yuuki who built the current system for the Society of Adventurers, now renamed the Free Guild. Thanks to him, the guild was able to build a sessful cooperative rtionship with nations across the world. He had forged new treaties with governments, earning the guild positions in their topmost of councils. His efforts had made the organization more powerful than ever.

    I should have expected nothing less. Until then, every nation had been focused solely on protecting its own borders. When the Free Guild began taking on monster-dispatch duties, it lightened the loads of every other government in the world. And that wasnt all. Adventurerspeople who traveled the world, never beholden to any single countrywere obligated to file reports on their journeys. The Free Guild then coted these reports to gain a grasp of how monsters were distributed worldwide. Danger levels were assigned to every region, allowing people to travel in rtive peace.

    The system had one other major effect. Knowing where and when to expect monsters made it possible to quickly detect anomaliesletting people discover and report on monsters not seen before or eliminate hordes in short order if they grew too numerous.

    Whenever a monster that normally didnt appear in a certain region suddenly menaced a nearby town, the guild was also obliged to send an expeditionary force to figure out the cause. Getting to the root of it early on let the guild and local governments assemble a dispatch corps far more efficiently than before.

    Having this kind of organization made peoples lives both safer and morefortable. Mankind found itself expanding its cities, and the overall poption has grown rapidly in recent years. The institution of rankings assigned to monsters did much to reduce the number of deaths as well.

    For someone charged with training new recruits, nothing could have made me happier. Thanks to Yuuki, the Free Guild was now an organization that neither the nations of the world nor its people could do without.

    Yuuki, for his part, justughed it off. I was just imitating what I saw in this video game I yed, he said. Though, of course, you can do anything you want in a game. You can have monsters that say, Im not a bad slime, you knowor even have them join your party!

    He was always a joker like that. Monsters bing your friends? That sort of thing could happen only in your dreams.

    The world I was born in had almost been razed to the ground by war. Had it recovered to the point where it could create people like himpeople who never seemed to have a care in the world?

    He exined to me that these video games were childrens toys that let you experience a full story yourselfso if Japan had recovered enough to give children dreams to y with, it must have be a wonderful ce.

    So I listened to Yuukis stories, thinking to myself about a home I could never go back to.

    I continued to serve as a support for Yuuki after thatadvising him from the rear, never appearing in the forefront. The Free Guild continued to grow and became an outfit used by nearly everyone. It embraced a philosophy of rescuing the weak, essible to everyone equally.

    Then Yuuki, my very own student, became the guilds grand master, its highest position, the one who organized and oversaw the guild masters of each branch. Given everything he had done for them, I should have expected it. His efforts were the catalyst that allowed people to live at peace for a change. He had done everything he needed to. I felt the satisfaction of a job well done.

    So I decided, then, to go on a journey. A journey to take care of some regrets.

    I kept having dreams of the past, back when I was still a magic-born. It was getting hard to contain Ifrits will. Perhaps I was approaching the end of my natural life. I knew my Mask of Magic Resistance was still working as well as ever, so the reason seemed obvious.

    Once I realized that, I concluded that I had best leave town as soon as possible. I couldnt know when Ifrit would finally fall out of control, and I had no idea how my death would affect Ifrit himself.

    Plus, I wanted to retaliate against my demon lord. Just once, I wanted to have my say with him.

    So I decided to set off on my journey.

    When I told Yuuki about my ns, he silently nodded, saying nothing about them. Hopefully he was willing to forgive this one final act of selfishness. Maybe, I thought to myself, this is how the hero felt, too.

    I made my way to Blumund. Heinz was retired by now, since his son Fuze had taken over the guild masters role in his ce. We got to meet up and chat a little about old times. He had a lot to say, which I was d for.

    Remarkably, he reported that Veldora had disappeared. The guild was conducting a frantic investigation to find the cause. I dont know too many details, Heinz told me with a snicker. They dont tell an old pensioner like me too much. I can tell its troubling my son, though.

    He must have trusted Fuze well to speak of him like that, I thought. I had gone on several monster-hunting operations together with the boy, and I remembered him doing a fine job supporting me. Now he was out of the front lines and following in his fathers managerial footsteps. He must have inherited all of Heinzs natural talent.

    Thank you, I said. Youve been very kind to me.

    I shouldnt get in their way. After my polite response, I stood up.

    Was Veldoras disappearance meant to be some divine message to us? Either way, I was headed for the forest.

    You stay safe, too, Shizu! I think theres an expedition leaving here tomorrow, actually, he muttered, almost to himself. If youre hitting the forest, you might as well join them for a while.

    He didnt try to stop me. He was always an awkward fellow, and this was how he preferred to show kindness.

    Ah, Heinz, I should have expected nothing less. I suppose Ill owe you to the very end, then.

    You owe me nothing, Shizu. And no talking about the very end yet! Id like another look at you sometime.

    I could feel the warmth behind his words. True. Ill be back.

    I bowed low and left.

    The next day, I managed to run into the expedition Heinz mentioned to me. It consisted of three adventurers, and as hed told me, they were a bright, inviting group. I genuinely appreciated joining such kind people for myst journey, though their excessive carelessness did baffle me.

    There was, to say the least, a lot of trouble along our way through the Forest of Jura. I was impressed, in a way, that they had attained a ranking of B at all. They had the battle technique such a rank implied, but if I had to sum up everything about their team in a word, it would be nonsensical.

    Our journey continued on nheless, right up until they jammed a sword into a giant ant nest. I was horrified. This happened not a moment after I told them it was a bad idea, too. Never in my life did I imagine they would try something like that.

    My mes couldve torched those giant ants instantly, I imagine. But by the time I realized how hard it was to control my power, I had already started to feel my body deteriorate. It remained physically young thanks to Ifrits presence, but as my power over him dwindled, it rapidly began aging. Or, I suppose I should say it went back to the age it should always have been.

    Would Ifrit be released once my body gave in? Or would he crumble and fall apart with me? I would have no idea what would happen until it did. That was why I had set off.

    And why I hesitated to pull out my fire.

    We were lucky enough to be rescued by a passing patrol, saving us from any further trouble. But this patrol was one of the fishiest things I had ever seen.

    Being saved by monsters? Nothing like that had ever happened to me before.

    These were hobgoblins riding upon magical wolves. It would have been one thing if they understood a few broken words of human speech, but these were intelligent creatures, and they had tamed what was clearly a high-level monster species. This was absolutely the kind of suspicious event this adventuring trio had been sent out to investigate, I thought.

    My destination, meanwhile, was the castle of the demon lord Leon. His domain upied thends just beyond the forest. I should have chosen that moment to take my leave of their party. ButI dont know. I suppose I just wanted to see, along with these adventurers, what kind of home these monsters had made for themselves.

    It was a strange ce indeed, this town our rescuers lived in. It was no dankir or stinking, filthy den. A town was the only way to describe it.

    The shock I felt was beyondprehension. This wasnt some rude shelter, some glorified hole in a mountain. It was a proper town, one they had built for themselves from scratch.

    It was under construction, I should probably add. It had been surveyed andid out, and building materials had been ced in each section, ready to be converted into houses. There were no buildings yet; the monsters were still living out of neat rows of tents. But they had even started their work by focusing on the underground infrastructure. I had never heard of anything like it on this.

    It was a bizarre settlement.

    But it was bursting with energy. The residents, despite being monsters, truly seemed to enjoy working on it. Most of them were hobgoblins, but they seemed to share theirnds with the ck direwolves. A tad different from the ones I was familiar with, and I didnt think it was my imagination.

    The leader of the hobgoblins spoke very fluently to me. I imagine he was the most intelligent among them. He even prepared food for us. Remarkably, though, he turned out not to be the leader at all. Instead, he was joined by a slimeone whoy back in his lofty throne, acting as if he were king of the world. It might be odd to say a slime could lie back on anything, perhaps, but that really was the sense he exuded.

    This slime was the strangest thing of allfor he, in fact, was the leader of all these monsters.

    It was hrious.

    I couldnt help but do a spit take as he spoke. Im not a bad slime was how he chose to describe himself! Just like Yuukis video game. I began to wonder whether it was a coincidence.

    Still, there was something inviting about the space this slime created. The strange creature somehow made me recall memories of my own hometown. My heart felt full. Now I was d Id decided to step away from my intended path. This meeting, I thought, was fate at work. And yet

    The hours we spent enjoying ourselves came to a sudden halt. My life was about to expire. I had yet to reach my destinationto fulfill my goalbut here it was.

    Ifrit had been waiting for this moment. I could feel his will taking over mine. Its happening Im going to ruin all of this, too

    If only, onest time, I could just

    The titan manifested himself, all butughing at my folly.

    My consciousness faded away.

    I went to see how she was. She didnt have long. In fact, she might never regain consciousness. Still, I wanted to take care of her to the end, this fellow otherworlder human.

    The wounded adventurers all pulled through, thankfully, whining incessantly about how itd take more than hazard pay to atone for getting burned half to death.

    Hey, whats the deal with this? Elen asked. I dont see any burn scars or anything Like, my skins as soft and shiny as a baby!

    Dang, Kabal added. I didnt think Id be able to move for another week or so, too.

    Yeah, count me surprised. Thats some potion he had there!

    They were right. That potion had made all of them good as new.

    You know, though This probably means theyll turn down our request for hazard pay, doesnt it? Elen moaned.

    Yep. Nobodys gonna believe us, Kabal replied.

    Yeah, I spose so. Beats beinid up for good, though! Gidomented.

    It never took long for this trio to start bickering with one another over their own self-interested quibbles. I wondered if they ever really had a thought about anybody besides themselves. They didnt have anything against monsters, at least.

    You know, I suggested, once things calm down a little, maybe I could go visit your town.

    Oh, if thats the case, I could give the guild master a message for you!

    Just what I wanted to hear. Kabal had made my day. I looked up to adventurers, kind of. I didnt have any sort of ID papers, though, and I didnt even know whether theyd let monsters join the registry, butit could be fun.

    So Kabal promised me that I could just say the name Rimuru and the guild master would hear about it soon enough. Nice guy. I was in such high spirits that I decided to give them a farewell gifta few pieces of equipment, freshly made by the dwarven brothers. They were all test models, made with materials they had procured themselves, but the quality was respectable.

    Spider robe:

    A robe of pure white, woven with spider silk.

    Scale mail:

    Heavy armor made from the shell of a lizard. Far lighter than appearances indicate.

    Hard-leather armor:

    Made from the skins of local monsters. Magical resistance included.

    I also tossed in some food and ten recovery potions for good measure.

    Ooh! Look at this robe! Its so light, and I cant believe how sturdy it is! And pretty, too!

    Whoa! Ive always wanted some real scale mail! This Waaaait a second, did Master Garm make this?! Thisll be like a family treasure to me!

    Yeah, are you sure we can have these? This is almost too nice for the likes of me. I mean, real direwolf fur?

    It was a miniature celebration for a little while. ButI mean, the fire had torched all their equipment, and I doubted their sry would let them rece it all that easily. It wasnt exactly my fault, but I had to feel a little sympathy for them. The equipment was all prototypes, crafted before the dwarves could move on to mass production, but it was decent enough.

    Besides, look how happy they are. I was confident theyd remember to pass my name on. They were calling me boss with the rest of them, too.

    The three of them had their qualms about what happened to Shizu, but not enough to keep them from setting off again after three days of rest. They had a report to file and a looming deadline. If anything, three days was a generous amount of time to worry over a woman whod essentially shoehorned herself into their traveling party uninvited.

    Still, I promised them all that Id take care of her, and that was enough to put their minds at ease.

    A week passed before Shizu woke up again.

    Is this? Oh. Iapologize.

    Despite the transformation, she still retained all her memories.

    I was dreaming, she told me. Dreaming about the past. The city I lived in A ce I can never return to.

    Japan?

    Tell me, slime. What is your name?

    Hmm. Maybe her suddenly elderliness was affecting her memory after all. I knew I had introduced myself in her presence. Rimuru, maam, I replied.

    Shizu closed her eyes, as if thinking over something. Could you maybe tell me your real name? she said.

    She mustve known all along. I hesitated for a moment.

    Hmph, I offered. You arent long for this world anyway. Ill tell you. Its Satoru Mikami.

    My real name. A name I figured I wouldnt be using again.

    Ah. From mynd, are you? I had thought you might be. I sensed it from you. She fell silent for a moment. I had heard from my students, as well. The citys much better now? Prettier? Thest time I was there, there was nothing but fire all around me.

    Yeah. I could show you, if youd like.

    I used Thought Communication to do exactly that. Fairly useful thing to have at a time like this. I liked it.

    Ahh The sight made Shizu shed a tear. Listen, slimeor I should say Satoru, I suppose. I have a request for you. Would you mind listening to it?

    What kind of request?

    Nothing particrly doable, I was sure. But I did promise to take care of her to the end. She deserved to be heard out.

    I want you to eat me

    Um? What did this olddy just say?

    You consumed the cursethat was ced on me, did you not? Im so d to be rid of it Her voice grew quiet. I wish I had the chanceI doubt I couldve ever done it, but I wish I couldve had the chance to confront the person who ced it on me, one more time So I have just one request for youwould you let me sleep inside you?

    Something about her eyes, the resolve that she just couldnt relinquish, grabbed at me. It seemed so absurd, so cruel

    I have to tell youI have nothing but spite for this world. But I couldnt bring myself to hate it, still. Its the same as how I feel toward that man Perhaps I cant help but think of him when I look around me. Thats why I I dont want to be taken into the earth here. So please I was hoping you could eat me instead

    Hmm. Well, thats easy enough.

    Fulfilling her request would bind me, no doubt, and give me a curse of my own. I would be charged with taking on her despair and hatred.

    Was there any need to waver on that, though? If I wanted her to see the afterlife with her mind at peacethe answer was obvious.

    All right. Ill be happy to take on your feelings. And what was the name of this manthe one who hurt you?

    At the question, Shizu opened her eyes, scrunched up her burn-scarred face, and shed a few more tears. Leon Cromwell, she said. One of the strongest demon lords.

    She looked at me with pleading eyes.

    I promise! I dered. By my name as Satoru Mikami, or Rimuru Tempest, or whatever works best for you, I promise Ill make Leon Cromwell know everything you feel about him. Ill make him regret every moment!

    Thank you, she whispered, and then she closed her eyes, her breath turning shallow as she slept.

    Use unique skill Predator?

    Yes

    No

    Heres hoping youll find some peace inside me, then.

    Yes, I thought to myself, in a sort of prayer to hera hope that her dreams inside would remain happy forever. With no more rude awakenings.

    Tap, tap, tap, tap

    She looked up, her face bearing the innocence of youth. Relief spread across it as a smile emerged on her face.

    Well, there you are! Dont leave me alone like that again, all right?

    But the figure shook its head before pointing at something far away. The girl turned toward it, her expression suddenly clouded with doubtful sadness.

    There she found

    Mom!!

    A burst of happiness rushed through her entire body as she rushed toward her mother. The figure watched her trot off for a momentthen disappeared, as if nothing had ever upied the space at all. Perhaps it was just an illusion crafted by the girls memories.

    Thus, the girl was reunited with her mother.

    It marked the end of what had been a long, long journey.

 Volume 1 - Ch 5

    FINAL CHAPTER

    THE INHERITED FORM

    Shizu was gone nowgone, after giving me one final goal to strive for.

    Up to now, I hadrgely taken things as theyd arrived, fighting to keep my head above water. Now, though, I had a motivation to gather some intel on this demon lord guy. It was a job I readily epted, but it was also a promise. And Im a man who keeps his promises.

    Besides, I wasnt empty-handed. She left me with a few new abilitiesthe unique skill Deviant and the extra skill Control me.

    Oh, right. I ate Ifrit, too, didnt I?

    He wasnt much of a match for me, but it turned out he was a tough characterrated beyond an A, in fact. No way some snake or wolf could handle him, to be sure, given that none of their attacks could even faze him. It took a lot to make it past an A, and now I could see why.

    There was still a lot of research to be done on my abilities. But! Before that! There was something even more important I needed to check up on.

    Thats righttransforming into an actual person!

    I ventured inside the new tent the hobgobs had set up for me, making doubly sure to have all visitors turned away before I closed the door.

    Heh-heh-heh Hah-hah Ah-ha-ha-ha-hah! Three levels ofughing, and then

    Transform!

    It wasnt apanied by any cool sound effects, but I executed Mimic: Human on myself nheless. But

    Huh? Whoa, whoa, whoa.

    There was none of the usual ck smoke I was expecting. What the heck? I thought, as I realized that my field of vision was only a little higher than usual.

    I had grown arms and legs, and my usual light-blue shade had morphed into a flesh tone.

    Hmmmm? I wasnt sure what had happened, but something told me it wasnt what I had nned. I didnt have a mirror on hand, which was a pain. But

    I kinda didnt want to admit it, but I actually was familiar with this form after all. It was from a long time ago, maybe thirty years or so.

    This was how the world looked to me back when I was still bumbling around in elementary school.

    Hang on a sec. I was too excited to notice at first, but there was one key difference.

    It wasnt there.

    My should-have-been newly born manhood, that is, which I was expecting to see down below. It wasnt there! What the hell? I internally shuddered as I took another close look at my crotch. It only confirmed the worst. It was smooth as the hypothetical babys bottom.

    Thinking back, this wasnt something I had bothered to check up on when transforming into other monster types. But I supposed it made sense. If I never had to eliminate waste from my body, what use would I have for the associated organs? And if I didnt need to reproduceI was still fuzzy on that, but if I didnt, then why bother with genitals at all?

    That was just who I was now, was all. It was strangely convincing, even as it drove me into a deep sense of mourning.

    Suddenly, I was taken by an urge to touch the top of my head. I felt soft hair up there. It made me breathe a sigh of relief. At least I wasnt shaped like a space alien! Thats a step forward! And,e to think of it, I was a giant ball of fur in wolf form. I dont even want to imagine what thatd look like without hair. Nope. Thats a dangerous line of thought.

    Really, though, I thought Id keep a cooler head than this. Why was I letting myself get in such a panic? Id just have to ept the truth about what happened down there. It was hard to swallow, but at least I wasnt a slime any longer.

    Too bad I cant check up on my whole body, I thought. What about the Replication skill I just picked up from Ifrit? Seemed like a nice idea. Good job, me. I didnt know if itd work, but it was worth a shot.

    ck mist darted out of my body, forming a human figure in front of me. Looked like it was a sess after all. It waspleted in an instant, only to reveal

    Oh, crap. Bad news.

    First off, my appearance. The hair was a silvery gray with a light tinge of blue to it, topping off a pair of wide-open eyes and a charming, young Feminine? Masculine? Theck of genitals made it fairly irrelevant, but in terms of appearance, I looked closer to a girl than a boy. This was probably thanks to Shizu; there were no features that I could identify as my own.

    But it wasnt a perfect recreation of Shizus genes, either. The hair color was one thing, but the golden eyes were quite another. Veldora had gold eyes, too, which was amon trait among the higher monsters, perhaps. And hang on, didnt Rangas eyes go from a blood red to gold as well? Although they also changed depending on his excitement level. Still, maybe they changed because of my influence on him as his name giver.

    Either way, nothing about this form was from me. In this world, the only thing that was truly mine was my soul, it seemed. This was mostly Shizu, and man, she mustve been one darling little girl My skin was tremendously smooth, too, with none of the rubbery bounciness of my slime form.

    So this cute girl was just standing there in front of me, butt naked. Not that there was anything that really required hiding, but it still presented certain ethical issues. If the police existed here, which they didnt, Id be in serious trouble.

    But that face was cute. I had to hand it to Shizu. She was blessed with a lot of gifts. I wasnt too hideous when I was young, either, but nobody would ever describe me as beautiful, no matter how much I padded my memories.

    I really have to thank her, I thought to myself as I wrapped a nket around my body, taking the time to hand one to my doppelgnger. Now I really needed to figure out some clothing.

    Right. Back to the main topicthe real reason I thought Oh, crap at first. That all came down to this human forms abilities.

    Something I hadnt considered with this replica of mine before actually conjuring it was that my enhanced thought processes allowed me aplete, real-time link with my copy. It and I were both me in a waythere were no appreciable differences between us. If anything, Ifrits Replication skills couldnt hold a candle to minehis copies were clearly imitations, but mine wasnt at all.

    All right. Almost not at all. One big difference was my copys capacity for magiculesit held only whatever I cast upon it when creating it, although I was free to install more inside if I wanted to. I had a fair amount of magic to work with, so depending on the application, I could probably do a lot with it. The other issue was that, while Ifrit could generate ten or so copies without breaking a sweat, my Replication skills were so intricate and detail oriented that a single copy was the best I could manage.

    Still, I could make a copy of myself with all the same attack and defense abilities. Any foe who ran into this skill would think I was cheating.

    The third and final oh, crap reason: the way it seemed so breezily natural to me, taking this form. That was something I noticed when I realized no dark mist had surrounded my body.

    Take my ck wolf form, for instance.

    I definitely used the mist to create that form, although it made for weaker resultspared to my slime self.

    It was hard to notice thanks to the limited movement avable to a form without limbs, but a slimes cells were powerful thingseach one could serve as a muscle cell or a brain cell or a nerve cell. See the streamlining effect this makes? Seeing things with the eyes, rying the information to the nervous system, bringing it to the brainI could skip all of that. Even without the Sages upgrading effects, my reaction speed was far above the average persons.

    Transforming with the ck mist, however, created a slight timeg between thinking something and moving my body in reaction to it. That, I figured, was what made the replication inferior, if anything, to the real thing.

    As for this mist-free human transformation?

    You guessed itit had the exact same reaction speed as my regr slime form. No wonder it felt so natural. Having limbs also improved my mobility immensely. Even in child form, it was so much easier to get around than as a slime, although it tired me out more quickly.

    The biggest thing, though, was that theck of ck-mist usage meant turning human cost me zero magic. Talk about convenient! I figured Id be taking this form for most of my future activity.

    It was time to try something else. I gave an order to my replicaand it was a totally smooth process, just like moving my own body. ck mist welled around itand the copy began maturing! A trim figure; long, flowing gray hair; and an androgynous sort of appearance. Perfect! I could then mold this figure to look more feminine or masculinego all macho, or obese, or in the prime of my life, or elderly.

    As I soon discovered, I could transform into all kinds of figuresusing magic to cover for anything I didnt have, just like with monster transformations. That might be a good way to give me some more strength as a human. It hurt my reaction times, but the bigger I was, the more powerful itd make me. Speed was the most important element of any battle, I knew, but striking a good bnce was something I could experiment with in the days toe.

    And so Satoru Mikami, an average middle-aged man living a perfectly unexceptional life, came to enjoy his unexpected reincarnation as a slime. After acquiring the form and the emotions of a certain woman, he also gained a mission in his new life.

    And before long, this single slime named Rimuru would y a central role in some of the most tumultuous times this world had ever seen.

 Volume 1 - Epilogue

    AFTERWORD

    Hello there! Fuse here. First of all, Id like to thank you for picking up this book.

    This volume is a heavily revised, rewritten, and expanded version of a story originally released on the web. This work, as Im sure some of you know, is still being released on , a Japanesenguage website for online novelists and storytellers. The side story and other extra material in this particr book are all original to this volume, crafted for followers of the web version to enjoy.

    If this is apletely new tale to you, Id like to suggest that you check out the web version as well. The main plot is the same between both versions, but youll also find a fair number of differences here and there, so I imagine it could be fun topare the two for yourself.

    This is the first time Ive ever written an afterword, and figuring out what I should write in it has made me slightly nervous. As a result, I suppose I should write a word or two of thanks to the original forces that brought this book to life.

    First, thanks go out as always to the people that read and supported this story on the web. Your reviews and thoughts gave me a great deal of strength.

    Thank you, Mitz Vah, who provided the wonderful illustrations for this book and gave so much life and motion to all the storys many characters. Im sure Ill be making lots more selfish requests to you going forward, but I hope youll be willing to put up with it.

    Thank you, Mr. I, the editor who first approached me about making a print edition. If it werent for his passion, this volume never wouldve been released.

    Finally, thank you to everyone who purchased this book. If you read through That Time I Got Reincarnated as a Slime and liked it, nothing could make me happier.

    With that, I hope to continue having you read my stories. Thanks again, everyone!

 Volume 2 - Prologue

    What he saw was a king eternally tormented. A lone, anguished figure, his heart reaching out to his starving people, but all too incapable of doing anything to help them.

    Thend had dried and withered, killing off their crops and triggering a massive famine. Just past the border, other nations were still prospering, bountiful. But there was no going there. It was the territory of the demon lord, and setting foot on it would be rebelling against the master of thisnd himself. No need to wait for starvation to take them then. He would kill them all before that happened.

    Thend they lived on was surrounded by a great forest and three different territories, each with its own demon lord serving as leader. It would be impossible for a horde of low-caste monsters like them to invade from any direction. Which left only one option.

    A little beyond the border, the foresty undisturbed. It was only natural that the king would turn to it for a chanceany chanceat survival.

    Im starving

    I need something Anything

    His people fell one by one, screaming their unheard pleas. Their numbers werent shrinkingif anything, they were multiplying. The starvation had stoked the peoples natural instinct to protect their species, resulting in a spike in the birth rate. It only made things worse.

    They had never seen the king smile, even as he distributed his own rations to the children who needed it most. Still, judging by their frail bodies and lifeless eyes, they would surely be dead the next day.

    Then the kingmitted a truly taboo act. He gave his own flesh, his own blood, to the one child he had left. And who could have prevented him from attempting to fulfill this all-too-fleeting dream? All he wanted was to save, at the very least, his own family.

    It was a crime that no one was able to warn him away from such an act. He couldnt. He saw a world where no one ever ate their fill. And every night, he had the same dream. The king, a gruesome sight on the floor, and a child innocently chewing away at his innards. He wanted someone to helpto deliver them from thisyer of hell, one that nobody saw any end to.

    That desire was firm in his chest as today, like any other day, began.

 Volume 2 - Ch 1

    THE START OF THE MAYHEM

    The rage in Rangas snarl was palpable. As if chiding him, two ogres, one with blue hair and one with ck, leaped in response.

    A momentter, a shock wave formed a crater in the earth, sending piles of dirt and mud into the sky. The st from Rangas Voice Cannon held enough power to atomize a group of goblins on the spot. But it would only work, of course, if it actually struck the ogres.

    The dodge did not unnerve Ranga. He was proud of his abilities, but seeing them avoided was the least of his concerns at the moment. He sprang off the ground, hoping to end any tandem attack from the blue- and ck-hairs before they could unleash it.

    They were both still in the air, and Ranga took aim at the ck ogre, reasoning this was the weaker of the two. Putting one out of the picture would rob them of the teamwork they seemed to be counting on in this battle.

    Ranga was halfway toward realizing his goal. What he failed to notice was that he had more than two opponents. The moment he was in the air, a wall of fire suddenly appeared before him. It resembled the spiritual magic conjured by shamans, but it was a different typea so-called mystic art, part of the family of illusory magic. Mastering such aplex spell indicated exactly how advanced these ogres werenot some rabble living primarily off instinct, but those capable of learning and acting on reason, like the human race.

    The me Wall blocking Rangas path was not particrly harmful, but it did allow the caster to fully block a single enemy attack. Conjuring such a shield in front of an advancing foe could also serve as a smoke screen, earning the caster precious time to formte a n.

    And that tactic seeded. Losing his target, Ranga was forced tond back on the ground.

    He didnt enjoy engaging with such foes, who used tricks and feints to avoid a frontal assault at all costs. The illusory spell Confusion, cast at the start of battle, had also knocked his keen sense of smell off-line. At least the effects had not fully incapacitated him yetthough it had taken out most of hispanions in battle, unable to resist the magic strike. The only ones who managed to fend it off were Rigur, head of the security team, and Gobta, Rigurs right-hand man. The rest of the dozen or so hobgoblins that had been summoned here by an emergency call during a hunting runalong with their tempest wolfpanionswere now de facto out of the battle.

    Ranga resentfully stared down the wall of me and the pink-haired ogre caster who had taken out his friends. There were six foes in allsix ogres, higher caste among the residents of the Forest of Jura. They were nothing to sniff at in battlenot the ck- and blue-haired ogres Ranga attempted to engage, nor the purple-haired ogress Rigur was tangling with, nor the gray-haired ogre elder Gobta was fending off. Certainly not the magic-wielding pink-haired one, so effortlessly giving herpanions a magical advantage, nor the red-haired ogre standing next to her, surveying the scene.

    Not a one could be left to their own devices for a single moment. They were working as a team to fight Ranga and his friends, a strategy no unintelligent race would employ. Easily B rank or higher, by the looks of things. Rigur and Gobta, as stout as they were, couldnt hold out for long.

    If only my master, Rimuru, were here

    Ranga snickered at himself over the thought. Relying on his master like that would be unthinkable. Then, as if wiping away any weakness in his body, he howled with the full conviction needed for the decision he had to make.

    Peace had returned to the vige, and the hobgoblins had been acting remarkably calm andposed despite the Ifrit attack that leveled the ce.

    The biggest surprise, I suppose, was how much of a born leader Rigurd, my newly appointed goblin king, turned out to be. Much more than I wouldve guessed. He had done a splendid job leading the work teams as they rebuilt the vige while I watched after Shizu. Among Kaijin, the three dwarf brothers, and the four goblin lords, everyone seemed to be sticking to their duties, working efficiently for the other vigers.

    Really, I didnt need to do much besides offer a couple words of advice. Overseeing our food supply was Rigur, whenever he wasnt busy handling security. Garm, oldest of the dwarves, was responsible for clothing; Dold, the next oldest, for making tools; and Mildo, the youngest, for home construction. All production was overseen by Kaijin, while Lilina, one of the goblin lords, managed our inventory ofpleted goodsthats how I figured wed split the responsibility.

    The remaining goblin lordsRugurd, Regurd, and Rogurdbecame my ministers of justice, legition, and administration respectively, all aiding Rigurd with keeping the local government together. Minister of legition sounds like a highfalutin job, but all it really involved was taking whatever I blurted out and trying to turn it into coherentw. Simple, really.

    These were more intelligent monsters than before, but they were still monsters. When someone stronger than them was around, they listened, mostly. So for the time being, everything was going pretty smoothly. No big problems on the road to building a new country.

    But I had other things on my mind anyway. I had this human body now, and I wasnt too hot on draping rough animal pelts over it. So I decided to have someone make me some proper clothes.

    Being a slime had proven to be quite useful, here and there, but it had its disadvantages. Apart from certain magical items, I was unable to wear any armor or, you know, grip a weapon. And slimehood itself didnt suck, but being naked (so to speak) could potentially lead to problems. What if I got a paper cut on a leaf or twig or something as I was going through the forest, and then some kind of poison or virus infected me? It pays to be careful, and I figured some actual armor would assuage any anxiety I had about that. I had just about given up on it unless I was able to find just the right magic item, but now that I could turn into a human, the world was my oysterand the dwarves were making all kinds of stuff from the magical ingredients they seized from monsters after a hunt.

    So I paid a visit to Garm, hoping to at least acquire a childs-size outfit. He was stationed at our little clothing factory, a log cabin that hade into being when I wasnt paying attention, and he was overseeing a small team of goblinas as they sewed away.

    Yo, Garm! I could use some clothing for myself.

    Uh, you sure about that, boss? How are you nning to wear it?

    Heh-heh-hehheh-heh Haaaa-ha-ha-ha! Thats what youve got to say? If you think I was nning to be a slime forever, youve got another thinking, man! Haaaahhhh!!

    Wh-wha?! Youregrowing? Well, not too much actually, huh? Were you a child all along, or?

    Eesh, I was hoping for a little more shock and awe Ah well. I can be full-size, too, but this is a lot easier. So could you make an outfit thatd fit?

    Oh, sure, sure. Mind if I take some measurements? Hey, Haruna, lets get the boss all measured up!

    I was naked, of course, but I didnt let that bother me as Haruna the goblina came up with a measuring rope. I was just a child, after all, and my body was genderless.

    Oh my! she eximed, blushing a little. Youve be so cute, my lord!

    Cute? I mean, I personally thought so, yes, but did that still apply when it was a goblins worldview? And for that matter, did monsters have aesthetic standards like mine? If you went way down the food chain, they were rted to fairies, so perhaps their tastes were closer to mine than I gave them credit for.

    So Haruna measured me, Garm told me toe back in a few days, and that was it. Having nothing more pressing to do, I decided to test out the skills I had obtained a bit ago.

    If I wanted to y with my new toys in peace, I needed somece where people wouldnt show up and bother me. I could only experiment so much inside my own tent, which prevented me from unleashing too much power.

    So I told Rigurd Id be out, ordered him to make sure nobody followed me, and moved offfrom the center of the vige to the Sealed Cave. It was the ce I first met Veldora, inside his vast underground spacepretty sturdily built andpletely devoid of other people. Even the caves monsters didnt dare draw near, as they were still so afraid at even the thought of Veldora.

    Once I arrived, I got straight to business. Consuming Shizu had earned me the unique skill Deviant and the extra skill Control me, both attacks that were already heavily associated with her in my memories. Beyond that, I had Ifrits trio of moves: Replication, me Transform, and Ranged Barrier. I had already used Replication to check out my human form, so that seemed to work well enough.

    So what to try first? Might as well start with Ifrit this time. First off, me Transform.

    Oops! Turns out that doesnt work in slime form. That wasnt the first time a skill was shut away from me due to some sort of ipatibility. I was starting to wonder what the reasoning for that was.

    Understood. Ifrit is a spirit, a being who lives off spiritual energy. Its me Transform uses its own body as a source of magical energy to unleash its full force. It thus cannot be used while in physical form.

    Mmm? So I cant cast it if Im still made of flesh or whatever? Would it work if I went into ck-mist mode and gave myself a magical body, then? Lets try it out.

    I turned myself into Ifrit and attempted to use it. This time, it worked without problem, although my corethe thing that houses me didnt seem to transform at all.

    So I needed to be magical, then, to make it work. But that didnt mean I had to turn into Ifrit himself, necessarily, right? I turned myself into a grown figure and tried me Transform once more. This time, me extended out from the tips of my fingers and toes.

    That seemed to prove it. I couldnt work it very much in regr form, but if I temporarily made myself magical in style, at least, I could manage the me Transform well enough. And at temperatures upward of 1,200 degrees Celsius, too, just like Ifrit. Whats more, I could focus the magic on particr areas for extra heat.

    As an attack, it seemed pretty powerful. The only issue was that Id have to use it inside a barrier; otherwise the energy outflow would be so huge Id immediately drain myself of magic. It was hard to regte. Id need some more practice.

    Good thing I had Control me, too; that ought to help keep me out of trouble. Spiritual creatures like Ifrit couldntst long in the physical world thanks to all the magic they ate up, but with my physical form and Control me, a little practice should allow me to cap and unleash the mes as needed.

    That brought me to Ranged Barrier. This skill locked the heat of mes within a barrier, which I presumed prevented heat energy from leaking outand, as my theory went, allowed spirits to manifest themselves for longer without wasting magic. Another unique property was that it contained certain physical durability, in case you wanted to keep anyone inside the barrier.

    I thought of ways I could use this. Thergest barrier I could make with it extended out in a semicircle three hundred feet or so in diameter, although it didnt affect anything beneath the grounds surface. I could shrink it down until it was covering nothing but my own body, which didnt reduce its effect at all and kept magic consumption at a minimum. This free control meant I could wear it like a sort of light protectiveyer. It could also prevent magic leakage during a me Transformnot that it would be much help, given that the mes never went beyond the barrier itself.

    So was heat leakage kind of like losing energy? Was that the reason it sapped my magic?

    Understood. me Transform consumes magicules and generates warmth in order to preserve a certain level of heat. The conversion of magic to heat means that leakage of either one essentially causes the same result.

    All right. I think I understand, a little. So if I keep the mes locked inside the seal, I dont have to waste any energy because itll stay active without any further work? Im pretty sure what I learned in physics ss on Earth said something a tad different, butheyNewton didnt have to theorize anything about magic over there. He had it easypared to me. If I started asking questions like How does it fully enclose the fire? or Wont it burn out once it consumes all the oxygen in the barrier? I wouldnt get anywhere in this world.

    Besides, for now, the me Transform wasnt as important as the Ranged Barrier as a form of self-defense. Would that work if I had it cover me alone, a form I decided to just call my Barrier for brevitys sake? I had the perfect skill to test that with. Yep: Time for another Replication.

    I had been a little reticent to test certain aspects of my skill set, just in case I damaged myself in the process, but Replication provided an efficient answer for that. My copies, after all, had the exact same abilities I did, except for the unique skills. Those were exclusive to me, I guess, and while I could have my copies use those while they were close by, once they went out of my sight, that was it for uniques. All except for my consuming skills, which were closely entwined enough with my slime identity that even my copies could use them a little.

    As long as I was half a mile or so away from my copies, I had full control over them. Anything beyond that, and they wouldnt be able to parse anything except for very simplemands. I still had an insight into their line of view, however, and my Thought Communication skill let me give newmands anytime I wanted. The perfect spy tool, in other words, but that was beside the point of this test run.

    So I created a clone of myself and cast a Barrier on it. Then I shot one of my Water des at it. It was sharp as a knifeI could see that much as it ripped through the airbut it shattered into nothing in front of my copy. A perfect block by the Barrier. Pretty strong, then. Just like I expected.

    I then tried practicing to see if I could fire off Water des while keeping the Barrier on myself. That turned out to be simpler than I thought. I just had to create a little jet shooter out of my finger and fire away. These shots, in turn, would be enclosed in their own miniature Barrier, a bit like arge soap bubble splitting into two smaller ones. That these tiny force fields expanded the des strength and range was another unexpected benefit.

    The testing continued with Poisonous Breath and Paralyzing Breath, and along the way, I realized that taking damage while under a Barrier consumed my magic. Not with Paralyzing Breaththe Barrier did a fine job absorbing thatbut Poison Mist drained it immediately, dismantling the whole Barrier once the magic was gone. Of course, this also meant that as long as I charged up the Barrier with enough magic, it would provide some temporary poison protection.

    I applied more magic to the next barrier and ced it on my clone. A few more shots of Poison Mist confirmed itthe more magic Iid on, the longer the Barrier would hold up. It proved to be pretty damn durable, in fact. Even more so if the Barrier was covering the original instead of a clone, I assumed, to the point that Poison Miststyle attacks were likely nothing to worry about. Now thats armor I could count on.

    The final experiment of the day involved using me Transform alongside Ranged Barrier. The results werefascinating.

    Damn right its A rank. At least.

    A me Transform inside a re Circle barrier would expose anything organic inside the barrier to several thousand degrees of heat, scorching them instantly. Being confined to a restricted space did wonders for the attacks strength. It cooked the very air itself, robbing it of all oxygen and searing the lungs of its victims before they knew what had happened. Any creature who breathed air would face little chance of survival.

    I didnt have to worry about breathing, of course, and my Resist Temperature tolerance would take care of me anyway. For anyone else, though, it was a death sentence. In a way, it was a relief. Without a body that just happened to be so adaptable to Ifrits attacks, my chances of victory would have been pretty slim.

    Still, this was another overpowered skill, and Id need to deliberate over it a bit more. Shizu had a Cancel me Attack tolerance, perhaps a side effect of merging with Ifrit. This kept her safe from fire strikes or extremely hot environmentsa bit like my Resist Temperature, except without the cold protection, although it offered even more instion against heat. Cancel must have been a higher level than Resist in this hierarchy, and considering Resist Temperature was already an upgraded tolerance, Cancel me Attack mustve provided a fantastic amount of protection.

    So all and all, the experiments bore a lot more fruit than expected. Nothing I couldve learned inside my own tent; I wouldve torched the vige immediately.

    Happy with the results, I returned to the vige. I didnt need sleep, but replenishing my magicule stores was vital, and rest was the best way to do that. Id had enough of being forced into sleep mode, and it was never a good idea to overdo things anyway. No need to panic. I had all the time in the world.

    The next day, I stopped by Garms cabin for a fitting session. They were still stitching up my outfit, but Haruna had some mass-manufactured armor and clothing for me to try on.

    Oh my! It looks quite good indeed, my lord.

    It felt like she was ying dress-up with me somewhat, like a child and her doll, but Haruna and her coworkers seemed to love it, so I let it slide. We found an outfit in their equipment that fit perfectly, so I went with that for the time being. It was basically the same as the rest of the hobgoblins wear, but it felt surprisinglyfy. Garm must have been pretty good with his hands, after all.

    Hmm, I said, not bad. Easy to move in, and it looks sturdy enough.

    Ha-ha-ha! d to hear it, boss. Just you wait until your own custom outfits all wrapped up!

    I was starting to look forward to it. I had given him the skin from the boss direwolf I dispatched a while ago, so in terms of fashion and function, it ought to be first-rate.

    I stepped out of Garms workshop with great anticipation, still in child form since there was no reason to abandon my new outfit just yet. I was expecting a few arched eyebrows, but everyone passing by immediately smiled and opened the road to me. They must have recognized me all the same, which I was pondering when I ran into Rigurd out surveying the scene.

    Hey, Rigurd. Things going well?

    Ah, Sir Rimuru! He beamed back at me, instantly making out who I was. Things could hardly be going better, and we all have you to thank for it!

    So you can tell who I am? Im not in slime form.

    Ha-ha-ha! Of course, my lord! The elegance you project from every pore of your body is unmistakable!

    So now I was just projecting how awesome I was, whether I intended to or not. Not an aura, but justsheer ss? Perhaps my naming them all had something to do with it, but regardless of the reason, I didnt care as long as people knew who I was.

    With that concern out of the way, I decided to stage another experimental session down at the cave, telling Rigurd not to bother me unless it was an emergency. I was working with some rather potent offense again that day, and I didnt want to put anyone in danger.

    Yes, my lord! By the way, I imagine you have no need for food today?

    The question made me give Rigurd a thoughtful look. Oh! Of course! Why did I forget about that? Ive got this lovely new human body, and I havent even tried eating anything yet!

    Actually, hold on. I think Im going to eat with you guys starting today.

    Y-you will , my lord?! Another beaming smilewhich always looked a bit threatening from hobgoblins, but it wasnt their fault. Well, we must hold a feast today to celebrate the asion! I will instruct Lilina to prepare a sumptuous spread for us all!

    I was just as happy as he was. I didnt feel hungry, no, but it would technically be the first solid food Id had in ages. It was exciting.

    A distance away from the vige, I stumbled upon Rigur and Gobta.

    Hey, I said. I guess theres a party at the vige today, so try to hunt down something tasty for Lilina, would you? Im capable of eating food now, so lets make this an evening to remember!

    Ah, Sir Rimuru! Rigur eximed. Is that so? Well then, I will provide the most sulent cowdeer I can!

    Cowdeer? Cowdeer? The name made it easy to imagine the sort of animal he was talking about. People around here seemed to dig it. I was starting to seriously look forward to this.

    By the way, Sir Rimuru, to what do we owe the asion of your new appearance?

    Heh-heh-heh! How kind of you to notice, Gobta! Life as a slime is pretty easy for me, but going around as a human aint too shabby, either. It offers a lot moremand over the five senses than I enjoyed as a slime, for one. Taste, in particr. That, and this form makes it easier for me to interact with you guys.

    I had already reproduced all my old senses pretty well except for taste in slime form, but being a human still felt morenatural, somehow. Although being a slime was second nature at this point.

    Oh, I see! Gobta shouted. I would like to interact with you, too, Sir Rimuru, but I do prefer more curves, sir!

    Thats not what I meant by interacting, you idiot!

    I rewarded his observation with a reverse roundhouse kick. My body moved exactly as I instructed it, which meant my right foot struck home in the pit of his stomach. The pain caused him to pass out, and really, I couldnt think of any better medicine for such a fool.

    My apologies, Sir Rimuru. I ensure you I will instill some discipline in Gobtater.

    Sure. Im not that offended. But thanks in advance for the meat.

    But of course! Weve had a number of herds migrating from deeper within the forest, so the pickings are quite good. We wont let you down!

    Oh? Something up in the forest?

    Indeed, we asionally seerge-scale migrations of magical beasts, due to changes in habitat or other factors. I doubt it is anything serious, but we are stepping up our patrols.

    That struck me as odd. He was probably rightitd be nothingbut you always need to stay a step ahead on these things. So I summoned Ranga and assigned him to sentry duty with Rigurd and his team. Nothing he couldnt handle, I was sure.

    In a moment, Ranga stepped out from my shadow. I was capable of summoning him nowmy pride forbade me from being unable to do something Gobta could handle with such ease. I had been practicing on the sly for a while.

    You called, Sir Rimuru?

    I did. I want you to join Rigurds team in the forest. I doubt youll see anything, but if you do, keep the team safe.

    Yes, my lord. I will make it so. His face was meek and docile, but his tail was wagging like mad, as if nothing pleased him more than being bossed around. He was back to normal size nowwhich still meant he was six and a half feet tall, or thereaboutsso the wagging didnt kick up any gale-force winds, at least. I was d to see he was listening to my training.

    Keep a close eye out, Ranga. And if you see anything, Rigur, let me know.

    Ha-ha-ha! There is hardly a thing to worry about, Sir Rimuru. I hope you have a hearty appetite worked up!

    He was right. Maybe I was overthinking it. Ranga was at least a B-plus in terms of strengthmaybe even an A-minus by now. His ss was on the upper end of what you saw in the Forest of Jura. Hed be fine. The thought of all that roasted fantasy-monster meat in my mouth was making my brain catastrophize over nothing.

    Ill be sure I do. Ill be in the cave, so let me know if somethinges up.

    Then I nodded at Rigur and left.

    The excitement was welling within me all the way to the cave. Actual roast meat! There was no way I could expect much from hobgoblin haute cuisine, but if all they were doing was grilling up some meat and nts and such, what could go wrong? They probably wouldnt season it with much apart from salt, but oh well.

    But hold on. Do they bother adding any seasoning at all? I hadnt thought about it, since I had no sense of taste. Theyve got to use salt, at least. Maybe I should find some rock salt and build a little supply for myself, just in case.

    The Analysis skill provided by the Great Sage let me track down some rocks with salt content in them. Predation let me suck it in and extract the salt, and I just tossed the rest. Couldnt be easier.

    Though was it really all right to use my skills for stuff like this? Hmm. It has to be. Whats the harm in using the tools I have?

    So with the salt in hand Oh wait, I was testing out my skills, wasnt I? I was so distracted by the uing feast that I lost track of my original mission. I shook the cobwebs out of my head as I headed for yesterdays underground cavern.

    Today, I wanted to try my hand at some Control me maneuvers.

    It was, as one would expect, an extra skill to control me. You could build up your bodys temperature and the ambient heat in the palm of your hand, focus it on a single fingertip, or just whip up a campfire on the ground wherever you liked, no actual wood or kindling required.

    That, however, was it. Hence, why its an extra skill. Nothing that powerful. I couldnt, like, set my finger on fire or shoot mes from my palms. I thought I could maybe release the heat from my fingertip like a sci-fiser rifle, but I was sorely disappointed. And forget about triggering explosions like Shizu did with ease. She was probably fusing this with some of her own magic to do that.

    Hang on. Fusing with magic?

    Suddenly, the me Transform I had worked on the day before came to mind. Back there, I had changed my form into a grown adult and infused my own body with that skillbut as Id thought about it overnight, I realized I could try working me Transform on my internal magic stores instead. For spirit beings, me Transform turned their body into energy waves, but I figured there was no rule that said I had to use it that way.

    For example, what if I released some magic and worked me Transform on that? And if I could then take the results over with Control me

    Received. It is possible tobine the Mimic aspect of your Predator unique skill, me Transform, the extra skill Control me, and the unique skill Deviant. Execute?

    Yes

    No

    Hee-hee-heeeee. Just like I thought. Yes it is, then.

    Pretty surprising to find this unexpected quirk of Deviant, before I even had a chance to fully examine it. I felt like Id been introduced to some new kinka bit guiltily, but at the same time, I was just beginning to realize the extent of this new world.

    Report. me Transform and the extra skills Control me and Control Water will disappear following thebination. In its ce, you will have earned Dark me and the extra skill Control Particles. Resist Temperature will also evolve into Cancel Temperature. This will eliminate the extra skill Cancel me Attack.

    I gave the order, and the Sage did the rest. The results let me earn a new skill far more easily than I wouldve guessed. Losing Control Water along the way was a regret, but I figured it was because I could do the same thing with Control Particles well enough. Time to try em out.

    Dark me was a skill that let me release mes from my body whenever I focused my internal magic force. I created a field of magic, transformed it into me, thenunched it awaythus, creating fire from thin air. I could also adjust the temperature based on how much magic I used.

    If I wanted to grab someones head and immediately encase it in mes, itd be possible (albeit a tad toasty). If I wanted to focus the mes on my palm and shoot them off, no problem. Basically, I pictured it as gathering a bunch of magicules in a single ce, setting them on fire, then releasingsomewhat like how my Water des worked.

    I fired a shot of this at a nearby boulder. It immediately burst into mesand judging by how the surface was literally melting, it had to be pushing 1,500 degrees again, about the same as with me Transform. What a weapon Ive stumbled upon. I could probably get it even hotter, depending on how much magic I crammed into it, and if I worked it on arger scale, maybe I could trigger an evenrger explosion. Better practice that. Never know when I might need it.

    Now I could work these mes however I wanted without thinking too deeply about it, and I suppose I had Control Particles to thank for that. Working the magicules around me allowed me to control the paths of other molecules in the air, creating heat from the resulting friction. Since I was controlling magic to move these particles around, I could boost the temperature simply by using a little more force.

    It hade all too easily, but Control Particles was a fearsome tool to add to my arsenal. The Great Sage attempted to exin the ability over the course of several minutes, using all kinds of unfamiliar jargon and logic, but I cut it off. It was indecipherable, a total waste of time. I figured it would handle the details for me anyway.

    More interesting was that now I could apparently control the very air molecules around me. My understanding of Dark me was that it transformed magicules into me to create searing temperatures, but if I could make any sort of molecules rub against one another for simr effects, could I use that to create electricity, perhaps? Like, say, what if I linked Dark Lightning up with Control Particles?

    Received. It is possible to link Dark Lightning with the extra skill Control Particles. Execute?

    Yes

    No

    Looks like I was right. Yes , I thought to myselfand with that, the skill Dark Thunder was mine. This, by andrge, gave me ess to Dark Lightningtype skills without the need to transform my body into a Twilight Starwolf, as well as adjust its strength to some extent. The wolves could use the dual horns on their heads to fine-tune the intensity and range of their attacks, but Dark Thunder eliminated the need for all that.

    I tried summoning some electricity between my thumb and pointer. An arc of bluish-white energy danced between them. Just like with Dark Lightning, I could freely control its size and force with the amount of supernatural energy and magicules I usedfrom a light, paralyzing jolt to a vaporizing thunderp.

    Honestly, this Control Particles stuff was getting a little godlike. It was nothing all that exciting by itself, but when paired with other skills, it turned into a juggernaut.

    Although, really, it was my Sage unique skill that was creating all this, alongside the Deviant skill that Shizu left for me. If it werent for that, then

    Hey, what kind of skill is Deviant anyway?

    Received. The unique skill Deviant is capable of the following

    To sum up what the Sage told me, Deviants effects could be broadly divided into two categories.

    Synthesize:

    Transform two differing targets into a single object.

    Separate:

    Release the properties inherent to the target and make it into a separate object. (The original object may disappear if it has no physical form.)

    This appeared to be the main engine behind Shizus transformation. Human and spiritual forms, two very different things, synthesized into a single creature. It was hard to say whether Ifrit took Shizu over first, or if Shizu invented the Deviant skill to keep Ifrit from staging aplete power grab. There was no way of knowing for sure now, but either way, it was clear I could adapt this skill for a number of things.

    I already knew that Synthesize could be applied to skills, leading to all manner of otherbinations. Perhaps it could bebined with magic as well? Maybe fusing me and wind to create hurricanes? Or maybe I could give magical effects to weapons and trigger a special attack with just a little magic force?

    To give you my honest opinion, this Deviant skill was a scarily good fit with my own skill set. As a slime, I wasnt capable of nervous sweating, but I might as well have been. A few quick experiments had already given me Control Particles and Dark me, and I now also had full control over electrical attacks. There were tons of monsters left for me to Predate and glean new skills from, and I nned to do that as much as I could.

    And for that matter, could I use the Separate function to seize skills from my enemies?

    Received. It depends on the specific scenario. However, erasing or separating skills etched into the targets soul is not possible.

    So it couldnt do everything . But itd work sometimes? Id need to figure out exactly what was avable to Separate from my target first.

    But really, Synthesize was the biggest prize with Deviant. I was nning to take a lot of skills from a lot of monsters going forward, and seeing what kind of things I could create from them was already getting me excited.

    I suppose it was all thanks to the Great Sage, but either way, Predator and Deviant made for a potent duo. It didnt exactly have the most attractive name, but in Deviant, Shizu had given me one hell of a farewell gift.

    I decided to wrap up that days session with a few Cancel Temperature tests. Temperature covered both fire and ice, I supposed, and considering even Resist Temperature was enough to handle Ifrits mega-charged fire, having an upgraded version should handle most attacks tossed my way. Anything short of beingunched into the sun like a slingshot, at least.

    There was a barbecue waiting, and I wanted to wrap this up quickly. But defensive skills directly contributed to the preservation of my life. I had to figure out what I had.

    Just as I had yesterday, I used a sizable amount of magicules to create a Replicated slime body. Something about attacking a cloned, naked human resembling a young girl gave me pause. I could probably summon up some clothing or armor once I was more versed, but that didnt make this any less in bad taste. (Slimes were pretty cute themselves, but if I wanted to do any real experimentation, I had to beat up something .)

    I knew from yesterday that I could apply a Barrier to block my own Water des. Now, lets try attacking it with Dark me.

    Using the same level of magical energy as before to smash Dark me against a Barrier, I found that it seeded in fully blocking the heat. Not bad. If it could annul Ifrits re Circle, it could handle well near anything, I supposed, to say nothing of Icicle Lance. So I was good against hot and cold, then?

    Received. Cancel Temperature is linked with Ranged Barrier, thus canceling the effects of temperature-rted attacks.

    Ah, perfect. If Shizu possessed Cancel me Attack, Ifrit must as well, since it let them each handle such high-temperature attacks in the first ce. It seemed like the perfect tool. Now that it wasbined with Resist Temperature, I had nothing to worry about from ice, either.

    Removing the link for a moment, I tried Dark me once more. This time, it smashed through the Barrier instantly, but my Replicated clone was perfectly safe. Resist Melee Attack must have helped absorb some of the shock wave-based aftereffects.

    Between all these resistances and my Barrier, I figured I could rest pretty easy when it came to my own defenses. Better not forget to link all this stuff with the Barrier first, though.

    Received. Ranged Barrier is now linked with your resistances. Runch as Multyer Barrier?

    Yes

    No

    As it turned out, I couldnt create a single Barrier with lots of different effects applied to it, but I was free to create multiple Barriers with one resistance effect each. So yes it was, once again, and the moment I thought it, I could feel a thin, colorless, invisible coatinge over me. It was a Multyer Barrier, consisting of severalyers but still so thin that my Magic Sense skill could only barely spot it. It didnt require much magic energy to keep going, eitheronce it was summoned, it barely consumed any at all, far less than I could naturally recover by myself.

    Another great sess for today, then. There were still some potential skillbinations I wanted to work my mind around, but for now, I had done more than enough. I had gained more offense and defense, and as I departed the cavern, I felt more than satisfied.

    Making my way down the path to the exit I had memorized, I thought about ways to suppress the mystical aura I had a tendency to exude.

    It was just the asional light aura of magicules, and while I could keep it down if I thought about it, for some reason, itd just appear while I wasnt paying attention. With all the energy I had absorbed after defeating and consuming Ifrit, it was getting difficult to hide.

    I ran into another giant centipede on the way up, but it simply gave me a quick nce before scurrying away. So now did all the other residents of this cave. d to see I was finally getting a rep around here, but really, it was probably that aura more than anything.

    The Multyer Barrier did wonders to hide it, but my presence still leaked out a tiny bitor, to be more exact, the Multyer Barrier itself was exuding a bit of force. It beat letting my power roll off me without any cover, but it didnt really help much.

    If I could do something permanent about this aura, I could probably pass for a human pretty much anywhere, but

    Suddenly, an idea came to mind. I reached into one pocket and took something outa beautiful, fetching mask. The Mask of Magic Resistance, the lone physical memento I had to remember Shizu by. I had absorbed the broken pieces with Predator and reassembled them with my body. Maybe this mask could block it?

    It was a magic item, one infused with four effects: Magic Resist, Antidote, Breathing Support, and Amplify Senses. Pretty valuable, I imagined. Also, the likely reason why Shizu could breathe normally when summoning fiery explosions within point-nk range of herself. Breathing Support probably kept her lungs full even as the mes consumed the oxygen around hernot that I needed that with my body. I could Synthesize up a respiratory system if I really wanted to, but I didnt. Maybe this mask could convince people that I was breathing, though. It wasnt useful now, but it could be depending on the kind of people I ran into.

    The other effectsAntidote and Amplify Sensesseemed a lot more useful to your average adventurer, if not to me. The one effect I needed the most was Magic Resist, which could both dull any magic attacks enemies cast and (hopefully) hide my internal magical force.

    I put it on. It had an oddly calming effect, and it seemed to fit pretty well. The moment I applied it, the aura pouring out of me immediately dispelled. Nice. Lets go with this whenever Im bumping around the outside world.

    So that wrapped up another nagging issue. Good. And I had some nice, juicy grilled meat waiting. As I made my way back aboveground, I was filled with glee.

    My first decent meal in agesturned out to be wishful thinking.

    The moment I stepped out of the cave, I could instantly feel that someone was fighting. The magicules in the air were stirring, disturbing the surrounding atmosphere.

    The meat would have to wait. I gave up on it and made my way in the direction of the particle surge. On the other end

    I found nothing short of a battle to the death.

    I could hear screaming as I approached the scene of the battle.

    It was Gobta.

    He was crossing swords with an elderly white-haired ogre, but he was far out of his league. Whatever physical strength and agility this adversary had lost over the years, his swordsmanship and footwork made it clear he was no amateur. Gobta, meanwhile, was totally an amateur. I had to hand it to him for managing to stay alive up to this point. He seemed to be holding his own for now, wildly flinging his body around to dodge the ogres strikes, but his astounding luck could only save him for so long.

    A momentter, the elderly ogre closed the distance between them andnded a single sh across Gobtas whole chest, right before my eyes.

    Gaahhhh!! he shouted as he rolled on the ground. Oh, that hurts! II may die! I may very well die here!!

    I figured he was fine if he had the energy to plead his case with that much gusto. Besides, to my eye, his opponent didnt seemed very intent on killing him.

    Noticing my presence, the wizened ogre abandoned the fight, confident enough that Gobta was no longer a threat.

    Calm down, you. The wound is a shallow one.

    Gah, Sir Rimuru! Are you here because you were concerned about me, my lord?!

    Yes, I said, and Im d youre in good shape. Dont need a recovery potion or anything, I see.

    Whoa, I, um, please? II apologize if I didnt make that clear enough!

    Yeah, he was fine. His wild instincts mustve propelled him to the ground, preventing him from being any more seriously injured. So I tossed him a bit of potion, more to shut him up than anything. One sk was plenty. The old ogre didnt move while I administered treatment; it seemed like he was observing me instead. It was a little unnerving.

    The area around us was littered with fallen hobgoblin warriors and tempest wolves. None appeared to be dead, but knocking them all out without dealing any grievous wounds wouldve taken some serious talent. A magical strike, perhaps.

    Farther off, I spotted a purple-haired ogress fighting with Rigur. This, too, was sadly one-sided. The ogress, wielding an iron mace that was little more than an enormous hunk of metal, was apparently blessed with superhuman strength. Rigurs sword was starting to bend against it, and his wooden shield was long since battered to splinters. It wouldnt be long before he was out of the picture, too.

    Ranga, noticing me, sprang to my side. Sir Rimuru, he said, my deepest apologies. I was here, and yet, look at this disaster

    I stopped him mid-sentence. This wasnt Rangas fault; they just had the misfortune of running into the wrong adversary. These were ogres, one of the highest-level races in the Forest of Jura, and no hobgoblin could hope tost too long against them.

    Hold your weapons, I softly ordered Rigur and the other stragglers. He instantly did so upon hearing mymand. The ogress, instead of striking any further blows, gave me a thoughtful look. She wasrge-framed, muscr, but still in proportion. Her chest was formed enough to make her identifiable as female, and to my surprise, she looked quite a bit more noble than I expected.

    I ordered Ranga to take the exhausted Rigur away. The ogres, while still wary of me, made no move to stop him.

    S-Sir Rimuru II cannot express my sorrow

    Rigur, covered in scratches from head to toe, could barely form a single word or two between breaths. Against the purple-haired ogre, he had little chance of victory. His skills maybe hovered around B rank on a good day.

    Dont worry, I said as I gave him a potion. None of his injuries were serious, so his recovery wouldnt take long. Just get rested and leave this to me. Ranga, what happened to all these fallen fighters?

    Ah, that

    ording to him, magic had felled them all. It was some sort of sleeping spell, and none had managed to resist it in time. Good thing it wasnt a confusion-type, at least. That couldve been murder.

    Magic, though Talk about drawing the short straw.

    * * *

    I took a moment to calmly assess the situation.

    There were six of them, and they were a rather odd group, one that totally contradicted my conventional wisdom of the ogre race. They were fully clothed, and dressed well, if simply. I was expecting tiger-skin loincloths and little else, but I was wrong. They were big, as Id pictured, and each one was well-built, but their full wardrobe was a surprise.

    If they were this well-dressed (and wielded magic to boot), they had to be highly intelligent. Perhaps more dangerous than an equivalent party of human adventurers, even.

    If you took two races of equal physical strength, the presence orck of intelligence could make a huge difference in danger level. That went double for such a high-level race. These monsters were B rank or higher as it was; if they were further armed and working together, they couldve even hunted down Ranga.

    The ogres weapons made me curious, too. That they had weapons wasnt unusualif even goblins could buy them from dwarves, pretty much anything with a pulse could. But there was a difference between simple clubs and full-on swords. Eastern-style ones, too, very different from the dwarven Western types that worked more like bludgeons.

    The elderly ogre who felled Gobta wielded a sword that could only be described as a Japanese-style katana. And judging by how he handled it, he was a seasoned swordsman. That,bined with his ogre strength and magic, made this group potentially lethal.

    That magic was apparently provided by the pink-haired ogress off to the side, dressed in a remarkably borate outfit. She had a sweet but extremely resolute face, and the way she carried herself suggested she was a noble among her race, perhaps some sort of demon princess.

    The most dangerous of all, though, was undoubtedly the red-haired ogre.

    What sort of evil monster is this?! the pink-haired one shouted as I gauged them all. Stay on your guard, everyone!

    Her expression appeared to be honest fear now, and with her eyes fixed on mine, she must have been referring to me

    Whoa, wait a sec. You think Im evil?

    Oh, attempting to y dumb, is it? the pink-haired ogress countered. No good-hearted human would ever have control over such a heinous horde of monsters. You appear to be hiding your magical aura from us, but you are fooling no one! Did you think you could deceive us?

    You cannot pull the wool over our princesss eyes! Reveal your true self, now! the ck-haired ogre bellowed.

    How nice for the mastermind to appear before us at such an early stage! continued the elderly one. With their sparse numbers, we have every hope of victory!

    They didnt sound too interested in listening to me, then. I did my best to plead my case, iming this was all a misunderstanding, but to no avail. They insisted I was a sinister presence, and that was that.

    And so

    Enough of this, the red-haired ogre snarled. If you insist on making such flimsy excuses, we have ways of making you reveal the truth. We know you are with the evil pigs who dared attack our allies!

    This made no sense. But a battle now seemed unavoidable. I could have easily fled, but there were still sleeping hobgoblins and tempest wolves all around me. I wasnt heartless enough to leave them vulnerable.

    Sir Rimuru, Ranga asked, what will we do?

    Even a freshly healed Rigur and Gobta wouldnt help us much. Ranga and I were the only really useful fighters. So I decided to point him at the magician.

    I want you to take on the pink-haired ogress over there. I think theres something else going on here, so I want to get through to them. Meaning: Dont kill anyone, all right? I dont want any more magic tossed around, so just run a little interference for me. I can defeat the rest.

    But, Sir Rimuru, you against five ogres?

    Dont sweat it. Like, I couldnt possibly lose.

    The ogres within earshot stirred angrily. I didnt care.

    Yes, my lord!

    Following my orders, Ranga zoomed into action. The ogres immediately fanned out in formation.

    I took a moment to figure out how I was going to handle this. I wasnt lying beforeI really didnt think I could lose. Based on my experimentation over the past two days, I knew I had gotten more than a fair bit stronger. Ifrit was well past A rank, apparently, and since he was part of me now, I had to be A level.

    Rigurd said ogres were around B to B-plus, meanwhile, and considering the stately dress of the ones before me, we might be dealing with A-minuses, evenbut stronger than Ifrit? Yeah, right.

    Itd be easy to kill them, I thought, but our inability to talk this out was concerning. If they clearly wanted to murder us, that would be one thing, but they had killed none of my allies. And while they werent willing to listen to me, I was sure they would if we could all just chill for a second.

    So I took action, making a beeline for the dark-haired ogre. My body felt light as it obeyed my thoughts. I had been human for a rtively short while, but already it seemed to fit me like a glove. The difference in height from my slime form didnt bother me, either, since Magic Sense gave me a 360-degree insight into my surroundings.

    Rearing back in surprise at my sudden advance, the dark-hair steadied himself, eyes wide open. He was still toote.

    Take a rest! I shouted, bringing my left palm toward him. A small vent opened up, and within a moment, it was spitting out a ck mist toward the bbergasted ogrethe Paralyzing Breath Id taken from the cave centipedes.

    Id figured I could belch it out now that I was in control of this body, and I was right. Mimicking only the monster skills I needed wasnt exactly a finesse move, but it worked.

    Report. Mimicry of the unique skill Predator,bined with the synthesis and separation skills of the unique skill Deviant, has earned you the extra skill Universal Shapeshift.

    Not only did it work, it bore unexpected fruit.

    I had wondered, with my Deviant skills synthesis and separation traits, could I just recreate whatever unique aspect of a monsters abilities I happened to need at the time and nothing else? Despite testing it out on the field for the first time, it went pretty darn well, I think.

    Now I could transform smoothly, without a lot of effort on my part, and I could even select the part of the monster I wantedfor that matter, busting out traits from multiple monsters at once. Using a direwolf or a ck snake as a base would make me look like some weirdo chimera, but I was free to use my human form instead, apparently.

    The most notable trait of this skill: I could control all my abilities at once without much limit. In other words, I had even more freedom with my attacks than before.

    The ck-haired ogre shuddered, mist covering his entire body. He fell to the ground, still bolt upright and unable to move. Facing the brunt of my B-plus-level ck centipede transformation was enough to stop even him in his tracks.

    But the ogres werent your run-of-the-mill foes. The moment I felled the ck-haired one like a mighty tree, two others lunged at me. In a moment, the purple-haired ogress was upon me, cannonball-like mace swinging in the air. The blue-haired one was lurking behind her shadow, ready tond a surprise attack when I wasnt paying attention. It was a well-practiced example of teamwork, but with Magic Sense, I could see iting a mile away. Veldora had told me no one would ever sneak up on me again, and he was right.

    The noble-faced ogress sneered, eyes like two long slits. I waited for the moment she raised her mace high, then pointed my left hand at her and unleashed a spinning flurry of Sticky Steel Thread. The flexible strands, strong enough to even keep Ifrit restrained, had been synthesized with Deviant to grow even more durable. They now cocooned the ogress, and she couldnt escape, no matter how she struggled. All that training really did pay off.

    As I sung my own praises in my mind, a sword shot at me from a blind spot below. The blue-haired swordsman had aimed straight for my heart. But I didnt panic. Magic Sense had told me he was there, so I was just thinking about how Id handle him.

    I decided to use my right arm as a shield to deflect the straight sword. After the dull thunk of steel striking against something solid, the sword broke neatly in two.

    The ogres eyes widened in surprise as Inded my follow-up, a straight jab from a scaly right arm. I had deployed Body Armorthe scale defense from the lizards in the caveup and down my hand and forearm, and it made short work of the blue-hairs chest te. It shattered, ensuring I had defanged him without hurting myself a single bit along the way. I didnt really need Body Armor hereResist Melee Attack linked with Multyer Barrier was enough to annul any potential damage to my armbut hey, just in case, you know?

    That meant three ogres were out of the picture. That left the pink-haired ogress Ranga was tangling with, the haughty-looking red-haired one, and the elder ogre, still standing there and gauging my every move.

    Do you see how strong I am now? Are you willing to hear me out a little?

    Silence! Now I am more convinced than everyou lie at the very root of this cmity. It was your cohorts who led those fetid pigs to destroy our home, was it not? A simple horde of orcs would never be enough to defeat us normally. It was you! The magic-born who doomed us!

    Um? The magic-born who what? This was getting to be one serious misunderstanding. And when that red-haired ogre said pigs , was he talking about orcs? Rigur and his crew had suggested there was some kind of struggle going on over forest territory

    Wait, youve got the wrong

    I attempted to state my case, only to be stopped by a premonition behind me. I turned aroundthe elder wasnt there. Was the other one lecturing me just to divert my attention?!

    In a panic, I turned, blocking a strike from behind with my right hand. It was a shock, someone evading Magic Sense to get so close undetected. Thankfully, the unique Great Sage skill sped up my thought processes to a thousand times faster than normal. The elder unsheathed his de in a sh, and I was just barely in time.

    But something about my arm felt unusual. My skill set kept me from experiencing pain, butoopshe had lopped the thing right off. This old guys skills were incredible. Even with Multyer Barrier and Body Armor in ce, it was like he could cut through paper.

    Mmh I must be growing senile. I was sure I had decapitated you there

    Senile, my ass. His physical skills were no match for hispanions, but his speed was ridiculous. He was lethal.

    Retrieving my amputated arm, I stepped back a little ways.

    Sir Rimuru?!

    Stay back! Im fine! I shouted, shooing Ranga away. The elder was too dangerous for him to handle. He looked confused for a moment but turned his attention back to the pink-haired ogress, apparently trusting me.

    I will not miss next time, the elder said as he resheathed his sword and readied it anew.

    No way I would underestimate his advanced age now. I needed to show him everything I had.

    Apparently waiting for the moment I was fully focused on him, he leaped up, and with a shout of Die for myrades! shed at me from my nk.

    Hah! the red-haired ogre shouted, still targeting me. Losing an arm should be the end for you. You were strong, Ill grant you that, but you were arrogant. You thought you could take us on alone, but that was your undoing!

    He had a unique way of moving, too, one that let him stab at my weaker points head-on. He must have seen me as enough of a threat to not bother keeping alive.

    Master-level teamwork like this was a huge pain in the ass. I was incredibly strong, so I didnt pay much attention to it, but I was really just an amateur in a fight. Whatever rubbed off on me during phys ed ss was about all I had.

    Getting all serious against a total newbie seemed a little immature, but then again, I did tell them I couldnt lose. I suppose I had iting. But I still had to make it out of this scrape, by hook or by crook.

    I considered the situation as I worked to keep the two at a distance. Taking them on with a single arm sounded like a steep order, so I used my Predator special skill to reabsorb it. Self-Regeneration, the slime-intrinsic skill I started with, was good enough to heal me when paired with Predator in the past. Hopefully, it could handle more delicate surgeries like this

    Report. Combining the mimicry skill of Predator with the slime-intrinsic skills Dissolve, Absorb, and Self-Regeneration has earned you the extra skill Ultraspeed Regeneration. Thises at the cost of the slime-intrinsic skills Dissolve, Absorb, and Self-Regeneration.

    Losing all those slime skills at once seemed kind of a hefty price to pay, but I couldntin about the results. I never used those things anyway, given that Predator covered for them all.

    Launching Ultraspeed Regeneration, I focused on rebuilding my right arm. The arm I had consumed was taken apart and instantly absorbed into my bodyand in the blink of an eye, it was back. It was crazy fast, like none of my recovery skills from before. Ultraspeed was right.

    Oops. No time to gape at my own handiwork. Lets try a quick bluff.

    Heh-heh-heh Ahhh-ha-ha-ha-ha! Did you think cutting a simple arm or two off meant you had won? Well, sorry to disappoint you. I will admit to underestimating you all earlier, though. Time to get a little serious!

    I removed the mask and ced it in a pocket. The ogres, already spooked at how fast I had rebuilt my arm, were positively stunned by what they saw under the mask. Releasing my full magical aura made my hair begin fluttering in the air. They mustve instinctively sensed the danger.

    You monster! the red-haired one intoned. Ill kill you with everything I have! Ogre me!

    I guess fire was his ace in the hole. I was immediately the center of a hellish vortex that might have been two thousand degrees or more.

    That little spark? That wont work!

    It would have vaporized anyone other than me, but Cancel Temperature meant that it didnt even singe my hair.

    Seeing his finisher fail so spectacrly sent the red-haired ogre, for the first time, into an obvious panic. He kept his head through sheer force of will, resolutely staring at me. He wasnt broken yet, I had to hand him that, but considering I didnt want to kill him if I could, I kind of wish he epted defeat sooner thanter.

    Right now would probably be my best chance.

    The ogres were by andrge stopped, wary of what I might try next. Lets bust out something huge to break em all at once. And if that didnt workif they still didnt want to hear my storythen Id have no other choice but to finish them off.

    Please let this be enough , I prayed as I made my final move.

    You want to see what real fire is like? Look at this!

    I let the Dark me whirl around my left arm. I was hamming it up, I knew, but I had to if I wanted to make my foes grovel before me.

    M-my brother! the pink-haired ogress tangling with Ranga shouted, the fear apparent on her face. That me Your illusory arts are nothingpared to it!

    It shocked her, at least. Her brothers Ogre me was a mystical art, one that turned his very aura into mes. Mine, meanwhile, was an innate skill, which mustve thrown her a little.

    Heh-heh-heh, youre right! But Ive got something even more fun than that!

    Now it was time for some Dark Thunder from my right hand. I needed this to be the clincher, the thing that finally scared them out of their wits. No need to hold back, although I couldnt waste all my magic on it, either. I adjusted the force to around a third of its usual level, then sent the particles flowing.

    Behold, my true power! I screamed as I loosed a bolt of Dark Thunder at a handy boulder nearby. It instantly evaporated, and a beatter, a st echoed. There wasnt even any soot left behind. Just like when I tested it, maybe even a bit stronger.

    Damn, this things crazy! Maybe there was a need to hold back. I knew I had poured fewer magicules into it thanst time. It didnt make sense. It shouldve been a third as strong, enough that I could fire several bolts if I wanted

    Received. Compared to Dark Lightning, Dark Thunder consumes

    I didnt ask for it, but the Sage swooped in to exin. Basically, it was stronger since it was more focused on delivering a powerful strike on a limited range, which meant it used far less magic. That was why it did more damage with fewer particles.

    I was starting to think this Dark Thunder was a bit more unique than I suspected. Just like Dark me, it was hard to figure out when it was best to use. It made my heart race, and I was the one wielding it. Good thing I didnt try it on myself , I thought. It was nothing I could rely on Multyer Barrier to save me from.

    So how will the ogres respond?

    Tremendous. It pains me to say this, but your powers are in a ss far above ours. However, as the next in line to lead my band, I was raised to take pride in my race. How could any leader allow his fallenrades to suffer in silence? Whether I seed or not, I must strike a return blow!

    Young master, let me join you!

    Great. The exact opposite effect. Now the red- and white-haired ogres were ying the tragic heroes, their faces bewildered. They were ready to sacrifice their lives against me. It wasnt how I meant to end this, but against that attitude, itd be hard to suppress them without causing their deaths.

    So theres no other way?

    Whether they were mistaken or not, I couldnt let them run free nowitd just lead to further troubleter. I hated to say it, but I was starting to understand it was their own damn fault for being so stubborn.

    Just then, the fetching ogre princess shouted out.

    Please, wait!

    The pink-haired ogress stood before her red-haired brother, arms open wide to stop him in his tracks.

    My brother, you must think calmly about this. Such an all-powerful magic-born using low-minded tricks to send the pigs to our homnd? It is absurd, for he himself is strong enough toy waste to all of us single-handedly. He is unique, to be certain, but I am no longer sure he is with the horde that attacked us.

    What?! The flustered redhead looked at me. Butperhaps

    Guys, I keep telling you, youve got me all wrong! Are you finally ready to listen?

    Steam was billowing from the spot where the vaporized boulder used to be. It was more than enough to back up the ogre princesss argument. The redhead nced at her, then me again, finally falling to a knee.

    My apologies. Perhaps I was driven into having the wrong idea about you. I hope you will ept my deepest regrets.

    So he finally admitted he was maybe wrong about this. I appreciated the thought. It came as a relief.

    Well, no point talking here. How about we go back to the vige? You guyse along. Ill be d to feed you, at least.

    And so the conflict that started for reasons unbeknownst came to a peaceful conclusion.

    The hobgoblins began to awaken, perhaps because the princess released the spell on them. It must have been one heck of a charm, considering all the noise from my magic didnt bother them at all. For my part, I released the Sticky Steel Thread covering the purple-hair and sprinkled a bit of potion on the unconscious blue-hair.

    I wasnt exactly sure what to do with the ck-hair, but it turned out Deviant was more than enough to separate the paralysis from his body. Normally, youd need magic or medicine to handle that. Id used Paralyzing Breath without thinking of the consequences very muchId have to make sure there was an easy way to undo it next time. That, I regretted a little.

    Nobody was seriously hurt, so we all headed for the vige. And just like they promised before I left, there was some magnificent food waiting. Thats Rigurd for you. The ultimate bureaucrat. His organization skills were nuts.

    I still didnt feel hungry, but I had been looking forward to this since morning. It had been a physically active day, and between that and the test of my taste senseing up, I was champing at the bit.

    And here it came. That first forkful of meat.

    Its so gooooood!!

    I thought I might cry.

    The voring was a worry for me earlier, but they had taken the juice from assorted types of fruit to make a sauce. The promotion to hobgoblin status mustve upgraded their ptes, too, and they were now experimenting with all sorts of new recipes.

    This magical beast was cowdeer, right? Well cooked, it was tasty enough even without any extra spices or such, but adding some fruit to the mix provided a very differentand very engagingsensation to my taste buds. It did wonders to mask the gamy vor and tie a neat little bow over the whole package.

    That was how Lilina, the goblin lord overseeing our food stocks, and Haruna, the proud cook, exined it. I followed their suggestions as I cleaned my te, taking in the experience Id missed.

    Speaking of which, they were pretty ecstatic when I gave them the salt I had collected. They knew what it was, I guess, but had given up on securing any because it was too expensive.

    I suppose, to a goblin race mainly preupied with survival up to now, seeking out new vorings wasnt too high a priority. They got the requisite salt in their diet from the flesh and blood of their prey, and beyond that, they didnt think deeply about it.

    I advised them not to go overboard with their salt intake, just in case. Not that I was sure monsters could suffer from high blood pressure in the first ce.

    The pink-haired ogre made a surprising contribution, too. She knew a great deal about herbs and aromatics and the like, and she brought in a few wild grasses we could use to hide the meats more unpleasant odors. I hope this will atone for our rudeness a little, she said as she helped collect the ingredients. She was a high-level creature, and she worked briskly, putting the freshly evolved hobgoblins to shame.

    The other ogressthe one with purple hairwas just eating along with the others, though. Perhaps female ogres werent necessarily banished to the kitchen in their society. If it was this delicious, I wasnt going to care about genders.

    It wasnt long before pink-hair was getting along swimmingly with the rest of the goblinas in the vige. Theyd try to learn as much as they could from her, I was sure. It was nice to have another positive influence around town.

    Alls well that ends well, I suppose. The roast-meat feast I was so looking forward to went off without a hitch, and our newpanions were all too happy to join us as we drank through the evening.

 Volume 2 - Ch 2

    EVOLUTIONS AND CLASHES

    We decided to sit and hash things out with the ogres the next day. We chose the log house built atop the recently burned-out public square in the center of the vige.

    Mildo, youngest of the three dwarf brothers, had done a great job crafting it from the basic sketch I drew on a n of wood. My previous stint as a general contractor gave me at least that much knowledge, as I measured out the dimensions and such as best I could with charcoal on wood and handed it over.

    It was the Great Sage, and the new freedom my body offered, that made it possible. Plus, the drafting tools the dwarves brought over. With a bit of effort, you could get something almost as urate as from aputer. I was starting to feel like I could whip up a skyscraper in no time t.

    Mildo had no problemprehending the blueprintmaybe my drafting approach was a lot easier to understand than whatever was this worlds mainstream.

    Which made sense. The buildings around here were childs ypared to the kinds of things wed designed for the concrete jungles back home. The Dwarven Kingdom had plenty of impressive architecture, to be sure, but in terms of technical execution, it still had a ways to go. Maybe wed have high-rises built on this square someday. It was amusing to think about.

    But I digress.

    I guided the ogres to the houses reception room, looking around to make sure everything was built as I ordered. They meekly followed behind, eagerly looking around the house like it was a novelty. There was zero decoration yet, so I dont know what enthralled them so much, but whatever.

    The reception room had arge table, along with a few simple stools encircling it. We were all gathered thereRigurd, the four goblin lords, and Kaijin the dwarf as a mediator. Thirteen in all, counting me.

    Why did I have Rigurd and the rest here? Because I figured the ogres had some important things to tell us. If something was happening to the Forest of Jura, itde to our doorstep soon enough. I didnt want to be the sole go-to point for every crisis. Rule but dont govern, as they say.

    Haruna came in with tea for everyone. She gave a quick bow once she was done and left the reception room. It was still a tad awkward for her, but she was beginning to learn some manners. Wonderful progress.

    I brought the cup to my lips. Bitter, but not distastefully so. I didnt used to be so picky when it came to this sort of thing, but the long-awaited return of my sense of taste was maybe making me more finicky.

    The green tealike bitterness yed around my tongue. I could feel its heat, too. My body had Cancel Heat, I suppose, but I could still feel this. Funny.

    The ogres seemed to enjoy it as well. I waited for them to settle in before we began to talk.

    I started by asking why they were there in the first ce. They replied that they were fleeing in order to regroup and rally themselves. That, in itself, was disquieting. I had a feeling this would go on a while.

    If there was a force out there that could defeat ogres, we had a threat on our hands. These were B-ranked creatures, even solo, and I could tell that much from yesterdays battle. And these guys here were the cream of the crop. Masters of the forest. The highest ss of monster youd find here, I was told.

    Better hear them out.

    To sum up the ogres story

    There was a war, and the ogres lost. That was about it.

    While I was busy fending off Ifrit at this vige, the ogres were getting involved in a war of their own. Who on earth could challenge the most powerful race in the Forest of Jura to warand win? It sent a thrill of tension across everyone in the room. Their faces tightened with concern.

    They attacked our homnd out of nowhere, the red-hair muttered angrily. Their power was overwhelming Those hideous pigs, those orcs !!

    It was an army of them, apparently. And unlike humans, monsters never thought about formally dering war before having at it. So while the ogres didnt decry the surprise attack in and of itself, orcs attacking them was far from the norm.

    Why? Simple: the difference in strength. Orcs were D-ranked creatures. Stronger than goblins, but nothing a veteran adventurer would lose sleep over. Ogres, remember, were two grades higher than that, rendering a one-on-one battle eminently predictable. And yet, the weak challenged the strong, and they won

    I decided to go a bit more in-depth.

    The ogres home was a fair bitrger than our own vigean informal collection of ns, which together formed a kind of battle-fort home to three hundred. About as powerful as a small nations knight corps, in other wordsa force equivalent to a three-thousand-strong army of fighters trained to B-minus monster status.

    These ogres lived a life you could describe as militaristic. The ns held battle training with one another on a regr basis, asionally joining this or that side to assist other races when they fell into conflict with their neighbors. Some of the ns had even made their mark on history, forming vanguard forces of an army for one demon lord or another, and these ogres were descended from them.

    They lived, in other words, as de facto mercenaries. And the ogres of this world were quickly destroying the image I once had from my own fantasy novels. But that wasnt the issue. They had been defeated by far weaker monsters, and it looked like they were all still in shockfor in this reception room, we were looking at the sole survivors of the entire settlement.

    The red-haired one had taken his sister, the princess, away from the ce while their leader was spearheading a team to defend them from the orcs. She was nobility, after all, a sort of ogre shamaness, and her people put her ahead of everything else in their lives.

    If only I were stronger, the red-hair groaned. Thest thing he saw was the orcs, d in ck armor, delivering the final blow on his leader. A giant orc, one that let off an eerie aura. And one other, a figure who didnt bother to hide their own brutally dark aura; one who wore a mask that looked a bit like an angry clown.

    It was one of the magic-born people, I am sure of it, the shamaness dered. A high-level one. Im afraid my brother never stood a chance.

    Indeed, the elder added. We jumped to conclusions about all of you because we saw that fiend in action. We thought you were one with them.

    Yeesh. Really? Cute lil old me? Getting lumped in with this murderous freak? The way they put it bruised my ego a bit, but then again, I was wearing a mask of my own back there. Perhaps it was natural to associate me with that magic-born guy.

    I was under the impression that a magic-born person could be almost any intelligent monster. Ogres would count as magic-born, even. But if this guy outssed them that much, he had to be something extra fierce.

    I knew from our earlier confrontation that nothing was more dangerous than monsters with a little intelligence. They could wield magic with the ease of a human caster and handle weapons equally as well. That,bined with physical strength that outssed humanitys, made them difficult to counter at all.

    And the higher level the monster, the more disastrous the results could be. Itd be safe to assume we were dealing with an A rank, at least. Not wee news.

    Oh, and just for ritys sake, goblins are a subrace of mankind, so their evolved hobgoblin forms dont count as magic-born.

    The ogres continued.

    It seemed there had been three other orcs equivalent in strength to the ck-armored one. The four made short work of the ogre strongholds elite fighters, and as they did, the rest of the orc soldiers poured into the fort and kicked off the massacre in earnest.

    There were several thousandjust an estimate on the ogres part, but still a massive figure. And the funny thing was, they were all d in the sort of full-te armor youd expect a human watchman or the like to wear as a uniform. Like a massive wave of metal, steamrolling across the forest.

    If that was true, this had to be the work of more than simply the orcs. Orcs were human types as well, but they were treated as low-level, unintelligent monsters, like goblins. There was no way they could cobble together the funds for such extensive, and expensive, armor. Plus, there were lots of powerful monsters in the Forest of Jura. Itd be impossible for the orcs to avoid attracting attention on the way to the ogre stronghold.

    It seemed fair to assume they were colluding with some other nationa nation of humans. But I couldnt guess what they wanted, and that concerned me. If the force was several thousand strong, they couldnt have merely wanted to crush that one ogre site. They were gunning for the entire Forest of Jura, at that rate.

    You know, Kaijin offered, they might be in cahoots with one of the demon lords.

    Demon lord? Shizus face shed across my mind, her final words echoing alongside it.

    Leon, the demon lordthe foe Id promised to defeat.

    Could that be possible? I wasnt sure I had it in me to topple a demon lord quite yet, but

    Generally speaking, I didnt think any demon lord cared much about this forest. Outside of it, theirnds spread far and wide, and their fertile fields were mostly tended to by vast numbers of golems and ves that had been captured in battle. Demon lordcontrollednds never had to worry about famines, and as a result, these lords were rarely concerned about areas under human control. The way it was exined to me, the so-called war ves had it good enough that their lives werent much different from anyone elses. I couldnt say how human nations considered them, but as far as the Forest of Juras denizens went, the demon lordnds were pretty chill.

    So if anyone was looking to conquer someone elses territory, chances were good that humans were involved.

    At the same time, there could always be a demon lord or two who wanted to kick off a war just for fun or to pass the time. Veldora the Storm Dragon had been another check on their behavior, and now he was gone.

    It made sense. I had to think more about defending this forest, I supposed. But either way, one thing was sure: This ce was getting overrun by orcs.

    So what now?

    I decided to hear everyone out.

    We believe the orcs are seeking to seize leadership over the forest, Rigurd said after I prompted him with a nce.

    Everyone was looking at me now. Fight them? Run? Or join their alliance? The way the ogres were acting, they knew that we could be enemies once again, depending on my decision. Suddenly things were far more intense. But I didnt care.

    Well, how about another cup of tea for now?

    One came to me.

    Everyone put their respective cups to their lips, and the tension abated somewhat.

    Right.

    So what are you people gonna do? I asked the ogres.

    Whatdo you mean?

    I mean, whats your future direction? Are you gonna run so you can fight another day, or just hide out somewhere instead? Cause if you were nning to run, I was just wondering if you had somece in mind.

    Is it not obvious? We will build our strength, wait for an opening, and challenge them again!

    Precisely. We must avenge our lord!

    As must I! We are all but powerless right now, but I refuse to let those two-legged pigs live!

    We promise to follow our young master and princess!

    The ogres certainly had an answer. Hmm. They mustve resigned themselves to this from the start. Even back in our own fight, there wasnt a single hint of hesitancy clouding their eyes. They mustve known it would mean their livesbut I had to respect it. Despite how cornered they were, they still had the dignity to not kill any of the hobgoblins. I had a feeling Id regret it if I let them march off to their deaths.

    Hey, you guys interested in joining my side?

    Huh? What are you?

    I put it clearly enough, didnt I? If you guys were working as mercenaries anyway, why dont you work for me instead? If you wanna fight for your old lord, Id be happy to hire you to do that.

    We

    Besides, if its strength youre seeking, dont you think you should side with me? I cant really pay you much outside of giving you three hots and a cot, but

    We couldnt! Doing so would involve this vige in our quest for vengeance!

    I do not see a problem with this, Rigurd said. We are here to serve Sir Rimuru, and no other. If he wills it, no one will work against his desires.

    Yeah, added Kaijin. That, and I kinda expect well get involved in this sooner orter anyway, yknow? If that many orcs are on the move, I doubt anyce around here is safe.

    Very true, another goblin lord chimed in. A lizardman spy once made contact with the vige we used to live in. As goblins, we were unable to understand what he wanted at the time, but I imagine he was investigating some new movement or trend. Which means this ce could be a battlefield. It is best for us all to work together.

    They all seemed well enough in agreement. Hmph. Not like a bunch of goblins could do much themselves. If we had an orc hordeing, we needed as many people on our side as possible.

    Right, I offered. If you agree to serve me, I think I might be able to make your dreamse true, too.

    How, exactly?

    Simple. If you join me, I promise Ill fight with you if somethinges up. I never abandon mypanions, and if you let me hire you on, I will be d to cooperate with you.

    I see. So we protect this vige, and in turn, the vige protects us? Not a bad proposal. In fact, it is a wee one. We could use this ce as a base to assemble the resistance forces we need against the pigs

    Yeah, exactly, I replied. Were gonna be fighting anyway. You might as welle along for the ride.

    And could this agreement stay in ce until the ringleader of the orcs is defeated?

    Sounds perfect to me. Youd be free to do whatever you like once the matter with the orcs is settled. You could work with me to build a nation, go out on a journey, whatever. What do you think?

    The red-haired ogre thought this over for a few moments while the others remained politely silent. They must have respected his decision-making skills. He closed his eyes, then opened them once more.

    Very well, he said. We will serve under your leadership!

    So thats the path he chose. Good. Thats a big help for me, too.

    Winning over the ogres was a major coup, as far as I was concerned. I figured they wouldnt be rankled by the idea of serving me in a mercenary capacity, and I was right. And if we had several thousand orcs to deal with, we needed to beef up our numbers, fast. We had no idea what kind of strength this orc army had, so I wanted as much to work with as possible.

    It may have been strictly business, but they had sworn to follow me, and that meant we were friends now. And if we were friends, Id need them to have some actual names, or else itd just be a pain in the ass.

    Right! Let me give you people names, then.

    Hah? What are you?

    What do you think? I said names. Its annoying not to have them, right?

    N-no, er, we are able tomunicate with one another well enough already, so

    Hoh-hoh, indeed! Humans may have names, certainly, but we monsters have little need for them

    Wha? Dont be stupid. I dont care if you dont think you need them or whatever. Im saying I need them, cause otherwise its a pain to get your attention, okay?

    Y-yes, but

    Please, wait a moment! the pink-haired ogress exined. Giving a name can be a very risky maneuver. We had best begin with those of a higher ranking first

    Dangerous? Right, like I use too much magic and I fall asleep? Well, Ill be fine as long as I dont try to name an entire vige at once, right?

    No, no, quit worrying, I said, ignoring the pink-hair. Itll work out just great!

    Time to think up some names. The ogres still looked dubious, but to hell with them. Lets get this show on the road.

    I was really on fire this time. The ogres were kind enough to each have different hair colors, which made it easy toe up with ideas. The red-haired guy became Benimaru, a name that means red circle and tends to get associated with the samurai of olden times. Something virile seemed like a nice match overall.

    The princess became Shuna, or scarlet nt. She had pink hair and knew a lot about herbs and stuff. Sounded about right. The white-hair became Hakuro, white elder, which was pretty obvious given how he looked. Blue-hair became Soei, blue shadow, thanks to that sneak attack that almost tripped me up. If hed targeted anyone else, those couldve been seriously dangerous.

    Purple-hair became Shion, violet garden, because the way her ponytail stuck out somewhat reminded me of a flower. Finally, ck-hair became Kurobe, basically ck but with a country ir. That seemed to match himboorish, unrefined, but still likable.

    I was pretty satisfied with my choices. I came up with them almost immediately, like a divine revtion of sorts. But as I patted myself on the back, I suddenly began to feel drained.

    Wait a minute

    By the time the thought urred, it was toote. It was back to sleep mode for me. Why would naming six people exhaust my magic like that? I thought as I reverted into slime form, no longer able to control my body.

    Wha? A slime?!

    How on?! You were a slime all along?!

    I was too weak to respond.

    This, apparently, rmed the ogres a lot. They fell to the ground, seemingly just as drained as I was by the ceremony. Whats going on here? I wouldnt have my answer until my magic was recharged.

    A night passed.

    This round of sleep mode, if anything, was even rougher thanst time. I was conscious, but it was like everything I saw was in a dream. My memories were vague, like something soft being pressed against me, or like I was floating amid fragrant flowers or something. I had no way of knowing exactly what was happening, but I was probably overthinking matters.

    Shion! How long are you going to hold Sir Rimuru close to your chest like that? Its time to switch out!

    Princess Shuna, you cannot be serious! There is no switching out to be done! I will take care of Sir Rimuru, so please, you should rest yourself

    Enough of your nonsense, Shion! I tell you that I will watch Sir Rimuru, and watch him I shall!

    Apparently, this was some kind of argument, but Im sure I was just imagining it. Just like I was imagining them ying tug-of-war with me. Lets just go with that.

    So what did happen? I got to find out once I finally woke up to the sight of all six standing before me.

    The one in front was a handsome young man with a burning ze of crimson hair. His eyes were just as bright-red, and they were fixed squarely upon me, never wavering. Whos this? I thought. But another look confirmed itit was Benimaru, the ogre referred to as young master by his cohorts.

    Two horns, smoother and more beautiful than obsidian, poked out from his crimson locks. They used to be thicker than elephant tusks, but now they were honed, polished, and as thin and beautiful as a work of art. The Benimaru I knew was a hulking figure, but this guy was maybe just under six feet tall, and his body was taut and well-defined.

    The amount of energy I felt from him, however, made him seem like apletely different person from before. He wasnt quite as strong as Ifrit, for example, but that was the firstparison that came to mind. He might be past A rank now.

    How the hell did naming someone unlock this much force? was my honest reaction.

    Next to him was a fetching young woman who was almost hidden in Benimarus shadow. Shuna, I supposed. She was already sweet-looking, and that had evolved massively along with everything else. Like, what the hell? This was a total princess now, man. Apletely different level from before. Her long hair, just a touch pink now, cascaded across her head to the ponytail below. She had two horns of white porcin, lightly shaded skin, and lips the shade of a cherry blossom in spring. Her crimson eyes seemed a little glossy as she looked at me.

    Dude, what a babe!! No 2-D anime girl couldpare. She was smaller, around five feet, and the aura she projected made you instinctively want to protect her.

    Hakuro, the wizened old ogre, seemed far younger now. He had looked about ready to keel over at any moment before, but now it appeared he was maybe just beginning to approach his golden years. His posture is perfect, and at least some of the physical strength he had lost with age has returned , I thought. Even in a straight-on test of strength, he was no longer someone to trifle with.

    His eyes were still ck, his hair still a shocking shade of white, but now those eyes were sharper. His long hair was tied back, and he had a pair of small horns on both sides of his forehead. He looked like a warrior, and if he took me on now, I wouldnt exactly like my chances.

    Shion, the other ogress, had clearly paid close attention to her hair. It was well washed andbed, nice and straight instead of flipping out in the back like earlier. It had a fetching sheen of purple, a nice match for her ponytail.

    She had a single horn, that obsidian-ck shade again, and it naturally parted her hair. Her purple eyes, like the others, were firm upon me. Her skin was nearly white, her lips bright red. She didnt look as wild as beforemaybe a little makeup?and that,bined with being about five and a half feet, made her look pretty damn amazing.

    The whole package was sleek as a supermodel, but she had one extremely unique parta part that whatever masculinity I had left all but forced my eyes to wander toward, I suppose. I was in slime form, at least, so she couldnt see where I was looking. Which was good. I bet shed look kick-ass in a business suit. Honestly, I wish she could be my secretary. Such were the thoughts of my soul.

    Soei was about the same age as Benimaru, with aplexion on the darker side and lips a slightly bluish shade of ck. The single white horn on his forehead contrasted well against it, and his navy-blue eyes exuded a strong force of will. He had handsomeness to him, something Benimaru most certainly did not, and he was about the same height, to boot.

    How were all these people getting so attractive all of a sudden? And not just attractive but, like, in thepletely opposite direction of what they were before. A total one-eighty. The sheer perfection irked me a little, which I suppose is only human.

    Kurobe was in the prime of his life. To put it nicely, he was rugged; in a not so nice way, he was hairy. It made him stand out a bit among the beauty pageant contestants surrounding him.

    His hair and eyes were ck, his skin a dark shade of brown. He had two white horns, noticeable without being too huge on his forehead, and in a way, the averageness of his looks made me feel a kind of kinship with him. It was a relief, in a way, his presence in the crowd. Between that and his apparent age, I had a feeling wed get along pretty well.

    So that was the six, and it wasnt just their looks that had changed.

    Benimaru and his friends had evolved from ogres to ogre mages, a natural progression like the one from goblins to hobgobs. It made for a showier-looking creature, but if anything, their strength received the biggest upgrade. Id say they were all past A rank now. At first I thought it might be a mistake, but no. All of them. No wonder they robbed me of all my magic.

    It was starting to look like the stronger the monster I gave a name to, the more magic it required to engineer the upgrade. Evolving monsters required amensurate amount of magicules, a valuable lesson I had to learn the hard way. If I had screwed that up, I couldve dried up my magic entirely, which wouldve been beyond bad. I had depleted it to the point where I was basically catatonic, after all. Id better try to take it nice and slow with this kind of thing from now on.

    I had done a pretty good job evolving six of these guys. I was proud of that. But I had my regrets.

    They had really better not turn traitor on me, for one

    And speak of the devil, Benimaru goes, Sir Rimuru, we have a request! Please, we beg of you to ept our solemn oath of fealty!

    Great. Now I felt dumb for even thinking about betrayal.

    Hmm? Geez, you dont have to get all formal about it. Just because youre my mercenaries doesnt mean I want you groveling at my feet.

    It is not that, my lord. We wish to serve you as your loyal retainers!

    What?

    I told them they were free to go once this little skirmish was wrapped up, but I guess Benimaru and his people had other ns. They must have talked this out among themselves in advance.

    Please, give us your benevolent aid!! they now intoned in unison.

    I had no reason to say no. But were they really okay with nothing but some meals and floor space in a cabin? That bothered me, but if that was what they wanted, I might as well believe in them.

    Thus, the viges poption grew by six in a single day. I decided to keep to myself that I honestly feared their strength.

    Taking another good look, I realized exactly how much they all had changed. They had shrunk a decent amount, which made their clothing p loosely about, but they still had the dignity to wear it well. Beautys a damn helpful thing to have at times like these. I didnt think Kurobe could pull it off, but I guess he borrowed an outfit from Kaijin, and it worked on him. If not for the horns, Id almost mistake him for a dwarf.

    Hakuro was the only one who hadnt physically changed that much. His outfit still fit him normally.

    Shion, on the other hand, was a bit precarious, her now much ampler chest threatening to spill out. Eep. Better do something about that. Garm should be informed of this at once , I thought as I kept sneaking secret peeks at her bosom.

    Soeis chest te was still in pieces, too. I had forgotten about smashing that up, but, hey, theres an easy way to make up for it. It was time for all the ogre mages to get new clothing and equipment. I had promised to take care of their basics, and I didnt want them to fight with old, banged-up crap.

    So I took them all to Garms cabin.

    Hey, boss! he greeted me, smiling as he stopped working. Those the new ogre friends weve got? You sure about that? Cause they sure dont look like ogres to me, but

    He looked pretty surprised, his eyes right on Shions chest.

    Yeah, well, I named em all, so they arent exactly ogres any longer. Ogre mages, is the term for em now, I think.

    Ogre mages?! Thats a high-level race, isnt it? Born only on extremely rare asions among the ogres

    Is it? Well, there you have it, I guess. You think you could make some clothing and armor for them?

    Oh. Yeah, sure thing.

    Garm still seemed dubious but refrained frommenting further as he brought the ogres inside. I was sure hed be measuring them all shortly. Hakuro was good to go as is, and Kurobe apparently borrowed a few days worth of outfits from Kaijin. Simple work clothes, really, but Kurobe seemed happy enough with them.

    And that reminded me: Why did their clothing look so Japanese?

    Hey, I asked Hakuro, your weapons are pretty unusual, arent they?

    As he put it, around four hundred years ago, a group of armored warriors came to the ogres homnd, heavily wounded and seemingly lost in the forest. The ogres were a warfaring bunch by that point, more akin to monsters than they are now, but even then, they nched at attacking the defenseless. They were a high-level race, not very preupied about food, so they took care of them.

    The warriors, thankful for this, instructed the ogres in battle techniques and gifted their armor to them. One among them knew how to forge these katana-style weapons, and after a long trial-and-error process, they seeded in producingrge numbers.

    One of the warriors they trained was my own grandfather, Hakuro said proudly, and he made well sure to teach me every skill he had.

    Yeah, Kurobe added, and my familys among the cksmiths that supply em all!

    So you can make those swords yourselves?

    I am more versed in a straight sword, said Hakuro, but I have learned how to take care of these well enough, at least. Kurobe, though, is a sort of weaponsmaster to us.

    Yep! I made all o these swords. I aint too good at fightin, but you want me to bang some metal together, Im your ogre!

    Wow. I had no idea there was a weaponsmith among them. Kurobe was notably weaker than the others, so I guess strength wasnt the only thing he was good for. This group from four centuries ago might have been otherworlders like me, I figured, not that I had any way of knowing for sure. The important thing was that the ogres were intelligent enough to keep their tradition going.

    Very good, I said. In that case, Kurobe, youre going to be our viges dedicated swordsmith from now on.

    Youre on, Sir Rimuru! Ill do my best for you.

    I introduced him to Kaijin at once, and since they had already met yesterday, our discussions went quickly. The two immediately hit it off, and by the time I left, they were already talking about new weapons they could craftthat, and some kind of weird research Kurobe wanted to tackle.

    I dont know if its because of this, but it sounded like Kurobe possessed a unique skill known as Researcher. It sounded a tad like my own Predator skill, and it was geared for producing things, offering subskills like Full Analysis, Spatial Storage, and Transform Material. Spatial Storage was basically like my Stomach, and Transform Material allowed him to mess around with the stuff he kept in Spatial Storage. For example, he could store a big heap of scrap iron and transform it into solid ingots for further processing. More or less like my Copy skills, then.

    It was funny how Researcher gave Kurobe the kind of skills that he, and only he, would find useful. He had also obtained Control me and Resist Temperature, and while Id peg him as B rank in battle, those skills would make him a pretty tough fight for most people, wouldnt it? Although it seemed the man himself wanted to devote his life to forging katanas.

    Now, at least, I was pretty sure the hobgoblins wouldnt have to worry about where their weapons wereing from. But before they swung into mass production, I really wanted them to craft some swords for me and the other ogres. I gave Kurobe a fairly massive supply of magisteel for the job and set him at it.

    Im gonna make the best swords you ever did see! he promised, striking a fist against his chest to prove the point. I was looking forward to it.

    Their measurements taken, Benimaru and Soei stepped back outside, dressed in fur outfits. People that handsome, they look good in anything. I am so jealous.

    Hmm? Wheres Shuna and Shion?

    Ah. Yes. About that

    Benimaru was a little reluctant to exin. After prodding him a bit, I learned that the two were apparently unsatisfied with wearing simple fur. Given how fancy Shunas royal vestments were, I guess I couldnt me her. She said shed just fix up her own outfit, finding bare fur to be too itchy for her tastes.

    Princess Shuna, you see, Soei said, is quite gifted with sewing and such. One of the best among us, in fact.

    I could believe it. She and Shion had been dressed in a fabric I could only describe as silk, assuming that existed here. It was made by weaving together string spun for cocoons by nearby creatures known as hellmoths, then infusing the thread with arge quantity of magic for extra protection.

    They were also wearing clothes made out of what looked like hemp fabrot far removed from the bare rags the goblins wore, though much better cared for. We werent talking about the same base nts, of course, but it was basically identical. The ogres grew arge amount of a cotton-like crop, something I supposed Shuna would be able to process, and the resulting fabric was sturdy enough.

    Itd be useful for everyday clothing, but ooh, that silk! We definitely needed more silken battle gear, what with the defense it offered. Itd be perfect for a baseyer underneath the armor Garm made for us. I decided to bring it up once I saw him following Benimaru out.

    I see, Garm said. Clothing from woven fabric

    Yeah, I was wondering if we could make something out of silk, actually.

    Silk?!

    I was shocked by how much of a surprise this was to Garm. Though maybe I shouldnt have been, given how expensive that stuff looked in the Dwarven Kingdom when I was there. Hemp and cotton clothes were all over the ce, but silk was a rarity. They didnt even know how to make it, and the core materials were beyond precious.

    Perhaps I could help with that, Soei interjected.

    Hellmoths were B-ranked monsters, capable of charming people with the powder they released from their bodies, but asrvae, they were defenseless. They simply searched for cocoons containing juvenile insects and harvested those.

    I decided to leave the harvesting to our troop of goblin knights, with Soei leading them to whatever secret spots he knew for that. Sooner orter, Id like to capture somervae and try raising them in a building on-site. Not that I knew much about how that worked, but if they could raise silkworms in captivity back on Earth, it had to be possible. Probably a bit of trial and error, though.

    Shuna and Shion soon stepped out themselves, their clothes refitted. I called for Garm and the fairly bored-looking Dold and formally introduced them to Shuna. Oh my! she eximed when I exined things to her. Id be able to help you, Sir Rimuru.

    So as we talked, I began to delegate duties. Shuna would produce high-quality textiles and fabrics to use for clothing. Garm would craft battle gear made from silk. Dold would dye the resulting fabric and clothing. With theirbined efforts, before long we would have all thefortable wear we needed.

    As we went over this, I suddenly wondered if we could use my Sticky Steel Thread for any of it. Given my Cancel Temperature ability, itd probably be able to handle most heat-based attacksor make the clothes fireproof, at least.

    Oh, thank you, Sir Rimuru! Shuna beamed. Im sure I will be able to produce the finest fabric there is for you.

    I hope you will!

    Just leave it to me, Sir Rimuru, she added, blushing slightly. How cute. She must have loved being relied on like that. Sewing was her hobby, and getting to use that in the course of her princess duties seemed to provide a lot of motivation.

    As far as I could tell with the dwarf brothers, working with such a fetching young ogress would be much to their liking, too. Please, please, please, just dont make any moves on her

    She might look cute, but she was deadly. If they tried to give her a p on the ass or something, I very much doubted they would be alive by sunrise.

    I wouldnt put it past them, either, which was the thing. Being freed of carnal desires like this had made me a fairly cold judge of other peoples character. If I wasnt a slime, Id probably be more worried about my own hide than anyone elses. That was how cute she was. A total demon princess. Youd risk your life trying to ask her out.

    On a whim, I decided to whip up a few drawings. There wasnt any paper around, so I was still using charcoal on wood. My new body made it pretty easy to craft what I wanted, which in this case was what wed call a business suit in my own world.

    I traced a few example outfits for men and women, trying to picture Benimaru wearing them as I did. Given the looks they were all gifted with, I figured these wouldplement them perfectly. Shion in particr, with her dignified appearance , I thought.

    Very interesting, Shuna offered when I showed her. I would be d to try sewing some of these.

    So that was that. In the meantime, I decided that Id go with something a bit more informal for myselfa light shirt and some pants, good for the summer heat. I wouldnt mind some kind of hoodie, either, but no way I could conjure up a zipper on this. For now, I had used Thought Communication tomunicate my image of how it should look and feel to the relevant people, so hopefully theyd make that for me sooner orter.

    With these orders ced, we all took our leave from the workshop, except Shuna.

    Lake Sisu was situated in the center of the Forest of Jura, surrounded by a broad region of marsnd. It was the domain of the lizardmen.

    A smattering of caves surrounded theke. These formed a sort of natural undergroundbyrinth that stymied anyone who tried to go inside, and at the end of ity the vast cavern that contained the lizardman stronghold. There, the race held control over theke area, secured by the natural protection they were blessed with.

    Today, however, the lizardmen were greeted with news that had the potential to affect their peoples very future.

    The orc forces were here, and they were advancing on Lake Sisu.

    The chief, upon hearing this, still managed to retain hisposure. Prepare for battle! he bellowed. We shall kick these pigs back to the abyss they came from!

    He was supremely confident, but that didnt mean he would rest on hisurels. Along with the attack order, he sent the call to gather as much urate information on the orcish army as his people could find. They had to have a grip on their numbers, to start.

    One average lizardman, carnivorous and ferocious in battle, ranked around a C-plus. Their battalion leaders would probably manage a B-minus, maybe a few up to B, even. Perhaps around half the tribe would serve in battle, and half would be a formidable presence in any war.

    The conventional wisdom was that a fully armed knight corps from one or another of the small kingdoms around the forest was a solid C-plus threat. In most of these kingdoms, the military consisted of at most five percent of the overall poptionusually more like one percent, unless they were involved in protracted warfare. A lizardman force ten thousand strong, exhibiting the teamwork and synchronization the race was known for, would offer no hope for a kingdom whose poption numbered beneath a million.

    And this would be a fight on their home turf. The chief liked his chances.

    But there was still something that bothered him. The orcs had no problem with going after weaker opponents, but they never dared to defy those higher up on the food chain. Lizardmen were not weaklings. They were higher up, as it were. Goblins would be one thing, but what was making them act so fearless against lizardmen?

    The question gave birth to a small seed of doubt in his mind, one that even now stabbed against the chiefs heart. He was a bold man, but he was also caref bnce anyone who wanted to lead such a fierce tribe had to have. And the chiefs concerns wound up being all too perceptive.

    The orc force numbers a total of two hundred thousand!!

    The spy teams report to the chief and his council of tribal elders sent a thrill of fear across the great cavern. Its content, delivered amid halting breaths by the lizardman warriors, froze everyone in ce.

    Ridiculous. That couldnt be possible! one of the elders scoffed.

    The chief agreedhe would have said the same, if so many others werent in attendance. He had a duty to be a rock for his people, unmoved by every ill tiding that greeted them. He couldnt believe it, but he couldnt simply say so. If the report turned out to be urate, he would have to ept it ande up with countermeasures.

    Is this true? he ventured.

    By my very life, it is, my lord!

    Very well. You may go and rest.

    He gave the warrior aposed nod and ordered the lizardmen, who no doubt had run at full speed day and night to deliver the news, out of the chamber. The sight of the chief, as sage and reserved as ever, must have relieved them a bitso much so that they fell to the ground, right where they stood, too exhausted to continue. It was all the proof the room needed that their news was true.

    Two hundred thousand? It is insanity

    Watching their fellow warriors carry the spy team away, the chief found himself forced to reassess the situation. The orcs were certainly a fast-multiplying race in terms of numbers, but he doubted even they could assemble such a huge array of fighting men and women in one ce.

    How could they even have the logistics to supply two hundred thousand hungry stomachs?

    It would be a gargantuan effort, keeping those supply lines fed. Transporting all that food couldnt have been feasible for such an undisciplined rabble.

    These orcs are selfish louts, one of his advisers whispered to him, not a care in the world for anyone but themselves. How could anyone have wrangled them into a single cohesive unit?

    Thats the question , the chief thought. Even the most gifted leader couldnt control a force of two hundred thousand at once, not unless they had absolute control over them all. A thousand at once would be about the practical limit. Orcs were D-ranked monsters with intelligence beneath that of humans. They cared little for anything that wasnt directly in front of their faces. They were foolish, to a man, and the word cooperation didnt exist in their vocabry.

    The chief had his hands full managing all the lizardmen who served him, which numbered around twenty thousand. And that was a race that, by andrge, lived in harmony with one another. Add a zero to that figure, and it was simply beyondprehension.

    Is there some manner of genius ss among them leading the forces? the chief said to himself.

    It could hardly be the case, his adviser replied. Anyone capable of maintaining order among them would need to be a unique monster, and I have never heard of more than one such creature appearing at the same time.

    Indeed, another chimed in. The idea of multiple unique monsters of your caliber, my lord, being born among the orcs Impossible to think of.

    The chief nodded as they each shook their heads in disbelief. No. It makes little sense. But there is no point denying facts. If I am to assume this report is valid, what are the orcs capable of doing?

    Even if the orcs did have several unique monsters like the lizardman chief, would they have it in them to work together toward the same objective? Assembling an unheard-of force like this would require some other presence, something pushing all those talented, unique monsters to strive for amon goal without going at one anothers necks. Such a uniquely charismatic leader would mean that even low-level orcs could not be trifled with. In fact, they could be a threat like none before.

    Should I take action under the assumption that such a superior leader is among them? Do the orcs have it in them, so to speak?

    Wait. Could it be?

    Reaching a certain point in his own logic, the chief grew visibly agitated. The thought was something he wished to banish from his mind, but he couldnt. Someone capable of ruling over such a force. Someone said to be born only once every few centuries

    Could there be an orc lord among their ranks?!

    As soft as the chiefs whisper was, it transmitted loud and clear to his people despite the risingmotion. Those who understood it fell quiet, eventually silencing the entire cavern.

    An orc lord

    But surely

    If, by some chance, this were the case

    The elders who served as the chiefs advisers were simrly unable to shake the possibility. An orc lord was the stuff of legend, and in their thoughts, indeed capable ofmanding a six-figure army. The more they mulled over the idea, the less they could imagine any other reason for this state of affairs.

    If If, somehow, they have an orc lord among them, that would certainly exin why they havee together in this way

    But for what purpose?

    Does it matter at this point? The only question is whether we can defeat them or not!

    The cavern was in an uproar once more, the advisers exchanging opinion after hostile opinion.

    Whether we can defeat them or not?

    Fighting on a in would put the outnumbered lizardmen at a heavy disadvantage. The marshes, however, were their backyard. With a careful hand and the right traps set in ce, they had every chance at victory.

    Or they thought they did.

    If this was just a simple orc horde like any other, the chief knew how to dispatch them any number of ways. But if an orc lord truly had been born, it wasnt so easy any longer. If they were this outnumbered, they would need to maintain high morale and overwhelm the enemy with their teamwork. The chief knew it was possible, what with their knowledge of the localnds, but that strategy wouldnt work against an orc lord. An orc lord was a monster, through and through, one who could sniff out and consume the very fear thaty in his allies hearts.

    The chief thought to himself , How can we escape this dilemma? If this orc-lord thing turned out to be a nonexistent threat, he could ask for nothing else. But nheless, he feltpelled to take every measure he could before the confrontation came.

    He would need backup.

    The chief, his mind made up, called for one of his men. This mans name was Gabil, and as prudent and thoughtful the lizardman chief was, not even he could see the sheer amount of fuel he would soon add to the mes of this chaos.

    The pallid goblin chieftains gave each other nervous looks as their meeting began. There were fewer attendees than beforewhich made sense. Many had fled in the face of this unprecedented threat, one that could dramatically change the Forest of Jura for all time

    It all began with the direwolf attack. That, and all the goblins who abandoned the viges that the named warriors belonged to. Despite this desertion en masse, the named fighters sessfully fended off the wolves.

    A savior among them had used his unfathomable strength to protect them. Not only did the named fighters ovee the direwolves threat, they made them do their bidding; and now they were attempting to rebuild. The vigers who had professed a desire to fight with them in a tribunal some time ago were now gone, moved to the vige run by this savior.

    Goblins, those petty, trifling little things, had no hope of survival unless they lived in groups,ing to one anothers aid. But even after all that happened, there was no way these goblins, after abandoning their kin like this, could drive a stake into their pride and beg for forgiveness.

    No matter how much, deep in their hearts, they truly wanted to.

    Some had already verbalized as much, in fact. But if they sought to join them now, they would no doubt be treated little different from ves. Thinking of it that way, it waspletely impractical.

    Fortunately, this savior gave no indication that he wanted to swallow up the viges that surrounded his. Perhaps they could just maintain the status quo, living as they did before. That would be best, yes.

    But life wasnt that kind to them. One day, out of nowhere, a small group of orcish knights dressed in full te mail came to visit.

    We are knights with the Orcish Order! As of this very moment, thisnd is under our valiant orc lords control. We shall grant you maggots the chance to remain alive, if you wish. You must collect all the food provisions you can within several days and bring them to our headquarters. If you do, we will spare your lives and treat you as the ves you are. If you do not, we will provide no mercy. We offer no terms of surrender to those who defy us. Think well before you take action! Gah-ha-ha-ha!

    Their one-sided derationplete, the orcish knights boldly took their leave.

    Orcs were, at best, D-ranked monsters. Stronger than goblins, yes, but not overwhelmingly so one-on-one. This kind of strength was beyond anyones knowledge.

    Some unknown, terrifying thing was happening to the Forest of Juraeveryone was sure of it now. Something that portended dark things for not just this vige, but every other one in the surrounding area. By the time the viges had assembled and learned that the exact same derations had been made to them all by the orc knights, desperation had fully taken hold. At that moment, the goblins all realized there was nowhere to go.

    The orcs wanted the goblins to supply their food, that much they knew. They wanted it from them so they wouldnt have to worry about procuring it themselves. Otherwise, they would have razed the goblin viges at first sight, burning them to the ground.

    They imed theyd spare their lives, but if they were going to confiscate every scrap of food they had, what was the difference? Theyd either starve or be killed. The difference was between a certain death or an infinitesimally small chance at survivalno matter how much they gritted their teeth, the goblins had nothing but utter annihtion waiting for them in the wings.

    Their battle-ready forces numbered less than ten thousand. There was no way to make contact with theirrades in the outernds, unaffiliated with the tribal elders. There was nothing to be done.

    Just as they found themselves at this impasse, they were greeted by news that forced their hand even more. A lizardman envoy hade to visit.

    Was this a glimmer of hope? The goblin elders scrambled to meet this messenger, a lizardman named Gabil who imed to lead his tribes warriors. The arrival of a named creature made them swarm around him, like a savior sure to extract them from this horrible predicament.

    I want you, this savior told them, to swear your loyalty to me. Do it, and your futures shall be bright indeed!

    The elders immediately decided to trust in him. It was the ssic mistake of the weak, grasping at anything that could possibly aid them. Some of the goblins suggested that itd be preferable to rejoin their old brethren instead of being ruled by the lizardmen, but they were in the minority. The vote was cast, and they were now under Gabils beck and callhaving no idea that this effectively set their fates in stone

    Gabil, warrior lord of the lizardmen, had taken one hundred fighters with him out of the marsnds via a directmand. The chief had given him his ordersorders he was not particrly fond of. He was a named monster, and his nameless chief was using him like a pair of oxen yoked to a wagon.

    And even if this chief was his own father or not, it was starting to test his patience

    He knew he was chosen. Special. It was a source of pride for Gabil, and the main source of his self-esteem.

    And chosen he was. He had encountered a certain monster in the marshes, and that monster gave him a name.

    You have potential, this figure told him. In the future, I could imagine you being my right-hand man. I will be back to see you someday!

    Thus, he was named Gabil. He remembered it like it happened yesterdaythe event, and the monster, Gelmud. He saw Gelmud as his true master.

    He may be my father, but what reason do I have to let a nameless minion boss me around for all time? I need to rule over all the lizardmen someday. I have to, for Sir Gelmuds sake!

    Was this how things should be? It couldnt be, or so Gabil thought. It was a side effect of wanting to be recognized by his fatherthe ever-stern figure in his life, the great leader of all lizardmen. He was letting his pride ovee him, but he didnt have the vocabry to realize that.

    What now, then?

    The chief had ordered him to travel around the goblin viges and seek their cooperation. He was allowed to threaten them to some extent, but he was expressly forbidden to do anything that could turn them against the lizardmen. A tepid idea, Gabil believed. What works with goblins are shows of strength. It always does. As far as he was concerned, his way would work just finehe had all the power he needed for it.

    Yes! What need do we have for a chief so weak-minded that the mere thought of an orc horde makes him quiver in fear? Now is my chance to seize control of the entire tribe!

    It seemed the perfect opportunity. But it wouldnt be easy to bring the lizardmen to his sidelizardmen who valued power, but also solidarity, above nearly everything else. The chief held control over all his citizens, all the way down to the lowliest muck sifter, and Gabil knew few would side with him at first.

    He thought, still, that he could cobble together enough soldiers who would be loyal to him. The goblins, for example. Low level, yes, but they would perform well enough as living shields. A significant number of them, and even they could pose a threat. Strengthy in numbers, he knew, and ten thousand sounded like a very useful figure to him.

    Why worry about the orcs? With my powers as the strongest warrior among the lizardmen, they are but a trifle. And I could seize this opportunity to make my father abdicate once and for all!

    So, one of the warriors with him chimed in, the era of Sir Gabil is soon at hand?

    Mmm? Ah-ha-ha-ha-ha! Indeed, indeed!

    Very good, my lord! And I promise that we all shall follow you to the end of the world!

    Gabil gave him a confident nod. In his mind, his future as the new chief and great leader of the lizardmen was already a matter of fact. Then, perhaps, his father would finally see him for who he really was. For now, though, he would need to be discreet. Lie low and wait for the right opportunity. Building his forces came first.

    So he traveled to the goblin viges. One by one, he put them under hismand. They had apparently made contact with the orcs already, and that was enough for them to treat him as some kind of benevolent god. It only served to boost his already burgeoning confidencewhich made things move in unexpected directions.

    I am the true hero here! Gabil thought. His actions grew bolder, riskier. His inting ambitions were famished, and soon they needed to be fed.

    Several days passed.

    I had worried at first that Benimaru and the ogres might not get along so well with my people, but I guess I had nothing to worry about. To hobgoblins, ogres were a rank or two higher on the pecking orderbut the goblins had the capacity to ept them as their own. And since ogres werent too keen to pick on those who were weaker, they were practically worthy of worship as far as goblins were concerned.

    With Kurobe making swords, Shuna sewing clothes, and Soei gathering hellmoth cocoons, I had everyone humming along, really. Benimaru and Hakuro were down in the underground cavern, which I had told them about. Training, they called it. Which was fine by mein their evolved forms, Im sure they had new abilities that needed testing out.

    Shion had mentioned where they were when we were out surveying the structures currently under construction around town. Or to be exact, I was being held close to Shions chest as she walked around. She had volunteered to be my secretary, and I had no reason to turn her down, so she was now serving as my transport in the ce of Ranga. I couldve transformed into a human, butreallybeing a slime was a lot easier. I definitely didnt have any impure motives like enjoying the sensation of being sandwiched in between her breasts or anything.

    I called it a town just now, and that was the best way to describe it. Certainly not a vige any longer. In terms of what I had cooking for the future, we were starting to get pretty broad in scope. Of course, we were still busy enough with the sewer system and other underground infrastructure that itd be a while before much would change aboveground. Given how much enthusiasm Mildo was giving his job, though, I had every reason to expect big things at the end.

    The center of town was starting to get pretty full with buildings, even if most were only temporary. It was bing our industrial districta line of log houses located next to our storehouses, serving as workshops for building weapons, armor, and clothing. Kurobe was holed up inside one,ughing heartily with Kaijin as he worked on something or other. I was patiently waiting to find out what it was, since I felt Id just get in the way of the creative process if I barged in.

    So we headed for the building Shuna was in.

    Ah, Sir Rimuru! She beamed as soon as she saw me. She quickly rose to pick me up, as if snatching me from Shions hands. She gave me a few loving pats as she toured me around, showing me how they were handling their work. They seemed to be having fun there, which I was d to see, and as we chatted, she had no particrints.

    Whenever Soei came back with his cocoons, theyd get right to silk production. Work on hemp and cotton fabric was already under way. I was impressed with their speed.

    Well, we have you to thank for that, Sir Rimuru, Shuna said.

    It turned outand I had no idea about thisthat Shuna had obtained the unique skill Analysis, the same one I had been using to such great effect. Apparently, she had inherited many of the benefits I had as part of my Great Sage skillHasten Thought, Analyze and Assess, Cast Cancel, and All of Creation. In her case, though, her Assess skills were so advanced that she could just use Magic Sense to analyze objects, where I had to use Predator on them first.

    Pretty convenient. But thanks to earning that unique skill, she had lost a decent chunk of her magic energy. The hit had taken her back down to approximately B-plus level, although the evolution was still enough of a strength upgrade that she had noints.

    Sir Rimuru, Shion said as our chat with Shuna winded down, Princess Shuna has her work to handle. Perhaps we had best leave her to it for now?

    She had a schedule for me, just like any decent secretary.

    Oh? Are you taking good care of Sir Rimuru, then?

    Of course! I could feel Shion taking me away from Shuna. I will see to all of Sir Rimurus needs, so there is no need to worry about that.

    Hee-hee-hee! I certainly wouldnt mind taking care of him, too.

    Not at all, Princess Shuna. There is no need. I will fully provide for him!

    I could almost see the sparks flying. Nah, just my imagination.

    Besides, I didnt need to be taken care of at all. I had lived alone for long enough that I could do pretty much anything I needed on my own. Maybe its time I got out of here , I thought

    Sir Rimuru! Who do you think is best suited to take care of your needsme or Shion?

    I was toote.

    Um, yeah Youve got silk to weave or something, right, Shuna? I guess you could help out whenever youre free, maybe?

    Help out on what, exactly? Hell if I know.

    Very well! Im d to be counted on like that!

    Shuna smiled. This was enough for her, I suppose. Well, good. Lets just leave it at that. Thank you! I replied. She nodded cutely in response.

    Absolutely! I will dly serve as your shamaness whenever you need!

    Shamaness?

    Yes! You have epted me as your Oracle, the one who will revere and serve you, have you not?

    Um, did I? Because I think I wouldve remembered that! But I hesitated to say so, sensing it might be a tad dangerous.

    Oh, er Yeah? Yeah. Sure. Have fun being my Oracle, then.

    I was weed with a rosy smile.

    You are in good hands, Sir Rimuru!

    So cute. I was ready to let her say just about anything to me.

    In that case, Sir Rimuru, we had best be off!

    Shion, of course, took the opportunity to ruin the moment, briskly lifting me up.

    Um, thanks?

    Youre wee, sir! Shuna chirped, her smile taut against her face, as if she had just emerged victorious from some manner of epic battle.

    d to see that was settled, then. I felt like the temperature around us had chilled a bit, though Im sure it was my mind ying tricks on me. With a lot of things in the world, its better for everyone to just chalk it up to their imagination.

    Now we were off to Benimaru and crew. They were no doubt busily testing their newfound abilities, and I wanted to find out what they had discovered so far.

    We arrived at the underground cavern to find Benimaru and Hakuro crossing swords with each other. Benimarus wooden de was, for some reason, shrouded in a white aura. When he shed it at Hakuro, it emitted a bright arc of light that surged forward. It slipped right through Hakuros body, instead slicing a boulder behind him cleanly in half. The next moment, Hakuro appeared behind Benimarus back, his own wooden sword against his opponents neck.

    This, apparently, signaled the end of the battle.

    U-umm These guys are ogres, right? Because that little snippet I just witnessed looked so refined. Those moves. And that white light? Whats up with that? Whyre wooden practice des enough to smash up rocks? Why bother with the sword at all, then?

    Hakuro was the first to notice me. Ah, hello to you, Sir Rimuru, he said. A rather nice ce, this is. Quiet, too.

    I do apologize you had to see me like this, Sir Rimuru.

    Oh, no, no. I heard you were training, so I thought I would see how its going. Doing well, I suppose?

    I think we areing to grips with this, yes, Benimaru said. Hakuros regained enough of his youth that hes as strong as a man half his age.

    Hoh-hoh-hoh! Indeed, it is as Lord Benimaru puts it. I can feel the power flowing into this withered old frame!

    Ah, but its only just begun for the two of us, Hakuro! I am still stronger than you, remember, which should have been enough to win, but

    Benimarus face visibly soured. I could tell that his stores of magicules did outss his foes.

    Indeed, young masteror should I say, Lord Benimaru? I fear, however, that you rely upon your strength reserves too much. You must lend an ear to your sword, the way I do, and be one with it. I would hate to let myself lose to you until you achieve that.

    Even before he evolved, Benimaru was a masterful enough fighter to sneak up behind my back. I still remembered how he evaded my Magic Sense long enough to slice right through my arm, even with Multyer Barrier and Body Armor protecting it. I didnt want to dwell on the thought much, but he might just be strong enough now to finish the job for good.

    Yeah, you lopped my arm off not long ago, didnt you? I said. If you dont mind my honesty, that threw me, man.

    Ha-ha-ha-ha-ha! And then you regenerated it at a moments notice! I believe I was the one nearing panic.

    Wellthat was true, yeah. urate, but it only happened because I stumbled upon Ultraspeed Regeneration on my feet back there. What Benimaru didnt know wouldnt hurt him, though.

    I was pretty impressed with how you managed topletely hide yourself like that, though. How did that work?

    That is a skill known as Battlewill. It uses my aura, which ces it in a different family of skills from magic.

    As Hakuro put it, Battlewill was a unique sort of Art, or technical skill, that transformed the magicules within the body into fighting spirit, thus powering up the wielders physical form. If ones aura is whates out while youre not doing anything, fighting spirit is what your body releases while, well, fightingalthough given the auras already avable to high-level monsters, it struck me as six of one, half a dozen of the other.

    There were a few other Arts, too. Instantmove, for one, which allowed exactly that, or Formhide, which forced your opponent to lose sight of you. Modelwill, which strengthened your fists and weapons, was more of a beginner Art, and that was the white light I had just witnessedthey could fire it off like a projectile. It was all a bit like magic, except not magic. No casting time, for one, which made it more useful to put into practice in a pinch.

    Given how anyone with the right level of intelligence could learn Arts, I guess the sight of ogres busting them out shouldnt have been a surprise. Shuna had that illusory magic on her side, too. I suppose it should be a given that high-level monsters had this kind of thing handy, as a rule. Great if theyre on my side, really annoying if not.

    If your garden-variety adventurer ever ran into a monster with that kind of arsenal at their fingertips I couldnt guess how many unlucky sods met their ends that way. I took a moment to say a silent prayer for them.

    This Battlewill thing, though, was interesting. I definitely wanted to learn about Formhide, which Magic Sense was apparently powerless against. My human form gave me normal sight, but if I hadnt had that, I wouldve been wide open to that attack back there. As they put it, the Art begins by suppressing your sound, then your smell, then your temperature, then your spiritand once you reach that level, you no longer even disturbed the magicules around you.

    Definitely a skill I wanted to have.

    Lord Hakuro was our teacher, Shion exined, and the most powerful swordsman among our retainers.

    Neat. So, Hakuro I want to learn that Battlewill thing, and Id like the hobgobs to get trained in it, too. Mind flexing your muscles some more for me as my official Instructor?

    Hoh-hoh-hoh! You seek a favor from this decrepit old man? He fell to one knee. It ddens me to hear! If it be for your sake, Sir Rimuru, I would be overjoyed to exert my weary bones one more time!

    Sir Rimuru, Benimaru added, you said you nned to build a nation in thisnd, yes? You were serving as king, and Rigurd as your top minister? I know nothing about government myself, but when ites to military issues, I believe there are few who could equal me. If you wish to appoint me to a role along those lines, I would dly ept it.

    Fine by mebut thats kind of a step down for you, isnt it?

    Nothing of the sort. We serve you now, Sir Rimuru, and we have offered our loyalty. If I may fulfill this by serving as your vassal, then I would dly put everything I can offer on the line.

    Hmm. I wonder how to handle this. He certainly seems earnest. Hed made a simr request a few days ago, but I honestly hadnt given it serious thought yet. Maybe Im the one who owes him some more respect.

    All right. I hope I can count on your strength, then.

    I had to repay his resolve one way or the other, I figured. Now was the time. The time for me and these ogres to firmly, finally, walk hand in hand.

    That is terribly unfair! Sir Rimuru! If this is how it will be, I would like to be appointed to a post as well!

    Sheesh. She startled me.

    Shion, still firmly holding me up to her chest, was visibly pouting. Oh brother. Did she think I was kicking her out of the cool kids club or something? Guess Ill need to whip up something for her, too.

    I jumped out of her arms and to the ground, transforming into human form as I did. Before I touched solid earth, I produced a change of clothes from my stomach and put it ona move I had been practicing in secret. Benimaru and Shion looked surprised, but they kneeled silently before me instead of saying anything.

    Well then, Benimaru, I hereby appoint you to be my Samurai General. From here on in, you will be responsible for running my nations military affairs.

    Yes, my lord! I will serve you well, on and off the battlefield!

    And you, Shion, I hereby appoint as my Royal Guard. Your duties will remain chiefly secretarial, I suppose, but either way, do your best, all right?

    Thank you so much, my lord! I will make a full effort every day to serve you as best as I possibly can!

    So now Ive not only named them all, but Ive given them three sses to work with. They couldnt have been more rapt with joy. Kurobe seemed to be loving his own job, too. I shouldve given them all formal titles earlier. Shuna and Soei deserved something, too.

    Just as the thought urred, a figure suddenly appeared next to Benimaru. It was Soei, and it looked like he had pretty much jumped right out from Benimarus shadowthe result, he exined, of the Shadow Motion skill he earned as part of his own evolution. I knew it involved harnessing peoples shadows to move from point A to point B in the shortest time possible, but I wasnt too deep on the specifics.

    I had learned it myselfit was part of what I had picked up from the direwolvesbut Id yet to actually try it. Probably more useful than I thought at first sight. I had so much stuff at this point, I hadnt had the time to fully experiment with it all. Id better get to grips with that soon, at least. Especially if Soeis already well versed in it. Itd be great for gathering intel, I think.

    Upon noticing me, Soei fell to one knee. Reporting, my lord! he barked.

    Y-yeah?

    I havepleted my cocoon-gathering mission, and on the way back, I witnessed a group of lizardmen on the move. Spotting them so far away from the marshes they call home seemed highly unusual, so I thought it best to report to you as quickly as possible.

    Soei seemed perfectly serene. His breath wasnt ragged or anything, but I was sure he mustve hurried right over. My Sense Heat Source skill told me his body temperature was slightly higher than normal.

    Lizardmen? That is odd, Benimaru said thoughtfully.

    So lizardmen and orcs? Something was definitely happening now.

    Soei, I said, Id like you to handle some intelligence work for me. Starting today, I want you to serve as my Covert Agent, gathering information for me and our cause.

    I could dream of nothing better, my lord, he replied, quietly but resolutely. I was always told that my ancestors were gifted in the so-called dark artsand I look forward to exercising those skills to their fullest extent for you.

    So now the ogres and I were one big happy family, more or less. I had a small group of loyal agents working under me. They had evolved into ogre mages, and they had regained a fair number of their ancestors abilities.

    When they first evolved, I had guessed they were all through the wall and well into the top of the A-ranked range. But now that they were obtaining skills and getting used to their new bodies, their individual ranks were changing. Head and shoulders above the rest of the vige in strength, but still, changing.

    I had the feeling that my assigning jobs, or sses, to them had helped cement the exact amount of magical force each had to work with. The same had happened with the hobgoblins who were assigned sses.

    In the end, sess in battle had less to do with brute strength and more to do with how you matched up with your foe skill-wise. It was really my skills that defeated Ifrit, not whatever my slime body did for me. Seeing these ogre mages obtain unique skills in the same way was fascinating.

    I had a feeling that Shuna had forced my hand a little bit, but I didnt mind. She did used to be a shamaness, I guess, so the ss I gave her worked well enough for me. She seemed happy enough with it, too.

    So now I had six ogre mages working under me, each with their own ss. Benimaru the Samurai General; Shuna the Oracle; Hakuro the Instructor; Soei the Covert Agent; Shion the Royal Guard; and Kurobe the Swordsmith. I liked it.

    Gabil was finding some very receptive minds among the goblin viges hed paid personal visits to. They didnt need any lofty speeches about how strong he wasthey were eager to follow him practically at first sight. Thats how the weaker races worked, he supposed. And if they showed any sign of defying him, he was ready to whip them into submission.

    The chiefs orders no longer figured in Gabils mind. He had the able warriors of each vige gathered together, bringing whatever food supplies they could scrounge up from their storehouses. They numbered seven thousand in all, dressed in flimsy leather armor and bearing crude spears with stone-hewn spikes. Not worth relying on in battle, but this was fine for now. The ones too scared to fight had already fled anyway.

    Elders! he bellowed. Are there any other viges in the area I should be aware of?

    The elders exchanged nces with one another, then one finally stepped up timidly to respond.

    Wellperhaps not a vige, exactly, but there should be one other settlement, yes.

    Settlement? The elders choice of words rankled the lizardman. What of it? What is so worrisome about this settlement you speak of?

    The elders responded with an astonishing talethe story of a goblin band riding direwolves. It made no sense to him. Those were strong monsters, those canines, roving in packs to rule over the ins. On their home turf, even the lizardmen warriors would watch their step. Why would they bend to the will of such a low-level species like goblins? It was preposterous.

    And the elders tales grew even taller as they continued. Apparently, they were being led by a slime, of all things. Ridiculous , Gabil thought. The lowest level of monster there ever was! Maybe they could find a way to charm the minds of the equally stupid goblins, but direwolves? Come on.

    Gabil needed to see it for himself. Perhaps there was a trick behind the founding of this settlement he could appropriate for his own ends. If all went well, perhaps even these alleged direwolves would join his side, turning the vast ins into his personal hunting grounds. So he sprang into action, letting his desires move him.

    The location Gabil was given bore no vige. This annoyed him, but he let it slide. If he wanted to gain control over the direwolves, he had to expect a hitch here and there. Being released from any sense of duty to his lizardman superiors made it impossible for him to rein in his lust for power, but still, he knew patience was key.

    Right now, the existence of his chief was nothing more than an obstacle on the way to his armys objectives. If he could gain the cooperation of the direwolves, the other lizardmen would no doubt recognize their new king by then. The lords of the ins, paired with the king of the marshes? Who had anything to fear from those low-level pigs now, no matter how much of a mob they were?

    Nobody. Gabil was sure of it. He would quickly suppress them, and then he would rule over the Forest of Jura.

    And that, I imagine, would prove worthy enough a feat to ce upon Sir Gelmuds feet.

    Picturing the joy his master would show him upon hearing the news made it easy for Gabil to remain patient. He already had men stationed at Lake Sisu, awaiting additional orders. Supplies were still tight, so they had to take action soon. There was no time to waste.

    One of his men reported spotting fresh tracks in the area. He immediately ced an order. A group of ten elite fighters, himself included, would ride upon their hover lizard mounts toward their objective. Gabil didnt even bother to hide their presence in the ins. The direwolves were a concern, but if they were doing the bidding of goblins of all things, they couldnt have been any threat now.

    I will need to train them , he thought, and bring them back to their former glories!

    He had no idea what was waiting for him. His head was too full of pride at the idea of serving Sir Gelmud, the only master he truly loved.

 Volume 2 - Ch 3

    THE ENVOY AND THE MEETING

    Several days had passed since I had appointed my pseudo cab of ogre mages.

    Just as they had said, things appeared to be going well between them and the hobgoblins, Rigurd included. Soei was providing raw materials to Shuna, and she was already sessfully spinning silk thread from it. The fabric it produced had made her the target of astonishment from the viges goblinas. Which made sense. Compared to the simple hemp from the goblin era, this was in a whole other dimension.

    Shuna was now instructing the goblinas under Lilinas leadershipincluding Haruna, right up fronton the Art of sewing. The ogre was now serving as the de facto head of the clothing workshop. She was working closely with the armorer Garm as well, exchanging opinions on makingfortable clothing and trying to improve their output.

    It wouldnt be long before we had a line of formal and everyday wear avable to us. I was looking forward to it.

    In much the same way, Kurobe was heading up our weapon forge. It was a learning experience for him and Kaijin, and they were both better artisans for it.

    Kaijin was more focused on overseeing our efforts at mass productionits not like any single person had the stamina to bang away at metal every single day for weeks on endbut he still had a wealth of knowledge to glean. He probably thought it best to leave the nuts and bolts of weaponsmithing to Kurobe while he focused on his passions in the realm of research.

    It was already producing results. I caught him when he was talking with Kurobe about some kind of weapon hobgoblins could use while mounted. Hopefully, theyd remain a solid team for a good while toe.

    Soei, meanwhile, was leading a small group of hobgobs as they built a sort of securitywork around town, lined with small-scale devices along the way that would sound an rm whenever someone approached. At the same time, he was constantly gathering intel and rying it to me as needed.

    That was thanks to Replication, which Soei could now use to create up to six copies of himself at once. We could also keep up with each other through Thought Communication, and since there didnt seem to be any distance limit for these clones, he could send them out across thend to conduct espionage as needed.

    It was worth noting that the clones generated through Replication had exactly as much ability in battle as their original bodies. The differencey in stamina, orck thereof. The clones had almost none, in fact, which meant theycked the energy tounch any mystic arts. Skills were another matter, and using abilities like Shadow Motion and Sticky Steel Thread was no problem. Talk about useful.

    Soeis abilities seemed more than a little inherited from mine, in a way, and he had already fully mastered them. It was interesting, actually, seeing how different people could use the same skills with such differing degrees of virtuosity. Not like I was a dunce, I dont thinkit was more like Soei was a genius at it.

    To tell the truth, I had actually sent out a scout or two of my own before I formally employed Soei for the job. Intel gathering was a fundamental part of my mission, and if the orcs and lizardmen were acting suspicious, I couldnt simply assume that our neck of the woods was safe. The hobgobs were still amateurs at that kind of thing, though. The best they could do was observe their faraway neighbors from a distance.

    As irritating as that was, theyd be in danger of capture if they came too close to anyoneand even if they escaped, theyd still tip off our presence to potential enemies.

    Putting Soei on the task was absolutely the right answer. These were the products of Replication, after all. If they were spotted, he could just make them vanish. And having Thought Communication handy was hugein a world without so much as a cell phone, we could now talk and trade info far more quickly than before.

    Should I go on reconnaissance, Sir Rimuru? I remember him asking, cool as a cucumber. Would you mind? Id said, and hed immediately replied, Right away, my lord and simply disappeared. A textbook Shadow Motion maneuver.

    Soei seemed coolheaded, not the kind of guy to make any brash moves. He was well suited for recon, in other words. The perfect Covert Agent.

    Benimaru, meanwhile, was conferring with Rigurd and the other elders about how to keep this town secure.

    I had established a new department of the army and left him in charge, although the only other member at this point was Hakuro. Rigur and the rest of the towns security force were busy securing food and natural resources; I couldnt draft them into the army that easily. Id probably have to reorganize them at some point and field volunteers.

    That appeared to be what Benimaru was talking about with Rigurd.

    Id like to create an organization suited forbat, he told me, selected from worthy candidates willing to dedicate themselves to battle duty. Would that be all right with you?

    Sure, I said. Sounds great. Let me know once youve got a roster handy.

    I wanted to leave the whole thing to him, really, but that felt a tad too irresponsible, even for me. I was charged with making the final decisions, and I had to fulfill that duty, at least.

    We were still basically a collection of monsters, but little by little, I felt like we were forming an actual nation of sorts. It was nothing I couldve doneor at least, done this quicklywithout Benimaru and the other ogres. Id hope I could rely on them for a while toe.

    That just left Hakurostanding in front of me even now, wooden practice sword in hand. He was a master of the sword; there was no doubting that. You underestimated him at your own peril. He was elderly, but his spirit was like nothing else.

    Having this new human form and everything, I thought Id learn some sword skills of my own. This was, to say the least, extremely optimistic, as was the prospect of learning new Arts for myself anytime soon. Myst experience with that sort of thing was back in middle-school phys ed, and Id never even held a sword before. No way itd be that easy.

    I figured Id be a quick study, what with Hasten Thought and all that, but Hakuro quickly taught me the error of my ways. He had that, too, it turned out, so I had no advantage at all from the get-go. The end result? I basically stood there and let this ogre mage beat me up for an hour or so.

    The ease with which I had been learning skills had probably spoiled me. Unlike those, Arts were earned strictly through training and concerted effort. It was never going to be quite that easy for me. And while magic seemed a bit like Arts, they essentially ran on two different engines.

    Yeesh. Icicle Lance came to me just like that , too, when I absorbed it. No pointining, though. I might be able to do the same with Arts as well, but it looked tricky. There would be no shortcuts with thisId just have to give up and admit that itd take constant, extensive practice.

    Oops. Now was no time for mulling over this. I had my own practice sword in hand. Manifesting as an adult slowed down my reaction time, which meant I was in child form so I could devote my all to this.

    Launching Magic Sense, I honed my consciousness on the world around me. Sense Heat Source and Keen Smell were also activated.

    Question. Enhance Ultrasonic Wave to evolve the extra skill Sense Soundwave?

    Yes

    No

    Ah. Good job, Sage. Just what I was hoping to hear. I thought yes to myself, and with that, I opened up a treasure trove of informationthe movements, temperature, smell, sound, and everything else rted to the magicules surrounding us. Now there was nothing that could escape my senses.

    That gave me an extra jab of confidence as I took on Hakuro, his sword casually lifted up to his chest. The next thing I felt was a dull blow to the crown of my head. It couldnt have been a cleaner strikeno pain, no damage. He didnt put any force into it at all. Still, though That was skill , not speed. We were onpletely different levels.

    What was that?

    Hoh-hoh-hoh! I call that Haze, he exined with a smile. It is part of my Formhide skill set, and the more magic I invest, the more I can dilute the presence I project. I believe you have the ability to obtain it for yourself, too, Sir Rimuru.

    It didnt sound very likely. It apparently took him a good century or so to learn, so I didnt like my chances that much.

    Yeah, I Id sure like to, sometime.

    Hakuro nodded approvingly.

    It hurt my feelings a little, but I couldnt do much about it. Arts werent skills, after all. They took time. And whatever advantage I had in skillsand I had a big one, I was sureit was nothingpared to what Hakuro could do.

    I didnt think I was acting all high and mighty, but he sure humbled me there. And maybe I could just cast a re Circle and be done with him, but that wasnt the point. This was a swordsman. One born as a nameless ogre, tirelessly practicing his skills in the shadows, away from public sight. No wonder he was the strongest in his tribe. I doubted he had shown a full effort yet, and I was sure his newfound youth only made him tougher.

    In an ideal world, hed be known across thend for his talents. Thats what I honestly thought.

    Right, Hakuro said, smiling like a doting grandfather. One more time, then.

    Before we could make another move, though, we heard the sound of arge bell ringing. Something had triggered Soeis rm system. Thank heavens for that. I had no chance of beating Hakuro, and I was ready to call it a day. So we headed for Rigurds residence instead.

    He ran right up to us once we were in sight. He tended to do that a lot. Maybe my mere presence stressed him out a little.

    I have news to report, Sir Rimuru, he said, half in a panic. A lizardman envoy hase to visit!

    Lizardmen? I was expecting that unwee visit sooner orter, but I guess theyre here, huh? Ahead of the orcs, no less. Well, I was ready to deal with either. Lets hear this one out.

    I headed for the towns entrance to greet this envoy. They hadnt arrived yet, instead sending an advance messenger who told us to bring everyone in the vige out front. I asked why the guard didnt just shrug him off, but he was riding a hover lizard, a fairlyrge mount reserved only for the knight sses, and Im sure that mustve made Rigurd pee his pants.

    If this was a troop of knight-level lizardmen, no goblin vige would stand a chance. Theyd be ripped apart. And if a knight was first to greet us, I could only imagine what the main outfit looked like. Wed need to mind our manners.

    There were four of us there at the entranceme, Rigurd, Benimaru, and Hakuro. I made sure everyone knew to tread carefully. Absolute politeness, unless I say otherwise, I said.

    Yes, my lord, Rigurd said, the rest nodding with him.

    Hmm? Where is Shion? Benimaru said. Apparently, the word politeness reminded him of something.

    Oh, I think shes been cleaning my ce since morning, but

    Wh-what?!

    For some reason, Hakuro appeared shocked at my reply.

    Um, is that a problem?

    N-no Not at all

    Indeed, Benimaru added. She has grown. It should be all right

    This was starting to concern me. And as it turned out, I shouldve been rmed. Shion was soon there at the entrance, providing tea. Working hard as my secretary, I figured. I wanted topliment her on itand then I took a sniff.

    Um This is tea, right? There were these weird, seaweed-like leaves flopping over the edge of my cup. It could not have been any potable beverage.

    I looked to Rigurd, seeking out a possible exnation. He averted his eyes. What the heck? Benimaru, meanwhile, had his eyes firmly closed, not giving me a second nce, and Hakuro had vanished, using his Arts to be one with the wind.

    They knew, didnt they? And all the time, as I hesitated, Shion was looking right at me, waiting for my praise.

    How am I supposed to heap praise on her for this? My instincts were screaming at me to dash the cup against the ground, but was I doomed to this fate all along? Why the hell did I have to be human right now?! It wouldve been a lot easier to deal with this as a taste budfree slime. Just use Predator to take it apart, and Id be perfectly safe.

    Toote to curse my bad luck now, though. Steeling my resolve, I slowly reached out for the cup in Shions hand. Just as I did

    Ooh, some tea? I was just feeling a bit thirsty!

    Gobta, freshly back from his patrol detail, grabbed the cup and emptied it in one gulp.

    Nice one, dude!! Perfect! A warm round of apuse for the man!! Shions face was now a mask of pure anger, but Gobta didnt bother noticing. Or to be more exact, he was in no shape to notice. When a small plume of foam escaped his mouth, he immediately copsed, twitching in a spasm. Yeesh. That couldve been me, man.

    Shion looked on quizzically, apparently not expecting this. It was a cute piece of bodynguage with her looks, but I wasnt fooled. From now on, she was banned from any work involving food or drink.

    Uh, Shion, I said, next time you make anything you want people to eat or drink, make sure to run it past Benimaru first, all right?

    Benimaru shot me an icy stare. Like I cared. Youre the boss, man , I silently replied. You handle it.

    He joined Shion in staring awkwardly at the ground.

    I still felt vindicated. If anyone had actually gotten hurt here, what would they do then? Oh right, I guess Gobta did, kinda. But Ahh, hell be fine. Id have to thank himter for serving as my inadvertent taste tester. And Id also have to count on Benimaru to keep the body count from rising any more.

    By the time we heard the full lizardman envoy thundering toward us, about an hour had passed from the initial rm call. I reverted to slime form, enlisting Shion to hold me in her arms. Just in case , I exined. I couldnt help but feel overall safer as a slime.

    Shion was all gung ho about her guardian role, too, and there was no reason to throw shade on that. I bet she wants to make up for that tea disaster, besides. Wonder how she did cleaning my ce, though,e to think of it? No, I couldnt let that bother me now. I shook off the ill omens in the back of my mind and focused on the envoy up ahead.

    There were around ten lizardmen, and after a moment, one of them, chest puffed out, dismounted his hover lizard and sauntered up.

    The leader, I guess?

    Thank you for greeting me! I will give this vige, too, the chance to submit to my rule and authority. I hope you will consider it an honor!

    Talk about a ridiculous opening line. This wasnt a negotiation so much as it was a deration. I was too dumbfounded to have an easy response. What was this idiot going on about? And none of mypanions knew what to make of it, either.

    I apologize, sir, Rigurd offered, but asking us out of the blue to submit to you like this

    Pfft! Have you not heard yet? Those pigs, the orc race, are on the move! They will attack this very vige before long. And I am the only one who can save your puny, pathetic hides!

    ording to this lizardman, at least, we were already his loyal subjects.

    Certainly, if we were about to be overrun by an orc horde, seeking sce under the direction of the lizardmen was one option. I was still waiting on Soeis report, but until we knew exactly what we were dealing with, it paid to work together, perhaps.

    Still, though

    Ah yes! I understand there are some among you who have tamed the direwolf race to do your bidding. Whoever aplished this task, I will dly appoint as one of my top advisers. Bring him here now!

    Ummm

    Okay. We could fight together, yes, but what if the team we aligned ourselves with was a pack of idiots? The great thing to fear is not apetent enemy, but an ipetent ally. Napoleon or someone said that, right? It sounded true to me.

    An ipetent ally would be nothing but a drag on my style. Especially in an environment as vtile as a battlefield. And especially if the ally was my boss. Simply entertaining the thought made me shudder.

    I gave Rigurd a nce. He was silent, mouth agape. Benimaru was scratching his head, looking at me like he was asking permission to rip this guy apart. I wasnt about to give itbut I still wasnt sure how to react. I was struck dumb, even more so than I was with Shions tea.

    Hakuro crossed his arms and closed his eyes, wordless. Was he sleeping? Shion, meanwhile, still had me in her arms, which she had tensed up out of anger. Whoa, youre crushing me,dy!

    I jiggled a bit to remind her I was still there. She apologized, breaking into a cold sweat.

    She had a hair-trigger temper, it seemed. Id have to remember that. Being held by her sure wasnt bad, I thought, but it came with some danger. She had obtained the dual skills of Steel Strength and Strengthen Body, making her one book you absolutely couldnt judge by its cover. Based on her act just now, she wasnt in full control of her own powers, and getting strangled to death wasnt on my bucket list. Id have to watch my back around her.

    Butyeesh. I had no idea the envoy would be such a damn fool.

    Okay, I said, trying to move things along. Um I guess Im the one who tamed the direwolves. Or, more like made friends with them, maybe?

    Huh? You, a lowly slime? Enough joking. Let me see some evidence. Then Ill decide whether to believe you.

    This guy had a bad habit of giving orders from whatever mountain peak he believed he was standing on. I was starting to get irritated. Refusing to listen to the other side in conversations like this Someone needed to knock this dude off his high horse.

    I asionally had to deal withpany presidents and government officials in my construction job back home, but not even they treated me like such an idiot. One thing I learned quickly with those guys was that the only way to beat them was refuse to y their game in the first ce. Teaming up with idiots would earn you nothing.

    So I decided to switch tactics.

    Ranga.

    Here, sir.

    He stepped out from my shadow. He had been adopting it as a sort of standby post as ofteanother way to adapt Shadow Motion, I supposed.

    Good. This guy wanted to ask you a thing or two. Could you hear him out?

    Thats right. I tossed the ball over to Ranga. Not because I waszy or anythingI just figured Ranga would be more effective at dealing with this bozo than Id ever be. Assuming I wasnt worth the space I took up in the world just because I was a slime was ruder than even Rigurd was when we first met. Could anyone me me for wanting to bow out? Besides, this dude hadnt even noticed my aura yet. He couldnt have been anyone special.

    It was all pretty weird, really.

    So Ranga, epting my order, turned to face the lizardmen. A single re from him was enough to make even the stout-looking guards in their iron chest pieces take a step back in self-defense. And why wouldnt they? Ranga was huge. Not shrunken down at all. The whole of him was right there.

    My master has ordered me to interact with you. Speak, and I will listen.

    Ranga was using Coercion as he talked. It struck home among the warriors, who were now frozen in ce. One, though, wasntthe envoy, who looked a tad groggy but still maintained his stately, puffed-out posture. I had to hand it to him; maybe he had more willpower than I thought.

    Ah Yes. It is you, then, the alpha or what-have-you of the direwolves? I am Gabil, warrior lord of the lizardman tribe! I am charmed to make your acquaintance. I am, as you have just heard, a named lizardman. Will you abandon this slime and join with me instead?

    How utterly brazen. I wanted to knock him out, but I held back. I had to take the high road here. Just let it slide.

    Im a grown-up, so just chill. And you chill, too, Shion. Youre going to permanently dent me with that vise grip youve got on me. A few more jiggles, and she bowed in apology. I really wish she could bottle up her anger a bit more.

    Why was this lizard Gabil acting like he owned the world, though? I didnt know him from a hole in the ground. I silently cheered Ranga on. Go get im, boy!

    You filthy lizard How dare you mock my master?

    He gritted his teeth, eyes turning red as he silently seethed in anger. Uh, not too much, okay, Ranga? Im not sure if this lizard can take it. If he tried anything funnywell, he had iting, but I wanted to avoid that if he really was some higher-up lizard guy.

    It would appear, he said, that you have been deceived. Very well. Let me use my powers to defeat this so-called master who has taken control of you. Who wishes to take me on? I would dly handle all of you at once, if you like!

    Whoa What the hells he saying now? Talk about a bad joke. This lizard really needs to know his ce. Youre the weakest guy here, dude.

    Okay, I take that back. Theres Rigurd. He could probably whip Rigurd.

    But thats still a B rank we were talking about; king of the hobgoblins and probably their strongest warrior. If your average hobgob was a C-plus, thats a pretty damn big leapand with the Kaijin-forged armor he had on, Id peg him at a high B right now.

    That being said, he hadnt really learned much of anything in terms of swordsmanship or battle tactics. Against a professional, I didnt like his chances. I had learned not long ago that the presence, orck thereof, of Arts could vastly change your worth in battle. And while Gabil had a big mouth and a pointless amount of swagger, he seemed to be well trained enough as a fighter in my eyes. He was certainly brimming with confidence anyway.

    Our eyes met.

    So who should I pit against him to start out?

    Huh? Whatre you guys up to?

    Gobta, without a doubt the best in town at popping up at the exact wrong time, executed this skill perfectly by waking up.

    Youre all right?

    Oh, you have to listen to this! he replied with a carefree smile. I was swimming across the river, and this kind voice said I had obtained Resist Poison or something like that! So I felt a whole lot better, and then I woke up!

    Something told me it was a lucky thing he didnt make it all the way across that river I thought itd be kinder if I didnt say that.

    Wow! Resist Poison, huh? Thats pretty neat. I dont even have that one.

    R-really? Ooh, neato!

    Gobta seemed honestly proud. But his knack for terrible timing had already sealed his fate.

    Heh-heh-heh, Ranga growled. Very well. If you are capable of defeating one among us whom we deem to be worthy, we will listen to your story.

    Then he motioned toward Gobta. I knew he would.

    Wh-wha?! he protested, eyes wide open. What are you?! But it had been decided. Which was good for me. I wasnt sure who to pick, myself. Everyone on our side was ready to beat the crap out of this lizardman, their eyes lowered in a threatening stance. In a way, it helped me keep my own head cool. Whenever someone gets visibly pissed off, it tends to put the brakes on everyone else in the room.

    Really, though. Ranga can be pretty mean, too, huh? I could see it in his eyes, even. He was putting Gobta up as a sacrificialmb.

    It wouldnt exactly be honorable to hurt this envoy, but if he struck first, that was enough of an excuse. I imagined that was Rangas way of thinking about it. Clever of him. Wonder where he got that from.

    Are you sure? Gabil asked me, a triumphant look. Because I would be happy to challenge you instead. Though, perhaps youd prefer to have one of your underlings step up for you, rather than reveal to the world how powerless you are!

    Now he was just dissing me. He seriously thought I was running somerge-scale con on Ranga and the rest. I wanted to punch him, full-strength. My head was distinctly no longer cool.

    Dont show him any mercy, Gobta. Get him! Lose, and Ill have Shion cook a five-course meal for you!

    W-wait a second, sir! II guess youve already made your decisionbut Id like some kind of reward if I win, at least! And please, anything but Shions food

    I do not appreciate this line of conversation, Shion sullenly added.

    He was right, though. I had the stick; now I needed a carrot. I figured a taste of Shions homespun efforts would be enough to make him fight like his life depended on it. I knew it was pointlessI mean, he had no chancebut I wanted to think of a reward, then.

    All right, I said. In that case, Ill have Kurobe make a weapon for you. Hows that sound?

    R-really?!

    Come on, Gobta, have I ever lied to you?

    N-no, not lie, exactlymaybe kind of withheld things from me sometimes, but

    Youre just imagining it.

    Am I? Oh, all right!

    This was why I liked talking with Gobta. He was so easy to work with.

    Sensing our conversation was over, Ranga threw a signal my way. I nodded in reply.

    If you wish to lend us your power, he said to Gabil, then show us what you possess first. You may begin!

    With that, the battle kicked offGobta, ready for anything, and Gabil, calmly carrying his spear. Gobta had a cavalrynce on him, too, making it a duel between two long-range weapons. He had no chance, to be sure. His usual weapon of choice was a dagger.

    Hmph, Gabil replied, lecturing his foe despite the fact that the fight had already started. You may be more than a mere goblin, but even a hobgoblin is no threat to me! We are the lizardmen, the mighty descendants of dragons

    Arent youing? Well, here Ie, then!

    Ignoring the boast, Gobta hurled his spear right at Gabil. He was serious about this, more serious than I expected.

    Impudent fool, Gabil listlessly muttered as he batted down the missile. That, apparently, was exactly what Gobta wanted. For just an instant, Gabils attention was focused on the thrown spearand the hobgoblin took that instant to disappear.

    Wait What?!

    If my eyes werent deceiving me, Gobta had just executed a perfect Shadow Motion move to hide. Perfect enough that even Gabil lost sight of him. Where are you?! he shouted, furtively looking around. But by then, the battle had already been won.

    Flying out of the shadow behind Gabils back, Gobta flung himself into a midair spin as he executed a kick.

    I figured Gabil had no idea what happened. The rear attack came as a total surprise, and he took it straight to the back of his neck, immediately causing him to ck out. Gobta had aimed right where neither Gabils armor nor his helmet could protect him, and he aimed well. Even the stoutest built of lizardmen couldnt hold up against a direct attack on such a vulnerable collection of nerves. His scales would keep the blow from turning lethal, but he would no doubt take a while to recover.

    Which meant

    that Gobta actually won.

    It is settled! The victor is Gobta!!

    Rangas promation was almost drowned out by the cheers and apuse from the ogres. Gobta soaked it up for a moment or two.

    Man

    Gobta, of all people, dominating a warrior-lord lizardman? I figured Gabil was B-plus or so, and he was down in one stroke.

    I had to hand it to Gobta. Hed matured. I was shocked, and Im sure I wasnt the only one.

    Well done, Gobta, Ranga said as he nodded approvingly. I always knew you had it in you.

    Yes! chimed Rigurd. Excellent! You have shown the world what hobgoblins are truly capable of!

    He might just be right, Shion observed. I think Ill forgive what you said a moment ago after all.

    A masterstroke, Benimaru said. You have grown stronger than when west fought.

    Indeed, Hakuro said, eyes sharp and focused on Gobta. Quite impressive. I wonder how he may respond to further training.

    Damn. Beingplimented by the likes of Hakuro? This day might just change Gobtas life. If that old taskmaster of an ogre sage saw potential in him, I was all for it. Itd help divert Hakuros attention away from me in training, at least.

    Though Wait a second. Was everyone else here expecting him to win? I took another look aroundand that was that vibe right now. I was the only one who doubted him.

    Better make amends for that. I knew how to read a room.

    Um Yeah, good job, Gobta. That blew me away! Ill make Kurobe start on your weapon before nightfall.

    So what about Gabil and his lizardman entourage?

    The warrior lord had no external injuries. He was knocked out but otherwise unaffected.

    As for his men, they had been frozen in ce before they even had a chance to form a cheering section. They still had no idea what had just happened.

    Hey, uh, we won, okay? I yelled at them. And I gotta turn down the offer, too, all right? If you want help fighting the orcs, well think about that, but for today, you mind leaving us in peace? And dont forget to take him with you.

    That was enough to stir them to action. And with that, our attempts at a cross-species summit were over.

    I was happy to see that idiot go, really, but we still needed to formte a future n. I gathered us together in a small hut I had built next to thergest lodging quarters in town for meeting purposes, ordering Rigurd to call for everyone else we needed.

    I will summon them at once, he said, sending Gobta out for them as I used Thought Communication to get Soei over.

    Most of the towns important figures were there. Among hobgobs, there were Rigurd, Rigur, Rugurd, Regurd, Rogurd, and Lilina. They were joined by the dwarf Kaijin and the ogre mages Benimaru, Shuna, Hakuro, Shion, and Soei. Twelve in total, not counting me, and they epassed most of the towns managerial duties, apart from production.

    Kaijin represented the towns building and production interests. Lilina handled management, and Rigurd, Rugurd, Rogurd, and Regurd were the top political brass. Rigurd was in charge, and the other three were his ministers, although I hadnt assigned them concrete duties yetbetter get on top of that. Benimaru and Hakuro were our military, Soei our intelligence, and Rigur our security.

    This meant our government now consisted of six departments, with the military and covert-ops sections newly founded by me. We were still weak as an organization, but it had worked well enough so far. Once the framework was in ce, itd be easier to fill out the details over time. For now, at least, we had roofs over our heads and food in our bellies.

    Thinking about it, Rigur was doing a damn good job for us all. The grease on the wheels, I suppose.

    Benimaru was deliberating over who to recruit for the army. I heard he and Rigur were discussing a list of possible candidates they could take from the security detail. Which was good. Id only just appointed him, but I would need some action on that fast, what with the orcs and lizardmen running around. It was a heavy burden to ce on Benimaru, but I was sure hed do his best.

    Lilina was a hard worker. Quick-witted, too. She was our city manager of sorts, but in terms of her duties, she was mainly responsible for our agricultural efforts. She had picked up some wild potato nts and seeded in cultivating them. They grew quickly and provided a great deal of nutrients, which did wonders for our food situation. She was also involved with things like taming magical beasts for livestock and building fish hatcheriesa pretty decent range of projects. This was in addition to managing all our stocksthe things we made, the resources we harvested, the materials we gathered. The secretary of agriculture, forestry, water, and livestock, all in one.

    We were still small, which was what made that possible, but going forward, wed have to adapt with the times. If we started building trade rtionships with the human race, Id love to pick up some vegetable seedlings from them. By then, Lilina would probably have too much on her te, so Id need to appoint more managers.

    The rest of the goblinas were pitching in, too, learning sewing from Shuna and so forth. We had a lot of winning people among them, Haruna included. I figured we were in good hands.

    On the architecture and production front, I was still leaving well near everything to Kaijin. He was trained as a cksmith, but after coborating with Kurobe, he had kind of drifted upward to the position of floor supervisor. They had divided their workload pretty well, as I saw itKurobe at the forge, Kaijin working on new ideas. Were still pretty busy putting everything together, he told me, but once things settle down, Id like to devote myself more to creative things.

    I had a feeling Kurobe would be joining him before long, once the current wave of weapons production wrapped up. Hell, I wouldnt mind joining them, even. But before that, I just needed things toas Kaijin put itsettle down.

    Once Soei returned from histest recon trip, the entire gang was at the conference room. Time to kick this off.

    With my signal, Soei began his report. It was generally divided into three partsthe state of things in the other goblin viges, what was going on in the marsnds, and the orcs advance. Each area had two Soei clones devoted to it, nimbly gathering intel. A few were still out in the field, rooting around for more.

    We all fell silent, listening to his tale.

    First, the goblin viges. Most had affiliated themselves with Gabil, warrior lord of the lizardmen.

    Ah, the one who just paid us a visit. Theyre following that idiot? Fickle bastards.

    The goblins who refused to this had run for the hills in a state of panic, several attempting to flee to human territory. No one gave them much of a chance at survival. It was one thing if they lived in humble forest viges in unchartednds, indeed another if they crossed the border. Its natural for anyone to want to keep their homnds protected, and the humans would undoubtedly give them no quarter.

    I didnt know what kind of firepower the nearby humans had, but I was sure itd make quick work of exhausted goblin stragglers. Which meant the goblins had little choice but to live hidden in secrecy, which didnt exactly paint a rosy picture for their future.

    Soei had some more information on Gabil for us, too. He had apparently gathered the fighter goblins from the assorted viges to assemble a force some seven thousand strong. They were now camped at the foot of the mountain range near us.

    Quite a number. They had epted the exact offer given to ussafety against the orcs, in exchange for whatever food resources they had. I suppose it was the best decision, but with all their food in the hands of others, they were doomed to starve, regardless of how the orc battle turned out.

    It waspletely careless, reallythoughtless of the vige elders who agreed to the proposal. Guess they figured it was better than getting their heads caved in by an orcish ax. Or were they betting that a substantial number would survive the war? That thered be enough to keep going afterward?

    It was something we all would have to consider, too. This town wasntplete yet, but I couldnt bear the thought of abandoning it at this point. If we let the orcs invade this far in, theyd ransack the surrounding forest and make it hard to keep ourselves fed.

    If we wanted to retain the lives we enjoyed now, wed have to repel the orcsand repel them at the marsnds, not here.

    Speaking of the marshes, the lizardman chief had been summoning some armies of his own. A force of ten thousand had already been assembled, safe and well-fed from the fish in nearby Lake Sisu. They were holed up in a maze of natural caves and caverns, ready to resist an orcish siege for as long as necessary.

    So they thought the orcs were that much of a threat, then? The lizardmen, a strong bunch of fighters despite Gabils little disy, were already in a state of near-total war preparednessto the point where they were even recruiting the weaker goblins.

    Finally, I asked about the orcs.

    The orc forces number Soei paused for a moment. Approximately two hundred thousand fighters.

    Two hundred thousand?! someone shouted.

    I think it was a few thousand thatid waste to the ogres fort

    So you mean to say that the force that attacked our home was merely a fraction of the entire army?

    Indeed, Soei reported. That is what I found in my investigations. We believe the total number involved to be two hundred thousand. The main force is working its way along the Great Ameld River from the south, covering a rtively broad range as they do. My estimate is based strictly on the length of their marching forces and the width of the roads they are using, but based on that, they can number no fewer than one hundred fifty thousand. Ive confirmed that some squadrons affiliated with them are making inroads here and there into the forest as well, so I would warn against lowballing our estimate.

    A massive parade of orcs, upying entire roads for miles on end, as far as the eye could see.

    Do we know where theyre headed?

    Yes, my lord. The force is aiming for the marshes that spread around Lake Sisu, working straight through the lizardman territory. However

    However?

    However, with their current trajectory, they will reach human territory immediately afterward. It is unclear where their ultimate objective lies, but if they continue along a straight line, they will be unable to avoid confrontation with a number of different human kingdoms.

    Wow. Whatre they thinking? Wait a second If all they wanted was control over the forest, would they simply stop once they destroyed the lizardmen? What did they want anyway?

    What do you think about all this, Soei? Are the orcs seeking to destroy the lizardmen? Or will they continue their conquest into humannds?

    It is hard to say as of yet, my lord.

    I suppose not. I had only a dim idea of the geography involved anyway.

    Well, I think finding out about that should be the next priority. Do we have a map or something handy, Soei?

    What do you mean bymap, sir?

    Huh?

    This was a bit of a surprise. The concept of a map was seemingly alien to most everyone in the room.

    Kaijin, bless his soul, knew what I was talking about. He knew, but he didnt have a lead on one we could purchase. Apparently, the way the world was at this point in its history, maps were still considered confidential military intelligence.

    Well, so be it. I had the assembled members line up a number of wooden boards on the table and then craft something simple for me so I could see where things were, rtive to one another. Most monsters had Telepathy, which let them share a pool of information with one another. This was helpful, but it had the adverse effect of dying the development of printed, or recordable, media.

    Hakuro started by drawing the general area around the ogre homnd, using what he heard from his grandfather as reference. Theck of paper was really starting to bother me, but I had more boards brought in so we could draw up the region around our town. Thought Communication came in handy for this, letting people pick up on exactly what one another was picturing in their minds. Too handy, really, given how it let people exchange urate information without putting it down on paper. I wouldnt necessarily call it an improvement over life on Earth. It was a dilemma, honestly, even if it posed no hindrance to day-to-day monster life.

    It was a given that humans were a lot better at transmitting knowledge down to future generations than monsters. That was the core behind developing a civilization, after all. The monsters around me might dismiss this mapmaking as a needless extra step for now, but I was sure theyd thank meter.

    I had the Sage cote all the information people were feeding me with their minds. Once I had it all, I neatly jotted it down on the wooden boards. The result was a fairly serviceable map. The distances and such were bare estimates, of course, but it could stand up to practical use well enough. Sucked that I had to waste a bunch of time on this map before we got to the main subject, though.

    On to business.

    So this is what a map is, I said. A way of showing what thend looks like that everyone can understand. I want you to look at this as I speak to you.

    Everyone gathered around the boards in the middle of the table. I linked it with everyone via Thought Communication to ensure we were all focused on the same thing.

    Okay. Im going to use this map to predict how the lizardmen and orcs are going to act. Were trying to figure out what the orcs are thinking here. If we can grasp that, itll be easier to plot our next move.

    They all nodded.

    I had Soei ce a small piece of wood on the orc forces current location. I had written ORC on it in big letters, like a game piece.

    From the center of the Forest of Jura, there were three basic directions an army asrge as the orcs could go. All involved tracing the Ameld River, which stretched out from the Canaat Mountains. This river forked into two tributaries near the center of the forest, one flowing into Lake Sisu. Therger branch moved upward in a north-south orientation, traversing nearly the entire continent. Toward the end, it made a slow curve before dumping out into the ocean to the east.

    The forest hugged this river for much of its outward flow, and generally speaking, the area east of it was upied by the Eastern Empirehumannds. After exiting the woods, the Great Ameld fed the fertile ins that were ruled over by demon lords. That plurality was important. Shizu had said as much as well, that the demon lord Leon was just one of them. It sounded a bit odd, the idea of multiple demon lords, but there you go. For all I knew, Leon and the one who gave Rigurds son his name were two different people.

    The topic deserved more exploration, but that would have to wait. We were trying to suss out the orcs invasion route and ultimate objective.

    ording to Soeis report, after leaving their habitat near the demon lordnds, the orcs had been making their way along the Great Ameld. It was the only routerge enough to hold an entire army, but apparently, they had also been sending squadrons into the forest, picking off the stronger monsters that might threaten them along the wayincluding the ogres. They were after food, I wagered, but it still seemed odd.

    What do you think? I asked as I moved other wooden pieces around to simte the orcs overtaking the ogre fort.

    In what way, my lord?

    I mean, why would they send a splinter force off like this? Why couldnt they just march right through the forest?

    Moving such arge force, Hakuro said, would be very difficult, what with all the trees in the way.

    Made sense. But in that case

    Why raze our homnd at all? Benimaru asked. If we werent in the way of the main force, why couldnt they have left us be?

    Hmm A good question, actually, Hakuro replied.

    They were right. The orcs didnt seem to have any motivation for picking off higher-level foes not directly in their path of advance. They could seize their food stores, yes, but if that was the sole objective, they paid an extremely dear price for it. The orcs numbered several thousand, but that was still a pittancepared to the main force. Why devote so rtively few fighters toward such an obviously tough opponent? Was food really the only reason they were willing to ept so many casualties?

    Remember, Benimaru said, they didnt even offer to hire us as mercenaries. I can only conclude they were prepared to kill us all from the moment they arrived.

    Shuna nodded. Very true. My Sense Threat extra skill told me as much. They were fully hostile toward usnothing more, nothing less.

    So the orcs wanted the ogres dead. And that wasnt all.

    Judging by the routes the main force and this splinter team took, Hakuro said, eyes focused on the map, they would likely regroup in the marsnds.

    Everyone looked down as he moved two ORC beled pieces forward. He was right. Proceeding in a straight line, they met right at the marsnds the lizardmen called home. A regionrge enough for the main orc force to regroup and prepare for the battle aheadassuming they didnt mind theck of drynd to work with.

    So theyd definitely run into the lizardmen sooner orter, right? Did they want to eradicate them so they could be king of the forest or whatever?

    Put that way, Im not so sure It makes little sense.

    Or maybe theyre in cahoots with a demon lord, like you said?

    They are receiving support, no doubt about that, but I cannot say whether it is demon lord support. We had best not jump to conclusions.

    Okay, but even if they are working with someone, what does annihting the main powerbrokers in the forest achieve?

    Everyone on hand offered their own response. In the end, though, no one had a definite idea about what the orcs wantedthe most important question.

    Plus, Shuna whispered, how are the orcs feeding an army of two hundred thousand?

    The observation made everyone freeze for a moment.

    How? Benimaru ventured. Thats what theyre seizing food supplies for, no? Then he fell silent, realizing how dubious that sounded.

    Shuna had a point. It just didnt seem right.

    Soei, did the splinter force have a supply team with them?

    I did not see any, no. The main force appeared to have a caravan carrying food supplies in the rear, but Indeed, not nearly enough of one, in terms of size. Nowhere near enough to keep an army of two hundred thousand nourished.

    Marching near the river eliminated any worries about fresh water, but they were essentially unable to supply themselves. Whatever food they had would dwindle quickly. Both forces needed something , didnt they? I doubted the orcs had perfected some just-in-time method of supplying a full military force nobody was aware of, but I also doubted they would just let all those orcs starve while they fought.

    And if they didnt bother to supply the splinter force, no way theyd seize the ogres food, then just deliver it all back to the main army. They had their own mouths to feed. And splinter force or not, we were still talking several thousand grown orcs, and that was an awful lot of people to force into potential starvation.

    I noticed Soei step up to say something, only to catch himself.

    What is it? I pressed. Did you want to say something?

    This is just spection on my part, but I wonder if, perhaps, they wereforaging upon the bodies of those who died of starvation or battle wounds. I say this because, while I conducted thorough investigations of the battlefields they fought in, I found not a single corpse.

    What?! Benimaru eximed. Including our own homnd?

    Yes. There was absolutely nothing, and no one, left.

    How?!

    Oh no

    The ogre mages were at a loss for words. Oof I could see why. Thats what orcs are like? Just imagining it made me queasy.

    Thats Thats just too hard to ept

    They are omnivorous, I know, but Really?

    Soei eyed Rigurd and Kaijin stoically. It is simply spection, he repeated. But wherever they were known to be, I found not a single corpseand our homnd waspletely devoid of anything. That is the full truth. And that brings to mind a certain skill

    He stopped, and his face twisted.

    No! Benimaru shouted. An orc lord?

    Indeed. I have not confirmed it, but I cannot deny the chance that an orc lord has appeared. I have, at least, confirmed the presence of high-order orc knights. Our attackers, likely.

    Indeed. They would have to be, judging by their strength. I could imagine orc generals among them, even.

    That would certainly exin everything

    The ogre mages faces grew more and more concerned. They seemed to know who this orc lord wasnot that it meant anything to me, Kaijin, or the other hobgoblins.

    Whoa, whos this orc lord guy? Kaijin asked, finally unfreezing himself. Could you maybe include us in this conversation, please?

    Yeah, I added. If you dont mind?

    That was our first insight into exactly how fearsome the orc lord was.

    To put it briefly, an orc lord was a unique monster with advanced leadership skills. They appeared one at a time, out of the blue, once every few hundred years, to spread chaos across the world. One bad hombre, in other words.

    What made them so nefarious was the skill they were born withthe unique skill known simply as Ravenous. It allows the caster to make his allies devour everything around them, like a swarm of locusts, afflicting them with a severe hunger they never have any hope of sating. It sounded like torture for the victims, but it had great benefits for the caster. It very efficiently removed all organic matter from entire regions at once, transforming it into energy for yourself. And even if it starved your peoplehell, because it starved them, the ultimate effect was tremendously powerful.

    But the scariest thing of all was that whatever monsters the hordes consumed in their mad dash for sustenance, their skills would be transferred over to the caster. Monster powers, physical attributes, even skills. It wasnt a sure thing every time, but the more monsters you consumed, the better your chances. In other words

    The orcs arent trying to eradicate the forests higher-level monsters at all? Theyre trying to take their powers for their own?

    Silence fell upon the room. It indicated, once and for all, that mypatriots had already made that conclusion.

    We all paused for a few moments. The air had grown heavy around us, whether we had solid evidence of an orc lord in our midst or not.

    We werent helpless against this threat, of course. This monster had appeared on the scene before, multiple times, and there was already a known strategy for dealing with them.

    And this is? I impatiently asked. The ogre mages responded by giving one another awkward looks. Kaijin and Rigurd stared at them, a tad put off.

    It embarrasses me to say it, Shuna finally began, but the orc lords of the past have all been defeated by human efforts. Ravenous is a powerful unique skill, no doubt about it, but it works only by seizing the powers of those the orc lord defeats. While monsters may have intrinsic skills or other magic-oriented effects an orc lord can take for itself, humans bear none of that. They bear Arts, not skills, and those are strictly the fruits of practice and effort. Thats what enables a human nation, or band of nations, to defeat such a threat.

    Huh. Dont feed the beast, and it wont grow, huh? I suppose they hesitated to say it because it meant wed have to get humans involved, sooner orter.

    Well, at least we had something to go on now. We had a general idea of the skills the orc lord mightve seized, and we could find ways to counter them. It might not be that much of a threat yet, assuming it hadnt been around for too long.

    Maybe thisll be easier than I thought? Maybe not. He already had a knight corps, for one, not to mention that two-hundred-thousand-strong horde of vering, starving orcs. That, and whatever organization fronted the funds to equip and armor all those guys. No point being too optimistic. If it gained any intelligence boosts through Ravenous, it could even be a demon lord in time, I bet.

    Bad news all around. Definitely shouldve gotten to him quicker. But ah well. Right now would have been a great time for some lofty hero to show up, but I didnt have one handy, to my regret.

    All right. Lets see if this orc lord exists or not, before anything else. If ones really been born, I suppose we should get a message over to Kabal and the rest of my adventurer friends.

    Yes, my lord! Rigurd nodded at the idea.

    They had mentioned they were affiliated with a groupthe guild, they called itthat provided assignments. Maybe the guild could help us out, if Kabal provided an in. I was expecting more pushback, really, but none made itself known. Kabal and his friends were certainly kind to us before, at least. No stereotyping or the like.

    I figured I could sell a few hunks of magisteel I had left to raise the money for the guilds help. They might turn down passing monsters, but they couldnt turn down the right pricethat, or I could just have the dwarf brothers negotiate on our behalf. An orc lord would threaten the humans as much as us. We had a lot of chips to bargain with.

    In fact, if we knew that humans would y a key role in this, perhaps we should send a message out ASAP. If the lizardmen were already goners, the orcs would very likely be going after human kingdoms next. And whether they could feed off humans or not, two hundred thousand orcs would be a life-or-death threat to pretty much any nation out there.

    For now, we needed more information. That was my watchword as I continued the conferencebut suddenly, Soei stiffened, wincing.

    What is it?

    Well, he began, one of my Replication clones has made contact with someone who insists uponmunicating with you, Sir Rimuru. What do you think?

    Contact? And they name-dropped me, even? Who the heck?

    I still didnt have many acquaintances in this world, really. Was it Kabal, maybe, speak of the devil? Nah. It took them several weeks to travel here from their home base, they said. Over a months round trip. Not possible.

    This contact has not given me a name, my lord. She simply seeks to send you a message, and she is quite adamant. She is a dryad.

    Everyones eyebrows whipped up in surprise. A pretty well-known monster, I guess.

    No! Rigurd eximed. It has been several decades since a dryad hasst made itself known, has it not?

    They have practically vanished! Why would one appear now?!

    To the hobgoblins, they were all but mythical figures. And judging by the ex-ogre Soeis response, they mustve been pretty high level. One who had spotted and made contact with Soei, despite how gifted he was at concealing his Replications. That proved the caliber we were dealing with. Better not get this dryad angry, then.

    All right. Ill meet with her. Guide her over here.

    It would appear my thought was correct. Not long after I gave consent, the conference room door opened to reveal a new figure. It had not lost a second to the Soei Replicant, even when he used Shadow Motion to guide him back.

    Calling her an it would be rude. She was a woman, and a beautiful one. Her hair was green, her skin light, her figure well tonedchiseled, even, like a Nordic goddess. Her luxuriant lips were a shade of light-blue, matched perfectly with her deep-blue eyes. She looked about twenty years old by human standards, but human she definitely was not. She was semitransparent, and any observer could tell that her body had no weight or actual physical presence.

    Dryads were, indeed, descended from the fairy races, as close to a form of spiritual life as one was likely to ever witness. Iter learned they served as the guardians of the treants, the living tree people that were another high-level presence around the forest. In terms of ranking, they were easily A or betterup there with Ifrit, and no doubt a terrifying presence for Rigurd and the hobgobs.

    But what did she want?

    The conference table was enveloped in silence. The dryads, long-lived though they were, rarely left their holy sanctuaries. They were heralded by some as the wardens of the whole Forest of Jura, and only a few lucky ones would see one for themselves. They were fabled to exact divine punishment upon the wickedthose who damaged the forests.

    Benimaru and the other ex-ogres reacted much the same way as Rigurd. But the dryad didnt let it faze her. She sized up the room for a moment before locking her eyes upon my figure.

    My greetings to you, Leader of the Monsters, and your followers. I am Treyni, a dryad. It is nice to meet you all.

    She smiled, like a bud sprouting into a flower. That was all it took for me to wonder, Am I being too wary of her, perhaps? She had a fairylike beauty, that was absolutely true.

    Um, you too. My names Rimuru. We can keep it casual here, okay? None of that Leader of the Monsters crap.

    I hated nicknames enough on Earth. I didnt want any here, so I made sure to do away with it before the rest of the room could introduce themselves.

    So, I said, still trying to ovee my embarrassment, what did you want to see me for?

    Thank you. I havee here to discuss the events taking ce in this forestevents which, I imagine, you all are aware. As one of the Forest of Juras appointed wardens, I cannot allow this series of cmities to go unaddressed, and so I have appeared before you. I do so because I hope to join in your conference.

    She nodded in turn to each of the participants before turning back to me.

    Treyni, huh? A named monster, then. High level, no doubt.

    But why here? Benimaru dared to ask. Surely there are races more powerful than the goblins you could have turned to for assistance.

    This is the most powerful outpost in the nearby region, the dryad replied. The others no longer exist, their people now affiliated with the lizardman known as Gabil. The treants are incapable of moving from location to location and thus interact little with other races. If they were blighted by an outside enemy or natural disaster, there would be little they could do to defend themselves. We dryads are granted permission to travel to the outside world only in these spiritual forms, and I regret there are but few of us If the root cause of all this were to attack the treantmunity we share our lives with, weck the numbers to provide them an effective defense. That is why I wish to tap your strength, if I may.

    She closed with another cheerful smile.

    In contrast to her astounding looks, the way she spoke was oddly calming. They must have been a long-lived race, indeedshe mustve seen a lot over the years. The issue was whether she could be believed. Someone as strong as Ifritseveral of them, living in thismunity or whatevernot even they could handle the orcs. Did she want to use us as bait, maybe? Or was there some other goal?

    You speak of a root cause, Hakuro said. Does that mean you know what is happening in the forest now?

    I do, Treyni responded without hesitation. An orc lord is invading it with a vast force in tow.

    The freely given revtion plunged the conference room into silence once more.

    Should we take that to mean, Benimaru finally said, you have confirmed the orc lords presence?

    You may. And if they were to turn their sights upon ourmunity of treants, we have no effective way to resist them. They cannot move from where they are rooted, and their mystical magic can do little against an orc race unafraid of death. We could perhaps sear them with me magic, rendering them into ashes, but that could backfire upon the tree people, and none have mastered it anyway. And anything more powerful than thatanything that could strike an entire army at oncewould wipe the treants out with it. That

    Treyni paused, sizing us all up before once again focusing her gaze squarely upon me.

    In addition, we have found that a high-level magic-born is working behind the scenes to support this orc lord. As dryads, we must prepare for this. We are unsure which demon lord might be behind them all, but we are not interested in letting these intruders do whatever they like with our forest.

    Her eyes seemed to sparkle even more as she spoke. As one of the most powerful creatures of the forest, Treyni exuded a presence in the room that was electric. It was like energy coursed across her entire body.

    Well, wed like to help, but what did you want us to do, exactly?

    I would like you to defeat the orc lord, Treyni immediately replied.

    This rendered everyone speechless. Whoa, I protested, this monster is, like, crazy-ass strong, isnt it? Why would someone like me have to take him on?

    Treyni responded with a quizzical look. But the ogre mages here are intending to fight against the orcs, though, arent they? And you n to contribute to the effort yourself, right? You were the one who extended a hand to save all those defenseless goblins, not long ago. I had thought you would show simr kindness to us and the treants.

    She smiled again.

    I wasnt sure what sources she was tapping, but Treyni seemed to know a remarkable amount about what happened in this forest. She must have looked at my assorted exploits in this world and concluded that I was a sort of omnipotent good samaritan. Perhaps the secluded lives the dryads led caused them to assume the best of everybody they met.

    Did it ever ur to her that weokay, I might stab her in the back? The smile made it impossible to tell, but as our eyes met, I could feel it in my gutthis was no liar in front of me. I decided to trust my instincts.

    If her story was true, we really did have an orc lord on our hands, as well as a high-level magic-born lurking around behind him. I didnt know exactly how I could contribute to the cause yet, but if she trusted in me, I might as well repay the favor.

    I took a deep breath. But before I could speak:

    Of course! To our leader, Sir Rimuru, the orc lord is no more of a threat than a passing cockroach!

    Shion stole my thunder, a bold look of determination on her face. Geez. Im not a god or anything. Wish she couldve conferred with me first. And whys it already a given that Im the one doing the orc ying around here?

    Before I could protest, Treyni gave me another smile. Oh! she eximed. Then its just as I have heard. I wish you great luck against the orc lord, then!

    And that was that.

    I had been more or less pushed into the orc lordying role by Shion, but that didnt mark the end of the conference. We kept going, while Treyni joined us for the rest.

    On the map, in the marsnd area, was a wooden board with LIZARDMEN written on it. Behind it, another one marked GOBLINS . In front of it was the spot where the two different orc contingents were going to cross paths. Putting it all down on the map like this made the sheer size of the orc force stark in our minds, but my eyes were turned elsewhere.

    You know, I said, if that idiot from before decided to stage an attack on the lizardman HQ right now, hed seize it pretty darn quick, wouldnt he?

    Indeed. Gabil, the so-called lizardman envoy. If he decided to raid the lizardmens home turf while their main force was busy tangling with the orcs, hed be greeted with only skeletal resistance. The caverns would be his in the blink of an eye. And the goblin forces were already in perfect position for it.

    Youre sure these are the right positions, Soei?

    I am, sir, Soei said. The goblins are encamped in the ins by the foot of the mountain range. If they deploy their forces from there, they will do so right in the spot indicated.

    I trusted him at his wordbut why were they just sitting around there instead of joining up with the other lizardmen? That was the thing. But I had to remind myself that I was making some pretty big assumptions, too. Gabil had no reason to attack his fellow lizardmen. The odd way he chose to position his forces gave me pause, but there was little reason to dwell on it, I thought.

    Ah, maybe Im overthinking it. Im kind of an amateur at this, so

    No, interrupted Hakuro, eyes sparkling. I think you may have a point. If the main lizardman force is deployed directly in front of them, it would be easiest to try to strike from the rear. But the orcs clearly dont have the time to try to circle behind them, and even if they attempted such folly, they could easily be attacked and routed from both sides while their lines are stretched thin. There is no reason to keep an army here.

    But what would the point be? Benimaru countered. Even if the goblins defeated the lizardmen, all theyd have waiting for them is death at the hands of the orc onrush.

    Perhaps. But Gabil seemed to style himself as a leader. He may want to seize the position of chief for himself.

    It is possible. And really, I see no other reason for him to position his forces here.

    Gabil was certainly confident. Dreaming big. But was he really that brazen? If thats what you think, I said, if you think its possible, then thats all the more reason why we cant team up with him.

    Nobody offered any disagreement.

    Do you believe Gabil may be rebelling against his own people? Treyni asked.

    Yeah, it looks possible, the way this map is showing it. He offered to have us join his army, but I dont think thats such a good idea anymore.

    I see. Perhaps there is someonepelling him to do this. I will investigate.

    I appreciated the gesture. But if she was covering Gabil for us, what should the rest of us be doing now?

    I would very much like to forge an alliance with the lizardmen, Hakuro said. By ourselves, our numbers are too low. I would hate to leave them alone and defenseless, besides.

    Nods around the table. Nobody seemed to have any concerns about that.

    But whether we have an alliance or not, were never gonna outnumber the orcs, I countered. You sure they wouldnt just treat the offer like an insult?

    The hobgoblins seemed to view that as a problem. The ogre magesughed them off. Sir Rimuru, you worry far too much! Hakuromented. Each one of us is as powerful as an entire army. I highly doubt they would look down upon the likes of us!

    I thought he was giving himself far too much credit. It sounded like something Gabil would say, really. But apparently, he meant it.

    I will go and negotiate with them myself, Soei said. Is it all right if I speak with the lizardman chief on your behalf, Sir Rimuru?

    I sized him up as he awaited my reply. He certainly seemed confident. I wasnt sure where it came from. But he seemed worth relying on.

    The map had just told us to expect a sh between orcs and lizardmen before long. Assuming that was true, we had more time to save this town than I first thought. Having a general idea of the near future helped everyone else calm down a bit, too.

    Right. So were gonna take two different tacks. Ill lead an advance force over to the lizardmen, and well bash up the orcs together. Well try to win the battle, but if it starts looking bleak, thats when well go to n Bwhere, basically, we abandon the town, regroup where the treants are, and focus on defending them. Well probably need to call upon human aid if ites to that, so Ill contact Kabal the adventurer and have them help us rub out the orc lord. Hes just as much of a threat to them as he is to us, so Im sure theyll step up to help. Of course, this is all dependent on forming an alliance with the lizardmen. Youre gonna be key to that, Soei. Make it happen.

    Yes, my lord!

    Soei nodded back at me. I had faith hede through, certainly.

    Right! In that case, feel free to talk to the lizardman chief whenever you can. Just make sure were both equal partners in this alliance. Nobodys serving anyone else!

    I understand, he said, then promptly disappeared, as if fading into the shadows. He works fast, doesnt he?

    Good. Now, if Soei messes up his job, well jump right to n B. I want all of you to be prepared for that, should ite to it.

    The rest of the room nodded in agreement.

    Thank you all for epting my sudden request, Treyni said, bowing low in my direction. I will do my best to ensure this rtionship is beneficial to us both.

    Oh, no, uh, same to you, I stammered.

    She smiled a little in reply, perhaps finding my hesitation cute or something. We will meet again, then, Leader of the Monstersor Sir Rimuru, I should say. Then she was gone, casting her own magic to return home.

    So we had our orders. Itd be great if we could form that alliance, but if not, wed have to think on our feet a little.

    By the way, Sir Rimuru, have you any interest in contacting Gabil again?

    Hmm Good question, Hakuro. I think Id like to save that for n B, when we get to seeking human support Hmm, but the kingdoms are gonna need time to mobilize their forces when pushes to shove, huh? You think maybe we could just tell them theres an orc lord out there for the time being?

    It sounds like a good idea, my lord. I will leak word to the kobold merchants. They will spread it well enough after that.

    Thanks.

    That should work for now. Theyd probably want some solid evidence about the orc lords birth before joining forces with us, besides.

    Rigurd was already outside of our conference-room hut, carrying out my orders. Even as goblin king, he still ran around all day like a chicken with its head cut off. Things were starting to happen. It was beginning to make me nervous, but there was no point stewing over it. We had to do what we could, and right now, that meant we had to prepare.

    An orc lord, though, huh? Sounded pretty tricky. Stealing peoples skills sounded awfully unfair, not that I was really one to talk. But I had been sweet-talked into confronting him, and I couldnt disappoint Treyni now. I wasnt at all sure about my chances, but I had made the agreement, and Id go at him with everything I had.

    If I screwed this up, Id have no chance of carrying out the promise I made to Shizu. I had to think about the future, even if the thought depressed me a bit.

    The orcish army stormed across the forest, feet stamping against the soil; entire trees toppled along the way.

    Destroy them! Destroy them! Destroy them! Destroy them!

    Such was the thunderous chant of the orcs as they marched along, their yellow eyes sparkling with rage.

    They were not capable of thought in the normal way. In their eyes, anything that moved was prey. They were eternally hungry, and the whole of their consciousness was devoted to filling their empty stomachs.

    Whump.

    Another one down. Those surrounding him were overjoyed. They had prey now. At one point, they might have been friendsbut now, he was just a b of something edible. He looked like he was still breathing, but all that meant to the others was that his meat was fresh.

    Those lucky enough to have been marching alongside him immediately took to taking the body apart. The liver was taken to the leader of their little group, with the rest snatched up on a firste, first served basis.

    Crunch, rip, smack.

    The air was quickly filled with the repulsive sounds of flesh and bone being torn apart.

    They were forever hungry. And the hungrier they got, the more powerful they became in battle. That, right there, was the hidden benefit of the unique skill known as Ravenous. The more orcs that fell and were eatenthe hungrier the survivors grewthe stronger it made the entire army.

    They numbered two hundred thousand, a citys worth of famished ves under the orc lords rule. There would be no salvation for them, as they worked feverishly to fill their stomachs

    It was all too futile an effort in this endless hellscape.

    Now the homnd of the ogres was before them. The orcs were D-ranked monsters. The ogres, with a grade of B, made them cower in fearnever in their dreams would they dare challenge them to a fight.

    But look at them now

    Destroy them! Destroy them! Destroy them! Destroy them!

    They never stopped. If anything, the hunt for prey made them go faster.

    Theirrades fell as the ogres raged, exercising the full brunt of their powers, shing them apart, caving in their skulls with the handles of their axes

    But all it meant was that the orcs suddenly had a bountiful supply of fresh meat. They were thrilled, hoping against hope that itd help stave off the hunger for at least one passing moment.

    An ogre fell. Several orcs immediately pounced, bathing in his blood as they gnawed at his body. Butahh, it didnt work. It filled nothing.

    But now look. The orcs bodies were changing. The power of the ogre was now within them. And now the ogres were swallowed up by the supposedly inferior orc hordes, screaming theirst, pained at the seeming uselessness of their powers.

    And slowly but surely, some among the orcs began to manifest new, unexpected abilities.

    The strength of thepanions I eat bes my own!

    The power of the prey I consume bes my own!

    The eating continued.

    None were afraid of death. Any sense of fear in their minds had been consumed right alongside the flesh of theirrades. And the power flowing within them was now making its way to the king. Their king. The orc lord, the one at the top of the food chain.

    The march continued. Their next prey was right in front of them.

    The lizardman chief shuddered when he heard the report. The thing he feared most was now reality.

    ording to the messenger, the stronghold of the powerful ogre race was destroyed before the day had even ended. As if swallowed whole by the orc horde.

    There was no longer any doubting it. The orc lord was here.

    In terms of sheer statistics, these were still D-ranked orcs, two hundred thousand of them or not. Ten thousand C-plus-level lizardmen, ying on their home turf in the marshes, had every chance of fighting evenly, or better. But if the thing he feared the mostan orc lordwas on the scene, nothing about them was D rank any longer.

    If they hadpletely overwhelmed the ogres, that was an indicator of their powerfrom the guy up top, all the way down to the lowliest peon in the army. They may not be as powerful as ogres, no, but you could put a plus sign next to that D, at the very least. And any orcs who were at knight level or higher would be at least a C. Hell, at this point, they might be leaning toward C-plus, matching the lizardmens grade.

    It would be hard enough to fend off such a massive army attempting to strike them at their weakest link. But if there was no meaningful difference in strength at the infantry level now, they had no chance. The presence of the orc lord meant that holing up in the caverns and attempting to weather out a siege would be pointless. It was one thing if they had reinforcements, but shutting off all potential exits would simply make the lizardmen starve, not the orcs.

    They would simply have to throw themselves against them. It was a bitter decision for the chief, but one that had to be made.

    Gabil, sent away to gain the goblins support, had yet to report back. They couldnt waste time searching for himit would only make their foes even more of a threat. The chief began to fear that he would have to lead the forces himself.

    A soldier ran up, shouting.

    Chief! We have an intruder! He wishes to meet with you in the limestone grotto entrance!

    The chiefs guards readied their spears in response. Calm yourselves, he said. He could feel the presence of a strong aura nearbymore powerful than anything he had felt beforeand he realized it wouldnt pay to do anything to stoke its owners anger. Any battle would lead to untold casualties, most likely, and he couldnt detect any hostility to the aura anyway.

    Whoever it is, he said as heposed himself, he is very brave,ing here alone. I would like to see him. Bring him over.

    But what about the risk, my lord?

    This aura is on the level of a magic-borns. If we wish to drive him away, we will have to pay dearly for it. He does not seem to be an immediate threat, so we have no reason to immediately threaten him.

    Shall we line the chamber area with our elite troops, then?

    Please. But I want no one to move an inch until I give the order. Make that clear.

    Yes, my lord!

    The chief nodded to his royal guard and waited for the uninvited guest to appear. They were in a naturalbyrinth, one with countless hidden nooks and crannies. If this magic-born-level foe attempted to cause any trouble, they would have ways of handling itif it came to the worst-case scenario, that is. The chiefs hope was that they could talk this out instead.

    Now the aura drew nearer, its size telling the chief everything he needed to know. Anything foolish , he thought, and not even a hundred of my elite force may be enough to defeat him .

    After a few more moments, one of his men brought a single monster into his chamber. He was dark-skinned, his hair ck with hints of blue, and eyes a lighter blue that were cold as ice. He was about as tall as your average lizardmannot gigantic by monster standards, but he lookedposed, impervious, ready for anything.

    The power he seemed to exude was overwhelming in itself, even as he was surrounded by several lizardman warriors to keep him in check. A hundred other troops were stationed around the chamber, ready to leap at this visitor whenever their chief instructed.

    The chief looked at the visitor, then resigned himself. If this goes wrong , he thought, I may have just wasted the lives of everyone in this room. Such was the extent of this monsters aura, exponentiallyrger than anything he knew.

    My apologies, the chief began. We have been so busy with our own preparations that I fear I cannot provide you with the proper courtesy you deserve. May I ask what brings you here?

    His choice of words angered the younger lizardmen in the chamber. What need was there for all this politeness before aplete unknown like this? The chief appreciated their concern, but now he was anxious. If they did anything to displease this visitor, they may never step out of this chamber again. The young warriors had far too little experience andcked the ability to urately gauge their foes. They hadnt lived as long as the chief nor developed their danger-sensing skills like he had.

    But not caring at all about the chiefs concerns, the monster spoke.

    My name is Soei. There is no need for excessive ceremony. I am merely a messenger.

    Betraying the chiefs worst fears, the monster serenely introduced himself. There was nothing savage about his demeanor as he regarded the chief, not caring at all about the grumbling guards around him.

    Soei, is it? A named monster. That would exin the overwhelming sense of power anyway. And this named monster was being employed by someone elsea thought that made the chief imagine a cold sweat running down his back.

    Allow me to state my business. My master wishes to form an alliance with you and has requested that I make the necessary arrangements. I feel we have good news for youmy master cannot bring himself to simply watch idly as the orcs decimate your ranks. That is why he has requested this alliance.

    It was no nightmare scenario for the chief after all. This master did sound a tad uppity and forceful, yes, but some aspects of the offer deserved to be heard. The chief thoughtabout this monster, Soei, and the goals of the one he served. Whoever he was, he was working against the orcs, at least.

    Before I respond to your proposal, may I ask you a question?

    Let me hear it.

    The reply was simple, but it confirmed to the chief that the other side was willing to negotiate. It came as a relief.

    Well, then If it is an alliance you seek, is it safe to assume that your master is willing to work alongside us as we confront the orcs?

    Indeed. As I told you, he does not wish to see you annihted. He wishes to fight alongside you, if possible.

    Then let me ask another question. What does your master think is the root cause behind this orc activity?

    Soei fell silent for a moment. A bold smile began to cross his face. Are you asking whether it is an orc lord we are dealing with? Then let me give you a piece of information I guarantee is the truth. My master, Sir Rimuru, has received a request from the dryads, the wardens of the Forest of Jura, to y the orc lord. He has solemnly promised to do the deed. I hope you will consider that as you make your decision.

    This reply offered even more for the chief than he expected. The revtion that dryads were involved caused everyone in the room to stir. And the man before him had just confirmed that the orc lord was very, very real. Whatever master this monster serveddid he have the power, truly, to defeat this menace?

    Considering Soei had dropped the name of the dryads, one of the top-level presences in the forest, it seemed safe to assume he was telling the truth. Nobody was dumb enough to speak of dryads if doing so would spark their ire. It was said they could see all and hear all, through the very trees that popted the forest. All forest residents knew that their names must be handled with respect.

    The term alliance suggested that the lizardmen would not be subjected to servitude. They would be treated as equals. It was an offer, the chief reasoned, that had to be taken.

    But before he could speak, another group of lizardmen bounded into the chamber.

    Chief! There is no need to listen to such talk!

    Indeed! We are the proud lizardman race! Why does some total stranger think he can simply stroll in and curry our favor?

    They were Gabils men, part of the group that stayed behind while their leader set off to secure the goblins support. The chief had bidden them to stay, fearing them too hotheaded to be useful in delicate negotiations with the goblins, and now he was paying for that error.

    He wished he could click his tongue and make them vanish. Certainly, there was no telling exactly how powerful this master and his people were. But simply dismissing them out of hand, over the authority of their chief?

    This visitor was demanding a lot, it was true, but he was a messenger, and these rank-and-file lizardmen had no right to treat him like garbage. Besides, the visitors demands were not, in themselves, a problem. The envoy represented a monster powerful enough to be relied upon even by dryads.

    In terms of level, he must have been equivalent to the lizardmen or higher. And in the world of monsters, it was all about survival of the fittest. Here was a higher-level presence seeking their help. Any perceived rudeness could be quickly forgiven. Even this envoy possessed a frightening amount of force, a magic-born through and through. Get on his wrong side, and he could easily be their enemyand taking on a magic-born like this before the orc horde arrived would be the epitome of foolishness.

    The chief eyed Soei, trying to read his emotions. The envoys eyes were still squarely upon the lizardman leader. Whew. That was a relief. He couldnt afford to let a witless bystander ruin this offer.

    Silence! he shouted, shutting down the chamber as he signaled to his guards with his eyes. I will be the one who decides what we do. You do not have the right to intervene. Take them to the brig! A night spent in there should help them see the error of their ways.

    The two transgressors were quickly whisked away, shouting Chief, please reconsider! and Sir Gabil will never allow this! But they no longer mattered. He turned back toward Soei and lowered his head.

    Please forgive the rudeness of my people. I think I would like to pursue this alliance with you. However, the affairs I must deal with at the moment force me to remain here. Under normal circumstances, I would love to confer with your master at the location of our choice, but I am afraid I cannot spare a single moment. Would it be possible for him toe to me instead?

    He swallowed nervously. This was asking a lot, he knew, of someone much more powerful. He knew it could anger the envoy easily enoughbut Soei showed no concern at all.

    I ept your apology. I am sure my master will be delighted to hear your reply, and I look forward to working together with you. In that case, I will make the necessary arrangements to bring our forces hereyou will get to meet Sir Rimuru yourself then, I imagine.

    Soeis demeanor suggested he never thought for a moment the chief would turn him down. Or the chief suddenly thought if I did turn him down, that would be it. The end of the lizardmens luck.

    And that is no idle spection , he thought. Without this meeting todaywithout this allianceour people could very well have perished.

    The envoy, Soei, had dered that the orc lord was real. The worst-case scenario in the chiefs mind was already in motion, and now there was a glimmer of hope that they could survive it. It filled the chief with a great sense of relief.

    Let us convene together, then, Soei said, seven days from now. I ask that you do not hurry yourselves into any type of conflict before then. I would also advise you to watch your backs for the time being as well.

    Very good. I look forward to meeting your master.

    The monster nodded at the chief, then disappeared from the spot, without a sound, as if fading into the shadows.

    Seven days. That would be enough , he thought. Hole up in their caverns to keep the orcs from getting any stronger, and wait for their reinforcements. He didnt know what kind of numbers his newfound friend would bring, but even someone as powerful as Soei alone would be a great help. If his so-called master was taking on the orc lord himself, then the lizardmen needed to grant him all the support they could. It was an uncertain, wait-and-see approach, but it certainly beat risking their lives in a confrontation that offered almost no chance of survival.

    Now, at least, the chief knew what must be done.

    Prepare for a siege, men! We must reserve our fighting strength until the reinforcements arrive!

    Yes, my lord!

    And so the lizardmen holed up in their naturalbyrinth, lying low and quiet for the sh toe.

    Gabil opened his eyes. It took a moment for him to recall what had happened. When he finally did, he shot out of bed, livid.

    Are you awake, my lord?! the lizardman serving him said.

    Yes. I apologize for rming you. I must have fallen into his trap

    His trap?

    Indeed. That impudent fool and his clever tricks

    Meaning, sir?

    Meaning that fighter who defeated me was the true leader of the vige.

    What?!

    His men began nervously conversing with one another, digesting this devastating piece of news. It exined a lot, in their minds.

    The little sneak pretended that slime was their leader to distract my attention. He yed the part of some foolish peon, then struck me right when my guard was down!

    Of all the dirty tricks, my lord!

    And to think the direwolves, of all the monsters, are willingly cooperating with such a small-minded weasel. So much for the so-called masters of the ins! Just a bunch of mangy dogs, in the end.

    The work of a coward, through and through! Unworthy of ever crossing des with a warrior such as yourself, Sir Gabil!

    Quite, yes. I offered him a chance to duel with me, fair and square, and now I see how much of an error in judgment that was!

    Ah, II see, sir. Indeed, there would be no other way I could imagine you tasting defeat otherwise.

    Bah! Curse those wretched direwolf beasts and those conniving hobgoblins! Just because they happened to be blessed with a round of evolution, my lord, they walk around like they own the world! If they think they can measure up to the lizardmen, we had all best relieve them of that idea with haste!

    Gabil gave his men an appreciative nod. It was true. He couldnt imagine any other reason why he lost that confrontation. That, and the direwolves proved to be a sore disappointment. All that talk of their pride, their wless teamwork, and here they were sharing their fates with a bunch of underhanded lowlifes.

    Anyone who uses such cowardly tactics against me is worthless! he spat out, still livid.

    Perhaps it was for the better we did not side with them, then.

    I would say so, yes!

    Indeed, indeed

    Gabil basked in the ego-massaging from his men. Then he let out a heartyugh. As far as he was concerned, he wasnt defeated at all.

    Come to think of it, another man said, I do find it odd, Sir Gabil, that you have remained at the rank of warrior lord for all this time.

    What? Gabil replied, sneering at the lizardman.

    N-no, II do not mean you are unworthy of the post, my lord. Quite the opposite! I just feel it a wasted opportunity of sorts, you serving that feeble old man for all this time.

    Keep going.

    Now Gabil was on his side. The lizardman straightened his posture, relief coursing over him.

    I feel, Sir Gabil, it is about time we allow our chief to go into retirement and establish you as the new lizardman chief. Ah, if only that were already the case! Then, perhaps, we would not be so thrown by the orcs as we are now.

    The others quickly stepped up to agree.

    Exactly! Once Sir Gabil shows his true strength, that stubborn old fool will soon take the hint and step aside. It will be a new era for the lizardman people, and nothing would make me happier than seeing ite to life!

    Very true! It is time for a new wind to blow across our homnd!

    Gabil nodded at the shouted adtion. He felt, finally, that the time was ripe.

    Ah, he said, so you were all thinking the same thing? I was just considering that the time hade to act myself. Will you be willing to fight alongside me, then?

    He sized up his men. They were all looking at him, eyes full of passion. He liked what he saw. They were envisioning a new epoch in lizardman history, one they would have a direct part in engineering. Soon, Gabil felt, they would be his most trusted advisers, offering the support he would need as he led his species to a new generation of bountiful glory.

    We will, sir, one said, if you are willing to lead us.

    That was the chance Gabil was waiting for. He nodded sagely.

    Then the new era is here, he proimed. Very well! Let us all stand together!

    The echoes of the ensuing cheers lingered for what seemed like minutes afterward.

    The fool had finally climbed onstage. The farce was about to begin.

 Volume 2 - Ch 4

    DISENGAGING GEARS

    The lizardman chief nodded at thetest war report.

    It had been four days since his conference with Soei. Three days remained until the two armies woulde together formally, but for that day, it looked like they could pass yet another night without any major losses.

    The orcs attack was, as they expected, severe. The corridors were teeming with them, pouring in like a flood. Asbyrinthine as the caverns were, that didnt matter as much if it was covered from corner to corner with the enemy. They had set traps in some of the chambers to whittle down the numbers a little, and that was about all the offense they had attempted.

    But not a single lizardman life had yet been lost. They had focused on the defense effort, trying to keep casualties as low as possible, and it was paying off. Their knowledge of the caverns yed a major role, as did the lizardmens ever-rising morale. Thework of cave paths ensured that their escape routes and emergency ess passages remained untouched. The teams facing the brunt of the orc attack switched in and out in shifts, ensuring that only the bare minimum of troops engaged the enemy at any one time.

    The lizardmen had their chiefs umon leadership skills to thank for their sess so far. But the chief refused to rest on hisurels. He knew that things were still under control mainly due to the promise ofing reinforcements. The warriors who had actually fought the orcs reported on the astonishing amount of strength their foes exhibiteda far cry from anything an orc should be capable of. It was clearly the result of their orc lords special skills, and if they had opted for a full-frontal sh, the lizardmen would have been decimated.

    They had lost nobody, but only because of their single-minded focus on defense. The lizardmens elite troops had not seen their defensiveworks prated yet, but with the sheer numbers they faced, they couldnt let their guard down for a moment. They had to keep their foes from growing any more powerful, no matter what.

    For now, everyone among the lizardmen had to admit that the chief was right. He had strict orders in ceif any fighter was wounded, he was to be reced on the front lines immediately. Anyone dying in battle would be consumed by the orcs, and that would only make them stronger. Everyone understood that they needed to be careful, thorough, and that the defensive lines must be protected at all costs.

    And it was only for three more days. Three more days until the reinforcements came, and they could stage a counterattack. Then they could use the caverns to their advantage and fight backor, at least, devote more men to offense instead of defense. Little by little, they all believed, it would turn the tables and bring this seemingly endless stalemate to an end.

    It was a hopeful scenario for the chief to picture, one that relieved him a little.

    And it was at that moment when an aide told him that Gabil was back

    Gabil was beside himself with anger.

    What is this? he thought as he hurried to the chief. The proud lizardmen, burrowing in their holes like cowards, hiding from the pigs Well, no worries now. I have returned. And now we can fight with the pride of true lizardmen.

    It ddens me to see you again, Gabil. Were you able to gain the confidence of the goblins?

    Yes, my lord! They only number approximately seven thousand, but I have their support, and they await our orders.

    I see. Hopefully they will be of service to us.

    Are we off to battle, then? Gabil asked, his tone already growing confrontational. He was back, and he had no interest in letting the pigs have the initiative. He was sure the chiefhis fatherhad been waiting for his arrival with bated breath.

    But the reply he received was nothing like what he expected.

    Mm? No, not yet. While you were away, we received a request to form an alliance. Their forces are set to arrive here three days from now. I n to wait for them, formally agree to the alliance, then discuss strategy at that point. After that, we will go on a full offensive.

    The news was aplete surprise to Gabil. It did not sit well.

    What? Our chief wasnt waiting for me at all?!

    Relying on these mystery reinforcements from who knows where, all for the sake of defeating a stupid little herd of pigs? It was uneptable to Gabil.

    My chief, if I take the lead, the pigs will be eliminated in a sh. Please, give me your order to strike them down!

    No, came the cold reply. We begin three days from now. You had best rest yourself today. You must be exhausted.

    The chief was wholly uninterested in the idea. Gabil seethed with anger. Tossing him aside in anticipation of these reinforcements? Unforgivable.

    Chief Father, you have to get ahold of yourself! I fear your advanced age is making you fail to see reality!

    What?

    What is the meaning of this, Sir Gabil? the head of the chiefs guard asked, while the chief himself eyed his son suspiciously.

    Gabil sized the two up, his gaze filled with pity. He felt oddly calm now. He had been patient with his father as the leader up to this point. There was much about him that he still respectedeven he had to acknowledge his innate leadership skills.

    He certainly did not hate his father, the leader of all lizardmen. If anything, it was his desire to earn the praise of his chief that drove him from day to day. The refusal to give him any rankled Gabil. In that case , he reasoned, let me stand above him and make him recognize me . That was the best way to word it, though Gabils pride made that difficult for him to ept, deep down.

    He nodded, then sent the signal to his men.

    Father, he bellowed across the chamber, your era has ended. Starting today, I will serve as the new chief of the lizardmen!

    With the deration, a battalion of goblins swarmed into the chamber, stone-tipped spears aimed at the chief and his guard. Gabils own elite guard stood by him, ensuring there would be no unwee resistance from the outside hallway.

    Gabil, what is the meaning of this?! the chief spat out, at a higher octave than usual. It was a rarity to hearand it only made Gabil feel even more superior.

    Father, I thank you for everything youve done for us. Now, I want you to leave the rest to me and enjoy life in retirement.

    With another order, Gabils team disarmed the chief and his guard.

    Answer me, Gabil! What is the meaning of all this?!

    Perhaps, Father, using our mazelike corridors to fight the orcs was a good idea. But it spreads our fighters out too sparsely around the entire structure. We have no way of staging a useful counterattack, and it dooms us to exhaustion sooner orter.

    Dont be ridiculous I told you, once we confer three days from now, we will get back on the

    Too little, toote! We are lizardmen! We are strong, and that strength is at its best in our homnd, the marshes. It is in those muddy, flooded regions where we are at our most mobile, and our enemy at its slowest. Our greatest of natural weapons. And what ruler of the marshes simply holes up in the dark and waits for their problems to go away?!

    He took the chiefs weapon in hand, a spear that served as the symbol of the lizardman leader. It was a Vortex Spear, a magical weapon to be wielded only by the strongest of tribal warriors, and as far as Gabil was concerned, he was born to hold it.

    Now he could feel the power within it, a sure sign that the spear had epted its new master for all time. Looking down at the chief and his guard, he held his new weapon high in the air for them to see.

    The spear has epted me. Lizardmen require no alliances! Allow me to prove that to you!

    Wait, Gabil! I cannot allow you to do this! At least wait until the reinforcements arrive!

    You may leave the rest to me, he replied, ignoring the shouted plea. You may find things a tad ufortable until the battle is over, but do try to hold out for me.

    Sir Gabil! My brother! You dare to betray us?!

    Could we save family concerns forter, my sister? I am not betraying anyone. As I told you, I am going to show you what the new era will be for us lizardmen.

    Thats nonsense! replied Gabils younger sister, the head of the chiefs guard. Everyone knows what a talented warrior you are. Why now, of all times? Is this what you truly want for us?!

    Do you think I am joking? Get out of my sight. Take her away.

    He could hear his sister shouting as the goblins hauled her out of the room. It didnt matter to him any longer. He had no intention of killing her or anything of the like, but he didnt want anyone in his way. He would defeat the foe that the former chief found impossible to overthrow. The results would turn him into a new hero, the perfect event for establishing his position at the peak of lizardman society.

    Then , he thought as his heart raced, my father will admit it. He will admit that he was proud of me all along!

    His men were already dealing with anyone who sided with the chief, with goblins to hammer the message home. They wouldnt be expecting it anyway, their attention too focused on the orcs in front of them. Theyd never expect their fellow lizardmen to attack them through the emergency tunnels.

    Before long, the news had arrivedall opposition had been suppressed. Gabil sat down on his fathers seat, the picture of calmposure. And then, as if waiting for this exact timing:

    Hows that chair feel to you, then?

    Ah, Sir Lace. Thanks for your hard work. It went even easier than I expected.

    Oh, lovely, lovely. d to be of service.

    It was a masked man, one with an asymmetrical smile that made it look like he was sneering at anyone he showed it to. His clothing stuck out, too, clown-like with its rabble of colors and patterns. It was a ridiculous sight, but Gabil was unfazed. This man, Lace, was in the employ of Gelmud, the man Gabil loved more than almost anyone else.

    He had first appeared before Gabil as he was returning to his homnd with his newly earned goblins. Lace is the name, he began. I used to be vice president of the Moderate Jesters, a group ofjacks-of-all-trades, you could say. Lord Gelmud has hired me to serve youanything you need, I provide.

    This Lace did with efficiency, freeing Gabils men from the dungeon and providing regr reports on the lizardmens moves. It was Lace who removed the seal on the Vortex Spear for him, ensuring his coup ended in sess.

    The original n called for Gabil and his elite guard to suppress the chief and his men while the main force was out fighting in the marshes, but with the army hunkering down in the caverns, that idea was a bust. It angered Gabil immensely, but Lace offered an alternative path. He brought the goblins, and Gabils own troops, right to the chief himself without arousing any attention. It was like magic, the way he led them through the escape corridors without a single lizardman noticing.

    In short, Lace was the triggerman for the entire coup.

    Aw, cmon, Gabil, Laceughed. Im really nobody that special, no. But he was to Gabil, this man working for Gelmud.

    Ah-ha-ha-ha-ha. Enough modesty, Sir Lace, Gabil replied. We are coworkers, after all, under the watchful eye of Lord Gelmud. Lets make it a useful rtionship.

    Sir Gabil, we have all the tribal leaders in our grasp.

    It was the news Gabil had been waiting to hear. Now, at longst, every branch of the military was under his control.

    Oops! Sorry if Im in the way here. Id best head off to my next job, then

    Ah yes. Sorry to detain you, Sir Lace. I think its time I whip those orcs and show my strength to Lord Gelmud, once and for all!

    With one final, sneering bow, Lace disappeared from the cavern.

    You were quite helpful to me, Lace. Lord Gelmud has so many talented people working for him Id best hold up my end of the bargain, then.

    Gabil stood up, supremely confident. It was time to attack. He couldnt even imagine defeat at this point, and the advice from his father failed to reach his ears. His loyal followers were now cheering his every move, especially the younger lizardmen who formed his most passionate support base.

    He called each tribe leader to his chamber, ordering them to prepare for an all-out attack. To teach those pigs exactly how daring and brave the lizardmen truly were, as he put it. The order was greeted with cheers from every tribe, weary from days of siege warfare. Their former chiefs order to hold the fort and prevent casualties at all costs had, ironically enough, made it all the easier for Gabil to consolidate his own power. He was giving the people what they wanted, and that made things go his way.

    ddened by the response, Gabil sat back down. His time was here. He was confident about that. Defeating the orcs, at this point, was just a minor detail.

    How could this happen?

    Waves of despair rankled the chief.

    Soeis final adviceto watch his backwas referring to this, no doubt. He thought he had the people under his full control. Even the more hawkish were faithfully following his orders, solidifying their defenses. And then his own son betrayed him.

    Desperation overtook him. This was a terrible situation. If it kept up, the lizardmen would be ruined before tomorrow, much less in three days.

    He looked down at his chief guardhis other child, Gabils sister. She noticed the signal and nodded. Go! he shouted, and the chief guard immediately slipped out of her shackles and ran off.

    The alliance forces needed to be notified as soon as possible. They might get caught up in all of this otherwise. He had to prevent that. His pride as a lizardman, and as a leader, demanded it.

    That envoy, the man named Soei, didnt bother hiding his aura from him. Once they were out of this natural fortress, they might be able to follow it to wherever he was now. It was a slim chance, but it was all he had to offer his chief guard.

    The lizardmen guarding the dungeon had taken measures to restrain both of them, butperhaps out of distaste at the idea of abusing their former leaderthey were not doing so with very much fervor. She quickly took advantage of that to escape.

    For now, the chief felt relieved. He would have to stay here; that was his responsibility for now. All he could do was pray his daughter couldplete the mission he gave her.

    Only seven days. That was what he promised, and he had failed. He cursed his own worthlessness, there in his cell, and hoped it would not lead his allies to abandon him. Soei offered that alliance because, to his master, the lizardmen held some sort of value. If this coup made him change his mind, that would seal all their fates.

    If this battle costs us the lives of those faithful to Gabil, so be it. Perhaps they had iting. I just wish we could keep our women and children safe

    They had yet to even formally enact the alliance. The chief fully understood that he was wishing for the stars. But one desire still ruled over himthe desire that this tragedy wouldnt spell doom for all the tribes he oversaw. He felt he owed them that much, after all these years, and no one could me him for it.

    The chief had a good idea of what was about to happen. Once Gabil was in control of all the tribes, he would immediately order an attack. They would have nothing left in the corridors, not even any defense mechanisms. Without any fresh soldiers to rece the wearied frontline fighters, and against an orc force that grew stronger as the fight wore on, it would only be a matter of time before their defense began faltering.

    The women and children of each tribe had been evacuated to a chamber deep in the heart of the maze. They would then have nobody to protect them.

    How did this happen?

    Wailing about it now was pointless.

    I will have to be the cornerstone of our final defense. I have toat leastbuy them a little more time

    Just a little more time. That was the best he could offer right now.

    On that day, the marshes werepletely covered in orcs. An observer in the air would have seen them swarming for the cavern entrances like so many ants.

    But even that was only a small part of the horde. Many were still in the forest, making their way toward the marsnd region. And the main force, marching northward along the river, was stilling. They faced no resistance, nothing preventing them from covering the marshes and descending upon the caverns like an avnche.

    Now, though, there was amotion in one small corner of the hordethe first sh between orc and lizardman out in the marsh.

    In thesends, the lizardman was king. Powerful inbat, they were capable of nimble, quick movements in the muddy, overgrown swamps they called home. That was how the battle begana handful of fighters hiding in the tall grasses, sneaking up on a clutch of orcs.

    Everything was going exactly as Gabil had hoped. His father, the former chief, and all those still loyal to him were shut up in arge underground chamber, and now he was back on the surface to reorganize his newly united troops, taking full advantage of the twisty ess paths that crisscrossed over one another inside. The defensive forces were still in ceGabil nned to wrap up the fight before they exhausted themselves.

    He didnt have an exact bead on the number of troops at the orcs disposal, but judging by the natural abilities of the two races, he figured there was nothing to worry about unless they were outnumbered ten to one or so. So what if they were throwing a ton of orc bodies at them? That didnt change the core fundamentals of this matchup.

    Plus, he had ordered his fighters to take a stick-and-move approach, dealing a blow or two and quickly falling back, just in case. Staying on their toes like that would let them regroup as often as necessary, readying themselves for the next strike.

    Over time, it would cull the orc numbers drastically, dealing them a decisive blow. The orcs on the inside would lose contact with the outdoor forces, and with that, theyd be forced to retreat.

    The lizardmens natural agility in these marshes made that strategy possible. Gabil was no talentless fool. Hecked his fathers ability to instantly gauge the entire theater of war in one nce, but the way he led his fighting men and women was worthy of praise. He had inherited a lot of talent from the former chief. Lizardmen were naturally attracted to the strong, the powerfulmerely talking a big show wouldnt be enough. Gabils men loved him, and the love proved that he was more than just bravado and mindless courage.

    But would it be enough?

    The final line of defense, the forces tasked with guarding thergest underground chamber, numbered a thousand strong. That room was now filled with nothing but women and childrennobatants. The grown women could fight if it came to that, but there was no use relying on them. That was why a thousand fighters were defending them, spread out across the assorted hallways linked to this room.

    Each defensive line nned to gradually fall back over time, grouping en masse around the site of the final stand. Everyone elseseven thousand goblins, around eight thousand battle-ready lizardmenwas under the direct control of Gabil. The new chief believed they could win in straightbat, without using whatever geographical advantages thebyrinth offered. Thus, only a skeletal defense team was left inside, every remaining avable soldier sent off to the marshes.

    The initial strike came as aplete surprise to the orcs, who found their battalions cut off from one another and heavily damaged. The stragglers who managed to flee the lizardmen were subsequently isted, making them ripe for the picking by the gangs of goblins. For a bunch of freshly minted soldiers, they performed magnificently, following Gabils orders to the letter. As they should have. Their lives were riding on this, too.

    It was hard to predict in advance, but the armies under Gabil were showing a remarkable amount of synergy. So far, so good.

    Behold! Gabil thought. There was no need to fear this herd of pigs at all. My fathers age has clouded his mind. He fretted far too much about matters. Once he sees what I am capable of out here, I am sure he will recognize me as the new chief. Wed best clear the marsh of these pigs before long

    Gabil wanted this to be decisive. He wanted no room in his fathers mind for doubt about his sons superior abilities. And even now, the cheering he heard in the distance seemed to indicate he was on the right track.

    Look at that! These orcs could never hold a candle to us lizardmen!

    He liked what he saw, as he surveyed the marshes before him. But this would be the end of his streak of luck. He had been expecting piles of dead orcs, and their foes morale subsequently crumbling. He was not aware of what made the orc lord a truly terrifying foe. His father didand now, that single difference of opinion was making its presence known.

    Splish, crunch, splish, crunch.

    The orcs appeared to be advancing over the bodies of their kindred, on all fours, attempting to gain purchase over the muddynd. It was only when one grew closer that the truth became clear.

    It was actually a banquet, a feast upon the dead, and it was enough to make an observers hair stand on end. Even the most seasoned fighters on the lizardman side felt sick to their stomachs viewing it.

    An eerie aura began swirling around the orcs. One fighter, rearing back in horror at the scene, lost his footing. The orc soldiers immediately seized upon his body, dragging it through the mud, ripping all the limbs off. The first lizardman casualty of the battle, and the turning point for the entire war.

    The orcish infantry gnawing on the bare flesh were transferring the lizardmans abilities to the orc lord himself. It would not be a perfect duplicate like the ones Rimuru could engineer with his Predator skill, but it had one advantage: It could give the caster not only the consumed victims skills, but also their innate physical traits. Whatever the orc lord managed to absorb from the body, he could then feed back to the rest of his army.

    This was known as the Food Chain, another ability unlocked by the Ravenous skill. It let the orcs function both as a horde, and as a single conscious entity. Ravenous did not work the way a well-trained direwolf pack did, but the effects it could have on an enemy could be just as devastating.

    It was exactly why the lizardman chief feared, above everything else, losing any of his men in battle. Doing so meant losing any inherent advantage his species brought to the table. Even if the orcs couldnt fully seize the skills of their foes, they could still gain some feature of the lizardmenand it would instantly be gifted to every member of the horde. Perhaps theyd grow webbing around their feet, letting them more freely move through the mud. Or perhaps scales would spontaneously appear over the more vulnerable points on their bodies, boosting their defense. They were little changes, yes, but they would have dramatic effects on how the battle would turn out.

    Do not fear them! Gabil shouted. Show them the power we enjoy as the proud lizardman race!

    It was enough to inspire his men that little bit further. They knew they were fighting on familiar territory, and they were certain they had the mobility advantage. The orcs would be too bogged down to catch up with them. And even if they were outnumbered, a nimble attack on their nk would cut them off, just like before.

    Or so they thought

    Matching the armys movements step by step, the orcish army stayed in formation, following their foes unerringly. They were now perceptibly quicker than before.

    Huh? The orcs are moving differently?

    But by the time Gabil noticed, it was already toote. With newfound speed, the orcs spread out to the left and right, enveloping the advancing lizardman force.

    In perfect order, the twenty-thousand-strong force hadpletely sealed off the escape route Gabils men used to have. The new chief had pushed his men too far into the fray, cing too much confidence in their mobility and figuring they could easily get away if need be. But right now, Gabils force was pitted against the ten-thousand-strong splinter force that had attacked the ogres, plus another thirty thousand, the advance force from the main horde. Half that number were now behind the lizardmen.

    It gave Gabil pause, but only for a moment. He decided to try breaking through the army in front of him. If things turned against him here, the lizardmen would be surrounded on all sides and annihtedto say nothing of the much slower goblins. And while Gabil didnt see the goblins as much more than cannon fodder, he wasnt heartless enough to simply abandon the whole lot at once.

    After me, men! he shouted as he began to run forward. Were breaking through the orc encirclement!

    If this was a typical orcish army, one not under the effects of Ravenous, Gabils desperation tactic might have had a chance. But now, that was only a hypothetical. The reality was much harsher.

    In a moments time, the powerful attack the lizardmenunched at the orcs before them ended with a whimper. And at that moment, the lizardman armyand by extension, Gabil himselfdoomed themselves to defeat.

    The encirclement was almost fullyplete now, and more orcs from the main horde were flowing in. There was no refuge from the enemy, in any direction. They were like a bug surrounded by a boundless number of army ants. As much as they wanted to resist, they were doomed to fall sooner orter.

    Gabil was not ipetent. In an instant, he recognized the dilemma his army faced. But as for why it had happenedthat was beyond his intellectual skills. He knew they had been the overwhelming favorite, and all of a sudden, their attacks were having next to no effect. It was unthinkable to him.

    Yet, he pressed on, trying everything his army was still capable of doing. He called for his troops, attempting to rally them back into position. The goblins were almost hysterical, and their panic was beginning to affect the lizardmen as well. He had to prevent that, no matter what, because once panic took over, the entire chain ofmand would fall apart. Then came defeat, and then annihtion.

    He considered a retreat, but only for a moment. He knew there was no escape route left. Even if they could punch their way through this encirclement, there was no ce to escape to anymore.

    Once he had wrested control from his father, he had ensured that all the troops under hismand had exited the caverns safelybut the caverns were too tight to let them all back in. It would be a stampede if he gave the order, the entrances quickly bing choked with crushed and mangled goblin bodies, and they would be left waiting for death at the orcs hands.

    Assuming they could even reach the caverns now. There was always the forest to flee to, but with the orcs suddenly quicker on their feet than before, all the forest offered was a future where theyd be chased down and picked off.

    So no retreat. Gabil could understand that much. And now, finally, he understood why his father had taken such a conservative approach. He knew how impossibly stupid he had been.

    But it was toote for regrets. What could he do right now? Not much. Nothing, in fact, apart from rallying his forces and doing whatever he could to calm their anxieties.

    Gah-ha-ha-ha! he shouted gleefully. Dont you start panicking on me, boys! Im right here with all of you! We could never lose to these pigs!

    By now, he was having trouble believing it, but he had to say it anyway. His troops needed inspiration, even as their fates were quickly catching up with them.

    Haah

    The chief, too, was full of regretregret that he couldnt convince Gabil that the orc lord was a real threat and not some fairy-tale bogeyman. Now he realized that his son needed things exined in more concrete, visceral terms. He didnt ce enough importance on that, and now he hated himself for it.

    This is all my fault , he thought. If he had a more urate idea of what the orc lord could do, perhaps Gabil would have been a bit more careful. But that didnt matter anymore. The chief sighed as he quelled the thought from his mind.

    He still had things to do. His brethren were still in thatrge underground chamber, anxiety all over their faces.

    In that chamber, there were four wide routes to the marsnds, along with one escape route behind them. That route connected directly to a hilltop near the foot of the mountains. It would be the long way to the forest, but it was safely away from the marshes themselvesand the corridor was a straight shot, ensuring that women and children could evacuate through it without getting lost.

    Which meant that the four pathways at the front of the chamber were the main worry right now. The forces that had beenunching attacks at the interior orcs had slowly, but surely, retreated back through them all. The final line of defense deployed in each one numbered around fifteen hundred at this point; not all the toons had made it fully inside yet.

    The orc numbers were high. With so many, they would discover this location soon enough. Before they did, the chief at least wanted the entire force back there, if he could.

    He shot a nce back at the escape route. This was arge chamber, but it was now crowded with so many lizardmen that the space felt cramped. If the orcs swarmed in here without warning, he doubted they could all flee in time. They had best start evacuating now, while things could still be kept orderly. It would take just a single spark, a moment of panic, to plunge this room into chaos.

    But what if they did all make into the forest? Would the orcs simply find and massacre them over there? It seemed usible. And even without the orcs, the forest presented an unclear future for everyone.

    For now, they needed more time. Time to wait for reinforcements, despite the chief having no idea if they wereing or not.

    But the chief didnt get to enjoy the dream for long. The sounds of battle began echoing from a corridor, apanied by the smell of blood mixed with sweat and metal.

    Theyre here

    Anxiety pervaded the chamber. The chief sprang into action, bringing the women and children to the rear of the chamber and positioning those who could fight up front, just in case the orcs had broken the blockade. The fighters formed an arc ahead of them, readying their spears far earlier than they expected.

    All four corridors in front should have been fully blocked off. The lizardmen were instructed to pick off the orcs as they appeared, giving them no quarter regardless of how much weaker they were. The hallways were narrow enough that only a few orcs could engage at once, a wee advantage. In a one-on-one fight, a lizardman could make quick work of any orcish soldierand this formation, the chief thought, offered them at least a few advantages.

    Things worked as the chief thought they would, at first. The orcs were stronger than normal, it was true, but the lizardmen were handling them well enough.

    The forces assigned to each of the four corridors devoted themselves to staving off the hordes. They took turns at the front lines, ensuring they were careful with their work, but not even they couldst forever. The corpses piled up near the exits, but the orcs simply consumed them and kept pushing forward. It was such a horrid sight that even the hardiest of the lizardmen couldnt deny the fear it began to strike in their hearts.

    Then, the decisive moment came. A yellowish aura covered the orcs.

    What on? the chief thought, just as an even greater nightmare attacked him. The orcs used to be a level below the lizardmen in strength. Now, it was disturbingly even. The difference wasnt dramatic, but it was more than enough to destroy the equilibrium from before. Quickly and efficiently, it removed any advantage the lizardmen enjoyed up to now.

    Observing the battle, the chief realized theyd be lucky tost the day like this. The reinforcements woulde after three days, if they came at all. It was untenable, and already they were losing good lizardmen at the defense lines.

    They had to get the women and children out. It beat waiting for their doom in there.

    Listen to me! I will have to ask you all a favor. It is a grim one, but it must be carried out, or else the history of our people ends right now, on this very day. We must survive. And I will provide you the time to do it!

    Escape was pointless. It would just extend the misery they all experienced before their ultimate deaths. He knew thatbut there was still one final dream he could hope for.

    You must get out of here, now, and ce your trust upon the monster known as Rimuru! Now, go! Go, all of you!

    Heh-heh-heh-heh! The path is blocked, my friend!

    A group of orcs walked out from the escape route, firmly crushing the chiefs final hope. They were orc knights, d in full-te armorand as they entered the light, screams began emanating from one of the four outer corridors.

    Appearing behind the shouts of pain was a hideous-looking orc, his body covered in jet-ck armor that was spattered with blood from head to toe. This most unusual orc was a bizarre sight, the fires of insanity burning in his eyes.

    Is thatthe orc lord?!

    The chief was stunned as he beheld the figure, farrger than even the orc knights. But if anything, the truth was even worse.

    You will all serve as an offering to our mighty orc lord, the orc in ck intoned. We will not let a single one of you escape.

    Now the chief knew who he was. He was not even the orc lord, just another one of his servantsand yet, all this power he wielded. He was an orc general, and now he was here, a heavy long-handled halberd in his hand. The mere sight of him called to mind a boundless hellscape of despair.

    This is it , the chief thought, his heart crushed. But I wontI wont go down that easily!

    Ha-ha-ha-ha! You will be a worthy adversary for me, orc general. I dly ept the challenge!

    The chief knew this was the end for himself, calmly readying his spear as he approached the general. He would be thest chief of the lizardmen, the one who led them to their final fates, and he intended to do so with pride

    The chief guard of the lizardmen ran through the forest, the orders still fresh in her mind. Her exact destination, though, wasnt clear. As much as she honed her senses, searching for a trace of the aura that belonged to the envoy known as Soei, she could find nothing. So instead she ran, trusting in her instincts.

    Lizardmen were nimble creatures in the marshes, but less so on drynd. Her breathing was ragged, her heart felt like it would explode, and she could feel herself growing more fatigued by the second. But she never stopped running. She had a bare minimum of duty for the monster who offered them an alliance, and she intended to fulfill it.

    It had been around three hours since she began running. It had been a constant run ever since she slipped out of her bonds, and while her mind was still strong, a single moments distraction and she was likely to fall on the spot.

    She knew the truth well enough. There was no guarantee that the monster Soei was anywhere ahead of here. If he was, there was no guarantee he would lift a finger to help. The thought was starting to ur to hermaybe she should just keep running? For good? Away from home?

    No! How could I betray my people? My own father?

    She tried to banish the thought, focusing on other matters.

    As far as she was concerned, the charge engineered by her brother Gabil was something she should have stopped. She knew that, above everything else, what her brother wanted was their fathers approval. But she could never bring herself to tell the chief. She respected Gabil too muchas her brother, and as a lizardman warriorand she thought he would be a splendid chief in time without her butting in on his affairs.

    And now look at what that earned them.

    Perhaps this was just the result of a hundred happenstances coinciding at once, knocking everything out of whack. But she couldnt help but think it. If only she talked things over with him more, as a sister, maybe they couldve avoided all of this. And if that was the case, she had a responsibility to uphold.

    No, she couldnt abandon her homnd. If she stopped running now, shed never run again. So she kept at it.

    Someone was watching her. Someone that she, running with all her might, could never have noticed. He was nimbly leaping from tree branch to tree branch, following her every move without a sound.

    Now he smirked to himself, a bit of drool falling from one edge of his lips. He was waiting for the moment. The instant when her exhaustion took her, and she could no longer move

    And when it did, he soundlessly descended in front of the chief guard.

    His arms were long, like a goris, his legs those of a carnivorous animal. His head and torso, however, unmistakably identified him as a member of the horrifying orcish race.

    Geh-heh-heh You appear tired. Your muscles must be so well-toned, so delicious.

    Pain filled the chief guards eyes as she looked at the monster. He was a high-level orc, no doubt about it. And he had more with him, a few dozen behind his back. Survival was not in the cards for her.

    You

    Geh-heh Bah-ha-ha-haaaaa! I am one of the generals of the orcish army. Consider it an honor to take up residence in my stomach!

    Anan orc general?!

    The chief guard readied the spear on her back. But it was clear to everyone involved how this fight would go. She was already slowed by her fatigue, totally bereft of the strength she would need to defeat the orc general and his men.

    She knew it was hopeless. But she was ready to fight anyway. Her pride dictated it.

    Oooooh yeah! Now this is getting good!

    The mysterious man did a little dance where he stood, his cheerful voice booming. His eerie-looking mask and clothing were like nothing else on this.

    Lace, the man who had exchanged a few words with Gabil earlier, was ying with three crystal balls, as if teaching himself how to juggle. Each one was about the size of a persons head, and images were visible inside them all. A keen-eyed observer would be able to see that each one depicted a scene from a battlefield.

    All three were valuable magical items by nature, capable of seeing through the eyes of any person of ones choice and projecting their field of vision into the crystal. Only one person could be followed with each ball, and that person had to physically touch the orb to make the connection work, so Lace could only track three at once. But that was more than enough for his needs.

    He had connected the crystals to three of the orc generals he found easiest to control, and now he was using them to steal nces of the current battle. It wasnt something he took a prurient pleasure in. It was his job, part of the duties his client ced upon him. But Lace was still taking full advantage, apparently having a st as he peered into each orb in session.

    The war was unfolding just as he wanted it tojust as he had been enlisted to make happen. Nice! That oughta please the boss, he said to nobody in particr.

    But something was different this time. He actually got a response.

    You seem to be enjoying yourself.

    Whatre?!

    A woman appeared before the confused Lace, a fleeting beauty to her form. Her green hair was as tangled as a wall of ivy, loosely covering her entire body, and its translucence made the contours of her frame visible.

    I am Treyni, one of the dryad wardens of the forest, and I have no intention of letting the monster tribes do as they please here. Thus, Im afraid I must remove you.

    The moment shepleted her deration, she began casting a spell. This unnerved Lace.

    Whoa! W-wait a second! I aint in no monster tribe!

    Silence. The disturbance you have caused to the forest already makes your crime clear.

    The magic began to take effect.

    Wait! Wait-wait-wait! Whats that spell?!

    Come to me, spiritual summon Sylphide. And with you, I summon the extra skill Unify!!

    The dryad constructed a shell of magicules over her own spiritual body. It was simr to Rimurus Replicationalthough she did not, strictly speaking, have any physical form at all, apart from the holy tree that housed her soul. Those properties allowed her to unify her spirit with others like her.

    Unified with the high-level Sylphide, Treyni now had the ability to wield the full powers of that spirit. And what she unleashed next was one of Sylphides most powerful magics.

    Your judgment is here. May you pray for your ultimate forgiveness. Aerial de!!

    The spiritual Unification meant Treyni no longer had need for long casting times. In an instant, Lace was locked inside a gap in the air itselfone upied solely by great des of air that rent everything they shed through. There was no escape once imprisoned.

    It was a fearsome move, and Lace, if anything, weathered it well. His own intrinsic Anti-Magic skills let him escape mortal injury. All it managed to take from him was a single armand with a puff of smoke, the arm went into so-called Stealth Mode. This was an original skill, exclusive to Lace, thatbined illusory magic like Deception, Infiltration, and Concealment, and he was so deft at casting it that it even let him deceive the spiritual senses of a dryad.

    Yikes. Prone to violence much,dy? You coulda let me at least get a word in edgewise Well, my works done here anyway, so I think Ill get while the gettins good. See you around!

    He had apparently set up several potential escape routes for himself in advance. When the smoke cleared, Lace was gone.

    I cannot believe he escaped my grasp, Treyni whispered. Butnot from a monster tribe? Then who are those people?

    No one was there to answer. Treyni filed the question away forter, instead turning her eyes toward the battlefield. Running her mind through the roots of the nts that surrounded her, she used her dryad skills to swim in an ocean of information.

    Things do not appear to be going well I wonder how much I should really be trusting him.

    The whisper disappeared into the wind, just like the one before it. Traces of concern began to manifest themselves upon her face.

    She should have been the one taking care of the orc lord. But she could sense someone maneuvering behind him. Until she could grasp who, she couldnt make any rash moves. And while it might not be likely, if the orc lord managed to absorb her as well, it could spell the creation of a new demon lord and make it impossible for her own sisters to handle him. That prevented her from doing too much in public.

    It also prevented her from going very hard on the magic-born Lace, giving him the chance to escape. That hurt her. The lizardmen were being consumed by the orcs out there, and she couldnt do anything about it.

    But Treyni was still focused on her own role as a warden of the forest, and what that meant to her.

    Gabil continued iling away in his desperate battle. Things were getting more and more one-sided.

    The orcs seemed to know no fatigue, attacking them without pause or end. The federated goblin-lizardman forces, unable to escape from their encirclement, found themselves picked off one by one. And even if Gabil tried to break through, how many of his menwounded and in a state of total exhaustionwould follow him?

    It seemed clear that now was the time to abandon the slower goblins for good. There was no room for retreat, but by this point, Gabil had to think about guaranteeing himself as many survivors as possible. Warfare, in general, stopped once it became clear who the victor wasbut these orcs seemed intent onpletely wiping Gabil and his force off this ne of reality. There would be no terms offered; just murder, and then the feast.

    The orcs saw them as nothing but prey, and it triggered a primal sort of fear. The formation began to fall apart at the seams, the weaker-minded ones sumbing to terror like frogs being eyed by a snake. The goblins were already a lost cause, running around like mad in search of any sce, and the orcs werent having any of it. They chased them down, killed them, and consumed them. Not even three thousand functioned as a fighting force any longerand to the lizardmen, a good fifth of which had fallen, the news was no less grim.

    It was already bing difficult to lead them as a cohesive army. But Gabil kept pressing his teams forward, prodding the orc lines for any possible route of escape. His tactics were impable, his abilities being used to their fullest.

    Then a group of those orc soldiers in the ck armor began to move. A well-ordered team, unlike themon rabble, and each one protected from head to toe by metal. They might have been as physically strong as any other orc, but they functioned as a trained army, and their equipment was a massive upgrade.

    The orc leading them bore an aura that overwhelmed all the others, proving how much stronger he was than the rest. An orc general, as powerful as an entire tactical squadron all by himself. And hejust one of five among the hordehad two thousand stout orc knights following him. His rank was A-minus, and he answered directly to the orc lord himself, the leaders most trusted of officers.

    Its over

    In Gabils eyes, the demonstration of power was decisive.

    No escape, either. Best prepare to die in battle, then

    If he wanted anything right now, it was to die like a warrior, at least.

    Gah-ha-ha-ha-ha! So its the leader of these cowardly pigs! Do you have the courage to duel me?!

    He could never win. Gabils scale mail was already in tatters, the fatigue building across his body. His foes armor was a work of art, enhanced with magical protection, and the aura he exuded told of his strength.

    If he epted this invitation, at least Gabil would enjoy a glorious end on the battlefield. Perhaps he could take a general with him, if things went well enough.

    Guh-huh-huh Very well. Let me take you.

    Striking down the enemy leader, crushing thest true support his lizardman fighters had to rely on, would make the massacre that much easier to carry out. That was the orc generals thought, and Gabil was aware enough of that. He also knew that struggling any more than this would only lengthen the agony. Any thought of the reinforcements the chief apparently counted on was gone from his mind.

    He had already selected this patch ofnd as thest one he would ever stand upon.

    I thank you.

    Then all was solemn as they began their duel.

    Holding his magical Vortex Spear, Gabil sized up his foe, searching for any weakness.

    Come on! the orc general howled.

    Bring it! Vortex Torrent!

    With all his remaining force, Gabil released the most powerful attack he coulda killer move,bining histentnce skills with the magic his current weapon provided.

    But

    Chaos Eater!!

    The orc general spun his own spear in the opposite direction, canceling out the force of Gabils vortex. It began whirling faster and faster, unleashing its own aura that took on a sickly yellow color before descending upon the lizardman.

    Is he trying to eat me?!

    He rolled to the side, relying on instinct, but the aura continued to close the distance.

    Geh-heh-heh! Just another reptile, the generalughed. Your kind deserves to slither along the ground!

    Gabil refused to give up. At least one strike; that was all he wanted. He grabbed a clod of earth, throwing it at the orc geners childish as it must have looked, he had to deliver at least one clean blow. The attack disappeared futilely within the yellow aura, showing exactly how outssed he was.

    Gabil was too upied with dodging the aura to focus on any other strikes.

    The orc general thrusted his spear at him, a twisted smile on his face

    Whoa! Better not get distracted, there!

    A familiar voice reached Gabils ears. At the same time, he felt himself beingunched backward, just barely avoiding the hilt of the orc generals spear.

    Wh-what happened?! the confused Gabil thought. Then came a roar that deafened the battlefield, like the heavens had fallen upon it. Gabil thought it was another orc trick at first, before realizing it wasnt. Even the orcs, with their insurmountable advantage, were visibly panicking.

    The tides were changing anew, and violently so.

 Volume 2 - Ch 5

    THE GREAT CLASH

    Just as Gobta was reaching out to rescue Gabil, I was checking out the battle from above.

    It was a pretty fearsome sight. The orcs mustve thought they had a massive advantage, and now wed just flipped the chessboard on them Just us, and a few ogre mages, really. I couldnt me them for freaking out. I kind of was, too.

    After I sent Soei off to the lizardmen, I decided to start assigning battle posts. We wouldnt all head out there; I wanted a setup that could work quickly on its feet. We didnt know what wed be dealing with, so I had to be sure we could extract ourselves fast if need be.

    That was my watchword as I gave the order to prepare for war. The construction effort across town was continuing to go without a hitch, but we still had no real defenses in ce. Not even an outer wall, since itd get in the way of the building boom. No way we could weather out a siege or anything. It was much more logical to picture ourselves bringing the battle to them.

    Along those lines, I told the people not joining me to prepare to travel to the treants. They might have to set off before we made it back to town.

    Before any of that, though, I had to assemble all the monsters in town and tell them what we had decided on. I tried to act as kingly as possible.

    The final battle will be waged in the marsnds, I began. If we win there, were good. If we dont, Ill let you know via Thought Communication, so I want you to abandon this ce and flee to the treant settlement. Ill also ask the humans for help, if ites to that, and youll likely fight alongside them against the orcish army. Ill be honest with you; this isnt some gang of little kids. Im nning to win this, but if I dont, dont use that as an excuse to lose your heads. You gotta stay calm and follow the n!

    I was once again up on some kind of pedestal, like an offering to the gods. Delivering these lofty speeches was honestly embarrassing, and this whole setup made it even worse. In some ways, the idea of giving lectures like this ever again was more distasteful than the horde of orcs.

    Perhaps that was why I hardly felt scared at all about our predicament. Monsters can be sensitive things and sumb to the emotions of the crowd pretty quickly. They all listened intently, picking up on the confidence I was inadvertently radiating, and I guess it worked. Maybe that embarrassing disy was worth it after all.

    Now, the people joining me in the primary force

    The monsters slowly grew more excited, not knowing what to expect. I guess they all wanted part of the actionI didnt remember them being so warlike, but who knows? Whatever. I didnt let it bother me as I continued.

    For this battle, we will deploy with a team of one hundred goblin riders with Benimaru as theirmander. Hakuro will be his aide-de-camp, and Shion will be our main point man on the field. Soei will be joining us, although hes elsewhere at the moment, and I suppose Ranga will be my transport. That is all. Any questions?

    I could hear smallmotions arise among the crowd. A hundred must have seemed like an awfully small number. I saw Shuna make her way to the front, serving as their voice.

    Sir Rimuru, she asked, isnt that far too few people? And I didnt hear my name called, either. What is the meaning of this?

    The meaning? Wellyou know. As a princess and all, I hesitated to expose Shuna to a life-and-death situationthat was one reason. But I had another, even more valid one. This whole operation was focused on speed. Wed only have a hundred and change on our side, although Ranga could probablymand a few more. I wanted speed, and that meant the infantry would stay home. Shuna and herck of skill as a tempest wolfsman would be a liability.

    Plus, I was still only working with around six hundred hobgoblins, evenly divided by gender. Around a third were assigned to Rigurs security force, another third devoted to the construction effort, and the rest were women and children unsuited for physicalbor. My force was small, yes, but how much could we spare, really?

    Yeahhh, well You know, Shuna, Ill need someone to lead the rest of the people here. If we have to negotiate with treants and dryadster, Rigurds gonna have a hell of a lot on his te, right? Your presence would do a lot to give the women and children some peace of mind, too.

    It sounded usible enough, as I tried to convince her with it, and it basically seemed to work. In that case, I will live up to the role, she said, which was a relief. She did have a fan base around town, and I thought it was a good role for her.

    Shuna was still giving me and Shion nces, so Im sure she still had a few questions, but she seemed epting enough now. Which was fine by me. No need to go out searching fornd mines to step on.

    Sir Rimuru, Rigur said, raising a hand, why did you not call upon me?

    That question was a lot easier.

    Rigur, I want you tomand the remaining security forces and beef up your patrols outside town. You know how crazy this forest is right now. If something happens after we head off, Im leaving you responsible for them all. Make me proud!

    I had both Rigur and Rigurd nodding at my reply. A number of powerful magic beasts, the kind that usually dwelled deeper in the forest, had started showing up here and there closer by. With that in mind, it was pretty easy to have them see things my way.

    So with everyone on my side, we all began to prepare.

    After the speech, I received word from Soei. Sir Rimuru, do you have a moment? he asked via Thought Communication.

    I had asked him to help us get an alliance going, but what happened? Did he, like, not know where they were, or something? After his shy exit, if that was all he had for me, I might have to drop the gentle act a little

    It worried me a bit, but I shouldve known that wasnt the reality. Unlike me, Soei was actually somewhat capable.

    I was able to meet with the lizardman chief. He seemed willing to ept the alliance, but he asked for you to personallye see him, my lord

    Hmm. That was surprising. It wasnt even half a day since our conference ended, and he had already extracted a promise from the guy. Talk about capable! And handsome, to boot. I almost resented him.

    As I tried to get that under control, I replied, Sounds good. Were gonna fight this out in the marshes anyway. Like, youre already there?

    Oh, um, yes, my lord. Shadow Motion made the voyage to the marshes rather smooth sailing. It allows me to immediately travel to any individual I personally know, but tracking down the chiefs exact location took me some time

    As he put it, Soei used Shadow Motion to reach the marshes, then deployed his army of Replicants to scope out the area. Gobta could only travel via Shadow Motion for as long as he could hold his breath, so Soei outpaced him. It appeared that his physical corpus was already back.

    I wondered if having a Replicant contact the lizardman chief was really the best thing. The mere fact he could control multiples at once still astonished me. It was nothing I could pull off. Well done.

    So when would you like to hold the discussions, sir? he asked, shrugging off mypliments in a way Shuna or Shion never would.

    Hmm Well probably need time to prepare, and the goblin riders will need a few days for the journey. A week from now, maybe?

    Itd be more like two weeks if we were going on foot, but a goblin rider wouldnt need five days. I reckoned wed take around two days to prepare, so a week should be fine.

    Gabil had his own transport beast, but it didnt look nearly as fast as a tempest wolf. If we arrived at the lizardman caverns before he and his men returned, we might wind up getting caught inwhatever he was nning. I wasntpletely sure it was a coup yet, but it always paid to watch your back at times like these. We needed to stay on top of the situation if we wanted to keep the initiative on our side.

    A littlete, in this case, would be just right. So seven days.

    Very well. I will work to make it happen.

    He ended the link.

    I wanted this alliance to be firm, in writing, as soon as possible, but I knew itd be hard to trust someone youd never met before. But if we waited to prepare until after we shook hands and dered the alliance done, the orcs would be knocking on our collective doors in an instant.

    If the whole thing fell through, I was nning to pull back our forces at once. If they werent willing to work with us, wed wait for the orcs to swarm them, then hustle off to the treants sanctuary. It sucked for them, but I wasnt here to give them lip service. This was war, and I had people counting on me. There had to be a line in the sand.

    They sounded open to the idea, though, so maybe I was just catastrophizing again

    Either way, though, I had to hope itd work out.

    Kaijin already had my next ordera hundred sets of goblin rider weapons and armor, as soon as possible. Benimaru and Hakuro needed some, too, not to mention Shion, but they could wait. Soei would be home soon anyway; they could get it arranged then, together. Kurobe was taking care of our weapons, Shuna and Garm our armor, and theyd be done with it soon enough.

    So while I waited for Soei, I decided to organize our goblin riders. Their leader, to start with. I inadvertently locked eyes with Gobta. He was second-inmand with the security forces. It seemed suitable enough.

    Hey, Gobta, are you free?

    Nhh?! Whenever you say that, I have a feeling it never works out too well for me

    Ah, youre just imagining things. Youre going, too, right?

    Gobta stopped short of replying. I smiled at him. He froze. Of course! he shouted nervously.

    I didnt appreciate the weirdness of that act, but I chalked it up to the ominous aura I could feel behind me. Well, huh. Guess a smile from Shion was more effective than anything I could cook up in slime form. She nodded at Gobtas reply, looking down at me as I mulled over the power she wielded.

    So Gobta was our goblin rider leader. No one had anyintsdespite his asional wobbles, they recognized how capable a hobgob he was. Rigur was just as enthusiastic about the decision, so I didnt foresee any problems.

    By the way, have you asked Kurobe about the weapon you promised me yet?

    Boy, I sure didnt, huh?

    Oh yeah, of course.

    Really? Cause you look kind of like you forgot.

    Damn, hes sharp.

    Ha-ha-ha! Youre such a worrywart, Gobta, my boy! Ive got the most wonderful shortswording your way, so be patient!

    R-really?! Ooh, I will be!

    Nice. Dodged that bullet. Good thing Gobta is so easy to work with. Better tell Kurobe before I forget again , I thought as he merrily skipped away.

    That left a hundred members to select. It was a pretty simple processI just selected the original goblins who were already paired with their rides as opposed to the relief members in the security force. I handed their names over to Kaijin, asking him to get their equipment ready.

    Just as I was done wrapping this up, Soei came back. I apologize for the dy, he said as he appeared from Benimarus shadow like some master ninja. You could just fall in love with him, the way he moved.

    So lets get started, then.

    We headed over to the production workshop, the nerve center of all our manufacturing. It was a wooden structure, about the size of a small gymnasium. We were nning to reinforce the walls with mortarter, but wecked the free hands for it right now. It was still one of thergest buildings in town, and it certainly stood out as such.

    When we went inside, we were greeted by several people loudly working on somethingthe hundred-man battle gear order, no doubt. The security forces equipment would have to wait for now, sadly.

    We moved deeper inside. There was a room devoted to sewing work, but at the moment it was a private office of sorts for Shuna. Her skills were so masterful, itd take a while for the goblinas to catch up, so she was alone for now. They were gung ho about learning, dont get me wrong, but at the moment I had them making hemp fabric and other clothing materials under the watchful eye of Garm. Once everyone had more equipment, I was sure Shuna would recruit some of the more talented seamstresses to help with the silk. We needed clothing before we needed armor, after all.

    I was now headed for this sewing room, greeting Shuna as I stepped inside. She smiled back at me, now wearing a beautiful, kimono-like dress she mustve sewn herself at some point. It looked meant for a priestess, but designed to be as easy to move in as possible. The top was pure white in color, but the skirt part was a light-pink, like Shunas own hair, and it made for a cute-looking picture. One look and you could see what kind of techniques she had at her fingertips. I was expecting great things.

    Shuna took out several outfits and lined them up on her worktable. Thank you for being patient, she said. Ive prepared your clothing, Sir Rimuru, along with a little something for my brother, I guess.

    You guess?

    This made Benimaruugh. Hoh-hoh-hoh! Can you me her?

    Your silk fabric is so exquisitely made, Hakuro added, having even a scrap of it is a great honor. Do you have an outfit for me, too, perhaps?

    Soei was wholly uninterested in the banter. Shion was probably the one with the biggest emotional stake in it. She was a bit more boorish than the others, but she was still a woman.

    Here you are! Shuna said,pletely ignoring the others as she presented some clothing to me. Afterward, she distributed outfits to everyone else, which was just the sort of thing shed do.

    Once we all had our respective gifts, she guided me to a small changing room.

    She had given me two outfits, along with a set of armor from Garm. He gave that to me, she exined, and I made sure the clothes would befortable underneath. I didnt see Garm around. Id have to thank himter.

    So there I was, in the changing room. My first outfit was a baseyera shirt and some short pants. She had done a great job reproducing the crude illustration I gave her. It felt great for everyday wear , I thought, and she had created three sets for me, so I didnt have to go naked while having theundry done.

    The second set of clothes, meanwhile, was for battle. A real tour de force from Shuna. Transforming into my child version, I immediately set to strapping it on. It felt so glossy and slick on my fingersmore wonderful than even the highest-quality silk I knewand the pants and shirt were done up just as I had designed them.

    It was an incredibly pleasant surprise. The cut, and the fabric, were better than anything I wore back home. Some of my Sticky Steel Thread was woven in, too, so itd protect me more than well enough. I had the Sage analyze it for me, so I knew.

    This outfit, though The moment I had it all on, it was like I was born to wear it. Perfectly sized. A sort of magic item, I supposed. I had absolutely nothing toin about, as I felt its magicules intermingle with my own. It already felt like another part of me. Just to test it out, I morphed into my adult versionand just as I thought, the clothes adjusted themselves to match. A perfect piece of work.

    I moved on to the armor Garm had provided. He said hed given it some extra attention, and it fit me just as well as the clothes. There was a dark jacket made from tanned leather, tied together with string in front instead of sporting buttons. It looked like a in old jacket, but it was also magical, and a perfect match for my aura. Maybe it was because I had the original pelts stored in my stomach before handing them over to Garm. That mustve turned it ck in color, matching well with my aura.

    Once again, noints. All I had left was the coat to wear over the clothing. This was a long jet-ck coat made from the original direwolf bosss fur. Another Shuna special, and since itcked any sleeves, it was light as a feather. The front was open, but that didnt make it annoying to wear at all, oddly.

    Putting it on, I wound up wearing it sort of like a robe. The rear had a high part like a cor to protect my neck, and I could remove this if I wanted or use it as a scarf. A scarf that, apparently, would keep me warm in winter and cool in summer, somehow.

    I didnt think it mattered much with my Cancel Temperature, but I had to give it a shot regardless. And thanks to that Sticky Steel Thread in there, it really did have some resistance to cold and heat. The coat also came standard with Self-Repair, which went way beyond basic seam fixes. Enough magic force, and I could basically regenerate it from scratch. Keep it clean, too. Ultraspeed Regeneration at work, I supposed. It made sense. This fantasy world, manit was a treasure trove of fun stuff to y with.

    So I put it all on and stepped outside. Shuna stared at me spellbound, clearly blushing, as the rest of the ogre mages tried their own clothes on. It turned out everything she sewed had the same magical properties of my outfit, absorbing the wearers aura to match their body perfectly. Thus, they were all natural fits.

    Benimarus kimono-like robe was bright red, almost like velvet. On a normal person, it wouldve looked unnecessarily gaudy, almost clownish, but he had the natural good looks to pull it off. Hakuro, meanwhile, had an outfit of pure white, like a mountain hermitno excessive decoration to get in the way of battle here. Between that and his sharp eyes, nothing couldve suited him better.

    Soeis robe and pants were both a dark shade of bluelight, airy, and no doubt hiding an arsenal of covert weaponry inside. Shion went with a Western-style dark suit of purplish-blue, exactly what I had drawn up, and framed her as the capable executive assistant she was.

    All these outfits, mine included, became magical by nature the moment they contacted our skin. Really fantastic results , I thought, and apparently we were free to customize or transform them as we liked. That was thanks to the magic thread used, the mixture of hellmoth cocoons and my own Sticky Steel Thread; their magicules could be freely remixed and adjusted, much like how weapons of magisteel morphed to meet the needs of the carrier.

    This meant the clothing would grow with the wearers body, but I thought it made for some neat fashion applications, too. I doubted there was much else like this in the world. I didnt know what sort of magic items humans used in their day-to-day lives, but I had to assume Shuna was among the best in her field. Weaving clothing that magically merged itself onto peoples bodies had to outss whatever they bought off the rack in their realms. I wondered how much my outfit would go for on the open market.

    Oh, I have this for you, too, Shuna said as she handed me a pair of shoes made of leather and resin. I think theyll go wonderfully with your cute little legs, Sir Rimuru.

    I tried them on. They fit and offered supremefort.

    Ooh, thesere nice!

    Dold made these for me, she said, smiling. Apparently, both he and Garm were too nervous about how Id react to hand them over directly. So why werent they too embarrassed to ask Shuna? They probably just wanted an excuse to talk to her

    She had pairs for everyoneshoes for me, Soei, and Shion; sandals for Benimaru and Hakuro. Even the sandals were top-notch pieces of work. I was sure enough of that, given how well my own everyday sandals felt.

    So we had our new clothes, sort of reinventing ourselves in the process. We left the workshop in a state of near bliss, waved off by Shunas gentle smile.

    Next up was Kurobes forge.

    I hadnt seen our smithtely, busy as he was with the creative process. He hadnt even appeared at the deployment speech I gave earlier. I knew he was doing fine; he was just the type to get totally absorbed in whatever he tackled. I did ask him to make weapon production his top priority, too, and he had apparently been spending well near every waking hour on the effort. Kaijin told me as much before our conference.

    The door to the forge was open when we showed up. It was fully equipped with tools he brought over from Kaijins workshop, with the raw materials for his work kept in an adjacent storage room. I had granted him a pretty decent supply of magisteel; he had everything he needed along those lines, but he was a little nervous about theck of other metals on hand. We needed to examine the nearby mountains for a permanent ore supply, but ourck of time and resources meant that had to wait. Until the construction frenzy died down a little, staff shortages were going to be a chronic issue.

    I could hear banging from inside the forge, waves of heat wafting out from the door. This was the only high-temperature forge in town, run by a furnace made from y blocks heated with Control me. It turned out better than I anticipated. We were nning to build more once we got to grips with this one. Lots of things in the works, not enough time to tackle them. A real pain.

    So we went inside and grabbed Kurobes attention. Once he noticed, he greeted us with a smile. I was expecting you! he said. Theres somethin Id really like to show you all.

    I could tell he was eager to show off histest work. A little too eager, in fact. He spent the next two hours talking about everything he had crafted, my eyes zing over along the way. Yes, I know, its all great, can I get out of here, please? I almost said it out loud a few times before stopping myselfhe just looked too happy.

    I was hoping Shion would step in, always eager to have her say on anything, but she just sat there and stared at all the weapons lined against the wall, enrapt. Weaponry was a hobby for her, I guess, as it was for all the ogre mages. They carefully studied every inch of what they were given, grasping it in hand as they took in every word of Kurobes guidance.

    Benimaru had an elegant, flowing longsword, Hakuro arge staff with a sword hidden inside, Soei a pair of ninja-style des. They all looked happy with them, and I could see whyeach one was a perfect fit for their owner.

    One thing did bother me, though. Shions war de Its kind of too big, isnt it?

    Oh, its fine, Shion said with augh. The scabbards covered in magical power, so I can make it disappear with a moments thought.

    Thats great, but it wasnt what I asked. Isnt it kind of impracticallyrge? But Shions smile informed me that further protest was useless. If she could handle it, fine, but it was far toorge for a regr person to pick up. I doubted even Kaijin couldve made thatdwarves were pretty strong, but they would need two hands just to move it. Shion, meanwhile, could unsheathe this massive hunk of iron with a single arm. I realized, at that moment, that angering her would never be a good idea.

    This is probably thergest weapon Ive ever built, Kurobe said, smiling confidently as he watched Shion. I figured she could take advantage of it.

    And he was right. Shion couldnt have looked happier.

    Finally, it was time for my own weapon.

    For you, Sir Rimuru, I got this. It aintplete yet; this is just the beginning. You talked about a sword with magic ore in it, and thats what Im aimin for. Kaijin and I are doin some research, but were gonna need a mite more time for it. Until then, if you could get used to this sword

    I was handed a long, straight sword. So he was actually going through with that idea? Sweet. It made me excitedand d I offered the suggestion in the first ce. Sitting through two hours of esoteric cksmith discussion paid off after all.

    All right, I nodded, storing the sword in my stomach. I could bend it to my will more easily in there.

    Kurobe, with a nod, handed me another de. This is just a test run, he exined, something we were experimenting with. Feel free to use it for now, though.

    It looked like a in old Japanese-style katana, but since it was made by Kurobe, I was sure it was a masterful piece of work. Id want to take care of it. And besides, Hakuro was currently beating all his swordsmanship knowledge into me. Itd be nice to have one to carry around , I thought, and in a moment, I had it around my waist. That alone made me feel a little stronger, for some reason. Weird.

    Finally, I asked Kurobe to make a shortsword for me. He looked a tad confused momentarily, but he smiled and nodded at the request. I didnt know what he thought about it, but I didnt really care, either. This would be Gobtas weapon, after all. I could hand him a stic fast-food knife and hed worship me for it.

    So he ventured back to the forge. We were all armed now.

    On our way out, Garm stopped us. Apparently, Benimarus armor was done. Without much ore at hand, iron was in very short supply, so he couldnt provide him with a full-te package. Ogres werent really into that sort of thing anyway, though. It didnt go too well with kimono, besides.

    Instead, Kurobe brought over a set of scale mail crafted from monster-harvested materials. Thepleted version of what he had given Kabal the adventurer before, and an outfit that melded with the wearers aura as well. d to see my magisteel was being put to such good use. It was much more sturdily built than the test run, designed exclusively for Benimaru and matching remarkably well with his red kimono. There were pieces for his chest and thighs, as well as gauntlets and shin guards. Benimaru instructed him not to bother with a helmet, as that wasnt his style. It was shy, but again, it worked perfectly with his good looks.

    I asked him about armor for the rest of us. Oh, Ill have Shuna handle that for you all, he repliedapparently, hed deliver each piece to her once it was done. He really liked having an excuse to see her, I suppose. For now, though, he provided three sets of chainmail for Hakuro, Soei, and Shion. They would wear it directly over their baseyers, so it would be well hidden. Garm and Shion had worked closely together on these, too, and they were designed not to distort the look of their outfits at all. Plus, Garm got to hang out with Shion more, which Im sure was all the inspiration he needed to do such a great job. I kind of wished his work ethic wasnt inspired by getting to hang with beautiful women, but I couldntin.

    I already had my dark jacket in hand, so I didnt need anything else. I made sure to thank Garm while I had the chance.

    The next day, the goblin riders were by andrge ready to roll, lined in a perfect row with a weeks worth of provisions strapped to their backs. We needed to be quick and decisive in this fight, so I gave them only the bare minimum of food. If I had to provide a full supply, itd slow us down too much. Speed would be everything, and if it was called for, wed need the ability to zoom outta there on short notice. Each rider carried enough food for themselves, and thatd be sufficient.

    I figured we might as well get going so we could scope out the geography in advance.

    Weve got an orc lord to take down! I shouted at them. Lets make this quick! I deliberately kept the pep talk short. No point getting too eager. We need to keep our eyes focused on the situation around us, and the simpler the objectives, the better. The riders, nheless, gave their war cries of approval in response, the deafening roar echoing across town.

    Most of these hobgoblin soldiers were survivors of our first (andst) battle against the pack of direwolves. There were a few newbies, but all were elite troops, each entrusted with a tempest wolf of their own. Morale was high, and watching them prepare to ride helped relieve some of my own anxiety as well.

    Maybe we could win this. Or at least escape unhurt if we couldnt. It wouldnt pay to be too optimistic, but theres no need to assume the worst in this battle, either. So off we went, spirits lifted as we made tracks for the marshes.

    Three days had passed since we left town. The trees were thinning out, indicating we were near the marsnds. We were ahead of schedule, thanks to keeping our luggage to a minimum. There were no watering holes on the way, so I supplied the forces water from my Stomach stores instead, and that apparently gave the liquid a strength-boosting, fatigue-reducing effect. It let the wolves run longer with fewer breaks in between.

    I should have thought about that, actually. The water in my stomach mustve been packed with magicules, which can affect monsters in all manner of ways. Maybe that morphed the water into some sort of healing elixir.

    For now, though, we were resting here. I figured we would chill a bit, checking out the area before we contacted the lizardmen. We werent due to meet with the chief for three days, and if we were this far along, there was no need to hurry. I ordered everyone to stand by, make camp, and rest up.

    Time for a little recon work.

    I will scope out the area, Sir Rimuru, Soei quickly offered. He was definitely the man for it.

    All right, Soei. Let me know what you find. And try to figure out where the boss of the pigs is, if you can.

    Im sure he could, what with his consummate scouting skills. Once I saw him off, Benimaru approached me. Sir Rimuru, he asked, is it all right if we go all-out in this battle?

    I wasnt sure what he meant. Even if I did, I still didnt know what kind of battle wed be facing.

    Huh? Well, sure, but if I give the signal to retreat, you better follow it, okay?

    Benimaru shed a fearless smile. Oh, I doubt youll need to, my lord! Weve made it this far, and were ready to annihte them all! Right?

    He certainly sounded confident, at least. It was a good match for his naturally rugged looks. Hopefully wed have a victory to back that up. It wouldnt look cool if he gave me all that bravado and lost. I was sure hed be bursting with shame, but I wondered if the thought of losing had even urred to him. I doubted they ever worried much about such things. But ah well.

    Shion, meanwhile, was still marveling at her sword, smiling as she whispered Ill let you crack as many skulls as you want soon and other creepy reassurances to it. At times, she acted mega-ditzy, and other times she exhibited this serial-killer streak. The more I knew about her, the more danger I sensed from her. Lets just pretend I didnt see that, actually.

    Hakuro, for his part, was as cool as always. As serene as a mountain pond, you could say, the sign of a well-seasoned veteran of battle.

    Then I heard him whisper, I do hope some of them will provide a challenge.

    Oh great. Him too? I was at a loss. Where did all this ogre self-confidencee from? Theyre about to fight an army theyve already lost to onceId figure a little more caution would be in order , I thought as I sighed.

    About an hour into our camping prep, I received a message.

    Is now a good time, sir?

    My Thought Communication sprang into action as I rested, watching everyone at work.

    What is it? Did you find something?

    Well, I found a group engaged in battle.

    What?! Gabil?

    No, not him. Theres only one lizardman, someone I believe to be a close aide to the chief. Here against a group of orcsone high-level orc, plus more under hismand. Around fifty in all.

    A close aide? All alone?

    Yes, my lord. The battle has only just begun, but I feel the oue is already clear. It would appear one of the higher-level orcs is seeking to torment the lizardman in order to show off his strength. What should we do?

    Could you defeat this higher-level orc and his men?

    It should be simple, sir.

    More of that confidence. I figured I could trust Soei on that. But what about that lizardman? I couldnt just let him die, but if the orc wanted a fight, now would be a good time to scope out their abilities.

    Thought Communication allowed me to see the world through Soeis eyesa pretty handy feature, in my opinionbut unlike myself, Soei couldnt keep the link going indefinitely. He needed to rest that muscle, so to speak, on regr asions. This applied to everyone else, too; they could receive all the thoughts they wanted, but sending them was subject to certain restrictions. If anything, the fact I could send all I wanted made me a freak of nature. We couldve linked together more closely if Soei werent so far away, but no pointining to him about that.

    All right. Try to observe them for as long as you can and ry what happens afterward. I feel bad for that lizardman, but keep your distance for the time being. Step in if you think the battles gonna turn fatal.

    Yes, my lord!

    The connection expired. Sounds like somethings up, then. No way a lizardman would be alone in the outer regions of the forest otherwise. I was hoping to rest and take my time gauging things, but I guess that wasnt going to happen.

    I gathered everyone together. Listen, people, I said, were not camping. It sounds like somethings going down.

    I saw the faces of the goblin riders tense up. So were fighting? one asked.

    Likely, yeah. Our enemy numbers approximately fifty, so I want to see two of you tackle each one. Remember, the orc lords capable of absorbing the abilities of dead enemies. So dont push it. If you think youre in trouble, get out of there. Are we clear on that?

    Yessir! they cheered, Gobta leading them on.

    Right. Ill get their position from Soei. Once were there, I want you to surround them, then rub them out as quickly as possible. And remember, dont push yourselves.

    Arent you worrying a little too much about this, Sir Rimuru? Benimaru interjected. Because I think we have an extremely capable crew of riders here, to say nothing of us.

    You think? Well, I suppose its up to you guys, then. Get moving.

    Yes, my lord!

    I watched as Benimaru and Hakuro led the riders off. Shion was staying with me. The riders could handle the infantry-level orcs, but I wanted to see this high-level officer for myself. The more I knew about our enemy, the more Id have to work with in the uing battle. I had Soei and Shion working on my sideI doubted itd be too dangerous for me.

    Thus, we mounted Ranga and made a beeline for Soei.

    We reached Soei as he deflected a sword sh from an orc that had just jumped off a tree limb. The orc bore a pair of heavy scimitars, curved to look like enormous meat-cutting knives but thick enough to slice through bone.

    The long arms on the orcish races made it hard to estimate their offensive range. Soei engaged in a little back-and-forth with him, his constant array of leaps and dodges bringing him precariously close to defeat at times, to an outside observer.

    I wasnt worried, though. This orc was, in my eyes, pretty weak. Unlike Hakuro, whose strikes seemed impossible to avoid even with the instincts of a born hunter, I could still predict this orcs moves just by looking at him. It was cute, in a way.

    Gehh! Who are you? the long-armed orc shouted at me, his face a mixture of pig, wild boar, and human. Here to be consumed by an orc general?

    Ah. This was the high-level one, then? The orc general?

    How dare you act so rude around Sir Rimuru! Shion fired back, staring the general down with her unnervingly cold eyes.

    Oh. You

    I looked down at this new, faint voice. It belonged to a lizardman, looking up at me. She appeared to be cowering, wounded from head to toe and just barely breathing. She had lost a lot of blood. I doubted shedst long unaided.

    I knew I had asked Soei to remain impartial for as long as possible, and I guess he followed my orders to the letter. He wasnt at fault for that, but now I wish he had stepped in a bit earlier. I was starting to look like a total viin, and I figured it was time for a good deed to make up for it.

    Drink this, I said, tossing the lizardman a recovery potion. She hesitated for a moment but quickly drained the bottle. The effect was dramaticin an instant, all the cuts and bruises were gone.

    What on?!

    Impossible

    The orc general and lizardman both expressed their surprise simultaneously. Nice. That oughta improve my rep a little. Good thing I earned some brownie points with these guys before the big meeting with the chief.

    As I patted myself on the back, the lizardman approached me.

    P-please, sir! Please, I need you and your envoy to rescue my father, the lizardman chiefand Gabil, my brother!

    She was on one knee, head bowed down, as if praying to me.

    What?

    I was about to ask what happened to her when the orc general came rushing in. Get in my way, and Ill eat you first! he bellowed, crossing his scimitars in front of him. He was probably trying to catch me by surprise, but with my Magic Sense, that was never going to happen. I nimbly leaped backward to dodge the iing strikes, but I didnt even need to bother with thatin a sh, Shion was in front of me,nding a single sh with her heavy de.

    The orc general instinctively recrossed his swords to block the attack, but Shions sheer force knocked them right out of his hands. The extra skill Steel Strength put her power off the charts, even by nonhuman standards, so I shouldve expected as much.

    Worthless beast, she murmured, angrily staring the orc general down with her well-defined face. You cannot stand still for a single moment while Sir Rimuru is deigning to speak?

    Dammit! All of you, seize this wench at

    None of the orc underlings responded to the order. It was understandable, given how they no longer existed.

    They hardly put up a fight at all, Benimaru said, riding up to me. Hardly worth my time!

    Yeah, Sir Rimuru, added Gobta, riding alongside him. Boy, talk about a letdown, huh? Going two on one almost made me feel bad for them.

    They had apparently wrapped up the encirclement and massacre, just as I ordered. The speed with which they had carried out those orders shocked me into silence. Hakuro was just cutting down the few surviving orcs behind them. Maybe I was worrying too much.

    Y-youre kidding me! the orc general managed to gasp out. Then things got even worse for him. Just as I was about to order Soei to interrogate him, everything finished.

    Die!

    The voice was apanied by a single sh of light, backed up by a low rumble. And with it, the orc general ceased to exist in any physical sense.

    What is that idiot doing? I whispered.

    Soei had the same intention as me, approaching the orc general to extract whatever information he could. But Shion had no simr thoughts.

    I have given this impudent fool the divine punishment he deserves, my lord!

    She smiled at me, anticipating the praise that was no doubting. I didnt know whether topliment her or scream at her.

    Uh, yeah, I ventured. Lets try to capture em alive next time, all right?

    Ah, yes, Sir Rimuru! We need to make them fully understand what happens when they cross the likes of you!

    No, nothing like that. At all. But I didnt want to bother exining it to her. She said yes to my request, and that was good enough. The entire squad was now dead, and while I wouldve liked some of the orc generals intel, I was willing to call this a sess. No point dwelling on whats already done.

    I mentally shifted gears as I turned to the lizardman. At least we wouldnt be interrupted any longer.

    Theres still a few days until our meeting. What happened?

    She looked at Soei and me in session before setting her eyes upon me. I am the daughter of the lizardman chief, she said, conviction clear in her voice. I serve as the head of his royal guard. In advance of our alliance, my brother Gabil has overthrown the royal family and imprisoned the chief. He intends to wage open battle against the orcs, but he vastly underestimates their strength. If this keeps up, we will lose, and the lizardman race will be wiped off thend.

    She paused for a moment, searching for the right words.

    The chief instructed me not to put an undue burden upon you as I rted this message. Butplease, as the one who offered us this alliance, I beg you to help us!

    Now she was fully prostrate on the ground at me.

    Well, huh. Gabil was the son of the lizardman chief, it turned out, and his sister was right here with us. They must have all had good genes. It was a pity how Gabil turned out.

    Still, I couldnt let anything happen to the chief.

    So now what?

    Well, keep in mind that we havent forged this alliance quite yet. The chief knew he couldnt count on us to get involved with an internal dispute at this point, so he sent you over to keep me informed of things. Is that how it is? If so, then whyre you asking me for help?

    It sounded mean, I knew, but I wasnt bound by any debt to the lizardmen. Itd be one thing after I signed on the dotted line, but itd still be a lot more intelligent for us to get out of there. I was also starting to resent her not having a name, either. I had heard monsters could tell one another apart via the subtle vibrations they emitted as part of their emotions, but as an ex-human, it was all Greek to me. I felt weird calling her a lizardman and chiefs guard leader, though.

    As my mind was veering off track, she looked straight up at my face. I thought, she said, that ones who have evolved to be as powerful as yourselves may have the strength to rescue us all. If the dryads who watch over this forest have recognized your skills, then I only hope you have the mercy to help. I fully know how selfish this is, but please

    Ah, well said! Shion suddenly burst out. You have a great deal of potential, indeed, if you have noticed the full glory of Sir Rimurus strength. I am sure the lizardmen shall be saved, just as you hope they will. Were already dedicated to destroying the orc forces, besides!

    Great. Here we go again. I had the weirdest sense of dj vu all of a sudden. I had appointed Shion to be my secretary, but she had a real knack for tossing more and more work into my in-box.

    Ah well. We were in for a fight anyway. Might as well cooperate as much as we couldas long as we didnt get hurt along the way.

    Soei, can you Shadow Motion yourself to where the chief is?

    I can, sir.

    All right. I hereby order you to rescue the lizardman chief. If anything gets in the way of our alliance, eliminate it.

    Yes, my lord!

    So youll?! Oh, thank you so much!!

    The lizardman was beside herself with gratefulness. Which I was fine with. But again, I had no intention of getting myself killed for her.

    Keep in mind, Im not nning to sacrifice myself or my people for this, all right?

    I would expect as much, yes. I would also like to serve as your guide, if you like

    Good. d to see she wasnt offended. She probably knew she was asking a lot, and that she couldnt heap all the responsibility on our shoulders alone. There wouldnt be much point to calling it an alliance otherwise.

    I appreciate the thought, I replied, but Soei will reach the chief a lot faster operating by himself, I think

    Can you hold your breath for approximately three minutes? Soei asked.

    Yes, absolutely! I can hold out for five, in fact.

    All right. You can join me, then. Is that all right, Sir Rimuru?

    Sure, no problem. Take these, too.

    I gave Soei a few recovery potions. If he was fine with it, I was, too. I had no reason to refuse her as long as she wasnt a drag on my men.

    You could probably dilute these to a tenth of the strength and theyd still do the trick, as long as the injurys not too serious. Use em on anyone who needs em. If anything happens, Im just a Thought Communication away.

    Yes, my lord. He nodded and saluted me. Were off, then.

    The lizardman bowed deeply before turning to Soei. He ced his hands on her hips and began Shadow Motion, disappearing from our sight in an instant.

    Im sure the chief is in good hands with him, Benimaru said approvingly. And given Soeis skills, I figured he was right.

    With Soei taking care of the chief, I went back to my original work of surveying the battlefield. Things had ramped up, apparently, so I didnt have time to waste.

    All right. Lets go see what this Gabil guy is up to.

    Can we help him, do you think? Shion asked.

    I shrugged. Depends on him, I suppose. I cant say if hes still alive or not.

    We had agreed to rescue the lizardman chief. I hadnt breathed a word about Gabil, and I certainly wasnt going to expose ourselves to danger for his sake

    For now, I wanted to check out the state of the war.

    You arent nning to venture into battle yourself, are you, Sir Rimuru?

    Thats my n, Benimaru. And Id like to see things with my own eyes before deciding on anything.

    Scoping out the situation was basic stuff , I thought, and I did want to check and see if Gabil was alive. Benimaru, however, was vehemently opposed.

    My lord, wait a moment. Hakuro and I could handle the job well enough by ourselves. You and Shion could simply observe us from afar, instead.

    Indeed, Sir Rimuru. You are my leader, and the leader of us all. I am sure it would be wiser to leave this battle to us, in this case

    Guys, guys, thats not gonna work. All we had here were Benimaru, Hakuro, and a hundred goblin riders. Everyone had to pitch in.

    I had been nning to work out a more detailed battle n at a conference once the alliance was set in stone, but I already had the general idea in mind. Wed use the lizardman force as bait, and Id have Benimaru and the other ogre mages take care of the higher-level orcs for me. In other words, I basically wanted to create a scenario where Id be fighting one-on-one against the orc lord. I wasnt interested in sending a hundred people to their suicides against two hundred thousand.

    Whoa, whoa, calm down, guys. Do you seriously intend to defeat two hundred thousand screaming orcs with a band of a hundred Riders? I pointed out with more than a little disbelief.

    Yeah! Gobta chimed in enthusiastically. You tell em, sir! I couldnt me him. You couldnt expect someone to follow an order to jump off a cliff.

    I figured, where theres a will, theres a way, Benimaru grumbled. Only Hakuro and Shion agreed with him. I was starting to wonder if all these ogres had a screw loose somewhere. Will can only get you so far, guys!

    I was nning to give them a fair bit of leeway, but maybe I should tighten the reins a little instead. They had already lost to the orcs oncethey should know how scary they all were. That was my take on their reaction, but I didnt verbally share it with them. They were all acting like their evolutions had wiped the te totally clean.

    Well, anyway, Im gonna be watching the situation from the skies above. Ill give out orders depending on how things go, so Ill let you handle the details on the ground, Benimaru.

    All right. Fair enough, then.

    That seemed to appease him well enough. But I was still nervous. Id never done anything likemanding an army before. I yed a lot of strategy games on the PC, but I had no experience directing actual flesh and blood around. So my intention was to watch the action from overhead and stick strictly to handing out orders. Id use Thought Communication to link up with everyone and keep them abreast of developments. Benimaru would then use that tomand the ground forces, although Id have ultimate authority over whether we retreated or not.

    So is that clear? I said to the assembled goblin riders. You are to follow the orders of Benimaru, unless I give specific orders myself. Also, dont do anything you think might get you killed! This isnt gonna be ourst stand, so dont fool yourself into thinking it is.

    Raahhhh!

    The riders roared their approval once more. I warned them not to get too hotheaded, but war was war, and they were rarin for one.

    We will not let you down, Sir Rimuru! Shion said, Benimaru nodding next to her. Hakuro was as unaffected as always.

    Ahh, Im sure itll work itself out. But between the way-overconfident ogres and the level of excitement among the goblin riders, I had a feeling I was getting in over my head. So I swore to myself If things get too hairy, retreat, retreat, retreat.

    I was about to sprout wings from behind my back when I realized that my clothes would get in the way.

    Wings granted me the ability to flythat I knew from past experimentationbut this was an unexpected snag. Then I recalled what Shuna told me. The magical thread used in the clothing could transform itself, to some extent, based on the will of the wearer. Now I know what she meant.

    Picturing myself with wings, I could feel two holes automatically open over my back. The wings came out, and the holes closed themselves. This customization is pretty nice. Better thank Shuna and Garm againter.

    It would take about an hour of running to make it out of the forest, but in the air, it took barely any time at all. Now I was above the battlefield, checking out the entire situation. I was a bit too high up to distinguish between the two sides, but I could use Magic Sense to figure it out well enough.

    It was almost like I was a satellite, taking photos of thend below from sub-stratospheric heights. Ande to think of it, having a birds-eye view of the entire battle like this gave us a killer advantage, didnt it? And using that info to send Thought Communication messages to any of the troops I needed It was like bringing thetest advances in war technology to a medieval battle. I had ess to information that no general in this world couldve ever imagined.

    It was just what I needed to make the numbers work with the small force we had. In fact, this approach was probably best suited for handling small, mobile armies like ours. I marveled at my good luck at stumbling across this tactic as I scoped out the battlefield.

    To sum up, it wasnt looking great for the lizardmen. They were clearly surrounded with no escape route, and it was only the wild rallying from their leader that let them hold out. There was no telling how long theydst.

    Squinting, I recognized Gabil as the leader. I thought he was some random idiot at first, but maybe I underestimated him. Given how obviously devoted his sister was to him, I shouldve recognized that he was a decent person at the core. The first impression he gave was disastrous, though.

    As amander, hecked the ability to see the big picture in battle, which might ultimately doom him. But it wasnt like leaders were born capable of doing that, without any experience. If he survived this and learned from it, hed very likely be a great general someday.

    Now a single orc appeared before Gabil. Another group, d in ck armor, formed a circle around him. Definitely higher-level ones, decked out in full te and showing a military discipline none of the other orcs had. The one facing Gabil was likely an orc general like the one Shion had erased from existence a bit ago; he clearly projected a much stronger presence than the orcs in the circle.

    Then the duel began. Gabil fought courageously. His considerable nimbleness and skill with a spear as he faced off against the orc general made me wonder if Gobta had had any chance at all, in fact, without that shadow-skipping trick.

    Sadly, though, the difference in strength between him and the orc general was just too much. Little by little, Gabils body was being ravaged by cuts and wounds. I hated to let him die. And if thats what I thought, the answer was clear. I gave my orders.

    Ranga, can you Shadow Motion yourself to Gabil?

    Yes, my master.

    As with Soei, Ranga could directly travel to anybody hed personally met before. Which simplified things for me, definitely.

    Gobta, you go there, too!

    Geh! R-really?! Its, like, a huge army there

    I heard a scream of pain through the transmitted thought. Gobta was cut off for a moment, then the line came back.

    He will dly ept the mission, Sir Rimuru.

    Now it was Shion inserting herself into my mind. I didnt know what had happened to Gobta, but I suppose I didnt need to.

    Great. I want you two to rescue Gabil for me. Get going!

    Gobta would get to Gabil first while Ranga was distracting the rest of the horde. Hed then work with the lizardmen and goblins to forge a path out of that hellhole.

    Off they went, together. But not even they couldst long amid the sheer number of orcs, I thought.

    Sir Rimuru , Benimaru asked, are we allowed to goall out, then?

    Help the lizardmen first. They need it. After that, do whatever you want. Pay attention to whatever orders Hakuro gives you, but otherwise, have at it.

    Yes, my lord! We will show them exactly what the ogre raceor should I say, the ogre mages can do!

    He sounded happy. Which was good. Because things were about to happen, and quickly.

    My ordersplete, I checked on the state of the battle.

    The lizardman defensive ranks were about to copse. It wouldnt be long now. And if thats how it was outside, the caverns where the chief was might be just as infested right now. I sent Soei in there by himself; would he be all right? I wasnt too worried about Ranga, but what about Gobta? To say nothing of Benimaru and his crew

    Oh well. No point fretting about it now. I gave the orders, and they epted them. If any agreed to do something they knew they couldnt aplish, it was their own damn fault.

    When I was still new at mypany, the boss would yell at me all the time about taking on more work than I could handle. If things got dyed as a result, it negatively affected everyone on the team, ording to him. The same went for managers, tooif they were too unobservant to realize they were overtaxing their employees, they deserved what wasing to them.

    It was key to do the work that was best suited to you. A bosss job was to gauge his teams abilities and distribute the work correctly.

    I still didnt have a full grasp on these guys capabilities. It was hard to figure out whether I was asking them for too much or not. I just hoped they knew themselves better than I didand that I wasnt dumber than I thought.

    It was an irresponsible thing to think, but I had to believe in it for now. And since a bosss task was to step in and help whenever things went awry, I had a duty to keep watch over them. If anyone ran into trouble down there, I didnt want them to be alone.

    A single swing of the halberd broke the spear in the chiefs hands.

    The fact the chief had survived this assault so far was worthy of praise in itself. He gave a proud sneer as he looked at the orc general.

    Pah-ha-ha-ha! I can fight all I want to without a weapon!

    All the bravado in the world didnt convince anyone else in the room that he meant it. His armor was already shattered, cracks in his proud scale mail obvious for all to see. With nothing left to protect him, the chief was a hairbreadth away from death.

    Listen! he shouted with as much authority as he could muster. Come forward, my guard! Protect as many of the women and children as you can. I refuse to let you give up! Buy us as much time as possible and wait for help to arrive!

    Ch-chief These reinforcements cannot truly exist

    Dont say that! he replied, admonishing the vice general of his royal guard. Believe in them! We can never abandon hope. Protect the pride of the lizardmen until the very end!

    The chief never wanted to show a moment of weakness. He was a symbol of the lizardman strength, their final hope. To the lizardmen with no ce else to flee to, they had nothing to lean upon apart from his words.

    Plus, he added to his team with a smile, as long as I can beat this foe, we can open a new path for ourselves.

    He was right. If they could defeat the orc ringleader blocking the exit, they would have a literal path to survival. There was no despair among the lizardman warriors.

    Even if their chief fell, they knew they would stand up and fight. This much they had learned over the years, seeing him stand for his people. They would fight to thest man, and as long as they evacuated as many of the innocents as they could, no greater victory could be obtained.

    They had to find a connection to the future. But even that hope was crushed before the orc general.

    You old fool! All the ridiculous chatter in the world wont save you now!

    A sh, and the halberd in the orc generals hands sliced its way into, and then through, the chiefs chest.

    Argh!!

    He fell, coughing up blood on the way.

    This is it

    The caverns echoed with the shouts of lizardmen.

    The orc general stepped forward, aiming tond the final blow upon the chief, only to be stopped by a small team of fighters. He cut them down, resentful at this obstacle, and reached the chiefs body.

    You fought well, for a lizardman, he rumbled. Your courage proves to us that you will serve well as our flesh and blood. When you die, you will die basking in the honor of bing part of us!

    He aimed the de of his halberd upon the chiefs neck, lifted it up, and

    Id rather you didnt do that. We have a promise with the chief.

    was stopped by the voice of someone who appeared in front of him.

    At that moment, the arrival of this man, Soei,pletely changed the destiny of the lizardman race.

    Soei smiled a thin smile. He felt, truly, that he had served his master well. To him, this was nothing Benimaru could ever manage, whether he was son of the past king or not. The two had been rivals since childhood, and sooner orter Soei would have be his loyal subject, serving the lord that led the way for the entire ogre race.

    But that was all in the past. Now, he had a new master in Rimuru. And the thought pleased him.

    The ogres had enjoyed a long era of peace, undisturbed by any kind of conflict. To them, the monsters of the forest were nowhere near challenging enoughand as ofte, they havent even had any rampaging lesser dragons to deal with. It was a good thing, Soei knew. But he could never deny that he wanted to make full use of all the skills that had been hammered into him.

    Then his settlement was attacked by orcs. He cursed his powerlessness on that day. He had assumed their end woulde quickly afterwardthey were rudderless, unable to avenge their friends and family.

    But now, he was happy, and thankful for his happiness. Under his new master, he had been granted a chance at vengeance.

    He would never let his pride weaken his guard. That single defeat had taught him a great deal. Along with the humiliating memories, he had etched into his heart exactly how foolish he had been all along.

    He had polished his Arts for his master, eliminating his foes, honing everything he had within him. Nothing delighted him more than having orders to follow. And now, Soei was ready to faithfully execute them.

    Looking up at the silent man, the chief recognized him as the monster who had met with him earlier. The high-level member of the magic-born races who called himself Soei, the very one who had offered the alliance. He came for me? But we have no alliance forged yet. But, but Doubts and questions swirled in his mind. Yet, the chief, near the end of his life, could do little. He attempted to speak, clearing the blood from his throat.

    Lord Soei You havee for me? After we forged ahead, ignoring your advice? By my very life, please, help the lizardmen

    He tried his best to entrust his peoples future to Soei before he passed. But now there was another figure there. One he did not recognize before she spoke.

    Father, drink this!

    An aqua-blue container was presented to his mouth. The moment he felt the liquid passing between his fangs, his hideous-looking wounds were magically gone, as if nothing had ever been amiss. In a moment, it had brought him back to perfect health.

    Wha?!

    The chief sprang up, in a state of shock.

    My advice? What do you mean? Well, it doesnt matter. I want you to wait here until the appointed day arrives. And try to be careful. Neither my master nor I would enjoy it very much if you were to die on us.

    It sounded so out of ce, this cold, oddly calming voice.

    Hes saying hell keep his promise about the alliance? But

    But now is no time for that, he said. The orcs

    Then he realized something was off. The orc general, halberd still high in the air, had stopped moving. His face had an odd dark-reddish tint to it, his muscles bulging as he focused all his strength on the uing swing.

    That What is the meaning of?

    Dont worry. Ive stopped him for now.

    Soeisment made the situation clear for the chief. But what did it mean?

    He gave Soei a wild-eyed look. He realized that this orc general, who hadpletely dominated him in battle a moment ago, was now renderedpletely helpless before this envoy.

    What? What are you?

    A pity, though, Soei blithelymented as he looked at the frozen orc. I had him captured, I was hoping to torture him so he would be of some use to Sir Rimurubut it would appear he is sharing information with some outside source. I suppose I will have to kill him, then.

    For Soei, an information merchant of sorts, having data leaked out to the enemy deeply bruised his pride. That was why he always took the utmost care in observing the enemy. A blue light flickered in his eyes now, detecting minute shifts in the magicules in the atmosphere. It indicated he was using Observing Eyes, one of his extra skills, and that skill told him the orc general was transmitting what he saw to someone, perhaps through a crystal orb or other medium.

    Soei decided it was better to kill the orc than to have his cover blown. But murder in itself did not interest him that much. So he decided to reveal a little more, in hopes of gauging the enemys movements.

    But just killing you would be boring, he said with a mild smile, so why dont I have you ry a message as well? I assume whoevers controlling you orcs is watching me now, right? Your turn is next. And well make sure you will deeply regret making the ogre mages your enemy.

    And with that, Soei took his eyes off the orc general, no longer interested in him. His work was done, and it was time to take out the trash.

    Die, he whispered. The next moment, the orc general was torn into millions of fine pieces by the Sticky Steel Thread Soei had wrapped around him.

    Right there was the moment that the final form of Threadmaster, a battle move first conceived by Rimuru, was born.

    The chief watched, stunned speechless. He tried to keep his mind from racing as he recalled what he had just heard. Then he turned to Soei, not bothering to wipe the sweat from his brow.

    Ogre mage He is among the ogre mages?!

    He stared at him, as if looking at something his mind refused to parse. Then he recalled the power he had shown a moment ago. Now it made sense.

    Perhaps I should have known. He is a legend along the lines of the orc lord. The next level of ogres

    Ogre mages were the evolved form of ogres, already high-level denizens of the forest. It made sense, then, that the force he exhibited was akin to a high-level magic-born. Well past A rank, and difficult to wrap ones mind around. So few among the magic-borns ever made it to that point.

    But something Soei said rang in the chiefs mind. He had said the ogre mages. Plural. There were more of them. The thought sent a shiver down his spine.

    My decision he thought. My decision to ept this alliance was the best one I have ever made

    Then the chief sank to the floor. He was sure of it now. If the ogre mages were helping him, the lizardmen would absolutely be saved.

    Despite having an orc general defeated in the blink of an eye, the orcish soldiers showed zero sign of panic. The battle continued at a frenzied pace as the guard chief used the recovery potions Soei gave him to tend to the wounded.

    Soei wearily eyed the hordes. We can hardly rest easy with these annoying flies around, he said, as calm andposed as ever. I might as well take care of them, too, while Im at it. Give me one moment, please.

    Shortly after, Soeis body appeared to disrupt into multiple images of himself. Five shadows leaped forward, each one identical to Soei, right down to his clothing and equipment. They were copies, made with his magical Replication skills, and each one silently began taking action.

    Heading for the corridors, they stood before the lizardmen doggedly propping up the halls defense. One was stationed at each of the five exits out of the chamber, including the evacuation route. The lizardmen stared in awe at them but let them through regardless.

    You may rest for now, each one said as he went down his individual paths. As they did, the lizardmen were greeted with an unbelievable sight. The orcish soldiers, who had seemed like demons from hell itself just a moment ago, were helpless as Soei mowed them down by himself. The same sight was unfolding in each of the corridors.

    Demonwire sh.

    An efficient, glittering machine of death. In a moment, the Sticky Steel Thread deployed across each corridor was infused with magic power, moving exactly how Soei wanted it to. There was no ce to run from it, especially in these tight underground halls.

    The moment he executed the move, the orcish soldiers found themselves instantly sliced and diced. It was perhaps lucky for them that they were incapable of fear. From the lead man forward, they were being massacred without even a moment of resistance. Soei showed them no mercy, no pity for even a second, ughtering the orcs like a hunter reaping the lives of prey caught in his trap.

    The orcs to the rear feasted upon the bite-size pieces of orc chopped up by the web-likework of string, ran full-steam forward, and got killed themselves.

    The corridors were a twisty mass of passages, and now they were the sole domain of Soei. He had his wiresid out in a dizzying number of ways, and he could alter their locations at any time. To him, the orcs were simply bothersome pests that needed to be exterminated, far too frail to be considered truly enemies. His Replicants silently, efficiently, followed their orders as they carried out the carnage.

    The lizardmen were too shocked to say anything. The scene before them yed over and over again, filling them with awe and fright. It was strength on apletely different dimension, the work of a person whose power surpassed anything they could even envision in their imaginations.

    Beyond this , Soei thought, the Replicants could take care of things themselves. He left the sixth copy there as a contact point, just in case, and then began moving again, undetected by anyone. He was on his way back to Rimuru, his master, seeking a new role for himself.

    After Gobta and Ranga went on their way, Benimaru thought in silence for a moment.

    If I could ask, he said to the hobgoblins within earshot, can all of you use Shadow Motion?

    The tempest wolves, Rangas n, could use itwhat about their partners on the battlefield?

    Not by ourselves, like Gobta can, replied one of the riders, who sported an eyepatch. But if were with our partners, we can, yes.

    Yeah! Were one with our partners, body and soul!

    Good to hear, Benimaru said, nodding contentedly. Were going to sh our way into the encirclement from the outside, so I want you to Shadow Motion yourselves to Gobta. Sir Rimuru sent him ahead first so itd be easier to transport the rest of you there.

    Oh, another hobgobmented. Wow, Sir Rimurus pretty smart!

    Yeah! So he had Ranga divert the enemys attention while he had Gobta shore up the lizardmens position?

    And then we charge in, regroup with Gobta, and while the enemys confused, we turn the tables on them. Right?

    Benimaru nodded. There was a smile on his face, betraying his delight at everyone understanding Rimurus train of thought.

    Thats exactly it. And if you understand it, charge in there, now!

    Yes, my lord!!

    Thus, the goblin riders began their first onrush into the war.

    That left only the three ogre mages in the area.

    Benimaru began to stretch out his body, not a trace of concern in his mind. As a fighter race who worked as mercenaries and such, ogres bore a particr emotional attachment to having a master to rely on. Earning a master to serve for the rest of their lives was the single sincerest wish they all shared.

    That, and Benimarus warrior past changed his outlook on the world. He knew he tended to act selfishly most of the time. That was why he had hesitated to take over the role of ogre king, back in the day, not that it mattered now. Having such a lofty position would mean he would never have been allowed on the battlefield where death was a constant presence. Now, things were different. He could y a front-and-center role all day if he wanted. He liked where he was, and he had two of his friends with him, following him withoutint.

    It ising soon, Hakuro observed, stretching out his body to prepare.

    It is, Shion chimed. We must thank Sir Rimuru for providing this chance.

    They, along with Benimaru, saw Rimuru as their master. That was why they felt so safe relying on each other. They were working together for amon master, and Rimuru enjoyed his position leading them both.

    All right. Shall we kick this off, then? The first battle in the glorious victory we will eventually offer to Sir Rimuru?

    The ogres nodded at Benimarus words, and instantly, the three took off at top speed. They ran through the lush trees and grass, almost flying along the ground, the smell of water growing stronger in their nostrils. They were upon the marsnds in the blink of an eye, smashing through the orc hordes on the outer perimeter without dropping their speed for a moment.

    A st of energy shot out from Shions heavy sword. The orcish soldiers crowded in front of her were blown away before they realized what had happenedand the attack signaled the beginning of their battle.

    Weak. That was Benimarus first impression. He didnt have to bother lifting a finger as Shion and Hakuro cut down anyone foolhardy enough to approach.

    To Benimaru, though, this wasnt very fun. His twopatriots were masters of close-quartersbat. Shion also had the Art known as Ogresword Cannon, which let her unleash pure energy from the tip of her de. From an overhead perspective, Hakuro worked in little dots of activity, while Shion fired lines of lethal bolts from afar. There was no room for Benimaru to do anything else.

    All right! You pigs standing in front of me; you had better run for your lives. Do, and I will spare you.

    None of the orcs flinched. They could hear shouts of Die, bastard! and You will not ridicule us! as they charged at the ogres, even more enraged than before.

    Prepare to die, then!

    Realizing his foes had no intention of fleeing, Benimaru casually thrust his right hand forward. A ck ball of me flickered to life above it, expanding to about three feet in diameter before he unleashed it. Realizing the danger, the orcish soldiers took evasive actionbut they were toote. The fireball continued to expand and elerate, faster than a hurricane, and the orcs were simply too slow to run from it.

    Anyone who touched it was instantly incinerated, not even leaving a pile of ashes behind. But that wasnt what made the dark fireball terrifying. Several secondster, upon reaching arge clutch of orcs in front of it, the me released all the energy it had stored inside. An area three hundred feet in diameter was suddenly cloaked in a dome of pure ck, centered around the fireball. Then, a mighty rumble, low and loud enough to freeze the entire battlefield, and the blood of everyone in it.

    The entire area was now quiet, robbed of the sounds of war that ruled over it just a moment ago. This was Hellre, an incendiary attack that dominated like nothing before or since.

    In his evolution, Benimaru had obtained the extra skills Control me, Dark me, and Ranged Barrier. Combining those with his own mystical skills led to this creation, an original skill exclusive to himself.

    In a few seconds, the dome disappeared, leaving nothing but scorched earth behind. The marsh water in the area affected had vaporized, the very soil under it turned into ss by the heat. The transformation was stark, and the several thousand orcs who had been under that dome were all now a thing of the past, never knowing what had hit them.

    And it all happened within a minute of the first flicker of me from Benimarus hand.

    This was the answer Benimaru had for this war. The evolution had turned him into a terrifying magic-born, one whose area-of-effect attacks could now wipe out entire regions at once. He grinned an evil grin.

    Open the way, pigs! he warned, once again. Now these orcs knew fear. The Ravenous unique skill inocted them to it to some extent, but Benimarus tactical strike was more than enough to stoke the fear at the deepest pits of their stomachs.

    This was an attack they could never withstand, no matter what they did. It was on a level they had never experienced before. Magic, they had measures against, but not even the orc generals, equipped with anti-magic full-te mail, could survive the incineration. Innate resistances to fire, the orcs reasoned, were useless, and they were rightyour garden variety of magical immunity wouldnt work here. This attack was a fearsome antipersonnel weapon, equal to a high-level forbidden incantation.

    There was nothing any of the victims could have done. And not even their ashes remained, robbing the survivors of the ability to consume the corpses and strengthen themselves. No orc soldier could handle a high-level magic-born, and his debut struck fear in their hearts.

    In a panic, they began to stampede, totally out of control. Nothing could knock them back to their senses now; the only thing in their minds was running, quickly, anywhere away from there.

    And it was that opening salvo that signaled to Rimuru and his forces that it was time to join the fray.

    Tossing a nce at the chaos he had just unleashed, Benimaru began striding forward. He was perfectly casual, as if taking a stroll in the park, and the two ogres with him were the same. There was nobody left to challenge them, and now they could see the army that engaged Ranga and hisrades.

    The orcish soldiers, to them, were no longer an obstacle.

    Just as he hade to terms with his uing death, Gabil found himself saved. He turned around, intending to offer a word of thanks. These figures looked familiar, but it took a moment for the memory to return to his brain.

    Ah! Yes! The ruler of that vige that tamed the direwolves!

    Gobtas dimwitted expression matched Gabils recollection of the noble hobgoblin that had defeated him in battle.

    Ahh! he couldnt help but blurt out. You! You are the master of that vige, yes? Have youe to our assistance?

    Gabil had dismissed him as a scheming coward before, but now that his reinforcements were here, he figured he had the wrong impression all along. Gobta, meanwhile, wasnt sure how to respond. Whats he goin on about? he thought, dumbfounded. This lizardman made so little sense to him that he decided not to grace his madness with a reply.

    Thispletely unexpected gift allowed Gabil a moment to survey his surroundings again. There was a greatmotion from afar, indicating something else going on. Probably had something to do with that rumble from before , Gabil imagined. But Gobta knew what it really wasa signal from Benimaru that the ogres were on the scene.

    Oops! Guess were getting started. Ummm, youre Gabil, right? Bring your allies together and get back in defensive formation!

    Mm. Yes. I know.

    Each had no idea what the other was talking about, but they still had the mental capacity to unite toward amon goal. They both hurried off, both with a new responsibility to handle.

    Outside of Gobta and Gabils scope of attention, Ranga was sizing up the orc general.

    You wish to get in my way? the fighter said, spear pointed straight at the wolf, a little unnerved by these new events but still in control of his wits. Who are you?

    These wolves were a concern to him, certainly. The orc general had a feeling that the low rumble from before was a sign of even clearer danger, but he couldnt simply leave the wolves unchallenged.

    I am Ranga, came the low, half-growled reply, the faithful servant of Sir Rimuru!

    The two red at each other.

    Rimuru, you say? Ive never heard the name, but if this Rimuru seeks to defy us, we will destroy him.

    Now the orc general had no interest in Ranga. If he wasnt aligned with a demon lord or high-level magic-born whose name he was familiar with, he felt free to kill him without regret. That rumbling roar suddenly seemed a lot more important to investigate.

    He distractedly thrust his spear forward, attempting to skewer Ranga and end this fast. Ranga effortlessly reared back, dodging the strike.

    Crafty little dog!

    Now the orc general gave Ranga a closer look. Then he noticedthis wasnt any regr wolf at all. What? Come on. Just a simple magical beast Why am I letting him worry me so much? He assumed his sudden trepidation was just his mind ying tricks on him.

    How dare some lowly animal bare its fangs at me! he shouted, giving orders to his team of elites. The orc knights fanned out, surrounding Ranga in a perfectly timed maneuver. Following their generals direction, they focused each of their spears on the wolf. There was no point challenging some animal to a one-on-one duel , he thought.

    Ranga chuckled. He hadnt felt this heartened in ages, able to release his full instincts as an apex predator.

    With a howl as long and loud as he could muster, he unleashed his aura. After spending so long in the shadow of Rimuru, he had been heavily exposed to his beloved masters aura and used it to picture himself as the magical beast he was. Something drove him to pursue this form of himself, and now Ranga realized it was time for his instincts to awaken.

    He could feel the power surging within. His muscles grew, propelling him to his full, sixteen-foot-tall frame. His ws enhanced themselves, his fangs transformed into steel-like daggersbut what stood out most were the two horns that now grew from his forehead.

    This was the form of his master, the one he saw in the past. The tempest starwolf. And now he had evolved into that.

    The howl made the orcish soldiers shudder, but they felt no fear from it. Their orc general was right by their side, and the Ravenous skill had dulled their hearts. Ranga gave them a disinterested snort as he nced at their leader. This was no threat to him now. He could feel his true strength, and it was time to show it off.

    Sensing the flow of power, he focused his magic on his horns. The orc general picked up on this higher-level transformation, and he knew the danger involved. He hurriedly ordered his soldiers to spread out, but he was toote.

    A sh of light ran across their ranks. Then the sound camethe crack of thunder as pirs of electricity shot up from the ground to the heavens, apanied by a small army of tornadoes.

    Ranga had obtained the Dark Lightning skind while he couldnt directly control lightning the way Rimuru could, his two horns allowed him to define its range and power. And he had something elsethe extra skill Control Wind. This was, in a way, an inferior version of the Control Particles skill Rimuru had picked up. It let Ranga raise and lower the local atmospheric pressure to generate wind gusts, andbining it with Dark Lightning provided a lethal one-two punch.

    Ranga knew thathis instincts told him soand he used it on his foes without a moments hesitation. Control Wind was his now, and he used it to generate a staggering pressure difference in the air above. This was the area he used Dark Lightning on, and the ensuing beams of electricity filled the exact area he wanted. The result was a writhing maelstrom of upward and downward air currents, eventually gathering themselves into a single massive vortex.

    This led to severalrge tornadoes, exuding electricity as they ran roughshod across the battlefield like a great death-dealing storm. The orc general was instantly rendered into a pile of carbon, and his nearby soldiers were quickly picked off by the storm and thunderbolts.

    Once the tornadoes left the scene, there were no more orcs nearby. Rangas broad-range attack skillDeathstormthus made its first impact on the world.

    Ranga watched contentedly as his tornadoes stormed across thend. It had not affected any of the lizardmen, and even at maximum range and force, they did nothing to damage him. It emptied his magical reserves, of course, but not enough to render him immobile.

    He wagged his tail, realizing it had worked perfectly. He let out another long, happy howl, more than enough to terrorize the orcs observing from afar. Ranga watched them flee in a panic, sitting down as he silently refilled his magic. The battle wasnt over yet. He would have more opportunities to contribute. There was no need to hurry things along.

    Gobta appeared to be doing well, too. The lizardman force was starting to gather itself back together under the watchfulmand of Gabil. The goblin riders had rejoined Gobta, and together they were mowing down the orcs that had so tormented the lizardmen and goblins not long ago. It wouldnt be long before Gabils men were a coherent force again.

    And nowthey could see Benimaru and his friends, walking in from far away. Ranga nodded to himself. Victory seemed assured now.

    Gelmud was looking into his crystal ball. He didnt like what he saw.

    Damn those worthless bastards!

    In a fit of rage, he dashed the orb against the ground, shattering it into a million pieces. It had been showing the proceedings in the forest from the eyes of an orc generalGelmud had chosen that vantage point to take in what he expected to be the ultimate realization of all his ambitions. But now, thest of his intact crystal balls was a murky shade of ck. All three of the soldiers he had entrusted orbs to had died inbat.

    Gelmud had been pushing forward with preparations for the uing ceremony for the past three years. A ceremony to mark the birth of a new demon lord.

    It had all been left in Gelmuds hands to arrange, and the assignment filled him with glee. If all went well, itd create a demon lord who would listen to his orders. It was too tempting a treat to ignore.

    The demon lords of the world had forged a pact with one another that defined the Forest of Jura as untouchable, not belonging to any dominion. That was, however, just a formality, and small-scale interventions into the wood were a daily urrence. Gelmud himself had several different operations under way below the surface.

    What he was doing was nting the seeds of conflict across the forest.

    Gelmud was personally giving names to the most powerful among each race that dwelled in the wood. Naming a creature consumed a great deal of magical energy, draining his powers for months at a time. It was a dangerous game to y, but the named treated Gelmud like a parent and listened to anything he told them.

    Slowly, carefully, he had been building a small clique of protgs for him to manipte forest-wide. Some had been uprooted from the ground before they could fully sprout, but others had fully blossomed. Some were goblins, some lizardmenand there were other races involved, too, all participating in the war as named monsters. It was poisoning the well to cull the weak from the herdpowerful against powerful, the survivors fated to be evolved into a demon lord.

    Gelmuds n had been going without a hitch.

    These great wars among entire races shouldnt have urred until three centuries after Veldoras disappearance. Whether sealed away or not, triggering a war while Veldora was still alive was ying with fire. It could break the seal itself, in fact.

    So he had taken his time, gathering more pawns under his control and adjusting the power bnce among the races. And now that Veldora had vanished far earlier than he anticipated, the whole thing was starting to fall apart.

    But luck hadnt fled Gelmuds side yet. An orc lord was bornand while he hadnt been expecting that, he did sessfully bring it over to his side. It was Gelmuds trump card, and now that ns were going well and truly awry, Gelmud had no choice but to y it. It would be better to let things work out naturally with a n like this, but the way he saw it, he had no other choice. It was a bit like fixing the entire tournament, he knew, but he decided that the orc lord would be the next demon lord, no matter what.

    Theck of time had forced him to speed up the n a little, and Gelmud still didnt have enough strength to bring the higher-level races of the forest under his rule. He had wanted to sow some seeds among the ogres and treants as well, but that had fallen by the wayside this time.

    To be exact, the ogres turned down the naming offer. He had tried to negotiate with them, but they steadfastly refused. As a warring race, the ogres were reluctant to quickly change allegiances. They were high level, yes, but Gelmud concluded that they could not be controlled.

    The experience riled him enough that he decided to have the orc lord target the ogres first. The way they easily steamrolled over the ogre homnd assured Gelmud that he was on the right track. He had sent a magic-born employee over to keep tabs on things, but it wound up being unnecessary. The orc lord was growing steadily, and even his underlings were now nearing A rank. It made Gelmud rest a lot easier at night.

    Rubbing out those annoying ogres first eliminated thest seed of anxiety for him. The treants were harmless as long as theirnds were not directly threatened. He could take his time crushing them. Everything was proceeding as nned.

    He had once feared the demon lords who ruled over him, but now, it was Gelmuds turn to man the strings. It wouldnt be long nowand when he topped it all off with the lizardmens destruction, all hed have left to tackle were those stupid goblin weaklings. And once the orc lord had supreme control over the forest, Gelmud intended to have him keep going and destroy a human city.

    It would be his deration to the world that a new demon lord had been born, and that deration would be supported by facts once he wiped away the dryads and treants from the forest.

    Soon, very soon, Gelmud would have a demon lord doing whatever he wanted. He would take his rightful ce as one of the most powerful rulers in the world. He could see it all so clearly in his mind, but now

    He hadnt bothered to renew the contracts with the people he spent a fortune to hire.

    Gelmuds master was the one who introduced him to the Moderate Jesters. They were a creepy little band, and while they offered a wealth of powerful magic-borns to him, the n was going so well that there just wasnt much work he could offernot without revealing his entire n, which he wanted to avoid.

    They had warned him to mind his business around the dryads. That was why he devoted so much effort to building an arsenal of magic-resistant armor and equipment. Problem solved, as far as Gelmud was concerned.

    The orc lords army had conquered the majority of the forest. One more step, and everything would be theirs.

    But now

    Just as the orc lord was about to enjoy his new life as a demon lord, an unexpected presence had thrown a wrench into the gears.

    All of a sudden, one of the crystal orbs went ck. One of the five orc generals, themanders who answered directly to the orc lord, had been killed. Gelmud grew confused, then panicked. He realized that if things went awry, not only would there be no ce in the table among the worlds elites for himhis master might decide he wasnt worth having around any longer.

    The realization came to him at around the same time his third crystal ball went silent. All hope seemed lost for his ambitionsand for himself.

    Gelmud flew outside, casting a flight spell to propel him forward.

    There was no time to bother formting a n now. He had to get to the marsnds, and he needed to be fast.

 Volume 2 - Ch 6

    THE DEVOURER OF ALL

    It was a sight to behold.

    I kept up my vigil on the battlefield from above, taking in the reality unfolding on the ground. shes of light ran from corner to corner, blowing away dozens of orcs at once. A loud roar rumbled in the sky as a ck dome-shaped something appeared, then disappeared after a few seconds and left nothing but a bunch of ss fused into the earth.

    All the orcs there must have been burned into nothing. I could tell what had happened easily enough, but I felt like my heart was still having trouble epting it. Before it could, tornadoes swirled across the field, sending gale-force winds in all directions and burning the orcs alive with bolts of lightning. It looked like one of the ck-armored orcs had either been incinerated or torn apart.

    My honest appraisal of all this: What the heck?

    With every swipe of her sword, Shion was cutting down great quantities of orcs. Her de was glowing a dim shade of purple, infused with her aura. A sh of the same color shot through the air with every sh, cutting orcish soldiers in half with the shock waves. The sword was no kinder to those it physically strucksome literally exploded. A single sh had a range of twenty feet or so, slicing through everyone unlucky enough to be in its path.

    She smiled a graceful, fetching smile as she danced her way through the hordes. The attacks just kepting, uninterrupted, and not a single orc couldy a w on her.

    Her strength was simply overwhelming.

    But there were a couple other guys in battle that made Shion look like a rank amateur. Those were Benimaru and Ranga.

    Lets tackle Benimaru first. What was up with that freaky ck dome thing? I had a vague idea when I first saw it, Ill admit. Abination of my Control me, Dark me, and Ranged Barrier, I guessed. He used a barrier to freeze the space, Control me to elerate the particle motion inside, and then Dark me to convert the excited particles into searing me. Itd instantly cook everything in the enclosed space, like Ifrits re Circle except with an evenrger range. It disappeared in the space of two seconds, but with temperatures this high, that was enough.

    It was a scarily efficient killing device, and the neat thing was how, unlike a nuclear bomb, it didnt affect the outside area one bit. Not a single shock wave or burst of energy leaked out from the barrier. He must have ranged it carefully to control the temperature inside, and I could only imagine how hot it mustve been. No way anyone couldve survived.

    The only real problem, I supposed, was the way he took this incredibly dangerous skillhe developed it himself, Iter heard, naming it Hellreand tossed it around with hardly a second thought, apparently.

    Now for the other guyer, wolf. Ranga.

    Transforming into a tempest starwolf out of nowhere was kind of freaky , I thought, but it was the skill he immediately unleashed afterward that really threw me.

    I suppose that was how you were supposed to use Dark Lightning, without cing any limits on it. And he even controlled the wind to enhance its effects. Dang. What was that?

    Understood. I believe the individual Rangabined Dark Lightning with the extra skill Control Wind, taking advantage of the differences in temperature and atmospheric pressure to create bursts of up-and-down-flowing currents, thus creating whirlwinds.

    Huh. Neat. I dont get it.

    So he generated tornadoes to attack a wider range than he could with just lightning? Well, it sure worked. It knocked out an entire section of the orc horde.

    It consumed a ton of his magic, though, so I doubted a second strike wasing any time soon. Which, I mean, if he could rapid-fire stuff like that, I think wed need to redefine everything about how war even worked on this.

    Gauging all of this made me realize something. The brakes I had subconsciously been applying to myself all this time they had nothing like that. No concept that some skills were a little too dangerous to unleash and just lobbed them willy-nilly at enemies. That was a given in the survival-of-the-fittest world they were born in, I imagined, and really, maybe I was the one being weird about it. Itd suck if I held back and my friends paid dearly for it.

    Over in my old world, there was this tacit agreement that, yes, weve got all these devastating weapons and stuff, but we cant actually use them. They were more for deterrence. But was that really the case? Whats the point of spending so much money on weapons you could never use? Taking all that time to develop them? Theyre meant forunching when the times call for it, no? And if youre not supposed to use them on innocent citizens, did that suddenly make it okay to use them on the battlefield? I think if you got your brains blown out in a war, you probably wouldnt care much about the exact murder weapon that did the deed, wherever you wound up.

    Maybe that was the whole point. You needed to show people that you were strong if your weapons were ever going to serve as a deterrent. Maybe there was nothing wrong with that at all, actually. Look at Ranga, for onehes just sitting there, observing, and nobodys daring to go near him. Theyre as deterred as they can get.

    I mused absentmindedly to myself for a while.

    The battle had been raging for around two hours.

    Benimaru had popped off four of those dark-dome attacks. Not even he could deploy them in rapid session, but I guess they didnt sap that much of his energy. Rangas attack, meanwhile, was proving more of a one-and-done thing. I guess he put his all into it, which exined his currentparative silence. It certainly helped cow his opponents into submission anyway.

    As I saw a bunch of orcs running around in a panic, trying not to get caught in Shions attack range, I decided to analyze the situation a bit. I felt oddly calm now. Benimaru decided where to attack first, but I had ultimate authority over where to gost. I wanted to strike the enemy hard on a specific spot, attracting our foes to Shion and hitting them where it hurt.

    Hakuro was busy handling themander-ss enemies for me, and I would hardly call that a battle. He approached them soundlessly and diced them up in an instant. The Ravenous unique skill let the armies boost their leaders strength by consuming the dead, so making the bodies themselves vanish was apparently a priority for him, which I appreciated. Part of his Modelwill Art, maybe? I could see him release an aura from his palm, burning the corpsesor melting them, really.

    We proceeded along those lines for a while, with me spotting an enemymander and sending Hakuro over to erase him. We were overwhelming the orc armies, and zero cost to ourselves. I kept up my watch, trying to stay as efficient as possible.

    Even the more eager ogres realized that the tables had turned by now, I was sure. They werent attacking as frantically as they were before. They kept their distance from Benimaru and Ranga, fanning out their formations so they werent bunched together.

    At that point in time, the orcs had suffered about twenty percent casualties. Over forty thousand had lost their lives. And it wasnt until then that the enemys nerve centerthe orc lordfinally took action.

    The orc lord, a pig-headed monster who redefined ugliness, came to the front. He had two orc generals with him, both clearly a level above the orcs from before. Their dull, yellow eyes were brimming with hatred, and I could see their auras all the way from up here.

    Benimaru, Shion, Hakuro, and Ranga were now lined up together to engage them. Even Soei was there, now next to Benimaru. They were clearly ready to rock.

    So how strongs this orc lord, then? I had no idea, really, but it seemed that all the powers he gained were starting to make him lose control of his own sense of self. Maybe that was why he was sote to react to us. I wasnt so sure I needed to worry much about him.

    Either way, though, we couldnt let him get any stronger. Now that Benimaru and everyone else had arrived, I figured the sooner we took him down, the better. I took my mask out from my pocket and put it on. Time to teach him a lesson , I thought as I descended to the ground.

    Just as I was about to touchnd

    Tiiiiiing.

    there was a sharp, ear-piercing sound. As it rang in my mind, my Magic Sense noticed something flying toward the area at high speedaimed right at the middle of the marsh where the two armies were fighting away.

    It was a man, dressed rather oddly and with a distressingly strong aura. One of those upper-level magic-borns Id been hearing about. Inded on the ground, following his trail, Ranga and Benimaru sidling next to me.

    The man gave us a sideways nce. What in zes is going on here?! he shouted, wearing his emotions on his sleeve. Who dares to disrupt the ns of the great Gelmud himself?!

    I think I had an idea of what we were dealing with. This was the bad guy, wasnt he? I knew it. And the way he revealed who he was without anyone asking indicated he might be a bit of an idiot, too.

    He looked minion level, but I didnt want to read this book by its cover. His clothes were odd, but eachponent seemed to be magical by nature. Id best not let my guard down, I thought. If I had to guess, this was the guy setting the orc lord on the general popce. And now that his ns were going awry, he looked seriously pissed.

    L-Lord Gelmud! Gabil stammered as he ran up to him. I never would have expected you toe to my aid at a time like this!

    Gelmud just looked at him the way someone would look at a giant pile of garbage. You worthless wastes of space! he spat out at the orcs all around him. If you had just eaten these stupid lizards and other fodder and evolved into a demon lord, then I, the great Gelmud, wouldnt have to be here right now!!

    Well, thats kind of mean. Does he understand what hes saying, really? He means that the lizardmen and goblins were just meant to be food for the orc lord? Not that it matters to me, but

    Wait, havent I heard the name Gelmud before?

    Understood. My information indicates the magic-born that gave the goblin called Rigur his name was himself named Gelmud.

    Oh right. Gelmud was the guy who named the first Rigur, the older brother of the current one. Did he name Gabil, too, then? The lizardman himself spoke up before I could pursue the question further.

    Eaten theselizards? Haha-ha-ha! Talk about your gallows humor, eh? Youll find I am still perfectly hale and hearty, Lord Gelmud. Ever since you granted me your name, I have done my best to exercise the full potential of my abilities

    Ah, so it was him. But naming a monster just so the orc lord could consume him? Thatmade an awful lot of sense, actually. Eating a named monster with enhanced skills and strength and all that, would make the orc lord that much more powerful.

    But why not name the orc lord himself, then? A lot of this guys M.O. still made little sense to me.

    Huh? Oh. You, Gabil? Gelmud asked while I was pondering this. I wish you couldve fed yourself to the orc lord sooner than now As blundering and worthless as you are, you still bother to haunt this world? Well, so be it. Now that I am here, I might as well help you shuffle off to your grave. Gabil, I herebymand you to be the orc lords strength. Your death will be the greatest thing you have ever done for me!

    He was gesturing wildly at the orc lord now. The orc lord didnt budge. He simply looked at Gelmud with his sunken eyes and opened his mouth.

    Evolveinto demon lord What is that?

    Dahh! Your brain must be the size of a walnut, Gelmud mustered. It seems all that prey has avoided your brain entirely and gone straight to your muscles. We are out of time. I am forbidden to meddle in thisbut I have no other choice.

    He turned his bloodshot eyes to Gabil now, showing an open palm. Then, without any further warning, he shouted Die! andunched a bolt of magic.

    Look out, Sir Gabil!

    Get, get down!

    A small detail of lizardmen scurried toward the awestruck Gabil to protect him, forming a living shield as they warned him of the danger. That single magic bolt was enough to send five high into the air. But it didnt kill any of them. Whether the force of the st was dissipated among all the bodies or the lizardmen were really just that tough, nobody was dead from it. Seriously injured, yes, but very much alive.

    Wh-what are you?! Gabil eximed. Lord Gelmud, why did you do such a thing?!

    So he was using and abusing Gabil all this time, and now that things werent going perfectly ording to n, he was gonna kill him? Something told me that I probably wouldnt get along too well with this Gelmud guy.

    Gabils face twisted itself in despair, betrayed by the one person in this world he believed in.

    S-Sir Gabil, its too dangerous! one of his injured troopers advised him. Please, get out of here as quickly as possible.

    He certainly had some nice people under himor maybe it was more like Gabil was a great boss to them. Judging by the state of things when I arrived, he hadnt used the goblins as the throwaway pawns I expected him to. Perhaps he was using them as a first-line tactical defense, but I could see he had a good reason for it.

    The belovedmander, huh?

    You cocky inferior races If you wish to die that badly, Ill kill the lot of you right now! Perhaps youll finally be of service to me once youre in the orc lords stomach!!

    Gelmud began focusing his aura above his head, attempting tounch an even more powerful magical bolt. Or was it magic? Because he took almost no time to cast it. All he did was close his eyes and gather his magic at a particr point in the air. Not that it mattered.

    I walked ahead, in front of the lizardmenand in front of Gabil, who was now digging down to protect his men, even in his current daze. I knew he couldnt see my face through the mask.

    What does Gabil think about me right now? I couldnt shake the thought.

    Why was I standing in front of him? That was an easier questionbecause I liked him. I wanted to help him.

    That was the only reason, and that was all I really needed. I wasnt afraid to do whatever I wanted in lifein fact, Id sworn it to myself.

    Gabil looked up at me in awe. I doubted he understood what was going on. Things had vaulted beyond what his brain could process. Dont worry, though. I dont expect any favor back. This guy here? Hes just pissed me off.

    Sir Rimuru, I

    I held Benimaru back with an arm and took a step forward. Gelmud paid no attention, still focused on the gigantic magic bolt he was conjuring up.

    Ba-ha-ha-ha! Let me show you what a high-level magic-born can do to you all. Time for you to die! Death March Dance!!

    Gelmud had an expression of crazed joy. He intended to do us all in at once.

    The bolt, when he finallyunched it, split into countless smaller bolts in the air, all arcing toward us. Each one was about as powerful as the first bolt he produced, and now tons were raining down upon us, one by one, as if forming an orderly line. Gelmud, Im sure, was expecting us to be helpless, perishing with nowhere else to run to.

    Sadly, though, they didnt work on me. I slowly brought a small hand forward, and that was all it took to absorb all the bolts with my Predator skill. A quick round of Analysis produced instant results. This wasnt magic, but an Artone where he could roll his aura energy together, mix it with magicules, and give it destructive power.

    The fundamental idea was the same as Hakuros Modelwill, I figured. But while the energy Gelmud expended on it outssed anything Hakuro had, splitting that force into so many smaller bolts made the overall impact equal or less. He wasnt too well-versed in the move yetand if that was all the power he could cobble together, I was in no danger at all.

    Hey, I said, is that all you got? You want me to die just with that? Maybe you could give me a demonstration in how to die first?

    I focused my own magic and triedunching a bolt of my own. But nothing came out from the right hand I thrust at him. I could feel the magic and aura flow within me, but I couldnt quite control it. Even if I understood how it worked, that didnt mean I could execute it that easily.

    So unlike magic, I couldnt just analyze this to grab it for myself? Practice really does make perfect. After that killer line I just gave him, too. This is a little embarrassing.

    Thus, to cover up for my mistake, I shot off an Icicle Lance. It wasnt like I was married to Modelwill or anything. I just wanted to see how well I stacked up against a so-called upper-level magic-born at this point.

    And once I get bored of it, Ill consume you, too.

    My Icicle Lance elerated in the air before contacting Gelmud. He had his arms in front of him in an attempt at defending himself, and then instantly froze. He screamed in agonymagic worked well enough on him, which I wasnt expecting.

    Of course, no magic-born of the upper ranks would be finished by that alone. He immediately shattered the ice off his arms and fired an evenrger bolt of magic at me. No fancy tricks this time; just a big, blunt hunk of magic, crafted with everything he had.

    Die! How dare you inflict pain upon me Ill st you to smithereens!!

    But he couldnt. I just ate it up with Predator again. He let out a surprised yelp, shocked that I snuffed out the attack once more.

    No! What What is that youre?!

    He began shaking fearsomely. I sent a Water de his way. He tried to dodge, but the speed of it caught him off guard, cutting a deep gash in his side.

    Gaahh!! Y-you That was not magic?

    So it wasnt that he couldnt guard ithe just didnt. He apparently thought Water de was magic, so he attempted to counter with an anti-magic barrier instead of expending the energy to dodge it. That barrier was probably why the Icicle Lance didnt do muchsting damage.

    Gelmud began chanting a spell, fervently attempting to heal himself. Wow, hes got that kinda thing, huh? He looked like a freak, but maybe he was more multitalented than I thought. Guess the magic-born name wasnt there for show. Maybe I ought to exercise the ol arsenal a little myself.

    Benimaru, Ranga, and the others were keeping a safe distance away, staying on the ready but apparently content in letting me handle matters. Shion was probably expecting me to go all-out, I imagined, but she didnt look disappointed in me. She was hooked, in fact, eyes sparkling with delight as she watched. Hakuro and Soei, meanwhile, were ready to join me at a moments notice, just like I figured they would.

    The orc lord and his minions didnt seem like they were going anywhere, either. Now was the time, I supposed. I casually sauntered forward, stopping once I was next to the still-cowering Gelmud.

    Hey, can we get serious now? You were gonna show me what a high-level magic-born can do, werent you?

    Then I kicked him. Hakuro couldve easily dodged it, I was sure, but Gelmud took the full brunt of it. I could feel the sensation of bones breaking against my foot.

    Mustve been a more telling blow than I thoughtor was Gelmud that much of a wuss? Oh wait I have Multyer Barrier and Body Armor on me, dont I? That probably had something to do with it.

    Y-y-you?! I am a magic-born, and you

    As I pondered over what I had just done, Gelmud began to unleash his full aura in a rage. Yep, he sure was an upper-level guy. But it was still at only about the level of Shion or Soeilower than Benimaru, in fact. Did that make him an upper-level magic-born? I knew I shouldnt have worried.

    With a sudden dash, Iunched myself toward Gelmuds chest, aiming a fist right at the pit of his stomach. I felt no pain as I propelled it through his magical defenses. They dulled the effect of melee attacks, apparently, but they couldnt fully dull the effects of my punch.

    A look of anguish spread across his face. I paid it no mind,nding a flurry of strikes. He could do nothing to keep up with them. His aura was huge, but in terms of physical strength, he was nothing. Long-range strikes must have been his forteand most projectile attacks werepletely helpless against Predator.

    I never thought much about it, but against long-range attacks, I had a pretty insurmountable advantage, I supposed. Lets try some long-range moves of our own, then. I adjusted the Water de I fired a moment ago, creating a ball of liquid. Then I tried infusing it with Poisonous Breath and Paralyzing Breath, seeing if it could all mix together.

    I then tossed the resulting ball, about the size of a fist, at Gelmud. It wasnt as fast as I thought itd be, given that it wasnt pressurized like Water des. It was slow enough for Gelmud to react to, and he fired back with a magic bolt of his own. That Water de from before mustve taught him to do away with the taunts and such.

    But it wasnt done yet. The ball exploded into a spray of fine mist, spreading all over Gelmuds body.

    Garhh!! he shouted in anguish, writhing in the mist. Just as I hoped. Now I knew how to modify the Water des themselves. Andwait.

    I think I had my finger on something here. When I created that ball just now, that feeling I had

    I pointed my right hand at Gelmud, who was still in pain and desperately attempting to heal himself. Will this work? When I made that ball, I didnt take any water out from my stomach for itI just rolled it out from my aura. Maybe if I tried that with magicules instead There we go. I now had a fist-size piece of spirit above my right hand. So far, so good.

    Now, how to fire this at him Slowly, I pushed it forward, as if executing a breath-type attack. I felt something push lightly against my palm, and then the ball of spirit shot forward as fast as a Water de. Guess it worked.

    Hakuros eyes burst wide open. Hes learned Modelwill, I could hear him whisper. Still unrefined, though.

    So now I had my own magical bolts. Well just ignore the second thing he said for now. Once I learned something, things would fall into ce pretty quickly. I was sure I could burn more magic to boost its strength, too.

    That shot just now missed, sadly. Ill hit the next one , I thought as I stared Gelmud down.

    What areyou?! How?! Not even an upper-level magic-born such as I could

    He was interrupted by the bolt of magic knocking him cleanly off his feet. I was still just practicing, so I didnt put too much force into it, but it still beat one of my punches, it looked like.

    Next I fired several in session. Smooth sailing. Itd just be a matter of time before I fully mastered it.

    Time for more practice , I decided as I targeted several shots on Gelmud. I then simply stood there as they all hit home. Geez, Im more merciless than I thought. I think I got a little too excited about learning this new attack.

    Still, this dude was way too weak. His store of magic was definitely beyond A level, Id grant him that, but he still felt weaker than the ogre mages. Whats with that?

    Understood. The ranking system, as defined by the human race, makes its calctions based on the quantity of the subjects magicules. However, even if two subjects with the same quantity of magic fought each other, thepetitor with skills and Arts that consume this magic more efficiently would have a decided advantage. A subjects level is an arbitrary figure, with no official method of calction, and is thus not reflected in an individuals ranking.

    Ahhh. So levels didnt count as far as the Sage was concerned. Not like you can really say what level you are in life, and have anything to back that up with. This wasnt a video game, after allsome things you could only figure out by actually fighting dudes and seeing how you stacked up. Maybe that was why Hakuro, already high level to start with, exhibited such a startling change in physical strength with his evolution.

    You could have all the power in the world, and it meant nothing if you couldnt harness it. Gelmud proved that much. I couldnt lose.

    Ya know, I said tauntingly, you can go around calling yourself a high-level magic-born all you want, but you dont look like much of anything to me. Or do you have some kind ofst resort youre hiding?

    Yeah, what kinda skills does he have? Cause I didnt feel like I was in any kind of danger, but I wanted to glean as much intel as I could. I wasnt letting my guard downmy mind was on the orc lords potential moves, but he still didnt seem interested in moving at all.

    All right, he said. I will let you join my cause. Soon, I will

    I punched him.

    Does he listen to anything people say?

    Agh! S-stop, stop! Wait a minute! I have the backing of a demon lord behind me! You will not get away with this

    Oh, now hees out with that. Man, what a pain in the ass.

    So? I asked. And whatre you gonna say when you run back crying to this guy? You dont think hed actually let you stay alive after this, do you?

    Gelmud began visibly shivering, face painfully tense.

    Gaahhhh!! Get away from me! He stammered the words as he crawled backward. Youre dead! The demon lord will never forgive this!!

    The demon lord, huh? Leon, hopefullyI had a date with him already. I doubted I could take him right now, really, but I was curious how strong he was.

    I knew there were multiple demon lords running around, but were they all about the same, power-wise? This guy seemed to know a thing or two about them, and Id love to pick his brain for a while, but Id hate to blink once and have him slip through my fingers. I had to think about that as I interrogated him. Hopefully hed stay just as loose-lipped as when he revealed his role in all this.

    A pity I couldnt just consume him and gain all his memories. That worked for magical knowledge, for some odd reason, but even that was kind of the luck of the draw. I could always extract skills from that, though, which almost seemed like cheating.

    Speaking of that, I quickly decided to use my Sticky Steel Thread skill to keep Gelmud in ce before he got any funny ideas. He had already been levitating into the air, chanting somethingprobably attempting to fly off, I assumed. But that was no problem now.

    Damn you! he shouted, attempting to unravel himself as I approached him silently. S-stop, get away! Hey! Orc lord! Over here! Help me!!

    Now he was seeking salvation from the very orc lord he called a fool and a dunderhead a moment ago. Talk about a lost cause. I always respected a leader who had the high regard of his staff, but I hated the opposite. Especially when they treated the people under them as disposable. I was merciless against that.

    He probably had a lot of juicy skills on him. No need to waste any more time. But having the chance to speak to Gelmud beforehand made the thought of eating him more than a little unpleasant.

    The heaps of corpses that now surrounded him made his heart cry out in pain.

    Im hungry

    Hungry

    You? A high-orc kid? Why dont you just die already, you worthless brat?

    All of us are starving now O great magic-born, grant us your mercy

    Dont touch me! Youll get your grime all over my clothes Hmm? Wait. You

    Is it all right if I eat this?

    Of course. No need to restrain yourself. Eat until youve had your fill, so you can grow big and strong.

    Thank you, o great magic-born!! I will never forget this

    It is fine. From today forward, you may consider me as your father. Ah yes. Let me give you a name. Your name shall henceforth be

    Scenes from the past shed in his mind. Memories of the first time he was picked up by the magic-born who adopted him. And now he was following his adopted fathers orders, hoping to repay the favor any way he could.

    The two shared the same missionto transform the Forest of Jura, this bountiful ce, into a second paradise for the orcs. So they could abandon their own starvation-racked, disease-ridden homnd, so barren of anything that even the demon lord no longer paid it any mind.

    If he could only gain control of the forest, his father would have his talents recognized by the demon lord. He would be part of the demon lords leadership, and once that happened, he promised that he would provide aid to even more of his allies.

    But to do that, he needed power. He needed to consume the higher-level races of the forest, gain more strengthand build a new paradise for the orcs, a safe haven to build upon. The forests blessings would ensure theirrades never had to think about starving again. The other races might suffer, perhaps, but they would have to ept that survival of the fittest, that absolute, incontrovertiblew, applied to them, too, in the end.

    This war, after all, was a struggle to find the seeds capable of survival.

    It should have all worked out that way.

    If only you wouldve evolved into a demon lord already

    What did he mean? What did his father, Lord Gelmud, want from him?

    For the one called the orc lord, all he could do was stare at his adoptive father, with his dull, yellowish eyes.

    Gelmud, paralyzed by fear, fired bolt after bolt of magic at me, materializing them out of thin air despite having his hands restrained. A very skillful act, but it didnt help him. They harmlessly bounced off my Multyer Barrierthe bolts counted as a melee attack, I guess, so they couldnt prate my defense at all. I knew that from my previous Analysis, so I knew I no longer had to bother Predator-ing them.

    The former sneer on his face was reced with a gasp of despair.

    Dammit! he shouted. Help me, orc lord I mean, Geld!!

    Ah. So he had named the guy after all. I suppose he wanted to conceal his rtionship to the orc lord, for reasons I couldnt surmise. He said he was forbidden to meddle before, which I imagined had something to do with it.

    That, at longst, stirred the orc lord to action. Did he want to help Gelmud? Well, all right. He was free to do whatever. I promised Treyni that Id take him out anyway. It looked, externally speaking, that he was little more than Gelmuds puppet, but I didnt care. It wasnt like picking off the guy behind the scenes was gonna neatly end all of this.

    I had no reason to hate this orc. But that didnt mean I could let him live.

    Watching him as he closed the distance between us, I gauged the situation. None of this felt threatening in the least. I couldnt estimate his magic stores since I hadnt made physical contact with him yet, but I figured it wouldnt be too far from Benimarus. And that was still around half of Ifrits. If I gave this a serious effort, it shouldnt be too tricky. My main concern was what would happen once all these orcish soldiers were leaderless.

    Well, its about time you stood up, you good-for-nothing idiot. Ha-ha-ha! I dont know who you think you are, but youre about to get a taste of real strength! Get him, Geld! Show him what it means to defy me and

    With a wet, squishy-sounding thud, Gelmuds order was cut off mid-sentence. His head rolled along the saturated ground a few feet. The orc lord had done a marvelous, if somewhat forceful, job of chopping it right off his shoulders.

    Crunch, splish, splorch.

    Ugh, gross Hes eating the dude.

    The orc lord, upon walking up to Gelmud, had not hesitated a moment in using his meat cleaverlike weapon to decapitate the man. Once that was done, he started to sh away, carving the body into small, bite-size pieces that he immediately hurled into his mouth. It was a low-born, pathetic, and all-too-suitable ending for Gelmud.

    So this pig-guy wanted him dead, too, huh? Or was this his orcish instincts at work? Either way, it wasnt exactly great news for me. The dull, yellow eyes now had the glint of youth and intelligence to them. He had regained his sentience, something he had once lost to the power he gained from all the different races he had tasted. I wasnt anticipating this Talk about biting the hand that feeds you.

    The resulting aura was like nothing I had experienced so far today.

    Confirmed. The orc lords magical energy has expanded in quantity. He has begun the evolution process to a demon lord seed Evolutionplete. The individual Geld haspleted the evolution to an Orc Disaster.

    Ooooh That was the World Language talking, wasnt it? Neat.

    Wait. Stay focused, man. Hes really done it now. There I was, figuring I could whip him anytime I wanted, and now look. Cut me a break, man.

    This waspletely my fault. I knew I shouldnt have gotten so cocky. Gelmud was so much weaker than I anticipated, and I figured killing the main guy behind all this would wrap everything up, neat and clean. Boy, was I wrong. Too bad I didnt kill him when I had the chance.

    Okay, new rule from now on. When you can kill a guy, just do it. Id have to keep that in mind. No point making mistakes if you never learned anything from them, after all.

    But getting back to the point. What should I do with this guy? I couldnt stew in my own juices forever. Hes gonna have to be taken down, one way or the other.

    Things were now moving along by themselves, regardless of what I thought. Reality wasnt willing to wait for me.

    Graaarrrgh!! I am an Orc Disaster, the devourer of all! My name is Geld Geld, the demon lord!!

    To Geld, I suppose, he was just bringing to fruition what Gelmud wanted for him this whole time. Gelmud wanted him to be a demon lord, and he simply selected the quickest way to evolve into one. Just as Gelmud wanted. No servant could have been more loyal to his master, and I sadly didnt notice that in time. All I could do there was groan out What a monster

    His eyes were now youthful, full of sparkling energy and intelligence. His mere presence was intense, severe, on a scale like nothing Gelmud had ever achieved.

    This was a demon lord. A monster whose magic energy had multiplied into something almost overwhelming. He certainly deserved the title. The World Language suggested this was a demon lord seed, toothe real evolution had yet to happen, maybe?

    I better kill him right now , I realized, or else he really would be a disaster for the world.

    * * *

    Benimaru and the other ogres were positioned for battle. They could see how much of a threat the demon lord Geld was. Their easygoing smiles were gone, reced with stern, serious frowns.

    Sir Rimuru! Benimaru said. Let us handle this! Shion, meanwhile, didnt even bother to speak. With a sh, she whipped out herrge sword and swung it home, putting all her strength behind it, enhanced further by the extra skills Steel Strength and Strengthen Body.

    Geld attempted to block it with one meat cleaverequipped hand. Even for him, it wasnt quite enough. He brought up his right hand now, too, doing his best to resist Shions incessant attack.

    You think some dirty pig can be a demon lord?! Shion shouted as shended another strike from up high. Dont you dare believe that! Kurobes expertly crafted de now had a visible aura around it, as itnded with a dull thud against the demon lords body.

    Both took a step back before shing once more. Longsword mmed against cleaver, raining sparks upon the battlefield. It looked like an even match, but before long, the differences between the two became clear. Every muscle on Geld bulged, his very armor pulsing as if it were part of his body.

    It was the demon lord who won out in the end. His muscle outssed Shions, even with Strengthen Body and all of that. The evolution had greatly enhanced his physical body. It made me want to sigh in despair.

    Shion was tossed back, and Geld pursued her. Realizing the danger, she attempted to deflect the blow while leaping backward to reduce the impact. The damage upon her was clear nheless. She winced in painitd be a while before she was ready to move again.

    But Shion wasnt the only one here. As Geldnded the follow-up attack, a middle-aged samurai stood strong behind him.

    It was Hakuro, and with a speed even I was just barely capable of following, he drew his sword from the staff it was hidden in.

    The de glowed with a constant light, energized by the battle force housed inside the wielder. Its brightness indicated exactly how focused Hakuro was on this. No one could block or dodge him now. A streak of metal ran across the demon lords body, cutting it cleanly in half and even slicing off the head on the way back up.

    That had to be enough , I thought, but I was still being far too optimistic. Gelds body reconnected itself, thanks to a yellowish aura that regrouped all the parts with tentacle-like tendrils. Thepleted body then leaned down, grabbed its head off the ground, and reattached it like nothing was amiss.

    The horror movielike scene silenced everyone for a moment. Even Hakuro was obviously surprised.

    Now I knew the most fearsome thing about the demon lord Geld was his otherworldly healing skills. For now, this monster wouldnt have any resistances, but once he gained them, hed be impossible to kill.

    Then:

    Demonwire Bind!

    Soei used his Sticky Steel Thread to apprehend Geld. He had been lurking within Hakuros shadow, waiting for the perfect timing to restrain the demon lords moves.

    Get him, Benimaru! he shouted. Benimaru was already on the move, suddenly unleashing a Hellre strike. Only a small dome opened around Geldwhether he was deliberately keeping it small or was short on energy after deploying four of them, I didnt know.

    Geld, restrained, had no means of escape from the barrier as it became engulfed in high-temperature mes, doing their level best to incinerate the demon lord. The power of the heat was unaffected by the size of the dome, giving us a guaranteed death.

    Or so we thought. Several secondster, the dome was goneand Geld was just casually standing there. Benimaru grimaced at the sight. Hellre was a powerful move, yes, but it was designed for efficiency. It was focused on doing its deed within only a couple seconds; it was incapable of keeping the burners on for extended periods of time like Ifrit could.

    Generating Ifrit-style temperatures with rtively little energy was an impressive feat, dont get me wrong. But a target with enough resistance could easily focus on defending itself to survive the st, I suppose. If Benimaru could make itst longer, the mes would eventually ovee any resistance or regenerative skills. That, or maybe he could focus further to make the fire even hotter, capable of burning anything in the world. But no.

    It wasnt wholly ineffective, though. Geld had no heat resistance; his skin was burned horribly. The resistance his aura offered was all that kept it from being a lethal blow. He had probably gained something along the lines of Self-Regeneration, like what I had in slime form. The burned skin was already sloughing off, with new skin being generated from underneath. And the moment Geld whispered something, he began to heal quicker than ever.

    He must have inheritedor seizedGelmuds own healing skills. Combined with his own inherent abilities, he could probably heal almost as fast as me with Ultraspeed Regeneration.

    The battle continued as I watched and analyzed. Ranga aimed an extra strike at Geld before he could fully heal from Benimarus damage. He focused his Dark Lightning on a single point and released it, much as I had before. Nothing fancy; just a killer amount of force. It hit Geld directly, freezing him. He was burned and ckened, and as we watched, he fell to the ground.

    This time, I was sure we had won. And why not? Not even I was sure I could withstand that kind of attack. If it were a Replicant of mine, itd be burned to a crisp.

    I guess we all wound up pitching in on this kill. Hope they dont think any less of me for it. I doubted any of the ogre mages couldve taken him on solo and had any chance. That attack just emptied Rangas energy, tooDark Lightning consumed a ton of it, with obvious results. He was now curled up on the ground, unable to move. I wish he couldve kept a bit in reserve, but I couldnt me him for not doing so at a time like this. Besides, it was over now, right?

    Then I heard something.

    So thisis pain.

    The ckened, charred demon lord was back on his feet.

    Guess not, then?

    No way, I whispered.

    This monster was totally beyond allmon sense. I wasnt sure this was reality any longer.

    Before my eyes, the demon lord had just ripped off both his arms and eaten them.

    An orc general ran up to him.

    My lord, let my body join yours

    They nodded at each other, and that was that. The orc general was killed, then casually cannibalized.

    Man And with every bite, that charred skin fell away, revealing yet another freshyer underneath. Then he grew entirely new arms, driven by the muscle and fiber gained from what he consumed. He could use that to cast Self-Regeneration on himself as many times as he wanted, I imagined.

    Talk about an incredible healer. I mean, seriously, if we dont kill this dude in one hit, were never getting outta this. Or maybe wed have to render him into nothing but atoms to finish him. The one thing we knew for sure, though, was that my five strongest underlings could pool their abilities together and that still wasnt enough.

    Then the demon lord let out a guttural battle roar. Not enough! he screamed, his yellow aura coursing across his body. More! More, let me eat more! Consume them all! Chaos Eater!!

    Like sentient tendrils, the yellow aura extended its way toward the nearby piles of bodies. They instantly corroded their flesh, consuming them whole. If anything, it was this yellow aura that was the true driver behind Gelds power.

    It was another application of his unique Ravenous skill. Part of that skill involved Rotsomething that could literally rot anything that it made contact with. If the target failed to resist it, it was corroded and killed if it was organic. Fearsome indeed.

    Instinctively sensing all this, I ordered my troops to retreat.

    Fall back!

    The moment I did, the ogres stepped back.

    Tell Gobta and the lizardmen not toe near here!

    What about you, Sir Rimuru? Benimaru asked.

    I opened my mouth to reply. I was cut off.

    You will be my next meal. Die! Death March Dance!!

    The same attack Gelmud tried out earlier. But now it was much more of a punisher. Not only was far more energy packed into it, but each tiny magic bolt had Rot added to it. Get hit by one, and even the ogres would be gravely hurt.

    I had to do something.

    I was no longer able to keep my body from quivering. This was something that came from instinct. Uh-oh. I just couldnt stop.

    Is this fear?

    No.

    Thisis joy.

    Oh. So Im overjoyed.

    Yes

    From deep within my body, I was quivering in a frenzy of joy, and there was nothing I could do to stop it.

    A foe that even five of my strongest fighters couldnt handle. And yet, there wasnt a trace of fear in my heart. The depression I entered this battle with was a thing of the past.

    Now, this demon lord had elevated himself in my mind. He was my enemy. Sorry I thought you were just a pain in the ass earlier. Now Im serious!

    A flurry of magical bolts flung themselves toward me. I used Predator to consume them, and then the tendrils of yellow wrapped themselves around me.

    The demon lord Gelds Death March Dance bolts danced around in the air, as if self-conscious, beforeing in to swallow me. It was infused with Chaos Eater, and it had a mission to carry out.

    In another moment, the stic tendrils were around me. Even if they were still on the other side of my Multyer Barrier, it still didnt feel very pleasant.

    Yeah? You wanna consume me? Well, all right. Do it if you can!

    Worked up as I was, my instinctsmanded me to sh a weak smile.

    If you wanna eat me, youll just get eaten first.

    Silently, I removed my mask and put it in a pocket.

    It was time for my sh with the demon lord Geld.

    An impartial observer would probably assume that Id have a hard time defeating the demon lord.

    But slowly, I took out my sword, the yellow aura still around me. I didnt like that aura, but it wasnt dealing me much damage. I didnt have Resist Rot in my arsenal, but it must have been dealing melee damage upon menothing I couldnt cover for with Ultraspeed Regeneration.

    Closing the distance between us, I shed at Geld. He cleanly blocked me with his meat cleaver, sending me somersaulting. I shouldve expected as much. I couldnt take Shion in a sword-on-sword sh, and she just lost to this guy. And Hakuro, who was on another ne of existence from me swordsmanship-wise, could do little against him.

    I tried another sh, moving at hyper-speed to confuse my foe, trying to find any weakness I could from every angle I could think of. I knew it was pointless, but I couldnt stop going through the cycle. Whenever I was blocked or swatted away, I just kept going back, testing it all out.

    It assured me of one thing. I was weak.

    I thought back to the five fighters I had directly under me, as well as Shuna and Kurobe. They had each inherited part of my skills, and in terms of using them, they were already far more expert at them than I was.

    A refresher:

    Ranga: Dark Lightning, Control Wind

    Benimaru: Dark me, Control me

    Hakuro: Hasten Thought

    Shion: Steel Strength, Strengthen Body

    Soei: Shadow Motion, Replication

    Shuna: Analyze and Assess

    Kurobe: Research

    Even among the most typical of skills, the differences were obvious. The ones they inherited were either downgrades or iplete versions of my own. Absolutely a step down, in all ways. But they were using them all far more effectively. If I fought each one-on-one, I was pretty sure I could win. Several at once? No way. That was how strong my fighters had be.

    And despite that, the demon lord Geld probably could take them all in one go. And win. My Sage analysis of the battle results told me so. They allcked a truly decisive weapon, and sooner orter theyd run out of energy and lose.

    This wasnt a foe I could beat if I fought normally. Emphasis on normally .

    The ogres could use their skills far more deftly than I could. Why was that? For Hakuro, that was mainly just his high level at work, but what about the others? There were a few reasonsthey mixed the skills with their own Arts, or their instincts allowed them to unleash their full potential without holding back. They had adopted the skills for themselves, and they could use them more efficiently than I ever could. Thats what made them strong.

    Through my Sage-based simtions, I knew Id have trouble defeating several at the same time. But was that really the case? Andreally, was I weak at all?

    To answer that

    Lets start with an assumption.

    Most of my skills were wrested away from other monsters. I wasnt born with them, so I needed to start by understanding exactly what they were in the first ce. You arent automatically handed a drivers license just because youre tall enough to sit behind a steering whend you sure couldnt expect to win a professional race that way.

    But when I found myself transferred to this world, I did already have a skill or two. The skills I was born with, ones I could use as freely as snapping my fingers.

    So all I needed was a single order.

    All right, Great Sage. Smash that foe for me!!

    Received. Switching to auto-battle mode.

    And there was my answer.

    The demon lord Geld was overjoyed. Monsters with some actual backbone to themand five at once!

    Any monster formidable enough to make Geld feel pain would be more than wee inside his stomach. He could eat the strongest he could find, and that would put him even farther down the road to demon lord evolution.

    Just as he was about to swallow them up, another monster blocked his way. Geld was hungry. He had taken severe damage, and he needed flesh and blood to heal himself. That was why this monster in his way riled him up so much, this strange creature wearing a mask.

    Worthless minion , he thought. He bore almost no palpable aura and looked like just another human. He had seen him sprout wings and fly, however, so there was no doubting his monster origins.

    The demon lord intended to kill this thing along with the five tidbits he already had in his sights. But it was so strangeGelds attacks seemed to do nothing. He would lose his five snacks before long.

    Now this monster was standing before the demon lord, all alone. It removed his mask, revealing its true facethough it was more girl-like in appearance than anything, with hair as silvery as the moon. It looked cute, but the smile on its face was one of pure evil. Almost like it was looking forward to this uing battle.

    The moment the mask was off, the aura it held back began wafting across the area. Geld sensed something was off. My imagination? I cannot evenprehend the bottom of this aura

    But despite his apprehensions, Geld was greeted with the sight of this creature unleashing a flurry of pointless attacks. Maybe it was his imagination after all.

    Ill eat you first, then!

    If this puny insect got in the way of his meal, Geld had no reason to show mercy. And this creature had far more energy than he originally thought. A high-quality entre.

    Flicking away the annoying pest, Geld adjusted the grip on his meat cleaver, preparing for the final blow. But then the creature halted its silly assault, standing bolt upright on the ground.

    Whats it doing now?

    The girlish creatures expression froze,pletely bereft of emotion. And then, it looked at him. Those eyesthey shone like gold, as if appraising him. Geld wondered what it meant. Then he realized there was an arm right in front of him.

    ?!

    He knew what had happened, but hesitated to ept it as fact. His own left arm had been severed at the elbow in an instant, and sent flying in front of his eyes. Then it was turned to ashes with Dark me.

    The sword in the monsters hand was wreathed in a dark me. It burned without heat, but it had vaporized the severed arm in milliseconds. The temperature levels must have been surreal.

    An enemy?

    Yes. An enemy. This thing he treated as nothing more than food before. Now, things had changed. The foe projected a muchrger presence now.

    The first enemy the demon lord had faced since his evolution made him anxious from head to toe. He began to feel physically ufortable.

    No My arm wont regenerate?!

    He checked his own arm. It was burning at the end with Dark me that never seemed to extinguish. It was keeping him from healing, its aura now connected to his enemys. As long as he didnt kill the foe who had put this upon him, the me would never disappear.

    Anger began coloring Gelds eyes. He ripped the remainder of the arm off at the shoulder, consuming it in severalrge bites, before regenerating the arm from the socket. Then he thought for a moment. If he didnt have enough power before, he could just use his skills topensate. This foes speed was exemry, but Geld held the power advantage. If he could just crush it, all that speed would be his.

    Matching his meat cleaver with this monsters movesnimbler than ever beforehe blocked the full brunt of the enemys force. But the moment sword met cleaver, the Dark me swallowed it whole, melting it.

    No!

    The demon lord Geld reared back, shocked. Was this an enemy? No. It was a threat. He had to consume it with every power he had at his disposal. Otherwise, he finally realized, he would be the one eaten.

    Gelds aura swelled, releasing a shock wave of force. He watched the monster elude it, then unleashed Death March Dance once more. The magical bolt split into eight in midair, each bolt hurtling toward its target. Each one was enhanced with Ravenous, bestowed with the Rot property.

    The monster evaded them as they flitted through the air, absorbing each one of its pursuers.

    Geldughed. Now you will be consumed!

    The five fighters from before no longer figured in his mind. All that mattered was the prey in front of him.

    The monster was still distracted by the magic bolts. He confronted it, reaching out for its body. The foe noticed just in time. It turned, then began to grapple with him. Geld had the strength advantage. I could crush it now , he thought.

    But then he fell, his bnce lost. The foe had kicked him in the knee, shattering it. This innocent little girl. It was unimaginable, how quick the strike, how brutal the impact.

    Geld refused to let go. Gah-ha-ha-ha-ha! I like it! Ill eat you just as you are!

    The prey was in his hands, ready for the first bite. It was helpless now. A little bit of damage was of no concern to Geld. Even that shattered knee was already regenerated, good as new.

    The demon lord filled his palm with the yellow aura, preparing to infuse it into his prey. Ravenous allowed him to rot his foes directly with a single touch, arresting all their life functions and converting them into more nutrients for him.

    Every fiber of his being desired to eat this creature, every ounce of energy poured toward his Rot skill. And in a moment, his opponent would stop resisting, as its body slowly melted into nothing

    Things have unfolded just as I thought.

    With the full support of the Great Sage unique skill, I was now fighting with my skills at maximum efficiency. I was makingplete use of them, but it wasnt because I had leveled up or anything. I wasnt fighting so much as I was letting the Sage do the fighting for me. It was a totally optimized approach, leaving everything to good ol Sage. Just as I figured, it demonstrated perfect mastery of my skills.

    Once I knew I couldnt overpower Geld, I ced a Multyer Barrier over my sword and imbued it with Dark me. This kept the sword from deteriorating over time, greatly boosting its attack force along the way.

    Even the skills I never managed to use too well were expertly handled by the Sage. It processed all the data at hand and always chose the most effective move to make next. It was covering the entire board as it figured out how to handle the demon lord, like a chess problem.

    But even then, I couldnt let up. Geld was starting to keep up with me speed-wise, and if this battle kept going, it might get worse. And if Resist me was one of the potential upgrades, I had nothing on him.

    Hell, for all I knew, we were already at that point. And besides, everything I had for myself applied equally to the demon lord Geld. He had only just evolved; he was unfamiliar with whatever he had just inherited. Whatever advantage I had, I was losing it with every moment I dawdled.

    Geld was in the throes of evolution, much as I thought I was. That was why I had to wage the battle this way.

    Grappling with him was exactly what the Sage predicted. It would prove difficult to burn Geld to a crisp with Dark me only. He healed so quickly that itd take too much time topletely burn him up. It might be possible if we could capture him in a re Circle, though, and that was why I had to subdue him first.

    So I had instantly overwhelmed my opponent, inviting him to fight using the skills he was most familiar with. The demon lord fell for it beautifully, epting my test of strength.

    Just like the Sage predicted, Geld wanted to rot me, then consume me. If I could deploy a re Circle before then, I won.

    I had to hand it to the Sageit had read the guy like a book. But now the one possibility I had given a passing thought tothe one the Sage dismissed as too infinitesimally unlikely to happenbecame reality.

    Gah-ha-ha-ha! me doesnt work on me, you know!

    I had locked myself in a Ranged Barrier with him. The re Circle was now under wayand the demon lord Geld, who was supposed to be bursting into mes now that it was several thousand degrees around us, was instead heartilyughing in my face.

    I hate it when these worst-case scenarios be reality.

    ?! Report. Enemy confirmed to have resistance to me. Requesting immediate alterations to n

    The Great Sage came back online, sounding the same as always, even if I imagined it sounding a tad unnerved.

    This was terrible. Horrible, really. Right at the climax of it all, my enemy had just checkmated me. Butwhy, though? There was still no anxiety or concern in my heart. As if I had hoped this would happen all along.

    Oh really? I said, shing a proud smile. Because you might be a lot happier sumbing to the mes soon.

    The Chaos Eater that served as Gelds aura was starting to make its way through my Multyer Barrier. It didnt hurt, but it was making me intensely ufortable as it wended its way around my skin. And yetI still felt nothing but joy. It was what I wanted. He was my enemy, and he had to give me this much, at least.

    I got this , I silently told the Sage, retaking control of my body. The Sage, while taking over, had allowed me to observe Geld at close range. Taking full advantage of the break, I had elerated my thoughts a thousand times to consider what to do if the unlikeliest of events urred.

    Aputer that never makes mistakes tends to see everything as a probability. It seeks efficiency, cutting away anything it deems redundant. That was why I was here. I was a ball of inefficiency, a former human with a deliberately iplete thought process.

    So dont be disappointed, partner , I whispered in my heart as I sneered at the demon lord. You were perfect. Just leave the rest to me

    This guy wanted to consume me. That prediction came true, at least. And that meant I had an opening.

    A little while back, I was a tad overoptimistic, reasoning that I should have eaten the demon lord back when I still had the chance. Right? And I was, at the core, a slime. I had exactly three intrinsic skills: Absorb, Dissolve, and Self-Regeneration. They were gone now, merged with assorted other skills, but I also had a unique skillPredatorthat was an enhanced version of them all. It suited me perfectly as a slime. Nothing couldve worked better with my inner essence.

    I doubted that my evolved Ultraspeed Regeneration was any less incredible at healing than whatever the demon lord was sporting. Which meant that if we started consuming each other, I was bound to win in the end, right?

    Report. The probability of you executing Predator first is

    The probability doesnt matter. Quit worrying. I told you to leave the rest to me, didnt I? Either the demon lord Geld rots and kills me, or I consume him first. It couldnt have been any simpler, and I was ready to do it, even if my chances were exactly zero percent.

    Why? Because that was my n from the very start.

    The demon lord, apparently pretty sure of his own victory, was now trying to melt me, looking every bit as ted as I was. I could take advantage of that, pretending to be rotting awayweakeningas my body fell apart. Apart, and over him.

    From my opponents palm, through his arm

    And by the time he noticed, the operation was under way.

    Letting my instincts take the wheel, I had engaged my enemy the way that slimes naturally do. Concern now crossed his face. He tried to peel me off, but he couldntI was already all over his body.

    You see now? Sorry, but all that strength of yours doesnt mean too much now, does it?

    Gnh No?! What are you trying to

    Heh. If you thought you had an exclusive license on consuming stuff, youre wrong.

    Nailed him. And Geld knew it. He winced at my words.

    But I still wasnt necessarily at an advantage. We were, for the moment, at a stalemate. He was using his healing skills to resist my Predation, and I was using Ultraspeed Regeneration to keep afloat over his Rot attack. We were eating away at each other, like an ouroborose to life. The Great Sage was too much of a perfectionist to evere up with something like this, but it was exactly what I wanted.

    Whichever side consumed the other was the winner. The rules were so easy to understand. And getting myself into this situation in the first ce was a requirement if I wanted to win. It wasnt that I came up with the idea after the Sages tactics failed; I just followed my instincts, and this was what resulted, really. Instead of relying on unfamiliar, unseasoned skills, I relied on whatever my instincts willed for me, at the root, and executed what they told me. The slimes Absorb and Dissolve skills had been merged into Predator, and so I was doing what those instincts wanted for me. I am, after all, a predator.

    Geld, your Ravenous is a powerful unique skill, Ill grant you that. But youre not a predator. Youre a scavenger. You can eat anything, which is incredible, but Im adapted for catching and consuming. And that gives me the advantage. If were gonna keep eating at each other, Ill be the one to gain new skills from it first.

    My Predaceous instincts will it to be done! I can analyze and obtain skills even from living creatures, but you, Geldyou can only steal them from their corpses. And thats what will decide this.

    It was hard to say how much time passed. We were still consuming each other. I concentrated on Predation, assured of my victory, when I started to hear the strangest voice.

    I cant afford to lose.

    I ate my ownrades.

    I cant afford to lose.

    I have to be a demon lord.

    Because I ate Lord Gelmud.

    I cant afford to lose.

    Myrades hunger.

    I cant afford to lose.

    I must eat until I am full!

    The thoughts flooded my mind. They belonged to the demon lord, I assumed.

    Talk about stupid. Think whatever you like, Ive already won.

    But I cant afford to lose

    I ate my ownrades.

    Imitteda terrible crime

    I cant afford to lose.

    Look, can you forget it already?

    Lemme tell you.

    This worlds all about survival of the fittest. And you arent fit enough.

    So youre gonna die.

    But I cant afford to lose

    If I die, I leave the sins of my crimes to myrades.

    I dont mind if I, alone, am sinful.

    I did whatever was needed to avoid starvation.

    I will be a demon lord.

    I will ept all the hunger in the world. So no one else has to feel this famine!

    I know I can.

    I am an Orc Disaster.

    The consumer of all.

    Aaaaand youre still gonna die.

    But dont worry.

    Ill eat up all those crimes for you.

    Youwhat?

    Eatmy crimes?!

    Mm-hmm.

    And not just yours

    Ill eat the crimes of all your friends, too.

    The crimesof all my friends

    How greedy of you.

    You think so?

    Yeah. I am greedy.

    Does that make you feel better?

    If it does, then just rest a bit and let me eat you already.

    Ah

    I couldnt afford to lose.

    But

    I am tired. It iswarm in here.

    Greedy one.

    You know there will be no tranquility down the road you travel.

    But you are still willing to take on my crimes

    I thank you.

    My hungeris sated.

    He was Geld, the Orc Disaster.

    And now, his consciousness had vanished within me.

    Confirmed. The Orc Disaster has disappeared. The unique skill Ravenous has been absorbed and merged with the unique skill Predator.

    So I win.

    There was no way someone as hungry as he was could beat me without starving himself in the process.

    I opened my eyes, carrying the weight of him and all his orcishrades on my back.

    In the quiet, I dered my victory.

    I have won, I said. Rest in peace, Orc Disaster Geld

    I could hear the cheers from the goblins and lizardmen, along with cries of anguish and despair from the orcs. Their conquest was over. They knew it, and from the thoughts they shared as they cannibalized one another before, they knew it was all caused by Gelmuds nefarious ns.

    What bothered me most was that the person or persons controlling Gelmud were quite likely still alive. He talked about having a demon lord patron backing him up, and there was no way to tell if that was the truth or not.

    Id probably need to be carefulbut careful about what? I had no idea. And I could hardly leave these orcs to their own devices. We had problems left to solve.

    The next day there was a very important meetingone that would go down in history as the one that established the Great Forest of Jura Alliance.

 Volume 2 - Ch 7

    THE GREAT FOREST OF JURA ALLIANCE

    The man sat alone, rxing in an impossibly ornate room. He smiled, which was visible through his mask.

    Elegantly, he waved a hand in the air, directing his servants to exit the chamber. They bowed to him, every motion carefully practiced, and left without a word. Just as they did, a jovial-sounding voice resonated from the previously empty sofa against the wall.

    Well, so much for Gelmud, huh? After all the help we gave im, he screwed everything up right at thest minute.

    The voice belonged to Lace, bizarre clothing and eerie-looking mask still intact. The news he brought was grim, but he didnt sound particrly affected as he walked up to the man.

    Pfft. It is not an issue. He died without breathing a word about our rtionship.

    True nough, Lace observed as he took a seat across from his conversation partner. But after all that work setting it up, its gotta hurt that it didnt result in a new demon lord, isnt it? You wanted a demon lord thatd serve as your faithful servant, rather than having to work as equals with the others. That was the whole point, yeah?

    The man gave Lace a fatherly nod. It would be a lot easier, he observed, if you were willing to take that role for me.

    Ooh, no thank you! Cant say Im up for taking on that kinda responsibility, no. Those guysre a buncha monsters! If something went wrong, itd be my neck on the line. I mean, thest demon lord that was born

    Demon Lord Leon. The humanLeon Cromwell.

    Yeah

    They could feel the temperature palpably drop around them.

    The one thing that any would-be demon lord had to bring to the table, above everything else, was strength. Real strength.

    Nobody in this world was stupid enough to call themselves demon lords. Anyone who attempted it would attract the ire of the current ones at the top of the food chain and probably not live for much longer. But there were some out there who could rile a demon lord, then actually fend them off in battle. These were also recognized as demon lords for the force they so clearly wielded.

    But for the past few centuries, no demon lord had been born with suchtent strength. Thest one was the former human Leon Cromwell. His almost eerie charm allowed him to attract an army of magic-borns to his side, one after the other, before he dered himself the lord of his little frontier territory.

    This enraged one nearby demon lord, known as the Cursed Lord, and he immediately dered war on Leononly to be beaten back, at great loss of life. Not by Leons army, but by Leon himself, acting alone. That was enough to make the demon lord title permanent.

    Such a debut, based purely on shows of force, was a rarity. In most cases, if you wanted to safely stake your im to the title, you needed the backup of at least three current lords. That way, if anyone tried fighting the new candidate, theyd have to tangle with his allies at the same timeso the theory went, at least.

    Then a demon lord came along who figured he could game the system a little. Instead of engaging in tense negotiations and forming alliances with other demon lords, why not will a demon lord to life who was perfectly willing to do whatever you asked of it? It was a tempting thought, even if it risked the ire of ones peers.

    That was how this n worked, thento make the new demon lord birth look as natural as possible, so no one could possibly question its authenticity. Gelmud was key to that, and it was also key to make sure his own ambitions were stoked as much as possible along the way.

    Well, the man said, ignoring the sudden chill in the conversation, enough of Leon. My real concern is that we have already reached out to two demon lords about this. I am sure they will be very disappointed to hear that the n failed at this ratherte stage.

    The n was meant to be put into motion a full three hundred years after Veldoras disappearance, set to unfold carefully over decades. But it was all over now, and the man would be lying if he said it didnt pain him.

    Okay, Lace countered, but look at these, will you? Theyll show you something pretty crazy.

    He produced a set of four crystal orbs. Three contained the stored visual records of three orc generals, while the other one contained Gelmuds. Lace had linked an orb to Gelmud without his knowledge as he handed him copies of the three others.

    Watching what the orbs contained, the mans eyebrows arched upward in clear surprise.

    The orc general orbs retold all their valiant glories in battle. Each one ended with the sight of the magic-born people who apparently defeated them, showing off overwhelming power as they did. They were ogre mages, a high-level race that the more elderly ogres might evolve into once every few centuries. With their abilities, they held the potential to be just as powerful as orc lords, even. They were fabled to crush the earth, rend the skies apart. And there were three of them recorded on these orbs.

    That, and a magical beast the likes of which he had never seen before. It wielded lightning and gale storms with ease, putting it in the upper echelons of the animal kingdom. Perhaps a direwolf that had undergone some manner of untold transmogrification, but it was hard to tell from the visuals alone.

    It was certainly well beyond A rank, though, and that meant there were four monsters in this battle that shot right past A and into the stratosphere. Gelmud never had a chance out there.

    The real concern, though, was what the fourth and final orb showed. A single human being, standing tall in front of Gelmud. A child, it appeared, wearing a mask. But nothing at all was normal about him. It was more urately a monster transformed into a person. If not that, a newly born hero.

    Both men in the room knew that human summoners and otherworlders could often be gifted with astounding abilities. But a child would be too immature to take full advantage of themand he or she certainly wouldnt be participating in a war between magical beasts and creatures. Thus, by the process of elimination, they assumed this was some manner of monster in disguise.

    It appeared from the visuals that this child had the four enigmatic creatures under his control. When the situation turned to battle, it was clear Gelmud was far out of his element. The image went ck quicklyno doubt when some attacknded a telling blow upon him.

    When all the orbs were sifted through, the man leaned forward and let out a long, deep sigh. Gelmud, an A rank, one of the greatest of those born of magic, had been overwhelmed by a child. A child with four upper-level magic-borns of his own. He was still unclear about the ultimate fate of the orc lord, but with this kind of force at y, he doubted there was much hope for him.

    This kind of force. A force that could no longer be ignored.

    Pretty crazy, eh?

    Yes, very interesting, the man ventured with a smile. Sowhat now?

    Lace took a moment to answer. Two demon lords, just as powerful as he was. And the person he had mentioned the potential birth of a new demon lord, too. There was much to consider.

    Well, keep the ship afloat for now, is what Id say. If you think you need any help, youll get my regr discount, okay? Take care for now, yman.

    He disappeared, leaving the manthe demon lord ymanalone in the room. He reyed the orbs several times over, thinking quietly.

    The battle was over.

    That wasyeah, pretty rough. If he had fullypleted his evolution, I dont think anyone couldve beaten him. I won precisely because we made it to him in timejust in time, as it turns out. It wouldve been so much easier pre-evolution, too; I was still kicking myself over that. But I had iting. I shouldve killed him fast instead of getting all cocky. It was more than half luck that earned victory for me, in the end.

    But the rewards I reaped from it made all my regrets look like a drop in the bucket. Thats rightits unique skill time!

    I had obtained my fourth unique skill from the spirit of the demon lord Geld, although I guess it got merged into Predator without so much as a peep. The Great Sage gave me the rundown after the battle:

    Report. Following the merger of the unique skill Ravenous with the unique skill Predator, the unique skill Predator has evolved into the unique skill Glutton.

    The Sage had the habit ofbining skills that resembled one another a fair bit, although everything was still downwardpatible. I analyzed this new skill, then closed my eyes.

    This skill, Glutton, consisted of four old abilitiesPredation, Stomach, Mimic, and Istbined with three new onesCorrode, Receive, and Provide. The new ones worked like this:

    Rot:

    Performs Rot on the target, dposing it if it is organic. Monster corpses partially absorbed in this manner will reward the user with part of the monsters skills.

    Receive:

    Gain the ability to obtain skills from monsters under your influence.

    Provide:

    Grants part of your abilities to monsters under your influence or linked to your soul.

    Giving each the once-over, I had to say, this was some pretty damn sweet stuff. My Stomach got a huge upgradeit felt maybe twice as big. And Rot sounded downright scary, although handy for things like destroying armor.

    Receive and Provide were the real plums, though. This meant, basically, whatever new skills people like Benimaru and Ranga earned when they evolved, I could get em for myself, right? And redistribute them to anyone on my team I wanted?

    Understood. You may interpret it as such, yes. However, there are restrictions to providing abilities. You will not lose the original skill, but if the receiver is not capable of making full use of the skill, they will not be able to obtain it.

    Seriously?

    It appeared that my underlings tended to grow stronger whenever I did, and vice versa. Giving skills to them seemed to offer no disadvantage, but I guess the receiver still needed to have whatevertent talent the skill required for it to work. I couldnt just pass around skills willy-nilly, in other words, which was fine with me.

    In a way, this skill was pretty scary, too. I couldnt use it to share personal knowledge or magic spells, and I would still need to put in the daily effort to raise my level, but still, it was really something. I gotta hand it to that Orc Disaster. I was kind of pissed that he got Gelmud and all, but if anything, this was an even better bonus. The more I put into it, the more I got out.

    By the way, it appeared that Analysis, originally part of Predator, had been merged into the Sage itself while I wasnt paying attention.

    Huh? I dont remember being asked for permission on that, much less giving it. But ah well. Im probably just overthinking it. No way the Sagenothing more than a skill, reallywould do something on its own volition. Analysis always seemed a little weird for the Predator umbre anyway. No point giving it much more thought than that , I figured.

    Still, the battle was over, as was all the joy and sadness and despair that swirled around the battlefield. Hoo boy. I cant help but think this every time, but the cleanups always much more of a pain than the battle itself.

    The day after the demon lord Geld fell, representatives from all the races were gathered inside a temporary tent pitched in the central part of the marshes.

    On my end, I was with Benimaru, Shion, Hakuro, and Soei. Ranga was inside my shadow, as per usual, and I was sitting on Shionsp in slime form. I had pretty much revealed what I really was when I defeated Geld, so there was no point hiding it now.

    Treyni was here to represent the immobile treants. She had appeared without me having to toss a Thought Communication her way, iming she caught the waves the two of us released or something. What a case. She was hiding just as much power as I was, I supposed.

    From the lizardmen, we had the chief, the head of the chiefs guard, and her assistant. Gabil was currently in a cell somewhere on charges of treason. Son of the chief or not, they couldnt exactly let his acts go unpunished. As idiotic as he was, a lot about him piqued my interest. But I was still in no position to provide unsolicited advice on his treatment.

    The goblins were represented by each chief of the assorted viges, somewhat huddled at the far corner of the table as they marveled at all the high-level monsters surrounding them. That was understandable, given how there was a dryad in the room, something they never wouldve imagined seeing even if they lived to be a thousand years old.

    Finally, from the orcs, there was the sole surviving orc general, along with sixteen chiefs from their tribal federation. The mood was understandably gloomy among them, given how they were the main catalyst of all this. Whether the orc lord had seized their minds or not, it wasnt like they werepletely free of responsibility. They must have known that, judging by the hangdog looks on their faces.

    It wasnt just guilt driving them, either. They were near the end of the food supply they had brought with them. Soei told me they carried little with them, and Geld the demon lord didnt offer much to them, either. They were in danger of starving all over again, except this time, they werent under the spell of a unique skill that kept them pressing forward. Cannibalizing one another to do so. That certainly wasnt normal orc behavior. In fact, being freed from the spell made some of the orcs faint immediately from malnutrition.

    Their current situation cast a pall over the entire tent. The orcs had no meaningful reparations to offer, everyone knew, even if they had asked. Their whole impetus for going to war, in fact, was the desperate starvation they faced in their homnd.

    There were still around 150,000 left, and I doubted they had the ability to feed themselves at all. All those soldiers, and they stillcked the will to continue warring. Nothing summed up their mental state better at the moment.

    Without Ravenous, they really would starveand my peek into Gelds memories taught me even more. I had mentioned the number 150,000, but those survivors also included women, the elderly, and children. In other words, the entirety of every orc n was right there, in the marshes.

    The issue was a famine.

    Thends ruled by demon lords were generally safe zones with bountiful arablends, protected by the great powers of those who ruled over them. Even if a monster or magical beast stirred up trouble, the magic-borns who served the demon lord would ensure thatw and order ruled the day.

    All of that, of course, came at a costin this case, high taxes. In exchange for living among fertilends, the citizens were required to give up a healthy percentage of their harvest on a yearly basis. And the orcs, who tended to multiply quickly when they had the resources, were an indispensable part of demon lordnds, theirbor keeping the farms and mines humming along smoothly.

    Failure to pay these taxes, though, meant death, though not at the hands of the local demon lord himself. Thends were dangerous. Many monsters attacked it, seeking bounties for themselves. If anyone didnt pay their due to the lord, the lord wasnt obliged to protect them. And that was that.

    The orcs were normally able to take care of themselves well enough. Even if an attack killed off half, they reproduced so quickly that their numbers were right back to normal before long. But the current famine made it impossible to pay their tax to the demon lordor lords, as it happened. The orcs territory had the misfortune to border the domains of three different demon lords. Attempting to raid thends of such powerful beings would mark the end of the orc species, but without the protection their taxes bought them, they had no way of surviving in the suddenly barrennd they called home.

    So they streamed into the Forest of Jura, all but chased away from their homes, in search of food. They wandered around its fringes for a bit, fighting off the hunger, and that was when the orc lord was born. But even that wasnt enough to make them strong enough to fend off the monsters that harangued them constantly.

    It was at that point when Gelmud extended a hand to them. Help they readily epted, not realizing what was motivating this unexpected benefactor. And that was when their troubles began.

    That was about all I knew about them. I didnt have the fine details, exactly, but I was still able to glean that much from Gelds mind just before he vanished. Could I use that info to help them, though? The thought weighed heavily in my mindjust like it in did in everyone elsesas we got started.

    Hakuro would serve as mediator. I asked the lizardmans chief guard to take the position, but she refused. The role is too weighty for me! she protested. It felt weird to have the losing side in charge of the negotiation, so I threw the responsibility ater, I mean, asked Hakuro to handle it, since he was practically born for it anyway.

    Once he dered the meeting under way, silence fell. No one dared open their mouths, instead turning right toward me.

    What a pain. I really hate meetings. Companies that hold lots of meetings never actually aplish anything. The important stuff should be left to people capable of handling it, really. But ah well.

    Well, I began, before we get down to business, Id like to tell all of you what I know at this point.

    Everyones faces tensed up. I tried my best to ignore it as I discussed what I learned from Gelds memories, as well as what Soei had researched for me. The reason why the orcs took up arms, and the current state of their affairs. The orc delegation looked at me wide-eyed. I guess they werent expecting this toe up. As I continued, some began shedding tears. Perhaps they didnt think theyd have a chance to give their side at all. Perhaps they were prepared to die on the spot.

    Then I gave Hakuro a look, indicating that I wanted to move on.

    Ahem! In that case, he said. I would like to make sure all of us are on the same page when ites to the casualties wrought by this invasion.

    The conference slowly sprang into action, the lizardmen going first. As they reported their numbers lost, the orcs hung their heads, unable to speak.

    Well then, Hakuro ventured, do you have any demands you wish to make of the orcs, Chief?

    Id never been in a war myself, so I wouldnt know, but when it came to asking forpensation, the winning side had a lot of say in how that worked. No way Id have the confidence to run a conference like this.

    Not particrly, the chief replied. This victory was one we earned through none of our own doing. It came thanks to the aid of Sir Rimuru.

    Thus, he essentially forfeited the right to ask for reparations. Not that he couldve expected to get much out of them.

    So were the orcs up next? I turned to their chiefs, wondering what they would say.

    Please, allow me to speak! the orc general suddenly shouted, all but rubbing his head against the rough ground as he bowed to me. All of us here, we wish to make up for this disaster with our very lives I know even that is not enough, but there is nothing else we could possibly pay you!

    He was ready to die, I could tell that much. This monster, ranked A-minus or so, would no doubt provide us all with a wealth of magicules to harness, and he wanted to put that on the table in exchange for our forgiveness.

    I had no interest in this, and it was beside the point anyway. I was really starting to resent this meeting. All these procedures and formalities were eating away at the time we could spend actually talking matters over.

    Well, screw it. Lets try things my way for a sec.

    One moment! Hakuro said, apparently noticing my intentions. I believe Sir Rimuru has something to say!

    The orc general fell silent, looking straight at me. So did everyone else. I was never a fan of being the center of attention, but I couldnt exactly say so.

    Um, I began, Im gonna have to admit that Im not very good with big meetings like this. So let me just say whats on my mind right now, and maybe we can all mull that over for a little while, all right? First off, I wanna make one thing clear. I have no interest in charging the orcs with any crimes or whatever.

    I went on to exin my reasoning. Staging an invasion of the forest was, if you had to rate it on a scale of naughty or nice, pretty naughty. Whether Gelmud was using and abusing them or not, the moment they said yes to him, they were aplices. But it was also clear that the forest offered their only possible hope for survival. All the races here mightve decided to do the same thing in their shoes.

    Simply asking us to ept their presence was, I suppose, tough. It would be like asking our neighbors to hand over theirnd. Nobody would simply roll over and say yes to that, and that was doubly true for the survival-of-the-fittest types around here.

    There was no point debating over what was now firmly in the past. Right then, we needed to talk about what would happen next. We couldnt spend all day dwelling on apologies and reparations and such. Plus, I promised Geld I would take on all the orcs crimes for him. Maybe it was pushy of me, but I wanted to make sure everyone knew I was serious about that.

    That is my thought about this, I said, and Im sure you all have your own thoughts, but I see no need to punish the orcs for anything. I say this because I promised the demon lord Geld as much. I have taken on all the crimesmitted by the orcs. And if any of you have a problem with that, Id like to hear it!

    The orcs stared at me, clearly shocked.

    Benimaru, I said, ignoring them, your homnd was annihted by their hands. Do you take issue with this?

    I do not, my lord, and I doubt any of my fallenrades would. The sole, immovable rule that links all monsters together is that only the strong have the right to survive. We faced up to them without fleeing, and thus we were prepared for the worst. And, Sir Rimuru, we would never have an issue with the decisions you make.

    The other ogres nodded in agreement. Everyone appeared to be with me. I then turned to the lizardmen, but the chief spoke before I could.

    We, too, have noint with your stance. There is one thing I wish to ask, however.

    Noints? Really? I was kind of expecting some. He was more sympathetic to their plight than I thought, maybe.

    What is it?

    It is a good thing, I think, not to pursue the orcs crimes any further. We were saved by you, Sir Rimuru, and are thus in no position to make any grand promations. However, there is one thing I wish to be fully clear on

    The chief stopped and looked straight at me.

    Are you suggesting, Sir Rimuru, that we ept the entire orc poptions right to live in this forest?

    And here we go. It was an obvious question, and it came at a critical time.

    I am, I said as graciously as I could. Instantly, the meeting erupted into amotion. The orcs, shocked, discussed whether such a thing was even possible. The goblins were screaming incoherently, some foaming at the mouth. Treyni watched silently, gauging the situation with a hostile eye. Only my ogre mage friends remained undisturbed.

    Silence! Hakuro shouted, finally bringing order back to the tent after a prolonged furor. He had waited for everyone to get over their initial surprise before giving themand.

    I understand what all of you are thinking, I said, and I understand how the thought makes you nervous. And youre rightI have no idea whether its possible or not. But I think it is. Like I said, I just want you to hear me out.

    So I began talking about my idea. The vision of a Great Forest of Jura Alliance, a proposal that wouldve been dismissed as a hopeless dream at any other time.

    Even if we let every orc in the marsh off the hook right now, they were still doomed to starve. The straggler forces, left without stronger leadership, would form small raider bands thatd strike the lizardman and goblin viges before long. They had nothing to eat, no ce to live, and nothing about this conference would mean anything until we tackled that fundamental issue.

    Hence this alliance.

    The lizardmen had plentiful water and seafood resources. The goblins had living space. We had a wealth of manufactured goods. The orcs, in exchange, could provide theirbor resources.

    Their settlements would have to be spread out among us all to some extentthey numbered in the six figures, after allbut I was sure we could maintain decent lines of contact. Wed need to put some in the mountains, some in the foothills, some by the river, and some deeper in the forest. My team and I could provide technical home-building assistance, although we still wanted them to handle their own affairs otherwise. We were already short onbor in my town; we didnt have the capacity to look out for others. If anything, my ulterior motive here was to obtain more stout men to beef up our own workforce.

    Thend the ogres ruled over was now free, of course, and I figured wed build a town there sooner orter. Forestnd extended well into the nearby foothills, offering a wealth of resources to harness. Itd have to wait until my town was finished, but by then, I wanted the orcs to be proficient enough that they could build their own. Then all the dispersed orc poptions would have somece to live together again.

    Everyone in the tent listened attentively as I exined.

    That about covers it, I said. We will form a great alliance among the peoples of the Forest of Jura and build cooperative rtionships with one another. Itd be pretty neat if we built a nationposed of multiple races, I think, but

    Unlike before, the conference was now filled with a sense of excitement. The attendees enthusiasm was starting to pervade the room, as if I had just taken their anxieties and reced them with a flickering sense of hope. Shion straightened herself up, like she was presenting me as a prize, which I didnt really appreciate. I forgave her, though. It meant she was pushing her breasts against me, which was pretty nice, after all. I always have an open mind about that sort of thing.

    The orc general was slow to react. Usbuilding a town?! It is all right for us to join in this alliance?

    Not like you got anyone, or anyce, to return to, do you? Well getcha somece to live, but you gotta work, all right? No room forzy orcs around here.

    Yes, my lord! The orcs immediately stood up and took a knee, ovee with an emotion that drove tears to their eyes. Of course, of course! We will dedicate our very lives to the tasks ahead!

    The lizardman chief nodded. We have no objection. If anything, we would love to cooperate! He kneeled as well, imitating the orcs, and the goblins hurriedly took action to follow suit. Was this the rule when forming alliances here, or? I dunno.

    I attempted to copy their lead and hop down to the floor, but Shion tightened her grip on me.

    What are you trying to do, my lord?

    Huh? Oh. I thought this was a ceremony or something.

    Oh dear, Sir Rimuru. It certainly is not

    I wasnt sure why she was speaking to me like a wayward child, but I must have been embarrassing her. And the ogres, judging by the looks they shot at me. She stood up, ced me on a chairand then fell to one knee before me, apanied by Benimaru and the rest.

    Very good, Treyni said. As a warden of the forest, I, Treyni, make the following deration. I hereby recognize Sir Rimuru as the new leader of the Forest of Jura, and the Great Forest of Jura Alliance hereby established under his good name!

    Then she kneeled, too. I guess she had word from the treants that they were all for it.

    Um, can you give me a moment, guys? Why am I suddenly the dude whos supposed to run all this crap? Because I dont remember any discussions along those lines. Whyd it turn out this way? I wanted to ask, but my voice was cut off by all the passionate eyes fixated upon me.

    All right. I get it, guys

    I knew the fate of the orcs rested on my shoulders anyway. Leader of the forest? Whatever. Ill take it.

    Well, so be it, I said, resigned to my fate. Do me proud, guys. Everyone took that cue to prostrate themselves before me.

    Yes, my lord!!

    The sheer fervor was as clearly present in all their voices as it clearly wasnt in mine. The Great Forest of Jura Alliance was born, and already it was making me break out in a cold sweat.

    Uh, guys? We still have a problem, right? Like, a really big, bothersome problem? I hate to rain on the party, but wed better get to talking about that, yeah?

    Right, thats enough, I said. So now that we have this alliance in ce, we need to solve thergest problem facing us right nowthe question of food supply. We have 150,000 surviving orcs here, and we need to keep them from starving to death. Id like some ideas, please?

    The orcs had less than two weeks worth of provisions on them, overall. Now that the unique skill Ravenous was no longer doing its thing on them, theyd be well and truly dead once these supplies were exhausted. We had no time to raise crops for them, and wed exhaust the river of fish if we tried going that route.

    It was a real thorny issue. The lizardmen had enough supplies for ten thousand people to live off for half a year. Even if they cleared all their storehouses right this instant, it still wouldnt keep the orcs going for more than a couple weeks. That meant our maximum time limit was just about a month.

    So now what?

    Everyone in the tent turned their minds to the issue. Nobody seemed to be acting like it wasnt their problem, which ddened me a bit. Maybe this alliance would work out after all.

    Then Treyni stepped up, smiling. So the issue is ack of food supply? she asked. In that case, I think I might be able to help. The treants that I help protect have agreed to join this alliance, and I think they mighte in handy sooner than I thought.

    So they were interested, then? Well, great. And if they were that enthusiastic about handling the food issue, let them, Id say. Not like we had any other great ideas.

    With all our most pressing issues covered, we ended the conference.

    And that was the day my name was first written down in the annals of history.

    The day our great alliance was formed was one which, I suppose, no monster would ever be able to forget. It was, after all, the day I decided that each and every one needed a name.

    Which, yes, I said I would, and I was super-cool about it.

    But why were they counting on me toe up with all those names? I mean, yeesh, a hundred-fifty thousand orcs alone. Insane. It took me three days toe up with five hundred goblin names, guys! I couldnt imagine how long itd take to handle this job.

    I gave serious thought to simply up and running away this time, but I still had all those orcish crimes to gobble up for them.

    Orcs were D-ranked monsters by nature, but they were more like C-plus while the orc lord was still influencing them. So basically, this was just a matter of me taking in the magicules lost to the air after Gelds defeat and breathing them back into each one. That way, I could name them all without exhausting myself in the process.

    The problem I had, though, was what the names should be. Simply going down the alphabet wouldnt save me this time. Maybe I could divide them by race or start giving outst names or something, but managing all that would be even more of a hassle.

    In the end, the solution I came up with was as simple as it was beautiful. The perfect series, one that I could extend for as long as necessary, all the way to infinity.

    Thats right: Numbers. It was a little like assigning an ID number back in my home world, but damn , did it make things easier for me.

    So I had all the orcs in the marsh stand in neat lines before me. I was worried they might resent being given such unfashionable names without any right to say no, but the magic they had lost could directly lead to their deaths. They might decide to take matters into their own hands if it came to that, and then the vige raids would begin.

    The cause of this confusion was the orcs numbers. There were too many, in other words, and naming them would help with that, too. Evolving into a higher-level monster would do a lot to lower their reproductive rate, something I saw for myself with the hobgobs.

    Now was no time for me to moan about my responsibilities. As Benimaru said, they always had the right not to be named if they didnt want to. I spread the word, since itd certainly save me some time, but not a single one took me up on the offer. So much for that.

    And so the ordeal began. I decided to start by assigning a basic sort of tribal name to each one. I devised ten of these: Mountain, Valley, Hill, Cavern, Ocean, River, Lake, Forest, Grasnd, and Desert. If you were part of the Mountain tribe, your name would be along the lines of Mountain-1M if male, Mountain-1F if female, and wed just go from there.

    What about the generations toe, then? Like I gave a crap. The first son born among the Mountain tribe could be Mountain-1-1M for all I cared. Simple. Though maybe itd be nice to offer enough leeway for middle names and real wordbased titles. I had a feeling things might fall apart a bit if two orcs from different tribes had a kid, too. But, hell, let them worry about that. I didnt care.

    And so I consumed some magic lost from each orc and used it to name each one in session. They were already lined up by tribe, males and females separated, so things actually went pretty quickly. It still took time, but I no longer had to think up fancy names, so at least it was efficient. Wherever each orc was among the lines they formed, those were their names. It didnt matter to me how each orc rted to the next. If they didnt mind, I sure didnt.

    So we breezed along; I gave the names and one member from each tribe wrote them all down in a ledger, just in case anyone forgot their own. That turned out not to be a problem in the leastit was that special for them all to finally be granted a name of their own. Having part of someones soul infusing the name youre given must make a lot of difference.

    The naming process continued anon. Once I got in the swing of things, it took maybe five seconds per orc, although I still lost time here and there. It was going to take a grand total of ten days and ten nights to wrap it all up. I had the Sage to thank for letting me pull that feat off, but I had a feeling that Id never want to look at a number again for a good while toe.

    Of course, while I was busy naming a small citys worth of orcs, my ogre mages werent just screwing around. They were on their way to the treant settlement, guided by Treyni. I had left procuring our food supply to them, although privately, I had my concerns about how theyde up with enough.

    Treants were monsters that lived off water, sunlight, air, and magic. They didnt need food in the first ce. But they did produce fruit from the magic they didnt need, which were beyond the reach of mosttreants couldnt set foot nor root outside of their own sanctuary, so they simply collected and stored the fruit on-site.

    These were magical fruits, of course, and when dehydrated, they would never go bad. People called these dried treants , and as I found outter, they were considered rare delicacies on the public market, going for oundish prices among foodies and the like. Considering how treants almost never connected to the outside world, you just didnt see them all that much. But rarity alone didnt dictate the pricesdried treants were packed with an intense amount of magical energy, enough to keep you alive and well for seven days at a time without even feeling hungry. A condensed drop of manna from heaven, in other words.

    It was these dried treants that we were apparently going to receive a bountiful supply of, helping the orcs stave off starvation.

    I wasnt too worried about the transport process. Keeping up proper supply routes was always the thorniest part of waging war; starving the soldiers on the front lines quickly spelled total defeat. They needed to be fed, and that was always a logistical challengebut these fruits didnt take up much space at all.

    The real problem was transport time, and the tempest wolves were ready to help with thator to be exact, the starwolves evolved from them. As a newly minted tempest starwolf and leader of his pack, Ranga was able to evolve all the other wolves in his pack to regr nontempest starwolf status. Each one was ranked around B, making them high-level magical beasts, and while we still only had a hundred, I had a feeling wed be caring for more soon.

    As part of his newfound skills, Ranga was able to summon something he called a Star Leader, an A-minusmander wolf that would serve as his representative during the transport effort. His take on Replication, I supposed; he could summon and dispel it at will. Geez, Ranga, you really dont want to leave my shadow, huh? Ah whatever.

    It was worth mentioning that all the starwolves were now capable of Shadow Motioning themselves around. Not at the near-lightning speeds that Soei and Ranga could manage, but still far quicker than their feet could take them. That was the neat thing about Shadow Motion; it always brought you to your destination in a straight line, ignoring all obstacles in between. As a rule of thumb, the starwolves could traverse this straight line at around twice their regr speed.

    With their enhanced strength, the starwolves would load up with the food at the treant settlement and bring it back. A regr caravan would take over two months to traverse the roundabout path one way; with them, they could do a round trip in one day. Crazy. Wed need to build arger cart-essible highway sometime, but at least that wasnt a problem for now.

    One little snag: The wolves hobgoblin riders couldnt apany them, since they could only remain in Shadow Motion space for as long as they could hold their breath. Itd be nice if they could be trained to fix that, somehow, but in the meantime they were helping me with the whole orc-naming process. I definitely didnt want them idle while I was going through this ten-day-long ordeal.

    Either way, we finally had a nice, clean solution to the most present problem facing us. I was satisfied.

    Ten dayster, I limped my way to the finish line. I could see nothing but numbers dancing in my head by the end, but the feeling of achievement was like nothing else. I mean, were talking 150,000 here, you know? Think about even counting that high, and you can get an idea of how much torture it had been.

    By the time I had wrapped it up, they were already starting to distribute our new food supply. Fifty pieces of dried treant per person. Each one somberly epted their ration, fully cognizant that losing it meant death.

    The naming process had evolved each orc into a high orc. I didnt use any of my own magic for it, so they didnt need to see me as their ruler or anything. They entered the alliance under their own free will, and I could only hope that we remained on sunny terms.

    In terms of monster strength, they had gone down from their former Ravenous-driven C-plus rank to around a Cwhich was still better than D, so Im sure there were noints. Their intelligence had undergone a nice upgrade, too, and they had retained all their intrinsic abilities. The evolution, in other words, had made them far more adaptable to a variety of new environments.

    Each of the tribes thanked me in turn and set off for their new homes, guided by a squad of ten goblin riders. We were nning to send tents and other supplies once they reached the area of their choice, along with technical instruction so they could build their own settlements. It wouldnt happen overnight, but wherever they settled down, I was sure theyd have better lives than before, at least.

    Treyni was sending notice to the races that lived near the areas where we were nning to have the orcs set up shop. She could teleport around magically, too, pretty much, so the notification process apparently went quickly. Nobody would be willing to turn down the request of a dryad (whatever they thought about it internally), so I hoped no major problems cropped up. We had deliberately chosen areas that werent popted by intelligent races, so I figured wed be fine, but you never know.

    Soon, the high orcs set off on the road to their new lives.

    But we werent done yet. I turned toward the several thousand remaining souls.

    It seemed that the orc general, along with the high orcs who directly served him, were insisting upon working directly under mymand. I said yes, as reluctant as I was. I did need some spare hands to handle the work around there, and we were still chronically short on people to build the town. They wouldnt number enough to put a major dent in our food supplies, either.

    So I didnt need to think too much about my decision, even though it meant a lot more people answering to me. Around two thousand, in factthe remainder of the elite orc corps, numbering two thousand or so, decked out in their ck full-te armor. Their strength mustve been what helped them survive this long.

    If they were going to be my elite guard of sorts, I couldnt very well put them in the same naming series as the rest. But if not, what, then? Given the yellow auras they emitted, I figured Id name their tribe after that color instead.

    Through the lens of Analyze and Assesslike Shuna, I could use it to analyze people to some extent via my eyes aloneI sized up the elite guard, then lined them up in the order I decided on. I then gave them numbers from strongest to weakest, without dividing them by gender.

    Such was the birth of what wouldter be called the Yellow Numbers.

    That left only the orc general to tackle. I had a feeling Id have to contribute some magic of my own into this one. Fortunately, I already had a name picked out. Hopefully hed be able to pick up where the previous orc lord left off.

    I hereby dere that you shall inherit the will of the Orc Disaster. You shall be called Geld from now on!

    Yes, sir!!

    Our eyes met. His overflowed with tears. And the moment I gave the name, the orc generals body was wrapped in a yellow aura as he began to evolve. At the same time, I could feel the magic flowing out of me. Oh crap. Not that much

    Once more, I was back in sleep mode.

    I have taken the wrong path. But I am happy now. In the end, I was fulfilled.

    Lord Geld, II will take your name, and your will. May you rest in peace.

    Indeed. There is no need for you to suffer any longer. You did not warn your father, and no one will me you for that. I am here precisely because he survived, back then. And your crimes will disappear as well.

    Yes, my lord. By the name I have taken up, I swear to protect the one who has taken all our sins for himself.

    Indeed I trust you will.

    All the magic I put into that sent me into a deep sleep again. I suppose the exact level of consciousness I retained depended on how much magic I spent.

    I felt like I had some kind of weird dream, but I couldnt remember what it was. Youd think I wouldI dont need to sleep any longer, so any dream was bound to be pretty valuable. Couldnt do much about it then, though.

    I awoke to a situation that I probably should have expected by now. There were two thousand soldiers in front of me, now high orcs. Still ranked C-plus, since they were stronger than the rabble, I guess.

    Geld, though

    My loyalty is forever yours, my lord!! he shouted as I groggily tried to get it together. I cursed him for being so damn ceremonious about everything.

    Lets see. He had evolved into Whoa, an orc king? Thats pretty much the same level as an orc lord, isnt it? Hmm. About what I figured. They were functionally identical, but Geld wasnt as creepy.

    He had also gained the unique skill Gourmet, which granted him abilities like Stomach, Receive, and Provide. Thetter two were restricted to his own race, but apparently all two thousand of his troops had ess to that Stomach. Maybe they could use that to transport supplies to faraway ces? What a goofy skill. It could turn the entire transit industry on its side, to say nothing of military supply lines. The only limitation was volume, not type of item. It could store about as much as I could, but it couldnt hold anything too bigin other words, about the size of an orc itself. A suit of armor was about all it could take in at once. (My Stomach had no such limitation.)

    The ability to make his men consume the corpses of theirrades was gone, thankfully. No need any longer, I imagined. Not much point retaining a skill if the user didnt want it, besides. The magical energy in him had also ballooned to the point where he was easily an A rank on the level of Benimaru.

    Overall, if the demon lord Geld hadnt lost his mind, he probably wouldve wound up turning into a magic-born person like this, abination of reasoned intelligence and overwhelming presence. I was d to have more powerful people on my side, but would it really pay for him to follow someone like me? I reminded him that this wasnt exactly a sried position, but Geld simply smiled and said that was no problem.

    Well, if he said so. Id feed and clothe him, at least. And if he decided to strike down his own pathter, that was fine. I kinda doubted he ever would, though.

    Thus, the Grand Naming Project ended.

    Before I took my leave, I decided to wish the lizardman chief a fond good-bye.

    Hey. Sorry we never really got a chance to talk amid all this nonsense. Hope we can keep this ship sailing smoothly, huh, Chief?

    Ah, hello there, Sir Rimuru! Theres no need to call me Chief like that. It puts me on edge to hear it from you! he eximed in surprise.

    I knew the monsters had other ways of identifying themselves, but I wasnt delicate enough to pick up on that junk. His not having a name really annoyed me.

    Well, yeah, but I know. Youre Gabils father, right? Why dont you try calling yourself Abil, or something?

    I always had a tendency to blurt out whatever was on my mind like that.

    What?! he eximed, half in shock.

    And so, in the midst of a little friendly chitchat, it came to pass that I named the lord of all the lizardmen who walked the earth. Not every lizardman who existedugh, nothing that big again. Just the chief, I figured, and maybe otherster, as kind of a reward for their exploits in battle or whatever.

    That I inadvertently transformed him into a dragonewt just because he didnt like Chief, well, whoda thunk?

    Everything was now well and truly wrapped up. Only about three weeks had passed, but I felt like I was now a battle-hardened veteran. Really, Im pretty sure I fought harder than anybody else in the marshes. These death matches were really trying on a body.

    Lets just go home and rx a bit.

    Gabil was marched up to his fatherAbil, the chief.

    He had been hauled off to jail the moment the battle had ended, given one morning meal and one evening meal a day, and otherwise nobody said anything to him. That had continued for two weeks straight. His crime of rebellion was obvious to all, and he had epted this punishment withoutint. He had had the best of intentions when he did the deed, but the results had almost brought the lizardmen to the brink of extinction.

    This was all his fault. He recognized that, and he could neither make excuses for it nor intended to. He figured he would receive the death penalty, and the thought did not particrly bother him.

    But when he closed his eyes, he could remember the incident. It was more shocking to him than anything; and it made the betrayal of the one who believed in him seem like a petty detail byparison.

    It was the magic-born disguised as a human beingpletely dominating him, and then taking on the demon lord himself. Even now, he could perfectly recall the sweet little child, his silvery hair flowing in the wind. It almost moved Gabil to tears, the sight of this creature standing strong to protect him. Any pain and anger he felt at Gelmud for turning his back on him was immediately whisked away.

    All that Gabil had left was his near-worshipful adtion for this creature. But what was even more shocking was the way he then transformed into a slime. The very slime he had dismissed as a low-level piece of garbage. Thats rightlow level. He was, but he wasnt, too. That slime was special. Not in a unique or a named way. Even more special than that.

    If he ever got the chance, Gabil wanted to ask: Why did you help me? This slime named Rimuru had no reason to rescue this worthless,pletely bamboozled lizardman, this utter buffoon. It was the one thing Gabil thought about for those two weeks.

    Now he was in front of the chief. He turned his face upward, finding it hard against the heavy atmosphere surrounding him. His father stood there like a grand boulder, and his eyes opened wide. The chief was brimming with youth, such was his newfound strength.

    Despite his fathers power, Gabil dared to defy him just because he had a name and his father didnt. He realized his eyes had deceived him all along, and now he mourned that fact.

    His father seemed far stronger than he remembered. It didnt seem possible. Gabil looked up, locking eyes with him, though the chief betrayed no emotion.

    One look at his cold, calcting eyes was all Gabil needed.

    Ahh Hell put me to death

    The leader of the herd must never show any weakness. He must retain discipline at all times, or else he would set a terrible example for the rest. But Gabil didnt mind this. Those were the rules, and the rules were set in stone.

    The chief opened his mouth.

    It is time for your verdict! Gabil, you are hereby expelled from our caverns. You may never call yourself a lizardman again, and you are forbidden from ever returning here. Leave us at once!

    Huh?

    Whatdid he say?

    He was taken by his fathers royal guard and shoved outside the caverns, tossed out on his rear.

    You forgot this, the chief said from behind the entrance as they left, throwing something at Gabil. Take it!

    It was a long, thin object, wrapped in cloth, that was part of his belongings. When he picked it up, the weight immediately told him what it was: the Vortex Spear, a magic weapon and one of the lizardmens greatest treasures.

    Tears fell from Gabils eyes. He turned to his father as he tried to say something. But nothing came out. He was no longer part of them.

    Instead, he saluted his father, face filled with solemn emotion. And as he hung his head, Gabil almost thought he heard his fathers voice:

    Gabil, as long as I, Abil, am still healthy, the lizardmen will be safe. You may live as you please from now onbut whatever you do, you must put every fiber of your body into it. Remember this well

    Y-yes, my lord! I will be a fighter worthy enough to gain your praise, as I serve underneath our savior.

    With this unspoken reply, Gabil turned and walked away, straight ahead, without another word. He still felt lost, but he had resolve in his heart, as he began to walk the path only he could take.

    After a while, Gabils way was blocked by a familiar-looking settlement.

    We were awaiting you, Sir Gabil!

    It was the hundred knights under Gabils directmand.

    Wh-what are you all doing here?! I have been exiled from our people!

    It doesnt matter, sir. We are here to serve none but Sir Gabil. If you have been exiled, then so have we!

    The rest smiled and cheered their agreement.

    What fools , Gabil thought. The tears almost flowed from his eyes again; he just barely kept them in. Now was no time for crying. He tried to summon up all the dignity, all the majesty he inherited from his father, letting out a heartyugh.

    Ah, you people are incorrigible! Very well, then. Follow me!

    And so Gabil walked ahead with his peoplewith confidence, where none existed before.

    It would take another month before the small force met with Rimuru again.

 Volume 2 - Ch 8

    FINAL CHAPTER

    A RELAXING SPOT

    I was resting in my room.

    Over three months had passed since I returned. All kinds of things had happened since, but I was taking a moment to reflect on all the chaos of a time gone by.

    After I left Abil behind, I decided to exercise my Shadow Motion skills and head home first. It turned out to be pretty useful, whisking me back far more quickly than expected.

    I was quickly mobbed by townspeople awaiting good news, so I made sure to tell them everyone was safe, going into further detail with those who were interested.

    Once they learned the town would have a few new members soon, people immediately set to work. Their anxieties were gone as they got down to business setting up beds for the uing move in. Nobody voiced anyints as they prepared the town.

    It wasnt long before Benimaru and his kindred returned. They were soon joined by the goblin riders who guided the high orcs across the forest for me. Like the rest, they too settled back to their posts, back to the old routine.

    The town wasing together at breakneck speed.

    The high orcs, who had reached town in less than a months time, had learned their jobs in a sh, guided by the dwarves and the better-trained goblins. Train em well enough, Kaijin told me, and they could form a corps of engineers as strong as what the dwarves have!

    With all this newbor, we were able to tackle jobs that had been shunted to the wayside before. The town experienced a construction boom, fueled by a steady stream of resources entering and leaving the area. We had dismantled the tents we no longer needed, sending them off to the orc settlements. The goblin riders mustve done their jobs welleach of the orc tribes took root in their newnds, crafting the fundamentals needed for life. The journeys they took between our town and their homnds kept them in contact with us, as they helped ferry the needed materials back and forth.

    We were in the midst of a true trade systemone where each settlement sent their specialty products to us, and we replied in kind. It wasnt much evolved from the barter systems of ancient times, but the orcs were actually thinking and taking action for themselves, which I loved seeing. They were in no shape forrge-scale agriculture yet, but I was sure it would happen before long.

    Speaking of that, while we didnt have many types to work with yet, we had managed to grow some pretty hardy potatoes, capable of growing even in harsh environments. They were fairly nutritious, and as long as you werent too picky, they could be the staple of anyones diet. We spread these nts around, teaching the high orcs how to cultivate them. And who knew? Maybe theyd be able to sustain themselves in two years or so.

    Geld was a huge help in moving those tents and nts around. The Stomach that his Gourmet unique skill provided was perfectly suited for small-scale resource transfers. The forwarding service he offered quickly became a vital part of the transitwork we were building between the high-orc settlements.

    His Stomach had a lot of restrictions associated with it, but it was still almost like cheating at life. And Geld himself was helping transportrger objects that his Stomach couldnt, er, stomach. Whatever we could take apart and fit in there, following his instructions and suggestions, we did. That did the job perfectly for things like tents and bulkier materials.

    The starwolves did their part, too. They roamed thends, making the most of their Shadow Motion, and even inspired Geld to train himself to withstand the skills rigors. It didnt take him long, with the kind of dedication he showed to all his work, and while he couldnt trigger Shadow Motion himself, he could hop on a starwolf and have them take care of the jump for him.

    After that, things went fast. A delivery run to the mountain areas that took several months on foot could now be finished in a round trip of twenty-four hours. It helped all the settlements stay closer in contact with us than evera kind of express mail, maybe. I was even able to write some content on wooden boards and send them to each orc colony, like a sort of neighborhood circr. Nobody else was exactly literate yet, so I didnt want to rely on that too much for now. Wed need to work on that, too. Thought Communication only worked at so much of a distance.

    Still, we now had solid links between all the settlements. Life was starting to be more stable. And time passed.

    Along the way, a group of goblins had arrived, bringing their vassals along. I might as well name these guys, too , I thought. I was the one who told them all not to look down on other races, after all, and I had to live up to that. If I merely let them live there without taking that extra step, I risked creating a ss-based society.

    These guys had kind of a greenish tone to their skin, so I decided to go with Green-[insert number here]. All that naming, though Yeesh. Maybe Gelmuds Death March was doing its work on me after all, dyed-action style. Scary guy.

    The gang wouldtere to be known as the Green Numbers. Together with the Yellow Numbers, they would form the twin walls of our alliances main defense force, but that was still well in the future.

    Once I waspletely burned out from number assigning yet again, we finally had enough homes in town for all the monsters to live in. The goblins would have to live in groups within dormitory-style buildings, but it still beat the tents.

    We had set up a water and sewer system pretty early on, but we had nowhere near the resources required to bring water to everyones houses. Instead, we had well pumps throughout the town, which made the whole ce seem a lot more culturally advanced than before.

    Having real flush toilets was incredible, too. You still had to fetch water from a well and fill up the toilet tank yourself, but we were a town of overpowered, muscle-bound monsters, so it was no big deal. After all, I didnt want this town stinking of excrement here and therethat was one must I refused to give up.

    Plus, some of em didnt even generate any crap to flush anyway. Me, for example.

    We still had a lot of things on the back burner, but I supposed we had time. We had a town to build, and it was never gonna happen overnight.

    So despite all the nuttiness, things wereing together. Right here, in thisnd, there lived over ten thousand monsters, gathered here because they believed in what I was doing, all working together to make it a better ce.

    They saw this as a ce of peace. Our ce of peace. A true town of monsters. And it was finally here.

 Volume 2 - Epilogue

    AFTERWORD

    This is Fuse. Good to see youfor the first time, or not.

    Im once again tasked to write an afterword for this book, so I thought a bit about what I should write. Im the kind of person who likes reading the afterword first, and there are times when Imit to buying a book based on what I see there. I mean, its rare for me to decide against a purchase because of that, but there are at least a few times when the afterword made me think Yeah, lets go with this!

    So even though this is just the second afterword Ive ever written, the process is already starting to make me nervous.

    This second volume is a revised edition of the original web version, with a bunch of rewrites and additions to cover things that didnt get enough attention online. I was nning to write a bonus chapter for this volume as well, but we wound up adding so much to the main text that we ran out of pages and I had to give up on it.

    The story still uses the web version as a base, diving even deeper into the story than ever before and even going inpletely different directions. How did you like it? If youre familiar with the original, hopefully youll see it as a much deeper tale than before. Itd be nice if I managed that, at least.

    Speaking of that, I have now officiallypleted the web version of That Time I Got Reincarnated as a Slime . I have a few ideas for extra content and side stories to tackle, but either way, its done. Now its time to work on the published editions, and I hope to continue receiving your support as I wend my way through this!

 Volume 3 - Prologue

    PROLOGUE

    THE DEMON LORD SUMMIT

    It was a vast, gorgeously designed chamber, the floor covered in a luxuriant carpet that must have taken a team of artisans several years to weave.

    The table in the middle featured wood carved from a fragrant tree, providing a pleasant, woodsy smell. It wasrge, round, and couldfortably seat a dozen or sobut despite the size of the room, only three chairs were ced around it. They were all the height of luxury, of course, the sort that even higher-end nobility would have difficulty procuring.

    One wall featured a mural of a fantastical scenebut was it really a mural? The elegant, deliberate artwork for the otherworldly creatures on it almost made it seem like they stirred slightly in their poses, from time to time. It was as if they could leap out from the wall and manifest themselves in this world at any moment. Which made senseit was all the work of Bismarck, one of the great artists of the demon lordcontrolled realms. He specialized in creating so-called Artifacts, visual masterpieces that were so realistic, it was as if his brush literally trapped these mythical beasts in a living state on the wall.

    Selling even one of the items that adorned this room would allow someone to live like nobility for a decade or so. Such was the quality instilled into each piece, enough to overwhelm anyone that walked into the chamber. But even as it did, the sort of person to visit this ce knew the power of moneythey had enough to buy any high-grade magic weapon they wanted or hire the best mercenaries in thend. They reveled in the assets they held, and a room like this was meant less to impress and more to rob the visitor of any desire to resist the will of their host.

    That was the role of this chamber, but the invitees assembling in the space in a few moments were not the type to be fazed by such public disys of wealth.

    This room was owned by a handsome man. He was thin, slender, and his eyes exuded intelligence even as they suggested he was rather high-strung. Even so, the demon lord yman had the force of will to make almost anyone follow his orders.

    His eyes slid across the room before he gave a satisfied nod and sat upon one of the chairs provided. There was a mask on the table with a smile molded on it; he picked it up, ran a hand across it lovingly, and ced it carefully away in a pocket. Every movement betrayed the methodical approach he took to all aspects of his life.

    He knew that his guests would being soon. Demon lords, the same rank as himself. And ymans goal today was to rein in these self-willed, wayward creatures, showing them enough of an enjoyable time to bring them under his full control. He had selected an ostentatious-looking white dress suit for the asion, and now he was checking the time on his pocket watch.

    Just as he thought that the appointed hour was near, he suddenly realized that someone was upying another seat.

    Yo, yman. Gelmud doin well for you?

    He had his legs crossed as he calmly leaned hisrge, muscr frame back into his seat and casually engaged yman. But every move of his was just as supple and elegant as ymans. This was no muscle-bound dolthe presented the air of a battle-proven military hero. His own formal outfit was obviously a tad worn, but it didnt make him seem unclean at all. If anything, it emphasized his wild side, building an atmosphere that made one hesitate more than a little to go near him.

    His unrefined manner of speech would seem to be a poor match for that, but it only served to make the man all the more charming. His well-maintained short blond hair, meanwhile, paired perfectly with the masculine contours of his face. His sharp, hawk-like eyes were burrowing into ymanhe was keenly focused, perhaps out of distrust for his fellow demon lord.

    Carillon? yman asked. Youre early, eh? I was nning to brief you on that today, actually. Certainly wasnt expecting you to arrive first, though.

    The man called Carillon shrugged. No need for that treatment, now. Im sure our littledy is busy with her own preparations, he said with a smirk.

    Carillon was, indeed, a demon lordperhaps more often referred to as the Beast Master, thanks to being king and leader of the lycanthrope race.

    Heh. Lady, now, is it? Hmm Yes, maybe so. Ah, but wed better not say any more of her for now. After all

    Shes rather sensitive to people bad-mouthing her, yes.

    The two gave each other a look, exchanging a slightugh. Just as they stopped, the door to the chamber was suddenly thrown open. A single young woman stood there, looking around the room for a moment before realizing only yman and Carillon were there.

    Were you guys just spreading rumors about me?

    She was young, very young, oddly so for someone participating in a summit like this. Fourteen or fifteen, perhaps, and while appearances were often deceiving for magic-born people like her, she looked woefully out of ce.

    There was a brace on her right shoulder, shaped somewhat like a dragons w. But not on it, exactlyit was actually floating in the air, leaving a slight gap between it and her body. Said body was, for the most part, barely clothedjust a loincloth and pair of undergarments made of thin cloth, along with a chest piece to cover the faintest suggestion of a still-developing pair of breasts. Whether meant for ease of movement or some other purpose, it exposed as much skin as the typical swimsuit would.

    Herrge, strong-willed eyes shone blue, even as they revealed a bit of the immature youth left in her. The strength in them proved to the other two that this was no woman to be trifled with. Her tinum-pink hair was tied into two flowing pigtails on either side of her head, and there was a bold, dominant smile on her face. Jutting her modest chest outward, she red at the demon lords she shared the chamber with.

    Yo, Milim! Carillon said with a heartyugh. No, no rumors. Youre usually so punctual with these things, is all. We were worried about you!

    Exactly, Milim, yman added as he elegantly ferried a cup of tea to his lips. Of course, I would never worry about you, myself.

    They were both used to her, enough that they knew making bald-faced excuses was pointless. It would just rile Milim up even more. Instead they took pains to rx their approach, ensuring they prodded her no further. The two shared a slight sense of nervousness with each other over her, and nervousness was what it clearly was.

    There was a reason for this: Despite her looks, Milim was powerful. This sweet young demon lord, Milim Nava, was a member of the dragonoid raceone that bore the simple but effective nickname of Destroyer.

    With an annoyed sniff, she gave Carillon, then yman a dirty look. Well, so be it, she muttered when neither reacted. In the next moment, she was sauntering into the chamberand someone else was behind her. A harpyone withrge, eagle-like wings.

    Well, well, Milim, yman admonished, eyebrows arched downward. I believe Ive made it clear that none besides demon lords are allowed in here. Im afraid I cant allow you to have your attendant apany you inside. Even for you, there are certain rules that have to be

    It is good to see you again, yman, came the dejected reply. I am not Milims attendant. Im not here because I want to be, but if its a demon lord you want, then its a demon lord you have.

    The harpy stood strong, not at all cowed by the powerful beings before her. She looked like a graceful woman, but anyone near her would immediately pick up on the unnervingly substantial aura that she exuded at all times.

    She was, after all, a demon lord herself

    Whoa, what are you doing here, Frey?

    Frey the Sky Queen, ruler of the harpy race. Just like yman, Carillon, and Milim, she was one of the pirs of strength that supported the entire world they lived in.

    Hello, Carillon. And yes, you are correct. I had turned down the invitation because I was busy, but Milimwell, you know

    Ha-ha-ha-ha! Oh, whats the big problem? She was acting all moody and grumpy about something, so I brought her over to let off some steam. You dont have a problem with that, do you, yman?

    No, not if that is the case

    This was the Milim that yman kneweternally pushing her own desires on other people. But there was no reason to openly defy her. In fact, the optimist in him saw this as something to be weed. Once he told everyone about how his efforts with Gelmud were aplete failure, he was sure Milim would suddenly be quite a bit less cheerful. Frey should help smooth things over a little once he had to drop the bomb.

    So yman began to devise a new strategy.

    Well? Can we have another chair for Frey, please?

    yman nodded at Milims order. With a flick of a finger, a chair materialized where none was beforea perfect match for its surroundings, as if it had always been there and everyone just failed to notice. Milim and Frey each took their seats, sensing nothing unusual about this.

    There were four demon lords assembled around the table. Now it was time for yman, the Marite Master himself, to flex his muscles a bit. He had a gift for controlling people, making them do whatever he liked, and now there was the hint of a smile on his face as he began to speak.

    The demon lord summit had begun.

    yman opted to kick things off with a in and frank rundown of events. Gelmud was dead, killed by someone or other, and his n had failed.

    That bastard wanted things to go too quickly for his own safety, hmm? Carillon offered. Even if Veldora is gone, was there any need to move this operation up, really?

    You may say that, Carillon, but mayhem was bound to result sooner orter with Veldora, the supreme ruler of the forest, out of the picture. If a promising new seedling was fated to be plucked from the ground, wouldnt it be far more satisfying for all of us if we were the ones who controlled that fate?

    This made sense to therge man. With all the assorted influential races calling the forest home, there was never any guarantee that their own pawns would win the match. They also knew that actively cultivating an orc lord gave them the greatest possibility of victory.

    Another among them, however, was more dubious.

    What?! So what happened to making the orc lord into a demon lord next?

    What Im saying, Milim, is that were back to the drawing board on that. We needed Gelmud to control the orc lord, and now he is dead.

    It hurt yman just as deeply to abandon this strategy. But as long as nobody noticed the connection between him and Gelmud, he would never hear about itter. At this point, the idea of hatching a new n to handle either the orc lord or the magic-bornswhichever had survivedsounded far more interesting to him. And if he could interest the other demon lords in it, he could use that to add another effective card or two to his hand.

    Carillon sat silently, eyes closed, as he listened on. He must have his opinions, yman knew, but was apparently ready to listen to the entire story before making a final judgment. He was much more careful about these matters than the short-tempered Milim was.

    And it turned out, much more prudent.

    But thats so boring! And here I thought wed have a new toy to y with before long. And remember all that bragging that bum Gelmud gave us, once upon a time? Too bad he turned out to be such a profound dolt, isnt it?!

    Now, now, Milim, no need for such anger. yman hasnt finished his story yet. Why not wait until then before you shout at him?

    Just as yman expected, the sad news was enough to make Milim seethe at him. He was expecting to expend a great deal of effort soothing her from now on, but Frey seemed to be doing a good job at it. It came as a relief.

    Thank the heavens she brought Frey along with her, he thought, maintaining a breezy smile the whole time. And he meant it. As her Destroyer nickname implied, once Milim broke into a violent spree, there was no containing her. It would require yman to expend his full energies in responseand by that point, any dream he had of manipting these demon lords without a fight would be lost. Milims behavior was easy to predict, at least, which meant he could steer her. But to yman, she was a double-edged sword. Steer her in the wrong direction, and he knew hed face the brunt of the fallout.

    At least Milim bringing along her own tranquilizer in the form of Frey should make things much smoother for him. Plus, not only did she have no hand (or wing) in this operation, but she seemed to have no interest in it at all. That was key. Any other demon lord wouldve demanded a detailed rundown of the n, from start to finish. Frey, meanwhile, was much more cooperative.

    Milim, yman said, I feel Frey is correct. Take a look at these first.

    He took out four spherical crystals, an eerie light burning in his eyes. His lips curled into a smile, anticipating how this would astound his fellow demon lords. Then he projected images into all four spheres, watching their reactions carefully as he did. Just as he thought, they were all enthralled by what they saw. The final crystal in particrshowing Gelmuds perspectivecaptured theirplete attention.

    Very impressive indeed, Gelmud, leaving these fancy baubles behind for us! Milim happily shouted, voice booming across the room. The images left no clue about the orc lords final fate, but the way they suddenly cut off indicated to them all that Gelmud was gone.

    All right. So this means Gelmud screwed up and got himself killed, yeah? Just like you said. But you didnt tell us about these magic-born on purpose, eh?

    yman nodded at Carillons observation. Fascinating, isnt it? And with Gelmud dead, there is no telling what maye after. But with all these high-level members of the magic-born races in one ce, I feel it is safe to say the orc lord met his match, too. However

    However, Frey interrupted, if he survived, he totally evolved into a demon lord, right?

    She had taken the words right out of his mouth. yman knew she couldnt have known about the n, but she was intelligent enough to guess most of it.

    Well done, Frey  I must be careful around you, unlike these two si m pleton warriors.

    He eyed Frey carefully, squinting a little. She acted distant, unaffected, but she was looking into a crystal sphere, as if pondering something. He couldnt tell what was going through her mind, but it was clear she was no longer annoyed at Milim forcing her to tag along.

    This is a threat  but Frey looks like she has her own troubles to consider. She actedpletely uninterested a moment ago, but now

    Now Frey was starting to interest him. As far as their positions went, yman was rightshe was more of a tactical leader than an on-the-battlefield fighter. Controlling her would be far from simple. She was too smart to be deceived that easily. But if whatever troubled her could be used to exploit some weakness A new and sinister n quietly unfolded deep in his mind.

    Okay, so what now? You want one of us to go down and check it out?

    Ha-ha-ha-ha! Firste, first served, is it?

    Firste, first served for what, Milim? yman interrupted. Figuring out what to do with the magic-born had toe first. He turned his thoughts elsewhere. I doubt you would be satisfied simply with observing the scene, hmm? Everyone, calm down for a moment. We are dealing with the Forest of Jura, a region that is strictly off-limits.

    Oh? Whats that matter? Its not like were actually doing anything in there. You just want to hop on over and scout out any magic-born who look decent enough to join our team, dontcha? Though whos to say what kind of unfortunate idents may befall anyone who refuses. Ha-ha-ha-ha!

    No getting a head start on this, Carillon. If what I have been hearing from you all is true, your aim was to create a new demon lord that you could use as a faithful pawn, yes? And if youve failed at it once, then why not just recognize one of those magic-born as a demon lord and have it serve us?

    Wow, Frey! You saw right through our scheme!

    She had demystified the core of yman and his fellows nto birth a demon lord that was putty in their hands. And Milim just went and admitted it. Now Frey would think she was rightand that was fine. It was still within what yman expected. If Frey was part of todays summit, he had already assumed it would happen. No point hiding things, if Milim was wholly incapable of subterfuge.

    But we do need to investigate, yes, he ventured. Not to speak for Carillon, but there is no guarantee they will be cooperative with us. If the orc lord did win, however, he might be rampaging out of control now that his father Gelmud is gone.

    He wanted to keep the other demon lords from traveling over there before he was ready. Now, he watched them mull it over.

    An investigation did seem to be necessary. Whether it was the orc lord or the other magic-born, the side that won the battle would now be more powerful than ever. Itd be nice if the demon lords could make them swear fealty, but losing any chance at that with some untoward gesture was out of the question.

    They needed to assume that, at the very least, something at a subdemon lord level of strength was now born. If they were to set up the board so they were guaranteed to dominate it, that was a tall order even for them. It would give them a leg up on the other demonic rulers of thend, but they also had to consider the substantial consequences if it didnt work out. And if whoever survived the fray decided to call themselves a demon lord, there would be no choice but to give it up and punish that insolence. But now wasnt the time for that.

    The four demon lords nced at one another, attempting to read one anothers minds.

    Carillon, the Beast Master, had a good feeling about this.

    He had spent several centuries ruling the lycanthrope race, waging several major battles that went well enough for him to expand his influence. That performance had earned him the endorsements of the dearly departed ursed Lord and the demon lord Milim, ensuring his own promotion to the demon lord post. Leon, the one who defeated said ursed Lord, assuredly had some objections about that, but he seemed to bear no anger or disgust toward the appointment. Survival of the fittest was the only irond rule hereand it had just been applied once again. Leon had no right to protest.

    Besides, Leon was more than strong enough himself. Even after attaining his current post, he had never ceased to hone his skills. Carillon understood that Leon had several new, and powerful, allies on his side as well. Even as a neer to this echelon, there was no underestimating what this rtively recent demon lord could do.

    Carillon had a taste for powerand powerful people. That was why he so readily epted Leon. But that didnt mean he stood by idly while Leon rued more and more force. As a demon lord, he felt an obligation to retain an ample supply for himself. Enough that he didnt have to submit to anybody else. Enough to protect the kingdom he controlled and smash anyone who dared to oppose it.

    This was less about Carillon being nervous about his position and more him following his natural instincts toward increasing his strength. But the end result was the same. It made him a force to be reckoned with. One who constantly sought to take in more strength, never satisfied with what he had now. And now, Carillon had a very enticing offer dropped in front of him.

    He had epted ymans invitation to the summit, figuring it would be a good way to kill some time. Three demon lords working in collusion could certify a new demon lord anytime they wantedand if this new lord was willing to do all their bidding, it would grant them a decisive advantage over any other demon lord out there.

    So Carillon was more than willing to go along with ymans guidance. There were several reasons for this, but the main one was the absence of any rule stating demon lords needed to be friends. There were always disputes among them, and everyone knew that yman and Leons ran particrly deep. It was a given that they constantly schemed to undermine each other, taking pains not to leave any evidence behind. Their public faces were one thing, but under the surface, they were constantly trying to check each others movements.

    Thus, Carillon was sure, there was no need to worry about yman going turncoat. Whether he could trust him was another matter, but in terms of using each other for themon good, he thought they had a nice give-and-take going. yman wasnt dumb enough toy hands on a cooperative demon lord, and the same could be said of Carillon.

    As for the other two in the chamber? Carillon didnt see much to worry about there. Frey, queen of the harpies, probably wasnt interested. She had to be dragged in here by Milim, and she wasnt even part of this n from the beginning.

    Besides, harpies were unique. Their society waspletely ssist, with winged creatures up top and everyone else down below. No matter how powerful an upper-level magic-born one may be, if they were wingless, they could not expect preferential treatment over there.

    It looked like there was one winged figure among the magic-borns in the crystalsbut Carillon didnt think that would be enough to make Frey take action. Besides, he thought, if its just one, Frey can have it for all I care. Assuming its still alive. There were other fish to fry, other magic-born to lure. They didnt know what had happened to the orc lord, but Carillon was pretty sure he losthell, if Frey wanted one of those guys, she could have them.

    That just left Milim. Carillon thought about this for a moment. In terms of their personal interests, yman likely thought of her as an enemy, but what about Milim? She had a short fuse and you could read her like a book, but she was just as cunning as any other demon lord. But more than that, she was ever faithful to her own desires. She let her emotions carry her, making decisions practically on a whim. In a way, it was difficult to predict her next move.

    Carillon did owe her, perhaps, for rmending him to the demon lord post. But, he thought as he gave her a look, I dont know. I just cant read her.

    Milim appeared to be bursting with confidence, looking in utter awe at one of the crystal spheres. She was undoubtedly the demon lord most interested in this tale. It was apparently the magic-born Gelmud who approached yman with this idea of crafting a new demon lordCarillon didnt know if that was true, but it didnt matter anyway.

    Basically, if something piqued his curiosity, he leaped at it, and Milim was likely the same. She had been alive for a long time, and she hated tedium. If an enticing prospect came along, shed greedily jump on it, not caring if the story were true or not. Plus, her power was the real thing, enough to let her avoid a certain level of countermeasures simply by steamrolling over them.

    Destroyer was rightas a demon lord, Milim was the personification of pure force, almost unfairly so. And because of that, no matter how simpleminded she was, her moves were still hard to read. It was obvious she wanted to go off to investigate the scene. Her opponents strengths, and the danger involved, was no big deal to her. If whomever survived that battle won her heart, shed be rmending them as a new demon lordand if they didnt, shed kill them.

    But she couldnt do that this time. This was all unfolding in an inconvenient ce. Simply entering the Forest of Jura presented political problems. Even Milim would have trouble indulging her curiosity if every other demon lord in the world was against it. A full investigation would being first.

    Carillon knew that Milim didnt give a fig about boosting her own powers. The question was what yman would gain out of this. In his eyes, yman used his gentlemanly demeanor to hide his true intentions at all times. It was hard to tell what he was thinkingand even harder to trust himpletely.

    This would be a battle of wits, and on that score, Milim was too easily deceived to be much of a concern. Frey would follow whatever Milim did, so no point fretting over her. That just left yman. It was the natural conclusion for Carillon to make.

    He licked his lips as he thought over his strategy.

    Now, how to kick this off

    Frey, the queen of the harpies, had had enough of this. This wasnt a conference she had any reason to be in. Milim had just forced her along for some inscrutable reason. Ah-ha-ha-ha-ha! You need to rx a little bit! she had said, not bothering to ask what Frey thought about itto say nothing of the other demon lords.

    Frey knew there was no point worrying about that, since it wasnt like Milim would. But she didnt like how she had been silently appointed as the demon lord to clean up the messes that followed wherever Milim went.

    Besides, the timing couldnt have been worse. One of the harpy priestesses had just prophesied the revival of a long-past cmity. A prophecy by name, perhaps, but it had already been confirmed. Reading the flow of magicules and the twisting and warping of space, she had confirmed theing arrivalthe arrival of the harpies natural enemy. The revival of Charybdis, the cmity-level monster that a long-lost hero had sealed away in time immemorial.

    Charybdis was a great magical creature that ruled the skies in antiquityone that could summon the shark-shaped megalodons to execute its bidding and make its tyrannyplete. It would die and be reborn on a cycle of every few centuries, and Frey had been a demon lord for only a short time when itst resurrected,ying waste to a hefty chunk of her territory. In the end, thanks to the hero who wanted to put a final end to the cycle, Charybdis had been spirited away to a locked region of space, somewhere inside the Forest of Juraand now that seal was about toe undone.

    Having a heros seal unravel like this was unnerving enough, but Frey couldnt shake the thought that Veldoras disappearance was intimately rted. Charybdis was a different creature from the norm, a so-called crystallization of evil thoughts. A sort of spiritual form created from a cloud of magical energies that sought to sow the seeds of destruction.

    As the legend put it, it could resurrect itself temporarily inside a corpse whenever a great die-off urred across thendor so the legends went. In other words, it needed a bodily receptacle in order to be reborn

    Ugh, this is so annoying. Spreading chaos across the Forest of Jura and using it to give birth to a new demon lord? If Id known about that, I wouldve put a stop to it before this happened

    She didnt know what caused it, but Frey reasoned that the conspiracy Milim had engineered with the others was one primary factor in this. It irritated her to no end, thinking about itbut could she have stopped Milim, even if she tried? That wasnt easy to answer, and there was no point dwelling on the question.

    Frey had toe up with a response. Even a megalodon was an A-minus in terms of the danger it presented. The Charybdis it served was on a whole other level. It was far beyond what an A grade could even express, a force truly worthy of being called a cmity. Even the human nations had awarded it the rank of S, terming it the equivalent of a demon lord. It had no mind of its own, simply acting on its instincts, and that was really the only reason why it wasnt called a demon lord itself.

    And all right, maybe these were mere humans awarding these rankings, but it still annoyed Frey to be ced on the same rung of thedder as this thing. But there was a reason for that rank. Those instincts were painful. It floated freely around the sky, randomly killing anything that grabbed its attention. Whenever it grew hungry, it would attack a city and eat its way through, consuming both human and monster at once. It was a menace on a level beyond what any orc lord could present.

    The harpies were the rulers of the skies, and Frey had enough force to be termed their Sky Queen. Her magic was a force to be reckoned with, and her skills in aerialbat were outstanding. She was proud that she had never lost to any earthbound foe.

    Combining these skills with Magic Interferencean ability unique to her raceshe had the ability to annul any flight-based magic on the battlefield. That alone meant any foe not flying with physical wings would immediately be sent plummeting to their deaths. Even that may not be enough to kill a higher-level monster, of course, but for a human, the chances of survival were pretty slim. Even if one did, they only had so many ways of attacking a target that was high up in the sky. Meanwhile, she could rain down attacks upon those helpless ants belowan obvious tactical advantage.

    Anything that couldnt fly was no threat at all to her. Except for Charybdis.

    It was massive, dozens of feet in diameter, and Magic Interference didnt work on it. To put it another way, Magic Interference was an intrinsic skill to it as it was to harpies. The races flight skills gave it an insurmountable advantage in battlelosing that advantage was a telling blow. It made sense that the harpies saw Charybdis as their natural nemesis.

    Of course, simply lying low and praying that this threat would nevere to greet them grated on Freys pride as a demon lord. She wanted to do something about it, but attempting a full-frontal attack would result in uneptably heavy casualties. That was what troubled her, and it was why she arrived at this summit in such a foul mood. If it werent for that resurrection, maybe shed be a bit more eager about the whole-new demon lord n, but

    She had noticed one winged figure in the crystal spheres. It made her think about the possibility that the magic-born had survived and grown more powerful, but she quickly dismissed it. Having one more magic-born means little, she thought. We have no idea how powerful it is in battle. A high-level magic-born has no chance against a demon lordss foe. Even if its grown into a sub-demon, theres no guarantee itll be friendly to our advances. What a pain. This would be so much easier if I could fight without all these  things holding me down

    Frey let out a dejected sigh. As a demon lord, she could no longer personally lead her armies into battle as queen. She had a responsibility to keep hernd and people safe, and that meant more than simply racking up victories on the field. No matter the sacrifice involved, Frey was strictly prohibited from joining a battle. Only when victory was assured could she take center stage.

    There was just one sure method of defeating Charybdis. It was the first thing she thought of after receiving the prophecy she dreaded so much.

    Butthat?

    Frey took a peek at Milim.

    She was eagerly peering into a sphere, this demon lord on such a different level from the towers of strength around her. Carillon and yman dont know what shes really like. Theyre too deceived by her external youth to read her true nature. And while she was technically a demon lord just like them, Milim was inherently different.

    Milim Nava was special. Not like Frey and the other demon lord neers. She was one of the most senior demon lords out there, and she was from the dragonoid race. A dragon-born. Which made her a special S grade. The Destroyer name wasnt just window dressingit was said she literally destroyed a kingdom single-handedly, in the past.

    She could fly, as well, using her own wings that she normally kept stowed away. Her body was strongnaturally, not by magicand her skills in battle were almost unfair. Something like Magic Interference would never work on her. Milim was just as much a nemesis to Frey as Charybdisand once again, she had dragged her over to something she wanted no part of. Frey just couldnt defy her.

    The whole summit was a distraction as she racked her brain for some way to deal with Charybdis. She provided a few hollow observations along the way, hoping the conference would end soon.

    But at the same time, she had another thought: If Milim could work with her, would that be enough to defeat Charybdis? She was impervious to Magic Interference, after all.

    But it wouldnt be easy. Demon lords were hardly one big happy family. You couldnt just saunter up to one and ask a favor like that. They were more about using and abusing one another than asking nicely. They say the rich are smart enough not to get into street fights, and while that didnt describe them exactly, they couldnt be overtly hostile to one another. Itd just give space where the other demon lords could drive a wedge. It wasnt worth the risk, and it could even provide that moment of weakness that would lead them all to their doom. That was the whole reason the demon lords had signed nonaggression pacts with one another in the first ce.

    Under those circumstances, there was no way she could ask a fellow ruler to y a demon lordss monster for her. And it wasnt realistic to expect Milim to agree to that. There was never any telling where her own desiresy. There was a nation of people who worshipped her as the child of a dragon, and she granted it her divine protection. It was a peaceful, bountiful, and also deathly boring ce. They had no military might, but Milim provided all the power they neededno nation was brazen enough to challenge a kingdom under the direct protection of Milim.

    In other words, Milim already had it allpower, riches, glory. She had no interest in conquering newnds, no motivation to forge alliances with other nations.

    If I could just find something to make Milim take action, Frey thought, I think I could find a solution to this  but thats easier said than done

    What Milim wanted more than anything was something to make the boredom go away. And Frey had no idea what that could be. But look at her nowher attention was wholly captured by what she saw in the sphere.

    Maybe I could take advantage of this.

    Maybe she could move Milim after all.

    No. More than that. I have to take advantage of this. Charybdis needs to be out of the picture.

    She took a deep breath, her decision finally made.

    With a polite smile, yman observed the three demon lords before him.

    yman was the one who had directed Gelmud throughout the entire operation. If that became public knowledge, it wouldnt be very good news for his positionbut that was no concern now. The moment Gelmud breathed hisst, all traces of evidence disappeared with him.

    Carillon had his suspicions, maybe, but he wasnt one to verbally pursue them very much. He was safe. Frey provided other concerns, but with no evidence at hand, he could talk his way out of whatever she said.

    This was an attractive offer to the other demon lords, besides, and yman was hardly the only one to me here. The scheme didnt work, but it wasnt like anyone was terribly hurt as a result.

    Now was no time to think about the past. Instead, yman focused on a new n. Some way to investigate who survivedand find a way to use them. Was that the best thing for him? It gave him pause.

    Fortunately, the other demon lords were showing a clear interest. To yman, the fates of the surviving magic-born really didnt matter much at all. If they fulfilled their potential as bait to lure in the other demon lords, thats all he needed. Certainly, if there was a subdemon lord among them, recruiting the lucky bum would be quite the boon for his own forces. But if force was all he wanted, yman had other outlets for that. He had the money to hire any mercenary he wanted.

    A full demon lord who faithfully did whatever he wanted was one thingbut your run-of-the-mill high-level magic-born? yman had no need for them. Thus, cing his own priorities on the scales, he decided to change his mission. He wanted to have Milim and Carillon owe him a favor, and he wanted them to trust him. In addition, he wanted their backing just in case something happenedter on.

    Or so he thought. But

    Milim and Carillon respect my strength, like I figured. Theyve happily taken the bait. But Frey is proving to be a wild card. She seems concerned about something; perhaps its some weakness that I can grasp. It might be interesting to examine this.

    yman had to chuckle at the unexpected results. He was hoping to get Milim and Carillon on his side, but now, perhaps, he could take advantage of a weakness on Freys part. Having full sway over even one demon lord would be a wonderful constion prize after losing the orc lord.

    Demon lords were shrewd, observant people. They knew that Milim and Carillon had the simplest personalities among their kind. But the two were also gifted fighters. While most found it prudent to hide the full extent of their powers from one another, these two never hesitated to show it off.

    Given their battle-oriented specializations, winning their trust was never a bad idea. And having a guaranteed three votes (counting his) at Walpurgis, the grand meeting that all demon lords attended, was huge. Adding Frey to the equation meant that yman could make nearly any vote, any proposition, go the way he wanted.

    Heh-heh  Excellent. Not exactly my original n, but this is almost as ideal. It would have been interesting, having an orc lord serving as my puppet demon lord  but this works just as well. And I can even have Frey join in

    yman had to stifle theugh bubbling up in his throat. It was time to show off his skills as Marite Master. Frey woulde first; then Milim and Carillon. Then, Walpurgis would be like a personal court to him. Everything in the world could be his, in fact. It was no longer an idle dream.

    The Forest of Jura was forbidden territory. No demon lord was allowed to send an expedition inside. He would need to bring on another unaffiliated high-level magic-born, like Gelmudand hed have to ensure this agent wasnt aware that yman was pulling the strings. It would be a delicate operation. But this kind of under-the-table exchange was ymans specialty, something Milim and Carillon werent suited for. Thats why he was the one who handled Gelmud in hisst scheme.

    And itd be just the same this time. Milim seemed to have an extraordinary interest in all this, which was a concern, but itd likely be yman handling the expedition anyway. The situation inside Jura was a total unknown, so he figured his role would be a foregone conclusion.

    In fact, I could have this person spy on Milim and Carillon for me before he goes into the forest. Now this is getting interesting

    yman smiled a little as he pictured it. He knew he shouldnt be too greedy. Depending on how things went, it wasnt impossible. Finding Freys weakness was priority one, and if possible, he wanted to take the lead on the Forest of Jura expedition.

    His objectives clear in his mind, he leisurely began to gauge the rest of the table.

    Milim Nava, the demon lord whose tinum-pink pigtails suited her perfectly, was lost in thought.

    If I leave things to these doofuses, I just know theyre gonna let my new toy go to waste. Theyre all still newly hatched rookiestheyve got no way to see how things really are. Im cool enough and smart enough to take the lead here.

    Thanks to her easyfort as one of the oldest demon lords, Milim felt herself taking a role as leader for the younger generations of rulers, who had only a few centuries worth of experience. It was ironic to think that the youngest-looking among them was also the most cunning, but it was the undeniable truth.

    After a moment of thought, Milim opened her mouth, then exhibited her full majesty as both the only dragonoid at the table and the most wizened of demon lords.

    Right! she began, practically bursting with anticipation. In that case, Im heading out now and negotiating with whoever survived!

    The demon lords met her with silence. Which made sense. With the current pact covering the Forest of Jura, there was no way to go in without making certain arrangements first. Simply stomping right over, as Milim suggested, was unthinkable.

    Um, Milim We cant do that, can we? We have that nonaggression agreement.

    Yeah! Whered that idea evene from?

    Milim, yman interjected, please take a moment to calm yourself. I will send a full expeditionary force to handle this, and I promise there will not be long to wait.

    Sheughed all of them off.

    To the demon lords who knew Milim, she was regarded as someone with muscles all the way into her brain. A lunkhead, in other words. But the truthy elsewhere. She was actually extremely intelligent, and it was only her short fuse that made people think otherwise. She had the full ability to sort right from wrong and process matters strategicallysomething that often made her leap directly into action, making her seem impossibly imprudent. She was one of the top geniuses among them, in fact, but sadly, very few people noticed this. If anything, they thought she was the simplest, most ill-tempered one.

    Utterly ignorant of all this, Milim confidently put her chest forward and revealed her own thoughts to the world. Who cares about that nonaggression pact? she said, a world-beating smile on her face. We should just abolish that thing right now. We got four demon lords here, so its easy, right?

    The rest seemed at a loss. They chewed over her words, as if the blinders had just been taken off their eyes. Yes. This was realistically possible. They tried to deny it, but they couldnt find anything to refute it with. At that moment, every scheme and n in their minds vanished into dust.

    Of course, to Carillon, trying to think up a reason to join the expedition, this was a gift from heaven. It meant he could send his own forces into the forest without bothering to hide them. Too easy.

    Makes sense, he agreed. With our signatures, we could provide notification that the agreements null and void. It should be epted, as long as nobody objects to it. Im up for the idea.

    Im with you on that, Frey said. My territory abuts the forest, and being forbidden from entering it was never exactly convenient for us.

    To her, agreeing with Milim was the simplest way to get the old demon lord on her side. The bountiful feeding grounds inside the Forest of Jura would also provide good hunting for her own cherished daughters. The wardens of the forest may have issues, but they could worry about that when it urred.

    Milim was beaming at both of her new allies when yman spoke up.

    Would it go that easily, though, do you think? Would the other demon lords be so ready to agree to it?

    Risking Milims rage wasnt normally a good idea, but the way yman saw it, this wasnt something he could readily agree with. He didnt intend to personally join the expedition, but he simply didnt want the other demon lords griping at him about the whole thingter. The agreement of four demon lords made the annulment a given to pass, but that nonaggression treaty had held over the forest for centuries. It didnt seem like something that should be abandoned with such impulsive gusto.

    If we could rip it up that easily, he reasoned, we wouldnt need to expend all this effort staying undercover. Is there some reason for this outburst? Such as  Veldoras disappearance, of all things?!

    Just as the thought urred to him, Milim grinned once more and nodded. Mm? Oh, did you notice? Well, youre right. The whole reason behind that pact was because the territory belonged to this big, mean dragon. We all signed it when Veldora the Storm Dragon was sealed away three hundred or so years agojust to make sure nothing we did wound up undoing the seal by ident. You guys became demon lords right around the same time, so I guess it makes sense you werent aware of that. And Im pretty sure the first person to back it was

    Thus began a long, meandering tale of demon lord politics from centuries ago. Milim clearly enjoyed recalling it, and as he ignored it, yman realized she was right all along. Veldora was the real problem, and if he was gone, no demon lord would lodge anyint about abolishing the pact. Even if one did, it seemed unlikely that three wouldthe number required for a quorum in these conferences.

    Perhaps, he thought, instantly casting away his original reasoning, it would be easiest to do what Milim says.

    If that is the case, then I have no objection. We may as well begin selecting our expeditionary force at once for deployment into the forest.

    Whoa, yman. Carillon shed a scowling, aggressive smile. Dyou mean we all work together? Or firste, first served, like what Milim said?

    Um, Frey said before yman could respond, I was thinking How about each of us deploys our own forces, and we could have thempete against one another? I could even have my own daughters go in my steadand besides, isnt this a rather silly thing to quarrel over?

    The somber way she put it indicated the pointlessness of fighting over an expedition that was meant to boost all their forces. It made total sense. The other three froze for a moment. To all of them, working separately seemed much more ptable than working together. Apetition meant not having to consider the needs of anyone else.

    They gauged each others faces for a moment, then nodded.

    Ha-ha-ha-ha! Firste, first served, then! No hard feelings!

    Very well. But I dont care about some slow, plodding expedition. I wont hinder any of you guys, but I aint helping, either. We got that?

    Well, so be it. We dont know who survived the battle, but I suppose well find out soon enough. You participate at your own risk, keep in mind.

    It was decided. The Forest of Jura would soon be the scene of not one, but four different interventions.

    Let thepetition begin, then! But no meddling with one another, all right? Thats a promise!

    Certainly. I will be sure to tell my daughters not to interfere with anyone else.

    Fair enough. I swear by my name as Beast Master that Ill abide by it!

    Understood, Milim. I, yman, will not break this agreement.

    Great! So all the arrangements are made, then. Now lets get that nonaggression pact annulled once and for all, a beaming Milim chirped.

    Thus, four demon lords agreed to not have their forces meddle with one another inside the forest. Their four signatures, the keys to annulling the treaty, were quickly sent by hidden courier to the other demon lords. The Forest of Jura was no longer neutral territory. Now it would be the stage for some demon lord wargames.

    Well, off I go!

    Milim tore out of the room the moment their deration waspleted. It came so quickly, her final good-bye was still echoing up high in the chamber by the time she was out of sight.

    Looks like were already left behind, an exasperated Frey observed. Just as self-centered as always, I see.

    Carillonughed and shrugged his agreement.

    yman shed a wry smile of his own, refraining from any verbalment at first. Then, a thought urred to him.

    But if the nonaggression pact is a thing of the past, wont the Forest of Jura require a new ruler? he whispered.

    Yeah? Carillon replied. You want me to take up the role?

    I would think that was part of the reason why the treaty was signed in the first ce, Frey countered.

    Gah-ha-ha-ha! Aw, cmon. Look, if we find out that the survivors up to subdemon lord ss, at least, I dont see why we cant have him be king. Then we can resurrect our n to create a puppet demon lord, yeah?

    True enough, yman said.

    Well, given that we apparently already got someone with eyes on ruling the forest, guess we better get movin, huh?

    There was not much nning to be made until they explored Jura. The rest of the demons decided to follow Milims lead.

    With another pleasantugh, Carillon opened up a Warp Portal, one of the elemental magics, to return home. Frey was soon gone as well.

    yman, left alone, smiled weakly as he began to formte a n for the future.

    Milim, Carillon, and Frey. Lets see, then

    The anticipation was clear on his face as he fantasized to himself, alone.

    All too soon, a new threat would be visiting the town Rimuru and his followers called home.

 Volume 3 - Ch 1

    THE NAME OF A NATION

    Recalling the report from his covert informant, Gazel Dwargo, king of the dwarves, pondered the information. He had asked this spy to observe a certain slime he was concerned about, but the briefing he received seemed far too preposterous to believe.

    The monsters are building a full-scale city.

    The dossier handed to King Gazel began with that sentence. The rest of it only confused him further. He thought it was some kind of joke at first, but his team was not one to y pranks on him. This spy was giving him the clear, unvarnished truth, and so he remained calm and ran his eyes across the rest of the report.

    It read as follows:

    Orc hordes have begun to rampage.

    Number: approximately two hundred thousand.

    The ogres, a prominent race in the forest, are reportedly eradicated.

    The lizardmen are galvanizing their military instations to prepare for war.

    Existence of an orc lord confirmed. Danger level: estimated at A.

    A major confrontation in the Forest of Jura is unavoidable.

    Overall danger level: Special A (estimated).

    All this was urate as of their delivery the other daythe results of his covert teams investigations, ryed to the king by magical means. This team, sent to keep an eye on the mysterious slime, had discovered a gathering of monsters constructing a town. As they kept surveilling them, the team discovered other unusual events around the forest. With Gazels permission, more men were added to the covert team to more effectively perform operations across the forestand this was the result.

    The birth of an orc lord couldnt be ignored. King Gazel immediately dered a state of emergency. Not because of this uber-orc alonedepending on how the battle in the forest worked out, the Dwarven Kingdom could very easily be exposed to hostilities before long. If an army of orcs numbering in the six figures knocked on their door, the very fate of the kingdom would be at risk. The kings spies reported that the orcs were advancing away from the Dwarven Kingdom, but that was littlefort.

    So by royal decree, he summoned the Pegasus Knightsa group of stout fighters, armed with the best weapons their artisans could forge, each mounted upon their own winged steed. Together, each knight worked as one with their ride in the skies, making them easily A-ranked opponents. They numbered five hundred in all, and within the Armed Nation of Dwargon, they were praised as the strongest corps of knights.

    If worse came to worst, these Pegasus Knights could buy the kingdom time for the general infantry to prepare for battle. It was ast resort, one that pained King Gazel to opt for, but even an Armed Nation required time to fully mobilize itself.

    Soon, Dwargon had transitioned into a wartime economy, quietly preparing itself for conflict. The air was tense around the kingdom as King Gazel awaited further reports. When it finally came, it told him this:

    The war is over, thanks to the intervention of several high-level magic-born.

    Our surveince efforts were discovered and interfered with, so details remain unknown.

    The magic-born are believed to be under the rule of the slime from before

    Addendum: In order to carry out our mission fully prepared, we hereby request that our equipment be reced with the highest level avable.

    King Gazel used a nearby candle to burn the sheets.

    What do your spies tell us, Your Majesty? his knight captain asked as he took a moment to ponder this, eyes closed.

    We seem to be out of danger. The war has ended.

    It has?!

    The captain couldnt hide his surprise, and the Pegasus Knights behind him were already murmuring among themselves.

    Wait. I am not fully ready to believe this yet.

    The knights fell silent, straightening up at the kings words.

    His covert team reported that one of the magic-born had rooted out their surveincework. The fact that a team so gifted in the art of camouge would be discovered was hard to swallow, but they had apparently managed to dodge their pursuers.

    However, the spy leader, judging any further approach to be too dangerous, had sent a request for ess to all levels of equipment, reflecting the added level of danger to their work.

    They were right. Gazel needed more details. Another investigation would be in order once the postwar chaos had settled down.

    I will have further orderster. For now, I want the Pegasus Knights to stand by and remain in a battle-ready state. For the rest of the forces, I will lower the alert level to a state of elevated battle preparedness. We must prepare for every contingency.

    Yes, my lord!

    The news that all was calm in the forest was good, but now was no time to breathe a sigh of relief. Thus, King Gazel decided to ept his covert teams request and enlist them to conduct a more detailed investigation of the area.

    Three months passed.

    The leaders of the kingdom were assembled in the kings receiving room, waiting for word from him. Whatever he had to say would mark the final conclusion to the past several days worth of debates and discussions, conducted with barely even a break for sleep.

    For the moment, at least, any damage caused by the sudden onrush of monster activity in the forest was surprisingly light. Things were stable around its boundaries, giving no clue that any war had taken ce at all. There were a few more monsters around than in the days of Veldora, perhaps, but no more than what would be considered a busy year for Jura. Dwargon was expecting at least twice as much damage as this.

    The slime, they all believed, was more than tangentially rted. As was the massive orc army that dominated, then disappeared. And the presence of high-level magic-born of mysterious origins who were powerfnd observantenough to realize the kingdom was watching them.

    And now, ording to reports, this horde of two hundred thousand were dispersing across the forestpeacefully. That, and they had evolved into high orcsa state of affairspletely beyond King Gazelsprehension.

    This town the slime was building featured argely hobgoblin poption, all born from regr goblins, and Gazel knew the mysterious ball of jelly had to be involved in this sudden rash of evolution.

    I cannot ignore this, he thought as he reread the report. Special A is one thing, but this could easily be ssified as an S before long

    In other words, yet another danger that struck at the core of Dwargon. As king, he could not simply sit here and wait for things to happen.

    Levels of danger were assigned based on the level of damage that could result from them, as follows:

    Special S:

    Also known as catastrophe level. This could be applied to some demon lords, as well as dragons and their kin, and reflected the kind of threat that no single nation could handle. It would require international cooperation to give the human race even a chance at survival.

    S:

    Also known as disaster level. Normally applied to demon lords. Small nations would have no chance against such a threat, and arger one would need to expend all its resources to handle it.

    Special A:

    Also known as cmity level. A threat that could topple a nations government, caused by the maneuvering of high-level magic-born and demons.

    A:

    Also known as hazard level. A threat that could potentially cause widespread damage to a single town or region.

    These were simply general guidelines, of course, but they had been widely adopted as a handy way to quickly reference the strength of a given monster. And Gazels covert team had already applied a Special A rating to this group.

    An orc lord by itself was an easy Anothing to sniff at, but also nothing a team of Pegasus Knights couldnt feasibly handle. But if a massive crowd of armored, frenzied orcs stampeded into a city, the casualties would be unimaginable. A smaller kingdom would be swallowed whole.

    There was no saying if, or when, the potential threats attention might shift focus to Dwargon. It wasnt a problem that could be solved merely by hoping for good fortune. Along those lines, Special A sounded about right to the king.

    But in a way, this wasnt even the issue. The real concern was this person, or presence, that stopped such an overwhelming threat. One who had several powerful magic-borns at his beck and callcreatures powerful enough to see through the kings A-level spies and their concealment magicand enact some mysterious evolution process on all his subjects. The conclusion of the staff assembled in the kings chamber was that the true nature of this presence needed to be uncovered, and quickly.

    If we make an error in handling this, it might spell the end of the kingdom.

    Thus, he concluded that he needed to gauge matters with his own eyes.

    The chamber was shrouded in silence. Everyone inside swallowed nervously, waiting for the kings speech. Gazel looked down upon their impassioned faces for a moment, then solemnly began.

    I feel that I must meet their leader.

    The deration visibly shook the others in the room. But no one spoke up. The kings word was final, and they knew there would be no defying it. Instead, responses sprang up from four people among them.

    Allow me to join you, then, my lord.

    And I, as well. I could hardly allow you to shoulder the burden alone.

    Hee-hee-hee-hee! Perhaps a little outing once in a while would be nice, yes.

    In that caseallow the Pegasus Knights to personally guarantee your safety.

    They were, in order: Henrietta, fetching knight assassin and leader of Gazels covert team; Vaughn, admiral pdin and the nations top military officer; Jaine, arch-wizard and a crafty old woman; and Dolph, captain of the Pegasus Knights and an officer who reported directly to the king. Together, they led the strongest of Dwargons military forces, and it would be the first time that all four would leave the kingdom together since Gazels crowning as Heroic King.

    Very well. Then allow me to see this throughpersonally.

    Upon their kings words, everyone in the room sprang into action.

    Which way would the pendulum swing on this? Gazel wanted to avoid making needless enemies, but if their intentions were evil in his mind, then this was one noxious weed that needed to be plucked out sooner thanter. Such were his thoughtsand either way, this potential root of evil could no longer be left unaddressed.

    His decision made, the king began to take action.

    I have to say, this town was really starting to look nice. A lot nicer than I had thought itd be.

    Thanks to nning the city out from scratch, the buildings had all been arranged in very neat order. Nice to see my efforts didnt go to waste. Though all I really did was yell at people to do my bidding.

    The homes were in such orderly rows, like pieces on a checkerboard, that things could get a bit tricky if you lost your bearingsbut that didnt really matter, I felt.

    My main concerns were things like toilets, water supplies, pest prevention, and bath equipment. I know what the standards were like in Japan, and I had no reason to lower my expectations over here. I knew the levels of civilization I was working with, among all the monster races, and I had every right to ignore their standards. So I nned things out the way I wanted, from the start.

    This was about where I pictured things would be, once we had water and sewers worked outbut really, it was even more perfect than I was nning for.

    Just look at the toilets, for one. At first, I had a toilet stall carved out of woodwhich didnt work at all, so I had it changed out.

    A wooden toilet, unlike the squat toilets you see across Asia, made cleaning a nightmare. Stter them with waste, and youre never getting that smell off, trust me. Let the cleaning slide a bit, and theyd start to rot. You shouldnt let the cleaning slide in the bathroom, of course, but either way, going with pure wood presented too many longevity issues to be eptable. Steel or metal were ruled outwe had far too few resources for that, and expending them on such luxuries was bound to be frowned upon.

    So I decided to go with a toilet made out of something close to the porcin I recalled in my memory. Good ol Thought Communication helped a lot with this. I was able to use it on anyone I liked, which made getting my point across childs y. Concepts too difficult to impart with words or pictures could be imagined in my mind and transmitted without any discrepancies creeping in.

    The rest, I left up to our dwarven artisans. Porcin did exist in this world, and a number of daily necessities were even made from it, so the seat itself wasnt hard to make. We just had to select the right kind of soil from the local area, then cook it up to high temperatures with the furnace I prepared. It was a trial-and-error process for them, but once they hit on the right form, the rest was easy. In a sh, they recreated the exact sort of sit-down toilets I recalled from Earth. Combine that with the wooden seats we had already made, and we were all set.

    So with that, every home now had a working toilet and drainage system. It never failed to amaze me how handy these dwarves were. But that was only the first surprise.

    For example, running water. I had projected into their minds the image of turning a knob to make water run out of a faucet, but I had all but given up on them managing to implement that. They spoke of devices that used highly refined magical stones to collect water from the atmosphere, but they were both expensive and bulky. Procuring such stones was an avenue that only the filthy rich could afford anyway.

    By the way, not even the dwarves had ever seen a flush toilet in action. The idea of using magic stones and other high-end equipment for something like that mustve seemed silly to them. Outhouse-style numbers were the norm around Dwargon, and even that was considered the peak of bathroom technology by this worlds cultural standards.

    Still, the concept of a clean-water transport system was clear enough to them, even when imparted through the eyes of a foreigner like me. So they began development on itwithout telling me. They never asked for budget approval, so I was caught totally unaware.

    Thinking about it, building a new water and sewer system from scratch wouldve required a ton of cash. We couldnt just snap our fingers and put one in because it seemed useful or whatever. I was expecting a gradual implementation, perhaps over several decades. But mymon sense didnt apply to this town. We started with barend, after all, and I was the leader. I could develop this city any way I wanted to. We had alreadyid out the design for the water system; pooling the dwarves knowledge together to install pipes and such was a cinch after that.

    But it wasnt wless. Providing a constant water pressure, like in my world, was a thornier issue. So we took advantage of gravity instead, like the rooftop water towers you see on high-rises. We had no pressurized pumps, so these rooftop tanks would need to be refilled with water manually. This, thankfully, wasnt much of a problem for a monster. If you had a Stomach like mine, or Spatial Storage like some others, then transport was never going to be a problem.

    Still, these newfangled structures were restricted only to the buildings we had in the center of town. Your average home-owning monster family would still need to trek over to the well for water. We did have smaller-size tanks positioned by each homes toilet and water-driven facilities, thoughfill those up and you were all set. A specialist had to stop by once a week or so to purify the tanks in each home, but by andrge, things worked as I pictured them.

    I had to hand it to Kaijin and Mildo. I thought they were just a bunch of anvil-hammering blockheads at first. Guess you never know until you ask. Our water system was going to be a long-term headache, I once thought, but it wound up being addressed in record time.

    After that, we needed to get the monsters in the habits of keeping areas around water clean, as well as handwashing and gargling. I had no idea if germs could survive long on monsters; I might have been wasting our time with that. But it was a just-in-case kind of thing.

    Kaijin told me that most adventurers either quickly required someone who knew the Clean Wash skill (allowing them to purify items or people near them) or learned it themselves. Hygiene was a top priority among them, to the point that failing at it made embarking on a quest impossible. Long journeys mean running into some filth now and then, I suppose, and around here they tackled that with magic. I cant imagine it had more than a cebo effect, though. Even the goblins were aware of Clean Wash, so I figured it was safe to assume monsters could catch illnesses here.

    So there you have it. We had realized my dreams of flush toilets, and as long as your home reserve tank was full, you could turn a knob and get water from the faucet. We were truly a city of culture, as much of an ill match it mayve been with the rest of the world.

    The next issue to tackle was bugs.

    We were in a forest, and there were loads of them. They needed to be addressed, or else all the stinging alone would be incredibly painful. It didnt bother me, but the hobgoblins seemed pretty distressed.

    A bigger concern was insects as potential disease carriers. No matter how hygienic we were, it wouldnt matter if some mystery virus was literally flitting around in our midst. Keeping things clean naturally kept insects at bay, but there wasnt much we could do for our winged visitors from the forest.

    So we had an issue to address, and my first idea for it was window screens. The homes in this town were Japanese-style wooden affairs made from natural materials, and we needed a way to keep bugs from getting in through the gaps.

    We used some processed spider silk to create screens. The result not only kept insects at baythe silk even provided a bit of an anti-theft system, repelling low-level monsters entirely. An unexpected, but wee, side effect.

    Word was that human-built towns used a magical barrier or the like to keep insects outone per town. Building one for each home would be financially unfeasible, and homeowners wouldnt have the funds to keep them in service anyway. Along those lines, having an antihome invasion system in every single house in town certainly wasnt the way of doing things on this world. But hey, I didnt care.

    Finally, we needed to bathean integral part of civilization.

    For our own house, in the center of town, we had a bath with water piped in from a faraway volcanic hot spring that I could use at any time. Soei and I used Shadow Motion to install the necessary plumbingShadow Motion retained the original temperature of whatever it transported, so I was always guaranteed perfectly heated water, fresh from the spring.

    I had left the design of the bath itself to the dwarves, and they hade up with a wonderful marble piece. The entire facility could hold ten or so people, and really, it couldnt have been more luxuriant andfortable. More than satisfactory work, I figured, for someone like me, working hard as the big boss around here. The bath was divided into male and female sections, allowing one to use it anytime without worrying about other peopleanother plus. Some of the monsters were apparently ignorant of that, but thats what they get for not using their brains a little.

    So I had the ideal bath at our own headquarters, but that didnt solve the bigger problem. Itd be easy to install baths in each of our residential homes, but providing warm water to them via pipes was a bridge too far for us. Even if we wanted to branch out the plumbing from the hot spring, the Shadow Motion trickery involved would be too convoluted to be practical. Wed be building more homes going forward, no doubt, and it just wasnt realistic for Soei and me to be doing home bath instations for them all. (It also went without saying that, deep down, it sounded like a supreme pain in the ass.)

    If the act of bathing grew more popr and people began to demand warm water in their own homes, I suppose they could learn Shadow Motion for themselves. Let it be their problem, not mine.

    So I had given up on that idea, but I had to admit, it would make winters pretty tough. I had to think of a way to provide some kind of hot water.

    Part of my motivation for this stemmed from the fuel problems we were facing. The goblins hadnt had much opportunity to harness fire before in their lives. If they used it for anything, it was for roasting meat. Now, with all those high orcs joining our ranks, it was bing vital.

    For now we had an ample enough supply of cast-off wood and such to work with, but it wouldntst forever. Chopping down trees in the forest and cutting the trunks into firewood would take a massive amount ofbor. We just didnt have the time to think about securing a more stable fuel source, and applying any kind of practical n would require more investigation. In the meantime, though, I couldnt just let people burn whatever they wanted.

    Just when I thought it was time to do something, Dold, the middle of the three dwarven brothers, stepped up. He had been devoting himself to crafting dyes and essories, but once most of the town was equipped well enough, he had some free time on his hands. So I asked him to make some tools using the inscription magic he was adept at.

    These were generally known as magitools, and unlike most magic items and their high prices, these were made for general use. These magitools ran on magic stones, which were extracted and processed from the magic crystals taken from the cores of monsters. Magic stones were mostly created by humans, who used spirit engineering to produce them; they also existed in naturebut were quite rare.

    A pure enough magic crystal was, ording to Dold, much more effective raw material for crafting a magitool than run-of-the-mill magic stones, but any monster who could offer that level of purity would have to be A rank or so.

    As he put it, there just werent many avenues for obtaining magic stones in the first ce. Their production required arge-scale workshop, and only one of those had ever been built, at the central Free Guild headquarters. Guild branches would take the magic crystals harvested on rare asions from monsters and send them to the home officewhich, in turn, provided support payments in exchange. That kind of system. Which meant adventurers fought monsters formercial reasons, too, not just to prevent harm to others.

    This was the way the dwarves put it to me, and it sounded pretty darn efficient, really. I tried cutting to the chase.

    So you dont think we could build a workshop like that here?

    Ooh, no, no, boss, thats just asking too much

    So much for that. Wed have to purchase magic stones with cold, hard cash, then?

    Understood. It would not be a problem to directly harness the energy from a monsters core. Through the use of certain revisions in carving methods

    The Great Sage suggested a pretty startling idea out of the blue.

    It wasnt a problem? Huh. I was pretty dubious, but I told Dold about it anyway. So just as doubtful himself, he began crafting a tool.

    So just change the carving right here?

    Yeah. Apparently, thats all.

    Apparently, boss?

    Ha-ha-ha! Dont worry. Itll be fine!

    I tried tough off Dolds concerns as he created a showerhead and applied a carving to its handle. Grasping it triggered a magic response that would warm the water flowing through it. Itd use magic from the users body, but no more energy than would be used for other household spells. With just a little magic, anyone could use it, and that went double for monsters.

    It was a groundbreaking magitool, and with a little effort, you could also modify it to draw a hot bath whenever you wanted. With the right temperature-adjustment carving on the tub, youd just fill it with water, apply magic for a bit, and wham, it would be heated to a lovely temperature.

    Ironically, it was the creator himself who was the most shocked at this.

    Whoa, is this for real? I know Im not one to speak, but this little method was all you needed? I mean, equipment like this installed in every home? I dont think youll find another town like that, boss

    inly, though, this invention had stimted Dolds creativity. He was curious about what else he could researchand along the way, we could create an environment that used a limitless supply of magicules to ensure we never ran out of fuel. Only a monster town could pull that off, and soon, wed have a litany of magic stonefree magitools at the ready. Im sure hell develop a ton of other useful things for us soon.

    So basically, all of my biggest hang-ups were already taken care of.

    Our homes for everyone had beenpleted. And that, of course, meant we now had to focus on the residents own issues.

    Compared to before their evolutions, the monsters reproductive rates had shrunk down to around the same as human families. You could expect five to ten offspring per live birth before, but now it was just one or two. That wasnt a bad thing at allthey were high-level hobgoblins from birth, which proved that these really were evolved creatures I had created. But it meant I had toe up with a formal marriage system before long.

    When it came to goblins and orcs, the stronger members of the tribe reportedly had the right to select any partner they wanted. It was a custom meant to ensure their children were as hardy as possible.

    The question, though: Should I be allowing polygamy, or what? It seemed practical in the case of (for example) female widowers who lost their husband, but I didnt want the alpha males hoarding all thedies exclusively for themselves. That would cause all kinds of discontent. The ogre mages told me they could procreate with one another, although they chose not to. But if, say, Benimaru or Soei decided to start a harem, I wasnt sure too many of the females would turn them down.

    However, as Benimaru put it:

    You know, Sir Rimuru, youre about the only creature in the world who doesnt have to worry about exhausting their magicules. A monsters magicule count is simr to a humans life force, you could say. Sometimes, giving a name to one of your disciples would sap your magicules to the point that you never recovered. You wouldnt even see a demon lordss creature tossing out names to everyone, you see? And if we do something like sire children, my lord, that would affect our strength gravely.

    This shocked me. Whoa, whoa, whoa! Ive given out, like, a zillion names, man! Dont tell me that now!

    Y-you didnt know, Sir Rimuru?!

    I hated it when Benimaru gave me that disgusted look.

    Maybe I should thank my lucky stars that my magicules have kept refilling up to now. Going forward, Ill really have to start thinking about who I name and when. I thought it was a given that you recovered your magic force over time. I was sure it was fine, but Yeah, lets be more careful.

    Anyway.

    Apparently, with monsters, there were two different ways of creating offspring. The normal way, where you simply impregnated the female, and then the lets do it for real this time way. With the former, the child would have some of the parents abilities, although itd start out pretty weak. This method consumed very few magicules, so a male could have at it pretty much all he wanted, although the threat of bottoming out his magicule count still loomed with too much activity.

    Thetter, meanwhile, made the resulting child quite powerful and a bearer of all the parents skillsbut doing it for real could even affect the fathers life span.

    To quote Benimaru: Im fine with being single. Evolving added more than a few years to my life. I dont care about leaving any descendants anyway.

    More than a few didnt begin to describe it. A run-of-the-mill ogre had a life expectancy of around a hundred years; for an ogre mage, it was over a thousand. No kidding, you didnt need kids. I could see why Benimaru was so disinterested.

    With ogre mages like Benimaru, at least, I wouldnt have to worry much about poption control. But what about the stronger of the hobgoblins? I decided to ask them, and while they werent quite as adamant about it, theyrgely shared the ogre mages views on parenthood. Monsters didnt work like humansproduce a child, and itd rob you blind of your magicules. Sometimes, beyond what you could recover.

    So basically, nobody was stupid enough to just go mating willy-nilly. Childbirth didnt affect the regr goblins as muchthey had to produce a lot of offspring if they wanted the tribe to survive another generationbut for hobgoblins, it took up a huge amount of magic.

    As they rather bluntly put it, the moment you consummated the act, you knew right then and there whether the impregnation worked or not. Kind of graphic, but it was the truth. If a healthy pregnancy resulted, it would cost the father around half of their maximum store of magic. This would fill back up over time, but not if you kept at it repeatedlythat might permanently dent your magicule capacity.

    Thus, I suppose, even if you had a bevy of girls to choose from, you couldnt just go and sire a huge herd of children. Realistically, a man would take multiple wives just so he could protect them, not to build a family.

    This didnt apply to the females, by the way. In fact, the way they put it, they were capable of willfully refusing impregnation, unless the sheer strength of the seed overpowered their bodies.

    Therefore, if an undesirable partner vited ethical boundaries tomit the act, a child still wouldnt result. Only those whom the women deemed worthy had the right to be fathersand this was also true for other high-level monsters and magic-born.

    You could say, surprisingly enough, that monsters mated strictly out of love a lot more than youd think.

    Sub-race demi-humans who crossbred with the human race didnt quite have this level of influence over the oue; they were hardly different from humans that way. I suppose, if you asked me which way was better, Id have trouble providing ament on that.

    So I decided to make a rule:

    With regards to leaving behind descendants, polygamy is allowed strictly with widowed females seeking children.

    Widowers who didnt want offspring could receive subsidized care from the nation, I figured. If this caused problems, I could always change itter. Like, maybe have a kind of ceremony at the start of each month where residents could confess their love to one another, and then wed give out homes to the couples it created. Thatd be a nice tradition to start. Single men or women could live in the dorms, although those with higher posts could have the right to a freestanding house, too.

    These were the kinds of things I thought about as I watched a few intimate monster couples pass me by. I can always fine-tune thingster, I thought. Gotta make sure everyone stays happy.

    With our homes in ce, my initial goals were all butplete. We had food, shelter, and clothing.

    Shelter, I just got done exining. For clothing, meanwhile, the goblinas apprenticing under Garm and Shuna were cranking out new clothes like no ones business. Our recent upswell in poption, meanwhile, made food a bit chaotic. All the new high orcs made procuring provisions for everyone rather difficult.

    Fortunately, during his outer patrols, Rigurthe captain of our security forcehad bagged a fairly massive amount of prey for us. He had beefed up the number of units under his control, and by now, he had roughly a thousand hunters procuring supplies in every direction. Growing vegetables and such, meanwhile, was Lilinas jurisdiction, and it was going well. Shuna was also evaluating the wild grasses and such that Rigurs teams brought in and making seedlings from them, producing even more edible goods.

    The next job for our construction crews, meanwhile, was developing the area at the outer limits of town. Our fields grew at a dizzying rate, doing wonders to improve our food situation. Barring disaster, we no longer had to worry very much about famine.

    We now looked, by andrge, like a real town.

    Theres one other person I ought to mention. Gabil.

    About a month ago, that fool traipsed into town like he didnt have a care in the world, eating our food like it belonged to him.

    Ha-ha-ha! Well, you see, Sir Rimuru, I, Gabil, hurried over at once because I wanted to serve you!

    What are you doing here? I implored at his shameless attempt at sycophancy.

    Shall I kill him? Shion asked, face serious enough to even give me pause. She absolutely,pletely meant it. You joked around with her at your own peril. Even a slight nod from me right now, and she might really slice up that dude.

    Gabil, perhaps sensing this, turned pale and promptly prostrated himself before me. Ive had hardly a decent meal for weeks, and I let my arrogance corrupt my head. Please, have pity upon me! We would do anything to be your loyal servants, Sir Rimuru. I promise we will be of great assistance to you, so please!!

    On cue, the hundred-odd fighters he had with him kneeled before me. That was enough to make Shion resheathe her longsword, a satisfied look on her face. Now, at least, we could get to talking.

    It would seem that Gabils father disinherited him, leaving him with nowhere to go. It was such a pathetic tale that I agreed to his request. Besides, given the way he freely ate our food, without looking out of ce at all among the hobgoblins, I figured he had a talent that I shouldnt make light of.

    We currently had no defensive wall in ce, since itd only hinder our construction efforts. It mustve been easy for them to breach our boundaries, but I could only guess that he convinced our patrols that he was one of my men.

    This was your n from the start, wasnt it?!

    Well, I hardly had anyone else I could call uponand besides, I had not the least intention of serving any master besides you, Sir Rimuru, Gabil breezily replied.

    It may not seem so, but he does regret his actions. Please, if you could grant him the chance to atone for himself, added another member of Gabils entourage.

    Looking more closely, I realized that it was the captain of the lizardmens royal guardthe team that guarded Abil, their chief. Abils daughter and Gabils younger sister, if I recalled correctly. I was pretty sure she was acting as an adviser to Abil when I christened him.

    Oh? Why are you here, too, Captain? I thought youd be involved with building whatever new system of government Abil was working on.

    Indeed. Unlike my brother, I have not been banished from our people. Ie here by my own free will.

    The name I had given Abil, she exined, had the effect of extending his life quite a bit. For lizardmen, the average was fifty to seventy yearsfor dragonewts, two hundred or so. And even that figure was just from the reference books; nobody was sure exactly how long he may live.

    Just like with Rigurd and the rest, I had basically turned back the clock for him. Any squabbling over his sessor would thus have to wait at least a few decades. So he agreed to have his daughter travel thend, perhaps to teach her more about the world she lived in.

    My father wishes you well, the captain closed by saying.

    What? Gabil shouted. I thought you had joined me out of care for my well-being!

    I do respect you, my brother, she countered, more or less. But if anything, I am more enthralled by Sir Soei. If possible, I would love the chance to serve him directly.

    Whaaa?!

    Is this a problem?

    They really must have been rted. The guard captain was just as odd as Gabil was.

    Most of Gabils own retainer was more obviously loyal to their lord. But some of the royal guard were among themno doubt at their captains request. Huh. Well, if they wanna help out Soei, let em, I suppose.

    If thats what you want, I could talk things over with him. But hes more of a covert agent, you know. Do you think youd be of help?

    Oh, certainly! Unlike this spoiled brat, Ive got spirit for miles!

    Wha?! I have sat here and put up with your carrying-on for too long! You will not berate me, you little girl!

    Not the best rtionship, then. Or is it one of those deals where they fight because they love? The guard captain mustve resented how she was also captured when Gabil hatched his coup.

    She shouldve just left him alone. It was no story I wanted to get involved with, so I didnt.

    ording to the story I heardter, though, there was another reason for this. It seems Abil, out of concern for Gabil, asked her to monitor the guy for himhence why it was better for their group to travel undercover. Depending on his actions, the lizardman chief was apparently ready to wee him back in.

    That was all kept secret from Gabil, though. Hed let it go to his head the moment someone told him. Best to let him feel sorry for a while longer.

    So we now had a small lizardman team on our side.

    And hey, if theyre going to be working with me, theyll probably need some names. (Benimaru hadnt warned me off reckless naming at this time, so I was still pretty unrestrained about it. A little knowledgeorck thereofcan be a dangerous thing.)

    I started with the guard captain. Well, I said, if youre gonna be serving Soei, maybe Soka would work?

    She had four guards with her, two female and two male. For them, I went with Toka, Saika, Nanso, and Hokuso. Each received one cardinal direction in their nameseast, west, south, north, in that order. To this I added ka, or flower, to the female names and so, or spear, to the males.

    No particr meaning to it. Just seemed nice.

    The moment I was done, the evolution began. Gabil looked on, clearly jealous, but he had a name and I saw no reason to add another.

    Quit acting so envious, I said as I rolled by him. Gabil is a fine enough name, wouldnt you agree?

    But before I was wholly past him, I could suddenly feel my energy draining. Oh, crap, did I just do what I think I did? I turned around. Now Gabil was looking right at me, eyes sparkling. His body was already starting to glowwait. Is thisevolution?

    Thus I managed to inadvertently name GabilGabil.

    I had no idea that you could, um, overwrite them like that. Maybe the fact his original christener was dead meant the wavelengths were aligned with me instead, or something. I couldnt know why, but either way, I named him. I was hoping to make him dwell on his crimes a bit longer, but whats done is done.

    Maybe I could have him follow in Gobtas footsteps and show him hell at the hands of Hakuro. Otherwise, this new evolution would just make him more self-absorbed and prickish than before.

    Hell definitely need to be assigned a jobter, I thought as I drifted away into my now-familiar sleep mode.

    The next day, I set out to naming the other hundred lizardmen. I had spent my immobilized time thinking up names, mostly random bits of alphabet strung together. As high-level a monster as the lizardmen were, I had to take a break after around twenty of them. The while process thus took five days.

    Now they were all dragonewts.

    A dragonewt was ssified as a sort of demi-human with dragons blood. Surprisingly, you could far more easily tell the males and females apart. The males didnt look much different from lizardmen, save for the dragon-like wings, the horns, and the firmer scales. The biggest difference was the color of those scaleschanging from a greenish-ck to a purplish one.

    The females, meanwhile, looked practically human. Rather pretty, even. They did have those dragon horns and wings, though, and with the dragonewts Scalify skill, they could transform their skin into leathery scales at any timeor for that matter, look even closer to a full-blooded human.

    It was a bit like my Universal Shapeshift in practice, but its too bad they couldnt look 100 percent like human beings. Maybe with practice, though? I suppose the males had less interest in looking human than the females, but that skill must be invaluable when conducting undercover operations in human kingdoms.

    The transformation also affected their strength, not just their appearance. Their already-honed bodies would be covered in solid, protective dragon scale, which automatically projected a Multyer Barrier that protected them from melee and magical attack.

    Dragonewts also had Resist Magic, something I discovered when the Receive part of my Glutton skill granted it to me. It made me regret expending all that effort to Provide them with Multyer Barrier, but all the same, I felt like I got something out of the deal.

    I probably gave them a few more skills as well, but well find out what they wereter. It kind of annoyed me that I couldnt control that unless I deliberately restricted a skill from Glutton ess.

    Which was fine and all, but I was starting to wonder what kind of defensive skills Gabil enjoyed. Time for an experiment. Transforming into human form, I mercilessly fired off a ball of magic at hima skill I had just learned.

    Wh-what are you doing?! he asked, a bit shocked as he was blown several yards away.

    You dumbass! I spat at him, making him stare nkly at me. Im making you pay for stabbing your dad in the back. And remember, Im not giving you a second chance!

    It was my warning for him not to screw around with me, but it was needed, I thought, to make it clear that I would not tolerate any further betrayal. Just a little add-on to the experiment, but I didnt tell him about that. Gabil seemed to ept it well enough. He was a dumbass, definitely, but I couldnt hate him for it. Hed give Gobta a run for his money.

    The ball of magic, by the way, didnt seem to affect him at all. I just fired it all casual-like, so I figured it was about five times the force of me punching him with all my might, but Well, maybe hes too stupid to feel pain, or hes managed to inherit my Cancel Pain skill. Dinosaurs were pretty dull to pain, too, I read somewhere, and maybe that applied to this species, as well.

    Either way, I had made myself clear with him, and I think Gabil was okay with it.

    So really, Gabil had gotten a fair bit strongerfrom a C-plus lizardman to a straight-on B-ranked dragonewt. He still retained his previous skills as a warrior, but they were all much more powerful now, without a doubt.

    But these were no ordinary lizardmen, it turned out. Soka was now an A-minus, the rest of her team B-plus rank. And Gabil had broken through the wall and reached A level. Now he wouldve been able to take on Gelmud and had a shot at whipping him.

    With the right training, they might grow even stronger, albeit not up to the ogre mages level. I figured Id ask Hakuro to devote particr attention to Gabils practice sessions.

    I introduced the royal guard to Soei and left them in his hands. Under his tutge, they could all be talented ninjas before long. He was never one to show mercy, after all.

    As I expected, Soka and her team immediately pushed themselves toward Soei.

    I can use them as I like? Soei confirmed with me as he watched them like a deer caught in the headlights. His voice was cold, enough to make me even more scared. But the royal guards didnt mind one bit, smitten with Soei as they were, waiting expectantly for me to give the word.

    Sure, I answered, go ahead. Train em however you want, Soei.

    As you wish, Sir Rimuru, he replied, formally agreeing to the request.

    A smile instantly erupted on Sokas face. I couldnt really understand why, but if they were all happy about it, I didnt mind.

    Now I had to deal with Gabil and his army.

    Soei seemed to have ample control over Soka and the royal guard, but Gabils crew was entirely my problem. They were my forces now, so I had to give them something to dobut before that, getting them situated was the first thing.

    Food wasnt the problem, but clothing and shelter were.

    The only armor they had was half-broken scale mail. They were equipped with spears, but the tips were nicked and scratched, making them almost useless. I asked Kaijin, our de facto minister of production, to prepare some new gear for them as soon as possible.

    Considering their natural habitat, somece near water would be nice for them to live inbut all we had was the river that flowed nearby, and I didnt feel like banging together a new riverside hamlet just for the sake of a hundred people. Then, as if a light bulb went off in my head, I recalled the undergroundke. The ce where Veldora was ensconced, which I had used as an experimental proving ground for my skills. That would be big enough, I thought. Not too many people could make it past the sealed door at the entrance, and as a ce to sleep, it would be perfect for Gabil and crew. Theck of light could be an issue, but I could teach them Magic Sense and they could work out the rest.

    When I first encountered theke, it was so densely packed with magicules that fish couldnt even survive in it. That had thinned out quite a bit since. Maybe enough that a B-ranked monster could just barely withstand it? I was hoping we could use that magic to cultivate some more hipokute herbs, which would be the perfect job for the dragonewts. Shelter and a work assignment, just like thattwo birds with one stone.

    My final worry was whether theyd be strong enough to venture in and out of the cave. Gabil was in A-ranked territorynothing could stop him in therebut the B-grade dragonewt warriors would still run into several monsters theyd have trouble with. The evil centipedes, at B-plus rank, were a powerhouse.

    If I tossed them in there and they wound up being prey for the monsters, Id sure have a guilty conscience about that.

    Understood. In terms of simple rankings, the evil centipede would outss them, but if five or more dragonewt fighters worked together, victory would be easily attainable. That was calcted using their current weapon set, so once they have more decent gear on hand, that will boost their chances at victory. With healing potion on hand, the odds of anyone dying would be extremely low.

    The Sage chimed in with the perfect advice. Dragonewts had wings and flight-based abilities. Evil centipedes were strong, yes, but apparently weak against aerial attack. The centipedes breath would need to be watched out for, but with Multyer Barrier, no one would be critically hurt.

    So trusting in their skills, I formally gave the contract to Gabils force.

    Gabil, I want your people to cultivate hipokute herbs in the cave for me.

    Leave it to us, sir! His eyes clouded up as his heart soared with emotion. I, Gabil, will work my fingers to the bone for you!

    Perfect. Ill do that. He sounds motivated enough.

    With them living in the cave, they could serve as guards, too. I wouldnt have to be so wary of the cave all the time, like I did now. I also made sure to forbid them from working in the cave unless they were in groups of five or more. Itd be a boon for their training, too.

    Finally, I gave each one a generous supply of healing potion, in part to provide motivation for their task. They all had permission to use it whenever the need arose. Even if they were caught unawares and faced critical injury, this should save them from danger.

    Gabil and his crew seemed to get the hang of things after a month or so, able to freely navigate the cave without any personal danger. With Garms and Kurobes new weapons and armor, their strength was more polished than ever.

    I went down there just to check on them, but things seemed to be going great. Their eyes did nothing for them in the dark, but with Magic Sense and Sense Heat Source safely taught to them all, there were no issues. They had formed teams of five, with three teams working in tandem at all times and staying in touch with Thought Communication. Whenever trouble came along, they could respond quickly.

    When it came to leadership skill, at least, Gabil was a born genius. They grew used to life in the caves far more quickly than I had thoughtand living in an environment where battle was a near constant seemed to be growing their experience and strength. It sounded like with five of them at once, they could stop an evil centipede without having to rely on potions at all.

    They couldnt be more reliable.

    It might be fun to have them engage in a mock battle with the goblin riders. A starwolf was ranked B alone, but with a seasoned hobgoblin on its back, you could add a plus sign to that. They were a seasoned unit at this point, so the goblin riders might even be above thembut with the advantage of flight, I thought the dragonewts could put up a surprisingly tense fight.

    That was the sort of thing that urred to me as I observed the dragonewts growth.

    Now Gabils team was devoting itself to cultivating hipokute. About ten, relieved from cave-patrol duty, were observing the herbs development and changing their horticultural approach in different regions to see which one produced the highest quality.

    The n was to go with whatever proved to work best; then I could make recovery potion with it, sell it off, and earn some much-needed foreign currency. It was one way I figured I could earn some coin before I set off to observe human society.

    I called for Gabil.

    Right, hows it going?

    Heh-heh-heh I am so d you asked! It couldnt be better! Behold, the fruits of ourbor!

    He handed me a few weeds. Yes, weeds. I gave him a look, then a taste of Dark Thunder. Oh, dont worry, he wouldnt die. I can adjust its intensity perfectly fine now.

    Gahh! What was that for, sir? What did I do?!

    You dumbass! These are just weeds! What are you growing down there anyway?!

    Wh-whaa?! A thousand pardons! I, Gabil, have perhaps been hurrying ourselves along too much.

    You dont get this just by hurrying a little Ugh. Could you be more careful? With that denseke of magicules, managing to grow weeds around it is a feat in and of itself.

    Our exchanges grew tense at times, but really, it wasrgely going as nned. Hipokute was a rare nt, and the dragonewts were, indeed, making steady progress. The hardest part, in a way, was teaching Gabil the difference between the herbs and in old weedsbut it couldnt have been easy, relying entirely on touch instead of sight for the job. I had my analysis skills to work with, but Gabil and his team had nothing as convenient as that.

    Only experience would make up the difference, and trying to hurry that along was pointless. Itd be nice if there was some light down therebut we can tackle that issueter.

    Gabil, for his part, acted like the de facto master of the caves these days, walking around like he owned the ce. The mere sight of him made the monsters flee, and some of Gabils personal entourage could even whip an evil centipede singlehandedly. Part of the cave was their territory now.

    I was impressed, but I definitely didnt offer him any praise. Itd go right to his head, and then hed screw something up. Kind of like me, in a way. Takes one to know one. Thats why I trusted him to step up and perform the work I assigned him.

    We were still busy with cultivation for the moment, but once that got on track, wed have to think about mixing next. I could produce oceans of potion with my skills, but I didnt want to. I wanted a system that could manufacture this stuff without me.

    I wanted to avoid creating a town that was incapable of anything if I wasnt around.

    You can make all the mistakes you want, so give me at least one solid sess

    Thinking to myself, I left the cave.

    The dragonewts were well situated now, and Gabil and the rest were fully used to life with their fellow townspeople.

    A long series of peaceful days followed. Ah, nothing like peace, I blithely thought as Shion carried me around, her breasts bouncing against me in a steady rhythm as she walked.

    Boing, boing, boing, boing. Ooh, this feels great

    I was just letting myself descend to everzier thoughts when

    Sir Rimuru, we have an emergency. Several hundred winged horses are headed for the direction of town.

    Soei sent me a cold, to-the-point message via Thought Communication.

    Shion, its an emergency. Ill call for Benimaru and Hakuro, so get Rigurd to alert the townspeople for me!

    Right.

    She lowered me down, then briskly ran off.

    Thought Communication wasnt enough to broadcast a message to an entire city. We needed to ring a special rm bell to make everyone gather at the public square. I ran down the situation with the ogre mages, then turned my attention to the sky, turning my Magic Sense all the way up.

    It let me detect somethinging from the Dwarven Kingdom. A force of around a thousand. None ranked an A aloneor I should say, an A as a rider and mount alone Wait, they had knights on flying horses?! It had to be a well-trained force, whoever they are.

    Understood. Using Analyze and Assess, I have determined the knights rank to be A-minus. Their flying mounts are also appraised at A-minus. However, their minds are synchronized to the point where one could treat each one as a single creature, ranked perhaps slightly higher than A.

    Right. So were talking five hundred mounted, flying knightsA-ranked cavalry, as the Great Sage put it. Even with all our forces pooled together, we couldnt hack this one.

    Gauging each mounted knight by itself, they seemed weaker than Gabil when he had just attained A rank. Let three of them surround that dragonewt, though, and I doubted he stood a chance. In a way, this was an even greater threat than two hundred thousand orcs at our doorstep.

    Shion came back with Shuna, with Benimaru and Hakuro arriving simultaneously. Soei had somehow appeared behind me, too.

    Geld was busy calling for the high orcs, currently handling construction and resource-gathering work in the forest. He was running all over, trying to get his battle equipment organized, but I doubted any of it would be in time. A force of C-plus high orcs would just get razed to the ground.

    Your orders, Sir Rimuru? Benimaru asked. I couldnt give him a clear answer.

    My orders? Well We dont know who they are or what they want. Itd be a losing battle if we fought them, and Id like to avoid that, but

    Understood. The advancing forces destination is this area, beyond a doubt. They are traveling in a straight line toward here.

    I didnt need the Sagesmentary to know that lying low and hoping itd all blow over wouldnt work too well.

    This is no problem! All we have to do is rout them all! Shion optimistically shouted, blowing my pessimistic thoughts away.

    I wanted to call her stupid, but I doubt shed understand why. She and I had two different definitions of victory. If we could expend all the sacrifices we wanted to smash this team of five hundred, that would make things simple. If you asked me whether that was possible or not, then, sure it was. But if you want to avoid civilian casualties, I had to conclude that was impossible.

    Based on the Sages calctions, the greatest chance of survival came if all of us immediately fled in another direction. That provided a survival rate, apparently, of around 90 percent. Staging a frontal counterattack would kill off half of us, and as the Sage put it, only luck would decide whether even I or the magic-born would make it through. And that assumed we fought with everything we had. Routing them, the way Shion wanted us to do, was not a word I wanted to bandy around.

    Either way, wed lose people. To me, the moment hostilities began, we wouldve already lost. Damage to the town, I didnt mind, but I couldnt abide the thought of personal injuries. Thats why I wanted to avoid battle, if nothing else.

    Well, what happens, happens. If this turns into a fight, our first priority is evacuating our residents. Well buy the time to make that happen.

    You got it. And indeed, this could be an easy win once were in the thick of it!

    Ill handle the magical support!

    Heh-heh-heh My longsword is seeking blood.

    I am only here to serve you, Rimuru.

    Good to see the usual gang was in on it, then. I assigned Hakuro and Kurobe to stay on point if we had to evacuate. Now that Rigurd was here, I also exined matters to him, ordering him to regroup with Gelds team outside of town if we failed to talk things out with our foes.

    Wait a second, I heard someone mutter in the group. Turning toward the voice, I saw Kaijin lost in thought.

    What is it, Kaijin?

    Well, if these are flying knights, Ive heard rumors about a top-secret force under the direct control of the dwarven king. Just rumors, but

    Huh? I thought the Dwarven Kingdoms military was all about heavy infantry and high-powered magic corps. And youre an ex-military officerwhat kind of top-secret force wouldnt you know about?

    Yeah, well The rumors came from a bunch of retired old generals. I mean, yeah, we were officers, but we were still young. I couldnt really boss around people who had several centuries more experience than I did, Kaijin exined, grimacing.

    So just like I expected, the long-lived, hard-drinking dwarves at the top of the militarydder still had a pretty heavy impact on the force. The rumors no doubt began their spread from them, at any number of taverns. A good wine can loosen anyones lips.

    ording to Kaijin, this top-secret personal army of the kings, independent of the seven official armies, was known as the Pegasus Knights.

    The winged horses they fly are normally C-ranked magical beasts. Dwargons been breeding them for their flight skills. You wont find too many A-minus ones in nature. I guess the rumors were true, huh?

    What Kaijin said seemed to make sense. Whatever could upgrade those creatures so dramatically must have been kept under tight secrecy. Even an ex-officer wouldve only heard half-told rumors.

    So was this was what we had to deal with?

    Kaijin, if what you say is true, do you think theres a chance the dwarf king himself is among them?

    Perhaps? King Gazel almost never leaves the royal pce these days, but he wasuded as a hero in his glory years. If he thought it necessary, it wouldnt be outside the realm of possibility for him to personally lead a force like this.

    Can you think of any reason why he would?

    Well Maybe because of the orc lord? But thats all settled now.

    Hmm? The orc lord?

    Hey, Rigurd, can I ask you a question?

    Yes, my lord?

    I told Kabal and his party to spread some rumors around their fellow adventurers, but did we ever tell them that its over?

    Ah?

    Oh, man, I forgot Better send a message to em.

    I apologize for this oversight, Sir Rimuru

    It wasnt just Rigurds fault. I forgot, too, so we were even, pretty much. I could get the message across through Soei in a sh, so I didnt see it as a fatal mistake. And while I wanted Soei to take care of that ASAP, I had to deal with our new visitors first.

    Do you think the dwarven king heard about this and came to help?

    Kaijin was awfully optimistic, but it didnt seem that way to me. But there was no point specting on what we didnt know anyway, so I closed the subject. All we could do was wait for these uninvited guests, debating with one another about what to do should the worst happen.

    A herd of winged horses was flying above town. They took sidelong nces at us as we watched them, looping around the city airspace a few times beforending in an open field just beyond its borders. We had some open space in town, toothe areas where we nned to build most of our central facilities, for onebut I suppose they didnt immediately touch down in the city out of politeness. Thatd be pretty much a deration of war, wouldnt it, if a nation did that to another? Internationalw probably didnt apply to monsters, though, and I wasnt even sure such a thing existed in this world in the first ce

    No point thinking about it.

    More pertinently, we now had confirmation that the dwarven king was leading the pack. That was a tad more important, as was the reassurance that he didnt want to attack us on first sight. He would have without hesitation if he saw us as foes.

    Maybe Kaijin was right? Are these just reinforcements or something? Not if this is supposed to be an undercover force, thoughand not if the king himself is on the field.

    Leaving the evacuation efforts to Hakuro, Kurobe, and Gobta, I headed out of town to greet them. Apanying me was Rigurd, who insisted that negotiations with the outside world were in his jurisdiction. Assuming we had any room to negotiate

    Obviously, Kaijin and the three dwarves were with me, too.

    The knights were lined up in neat rows in the field beyond the city. In front was one whose force of presence dominated over all of them. He was nked by four bodyguards, each obviously several times stronger than the rest of the force.

    Counting King Gazel himself, that meant five incredibly powerful dwarves were before us. I couldnt know exactly what kind of threat they were, but well into A territory, at least. Considering the aura of danger I felt when I wasst ced in front of himand considering that aura was still there nowhis powers had to be on another dimension. If I had to guess, his fourpatriots dated from his days on the road as Heroic King. No wonder their kingdom was so strong. If you ever bumped into these guys on the road, running was your best bet at survival, for sure.

    We really have to avoidbat now. Otherwise, itll get ugly.

    Well, well, Your Majesty. It has been a long timeand quite an impressive showing, as well! May I ask what brings you here today? Kaijin stepped forward and took a knee before Gazel.

    Come to think of it, Ive never directly conversed with Gazel before. I wasnt allowed to back in his kingdom, in keeping with dwarf tradition. Instead, unable to defend myself, we were made into criminals (Kaijin did punch out the nobleman Vester, but still) and almost made into forcedborers. Their king was a fair and upright enough ruler that we managed to avoid that, so I imagined he wouldnt spring war upon us without a fair exnationbut if he did, I was prepared to give him a piece of my mind.

    A pleasure to see you again, Kaijinand you as well, slime. Do you remember me?

    The king was surprisingly casual with us as I sized up his approach.

    Are we doing away with the obnoxious formalities? I blithely wondered as I felt something dark and ominous from behind.

    In a sh, Benimarus smile vanished and he had a steady hand on his sword, apparently not a fan of the king calling me just slime.

    Soei, on the other hand, kept it supremely coolthe faint smile on his face told us all how he felt. He was pissed. He normally had no expression at all, but get him mad, and hed smile back at you. A dangerous man to trifle with, and it was pretty funny how the only way to make Soei smile was to basically bait him into killing you.

    Benimaru mightve had a short temper, but by ogre mage standards, he was showing remarkable restraint.

    Meanwhile, the aura I felt from Shuna and Shion was nothing to sniff at, either. They were showing the opposite of restraint, actively exuding danger with every fiber of their being.

    This was ugly. They still respected my orders enough to stick to them, I supposed, but if anything else happened, theyd be liable to blow their top at any moment. I needed to get this squared away before they went beyond my control.

    As I fretted over this, I realized that Kaijin, himself, was deeply disturbed by the kings greeting. M-my liege?! he stammered, eyes ready to pop out of their sockets.

    Apparently this wasnt the Gazel that Kaijin knewbut to me, this was a good sign. It meant the lord of a kingdom had taken the time toe here himself, do away with all the procedural BS, and get down to brass tacks with me. The fact he didnt immediately sic his knights on us was, in itself, a victory. Regardless of how much it rankled the ogres, I had to take advantage of this chance.

    Ha-ha-ha-ha! the king boomed. I see your head is unbending as always, Kaijin. Can you not see? I havee here strictly as a private citizen. At least, on paper. Otherwise, I hardly would be allowed out of my own bedchamber.

    Kaijin, still flustered, exchanged looks with his king and me. Realizing that nobody on the scene had any furtherment, he took that to mean Gazel was telling the truth. It was hard for him to swallow. He froze.

    So. The dwarven king wasnt paying us a state visit but just doing a little private tourism? So what were all those ominous-looking knights behind him for? Hmm. Thinking about it, theyd never allow a king to just walk around in the forest alone. They had to be guards sent with him to appease the elders and bureaucrats who formed the core of dwarven government.

    Well, if were doing away with procedure, I dont see any reason not to address him directly. Trusting in my hunch that Gazel meant no conflict, I decided to take a bullish approach.

    Which means, sir, that Im free to speak as I wish?

    By all means. This is no ce to allow ourselves to be bound by formal ceremony.

    Right. Well, lemme introduce myself first. My name is Rimuru. Youre right that Im a slime, but Id prefer if you didnt call me that. I mean, Im kind of the leader of the Great Forest of Jura Alliance, so you could say things have changed a bit sincest time. I took this moment to turn into my human shape. This isnt exactly who I really am, but its probably easier for you to talk to.

    I grinned, waiting for his reaction.

    It It transformed?!

    A magic-bornand such a high-level one.

    Hmm. I sense magical force but no casting of magic itself. A skill-based status transformation, I would say. I sense no sudden burst of magicules, so it is likely as it saidsimply a change of appearance, not of nature. But this could change its method of battle. At the least, being able to wield equipment like our own could boost its own offensive and defensive powers.

    Sounds like trouble I havent seen a rare variant like this in quite a while. And the monsters behind it are rather strange in themselves!

    Hmm, said an old woman among them. Those, I can identify. They are ogre magesa race just as rare as orc lords.

    They are? Thats the evolved form of an ogre, is it not? Should we not dispatch them before they grow too strong to handle?

    You think itd go that smoothly? Four of them bear horns. We would have to prepare for a bitter fight.

    I hate to sound timid, but yes Best not underestimate them.

    The king looked on silently, but his personalpanions seemed fairly unnerved. They even guessed what Benimaru and his kin were. That old crone mustve used some kind of magic to prod us for data. I didnt like being evaluated like that, but it wasrgely out of my hands. I needed to show off a little strength, or else theyd stomp all over me. Even if we survived, I sure as hell didnt want to be subservient to these guys.

    Silence! the king suddenly bellowed, never taking his eyes off me. Enough of this racket. This slime and I are speaking right now. Excuse meRimuru, I mean. I will evaluate him for myself, and I would appreciate it if all of you held your tongues in the meantime.

    It was a pure show of force, and it stunned them all into silence.

    Yeah, uh, sorry if I scared you all. I just transformed because I thought thisd be more natural for you. Just like thatdy said, this is the work of my skill, Universal Shapeshift. A form of mimicry, is all. So you dont have to freak out about it.

    I will be the judge of that. I would hardly believe the words of someone unless I was reasonably sure they were a friendor foe.

    True enough. Friend or foe, though, huh? That might be why King Gazels here, thento figure out exactly who the heck we are. If I had to guess, he knew about the orc lords defeat, and thatpelled him to move. As long as I could gain his trust, there was no need to be hostile.

    Well, I ventured, you can doubt me all you want, but we cant really sustain a conversation that way, can we?

    No need to worry. Words are not what I need to judge your character. Instead, I will use my sword to divine your true nature. If you insist on such ribald boasting, calling yourself the leader of this forest, it may be about time to show you your ce. If that sword of yours isnt mere decoration, I ask you to ept my request.

    With that, he handed the halberd he carried in his hands to an attending knight on his side. My katana-style sword must have set off his battle lust or something.

    Y-Your Majesty, surely

    Ha! What faster way to settle this than with a man-to-man duel? The kingughed, ferocious.

    Judging by the shocked looks on the knights and Gazelspanions, their monarch was seriously looking for a fight. I had no reason to turn him down. We were still evacuating the town, so itd be a helpful way to buy some time.

    I ept the request. And Ill make you regret calling me a boaster, I said, looking King Gazel in the eye.

    We both took a step forward, the ogre mages keenly looking on. Im sure they didnt think I could lose. The kings side seemed intent on letting him fight as well; nobody dared to dissuade him from the idea. The crowd had already formed a ring, with us facing each other down in the middle.

    Regarding the rules, Gazel said, if you can block a single string of my attacks, you may call yourself the victor. Not that it has to be said, but you are free to attack me at any time, too. But remember: I am Gazel Dwargo, Master of the Sword, and my de shall not be taken lightly.

    He took his weapon in hand and aimed it in front of his eyes. It held a single edge, with a bit of a curve to it, and pretty patterns were etched up and down its length. It resembled a samurai sword but had its own unique designcertainly, a very well-made weapon for the Master of the Sword to carry.

    Just when I was preparing to draw my own de, a clear voice prated the ring.

    Allow me to watch over the match!

    As it did, I felt the presence of three more among us, hearts pure and bereft of evil. One had spokenTreyni, a dryad I was familiar with. As always, she had a knack for appearing and disappearing whenever it suited her. The other two resembled Treyni, so I assumed they were among the sisters she spoke of.

    Dryads?! eximed the elderly woman who scanned us earlier. I couldnt me her surprise. Anyone would be rmed at a monster teleporting in from out of nowhere.

    Treyni smiled as she gave both of us a quick nce. Dwarven King, you are being terribly arrogant to our forest leader. Calling Sir Rimuru a boaster tells me you are willing to make every denizen of this wood your enemy. Is this right? However, if Sir Rimuru has epted this challenge, it is my role as his subject to allow it. I will close my eyes to it this time. But relent on your promise, and do not expect mercy from us.

    She was willing to ept no back talk against this. Mypanions nodded at one anotherit was like Treyni said what they all were thinking.

    The dwarves, on the other hand, didnt look well at all.

    The loftiest presence in the forest, one whispered, siding with a single force?

    They are as powerful as high-level elementals. And three of them! I hope you are all ready for this, my friends

    The mood was grim among them.

    This was exactly why I wanted to avoidbat

    Ha! Ah-ha-ha-ha-ha! So leader of the forest was no boast, after all. I apologize for branding you a liar, Rimuru. And I think I have a vague understanding of the situation here. But I still seek to gauge your true nature. And if we have a referee for this contest, all that remains is to cross swords! Gazel seemedpletely unmoved.

    He had been watching me the whole time, without wavering.

    Yeah, youre right. Well have a quick match, and then we can talk about what has brought you here.

    Heh-heh-heh And if you can beat me, I will do what I can to answer.

    There was no longer a peep from our audience.

    Treyni, face tensed, stood between the two of us as we confronted each other. The match was on.

    Begin! came the dryads shrill voice over the still field.

    And with that, Gazel and I instantly took action.

    My Magic Sense skill allowed me to read all avable information within the local range and rey it in my mind. Using it, I had a full grasp of the ring, as if I were looking down at ourselves from overhead. Speeding up my thought process by a thousandfold, I began to consider my tactics.

    It had been a long while since I had given my all in battle. Since my fight with Geld, the Orc Disaster, I hadnt skipped a day of practice with Hakurobut the fact that none of it was for keeps had prevented me from really treating it seriously, in some corner of my mind. I honed every sense in my body as I sized up my foe.

    At the moment, my height was around four and a quarter feet. Consuming the Orc Disaster had expanded my own magicule storage, so I had more all-purpose slime tissue to work with. King Gazel, meanwhile, was around five and a half feet, a bitrger than the dwarven average. Over a head taller than meand in my mind, he loomed like a mountain. His role as king undoubtedly contributed to that.

    Still, I kept my heartbeat calm as I observed him. He had his beautiful sword up to his eyes, taking a full-frontal approach and not moving an inch. He was ready to deflect anything I could dish up for himand really, I couldnt find any gap to exploit at all.

    I was stricken by a sense that I was facing Hakuro. Master of the Sword was right. Or maybe I should be more amazed at Hakuro, given how he was the first person who sprang to mind when as aparison to Gazel.

    Regardless, this wasnt training. I couldnt afford to call time-out. Lets test him, then. Gazel only talked about a single string of attacks, and I was free to try attacking all I wanted in the meantime. Or defeat him, even.

    The more masterful the fighter, the better a gauge they had of the space around them. In that case

    Using Strengthen Body to boost my leg muscles, I zoomed forward and shed at the king. He was free to take the blow; if he tried to respond to it, he was right in my trap.

    I was sure Id given him enough data to work with before I sprang into action, and I was sure he read it all urately and factored it into his own approach. Which meant that, if I could just stretch my arms out four inches or so more as I shed, thatd be enough for him to misjudge everything. Not too muchjust enough.

    Maybe this strategy sounds petty, but it definitely works. One of the most important rules of close-quartersbat is not to let your foe gain a solid sense of distance. I used the same trick tond a blow on Hakuro once. It never worked again, and Hakuro truly lived up to his ogre name as he showed me hell the rest of the day, but there it was. One point for me. And if it deceived a master like him, would it work on this one?

    But betraying my total confidence, Gazel executed a precision move to deflect my hand away, as if expecting it the whole time.

    Dude! Youve gotta be kidding me! I thought as I readied my sword again. Gazel showed no interest in countering, still just watching me quietly. I tried a few other attacks, switching out my tactics each time, but he breezily shrugged away each one. I should mention that I wasnt going easy on him. I had potions on me, so I could heal him as long as he survived.

    But my full force wasnt enough to work on him. Lightly, gently, he was handling me with just the right amount of power, ensuring he didnt nick his sword in the process. It seemed there was a clear, and overwhelming, difference in skill between us. I was so helpless against him that even I had to admit it.

    What? Are you done? Is that all the power you have, Rimuru?

    Come to think of it, he wasnt restricting me from using my skills at all. It wouldnt be breaking the rules, I reasoned. But relying on such skills seemed basically the same as admitting defeat. It peeved me. I had to get a clean blow in, no matter what. This whole match had lit a spark under thepetitive streak Ive had since before.

    Shut up! I spat. I havente at you for real yet, so dont hurry me! But I still didnt have any new ideas. I didnt want to lose, but I had nothing to work with. And as if reading this state of mild panic, King Gazel started to move, confronting me with terrific fighting force. Exposed to this aura, my movements were fully held in check.

    Oh, crap. Im leaving myself wide open to him!

    Report. Analysisplete. This force is Heroic Aura, an extra skill that is a higher-level version of Coercion. Its aim is to make the target cower and be unable to move. Targets with low resistance will find themselves submitting to, and even adoring, the wielder.

    Just as I feared the worst, my reliable partner gave me a report. Now thats what the Great Sage is for. So how to counteract?

    Understood. As with Coercion, the correct way to resist the skill is via fighting spirit.

    Um? Fighting spirit? Come on

    Talk about unreliable. I had the feeling that the Sage was starting to phone it in sometimes.

    But no time for that. I need to get out of this. How do I conjure fighting spirit? Shouting could help, maybe. I couldnt move, but I could speak. If it didnt work, Id think of something else.

    Uh Oraaahhhhh!!

    I screamed as loud as I could. It wound up firing a Voice Cannon, one of Rangas specialties, right at Gazel. I also released a bolt of Coercion of my own, hoping it would neutralize Heroic Aura.

    The king dissolved the Voice Cannon without bothering to dodge it. But it still distracted his attention enough that his aura disappeared. Now we were back to square one. The two of us red at each other, swords ready.

    If this was how itd be going, the only way to win was via the conditions he offered. See through his attacks and block them. But I wasnt expecting such an expert fighter. The depth of his strength was unfathomable. It really was like fighting Hakuro. If he wanted to kill me, he probably wouldve struck a fatal blow long ago. He didnt because, as he dered earlier, he wanted to see what I had.

    But I wasnt ready to ept defeat that easily. I had proimed myself leader of the forest, and I had to go all-out to win this. At the very least, I would never allow myself to fight like a wimp in front of all these people.

    Shaking the cobwebs off, I quietly brought my sword up to eye level, facing Gazelready to take his instruction, like I did with Hakuro. If I can deflect his moves, I win. Banishing all doubt from my mind, I focused on bing one with my de. Turn an ear to its sound, and be one with itthat was Hakuros advice to me. I had no idea what he meant, but I meekly tried to follow it.

    Watching me, Gazel grinned.

    Yes. Thats it. Now, it is time for me to move!

    You dont have to telegraph it that much, I thought. But just as I didhe disappeared. Not a single one of my search skills could find him.

    What on?!

    It was only luck and coincidence that let me deal with it. SomehowI had no reason for itI had a feeling that danger wasing at me from below. I had never trusted my fate to such vague premonitions before, but this time, I decided to follow my gut feeling. Maybe it was the voice of the sword I feltwhat you hear when youve fully mastered your craft.

    But it wasnt the end. Because this This skill

    Oh, crap!

    The moment I thought it, I held my sword aloft.

    A loud, sharp tiiiing! echoed. The battle was over. I had sessfully stopped King Gazels sword strike.

    Heh-heh-heh-heh Ahh-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha!! Youve stopped me!!

    Y-yeah So, uh, if you admit it, does that mean I win?

    It certainly does. You dont appear to be at all evil to me.

    With another bellowingugh, Gazel removed his sword.

    This fight is over! The winner is Rimuru Tempest!!

    With Treynis official notice, my victory wasplete. I sat down on the ground, relieved. The battle had taken more out of me than I had thought.

    So this was Gazel Dwargo, the dwarven king. Somehow, I felt like I had been granted a glimpse, just a glimpse of this heros full force.

    Treynis voice was immediately followed by a chorus of cheers from the monsters assembled in the field. The dwarves, meanwhile, were already grumbling about the result.

    He stopped the kings very sword?!

    Ridiculous! Its simply not possible!

    Did His Majesty relent at thest minute?!

    And so on.

    Though, really, King Gazel was trying to test me. Anything else, and I wouldve lost any sword battle against him. Relent, however? I know me winning doesnt exactly fill you with delight, but isnt that going a little too far?

    Silence! shouted one of the knights, d entirely in white. Have you no shame, my fellows?! How arrogant for anyone to use His Majesty of relenting on any foe! Are you saying you could follow his movements with your eyes, when none of us even could?

    Hes right, spoke another, a warrior-type dwarf dressed in jet-ck. Gazel did not relent. The Master of the Sword fully deserves his title. This was no duel to the death; it was focused squarely upon gauging eachpetitors true nature. Do not forget: We are not here to create enemies!

    How nice of them to plead my case for me. It also proved, for good, that the dwarves were here not for war but to judge my character.

    The other dwarves scowled at this dressing down. Forgive our impropriety, they said to Gazel and me. Im sure they werent trying to throw mud on the matchthey simply didnt want to admit that their beloved king was fallible.

    The apologies sounded sincere enough, so I epted them. Besides, I could understand their thoughts. Not to be blunt, but I blocked thatst attack out of sheer luck. I should know, because I was there. I knew the stance that strike of his required, and it seemed like itd be pointed at me in the same way, so I just followed my instincts and held my sword aloftand I turned out to be right.

    Well done, though! You saw right through my Haze of Rumbling Heavens move. Impressive!

    No, no, it was sheer coincidence. I saw my instructor use that skill before.

    Well, not saw it so much as was beaten to the ground by it in training. Just the other day, I managed to dodge his first sh, only to be smashed right on the crown by his real strike. Talk about a disappointment.

    A piercing blow from the ground to the heavens like that is mainly meant to throw ones foe off guard. It was the strike that followed after this blow that disyed the true worth of Haze of Rumbling Heavens. It was one of Hakuros beginner-level moves, but I was juuust about in a position to deal with it by now. I only stopped it because I was familiar with it. Nothing worth praising me for.

    What was that? Could this instructor of yours be? Gazel asked, looking down at me in excitement.

    Hmm. Could it be, indeed? The same skill and everything

    Hoh-hoh-hoh! Well performed, Sir Rimuru. d to see you are hearing your swords voice!

    Hakuro, who was aiding the towns evacuation, chose that moment to sidle up next to me.

    The women and children have been directed to safety. I left the rest to Gobta and came here, but what a sight awaited me!

    He gave me a smile, clearly enjoying this. I guess he mustve thought I needed some help over here.

    If I may, Gazel said, suddenly humble. Are you the Sword Ogre?

    Aha. So they did know each other.

    Hohh. The child from way back when, is it? I hardly even recognized you. Well, forgive me for being so rude, Your Majesty. I was wondering what kind of stalwart warrior could use such a sword move. How splendid to see you have grown to be a better swordsman than I! Hakuro gazed upon the king with a smile.

    It is an honor to hear such words, Sword Ogre.

    Mmm. Three hundred years, is it? Since I found you as a child, lost in the forest, and began teaching you the way of the sword on a whim? A fond memory, nowadays. And now you are the dwarven king!

    So he instructed Gazel at some point? No wonder they had a simr style. Which meant the king was kind of my fellow student. Still, three hundred years? How long has Hakuro been around anyway? Talk about a man of mystery. And talk about never knowing who youll run into from your past.

    We decided to talk in more detail elsewhere.

    Gone were the provisional tents from before. Now, in the center of town, we had a dorm full of rooms for everyone who held central posts rted to keeping things running. There was a government building of sorts next to it filled with offices and meeting halls, and we all went inside to hold a little catch-up meeting. The freshly returned town residents could take care of the knight corpsthis meeting was just for the top brass, and it began as a rather rxed affair.

    The mission of the dwarves was to investigate the mystery team of monsters that defeated the orc lordin other words, us. As they put it, they needed to see if we were friend or foe, just like I thought.

    Between the dryads and running into the kings old sword master, any potential hostilities (that duel notwithstanding) were a thing of the past. The dryads were known to be a kind and fair race, and the dwarves believed they would never lend a hand to anyone with evil intentions. If they liked us, then they didnt even need that duel to know we were okay. I guess that fight was just out of curiosity, then?

    Once the dwarves gave their story, I gave oursfrom the first rumblings of the orc lord to the Jura alliance we forged. I didnt mention how the orc lord had evolved into a full-fledged demon lordits all solved now, so I figured I didnt need to.

    Somewhere along the line, the meeting transformed into a sort of banquet. The tension between us dissipated as we spoke, and by the time night fell, Shuna had offered us all dinner. We had a pretty bountiful food supply in town, so she was capable of some pretty decent eats. Nobody was better at it than Shuna, either, so I guess I should have expected this would devolve into a feast sometime.

    It was dangerous for the Pegasus Knights to fly in the dark, so we would be hosting them tonight.

    We had them all kick back in our public assembly grounds. Staying in regr contact with their home kingdom was no problem, they told me, so I thought Id build a little amity and bust out some of the wine we were developing. Then the good times started rolling.

    In the midst of this friendly affair, I thought Id ask about something that bugged me.

    I have to admit, though, you guys work pretty fast. We informed the adventurers guild about this three months ago, so it couldnt have reached you that long ago, could it?

    Ah, our covert teamour intelligence gatherersI had them keep tabs on you.

    For a king, Gazel seemed awfully forting about what sounded like top-secret stuff. Maybe it was the wine talking.

    Uh, you sure you want to blow their cover or whatever?

    Oh, what of it? You spotted them anyway.

    Ah yes, Soei coolly replied. We did find someone sniffing around rather suspiciously. We had orders from you not to kill anyone, Sir Rimuru, so we simply chased him away. We thought it of little importance, but perhaps we should have taken him into custody?

    It barely even registered in Soeis mind, so he didnt think to brief me about it. I told him to just tell me next time instead of making judgment calls on his own.

    Well, thats a rather hard pill to swallow. Yeah, my team isnt too well suited for directbat, but

    This was Henrietta, a beautiful woman but apparently a bit of a mean drunk. One of Gazels close associates, she was a knight assassin who ran all the kingdoms intelligence-gathering operations. I suppose Soei just hurt her feelings, but a serious-looking man in the white armor of a knight stepped in to assuage her. That was Dolph, captain of the Pegasus Knights, as he saida man who adored Gazel, and one of the dwarves who apologized to us after the duel. Running a covert force as he was, he was more honest and upright than I originally thought.

    After intervening between Soei and Henrietta, Dolph quickly fell into a deep conversation with Benimaru about aerialbat. I suppose not even someone as magnanimous as Dolph wanted to hang around those two for long. They had stopped sniping at each other, but the air was now silent and frigid between them. Im sure anyone would rather talk about their favorite battle strategies instead.

    Jaine, the old woman so curious about my own skills, was an arch-wizard and one of the most gifted dwarven clerics in the kingdom. She was now debating this or that finer point about magic with Shuna, and it seemed like Shuna was willing to learn from her, perhaps picking up on Jaines investigative magic. The crone also discussed the concept of legion magic, a kind of spell that could be cast on an entire military unit to annul the abilities of a rival force. It made me shiver a bit. If Benimaru decided to cast Hellre on the knights, it probably wouldnt have damaged them much at all.

    This arch-wizard was decent enough in battle against individual foes, but apparently her true expertise was in strengthening entire units with magic. A much more dangerousdy than she looked.

    Meanwhile, Kaijin was in friendly conversation with a dwarf d in heavy ck armor. This was Vaughn, arguably the strongest warrior of the entire Armed Nation. An admiral pdin, he said, and second only to Gazel in his field. He used to be Kaijins boss, and while his post meant he couldnt y favorites, Vaughn still dearly regretted losing Kaijin. If we hade to blows today, he was prepared to make sure Kaijin and the other dwarves were escorted to safety. Nice guy. Bit scary-looking, though.

    So thats how we managed to break the ice with them all. And heres King Gazel himself, reminiscing about the old days with Hakuro.

    Well, you may call me Hakuro the ogre mage now. I have taken on the post of instructor for Sir Rimuru.

    Thisment of Hakuros made the good king promptly request his tutge as well. His friends had to talk him out of it. The king of a nationa superpower of sorts, evenleaving it all to go be an apprentice martial artist in a foreign country was gonna be tough to win approval for. So he red at me instead, green with envy. Yeesh, could you knock it off? Its not my fault.

    It was funny, though. Gazel imed to be visiting as a private citizen, and right now, thats what he was. None of the grandiose atmosphere he presented in his royal chamber. Now he was more subdued, all the pomp and circumstance toned down. Or maybe thats the real Gazel Im seeing now? Watching him practically ooze delight as Kurobe praised his sword training, I couldnt help but wonder.

    There was Gazel the Heroic King, and then there was Gazel the fighter. He had seen what I was made of, and I felt like I had done the same with him.

    Just as the feast got into full swing, Gazel suddenly turned to me, his expression grave.

    RimuruI want to ask you something.

    Sure! Anything you need.

    Dyou want to forge a covenant with me?

    This body of mine didnt allow me to feel buzzed, but I still felt like I had just snapped back into stone-cold sobriety.

    I ask you not as a fellow student of Hakuro, but as king. If you are the leader of this forest, that would put us in equal positionand if youve been able to hold this entire vast forest under a single government, I am sure you will be rewarded with riches and bounties that not even my kingdom can enjoy. We observed this city from the skies, and let me tell you, it is a beautiful one. That, and you have built great roads through the forest; I could only guess at the logistical and technical skills required to build them. They may yet be iplete, but I can easily see this town bing a vital trade center in due timea vast new market, one that will take on great strategic importance. And when that happens, having another nation to back you would help in various ways, would it not?

    Some of that royal coercion wasing back again. He was pressing the offer at me, eyes dead serious. Ignoring that fellow student nonsense for a moment, he was basically recognizing that we were a coherent organization. A group he wanted to support, even. What a coup!

    Are you sure? Because this is the same as admitting that wethis group of monstersare a full-fledged nation.

    A coup, but not something that King Gazel could decide upon by himself. If he was speaking as a king at the moment, this was hisst chance to take it back.

    Of course! And since we may perhaps see this differently, let me say this: A covenant would be of great help to us, as well. This is no charity mission, Rimuru. We could both stand to benefit! He told me all this with a grin, then offered his terms, dead serious.

    These were as follows:

    1. A nonaggression treaty with each other.

    2. Assistance whenever one nation is endangered.

    3. The building of a road to Dwargon, in exchange for their backing.

    4. Guaranteed safety for dwarves in the Forest of Jura.

    5. Promises of technology sharing between us.

    There were a few other details, but those were the five main points.

    The nonaggression thing went without saying, and safe passage for dwarves seemed suitable enough. In terms of military assistance, it seemed unlikely that wed suddenly be tapped for that, just because we were getting along a bit civilization-wise. Dwargon shared a border with the Eastern Empire, but given that the dwarves were strictly neutral, the Empire wouldnt be dumb enough to pick a fight with the Armed Nation. If they did, it wouldnt really be our business to intervene.

    If we were going to build formal trade links, a road would obviously follow along shortly. Having essible trade routes is an indispensable part of encouraging trade, after all. But making us foot the bill for the whole thing? That would normally be a bit hard to ept. I suppose that was Gazel being as sharp as ever, but still, this was an extraordinary deal.

    Recognition of monsters by humans like this was, in terms ofmon sense, just something youd never see too often. I was picturing it happening over a long period of time, gradually. If I could get some real interaction with other nations going within, say, a few decades, that wouldve been fine by me. And here we were being offered the backing of the Armed Nation of Dwargon. Priceless. We couldnt snag that even if we tried negotiating with one of the smaller kingdoms around us. It was such a stroke of good luck, I couldnt help but shiver a bit.

    I would be d to take this offer, I told him.

    Rigurd, Benimaru, Treyni and the others had no objections, willing to let me have the final say on it. As Treyni put it, none of the dryads disagreed with naming me leader of our alliance, and none of the monsters had any innate aversion to interacting with humans or dwarves.

    So now we had an alliance.

    Lets ry this to the kingdom, the king told Henrietta. The head of Gazels undercover team would transmit the message back home by magic. To her, it was as casual an operation as making a phone call.

    What do you call this nation anyway? he asked. It was a natural question, but one that made me freeze. We all gave one another surprised looks.

    Our name?

    I mean, yeah, if Gazel was calling us a nation, wed need a name like any decent one. But wow, a nation, huh? I was happy enough with a town, so I hadnt really thought about that. I thought itd be neat to have a nation of monsters sometime, but I figured that was a while in the future.

    Well I dont think were really at the nation point, yet. I mean, theres the Alliance, but thats just a bunch of different races that epted me as their leader, is all. I dont know if everyone in the forest is ready to ept that.

    I knew from the start that it sounded weak. Everyone in the room shot me down.

    If anyone refuses to recognize you as their lord, Shion dered, I promise I shall y them where they stand!

    Well, Benimaru added, its a monsters natural instinct to follow the power chain. But I think its a little different with you, Sir Rimuru, at the core of it. You know? Nobodys being forced to follow you, and I dont think youll find anyone against it, either.

    It seemed to be beyond questioning for either of them, at least.

    Hee-hee-hee! Right now, Sir Rimuru, you hold control over approximately three-tenths of the forest. The other advanced races have decided to watch you carefully for the time being. However, the middle levels among them have already expressed interest in aligning with you, and I am sure the lower-level races wille flocking to this town for protection. We are united under a so-called alliance for now, but it is an alliance based on amon will, one that I believe will birth a full nation. One with you, Sir Rimuru, at the center.

    Way to stab me in the heart, Treyni.

    Even in these circumstances, the old survival-of-the-fittest rule held true. Now that Veldora, the guardian of the forest, was gonewhatever that dragon thought about itit meant the local monsters needed to band together before greedy humans or ambitious demon lords came in first. If not, the whole wood would either be exploited or demolished.

    I had said it myself: We will form a great alliance among the peoples of the Forest of Jura and build cooperative rtionships with one another. Itd be pretty neat if we built a nationposed of multiple races, I think, but

    Treyni and the others had run with it, apparently, and that little quote had been causing a huge stir from one end of the forest to the other. Things had been moving really fast, and growing, while I wasnt paying attention.

    Guess Id just have to live with it.

    All right. Lets think up a name, then

    Gazel gave a distressedugh in response.

    Leaving him behind, we took up a separate room for the debate. The dwarves hadnt had enough wine yet; they wanted to keep it going all night, so we promised that wed officially enact the covenant (really, an international treaty at this point) tomorrow and left them to their devices.

    Over the previous night, we had hammered out a name, assembling our top officers and staying upte discussing it.

    The result we came up with: the Jura-Tempest Federation. Tempest for short. They were almost ready to name it Rimuru at first, but I was too embarrassed to allow that. I can just barely put up with Tempestit didnt really sound like a name unique to me, and it had a nice ring to it.

    Of course, while I had my guard down, they went and named this town Rimuru on me. Ugh. The Central City of Rimuru, officially, but you know theyre gonna call it Rimuru or the town of Rimuru. Just thinking about it makes me want to crawl into a hole, but their conventions were simply too firm to let me turn it down. I just hope I get used to it quick.

    We also talked a bit about what direction our fledgling nation should take. It was nothing we could settle upon in a single night, of course, so we nned a series of conferences to discuss it. I would be the sovereign ruler, more or less, but over time, Id like to shift toward more of a republican form of government. You knowemploy intelligent monsters, whether they had physical strength or not, and get them involved with politics. The right person in the right job, thats my motto.

    It was a long way from what you could even call a framework, but for now, we were good. Besides, this covenant came out because King Gazel and I trusted so much in each other.

    This current covenant between the Armed Nation of Dwargon and the Jura-Tempest Federation took the form of a pact between the two nations. It would take effect after representatives from each side applied their signatures. It would then be kept in safe, magical storage and announced to the world.

    And so the term Jura-Tempest Federation appeared in the public record for the first time.

 Volume 3 - Ch 2

    THE DEMON LORD INVADES

    On a flying horse, the trip from Dwargon toughRimuru apparently took just one day. They were soon off, with Gazel promising to visit again soon.

    And he did.

    Well, Rimuru! the king half shouted as he dismounted. Here I am, as promised!

    Uh, didnt you just leave two days ago? I couldnt help but point out.

    What are you talking about? Your fellow swordsmanship pupil is here to visit! I thought you would be happier!

    I hate people who obviously never listen to anyone else. And that fellow crap again. He wasnt even trying to hide the fact that he wanted to be my big bro at the sword dojo. It was really starting to affect his majesty as a dwarven king, and I didnt think I was imagining that, either. And he came alone this time! Did he even have the time for this?

    As I silently stewed over these doubts, Kaijin came running up to me. Your Majesty! he shouted. You didnt sneak out of the castle, did you?!

    Pfft! Can you believe it? A hundred-man security detail, and not one noticed me escaping! Such ignoble ckers! Its right back to hard drilling for them when I return home.

    WellI meanthey cant handle someone like you, my liege

    Mm? Did you want to say something, Kaijin?

    N-no, Your Majestynothing

    Oh? Capital, then.

    Considering the speed at which he sprinted up to us, Kaijin was surprisingly weak against his king. He was refuted before I could even get a word in edgewise.

    Buta king sneaking out of his castle? Whats with that? Was the Dwarven Kingdom going to put up with this?

    Er, so what brings you here this time, Your Majesty?

    Well, simple, really. You recall how I exiled you both from Dwargon based on my own personal judgment, so thats why I had toe here. And you will recall how our covenant included the sharing of technological expertise? Well, Ive brought along the perfect man for the job.

    He tossed the bag he was carrying on the ground. It began to wriggle around.

    What on?!

    Flustered, Kaijin opened the bag, only to find a skinny, pallid man flying out.

    Oh, geez, Vester?! I couldnt help but shout. The very bastard who had trapped us. Why here?

    Heh-heh-hehprecisely! I banished him from the pce as punishment for his scheming against you, but itd be a waste to let him just y around for too long! So I brought him here.

    I had no response to that.

    Mymy liege, what do you mean by so I brought him here, exactly?! Do you even understand what it would mean, having Sir Vester work here?

    Mm? Dont want him?

    Of course I dont, Your Majesty! You would be leaking all his knowledge to us!

    Kaijin was impassioned about pleading his case. Deep down, I guess hes more serious-minded than I had thought. Vester, meanwhile, didnt seem like he knew what had happened yet. I guess he was in that bag for the whole previous evening, on a winged horse, so I couldnt me him.

    Leak, you say? Gazel returned Kaijins look of concern. Well, a bitte for that now, is it not? It was already leaked the moment you left us! I honestly considered asking my covert team to assassinate you, do you realize?

    It didnt sound like he was joking.

    My My liege, is that

    Its true! I called it off, though, after quite a bit of thought. There is nothing I hate more than wasting good talent. And thats why I want Vester working here!

    Vesters eyes sparkled at the words.

    YourMajesty

    And dont you get the wrong idea, Vester. I have not absolved youbut as I said, I have great expectations for you. You may no longer serve me, but I hereby grant you the right to pursue your duties here. Make use of your natural talents and show me you can live an honest, fruitful life for a change!

    K-King Gazel?! Kaijin sounded like he was beside himself. Should I take this to mean youre fine with letting us take every piece of dwarven technology you have?

    The kingughed, like it didnt bother him in the least. Pfft! Let me give you this request, then. I want you to take thisnd we stand upon now and harness it to create technology like none seen before. You understand me? Your research should not rely on previous perspectivesyou must work more freely than that, as you conceive new ideas. That is the whole reason why I have allowed the free exchange of technology between my nation and yours.

    So this was his aim the whole time, I thought as Gazel pressed his full royal authority upon them both. He wasnt just looking at my skillshe had his eyes on Kurobes forging abilities, Shunas weaving, even our top-secret potion development. His keen sense of self-interest let him sniff out what we were doing here, to some extent. No wonder the Dwarven Kingdom had been so prosperous for so long. In some ways, I was less than thrilled by it. He just kept leading us around by the noseas if he was reading my mind

    I was interrupted before I could continue this train of thought.

    Rimuru, listen to me. You failed to detect Haze, the deepest level of our concealment magic. Magic Sense is a powerful skill, but there are a thousand ways to outwit it. That lies at the core of any battleguess how your foe will scope you out, and get a leg up before he can. Relying on ones skills prevents real growth. And politics, you see, are just the same. You must read what your opponent is thinking and work beyond that. Fail at that, and you have no future as a politician. You must remain diligent.

    See? Reading my mind. Good advice, though.

    But really, this has to be

    Understood. There is a high probability that the individual named Gazel possesses mind-reading skills.

    Yep. That was the only exnation. In fact, that exins the whole thing. Dodging every single move of mine did seem a bit unnatural. His evasion was a little too spot-on, like he knew what I would do each time.

    Hey, are you

    Oops! Bet my covert force has caught up to me by now. Ill be on my way, then!

    As if waiting for the opportunity, Gazel grinned and took a fist-size crystal from his pocket.

    Let me give you this, he said. I took it without objection. Thismunication crystal will let us keep in contact. Vester should be able to set it up for you. Use it to call us in case of emergency. Farewell for now!

    In a sh, he was on his horse.

    Vester, he said with a final nod, may you strive as much as you can to seed in your research!

    Y-Your Majesty! Vester nodded. This time This time, I promise I will not let you down!

    I am off!

    Then he flew away. A very sudden arrival, and a very hurried exit. The man was like a living thunderstorm.

    The king had left Kaijin and me staring at each other.

    Kaijin, are you sure your nations safe with such a freewheeling man ruling it?

    Who can say? Hes been ruling for centuries, so I imagine well be fine, but Certainly, he was not so flighty when I served him in the pce.

    Ah, well. Im not one to speak, I suppose.

    And I wasnt. I was nning to hang out in some human towns before long. No need to voluntarily put my foot in my mouth.

    With that hazy end to the subject, we were walking away from the main square when we heard a voice behind us.

    Sir Rimuru! Sir Kaijin! Vester was there, head bowed downward. I deeply apologize! Please, let me atone for matters first. And if you will forgive me, please, I hope you will let me work here!

    I hadnt forgotten the trap he almost sprang on us. But Vesters eyes were clear now, not filled with the avarice from before. I can trust him, I thought.

    Well, lets get one thing clear firstyoure following my orders, you got that? No more dissing me because were all monsters here. You think you can manage that?

    Of course. Looking back at my behavior fills me with shame. It began with this terrible jealousy I had for Sir Kaijin, but every time I think about it, it makes me feel like a fool.

    He sized me up, looking me in the eye.

    Ive been given the chance to restore my good name, and I would never want to lose it. And I can assure you that I really do want to devote myself fully to the research I so enjoy!

    Kaijin responded by patting him on the shoulder. To me, he said, itll be great just to have another talented researcher on hand. So you think you can give him a chance? You can yell at me about it if he gets up to anything bad, Rimuru, so trust me on this one and lets let bygones be bygones!

    Id say Vester was more of a threat to Kaijin than to me, but  Ah, well. He seemed pretty ready to believe in him, and if he was willing to let it slide, I had no reason to object.

    Well, noints from me, Kaijin, if thats what you want. Wee to town, Vester!

    Y-yes sir! I am unworthy of your forgiveness, but I promise you that I will work as diligently as I possibly can!

    Good news, eh, Vester? Kaijin added. I guarantee you, youre never gonna be bored around here. No time to worry about stupid stuff, let me tell you that much!

    Vester needed a joband quickly. This time, I actually had just the thing.

    Our hipokute-growing operation was finally starting to gain some steam, so I figured we could move on to the actual production of healing potion next. I was anticipating having to teach Gabil the process from the ground up, given he had no real relevant knowledgebut with Vester and his spirit-engineering experience, now it was a different story. I figured the two could work together on the project, with Gabil serving as Vesters assistant and cave bodyguard.

    Before anything, though, I had to introduce them to each other. We headed to the Sealed Cave, Gabil hurriedly trotting out when I called for him.

    Hello! My name is Vester, and it sounds like well be working on this research together.

    Mmm. Gabil. I am tasked with cultivating hipokute herbs, but if there is anything else I can do, please tell me. Let us both work together for Sir Rimurus sake!

    The two of them shook hands. I was concerned the sight of Gabil would unnerve him at first, but I didnt need to be. So I asked Gabil to guide him into the cave for me.

    Sir Rimuru, look at this. All of this is freshly cultivated hipokute!

    I had to nod my approval. The operation was really starting to go well. The open space beyond the caves door seal was awash in green, thriving hipokute, as far as I could see.

    We had a problem, though: Gabil and I were one thing, but Vester didnt have any way of seeing in the dark. Light, whether from a torch or via a magic spell, still wasnt enough to let you even see where you were standing. There were some dimly lit parts of the cave, but not enough to really work with.

    I recalled when Kaijin first entered the cave. His reaction: Boss, I cant see a thing in all this darkness And he was right. I had forgotten since I had no problems seeing in there, but no way could anyone perform real work in this pitch-ckness.

    In the midst of this, it was Shionmy self-appointed secretary, and someone who hadnt joined the conversation at all until nowwho offered a solution.

    So do we just need some light, then?

    Yeah. Any ideas, Shion?

    Yes! We can open a hole in the wall to bring in some light

    No, you idiot!

    Shion scowled at my immediate refusal. This was called the Sealed Cave for a reason. The walls were incredibly solidly built. Maybe you could smash a hole in them if you applied all your strength to it, but that ran the risk of a massive cave-inand losing all Gabils noteworthy cultivation progress. I hated to pop Shions balloon like that, but I had to.

    Itd be nice if we could run some electricity through here, I muttered to myself.

    Whats that, boss?

    Could you tell me what you mean by that?

    It seemed to grab Kaijins and Vesters attention. So I gave them a basic rundown of how electricity worked back in my realm, projecting the image of a light bulb into their minds.

    I see Apply heat to a metal fment to generate light, then?

    Hmm. Yes, it is quite astonishing. The luminescent moss here wont provide enough light to work with. It is certainly something we need to develop.

    I was expecting to generate the required heat via electrical resistance. Instead, they proposed a solution involving a magic circle topress magicules inside. Much like how a magic-imbued sword emitted a faint glow, applying a little magic engraving to metal would apparently let it light up. Wed be using magisteel for the metal, I assumethe best kind of raw material for swords, and verypatible with magicule usage. Itd generate a lot of light, as well as provide heat resistance and durabilityand the way it readily soaked in inscription magic meant there was little need to test anything else. Its pretty valuable stuff, but I had a vast supply on tapa supply that I kind of mined from this cave, so I might as well use it.

    Metalwork and carving work were mostly done in Dolds wheelhouse, so we decided that Kaijin would discuss matters with him afterward. I gave Kaijin the necessary materials, and with that, my role in the project was over. The three had what they needed, and I figured Id leave it to them.

    You know, I ventured, if were going to have some light soon, why dont we just build aboratory in here?

    Could we?! Vester excitedly replied. I do rather like the rxed atmosphere in this cave. Having such a secretb is a concept I always enjoy.

    I guess Vester was more childlike than I thought. His eyes sparkled as he said all this, so I couldnt walk it back. For now, though, I thought it best to remind him of the local dangers.

    You sure about that, though? There are evil centipedes all over the ce. Thats like a B-plus right there.

    Hmm? Not a problem, I would say. I have dabbled in magic myself a little, and I actually have quite a bit of skill at it!

    I looked at Kaijin. He responded by shaking his head. Guess we cant rely on that too much. I pressed on, a little concerned for his safety.

    Well, I could set one up for you, if youre sure you wont regret it?

    Oh, absolutely! Besides, I have Sir Gabil to back me up. Oh, I do hope you could provide that!

    True. Having Gabil around probably meant no attacks were forting. With those concentrated levels of magicules, too, normal monsters couldnt even approach the ce. Gabil and his team just barely got a pass, and even then, thats thanks to the magicules dissipating a fair bit after I swallowed up Veldora. Humans and demi-humans had no issues, though, and the dwarves and hobgoblins coulde and go freely, too. It seemed to me like natural-born monsters were more easily affected by magic, somehow. That seemed to exin it.

    Can I leave Vester in your hands, Gabil?

    You certainly may! I am here, and I have two of my people on watch at all times!

    Gabil had certainly be a lot more reliable as ofte. He got carried away far too easily, which worried me, but he certainly had skill. I could tell he was getting used to his new life here, and he and Vester seemed to hit it off. I thought I was safe leaving things to him.

    So before I could work on developing potions, I wound up having to devise a home andboratory for Vester.

    I had both of them wrapped up in a few days.

    Its worth noting that Gabil and the other dragonewts slept immersed in water, so they didnt really need living quarters to speak of. They could handle a bed just fine, but apparently the wings got in the way, so they were morefortable underwater. Soka and the other females could fully put away their wings, so they slept in rooms, but I suppose even dragonewts had their own likes and dislikes.

    For Gabils room, however, he had several of his men dig out what looked like a prettyfy personal space for him. There was a venttion duct and everything. He had brought in all the stuff he needed, and it sure didnt lookcking at all to me.

    Now we just needed a way for Vester to safely travel between here and town.

    Sir Rimuru, is it all right if I install a magic circle in here? Summoning magics going to be pretty rough on this side of the door, but it appears to be possible outside of it. Id like to build one here, if possible.

    Vesters chosen location was the spot where I defeated that first ck snake way back when.

    What kind of magic circle do you mean?

    A teleportation circle, sir. It would let me travel instantly to any location I associate it with. Activating it takes some time, but no more than a few minutes, so I think it would do wonders to reduce travel times

    He was talking about a Warp Portal, a type of elemental magic. The caster made them work by drawing the same series of symbols at the entrance and exit. These symbols worked strictly as pairs, so stepping into a Portal would always bring you to the same destination, but linking this cave with somece back in town would still be a great timesaver. Maybe Vester really did know a thing or two about magic. It came as a total surprise to Kaijin, who knew nothing about it.

    The required symbols for a Warp Portal would normally be drawn with intricate, and expensive, magical potions. Here, however, wed be using carvings made on magisteelwhich technically was even more expensive, but it meant we could reuse them many times without having to draw them repeatedly. This, we could use to link up top-secret facilities within our own nation.

    Elsewhere in the world, magisteel was too precious tost very long without being stolen. Carving-based Portals could only be built in areas where theft wasnt a concernleave one out in the open, and itd face the full brunt of the elements, along with the potential for breakage or robbery.

    We didnt have to worry about cave monsters teleporting themselves into town with it, either. The user needed to exercise a few magical muscles to activate it, focusing on the destination in their mind.

    It all sounded good to me, so I gave Vester the nod to go ahead. Magic teleporters, though, huh? Pretty useful. Ill definitely need a primer on those soon.

    Vester was proving to be a much more useful man than I had thought. Having total freedom to pursue his research made him a much less wily, treacherous fellow. He seemed to really love life now. And recalling my time in Dwargon, he didnt seem particrly happy over there, constantly struggling for power. Research probably suited him more thandder climbing. Having greed and envy rule your life, instead of the stuff you really want to do, would change anyone for the worse. Its best to just do what you like, I think, as long as you arent bothering anyone.

    So either way, we were all set to go, and before long, Gabil and Vesters tandem research efforts were under way.

    It had been a bit of a hectic time with King Gazel visiting and Vester joining my crew, but we were receiving quite a few other guests in the meantime, too.

    Just as Treyni warned, the town was now ying host to a wide variety of races. The kobolds came first, stopping by in their usual trade caravan, and they must have been taken aback seeing all the massive changes to the forest. We were, after all, chopping down trees to procure more emptynd to ce buildings on, and once we wrapped that up, we kept ourselves busy widening the road to the lizardmens homnds around Lake Sisu.

    Wh-what is going on in here?! one shouted at me. They knew something was changing near their ownnds deeper in the forest, and now their finely honed nose for business had led them to brave the risks and check things out.

    But the changes these kobolds experienced werent just to the scenery.

    Well, hello there, kobolds. I do so appreciate your business!

    Er, who may I be talking to?

    Ha-ha-ha! Its me. Rigurd!

    They need more of a hint than that, dude And once we exined that Rigurd used to be chief elder of the goblin vige, that made the kobolds yelp in surprise even more.

    These kobolds, however, were pretty nice guys. The ones here spent their days wandering across the vast forest, covering their own sales territory, and one of them had been the main merchant handling Rigurds vige. He was now talking cheerfully with several hobgoblins on the road.

    Would we be able to have your permission, the kobolds asked me, to build an inn and storehouse to serve as our base of operations?

    I dly epted the offer, and with that, I now had a kobold HQ in town, along with an entire n of the guys to staff it. The old wandering-caravan days were over; instead, they used the town as a base to fan out and tackle all the other settlements they sold their wares to.

    Some of our other visitors included halflings and merfolk. The halflings swore their allegiance to us, and I had them work on our farms. The merfolk, meanwhile, were seeking protection. They lived nearby argeke that had recently be infested with a growing horde of amphibious monsters. I ordered Benimaru to send a cleanup force their way. Most of the trade between us and the Dwarven Kingdom would involve traveling along riversides, and I was sure the merfolk could provide some assistance with that. If they were willing to work with us, they were more than wee.

    As far as more umon visitors go, one time, while exploring in the woods, I came across an insectoidan insect-type monsterthat was near death. It was maybe a foot and a half tall, kind of a cross between a stag beetle and one of those big fighting ones, and I just thought it looked so cool. There was a dead de tiger next to it, a B-ranked monster, and imagining this small creature defeating such a formidable foe was remarkable to me.

    So I decided to take care of it. It was hostile at first, attacking me without a moment of hesitation. That seemed reckless, but I quickly realized the motivation. There was another insectoid behind itit had attacked me so the other one could make its escape.

    I didnt notice the other guy until it spoke up. W-wait, it pleaded. This one was about a foot tall and looked like a garden-variety wasp. A foot-long wasp would be the subject of horror films in my world, but this one, too, was critically injured. It was intelligent enough, at least, tomunicate with me via thought, albeit haltingly.

    Why do you not flee? I have no way left to protect you. Forgive me, the insectoid who attacked me muttered, resigned to its fate.

    The other guy mustve been pretty smart, too. And even though the de tiger almost killed it, it was using whatever strength remained to confront me. It seemed to be choosing to die a noble death, perhaps realizing that the time was near.

    Strong one, the wasp asked me, youprotect us?

    I couldnt find it in me to just abandon them. Something about that beetle doing whatever it could, even near death, to protect its friend struck a chord. No reason why they couldnt join the party

    Then an idea hit me.

    Hey, can you guys collect nectar or whatever?

    Yes Can.

    I figured they might be able to collect nectar from flowers, and they could. That provided all the reason I needed to lend them a helping hand. They both had lost around half of their bodies, so I lent them a few cells from my own slime form to treat them, using processed magisteel to rece the missing parts of their exoskeletons. That, plus a dose of healing potion, fixed them right up. I named the cool-looking beetle Zegion and the wasp Apito, and now they were my subjects, or pets, or something.

    The rarer nts I collected in the forest included those that would only bloom in special environments or cesden with magicules. Apparently such flowers bloomed readily in the treants settlement, however. I figured Apito, with its intelligence, could scope out those rarities for me and provide the nectar from them.

    Treyni was kind enough to give permission for this, so I ordered Zegion to keep the treants safe while Apito collected the treasure. It would then deliver the nectar spoils to me on regr asions.

    So along those lines, we were starting to find more and more friendly people to interact with. But they werent all friendly. Sometimes wed get small gangs of lower-level magic-born sniffling around and spouting out ssic hoodlum clichs like Whoo, ha-ha! What a fancy-lookin town this is! Were gonna treat it reeeeal good from now on!

    Gobtas or Rigurs patrol teams were usually all it took to chase them off, but wed asionally run into monsters with some actual strength as well. Such lower-level species always met a tragic end before long.

    Oh, uh, Shion? Weve got some guests.

    Yes, Sir Rimuru!

    The idea of talking things out never registered in Shions mind. She was much more a fan of duking things out. Really more of a bodyguard than a secretary, and she was harsher on her opponents than Gobta or Rigur ever were.

    It was the same thing every time, reallyno matter how many lower-level magic-born gathered together, there was just no beating Shion. And when they were sniveling on the ground, begging for forgiveness, only then would Shion smile and ask So how can I help you? Even the most arrogant of them would never be seen in town again after thatand if they did, Shion wasnt keen on second chances.

    Generally, I asked her to avoid killing if she was able to. Monsters were all about survival of the fittest, and a convincing show of strength would usually be enough to force them into obedience. Any wayward souls who couldnt listen to reason and decided to be naughty a second or third time, though? Yeah, I gave her permission to execute them. I didnt have time for monsters who couldnt show regret for their actions.

    There were still a lot of folks out there who looked down on me for being a slime, weakest of all monsters. That, or called me soft for not killing my foes, no matter how much they dissed me. But I figured those stories would disappear pretty fast, in time.

    Soei, in particr, was even colder and more calcting than Shion; he tended to expel any would-be attackers only after introducing them to the meaning of fear. He told me he was busy building up a defensework for the town, but I think he was also doling out punishments for anyone who thought they could do whatever they wanted with us.

    At the moment, the forests native races were most likely testing us, trying to see what this new force in Jura could do. Thats why we were kind of obligated to puff out our chests a bit, so we could get everyone else to recognize us. Well gradually roll that out, and slowly but surely, well make ourselves known.

    So the city of Rimuru, in the heart of the Jura-Tempest Federation, was doing a pretty roaring businessbut then we encountered a guest we werent expecting at all. My Magic Sense alerted me to a massive chunk of magic power flying our wayat a speed I could only call ridiculous.

    Oh, crap! In an instant, I jumped off Shions chest and headed outside the gate at a full clip. I was right to be concerned. The magic force changed its aerial trajectory andnded right in front of me. If it had gone inside town, I think we wouldve seen some substantial building damage. The nearby trees had been uprooted and blown away, and there was a crater on the ground where itnded.

    I instinctively realized there was no way I could handle this level of force. Steeling my resolve, I decided to observe my opponent. Just one look was enough to see that this was on apletely different dimension from anything I knew.

    A powerful will hid behind her blue eyes, and her tinum-pink hair was done up in a pair of pigtails. She looked around fourteen or fifteen, but there was no telling a magic-borns age from external appearancesand with the overwhelming amount of magical power that she didnt bother to hide, she couldnt have been the age she seemed to be. She was wearing an outfit that left quite a bit of skin exposed, made out of some unknown material. Andmore than anythingshe was a beauty, the likes of which I may never have seen before.

    Before I could ask who she was, she arrogantly puffed out her chest (her breasts only barely developed). Hello, hello! I am the demon lord Milim Nava. You look like the strongest hombre in town, so I wanted toe n say hi! the beautiful and powerful girl dered.

    A few minutes before, Milim the demon lord had spotted the town below her. It was a pretty ceneatly organized rows of buildings, attractive trees lining the city roads. It was a town that seemed to exist in perfect harmony with nature, and she could tell that several high-level magic-born, rated A or higher, lived there.

    The biggest surprise of all, however, was that even the rank-and-file residents of town were at least low-level magic-born people as well. Their magic potential varied, but they were all creatures with intelligence, thinking for themselves and carrying out the work assigned to them.

    Nothing like these people existed in the Forest of Jura before this point. Seeing such a settlement appear practically overnight would normally be unthinkable. They were all working together, regardless of their differences in strength. Milim couldnt even imagine what kind of leadership skills were required to make them all follow that.

    It excited her like little had recently, and she used her truth-revealing Dragons Eye unique skill to gauge the abilities of people around town. Amazing, she admirably thought to herself. Unbelievably, nearly every single resident of the town was a named monster.

    No wayeverybody heres got names?!

    For the first time in several centuries, Milim felt a mixture of shock and excitement well forth from her heart. No way could she ever bother making something like thisgiving away a portion of your own power came with the chance that youd never get it back again. Any sane magic-born would never try something so hazardous. In a winner-takes-all world like this, there was nothing more distasteful to her than letting her own power flow away from her.

    Milimughed a little. She was happy. This! Good thing I dissuaded them all froming here!

    The moment their summit ended, Milim was already out the doorbut instinctively feeling she needed toy a bit more groundwork, she had also engaged in direct discussions with two demon lords who might present problems. As negotiations went, it was pretty simpledonty a finger on the forest, or else youll have Milim as your enemyand they ended with a mutual agreement.

    yman, Carillon, and Freythey were the younger generation. In Milims eyes, they could do whatever they wanted; she was sure she could overpower them if push came to shove. But there were a few demon lords that even Milim found to be a pain in the rear. That applied vice versa as well, however, so as long as she made an arrangement or two with them in advance, she didnt have to worry about them meddling in her affairs.

    Now, she was happy she made the effort. She had a feeling she was about to meet somebody very special, and nobody was going to interrupt her. Lets start, she thought, by tracking down this magic-born

    She had signed on to ymans proposal for the same reason she always did: a way to pass the time. As long as Milim had breathed, the day-to-day grind was just a bore. Whenever some interesting offer came along, she always snapped it up. Whatever that disgusting low-level magic-born Gelmud was scheming, she didnt careMilims only motivation was to see how strong the resulting orc lord would be. If Gelmud raised it up to be a new demon lord, that was fine. Being around for the magic moment, she figured, would add some spice to the usual tedium.

    Gelmud failed, of course, and given the expectations Milim had heaped upon him, the letdown hit rather hard. But the images yman subsequently showed her were enough of a shock that the orc lord hardly mattered any longer.

    Her unique skill, Dragons Eye, allowed her to view the truth behind whatever she sawsomething that worked even through ymans crystal spheres. It wasnt aplete picture, but it provided enough information to pique Milims interest. The mysterious magic-born fighting Gelmud possessed enough power to ce it far beyond merely high level. Carillon and yman may not have spotted it, but there was no pulling the wool over her Dragons Eye.

    She also had a guess about who killed Gelmudsomeone who then gained Gelmuds power for their own, letting them evolve up to pretty much one step away from demon lord status. It must have been an awe-inspiring battle.

    Wait. Maybe not. The orc lord wouldve only been able to evolve into a demon lordlevel creature. This magic-borns already far beyond that

    And now she saw that, just as she figured, it was only the mystery magic-born who survived. She scanned the town from the skies, satisfied with herself.

    When did they even build a town like this?

    There were people maintaining the roads, people carrying around the chopped-up wood to and fro, monsters going in and out of construction sites. They were inly building their own city.

    Milims own castle was made by human handsthe devotees who worshipped her as a goddess. It was built to function as a temple, and really, the people were nothing more than a bother to Milim, but they never interfered with her activities. To her, they were worthlessbut to them, serving Milim had earned them a millennium of peace. Theirnds were recognized to be Milimsnds, and thus they were safe from anything up to and including a demon lord invasion. No demon lordined about this; few even enjoyed the right toin to her without consequences.

    But thanks to that, life among her believers had stagnated. They were drowning in serenity, and none dared challenge themselves to try new things. They just went on, generation to generation, gaining absolute bliss from serving Milim. A thousand-year-long morass.

    The townspeople here are a far cry from those boring old fools

    She didnte here because she was searching for new people to worship her. She wanted some new stimulus, something to fend off the boredom. That was the only reason. If yman or Carillon wanted more war power, she was willing to hand it over once she was bored. Shed tyrannize the young demon lords, watch them stew in their own juices, and once she was satisfied, shed think up some new game to y.

    That was her original nbut the mystery magic-born was much stronger than any of the demon lords had guessed. She couldnt just leave this guy be, and she was too old to have anyone tell her what to do. She could fight and kill them, or

    Now the other young demon lords werent present in her mind at all. She had found him. The one with the demon lordss powers in this town.

    Wah-ha-ha-ha-ha! It really has grown to the point of a demon lord!!

    Then she plunged forward, eagerly awaiting her prey.

    I somehow managed to avoid blurting A demon lord?! out loud. What was someone like her doing here?! I didnt have to ask if she was realthe sheer force she exuded from her every pore was among the strongest I had ever seen. It was just as overwhelming as Veldora was. Plus I mean, dont these people send their underlings for jobs like these first? Or, like, one of the four sub-bosses? Something like that? I wanted to chide her but opted against it.

    How should I answer her, though? I was in slime form, and I knew my aura wasnt leaking out at all. I had grown used to controlling my magictely, and I could hold it back to some extent without actively thinking about it. To the uninformed observer, I shouldve just looked like a wimpy lil slime. I knew this because I created a copy of myself and ran Magic Sense on it; the only aura I released was what youd see from a slime out in the woods somewhere.

    If this demon lord saw right through that, she was definitely not one to mess with. No point trying to deceive her. Either way, I had no offense I could hope to use on her. Better not to trip up and do something to anger her.

    Well, good afternoon, I said, eyeing her closely. My name is Rimuru, and I am the leader of this town. I am impressed that you recognized this slime as the strongest presence here.

    Actually, that might have been Hakuro. Thats what I thought, but there was no need to say it.

    Hee-hee-hee! Thats kid stuff for someone like me. My Dragons Eye can measure all the magical energy people try to hide from me. Dont try to y the fool around me, you! she proudly boasted.

    She had her chest stuck way out to emphasize her magnificence, although her chest size was, shall we say, disappointing. You could tell from one look that they werent fully grown yet. The skimpy outfit made it even more impossible to hide. I, of course, was too mature an adult to mention that out loud. Im not stupid enough to go dancing into an obvious minefield like that.

    But she had a skill kind of like my Analyze and Assess, huh? No point trying to hide anything, then. This was a tad dangerous. My own analysis revealed that she had a clear power advantage, and Im sure her skill levels were far above mine.

    I couldnt win. If we got in a fight, I didnt think anything would work on her. I could string my skills together to keep things even and buy some time, but thats about it. It made the Orc Disaster seem like a walk in the park.

    By the way, she continued, is that how you really look? Was that silver-haired person I saw thrashing that bum Gelmud a transformation, then?

    She knew about that fight? Either she heard about it from Soei, or somebody was watching us. I knew Gelmud was, but I didnt even think that someone would be watching Gelmud, too. So his ns were leaked from the start, thenor Gelmud was nothing but another puppet, another character in the grand show. He did mention that he had demon lord backingI thought he was just being a sore loser, but maybe he had some connections in high ces after all. Someone at this level, for example.

    Ah, did you mean this? I said as I transformed. My mask was off; there was no need to conceal my aura.

    Oooh, it was you! So you defeated the orc lord? I thought it consumed Gelmud and turned into a demon lord, kind of.

    The demon lord Milim seemed to enjoy this news quite a lot. So she knew Gelmud was dead, but nothing past that, huh? Maybe I could hide the truth a littlebut that still seemed dangerous. Honesty was probably the best policy.

    Impressive! Yes, the orc lord evolved into an Orc Disaster, butwell, I fought it and beat it anyway, I guess. So I tried to change the subject. Are you just here to say hello today, or could I help you out with something? You arent here to, say, take revenge for Gelmud, are you?

    If she answered yes to that, we were doomed. But she didnt look like the kind to resort to such pettiness. She might insist on me bing her vassal in exchange for forgiveness, but thats about it. There wasnt much merit in rubbing us out right now, besides. Either way, though, I needed to figure out what she wanted, and how she intended to achieve it.

    Mm? Help me? Um, Im just sayin hi, but

    An awkward silence. The demon lord Milim and I stared at each other wordlessly for a bit. Then:

    Prepare to die!!

    With a shout, Shion shed at the demon lord.

    All the force this demon lord exuded must have robbed Shion of herposure the moment she caught up to me. She was trying to attack first and gain the upper hand. She was apanied by a lightning-fast ck shade; Ranga, leaping out of a shadow on the ground, simrly lunged for Milim. It was a total surprise attack, timed such that even if one strike was parried, there would be no dealing with the next.

    Not against Milim, though.

    Wah-ha-ha-ha-ha! Oh, did you want to y with me?

    With a teasingugh, Milim stopped Shions sword with her right hand, swinging her left arm as if to swat Ranga away. There was a high-pitched ng, like someone hammering at solid metal, and the sword was stopped cold. She took the longsword straight against her skin, and it didnt hurt her at all. Ranga, meanwhile, was blown backward by an invisible shock wave, every hair on his body standing on end. I only realized after it was all over that her left-arm swat had unleashed a faster-than-sound shock wave.

    Wh-whoa, wait, guys?!

    By the time I could tell them to stop, they were already making their next moves.

    Not even a demon lord can escape from this restraining web.

    Using Ranga as a distraction, Soei had used Demonwire Bind to capture Milim. Benimaru, meanwhile, was preparing to encase her in a Hellre st.

    And now, the final blow. Burn to a crisp!

    It was a merciless attack, one made with full knowledge that this was a demon lord. They put every ounce of energy they had into it. I imagine that was the ogres best idea for dealing with something like this. But

    Wah-ha-ha-ha-ha!! Impressive! If it was any demon lord except for me, Im not sure that kind of attack would leave them unhurt. You might even be able to defeat them! But

    Her aura began to rapidly expand. Then, another shock wave, as if a volcano had just exploded on the spot. She hadnt unleashed an attack or done anything, reallyall she did was unleash the aura she had been keeping restrained.

    It wont work on meeee!

    In a moment, the web restraining Milim was shredded to fine pieces. She had her freedom back, and while it was a bitte to say this, the demon lord was just too much. Trying to use cheap tricks or overwhelm her with numbers was never going to work. As King Gazel of Dwargon put it, high-level magic-born were ssified as cmity or hazard-ss dangers. A demon lord was a disaster, and certain dragonoid types (like Veldora) were feared as catastrophes.

    Now I could see it for myself. This was a catastrophe. The demon lord before me had force like a howling storm of nature, something no human being could ever contest. One person, posing so much of a threat. What a nightmarebut it was our reality.

    So now what?

    Right this moment, all four of my alliesShion, Benimaru, Soei, and Rangawere on the ground. Not dead, but certainly out of the battle. But Shion and Benimaru still found it in themselves to try to stand up, giving me a chance to flee.

    Sir Sir Rimuru Please, run away

    We can takecare of

    I knew it was impossible, and I knew escape wasnt an option. Plus, I didnt exactly have a lot of self-respect, but not even I could toss away my friends and run off by myself.

    You just stay there and rest. Ill handle this.

    B-but

    If I give up, this is over, so Ill do what I can, all right? I shrugged. Just dont expect too much.

    That seemed to calm them down a bit. There was no running away, and I had to give it a shot, at least.

    Hohh? The demon lord gave me a curious smile, beckoning to me with one hand. You want to take me on? This is fun!

    Well, sure, if you put it that way. If this is what its be, no point trying to be modest. Time to bluff and bluster my way out of this.

    Of course, as far as I can tell, theres only one attack that stands a chance of working against you at all.

    Oh?

    Think you have the confidence to try withstanding it?

    I knew full well, frankly, that nothing I could do would win this. How should I put this?

    Understood. The measurable phase indicates a magical energy supply at least ten times greater than yours on the low end. On the high end, it is immeasurable.

    I suppose the Sage put it a lot better than I could. And ones magicule count wasnt everything, really, but being outssed ten times over was a tad insurmountable. No wonder the ogres full-bore attacks didnt work.

    So theres just one strategy for me to try. If it was a given that none of my skills would work, Ill just have to form a n using the items I have on me. All this, of course, assumes that Milim falls for my prodding.

    Wah-ha-ha-ha-ha! All right. Sounds fun to me. But if it doesnt work, promise me that youll be my servant, all right?

    Ooh, theres a stroke of luck. Shes even more generous than I thought. The fact she wasnt going to kill us all despite our preemptive attack was a big win. We could just be herckeys for life instead. That works.

    Okay. You got it. But if it does, youre gonna let my team here go unpunished, okay?

    All right. Lets get this going already!

    epting my challenge, Milim gave me an expectant look. Id better live up to her expectations. With a kick against the ground, I ran with all my might toward her. Without removing my sword, I stormed straight toward her and created a small sphere of water in the palm of my hand. She looked on, full of curiosity, as I approached at full speed. She could tell exactly how I was moving, so I knew no underhanded tricks would work.

    Take this!

    Mmmm?!

    I stopped right in front of the demon lord, then threw the sphere of water at her. She seemed breezily nonplussed by this, knowing full well this wasnt much of an attack. Thats why she let it ssh against her, uncontestedright on her mouth.

    This bit of water wasnt an attack at all. It was just there to ensure the item I had for her didnt spill out mid-delivery. Now it was just a matter of whether Milim took an interest in this item or not. Our entire fate rode on her reaction.

    What What is this?! Ive never eaten anything so delicious in my life!!

    She shouted at the top of her lungs, clearly excited. Her cute little tongue was licking at the droplets stuck to her lips. Whew. Looks like victory is mine.

    Heh-heh-heh! Whats wrong, demon lord? I grinned as I conjured up another water sphere to show her. Lay a hand on me, and the secret behind what I just treated you with will be lost and buried forever. But if you ept that I won, Ill give you some more of that. Okay?

    Milims eyes were fixated on the sphere, following it as I tossed it around in the air. She couldnt have been more enthralled. I was starting to feel like I could talk my way out of this after all.

    This was actually some of the honey that Apito was collecting for me after I rescued it. Id be lying if I said I thought itde in handy at a time like thisI just hid it on me because I wanted to eat itter. I hadnt eaten anything sugary at all sinceing to this world.

    I was finally able to enjoy some decent grub with this body, so I wanted to satisfy my sweet tooth next. But! Even when I asked Shuna, she said that sweets are considered mega-luxury items and you almost never run into any. The only way to taste anything sweet at all was, realistically speaking, by eating fruit. The western kingdoms and Eastern Empire apparently cultivated sugar, but only rarely did it leave their borders, and its at no price the average person could afford.

    Well, so be it. I turned my eyes toward honey first, figuring wed start with something simple. Lucky thing I helped out Apito when I did, in that case. We were still in no shape to be mass-producing honey yet. I had to work hard to gain this small supply of it, soas guilty as it made me feel about all the othersI was hiding it for myself.

    Meanwhile, the demon lord Milim was clearly at an impasse. I could see she was having an internal conflict, interspersed with Nnnhh But But and other mutterings. Lets be doubly sure about this. I tossed the sphere I was ying around with into my mouth.

    Mmmm, this is good!

    Ah!!

    Whew. Really good. Oops! Im almost out.

    Whaaa?!

    This is fun. Shes just like a child, ripe for getting picked on.

    So you gonna admit that I won?

    Wait. I have a suggestion.

    Lets hear it.

    Call it a draw. How about we call it a draw this time?

    And what do I get out of agreeing to that?

    Ill forget about everything that happened.

    Oh?

    That, thats not all, either! I swear I wont meddle with you guys at all! And you know, if you have any problems, you can talk to me about them, okay?!

    I won!

    Her strength was overwhelming, but inside, she was every bit the kid that she looked like. Against a grown-ups negotiation skills, she had no chance. Yep. Grown-ups y dirty.

    Of course, trying to extract anything else out of her would be dangerous. She was a catastrophe-ss demon lord, and if I got on her bad side any further, I ran the risk of my town being turned into ash. I decided to y my hand before she changed her mind.

    Sounds good to me. I ept. Well call it a draw, then.

    I had a fair bit of inventory left, so I put a generous supply of honey into a jar and handed it to her. It wasnt a fancy jar, misshapen and handmade from y, but Milim still epted it with a smile, scooping a bit up and sucking at it with gusto.

    The danger was gone. She was in a good mood, and the most unprecedented catastrophe to ever hit our town ended before it began.

    I had just healed the ogres and started to head back into town when I realized that Milim was following me. Oh, brother. I thought I had talked my way out of this, so I assumed she would be going back home, but already my ns were failing.

    Holding the jar of honey drops carefully, the demon lord stuck right to my side in lockstep. Does she want more honey? I had a supply, but no intention of letting her have more of it. I didnt want my portion to run away on me.

    Hey, she asked, sidling up to me as we walked. Hey, have you ever thought about calling yourself a demon lord, or trying to be one?

    What on earth is she going on about?

    Why would I want to put myself through that? I asked.

    She gave me a genuinely perplexed look in response. Huh? I mean Were talking about a demon lord, here! Theyre really cool, you know? You kinda want tolook up to them, right?

    Nope.

    Huh?

    Huh?

    It appeared that Milim the demon lord and I saw things in very different ways. We looked at each other.

    Well, lemme ask you this: Do you get anything good out of being a demon lord?

    Huh? Umm, well, all these strong guys seek you out to try to start fights. Its fun!

    Im already getting in enough fights now, thanks. Not interested.

    Whaaaa?! Well, how do you get your fun in life?

    Oh, all kinds of things. Theres practically too much for me to do, if anything. I only just got my hands on that honey a little bit ago. Theres lots of other stuff I want, too, so I really dont have the time to be a demon lord. Or is there something to it besides fighting?

    No, butyou can act all big around humans and magic-born?

    Isnt that kind of boring?

    The question caused Milim to make a face like she was just struck by lightning. I guess it was kind of boring. I was so on the mark that she had nothing to say.

    We were almost back at town again, and if she was that shocked about it, I kind of wished she would go away and leave me alone.

    Well, I guess you know my story now. Be careful on your way back home, all right?

    I thought that was a pretty smooth way to drop the hint. I was wrong.

    Wait! Y-you?! Youre doing stuff thats more fun than being a demon lord? Thats not fair! Its totally not fair! Now Im angry. Tell me what it is! And let me join you, too!!

    I did my best not to call her a spoiled brat to her face. She was a demon lord; riling her could have unexpected consequences. Really, just thinking of her as a child made dealing with her a cinch. Judging by our confrontation just a moment ago, it was super-easy as an adult to talk around her. You cant try to read someone like this too deeply. Just work around her selfishness and nudge the conversation in your directionthats the real key to it, and along those lines, I was already treating Milim like the children of my rtives.

    All right, all right. Ill tell you. But on one condition. Can you start calling me Sir Rimuru from now on?

    What? No! Youre crazy! It should be the opposite. You need to call me Lady Milim! Dont go bandying about my first name like that

    Oops. Maybe I got a little too cocky? She looks and acts like a child, but angering a walking potential catastrophe could be lethal.

    Well, hang on a sec. We just drew ourst fight. Thats fine, isnt it?

    Nnngh

    All right. Lets do this. Ill call you Milim, and you can just call me Rimuru. Sound good?

    Mmmmhh Well, okay. I got it! Ill allow you to call me just Milim. You better appreciate that, though! Only my demon lord friends are allowed that.

    Well, thanks. I guess were friends now, too, huh?

    Huh?!

    Despite all the sparks, we had ovee our naming dispute. Wed just call each other by our own namesno honorifics or anything.

    Okay, well, Ill give you a tour of the city, but no wandering around by yourself, okay?

    Okay, Rimuru! Ee-hee-hee!

    The demon lord Milimjust Milim to mewas being oddly cheerful.

    Great. Theres a good girl. And no starting fights in town without my permission, either. Promise me?

    Of course! I promise, Rimuru!

    So far, so good. Easier than I thought, even. I ought to be fine now.

    Well done, Sir Rimuru. Taming the wild demon lord so briskly

    We should expect no less of Sir Rimuru!

    I will let Sir Rigurd know about thisand to take care not to anger the demon lord.

    The feedback from the ogre mages seemed positive enough, too. Noints, at leastand if they did haveints, I thought as I guided Milim toward town, lodging them to a demon lord wouldnt do much.

    It seemed, by the way, that calling yourself a demon lord was a good way to make the other demon lords punish you. If you couldnt prove your strength, theyd boot you right out of the club.

    Whew. That was a real close one. If I dered myself a demon lord, like Milim was semi-pushing me to do, Id start to get watched by real demon lords. Not that Milim wasnt one, but either way, I dodged a bullet without realizing it. Hearing that story afterward, I gave myself a mental pat on the back for refusing the bait.

    I was showing Milim around town.

    It turned out to be much moreborious than I was expecting. If youve ever taken a young child to an amusement park, I think you can imagine how it was. Take your eyes off her for a moment, and shes gone. It was exactly like that.

    Hey! I told you to stop running off!

    Wah-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha! Im over here! Whats this thing?!

    Listen to me! Just calm down and pay attention.

    Wah-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha! Whats the big deal? Im listening!

    She inly wasnt. She was running up and down the streets, her tension level so high that it honestly made me wonder about her.

    Ah, Sir Rimuru!

    Just inside town, we ran into Gabil, who was carrying a box.

    What good timing. I am here because our test run isplete.

    He may live to regret calling it good timing.

    Oooh, a dragonewt! Wah-ha-ha-ha-ha! Thats pretty rare. Doing okay?

    Well, well, heres a new girl. Indeed, I am Gabil the dragonewt! As Sir Rimurus right-hand man, I have been tasked with the development of a secret potion. Are you new to town, too, lildy?

    Snap!

    Huh? What did you just say? Littledyyou dont mean me, do you? You want me to kill you?

    She was all smiles a moment ago. Now, Milim was transformed. Guess she didnt like what Gabil called her.

    Grabbing Gabils head with a single hand, the demon lord pulled it toward her, then nted a fist in his stomach. I had no time at all to stop her. With a pained exhtion, Gabil had been brought to the brink of death.

    Uh Wait. What happened to her promise not to start a fight without my permission?

    Listen to me. Im in a very good mood at the moment. Thats why Im willing to forgive you now that Ive done thatbut not next time, so watch yourself, got it?

    I dont think she couldve done much more than that without causing literal death. Some forgiveness. It was like she expertly judged the exact amount of force to bring Gabil up tobut not overthe cliff. This girl was fearsome! She probably used Dragons Eye to gauge the strike, but still, fearsome.

    Good thing Gabil was carrying a test run of our healing potion. We quickly used it on him. It worked.

    Phahh?! I saw my father waving at me from across the river! he shouted upon waking up.

    Guess youre fine, then, I muttered, rolling my eyes. Your fathers still alive, isnt he?

    Eroh, right. Many pardons. I really was rather close to death, however. Who is this girler, this esteemeddy before us?

    Yeah, Soeis informing Rigurd right now, but I guess nobody told you guys in the cave yet. This is Milim. I guess shes a demon lord?

    Huh? Whaaatt?! A demon lord?!

    Gabil was so shocked, he looked ready to piss himself. I could understand why. I waited for him topose himself, then exined that Milim would be staying in town for a little while.

    I see No wonder that was such a powerful punch. I suppose I should be d to be alive

    Yeah, well, she promised that she wouldnt start any fights, so I doubt shes aiming to kill anyone.

    Wah-ha-ha! Of course not! That was just my way of saying hi!

    Hell of a way to do that. I guess I shouldnt trust her on that promise too much. A little love tap from her would have life-altering consequences for any of us. Id have to make sure everyone here is sufficiently warned.

    Ill head to the caveter, so let Vester know, too, all right?

    Yes sir.

    Gabil bowed as he bounded off. Considering the punishment he just endured, he looked in pretty good shape. Maybe the potion was pretty potent, or maybe Gabil was really that tough, or maybe both. Milim gave him a broad, approving nod, waved, then turned to me like nothing had happened.

    Wow, hes pretty solidly built, huh? Maybe I oughta turn it up a notch next time?

    Um, dont ask me, I pleaded from the bottom of my heart.

    Hey, um, you know you cant start punching people just because youre mad, okay?

    Hmm? Its his fault for angering me. Plus, like I said, thats just a form of greeting!

    No, Milim. No, its not.

    Well, Im not gonna let you greet people with a boxing match, all right? No more of that!

    No? But I gotta show people a little force to start out, or else theyll think Im a pushover

    I said, you cant! Ill tell everyone in town to treat you with respect, all right?

    You will? Well, great. Ill leave that to you.

    Yeah, thanks. Just chill for now, okay?

    That was about all I could warn her about at the moment. I had a feeling Id need to gradually teach Milim somemon sense over the next little while. It felt like the demon lord had a couple different triggers that enraged herId just have to pray that Gabil was her first, andst, victim.

    We continued our journey across town. It was almost dinnertime, when most people would wrap up their work and gather around outdoors, and I figured it was high time to introduce her.

    Soei had been nice enough to spread the word around town about our little tyrant, but it was probably safest to show her around and make sure everybody knew exactly what she looked like. I really doubted anyone was stupid enough to try to make a pass at her, but it paid to be doubly sure.

    I sent out the announcement for everyone to gather at the main square. They slowly filed in after finishing work, and once the square was filled up, I hopped up on the podium.

    Umm, so starting today, well have a new friend living with all of us. Well be treating her as an honored guest, so Id like you all to treat her politely for me. Shes also promised to follow all the town rules, so if you see her viting any, please let me know.

    I wasnt willing to let a ton of things slide just because she was a demon lordbut given her violent force, figuring out how toy down thew was a thorny question. I did make her promise to y nice to the general public, and she seemed confident that shed stick to that.

    Arent you worrying too much? she said. I always keep my promises!

    I had my concerns about that, but I couldnt just sit here and doubt her every move. I decided to trust in her.

    Next, Milim took the podium.

    Im Milim Nava, she told the crowd, and starting today, Ill be living in this city. Its good to meetcha!

    Um, wait. What did she just say?!

    Whoa, hang on. What do you mean, youll be living here?

    Um, thats exactly what I mean. Ive decided to live here, too.

    Wait, wait, wait. Dont you already have somece to live? Arent there people you have to worry about over there?

    Oh, theyll be fine. Ill just go home every now and then, and itll be no prob!

    Its a huge prob to me, you idiot! I had to mentally keep myself from screaming my thoughts at her. Well, whatever. She was a pretty flighty girl. Once she got bored of us, I was sure shed be outta here.

    Well, you heard her, so treat her well, I said, defeatedly addressing the crowd.

    Milim was free to do as she pleased, and the residents generally seemed positive about the newsWhat?! Lady Milim, the demon lord?! My stars, Ive never seen her royal countenance in person before! Well done, Sir Rimuru! Striking such cordial rtions with that tyrant! Ahh, itll be peaceful days for Tempest now! And so on.

    The name of a demon lord had a lot of cachet around here, Milims in particr. Nobody used her of being a fake, eitherwith my good word to back her, there was no room for doubt.

    So just to make sure were clear, starting today Well, Milims one of us. If she runs into any problems, I want you all to help her out.

    Yes! Rimuru and I are friends now, so if somethinges up, Im your girl!

    I didnt expect Milim to require help from any of us. If anything, wed take the brunt of whatever drama she conjured up. That was what I meant from the statement, but that didnt register with the demon lord. She took it straight, and I couldnt deny her.

    Still

    Friends, huh?

    Was that really all right? Befriending a demon lord and all? I mean, in the short time wed known each other, Milim seemed nice enough and all, but

    The girl herself, perhaps picking up on my whisper, began to blush. Yeah, she said, friends does sound kind of odd. Uhmm Maybe not friends, so much as BFFs!

    Um BFFs? Milim, when did I give any indication that we were BFFs?

    Er, BFFs? I hesitantly asked.

    Huh? Arent we?!

    I could see the tears welling in Milims eyes alreadybut if anything, the hostile force in her already-balled fists came even more quickly. Crap!

    Hee-hee-hee! Kidding, kidding! BFFs forever, man!

    I quickly corrected myself. Now theres a mine I almost nted my foot on. I was not gonna go down the same road as Gabil.

    Right? Totally! You sure are good at scaring people! Milim beamed at me, indicating I had made the right call.

    Too easy. Too easy, but still a tough one to handle. No letting my guard down any longer. This had been a real lesson for me. Thend of Tempest had a new resident, and she was more dangerous than a warehouse full of powder kegs.

    With her introduction over, we filed into the dining hall. Food was on the way, and todays main dish was curry.

    To be honest, it was a dish that did its best to simte curry. We had discovered a grass that resembled wild rice well enough, and we were in the midst of improving upon it right now. It wasnt very nutritious at the moment, and it certainly didnt taste great, but currys great at covering up stuff like that, so the results turned out pretty well. I had Shunas culinary gifts to thank for that. If we could figure out how to grow some honest-to-goodness white rice, I think itd be a ssic, but either way, this worked, too. We also had some ersatz Indian-style naan bread, so you could choose that instead.

    Cooking in this town was the result of a long trial-and-error process. We had a stockpile of recipes at this point, but without any sugar, recreating the dishes I knew on Earth was a challenge. I had monsters scouring the forest for anything that resembled sugarcane. There might be nts with sugar stored in the roots, like sugar beets or whatnot, so Id been asking our patrols toe back with as many different types of nts as they could. A sample was all I needed to run Analyze and Assess, figure out what was inside, andover timeextract real sugar from it.

    Milim certainly enjoyed the meal. I figured she had pretty childish tastes in food, too, so I asked Shuna to put some extra fruit juice in her curry to make it sweeter. Judging by the way she tore through her helping, I guess I made the right choice.

    Wow!! I havent eaten anything this good in suuuch a long time!

    Shuna smiled as she doled out a second serving. It was a darling little scene. One that was ruined by the bombshell Shion had for me.

    By the way, Sir Rimuru, I had been wonderingwhat was that present you gave to Lady Milim outside of town?

    Erk.

    Aw, geez, Shion, whyd you have to bring that up all of a sudden?

    No! You cant have any! That jars mine!

    Milim immediately tucked her jar of honey drops out of view. Sheesh. She couldve just tossed it into Spatial Storage, but noooo.

    Oh, dont worry, Lady Milim. Nobodys thinking about taking your things at all, Shuna said, smiling.

    Yeah, Id hope not. Nobody was suicidal enough in town to try it. And the moment she realized her honey wasnt in danger, she grinned and resumed her mealsopletely defenseless, one would begin to wonder how demon lord-ly she really was, if at all.

    Though Milim wasnt really the problem. The problem was that people now knew about my secret honey stash.

    You know, Shuna continued, I have been noticing a rather fragrant scent around heretely. I had thought it belonged to you, Lady Milim, but was that what Sir Rimuru gave you, perhaps

    Crap. I did not like her leading the witness like that. This was bad. Soei had his head turned aside, pretending not to be involved, but Benimaru was already giving all of us a curious look. There were six of us seated at the table: Benimaru, Soei, Milim, Shuna, Shion, and me. Shuna was the only one not there for my confrontation with Milim, so I couldnt exin my way out of it.

    Ah, such was my fate, I guess. I was hoping to keep it under wraps until we could figure out how to mass-produce it, but oh well. I took out some honey from my pocket and filled a nearby cup with it.

    Okay, well, this stuff is called honey. I got this as a substitute for sugar, but I cant make very much of it yet, so I cant give you all a supply.

    I directed them all to scoop some up with their fingers and give it a try.

    Ah?!

    The looks on the two females faces were of abject shock. Soei just raised a single eyebrow, but Benimaru was already looking at me expectantly, hoping for more. Milim, of course, scooped up a bit herself, not that I invited her to. You already have your own, you greedy brat!

    So as you see, the honey tastes extremely sweet, but it also has a medicinal effect. In fact, it can cure almost any disease, but sometimes there can also be poison mixed in, so you need to be very careful extracting it. Thats not a problem if Im doing it, but still.

    And you think we can make arger amount?

    Not right now, no. I can produce maybe a single cup of this a week. If I pushed Apito hard enough, we might be able to up that to three cups, but there was no pressing need to, so I let it slide. I want to conduct more research into its makeup to evaluate it as a medicine, so theres not a lot to spare for eating quite yet.

    This wasnt a lie. My Analyze and Assess skill told me that this was a special-grade panacea. The rarity of the nts we extracted it from no doubt meant it had all kinds of astonishing benefits.

    Yes. The nectar we harvested from giant honeybee hives simply doesntpare to this. As a sweetener, it was fairly disappointing.

    Shion nodded. She was always a font of information about stuff like that, even if it didnt directly connect to cooking. And she was rightgiant honeybee nectar was more poisonous than sugary, making it ill-suited for food. I figured I could analyze it and extract something decent from it, but taming giant honeybees sounded like pretty tricky business to me anyway.

    If we could prepare a suitable garden for them and let that be their territory, I think we could get some pretty decent honey from them, though.

    You think? Shion said, finally seeing things my way.

    You said this could be a substitute for sugar, Shuna asked, clearly curious. Is sugar itself really this sweet?

    I could see Milims and Shions ears perk up at the question.

    It sure is. Theres no medicinal value, but its so sweet that people get literally addicted to it. You can use it in food, in drinks; all kinds of areas. Well be able to craft a great deal more food than before, once we have it, I exined.

    Ah I see. In that case, I will have us devote all our efforts to discovering this sugar, starting tomorrow. Shion

    Yes, Shuna. I promise you, I will stake my life on discovering this sweet nt for us all!

    Yes! Very good!

    The three women gave one another firm nods. I wanted to ask why theyd stake their lives on this (and since when were they all best friends, too?), but it was fine for now. I took a final lick or two of the remaining honey, already assured that real sugar would be ours sooner than ever now.

    With dinner wrapped up, I directed them all to the bath, my crowning achievement. The tub, made with the finest dwarven marble out there, was filled day and night to the brim with hot-spring water, ready to be used at any time.

    Milim had joined us, meekly following along behind Shuna and Shion. Normally, Id nonchntly hop in the bath with them all in slime form, but that definitely didnt feel right today. Shed be happier alone with the other females, and besides, I would need to discuss things with the ogres whenever Milim wasnt around.

    So I moved on to our meeting hall and gave a rundown of the days events to the people assembled there. My goodness I hardly know what to say. I never expected a demon lord to visit here on her own volition, Rigurd said, shaking his head.

    I could understand his position. I had never pictured this happening, myself.

    Well, I think itll be all right, though, I said. Shes promised not to start any fights in here, at least. Not without my permission.

    I wasnt exactly confident about that, but I had little choice but to trust her on that count.

    Perhapsbut shouldnt we be more worried about how the other demon lords will react? Kaijin spoke up.

    Hakuro and Benimaru nodded at this.

    How do you mean? I honestly asked.

    Well, there are multiple demon lords out there, and they all work under a convoluted system of checks and bnces. You and Lady Milim just dered each other allies out in the public square, and that basically means this towns under the protection of Milim the demon lord. And normally, I suppose, that would be incredibly desirable, but

    Sir Rimuru, you are leader of the Great Forest of Jura Alliance and ruler of the Jura-Tempest Federation, Hakuro interjected. I suppose the actions of today would seem, in the eyes of the other demon lords, to mean that the Forest of Jura has forged an alliance with Milim herself.

    Yes! Benimaru added. It means that Milim, who hardly has any subjects of her own, suddenly has a muchrger force backing her up. It shakes the foundation of the current power bnce among the demon lords. One wrong move, I fear, and the entire forest could be subject to a major war.

    Hmm. Yes, I will admit to not thinking too deeply about it, but I suppose my decisions could wind up affecting the whole forest, huh? But I mean

    Practically speaking, though, none of us could stop Lady Milim if we wanted to, could we?

    Rigurd offered his opinion, and he was right. Even all of us at once would never have a chance. It left us with nothing but the most passive of approacheswaiting for her to grow bored and leave.

    To be frank, Benimaru said, her strength is on a totally different dimension from any of us. There is no point even debating whether we could beat her or not. None of us would be alive now were it not for Sir Rimurus quick thinking.

    Exactly. If other demon lords oppose her, I honestly like our chances against them more than her. Milim the demon lord is a walking catastrophe.

    Soei nodded at hispatriots honest feelings.

    Thatrgely settled it. There was nothing else to be done, and that was that. So how to handle Milim in the meantime?

    In that case, I vote that we should leave the day-to-day handling of Lady Milim to herah, BFF, Sir Rimuru. All in agreement?

    Aye!!

    Wha?! Dammit, Benimaru! But by the time I had the thought, I was toote. I was used to tossing the ball to someone else most of the timethis time, they did the same to me.

    Besides, Hakuro said, Lady Milim is one of the oldest and strongest of demon lords. A lord that we absolutely must not be hostile toward, one could say. For this issue, at least, I see little we can do besides let Sir Rimuru handle it.

    Way to drive the stake in like that. I didnt think she was that dangerous, but so be it. I sighed. Nobody else seemed to know how to curry Milims favor, and since I was apparently a genius at handling children, I suppose it was up to me to help out. We now had a silent, but steadfast, agreement that the demon lord Milim was my problem.

    Milim was already looking drowsy by the time she left the bath. Apparently, she was beside herself with excitementfew bathsrge enough to swim in existed in this world, so I couldnt me her. Most people had to make do with quick dips in cold water, and even nobility had to be content with hot water in cramped little tubs, I was told. Assuming you lived in a rich enough nation to have dedicated baths at all, which wasnt always the case.

    I was admittedly kind of picky about having this bath. Selfish of me, I know, but it had turned into a lovely facility. If people liked using it, I couldnt be happier.

    I asked Shuna to lead Milim to a guest bedroom and put her to sleep. There werent any Western-style beds here, just pseudo-tatami mats and futon mattresses on the floor. I worried that shed have someints about that, but it wound up not being an issue. She immediately fell asleep, looking snug as a bug.

    It was the demon lords first day and night in Tempest, and by andrge, it could have turned out a lot worse. Of course, the whirlwind she was kicking up had only just begun.

    We were busy as bees the next morning.

    First, waking up Milim at sunrise wasnt easy Why does a demon lord have to wake up early?! she grumbled.

    We managed to get her up and dressed. Her current outfit was just too exposed, so we prepared some other clothes for her the previous eveningjust a quick outfit built from whatever we had around, but she was pretty enough that she looked just fine wearing anything.

    This is hard to move in.

    Oh? Well, it looks nice. Isnt that better for you?

    I made a decent attempt to mollify her, and her mood instantly improved. Noints there. Children can be so simple like that sometimes.

    Next up was breakfast. Something resembling bread, fruit jam, and milkchilled cowdeer milk. I had been telling people about how good cows milk was, and this was close enough. That, plus some hot vegetable soup.

    The jam used fruit that had been boiled, cooled, and then sealed in chilled jars. It used no additional sugar, and I wasnt wholly sure what kind of fruit it was, but it was Shunas homemade recipe and quite a bit sweeter than I expected. It was more sour than sweet to my pte, but in a world socking in sugary food, this was still a rare luxury. Most people in town just had bread and the remaining vegetable soup for breakfast, so the jam was more reserved for honored guests, so to speak.

    Woww!! This is incredible! Milim gushed as she ate. d she liked it. I watched her go as I thought over a few things.

    I didnt particrly mind being the go-to guy for Milim-rted issues, but should I really just be acting normal like this? Most of my work around town involved inspectionchecking on construction sites, fields as they were being tilled, the weapon production workshop, our food storehouses. Id discuss things with the supervisors of each location and nail down our future direction.

    If any trouble happened around town, Id sometimes stop by to arbitrate. With all these races living in the same space, we needed rules in ce that everybody had to follow. It was one thing when this was just a vige or settlement, but we were now a federation with a poption in the tens of thousands, and the rule ofw was more important than ever. I didnt have enough time in the day to enact a ton ofws by myself, so the town still ran on a lot of general guidelines more than anything. Thus, if there was a difference of opinion or some other dispute bubbling, I was left to make the final decision.

    Rigurd and the rest of my staff solved most issues for me, thankfully, so I didnt hear about it unless it was something pretty serious. It seemed to me that this was on purposethey made sure not to bother me about something unless it really was that important. It was surprising, seeing how well these monsters could cooperate with one another. Im sure everyone had theirints, but we now had a culture where, instead of acting out physically, people preferred to let me do the judging.

    For today, at least, there were none of those problems to tackle. When there was, Id be contacted about it at least a week in advance, giving me time to listen to both sides and everyone else time to gather evidence and such. Which meant that the only nned appointment for today was a quick stop by Gabils ce.

    I dared a quick nce at Milim. Would I be okay taking her into the cave? It was now filled with Vesters valuableboratory tools and experimentsa sort of federal research facility.

    Suddenly, I had a good idea. Milim still had only a patchwork outfit on. If her stay here would be extending a while longer, wed need to prepare several outfits for her. Which meant

    Hey, Milim, once youre done eating, you want to go get some clothes custom-made for you?

    Why? Isnt this good enough?

    Youll probably want more than one outfit. Besides, I think youd look nice in something cuter anyway.

    What? You have cute clothes?!

    Sure. You can pick out whatever you like.

    Perfect! Ahh, I should have known, Rimuru! This town has everything!

    The moment I brought it up, she was already dancing around in her seat. Perfect. That oughta buy me some time. Going into that gauntlet of a dress shop, it was easy to spend half a day without realizing it. I had experienced it for myself, being stuffed into outfit after outfit like a dress-up doll. Most of the designs were made for fun looks anyway, so Im sure Milim would be able to find something she likes.

    Oh, Lady Milim is choosing some clothes? Id be happy to join her.

    Yeah, if you could, Shuna? I got an errand to run in the cave, so toss me a line with Thought Communication if somethinges up.

    Certainly.

    Oh, you arenting, Rimuru?

    Ah, um, I already have some clothes, so. Ille back to see you once youre all set, Milim, so feel free to select whatever you like and have em tailor it to your size. You could even have some new clothes made for you.

    Ooh! Got it!

    Great. That went well. The moment she heard the magic phrase new clothes, her interest immediatelyunched her in that direction. It oughta keep her from starting a riot or genocide in my absence for a while.

    She went off with Shuna to the production workshop after breakfast. Now I needed to get my own errand over with.

    I headed for the Sealed Cave with Kaijining along.

    Were you all right after yesterday? I asked Gabil, who was waiting for me. He seemed fine to me, but a cheap shot from a demon lord could lead to all kinds of aftereffects.

    No problem at all, sir! he replied with a heartyugh. I am supremely confident in my bodys durability!

    He certainly acted like always, too. I breathed a sigh of relief as Vester gingerly came up to me.

    By the way, Sir Rimuru, I did file the report with King Gazel as well. I hope it was all right?

    A report about Milim was what he meant. I asked him to send one off yesterday. Our pact with Dwargon did includenguage about providing whatever support we could if danger befell one of us, and this definitely counted. There wasnt much Dwargon could do, really, but itd be polite to at least let them know and prepare for the worst.

    Not a problem. Did themunication crystal work all right?

    It did, yes. It connected me to King Gazel almost immediately. All I said to him was that the demon lord Milim attacked and that you handled it, Sir Rimuru, but was that good enough?

    I could understand Vesters concern. That terse report probably threw the Dwarven Kingdom into chaos, scrambling to collect whatever intel it could. Vester was probably being swamped with requests for more information.

    Well, we talked it overst night, and it was decided that Id be taking care of Milim. The only conclusion we came to was that, uh, there really aint much else we can do right now. I cant do anything besides warn him, but I figured itd be nice to do that, at least. If they have any bright ideas, Id love to hear them.

    Yes, I am sure. The demon lord Milim is a ss beyond all the others, as I understand

    Quite, Gabil added. The strongest in the world, as far as I am aware.

    Huh. Famous enough that even these two knew about her? Hakuro mentioned she was the oldest and strongest of demon lords as well, so Gabil couldnt be lying.

    But maybe this was a good thing, depending on how you looked at it. If every demon lord was such a monster, then no way was I ever going to keep my promise to Shizu and y her nemesis. Milim being such an exceptional force meant that hey, maybe I had half a chance at offing your run-of-the-mill demon lord after all. The thought lightened my spirits a little.

    The passiveness of our current approach notwithstanding, maybe we really would have better luck duking it out with the rest of them. On that point, at least, my staff agreed.

    But there was no point in worrying all day. I had time to think about demon lord politicster. For now, I wanted to ask about healing potion.

    Do you have your report, then?

    Gabil nodded, then began exining his current status with Vester.

    The potion from yesterday was apparently the newest that Vester had produced. Something quite different from the things he tried making using dwarven technology, as he put it.

    The potion I produced within myself was the result of a 99-percent extraction of hipokute herbs. Drink it, sprinkle it on someoneit worked great either way. Meanwhile, the dwarves could manage only 98-percent purity at best, and that single percentage point made a world of difference in performance.

    The official name for the magic elixir I had created was a Full Potion, one that could fully heal any type of injury or woundeven repair missing body parts, like arms and legs. There were a lot of ways to lose those in this world, whether they were bitten off by a monster or blown off by a magical st, and this potion could fully rebuild them. Magic was the only word for it.

    ording to the Great Sage, all this was possible because my potion could read gic information from the body to regenerate limbsas long as the subject wasnt born that way, anything was heble.

    What dwarven technology could make, meanwhile, was called a High Potion. It was a first-ss concoction, capable of healing even major injuries, but sometimes it couldnt fully restore certain woundsand it definitely couldnt regenerate lost body parts all the time. I conjectured this was because the potion wasnt quite pure enough to fully read all the bodily data it needed for that. It could handle most injuries but couldnt quite push itself up to perfectionthat was the difference.

    The hipokute we were growing in here was of the same quality as natural-grown nts. The best out there, in other words. So any difference in quality from the potions that resulted were purely the result of production issues.

    Yknow, Id think a High Potion would be good enough, most of the time, Kaijin said as he scratched his head. He had a point. Already, down here in this cave, they had replicated the best that the dwarves could do in their homnd.

    Perhaps, Vester replied, but listen, Sir Kaijin: Once a scientist realizes there is something yet better to achieve, he refuses to make anypromise until he reaches it!

    Once he knew what my potion could do, he wanted to achieve that for himself. Which led up to what we saw yesterday.

    The potion used on me yesterday was in no way inferior to Sir Rimurus own potion. If I may be so presumptuous to say, I feel we have seeded this time. Even Gabil was confident in this batch of medicine.

    Let me assess it, I said, running Analyze and Assess on the vial presented to me.

    Understood. This medicine is equivalent to a Full Potion.

    Oooh. Nice. Vester really made it.

    Good job, Vester, This is definitely Full Potion, all right.

    Hohhh! Ive done it!!

    Superb work, Sir Vester. I am grateful to have aided you.

    Yeah, not bad, Vester. I always thought you were best suited for research work like this.

    As Vester was almost ovee with emotion, Gabil and Kaijin gave him their blessing.

    Man, I didnt think he could really do it.

    I couldnt have done it without the hints you gave me, Sir Rimuru, Vester said, turning to me. Geez. I didnt really do anything. It was all the result of his efforts, so I didnt want to unfairly take the credit. I just gave him my thoughts, thats all. It didnt seem to me that Vesters work process was much different from the extraction I did within my own body. The quantities involved differed a fair bit, but I thought it odd that he saw so much more of a performance hit than I did.

    My reasoning was that it had something to do with the way the potion reacted to the atmosphere around it. The work space inside my stomach was aplete vacuum, free of impurities and the like, and I figured that let me perform the mostplete extraction possible. The fact that even this produced only 99-percent purity, I chalked up to the resulting liquid being highly reactive to particles in the air.

    I exined this to Vester, and he took it seriously. It was just a passing idea on my part, but Vester believed in me and carried out the relevant experimentsand that, I guess, is what led to this Full Potion before me.

    Which was great and all. But you know, not everything about it was great.

    I bet this could be a huge source of ie for Tempest if we sold it, Kaijin. What do you think?

    He thought it over a bit, then shook his head. Ooh, that could be tough, boss. If anything, this stuff is too good. The purity levels so high that its not something you can use on a whim, yknow? This kind of quality, maybe some hero-ss adventurer would bring it along now and then

    Vester hmmed his agreement. Quite true, I fear. Im happy this resulted in the best quality youll ever find, but in terms of selling it? Im not quite sure the market is prepared for it.

    So what the hell were we making it for? I kept myself from interjecting. But thinking about it, maybe I was wrong this whole time. I thought we could make this potion kind of the towns gship product, but Vester and Gabil were picturing it more as a potion ofst resort, so to speak.

    Still, Sir Rimuru, there are not so many educated doctors in the Dwarven Kingdom. There are alchemists capable of mixingpounds together, but it is rare for someone to make his entire living off selling High Potions. The medicine you see in the markets is actually Low Potion, made by diluting High Potion with water. They just call it potion in the shops, however. Thus

    Vester had probably noticed my disappointment. Listening to him, it was actually rather simple. Naturally grown hipokute was a rare thing to find. You almost never saw it bought or sold in the marketce. There were some benevolent botanists who cultivated it themselves, but even they could only harvest a very tiny amount of it. Along those lines, our mass-production project was a totally alien concept. Thats why even diluted potion was considered a rarity.

    Instead, Vester suggested this: Perhaps we could negotiate with King Gazel to have them ept delivery of Low Potion from us for sale over there? Id imagine hed want us to take in those few medicine makers who work in the Dwarven Kingdom in exchange, but

    Yeah, that might actually work, boss. If they leave the potion making and selling to us, they can just buy in whatever they need for their own purposes. That may ount for a lot of the motive behind their technology-share request, actually.

    Kaijin had a point, but that was fine by me. He and Vester began talking between themselves, figuring out how to best convince Gazel of the idea. It was hard to believe they came to blows not long ago, given how well they got along now. They must see eye to eye on a lot of things, deep down. Good thing, I thought.

    One Full Potion could apparently be diluted down to a hundred Low Potions. If this idea gained any steam, it could be a pretty lucrative source of ie. But no great need to hurry. I didnt want to hurt any of the Dwarven Kingdoms vested interests. Wed have to work things out so wed both benefit from the deal.

    So I decided to let the topic simmer for the time being and took my leave from the meeting.

    The friendliness of our chat made me stay longer than anticipated. It was just a little bit into the afternoon, but I was sure the goblinas at the workshop were working their dress-up-doll magic on Milim, so I figured I better pick her up. Meals in Tempest were handed out in the morning and evening, but if she was up for it, I intended to get her something in between.

    The moment I stepped out of the magic circle, the fracas was under way.

    There was shouting, screaming, and a great pir of fireing from a plot ofnd near the center of town that hadnt been built on yet. It was a pretty sordid-looking scene. There was no damage, thankfully, and no workers nearby got caught up in whatever it was.

    Soei, realizing I was there, sidled up to me.

    What happened?

    Well

    He gave me a quick rundown, although once I reached the site, I found it easy enough to figure out for myself. While I was off to the cave, the town had another visitorone who was positively livid with Milim.

    I was guided to the center of it, where I found Shuna, Shion, Benimaru, Hakuro, and Rigurd with a few other hobgoblins. Rigurd was sporting a heavy bruise on his face; someone must have hit him.

    Whats up, Rigurd? You all right?

    Ah, Sir Rimuru! This much is nothing to me!

    That was just an act; the damage was obviously fairly serious. I handed him some potion and turned toward where everyone else was watching.

    Did he get you?

    Yes, my lord?

    I didnt need to check, but I did anyway. There was a dark-haired magic-born on the ground, apparently struck by Milim as well. His face was twisted in pain, his tongue sticking out of his bloodstained mouth. He seemed alive, but motionless, his eyes rolling into his skull. Around him were his entourage of underlings, frozen stiff and too thrown by this state of affairs to know what to do.

    The fallen magic-born was wearing a fancy-looking outfit, dyed in ck, and some rather expensive-looking armor.

    ording to Soeis report, he identified himself as working for the demon lord Carillon, and Soei had hurried to the scene after the intruder set off his alertwork, only to find this magic-born and his grouping down to the vacant lot from the heavens.

    Rigurd handled them first since I was away, and things came to a boil pretty quickly afterward. Before Soei could even grasp the situation and report to me about it, everything was already done with. I apologize for failing to inform you earlier, he said to me, but I couldnt find much fault with him.

    First, the magic-born had begun by taking a self-guided tour of the city, going around like a would-be conqueror. This was when Rigurd had shown up, and the magic-born had this to say to him: I am Phobio! The ck Leopard Fang! One of Lord Carillons Three Lycanthropeers, and the strongest of all in the Beast Masters Warrior Alliance! What a fine town this istruly one worthy of falling under the rule of the Beast Master himself, wouldnt you agree?

    Surely you jest was all Rigurd had managed before getting punched out without furtherment. The visitor did not use his full strength, keeping the injury merely serious instead of critical. Soei judged him to be a formidably strong magic-born, and as he put it, a full-power strike could have killed Rigurd on the spot. Kind of hard to imagine, given how frozen and helpless he was now, but still.

    But why was he on the ground? Simple.

    Spotting the presence of the ck Leopard Fang Phobio or whatever, Milim flew in, saw that Rigurd was down, and got angry. Phobio hurriedly responded with a skill he called Panther Fang Explosive Chop, although nobody knew what it was supposed to beit seems Milims force of will deflected it and sent it hurtling into the sky.

    That was the pir of me I saw, and the fallout from that singed the cute dress she had just put on. No longer able to contain her rage, Milim plunged her fist into Phobios stomach, which brings us to the current scene before me.

    So now what?

    Ah, Rimuru! This freak was acting like he was the big boss around here, so I put him back in his ce!

    Now Milim noticed me, and she was evidently proud of herself. Fishing forpliments. Should I take the bait? He started it, yes, but I didnt want to spark a conflict with another demon lord quite yet. I had never heard the name Carillon before, and I had no idea what kind of force he had, even. But we just decked one of his men, and we couldnt say we werent involved anymore.

    I swear. Take your eyes off her for a momentand all these headaches she gives me.

    Didnt you promise me you wouldnt cause a ruckus without my permission?

    Geh?! Um, I, erm This, this is different! Hes not from this town, so its all right! Really!

    No, its not! Still, you did help keep Rigurd safe. Well just say no lunch for you today and call it even

    Youre mean! Thats so mean! Waaahhhh!

    Well, thats what you get for bothering me when I was just thinking about lunch. I didnt need to eat anyway, and Milim must have been the same. What a glutton of a demon lord.

    Dammit, this is all his fault! And that Carillon, breaking his promise like that What a scoundrel! One shots not enoughlet me hit him again

    Wait, wait, wait!

    I had to spring over to keep her from punching Phobio again. His men turned white as a sheet of paper, terrified at her brutality.

    Look, how about we go somewhere else? I pleaded to the bawling Milim.

    This was really turning into a travesty, so I decided to try talking this out away from the carnage.

    We were back in the old meeting hall. They had just finished taking Milims measurements and were preparing something new for her when all this happened, so her outfit was quickly reced.

    I didnt want to spoil her, but we wound up serving her lunch anyway. This was partly because she had revealed a couple curious things during her wailing, and I wanted to follow up on that. She happily nibbled on her sandwich, once again in a good mood, so everything was fine with me.

    The hall was draped in tension, though. Milim was about the only one unaffected by it. She definitely earned the demon part of her name, catching trouble the moment I wasnt around. Perhaps this wouldve happened even if Milim werent here, but it wouldnt have gotten soplicated this quickly.

    Well, no point dwelling on the past. The future was more important.

    So what are you all here for? I said as I sized up the now-awake Phobio.

    Hmph! And I have to reply to you lowly would-be magic-born?

    Benimaru and Shion immediately red at him. I motioned them to stay cool, and they reluctantly stayed there, watching things unfold.

    It was just Rigurd, Benimaru, Shion, and me, along with Milim. Phobio had three of his own troops with him; we hadnt restrained him or anything, which could be why he was giving us so much attitude. I figured Id try to outss him, tossing in a bluff or two for good measure.

    Call me lowly if you want, but Im definitely stronger than you. Also, Id advise you to just give me some answers. I dont know this Carillon guy, but depending on how you act around me, maybe hes gonna have to answer to us before long, okay? Think youre ready to make enemies with the entire Forest of Jura?

    Ha! Well, look at you! The most self-important slime in the world, eh? And this entire town carries out the orders of such a base creature? What a bunch of wimps you must have here. And just because Lady Milim likes you a little, dont let that get to your head, boy.

    Magic-born, just like monsters, tended to flock to whoever was strongest around them. Reacting to all these barbs would do nothing but tire me out. Certainly, this guy was toughone of the Three Lycanthropeers, the so-called ck Leopard Fang, whatever. And even without all that bluster, I could tell he boasted a fair amount of magical energy. Maybe no match at all for Milim, but likely stronger than Benimaru or Shion. Even I wouldve had trouble a bit ago, although not with the Orc Disaster stored in my Stomach now.

    This was a powerful magic-born, one worthy of being categorized as a subdemon lord. I was fairly sure I was stronger, but I was in no hurry to test that out. Itd just make things harder, and winning would aplish nothing. It may even earn me the ire of this Carillon guy; we could seriously be at war soon. I wanted to avoid that, so I had to exercise my social skills to extract some info from him.

    A base creature? Milim, done with her sandwich, raised her voice again. You think you can pick on my friend like that?

    She was more than an ammo dump; she was explosive all by herself. Before I could even begin the conversation, I had a premonition she had ruined everything. But I was getting the hang of dealing with her. Lure her in with food, and she was easy to soothe.

    Hang on, Milim. If you do anything else, Im seriously taking dinner away from you, okay?

    O-okay. Ill be good, I promise.

    Great. With that squared away, it was time to start the investigation.

    Well. First off, youre right; I am a slime. But Im a slime that rules over thirty percent of this forest, and if youre rarin for war, then Im willing to ept that. So Id advise being careful in how you respond to me.

    I mixed a little Coercion in with my subsequent questions. The answers came surprisingly more readily than I thought. Milims threats must have hit home, after allprobably not my Coercion, sadly, but at least I got what I wanted out of him.

    The pouting, sullen answers could be summed up as follows: The demon lord Carillon had ordered him to try to scout either the orc lord or the mystery magic-born that fought him, whichever had survived. The magic-born referred to us, apparently, which suggested that the demon lord backup Gelmud had hinted at wasnt Milim after all.

    I didnt think multiple demon lords were involved with this, but thinking about it, I doubted Milim would bother with such a convoluted n anyway. It was more natural to assume someone else was behind it.

    Getting back to the subject, whoever won the fight between the orc lord and his foe was likely going to be an incredibly strong foe, so Carillon sent the ck Leopard Fang Phobio, a subdemon lord in his own right, to check it out. Carillon had a good eye for that kind of thing, apparently, but Phobio was just too much of a moron for the job. If the demon lord wanted me on his side, he shouldve sent a more intelligent magic-born, one who could bargain with me and put an enticing offer on the table.

    Carillonnnnn Breaking our promise not to get in each others way Milim was stewing next to me. Phobio, meanwhile, averted his eyes, as if afraid of her.

    The proud subdemon lord was just a pale imitation next to a real one. Feeling her seething next to me, I reasoned that just about anyone who came here wouldve wound up the same way. Id definitely need to ask her about that promiseter, too; that sounded important.

    Now that we had gotten everything out of Phobio, I asked him to take his leave.

    Milims presence meant that Phobio had no power here, so he red at the two of us, barked out You will regret this! and took his crew out of the city. I told him to ry a message to Carillon, telling him to contact me at ater date if he wanted to negotiate with us, but I doubted hed ever receive it. When I left that job to Phobio, I knew hed only provide whatever info made him look good. Itd be better for him to tell the truth, given how his mission was a failure and all, but that was Phobios business.

    Id better get as much info as I can from Milim about this Carillons personality and other traits, so I can be ready to deal with whatever hes got. But how to bring up the topic?

    All right, Milim. Id like some more details.

    I cant let you do that! We made a promise that we wouldnt meddle with each other, so I cant even tell you, Rimuru.

    Ah, thanks for revealing youve got a secret, then. Now we had a grown-up and a child trying to outwit each otherand honestly, I liked my chances.

    Oh no? Was this a promise that youd keep things a secret from each other?

    No, nothing like that. Just not to meddle

    No? Well, its fine, then, isnt it? I mean, Carillons obviously told his minions all about you, huh, Milim? Besides, were BFFs, and we gotta help each other out, yknow? And I just figured, I better know what I can about demon lords besides you, Milim. Plus, if I dont know what kind of promise you made, how can I make sure I dont identally start meddling, huh? I put a special emphasis on BFFs.

    YeahbutBFFs

    Just one more push. I decided to offer a toy to cheer her up.

    Oh, right How about I make you a weapon sometime? I cant help but worry about my BFF, so

    Wah-ha-ha-ha-ha! Youre right! Being BFFs is the most important thing, huh?

    And down goes Milim. Just way too easy.

    I kept my lips from spreading into a maniacal grin as I nodded with the breezy confidence of a grown-up.

    So I sessfully extracted what I wanted from Miliminformation on three other demon lords besides her, and what they all wanted; what happened just now; and what was happening behind the scenes. Quite a bit about the mysteries I was concerned about.

    Butwow. Demon lords, trying to create a puppet demon lord of their own Milim was in on it just to alleviate her boredom, but this was a pretty serious operation, wasnt it? And if Im getting in the way of it, then no wonder theyre after us.

    Thiswill soon involve other demon lords, will it not, Sir Rimuru?

    A sordid state of affairs. We had best bring this up with Treyni at once.

    Not a problem! With Sir Rimuru at our side, we have nothing to fear from any of the demon lords!

    All of us (save one) were holding our heads at this disaster.

    The gale that blew in with Milims attack was growing in strength, and it was creeping ever closer to Tempest.

 Volume 3 - Ch 3

    THE CONGREGATION

    The Kingdom of Farmus was a vast nation, a sort of front door leading to the assorted nations to the west.

    These nations had no direct ties to the Eastern Empire. Instead of official rtions, they had powerful merchants who took it personally upon themselves to distribute in-demand goods between the twonds. Most of this informal trade went through the Armed Nation of Dwargon, which (publicly, at least) was neutral and thus gave their tacit consent to the goods going to and fro between them.

    Part of Farmuss territory was adjacent to the Dwarven Kingdom, meaning that anyone who lived in one of the so-called Western Nations would have to go through Farmus to reach Dwargon. That is, unless they were willing to brave a path through the Forest of Jura. The Farmus path was far safer and more monster-free, and even with the tariffs and fees applied, it still resulted in a more profitable journey. No merchant in their right mind would opt out of it.

    This all meant that not only rare Eastern Empire goods but also high-quality dwarven weapons and armor could be obtained by the Western Nations through the informal trade market with Farmus. It had made Farmuss capital of Marris a well-funded and burgeoning trade city, home to people from all over the world, and earned it the nickname of the front door to the west. It also meant the kingdoms coffers were full to overflowing, both from the taxes charged to traders and the revenues from the more well-heeled merchants, paid in exchange for assorted services.

    Among the nations of the west, it was certainly either the richest or very close to it.

    Nidol Migam, Earl of Migam, was indignant.

    Farmus was, indeed, a rich kingdom, but so much power was tipped toward its central government that practically none of those riches reached the nobility tasked with running its more remote regions. Redistribution of wealth was an alien concept around here, and the earldom of Migam never seemed to see any relief from the taxes they were expected to collect from their citizens.

    As with other nations, they were taxed based on their agricultural harvestsand yet, they were also charged with defending their borders against the threats posted by the forest. That was the current source of the Earl of Migams indignation.

    Have you ever heard something so ridiculous? he spat out, recalling what the finance minister had just told him. Simply remembering it made his blood boil: The Storm Dragon has vanished, and thus, the central governments special support payments will be ending, as of today. And that was thatno back talk allowed. After being summoned to the capital. After being forced to wait for three hours.

    That stipend had been a huge aid to them, certainly. The earlsnds went right up to the Forest of Jura, making it a keystone of Farmuss border defense. But that wasnt just Migams problem. It was a problem that loomed over the entire country.

    And yetof all the patronizing things they could have done!

    Nidol was so angry, he couldnt help but verbalize his thoughts. There was too much to consider. He had to think about how he would keep the earldom going.

    Sealed away or not, Veldora the Storm Dragon was a special S-ranked monster and thus ignored at ones own peril. With the disappearance now public knowledge, it was perhaps understandable that such speciali.e., provisionalsupport payments no longer made sense.

    But the timing couldnt have been worse. The Storm Dragon was just as much a threat to the monsters, tooand no more dragon meant no more overlord to keep them in check. They needed to strengthen their border forces, if anything, for all the new monster activityand then they lost their budget for it.

    That, in a nutshell, was what angered Nidol at the moment.

    The government might have a point, but to the Earl of Migam, that didnt matter.

    How do I protect mynd now?

    Mercenaries cost money. Adventurers from the Free Guild couldnt be trusted, when push came to shove. Now was exactly when the government should be extending a lifeline to him. They were talentless fools,pletely failing to grasp the situation.

    If, heaven forbid, Nidol Migamsnds were swallowed up by hordes of monsters, itd cost Farmus all the trust ced upon it by neighboring countries andrge-scale merchants. It would be the government that would pay the price for that, and right this minute, it was setting itself up for doom.

    The earl continued to curse his superiors under his breath. None of this was his own responsibility. He knew that, but still

    He sighed in his wagon, his mind a tad more settled. No one left but the royal family to press upon  He recalled the face of the king. It filled him with despair. The sheer avarice of that man would never allow him to care about the fate of some patch of frontiernd. It would be sphemy to say that out loud, but those were Nidols honest feelings.

    Without the pretext of the Storm Dragon to prop him up, the Earl of Migam might be forced to raise taxes, even.

    His territory bordered only two other areas: Central Farmus and the forest. There was no reason to prepare for invasion from other countries, and thus no need for a permanent standing army. The earls territorial force, tasked with driving off monsters and magical beasts, numbered no more than a hundred or so knights.

    The number made Nidol wince.

    Technically speaking, the earl had been taking the special stipend and pocketing it. The payments were meant to keep up strict patrols across the border with the Forest of Jura, but in this far-off region with no need for arge army, all they had to worry about was handling monsters. With the rise of the Free Guild over the past decade or so, too, the costs of dispatching monsters had gone down a great deal.

    Thus, this whole disaster was something of aeuppance for the earl himself, payback for failing to enact the measures he should have. He was aware of that, but it was still a bitter pill for Nidol to swallow.

    It all began with a missive from the Western Holy Church. The official announcement that the Storm Dragon had vanished came via magic courier, and it forced the Earl of Migam to take action.

    The Western Holy Church was the state religion of the Holy Empire of Lubelius. It worshipped a single god, Luminus, as its absolute deity, and served as the headquarters of what was generally thergest religion practiced across the Western Nations. This broad faith was for good reasonthere were pdins within their armies, holy knights who each boasted A-ranked powers and beyond, and they were trusted and revered as reliable experts in the ying of monsters.

    The Churchs central creed revolved around eradicating monsters from the world, and thus whenever a smaller nation had an issue with such creatures it couldnt handle alone, the Church would send Crusader pdin forces to aid them.

    Such a virtuous organization, working for the good of the faithful, would never send false information to its people. The Church was already alerting him about monsters growing more active in the forestit had to be true, Nidol concluded. So he reluctantly sought to reinforce his own force of knights. A hundred would be enough to simply patrol the forest, but should the monsters fall out of control, being unprepared for it would be a problem. His knights needed to stay in cethat was his conclusion.

    So citing emergency provisions, he called in retired knights and the like, sessfully beefing up his force to three times its original size. But that still didnt quell his fears. It would take at least ten years, he thought, for a new pecking order to make itself known among the monsters. Relying on retired knights to weather that long, long decade would be tough.

    Requisitioning Free Guild adventurers would ce pressure on his financial affairs. Calling for an emergency draft was ast resort. For now, he would have to hope for a healthy crew of volunteers.

    The adventurers would dly take up a monster-ying role around the forest, but that came at a pricea price that ballooned depending on the danger rank awarded. Having them permanently stationed in Migam was out of the question, but if the worst happened, he still needed to consider tapping their resources. He had already used up most of the governments special stipend, but his earldom was not facing a financial crisis yetfor the most part, those funds went toward his personal entertainment anyway.

    Right now, while the retirees were back on the force, Nidol figured he needed to raise a new generation of young knights at once. It was, he imagined, the best measure he could take at the moment. So he funneled all future special stipend funds into the force, along with some of his own moneyno point scrimping now.

    And it seemed to work. Over time, it seemed like it would alle together. And then the central government summoned him and took his funding away. Who could me Nidol for losing his temper? Not that being azy, embezzling ruler would earn him much sympathy

    In his wagon, as he returned home, Nidol continuously racked his brain, figuring out what he should do next. His mind was full of financial issues. There was no more space in it for the even thornier problems awaiting him soon enough.

    Upon arriving back at his own earldom, the Earl of Migam was greeted by a request from Franz, the local guild master, for a meeting. The earl agreed to it, wanting to discuss how to defend thend going forward, and they arranged a conference the following day.

    The guild master was practically breathing down his neck, pleading that now was no time to act slowly. Franz was usually a calm, even-minded leader, and seeing him in such ather was a concern. It made Nidol fear the worst, so he ignored the usual procedure and immediately gave permission for the meeting.

    This is an unverified report, but it is said that an orc lord has appeared. The next day, Franz offered only a brief hello and told him.

    What did you say? An orc lord?! And what do you mean, unverified?

    It almost made the good earl faint on the spot. This was a serious crisis, and only his rage kept him going as he confronted Franz.

    Unperturbed, Franz continued his report, stating that adventurers from the kingdom of Blumund had heard rumors of the orc lord.

    I would like your help in gauging the nature of this threat. To be exact, I would like you to send out an exploratory force for us.

    There was nothing unusual about this request from the serene guild master to the half-hysterical earl. The Free Guild was not a charity, and it was unaffiliated with any government. They existed in cooperation with, but not within the framework of, the earldom.

    If you would like us to handle this investigation, we could ept that, at a special emergency price

    Silence! You money-grubbing weasel!!

    Look whos talking, Franz thought, remaining silentlyposed. He knew the matter needed looking into either way. Franz had a duty to keep his guild members safe; he wasnt going to expose them to dangerous missions without a suitable reward.

    Normally, monster-hunting requests like this would need to follow a certain procedure. A town or vige would file an official request, providing all the relevant information to the Free Guild. The guild would then use eyewitness ounts and the like to assign a danger level to the monster (or monsters) in question, sometimes sending appropriate personnel to further examine the issue.

    Guild regtions dictated that for particrly dicey jobs, pre-evaluation was even more vital to ensure the right rank was assigned. If you wanted a monster in, you needed several adventurers (guild rules stated three or more) of simr level or higher to tackle it.

    Promotions were awarded to members based on their ability to defeat a given target one-on-one, but based on safety considerations, such duels were not the norm during guild business. This was because even if a group of adventurers went against a monster, if the level disparity was significant, they would most likely be wiped outor at best, eke out a victory at the cost of several deaths and severe injuries to the survivors.

    This all meant that Franz couldnt just throw a posse of brave men and women at a monster the moment it was spotted.

    Normally, theyd have the time to take a more gradual approachbut they were being swamped. Monsters were showing up more and more frequentlytely. The timeg between taking a request, sending people out to handle it, anding back was turning into a problem. There were starting not to be enough adventurers to go around.

    They needed some kind of organization that could patrol the viges, tasked with handling monster duties without having to file a formal request. And they didnt have that, so instead, Franz asked the earl for more intel. It was all perfectly normal.

    Having this situation so politely and thoroughlyid out for him made the earl fall into silence.

    He didnt want to deploy his own knights to keep his own town safe, but he couldnt just leave the countryside viges to fend for themselves. As long as they paid taxes, the earl had a duty to protect them alleven as it squeezed the noose tighter around his neck. Franzs guidance was perfectly logical, and Nidol could mount no objections to it. Thisck of guild personnel was likely the reason Franz requested this meeting in the first ce.

    And what about that orc lord? This beast of a monster that consumes everything ites across? That was nothing to ignore, either. He would have to file a full report with the central government and ask for reinforcementsand as a result, gathering more information was job one. Reliable intelligence was the only thing that would make that bureaucracy take action.

    So an investigation was a mustand an urgent one.

    And another thing, I have another unidentified report, and one I find rather difficult to ry to you Franzs voice was grave as the Earl of Migam fretted over what to do with the expeditionary force.

    His face was embittered enough to make the earl fear the worst.

    Enough bluster. Give it to me.

    My pardons, sir. The orc lords armies reportedly

    His armies?! Hes already built up that much of a force?!

    Yes, I am sad to say. And they are reported to numberapproximately two hundred thousand.

    What? Can you truly be serious?!

    Nidol was shouting at the top of his lungs. It did nothing to affect Franzs facial expression. He was not one to make jokes, and the earl knew this was the truth. But it was tough to take. It was just too far separated from reality.

    And how sure are you about this? he asked, silently praising himself for not fainting on the spot.

    Based on circumstantial evidence, we believe it is quite likely to be the truth.

    Any suggestions on how to deal with it?

    Our only option is to ascertain which direction their armies are going and enact swift evacuation measures

    You want me to abandon this town?

    If you believe you have a chance at victory for yourself, then we will not stop you from pursuing that. But if you ask us to participate in the effort, then Im afraid we cannot ept that without hearing some concrete operational ns.

    All right, Nidol whispered, head hung down. You know thered be no chance anyway.

    In that case, I will leave the expeditionary force deployment in your hands.

    With that final reminder, Franz quickly left the room.

    The Earl of Migam thought for a moment.

    Whether the town would have to be abandoned or not, he had to consider the worst-case scenario. Which meant his knights had to stay put. But they needed that expedition to take ce.

    What should I do?

    It was like all his neglect and mismanagement wasing back to him like a roaring tidal wave. But was there no pointining about it.

    After pondering a few moments, Nidol came up with what he thought was an excellent idea. All he really needed was intelligence on the threat. Perhaps he could deploy a magician versed in teleportation magic, one who could return to town the moment he was finished with his investigation. This sorcerers escort team wouldnt know about their own mission; all they had to do was protect him until they reached the forest. And if he just cobbled together a few of the expendable knights to build this expedition, he should be able to keep the sries he paid to a minimum.

    And if they did manage toe back alive, he could deal with it then. The vital thing was to figure out where the orc lord was going.

    The group that Earl Nidol Migam put together in response to this was called the Frontier Expedition Force. It wasposed of thirty members.

    Inside town was a correctional facility that housed Migams petty criminalsvigers who went into debt and attempted to rob travelers from out of town; rowdies brought into custody for picking fights on the streets. They were usually put to work assisting the knight corps, at times even serving as opponents for the knightsbat drills as part of their corrections. One of these inmates was appointed the leader of the expedition force.

    Nidol wouldnt lose a minutes worth of sleep over their deaths. They were light on his finances, too, as an added bonus.

    That was about all the thought Nidol put into their selection. But the group did not share the earls motives.

    Pfft. That greedy old coot. If its freedom hes giving us, lets ept it with good cheer, eh?

    Such were the feelings of Yohm, the man assigned to lead the thirty miscreants of the Frontier Expedition Force as a coherent unit. His skin was darkly tanned and supple, stretched tightly over his muscles. He was not notably tall, but facing him would still intimidate the casual observer into fearing for his safety. Often, that was all Yohm needed to win the mental battle. This was backed up by his face, which wasnt unattractive, but his guttural, sneering smile made him difficult for anyone to dare approach.

    His talents would seem to indicate a quick promotion from street tough to the boss of one alley gang or another. Instead, Yohm was now leading a force of thirty deep into the Forest of Jura.

    It had been a week since they replenished their supplies at thest vige bordering the forest. Rommel, magician and the earls protg, could feel himself wither around Yohm, as if he had been ced in front of a ferocious man-eating tiger. He could almost feel his knees knocking.

    So what kind of expeditionre we on?

    Im afraid I cant tell you. It is a secret mission.

    Oh-hohh? What kinda nonsense is that yer spoutin, eh? I think you better tell me while Im still askin nicely, know what I mean?

    Im telling the truth! They havent given me any details either, believe me.

    Hmm! I see, I see. Well, fine. They used contractual magic on us to make us follow your orders, but once this is done, weve all been promised our freedom. Right?

    Yes, precisely. The contract that was signed with my client, the Earl of Migam, said exactly that.

    Yeah, and Im tellin ya, man, thats BS! How the hellre we supposed to finish this mission if we dont even know what it is, huh? Bumpin around in the middle of this evil forest You screwed in the head, or what?

    Facing the full brunt of Yohms anger made Rommel feel like hed faint from fear. He understood that his exnation made little sense, but no way could he give them the truth. If he did, hed find it perfectly logical if they killed him where he stood.

    L-listen, we We received a report from the Free Guild that something strange is happening in the forest. So like I told you, our mission is to use this image-capturing magitool to record whats going on, then bring it back to town

    Oh-hohh! So you wanna die, huh? Now I get it. Or do you think some sorcerer off the street like you can take on a pack of natural-born fighters? You dont believe that contract means you get the right to treat us like crap cause we cant do anything, do ya?

    Rommels heart was struck with the distinct sense that this man was serious. The contractual magic meant that he had to follow Rommels orders, but now he was starting to wonder how well that stuff even worked.

    Ah, ahh

    He took a fearful step back, only to suddenly feel something cold upon his neck.

    Ey, boss, wouldnt it be quicker to just kill im?

    A man dressed in ck appeared, as if oozing out from the darkness. He held a knife,pletely ck in color, and it was now squarely against Rommels jugr.

    Not so fast. I wasnt nning to, if he was willing to talk, but

    No! No, wait! Ill tell you everything! Just dont kill me

    Oh yeah? You willing to admit that were here to investigate that orc lord yet?

    Huh?! How did you know that?!

    Ha! What, you think Im an infant or somethin? I got thirty people hereyou thought I didnt have any guild insiders I could swap someone out for? I left you alive so you could undo that contract on us, thats all. So What happens next is up to you, I guess. Whatll it be?

    Rommel, without hesitation, decided to release the contractual magic. He clearly didnt have long to live right now, and Yohms tone of voice indicated that it was best not to defy him too much. Terror gripped Rommels heart to the point that he was willing to do anything Yohm told him.

    Good thing we got a guy here who listens to reason, huh, bro? Forget about being used and abused to death! Now we finally got some real freedom!

    So whatre we gonna do with him?

    Please! Spare me my life, at least!

    Rommels voice was shaky, his face wet with tears, as Yohms men approached him.

    Well, hang on, now. Im sure hes at least got Life Search cast on him. We cant let this magician die without being able to report his mission results.

    Okay, sowhat? If youre sayin we gotta keep watch on im all hours of the day, Id rather just kill the man.

    Rommel barely felt alive as he listened to Yohm argue with his crew.

    Yeah, yeah, hang on. Hes a sorcerer, remember? Maybe hell be able to do a thing or two for us, eh?

    Yes! Yes, I will! Anything!!

    Yep, you hear that? Sides, he did free us from that contract and all. I wouldnt feel all that right about killing im, but whaddaya think?

    Well, still

    I wont tell anyone! I swear I wont tell anyone, believe me! Please!

    Being employed by nobility ever since he graduated from his magic academy, Rommel was not exactly worldly-wise. Yohm never intended to kill him; he just wanted to put him to work. Rommel was too naive to see through that. All he could do was beg Yohm for any type of help he could offer.

    Hey, how bout this, boss? Jagis a mysticist; maybe he could conjure up a spell to put im under our thrall?

    Dahh, no way! At my level, Rommels gonna Resist it for sure.

    I wont! I promise I wont put up any resistance! Please, do it!

    Great. Anyone got any objection to that? Cause personally, I wouldnt mind having him around as our adviser, sort of thing.

    Well do whatever you say, boss!

    If thats what you want, bro, I aint got noints.

    Yohms men said their lines, exactly like they worked it out beforehand. Rommelpletely fell for it, epting the mystic binding spell in an effort to make Yohm believe in him. The ruse fell apart immediately afterward when they all startedughing at him, but for the sorcerer, it was a moot point.

    A moot point, but Rommel still had no issue with it. This street punk, Yohm, exuded a sort of evil maism that was hard to put into words. One that could make any innocent, open-minded young man lose his footing along the way.

    This was the beginning of a truly free Frontier Expedition Forceone free of the Earl of Migams leash and one sporting a sorcerer who would meekly follow Yohm wherever he went.

    Around the time when Rimuru first encountered Benimaru and his nback when they were still merely ogresFuze was sighing as loudly as he could at the three adventurers in front of him. He had sent this trio to figure out what was happening in the Forest of Jura, and the moment they got back, they began telling him the most astounding of tall tales.

    They were Kabal, Elen, and Gidothree talented guild members, all worthy of Fuzes trust. Their ranks were all B, and Fuze knew they were more than up to the challenge that letter came with.

    The first story they had for him was about their final moments with Shizue Izawaa woman Fuze, as well, felt he owed his life to.

    And thats how she summoned Ifrit, only to get swallowed up by the raging beast!

    She probably traveled out of town because she knew that would happen I think she realized she didnt have much time left.

    You said it. And who knows if she ever recovered My guess is that she wouldve been a lot happier with just lying down n dying in her sleep.

    Shizu had been ordered by Heinz, Fuzes father, to apany them on the expedition. She was a hero in Fuzes eyes, as well as a friend he had hunted monsters with, and he was willing to do anything for her. If anything, giving her the ending she wanted filled him with happiness.

    After the expedition was over, Shizu said she intended to travel to the demon lords territory. She had some unfinished business there, apparently, and she insisted upon attending to it. Fuze knew there was no convincing her otherwise. So he decided to help her from behind the scenes, pairing her with three adventurers he nned to send into the forest.

    A pity, then, that they werent with her to the very end. Fuze had no right to criticize them for that. Their mission came first, and Fuze himself had kept her true nature a secret from them.

    But did they really have to leave her under the care of monsters?!

    He had no right to criticize them, but it still left a bad taste in his mouth. Plus, there was so much of their story that he just couldnt ept.

    Shizu was one thing, but their briefing was entirely based on monsters building a town for themselves. A single slime was at the top of the food chain, gathering hobgoblins to construct this towna full-on, sturdily made municipality, just like any human settlement.

    Some of the more intelligent monsters did build smallmunities. Even goblins and other low-end creatures could p together shelters for themselves. So having a settlement or whatnot was nothing to shout about. But this trio was talking about a bunch of monsters clearingnd in the forest, chopping down trees, and using the wood to build homes. They even divided the town into distinct zones, crafting intricate ns about what would be built where.

    The more Fuze heard about it, the more it sounded like a real, full-on town. But it was hard to ept monsters pulling a trick like that. And that slime made him wonder. This creature, apparently named Rimuru, didnt seem like your typical named monster. In fact, all the monsters in this town were named, a situation that turnedmon sense on its ear.

    All this apparently happened after this Rimuru monster appeared. It was too shocking a tale to ignore.

    So after these monsters rescued you, this is the town you were taken to?

    Right. And were talking, you know, several hundred C-ranked monsters living together? There was really nothing we couldve done. I thought I was a goner for sure. And then, they fed us actual cooked meat!

    Mmm, yeah, that was good. I hadnt eaten anything for three whole days, so

    Shocking though their tale was, however, these three buffoons were making it sound like a nice campout in the woods. And after that, Shizu went out of control and Rimuru defeated the magic-born she transformed into. It was all simply beyond belief. Ifrit was a Special Agrade spirit. If something like that went rogue and started attacking, itd be a cmity-ss danger. A nation the size of Blumund would face a truly existential crisis.

    Anda slime, the lowest ss of monster, defeated this?!

    Fuze wanted to shout at them to quit joking, but they all acted dead serious in their report. Between that, the dwarven artisans in town, and the healing potion that took care of even near-lethal injuries, he honestly began to wonder if they had dreamed it all.

    He suspected some form of illusory magic, but that was doubtful. Not as long as Elen was there. Magicians like her had high magical resistance, and anyone who could ovee that with their illusions was a Special A grade in themselves.

    Plus, the equipment the trio had on was some seriouslypelling physical evidence. They had boasted about it to Fuze to no end, but clearly it was of quality make and superior performancea first-ss set. They even possessed an item or two forged by Garm, that most famous of dwarven craftsmen. Fuze could tell they werent fakes.

    Based on that evidence, the story couldnt have been a magic-driven fever dream. It was ridiculous, but he had to ept it as the truth. He had to, but the report left him at a loss.

    How should he even judge this news?

    We had best send someone else to investigate, he decided after a weeks worth of pained deliberation.

    By Kabals description, his team never felt in danger inside this monster town. They hade home with gifts of equipment and healing potion, so that evaluation made sense. That, and after examining all this equipment, they found no curses applied to it and also potion of a better quality than almost anything the local guild had seen.

    Fuze had the equipment returned to themtheyd be constantlyining to him otherwise, and their original gear was all broken into pieces anyway, apparently, which meant they couldnt take any more jobs without it. In exchange, he did collect the remaining potion from them, using it to confirm their story.

    When a painful burn victim came into the guild, he used the potion on him, wondering if itd work as well as Kabal imed it did. In an instant, the blistered skin was healed, without so much as a scar remaining. The sorcerer-doctors at the hospital had seen nothing like itthey swore it was akin to a divine miracle, brought about by the holiest of magic. That bumbling trio wasnt lying after all.

    This town of Rimurus was orderly, popted by monsters that followed the slimes orders. Whats morealthough Fuze couldnt guess at the motivethe slime expressed a desire to visit their own city sometime. Kabal and his friends said he was wee, and should it ever happen, Fuze had already asked the trio to arrange things with him.

    To him, the idea of letting some unknown monster venture into the kingdom of Blumund was outrageous. But defying the will of a monster powerful enough to defeat Ifrit solo would be just as foolish.

    Fuze found himself gued with self-doubt. If I let such a monster into town, I could easily be prosecuted for subversion against the state

    No matter what it tookeven if it meant providing his own funds for the jobhe really had to investigate this in more detail.

    Just as Fuze was fretting over who to select for this new expedition, Kabal and his cohorts came running over with a new problem. He could hear Kabal calling for him in the guild building now. Meeting him without an appointment normally wasnt allowed, but the panicked tone of his shouting gave Fuze pause.

    What is it this time? Is it something to do with that one? he asked inside his secret reception room, pointing out a hooded figure among them.

    We got trouble, Fuze! This guy said theres an orc lord out there!

    An orc lord?! Fuze almost spit his tea out. First Veldora blinking out of existence; then this mystery slime; and now this orc lord. Maybe none of it directly affected Blumund much, but he was aware that monster sightings had been going up in some nearby kingdoms. Fuze suspected it might all be connected, and the thought was draining.

    But the task at hand was the orc lord. Im sorry, but could I ask you who you are? Fuze queried, rposing himself.

    The hooded figure immediately removed his cloak, as if waiting for his cue. Sorry bout that. My names Gobto, and I work under my captain, Gobta. I came here to tell Kabal over there about the orc lord, upon the request of my leader, Sir Rimuru. Then he put his hood back on and sat down again.

    Fuze knew what he saw. That was a monstera hobgoblin. He might resemble a human from far away, but the green twinge to his skin was unmistakable.

    And a named monster, no less  Kabal was telling the truth

    Thisst bit of evidence finally convinced Fuze to believe fully in him. This orc lord report must have been the unvarnished truth as well, then.

    My name is Fuze. I serve as guild master for the Free Guild here in Blumund. Gobto, do you mind if I ask you a question?

    Whats that, sir?

    This Sir Rimuru, your master Why did he want us to know about this?

    Ooh, the rank n file like me dont get told those kinds of things. But he also told me to tell you this: If worsees to worst, we might need to have the humans y the orc lord for us.

    I see

    Thats what he said before going out to face the orc lord. If yask me, Id say the orc lords well n truly dead already, but so be it. I wanted to go in with Gobta, too, but Sir Rimurumanded me personally to travel here instead.

    Gobto must have been fairly peeved about that, if he volunteered that information without being asked. He practically grumbled thest few words out. But Fuze was too thrown by the revtion to pay his tone of voice much mind.

    Wh-what?! The slime, defeating an orc lord? Are you kidding? Wait  Is this slime treating us as insurance? Is that how far ahead hes nned his moves? A monster? Thats ridiculous!

    Fuze tried to process the news though his extreme confusion.

    Kabals group watched on blithely, apparently willing to let Fuze decide whatever he wanted. Fuze didnt appreciate that much, but now was no time toin. He calmed his troubled mind.

    You ask me, though, Kabal volunteered, that orc lords gonna be no match for Rimuru.

    Oh, you said it! He took out Ifrit all by himself. If you let an orc lord mature, it can be pretty bad news, but freshly born? Nah. Its just not enough of a threat for him!

    Not that weve got much to do with it, though

    Hearing the trios uninvitedmentary made Fuze feel like he was about to have a coronary. He summoned up all his spirit, trying his hardest to keep calm as he sized up the situation.

    Between them and Gobto, nobody in the room seemed to doubt Rimurus ultimate victory. That waswell, whatever. The problem was, what was Rimuru thinking at the moment?

    His distinctly unmonsterlike activities stood out in Fuzes mind. Building a town, leading great crowds of monsters, and yet apparently seeking a cooperative rtionship with mankind.

    And thistest development seemed to confirm all that. If he was defeated or thought he couldnt win, Rimuru probably intended to retreat. If the humans werent aware of this before that point, theyd be so unprepared that theyd have no chance against the orc lords armiesthat was the slimes prediction.

    So if he was telling us beforehand to prevent that

    Was Rimuru the slime some kind of special creature? He seemed so to Fuze.

    All right. Thank you for rying the message. Well take action here if ites to it, so could I ask him for his help at that time if need be?

    Understood, sir. Ill be off, then.

    Before anyone could stop him, Gobto was off his seat and out of the rooma dignified, and very unmonsterlike exit. We gotta go, too, Kabal said as he herded his gang out behind him.

    What a crazy scene this is turning into, Fuze whispered as he watched them leave.

    Im not sure I can deal with this guy by myself. Better talk to my friend first

    The image of his good friend, the Baron of Veryard, popped into his mind. This was now a national issue, and Fuze was prepared to tackle it. The expedition he was picturing in his mind would soon be greatly expanded, to the point where it would be a three-month investigation.

    Three monthster, he had his reports. This was right when the demon lord Milim attacked Rimurus city.

    Fuze was there, at the usual spot, having a secret meeting with Baron of Veryard.

    So this is the report from your investigation? Based on the evidence from their march, the force numbered several hundred thousand. That suggests beyond a doubt that it was an orc lord, doesnt it?

    Indeed, Baron. You would never believe how hard it was to ask the king for permission to deploy his intelligence department They certainly came through for us, though.

    Fuzes face contorted in frustration. The conditions required to earn this favor from the king were far from ptable to him.

    Ha-ha-ha, yes, I heard. It seems they have a chair all ready for you in that department, no? I imagine your father would like to hand his position as supervisor over to you sooner rather thanter.

    Dont remind me. I have enough on my te dealing with guild master duties here in town.

    True enough. But thats a discussion for another time. This is some extremely valuable informationa town of monsters, and a slime living there that can ovee an orc lord by force. An orc lord who may have led an army of up to two hundred thousand, no less. And scariest of all, all those surviving orcs simply settled across thend instead of rioting and running roughshod over it. Is it all really true? I mean, I know it is, but I cannot believe any of it.

    Fuze could understand the barons feelings all too well. He felt the same way. He had asked the king to deploy his spies on the assumption that Kabals report and the hobgoblin Gobtos message were entirely true. The resulting intelligence both blew his mind and made him realize Blumund was facing unprecedented danger.

    No adventurer in the world could y an orc lord with an army in the six figures supporting it. Even if they managed some kind of stealth mission to assassinate this nemesis, and even if it worked, that army would go nuts and raze all the nearby viges. Thered be no way to counter that. The national army would be a drop in the bucket, and the knight corps of some tinier kingdom would just be swallowed by the stampeding horde.

    Youre right. Its simply unbelievable. Would monsters take such an intelligent, considered approach to this? And how did they convince that massive army not to riot in the first ce? Did they actually manage to feed that many orcs?

    They must have. Its impossible to ept, but we have to. That slime, Rimuru I think hes saved all of us.

    Yes. Indeed.

    Fuze fell silent for a moment before continuing, trying to gather his thoughts.

    So we have a town of monsters about a two-week journey from Blumund. That much, weve confirmed. They said it was an astonishing example of functional beauty, but they only had the chance to view it from afar. Theyve clearly been at work on a wide swath ofnd around the town, but all of it was still covered under a tightwork of patrols. Even our own agents suggested that infiltration would be difficult at best. Doesnt that tell you a lot about the intelligence level of this towns monsters? And the real question is: How should we handle our own rtionship with them? Should we approach this slime as a benevolent presence or as a potential threat to try to eliminate

    Wait. You speak of eliminating him like it would be simple, but is such a thing even possible?

    Permission to speak freely, sir?

    Go ahead, but I think I already know the answer.

    Heh. Well, its not. Howd you guess?

    Baron Veryard didnt raise an eyebrow. To him, as much as it was to Fuze, that was already a given. They had both concluded that Blumund had no chance of victory alonenot unless the Western Holy Church was willing to expend pdins for the job. Each resident of that monster town was at least a C rank in themselvesas expected, since they were all named. Some were reportedly in B or A territory. Their total war power couldnt even be measured right now.

    Perhaps I should try paying a visit

    Are you volunteering for that, Fuze?

    Sure. I want to measure this Rimuru guy with my own eyes.

    Veryard gave him an approving nod. Hostilities werent anyones first choice, but this was no potential challenger that could be left ignored any longer. Fuze felt the need to judge for himself. Relying on someone else to make that call wouldnt work. That was the best choiceand a choice he could only make because the baron respected him so much.

    Plus

    Yesterdays events made Fuze believe all the more that visiting this slime directly was the best solution.

    He had asked Kabals group to guide him to the monsters town on that same day. While they spoke, they were all approached by another stranger with a message.

    You are Kabal, right? the man asked. I am here to ry a message from Sir Rimuru. The orc lord issue has been resolved. Sorry I forgot to tell you guys! That is all.

    Nobody in the group was more surprised by this sudden intrusion than Fuze. They were all seated in a space inside the Free Guild, a room that took every measure possible against people sneaking in. If this stranger was invited in, that was one thing, but it would have taken unbelievable skill to make ones own way inside.

    Wait! Who are you?

    The blue-haired intruder turned his cold eyes toward Fuze. I am called Soei. Sir Rimuru has appointed me his Covert Agent. He gave the reply softly and steadily,pletely unfazed by the Coercion from Fuze, an A-minus fighter himself.

    Fuze may have felt overwhelmed by this all-powerful presence before him, but he still had the kingdoms intelligence force at his fingertips, and he knew how to use those skills of his. So he decided to gather as much information as he could from Soei.

    Rimuru The leader of the monster town? Why are a bunch of monsters worried about us?

    Heh Havent your friends already told you? Sir Rimuru is exploring ways to live in peace and prosperity with the human race. I am unsure why you are so wary of us, but I would suggest that selecting reconciliation over rejection would be the smarter decision.

    Not even Fuze could hide his surprise at the statement. It meant that his attempts at intelligence gathering werepletely exposed.

    Hoo boy  If this is the level of monster Rimuru has recruited, I simply must meet him soon.

    He could tell that Soei was a monster. Even without the horn on his forehead, the aura was as clear as day. He had no intention of hiding it, but it emitted only a slight amount of magicules. It didnt suggest this creature was anything special, but Fuzes sixth sense was still ringing rm bells. He decided to trust in it.

    I see. So youre on to the fact that weve been investigating you. Well, before that, theres something Id like to ask How did a magic-born of your level infiltrate this town? Because I believe were protected by a barrier that blocks out all monsters ranked A or higher. A high-level magic-born like you shouldnt be anywhere near here.

    As guild master, this was a point Fuze couldnt let slide. Even though it was a short meeting, he was sure this Soei before him was a high-level magic-born, and thus he needed to know how he got past the kingdoms defenses.

    Hmm. Ah yes. I did notice the presence of that barrier, but thats what it was meant for, then? Perhaps Sir Rimuru or Lady Shuna could have identified it as such, but I wasnt able to see quite so much. Thank you for telling mein exchange, I will answer your question. This body is generated by my Replication skill, and thus retains only a tenth of my magical energy. In your ranking system, I imagine it would only manage a B or so. Do you see what I mean? This kingdom truly does have a splendid defensework, but if it is willing to let low-level monsters slide that easily, I can see it still has its holes.

    Fuze listened ck-jawed at Soeis exnation, feeling the cold eyes on him. It sounded true enough to him, and his point was totally valid. With all the effort they expended dealing with hazard-ss A ranks, they had overlooked some of the most basic threatsand it was a monster, a potential target of this system, who had pointed it out to him. A small wonder that it turned Fuzes world upside down.

    Well, if you will excuse me

    Wait!

    As Soei turned to go, Fuze shouted and stopped him. He had just enough time to exin to the monster that he wanted an audience with Rimuru, in the town that he ran.

    I will inform Sir Rimuru, in that case, he said, bringing a close to the days events.

    This was why Fuze was making the journey. Heughed a bit at the position he was indragging the kingdom into this, then dragging himself into the kingdoms work all over again.

    Damn. I didnt intend to serve my kingdom doing this, but

    He might haveined about it, but he liked life in Blumund. He couldnt just abandon it and flee. So he hired Kabals trio as his guides, and they quickly nned the journey to Rimuru, capital of the Jura-Tempest Federation.

    Yohm and his men proceeded through the forest.

    Several days had passed since they had cowed Rommel into submission. They had no need to heed Nidols orders any longer, and yet Yohm insisted on plunging farther into the wood. He had no intention of returning to Migam territoryinstead, he had a different destination in mind.

    Boss, why aint we goin back to town?

    Yeah, Id kinda like to find a girl to sleep with sooner orter

    Shut up, you fools! I dont trust that crafty ol Nidol, but hes still nobility, ysee? We cant beat im in a head-on scuffle. Itd be easy enough to off the bastard, but then well be wanted by all o Farmus. You want the royal knights breathin down our necks? Theyll kill the whole group of us!

    Yeahhh, but

    So where dyou want us to go?

    Oh, now youre askin me? Use your brains a little, guys

    None of them had much in the way of brainpower, so Yohm spelled it out.

    He had a pointeven if they returned to the Earl of Migamsnds, they couldnt expect to ever have a decent living there. Theyd be imprisoned againand indentured into work again. So he thought their best chancesy in other nations.

    Were gonna head for the central part o the forest and find out what this orc lords up to. Then, well travel in whatever directions the safest, and whenever we hit another country, we will settle there.

    But, boss, why do we have to expose ourselves to danger like that first?

    Oh, what, you wussin out on me, you imbecile? The orc lords grown to the point where hes already got an army at his beck and call. What do you thinks gonna happen if we stop in some town and theyre headed straight for it? Well be dead with all the other townspeople, is what. Yeah, its dangerous, but we need more info if we wanna keep ourselves safe, okay?

    Wow. Smart n, bro.

    I got it now, boss!

    Plus, added Rommel, Yohm has no intention of actually engaging in battle. Hell just have me check on where the orc lord army is, then ry that information to the earl.

    Whoa, hang on, Rommel. Whaddaya mean by that?

    This was Kazhil, Yohms right-hand man, who spoke up.

    Rommel was quickly solidifying his position as the groups chief of staffand everyone in the band recognized his extensive knowledge of matters.

    I mean, once we take care of the original job assigned to us, we can make the good earl think we were massacred by the orc lord.

    Wait, so

    We make that old coot think were all dead, then we aint got to worry about his men pursuing us, and if the orc lord decides to hit Migam, Nidol can figure out a way to deal with it himself. Id hate to just let my homnd burn at the orcs hands, so we oughta warn em, at least, yeah? Yohm exined to Kazhil, who was having trouble understanding.

    Quite so. I will tiptoe up to the orcish army and use my magic to detect their activity. Once Ive confirmed where they are headed, I will teleport myself, and only myself, to the earl and report back to him. This is when Ill tell him that you were all vanquished, so no need to worry about that. Besides, if weve gone this far, I might as well collect our pay from him, yes? Then Ill make up an excuse to return here, so do make sure to wait for me.

    The spark of understanding finally began to spread around the band as Rommel went more in-depth.

    Ahh. Now I see. Then we can escape to somewhere safe and start a new life, huh?

    Yep. Exactly.

    Yohms intention was to have the entire band join the local Free Guild or whatever, gaining a little security for themselves. Free Guild identification papers were added to a ledger kept by magic, ensuring they were valid in any nation. Criminal records, meanwhile, werent. It felt like the perfect n to Yohm, but any crimes theymitted after joining the guild would also be marked on their magical records, so theyd have to be careful about that.

    Well, we can think about our next moves once we reach our new homnd. With our numbers, we oughta be able to take on some decent monster runs and live off o that. But before that, we need to make it outta this mess. You hear me? If the orcs stumble upon us all first, were gonna be in deep trouble. Yall keep your eyes open, you got that? With that, Yohm closed the topic.

    First, find the orc lords army. Then, get out safe. They could bitch and moan at one another all they wanted, but one thing was for sure: They could absolutely never let their guards down.

    Several hourster

    The band was on the move, running regr patrol shifts to stay alert.

    They could hear fighting up ahead.

    Boss

    Sshhh!

    Yohm quieted his men down, gesturing them to group together and get into military formation. When they were ready, he waved a hand forward, and they all began to quietly march, weapons in hand and ready for battle.

    Already, they could hear voices from up ahead.

    Whoa! Stop, stop, stop! We go there, were walking right into its trap!

    Butbut I dont think we can win if we keep fighting like this!

    Guys, I can only keep our position here for sowhoa! Look out!

    They could hear all the shrillints above the Ting! Ka-shing! of solid metal shing against metal.

    I swear, you guys Why do you do all this dangerous crap every single time?! How do you even survive, performing all this utter nonsense? I knew I was putting too much faith in you Dah! Elen! Look out! Its headed over there!

    The noise grew louder. They could hear the entire conversation now. They were humans, apparently ambushed by monsters. Several of them, Yohm figured, based on how the sounds of battle never halted for a moment.

    What now, bro?

    Yohm wasnt sure. He didnt answer, instead carefully eyeing the woods ahead.

    He had thirty men under hismand, but by adventurer standards, theyd be a C rank at best. Maybe Kazhil, his partner in crime, could manage a Band Yohm himself, while confident in his strength, didnt have that much experience against monsters. Thinking rationally, they were better off letting them be.

    What a pain in the ass Well, sorry, you guys, but were outta here Wait. That girl?!

    Just was he was prepared to give the order, Yohm spotted a woman running at them from ahead. There was the sound of a female among the voices he heard; it must have been one of the fighters.

    Dehh! All of you, prepare for battle. That bitch spotted us!

    Yohms Farsight skill let him see the situation clearly. Arge male fighter was using his shield to fend off an attack from a spider, but it got sent flying after one strike made it through his parrying.

    The spider, opting not to pursue its opponent, changed its focus to the woman some distance behind. It must have been intelligent enough to leave the tougher, dicier foes forter. And indeed, the woman was quick and unerring in her movesthe moment the spider was upon her, she was already fleeing.

    Truly, a seasoned adventurer. Yohm took a moment to marvel at the sightlong enough for one of the spiders eyes to focus squarely upon his group. This spider chasing the girl was a true monster, its body protected by an exoskeleton harder than steel that defended almost everything except its joints. It could move all those many joints freely and easily, making it far quicker than any human. Each leg was as sharp as the keenest of des, ready to slice through any tree trunk or human torso. They werent swords so much as retractable spears.

    It was likely the boss of the local territory, and between its foreboding appearance and its apparent strength, it was a far cry from any monster Yohms band had defeated before.

    Those adventurers look pretty expert, so theyll probably hold out for now, but attritions gonna kill em in the end  That swordsmans still keeping things pretty even, but

    All the same, Yohm didnt expect this to end well for any of them.

    That Thats a knight spider! An A-minus monster! Oh no Yohm, theres no way we can defeat it. Lets go! Were just no match for it!!

    Rommel, using the elemental magic spell irvoyance, was already looking pallid as he gave the report to his boss.

    Yohm wasnt interested in listening. Forget it. Look at that monster move. It can use the trees to go wherever it wants. Once that partys annihted, were gonna be nextitll hunt us down in an instant and kill us all. Running at full speed aint gonna save us now, huh?

    He had no knowledge about knight spiders, but Yohm was still coolheaded enough to instinctively feel what this monster meant. Those instincts told him that fleeing was not in the cards. So he decided to fight back.

    They were surrounded by treestrees that the spider could cross more quickly than skittering across the ground to catch its prey. Once it caught sight of you, it was all but hopeless. These were the knight spiders hunting grounds, and Yohms men were the hapless prey. The only way to survive was to y the foethat offered the only potential for survival they had.

    Yohm steeled himself. Dammit, Ill make you pay for dragging us into this, ya bastards! Rommel, cast some strengthening magic on me! Kazhil, you direct our men! Form a circle, and if anyones hurt, change em out. Youre all gonna survive! Thats an order!

    Following hismand, the band formed a circle formation. In the middle were healers and scoutsmen not suited for battleand Rommel. The rest were forming a shield to protect them. Their orders were to focus exclusively on defense and notunch any attack. Instead, they would let the fighters in the safe zone deal damage with arrows and magic.

    The scouts readied their bows, waiting for the knight spiders advance, as Rommel began to cast a spell. It involved several inscription magics, something he normally never used, as he set about boosting Yohms strength. There was the supplemental magic spell Strength, along with Agility, Protection, and Reinforce Weaponall serving to power up every aspect of his weapons and armor, granting him a great deal more force. It didnt make them any less anxious about his chances against a knight spider, but it helped.

    Still, Yohms heart was serene as he stared the spider down. In a moment, the battle was under way.

    The woman truly had no shame, showing zero hesitation as she made a beeline straight for Yohms band.

    Excuse meeee! she shouted as she wriggled her way inside the circle, not bothering to ask for permission. The moment she was safe, she took a moment to catch her breath.

    Shes got a lot of nerve, Yohm thought.

    Whoa! Lady! Thats not fair, going in alone!

    Somewhere amid the chaos, another mana thief, by the looks of ithad made his way inside as well. Not a moment off their guard, Yohm thought as he rolled his eyes, but he had other things to attend to.

    Oh,e on Are you in any position to whine at me? the woman said.

    Whaddaya want from me? Theres nothing I can do against that guy! How am I supposed to strike any kind of lethal blow with a dagger, I ask you?

    This pair, at least, didnt seem too concerned about the danger.

    Geh. Ill settle things with youter, Yohm said as turned toward the spider and swung his greatsword at it. He preferred wielding a two-handed weapon like this in ce of carrying a shield. It was a good six and a half feet long, ded on both sides, and the force behind its weight made it a fearsome shing weapon. That weight also made it extremely hard to handle, but even without magical enhancements, he had the brute strength and ability to easily heft the greatsword to and fro.

    Now he was using that magic support to whip the giant hunk of iron around like a steel demon.

    Hard, solid noise surrounded him, and the tortuous nggggg irritated his nerves. It was the sound of Yohms sword smashing against the knight spiders leg. It should have been cut cleanly in half, but the exoskeleton was more than capable of resisting this force.

    He groaned. Geh. Damn, its tough. Is that what all that sound was before? Then he changed position, hoping to divert the spider from his partys circle formation. The spider followed, predictably enough, then attempted to spear Yohm with several legs at once. Unfazed, he danced his way through the attacksthe same ones therge fighter parried with his shield earlier. Without any kind of shield, Yohm opted to wend his way through the stabbing legs instead.

    For what seemed like forever, Yohm continually deflected the knight spiders strikes. It was never-ending for Yohm but a mere instant in reality. Several legs grazed past his cheek, dug into his side, pricked at his legs, but none of the strikes affected the battle.

    He had dodged them and as he had the spiders attention, the man with the shield, along with a lightly equipped swordsman, were back in the battle, equipped with a new set of magical enhancements and ready to fight again.

    Sorry we got you into this. Im Kabal. You can whine at meter.

    No time for details. Just call me Fuze for now.

    Yohm. My bands nothing but a drag on us, I guess. Well have to take care of this ourselves.

    Got it.

    With that short conversation, the three refocused on the attack. They each moved to surround the knight spider, restricting its movements, taking turns to attract its attention while the others hit at it.

    Faced with this steel-like exoskeleton, no pedestrian attack would cut it. Yohms men understood that; none dared any foolish moves. If they failed and a pincer felled one of them, the results would be too terrible to look at.

    They knew their role was not to drag down their leader. They believed Yohm could win, and in the meantime, they reinforced their defenses.

    The magicians Elen and Rommel were each preparing their trademark spells.

    As a sorcerer, Elens specialty was elemental magic, granting her ess to arge swath of damage-dealing offensive spells. But she was positioned poorly for that. All the trees surrounding them made the most powerful of her me-based magic out of the question. Magic was all about picturing what you wanted to happen, allowing the caster to change the nature of their spells to some extentbut attempting to corral white-hot me was a tall order.

    But right now

    Lets see how you like one of my strongest moves! Stone Shot!!

    In a moment, Elen had converted the stones on the ground into lethal bullets, infusing them with yet more magic force to summon a punishing, coordinated rain of ammunition upon the knight spider. Every magic-enhanced stone bullet was the size of a human fist, and based on its speed and mass, each one delivered several tons worth of force. It was a merciless, punishing magical rain.

    Meanwhile, the three fighters were still taking turns to confront the knight spiderYohm deflecting its strikes with his greatsword, Fuze with his smaller, nimbler sword, and Kabal with his shield. This is what the spider had to deal with as it was pelted by magical bullets from all directionsbut none even dented its exoskeleton. They all bounced harmlessly off, knocking the creature slightly off-bnce for an instant but doing little else.

    Aw That was my killer move, toooo

    The sight of her killer move failing after she used most of her remaining magic force on it astounded Elen. She had already tried out Icicle Lance and Windcutter, and the results were simrly pitiful. Really, thest finisher she had left was also her strongest Fireball.

    Its hardly a surprise, Rommelmented. This knight spider is a local boss-ss monster, rank A-minus. We can expect it to have a lot of magical resistance. Given how its the apex predator around this area, youd have to expect at least this much strength. Itll be hard for any of us tond a convincing blow at our levels

    Okay, so now what do we do?

    Rommel shrugged at Elen. Nothing left but to help them with support magic, I suppose.

    Elen tried to counter this brief assessment. But faced with the reality that none of her magic worked, she gave up. She had a feeling, without even trying it out, that Fireball would meet the same fate.

    Oh, all riiiight! I hate not being in the spotlight and using stuff like thisbut Ive got Magic Barrier on me.

    Rommel nodded. As a sorcerer himself, he had several inscription magics at his disposal. Those were what he had used on Yohm, and the other two fighters were already enhanced enough.

    The enemys offense is so strong that it just peels away any magic effects on them. Its over if they break their weapons, so its all I can do to keep just Reinforce Weapon going. If you can fully focus on building that Magic Barrier at all times, thatll help us out.

    All right!

    Elen adjusted her outlook on the battle. She couldnt deal magic damage, so she was stuck with a support role insteada role she happened to be first-ss at. Calcting her remaining magical force and recovery skills, she distributed her magic as needed for the battle at hand, and Rommel did the same by her side.

    It wasnt shy, but it was a consistent approach to magical support as they concentrated on keeping the aid flowing to Yohm, Fuze, and Kabal. He may have said just Reinforce Weapon, but he still managed to keep his other spells going as well without interruption.

    It was an impressive, top-level feat from Rommel, the result of him perhaps toughening up a bit and sowing the seeds of his own magical talents during the past few days with Yohm.

    The performance lit a fire in Elen. Not bad. Better not lose the spotlight to him! Now, she didnt mind the role so much. Not shy, but absolutely important.

    Meanwhile, the knight spider and its opponents continued to trade blows with one another, the sheer, wearying intensity of the confrontation not allowing them rest for a single moment. Even in such extreme conditions, the three were still shing bold, intrepid smiles.

    YoKabal, yeah? That armor of yours sure is toughern my cheap piece of junk.

    Heh-heh! Yeah, Ill bet, huh? This was crafted by Garm himself, you know! It aint no ordinary piece of scale mail!

    Huh. Garm the dwarven armorsmith? Dang, no wonder. It looked like you took a couple direct stabs, and yer none the worse for it!

    Oof, you saw that? Thats embarrassing. Well, I may not look it, but

    Will you two take this more seriously, please?! Stop chatting while its my turn to distract him!

    Fuze couldnt help but lecture the other two as they enjoyed a lively bragging contest better suited for a tavern. They both grinned, like students being admonished by their teacher.

    Im up next, old man.

    With an exaggerated sh, Yohm tagged in for Fuze. The magical light surrounding him, slightly dimmed just a moment ago, was now bright once more. He was ready.

    The rotation of magical support was being timed perfectly with their own juggling act, as if all five had been working together for years. Very few could have guessed they were fighting in this group for the first time.

    Thanks, Fuze shouted, leaving the heavy lifting to Yohm. Dodging his way through the knight spiders string of stabs, he felt exhausted, his very nerves worn to the core. But he never griped about it. He was the oldest and most experienced man in the circle.

    By the guilds rankings, he was an A-minus adventurer. His position as Blumunds guild master meant he was no longer on the front lines, but he never stopped honing himselfthe reason he was still able to keep up with this spiders movements.

    But Im definitely losing my edge. I couldve taken this guy solo way back when, but not now. All Im doing is buying us just a small sliver of time

    Still, he was the great natural talent among the trio surrounding his foe right now.

    And because of that, Fuze could predict how this would turn out.

    This isnt good

    Sooner orter, they would falter.

    With the right magic, tackling a monster stronger than you would be feasible enough. Here, that wasnt working out. Knight spiders were too resistant to magic, requiring punishing physical damage instead. Fuze understood that, out of this group, only the three of them were gifted enough melee fighters to deal out that kind of damage. Yohms men werent up to snuff.

    So it was all up to these three men, but after ten or so minutes of battle, they had hurt the spider only a tiny amount. None were seriously injured yet, but they couldnt hide their umted fatigue. Gaining another fighter in Yohm, along with some much-needed magical support, was what allowed them to even tread water.

    Oh, man, I dunno

    Pfft! Quit your cryin! Youre the ones who roped me into this! Were all gonna get killed if we cant do this guy in, so if you got breath left to bitch at me, move yourself!

    When Kabal muttered to himself, Yohmunched into a tirade.

    They all understood that perfectly well. Without any really decisive magic that worked, they knew that beating it with their own muscle was next to impossible.

    But giving up was a one-way ticket to death.

    They all drummed up as much courage as they could, continually throwing themselves into the all-but-desperate battle.

    Then they heard another voice. One much more rxed.

    Huh? Ooh! Hey, is that you, Kabal? Whoa, long time no see! And youre fighting a monster like always, too, huh? You sure must like fighting.

    They were being greeted by five monsters riding wolf-type creaturesa toon of goblin riders, led by Gobta.

    Just as they were about to return from their usual patrol, they heard the sounds of battle from before. Gobchi, the eye-patch-wearing assistant to Gobta, noticed first.

    Gobta, I can hear fighting from somewhere.

    The toon captain was pretending to ignore the noise, hoping for a nice, chill ride back to town, but his team was having none of it.

    I guess so, huh? Should we go check it out?

    Ooh, well, Id say thats a good idea, yes. Dont want to be yelled atter, do ya?

    Yeah, yeah Lets just check up on it, then.

    Following Gobchis advice, the toon headed toward the sounds.

    And then

    Gobta found a couple of familiar-looking faces fighting a knight spider.

    Whoa! Damn, its you, Gobta! Dont just stand there like an ass; help us out! Were running out of time!

    Kabal sounded quite a bit more harried than Gobta, dodging the spiders sharp barrage of strikes as he shouted. He was inly near the end of his rope, simply letting the multi-leg attacks he couldnt fully parry bash against his armor. It wouldnt be long before that armor gave wayand with it, his life, perhaps.

    Ooh, thats Fuze, isnt it? Hey! Fuze! Its me, Gobto!

    You too, Gobto?! Hurry up and take my ce!!

    Just as Gobto spotted Fuze and called out in greeting, Kabal was the one who shouted back as the spider flicked his helmet off his head for him.

    Well, all right. Ill take over for Kabal. Gobchi, you get everyone else to distract the spider!

    At Gobtas orders, the toon began to move.

    Nimbly dismounting his starwolf, Gobta strode over to follow Kabals lead as the other goblin riders directed their partners to divert their foes attention. The wolves attacked with their sharp fangs and their ws, and while neither found any y on its hard exoskeleton, their speed outssed the spiders, letting them take a secure stick-and-move approach.

    The B-ranked starwolves couldnt scratch a knight spider, but in terms of agility, they were an even match. So giving up on the direct approach, they shifted styles so their hobgoblin partners would take over on offense. Thanks to the able hands of Gobchi and the rest of Gobtas crew, this let them slowly pile on damage.

    Dang, those spears of theirs are sharp. It looks like they can lengthen and shorten them at will, too.

    They are. And theyre a measure sharpern my greatsword, even. Maybe we coulda had a fightin chance if I had somethin like that, eh?

    Kabal muttered in wonder as he took a break to heal himself, and Yohm appeared beside him to take a break as well.

    I just cant believe this. What are those wolves? Some kinda mutant from ck wolves or gray wolves? And why do a bunch of hobgoblins have such incredible weapons, too? And whyre they so strong?!

    Fuze picked this moment to join them, still panting for breath and taken aback. Neither of hispanions had a ready answer, so they settled down and began to watch.

    Considering the brutal battle theyd just waged, it was hard to imagine what they were seeing now. The goblin riders were boldly attacking, or seemed to be anywayalthough they appeared to be giving themselves a fairlyrge safety margin. None of them were damaged. Meanwhile, Gobta was the only one confronting the knight spider on foot, leaping this way and that to attract his foes attention. He didnt have to fight for it. It seemed like he had a full grasp on every twitch of the spiders legs.

    Man That hobgoblin Gobta, he said? Who the hells he, huh? And, like, even before that Yohm cut himself off.

    There was a lot he wanted to ask, but he resisted. Now wasnt the time. He wanted to catch every moment of this battle while itsted.

    Gobta busied himself with twisting, bounding, and dodging the spiders attack. Hmm. Kinda slow. Compared to the wringer Hakuro puts me through, this is easy peasy.

    Taking a closer look at the spider, he realized that it always stopped moving for a moment before unleashing one of its leg-pincerbos. The multi-leg attacks followed a set rhythm as well, making it simple to predict where they would stab next.

    Okay, lets get this over n done with!

    With a single, spirited shout, he removed the shortsword from his waist and, with pinpoint uracy, shed at a small wound made by one of his goblin riders. One of the spiders long, spear-like legs arced through the sky. It was sliced cleanly from its body.

    Dang!

    Whoa, Gobta! Thats incredible!

    Now thats a shortsword. I think Im in love with how it cuts!

    Gobta wasnt one to ignore all the praise from his friends. It was forged by Kurobe for him, thanks to Rimurus promise. It was certainly no bargain-basement item from the local weapon shopit was a masterpiece of a de, crafted to be as sharp as possible.

    It was also magic, imbued with a certain extra-effect thanks to Rimurus Deviant unique skill. When Gobta willed it in his mind, the de would encase itself in ice, turning it into a jagged, frigid de that could also beunched as an Icicle Lance. Gobta didnt invoke it here; using magic took up a massive amount of his own magicules, so he couldnt just whip it out on a whim. Kurobe had reminded him time and time again about how his ace in the hole should only be used when the time was right, and he followed that advice faithfully, never wasting his arsenal.

    Besides, now he had a weapon even more effective than an Icicle Lance.

    This is even better!

    He held the sheath for the de up high, still clenched in his left hand. He didnt mean to sound like a braggart, but he undoubtedly looked it.

    A sheath?

    Instead of answering Gidos question, Gobta made his move. He pointed the sheath at the spider, hole first. The next moment, it emitted a sort of ckish-red glow.

    The entire inside of the scabbard was lined with magisteel, with insted electric wire wrapped around it like a solenoid. Energizing this wire with Dark Thunderthe skill that Deviant had granted itcreated a powerful maic field, which thenunched the bullet at the bottom of the scabbard out of the hole. A sort of coilgun, in other words.

    It was called the Case Cannon, and while Rimuru had made it mostly for fun, Gobta was a huge fan.

    The scabbard ejected a hunk of iron around two centimeters across. It made no sound, but the effects were dramatic. The spider writhed in intense pain, its mouth shivering and gnashing. The resulting otherworldly noises sounded like pure anguish. And why not? The shot had gouged out or ttened several of its eyes, which were now spurting out jets of blue liquid.

    Yow! That was great, Gobta! one of the other goblins whooped.

    The humans, meanwhile, had nothing to say. Not even Fuze could fully parse what had happened.

    What the hell was that?! he stammered out.

    Gobta had other things on his mind.

    Well, were gonna have one heck of a feast today! Theres gotta be some great eatin on this spider!

    His eyes were on the knight spidernot as a foe but as a yummy piece of prey.

    Whoa, whoa, thats an A-minus area boss! And youre worried about eating it?!

    Fuze was ignored once more, his voice rapidly losing its strength. His mind had trouble keeping up with the sights before him. All he could do was sit there and watch absentmindedly.

    Yohm and his men were just the same, gazing at this former clear and present danger to their lives that had been swatted down like a bug. Yohm didnt like that much, although he couldnt articte why. A natural sort of disappointment spread across his face as the five goblin riders ignored him and kept toying with the spider.

    A few minutester, the humans were presented with a dissected knight spider.

    Gobta was next to it, looking incredibly pleased with himself and chatting with someone via Thought Communication.

    Theyll have a recovery team here before too long. You leave three of us here to stand guard. Ill guide Kabal and his friends back to town.

    Got it. Be careful.

    After finishing the conversation, he briefly discussed with his right-hand man, Gobchi.

    Well, ready to go?

    And with that cheery question, Kabal and the others set off.

    Fuze was too bbergasted, Kabals gang too overjoyed, and Yohm too annoyed to formte any answers.

    It was up to Yohms band to shout their approval instead. They werent quite sure how it all worked out, but regardless, they were all on their way to Tempest, thend of monsters.

    Gobta certainly sounded triumphant in his briefing.

    We were at the usual meeting hall, Milim seated next to me like she had somehow earned the right. Shion and Soei were behind us, with Rigurd and Benimaru seated ahead.

    Next to Gobta were Kabal, his two friends, and an unfamiliar middle-aged guy. He was joined by a tanned, rugged-looking man and a fairly nervous-looking magician type. Shuna had just taken her own seat, ordering one of her assistants to bring out tea for the group, and then Gobta began talking.

    Once he finished, we all decided to introduce one another. The middle-aged guy was Fuze, the top guy at the guild in the kingdom of Blumund. Mustve been the dude who told Soei he wanted an audience with me.

    The tanned guy waswell, pretty handsome. Not as much as Benimaru or Soei, but he had smooth, taut muscles and a wild look about him that mustve floored em at the tavern. His name was Yohm, and he called himself the captain of the Frontier Expedition Force, sent out by one of the earls in the kingdom of Farmus. The thin, flinchy guy next to him really was a magician, as it turned outRommel was his name, and judging by the looks of things, he was the brains to Yohms brawn.

    Once they all gave their names, I decided to give mine.

    Guess I better speak up, too. My name is Rimuru Tempest, and Im the leader of this town, or nation, or whatever you wanna call it. The Jura-Tempest Federation is the official name for it. And as you can see, Im totally a slime!

    It felt necessary to mention that, given how I was the only nonhuman in the room. It made the older guyFuze, I meanopen his eyes wide.

    Truly, a slime?

    He seemed to know at least a bit about me, but I guess I shouldve expected him to be a little shocked. If it didnt personally happen to me, I guess Id have trouble believing that a slime was going around acting like the king of his little nation of monsters.

    So, uh, Rimuru, Kabal asked, whore all the new faces in the room? He mustve meant the ogre mages. I gave them all an intro. That just left Milim, who spoke up before I had a chance to point her out.

    And Im Milim. Good to meet ya!

    A pretty casual intro, especially for a demon lord prone to bouts of cruelty like she was. Hopefully nobody was fooled by the pretty face.

    Fuze was the only one to respond to the name Milim with any sort of suspicion; maybe he knew about her demon lord side. Kabal and Gido, meanwhile, were alternating their gazes between Shuna and Shion. Milim mightve been cute, but they mustve already dismissed her as too much of a child. They certainly are honest to themselves, at least.

    Yohm and Fuze must not have been too interested in potential romanceor maybe they were just nervous, having to deal with monsters like this. Their faces remained stony serious. I wish Kabal and his gang could learn from them a bit. I can understand how they feel.

    It was odd, though. Gobta ran down the whole story for me, but I still didnt understand anything about what went on. Why were Fuze and Yohm fighting together?

    Just as I thought it, Fuze opened his mouth.

    Allow me to exin, perhaps

    He must have noticed that Gobtas report wasnt quite enough. d to see someone has some tact around here. Witnessing my slime form mustve thrown him off a bit, but he was still being remarkably polite with me. Better hear him out.

    Once he was done, I think I began to get the idea. I guess the orc lord news had sparked so much chaos that he decided to have Kabal guide him here to check things out for himself.

    Rommel provided some supplementary info of his own, too. He wasrgely in the same boat, driven by the guild in Earl Nidol Migams fief in response to the rumors spreading across Blumund. The magician told me everything he seemed to know about Nidols thoughts on the matter, and judging by that, he had a pretty urate grasp of what was going on.

    Why are you being so honest with me? I asked.

    To which he replied, Well, to be frank, Im really not sure what I should be doing here, right now. I just figured, you know, honesty would be the best policy, as we try to move things forward.

    I solemnly nodded at him. That sure helps me, too.

    Suddenly, the previously silent and sullen Yohm shouted out, like someone had flipped a switch. That crap doesnt matter! What Im wonderin is: Why is this slime actin like hes king of the world around here? I mean, yall realize this is insane, dont you? And how do slimes even talk anyway? I mean, what the hell? Whys he got all you guys under his spell or whatever?

    How dare you be so rude! Shion roared.

    You shut up, woman! Yohm shouted back.

    Ooh. Bad move, I thoughtbut before I could even finish that thought, there was a dull thud as Shion used her sheathed longsword to send Yohm crashing to the ground.

    Ah! Im sorry, I just

    You just what?!

    I should have expected it, but I really need to do something about Shions temper. Yohm may have been out of line, but this instantaneous resorting to violence had to be addressed sooner orter. I immediately had her look after Yohmshe hadnt put much force into it, so at least he wasnt dead. A few shakes of healing potion, and he woke right back up.

    He winced at the sight of Shion looking right down at him, but otherwise returned without a word to his seat. I had to hand it to him. It took a lot of guts to pull that off.

    Sorry about Shion there. She tends to lose her patience a lot. I hope youll forgive her.

    Yohm noddedIm sure very reluctantly.

    But that was so terrible! Im known for my endurance under fire, you know! That was news to me. I figured it was safe to ignore her babbling.

    Wah-ha-ha-ha-ha! Losing your patience, huh? I see youve got a lot to learn, Shion. You need to broaden your horizons, like I have! No wonder youre so hot-tempered!

    I felt like I could hear Milim happily blurting out something like that, but Im sure I was imagining it. No doubt it was thest thing Shion wanted to hear from her.

    But anyway.

    It was time to put all these reports together.

    Fuze was here because he heard about this mystery slimei.e., meand wanted to get to the bottom of it. Figuring out whether I was friend or foe was his main priority.

    The very idea of monsters creating towns Ah, pardon me. I can understand demi-humans building settlements well enough, but a town where multiple races live together? Ive never heard of such a thing. I have a habit of not fully believing something unless I witness it with my own eyes, you see. And if this whole story was true, I wanted to figure out how we would interact with it, and how much. The reports I received told me thisnd wasnt a threatbut I thought ascertaining for myself would be the best move. So thats what brings me here. I was hoping youll permit me to stay a while so I can survey the entirety of your operations.

    It made sense to me. Id hate to be feared as a potential threat, so I readily gave him permission.

    I also gave him my own outlook. Being guild master suggested Fuze was in a fairly high positiona man of influence, perhaps, in Blumund. Being able to speak frankly with someone like him, and request their cooperation, sounded like a good idea to me.

    You might not believe it, I exined, but Id really like to be friends with the humans. I already told Kabal and his friends about that. Im not asking for it immediately, but you know, I think itd be nice if we could start engaging in trade or some other kind of interaction. Weve already opened formal rtions with the Dwarven Kingdom along those lines, which youre free to confirm for yourself. I think your merchants would find it pretty convenient if they could run caravans through this area, but what do you think?

    Hang on I mean, please, just one moment. You mean the Armed Nation of Dwargon?! I know that is a neutral kingdom, one that had close rtions with many demi-human racesbut youre saying its recognized thisnd of monsters as a nation? Because I find that extremely hard to believe

    I had asked him to trust in me, but he was proving a tough nut to crack. So I called for Vester as a witness. It turns out Fuze was familiar with him.

    Minister Vester! Or not anymore, I suppose. But regardless, I never imagined meeting someone of your stature here Is all of this true?

    Ah, well met, Sir Fuze! It has been quite a while, hasnt it? Well, you are correct. Through a rather unique turn of events, I am now living quite peacefully in thisnd. Everything Sir Rimuru has told you is the truthKing Gazel and Sir Rimuru signed the covenant themselves.

    The conversation wended its way across a few other topics, but I still had the impression Fuze thought he was dreaming all of it. Maybe the idea of monsters banding together and establishing a nation was a little too wild for just anyone in this world to start believing yet.

    Yohms motives, meanwhile, were a bit moreplex.

    He and his band of men intended to fake their own deaths in order to gain their freedom. They were seeking asylum in some safer country than their own, where they intended to join the local Free Guild. They also intended to inform Earl Nidol Migamthe greedy old fox, as they called himabout what they found in here. This wasnt out of any love for the earl, but so they could potentially save as many of their fellow countrymen as they could. A man of honor, certainly, no matter what his looks and attitude suggested. Rommel had grown to like him, inlyto the point that he betrayed Nidol, his benefactor, to be Yohms top aide.

    Hearing all this made me think a bit.

    All right, soFuze, people already know around your kingdom that the orc lord was defeated, right?

    No Only the king and a few select people are aware.

    And that meant

    Okay. So, Yohm, wanna forge a contract with me?

    Huh? What the hellre youerm, how do you mean, sir?

    Now both Shion and Shuna were ring at him. They must not have liked that tone of voice. Maybe itd be kinder of me to pretend not to notice.

    Well, to put it simply

    To put it simply, Yohm and his band of thirty men would be the saviors of the day, the yers of the orc lord.

    That monster was well and truly defeated, and yet Fuze still eyed me with suspicionbecause I was a slime, a monster. In that case, why dont we frame the rumors wed spread so that I merely cooperated with Yohm, and he was the one who pulled off the feat?

    Thered be a few unnatural time-rted contradictions to that story, but the general public didnt need to know all the details. If the top brass who did know the truth were willing to keep mum, the regr Joes out there could work out the rest of the tale for themselves. As for the surviving orcs, we could say that there was a mutiny in the army, and there you go. A nice, simple storyand easy to believe, as long as that two-hundred-thousand figure didnt get mentioned.

    Meanwhile, I couldve helped Yohm with supplies, armor, what have you, instead of directly participating inbat. That way, I could establish myself as this really helpful, trustworthy slime who gave our man of the hour material support, right? That, I figured, would paint me in a better light than being this mystery threat of a monster to everyone.

    Thats the basic idea of it, but what do you think?

    Our guests were dead silent. Too frozen to react. Kabal and his friends, meanwhile, were so lost in this conversation that they had decided to sit there and enjoy their tea instead.

    Compared to that, Benimaru and Shuna were thoughtfully nodding, impressed at the idea. Milim and Shion were all smiles and puffed-out chests, but Im not so sure they understood me.

    Milim had nothing to do with this anyway. Shes behaving, at least, but maybe I should give her some honey before she gets bored and starts wreaking havoc somewhere else.

    Who do you think I am? Well, all right. Ill take this.

    She dly epted the jar of honey I presented to her. Shion shed a jealous look at her, butwell, sorry, none for you.

    Wait Wait, wait, waitwhat kind of idea is that?! What do you mean, what do you think?!

    Come on. Me, beating that guy? You want me to be some fairy-tale hero or somethin?

    Fuze and Yohm were protesting in stereo. I didnt expect them to be very amenable to it at first. That reaction was a given.

    Whoa! No hero stuff. Thats someone special, so you cant just call anyone that. Being a heroes with a lot of baggage from the past. Just call yourself achampion instead, Milim replied.

    Hmm. Interesting. So just like with demon lords, people didnt take kindly to guys dering themselves heroes with a capital H. Hero, champion, whateverI wanted Yohm to be that for me.

    Thats not the problem, you little brat! Besides

    Thud!!

    A cold wind drifted across the hall.

    Hey!! I shouted.

    Lady Milim Shion seemed like she wanted to say something.

    W-wait! No! This isnt my fault!

    Milim was already in a panic. I hadnt said anything yet, but already she was nearly in tears.

    I dont want to hear any excuses, Milim. But this is yourst chance, all right?

    All right. Believe in me, Rimuru! Milim swore to behave, nodding fervently.

    I felt kind of bad for our new champion here, but really, this was Milims fault. Spoiling her would do nothing good for me, so I gave her the scolding she deserved. Shion, for her part, smiled a littlejust deserts for what happened to her earlier, maybe. I resisted the urge to remind her she was in the same boat. Hopefully she got the message well enough without that.

    Milim? I feel like Ive heard that name before.

    Uh-oh. Fuzes eyebrows furrowed at the mention of Milims name. He hadnt identified her yet, but I needed to stay on guard. This demon lord was a lot more famous than I gave her credit for, I guess.

    Lets, um, dodge that question for now.

    Well, uh, is Yohm all right?

    I was worried. That was quite a thud Id heard.

    Yes, Sir Rimuru. Ive already administered the potion, Shuna reported with a smile, just as Yohm himself woke up.

    Nngh What What just?

    He was still a bit confused, but nothing was wrong with him. Getting beaten by Shion and Milim in rapid session like that made me marvel at his natural toughness. That potions some hot stuff, but he deserved credit for surviving at all.

    Um, Rimuruyeah? Well, all right. Ill do whatcha say. All these menaces to society you got servin ya, I gotta admityoure one hell of a slime. From now on, as far as Im concerned, Im all yours, pal. Tell me whatcha want.

    It was a surprise, hearing that the moment he got his marbles together. I didnt like how we more or less had to beat it out of him, but if that convinced him, there was no need to browbeat him about it.

    Yeah, sure thing. And thanks. I nodded at him in agreement.

    We were now together, and the whole event was enough to make Fuze forget all about Milim. In that case, I have no objections about working with you on this, too. However, would you mind if I made absolutely sure, first, that you are on the side of the human race?

    Mm? Okay. Thats fair enough.

    And now Fuze was with me, too.

    Fuze was kind enough to work with a friend of his, the Baron of Veryard, to smooth things over with the king of Blumund. As he did, I worked out the exact sort of rumors we needed to spread around the local nations, adjusting the little details to match with the plotline I came up with. Soon, we were in contact with every Free Guild in the area.

    In exchange, I offered Fuze preferential treatment for some of the merchantsing from Blumund. Any merchants affiliated with the Free Guild there would be allowed to stay at Rimuru, capital of the Jura-Tempest Federation. For now, we werent charging any tariffsthat could be discussed among us once they trusted us well enough and we opened a bit more formal diplomacy. I had no idea what we should charge anyway. Im not a politician; I cant calcte stuff like that. I may have acted all kingly and magnanimous about it, but seriously, I was sweating bullets inside.

    This meant that any merchants who work through the Blumund guild would get a pretty damn good deal until I worked all of that outand part of that consideration would go back to Fuzes pocket.

    How long would it take for Blumund to trust in us as a fellow nation, though? Not very long, perhaps, or maybe never, even after several decades. I was prepared to wait them out, and in the meantime, I could at least prepare to enact some official ties.

    Wed need to build that trust first, but at the same time, wed need to figure out how much of a tax would be appropriate. Itd have to be cheaper than Farmus, of course, and itd be important to boost our amenities and spread the word on our safety record. We hadnt finished up our trading roads yet, so any tariffs could probably wait until that was all wrapped up.

    There was still a ton of work to do, but at least things were settled between ourselves and Fuze. And Blumund was a small countrythe rise of a nation with trade routes and a friendly leader offering them held major meaning. If we could toss guaranteed safety across the entire region into the mix, Blumund could stand to make a major profit from it. If they could trust us enough tomit, that is.

    Now, to let Fuze bring that offer home ande back with a more detailed report. I couldnt say how it would turn out, but I had to hope things would go in a more positive direction from now on.

    As for Yohm and his band, they would be staying here for a while.

    If he was going to be our orc lordying champion, he needed to look the part. Hakuro was probably training him hard right then.

    The man had a decent amount of natural talent, but not quite enough strength to be the stuff of legend. Just giving him some big, long weapon to carry turned him into a different man, but wed need more than that. Instead of just relying on his physical strength and instincts for battle, Hakuro thought, hed need to have control over some arts as well.

    Equipping him wasnt a problem. We just happened to have raw materials from a recently pummeled knight spider on hand, and I figured we could use those to give him the best weapon and armor he ever saw. Until that was taken care of, his training would focus more on his body and mind.

    In battle, there were three things that mattered: speed, offense, and defense. That applied even if you brought magic into the mixthat could always be countered with magic defensespiritual resistance. The Free Guild based its ranks off the aggregate of those three elements, which meant that simply finding some better weapons and armor would be enough to boost your rating.

    In that way of thinking, the materials we used in thepleted equipment were top-of-the-line. Knight spiders, at the end of it, were not that terribly fast. It might seem otherwise, given how they could attack with multiple legs at once, but keep your wits about you, and it bes clear that they arent moving too nimbly. That was in, given how the B-rated Kabal and Gobta more than held their own against itI was starting to peg Gobta as more of an A-minus, but regardless.

    The knight spider earned its own A-minus mainly thanks to its exoskeleton. Its strength came from how incredibly solid that was, as well as its ability to inflict serious damage even by grazing its opponents. Which meant

    Whoa, Rimuru You sure yer okay with me havin equipment like this, pal?

    Yohm seemed honestly touched as he took in his new exoskeleton-crafted armor. It was a full-te suit, mottled in three different colorsa dark brown as the base, with a unique pattern of green and red on top. It almost looked like a work of art. I called it the Exo-Armor.

    He was surprised all over again when he picked up the chest piece.

    Man. So light, too

    Of course it was. Compared to regr armor, which took a shirt of chain mail and added metal ting to all the most vulnerable areas, a suit of full-te armor was ponderously heavy. They defended you well, but at the cost of all mobility, so normally you never saw them in action.

    This Exo-Armor, meanwhile, used no metal, making it rtively lighter than steelthe key to its weight advantage. Sticky Steel Thread lined the inside in a mesh formation, keeping the wearer safe against heat or cold. The exoskeleton itself boasted superior defense against magic and physical attack, and with the thread reinforcement, it easily shrugged off your garden-variety magic and melee strikessomething wed already proven in our experiments.

    In a nutshell, it offered more durability than full-te mail at a third of the weight. I couldnt say how it felt on a monster whose muscr strength outssed any humans, but for Yohm, it was the best armor in the world.

    Yep. Garm put his heart and soul into this. He bragged that itd fetch a price higher than any Unique piece of gear if we put it on the market.

    M-more than a Unique?!

    Like, the kind of thing an adventurer spends ten years or so savin up for? How top-end are we talkin, pal?!

    The news came as a major shock to Yohm.

    Just as adventurers were ranked, weapons and armor received their own ratings.

    The type of thing youd find regrly at shops was Normal. If it performed a little better or had magic effects applied, it was rated Specialworth a lot but still rtively essible to the average consumer. In a world like this, where death was always lurking around the corner, you wanted the best equipment you could afford, so most adventurers hit the road with a full array of Special equipment.

    However, even this stuff was still nothingpared to a top-shelf piece of work, crafted by a master forger and priced as such. The kind of broken-stat weapon or armor that boosted the wearers rank the moment he or she grabbed it. This kind of first-grade stuff was rated Rare, and amassing a full set of Rare gear was something of a status symbol in adventuring circles. Anyone who managed the feat was revered and respected as a person who could get the job done. The armor Garm crafted was all Rare pieces, and that was why Kabal and his crew were so overjoyed to receive it.

    And at the very top, there was a level even above this highest of levelsequipment with world-shattering performance. Exquisite pieces made by old masters from only the best materials, taking no ount of matters like production cost and profit. These were called Unique. Weaponsmiths in therger cities would decorate their shop walls with these for advertising purposes; nobility would store them with tender care as family heirlooms. They were the best of the best, and there werent many such pieces around, only adding to their rarity value.

    As an example, these sorts of Unique items were equipped by every member of Gazels personal friends, along with his Pegasus Knights. The pride of a nation of craftsmen, one could say. Money and materials were no object with their top-caliber equipment, honing an even sharper edge to their world-beating war power. Hell, no wonder theyre so strong, I had thought to myself when I learned about it.

    Boosting their talents with weapons and armor were one way humans handled monsters, which I had noint about. But it had to suck for the monsters felled by such overpowered equipment.

    It follows that we wanted to y that same game with our own stuff.

    Based on that, again, Yohms shock was understandable. The greatsword he wielded was all scratched up, even chipped in ces; it was no longer useful. Kurobe had prepared another weapon in its ce, and it was another masterpiece.

    This was a Dragonyer, a type of greatsword that could hold its own againstrge-size magical creatures. It didnt have a curve to it, unlike therger battle swords the ogre mages had; it was more of a Western-style dual-edged de. One edge was sharpened to a shine, dedicated to slicing and dicing, while the other was solidly reinforced, making it more of a crushing weapon.

    Given Yohms shield-free fighting approach, I figured hed find that easier to handle than hisst weapon. The way he stared at the Dragonyer in his hands and murmured Look at this thing suggested he was happy with it. Good.

    As a Kurobe creation, the Dragonyer was another Unique piece. With the right technique, it had the power to slice through even a knight spiders exoskeleton. If you ask me, those two pieces alone just made Yohms power zoom up to A-minus rank.

    It sounded a bit like cheating, relying on equipment to boost your strength. But I let it slide. You needed technique to make the most of it anyway.

    Yohm, to his credit, had grown strong enough to truly be worthy of owning this stuff. I hadnt given him anything except food and a ce to sleep, and he had noint about that. I did hear him scream in pain and call Hakuro a demon and all kinds of other colorful things, but nothing about my treatment, at least.

    He was under contract to work with me, after all, and I gave him some pretty nifty equipment, so I figured I was fine.

    If I can be honest for a moment, I almost hesitated to let him have it all. Unique items were a rarity in this world, and I wasnt wholly sure I wanted ours to flow into the hands of outsiders. Ultimately, though, I decided that if he had champion-level equipment, thatd make my story all the more convincing.

    He was training hard in this town, his talents now noticeably improved. He didnt look out of ce at all in his Exo-Armor. A little bit more work on him, and nobody would ever doubt for a moment that Yohm slew the orc lord.

    The days of training continued for Yohm.

    His weapon and armor wereplete, but I decided that his band had better get equipped, too. Id need to invest in them a little if I wanted them to help me outter. Hakuro would hammer them all into shape, too, so it should help them ability-wise. Plus, itd give even more weight to the tale of this great champion and his stalwart band of supporters.

    Of course, they were after more than just nice equipment. Apparently, they were enjoying life here in the city as well. I didnt mind at all. They were working hard for me.

    What I had to offer them was scale armor dyed a fresh, bright-greenthepleted version of the test piece I gave to Kabal. For the lighter-equipped thieves and the like in their crew, I had a few sets of red-colored hard-leather armor built. Both colors were a nice match for Yohms own Exo-Armor.

    You Youre even giving this amazing armor to me?

    This armor didnt offer much against melee attacks, but it was pretty darn resistant to magic. All I wanted was for Rommel not to look out of ce as the champions personal sorcerer, but Im d he apparently liked it so much. Besides, this was about all I could do for him. Magic isnt something you can train your body for the way Yohm trained with Hakuro; the rest would be up to Rommel himself.

    I also handed him a copy of ourmunication crystal. Itd be a pain if we couldnt stay in contact, and luckily for us, he just happened to be a magic user. That oughta make things easier.

    After preparing and presenting this equipment, I had Rommel go back to Blumund. There, I wanted him to spread the word (and exaggerate a bit) about how the mighty Yohm and his men gave the orc lord a swift and fatal whipping. He said he had no interest in living there again, eitheras he put it, being the earls magician mainly just meant being assigned all kinds of potentially lethal tasks. Once he received his payment, he pledged to stick with Yohm from now on.

    This earl, Nidol Migam, sure didnt sound like he was much good at all. He put his personal fortunes above those of his people, he was greedy, and he treated his own staff poorly. Considering the high taxes he charged the local peasants, he certainly didnt devote much of it to territorial security. Given he dealt with issues only after they popped up like that, no wonder his people relied so much on the Free Guild.

    Hes the worst bastard you ever did meet. Eh, not that were angels ourselves, but he takes the cake! Yohm practically spat at me.

    The trope of a wicked, greedy nobleman was a familiar one in the stories I read, but when one was actively affecting your real life, nothing could be more depressing.

    But if anything, that was good for me. I could have Yohm return home a champion, one who protected all of Migam. Hed go from vige to vige, allowing the locals to skip all the guild bureaucracy. He wouldnt work for free, of coursethe vige would simply submit theirpleted monster-ying job papers to the guild, and he could get paid through the earlter. No way would he, nor anyone else, want to serve Nidol for free.

    The arrangement would benefit us both, but its biggest merit was boosting Yohms reputation as a champion. Hed earn the thanks of whomever he saved, and stories of his strength and sincerity would spread across thend. That, in turn, would boost the rep of the monsters who supported himi.e., us.

    Plying his trade across the viges wouldnt be easy, but keeping his base of operations here, in Rimuru, would simplify a lot of things. Amunication crystal could be activated by any of the shamans that every vige had at least one or two of, so I decided to pass a whole bunch of copied crystals around. I could essentially duplicate them for free, thanks to the Great Sages backup. That was just a matter of processing the magic stones from monsters and crystallizing them to a high enough purity. I kept that a secret, since word going around seemed like itde back to bite me.

    These crystals could always be stolen, of course, and there wasnt much I could do about that. That was each viges problem, and I didnt see the need to babysit them that much. Itd be part of their normal lives to tackle, so they could handle it for themselves.

    So taking in feedback from Rigurd and the ogre mages, we gradually sorted out the details behind Operation: Make Yohm a Champion. We may have had a contract, but he wasnt exactly my underlingon the surface, we were working cooperatively with each other. Which was great, because it meant I didnt have to pay him a sry. Really, we still didnt have any outside currency, so if anything I oughta be charging him rent.

    No point being so miserly, though. That was why I gave him room and board for free.

    Another motivation of mine, speaking of this town, was that I wanted to advertise this ce. I had heard about how people who have it tough in their local vige head for the big city to try to make a living. Why note here instead? I wasnt expecting humans and monsters to be arm in arm overnight, but again, I was thinking long-term.

    Several weekster, all of Yohms equipment was ready. We finally had his horses and hismunication crystals. Rounding up thirty-one wild unicorns was a huge ordeal, though. B-plus magical beasts, every one of them. Strong.

    But this wasnt the ouw band from before. Hakuro had trained Yohm and his men up to the point where they were almost unrecognizable from a few weeks back. None were going to faint at the sight of a magic creature any longer. You could rely on these guys nowand with their brand-new equipment on, they had the air of brave, battle-proven warriors. More than worthy of apanying a champion.

    Well, its been fun, pal. Well see you for now, Rimuru!

    And with that, Yohm set off, promising to use this town as a base for their future activities.

 Volume 3 - Ch 4

    THE ADVANCING MALICE

    The magic-born Mjurran pushed her emotions deep inside as she walked across the forest.

    Mjurran was once a witch, living in this forest. Persecuted by others, she had fled here three hundred years agoquietly researching her magic, interacting with no human or magic-born. But those days were nearing their end. Extending ones life with magic only worked for so long.

    Facing death, Mjurran had some slight sense of regret. She had yet to even peer into the great, dark crevice that was the world of magic, and she had no sessor to take on the knowledge she gained. She couldnt help but ask herself what her life was even for.

    In the midst of this impasse, she was greeted by the demon lord yman. He had been at that post for about three hundred years, and he was negotiating with the more well-known monsters and magic-born in the area at the timeor smashing them to bits, one or the other. He was building an army of subordinates at an astonishingly rapid pace, and that was what brought him to meet Mjurran today.

    Seeking the witchs magic, he made her this offer: Let me grant you eternal time and a young body that will never age. In exchange, I ask you to swear your allegiance to me.

    Mjurran epted it, and right now, she thought it was a mistake. She did indeed grow younger, earning the gift of eternal lifebut in the process, she lost her freedom. It was a terribly unfair, uneven bargain. For the demon lord, swindling someone with as much magic knowledge and as little experience with the outside world as Mjurran was like taking candy from a baby.

    The moment she made the oath, a cursed seal was carved into her heart. The so-called Marite Heart was one of ymans most secret of mystic abilities, allowing him to use a mix of fabulously expensive magical media with the magicules of the target to turn the receiver into a magic-born.

    This skill was pulled off sessfully, and Mjurran was rebornand became a marite, unable to defy the will of yman.

    With the magical skill she already bore, Mjurran proved to be a fairly high-level magic-born. It was nothing that made the now-captive witch content. Ever since that moment, she was ymans eternal puppet.

    She could not understand people like Gelmud: magic-born who willfully wanted to be ruled over. She was always looking for a gap, a loophole she could use to free herself from the curse and strike back at yman. But her knowledge told her this was all but impossible. The moment she broke through Marite Heart, the demon lord told her, she would revert to human form. Frozen time would start to flow for her again, and there would be little, if any, of it left to her natural life span. And there was another reason: yman was just so much more powerful than she wasenough to make her writhe in disgust.

    So Mjurran continued to serve the demon lord, knowing she would never find it in herself to defy him and dreaming of the day she might be released from this detestable curse.

    And now

    ymanstest assignment for her was an investigation.

    Im not sure I am suited for battle

    No. You arent, regardless of how high-level you are. So I want you to observe how those who serve another demon lord fight, and then record it for me. You wont be in direct contact with them. I am sure youre capable of that, yes?

    Mjurran was hoping shed be asked to scout for new members of their fighting force. She was disappointed. Instead, the demon lord shed a serene smile and gave her his orders.

    The demon lord yman, the Marite Master himself, could manipte his underlings like puppets and grab the very hearts of those he encountered.

    Only a very small subsection of people could call themselves his friend. The rest of his force were mere tools, incapable of resisting until they were worn to nothing. If they wanted to live, their only choice was to carry out the jobs they were given. This mission, too, was already set in stone, as far as yman was concerned. If Mjurran said anything else, it would just anger him.

    I understand, she said, suppressing her own emotions. She had to follow him. All she could do was nod.

    Such a regret, she whispered. Some memories of her past, when she was free, were making her sentimental.

    Snapping herself out of it, she refocused on her mission, spreading the illusory skill Detect Magic around the local area. The magic was used to sense the magicules around her, but whenbined with the extra skill Magic Sense, she could read information from an even broader radius.

    Mjurrans centuries-long life span was not the result of good luck. It was built on the back of sheer ability. She was, indeed, weak at directbat, but not because she was powerless. She was a wizard, a master of three different systems of magic. While none of it was suited for battle, in terms of usefulness, she was at a far higher level than Gelmud could ever hope to be. yman understood that all too well, making sure to assign her the exact jobs she was suited for.

    Any reaction?

    With the spell came a vast amount of data that streamed into her mind. She had examined it all from moment to moment, and now she detected the presence of another magic-bornone with a vast store of magical energy.

    She braced herself. She must have been near the territory she was asked to observe. Focusing her mind as intensely as she could, she turned her eyes toward her target

    She was greeted with a strange sight.

    Arge number of monsters were chopping down trees, then processing them in assorted ways. Therger trees were transported away, the smaller ones disappearing into thin airsome spatial skill, she thought.

    They appeared to be building a road. Behind this crew was a well-built path which, from her viewpoint, seemed to extend to the far horizon. Some on this team were digging uprge boulders buried in the earth and pulverizing them into pebbles; others would then take these away and nket them along the ground. These were then further crushed and distributed evenly byrge, heavy-looking cylinders, like logs made of iron.

    These iron logs were a type of road roller that Rimuru had ordered. It was being pulled by man powerwell, monster powerbut there were handles on the front and back, with three crewmembers assigned to each end. It was heavy work, but with a steady stream of heave-hos, the crew easily pulled the roller forwardand behind it, they left a well-tended path of crushed gravel.

    A higher-level monster served as foreman for this crew, and everyone appeared to be working together toy this road out. It was like nothing Mjurran had seen before.

    All this was being carried out by high orcs, one of them higher level and emitting an unusual aura from under its full-te armor. This must have been the mass of magicules she detected earlier.

    So the orc lord won  and he evolved.

    That was Mjurrans judgment, but it was not her role to draw conclusions, so she abandoned the thought. All an observer was tasked to do was watch and record something she continued to do over the next few days as the crew rolled on.

    As she observed and chronicled what she saw, she began to wonder whaty at the end of thepleted road.

    Hmm  It might be best to continue observing the targeted monster, but I suppose I should broaden my information gathering a little.

    yman was a wary, worrisome demon lord. He would no doubt ask. Knowing him as long as she did, Mjurran could easily imagine itthough she couldnt deny that she also wanted to flee the stress of continually observing a magic-born stronger than her without being detected.

    So she stepped away from her assigned job and began to move. Taking a detour through the forest, she stealthily traveled away from the crew and onto the gravel road. Then, seeing it unfold before her, she dashed along it in the opposite direction from the construction team. She was invisible thanks to perception-blocking magic, and she stayed that way as she ran uninterrupted for several hours.

    Now Magic Sense was telling her something else.

    This is  a pretty high-level presenceing up. Is that  Phobio, the ck Leopard Fang?! Carillon must be serious, if hes sent one of the Three Lycanthropeers

    This was a massively powerful magic-born, one Mjurran would have no chance against. Not even the orc lord would give it much of a workout. But what was odder was Phobios movementshe was traveling right past the orc lords position and toward somewhere else. The ce Mjurran was going. The roads must have been connected.

    She began to wonder what was so important on the other end of this road.

    Her intel-gathering mission meant she wasnt allowed toe too close to her target. With her magic eyes, however, she didnt need to. She could see them well enough from far away, and her curiosity was driving her to track Phobio now. She continued doing so for a while, until she finally caught sight of arge, open area up ahead. It was still too far to be seen without magical support, but apparently that was where Phobionded.

    So thats where he went. The orc lords stronghold, perhaps? Perhaps he wanted to smash their headquarters first.

    Mjurran wasnt sure what to make of ituntil she turned her gaze toward Phobiosnding point. She immediately regretted it.

    The  The demon lord Milim?!

    It was an absolute wave of violence, unleashed by that girl with the tinum-pink hair.

    The girl was grinning, this infallible presence that dominated the other demon lords.

    Milim, the Destroyer herself, was thereand despite the distant point Mjurran was observing her from, Milim still noticed her. With a smile, she rolled her eyes toward the faraway spy. Mjurran hurriedly turned off the spell, even as fear shook her, even though she knew it was likely toote.

    Her position was known, and she had to flee, no matter how futile she felt it was. If there was any silver lining to this, it was that Milim was in no hurry to take action. She was willing to let this observer go.

    Dont interfere with anyhat was the deal, right? I suppose I owe my life to that, she said to herself.

    Slowly, Mjurran stood up. Locking eyes with Milim came as a shock, but they had both seemed to tacitly agree not to interfere. Very well, then.

    Some of the mystery magic-born she was shown in the images were near Milim as wellthey must have survived, too, along with the orc lord.

    How should I report this to yman?

    Wondering to herself, she left the site.

    After finishing her report to the demon lord, Mjurran hefted a deep, depressed sigh. His first response to it was harshSpotted by your observation target? Thats far too sloppy for you. Just recalling it disgusted her.

    If you cant even perform the job I assign you, you really have no value to me. I cant have you just up and dying on me, so please, try to be more careful in the future. Continue observing and wait for your next orders, yman spitefully continued.

    To him, Mjurran had no value, just like Gelmud. That was the kind of man he was. The Marite Master was, as his nickname suggested, an excellentmander of other peoples workbut he never treated his servants as anything special. It was a master-ve rtionship.

    I failed. Ipletely failed  Why did I have to pledge my faith to a man like that?

    Pushing her emotions back, Mjurran turned her focus elsewhere. If she wanted to live, she couldnt afford to fail next time. She had only been tasked with intel gathering, but against the demon lord Milim, that was a tall order. Continual observation of her would be suicide. She knew Milim was not at all unintelligenther temper often made people misjudge that, but it was true. Whats more, her instinct for picking up on other peoples thoughts made it all but impossible to hide things from her.

    Another concern for Mjurran were the next orders yman had for her. Something told her that continuing to follow hismands would be far from a good idea. Forget about following in Gelmuds footsteps, she thought. Her situation wasnt good. If she continued to stand by idly, she feared it would be the end of her.

    This is awful. But

    She was prepared for what mighte. She had no hope, but in some way, Mjurran thought this could also be her big chance. Serving the demon lord as long as she did, she felt she could read his thoughts a little by now. She was aware that yman was nning some kind of new,rge-scale operationone that, she predicted, shed have to serve as a sacrificialmb for.

    If she couldnt escape from ymans rule, then death was waiting for her. Maybe she could fake her death and beat him to the punchor maybe she could free herself from the Marite Heart and regain her freedom. Those were the hopes Mjurran was betting her life on.

    If she could find some piece of information that would please yman, that would be perfect. If it was juicy enough to earn her freedom, even better.

    Regardless, she wanted to make it look like she died, as in her initial thought. Doing so might arouse suspicion, but having the demon lord Milim around actually made it more convenient. If Milim decided to kick up some dust, itd attract attention from all corners. Itd be more than enough to attract ymans eye, and after that, Mjurran would mean little to nothing to him.

    She had made up her mind.

    She couldnt read what Milim might do. But if the Destroyer was on the move, that would be onerge stone she was throwing into the pond. The more ripples that resulted, the less Mjurrans presence would stand out.

    There was no need to hurry on this. yman was not a demon lord to trifle with. He would see through a half-baked n of action. For now, she needed to remain in obscurity, faithfully carrying out her orders.

    So Mjurran sat there quietly, waiting for time to continue onward.

    The demon lord yman closed his connection to Mjurran and sneered.

    He had been a bit harsh with the witch, but so far, everything was still ording to n. Given Milims behavior at their summit, he presumed that she would head right into the forest. Based on that, it wouldnt be good for her to think that he was uninterested in these mystery monsters. He was the one who hatched and supported this plot in the first ce.

    What yman wanted was a demon lord whod serve as his faithful puppetand now that some uncertainties were making themselves known, supporting whoever survived as a future demon lord seemed dangerous to him. They would be too hot to handle, much less make into one of his underlings. If he could grasp some kind of weakness inherent to his target, that was one thing, but yman had no intention of dominating with sheer force, the way Carillon would.

    But there was no need to spell all of that out. Just indicating that he was interested, or making Milim think as much, would work fine without nting any seeds of doubt in her mind. Plus, his true mission was to entice Frey to join his side, and as long as that was so, keeping Milims attention focused on the mystery magic-born freed up his own movements a little.

    He was sure Milim was gloating right now,ughing about how much of a head start she had on him. Thanks to her keen sense of intuition, any attempt at deceiving her usually ended in failure. Thats why he needed Mjurran to take her assignment as seriously as possibleand if Milim took care of her in the process, that was no great issue, either. The moment Milim spotted her, Mjurrans role in his life was over. Having Milim rub her out wouldnt hurt yman at all.

    By this point, Mjurrans a pawn I can stand to get rid of. Ive obtained all her knowledge. Shesrgely useless in battle. It was about time to dispose of her anyway. This works well for me, he mused coldly.

    Just then

    Just as terrible as always, arent you, yman? Sad to hear. You need to treat your tools right, or else theyll fall apart. Didnt Lace tell you that?

    The apparent response to ymans whispers came from a hazy presence in a corner of the room. It revealed a young girl wearing the mask of a clown, one with tear marks running from its eyes.

    Her voice was equally forlorn. It didnt bother the demon lord, who leisurely turned around to face the girl.

    Oh, youre back, Teare? That was fast.

    He addressed her with a deep sort of affection, despite her entering the room unannounced. That was rare for yman but nheless to be expected. This was one of the demon lords very few true friends. Teare, the Teardrop Jestermuch like Lace, the Wonder Jester, her coworker and vice president of the Moderate Jesterswas an oldpanion of ymans.

    Uh-huh. It was pretty tough this time. I couldnt move around too freely in Freys territory. She is a demon lord, after all.

    I could imagine. You werent noticed, were you?

    No problems there. Missionplete! I am part of the Moderate Jestersyou could learn to trust me a little more!

    yman shed her a contented smile. Ha-ha-ha-ha-ha! Oh, I do, I do, Teare. I just worry youre putting your neck on the line too much.

    The concern he had for Teare was evident in his voice. It was a much different tone from what he used with Mjurran a moment ago. Anyone could see that any worry he had for Teare was the genuine article.

    Ugh! Can you stop treating me like a child already?!

    Ha-ha-ha-ha-ha! Yes, of course, Teare. But did you hear the news? Milim seems to have taken quite the liking to those magic-born. This is turning out even more interesting than I had thought it would. Who could have imagined that Milim herself would seek out one of Carillons Three Lycanthropeers? Such a pleasure to see unfold.

    Well, fair enough, Teare replied quizzically. But how do you think its going, though? I havent seen your crystal-ball recordings yet, but are these magic-born really amazing enough to keep Milims interest?

    yman could sense her curiosity. He made no attempt to hide his own heart from her. Well, to be honest, I suppose they cannot go on ignored. In terms of strength alone, I would easily be able to dispatch them He paused to think for a moment, carefully choosing his words. But Lace wasunnerved by them. He felt something, is how he put it. I thought he was overthinking matters, but if both the orc lord and these mysterious magic-born survived, it does give me pause.

    Hmm Really? Teare sounded convinced by this assessment. Well, she continued, if it was enough to unnerve that little sneak Lace, theres got to be something to it, doesnt there? Either them and the orc lord made peace, or one sides subjugating the otheror something else? Its hard to judge their value, I think, as long as we dont know. We at least need to know what the demon lord Milim finds so fascinating about them.

    Certainly I cant disagree with that.

    Right? You arent acting like yourself, yman. Youre usually a lot more cautious about these things.

    Such a scathingment forced yman to reconsider his approach. If some monster under his control made this statement, he wouldnt have given it any kind of sincere thought. It mightve enraged him into killing the poor creature.

    Perhaps I might be a little too hasty here. I suppose Id best collect more information from a variety of angles before I debate it any further.

    Yeah, I think youre right!

    So following Teares feedback, yman decided to investigate the magic-born a little more. He had no interest in recruiting them; his objectives were still the same.

    The only question he wanted to tackle: What was Milim so interested in with them? That was a major concern for him, and he thought learning more about the magic-born might lead to an answer.

    Otherwise, to a demon lord like yman, high-level magic-borns hardly mattered at all.

    Rposing himself, yman decided to listen to Teares report.

    So how did your investigation turn out?

    Well, it looks like Frey has no intention of getting involved in the Forest of Jura.

    Ah So she wont make a move, then? Did you get a grasp of what was going on over there?

    Oh, absolutely! Teare grinned.

    She had taken on this job because Lace was busy with another assignment.

    Her mission was to investigate the demon lord Frey and collect intel on any potential weakness they could take advantage of. That was what brought Teare into Freys territory.

    Teare might have looked like a little girl, but much like the demon lord she served, she was a first-ss superpower.

    So, um, my impression was that Frey was kind of on high alert about something or other. She had harpies flying around all over her realm, like she was preparing for war or something.

    Ah. It figures. Did you find out why?

    Teare snickered a little. I did. And guess what?! Shes freaked out because Charybdis might resurrect itself! she reported cheerily.

    It made perfect sense to yman. I see, I see Well, Teare, Id like to make another request of you, but hows your schedule looking?

    Eee-hee-hee! I thought you might say that. I have Footman on standby, too, so if it involves some rough stuff, we can handle it!

    Heh-heh Well done, Teare. But Id like you to keep this from turning violent. First, Id like you to travel to where this Charybdis is sealed away and see if its possible to win this creature over to our side.

    Sure thing! Leave it all to me, yman!

    I believe the location is

    I said, leave it all to me! I gotta get going, okay?

    With that, Teare once more sank into the muddy darkness. Watching her leave, yman exhibited a twinge of worry in his eyesan extraordinarily rare thing for him. In an instant, they were back to their bold, fearless shine.

    Well Charybdis, eh? Very good. If its power is truly up to demon lord standards, I can hardly wait to see what it packs.

    The whisper was delivered with a joyful smile as he descended into his own thoughts.

    Carillon, king of the lycanthropes, first dered himself demon lord four hundred years ago in his thirst for more power. The world was in a great era of upheaval back then, with demon lords stepping in and out of the picture at a dizzying rate, and he made the move near the end of a great world war, one fabled to take ce every five hundred years.

    Frey was one of the other survivors of that era to join the demon lord club, with yman staking his im a centuryter. Leon Cromwell, meanwhile, assumed the title two hundred years ago, with his defeat of the ursed Lord under his belt.

    Together, the four young demon lords were known as the New Generation.

    The older ones, meanwhile, were wizened generals byparison, all surviving at least two world wars, and their strength was on apletely different level from the new gang. That led many in the New Generation to strive to expand their own forces, and Carillon was one of them.

    It was little wonder, then, that he was now attempting to recruit some more brawn for his side.

    Phobio, the ck Leopard Fang and one of Carillons Three Lycanthropeers, understood his masters feelings better than anyone else. That was why, even after being trounced to a terrifying degree by the demon lord Milim, he was still hiding himself deep in the forest.

    There was no way he could do something as utterly shameless as returning home right now. If he exined everything to Carillon, he would no doubtugh it off and forgive him. But Phobios pride refused to allow that. Failing to live up to the expectations of Carillon, the man who saved his life, would be unbearable.

    I cant let that happen! he half howled into the air.

    Please, calm yourself, Sir Phobio!

    That defeat was unavoidable. Not even Lord Carillon could quell the rage of Milim

    Shut up! Lord Carillon would never show his ugly face again if it happened to him. I was just too inexperienced for the jobbut my pride forbids me from returning without anything to show for it.

    The anger in Phobios embittered reply made his men fall silent.

    They had been hiding out for a week, taking shifts as they kept watch over the town. The demon lord Milim had stayed there the entire timeand they had also seen monsters engaged in a variety of tasks, from building construction to road expansion. There were also monsters tasked with procuring food and patrolling the areathe order preserved around town was amazing to see. Not even Phobio could hide his shock.

    Just look at those bastards. Up and building a town for themselves I dismissed them as lowly monsters, but theyve got technology that not even I am aware of

    You certainly said it. I wouldnt want to subjugate them so much as open formal rtions with their leader.

    This was Enrio, a monkey lycanthrope, taking an intellectual approach to the question. He had a point. These monsters were working in orderly crews, under themand of their leaders. This was clearly some state-of-the-art engineering. It was iparable with what Enrio knew in his homnd, the Beast Kingdom of Eurazania, with its crude stone houses and roads of bare, ttened earth.

    Yeah. Even if Milim wasnt here, weve taken the wrong approach. We tried to conquer them without any chance for them to counter usand that cost us the opportunity to earn their trust. But whats done is done. And even if Im all healed up, my humiliation at the hands of Milim hasnt disappeared. I have to find a way to get back at her! Some way that wont put any trouble on Lord Carillon. I know in my brain that its impossible, but this is about my heart. Phobios voice was dark, ghostlike, and bereft of its usual cheerfulness.

    Up to now, Phobio was an absolute ruler. Nobody could defy his strengthbut now his first setback was giving him pause. He had never lost to anyone before, except Carillon. His logical mind told him that losing to Milim was unavoidable, but the mes of humiliation still simmered deep below.

    I know what you mean, sir, but

    Enrio knew exactly how Phobio felt. But exacting revenge upon Milim was not in the scope of reality. He tried to make Phobio give up on the idea but found himself interrupted.

    Ohhh, Ipletely understand. All that anger and frustration Im an old veteran of those feelings.

    Who goes there?!

    Since when were you here?

    Phobios troops were far toote to react. The figure had already sidled right up to them as they sat around the campfireand judging by the way it had avoided detection by an entire group of high-level magic-born, it must have been quite talented indeed.

    Hohhhh-hoh-hoh-hoh! A good day to all of you! I am called Footman, member of the Moderate Jesters. They call me the Angry Jester, and I am delighted to make all of your acquaintances!

    The polite greeting from the rotund figure was marred slightly by the enraged expression on its mask. The gregarious tone of the clowns voice made its presence seem, in a way, quite surreal.

    Mm-hmm. You dont have to be so wary of us. My names Teare, a fellow Moderate Jester. Were sort of jacks-of-all-trades, and I promise were not fighting against you!

    And then, a female clown stepped out from behind Footman, this one with a tearful mask. The angry man and the sobbing gi very strange thing to see beside a peaceful campfire.

    Asking Phobio and his cohorts not to be wary of them was a tall order. But the way they appeared out of nowhere certainly hinted at their powers. If they werent foes, perhaps it was best to believe that.

    Hohh? Ive never heard of this Moderate Jesters group before. A jack-of-all-trades? Well, whatever. What are you after anyway? Phobio asked, trying to work out their objectives.

    Footman seemed like he couldnt wait to answer. Hohh-hoh-hoh-hoh! Well, I was called here by your feelings of anger and disgust. The waves of rage I felt rippling from here were quite noteworthy, indeed! Were you the source of them? I would love to know what makes you so enraged. Would you be so kind as to tell me? Because Im sure I could offer some assistance!

    He transformed his mask as he spoke, making it erupt into an eerie smile.

    You expect us to talk to someone as creepy as you two? Enrio countered. Sir Phobio, theres no reason to fall for their politeness. May we dispatch them for you?

    Hes right! another of Phobios men added. Its not normal, someoneing here without being asked to. You two look to be high-level magic-born as well, but you picked the wrong group to wrestle with. We belong to the Beast Masters Warrior Alliance, part of the armies of the demon lord Carillon. Do you think a pair of wandering magic-born like you could defeat us?

    The group had little interest in hearing them out. The strangers were too suspicious-looking, and the way they dared to offer help riled their anger. Phobios group were in the elite echelon of Carillons forcesthey hadnt fallen to the point where they required the help of random creepsters.

    Ignoring them, Footman continued. You seek power, do you not? Well, powers just what we have. Quite a bit! Ites with a level of danger, of course, but if you can conquer this danger, the strength you could earn from it is tremendous!

    Oh?

    Yeah! You want to beat the demon lord Milim, dont you? So why dont you be a demon lord, too?

    Teares question drove the camp to silence. The sound of one lycanthrope swallowing nervously seemed to echo against the trees.

    Ademon lord? Did you think you could trick us with such ridiculous

    Charybdis. Have you heard of it?

    The single word from Footman had earth-shattering effects. The moment he uttered it, Phobio froze in ce.

    And then

    The evil powers that giant fish holds are incredibly massive! If you dont need it, well, we can always offer it to someone else. See ya!

    Teare dealt the next blow.

    Gesturing to Footman, she turned and prepared to walk off. This was how the devil tempts youby making you panic, stealing your decision-making skills, and blocking your ability to think rationally.

    Wait.

    Phobio stopped her, defeated by his very own ambitions.

    No, Sir Phobio!

    You cant listen to these people!

    Tell me more, Phobio asked, ignoring his men.

    The mes of crazed desire were dancing in his eyes as he turned them toward Footman. Maybe this was his chance to scare the wits out of Milim with all her power. It could even let him rule over thends as a demon lord himself. None of it was a dream any longer. And imagining it made Phobio fling away all hisposure.

    No. I never liked this from the start. Why did the demon lord choose me to dispatch a single, wimpy orc lord? I dont need to take that crap. Yes If its a new demon lord they need, nobody should have anyints about me taking the helm. If it makes me stronger, Im sure Carillon willugh it off anyway!

    Phobio, prone to hasty thinking even in the best of times, had beenpletely hooked by Teares and Footmans sweet words.

    Ooh! A fine decision, Sir Phobio. And the correct one! Who besides you could ever be a demon lord?

    Youre up for it, then? Teare added. Well, it makes sense to me. Someone strongs gotta be demon lord, or else itd be a terrible mistake! Thats what I think, tooand youre just the man for the job, Sir Phobio!

    Yet, Phobio was no fool. He still had ultimate authority over these two ttering him, and he hadnt forgotten one very pertinent question to ask.

    Knock that crap off! I said, tell me more. If I say yes to that offer, what do you get out of it? You gotta have some kind of endgame! So out with it!

    Teare and Footman had expected this.

    We do get something out of it, yes. If you be a demon lord, Sir Phobio, were hoping you can show us a little favor afterward. Hopefully, youll be able to amodate us in a few areas?

    Hoh-hoh-hoh! And we could hardly subdue Charybdis by ourselves. Weve discovered where its been confined and everything, but if we cant tame it, itd be such a waste! And just as we were pondering over what to do about that, who should we run into but you, Sir Phobio!

    That was easy enough for Phobio to ept.

    Huh. All right. But how do you know I can tame Charybdis any more than?

    Hohhhhh-hoh-hoh-hoh! No worries there! I am positive you will seed at the task, Sir Phobio! And even if you should fail by some incredibly unlikely event, we will demand no reparations from you. We only charge our clients if they win, win, win! On that scoreat the leastyou can ce your full trust upon the jacks-of-all-trades at the Moderate Jesters!

    Huh, Phobio thought. So when I be demon lord, they want it to be clear who helped me out the most.

    In that case, perhaps it was best to leave the demon lord Carillons army. That move could do him well, whether he seeded at this or not.

    Phobio had a lust for power. He also felt confident that he could tame Charybdis. Instead of fearing failure, he was already sure of his sess, ready to ept the deal. All the extravagant praise from this pair made him feel like he was sitting on a demon lords throne even nowor perhaps, Phobio was already caught up in their spell by then.

    All right. I ept your offer!

    Following his instincts, Phobio nodded, signing the papers that Teare handed to him.

    Phobio then turned to his troops and gave his final orders.

    I want you to go back to Lord Carillon and tell him what I agreed to.

    Sir Phobio?!

    But

    Listen, you guys, he said, stopping them. Im not gonna cause any trouble for Sir Carillon, so tell him Im giving up my post in the Three Lycanthropeers and leaving the force. Nobodys gonna whine about what I do if Im just some magic-born unaffiliated with anyone. BesidesIm going ces. Im going to be stronger. Strong enough toy waste to the world. And Ill make Milim recognize that!

    Nothing could change Phobios minda mind that was almost unnaturally attuned toward revenge against the demon lord who slighted him. As if his unfading feelings of humiliation and anger were pushing him forward.

    Enrio silently watched him, thinking and observing as hispanions exhorted Phobio to reconsider. After all the years he had been his closest confidant, he knew well that once he made up his mind, it wasnt easy to make him reconsider. Phobios will was firm, and his heart could not be moved. So

    Very well, sir. I will report to Lord Carillon first. However, the strength of Charybdis is still an unknown. I would suggest you be careful with itdo not expect it to eat from your hand that easily.

    And with that, he left, taking hispanions with him. Considering the nonaggression pact the demon lords had with one another, Phobio picking a fight with Milim could be a serious crisis. Enrio needed to confer with Carillon and take countermeasures before that happened. It was with some reluctance that he left, but he couldnt afford to do anything as foolish as let his emotions dictate his priorities. It was an order, besides, and one made with whatever reasoning power remained in his mind.

    Sir Phobio is not a fool. I cannot think he will be deceived for long by that strange duo. And even if this Charybdis actually exists, Sir Phobio should be able to tame it.

    He chose to have faith in Phobio.

    With Enrio on his way, the only people left were Teare, Footman, and Phobio.

    Well, shall we be off, then?

    Yes! I cant wait to show this Charybdis my power and smash it to the ground. And with ourbined forces, well turn that demon lord Milim into a sobbing baby!

    Yep! You sure will! Im totally cheering you on, too, so dont let your guard down! Ready to go?

    Teare and Footman motioned Phobio to follow behind them. After a short journey, they reached a small cave, deep in the very heart of the Forest of Jura.

    Charybdis is here?

    Sure is!

    It has not resurrected itself quite yet, you see, but you can still feel its lust for destruction bubble into the air. We love such emotions, so thats how we found it.

    There was an evil grin on Footmans face as he spoke. Phobio failed to notice, enraptured as he was by the strange aura he could feel from the cave.

    Now, the clown continued, let me exin how this works. Resurrecting Charybdis requires arge number of corpses. Charybdis is a sort of spiritual life-form, essentially like a demon. We have to give it a physical corpus, so it can exercise its power in this world. So

    He gave Phobio a sidelong nce. Phobio could read what it meant. He gulped nervously.

    Wait. Are you?

    Why, yes! We are! To tame Charybdis, you must instill it within your own body. You will be one with it! Footmans voice boomed, revealing his obvious excitement.

    Mm-hmm, Teare added. If you want to stop, nows your chance, okay? This seal wontst for much longer, and when it breaks, Charybdis will wind up resurrected on some battlefield or monster fight or whatever. In fact, its probably gonna try using the remaining dregs of its power to cook up the monster corpses it needs to resurrect itselfand if that happens, well have gone through all this trouble for nothing!

    Was that true? It might be. There was a slight twinge of impatience to Teares voice.

    If Charybdis automatically resurrects itself, I doubt wed be able to control it. Its just a pure drive for destruction, so it wont take orders from anyone, I dont think. Not even if we defeat it. Sowe have to unseal it before it resurrects and take its powers away, or it wont work, she continued, choosing her words carefully.

    Her eyes turned straight toward Phobio. They stabbed into him, much as Footmans had. There would be no more eloquent way to ask the question they were asking.

    All right, Phobio replied sternly. Im alreadymitted to this; I aint gonna chicken out now. I am ready to make the power of Charybdis my own!

    Yeah! Thats the spirit!

    Hohhh-hoh-hoh-hoh! Well said, Lord Phobio. I really must thank youand toast our good fortune as well for running into such a trustworthy partner!

    So it was decided.

    Phobio ventured into the cave alone, eyes filled with the pride he held as a high-level magic-born. A finely purified will that believed in victory without fearing defeat. But sadly, his heart was still filled, deep down, with his grudge against Milim and his buried anger at his own immaturity.

    To the spiritual life-form known as Charybdis, nothing could be more delicious.

    The moment he fell for Teares and Footmans sweet words, his fate was sealeda fact he had failed to notice as he plunged into the caves darkness.

    Time passed.

    He is gone, isnt he?

    He certainly is.

    Hohh-hoh-hoh! Hohhh-hoh-hoh-hoh!

    Ha-ha-ha Ahh-ha-ha-ha!!

    Theughter came loud and fast once they were sure Phobio was fully inside.

    Exactly the sort of person one would expect to be serving that blockhead Carillon, eh? And after all the excuses we practiced beforehand, he barely questioned us at all.

    Totally, totally! That monkey guy looked a lot smarter than him.

    They had contrived a fairly extensive amount of arguments and strategies to convince Phobio to ept the offer from this pair of odd-looking strangers. But Phobios eyes were so clouded by rage and greed that it went far easier than predicted. They ridiculed him for it in his absenceso easy, it was almost a disappointment.

    Is that the end of the job, then, Teare?

    Mm-hmm! All I heard from yman was to revive Charybdis and have it head for Milim.

    And no new business after that?

    Nope. This jobs all wrapped up! Oh, and how about we just dispose of the lesser-dragon corpses we brought in? Were not gonna need em anymore.

    Indeed. We go through all the trouble to prepare a temporary body, and then that fool volunteers for the job instead! No need for these corpses, no.

    So they tossed the bodies to the ground.

    There were a dozen or so lesser dragons in all; they had killed an entire flock of them for the job. Lesser dragons were not part of the draconic races that Veldora belonged to; there was nothing inherently magical about them. They were unintelligent creatures, incapable of handling magic, but they were protected by a tough body and strong scales, giving them a killer advantage in close-quarters fighting. The human race usually ranked them around a B-plus or A-minus, but not even such a powerful beast was any match for two high-level magic-born.

    Their lives were cruelly taken, and now they were being treated like garbage. Bringing them to a human town and selling the assorted parts from them could fetch a small fortune, but to Teare and Footman, they were just an encumbrance.

    Once they removed the corpses from their spatial-magic storage and dumped them on the ground, they left the scene, satisfied at a job well done.

    It had been several weeks since Milim arrived, and the time really passed by in a sh. Every day was a battle with her.

    Some days, she would check out our agricultural operations and even help plow the fields. I was willing to bet that we were tilling the fields created after clearing trees from the forest faster than any modern farming equipment could manage. It was exhrating, seeing how quickly the job was being done.

    Other days, shed observe our workshops. Watching Kurobe forge a new sword practically made her swoon for the guyand then shed immediately get bored and whine about wanting to try doing it herself. He said yes, and of course, her approach was incredibly violentone strike was all it took to almost destroy the forge space, anvil and all. It taught us all that Milim wasnt really suited for delicate work.

    Chaotic days, to be sure, but at least they were peaceful now.

    Not much had changed with life around town after Yohm and his crew left. The only real difference was the guests we were now hosting. Kabal and friends were still staying here, as was Fuze.

    Uhh, dont you kind of need to get back home sooner orter? How long were you nning to stay anyway?

    I decided to bring up the question with Fuze while Kabal and his gang were taking Milim out hunting. They got along pretty well with her, too; by now they were her second favorite after me. I needed to take advantage as much as I could.

    Well, is it all right if I stayed a little bit longer? Theres, you know, a lot of things to tackle.

    He wanted more time. He, too, had been walking around town, observing the assorted goings-on. He wasnt liable to cause trouble if I took my eyes off him, unlike Milim, but it still made me nervous.

    Oh,e on, youre still not convinced that were not a threat?

    The whole reason for his stay was because he was suspicious of usor me, really. The longer he stayed here, the more concerned it made me.

    Mmm? Oh no, Ive long since dropped any worries I had about you, Sir Rimuru. Its just

    His voice trailed off.

    Okay, so why are you still here? I pressed.

    Fuze scowled a little, then resigned himself to reveal the truth. Well, its justfortable living here, you know? Thinking about it, its been a long while since Ive had a chance to rest and take it easy, soyou know, I was thinking this was a good chance to let my hair down for a bit.

    What? Wow, talk about brazen! Ive been on pins and needles worrying about Fuze, and he was treating this as a resort vacation?!

    Uh, you realize I permitted you to stay here because you were going on about trying to gauge us out and so on, right?

    I was truly at a loss for words. All the politeness I extended to him at first now seemed like a truly stupid idea. And that wasnt allthere was one other thing too important to forget.

    Also, what happened to your promise that youd help make Yohm and his band into champions?

    Oh, no need to worry! Ive decided that I can trust you, Sir Rimuru, so Ive already instructed my team to finish up the arrangements.

    Apparently, he had already reported to Blumund and gotten everything set up for Yohm over in Farmus. Despite being on vacation, he was still handling his job for me. Shrewd of him, I guessor maybe, indicative of the fact that I couldnt let my guard down around him.

    Really? Well, great, then. So you like it here?

    I should say so! This town is amazing! Having such a fine ce to rest and recuperate so near to Blumund is truly wee. Of courseI cant help but think about the dangers involved in traveling between here and there.

    I suppose Fuze really did see this town as a kind of health spa. Guess installing that hot-spring bath and working hard to improve our food quality paid off. It was more the work of Shuna and the three dwarven brothers than me, but still.

    Our diets, in particr, had dramatically changed over the past few weeks. It still wasnt all that varied a menu, but each meal had started to taste quite a bit better. We didnt have much in the way of seasonings, such as mirin or soy sauce, so no really strong vors yetbut we did have salt, as well as something kind of like pepper and a variety of condiments from the fragrant grasses of the forest.

    These ingredients,bined with Shunas genius in the kitchen, were producing some pretty high-grade food.

    Ahh, being able to consume such fine cuisine, day in, day out. I am a happy woman indeed! Milim also approved.

    She had made friends with Shuna while I wasnt paying attention, and the sight of her stealinger, samplingtastes of food in the kitchen became a regr urrence. Shuna was fond of her, too, and sometimes I wondered if anyone saw her as a demon lord any longer. But hey, having friends isnt a bad thing.

    We were also training apprentice cooks for Shunas operations. From both genders, too. Shuna didnt have the analysis and assessment abilities that my unique skills provided; she had to rely on her five senses to make the food she did. The new cooks stuck to Shunas advice along those lines, working hard to keep bellies full across town.

    With all the different racesing in, our poption was starting to swell. This naturally meant we needed to employ arge number of people to cover our food needs, along with keeping the peace, cleaning the rest houses, and doing theundry. Everyone had their strong and weak points, so we had decided to divide the work into six categories: cooking, cleaning, upkeep, sewing, assistance, and misceneous. Rigurd was responsible for takingmand and providing assignments. He was good at it, and the job he was doing bringing all the towns monsters together was a wonder to see.

    Yohms band also had nothing but good things to say about our food. They liked their living quarters, too, along with the town experience in general. If it wasnt for that, Im sure they wouldve fled from Hakuro and his demonic training regimen long ago. Judging by the way monsters around town treated them, they must have enjoyed the work well enough. Once we started hosting merchants in here, I was pretty sure itd work out just fine.

    Itd be great if we could all work together and turn this area into a tourist destination. I had certain ns along those lines, but nothing concrete yet. For now, our first priority was convincing everyone else that we werent dangerous.

    Danger on the roads, though?

    That was probably a good point. Itd be exceedingly rare to run into something as big as a knight spider, but there certainly were arge number of monsters out there. A forest as deep and thickly vegetated as this one was no ce for a human being to livethe monsters posed a danger, but so did getting lost and running out of food. Nobody was around to treat you if you hurt yourself, and the threat of illness on the road was also present. It took nearly two weeks toplete a one-way journey between Blumund and here, but you could expect to tack on a few extra days for all sorts of reasons.

    Having Shadow Motion and the like on hand made the distance something we could cover immediately, but that wasnt avable to adventurers. Even seasoned travelers like Kabals team needed around ten days to cover it, no matter how quickly they went. If they got in a fight and lost their bearings, it was a given in this world that theyd need to expend a few days getting back on track.

    I wanted to use the merchants to spread the word about this town for me. That was my n, but there were still a few stumbling blocks to cover before we brought it to action.

    Hmm I see. Itd be quicker to build a new road, wouldnt it?

    Huh? What do you mean?

    Um, well, Im having a crew pave a road between here and the Dwarven Kingdom, but Ive also got another team handling building construction. Their works settled downtely, but I was thinking maybe they could put in a road to Blumund. Itd keep people from getting lost, at least.

    Wait, really? Thats kind of a big national operation, isnt it? Youd need a ton of money to

    There you go again, Fuzie.

    Fuzie? Something about you calling me that really creeps me out.

    Ah, dont worry about it, Fuzie. If we can build a road and pave it with gravel, thatd open passage to carriages and wagons and such. Itd save a ton of time, plus, itd be useful for future rtions, right? And wed be happy to undertake this operation. Just one thing

    Whats that?

    I want you to spread the word, like you promised. Just let everyone know that we arent a pack of dangerous monsters. And Id also appreciate it if you could introduce me to an expert in customs and tariffs and stuff. I want to sell some of the goods we produce, so if I could get in contact with people who can help with all that stuff, thatd be great. How about it?

    Right now, the path between here and Blumund was little more than a rough animal trail, capable of amodating horses but not full carriages. We had started to build a road to Dwargon, but we hadnt even gotten around to clearing the trees that dotted the path to Blumund. We hesitated to, because we were afraid of calling too much attention to ourselves, but that was before all the battles and such in the forest.

    Things were starting to calm down again, and I wanted to have some highways we could leverage to improve our trading activity. I was prepared to leave that issue alone if we were seen as the enemy, but if we were building diplomatic rtions with other countries, we needed some real roads, fast. And since I ran things in the forest, it was up to us, I felt, to do all the construction work.

    I figured now was a good time to plead my case to Fuze about this, even if it sounded a tad patronizing, and have him do his job for me. It had the intended effect. Fuze looked honestly touched.

    Sir Rimuru, you would really do all that for us? In that case, well do our best to provide any kind of support you need!

    Heh. That was easy. Fuze will probably be singing our praises to anyone who listens to him once he returns home. At the very least, if he didnt have a narrow, prejudiced view of us, then Id say I won this battle.

    If using some of our idle man power to build a road was enough to earn that much appreciation, its a pretty cheap deal for us, I think.

    Kabal and his friends were back by the time I had finished cajoling Fuze. Milim came running up to me, a big smile on her face.

    Wah-ha-ha-ha-ha! Another bumper crop today!

    Behind her, Kabal and Gido were both carrying a huge number of monsters on their backs.

    Boy, that Milim sure is something else! She can spot out monsters in the blink of an eye! She made things so much easier for us. The empty-handed Elen beamed as she trailed behind the demon lord.

    There wasnt a speck of dirt on Milim at all; I guess she had the men in the party handle all the heavy lifting. She was wearing a new dress from Shuna, and I suppose she didnt want to ssh any blood on it. Not exactly hunting gear, I dont think

    Phe! Finally back!

    That was a hard day of work, eh? Lets hit the hot spring and grab a mugful of something.

    Ooh yeah! The fruit wine here is awesome!

    Kabal and Gido didnt seem to mind being used and abused, at least, although that probably wasnt the way they thought about it. The men were spoiling Milim, after all, and it wouldnt be very nice to gripe about that and stir up conflict. If they had no problem, neither did I.

    It did, however, remind me all the more about how, no matter which world you lived in, some men were doomed to have women use them. I, at the very least, could show them a little kindness.

    Hey, good work, guys. Why dont you get yourselves cleaned up first?

    Yes, I would hardly want you to remain all dirty like that

    Shion started toment, but then

    Hmm?!

    Suddenly, Milim ran next to me, eyes pointed forward.

    Whos there?!

    Shion handed me to Milim as she addressed some presence in front of her. Im not a piece of baggage, you know. I have no idea why theyre ferrying me back and forth, like Im some fragile work of art.

    Benimaru and Soei took position behind Milim as I grumped about this for a moment, Hakuro standing nearby among the trees. I didnt spot him arrivinghe must have been training just now, but his clothing was still in perfect order. Impressive. And with Ranga bursting out from my shadow, we now had the towns main force gathered together.

    Geld was out working on the road project, so he wasnt here. He had reported to me a few days back about how he sensed something suspicious nearby, but he never actually saw anything, so he chalked it up to his mind ying tricks on him and kept up the road construction. I had a feeling that I was forgetting about someone else, too, butheywith all the guys we did have, I didnt predict any issues.

    Besides, the person facing us was familiar to me.

    It has been quite a long time, my leader.

    It was Traya, a dryad and Treynis younger sister.

    Sure has. But why are you looking like that? All like youre about to kill someone? I said as she kneeled before me.

    The seething rage was something you could detect even from far away, sharp enough to make both Milim and Shion react to it. Her semitranslucent body was a bit hazy in ces; perhaps she had taken some damage. It was clear that something happened to her.

    Well, I am afraid it is an emergency. Charybdis, a cmity-ss monster, has revived itself. The power wielded by this great spirit is akin to a demon lords. My sisters are keeping it immobile for now, but we are hopelessly outssed. Plusit appears the great spirit is seeking out thisnd. Charybdis is a tyrant of the skies; ground-based forces can do little against it. I came here to advise you that you must solidify your defenses and prepare some aerial war power.

    The fatigue was clear on her face as she exined.

    Tension quickly filled the air. Surprisingly, Fuze was the first to reacthe was stunned to near silence the moment he saw Traya (A dryad?! he had shouted), but the mention of Charybdiss name got his brain in gear again.

    The blood drained from his face as he shouted. Charybdis?! Oh, man, if its really revived, thats a bigger threat than any demon lord. Unlike those guys, you cant even reason with this thing. Its ssified as a cmity, but Id say its safe to assume its a full-on disaster, if anything

    As he put it, its strength was demon lordcaliber, but instead of leading an army, it just went around by itself wreaking havoc. A sort of unintelligent monster, to put it another way.

    However, thanks to its unique Summon Monster skill, it could call out schools of megalodons, arge, shark-type monster, anytime it wanted. The otherworldly creatures dissipated after a period of time, once the magicules giving its body physical form were exhausted, but even so, they were an A-minus force that couldnt be ignored. Whats more, Charybdis could summon ten or so at once, making even its servant beasts a formidable presence.

    If Fuze was right, then I honestly had to agree with him. This was worse than a demon lord.

    I dont know why we would be targeted, but if we are, this is great for us. We must choose the best fighters we have and prepare to counter this force.

    Benimaru was certainly excited, but we needed people who could fly

    Oh! Wait! I forgot!

    Right. I forgot Gabil. Hes probably doing research in the cave. Can someone get him for me?

    Soei went off to fetch him. In the meantime, I decided to go back to town and hold a prep meeting.

    We were back in the now-familiar meeting hall, Traya using Thought Communication to speak with her sisters.

    Soei was back with Gabil, with Vester joining him, so we could make contact with King Gazel if need be. On the question of aerial firepower, the first thing that crossed my mind were his Pegasus Knightseach one of them were A-ranked fighters, so if I could gain their support, I couldnt ask for anyone better to rely on.

    Gabil and his fighters could fly as well, but they were no better than B-plus, and taking on someone ranked higher than you was gravely dangerous. I preferred to think of a way we could guarantee victory for ourselves, with minimum damage.

    Things couldnt be much worse, Traya began. For some reason, the summoned megalodons have incarnated themselves in the corpses of some lesser dragons. Theyve manifested to creatures over sixty feet in length, like nothing we have ever seen before, and there are thirteen of them. My sisters estimate that each one is in A-ranked territory.

    Everyone in the room lost their voice at this. A creature as strong as a demon lord, plus thirteen other A-ranked monsters? I wanted to ask if this was some kind of a joke.

    What will we do, Sir Rimuru? Benimaru asked.

    Ugh, thats what I want to askbut Im the leader of this alliance, and its my job to make the decisions. Plus, no matter how much I hemmed and hawed about it, there was only one answer to give.

    Whatll we do? Well, well kill it, wont we? Reluctant though I was, I presented that conclusion to the others.

    The moment I said it, everyone in the room took action.

    Heh. I didnt need to ask. In that case, I will begin to prepare.

    Indeed, what else could we do?

    Exactly! This will be no sweat for Sir Rimuru.

    When it came to this sort of thing, they knew exactly what to do. Nobody voiced any disagreement with me; instead, they sought out their roles and sprang into action. The sight made Fuze lose his head a little.

    Whoa! Is that all? Dont you understand? This is a demon lordss enemy

    But even if we stalled for time, we cant expect much support from Blumund, can we, Fuzie?

    Well, no, but

    Im not fighting to lose this, of course, but if ites to it, I hope youll consider taking in some of our residents.

    Not fighting to lose? But even the dryads cant handle this monster! Nows no time for this kind of easygoing nonsense. Its a huge problem! One that requires an international response!

    I wasnt intending to sound easygoing. I was honestly fairly panicked myself. Thats why Benimaru and the other ogre mages were so quick to begin preparationsand Gabil himself was running off to gather his troops. Hakuro was in contact with Gobta to get the goblin riders assembled.

    Each of them was a B-plus threat alone, but working together as a coherent unit, he dered that they could easily have one or two of the megalodons for dinner. They even looked forward to the chance to experience battle against a higher-ranked enemy. Crazy.

    Meanwhile, Rigurd was bringing the town leaders together, exining the situation and ordering Rigur to lead the evacuation. Calling attention from the air would make you a target, so I imagine hed take them all into the forest.

    All of this was done in orderly fashion, without anyone getting too worked up about it. Sadly, with the frequency of the crises weve been asked to tackle, I suppose weve gotten use to things like this.

    Fuze, being unaware, mustve thought I wasnt sensing the danger enough, and I cant me him for that.

    Milim, meanwhile, was going with Shion to the bath.

    Some enemying to attack the town wasnt any concern of hers. Her devotion to the routine was at least helping keep everyone around her calm.

    After everyone sprang into action, the only people left in the meeting hall besides me were Fuze and Kabals trio. We took the opportunity to talk over a few things.

    All right, Im not gonna tell you guys not to worry about anything, but I intend to do everything I can for this. Im having Vester make contact with King Gazel for me, so we should expect some more support, too. After that, well, Ill do what I can, I said.

    Fuze looked less than optimistic. He had a lot of questions, doubts, and other thoughts in his mind, and I got the impression he was having trouble forming them into words. I was in no hurry, so I wanted him to calm down a bit.

    You arent going to run? he finally asked after a moment of thought, clearly worried for all of us. He was gravely serious, and I thought he deserved a serious reply.

    What would running aplish? Im the strongest dude in this nation. Ive told my people to take refuge if I ever lose, but you know, just because I lose one fight doesnt mean Im giving up on the battle. If theres absolutely no chance of winning, then sure, Ill run away and think up another n. If not, though, then its important that I go right in front of our foe and gauge how strong he is with my own eyes, isnt it?

    I need to do that if I want to formte any kind of strategy. Plus, since I am the strongest in the Alliance, nobodys running as long as I dont lose.

    I thought about saying that, but I found it a little too embarrassing.

    It just felt some, telling people that it was a leaders job to take the loss sometimes. Thats why I tried not to lose, if I could. Until I actually did lose, I had to y the strongman role to live up to everyones expectations.

    And even if I was defeated, I didnt have much to worry aboutnot after telling everyone so many times to take refuge in that case.

    Ah. Thats what being a leader of monsters means, I suppose.

    Yeah, well, this isnt the kind of nation that would crumble after losing its king anyway, so

    Fuze nodded at me. He looked convinced enough. Still, it strikes me, Sir Rimuru, that you think quite a bit like we humans do. You dont seem like a monster at all. Plus, its just so strange, having a slime be the most powerful being in the realm, he said with a chuckle.

    He might be right. It didnt seem like anything unusual to me, since I was a former human, but to Fuze, having a monster think and act so human must have thrown him. Plus

    Id actually been hiding something from Kabal and his friends. I still hadnt told them what had happened with Shizu in the end. It was kind of a tough subject to bring up, so I intended to stay mum about it until asked. But if I was ever going toe out with it, now seemed like a good time.

    Hmm Maybe so. You might find this hard to believe, actually, but I used to be a human being, too. You know Shizu, right? I think Im probably an otherworlder, just like she is. Though, really, it was more like I died in my old world and got reborn as a slime in this one. And while Im at it

    I used my Universal Shapeshift extra skill to transform into a human.

    What on?!

    Fuzes eyes lit up as Kabals crew audibly yelped in surprise. It was Elen who noticed first.

    Umm, looking at you Thats like a smaller version of Shizu, isnt it? she timidly asked.

    Oh, no way, Elen.

    Yeah, Shizu was an olddy! She wasnt anywhere near as cute looking as this.

    Kabal and Gido were quick to protest, but Elen held her ground.

    No, theres no doubt about it. I mean, I saw her! Like, what she looked like under the mask

    Oh, she did? It was just for an instant, so I didnt think any of them caught a glimpse, but This works well for me, though. I was going to tell them now anyway.

    I removed the mask from my pocket and put it on the table.

    Thats Shizus mask, right?

    They eyed it, then me.

    Yeah. I wasnt really hiding it or anything, but I didnt take this form around you guys because I didnt want you to get the wrong idea. Elens rightI inherited this form from Shizu.

    Inherited?

    Yeah. When I ate her.

    The four of them looked surprised, but none seemed angry. They retained their cool as they waited for me to continue. They had chosen to believe in me, luckily enough.

    Shizu and I came from the same country. When she died, she asked me to take over her missionand as proof that Ive taken on her will, I picked up the form you see here. SoI cant go around acting like an ass while I look like Shizu, you know? I said quietly.

    About half of that was my real feelings. The other half, really, was just an excuse I was using to deceive myself. Guess theres no helping it if theyre suspicious of me now, I thought, as I turned my eyes to Fuze.

    Can you tell us what happened?

    There was not a trace of doubt in his voice. So I spent the next few minutes describing Shizus final moments, as well as the circumstances behind my death and rebirth.

    I see So thats what it was, Fuze whispered.

    Perhaps Fuze had been spending so much time in this town because he wanted to ask me about Shizu. Just like me, he had trouble finding the right time to bring it up.

    Well, Kabal said, I believe in you, pal.

    Yeah, me too.

    And me! And me! Elen insisted. But Wow, Shizu really did everything she could to make her dreame true. And now youre gonna try to make that happen, Rimuru?

    Elens question was more to the point than I had anticipated. But there was no need to tiptoe around answering it.

    I am. I promised her as much. Im going to free up all the emotions that are binding her heart down. Not that Ive met the guy or anything yet, but as far as Im concerned, the demon lord Leon is my prey to catch.

    Wow I always knew I could believe in you, Rimuru!

    Elen shed me a friendly smile. As for the other three men:

    Leon? Huh?!

    Youve got a death wish, Rimuru. I mean, Charybdis is practically a pushoverpared to that guy

    Yes! You cant go around calling someone like that your prey! Dont me me if it leads to your death!

    They were, to say the least, a little unnerved. Well, so be it. Wish they could learn a little from Elen, but our little heart-to-heart seemed to have earned me all their trust. They each offered to join in this battle, but I turned them down. If I blew this, as I exined, itd be up to them to figure out a new n immediately. They relented pretty quickly.

    Charybdis, though, huh?

    Thinking about the battle up ahead was already dampening my spirits.

 Volume 3 - Ch 5

    CHARYBDIS

    The fight was about to begin.

    We were at the end of the gravel road leading toward the Dwarven Kingdom, near the midway point between the capitals of Dwargon and Tempest. We rendezvoused with Geld and his construction team there, waiting for the moment toe.

    It was about time for Charybdis to appear.

    Vester had contacted King Gazel to exin the situation. We didnt even have to mention our pact; Gazel immediately deployed his knights for us.

    As he put it: Hmph. What kind of swordsman would I be if I didnt help my younger fellow student in a pinch?

    He really loved ying the role of the dojo big bro with me. It made me fear for the Dwarven Kingdoms futurebut if he was helping us, it was all good.

    The team of one hundred knights he quickly put together had already gone on ahead. The n was for them to strike at Charybdis from behind as we advanced from the front, in a ssic pincer attack. Wed be relying on them quite a bit this time.

    An additional four hundred knights were also preparing to step in, just in case this first attack ended in failure. Itd be nice if this n of ours worked, but we needed to consider what would happen if it didnt. Gazel was no fool; I was sure hed be using this attack to gather intel on the creature for himself. I didnt mind, since I was nning to defeat it right here and therefore didnt need to worry about things after that. Thatd make life easier for us.

    Beyond that, all we had to do was wait for the n to unfold.

    We used the time to have Treyni (who had joined us on-site) tell us more about Charybdis.

    I knew it was this super-powerful monster already, but listening to her story, she made it sound even more hazardous than that. It was no exaggeration to say that it was as strong as a demon lord. Being called a cmity monster, one would expect it to be a cmity-level threat, but not necessarily here. Fuze was apparently telling the truththis is more of a disaster-ss menace.

    Why not just call it that, then? Well, there was a good reason for that. The term disaster was normally reserved for demon lords, which Charybdis wasnt. So why wasnt it ssified as a demon lord? Simple: It was just a monster that wreaked havoc wherever it went. It took no intelligent action, neither working in groups nor deliberately seeking to destroy the human race, and some wondered if it had any true intelligence at all. A real terror of a monster, but on that point, it was also quite different from a demon lord.

    She called Charybdis a spiritual life-form, whatever that was. That term meant it could resurrect itself if defeated in one body by moving over to a new one. That sounded a little familiar to mein fact, it sounded a lot like how Veldora worked.

    This Charybdis was born a very, very long time ago, running through cycles of death and rebirth. It is the cruel, brutal ruler of the skies. One could even call it the heaven-sent child of Veldora the Storm Dragon, ruler and guardian of the forest.

    Huh? Did Treyni say something important there? Because it sounded kind of important. The child of Veldora? Was my guess correct, after all?

    Wait a sec, I hurriedly interrupted. What do you mean, the heaven-sent child of Veldora?

    Treyni exined. Charybdis is a monster created by the umted piles of magicules that leaked out from Veldora.

    Which meant it was the same as I was. We were sort of like what the human race would call siblings. That, in turn, suggested one possible reason why Charybdis was so doggedly honing in on my position. I was rted, in a way, to Veldora, so it was gunning for me first.

    Perhaps its already noticed that Veldora exists, in a way, inside me. Maybe Im overthinking it, but I suppose Id better stay on my guard.

    After our discussion with Treyni, we went over the details of our strategy one more time.

    The thing we had to watch out for the most with Charybdis was its unique Magic Interference ability. Using this made any magicules within a thousand-foot radius of the monster go haywireit could use its own powerful magic to interfere with the very way magicules worked.

    Even the high-level wind magic at mymand had no effect on Charybdis, Treyni recounted. Under Magic Interference, we believe the effects of all magic are greatly reduced. Whats more, the biggest difficulty lies in how it annuls any sort of flight-based magic. Try to make contact with it, and youll lose your magic and crash to the ground. Losing the advantage of height makes it a very difficult enemy to fight.

    This was exactly why we needed an aerial offense that wasnt dependent on magic. Even if you had wings, though, could those be canceled like magic, too?

    Understood. The principles of flight differ for creatures like winged horses and dragonewts. Their wings contain the power to control gravity, lightening their overall bodily weight and letting them adjust the flow of power to propel themselves forward. This method of flight is unrted to the presence, orck thereof, of magicules.

    Judging by the Sages answer, my wings shouldnt be affected, either. I did find it a bit strange that having these wings alone let me fly. Turns out it had nothing to do with physical strength. I didnt have to p my wings a bunch to stay aloft, not that it mattered at the moment.

    This brought up another question, though.

    I see So flight magic works by taking advantage of magicule resistance around you. But does that mean Benimarus Airflight wouldnt work, either?

    Airflight was one of the ogre mages Battlewill arts, powered by the users magical aura. It provided basically the same benefits as regr flight magic, but given that fundamental simrity and what I had just secretly learned from the Sage, I figured Magic Interference must affect it.

    Indeed, I believe it is just as you say. A very keen insight, Sir Rimuru.

    I appreciated thepliment, but it wasnt the answer I hoped for.

    Geh. Seriously? This guys no slouch. So I guess me broiling it with ranged attacks will be pretty tough.

    It seems likely, my brother. If magicule-driven attacks wont work on it, that puts ratherrge restrictions on our offense.

    Benimaru and his friends, meanwhile, were already debating how they were going to fight.

    Heh-heh-heh Arent you guys forgetting something important? Dont tell me youve forgotten who I am! Some big ol fish isnt gonna make me break a sweat. Ill give im one heck of a beating!

    It was Milim, who had changed into battle gear while I wasnt paying attention. She stuck her small chest forward, trying to look as defiant as possible.

    Can we go with that?! I was all ready to wee her to the force.

    But Shion had to go and turn her down. Im afraid we cant allow that. Itll put you in a bind, Sir Rimuru, and this is an issue for our town to handle.

    Why would it put me in a bind?

    Just as I was thinking that, Shuna butted in. Shes right. Itd be a mistake to rely on her for everything, just because shes our friend. But if Sir Rimuru is in serious trouble, we will dly ask for her support then.

    Um, Im kind of in serious trouble right now, guys. Not that I could say that out loud to them. The others were all nodding; they were keen to defend their home by themselves as well. I wouldnt get away with relying on Milim from the start.

    Haha-ha. You heard them, Milim. Just trust in me, okay?

    I hated to turn her down, but I did. Way to go, man. You barely trust in yourself. I kept the thought a secret.

    Wh-what?! And here I thought my time had finallye to shine, too

    Milim hung her head in disappointment. She was ready for action, changing her clothes for it and everything, so the shock of being refused must have been intense. She stole a few nces at me, looking ready to cry, but I couldnt do anything for her. It was a disappointment for me, too.

    So thats what was on our te, then. It was us against Charybdis.

    Our discussions continued. Another major problem was that the megalodons that served Charybdis most likely had Magic Interference at their disposal, too. Our long-range attacks were already heavily restricted, and trying to get closer would fail once our flight skills were blocked. Practically speaking, we had very few means of defeating Charybdis or its megalodons.

    Ultimately, we decided to just try fighting it and see what happened. There was little point debating any further at this juncture, so instead we would try out whatever attacks we thought could work.

    Eventually, my Magic Sense picked up a group of fourteen monsters approaching us. It wasnt long before we could see them.

    Even from afar, the eerie sight was astounding. Giant sharks, over sixty feet in length, were gracefully swimming across the sky. Their bodies were protected by solid, stiff dragon scales that would assuredly deflect most garden-variety attacks. It was shaped like a shark, but at the core, it was apletely different monster.

    With them was another, even more bizarre sightthe gigantic dragon apanying the thirteen sharks.

    Its size was enormous, making the megalodons look tiny byparison. Maybe three or so times their size? Its total length had to be over 150 feet or so. There was a singlerge eyeball on the bottom of its wedged, sharklike head; on the top was a pair of solid-looking horns that appeared as if they could gouge their way through solid stone, or anything else for that matter.

    Byparison, its limbs looked like mere decoration, tacked on to its shark-shaped torsobut the two pairs of wings on its back, onerger than the other, looked almost exactly like Veldoras.

    Charybdis exuded a weird, ominous sort of beauty.

    And with that, hostilities began.

    The Pegasus Knights were currently traveling here as fast as they could. Doreth, one of Treynis other sisters, used the elemental magic Wind Protect and the legion magic Army Move to boost their speed. A Thought Communication message confirmed that they would arrive earlier than nned.

    In the meantime, we decided to engage the foe. Once the Pegasus Knights showed up and it became a free-for-all, we wouldnt be able to use anyrge-scale magic. When we made contact with Charybdis, we wanted to strike.

    Eat this! Hellre!!

    Benimaru kicked things off by choosing his biggest, strongest wide-range me attack. Always something ssic about using your most powerful move the moment you meet your enemy

    Maybe I was overthinking it, but the ck dome this move produced, over three hundred feet in radius, was still only big enough to encase Charybdis and one megalodon. I mean, these dudes were way too huge. At 150 or so feet in length, they looked like they were pretty close to us, but they were actually still far away. A six-hundred-foot diameter was pretty big, but to these giants, it mustve felt cramped, if anything.

    And the results?

    Youre kidding me! I put everything I had into that

    Benimarus frustrated muttering was understandable. Charybdis continued to leisurely soar through the air. Its megalodonpanion had fallen to earth, mostly burned up by the attack, but Charybdis itself was the same as before. Some of the scales that burned off were reced by new ones, but that was all. Between its naturally high defense and the effects of Magic Interference, it had sessfully resisted Hellre. It hadnt even fully incinerated the megalodons, indicating exactly how effective Magic Interference was.

    I wasnt too shocked by thisI was expecting thisbut it made me realize again that this foe was going to be a huge pain in the ass. But we all kept our cool. Our n was to expect this, so we moved on.

    All right. Lets follow the n: Break them up and take each one out.

    Our priority now was to buy some time for the Pegasus Knights and wipe up those meddlesome megalodons. Heeding my order, we all spread out to our positions.

    I had transformed into a human, too, so I could handle whatever came my way. There were twelve megalodons left. Paring their numbers down looked like itd be a tough row to hoe.

    Each one was an A-ranked monster, but despite their speed, they didnt have all that much power. They werent exactly technical fighters, eitherlike Charybdis, theycked intelligence and thus didnt seem like they required that much caution.

    If a megalodon fought that knight spider Gobta dispatched, for example, the spider wouldntst a momentitd get crushed by those jaws. If it fought Gobta, though, hed be able to dodge and run all over the ce.

    To sum up, those sharks were offensive and defensive powerhouses, but their speed in battle wasnt that much of a threat. Based on its speedan integral element of any battlethe megalodon wasnt that astonishing of a monster.

    Of course, a single strike from one could still easily be lethal. You didnt want to approach one with a halfhearted effort, and my forces knew that well.

    Geld and his team were the next tounch an attack after Benimaru. I had mymand post set up on a slightly elevated hill, so I could see the action unfold below me.

    This force under Geldsmand was an elite one, all high orcs ranked B or higher. Anyone ranked below that would potentially get in the way here, so we had them handle the town evacuation instead. They numbered less than a hundred but still took a leading role in our strategy.

    Using the trees as cover, the force began trying to entice the megalodons toe closer so they could strike. This, sadly, did not work well. We were anticipating that the sharks wouldnt be able to move very much surrounded by treesbut with their powerful bodies, they could simply raze any trunks that stood in the way like so much dried kindling.

    Following that, the megalodons unleashed a blitzkrieg attack. This involved bashing into the enemy, using scales sharpened like des to slice into themyou could call it de Charge or something simr, if you were inclined to give it a name.

    The elites under Geldsmand took evasive maneuvers, but the sharks were just too big. Even though its speed shouldve made it avoidable, a gigantic shark capable of swimming freely through the air made evasion difficult. Now the orcs were the ones caught in a forest prison with the trees getting in their way.

    Thanks to everyone being geared for defense like Geld was, there were no apparent deaths. Several dozen of them, however, were seriously hurt, unable to continue in battle. The remaining fighters lying low in the forest were clearly shocked by thisand when faced with the megalodons punishing strikes, I couldnt me them.

    I could hear a scream of rage.

    Youll pay for hurting my friends!

    It was Geld.

    As he shouted, he faced a megalodon in front of him, halting its charge. His entire body was covered in armor, which protected him from the sharp, delike scales. Using his ponderous strength, he stopped the shark in its tracks.

    Now! Get im!

    The moment the order was made, a horde of high orc fighters took action. They moved slowly, but the damage from their battle axes was heavy. Little by little, cuts and shes appeared on the megalodons body.

    But sadly, none were lethal. The sheer size of it meant this barrage of attacks was too little, toote.

    The megalodon shook its frame. That was all it took to send several dozen fighters flying. Gelds face grew stern, harnessing his hatred to apply pressure to the sharks head. It thrashed around more in response.

    It was Gelds otherworldly strength against the megalodons violent rage, and it proved to be an even match. Then fortune smiled upon Geld.

    I will assist you!

    I heard another scream, and a sh of light descended from the sky tond squarely on the megalodon. The creature died right there, never aware of what happened to it.

    Gabil had appeared.

    His force was functioning as a hit-and-run unit here, and when he saw Geld was in danger, he immediately stepped in to bail him out. Realizing Geld had the megalodon pinned down, he fired off an attack fueled by all his strengthand with his rank of A, that was nothing to sniff at. Even a sixty-foot-long shark couldnt withstand that kind of force.

    And Gelds good fortune didnt end there. The dragonewts under Gabilsmand were using the Full Potions they had manufactured to quickly heal the wounded. The potion flowed freely on the battlefield, restoring even the serious cases to perfect health.

    Gwa-ha-ha-ha! Thanks to you restraining that monster, Sir Geld, dealing the final blow could hardly have been easier!

    Thanks, Sir Gabil. Would you like to keep fighting together with us?

    Ooh! That sounds like fun. If we can help you out, I would dly take the opportunity!

    Now Geld and Gabil were a tag team. Their respective forces worked together as well, allowing them to keep up the vicious onught against the megalodons without worrying too much about injury. This battle would deepen the bonds between them, no doubt.

    Before long, they had seeded in ying two more of them.

    Lethalbat was breaking out elsewhere as Geldmenced his attack.

    Gobta, following Hakuros orders, was using his Case Cannon to strike at megalodons. It packed a powerful punch, but there was no way that a bullet an inch wide could strike a lethal blow on these guys. It had opened a gash in the megalodons stomach, about half a yard in width, but all that did was add fuel to its anger.

    Hey, uh, I dunno if this is gonna work!

    Hoh-hoh-hoh! Of course it wont. I lured it over here so I could have all of you defeat it.

    Gahh! Youre just bullying me, old man!

    Nobody bothered trying to stop Gobta from yelling bloody murder at him.

    What transpired next was a game of tag in the forest. Just as Hakuro dered, he intended to have the goblin riders defeat this megalodon for him. The riders were now surrounding it, ready to stake their lives on this game. Each, in turn, would take a stab with their spears, then edge away. When the shark targeted one, another would attack in their ce.

    They were all frantic. They werent quite as speedy as the shark, but their opponent was enormous. Being able to maneuver more nimbly in the forest gave Gobtas team a slight advantage.

    In a battle under those conditions, even a tiny error could be life-threatening. But they continued with the near-suicidal attack, using High Potions to clear up any wounds.

    If worsees to worst, we have Full Potions. As long as you arent instantly killed, youll be fine! Hakuros voice might have been friendly, grandfatherly in a way, but his instructions belied his demon-instructor persona.

    Whoa! Are you serious, old man?

    Only Gobta had the presence of mind to lodge aint. The others were too busy attacking and dodging.

    Come on! The bait needs to fully grab its attention! Attackers, dont think about anything elsejust put all your power into pummeling your foe! But dont forget to fall back after your attack. If you do forget, well, itll be a painless death, at least. Hoh-hoh-hoh!

    The very definition of a demon, Hakuro offered Gobtas riders no mercy in their training.

    They numbered only twenty, each taking turns baiting and attacking the shark, and they had divided into five teams that engaged it in a set order. Each one of them toyed with the megalodon, one after the other, although they had to watch out since it wouldnt always change its target for them. The basic procedure: attack, dodge, move, heal, and prepare for the next strike.

    Having no defense on hand, the bait had to devote themselves fully to grabbing the sharks attention, then dodging. It was the most dangerous of the jobs, and if the megalodon didnt focus on a new target, itd have to keep on baiting. The time between the goblins attack and the megalodon adjusting its target provided the most dangerous moments of the entire battle.

    But Gobtas goblin riders worked in perfect order, carrying out their shifting roles with no confusion.

    Impressive, I said.

    Yes. Sir Hakuro taught them well, Shuna replied.

    He certainly has, Benimaru agreed. Growing younger has only added further polish to his demon-instructor ways.

    Wow! I wish I could y with em, too!

    Milim, meanwhile, apparently had the wrong idea about this whole battle. Better not think about it. If I y her game, I lose by default.

    Hey, cmon, do you think I could

    No.

    She was tugging at my clothing, begging for a chance. I had to y bad cop with her.

    I wish she wouldnt look at me like that. Im about ready to cry myself, here.

    Up in the sky, things were getting pretty explosive.

    Soei was there, and like Benimaru, he was only capable of using Airflightand he wasnt particrly great at it, either. Despite thatand I dont know how he managed ithe was grappling with a megalodon in midair.

    The secret behind it was actually simple. Soka and her four dragonewt guards were positioned above the shark, casting their shadows over its body. Soei could then use Shadow Motion to make a beeline for them. Magic Interference only interfered with magicules in midair, so Shadow Motion didnt seem to be affected.

    I gotta hand it to Soeithe moment he spotted that loophole, he immediately made use of it. But he was just getting started.

    Now Sokas team of five was hovering over a single megalodon. This was indicated by the way both the real Soei and four of his Replication-conjured clones were eachtched on to a different shark.

    Monster Puppet String!!

    Soeis four clones eachunched the skill at once. It was a secret move, letting the caster fully control monsters thatcked intelligence. Special bewitching string was used to tap into the neuralwork that carried messages from the brain, recing them with fabricated orders instead. This immediately ced four megalodons under Soeis controlusing the dead bodies of other animals just came back to bite these guys.

    Controlling each of his replicated bodies, Soei had the megalodons attack one another. They split into two pairs, feasting upon each others flesh.

    Take those four out when the time is right, he shouted to the dragonewts above, using the fifth megalodon he was personally riding to head for Charybdis. It was such a brilliant, dazzling disy that you almost forgot those sharks were supposed to be A rank.

    It looked like Soei was on a whole new level now, much like Benimaru. Im sure he was putting his all into this fight, but he made it seem incredibly effortless. He couldnt have been much different in strength from Geldwhere did that clear differencee from? Despite the chaos all around me, I couldnt help but wonder.

    As for Sokas team:

    Understood, Sir Soei. Leave the rest to us.

    Soka gave him a quick salute, steeling her gaze at the megalodons.

    Dont let up! I refuse to let you do anything to disappoint Sir Soei!

    Her voice was cold as she addressed her team. Toka, Saika, Nanso, and Hokuso looked just as grim and resolute.

    I knew Hakuro was a demon instructor. But what about Soei? In a rtively short time, this group of five had grown astonishingly coolheaded. What kind of education did it take to instill that in them?

    After a little bit, when the megalodon-on-megalodon fighting grew more intense, the four dragonewts under Soka began their attack. Soka stayed high above, giving out orders for the others to follow.

    It worked. Despite the difference in rank, they were bringing the sharks down.

    Soei wasnt the only one pulling off impressive feats today.

    And thus, Sokas team bagged four confirmed shark kills for themselves.

    Even more impressive were Shion and Ranga. They mustve formed a team when I wasnt paying attention.

    This time, no matter what, Ive just got to stand out!

    Mm. Yes. I am in agreement with that opinion.

    So Shion jumped on the back of Ranga, now at his default huge size. He was expecting this, and once she was on, he started runningand jumped right off mymand post on the hill, sprinting straight into the air.

    Wait. Into the air?

    Looking closely, Ranga was running in midair, making a few powerful leaps as he did, as if there were invisible footholds to stand on. And there were, in a way. He was using the extra skill Control Wind to create them. Pretty skillful feat, there. Maybe you could call it Windwalker or something. But anyway, it meant that Ranga could run even faster in midair than he could on the ground.

    This art used magicules, however, which meant that Magic Interference could affect it. No matter how sturdy Rangas footholds were, a megalodons interference might be enough to shatter themor so I thought.

    As I watched, trying to figure out what he was doing, Ranga showed off some truly amazing moves. In a moment, he was in the air above a megalodon and jumping off, gaining speed as he practically dive-bombed the enemy directly below him.

    At his full size, Ranga was a good fifteen feet or so in length. Not muchpared to a megalodon, but still, thats a lot of mass. And now Ranga was approaching the shark,bining his own leaping skills with the pull of gravity to gain more speed than running alone could aplish. But this wasnt simply a ramming attack. Shion was still riding him, and herrge sword was out.

    Despite being parallel with the ground below, Shion couldnt have looked more serene. And the moment that Ranga and the megalodon crossed paths, she brought her sword down, the light-purple glow it emitted arcing across the air. She had used her aura to expand and strengthen the sword, extending it to over three times its normal size. Like a guillotine de thundering down from above, the demon sword descendedand neatly removed the megalodons head.

    Behold! Decapitating Demon de!

    Decapitating Demon de was the name of the skill. Instead of unleashing pure aura like Ogresword Cannon, it simply formed it into a set shape for use. But thanks to working with Ranga to gain as much speed as she possibly could for the strike, the tip of the extended sword flickered faster than the speed of sound, cleaving right through the megalodons head.

    It was a simple, yet absolutely heroic move, I thought, and in that way it befitted Shion well. After that, now that the sharks Magic Interference was gone, Ranga shot some lightning down to burn the body, and that was that.

    Shion and Ranga used the same tactics to take out two more of the sharks.

    Fighting these huge, tactless brutes is no fun at all. I grow tired of it. Id like to target their leader, but what do you think, Ranga?

    Shion, that opinion speaks to my own heart as well. Let us go and see what this foes strength truly is.

    Thats the spirit, Ranga. Lets do it!

    Their excuses made, the two of them sprinted toward Charybdis.

    There were, at first, thirteen megalodons, each an A-ranked monster. Of the two remaining survivors, one was already dead, shed to ribbons by Hakuros barrage of strikes. We had lost nobody on our side to death or injury. Things were going well, and I breathed an internal sigh of relief over it.

    Ah, how disappointing. Your mobility and ability to avoid danger have improved, but your offense is still woefullycking. You couldnt even defeat a single one of them Once this battle is over, I will need to toughen up your training.

    Whoa! Come on, gramps! If you toughen it up any further, Im gonna die! Like, really, really die!

    Did you just call me gramps?

    Aghh?!

    I heard a pained scream from Gobta, and then all was quiet. I wasnt sure what had happened. Maybe some passing megalodon bit him or something, huh? So I guess we now have one casualty. Im sure hes not dead, though, so Ill just believe that hes still all right.

    And as I was thinking all this nonsense, new developments began to unfold. Soei was controlling the final megalodon like a well-trained mount, making it sink its teeth mercilessly into Charybdis. It wastched on to the great dragon now, looking like a work of surrealist art.

    The megalodon was still alive, but it was no longer any sort of threat. That just left Charybdis to tackle.

    Paying no further mind to the megalodon, Soei flew over to Charybdis.

    Whoa, you think Soeis gonna be all right?

    Sir Rimuru, there is nothing to worry about. Soei is second only to me in terms of real strength. This is the perfect chance to test out Charybdiss powers.

    Benimaru heard me muttering to myself and cheerfully replied. He didnt sound worried at all, implying just how much he believed in Soei.

    Besides, we have that pair in the battle, too. He pointed to Shion and Ranga.

    They were both on the dragons back. Presumably they had climbed up to a pretty high altitude to avoid Magic Interference, then dive-bombed down on it. Looking at Charybdis, though The sheer size of it was mind-blowing. Being over 150 feet long was a threat in and of itself. Simply dropping a mass that size on a city from above would result in unimaginable damage.

    Understood. Based on an estimate of its size, from a height of

    Thats fine, Great Sage. Thanks, but I dont need to crunch the numbers. Itd just depress me to hear it anyway. If youre gonna be that way, how about giving me some easy way to beat this guy?

    Radio silence, huh? The Sage had this incredibly bad habit of going mum exactly when I needed it the most. Or maybe it was just pouting at me.

    Anyway.

    Before my eyes, Soei, Shion, and Ranga hadmenced their attack on Charybdis.

    Things have been going well so far. Maybe

    But despite my wishes, it wasnt that easy. The sheer size was a true menace, and now that was clearer than ever. All threeunched attacks, but none worked at all. They were up against a 150-foot-long frame; anything they could throw at it was little more than peeling ayer off an onion. And more importantly, none of it could reach its magic-controlling neuralwork.

    Charybdis, technically speaking, was not a living thing. It was a monster with a pretty twisted ecology, and thus it had no internal organs or anything. Picture it as using the flesh of lesser dragons to construct an armor of meat surrounding it.

    This was to be expected, and it was also a given that no half-baked attack would be enough to stab through it.

    So itse to this. My magic had virtually no effect from outside of a thousand feetbut if a close-range approach like that fails as well, there is nothing we can do. Magic doesnt work, and now we know that physical attacks are just as meaningless, an anxious Treyni said.

    See, this is why I told you to leave it to me

    Even at a time like this, Milim was still wheedling incessantly. I had no time for her at the moment.

    ording to Treyni, even Aerial dethe strongest elemental magic spell she had at her disposalwas reduced to only about a tenth of its natural power. Far from the deciding blow it was meant to be. It did deal some damage, but as she put it, the wounds immediately healed themselves.

    Plus, after the attack had continued for a while, it suddenly flew into a violent ragethe pain receptors mustve taken their time transmitting their message to its brain.

    It suddenly sped up and attempted to ram me. Each of the scales on its body shed at us, like small individual swords. The light rays from its eye scattered the nearby magicules. To beings like ourselves, which create their corporeal forms through magicules, it was a very difficult attack to deal with.

    She recounted the situation for us.

    I had this exined to me at the meeting hall, but seeing it in person made the sheer ferocity easy to understand. Run-of-the-mill attacks were meaningless against this monster.

    Oh no! Treyni suddenly shouted.

    Its single eye shed red for a moment. That might be a sign that Charybdis is preparing to attack, Benimaru exined.

    Uh, I saw it, too, guys, okay? I was just, you know, taking a moreid-back approach to assessing it. Besides, Shion had just summoned her full aura to bust out an Ogresword Cannon, so I was kind of distracted by that. Maybe thats what pissed Charybdis off, but regardless of the reason, it looked dangerous. I decided to send a Thought Communication their way.

    Did you hear that? It might be hatching something, so keep your guard up!

    Yes, Sir Rimuru!

    Understood.

    I hear you, my master!

    I nodded at the replies. Im sure they didnt need that keep your guard up reminder, but hey, just in case.

    But my message turned out to be an incredibly good idea. Just a momentter, Soei and the others were exposed to a truly massive attack. A deafening sound akin to fingernails on ss filled the air, itself enough to make it feel like your very soul was being contaminated. It was the sound of the scales that covered Charybdiss body grating against one another. And then

    My heavens! I had no idea it possessed an attack like that

    Thisis bad. It cant be evaded.

    The tension was clear in Treynis and Benimarus voices. From every inch of its own body, Charybdis was unleashing a cmity, one that would spread death and destruction wherever it went.

    And in the midst of it

    Hohh! So this is Tempest Scale, the attack that made Charybdis feared as a tyrant! Never seen that before!

    That was Milim. Having nothing else to do, she was offering colormentary to me now. The name of it doesnt matter. And if you knew about that, I really wish you couldve told us

    I almost asked her what she knew, but I stopped myself. Now was no time for a long-winded exnation, and the attack was pretty self-evident anyway.

    Right now, I was more worried for Shion and our other allies. It had happened right after I warned them to stay on guard, so Soei, Shion, and Ranga were just barely able to take evasive action. But they were being threatened by Charybdiss overwhelming supply of scaleshundreds, thousands, tens of thousandsbeing shot out in all directions like high-caliber bullets. They varied in size, but even the tiniest were several inches in diameter. Take one unguarded, and itd no doubt be even more disastrous for you than a sword sh.

    There were tens of thousands of them raining down at incredible speed. There was no ce to run. The so-called Tempest Scale worked at a far broader range than even Hellre, which was capable of mowing down entirendscapes.

    Ngh, I cant dodge them all. Ranga and I have Shadow Motion, but

    Dodge them? What a childish thing to suggest. This wont be enough to kill me! Shion snickered at Soeis assessment.

    Her eyes were bloodshot, and I was pretty sure she had lost all sense of reason. She was brandishing her sword at Charybdis, not even bothering to protect herself against the storm of scales. She was obviously in danger.

    Soei and Ranga met in the air once more.

    Soei, you should flee. I will serve as a shield for Shion.

    Fully stretching out his legs, Ranga leaped away from their foes Magic Interference radius, then used the extra skill Control Wind to turn back toward Charybdis. The first wave of scales had already reached him, cutting through skin. Just as he promised, he intended to shield Shion with his own body.

    Are you crazy, Ranga? You need to go! Shion shouted, regaining her senses.

    Heh-heh-heh I imagine that Sir Rimuru, too, would select the option that gave him the greatest chance of survival. But with a body this size, I cannot find shadows suitable enough for me to use Shadow Motion with. You go alone, Soei.

    Shadow Motion often seemed like an all-powerful skill, but even it had its limitations. In the air, with only stable and temporary footholds avable, it simply wasnt avable to Ranga. Hearing this made even Soei hesitate for a bit.

    The greatest chance of survival, eh? Then Im staying here. But dont worry. Ill make the real me retreat before I die.

    Ha! How Soei-like of you. In that case, may we all live to see another day! Shionughed, voice loud and clear.

    Faced with the terrifying Tempest Scale, not one dared to give up on themselves. It could be called reckless, but to me, I couldnt have asked for anything else.

    They were all ready for this.

    You people really are a bunch of idiots, you know that? You could at least count on me now, of all times.

    I decided now was the time to speak.

    ?!

    All three froze in surprise. I flew in front of them, raising my left arm against the advancing scales.

    Sir Rimuru!!

    I could hear them shouting my name, a mixture of shock and joy in their voices. I didnt respond, head faced forward to handle what must be done.

    Which was

    Consume them all, Glutton!!

    With my call, the insatiable Glutton within me stirred. The results unfolded in a single moment. I imagine not too many knew what had happened. The wall of innumerable scales that loomed over them just a moment ago had now neatly disappeared.

    Aastounding. Well done, Sir Rimuru

    It was Soei who found his voice first. And really, I was just as surprised as he was.

    I flew up there since, hey, if its a long-range attack, I could just eat it all up.

    Okay, thats a lie. The Great Sage actually tipped me off. All I did was take it at its word and step up to protect my friends. Using Shadow Motion to appear in front of them, I just barely made it in time to follow the Sages advice and unleash Glutton.

    The effect was awe-inspiring. All the scales that hurtled through the air between us and Charybdis were fully consumed. This skill was even more off the charts than I had thoughtand well done on the Sages part, too, for making the timely suggestion.

    Not that I needed to tell it that.

    Instead, now seemed like a good time to look a little cool around everyone else. Leave the rest to me. You three go back down and rest, I dered, like it was the most natural thing in the world.

    B-but We can still help you

    I stopped Soei before he could continue. Look! Its already regenerating its scales. That wasnt a single-use skillits something it canunch again and again. I dont know if I can protect you all from a second round of that. We should be d that we made Charybdis attack us at all, reallyif we didnt know about those scales and left the Pegasus Knights to handle it, the casualty list wouldve been huge. You can be proud of yourselves today, people!

    Soei retreated back, apparently convinced.

    I wish you good luck!

    Be careful, Sir Rimuru.

    You may summon me at any time, master.

    Ranga carried them off after they all said their farewells. Now, then. I just gave them that big-hero act, but being faced with this huge freak, I wasnt exactly feeling serene. No point whining about it now, though. Ill just have to do what I can.

    It was time to face off against Charybdis.

    I wasnt kidding, though; we were really lucky we got to see Charybdiss Tempest Scale before the Pegasus Knights showed up. The scales that didnt quite fall in range of Glutton were causing serious damage in virtually all directions. If we took the brunt of that shot, defense just wouldnt be possible. Wed all be mincemeat.

    None of our forces took a direct hit from the scales, thankfully, but the nearby forest had been heavily damagedor really, violently reshaped. The amount of power behind it was just ridiculous.

    Well, better do my job, then. The first question to tackle was how many seconds I had until another Tempest Scale barrage came along. I could already see the Pegasus Knight reinforcements off in the distance. They were stopped, apparently just as awed by thatst attack as we were. Presumably someone would exin whats up while I was engaged with Charybdis.

    It was my job to keep that dragon engaged with me and reveal as many of its attacks as possible. After that, we could keep ourselves at a safe margin and gradually chip away at the guy together. Itd be a marathon, but well just have to slog through it.

    Now I was starting to regret turning down Milims offer. Really, I wouldnt mind if we swapped positions right now. But thatd look some. I should give this the ol college try, at leastif we just cant do it, Ill think about it then.

    So our mission to conquer Charybdis was now fully under way. To kick things off, I fired a bolt of magic fire, one of my new moves. The moment it struck Charybdis, a searing Dark me burned and wrinkled its skin. Just as I thoughtit worked.

    A regr old spout of fire wouldve been snuffed out by its magic resistance. Dark me wouldve been no different, its magical energy dissipating the moment it made contact. To get around that, Id either have to make physical contact with it and attack, oras I did nowcover my magic with something else until it made contact.

    Thats why I tried loading a magical bolt with Dark me and shooting it. The result was a sess, making Charybdis writhe in pain from the intense heat Or at least, act a little irritated, maybe? Its so big that I wasnt sure that bolt did much damage at all. Cant give up now, though. Enough of them, and the damage is bound to pile up over time.

    So I kept attacking, spurring myself forward. I tried a few different moves, gauging the dragons response. It seemed like Dark me and Dark Thunder both worked well against it. Fire-based attacks worked across a broader range of its body, and the lightning seemed to affect its magical neuralwork a little.

    Along with that useful info, however, I learned a few things I wish I didnt have to.

    Uhhang on. This guy has Ultraspeed Regeneration, doesnt it?

    I whispered it out loud, even though I knew nobody would respond.

    Understood. Judging from the recovery speed of its physical structure, it is not incorrect to assume the individual Charybdis possesses the extra skill Ultraspeed Regeneration.

    Oh, wait, someone did respond. Or I should say, I learned something at that moment that I fervently wished wasnt true.

    Basically, Ultraspeed Regeneration was what made Charybdiss scales grow back at such high speed. Once that process wrapped up, I was sure thered be another Tempest Scale steven quicker than before, if it didnt bother aiming at the storm this time. Perhaps as soon as three minutesbut if I could damage parts of it enough, maybe it wouldnt be able to release scales from those sections of its body.

    Confirming this, I used Thought Communication to let everyone else know. Then, with a now-ample amount of info in hand, I figured out how I would get the Pegasus Knights involved.

    The battle continuedfor over ten hours after that.

    Milim had grown so bored with sitting on the sidelines that she fell asleep, but I was fighting for my life. We had to damage Charybdis quicker than it could heal itself, or else wed never get anywhere. All of us plunged ourselves into this desperate struggle, drinking mighty swigs of healing potion with abandon as we fought.

    Id say we were about 30 percent of the way, maybe? We were all in on the effort. Anyone who could fly was up there, along with Ranga and Soei via Shadow Motion, while Benimaru and the dryad sisters lobbed magical attacks from afar and Shuna and the rest provided support healing and protection. Beams of searing light and sharply honed scales zipped to and fro across the battlefield, magic and skills flying past the other. It was an incredible, yet terrifying spectacle to see.

    All of us were working together and giving it our all, and we were not quite a third of the way there. We were all keeping a safe distance, so none of us had dropped out yet. I think there might have been one dropout, actually, but maybe I was just imagining it. But even the most well trained among us were gonna have trouble keeping this pace up forever. We werent going to be afforded a single mistakelose focus, and not only you, but our entire strategy would go up in smoke.

    It seemed hopeless. But nobody in our army dared to give up. And just as I was racking my brain, figuring out what I should do:

    Gnh. Grnhhhaahhh Y-you Mi

    Hmm? Did I just hear something?

    Curse youuuuuu, MiMili Milim!!

    Huh?! Milim? Did it say Milim just now? I immediately had the Great Sage perform an analysis.

    Understood. A small, slight presence of life is confirmed to be within the body that Charybdis is upying. It is believed that the damage it has taken has led to biological distortion, perhaps because it did not fully assimte with the bodys magical core. In addition

    I listened to the details.

    ording to the Sage, Charybdis used the bodies of other magic-born in order to create its own physical form. These bodies would normally disappear and be assimted, but if the magic-born involved held strong enough feelings or anger or disgust, the assimtion might not fullyplete itself.

    And now its rage was aimed at Milim, not me. Hmm? Wait a minute. So did this monster head straight for our town because some magic-born out there had a bone to pick with Milim?

    Oh, great.

    This didnt have anything to do with us! And here I thought it was picking up some kind of magic waves from Veldora inside me. Talk about overthinking.

    Andhang on. So its no problem at all if I shove this on Milims shoulders, then?

    The shocking truth hit me.

    The moment I woke her up, I sent Milim a Thought Communication.

    Hey, uh, Milim, I think this guys got a score to settle with ya, after all

    Ooh, I heard it. Looks like Charybdis is using Phobio, the ck Leopard Fang, as its core body. You know, the guy who was here before?

    Despite being a long distance away, Milim had still picked up on Charybdiss thought waves, using her Dragons Eye to urately discover its identity. Its analytical abilities were ahead of even the Great Sages, but I should have expected nothing less from her, I guess.

    I suppose youre right. And here I was keeping you idle because I thought this was our guest to handle.

    Ooh, does that mean I can tackle it, maybe?! she excitedly asked, not bothering to wait for my full exnation.

    Just as I expected, she pounced on the offer. Nice. I knew she was champing at the bit for this from the start, but still. Gotta hand it to her; Im impressed she had the patience to wait for so long.

    Okay. You take my ce. Sorry I got between you and your friend here, I guess.

    I made sure to emphasize that. This was Milims guest, not mine. Now I could take Charybdis, this unfathomably hideous cmity of a monster, and palm it off on Milim.

    Oh, and one more thing:

    Also, uh, Phobio was working for Carillon, wasnt he? You think you could maybe spit him out of that thing while you take the monster out? Id like to rescue him alive, if possible

    This was important. I knew it was a pretty crazy thing to ask, faced with a monster like Charybdis and all, but I had a feeling Milim was up to the task. Plus, if she killed a servant of the demon lord Carillon, thatd just create new problems for us. I had another motivation, too, but that one was so pie in the skyI could save it forter. For now, I just wanted Phobio safe.

    Wah-ha-ha-ha-ha! You got it! Thatll be a cinch for me. Ive learned how to hold back my power a littletely, too. Lemme show you how good Ive gotten at it!

    Milim dly epted, relishing the chance to boast about herself. Shed learned how to hold back, though? Like she had any idea what that meant. For some reason, that made me a bit concerned. I opted not to voice that concern, though, as I let her take care of the rest.

    And now that that was squared away, the rest would happen pretty quickly.

    Okay, guys! Retreat from the area immediately!

    What are you talking about, Sir Rimuru? We have hardly given up yet.

    Please, just do what I say! Believe in me! You all have to get out of here!

    My shouting was enough to make Dolph, captain of the Pegasus Knights, call out the order to retreat, albeit grudgingly. We were in a state of total exhaustion, it was true. Things would gradually get worse for us like this. Perhaps he figured my strategy was to wait for the remaining knight corps to show up before reengaging.

    Its all yours now! Good luck! And with that, Dolph sent his cavalry back. My own friends didnt voice any such objections, of course; they had picked up on enough of my Thought Communication to get the picture.

    And so, once I was sure everyone except me was gone, I sent the signal.

    Okay, Milim! All set here!

    You got it!

    She had already flown into the air, not bothering to wait for the signal. Her dragon wings were stretched high behind her, a self-contented smile on her face. In another moment, she was next to me.

    Gnh. Grrrhhhhh! Mili Milimmmmm!!

    Noticing her presence, Charybdis arched its body and red straight at us. It was already toote.

    Well, here we go! Heres what holding back looks like for me! Drago Buster!!

    A fantastic stream of bluish-white light rushed from Milims outstretched arms.

    It was a light of destruction that made everything disappear.

    ?! Cannot analyze. Collecting data Failed.

    The Great Sage within me sounded a bit surprised. Maybe I was just imagining it, but still. It failed to identify the exact nature of Milims attack, but the results were pretty obvious.

    The sight before me was forcing me to rethink the meaning of the term holding back. Several streams of the white light had pooled together, crashing right through Charybdiss body. It began to eat away at it, giving the dragon no time for Ultraspeed Regeneration to work. The 150-foot-long frame was no match for it, and in the blink of an eye, it disappeared.

    All I can say is, thank heavens this was an airborne target. If it was onnd, it wouldve reshaped the entire geography of this forest. That was the sheer enormity of the attack. We had spent the past X number of hours gradually whittling away at it, taking out 30 percent of its energy, and now it was destroyed beyond repair in the space of several seconds.

    Truly, Milims strength could only be described as beyond imagination.

    Charybdis was gone, and a little piece of its body fell to the ground. Or not a piece, actuallythis was Phobio, that magic-born it was built around. Milim kept her promise. She called it holding back; I would call it a masterpiece of work.

    I flew over to the magic-born, grabbing him before he smashed against the ground. He was alive, if barely, which meant I got what I wanted. I decided to get to work immediately, preferring if nobody else had to see this.

    Analyzing Phobios status, I found that he and Charybdis were 90 percent fused with each other. Without quick action, the beast would just resurrect itself again. Thats why I needed to do this.

    What are you doing with him?

    Just watch, I said, dodging the question as I began. We cant let Phobio go free, right? I figured we better take care of him right now. Fully.

    The task at hand involved fully separating Phobio from Charybdis. My Deviant unique skill allowed me to synthesize and separate things, and itd be thetter that Id use for this job. However, just doing that alone would cause Charybdis, a spiritual life-form, to float away out of my hands. Thats where my other unique skill, Glutton, woulde in.

    Even with my Sage and all, I wasnt able to fullybine unique skills together. Under its control, however, I could run them in parallel to one another. It would be a delicate sequence, a bit like performing surgery, but I was capable of it. If I screwed it up, Id have to take Phobios life as well, so this could have repercussions on my rtionship with Carillon. I really wanted this to work, if I could help it.

    I focused on the job, devoting all my strength to it. First, I separated a little; then I consumed the bit I took off. The Sage took care of controlling the two disparate skills for me, so I had to do the actual job all by myself.

    The battle against Charybdis was starting to seem like someone elses problem by nowand I knew the reason why. It was Milim. She had dozens of times more magical energy than I did; a demon lord with untold amounts of power. Having her around meant I wasnt nervous at all about facing Charybdis. I knew in my mind that we were all in mortal danger, but in one corner of my brain, I was spoiled by the fact that I could always call on Milim for help. There was no real sense of danger to me.

    This, on the other hand, was different. I couldnt leave this job to anyone else. Mess it up, and it could be the spark that touched off a whole other crisis. That was why I didnt want anyone else watchingI wanted to take full responsibility for whatever happened.

    Of course, I had Milim right next to me, curiously taking in the proceedings, but

    Report. The magical core of the individual Charybdis has sessfully been separated from the individual Phobio. Consuming the magical core of the individual Charybdis Sessful. Analyzing core Partially failed. Isting and continuing to analyze. The following skills have been obtained

    Sess. It felt like that took forever, but I hadpleted it before everyone who evacuated out for Milims attack hade back.

    A torrent of information streamed into my head. I didnt like the partially failed bit of the Sages report, but now that everyone was back, I filed that concern away forter. Given that it was isted or whatever, I was pretty sure there was nothing dangerous about it.

    All I had left to do was give some healing potion to the weakened Phobio before I forgot. I gave him a swig of my very own, handmade Full Potion, quickly stabilizing his physical condition.

    Now to wait for him to awaken.

    Thus Charybdis, the threat thatnded on our doorstep, was fully in.

    Would you be able to exin to us what happened?

    That was the first thing knight captain Dolph said when he saw me.

    Hmm. Yeah. I guess youd want an exnation, wouldnt you?

    Well, um You know. This girl here, shes actually the demon lord Milim, so

    Ha-ha-ha, you certainly enjoy your jokes, Sir Rimuru.

    His eyes werentughing.

    But if you had a magical weapon capable of outputting so much force, I wish you could have informed us of that in advance! Well be expecting a more official exnationter on.

    He was clearly miffed at me, and I could understand why. I didnt have much excuse, really.

    Still, whatever you did managed to eliminate Charybdis, a being that could have been a true disaster to all living races. It is a stroke of good luck, indeed. If you will excuse me, then, I need to report to His Majesty.

    He rxed his scowl a bit and bowed.

    Thanks for all your help. I will provide my own exnation to King Gazel shortly. I returned the gesture.

    I meant that. This was a demon lordss monster, and the dwarves didnt hesitate to step up against it. Without their support, I probably wouldnt have even noticed that Phobio was the magic-born driving its rage. Chances are that I wouldve asked Milim to kill it anyway, but then she wouldnt have held backshe wouldve atomized it all the way, and I wouldnt have lifted a finger to stop her, no doubt.

    It was that small sliver of extra time that helped us notice the ever-so-slight discrepancy between Phobio and Charybdis.

    Provide your thanks to His Majesty, not to me. Also, if I may speak only for myself Dolph came a bit closer, lowering his voice. If you are going to report to the king, could I ask you to travel to Dwargon to make the report personally? His Majesty is still rather distressed about how yourst visit turned out. The exile and refusal of board he sentenced you to has already been lifted, so

    This was probably less Dolphs personal invitation and more his interpretation of Gazels feelings, I imagined.

    All right. In that case, tell King Gazel that I would love to be extended an official invitation. I look forward to visiting again and giving my report.

    Excellent! I am sure His Majesty will be overjoyed. Kaijin, Garm, and the rest are also wee to return at any time. They could join you, if they chose to.

    Dolph was already excited about the idea. Im sure Kaijin and the gang would like to visit home sometime. Taking them along could be nice, and Im sure thats the whole reason Dolph brought this up with me. He might have that gruff military veneer, but I guess he really looked out for others, too.

    After that and a few other small pleasantries, the Pegasus Knights were busily hurrying their way back home. I felt truly grateful, from the bottom of my heart, that none were hurt.

    With the danger past, I went back into slime form. But just as we were about to head home

    Ngh Wherewhere am I? What happened to me?

    I heard confused muttering.

    Phobio had awoken. It put Benimaru and Shion on their guard, but Phobio wouldnt have had any energy to fight right now. His wounds were fully healed, but his magic power was exhausted. Plus, with Charybdis fully extracted and eliminated from him, he was back to merely being a high-level magic-bornnobody we couldnt take, if it came to that.

    Hey there. You up? Do you remember what you did?

    I spoke slowly to the bleary-eyed Phobio, who was gradually regaining consciousness at the sound of my words. Then he jumped up and, incredibly suddenly, prostrated himself before me and Milim. Guess he remembered.

    II am sorry! I mean, I deeply apologize to you! Ive done something horrible to you, Lady Milimand Ive put so much trouble upon all of you a second time!

    The pallid magic-born before me was a lot more impulsive with his emotions than I had thought. It seemed unnatural, in a way, someone like that causing so much chaos.

    I was just about to ask what drove him to do all this when Treyni asked an even more pointed question.

    Howdid you know where Charybdis was sealed away? Because I highly doubt you merely stumbled upon it.

    That was a good point. This was a proud magic-born; if revenge against Milim was what he wanted, I bet he figured he could do that by his own hand. But pursuing revenge to the point that he instilled Charybdis into his own body? That seemed quite unusual, and I had been wondering about that for a while.

    Well

    To his credit, he didnt hide any of it and fully exined what happened to himthe request he made to the two masked agents of the Moderate Jesters.

    A pair of strange-looking masked clowns? But that location is secretonly we knew where it was, and it was the hero herself who told us. A formidable foe, indeed, if they were able to track it down And masked, you say?

    This seemed to trouble Treyni in particr. She seemed to know them.

    Was one of the masks asymmetrical, perhaps? Drawn to look like they were making fun of you?

    N-no. There was a girl whose mask made it look like she was crying, and then a fat man with an angry mask. They called themselves Teare and Footman.

    Not the guy Treyni knew, then. Butwow, mysterious masked magic-born, huh?

    Wait a sec.

    Hey, I think Benimaru said there was one there during the attack on their homnd

    Yes. I just thought of that myself. A rotund magic-born wearing a mask of anger. That was one of the people controlling the orcs!

    So that was it. The figure who pitted me against Benimaru and the other ogres in the first ce.

    Indeed. One of the orc generals working away from mymand was apanied by a high-level magic-born bodyguard, hired by Gelmud. That mans name was Footman, Geld added.

    Then

    Ande to think of it, when Sir Lace rescued me, he said he was in Gelmuds employ as well He said he was the vice president of the Moderate Jesters, which he described as a jacks-of-all-trades group. And the mask he had on It was just as Treyni described. Asymmetrd with an arrogant expression on it!

    Gabil dropped the bombshell.

    Events from across thend were suddenly being connected together.

    I see. The man was called Lace, you say?

    AndFootman? I will be certain to remember that.

    Treynis eyes were filled with a dangerous light, and Benimaru wore a defiant smile.

    I was surprised to hear that Treyni had made contact with these guys as well. Given her penchant for popping in and out of existence all over the ce, they must have crossed paths somewhere. And while Footman had not personally interacted with the ogres back there, he was certainly a major factor behind the destruction of their homnd. They were not fully our enemies, perhaps, but they certainly had something against us all.

    The Moderate Jesters. A mysterious band of jacks-of-all-trades. They sounded like trouble, so I decided to ask Milim if she knew anything.

    Mmm? Ive never heard of that group before, no. Nobody said anything about using guys like those to cause strife among races or anything. How interesting! I wish I couldve gotten to meet them.

    Milim, at least, had heard nothing from her demon lord cohorts. She didnt know many details about the whole orc lord operation, I suppose. Gelmud was the main man behind all that, apparentlyMilim just got the outlines of it, not the little details like hiring a bunch of jokers to help push things along.

    Maybe it was yman scheming behind the scenes with this, not Gelmud. He had the connections for that, she indifferently continued.

    yman? Whos that?

    Mm? One of the demon lords. He just loves dirty little schemes like that.

    Geez. She was exposing him like it was no big deal, but what the heck? The guy was still just a suspect; we didnt know if he was the real criminal here yetbut as Milim put it, yman was the kind of guy whod arrange something like that. Not because Gelmud wasnt up to the task, but because yman was always trying to set it up so hed have an advantage over the other demon lords.

    The orc lord operation was devised by three of those lords, who assigned the job to Gelmud in order to keep things bnced among themselves. If any of them was gonna try to game the system, as Milim described it, it was definitely yman. I didnt have much toment about on that point, so I filed the fact away in the back of my mind.

    I had thought this whole affair was over, but there were still inly some issues left to tackle.

    Something does bother me. This Lace He said he was not among the monster tribes. After Milim was done speaking, Treyni offered another observation.

    In this world, a monster tribe could still be defined as pretty much anyone who was hostile against the human races. Saying you werent a monster was another way of saying you were allied with humans and so on. Assuming you werent lying. But if they had no quarrel with the human race, that seemed feasible enough to methere were bound to be other magic-born who took my approach.

    Or Hang on.

    He said he wasnt magic? I asked Treyni.

    Yes, Sir Rimuru. He might have supporters in human society.

    Aha. Yeah, this was rough. A major issue, in fact. But I had no way of confirming it. Without any evidence, debating over it was useless. So I resolved to keep an eye out for this weird group and wrapped up my interrogation of Phobio.

    We now had a fairly ample amount of info to work with. Putting it all together, one truth became clear about this incident: These Moderate Jester guys liked approaching their targets with ims of offering help. It allowed the Jesters to achieve their goals without dirtying their own hands.

    With the orc lord, they attempted to set off a war among monster races. This time, they wanted to have Charybdis fight usor Milim, at least. It sounded to me like Phobio had simply been taken advantage of. The real mastermind was someone else.

    Sounds like they used and abused you, huh? Try to be a bit more careful about taking fishy offers like this in the future, all right?

    Phobio wasnt exactly free of fault here, but given that the real culprit was elsewhere, it didnt seem right to punish him. I didnt want to stir up added trouble, besides. If he swore he wouldnt bother us anymore, I was d to let him go free.

    Huh?

    He was still prostrate before us.

    I, er, I dont deserve to be forgiven. I epted this offer at my own discretion. It had nothing to do with Lord Carillon, so please, allow me to pay for this with my life

    It was weird, seeing him act so bold and brave while bent over in front of us.

    N-no, really, I have no reason to kill you. Right, Milim?

    Mm-hmm! Of course! I wanted to give you a wallop, sure, but Im all grown-up now. Im not angry at all, so consider yourself forgiven!

    A wallop, huh? Doesnt sound all that grown-up to me. But oh well.

    See? And if she forgives you, I wouldnt worry about any of us.

    But I let my anger take control of me

    Mm-hmm. And probably That guy with the angry mask? He was probably using those emotions of yours.

    Phobio looked up at my observation. Come to think of itthat bastard said he was attracted to me by my feelings of anger and disgust

    His face was astonished as it dawned on him. I was just giving him a bit of a lecture, but maybe I was more on target than I thought.

    Yeah. See? So dont worry about it.

    Hes right. And youre fine with that, too, arent you, Carillon?

    Huh? Carillon?

    As if to answer my question, a man appeared from the underbrush. He had an attractively rough, unpolished look, sporting a well-tailored but well-worn outfit. His short blond hair stood on end, his sharp eyes only adding to the intense atmosphere he presented.

    Heh. You noticed, huh, Milim?

    Of course.

    Yeah, of course, he replied.

    Between the name Carillon and the obvious friendliness they shared, I could guess the identity of this wild-looking man projecting his inner strength in the quiet. He was nowhere near asrge as Charybdis, but he presented exactly that sort of overpowering auraif not more of one, like hed blow you away with a thought.

    So this is Carillon the demon lord, huh?

    Hey. The names Carillon. Thanks for helpin this guy out without killing him.

    Thus the demon lord Carillon greeted me, looking me straight in the eye.

    The air grew suddenly tense.

    I had no words to ovee the daunting aura of strength that overwhelmed me. Once again, I recalled how the term demon lord wasnt just for show. But as the leader of thisnd, I couldnt let myself be cowed like this.

    I wasnt expecting the man himself to show up. My name is Rimuru Tempest, the leader of Tempest, our nation of monsters here in the forest, I dered, summoning all the courage I could.

    Pfft! A single magic-born person, establishing a new nation? Perhaps I woulda believed it in the past, but in this world, youd have to be suicidal. I was told the orc lord killed our mystery magic-born, but I guess that report wasnt too true, huh? Youre the masked magic-born that killed Gelmud, arent you?

    You look at this slime, and thats the conclusion you reach? That was the only thing I could think. But Milim was here, and maybe he got to witness the battle against Charybdis as well.

    Yep. Youre right. I transformed into a human. So are you here to get back at me for that, or?

    I doubted it, but I asked anyway. Carillon grinned at the question.

    Ha-ha-ha-ha! Funny. No wonder Milim likes you.

    Theughter instantly dispelled all the tension. But once he was done guffawing to himself, Carillons face stiffened. Then, he did something none of us was expecting. He admitted he was wrong.

    Well, sorry one of my men went berserk on you. Guess I neglected to supervise him well enough, and I hope youll forgive me for that.

    He didnt bow his head or anything, but he did apologize in the only way he could. Plus:

    You could say I owe you one now, I spose. Lemme know if you have anything I can help ya with.

    Really, he couldnt have been more sincere with us. Carillon, this demon lord who was far more powerful than myself, was acting in good faith with someone like me. I suppose it just proves how incredibly, deeply broad-minded he was. He owes me one, huh? If thats how he sees it, I can think of something

    In that case, itd be nice if you could sign a nonaggression treaty with us.

    Is that all you need? All right. By my name as demon lordor should I say, as the Beast Master Carillon of the Beast Kingdom of EurazaniaI swear Ill never turn our des on any of you. That assumes, of course, you promise the same to us.

    He epted it easilyanother sign of his incredible capabilities. I found it quite admirable.

    Since we were already flustered enough, we agreed to send envoyster on to work out the details.

    I didnt know how much I could trust in this pact; given how impulsive Phobio turned out to be, could his master Carillon be much the same way? It should mean that he wouldnt butt in on our affairs for a while, at least.

    If I could learn more about Eurazania, maybe we could open diplomatic rtions with them, too. Thatd be the best thing.

    And that pretty much wrapped up the day. Carillon let his fists do the talking with Phobio, putting him near the brink of death once more, but we all have our funny traits like that, I suppose. He lent his limp subordinate a shoulder as the two of them shuffled away and teleported themselves back home.

    It was time for us to return home, too. The day had its ups and downs, but things were finally starting to settle down a bit.

 Volume 3 - Epilogue

    EPILOGUE

    A NEW ARTIFICE

    Several days had passed since Charybdiss defeat. Thend of Tempest was calm once more. A lot had happened, certainly, but our nation was finally starting to get recognized, and I couldnt have been happier.

    We were now on friendly rtions with the Armed Nation of Dwargon and the kingdom of Blumund. The road between us and Dwargon would be opening up soon, and my official invitation had already arrived. I needed to make my report, but they were nning more to receive me as an official state guest.

    Over in Blumund, Fuze was doing a lot for me by going around royal and noble circles and convincing them that given how thistest crisis had turned out, itd be much more to their advantage to work with us, not against us. Blumund wasnt arge nation, so noble circles didnt epass that many people, as he said. None were putting up a lot of roadblocks against him, so I doubted I had much to worry about.

    Oh, trust me, Ive got so much dirt on the nobles that the carrot-and-stick approachll work just fine with them, he had told me as he left. And given the sneer on his face, I felt safe in leaving all that to him.

    Kabal and his cohorts seemed pretty intent on staying here, but they still had a job to carry outescorting Fuze back home.

    Can we visit again?

    Yeahhh, Im not sure I can live without Shunas cooking any longer.

    You can say no all you want; well be back soon!

    They very reluctantly left, taking Fuze along with them. I wasnt going to turn them away; they were more than wee to return, and I set up bed space for them and everything.

    And theres another nation I shouldnt be forgettingthe Beast Kingdom of Eurazania. If our talks went well there, thatd be one more nation to build formal ties with. We got put through the wringer, but we sure earned a lot from it. There was no telling how our discussions would turn out yet, but building a formal friendship with one of the bigger demon lords was a major coup. I wanted to see it seed.

    So we gained a lot, and if anything I, personally, gained just as much. The Charybdis-specific skills Magic Interference and Gravity Flight, for one. That, and Resist Magic, the ultimate ace in the hole against any magic thrown at me. I was having the Great Sage analyze all these to the hilt, so I was sure itd be connecting them to other skills before too long.

    That was one other reason why I asked Milim to keep Phobio alive. I mean, I did want to wrest Charybdis away from him, but itd also be nice, I figured, if I earned a few new skills as a side effect. With all the trouble he put me through, I felt I deserved to reward myself a little.

    So what were we doing now?

    Thus! Swishh! Thwam! Bash!

    I think the ambient noise speaks well enough for itself.

    Benimaru, Soei, Shion, and I were being pummeled.

    Wah-ha-ha-ha-ha! Save your breath!!

    The womanughing shrilly at us was, of course, the demon lord Milim. She was training us, which I thought appropriate given how unfairly strong she was. It was four of us against the one of her, but it was hopeless. The Dragons Eye from her sawpletely through every trick and attack we attempted.

    Thats Milim for you. Shes incredible, I thought, more intensely than ever before.

    Milim was wearing a Dragon Knuckle around her fistthe weapon present I had promised her long ago. Such knuckles were originally meant for punching with your bare hands without hurting yourself, boosting the force of your strikes in the process. Not this his was the exact opposite. Put this on, and it restricted your punching power by around 90 percent. The magisteel at its core applied the Reduce Speed and Power Drain inscription magics to the wearer.

    When I gave it to her, she peered at it with intense curiosity, then dly epted it. Shed been wearing it every moment sinceincluding during meals, which I had to warn her about, much to her whining chagrin. I was d she liked it, but she had to learn the right time and ce.

    This Dragon Knuckle did a whole lot to save us all. Wed been engaging in mock battles every morning with Milim since that day; it had be a regr part of the routine. Her power was just ridiculous, her agility practically cheating, her stamina inexhaustible. Thank heavens she was on our side.

    Only Hakuro could put up any real fight against her, which taught me all over again how important actual technique was, instead of relying on physical strength and skills. Of course, even with Hakuros technique, a Milim who took the fight seriously would offer him no chance.

    Technique was important, but it wasnt enough. What Icked most of all, however, was battle experience. These morningbat sessions were my attempt at ying catch-up.

    Why was I going through this? Easy. Compared to my past lifemy past world, reallythere were far too many issues that were solved here by duking it out. The orc lord. Charybdis. I was on good terms with Carillon, but the other demon lords could be a different matter. Plus, I had that vendetta against Leon.

    After meeting two demon lords in personMilim, then CarillonI realized there was no way I could take on one of them right now. So I was working hard, taking the steps I needed to improve on that.

    I stayed busy otherwise, too. Training with Milim upied my mornings; after lunch, I did my rounds in each section of the town. It was an orderly, scheduled life, and I stuck to it for many weeks.

    Having a nice, nutritious meal after a training round was always pleasant, too. Fried chicken, steak, hamburger, croquettes. Fried shrimp, tooor at least, an animal that looked kind of like shrimp. It was called ebiira, as well, which was frighteningly close to ebi, the Japanese for shrimp. Funny coincidence.

    We never had to worry about food getting contaminated, either. Shunas hygiene and disinfection habits were perfect, and besides, I could Analyze and Assess anything presented to me, so I knew my stuff was safe. I still wasnt exactly sure if monsters got food poisoning, but

    All this variety to the menu was lifting Milim to ever-higher heights of ecstasy. Wah-ha-ha-ha-ha! How can cooking the same meat produce such amazing food?! That was her reaction to her very first steak.

    Every day brought her new joy.

    With the fried shrimp, she gobbled it all up instantly, not exchanging a word at the table. I suppose trying to recreate foods popr with kids paid off well, and Shuna was polishing her skills more than ever.

    d Milims such a fan. Shes repaying me with her training, so Ill want her to stay in high spirits if I can.

    So the days passed by, all of us growing even stronger than before.

    Hakuros skill set was alreadyplete, so he didnt grow as quickly, but everyone else? You could hardly recognize them. If Treyni decided to pop in right now, Benimaru or Soei could give her a serious run for her money.

    I was growing, too.

    Youve certainly improved, Rimuru! If you dered yourself a demon lord now, I sure wouldntin!

    If Milim was putting it that way, I mustve been improving by leaps and bounds. I kept telling her I wasnt interested in the role, though. Plus, she whipped the four of us again today. Trying to join the Demon Lord Club right now would result in nothing but trouble for me.

    By the way, why did you be a demon lord, Milim? I asked to change the subject.

    Ooooooooooh Hmm. Im not sure? Something really bad happened, and it got me so angry that I became one?

    Why are you asking me?

    WellI dont remember. It was a super-long time ago, so I forgot!

    Despite her cheerful reply, I wondered if maybe something bad had happened after all. Itd be rude to prod her any further about it.

    All right. If you forgot, you dont have to try to remember it or anything.

    I ended the conversation there.

    Milim looked and acted like a child, but inside, she was a full-fledged demon lord. One of the oldest, in fact. Shed probably lived far longer than I could evenprehend. Maybe she didnt have any friends, thanks to her expansive life span separating her from herpanions over time.

    I decided to ask about something else I had wondered about.

    Hey, so Do you have any, um, family, or people youre looking after? Youve been here this whole time, but are you sure you dont need to get in contact with anyone?

    Mm. I have people who take care of me, but Im not worried about them. Im the strongest one out there, so itd be too intimidating for people if I showed them some care, even, you know? Thats why youre my only friend.

    The sudden deration made me pause a little. Maybe BFF, the way she defined it, meant a lot more to her emotionally than I had thought. Id better take that seriously and try to live up to it.

    Yeah. Well, lets hope we keep it that way for a while, Milim.

    I gave her a pat on the head. She just looked so childish, I couldnt help but feel like she was some family rtive.

    She gave me a happy smile.

    You bet!

    Several dayster

    Okay, Im off to work!

    Milim made a sudden deration.

    Huh? Thats kind of sudden, Milim. Right now?

    Mm? Well This isnt, like, thest time Ill see you or anything, so yeah, Im headin out!

    With that, she changed back into the bikini-ish outfit shed first arrived in. She used Change Dress for the job, a bit of magic that was so helpful that I had her teach it to me. Its rmended to anyone with a lot of clothing, although you need to learn spatial magic first (for clothes storage), which actually makes it tough to learn.

    In her original outfit, Milim turned to me and smiled. Ill be sure to tell the other demon lords not toy a finger on this ce, okay? Youve got nothing to worry about, Rimuru!

    Oh? Great. So youre off to meet them?

    Mm-hmm! Thats my job!

    She puffed out her chest proudly.

    There was apparently some kind of conference among her, Carillon, and the assorted other demon lords out there. The concept kind of scared mea secret tryst where the demon lords of the world wove their sinister conspiracies in private. The whole orc lord thing resulted from one of those meetings, so I felt I had a personal stake.

    Buthey, if it means the other demon lords leave me alone, then great. Perfect.

    The group Milim was affiliated with, by the way, reportedly didnt include Leon in its ranks. Leon was one of the newer demon lords, so Milim didnt know too much about him, either. Carillon didnt seem like such a bad guy, thoughwhat were the rest of them like? I was a tad worried, but it wasnt like Milim couldnt handle them. She was cunning, and she was on a whole different level from the demon lord pack.

    I did warn her, at least, to watch out for other people trying to deceive her. Oh, you worry too much. Im really smart, Rimuru, so nobodys gonna trick me! she replied with a smile.

    Yeah, its that confidence of yours that Im worried about

    Well, Ill be back soon!

    And she was offinto the air. So sudden, just like when she came. And in another moment, she was silently breaking the sound barrier (no shock wave, oddly) and falling out of sight. She said the site was pretty far-off, but at that speed, she didnt have long to travel.

    Hmm? Did Lady Milim go somewhere?

    Shion looked concerned. They had be rather good friends.

    Yep. She said she had work.

    Work?

    She had promised to meet up with a few other demon lords.

    Other demon lords? I hope they dont trick her

    See? Thats what youd totally think. Shion had the exact same worry I did.

    Well, she said shed be back once her work was done, so theres no point worrying much about her.

    Quite true. Rather rude of us, Id say, worrying about someone so much stronger than any of us.

    True

    Im going to grow strongerand when shees back, Im sure going to surprise her!

    Better train harder than ever, then.

    It didnt seem right, feeling all sad about someone like Milim, but losing her so suddenly like this did make one feel lonely. Thinking about it, she had really be a big part of this town. The way she could take over your mind like that She was one mysterious demon lord.

    For now, though, lets focus on what the ogre mages want to be stronger. And lets see if we cant shock Milim when shes back.

    So before long, I resumed my training under Hakuro, my mind refocused on my mission.

    It was a broad, expansive, and decadently decorated room. The demon lord yman was taking a moment to drink some wine and take in the elegance. Across from him, Frey the Sky Queen was seated, looking out the window and acting depressed.

    How did things turn out, then?

    Apparently quite well, Frey. We took advantage of a servant of Carillon who was disgruntled about Milim to set Charybdis on her.

    yman smiled broadly.

    Milim defeated the beast, ording to our observers. You have nothing to worry about now, yes?

    Yes, everything went exactly as yman wishedincluding the results of the battle. Milim was clearly going to win; there was no doubt about that between the two demon lords.

    But none of this angered Carillon himself at all?

    Why would it? Theres no evidence linking any of this to me. If Carillons angry at anyone, its either Milim or that mystery pack of monsters. Or perhaps hell point it toward those jacks-of-all-trades that tricked that Phobio gentleman, but as long as he doesnt learn that I hired them, thats not a problem.

    Another light chuckle.

    The Moderate Jesters, his true friends, were a group shrouded in mystery. There was no way ymans involvement with them could evere out. Carillon had no way of contacting them, no way to figure out where they werehe couldnt touch them.

    Still, though

    yman recalled the final set of images Mjurran gave him.

    Milim, pulverizing the all-powerful Charybdis in a single instant. Herand someone else.

    This magic-born, though. The one who defeated Gelmud. It attempted to take on Charybdis solo. Very powerful, indeed; I can see why Milim is so preupied with it. If we arent careful, it may grow to be as strong as us demon lords.

    Heh-heh! Thats a pretty funny thing for you to say, yman.

    Frey didnt sound terribly interested. Instead, she changed the subject to the main issue at hand.

    So about yourpensation, then. What am I supposed to pay you?

    She turned her eyes to yman. This was why the two of them were here today.

    You dont have to be so wary of me, Frey. This time, if you could just listen to a request of mine, that is more than enough. I helped you out, and in exchange, you can do the equivalent.

    All right Ill do that, if Im capable.

    Thank you very much. I was sure you would say that. He gave a satisfied smile at the deal.

    Hee-hee-hee-hee-hee. This should help make things go my way at the next demon lord summit. Itll also let me approach my other goalhmm? Wait a moment. If this goes well enough, I could even take control of Milim. Yes, with that certain item I was provided

    yman almost found himself shaking at the thought. With Frey now on his side of the chessboard, the idea he had juste up with no longer seemed so impossible.

    However, he said, stopping Frey as she tried to leave the room. this now means that the only thorn in your side at the moment is Milim alone. Having superiority in the air means nothing against her, doesnt it, Frey? I would be happy to discuss matters with you, so if its something I can help with, dont hesitate to mention it. You can contact me at any time.

    Behind the friendly face, a new artifice was beginning to formte itself. Frey didnt notice, or pretended not to if she did. Ill be d to when the timees, she said as she offered her good-byes and left ymans castle.

    Alone in his room, yman was deep in thought.

    If I could obtain Milims power, there would be no need at all to incite the other demon lords. I will need to take the time to seriously consider this. And I hope youre looking forward to it, Milim

    He removed a mask from his pocket and ced it against his face. He could feel his heart rxing itself. To yman, he only felt like his true self with this mask on.

    But still  This mystery magic-born cannot be ignored, no. Wed best be careful with it, just like Lace and Teare warned. I could assign Mjurran to infiltrate their base of operationsitd be a fine chance for her to restore her good name.

    Mjurrans intel helped a lot more than he expected. He had thus decided to use her as much as possible, until there was nothing left.

    Besides, this infiltration job was right up Mjurrans alley. If it went well and she curried their favor, great. If not, and Mjurran was rubbed out, yman had the perfect excuse to get personally involved. It would provide the best pawn to rece Mjurran with.

    That mystery magic-born needed to be watched, butpared to bigger things on the horizon, it was still a small presence. He just had to wait, gather information, and use it when the time was right, just in case the monster interfered with the n he was hatching.

    He was not giving it his full attention, perhaps, but regardless, the demon lord yman was not watching Rimuru and his city.

    An ashen sort of joy erupted across his heart, a smile running across ymans face as he worked out his new artifice

 Volume 4 - Prologue

    PROLOGUE

    BEAUTY IN ACTION

    Hinata Sakaguchi was bored as she sat in her personal room, assigned to her within the Holy Empire of Lubeliuss main pce. This world was just so boring.

    She was still fifteen when she fell into this world. It was her first day of high school, the date of the official entrance ceremony, and the only reason she attended was because she didnt want to be at home. On the way back, passing by the temple she passed by every other day of the week, a sudden gale shed across her body, so powerful she couldnt keep her eyes open. When she did finally pry her eyelids apart, she saw a new and unfamiliarndscape before her.

    Hinata liked it.

    Now, she thought, she was finally free of her mother, who had gotten into religion and never gave a second thought to her family since. Her father had long ago disappeared, so sure it was only a matter of time before hed hit it big at the horse races, only to find nothing but massive debt at the end. Unable to bear the violent episodes that inevitably followed, her mother escaped into her faith.

    All this after Hinata tried so hard to kill her father so her mother could enjoy the life insurance payoff. Just a little while longer, and it wouldve all been in the family bank ount. She made sure nobody would suspect a thing. All she needed was for her father to disappear.

    Thinking about it, though, she came to the realization that pulling this off right would require her tomit other murders. Shed have to kill the religious officials who associated with her mother, and sooner orter, shed likely have to take her own mothers life. That was the result of Hinatas cool-headed analysisand that, more than anything, was why she didnt want to be home.

    Here, at least, she wouldnt have to kill anyone else. Or so she thought, before some men surrounded her.

    Hey, theres another one here!

    Whoa! Another young girl, eh? Sweet!

    Hey, nobodys gonna know if we have a lil taste before sellin her, will they?

    Oh So its the same thing here. To her, the world was filled with nothing but despair. A world filled with the ugly, the repulsive. A world that should just be destroyed already.

    I will take from them. I will let them take nothing from me.

    Confirmed. Unique skill Usurpersessfully obtained.

    I am in the right. My calctions are wless, for the world is eternally unchanging.

    Confirmed. Unique skill Measurersessfully obtained.

    Suddenly, her vantage point was clear. The fog lifted from her heart, sharpening her mind.

    If the men in front of me want to take from me, let me take from them first.

    Take their lives.

    Then the massacre began. Hinata didnt even need five whole minutes to kill three men with her own two hands. She was freshly awakened to her skills and not exceptionally gifted with muscr strength, but that was all it took.

    Those were the first murders shemitted in this world.

    Hinata did have people close to her, but she could never believe in them. They were too weak to trust. She felt she might kill them with her own hands sometime. So she left their side.

    The killings continued, and with them came knowledge and technical skill. She used those newfound talents as a foundation to be a strongman, one of the rulers of the world.

    Days passed

    And then Hinata found him.

    The one god she was truly qualified to serve.

    Gods actually exist in this world.

    She could no longer remember how many shed killed. Good people, bad peopleit didnt matter to Hinata, for everyone was equal before her god. She continued to fight, never questioning the orders of the one she served. Monsters, too. The orders were absolute, and her god refused to tolerate the monsters existence. Thus, with her unchallenged force, she eliminated her gods enemies.

    The little girl was no longer there. Now, she was the right hand of her god. She held the title of pdinchief knight of the Imperial Guard, answering directly to the Holy Emperorand she bore beauty worthy of the title.

    A title that made her the nemesis of all monsters.

    Then she was visited by terrible news. Shizue Izawa, her teacher and mentor, was dead. The only person in this world who showed Hinata any kindness.

    There were no sentimental memories, no hatred. No name for the emotions that flew in and out of her soul.

    I cant forgive this. How could some monster do that?

    Her boring days at the pce were over. An icy smile cracked across her beautiful, almost saintly face, and she sprang into action.

 Volume 4 - Ch 1

    TRADING WITH THE BEAST KINGDOM

    I could see a bunch of children ying around outside. Three boys and two girls. They ran up to me at first sight, overjoyed to see me.

    Teacher! Whatre we gonna do today? they all asked, their eyes shininga determined-looking boy; a timid-looking boy; a reticent-looking boy; a lively looking girl; and a wise-looking girl.

    They were all my students, and I doted upon them. Today, however, my emotions were a churning mix of happiness, sadness, and loneliness.

    Well, I said to them, thats a good question. What should we do?

    This was my regr life until a bit ago. A life I myself threw away, one that would never return.

    But these are her memories, arent they? Not mine.

    The lingering attachments of Shizu, back during her instructor days. I could tell, from my viewpoint, that she didnt want these kids to be involved in her strife. But perhaps they felt abandoned. Perhaps they cried. But even if they didnt, it was all so

    Hmm? All so what? What was I trying to?

    And then my eyes opened.

    Please. Those children

    Those children? The ones in the dream?

    Please, rescue those children.

    Rescue? What on earth from?

    There was nobody to answer. She wanted to have me do something. That much was clear. But that was it. No more words, as her voice plunged into the darkness and disappeared.

    The remains of the dream faded away in my mindthe intive request left deserted and unnoticed.

    This felt like the first dream I had in a while.

    Ever since I became a slime, which by definition never slept, the only chance for dreams was during emergencies like exhausting my magical force. It didnt feel right to me at all, so I forced myself to engage in periods of inactivity on a daily basisworking hard toze around, in a way.

    If it sounds like a contradiction, it isnt. Giving oneself time to rx is never a bad thing, and theres no pain in working hard for some goal you have. And all that effort paid off. For short periods of time, at least, I could let go of my consciousness and achieve a state of sheer serenity. The experiment worked, in other words. I forgot what the dream was about, but that wasnt important. Thats kind of what dreams are anyway.

    Ahh, now I can live my days in sheerziness

    What sort of nonsense are you going on about, Sir Rimuru?

    She was angry. Shunas smile never faltered when she was angry. Thats what made it so terrifying.

    Blithely following Shunas lead, I crawled out of bed, grumbling to myself. Id be busy during the daybattle training with Hakuro was on the schedule, as was an inspection trip to see how construction was proceeding. Youd think there was no harm in kicking back a little at night. I had just wrapped up analyzing and assessing the skills I took from Charybdis, so there were no major unaddressed issues left to tackle.

    By the way, Charybdis gave me Magic Interference and Control Gravity, both extra skills. Magic Interference, paired with Control Particles, resulted in the new extra skill Control Magicwhich, when associated with Multyer Barrier, gave a pretty hefty boost to my defenses. Magical attacks were nothing to worry about nowthat, along with the Resist Magic skill I picked up from Gabil and the rest of the freshly evolved dragonewts, meant I could withstand well near any direct magical strike. Of course, I had Glutton on me, so I could already consume and neutralize any magic attack I could identifybut still, this new stuff could protect me from ambushes and surprise attacks, and that was huge.

    As for Control Gravitywell, my research into it certainly paid off. I had always felt it a pity I couldnt capture Gelmuds flight magic, but Control Gravity very elegantly solved that problem. I didnt even need to chant a spell in advancehigh-speed flight was now mine, in any shape or form I wanted it.

    This time, I didnt rush things. I hadnt forgotten the failures I ran into on the way to stumbling upon Water Pressure Propulsion. Trying out whatever jumped into your imagination was a surefire ticket to some seriously unfunny situations. So I took it easy, spending every evening examining my skills. I started by lifting myself into the air and practicing some low-speed flight. I could control my trajectory with my wings to some extent, which helped me pick up the knack more easily than I thought.

    Now, I didnt even need the wings. Multyer Barrier even protected me against wind resistance; I bet I could break the sound barrier before long with this. But no rush. Id just keep up the slow, steady practice.

    As I thought all this over, Shuna gave me an exasperated sigh.

    Sir Rimuru, youre being inattentive again. You will be seeing off my brother Benimaru and Sir Rigur today. I want you to focus on being the most majestic figure you can for the big farewell.

    Oh yeah, that was today. Sure thing.

    Ah, yes. Benimaru and crew were heading off today.

    Several months had passed after Milims departure. Several calm, chill, and very peaceful months. I was busy as always, but still, extremely chill.

    One day, though, a messenger appeared from Carillon, the Beast Master and one of thends demon lords. I hadnt forged an official agreement with him on paper, but it appeared Carillon was a man true to his word. As the messenger put it: Let us send envoys to our respective nations, so they may see for themselves whether forging trade rtions would be beneficial to both sides.

    I gave my immediate approval, and Carillon had already given his. Which brings us to today, the historical day of departure for our envoy mission to the Beast Kingdom of Eurazania.

    Benimaru, a gifted warrior and my right-hand man, would lead the envoys. For his assistant, I appointed Rigur, son of Rigurd. Their mission: to travel to other nations and report what they observed, so I could figure out how to run my own country. They were apanied by a small group of other hobgoblins, all candidates for future leadership roles in my government.

    They would be representatives for the Jura-Tempest Federation, Tempest for short. Our nation. A brand-new one, and thus, inexperienced in almost every way. We needed topensate for that, and toward that end, we were all working together, putting in the maximum effort on a daily basis. Its thanks to that work ethic that I think this envoy mission to Eurazania should bear some serious fruit for us.

    We were also fully prepared to receive the Beast Masters own team. Theyde here, look around our nation, and (hopefully)e back with someplimentary things to say. If all goes well, well stay on good terms and (again, hopefully) begin formal tradeand from there, formal diplomatic rtions. It shouldnt take long.

    But that was still ahead. One step at a time. For now, I needed to focus on seeing everybody off.

    Awakening my conscious, I assumed human form. There was a ceremony scheduled, so I changed to some suitable formal wear. Looking back, I sort of miss the days when we had almost nothing to wear. Now, weve got almost every type of clothing you could think of. A much better selection than I ever had in my closet back in Japan.

    And really, in terms of the conveniences we now enjoyed in life, it was just iparable to the early days. We solved the sugar problem, for one, so we currently had a steady supply. It helped us add stews to our cooking repertoire, and there was even a selection of candy avable, albeit not a big one. At this point, now that I had mastered the art of taking short naps, I figured the next question to tackle was entertainment.

    But I still had a long road to travel. All these ideas kept storming into my mind, one after the other, and it made things tough. No matter how hard I worked, I never seemed to run out of new wishes and desires. There was no telling when Id be able to sit back with a big bag of potato chips and veg out in front of my game console all day.

    I wasnt willing to give up on any of these goals, though. And thats why I needed this envoy team to do their best and make international trade a reality.

    So there I was, in our citys main square, standing in front of the crowd in my finest attire. It triggered a small, excited uproar among the monsters, in all their many species. I didnt make a habit of addressing them in human form. The cheers and shouting seemed like theyd go on forever, but a single Silence! from Shion shushed them all in an instant. Nice one, Shion. She was so good at handling these kinds of rowdy scenes.

    With the monsters calmed down, I decided to give my team a few encouraging words.

    Ladies and gentlemen, I hope you will do your best for me!

    Is that it? the perplexed Shuna asked.

    Hmm Was that too short, maybe? My high-school principal droned on so long that nobody listened to him, so I figured shorter is better for speeches like thisbut maybe this crowd was more excited about what I had to say.

    Yeah, maybe that wasnt enough? Ill give them a little more

    With that, I decided to run down the list of things I wanted my envoys to watch out for. The Beast Master Carillon was a demon lord and certainly one of the more warlike ones. I couldnt be certain the rule ofw even existed in his domain.

    Right, listen up. Youre about to travel to a nation of magic-born who never believed in anything besides Might makes right. Underestimate them at your own peril. If you let up, theyll make you do whatever they say. You might lose to them in a fight, but I want you to make damn sure you dont lose to them in heart! Remember: Yourpanions and I are behind you all the way. Keep that in mind as you tell them about what were seeking. If you think a fight is brewing, run away ande back. One mission here is to see if we can remain on good terms with these guys going forward. I dont need a rtionship where we have to hold our noses and merely tolerate them. I want you to see matters with your own eyes and make sure we can maintain a kind, friendly rapport. Im counting on you!

    The moment I wrapped it up, the square was filled with wild cheering. It was like being in some pop idols concert. What I said probably didnt matter. They were just really keen on listening to me. Im sure the envoys themselves were paying attention, but the rest were just treating this like a big festival. Ah well. The fact they listened at all indicated a pretty well-disciplined set of monsters. Thats a pretty big step for them.

    Might as well take this opportunity, I suppose, to give them another important warning.

    Lets see, what else? Well, I dont mind a mistake or two, but please dont start a fight yourselves, all right? Im looking at you, Benimaru. Think youre up to that?

    My speech made the assumption that any hostilities woulde from the Eurazanian side. If my team started anything, this whole expedition would be worthless. I had to hammer into them that Id ept no mistakes along those lines.

    Heh! You are in good hands with us, Benimaru barked back, supremely (almost scarily) confident. I have learned quite a few lessons myself. After the days we spent with Lady Milim, any fool could understand that impudence leads to disaster!

    Theparisons to Milim set off rm bells, too. Using her as a standard for building your own confidence didnt give me any sense of security at all. At least it beat Shion, though. Watching her eagerly nod at Benimarus words made me sigh. Really, I was hoping Shion could watch the town as I joined this envoy, but that was just far too risky. Although Thinking about it, Benimaru was a pretty thoughtful man, despite appearances. I guess it was rude of me topare him to Milim and Shion.

    Good to hear. I wish I could have joined you there myself

    Not at all, my lord. I think it best you do not travel to a demon lords domain until we can confirm it is safe.

    It was clear from that denial that Benimaru wished to gauge Carillons trustworthiness with his own eyes. Not just Carillon, but every other magic-born who called hisnds home. Would working with them benefit Tempest? Or would they cause untold harm for me? Really, I was d to see his initiative, even though it only added to my worries.

    Imagining Rigur and the rest alone in a magic-born nation was a bit frightening. I needed to have some strong fighters in the group, at least to serve as bodyguards. Soei was already protecting our nation from the shadows, and Hakuro was busy with military training. Geld couldnt be wrested away from his construction work, and Gabil was working hard to extract High Potions and produce Low Potions from them. Shion, of course, was out of the question, and thinking along those lines, Benimaru was the sole remaining candidate.

    All right. Do your best.

    Yes, my lord!

    And you, too, Rigur, and all the rest! Id like to see good thingse to our nation.

    Absolutely, a starry-eyed Rigur replied. We will spread the word far and wide! Those eyes told me he couldnt wait to head off; he was really leaping at the chance to try something new. Hell be fine, I figured.

    Ranga, I want you to stay in Benimarus shadow and apany him. Keep them safe, but do not let your presence be known.

    I will not let you down, my master!

    Immediately following my orders, Ranga slipped right into Benimarus shadow. Benimarus own aura was hiding him, and hopefully thatd be enough to keep him invisible on the road.

    Great! Now, lets give them all a big hand as they set off on their journey!

    On my cue, Shuna gave a signal with her eyes. It was picked up by our band of specially selected musicians, ready to strike up a great, lively tune. The envoy made their way through the watchful crowd, traveling toward a future full of hopethe hope that this stream of cultural exchange would help nt the seeds for future diplomatic ties. Our first government envoy set off with a flourish.

    Benimarus team was gone, but I still had a pile of things to do. I had ns to visit humannds sooner orter, but with one jobing right after the other, there was no time for that. With anything you do, that first step you take is so incredibly essential. Cut corners at the start, and youll often pay dearly for itter. That applies not just to work but to life itself and certainly to kick-starting a new nation. Just because I wanted to hang with humans didnt mean I could throw everything else off for now.

    My top security and military leaders were gone for the time being, and I had to fill in those gaps. Soei could handle security, and I appointed Hakuro as the head of our military for now. Thatll leave things in good hands.

    Next was making arrangements to receive the contingent from Eurazania.

    One thing I did not want them seeing was our hipokute grow-setup and potion-manufacturing nt. Everything else was safe enough for public viewing, so I decided to prioritize keeping the Sealed Cave just thatsealed off. There was only the one entrance, and a heavy boulder or the like would close it just fine. Gabil and the rest still had the magical transport circles to travel to and fro with, so physically hiding the entrance seemed the best option.

    I worried that sealing it off might affect the caves oxygen content, but there were so many venttion holes lining the cave walls that it didnt seem like an issue. Plus, Vester had a pretty handy piece of magic to contribute.

    There is magic to detect changes in the airor in the environment in general, one could say. There is also magic that alerts the caster to any threats to their lives, so I see little to worry about.

    Theres one concern knocked down. Vester was so incredibly talented. If he didnt have such a demented personality, hed still be using those talents as King Gazels most trusted adviser, no doubtbut, hey, if it means hes working for me now, then Ill take itdefinitely.

    So it was settledno more Sealed Cave entrance for now. And that reminded me of something else about Vester. Besides our potion factory, I was willing to let the envoys see whatever they wanted, so I went over our assorted preparations with a fine-toothb. We had just constructed a guesthouse to receive special visitors witha fancy, luxurious hotel of sorts, not the simpler lodgings Kabals and Yohms crews were assigned.

    And we werent just building fancy new boxeswe were building people, too. Shunas apprentices were growing into talented chefs. At this point, they had gained a natural instinct for just the right amount of seasoning to add. They were fully versed in managing cooking fires and chopping up ingredients. I wouldnt be embarrassed to have em handle any event at all.

    The goblinas, for their part, had learned the fine art of hospitality through their practice with Kabals and Yohms teams. Handling nobility would still be a tall order for them, but they were more than educated enough to take care of regr people or adventurers.

    For the finishing touch, I selected the best-performing ones out of the lot and had them personally treat me as a guest. Given the boorish crowds we usually got around town, I wasnt too sure whether we could really provide luxe service if we tried. Vester, once more, helped a lotas nobility himself, I figured he could school me on things I never wouldve thought about. His knowledge rubbed off on my selected team, who put in some of the most beautiful work you ever saw.

    You are doing quite well, indeed! Stay diligent, and you all will certainly grow talented enough to receive royalty from any nation without causing offense. I look forward to seeing how you advance!

    Thank you for your instruction, my lord! the goblina hospitality crew said as they bowed to him. If they kept someone as high-strung as Vester happy, I thought, they mustve been good.

    Sure am d I asked you for help, Vester!

    No, no, he replied with a cheerfulugh. This has been quite the added benefit for me! I would be happy to help anytime.

    I presented him with a free lodging pass in exchange. He could stay whenever he likedboth enjoying the guesthouse and observing the staff to make sure they werent cking off. Two birds with one stone.

    With that, I figured we were all set to keep our visitors happy.

    There was one more big event left. In fact, if anything, this was my favorite one of allmy official visit to the Armed Nation of Dwargon, the Dwarven Kingdom.

    My schedule was already set in stone, thanks to a couple messenger exchanges. It would be one of the most auspicious events our nations enjoyed so far, a chance to prove to both Dwargon and the world atrge that we, Tempest, were an officially recognized, independent country. Having agreements signed on paper was one thing, but being physically weed by foreignnds like this was something I wanted to leverage for our future ns.

    Were people willing to ept a new nation founded by monsters? That was our biggest ongoing issue. But building up Yohm to be a heroand having Fuze spread all the right kinds of rumors about itwas starting to establish us in the public eye as friendly monsters, willing to lend a w to the good guys.

    And now, we had an invite from a full-fledged superpower. This was the perfect opportunity to earn ourselves a ton more trust, and I couldnt let it pass. No way I could let up until this visit was sessful. Visiting human realms could wait until I was sure our government was on the right track.

    Weve got to make this seed!

    Shuna and Shion nodded.

    Of course.

    You are in good hands, my lord. As your secretary, I will make every effort I possibly can!

    Time to get to work. Summoning up all my energy, I strove to cut down every issue I could think of, waiting for the fateful day to arrive.

    We received a sign that our envoys were back. A sign, that is, in the form of Treyni. Kneeling before me, she reported our team was near the Forest of Jura the moment she spotted them.

    Thanks for letting me know.

    Not at all. She smiled. It is no hardship for me.

    She was beautiful as always, what with that translucent, mystical air she had. It let her capture the heart of anyone she saw. If I werent a slime, Id easily fall for her, too.

    Oops. Staring at her too long would only make Shuna and Shion all snippy. Im a slime, totally eyeless, and they still seemed to know where I was looking. Was it some supernatural power or just their womanly intuition? Anyway, better not set off any needless conflict.

    Let me know if anything elsees up.

    Certainly. I had best be off, then.

    With another smile, Treyni disappeared. Here one moment, gone the nexttruly one of the most mysterious women I know. Regardless, I ryed the news to everyone else that we should expect the envoy team back in a few days.

    Just then, Yohm and hispanions paid a visit to town. As I hoped, our little intrigue had established Yohm as a top-of-the-heap champion around the kingdom of Farmus. That put him in demand over there, so he was back for a chance to let his hair down for a change. He had the lofty-sounding excuse of getting a little training from Hakuro, but what he really wanted was some decent grub and a soak in the hot spring. I knew because I could tend since he was staying for several days this time, I didnt forget to keep an eye out for any trouble he might cause.

    Listen, were gonna have a party of envoys representing the demon lord Carillon soon. Can you guys promise me you wont pick any fights with them?

    Aw, cmon, pal, who dyou think youre talking to? You think Im the sort of fool wholl get in a brawl with a demon lords underlings?

    Yohm slumped. He was right. But there was never ounting for some of the idiots running around out there. It could boggle the imagination.

    But why are demon lord folking here in the first ce? he asked before I could answer his first question.

    One of Carillons top officers had been instilled into the core of Charybdis, a monster who was demon lordss in itself. After an extended battle, I separated the guy from the core and saved his life, which led to this new thaw in Eurazanian rtionsbut Yohm and his crew werent around to see that, so they still had no idea. I hadnt gone out of my way to tell them. I wasnt sure itd be the best thing.

    Ah, yes, Id better exin. Come to my reception room once youre out of the bath.

    Sure thing!

    I suggested a time, and Shion marked it down with a skillful hand. She hadnt exactly been my first choice for the position, but she was shaping up to be a half-decent secretary, after all.

    So how should I put it to Yohm? It seemed like a good idea to give him, and him alone, the whole story. In my mind, I reasoned that I ought to give him a few choice detailsthe basic tale of my origins and how Im interacting with the demon lords. Exactly how much I should divulge, I wasnt sure, but it didnt seem wise to trumpet it around to the general poption. Most people would never believe I was an ex-human in the first ce.

    In fact, maybe now would be a good chance to tell him everything. It was going to be an intense conversation, I thought, not the sort of thing you wanted to do in the middle of the street. I wanted a rxing atmosphere for it. So thats why I told Yohm toealo my room afterward.

    Now he was hereout of his traveling clothes and fresh from the bath. It was just after dinner, and he was right on time.

    So whats the story, pal?

    Hey, hold your horses, I said as I offered Yohm a chaira plush leather sofa with a back and armrests. I sloshed over near a chair that faced it.

    First off, I want to tell you something, but promise me you wont be surprised?

    Surprised? Why would I be?

    Ignoring him, I transformed into my human shape. It takes a lot less time than any exnation would.

    Wha?!

    Yeesh. I warned him and everything. It didnt help much.

    I told you not to be surprised, I said as I sat on the chair. As if waiting for her cue, Shuna entered the roomjust as nned. She politely bowed and provided Yohm and me with some drinksa colorless liquid in a pair of sses, both exquisitely blown from real ss by Dold, the middle of the dwarven brothers.

    With another bow, she took position behind me. That was my signal to raise my ss. With a sniff to ensure it was up to my standards, I addressed Yohm.

    So how about a drink?

    Shocked at my metamorphosis and swooning at Shunas touching manners, Yohm was frozen in his seat. The offer of something alcoholic helped him snap out of it.

    Uhyeah. Sure, he said before downing the entire ss in one go. It immediately triggered a coughing fit.

    Haghh! Kaff-kaff-kaff Uggghh, what is that?!

    Shuna hurried over with some water. Yohm drained that ss just as quickly. After a bit more sputtering, he finally regained hisposure enough to ask what the hell I just gave him.

    Not used to drinking spirits too often? We held a feast here a bit ago with some folks from the Dwarven Kingdom, but they were kind of disappointed at theck of booze around this city. We had some beer and wine brought over, and they could pretty much drink that stuff like waterthey never get drunk off it, they said. So I figured Id surprise em with a little concoction Im familiar with. Thats our first test batch.

    And he was my first impartial test subject. Yohm had bragged to me about how strong a drinker he was, so I made him my guinea pig. He had just consumed brandy, a spirit produced by distilling wine, and while I knew it was cheating, I used Analyze and Assess to reproduce the best-tasting brandy I could recall in my mind.

    The Glutton unique skill wasing in handy in all kinds of ways. There exists a fine line between fermentation, which is usually a good thing, and spoge, which isnt. With Gluttons food-corrosion properties under the expert control of the Great Sage, I could corrode food and drink without producing any harmful materialsin other words, ferment it. This would make producing things like yeast and koji starter a breeze. I had already left yeast production to Shuna, so we had all the bread we wanted, not to mention a few alcoholic beverages. Making koji from scratch was a bigger challenge, and one we were experimenting with, but it would hopefully not be long before I could enjoy some real Japanese sake again. I could make soy sauce, too, if I could get my hands on some soybeans.

    Such a great skill. I cant stop dreaming up new uses for it. I wasnt sure if using these jaw-dropping powers to satisfy my personal cravings was such a great idea, but who cares? A tools at its best only when you use it to the hilt.

    Once Id advanced to the point of manufacturing fermented beverages, the rest came easy. We had brandy on hand as well as whiskey from applying distition to the beer process. They were both high in alcohol, enough to burn the throat of someone not used to it, but an aficionado would definitely love how they tasted.

    I exined all this to Yohm, showing him how to best enjoy it. My body no longer allowed me to get drunk, sadly, but the sensation was still nostalgic enough that I imagined I felt a tad tipsy regardless.

    Huh. I see. Yeah, you know, this is pretty good, pal!

    Yeah, isnt it?

    Though, personally, I think I prefer putting ice right into the ss instead of just watering down this stuff.

    Youre a man of good taste, Yohm.

    Now that the tension had dissipated, I moved on to the main topic.

    So

    I gave a broad, sketchy ount of my adventures so far. This included my reincarnation and a lot of other details, but it was a toss-up whether he understood much of it. Which was fine. Thats why I offered the drink first. It just wasnt the kind of tale you could convincingly tell stone-cold sober. If I was gonna go on about how I was chummy with demon lords and such, I had to do it with a smile and a wink.

    But Yohm surprised me. Oh, I believe you, he said without prompting. I mean, monsters building an entire city? Thats unthinkable enough right there.

    Im d he adapted so easily. He was taking to the brandy like a champ, too, delicately sipping it without hacking his lungs out.

    You believe all that?

    Ey, I just said I did, didnt I? Man, demon lords, though I bet Carillon has some mean fighters working under im.

    Hmm. Hard to say, actually. They arent here to fight us. Theyre justing to see if were worth building diplomatic ties with.

    Yeah, but didnt you send Benimaru over there? You wanted em to be prepared for anything in that domain, didnt ya? Ill betcha theyre thinkin the same thing. Id expect some fairly strong magic-born if I were you.

    Maybe so, but I dont think it really matters. If we provoke em with a fight, its over anyway. Getting all hostile with Carillon wont earn anything for us. So what Im trying to tell you is this: Like I said this afternoon, dont start any arguments with the envoys. And make sure your posse fully understands that, too. I want things to go a little more peacefully this time!

    You got it, pal. And like I told you, we aint stupid enough to pick a fight with folks that dangerous!

    Yeah, Ill bet.

    He had convinced me enough that I dropped the topic. The brandy was a big sess; I was sure itd make an excellent gift on my trip to the Dwarven Kingdom. Yohm and I wound up chitchatting about far less important affairs well into the night.

    Several dayster, right on time, the envoys from the Beast Kingdom of Eurazania arrived. I greeted them in my slime form with Shuna and Shion behind me, along with Rigurd and the other hob-gob bureaucrats. Then there was Soei, keeping tabs on things undercover. If something happened, I was sure hed hop right out. Yohms group was there was well, and by their standards, they were acting downright somber.

    The envoys made their way through our ranks in a luxuriant line of gilded wagons. They were pulled by a streak of Thunder Tigers,rge magical beasts crackling with lightning that ran across their framea potent symbol of military force, one easily visible from long distances. In terms of armor, these tiger wagons of sortsif you took all the fancy gold and such off themwould probably work as tanks.

    Yep, this is sure a demon lord envoy, I marveled.

    Ah, it is nothing impressive, Shion replied, shooting me down. Compared to the glorious light you bring us every day, Sir Rimuru, taming these beasts is nothing but a bluff.

    Um, Shion? Its gotta be more impressive than that, isnt it?

    Theyre clearly trying to demonstrate their power to us. You think all this dazzle is nothing impressive? You sure you arent being too pretentious for your own good? Cause that aint cool.

    You think? All those needless cosmetics would be meaningless in battle.

    But were not in battle here

    Theres Shion for you. Her mind never leaves the war zone. Dismissing what was likely Carillons handpicked battle lineup just because they werent prepared for meleebat right this minute struck me as ridiculous.

    Of course, the artistry of all this decor could use some work. Nothing that Dold couldnt runps aroundplus, hes got Kaijin and Garm helping him out. Were really blessed with good talent that way.

    Thanks for sayin so, Boss!

    Makes us proud to hear.

    Kaijin and the three dwarf brothers appreciated thepliment, rewarding me with smiles. But I meant it. They had fulfilled all my crazy orders this entire time, and it had really been a huge help. I figured they could use some more recognition.

    The procession of tiger wagons continued solemnly forward as we spoke. The lead one was the most ostentatiously decorated of all, and when it came to a halt, two women emerged from the door.

    The first one had long, shiny white hair that was slick and straight. She was a beauty with a supple body and catlike eyes, but the aura around her was ferocious, suggesting she was a battle-hardened leader. The second woman was just as head turningthis one bewitching with her ck-and-gold hair and jewellike snake eyes. She seemed graceful at first, but she practically froze the air with her coldhearted gaze, repelling most who dared to approach her.

    They were both magic-born, and not the garden-variety sort. The sheer quantity of magicules they held rivaled that of Phobio at hisst visit. If I had to guess

    A pleasure to meet you, lord of the Great Forest of Jura. I am Alvis, the Golden Snakehorn and one of the Three Lycanthropeers serving the demon lord Carillon.

    I knew it. A real big shot. I wasnt expecting a top-level officer, but there you go. Which meant the other was

    Hmph! I see no need to offer any formal greeting to this crowd, Alvis. After all these days of journeying, wondering what sort of monster might rule over Jura, Ie here to find a puny slime to greet us? This is an outrage!

    Enough, Sufia. Such behavior brings nothing but disgrace to the face of Lord Carillon

    Enough from you, Alvis! How dare you order me around! And look! They associate not only with dwarves but with humansthose stunted, conniving, cowardly humans. They are a disgrace to all the monster races!

    Whoever this magic-born Sufia was, she had a bone to pick with human beings. I intended to be patient as long as she kept the name-calling focused on me, but if that extended to humansYohm and his cohorts, in this caseI couldnt let it slide. Besides, Im an ex-human myself.

    Yohm, for his part, stayed silent for me, afraid of triggering a breakdown in rtions before they even began. Good to see him living up to his word. Plus, looking back, his skills had grown immensely over the past few months. He had no obligation to put up with such a barrage of one-sided insults.

    He was being patient with them. I no longer could.

    Whoa there, dont you think youre pickin on those humans a little too much? Knock it off, man. Right, Yohm? I know you hate being treated like a fool. Why dont you show off some of your skills? Youve got my permission.

    I mean, what do you want? Yohm was, more or less, our frienda devoted trainee of Hakuros. Sure, he was on a different training regimen, and no way could he dream of taking on me or Benimaru. But he was so brazen, such a tenacious fighter, that he put up with Hakuros gauntlet without a singleint. He kind of reminded me of Tamura, this guy who worked under me at the office back in Japan. He was cocky, but I liked himjust like I liked Yohm, with his calling me pal and so on. And I guess he wasnt under me, exactlymore like an equal, a fellow student working under the tutge of Hakuro. Seeing his good name so thoroughly trashed like this angered me more than it would if it had happened to me. I kind of understood how King Gazel felt.

    Huh? Me?! the shocked Yohm fired back at my tirade. Whats he so surprised about? Its got everything to do with him, doesnt it? I want him to put on a little show for me.

    Yeah. Ill heal you as long as you dont die, so show em how strong you are!

    Whoa, whoa, pal I thought we were keeping things nice n peaceful? Like, no starting fights?

    Shut up, fool! Quit ying dumb! I wasnt nning to start anything, but if they are, we gotta answer up to that!

    Exactly. If someone gives you a shove, you gotta shove em right back.

    Something else began to grab my attention.

    Yeah, go for it, Boss!

    Youd look like an old fool if you dont get er back, sir!

    The assorted hoodlums and petty criminals in Yohms crew were raring for a brawl.

    Heh. Guess Ive got no choice. Promise youll look after my team, pal?

    With a grin, he unsheathed his beloved Dragonyer sword. My words had triggered something in him, igniting his lust for battle.

    No problem. Ive got tons of healing potion, so dont let up!

    Sure thing!

    Yohm took a step forward. Sufia answered this with a jubntugh.

    Haaaaaa-ha-ha-ha-ha! Well yed, human. Think you can satisfy me?

    As I watched her gloriously overacted performance, Shion handed me over to Shuna. Uh-oh. Does she have ideas of her own? Just as the thought urred to me, Shion did exactly what I expected.

    Not so fast. I have stood here patiently and let you have your say, but the sheer brazenness of your insults toward Sir Rimuru I have held my tongue for this long only because Sir Rimuru instructed me to, but it would appear I no longer have a need to. I shall be your opponent!

    Shions eyes grew bloodshot as she sprang into action.

    I was willing to let Yohm join in on this, but Shions self-insertion was no longer a joke. Ah well. Not like I could stop her if I tried. I would just have to leave things to her nowand with such an eager opponent, now was no time to try to stop the bout.

    How niiiiice! Sufia howled, her ferocious feline natureing to the fore. ISufia, the Snowy Tigerwam ready and willing to test out these would-be minions of the high-and-mighty slime lord!

    Then she and Shion shed, driven purely by their war instincts. In an instant, the ce turned into a battlefield.

    Yohm, meanwhile

    Oh dear. There is just no dealing with you, Sufia. In that caseGruecith! Provide an opponent for the human.

    To the side of Shion and Sufias duel, the Golden Snakehorn, Alvis, gently slipped an order to one of her magic-born.

    Me? Take on a human? sneered the gant-looking young creature who stepped forward. I know I am a low-ranked member of the Beast Masters Warrior Alliance, but Well, so be it. Let me be your ymate, human!

    His hair was gray, matching his eyes, and his skin was a dark shade of brown. He was as muscr as he was flexible, and therge knives he held danced in his hands while he red sharply at Yohm. This human was less than nothing to him, but his eyes were still focused, like a hunter steeling himself against their prey. Despite the insulting words, he was clearly not going easy.

    I shouldve expected nothing less of Carillons servants. Say what you will about them, but they were first-ss warriors. It was the lycanthrope races, I believe, that Carillon ruled over. Milim had taught me a thing or two about themhesitantly, at first, but the moment I dangled a few more of my sugary sweets over her head, she said I shouldnt tell you, but I will and then talked my ear off for the rest of the day about them.

    Lycanthropes were, as the name suggested, the family of demi-humans who could transform themselves into beasts. These chiefly epassed dogs, cats, monkeys, bears, snakes, and birds;rger species like elephants also existed but were rare. Lower-level monsters, like orcs and kobolds, were said to be devolved versions of these lycanthropes, no longer able to transformwhich, in turn, suggested that these lycans were pretty upper-tier as far as monsters went. If anything, having both human- and monster-type powers from birth made it fair to call them low-level magic-born. Once a lycanthrope transformed, they would gain new abilities based on their unique characteristics. They were born soldiers, ready with battle skills from a young age, and even in this dog-eat-dog world, they were widely acknowledged as superior to the rabble in many ways.

    If I was to believe all this, then lycanthropes exhibited their true strengths only when transformed into the beast they were derived from. This suggested that, even if I didnt think these guys were just ying around, they werent truly fighting just yet. Sufia was still in human form, just like Gruecith. Could Shion defeat her? Regardless, the two battles between Shion and Sufia, and Yohm and Gruecith, were already under way. I watched from my safe spot nestled against Shunas chest.

    In a word, the Shion-Sufia bout was intense.

    They were both the type who derived joy from battletrue berserkers. Their surroundings no longer mattered as they immersed themselves in the fight. For now, they were equals in speed and strength, a very well-matched pair. From what I could tell, however, Sufia had a far vaster cache of magicules to draw from. As it was now, Shion had a disadvantageor should have.

    But she was grappling with Sufia with her massive sword still in its sheath. Was it because she didnt want to kill? Or just an expression that this wasnt everything she had? Not a very smart way to approach a higher-ranked magic-born, I thought. I hadnt expected Shion to join the fray, but if she was going to, I really wanted her to give her all.

    Will Shion be all right? Shes fighting on her opponents terms, not drawing her sword

    She will be quite fine, Sir Rimuru. It may not seem so at the moment, but the only person stronger than her is my older brother.

    In Shunas eyes, at least, Shion was number two among the ogre mages. I was impressed she was able to grasp how they were fighting. Her own Analysis unique skill was nothing to sniff at, either. She mustve seen how powerful Sufia was, but she seemed wholly unperturbed by that. A sign of trust, maybe?

    True, added Soei, lurking within my shadow. In full-frontalbat like this, Shion probably outsses me, as much as I hate to admit it.

    I guess she was more than a barely qualified secretary, after all.

    We continued to watch as we spoke. Shion and Sufia were entirely upied by theirbat, testing their skills and might against each other, attempting to gradually break out their full potential. It continued apace, remaining evenly matched to a surprising level.

    Yohms battle, meanwhile, was a showcase of advanced techniques being thrown against one another. He really had grown stronger. Several months have made him almost a different person, as he went on monster-ying journeys between here and the towns and viges of Farmus, his home kingdom. It had built his name as a champion, and it had also earned him a bounty of experience. No doubt, he had been leveling up a ton. Id have no problem giving him a solid A rank.

    The casual spectator could be forgiven for thinking he was just shing his heavy Dragonyer downward from the air, letting his brute strength win the day. But he wasnt. That attack was merely the first of a series of well-calcted moves. He waited for his foe to dodge it, putting him off guard just enough to raise his de upward and connect it to a multilevel attack. He wielded that Dragonyer like it was made of cardboard, his superhuman skills and strength keeping him in constant pursuit of his magic-born opponent.

    But Gruecith wasnt here to lose. He continually dodged the barrage of killer strikes from Yohms sword by a mere hairbreadth. The cleavers in his hands allowed him to unleash a flurry of quickbos, like a beautiful dance that effortlessly but inevitably cornered his enemy. You could tell he was supremely confident in his speed.

    Being faced with such a talented magic-born didnt faze Yohm. He smiled, obviously enjoying himself. Being able to fight a magic-born who let him exercise all his powers allowed him to feel exactly how far he progressed.

    Attack followed parry, and parry followed attack, all mere instants from one another. Gruecith threw a knife at Yohm; Yohm easily avoided it, mming his Dragonyer down in a ssic finisher move. But Gruecith lunged forward, tumbling to the ground to deflect the blow and slipping right between his legs.

    As Yohm twirled around to pursue him, Grueciths cleaver returned to him, spinning back to his hand like a boomerang. He crossed both des in front of his chest, taking the full brunt of his adversarys gigantic de. It was an even match, the kind of epic battle that makes one sigh in admiration.

    Yohms not too shabby, I remarked. Hes fighting on an even keel with that magic-born

    Indeed, Shuna agreed, it is a remarkable effort.

    It was starting to look like Yohm had advanced even further than I thought. It was like that with Gobta, tooHakuros instruction put speed above everything else. If your reaction timegged even a little, you could expect some seriously painful retribution from him. Dont like it? Then pick yourself back up and work on your intuition skills. That, if anything, was the key to Yohms astonishing reaction speed.

    That and something else. There was a secret to the Exo-Armor I gave him. It was noted for its light weight and remarkable protective ability, but that wasnt allit also assisted the wearers movements, boosting their reflexes. Weapons and armor infused with magicules modified themselves based on howpatible they were with their ownerthe more you use them, the better theyll be in your hands. His Exo-Armor was no exception, and it was now fully used to Yohms battle style. It proved that, in several months of battle experience, he had made the Exo-Armor something truly his own.

    These two factors were what gave Yohm the strength to not only take on the magic-born Gruecith but fight as his equal.

    The two bouts grew more and more intense. The attacks Shion and Sufia exchanged were white-hot with intensity, as if they were each measuring how far the other would go.

    Ha-ha-ha! I was not expecting to have this much fun.

    Hmph! Ridicule me at your peril, lycanthrope! Let me show you the sky-rending, earth-crushing power of an ogre mage!

    Ha-ha-ha-ha-ha! Go right ahead! Make this even more exciting!

    The decisive moment was drawing near. Stillughing, Sufia shed at Shion with her long, extended ws. They glowed a pale white, unleashing electricitythe kind of ability youd expect from someone who can tame Thunder Tigers, I suppose.

    Shion was ready for this. Her sword still sheathed, she stopped the lightning-infused ws with her bare hands. The moment she did, bolts of electricity coursed across her body like a lightning rod. Her thick skin fully absorbed them, preventing any cuts or burns, and the current surged into the earth without seriously damaging her.

    Seeing this, Sufia hardened her gaze in reluctant admiration. Her foe had just used Diamond Path, one of the ogre mages Battlewill skills. It let her control her mind and solidify her body, almost to the consistency of metal. Her fighting force protected her skin, dissipating any enemy attack. Not exactly entry-level stuff, it goes without saying, and Shion executed it perfectly in battle, like an instructor schooling her opponent.

    Prepare yourself! Its my turn now

    Bring it on! My blood is on fire!

    After Sufia came Shionwhether Sufia agreed to that or not. Shion readied herself, still weaponless. Hakuro had been teaching us barehanded martial artsbut nothing like this. It looked like she was about tounch a massive bolt of magic from her hands, focusing all her authoritative might on the effort. She devoted her entire half-crazed will to drumming up her aura, spreading it around her. If this was a Hakuro skill, itd be a natural part of his inbat repertoire, not this showy full-on st that ran on every fiber of his being.

    Leave yourself that open inbat, and itd just be giving your opponent a chance to strike. But Sufia merely stood there, arms open, as if it were a perfectly normal thing to do. I could never figure out what these battle-crazed maniacs would do next.

    Now Shion was ready. To us in the audience, only a short time had passed; to thepetitors, it would have been a fatal dy. One that Sufia had just spent standing there, smiling like she couldnt get enough. Shion smiled back.

    Sorry for the wait. Now, take some of this!

    The aura that had wended its way around her hands formed a ball of fearsome, destructive energy, one that she was just about tounch

    Enough!

    when a voice informed us all that the battle was over. A golden staff was suddenly thrust before Shion. Alvis had stepped in.

    Her tail was pointed straight toward Sufia as well; she apparently had an energy bolt of her own to unleash. Alvis was, indeed, half human and half snake, her upper body an attractive woman, the lower half transformed into arge, ebony-colored reptile.

    This transformation into her beastly form had taken ce without anyone noticing. Neither, it seemed, did her slipping between them attract anyones attention until the moment she spoke. Not even I could fully block the aura Id sensed before, and yet none of it exuded from her body. It was impressive. The Three Lycanthropeers absolutely deserved the reputation they enjoyed.

    Hearing Alviss shout, Gruecith immediately ceased all hostilities. Yohm joined him, giving me a confused nce. I raised a hand and nodded at him.

    Is that enough for you? Should I take it to mean weve passed?

    Yes. You have certainly demonstrated your skills to us. Havent they, Sufia? Are you willing to recognize them for who they are now?

    I am, she replied with a clear, cloudless smile on her face. Noints here. They seem more than worthy of being treated as equals, that much I firmly believe now. She turned to the other lycanthropes in their entourage. I trust they have convinced you as well? I will not allow any of you toin about them and their humanness any longer!

    Gruecith nodded. Right you are, Lady Sufia. Rare are the humans who can fight with me on such an advanced level. Pay these people the respect they deserve!

    He let out a loud, heartyugh, then extended a hand to Yohm. His opponent epted it with a wry grinand at that moment, everything was resolved.

    Alviss actions just now confirmed it to meI had been right about their motivations. They were testing us, deliberately greeting us with hostility to gauge our reaction. I began to suspect as much when Sufia started giving me guff for being a slime. Carillon, her direct boss, already knew who, or what, I was. He had talked with most of my monster officials, and he had already sworn to me (by his own name, even) that hed work on friendly terms with us. It seemed unlikely that hed instruct his representatives to start picking on my sliminess all of a sudden.

    Sufia, I could tell, was just using me as a way to provoke us all into action. She mustve thought at least one of us would go berserk when she started berating their master.

    I also had another reason to suspect their behavior. They were, in a way, revealing a lot about themselves, amid all that huffing and puffing.

    Take their nicknames. Alvis referred to herself as the Golden Snakehorn, and now I could tell that was a pretty literal way of putting it. Snake on the bottom, two sparkling gold hornsing out of her head, branching out like those of a dragon and suggesting all manner of untold secrets. Sufia, for her part, was the Snowy Tigerw, which suggested something feline about her transformation. She used ws charged with electricity during the fight, so it made sense. Phobio, the ck Leopard Fang, presumably excelled at using his long, sharp fangs inbat. Or maybe he had some dark weapon modeled after a ck fang. Who knows.

    Regardless, it all meant that lycanthropes were remarkably honest with their opponents, using their nicknames to reveal the sorts of abilities theyd really be better off hiding from foes. I guess you could say they were proud of keeping things fair and square in the ringand there was no way theyd defy the orders of their master, the demon lord. Lucky for me that both my hunches turned out to be correct.

    That left one more group to handle.

    Are you all right with that, Shion?

    There was still a gigantic ball of pure magic hovering above Shions outstretched hands. She looked at me, troubled.

    It is not a problem for me, Sir Rimurubut what should I do with this?

    This meaning the ball, I assumed.

    You cant banish it?

    I cant. Or I should say, my magical force is at its limits.

    Looking closely, I could see Shions entire body starting to quiver. She looked ready to unleash that time bomb of a magic bolt at any moment. There were tears in her eyes. She wasnt lyingsomething everyone else could tell, too, judging by how they were suddenly keeping their distance.

    The most panicked of all about it, of course, was the balls target.

    Wh-whoa, calm down. Slowly Slowly point it upward.

    Alvis had already put her staff away and wasted no time sprintingor more urately, slitheringoutta there. Sufia had tried to edge back herself, but the high-voltage electricity zapping to and fro between her and Shion made it impossible. The lightning infused in Sufias body was reacting with Shions own aura, creating a sort of energy field that both had trouble escaping.

    Come on! Put your heart into it!

    This ball was putting the fear of God into Sufia. I could tell by the way she shouted at Shion at the top of her lungs. I swear, theres just nothing I can do about her. Condensing all that power into a ball so tightly wound, not even she could control it

    Jumping out from Shunas arms, I nimbly maneuvered in front of Shion, going into human mode and pointing my left hand at her.

    Shion! Fire it!

    But

    Its all right! Trust me!

    Y-yes sir, she warbled, confused. But she was already at the end of her rope. The vast ball of magic unfurled itselfthen, leaving just a short afterglow, was absorbed into me. The unique skill Glutton in action, once more.

    This utterly shocked the lycanthropes as much as it relieved Shion, who fell to the ground exhausted. Cheers erupted around us as peace finally returned to the battlefield.

    As I guided Carillons officers around, I decided to ask a question that had been weighing on my mind for a bit.

    Say, what were you intending to do if we didnt take you up on your little challenge?

    Mm? That would have been trouble for us, yesbut if you were the sorts of cowards who couldnt even fight us, wed have no reason to recognize you as friends. We would have called everything off, I imagine, and I am sure Lord Carillon would havepletely understood.

    Talk about an open book. No ulterior motives with these guys at all. I was starting to think wed get along pretty darn well in our exchanges. It certainly cheered me up to think that.

    We held a weing feast for them that evening. Shuna was putting all her efforts into cooking for it, and I could hardly wait for night to fall. We were cracking open all the alcohol we had, too.

    Once all the dishes wereid out, the party began. Gobta, fresh from patrol duty, did a funny little dance, provoking raucousughter. Hakuro provided a more serious demonstration of his sword skills, earning him the respect of the lycanthropes in the audience. The dwarves all tried their hand wooing Shuna, only to be shot down one by one. It goes without saying they proceeded right to drowning their sorrows after that.

    Yohm and his men, meanwhile, were already at the gambling table. I had taken to propagating the game of mahjong around town as a way to kill time, and the magic-born Gruecith, fresh from fighting my champion, was joining the match out of curiosity.

    I wanted to hop in myself, but Shuna stopped me. Sir Rimuru, she angrily intoned, you know you dont have a good mind for gambling. She had me there, I have to admit. Whenever I get really passionate about something, I get too reckless for my own good. I could have the Sage advise There is a ny-nine percent chance the south yer is waiting to snatch that tile if you y it in my mind, but itd toss it in anyway. Im a man! Id reason. Screw the percentages! I gotta push through! And Id pay for it every time.

    An all-toomon storyloving a hobby, even when you suck at it. Youd think I would be smart enough to rely on the Great Sage to sail me to victory every time. If you dont keep a cool head when gambling, youre bound to lose big. I know that, but I cant stop. Happens every time.

    Tonight, at least, my main responsibility was to be an amiable host. Best heed Shunas advice and provide someone for the lycans to talk to. So I turned to Alvis and Sufiaonly to be greeted with two utterly sloshed beasts. Their attendants were urging them to stop, but they had no interest in listening. Alvis had her tail wrapped around a barrel, dunking her head in to drink mouthfuls at a time. This was apple brandysweet and mellow but definitely strong stuff. I had been nning to save it for a more refined tasting sessionter, given its premium quality.

    Who the hell gave her the whole barrel? I whined to myself as I turned my eyes to her drinkingpanion. There I found, to be as sinct as possible, arge white tiger. Not a metaphor. It wasnt some half creature, but Sufia in full animal form,pping eagerly away at some mead from one of ourrge drinking cups. This is going nowhere, I thought.

    There were ten or so empty barrels casually discarded next to her, which made it simple to calcte just how much they had drunk. But that didnt matter. The honey wasnt the primo stuff I had Apito harvest for us; we just used honey picked up from a giant-honeybee nest. Being all-natural ingredients, we didnt have a lot of it, but there was always more avable.

    The issue herefor them more than me, maybewas these two lycanthropes revealing their full, true selves, something I imagined was better off hidden.

    Hey, hey, I asked in a panic, do you think you should be showing your transformation around other people so much?

    Milim had shared her own observations of these lycans to me, so I was pretty sure of the answer. I was quickly proven wrong.

    Ah, Sir Rimuru, I am sorry you have to see this embarrassing state of affairs

    The meek young lycanthrope who answered was named Enrio, a close confidant of Phobio, who hade on this journey to offer me his thanks. Enrio had bowed his head deeply to me multiple times, singing my praises to the high heavens for retrieving Phobio alive from the massive thing that took him.

    Indeed, he continued, we lycanthropes vary in the forms and styles our transformations take. There is now that says we must not show them, butcertainly, we do not often reveal them to others, except those whom we fully trust.

    This was even more detail than what Milim had offered.

    Whoa, you sure thats not ssified lycanthrope information or something?

    No, nothing like that. Its no great secret to speak of. Any upper-level magic-born would be aware of it. Besides, heughed, we never were very good at keeping secrets.

    He seemed truthful enough to me. Which meantcrap, Milim tricked me, didnt she? It was no big deal, but she acted like she was imparting the great secrets of the world when she started bbing. She cheated those sweets from me, in and simple. I thought I was pulling the wool over her eyes, but she was one step ahead of me. Better keep my guard up more, I thought.

    I had the lycanthropes brought into their rooms, each furnished with full barrels of their own. Whether it was a secret or not, I still felt a bit squeamish about the females exposing themselves in public at my party, and I wanted to show a little hospitality to the rest of the gang, too.

    The event ended without a hitch, and the next morning, the two beauties arrived at the breakfast table looking incredibly refreshed. Not even a little bit hungover. There aint a creature in the world they cant drink under the table, I mused.

    Ah, Alvis began,st night was like a dream! Such a wonderful wee. I cannot wait to tell my master all about this excitement.

    Ooh, Ive never had such pleasant drink before. Simply learning such a thing exists makes me confident we are right to build rtions with yournd.

    Oh, Sufia, stop being so uncouth! I will admit, though, it was quite pleasant on the tongue. I dont recall tasting anything so strong in my life. The dinner itself was wonderful as well, of course, but ah, that liquor

    My booze wowed them both, far more than Shunas food.

    As we spoke, the topic turned toward our issues with fruit, and our inability to find enough people to cultivate them and makerger harvests.

    By this point, our food situation had undergone some major improvement, but our focus was still on growing things like wheat and barleynot to mention potatoes, which formed a very effective side dish. We were experimenting with rice-nt cultivation as well, with an eye toward crafting a rice grain ptable to us all. Fuze and his men had told me they werent aware of anywhere in thend that raised rice in an agricultural environment, so wed have to build all that from scratch. Once we reached our goal, I was nning to turn some of our wheat fields into rice paddies and ramp ourselves up into full production.

    It should be noted that I wasnt focused on rice for purely selfish reasons. Its an incredibly nutritious staple, and mixing it with wheat would improve the bnce of our food supply. I knew now that flesh-and-blood monsters werent constructed much differently from humans, so I wanted to keep our food production as bnced as I could. (Having rice also meant we could make rice wine or sake inrge quantities, so Ill admit to having that little dream in mind.)

    Between this, that, and the other thing, growing fruit had fallen on the back burner. There just was no time to develop new farnd for it. Our construction schedule was packed to the gills; I was already asking Geld for too much. I wanted the sweetness fruit would bring to our diet, but we couldnt ask for such luxuries until we were more fully prepared for future famines. Thus, I had given up on it for now.

    And with that, I finished giving them the rundown.

    I see, Alvis remarked. That does sound like an issue. Perhaps I could arrange matters so the fruits offered to Eurazania are passed over to your nation? With that, you could

    You could use that to make more fancy liquor for us, I could practically hear her say between the lines.

    What percentages are we talking? I asked.

    Oh, you can handle the details, Sufia fired back with a smile. As long as I have something good to drink, I am satisfied. Our lords domain enjoys a great deal of high-quality fruit, so I do look forward to what you could make with it!

    So the ball was back in our court. Which I was d for, since I was in no position to give out numbers right now anyway. Even if they just wanted a supply for themselves, not to sell across thend, transporting such a huge amount of liquor was a logistics issue I didnt want to think about.

    Itd be nice if we could get a mary system in ce already, so I wouldnt have to sweat the details on every single barter we worked out. But even if the Beast Kingdom understood the concept, I doubted they would see any need for it. What a pain, though.

    Then I rememberedI had experts in that sort of issue, didnt I? The kobold merchantsI hade to name their leader Koby, for simplicitys sakementioned they plied their trade all over Carillons domain. Theyd be good folks to bring up the topic with. No time to waste. Lets get em over here right now.

    Koby was usually stationed at the merchants office in the city of Tempest, so he came right over upon my summons.

    S-Sir Rimuru, what is the?

    Right, so Koby heres gonna send a team of kobold merchants to pick up the fruit, so make sure theyve got permission to travel through yournds.

    Excellent, Sufia said. I shall guarantee their safety in Eurazania.

    Ah, um, what?! Andahhh, Lady Lycanthropeer?!

    Great, thanks. Oh, and if theres anything besides our beverages that strikes your fancy, well be d to sell it to you. What do you think?

    In that case, Alvis interjected, waiting for this moment, I do have something in mind. The clothing you all wear is made of very fine cloth. The bedding I enjoyedst night was of a simr quality; it felt so smooth against my skin. I absolutely loved it. If we might be able to discuss that

    We had just recently perfected the mass production of magical silk from hellmoth cocoons, and it looked like it had gained a few ardent fans. We gave them a couple yards of fabric, their eyes gleaming as they examined it.

    Please, by all means, then!

    It was not only pretty and soft to the touch, but it was also made of rather protective material. I wasnt about to give permission that readilybut then, this was a negotiation.

    So I guess they need some of this, Koby. As beautiful as they are, its no wonder these fine women have such good taste in fabric!

    N-no, please, wait just a moment, sir! What is the meaning of?

    Yep! Just like Koby said, this is one of my nations specialties. Both rare and quite valuable. Would you have some product of your own that would provide a worthy exchange?

    I was willing to part with a suitable amount of booze and just a bit of hellmoth fabric for the fruit supply. But I didnt want to fold that easily. Someone as on the ball as Koby would immediately see the benefits of this, no doubt.

    Well, Alvis said, about all we can offer you right now are these decorative stones. She pointed to a small collection of stones that shone a dazzling array of colors. They resembled the magic crystals dwarves could refine from magical ore, but it couldnt have been thatit wasnt dark in color, for one.

    I picked one up and ran Analyze and Assess on it. It came back as a gemstonewhich shouldnt have surprised me. I guess this world had gems in it, too.

    Ah, a jewel, eh? I was hoping for some gold, personally

    S-Sir Sir Rimuru, these are Lycanthropeers you are

    Gold? We got that, right, Alvis?

    We do, yes, locked in our storage rooms. We have little use for what is offered to us, apart from decorating our pce.

    Ah! Could I ask you for that?

    There were tons of uses for gold. Decor, yes, buthell, we could just ferry that stuff right to the Dwarven Kingdom to feed their mint, for example. Koby seemed just as excited about that; hopefully he was happier with this exchange now. He was wagging his tail to and fro, so I knew he was eager to lunge at the opportunity.

    Hang in there, Koby! This is gonna be a big job for you guys!

    But please, Sir Rimuru! This is too big a job!!

    His shout echoed across the chamber. I brushed it off with augh.

    Koby soon grew quiet, perhaps resigned to his fate. He realized this was all decided upon, and now he was ready to be a little forward-thinking about it. The ssic merchanteverythings flexible with him!

    We quickly moved on to the smaller details. These were matters that the lycan officers here preferred to leave to their attendants; the magic-born Enrio would be handling them. Koby, once he finally grew serious about this and acted like the merchant he was, soon threw himself headlong into negotiations. We took a whiff of the roasted tea Shuna made for us as she did.

    Unbeknownst to me, it turned out that kobold merchants technically werent allowed to enter the Beast Kingdom of Eurazania. Not just kobolds, either, but the domain was known as a ce of great trial upon its people, especially the weak.

    Every inch ofnd the demon lord Carillon ruled over was obliged to provide its assorted bounties to the main government. This meant the centralnds of the domain took it as a given that it received anything it could possibly want. The kobold merchants, in turn, would travel around the towns and viges ruled by the central forces, picking up any necessities they required. If this new agreement meant the kobolds went from bottom-feeders to a full-fledged merchant ss in Carillons eyes, no wonder Kobys head was about to explode.

    It was the same case, more or less, in the other demon lord domains. With the Winged Nation of Fulbrosind of Frey, the Sky Queenpeon-level monsters wouldnt be allowed in the cities to start with, not unless they bore wings themselves. Rumor had it the city space was formed inyers carved into a mountain range, climbing its way to the very heavens. As someone who used to work in construction, Id love to check that out sometime, but it didnt sound like permission woulde too easily.

    Doing business with Milims domain was a bit impractical, given how far away it was from us. That left the demon lord yman, the Marite Master himself. He was the exception among his kin, allowing free and legalmerce across all hisnds. The economy was a pressing concern for him, and his domain had a working mary system in operation. There were stories about them trading with the Eastern Empire, even.

    He struck me as a very refined thinker by this worlds standards. Then again, if the nearby demon lords could be trusted, yman was about the only one among them who could engineer something like that orc lord. The only one with the financial clout to outfit a horde that size with weapons and armor, as they put it.

    But there was no concrete evidence, and I couldnt deny that human hands seemed to be involved as well. The question would have to be addressedter.

    I discussed all this with Alvis and Sufia over tea. As we did, our respective underlings wrapped up their own negotiations.

    Sir Rimuru, I must admit that I, your humble servant Koby, cannot thank you enough. To a band of itinerant merchants such as ourselves, the chance to receive a job of such enormity is soso

    He looked about ready to cry as he took a knee before me, tail whipping back and forth so rapidly I was afraid itd rip off his body.

    Hey, anytime, Koby. Good luck with it. Its sadly gonna be a while before we canplete a road, I imagine, so transports gonna be rough going to start with.

    In addition to preparing a highway to the Dwarven Kingdom, I was having Geld work on a simr path to the kingdom of Blumund. Asking any more of him would be too much on his te.

    Not a problem, sir! This is where wee in!

    Koby dispelled my worries with a smile. Despite his doglike face, I could tell from the aura of joy he emitted that he was really smiling. They were used to peddling their wares along marginal roads; travel conditions didnt seem to concern them much.

    Will you have enough people? I thought to ask, though it was a bitte to turn back now.

    That will not be a problem, either, Sir Rimuru. Thanks to you permitting us to build a base of operations in this town, our business has been proceeding along quite smoothly in the Forest of Jura. We have ample personnel for the job, I believe.

    Ah. Well, great. Well just provide your guard escort, then.

    Thank you very much. That will help us greatly!

    He gave me a resolute look, eyes narrowed, then scampered back to his office. This new client of his had filled him with an all-epassing desire to get the job done. Which was greatreally great. We couldve just used teleports, at least with the quantity of goods we were talking, but that had its limits and only worked with predecided amounts. If this was just a small gift exchange now and again, thatd be one thing, but physical transport would be the name of the game with this job.

    If we didnt get down to brass tacks on goods and equivalent values right now, it could lead to troubleter. I wanted to be sure I had someone trustworthy in the mix first thing, and for that purpose, the kobolds and their long, long rtionships with our goblins were a more than capable partner. I couldnt ask for a better one, in fact.

    This all put my mind tremendously at ease, free of the pains of bartering by myself. It also marked the beginning of official trade rtions between Tempest and Eurazania.

    After staying on for several more days, the Lycanthropeers Sufia and Alvis headed back home. Enrio, the magic-born serving them, remained in town with the other attendants.

    They had apparently been instructed to learn about the assorted technology we enjoyed here, and they were already beavering away at their studies. Kaijin and the dwarf brothers workshop wowed them; when they visited one of our new construction sites, they assiduously took measurements of the frameworks strength and stability. On a day trip to see our highways, they were shocked to see how effective our building crews were.

    Soon, they wanted to get to grips with this stuff themselves. If you are willing, they asked, we would be delighted to work with your teams.

    They werent beholden to any particr schedule but wanted to stay on hand until recements arrived for them. After discussing matters with Rigurd, I decided to give them my permission. Before a month had passed, they were fully part of our work operation, far more serious-minded and good-natured than I gave them credit for.

    One of the lycanthropes was involved with other business. That was Gruecith. Enrio and the others were ordered to polish their technical knowledge here, but not Gruecith.

    While my master, Phobio the ck Leopard Fang, is serving his penance, I was ordered to provide whatever aid I could to you, Sir Rimuru. I am hoping I could return the favor, in some way.

    Thus, he agreed to help patrol the cityalthough between him doing ride alongs with Gobta and training with Hakuro alongside Yohm, it seemed to me he was just doing whatever he felt like around town. Ah well. If he was having fun, it was no skin off my nose.

    And so, the envoys sent from the Beast Kingdom of Eurazania shortly found themselves naturally bing friends of the citizens of Tempest.

 Volume 4 - Ch 2

    KING GAZELS INVITATION

    I could see a child suffering from an intense fevera cold, damp cloth upon his forehead. Before it reached room temperature, a new cloth was immersed in water and wrung out. It was a valiant effort. It wasnt even her own child, either.

    Its all right, she said, smiling at the child as he groggily forced his eyes open before closing them again, relieved.

    The dream kepting anding. The fade to ck, and then with each scene, the child would change out, each one looking in terrible pain.

    It was supposed to just be a dream, but somehow, it weighed all too heavily upon my soul.

    Hmm

    After all that work practicing how to sleep and rewarding myself with the asional nap, the dreams I had were starting to get pretty intense. Am I being punished for something?

    I doubted it. No point in being pessimistic. Lets keep our eyes forward. I make people worry whenever I act all gloomy. Gotta keep things bright.

    The day of the promised meeting with King Gazel drew near. Benimaru was finally back after his extended absence, so now I could head over to the Dwarven Kingdom with some peace of mind. If he had been dyed, I was nning to dy my own trip as well, fretting that our simultaneous absences would leave my own nation wide open for attack.

    Benimaru and Rigur briefed me on what they saw over in EurazaniaBenimaru first.

    Their warrior alliance is just as formidable as I expected. They are a thoroughly trained fighting team, down to thest soldier. Without factoring Carillon or yourself into the equation, Sir Rimuru, I am unsure if we would emerge victorious with our own troops alone.

    He had mostly focused on observing the domains military situation, and judging by his assessment, they were a force to be reckoned with.

    Yeah, their envoys had a lot of good things to say about our battle training, too.

    I am sure, my lord, and we have Hakuro to thank for that. In terms of battle readiness, we are fully in step with them, but they have the advantage in numbers and core ability. To be frank, an army of two hundred thousand orcs would pose less of a threat than a lycanthrope force a quarter that size. Avoiding war with them is undoubtedly the right choice.

    Considering the supreme confidence he normally exuded from every pore, it was odd to see Benimaru provide no guarantee of victory this time. In any case, an all-out war was our veryst resort. Thats why negotiating to avoid that was the smart thing with diplomacy like this.

    Well, speaking in smaller scales for the moment, dyou think we should develop some tactics for dealing with them that dont involve a full-frontal assault?

    Tactics, sir?

    Yeah. I mean, with a military battle, if you defeat the main guy in charge, you win, right? Dont try to wipe out the entire force attacking you. Just take down theirmander, and its all good. Thatll mess up the chain ofmand and make it impossible for the force tomunicate with one another, wont it?

    Strike themander I see

    Its nothing thatplicated, dude. Remember the orc lord? We didnt kill all two hundred thousand of those guys, did we? We just decapitated em at the top. Im just saying, we can do that at the force level with other opponents, too. I think training ourselves to take down enemymanders will let us enjoy a pretty big advantage in battle.

    Indeed. Withoutmanders to lead them, they will descend into a simple, unruly mob.

    Right, right. And itd suck if the enemy did that to us, too, yeah? So before we have to deal with that, Im saying lets grab an advantageous position for ourselves. Its not easy to build up individual soldier skills, but what we can do is train em on that kind of teamwork. Then, we can use Thought Communication or whatever to confuse our enemy and make em lose track of whosmanding our own forces. Thatd help us be a better army, wouldnt it?

    Very interesting, sir. And I think I have just the method to train for that. Our fighters have been much better at keeping up with Hakuros training as ofte. Now would be the perfect time to proceed to the next level.

    Great. Lets see what we can do with that.

    Benimaru grinned with excitement. The sight of Carillons proud forces unnerved him, but my suggestion seemed to ignite something within him that dispelled any uneasiness. So he promised to work with Hakuro to train our monster soldiers while keeping watch over the city. Good on him.

    Next was Rigur.

    The buildings in Eurazania were a measure cruder than ours, my lord. However, the royal pce in the middle of the domain boasted the very heights of extravagance, striking a noticeable difference from the rest of thends. The domains riches seem centered upon this pce, but not, perhaps, in an ill wayit seems to be what Carillons people want for their leader. The demon lord wields tremendous influence over his Warrior Alliance squadrons, and he seemsmitted to making life safe and peaceful for all his citizens.

    I had to hand it to the guy. His domain seemed an incredibly safe ce to live. Simply recalling the sheer ambition he showed during his visit made me shudder, so I expected Rigurs glowing report.

    Not just with the buildings, either, Rigur continued. Their overall industrial craftsmanship demonstrates technical skill notably below our own.

    Oh? Yeah, Ill bet, given that we got Kaijin and his men, plus Kurobe and Shuna and all. Guess we really do have it pretty good over here. Im happy to hear that.

    Rigur is right, chimed in Benimaru. From what I saw, the lycanthropes, along with the assorted races under their protection, lived in rather modest circumstances.

    Hmmmm. So they both felt that way. I suppose that meant our creaturefort level had improved a fair bit, if itpared well with a demon lords personal domain.

    However, Rigur interrupted, there was one rather impressive thing that caught my attention.

    Whats that?

    Their agriculture. In Carillons domain, the fields are spread farther and wider than any of ours could hope to, packed with a wide variety of bountiful crops. Thend is fertile indeed over there, sir, and they are highly skilled at managing their agricultural efforts.

    I see. Fertilend, huh? I was fresh from agreeing to ept some of those crops in exchange for finished goodsbut could we wrest some farming know-how from them as well?

    Are any of these skills obtainable for us?

    I believe it is possible, sir.

    Great! In that case, Id like to have Lilina rmend a few members from ournd managers for our next envoy trip. I want them to study the system they have over here in-depth and see if we can adapt any of it for our ownnds.

    A fine idea, Rigurd said. Our food situation has improved greatly, but we are still taking a trial-and-error approach with many of our issues. Perhaps that would help us speed things along.

    Now we knew what to have the next expedition focus their attention on.

    Leaving Rigurd and the other elders to work out the details, I left our meeting hall. The Dwarven Kingdom awaited, and it was time to address all the little things I needed to cover before then. Between selecting a gift or two for King Gazel, building a portfolio of everything we had under development, and working out what Id wear for my visit, there was a lot of annoyingor should I say, thorny issues to tackle.

    Benimaru, of course, joined me.

    Hmm? Shouldnt you stay in that meeting? Youll be leading the next team over there, wont you?

    On that question, sir, I believe we are in good hands. We found the demon lord Carillon to bepletely trustworthy. We may need bodyguards along the way, but with the rtionship we have, I see no reason at all to worry about sudden ambushes. Sir Rigur and I were in agreement in that regard, so we have already decided to have him lead the next mission.

    Oh? Well, sounds good, then. Guess Carillons not just some fool relying on his power, then.

    Not at all, no. I did try picking a quarrel with him, but he merelyughed it off.

    Whoaaaaaa there! Whats with that out of nowhere?!

    Um, you sure that was a good idea? He wasnt really angry, was he?

    No, sir. I couldnt exactly unleash Hellre, so he beat me pretty soundly. I still have much to learn. It reminded me of Hakuros familiar refrain: Never rely on sheer strength to direct your moves. I had thought Lady Milims training had improved my technique to some extent, but

    He gave me this story as nonchntly as if he were reporting the weather. Ugh. Maybe I shouldnt allow Benimaru outside our borders, after all. If Rigur was leading future envoys, at least I wouldnt have to worry about that. Maybe thats why Rigur volunteered for the position, actually.

    Regardless, I needed Benimaru to keep our own domain safe in my absencea task he was already aware of.

    Ill be counting on you for that.

    Understood, sir. I have already defeated Phobio, the ck Leopard Fang. Unless a demon lordcaliber foe rears its ugly head, I promise I will keep us all safe!

    Yeah I didnt want to give him too much praise after he admitted to picking a fight with a demon lordcaliber foe just now, but whipping Phobio like that was pretty kick-ass, I had to admit. Having a higher-level opponent like Milim train us in battle mustve helped.

    Benimaru was really growing with the rest of us. His unfettered aggression made me nervous about him representing us in foreignnds, but he should keep my ownnds safe in my absence. Id be making more and more foreign trips going forward, and Benimaru would need to be the keystone to our own defenses.

    The big day was here. Changing into my travel clothes, I headed outside. Everyone was in a huge tizzy with departure prep; I was the only one without much to do. Well, myself, Kaijin, and the three dwarf brothers, that is. They were all milling around outside, dressed in fancy formal attire theyd normally never be caught dead in and looking all tense about it. They were so nervous, I almost had tough.

    Good morning, gentlemen!

    Whoa! Hey, Boss!

    Good morning!

    Mildo was his usual taciturn self. It was always odd how I understood what he meant to say despite that. The four would be heading back home for the first time in a while; there was little wonder, then, that they all had a lot to think about.

    We really gotta thank you, Boss, Kaijin added. If it hadnt been for you, I dont think wed ever see our homnd again.

    You said it! Didnt he, guys?

    Dang right, he did.

    Mildos reaction made me chuckle. They were being far tooplimentary, but if they were excited for the trip, all was well, I thought. I did, after all, force them to leave the only home they knew. That was always a concern of mine.

    Well, Im d for you guys, too. And that I came to know you all. Kaijin, youve done wonders for us, both as a weaponsmith and as the manager of all our production efforts. Garms workshop is responsible for all our nations armor; Dold is handling everything from handicrafts to magical tools. And Mildo, with your assistance in running our construction department, youve got a hand in designing every building around us. Youve all been a big help to me.

    Heh-heh-heh! As craftsmen, we couldnt ask for higher praise from ya!

    The three brothers nodded their agreement with Kaijin. Yeah, you really are craftsmen, guys. It made me so happy, I couldnt help butugh along with them.

    After a little bit more waiting, we were all ready to go. That conversation with the dwarves helped mepletely forget about that gloomy dream I had earlier. Its always nice to kick off a journey on a high note like that.

    Things proceeded smoothly en route. Gelds efforts had paid offwe now had a beautifullyid road to travel on. It had been widened to afortable size, making it easy for wagons to traverse. Taking advantage of this, we were now traveling in style with two horse wagons in our party.

    Well, not horse wagons. The Eurazanian envoys had tiger wagons; I suppose this means we were rolling with wolf wagons. They were being pulled by starwolves under Rangas leadership, and having such fine beasts leading the way made for an easy ride for all of us.

    There were a little under ten people joining the dwarves and me on this trip. First, Shion, my main assistant, and Shuna, my deputy secretary. Shuna was more my personal cook than deputy, maybe, but I figured she could help introduce things like our fabric-making operation to the dwarves.

    I was actually intending to have Shion stay behind and help Hakuro hold down the fort, but she put up such intense resistance that I let here along. All Its not fair! this and It cant be! that and Just Shuna aloneon a solo journey with you, Sir Rimuru and so on, with bouts of sobbing and violence in between. Quite an ordeal. I tried exining to her that this was serious business, not a fun summer road trip, but she wasnt listening, and in the end, it just wasnt worth the time to try to make her.

    She was, of course, all smiles as she held me close to her chest, enjoying the ride aboard one of the wolf wagons. We were on the lead one, alongside Shuna, which meant Id be gently cradled by one or the other, in turns, the entire way. The second wagon was upied by the four dwarves, andpared to that, I couldntin about riding with a couple of beautiful women.

    Ranga himself was with us, although out of sight and guarding me from the shadows. Thanks to Shadow Motion, he was literally shadowing me nearly all the time these days. I could feel him shutting his eyes in sheer bliss as he basked in my aura. I asked him whether he felt cramped, holed up in my shadow, and he said Not at all, master! It is quitefortable! So I let him. Having him on call for emergencies made me feel better, besides, and everyone else agreed with me on this, so hed be lurking around in that shadow for a while toe.

    Finally, Gobta was shoring up our guard with several hobgoblinspatrolmen under his direct control.

    One of the hob-gobsa trainee named Gobzostruck me as especially dim. I came up with the name on a whim, and he justI dunno, looked stupid.

    You think that guys okay?

    Who, Gobzo? You bet, sir!

    Gobta swore the guy was all right, just a little lunkheaded. A hobgoblin described as a little lunkheaded by Gobta, whos a little lunkheaded himself. Hoo boy. He had a tendency to stare nkly into space, mouth agape, which made me worry. He didnt seem too with it to me, but he did seem handy enough atop a starwolfs back, so I figured itd be just as lunkheaded of me to lose any sleep over it.

    So we proceeded down the highway, guarded by Gobta and the other six goblin riders. The wagon was sturdy enough to make the ride eptablyfortableespecially considering we were doing around twenty-five miles an hour, which your typical horse wagon just wasnt made to handle.

    The exclusive shock-absorber tech we developed was the secret behind the wagons sturdiness, allowing the axles to move independently without being hammered into the carriage. It did wonders to cancel out the bumps along the way, another hallmark of the precision quality being cranked out by our dwarf-driven forge. And it didnt end thereour tires were cutting-edge, too. Normally, they were made for little more than reinforcing the wheel, which meant they quickly got scratched up and damaged beyond use. These tires were made of a special hardened resin that provided an additional shock-absorbing effect. The resin was more flexible and sturdy than I thoughta pretty good match for the tires from my world, even.

    Gobta was taking a keen interest in these axles and wheels, curiously examining them up close. He had made a cart for himself long ago, and he mustve beenparing these to his previous effort. Wow! He sighed in amazement. I knew I shouldve built mine like this!

    I should help him build a second er on, I thought.

    But I digress. The point is, these innovations were making this journey go rather swimmingly. Maybe it was less because of our wagons suspension and more thanks to the t, obstacle-free road Gelds crew made for us, but it was still true.

    We spied the faraway Canaat Mountains on the second day of travel.

    Things had gone exceedingly smoothly along this well-maintained road so far. The trip was a bit over six hundred miles one-way, but traveling through uncleared forest ate up dizzying amounts of time. Spending the same amount of time on a road like this made for a much easier experience. I was a state guest this time, and showing up a dirty mess from the journey wouldnt be too befitting, I thought.

    We had made an effort to give ourselves plenty of time. Unlike before, there were sleeping houses put in ce at regr intervals along the way. They served as workers quarters during construction, the idea being they could be simple inns once this became a public trade route. Thus, we were all squared away for night lodging.

    Along the way, we also ran into a few high orcs in the middle of road-surfacing work. They worked as a unified team, under themand of a smug-looking foreman. Like a well-oiled machine, they skillfully carried out the job. Hell, they could teach a few of the construction crews I dealt with in my previous life a thing or two.

    It was really an ideal environment. I gave them a Good work, guys! as I passed by, and they all kneeled and waved at me.

    S-Sir Rimuru! Our work is progressing on schedule. Weve prepared the soil were using without a hitch, and right now were finishing up the surface. Were making our way back from the Dwarven Kingdom right now, so the roadway ahead for you is fullyplete!

    I shot a nce forward. The foreman was rightI saw a well-crafted road waiting for us. It was a simple one, yescovered in gravel, with crushed stoneid out evenly above it. That was all we really needed, but above that, the crew had ced freshly extracted stone material to make a sort of paved surface.

    Procuring all this stone andying it out evenly across such a wide expanse of road would be all but impossible in my previous world. Here, meanwhile, our workmen had a wealth of helpful skills to assist the effort. The Stomach that Geld maintained with his Gourmet skill made small-scale transport (teleportation, really) between high orcs a snap, allowing them to ship processed stone from the quarries straight to the construction site as is. Talk about efficient. My job wouldve been so easy in my previous life with that stuff. No worries about material storage, no shipping hassles; just a few extraordinary skills used to maximum effect. A very monster-like approach.

    It was clear, however, that the high orcs werent just letting their skills do all the work. They were giving 110 percent the whole way. Thats why I wanted to thank them for their efforts.

    Look at this! Youve all done a great job for us. Feel free to knock off early and take it easy the rest of the day!

    I took several barrels of drink out from my Stomach, plopping each one on the ground.

    Dont overdo it, now!

    Cheers erupted up and down the road. And with all the thanks I was showered with, we decided to stay there for the night.

    The next day:

    Good morning, Sir Rimuru!!

    The moment Shion carried me out from the hut, we were greeted by several hundred orcs standing in neat lines. Whoa! I shouted. All the workmen I couldnt greet personally yesterday mustve assembled here in the early morning.

    Good job, everyone! Shion nodded, trying to sound as self-important as possible. Shuna giggled at this as she greeted them all. The hobgoblins whispered among themselves, amazed at the spectacle.

    Ranga, meanwhile, stayed curled up in my shadowthis was no concern to him, since road conditions didnt really matter to his species. Unlike Ranga, I had a keen interest in how thepleted road ahead looked. I had to give these high orcs my thanks.

    Im d to see the magnificent work youre all doing. Keep it up!

    A simple sentiment, but still a major morale boost. I followed it by going up and down the ranks, offering my personal appreciation as they greeted me. They all smiled at me from start to finish, which did a lot to lift my spirits as well. The beer I providedst night was apparently a big hit, so I gave the foreman a few more barrels before we left. It was key for a leader to show proper appreciation when the times called for it. I felt thered be few better ways to provide that than with some fancy alcohol when visiting the front lines like this.

    We rounded out the stop by watching the crews as they got back to work. Before long, we were on the road once again.

    Riding on thepleted road made the wolf wagon ride smoother than ever. It felt like we were going a bit faster. This construction effort was starting to feel worth it. The stones lining the highway were rough to the touch, meshing well with the resin tires on our wagons and also preventing slippage. They were designed this way to provide traction in rainy weather; I wasnt expecting it to smooth out the ride as well, but I was sure the merchants whod ply their trade along the highway would appreciate it.

    I observed all this, satisfied with myself, as the wolf wagon sped along. It would be the afternoon of the fourth day by the time we reached our destination.

    The Armed Nation of Dwargon.

    Last time I was here, they made us line up in front of the gate. Looking up at thatrge, oppressive entrance, I shut my eyes and reflected on the pastor I would have, if I had eyes. Instead, I assumed human form inside my wagon and changed into my ceremonial attire.

    As I stepped out of the wagon, I found a small furor erupting in front of the gate. Oh, crap, not Gobta again?! I reflexively thought, but I was wrong. It turned out the dwarves had already run out of their wagon, trying to get the gate open by themselves, much to the chagrin of the other merchants and adventurers nearby.

    Hey, bro. d to see youre well.

    This was Kaido, head of the local guard and Kaijins younger brother.

    Ah, Kaido! How long has it been? Lifes been a st working for my ol boss Rimuru, lemme tell ya!

    Im sure. Its written all over your face. Where is Sir Rimuru, by the way? He may be your boss, but hes also our state guest. Well need to give him a warm greeting first

    They were having this conversation right next to me. Come on, guys. Why are you ignoring me? Oh, right, Im in human form, arent I?

    Kaido, Kaido! Its me! Rimuru! That cute lil girl genius whos got the magic to transform into anything she wants! Eeeek!

    I couldnt help but join in the fun, as much as it made me hate myself. Thanks to Kaidos extremely leading questioning at myst visit, it had somehowe about that I was a fetching young woman with magical skillsand while it was Shizu who granted me this particr form, it was a shockingly perfect match for my cover story in Dwargon.

    What?! That couldnt be! Er Sir Rimuru? Do you mean to sayyou actually were cursed by an evil wizard?!

    Of course not! Enough with the formalities! This is Rimuru, Captain Kaido!

    He stared ssy-eyed at me, unable to form a response. I must have thrown him into utter confusion, and I could understand why. Id probably be pretty freaked out if a slime turned into a pretty girl, too.

    II am d you are well, er Sir Rimuru

    It wasnt until long after the gate was fully opened that he managed to croak out a response.

    We passed through the gate, guided by Kaido and his guardsmen. Normally, wagons and vehicles would be directed through another entrance, where theyd be parked in a holding area for unloading. As state guests, though, we were allowed to prance right in on our wolf wagons. We had starwolves pulling usdazzling, muscly beastsand that was attention-grabbing alone. But the simple fact the government opened the main gate for us was enough to attract a crowd on the other side.

    I could hear thements thrown from either side as we rode along.

    Taming such magnificent magical beasts A powerful group, indeed!

    Are those magical? Ive never seen the likes of them before

    What strange wagons, too. The wheels move independently of one another! See how they bob up and down along the pathway, even as the wagon itself remains steady? A magnificent piece of smithery, there.

    But who are they? And why do they deserve the full front-gate treatment? We dont even do this for royalty from the smaller kingdoms, do we?

    No. Maybe from one of therger powers? Pretty small guard contingent, if so.

    Also, with all this kindness were giving em, I was expecting a king or the likebut they sent a princess instead?

    Ooh yeah! Shes pretty cute, isnt she?

    Oh, crap. I was still in human form, since I was toozy to switch back, but I really shouldve tried looking more male, at least. Doing that would mean expending a continuous stream of magicules, which was a pain. But it was toote now, and I was an honored guest of Dwargon and all, so better just keep it natural, I guess. Lets go with that.

    As I listened to the crowdsmentary, I noticed Kaido nod gravely in my wagon, helping us lead the procession. You know, I have to say,ing here with such a small group in response to a royal invite is a little careless of you, isnt it? I know Im being rude, but Im afraid youll have to ept a few doubtful nces in response.

    Oh, no, I appreciate the advice. I gotta admit, Im kind of new at this sort of thing. Does this look like that tiny a contingent, though?

    Fairly so, yes. Normally, youd expect arge, ostentatious parade going through here, an awe-inspiring show of force. The yearly visit from the nobility over in Farmus, let me tell you Its nothin short of gorgeous.

    Is it?

    International rtions were starting to sound like much more of a pain than I had guessed.

    Perhaps, Shion resentfully remarked, we should have brought the entire goblin rider force with us. With them, and with a dragonewt team patrolling the skies, we wouldve been able to express the fullness of your majesty, Sir Rimuru.

    No, I rejected that idea because itd leave our ownnds vulnerable. Dont you remember us deciding on all that in the meeting?

    I had thought Shion was going too far with that idea she floated at the meeting, but she mightve been right all along.

    Still, intervened Shuna with a smile, I dont think we are underselling ourselves with our procession. Gobta and his force are equipped with a full array of thetest in magic weapons. The trained eye would recognize their value and strength in a moments notice.

    She was right. It was all Unique equipment of exceptional make. As they were prototypes, there were very few of them around. The weapons were from Kurobe, the armor from Garm, and both were fortified with Dolds magical carvings. Part of our mission here was to show off our technology to the world, so it was important they all bore thetest and greatest for us.

    Such inscription magic still had very low sess rates. Itd be a while before we could outfit all our fighters with Uniques. But we didnt need to, either, and I was satisfied enough with what we aplished already.

    Certainly, Kaido said with a smile and a nod, I couldnt help but notice myself. I cant say what other nations would think about it, but ourrades, at least, are pretty awestruck right now.

    Arriving with such a small group was a misstep, but in terms of quality, I think we were right up there with any other nation.

    Well, I said with a satisfied grin, no worries, then.

    We proceeded along the wide street as Kaido guided us to the pce. He would not be joining us inside.

    See you soon, brother.

    You got it. Ill see you.

    The two brothers said their good-byes, and Kaido saluted me before leaving. Picking up from Kaidos lead was Dolph, captain of the Pegasus Knights, d in his fanciest attire. He was wearing a civil officers uniform, but that was likely just a front. The Knights he led were a covert team reporting directly to the king, and if I didnt recognize the outfit, I definitely recognized his sharp eyes.

    It is good to see you again, Sir Rimuru. It pleases me to see you in good health, he said in greeting, a smile softening his stony face.

    And the same to you, Sir Dolph. Thank you for inviting me today.

    Sir? Ah-ha-ha! No need for that with me! Im just here to guide you to His Majesty. But before that

    Dolph shed a sign to his men. Most appeared to be real, non-covert bureaucrats, but I spotted a few Pegasus Knights among them.

    My apologies, but may I ask to hold your weapons for you during your visit?

    Oh, sure. I nodded as I gave him the straight sword dangling from my hip. He epted it with a polite pair of arms and ced it in a storage box. Shuna handed him a magisteel-crafted folding fan, which I wasnt entirely sure was a weapon per se, although it sure as hell wasnt a regr old fan.

    Shion also removed her own longsword, but instead of surrendering it, she just red at the attendant handling her. This is Goriki-maru. It is extremely valuable. Treat it roughly, and you will pay for it, she said, giving it a tender look in lieu of caressing it against her face. Once shed said her piece, she handed it over.

    Just how important is that thing to her? I thought. Geez, giving it a name and everything. Talk about beloved. The attendant struggled with it a bit before applying a steadier grip. Had he dropped it, Shion wouldvepletely lost it. I figured the attendant was a covert Pegasus Knight, because the average person wouldnt have any hope of lugging that thing around.

    The weapon handover went pretty smoothly for all of us. Not so for the hob-gobs. Gobta and his crew all had armor on, and so they had to be escorted out of the chamber to change.

    See you guyster.

    Roger that, sir!

    Gobta wouldnt be entering the kings receiving room anyway. Our guard contingent would be waiting in the next room over, up front. It would just be us and the kings attendants in there, and I was fine with that. I was just happy they let Shuna and Shion in as government officials. Shion was my secretary, but the way she looked and acted just screamed military. If they decided that only I coulde in, I knew shed raise holy hell over it. Good thing the dwarves were open-minded about this.

    Once that was all taken care of, Dolph escorted us inside the royal pce. We headed straight for the dungeonst time I visited, so I took my time to gawk as we moved along. Magic Sense was convenient at times like these. It let me do all that looking without having to swivel my head all over the ce, allowing me to retain a (hopefully) regally authoritative air along the way.

    So on we went down the long corridor before arriving at arge, ostentatious-looking door. His Majesty Rimuru, shouted one of the guards as it opened from the inside, sovereign of the Jura-Tempest Federation!

    Follow me, a female dwarven attendant said as she approached. King Gazel is waiting for you. This was the end of Dolphs duties, so he gave me a salute and stood bolt upright at the side of the door. It was all so stiffly formal to me. There were so many little rules I had no chance of knowing, I grew anxious that I was bound to screw something up.

    How nice to see you again, Rimuru!

    But I shouldnt have worried, because once Gazel spoke to me, things started moving so fast I didnt have any time to think.

    I sat down on a seat offered to me, facing the king, as Shuna delivered a formal greeting. I could still feel the nerves as she provided a royal attendant a list of the gifts we had brought along. Man, Shuna rocks!

    I had absolutely no idea what I should have been doing there, so I just remained seated, smiling, like we said I should beforehand. Just act rxed, in control, she had suggested to me, and I will find a way to take care of the rest.

    I trusted her to do that, so I remained seated, trying to look as elegant and unaffected as I could. Shuna was doing all the heavy lifting, for sureshe was an ogre princess, after all, and she demonstrated stateliness and dignity that I couldnt help but admire.

    The initial exchanges seemed like they took forever, but really, it wasnt long at all. I was too out of it to pay much attention to what was being said. The Great Sage was automatically memorizing everything for me, I figured, and I could refer to thatter.

    Soon, Shuna and the attendants had wrapped up their back-and-forth. It sounded like they were preparing a royal dinner in our honor this evening. They say it takes several days to prep for that kind of event; I was sure d we werentte.

    We had some time before evening came, and they took this opportunity to show us to our rooms, figuring we would be tired from the journey. Only then did I dare breathe a sigh of relief.

    Oh, man, I was such a bundle of nerves.

    Hee-hee-hee-hee! Were you? You seemed very dignified to me, Sir Rimuru.

    Oh, absolutely! You cut a gant figure in the royal chamber. I was in awe.

    It seems to me that Shion could use more instruction as a secretary, however

    Hee-hee! My, Shuna, cutting it rather harsh with the jokes today, are we?

    I wasnt joking

    Listening to Shuna and Shion carry on as usual helped me calm down a little.

    Yeah, well, Im d theyre treating me like royalty and all, but I really hope I dont have to go through that again.

    Im afraid you may have to get used to it, Sir Rimuru. More of these opportunities will arrive in the future, no doubt.

    Perhaps, yes. As you build your political and military might, little matters like these will be unavoidable.

    Wait a sec, Shion. I wasnt thinking of this as some kind of world conquest; I dont know where she got that idea. I just wanted to get along with my neighbors, if I could.

    Um, just so were clear, Im not trying to rule the world here, yknow?

    What? You arent?

    Shions obvious surprise was a shock to me. Thats what he has said from the very beginning,mented Shuna with a sigh. At least nobody else was working under that assumption.

    Our banter continued along these lines until it was time for the banquet.

    Gobtas team would be in another room, eating separately, and after meeting with King Gazel, Kaijin, Garm, and the other dwarves asked for permission to explore their old stomping grounds again; undoubtedly they were seeing friends and family right now. Thus, it was only me, Shuna, and Shion present with the king. I was a tad nervous about Shioning along, but the dinner ended uneventfully enough.

    Now, Gazel asked softly, do you have a little time to spare after dinner?

    I nodded. Good, he said.

    Events like these were no ce for frank conversation. It was all just a bunch of pleasantries exchanged back and forth. It was hard to truly speak ones mind with all thepliments and roundabout speeches the atmosphere demanded. Nobody wanted to shoot their mouth off and have promises extracted from them, so that naturally limited the topics of discussion a bit. In my case, too, I was so focused on King Gazels mannerisms and my own table manners that there wasnt room in my brain to think about any of that. The king mustve spotted it, which was why he offered some extra time to speak more confidentially.

    I was finally able to rx once we moved to another room.

    That was a good meal, I said to Shuna, but I sure didnt have much time to savor it.

    Oh, no? I was quite pleased! All those umon things on offer

    I think Shion could stand to learn some mannersfollow your example some more, if you will.

    Oh, maybe. I think shes fine, though. With manners, as long as you arent actively offending someone, then it doesnt really matter.

    Etiquette changes with every situation, after all. Something that waspletely wrong in one scenario could be perfectly eptable in another. I didnt see any need to try to memorize everything. Its worth noting that in Tempest, where were still striving to improve our food situation, it was considered impolite to leave any part of a meal uneaten. That was a rule I enacted, no doubt affected by my past experience as a Japanese person, but that only applied to us, not the rest of the world. Those things change from nation to nation. Other countries saw virtue in providing the most extravagant experience possible for visitors; I heard that, in some, leaving some food behind was seen as a nice gesture, a symbol that youve been so well taken care of that you couldnt possibly eat another bite. Some people did that in my previous life, too, so it sounded eptable enough to me.

    Fortunately, the Dwarven Kingdom worked like Tempest in this regard. Vester had schooled me on that beforehand, and it turned out the advice he gave was spot-on. His instructional briefing covered everything from polite greetings to proper manners around the royal courtbut even then, I was so anxious around the king that I mostly just copied whatever he did. Hopefully, the experience would help me get morefortable for next time. Shion was the same, too, but we had both performed above the minimum expected of us, so there was no issue.

    We certainly did sprint through each of the courses, though. It was all so delicious, Shion said, I just couldnt help myself

    Ahh, its nothing to worry about. Im sure the cooks would prefer this to having any leftovers.

    You are spoiling her, Shuna said with a cheerful look in her eyes.

    After a few more minutes:

    Sorry to make you wait.

    King Gazel arrived, ready to have a frank discussion about the most important issues facing our two countries.

    The king and I were seated in two padded chairs facing each other. Vaughn and Dolph stood guard behind him, Shion was behind me, and Shuna was off to fetch some drinks.

    He was much more informal than before, which was a relief. Itd make talking things over a lot easier. I thanked him for the banquet; he replied with a heartyugh.

    Ha-ha-ha-ha! You were probably so nervous, you could barely even taste what you were eating, right? Let me tell you something: Diplomacy is all just one big bluff. If you act like that, dontin if people feel they have the right to run you over.

    You say that, but Vester gave me his personal seal of approval.

    Hmph. As skittish as he is, Im sure he was simply going easy on the master he serves.

    The king was hurling a lot of criticism my way, but if anything, it made me all the morefortable.

    Well, Ill do better next time.

    Heh-heh-heh Im much morefortable wielding a sword than navigating these types of negotiations, too.

    As he put it, Gazel wished for nothing more than the ability to freely and aimlessly wander thend. Perhaps he would have been able to if his father hadnt died so unexpectedly. But before the topic got too gloomy, he changed the subject.

    So! Down to business, then?

    I nodded. Certainly. First, thank you for pardoning Kaijin and the others. I know they appreciate it a great deal, too.

    Hah! That was the best way to earn the approval of my cab members. I was nning to forgive them from the very beginning. Plus, with someone as strange as you involved, I didnt want you running around my kingdom too freely, he bashfully admitted with a grin.

    Wow, thats a pretty mean way to describe me. Of course, I wouldve had the exact same thought, but

    Would you?

    We faced each other and smiled.

    It really was a hard decision for me, you realize. Letting go of Kaijin and Garm was heart-wrenching. Im d its proven to be the correct answer, at least.

    Yeah, theyre really working hard for me. We have a steady supply of armor thanks to Garm, and Dold and Mildo are a huge help in our construction efforts. And with Kaijin handling all sorts of things I couldnt, were still able to function as a coherent group right now.

    Is that so? Well, perhaps it was all for the better, then. I thought theyd be better off exercising their skills in a freer environment, rather than toil in obscurity over here. And how has Vester been, by the way? He didnt join you on this visit?

    Well, I invited him, but

    I did invite him, but he refused.

    He was all Oh, I do appreciate it, but I could never show my face to King Gazel until I can offer him some real aplishments! and so on. If you ask me, I think he just wanted to stay focused on his research.

    Ha-ha-ha-ha! Now thats the Vester I know. So he has an environment where he can put his genius to work now, eh? Wonderful to hear, the king said with a smile.

    Deep down, he must have truly worried about his old staff. It wasnt something he could publicly express, which no doubt led to all sorts of dilemmas. I was the same way.

    Shuna came back with drinks just as I finished offering my thanks. She had brought in some of the whiskey I tested on Yohm before.

    Help yourself.

    Hmm, is thisone of Dolds creations?

    Gazel picked up his ss in wonder. It was almost crystalline in appearance, and it gave off a pale gleam in the light. The ss bore an intricate pattern, and it didnt take an expert to see its value. This was also a magitool with a magical inscription lurking under the artistry to apply an antidote effect on anything poured inside. Youd need to be a magic user to trigger that, of course, but

    Ah, this has an antidote magic inscribed in it? Very thoughtful.

    The king spotted it in an instant. Then he activated it.

    You can use that to check for poison, I said, but Im a monster, so Im too resistant to have much use for it myself.

    It was true. Alcohol isnt exactly poison, but too much of it can lead to unpleasant experiences. Some people had trouble digesting it, leading to acute alcohol poisoning if they werent careful. I doubted the dwarves would have a problem with that, but just in case, I figured.

    Gazel brought the ss to his lips. The smell instantly registered in a look of surprise.

    Hoh! A very elegant aroma.

    He took a couple moments to savor it. I, on the other hand, took an immediate gulp. I could feel something hot burn through my throat as I imagined my head catching on fire. Sadly, itsted for a mere instant.

    Report. Poison resistancesessful.

    Dont seed on that, man! Alcohol isnt poison. Why doesnt the Sage get that? Ive made this lovely indulgence for myself, and I cant even enjoy it. It was very depressing, but Id just have to be content with seeing others cherish it instead. Nothings sadder than an exquisite liquor you cant even get drunk off of.

    My, my, my!

    Watching me take a swig, King Gazel tried a sip of his own. Im sure the ensuing sensations that ran down his mouth, throat, and stomach were like nothing he had experienced before. But he was a dwarf. He didnt gag on it like Yohm did.

    I like it, he said before asking Shuna for another ss. Dolph watched on behind him, no doubt a bit jealous. He probably had a sip earlier to test it for poison, so now hed know what it tastes like. Vaughn, left out of the party, simply gave his lord a perplexed look.

    Would you like some as well? Shuna offered, reading the atmosphere.

    Ah, yes! Just one ss, then.

    Dolph greedily epted his cup, as if hed been waiting for the invitation all his life.

    It may not be right to drink during guard duty, Vaughn dutifully stated as he took his own, but to us, a good drink affects us no more than breathing the air.

    They took their respective swigs.

    Mm, mmmmmm?!

    Vaughn did a poor job hiding his reaction to the alcohol burn.

    There is no need to be modest. The kingughed with a fiendish grin. We are the only ones here. Lets drink together, as we did in the past!

    Y-Your, Majesty, Im not sure we should

    All right! Let us, then!

    Despite his grizzled, battle-worn features, Vaughn wasted no time shouting over Dolph as he took a seat to Gazels right and thrust his ss in Shunas direction.

    If thats what His Majesty wants, thats what His Majesty gets. Lets have it!

    The king gave anotherugh as he pped Vaughn on the back, making him wince and cough a bit. Wah-ha-ha-ha-ha! What has gotten into you today, Vaughn? Youre so open to suggestion, for a change!

    Ahh, enough silliness! We have a toon of elite forces on standby beyond that door. There is nothing to worry about. Plus I doubt these visitors of ours could possibly mean us any harm. They would achieve nothing from it. If they intended to, they wouldve taken action thest time we shared a drink together, Vaughn said, taking another swig.

    This was enough to either make Dolphs concerns go away or just make him give up entirely. Either way, he plopped down to the left of King Gazel. Let me have some, too, then! he said, presenting an empty ss to Shuna. I wasnt sure exactly when he emptied it, but I suppose it was too tempting for him to resist.

    After we enjoyed this bender for a little bit:

    So, Rimuru! Before I be too inebriated, I wanted to ask: That potent magical weapon you used to defeat Charybdis; what is it, exactly? I am told you unleashed a force unlike anything seen before, more powerful than even the most fearsome of tactical-level magic attacks.

    Ahthat

    Yes, that. The thing I already exined to them but failed to get anyone to believe. That crazy-powerful attack from the demon lord Milim, the one that indirectly led to this state visit. Ah well. Lets try giving them the truth one more time.

    Hmm Well, nobody believed me when I told them, yknow. I dont think you quite understood what I was talking about, Dolph

    I didnt?

    No. That wasnt any secret weapon of ours or anything. It was really just the power of the demon lord Milim.

    Ah, Sir Rimuru, you and your jests again

    Well, hear him out, Dolph. Vaughn stroked the hairs on his chin. Im rather curious about that question myself. Asmander in chief of our armies, I know that if a hundred Pegasus Knights working in tandem cant take down a threat, the only thing left to turn to is tactical-level magic. The most effective approach would be to neutralize the enemys magic defenses and deliver constant damage without giving them a moments rest to heal themselves. But Jaine told me herselfin her eyes, not even a nuclear-level magic strike could defeat the likes of Charybdis. The power levels needed would bend the rules of magic themselves, leading to heat-transfer problems or somethingthe exact details are beyond my understanding, admittedly, but in short, magic wouldnt work, would it? So neither would magic weapons, I imagine?

    Jaine was the arch-wizard of the Dwarven Kingdom, an expert in all forms of magic and someone smart enough to notice that her skills didnt work on Charybdis. Magic, in this world, gained its energy through magicules, unique particles that floated around in the atmosphere. Charybdis had the power of Magic Interference, letting it dispel those magicules and render all magic useless. I only discovered that because I possessed that skill myself.

    Lets say, for example, that a fireball attack works by heating up magicules in the air and directing that ball of heat toward your target. If I can dispel the magicules around me, that drastically reduces the transfer rate of that heat through the air. Its possible to shut down shing-, freezing-, and lightning-based attacks in simr ways. Pretty useful stuff.

    If you wanted to break through that, itd have to be via something besides magicules. Instead of aiming right at Charybdis, perhaps we couldve triggered a shock-wave st that heated up the air and sent that wave hurtling toward it. Maybe we couldve damaged it more then.

    We were flying by the seat of our pants out there, too focused on the fight to really notice any of this. It was toote to quibble about it now. But what was Milims attack, really?

    Understood. Two possibilities are avable. Either the Magic Interference was obliterated by an evenrger force, or some simpler attack was used that did not work via magicules. Due to data collection errors, the exact attack cannot be identified. However, there is a high chance that the former possibility is correct.

    That was the Sages guess. As it saw things, the presence of that unknown material it couldnt detect the nature of indicated the second scenario was unlikely. Plus, logically speaking, it was totally possible for someone with the magical strength and energy of Milim to simply overwhelm Charybdis in a magical arm-wrestling match.

    Dolph shrugged. Indeed, magic was wholly useless. But pinning everything on the demon lord Milim just seems too convenient an excuse to me. If you had a previously unknown weapon you wished to keep a secret, though, that makes it more understandable.

    He was more willing to believe we had a secret doomsday bomb of some kind than that Milim actually agreed to join inbat. King Gazel gave him a thoughtful look.

    But, Dolph, do you think thats possible? Even if we made our tactical magic ten times more powerful, do you think that would have defeated the opponent? We are talking about a monster that annulled the almighty force of a high-level dryad-driven spirit. Any magical force capable of defeating it would be beyond anything I could imagine. But with Milim, the dragon princess herself, we should expect the unexpected, to be sure.

    Gazel, at least, seemed familiar with her. I didnt even know if Milims attack was magical or not, but either way, it obliterated Charybdis. The king was right; it really was beyond anything I could imagine.

    So you think that really was Milim? asked an excited-looking Vaughn.

    Yes, well That would exin a number of things. But why would a demon lord like her be there? That I cannot say. If you im Milim was with you, could you exin exactly what led to that?

    Now the king had pointed the argument back at me. Dolph and Vaughn followed his gaze.

    Yes, wellitll be a bit of a long story. But let me begin with what happened after Ist took leave of this kingdom.

    So I did, telling them about everything following my unceremonious removal from Dwargon. The rest listened on, consuming our brandy and finger food in silence. By the time I was done, a third of the barrel was gone. Talk about maintaining a pace. The barrel wouldve been bone-dry by now if it was beer Id provided, no doubt.

    That does seem to make sense, but

    The very idea of taming that demon lord Imagine!

    Hard to believe, indeedbut we do have reports of a young girl taking a central role in the battle

    The three looked at one another, exchanging their own takes. Hmph! Shion snorted next to them. Sir Rimuru would never lie to anyone! I supposed she must have been sampling some of the wares in the barrel with the rest of them. Shuna was the sole attendant responsible for keeping our cups full and our stomachs filled with something to absorb all the liquor. It certainly kept her on her feet. Very thoughtful of her. I wish Shion could learn from that a little.

    As I thought about that, King Gazel and his men made their conclusions.

    I believe your tale, Rimuru.

    My apologies for mistrusting you. It was just rather difficult to wrap ones mind around

    Wah-ha-ha-ha! You are a mysterious one indeed, Sir Rimuru! Making acquaintances with the oldest demon lord in thendand in such a short time, too!

    Finally, they were seeing things my way. Which was better for me, I suppose, but either way, I was d we were on the same page. I figured that was the end of the nights serious discussions, but I was wrongif anything, our summit conference disguised as a domestic drinking party was only getting started.

    Our conversation turned to recent events in our respective kingdoms as well as ourtest research results. I also heard about an event nned for tomorrow, where wed go before the public and formally dere friendly rtions between our two countries.

    As the night wore on, the topic drifted over to the whiskey Id brought.

    This is such a wonderful drink. I have never tasted anything so intense before. What is it exactly?

    The barrel was now less than half full, which I probably shouldve expected. This was some heavy drink, and we were having it straight on the rocks, so a little drunkenness at this point was unavoidable.

    This is called whiskey. Its made by distilling beer.

    Oh? What is this distilling?

    Hoo boy. This was gonna get thorny.

    Well, youre a researcher, so Im sure you know its the alcohol in beverages like these that makes you feel drunk. Alcohol has a lower boiling point than water, so if you boil a fermentedpound like beer and collect the steam that results, youll wind up with a higher-alcohol beverage. Thats what a distilled spirit is, basically.

    Gazel nodded at my executive summary. I see. Perhaps that high-grade liquor made by the otherworlder was crafted in the same way.

    An otherworlder?!

    Oooh, now this sounded like some useful information. Id love to meet them, if were all from the same country.

    Yes. In the capital of the Empire, there was a beverage created by an otherworlder who was presented to the emperor. Some of it was put up for sale, and given the limited supply, its being traded for exorbitant prices. It seems it cannot be made inrge quantities; does the same apply to this whiskey?

    Ah. Too bad. I wanted to check out the Eastern Empire, but they were a full-on military state, and they ran their borders pretty tightly. Itd be harder to pay a casual visit than itd be with the Western Nations. Plus, they even had a specialized force devoted to monster yingnot to mention monster-specific fighters in the west as well, something else Id have to watch out for. No need to rush itbest to wait for the right opportunity to meet this Empire otherworlder.

    If I had to guess, the short supply was more an excuse than anything. Perhaps they didnt have facilitiesrge enough for mass manufacture, but money could do a lot to fix that. They probably just restricted production to retain its premium value.

    Well, this is a luxury item of sorts, so we cant make massive quantities. Its not a technological problem, though; more of an issue with my nations food situation. Remember how we didnt even have beer to offer you at your visit? Weve finally finished growing some test samples for the wheat and barley wed need for that. Well begin brewing in earnest starting next year, but depending on how much grain we harvest, theres only so much we can devote to high-end distition like this.

    So as I told them, we can only make enough to enjoy for ourselves.

    Ah, is that so? Yes, we rely on Farmus or the Empire for much of the food we import as well

    Indeed. Our low food self-sufficiency is our kingdoms single weakness.

    And you cant use magic teleportation to send food long distances, unlike weapons and armor. Youre forced to work through merchant middlemen. Which is partly why weve made ourselves into a sessful free-trade city, but

    Hmm. Interesting. Their nation was built from the ground up for self-defense, butrge-scale crop production couldnt be very easy in underground caverns. It wasntpletely shut off from sunlight, but it wasnt really suited for food production, either. Thats why they decided to tackle that obstacle by polishing their tech skills and encouraging trade. Being a free-trade city pushes more merchants to stop by, strengthens economic bonds with other countries, and makes them a more valuable asset to the world atrgehence why the Dwarven Kingdom was such a force in thisnd by now. Id love to learn from that and build our own economic links.

    But something else about that grabbed my attention.

    Hey, can I ask a question?

    Mm?

    When you said you cant use magic to transport food?

    Ah, yes, about that

    Dolph exined it all in King Gazels stead. As he put it, transportation magic wasnt a cure-allusing it to teleport organic matter could transform it, due to all the magicules itd get exposed to. Things like fur pelts might just have their quality affected a little bit, but food would be mutated into something wholly inedible. Gobta had mentioned to me that the Dwarven Kingdom had transport offices in ce; I was hoping to research them a bit to see if they could help with our own logistics. Hearing about this issue sounded like a big setback.

    But you can transport people all day with teleport magic, I mused. Dolph and Vaughn immediately seized on that point.

    Exactly. Jaine tells us that teleportation works on wholly different principles and levels of magical force consumed. She mentioned it during a military conference where we discussed more effective methods of troop transport.

    Ha-ha-ha! I thought itd be nice if we could teleport an army division directly behind the enemy with magic. But apparently another nation tried that once and wound up killing several thousand soldiers in the blink of an eye. It was meant to be ast-ditch tactical maneuver, but it wound up wiping the nation off the map.

    Hold it there, you! King Gazel bellowed. Are you drunk? That is confidential military intelligence!

    Ah! II apologize, Your Majesty!

    Aye, shouldnt have let that one slip. Sorry, sorry. Forget about it.

    Normally, Id court-martial you for that one. Honestly

    The king was forceful in his words, but his demeanor didnt indicate much offense. Dolph and Vaughn just smiled and expressed their regret, no doubt recognizing this.

    I see, though, I ventured. I suppose well need to build our trade routes the old-fashioned way. Were on our way to procuring an import source for fruit, too

    Oh? Somebody besides us has tried to build ties with you?

    More or less. Not a humanoid kingdom anyway.

    What? Which country, then?

    Weve only exchanged envoys at this point, but the Beast Kingdom of

    No! Eurazania?!

    Ridiculous! That domineering Beast Master, reasoning peacefully with other nations?!

    I find that very, very hard to believe

    This came as more of a shock than I expected. I felt a little proud at so thoroughly flooring them like that. I gave them a grin, basking in it.

    Oh, believe it! I had the chance to get acquainted with the demon lord Carillon. He kind of owed me a favor, so I suggested we open up some trade ties, and he dly agreed to it. So we sent teams of envoys to each other.

    So not just Milim but the Beast Master as well, you? If thats a lie, then youre the greatest impostor this century has ever known. But

    It doesnt seem like one to me.

    If so, then Tempest is suddenly more important than ever. You may be sitting right at the center of world trade before long!

    So, Rimuru, what do you intend to trade with each other?

    Despite their surprise, King Gazel and his team had opted to believe me. I suppose they analyzed it in their heads and decided it mustve been the truth. Gazels eyes were back in king mode now, searching for ways his nation might profit from this. I was ready for it.

    Well, they have a good supply of fruit and other luxury goodsbefitting the magic-driven country they are, I suppose. A far cry from a nation like ours, still scrambling to feed ourselves. Theres only enough fruit and such from the forests to keep our own tes full. If we can get enough trade going with that, well be able to shift more supply over to our liquor manufacturing efforts.

    Ah! Fruit? Could you distill some of that as well?!

    Of course we could. Shuna?

    Yes, Sir Rimuru?

    Right on cue, Shuna presented a different bottle, this one filled with our scarce secret stash of apple brandy.

    Try some.

    She passed out new sses to everyoneher elegant hands filling each one halfway with a clear liquid. Shion had been silent for much of the past while, focused wholly on the drinking effort. I worried a little about her.

    Hohh! What a sweet-smelling concoction this is!

    The scent was thicker and mellower than the whiskey from before. King Gazel was immediately in love with it, letting just a few drops fall upon his tongue to sample it before proceeding.

    Icannot believe this. This is even better than that drink from the Empire I mentioned

    Hes had some of that?! I resisted the urge to ask. Unlike that otherworlders liquor, I had the Sages Analyze and Assess skills to help me craft the best distition process possible. It was then aged in barrels made from magical trees harvested from the treants vige, ensuring all the beneficial traits of the original ingredients were matured to their fullest. Keeping thetent vors, in other words, while imparting aromas from the barrel itself created exquisite harmonies that only deepened the final vor.

    The result was this transparent liquor hereaging didnt give it a whiskey-like amber hue; it remained crystal clear. Amber would make it look more like fancy liquor, but that was really a matter of personal preference. This tasted a hell of a lot better. If I had started from scratch on this, I wouldve had to spend years sifting through and selecting the finest ingredients. Relying on my magic skills instead felt a bit like cheating, but nobody could say that the final product loses out at all.

    I do hope your overtures with him seed, King Gazel whispered to me. I could tell there was a flood of emotions behind that statement. Dolph and Vaughn both eagerly nodded their agreementeveryone mustve really liked that brandy.

    Suddenly, Shion stood up. No need to worry about that! she shouted. Sir Rimuru is bound to solve all our problems. It is now a given that we enjoy a wealth of delicious food on our tables on a daily basis. Having it be joined by good drink is all but promised to us!

    She entuated her point by draining her ss, settling back down, and immediately falling into a pleasant, self-satisfied sleep.

    I found myself at a loss. Youre making me handle all this now? I wanted to yell at her, but she was already far off into dreand. Its just every time with you, isnt it, Shion? Geez. Still, it was weird. Whenever I had Shion avowing her trust in me, I felt like I could do pretty much anything. Id bitch and moan about it, but Id always try to make her wishese true.

    Well, I offered, if thats what Shion heres expecting, Ill do my best, I suppose.

    Hee-hee! How reassuring to hear, Gazel said. Id expect nothing less from a fellow pupil of Hakuro like yourself, Rimuru. I hope you will be generous with this when the timees.

    Hakuro doesnt have anything to do with this, man. And I know I readily agreed to it, but the Beast Kingdom of Eurazania wasnt exactly right next door. Maybe we could ze a rough track, but paved-over gravel was out of the question for a while.

    Well need to build some kind of transport path first, of course.

    Ah, about that The hard work your crew has been putting in is nothing short of astonishing. They work several times faster than the best of our engineer corps, and seeing them build a road practically before my eyes sends shivers down my spine.

    Yeah, Im pretty impressed, too.

    But are you sure you are content with this? We are providing you with no support at all. I didnt expect you toe up with such a splendid highway for us

    Hey, dont worry about it. Thats what we promised you. And actually, I have another offer for you, so if youd be willing to give it some thought going forward

    I gave him a satisfied grin.

    Step one, put your partner in a good mood. Step two, move on to the main issue. All ording to n. It was now time for me to sell the king on our Low Potions and procure a doctor or two from themmy two biggest goals here. The result: a total sess, as I extracted a promise that he would give both offers ample thought.

    With the night now behind us, today was the big day of our friendly bteral rtions pact.

    I felt fine, of course, but King Gazel seemed totally unaffected by all the whiskey he drank. Dolph, on the other hand, was looking a bit green around the gills, and I heard Vaughn was still sleeping it off in his room. Wasnt he supposed to be an admiral pdin in the Dwargon force? Could he get away with that? It wasnt my ce to criticize how they do things in foreignnds, bute on.

    Gazel whispered at me to keep smiling, so I did. The ceremony came and went, and while I was still nervous throughout, nothing terrible happened. Not until just before the end of it, when I was expected to say a few words.

    I pored over the speech in my brain before my turn came up. Rigurd and Kaijin had offered some feedback before I left, so after several rewrites, I had it memorized. I can do this. Lets rock!

    In another few moments, King Gazel wrapped up. I was in slime form now, and Shion held me up to the skies in front of the lectern.

    Umm, hello, everyone. I am Rimuru Tempest, lord and overseer of the Jura-Tempest Federation, or just Tempest for short. To tell the truth, I am, as you see, a slime, and one who was actually born rather recently. Through various twists and turns of circumstance, I came to know and foster a close rtionship with Yohm, the champion. When the orc lord threatened to conquer the Forest of Jura, we both worked together to fight off and defeat this menace. Here, in this wonderfulnd called the Armed Kingdom of Dwargon, man and monster work together to create what is truly an ideal and prosperous coexistence. It is an ideal I wish to pursue for ourselves, as we attempt to build a nation in the Forest of Jura that serves as a bridge between the human and monster races. King Gazel has given his stamp of approval to my dream, which I cannot thank him enough for. Going forward, I want to maintain the mutually beneficial rtionship we have. In order to do that, we will need help from each and every one of you. There are a great number of monsters in my nation, myself included. In fact, it would be fair to call ourselves and of monsters. However, at our core, we are no different from any of you. Instead of fearing us as monsters, I hope you will ept us as new friends. I hereby swear to you that everything I have said is the unvarnished truth, and with that, I conclude my address to you.

    It was short, but I still put as much firm emotion behind it as I could, hoping it would reach the hearts of Dwargons people. I was trying to be honest; it wasnt like I was capable of pulling a bunch of crap out of nowhere for a speech like this. I also didnt forget to casually note my rtionship with Yohm, who was starting to be a legend in his own time.

    To me, the speech was pretty well perfectbut King Gazel still gave me an earful about it afterward. One, it was too short; two, it was too self-effacing; three, it was too much of an emotional appeal. To him, it was a near-perfect zero, but its not like I would get Gazel-style feedback from the likes of Rigurd or Kaijin. Ill let it slide and tackle things in earnest next time.

    A leader was someone who governed his country; it therefore wasnt advisable for one to depreciate himself in public, it seemed. That was all the more applicable when addressing a foreign audience, since that could lead to them writing you off as a pushover.

    Most important of all, however, was that ruling a nation under the concept of Wouldnt it be nice if? was strictly prohibited. As Gazel put it: I wont ask you not to expect great things from your people. But if you speak like that, could you me them if they betray youter? A leader is treated as a leader because he leads. Hed be wholly unsuited for government if he cant even believe what hes thinking. Truly wonderful happenings wont simplye running up to you. You need to grab them for yourself.

    I suppose that advice came from the heart; hed never need to say it otherwise. I epted it with my utmost appreciation. I had lived wholly outside the realm of politics, but now I had (somehow or other) be the head of a nation. I had to stop crying about things and start doing things.

    In a way, building the kind of rtionship with King Gazel where he kept looking out for me like this Could I have asked for a better stroke of luck? I wanted to harness that luck as much as I could, no matter how much our personal interests got involved.

    That wrapped up all the major events at Dwargon. Beyond a few casual meetings, Id be devoting the next few days to tourism and the like.

    Dolph would be leading me around. He headed the Pegasus Knights, but that job was ssified; officially, he led the civil servants who filled the governments bureaucracy, which chiefly meant he was King Gazels assistant.

    So was there somece you wanted to see? Ill be happy to fill your requests to the best of my ability.

    I didnt hold anything back. I wanted to check out every facility here in Dwargon that could teach me something to improve on back home. Dolph was amodating to it all, thankfully, and we spent several days going through all the Dwarven Kingdoms most famous spots. Production workshops,rge-scale transport facilities, even cavern air-purification setupsthe works. A lot of it would be helpful to uster, I was sure, especially the air-conditioning facilities and such. I definitely wanted to get something like that set up for Vester and the rest of the gang conducting research underground.

    Regr people arent allowed inside here, though, are they? I asked Dolph.

    Ha-ha-ha! Not normally, no, but we have a technology-sharing agreement with you. You already know about things even more ssified than this; theres no point hiding anything more from you.

    That was a relief. It also showed exactly how much Gazel trusted me.

    We finished up most of the touring over the next few days. But of course, there was one ce in the Dwarven Kingdom Id never want to omit. Thats rightthe Night Butterfly.

    Ah, nightlife! I was rudely interrupted by a highly agitated Vesterst time I paid a visit, but that was no worry this time.

    Gobta.

    Yes sir!

    You sure youre fully prepared?

    Of course, sir!

    Well, thenin that case, shall we head over to the ce I promised you?

    Ooh, finally, sir! Cant wait!

    We smiled and chuckled at each other.

    Gobta and I had been discussing things in great depth to prepare. I would retire early to bed, use Replication to keep a version of myself in there, then head back out to rendezvous with Gobta so we could hit the club together. Kaijin and the others were aware of our ns and would meet us there. There was no need to worry about unwee visitors since we had reserved the entire ce for ourselves tonight. I was covering all the expenses; Id been saving up for it, and I still had some of the gold fromst time, so I doubted Id get cleaned out.

    It was gonna rock.

    I mean, I wasnt anticipating much, but Gobta and the rest of the gang were so excited, I didnt want them to be a pain on the staff or anything. I waschaperoning, thats it! A grown-up conscience for the rest of the crew. Convincing myself this was true, I waited for the night.

    Once night finally came, I snuck out of my room, beside myself with anticipation. My body double was in bed, and I knew what Shuna and Shion were doing. They, of course, were my biggest obstacles to enjoying my night. Shion was engaging in some night training with Dolph and Vaughn, with whom she had hit it off, and luckily, the session was set to run exactly as long as our reserved time at the Butterfly. Shuna, meanwhile, was meeting with the pce cooks to organize the going-away banquet tomorrow night.

    God had truly blessed us with perfect timing. Without this opportunity, Id never have had a moment to myself. It was little wonder that I couldnt wait for night to fall.

    Gobta, you there? I whispered.

    Yes sir! Right here, sir! he whispered back.

    I gave him a nod of approv spring in our step as we walked.

    Sure gonna be fun, huh? Gobta asked for the millionth time. He was really attached to this ce; hed been bugging me abouting there for ages. He probably couldnt be happier now, as his massive smile suggested.

    Our preparations fullyplete, we followed the familiar path without fail to the club. The moment we opened the door, we were eagerly greeted.

    Oh! Hello! Its the big slime himself! Hey, everybody, hes here!

    Good evening!!

    Eeeeee! Ive been waiting forever for you!

    Wait! I get to hold him this time!

    What?! Since when do we have a rule like that?

    Wee back! the owner shouted. Everything been good with you?

    You bet, sir! How bout all of you?

    Oops. I let a little bit of Gobta slip in there.

    Oh, of course! The rest of your friends are already here.

    We had the whole ce to ourselves, so my friends meant Kaijin and the dwarves. Led inside, we saw them in the main lounge, each with a femalepanion and in their own respective states of bliss.

    Rimuru! Hey, Boss, this ce is spectacr!

    Yeah, thanks for inviting me today, too, Sir Rimuru!

    Why wouldnt I, Kaido? Youve been a lot of help to meat least let me spot this for ya. Were outta here in two days, and you probably wont see Kaijin too often after that, either. So lets kick back and chat, okay?

    Sounds good to me!

    Hah! Whatre you, crazy? A club like this, and you wanna chat with other guys?! Cmon, we got all these finedies herelets have some fun, too!

    Yeah, Kaido! Kaijins right!

    Right. Tonight I brought along some nes I made for youdies as souvenirs. Take whichever ones you like!

    !!

    Good to see Kaijin was being Kaijin. The three brothers seemed to enjoy themselves well enough, too. But yeesh, Dold, when did you make those nes for thesedies? Trying to earn some brownie points? I cant take my eye off this guy for a single moment.

    Hey! No fair! Youre tryin to get a head start on us!

    What? This is a battlefield, man. Only the strong survive!

    It was an incredibly cool way for Dold to fend off the usation, I thought, although other peoples mileage may vary. The women seemed to enjoy the presents well enough, though, so Dolds tactics certainly won out tonight.

    At the moment, I was on the knees of the owner, a familiar boinging sensation making itself known behind me. Yes. This is it. This is it! This is what men go wandering in the vast wastnds forthis oasis, this fleeting sanctuary.

    It filled me with such deep emotion that I offered her a drink. The club had all the usual itemsbeer, wine, milk, assorted fruity thingsbut I had a sneaking suspicion itd be offering more mature selectionssay, whiskey and brandy before long.

    Ooh, whats this?

    Ah, a new product were nning to make. Well be providing King Gazel with a supply, but well let you guys have a bit as well, so offer it to your regrs and see what they think. Id love to hear whatever feedback you get.

    My! Are you sure its all right?

    Oh, no problem. We cant make very much, though, so its not the kinda thing we can ramp up production on for money. Maybe if you couldp your regrs one ss each, then see how much theyre willing to pay after that? Id like to do some test marketing.

    Well, arent you a shrewd little rascal, Sir Slime! I cant believe this is the same slime who gave that stiff speech in the main za earlier!

    The owner smiled warmly andughed. Realizing she was in the audience filled me with embarrassment. And here I thought shed be asleep during the day since she works the night shift.

    Yeah, well, thatwas kind of an act, you know? I probably looked like a total amateur, didnt I?

    Hee-hee-hee! Yes, lets just go with that. She smiled at my bashfulness. But you know, I really liked it! You sounded really sincere. Thats the kind of thing that attracts people, I think. In that respect, you were a perfect ten. I was like I can totally trust this slime! And Id just love to see a nation like thatpeople and monsters living in peaceful harmony.

    This made me happy. Now I knew there was someone out there who took my heartfelt speech seriously and didnt justugh it off as a delusion.

    Well, thanks.

    That was about all the reply I could muster, though.

    The night was an enjoyable one for everyone involved. Gobta was all nerves at first, but now they were all egging him on to perform some acrobatics for their entertainment. Thedies had him wrapped around their fingers, but he seemed to be basking in it, so I didnt intervene.

    Soon, our reserved time slot was almost up.

    Well, time to head out pretty soon.

    Yeah. I wouldnt wanna bother these girls all night.

    Oh, youre not a bother!

    Aww, youre leaving now?

    Ha-ha-ha! Sorry, maam! I promise well be back!

    I was reluctant to go; still, I had to get back. My Replication double was still active, but if they found out about this, Id be in deep crap.

    Kaido had cleaned up the home Kaijin and the dwarves used to live in, so theyd be staying there for the night. Itd be ready for use whenever they came back, too. Gobta and I, meanwhile, were headed back to our staterooms in the pce.

    Now listen, guys, make sure nobody sees you on the way back home, all right? This whole nights my little secret!

    No point hammering the point home yet again, but I did so anyway. Just to make sure we all had operational security in mind. But then, one of the hob-gobs sitting on the far end of the lounge spoke up.

    Oh? Um, Lady Shuna asked me where I was goin, so I told er everything, sir, but

    Wh-what?!

    The rest of the group stared at him. Gobta went pale and mmy, and the rest of his team was unable to hide their agitation.

    Whoa, whoa, whoa, you told her everything?

    Seriously?! Gobzo, what have you done?!

    That, um. Yikes.

    W-well, Boss, Kaijin said, already stone-cold sober, we, um, were going home. Best of luck with today and, yknow, Shuna and things

    He headed for the door with the other dwarves, leaving us to pick up the pieces.

    Gobtaaaaaa!! What kind of training have you been giving these idiots?!

    I-Im sorry, sir!

    With tears in his eyes, Gobta apologized profusely. But this wasnt the kind of problem a bit of sobbing could solveand losing my temper would help even less.

    Then I heard it.

    You look like youve been enjoying yourselves tonight.

    You were soteing back, we came to pick you up, Sir Rimuru!

    Shunas frigid voice and Shions resentful one.

    Its all over. The dwarves sat themselves meekly on the floor, preparing for the end. They didnt quite make it out in time.

    Time for me to give up all resistance, I suppose.

    W-were so sorry!!

    Hmm? Theres nothing to apologize about.

    Exactly. We certainly arent angry that you didnt invite us!

    Their hatred ran deep this time. And thus, like perhaps a lot of evenings here at the Night Butterfly, ours ended with us wailing and apologizing to the most fearsome women in our lives.

    Gobzo, one of Gobtas Goblin Riders, had put all of us in the doghouse. I thought Gobta was enough of a lost cause, but Gobzo was even worse. Better keep an eye on him.

    The next day, after wrapping up our final dinner banquet, I was called into King Gazels personal chamber.

    Rimuru, he said, I have decided to ept your offer. He handed me a stack of documents outlining a potential transfer of medical staff to our city. This is just a draft, so Id like word on how much youre willing to ept as soon as possible.

    All right. Ill bring this home with me and discuss it with my team.

    Fortunately for us, he seemed willing to take on what I had offered him. It was a nice way to end our stay in Dwargon, not to mention begin our journey back.

 Volume 4 - Ch 3

    TO HUMAN LANDS

    I had a dream.

    A dream that had grown more and more vivid over time.

    Hurry.

    Again.

    Pleasethe children

    Not this dream again.

    Please, save the children

    All right, all right, I promise.

    Please. The children are in the royal capital.

    The what?

    The capital of the Kingdom of Englesia. Please, save them before its toote

    And thats when I woke up.

    I woke up and then realized I was crying. This was no longer something I could just dismiss as a mere dream. I suppose I needed to head to Englesiato human-governedndsas soon as possible. There wasnt a single moment to lose.

    For the first time in several weeks, I was back in Tempest. Benimaru and Rigurd had worked together to keep things running smoothly in my absence.

    No fights or thefts to speak of, my lord, Benimaru reported. Things couldnt have proceeded more smoothly. Of course, if anyone was foolish enough to try any of that, I wouldve taken care of them immediately.

    Weve already received a shipment of fruit from the demon lord Carillon, added Rigurd. They were delivered by air, on the backs of theserge avian monsters, so Im afraid there is just a limited quantity for now.

    The monsters who called Tempest home got along pretty well by default, so I wasnt expecting a sudden crime surge. If anything, I felt like my presence attracted the kind of attention this country really didnt need.

    Our people had already performed quality checks on Carillons shipment and divided it into supplies for food and ingredients for future distition. Very well done, I thought.

    Things seemed to operate without a hitch whether I was around or not. Yohm and his men were getting along well with the hobgoblins, high orcs, and other local monsters. It was more than my presence that kept Yohm from starting street fights. The monsters, abiding by my rules, were quite a bit friendlier toward them than I thought theyd beand nobody in Yohms crew was bigoted enough to look down on them. It was really chill.

    They mightve been a rabble of hoodlums and pickpockets when I met them, but maybe they werent so bad at heart. Plus, I really think Yohms got this inscrutable maism, the kind of charisma money just cant buy. And perhaps because both he and the monsters wanted to work together, they were dividing up their roles with surprising ease.

    Using Tempest as their base of operations, the team was conducting regr patrols around the viges that dotted the forest. If everything was normal, they trained daily under Hakuros instruction. The frontier viges now had a firm support system backing them up.

    Before, if someone discovered a dangerous monster or herd, theyd have to contact the guild, select a team to dispatch them, and asionally send out an investigation party first. Without amunication crystal (an expensive magic item), itd take at least a week for a vige to receive any support at all. Unicorns rode damn fast, though, so if they got an emergency message from a faraway vige, they could head to the rescue within two days. They could just go on and on without eating or drinking. In terms of all-out speed, they could even beat the starwolves.

    Thats what being ranked B-plus gets you, I guess. Good thing they werent all snobby or only allowed virgins to ride them or whatever. That was a relief.

    The Goblin Riders were handling security duties around the main city, but if anything, our capital was almost too well defended. As a result, we agreed to have around five Goblin Riders join Yohms team to handle sudden alerts. They had the free hob-gobs for it, so they were happy to work together. It also helped spread the word about our nation to the more remote viges, so I was all in favor. Yohm appreciated it most of all, and it never hurt for me to be on his good side.

    Perhaps he felt a bit guilty about me doing all this stuff for him, so they provided us some instruction of their own on topics like groupbat, sword skills, man-to-man martial arts, and so forth. I learned a lot from them about survival techniques and the way they kept themselves fed out on the field.

    Our rtionship of trust had grown to the point that it wouldnt be ruined if I was out of town for a little bit. And if thats where it was at, that made me feel all the safer about journeying to humannds.

    That night, I gathered my officials and talked things over.

    So I would like to spend some time traveling around human towns and nations. I want to keep it under wraps, too. No need to make a big deal about it.

    I told them all about the dreams Id been having. Dreams I suspected were being shown to me by Shizue Izawa, the woman I consumed. I believed they revealed some of the reasons why she was so intent on confronting the demon lord Leon, despite all her internal conflict. And I unlocked ess to them simply because I trained myself to nap a bit, out of sheerziness. You never know what life will throw your way.

    But did that mean when I ate Shizu, I took in her very soul as well? I was starting to think so, but the Great Sage provided no answer. Its always lecturing me on things I didnt ask it about but keeps its mouth shut in times like these. I imagine itd answer if I deliberately thought the question, but nebulous queries like these were its main weakness. The Sage, which always sought to be as urate as possible with its replies, probably didnt want to admit it could be wrong about something. What is a soul? Not even it knew.

    Once I was done, I gauged the faces around me.

    I understand, a sullen Rigurd began, but the idea of you setting off alone, Sir Rimuru, is not one we can ept very easily

    Indeed, added Hakuro, if something were to happen to you, it could upset the very foundation of the Jura alliance, and just when its beginning to take form.

    Well, if we dont want Sir Rimuru to go alone, perhaps we could provide him with protection?

    It was Benimaru who extended that lifeline out to me. As long as I could be kept safe, in other words, he wasnt going to chide me too much.

    Then Shion raised a hand.

    It would be all right for me to apany him, then?

    Im sure she hadnt been listening. There wouldnt be anything covert about my trip if she was with me.

    No, I I dont want to cause any trouble this time, so Im nning to do my travels in human form, not as a monster. Soei tells me there are assorted magical barriers covering many of the towns, so if a bunch of super-A ranks like youe with me, were gonna get spotted immediately. Plus I mean, look at you, youve all got horns on your heads.

    Our horns are purely decoration! And Ill work to hold my aura back; I promise you!

    Okay, try it right now.

    Iid down the gauntlet, having had enough of Shions selfishness. If she really could dispel her aura, then sure, thatd work. We could conceal her horns some other way.

    Haaaaaahhh!!

    Instead, her aura just expanded. Wrong way, dumbass!

    Stop, stop! Youre gonna take this building down!

    Shion gave me a glum look of disappointment as I scolded her. I needed to. If I went easy here, Id wind up bringing nothing but trouble along with me.

    Look, youre a strong woman; I want you to keep order around this town for me. Im counting on you!

    Y-yes, sir! I will not let you down, Sir Rimuru!

    Giving Shion apliment and some work responsibility helped bring her motivation back from the brinkeven as her abject failure brought a pained look to Benimarus face. So Im holding down the fort again, he whispered, clearly disappointed. He was probably going to offer himself as a substitute, but if Shion couldnt hide her aura, he didnt have a chance yet, either. Not with the massive amount of magicule energy he carried around, easily the most among the ogre mages. There was no one else Id want to keep watch over things while I was gone, regardless. He was the only one who could retain authority over all the different monster species here. Shion and Soei, meanwhile, werent as deft at inter-monster politics.

    Well, Shuna retorted with a prim smile, I suppose itlle down to me to join you, then. But that was a problem in itself. Yes, Shunas aura wasnt as in your face as Benimarus or Shions, but she was still nearly an A-ranked monster. There was no talking her way out of that. Plus:

    Actually, Ive got a job for you, Shuna. While Im gone, I want you to keep watch over the town gates to make sure we dont have anyone suspiciousing or going.

    If I were there, Id immediately know if any shady characters showed up. The Analyze and Assess skill kept a constant vigil over what happened in town. Soei could do that on a physical level, but not even he could do much about a magic-born who hid their aura well enough to avoid detection. The demon lords were aware of us now; we had to stay on alert. I was friends with Milim and had at least a working rtionship with Carillon, so I didnt think anyone would pick a fight by now, but I mean, these are demon lords. You gotta stay vignt. So I thought it best to have Shuna stick around and keep tabs on our visitors. The Analysis unique skill she had was at least as good an investigatory tool as mine.

    Geld remained silent. He was heading up our road works leading to surrounding nations, which one could say was the biggest civic-works project attempted in Tempest so far, and he wasnt about to abandon his duty that readily. He was too responsible for that, and he knew what his role was.

    Hakuro and Kurobe felt simrly. I could join you, perhaps, the former said, but I imagine youd rather have me continue training our troops, Sir Rimuru.

    Yeah, me too! I still got weapons to make with Kaijin!

    They looked despondent about it but relented.

    That being said, I wasnt about to go traipsing off totally unapanied. From what Kabals band told me, and from the dangers Id ovee so far, I had the impression that I was pretty damn strong by this point. But when faced with a threat as overwhelming and hopeless as, say, Milim, I clearly couldnt afford to let my guard down yet. I could always run if I felt there was no chance to win, but for all I knew, something like her could kill me on first sight. I needed some protection.

    Do not worry. I will always be alongside my master. You may all have peace of mind as you carry out your tasks.

    Ranga seemed a little too eager to say this, with his tail wagging so hard I thought itd propel him into the air.

    Plus, Soei added, I can use Replication to send a body double to maintain contact with Sir Rimuru, informing him immediately if anything should happen. I do not think we need to be that wary.

    As a magic-born with some expertise in traversing human cities, I appreciated the experience hed have in this endeavor. Having them both nearby did a lot to calm my own anxieties, too.

    I also had the perfect guides in mind.

    Yeah, guys, quit worrying about me. I made nice with Kabal and his friends just for this kind of asion. I was thinking they could help guide me.

    I see. In that case, I have no qualms left about this. Sir Ranga, Sir Soei, I leave Sir Rimuru in your hands.

    With Rigurds concerns apparently addressed, he gave me his formal permission to head off. Plus:

    In that case, I had best have Gobta alert Kabal at once. I will get their things ready.

    He was already helping me prepare. Thats Rigurd for you. Always reliable. And with everyone else nodding their approval, I could embark on this journey without any unfinished business.

    The three adventurers walked through the forestKabal, Elen, and Gido.

    Their job was to explore these woods, handling any monster-ying and resource-gathering duties that fell on their shoulders. It was tough work that sometimes required them to sleep outdoors for days at a time, but it was getting to be a lot easier than it used to be. That was thanks to the birth of Tempest, the nation of monsters who called the Forest of Jura home.

    By this point, they had visited the town of Rimuru several times. They couldnt ask for a better spot for their adventures. The ce seemed to change every time they showed up, growing and expanding. It gave them ess to artisans who could fix their weapons and armor, and to be honest, all three wouldnt mind having a dedicated adventurers station of some sort to call home.

    Whenever they showed up, they would bring along the assorted fragrant herbs and fruits they found in the forest. Anything rare they presented was weed with open arms, and before they knew it, they had adopted a habit of keeping an eye out for anything harvestable Tempest might like. It helped them, too, especially since Tempest had seeded in cultivating and producing some of the nts they brought back in quantity. That let them use it in food and such, and that directly contributed to the adventurers general level of satisfaction in their lives.

    Man, Kabal noted, the food over there gets better and better every time, huh? Shunas got to be up there with the cooks in the royal capital by now!

    Nah, better than that! I mean, her stuff would beat any fancy-pants joint back home.

    You said it. Im a good judge of food, you know, and Shunas is top-of-the-line. And some of the team under her are nobody to sniff at, either.

    True. But remember, guys, we arent here just to eat other peoples food, got it?

    Kabal gave hispanions a stern look before they got too carried away. The quality of Tempest cuisine went without saying, but they stood to earn far more than that.

    You guys havent gotten so focused on eating that youre forgetting our real mission, have you?

    Oh, dont be so silly, Kabal.

    Yeah! We got Rimuru relyin on us out here. Better pay him back, eh?

    Kabal nodded.

    Rimuruthe monster who had suddenly appeared in the Forest of Jura and started practically ruling the roost in the blink of an eyehad called them to his chamber earlier. The familiar sight of Gobta the hobgoblin gging them down in the forest was a surprise, but it wasnt the first time, so they managed to keep their cool.

    Um, I guess Sir Rimuru had a request from you guys?

    They werent bothered to hear this from Gobtathey were pleased, even, as they volunteered their time. Rimuru had treated them well, letting them roam freely around town and even having his underlings help them out of a bad scrape. He had done wonderful things not just for these adventurers but for the human race atrge. The berserk Ifrit, the orc lord and his massive horde, the nation-consuming Charybdis: All were unprecedented threats to the small kingdom of Blumund, and Rimuru the slime briskly handled each one. They honestly couldnt thank him enough.

    Not that this was their only motivation.

    Buthey, hey, insisted Kabal, they got their patrols lockin down the forest so tight these days, itd be a waste of time for us to take any guild monster-yin work, wouldnt it?

    You probably got a point, replied Gido. All the monster-based materials we need, and we dont even needa break a sweat!

    Yeah, exactly. And we couldnt have upped our rank to B-plus without him, either!

    That was kind of cheating, though, wasnt it?

    Ahh, dont be stupid, Elen! Its just a lil inside advantage, is all!

    Yeah! You know what they say bout looking gift horses in the mouth, right?

    Im not saying youre wrong, guys, countered Elen, but we have practically a whole stud farms worth of gift horses from him by now, no? We spent a while exining how things worked in our town and with the Free Guild, but still, we havent given him much else!

    Maybe so. Gido nodded. Ive been trying to get some inside info to pay ol Rimuru back, but

    Ah, you know him; he aint the kind of guy to sweat the details too much. He said intelligence gathering was important, too, remember?

    Tempest did indeed have regr patrols navigating the areas around the main townGoblin Riders,posed of hobgoblins and their starwolf mounts. They moved nimbly and quickly to keep the region secure, and it was thanks to them thatw and order mostly reigned around the forest. One consequence was all the monster-derived materials and ingredients that now made their way into Rimurus towna cache that was being channeled partly to Kabals team in exchange for new intelligence. Tempest itself wasnt squeamish about using these materials. Much to the adventurers shock, Tempest was home to several well-known dwarven artisans, but not even they could use all the stuff they had ess to. So whatever couldnt be harnessed for weapons, armor, or food, they treated as scrap and let the adventurers have for free.

    This was, to put it lightly, a windfall. Horned Hare horns, Poison Frog flippers, Giant Bear earseven things like armorsaur horns, if they were lucky. Bringing this stuff to the guild was treated as thempleting their missionproof that theyd in some of the dangerous creatures threatening the towns. This earned them points, and points meant rank upgrades. They couldnt sell these parts for money, but to the adventurers, they were still eminently valuable.

    Was it cheating? Oh, absolutely, but cheating was fine in this business if nobody finds out. That, at least, was the attitude Kabal approached this arrangement with as they sifted through Tempests refuse on a regr basis.

    It was true that Fuze, guild master of the Kingdom of Blumund and head of the Free Guild they were affiliated with, was totally aware of all this. He had spoken with Rimuru himself, had seen the town he built, and knew exactly what Kabals gang was up to. The fact that he simply sighed at them and said Dont let this make your training go to pot, all right? was because the trio were an important link between himself and Rimuru. He knew Hakuro, an ogre mage who offered military instruction to the towns monsters, was training them as well. Thus, he reasoned, even with the way they gamed the system, their skills werent suffering for it.

    Fuze was one thing. Others around them were less appreciative. Anyone shooting up the point rankings as fast as them was bound to be suspected of treachery. Taking it too far could blow the whole arrangement open, so the guild master called them in one day to advise them to exercise a little restraint.

    Now, however, Gobta had brought them much more exciting news.

    But I guess ol Rimurus got a direct request for us today, for a change?

    Yeah! Kinda feels nice to know hes relying on us!

    Mm-hmm. Time to flex our muscles a little bit!

    Thus, with exceptionally high spirits, they made their way back to Rimurus town.

    ording to Gobtas report, the Kabal trio were on their way here right then, likely arriving in two or three days. They were reportedly more than a bit jealous of Gobta just hopping on his starwolf and using Shadow Motion to zip back to town. Elen apparently had the elemental magic Warp Portal in her repertory, but it was only practical for short-range emergency jumps; a very long distance required a massive amount of catalyst energy to work.

    Vesters own warp points needed none of this because they were made out of incredibly valuable magisteel. Perhaps we could provide Elen with one to eliminate the hassle, but they were sorge and heavy that delivery would take major effort. Using a catalyst was the easier-to-employ solution, and given the choice, an adventurer would choose the quick-and-dirty method almost every time.

    But anyway. Rigurd was handling my travel preparations, so for now, I decided to let Vester and Gabil know about the terms of my contract with King Gazel.

    I had gone over the working papers Gazel provided me while on the wolf wagon that took me home. It included the names of dwarves currently working as doctors and the minimum conditions required for their eptance. I looked all of this over and pondered whether I was willing to sign on, discussing matters with Kaijin along the way. As I did, I came to a mental conclusion, one I now wanted to run past Gabil and Vester, since theyd be working with the guys the most.

    Vester was so devoted to his research that he refused an opportunity to return home. Either its going really well, I mused as I teleported into the cave, or really poorly.

    Gabil greeted me on the other side. Ah, Sir Rimuru! he bellowed. Weve been waiting for you. What a wonderful environment this is! He directed me over to Vester, who was deep in the middle of work but scrambled to his feet upon noticing me.

    Good to see you again, Vester. Im d youre doing well, butis it my imagination or have you gotten thinner? Are you eating all right? Or sleeping?

    I am quite fine, sir. The food here is simply wonderful, and our menus are growing by the day, no less. I am eating very well. As for my sleep schedulewell, yes, my work might be affecting that, but I do have a cot here I can use. And besides, its rather nice to sleep only the barest amount that you need!

    So not much sleep, then. Letting him work himself to death would be noughing matter. As much as he liked it, it was still possible for him to take things too far. But he seemed to enjoy it so much that I simply left it at cautioning him to keep it in moderation. If he didnt heed that, I could always force the issueter. Unlike Kaijin, who had to supervise and direct pretty much everything in his job, Vester was devoted to pure researchsomething which Im sure felt like heaven to him.

    So how are things developing? Have you seeded in stabilizing the extraction process?

    Oh, its perfect now, Sir Rimuru. He smiled. The problem did indeed turn out to be interaction with particles in the atmosphere. Performing the extraction in a vacuum environment now allows us to create Full Potions on a consistent basis. We should be able to produce medicine in quantity regrly.

    And hows our hipokute cultivation efforts?

    No problems there, sir! chirped Gabil. Im putting diligent effort into raising them!

    He sure is. At this point, Sir Gabil is something of an authority in pharmaceuticals.

    So now we had a manufacturing facility on our hands.

    At first, I was going to ask Kurobe to use his Researcher unique skill to produce a ton of copied potions for us. However, that presented problems for the future. Relying on some special, secret ability like that created a weak link thatd knock us out if we lost the person in question. We needed an environment that allowed continual work to be done. Nurturing the right technical staff would make us more powerful as a countryter. That was the whole intention behind forging a pact with the Dwarven Kingdom.

    Great. So following discussions with King Gazel, I think were going to see some more personnel in here soon.

    Oh?

    Heavens

    Gabil and Vester both swallowed nervously as they waited for me to continue.

    First, I want both of you to take a look at this.

    I handed them the list of doctors, along with their conditions.

    Hoh. Vester marveled as he read over them. I see Johann and Marchet on this list. With these conditions, I dont see a problem with employing all of them

    His eyes, burning with a new passion, turned to me.

    Theyre each talented?

    Theyre all personnel Id like to have assisting me. If I can train them here right now, I can have at least one train the next generation of researchers, too.

    And you can trust in these people?

    Of course. I stake it on my dwarven pride!

    He certainly acted proud. I wanted to know whether these people would live up to the trust required to live in a ce like this, and judging by Vesters reaction, it was worth betting on. They were already worthy of assisting him, he saidand he was already thinking, like I was, about how thisb would develop in the future.

    What about you, Gabil? You think you can work with the new people we have in here?

    Wah-ha-ha-ha-ha! Not to worry, sir! I have trained my underlings to be as good a guard unit as youve ever seen. Goodness me, if Sir Vester can vouch for them, I could hardly think of a better team to rely on and work with!

    Gabil certainly didnt mind more people around, which meant my answer was clear.

    Great! In that case, Ill ept these conditions and take in all these dwarven doctors. Vester, you said youre happy with these skills and conditions, but Id still like you to examine these documents in detail, if you dont mind. Gabil, you inform the other dragonewts and make sure this caves safe for them all!

    Absolutely, Sir Rimuru!

    Yes, my lord! I, Gabil, will sacrifice every bone in his body to serve you!

    Oh, also, Gabil?

    Yes, my lord!

    Do a good job on this, and Ill appoint you to my executive team. Ill expect you to give it your best.

    Ah Me, an executive? In your cab?!

    Um, yeah. And that applies even if Abil decides to wee you back and appoint you chief of the lizardmen. Youre one of my people now, and Id like to treat you as one. Do you think thatll bother you?

    Notnot a single bit, sir! Nothing would bother me about that at all! II am so overwhelmingly happy that Isniff

    So ovee with emotion was Gabil that he burst into sobs, shedding a steady stream of manly tears. Wonderful, Sir Gabil, wonderful, Vester said as he patted him on the shoulder.

    Whoa. Not so fast. That assumes this is all sessful. Dont pretend its proven fact yet, or else its gonna blow up in all our faces. I want to see serious effort, okay?

    Yes, sir! Never have I been so inspired!!

    Gabil had managed to calm down enough to choke out the words. Which was good, because if we were going to bring our recovery potion business (one of Tempests new specialties) to the next level, I needed him with a cool head.

    Vester filled me in on the detailster.

    At the current rate of manufacture, we could produce a single dose of Full Potion, the highest-quality healing medicine out there, in a full day of work. This included harvesting the hipokute herbs, magically conjuring an air-free vacuum, and operating the extraction equipment. It was a job that ran from morning till evening, followed by another ten hours for the herbal essences to be fully extracted within the potion. It took this long for said essences to make the required magicule fusions in the solution; there was no way to speed up that process.

    It all happened instantaneously when I made it inside my own body, but pointing that out wouldnt help matters. Kurobe could harness his own skills to make one in about three hours, apparently, but like I said earlier, this wasnt for Kurobe to get involved withI wanted him to focus on weapons production. But back to the first topic.

    Apleted Full Potion could be diluted to create a hundred Low Potions. We were using water from an undergroundke infused with magicules, so it was pretty powerful stuff. This dilution works via a magic known as Build Membrane, which was Vesters job, but apparently Gabil had taken it upon himself to learn it and help out as well. They had now divided work duties evenly among themselvesthe dragonewts picked the hipokute herbs, Vester mixed them, and Gabil diluted them into a hundred doses each.

    In other words, we could now potentially manufacture a hundred Low Potions a day. For sake ofparison, one Full Potion could be diluted to 5 percent strength to craft a High Potion, as produced in the Dwarven Kingdom.

    What does this mean, exactly? Heres a quick rundown:

    Full Potion:

    Equivalent to my own self-made healing potion. A de facto cure-all, capable of everything up to and including reconstructing missing body parts.

    High Potion:

    Fully heals even serious injuries. Cannot handle missing body parts.

    Low Potion:

    Heals injury to a certain extent.

    By body parts, Im talking full-size limbs and such, which ought to give an idea of how potent it was. The magicules inside the medicine crafted temporary limbs; then, over time, the actual flesh and blood would regrow itself, just as it was before.

    This was all great, but it led to a thorny issue. What kinds of potions should we be producing? We could only make one Full Potion a day, which meant twenty High Potions and a hundred Low Potions were our production limit. With those research doctors helping out, however, it felt like we could up our daily output to three times that. It took time to grow hipokute, though, so there was no pressing need to speed it up.

    All right. Once we have a steady manufacturing process in ce, lets keep a single Full Potion for safekeeping. After that, well make a hundred Low Potions to satisfy the terms of King Gazels contract. Then well spend a day making twenty High Potionsthatll be kind of a Tempest specialty, and itll help us target a broader audience. So what Im suggesting is well cycle through making a little bit of each. That sound doable to you?

    Hmm. I imagine so, Sir Rimuru, once Johann and his colleagues arrive. I should be able to devote myself entirely to supervising the effort by then.

    If we could make this much happen, Id say that was enough. It was important, going forward, to have Vester serve as a teacher for our future employees, as much as I was sure hed want to shove the grunt work on the new guys and focus on research again. If we wanted to have it easy, wed need to have a fully trained staff working under him first.

    Sounds great, then. Ill be expecting hard work from you two!

    Yes, sir!

    I promise I will!

    With those firm promises, I took my leave.

    Now we had our general direction in ce.

    For the time being, I took ten samples of each potion type from our storage and ced them in my Stomach. I thought theyd be nice to show off to any merchants I passed, especially if I wanted to make these into trademark Tempest goods. Better talk with Kaijin to figure out what I should be charging for them, though.

    Currency in this world mainly took the form of coins, or metal pieces. There were no paper billspaper had only just be amodity, and it was still too costly. I was surprised to find out that the coinage circted around the Western Nations was actually minted in the Dwarven Kingdomwhich made no sense to me, but thats what it was. The conventional wisdom back in my own world was that the value of a currency was directly proportional to the power of the nation that made it, and that rulergely applied here, too. Some of the individual nations to the west minted their own, yes, but Dwarven coinage and its guaranteed quality were treated as the official standard across most of thend.

    To put it another way, it was a key currency around here, the coinage of a superpower. If you wanted to use some other money from a smaller, less powerfulnd, itd be subject to careful scrutiny from a money exchangerwith high fees, of course. The money I had was the gold coins Kaido gave me, so at least I didnt have to worry about that.

    This worlds economy was still in its early stages, in that money was really nothing much beyond a substitute for bartering. I figured there was nobody issuing government bonds, no futures trading, no systems that helped back peoples trust in currencies. It was all based on solid, real-life exchanges, for better or worse. All this was instead made possible in the Western Nations by a regtory system run by an outfit called the Councilbut it was all starting to be too much to wrap my head around, and it wasnt like it involved me at all, so I resolved to check that outter.

    There were generally three types of coins in cirction: bronze, silver, and gold. To me, one bronze coin was equivalent to around ten cents. Anything below one cent in value was considered small change. Their usage depended on each individual nations currency, but I doubted Id be dealing much with anything like that. Silver coins were pegged at one hundred bronze coins, which made them kind of like a ten-dor bill. Two of these coins were the going rate for a night at the inn of a rural farming vigewhich, hey, twenty dors for a hotel room sounds great, but dont expect the quality of a modern Earth hotel or even a hot meal. If anything, two silver seemed a little pricey.

    Finally, gold coins could be traded for a hundred silver pieces, making them the equivalent of around a thousand bucks. This world was based on the gold standard, meaning the metal had inherent value in itself, so this made sense. Some of the peasantry might go their whole lives without handling a single gold coin, which made it easy to gauge what kind of economic prosperity much of the people enjoyed.

    Speaking of things you may never see, there was also something called ster gold coins, or just sters for short. These were produced with a specialized dwarven process and instilled with apressed supply of magicules, giving them an artistic value beyond their mary one. One of these was worth a hundred gold coins, making them chiefly reserved forrge business transactions and payments between nation-states. Which made sensebeing worth around a hundred thousand dors, it was really more like a security certificate.

    Our extravagant evening at the dwarven nightclub a while back still left me with fifteen gold coins to work within other words, about fifteen thousand dors, which meant I was carrying some pretty serious bank around. Not sure I want to think what that night cost me, though

    To sum up: one hundred bronze equals one silver; one hundred silver equals one gold. Easy. So what to charge for those potions? The main reference I had were the Low Potions on sale now in the Dwarven Kingdom, which went for three silver coins a pop. More than I thought! That could be an entire days wages for someone. However, an adventurers main asset was their physical health. It was considered far wiser to shell out for some potion than risk losing a few days or weeks of sry due to injury.

    Trying to skimp on your healing tools on a monster-ying job, where your life was constantly on the line, would be silly. Even if you had a sorcerer on hand for healing, you still needed to take care of yourselfthe dy before healing magic takes effect could easily spell your doom. Some sorcerers were better than others, of course, but either way, having an emergency potion in hand was quicker and much more reliable.

    With that in mind, it was time to think about High Potions. The level of healing they provided was on a scale far beyond Low Potionswhich made sense, given they had five times more hipokute extract in them. Thus, they needed to be at least five times the price, or they wouldnt be worth crafting.

    Listen, Boss, Kaijin said when I asked him about it, those things would be a steal even at quintuple the price. Id say at least twenty silver. This isnt some toy an idiot out on their first errand would purchase. Youd be targeting at least B-rated adventurers with em. Dont be afraid to charge a premium, eitherlets try for twenty-five, maybe.

    All right. Fair enough. It was pretty useful stuff, and I didnt want to be overwhelmed with orders anyway. Twenty-five silver coins seemed like a fair target, tooI wasnt running a charity.

    Wed already decided to supply Low Potions to King Gazel for two silver each. A stock of one hundred would go for two gold coins, then, which meant wed be grossing the equivalent of about two thousand bucks per day? Theyd be a regr customer, too, and it seemed like decent remuneration for the efforts of Gabil and crew. Better to save the higher profit margins for those Tempest-exclusive High Potions, I thoughtsell those wholesale for twenty silver, and thatd be four gold per day; twenty-five silver, and that was five gold. But that was all up to my negotiation skills going forward.

    All right. Ill put the prices up high to start and earn as much profit for us as possible. And in the future, when our operations ten, twenty, a hundred times bigger, Ill do my best to make sure our treasury gets the maximum out of that!

    Thats the spirit, Boss!

    Now I was all ready to go.

    Woo-hoooooo!

    There was something about hitting the big cities that always got my adrenaline pumping. Getting to embark on a trip solo like this, unbothered by any other obligations, made me feel free for the first time in a while. I liked it. I couldnt afford to let this opportunity go to waste.

    Of course, there was one goal I didnt want to forget as I forged my way into humannds. There were those dreams with the children, yes, and trying to secure some new sales routes for our potions, but I hadnt forgotten my original objectiveto meet one or two people from my original world. People like Shizu and her two apprenticesboth otherworlders, as she put it. When I showed her a little bit of what Japan looked like these days, she also gave me some insight into her own memories.

    Yuuki Kagurazaka and Hinata Sakaguchi. I wanted to see them both, but honestly, that Hinata Sakaguchidy kind of freaked me out. She was the kind of person whos relied on nothing but her own powers to survive. Even ten years ago, she was either equal to Shizu or above her power-wise, which unnerved me.

    Might be better to save her forter and hit up Yuuki first. He was said to be the Free Guilds grand master, the highest position in the organization, so he had to be pretty capable, too. If I had his support as a monster, I couldnt ask for someone better to rely on.

    I ticked off all the things I wanted to do as my mind raced with thoughts of the human towns I had yet to see. It had been nearly two years since I was reincarnated in this world, and now, I could finally interact with their nations a little.

    Our own stronghold was deep in the forest, behind the mountain with the cave Veldora was sealed in. The Dwarven Kingdom was northeast of us, Carillons Beast Kingdom southeast, and Blumund to the west.

    Right now, three highways were in the works leading out from Tempest. One, linking it to the Dwarven Kingdom, was nearlyplete. The second, leading to Eurazania, had only just begun construction. The third, headed for the Kingdom of Blumund, would begin to proceed in short time, I imagined. There were (generally speaking) two paths between us and Blumunda trail that plunged straight through forestnd, and another that circled over to Farmus before hitting Jura. That path took longer, but with all the dangers in the forest, the Farmus route was the safer one, if you had the time for it.

    Kabals party usually took that one; it involved beginning on one of the highways from Farmus or the Dwarven Kingdom and taking a turnoff for the forest midway. These were rough walking trails, of course, originally zed by animals. Thus, taking a round trip from Blumund to Tempest was a daunting taskyou could pick up a stagecoach on your way here, as Kabal put it, but you might not be so lucky on the way back, especially if youre trying to cram in three people.

    As a result, even a one-way run took anywhere between two and four weeks, which just shows how impossible it was to schedule one with any uracy. Bad weather or the wrong kind of monster encounter could further dy things. You really did stake your life on the journey; Kabal took his familiarity with it as a source of pride.

    So he and I discussed all this as we prepared to leave. To them, hearing about a new highway opening a formal route from Tempest to Blumund was a real eye-opener.

    What kind of trailre you talkin about?

    Hmm? Didnt I promise you Id build a highway to Blumund?

    N-no, you did, but Its going rather fast, isnt it?!

    Hmm. Is it? It was an ambitious schedule by my old constructionpanys standards, but with the monster crews I had at my fingertips, it seemed doable enough to me. I must be getting too used to this world.

    It is not too fast, no, Geld advised. (He would be leaving town with us, so he could rejoin his work crews out on the field.) Im working hard here, but theres still room for more. I need to do everything I can to earn my keep with you, Sir Rimuru.

    Gido, Elen, and Kabal looked stunned.

    Yeah, um, Geld might say that, but to me, this kind of construction speed is crazy! I mean, even with a nationally funded highway like the one were taking, this level of quality in such a short time couldnt possibly be real

    No, not at this speed. Not even if you had a team of wizard-ss magicians working for you.

    I dont know whats with these guys, really. Theyre so amazed by the tiniest of things. But Im sure Kabal and his gang will get used to things shortly.

    Well, no need to worry about it, I said, trying to shift the topic toward more positive things. Boy, this is gonna be one hell of a trip! I hope youll have fun guiding me, Kabal.

    The mention of his name made Kabal snap out of the weird sort of daze he was in. He gave me a half-panicked nod and boarded our wolf wagon.

    We traveled for a little while after that, but for some reason, our humanpanions didnt seem very cheerful. They stared at me, looking a bit dubious of the whole thing. Maybe they were hoping to spend more than a single night in Tempest before getting back on the road. They had actually arrived right on schedule, the evening after I hadpleted all my preparations. I felt a little bad about it, but we left early the following morning, as nned.

    Hey, thatll be no problem.

    Yep! Youve been real kind to us, Boss.

    Ooh, sure, thats what were here for!

    They all seemed epting enough earlier, but I decided toe out with it.

    Hmm, maybe I shouldve had you guys stay in town a little bit and rest up first?

    Oh, no, Boss! Kabal vigorously shook his head. This wagons almost too well-built, so I was just kicking myself for all the pain we had to go through byparison to get here!

    You sure said it! Elen eximed, clearly waiting for this. I mean, what kind of horseI mean, wolf wagon is this? I havent felt a single bump this whole time!

    Yeah, exactly! This is sofy, it barely even feels like a journey to me!

    Well, hang on, hang on! I had to stop Elen and Gido before they got any redder in the face. What do you mean, you havent felt a bump? Its been springin around all over the ce!

    On roads like this one,id out but still unpaved, the wheels bounced with every small pebble they ran over. Running paths like these at twenty, twenty-five miles an hour made for a lot of shaking. It really made me wish these roads would get done already. But Elen justughed the idea off.

    Hah! This barely even counts as bumpy in my book! Regr horse wagons cant run this fast in the first ce, and if they did, theyd put the passengers through all kinds of hell!

    Damn right, echoed Gido. With a real horse wagon, its a given that your ass is gonna have a bad time. Ride in one for long enough, and youll have aches and pains up and down your whole body! If you think a little tink! here n there counts as bumpy, a real horse wagons gonna reduce you to tears!

    Hes right, Boss. Being in a smooth ride like this and having someone be all like Man, this sucks or You guys tired out yet? I mean, it makes me wonder why we went through all that crap up to now, is all. Especially if youre all set to explore these unknownnds, watching out for monsters that might leap on ya at any timesomething as easy as this doesnt count as a journey at all!

    Well, what do you want from me, guys? Its still a journey either way, isnt it?

    Yeah, well anyway, just rx. Kaijin didnt say anything along those lines when we went to the Dwarven Kingdom in it. Dont you think youre ying this up a little too much?

    No.

    No!

    I sure dont, no

    Ugh. Like I said, what do you want from me?

    Well, look, this is reality, you know? Just another way of traveling.

    No, Boss, Gidoshed back, what Im telling you is that youre crazy to think that.

    Yeah! I mean, the easier the better, but

    That, and Kaijin didnt say anything like that because his guys built this. Hes happy with it because hes got your approval on it, Rimuru. Thats probably why it didnt feel right to state the obvious. Plus, hell, why are Kaijin and Garm even living with you guys anyway, Boss? Isnt that weird?!

    It seemed they couldnt hide their shock at having some of the best dwarven artisans in thend living alongside monsters like us.

    Whats the big deal with that? Theyre friends of ours. And if you dont like having a nice, easy journey, we could always walk instead.

    Well, no, um

    I just said, the easier the better!

    I wouldnt want anything else, Boss!

    If they were that dissatisfied with traveling infort, I figured they wouldve been a lot more eager about my suggestion. Guess not. What a pain.

    Okay, then the topics over, guys! How bout we talk some more about the city you live in?

    They muttered a few buts and as about this, but even they had to admit that a wolf wagon was a pretty awesome ride, so they dropped the subject. Nobody gave me this kind of feedback during myst journey. It was funny to see these kinds of differences inmon sense among my friends. I was nning to purchase a horse and wagon once we hit Blumund, but if they were that keen on walking, maybe I shouldnt bother.

    So the journey continued on without incident. We had left at sunrise, and it was already past noon.

    I cant believe this, Kabal muttered. That mountain looks so small now

    Gido and Elen nodded their agreement. Well, yeah, guys. A starwolfs a B-ranked monster by itself, and unlike a horse, it didnt need to rest after this much distance. If anything, this was a mild jog to that species standard. It could keep on going practically forever at this rate.

    I gave Kabal a wry grin as Geld turned to me. Sir Rimuru, what will we do for lunch? Theres a resting house a ways ahead.

    Ever prepared, he had set up food for us in a nearby waypoint.

    Nice one, Geld. Lets take a break and have ourselves a meal in there!

    That lit up the mood across the wagon. Despite their initialints, the adventurers were well used to traveling in wolf-wagon luxury by now, even enjoying the view out the windows. Talk about self-absorbed.

    Once we reached the hut, Geld hopped off the coachmans seat. The starwolf pulling us was a body double of sorts provided by Ranga, so there was no particr need to attend to it. It was simply being run down the road at the equivalent of cruise control. Geld, however, volunteered to take the seat anyway, iming hed take up too much space. I loved how serious-minded he always was, and it reflected clearly in his work. The perfect picture of an artisan, I suppose.

    As we ate, we discussed our future ns.

    At the moment, we had only zed about half the trail to Blumund. Over a third of it was still untouched forest. We had kicked things off by having me examine the forest from above, picking the route with the fewest obstacles. We drew up a n for building the most suitable highway possible after we took height measurements at regr intervals to figure out how the path sloped.

    Gelds crew was now in the midst of following that n and constructing the road itself. The crew was divided into three teamsone to cut down and transport trees; one to level and improve the road surface; and one toy down the paving and finish it off. Such was the general division ofbor. The route we picked didnt require any wide detours and extended a little bit under two hundred miles, with Blumund being a measure nearer to us than the Dwarven Kingdom.

    On the way was a lush forest, rugged mountains and valleys, and a wealth of native creatures. With this highway, however, merchants couldplete a full one-way walk in under a week. Theyd need to deal with monsters, granted, but itd still be an enticing route to take.

    A regr wagon sans wolf could finish the journey from Blumund to Tempest in three days, as opposed to ten between us and Dwargon. Depending on conditions, this meant a trip from human to dwarven kingdoms could bepleted in around two weeks. The current Farmus route apparently took at least three, and while monsters werent a major threat there, bandits and the like were, so security costs often ate up any potential mary savings. It could make our nation an even more important hub in the local infrastructure.

    But Im getting ahead of myself. For now, after another hour or sos journey by wolf wagon, wed reach the edge of current construction. From there, I imagine wed switch to walking.

    Ah, so thats where well being in, Kabal eagerlymented. He was right.

    You certainly will. Make me proud!

    Sure thing.

    Absolutely!

    About time I had something to do, Boss!

    They were all raring to go, so I imagined I was fine. Soon, our lunch wasplete, and it was back on the road.

    Two hourster, Geld and his crew of high orcs waved their good-byes as we set foot in the deep forest ahead.

    Heh-heh-heh! Better be careful, Boss! This is already the Forest of Jura here! The den of monsters itself!

    But dont worry! Youre with us, so!

    Leave the heavy lifting to us, Boss!

    They were certainly enthusiastic now. I was d. Trying to convince a Jura resident like me that this was a den of monsters would be an uphill battle, however.

    Kabal quickly took out a dagger and began swiping at the coiled vines ahead, carving out a gap justrge enough for a person to squeeze through. Gido, meanwhile, put an ear to the ground, checking for any violent monsters in the area, as Elen ran around and cast spells to grant everyone things like insect repellence, poison detection, and some light bodily defense. A forest like this wasden with potential danger, from stings by poisonous bugs to the thorns on hanging vines.

    I was impressedthis certainly wasnt their first rodeo. I was in human form, wearing my mask. Nobody would ever mistake me for a monster now. I was just the weird littlepanion of a bunch of equally weird adventurers.

    Hey, Gido asked, whyd you bother putting that mask on?

    I cant fully hide my aura yet, actually. Itd be bad if I got caught in some magic barrier, and people found out I was a monster, so this is a just-in-case kind of thing.

    Ahh, you sure dont look like one to me, he muttered back, but he didnt press me any further.

    We continued in this vein for three hours. It was already evening, about time to set up for dinner, but the three didnt show any sign of resting. Instead, they were discussing something, cold sweat dripping down their foreheads. We were on a path that, for some reason, I remembered being on before. What were they doing? I figured I could leave things to them, being veterans and all. One of em looked ready to cry, even. Better butt in.

    Hey, hey, you guys arent lost, are you?

    N-nnnnno, of course not, I dont imagine!

    Kabal was talking funny. I didnt like that. Are we okay? I brought up a map in my mind; this was definitely a path we traversed earlier. Maybe I was just imagining itwait, I couldnt be!

    Quit screwing with me, guys! Youre lost, arent you?!

    The three shivered.

    Im sorry!!

    They shouted their apology in unison, bowing their heads at me. They were lost. Are these guys really professionals or what? Ah well We werent in that big of a hurry, and I didnt feel like setting up camp. Thered be huts set up in the construction zone; we could rest up over there.

    We made it back in about an hour, following the trail we zed. I used Thought Communication to warn Geld, so they had food ready for us upon arrival. My threepanions couldnt have looked more sheepish.

    How could we have gotten lost in a ce like that?

    Kind of hurts my confidence

    Yeah, and Im supposed to be a pro at forest trails, so this is even worse for me!

    Gido seemed to take it the hardest, but it hurt them all, given how much they wanted to show off around me. Geld responded by showing them all a single flower.

    Maybe this was the cause?

    Hmm? Whats that?

    Ah! Elen eximed. Thats a baffledil, isnt it? Theyre a collection target for B-ranked guild quests. Not exactly easy to track down!

    This flower, which has a hallucinatory effect on its environs, was both rare and sought after for use in magical items.

    Yep. This guys been dying our own work effort today, too. He bowed to the trio. Sorry I didnt warn you about it earlier.

    He hadnt bothered, he exined, because he figured we couldnt be lost with my Magic Sense ability. He had a point. Given that I flew right over this patch of forest to help n out the route, the idea that Id get lost walking much more slowly through it must never have urred to him. It was hardly Gelds fault. If anything, it was mine, for wanting to have an Authentic Adventurer Experience without any cheats.

    Oh, no, Im sorry for being negligent myself. Ill help em out more tomorrow!

    Geld had already had his crew track down and uproot the baffledils in the area, lest they interfere with work any further. There were over a hundred stuffed into a bag inside their storehouse. It seemed like a neat opportunity, so I swallowed them into my Stomach and had them analyzed. They were d for it, tooburning them would just release the hallucinogens into the air, and burying them could make them take root and threaten passersby againter. If they were useful enough for the guild to assign quests about them, then win-win, I guess.

    That was our first day on the road. The next morning, as promised, I nned to provide my adventuring team with my full assistance.

    Time to shine, Glutton! I thought as I pointed my right hand forward. In an instant, the trees and growth in front of us disappeared.

    Hey, Geld, Id like to eat up enough width for you to build the road on, but thats gonna take too much time, sadly. Ill just eat whats in the way of us and put it in a big pile, so can you clean up for me?

    Yes, sir. No need to worry about that. Thats our job.

    With his agreement, I breezily ate up the trees and vegetation in our way as I walked. It went much more quickly than yesterday.

    Are you kidding me?

    This is crazy. Im telling you, this is crazy!

    I know Rimurus not, like, normal, but this is just

    I seemed to be scaring mypanions a little, but I wasnt worried.

    Hey! Quit staring and start following me!

    We were back on the trail.

    After about a week of this and that, we finally reached the edge of the forest. It was mostly along the trail I originally surveyed from the air, and we didnt waste much time along the way. I was in no hurry, though. Id been enjoying the sights and wonders along the journey.

    I never tired in slime form, really, and by definition I never got dirty per se, so I admittedly had an easier time of it than others. Elens cleaning magicor whatever she hadhelped a lot, though. I tried it out, and my version was more powerful anyway, so I cast it on the rest. The results reportedly made the journey quite a bit more pleasant for them.

    Building a campfire was a snap, and we had a lot of food along with us. More than anything, though, the wolf wagon in my Stomach,plete with long, sofa-like seating and a solid roof, was excellent. There were sofas in the front and back, facing each other, letting two people use them as beds. I didnt need to sleep and thus could keep watch every night, but they were too polite to let me. So two of us took turns keeping watch while two rested inside.

    It was much more rxing than a lot of inns out there, so the other three loved it. Rimuru, Elen said, beaming at me, lets be adventuring partners forever!! I couldnt say yes to that, but Im d she enjoyed my digs, at least.

    Maybe life wouldve been a lot different if I wasnt leader of the Forest of Jura, huh? I could probably leave most operations to Rigurd and the rest of my bureaucracy by now, but I couldnt go AWOL forever.

    In the future, though, maybe. Once I wasnt so needed any longer, perhaps itd be fun to be a frence adventurer for a while. Too bad you guys will probably be dead of old age by then

    Well, that thought came out of nowhere.

    Now part of me wondered if Milim had simr feelings. Maybe itd be better to be a lone wolf, after all, instead of making lifelong friends who Im doomed to outlive. I dunno. I didnt have enough experience to answer that question right now.

 Volume 4 - Ch 4

    THE KINGDOM OF BLUMUND

    Blumund. A smaller kingdom, poption under a million. It consisted mainly of little viges, collected into regions ruled by noble lords. The only big settlement to speak of was the capital. It was seriously a super-tiny country.

    Guided by my trio of friends, we proceeded to a rural vige. The tranquil sight of it, surrounded by fenced-in fields, greeted us past the forest.

    Our first mission was to reach the Blumund office of the Free Guild in the capital. There, I nned to meet up with Fuze and have him write an invitation to see grand master Yuuki Kagurazaka. No way would they let me just walk up and see the man; I figured Id need some kind of reference. Fuze had already sent word that hed be okay with this, so presumably, hed get that thing written up once I arrived.

    There was a regr passenger route from this vige to the city, serviced by two stagecoaches a day. It took less than three hours to reach our destination. It was a small kingdom and thankfully one with a pretty decent road infrastructure. Transport didnt seem to be a problem.

    Reaching the vige just before noon, we had lunch at the local inn and tavern. As we rxed in there, I suddenly heard someone bragging in a loud voice.

    So yknow what I did? I took my Great Axe and Fwam! I smashed that sucker to the ground! And heres what I got tshow for it!

    Wow! Thats incredible, Bydd!

    Thiss a pretty strong monster, aint it, Bydd? You beat it all by yourself?

    Yeahhh, you could say that. After all, the likes of a Horned Bear aint no threat to me!

    It sounded like he had whipped some powerful monster pretty well. Curious, I took a nce in their directiononly to find the massive corpse ofsomething sprawled out on a table, almost wholly covering it.

    I thought I was going to spit out a mouthful of food right there. I was expecting the Horned Bear of the storythis wasnt it. A total fake; a regr bear with the horn from a Horned Hare lodged in its skull.

    It could admittedly be tricky to tell the difference between regr animals and monsters. Throw in creatures thatre mystic or magical in nature, and they get even trickier to categorize. Ranga, for example, would probably be ssified as demonic, since he relied mainly on magicules for sustenanceif he were carnivorous or herbivorous, thatd be more in the realm of magical. But then, of course, hed been known to chow down on some prey now and then, too. The whole exercise gets a little meaningless after a certain point.

    There was, however, one pointed difference between animals and monsters: strength. Technically speaking, magical beasts be magical in the first ce once an animal is infused with magicules; it was a given that this led to certain physical boosts. As a result, its actually quite easy to ssify a cadaver as magical or notjust examine its muscture and theposition thereof. My magic-driven analysis skills made it simple, although maybe not quite as much for the average vige bumpkin. Not unless the corpse coughs up a magic crystal for them.

    Hey, hes trying to pass off a fake Horned Bear on those guys. Is that, like, okay?

    Hmm? Kabal took a peek. Ooh, youre right. Well spotted, Boss.

    Elen had to stifle augh. Ahh, they stuck a Horned Hare one on it! Anyone whos had more than half an hours magic practice could tell that right off.

    Wow, its that obvious to you guys? So whats the point of doing that? If you saw right through it, Im sure the guild would, too.

    Nah, Boss, I think hes got different motives. Hed get branded a chatan the moment he dragged that thing to the capital, but in a vige like this? Hes the hero of the day! So in a few seconds, Im sure hell be all like Ill guard this vige for ya, so how bout some room and board?

    Aha. Gidos theory made sense. So this was just a swindler, then. You never know what kind youll run into.

    I was prepared to leave the guy alone, chalking it up as a learning moment for me, when:

    Whoa, whoa, hang on a minute. You think I cant hear you bastards mumblin about how you think thiss a fake? You wanna mess with me, you better be prepared to pay for it!

    Bydd, the swindling braggart, stood up and walked our way. Why is it always the guys like these who have excellent hearing? Its like theyre just itching to cause trouble. Plus, there was another side effect to thisit drew the attention of the entire tavern to our table.

    Hey, isnt that Kabal?

    Elens there, too!

    And thats gotta be Gido, then!

    In a few moments, we were surrounded by well-wishers. It was enough to make Bydd hesitate, his face growing visibly paler by the moment.

    What? Ahh, you three are so mean! If youvee back home, you shouldve at least said as much!

    He sidled up to Kabal, so close that I thought hed shortly be giving him a backrub, andunched a flurry of polite bows at him. It was quite the flip-flop.

    Sorry, you were?

    Aw, cmon, its Bydd! The guy you beat up over in the capital a while back? I sure learned a lot from that session, Kabal!

    Theirst encounter reportedly involved Bydd trying to steal some of their possessions. Now hed changed professions from thief to con man. He never quits, I supposeor never learns.

    Still Whoa, Kabal and his friends are pretty famous around here, huh? This swindler isnt exactly on a first-name basis with Kabal, but he definitely knows and respects this trio. The rest of the tavern stared at them, positively dazzled.

    I was sure Kabal didnt appreciate being respected by underworld elements like this guy, but this kind of notoriety was a surprise to me. It sounded like their recent rise through the adventuring ranks had earned them some fame. Which meant Ooh, thats not entirely thanks to me letting them bring back monster parts we didnt need around town, is it?

    I gave the three of them judgmental stares, and they hurriedly turned their eyes elsewhere. Ah wellbetter not pursue it right now. Everyone has little nits theyd prefer people didnt pick at.

    So I wont get into it. Not right now.

    You guys You know why Im looking at you?

    Y-yes, sir!!

    All three responded in unison, of course. Well, good. Now, if I ever need some help, Im guaranteed to have them at my beck and call. Next, lets tackle Bydd.

    And you, tooif you want people to think youre cool or whatever, then why dont you actually help them out when they need you? I think youll find people will treat you a lot differently once you do.

    Yeah, Ill try.

    I let him go with just that warning. I was technically Kabals guest here, so I didnt want to make things awkward for his bandter. Bydd did seem genuinely sorry, so there was no need to go beyond that.

    Apart from that run-in, the journey was going pretty smoothly.

    Soon, we were walking down the street in the capital of Blumund. To me, the buildings seemed old-fashioned but solidly made. A throwback to the good old daysI couldnt say how good they actually were, but definitely that romantic sort of medieval-European feel. Kind of a neat contrast to our own city, which boasted a great deal of Japanese-style homes.

    Everyone we passed by seemed bright and cheerful. The atmosphere certainly wasnt gloomy or downtrodden. ording to Kabal, the government had sent out an alert previously to prepare for arge influx of monsters, but that was now lifted, which meant nobody had to worry about their homes being wrecked.

    Regardless, this was still argish city in an otherwise rural nation, and even here on the streets, I couldnt help but notice how many passersby were armed. Many were also rather, shall we say, suspect in appearance. Even with my mask on, I still felt like just part of the crowd, which I was d for. Its all very, well, fantasy.

    One thing did stick out, though. As I Analyzed and Assessed my surroundings, I noticed that much of the weapons and armor I spotted were in very poor condition. In that way, it seemed fitting for the people around us, none of whom seemed capable of putting up a decent fight. The adventurers I saw in the Dwarven Kingdom seemed a lot better equipped than this.

    Well, that goes without sayin, Boss, Kabal exined. We dont have too many talented cksmiths in this city, ysee.

    Yeah, it can be a pain for us to assemble a full set of battle gear in this joint. Its not the sort of thing money can even buy sometimes.

    Ooh yeah, Id like to get a new magical staff, but I just cant find the right one

    No wonder the three were so shocked to find dwarven artisans working with us. It mightve seemed natural to me, but it mustve bowled over those guys.

    Still, experiencing my first taste of an established town in a while was supremely exciting. I brought a grilled skewer of meat from a roadside stand, taking bites from it as we walked. Even the presence of stalls like that filled me with nostalgia for my old daily grind. I couldnt tell what kind of meat it was, but I liked it. I could Assess it, I suppose, but I wont.

    Instead, I turned my magical eye to the sauce, Analyzing the recipe as I tasted it on my tongue. Now Shuna had something else to add to her cookbook.

    In the midst of our walk, we arrived at the Blumund office of the Free Guild, a solemn-looking stone building. It was five whole stories tall, a rarity given that the highest structure Id seen so far was two.

    Being constructed in a great hollow underneath a mountain, the Dwarven Kingdom had certain height limits you could build up to. That applied as much to the royal pce as it did to some low-rent hovel. The idea of building vertically didnt really exist over there.

    They did have an astonishing amount of sunlight, powered by magic-driven daylight windows dotted throughout the kingdom. But I had thought the whole concept of multi-floor buildings didnt really exist here yet.

    The building seemed to be temperature-controlled somehow, as it was quite pleasant inside. I wasnt affected by temperature myself, but with Sense Heat Source, I could tell the ambient temps were markedly lower than outside. There must have been some sort of magic climate-control feature in this building.

    Maybe this worlds more high tech than Ive given it credit for. Maybe the presence of magic has just made it advance and progress in a different direction from my old one. If it werent for things like monsters or demon lords, maybe wed have an even loftier magic-driven civilization around here. Though, to put it another way, all the developmental energy they could use for that is instead being consumed by handling the monster threat, I suppose. Thats how much it took to stay alive in this world. Harsh ce.

    Right now, the demon lords were granted fairly bountiful tracts ofnd in order to avoid riling them, but who knows? Maybe the humans around here would decide to invade the more monsterden realms before long. And maybe monsters had the strength advantage for now, but there was no telling what the future held. Human desires can be limitless, and wed need to address that back home if I wanted my own nation to keep its privileges.

    Now, I was d I came here. I wasnt nning to antagonize my neighbors, but if rtions ever did sour between us, it was important that I know how the other side lives. Seeing human towns and knowing how their inhabitants lived would have a major impact on our future direction. I wanted to see and learn from as much as I could.

    But no point just standing here. I let the trio guide me farther inside into a chamber that looked a bit like the front lobby at city hall. I spotted a long counter, like the luggage drop-off at the airport, with SALES written above it. I couldnt read it myself; it was the Great Sage who made me literate around here. Good thing for that.

    This counter was divided into three sections. There was the sales department, like I said; the general-affairs department, essible to all guild members; and then an expert window essible only to guild adventurers.

    Sales, as the name implied, was where they picked up and processed anything earned from quests or otherwise meant for guild delivery. The general counter wasrgely for beginners or guild members who lived in town; it was where you went to join or leave the guild as well. The final expert section was only for guild-redited adventurers, which were in turn divided by specialtyretrieval, exploration, or monster ying. This was mainly for members engaged in out-of-town activities, who were generally all referred to as adventurers. This meant that if you wanted to be an adventurer, you had to at least be able to defend yourself.

    How did all this work in practice? Well, for example, there was a department of the guild that specialized in magic. This was open to anyone who could handle magic spells, but that alone only granted you ess to general-affairs services. It took more than just magic to reach the expert tier; you also needed to belong to a retrieval, exploration, or monster-ying department and have actual field experience doing one of those three. That made you an adventurer.

    Kabal, Elen, and Gido were each a member of a different departmentmonster ying, retrieval, and exploration, respectively. That made it easier to divide up duties among them. Maybe they were a lot more talented than I thought, actually. The way its been described to me, only a select few out there can earn that adventurer title and keep it.

    What were the merits of that title? Above anything else, freedompart of the origin of the Free Guilds title. All Free Guild members had to dere which country they belonged to, but adventurers were free to switch whenever they wanted. Changing your residence to a different town, or a different country for that matter, was allowed with rtive ease if you liked. There were restrictions, of course, such as during times of war, but as long as you went through a third nation for the move, it was all good.

    Traveling between nations always leads to hassles with identification and the like. For an adventurer, though, that was all covered as long as the nation in question had agreements with the guild, making it a snap. Adventurers could act freely without ever being bound by borders, a sign of the respect given to them as protectors against the threat of monsters.

    Of course, I say all this, but it wasnt like adventurers changed their dered home nation very often. If they did, it was more frequently so they could choose the country where they were obligated to pay taxes. Freedomes with responsibility, so I suppose if everyone had the chance, theyd prefer to set up shop somece where they had it easiest.

    This was the rundown they gave me.

    I had to head for the kingdom of Englesia after this, so I was definitely hoping I could gain some guild reditation instead of having to deal with a bunch of immigration nonsense. With that in mind, the trio took me to the general-affairs counter.

    Registrations right over there, Boss.

    Ooh, Im sure theyll put you in the adventurer ranks in no time t, Rimuru!

    I dont even think theyd make you take the test, for that matter.

    It was just before evening by the time we got in line. Apparently, the front lobby would soon be swarming with people. It was pretty chill in the afternoons, but at night, itd get packed with people returning from the field. If we wanted to get this done soon, we had to hurry.

    Id like to register as an adventurer, please.

    How old are you? the woman on the other side gently asked. Being a general members one thing, but arent you a little young to be an adventurer?

    Hey, hey, no need for that, Kabal said as he stepped in. This guy here, Rimuru Lemme tell ya, hes way more of a performer than he looks. Is my word good enough for ya?

    I was expecting this, given my looks. Kabals team and I had discussed this in advance, and they had agreed to help me with whatever it took to get added.

    He performs enough to impress you, Kabal? Well, the test can be quite a dangerous thing, however

    Not a problem. I dont mind.

    With the three begging her in stereo, the counter clerk finally (if reluctantly) agreed to run through the registration paperwork. I filled out the sheet handed to mename, age, special skills, birthce, and so on. Just whatever I could fill out was fine, she said, so I simply wrote my name and SWORDSMANSHIP under the skills section.

    That was all it took for a general-purpose membership. Now I needed to decide which department to join. In terms of my achievements, I was qualified for all three, which made the selection process tough. I decided to start out with monster ying. Retrieval would require me to head into the forest and search for a given target item to fetch; exploration required me to take a test in a man-made ruin in Englesia to assess my investigational skills. Monster ying was the only test I could do right there.

    As I filled all this out, I heard people shouting at us.

    Hey! Lookin good, Kabal!

    Elens looking just as beautiful today as always!

    What are you, blind? Anyone who isnt amazed at Gidos pure manliness is just an idiot!

    None of that made sense to me. Why are Kabal and his friends so revered? Theyre just as much celebrities here as they were back at the vige. I pondered that as I wrapped up the entry sheet.

    Are you sure about this? Monster ying might be the most essible, but its also the most dangerous department.

    Oh, hes fine! Elen insisted. Honestly, we couldnt defeat him even if all three of us took him on at once!

    Very true, added Gido. We couldnt hold a candle to im.

    This made everybody in the lobby stare at me, sizing me up. And while I hadnt paid them much attention as I filled out the sheet, they had been talking about me for long before now.

    Whoa, that little kid wants to take the exam?

    Hes crazy! Hes gonna be way over his head.

    Youd have to be messed up in the head to take those odds!

    I havent seen a katana like the one on his belt before, though. Must be pretty rare

    Hey, you never know, maybe hes capable, after all!

    Maybe. Those three are sure treating him nice anyway.

    They certainly werent shy in their assessments. But when Elen dered to the world that I could whip my friends soundly, that only added to the crowds runningmentary.

    Are you kidding me? That kids stronger than Kabal?

    I cant believe it, butif theyre treating him the way they are, then its gotta be true.

    Enough! Settle down, you guys! Im sorry, Boss, this aint exactly a polite bunch

    Oh, its fine, Kabal. So how do we get this test under way?

    The counterdy, stunned into silence at all this, briskly nodded. Umm Yes, well, I hereby grant you permission to take the examination. You must attain a rank of at least D in order to be an adventurer, so I do not rmend this exam for anyone not specialized inbat. The monster-ying departments exam is particrly trying, so its not rmended unless youre at least a D-plus, preferably a C. Are you sure you wish to take it?

    I nodded my approval. It took real strength to cut it outside of town, I suppose. But even that swindler Bydd was an adventurer with a D-plus rank, I heard. It couldnt have been that hard.

    This ranking system, by the way, was also devised by Yuuki Kagurazaka. You were assigned the rank of F the moment you joined the guild and upgraded to E once you gained some battle experience. After enough time on the field, you were assigned rank D and gained the ability to call yourself an adventurer. Different guild jobs were assigned different ranks that corresponded to this, and you were also allowed to take a quest one rank higher than yours, as long as you banded with a team of several people. This was all set up in detail to prevent idents and provide for an ample safety margin.

    Im ready when you are.

    So I was all set for the test. As long as it wasnt written, I wasnt worried at all.

    The woman stood up, went into her office, and brought back a man who I assumed was the examiner.

    Hmmm! You, taking the test? And stronger than Kabal, even? Well, all right. Follow me.

    He certainly acted full of himself. He gave my friends a mean-looking re on the way, too. Was there some history between them?

    Hey, whys he sneering at you?

    Ahh Kabal paused. Thegis has been acting all jealous ever since we got famous. Hes retired from the field and all, so

    His eyes were turned toward the legs of Thegis the examiner. One was a prosthetic. Retired was right.

    Quit gabbing and follow along, Thegis rumbled. I followed his instructions, exiting out the back door toward another building.

    The test site was in a building best described as a gymnasium. There was me, Thegis, Kabal and team, and a few guild members looking to kill time by watching us. Theck of entertainment options in this world must have made something like this seem like an epic asion.

    This was where the guild also held examinations to decide whether to boost a members rank or not. The jobs you were offered were strictly based on your rank, so the results of these tests directly connected to your wages. They were thus offered six days a week, whenever the test takers were ready for it.

    Examiners were assigned to each guild branch to allow for this. These examiners needed the ability to step in and provide assistance if needed, so their ranks were mostly filled with ex-adventurers who made it to A-minus rank or so. Thegis must have joined them once he lost his leg.

    Let me say this first, he briskly began. Once you earn an E rank, youll have the chance to immediately try passing the D, then the C-ranked exam as well. If you fail, however, you will not be able to take another rank-upgrade challenge until you regain your current rank and earn enough points in your work to do so. Do you understand?

    In other words, if I failed a ranking test, Id have to start over from one rank below that. I appreciated how better ranks offered a better range of jobs, but this struck me as kind of a pain. They probably set this up to keep would-be adventurers from bothering the examiners all day with tests they couldnt possibly pass.

    Sounds good, I replied. Thegis nodded, then turned to Kabal.

    Hmph. I look forward to seeing exactly how youre more powerful than Kabal and his team. Lets just hope you dont wind up being a sheep in wolfs clothing, hmm?

    I couldnt me him for doubting them, what with the monster-parts racket they were pursuing with me at the moment. Padding your point tally as quickly as they had would make anyone the target of haters. It was their fault, too.

    Then Thegis pointed toward the floor. We will hold the examination inside this magic circle. We have a safety barrier over it, but dont rely on that too much, all right? If youre willing to risk your life for this, step inside and give me a signal when youre ready.

    I looked where he pointed. There was a broad circle drawn on the floor, maybe sixty or seventy feet across. The geometric shapes stacked atop one another inside it indicated this was a magic circle. A semicircle-shaped barrier materialized the moment I walked in. The audience watched carefully, waiting for my response.

    All right! I said, trying not to sound too worked up.

    Right. Defeat the enemy before you!

    Thegis released the magic he had previously chanted. The test had begun.

    He was using summon magic to stage this exam. As Elen mentioned to me, he was a summoner by trade, calling forth monsters to fight the enemy in his ce. If I recalled correctly, summoning monsters stronger than yourself could only be done under a number of conditions, so one could guess at whatde out based on the level of the caller.

    The first monster Thegis brought out was a Hunter Hound, a low-ranked monster I had never seen before. It was well trained, but that was about it. Before it could even let out a yelpor even feel any fear, I supposeI lopped its head off with a sh of my katana. That awarded me rank E. Super-easy.

    Kay, all done. Next, please.

    The room fell silent. Whoa, I could hear someone whisper. Thegis was less than impressed.

    Oh-ho? Well, you handled that, at least. Let your guard down, though, and youll pay dearly for itter. Youre ready to take the next challenge?

    Mm-hmm. I kinda wish we could skip to rank A, really.

    A? You think you can get away with being that cocky? Just because you can beat a party like Kabals doesnt mean you can act like youre king of the world. Here we go!

    I started to feel like he was angry at me now. I was just trying to be honest, but Ah well. Lets just get this over with.

    Even as Thegis seethed, he summoned my next opponenta jet-ck Dark Goblin, fully armed and ripped with muscles.

    Ummm Isnt that Thegiss main servant?

    Hes got full armor on! I think thatd be tough for even a C rank to beat

    Before I could process these audience whispers, the examiners bellowing silenced them all.

    Begin!!

    They said this would challenge a C rank, but this is the D-ranked exam, right? Ah well. No challenge for me, either way.

    And there you go. Next, please.

    I had shed the goblin to a heap with a single strike. It made Thegis quiver in anger.

    Oh-hohhh! Not bad. All rightnext it is, then!

    The air fell silent once morethe audience being much more gripped with tension than I was.

    Youll need experience in groupbat as well. Are you ready for that?

    He summoned three Giant Bats. Ooh, they sure bring me back. When was thest time one of those attacked me? It seemed like ages ago.

    Sure, sure, just get it started.

    Our small clutch of onlookers looked like they wanted toment on this, but they were drowned out by Thegiss signal. Not that it mattered to me. I swiped the bats down from the air, one after another. There wasnt even any need to rev up my perception for this, like beforethey appeared frozen in the air to me anyway.

    The audience watched this wordlessly, enraptured by the performance. I doubted they could even follow it with their eyes. The moment the Giant Bats approached, a single sh of my de downed them.

    Okay, so theres rank C wrapped up. Next, please.

    My request brought Thegis back to his senses.

    Not even my own eyes could see it?! Now he was starting to lose hisposure. Heh-heh-heh-heh Well done. There is no doubt in my mind that you could defeat Kabals band now. Very well. I challenge you to face the trial of the B-ranked challenge!

    Oh, so now its a trial, not an exam? I could see the veins in Thegiss eyes bulging as he began chanting once more, this time with clear rays of magic shooting up and down his arms. The observers looked on silently. I, uh, Im gonna get the guild master, shouted one before running offbut before anyone took notice, Thegiss summon wasplete.

    An evil creature appeared before me. It was a Lesser Demon, a monster with four wriggling arms. I hadnt seen a demon-type creature like this before. My impulse was to consume it and take its skills.

    And for that matter, that wasnt a Summon Monster spell just now, was it? It was Summon Demon. Thatde in helpful, too

    Report. The summoning magic Summon Demonsessfully earned.

    Oh, whoops. That wound up being easier than I thought. It was funny how arts took forever and a day to master, but magic was just a quick snap of the fingers. It came that easy because he unleashed it right in front of me, yes, but it hardly seemed real sometimes.

    So I had that in hand, but now was no time to think about it.

    This monster is a Lesser Demon! It has the ability to nullify simple melee strikes. Now what will you do? If you want to give up, better say so soon!

    Thegis was getting excited now, even as I was musing about how unfair this easy magic ess was. His objectives werepletely changed. He hated Kabal and his friends, and he wanted to take it out on me. This was definitely not the kind of monster you carted out for a B-ranked exam.

    Someone had just run out to fetch the guild master, which I assumed to be Fuze. Hopefully, I could get a retest without having to defeat this guy, butwell, I was pretty sure Id win anyway.

    In the midst of this, I started to overhear the audience again.

    Hey, isnt that kind of a team-based exam subject?

    You know, I was just thinking the exact same thing, actually.

    Whoa, he wants him to beat that dude single-handed? Thatd be rough even for a B-plusser.

    Even they could see this was a tad unusual. And if they could, Kabal and friends knew way before now.

    Um, Thegis, isnt this going a little too far? Not to brag, but with a Lesser Demon, itd take all three of us to finally knock im out for good, wouldnt it?

    Yeah! Elen chimed in. You cant even damage demon-type monsters with regr weapons!

    Exactly. I hate to admit, but Id be useless against one. All I could really do is distract it and try to earn the front lines some more healing time!

    Thegis had no time for any of this griping. Hmph! I believe its the little one in that mask taking the exam? If hes going to y chicken just because things are a little dangerous, he was never suited for adventuring work in the first ce! Well? Do you want me to cancel it?

    He was acting all tough, but take another look, and youd realize something was off. He was sweating bullets, doing everything he could to focus himself. Turning my eye toward the Lesser Demon, it looked ready to escape its restraints and take off at any moment. Thegis was starting to lose controlwhich made sense, if you think about it. Hed been using his magic nonstop for several summons in a row. It would be hard for anyone to concentrate that long, especially when it required so much physical force.

    Lets make things a little easier for him.

    I see a few problems, but Ill work them out. Lets go.

    Thegis opened his eyes wide, looking like he wanted to say something but stopping himself just before. He had already dived into the deep end. He poured even more magical force into the demon before shouting bombastically at me.

    Well said, you! Let me see you survive this one final trial!

    Huh? Final trial?

    The moment the thought popped into my head, the Lesser Demon was unleashed. The trial for rank B had begun.

    What should I do, though? I didnt want to show off too much of my magic or skill arsenal.

    As I worried over this, the Lesser Demons eyes flickered a bright red as it began to intone a magic spell.

    Four fireballs flew toward me. Thats a demon for you. Magics their bread and butter. I could just eat them with Glutton, and thatd be it, but I didnt want to bust that out in front of an audience.

    Instead, I dodged all four. They exploded against the barrier behind me in spectacr fashion. I had Cancel me Attack on me, so it wasnt much of a threat, but emergingpletely unscathed wouldve looked fishy, too. I tried to il around a little, acting like I was panicking as I began casting a spell of my own.

    Icicle Lance!

    The freezing magic Iunched neutralized part of the mes that now burned within the barrier, creating a safe zone. The screams around me turned into cheers, but I paid it no mind as I readied my sword. A sh of light. I guess demons really are pretty resistant to melee damage. The strike felt a little strange to me as I carried it out.

    Report. Melee attacks are ineffective against spiritual life-forms.

    Id best remember this feeling. Whenever I get this odd bit of feedback from my de, that means Im not damaging anything.

    To sum it up, this Lesser Demon had whats called a fully formed magical corpus, a form madepletely of magicules. As opposed to the replicated versions of ourselves Soei and I could construct, this could immediately regenerate itself from most physical damage since its creator was right there. I hadnt injured it in the first ce, and I wasnt going to this way.

    It was said that a spiritual life-form like this became a full-fledged demon with intelligence upon receiving a physical body to inhabit. That would make it more melee susceptiblebut that didnt really apply right now.

    The Lesser Demon, perhaps huffy about me dodging its fireballs, began attacking with all four arms at once. Solid as steel, each one swung downward over and over. Its speed was nothing to sniff at, but the limbs still looked frozen in time to me.

    This would end so much quicker if I could just eat this guy. What should I do? Icicle Lance seemed like itd damage the demon but not decisively so, I didnt think. Demons have a lot of magical resistance, too

    Oh, hang on. Magic was simply the embodiment of whatever you pictured in your mind. If the Icicle Lance was the embodiment of taking heat from the body, fireballs had to be all about burning something. Meanwhile, Modelwillone of the arts Id learnedtook your aura (your fighting force) and converted it directly into offensive power.

    That ought to work against a spiritual life-formand since I knew how to lodge magical projectiles by now, it was just as easy for me to control my aura. But ooh, if I start busting out my aura, everyone would know I was a monster. Which means

    Well, lets test something out. Carefully summoning a bit of my aura, I converted it back into magical force,bining it with the magicule energy one normally uses tounch magic. For a human being with few magicules flowing through their veins, they would need to gather the required energy from the atmosphere at this point. As a monster, though, I could skip that. I had a supply I could tap at any time.

    So I took this fresh quantity of pure magical force and applied it directly to my sword, as if wrapping it in paper. In my mind, I pictured strengthening, slicing, destroying. It began to emit a faint light, telling my instincts that it was set to go.

    Report. Extra skill Magic Aura obtained.

    That turned out to provide even more than I had pictured. Basically, Magic Aura was a skill that let me easily add magical effects to attacks with my own aura. A sort ofbination of magic and arts. Now all I have to do is get shin.

    The moment my sword touched the Lesser Demon, it splitpletely in half, dissipating into dust and disappearing.

    And there you have it. Did I pass the B-ranked exam?

    The onlookers snapped out of their trance.

    Woww!! That was soooo cool!

    Whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa! That dudes just too damn strong!!

    Are you kidding me?! He ripped a Lesser Demon apart all by himself?

    Hey, take that mask off a sec! I wanna see your face!

    Oh, whats the matter?! Hey, ignore that idiot! Lets party it upter tonight, okay?

    It was quite an uproar.

    One quickly silenced by the appearance of a single person.

    Enough of this, all of you!!

    One shout from Fuze was enough to halt the ruckus. He ignored the crowd as he walked up to me.

    Sir Rimuru, you areall right, I take it? If something happened to you, it would portend terrible things for us all.

    He looked at me for just a moment, relieved, before bottling that up and turning to Kabal.

    And what are you people doing? I told you a million times, didnt I, to just bring Sir Rimuru directly to me? Not to make any side trips? So why do I find him in this state of affairs, hmm?

    Blue veins appeared to pop above his forehead as he scowled at the trio. It was quite impressive, and it made the three freeze in ce, giving excuses like Um and Well, you know and I tried to stop them He wasnt buying it.

    Silence, you fools! From this moment forward, you will hereby be referred to as the Three Fools of Blumund!!

    Well, wait a second

    Thats just mean! Rimuru said he wanted to be an adventurer, so

    Could we maybe get a better name, please?

    The intive request was turned down.

    You idiots! I could have used my guild master privileges to simply award Sir Rimuru a B-ranked license without going through any of this!!

    This was turning into a good scolding. It also told the crowd I was Fuzes personal guest and a pretty powerful dude.

    It wasnt long before I was back in Fuzes office. The Three Fools kneeled meekly on the floor as Fuze sat there, running a hand up and down his forehead in agony. Thegis was standing right next to him, looking incredibly awkward.

    I have to say, Sir Rimuru, you really could have done better than to stick out like a sore thumb immediately upon your arrival. There cant be more than a handful of people in this world who can defeat a Lesser Demon with a single sword strike. Was that some kind of magical weapon? An enchantment or the Aura Sword art wouldnt produce that much force in one blow. Ah, I imagine the rumor mill will be working overtime in the taverns tonight

    Was it that bad an idea? Like, if you were watching, you couldve stopped me

    I wasnt exactly provided the time for that, Sir Rimuru! Fuze sighed. But whats done is done. An art that applies magic itself to a weapon is a high-level ability indeed, but I understand that pdins are capable of such a feat. A few A-ranked adventurers in the Free Guild headquarters have unique skills of their own along those linessuch things are not unheard of. But being able to y demons with it? Unless you want a crowd of people harassing you wherever you go, I would rmend being careful with that move. You may regret being known for it.

    It was Fuzes opinion that this was all the result of Kabals trio failing to follow his orders. But as he put it, there was one silver lining: The crowd was all a bunch of C ranks and below, so Im sure they didnt even realize what they were seeing.

    Magical swordsor in my case, Magic Aurainfused swordswere best used where there werent any eyewitnesses, it seemed. Good thing I found that out sooner thanter.

    Well, thanks. Ill watch myself with that.

    Kind of a pity, though. One more test, and I couldve been in the A ranks. If Fuze was going to make me an honorary B-grade adventurer, I wouldve loved a shot at going all the way. There were also Special A and S ranks, but being an A alone made people treat you quite a bit differently.

    Too bad I was so close to the A rank, though, I muttered.

    Ahh, that wouldnt have been possible, Thegis replied. Not because you werent strong enough for it, Sir Rimuru, but because regtions state a guild branch can only award ranks up to B. Youll need to take on work and achieve a rank of B-plus before you have the right to tackle that.

    When going from E to D to C to B, you were free to skip ranks and take on a higher one if youre up for it. Fail that exam, though, and youll need to build up enough points before tackling it again. However, qualifying for the A exam required having an established portfolio of work on the field, and it was only offered at the Free Guild HQ in Englesia. Examiners up to A-minus could handle any test up to rank B, but when it came to an A-ranked test, that needed to be held by someone ranked A or higher. Which made sense. Ill just have to follow Thegiss guidance and build up my score.

    Still, Thegis said, head bowed, your strength is nothing short of exemry, Sir Rimuru. I thought this was all a trick, given it was Kabal referring you to mebut I see I was very wrong about you.

    Aw, dont be so mean, Thegis!

    You really dont trust us that much?

    Cut me a break, sir!

    So Thegis and I came to know each other better, regardless of how much the trio over there whined about it. Hopefully, theyll be driven to restore their good name by looking out for me a bit more during the rest of our journey.

    So that night, we set out to devise our future ns. It was me, my adventuring friends, Fuze, and Thegis. My main mission, of course, was to meet with Yuuki Kagurazaka, whom I believed I shared a homnd with. Fuze had already written the letter of introduction I asked for via Kabal; I gratefully epted it and ced it in my Stomach, lest I lose it somewhere. If they could just produce some ID documentation for me, Id be all set.

    I think your papers will be ready for you tomorrow morning. Tell the person at the counter that I know you, and Im sure theyll expedite it.

    Thatdy at the counter was in the crowd, too, Boss, I think. I bet shes a total fan by now!

    Ooh, could be. Who wouldnt be after that kind of performance?

    Yep. It was a treat to watch.

    It chagrins me as an examiner, but that was some masterful fighting.

    All this praise from Thegis and Kabals crew was starting to embarrass me.

    And that, Fuze mentioned, is why I was hoping to preemptively award you your reditation, so you could keep your strength a secret. Youre going to stand out no matter what you do, besides.

    Kabal shrugged. Yeah, uh, sorry about that.

    Were sorry! Elen and Gido shouted in unison.

    But really, I should have been more considerate myself. Being in a big human town got me so excited, I must have lost my head a little.

    Ill try not to be so rash next time, either, so hopefully, youll forgive them for all this, Fuze.

    For now, the guild master seemed willing to let it slide in the long run.

    Our n, then, was to finish up the prep work by the end of tomorrow and get moving as soon as possiblebut Fuze had other ideas. Actually, he told us, the king of Blumund wanted to have a confidential talk with you.

    My arrival must have already reached his ears. Apparently, he was interested in holding a conference in three days. I readily agreed to this. Before that, we nned to have a chat with a well-ced nobleman Fuze knew, in order to discuss the practical issues around our nations rtionship. The royal summit would then focus on these issuesthis would keep it from being bogged down and rudderless, as Fuze put it, since meeting the king with no itinerary at all would be a waste of our time. Royal decrees would asionallye down directly from the king when time was of the essence, but this was rare, and we were in no hurry, so the king just wanted to discuss the more big-picture stuff.

    I had no problem with that. If I had three days to kill before the king, I needed to fill that up with something anyway. Plus, I probably wouldve been an unprepared ball of nerves anyway, so knowing what to expect in advance helped me out a lot.

    So that took care of tomorrow and three days from now. Our talks continued well into the night, sote we wound up staying in the guest room of Fuzes guild branch.

    One more thing I should add: Despite the novelty of being in a human town and all the experiences Id already had inside, I sadly did not explore any new frontiers with my dreams that night.

    This well-ced noble was a man named Veryard, a baron. He lived in a quiet, unassuming manor in the middle of a neighborhood lined with fancy buildings; apparently, he was too low-level of a noble to have an entire domain to rule over. He thus spent his days working within his house, or castle, or whatever.

    Let me tell youand promise me you wont go telling him thisbut the man practically lives and breathes his work.

    That was Fuzes assessment, and I intended to keep my promise. It would apparently be ufortable for the guild and nobility if people found out they had underground connections to one another.

    So I followed Fuze to the manor. We passed through the eye-catching and well-kept front gardens before entering the foyer, where an old man who looked every bit like your stereotypical butler type greeted us. Maids stood by on each side of the chamber, their heads politely bowed. This was a low-level nobles house? I worried that this meeting would be a lot more formal than I had nned.

    I went to a maid caf once in my old world, but these were real maids. It was deeply moving, somehow. Funny that it took me going to another world to discover this air of elegance, this graceful demeanor. The real thing sure is different. Watching them had the odd effect of calming my nerves.

    Refreshed, I followed the butler down the hall. He took us to a room on the other end and stopped in front of an ornate-looking door. There was a moment of tension as he knocked on it. Come in, said someone on the other side. Kind of an annoying procedure, I thought, but as someone who sessfully navigated etiquette in the Dwarven Kingdoms pce, I was prepared for anything. Whatever I didnt know about politeness or procedure, I could ovee with pure attitude.

    Going in, I was greeted by a very intellectual-looking gentleman with thin, sort of Asian-style eyes. He certainly lived up to the description Fuze gave me.

    Thank you so much foring, he said before I could start. I am the Baron of Veryard, one of the ministers of the Kingdom of Blumund.

    Many thanks to you as well. My name is Rimuru Tempest, and as I imagine youre already aware, I am a slime monster. Im not really well versed on etiquette in this country, so I apologize in advance if I mess something up.

    We shook each others hand. Something like this reminded me a lot of my old life.

    Oh, theres no need to be concerned about such stuffy affairs. Feel free to approach me as you would anyone else.

    The Baron must have seen just how concerned I was about it. He showed me to a seat, being very careful never to let his guard down around me. A shrewd negotiator, no doubt.

    Well! he said as a maid came in with some tea. He took a sip. We have only so much time. Lets begin.

    Fuze, my fellow witness, straightened up. I followed his act, bracing myself and preparing to listen.

    Our negotiations with Veryard went on into the night. The gist of it was twofold:

    A joint security agreement between Tempest and Blumund.

    Mutual permission to travel freely within each of our nations.

    First order of business: The Kingdom of Blumund was, frankly, not very big. It was a rtively weak nation, one that even had issues dealing with the monsters that marauded it. Their rtionship with the guild shored up a lot of that, but the government just wasnt up to the task alone.

    Thus, after feeling around to figure out their position, the kingdom had decided torgely subcontract out monster control to the Free Guild in exchange for a boost in funding, allowing the government to focus on intelligence gathering. This let them promptly detect dangers and think of ways to deal with them, allowing them to stave off potential disasters before they happened.

    Fortunately, this strategy had kept them from dealing with any major damage so far, but as the Baron put it, there was no such thing as having too many seawalls, so they hoped to build a cooperative rtionship with my nation as well. And that was all it was: a promise that, should one nation fall into danger, the other would provide as much support as possible. This included supporting the adventurers working in the Forest of Jura, but didnt imply anything that specialjust an agreement that wed provide supplies for them in our town.

    That muchsupporting Free Guild membersFuze had already asked me for previously. Providing amodation and materials for people working in the forest would help them cover a broader range, which naturally meant theyd be able to address more threats around the area. It also meant that these guys trusted us, which I liked.

    So I happily agreed to this, but

    Of course, I am sure theyll be happy to pay a fair price for what you provide. You could perhaps use the inns in our city as a reference for how much to charge

    Well, hold on, Baron, interrupted Fuze. The amodations in Sir Rimurus town are easily on the same level as the highest-quality inns in this one. Compared to what passes for the norm here, I would call it fair to even charge more.

    Would you? Well

    To be honest, I would call what they offered me more akin to a health spa than an inn.

    All right. We can think about thatter. In terms of weapon and armor maintenance, however

    Well, again, sir, their workshops are overseen by Sir Kaijin and his close confidant, Garm, two of the most talented metalworkers in the entire dwarven race. Would you really ask them to handle such rote maintenance work?

    They work there? Is there anything they could sell us, then, that may?

    Im afraid not, Baron. I saw a great deal of weaponry there I have not seen anywhere else. I am talking very high-quality goodsthings I never even saw in Englesias best forges. I was too cowed to ask whether it was for sale, but by my estimation, one would have to be at least a B-ranked adventurer to consider them. It makes oneugh, doesnt it?

    Fuze was certainly doing a good job at shooting down Baron Veryards suggestions. He had a point. The inn we stayed at in that farming vige was not very posh. The guild branch here in town wasnt bad, but in little details like the toilets and baths, our town certainly offered far morefort.

    And those weapons Fuze mentioned werent for salethey were test samples. At this point, we now had a steady supply of assorted raw materials. Gabil was killing off monsters in the caves, Gobta and his crew were doing the same in the forest, and they were transporting anything useful back to town. This asionally included items from high-ranked monsters, allowing us to craft rarer weaponry. Some great stuff, and I was sure finding a buyer wouldnt be hard, but we werent selling. We need to beef up our own war power first.

    Which meant it was time for me topromise a little.

    All right. Ill set up a long row house for basic lodging purposes. And as for weapons, I could have our craftsmen take on some apprentices to build up. They should be able to handle basic weapon maintenance within a month or two, I think.

    We could provide the row house by expanding the building we lent Yohms men. Those new craftsmen, however, were a moreplex issue. Kurobe was toiling away right now, single-handedly building weapons for everybody in the nation. Kaijin was helping craft new ones, using his Researcher unique skill to copy them, but Kurobe didnt have any Great Sagetype skills like that, so it took time. Not as much as hand forging them all, but

    I couldnt have him be the only one working that hard, so I had already employed a few enthusiastic young men to be his apprentices. They were proving to be quick learners, and it might not be long before they were full-fledged craftsmen of their own.

    Thats why I made that offer to the Baron, and it was clearly weed. I agreed to discuss the details with Rigurd and the elders, so we could decide on itter.

    Now, travel permissions. That was a bit of a thorny path.

    When I asked Fuze for his support, I promised to waive customs tariffs for any merchants belonging to the Free Guild. This meant that I would need to collect them from sellers affiliated with the Kingdom of Blumund itself. This was inherently unfair, but I couldnt renege on my previous promise; at least not for a few years toe.

    You might say Whats the big deal? Why not waive the fees for Blumund merchants, too? That was something I absolutely couldnt allow to pass. I couldnt just fritter away our rights as a sovereign nation without anypensation to show for it. Itd also impugn on any profits guild-affiliated merchants would enjoy, which would be rude to Fuze.

    Thus, even as it grew darker outside, the talks between me, Fuze, and the Baron fell into further and further of an impasse. We were all working with certain stakes, which no doubt contributed to how heated things got. Ultimately, though, it was Veryard who blinked first.

    All right. To our kingdom, the most important issues rte to our security agreement. For the tariffs, let us establish a given grace period, during which our government will cover any fees incurred by our merchants.

    So we went with that. All merchants were allowed to enter and leave Tempest free of charge, regardless of who they worked under. Whenever we put formal customs charges in ce, we would confer once more to decide on matters.

    As I confirmed during our discussions, Veryard was fully aware of the importance of Tempest. He understood it at a more thorough level than I did, even. Traveling to the Dwarven Kingdom via Tempest, as opposed to the Kingdom of Farmus, would be both cheaper and safer to them. The highways werent done yet, but once they were, and we had regr traffic going back and forth, the difference would no doubt be dramatic. And once it was all in ce, those highways were going to see heavy use, even if Tempest charged a bit of a premium at the borders.

    Hopefully, the Baron said with a smile, we will both be on beneficial terms with each other by that time.

    After confirming our stances on both issues, I spent the next day casually perusing the capitals markets. I also stopped by the guild branch again to pick up my ID papers. The woman at the front counter was eyeing me up and down, but I had no time to ask her out on a date.

    Kabal and his friends guided me around the whole time, allowing me to enjoy myself thoroughly without getting too lost. We had all the supplies we needed for our journey, too.

    Then came day three, the day of the royal summit. If we could get a treaty signed here, it would mark a second stamp of approval for our nation after Dwargons. A nation of monsters, receiving the formal nod from a nation of humans. The implications were huge. It meant we could interact in peace and even be friendly with regr people.

    The security agreement really didnt offer much benefit to Tempest. In fact, it had many downsides. But the potential revenue we stood to gain from that travel agreement was enormousand since it was a mutual agreement, it allowed monsters to travel to human towns, which was a pretty major step. I wanted to work on amicable terms with mankind, and I was hopeful we could get something signed during my time here.

    So I was pretty excited when we kicked off the summit. There, at the pce, I was greeted by the king, a kind-looking fellow with a round face and a slightly pudgy figure, and the queen, whose sheer beauty made for a shocking imbnce.

    Fuze was there to serve as a third-party witnesshe was already very familiar with all manners of government affairs, but having a third party in on this implied a sense of fairness to neighboring nations, and Fuze wouldnt go bbing about top-secret stuff regardless. He looked ufortable in his formal garband being in human form all this time was getting a little oppressive for me, too. Better put up with it for now. Its tough on both of us.

    The summit proceeded without a hitch, and once assorted ministers had wrapped up their reports to the king, it was over.

    I do look forward to working with you in the future, Sir Rimuru, said the king in his receiving room as he shook both my hands. He was a lot more sociable than I gave him credit for; I felt a natural liking toward him. But this room was also where I learned that Baron Veryard had deceived us.

    Well, as the king put it, if some kind of force should evere out of the forest and threaten to invade us, let us set out to work with each other at once! And we, of course, would be happy to work together with you as well.

    Smiling with his wife, the king left the room just as I realized what he meant by it. I was no longer in any mood to wish him farewell. Some kind of force? What an odd turn of phrase. It didnt sound like he was talking about monsters.

    I was so focused on those guys, but that certainly wasnt the only danger out there. Look at Farmus, right next door. If a new trade route was opened to the Dwarven Kingdom, they might see Tempest and Blumund in a negative light for that. And thats not all! The Eastern Empire, too! They had eyes on being the sole superpower in thend, didnt they?

    Oh, crap, Ive been tricked!!

    It didnt take a genius to see that an invasion by some foreign country would be a huge danger to Blumund. I just wanted to scream, right on the spot. If it sounds too good to be true, it usually is, huh? Now I recalled Baron Veryards smile. He said it himself: The most important issues rte to our security agreement. Customs revenue would be chump changepared to a nations entire defense budget.

    What Blumund was really afraid of was a foreign power invading it through the forest. The Eastern Empire probably had them on constant high alert, and they wanted a bulwark against them. They didnt lie to meif we ever got in danger, I bet they woulde to help. Itd be our turn next, after all.

    They got me good.

    The Baron chose this moment to address me. It would appear you have noticed? Your mind certainly works quicker than I gave you credit for, earlier. However, the treaty has already been signed. I do hope we will continue to have a fruitful rtionship.

    He gave me the biggest cheese-eating grin I ever saw. He performed his duties wlessly, no doubt about it. A sly old noble who found tricking me as easy as taking candy from a baby. Pfft. Ah well. Not much I can do about it here

    But despite all this, I felt oddly serene about it all. It was more frustration at my shallowness and admiration for my opponent than anything. All a learning experience. If the Empire makes a move, Ill think matters over then.

    It did tell me one thing, though: I couldnt let my guard down around human beings. Monsters were so unexpectedly straightforward with everything, which created an openingrge enough for humans and their cunning to drive a truck through. I swore to myself that Id think things over more deeply and carefully when negotiating with them from now on.

    But its no fun to just sit here and be treated like a fool. Ive got a decent opportunity here, still, to engage in some discussion thatll be a lot more helpful for my side. I took a High Potion out from my pocket and ced it on the desk.

    And whats this?

    With that treaty in ce, I said, could I ask you a favor?

    Hohhh, a favor? Well, as your partner in diplomacy, I could hardly refuse to hear you out.

    The Baron shed me another perfect smile. Hes definitely a pro at this.

    This is a healing potion that we made over in our town. I was thinking we could sell this in your marketce

    What?! The potion that Kabal brought back, some time ago? Was this the specialty you were proposing earlier?

    It was Fuze instead of Veryard whotched on to the offer.

    Oh, um, yeah. I did give him some, didnt I? I gave Kabal some of the medicine I had crafted myself, the equivalent of a Full Potion. But this is different from that. Not quite as potent, but I promise you its a much better product than anything youll find on sale now. What he had is more of a raritysomething we can craft perhaps every two days. These, meanwhile, we can manufacture more readily, so I thought about putting these up on the market. The only real difference from what you saw, Fuze, is that this cant regenerate missing limbs.

    I had meant that as a bombshell, making sure to lowball our production capabilities while I was at it. The effect was dramatic. Regenerate missing limbs? the Baron parroted back. You mean, if you lose an arm in battle or an ident, his potion can grow apletely new one out of thin air?

    Not really grow, so much aslike, it gathers magicules from the air to create a recement, you could say? But over time, once blood starts circting through it, and your body metabolism goes back to normal, itll look and act just like the old limb.

    What nonsense!

    Now the cool, collected Baron looked like he was in a panic. Looks like I scored a hit with him. This was exactly why I kept telling Kaijin to keep quiet about it.

    If what you say is true, that is equivalent to holy magic, the exclusive secret of the Western Holy Church! In fact, it is the holy spell Regeneration itself, the product of a pact with the spirits above us! A divine miracle! Only those ranked bishop or higher are capable of harnessing it!

    He paused a moment, regaining hisposure, then looked around. His outburst had attracted some attention, but no one had overheard the conversation. The moment he sensed this, he had said Let us discuss this elsewhere and began walking off. Fuze and I had no issue with this, so we wound up settling down in the Barons study once again.

    The moment Fuze and Veryard entered the manor, they looked at each other and sighed. Well, well, the Baron sighed, what shall we do with this, then?

    Is it all right for you if we appraise its value? Fuze asked.

    Go right ahead.

    He chanted a spell to gauge the potions contents.

    Hmm I really cant tell the difference between this and what Kabals party was carrying. Fuze scratched his head. We tested out that previous potion as well, but I never dreamed it could rece entire limbs. They said it was equivalent to magical medicine or holy magic, but I was certainly not expecting Regeneration-ss performance

    By that, I doubted he meant they tested it out on someone whod just had an arm chopped off. It wasnt the kind of thing one would volunteer for. If I didnt bring up the High Potions limits, I doubt he would have ever noticed the difference.

    Do you have any of those remaining? Veryard asked.

    Yes, onefor safekeeping.

    They must have used up the rest for their experimentation.

    Bring it here at once.

    Fuze nodded. The only way to prove this, he muttered as he sent a magical message out into the ether, is with Thegis.

    My former test examiner was with us in a momenta small safe under his arm.

    What is the meaning of this, Fuze? he bellowed as he walked in, but he fell silent as he realized Veryard and I were there.

    I want you to promise, the Baron said, that you will keep everything you see and hear in this room a secret.

    He described himself as a minor bureaucrat in this kingdom, but the dignity and presence he exuded was enough to put even a prince in his ce.

    I promise you, sir, Thegis hurriedly replied with a confused nod as the Baron took the safe from him.

    So this is the item? He took out the contentsone of the potions I had madeand carefully observed it. I have little knowledge of magic, but this one shines true, that much I can tell. Certainly, I feel this is no ordinary medicine. Lets test the potion you have first, Fuze.

    To my great surprise, he intended to have Thegis remove his leg prosthesis and test the potions effects on that. Would it work on a wound that old? Itd be interesting to see, actually. Following his instructions, we first tried the High Potion on the stump. As expected, there was no external change.

    Next up, my self-crafted potion. The moment we sprinkled it on, a pale, shining light covered the site, transforming itself into the shape of a leg before our eyes. It proved, once and for all, that the age of the wound didnt matter. Maybe a Full Potion could read information from the bodys DNA or something to do its work. Whatever it did, it sure wasnt simplebut either way, it meant I had a medicine that outssed just about anything modern science in my world coulde up with.

    Wha?! Mymy leg?!

    This This is astounding

    Good heavens. Another amazing secret you bear, is it not?

    The three gave me looks of nk surprise.

    Id let this doozy slip mostly just to get back at Veryard a bit, but it only served to further damage my stanceperhaps even severely. Loose lips really do sink ships. I had hoped to gain a new advantage in our negotiations, but things had now grown muchrger than that.

    In the end, we agreed to frame it so Thegiss leg was healed by a mysterious robed bishop for a kings ransom in money. Thegis sure wasntiningit let him get out from behind his desk at the branch office and get back to adventuring. He profusely thanked us all as he agreed to the backstory.

    As far as my sales pitch went, Blumund agreed to purchase a set quantity of High Potions from us on regr asions. They would also select preferred merchants of their choice to spread the word about this medicine to the Western Nations. We still werent making mass quantities, so hopefully, they could keep a damper on customer growth for the time being. If adventurers started hearing the stories anding to Blumund to find out more, thatd help spread the word about Tempest right nearby, too.

    For now, I just wanted to build a trustworthy name for ourselves. Pitching it as medicine made by monsters didnt sound like effective ad copy to me, but once people saw for themselves what this stuff could do, I doubted itd keep them from bing regr customers. At the moment, getting it into their hands and letting them see how useful it was took first priority.

    So theres another regr purchase base, then. A good first step, I thought. I really didnt want to be hostile with human beings; Id have to work harder to build friendly rtionships with the other human nations of the world.

    It was time to say good-bye to Fuze.

    I do hope youll remain careful on the trail, Sir Rimuru.

    Im telling you, Ill be fine. Just make sure nobody goes into that room, all right?

    Nothing to worry about there. You can only ess it through my office, the branch managers chamber.

    That was a relief. I had a magisteel teleportation circle installed in that room, about three feet across. When I showed it to him, he was agog. Teleportation, even? he marveled. But then, I suppose nothing should surprise me by now, Sir Rimuru

    I set this up so people coulde visit Tempest whenever they wanted. We had agreed to the outlines of the treaty, but we hadnt designated any merchants yet, and Id need an easier way to ess the Kingdom of Englesia, besides. Thus, I asked to borrow a room from Fuze for use as a Warp Portal.

    I should note, by the way, that once the Great Sage analyzed the Warp Portal elemental magic, it arranged things so I could manage multiple entry and exit points at once. I still needed a physical magic circle at each site, but they could now open paths to multiple exits at once, which was extremely convenient. Wed need to make sure nobody could steal those magisteel portals, though Hopefully we could find a way to eliminate that worry sometime. Not that Id tell these guys if we did.

    As I was dreaming about future advancements in teleportation tech, Fuze was saying good-bye to Kabal as well.

    And you guys keep Sir Rimuru safe, all right, Kabal?

    Of course!

    You got it!

    The road to Englesias safe enough. Itll be a cinch for us!

    Do not treat this as easy, Thegis bellowed again. I am willing to forgive your behavior as long as you keep Sir Rimuru guarded. I will not allow you to shirk your duty!

    His new leg had revitalized him in many ways. He was just as strong as he used to be, and his presence loomedrger than ever. But he wouldnt be hitting the road just yetit sounded like hed agreed to be the pce magician for the kingdom, although hed still run guild testing until they found a recement. That came at the Barons suggestion, no doubthe never kept anyone who knew his secrets too far out of reach.

    So I had my guild paper, along with a new wholesale client. And not only thatI had built formal rtions with one of the Western Nations, albeit a small one. It was nothing to sniff at achievement-wise as I left the Kingdom of Blumund behind me. A good start, I felt.

    Next up was the Kingdom of Englesia, home of the Free Guild headquarters. I still had those children from my dreams in mind, and I wanted to gather some intel on Hinata Sakaguchi as well. But before that, lets try meeting with guild master Yuuki Kagurazaka first. I had my intro papers, so it shouldnt be a problem.

    Time to get back on the road.

 Volume 4 - Ch 5

    THE SUMMONED CHILDREN

    He gave his visitor a warm smile, deftly showing him to a seat.

    Ay, what a pain! Our strategy ended in aplete failure. It might be a little while longer before yman awakens to be the first true demon lord, sadly.

    Lace, the visitor in question, sat down and gave him the news. Failure, after years of effort. He didnt sound too broken up about it.

    Hmm. And here I thought an orc lord on the rampage would guarantee us at least ten thousand or so deaths.

    The master of the room seemed to take the news pretty lightly.

    But I suppose obtaining the power needed wonte that easily to us. There are other conditions to worry about.

    Yeah. Hes strong enough, though, without having to dabble in any crazy stuff. Although I think he has it in for Leon, a bit

    He still has much to learn, that yman. Sowas that all you came here to say?

    Lace defiantly grinned at the rooms owner. Oh, of course not! That was just a side note. I bet you heard all about it from yman already, hmm? All I did was help out a bit, so I dont know the whole story myself. But enough about thatIve been going undercover to keep tabs on the pdins movementstely. Theyre really out to start something, yknow that? Now that theyre pretty sure Veldoras gone for good.

    Hmm? You think so? Do you know what theyre after?

    Itd be a hell of a lot easier for us if I did, huh? I tell you, the Western Holy Church is one mean group to get involved with.

    Lace shrugged. The mask hid his expression, but despite his pessimism, his attitude was just as bold and invincible as ever.

    You sure are right. Passing themselves off as righteous guardians of the weak or whatnot. I highly doubt theyre acting out of sheer goodwill. Theyre an enigma to me.

    Yeah, arent they? But if theyre starting to get more active, yknow, thats our chance to catch em by the tail, too, yeah? Theyve been around since time immemorial, so I cant wriggle my way into the upper management. But in their current operations, I might have a way in, yknow?

    He smiled once again.

    So Im thinkin its time for me to get a bit more serious about infiltrating the operation. Thatll probably put me out of contact for a while, but you okay with that?

    No, fine by me. Oh, but if you do find out whats behind the Holy Church, Ill be d to grant you a wish.

    Lace greeted this news with a heartyugh. Really?! Well, thats a nice little motivation!

    Ill bet. But dont overdo it. I dont want you messing this up.

    No need to remind me! In that case Lace stood up, preparing to leave.

    Oh, one more thing, a rxed voice said behind him. The main cause behind your most recent failures is traveling in the Western Nations right now. Things are about to be rather interesting, Id say.

    Wh-whaaaaa? What the heck for? That dopey-looking slimes supposed to be the grand pooh-bah of the Forest of Jura! Whats it doing bumping around humannds?!

    Ha-ha-ha-ha! It surprises you that much? You really are a unique little monster, arent youer, what was his name again?

    Umm It was Rimuru, I believe.

    Ah, right. Well, no doubt about it, then. He entered the Kingdom of Blumund several days ago.

    This stunned Lace into silence.

    Well, fine. Aint got a thing to do with me. I mean, I havent seen a monster who posed less of a threat to me in my life.

    With that, Lace left the room.

    The master of the room gave a contented smile.

    Given his strange behaviorhes no normal monster, that much is for sure. Which meansmaybe hes got memories of his past life? Perhaps I can take advantage of that. Itd be worth testing out a little, at least

    The Forest of Jura was surrounded by a number of nations. There was the Kingdom of Blumund, which I just left. There was Farmus, the muchrger kingdom adjacent to it. Then there was Englesia and a number of other smaller countries.

    All these nations came together to form what was known as the Council, which consisted of representatives elected by each country. Most important decisions affecting the region were managed by this Council. Each nation had its own methods for electing representatives, but for the most part, the seats were taken by lower-level nobility without much in the way of inheritance rights.

    The Council of the West (as it was formally called) was originally founded as a sort of monster-fighting co-op, before growing into a force devised to keep the Eastern Empire in check. Not every nation in the area was part of itthe powerful Sorcerous Dynasty of Thalion was one of the exceptions, for examplebut this was rare. In a world this brutal to its inhabitants, you had to pool your resources for a chance at survival, I suppose.

    The Kingdom of Englesiay at the core of this Coud for good reason. Geographically, Englesia was the easiest central point for Council members to assemble at. It naturally followed that the Free Guild would set up its headquarters here as well. You could say that the most powerful Council member nation was the Kingdom of Farmus, but in order to prevent any one nation from having too much clout over the assembly, the nations agreed to set up in Englesia for logistical reasons.

    Partly because of this, rtions between Farmus and Englesia were apparently frosty at best. And there was another reason: Englesia was the only Council member nation that didnt share a border with the Forest of Jura, giving it an extra measure of stability and protection from monsters. That was another factor that led to its selection as Council HQ.

    But what does the Council do, exactly? To put it broadly, it acted as a mediator between nations, weighing each members interests against the others and managing them to prevent conflict. It held power in both economic and political circles, making it a strikingly influential group in this regionsort of like the United Nations of my old world, with a lot more force to take action.

    Much like the United Nations, the Council had no standing military force. It didnt need one. Thats because, in a way, the Council formed the higher bureaucracy of the Free Guild itself. The money paid to adventurers for ying monsters came from Council fundingand in exchange, the Council had the right to give orders to the guild.

    This funding came from contributions provided by each member nation, which varied depending on how much speaking rights each one had. Refusing to pay these meant leaving the Council. It was a way for the Council to gain a louder voice in local affairs, using the shield of security it offered members. Many nations relied almost wholly upon the guild for monster management, and that meant there was no choice for them but to support the Council.

    Speaking of security, I heard another interesting story: The main thing that kept the Western Nations strongly connected to one another was religion.

    In this world, where monsters were a real, tangible threat, religion provided more than just spiritual supportit was a sort ofst bastion for survival. Thus, you had the Western Holy Church, the font of all regional religious activity, with Luminus as its sole and absolute deity. To put it another way, the Western Nations were the Churchs main sphere of influence, and the Holy Empire of Lubelius the holynd of the Church.

    Confusingly, this didnt necessarily mean the Western Holy Church ran Lubelius. It was an independent religious organization. However, the leader of Lubelius was called the Holy Emperor, defined to be the pope-like mortal spokesperson of divinity whose orders had to be followed without fail.

    So was Lubelius a kind of puppet state for the Church? Yes and no. It was tooplex for me to really get from what Fuze told me, and Im not sure he really knew, either. Its just, you know, that sort of thing, as he put it, and I guess hes right.

    The Western Holy Church wasnt the only religion in this world. There were other indigenous ones that worshipped a variety of different gods and goddesses. But in terms of followers, Luminus had the overwhelming majority. And thats simply because this particr deity had the pdins, the most powerful knightly warriors on this.

    These formed the so-called Crusader groups, armies of knights whose strength went beyond A rank, and their numbers totaled over three hundred. They were considered the saviors of mankind, monster-ying experts tasked with eradicating them all from thendscape. I was told they were formed by virtuous inspiration to protect the Western Nations, although I dont know how true that is. Some people even gave them enough respect to call them defenders of righteousness.

    The thing was, though, this Luminus apparently didnt ept any other gods. The One God Luminus, as the full name went. As a result, practitioners of other religions were not qualified to receive his salvation. There were several Council nations that didnt designate Luminism as their national religion, and pdins were never deployed over there. I guess I cant me themif you think someones unworthy of salvation, then of course you arent gonna risk your life for thembut that didnt sound too righteous to me. Just my take, though.

    The Sorcerous Dynasty of Thalion, by the way, had no state religion. Its imperial family imed to be the descendants of gods, so no other religion was officially designated. On the other hand, its people enjoyed full freedom of religion, making it a pretty unique nation in its approach. They also steadfastly refused to join the Council, making it a fully independent force in the region. Their borders werent entirely shut, but they had no interest in ying nice with others. It was really interesting; I wanted to check it out sometime, especially since it sounded a little bit like the Japan of my old life.

    That rounded out the new knowledge I had gained from my time in Blumund. The Western Nations were propped up by the economy on one side, religion on the other, helping it form strong bonds from country to country. A pretty neat setup, I thought. In a world with so many things trying to kill you, I didnt think you saw too many wars between human nations, though.

    Oh, and I learned something rather surprising about Hinata Sakaguchi. It turned out she was the chief of the pdins, the main officer running the Crusaders.

    I think Veldora mentioned that otherworlders often tended to gain special abilities when they came to this world. Maybe that power let her lead the greatest knight force known in thend? She was already a pretty tough cookie when she left ShizuI couldnt guess how strong she was now.

    Thinking about it, I was a monster presently. If I just casually strode up to her, she might decide to target me. Better not try anything too untoward. Ill just keep my distance, I think, until I gain a better grasp of who exactly this Hinata person is.

    And to that end, I needed to gather some more information.

    The journey to Englesia went smoothly. It was time to bust out the wolf wagon again. There was a road set up, although it wasnt paved. Of course it wasnt. Itd take a huge amount of time and money to pave every road around herevia normal means, that is.

    I had Ranga pulling the wagon in slightly shrunken form. He didnt look much different from a regr old ck wolf, so I figured it wouldnt be a problem. Having him sprint at full speed would break the wagon apart, so he was going at a light jog at the moment. Doing around twenty-five, maybe? We couldnt risk going much faster on these unfinished roads. As Kabal and his gang put it, though, it couldnt have been a morefortable ride.

    We encountered several mounted soldiers on patrol along the path. They all imed that I wouldnt expect to see much in the way of strong monsters around here. There were robbers and brigands to content with, but we never got involved with any. Which, I mean, twenty-five didnt seem that fast to us, but its not like they could have caught up to us on foot. A horse could, but not for the long distances Ranga could pull off on ark.

    So things went well for the mere three days it took to reach the capital of Englesia.

    The gate had an even stricter entry process than the Dwarven Kingdoms. There were three levels of inspections, the first of which required identification. Anyone who couldnt produce papers on the spot was forced to the back of a ponderously long line for level two; mess that up and you were on to level three, where you were all but treated as a criminal. By that point, once they were done with you, youd seriously begin to wonder why you tried to enter in the first ce. But a lot of people were willing to risk it. Thats how attractive this nation was.

    Thanks to my guild papers, I didnt have to care about any of that. Good thing, too. If I didnt have them, Id be waiting in line longer than I did for the dwarves.

    My onlyint:

    Whoa, whoa, youre an adventurer, lildy? This isnt some kind of joke youre ying on us, is it?

    The guards treated me like some spoiled girl.

    Im not ady, thanks. Just check the papers.

    Heh. Guess youre about the age when you wanna act all grown-up, huh? You got that cute voice, but between that mask and the way you talk

    The griping continued as they ran the papers through some kind of magical device. Then their attitude changed.

    Oh, my apologies! Sir Rimuru, adventurer rank B? Wee to the Kingdom of Englesia!!

    Well, that was easy. It sure didnt seem so from the way Kabals party bumbled around, but being ranked B earned you a lot of social status, I guess.

    Dont let it bother you, Boss,mented Kabal once he was through. The guards didnt mean anything personal by it.

    I wasnt angry in particr, but getting the lildy treatment struck me as needlessly cruel. But My voice, huh? No wonder everybody mistook me for a girl. I didnt expect that, given the mask covering my face and all, but my voice made me out to be a child, huh? It didnt bother me at all beforealthough,e to think of it, I got simr treatment in Blumund, didnt I? Maybe I should try altering the pitch on it to sound more mature? A bit toote for that, I thought.

    Lets just stick with the current one. My body was maybe four foot three anyway, so Id try passing myself off as kind of a stunted young man. I was innocent at heart, after all, so its fine. A Masked Boy of Mystery would work just fine in this world. Its already filled with demon lords and Heroes; why not toss in another fantasy trope while Im at it?

    The first thing that surprised me about the city was how advanced it was. It was fairlyrge in size, yes, but it was also surrounded by outer walls that seemed to extend to the horizon, with entry provided by only two gates. I couldnt imagine how much time and cash it took to build a wall covering this much terrain.

    Going inside, however, the view was even more stunning. There werent skyscrapers lining the streets, exactly, but the buildings were much higher than anything Blumund had to offer. I spotted five-story stone buildings all over the ce, along with a variety of brick and wood structures. But more impressive than anything was the chalky-white castle that loomed in the center, easily visible from each of the citys well-nned neighborhoods. Basking in its majesty made it clear that the capital had a legion of talented architects. Thats how beautiful it was.

    Another thing that caught my eye was the castles location. There was argeke in the middle of the city, and the edifice was built right in the center, making it appear to rise straight up from the waters. It certainly wowed visitors. Four roads spread out from it in each direction, connecting it to the rest of town. During emergencies, these roads could have their bridges removed to prevent outside forces from invading. It was an impressive sight, an ostentatious disy of Englesias power. I had to hand it to them; it was awesome.

    Security around the capital was handled by knights stationed at important points. Youd have to be pretty desperate to attempt a crime around here. Id expect nothing less from the home of the Council, really. Any issues involving representatives would spark an international incident, so they couldnt bezy about that.

    I had Ranga dive into my shadow before we approached the capital, sticking the wagon back into my Stomach. Something told me the guards wouldnt like wolves running around the streetsI wasnt that crazy, so I didnt want to push it.

    Thus, nobody bothered us as we walked around, taking in all the sights. It was our first leisurely stroll in a whileand as I discovered, the most amazing thing wasnt the city views, but its culture. We discovered arge sports arena, next to what looked like an outdoor amphitheater. There was artwork prominently disyed throughout townposters, apparently, for stage ys. Paper was rtively cheap around here, and I even saw people handing out flyers advertising this or that product or event.

    The big city. I could taste it in the air, for the first time in ages. But the thing that really made me think Are you kidding me? were the ss-lined buildings I saw. Merchandise was lined up inside, a bit like a department stores disy windows. In fact, they were disy windowsthe only difference being the weapons and armor on the shelves inside.

    In a fancier city block near the castle, I found a shop featuring dresses and other clothing. It sure wasnt a ce for the masses. Simply living inside the city walls probably meant you were at least somewhat well-off, but owning a house close to the castle was apparently a right reserved exclusively for the nobility. The disparity was like night and day. The more you paid in taxes, I suppose, the better treatment you got. Plus, being nobility usually meant a job inside the castle, so it was probably a given that you could enjoy first-ss housing within walking distance.

    Once we made our initial rounds, we looked for an inn to spend the night. Broadly speaking, the city was divided into four sectionmercial, tourist, industrial, and residential quarters. The castle was at the nexus of all four, with the rest of the city radiating out from it, and the closer you were to the center, the more upscale it got. Pretty easy to figure out.

    Following Kabals lead, we quickly made our way to the tourist quarter, finding a wealth of inns (and alleyways full of taverns in the rear) to serve us. I could feel my heart soar, but sadly, we werent there to drink that day. I frowned a bit at that as we worked out room arrangements.

    We set out the next morning for the Free Guild headquarters.

    The closer you got to the city walls in the tourist quarter, the more tiny shops and public performances you ran into. There was a wide selection of food stalls on offer, too. Toward the center, however, you saw more diplomatic residences, conference centers, schools, and other municipal buildings. It was the most well policed of the four quarters, and toward dead center, we found the Free Guild HQ.

    Right this way, Boss.

    Boy, there sure are a lot of people, huh? Its like a real city.

    Hey, watch out for pickpockets, all right? This ce is crawlin with guards, but thats how a lot of people get lulled into a false sense of security.

    Gido had a point, but all my important stuff was in my Stomach, so I was fine. If anyone needed to worry, it was Elen.

    Kabal guided us closer to the center. The ivory castles overbearing presence made it impossible to get lost.

    The HQ building was arge, grand, modern-looking structure, a far cry from the medieval norm. The US had steel skyscrapers with a dozen or so floors in the neenth century, back when Japan was still mostly single-story wood structures. That was how powerful a nation it was byparison, and the Kingdom of Englesia started looking simr to me.

    Adjacent to the guild was a tall building that had just as grandiose a presence, adorned with a statue of a goddess and arge holy cross on the roof.

    Is that the Church?

    Sure is, replied Gido. The Englesia branch of the Western Holy Churchwell, the headquarters of the whole thing, really.

    Ah, the Churchthe one thing I had to be the most careful with around here.

    The headquarters?

    Well, its a bit of a story, actually

    As Gido put it, the official Church headquarters were located over in the Holy Empire of Lubelius. However, it was chiefly used for religious ceremonies and the like, with most of the actual work taking ce here in the Englesian capital. They dont allow regr folks in here, he said, and Im sure thats the way the Church wants it in this city.

    I didnt have any business with the ChurchIm an atheist, if anythingso I sincerely hoped I wouldnt get involved with them during my life. They see monsters as the enemy, after all. And no matter how I wanted to approach Hinata, I couldnt risk any moves that would attract their attention.

    Kind of funny to see them right next door to the Free Guild, though. The mask was hiding my aura; I didnt think Id get spotted. No point worrying about it. If I did, Id figure something out.

    The guild HQ entrance was protected by a pair of ss doors that mustve cost a fortune to install. Now thats something I never expected to see in this world. The otherworlders around here must have been quite an influenceI bet they went out of their way to get these made, too. Where theres a will, theres a way, I guess. I still had a while to go. Instead of worrying about can, I should just do.

    Something to learn from, I thought as I stood before the doors. As I did, I felt something searching about my body. At the same time, the doors opened. Holy crap, really? Theres some kind of sensor that automatically opens the doors? Talk about high tech being used for the most trivial things! Seeing this piece of Earth tech replicated here was a shock, especiallypared to the wooden Church building next door with its in old push handles. It felt like the architect just wanted something as different from the neighbors as possible.

    It sure has changed in two years, Elen remarked. Well, I wasnt gonna lose out. If this is what Im batting against, I better start nning out a high-rise or two when I get home.

    Stepping inside, we felt several pairs of eyes upon us. They all appeared fairly high-level at a nce. It was only natural that the HQ would be full of the best people theyve got.

    Wee! How can I help you today? said a woman stationed by the door. Her greeting, perfectly timed between breaths, made it feel like the lobby of a five-star hotel. Not to be rude, but it was a far cry from the Blumund capital branch.

    Yeah, were here to see the grand master. Heres our letter of introduction.

    I handed it to her.

    Certainly. Please give me one moment while we confirm.

    She stepped away as another man approached us.

    Uh-oh

    Hey, hey, whats a kid like you doin in here?

    I knew it! Someone wanting to start trouble. First impressions were everything here. If I let them screw with me, I was done. But just as I was set to fire back

    Whoa! Hey, Grass! You reach rank B, too?

    Kabal spoke up, tossing him a few kind words. It made Grass freeze in ce.

    Ahh! Well, look at you, Kabal! Sure havent seen youtely!

    What a letdown. I was all ready to make him see how powerful I was, too. Of course, I had a tendency to screw that up anyway, so maybe its for the better.

    A few other guild members were starting to notice my friends. Soon, they were all trading nostalgic banter with one another, which segued into retelling stories of past glories on the field, h, h, h. I sat down on a sofa and waited. An attendant brought me some tea. It was all just too perfect.

    Enjoying the aroma, I decided to ask about something bothering me.

    Hey, Kabal, howd you know Grass was a B-ranked adventurer?

    Whoa, whoa, Grass shot back, watch your manners! Thats Sir Kabal to you, lildy! You must be a beginner if you dont know how things work around here, huh? How bout you show some respect to your elders?

    Hey, I wouldnt mouth off at Sir Rimuru like that

    You should really show some more discipline to that kid, Kabal. You know we dont allow any guild members under rank B in here, and look at the attitude shes giving off! If you keep spoiling her like that, whats she gonna do when she has to fend for herself?

    Knock it off! This guys here on his own merits! Im sorry, Ill fill him inter, so

    Kabal gave me a regretful bow. I didnt mind as long as people stopped picking on me, but this lildy stuff was starting to get old. Ah well. This particr form of mine, magic-free and carried out strictly by my own body, was the mostfortable thing for me anyway.

    Im not a kid, all right? Or ady. Try to remember that.

    Still, Grass did answer a few questions for me. Our IDs were all checked at the door to confirm our qualifications. Not good enough? Then you didnt get in. I suppose that was why the HQ didnt seem all that heavily guarded. As Elen exined, members below B rank used a branch office near the main entrance, which offered cheaper lodging and was more convenient for day-to-day activity. Good thing I went through all that effort to earn a B, then.

    As all this unfolded in my mind, the woman from before returned. Thanks for waiting, she said with a smile. I was told that only you were allowed in, Sir Rimuru, so if you would follow me, please

    This sent a jolt of tension across the lobby.

    The grand masters gonna see im?!

    So that letter was real?

    Real or not, how often does the grand master give an audience to some guy off the street?

    Thats why Im telling you guys, Sir Rimurus not some guy off the street!

    Kabal proudly boasted about me to the suddenly interested audience. I wish hed stop that; its embarrassing.

    Ill be back in a bit, I said as we walked off.

    The woman directed me down a deeper hallway before knocking on a certain door. There was no response, but she opened it and went in anyway, inviting me to follow.

    Going inside, I immediately noticed a magic circle drawn on the floor, much like the one Vester had drawn. Probably from the same family. Invited to step inside, I stood alongside the woman, feeling her activate the magic behind it for just a single moment. We must not have been teleported very far.

    This new room, a sort of informal reception chamber, felt airtight to methat circle might have taken us somewhere underground. These were probably all anti-spy measures, I figured, and the thoroughness of it all left me with a lot to learn from.

    The woman, well used to this procedure, gave me a bow before teleporting herself back. Left alone, I sat on a chair and waited. After a couple minutes, a door opened, revealing a single young man. He was fairly handsome, with ck hair and ck eyes, but there was still more than a trace of youth to his countenanceyoung enough that Id believe him if he said he was in high school.

    Wee, he began, smiling. I am grand master Yuuki Kagurazaka. Its nice to meet you, Rimuru. Ive heard quite a lot about you! Feel free to call me Yuuki.

    Its good to meet you, too. My names Rimuru Tempest, and I am the leader of the newly established nation of Tempest in the Forest of Jura. Just Rimuru is fine with me, too.

    Thus, I had my first encounter with Yuuki Kagurazaka.

    After introducing ourselves, we settled down to a little Q&A session. It began with a bit of idle chitchat as we probed each others motivations and such, but it wasnt long before I was totally at ease with Yuuki.

    He was just a kind, good-natured guy, supposedly in histe twenties but not even looking out of histe teens. I asked him why; he said it was a type of curse. He didnt obtain any special or unique skills on the way to this world, apparently, but the journey did grant him massively upgraded physical abilities.

    It was really just, like He scratched his head. Like, what should I do? And really, it took me about five years until I realized that something weird was going on with me.

    His eternally boyish looks, among other things, meant he had never been in a rtionship. I couldnt help butugh and cheer him up. I was starting to like the guy.

    Wow, really? Ooh, thats too bad, ha-ha-ha! But, hey, youll get luck on your side eventually!

    Thats really not helping

    Yuuki sounded a little huffy about it, but Im sure I was just imagining it.

    Either way, we quickly broke the ice.

    Still, I have to hand it to you A monster building an entire city?

    Oh? Its not that rare of a thing, is it?

    Well, I mean, I sure havent heard of itand I kinda doubt I will again, after you.

    You think?

    Yeah

    We stared at each other for a bit. Whats the big deal with monsters building cities? Yuukis getting too bogged down in the little things. I let it slide as the topic turned to our current situations, and once that conversation ran its course, Yuuki brought up his main concern.

    So, Rimuru Youre a monster, right? Thats how Fuze described you to me, but Im pretty surprised that you went right through the barrier we have over the headquarters building. How did you transform yourself like that?

    Mm? Oh. Yeah, Im a monster. A slime, to be exact. Keep this between us, but Ive got a skill called Universal Shapeshift that does this for me. I can imitate any monster Ive consumed. That, and this mask contributes a lot, too.

    I removed the mask. I knew Id be dealing with the grand master for a while toe. If we ever got hostile, Id have a hell of a time getting epted by people in this nation. This was a do-or-die moment. I couldnt let him think my city was some house of horrors. Lets just go out with the whole truth, right now.

    Imitate monsters youve Wait. Is that Miss Shizu?!

    A murderous look crossed Yuukis face. A beatand then he disappeared from the opposite side of the table. We exchanged a pair of kicks. The resulting shock wave split the table in two. It was a tremendous blowheavy, furious, like nothing a human couldunch. I might not ever feel pain, but for just a moment, my leg felt too numb to move.

    Calm down, kid I said, cool as a cucumber.

    Looking back, Shizu managed to spot me purely on the atmosphere I exuded around her. A pretty amazing feat, now that I think about it. It took a lot of imagination to picture an otherworlder who wound up turning into a slime.

    The rage was gone from Yuukis eyes, but he was still on his feet, ready to continue. Could you exin this to me in detail? he asked, his gaze fixed upon me.

    We sat across from each other once more, leaving the broken table where it was.

    Well, all right. Look, to be honest with you, Im an alien from a faraway

    What are you talking about? I want you to be serious with me! Honestly, Im impressed you think this is a great time to goof off!

    Yikes. Yuuki looked pretty pissed. I figured a little joke would help ease the tension, but maybe not

    All right, all right. Ill be serious now, so just chill out a little

    Youe all the way here, and thats the joke you go for? Thats the first time Ive heard that one. Are you by any chance?

    Yuuki guessed it before I could even say it. I decided to start from the beginning.

    SoI was attacked by this guy on the street

    I spent the next while going into minute detail about what happened.

    Ah So you are Japanese, huh, Rimuru?

    Heh-heh. Just as nned. I make a joke that only someone with my background would understand, and he was instantly on my side. It made him angry at first, but, hey, it worked! The quickest way to make him realize who I really was! (Whether he believed that was my intention is another issue, but, um, it worked!)

    Once we got through with that, we talked about all kinds of things. What wed been up to in this world. Our trials and tribtions. Shizus final moments.

    Thats how she decided to go? I have to admit, she often told me about how much she didnt like this world

    Yuuki closed his eyes.

    No point dwelling on dreary topics. I brought up other things from our old world. He demonstrated a particrly keen interest in how his favorite manga and anime wound up ending.

    Aw,e on! You gotta tell me what happened after that!

    Hee-hee-hee! You wanna know? Well, guess what? Pretty much all the manga and anime you mentioned ended by the time I left! And you know I kept up with all of it. A true gentleman always makes sure to cover all the bases!

    Thats amazing! Please, sir! Please, give me your knowledge!

    He was starting to sound frantic. It made the woman from before almost drop her tray of tea and snacks when she teleported back in. Maybe I took it a little too far.

    Well, here, Ill show you, then. Do you have a piece of paper?

    Paper?

    Yeah.

    Yuuki gave me a doubtful look as he provided me with one. I swallowed it into my stomach

    There, all set.

    and took out my finished work, handing it to Yuuki.

    Wh-whoaaaaaaa!! What kind of magic trick is this, sir?!

    I couldnt me him for his surprise. I had just handed him a neatly bound volume of manga.

    This was the result of me wringing everything I could out of the Great Sage. I basically took the paper and copied the images I reyed from my memory upon it. Talk about a waste of a great talent. Real effective, though.

    Right! If you want to read more, Ill need some more paper to work with!

    Without a word, Yuuki stood up and ordered another woman to bring some paper. His face was dead serious, so the woman quickly stepped up to bring a few reams down. I spent the next little bit burning all my memories upon them, making sure to keep the extra sheets for myself. Paper was still a high-end productwhat I took was worth a small fortune. Never hurts to have some. I had some actual, non-stupid uses for it, too.

    Plus, Yuuki sure wasntining. I bet not being able to catch up on his favorite series was a big disappointment for him. Getting that chance in this world, he had nothing toin about.

    Thank you so much, sir!

    Of course, some of the series he requested hadnt gone much of anywhere plot-wise, much less wrapped up publication. It sucks how those are often the most engaging series. I wanted to know how some of those turned out, too. Hopefully another Japanese otherworlder will show up in, like, ten years or so to fill me in.

    You know, Rimuru, I wanted to ask you

    Oh? Whats that?

    When you signed on for the guild, how did you fill out the entry form? You didnt have any time to learn thenguage in this world, did you?

    Oof. Talk about hitting you where it hurts.

    Hee-hee-hee! Well, about that. Its because I studied thisnguage, of course! After days of unbending effort, I should add!

    The Sage was deciphering and copying everything I needed for me, actually. But Kabal and the gang did teach me the basic alphabet, and the rest came quickly after that.

    Really? You didnt use some magic cheat or anything? Because learning thenguage was one of the toughest things I dealt with,ing here.

    Oh, um, ummm, dont be silly! No matter how old you get, studying never stops being important!

    I wavered a bit, but I think I managed to keep the facade going. It hurt a little, seeing Yuuki show me such respect, but I wasnt strictly lying, so its all good. The Sage was what let me read and understand things, but, heythats my ability. Just because I omitted that fact didnt make it any less true.

    Over dinner, our conversation drifted back toward more serious topicsin particr, about what wed both do next.

    So you risked your life to travel here, Rimuru, because Miss Shizu said were both from Japan? I mean, Id love to keep helping you going forward, but was that your only motive?

    How do you mean?

    Oh, I just thought you might have some other reason. Like, maybe youre trying to find a way back home or something?

    Back home.

    Yes, I had thought about it. But I gave up on it. I was already dead over there; I was sure theyd cremated my body long ago. There wasnt really anyce for me to return to. Id just make everyones lives chaotic. If they thought about me now and then, reflecting on the good old days, I was okay with that. To younger otherworlders, however, Im sure getting back home was their number-one priority.

    Do you think its possible? I asked. I was greeted with silence. Not that easy, I guess. He wouldve done it already if it was. Thats about what I figured.

    Well, Yuuki said, it kinda looks like a one-way street. Thats because this world isI guess you could call it semi-physical.

    He went into detail on what he knew so far. Essentially, our old was a purely physical worlda world free of magicules. The opposite of that is a purely spiritual worldone teeming with spirits, demons, angels, and other mystic life-forms; one full of mysterious and astonishing energy. The two were pr opposites but still retained some deep, important connections.

    Which led to this worlda world of chaos. An extremely unique entityone that shared properties from both the physical and spiritual worlds. Its atmosphere was packed with magicules, allowing fairies, ghouls, and other spiritual life-forms to manifest themselvessomething Yuuki figured out via his own experimentation.

    Traveling from a physical world to this one meant that our own bodies had to be broken down once, then rebuilt in semi-physical form. That, he exined, was likely why we couldnt go back to a purely physical world again.

    However, he added, I dont think its a zero-chance possibility. Japans full of stories about demons and monsters and things, and you see the same kinds of tales and myths all over the world. So if were able to get the conditions just right, Im thinking that maybe we can, you know?

    He sounded right to me. I had my own thoughts about it, too. It all felt like a vague fever dream at this point, but I definitely remembered hearing the World Language from pretty much the moment I was stabbed. There was definitely some kind of connection between Earth and this world it had to ride on.

    Plus You can cast magic, cant you, Rimuru?

    Yeah, I replied to the sudden topic change, I had a spell or two taught to me.

    Yuuki squinted at me, jealous. That sure is nice I was really excited about magic, too, at first

    As he put it, when he first came to this world, he bothmented his plight and fostered a deep fascination for the unknown force of magic. I was the same way. Anyone whos a fan of manga and anime must have wished they could toss around magic at least once in their lives.

    I wanted to learn some, but for some reason, I just couldnt do it. I think its because of the way my body changed. It felt so, like, romantic, too, but no

    Yep. Something adventurous to it, isnt there? If somethings right there at your fingertips, of course youll wanna try it out. But Yuuki just didnt have the right characteristics for it. Reality sucks sometimes.

    Still, I can perform research into it. And what I found was that in this world, magic is the power to interfere with thews of nature. Theres a mysterious set ofws to this worldpeople call them the World Languageand when you earn a new power, or the value of your life rises in some way, like when you evolve, then thats how nature tells you about it. Magic runs under the same rules as this World Language; when you cast the spell, it turns that nonphysical phenomenon into real life. And if you look at it the other way

    Yuuki paused. I tried to guess where this was going. Look at it the other way

    Everything has a cause and an effect, and if you figure out thews behind all that, you might even be able to find a way homeis what youre saying?

    I was familiar with the World Language. My skill, the Great Sage, used the term when talking to me. It was my familiarity with it that led me to that conclusion.

    Right. Thats very good, Rimuru. Im surprised You understood a concept that I had to spend years researching.

    Take the concept of returning home, render it into a set ofws, and trante it into the World Language. Easy for me to say, but trying to discover thosews would take a lifetime of research. Even with that much effort, it may not be possible at all.

    But if you were able to interfere with the World Language on a deeper level

    The Sage was silent. No, a skill like thats just a fairy tale. Guess wed just have to keep plugging away on that research.

    Yuuki gave me a wry grin. Of course, Id never have enough time to uncover all of it, I guess. Id have to decipher and evaluate each of thews, one by one.

    And thats probably his main goal. Im sure hell keep up his research.

    Well, Ill definitely help you with whatever I can, and Ill try doing a little research on my side, too.

    I had to volunteer to pitch in. I just had to give a shout-out to his spirit.

    But anyway, if you arent trying to return home, what brought you here, Rimuru?

    Now he was getting back on topic. I figured he deserved a full answer.

    Well, if I can kick back and chill out a little in this life, thats all I really want. Ive got a town pretty well built up, and basically, Im just in this to have fun with my friends. But theres something thats been bothering metely

    My other mission. I needed to purchase magic stones and check out the cities, figuring out how advanced their civilization wasthat was important. But I hadnt forgotten the biggest one. The children I saw in my dreams.

    I see. Miss Shizu must have been really worried for them. But those kids are Well, if thats what she wants you to do, then I trust you are up to it.

    He then dived into a long story, telling me about the children I saw in detail.

    After the end of our long conversation, I walked out of the guild headquarters, offering to treat my friends to dinner for making them wait so long. Oh, dont worry about it, they all said, but it was already early eveningYuuki and I had been talking practically from dawn till dusk. I wasnt expecting the meeting to go on for so long, so I felt bad for them.

    We went to a restaurant with a famed reputation across the city, a far cry from our lodging. As we greedily tucked into the gourmet dishes ferried to us, I went over everything Yuuki and I had agreed to.

    So yeah, starting a week from now, Ive agreed to be a schoolteacher.

    Huh?

    Where did thate from?

    You sure are a joker, Boss!

    Neither Kabal nor his cohorts were ready to believe it at first. Sheesh. Better start from the beginning.

    Basically, Im gonna be living in an empty room in the school dorm starting tomorrow. I told you about the dreams Ive been having, right? Yuuki thinks he knows them, so hes setting me up to work as their teacher.

    They responded with several questions, which I answered in order. I had seeded in convincing them by the time we finished dinner, although they still couldnt hide their exasperation.

    Wow, Boss. A teacher, though, huh?

    Pretty hard to imagine

    Im worried for those kids.

    Whatre you looking at me like that for, Gido?

    Yeah, so as far as it goes for you guys, today marks the end of you guiding me around on this journey.

    Kinda sudden, Boss.

    I thought we were contracted to stick with you until we were back?

    Oh, Ill be fine! Thats why I set up that teleportation circle, right? Because I figured something like this might happen. This way, I can go back to Tempest or Blumund in the blink of an eye. Gonna be a bit harder for you guys, though, huh? Good luck out there!

    Whoa, whoa, are you serious? I thought wed be taking that wolf wagon back, man

    Yeah, really! Ugh, just thinking about the journey now makes me so depressed!

    Aw, cmon, Kabal, chided Gido. And you, too, Elen. You guys are getting too used to life on easy street, arentcha? Not that Im lookin forward to getting battered and bruised on a regr wagon again, but

    These guys One moment, theyre going on about how theyll take responsibility and keep me guarded till the bitter end; the next, theyre whining about losing their luxury travel. It was certainly in character for them all, but still.

    So the four of us proceeded to drink away the loneliness and regret untilte that night. The next morning, just outside the city gates, I said my final good-byes to the extremely hungover trio.

    Drop us a line if anything happens, Boss!

    Are you sure youll be fine without us?

    Well miss havin you around, but take care! Let us know when youre back in town!

    Sure thing, I said. Ill let you know if somethinges up.

    I whipped our wagon out of my Stomach. A merchant was already approaching us, two horses in tow.

    Uh, Boss Aw, man, why?

    Youyou arent?

    Are you serious?!

    Ignoring their pleas, I ordered the seller to hitch his horses to the wagon. All right, thanks for delivering em, I said as I signed his payment form. Kabal andpany had finally epted the bitter truth by then.

    Yeah, so consider this wagon a parting gift for you guys, okay? Give it back to Rigurd if you dont need it.

    Uh, I think were gonna need it a lot, Boss!

    Youre so nice to us, Sir Rimuru!

    Whew! What a man. I wish Fuze could learn to be this nice to his people.

    They were all touched by the gift. Im d the surprise was a sess. One more thing

    Your payments inside the wagon, too. Check it outter

    Whoooaaa! Lookit this shield!!

    Aaaaahhhh! This staff is incredible!!

    Well, look at this! Thats one damn sharp-looking dagger. Wait, is this a magic weapon?!

    Man, theyre like hyenas. I was hoping theyd open up the boxes while I wasnt around, but that idea sure went to waste.

    Sheesh, you guys Ah well. Thats your payment. One Scale Shield for Kabal, one Dryads Staff for Elen, and one Tempest Dagger for Gido. Take care of em for me, okay?

    Of course, Boss!

    Wed be crazy not to! How did you know I was in the market for a new staff? Thank you so much, Sir Rimuru!

    But, umthese are all Uniques, arent they?! I dont think Ive ever seen a weapon as amazing as this one. Are you sure about this, Boss?

    Sure, Im sure. We didnt pay anything for the materials. The staffs a gift that Treyni was nice enough to supply, so treat it with care, got it?

    Oh, yes, yes!

    Elen lovingly rubbed the side of her face against the staff. I was sure shed treat it just fine without me harping on it. Kabals and Gidos weapons were manufactured goods, but the Dryads Staff really was one of a kind, so. If she lost or broke it, Treyni would probably have my head for itand I told her it was for Elen, too, so I was more worried than I should be, probably.

    Kabals Scale Shield was another product from the mind of Garm, crafted from scales taken from the Charybdisthe same scales forged by Kurobe to make Gidos Tempest Dagger, which was infused with wind magic to boost the holders physical speed. We still retained a ratherrge cache of those scales from the battleI had given several hundred to King Gazel as a thank-you gift. The ones I had personally consumed were still in practically mint condition. We had researched putting them to use in battle equipment, and these two items were the firstplete test samples. As Gido said, they were Unique-caliber weapons.

    Thanks to the three of them ripping open their presents early, this was no longer any kind of lonesome, depressing good-bye for us. They were all in high spirits as I saw them offwhich is fine. Nobody likes sad farewells. Besides, all the excitement seemed to cure their hangovers. And this is Kabals gang were talking abouttheyd no doubte groveling to me for help with some other crisis soon.

    Thus, it was with an odd sense of satisfaction that I sent them on their way.

    Once they were gone, it was time to kick off my big move.

    All it really entailed, of course, was heading to the dorm and picking up my key. Once I filled out all the paperwork, I told the manager that Id be moving in that night. As Yuuki excitedly put it to me, Id get to enjoy a dedicated staff dormitory, plus three meals and ten silver coins per day! The manager confirmed that with me, stating theyd get the ce cleaned up before the day was through.

    The average sry in the capital, by the way, was seven silver a day. Educators were treated a lot better around here than I wouldve guessed. A night at our inn cost four silver, not including meals, and while it was nice inside, it still felt priceypared to that joint in the farming vige. Itd be much more economical to move into the dorm Yuuki had for me.

    I also took a quick peek inside while I was there. It wasnt a major step down fromst nights inn. I was happy with it.

    Like I told Kabal and the gang, Id begin teaching in seven days, although Id need to report to school in six to manage the handover. Thus, I had five days to use however I wanted, although this particr day was mostly spent purchasing assorted household goods. I had the budget to purchase most of what I wanted and have it carted back to the dorm, touring around the city a little more as I shopped the day away.

    I upied most of the next day unpacking and organizing all the stuff I purchased. I knew I shouldnt have sent those guys off so early. I regretted that now.

    On day three, I decided to hit the library. I still hadnt heard anything about, like, what Id be teaching at school. Yuuki was working that out for me right now, but in the meantime, I figured I should brush up a bit on my core knowledge.

    That and fulfill one of my other important goalslearning magic. I wanted to take this opportunity to read through as many magic tomes as I could in there. ess to the room with said tomes was restricted, but you could get in if you showed ID proving you were a B-ranked adventurer or higher. You couldnt take any of the books out, either, and I wanted to read em all while I was in the capital, so that was job one for me.

    This was thergest library in the city, but it wasnt affiliated with the government. The full-on Royal Library was inside the castle, avable only to nobility and court-appointed magicians. A-ranked adventurers who were official guests of the state could request ess, perhaps, but that didnt apply to me right now. Certain magic was treated as ssified information by particr nations, so it wasnt just a matter of walking up and asking for a library card.

    For now, Id have to be happy with this regr library. Besides, there were a lot of valuable books in there, filled with tales of forbidden skills and techniques collected by adventurers worldwide. Some of the more ancient tomes discovered during Free Guild work were gathered here, too. The collection is easily as valuable as anything the Royal Library might have, I thought.

    It was wonderful. I felt lucky to be blessed with such fortune, so soon after arriving. Im sure it was karmic repayment for all my good deeds.

    I quickly began browsing through the magic tomes. There were so many here, you could never finish them in a lifetime if you read them any normal way. So, um, apologies to the diligent schrs out there putting in all that time in reading rooms, but Im using the Great Sage to read these suckers.

    If someone watched me in there, itd probably look like I was just running a hand over a book, then meekly returning it to the shelf. But my hand was taking in the entirety of each book, recording it fully and urately. Running the Sage and Glutton skills in parallel, I copied each magic tome into my mind at breakneck speed. I could take the time to pore over the contentsteror really, I could let the Sage do that. All I had to do here was pluck a book from the shelves, then put it back.

    Would that be enough to let me harness the magic inside, though?

    Received. It is possible to thoroughly examine the contents with Analyze and Assess, thenprehend it with the All of Creation skill. Onceprehended and stored within memory space, the magic may be executed with Cast Cancel.

    Really? Whoa. So all I gotta do is think about what kinda magic I want? What a crazy set of skills. Theres just no end to the wonders the Sage brings me.

    In that case, its settled. Im not even gonna bother reading the titles of these books. Just in and out, shelve and unshelve, over and over. Each volume converts itself into knowledge for me. The mere thought made me want to do this more than ever.

    So over the next two days, I read those books until I was blue in the face, sessfully memorizing every one in the magic-tome stacks. That was how I rounded out my little vacation. The other librarians and visitors gave me passing stares, like I was some kind of wacko, but I had no regrets. Before my lofty goal of learning more magic, that was just a trivial detail.

    It was now my first day of work. After a few greetings, I was given a word or two of advice from the academys vice principal.

    Yuuki had already warned me it would be hard workin addition to being guild master, he was also chairman of this schools board of directors. He called it more of an honorary title than anything, but I was still impressed. In the ten or so years he had been there, he not only built up the entire Free Guild but even set up an affiliated school for the outfit. In a way, he was the ideal all adventurers should aspire to.

    This school was, indeed, a sort of training ground for would-be guild members. Like the guild itself, you decided on a department to specialize inbeyond themon courses shared by all students, there were also ssroom-based lectures in magical and monster sciences, as well as on-the-field training in battle and survival. You were free to devise your own curriculum, not unlike the universities of my previous life.

    My job, however, would be running a special ss that was a tad different from what most students had ess to. The S-ss, as they put it, was a group of students deemed to be problematic in one way or another. Ever since their previous adviser, the notoriously hard-line Shizue Izawa, left her post due to personal issues, the ss had been left teacherless and free to wreak havoc however it liked. She was a Hero, the Conqueror of mes, and I definitely had some big shoes to fill. I suppose I should get used to beingpared to her all the time around here.

    It seems this ss was wild enough that it had already driven off several would-be teachers in the meantime, including a few B-ranked adventurers. The administrators were at their wits end trying to figure out what to do with them. The vice principal told me all this, much as Yuuki did before. It wasposed of five students, as he put it a few days back

    All five of these students are otherworlders, he began, people just like us. Let me ask you, though, Rimuru Do you know someone named Hinata Sakaguchi?

    Whys her nameing up now? I mean, I wanted to ask about her, but

    I know the name, at least. Shes an otherworlder and one of Shizus old apprentices, right? Also that shes stronger than Shizu and has a really great memory and stuff.

    Stronger than Miss Shizu at her peak, to be exact, yes. And do you have much idea of just how strong Miss Shizu was?

    How strong she was? Well, strong enough to summon a high-level spirit like Ifrit and be one with it. The sheer temperatures involved were brutal. Without Cancel Temperature, I wouldve been a goner, for sure.

    Well, she wielded Ifrit, a monster who goes past A level, so

    Right. At her peak, Miss Shizu could bring Ifrit fully under her control. In terms of the scale I implemented for the guild, shed be in the upper echelon of what wed call A-plus, even. She was something specialbut Hinata, at the age of fifteen, gained strength that even went beyond that. That should give you some idea of what Im talking about.

    I nodded. Hmm. I didnt have any idea at all, but I kept listening.

    You might be wondering why Im bringing this upbut first and foremost, I wanted you to know what makes us otherworlders different from the people in this world. Some of us are gifted with incredibly powerful battle skills, like Hinata, but some of us, like me, dont have any skills at all. You cant put all otherworlders into the same category; it really runs the gamut. My favorite caf in town is run by an otherworlder, and hes powerless, so to speak. Most otherworlders have some kind of special ability, usually, but thats not an irond rule.

    I see. So most, but not all, people gain a skill or two when they make the journey.

    However, Yuuki continued, the real key here is the difference between naturally traveling over to this world and being called over.

    Hmm. Veldora discussed that a little, too, didnt he? Yeah, he did

    (Many otherworlderse here bearing special powers. Powers that are chiseled into their souls in the midst of their journey. The summoned will always bear one such ski unique skill, one exclusive to them and them alone. Unlike the otherworlders whoe here by sheer ident, these people bear a soul strong enough to withstand the stress of the summoning process. The fact that said summoning process so rarely seeds in this world otherwise proves as such.)

    I think thats what it was.

    In other words, you need a soul strong enough to handle the summon process, or else it wont work. I ryed all this to Yuuki. Im impressed you know that, he replied, eyes wide. Thats exactly what Ive learned in my research. Wasnt really research for me; Im just parroting what Veldora said, but oh well.

    As you say, Rimuru, the summons that are called over here for some purpose are always granted powers suited for this purposefor example, so they can be a Hero to give mankind a decisive edge in battle. During this journey, your body is disassembled and put back together in semi-physical formin other words, its rebuilt. Without a strong enough will, I imagine youd get swallowed up in all that energy and disappear into the ck.

    Even Hinata, who came here quite by ident, was granted otherworldly powers. If she had been called here for some specific goal, I couldnt imagine how strong shed be then. I imagine thats what Yuuki was trying to saybut what he said next sent shivers down my spine.

    Now, what do you think would happen if you are summoned while still in iplete form?

    Iplete form?

    Exactly

    What he then exined to me almost made my skin crawl. Normally, performing a summon under a given set of conditions required thirty or more summoners to work as a team. The ceremony took seven whole days topleteand even then, the sess rate was less than 1 percent. Even worse, once a ceremony wasplete, the same summoners would need to wait for a certain interval before performing it againan interval that took something like thirty-three or sixty-six years. The longer you waited, the more youd be able to narrow down the conditions you wanted.

    So what happens if you perform a summon without stipting any particr conditions? That certainly loosened things up quickthere wouldnt be anywhere near as much of an interval required between summonings. The same summoners could try it again and againbut the sess rate didnt get any better, and even if you pulled it off, you often wound up summoning children and the like.

    Despite these disadvantages, there were still apparently good reasons for choosing this approach. But what about the children who were summoned? Their wills were quite strong, of course, their bodies now infused with energy in the form of magicules. But they did not obtain any skills to go with that willpowerand all that energy was a severe mismatch for an immature body. So much so, in fact, that given enough time, the energy would literally burn the body away, having no other outlet to release itself with.

    Huh? Wait, so are those five children?

    Yes. As Im sure youre imagining, they were summoned.

    Whoa. Is that, like, okay, or?

    Yuuki didnt answer. But his silence provided enough of one.

    Those children, he continued, were the ones not fully summoned. Attempts at crafting a Hero that failed.

    A Hero? What do you mean?

    Remember what I said? A Hero can provide a decisive advantage for the human race in battle. In this world, the monsters are much stronger than usoverwhelmingly so. Its safe to say were under constant threat. The power of mankind around here is pitifully weak. Theyre all seeking a Hero they can pin their hopes upon.

    What, so theyre summoning people willy-nilly to find Heroes to fight em off?

    Exactly, Rimuru. What this world has decided is that its worth sacrificing thousands if it means the birth of a Hero for themselves.

    Yuukis voice rang cold in the underground room. It was the worlds choice. I had a hard timeing up with a response to that. Did I have a right to criticize them all for putting their own beloved family above a bunch of alien strangers? If youre presented with two people in danger and you could only save one, what would you do? If I was friends with one, of course Id reach out to that guy first.

    These children are the results of failed summonings, conducted by multiple nations under strict secrecy. They were picked up by Miss Shizu, and she wanted to do whatever she could to save them.

    Multiple nations? Therere governments involved in this?

    Yes. Its what the world has decided to do, like I said. In their eyes, instead of gradually investing in armies to fend off the monsters, its more efficient to stake it all on one otherworlder who can stand far above everyone else. And if you know how strong Miss Shizu was, you can see why.

    I suppose I could. A force in the tens of thousands would mean nothing against something like Ifrit. If an Orc Disaster stepped into town, they could pool Kabal and all the other B-ranked adventurers in the world together, and theyd nevernd anything close to a serious blow. If those were the odds, then having an otherworlder like Shizu or Hinata could make all the difference, once the people knew about them.

    The other thing is that its not like a Hero is born every day in this world. How I understand it is that it involves being willing to take on the crimes and sins of all mankind, in a way. Otherwise, you wont be able to ovee the trials ced upon you by the spirits that rule over thend. Of course, there are some Heroes out there who are anything but. Theyre willing to invite divine wrath upon themselves

    Huh. The idea of just leaving everything to these Heroes sounded pretty irresponsible to me, but that assumes you had some Heroes to start with. Some real ones, with official World Language approval. And thats why all these nations are willing to dabble in the dark magic of summoning, damn the consequences. Any sessful ones wereuded as Heroes, and as Yuuki put it, each nation had a few on hand.

    The demon lords held so much power in this world that, if you were foolish enough to take one on, you couldnt afford to be picky with your methods. All these human nations scrambling to procure Heroes didnt seem strange at all to me anymore.

    Theres that many around, though? I havent seen any in the smaller towns and viges

    Thats because these summoned otherworlders are usually ordered to serve as bodyguards for the nobility or people associated with them.

    Oh, right. Veldora mentioned that, too.

    So summons that havebat potential are branded with a magical curse in their soul, I blurted out, preventing them from defying their summoners?

    You know about that, Rimuru?!

    I did know, yes. I knew, but I just kinda forgot. Yeahhh No wonder Shizu wasnt so crazy about this world.

    So whats gonna happen to these kids?

    As far as I know, Yuuki grimly reported, the longest any has survived is five years. Those are the facts, when ites to iplete summons. We havent found any magic spells that can stave off the bodily copse. If someone is summoned under the age of ten, theyre almost certain to die, being unable to obtain any unique skills.

    Then he gave a self-effacing smile.

    But at least each nation was kind enough to hand the children over to us.

    Ill bet. No need to take care of children whore useless in their minds, Im sure.

    But the Western Holy Church doesnt have a problem with that? Theyve got those crazy strong pdins and stuff, right?

    You could say the Church gives it their tacit consent. To them, the total annihtion of thiss monsters is the major goal.

    For real? And theyre the defenders of righteousness or whatever? Gimme a break. And does Hinata think that way? She really doesnt care about all these children from her homnd dying as long as she can beat the monsters?

    Hinata, I suppose, is a realist. She takes the most rational of approaches to her problems. If something seems the most effective way to her, shell do it, I guess you could say, butbut it makes no sense to me, no.

    He knew for sure, at least, that Hinata wasnt applying pressure internationally to put an end to these summonings.

    All right. So would anyone mind if I did something about these kids?

    What are you thinking about doing?

    I looked Yuuki in the eye. If its what Shizu wants, I dered, I think Im ready to take them on.

    This mustve been the work Shizu left behind. Something she regretted so much, she infiltrated my dreams to beg me for it. I saw no reason not to answer that. Too bad I couldnt tell her I got this in real life.

    Yuuki nodded. By all means, he whispered as he bowed his head. I hope youll save them, if you can.

    Yes. I always do what I can. Always have, always will.

    And so, I agreed to take care of these children in the school.

    My role was more of an adviser than a traditional teacher. Instead of just teaching coursework to my students, Id be living with them, enlightening them. In other words, Id be taking all the same courses they were, in all subjects. Id be eating with them, toogood thing food was included in the deal. If I could teach them about a subject, I would; if not, Id help other teachersbut either way, my job was to watch over these special guys.

    Id love to put my trust in you, the vice principalmented. Its not every day that the chairman makes a personal rmendation like this. But those kids were too much even for B-ranked adventurers. Plus, youre practically a child yourself, arent you? Nobodys going to hold it against you if you decide to turn the offer down.

    Thanks, but Ill be fine.

    Are you sure? If you find youre in over your head, be sure to tell me as soon as possible, all right?

    I appreciated the concern, bute onthese are children were dealing with.

    Such were my thoughts as I kicked off the first day of ss.

    Hey, guys! Im in charge of you all starting today

    My friendly greeting was immediately countered with the sh of a ming sword.

    Sweet! Nice one, Ken!

    Is that your finisher? Its all done now?!

    Kinda weak in the end. It didnt evennd!

    Without a shred of concern for me, the children carried on, clearly seeing me as the enemy.

    Um, I thought these kids had, like, barely any time left to live? Cause theyre looking crazy healthy right now! A little too healthy! The ckboard behind me was now in mes, cut into two pieces. Hoo boy. Kids these dayswhats gotten into them? Why, back in my day

    Already, these kids were making me sound like a crotchety old man. I thought about throwing in the towel right there. We arent on Earth, right? Nobodys gonnain if I toss out a little corporal punishment, will they?

    Before me were five children, the summons Yuuki had gathered from assorted nations. They were:

    Kenya Misaki: male, age ten

    Ryota Sekiguchi: male, age ten

    Gail Gibson: male, age eleven

    Alice Rondo: female, age nine

    Chloe Aubert: female, age ten

    They were still grade-school age, but I guess they packed a punch. With Shizu building them up, I was liable to get hurt if I went easy on them.

    Honestly, I wasnt expecting this. I thought theyd be a little more obedient. Watching the children as they returned my gaze with looks of sheer hostility, I felt my first pangs of depression in a long time.

    They were all young, around ten years old. Gail was built enough to pass for middle-school age, but he was still only eleven.

    I called each by name, looking over the files I picked up in the staff room. No reply. Um, I really needed some kind of response from these guys if I was gonna do this

    Ah well. Time to call upon my trusty assistant.

    Please give me a reply when I call your name, I gently advised. Kenya was the first to voice his tearfulints.

    Hey! Whats that dogis that a wolf?! Get it out of here!

    K-Ken, are you okay?

    G-get away from me! This is crazy!

    Ahhh! Ill behave, Ill behave!!

    I am Ranganeither dog nor wolf. My master demands a reply, child. Will you follow the order, or?

    Whoa, Rangas a big hit. Look at him y around with those kids! It really warms the heart, doesnt it?

    All right! Okay! Kenya shouted, eyes tearing up at Rangas threat. Theres a good boy. He may not have liked it, but I needed some good behavior in here.

    There you go! Children must do as theyre told!

    I smiled and conducted my roll call.

    Apparently, these kids had hit it off pretty well with Shizu. Apart from her, though, Yuuki was the only person theyd listen to. Given their circumstances, I should have expected that, but that didnt mean Id let them steamroll over me. I had agreed to be their teacher, and I had better drill that much into their heads real quick.

    My names Rimuru, and Ive been appointed to be your adviser starting today. I aint gonna coddle you the way Shizu did, so you better be sure you understand that before anything else!

    I started things off by drilling into them the importance of polite greetings.

    Right, then. They were no longer in a state of outright rebellion, but they were hostile as ever. The ssroom was bathed in silence; I could literally hear one of them gulp nervously. Ranga loped back up to me, tail wagging.

    All right, I said with a refreshing smile. Take your seats, everybody. Nobody moved. That sucked. The deep hatred they obviously had for anyone outside their group would make earning their trust a trial. If I were them, my thought process would probably be along the lines of Ill kill that asshole, but I wasnt. This world was all about survival of the fittest. If they couldnt beat Ranga, their selfishness ended now. If you wanna hate someone for it, hate yourself for being so weak.

    So

    Okay, then! I suppose youve all got something youd like to say to me. So how about we have a little test?

    Hey! Alice eximed first. Whys it gotta be that?!

    A test? Ryota asked the boy next to him.

    Blehhhh!! replied Kenya.

    I hate tests was the more direct assessment from Chloe.

    This is all too sudden, the more intellectual-sounding Gail added. I demand an exnation!

    Quite the protest. Children have such a wealth of personalities, dont they? And no matter what world youre in, nobody likes a test.

    Enough back talk. I know what youre all thinking, but listen. What were about to do is something thats necessary for each of you!

    Why?! Were all gonna die pretty soon anyway! Whats the point of studying n taking tests and stuff?!

    Y-yeah Ourst teacher just brought in a bunch of toys and books n said we could do whatever we wanted

    We havent done any real sswork since we came here

    I wanna read more books!

    And who do you think you are? Just because youve got a big dog doesnt mean you can lord it over us!

    Ah, theyre bursting with energy. Thats great. But I wasnt lying. This was necessary. And sadly, I wasnt willing topromise.

    All right, all right, just calm down. I called it a test, but really, its more of a fun game for you all to y. And if you dont like it, you canin about it as much as you want. So what youll do is take turns taking me on in mockbat. The rules are simple. Attack me with everything youve got. If you can beat me, its over. But if I can dodge your attacks for ten minutes, I win. Easy, right?

    Thats it?

    Yep. Easy, right?

    Ten minutes?

    Hey, Ill spot you guys an hour each if you want.

    Ha-ha-ha! If you dont sic that dog on me, I dont even need ten!

    Great! I promise I wont do that, okay? But its one at a time for you guys, too! No helping out your ssmates, all right?

    Okay!

    Sure.

    Heh-heh! Ill totally win if that dog aint in it!

    I just want to read some books

    So wherere we doing this?

    Hmm, the gymnasium ought to work, I suppose. Do you all understand the rules? You can figure out the turn order on the way there.

    With that, I took the kidsmy studentsover to the gym. A few passersby gave us looks of horror on the way, which I ignored.

    This was a simple sparring session. I wasnt going toy a hand on themI just wanted to see what abilities they had. None possessed unique skills, making them unable to expend the magicules that threatened to destroy them from the inside. Would all-out battle be enough to consume them instead? I didnt know, but I wanted to try. I doubted Shizu and Yuuki hadnt thought of that, but with Analyze and Assess, at least I could observe them in closer detail than either of those people.

    By the way, monsters were generally assigned strength ratings based on the amount of magicules within them. Adventurer ranks, on the other hand, were based on proven strength, meaning a C-ranked adventurer could bear more magical energy than a B rank. I found that kind of weird, but that testing I went through proved it to be the case.

    Monsters, meanwhile, mostly fight based on instinct; there wasnt much difference between individuals of a species in terms of technical level. This meant that magicule count was the handiest way to rank them. (Some individual monsters did have special giftsa lot lived in Tempestbut whatever.)

    One other thing I noticed was that,pared to adventurers, monsters often held a ton more magicules. That fact made it all the clearer how frail the human race was against them. A human could raise their technical skills only so far, after all. And again, that was the reason why nations were going through with these forbidden summonings. It enraged me; I couldnt believe it was allowed to go onbut I could see the logic to it.

    Getting back to these kidsone surprise I got from Analyze and Assess was its magic measurements. In monster terms, each of their magicule counts would rank them as A or higher. Chloe, in particr, had enough energy to put her up there with some high-level elementals.

    This was weird. Theyd be fearsome foes, if they only had a way to harness that force. But wed see soon enough.

    They had worked out the order of taking turns. Kenya stepped up first, all but bursting to go. He was only ten, but he was the most defiant of the groupkind of the boss, maybe?

    Hey, is it cool if I use this sword?

    Impudent little brat.

    Dont you remember? I said to gimme everything you got. But if you lose, you better start calling me Professor Rimuru!

    Pfft! No grown-up can beat us. Weve never lost to anyone except Miss Shizu!

    Oh, really? Why dont you save your bragging for after you win?

    And so, the test began. I let the kids decide on a signal, providing them with an hourss Id bought the previous day and telling them how to use it.

    Shall we, then?

    Umm, begin!

    With Ryotas signal, Kenya began to run. For a grade-schooler, he moved wellhed put most grown-ups to shame, really. But it was no sweat for me.

    You can do it, Ken!!

    Dont let im beat ya!

    Kenya strained his body, attempting to live up to the cheers. He tried his hardest tond an attack on me, but I didnt even need to predict his moves. He was an open book.

    He looked about ready to cry by the time the five-minute mark passed. He began shooting fire from his sword, but Hmm. This fires pretty weak. The way heunched it without any chanting time was impressive, but it was simple to guess where itdnd. I didnt bother taking any shots on my body, but the heat waves from the explosions didnt feel very toasty to me. A notch below, say, the Fireballs a B-ranked adventurer like Elen could conjure. And considering Kenya bore A-level magic energy, his energy was being wasted on a massive scale. He wasnt going easy on me, but it was probably just a trick he picked up by watching others. He wasnt taking advantage of his power at all.

    Hey! Quit worrying about shooting fire. Just focus all your energy and try to hit me like normal.

    My advice fell on deaf ears.

    Shut up! Miss Shizus skills were awesome! I dont need to listen to your crap!

    He really was an impertinent little bastard. And it cost himhe didnt take my hint for the rest of the ten minutes. I won.

    And its over! Remember, Professor Rimuru from now on. Next up!

    Kenyas shoulders slumped as he shuffled back to the other children, dejected. Though, really, Id be far more shocked if I lost to a grade-schooler.

    Chloe Aubert came out nexta ten-year-old with an umon hair color. Kind of ck with silver mixed init gave her a bit of an enigmatic feel. Maybe she had some Japanese blood in her.

    Off we go, then. If I lost to a girl as clearly mesmerizing as this, I would look some. Gotta keep my guard up.

    Dont push yourself, Clo!

    Yeah, dont get hurt!

    The children were more focused on Chloe getting injured than winning. She didnt look all that strong, no. In another moment, the hourss was turned. What kind of attack would she spring on me? I could guess she liked books; she always had one or two in her hands. Was she gonna try to conk me in the head with one or give me a paper cut? Use them as blunt weapons? Seemed like decent grade-school logic to me. Or maybe not.

    But as my mind wandered, I heard her chant Flowing water, confine my enemy! Water Jail! Instantly, a torrent of water pinned my legs to the floor. Sense Heat Source told me it was the real thing.

    First Kenya, then this girlthey both had magic-controlled skills. Pretty neat. They might be natural prodigies. But now was no time to marvel.

    The water current grew more violent, forming arge sphere that enveloped me. I tapped the outer edge with my finger, only to feel a cutting sensation. Much like my Water des, she circted the water at high speed to make the ball retain its shape. Impressivebut what was she gonna do with it?

    Ive transformed that magic to have it rain down constantly upon whomever it captures! Admit your defeat, and Ill release it, but if you dont, youre gonna die!

    Damn! Scary little kid! She was all about keeping me in check, unlike Kenyabut sadly, it wouldnt be enough.

    Pretty impressive, but it wont work on me. Youre using it really well, though. I hope you keep up practicing!

    Stepping out of the watery dungeon, I patted Chloe on the head. Some dungeon that was. I could just use Control Magic to rework it any way I wanted. Seriously, even among my extra skills, it was wicked powerful. You could even get away with calling it a unique. Magic was all about controlling magicules to create phenomena. Interfere with those magicules with a stronger force, and it couldnt be easier to break it.

    Chloe sat on the floor, surprised. Her face reddened as tears came to her eyes. Sorry, girl. This is me trying to go easy, too. I need to show just how much more powerful I am. You would never listen to me if I didnty down thew.

    No longer interested in fighting, Chloe ceded victory. She rubbed her head where I patted her, looking oddly content as she smiled.

    Lets keep it going!

    My next opponent was Gail Gibson, the oldest of the gang at age eleven. He was arge boy with brown hair and handsome, chiseled features. Give him a few years, and Im sure his looks would put Hollywood actors to shame. I had no interest in crushing his spirit; I just wanted to show him that the world can be cruel sometimes.

    Dont hate me if this kills you, all right?

    Gail immediately greeted me with an unhesitant, full-force blow. Seeing the previous two rounds mustve changed his views about me. It was a fairly fearsome ball of magic, potentially lethal even for a B-ranked adventurer. Hey, I had a lot of trouble learning that one, too

    He probably put every ounce of his energy into that st. It was the right thing to dobut he chose the wrong adversary. Projectile-based moves didnt work on me. I used Glutton to scarf it right down.

    Wh-what was that?! Thats dirty!

    Yeah, it sure is. I think so, too.

    Listen: Grown-ups are dirty people, all right? Theyll do anything and everything to beatcha! Thats how they work.

    Kind of an immature way to put it to a child, I guess, but I didnt want to leave anything off the table. There were other tactics I couldve taken, but I wanted to both win this and make it look easy. It was actually kind of hard.

    Gail bit his lip in frustration, then focused his energy upon his fists to strike out at me. I was impressed he didnt give up, but there was no path to victory left for him. The rest of the battle went just as it did with Kenya.

    Ryota seemed like a wimpy kid to me. He was always by Kenyas side, ever cheering him on. Opposites attract, maybe. Beyond that, he seemed like just a regr child.

    His ability, though

    Get im for me, Ryota!

    His eyes lit up the moment Kenya started egging him on, and he attacked with Magic? No. It was closer to Shions Strengthen Body skill. With zero spell casting, he instantly doubled his strength and speedmaybe even more than doubled. His magicules briskly converted themselves into fighting force as he protected himself.

    A very impressive power-up move, though I had to take points off since he couldnt activate it by himself. Losing your cool inbat was, nine times out of ten, a negative. It meant tossing away your intelligence, the one advantage you could rely on over a monster.

    Ryotas skill wasnt Strengthen Body so much as a Berserker-style transform. It was useless as is. Id better help him hone that. He did move well, though. If he werent fighting me, he couldve fended for himself rather well.

    Butoops, too bad! I effortlessly dodged him for the entire ten minutes.

    That just left Alice Rondo. Youngest of the group at nine, she had shiny, straight blond hair that ran down her back and made her look just like a doll. Very fetchingbut unlike the reserved Chloe, she had a mean tomboyish streak.

    About time my turn came up, she boastfully dered. You worthless idiots better take a lesson or two from me!

    And here I thought Kenya was the boss of the group. It mightve been the youngest one, after all. Or maybe she was the secret boss? Whatever she was, I needed to show her who was in charge, or else this whole effort was a failure. Better brace myself for anything. Plus, I couldnt help but notice that wed been attracting an audience of students and teachers. As much ruckus as we were causing in this gym, it wasnt weird that we were building interest. Well, bring em on! Itd be a good chance to show the school that I had this. That I was treating these kids as real students.

    But whats Alice got in store for me? The girl gave me a bold smile, then tossed the assorted plush toys she carried behind her back up in the air.

    Okay, guys! Take that freak down!!

    I looked up, confused, only to find a small army of living, breathing toys closing in on medogs, cats, birds, even bears. They packed a surprisingly heavy punch.

    Alice, it turns out, was a Golem Master, something she mustve stumbled upon as she saw Shizu and her spirit skills. It was astonishingly creative, especially for a child. If fur and foam produced this level of attack, shed be packing some serious heat if someone gave her some steel robots or something. She might be the strongest of the five, even.

    But if all I had to do was avoid them for ten minutes, that seemed doable.

    Hey! Quit running away from them, you wimp!!

    I heard herint loud and clear but ignored it. I had a passing thought of incinerating them all as I danced around

    Report. Chances of the individual Alice Rondo bursting into tearsone hundred percent.

    but resisted. Not with those kinds of odds. Itd be even harder to cate her after that, and Im sure the crowd would think I was a bully. So I kept running and running until the clock ran out.

    Well, at least I managed to save face. I had now shown what I could do to all five of my students.

    Wow, that adviser in the mask is amazing! He doesnt look older than ten or so, and he just dominated those little hellions!

    That was a B-ranked adventurer? No way. Strength like that has Shizu written all over it!

    With that kind ofmentary from the crowd, I felt safe assuming my reputation around school was now secure.

    These kids were powerful, but their skill sets had a sort of patchwork feel. If I had to guess, it wasnt because those were skills they were aiming forthey just tripped over them as they imitated Shizu.

    Plus, I had made a vital observation. I theorized that letting them fight all-out would sap their magicule count a bitbut all it did was skim a bit off the top. The energy at the root of their bodies didnt drop at all. That much was clear from the generally weak performance of all their magics.

    I guess there was no fixing the imbnce that way. Beyond that, I thought about using my Deviant unique skill to separate the energy from them, then Gluttony to either consume or iste it. But if I had to guess

    Received. Energy fused with an entitys soul cannot be separated from it.

    Nope, guess not. I had noticed as much as I observed them in-depth duringbat. So Id have to make them obtain a unique skillor figure out something else.

    There wasnt much time left. If five years was the maximum Yuuki knew about, these children would be lucky to have twelve more months. I had to find a wayany wayto drain the magicules from them before the power destroyed them from the inside.

    But while it didnt exactlye by the gentlest of methods, I now had a full grasp of their situation. I weighed my options as we cleaned up the gym and returned to our ssroom. Physically exercising their skills didnt solve anything, but helping them release some magic would help dy the inevitable, at least a little. Wed need to hold these treatment sessions regrly as I worked out a way to address the main issue.

    Back in ss, I sat the kids down and addressed them.

    Now. As youve all just experienced, I am, um, kind of strong. But I promise you: I am going to help all of you out. I swear it by my mask here.

    They sat quietly. I felt like they were paying much closer attention now. Theres one victory for the time being, then. We needed to connect this way, heart-to-heart, or else theyd just tune me outbut now, as much as I had to force it, we had that connection.

    Umis that Miss Shizus mask?

    Thats right, Alice. Shizu gave it to meand when I epted it, I guess I agreed to take you guys on, too.

    Not until I started dreaming about it recently, technically. But that didnt matter.

    All right, Alice said, nodding her satisfaction. I believe you.

    Um, m-me too

    I believed in you from the beginning, ya know!

    Alice, Ryota, and Chloe were willing to open their hearts to me, at least.

    Oh,e on, guys In that case, I guess

    Yeah, Kenya. I think we can trust in this guy, too.

    Kenyas and Gails consent sealed the deal. I had their trust. They recognized me as a teacher now.

    Speaking of that mask, though I feel like something just jogged my memory. Shizu had tasked me with the missionof striking the demon lord Leon. Not kill or defeat, but strike. Did she not really want revenge on him, after all? Maybe not. If she did, she wouldve attacked him back when she was at the pinnacle of her strength.

    Buthang on. She said she came here before she was even ten years old, I think. So how did she survive? I needed to think. We didnt talk for very long, but I felt like she mightve hidden a hint or two in there. I always found it weird that shed abandon these children for her own mission. Why did she suddenly see fit to take action on them now, of all times?

    Hurry!

    Ah, I see She headed for Leon because she wanted to help them out. Striking Leon and saving the childrenthese both connected to the same goal.

    The demon lord Leon knows how to rescue the children. I know, because he rescued me.

    Was that her line of thinking? Buthow?

    I hooked myself up to the Great Sage, pondering over this with everything I had. As always, it didnt let me down. Whether Leon deliberately saved Shizus life didnt matter. The only question was how.

    Received. Inferring the demon lord Leon Cromwells method for saving Shizue Izawa Complete. This is an inference based on collected circumstantial evidence, but

    The Sages answer rang in my head. It would be a gruelingly difficult road for these childrenthe long bet to end all long bets. To me, though, it was an easy ordeal to ept.

    The only issue was

    Listen. I promise Ill save all of you, but to do that, I need you to trust me and act like good boys and girls. All right? Shizus entrusted me with you, and Im not going to abandon any of you!

    Confidence spread within me as I spoke. I couldnt show any anxiety in front of these kids. They rewarded me with their calm, resolute stares.

    Thank you, Mr. Rimuru!!

    Mr. Rimuru. I liked the sound of that. Well, youre on. I was Mr. Rimuru to them, and that meant they were as good as saved. I swore it in my heart now.

 Volume 4 - Ch 6

    CONQUERING THE LABYRINTH

    It was a tranquilte afternoon as Shuna set to reading in her room. Just as she did, Shion came barging in, like always, begging her for help with one recipe or another. But she keenly noticed the book in Shunas hand and asked her a question.

    Whats that, Lady Shuna?

    Hee-hee-hee! Shuna smiled. This is a book, Shion. A book of magic that Sir Rimuru gave us.

    Just when they were getting used to the daily routine of running the ce by themselves, Rimuru returned. It had only beenst night when he came up to Shuna and dumped a massive pile of magic tomes on the ground. Oh, are you up, Shuna? he said casually, like nothing was unusual about this. Perfect. You wanted to learn magic, right? Here; I got some stuff for you.

    One look, and she could tell these were valuable, secret tomes, the sort that humans would cherish as confidential knowledge and store under lock and key. It was a fortune, and she thanked him profusely for it. After that, Rimuru teleported away after waiting only long enough for Shuna to brief him about goings-on around town.

    Wha?! He only met you, Lady Shuna? Thats not fair!

    Oh! I forgot! He had a gift for you as well, Shion.

    Youre so mean, Lady Shuna

    But looking at the sweet-smelling snack presented to her, the anger immediately drained from Shions face. This was a new sort of sugary sweet, one Rimuru had reportedly discovered in the capital of Englesia. He had purchased arge quantity, enough for everyone in town to share.

    Watching Shion happily take more than her fair share, Shuna couldnt help but giggle as Benimaru walked in.

    Mm? Hey, Shion, whatre you doing, eating away in here? n to share?

    Oh! Benimaru! Is your work going well?

    It is. The envoys from the Beast Kingdom are the same as always; the deliveries were just as we agreed to. We provided our own goods, and they left with smiles on their faces. Geld reports in his regr briefings that construction is still going well. The tree-clearing crew has finished their work and should be home soon. But enough of that. Let me have one already!

    Before Shuna could stop him, Benimaru reached down and plucked out one of the treatsan otherworld pastry Rimuru had purchased, known as a cream puffand scarfed it down.

    Ooh! he shouted, sweets being one of his few weaknesses. This is good!

    Sir Rimuru purchased it for us, Shuna said with a grin.

    Did he? So hes paid a return visit? I tell you, working in his stead, I had no idea how difficult a task he had. He made it all look so effortless when he was here

    That he did. He even had ample time to goof off and do nothingunlike you, not that you let that stop you.

    What? Come on You know, normally Id be very angry to hear that, Benimaru countered, although the grin on his face suggested otherwise. They almost always acted like this around each other.

    Sir Rimuru also asked us to construct some more row houses for lodging purposes.

    I see. I will inform Geld at once.

    With that business out of the way

    This is delicious. Its almost too delicious! Truly, I can taste the love of Sir Rimuru cooked into each one!!

    Out of nowhere, Shion half shouted her approval of the cream puffs she was eagerly inhaling.

    Did you taste that, Shuna?

    I dont think so, no

    Shion was too far into dreand to hear them. They sighed. This, too, was how she always acted around them.

    Hmm. I had the nagging feeling Shion took my visit the wrong way. Better rescue those children and get back there quick.

    I focused on whaty ahead of me as I shrugged off the sudden chill tickling the back of my neck. Before me were five children, sitting at their desks and concentrating on their reading and writing lessons.

    You need to be able to do at least that much, or else youre gonna find it hard living in this world. You got me?

    Uh-huh! they all replied. Good. Nice to see some enthusiasm. And they had a reason for that, of course. Id have liked to think it was because they adored me, but I knew that wasnt true. I had a carrot dangling in front of them.

    Ahhh, I wanna read what happens next!

    Boy, I sure didnt think Id get to catch up over here!

    Well, Im gonna get to it first!

    I like picture books more, but mangas good, too!

    I think its more important to study, of course. But, wow, Mr. Rimuru, I didnt know you were an otherworlder, too. I dont know much about Japanese anime or manga, but thats really fascinating.

    The carrotmore of that manga I copiedcertainly had its effect. Said manga, however, had been tranted inside my Stomach into this worldsnguage. You had to learn how to read it to understand anything, but it had already done wonders to improve their academic enthusiasm.

    I had been teaching here for a month, guiding the kids through their studies as I worked on my own preparations. I had only one thing to investigate, and until I found my answer, I couldnt go anywhere. I wished it couldve gone faster, but I had to be patient. I wanted to do everything I could for these children, instead of letting this time go to wasteand luckily, it turned out I was pretty good at lighting a fire in them.

    The days were upied by sses; the nights by info-gathering sessions. It made me d I didnt require sleep with this body.

    Unfortunately, nobody had the information I wantedthe location of a high-level elemental. Not even Hakuro, the smartest person I knew. I traveled over to Treynis domain in search of clues and paid another visit to King Gazel. I even tried hitting up Zegion and Apito for some leads, but nothing.

    I was searching for elementals high-level enough that they could be imbued into these childrens bodies and tasked with controlling their magicule stores. That was the answer the Great Sage came up with for me.

    I already had the ability to summon Ifrit, but that alone could let me save only one of them. That wasnt good enough. Treyni and her family could summon simr spirits, but those were bonded with them as part of the summoning contract, and I couldnt ask the dryads to sacrifice themselves for these childrens sake.

    So I pressed Treyni for something else, and she told me about a Dwelling of the Spirits, and ruled over by the so-called Spirit Queen. Sadly, it seemed like a dead end. I apologize, she told me, but while there are several entrances that lead to the Dwelling, the one I am aware of has already disappeared.

    It seems the Spirit Queen that Treyni and her family served had passed away long ago, practically in ancient times. They had no personal connections to the current queen, so not even the dryads knew where this Dwelling was any longer. A royal audience was apparently out of the questionand since the Spirit Queen could reportedly move these entrances around whenever she liked, they were difficult to track down. I suppose it made sense. Treyni was slippery enough at timesanyone higher up on the spirit-elemental food chain than her has to be even worse.

    Figuring there was no need to hurry things, I decided to take a break and travel back to Tempest the previous night. Shuna caught me up with local news. Nothing too epicthe biggest highlight being a freshly minted sorcerer who had recently joined Yohms team. I wanted to meet her, but they were already on the trail somewhere, so I decided to pass for now.

    That, and there was another piece of good newsa great discovery, in fact. We had been crafting Low Potions, a hundred at a time, by diluting Full Potions with magically treated water, but one day, Gabil decided to try using water directly from the undergroundke instead. All the magicules inside that stuff apparently made the resulting medicine quite a bit more potent. Vester, surprised to find this, conducted some more rigorous researchand ultimately found that using thiske water would let us double our manufacturing output. Really good news. These potions were gonna be a huge revenue source before long.

    Tempest also recently yed host to a merchant from the Kingdom of Blumund, escorted by Kabal and his friends. This merchant, Gard Mjllmile, made a purchase of one thousand High Potions for the price of two hundred and fifty gold coinstwenty-five silver per potion. That was our asking price, and he epted it. Gard apparently had a trade route or two in Englesia that he ran as well, so I may actually run into him here sometime soon. Id have to give my thanks if I did.

    So all of that sounded good to me, but I was still pretty much stumped when it came to finding the Dwelling of the Spirits. As I watched the kids fight over the manga I just tossed their way, I resolved to redouble my efforts.

    Today, I decided to take them all out on a pic.

    School wasnt in session; it was the equivalent of a Sunday in my old world. Sitting in the same ssroom for days on end would take the wind out of any students sails, and I still needed to work some magicules out of their system on a regr basis.

    So we were walking down a street in the capital when I realized that arge crowd had gathered in the center of the city.

    Some kind of event going on?

    Oh! Right, Mr. Rimuru! The Hero, Sir Masayuki, is holding a fighting demonstration at the arena today!

    Yeah, they say that Heros a really strong guy. Who do you think would win if he fought Mr. Rimuru?

    Oh,e on! Itd totally be the Hero! No way Sir Masayuki would lose to some weird dude with a mask on!

    Um, well, Im still on your side, Mr. Rimuru!

    Well, Gail intervened, Id kinda like to see the Hero, but were probably way toote to get seats by now. Lets head out of town for that pic we nned.

    The five acted remarkably excited about this, but we stuck with our original idea, resolving to buy advance tickets for the next showing. Gail, in his own inimitable way, was great at keeping his group pointed in the same direction, which was super-helpful to me. Having someone a little older serving as the leader made my job a lot easier.

    I seemed to remember Milim telling me that Heroes were special people; simply calling yourself a Hero without the strength to back that up would set you up for a quick and nasty death. As Yuuki put it, There are two kinds of people who go by the name of Herothe kind whos willing to shoulder the sins of the entire human race and the kind of fool who never thinks about the consequences.

    And then theres this guy, starring in these diator shows or whatever in a city like this. Which pool does he fall under? Something told me his aims werent all that lofty. But then again, Milim said simply iming to be a Hero would invite divine wrath upon you. Maybe this Masayuki guy wasnt an idiot, after all, but just someone unfortunate enough to have a very interesting life. As Japanese-sounding as that name was, he might be an otherworlder for all I knew. I kind of wanted to meet him, but for today at least, I skipped out on the chance.

    We stopped by a cafthe owner greeting us with a heartyugh as he provided the kids with juice.

    Hey, kids! You guys better sit up straight and listen to your teacher, you got it?

    Thanks, mister! Can we have some cake, too?

    Hmph. This juice isnt bad, I guess. That cake over there looks really good, though, doesnt it?

    Kenya and Alice always got straight to the point like that. It annoyed me, but I took out my coin pouch anyway.

    All right, all right. Hey, how bout some slices for all of them?

    Gah-ha-ha-ha-ha! Hey, I heard you made it to B-plus rank? Yuuki sure was surprised to hear that! We oughtta celebrate it! You can eat and drink on the house today, guys!

    He was a big, beefy-looking guy, but the owner was really nice to talk towell-connected, too, if he already heard about that. I spotted a notice on the guilds bulletin board about a baffledil-collecting jobthose flowers that tripped Geld up before. Despite being a collecting job, I was still allowed to ept itand since I rather fortuitously had a hundred or so blooms in my Stomach, I gave them over to the guild. This,bined with a few other tricky collection missions that I contributed to, made it surprisingly simple to get promoted to B-plus.

    Now I had the right to try for rank A. Undertaking that examination several times, proving that you were as close to an A as it gets talent-wise, would earn you a promotion to A-minus. The wall to A itself was pretty darn high, I suppose, and while I nned to take the challenge sooner orter, being a B-plus was no big setback.

    Either way, though, if theres free cake in it for me, I aint gonna turn that down.

    Wow! Youre really too kind! In that case, Ill get one of those strawberry shortcakes!

    The owner chuckled as he took the childrens orders. Hah! Nothing like free food to pep you up, huh?

    This caf was owned by the otherworlder who Yuuki mentioned. I had him mention me to the guy, and hed been treating me real well ever since. He looked tough, but he was really a softy at heart, and the kids loved him (or the cake he was spotting them, at least). I was here just a few days ago, too, buying some cream puffs to give to Shuna as a souvenir. I figured I needed to cate Shion, at least, for being gone for so longand of course, I was hopeful that theyd reverse engineer the recipe.

    The menu had a lot of other things besides cake, so I attempted to convince the owner to open up in Tempest. He turned me down, but I didnt mind that. Everythings a negotiation. Ill keep up the effort.

    With the cake in our bellies, I picked up the box lunches for that days pic from the owner. He had sandwiches for us all, ready forter in the afternoon. The kids were full of energy today, so I figured we could run a few mockbat rounds once we reached the countryside. Im sure thatll make their lunches taste all the better, once theyre tired out.

    Before long, we were at the city gate.

    Ah! Good day to you, Sir Rimuru, said the guard sentry there, whom I hade to know fairly well. More training today? I would love to receive some instruction from you someday.

    B-plus adventurers definitely enjoyed a lot of preferential treatment around this city. It was like we were champions of the people or somethingalthough, in this world, I suppose we literally were. I was finally starting to understand why Kabal enjoyed de facto celebrity status around Englesia City. He was a man of the people, and they could all see how he protected them. Unlike some high-and-mighty noble kicking back in his castle, adventurers worked on the ground level and earned themon mans near-infinite appreciation for it.

    Keep up the good work, men, I rather haughtily replied, the ttery getting to my head. Here, Ive got something for you. Feel free to pass it around the guardhouseter.

    That something was a te of cookies I baked with the kids. Sugar was a high-pricedmodity in Englesia as well, so these things were like gold to anyone with a starved sweet tooth. Even these slightly misshapen amateur-hour cookies would be a cherished treat.

    Well, heavens, thank you so much! And you kids be good around your teacher, all right?

    Pfft. Not you people, too?! Were always good around Mr. Rimuru. Right, Ryota?

    Yeah. If we werent, hed punish us.

    You dont have to say that, stupid!

    Dont lump me in with these kids, sir. If you guys keep carrying on like that, theyll start to think Im just as stupid as you, all right?

    Boisterous as always. Weughed as I waved good-bye to the guard.

    So we walked for about another hour, as nned, before reaching a mostly deserted grassy in. The perfect training ground. There wouldnt be many people watching us, either, so we could go all-out to some extent. They had matured to the point where going easy on them would actually expose me to danger. Their moves had grown much more refined, thanks in part to the fact they were actually beginning to take my advice.

    I fought them one by one, like always, making sure to keep my guard up.

    Shoot! I messed that up today, too

    Mr. Rimuru is just way too strong! Its cheating!

    Arent you supposed to go easier on girls?

    I better learn more magic

    Agh! I was so focused on defending myself better today!

    Perhaps it was immature of me, but I wanted to be like an imprable wall to them. On this point, I was acting in stark contrast to Shizu. I had no intention of spoiling them at all.

    Ha-ha-ha! You kids think you could ever beat me? Youre dreaming!

    The kids startedining back at me. This was a prettymon routine in my ss.

    Just then

    Hmm? I feel this weird sense of pressure

    Report. Large quantity of magical energy detected. Approachingthis is from a Sky Dragon.

    ording to the knowledge I had picked up at the capital library, a Sky Dragon was reminiscent of a wyvern, although pretty different in reality. Wyverns were an airborne offshoot from the Lesser Dragon family, but a Sky Dragon was part of the Arch Dragon group, maintaining a greater amount of original dragon blood. As a threat, it was ranked at Special Aa cmity-ss monster.

    It would appear our fun little pic would have to wait.

    My heavens

    Gard Mjllmile fell to the ground, head in his hands.

    It was one of the biggest deals he had made in a while, a stroke of good fortune that hade only recently. The Free Guilds Blumund branch had reached out to him, and the guild master Fuze had discussed things with him personally.

    So the guild is starting to get serious about this potion deal. Were talking about procuring three hundred per month for the guilds reserves and two hundred for the royal knight forces. So five hundred, and wed pay you a hundred fifty gold for them, Fuze began, regarding Mjllmile like a mobster shaking down a client. Now, we got a business partner wholl sell these to you for twenty-five silver coins each, and thats probably gonna be the most discounted price youll get for the time being. Right? If you went over and bought em without that, theyre gonna ask for thirty each, so What do you think? Its not a huge deal money-wise, but this is a government jobits gonna be continual, for a long time toe.

    Mjllmile worked out the arithmetic in his mind. By that arrangement, five hundred potions would earn him a profit of twenty-five hundred silver coins, or twenty-five in gold. Not bad, but not enough to risk ones life over. This was Gard Mjllmile, after all. A guy used to working back alleys and arranging loans to low-level street gangs. It would take more than a stern frown from Fuze to make hime to the negotiation table.

    You must be joking with me, sir. Under these conditions, Im afraid I cant give a yes to that. If those are your final conditions

    Oh? You dont like it? Okay. Head back home, then. But if you do, keep in mind that youll lose any rights youd have earned for the business deals well be making with that country. This is something I wanted to offer you first because I trusted you, you know?

    Mjllmiles eyebrow twitched.

    That country?

    Mm-hmm. But I cant tell you any more if youre heading out

    Well, give me just one moment, Sir Fuze. I was never good at this sort of tit-for-tat negotiation. Why dont we justy it all on the table?

    Now Mjllmile smelled money. Fuze grinned as he realized this.

    Sure, sure. But before that, I need to show you the goods, dont I? Heres the first of their waresa High Potion. What do you think? Still not interested?

    On the table, heid down a High Potion, a special brew that made all potions that came before it seem obsolete. Whatever country was behind this, they had technical skills at least on par with the Dwarven Kingdom. That, plus the number values Fuze mentioned earlier, made Mjllmile shudder.

    You want five hundred of these delivered to the guild? Just to be sure, is there any limit to the quantity I can purchase?

    That I couldnt tell you. Another grin. But thats your job as a merchant to find out, isnt it? Why dont you travel over there yourself and ask?

    And Mjllmile hadand now he was even more surprised. A journey he had expected to take at least two weeks waspleted in one, just like his bodyguard Kabal imed.

    See? I told you, this town is amazing!

    I I cannot believe this. Where did this highwaye from? And for that matter, this whole town?!

    He was bbergasted. Hiring a party of three B-plus adventurers for this job meant he was all but guaranteed to lose money. They cost him a hundred silver pieces per day, and even that was a bargain at the B-plus level. A hundred silver made one gold coin; it meant hiring these guys for a month was thirty gold gone. The only assured profit from this journey was twenty-five, and between that and his travel expenses, he figured itd put him deep in the redbut he still wanted to see thisnd personally, to see if it could lead to regr business.

    Just a little whileter, he purchased one thousand High Potions. Half would be delivered posthaste to his client; the other half, hed see about selling outside Blumunds borders. What he had also gained, however, was the priceless experience of having the monsters know him by name. That and information. These monsters, after all, held usage rights on this new trade route.

    Taking this job couldnt have been a better idea, Mjllmile thought, chest practically bursting with joy. One of the leaders of the monsters, a hobgoblin named Rigurd, stated that he believed they would boost their manufacturing output going forward. He was also considering other specialties they could produce, too. Hed be a vital trading partner before long, no doubt.

    Thus, Mjllmile had traveled back to Blumund, sessfully delivering five hundred of the monsters potions. Kabal and his crew took their leave afterward; in their ce, Mjllmile hired a C-ranked adventurer who called himself Bydd and embarked on another journey to Englesia. His wagon, loaded with the remaining five hundred potions, reached the kingdom without incident.

    The incident only came after hed crossed the border.

    What is that monster?! Mjllmile shouted. Ravaging thendscape in front of him was a glittering white Sky Dragona personification of pure destruction that no human could stop. Gate guards, presumably Englesian soldiers, had begun evacuating nearby residents, leaving travelers and merchants from other nations to fend for themselves. There were already casualties.

    Lets get outta here, man!

    He could hear Bydd screaming at him, but Mjllmile couldnt quite drive himself to run. His wares were in his wagon, but the horses were too spooked to listen to hismands. They would have to abandon their loadwhich was fine. A major loss, but at least hed live to make up for it some other day.

    No, that wasnt what made Mjllmile hesitate. It was hisck of running speed. He hadnt cursed his pudgy frame quite like this in a long time.

    Dammit!

    Ever the merchant, Mjllmile quickly reached a conclusion in his mind.

    Hang it all, Bydd, were going to pass out these potions to the soldiers!

    Whatre you talking about? All we can do at this point is run, man.

    You fool! How are we going to flee from that winged monster on foot? The only way to survive is to reach the other side of the gate! The capitals got a magic barrier over it that blocks out monsters. Better to help out the soldiers and buy ourselves some time!

    But

    Even as they bickered, the Sky Dragon sent out bolts of lightning that charred the earth, delivering merciless judgment upon those toote to make their escape.

    Mommy! Mommy!!

    Elno!!

    The mother had hugged her girl tightly to protect her. Now she was about to breathe herst, burned across practically her entire body.

    Waaaahhhhhh!

    People ran in all directions, shouting. Nobody would be left to give a helping hand to this woman who was on the brink of death

    Dahh, let me have it! Ill do it!

    S-Sir?!

    Mjllmile grabbed a box of High Potions and ran to the field where lightning had just struckstraight for the mother and her daughter. Lightning scared him, but he still ran, trusting in his good fortune.

    It wont hit me. Im a luckier man than that!

    He stumbled his way there, sprinkling the medicine on the half-charred woman. That alone was enough to stop her from dying on the spot. He breathed a sigh of relief, bending down to pat the crying daughter on the headthen noticed there was a shadow on the ground. His blood froze in fear; he could feel it drain from his face.

    Reluctantly looking upward, Mjllmile found exactly the kind of horrid sight he expected. It was fifteen or sixteen feet long, small for a dragon, but its strength was unstoppable. And now, the Sky Dragon had descended on the spot, ready to make quick work of them all.

    Dammit, so much for my luck

    Just when Mjllmile was ready to give up, something fell near him.

    Hey! Over here, monster! Ill take you on!

    It was Bydd. He had thrown a rock to divert its attention.

    Y-you fool! Why arent you running?!

    Heh-heh. I aint exactly led a clean life, but I had a guy tell me once He said when people need help, you gotta give it to em! Thatll help people see ya in a better light, yknow? So get those victims up and bring em in the gate!

    Mjllmile could see soldiers behind Bydd. They were passing around the potions, just as he had instructed them to. We can buy some time with these! they marveled once it became clear just how effective they were.

    Maybe this will work, he thought for a moment. But it was an illusion. The Sky Dragons lips curled up, as if sneering at him. The next moment, with a terrific rumble, a rain of lightning fell upon the soldiers.

    Now they were all down, a few apparently surviving, but none were able to stand after taking the strike at point-nk range. Bydd alone remained on his feet, arms opened wide to keep Mjllmile and the others safe.

    H-hey, Bydd

    Heh-heh! If Im gonna die, at least lemme look cool in the process.

    Hah! Ah-ha-ha-ha! You know, I think I had you all wrong, Bydd. Youre a true champion, no doubt about it. If we survive this, Ill hire you as my personal bodyguard.

    That bettere with a raise!

    They smiled at each other, then stared down the Sky Dragon. The fear was gone, although he regretted they couldnt save that mother and daughter in the end. Mjllmile knew Bydd felt the same waybut they were able tough in the face of death. It reenergized them as they awaited the end to fall upon them.

    As if toying with its prey, the Sky Dragons smile deepened. Now the two were ready. But before the moment coulde, someone appeared in front of them. A beautiful person with waist-length, silvery hair tinged with blue and who came quicker than the lightningand the moment the bolts touched the small figure, they disappeared.

    N-no way That person brushed away the Sky Dragons lightning like it was nothing?!

    Is Is that a Hero?!

    Bydd and Mjllmile reeled back in surprise as the figure spoke to them in his beautiful voice.

    Oh, hey, Bydd! Nice to see youre putting in an effort out here. Im impressed. But you probably shouldnt take on a foe you could never beat, yknow?

    Bydds eyes opened wide. He didnt know anyone as beautiful as this. It mustve been a case of mistaken identitybut somehow, there was something familiar about his eyes.

    And given that I see our potions strewn all over the ce, you must be Mjllmile, right? Pretty softhearted of you, isnt it, trying to help all these people? Thats not the sort of thing that makes for a sessful merchant, I dont think. Not that Imining, but

    Mjllmile froze in shock. This was definitely aplete strangerthis slim figure dressed in unfamiliar, foreign-looking garb. Something about this persons behavior reminded him of royalty. He wanted to ask who this neer was, but Mjllmiles mouth was failing to find the words.

    Right. Since youre here and all, you might as well keep helping out the injured with those potions! Ill do something about this monster in the meantime.

    Ignoring the frozen duo, the figure set off.

    The decisions came fast once I felt that wave of pressure.

    All right, I said to the children. Ill go help em out. Leave that thing unattended, and itll lead to a lot of killing. Ranga!

    Here, he said, emerging soundlessly from the shadows.

    Im gonna go beat that dragon real quick. You stay here and keep the kids safe.

    Would you like me to go out and give it a taste of my fangs, master?

    Ummm, I wish I could let you, but Ill handle this. These kids are still treating me like some kinda chatan anyway.

    I wanted Ranga to babysit for me. Plus, it was highly debatable whether he could defeat a Sky Dragon or not, although I didnt say that to him.

    Mr. Rimuru! If youre gonna take that monster on, you need to wait until the knights show up!

    Yeah! Like, youre stronger than us, but no way could you beat that freak!

    Wait, wait, wait! If you die, whos going to save us then, huh?! Im not gonna let you die!

    You see? Times like these, its like theres no trust in me at all. Chloe and Ryota were giving me concerned looks as well. I really needed to show them my full skills.

    Please, kids, just leave this to me! Im not stupid enough to take on a fight I cant win.

    Indeed. My master is invincible. Perhaps not the winner of every battle, but invincible.

    True enough, Ranga. Id never beat Milim in a million years.

    You heard him. Thats a core fundamental you need to learn first, before anything else. How to gauge your opponent.

    I began to prepare. If I retained my current childlike form, that opened the possibility that Id blow my cover. Thus, I thought it best to disguise myself. Transforming using my slime-based cell structure would make me only about a childs size, maybe four and a quarter feet, if that. So I decided to bust out my ck mist, for the first time in a while, and take an adult form. Itd make my line of sight higher, but my perceptions were based on Magic Sense anyway, so it wouldnt affect me in battle.

    Instantly changing into the fancy kimono Shuna had prepared for me, Ipleted the transformation on the spot.

    Ah, Ryota said, stunned into silence.

    No way! eximed Alice.

    Whoaaa, Kenya shouted, eyes sparkling.

    Wow, Mr. Rimuru, thats so cool! Chloe concluded.

    You can do anything, cant you? Gail said as he rolled his eyes.

    All this assessment helped me remember something.

    Oh, right. Here, hold this for me.

    I took off my mask. Id need it once we got back to the city, but having it on now would be screaming my identity to the general public. The children all gasped as Chloe epted it from me.

    Hey! No fair, Chloe!

    I took Alices whining as my cue to sprout wings and fly off to battle.

    When I reached the site, I found a familiar-looking face staring down the Sky Dragon. It was Bydd, and I guess he really took my advice to heart, because he was stepping up to protect the wounded strewn around the fields.

    Next to him was a fat little man holding a potion bottle with the Tempest seal stamped on it. Presumably, that was the merchant Shuna had mentioned. Considering the money-grubbing qualities of most merchants I knew, I was rather surprised to see him giving up profit to pass this medicine around. I didnt know if that was a good or bad sign, reallybut I suppose it was nice of him, even if his face was kind of weasel-like. If he was doing this for advertising purposes, it was a genius move.

    I called out to them, which I really shouldnt have, since I was supposed to be incognito. It was just such a surprise to see them on the battlefield that I couldnt help myself. Better make sure they dont b about itter.

    Right. Since youre here and all, you might as well keep helping out the injured with those potions! Ill do something about this monster in the meantime.

    As far as I could tell, there were quite a few wounded, but nobody was dead yet. With enough High Potion, it wouldnt be toote to save them all. The gate guard I knew was among the injured, making me all the happier that we were in time.

    The two looked at each other in astonishment, then immediately sprang into action. Nice. Now to tackle that Sky Dragon.

    After that, I killed it in quite literally the blink of an eye. It was big, at fifteen or so feet long, but a mere small frypared to Charybdis. It had lightning and sonic waves and thick skinbut none of the Sky Dragons attacks worked on me.

    So I battered the guy around a bit, then used Glutton to have it for dinner. An easy win.

    That night, I took Bydd and Mjllmile over to a high-end nightclub in the capital. As high-end as it was, the hostesses there sure gave the dwarven gang at the Night Butterfly a run for their money. No elves, disappointingly, but otherwise I had nointthe decor, as well as the food and drink, were a lot better than Dwargons club. Given its location in the very center of human civilization around here, it was about as fancy as this world got. There was little surprise it had all the good stuff.

    I was back in my usual, masked human form. Mjllmile, of course, was paying the tab. When I had a word with him about protecting my identity, he all but dragged me over here. I turned him down, bringing up the children I had to watch, but he kept insisting.

    So, Mjllmile. If you have a moment, Id like to discuss future ns, if you dont mind?

    Hee-hee-hee-hee! Absolutely, Sir Rimuru. I promise you by my name as Gard Mjllmile, he had said earlier, that I know the perfect ce for such discussion!

    Oh, do you? I like the sound of that, I do! Are you maybe talking about?

    Say no more, say no more! I promise youll be very happy you joined me!

    That sort of thing. I agreed to it, if not with much enthusiasm.

    This Gard Mjllmile guy was apparently one of the major merchants plying the trade in Blumund. He had full guild reditation, as well as an official permit from the kingdoms government. Thats why he got this job, representing both his nation and the guild as he reached out to me.

    It was rare for merchants to be licensed both by their local government and the guild, since it meant paying double the fees, but Mjllmile saw it as a must. Trust, he exined, is the most important thing you have. He might be a short, fat, ferret-like kind of guy, but he still had it in him to show a little authenticity.

    Like any good merchant, nothing escaped his attention, and he seemed to be dealing in quite a wide range of business. He was the president (boss, really) of Blumunds main marketce, and he was also something of a loan shark, lending at high interest rates.

    Bydd was one of his clients on that front; this bodyguard job was part of paying him back. Being able to boss around someone like Bydd, who had muscle and wasnt afraid to use it, definitely said something about how in control he always was. Apparently, he even held sway over a few members of the nobility who turned to him for loans when they were down on their luck. It exined why Mjllmile was known as Emperor of the Alleyways back home. Getting caught up in debt like that is a terrifying thing. Gotta remember to borrow responsibly. Wed be bound to take out some loans as a nation sooner orter, after all.

    Regardless, he was a merchant who knew what he wanted, and anything we could both stand to profit on was of keen interest to him. In some ways, I trust that a lot more than some alliance written out on paper. Plus, given his act out in the field this afternoon, I had the impression he was a really good guy, deep down. I love all the colorful characters Fuze introduces me to.

    I think I could use this guy, Mjllmile. I kinda like him.

    Mjllmile was now rubbing his hands together as he approached meall smiles.

    Are you enjoying yourself here, Sir Rimuru?

    Hey, Mjllmile. Everything okay with us and the management here?

    Ah, yes! It certainly did note easily, but my reputation was enough for them to give the nod!

    Hoh! Sorry to put you through that.

    Oh, no, no, its all for you, Sir Rimuru. Not a problem at all!

    I had given Mjllmile kind of a tall order. He had sessfully reserved the entire club for us, having anyone we didnt know kicked out. It turned out that hes got an investment in this clubhe really does work in a lot of fields. I was surprised at the kinds of connections he had avable to leverage here in the city.

    None of the other customersined; one look from Mjllmile mustve been enough to silence them. I guessed he had a fair bit of power in this nation, just like back in Blumund.

    I asked him this favor for a reason.

    By the way, Sir RimuruIm sure this will sound rude, asking youbut are you sure it was such a good idea to bring these children to a club like this?

    He chose his words carefully as he turned his eyes over to one side.

    You were so cool, Mr. Rimuru!

    That was amazing! You just, like, zoomed into the air, and you gave that dragon the biggest KO punch ever!

    Eh, it wasnt bad. When I grow up, I bet Ill be able to pull that off easy!

    Very nice, very nice.

    But you really were that strong, huh? Maybe even stronger than Miss Shizu

    Oh, no way!

    But did you see him transform? That was really awesome.

    He looked kind of like Miss Shizu. Very nice.

    Yeah, Ill grant you that, but

    Well, either way, now we know for sure that Mr. Rimuru is super-amazing!

    Mm-hmm!

    Yeah, I agree with you.

    I like Mr. Tempest a lot!

    Yeah! I wanna be that strong someday, too.

    It wasnt the usual club crowd, no. They were childrenmy students, of coursehaving the time of their lives in here. Bydd was keeping thempany, although for the most part, they were recapping todays battle among themselves. They really shouldnt have been in there. If someone found out, Id lose my teaching job, for sure. I wanted to leave them behind, but they moaned about it so much I thought Id go crazy. So I decided to bring them along. Two things in the world I couldnt beat: Milim and crying children. Yep.

    Still, the sexy hostesses were all smiles around the kids, no doubt recalling their own childhoods. I didnt think any wouldin about this. It wasnt exactly the way I nned this meeting to work out, but hell, it was good enough for me.

    With the other customers gone, I had nothing keeping me from being as frank as possible with Mjllmile. Of course, we didnt have anything that important to discussit was mostly about recing the High Potions he used up today. I offered him full recements as long as he kept on advertising them.

    I see So for you, Sir Rimuru, spreading the word is more of your goal right now than pushing sales? Indeed, once people know about how effective it is, Im sure well have customers seeking us out before long

    Mjllmile, clever man that he was, immediately realized my intentions.

    Exactly. So keep on passing em out, all right? Hell, you dont even need to stop with five hundred. Give out one or two thousand if you want.

    Hee-hee-hee! I see, I see. My first impression of you was correct from the very beginning, I see. And Ill dly pay your fees as well. We have a contract, and I was the one who started providing them to the soldiers.

    Cmon, you really dont need to worry about it! Just because I saved your life and stuff

    Well, no, I do thank you for that, of course. But Im not going to throw away profits for you just because of that. Youve built that highway for us, making the journey safer and more convenient for merchants everywhere. Youre the leader of the Jura-Tempest Federation, which is bound to be a major hub among the trade routes. My losses are nothingpared to the chance to build connections with you like this.

    Gotta lose a fly to catch a trout, as the saying goes, and he certainly believed it.

    All right. Well, I look forward to doing more business with you, then.

    Oh, absolutely! And I with you, too!

    And so, having earned each others trust, Mjllmile and I established a new business rtionship.

    I picked his brain for a while longer, asking about future concerns and his impressions of Tempest. He gave me a lot of useful feedback, and as time went on, the children began to get sleepy.

    Just when I was ready to head out, one of the hostesses whispered something I couldnt afford to ignore.

    Ah, may the Spirit Queen bless all these children!

    Huh? Wussat? Some kinda magic spell?

    No, its not! Its a prayer that people from my homnd say all the time. Theres a Spirit Queen, you see, who lives in whats called the Dwelling of the Spirits, and she watches over them all!

    Huh? What did she just say? I had to delve into this.

    Hey, maam, sorry, you just said the Dwelling of the Spirits, right? Do you know where that is?

    The woman gave me a confused look, perhaps surprised at my sudden curiosity. Oh, sure I do. I was born in a vige right near it!

    Then, with a smile, she told me the location. It was in the Republic of Ur-Gracia, a sparsely popted country unaffiliated with the Western Nations, in a vige near Urgr Nature Park in the northern tip of thend. She was born there, and thanks to that, I finally had an ina clue in the most unexpected of ces. No doubt more karma for my good deeds or something.

    So I said my good-byes to Mjllmile and thedies.

    Well be back soon!

    I look forward to entertaining you in Blumund next time, Sir Rimuru. I hope youll pay a visit to my store there.

    Sure. Ill tell the folks back home to prioritize you for potion recement. Keep up the good work advertising that stuff!

    Absolutely!

    Thanks! Come back soon!

    The club staff all demonstrated visible surprise at Mjllmiles behavior. Ill bet theyre pretty freaked out. After all, here was this tycoon, the guy who gave the orders around the joint, bowing profusely at this little kid. I was a B-plus adventurer, so my name was starting to be a bit known around here. They mustve been willing to ept that as the cause.

    Now, I just hope no one tattles on me about bringing kids to a nightclub.

    So here I was at the Urgr Nature Park in the Republic of Ur-Gracia, alleged home of the Dwelling of the Spirits.

    Two months had passed since I epted the teaching role at Englesia. It took a fair bit of prep time and about three weeks of traveling, but I finally made it.

    I had given my wagon to Kabal as a gift, but I wasnt missing it much. We already had a new, improved version all finished up. I had borrowed it for the trip, Ranga pulling it at full speed the whole timewell, about thirty miles an hour, that is, just to make sure the wagons upants didnt get scrambled. Going at full-full speed on unpaved roads would have been suicide.

    At night, meanwhile, I went back to the dorm. The Warp Portal elemental magic really came in handy here. With my level of magical force, it was no problem for me to make the leap and bring all five children along. I was really tossing around a lot of magic, which seemed kind of like cheating, but I didnt want to put the children through a lot of stress. Using this magic meant I didnt need to buy food or other supplies, too, which made things a lot easier. Whether it was right to use it, on the other hand, is another question.

    The Republic of Ur-Gracia was far different from the nations that ringed the Forest of Jura. The Western Church had no influence on it, and it wasnt a Council member, either. It didnt even border Jura and had only a scant few connections to the Western Nations. Trade, for the most part, was with the Sorcerous Dynasty of Thalion.

    It was situated on the southern coast of the continent, all but forgotten, but it was a peaceful, democratic nation, one that received the blessings and protection of the elemental spirits. There were no restrictions on entering or leaving, but crime was not exactly an issue. The reason? Simple: Every native of Ur-Gracia was a shaman or shamaness, capable of using elemental magic.

    This involved providing some of your magicules in exchange for borrowing the power of the spirits to do things. Such elemental magic required no casting time; forge a pact with a spirit, and anyone could pull it off. That pact, however, required earning the trust of an elemental, and the one you chose could affect the power of the resulting magic. Humans didnt have a lot of magicules by default, so without training, your average person couldnt wield a whole lot of force. Still, even if it was only a bit more powerful than household magic, it was still magic, and itd be enough to protect you from criminal activity, I suppose.

    Mastering spirit magic like this could reward the user with an offensive arsenal that rivaled any other. After yet more training, one could even summon elementals themselves. Building stronger connections with elementals like this let you take advantage of their powers more fully, ruling over them and controlling them freely. It was certainly a lot more powerful than simply having one lend you a hand.

    Ur-Gracia was a nation the spirits seemed to love a lot. As a result, legal custom called for a pact-themed ceremony held for everyone at the end of their tenth year of age. This ceremony, oncepleted, qualified you as a citizen of the country and was also the reason why literally everyone was a shaman.

    Anyone who failed to forge a pact with an elemental was exiled from the nation at the age of twenty, losing all rights as a citizenbut with all the many spirits out there, it was rare to bepletely unable to find one to partner with. The hostess I met that night apparently dodged it on purpose so she could see more of the outside world, but apart from exceptions like her, pretty much everyone seeded.

    Elemental spirits tended to dislike people with evil intent, so if youmitted a crime in Ur-Gracia, itd get spotted almost immediately. That was why the people around here were all pretty chill.

    Having an entire nation of shamans naturally made it a threat to its neighbors. It was not widely known to the Western Nations, but its next-door neighbors in Thalion were well aware of them. That was why they had formal, equal diplomatic rtions, despite Thalion being muchrger and masters of its own brand of elemental magic. Thanks to the disposition of most Ur-Gracians, rtions were friendly and trustworthy between the two, allowing them both to advance their civilizations and grow.

    That was about how thedy at the nightclub described it. Now the kids and I were here, and our mission was clearsummon some elementals.

    ording to the theory I (really, the Great Sage) came up with, Ifrit fused with Shizus body to avoid a physical breakdown caused by magical energy gone out of control. A high-level elemental like Ifrit could keep a massive amount of magicules in checkif I could get some to fuse with these kids, that should hopefully solve the problem.

    Fortunately, I had the unique skill Deviant, which let me Separate and Synthesize things. I wasnt sure how the fusion process worked, but hopefully I could just smash the two sides together and see what happened. If the demon lord Leon could do it, I probably could, too.

    The one problem that cropped up at a time like this was how the elementals feel about it. Few of these spirits had wills of their own. Possessing one at all was enough to deem an elemental as high-level.

    In the hostesss vige, it was said there were two ces to forge pacts with spirits. One was the altar in the main square, where local citizens performed their pact rituals. No high-level elementals had ever been found there. If you wanted to forge a pact with one of those, you needed to go to the other ce.

    These spirits often had, shall we say, attitudes; they would never ept you unless you passed a trial of their liking. Such pacts could only be forged in a ce called the Dwelling of the Spirits.

    The question was, were the hostess and Treyni talking about the same ce? As the hostess put it, nobody who ventured forth to find the Dwelling had evere back. The rumors about it kept circting, though, which she found strange. They called it a sort of maze that spread out underground, or up in the sky, with the Dwelling itself found only at the other end.

    Only the entrance existed in Urgr Nature Parka simple door blocked by arge boulder, as if connected to another dimension. We were here to find some high-level spirits, and that meant we had to go that way.

    We spent an evening resting up and preparing. I wasnt wholly sure I could use a Warp Portal to get back outside from whatever was beyond that door. I had a feeling I couldnt, but just in case, I drew a magic circle on the ground in an inconspicuous section of the park. Just a bit of insurance. Itd be nice if it worked.

    I sized up the children.

    You guys ready? Once we go in, we might not be able to get back out. Do you think youre prepared for that?

    They all briskly nodded at me.

    Of course!

    Well be fine.

    And so forth, from one kid to the next. Good. At least theyre not scared. It feels like theyve been friendlier with me, trusting in me a lot moretely. That little dragon hunt a while back mustve had the intended effect.

    I had earned their trust. It was time to go.

    There wasnt any information on this spot in any of the books I scanned at the library. Unfortunately, I had no idea what monsters might be lurking on the other side. It was described as a trial, so it had to be pretty dangerous. But howe nobody ever came back? There were other elementalists out there besides just Shizu, after all, capable of taking full control over high-level spirits. I couldnt make contact with any of them, but Yuuki had said as much to me, so it had to be true.

    There was at least a touch of concern in my mind over whether Ranga and I could keep the children protected. If it looked hopeless, I intended to fall back and ask Benimaru and the other ogre mages for backupassuming, of course, we could get out that easily.

    Either way, it was with a sense of firm resolve that I grasped the door handle. Slowly, carefully, I stepped inside. It was strangethe sun shouldnt be able to reach in, but the entire area was bathed in a dim light. I tried it out before letting the kids in, but it was bright enough to keep things visible without using Magic Sense. Nothing bad in the air, either.

    At my signal, all five went inside. We had just taken our first steps into thebyrinth.

    The moment all of us were in, the door closed. I immediately tried out my Warp Portal. Just as I thought, it failed to activate. I suppose this maze or whatever was set up so spatially oriented magic wouldnt work in it. Rangas Shadow Motion failed, too, so I was pretty sure that was it.

    Better give up on escaping for now and switch gears to solving this trial. We proceeded inside. It wasnt really much of abyrinthmore of a single corridor. Nothing you can really get lost in, I thought as we carefully pressed forward.

    Good thing my brains got a map function.

    It looked like a single path, but it was packed with traps designed to throw off your sense of direction. Try to go back, and the light would adjust itself to hide your previous path in the shadows. Even going forward, a path that lookedpletely in would be hiding branching paths at the outer edge of the light.

    Yep. It sure was abyrinth, one a regr humans directional skills would never work inside. You might not even be able to go back, for that matter. Pretty scary setup they got here.

    Just then:

    (Oh dear, oh dear, oh dear)

    (He noticed, he noticed.)

    (Oh, my, my, my, my, my)

    (Tee-hee-hee-hee-hee!)

    Suddenly, voices echoed in my mind. A very powerful form of telepathy?

    (You bore us, guest!)

    (Be more scared for us!)

    (Be more frightened for us!)

    They babbled on at me. I saw Kenya and Ryota look around searchingly; they could all hear the same voices, no doubt. Chloe hung on to my clothing, refusing to let go. Alice was acting defiant, but she, too, was staying right by me.

    Gail had his sword out, seeking to keep everyone safe. His job as the oldest, I suppose. It was the sword I gave him, a child-size one I asked Kurobe to forge for me. Small but made of pure magisteel and capable of changing its shape to match the wielders habits. I was hoping he wouldnt have to use it, but

    (Good, good!)

    (Be more afraid!)

    (Thats it, thats it! Its too boring otherwise!)

    Hmm. Now I know where itsing from. All this selfish chatter was getting on my nerves.

    Hey, do you guys live here? Are you elementals? Were here on a mission. We need to talk to some high-level elementals. If you dont mind, could you lead us forward instead of getting in our way?

    I figured Id give it a try. How would they respond to it?

    (Ah-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha!)

    (Ee-hee-hee-hee-hee!)

    (What a funny thing to say!)

    (Interesting. More so than being surprised. More so than being scared.)

    (Good, good!)

    (Let me tell him.)

    (But, but)

    (Before that!!)

    Another pathway of light appeared in the corridor in front of us. Apparently, we were being invited. We had to go.

    The path of light was no problem to walk on. Proceeding across it, we found ourselves in arge, open chamber that housed a big standing statue, a giant of steel looming over us.

    (Let me exin the rules of the trial!!) a telepathic voice boomed. As it did, the eyes on the giant statue glowed red. What is it with creepy monsters all having eyes that glow red like that? I dont know why that thought struck me, but it did.

    Whoa, wait. By trial, do you mean I gotta beat this statue thing?

    (Uh-huh!)

    (Yep!)

    (You got it!)

    Well, thats easy.

    Shall I?

    No, Ranga. Ill do it. You stand guard for them.

    I stepped forward. It was my job to deal with the worst. And if we had to run for it, I wanted Ranga in healthy shape.

    (Hmm? Hmm? Hmmmmmm?)

    (Doing this by yourself?)

    (Too much confidence is a dangerous thing!)

    They were worried about me? I sure wasnt too concerned.

    I ran Analyze and Assess on the statue in front of me.

    And I almost choked. It wasnuts. A golem, built in magisteel from head to toe, with enough magical energy to put it beyond A rank. Stronger than the Sky Dragon I beat earlier. It was nearly ten feet tall, looking dignified and massiveId have to guess it weighed over thirty tons. Simply falling on me would be a strike Id have trouble dealing with. I had Resist Melee Attack, sure, but it wouldnt help much if I got squashed t as a pancake.

    As I racked my brain figuring out what to do, the statue shuddered. I immediately sped up my thought process, following its moves. It went nimbly, quickly, like a master swordsman. At that size and with this speed, it was an incredibly dangerous foe. It could bump into me, and Id look like the victim of an especially gruesome highway ident.

    You call this a trial?

    H-hey! Hey! Whats with this guy?! This isnt any kinda trial at all! Youre trying to kill me!

    The elementals erupted inughter.

    (Tee-hee-hee-hee-hee!)

    (Yes, yes we are, exactly!)

    (Think you can win? Think you can win?)

    Were these really elementals? Because they seemed downright evil to me. Plusthat attitude, treating me like a baby. They were really starting to piss me off. Likereally.

    The rage from the pit of my stomach made me start to get for-real serious about thisa rarity for me. Hoo boy. Cant let that happen. I need to retain my dignity around these kids. I never got angry about muchsomething they already knew. I was a role model for them, and I needed to show that losing your cool was a negative.

    Right. Deep breaths. I retained myposure and tried to look as casual as possible as I took a battle stance. No need to go crazy here. Just dont let it hit me, and Ill be fine. The statues pretty fast, but Im much faster. Im a guy who can break the speed of sound, even.

    But just running all day wouldnt get me closer to beating it

    I had a feeling Dark Thunder wouldnt work on it. It was steel, after all. The electricity would just get sent to the ground. A few spells from the magic books I pored through seemed like they had potential, but they were toorge-scale in effect to be suitable. Water de and magic fireballs wouldnt be enough to break through the statues armor, either. Hacking at it with a sword would be pointless; Id chip the de long before Id ever cut through. I might even break it, which would suck.

    Like, seriously, a giant walking hunk of magisteel? Cut me a break. A golem made out of the hardest metal on the, moving this flexibly There were so few weak points, I didnt know where to begin.

    Only one thing left I can think of. Burn the thing down. Burn it but keep the mes limited to reduce any coteral damage.

    Hey, if youre gonna apologize to me, better do it soon. If you dont, Im gonna destroy this thing. You okay with that?

    (Ah-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha!)

    (Thats funny! Very funny!)

    (Ooh, a big, strong boy!)

    (Good, good. Very good!)

    (Lets see if you can!)

    Hnnnnng.

    Come on. Im a grown-up. Im fine. I wont let a bunch of telepathic brats get me angry. Im sure the way the veins in my forehead felt like they would explode was just my imagination. I didnt even have any veins.

    Well, at least I had their permission. Sayonara, golem. Id love to take you home and use you as a toyer, I mean as research.

    Demonwire Bind!

    This was a Soei move, but I was trained in it by now, the result of regr efforts over time. Plus, my Sticky Steel Thread had grown stronger, far more than it was before. It was a cinch to wrap it around the statue and keep it from moving.

    (No way?!)

    (I cannot believe it!)

    (The Elemental Colossus?!)

    Then an ebony darkness covered the statue. Ignoring the surprised elementals, Iunched a Hellre at it. Again, a move I mastered from Benimaru. Focusing my concentration to a razors edge, I kept its range as small as possible. Such focus wasnt necessary if I was just using it normally, but defining a specific range required full control over a massive amount of magicules.

    A dome about ten feet in radius, a size sopact not even Benimaru could conjure it, covered the statue. Even this was something I could only pull off with the help of the Great Sage. There was a massive foom sound, and when the dark dome disappeared, nothing remained.

    ording to the Sages calctions, the temperature inside the dome exceeded several hundred million degrees, enough to create a burning hell that vaporized everything in an instant. Even my own Cancel Temperature would be worthless against that.

    It was the strongest attack skill in existence, one nobody could ever resist. Not too useful against oversize monsters like Charybdis, but still. Its main weakness was how easily avoidable it was; it took long enough to create that simply running away worked pretty well. You couldnt just throw around an attack with an inherent weakness like this, or else your opponents would figure out how to deal with them. I had to save the big guns for situations like these.

    Of course, binding my foe in advance took care of that weakness pretty handily. Either way, though, this was one of the attack skills I hardly ever wanted to show anyone.

    (No!!)

    (I dont believe it)

    (In one strike?!)

    Some very flustered-sounding messages rattled in my brain. It would seem they had had absolute confidence in that golem. I couldnt me them. The children all had their jaws to the floor as well; it mustve been quite a shock. Exactly why I didnt want to show them, but ah well.

    Those elementals had screwed with me for long enough. I hope theyre ready for me now. Its my turn to hand out some punishment.

    After burning away the Elemental Colossus, I let an evil grin spread across my face. Heh-heh-heh-heh. I think I had a negotiation advantage by this point.

    Right, then. Come on out! Unless you guys wanna be burned to ashes next. I know where youre hiding!

    I didnt, of course. I had a general idea, but the telepathy-based blocks made an exact location hard to pinpoint. Itd save me a lot of trouble if they came out voluntarily.

    Yes! Yes, yes, yes!! I have humbly been called upon!!

    What then flew out was a cute little girl (?), looking a bit like a poseable doll with dragonflys wings attached. Not a dwarf, but more like a fairy-tale sprite. Her hair, a mix of gold-based green and ck, was braided, and she wore a red dress with white-and-green patterns over a ck background. It was a pretty shy outfit, full of fancy frills and the like, and it was opened in the back to make room for the dragonfly wings. Behind this fairy were several others like her, though dressed much more inly.

    Ta-daaaaaa! Behold, for I am the mazzh Ahem!

    It sounded like she just tripped over her words in a script. Should I poke fun at her for that? I guess theyre so used to telepathic speech that her vocal cords are out of practice.

    You all right?

    She waved a hand to dismiss the question. Behold, for I am the majestic Ramiris of the Labyrinth, one of the Ten Great Demon Lords!! Bow down be Um, before me!! Then she cocked her head at me, like she was king of the world. I had no idea how she kept pushing my buttons like this. I think someone here needs a karate chop.

    Oww! Wh-what was that for? You scared me!!

    She dodged it. Darn.

    (Thats mean, isnt it? Isnt it?)

    (Can we beat him up? Can we beat him up?)

    (But, but, but, but he beat our Elemental Colossus!)

    (We cant. We cant. Hell kill us!)

    Oh, shut up.

    Besides, youre cheating! Why doesnt Spirit Control work on you?! I havent seen someone as tuned out as you in ages!!

    They were certainly working themselves into ather over me. My unconscious resistance to Spirit Control or whatever it was might have been the cause of a lot of their anger right there.

    But thats not the only reason. I had the sense they wanted dearly to deceive me about something. No way this little pixie was a demon lord. Why were they telling such an obvious lie to trick me? Or were they still making fun of me?

    If youre gonna lie to my face, you really oughttae up with a better story. How could a little kid fairy like you be a demon lord?

    Im not a kid! You really are rude. And what am I, exactly, if Im not a demon lord?!

    Huh? Youre that dumb? I have a real demon lord as a friend, you know. Her names Milim. Thats how I know youre making that up. Youre so weak, its not even worthparing you two.

    Youre so stuuuuuuupid! Stupid, stupid, stupid!! A big stupid man!!

    Ramiris had to pause a moment to catch her breath after all that shouting. She continued on.

    Listen, you, she growled. You know what they call Milim? The call her the most ridiculous demon lord in the universe. She tries to solve every problem she runs into with her fists. Its pretty rudeparing someone so ridiculous with sweet lil old me, dont you think? Because if you dont understand that, were gonna have problems, mister! Besides, arent you a little messed in the head anyway? Like, whats with that attack? Its crazy! And dangerous, too! Dont you need tobine a bunch of special skills together to create something like that? I wish you wouldnt be so reckless, you!

    She had concerns about how dangerous Hellre was. I wish she would stop being so reckless with me, actually.

    So you really do know Milim? she asked.

    Uh-huh! We just became friends recently.

    Oh. Well Wait a second. Are you, um, that slime who became the new leader of the Forest of Jura?!

    Yeah, but how do you know about that?

    Ahhh, I knew it!! She stopped by for the first time in a while and bragged about this new friend she had, so Iughed her right out of this ce

    Ramiris gave me a surprised look, beating her wings in a rhythm in the air. So she wasnt lying. Shes really a demon lord, though?

    Well, d my reputation precedes me. Im Rimuru, Milims friend. And Im here because I had a request.

    Oh, all right. I guess you really are someone Milim knows, so Ill believe you. So stop looking at me so suspiciously! Im a demon lord, I mean it!

    Guess she could tell I didnt believe her. Ah well. She seems harmless. Might as well ept her story for now. I decided to rx and hear her out with a calm mind.

    For some reason, I was the one providing tea and food. She had been calling me a guest for a while now, but doesnt it usually work the other way around? Whatever. The children made fast friends with the fairies, enjoying a few cookies together in a scene I could only describe as darling.

    Ramiriss aim was to try to scare us with that big statue. Once they watched it happen and had a bigugh about it, they would then step in to offer assistance, earning our profound respect and appreciation. She imed they had no intention of killing or hurting us.

    All those rumors about adventurers and travelers never returning got their start because they usually dumped them into an exit connected to some farawaynd. Maybe theyre just taking their time getting home? she remarked nonchntly.

    This was the reason she was so whiny about me destroying her Elemental Colossus. Really, more vaporized instead of destroyed, I suppose. Sure cant repair it now. Either way, though, she really had iting.

    Dahh, she said over and over again, after we spent all that time tinkering with that toy I picked up, we finally got it done, and now

    Well, sorry. My take on it was kill or be killed.

    Besides, you know, that thing had a lot of features! It had earth elementals controlling its weight, water elementals working all the joints, fire elementals powering its engines, and wind elementals adjusting its heat level. A big elemental party! All the top names in spirit engineering worked on it, too

    She just refused to drop the damn subject. Maybe I shouldnt have destroyed it, after all, I almost caught myself thinking. But then Id be indulging her too much.

    Spirit engineering, though? I was curious about that. Maybe it was rted to the magical soldiers Kaijin discussed?

    Is that like the magic-armor soldier project the dwarves were working on with the elves?

    Ding-ding-ding-ding! Im impressed you knew that! But that failed because they couldnt make the spirit-magic core that served as its heart. No way you can just make that out of in steel and expect it to withstand an elementals force. So thanks to them using a bunch of shoddy parts like that, it went berserk and got all broken up. They just threw out its outer shell, so I brought it back home and fixed it up! I guess you could say Im kind of a genius, huh? Isnt that great?

    It was, although I didnt care for her boasting. Thinking about it, spirit engineering was based around the power of elemental spirits, so it made sense that a fairy so intimately familiar with elemental powers would better understand it.

    Listening to Ramiris gave me a general outline of that magic-armor soldier project; it was apparently meant as a way to produce so-called crucial golems, driven by elemental power and controble by a regr person. A sort of ultimate weapon in this world, you could say.

    It was really crazy, this thing King Gazel was trying to make. Magicules ran up and down its body like blood vessels, working the same way as oil pressure on a car to spring it into motion. Its weight could even be controlled by magic, allowing it to flyon paper anyway.

    Whether the project failed or not, though, were the dwarves really that keen on boosting their military? Well, maybe so, actually. It was just taking a different approach from the pack. Instead of relying on otherworlders like their rival nations, they were using their technological supremacy to create a would-be death robot. That made senseand it showed all over again how enormous, and lethal, a threat magic was in this world.

    Still, though, she had seeded where Kaijin and his team failed, in her own way. She looked like an idiot, but this demon lord Ramiris might actually be someone real special. She transformed the concept into a golem that worked on given orders, but it was a fullyplete machine.

    All right. Ill admit it, that golem was pretty impressive. And thats why I have a request for you!

    Huhh? Why do I have to listen to?

    Sensing she was about to turn me down, I stopped her by summoning a little Dark me in my right hand.

    Icould be interested in hearing you out, I think, yes!

    Right. Thats a good girl.

    I appreciate that. Thank you. I wont ask you to do it for free, either. If youll help me out, I can have a new golem made for you!

    Lets hear it!

    She sure was fickle. Dropping the right bait her way made it easy to change her mind. Which was great. Now I could finally get down to business.

    I exined the kids situation to her. The whole, honest story, not hiding anything. The children meekly listened.

    So thats why were here. We want to go to the Dwelling of the Spirits that lies beyond here.

    Ah-haaaaa. Ramiris sighed, watching the children as the fairies chased them around. These kids have been through a lot, huh?

    They have, havent they? I drew closer to drive my point across. Thats why I want to introduce them to the Spirit Queen. Weve got to get some high-level elementals on our side.

    Oh, didnt I tell you? The Spirit Queens me! Im it!

    Huhh?

    This was rather sudden.

    Im not really in the mood for jokes

    How rude! Its not a joke at all. Its real!!

    So this fairy calling herself a demon lord was now iming to be the queen of all elementals?

    Um, look, why is a demon lord working as the Spirit Queen?

    Its the other way aroooouuund! I, the Spirit Queen, went to the dark side and got demoted to demon lord!!

    Now thats her story? I couldnt expect much from this stupid kid, but if she imed to be the Spirit Queen, I had to hear her out.

    In that case, I continued, wondering if it was really okay to do this, I want to summon some high-level elementals. Can you help me with that?

    Hmm, right, right. Now I remember. Someone else who came here and made it past the trial Oh! Leon! That was Leon! And then, he had the nerve to up and be a demon lord, too. Can you believe that? An ex-human doing that? I could KO him in one punch, you know! Easy! I mean it.

    This was obviously a lie. You could see it in the way her eyes darted around. But enough about Ramiris. Lets go back to Leon for a second. He was here? She didnt exactly answer my question, but I couldnt let that topic slide, either.

    Keeping my cool, I asked her for more details, and heres what she told me: Leon, as a human child, paid a visit. For whatever reason, Ramiriss Spirit Control didnt work on himin fact, he almost brought her under his thrall, which made her panic. She was gifted in elemental-oriented illusory magic, but none of it managed to fool Leon. So, her options exhausted, she listened to his tale.

    And like, you were the same, too, but if my illusory magic doesnt work, Im done, you know? I dont have anything else to throw at em, right? It means that sweet, helpless, lil old me has nothing to defend herself with. Thats why I made that Elemental Colossus for a little extra muscle, right? And here I thought I could get back at all those mean demon lords whoughed at me

    Here we go again.

    I told you, I can make you another one!

    Hee-hee-hee! Im looking forward to it!

    Nothing like a little bait to steer this simpleminded girl back on topic.

    So anyway, I wound up helping Leon out a bit.

    Utterly defeated, this nondemon lord Leon forced her to cooperate. He was apparently seeking information on something and asked her to summon an ancient high-level elemental who would know about it. Then, surprisingly enough, he forged a pact with the spirit.

    Now that certainly startled me! That was a light elemental, practically my right-hand man around here, and it just sidled right up to Leon. It recognized him as its master and popped right into his body.

    Having little other choice, Ramiris officially named Leon a Hero and offered him the divine protection of the spirits.

    Wait a second. Why did someone who was named a Hero be a demon lord?

    Who knows? Maybe he fell to the dark side, too. Following in my footsteps, you know?

    I doubted that, but I didnt mention it. Ramiris apparently didnt have much idea how Leon became a demon lord; Id have to ask the man himself about it. This world, though Heroes could be demon lords, just like that? Heroes here were bound by fate, granted astounding powers in exchange If anything, it made me worry that Leon was an even more formidable foe than I gave him credit for.

    If you give it a little thought, it looks like I might be the one who pays for it when we ever meet. Maybe Im lucky I got to learn about this facet of him here. Better brace myself for anything with him. I cant let my guard down.

    Ramiriss story continued. She had hoped that would be thest of Leon shed see, but it proved not to be the case. Even with the high-level elementals knowledge, the man still didnt find any of the clues he needed. This angered him so much that, out of spite, he went back here and stripped away a high-level fire elemental.

    That shameless young man was being so unreasonable. He wanted me to summon a certain person from another world. He knows I cant do that. Like, how stupid can you get? Then he gave me a look like he was about to cry. In fact, he did cry! Yeah, its not lying to say he cried. Not only was he a crybaby, but so self-centered, too! What a doofus!!

    The memory was getting Ramiris worked up. It mustve been frustrating for her, but to me, it sounded more like she was just being a sore loser. Milim was a handful herself, but at least she exuded real presence as a demon lord. At first anyway.

    Is this fairy sure she should say all this, though? If certain people find out about herints, they could make her disappear, no? If I discovered people were talking about me this way, I could easily vaporize em.

    Hey, you arent thinking about something really rude right now, are you?

    No? Not at all.

    Her eyes doubted me, but she was too ditzy to see through my ruse. I could see why she was on alert, though. I wanted her to summon some high-level elementals, and she was no doubt worried shed be repeating mistakes from the past.

    Well, I promise I wont do anything like that to you, so dont worry about that.

    For real? For really real?

    I promise!

    That was the key that finally made her agree to help out. I wasnt without my concerns about this, but I decided to just believe in her for now.

    All right. Could you take us over to the Dwelling of the Spirits, then?

    Ramiris gave me a serious and thoughtful look. Then she flew over toward the children, peering intently into their faces. I had no idea she could express herself this way, actuallywith that kind of real and very nondemon lord affection.

    Mmm. You know, Im a demon lord, but Im also a guide for the holy. I am a fairy resident of thisbyrinth, and I was also the Spirit Queen. My job is to instill the protection of the spirits into Heroes, just as I did with Leon. So dont worry. I always y it fair with people. Because Iyes, I!am the one who maintains the bnce in this world!!

    The other elementals flitted happily around in the air. Blessed light filled the chamber. It was a very solemn, very divine series of events. Her ditziness was now gone and reced with true dignity.

    Ramiris turned to each of us and smiled. All right. Let me help you with the summoning! Lets see if we can get a buncha nice ones for ya! she dered.

    She began by giving me a crash course on elementals, helping me understand what they were a lot more.

    Higher-level spirits had sentience; summoning them sessfully was more dependent on their own whims. One way around this, however, was to siphon some energy off one of the greater elementals, creating a new high-level elemental with it.

    So, like, if you cant call for one, you can just have a new one made?

    Ramiris gave me a broad nod. Birthing a new spirit, as she put it, eliminates a lot of unknowns from the equation. She thought shed be able to pull that off before she ran out of time.

    It wouldnt be easy. There was the issue ofpatibility with each of the children. Ideally, itd be better to find elementals that volunteered to join their bodiesbut wed have to do what needed to be done.

    I looked at the children. They all returned my gaze with firm looks.

    You guys okay with this?

    Yeah!

    It was a stupid question. Now, wed just have to try it out and believe.

 Volume 4 - Ch 7

    RESCUED SOULS

    We changed locations to the Dwelling of the Spirits, located in the deepest part of thebyrinth. No matter how this turned out, my only role in it was keeping the kids safe. We had Ramiris on our side, and for all her weirdness, she was still the exSpirit Queen. She was quite a far cry from the stately noblewoman Treyni described her as, but I was sure itd all work out. Probably.

    It turned out Ramiris knew about Treyni, because the fairys mind was passed down with every incarnation of her body. Oh, shes still doing good? she asked. She was such a cute little spirit, back in the day! She theorized that when she was demoted to fairy, Treyni was impacted by the fallout and became a dryad. It sounded like a true enough story to me.

    As a fairy, Ramiris gave birth to a replicated version of herself whenever her rising magical force reached its limit. This was a new Ramiris of sorts, one who retained all the thoughts of the previous one. Apparently, through this process, the grown children could retain more magic force than their parentsbut until fully matured, the child was actually weaker.

    This made her the only demon lord with a family tree, one filled with a constant cycle of evolution and retrogression. There was no need for this generational nonsense in the past, but post-demotion, she wound up reborn as a fairy, which (as she whined about at length) was not as useful a body to work with.

    Ramiris was still a child at the moment, which was part of why I was so anxious about entrusting her with so muchbut it beat nothing.

    We reached our destination as we talked this over. On the other side of the door was arge, seemingly empty chamber. This was the Oracle Chamber, connected directly to the Dwelling itself. A corridor of light extended from it, about three feet wide and sixty or so feet long. At the far end of this was a round tform, around fifteen feet in diameter. I dont know what it was made of, but it appeared to be floating in thin air.

    All right, so listenI want you to go up on that tform and call for the elementals!

    What should we say, exactly?

    Oh, anythings fine. Like, Help me! or Lets y a game! or whatever. If you capture the interest of a spirit, itlle over, and youll have seeded.

    Theyle for us?

    Of course they will! Youll join us up there, right, Mr. Rimuru?

    Yeah, will you?

    They were getting butterflies now, no doubt. Well, thats fine. If worsees to worst, Ill make the resulting demon or whatever bow to my will. Mu-ha-ha.

    Hey, did you just make a really eeeeeevil face?

    Ramiris was sharper than I thought. I ignored the question and spurred the children forward.

    Itll be all right, okay? Well figure it out!

    I needed to go up there, too, just in case no elementals showed up.

    Dont worry. Ill be up there with you.

    Um, sure? That works for me. You can have as many people as you want up there, but its a pretty tight space, okay? Ill be there, too, so maybe one kid at a time.

    Makes sense. No need for more than one spirit at a go, either. We may need to negotiate, depending on how this goes. Id like to avoid letting my skills do the talking.

    Right! Well each go in order, then. Whos first?

    We worked out who would go when. Gail, the oldest, would be first up, followed by Alice, Kenya, Ryota, and Chloest. It took a while to argue it out, but that was what we came up with.

    The air in the room was serene. There was no sound and only a dim light. It reminded me of the inside of Veldoras cave, the way it was bursting with natural energy. Our footsteps seemed to echo forever.

    Mr. Rimuru, if anything happens to metake care of those guys, okay?

    Sheesh, Gail, you dont have to be so serious. Chill out. I said nothing as I patted him on the head.

    We were at the disc-shaped tform now. It felt very much like we were floating in space. I set a foot out to walk forward but hurriedly stopped. I couldnt see any floor in front of me, but Magic Sense told me one was there. Was this transparent ss? Some kind of acrylic?

    I walked forward, surprised. Its fine, I told Gail, who was clearly scared. Theres a tform here. No matter what happens, Ill help you out. It was enough to coax him on.

    Slowly, carefully, we headed for the center of the disc.

    Okay, Ramiris cheerfully shouted, youre in position! I cant wait to see whats gonnae out!

    I gave Gail another pat. He closed his eyes and began to pray, taking a knee as he offered what tribute he could to the gods. I crossed my arms and watched.

    A little time passed. Eventually, little particles of light began to float down from the heavens, like a light snow. I couldnt feel any sense of strength or will from it. Gail failed to notice any of this and continued praying.

    His prayer had been answered not by a high-level elemental but by low-level ones with no sense of self. Fragments of natural energy. Sort of like magicules, but not really.

    If you piled enough of these together, would they gain free will and be a high-level spirit? Or even if they didnt will it, they might still spread out, form into a whole again, and turn into some kind of elemental.

    Despite the small spirits in the air, we saw no further changes. It seemed no high-level creature was there to answer Gails call. I knew this wasnt going to be easy. There was no guarantee a great spirit was even present, no matter how much you begged for one.

    So wed just create a new one! If these small spirits were pieces from a bigger one that Gail had snipped off for himselfthen gathering them together should make it evolve into a full elemental.

    Question. Would you like to use Glutton to consume these and synthesize a spirit?

    Yes

    No

    Keep praying, Gail!

    I wasted no time consuming the spirits.

    Wh-whoa! Whatre you doing up there?!

    Just shut up and watch me. Ive got an idea.

    Keeping my mind tranquil, Iunched the Great Sage. It epted my request and began crunching the numbers at high speed, instantly providing the best response and beginning the synthesis.

    Report. The unique skill Deviant haspleted synthesizing a high-level spirit. Its element is earth. Analyzing Ifrits self-will data and creating an auxiliary pseudo-personality Sessful Adding. Would you like to synthesize the pseudo-high-level spirit (earth) with Gail Gibson?

    Yes

    No

    I ced a hand on Gails head and thought Yes.

    With that order, the pseudo-high-level spirit (earth) the Great Sage created safely merged with Gail, beginning to serve its purpose. I ran Analyze and Assess on him, hopes high. The rampant energy running out of control within him had neatly subsided; the pseudo-spirit had brought it perfectly under control.

    It seemed to go very well. Soon, hed be able to control that berserk energy to some extentand as he grew, hed gradually gain new abilities.

    This worked! I mentally shook hands with the Sage, not that it cared very much about how I pictured it.

    Okay, its all over. Great job!

    This had all happened in the space of several seconds. Gail, still nervously praying, didnt seem to feel any different. He looked up at me nkly. Then he gave me a strong nod.

    Its all right now. The destructions all gone, I promise!

    Tears began to form in his eyes. He might act all tough, but a kids a kid. The sheer sense of relief made it impossible to hold back, Im sure.

    Thank you, Mr. Rimuru!!

    Hey, no problem. Its my job to keep my students safe.

    I patted him on the head again, kind of hiding my embarrassment as I took him back down. They all cheered joyfully for us. But it wasnt over. I had to make that work four more times, or else itd be meaningless.

    Its too early to celebrate yet, guys. Lets save that for when were all cured!

    They nodded at this, but the concern was starting to clear from their eyes, reced with the color of hope.

    Time for number two.

    Next up was Alice. Climbing that narrow pathway was too scary for her, so I decided to carry her up myself. She and Chloe had been talking to each other about somethingsome final words of encouragement? I dropped the thought from my mind as I picked her up and took her to the tform.

    Hopefully this works again No, I know it will. As we watched, Alice closed her eyes as if in prayer, clutching at her skirt hard with both hands. The same thing happened as it did with Ga few moments, and those particles of light came streaming down once more. Ramiris looked at me, debating whether to say something, but I ignored it. This was the second time, and I was starting to get used to it.

    Report. The unique skill Deviant haspleted synthesizing a high-level spirit. Its element is air. Creating pseudo-high-level spirit (air) Sessful. Also, through analysis and assessment of the air element, Shadow Motion has evolved into Spatial Motion. Would you like to synthesize the pseudo-high-level spirit (air) with Alice Rondo?

    Yes

    No

    Looks like Alice attracted an air elemental. Consuming, analyzing, and assessing it also enhanced one of my own skills. That was an unexpected event. Spatial Motion sounded pretty useful, so I was all for this.

    The synthesis process finished up without incident. I picked her up off the floor.

    You did great, Alice! Its all right now!

    She gave me a happy smile, then kissed me on the cheek. Talk about precocious. Getting affection from a nine-year-old made mehappy, yeah, but also unhappy. Well, okay, happier than anything. Im a gentleman, not a perv; lets set the record straight.

    Thanks a bunch!

    I patted her head as I took her back down. She immediately started chatting and carrying on with Chloe again. Nice to see theyre good friends, at least.

    Now I was back on the disc, with Kenya this time. I was starting to feel more confident. Everything was going great. Three more kids.

    I was thinking Id have to force through a summon, whip whatever spirit showed up, and cram em inside each one, but it looked like that wouldnt even be necessary. It mightve actually helped, though, because synthesizing all these low-level elementals took up a hell of a lot more magic force than I thought. Still, just three left. Gotta hold out.

    The moment Kenya began to pray, light began raining down on the tform, even before he could close his eyes. I felt a pressure upon me like none before in this chamber. Whoa! This guys on a whole other level!

    In another few moments, there it was, on the altar in front of us: a single spirit. A boy, it looked like?

    Hey there! Howre you doing? Cause Im doing fine. I figured Ide on down for some fun today!

    Kind of an informal way to greet us. But there was no doubting this was a high-level spirit.

    Ah, aahhhhhhh!! Whatre you here breaking into my house for?! Ramiris pressed closer to this boy spirit, looking up into his face. Guess they knew each other.

    Um, he is? I asked. Before Ramiris could introduce us, the boy answered.

    Oh yeah! Hey! Im a light elemental! Unlike that evil fairy who let the monsters take her down, Im a totally pure bastion of light!

    Kenya had summoned a high-level light elemental. That kid had talent. We talked for a while, and as the elemental put it, Kenya had the right attributes he was looking for

    So yeah, I figured Id cmon down and help Ken here out!

    Light and dark elementals were typically ssified as the highest of the high, as top level as spirits gotbut having this chill kid here hanging with us certainly made that difficult to picture.

    They were also tasked with the important role of selecting Heroes and granting them their protection. It was those Heroic elements inside a persons body that allowed them to serve either a light or dark elemental.

    As Milim put it, simply calling yourself a Hero was considered both forbidden and extremely arrogant. Maybe Masayuki, that Hero I heard about in Englesia, went through an approval process like this. Or did he? It didnt seem that way to me. I had a hunch he was just trying to look cool

    but now was no time to be thinking about that. I hadnt even met the dude; no point worrying about him.

    So Ill keep Ken here safe until hes grown. And between you n me, he might even wind up bin a Hero someday!

    That observation snapped me out of my reverie. Kenya, a Hero? Wow. Another big surprise. But as I stood there bbergasted, the light elemental helped himself and whizzed right into Kenyas body. So quickly and easily, the magic within him grew tranquil.

    Mr. Rimuru?

    Mm? Oh, um, youre fine. Just like I nned it!

    Like you nned what, exactly?!

    I couldnt help but scold myself over that. But itd be silly to dwell on. Hey, these things happen with elemental summoning. Just gotta ept it and move on.

    Kenya seemed a little dubious, but even he could tell his body was better now. So he epted it, asking no more questions, then walked back down and told everyone what happened. That kid really has it together.

    So Ryotas up next, I guess. Since he was a bit of a wimp, I couldnt help but wonder what kind of spirit hed summon.

    He made it up the walkway by himself, albeit quivering a little, so he certainly seemed ready enough for this. This being number four, we were now used to the routine, and I had him start to pray without furtherment.

    Lets see what happens.

    This time, the light just didnt seem to wannae out for us. Growing impatient, I began to consider whether I should summon a high-level spirit for him. But just then, balls of blue and green light began to fall from above, tracing a spiral in the heavens.

    I guess two forces were fighting over which one would reach out to him, but neither were high-level, so I immediately consumed them without further deliberation. Time was of the essence. Starting up Analyze and Assess, I found their elements were water and wind. Which would be a better fit for Ryota? Lets ask the Sage.

    Report. The unique skill Deviant haspleted synthesizing two high-level spirits. Their elements are water and wind. Creating pseudo-high-level spirit (water/wind) Sessful. Also, analysis and assessment of all five elements of earth, water, fire, wind, and air sessful. Obtaining Quantum Control Failed. Would you like to synthesize the pseudo-high-level spirit (water/wind) with Ryota Sekiguchi?

    Yes

    No

    Thinking Yes, I executed the synthesis.

    Pseudo-high-level spirit (water/wind) meant this had two elements, although the amount of magical energy was the same as Gails and Alices. Kenya had actually seen his energy boosted, but thanks to the light elementals power, it was being controlled perfectly, so it was no problem for him.

    Regardless of the results, Ryota was now all fixed up, and that just left thest one. I gotta say, though I had pretended to not hear that, but what the heck was Quantum Control? That sounded like one mean skill. I couldnt even guess at what I could use it for.

    I would think Maybe I can do this or Itd be nice if I could do that, then gain effects that sort of did itand those were my skills, in a way. Whenever I wanted some result, the Sage would make it happen in real space for me. But I had to be able to picture it. If I didnt understand something myself, the Sage had nothing to work with. Maybe that was why the skill evolve failed.

    On the other hand, if I really wanted something, that meant I always had a chance of making it happen. Hmm.

    Chloe, the final child, was a bit scared as well, so I lifted her up onto the disc. She seemed to appreciate it. I couldnt believe she was scared at first, actually.

    Y-you know what, Mr. Rimuru? she whispered in my ear, cheeks blushing hard. I I looooooove you!!

    Well, me too. But I wish you couldve said that at least eight years from nowand preferably more like ten. Or like, how bout telling me that back when I was still a living human being? Man, poor me. A single loner, unable to find a partner before I passed on. But that led directly to me obtaining the Great Sage, the unique skill to end all unique skills. So wereeven, maybe? I had my doubts.

    Either way, that was cute of her. Children can be so honest like that. Its toote for me now, but I guess its trueyou need to enjoy love while youre still in school. Dont let those middle-school nerves get in the way.

    But this was not the time to talk about this; Chloes sudden confession threw me off my game a little. So what kind of spirit would be greeting her? This is it. Brace yourself.

    Just like all the others, Chloe began to pray.

    Thats when things changed.

    How should I put it? I suppose it was something like the sky falling down.

    With an intense gust of air pressure and a strikingly vivid aura, a beautiful woman appeared. Her hair was long, shiny, and a darkish shade of silver, radiating light throughout the chamber. The energythe sheer force of existencewas like no elemental spirit I knew. But she didnt have a physical form?

    Received. This is a spiritual body, the same form of existence as a high-level elemental. Unusually high energy levels detected Maximum limit not calcble.

    There it was again. Not calcble. The second time, after Milim.

    As the Great Sage exined, there were three types of topological forms in the world: astral bodies, the weakest form that surrounds the soul; spiritual bodies, which can form a base upon which to build ones internal force; and material bodies, those directly connected with this world. The human body is thebination of all three forms.

    A high-level elemental is nothing more than a mass of energy that gains sentience. In other words, it uses the heart protected by its astral body to control its spiritual one, you could say.

    This also applied to draconic races like Veldora, but in his case, he not only had a spiritual body, but he had a material one made from matter in the local area that he could freely control. High-level elementals didnt have that kind of power, so when they left the spiritual world, their energy would disperse, and they would disappear. This is the fate that awaited any type of spirit-based life-form in the physical world, including angels and demons.

    To keep their energy from fading away, they must either find a physical receptacle to form a pact with or a way to physically incarnate themselves. That, in essence, was what made the material body so important in this world.

    This silvery-haired woman who appeared before us was clearly not human. She was something like a high-level spirit but with more energy than even the Sage could reckon. She did not, however, have a material body and would normally fade away before too much longerbut the Dwelling of the Spirits was soden with energy, she didnt have to worry about that. Her sheer force made even high-level spirits look like pushovers.

    She eyed me up and down. Then, out of nowhere, she hugged me and gave me a kiss. Unfortunately, I didnt feel it, her being all ghostlike and everything. A major shame. With a beauty like this, even if shes just a ghost Wait, thats not the problem! What the heck is she?!

    The pretty woman with the dark-silver hair looked at me, disappointed, then reached out to touch Chloes body. Before she could

    Stop!! You cant do that! Im not gonna let you do what you want with her!!

    Ramiris, who had been simply watching everything until now, suddenly spoke up. Spreading both hands in the air, she went into an attack stance. The rxed expression on her face was gone; now she was dead serious.

    Hey! Whatre you talking about?

    Shut up! That womans bad news! Cant you tell?!

    How should I know?! Whats so bad about her?

    Even as we yelled at each other, the woman kept movingand instilling herself within Chloe. There was simply no time to stop her; even Ramiris, as prepared as she was for battle, could do nothing.

    Aaaaaaah! Its toote. Im outta here! Dont me me for anything that happens!

    Ramiris had her cheeks puffed out in obvious annoyance. In a panic, I ran Analyze and Assess on Chloebut all that energy there a moment ago was nowpletely gone. I didnt see the problem. Her body was stable now, and the threat of magicules going out of control was no more. Simplygone. She blinked a few times in confusion, equally surprised.

    What was that just now?

    Ramiris didnt try to answer. Chloes eyes fully opened; she turned to me, then to her, then to me again. She didnt know what was going on, and I sure as hell didnt.

    I asked the fairy once more. I dont know! she whined. I dont know a lot of the details, either, but that woman was probably born in the future. Something kind of like an elemental from the future? I cant really believe it, but finding a home inside that kid maybe ensures it has somecefor herself to be born? Ahhhhhh, I just dont know!! But you saw how much power she had. If something like that gets born in the future, I think its gonna be baaaaaaad news. Maybe sheshesbeing protected by the great spirit of time?

    Hmmmm. Hearing all this only made it more confusing. I was clueless, so I decided to stop trying to make sense of it. Im a results-oriented man, and everything turned out all right. If Chloe was okay, it was all good. Who cares about the future? That stuff wasnt set in stone anyway.

    Well, isnt that great, Chloe? Everything went just as nned! Now you arent in any danger, either!

    I picked her up.

    Did it really go as nned?

    Urg. Hit me where it hurts, why dont you? Kenya was a lot more cooperative when I tried that on him.

    Y-yeah. Yeah! Of course!

    Chloe finally rewarded me with a smile. Ramiris sighed in resignation as she watched us.

    Well, all right. The moment she went into that girl, it was all out of my hands anyway She turned her back to us.

    Hey, whats the big deal? I asked as we went back down to the others. Thatst one was kind of a surprise, but were all doing just fine. One way or the other, it was a big sess for everyone involved. So thanks. You helped save these kids lives!

    Once they were all back together, I had them all give their thanks to Ramiris.

    Thank you very much!!

    Bah! Its fine, its fine!

    She turned red in the face, fanning herself as she flitted around. This is a demon lord? I wonder whats going on with this world sometimes.

    The other fairies flew around the chamber with her, making for a pretty fantastic sight. Even bratty as she was, that demon lord was still pretty cute when she smiled.

    It was, it seemed, a little celebratory dance for the children. And it worked, kindling a warm contentment in all our hearts. Soon, a natural smile spread across the childrens faces. I had promised to save them, and at that very moment, I had fulfilled that oath.

    With that relief behind us, we decided to head back to the academy.

    Ramiris, I could never repay you enough. Well, see you round!

    I turned to leave, but before I could

    Wait, wait, waaaaaaaaaait!!

    Ramiris sounded half beside herself with panic as she called after me. She sure could make a racket when she felt like it.

    Wait, you, she wailed as she tugged at my cor, half strangling me (not that I needed to breathe). Dont you think youre forgetting something?

    Oh, what? Whatre you gonna gripe at me about this time?

    Im not griping! Remember? The thing you promised!

    The thing? Whats this girl talking about?

    Oh?

    Dont tell me you forgot already! You said if I helped you, youd get a new golem for me

    Ah!

    Ah? So you really did forget?!

    Oh, no, dont be silly, Ramiris. Who do you think I am, huh? Of course I remembered my promise!

    I did! That bait I dangled in front of her while I gave her the hard sell!

    Well, I helped you out, and I want some help back for it! If positive vibes are all you have for me now, then fine, but you did make a promise, and youll live up to it, right? Right?

    I let her whine as I crafted some of the magisteel in my Stomach, molding it like y. It was a tremendous waste of good material, but I didnt have anything else to work with. Working from memory to re-create the robots humanoid form, I wordlessly handed it over to her.

    Ah, yeah, sorry about that. How about this, then?

    It was the magisteel robot I promised hera golem.

    Hey, wait a!

    It was just under a foot tall, much like Ramiris herself. Taking it like a little girl with a doll, she wavered in the air, finding it too unwieldy to carry.

    Right, so thats that!

    My promise fulfilled, I set off to leaveonly to be stopped by Ramiris wailing like that same little girl.

    Are you seriously going to break your promise?!

    What? I gave you that golem you wanted.

    No, no, no! Not this I mean, it does look pretty neat, but not this! You broke my Elemental Colossus, and I dont have anything to guard this ce anymore! Until you make me something that can protect me, Im never gonna let you out of here!

    She was in tears by the end of it, threatening me with a life spent forever lost in thebyrinth.

    Oh, no worries about that. I just learned Spatial Motion, so I can get out of here anytime I want.

    I was definitely not expecting this end result, but good thing I picked up that skill just now.

    Waaaaaaaahhh! Wait, wait! I mean, really, Im in big trouble here! Im still a child, remember? All weak and innocent and stuff? Soe on! Im in deep here! Do something about it!!

    Now the tears were pouring out like raindrops. Being around a demon lord like this was making my head hurt.

    Hmm, this was trouble, though. I could just tell her You deserve everything you got! and teleport off, but I did kind of destroy her property. Plus, I was withering under the stares these kids were giving me. I guess they thought I was just bullying this weak little fairy.

    Why did I have to vaporize that thing into thin air? I mean, honestly speaking, I didnt think I applied that much force to it. Magisteel was really resistant to magical forces, and it was one of the hardest metals out there. But like any other metal, it had a melting point. One I thought was so high, I kind of overdid it.

    The Sage acted like it was no big deal, so I thought itd be fine, but now look what happened. It was the first time Id used a shrunken-down version of Hellre in actualbat, and I failed to adjust it correctly. I wont be using that very much at all, really, but I better turn it down a little next time.

    So how to rece that golem?

    Oh, man Look, its gonna be hard to reproduce something that big, all right?

    I dont need it to be that big! Just something thats strong enough to protect me! Thats all I need!

    Right. Ramiris was willing topromise; now we were getting somewhere. I had a fair amount of magisteel left, but I didnt want to waste a bunch of it in here. The Elemental Colossus was entirely magisteel on the surface, so Id have to use quite a lot to ever reproduce it. Buthmm. Strength is all she wants, huh? Maybe I could make a human-size mannequin, instill a spirit in it, and Hang on, didnt I have some magic along those lines?

    Understood. Searched for Creation: Golem magic. It is possible to execute. A golems strength is dependent on the strength of its materials and the elemental spirit or demon it is instilled with. Iron, stone, wood, and y are the mostmon materials. Its external shape may be changed depending on the image in the casters mind. After creating the body form with your materials, the instition and final forming can begin then. Once your conditions are met, you may activate the process by thinking of it.

    Thats the Sage for you. It had discovered creation magic for me, a level above the inscription magic I had before, and instantly retrieved it from the vast archive of magic tomes I had leafed through.

    As magic went, it was rtively simple. I learned Summon Demon back at my guild examination, letting me easily conjure up a demon. Lets go with thateven if I called forth an elemental, I figured itd be a pain to control. An elementals spiritual connection with its caster was very important, but with a demon, as long as you paid the price, itd do anything for you. Plus, for a protection job like this, Id need nothing but high-level elementals, or else it wouldnt work. Nonconscious elementals were no use.

    So I decided to instill the golem with a demon. You might think they could rebel against being used like this, but that never really happened. A summoning was a sort of contract, and they never betrayed their summonerassuming the right circumstances, of course. If you asked for more than you did when you originally forged the pact, it ended right there. That, and if the conditions were too unreasonable, it also automatically canceled the contract. Demons were all business that way, so trust was important. Just because someone was a demon didnt mean they were all evil, after all.

    Anyway, I now had a n in mind. Lets make the core body with magisteel, install a demon inside, and craft that golem. I was pretty sure I could build something far stronger than your average run-of-the-mill, A-ranked monster.

    All right. Ill help you, all right? So stop carrying on like that, Rami. Im gonna make this crazy-strong guardian for you, so noining, okay? In exchange, would you be able to teach me spirit engineering?

    Kaijin and Vester would be interested in that Elemental Colossus as well. We could probably have them work together back in town to reproduce it. That, I wouldnt mind providing the materials for. In exchange, though, lets get Ramiris the guardian she needs.

    Thats finebut you arent trying to trick me again, are you?

    Man, oh man. Her mistrust ran deep. Why couldnt she just believe in people a little more?

    Im not trying to trick you. I have some dwarven craftsman in my city, you see, and they were involved with that magic-armor soldier project, too. I thought we might be able to conduct some research over there.

    I wanna research that, too, Mr. Rimuru!

    Me too!

    The kids were certainly enthusiastic about it. Hmm. Armored soldiers with human pilots inside? Sounds pretty ambitious.

    Are you gonna make it look like this? Ramiris asked, thrusting the doll I made at me.

    Well, thatd look pretty cool, dont you think?

    Let me ride on it first, Mr. Rimuru!

    I wanna ride, too!

    Even the reserved Ryota was up for the idea. Ill definitely have to try to make that happen, I thought as I reached out to take the doll from Ramiris. She whisked it behind her back, handing it over to several servants, who struggled to carry it to parts unknown.

    Um

    Thats mine! You cant have it back!

    How selfish can you get? First, she wants a guardian from me, then she wont give me back that doll. A lot of demon lords, I was starting to realize, were really damn self-centered. I wont name names, but Im talking really self-centered.

    Well, you will help me with this, right?

    Sure! So what kind of guardian will you make for me?

    Hmm? Oh, I was just thinking of a stronger version of the guy I defeated

    Really?! Wow! Youre really a super-nice guy, arent you?!

    And so, I took on the job of making a new, improved protector for Ramiriss domain.

    Beginning with the prep work, I burped out some magisteel from my Stomach, lining up the pieces. It was some of the finest quality out there, enriched with magicules to make it easy to apply magic to. The children watched, intensely curious.

    Where? Hey, where did you get all that stuff?! Oh, justnever mind

    Ramiris gave me a look of utter exasperation. Whatever she thought about it, she kept to herself, so I got straight to work, processing each piece of magisteel I had taken out. If we were gonna make a humanoid figure, it had to have ball joints. That was nonnegotiable for meand it actually surprised me how much it turned out the way I pictured it.

    Carefully, I put together the movable parts, adding a few original elements of my own. I had a friend back on Earth who was really good at assembling and painting anime figurines. I was so jealous of that, given I was just dexterous enough to maybe put together simpler robot models. Now, things are different! With the Great Sage backing me up, I could craft things exactly the way I imagined them in my mind.

    The former Spirit Queen was looking at my work with great skepticism, no doubt wondering what the hell I was doing. Along the way, though, she started to get visibly excited.

    W-wow! Wow, this is amazing! Oh, my goodness! Youthis, this is incredible! I cant believe you can make it move so freely like that!

    She couldnt wait for itand really, I wasnt expecting this to be nearly as precise as it turned out to be. The fact that pure magisteel could bend itself to better meet the makers intentions helps, no doubt.

    Before long, the job was done. It was basically human in shapeslender, a little under six feet, and a facial covering on its head that matched my mask. I felt proud.

    Right! All done! Now Im gonna summon a demon and put it inside thisbut promise me you arent gonna do anything bad with it, all right? Im gonna put a master lock on it to make sure it can refuse anything weird you tell it to do!

    Okay, okay! No problems there! But I can y with it all I want in here, right?

    Hmm? Sure, yeah, in thebyrinth. Just dont be a bother on other people, okay? Also, Im guessing that this guys gonna pack a real punch, so make sure you dont get hurt, either.

    With Ramiriss permission, I applied the finishing touches. First, the master locka spell with orders from the original maker, outlining a few simple ground rules. Then, the demon. As much trouble as I was going through with this, I was sure the results would be several times stronger than just whipping up a golem with a spell.

    Spreading my arms wide, I pretended to chant a spell to that effect. We were still by the altar from before, although I had the children kept away from it in case of danger. Only Ramiris was behind me.

    Itd be great if this worked, but if I didnt apply enough force, the demon might fall out of control. Then Id have to either make it bend to my will in battle or cancel the whole summon. Lets just pray that doesnt happen. All this continual work has pretty well sapped my physical and magical energy, so Id really like to avoid any more unforeseen snags.

    As I cast this pretend spell, a magic circle drew itself on the floor. There was no need to cast anything for it, but I thought itd help create a little atmosphere. I was trying to call forth a Greater Demon, tougher than a Lesser Demon and around an A-minus in rank. Pretty high for a monster, but I didnt want some newborn without any sense of self, so I prayed for an older, more intelligent demon as I carried out the summon.

    And the results certainly did produce a Greater Demon for us. Its eyes had the spark of wisdom in them, unlike your typical Lesser Demon whod go into a murderous rage without the caster magically shackling it. The difference was clear in its behavior from the start. It immediately kneeled before meits head reverentially bowed down.

    You called for me, master?

    Looks like I pulled it off. The Greater Demon was pledging its allegiance.

    It wasrger and more muscr than its Lesser brethren, its magicule-formed corpus already starting to dissipate over time. Its skin was jet-ck, covered in clothing made of a sturdy but torn fabric. Looking at that, I could tell it had been alive for quite a while. Its gender, I couldnt tell you, although the horns that jutted out both sides of its head looked pretty stately to me.

    Do demons have, like, real muscles at all? It probably doesnt matter. The Greater Demon kneeling before me certainly fulfilled all my conditions anyway.

    Right. I called you here in order to create a golem. I shall grant you this figure of magisteel to serve as your physical body, so I want you to fill it with your spirit. In exchange, I will provide my magical energy. This contract willst foruh

    I looked at Ramiris. Hurriedly, she began counting on her fingers. II want a hundred years! she replied. Ill be fully mature in a hundred more years!

    This contract willst for one hundred years. Once it expires, you may retain this figure as your body if you wish. Well?

    Contracts like these that veered off the beaten path were always risky. If it was something like Beat up that guy in front of you! itd be epted in an instant. Long-term orders like this were harder for demons to swallow. If I simply wanted this demon to stick by Ramiriss side, a regr supply of magicules would do the trick, but without that physical corpus to support it, itd suck up way too much magical energy. Plus, once you summoned one creature, you couldnt immediately summon another, although there were loopholes around this.

    Right now, I wanted this demon to be Ramiriss guardian, and I had to be sure the contract covered all of that.

    I would wish for nothing else, my master! And I have already received your energy as payment.

    Well, d its up for the job. The contract wasplete. Honestly, I wasnt expecting the magicules I used for the summon to cover the whole tab. It absorbed a ton, sure, but I still had enough inside me to work with.

    Good thing I was clever enough to give it more than I thought I needed. No wonder it was so respectful to me. With the right pact, it wasnt a problem, but if you summoned someone with a measly pittance of magicules and asked the world of the creature, you might wind up killed on the spot. The only way to y it safe was by summoning the right monster and providing a reasonable pact. Something to keep in mind.

    Anyway, we now had an agreement. This guy didnt appear to have a short temper or violent streak; he seemed calm and wise to me. I was just d I got exactly the kind of demon I ordered. I was sure he wouldnt have a problem with the master lock, either.

    Continuing on, I instilled the magisteel figure with the demons magical corpusincarnating it, you could say. The figure was actually a step down from the Greater Demon size-wise, but it seemed to fit the guy perfectly. It voluntarily did away with its magic-driven body, fully fusing itself with the new metal one. Then it did a few exercises to get used to the thing. No problems, apparently.

    I was the one who designed the mask on the figure, but the moment the demon took over, the expression took on a more, dare I say, evil bent. Funny.

    This is wonderful, it said, the mask now betraying surprise and joy. I would expect nothing less from you, master. I thought that moving this body would require expending magic force to transform the joints themselves, but with this, I ampletely free to move. The perfect body for me to upy!

    Well, Im d it likes it.

    I then proceeded with some minor adjustments to satisfy Ramiris and the Greater Demons requests. Before long, though, the fairy had its new guardian on watch.

    How does it feel?

    Yes, it is simply wonderful, it said, moving its limbs around to get used to them. Its physical intervention levels are showing very high numbers. Compared to incarnating in a human or magical beast, my offensive strength goes without saying, and my physical defense is simply iparable. Wonderful! This is truly an astounding body!

    In order to have a physical presence in this world, demons needed to incarnate themselves within something else, usually an animal or monster. A magisteel puppet like this, however, worked just as well. Being pure metalmagisteel, for that matter, the toughest in the worldit would naturally be a defensive powerhouse. There were some rare metals out there with a melting point of over nine hundred degrees, but magisteel topped out at upward of eighteen thousand. Between that and its self-healing abilities, there wasnt a better metal out there.

    All in all, itd be a Herculean task to break down this guardian with any physical weapon.

    After it stretched its new legs out a little, the Greater Demon turned to me.

    I swear upon this body that I will fulfill my role, master. Once my pact to serve as that fairys guardian expires in a hundred years, I hope you will let me work under you.

    Thatsrather sudden, isnt it? And a hundred years from now Im not sure Ill even be alive then. Maybe his loyalties will switch to Ramiris by then; you never know. She is a demon lord, after all.

    Well, sure, if Im still around

    Ha-ha-ha! Dont be silly. There is no way someone like you, master, will be dead in a century. If you promise me that, I will not demand any further reward.

    How long was my life expectancy here anyway? I hadnt thought about it much. I guess Ill die when I die. You never know when some random dude will knife you on the street.

    d it likes me, though. I guess Im just naturally attractive to monsters. In which case, itd be kind of inconvenient not to give it a name. I had about half my magicules left, and judging by previous naming experience, higher-level monsters would take a massive amount. That would certainly include a Greater Demon at A-minus rankmaybe even A in this new incarnation. Named, itd surpass even that, no doubt.

    Ah well.

    Perfect! In that case, from today forward, you may call yourself Beretta. May you remain ever loyal to Ramiris and myself! I want to see your best effort.

    That was a nice bit of inspiration, I thought. Something about the golems form reminded me of the beautiful lines of that famous family of firearms. And whoop, theres that familiar draining feeling again. I barely held out against it this time; the fuel gauge got dangerously close to E. This bum just made off with nearly a third of my magicules Geez. Its gonna be a real powerhouse now.

    With its new name, Beretta began to evolve. Spreading out from each of its ball joints, its chest, head, hips, arms, and legs connected together, the surface now covered by a skin-like membrane. It looked practically human, although the membranes transparent color made the internal structure look all the more fetching. The face remained the same as my mask; the long, jet-ck hair was now a radiant shade of silver. It was a sort of demon golem, with a beauty I could only call bizarre.

    Once the transformation ended, the body was fully coveredthe eyes in the mask glowing red. It was all over. So what kind of skills did it pick up from me?

    Beretta stood up, then bowed deeply.

    I am Beretta, the arch-golem, and I am ready to carry out my received orders.

    It was a rather strange figure, with a mask for a face and nothing underneath. A golem of destruction.

    It turned to Ramiris, then saluted.

    Lady Ramiris. Your wish is mymand. Allow me to protect you.

    She nodded briskly, almost ovee by it all. Um, umm, yeah! she stammered, trying to retain some of her dignity. Sure thing! Ill be counting on you!

    Welp. That oughtta suffice as an Elemental Colossus recement. Probably about twice as strong in battle, too.

    Now I had kept my promise to Ramiris, even if I got a little carried away and made an even stronger guardian than I meant to.

    Once I started making the figure, Ramiris kept yapping to me about how I should do this and add that. It annoyed me so much that I suppose I got a little too heated. Berettas magic force helped boost its offense a lot as well, though, so in terms of strength, I was sure shes satisfied.

    I went through the trouble of crafting it, so Id like to hope it helps her out a bit. Though, to be honest, I didnt even want to imagine Beretta fighting for keeps inbat.

    * * *

    The kids wound up falling asleep while I was assembling that golem, finally released from a long period of anxiety and fear. Being freed of all the stress theyd put up with mustve made them totally at ease; they were sleeping peacefully, with Ranga serving as a pillow. I didnt need sleep, but with kids, thats part of the job description. Sleep well and grow up strong.

    Lets wait for them to wake up, I thought as I decided to rest a bit myself.

    The next morning, once their energy was restored, I took the kids out of the Dwelling of the Spirits. They all had elementals within them; their lives were no longer in danger. I had answered Shizus wish beyond her death, and all our problems were behind us. NowI thought, at leastI can go back to Tempest in peace.

    Upon leaving the maze, I used my new Spatial Motion extra skill to bring the kids back with me to Englesia. Connecting two fields of physical space together required several minutes of work, but it let you revisit any location youve been to before, making it pretty helpful. I also picked up the magic ring I dropped off outside as an escape route. I didnt need it to execute Spatial Motion, so I stored it in my Stomach, as much as I doubted Id ever use it again.

    Once back at the academy, I immediately made contact with Yuuki, reporting on the results of our journey and going in-depth on the childrens futures. I had considered taking them in for good, but I also thought children like them really needed the right learning environment to thrive in. We had this academy here, filled with talented teachers. They could receive both a basic education and magic in the same ce.

    Thus, we decided they would remain here at the academy to learn. Seeing my magic for themselves mustve convinced them how useful it was. They did cry, however, when I told them I was leaving. I promised Id attend all their graduations, and of course, they were eager to wee me.

    Really, theyd be fine now. Their magical energy levels were now restricted to a little above the average, allowing them to live normal lives. Even someone with magical Assessment skills wouldnt notice whats going on inside them.

    It was a topic I also discussed with Yuuki a bit. Once a nations abandoned a child, he reasoned, I doubt theyll try to take them back again. Thats a vition of internationalw, and itd also make them enemies of the Free Guild.

    You think maybe we could have them earn their adventurers cards and be guild members?

    Hmm Perhaps we could, yes, if they want to.

    Sure. Theyll have time to think about it as students.

    That they will.

    They were still children, but in this world, you were considered grown-up at age fifteen. It wouldnt be long until they were all that age, qualified to join the Free Guild. Theyd get to do whatever they want, living in pure, unrestricted freedom.

    Yuuki also pressed me several times on how I solved their problems, but that was a secret. He assumed the children were just normal kids now, and I was fine with that. Their surging magicules were actually being neutralized by elementals, but I didnt see the need to tell anyone about that. That really could make them the targets of rogue yers worldwide, setting off wholly new problems for them.

    The children had already been assigned new schedules and teachers. My role in their education was more or less over. They had undergone basicbat training, as well as gotten used to speaking with their pseudo-elementals. In between, we went out on pics, with Kabals team stopping by for fun sometimes.

    Potion sales, meanwhile, were going well. When I finally visited Mjllmile in Blumund, I received a heros wee. He had the profits he wanted, and I was happy with that, too. And every time I came back to Tempest, I saw more and more adventurers taking advantage of our lodging. It was turning into a lively ce. Id better get back for good soon, before some other huge problem reared its ugly head.

    The time hade to go home.

    It was the day of my departure.

    You Youre leaving, Mr. Rimuru?

    You cant make him wait any longer, Clo.

    No, but I I mean

    But

    Chloe was about to cry. I wasnt feeling much better myselfbut, you know, I could pop on over anytime I want with Spatial Motion. This wasnt the end.

    Ha-ha-ha! Youre such a crybaby, Chloe. Here, how about something to cheer you up?

    I removed the mask I had on and gave it to her. The Mask of Magic Resistance, a memento of Shizus that was broken once before I repaired it. I wasnt sure what drove me to give it to her; it just seemed like the natural thing to do. She epted it without hesitation.

    A! I wanted it, too

    Hee-hee-hee! Its all mine now!

    It cheered Chloe up, so I was happy. For the crestfallen Alice, meanwhile, I had a school uniform Shuna prepared for her.

    Ah!

    Are these for us?

    I had outfits for Kenya and GailRyota, too, of course. They looked the same as all the other uniforms in the academy, but they were sewn with sturdier custom cloth. The children all gleefully epted them.

    Now listen, I want you guys to keep studying, all right? Its hard to say good-bye like this, but its not like Ill never see you again. Come over to my town once youre on break, okay?

    Okay!

    The children saw me off, their teary eyes turning into smiles. I left the Englesian capital while the smiles were still fresh on their faces.

    It seemed like a short trip to humannds, but it wound up extending for quite a while. It was tough going, but Id built some bonds I could never rece, not for anything in the world. Getting to interact with children like that again, as a slime, was something I never couldve dreamed of.

    Everything seemed to be going great.

    Or perhaps, a little too great.

    In a world like this, negative emotions like jealousy and envy can unknowingly fester in the hearts of your peers. I had intended to be careful in all my actions, lest I be the target of such feelings.

    But as they say, garbage in, garbage out. The Great Sage had astounding predictive skills, but if I gave it the wrong questions, itd give me the wrong answers.

    If Tempest grew prosperous, that meant somebody was going to lose out in the bacsh. I instinctively knew that, of course, but I didnt think it would happen at a scale or speed beyond my expectations.

    During my time as a slime here, I had my own small ambitions. To live among the humans I looked up to. To make contact with otherworlders. I had made that happen, and now, in my new homnd of Tempest, I was building the foundation for even greater developments. In a way, I had already seeded, and in another, I had failed.

    I was just a regr person; I didnt understand much about government or politics. About the cold egoism and Machiavellianism that often reigns. Now, fate was making changes at an ever more rapid pace, forcing me to settle upon my future direction.

    The days of peace were drawing to a close; days of war were beginning.

 Volume 4 - Epilogue

    EPILOGUE

    A MONSTERS NATURAL ENEMY

    Taking my leave of Yuuki and the children, I had reached the outskirts of the city. Away from the gaze of others, I figured I could use Spatial Motion to return home without further dy. I thought so anyway, but for some reason, the skill wouldnt activate.

    Whats going on?

    Report. You are covered in a long-range barrier. Any spatial-intervention skills targeted for beyond the barrier are forbidden.

    Huh?

    I didnt like the sound of that. In a way, I felt in more danger than I ever had before. When Milim attacked us, she didnt really have any intention of killing anyone. I wasnt overwhelmed with a sense of danger. Now, that sense was sounding its loudest rms yet.

    My suspicions were confirmed when I saw Soei appear before me, badly wounded.

    SirSir Rimuru, you must flee at once

    This Replication of Soei mustve expended all its strengthing here. The body was already starting to fade into thin air.

    What happened?

    Enemies, sir. More powerful than I could ever imagine

    And then, he disappeared. I was sure his original body was okay, but these Replications were supposed to be on the same level as the original strength-wise, werent they? Did he fall into a trap or something?

    I called for Ranga from my shadow. No reply. Just as the Great Sage warned, I was so shut away from the outside world that not even Ranga could intervene from beyond. This barrier must have been the spatial-division type, fully isting me from beyond its borders. I could neither call for help nor run away from it.

    The bad feeling I had was now pushing me into a panic. Just in case, I put out some insurance. Fortunately, there were no restrictions on my skills within the barrier itself, I didnt thinkbut then I heard another warning.

    Report. You are covered in a long-range barrier. Any skill usage within the barrier is forbidden Resistance seeded. However, restrictions are in ce on all magic-oriented skills.

    What? Whats going on here?! Magic-oriented kind of describes, like, all my magic and everything that involves controlling magicules! Things like Dark me and Dark Thunder were simrly restricted, as well as control-based skills like Sticky Steel Thread. This kind of barrier wasnt in ce even during that Sky Dragon attack before.

    If there was someone capable of deploying a barrier like this, there was no way Soei wouldnt have noticed. And if I was caught in this before he could warn me via Thought Communication, it had to be spread out across a vast amount of terrain. It felt safe to assume it wasnt meant for someone else. This was an attack targeted squarely upon me.

    For what purpose, though?

    I waited for my foe to make itself known, steeling myself against the potentially lethal threat surrounding me. Even if I wanted to release this barrier, the Sage needed time to analyze it. I could begin the process immediately, but with such a broad range to cover, Id need to wait a while. All I could do right now was wait for the enemy.

    This was really bad. For the first time, I thought I felt my heart tremble with anxiety. It wasnt an emotion I had experienced very often sinceing to this world.

    Bing a slime had changed the structure of my mind, yes, but the biggest reason for that was because the Great Sage could always predict results for me in advance. Whenever I thought about doing something, itd give me a general idea of how the n would work out. That was what allowed me to fearlessly confront powerful-looking monsters. They mightve looked strong, but the predictions, the odds, were already in my mind. On the other hand, if I knew for a fact that I couldnt beat a foe, that wasnt anything to strike anxiety in me. If I couldnt win, I could just run. And if I couldnt run, I could at least try for a parting shot before I got struck down.

    This time, though, I was dealing with an unknown. I had nothing to make a prediction onbut I knew the enemy was out for blood. I didnt know if I could win, and I couldnt escape. I had no idea about their numbers. It had to be several peopleunching this long-range barrier, but Sense Heat Source told me that only one was approaching.

    The magicules had seemed to disappear from within this barrier. Magic Sense wasnt working. If I was booted out of human form, I wouldnt even be able to see. Without that all-purpose vision, itd be that much harder to grasp the situation around me. From the moment I was caught in here, my chances of winning plummeted.

    But sealing away your foes abilities before the battle even begins Yeah, thats another way to fight, I guess. Get into range without being noticed, then deploy a barrier before the opponent can recognize it. The work of a professional, one well seasoned in monsterbat.

    If I had to guess, this barrier extended over at least a mile-long radius. It caught mepletely off guard. I had to marvel at how well nned it was.

    Time passed slowly

    Hello. I suppose this is the first time we met? Itll be good-bye before long, though.

    With that greeting, a woman appearedright in front of me, alone. And with enormous self-confidence.

    She was maybe twenty, maybe not quite there yet, and her frighteningly cold eyes contained the shine of a deep intelligence. The beauty to her countenance made the ice in her gaze even more striking. I didnt remember meeting her, but there was something familiar about the sight.

    Her shiny, beautiful ck hair was cut above the shoulders,bed down and back on the right side and flowing down the left, not quite hiding her eyes. On that almost-hidden left eye, there was a monocleperhaps just a fashion item, because she quickly removed it and put it in a pocket.

    Her clothing was chiefly whiteloose, easy to move in, and reminiscent of business attire. Her legs, visible underneath her short skirt, were long, thin, and covered in ck stockings. The rest of her was covered in a robe of pure white, like something a cleric would wear. There was a cross symbol on the front of her cor, indicating she held a high position in the Western Holy Church.

    This was a pdin, a Church-ordained guardian ofw and orderand a sworn enemy of all monsters.

    I suppose it is, yes. What is it that you want from me? My names Rimuru, but perhaps you have me confused with someone else?

    It was pointless, but I thought Id check anyway. She was obviously gunning for me. I doubted this was mistaken identity, but if it was, I definitely didnt want to get killed over it.

    You certainly are polite, for the lord of the monster nation. No, theres no mistake. Your town, you know Its a bother to us. So weve decided to crush it. Thats why we cant have you going home quite yet. Do you understand me?

    There was no evil sneer with these words. It was in, emotionless factjust not the kind I was too interested in epting. Plus, they knew I was running Tempest? What the heck?

    Why are you calling me a monster at all, much less a monster lord? Im just a regr adventurer, as you can see.

    Oh, ying dumb? Well, it wont work. We have an informant. I wont tell you who, but thats how we received word. We have eyes, you know, all over Englesia. Youd best keep your own eyes opentheres no telling who may be watching.

    An informant? I couldnt imagine who. I had an eye out for people tailing meany skill-based teleport, I executed with the utmost caution. I didnt get it, but I could tell that she was pretty sure about it. And about killing me.

    This is really bad.

    She was armed with nothing but the rapier dangling from her hip. There was no armor, but she seemed totally at ease. No one else was in the area, no indication that the person or persons who built the barrier would be swooping in to assist. They had this perfect trap for killing me, but it was only one of them? Or was that how strong this woman was?

    There was no time to think. If she was telling the truth, there was a force out there trying to destroy Tempest. If theyd already started attacking, I didnt have any time to sit here idly.

    Which nation was it? Or a demon lord? No, not one of those. The Western Holy Church would never associate with monsters. We were bordered by Dwargon, Farmus, Blumund, and Thalion. I could cut Dwargon and Blumund out of that, which left two countries. Thalion wouldnt make much sensethere wasnt a path built to there yet, so their armies would have to go through another country first. Soei wouldve spotted that right off.

    That made the Kingdom of Farmus my primary suspect. Assuming Farmus had an army raised, itd take at least two weeks to march to Tempest. Theyd need to find roads wide enough for their forces, which meant a long, circuitous route. Even if they advanced without rest, itd take ten days. However, this world had something called legion magic, which if used efficiently enough, could easily cut that time down.

    I couldnt assume anything, but there was no time to waver now.

    So I guess you wont believe me when I say you got the wrong guy.

    No. I already heard the monster lords name was Rimuru.

    Oh.

    Well, great. She knew me by name.

    So are you ready?

    No, I swiftly replied as the woman motioned to unsheathe her rapier, but could you at least tell me your name first?

    The stunning woman gave me a bemused look. Since when were monsters interested in names? It didnt matter to me, so I forgot to tell you. She smiled faintly. In that case: I am Hinata Sakaguchi, captain of the Chief Knights of the Holy Imperial Guard, the faithful servants of Luminus in the Holy Empire of Lubelius. I am d to make your acquaintance, although I fear it will be a very short one.

    Aha. So this is Hinata Sakaguchi.

    Hinata? I heard you were leader of the pdins, but youre running Lubeliss imperial guard, too?

    You were aware of that? Not that it pleases me to be known among monsters. But yes, I am the holder of both positions, although it is meaningless. I serve Luminus, not the mortal Holy Emperor.

    She then drew her rapier, a clear sign that the conversation was over. The grip was decorated with seven small jewels, its de a light shade of silver that was covered by the faint, rainbowlike glint of magical force.

    I had heard she was kind of an extreme rationalist when it came to reaching her goals, but if so, she was kind of botching the endgame. Going out to defeat her foe single-handed If she wanted to be sure about this, she shouldve brought enough manpower to make it a m dunk. I gotta hand it to her info-gathering skills, though, knowing all about the Jura-Tempest Federation and me.

    But I still didnt like this. Hinata was ready to go, but it kinda pained me to fight a former student of Shizus. Could we talk this out a little, maybe? I took out my own sword, readying it, but still gave that another shot.

    Wait a minute. Theres something Id like to tell you, and then something Id like to talk to you about.

    I care not for the words of monsters, she coldly replied as she jabbed at me with lightning-fast force. I could just barely keep up with it. If my nervous system werent directly connected to my brain, that wouldve broken skin. Sucks that they took Magic Sense from me.

    No, wait! Youre Japanese, arent you? Me too. Shizu asked me to

    Im a little surprised you dodged that. I suppose you really are the monster who killed my teacherbut revenge will be mine soon. And a monster being Japanese? Miss Shizu asking a favor of you? How ridiculous. Dont make meugh.

    Not too interested in believing me, then. Or really, in having any sort of conversation. But I had one more idea.

    I said this in our nativenguage. Hinatas got to believe me. But her voice sounded colder than ever.

    So you speak Japanese. Just as I thought you would. There is no need for any more of this act.

    Instead of believing me, she acted as if I just added more fuel to her anger. What did she mean Just as I thought you would?! Does whoever leaked word about me to Hinata know I was Japanese? Because only a handful of people did Or did she think I could speak Japanese because I imed to be from there? Or was she just told that I killed Shizu and inferred that I mustve known about other worlds and learned Japanese?!

    Thats not just blind guesswork. Thats morecalcted by

    You really want to go through with this? I asked. You, by yourself?

    Even if she was an otherworlder and pdin, I still had demon lordssbat strength. My skills were dulled, but theres no way I could lose to a human like Hinata. That, at least, was my thought.

    Oh, now you make meugh. You think you can win? Inside this barrier?

    She smiled a light, bewitching grin as she whispered the question. The next moment, a rainbow of colors shot out from the tip of her rapiera supersonic sh. The afterimages of the jewels looked like a rainbow. I took evasive action, but my body felt heavy and my physical skills weakened. Too slow to react, I took three or so hits from her shes.

    Whoa, really?! I started to worry as searing pain raced across my body.

    Pain? Dont I have Cancel Pain for that?

    Hmm Just three strikes? Maybe I underestimated you.

    She may have said it, but her expression indicated she was in total control. Perhaps this pause was another part of her n, because she kept striking, giving me not a single moment of rest. Holding my katana forward, I attempted to deflect the blows. But it was like she could slip right past it, letting her stabs and shes work their way toward my body.

    Driven by the instinctual realization something bad was happening, I reared back. That was the fourth strike. I felt like any more would be dangerous.

    Have you noticed the danger behind this skill? She gave me another quizzical look. There are some fools who confidently let themselves be struck, only to diepletely helpless. You have some intelligence, I see.

    Thanks for thepliment, but Id be a lot happier if youd be willing to hear out my whole story

    Understood. This arts-based skill is believed to be a direct attack on ones spiritual body, not the material one.

    So the Sage says its directly affecting my very spirit? No wonder it slipped right through my sword. There was no way to defend it at all, and theck of blood and sh wounds on my skin proved it.

    Plus, if what the Great Sage then told me was right, I would lose my life in three more strikes. My body wouldnt die; my spirit would. Unbelievable. I didnt know if this was a skill or some effect of that magic sword, but if anyone underestimated their foe here, it was me. I knew Hinata had to have a unique skill or two, but as of right now, she didnt even need to show them off to overwhelm me.

    Without knowing any of her skills, and with mine sealed away, I was at more of a disadvantage than I ever imagined. Trying to run wouldve been the correct answer here, although that was a gamble in itself.

    All my initiative was gone. I had been trying for a while, but Dark me and Dark Thunder still werent working. Neither was Universal Shapeshift, not without magicules to drive it. Simply maintaining my current body was enough of an ordeal, and with Hellre simrly offline, I had no ace in the hole to rely on.

    But I wasnt helpless.

    Hmm Trying to buy time, then? Dont bother. You are cornered. This Holy Field prevents monsters ranked below A from even taking action. It is the ultimate anti-monster barrierthe pride of the Western Holy Church.

    Not only did she see through my n; she dropped quite a bombshell. This Holy Field was affecting me, making my body weak and my spirit weaker. If it was slowing me down this much, itd probably kill any monster who didnt merit a C rank. My hobgoblins would hardly be able to move and would be ripe for being mown down. The realization upset me even more.

    Do you understand? All magicules inside this barrier have been purified. Even higher-level monsters like you find most of their energy taken up simply by continuing to exist. Yourtent powers have left you.

    I didnt need Hinata to spell it out. Experiencing this for myself, I could tell right off how dangerous a barrier this was. If I had to guess, it was crafted to hunt down monsters ranked A or higherthe so-called hazard ss. A sort of ultimate weapon for these monster-reviling Crusaders. Simply deploying it made conditions ripe for victoryand I was sure Hinata thought victory was hers. Now she was egging me on, trying to make me panic. Even trying to speak with her could be lethal by nowno way shed let me buy any time with conversation.

    I suppose you were unhappy I approached you solo, but normally, I wouldnt even need to show up for jobs like these. There is one reason, and one reason alone, why the captain of the pdin corps is personally handling this

    I kept my distance from Hinata. Trying to gauge that rapiers range was a dangerous gameand the moment I thought that, I felt a pain on my left leg. She got another strike in. Two left.

    and thats because I heard you killed Miss Shizu. I told you, I want revenge. Revenge, with your death, by my own hand.

    Revenge? I mean, all right, I did sort of kill her in a way, but that was

    In a way? It doesnt matter. The end result is the same. She was the only woman who showed me a shred of kindness in this world, and now shes gone I dont really understand this feeling myself

    Her voice fell to a whisper as she looked at me. Her eyes were emotionless; she saw me as unworthy of even being her prey. She just stood there, showing how little I troubled her.

    Hinata hade because she was absolutely confident she could kill me. That confidence didnt stem from the barrier. Was it from her own skill, which I still hadnt plumbed the depths of? Maybe Hinata alone was overkill, even. She was treating me like a total wimp, but I had nothing to counter with. Inside this barrier, my chances at victory were close to nil. If I didnt step up and do something, I was sure to lose.

    But who told this woman Shizu was dead? Someone had turned me into the viin of this story. But I couldnt worry about that. My heart went out to the residents of Tempest.

    You worry about your friends? Im sure you do. If you idle for too long here, you wont have any home to return to, will you? Not that I intend to let you.

    If they use a barrier like this to attack, well be wiped out. I had no time to waste dealing with this womanbut she was huge trouble. Major trouble, and the only skills I could count on were those that didnt rely on magicules. Either my sword moves or my own unique skills. Hinata had me beat with her rapier. Even without the damper on my physical abilities, I could tell from the moment we crossed des that she wasnt giving her full effort yet. It was hardly believable to me, but only Hakuro had this sheer, overpowering force.

    So that left unique skills. My secret ones. I hesitated to use them, but ah well. I used Battlewill to improve my physical skills,unching Steel Strength and Strengthen Body alongside it. Just as I thought, skills or magic that activated my own internal magicules were still avable to me.

    I think its a little early to start boasting about that!

    Holding my katana straight forward, I struck down hard with a renewed force. Through my training with Hakuro, I had gained some fairly decent sword skills for myself. If she had assumed this battle was already hers, then maybe this strike would

    Hinata, perhaps surprised by this, immediately took a defensive stance. Or maybe just cautious. And there were those eyes. Those freezing, mathematicians eyes, devoting themselves to pondering over some logical proof.

    There was no surprise there; no indication her guard was down. There was also no pride; just a dispassionate woman doing her work. She observed my movements, coldly searching for a weak spot. Her words were driven by the predictions she had calcted for herself. It mustve been obvious to her that she didnt need to be here.

    She hadnt underestimated me. She was still observing my movements, predicting how I would act next, calcting my increased speed, and replying with suitable speed of her own.

    It was like fighting against my own Great Sage

    The moment my powered-up katana strike was deflected by her rapier, it made me fully understand where this overwhelming difference in power came from. My sword strike, its edge traveling at nearly the speed of sound, was softly, lightly deflected, and it didnt damage her own de at all. She had perfectly read my katanas path, speed, and force. Only someone at Hakuros level could pull off a feat like that.

    Then, as I went off-bnce, she added a return blow of her own.

    Its over. Im impressed you can move that well inside this barrier. To be honest, I underestimated you. But you know, you cant beat me.

    Because itll take one more blow to kill me?

    Oh, you know that? This sword is infused with a special ability known as Dead End Rainbow. On the seventh strike, it is guaranteed to leave its opponent deadeven if they only exist in spiritual form. You put in a noble effort, but havent you had enough yet?

    I had thought I could manage something here, even without my skills. But my opponent was just too much. An opponent with no weak point, no pride, and who always used the best move possible to bring her to victory. With the ability to observe and analyze everything about me. Even though she was absolutely sure of victory, she never stopped analyzing.

    There was nothing I could do. I had nothing to take advantage of. I really didnt think victory would be so hopeless.

    No, I replied, Ill keep on struggling. Im not enough of a sucker to just lie back and die, thanks!

    So I tested out everything I could. Recognizing my opponent was above me, I reached out for anything I was capable of. If magicules werent around, how about spirit magic? That worked on a different type of energy; maybe the Holy Field wouldnt affect it. I couldnt summon elementals, not if Im separated from the outside world. But I did have a certain deviant spirit inside me.

    Report. Using the unique skill Deviant, the higher-level elemental Ifrit has been separated into a pure elemental.

    Ifrit, transformed into a half monster, returned to full spirit form.

    I could use him to harness elemental magic, but I doubted it would work. Besides, a little ruse like that wouldnt save me. I needed something huge, something thatd throw my opponent for a total loop.

    O Ifrit, greatest of elementals, defeat my enemy!!

    Then I released him.

    The force of the elemental, going far above A rank, was tremendous, containing a massive amount of heat force. Elementals had to run on the magical force of the summoner, but Ifrit and I had a channel of magic running between us, so that was no problem. My energy converted itself into elemental force, flowing freely into the spirit.

    Ifrit began attacking Hinata. She probably assumed this was myst trump card. ButIfrit was just a nt. My real aimmy winning movewas elsewhere.

    Fully preupied with fighting off Ifrit, Hinata could no longer fully focus upon me. I could be killed in a single stab. Ifrit was far greater of a threat, and he took priority. Exactly the situation I hoped to make.

    Leaping behind her back, I attempted tond an enhanced strike, as punishing as I could possibly make it. But as I did

    You can harness a high-level elemental while isted from the outside. I didnt expect that. But that still isnt enough topete against me.

    Whipping around, Hinata turned her sword toward me,pletely ignoring Ifrit. He stopped. Not being a monster, the Holy Field didnt bother him at and yet, reality could be cruel.

    Before my eyes, Ifrit was curled up into a ball, grabbing his headas if struggling under themand of two diametrically opposed orders.

    What did you do?

    Ill tell you, if youll tell me what you were just trying to do.

    As if. Thats one of thest cards in my hand.

    Come back, Ifrit!

    Upon my words, Ifrit disappeared back inside me. I immediatelyunched Analyze and Assess to figure out what happened.

    Understood. Ifrit appears to have fallen under the effects of Force Takeover. It is believed that the magic channel connecting you prevented the takeover from seeding.

    Force Takeover?! Does it let her seize other peoples skills, or?! Was that her unique skill? This otherworlder, Hinata Sakaguchi, was more of a monster than I had ever guessed

    Apparently, I had the wrong idea all along. My attention was focused on the barrier, the thing I assumed was her ace in the hole. I thought that was what made this battle so tough. But I was wrong. That was just a prop to distract my attention.

    Looking at Hinata, I saw an affectionate smile on her face. She was one scarydy, let me tell you. She mustve been totally sure of victory, barrier or not.

    Did you try to take Ifrit from me?

    Im shocked. How did you know that? But if you noticed it, I might as well tell youyoure right. I tried, using my Usurper unique skill.

    Usurper? You can use that to seize servant demons and spirits? Or skills themselves, even?! Sounds a lot like Glutton, then. Talk about the ultimate battle skill. And no wonder nations treated otherworlders as so special, just like Yuuki mentioned. If youre fighting an otherworlder, you have to assume theyve got some kind of unique on hand. The way they decide to use it serves as the key to the entire duel.

    If I had relied too much on my own force without realizing what my opponent was packing, the results would have absolutely been my fault. Now I saw why Hinata never took pride in herself, constantly observing and analyzing me. It was like a textbook model battle. I could see what the difference in fighting experience in this world had done for her.

    I couldnt say exactly how superior her unique skill was, but the difference in sheer power between its wielder and me was tantly obvious.

    I needed to resolve myself to this. If I wasnt prepared to die, Id never win. But one more strike, and I was dead. I thought I could use Ultraspeed Regeneration to heal most damagethat was a tactical error.

    Ifrit, my final weapon, was easily defeated. That just left one more thing to work with. I was hoping I could catch Hinata in a surprise attack, without killing her, but there was no hope for that now.

    I didnt know what unleashing this at full force would do. I might not even live long enough to see the results. But I had to do it.

    Hinata Shizu asked me to look after you, but I dont have time for that. I apologize, but I cant go easy on you anymore. Im gonna decide this with my next move.

    Hee-hee! Are you telling me you still havent given your all yet? Well, all right. Ill give you some of my all, too, so I hope youre ready. This blow is going to make the pain youve felt before seem like childs y.

    We exchanged nces. Then we went on the attack.

    Die! Dead End Rainbow!!

    Awaken, Glutton!!

    Understood. Order epted. Executing at once.

    Just as I gave the order, I felt my consciousness sink into darknessbefore losing it entirely, as if drifting off to sleep.

 Volume 5 - Prologue

    PROLOGUE

    THE DAY OF RUIN

    The demon lord Carillon gazed up at the sky, a tense look on his face. Far beyond, he could feel arge, concentrated ball of magical energy flying his way, its aura so powerful that its owner didnt even bother to conceal it.

    It had to be his fellow demon lord Milim. She was clearly ready forbat, and her target was this very country.

    Swooping in faster than the speed of sound, Milim stopped on a dime directly above Carillons castle. The deration that ensued was made at deafening volume. It generally unfolded like this:

    Ah-ha-haaa! I am Milim Nava, the demon lord! And as of this moment, I hereby dere all treaties and agreements made between myself and the other demon lords null and void. That includes any and all pacts made with the demon lord Carillon! Im also dering war on him, so how about we meet up again a week from now? Best of luck trying to figure out how to deal with me. Ahhhhh-ha-ha-haaa!!

    As both a demon lord and Beast Master of his realm, Carillon got a headache from simply this one-sided deration. What in the hell is that airheaded woman thinking?! he pondered. But he could stew over thister. For now, he needed to give out his marching orders.

    All warriors of the realm, assemble here at once!!

    Themand was carried out with all due haste. In another moment, the whole of the Beast Masters Warrior Allianceled by their erstwhile leaders, the Three Lycanthropeerswas assembled in the great za in front of the castle.

    My lord, stated the Golden Snakehorn Alvis, we are all present, save for Gruecith.

    Right. Carillon sagely nodded. That single moment was enough, apparently, for him topose his thoughts. In a weeks time, he gravely began as his army eagerly awaited his speech, that Milim wille to attack us. The impertinent fool has abandoned all agreements made with other demon lords, not even bothering to convene a Walpurgis to make it official. This means she has made enemies out of all ten of the other great demon lords who rule thends. It is simply beyondprehension. Milim always was one to work on impulse a little too quickly, but she can be both cunning and prudent in thought. I can only assume something has happened to drive her into action.

    No one in the audience doubted him. They could hear Milim well enough from back there. But it all seemed so unreal that many among them couldnt even guess how to respond.

    So, Alvis calmly said, how are the other demon lords reacting?

    Frey and yman arent believing a word of it, Carillon spat back. Valentines as unresponsive as always, and Ramiris is too busy bragging about her new guardian or whatnot to listen to a word I say. Mypatriot Guy couldnt care less, and I imagine the other three are simrly disinterested. Of course, if Milim and I really do engage in war, theyll certainly be forced to believe it then.

    It didnt sound like Carillon had many allies to rely on.

    Then war is the only option, General! bellowed Sufia, the Snowy Tigerw. And as for me, Ive already got a ticket for the front row!

    Phobio, the ck Leopard Fang and a man known to let his passion for battle get the best of him, rose. Sufia, he said, you can be so optimistic only because you know nothing about the demon lord Milims strengths. I cant state this more clearlyshe is on a different level from anyone else. The entire Warrior Alliance could take her on and be wiped out within seconds.

    His previous experience with Milim gave him due reason to be cautious, taking a more analytical approach to this threat. As far as he was concerned, any fight would mean a quick defeat for them.

    I am d to see you act more maturely, Phobio. You know of Milims power; I have no reason to doubt you. So who do you think is strongerMilim or myself?

    Phobio winced at Carillons fastball of a question. He took a moment topose himself, then looked his master in the eye.

    It is impossible for me, Lord Carillon, to estimate the full strengths of two demon lords. However, as rude as it may be to say, I can tell you that the demon lord Milim lives up to every syble of her alias, the Destroyer.

    He had avoided giving a direct answer, but Carillon could read between the lines well enough.

    Really, then! She is stronger than myself? He gave this a good bellyugh. Then perhaps this is the perfect opportunity to show all of you how powerful the Beast Master can truly be!

    This, as far as Carillon was concerned, could be a golden opportunity. And he was not trusting too much upon his own powers, either. He knew, with reasonable certainty, that Milim was likely stronger than he was. But

    You know, in the end, if I turn tail and flee from my foes simply because of their strength, would I honestly deserve to be called demon lord? Plus, you want me to give up the chance to fight one of the most legendary demon lords ever? Id never turn my back on that much excitement!

    Now his blood was pumping, his heart dancing in his rib cage. Milim was a pir of strength. One of the oldest demon lords and (despite her looks) someone who struck fear in the hearts of almost anyone with a pulse. And hed get to fight her. It was impossible not to be enthusiastic.

    His parents had told him, as a child, a fairy tale about a dragon princess who ruled as a tyrant over her kingdom. Perhaps it was about Milim; perhaps it was about someone else. But back then, his parents words to him were:

    Inspire the wrath of the dragon princess, and your nation shall fall to ruin! Do not engage in conflict with the dragon princess, at all costs!

    Carillon always thought they were being silly. The Beast Kingdom of Eurazania was one of the continental superpowers, boasting arge expanse of bountifulnd. They were a warlike people, and over half the poption could credibly call themselves warriors. Its military was easily the equal of any other demon lords domainand since Carillon became a demon lord, the ensuing several centuries had seen its power grow even further. There was nobody to fear. Carillon was sure of it. And gaining the chance to fully express his strength made his bloodlust burn white-hot inside him.

    But, as king of a nation, he remained coolheaded enough to give one more order.

    Milim will be entirely my quarry. Along those lines, if she brings an army with her, Imand you to engage them inbatbut if Milimes by herself, I want all of you to evacuate the country at once. You guys get caught in the cross fire between us, I guarantee itll be painful for you.

    B-but, my lord?!

    Allow me to join your side

    Lord Carillon, we must

    Silence!! Carillon shouted, cutting off the Three Lycanthropeersints. I am the only one of us who can prove a worthy opponent to Milim Nava! All of you must devote more attention to protecting our people. You are forbidden from joining the battle!

    On cue, Carillon unleashed the full extent of his aura, using it to cow every high-level demon into agreement. The sheer force was overwhelming enough that no one dared to object. Immediately, everyone there kneeled and expressed their allegiance.

    Trust me. I will win for us all!

    Raaaaaahhh!!

    The za was bathed in cheers. The demons and vassals all looked up to their master, roaring with excitement. It had taken precious little time for the nation to decide its direction. From this moment on, the Beast Kingdom plunged into full war mode.

    Once it was decided, the beasts began to work quickly. In short order, the evacuation of nobatants kicked off. It would proceed quickly enough to bepleted within a short weeks time.

    Say, Carillon reflected to his three closest generals, wouldnt it be a good idea to confer with that slime at a time like this?

    Meaning Sir Rimuru, sir? asked Alvis.

    Ah yes, that was the name. Tell him to stock up on that wonderful drink of his, because well be holding one hell of a victory celebration.

    Hee-hee-hee! I look forward to it, my lord. The citizens should be evacuated to the Forest of Jura, then?

    At once. I leave that in your capable hands, Alvis.

    With the order, tens of thousands of Eurazanian residents were on their way to Tempest, under the watchful leadership of Alvis. All who would remain in the country were Carillon, Sufia, Phobio, and twenty or so Warrior Alliance members serving them. The fateful battle with Milim wasing, but for now, they contented themselves with quietly sharpening their fangs.

    The day came. Carillon looked up at the sacred mountain that loomed behind his castle, confident in his power. Then he stood, ready to engage Milim.

    Today will be the day when I prove to the world that I am strongest!

    Fight on for us, Lord Carillon!

    Sufia nodded. Once we are sure Lady Milim is alone, we will retreat to safety as well.

    I dont dislike you, Milim. We couldve been good friends, I think. A pity.

    Carillon only barely whispered the words. Even in the best of conditions, it would have been difficult for anyone to hear. But they were wholly extinguished by the sound of Milims flight rippling across the battlefield.

    Slowly, Carillon engaged his flight magic. Just as Milim arrived, without a single word between them, the battle began.

    First, the preliminaries. His fists, filled with all his might, were enough to hold Milim back. But they failed to damage her, as if her body were simply refusing to take the blows. Her skin was protected by a Multyer Barrier, repelling all physical stimuli.

    With a light exhale, Carillon spread his aura forth, brimming with fighting spirit. As he did, he deployed a multyer attack of his own, gouging away with it. Each blow had a vast store of shing force as it struck at Milimand none of them was enough to ce even a single wound upon her. The spirit-infused blows simply knocked a fewyers off her barrier, failing to reach her actual body.

    Even with his ace in the holethe White Tiger-Blue Dragon halberd he wieldedMilims Temma Sword absorbed every blow. Despite her small, childlike frame, she had enough power to fully resist the untold extent of Carillons own might. This Temma Sword was an ominous de, a long, curved scimitar that suited her well and glowed a bluish-white. It was legendary, a sword that had felled many magic-born and demon lords in its time.

    Geh, shes drawn that sword?!

    With a click of the tongue, Carillon fell back, regaining his bnce. That single engagement was enough to make him revise his opinion of Milim. Hed had no intention ofughing her off before, but this was beyond all expectation. He hadnt gotten truly serious about the battle yet, but he still had no idea how deep Milims strength ran. He instinctively realized now that this was no time to leave anything off the table.

    Look, Milim Why are you doing this?

    The question was greeted with silence. Something was strange about this to him. She barely seemed there mentally, almost acting like someone else was controlling her.

    Heh. Let me guess: Has someone taken over your mind? If so, that is quite a pity. I wanted you to put your heart into this so that I could defeat you and prove I am the strongest!

    The silent treatment, eh? Could it really be, then? Carillon grinned. Well, it doesnt matter. Im going to win either way!

    The idea of the demon lord Milim having her brain taken over seemed like a sick joke to him. But she was acting weirdweird enough that he couldnt dismiss the idea as sheer fantasy. If that was the casethen whatever the cause of this extremely odd turn of events, Carillon knew there would be no negotiating with her. This was a fight to the death, pure and simple.

    So, without hesitationfirst as a magic-born, then as a demon lord, level by levelhe unleashed his force.

    As befitting his name of Beast Master, Carillon was a lion-type creature. The king of the beasts, leading all his own beasts. Beast Transform, the intrinsic skill that all his subjects possessed, was now more powerful than evertransformed within him into the unique skill Royal Beast.

    Such was the form that Carillon was in now, the king of all creatures both beastly and magical in nature. His head was the proud head of a lion, his body as hardy as an elephants. His arms were as strong as a bears but boasted simian dexterity. His legs were supple, as powerful as any in the feline familyand upon his back, he bore the wings of a great eagle.

    All these natural animal advantages melded with one another in the most beautiful of ways, covered in tough silvery fur. He was protected by Legend-ss equipmentthe best there was, obtainable only by evolving ones own Unique-ss weapons and armor over many years.

    On his head was a crown, a mighty bird decorating the edge. Around his waist, a jewel-encrusted belt bearing a ck tortoise of basalt. In his hand, the White Tiger-Blue Dragon halberd. All of these were infused with the magical power flowing from Carillons own body, letting them fully release their sheen and force.

    The power was overwhelming, iparable to before the transformation. This, beyond all doubt, was the demon lord Carillons true form.

    Milims eyes twinkled momentarily at the sightlong enough that it caught Carillons attention but short enough that he wondered if hed imagined it.

    Now, Milim, he intoned, dismissing the thought. I hate to say it, but since I have shown you this form, Im afraid Ill have to ask you to leave, all right? It is a pity, but farewell!

    There was no room for sentimentality on the battleground. The moment he shouted it, Carillon focused all the power coursing through his body upon his de. On the ground, the sheer weight of energy would be enough to rend the earth, pulverizing anything nearby. Even now, the remains of the aura filled the air like burned-out embers, hot enough to scorch the atmosphere itself.

    Prepare to disappear from this world forever! Beast Roar!!

    This was, in essence, a particle cannon that fired magical force. The tip of White Tiger-Blue Dragon was now gone, reverted to itsposite magical particles. It was the Beast Masters ultimate finisher move, one that could make everything in front of it vanish without a trace on the ground. Normally, its force did not begin to dissipate until around three hundred feet from theunch point. From there, it would gradually disperse before it reached its final point, one and a quarter miles away.

    It was a long-range move meant for handling hordes of foes, and now he was focusing its entire fury upon a single figure. It was the first time he had ever done anything of the sort with Beast Roar, but Carillon was absolutely positive nobody could possibly survive such a st. He gave it everythingno letting up, no thinking about what came next; it contained his full power.

    He could feel the magicule count drain from his body. Even flight might pose a challenge after this, but if it earned him the win, it was a fair price to pay. Normally, hed restrain it enough so he could fire off two or three sts without issue, but not against this foe. This was Milim Nava, the Destroyer.

    The attack was true, expanded to maximum range and powerful enough to cause damage to its own caster. No creature could ever survive thisthat was how sure Carillon was. He breathed a deep sigh as he attempted to descend to the earth

    then immediately went into evasive action as his animal instincts sniffed out a lethal threat right behind him. That snap decision saved Carillons life. Blood gushed out from a wound on his side, caused by the sword as it swished by. He closed the cut through sheer force of will.

    In a panic, he turned around. He knew there was no point confirm ing it, but his mind still couldnt believe it. His eyes were greeted by just the person he expected, floating there in midair, tinum-pink hair flowing in the wind as she spread her dragons wings wide. Now there was a bloodred horn jutting out from her forehead, which hadnt at all been there before. Her skimpy outfit, somewhere along the line, had transformed into a suit of ebony armor.

    Ahh Is that how you usually look in battle form?

    Carillon had just about exhausted his magical force. Despair began to paint over his previously indomitable will to fight. Youre kidding me! She took that without getting hurt? Give me a break It put him in an odd state of mind; he wanted to cry andugh simultaneously.

    Then, for the first time in the battle, Milim spoke.

    Ha-ha-ha! Not bad! I like it. Its been a while since my left hands gone numb like this. As thanks, Ill show you something Ive got saved up.

    The words sounded a bit t and unemotional to Carillons ears. But the impending danger they portended gave him no time to ponder over it. He didnt want to see it. He really didnt. At least none of his citizens was anywhere nearby. They were fully evacuated. There was no need to worry about the castle town.

    Carillon contemted fleeing the scene at full speed. His instincts, so trustworthy up to now, were telling him that staying here meant death.

    * * *

    Her draconic pupils burst wide, her wings fully extended, Milim shouted:

    Drago-Nova!!

    The st of light was thin, beautiful, reminiscent of the twinkling of stars. It rained down upon both the castle and the townscape that surrounded it, and remained soundless as it disappeared. The frequency it emitted reached beyond a humans auditory range, which, along with the apanying shock wave, was enough to fully destroy everything visible to the naked eye. Anything exposed to the light was helpless as it was ruthlessly disintegrated.

    It was the ultimate in magic, the strongest in existence, and it was one main reason why Milim had always stood at the peak of all the battles she had fought over her many years.

    Thats insane!!

    Carillon just barely managed to flee above Milim in time. The fact that Drago-Nova hadunched out in the direction she faced saved his life againbut the sight under him now made him lose all his words. The town, built of simple stone structures that integrated well with the localndscape, waspletely erased.

    This was Milim Nava, the Destroyer. A demon lord with whom you absolutely never engaged in conflict. Now Carillon had to admit it: His parents had been right. This was doomed. She was in too different a dimension.

    But

    But I wonder if theres

    You wonder if theres what? Id like to know.

    Carillon could feel a thin de touching the back of his neck. He sensed another woman there, flying in from behind. It was Frey the Sky Queen, the demon lord who held absolute rule over the heavenly skies. Now Carillon realized why Milim hadnt bothered to hide her overwhelming aura. It provided Frey all the cover she needed to make her approach undetected.

    Ngh, Frey Not you, too?!

    Not me what, exactly? Would you mind taking the time to exin?

    Frey moved her handand Carillons consciousness went dark.

    It was the worst day in the history of Eurazania, one that wouldter be referred to by the assorted lycanthropes who called it home as the Day of Ruin.

 Volume 5 - Ch 1

    CALMER DAYS

    Long before thenlong, long before the Day of Ruin unfoldedthe magic-born Mjurran was off to spy on Rimuru and his town once again. Her master, the demon lord yman, had given themand right after she finished a delivery of a certain magic item. Investigate these mystery magic-born, he said. Find any weaknesses we can exploit, and find me some intelligence we can utilize on the bargaining table.

    The report Mjurran gave him several months ago had been quite extensive. It covered the monster town yman was curious about, their level of cultural advancement, and the fact that Milim had apparently be friends with the enigmatic magic-born leading them. Said magic-born was a slime, as well as the masked figure yman had seen in previous reports. More important than that, however, was how the dryads, the overseers of matters across the Forest of Jura, had recognized this slime as the head of an alliance between them. They were now a kind of third power in the world, one neither human nor demon lordand that made them difficult to touch.

    yman didnt hide his astonishment at the news of Milims new friend. The fact that this weak-sounding slime was the real identity behind that masked magic-born was surprising in itself, but Milims behavior was unfathomable. Unthinkable. Beyond the realms of imagination. The thought of a demon lord befriending some random magic-born off the street was the height of recklessness. It did nothing but confuse him.

    Mjurran didnt mind this. She was a regr person, and she long ago concluded there was simply noprehending the thoughts of a demon lord. There were a couple of thingsokay, many things about that demon lords behavior that gave her pause, to be honest. But it wasnt her job to figure out what made them tick.

    So she just reported everything she saw to yman and gave him the unvarnished truth. He rewarded her with a broad smile. I see, he said. This could prove useful. A very fascinating story, indeed.

    It came as a relief to hear. Mjurran was d her master was pleased, but above that, she had provided him with her ace in the holea crystal ball, the most important magic item there was. The information it contained documented the entire battle between Charybdis and this mystery magic-born, as well as a quick sample of Milims own strengths. It was a priceless asset, one that ted yman.

    Not even this, however, was enough to make Mjurran a free woman. She needed to put in an even better performance or else yman would remain unsatisfied. She might not have been that useful to him, but she knew full well that yman was not the kind of man to let an upper-level magic-born go unchecked.

    But it was still a major achievement. One that sessfully earned her a decent amount of trust. And being granted a solo mission was perfectly suited to Mjurran, too. If she wanted to escape yman, any chance to prepare away from his prying eyes was perfect. And with the demon lords authority on her side, she had the ability to do what she wanted without checking in with him.

    Back at the monster town, Mjurran continued her surveince.

    During the demon lord Milims stay, she had not once engaged in magical conversation with yman. She hadnt used any magic at all in the regionin fact, shed snuck into the town while holding her breath and restraining her aura as much as possible. For much the same reason, yman had not contacted her. Mjurran couldnt have asked for much more.

    Milim was aware of his presence now. True, she had to be more careful than ever. Fully realizing it might already be for naught, she made every effort to stay alert during her duties. Perhaps thanks to that, nobody else had noticed her.

    After a while, Milim left the monster town. What could she be doing now, and where? That went beyond Mjurrans orders to observe the magic-born and his people. There was no need to worry about it. Now Mjurran figured she could rest a bit, as much as her continued alertness made her hesitate. She kept observing quietlyand to achieve this, she decided to take advantage of a group of humans who were now regr visitors to the town.

    It was now several months since Mjurran had given her report to the demon lord yman. She had been active that whole time, but yman had never contacted her. Shed given a report when Milim left town, but his only reply was to carry on with her mission.

    She could tell his interest in her was dwindling, and she decided some brash action was called for. She was here to gather intelligence, so she thought of ways she might be able to enter town. It was that group of humans who caught her eye first.

    Slowly, carefully, Mjurran gathered her information. It told her this was an armed group that engaged in business within the monster towna group that Rimuru, that mystery magic-born, was attempting to prop up as champions of mankind. Infiltrating this group would be the perfect approach, she thought. Itd let her enter town freely and with the perfect alibi.

    So she put together a n of action. As a former human, pretending to be non-magical was childs y for her. Right now, she was beholden to yman for everything, but if it meant her freedom, she was ready to do virtually anything. If something could be exploited, exploit the hell out of itsuch was her way of thinking. An approach that probably rubbed off on her from yman, as loath as she was to admit it.

    Before long, she was off to the Kingdom of Farmus, the reported destination of the human party. My, she said with a sigh, human towns have certainly advanced as ofte.

    Mjurran hadst been a human being several centuries ago. The only towns to speak of at the time were the capitals of kingdoms, where all the royalty lived. Beyond that, you had a few vigesrger than the norm, and that was it. There simply hadnt been a lot of humans aroundnot as many as now.

    She stayed out of sight by habit as she walked around town, in search of a certain locationthe local Free Guild branch, in this territory ruled by Nidol Migam, Earl of Migam. She found it just as the sun was about to dip under the horizon. Opening the door, she saw it was crawling with ruffians of all shapes and sizes. Thickly ented voices attempting to negotiate with the front-office brokers, voices yelling at one another in hopes of raising the sale price of their goods, happier voices bragging about the lofty achievements they scored today The din almost made her feel dizzy, but she tried to tune it out, not wanting to use her magic for it.

    Then Mjurran heard someone whistling at her. One of the ruffians, no doubt, sniffing out the fragrance she typically wore to mask the smell of blood.

    Hey, look! Shes a real beauty, eh?

    Now this is a find. Whats a lovelydy like you doin in a ce like this, huh?

    See this creature I bagged today? Im gonna sell it in a bit, so how bout you join me at the bar and well drink on the profits, eh?

    Ugh, what a pain , Mjurran thought as she wrinkled her nose. It was beyond her why she was such a target of attention around here. Thanks to living her life in seclusion, avoiding thepany of others and focusing solely on her magic research, she was wholly indifferent to her outside appearance. But between the green-tinged silver hair, the blue eyes, and the calm demeanor, the consensus was clear: This was one beautiful woman. A beautiful woman who had just stepped into a Guild branch office packed with people just barely on the right side of thew. In the evening hours, no less. The furor was only to be expected.

    So? How bout it, eh?

    Sorry, she bluntly stated, Ive got some business to do.

    Aw, dont be like that, the man countered. Juste here n join me for a bit!

    Lay off me, wont you? I told youIve got business.

    For a magic-born, Mjurran was more convivial with other people than most. But not even she was magnanimous enough to let a total stranger act like her best friend out of nowhere.

    Lay off? Hell, you just walk right in here n think youre better than all of us?

    Ahh, quit it, Isaak. You want the guild master to yell at ya again? This aint a tavern. Maybe shes got a job for the Guild, huh?

    Pfft. Yeah, yeah.

    The man called Isaak took a step back, his eyes still squarely upon Mjurran. She nodded her thanks to the man who had stopped him, then made a beeline for the service window.

    Id like to register, please.

    Registration? Will that be for a general-purpose member ount, then?

    No. As an adventurer. Umm Mjurran paused for a moment, thinking about which department to joinretrieval, exploration, or monster ying. Then she remembered how she used to make a regr habit of picking and preparing medicinal herbs. The retrieval department, please.

    Retrieval All right. Theres a test required, so are you ready to take it?

    I am. What do I have to do?

    Well, please fill this out for us first.

    Mjurran did so, offering all the information needed for the Guild to provide her identification papers. Then Isaak decided to try his luck again.

    Whoa, whoa, a woman filing to be an adventurer? Like, you arent by yourself,dy, are ya? I could help with the exam if you like.

    He was grinning the whole time, but the questions real purpose was more to intimidate the rest of the adventurers in the room than anything. Even if Mjurran decided to hire some bodyguards, itd be harder for anyone else to ept the invite now that Isaaks hat was in the ring. Doing so would instantly make Isaak your enemy, after all, and despite his attitude, Isaak had a pretty serious rep around this Guild.

    In terms of pure strength, he was on the lower end of the C rank, but that still put him near the top of the membership roll in this rural branch. Anyone with real talent for this line of work usually set up shop in therger cities, only traveling to the hintends if work demanded it. This, unfortunately, gave Isaak something of a mistaken impression of himself. He thought he was one of the big men around the vige, and that meant nobody was allowed to defy him.

    Oh, please. I dont feel like getting involved with these yokels. Should I just kill him, maybe?

    Ending his life here would cause serious problems, but killing him covertly wouldnt warn the others to stay away from her. Mjurran saw no merit in voluntarily bing a murder suspect. But what to do, then?

    Hmm. I think itd be faster if I showed off some of my skills to you. She turned back to the Guild agent, her voice calm andposed. HeyI changed my mind. Instead of retrieval, Ill join the monster-ying department. I can take that exam on-site, cant I?

    The agent nodded.

    A little whileter:

    Hee-hee! This heres the inn,dy!

    Isaak was scared so straight by the carnage Mjurran released thatwithout her askinghe became her underling.

    A few dayster, Mjurran was already part of the regr Guild crew, taking on work and living nearbyjust as she had nned it. Yohms team, the armed group she was targeting, would be here soon. She was waiting for them.

    Isaak, for his part, was proving to be a surprisingly devoted henchman, unwittingly helping her gather more intelligence. He was used to showing people around town, which helped Mjurran catch up on customers much more quickly than otherwise. He also happened to know a great deal about Yohm and his team, which was an unexpected bonus.

    Good thing I didnt kill him after all , she mused as Isaak came to her with some pressing news.

    Theyre here,dy!

    Now it was time to proceed with her n.

    The scheme Mjurran devised was fairly simple.

    She had asked Franz, master of the local Free Guild branch, to introduce her to Yohm. Her work performance over the past few days was already enough to make rumors about her skill spread far and wide. Franz himself was a catalyst for this, given that he served as Mjurrans test manager. At this point, nobody involved with the Guild was unfamiliar with her name any longer.

    I wish youd stay with this branch permanently, Franz even offered her. But that wasnt part of her ns. All she wanted were those ID papers.

    Im a pretty handy woman when ites to magic, you know, so if this man is a true champion of thend, I would love the opportunity to serve him. I hear Sir Yohm has few magic-users among his team.

    Ah, thats a pity to hear. Still, you in Yohms party would help us out enormously, if indirectly. Very well. Rest assured that I will give you a glowing rmendation.

    Things seemed pretty well set in motion, then. Or so Mjurran thought.

    Now she was holding her head in her hands.

    Why did it turn out like this?

    The introduction had gone well enough, at least.

    Huh? I already got a sorcerer and mysticist in Rommel and Jagi. What can some girl do for us beyond that? Im fine, thanks!

    This out-of-hand denial riled Mjurran.

    Hmm. In that case, let me show you what an angry wizard can do.

    And she did. She, in so many words, beat the crap out of Yohm. This got her on the team, and for some reason, they were treating her as the number-two of the crew, a military adviser with the power to guide their direction, second only to Yohm himself. This put her up there with Yohms aide-de-camp, Kazhil, and staff officer, Rommel.

    Ugh. I was hoping I could just pose as a shamaness and keep a lower profile in this group

    Maybe, Mjurran ruefully admitted to herself, she had a much shorter temper than she thought.

    The day taught Yohm a lesson he had almost forgotten: Never judge a book by its cover.

    They were in argely deserted wood outside town. The only witnesses were Franz, who had introduced this woman Mjurran to him, and Isaak, a local petty adventurer.

    Yohm sniffed at her. There was no way he could ever let a woman defeat him. A few of his men had joined his side, concerned and overprotective, but they were just silently watching for now.

    He saw no reason why he couldnt handle this fight by himself. After all, he was wearing the Exo-Armor Rimuru gave him, the best protection anyone could ask for. It brimmed with enough magic resistance to neutralize pretty much any threat he mighte across.

    Ha! I have nothing to worry about with conjurers like her. Just dash forward, close the distance, and cut her down!

    It was a tactic that served Yohm well. No magic-user had ever given him much of a headache up to now.

    I would like three of you to take me on at once, the woman called Mjurran dered. In fact, you can all descend upon me simultaneously.

    This offer immediately made Yohm lose his self-control.

    Dont give me that nonsense,dy! Rommel, Jagi, dont bother going easy on her. We got potions to spare anyway. Give er all youve got!

    They both prepared to follow his orderRommel less than enthusiastic about it all, Jagi cool as a cucumber.

    It was three-on-one when Franz gave the signal to begin. No sane witness could have imagined any possible scenario where theyd lose. The moment the signal came, Yohm was immediately bathed in strengthening magic from Rommel and support magic from Jagi, both enough to make him physically feel his muscles expand to their limits. Supremely confident, he rushed toward his targetand right into a pitfall trap.

    Ah?!

    Right in front of Mjurran, just as he nted a foot down tond a lethal blow upon her, that foot fell through the ground.

    Aspectual magic: Earth Lock, came the quiet voice as Yohm floundered. Normally, this magic was used to help the caster gain surer footingbut when used on a target trapped in a pit, it made the walls literally close in. Just as the battle started, Yohm was out of the contest.

    How on?!

    Ive never seen such simple magic used in such a devious way! marveled Rommel. One couldnt me him. Mjurran had used two magic spells, one to soften and muddy the ground enough to build a pitfall and a much simpler one to solidify it again. No matter how resistant to magic Yohms equipment was, it couldnt do much about the ground caving in on him. It was a breathtakingly straightforward tactic, one crafted with a clear understanding of how Yohm would strike.

    The two witnesses were stupefied but not enough to miss their enemys next few words.

    Ailment: Silence.

    ?!

    !!

    That was the finisher.

    What a pitiful show. Mjurran groaned. Neither of you prepared any defense against ailment magic? How are you going to handle magical opponents that way?

    She hadnt even needed three minutes to im victory. It all but forced Yohm to ept that she was a force to be reckoned with.

    They were all at the local tavern that night, holding a small celebration tomemorate Mjurrans induction into the group.

    Yahhh-ha-ha-ha-ha! Youre a strong woman, you are, Kazhil managed to work in between hisughter. Sure wasnt expecting the boss to get trounced like that!

    Ahhh, shut it, Kazhil. I just didnt think itd be so easy . Is that normally how magicians go at it, Jagi?

    Oh, no, boss, thats just crazy! Youll never find a wizard who wouldnt flinch at the sight of a skillful warriors sword thundering their way. You need to define a point to dig a hole at, too, so you gotta have enough courage to stand right by it to serve as the bait. I dont think either I or anyone else would try something like that.

    Hes right, Yohm. She mustve nned out that whole bait job in advance. I guess Mjurran was rightsooner orter, we wouldve met our doom in a sh of magic.

    The conclusion made Yohm realize all over again howcking their team was.

    Pfft. True enough. I can brag all day about how invincible I am, but it dont mean a thing without results. We took you on three against one, and we still lost; Ill admit that to ya. So, you know, Im sorry to bother you about this, but I hope you can teach us how to fend for ourselves against magic-wielding foes.

    Indeed, Rommel added, they never taught us how to fight like that at the magic academy. We did learn about taking advantage of the terrain in my legion-magic sses, but

    Well, I could help you a tad, perhaps?

    Oh, wonderful! Ive just got to broaden my knowledge a little. Better learn how to use my skills more effectively!

    Im in on this, too, yeah, said Jagi.

    Certainly, certainly. But just a little, all right?

    Yeah, Yohm interjected. Thanks a lot for puttin up with us.

    It felt a little shameless to him, asking Mjurran for help. But it nheless meant that she was part of the team nowa trusted adviser, no less.

    Mjurran was starting to suspect she was a bit of an easy mark. She had infiltrated Yohms team in order to more fully investigate the nation of monsters in the forest, which was fine, but now she was some kind of senior official among them.

    These people are so stupid. They dont suspect for a moment Im magic-born.

    She looked down on them for that, but there was still a faint smile on her lips. Interacting with these kinds of people for the first time in quite a while was oddly exhrating. She wanted this to continue, whether she consciously thought it or not; she wanted to enjoy this state of affairs for just a little while longer.

    Then, an innocent look on her face, she went back to her usual work.

    Once shed joined Yohms team, Mjurrans days suddenly became packed.

    She was responsible for giving tactical advice to the party, providing in-the-field guidance on working together to fend off monsters and magical attacks. She had inadvertently admitted to them that she was a wizard, but there was no point regretting that after the fact. She couldnt take back the words, so she resigned herself to their consequences, offering her teachings to Rommel, Jagi, and everyone else in the party at least somewhat familiar with magic.

    Tactical advice was enough of a workload; magic only added to it. Simple curses were easy enough to teach others about. She was a witch, so talking about the kinds of magic avable to humankind was childs y for her. Higher-level magic, on the other hand, was a far different story. Some of it could be conjured only by magic-born. Blithely imparting everything she knew could cause serious problems for herter.

    So what were humans capable of? Where did the boundary lie between what they could and couldnt handle, magic-wise? She needed to know that before anything.

    This is such a pain. Why did it turn out like this?

    She could whine about it all she wanted, but she knew full well that she had done this to herself.

    As military adviser, she had one other important role: casting the deciding vote on the partys actions. This was its own barrel of monkeys, one that required far more work than shed anticipated.

    Whenever regr reports came in via themunication crys tals installed in each vige, the teams main officers would congregate and work out their future direction. Mjurran was among them, but something about these meetingslikely theck of intelligence among the men, she guessedmade them drag on forever without any resolution. It sorely tried her patience. They passed out these incredibly valuable magic items to all these settlements, and now they were wasting time quibbling over the silliest things thanks to them? She spoke up about all this waste, and once again, she sealed her own fate with it.

    Now she was giving orders to each individual toon, making arrangements for them and reporting directly to Yohm about them. It was all her. She didnt understand why they were giving so much responsibility to someone brand-new to the squad, but given theck of other qualified candidates, it was like they had just been waiting to spring all this on someone like her.

    The only real decent-minded person among them was Rommel.

    Man, Mjurran, I dont know what we couldve done without you!

    Receiving such heartfelt thanks made it tough for Mjurran to disappoint him. Imagine , she thought, trusting a magic-born like me I cant believe what a pushover I am! But she never said it.

    He had apparently been hired right from the magic academy by the local earl, who had tapped him to serve as his personal conjurer. He had essentially no battle experience, making it hard for him to be decisive on many matters. Until Mjurran came along, every day was a long trial-and-error process for him.

    Rommel did seem to have a good head on his shoulders, though. She could practically feel him maturing as she taught him. For now, her main mission was to get Rommel up to snuff as quickly as possible so he could take her ce for a change.

    Once they decided on a n of action, the team had to carry it out. They went around the viges in their territory, in order of priority, and dispatched the monsters that appeared. It was her job to juggle the adventurers stationed in each area and keep the whole operation purring.

    Why do I even have to do this? This is ridiculous

    She thought she had a legitimateint, but as long as she had that mission to infiltrate the monsters country, she couldnt quit in a huff yet. The whole n was starting to seem like a failure, but she couldnt bail on it now.

    Through it all, days passed on as Mjurran firmed up her position on Yohms team. Defeating monsters, saving viges

    This is wrong. Its got to stop somewhere.

    But even as she whined to herself about it, she also felt oddly fulfilled. Dealing with people for the first time in ages, recalling emotions she thought shed forgotten about. And then, finally, mercifully, the group found the opportunity to head back to Tempest.

    The magic-born Gruecith was joining them as a guest in their battle training.

    Argh Boy, that old coot sure isnt letting up today, either!

    G-Gobta Is that demon, er, is Sir Hakuro like this every time?

    It astonished Gruecith, covered in welts and bruises from head to toe. Gobta, his hobgoblinpanion, didnt look much better.

    Oh, you bet he is. No joking!

    Gobta wouldnt dare say that in front of the teacher himself. Gruecith firmly agreed, but he bit his tongue so as not to sound ungrateful. It saved the day for him.

    Ohhh? By old coot, you wouldnt happen to be referring to me, would you?

    Gahhh!! M-Master, why are you?

    Silence, you insolent oaf! Itll inly be at least a hundred years before I let you call yourself a disciple of mine!

    Theyd both thought he was gone, but there he was,pletely concealing his presence until thest minute. His wooden practice sword swung down, faster than Gruecith could follow with his eyes, and smacked right against the crown of Gobtas head. He was out cold in an instant, eyeballs lolling around the backs of their sockets. Gruecith watched piteously as Hakuro then dragged him off, no doubt for yet more instruction. All he could do was pray for his friends safety.

    He was here in Tempest on orders from Phobio, one of the Three Lycanthropeers, to live in this nation and observe its people. Rimuru, its leader, was away from thend for the moment, but he had already given his full permission for Gruecith to be there. It was hard for him to believe the leader of Tempest was traveling the world solo, but none of his subjects had any objection to it, so he did not press for an exnation.

    Right now, his priorities were pointed more toward using this opportunity to gain as much knowledge and experience as he possibly could. Along those lines, he was joining in every training session Hakuro offered him. This was per the invitation of Yohm, the first human friend hed ever had; Gruecith hadnt expected it to be so grueling at the time, but this session was different. The training Hakuro gave when only native Tempestians were in attendance was like nothing he had seen from him before.

    This is incredible , he marveled. He was going easy up to now just so Yohm and the humans wouldnt be ripped apart!

    Yohms training involved a rundown of the basics with a bit of skill training mixed in, but the session they just wrapped up was almost all core foundational stuff. Dont expect me to teach any Arts to a bunch of weak-hearted sissies like you! Hakuro bellowed as he bashed his pupils to bits with his practice sword in battle (Gruecith included). Youll have to seize them from me by force! Watch with your eyes, and stake your very lives upon learning them yourselves!

    Gruecith was at least somewhat confident in his skills when hed joined in. Now, he wasnt. The results were clear as day. Hakuro closed the distance between them in an eyeblink, shing away faster than he could follow. Hence all the bruises on his body.

    I mightve died if that sword wasnt wooden And how could a wooden sword be so damaging to me, even?!

    He was a lycanthrope and therefore gifted with natural healing abilities, but dull pain radiated from everywhere he took a blow. It was some unknown-to-him Art, perhaps, that drilled into him and made the damage cut deeper.

    They had put it in different ways, but Gruecith and Gobta agreed: Hakuro was a demon beyond allprehension. Maybe he could have survived against him for a few moments longer than the other hobgoblins. Now, though, all confidence he had in his own strength was shot.

    Gruecith had taken an interest in the creatures who served under Gobta, the hobgoblins who rode the starwolvesthemselves a rare evolution to see. They were called goblin riders, and they were responsible for security around town. Hakuro trained them, focusing primarily on team-oriented strategy, and they functioned as a single cohesive unitwell honed, well practiced, and moving wlessly. If I had to tangle with them , he thought, five would likely be the most I could handle.

    He hoped to invite them to the Beast Kingdom someday, as impossible as he imagined that was. Judging by the residents around town, he knew there was almost no chance they would leave their posts.

    Thend of Tempest was filled with warriors whose hardiness went far beyond Grueciths imagination. He might have beenining about it the whole time, but Gobta, his partner in training, was keeping up with every step Hakuro the ogre mage took. That in itself made him formidable. And he was hardly alone. Rigur, head of the security patrol, was even stronger than Gobta. The dragonewts Gruecith asionally caught sight of seemed just as daunting to him. He had spotted several powered-up high orcs among the ones who served as Tempestsbat engineers. One among them, named Geld, even looked and acted every bit like a reincarnation of an orc lord. Taking that guy on, Gruecith gave himself a fifty-fifty chance. It was his battle to lose.

    Last but not least came the ogre mages. Approach one, and their strength was obvious. In his own mind, Gruecith figured he could defeat Kurobe the cksmith and Shuna, that fetching youngss. Beyond that, he had no confidence at all. The other four ogre mages, his instincts told him, he couldnt even scratch.

    Gruecith might have been on the low end of the Beast Masters Warrior Alliance totem pole, but even he could tell there was something unnatural about this. His instincts on that scorejudging by the thrashing Hakuro just gave himwere right.

    What in the hell? This entire town is sheer madness! I mean, they could even take on my homnd in battle, couldnt they?!

    He had to breathe a sigh of relief. His master, the demon lord Carillon, was absolutely right not to challenge Tempest to war.

    Yohms team returned to town a few dayster.

    Hey. Doing well?

    Gruecith smiled back at Yohm. I am. d to see you are, too. But what struck his interest the most was the beautiful woman among them. So, who is that?

    Oh? I didnt think magic-born like you cared about women.

    Dont be stupid! All magic-born arent the same, you know. Lycanthropes like us are closer to demi-humans than full-on magic-born. Its not umon for some of us to mate with humans and produce offspring, too.

    Really, now? Well, heres a word of advice for you: Dont you dare cross that woman. I did, and lemme tell ya, I paid dearly for it.

    What? Of all the ridiculous things to say!

    This threw Gruecith. Yohm the champion, defeated by a woman who couldnt look more out of ce on a battlefield? It was a difficult story to swallow.

    Would you like to try your luck, then?

    Ha! I like that! No point trying too hard for this one. Let me at her!

    Grueciths behavior was fairly easy to predict. A challenge like that , hed never turn down.

    So they traveled to the usual training ground, and Yohm brought with him the womanhis new military adviser, apparently.

    Why do I have to go through with this charade? she asked, looking seriously reluctant.

    Oh, its nothing big, Mjurran. I just want you to show this guy how strong you are.

    Yes, and I told you, I dont see why I have to.

    Theres a good reason for it! Hes already put you down. I hate it when people put my team down!

    Gruecith gave Yohm an exasperated look as he sized up the woman. Hmm. Mjurrans her name? She sure is a sight to see. But whys that bastard Yohm trying to trick me? There was a kind, gentle air about her. Strong wouldnt describe it at all. He couldnt believe the thought of her defeating Yohm.

    After a few more pleas to his cohort, Yohm atst turned toward Gruecith and smiled.

    Heh-heh! I finally convinced her. Gruecith, if you can beat thisdy, I promise Ill serve as yourckey forever. But if she beats youyoull have to be my gofer!

    What?! What kind of nonsense are you spouting now ?

    Oh, dont like your chances?

    You think so? Well, youre on. Youre gonna be the one calling me boss in a few moments!

    He epted the bait all too quickly.

    Listen, interrupted Mjurran, youre probably looking down on me because Im a woman, arent you? It feels ridiculous being the subject of a bet like this, but Ill be happy to spar with you. But let me warn you: Im a wizard, so I hope youll fight me appropriately!

    A wizard, eh? You sure you should be giving me so many details beforebat even begins? Of course, with that getup, its pretty easy to picture you as a conjurer.

    The term wizard referred to those adept in at least three different systems of magic. It implied talent in these dark arts far greater than your run-of-the-mill sorcerer or mysticist. The magic they wielded was as diverse as it was powerfulseveral times more so, it was said, than the attack magic of a typical conjurer. What Mjurran had just said, in effect, was that she was a well-seasoned, battle-tested magic expert.

    Gruecith got the hintand it made him respect her more. But he still didnt take any special precautions. A higher-level magic-born like him had intrinsic magic resistance, and as long as limbs werent flying off him, his Self-Regeneration skill could heal most wounds. Anything short of lethal magic could be safely ignored.

    Plus , he thought, if she can cast magic powerful enough to kill me in one stroke, shell need a vast amount of time to chant the spell. Conjurers like her leave themselves wide openI can just finish her off then.

    It was the exact same thought process Yohm had gone through back in the day. The results were simrly predictable.

    Baaahhh-ha-ha-ha-ha! Woudja look at that!

    Gruecith found himself bitterly looking upward as Yohm held his stomach andughed for a good long while.

    Damn it!! Hows this even happening?!

    His cheeks were red with embarrassment, not half because he was buried up to chest level in the ground. It took a lot to keep from crying.

    I know I probably should have begun with this, he told Mjurran a bitter, but my name is Gruecith. Perhaps it did not show very much earlier, but I am a lycanthrope and upper-level magic-born. And by that, I dont intend to suggest I could have won if I transformed, let me assure you.

    They exchanged a few pleasantries with each otherpleasantries filled with sarcasm and excuses, although it wouldve sounded innocent enough to the impartial observer.

    Well, you two keep gettin along, all right? So, Gruecith, about the promise earlier?

    Mm? Ah. Right. Yohm, from now on, I promise I will call you boss. The demon lord Carillon is the only master I will ever truly devote myself to, but I see no reason not to show respect to someone I view as above me.

    You sure about that? Cause I really meant it more as a joke to motivate you than anything

    Its fine; its fine. But if I may be honest, if Lord Carillon ordered me to kill you, I would not hesitate for a single moment. My apologies, but that is how the rules operate between us.

    Fair enough. Ill try to keep that in mind.

    At least Gruecith was honest as he lived up to his end of Yohms bet. He had to appreciate the lycanthropes devotion to his promises.

    In that case, Im going to join your band as well. Im pretty used to things around town by now, and Id like to see some other human nations while Im at it.

    You sure bout that?

    I am. Gruecithughed as he pulled himself out of the hole in the ground, grinning. My job here is to explore the world. Im allowed to do whatever I wish until ordered otherwise.

    But now someone was stealthily approaching them.

    It was none other than Gobta.

    Hee-hee-hee I saw them. If she can do that

    He was plotting and nning as he interrupted the pleasant atmosphere surrounding the group. I saw that battle just now! What a marvel! I am astounded . I simply fell in love with thatdys moves, I did! And thats why I hope I can ask a favor of her.

    He smiled eerily. Yohm and Gruecith both knew him well enough to grasp what this meant. He was scheming something again. Mjurran, on the other hand, raised a quizzical eyebrow at him.

    Ah, Mjurran, this is Gobta. Hesum, well, you could say hes a force all his own around here.

    Hee-hee-hee! No, Im really not.

    No, seriously, Gobta heres a real performer, volunteered Gruecith. He let that demon instructor beat the daylights out of him just now, but he alwayses back for more.

    Ooh yeah, that was rough earlier

    Gobta modestly turned away a bit before remembering what he was here for. His face stiffened.

    So, um, theres someone Id like you to defeat,dy, using that same tactic. That demonum, I mean, that old coot, um, I mean our sage instructor always goes around acting like hes king of the world, ysee? So

    Yohm and Gruecith nodded their recognition. Gobta lowered his voice, looking around in case anyone was eavesdropping.

    Ill help you with this, Mjurran. If we can beat him, thatll force him to treat us with some respect, at least. Besides, Id love to see how the guyd react to that.

    Indeed, Gruecith agreed, it is an excellent strategy. Even an ogre mage would be helpless!

    So Mjurran, outnumbered three to one, reluctantly agreed to the request. But can we make this thest time, please? she begged. Something that simple isnt guaranteed to work every time.

    Oh, itll be fine! The old mans a swordsman, fighting at close ranges. He prides himself on his speed. Hes got to fall for it!

    Yeah! He acts like hes sooo superior to us hobgoblins, so I wanna make him pay for it for a change!

    It was enough to trick even me, after all. A close-range battle, reliant on quick footwork like that, would be much harder if the trap was sprung in the right ce.

    That trick worked , Mjurran said to herself, because youre too simpleminded to spot it. It cant put up with that much heavy use.

    But, she pleaded, what pretext should I challenge him with?

    Hmm Any excuse should do, ventured Gobta. Just tell him you want more instruction on dealing with magic-castin foes.

    So this should be a scrimmage, then, not a real battle?

    Thats fine, isnt it? Itll just be one strike. Tell him whoever hits first wins, and Im sure hell be fine with it.

    Indeed, Yohm. Magic resistance ys no part in those rulend a spell upon him, and you win. If he touches you first, he wins. A test of speed, you could say.

    Um, do you really think Ill be willing to ept those rules? That puts conjurers at an enormous disadvantage. How can someone like thatpete in speed with a swordsman whos clearly faster than they are?

    Ooh yeah, Gobta admitted.

    epting restrictions on your own abilities when you dont know what your opponents capable of is like signing your own death certificate. Mjurran sighed.

    To her, serious-minded at heart, Gobtas poorly thought-out ideas were enough to give her a headache. Suggesting rules like that was all but advising her foe to expect a trap of some sort. All the men here were too boneheaded to pick up on that.

    All right, said Yohm. So Mjurran doesnt fight. We just want im to ept that youre good with magic, yknow? So since Gobta suggested this first, maybe we can use him as bait.

    A fine idea. He would certainly ept a challenge from the hobgoblin.

    Gobta began to dislike the direction this was going. H-hold on a second! he barked. Yohm and Gruecith were too busy working out the n to listen. Itd be hard to bow out at this point. Having Mjurran fight for him seemed like itd bear positive results, but if it was his neck on the line, that gave him pause.

    Oh no If I mess this up, Ill be in big trouble, wont I? I guess Ill have to help think up a more serious n

    All right, guys. I have an idea. First, I challenge him to battle. When I do, I want you to put pitfalls in a big circle around us!

    From that distance, a safer bet would be to liquefy the soil and keep him from moving.

    How will that work?

    Mjurran liquefied a small patch next to her to demonstrate the process to Gobta. He took a step, then marveled as his foot went right in with a ploop , resisting his efforts to pull it out.

    Ooh, this oughtta work!

    That was the end of their deliberations.

    Right, Mjurran said. So my role here is to wait for the battle-start signal and transform the earth. Is that it?

    Right you are! Gobta beamed.

    Now they just had to pull it off.

    So will I receive an exnation for this?

    Gobta, Yohm, and Gruecith had been made to kneel on the bare ground. Mjurran stepped up to join them, but Hakuro shooed her off with a wave and a grandfatherly smile. You are fine, he said. Im sure these fools before me instigated it, did they not?

    But I couldnt just

    Oh, think nothing of it. They got caught in your trap, so they reasoned that itd have to work on me as well, no? It was an impressive spell, but their eyes telegraphed it from the start.

    Mjurran sighed. Shed seen iting the whole time, too.

    After settling on their n, the group had called their teacher, the elder Hakuro. That much, at least, went well enough. One look at the man was enough to make Mjurran recall that he split a megalodon in half with a single swipe. Between his foreboding demeanor and the sheer sense of presence, she already predicted doom for this silly prank. Had this been a no-holds-barred battle, she would have immediately suggested a hasty retreatbut this was just a game, and she reasoned that being defeated would help her cohorts mature a bit.

    Its not going to work, Im sure, but it might be a good idea to see for myself how this Hakuro character fights.

    So she agreed to join in.

    Excellent! Hakuro bellowed when asked. Thats the spirit,ds! I will base it on real battle situations for the first time in a while. All three of you, take me on at once! And will the new woman be joining us? She seems to be a magic-user, yes?

    Whoa, you oldI mean, sage master! Dont count us out too early!

    Listen to the hobgoblin, sir. Ya sure you arent being a little too confident for your own good?

    Heh-heh-heh! As your guest, I thought it rude to horn in too much on the funbut after what you just said, I suppose Ill have to go all in, wont I?

    The sight of the entire triotching on to Hakuros goading made Mjurran modify a key part of her prediction. This was doomed even before the battle began. I have much to teach them after this

    Despite herining, she was used to being Yohms military adviserreally, anything adviser at this point. She was as strong and responsibly minded as ever, and she opted to just smile and treat this as a learning opportunity for her group.

    Once things began unfolding, the match turned out just as wretched as she predicted. Liquefying the ground around him did nothing to slow Hakuro down.

    Geh! Whys he moving like normal?!

    Mjurran hadid out her magic in a circle around the area, dispelling it just enough to create a path for the panicking Gobta to escape through. As she did, she defined a position for her pitfall and set it in ce. Hakuro acted like it wasnt there, as if running on thin air.

    Ahh, he must have noticed. But nothing would change if he didnt. That looks a lot like Instantmove to me.

    That was one of the more difficult skills in the arsenal of Battlewill, a set of Arts that only the most talented could ever hope to master. Seeing it unleashed so effortlessly made Mjurran fully aware of just how pointless her tricks were.

    Tch! Over here, old man!

    But Yohm pressed on, revealing his position with a shout as he shed at his foe. He was being read like a book. Gobta, to his credit, tried to tumble his way back to safety. He was rewarded with a wooden sword to the forehead.

    Not again He groaned as he sunk into the ground. Yohm joined him shortlynot to rescue him, exactly, but the real reason didnt matter much anymore. Hakuro was just too fast. Before Yohm could even stick the follow-through, Gobta was down and Hakuro was behind him.

    Whoa?! I didnt even see

    Fools.

    One striketer, Yohm was down.

    If the liquefaction trick didnt work, the original idea called for Yohm and Gobta to distract their foe while Gruecith snuck in a surprise attack. That proved a simr waste of time. Before Gruecith even realized what Yohm wanted him to do, Hakuro had defeated both his teammates.

    And, in the midst of all this, Mjurran looked on at this beautiful demonstration of athletic ability. It required Magic Sense; the naked eye couldnt keep up fast enough to let her understand what was going on. And she wasnt just looking. She had the spell cast in advance to keep her magic-born roots a secret.

    Still If youre going to challenge a foe who requires Magic Sense just to keep your eyes on him, the only thing thatd work is ranged magic covering a wider area. That wasnt avable here, so this was over before it began.

    Really, any magic that required casting time wouldnt do a thing against a target coursing at supersonic speed. For a wizard, tackling a foe like that would require racking several spells in advance, chanting them beforehand so they could be summoned with a deftly woven trigger during battle. That, or using Cast Cancel.

    But even if I used Cast Cancel on my own, itd only work up to midlevel magic. Any serious attempt might be doomed to fail

    Mjurrans body contained more of the magicules that provided energy for all her spells, but trying to outss him in strength seemed like a struggle to her. The sight of it all unfolding did make this nonsense seem worth it to her, though. Hakuro was targeting Gruecith, not the cautious Mjurran. Before neutralizing the magic-caster, he first wanted to defeat the biggest obstacle out of the group. In other words, Hakuro didnt consider her magic to be an impediment.

    A bit insulting, but so be it. Sir Hakuro could likely handle anything I could throw at him, here in my human form. I wish I could have hit him with something , though

    Following her pregame analysis, Mjurran had prepared three small explosive spells, meant to be triggered in a staggered arrangement. The first went off before Hakuros eyes as he struck down Gruecithnot a lethal bomb but a blindness strike that plunged the two of them into darkness.

    Ngh?!

    It was enough to produce a surprised grunt from Hakuro. But he pressed right on, unwavering. Gruecith had a keen enough sense of smell that blindness wouldnt affect him in battlethat was the whole backbone behind this nbut Hakuro didnt rely on that sense much, either.

    So much for that. Can he read peoples presences, or?

    Of course, Mjurran had guessed in advance that blindness wouldnt slow him. Without flinching, sheunched her second magic. This was a shbang, a spell that created a sh of light and a deafening noise to paralyze the targets sight and hearing. It was one of her antihuman spells, effective in or out of doors, and she expected the blindness bomb would only entuate the effect.

    And again, she was right. Just before the magic took effect, she saw Hakuro edge backward for a brief moment in his darkness. He was within point-nk range of the light and noise, but he paid it no attention at all as he sprang back into action.

    I knew it! I suppose Hakuro knows Magic Sense as well

    The reaction to that shbang was something shown only by those who could read the flow of magicthe movements of magicules. The st itself, too, had no impact on him whatsoever. Just like Mjurran, he based his decisions in battle off Magic Sense. That meant he could read all magic before it happened, and that meant Mjurran wouldve had to bust out the big guns immediately if she wanted to impact this fight at all.

    Ignoring her and tackling Gruecith first was an extremely sensible decision. She had focused on keeping him safe from status ailments rather than trying to cast magic directly herself, but Magic Sense made all that moot. The operation was upended at its very roots.

    If anything, it hurt Mjurrans ego, seeing her magic be so dismissively tossed aside like that. That was no fun , she thought. I was never too enthusiastic about this, but if he thinks he can pick on a wizard, let me show him what that costs!

    So she turned her eyes toward Gruecithand then she lost all interest.

    Arrrhhh! Mymy eyes; my ears!!

    What are you doing , you fool?!

    She could be excused for yelling at herrade. That shbang had been pointed in a single direction. It shouldnt have affected Gruecith that badly. The idiot must have stared right at it. She told them all beforehand what magic she intended to use. She could conclude only that Gruecith was the kind of lycanthrope who, if you told him not to do something, would immediately try that out first.

    Mjurran threw her arms up in surrender. This is just ridiculous. I thought the way lycanthropes are so stupidly straightforward with people would make them easy to use. But its the exact opposite, isnt it?

    If that did nothing to you, then we have lost. I doubt Gruecith will make any further contributions to our cause.

    Ho-ho-ho! You are quick to read the tides of battle, my gooddyat least, much more than this rotten trio. So you will not use your final spell?

    No. I doubt it would make any difference.

    The final spell was Sleep Mist, her trump card. Putting Hakuro fully to sleep was likely impossible, but if she could slow his thought process just a bit as he locked swords with Gruecith, that would provide just the chip in the armor into which to potentially drive the sword of victory. Even if it didnt, Mjurran figured the surprise factor would throw off his game.

    But the sight of Gruecith vaguely sort of floating atop the liquefied soil drained her will to continue. So she sighed and unraveled the spell.

    Their eyes telegraphed it from the start.

    Mjurran rolled her eyes when he said it just now. All the prep work shed done to ensure the magic could never be spotted, and Gobta and Gruecith had their eyes on the ground the whole time. There you go, then , she thought with a sigh. Its all but opening your mouth and telling him, Ohhh, hey, somethings here. Yohm was stout enough to resist the urge, at least, but hes only human. Nothing from him would work on Hakuro.

    Ho-ho-ho! You may be a fine strategist, mydy, but without a keen insight into your allies personalities, one can never hope for truly effective teamwork. No hastily put-together team could ever defeat me.

    Mjurran nodded at the condolences. Its been a lesson for me, yes. Id like to begin by examining them further in depth.

    Mm. Yes. A good idea. Hakuro nodded, then turned to his three kneeling opponents. So may I suggest you answer me now? Before I decide to switch des from wood to metal?

    The avuncr smile hed given Mjurran was a thing of the past. Now he was back in full demonic form.

    Pah!

    Whoa?!

    Waaaaaait!

    Three hourster, they were still there, legs numb from all the kneeling. Hakuro was making them stay until he was damn sure they wouldnt pull any more mrkey like that. Mjurran gave them a passing nce as she returned to her bedroom, promising herself that shed never join them on a n like this again.

    Now, I say this just in case, mind you, but promise me you wont try to test Sir Rimuru like that, please?

    Whatre you talking about? Gobta pleaded to the rather concerned-looking Hakuro. No way any of that would work on Sir Rimuru!

    Oh? Because, to be honest with you, I think it might have more than an outside chance of working

    Ha-ha-ha! Come on, Gramps. Dont you think youre worrying too much? Someone like Rimuru, hes not about to fall for a trick y!

    Hopefully not, Hakuro said. If he did, we would all be in trouble.

    His three pupils shuddered at the thought.

    Y-yeah We werent nning to, but definitely not now , no.

    Gobta said it. He and that other girl, too. The violent one.

    You mean Shion? Gobta asked. Or, wait, not Mili

    Whoa, stop right there, Gobta.

    The hobgoblin nodded at the panicked-looking Yohm. Gruecith failed to follow this conversation but understood well enough that he should stay out of it. A smart move, although he may not have realized it.

    All right, Hakuro gravely intoned. Soei is too prudent to fall for that, but Sir Rimuru and Sir Benimaru They have their quirks, shall we say? Sir Rimuru seems to be restraining his Magic Sense, too, to some extent.

    Whys he doing that, sir? asked Gobta.

    Who knows, Yohm replied, looking at him. I couldnt even guess how that Magic Sense stuff works.

    Well, interjected Gruecith, I certainly see why Lord Carillon epted Rimuru as an equal. cing limiters upon his own strengths like that A constant, never-ending cycle of training!

    Huh?!

    Wow, is that it? Boy, Sir Rimuru sure is great!

    Huh. Man, his mind works on a whole different ne from ours, eh?

    This, along with Hakuroster approval, led to a new fad around Tempest where monsters deliberately limited the release of their skills to better hone them. It had nothing to do with Rimuru, but if he were around, they hoped he would approve.

    All that slogging through liquefied soil and getting rapped soundly by swords had made the three of them very muddy. It wasnt long before they discussed entering the towns famous bathing facilities together.

    Boy, Gobta observed, thatdy sure knows how to use her magic. Shes pretty, too!

    Yeah, aint she? And shes got personality, too. It aint just looks.

    I have no argument with that. Her name is Mjurran, right? Itd be nice if she could give birth to my child

    Whoa there, Gruecith. Ya cant go talking like that. Shes one of my officers.

    What does that have to do with anything, Yohm? When ites to romance, Im free to do whatever I want. Firste, first served.

    Wow, really? Ill keep that in mind!

    Dont you start, Gobta!

    Gruecith snickered at the wailing Yohm. Maybe I should talk to her myself, hmm?

    Damn it, Gruecith, I go first! Im your boss!

    Are you crazy? I just told you: Romance is all about freedom!

    Yeah, Yohm!

    It was turning into quite a heated argument by the time they reached the bathhouse. The moment they washed off and settled into the hot bath, Gobtas eyes began to emit a sinister twinkle once more. I just remembered Kabal said something to me when he was herest, he began. They say there are some baths in the world with a mixed gender rule. He said Sir Rimuru told him about it And, you know, Sir Rimurus word isw, isnt it?

    Hang on, Gobta. If thats an order from Rimuru himself, then we gotta make sure its enforced, yeah?

    Uh-huh! I think so, too!

    What? Gobta, what do you speak of? Tell me more of thismixed genders.

    Hee-hee-hee! You like it, too, huh, Gruecith? Well, its like this

    He went over the topic in detail, growing more excited with every syble.

    So you meannot only Mjurran but Lady Shuna and Shion as well?

    You gotta be kiddin me, Gobta. I had no idea those were the rules around here!

    The pleasant sensation of the hot mountain-spring soak was putting the trios minds at great ease. It also raised their voices high, their schemes echoing around the chamber.

    Not all of it bounced back, however. Some of the sound waves wriggled their way right through the wand into the ears of Shuna and Shion, who had invited Mjurran to enjoy the womens bath with them.

    I wonder if we should develop a potion to banish the stupid from their minds?

    Do not worry, Lady Shuna. I will beat it out of them until they cry for mercy and their willpower is retempered!

    Ill be d to help, Mjurran added.

    Records, sadly, did not exist to say what happened to the men afterward.

    Mjurran, can we have a talk?

    Several weeks had passed, enough time for Mjurran to get fully used to life with Yohm and his crew, when her leader spoke to her.

    Certainly. What about?

    Not here , if you dont mind.

    Oh?

    That struck her as odd, but not queer enough to turn down his request. She followed Yohm out of town and toward a deserted patch of forest.

    Hmm? Uh-oh. Did he find out who I am? I dont sense any traps or ambushes up ahead

    The rest of Yohms team was still garrisoned in town; Mjurran knew all their exact positions. She didnt much like the look Yohm had exchanged with Gruecith when he called her to him, but it still seemed like her cover was safe.

    So what is it, then?

    She remained baffled right up to the entrance into Forest of Jurand.

    Have we walked enough, then? What is?

    Mjurran!

    The interruption made warning gs shoot up in her mind. No! Really?! So had he found out after all? Had he told anyone else yet? Or was Yohm the only one to ferret her out so far? Either way, she had toe up with urgent countermeasures before

    I love you! I swear: I fell in love with you the first time my eyes met yours!

    Her mind stopped.

    What?! What did he say?

    Huh?

    Assorted questions popped in and out of her mind, but that was the only response she could muster. Simply returning Yohms gaze took all her mental fortitude.

    Looking back, Mjurran had always felt a pair of eyes upon her. It was true ever since shed infiltrated his force. It belonged to Yohm, and when their eyes met, she found herself averting hers out of awkwardness several times. It made her a tad nervous, perhaps wondering why he was so watchful of her. But maybe her misgivings were really about something else entirely.

    Are you serious?

    Yes. I promise Ill make you a happy woman. I promise!

    The sheer frankness of the confession made Mjurrans cheeks flush. Thest time she was (chronologically) a young woman, it was a good seven centuries ago. Her memories of it were vague at best. No memories of anyone else back then. To her, romance was apletely novel experience. Unexplorednd.

    Anxiety won out over happiness in her head. That, and:

    Hell make me a happy woman? The demon lord ymans used Marite Heart to make me his personal puppet. If I cant get my real heart back, I can never be freeand theres no way to do that. And how could a human ever love me? They all die far too quickly

    So she opted to dy her response. The logical part of her brain told her to say no and get on with life, but somehow, she didnt quite have the courage for that. Four hundred years of life as a magic-born, and it was the first time she had ever felt so anxious about herself.

    Even after the confession, life went on as usual.

    Yohm was usually fairly shallow personality-wise, butperhaps out of respect for her feelingshe made no further advance upon Mjurran. The feeling was no doubt mutual. Whether circting around viges on monster hunts or rxing back at town, Yohm showed concern for her, but he never did anything to squeeze a reply out of her.

    I What should I even do? As long as yman lives and breathes, theres no way his dream could evere true

    Somewhere along the line, Mjurran began to have daydreams of herself more closely united with Yohm. The logical part of her brain denied it could ever be a possibility, but she just couldnt bring herself to abandon the thought. Her mind gradually began to open itself to it, enthralling her so deeply that she didnt even notice Gruecith staring at her, a troubled, lonely expression on his face.

    Life was goodand now, within a weeks time, it would be destroyed.

    It has been a while, Mjurran. Are you doing well?

    The magicalmuniqu from yman arrived out of the blue. It made her panic a bit.

    L-Lord yman! What motivates you to contact me?

    To her, yman was unworthy of her loyalty. If she could, shed murder him in his sleep. She didnt because it was so obvious to both parties that shed fail.

    Thest time shed reported back to him, yman had been in oddly high spirits. The same was true this time. Mjurrans instincts sounded the rm. It creeped her out. yman almost never showed emotion to his underlingsif he was so obviously enjoying himself now, things must be going exactly the way he wanted. It did not seem like good news to herand it wasnt.

    Thanks to the intel you provided me, yman told the cautious Mjurran, things are going quite well over here. Youve done a superb job. Why, Im even starting to think its time to return this heart in my hand and set you free.

    Mjurran paused, confused at the proposal. For just a moment, Yohms face appeared in her mind. She could feel her spirit leap with excitement, but she still managed to keep her voice calm. yman must never learn of her true feelings. He was a demon lord, a devious Marite Master perfectly willing to deceive his own servants.

    Thank you very much, sir. This sudden suggestion is quite a surprise to me. Does this mean you no longer require my services?

    Haaa-ha-ha-ha! Ah, you never change, Mjurran. There is hardly any need for such modesty. Why would I ever want to do away with such a talented pawn? I do hope youll still be able to serve a role for me, yes.

    I see. I am d to hear

    Mjurran, the demon lord quietly interjected before she could finish her wary answer. There is no need for rm. I simply want you to perform one final piece of work for me. You wont turn me down, will you? Im sure you arent ready to die yet, and Im sure you dont want to see the man you love die before your eyes!

    She could feel the blood drain from her head.

    II have no love for?!

    For any man, is it? You give me far too little credit, Mjurran. All you have to do is follow my orders, and everything will be fine. I showed you the sweet dream of release there; I wouldnt mind a little appreciation for that. Just sit tight until I provide your orders, if you could?

    Then he shut off the link.

    Mjurran, sadly, had nothing to counter with. No matter how unhappy it made her or anyone else, the only road to salvation was to serve him. The only thing that remained in her heart was the demon lords final words: When it is all over, I will release you. Your dream of living with the man you love may not be a dream before long.

    Was this a trap?

    No, it had to be one. But all Mjurran could do was trust in his words. If she ever doubted them, itd lead to potential tragedy for both Yohm and her. Far better for her to just do what yman said and hope for another passing whim in her favor.

    Just as it always was, the only option avable for Mjurran was to wait for her orders. But if it really did lead to her release

    Could I ever really ept him?

    She had to explore the thought, no matter how much she knew it was unforgivable.

    If this dream cane true, itll likely mean selling my soul to the devil.

    It was settled. Mjurran was resolute now. And then, as if nothing had just happened, she was back in action.

 Volume 5 - Ch 2

    PRELUDE TO CALAMITY

    King Edmaris of Farmus winced at the report he was just handed. He had reason to. His kingdoms situation had just faced dramatic changes for the worse.

    It all began when the seal ced on Veldora, the Storm Dragon, vanished from the Forest of Jura. It led to a flurry of requests for mary and military support from Earl Nidol Migam and the many other nobles with parcels of territory out in the hintends. It wasnt a problem the nation could afford to ignore. Edmaris had ordered measures to be taken at oncebut instead of providing what the nobility hoped for, he sought instead to further entrench his authority.

    I suggest that we couldy waste to the monsters only after they ravage one or two of our frontier provinces.

    That would certainly help prove the battle might of our Knight Corps, yes.

    Heh-heh-heh Sacrificing a few of those yappy little Free Guild men wont hurt our budget at all. You cant pay a creditor if he ceases to exist.

    Very true, very true. And what better stage could we set to boost your political strength, Your Highness?

    The losses had been factored into the equation, as it were.

    It was the job of a king to guarantee the safety of those who swore loyalty to him and followed his will in protecting their province. King Edmaris believed this. But there was no need to save the likes of Nidol Migam, some greedy knave more preupied with filling his own pockets than serving his people. Things had changed dramatically, yes, but Migam had failed to prepare for the future, and this was what he deserved for it.

    An act like this may temporarily hurt Farmuss reputation in othernds, but once their knights proved themselves inbat, it would be a wash. Instead of trying to keep the entire country safe, it was both cheaper and safer to attack only when attacked first. The outer provinces were a shield that protected the Farmus homnd. They were useful tools, easily receable if lost. And there was no need to risk ones neck trying to save a set of tools.

    Still

    To Farmuss central government, which had fully prepared for a monster attack, there was something of a disappointment. A single champion, Yohm, had disrupted the entire n. This man, rising up from themon people to form his own band, had gone so far as to defeat an orc lord and its entire forceso the rumors had it. And monster-based losses had been down from the usual rate so far this year. The king had no word about Veldoras disappearance causing the monsters to grow unrulierif anything, it seemed to be the opposite. That, as well, made the story of this new champion more believable.

    A champion? Ridiculous.

    Unbelievable. But the Free Guild said that an orc lord had appeared. Perhaps it is not entirely untrue.

    Indeed. They might not have been a full-fledged force yet, but a brand-new orc lord would have several hundred orc soldiers serving it, perhaps. That would still be enough of a threat to the bordends, but

    Ha! This is pointless. If thats all it is, I could wipe them out myself! And now this man goes around calling himself a champion

    The core of the governmentthe advisers King Edmaris put the weight of his trust uponhade to a conclusion.

    Well, if it means a threat has been eliminated, then very well. A pity it means our royal knights cant have their day in the sun, though.

    Folgen, head of the Knight Corps, looked less than happy with the chief royal sorcerer Razens statement. For now, though, the topic was settled. He could tell well enough that Razen was simply telling the truth. There was no need to sally into battle just for the fun of itan opinion King Edmaris seemed to ept.

    The next issue to tackle, however, wasnt one they could afford to watch and wait on. Their tax revenues were falling.

    Usually, figuring out the state of the national treasury required careful analysis over at least several years. Here, though, the downward trend was both looming and blindingly obvious over the previous fiscal cycle. Month after month, the figures spoke volumes. After a certain point in time, trade-based revenue simply fell through the floor.

    The Kingdom of Farmus, thanks to its geographical location, had a hand in almost every international exchange with the Dwarven Kingdom. It was part of why it served as the front gate, so to speak, for the Western Nations. They had the strength of direct trade with the kingdom; no need for dangerous sea ornd routes. The high taxes they levied on the goods they imported from there and sold elsewhere provided enormous profits for them.

    But then, one day, the number of adventurers passing into the nation started to dwindle. Previously, Farmus had been rather bustling with adventurers, all bringing a tidy amount of cash to purchase Dwargon-made weapons and armor. The potions Farmus could provide literally saved lives; adventurers could never have enough of them.

    After a while, though, the number of itinerant merchants fell alongside the adventurers. They were seeing simr crowds of them from the direction of Englesia still, but the flow from Blumund and other nations neighboring Jura provided far more profit to themwith theck of any otherpetition, Farmus was able to sell potions to these merchants at practically usurious prices. And now those people were gone. With all these foreign visitors suddenly disappearing, of course, it didnt take long for the inns and taverns that served them to suffer.

    The numbers were clear as day on paper within a month, so the economy minister hurriedly ordered his department to find the cause. The report that came back was enough to shock the entire cab.

    A new town has been established in the Forest of Juraa town inhabited by monsters.

    The news, provided by a spy sent into the forest, made King Edmaris whisper It cant be the moment heid eyes upon it. But he remainedposed. He was the ruler of a nation, and he needed to project his authority as king.

    I cannot believe itbut I must. The most important thing is: How will I connect this to our own profit?

    His outstanding intellect pointed itself toward the future.

    Before long, Edmaris ordered an emergency meeting among all the provincial lords of his kingdom.

    But, my lord, the merchants are keenly aware of their own self-interests. They are already traveling to thisnd of monsters, avoiding Farmus entirely.

    It is said the nation provides a safe route all the way to the Dwarven Kingdom

    I heard the same. They have these stations, I hearsmall guardhouses located every dozen miles or so, each with sentry monsters assigned to them

    It is a difficult tale to swallow, but several trustworthy merchants have confirmed it. If a traveler is attacked in the midst of their journey, they can apparentlyunch these res provided to them in town to signal the monsters. Help arrives in five minutes or less.

    What?!

    The ministers and nobility called to the conference seemed ready to leap right out of their chairs as they exchanged the stories. Wild, seemingly unbelievable tales flew out of their mouths. None of them could hide their shock.

    The Forest of Jura was teeming with monsters. Thanks to its vast size, only low-threat creatures lived in the bordends near human civilization. But that wasnt always the case. You saw the odd B-ranked (or above) monster from time to time. The very idea of building a town smack-dab in the middle of this chaosand even building links to it from Blumund to Dwargon? How much money, and how much military power, would that take? No one at the conference could begin to imagine. Even outside the forest, they had to expend a hefty chunk of tax revenue defending the border viges and towns. They were the nations shield, but every shield needed the asional upkeep.

    And monsters lived in this town? That was unheard of.

    The nation was apparently led by one calling itself the head of the Forest of Jura. It did not, however, call itself a demon lord; it even wanted to build friendly rtionships with human nations. A monster building a nation-state. It was crazy talk.

    King Edmaris raised a hand to silence the room, turning an eye toward one of his ministers.

    The nation, he said upon the kings order, is known as the Jura-Tempest Federation. The merchants refer to it simply as Tempest. It is led by Rimuru Tempest, a slime who has apparently

    A what ?! Are you kidding me?!

    The minister was cut off by a young man with dark hair and dark eyes who stormed up to his feet. Not a single minister or nobleman would dare to exhibit such rudeness before the kingbut this man lived in a realm where politeness didnt pay the bills. If anything, he was in a position to be forgiven for such outbursts.

    He was, in other words, a champion of Farmus. An otherworlder. Thus, nobody took offense at his outburstor, to be more exact, they didnt voice anyints if they did. Some of the more powerful nobles clearly looked down on him, but nobody needed the facts spelled out for them. Publicly revealing any enmity would put a dent in ones own profits.

    This was a human weapon, one of the people summoned by Farmuss triennial summon ceremonies and a man gifted in battle skills. His name was Shogo Taguchi, a twenty-year-old Japanese man.

    Enough, Shogo, chided Chief Sorcerer Razen. Hear out the report to the end.

    But a slime ? Thats the lowest of the low. How can some vermin like that be lord of the entire forest? Orwhat, is the forest that full of wimps? Are you guys training me day in, day out just to swat a bunch of pathetic little monsters?!

    As part of this training, Shogo had managed to seriously injure ten or so of Farmuss most elite knights just yesterday. Razen smiled bitterly as he recalled the events. This young man, Shogo, undoubtedly wielded tremendous powerbut his heart, his mind were too raw and immature to bear it. It had been three years since he was summoned at the age of seventeen, and in Razens eyes, his ferocity had risen by the day ever since. If he werent being subdued by the controlling magic ced upon him during the summon, hed be a bomb big enough to raze an entire nation. Lucky for Farmus, then, that the controlling magic was absolute in its force.

    I said, silence .

    Geh.

    Shogo returned to his seat, humbly following Razens trigger word. Anger still burned in his eyes, but Razen was too dignified in his role as head magician to pay it any heed.

    Sir Razen, a clear voice rang out, I feel Shogo does not mean any ill will. In our world, slimes are notorious for being about the easiest monster there is to killwell, it depends on the game, actually, but either way.

    Ah, Kyoya. If you are in attendance, please help us keep Shogo on his best behavior. We are sharing a room with His Highness. Do not ce further shame upon me!

    The man called Kyoya was another otherworlder summoned from Japan. His full name was Kyoya Tachibana, and he had been brought here after being summoned into a small nation a ways from Farmus. This made him the newest face among the kingdoms otherworlders, and now he shrugged in a show of allegiance and nced at Shogo. The other young man nodded, fell silent, and turned to hear the conversation. Razen, seeing this, asked the minister to continue.

    This town called Tempest was apparently home to arge number of monsters evolved from goblins, orcs, and so on.

    In the self-dered neutral Dwarven Kingdom, it wasnt umon to see creatures like hobgoblins, orcs, and kobolds, but that was the exception that proved the rule. An entire settlement of evolved monsters was something far beyond the realm ofmon sense for them all.

    asionally, every few years, youd see the leader of a pack or herd spontaneously evolve into a higher-level creature. Whenever one was found, they werergely hunted down at once before they grew any more powerful. In human eyes, the way Dwargon freely associated with such beasts was virtually heretical.

    Here, meanwhile, every townsperson was evolved. You likely wouldnt see anything simr in history, no matter how many centuries you turned back the clock. But there was no doubting their spys report.

    With that in mind, suppressing this upstart federation would be everyones likely first instinctbut it wouldnt be so easy this time. These were monsters with demi-human traits; they had ess to knowledge and technology, clearing out the forests, building highways, and even using humannguage to conduct business. That, and the rumors of that station system along the roadanother spy report. Each one was officially called a substation, manned with monsters who worked in shifts day and night.

    These substations, as the minister calmly exined, were positioned in relevant spots up and down the highway. They had served as temporary lodging for the crews who built the road before being repurposed for this roleand the monsters stationed inside were tasked with keeping travelers safe.

    Substations? Shogo sneered. What are these, cops?

    Shogo

    Yes, Razen. Silence. I get it.

    No. What are these cops you speak of?

    Huh? Um, you know, a cop?

    Kyoya snickered at the awkward exchange as he provided Razen a quick rundown of how policing worked on Earth.

    Hoh An organization of sentinels, each charged with their own parcel ofnd to patrol. I see. But how could a horde of monsters keep this going?

    Well, maybe theres an otherworlder like us with them. If he has the right abilities, maybe its really easy for this guy to make nice with the monsters.

    Huh? Who would go through all that trouble, I ask? If this hypothetical otherworlder was that powerful, he would have no problem surviving in this world alone. Why would he go through all the trouble of drawing attention to himself like this?

    Yeah, thats a good point.

    Shogo and Kyoya quickly lost interest in the topic, but Razen was still intent upon it, face grave as he thought.

    An otherworlder? Could that be a possibility? Yes, that does sound rather more convincing now

    He nodded back at King Edmaris, noticing the rulers eyes upon him. Having a potential otherworlder lurking in the shadows behind this problem nation was a concern, but he wanted to signal his leader that he didnt see it as a major hindrance to their n. Razen and his apprentices had summoned far more otherworlders than just Shogo and Kyoya. A possibility was just thata possibility, one they could weave into their n of action. No problems to speak of.

    Heh-heh , thought Razen as the minister continued. Even if they do have an otherworlder as a leader, they are nothingpared to Shogo, the greatest weapon in our arsenal

    Farmus was hosting fewer merchants, and that meant the countrys finances were looking grim. Once the minister finished exining that, he went to the main topic of this emergency meetingthe news that there was a new town in the Forest of Jura, one that adventurers were using as a base to gather monster-derived ingredients.

    This town offered potions for sale that were just as good as, if not better than, those manufactured by the dwarves, plus a cksmith at least capable of performing basic weapons and armor maintenance. Some merchants had even taken up permanent residence, no longer having to travel the world over to sell the items theyd harvested. No wonder the ce had be a ma for adventurers. As far from the forest as it was, there was no longer any reason for them to travel to Farmuss capital.

    And that wasnt the thorniest issue. The big he public reason why the king convened this meeting of nobilitywas the stable road link now established between the Dwarven Kingdom and thend of Blumund. A brand-new highway, one patrolled by demi-human monsters who guaranteed its safety as a trade route. It meant that most merchants could now travel directly to Dwargon without having to circle through Farmus.

    This they could not afford to ignore. If they let it slide, it could grow into a life-or-death issue for the kingdom. Farmus, after all, had no real manufacturing specialties to speak of. It had no resources under the ground to mine. Having the Dwarven Kingdom next door meant its own industry was still pretty low-level. It grew enough crops to keep its own people from starving, but that wouldnt be enough.

    The whole economy was dependent on the twin supports of tourism and trade. Without those, what could possibly refill the states tax coffers?

    The minister saluted King Edmaris as he wrapped up his report. The king nodded back, surveyed the nobility assembled before him, and asked a question.

    Well. What now, then?

    There was nobody to answer him.

    The same report the king had seen was distributed among the nobility and ministers in the room, outlining the details behind the justpleted briefing. Everyone gathered was a high-level noble official, deeply involved with running the country and extremely well-heeled. People deep in the core of the central government. People who knew what was at stake if their homnd lost itspetitive edge and tax revenue.

    They had no answer for the king, but their thoughts were the same. If anyone dared to speak their mind, though, they might be forced to take responsibility for it all. None was brave enough to risk that.

    Themon thought: Attack this town and burn it to the ground.

    Farmus was a vast nation. With the resources it had at hand, it could send a maximum of a hundred thousand soldiers into service. But they were dealing with evolved monsters. Regr infantry would be useless. Well-trained knights or experienced mercenaries would need to be deployed. Unlike battles between fellow human nations, this was an annihtion missionkill or be killed. It was no ce for amateurs. Itd just boost the body count and drag down the rest of their forces.

    So how many of these hundred thousand soldiers were actually useful inbat like this?

    First, there were the five thousand members of the Farmus Royal Knight Corps, the all-powerful army led by Folgen, its captain. Serving the king directly, it was a pack of elites, allowed to move freely under the kings orders. Each one of them rated a B in battle, and they boasted a reputation as the most powerful fighters among the Western Nations.

    Next, there was the Farmus Sorcerer Alliance, a thousand-strong group of royal magic academy graduates led by Razen. Each one of them was an expert in magic, handpicked for their unique gifts in battle-oriented spells.

    After that came the Farmus Noble Knight Federation, an elite corps of five thousandposed of specially selected soldiers (including some of the younger nobles) who served the upper levels of nobility directly. They were a force to be reckoned with, even if they were primarily career soldiers with only sparse experience in actualbat.

    Finally, there were the six thousand members of the Farmus Mercenary Brigades. This group was normally charged with keeping the peace inside and outside Farmus with a bare minimum of members, but they could be conscripted for emergencies and have their full strength taken advantage of. Their ranks contained a wealth of ambitious young men and women eager to prove themselves in battle and earn a spot in the ordained knight rolls.

    These 17,000 fighters were the standing force for the Kingdom of Farmus, ready to roll out at a moments notice. It struck quite a presence, more than enough to dominate over any nearby nation.

    But the reports said the monster nation had at least ten thousand inhabitants. If they were all in fact evolved, it likely meant they were a C-ranked force or more, and it wouldnt be amiss to expect some of them to reach B as well. Even if Farmus was still assured victory, they would have to pay in blood for itperhaps even the blood of the royal knights and sorcerers, the nations greatest treasures. Any casualties in their ranks would no doubt lead to questions and usationster on. Farmus had spent a fortune cultivating these forces; wasting them in needlessbat was out of the question, and because were afraid of losing our tax base wouldnt be enough of an excuse to mollify the nobles.

    Given that the mercenary brigades alone were unlikely to bring them victory, it was a must that Farmus devote all its forces to the effort. Everybody in the room came to that conclusion in an instant. If any one of them suggested war, however, they might be the one left holding the bag for maintaining all those armiesand any losses incurred along the way.

    And how were they going to exin this to the Western Nations? Especially Blumund, which reportedly already had rtions with this monsternd? Theyd put up a strong resistance, no doubt. Everyone in the diplomatic ranks was too conscious of that thought, and of the future, to dare speak without good reason.

    Nobody wanted to lose ess to their own interests, but nobody wanted to lose money, either. They didnt, but doing nothing would lead to unavoidable lossesit may even tip the nation over the brink, if it was weakened enough. Every one of them thought the same thing: We have to do something. If only someone could get the ball rolling for us

    They needed diplomacy to silence their neighbors. Power to make victory in war an assured result. And, more important than anything, a n for the adventurers living in the monster town. Farmus had to make sure they wouldnt be hostileor convince them to join Farmuss side, even.

    All these problems at hand and no profit to be made from it. Keeping the Forest of Juras status quo was difficult enough. If they attacked and destroyed an entire nation of monsters, they couldnt even im thend for their own provinces. No wonder they were facing a severeck of volunteers.

    King Edmaris knew precisely what all his nobles were thinking. He had the exact same thoughts. The difference was, he was already taking countermeasures.

    The moment he heard the briefing, he already had his closest aides on hand, working out how to react. They discussed how to make the most profit from this. The crux of the issue was how to handle it without affecting the national interest.

    If we leave the monster nation to its own devices, Razen conjectured, its presence will be known to the Western Nations. Once it does, itll be impossible to make any move against it. If we strike, we must strike now.

    Ha! Monsters? Knight Captain Folgen half spat out before realizing he was in the kings presence and immediately regretting it. Certainly, he continued in a more disaffected voice, evolved monsters are a handful. The knowledge a demi-human has certainly makes one a formidable enemy. They are showing at least rudimentary levels of organization, and they number over ten thousand. In terms of the threat, we could charitably call them cmity-level and even boost them up to a disaster, depending. If the leader of such a monster group was hostile toward mankindit could even mark the birth of a new demon lord.

    What? the king shouted. If it is really disaster-level, the mere idea of handling this alone is ridiculous!

    Nobody could answer him. Razen merely nodded his apparent agreement with Folgen.

    Do not worry, sire.

    This was Reyhiem speaking, the most powerful religious figure in Farmus. As an archbishop sent by the Western Holy Church, he was (on paper, at least) on an equal position of power as the king himself, given Farmuss adoption of Luminism as its state religion. That was just a formality, however; in reality, Reyhiem was more of a trusted right-hand man, taking his cues from the king.

    Ah, Reyhiem. Do you have a proposal?

    The bishop shed a smile that seemed a little too sinister for a member of the clergy. I do, I do, of course. Regarding thisnd of monsters, our Church has already identified it as a very dangerous presence. I was contacted earlier by Cardinal Nicus Speltus, and he told me we n to smite this nation, as it poses a clear threat to the heavens above. However, we have almostpletely failed to damage them so far, and weve even encountered traitors among the human nations Our Church wants to avoid making the Council our enemy, as he said, and he told me to keep my ears open for any nation willing to offer us assistance.

    He did! So the Church has already certified them as an enemy of the gods But they seek the help of other nations?

    King Edmariss eyes sparkled. Cardinal Nicus Speltus was a close confidant of the pope, the supreme leader of the Holy Empire of Lubelius, the man at the de facto seat of power across all the Western Nations. He was also Bishop Reyhiems direct superior, and he was an arrogant, coldhearted man, one asionally appraised as a devil under the sages mask. He was a sharp-witted figure, ever ready to take action, enough so to give even King Edmaris pauseand this man had made his decision. Which meant the woman serving him was ready to move. It made the king smile a sincere smile.

    Ifand this is just a hypotheticalbut if citizens of Farmus were toe to harm in this monster nation, what would happen then?

    The Western Holy Church would take full responsibility to provide rescue to its followers, I imagine.

    Ah. Well, well! We are ever the devout followers of the faith, after all.

    You are; you are. Very true.

    The king and the bishop shared a smile.

    If so, interrupted Folgen, I promise we would be delighted to march forward and smite these monsters. I believe the Royal Knight Corps would be enough to annihte this nation, but I would like to be thoroughly careful. Archbishop, will the Church be able to provide further resources to us?

    Reyhiem, apparently expecting this question, deepened his smile. We can, Sir Folgen. I understand your concern. Cardinal Nicus has already provided his approval to deploy the Temple Knights.

    The Temple Knights was a catchall term for Church-affiliated fighters sent off from its central temple to other nations. Said to number in the tens of thousands, they offered the manpower to back up the immense influence the Church had in the area, the most gifted among them forming the Crusader groups and calling themselves pdins. Farmuss own Church sites had Temple Knights stationed in them, about three thousand strongthergest number stationed in any nearby nation.

    Even as an archbishop, Reyhiem didnt have the authority to issue orders to them. Now, though, Cardinal Nicus was ready to give themand. They could all be sent into battle in the forest without a single probleming up.

    You have permission to use the Temple Knights? Folgen nodded, satisfied. The Holy Church must be quite serious about this, indeed.

    The king joined him in smiling as he pondered this. Judging by how the Western Holy Church sees all monsters as themon enemy of mankind, theres no way they would ever allow this nation to exist. Still, without a just enough cause to stir mens minds with, they would have trouble filling their armies. And thats precisely why they want to use us, eh? Heh-heh-heh-heh Well, the same works vice versa, you know

    If both sides were of the same mind, it would be easiest for them to simply join hands in battle. Such was King Edmariss conclusion.

    I would suggest, Reyhiem said to sum up, that we take up the advance force at the same time as when the Western Holy Church deres the war to begin. You will enjoy the full glory of serving as the sword of mankind!

    The king was in agreement. Whether it was diplomacy or war power, there was nothing to fear with the Holy Church backing you up.

    That left just one problem:

    Now, what bait can we prepare for the nobles to pounce upon?

    They needed to make the noble ranks cough up their soldiers, and they needed something to reward the mercenaries with. A worthy cause and some lofty speeches wouldnt sway them. It could even antagonize them.

    I imagine glory alone wont move them, a scowling Razen intoned. If we put the Royal Knight Corps, the Sorcerer Alliance, and the Temple Knights within Farmus together, thats nine thousand troops. That should be enough to assure victory, but

    With the exception of Reyhiem, everyone in this huddle wanted their approach to be foolproof. But it was Reyhiem who broke their silence once more.

    Oh yes, yes, he said with a smile. Cardinal Nicus mentioned that in his message as well. As he put it: Monsters are not people. Therefore, the Church has no interest in theirnds. Do as you will with them.

    Monsters arent people? Isnt that obvious? King Edmaris had to keep himself from asking out loud. Once they destroyed the monster nation, itd be a waste of effort if they couldnt manage theirnd afterward. An extremely unattractive proposal. But could they manage it?

    Perhaps if they blessed thend and then received the Churchs permission to rule over it? The king had no qualms about ruling over monstersmonster ves and the like werent rare sights. If they were willing to negotiate with and submit to them, he could guarantee them protection under the name of Farmusassuming they converted and became servants of Luminus. If not, theyd raze thend, enve the surviving monsters, and annex the entire territory.

    There might be certain issues with this if Farmus was dealing with demi-humans like dwarves. Simple evolved monsters, though? Those werent people. They could even use magic to enve them without a second thought.

    I see. Cardinal Nicus is a broad-minded man indeed, reading that far ahead in time

    He is; he is! And he wishes for nothing more than the continued prosperity of your kingdom, sir.

    King Edmaris gave this a firm nod. Farmus would gain new territory, along with all the natural resources the Forest of Jura had to offer. No one wouldin if he left the regions defense to them. The Council had already recognized monster ves as perfectly legal.

    Best of all, this would earn Farmus new trade routesroutes thatd let them leapfrog right over Blumund and continue their previous lucrative rtions with the Dwarven Kingdom. Charging tolls for the highways already built in the forest could even lead to bigger earnings. Giving the nobility shes of such potential fortune should be enough to make all of them sign on for battle.

    And thenId love to procure and enve that monster nations engineers for us

    With all apparent problems solved, it was time to see what else was on the table. King Edmaris recalled a certain item that had charmed him not long agoa bolt of silken cloth. It had been obtained from that monster nation, they said, and it felt more pleasant against the fingers than any fabric he had seen before. Magical fibers and cloth seemed like mere ythingspared to this. Upon further analysis, it was found to be intricately woven with fiber obtained from hellmoth cocoons. Hellmoths were B-ranked dangers, and the idea of using their cocoons was seen as beyond foolhardy But just look at what you could make from them!

    He simply had to learn how this was made then position it as one of Farmuss showcase exports. This wasnt the only wonder product from the monsters, eitherothers were circting, ording to the report. He had already ordered his government to procure as many examples as possiblebut why even make that effort? Just exorcise the evil from the monsternds, and it was all there for the taking. It couldnt be simpler.

    King Edmaris found himself struggling to maintain hisposure at the thought of all these untold riches. It made him want to burst into a childlike smile. If he had the Western Holy Churchs backing, this battle was now a holy war , one with him as leader andmander. The honor that victory would earn him suddenly took on an even more important meaning. Itd firmly establish him in the world scene, and itd firmly put even the upper nobles in their ce.

    He needed tomand this holy war, he thoughtand once it was over, hed be able to bask in the reputation of being King of Champions. Folgen, the champion whod defeated a disaster. Razen, the sage whod assisted him. Theyd all have their glory. And with Cardinal Nicus looking on, Reyhiem could even get on the fast track to the next cardinalship.

    Everyone had much to gain from this battle. And while the Western Holy Church would take their alms in return, it was a small price to pay for all the fortunes theyd be amassing. Andheny of the nobles who excelled in battle could be granted monsternds as tribute. The king wanted their industry and their technology; thend didnt really matter to him. As long as he retained the right to charge tariffs and tolls, he didnt mind sharing the leftovers a little. Compared to the small ransom he paid to defend the frontiernds, itd be a huge money saver.

    In short, King Edmaris wanted exclusive control over all his nations riches. So he needed to create a situation where the nobility would have no room toin if they didnt step up.

    This entire emergency meeting was a charade to make that happen. A charade to make them all convinced the king thought, Well, if nobodys going to volunteer, then I suppose it is my duty as leader to .

    The king looked around the room one more time, making sure none of the higher nobles or ministers was about to open their mouth. Now he had the atmosphere he wanted. The king would have toe out himself. The time hade.

    I was hoping I could ask all of you, but perhaps it is too heavy a burden to bear

    King Edmaris attempted to continue. Before he could, a single nobleman raised his hand.

    My lord, if I may dare to interrupt you! This monster nation, Tempest, has reportedly already made ties with the nations of Dwargon and Blumund. They have begun engaging in trade with adventurers. I thus wonder about the wisdom of making any rash moves

    Indeed, said another. And this talk of developing their own technology, with the full assistance of dwarven smiths If we raised an army, who can say what sort of meddling our neighbor kingdoms would engage in?

    This was, in turn, the Marquis of Mullerhimself a leader of one of therger nobility factionsand Count Hellman, who generally followed his lead in court affairs. They both turned to Razen, resisting the urge to scowl at him.

    You are correct. To be honest, I can certainly see the wisdom of letting sleeping dogs lie

    I am in agreement with you, Razen, stated the king. But

    Yes, I am aware, sire. If we leave that nation to their own devices, our authority in the region will plummet. Thus, we must strike them before that happens, regardless of the potential profit at stake This is apetition for survival.

    King Edmaris nodded, eyes clouded with greed. As were Razens. They had practiced this exchange earlier. The king, ever thinking about his own nation, and the loyal retainer who served him. None of it was real, but the kings trap was already sprung upon the audience.

    I also have an announcement to make, Reyhiem stated. We have not submitted public notice yet, but we have already received divine guidance on the subject. Our gods tell us that thend of monsters must be destroyed.

    This unnerved the nobles. It was now a holy war they were talking about, a Holy Churchapproved conflict. The will of the nation would be on their side now.

    I understand the concerns of our good marquis and count, the king said. But I could hardly find it in me to doubt the words of the Holy Church.

    And consider this! Folgen shouted. Consider this a way of opening the eyes of the assorted nations who have been tricked and deceived by this country. No monster is worthy of trusta lesson I feel we should teach them personally!

    B-but

    That would mean we could potentially take the me

    Hmm? King Edmaris turned a gentle smile toward his two doubtful noblemen. Then what do you suggest we do?

    Any concerns from neighboring countries would no longer be an issue the moment the Holy Church backed them up. Farmus was a superpower, one with major clout in the Council. If the cause was presented as just, both politically and religiously, it would be simple to spurn any outside interference.

    The two nobles turned to face each other for a moment. Could we perhaps send a messenger? Muller suggested for them. If we could negotiate with them, wed be able to tell whether they are worthy of our trust or not! And if they seem ready to be allies, the monster threat would be a thing of the past. We would have nothing to fear. The Church has not made an official promation yet, I am sure, because it wants to discern their true motives first.

    Exactly. Count Hellman nodded.

    He and Muller both owned domains that bordered the forest, making defense a constant worry. The marquissnds also shared a boundary with Blumund, which they had good rtions with. That must be what drove his opposition.

    Well, well. Perhaps Blumund has been bribing youbut this is already settled business.

    King Edmarisughed a bit internally, reveling at howte this resistance was as he ced both of them on his watch list. His mind was already full of the fortune and glory he would no doubt acquire soon.

    No, my good marquis and count, Reyhiem interjected. The divination has already been provided. Luminus refuses to abide the presence of any monsterespecially monsters who dare to build a nation. Any such nation would mark the birth of a new demon lord! Allowing such a filthy thing to exist is an egregious and unforgivable sin!!

    Muller and Hellman both gasped, taken aback by this outburst.

    I understand your views, King Edmaris added solemnly. Let me ask you: Can we trust these monsters? Who could guarantee that they will not attack people someday? Are you willing to take that responsibility? Are you willing to protect the lives and fortunes of my beloved people? We are dealing with monsters. Creatures we could never fathom. Creatures in eternal conflict with mankind. Dont you find the views you espouse to be rather imprudent?

    The overpowering performance caused both of them to turn white, unable to respond. How could they? The enemy wasnt even human. What could possibly bring anyone to trust in them? That unspoken implication was impossible to refute.

    As far as King Edmaris was concerned, the so-called leader of this horde was nothing more than a softhearted pushover. The speech he reportedly held at the Armed Nation of Dwargon made that patently clear. When he read that ridiculously idealistic quote in the reportas we attempt to build a nation in the Forest of Jura that serves as a bridge between the human and monster racesheughed. What a foolish, easily manipted leader this was! Someone with no force of personality, a monster who found it impossible to tell a liethat was the impression the king received.

    That little tidbit wasnt included in the reports handed out to the nobility. It was a small trick, crafted to ensure there would be no dissenting opinions, and it could be easily defended as not my fault if someone found out.

    If their leader is this softhearted, it might be easier to make them surrender than I thought

    In Edmariss mind, this leader might find war so distasteful that a bit of a sales pitch on the benefits of life under Farmus rule might bring him right to the bargaining table.

    And if so, we can resolve all of this in peace. If they provide their fortune, I could even allow them the right to self-govern

    He tightened his expression, now in danger of bing twisted in avaricious glee. Confirming that no further dissent wasing, he spoke.

    This is a holy war! We will begin by deploying a vanguard force to ry my will to our foes! If they acquiesce to us, then fine. If not, I will show them the will of divinity with our most loyal of forces!

    Rahhh!

    And with that out in the open, nobody would dare voice their disagreement now. The effort to cleanse thend of Tempest had begun.

    After the conference:

    But what if they dont surrender once our vanguard force causes an uproar in their territory? They might show their true colors and resist us.

    They could, Razen replied to Folgen. Thats why I believe we should send the otherworlder Shogo along with them to prove our strength

    Oh? Im not sure if sending Shogo alone would be wise. He may spout a great deal of nonsense most of the time, but his strength is genuine. We cant allow him to go out of control and lose him for good.

    Indeed. Well, you know the number of monsters involved. We might be able to flee back home, but one bad decision and he might just be killed. With Kyoya along, I doubt we will run into any issues. Besides, we have the perfect person for a mission like this.

    Ah. Her, you mean? I see.

    King Edmaris nodded his agreement.

    The mission of this military strike was to sap the enemys will to fight. If they could subjugate Tempest without any bloodshed, they could hope for nothing more. They had the numbers to guarantee victory if push came to shove, but as the king theorized, the fewer casualties they could get away with, the better.

    Yes, he said. We may not need to target our full forces upon these creatures after all. But keep your guard up.

    Worry not, sire. We have taken every possibility under consideration. I ordered them to simply spread a little havoc and then return to us.

    As the king hoped, Razen was nning to take a wait-and-see approach.

    The three of them were then interrupted by Reyhiem and his near-inhuman smile. My lord, he said, if possible, would I be able to test out one of my secret spells?

    Secret? What sort of spell is this, Archbishop?

    What are you scheming now, Reyhiem?

    Well

    He gave them a full rundown, his smile growing ever more cheerful. It proved contagious, spreading to King Edmariss face, then Razens and Folgens as he continued to speak.

    Heh-heh-heh I like it.

    Your answer?

    Very well. Go right ahead! I will allow it, Reyhiem.

    It ddens me to hear that, sire. I promise it will bring you the utmost of glories!

    And so Reyhiems pawns slowly, secretly began to move themselves.

    Following King Edmariss missive from on high, a vanguard force was quickly formed. It consisted of a hundred mounted cavalry, plus a breakthrough force consisting of several wagons. Three otherworlders were among them: Shogo Taguchi, Kyoya Tachibana, and a woman named Kirara Mizutani.

    Umm, Shogo griped, I havent been on a trip in, like, ages. If they chose me, does that mean, like, its that kind of thing?

    Yeah, no doubt about it.

    You hear anything, Kyoya?

    You were there, too, werent you? The Kingdom of Farmus is stepping up to wipe out that slime.

    Thats crazy. All these forces just to squish a slime?

    Well, who can say? If its got ten thousand or whatever monsters under its control, thats gonna be a pretty decent threat.

    Yeah, whatever. I mean, the knights in this country are just pathetically weak! Seeing that, it makes me thinklike, the humans in this world are such massive wusses that even dinky little monsters are enough to make em crap their pants.

    Kiraraughed. That, or maybe youre just too damn strong, Shogo. I mean, that unique skill you got for battle is nuts.

    Ahh, Im more scared of your skill than Shogos.

    Yeah. Even I wouldnt like my chances against you.

    Kirara was still young, aged eighteen. Just like Shogo, she had been summoned into Farmus-controllednd three years ago. Her skillwhich involved influencing peoples thoughts during negotiationwasnt directly rted to battle, which led to rough treatment and assumptions that she was just another failed summon. At first.

    Then it happened. It was too much for her to put up withand that had made her use the power right . Stop screwing with me, you assholes! shed screamed. I just wish anyone who messes with me would die ! The nature of the resulting Bewilder skill ensured that the effect was immediate. Anyone whod failed to resist it immediatelymitted suicide.

    A negotiation skill? No way. All she had to do was bark out an order, and she could make anyone do her bidding. It depended less on the actual words and more on what Kirara wanted on the inside. The results were nothing short of a massacre until Kiraras summoner managed to ce a locking curse upon her.

    All three of them had had their powers checked from the moment they were summoned. The first few months were devoted to magic-assistednguage lessons, along with a wide array of testing. The locking curse could not be resisted. Any order made with it simply had to be followed, whether you wanted to or notand as part of that, Kirara was forced to reveal what her skill really was.

    She revealed it, but she was inurate on a few of the details, thanks to her unfamiliarity with thenguage. As a fifteen-year-old at the time, for Kirara, learning a foreign tongue was a struggle. Even with the magical support, the mere act of studying was pure torture to her. The results led to that I hope you all die tragedy, and ever since, Kiraras skill had been sealed away, restricted from activating without permission.

    The same was somewhat true of Shogo, but (whether it was lucky for him or not) it didnt take long for Shogos full strength to be obvious to all. That was what happened when you killed the thirty magicians surrounding you the moment you got summoned. It was the work of the unique skill Berserker, and as the name suggested, it simply provided a massive boost to the wielders physical strength and abilities.

    He had been seventeen then, a delinquent from a failing high school, and his discontent and lust for violence had awoken the skill in him. Combined with the karate Shogo had studied since childhood, Berserker provided a massive boost to his fighting strength. That led to thirty massacred sorcerers. If Razen hadnt been there, it would have been even worse.

    It was never a given that people summoned into this world would just go quietly with their new guardians. They were taken from their own lives for purely selfish reasons; anyone could see the effect that would have, and the people on this world knew it well. To handle it, each set of summoning-ceremony spells came with a locking curse included that made the otherworlder do the summoners bidding.

    I swear, muttered Shogo, I wanna kill that old man. Just ordering us to do whatever he wants

    Yeah, seriously. One of these days hes, like, totally goin down.

    Oh, dont be like that, Kyoya replied. At least if you do what he says, youre guaranteed the best food and amodation this world has to offer.

    They had gone through this conversation before. It was never enough to leave Shogo or Kirara convinced.

    Huh? Yeah, no shit! Especially when the best they have to offer is garbagepared to our world.

    Oh, totally, Kirara added. There are no cute stores, no cosmetics No TV, no Inte, no smartphones. This worlds, like,pletely devoid of entertainment. Id be totally fine if this just exploded.

    Theints had piled up to the point where all three could blow up at any time. Being forced to carry out orders with no free will, in particr, was proving unbearable. And Kyoya knew that muchbut unlike the others, he was willing to take a more flexible approach to his plight. There was nothing he missed about his old world; he was far more interested in the powers obtained on this oneShogos, Kiraras, and his.

    He had observed them, researched them, and thought about what could be done with them.

    And as he had, this current incident urreda monster-ying quest, their chance to work in the open. Finally, after two years, Kyoya would get to see actual battle.

    Maybe Shogo and Kirara dont like this, but I think this is our big chance. If it turns into a war, thatll keep the guys with the locking curses on us too busy to keep tabs. Maybe we could even kill themor maybe theyll just go die themselves.

    He couldnt discuss this much with the other two. There was too much of a chance they were being magically eavesdropped on. Which wasnt a bad thing exactly. But there Kyoya wasseeing this as a chance, waiting patiently for the exact moment he could strike and reim his freedom.

    Soon, the wagon carrying all three of themeach with their own thoughts in mindset off for Tempest.

    Mjurran had received an emergency contact from yman. He ordered her to deploy a special sort of high magic.

    This magic involved taking the entire area within a three-mile radius and converting it into an anti-magic zone. Spells like these took time, so he ordered her to begin working on it at once. The purpose was to shut offmunication with the outside worldthere was more to it than that, no doubt, but the demon lord offered no further guidance.

    It was clear yman nned something bigsomething that he didnt want the people of Tempest to know about. It deeply concerned Mjurran, but she would never be allowed to ask questions. Orders were orders.

    Whats more, this magic was meant as a defensive spell against other magic. It was being specially customized to fulfill ymans request, and as a result, it would have to beunched around a circle with her at the center. There was the rub. To keep high magic going, Mjurran would have to reveal the identity of the high-level magic-born who drove it: herself. There was no way doing so wouldnt draw the attention of the locals.

    In effect, Mjurran, a magic-user, was being faced with a potential angry mob of Tempestians in a zone that she herself had blocked all the magic from. It was essentially being ordered to die. The magic yman stipted was positionally based, so once it wasunched, itdst for several days whether Mjurran was around for it or not. She was, in effect, a throwaway piece of the puzzle.

    Receiving this order crushed her. But there, yet again, the figure of a single man in her life crossed her mind. If she refused this order, it would bring that man an all-too-tragic fate. Mjurran knew this better than anyone else, and that was exactly why the only choice avable to her was to ept it.

    I knew this would happen. A suitable end for me, I suppose, but I wish at least he could be spared

    She recalled the face of Yohm, the man who imed to love a woman like her, and smiled. For someone who had lived with the coldest of frozen hearts for the past several centuries, those words were as gentle as a spring breeze.

    Those words are all I need

    Steeling her resolve, she began to walk off by herself.

    Wherere you going, Mjurran?

    Oh, Gruecith. Did you need something?

    Heh! Not exactly, no.

    But he was clearly trying to follow her.

    She tried to get away, recalling how yman had acted around her just a moment ago. He was always so calm and collected, but his orders just now hid a twinge of panic behind them. You will trigger the magic as soon as possible, he had said before shutting off their link. Something unexpected must have happened.

    Hey, speaking of which, did you see the new dessert theyre offering at the dining hall? Its called a cream puff or something, and Yohm said it was the best thing he ever had. Wanna try it out with me?

    Gruecith couldnt have acted more carefree. It annoyed Mjurran a bit. His smile was already starting to corrode her steely resolve.

    I appreciate the invite, but sorry. Yohm brought one for mest night. He said it was a present.

    Pfft. That bastard Trying to get a leg up on me again.

    A leg up? Whatre you talking about? I have a bit of an errand to do, so if we could talkter

    An errand? Ill really get to see youter?

    Er, of course. Why wouldnt you?

    She did her best to brush him off, leaving Gruecith behind on the path.

    Well, I got the weirdest news just now, yknow? He pointed his eyes at Mjurran. Something about the demon lord Milim dering war on my leader. It sounded insane to me, but youre acting pretty weird, too, so I was just wondering.

    Ah. There we go. Now Mjurran understood. She had no idea why the demon lords Milim and Carillon were at odds with each other, but she was sure yman was pulling the strings yet again. He was pulling themand then something happened that he hadnt expected. Maybe Milims deration of war was outside his prediction? Maybe his n was to have Milimunch a surprise attack on the Beast Kingdom, with Mjurranunching a spell to coincide with that. But now that Milim was going off script, she imagined, the whole thing was falling apart.

    But why does he want to cut off allmunication from this country?

    Englesia and Tempest had an agreement with each other, but against an angered Milim, they simply didnt have enough war power. What would be the point of cutting their?

    Then it struck her like a bolt of lightning.

    Oh. Hes afraid of that slime Rimuru. That slime might just have the power to change Milims mind, after all.

    The demon lord yman feared Rimuru, a presence increasingly bing an X factor in his life, joining the fray. So he ordered Mjurran to prevent Carillon from contacting Tempests leaders, whod then surely ry his SOS to Rimuru. The longer she dallied, the angrier yman would be with her. She needed tounch it at once.

    Plus, Gruecith continued, knowing you, Im sure youre already aware, but the top leaders in this nation are pretty damn busy right now. Do anything funny at a time like this, and itll be your life, yknow?

    He was right. The top staff in Tempest were, to say the least, flustered. Some mysterious armed group had been approaching their territory for the past few days, requiring the full attention of Soei and his agents. There were storm clouds ahead, it seemed, and everyone could practically feel the tension among the leaders.

    Oh? I didnt know.

    Something was happening. Something beyond ymans expectations. It unnerved her. There was no telling what it could be. She had tounch that magic at once, or else yman, crazed with fury, might just kill her and everybody else in this town. And Gruecith just refused to let her go.

    I didnt know aint gonna cut it,dy. I cant let you do anything weird right nowyou got that?

    What kind of nonsense is that? If youre fighting against Milim, arent you in much more danger than any of us?

    Oh? You talk like you know her. Dont worry about me. Lord Carillon is invincible. I dont care how strong Milim is; I couldnt even think of my lord tasting defeat. What I care about more right now is you , Mjurran!

    Look, really, what are you?

    Lets stop ying games here. Youre magic-born, arent you?

    Maybe shed be able to talk her way out of this. But right up to the end, Mjurran never considered the option of deceiving Gruecith.

    Huh. Your minds always the sharpest when ites to things like that , isnt it? Well, no point hiding it. I think the ogre mages spotted it, too.

    So why?!

    Because I have to. Listen, Gruecith, I like you a lot, tooas a friend. But if youre going to get in my way right nowIm ready to kill you.

    With that, Mjurran did away with her magic-driven human disguise, revealing her original magic-born form.

    Ah?!

    Gruecith quivered under the pair ofrge eyeballs boring down into him, virtually roaring with me.

    Why are you so ready to? Are you preparing to die? What for? What? Youve got a master giving you orders, dont you?

    I dont see any need to answer that.

    For Gruecith, that was as good as a yes.

    Yknow, they said Lord ymans notorious for using his minions like throwaway cannon fodder. You arent?

    Enough from you! Say one more word, and I will kill you, Gruecith!

    Seeing the normally immovable Mjurran descend into such a panic told him everything else he needed to know.

    Oh. I get it. If youre willing to follow him straight to your own death

    He was interrupted before he could finish.

    Let me hear more about that.

    It was Yohm, using all-but-perfect camouge skills to trick them as he strolled out from underneath the trees. He usually took great pains to look out for Mjurran. There was no way he wouldnt notice her bizarre behavior.

    Yohm

    She had revealed her secret to the one person she least wanted tobut, oddly, it filled her with a sense of relief. A relief that turned into surprise at what he had to say next.

    Mjurran, you have to believe in me. I swear Ill protect you.

    What are you, crazy? You can see perfectly well by nowIm a high-level magic-born! How is a human weaker than me supposed to keep me safe?!

    Yohm ignored the frantic plea, growing unusually passionate.

    Human? Magic-born? None of that stuff matters, man! I fell in love with you. I love your face, I love your scent, I love your warmth. The way you live, the way you hold yourself all proud like that. I love all of it. And that means everything to me!!

    What are you saying? All that was just a fantasy created to trick you.

    Dont worry, Mjurran. Im prepared to let you keep on trickin meright up to the day I die!

    Nh!!

    What an idiot , she thought from the bottom of her heart. But it was such a bold, pleading deration that it struck herpletely dumb.

    Heh. I won, didnt I? Youve fallen for me? He shed her the biggest smile she had ever seen. I swear Ill believe in you until I die. If I do, then hows that any different from it being the truth, huh?

    Mjurran stillcked the words. Youre so stupid. So, so stupid. But if thats how you are, then I

    Heh-heh-heh. What a pitiful man you are. I approached you because I wanted to take advantage of you. Youre so pathetic; it makes meugh. This is ridiculous. Enough of this charade!

    And with that cold rejoinder, Mjurran began to cast. There was no more time left to waver. The tears she felt on her cheeks surely must have been her imagination.

    No! Stop, you fool! Youre really?!

    Whats going on, Gruecith?

    With a beautiful, lilting voice, the spell unfurled itselfand thews of the world began to be rewritten. Yohm and Gruecith were already powerless to stop it. If they could, the only real way would be to kill her. And if that happened, she was okay with it. But she simply had toplete this spell.

    She continued to chant, as if in prayerwith her heart and soul, aching to protect the man she loved.

    The scene in Tempest was even more chaotic than Gruecith thoughteven before everything went to pieces, just as Mjurran neared the end of her work.

    Benimaru, drowning under a deluge of hurried reports, already looked sick of it all. The most worrying one hade from a sentry posted at a substation a few days ago, by way of Gobta. Uh, Benimaru, hed said, I guess theres this bunch of humans in full armor, and theyre headed right this way. The sentry asked what they wanted, and they just said, We have no need to speak with underlings! and marched on.

    Soei had quickly been dispatched to investigate. It was a group of knights, over a hundred in number, and Benimaru decided they could no longer be ignored. Soei kept gathering intel, along with Soka and his other men. Soon, theyd pinpointed the groups origin: the Kingdom of Farmus.

    As long as the Farmus toons goals were unclear, working with them had been difficult. Thus, Benimaru had Soeis team keep a close eye on them as hed discussed the increasingly worrisome issue with Rigurd.

    Perhaps we should inform Sir Rimuru?

    Ah, Rigurd had replied, after he left us to watch this town, is it really good to keep pestering him?

    Perhaps. He makes frequent return trips at night, so we could inform him then.

    That brought them to now. Rimuru, after all, could use his Warp Portal toe back here any time he wanted. So Benimaru left his briefing forter and worked on the medley of other issues awaiting his attention. It was all very unfamiliar work, and being chased constantly by it made the days pass like lightning.

    In the midst of all this, Soeis team sent a report from Farmus itself. The kingdom was apparently engaging in rapid preparations for war. It made Benimaru wrinkle his eyebrows.

    This might be bad news for us, Rigurd.

    Im afraid so. Not something we can afford to take so casually. I think we had best have Sir Rimuru back here at once.

    The two looked at each other. They both concluded that handling this brigade of knights the wrong way could very well lead to war. So Benimaru tried contacting Rimurubut before he could, he received an emergency magicalmunication from Alvis, the Golden Snakehorn and one of Eurazanias Three Lycanthropeers.

    The Beast Kingdom will enter hostilities with the demon lord Milim in one weeks time. As a result, I want you to ept the citizens we are evacuating.

    The dys Mjurran experienced in deploying her anti-magic zone allowed this message to squeak its way through. Although yman himself should take some of the meMilims flight speed was so fast that she reached Eurazania far ahead of his nned schedule. Not that it mattered to Benimaru. No, the portent of this news was so vital that it seemed to change the very air around them.

    You must be joking!

    At once, the top leaders of Tempest were gatheredRigurd and Rigur, Lilina and the other chief hobgoblins, Kaijin as a special adviser, Shuna as secretary, Shion as Rimurus representative, plus Hakuro and Geld. Nearly a dozen people crammed into the meeting hall. Gabil was not in attendance, not having been appointed to this level of leadership yet. Instead, he was simply advised that an emergency was underway and to stand by until further orders. Kaijin also informed Vester of the news, telling him to maintain regr contact with King Gazel of Dwargon as needed.

    And in the midst of all this, the very party of humans who had vexed Benimaru earlier arrived, disguised as merchants.

    Dude! This towns more advanced than the capital of Farmus!

    Shogo couldnt hide his surprise.

    He and his otherworlder friends were trundling into town, a single knight serving as their coachman while the rest of the hundred-strong team kept their distance. The unexpected sight of the town rendered him speechless. It was amazing. Nothing about the term monster town had prepared him for this. The sewer system kept all foul-smelling odors at bayand, really, the monsters walking around seemed more identifiably human than any other species. They were clean, bathed, and wearing more proper clothing than many of the merchants and townspeople around Farmus.

    One look was all it took to confirm that life here was far more bountiful than life over there. It was packed with adventurers, merchants briskly running to and fro as they carried out their business.

    Goddamn! Ive been ripped off this whole time! Why the hellre the monsters livin better than we are?!

    The initial waves of shock were wearing off. Now, within Shogo, a darker well of anger was beginning to rise. The same was true with Kirara.

    Um, whats the deal with this? Like, whyre these guys living way swankier than we are? Somethings got to be wrong here.

    Ahh, dont get too angry, Kyoya saidbut even he couldnt help but feel it was unfair. His eyes were squinted, brooding with resentment.

    And this whole ce is run by a slime, yeah? If we kick its ass, we can take over this joint, cant we?

    Thats, like, the best damn idea I ever heard, Shogo! Lets do it!

    Im fine with that, too, but we cant stray from our orders too much.

    Oh, itll be fine! Im just sayinthey told us to kick up a ruckus before the rest of the knights showed up, right? Everythingll work out great!

    Totally. Like, they wanna stage it like were a bunch ofwful citizens and the monsters attacked us out of nowhere, yeah? I can just use Bewilder to set up some kinda pretext, and all the non-monster adventurers will do whatever I want.

    Kirara liked her chances, and she had reason to. It was the main reason why the three of them were here. And neither of her friends saw much to worry about, either.

    Yeah, Kyoya agreed, thats pretty much what Sir Razen told us to do.

    Pfft. Quit callin that asshole sir around me!

    Totally. I hope that dude gets a heart attack or something. Then wed be, like, free and stuff.

    Ha-ha-ha! Sorry, just a habit, Kyoya said. We cant really dis him to his face, you know?

    His lighter approach had a distinct motivation behind it. Kyoya, unlike the others, was still hiding his true character in this world to some extent. For now, he felt, it was best to y the loyal student around Farmus circles.

    As they spoke, Shogo mentally went over his orders one more time, growing increasingly impatient to kick some ass. I dont care what kind of excuse you have to make, Razen had told them. Just start some kind of troublethen you , Kirara, use your power to get the adventurers on your side! Well begin taking action once you do.

    Farmus was currently engaged with a total of three otherworlders. That alone was enough war power to decimate a smaller country. It was rare to deploy three at once, but the government wanted to cover for the possibility that another otherworlder was aiding the monsters.

    Once Shogo and his friends began their business, the coachman driving their wagon would send off a signal to begin the rest of the operation. The otherworlders werent informed of the exact details, but nothing theyd do would be any hindrance to them, and presumably itd make things even more favorable for victory. Shogo despised Razen, but even he had to praise his talents. If he werent a gifted magic-user, all three of them wouldve been free long ago.

    Now he ran a hand through his well-oiled hair, lifting it up like theb of a chicken.

    All right. How bout we get things moving?

    Kirara was the first to take action.

    Aaahhhhh!! Youyou touched my butt just now, didnt you? You tryin to do somethin to me?

    She had deliberately bumped herself against what seemed to be the perfect targeta kind of dopey-looking sentry who was staring into space. This was Gobzo, a guard under Gobtasmand and a hobgoblin known even among his own species for being a bit special.

    Unhhh? II didnt do anything!

    He lifted up his arms, head swiveling around in search of some kind of support.

    Hey! Dont, like, y dumb with me! Just tell me what you pped me there for. All right?

    Kirara drew closer to him as she spokethen, suddenly, she jerked her body backward and tumbled to the ground.

    O!! Help! Somebody call the guards!

    Wh-wha? No! I didnt even do nothin! I, uhI am a guard

    Gobzo was already starting to tear up a bit. He was the victim here, but frankly, he didnt have a lot of allies nearby. The sheer dopiness of his act did little to turn the suspicion away from himand Kirara was already deploying Bewilder, letting it sink in to the minds of human passersby.

    Whoa, the hobgoblin attacked that girl?

    Thats a town sentry, isnt it? What kind of sentry would pull that crap? I cant believe it.

    But he just knocked her to the ground, man.

    Really? I thought the monsters here were supposed to be nice.

    They are . Usually. So whats the deal with this guy?

    The locals were still a bit incredulous, but few to none of the adventurers and merchant types nearby were willing to stick up for Gobzo. Nobody had a full grasp of the events, and it wouldnt be long before Kiraras skill had their mindspletely under her control.

    Shogo and Kyoya grinned at each other, then took a step forward to drive the dagger down.

    Whoa, dude, so this town just attacks its visitors without warning?

    Thats their n, huh? Invite merchants and people over and then strike when they least expect it?

    They shouted as loudly as they could as they walked over to protect the frightened-looking Kirara. Their trumped-up charges were lodged. The real show would begin only when this sentrys supervisor showed up. If he was apologetic, they could just ratchet their beef up the ranks, with the crowd on their side. If he got angry and started throwing his weight around, thatd be a godsend. Even if he didnt, itd grow into a huge hubaloo, the rest of the knights would storm in, and then theyd serve as judge and jury.

    Shogo was therefore hoping whoever showed up next was just as stupid as their first target. He was disappointed.

    So whats up?

    Gobta, apparent captain of the sentries, cheerfully strolled onto the schen did something Shogo wasnt expecting at all.

    Oh man, Gobzo, not you again! I swear, every single time something happens, youre in the middle of it!

    He gave him a bop on the forehead before turning back toward the otherworlders. Hey, sorry about that, guys, he said with a friendly nod. Ill try to educate im better.

    G-Gobta, I, but, I

    You didnt do it? Doesnt matter. If youre under suspicion, youve already lost. He ominously raised an eyebrow. Remember what Sir Rimuru said about the horrors of being falsely used of assault on the street?

    This raised some eyebrows among the onlookers as well.

    S-so you believe me, Gobta?

    The sentrys boss sighed. Why dyou have to ask me that? You wouldnt have the guts to do anything anyway.

    Gobzo rewarded him with a hug and a hearty Ill follow you wherever you go, sir!! as tears streamed down his cheeks. This didnt particrly delight Gobta, judging by the look on his face, but he still patted his sentrys shoulders to calm him down.

    It wasnt a sight that pleased Kirara much.

    Whoa, what the hell? Are you saying that Im, like, lying or something?

    Oh, it didnt sound that way? a surprised Gobta asked. It was more than enough to set the girl off.

    Dont give me that, you piece of shit! You got a lot of balls, tryin to pick a fight with me! Why do you trust this guy right off? You werent even here to see it!

    The shouting did little to affect the unbothered Gobta. Its simple, he said. Its natural for us to trust our friends.

    What?! You want me to ept thatme excuse?!

    Well, he calmly exined, if you want me to exin further, the only girl Gobzos got a thing for is Shion, ysee. Everybody in Tempest knows this, so theres no way hed try puttin his hands on a young girl like you, no.

    There was a moment of silence as everyone digested this.

    Oh, thats just mean , Gobta! Gobzos face turned bright red.

    Yeah, yeah. Everyone already knows, remember?

    Everyone?

    Gobta shrugged. Yeah, everyone. Deal with it, Gobzo.

    II think I wont follow you wherever you go anymore, Gobta!

    Now Gobzo was almost as angry as Kirara. Almost.

    Will you stop with this stupid crap?! Im still here , you bastards! All of you should just die !!

    There was no longer any n of action. All Kirara wanted to do was take everyone making her into aughingstock and kill them. Shogo and Kyoya would be the only ones left standing in this street intersection, probably, but Kirara was too furious to care. It wasnt like those guys cared about Razens orders that much. So she screamed it out without reserve, half smiling as she did. Thanks to living fairly restricted lives in Farmus, the three otherworlders were near the ends of their ropes mentallyand now the rebound was happening.

    Already, Kirara could picture the stabbed, mangled bodies that would litter the street shortly.

    But nothing happened.

    Wha? Huh?

    ?!

    The adventurers and merchants looking on were too busyughing at Gobzo to die for her. It visibly unnerved Kirara, as it did Shogo and Kyoya.

    I see, a gentle but firm voice said to them. Your skill converts your voice into streams of force that interfere with your targets brain waves. Thats quite a powerful one, so Ill have to prohibit you from using it in our territory.

    It was Shuna. A pair of hobgoblins had reached her to ry the events just before the conference began. It had sounded like bad news to her, so shed run over with Shion as her bodyguard.

    Shuna revealed a breezy smile as her eyes focused upon Kirara. Her unique Parser skill provided aplete analysis of the girls ability, letting her unleash an aura that matched and neutralized the waves of force. One look from her discerning, fearsome eyes was all it took.

    You do not appear to be suitable for this nation. Please take your leave at once.

    She smiled againbut her eyes were frigid. She could tell Kirara had meant to kill with that attack, and she wasnt about to take that lightly.

    Likeno way

    Kirara sat weakly upon the ground. Now she knew it. She waspletely outside her element. This woman was different. Not just another face in the crowd. She was a real monster.

    Her twopanions, however, had yet to pick up on thisor they did, perhaps, but didnt find it worthy of note. Kirara had lost, but the violence her friends could mete out wouldnt be suppressed by any weird mystic force. They had absolute confidence in their powers, and now they had the ideal opportunity to test them out. Besides, the n was in full swing, and there was no canceling it at this point.

    Hmm

    Shunas beauty attracted Shogos eye for a moment. Then he recalled why they were here. To enve them. And if a woman as beautiful as this was a monster, there was no reason not to treat her as a ve.

    Thats your attitude, huh? Well, all right. If youre up for it, Im ready for you!

    His desirous eyes turned to Shuna, analyzing how best to tackle her. He looked forward to bellowing withughter as shey on the ground, bruised and crying, and continuing the torment until she begged for mercy.

    Then a quiet voice broke his concentration.

    Your licentious thoughts are written all over your face, lowlife. March straight out of this town, and well let you live. Refuse to obey, and your life will be forfeit!

    Shions slim, well-proportioned body was attired in a business suit, the epitome of cool beauty as she stepped in front of Shuna. Her eyes were furious as she strode forward.

    Shogo shed a ferocious smile. He stood strong, never even contemting defeat. Ha! I like it! Get in my way, and Ill crush you!

    I see. It appears you will not understand until you are smashed to the ground. Very well. Allow me to engage you!

    Then the two of them collided.

    Kyoya couldnt wait for this moment. There was no meddling referee overseeing this sparring match and thus no need for him to y the star-pupil role. And with Shogo wrecking things first, he had no reason to be patient any longer.

    If thats how it is, he said with a twisted smile and drawn sword, I get free rein, too, dont I? I was hoping Id get to test this out sometime.

    Ever since hede to this world, Kyoya had been waiting for the tides to turn in his favor. Now, the time hade. Before his eyes was Shuna, with Gobta and Gobzo behind her.

    Heh-heh-heh I cant wait to see how much I can do!

    Hoo boy. Gobzo, protect Lady Shuna for me.

    Yes, sir, Gobta!

    Gobta drew his dagger and lowered himself forbat. Kyoya did the same, sword straight ahead of his eyes. He was a talent in kendo, and his unique skillknown as Severerwas focused entirely on slicing and dicing.

    It was backed by his natural-born fencing talents and the extra skill All-Seeing Eye. The skill allowed him to fully grasp the situation around him, as if watching the action from a video games camera perspective. It sted this information straight into his eyes, boosting his reaction timeand thanks to Mind elerate, he could recognize and address threats three hundred times faster than normal.

    With these three skill powers in hand, Kyoya had be the greatest swordsman in both Farmus and the rest of the Western Nations. Razen had ordered him to keep these powers hidden, but that order was no longer valid. Kyoya finally had his chance to unleash them all, and it made the blood surge through his body.

    Haaa-ha-ha-ha! With these kinda skills, not even that olddy Hinata could challenge me, much less some wimp like you!

    With a final heartyugh, Kyoya descended upon Gobta.

    * * *

    The conference began in the meeting hall, minus Shuna and Shion.

    All right, dered Benimaru. Are we all ready? It is time to call for Sir Rimuru!

    Heunched the Thought Communication.

    Nothing happened.

    The line was silent.

    II cant connect to Sir Rimuru?!

    The whisper from Benimaru plunged the meeting hall into silence. Silence then gave way to panic. The hall bustled with worried faces and hurried speech. Even Benimaru, who was scarcely ever rattled, instantly turned pale. That was how much Rimurus silence filled them with a sense of impending doom.

    It was around that moment when Mjurrans incantation reached itspletion.

    In an instant, all magic disappeared, throwing the entire town into a state of chaos. The townspeople moved to evacuate their panicked guests, but the effort didntstor, really, wasnt even possible. Because alongside Mjurrans high magic, another secret spellunched itselfPrison Field, the result of extended research on the part of Archbishop Reyhiem. It worked on the same principle as Holy Field, the spell used on an official basis by the Churchs crusader teams, but modified so even the less-experienced Temple Knights could set it off if several of them worked together.

    The buildings sagged down, creaking painfully. The merchants ran for cover, the adventurers trying to protect them. Some basked in the mayhem; others tried to save the town from it. The multiple factors tangled together to spread chaos, creating a day of disaster unlike any Tempest had seen before.

 Volume 5 - Ch 3

    DESPAIR AND HOPE

    Ensuring the magical field was dispelled, I crept back outside, breathing a sigh of relief. I could feel my Replication-driven other half disappear.

    Ranga half threw himself out of my shadow. You are safe, my master! Being cut off must have rmed him beyond belief, his hair standing on end from all the nerves. I gave him a pet, trying to reassure him that everything was okay.

    This time, though, it was like Holy crap. That bit of insurance I took out at the start wound up saving my hide, but man , talk about a hairbreadth. When I was locked up in that Holy Field, that put me at one hell of a disadvantage. Trying to hold my own inbat there, with no idea who I was fighting or how strong they were, wouldve been idiotic.

    Realizing that, I created a Replication and got my core slime self the hell out of there. My human-form Replication was a full magical corpus of sorts, created by pping a whole bunch of magicules together; it couldnt move too quickly, but it was a small price to pay if my main body could escape. Looking at it that way, it was a small miracle I kept that corpus going as long as I did. I wanted to pat myself on the back. Thats how rough that Holy Field was.

    But hey, at least I made it. Now I was kinda d Id treated Hakuros training in the Formhide skill so seriously. If thatdy Hinata had considered the possibility of a Replication in the mix, it wouldve been all over But I guess she wasnt that wary of me. Few people would be. And that wound up saving my life.

    It sure taught me a lesson, though. I had to keep a closer eye on myself, no doubt. Oh, and I almost forgot: I was hiding my aura, since I was inbat until just now, but it might be seeping out by this point. Im pretty sure Im able to keep it perfectly hidden these days, but lets just be doubly careful about buttoning that up.

    With that in mind, I crafted a new mask within my Stomach. It was a copy of the first Mask of Magic Resistance I saw, but I got rid of all the traits I didnt need and boosted its core magical resistance instead. Then I shape-shifted into human form and put it on. That should keep Hinata from picking up on my presence. I think.

    Stillthat Hinatady was just way too powerful. Off the charts. If that Holy Field wasnt there and she put her full force into it, what then? I had the creeping suspicion that, nine times outta ten, I would lose.

    Such were the thoughts in my mind as I looked back at how the Glutton had fought for me back there.

    When I awaken the Glutton inside me, it is, to put it broadly, kind of like executing a program. A highly destructive virus of sorts, one that consumes everything within eyeshot. That was why her rapier caused no pain as it shed into my body.

    The Glutton had been transforming my own physical body, as Hinata looked on in astonishment. This was a freshly harnessedplete form of Universal Shapeshift in action. It let me transform my body such that it boasted only the most useful aspects of every monster I had consumed in the past, creating a well-oiled battle machine. The Glutton absorbed the grass, the earth, the air around me to rebuild myself into this new physical form.

    Inside the Holy Field, I hadnt even had the magicules to create a new magical corpus for myself. But the Glutton pretty much forced it to happen, taking in regr physical objects and using them to power myself up.

    Hinata brought her rapier back a bit, no doubt sensing the danger. That wound up saving her life. As out of control as it had be, the Glutton was lunging upon both the rapier and Hinata herself, using sound, heat, and scent to track down her position. If she reacted anyter than she did, she wouldve been torn apart by that ravenous appetite, maybe.

    As Hinata looked on in fright, the Gluttonpleted the transformation. Standing there now was a beast in the shape of a person. The only signs of my former self were the golden pupils and the slightly bluish-silver hair. My body rippled with malice, looking every bit like a demon from hell.

    I cant believe it, Hinata whispered. But the surprise was already gone from her face. She was peering intently at me, like an excited scientist making a new discovery. Her Dead End Rainbow skill shed right into peoples spiritsbut since it didnt kill me, she understood now that the Glutton had no spirit, no will of its own. It was a soul in its purest form, the origin of the power that lies at the root of man and monster.

    A soul is a consciousness, by definition, but that alone didnt provide the consciousness any way to express itself. It still needed an astral body to operate upon and begin the thought processbut that wasnt enough, either, since any thoughts produced would just dissipate into the wind. Thats where the spiritual body came in, to record and keep those thoughts captive. Even that was still a virtual memory, though, not any kind of permanent storageand so wee to the material body.

    If one had enough mental fortitude, they could recover all their memories even if their brain was permanently damaged. The fact that you saw spiritual life-forms among the monsters was proof enough of that. But if the spirit is damaged, that likely wounds the astral body deeply, even if the brain is left intact. If that wound reaches the soul, resurrection is no longer possible.

    That applied equally to every living thing in this worldfrom the weakest creatures all the way up to dragons and elemental monsters.

    By this point, Hinata fully understood what the Glutton was capable of. A sweet smile crossed her face, her piercing eyes shining brightly as she considered her countermeasures. She had lost her rapier now, but not even that seemed to bother her much. And then she removed an amulet from her pocket and threw it at me.

    Astral Bind!

    A skill that restricted the astral body, the vessel of the soul, instead of the material one. It still couldnt stop the Glutton.

    Realizing this, Hinata gave me a scornful frown. Before the Glutton, its limbs morphing and transforming in unpredictable ways as it lurched toward her, she showed not a single moment of agitation. If anything, she was still calmly observing me. Through all the Gluttons twists and turns, she kept dodging every attack by mere millimeters. She predicted every move.

    I see, she whispered. So youre already dead. She shook her head. Youre going to be obstinate right up to the end, arent you? Why are you pestering me like this? Continuing to have it attack your foe, even after death If someone doesntpletely wipe this thing out, its gonna threaten the whole world someday.

    Hinatas face remained taut as she summoned several non-elemental spirits from thin air. They followed her orders, mobbing the Glutton. The effort did little apart from sacrificing the spirits to stop it in its tracks temporarily.

    The only magic that could be used within a Holy Field involves amulets, Battlewill, spirits, and the like. Among them, Hinata now chose one of the greatest of holy magics, a powerful attack that she usually kept as one of herst resorts. Tracingplex shapes with her outstretched hands, she crafted a geometrical design in the air, stretching it out into ayered, physically present magic circle. In the middle of it was the berserk, spirit-consuming Glutton, unconscious, unthinking, and pitiful.

    Let me provide you a prayer to the divine. I hope and desire for the power of the holy spirits. Listen to my appeal and ovee all in your way! Disintegration!!

    The request, delivered in Hinatas beautiful voice, was granted. The resulting show of force was literally divine, enough to crush all physical and spiritual presences within its defined space. It was the ultimate in targeted, destructive magic, emitting shes of white light as it poured from Hinatas hands to the circle. It sped out at thousands of miles per hour, almost at light speed, as its holy power made cells and souls vanish without a trace. It was more than enough to make the Glutton disappear, not affecting the space around it at all.

    Thats what the battle record told me. I was watching from the side, as if it was on TV or something, and it was simply breathtaking.

    One thing I earned from this battle was Hinatas broken rapier. I was able to run it through the Stomach to take it for myself. More important than that, though, was the info I gleaned about her magic and skills. I had deliberately set the Glutton out of control, linking it to the Great Sage itself without going through my own spirit. I had no spiritual link to it myself; it was operating purely on its own volition. That was why, even when it took Hinatas final Dead End Rainbow strike, it didnt affect me at all.

    I didnt think I could win with it. Not from the start. Thats why I ordered it to gather data for me, so I coulde up with a better solutionand thats what I was poring over now.

    That Disintegration, though Wow. It was enough of a threat to send a chill up my spine. If I had taken that strike first thing, I wouldve been defenseless. It wouldve gone right through my Multyer Barrier and made me vanish instantly. Its only weakness was the amount of time it required to cast, but with that kind of force, it was only a minor quibble. Hinata made excellent use of it.

    It was definitely no joke. I wondered why Hinata even bothered with that magical barrier at all if she was that strong. I hate dealing with a foe whos both powerful and careful. With my Replication, I couldnt do more than slice a few hairs off her head. No wonder she was so confident, not even bothering with armor or anything. If thats what she brought to the table, I was correct to focus on escaping that barrier from the very beginning.

    Are all otherworlders and summoners that strong, the way Yuuki said? If so, Ill have to assume that every one I encounter has a unique skill and prepare appropriately for that. I was under the impression that I was pretty strong myself, but after that experience with Hinata, my confidence waspletely shattered. Maybe the wound to my pride was exactly what I needed.

    Getting to experience Disintegration for myself was a windfall, too. The moment she deployed thatyered magic circle, it was all over. There was simply no way to deal with it, apart from fleeing or interfering with her before the circle wasplete. Wouldve been nice if I could have Analyzed and Assessed it, but I was too busy trying not to die to consider that. It cant always be that easy. The moment I saw it, after all, my data link with the Sage cut right out and I (my non-Replicated self) got dizzy in the head. Its impossible to avoid once you see it, and theyered barrier it emitted had a heat-seeking property as wellif you cant get out of its trail, you cant avoid a direct hit.

    Could Milim have handled it? Ill have to ask her next time.

    I told Ranga about everything that happened as I checked up on my own body. I was physically fine, no longer affected by the Holy Field. What was up with Hinata, though? She refused to listen to me, breaking out the big guns with no provocation whatsoever. Maybe I shouldnt have taken the bait, but I only did because I thought I could win. Sure proved me wrong. Not that I lost , exactly. Sometimes the best winning strategy you have is to run, you know? And thats what I tried to do from the start, so if I made it out, I won.

    You could, if you squinted hard enough, call this a tactical victory. Plus I gathered all this valuable data. It wouldnt be going too far to call it a win. A tie, at least, if I wanted to be generous.

    Im definitely not being a sore loser, all right?

    But enough joking around. I was worried about everyone in town, so I decided to head over at once.

    Attempting to teleport myself to Tempest, I caught wind of something odd. I had tried to take a Warp Portal back to my own ce, but the magic failed to activate.

    Report. Impossible to specify a target location. The cause is believed to be some kind of barrier isting the area.

    Uh-oh. It sounds like someones trying to destroy Tempest, just as Hinata said. Better get back quick, or else Ill have nothing to go back to.

    Even as I thought that, the Great Sage was searching for ces still avable for teleportation. Soon, it tracked down the magic circle inside the cave that Gabil was guarding.

    Lets go! I shouted to Ranga as we hurriedly made the warp.

    Gabil and the others were assembled at the Sealed Caves magic circle, waiting for us. The moment he saw us, Gabil ran up, looking visibly relieved.

    Ohhh! Sir Rimuru, you are safe!

    He then briefed me on events. And then, just after we received word that Lady Milim would wage war against the Beast Kingdom of Eurazania in a weeks time, I lost contact with Sir Benimaru. Concerned, I made contact with Soka, but apparently no one outside the cave could reach our leaders, either.

    I told King Gazel as well, Vester added, but it was hard for us to make any concrete moves, given theck of information at hand

    Certainly, the king of dwarves wouldve had too little knowledge to provide any real support. He must have been terribly concerned. He hadst made contact viamunication crystal about an hour ago, but nothing beyond that, despite a second call being expected. Thought Communication didnt work, either, and just as they were discussing among themselves what to do, I came back.

    I guess the bad feeling I had about all this was right. No doubt about it; something terrible was taking ce. But why couldnt we even contact anyone in town?

    As I thought about this, Soei leaped out of my shadow, just as Soka and his other men had jumped out of Gabils.

    Sir Rimuru, it is a tremendous relief to see you safe and sound.

    He had apparently lost contact with me just as I was using Replication to save myself from Hinata, causing him a great deal of consternation.

    Whoa, Soei, Im a lot more worried about you than me at the moment!

    He was both wounded and exhausted. Vester jogged off to fetch him a Full Potion to drink.

    Forgive me for interrupting, but Sir Soei was injured attempting to escape the barrier deployed around Tempest.

    Silence, Soka. I am fine. Sir Rimuru, I am afraid the situation does not bode well for us

    The story he had for me was a shock. There was a military force from Farmus marching straight for Tempest. Soei, learning this, hurried back to tell Benimaru but was blocked by a barrier ced around town, preventing ess. Bashing right into it, his real body got away with just an injury (he said in his oh-so-Soei-like way) and all his Replication copies were expended. Anyone else wouldve died in a hurry. Regardless, his men were just about to attempt to break through the barrier when they noticed I was back.

    Soeis apparent nervousness was entirely due to my disappearance, it seemed. A lot of things mustve happened in the past half hour or so, Hinatas attack on me being one of them.

    Well, sorry I made you worry, Soei.

    Not at all, Sir Rimuru. As long as you are safe, there is nothing toin about.

    I appreciated the thought, but if I had returned to Tempest faster, I might never have run into Hinata at all. I had left for my own selfish reasons, and I had better make up for it.

    Before that, though:

    So if the Kingdom of Farmus is moving against us, was it them who built the barrier over town?

    It is likely so, yes.

    In that case, everyone in town is in danger?!

    The thought made my mind begin to race. Hinata had cost me a dear amount of time. We couldnt sit here talking all day, I decided. I needed to head to town, fast.

    Gabil, you guys guard the cave. Keep Vester and the dwarven potion staff safe! If any intruderse in, try your best to capture them alive.

    Yes, my lord!

    Sir Rimuru, what should we do about contacting King Gazel?

    Ah Wait until I get a grasp of the situation. Right now, all wed do is worry him further.

    Very true. All right. Be safe!

    I could understand Vesters concern, but there wasnt much I could say to the king yet. He already had his preliminary report; he would have to wait a bit for more.

    Ill go on ahead.

    Yes, sir! We will follow soon behind.

    I attempted to use Shadow Motion to head for town, only to remember the skill had evolved into Spatial Motion.

    Hold on, Soei. Lets go together, actually. All of you!

    Huh?

    Iunched Spatial Motion without further exnation, connecting our current location with a point just outside the barrier. There was a hole in the air, justrge enough for a person to shimmy through, and our target point was on the other side. Talk about convenient.

    The caves in your hands, Gabil!

    Yes, my lord! I will await further orders!

    He and his men nodded at me as I stepped through the portal. In another moment, we were outside of town, Soei and his team behind me. Soei seemed calm, but Soka and the others were pretty wary of traveling this way. I guess I couldnt me them. Wish Id had the time to exin things in detail, butyou know.

    Now I had an ominous-looking barrier in front of me. If someone as powerful and talented as Soei couldnt bust through it, it must be a pretty damn strong one, too. I brought my left hand up to it, absorbing part of its surface, and ran Analyze and Assess.

    Understood. The effects of Great Magic: Anti-Magic Area are detected, albeit with a reduction in magicule density. It runs on the same principle as Holy Field but is not uniform inposure, some areas being less dense than others. It is impure, likely an inferior version. Anyone inside it will be affected, but the effects can be resisted with Multyer Barrier.

    Well, if its inferior, then no worries. Lets head on in. I had Benimaru and everyone else to worry about right now. Plus, the way the Great Sage put it, any great magic needed to have its caster in the middle of it, but this barrier was activated from the outside. It was arge-scale casting, likely requiring several peoplemore than one or twotaking care of it.

    Soei, track down the guys casting this barrier so I can take them out. Do not engage inbat with them. Just bring all your men to them and gauge their strength.

    Yes, sir. How should we contact you?

    I produced a string of Sticky Steel Thread and wrapped it around his neck. How about this? Run it through this strand, and we should be able to pick up on each other.

    I see. That should work

    Upon testing it out, we found that Thought Communication worked as long as you cast it through the Thread, inside and outside the barrier.

    Right. Get going! Ill head over if you run into trouble. If you think you can beat them, neutralize them, but dont kill anyone.

    Yes, sir!

    Then all five of themSoei, Soka, and their three traineesdisappeared without a sound. Man, they really were like ninjas. Theyd easily hold their own against a high-level magic-born, no doubt, if Soei was leading them.

    But right now, we had to be careful. A single mistake could kill us. Every possibility had to be addressed. Along those lines, I had the Sage continue its analysis, hoping itd find a way to remove the barrier from the inside. Soei had his orders, and I had mine. It was time to break in.

    There were magicules left in the air around town, although not as much as before. If it wasnt for the Anti-Magic Area over it, youd be able to cast magic to some extent. The Sage was right; my Multyer Barrier made me feel no ill effects at all. This was far weaker than the Holy Field, which was a relief.

    Running through town, I headed toward our main office off the central za. The space was filled with people, the atmosphere tense and panicked. Something definitely did happen. It worried me.

    Realizing I was there, the crowd opened a path for me and fell to their knees. A few of them ran toward me. There was Rigurd, sprinting at top speed, with Rigur, Lilina, and the hobgoblin elders following behind.

    Sir Rimuru! It is wonderful to see you back. I am so d youre safe

    He kneeled, practically clinging to my legs, looking about ready to burst into tears.

    Yeah. Sorry I made you worry.

    Oh, not at all!! he said in abject relief, before he did indeed burst into tears. The rest of them also knelt, keeping a polite distance away from Rigurd and me as they celebrated my return. I guess losing contact with me worried people a lot more than I thought it would.

    Not everyone there was bawling over me, though.

    Nice to see you back, boss, Kaijin said, his voice taut. It sounded like he was painfully trying to keep the worry from showing. I could feel emotions a lot more instinctively from the monsters, but I had a feeling he was hiding his at the moment as well. Garm and his two dwarven brothers were there, too, blocking the way to the za as if trying to prevent me from going there.

    Follow me to our meeting room, if you could, Rigurd said as he calmed down from his crying jag and stood up. There are things I wish to report and discuss with you. Now he was back to his usual bold selfno time for sobbing hereand his voice was firm and unyielding. He was ready to do what needed to be done. The building he led me to was away from the za; I guess he didnt want me in there, either. What was going on? It worried me a little.

    Here, Rigurd, you and Kaijin get out of the way. Whats going on?

    Oh, um, just a small hup

    No talking your way out of it. Let me through.

    The Coercion skill I inteced with my words made them all give up, opening the way for me. Just as they did, an explosion rumbled a little distance from the za. Even with the lowered magicule density, I could recognize the aura as Benimarusand judging by the sounds of things, he was in battle.

    Is he fighting someone? Lets go!

    I ran for the area. Rigurd and the others followed behind me, expressions of relief on their faces (not that they noticed).

    As I expected, Benimaru was in battlewell, not a battle so much as him heaping one-sided torment upon his opponent. There was a team of high orcs surrounding him, all d in ck armor, led by Geld and watching the proceedings instead of helping Benimaru out. Geld was usually cool as a cucumber, but just like Benimaru, he was fired up right now.

    His opponent was the beastman Gruecith. I wondered why someone serving Carillon was drawing Benimarus ire like that, but then I noticed Yohm behind him, lying limply on the ground, and a beautiful woman I had never seen before cradling him. It seemed like Gruecith was trying to protect them. Benimaru had yet to draw his sword, but his aura was practically gushing from his body, making it clear he was struggling to hold back his anger.

    You seek to protect this woman, too? he asked. We dont have time for this right now. Get out of here at once.

    Heh-heh! Cant do that. No way Id hand her over when all of you are so worked up like this!

    Oh, worked up, you say? If I was worked up, I would have turned you into a pile of ash long ago, trust me. Just give it up and

    Not gonna happen! Im on her side, no matter what!

    Then Gruecith sprang into action, zooming toward the still- unarmed Benimaru. He transformed in an instant, turning into what looked like a gray-furred werewolf. His speed was far beyond what he showed in the fight with Yohm as he rushed ahead, confronting him with a dagger in each hand.

    I told you to give it up!

    The daggers instantly vaporized the moment they made contact with the aura protecting Benimaru. It made Gruecith freeze in his tracks, just enough to let Benimaru catch him, pick him up with a single left hand, and hurl him against the ground. There was a dull thudding sound as cracks appeared in the earth. Blood flowed from his head.

    It was the first demonstration of Benimarus force I had seen in a while, and it was on apletely different level from his opponent. Without even really trying, he had victory in hand from the start. But Gruecith refused to give up, springing right back to his feet.

    Ngh But Im still

    Pfft. Enough of this nonsense. If you continue to resist me, I will be forced to kill you, you understand?

    He tried lifting Gruecith again, a look of resignation on his face.

    Benimaru, stop!

    It was then that I finally shouted and put an end to this.

    Noticing me, Benimaru promptly let Gruecith go, and he fell to his knees, the aura flowing out of himing to an instant stop, and the intensity in the air faded. Geld and the rest of the audience did the same, celebrating my returnbut Yohm and Gruecith needed attending to first.

    Benimaru, what is going on here?

    Well, my lord

    He ran down the story for me as I had the two injured drink some potion. As he put it, a group of people disguised as merchants attempted to attack the town. They were quite a bit more powerful than expected, creating some serious chaos. Then, he said, we were no longer able to use magic, and we could feel the strength ebb from us. Thanks to that, the people in town were

    Sir Benimaru!

    Rigurd shouted down Benimaru before he could finish. They exchanged nces with each other as Benimaru awkwardly nodded.

    Let us discuss thatter Regardless, however, we were weakened thanks to whatever magic that woman over there cast.

    Geld nodded deeply at this, telling me about how he tracked down this caster and attempted to capture her. Yohm got in his way, and they were forced to fight it out. The rest of Yohms force was not involved; they were still confined in their barracks for the time being. Things had definitely gotten a lot sourer than I thought.

    Just then, a rejuvenated Yohm threw himself down at my feet.

    Rimuru, man, Im sorry! I had no intention whatsoever of betraying you. All I wanted to do was protect Mjurrans life!

    Mjurran, the mystery woman who had simply looked on dejectedly so far, stepped forward. Enough, Yohm, she said, looking a bit sadsomber and perhaps afraid of losing something dear to her. Just go ahead and abandon me. Theres no need for you to be involved, too.

    Please, Sir Rimuru, Gruecith added, simrly prostrating himself before me. I fully understand that, as your guest, I have no right to speak about this. But still Please, could you at least hear her out?

    Benimaru and the others looked disgusted at this, but my return had at least calmed them somewhat. Geld was normally coolheaded; as freaked out he was, it must have been something pretty deep But I couldnt make any decisions on this until I heard the whole story. Best to get both sides of this , I thought as Mjurran quietly spoke once more.

    No, Yohm. No, Gruecith. I have no right to be protected by you. Who can say how much this town has lost, thanks to me? I was the one who engineered this tragedy

    Rigurd winced at this. Benimaru averted his eyes. Kaijin just closed his and stood there awkwardly. This tragedy? It did seem like something was being hidden from me, yes

    Um, what do you mean by tragedy?

    The silence my question conjured hung heavy until Mjurran stepped forward. Geld warily sized her up, requiring me to stop him.

    Follow me, she said as she boldly walked off, apparently ready to ept all responsibility for the crime shemitted. There was something beautiful about it, in a way. She was headed for the za in the middle of town, the ce theyd tried to keep me from reaching earlier.

    There, before my eyes, was an untold number of monsters on the groundmen, women, even children. I approached them. Every single one of themid down there

    was dead.

    How the hell did this happen?!

    I felt my legs go weak. Whats going on here? Damn, my minds racing on me. There was about a hundred of them on the ground. Huh? And theyre all dead?

    Youre kidding me!!

    I heard one of the hobgoblin elders speak as I tried to take it all in.

    We followed your wishes, Sir Rimuru, and treated the merchants with kindness and civility. We had no idea there was evil among their ranks

    S-silence! Rigurd shouted. You make it sound as if Sir Rimuru is at fault!

    It was toote. The words battered harshly against my mind.

    II apologize. I had no intention of that

    I could hear the apology from afar, but my heart wasnt open to it.

    He was right. My orders, my words, were the cause.

    I may be a monsterbut I used to be a human being. I just wanted to be nice to people. Now, realitys setting in.

    So what the hells the right thing to do, then?!

    Who knows? Thats what Im supposed to figure out.

    My irresponsible mind attacked me incessantly, but I couldnt let it dictate my actions. This was my fault, and it was up to me to shoulder the consequences. It felt like a torrent of regret, a wellspring of anger with no ce to go, was gushing out of me. It was hard to think. I felt like I was breathing more rapidly, even though I didnt need to breathe in the first ce. I had no physical heart, but I could still sense it racing.

    It just didnt seem like reality. I almost sttered against the ground, unable to retain my human form. But that wasnt allowed. All I could do was grasp the situation and make sure I didnt pile mistake on top of mistake.

    What is? What happened here?

    My voice was far away, cold and remote. It felt like all emotion in my mind had frozen.

    If I hadnt cast a great magic, Mjurran said as I attempted to stay on my feet, Im not sure any of this would have happened.

    So this womansthe cause of it? And thats why Benimaru was so riled up?

    Ive got to clear my head!!

    Report. Great Magic: Anti-Magic Area does not weaken its targets in and of itself. In terms of a cause, it is believed the people who the individual Soei was investigating are more relevant.

    My mind echoed with the voice of my partner, someone never swayed by emotion.

    No, but Right. Calm down. This woman Mjurran was attempting to rile me up to the point that Id kill herand only her. She was diverting me away from Yohm and Gruecith. I knew that, as long as I could keep my head cool

    Giving in to my rage and killing Mjurran wouldnt solve anything. Itd just be venting my anger.

    It was only thanks to the Great Sage that I didnt make another mistake.

    Thus we decided to get ourselves together and discuss matters somewhere else. On the way, I asked Rigurd if there were any other victims.

    No, my lord, he said, we assembled all of them here. There are other injured, but Lady Shuna is taking care of them.

    I was wondering why Shuna wasnt around, actually. That exined it. Our potion storage was all concentrated in the cave, so she was probably using her own healing magic for the job.

    Should I give them some potion, then?

    N-no, I dont think thats necessary. I hate to put it like this, but our attackers were rather formidable And surprisingly few people emerged only with injuries.

    In other words, they were all killed off in one shot. I could feel my angering back. Cant have that. I need to stay calm.

    All right. Lets talk this over first.

    Once we were all in the meeting hall and a bit more rxed, I received my briefing. I put my mind to work, even as the shock made the whole thing feel like an out-of-body experience.

    The first attackers were a trio who targeted Gobzo and got him into a conflict. That dopey face of his definitely made him look like an easy mark, and I bet it didnt take much to shout him into submission. Not that it was his fault, but he sure was unlucky to have this riffraff notice him.

    The conflict seemed to make Gobzo look like the bad guy, but Gobta stepped in to resolve it quickly. What happened next was the problemthat was when the attackers revealed their full strength and conflict began in earnest. They were astonishingly strong, it seems, enough so to even give Hakuro a run for his money when he stepped into the fray. From how it was described to me, at least, they were the real deal.

    If he hadnt been weakened, grumbled Benimaru, Hakuro would never have been defeated.

    He and Gobta were injured in the midst of all this, and now that made sense to me. They avoided death only because they gave their all in the fight. Im sure neither of them was a fan of being told they lost, but if they survived, that was all that mattered. I was having Soei check out the energy-sapping barrier. Hed provide a report before long, no doubt, and all wed have to do then was deal with that and take on the next fight fully prepared.

    After that, Rigurd continued, a group of one hundred regr knights from the Kingdom of Farmus visited town. The attackers requested help from them, and the knights agreed, stating they would take on the task under thews of humanity and the name of divinity. They refused to listen to our words. It was all too one-sided.

    As he put it, the head of the knights shouted, We came here to investigate reports of a nation of monsters, and what manner of chaos do I find?! In the name of humanity, we promise to provide aid to our defenselessrades! Then they all drew their swords and joined in the fracas, attacking both the monster soldiers and the residents looking on. This included children, indicating that they saw us as little more than animals.

    Id told them to try their best not to be aggressive against human beings, and I guess that put them at a big disadvantage. It took time for Benimaru, Geld, and the rest to tackle the threat in earnest. We should have made them give up their weapons before entering town, Benimarumentedbut theres no way these guys would do something like that of their own volition and without an order from me.

    I figured they would contact me via Thought Communication about anything like that, and I paid dearly for that error. In the end, the cause all goes back to me.

    One of the Farmus knights left a message before leaving. It went like this:

    This town is contaminated by the presence of monsters! As protectors of thew of humanity and as faithful followers of the One God Luminus, we refuse to acknowledge the existence of a monster nation! We have therefore signed an official pact with the Western Holy Church to consider how to deal with this country! We will return one week from today,manded by our leader himself, the wise and noble King Edmaris. If you surrender and agree to fall under our rule, then by the name of our god, we will guarantee your continued existence. Give up your pointless resistance and surrender at once. If you do not, then in the name of Luminus, we will eradicate all of you from the face of the Earth!

    It was clear they didnt care at all about what we would do. Soei had already reported that the country was preparing for a military operation. All that stuff about investigating our nation was a big lie. Maybe they were doing that, but they had already decided that wiping us off the was the only option.

    What a charade.

    It certainly is. Rigurd nodded.

    I recalled what Hinata had said: Your town, you know Its a bother to us. So weve decided to crush it. Farmus and the Western Holy Church must have been conspiring against us from the start. Instead of one taking advantage of the other, I imagined they teamed up because they shared amon interest.

    So I told everyone about my battle with Hinata and the words we exchanged.

    The head of the pdins?

    Wow, boss. Nice job surviving that.

    Benimaru and Rigurd seemed unfamiliar with the woman, but Kaijin and the dwarven brothers were fully aware of her, and my story gave them a shock. Considering the dealings theyve sustained with monsters, the Dwarven Kingdom and the Western Holy Church werent really on good termsnot bad enough that they were off to war tomorrow but more like each pretending that the other didnt exist. They did keep some tabs on each other, though, as any nations would.

    Really, Kaijin said, even with the full might of the Dwargon military, itd be a bad idea to make the Western Holy Church your enemy. But the Dwarven Kingdom is built kind of like a natural fortress, and they carefully check everyone who goes in and out of it. Its that kind of protection that makes it hard for the Church to dere them an enemy of god or whatnot. They both have a lot of history, though, and theyve had hostilities in the past.

    I figured the Western Holy Church had it in for us because it saw monsters as these horrid things that could never be abided. But what about Farmus?

    Sir Rimuru, a tentative voice said, about that

    This was Gard Mjllmile, the merchant I met when he helped with our firstrge-scale potion sale; he had listened in silence up to now, seated alongside a few other merchants and adventurers. I had called in several people from the kingdom of Blumund so I could get a second opinion on all this; I just wanted to learn the truth, so I decided having them listen in wasnt a big deal. It seemed to pay off, as nobody in the hall suspected us of being anything besides the victims here.

    The rest of our visitors currently in town were being cared for in the guesthouse. The fact that none of them was hurt was the only silver lining, really. Rigurd suggested it, figuring that the ornateness of the ce would calm their frayed nerves. I love how much I can count on him. Its a far cry from his goblin days, definitely.

    Ah, Mjllmile. Go ahead.

    I tried to address him as informally as possible. All of our other leadersBenimaru, Rigurd, Geldwere still seething with anger, so the atmosphere in the hall was rather taut. I was pretty emotionally spent myself, making it hard to be my usual open-minded self. I knew it was a bad thing, but I couldnt shake out of that cycle. It was no doubt rubbing off on Mjllmile, making him oddly silent.

    I know this is heartbreaking for all of you, but with the situation being what it is, I felt the need to speak up.

    I appreciated the thought.

    At this point, we have a brand-new trade route that runs through Tempest. It has already begun to change the way merchants distribute their goods. It is still not broadly known about outside of Blumund and its neighboring nations, but once word begins to spread, it will be known across the Western Nations in the blink of an eye. As a result

    As a result?

    Well, I imagine it wouldnt be out of the question for someone to think about conquering this nation before word gets out.

    As Mjllmile put it, any perceptive leader wouldnt fail to understand the importance of this trade route. The ie from tariffs alone would be a likely fortune. That, and Farmusthe gateway to the Western Nations, as it werewas prospering in no small part thanks to just that kind of ie. If a new trade route opened here, Farmus stood to lose the most from it.

    To them, no doubt, they didnt want any of this to exist; theyd have no effective way to stop people froming here instead of there. Youd figure the best way to tackle that was to shore up their own infrastructure and make travel easier, but that required a vast amount of money. Building roads from scratch took time as well. There was no ready response they could take.

    I didnt intend to be the kind of leader who pursued only what was best for Tempest, ignoring how other countries profited or lost from it. If we were seeking to coexist with the rest of the world, I figured, I wanted everyone to profit from us. But I was still such an amateur at this. Theres no way I could perfectly understand how this world was connected, and I must have stepped on the tails of one too many tigers here.

    Indeed, stated a merchant whose name I didnt know, the king of Farmus is notorious for his greediness. Even if he didnt take a military solution, I could see him looking at the profits being made here and reaching out for a slice.

    Thats a good point, I replied. Im not a genius at this, but even I think this approach is a little strange.

    It is. Taking action like this, without going through the Council

    As an adventurer, I cant say how Blumunds gonna respond to this, but this move on Farmuss part makes no sense to me. Pulling such an obvious trick and attacking women and children, even

    Yeah. We like this ce, you know? And if theyre gonna attack in a week, Im willing to help if youre fighting back.

    But the Church called you all enemies of their god? Thats not exactly good news.

    Mjllmiles observation opened the floodgates for more feedback from the merchants and adventurers. I appreciated all the helpful advice. It really felt like they were looking out for usin other words, unlike the Farmus knights who dismissed us as monsters, these people really saw us as their friends. The fact that some of them were even willing to take up arms for us surprised me quite a bit. I thanked them for the sentiment but turned them down. The reason was simple: I didnt want to get them caught up in this.

    I appreciate how all of you feel, Rigurd said, but this is a problem that we need to wrap up by ourselves. What I want you to do instead is return to your nativends and spread the word about this as quickly as possible.

    Oh? We could just send out a wagon.

    Staying here might not be a good idea for all of you, though

    How do you mean?

    I exined it to them. Maybe I was overthinking matters, but the worst-case scenario in my head seemed all too believable. The way I saw it, Farmus and the Western Holy Church no doubt wanted to dere to everyone in the Western Nations that Tempest was a den of evil. If and when they did, having our local residents advocating for us would be a hindrance to the propaganda effort.

    If Blumund wasnt siding with them, would Farmus consider residents like these just a hindrance? Because if they did spread the word, Farmuss act would be notorious nationwide. The Council might even pursue the matter. How would Farmus prevent that? Well, they were the type of nation to make militaristic threats from the get-go instead of negotiating. To them, the hundred-ish Blumundian residents here meant nothing. Theyd kill them, make sure they could never talk, and maybe even me it on us. Itd help further the impression that we were a ferocious threat, and itd provide the Holy Church just what it wanted. Two birds with one stone.

    Thats why I wanted them all back in their native nations and pleading our case for us. They were the best character witnesses we could ask for.

    I see. So were lower than dogs in their eyes, eh?

    Killing us and pinning the me on Tempest

    It does sound possible, yes.

    Especially if its a humans word against a monsters, if youll pardon my rudeness.

    But in that case, Rigurd replied, Im not sure how we would transport everyone out of here. I would like to lend you guards, but in essence, were pinned to within our own borders for now.

    It was a valid question, and I already had an answer for it.

    Thats no problem. Id like all of you to go back to your quarters and prepare to leave for now. I promise safe passage to the outskirts of Blumund.

    Then I began my own preparations. The Blumundians were con fused, Im sure, but they followed my request without further questions and filed back to the guesthouse.

    So. Time to switch gears. Rigurd and Benimaru briefed me on the attack; our Blumundian guests exined their position and opinions. Now it was time to speak to the woman herself: Mjurran, who had sat silently and watched up to now.

    All right, I began. Can you exin in detail, please, about the events that led to your meddling with our nation?

    She exined in a calm voice. I am one of the five fingers, the closest servants of the demon lord yman. As his nickname Marite Master hints, he uses his subordinates like puppets, making them do exactly what he wants. I am one of those puppets. He assigned me to spy on this nation, and I used Yohm to gain entry into it.

    She went on in detail. It sounded like the cold, hard truth to me, no lying or excuses mixed in. yman, it seemed, was the kind of boss who used and abused the crap out of those under him. Mjurran was the so-called ring finger of the group. She used to enjoy a position of favor, providing essential information to yman on a variety of subjects, but now he saw her as used up and not particrly worthy of attention, although he imed he would free her uponpleting this mission.

    Milim told me that yman loved scheming behind the scenes, attempting to outwit his opponents. It sounded about right. I was sure nothing yman did would ever bother Milim very much, but to the magic-born who served him, every day must have been a life-and-death tightrope walk.

    Magic-born like Mjurran served yman for a number of reasons, but most of them were either threatened by or magically bound to him. Her own mission in life was toplete her research and peer into the deepest depths of magic, and she had taken ymans offer for immortality and an eternally young body. In exchange, she had lost herself, living purely to follow ymans orders.

    I know it was stupid of me, she added with a regretful look on her face, but my heart was taken from me with a secret skill known as Marite Heart. I no longer have control over my own destiny, and carrying out his bidding is the only thing I can do.

    So she was just following orders. Apparently, she learned from Gruecith that Milim had dered war on the Beast Kingdom of Eurazania, and she surmised that yman sent her here to keep us from interfering. Now, though, she realized that a mission like that could be carried out simply by blocking magicalmunication; there wasnt any need for this massive (and non-hidable) magic barrier.

    He had said that doing this would guarantee her freedom, but she knew the chances of pulling the job off sessfully were slim. She had to do it anyway, though, or else yman threatened to strike at Yohm and his team. So she decided to take him at his word, that this was hisstmand. She didnt really have any intention of surviving, as she put it; her death would ensure that Yohm and friends wouldnt have to face any consequences.

    Things are starting to grow interesting, yman reportedly said to her in hisst message. Theres going to be an enormous war! Certain unexpected events have led to developments I did not anticipate, but who can say how it will turn out?

    Mjurran had thoughterroneously, as it happenedthat he meant a war between the demon lords Milim and Carillon. Now it looked like he was talking about this conflict, the one between Tempest and Farmus. Which sounded right to me. ymans part in this was to work alongside Farmuss moves and block any outside contact from Tempest. It certainly would be difficult to avoid war that wayand Mjurrans great magic pulled one hell of a job on us. This wasnt just in old jamming magic. It was position-based, and since it was meant to block all contact, it couldnt be easily undone.

    Killing Mjurran at this point wouldnt release the magic. It took time to disappearnearly a week. Even if we wanted help from other countries, magicalmunication didnt work. It would take time to make contact with Blumund or the Dwarven Kingdom without magic. There was just too little time to address Farmus, which already had their boots on the ground.

    We were behind the eight ball here, for sure. But ah well. I can get out from under the barrier, and theres amunication crystal waiting for me in the cave. Thats where ymans n begins to fall apart.

    All the same, I didnt want to get Dwargon or Blumund involved in this. I just wanted people there to be on our side, so to speak. Really, if it wasnt for the Western Holy Churchs involvement, I wouldve had both countries conduct somerge-scale battle exercises or something to keep Farmus in check. With the Church backing them up now, I couldnt get those nations involved for no reason.

    In a war, each side has certain advantages and disadvantages, but each battle is also a test to see how long each side can hold out. If Farmus didnt fall back under threat and continued with their military activity, itd involve Dwargon, Blumund, and the Western Holy Church, turning the whole thing irreversibly into a major war. If the Church dered our allies and us to be their enemies and spread the word across the entire world, I couldnt deny that itd be a world war for all of us. Thats exactly what yman would want; hed naturally use the chaos to carry out some nefarious secret n of his.

    Even if it was Milim against Carillon, I had no way of stopping it. If only my own nation wasnt in so much trouble Although, thats thanks to yman, too. Throwing me into confusion, mixing things up I suppose Ill just have to trust in Milim and put my own priorities first.

    It all made me realize, for the first time, that between what Milim and Mjurran told me, this demon lord yman was one dangerous enemy. It was a hunch, but it seemed to be a correct one. Mjurran told me that Gelmud was one of ymans other agents, toounlike what Milim said, she imed that he was being fully controlled by the demon lord. Any of the other demon lords who worked with yman on that endeavor were being tricked. He had a knack for moving his pawns to the right ce at the right time and never leaving any evidence behind. I couldnt say how strong he actually was, but he was definitely a master at maneuvering under cover.

    Mjurran also suspected that yman was behind the battle between Milim and Carillonbut I didnt have any evidence of that. Someone as, um, straightforward-thinking as Milim could be easily goaded into something like that, its truebut between his misleading words, the careful way he never revealed his true intentions, and the slyness it took to break promises without a second thought, all signs showed that yman was a demon lord who could never be trusted.

    And if you go even further down this rabbit holethe Great Sage suggested that yman might have nned to leave thatmunication crystal in the cave the whole time. You know, just to make me think I outfoxed him and call for reinforcements from my allies. It wasnt an unthinkable scenario, so I filed it away in my mind.

    With Mjurrans story all told, I now knew how we all wound up where we were. Her heart wasnt given back, of course; she was seen entirely as a throwaway piecea mere pawn.

    Whether I would forgive her or not was another question.

    Look, Yohm said, I know youre angry and everything, but I really hope you can let Mjurran off the hook for this!

    I have the same request, Gruecith added, eyes pleading with me. Theres just no way she could defy yman, thats all!

    Turning them down would make me look a bit like a viin, wouldnt it? Now what do I do?

    Ill think about your fate once all this is over. For now, I just want you to stay in your room. Dont think about escaping.

    All right

    Rimuru

    Sorry, Yohm. My minds all mixed up right now, too. If youre worried, you can always stay with your men in their rooms.

    So I saved the question forter and ordered Yohm and his band to remain in their own quarters, asking Rigurd to appoint guards to watch them. I doubted they were going to betray me at this point, but you could never be too careful. I was doing this in part because, if they did try something funny, that would seal Mjurrans fate for good. Yohm, realizing this, agreed to the order and returned to his quarters.

    After all that briefing and interviewing, I went back outside. The visitors from Blumund were milling around, waiting for me.

    Were ready to go, Sir Rimuru, but what should we do, exactly?

    I had them outfitted with all the extra wagons we had in town, so they finished up quicker than I thought. I nodded at them and guided them a little ways outside of town, all one hundred or so of them following me in orderly fashion.

    I wanted to provide guards for them, a repentant-sounding Benimaru said, but none of us can get past this barrier

    Not a problem. Nows not the time to be stingy with my magic. Its gonna take a lot of energy, but Ill figure it out.

    So I left my monster cohorts within the barrier and guided the human visitors past it.

    We will hurry back home as quickly as we possibly can, Sir Rimuru.

    I raised a hand in response. Before that, Mjllmile Can I have everybody here promise to keep what Im about to do a secret?

    Hmm? Mjllmile raised an eyebrow, already well aware of the kind of nonsense I asionally pull off (much to my chagrin). What are you nning to do this time?

    This time? Youre always expecting the worst from me, arent you?

    Ha-ha-ha! No, no, youve provided me with so much, Sir Rimuru!

    Heh. You said it.

    Mjllmile and I pped each other on the shoulder.

    I hope you will keep yourself safe.

    Ah, Ill be fine. Im not a fan of fighting battles I cant win.

    Then I activated Spatial Motion, deploying it across a wide swath ofnd. Everyone looked on in shock. Benimaru and Geld watched from within the barrier, both surprised and exasperated.

    The outskirts of Blumunds about the best I can do for you all. It wontst long, so hurry up and hop in there.

    The visitors nodded at me, faces still frozen in disbelief, as they filed on ahead. None of them asked any more questions, which I appreciated. Magic exists in this worldeveryone knows thatso it takes more than a little pixie dust to really rm these guys.

    I made them promise to spread the word and provide as much support for our cause as they could. But would it have much effect? We were already at war. We couldnt make any really brash movesnot against the Western Holy Church. Theyd have to provide military support if I asked for it, as our pacts with them stipted But I didnt want that, and there wasnt much else they could do as a nation, I dont think.

    Better not expect muchand theres no need to, really. This was our nations problem, and I intended to make the Kingdom of Farmus pay amply for itby my own hand. If I didnt, I knew, Id never have a chance to make up for the anguish all those dead felt.

    I watched our visitors go as I mentally pored over my situation. I had been dyed a bit longer than I thought, but now I decided to help out Shuna with the wounded. Rigurd mentioned an errand or something he wanted done, but I figured he could handle that without me.

    Heading over to the building that served as our hospital, I found two peopleid up in beds, Shuna providing nursing care and Kurobe helping her out.

    How are they looking?

    Oh, Sir Rimuru!

    Sir Rimuru, I dont know what I can say to you

    Shuna looked tired, and Kurobe was a lot more hesitant than usual. I told them to rx a bit as I examined the patients. These were Hakuro and Gobta, both sportingrge and bloodied wounds.

    Whoa, these are some serious sh wounds! Why dont we just use these

    I whipped some potion out of my pocket and sprinkled it on both of them. Nothing in particr happened in the healing department.

    I apologize, Rigurd said, lowering his head. We have already made the attempt. Im afraid we will have to rely on Shunas care

    As leader of our nation, I had to decide on our future direction. I was also responsible for handling the remaining resident visitors from other countries. Thats why Rigurd didnt want to worry me further.

    Hakuro, despite looking like he stepped off a horror movie set, still gave me a smile. Nh Do not concern yourself about me, Sir Rimuru. I am fine. This injury was likely brought about by a skill invoked by the attackers. In time, the skills effects will fade, and I will heal up then. Gobta is a well-trained apprentice of mine; he wont die like a dog over something like this.

    I shouldve expected nothing less from him. It almost made me cry, but I held it back and returned the smile. No way the master of all these monsters could show tears to anyone.

    Ha-ha! Well, d to see your spirits are high, at least. Let me see this wound. Maybe I can do something about it.

    I checked over his body.

    Sir Rimuru, Shuna said, the wound is caused by an air-type attack. We need to keep him stable and full of stamina until it heals naturally over time.

    She had already used her Parser skill to figure out what was up with him. I was of the same opinion as her; it sounded like the right thing.

    Air type, though? That sounded like something I might be able to harness for myself. Ive already analyzed a high-level spirit. Lets see if this works

    Understood. The effects of the air element have been confirmed. Use Glutton to acquire this effect?

    Yes

    No

    The Great Sage followed through more than I expected. I thought YES and sprinkled some more potion on Hakuros wound.

    Oh Ohhh! Amazing, Sir Rimuru

    I left Hakuro to marvel by himself as I attended to Gobta.

    I should have known, Shuna said with a light smileone with just a twinge of gloominess to it. A sort of hmm? level of doubt. And that reminded me

    Or it would have if Gobta didnt choose that moment to leap right out of bed.

    Gobzo! You all right?!

    Hey! Gobta!

    It took Rigurd yelling at him to make him realize where he was. He blinked once or twice.

    Oh wow, soam I good?

    I scoped him out as I decided to ask Shuna about the thing that bothered me just now. Someone I expected to be here with her wasnt present. If she was, Im sure she wouldve been carrying on about me to no end.

    Hey, wheres Shion, by the way? I havent seen hertely

    The question made everybody in the roomRigurd, Shuna, Benimaru, even Hakurofreeze. Whats with that reaction? Whoa, whoa, theres no way

    Dont tell me, I said, that idiots gone to get revenge all by herself?

    Oh man! Gobta nodded warily at me. And maybe Gobzo, too? Hes so absentminded; hes probably running full-speed without realizing how badly outmatched he is

    N-no, its not that Um

    Huh? This was getting weird. Nobody was looking me in the eye.

    Okay, so whered she go?

    No answer. I looked up to find Shuna turning her face away from me, eyes growing watery. I had a bad feeling. Gobta looked just as concerned. No way , I said to myself. That could never happen.

    All right. Im not going to be angry, so can you tell me where she is?

    Very well, Benimaru finally replied. Over here. Follow me.

    I nodded, and we began to move

    Our destination was the central za.

    And there she was, lying right in the middle of the neatly made rows. There was a white cloth covering her, ensuring she wouldnt be easily spottedby me or anyone else. Ha-ha. As if Id just never wonder about where she went It wasnt funny.

    Open your eyes

    I couldnt believe it.

    Open your eyes for me

    I didnt want to believe it. Why? Why did it turn out like this?

    Next to me, I could hear Gobta sobbing and shouting, Gobzooooooooo?! as loudly as he could. I paid him no mind as my ears turned toward the voice providing what sounded like a faraway exnation.

    Shion had been protecting a child targeted by one of the attackers.

    With her own body, weakened by the plummeting magicule level.

    She couldnt move, and then an attacker came

    Gobzo had been trying to protect Lady Shuna.

    He didnt have anywhere near the strength for the job.

    The attacker justughed at him as he swung

    The words were meant for me, but I didnt want to hear them. Each syble gouged its way into my brain. Open your eyes, Shion I wanted to cry, but I couldnt. My heart felt like it was going to burst, but this body didnt feel any need to shed tears.

    Yeah , I thought. I guess I really am a monster. Somehow, it seemed so incredibly convincing now.

    Im sorry. Leave me alone for a little while

    Silence enveloped the za. I could feel everyone edging away from me. Shuna was the only one to give me a tearful hug before she joined them alongside Gobta, Hakuro cing a hand around his shoulders. Sorry, Gobta. I know you just want to say good-bye to Gobzo, but

    Yeah. I wanted to be alone. I no longer had a grip on myself. I felt like I was going insane, but my mind was sharp as a tack. There were tempestuous levels of sadness, regret, and anger, all crashing against one another in a mad contest to find an exit.

    Why did all of this happen?

    Report. Cannot calcte,prehend, or reply.

    What wouldve been the right thing to do?

    Report. Cannot calcte,prehend, or reply.

    Was getting involved with human beings a mistake?

    Report. Cannot calcte,prehend, or reply.

    Come on Was I wrong?

    Report. Cannot calcte,prehend, or reply.

    Thats right. Even with the untold powers of the Great Sage, there were some problems that just didnt have an answer.

    Goddamn it. If this wasnt our town If it wasnt our town, I couldve just flown into a rage, mowing down everything in my path. Goddamn it all. Taking so many people dear to me

    Looking back, this was the first time I was there to see someone close to me die. I had never gone through a loss like that, and now I understood the sadness involved. I felt it vividly, with a pain more intense than being shed ear to ear. Cancel Pain wasnt cutting it for this onenot against the all-too-strong currents of magic and emotion within me.

    It was maybe too much for my new mask. A crack appeared on it, almost looking like a tear of sadness. I couldnt cry, so it seemed like the mask was weeping for me.

    Somewhere down the line, night fell. I gazed at the moon.

    What should I do?

    There was no answer. My mind was clear, but I couldnte up with a single thought. I looked up at the moon and kept asking myself, over and over, for an eternity. Even though I knew there was no way to find an answer. But I couldnt stop. It was so foolish, but I couldnt stop.

    And I never noticed the small light, the reflection from the moon, that was upon me.

    Three days passed. Shion didnt wake up. Shes sleeping in way toote. I wish shed knock that off.

    No, I know. I understood that shed never open those eyes again. But I didnt want to admit it. I wanted her back to her usual stupid antics, making her terrible meals. Gobzo, too. I didnt know him well. We exchanged a few words on the way to the Dwarven Kingdom. But Gobta loved him as a valued sentry. He was his friend.

    All the monsters whoy here had valuable rtionships in their lives. Noit wasnt like these monsterscked any kinds of feelings. They were my most cherishedpanions. My family. I wanted to enjoy life with them againbut it just wasnt going to happen.

    Theres no way to resurrect the dead.

    What do we do?

    Do monsters not count as people? Does that mean well be forced into subjugation without a passing thought as to our own feelings?

    That better mean theyre prepared to be subjugated, too.

    Dark emotions began to get the better of me.

    And just then:

    Report. Analysis and Assessment of thepound barrier and Great Magic: Anti-Magic Area covering it ispleted. Removing thepound barrier will be difficult, but the great magic can be canceled. Execute?

    Yes

    No

    No, we dont need to yet.

    The Great Sage mustve just wrapped up that request for me. As it did, I realized that Thought Communication messages had beening in through the Sticky Steel Thread wrapped around my neck for a while now. I had been contacted almost constantly for the past three days. I made Soei worry for me, which I regretted.

    Sorry. I didnt notice.

    Ah! You are safe? I am so relieved.

    It was clear from Soeis tone of voice. It also made me realize that everyone else must have been just as worried. I could whine and plead to myselfter. We had a time limit, and I had things to do.

    So I asked Soei how things were. Our enemies had set up battle encampments in the four cardinal directions around town, each one holding apanys worth of knights. The magical machinations protecting each one were apparently projecting the same type of barrier that had weakened our townspeople. Sadly, the power of Soei and his team alone wouldnt be enough to take down even one of these camps. He had also detected transportation magic at work; if we wasted time, they might call for reinforcements.

    All right. Dont stretch yourself too thin. Join up with Gabil and rest.

    But

    Thats an order. Rest.

    Yes, my lord.

    I wasnt epting any other reply. I couldnt make Soeis team do something reckless and get them killed as a result. I just couldnt.

    So, about that barrier.

    Simply canceling out the magic wouldnt do anything for us. What I really wanted to do was address the weakening effect it had somehow. Being apound barrier or whatever it was made it a much thornier issue than I had expected.

    But that could wait. What about the other search I had going?

    Report. No search results found. Failed to find any magic rted toplete resurrection of the dead.

    Ah. No, I suppose not. Nothing that handy can be found too easily. It makes sense. You never know for sure, though, until you check. As pointless as I thought it was, as useless a struggle as it must have looked, I couldnt stop myself.

    Shion didnt open her eyes. Neither did Gobzo nor the rest of them. Of course they wouldnt. They werent sleeping.

    But I still put all my skills in motion to find some kind of measure I could take. All the bodies here, Shions included, were being preserved by my magical forceto keep them from dposing, from reverting back into piles of magicules and disappearing. I knew it was pointless, but I was still betting on the possibility.

    But nothing.

    There were no resurrection spells in the magic books I scanned through back at that library. I guess there wouldnt be. I had to stop grieving like this. Lets just give them the rest they deserve in my body, as I pray theyll wake up someday.

    With that decided, I prepared to absorb them and thats when my Magic Sense told me about several figures approaching.

    It was the trio of Kabal and his friends. It made sense. With the order I gave, itd have to be someone from out of town if anyone wasing near me right now. I guess they had been traveling night and day on the wagon I gave them toe here.

    Im sorry werete, boss.

    Rimuru, um, I gotta admit I really dont know what to say here

    Kabal and Gido no doubt wanted to say, Hang on, youll get over this , that kind of thing. Elen stopped them before they could.

    Rimuru, I I cant say this has much of a chance of seeding or, like, any , reallybut there are several fairy tales abouting back from the dead

    Now was no time to be depressed. The statement made all the diverging thought processes in my mind snap back into ce.

    Can you tell me more about them, Elen?

    I turned toward her. If there was any chance, I wasnt about to refrain from betting on it. She nodded and began to speak.

    A story about a girl and her pet dragon.

    Through assorted events, the girls dragon was killed. She grieved over the loss of her only friend, and with her head full of anger, she destroyed the country that had carried out the killingalong with several hundred thousand people who lived there.

    The girl evolved into a demon lord, and then a miracle urredthe dragon connected to the girl evolved right alongside her, regardless of its death. But that was the end of the miracle. The dragon had lost its soul at the moment it died, and as a result, it revived in the form of a chaos dragon. It still followed its masters orders but now brought nothing but death and destruction to everyone else.

    Thus, no longer driven by anger, the demon lord shed tears for her pet, her best friend, as she sealed away the chaos dragon herself. Thats where the story ends.

    Elens story was a fairy tale, but it had a suspicious amount of detail to it. There were also stories about vampires using a spell called Bloodraise, as well as necromancers using Raise Dead on the dead to make them their servants. The Great Sage picked up on those, too, but it wasnt what I was looking for. It changed the target too much, making them into a different person from when they were alive.

    In the realm of holy magic, there was something called Resurrection, the so-called miracle of the godsbut there were tons of restrictions on it. It was no panacea. And whats more, all these magics (except for Bloodraise, which was species specific) were treated as forbidden spells, passed on strictly orally and never written into a book.

    But that didnt matter. The issue was that evolve thing. Monsters evolved all the time here, for reasons that were beyond me. Just giving them a name was a huge deal to them. Maybe there was some potential there? Maybe if I could just be a demon lord myself

    just as that girls pet evolved and revived itself

    But I didnt want creepy, soulless minions on my hands. And not even the Great Sage could use its analysis tools to determine whether their souls were still there or not.

    Buthang on? Right now, this town waspletely covered by a barrier that no monsters can go through. Maybe thats keeping their souls in here, too, preventing them from flying to the four winds.

    Understood. The chances of the souls of the individual Shion and the rest of the monsters being preserved within this space is  3.14 percent.

    Whoa! Its pi!

    Well, okay, maybe not quite. It felt like a low number to me, but I had to think about it the other way around. It needed to feel like a big one. I mean, over a 3 percent chance of literally being able to resurrect someone. Plus, theres no way someone as tenacious as Shion or as dopey as Gobzo could die. I couldnt let it happen. They had to be doggedly clinging to this world, waiting for my help.

    Now I had some hope. Next, I just had to carry it out. Of course, that assumed I could even be a demon lord, of course

    Understood. You currently satisfy the requirements for evolving into the demon lord type. In order to carry out evolution into a true demon lord, the process must be nourished with the sacrifices of at least ten thousand humans.

    Oh, thats it? Well, easy, then. Demon lord? Oh, Im totally bing a demon lord. Way simpler process than I thought. Hopefully all those garbage troops around the outskirts of town number at least ten thousand. But hell, if there arent enough, Ill just add some more. If it brings Shion and everyone else back, I have absolutely no reason to waver.

    Then I came back to my senses.

    Thanks for telling me about that, Elen. Are you sure about what youre saying, though? I mean, youre basically telling me to be a demon lord.

    I looked at her. She stared down at the ground silently, but just for a moment as she made up her mind. She returned my gaze, face resolute.

    Well, you know, Ie from the Sorcerous Dynasty of Thalion, and You know, I really looked up to adventurers and the freedom they had. But you know what? Im done. I want to help out Shion, too, besides. I cant let Farmus and the Western Holy Church get away with what theyve done. I hate people who think monsters are evil just because theyre monsters. I know that telling you about this isnt something I can ever go back on, buuut I dont know. Its just terrible, I think, leaving things like this.

    And with that, she went on to exin that continuing to be adventurers would put undue strain on the Free Guild, so she wanted to change her bands home to our nation. Live here, even, if possible.

    Elens real name was Ellwyn, apparently, and she came from a noble family in Thalion. After being trained at the royal academy, she left the country in search of an adventuring career.

    The confession made Kabal shake his head silently and Gido turn upward toward the sky, eyes closed. Ah well, Kabal said. If thats what thedy wants, youll see noints from me as her bodyguard.

    Me neither. Guess itll be Lady Elen from now on, huh?

    The other two, it turned out, werent exactly standard adventurers, either. Upon further questioning, Kabal and Gido revealed that they had followed Elen out of Thalion to serve as her personal guards. They were also good friends, obviously, given how they trusted her without question just now. Talk about a great trio. I was a little jealous of them.

    So, um, probably, when you be a demon lord, Rimuru, its gonna be totally obvious pretty quickly that I tipped you off. Thalions spy agency already knows that Im involved with you, so it wont take long for them to connect the dots. Soyou know. Until then, I want to help you out as much as I can here. I want to see how it all works out in the end.

    She knew she wouldnt be living a life of adventuring freedom for much longer. And she wanted to spend thatst bit of freedom here.

    All three of them looked at me, faces stern. If I allowed them to live here, it might force me to tangle with Thalion in the future. I didnt know what kind of impact their reaction would have on us, but they couldnt just ignore one of their nobility in the custody of a foreign nation. It didnt seem like she was in any real danger, though, and all she wanted right now was to be around for this battle I wasnt exactly sure what I thought about it, but it was a question we could safely save forter.

    All right. Well, lets leave that for the future. Id kind of like to avoid making any more enemies than I need to

    Oh? Aw, but its all right if I stick around long enough to see if you can save Shion, isnt it?

    All right. Youre the one who tipped me off. You can stick around until its over. But you realize that my bing a demon lord might change me. I may even wind up attacking you guys. I cant take responsibility for it if I do, but are you okay with that?

    Hmm I wouldnt like that too much, no, but a little toote to worry about that now! Ill just have to believe in you, Rimuru!

    Whoa! Is that how much were involved now? Hoo boy. A little toote, indeed!

    Thats right, Gido. A little toote for that. Thats Lady Elen for you, isnt it? Its always like this with her.

    The two bodyguards sighed. It didnt seem to harm their loyalty at all, though.

    Thanks to all this, I finally had a n. I could save Shion, and Gobzo, and all the rest! And if it meant bing a demon lord, then I was all in. The enemy forces were attacking in four days. I had a firm grasp of the situation. Now it was time to take action.

    With the decision made, things could proceed faster now.

    Step one was keeping all these monsters souls from dissipating. For that, I adjusted the great magic Id acquired with Analyze and Assess and used it to strengthen the barrier around town. It wasnt clear exactly how much longer Mjurrans magic wouldst, and I was afraid itd flip off like a light switch and send their souls flying. It cost me a surprisingly vast among of magicules, but it was nothing I couldnt deal with now.

    If anything,pared to the utter despair up until yesterday, I was practically ted. Good thing I thought to analyze that barrier, even though I didnt see much of a point. That connected everything together really well, opening up our big chance to get Shion and the rest back.

    My casting that great magic sent Benimaru and the others running toward me in shock, of course.

    Sir Rimuru, what have you?

    Benimaru, get everybody together here! Im gonna hold a conference to outline our future ns!

    Wha?! Yes, my lord!

    They ran right back off, my orders putting a spring in their step.

    Elen, Kabal, Gido Im sorry I made you guys worry. Im a lot better now.

    Rimuru

    I smiled at Elen as I ced my cracked mask back in my pocket. The show seemed to relieve them a little, too.

    If theres anything we can do to help, Elen said, just say it!

    Heh-heh! Yeah, youve been a big help to us. Now its our turn to step up!

    You said it, Kabal!

    It made me happy, hearing that. I appreciated it, but I didnt want the trio actively participating in the war for me. Id have them exin the situation one more time at the conference, though. I wanted all of us, not just me, working together.

    All right, I said before leaving them. Would you guys mind joining me in the conference, then? Ive got something to handle in the meantime.

    I then walked directly toward the quarters being used by Yohm and his team. Yohm looked flustered to see me as I walked in the door.

    R-Rimuru?!

    Ive decided upon Mjurrans punishment, Yohm. Where is she?

    Um, resting upstairs, but

    The word punishment disquieted him even further. I felt bad about it, but what I had in mind just wasnt something I could tell him. Not yet.

    The moment I was up the stairs, I faced Mjurran and spoke.

    Mjurran, youre going to die for me.

    Hey?! I heard Yohm yelp. I ignored him. Mjurran looked at me, eyes full of surprise, but gave me a resigned nod. She was prepared for this eventuality.

    Sir Rimuru, that

    Gruecith tried to cut me off, but I wasnt about to let him. Then Yohm stood between her and me.

    Well, Im sorry, pal, but Im here to protect her!

    He knew he had no chance at all, but he still tried to resist me. Hes such a nice guy that way. I mean it.

    So I bound both him and Gruecith in Sticky Steel Thread.

    Rimuru, please !!

    Mjurran gave them a light smile. I loved you, Yohm. Youre the first person Ive fallen for in all my life. If theres such a thing as reincarnation, I hope I can live together with you in my next life, so Good-bye, then. Try not to fall for a bad woman next time, all right?

    Another smile, and then she closed her eyes. I love that resolve. You dont see women as good as her too often. To be honest, this act was making me feel tremendously guilty But hey.

    So, without hesitation, I plunged my hand right through Mjurrans chest in a chopping motion. Her head lurched forward, powerless, as Yohm and Gruecith screamed their heads off. Thenwith a look of utter confusion and puzzlement on her faceshe opened her eyes again.

    Um Im not dying. That didnt even hurt.

    Well, yeah. I know I said shed die for me, but I wasnt nning on killing her. You hear stories about people dying anding back to life all the time, dont you? I had a bunch of people I needed alive again, Shion included, and I figured Id try my luck at padding the probabilities a little here.

    Oh, um, yeah. You were dead, for maybe, oh, three seconds?

    Huh?

    Wha?

    What does that mean?

    Report. The individual Mjurrans pseudo-heart has begun regr operation.

    Nice. Came off without a hitch. With the Sages confirmation, I removed my hand from Mjurrans chest.

    Well, the operations a sess, I guess, so let me exin what I did. You dont have to look at me like that , guys. Have a seat and kick back if you want.

    Whoa, pal, what kinda crazy talk are you giving me?

    There better be a good exnation for this, Gruecith grumbled. Look at them! Crying just a moment ago and now whining andining. Mjurran, meanwhile, was just as calm as always.

    Shut up , guys! Mjurrans gonnaugh at you if you keep carrying on like that. So the deal is, the temporary heart inside Mjurran was being used so yman could listen in on her. Its a form of encryptedmunication that runs on electric signals and natural maism, so it doesnt use up any magicules at all.

    In essence, alongside providing a pulse and electrical signals for the body, her heart also emitted encrypted signals that ran across the Earth and made it all the way to yman. He was forcing her to file detailed reports with him anyway, just to make sure she never noticed.

    It was an underhanded trick worthy of a demon lord. Those rumors about how he treated his staff were true. But you had to hand it to him, too. If he was pulling something simr with all his people, thats a vast amount of encoded information he was receiving and unraveling in his head. No wonder they called him the Marite Master. Its that hugework of data he collected that served as the invisible strings on his puppets.

    Funny coincidence that I managed to notice that. Or maybe not so much actually. You could call it proof that Shions still helping me out. When I cast that great magic to prevent all those souls from fading out, the Great Sage discovered an all-electronic signal that the barrier reacted to. It was easy for it to decipher the coded message, so I figured I could just use that device to fool yman into thinking I killed Mjurran.

    And so it was all just a prank on my part! Sorry!

    Just a prank?! God damn , pal!!

    Whoa, Yohm! It wasnt something he could deal with that easily! I mean, thats the whole secret behind the demon lord ymans power! Something nobody else knows about!

    And now theyre carrying on again. What a pain.

    But lets not sweat the details, all right, guys? So! Mjurran! Guess there is such a thing as reincarnation, huh?

    What?

    It was at that moment that Mjurran finally realized the curse upon her life had been lifted.

    Youre a free woman now, Mjurran. Well, sort of. Before that, I have one favor to ask.

    She turned toward me, still not fully cognizant of what was going on. Say anything. If you wish me to swear my loyalty, I will, dly.

    Nah, thats fine. Actually, it turns out theres a possibility that we can resurrect Shion and all the othersjust like how you died and came back, you see? And I want you to help me pull that off.

    Huh?

    Resurrect?

    How? Gruecith asked. Raising the dead isnt even possible for high-level magic-born like me.

    Its just a hypothetical for now. But Im gonna make it happen.

    Yep. Just a chance. But I couldnt ever allow myself to mess it up. Id do everything I could to boost my chances, and to do that, I needed Mjurran.

    But, I said, if I do pull that off, whatll you do after that?

    Well I may be free, but if Im limited to an all-too-short human life from now onmaybe I dont mind being a little confined after all.

    She gave Yohm a look that made him blush in the most darling fashion. Her own cheeks reddened a bit. I had to feel bad for Gruecith, though. He had been turned down, pure and simple.

    Cmon, cheer up!

    Dont give me that smile of yours! he protested. Besides, Yohms human, so hell live maybe a hundred years. After that, its my turn!

    What the hellre you talking about? Was that the dirty kinda crap you were thinking of, you deranged wolf man?!

    Shut up! If you dont like it, just try to outlive me!

    You dog turd! You can howl all ya want, but would your master Carillon even allow that?!

    Ha! Lord Carillons a generous leader. Hes asked me to broaden my horizons here. My loyalties are with him, but its not like Im forced to stay in the Beast Kingdom, yknow!

    How is something like that okay?!

    Shut up !

    Actually, I take back what I said. I just lost my head for a moment there.

    Oh,e on , Mjurran!

    It was a pretty chaotic scene, but it did make the smile return to my face a little, too. Id offer more of a celebration if it was any other time, but right now wasnt it. I braced myself and returned to my other main priority.

    By the way, Yohm, Ive got a favor to ask of you, too

    Say it! Ill do whatever you want, pal!

    Good. I figured hed say that. I was kind of counting on it, and that was why I helped out Mjurran. I wasnt usually as calcting as this, but ah well. I couldnt afford to make any mistakes here. So:

    I need you to be a king for me.

    Yohm gave the offhand remark a puzzled look as I exined.

    Basically, it was like this: We were going to kill the entire army attacking us. That was a must, and I wasnt going topromise on that. That led to the next questionwhat to do with Farmus. Should we kill all the people in that country? No, there was no reason for that. I mean, I wouldnt hesitate to if I didnt have enough sacrifices to be a demon lord yet, but lets just concentrate on their military first.

    Soei had reported that their total number likely did exceed ten thousand. That, honestly, was a huge relief. Kind of funny to be thanking the enemy for providing such a huge force. If it was a given that wed kill em all, there was no reason to go easy on them. That made things simpler for me. I didnt want to hurt any civilians, as much as I could, so having a nice big crowd of career soldiers to work with served my needs well.

    So what would happen once this army was annihted and I was a demon lord? That was the problem. If Farmus kept attacking me, I would have to kill them, but if possible, I would like to arrange an armistice somewhere along the line. Everyone in the Kingdom of Farmuss executive levels of government would die, though. They had to take responsibility. Of course, that meant the central core of government would be wiped outand thatd put the people in a bind.

    You see? And thats where youe in.

    I gave Yohm a domineering look. His role, in essence, would be to clean up the rotten government. Id kill anyone who came out of the country, and hed take care of the garbage left inside it. Hed also lead the people and take on a role as the new kingand then wed build formal rtions with each other.

    Heh. You make it sound so easy. I mean, me, a king?

    It is easy. I mean, hell, Im a king. You oughtta try it out, too.

    King, demon lord, same thing.

    Yohm, SirRimuru believes you can do it. I promise youll have my full backup, so why dont you inject a little excitement in your life?

    Mjurran apparently wasnt a fan of boring men. Her words pushed Yohm forward.

    Ill help out, too, Yohm.

    Uh, werent you busy waiting for me to die a moment ago, Gruecith?

    Ha-ha! Whatre you talkin about? Like I said, just outlive me and youll be fine.

    Pfft. All right. You got me. Im signin on to this thing!

    He nodded firmly at me as we shook hands over it. Something told me we were gonna get along just fine.

    We could work out the details once this was all over. First, I had to be a demon lord. I had to get Shion and the others back alive. When a lifes lost, it neveres back, but they werent lost yet. There was a chance.

    Im an atheist. I dont think theres a God, or a god, out there. Right now, though, I was willing to pray. Pray to the figure that controlled all miracles. Before, Id probablyugh at senseless stuff like that. And maybe it was senseless. But, you know, while Im praying, I feel like I can believe in it. I can believe that Shion is all right.

    That glint of moonlight illuminated me, flickering faintly in seeming approval of my prayer.

 Volume 5 - Ch 4

    THE BIRTH OF A DEMON LORD

    I headed for the meeting hall, Yohm in tow, once I heard that all my people had quickly gathered there.

    As I stepped inside, the entire Tempest government currently in town was waiting for me, strained looks on their faces. Gabil and Soei were still on standby in the cave, but Soei was connected to me via the Sticky Steel Thread trick, and I figured he was monitoring the audio.

    Sorry I left you guys in the lurch for so long. Were here to convene a meeting over resurrecting Shion, Gobzo, and everybody else!

    The deration made the hall stir. They were happy to see me back to my old charismatic self, and now they had hope that there was something to be done. It kindled a me in each of their eyes. Not one of them expressed a single doubt. Shion and Gobzo wereing back, and it was time to move.

    Now, before I give you my own ideas, I would like to hear your opinions about the Kingdom of Farmus and about humans in general.

    I received a great deal of feedback very quickly. The majority of them were in agreement with me on one key point: There would be no forgiveness for the humans who had yed that cowardly trick on us. They were right to feel that way, no doubt about it. Some of them, however, also said not to treat all humans the same, that there were a lot of good ones out there as well. I was happy to hear that. All this anger, fear, and hatred threatened to drive us away from the goal we needed to seek.

    Even after all of this, they still faithfully adhered to the advice I had for them. These monsters considered very seriously the idea of living alongside mankind. I had to love these guys for it. They were precious to me, like family. I never really loved anyone before, so putting it that way sounds kind of fakey to me still, but

    I waited for everyone to settle back down before I continued.

    Right. Listen to me, all of you.

    I felt all eyes upon me as I began.

    I myself am a former human being. I was reincarnated, as it were.

    This caused a littlemotion, but nobody spoke up. Shuna, Ranga, and probably Shion already knew, I believed. I didnt take great pains to hide it, and I think I mightve even mentioned it offhand to them at some point. Judging by the looks of surprise on many of my audiences faces, though, word must not have gotten around.

    I lived as a human in the same world that the so-called otherworlderse from. I died over there, and then I was reborn here as a slime. It was pretty lonely at first and deste, but even someone like me managed to make friends here. By friends, I mean you. Its possible that all of you became closer to human with your evolutions because of my own hopes, for all I know.

    I paused to gauge the response. Everyone was intently listening to me, nobody expressing any doubts. I kept going.

    I created that rule not to attack humans for that reason. I said I liked humans because I used to be one. And let me assure you, it was not my hope that my rule would cause any of you injury. Im a monster, but I thought that my heart was still human. I wanted to interact with them, and I wound up spending a really long time in human towns and settlements. If only I could have saved those children ande back here sooner

    Then, out of nowhere, I ran out of words. I felt like anything I could say would just sound like a trite excuse.

    No, youre wrong. We were too dependent upon you, Sir Rimuru, assuming you would always be there to protect us. Thats what led to this tragedy, said Shuna, her beautiful eyes fixed on me.

    It pains me, Benimaru added, to have my sister say it before I could. This has been an excruciating lesson for all of us, Sir Rimuru. When we lost our Thought Communication with you, that feeling of invincibility we had crumbled. It made us all feel helpless, deep in our hearts. We were forced to realize that this state of affairs was brought about by ourwell, really, my dropping the ball.

    Wait a moment, Benimaru, Rigur replied. If you put it that way, then I am responsible for the towns security. I am the one most at fault!

    It sounded like both Rigur and the rest of them felt an intense responsibility for this. They all insisted it was their fault, refusing to budge. I quickly put a stop to it.

    Hang on, people. I was chilling out, I let my guard down, and thats what led to this. Plus, as an ex-human, I put too much priority on my own thoughts. I was careless about my standing in this world, and then this happened. I think its all my fault. Im sorry.

    Everyone fell silent, each of them taking my words in their own way. There was a moments pause before Hakuro finally responded.

    You may have put your own thoughts first, Sir Rimuru, but that is not a problem at all. As Sir Benimaru and Lady Shuna stated, all of us dropped the ball. It was our own weaknesses that caused this. We epted this nation from you, and we let those brutes pige it because of our negligence. Am I wrong, everyone?

    A streak of tension crossed the room. All of them immediately nodded their agreement to this. Um. Hmm. Wasnt expecting that. I was worried that people would brand me a traitor, in the worst case, but they were all ignoring my wholeing out as an ex-human. Like, I seemed to be the only one to care at all. I couldnt help but ask:

    Well, no, I mean You dont mind having an ex-human as your leader?

    Huh? You are still you, arent you, Sir Rimuru?

    Sir Rimuru, you are my only master. What you were in your past life seems not to matter much.

    Yeah. What we know for sure is that youre here for us, is all.

    I guess it wasnt anything like a concern from the start.

    Sir Rimuru, Rigurd boldly stated, we all feel the same way about this. None of us cares a bit, so please, do whatever you like. We will follow you all the way!

    I nodded. This really was my home. I felt happy. As long as you were all of one heart, one mind, you could ovee any walleven the one separating human from monster. That much was crystal clear now.

    Kaijin, tearing up a bit as he watched this, steered the topic back to our main issue.

    So let me ask, then: How is Tempest going to deal with humans from now on?

    The room fell silent, eyes focused upon me again. Yeah. That was the problem, wasnt it? The monsters were one thing, but to Kaijin, the other dwarves, Yohm, and Kabal and gang, this was the biggest issue on the table. If I dered myself to be the enemy of all mankind, thatd be a threat to them. I didnt want that, of course.

    First, I said, before I give you my conclusion, let me give you a quick outline of my thoughts. In my old world, there are a couple of different beliefs. Theres one that says humans are inherently good by nature and learn how to perform evil deeds as they grow older. Then theres another that says humans are selfish and evil by default and learn how to do good over time. Basically, people can be good or bad, and humans tend to pick the easier of two options when they have the chance, so if that option leads to evil, they can be bad that way. Just like Farmus did, abandoning all negotiation and throwing around their power.

    I figured I was in the right here. After all, people could be good individually but lean more toward evil when they assembled together as a nation.

    However, it would be a mistake to judge all of mankind as evil. It takes a human to do something as contradictory as working hard to make things easier for themselves. I was the same way, really. And I think that as long as you dont mess up where youre aiming your efforts at, you can make your existence a lot better for yourself. Thats why its so vital to have an environment you can learn inand I want to create that environment. We can educate those wholl befriend us, and well do away with the barriers between people and monsters. That makes for better neighbors, after all, when you understand and help out one another. Doesnt it? Thats the potential I want to believe in

    That was what I thought about humanity. It wasnt that I wanted to make mankind my enemy; I wanted us working hand in hand as a result. But:

    But thats just my hope for the future. If we trust in them unconditionally and run into this kind of situation again, were wasting our time. Thats why Ive concluded that, for the time being, its too early to shake hands with humanity. The most important thing right now is to put on a show of force and make them recognize our presence. We need to build a position where they can no longer afford to ignore us. As it is, were probably being downyed, treated as something they can use and exploit. We had been dealing with nations like Blumund and the Dwarven Kingdom, decent kingdoms that looked out for us, so we forgot about the darker side of being a nation. Even if individual people are good, the moment they form a nation, thats when they expose their cruel fangs to us. Any nation is basically a bunch of weak people grouping together to be stronger, so I guess you cant avoid that if you want to keep all the decent ones protected. Thats exactly why we need a show of force for people like that. My ruling thisnd as a demon lord will make them realize that trying to coerce us with military might will aplish nothing for them. I can keep the other demon lords in check, too, serving as a shield for the other human nations. If we can make them think its better to be with us than against us, thats all I could ask for.

    I took a breath and gauged the reaction. Even the normally clownish Gobta was listening intently instead of napping like he usually did. It was nice to see what I wanted to say get across to them.

    If the Western Holy Church has judged us to be evil, then we must be firm in fighting against that. Not just with force but with words and economic policies. I want us to act like a mirror for these peoplethose who bare their fangs against us will themselves be punished; those who extend a hand will be amply rewarded for it. And then, over a very long time, well try to build friendly rtionships. Thats how I think about this.

    And with that, I wrapped it up.

    Kaijin was the first to react. I think thats just too idealistic. He sighed. Like, what kind of guy trying to be a demon lord talks like that ? Come on. Gotta admit, though, I kinda like it.

    Shuna snickered. Nothing wrong with being idealistic. I think Sir Rimuru has what it takes to build that kind of ideal.

    Indeed, Geld said, there is no need to lose ourselves in thought. We have decided to follow in Sir Rimurus footsteps, and thus we can only believe in him.

    I wasnt sure I liked thatck of critical thought on his part, but he meant it with the utmost sincerity.

    If you do manage to be a demon lordBenimaruughed I hope there is a role for us in it all.

    I am your faithful shadow, Sir Rimuru, Soei saidI guess he was listening in. There is no need to confirm our rtionship. I will move ording to your orders.

    And I, my master, Ranga added from my shadow, am your faithful fangs. The one who will tear apart any foe who stands in your path.

    They all voiced their agreement in their own waysRigurd, Rigur, Gobta, Hakuro, and everyone else. Yohm, too. Damn, pal, he said, scratching his head. And you want my crew to build a new nation and turn everyone there to your side? Well, you dont need toy it out for us. I know how your mind ticks. Youre a real ve driver to all of us, yknow that?

    Im so d we have an understanding, Yohm.

    Ah, shove it, he pouted, his lips smiling. Mjurran was on his right, Gruecith on his left, and the rest of his followers behind him. I saw Kazhil, his aide, and Rommel, his main staff officer, among them. They were all humans, and they, too, voiced their agreement in a variety of ways.

    Hee-hee-hee! So lets keep things friendly between us, okay, Rimuru?

    Everyone nodded at Elen. Her words had weight in my mind. I was pushing a lot of stupid ideals upon them; I didnt have any excuse for that. I lived life the way I wanted to, and I had to take responsibility for my actions.

    Thanks, guys. Hope youll still put up with my selfishness in the future!

    They all shouted their agreement, harmonizing like a choir.

    With that out of the way, it was time to switch gears and figure out a strategy against this invasion.

    Um, do we have any details on the enemy force?

    Soei quoted a figure of at least ten thousand men, but I didnt hear about what types they were yet. We needed to let the rest of this meetings attendees know, too.

    Yes, Benimaru stepped up to state. ording to Soeis investigations

    We were being invaded by a tandem force, with soldiers from both Farmus and the Western Holy Church. The Church force were the Temple Knights, the minor leaguersabout three thousand of them, which consisted of the garrison that was already stationed in Farmus. In addition to that, essentially there were ten thousand Farmus knights, six thousand mercenary troops, and around a thousand magic-users.

    So, around twenty thousand in all. Pretty big force. Larger than our countrys entire poption. But if the Churchs Crusader groups and their legendary strength in battle werent part of the equation, I didnt see any major problem. The sheer numbers were more than expected, but the only implication this had was that Id have arger sacrifice to snack on. I had no intention of offering any of them mercy, after all. The real question on my mind was how many otherworlders were among them.

    How should we allot our own forces? Geld gingerly asked.

    I think, Benimaru replied, my force should address the main enemy presence.

    He was ready to go, definitelyapparently, he had formed a group of hobgoblin warriors on the sly, trained by Hakuro and pretty well honed. Rigur and Gobta weremanding the goblin rider teams, too, and ready to kick up one hell of a lot of dust. I wasnt the only one to be enraged by what happened.

    But:

    Im sorry, guys, but Im gonna be the one to take down these forces. Or, I mean, I hope youll let me.

    How do you mean? Benimaru asked for the crowd.

    My exnation was simple. It turns out ten thousand sacrifices are all I really need to be a demon lord. Presumably, Ill be evolving into a so-called true demon lord, and thats how the process works. Luckily, we have double that on our doorstep, so I got more than enough. After that, I just need to show off my force a bit. Its part of the whole ceremony, or process, toward reaching demon lordhood. I need to annihte all the invaders by myself.

    I wasnt being entirely honest here. There wasnt any need to go it alone, ording to the Great Sageas long as the souls were connected to me, no worries. My own will needed to align with theirs, and thats all it took. The exact conditions, however, were allegedly a little hard to engineerit wasnt just a matter of killing ten thousand and Bobs your uncle. But I didnt care.

    A passing thought struck me that maybe yman had been aiming for this all alongto start a war for the express purpose of collecting ten thousand human beings together for reaping. Attacking viges singly only got you so farmaybe he aimed for a war thatd let him efficiently harvest those souls and be a true demon lord himself. He just didnt know the exact conditions needed, so he had to satisfy himself with spreading evil around his domain instead. It almost seemed to me that he was taking advantage of the other demon lords so he could be a true one, even.

    He wouldve been eliminated from the fray sooner orter, I suppose But right now, the demon lord yman was my clear enemy. Once I took care of things with Farmus, he wasing up next.

    So really, I had just one reason for handling this solo. It was because I had this well of intense anger deep in my chest, and I wanted to release all of it. I didnt want to give people the impression that Id kill at the drop of a hat. I wanted them to know I was pissed . And if it meant Id make a mistake and get killed, then thats just all I was capable of, really.

    Plusyou know, I felt like I had to take responsibility for all this. I couldnt allow myself to take it easy any longer. Even if Hinata was among the invaders, I intended to kill all of them by myself. Id already seen her skills once. The same skill never worked twice on me, because the Great Sage always had the perfect remedy for it.

    It felt like the Sage wanted to say something about that, but that assumption had never let me down before. Knowledge provides me the biggest advantage there is. If you use a skill meant to pick someone off on the first view, then you have to kill with itotherwise, the survivors will pull their knowledge together ande up with countermeasures.

    It didnt matter who my foe wasI wouldnt lose. Id never be allowed to. And, perhaps sensing my resolve, Benimaru grudgingly epted it with a nod.

    Very well. We leave this to you, Sir Rimuru

    I nodded back. Although, of course, I didnt intend for him and everyone else to just keep quiet and wait.

    There is a job I would like to have all of you do for me, though. Right now, there are magical devices of some sort in all four cardinal directions around town, generating that weakening barrier over us. Each is being guarded by apany of knights. Id guess theyre pretty powerful, but Id like you to attack them and take them all down simultaneously.

    Ohhh?

    I see. So we do have a role in this?

    Allow me, Rogurd, to ept this mission!

    Yeah, Im pretty darn mad right now, too!

    Everyone was raring to go, even before Id finished my request. I raised a hand to silence them. Hold on. Ive already decided on my personnel. I want to ask as few people as needed to go through the towns barrier. First, Benimaru will tackle the east. Hakuro, Rigur, Gobta, and Geld will handle the west. The south will be taken by Gabil and his team; the north by Soei and his. The enemys reportedly got teleportation circles in ce, so we have to strike them before reinforcements can be sent in! If they do manage to send more troops, call Ranga over immediately, even if you think it wont be enough to put up a resistance. Did you hear that, Soei?

    Not a problem, Sir Rimuru. I thank you for providing us the opportunity. Gabil is ready to go as well, and I doubt any of us will fail.

    Does it look like you can win, from your perspective?

    It will be simple if we only handle one of the four.

    Great. Soeis team consisted of a mere six peoplehimself, Soka, and four others. Their skills were honed for assassination missions, and theyd provide a good match even for an entire enemy unit if it wasnt prepared for them. Plus, with their movement speed, theyd certainly be able to pull the wool over the enemys eyes and flee if needed.

    Gabil and his men had grown far stronger during the evolution to dragonewt form. Each one ranked a good B-plus now, and I doubted theyd lose out to even the most well trained of knights. They all had ample potion, too, so as long as they werent one-shot killed, they could keep up a fight indefinitely.

    So north and south were no problem, and to the east, I had Benimaru to count on.

    I have no concern about your chances, Benimaru, but itll be you operating solo against nearly a hundred knights. If you sense any danger

    Sir Rimuru, there is no need for worry. It is a given that I will

    You dont have to go easy on them, keep in mind.

    Heh. In that case, victory is assured.

    No worries about him, either. Among our group, only I was stronger than him, and he had the skills needed to handlerge numbers at once.

    That just left the west side, which did concern me.

    Okay. So: Hakuro, Rigur, Gobta, and Geld

    Sir Rimuru, Rigur said, you are safe in our hands. I have no intention of tasting defeat twice. But if you are that worried about us, is it becauseyou feel its likely they are among their numbers?

    Exactly. The west side connects to the shortest highway route to the kingdom of Blumund. If the enemy anticipated that our merchants would flee down that road, then the knights who attacked us earlier were probably stationed to the west so they could strike at our visitors.

    Can you win against them? Theres a very good chance those otherworlders are among them.

    Sir Rimuru, we are not as weak as we used to be. We have the power to fight, not just to be protected by Sir Hakuro.

    Yeah! Plus, I gotta get me some revenge for Gobzo!

    I know we number just four, Geld said, but I want you to trust us. I promise you, Sir Rimuru, I will wield the powers you granted me as an orc king as much as I possibly can!

    Hakuros reputation preceded him. Geld was powerful, if not quite as much as Benimaru. Rigur, in his role as leader of our security forces, was just as capable in battle as Rigurd. Gobta Okay, I was a little worried about him, but I figured not even that fool would try anything too rash.

    All right. Take those magical devices down, make this annoying barrier disappear, and give our people their full strength back!

    Yes, my lord!!

    With them on the job, the barrier was as good as gone. That just left me to take on the invading forces by myself.

    There was one other thing too important to forget.

    Now, Shuna

    Yes?

    Like I just said, Benimaru and everyone will remove the barrier for us. However, its that very barrier, in all likelihood, that is helping keep the souls of Shion and everyone else within reach. Do you see what Im getting at?

    Yes, Sir Rimuru. You want us to prepare a recement barrier for you?

    Exactly. Can you do that?

    Oh, that goes without saying, my lord. I promise it will be done!

    Right now, as we spoke, I was casting a unique sort of great magic. I was also releasing a vast quantity of magicules into the air, filling it. That was what it took to maintain the barrier and supplement the magicule supply around hereand I wanted Shuna to make a new reinforcing barrier to help with that. The rest of the people in town would pitch in, too, of coursewhatever it took to boost the chances of bringing them all back alive.

    In thews of magic, just like thews of physics, there was the concept of going high to low. Basically, if the air was filled with energy, I figured that would help prevent the energy covering all those souls from dissipating. If they lost this protection, the souls could go right through the barrier and be vaporized. A soul is a pure, unadulterated collection of energy; there is nothing to fence it in. And with the astral bodies of monsters made of magicules, if we could keep this energy from dissipating, I figured that would pen up the souls well enough. That was the Great Sages take on things, and all I could do was count on that. (Humans, by the way, could pass through the barrier without resistance, since they had rtively few magicules inside their bodies. It was totally different from monsters, who were much more directly affected by that energy.)

    I would love to help with that if I could, Mjurran said. Great magic, along with barriers, was an apparent specialty of hers. I appreciated the offer a ton.

    Hey, Shuna

    Yes, Sir Rimuru. Thank you for that, Mjurran.

    Leave it to me. I promise Ill devote my full energy to it.

    So Shuna and Mjurran would be working together to keep my great magic going strong. Now I could fight with a clear mind.

    Rigurd! I want everybody left to help keep these two safe in the meantime!

    Yes, my lord!

    II can do that, too?!

    You got us here, too, pal!

    Allow the noble Gruecith to see this through for you!

    Yeah, my bodyguards and I will do our best!

    You are in good hands, Rimuru.

    Yeah, you heard em, boss!

    I had Kurobe, Yohm, Gruecith, Rigurd, and the Kabal trio in town. It couldnt be a safer ce if they were here.

    Right! I imagine our enemy assumes the final battles four days from now, but that doesnt matter to us. Right now, from this very moment, it is time to do what must be done and annihte our foes!

    And with that order, everyone began to move, working to thest man to bring Shion, Gobzo, and everyone else back.

    Benimarus back was straight, shoulders high, as he strode directly for the magical device installed east of town. One of the Temple Knights there was the first to spot him.

    Someone approaching ahead! All troops, prepare for battle!

    It was thispany of Temple Knights that established the Prison Field, the barrier weakening the monsters, at Archbishop Reyhiems order. There were a bit over a hundred of them, each ranking a B-plus threat individually. Three otherpanies were in each of the other directions, attending to the barrier devices. They boasted astonishing battle skills, geared more toward tackling monsters than your average knight, and all of them were more than amply trained for the job. And like any devout member of the Western Holy Church, none of them wascent. They had guards on duty, tense and focused, and Benimaru was discovered in short order.

    And yet

    Sorry, man, but youre gonna help me vent my anger a bit.

    It sounded almost haughty, the way he put it, but nobody was there toin. In an instant, they were all dead. With his sword, encased in jet-ck me, he cut the knights neatly in halfarmor and as easily as ripping a sheet of paper. Their fresh blood stained the ground red, like crimson fields of flowers blooming amid the ck fire.

    One of them held out just long enough to voice his final resentments.

    N-nobody said anything about thisthismonster

    It was the captain of the knightpany, and it was hisst act on this world before the ck me consumed him. That single dance-like motion from Benimaru didnt even need half a minute to knock them all outand another offhand swipe of his sword shed right through the magical device.

    Missionplete, he whispered. Noware any of my allies pathetic enough to be having trouble with this?

    He sincerely doubted it, but he still set off to check out the scene in the other directions.

    Over to the south, Gabil was busy rousing his men.

    Gah-ha-ha-ha! Ive finally been given a ce in the sun! I was hoping my sesses in putting our potions on the market wouldve merited my appointment to higher government by now But then we had this distraction happen to us. It is simply outrageous that these minions should get in my way! Isnt it?

    It is exactly as you say, Sir Gabil!

    Well put. I was hoping that our efforts would be rewarded by now and that Sir Gabil would be basking in the fruits of his sess. But now

    Yes! Yes, precisely! But! If this battle can prove to Sir Rimuru that I can be of aid to him, I am all but guaranteed a lofty role in his hierarchy! I want to see the full extent of your force in action right now, people! Show them what a dragonewt riled is capable of!

    Raaahhh!!

    Spirits were high, no doubt, although some of Gabils men might have questioned the way he phrased that speech. They knew Gabil didnt need some fancy title in the Tempest governmenthe had already proven himself a capable leader in their eyes. That was why they had followed him when he was banished from his homnd, after all, and as petty as he could be about it sometimes, they knew he was seriously trying to boost their good name.

    Such words, one of them whispered, are exactly why Soka and the others make fun of him, you realize.

    Shhh! You want him to hear you?

    Yeah, well, thats one of the good things about our general, after all, isnt it?

    No doubt. You said it.

    Enough idle chitchat, barked Gabil. Put yourselves into this! Ah, you make life so difficult for me!

    Oh, we do not, General!

    A quickugh.

    Right! Forward!!

    They were roused and ready to fight as they took flight from the cave, cutting through the clouds as they went southward and attacking in tandem with the others.

    The Temple Knights protecting the south were thrown into chaos upon witnessing the surprise attack from the skies. The ever-changing breath attacksfire, ice, airtook out nearly a third of them in short order.

    Retain your positions! a senior knight half ordered, half shouted as his men flew into a panic. Go into our air-defense formation and prepare for magical impact!

    But he was already toote to avoid Gabils second wave of offense.

    Damn it! These arent lizardmen at all, are they? They dont have anywhere near this level of forcemuch less wings to fly with!

    Dont panic! These are dragonewts! Theyre not asmon, but theyre nothing we cant handle!

    Dragonewts?! I cant believe it! Such great numbers, and working as a team

    Their confusion subsided before the third attack arrived, as they finally began to grasp the situation. But half of them were already down, and none of the survivors was free of injury.

    Curse them! Contact our headquarters and call for reinforcements!

    One of the knights prepared to follow his captains order. Then Gabil himself alighted next to him.

    Hngh!

    His spear plunged straight through the knights heart.

    May God damn you now! the captain shouted as he engaged Gabil.

    Gah-ha-ha-ha! You captain this force? My name is Gabil, but there is no need to remember it. Consider my telling you a final gift before your death!

    What? A named monster?! Very well. You should prove a worthy opponent for me!

    Gabil was upying the full attention of thepanys leader andmander, and it threw the rest of the knights into disarray. This was the moment the other dragonewt warriors were waiting for. They were an even match, pound for pound, but thanks to the gift of flight, Gabils fighters had the advantage. Even the injured among them had High Potions at the ready, rapidly returning them to the front line.

    God smite them all! We hit them and hit them, and the bastards keeping back!

    Stay strong! We have the protection of Luminus upon Gehhh

    Their numbers were few now, and the shock of these monsters working in precise tandem had hardly worn off. The medicine these foes used to heal their wounds struck fear in their hearts. Even the most devout of the knights began to trembleand as they did, the captain they so heavily relied upon was in by Gabil.

    Gah-ha-ha-ha! Victory is mine!!

    Now the fate of this battle was sealed. Without amander, the rest of the knights were helpless, quickly tasting defeat at the ws of Gabils men.

    Over to the north, Soei and his toon were on the move, silently using Shadow Motion to sneak into the encampment.

    Out of nowhere, there was a dull thud the sound of someones head hitting the ground. Soei had decapitated the garrisonsmander. It was a signal to all that the battle was on.

    N-no! Where did they?!

    Grahhh!

    Aaahhh!!

    The shapeless assassins had sessfully thrown the northern encampment into fits of terror.

    Sir Soei, these troops were weaker than I thought. I apologize, Soka said as he took a knee before his leader.

    Apologizing would be meaningless. I am the one who shall make the final judgment. Plus

    Soei paused a moment to think. Soka was right. These were all weaklings. If this was what they were dealing with, Soeis team could have easily destroyed the magical devices in all four directions. Killing all the men as well would pose a challenge, butpleting the objectives and escaping alive would have been no sweat.

    But the problem wasnt here on the north side.

    I was hoping they would be herebut I suppose it is the west, after all, just as Sir Rimuru surmised.

    Yes, my lord! I believe you are right.

    The otherworlders had to be in the west. By Soeis estimation, if their team worked alone to strike all four bases at once, it might have failed entirely if Soka and the others ran into those guys. Soei had already reported back to Rimuru along those linesand that was why Sokas apology was pointless.

    But who can say, he whispered as a smile crept onto his lips, who the unlucky ones really are here?

    Hakuro was on his mindthe Hakuro he saw just before they all moved out. The look on his face was nothing short of bloodcurdling. It made Soei happy he wasnt the one facing him down. The otherworlders who struck in town conducted their killing like a pleasure hunt. Now things were quite different. Theyd be taking on the Sword Ogre himself.

    It appears to be over, Soka coldly stated. There were no survivors left among the Temple Knights of the north. Soei and his team were unhurt. It was a victory as total andplete as he had predicted.

    The magic-producing device installed west of town had been ced atop a hill with a good view of the highway leading out. Unlike the other positions, the Temple Knights guarding it felt rather rxed. Their encampment was the safest of all four, and it was loaded with forcesover two hundred troops in all.

    There was, of course, a reason for this.

    Hey. Hasnt anyone fled yet?

    Oh, er, Shogo! No enemies sighted today, either, sir!

    The soldier who answered Shogo Taguchis question seemed terribly ill at ease around him.

    Pfft. How many days are they gonna waste nning their escape? Or did the merchants and adventurer bodyguards decide to share their fates with the town?

    Ha-ha-ha! Oh, I wouldnt be so impatient, Kyoya said to soothe the clearly annoyed Shogo. The other positions didnt have any news, either. If theyre running, theyll have to go down this road. Its the only option.

    Huh. Yeah, I hope, Shogo resentfully replied. It had been three whole days, and nobody had fled town. It made him suspicious. He was here because of the merchants and adventurers who were supposed to be skipping town. Kyoya seemed content with just shutting down this highway, as ordered, but Shogo had other ideas. Razen, the head sorcerer of the Farmus court, had personally told him that he had free rein to massacre anyone on the highway.

    Just as Rimuru thought, the Kingdom of Farmus had decided that anyone from Blumund trying to flee the region should be killed. Shogo was no homicidal maniac, but the order filled him with glee nheless. He had noticed something in this new world, and that was the way his skills could evolve.

    Once, during training, he had failed to fine-tune his Berserker unique skill, and the results killed one of the knights. Somehow, it felt like he was just a bit more powerful after that event. Maybe killing more enemies with that skill would continue to boost the effect. He still couldnt defy the locking curse Razen had put on him, but maybe, if he powered up enough, he couldter.

    That was Shogos thought, but defeating monsters didnt provide that concrete feeling of strength he craved. It was a disappointment, but now, with carte nche to kill the Blumundians who would no doubt be flooding this road shortly, he was doing a little dance in his mind.

    But the people he had wanted to see so badly showed no sign of appearing, even after three days. For someone as quick-tempered as Shogo, it was sorely trying the limits of his patience.

    Kyoya tried his best to keep him calm, even as he struggled to contain his own cravings for murder. The previous attack on the town opened his eyes to just how wonderful shing up bodies could be. Especially that one elderly ogre. Those sword skills were the real thing; Kyoya could tell that much.

    Ooh, Ill never forget that surprised face! The way it was so confident in its own strength! Its irresistible!

    It made him lick his lips in anticipation. And even though his motivations were different from Shogos, he was just as ready for the fleeing crowds to appear.

    Then they heard a messenger provide a report.

    Enemies up ahead! They numberfour?!

    Tension and nervousness found their way into the western encampment. The knights immediately cast magic to boost their physical strength, preparing to engage this threat and going into a formation that guaranteed at least three troops could tackle each one. They might have slept on the job a little, but these were Western Holy Church monster hunters, each one an expert in the field. There was no panic, no agitation. They simply did what needed to be done before a battle began.

    Hakuro, Rigur, Gobta, and Geld wereing their way.

    Lets give em a show! shouted Gobta as he drew his dagger and held its scabbard in his left hand. The starwolf he was on leaped forward, and then he jumped off his mounts back, somersaulting once in the air. Steadying his aim with his scabbard, heunched a Case Cannon strike upon the head of the most important-looking knight in the crowd.

    Easily surging past the speed of sound, the two-centimeter-wide iron ballsnded a direct hit. There was a soft zwing! sound as the knights behind the targeted captain were bathed in bloodthen a thud as he copsed to the ground.

    Nice! Direct hit!

    The knights began to scream and shout as Gobta admired his efforts.

    Enemy of God! What sorcery is this?!

    Thepany fanned out, which was exactly what Gobta and the others were anticipating.

    Well done, Gobta. Keep diverting their attention, but dont let them capture you.

    Roger that, sir!

    Youre just as nimble as always, observed Rigur. You always were good at sniping like that.

    Heh-heh! Yeah, wasnt I?

    Dont let it get to your head, you fool.

    It was rare for Rigur topliment Gobta. The subsequent warning quickly silenced him.

    Keep your guard up! We need to work together to shoulder some of Hakuros and Gelds load!

    Got it!

    Rigur and Gobta climbed onto their starwolves, working to throw the knights teamwork out of whack. Geld was waiting for this. Even their breathing was fully aligned as he watched them send their wolves into the airthe signal for him to stomp his right foot against the ground. The impact shook the earth under the knights legs like an earth tremor. It was called Earthshatter Kick, one of the Arts Geld had learned, and it sent a shock wave of aura force below him to further extend its power and range.

    Whoa?!

    Ngh!

    The quakested for just a moment, but that was enough. By the time Rigur and Gobta reached ground again, they were right in front of several unbnced, teetering knights. They were left lethally wide open in the midst of battle, fated with nothing but broken windpipes at the fangs of the starwolves.

    Boy, that sure was something

    I can hardly believe it. We didnt even practice that in training, but your timing was perfect, Geld

    Rigur and Gobta looked at each other and grinned. Then the three of them sprang into action anew, maintaining their impable teamwork as they beat the knights at their own game. Before their overwhelming numbers, the trio couldnt have looked less concerned.

    But now there was a dark-haired young man standing before them.

    Ha-ha-ha-ha! Nice! I like it! But now you gotta take me on!

    Ah, ahhh! Sir Shogo!

    Please do something about these monsters!

    The smell of death surrounding Shogo intoxicated him, making his face twist viinously. He could feel force flowing through him like never before. Yes! This is it! Just as I thoughtmy power grows as people die around me!

    His spirits soared as he began running toward the trio.

    Oh, there he is, Gobta noted, eyes showing an umon (for him) anger as he sized Shogo up. But he aint fightin me!

    It was Shogo who had kicked Gobzo to death back in town as he tried to cover for Shuna. The memory of the moment he heard the news made Gobta boil with fury at the figure running for him. But he was fully aware of the difference in strength between them both. No, Shogo would have to fight Geld, just as they nned originally.

    Do not worry, Sir Gobta, the orc king dered. Its time to deliver the iron hammer of justice!

    Hee-hee! Just Gobta is fine, Geld!

    Understood. Allow me to handle the rest, Gobta!

    I hope you do, Sir Geld, Rigur said as he nodded. Gobzo had his faults, but he was a good man to all of us.

    And in another moment, Geld and Shogo were locked in battle.

    Amid this fury, there was another confrontation taking cebetween Hakuro and Kyoya.

    Wow, old man, you survived? If you were lucky enough to live, you shouldve tucked your tail and fled when you could. It woulda been easy for someone as strong as you to make it out.

    Ho-ho-ho! I may not look it, but I happen to be a very sore loser. Besides, something about some youngster getting a swollen head with me when I havent even revealed my full strength just doesnt seem right.

    Oh? You arent talking about me, are you?

    Does it not seem that way to you? Well, my apologies. I suppose your brains just as empty as your morals.

    Ha-ha! So getting shed once didnt bring the message across, huh? Or are you growing feeble in the head?

    Just then, a sharp ting! echoed across the field. It was the sound of Hakuros hidden sword deflecting the blow Kyoya unleashed in the blink of an eye. The otherworlder had lunged upon Hakuro in the middle of their chat. Anticipating the strike, he drew his sword against it as if he had all the time in the world.

    Impatient, I see. But I suppose we both are. I can hardly contain my anger any longer.

    Kyoya suddenly felt a chill down his spine. He took a step back. Hakuros ghastly visage mentally overwhelmed him, as much as he didnt want to admit it.

    Dont make meugh, he spat back, eyes squinted and blurred with the desire to kill. Quit acting like my boss, old man! You couldnt do a damn thing against my sword!

    Not your sword. Your power, yes. As Rimuru put it, your force is based on the spatial element. Not even I had an answer for itbut now that I know the trick, I can avoid it.

    Yeah? Well, great. So lets have a sword fight, all right? Fair and square.

    Kyoya brought his sword before his eyesthose eyes zing with a fearsomely evil lightas a distressing grin crossed his face.

    Very well. Allow me to show you the true essence of swordy.

    Hakuro held his own de down low. Kyoyas grin widened.

    You ready?

    The otherworlder lifted his sword higher and then swung it down. He was far too out of range to hit Hakuro with it, but his aim was elsewhere. The de itselfunched out, away from the swords grip, transforming into millions of tiny shards, each one too small to see but packing lethal force as they hurtled toward Hakuro. Kyoyas sword was a fake, a dummy created by his Severer unique skill. Switching between it and his actual sword allowed him to trick his enemy, stymieing them in battle.

    Ha-ha-ha! That fool got tricked again!

    Kyoya held his stomach as heughedbut a cold, prating voice stopped him.

    Hmm. So such tiresome little deceits are part of your arsenal, eh? It seems I overestimated you.

    No way?!

    Kyoya looked around, searching for Hakuros frigid, lecturing voice. He found the ogre exactly where he had been standing,pletely unhurt.

    What What did you just do , old man?!

    Hmm. Interesting. You werent able to see it? Then I suppose youre just a second-rate fighter or worse.

    What?

    Second-rate or worse is what I said. I can fully keep up with your sword style, and frankly, I couldnt find it more childish.

    Dont mess with me, you senile piece of shit!

    Kyoya lost his cool, eyes wide open. That was why he couldnt notice. His Severer de, capable of ripping through anything, had been fully deflected by Hakuroand now, he had to ept that.

    He hadnt even noticed that the third eye on Hakuros head was now open. Aura, all-powerful and overwhelming, flowed from him. It was enough energy to easily propel him into the A ranks of monsterdom.

    Right. I said I would show you the true essence of swordy. Pay close attention to this!

    Shut up! Shitty little monsters, acting all tough and crap!

    Kyoya, still enraged, created a new de and shed at Hakuro. Hakuro paid it no mind. He just stood there, quietly transforming the intense rage inside him into power. Not even the sight of Kyoya bringing down his sword at point-nk range fazed him. He just kept his third eye openthe extra skill Heavengazeand dodged his opponents unseeable de by a hairbreadth.

    You talk big, Kyoya shouted as heughed loudly, but you cant do a thing against me! Can you?! Theres nothing you can do! Just sit there and watch my invisible de rip you apart!

    The time hase, I see. Perhaps your eye is not so all-seeing after all

    Huh? What did you?

    Kyoya didnt understand. But he could tell it meant trouble. He took a step back, but it was already toote.

    A sh.

    The resulting sword moveCrestwater shwas clearly visible to Kyoyas All-Seeing Eyeand then Kyoya realized something was wrong. He was frozen. Not frozen, exactly, but moving at an impossibly slow speed. The sword flowed its way toward him. His All-Seeing Eye picked up on that; it should have been evadable enough. But the sword kepting. It touched against his neck. And then it went all the way down into his torso.

    Uh?

    Then the sword came back out, gouging Kyoyas heart along the way, as Hakuro just barely grabbed his head before his body hit the ground. In less than a second, it was all over.

    And there we go. I hope you will use the remaining time youve extended a thousandfold for yourself to figure out where you went wrong.

    Those words, via Thought Communication, were thest thing Kyoya ever heard.

    Hakuro could have killed Kyoya at any time. Even in town, he wouldnt have fallen behind if he had any intention of killing him then. It was a loss with its cause squarely upon Rimuru and his order to drive away their foes alive.

    Now, though, his good name was restored. He had waited for the moment when Kyoyas All-Seeing Eye was at its maximum level of activation. Then he showed his own skillsand the sheer difference in talent between them.

    It would be just a few seconds before Kyoyas oxygen-starved brain would expire, and even less than that before his consciousness grew cloudy. But thanks to Mind elerate, he had extended his perception speed to a thousand times normal. Hakuros taunting goaded him into it, although Kyoya had no idea.

    Now, all he could do was taste the pain, the bitterness, for a small eternity until the moment he finally, mercifully passed. Such was the end of Kyoya Tachibana, the otherworlder who attempted to con his way through life and met his doom over it.

    Shogo was intensely irritated. Geld, the warrior looming in front of him, seemed invincible to his powers. Nothing of the sort had ever happened to him in this world. Everyone always groveled before him, begging for mercy. And now look.

    Goddammit!

    He poured every ounce of strength he had into Berserker andunched a kick at Gelds frame. It helplessly nged against the orcs Scale Shield, the unique piece of equipment Garm forged out of Charybdis scales for him.

    Thats cheating! If youre a man, fight me with your bare hands!

    Geld raised a quizzical eyebrow at Shogos absurdmand.

    I dont know what you mean. This is war. Cheating or not, it is only polite to bring out everything you have against your foe.

    Dont give me that shit! I dont have any weapons, and youre fully outfitted! You should be ashamed of yourself!

    This bewildered Geld. His opponent was making less and less sense. The word patience wasnt in Shogos dictionary; it seemed like he expected his selfish, childlike whining to work against grown men. That was why failing to even put a dent in Geld was filling him with a passionate rage. But that wasnt Gelds problem. All he could do with Shogos nonsensical ramblings was ignore them.

    All right. Im sorry; Im sorry, Shogo backpedaled. I thought Id just ask, yknow, if you could put down that annoying shield for me. Im all warmed up now, so I guess its about time I put everything I got into this.

    To Geld, someone whose mind was configured to follow his warrior code, it was impossible for him to follow the thoughts of the oblivious Shogo. But this was a battlefield. Just because his foe threw him for a loop didnt mean hed abandon the fight.

    Everything youve got? Very well. I will do the same as

    Haaah!!

    Not listening to Gelds words, Shogo focused his spirit just below his navel and shouted out loud. Then, like a tiger, he nted a foot on the ground and sped off, unleashing a flying kick in Gelds direction.

    Eeeeee yaaah !!

    With a scream, the kick unleashed itself. It put a crack in Gelds shield.

    One more! Hraaah!!

    Hended on the ground, away from the shield, and used his momentum tounch another back kick. That was enough to shatter Gelds shield for good.

    His Berserker unique skill had the special effect of breaking the weapons of his opponents. Of course, a unique piece of equipment was hard to break with one or two strikesthat was why Shogo was acting like he had no strategy but was actually attacking the same spot over and over again. He might have looked like a simpleton, but Shogo had a uniquely honed talent for battleand that skill was perfectly suited for his martial-arts approach.

    Ha-ha! Lookit that! You aint gonna block the next one without that shield!

    Shogo was proud of his victory. But it didnt move Geld at all.

    I see So you acted short-tempered and mindless for that reason?

    He was impressed. But ever so casually, he took out a brand-new shield from his Stomach.

    Huh? What the?! Thats dirty !

    What is dirty about this? I told youthis is war. It is onlymon courtesy to use every weapon at my disposal. No matter what kind of cowardly move you may attempt, I am willing to forgive it.

    Right from the start, Geld had been consistently and doggedly sticking to his own principles as he tackled Shogo. He had only one motivation. Shogo was the man behind Gobzos death, and the iron hammer had to fall upon him.

    Cowardly? You callin me cowardly? Dont give me that shit, you pig!

    I am not a pigbut fine.

    Shut up!

    Shogo let out a deep breath as Geld readied his shield. Composing himself, he observed his enemy, finally recognizing him as a worthy challenger. With that shield, Geld had no opening to exploitbut Shogo decided to force him to the ground anyway. Taking the sanchin stance (a standard position unique to karate), he breathed in and let out all his tension with a Kaaahhh!! Muscles tightened up and down his body, boosting his focus.

    It was a basic breathing move, but it was also a harrowing finisherand, repeating it three times as he took in the air and its magicules, it transformed his flesh and blood, adding the Adamantine Body effect of Berserker to his already well-built frame to make it hard as rock. His body was remade into a living weapon of battle.

    Now Im ready. This is how I really fight, and Im ready for you. Try to make this fun for me, all right?

    That goes without saying. Come at me!

    With a light exhale, Shogo lunged at Geld. With his bodily strength much enhanced, all limiters restricting his powers were gone. The difference was like night and day, and he even moved faster than before.

    Shyahhh!!

    Quickly closing the distance, Shogounched a frontal punch. The power from his toes upward ran through his navel and focused itself upon a single point in his fist. He called it the Tornado Punch, and it mixed Berserkers weapon-breaking and Adamantine Body properties to unleash a torrent of forceand as it smashed through Gelds shield, Shogo felt assured of victory.

    Heh! The moment I get serious, this Wait, what?

    The next moment, he realized something felt off. Pain erupted from his limbs, forming together in intense agony in an instant.

    Whoawhats?! Goddammit!!

    It was Chaos Eater, a yellow aura that snaked its way around him. Now Geld was on the attack.

    Your physical strength ismendable. I can certainly tell that much from what I have seen in this short battle. But it seems rather weak against rot .

    R-rot? Shit! Getget this off me!

    The intense pain made Shogo writhe on the ground. Looking on from above, pity in his eyes, Geld prepared his Meat Cleaver de.

    Let me end the pain.

    Ahhh! W-wait! Wait a second!

    Gelds slow approach made the orc look like a man-eating demon in Shogos eyes. He was strong of will when attacking, but now that it was his turn to take a shot, he was defenseless. It was always a sad sight to see, someone experiencing this helplessness for the first time, but that was Shogo now, edging away as best as he could. But that only added to the pain. Shogo had nothing to undo the Chaos Eater around him. The yellow aura drilled further into his body, making the flesh on his hands and legs rot into nothingbut still he tried to get away from his foe.

    Geld didnt care. He had other things on his mindsuch as Hakuro, whom he could see casually walking up to him.

    You still arent done, Geld?

    Ah, Sir Hakuro. You are finished? I was just about to strike the final blow.

    Now, even Shogo could see that the knights around them were strewn across the battlefield.

    Youyou assholes! What the hell did you do to Kyoya?!

    Him? Hes dead, came the matter-of-fact reply as Hakuro tossed something at him. It was Kyoyas head, rolling along the ground there, and it provided all the evidence necessary.

    Ah, aaahhhhhhhhhh !!

    Shogo attempted to flee at full speed, no longer caring about the pain in his limbs. Deep down, he knew hed be meeting the same fate, and it terrorized him.

    Goddamn it! God Why did this happen to me?!

    The pain was as intense as the terror and confusion.

    Shit If this keeps up, Im dead

    His mind raced, trying to figure out a way to survive this. Then, out of nowhere, he had a brilliant idea. He recalled that there, in the tent in front of him, was another otherworlder. So he ran, cing all hopes upon this new n.

    Raising the tent p, he found Kirara rxing inside.

    Hey, you done? Cause you sure took your sweet time with

    Shut up! Kirara, Shogo said as he ran up to her, Im sorry, but youre gonna have to die for me!

    Huhhh? Whatre you talking about, you dumbass? Whyre you picking a fight with me?

    Kirara took it as a joke. It had the effect of greatly shortening her life span.

    Clench

    Nh Wha? Youre choking me

    She had left herself wide open, and now Shogos hands were fully engaged with her. She struggled mightily, even as Shogos tremendous power shattered her neckbut in another moment, her resistance grew weaker.

    Memories of her life in Japan shed before her eyes. The boyfriend she liked. The friends she got along with. The parents who put up with her selfishness. All Kirara wanted to do was go home. Razen had told her himself: Do what I say, and Ill develop a spell to whisk you back someday. To her, this world wasnt reality, and that meant she could do whatever she wantedotherwise, shed have to seriously contemte all the crimes shedmitted. All the murders. She just wasnt mentally mature enough to deal with that. She had run from her crimes, from the killings she did after a moment of emotionand now time was running out for her.

    The world went white. The pain was already gone as a cavalcade of familiar faces greeted her

    Mom!

    And this was the end of Kirara Mizutani, the otherworlder who turned her back on her weaknesses and med everyone else for them but herself.

    Hakuro and Geld had given chase, only to find Shogo in the midst of killing his ally Kirara.

    An abominable deed. You have fallen that far?

    No need for pity now. You are no warrior.

    And then a transformation urred.

    Confirmed. Unique skill Survivor  sessfully obtained.

    Shogos desire to live was the trigger for a new power within him, snagged at the expense of Kiraras soul. The yellow aura eating into Shogos body dissipated as he rapidly healed himself. This was Ultraspeed Regeneration in action, one of Survivors subskills.

    The World Language So thats what he was after?

    Sir Rimuru described killing your allies as the greatest crime there is. Your deeds are the work of a soulless minion, lower than a monster himself.

    Shut up, you worthless maggots! Winnings what matters, isnt it? Its easy! I got the power for it!

    Shogo screamed as he unleashed both his unique skillsBerserker for the attack and Survivor for the defense. It fooled him into believing he was invincible. The sheer forceand the Ultraspeed Regeneration and the resistance to all types of elements. As long as a blow didnt kill him instantly, he had invincible force and the ability to regenerate himself at any time.

    Yes. Even if Hakuro used one of his sword strikes to lop his head off, hed be right back to normal in an instant. Even if Geld used his superhuman strength to smash both his arms, theyd grow right back and be even stronger.

    How dyou like that, you piece-of-shit monsters?! This is it! This is my full power!!

    And he couldnt be med for bragging to the skies about it. As abination, his powers were like none seen before.

    But there was one thing Shogo didnt realize: No matter how lofty the heights you achieved in the world, there was always someone above you.

    Shall I lend a hand?

    No need, Sir Hakuro. Please go and support Sir Rigur and the others.

    Assuming such support is necessary, Hakuro said as he stepped back and gave Geld the right of way. The orc strode forward and prepared to strike.

    Huhhh? Youre gonna take me on by yourself? Cause right now, Id be more than happy to whip both your asses at once!

    You seem to have confidence in your martial arts. So be it. I will fight you with my bare hands as well.

    Oh, quit acting like youre so much better than me. Youre just lookin for an excuse for when you lose!

    Such was the way Shogos mind worked. It made him go immediately on the offensive. His face was brimming with confidence, testing out his new powersbut that ease of mind didntst long. It was a bit harder for him to die now, and he was ever so slightly powered up, but that still didnt make him a foe for Geld to concern himself with.

    Orgggh!

    Geld had more than ample strength to tear off one of Shogos arms and use his free hand to drive a fist into his stomach.

    Ah. Yes, you can heal yourself faster than I can. Now lets see how much you can stand at once.

    As he said it, he wrapped twin curls of Chaos Eater around his fists and beat them into Shogo. Over and over again, before he could recover, Geld pummeled him into oblivion. Thanks to the Survivor skill, Shogo was enjoying Cancel Pain privileges, preventing him from feeling any of the anguish these injuries provided him. But Geld just kept on punching, doing away with all weapons.

    By its very nature, Chaos Eater bit its way through everythingdamaging not only Shogos material body but his spiritual one as well. The unique skill Survivor was capable of regenerating all bodily systems, but a life-forms spiritual needs were beyond its feature set. Indeed, before Gelds unrelenting attack, it was only a matter of time before Shogos frail spirit was against the ropes.

    S-stop, stop! Pleathe, thtop!

    It hadnt even been ten minutes, but to Shogo, it felt like an hours-long torture session. Selfish words fell out of his mouth, seeking salvation for him and him alone. Geld and Hakuro were almost too disgusted to watch.

    And that was the exact moment Shogos heart and soul broke.

    I suppose it is over.

    It is. Now to finally ease his pain for

    N-no! Wait a thecond! II was jutht kidding! I didnt really want to; III jutht got carried away Help me

    Shogo, faced with this cruel reality, fell into confused terror. In this world, simply being an otherworlder gave you overwhelmingly preferential treatment. That only fed his arrogance, twisting his personality beyond repair. And even more importantly, he and the others summoned into the Kingdom of Farmus all suffered from the same affliction: a terminal case of egotism.

    And it had led to this.

    I came over to see what all thismotion was aboutand Shogo is thest man standing, is he? My, my, look at that! Perhaps I misestimated the power of these monsters after all. Now another older man stepped in front of Shogo.

    He had on his robe, woven with magical fibers, a staff with untold stores of magical force in one hand. This was Razen, court sorcerer and the greatest magician in all of Farmus. With a hand in the air, he used his aspectual magic to cast a Magic Barrier in front of Geld, nullifying his attack. This spell was normally used to build a shield over the caster, but Razen could adapt it to block his enemies moves as well.

    Nh! R-Ratthen, you came to thave me?!

    Shogo clung to the sorcerers back. Razen replied with a nod before returning his eyes to Geld and Hakuro.

    Well, well, well. No wonder our otherworlders werent enough to secure victory. I find it hard to believe, but you are both A-ranked and a cmity-level threat. I do not like our prospects. Time to fall back for now.

    Then, with the Magic Barrier still in effect, he began to chant a high-level teleportation spell. Unlike Warp Portal, which required a magic circle to base itself on, this allowed the caster to define any point they liked to serve as the jump site. You had to be at least wizard-level to use this forbidden spell, and Razens ease inpleting it indicated the full extent of his power and experience.

    Geld attempted to give chase. Hakuro stopped him.

    No rash moves, Geld. This is no also-ran.

    What?!

    Geld faithfully followed Hakuros adviceand, before him, the very air tore itself open. Razen had installed a trap in the Magic Barrier, setting it to explode after a given time dy.

    Kah-ha-ha! Very shrewd of you to notice that. I should have paid you all much more caution than I did. Perhaps we should not be so optimistic about this battle after all

    He had been wary of Gelds magical energy, but now, he acted like he noticed the threat of Hakuro for the first time.

    You sly fox. Youve been cautious of me from the very start

    Oh, not at all, my dear ogre mage. It is only natural, after all, to spot this orc lord first in terms of brute strength. But now it is time. I would love to speak with you further, but my spell seems to bepleted, so I had best take my leave. We may meet again in battle, assuming you survive

    I rather doubt that, Hakuro shot back, because the battlefield you are headed for will be attended to by our master. You have all gone too far this time. You have enraged the one creature in this world you should never have riled. I pity you. Your death will not be an easy one.

    Kah-ha-ha! Enough of your silly bluffingbut if you mean it as a warning, I will keep it in mind. Farewell!

    With that, Razen disappeared, carrying Shogo with him. Silence returned to the scene, although the sounds of battle could still be heard from outside the tent.

    Are you sure it was best, Geld said, to leave that sorcerer Razen be?

    I imagine not, but if we fought him, then either you, I, or at worst both of us might have died. He had another hidden magic queued up for us, one set to trigger in the event of his death.

    He did? And the magic was that much of a threat?

    Likely nuclear in nature, he muttered bitterly. The ultimate in aspectual magic. Rigur and Gobta are here as well, and we cannot have them caught up in it. Now is not the time for ill-advised gambles.

    Heavengaze gave him a better sense of the magic around him, from the flow of magicules to the extent of its force, than even Magic Sense could allow. It told him that the area beneath Razens rib cage was packed with highly dense magicenough to set off a dangerous, forbidden spell, by Hakuros estimation.

    I see

    It would not be an issue for Sir Rimuru, but we will still need to prepare for this. We must tell everyone about this dangerous figure before us.

    Geld nodded. I understand. I will ry the news to my own forces.

    Then they both went outside to assist in the final mopping-up of the western troops.

    With Shogo in tow, Razen safely made it back to Folgens side at their headquarters. Triggering several powerful magics consecutively in a short time filled him with a sense of fatigue like none hed experienced in recent years, but now was no time to rest. He had work to do.

    Th-thanks, Razen. Im sorry.

    Forget about it, Shogo. You are one of my most valuable tools. One of our kingdoms most precious pieces of war machinery.

    Y-yeah I lost this time, but not in the next round. Ill show em!

    Very good, Razen gently repliedeven as his eyes shone coldly, something Shogo failed to notice. Your injuries seem to have taken care of themselves, but let me cast some magic to help you rest better. You need to recover your stamina first.

    Sure. Sounds good.

    He epted Razens offer without questionand, without hesitation, Razen cast his spell. It was the illusory magic Mental Strike, a move that shattered the targets spiritual and astral bodies. Shogos spiritual corpus was already heavily damaged by Gelds attack; this was nothing he could withstand, and he trusted Razen too much to have any of his own resistances up.

    So the otherworlder Shogo Taguchi saw his enddoomed to die either way, between his weakness and his egotism. But this death was not one of the body but one of the heart.

    With the still Shogo in front of him, Razen prepared his final great magic of the day.

    Rather earlier than nned, isnt it, Sir Razen?

    My hands are tied, Folgen. The monsters unnerved him so much that hed hardly be useful to us any longer. The time hade.

    Heh-heh-heh Still a pitiful sight, though. He really believed he was the strongest man in the world, didnt he?

    It appears that way. And look at Kyoya. He honestly believed he could defeat Hinata Sakaguchi, head of the pdins. With his strength.

    Bah-ha-ha-ha-ha! Dont make meugh. Not even I could take her, and that little upstart expected victory?

    Folgen could at least put up a fight against her thanks to the fact that he himself was an otherworlder, summoned by a younger Razen decades ago. He had no locking curse restricting his soul; in terms of their rtionship, he was both friends and cooperative partners with Razen. Even to someone like that, Hinatas strength was in its own realm, enough to convince him without trying that he had no chance.

    It is a pity, though, stated Razen. Kyoyas Severer skill slipped through our fingers before I could pass it on to you.

    Thats fine. Theres always next time.

    Folgens own unique skill was called Spearhead. It gave him special insight into the strength of the forces he led, letting him select from and obtain the skills of any dead member of his force within eyeshot. He could earn only a limited number of skills this way, however, which annoyed him to no end.

    Indeed there is, Razen agreed. The stronger among our forces always seem to foster powerful skills within them, but look at how selfish they all are! The one fly in the ointment. Summoning at random is much easier, but it never results in anyone strong enoughnot that their personalities matter then, since we can always sacrifice them and seize their powers.

    No doubt. Weve constantly spoiled them, treating them like the linchpins of our armies they are. I see no reason for them toin about it.

    The two shared augh.

    And this, right here, was the whole crux of Farmuss problem. It wasnt just the otherworldersthe summoners who called the kingdom home were just as egotistical, assuming by birthright they were the strongest out there.

    Razen smiled as he continued his work. But this may be a blessing in disguise, he said. At the very end, Shogo did help me out a great deal. Im not sure what happened, exactly, but he seems to have obtained another unique skill. Now, then

    The job was almost done. He was resetting Shogos brain, overwriting it with his own memory. Once he transported the soul over, he was good to go.

    You sure youre all right? Theres no chance of it failing?

    Dont worry. This isnt the first time. My teacher, Lord Gadora, reincarnated himself by literally birthing his soul all over again. No greater secret magic out there. Compared to that , casting Possession couldnt be simpler.

    Razen hadpletely destroyed Shogos astral body in order to take over his physical one. He then destroyed his brain and rebuilt it again with Survivor. It was a total nk, with none of its souls memories restored, and now Razens own memories were burned into it. All he had to do now was imnt his soul into Shogos body.

    The Possession spell was a simplified version of Reincarnation, the mysterious, esoteric skill first woven by Razens master, the great sorcerer Gadora. It was an original skill of Razens, and now it was activated. This was how the head sorcerer of Farmus managed to serve his nation over all these many years, transferring himself from powerful body to powerful body. With Shogos, he was now reborn as the perfectbination of indomitable spirit and undefeatable muscle, the strongest magic-born in all of Farmuss history.

    Ahhh It does feel so nice to be in a younger body again.

    Heh-heh-heh! Youre sounding much older than you look right now.

    Enough of that. Now to report to His Highness and show him what I am reborn as.

    He slipped back into the robe he had discarded earlier, staff in hand. There was a new spring in his step as he boldly sauntered off, brimming with confidence and aspiration over the new strength he had. It was enough to amaze even Folgen, reinforcing his confidence in his friend and partner.

    Losing three otherworlders, a hefty chunk of their nations fighting force, stung badly. But Razens strength put him beyond the realm of special A rank at this point, so it was hardly worthmenting. Right now, Razen was confident he could take Hakuro and Geld, those two enemy monsters hed run into earlier, and easily trounce them.

    Deep inside, he even had a suspicion that he could challenge a demon lord, the so-called S ranks. Then he recalled the words of warning Hakuro left him with.

    Have I enraged the one creature in this world I shouldnt have? That witch dispatched the monsters so-called master long ago, no? Hesactually alive?

    The suspicion made him stop in his tracks.

    What?

    Oh, ah, nothing.

    He immediately started walking again.

    Im letting my mind paralyze me. Perhaps he is more of a menace than I thought, but Im overthinking matters. And even if he did survive that witch, I can just dispatch him myself.

    He smiled boldly as he approached the pavilion where his king awaited.

    On the third day, with the sun hanging in the middle of the sky, the nightmare finally began for the Kingdom of Farmus.

    A legion of troops was marching below mebut in my view, they were nothing but sacrifices to feed upon for my evolution.

    These were the ones who got Shion and the rest. Normally, I suppose I should give some kind of warning or indication that I would attack. But I already knew these guys had dered war on us, and if they were marching for town, I imagined they were ready to die for the cause. Besides, this wasnt even a war. I was nning to consume every single one of them. Fair and square kind of lost its meaning if I intended for there to be no survivors.

    This human garbage wrecked my territory. The least they could do now was enjoy the honor of helping with my evolution before dying.

    I was hovering in midair, in human form with my mask on and my wings out. Control Gravity let me unconsciously maintain this position as I peered downward, gauging the situation.

    As I did, Benimaru sent a Thought Communication reporting that the magical devices running the barrier were destroyed. Hakuro also informed me of a dangerous sorcerer hed encountered, but I didnt see the fuss. Id just take care of him alongside the rest. Everyone else was back in town, staying on the lookout to make sure there werent any detached forces. It was my turn.

    It had taken a little time, but Analyze and Assess had wrapped up its work on the forces below. I now had an urate picture of their strength and numbers, and I had also finished calctions on a new magical spell. Everything was ready.

    Shall we, then?

    I deployed arge-scale magic circle, big enough to cover the entire Farmus force. It was powered by Anti-Magic Area, a great magic Id picked up from Mjurran. It was about thirty miles in diameter, and it couldnt have been more perfectly positioned. It covered the entire atmosphere up to ten feet above the ground, cutting the area off from the sky and the earth. Now the enemy could cast no magic.

    All of this was just to prevent the force from fleeing. I didnt want to let a single one of them go, so I blocked any chance of their magically teleporting away. Now it was time to deploy the main coursea vast killing magic, the perfect weapon to seal the deal with. It was called:

    Die! May the anger of the gods sear through your very souls! Megiddo!!

    Dancing, swirling rays of light rained down from the heavens, repeatedly reflecting and refracting near the ground and plunging through the knights before they could react.

    There would be no opening bell to signal the beginning of the quiet massacre.

    Usually, a military force in this world would deploy underneath a protective barrier established by the magical toon attached to it. This was known as legion magic, and it put the force on notice against any type of magical element. The right kind of so-called nuclear magic from long range could change the tide of battle even if there was a lopsided difference in force involved, so most military marches in this world were done while keeping a close eye on magic from any number of distances.

    Farmus, of course, had made thorough preparations along those lines, keeping up a stiff guard against all magic it could think of. Considering they were marching for a nation of monsters (including some that ranked even beyond A), theyd be deranged not to.

    But none of that prep work had any meaning against my new magic.

    Barriers in this world primarily worked on the principle of blocking the flow of magicules. It required a different approach from resisting thews of physics, something I discovered when I analyzed the barrier.

    It was simple, if you thought about it. If a barrier could block a heat st of thousands of degrees, then what exactly was the barrier doing to resist it?

    The aspectual magic of this world worked by intervening into thews of physics, through the careful control of magicules. If you wanted to block such magic, you could just erect a barrier to keep those magicules from streaming in. Any offense against that barrier would have to outss it in strength, or else it couldnt apply any of its effects beyond the barrier. The magic would simply fail to set off. Things like Charybdiss Magic Interference were applications of this principle.

    Elemental magic, on the other hand, rewrote thews of physics with the powers of spiritual intervention. It didnt work on suchrge scales of force and distance, and the barrier had been built to block that type of magic as well. It was a pure test of strength between elementals, which made it easy to block your opponent if need be. As long as you were prepared for ambushes, itd just devolve into an arm-wrestling match.

    Really, with any type of magic, it all came down to figuring out the principle and going beyond it to neutralize the threat. That was why barriers like these were prepared to deal with just about anything, usually stacking at least two types of protectiveyers above each other.

    To deal with this, I thought outside the box a little and used magic to create a pure form of physical energy. Between my experience with Charybdis and my analysis of Control Magic, I had a general understanding of how the triggering of magic worked. Getting to see Hinatas Disintegration in action was also an inspiration for the final concept. It all allowed me to have the Great Sage develop a magic effective enough to poke a hole through every type of defensive magic. I had just finished the final adjustments on it, and now it was deployed.

    Over a thousand or so droplets of water were floating around me. I had deployed a dozen-ishrge ones up above, shaped like convex lenses. These droplets gathered the sunlight overhead, honing it into thin rays of light and refracting it against the mirrorlike droplets below. This focused all the light upon a single point, where it was then further condensed by the convex-lens droplets down below me before being channeled toward its target. The temperature of these thin rays, no more than a pencils width in diameter, was several thousand degreesmore than enough heat to take a persons life.

    The droplets were water elementals I summoned and transformed for my needs. With my magic, each one of them took in the suns energy, refracted it, and collected it. And that was how Megiddo, my new physically driven magic spell, worked.

    The first wild st of light led to a helpless death for over one thou sand knights. Their ranks began to fall apart below meMegiddo was terrorizing them, or so I hoped. But that wasnt the end. Optimizing my calctions, I automatically adjusted the positions of the relevant droplets and set off the second st. Another thousand or so fell, unable to resist the searing heat.

    That was the really scary thing about this magic, actuallyhow little energy it cost me to orchestrate. The convex lens that served as the finalunching point was vaporized every time by the heat, but I could instantly provide another one. That was what the water elementals were for. And gathering water vapor from the air didnt take much work.

    Rebuilding a lens took less than half a minute, so it was even possible tounch a volley of air strikes. All I had to do was gather more water and adjust my aim. It cost me nothing more than whatever it took to summon elementals and keep the machine purringthis spell, for the most part, ran on sunlight, the purest symbol of natural energy. It meant I could use it only during the daytime, but these forces were kind enough to march upon Tempest close to high noon. All potential issues had been addressed. Now I just had to clean up the garbage below me.

    The soundless bolts of light-speed force offered the knights no chance to react as they toasted them. The massacre went on. Magic Sense gave me a perfect picture of their locations, letting me strike them right where they were most vulnerable. The only thing their barrier obstructed was magicules, so I luckily had a clear view of them all.

    Whether a mercenary d in crude leather armor or a knight in government-issue metal te, death came to all equally. asionally, I would deliberately aim a beam at someones arm or leg or torso, making them scream in despair to add to the chaos. It only made the scene more gruesome. Terror was everywhere now.

    What I did not aim for were the fancier wagons and tents. I didnt know where the king was. If I killed him, Id never be able to make him confess his sins. I wasnt thatpassionate. Anyone stupid enough to incur my wrath needed to be amply rewarded for it.

    A mere five minutes or so after this one-sided strike began, two-thirds of the advancing force were out ofmission. That meant over ten thousand lives had been snuffed out by me, their souls harvested.

    Now ought to be a good time

    With a flutter of my wings, I descended to Earth, ready to deliver yet more despair to the fools before me.

    When Razen spotted the Anti-Magic Area deployed by the enemy, he was amazed at the sheer size of it. But he paid it no further mind, instantly recognizing that it didnt matter much to them.

    Unlike in the Dwarven Kingdom, whose magical forces were the star yer in their offense, Farmuss magicians were tasked strictly with handling defense first, followed by strengthening and support spells. Magic that enhanced the bodies of targets wasrgely impervious to jamming, which meant having offensive magic robbed of them was not a major problem. Plus, they already had assorted legion magic in effect, and dispulsion magic would be the only way to get rid of that. An Anti-Magic Area made it impossible to cast any new magic within its range; it had no effect on things already cast.

    Razen checked one more time to make sure all their defensive magic was still operational. It was.

    Hmm. Looks all right. Our enemy is rather confident in their close-rangebat skills, then?

    Sounds like a job for me. Let me drum up my knights morale for a

    Just when Folgen was replying to the sorcerers question, a beam of light mmed down. Razen could barelyprehend what had happenednot just him but everyone in the area. There was a dull ting of impact, and the guard sentry behind them fell, a tiny round hole right between his eyebrows.

    Ah?! What was that?

    Razen found himself shouting out in surprise.

    Stand strong! Protect His Highness!!

    Immediately heeding Folgens orders, the knights sprang into action, trying to bottle up their trepidation inside. But it was pointless. That first beam was just a test firing; what followed was a brilliant, dazzling array of light.

    In the blink of an eye, soldiers began to fall anew. There was no time to heal them. The beams ran right through their vitals, killing them instantly.

    Gahhh!! My armmy arms!!

    Help! Help meeeee!

    Aaaaaahhh! Wherewheres iting from?!

    Those unlucky enough to be caught up in firing range cried and begged for mercyor fell into panic at the sight of their unresponsive squad mates. In a single moment, it was pandemonium across the battlefield. Their spirits were once high, their minds confident in victorybut that was all long gone.

    The leader of the Farmus Mercenary Brigades bitterly clucked his tongue.

    His old soldiers, all veterans of more than a few intense battles in their time, were being run through by these beams of light out of nowhere, killed instantly. The new, younger recruits were running for their lives, driven by terror and barely in control of their senses. It happened in an instantthe blinding light dancing around them, everything within range of it dying all too easily.

    Resistance was futile, and after a few moments, the second wave arrived. He saw his right-hand man, the vice captain of the force, fall before himand that finally made the leader realize this was an enemy attack. Immediately, from the bottom of his heart, he regretted ever joining this expedition.

    Goddamn them all! What the hell is behind this?!

    There was nothing he could do to counter this thing that went well beyond his understanding. But the mercenary leader had luck on his side. The third merciless wave that visited the squad killed him painlessly. He was a famed fighter,uded as an A-ranked champion to the world, and he lost his life before he even knew what had happened.

    In response to this emergency, the anti-monster Temple Knights affiliated with the Western Holy Church stuck to their guns.

    All troops, fall into rows! Every group, stand in close defensive formation andunch your Multyer Barriers! Show the enemy that no attack can faze our holy might!!

    They were trained to move like this, instantly reacting despite all the friends theyd lost. It was a kind of dedication that amazed anyone who saw it. But just as they built their barriers, firm and confident, they all had their heads shot through and died.

    It was as if someone was ridiculing them from up high, showing them how useless their defenses were. And staying in close formation wound up being suicidal. Having so many troops in a tight space allowed one beam to kill several knights at once.

    No faith in the gods above would be strong enough to have any meaning in the face of Megiddo. By the time the fifth wave subsided, the Temple Knights were annihted.

    The strong and the weak trembled in unison. There was nothing they could do. Even the Farmus Noble Knight Federation, that group of hardy young Farmus noble-born, had copsed, seeking any kind of escape they could. They were even attacking one another in a crazed, ugly disybut it was that ugliness that allowed them to survive the longest. Whether that was lucky for them or not is a topic for debate.

    The magicians among the Noble Knight FederationRazens personal apprenticeswere forced to wallow in their helplessness as they died. They were unable to cast magic, and instead it was magic being endlessly thrown upon them. Or was it even magic at all, really? They just didnt know, and it pained them.

    Even at the very end of their lives, on the brink of death, they were students. All they wanted to do was know. And they couldnt.

    At the end of light wave number seven, half of them were dead. Razen and Folgen stared nkly at the scene for a single moment, then resolved to regroup with their king and leader.

    There was no longer any way to maintain order among the ranks. Everyone was too busy trying to save their own hides. Their best bet right now was to hasten over to their king and keep him safe. They still had no idea what these beams of light were. Even with their intellectual senses turned up to maximum, it was beyond their grasp. The moment something bright passed by, someone else was fallen. Even the afterglow took precious time to be perceived in their minds. The speed of it all was simply unimaginable.

    But Razen had another theory about this. By his observation, a single beam could kill at most a few knights at once. He could tell there was some set ofws behind this light. If there was a wall, something he could use to cut off the light, thats all he would need. Even if it wasworst-case scenarioa wall of humanity, the king would still be protected. And as for himself? He was willing to bet he could withstand this light.

    So he and Folgen pushed toward the kings tent, shouting the whole way:

    Where is King Edmaris? Is His Highness safe?!

    King Edmaris was doing everything he could to quell the wellspring of terror robbing him of his very breath. He had to save his dignity as a monarch at all costs. His mind raced, his thoughts chaotic.

    There was now no denying it: This campaign was a failure. Even if he wanted to escape alive, developments no longer allowed for that. He just wanted to scream, How did this happen?! but there was no time for that.

    Reyhiem, what will? What should we do?

    Wewe must remain calm. We must remain calm!

    The king and the archbishop hugged each other inside their ornate tent, shivering. An attendant who had stepped outside to gauge the situationliterally just a moment agohad already been incinerated.

    It wasnt so long ago that he had seen off the advance forces, waiting for the knights who would march forth from behind them. They all seemed so confident, so reliable. He was sure this campaign would end in victory, part of the path to glorious honor for him. But a few minutes were all it took to turn the tables. All it took to fill the fields with the dead.

    The sight was so detached from reality that King Edmaris couldnt evenprehend how it had happened. All he could do was sit in his tent and quiver. And Archbishop Reyhiem was exactly the same. He had no interest in protecting the kinghe stayed here simply because he imagined it was safest for him. He had no proof of that, but he wound up being correct. None of that merciless light had shone upon them yet.

    Your Highness! Are you all right?

    Knight Captain Folgen is here for you, my lord!

    Ah, Folgen! How great it is to see you! And you too, Shogo. Please, please let us get out of here at once. We must return home and regroup our forces!

    Indeed. I have no idea what has urred. We must leave at once, or we may be caught up in the carnage as well!

    With two of Farmuss greatest fighters on hand, King Edmaris could breathe at least a slight sigh of relief. He ran up to Folgen, practically clinging to him.

    Now, please, hurry! Where is Razen? We need his teleportation magic if we want to

    The ninth wave of light struck.

    Aaaah!!

    The king squatted down, arms covering his head, as his good archbishop sank to the floor.

    Please, Your Highness, stay calm. Your sorcerer stands right before you.

    Shogo? No, is thatRazen?

    That is correct, sire.

    Ah Ahhh! Oh, Razen, Razen, thank you foring! Now, please, we must go home at once!

    One moment, sire. There are a number of things I wish to report to you, but for now, I will keep it brief. To put it sinctly, right now, we are unable to cast magic within this area. We will need to somehow assemble our knights and use them as shields as we fight our way back to safety.

    What?!

    Um, are you sure about this? Reyhiem ventured. We have, um, our current force numbers

    Do not worry, Archbishop, chimed Folgen. Thanks to my Spearhead unique skill, I can force our surviving troops to group together. They will form a wall of humanity to keep yourself and His Highness safe.

    Ah, ah, ahhhh, I knew I could count on you, Folgen!

    Indeed, I would rather rely on no one else right now, Sir Folgen!

    Very good. I will ry our status to my men. Prepare to retreat!

    It shall be done!

    Yes! Godspeed to you, Sir Folgen!

    Folgen nodded back and ran outside, King Edmaris looking expectantly on.

    So how should we prepare? he asked the man who looked for all the world like Shogo next to him.

    Razen nodded and provided the king and Reyhiem two pairs of shoesWinged Shoes, magical in nature, which boosted the wearers running speed and reduced their fatigue. Someone well trained in their usage could almost look like they were flying through the air, but the not-so-battle-hardened king could not expect that. He would need to run during this retreat, though, so anything that could make his flight more efficient was a godsend. Even within the Anti-Magic Area, magic that had already been activated would continue undisturbed. Razen had confirmed long ago that magic items werent affected at all in one.

    Now, sirethe next time a wave of light strikes, we will make a break for the exit outside. Are you all right with this, Sir Reyhiem?

    Yes. I am ready.

    Understood, Sir Razen!

    They packed only what they needed with them and waited. Soon, the tenthand finalbout of dancing light dazzled the battlefield anew.

    Now!

    Under Razens signal, the three of them ran off. Outside, the first thing they saw was Folgens broad, burly back. When King Edmaris caught sight of it, he shouted at his knight captain:

    How is it going?!

    He was ranked beyond A as an otherworlder, a battle-hardened veteran and the pride of all Farmus. As strongest in the nation, the proud Folgen was one of King Edmariss closest confidants and a man he knew he could always trust. But Folgen offered him no answer.

    Folgen? Folgen, what is wrong? Answer me!

    Fear, confusion, and anger intermixed in his voice as the king pped the knight captain on the shoulder. Then, in a single motion, therge, monolithic frame tilted and fell to the ground. A closer look revealed a hole in both his temples, running in a straight line from right to left. It was burned through, instantly cauterizing the wound and preventing much in the way of blood loss.

    Ee, ee, eeaaahhhhhhhh !!

    The king let out a loud yelp of terror, lost his footing, and practically crawled back into the tent. His choice of stance meant his Winged Shoes went to waste, as he demonstrated not even a shade of regal dignity. A warm liquid dripped out from his crotch as he sobbed, eyes and nose dripping like a faucet. And as they did, he knew: He was going to die. If he stayed here, he was dead.

    Even as he tried to flee in terror, he kept falling down, his legs failing him. But there was no one there to notice. The knights who Folgen had called together had been wiped out with the tenth wave. Anyone still surviving had lost their sense of reason, too focused on saving themselves. Order and discipline were a thing of the past. The knights could easily boast of being the mightiest military power of the Western Nations, but now they were powerless, lowlier than a disorderly mob.

    All of them now tasted their powerlessness in equal measure. The terror should only have been expected. In a single instant, the absolute superiority over monsters they enjoyed had copsed into a heap.

    The feel of the battle had now changed.

    The soldiers, running amok in all directions, stopped moving, their eyes turning toward a single point in the sky. King Edmaris was among them.

    The cause of this scourge was there, a human figure flying down from above with its bat-like ck wings. It was not that tall, and the mask it wore had a clear crack that made it almost look like it was crying. It had on a kimono of pure ck, giving it a beautiful, almost divine look. The only obvious weapon was a straight de slung at its waistshockingly light gear for a battle like thisbut the drive and ambition that oozed from its every pore provided all the exnation needed to overturnmon sense. It proved that even the most elite of Farmuss forces were worthy of a fate no better than a bugs, crushed under the heel of this figure as if it took a leisurely stroll across the park.

    The instincts of every witness on the scene told them all the same thing. Is that a demon? No, it

    Its a demon lord!

    Now, finally, King Edmaris realized the greatest mistake he had made. He should never have prodded this wasps nest. He should have forged formal rtions with them, the way the kingdom of Blumund had. That outfitand that beautiful, fetching cloth it was made from. And that appearancethat presence. This was surely the leader of the nation.

    So Hinata, that witch from the Holy Church, failed after all?!

    The conclusion made King Edmariss face turn pale. But perhaps, the terror had gone so far past its limits that he had cycled back into calmness. He had the capacity to think now. That witch wasuded as the most powerful in the Western Nations. She was tasked with defeating the master of the monster kingdom, and that master was now flitting in the air above him. He had never heard of that cold, calcting witch ever failing to execute her orders before.

    The voice of a dumbfounded Razen echoed in his ears.

    The masterof the monster nation?! Youyou were truly alive all this time?

    Realizing that his chief sorcerer was of the same mind convinced the king once and for all. The witch had failed. And, he saw now, the monster before them had more than enough strength to make that happen.

    But that could wait. This monster bore the appearance, the air of a demon lord. Which meant, perhaps

    What do I do? How can I survive this?!

    King Edmaris racked his brain. Then, like a sh of light, an idea appeared.

    This might be our best chance! I am a king, a monarch. If I can phrase this to sound like Ivee to negotiate, Im sure he will listen to me. The report said he was soft, an easy mark!

    It seemed like a brilliant idea. It was not. It was the opposite of that, and it made his thoughts veer in ever more terrifying directions.

    If hes willing to happily negotiate with a tiny little speck like Blumund, why, hell prostrate himself before me when he hears the king of the greatnd of Farmus speaking to him!

    He was failing to read the situation, reasoning with himself strictly based on what he hoped would happenbut that didnt matter to him. He simply clung to the shallow desire to return home and prepare a counterattack. And it made him take action, instead of realizing how full of wishful thinking his head was.

    Once I was ten feet above the ground, I realized how utterly razed the whole area was. It was exactly what I had pictured and calcted out with the Great Sage, mind you, but even I wondered a bit if Id gone too far.

    Wait. No. Cant let my mind waver over something like this.

    The survivors who spotted me sank to the ground in fear.

    Aaah, help, help me!

    I could hear what sounded like people pleading for their lives. I gave each of them a shot between their eyes for their trouble.

    It did take some time to get used to things, but now I could control the beams of light like second nature. The key was in the angle of refraction. You could fire all you wanted for the barest minimum of energy. Focusing your heat source on a single point cooked it up to several thousand degrees, and that was more than enough to take down a man or two.

    Once I grasped the concept, I could always strike from the most optimal angle whenever I wanted. Theres a slight timeg to deal with, but were essentially talking the speed of light, so you cant dodge it once you see it. I could fire it from six thousand miles away, and itd still take about 0.034 seconds to find its target. Far faster than a human being could obtain the visual information and transmit it via the nervous system to their brain.

    I couldnt control and aim it with any uracy without theputations of the Great Sage. Gotta give the guy a hand. It made me realize all over again how amazing it was. If someone fired this on me at close range, Id have trouble evading it even with the Sages help. I couldprehend what it was the moment I caught sight of it, so maybe I could just barely get out of the way in timebut itd probablye down to luck.

    For humans, there was just no chance. And when the tenth wave wasunched, I heard a certain voice for the first time in a while.

    Confirmed. The unique skill Merciless is  sessfully obtained.

    It wasnt the Great Sage but the World Language, popping in after a long hiatus.

    Uh, dude, I really dont need that skill. I know I have it and all now, but still. But just as I was about to check what it did, someone down there started shouting at me.

    W-wait! Wait! Are you the master of this domain? I am Edmaris, supreme ruler of the Kingdom of Farmus! Bow before me, for we have matters to discuss!

    It was some scruffy-looking old man.

    Addressing me at a time like this, he was either brave or just a reckless fool. His crotch was all wet, which made me assume he had pissed himself at some point. Between all the tears, snot, and spittle on his face, he probably had seen better days. And this was a king? What a joke.

    Oh? You a body double or something? Dont worry. I wonty a hand on the real thing.

    I was just about to open fire on him, not wanting to waste my time on idiots like this, but something stopped me. What if he is the real thing?

    That-that is no body double!

    Huh? Someone else now, just as old and even seedier-looking.

    It is not! I swear it by my name as Reyhiem, archbishop of the Western Holy Church!

    Taking a closer look, neither of this pair appeared to be knights. Their clothing was too ornate for that. Whew! That was close. They were more real than I thoughtbut lets check, just in case.

    All right. Well, Im gonna kill everybody except for youyoure definitely sure theres not some other real king around here?

    I am the one and true ruler of my realm! Butbut everyone ?

    Eep! W-wait, wait! Atat least spare my life as well, please! I wield great power within the Holy Church bureaucracy. I will dly testify before all of them that not one of you is an enemy to mankind!

    The seedy-looking guy who called himself Archbishop Reyhiem was practically praying to me. Its not like sparing him would change matters much, but maybe I could use him somehow And he definitely seemed important, for sure. Lets keep him alive for now.

    Which left the other one

    I gave him a quick nce. The man who called himself the king instantly noticed. W-wait! he prattled. I told youwe have matters to discuss!

    Well, all right. I have a positive ID now. Lets hear him out.

    What matters are those, old man? Ill listen to what you got.

    It was a nice show of generosity on my part, I thought. But the guy took it as an invitation to shout his head off at me.

    H-how dare you! Such rudeness! I am the leader of the great Kingdom of Farmus! Normally, I would never even deign to speak to the likes of you. Now Ive granted you that right, and that is how you treat me? But very well. This time, I shall

    Then I shot his arm off.

    I dunnoI guess the scope of his utter delusion grated on my nerves. I really had no reason to be courteous to him. I save the politeness only for people who sincerely return the favor to me. That much applied whether this guy was a king or not. Plus, was now really the time for him to act all high and mighty?

    I guess he didnt get the situation he was in, so I just wanted to open his eyes without killing him in the process. I took pains to avoid that, reallyI even used Dark me to sear the wound and prevent excessive blood loss. Like, he was probably gonna die a painful death anywaybut that wasnt my job. I was kind of hoping Shion could handle that for me. Shed be the one with the real grudge.

    Now, will you look at me when youre talking? Dont get all carried away just because Im being nice. You are allowed to speak. Get to it.

    All he did at first was nkly stare at the stump where his right forearm used to be. He realized what it meant at the same time the pain struck home.

    Gaaahhhhhhhhh!!

    He started rolling around on the ground, screaming. Um, what did they call him again? A national hero, the ever-proud something or other? I was finding it hard to equate that great-sounding guy with the old dude in front of me. I still wasnt sure he was truly a king, but nobody else in the area looked like theyd fit the bill. I told him I was going to kill everybody besides the king, and there were no other imants to the title stepping up, soooo

    Guess Ill just go with this guy as the king for now. As I settled on this, it began to seem like the mans pained screaming was starting to make the anger within me subside. But if this dude died on me, the potential rebound in my anger level honestly scared me a bit. I had to be very careful not to kill him.

    Look, did you have something to say or not? If you just wanted to show me your interpretive dance, thats great, but Ive had enough.

    The statement made him open and close his mouth like a fish, desperately struggling to say something. I guess the terror and pain made it impossible to find his voice. This was getting really troublesome. Ah well. Just for a bit, lets make him forget the pain. I grabbed the man by the hair, lifted his head upward, and peered into his eyes.

    You get one chance, I threatened through the mask. Theres no next time, got it?

    That was enough to make the guy freeze in ce, nodding furiously. Enough to make him regain his wits, I guess. Or maybe I just scared him so badly that it paralyzed all his senses. He was still having trouble with artiction, but now the words wereing out freely.

    Thisthis is all a misunderstanding! It all began with a misunderstanding. I only came here to form friendly rtions with thisnd. Did you find the force I brought along with me n-not to your tastes? They were here to guarantee my safety, and I merely brought them along out of hopes that I may gain anan audience with you!

    Huh? You dere war on us out of nowhere, I coldly spat out at this pile of bullshit, and thats the nonsense you conjure up for me? The moment I lost friends in that battle, you all became my enemy.

    But the guy didnt give up. W-wait! he shouted, talking even faster than before. Youre wrong. Thats where the misunderstanding lies. The Western Holy Church saw all monsters as enemies, so I wanted to see for myself if it was worth attempting to make peace with you! And then the otherworlders we deployed here went out of control on us. II was tricked as well! I had no idea those miscreants were as dangerous as they proved to be. But what a stroke of luck! Now I know for a fact that your nation houses brave fighters capable of defeating those menaces. A country with such wonderful heroes at its disposal certainly passes muster with me! I, er, my nation would be d to forge formal rtions with yours! Wouldnt that be wonderful? A great honor, if I say so myself! Farmus is a mighty power, unlike Blumund and the other small fry. Wouldnt aligning with us put you in a much more prominent position? It would put our government at ease, and you would gain powerful backup from our forces. I could even introduce you to the Council at some point. We could both stand to profit greatly from this, no? I mean, I will need to ask for fair reparations to cover for the military losses weve incurred, but I truly think this has been a powerful lesson for the both of us. So how about it? You will ept, will you not?

    Uh Wow, is this guy a genius or what? How much does he need to talk down at me, making me as ufortable as possible, until hes happy? And whys he working under the assumption that Id dly pay him anything? Does he really want to piss me off that much, just so he can taste more pain during his inevitable death? Is he one of those?

    Unaware of my confusion, the old man just kept on talking, up to the end. Right. Lets take off his right leg to shut him up.

    He started screaming, but I had taken pains to keep him alive again, so I let him be. No need to cauterize the wound or anything; I just cast Dark me to burn off the relevant blood vessels, so nothing came out. A pretty useful way to keep someone alive, I thought.

    I then realized things had grown awfully quiet around us. I scanned the field, only to find the remaining soldiers kowtowing before me, too awed by the horror to do anything else. They had watched this whole exchange with bated breath, and seeing our talks get (literally) cut off filled them with despair. Some of them were half praying, half pleading for their lives, giving the proceedings a suddenly tragic air.

    Sadly, there was no point in pleading now. My normally generous heart had been fully drawn over by the scrawls of rage. And I had just happened to finish analyzing that Merciless skill I got. Turned out it allowed me to seize the souls of anyone begging for their lives or seeking help from me. In other words, if they ever lost the will to fight, it meant death for them. It didnt seem to have a vast range of uses, really, but something told me itd help out a bunch right now.

    Question. Use the unique skill Merciless?

    Yes

    No

    If I had umted the necessary number of souls to evolve into a true demon lord, I could have always left these guys alive. But, sadly, it looked like I still didnt have quite enough.

    YES , I thought. My heart was calm. There was no pain, no real sense of guilt I could find lurking in some corner. And an instantter, everyone except for Reyhiem and that guy with him (whom I had specifically defined as out of range) was exposed to the tyranny of Merciless. The knights all fell, unable to pose any resistance, and with that, the nearly ten thousand soldiers still alive all breathed theirst.

    Merciless, huh? Youre damn right it is. It was safe to merely fear me, I guess, but the moment I fully broke their hearts, I couldunch it. It was like they just handed their souls to me on a silver tter. I was free to choose whether I let them live or dieand if I let them off the hook, they came back home, and then they started plotting revenge against me, I could flip the switch on their lives any time I wanted.

    Plus, the real surprise when I used this was that it worked even on the soldiers already fleeing me. It applied to everyone I had identified as an enemy at the beginningin other words, everybody I watched over, up there in the sky. I know I talked a big game about killing everybody, but even I expected to lose some of the more prudent ones who decided to ditch this scene early. They were fleeing in all directions, too much of a hassle to track down one by onebut the moment Iunched Merciless, the survivor count reached zero.

    Just crush an opponents heart, and the fights over. Whoa. Maybe this is more useful than I thought. I have a feeling Ill be tapping it again in the future.

    The waves of chaos and terror that permeated the battlefield neatly dissipated. I had made all the pain and fear go away, which I suppose was one way of showing a little mercyeven if it meant my two survivors were about to experience even more pain and fear.

    Then the World Language echoed anew.

    Report. Checking the number of souls required for evolution  Confirmed. The required conditions have been met. The Harvest Festival will now begin.

    As the voice rang through my mind, I could feel vast amounts of power suddenly flow away from my body. Whether I wanted it to or not, my body was transforming, rebuilding itself. I was bing a true demon lordone recognized as such not just by me but by the very world itself.

    My body fell lifelessly to the ground, reverting to slime form.

    Oh crap. I could barely keep my eyes open. Like, this wasnt gonna just be a nap or anything. I was freakin exhausted .

    My vision was starting to fade around me, which I assumed was because Magic Sense was starting to falter. I was even getting dizzy. I mean, yeah, they said Id have to go through evolution and stuff, but I was seriously worried that my consciousness would fly away from me. I sure as hell didnt want to sleep in this field full of stinking corpses.

    Lets get back to town. I still have my two conspirator friends safely captured here. My mission was aplished. There was no harm in returning to Tempest.

    As I tried to console myself with that thought, Magic Sense picked up something. A single person. If they were still alive, it meant I hadnt broken their heart yet. Better be careful. God, as tired as I am, and theres still someone left? I gotta do something about this fatigue

    Report. Once triggered, the Harvest Festival cannot be halted.

    Well, shit. Im, like, in real trouble, arent I?!

    Hurriedly, I called for Ranga. Lucky thing I had him in my shadow, just in case.

    Ranga, you there?

    Yes, my master.

    He was! Nice. He appeared smoothly out from his hiding ce. Seeing him offered so much new promise for me. I sighed contentedly.

    Ranga, this is a top-priority order. Keep me safe and carry me back to town! And bring these two people along, too. Tell everyone there they are not to be touched, and definitely make sure nobody tries to kill them. You can ask Kabals crew or whoever to take care of them until I wake up.

    Oop. Here we go. I was now having serious trouble keeping my mind together. Spatial Motion wouldve gotten me there faster, but I was afraid Id blow myself up if I tried it now.

    Yes, Master. What should I do with the surviving enemy?

    Oh. He mustve noticed, too. I had to think about it. There was someone there, pretending to be dead. Merciless told me after I used it that there were no survivors. So did this guy die thene back to life? It meant his soul was still safe in there. I couldnt treat this lightly.

    Ranga would probably win, I imagined, but I opted for a more careful approach. Safety first and all that. But just turning tail and fleeing didnt seem right, and itd be a pain if this foe decided to give chase.

    So I chose to summon some demons, whod hopefully at least dy my foe for a while. Itd really suck if word about Megiddo got outit worked best only if the adversary wasnt aware of itbut my safety had to take priority.

    I will leave that to the others. They will bring the foe to you if they can capture them. Meet up with them for me.

    I shall, Master!

    I pooled together what little mental power I had left. Dispelling the Anti-Magic Area, I worked to summon a demon, offering the piles of corpses spread before me. I thought about using Glutton to eat them, but it wasnt like theyd have any useful skills or anything.

    There was no telling what kind of demon would result, but hopefully it wouldnt be a waste of twenty thousand bodies. It was exactly the kind of thing a selfish demon lord would do, I suppose, but it was the thought that counted. I hope.

    Come to me, demon! I have something for you to eat, se on up and serve me now!

    I sounded like I was trying to call my dog back from the yard. It was such a hassle to stay conscious that I could barely even pull off the summon correctly. Any demon willing to get summoned with something like that must be one damn curious idiot.

    But maybe I shouldnt have let such passing thoughts bother me. In a moment, three demons were there on the field. Just three? And here I thought thirty or so bodies were enough to summon a Greater Demon. Thousands of times that, and three is all I get. Ugh.

    Well, at least theyre Greater Demons, ranked A-minus. Certainly no trio of monsters to sniff at. Plus, I did kind of pluck the souls out of all these corpses.

    Ugh. Daaamn. I had never felt so wasted since I came to this world. My head barely even worked now. I wasnt so sure these guys could find this enemy, this needle in a haystack. But whatever.

    Hey. Guys. Theres someone hiding here, pretending to be dead. Capture them alive and bring em to Ranga here.

    Three Greater Demons, bossed around by a slime. To an outsider, it mustve been a surreal sight. I couldnt help but marvel at it. I was getting deliriously loopy as the dizziness grew. Simply keeping my body together was getting tough.

    I needed to get somewhere safe

    Hee-hee-hee-hee-hee. The birth of a new demon lord! Quite an old sensation but a familiar one. What a truly wonderful day! Such an offeringand the very first order from our lord, no less. This is such an honor; I couldnt possibly be more enthusiastic about this. Would it be all right to continue serving you in the future?

    I suppose one of the demons was greeting me, but I was so out of it that I didnt even recognize half of it.

    Well talkter. Just prove you can be helpful to me first. Go.

    That was all I could sputter out.

    It shall surely be done. Do not worry for a moment, O great Master

    I ignored the trio as they kindly saluted me, my mind being enfolded in the darkness. This was my first bout of full unconsciousness in this worldthe Initiation, if you will; the sleep that predated the evolution

    and the birth of a new demon lord.

 Volume 5 - Ch 5

    THE UNLEASHED

    After Rimuru set off for battle, the residents of the town assembled in the central za and began to pray. It wasnt out of sentiment, but for real work reasons. Shuna wasmanding them, as part of her efforts to keep the barrier up.

    The stronger ones were set in ce so they could better protect the fringes of town, out of concern for intruders. At the same time, Shuna released a stream of magical force within the barrier, boosting the number of magicules in the air.

    All of them had a firm grasp of their roleand all were deadly serious about carrying it out.

    In the middle of the za, the bodies of Shion and the other victims wereid to rest, kept in good condition by Shunas magic. There was a throne in the middle for Rimuru, an enshrinement site for his demon lordevolution ceremony. The hope was that performing the evolution as close to the victims as possible would make it that much more likely theyd be resurrected.

    The townspeople surrounded the whole siteShuna among them, standing next to Mjurran. And as she stood there, Shuna couldnt help but think: Rimuru seemed to care a great deal about being a former humanbut thats such a trivial issue. To Shuna and everyone else, soul-to-soul connections mattered the most, and the connection she shared with him gave her an absolute sense of security. She wished Rimuru would realize that as well. The eternal euphoria he provided filled her soul, nourishing it. If that went away and Rimuru disappeared, she thought it might drive her crazy. Just imagining it produced such a profound sense of loss that she shivered.

    Sir Rimuru, she whispered. As long as we have him, thats all that matters. But even missing one of us could upset his mental bnce greatly.

    Benimaru, just back to the za, nodded at this. It made sense to him. The transformation that the usually gregarious Rimuru made, he was convinced, might impact that bnce heavily. To him, he wanted to believe that life would go back to what it was someday.

    I just hope he doesnt turn into a different person as a demon lord. Going berserk on us

    With the barrier destruction work done, all of themBenimaru, Soei, Hakuro, Geld, Rigur, Gobzo, even Gabilwere now surrounding the throne. That was on Rimurus orders; hed asked them to kill him at once, should he lose all sense of reason and turn into an uncontroble beast up there. No matter what, they wanted to keep that from happeningall of them.

    Its because you keep on sleeping there, Shion, Benimaru whispered before returning to his prayers. Just wake up already

    His faith wasnt in some god up above. It was in a single slime. That faith had never betrayed him before, and it shouldnt this time. Everyone believed that; no one doubted it.

    Just then:

    Report. The individual Rimuru Tempests Harvest Festival is about to begin. Upon itspletion, all monsters in his genealogy will receive their due gifts.

    The World Language echoing in the hearts of every monster gathered in town sent a shock wave of tension across thend. Everything had gone as nned; Rimuru had sessfully crushed the invading force and begun his evolution. Now it was everyone elses turn to pitch in.

    Brace yourselves! Our master is victorious. Now is the time for us to wield our own powers!

    Everyone on hand voiced their approval of Benimarus words. Things had begun to move. Losing Shion and the rest could very well destroy Rimurus heart forever. They all needed to do everything they could right now to prevent that.

    After some time, Rimuru returned, carefully ferried over on Rangas back. As directed, he was taken to the throne andid to rest.

    Benimaru took this moment to think about what he would ask Rimuru when he awoke, to ensure he was still in full grasp of his reason.

    All right, hed suggested at the conference earlier, I will ask you, What do you think of Shions cooking?

    Sure, Rimuru had muttered. And then Ill say its shitty, right? Howd youe up with that question? Is that really the best thing to ask?

    It had been Benimarus idea, of course. He hadnt forgotten about how he was always having hertest creations tested out on himand the boundless pain and suffering that resulted. But nowif Shion could listen to that conversation and it enraged her enough to wake her upthey could hope for nothing more. Beyond that, all they had to do was carry out the duties theyd discussed earlier.

    And that was why Benimaru missed it. He was too worked up with performing the procedure exactly as nned to think at all about what these gifts might be. But even that was quietly beginning its preparations, ready to manifest itself in reflection of his subconscious thoughts

    Rimuru was in a deep sleep. His consciousness was gone; he was an irregr, unresolved blob, not even able to retain his usual streamlined form. And there, in the deep, deep darkness beyond the reaches of Rimurus consciousness:

    Report. The Harvest Festival has begun. Your bodily structure will be reconstructed in order to evolve you into a new species.

    Confirmed. Super-evolution from type slime to type demon slime  sessful. All bodily attributes have been greatly enhanced. The material and spiritual bodies are now freely transformable. Intrinsic skills Infinite Regeneration, Control Magic, Multyer Barrier, Universal Detect, Universal Shapeshift, Lords Ambition, Enhanced Replication, Spatial Motion, Darkme Lightning, and Universal Thread acquired. Reacquiring resistancepleted. Cancel Pain, Resist Melee Attack, Cancel Natural Elements, Cancel Ailments, Resist Spiritual Attack, and Resist Holy Attack acquired. Evolution is nowplete.

    Then, as if responding to its mastersmand, the unique skill Great Sagewhich never demonstrated having a sense of self beforerequested its own evolution.

    Report. Re-executing skill acquisition requested earlier. Unique skill Great Sage attempting evolution Failed.

    Failed.

    Re-executing.

    Failed.

    Re-executing.

    Failed.

    ENDLESS

    Report. Unique skill Great Sage attempting evolution, using Deviant as a sacrifice  Sessful. Unique skill Great Sage has evolved into Raphael, Lord of Wisdom.

    The Great Sage attempted it without sacrificing anything several hundred million timesand then, after a trial-and-error process that seemed like it wouldst for all of time

    it obtained its Harvest Festival giftconquering, and evolving, into an ultimate skill , the loftiest height possible in the world.

    The chances of this working were thought to be so small that it wasnt even worth considering. It almost seemed like a reward provided for the infinite effort involved with the attempt. Seeding made it more likely that it could carry out its masters request, but the supposedly soulless conceptual intelligence bore no happiness. It could never understand emotion.

    Butdespite theck of emotion, theck of happinesssomehow, it felt fulfilled. And then, with its evolved skill, it carried out its masters request once more. The way it acted, working incessantly to make its masters dreamse true, could even be

    The evolution continued.

    Glutton consumed Merciless to be Belzebuth, Lord of Gluttony, perfectly honed to more effectively handle its masters desires. There, deep in an abyss beyond what Rimurus soul could detect, the skill softly, deeply evolved itselfall to make his own dreamse true.

    But the Harvest Festival still wasnt over.

    The gifts meant to celebrate Rimurus evolution were passed out to everyone who had been named by or evolved from him. A raucous festival, indeeda gift for the one who had evolved from demon lord seedling to true demon lord. And the party was just getting started.

    Razeny in hiding, concealing himself with all his might.

    He was lucky to have died once back there. Having fullymandeered Shogos skills, he was brought back to life over time by Survivor. Before his brain could evenprehend the unbelievable events taking ce before him, his instincts understood and made the right call. They told him: Here was a foe who no one in human form could ever beat. Folgen, his sworn friend, was rendered helpless and killednot even able to stand before the monster, much less shield King Edmaris.

    He wanted to go and rescue his king but stopped himself, knowing that going right now would be a waste of life. So he kept his breath low, ying possum until the masked magic-born left the scene, looking for all the world like a demon lord. He had no ess to magic and was facing an attack he couldnt identify, so fleeing would be difficult in itself.

    Just as he came up with this idea, several thousand soldiers died around him. If he moved right now, hed just be targeted and shot down. It wouldnt kill him, but attracting that monsters interest wasnt a good idea. So he chose to wait and see what unfolded, hoping itd boost his survival chances at least a little bit.

    Then he sawand feltit. The fear. Even Razen, with his intrinsic resistance to the emotion, was stricken with terror at the sight. Nearly ten thousand surviving soldiers had their lives snuffed out in a single instant.

    He had never seen anything like that in his long life. This was beyond anything a champion or otherworlder could pull off. Even if he had a cornucopia of unique skills to choose from, he could never beat that monster. Cmity-ss, indeed. Razen had thought of himself as equivalent to a demon lord in strength, but now he knew that was just wishful thinking.

    What is that monster? he asked himself. Ive never heard of such a thing Isnt the leader of the monster nation a slime?

    His own heart didnt break, for the simple fact that he was so driven to save the king he was loyal to. But Razens sole desire was not to be fulfilled. His presence had already been detected.

    Had he resigned himself to death and attempted a kamikaze charge, maybe he couldve defeated that monster if he was lucky. He wouldnt have killed the thing, but he mightve been able to save his king from the jaws of death. But Razen was too careful. And there were already ns for him.

    Arge wolflike monster was summoned to the scene, gingerly carrying the monster (which had turned from a human form into a slime) in its mouth. Using a pair of forked tails, it snatched up King Edmaris and Archbishop Reyhiem, cing them on its back before running off at extraordinary speed. All that remained were three Greater Demons.

    Seeing the fearsome masked magic-born turn into a slime, Razen was both surprised and oddly convinced. I knew it. That really was their master. And deploying such great magic spells, one after the other, would easily exhaust his magical energies. If he summoned those demons to serve as bodyguards, then perhaps I will have a chance at rescuing the king

    He was half-right. The demonsin particr, that demonhad been summoned. To that one, Razen was nothing more than prey. A poor, forlorn piece of prey, left to live only so this demon could carry out his summoners request and be amply rewarded for it.

    Figuring he could beat these three demons, Razen rose up from the shadows cast by the dead. Fortunately for him, the masked magic-born canceled the Anti-Magic Area as it cast the demon summon. Now Razen could fight with his full force. Whether they were ranked A or not, there was no way he could lose to only three Greater Demons.

    Stretching out his body, he attempted to silently sneak up from behind one of themonly to find that the other two were already standing before him.

    Oh? Spatial Motion, eh? I suppose youve all been serving as Greater Demons for quite a long time.

    The two demons didnt answer him. They showed no signs of movementthey were ordered only to confine him for the demon who was leisurely walking up to the wizard.

    Now that demon was alone, in front of Razen.

    Heh-heh-heh-heh-heh. Done with your stretching? In that case, it is time to capture you. If you wish to resist, go right ahead. I will not kill you, but I am not prohibited from tormenting you

    The demon shed a twisted, beautiful smile, its gender unclear as it addressed Razen.

    Oh? Youre here to take me on?

    Take you on? Hee-hee-hee. Quite an amusing joke.

    What are you calling a joke, you putrid demon?!

    Heh-heh-heh-heh-heh. Very good, the demon whispered, its expression still twisted. This should be quite a bit of fun. Allow me to join you in a bit of post-meal calisthenics.

    Its smile was terror itself for anyone witnessing itterror welling up from the root of the soul.

    It looked toward the sky. Razen snorted at the creature. It thinks its so clever, trying to feint me with its eyes.

    Enough of your lip! Nuclear Cannon!

    Utilizing a spell he had precast earlier to save time, he used a simple trigger to set off hisst resort. This method, however, ran the risk of an idental discharge, meaning only wizards and simrly powerful magicians could execute it. The effect, however, was massive. Avoiding the casting time that was the central weakness of any magic-user was huge. From the get-go, Razen was doing what he needed for victory.

    The magic he chose was of the nuclear-attack type, the greatest and most sinister of the aspectual magics. Against people, it was the strongest magic in the world. Demons required physical bodies in order to manifest themselves; destroy theirs and Razen was in the clear. They wouldnt be gone for good, but theyd no longer be able to interact with this world. And before the intense heat this cannon produced, no demon could long continue to exist.

    As far as Razen was concerned, victory was his at this point. But the white-hot rays from his surefire magic were bent away before they could reach the raised left hand of the demon, zooming straight toward a certain point in the sky.

    Itmisfired? Dah, not now, of all?!

    With magic prepared in advance like this, there was a very slim chance that the spell would lose its force and fail upon casting. Razen assumed this was what happened, at the worst time possible for him. He sulkily red at the demon as he jumped backward and away.

    Hmm? That was an impressive piece of magic.

    What did you say?! Its pointless if the effect of it doesnt work.

    Ah. I see. If by effect you mean you intended it to defeat me, I would advise you that relying upon magic will not achieve this for you.

    The demon seemed almost eerily confident as it addressed Razen. It got on his nerves greatly, but not even Razen could shake off the faint sense of impending doom in his mind.

    Oh, now youve said it! In that case, how about this one? Summon Spirit: War Gnome! Come to me, great spirit of the earths foundations!

    This was Razens trump card, the most powerful summon magic he had on hand, and he was ready to fight with it. He had summoned a high-level spirit, one ranked well beyond A. Only a Champion-level opponent would give this all-powerful creature any difficulty. A Greater Demon was no problem at all.

    Replying to Razens call, the earth began to well up, forming the shape of a knight in solid-looking armor. Sensing the terrific force behind it, Razen finally began to feel confident and relieved. With a spirit of this caliber, he could even take on Arch Demons, the legendary creatures that ranked even above Greater Demons.

    If that magic hadnt failed to activate, I wouldnt have had to break this out But this demon irks me. I have a bad feeling about this. Best not to let my guard down here

    With this , Razen thought, no matter how much this opponent unnerved him, hed be just fine. He intended this magic to mow down not just the demon before him but the other two behind him. Then he could finally set off to rescue King Edmaris.

    But:

    I see; I see. Certainly, demons are strong against angels, angels against spirits, and spirits against demons. If selecting based on this three-way rtionship, calling for a high-level spirit was the correct response. However

    Even before the War Gnome Razen summoned, the demon waspletely unfazed.

    it is too young.

    When did it even move? Even with his senses turned up to maximum, Razen couldnt trace the demons actions fast enough. Arge hole opened up in the knights strong crystalline armor as a beautiful hand sliced through the spirits core, grabbed it, tossed it in its mouth, and chomped down upon it with a frightful crunch.

    There, you see? The demon snickered at Razen. Itcks experience that can only be umted over years. A puppet like that, nothing but pure strength, is a pushover for me.

    Youre kidding! That was a spirit! A greater spirit!!

    Having his trump card killed instantly put Razen in a state of near panic. Every fiber of his brain told him this was impossible. It just made no sense. A spirit easily the equal of a Greater Demon, not only facing difficulty but being wiped out in one shot.

    Enough magic, the demon said kindly as Razen stewed. I would like to test out more this body my summoner provided me, so lets use a different tactic this time.

    The demon snapped its fingers, triggering a magic spell. For over a mile in radius around him, an Anti-Magic Area appeared.

    Now magic is no longer avable to you. Feel free to attack me with your preferred physical strikes.

    Razen struggled to understand this. Huh? Why did it shut off the magic? Magic is any demons most powerful weapon And it cast a great magic with no ritual? No spell chanting?! Ah, but nows not the time to think about that!

    Shaking off the cobwebs, Razen stood on his toes, steeling himself. With Shogos body in hand, all of the otherworlders karate skills were his.

    Hnh!!

    With a light exhale, he focused himself and fired a fist at the demon, backing it up with a flurry of kicks. The Berserker unique skill let him pack the greatest punch possible, firing away at the demon with speed impossible to catch with the naked eye. It was a torrent of punches, a rain of kicks that could chop arge tree in two, and soon, they did their damaging work on the defenseless demon

    Wait! No!

    Every attack was neatly and cleanly dodged, as if all this was a pre-orchestrated karate demonstration. The demon wasnt defenseless at all. It was weaving its way through every strike, using skills far beyond what Razen had ess to.

    Now, for the first time, Razen understood. He was too afraid to notice it at first, but now he was forced to ept it. The demon standing before him. The golden eyes and crimson pupils. The pale skin. The beautiful ck hair, the streaks of red and gold within. The way it looked, unlike most demons, so close to a human being.

    This was a higher ss of demonand, if anything, Razens blind pursuit of ultimate strength was his undoing. He had peered into the dark reaches of the world, pursuing the deepest recesses of magic. His eyes could coldly perceive his own strength, and even among the small clutch of superpowered fighters in the A ranks, he stood head and shoulders above them all. If he didnt, the waves of terror the demon emitted would alone be enough to make him lose all will to fightalthough perhaps that wouldve been a happier fate for him.

    That demons knowledge, its strength, only worsened Razens mood. If he didnt knowknow that this was an Arch Demon at the very least, easily capable of destroying Greater Demonshe wouldnt be this terrorized. The way the demon cast a great magic without a ritual or casting timeproof that it had reached an abyss even further below what Razen had descended to. That Nuclear Cannon strike wasnt a misfire at all, and nothing else Razen threw at it worked because this foe was simply that far above Razen in strength.

    If he didnt have the kind of knowledge he did, Razen might never have noticed how unusual this demons strength was. But he had it.

    Wait. Is thisaa Primal?

    With his magic shut off, Razen had no means of escape. Despair painted his heart a deep shade of ck.

    Whatwhat kind of horrifying beast did that monster grant a body to and unleash upon this world?!

    If it didnt have a physical body, at least, it wouldve returned to the demon realms sooner orter. But it was tootemankind was now exposed to an unprecedented threat.

    As Razen was struck by this terror, a sweet yet terrifying voice reached his ears.

    Have you had enough yet? In that case, its my turn.

    The moment he heard it, his legs shook like jelly as he lost control of his dder. Now he understood everything, and he could no longer even think of resisting. His steel will was shattered, and in a single instant, his heart broke.

    Keffkeff Ah, ah, ahhhhh

    His terror was impossible to articte. An Arch Demon was a cmity-level monster, a leadership role in their native realm. They were half-legendary, with only a small handful known to recorded history. Their power was said to rank A-plus, alongside that of higher-level spirits, and they were dangerous enough to even be considered subdemon lords.

    Even against such a dangerous presence, Razen would have been confident in the past that he could win. Over the past few centuries hed spent protecting the great nation of Farmus, he had defeated an Arch Demon at least once, with the help of severalpanions. But this demon was different.

    Ifif this is one of the Primal Demons

    then there was just no chance. Even escape was impossible.

    Faced with despair, Razen crumpled to the ground, wailing at the reality this demon had unleashed upon him.

    The demon looked disappointed as he watched him. Oh? Its over already? he whispered.

    The other two demons under hismand scooped Razen up, resigned looks on their faces, and took him to the designated town. Their first job was done, and they wanted their master to praise them.

    Before the eyes of Benimaru and the rest, Rimurus body repeatedly transformed itself from a slime to all kinds of irregr shapes. After a while, it calmed down, settling into its usual droplet formbut then it began to glow, eerily flickering on and off. Red, blue, yellow, green, purple, white, ck, all kinds of colors.

    This went on for a while. Everyone there was starting to lose all sense of time. And after who knows how much of it had passed, the echoes of the World Language resonated in their worried hearts.

    Report. The individual Rimuru Tempests Harvest Festival is nowplete. Monsters in his genealogy will now begin to receive their gifts.

    Then they, too, were greeted with intense exhaustion.

    Ngh! What is going on?

    Ah?! Is this our gift? I feel more connected to Sir Rimuru than ever!

    Benimaru, Shuna, and the other monsters couldnt hide their surprise. Now Benimaru realized that Rimurus evolution was sessfullypletedand it was their turn. Nobody expected this kind of fatigue to arise. The less resistant among them began to fall into a deep sleep. But Benimaru had a promise with Rimuru. He couldnt afford to fall that easily.

    He did his best to fight off the tiredness. And as he did, Rimurus body began to shine brightly before him. When the light faded, there stood a fetching figure with long, smooth silver hair flowing in the wind.

    It was Rimuru, with his mask off, looking a little taller than before. He still didnt have any physical gender, sadly, but Benimaru couldnt help but feel a little smitten anyway.

    Report. Leave the rest to me and enjoy your slumber.

    The soft voice whispered against his mind. It gave Benimaru inner peace; he had nothing with which to defy it. So he let the voice guide him into an irresistible sleep.

    As he watched this unfold, the figure with Rimurus form checked to see if anyone else was awake.

    Mjurran looked quizzically at all the people falling asleep around her. One by one, they fell like fliesand now, there was nobody else awake.

    The humans and dwarves left in town had all been moved into buildings away from the central za. The amount of magicules in the vicinity had grown beyond what most humans could withstand, so they were forced to evacuate the scene. Elen would build a barrier over them, no doubt, as she monitored the proceedings. Yohm and his friends stayed there until the end to protect Mjurran, but they were gone over to Kabal and his gang now, carrying the king of Farmus and the Holy Church archbishop Ranga had brought over. By now they should be fully in Kabals custody, unable to escape.

    It was a good excuse for Yohm to leave, Mjurran thought, given that he could hardly take being in that magicule field any longer. If it wasnt for that, he probably wouldve stayed right next to her until he died. It ddened her to know that, even though she knew it was stupid of him. Of course, she wouldnt actually say that to the man. If she did, Yohm would no doubt let it go to his head and do something even stupider.

    It was, in other words, evidence that Mjurran wanted Yohm to be safe above all. But it also meant Mjurran was thest person standing in the za.

    The Rimuru-like figure gauged this situation, eyes emotionless. Then, seeing Mjurran and assuming there were no issues, he opened his arms wide, the long silver hair pushed back and emitting a light that shone like angels wings.

    Report. By the name of Raphael, Lord of Wisdom, Imand Belzebuth to consume all the magicules within this barrier. Do not leave even a single soul fragment behind.

    With those words, Belzebuth was activated, a viinous force unleashed upon the worldbut one used for a certain goal, tracing each of the results Raphael calcted. Every magicule within the barrier covering the town was absorbed, converting the atmosphere back into pure air. Then the barrier itself was neatly eaten up, and then Belzebuth was halted. It was as if nothing had ever happened to this space at all.

    This was Raphael, the figure that took the form of Rimuru, the apparently soulless master. And even now, the Lord of Wisdom was edging his way closer to Shion. Bringing his hands forward, he began to cast Analyze and Assesscarefully, with every intention of making his masters hopese true.

    Mjurran watched ck-jawed as all this unfolded. The barrier they had all built over the town was devoured instantly, which was a threat in itself, but beyond that:

    This just cant be!!

    The skill had engaged in its own actions, without the will of its master. She could understand if it had been ordered to do so beforehand, but it didnt seem that way here. This figure seemed closer to a spirit than a monster.

    It was crazy, but she sensed that it was nothing she couldugh at. All she could do was stay out of the way and watch.

    Once he handed over the king of Farmus and the archbishop, Ranga returned to the town entrance and stood guard. Rimuru had ordered him to meet up with the demons, and while he wanted more than anything to be at his masters side, he had to prioritize his orders before he fell asleep. Deciding between his concerns for Rimuru and his vital orders, he ultimately sided with thetter.

    The magic-born Gruecith looked on, bemused, as Ranga waited.

    He had been asked by Benimaruor, really, Shuna, more liketo stay with Ranga just in case something happened. If intruders showed up, he was to call for Benimaru and the others while Ranga engaged them. But there was clearly nobodying, so Gruecith chatted with Ranga to kill the time.

    That ogre princess Shunas quite the magic-user, isnt she? Fortifying that barrier like it was the easiest thing in the world.

    That barrier kept them from leaving town right now. Them and every other monster in the ce, unless Rimuru was with them. Gruecith was no exception to thatthe powerful barrier kept him efficiently penned in. It needed to if they wanted to resurrect Shion and all the other victims of that assault earlier.

    Benimaru and the others were able to return to town thanks to the intricate workings of Shuna, who had analyzed Mjurrans great magic and took further measures to improve upon it. It was now set up to keep all magicules inside but also allow anyone to enter the barrier without an issue. A one-way street, in other words.

    Theoretically, it was certainly possible, but actually developing the magic was quite a creative feat. But Gruecith was even more preupied with how surprised Mjurran looked when she learned about it. He found it cute, that expression of hers, although he would never ever tell anyone else that. Discussing romance with Ranga wouldnt aplish much, he figured. Gruecith wasnt that stupid.

    Ranga cheerfully nodded. Yes. I think the same. Lady Shuna is second only to Sir Rimuru in intelligence.

    Generally, monsters in town enjoyed praising one another. Gruecith had the impression that Ranga was a little tooplimentary toward his master but he figured itd be tasteless to bring it up. Besides, he liked that kind of atmosphere. It reminded him of his native Beast Kingdom, where people generally got along in the midst of all their chattering and carrying on.

    Lord Carillon is very shrewd, after all. And just as Lord Phobio said, every monster in this town seems so nice.

    By the way, Sir Gruecith, I was wondering about something. I had heard the demon lords Carillon and Milim would be waging war soon

    Ranga gave Gruecith an expectant look, as if to ask whether everything was all right with him.

    Ah, yeah

    It was a topic on Grueciths mind as well, but the barrier and its magicule blockage kept him from contacting Eurazania at the moment. He wasnt that concerned, however. It was still three days before the start ofbat, and as he said before, he believed that Carillon would win. It seemed like Rimuru was well on his way to bing a demon lord, so Gruecith also figured he had enough time to see how that all shook out before heading back to help his own master. Besides, the Three Lycanthropeers were there, each far stronger than the likes of him. And as long as they were, no matter how much strength Milim might boast, Gruecith doubted she really meant to wage war.

    No point fretting over things now, he thought. He knew they were all bold and courageous over there, far more than people believed. No, his mind was elsewhere.

    Hope they all get resurrected.

    His biggest concern was the fate of those sacrificed in battle here. If their resurrection turned sour, there was no doubt that Rimuru would suddenly be a major threat. He could feel that instinctively.

    It will be all right. Monsters are made of tough stuff. Plus all of us are connected in spirit. As long as we remain under Sir Rimurus protection, we will not be defeated that easily.

    Yeah. I think itll probably turn out fine, but

    Heh-heh-heh. No need for concern. When my master finishes the evolution, I am sure he will bring everyone back.

    It was a firm deration, one based on Rangas confidence in Rimuru. Perhaps sensing Grueciths concern, he wanted to make it clear that the concept of Rimuru going out of control couldnt be further from his mind.

    Yeah, no doubt, Gruecith replied with a smile. Regardless of the potential threat involved, he didnt want Rimuru to change very much, either. He didnt serve him, but he admittedly was attracted to his characterand he owed him a lot for saving Mjurrans life, too.

    Of course, the girl I love is with another guy at the moment Heh. If he was a bastard, Id have killed him long ago, but if its Yohm, I cant do much about that. Ill just have toy low until she inevitably dumps that idiotor maybe get a little in the way between them, at least

    The lingering attachment was clear in Grueciths thoughts. But he didnt see the point of pursuing the topic.

    Man, though, I wasnt expecting to see a demon lord evolution with my own two eyes

    Nothing to be surprised about. This is Sir Rimuru, you know.

    Um, no, I mean! A monster bing the seed of a demon lord is something that happens maybe once every few centuries, you know?

    The seed?

    Yeah. It proves the worlds recognized them as a powerful-enough monster. The strongest beings in thend. There are only ten of them, Lord Carillon included.

    Oh? So Rimuru will be the eleventh demon lord?

    Well, who knows? You cant say how the other demon lords will respond to this. This whole things ruining the current bnce of power among them. There could be some pretty tumultuous years ahead if it goes wrong.

    If so, then we will protect Sir Rimuru with our own powers!

    Yeah, well, Im in the same boat, too. Ill be a sword for Lord Carillon to wield. I sure hope I dont have to face off against you guys, though, Ill say.

    Heh-heh-heh. I agree.

    Theyughed with each other, d they were on the same page. The chitchat continued for a while longer.

    Gruecith was expecting absolutely nothing out of the ordinary to happen. But after a decent amount of time passed, Rangas eyelids began to droop heavily.

    Shuna had apparently anticipated this possibility. When a demon lord was born, anyone below them was given a so-called gift, a sort of evolution that could not be resisted, and it put the target in a deep sleep.

    Gnnh II am not sure I canst much longer. I will sleepbut if I do, my orders LordGruecith I need you totake something on for me, butwill you?

    Apparently, three demons might being to the entrance shortly, summoned by Rimuru and ordered to bring over a survivor from Farmus. Ranga hated to pass the buck to him, but he could ovee his fatigue no longer, so he extracted Grueciths promise to take care of matters before dejectedly falling asleep.

    There was a single survivor, he heard, and a fairly powerful foe at that. Powerful enough that he could attack and defeat the demons. Gruecith would have to be careful, even though the thought of being trusted so much made him a little happy. So he began patrolling the area, a new spring in his step, as he tried to keep Ranga and the defenseless townspeople safe.

    Not half an hourter, they appeared.

    Ah, Sir Ranga, a rather beautiful-looking demon said. It would appear hes gone into an evolving sleep.

    It was a shocking sight for Gruecith. The demons had obviously been granted physical bodies, all far more powerful than your garden-variety summon. Ranga said they were Greater Demons, but these guys were clearly a level above even that. The sheer terror of the sight made his hair stand on endthe loudest rm bell his own instincts could give him.

    Whoa, whoa, Ive never seen the likes of you before. You an Arch Demon?

    Heh-heh-heh-heh-heh. That is correct, magic-born.

    Even at first sight, the danger this Arch Demon presented was obvious. He felt an overwhelming sense of awelike what he felt whenever he saw Benimaru or the Three Lycanthropeers. Maybe even more powerful.

    Heh-heh-heh-heh-heh. Please dont be so rmed, the demon cheerfully stated. I am just a nameless demon summoned by the new demon lord. The two behind me are meant to handle the chore work for me, so no need to worry about them.

    Chore work?

    He gave the pair a look. They were two Greater Demons, one carrying a passed-out man on his back. Both of them possessed enough magic power to pose a formidable threat. They were cer tainly on the same level as a stronger magic-born in terms of bat strength.

    And these were Greater Demons ? Gruecith couldnt believe it. But he just shrugged and nodded instead of bringing it up.

    All right. Sir Ranga told me to expect three demons here before long. Is that man the survivor of Sir Rimurus attack?

    It was not an attack. To someone like that, it was just a bit of ytime. Plus, thanks to this mans surviving, the three of us were summoned here. Weve been treating him well because we do appreciate that a little.

    Treating him well, huh?

    One could question whether riding on the back of a Greater Demon qualified as kind treatment. Gruecith was too smart to say that out loud, though.

    All right. The magicules are pretty thick in town, so you better protect him with a barrier.

    Wouldnt that be spoiling him a little too much?

    I thought you were treating him well.

    Ah, yes. Youre right. Having him die would be very bad for us. We have to be sure he sees us performing well for him.

    So Gruecith cast his suspicions aside and decided to guide the demons into town. If they knew Rangas name, they had to be the ones Rimuru summoned. They didnt seem to be under anyones thrand if there was someone powerful enough to control these freaks, Gruecith knew he was better off not riling them. Here, too, he demonstrated an uncanny ability to know when to shut up.

    He was just about to turn around and walk into town when the barrier covering it suddenly vanished. Something was up.

    What on?!

    Mm? I-is this?

    Gruecith turned toward the demon for just a moment. Im sorry, he said, but wait here for me. Im worried about whats going on in there!

    Then he ran offjust as the final events of the day unfolded.

    The demon could feel a presence in the air. He took a moment to enjoy it, spellbound by it, before giving orders to his underlings.

    Do not kill this man. Make absolutely sure you do not let him escape.

    Then, by himself, he calmly traveled through space. To a demon like this, using Magic Sense to travel instantly between two points several miles from each other came as naturally as taking a walk around the block. The Greater Demons, unable to do this, nodded their acknowledgment and began following their masters tracks. There was no panic, no loss of purpose among them; they simply began running unnaturally fast toward the center of town.

    The demon had teleported right next to Rimuru.

    I am back, my master, he said, taking a knee before the figure as his silvery hair blew in the wind. Rimuru had been a slime when he summoned these demons, and while he was now much more handsome in appearance, there was no mistaking him. The near-divine aura he let out was a telltale sign for any monster, no matter what their eyes told them. It was a sort of shine from his very soul, and discerning the color of ones soul came naturally to a demon.

    This demons master was currently conducting a solemn ceremony, one aimed at the neatly lined rows of dead monsters before him. To the demon, it was simply a beautiful sight. He wanted to stay there, just basking in the glory of it all, but not now. There was something on his mind.

    He quietly came up to his master, taking the utmost care to stay out of his way. Perhaps it would be better to wait until the ceremony was done?

    Forgive my rudeness, Master. It seems you do not have enough magicules on hand

    The demon was right. Rimuru didnt seem to have the quantity of magicules this ritual required. Based on his knowledge, the demon surmised he was attempting to hold a ceremony known as the Secret Art of Revival, a skill that created a fully new soul for its targeta level below straight-up raising the dead. If this failed, the targets would be totally unlike how they were before death, transforming into uncontroble beasts. The act was so difficult that even losing some memories and knowledge in the process was considered a great sess.

    The Secret Art of Revival had to be woven using arcane wisdom that humankind couldnt even begin to understand. It naturally required a massive amount of magical energy, along with an unimaginable amount of force to control it. Even a high-level magic-born couldnt do that. Only demons, with their knowledge of controlling souls, could handle the job, and even then only a handful of higher-level demons.

    Heh-heh-heh-heh-heh. Id expect nothing less of my master.

    Rimuru was performing this arcane act on nearly a hundred monsters at the same time. Even a single target took up tons of magicules, and this was multiplying that by a hundred-ish. Of course he was short on magicules. So the demon decided to speak up, just in case he could provide some help.

    Yes. It is not meeting the stipted amount of magicules. I am consuming life force as a substitute.

    The words flustered the demon.

    Wait, my master! You dont need to use up your own life for this Ah, yes! I have a good idea

    His eyes turned toward the two Greater Demons who had arrived earlier, as if appraising their value, then gave them a satisfied nod.

    Please use these two!

    The two Greater Demons stationed behind their leader stood up then kneeled toward him.

    It would be an honor if these could serve you as well. Nothing could possibly make us happier.

    The other two nodded their agreement. To them, the choice was obvious.

    Rimuru, or Raphael, looked at the two demons, observing them with his shining golden eyes. No emotion was present in their dazzling beauty. Instead, he gave this t response:

    Understood. This will supply the required number of magicules. The offer is epted.

    Then, without further hesitation, he consumed them with Belzebuth. The Greater Demons disappeared without a trace, gobbled up with the air, taken apart, and converted into pure magicules. The energy appeared to shine a golden yellow to the demonperhaps, he thought, because their wish to be useful had finallye true. Nothing could satisfy them more.

    Ahhh How I envy them. Well done, my master. Your evolution into a demon lord seems to be perfect. I feel an overwhelming force from your body, the likes of which I never feltst we met

    He looked longingly at his newly evolved master. Being able to serve such a new and beautiful demon lord was exactly what he craved. To do that, he needed to prove that he could be useful to him.

    Steeling his resolve, the demon stepped away from the ceremony and waited quietly. No need to be further involved now. Meddling too much could stoke his masters ire, he felt. If he interfered just because he wanted to help, he would be sabotaging his masters efforts.

    Confirmed. The prescribed amount of magicules has been reached. We will now conduct the Secret Art of Revival.

    As the demon tried to be as invisible as possible, the ritualmenced.

    What began was one of the deepest, most mysterious secrets of this world.

    Colorless, transparent balls of beautiful light were enveloped in a thin film of wless light purple. These were the cores of the victims, along with the astral bodies that protected them. Next, following the Secret Art of Resurrection, the rebuilt monster souls were returned to their bodies. The sess rate was 3.14 percentbut that figure had been calcted before he became a demon lord.

    The souls of all the demons lined up in that za had been gifted Complete Memory as part of the evolutionary process. They all epted it as a way of fulfilling Rimurus hopes. This was an extra skill that made it possible topletely restore the memory of someone, even from a damaged brain. As long as the soul was intact, it could rebuild those memories from the state of death an infinite number of times.

    The link between soul and body was established. And now, the monsters cores unleashed their powers, and their hearts began to beat out a pulse

    Right there, the resurrection was settled. A divine mystery, born from theplex interactions of myriad elements. A miracle and a foregone conclusion, engineered by the prayers of Rimuru and everybody else.

    But to Raphael, the Lord of Wisdom, who carried this out, there was no happiness at this sessful feat. He had just performed the answer provided by hisputations, followed the probabilities, and obtained results. He saw no further meaning in it. Sess didnt make him feel happy, and failure wouldnt have made him feel sad in all likelihood. He didnt even understand what feeling those emotions would mean. Even with all the great knowledge he wielded, the brilliant brain he was blessed with, it wasnt enough to understand human emotion.

    But deep down, in a heart he should never have had, in a corner of Rimurus so will was born. A self, to put it another way. There had to be one there or else a skill wouldnt evolve in such rogue fashion in order to fulfill its masters wishes. And then the question came: Why did I take this kind of action? It came from within Raphael, and it was solid proof that this being had a self, separate from his master.

    And yet, even this slight suspicion toward himself that was born in his head was something Raphael quickly turned his eyes from.

    I think, therefore I am

    It was a thesis that Raphael would find himself constantly thinking about, going forwardand never finding an answer.

    Regardless of his internal conflicts, Raphael continued with his iparably urate work. He analyzed and assessed nearly a hundred monsters at the same time, repairing their bodies, regenerating their souls, and finally resurrecting them. It was a seamless flow, not a single extraneous motion involved, and everything was handled at the right ce and time. Before the monsters in town realized it, the miracle had secretlypleted itself.

    Only three people knew this: Mjurran, Gruecith, and the demon.

    Mjurran was rendered beyond speechless as she watched the ceremony intently, face turned pale as a sheet. She had a front-row seat to the ultimate in secret arts, the exact thing she had been pursuing for so long. A chasm of deep, dark magic of which Rimurus presence as a demon lord allowed her an all-too-brief glimpse.

    A high-level magic-born like Mjurran would never have a chance. Even the demon lord ymans power seemed like a rude blurpared to this.

    She gave thanks for the great fortune of obtaining this insight, even as she swore to herself never to let Yohm be Rimurus enemy. If he did, itd ruin the both of them. Thats why she knew now that he needed her guidance and protection. He knew too little about all of this for any other alternative to work.

    Grueciths eyes were dazzled by the miracle that took ce before him. He didnt have much in the way of magic knowledge, but he could see well enough that this secret art was like nothing else. It made him tremble in awe at how easy Rimuru made it look.

    Damn it, what kind of magic force is this?! This massive, seemingly endless magicule supply, all being controlled with utter perfection. Is this really a newborn demon lord? It cant be! Lord Carillon couldnt even do this

    Awe and fear swirled in equal measures.

    And those eyes. Those eyes look like theyre beholding something totally worthless. They treat raising the dead as nothing moreplex than repairing a useful tool Did he think he could just make a new one if he messed up? What the hell is going on here? Hes usually so warm and kind to other people; was all that just an act? Is this the real him?!

    What Gruecith was watching now was both Rimuru and not Rimuru. Unaware of this, all he could see was a demon lord working beyond the realm of mortal intelligence. And from that point forward, he swore to admonish both himself and the other lycanthropes from ever daring to defy Rimuru.

    Unlike the two of them, the demon was filled with utter joy, gazing at Rimuru in sheer, silent awe.

    Then a question to consider appeared in his mind: The person who just spoke to me Was that not my master at all? But he dismissed the thought at once as overthinking matters. In all the many years this demon had lived, he had never heard of anything quite like that. The idea of a skill bing sentient was too ridiculous to even consider. Working independently to fulfill the requests of its master

    or maybe it took a demon like this, living in the deepest depths of the world, to even have the possibility ur in his mind. Regardless, the demon didnt buy it. Besides, there were more important matters to consider.

    Heh-heh-heh-heh-heh. No matter what happens, I have to gain at least the lowest seat at the table for myself

    His mind resolved anew, he began to consider other ways he could stand out for his master.

    Thus, the hope was fulfilled.

    When Rimuruor Raphael, Lord of Wisdopleted his work, he returned once again into sleep mode, his magicule stores exhausted. The demon lovingly picked him upan easy task, since he was back in slime formand, following Mjurrans instructions, gently ced him on the throne prepared for his rest.

    Both Mjurran and the demon agreed that Rimuru was simply out of energy and would likely awaken in a few days. But what kind of person would he be like once he opened his eyes? Only the gods could know.

    As the three eyewitnesses each pondered internally how to deal with this, they heard several sets of footsteps running toward them. Then they realized that the pressure exerted against Elens barrier was gone, reducing the magicule count in the air to practically zero. Yohm, Kabal, and the others immediately ran over to investigate, only to find row after row of sleeping monsters.

    Mjurran! Gruecith! Are you two all right? Wheres Rimuru?

    Whoa, whoa, observed Kabal, theyre all sleeping? What happened?

    Did Shion get resurrected and all that?

    Mjurran took a moment to think before responding. Gruecith didnt appear to have any idea what happened, and the demon seemed too enamored with himself and Rimuru to bother exining matters to anyone else. Everyones gazes naturally began to focus on Mjurran, making her sigh dejectedly.

    Sir Rimuru has sessfullypleted the demon lordevolution process. All the other monsters shared in this, too, so theyre all sleeping during their own evolves. And Shion and the other dead Theyve all been safely resurrected using a secret ritual conducted by Sir Rimuru when he was awake. The ritual sapped all his magical energy away, and he is back asleep now.

    Everyone on-site breathed a hefty sigh of relief.

    Yeah, theres the boss for ya! I knew I shouldnt have worried.

    I wouldnt rx quite yet, Mjurran replied to Kaijin. Their souls might have been revived, but they all definitely died once before, so theres no guarantee theyve retained any of their memories.

    Although itll probably be fine, she then just barely whispered to herself. She wanted to keep everyone on high alert just in case, but as far as she was concerned, there was no real danger left to consider.

    But her words had the effect of instantly silencing everyone else. Now they realized it was still too early to celebrate.

    Well, outside of that, Elen breathed, how about we get a roof over all these sleepyheads for now, huh? There are matsid out in the great meeting hallI guess they figured something like this would happen.

    Fine by me, but every single monster in town? Thats kind of a big project.

    Yeah, Gido chimed in, were talking over a thousand of em in the za alone

    All right, Kaijin said. In that case, well just take responsibility for bringing Lady Shuna into her bedchamber, all right?

    Kabal erupted into action. Whoa there, you! I dont care if youre Kaijin or notIm not letting you get away with that!

    Yeah, man! Thats far too delicate a job to leave to someone besides us!

    Elens suggestion had triggered a war of words between the dwarves, led by Kaijin, and Kabal and his right-hand man, Gido. It went on for several more seconds before Elen finally yelled at them to knock it off.

    But the conflict wasnt necessary from the beginningbecause as they bickered, the residents of town began to wake up by themselves.

    It was a neat sequence of emotions for them all as they did. First, panic over the vanished barrier and missing magicules in the air. Then, massive outbursts of joy as they realized Shion and the other victims were resurrected. To them, it was a miraclebut only the three witnesses on hand knew what it really was.

    In effect, it was just the power of Raphael at work. And nobody on hand realized, in the shadow of all that joy, that Rapha simple skill, nothing morehad somehow grown a sense of self-awareness.

    Rise and shine!

    It was a trite old phrase, but it was the first one my mind came up with.

    I hadnt enjoyed waking up like this in ages. Unlike my previous experiments with forcing myself into a nap-like state, I felt refreshed, satisfied. It goes without saying that I had never experienced anything like it before in this world. But as I got up and took a look, I realized that things had gotten pretty hectic around me. More problems to deal with, I guess. Give me a break.

    I could feel this sort of pulsing energy from the monsters. I did a quick Analyze and Assess on them, only to find they bore more magicules than before. They were stronger now, in other words, so I guess my evolution mustve turned out okay.

    Correct. The Harvest Festival has sessfullypleted. Gifts were distributed to all creatures within your genealogy, leading to further evolution among individuals.

    Aha. So bing a demon lord made everyone under me evolve, huh? And is it my imagination, or is the Great Sage being a lot more talkative than it used to be?

    No. It is your imagination.

    Oh, all right

    Hey, wait a second!

    But as much as I wanted to poke at the Sage about it, it offered no further response. Was it really my imagination? Ahh, I cant think about this right now. Hows Shion doing? Not to mention everyone else? Whats happening right now? I had an endless wellspring of questions. And as if to answer them all at once:

    Ah! Sir Rimuru! You are awake!

    I heard a familiar voiceand felt a familiar sensation behind my back. A pair of hilly peaks, pliant and warmly surrounding me.

    My evolution wasplete, but there was no huge difference in my slime form. The only real change was that Id sometimes turn more of a yellowish color. Was I one of those gold slimes now or something? Like, zooming along at the speed of light? I didnt actually have that power, but I sort of felt moreelegant. Like I was on top of the food chain when it came to slimes. Not that I looked any stronger, still

    More to the point, this sensation, this familiarp I found myself in, the way my cheeks were getting rubbed

    You came back to life!

    It was Shion.

    Mm. This feels really great. Just like before. Nothing changed.

    Yes, Sir Rimuru! All of us haveepletely back to life!

    Hearing this, I realized that I had a hundred kneeling monsters surrounding us. Then, all at once, they greeted me, excited beyond description for me to wake up.

    We have all been revived, without a single person missing!!

    Great. Thats really great. And whos that I see in the front row? Of course its got to be that doofus Gobzo.

    Just as I anticipated, the effects of the evolution brought everyone back to life. I guess it was worth bing a demon lord after all. The resemnce of my chances to the number ? was a worry, but if it worked on everyone, I couldnt be happier. Hell, even the Sage makes mistakes sometimes. Ill always wee a pleasant mistake like this.

    Smiling to myself at Shions return, I spent a moment to enjoy my position underneath her breasts for the first time in a while. Truly an elegant way to pass the time. But the bliss didntst long.

    Sir Rimuru, Benimaru said, youre awake? Wonderful. We have a variety of issues to Ah, but before that, I cannot proceed until I confirm you have retained your sanity. You remember the question and answer we discussed in our conference, yes? Lets go, then: What do you think of Shions cooking? Give me your answer!

    He gave me a sarcastic grin. Yeah, I sure remember. Its shitty, right? Man, he worries way too much sometimes.

    But just as I was about to give the correct reply, I realized something horrifying. Ummmm Im kind of being hugged by Shion right now, arent I? If I use the S word to describe her kitchen workwhat will happen then?

    An image of hell ran across my mind. Oh crap!! If I dont think of something, Shions gonna crush me into jelly with those arms of hers! I cant believe I let myself fall right into this trap! How utterly devious of him! Whatll I do? Is there some way out of this?

    I got it! Time to have the Great Sagee to the rescue. Im sure itll have the most wonderful solution to all of this

    and then, upon trying to summon it, I realized it was gone. Umwhat? Great, uh, Great Sage?!

    And, wait a second, who had been answering me just a moment ago?

    Report. The unique skill Great Sage has evolved into the ultimate skill Raphael, Lord of Wisdom. As a result, it has disappeared and cannot be essed.

    Whoa. Skills can evolve, too? And, uh, Raphael? Named after the angel and everything? Sounds pretty neat

    But I can explore thister. I still have an unprecedented crisis to deal with right now. All right, Raphael, if youre the Lord of Wisdom, find the best way possible for me to deceive Shion!

    Understood. My calctions did not find any relevant results.

    You piece of crap!!!

    The Sage was never all that useful for things like this, either, and I guess Raphael inherited that same quirk. He said something about calctions, but I doubt he gave the question any serious thought at all. Probably just trying to humor me. The more things change the more they stay the same. Maybe he hasnt really evolved much at all, apart from the fancy-pants name he grew.

    This whole exchange took less than a second to unfold in my mind.

    Hmm? What about my cooking?

    Ah, um, well, Im sure Sir Rimuru misses it terribly, no? He cant wait to see what youve been working on, Im sure.

    Someone needed to stop Benimaru before this got any worse. Damn it. That bastard wanted this to happen from the start! And he even made damn sure in advance that he didnt get caught up in it. What an asshole! This great sleep session I had, and hes threatening to have Shion put me in the kind of sleep you never wake up from!

    Ah, I see! He wants me to cook a meal, then, is it? How thoughtful of you, Sir Benimaru.

    Shion smiled triumphantly at the suggestion as I was seized by a turbulent sense of foreboding.

    So you see now? Benimaru said. I know this goes without saying, but I

    Let me provide a suggestion, then. I rmend replying with, The answer Benimaru suggested I make was Its shitty, wasnt it? I do remember that well.

    Wha?!

    The Great SageI mean, the Lord of Wisdomjust came up with the most brilliant answer in the universe. Man, Im sorry I used him of not evolving too much. You rock, Raphael!

    Hang on, Benimaru! We had a question and answer nned out in advance, right?

    Um?

    Oh, dont worryI remember the whole process. The answer that you decided was correct for this was Its shitty, was it not? I remember it perfectly!

    Shions smile froze in ce as several beads of sweat began running down Benimarus face in tandem.

    Sh-Shion, wait! Sir Rimuru has only just awoken! I fear his brain might still be in a state of confusion!

    I took this moment to nimbly evacuate myself away from Shions chest, keeping an eye on the panicked Benimaru as I did.

    Very well, Shion tly replied. Sir Benimaru No, just Benimaru. I serve Sir Rimuru directly; I have no need to use noble titles to refer to you. But if you had wanted to try my cuisine that badly, you should have said so. I will dly feed it to you until youre ready to burst!

    She stormed off, smile still frozen on her face. That was pretty scary. Really scary actually.

    Wh-what did you do that for?!

    Ha-ha-ha! Im not sure what you mean, Benimaru. Have fun trying to survive the next meal, I guess.

    This isnt funny, my lord! I have been testing her new creations so long that Ive developed Resist Poison recently, too

    Benimaru could see doom lying ahead. If Shion was that enthu siastic to start cooking, this could be the end for him. Poison resistance, though? Really? Thats pretty much saying that Shions food is poison, isnt it?

    Yeah, well, as they say, you reap what you sow

    Benimaru gave my assessment a dejected shake of the head. I had no words to console him with. One misstep, after all, and it couldve been me facing that maelstrom. Better, I thought, to let the original perpetrator face her wrath instead.

    After Shion left, the newly resurrected survivors mored to greet me, as if theyd been waiting their turn this whole time. Everyone had the same knowledge and personality as before (although the atmosphere was maybe slightly different with some), which was a great relief. No memory loss, no nothingand their souls were all fully intact.

    That wouldnt have been possible if I didnt obtain the Complete Memory extra skilld to see all that evolution effort didnt go to waste. As one of the crowd put it, Now I can keeping back to life no matter how many times I die!and I wasnt entirely sure he was joking.

    Complete Memory allowed you to directly tap into the targets soul. Normally the power could be possessed only by spirit-type life-forms, but somehow I had stumbled upon it, too. They said something about souls that shared the same genealogy with me and all that, so I guess it technically applied to me. Thats what the gift thing was, probablyit got everyone back, and I couldnt be happier with it.

    After we wrapped up our reunion, everyone went right back to work. The rest of the townspeople also received some kind of gift, I think, but there was no time to examine them all in detail. Benimaru mentioned a variety of issues, and I had to address them quickly.

    So the moment we ovee one crisis, a new onees right down the pike, huh?

    Ah, before we discuss Shions cooking, I have something important to tell you.

    Benimaru gave a signal, and on cue, the Three Lycanthropeers from the demon lord Carillons domain appeared. Ohhh, right, Milim was fighting him, wasnt she? I forgot.

    First, let me congratte you on your evolution! Alvis the Golden Snakehorn dered as he fell to one knee.

    Yes, yes, but whats going on?

    Benimaru was the first to open his mouth. As he put it, evacuees from the Beast Kingdom of Eurazania had arrived just a few moments ago. Remarkably, I had been fast asleep for three whole dayswhich meant that, um, the conflict between demon lords was over and done?

    Yes. I saw it all for myself.

    Phobio, the ck Leopard Fang, had stayed close to Carillons side for the entire battle against Milim. And the result?

    Lord Carillon and Milim collided right into each otherand the demon lord Milim proved all too superior. The Beast Kingdom isI am sad to sayno more.

    Dang.

    I had trouble forming a response. Benimaru gasped as well; apparently, this was news to him.

    Phobio was himself gravely injured but still managed to take a Warp Portal over and regroup with Alvis. Gabils potions saved his life after that.

    The Three Lycanthropeers were silent, Sufia the Snowy Tigerw gritting her teeth.

    However, Phobio continued, after an unbelievably massive explosion, it was none other than the demon lord Frey who delivered the blow that defeated our lord. The very idea of demon lords working together I could hardly even imagine. I always believed that Milim had a distaste for such schemes. And, looking back, something else about it struck me as odd

    So Milim and Frey had joined forces to defeat Carillon. I found that pretty damn odd, too. Milim promised him a one-on-one grudge match, and she didnt strike me as the kind of demon lord to pull a mean trick like taking along a ringer. Frey, ording to Phobio, met eyes with him for just a passing moment. It happened so fastFrey flying off with Carillons body as if nothing was amissthat he decided it was just his mind ying tricks on him.

    But, he went on, the demon lord Frey has the best eyesight out of all her kind. They say she can shoot down small animals on the ground from the loftiest of heights. I may have been hidden, but there was no way she could miss me. And something else concerns me about her behavior

    Apparently, Sufia reported, the direction Frey flew off to was all wrong. A perfect 180 degrees from her own domain, in fact, and a fair distance off from Milimsnds.

    Her bearing would have taken her straight for the demon lord ymans domain.

    The other two Lycanthropeers shuddered.

    II need to go out for a moment.

    Alvis stepped up to stop him. Wait right there, Sufia!

    Yes! If youre going, then we all need to join forces in our attack.

    Hoo boy. Thats not gonna work. Beastlings like these have a one-track mind, and theyre so easily riled into fury. Even Alvis, who seemed like the most levelheaded of the crew, was no exception.

    Well, hang on, I ventured. We need more information before anything else. The way you put it, Phobio, Carillon is still alive. I dont know what Frey is like as a person, but theres no way Milim would let someone just horn in on her fight without getting damn angry about it. There has to be more behind this.

    I feel the same way, Benimaru said.

    Right. So listen: We all want to help you rescue your lord. So dont go berserk on me right now, all right? If we dont work together on this, you might wind up destroying whatever chance youve got. Worst-case scenario, youll have to fend off three demon lords at the same time. So dont jump right in yet, okay?

    Understood.

    All right

    Yes, Sir Rimuru.

    They all nodded, regaining theirposure.

    We then decided to let them rest and recuperate for a bit. Them, and the other ten thousand or so people who evacuated to town with them, all utterly exhausted. Trekking all the way to ymans domain and challenging him to battle right now was absurd.

    In a short time, we had emergency stations handing out food, and the great meeting hall had lodgings hastily prepared to deal with the influx. We werent at full strength yet; my people were only just beginning to wake back up. For today, at least, we decided to kick back and rx with a meal together.

    Surrounded by the pleasant smell of the emergency kitchens, we awaited Shions cooking with a sense of impending terror.

    So, um, good luck at dinner, okay, Benimaru?

    Wait just a minute! We should be eating her food together, shouldnt we?! Shes trying her best! Maybe itll actually be good, by some miracle! Just promise me you wont leave me alone!

    L-let go of me! Miracles dont ur that often!

    Ive just wrapped up this awesome, awe-inspiring evolution event, and the first thing I do after that is sample Shions cuisine? What kind of prank is this?

    In the end, though, the teary-eyed Benimaru was just too pathetic a sight to bear, so I agreed to join him at the dinner tableor more like Shion pushed me to a seat adjacent to him.

    Hee-hee-hee-hee-hee! Im sure youre looking forward to this just as much as Benimaru is, arent you, Sir Rimuru?

    No! Not at all!

    Easy enough for me to think that, really, but near impossible to say it. One look into Shions eyes, and I realized oh crap, theres nowhere to run .

    Thus, as the people around us celebrated their resurrection and revitalized their spirits with food and drink, we were being treated to a tasting session straight from the deepest pit of hell.

    A few more moments and the lethal weapon that was Shions cooking was locked and loaded on tes. She beamed as she brought the food (?) in onrge tters. The time hase.

    I took a look at one of the steaming tes, and

    Whoaaa! Whoa, whoa, whoa! Whats that stuff?

    It wasnt food. I absolutely refused to ept that this was food. There was a bowl with assorted stuff tossed into it. A stew, maybe? Was that her intention? Waitno, right, this wasnt food. Never. There shouldnt be any question about it in the first ce.

    Shion?! Shion, wait a second! Theres something I want to ask you. Do you understand the concept of what cooking means?

    Of course, Sir Rimuru. What do you think? It looks scrumptious, doesnt it?

    You damned fool! You got carrots, potatoes, peppers, tomatoes, onions, and all kinds of other vegetablesbut you just tossed all of them in whole! I shouldnt be able to recognize every single one of them in the bowl like that, all floating in the broth or whatever! Youre supposed to peel them, or cut them, or do a whole lot of other crap with them!

    I was shouting, straight from the heart.

    Then I turned to Benimaru. What is the meaning of this? I thought I left Shions care in your hands. She hasnt learned anything at all from you, has she?

    He gazed back at me, as ssy-eyed as a dead fish. I just couldnt do it. Ive never had a setback in my life, but with her, Ive hit a wallthe wall of my personal limits. Since childhood, I always assumed that nothing was impossible for me, but now I see just how shallow-minded that was.

    How brazen of him. The wall of his personal limits? Bullshit. Im eating this, too, remember?

    I nced up at Shion. She was quivering, on the brink of tears. I began to feel like maybe I was the bad guy here Ah well. Like a monk experiencing enlightenment, it was time for me to brace myself, treat this as training, and have at it.

    All right, all right. Ill take it, okay? But at least try to actually prepare your ingredients before putting them in next time.

    Umm, but whenever I try chopping up food, I wind up chopping up the rest of the building Im in, too

    Huh? The whole building? Not just the cutting board?

    Right. My Goriki-maru is so wonderfully sharp, but its a little long as well, so Shion pointed at the longsword strapped to her back.

    Uh, she cooked with that?

    Benimaru threw his hands in the air, as if in surrender. Talk about someone you cant rely on in a pinch. My esteem for him was in free fall right now.

    Listen, I attempted, a katana isnt meant for cooking. All right? Thats what theyve invented cooking knives for.

    No, I work strictly with Goriki-maru. I wouldnt want to cheat on it with other des

    Oh. I was nning to give you some kitchen knives as a present actually, but I guess you dont need them?

    Wait! I was wrong! My mistake! Goriki-maru just told me I was allowed to y around with other knives after all!

    Good to hear. So yeah, use those knives to cook from now on, okay?

    She sure knew a gift horse when she saw one. Ah well. It certainly beats chomping into whole tomatoes in what was supposed to be soup. If he ate nothing but food like this (not that I was acknowledging it as food, mind you), no wonder Benimaru acquired Resist Poison.

    Now it was my turnbut, hell, I was a demon lord now. Ingesting something like this couldnt kill me, right? So I resigned myself to my fate and went into my human form. Closing my eyes and steeling my resolve, I brought a spoonful of some kind of mystery goop to my mouth.

    Just as I was about to swallow it as quickly as possible, I noticed something odd Huh? This is, like, super good. Almost like shes fully re-created Shunas home cooking? Youre kidding me! It tasted nothing like it looked.

    I opened my eyes wide as I slowly, carefully ferried another spoonful of ingredients to my lips.

    This is good !

    Benimaru watched, half praying, his eyes asking Are you all right? to me. I motioned him to give it a shot as well. I guess his experiences with Shions food up to now were just as bad as I imagined.

    He dejectedly took a spoonfulthen his eyes burst open in surprise. Guess my tongue wasnt lying to me. I almost thought something got screwed up with my evolution for a moment.

    Shion watched us with the biggest cheese-eating grin I ever saw in my life. It kind of pissed me off, frankly.

    Shion, what What is this? Whys this so much better-tasting than it looks?

    Hee-hee-hee! Well

    It turns outand I had no idea about thisthat when the moment of evolution arrived, Shion wished deeply in her mind to be good at cooking. It would take a dumbass like her to wish for something like that as her gift. What was she even thinking? It was exasperating, but I supposed it was also supremely Shion-like of her.

    Hee-hee! So there you have it. Ive obtained the unique skill Master Chef!

    Yeesh. What a sight. Earning a unique skill because she wanted to get better in the kitchen How badly did she wish for that anyway? And the way she described it, the skill let anything she made taste exactly how she pictured it in her mind, no matter what kind of dish it was. No wonder it tasted like Shuna made itthat was exactly what she was aiming for.

    Shions efforts, as always, were pointed in thepletely wrong direction. And nothing couldve been purer Shion than that.

    So the rest of the day turned into a wild party, a feast that continued well into the wee hours. There was none of the grim pathos of the past few days. Shion, and everyone else, was back, and their presence brought joy to the town.

    There was Gobzo and Gobta, showing off assorted tricks to their audience. One of them had a knife stuck in his headwonder how they pulled that off. It looked like it was bleeding, too, but maybe I just imagined it. They wereughing so much that Im sure there was nothing to be concerned about.

    Yohm was there, too, along with Elen and her bodyguards. He and Gruecith were staggering around, which was still a better showing than the totally passed-out Kabal. But Mjurran was the clear winner of the night. She didnt act a single bit drunkan experienced partier, I suppose. Sufia, noticing this, became thetest challenger to fall victim to her in a drinking match as the party descended further into chaos. It was a wild scene, but at least it helped the lycanthropes forget their worries for a while.

    Starting tomorrow, wed have a lot of cleanup work to do. Id need to consider what to do with the Beast Kingdom refugees, as well as how wed rescue Carillon. Plus, there was the Western Holy Church to consider. Wed need to pay careful attention to how they reacted, assuming we wanted to keep on the Western Nations good side.

    There was a mountain of issues to deal with, butfor nowI supposed we could have a little fun. And maybe it was just for today, but this was turning into a real fest, Id say. Japanese people love their festivals, after all. No excuse is too petty to kick one off, no reason too trivial for someone to n a drinking party for his friends. Thats how we lived around here. No need to keep things tense all the time.

    I should also mention that this party wound up bing a yearly urrence in thisnd. They named it the Tempest Resurrection Festival.

    Deep into the night, while everyone was sleeping off their epic benders, I was pondering over our future direction when an unfamiliar person greeted me.

    I am d you are awake, my lord. Allow me to express my heartfelt joy at seeing you be a full-fledged demon lord.

    The figure bowed deeply before me.

    Uh, whore you?

    I?! Surely you jest, my lord. Nothing could damage a demons heart more than to hear that

    The visitor seemed genuinely insulted. He looked like a pretty high-level demon, but I seriously had no idea who this was.

    Then Ranga poked his head out from my shadow. Master, this is one of the demons you summoned, using the knights as your bait.

    Ohhh, right. This dudes still here.

    Ahhh, Sir Ranga!

    The demon turned thankful eyes to Ranga, as if in the audience of a personal savior. And,e to think of it, I did see him during the party, fidgeting and looking supremely out of his element.

    Well, thanks for all your help. I heard you rounded up the survivor for me, too, so Ranga and I could get back here safely.

    Oh, no, I am hardly worthy of your thanks. But along those lines

    Well, sorry to keep you here all this time. You can go back home now.

    What?!

    That would exin his behavior. He wanted to leave, but I hadnt gotten around to giving the order. So I didbut this demon was acting all weird about it. He had rather handsome featuresreally, youd almost call him beautiful, despite being male and all. And now that face looked bewildered, ready to cry at any moment. It worried me.

    Oh, um, did I not give you enough of a reward or something?

    Nothing of the sort, my lord. As I asked you before, I seek the honor of joining your followers! What do you think? Will you please give it some consideration?

    Joining my followers? Umm, I think this Greater Demon I summoned said something like that, yeah, but Wait. This guy in front of me aint just Greater. We were talking like nothing was amiss, but this wasnt any kind of Greater Demon at all.

    Huh? Ranga, did I really summon this dude?

    You certainly did, my master!

    Hmm. All right.

    Upon receiving the knight corpses you offered as my summoner, I have earned my physical body. I can only hope that I may repay this great favor to you in some way.

    Oh really? Well, neat

    He did seem kinda strong, and if he wanted to be my follower that badly, then hell yeah. But that was a two-edged sword. If he ever went out of control, I worried that even Benimaru would have trouble stopping him.

    And what about the other two demons with him?

    Understood. When carrying out the Secret Art of Revival, you began to run short on magicule energy. When you did, the two demons rendered themselves into magicule form and disappeared in order to help you earn the energy required.

    Man . Raphael tossed that bombshell out like it was nothing. He was acting even more coldhearted than the Sage, showing off the kind of stakes he worked with. So the demons helped out with Shions resurrection, ying a role of their own behind the scenes? Boy, now Im sorry I thought for even a moment that they were useless.

    But what now, though? This guys aching so badly to help me out that he tossed his demon friends under the bus for me. Itd just be mean to ignore that.

    I cant really give you a sry or anything. You okay with that?

    The right to serve you will provide all the joy I need, my lord.

    Well, hell, if hes willing to work for free, I like those terms a lot.

    All right. Well, sounds good to me. As of today, youre officially one of us.

    Ahhhh! I thank you, my lord!

    Quit with the my lord crap. Its creepy.

    I understand. How shall I refer to you, then?

    Rimuru works.

    Ahhh, Rimurusuch a sweet tone that name has. Sir Rimuru it shall be, then

    Talk about grandiose. I had no idea what about me he found so attractive, but he just couldnt wait to be my servant.

    Right, yeah, great. But whats your name?

    Being a nameless demon is more than enough for me, Sir Rimuru.

    Huh? He looked way too high-level to not have a name. But thatd be too much of a pain in the ass to deal with. Lets do what Ive always done, then.

    Okay. Well, in ce of any other reward, I want to give you a name. You got a problem with that?

    My word! No, no problem at all. This is the greatest gift a demon could ask for!

    His well-featured face burst into abject joy. I guess thats just how I am, huh? Theres something about me that demons find irresistible. I think I had a right to boast about that a bit.

    Right. So, a name. Time to fish into my grab bag of supercar models, maybe? Something that sounds nice and demonic? In fact, why not just throw a fastball straight down the middle with this?

    Your name is Diablo. May you live up to it in your service to me!

    And the moment I said it, I felt my energy drain. I was getting pretty used to this by now. It took only about half my magicules this time, too. The pessimistic side of me was expecting more, given how high and mighty this demon looked. Naming Beretta, that Greater Demon, took over 30 percent of my magicules, so he mustve been greater than Greater after all.

    Report. The individual Diablo was an Arch Demon. When his master evolved, he experienced a massive upgrade in magicule stores. As a result, making aparison strictly on percentage of magicules consumed will not provide an urate picture.

    Um, all right?

    But really, Raphael here seems a hell of a lot more informal with me than the Sage ever was

    Incorrect. It is your imagination.

    Oh yeah? You seem awfully free with the advice youre offering, considering that.

    But the Lord of Wisdom just said something I didnt want to ignore. My energy had gone up that much, and Diablo still took half of it? Like, how much of a boost are we talking here?

    Understood. For references sake, the figure is over ten times what it previously was.

    Holy crap.

    What the hell did I just walk into? Ive turned into some kinda monster.

    Diablo, the demon before me, remained motionless on one knee. A sort of dark cocoon enveloped his body as he prepared for his own evolution. I am so careless sometimes. I guess theres no cure for stupidity, even after death, so Ill just have to grin and bear it.

    No more casual naming for me! I mean it this time!

    I swore it to myself, but something told me I wouldnt stick to it for very long.

    The evolutionpleted itself as I mused over this. Within the dark form I was greeted with, I could see streaks of red and gold amid his ck hair. His eyes were just as golden as before, his pupils shining just as eerie a shade of crimson. The areas thatd normally be white were instead a shade of jet-ck, which made them stand out all the more. As he rose to his full slender height, I realized he was dressed in the very peak of ssy domestic clothing, like a perfect butler. It was a new image for him,pared to the high-born prince hed looked like before.

    He used to be a ruler; now he served one. But, if anything, that arrogant aura that surrounded him had grown, not shrunk.

    Diablo. That is my name. My heart is filled with deep emotion, Sir Rimuru. From this day forward, I promise to serve you with all my heart.

    He gave me a respectful salute.

    This transformation apparently reflected his desire to be my ever-loyal servant. Demons could use the intrinsic skill Create Material to whip up any kind of clothing they wanted, it turned out, so there was no need for a wardrobe. Pretty useful. Im kinda jealous.

    Almost immediately, he said, Sir Rimuru, you appear to be fretting about something. What is it that troubles you? Because I would hope you can discuss it with me.

    It mustve been obvious to him. I decided to exin the whole situation, since itd help me arrange my own thoughts as well. Even if it didnt lead to an answer, itd help keep my mind calm.

    Its nothing big Well, it is, I guess. Im thinking about the future.

    The future?

    Right now, weve got too many problems to deal with at the same time. I think were already over capacity with all the ns we need to carry out.

    Ah

    I reviewed the circumstances for him.

    My main concern was the demon lord Carillon and how Milim was involved with him. But the most pressing matter was how wed clean up the Kingdom of Farmus and check the Western Holy Churchs movementsboth issues that could greatly affect our future rtionship with mankind. If we made any misstep with the Church in particr, wed wind up being the nemesis of every human being in the world. I wanted to do whatever I could to prevent that.

    It would be ridiculous, though, to attempt to address all these problems at once. I needed to line up our enemies, our problems, one by one and secure victory against them.

    I see. All of that makes sense to me now. Allow me, in that case, to shoulder some of the burden! I will be happy to fine-tune matters so multiple problems never ur at the same time for you. Your orders, Sir Rimuru!

    Ahhh, ever the sly demon, isnt he? He understood my worries in a sh and was ready to take action against them. But I wanted to discuss matters with everyone else before deciding on anything.

    Well, hang on. Theres no big rush. Well decide on a direction at a conference tomorrow, so why dont you join us?

    If Diablos that eager to pitch in, let him. He seems pretty shrewd, and itd be a waste to let his powers go unflexed.

    Report. I believe we do not need to worry about the Western Holy Church. The Analysis and Assessment of the Unlimited Imprisonment that has shut away the individual Veldora will bepleted shortly. Releasing this individual is believed to provide a suitable restraint on the Holy Churchs actions.

    Ooooh. Neat. Yeah, if we could release Veldora, thatd sure keep the Church from pulling any funny moves.

    Uh, wait, whaaaat?! Youre being way too engaging with me, Raphael!

    Incorrect. It is your imagination.

    Yeah, yeah, my imagination. Knock it off, man.

    Lets get back to Veldora. We can actually release him?

    Analysis is ted to finish by tomorrow afternoon.

    Wow, Raphael. I guess youve gotten a lot more useful than I thought.

    Well, that certainly opened up a few paths to a solution. As long as we could keep the Western Holy Church in check, thatd give us all the time we wanted to negotiate with the Western Nations. I was scared the Church was agitating them to believe we were evil, and if we kept that from happening, we already knew there were nations there willing to work with us.

    Farmus, meanwhile, was no longer a threat. We had crushed the core of their military, and we held their king hostage. Wed help pave the way for Yohm to establish a new nation and focus the attention on him, and nobody there would even have the free time to meddle with us then.

    So what problems did that leave?

    Right! I think somethings gonnae together after all!

    I would focus exclusively on striking the demon lord yman. Milim told me that anyone who dered themselves a demon lord would quickly face retribution from the others. Why not turn it into a big debutante ballget my name out there with a bang and go onstage as the sassiest, brassiest demon lord out there?

    Ah, has an ideae to mind?

    It sure has. Ive decided to be a demon lordin name and deed.

    Hee-hee-hee-hee-hee. Thats the spirit, Sir Rimuru. And I, Diablo, shall be faithful to you for all the days of

    Hmph! And I, Ranga, am his most faithful of servants!

    I gave Ranga a pat on the head for that. The unexpected deration was kind of endearing, I thought.

    It seemed like we had a good ybook to work with tomorrow. And under a sky full of stars, atop Rangas back as he squinted in bliss, my own mind felt just as clear and glittery.

    The next day, I informed everyone of my n.

    The following people were in attendance:

    Shuna, my temporary secretary.

    Shion, my official secretary. The temporary one was far better-suited to the job, but never mind that.

    Rigurd and the other hobgoblin elders in government.

    Rigur and Gobta from our security team.

    Benimaru and Hakuro, representing our military.

    Kaijin and Kurobe from the manufacturing department, along with Garm and Dold.

    Geld and Mildo from construction.

    Lilina from management.

    Soei, Soka, and the other three members of our espionage team.

    Ranga in my shadow as kind of an emotional support animal, I guess?

    I also invited Gabil to join in, as well as Diablo, serving as a second secretary of mine. Itd be a good opportunity to introduce him, I figured.

    Outside of native Tempestians, there was Yohm; his assistant, Kazhil; and Rommel the staff officer. Mjurran and Gruecith were there, of course, along with the Three Lycanthropeers of Eurazania. There were over thirty people in our meeting hall, all told.

    Thank you all for gathering here,dies and gentlemen!

    Why this sudden meeting, Sir Rimuru?

    I was trying to act all cool here, given that I was about to announce my presence as a demon lord, but Benimaru just cut me off. Guess Ill keep it normal after all.

    First, I have someone to introduce to you all. This is Diablo, who helped me out of a rough spot just a bit ago. Hes pretty strong, and we can all rely on him, so make nice, all right?

    Hmm? He certainly seems well guarded I imagine he is just as experienced as you say, Sir Rimuru.

    With Hakuros stamp of approval, everyone else safely assumed that Diablo wasnt some also-ran strength-wise. Without any furtherint, he immediately became one of the gang. Moving on:

    NowGabil!

    Y-yes?

    The dragonewt looked ill at ease in this gathering of top brass. He nervously shot to his feet upon hearing his name.

    Effective today, Im going to name you head of our development department. Thats a provisional title, but it means youre now in Tempest leadership. Make me proud, all right?

    Y-yes! Yes, sir! I promise you that I, Gabil, will eternally put my nose to the grindstone for you!!

    He choked up midway as he epted the offer. Research and development seemed to suit Gabil a lot more than I wouldve guessed. I was sure hed do a great job.

    Now it was time to visit the main topic.

    So Ive decided on our direction going forward, and I wanted to ry it to all of you. This has everything to do with Yohm and the Three Lycanthropeers as well, so I want you to listen carefully.

    Whatever you want, pal.

    Does this have to do with rescuing Lord Carillon?

    All eyes were upon me. Without further dy, I turned into human form and faced them.

    Ive decided to be a demon lord.

    Right.

    Huh? Kind of a tepid response.

    Um Meaning that Im taking the role

    You already have, havent you?

    Shion gave me an odd look. I guess she figured that was the whole reason she was alive now. And yeah, I was a true demon lord in terms of my rank or whatever, but

    I dont mean that. I mean, Im going to dere to the world that Im a demon lord, too!

    Oh? Meaning that youre going to challenge the other demon lords at their own game, Sir Rimuru?

    Hakuro was kind enough to say it for me.

    Right! Exactly! And not the other demon lords exactly. Im gunning straight for yman.

    Yohm, Mjurran, Gruecith, and the Three Lycanthropeers nodded their earnest approval.

    I see, said Benimaru, boldly smiling. Seizing a seat at the demon lords table for yourself, then? Interesting.

    Nobody else had any objection.

    Right. Behind the scenes, as Farmus attacked us, it was yman controlling Mjurran and all the rest. I cant let that stand. Theres a pretty good chance hes the one who sed Milim and Frey on Eurazania, too. Thats all the reason I need, isnt it?

    My audience nodded back.

    I then discussed my thoughts further with themabout our future rtions with the Western Nations, about the postwar cleanup with Farmus, about the need to keep the Holy Church from interfering with us, and about rescuing Carillon, as I prom ised the Beast Kingdoms denizens. I also passed out work assignments along the way.

    Rigurd! Im leaving negotiations with the Western Nations to you. Evacuating all those merchants back to Blumund should be a pretty good bargaining chip to work with. Keep in mind the trust weve built so far and proceed carefully.

    Yes, Sir Rimuru! You can count on me!

    He sounded ready for the job. The other elders looked just as enthusiastic about it, practically bursting with confidence. I guess they were on pretty good terms with the merchants.

    Benimaru! I want you to tabte exactly what happened to everyone who evolved in town. Were going to use every weapon at our disposal to crush yman, and to do that, I need to know what kind of powers I have to work with.

    Yes, Sir Rimuru.

    He, too, was brimming with confidence. It was the expression of a true general, one worthy of being entrusted with all military matters. He sucked at keeping an eye on Shion, but when it came to this job, here was a man you could rely on.

    Shion! Ill have you interrogate our prisoners. Yohm and Mjurran, youll help Shion out with that. Make them talk as much as you can about the state of things inside Farmus, and help us seize their country. Before we do that, well have to finish all the postwar cleanup work, too. Theres going to be a new nation set in ce, one with Yohm as its king and leader, and we need all the intel we can to make it work. Dont kill any of them, all right? They might be useful to uster.

    I happily ept the task, Sir Rimuru!

    Sure thing, pal.

    I will do what I can. Hopefully it will help me repay the favor a little.

    Shion was ready. I made doubly sure to instruct her not to kill anyone, because I easily imagined her doing so otherwise. We should be fine now, hopefully, even as I sensed a sort of restless turbulence deep within her eyes that concerned me. Hopefully I was just imagining it. She was always quick to fly into a rage, so I figured this would be a good way to let her get back at em, but maybe I was being a bit too rash.

    Ah well. She wouldnt be alone, ever, so I figured itd be fine. I had future work for Yohm and Mjurran, so itd be best if they helped her for now. I made sure to have them contact me should Shion begin to act unstable. That ought to be enough caution to cover my ass.

    Soei!

    I will gather information on yman as quickly as I can.

    Ah. Right. Good. Soeis certainly a man who can work. He guessed at my motives before I could even give him his orders, and yman was the only prey in his eyes right now. Scary dude. d I could rely on himand before I could finish the thought, all five members of our espionage team had disappeared, already carrying out their duties. Once he was back, I was sure wed have another strategic conference to carry out.

    As for the others:

    Now, as Ive said, Im going to crush yman. Id like the Three Lycanthropeers to help me with this if possible?

    I would expect nothing else, O great leader of Jura.

    Just say the word! Were running on your orders for now!

    We are all of the same mind. We lycanthropes reward trust with trustwe repay our favors with our lives. We trust you, and you have given us a favor we could never repay. Now allow us to stake our lives on paying you back!

    All right. Well, heres the order. I want you to rest up, recharge yourselves, and prepare for the decisive duel!

    Yes, Sir Rimuru!

    All three of them kneeled and acknowledged that they were under my orders. Thatd be a huge boost to our war power, not to mention some extra provisions to use against yman. That was a relief.

    Good. So, I want everyone else to evaluate the damage to our town and repair it. We also need some living quarters set up for the lycanthropeshelp them maintain a decent quality of life while theyre here. And keep up your security patrols to make sure we dont have any fights or trouble!

    Everyone nodded their agreement. That marked the end of this salvo of orders.

    Excellent. Now well just wait for Soeis report before we hold another conference. Until then, I want all of you to figure out the main issues with the work youre assigned and put together a n we can execute against them!

    Yes, sir!

    The audience stood up and saluted me. I nodded and gave them a little smile, putting on my mask as I sat down.

    Get to it!

    Every one of them immediately sprang into action.

    The only ones left in the room were Diablo, Shuna, and me. Shion griped a bit about being the real secretary and all that, but (luckily for me) she put the orders I gave her first. She lectured Diablo a bit on what the job of secretary entailed, but he was perfectly safe in ignoring all of that. Already he was eagerly nodding and giving thoughtful looks at what I said, so maybe that made Shion get all stuck-up with him. If I hadnt stopped her, she might still be yapping at him now.

    I had given her three prisoners to interrogate. She had to take that job seriously or else itd be pointless. It wasnt an interrogation so much as torture at Shions hands, truthfully speaking. I had given permission for her to deal any kind of mental anguish she could think of, as long as physical pain wasnt involved. The victims I resurrected were allowed to join in, too, and I was sure theyd be more than eager to make them sing like canaries.

    The anger swirling within me hadrgely calmed now that they were all back. It meant I had no real drive to kill that seedy-looking old man and the guy from the Western Holy Church. The main perpetrator already had his heart broken by Diablo, besides. I couldnt forgive them, but I no longer had much interest inying my hands on them.

    Depending on how things went, it might be better to let the king of Farmus and the archbishop live so we could more effectively use them. As long as Shion didnt kill them, then, I was prepared to give tacit approval to whatever she did. If someone hits you, you gotta hit back. Hit back, put the fear of God in them, and make sure they never make the same mistake again. Shion was the perfect person to handle this, and once she extracted the info we needed, I was sure shed give them a hearty mealusing Master Chef to make sure it tasted just the way she wanted.

    While Shion yed the role of interrogator, I had other business to take care of.

    First, I had to study how this world handled postwar cleanup. I wanted to at least consider things like what they did with POWs, as well as the other conventional wisdom surrounding warfare around here. If all of mankind considered us to be monsters, then I could just operate by my own rulesbut if there was a chance we could build cooperative rtionships, like we had now, I wanted to nudge things in that direction as much as I could.

    Thus I decided to examine what nations generally did in times like these. Yohm and Elens gang wouldnt know anything about politics or government. For something like this, Vester was my man. Soon, there was a knock on the door, followed by Diablo bringing the former dwarven minister into my chamber.

    I hear you called for me, sir? he asked when he set eyes upon me. And let me say, I am so d to see you safe after all these cmities that befell us!

    Yeah, that aint the half of it. Not that they were over yet, either. I decided to cut straight to the point.

    You said it. But I wanted to ask you: How do human countries around here wage war against each other?

    Ah, you are curious about Farmus, then? That is a rather thorny issue to deal with.

    Vester then began discussing the rules of war with me.

    First off, Western Nations countries that were members of the so-called Council of the West generally didnt fight one another. Even if they did, itd have to involve formal derations of war and a litany of strict rules. Failure to adhere to those would put the full weight of the Council against youmeaning every other nation in that western region, pretty much.

    What about nations not involved with the Council, though? Assorted scenarios could y out in that case, but basically, the Council never got involved no matter who won or lost. If one side engaged in behavior that was cruel and inhumane beyond reason, however, it would certainly torpedo that nations reputation within the Council. Just because rules didnt apply to the other side, that didnt mean you could do whatever you wanted. Trying to navigate the boundaries of this seemed like a big headache to me.

    On the other hand, though, if you were invaded by another nation, that was a different story. You had the right to request rescue support from the Council, and that was one major reason why the Council had so many small kingdoms represented among its ranks.

    Larger nations, such as the Dwarven Kingdom and the Eastern Empire (full name: Nasca Namrium Ulmeria United Eastern Empire), naturally werent involved with the Council. Get stormed by one of those outfits, and the Council was ready to handle that with a unified frontbut if youre the one storming them, the Council was totally hands-off. You might even get kicked out of the Council for needlessly riling a superpower like that.

    Having itid out for me like that, it sounded like the Councilthis sort of United Nationslike presence in this worldwas based pretty heavily around the idea of weaker nations helping one another out. Considering the ever-present threat of monsters, I suppose, people there had learned that wars among mankind were pointless.

    Now I had some level of understanding to work with. Within that framework, the Kingdom of Farmus had staged a single-handed invasion of Tempest. Was this a holy war, involving the full will of the Western Holy Church? That was a thornier question.

    Thats exactly the issue, Vester advised. If Farmus had won or at least forced a stalemate, the Holy Church couldve driven a litany of other nations to join the battle. The way things are now, though

    Yeah. It took one slime to wipe out the entirety of Farmuss military force. Were talking literally three survivors. It had to be one of the biggest routs in all of history. Plus, they invaded a country with ties to Blumund. Was it really worth picking a fight with a nation like ours? Beating us wouldnt earn them anything; it wouldnt make anyone move from one side to the other. And winning was a pretty big long shot from the start

    So, I said, if the Holy Church abandons Farmus, is it safe to say no other human nation will be willing to stage a military operation against us?

    The Dwarven Kingdom isnt part of the Council, but they do keep up on their internal goings-on. From my perspective, I would not expect any moves from them at all.

    Well, huh. Maybe were in a better situation than I thought.

    Hee-hee-hee-hee-hee! I see, I see. Perhaps a show of force would be advisable against the Western Nations

    Hang on, Diablo. I have my own thoughts about that.

    My pardons.

    Nah, nah. I think Im gonna ask you to make Farmus capitte to us.

    Ohhh! I would be d to take that duty.

    I nodded at him as I thought this over. Once we had Veldora resurrected, the Western Nations and the Church would be essentially bound and gagged. We could use that opportunity to prove we werent their enemy. Farmus was probably going to get cut out of the Council before long, besides.

    Report. I believe matters will proceed in the way you predict.

    Good. With Raphael, Lord of Wisdom and all that backing me up, it had to be a sure thing.

    Now, how were prisoners of war handled in this world? Unfortunately, even Vester didnt have much to offer. Wars just werent thatmon, and POWs were generally exchanged for other prisoners, for money, or for other rights and privileges.

    The idea of a nation taking a rivals supreme leader prisoner was practically unheard of. Such a talentless king would quickly lose the faith of his people, no doubt, so Id be surprised if anyone used us of regicide or some other dirty deed like that. I suppose we could say that he died in battle, but itd be much better to give him back alive, I think.

    All right. Thanks for the advice. Im d youre here for us, Vester.

    Oh, no, its nothing that impressive, he replied, visibly blushing.

    His personality had mellowed out considerably here in Tempest, making him kind of a cheerful, intelligent man with a darker side that asionally rose to the surface, but blushing definitely did not fit his look. Theres nothing cute about a middle-aged guy acting all bashful. Ah, I almost forgot: Is it all right if I report on these events to King Gazel?

    Sure, no problem. Tell him to give me some feedback if he has any.

    Even if we tried to hide it, theyd find out in a sh. Better to just give him the whole, unvarnished truth.

    Very well. I will be off, then

    He was still blushing when he took his leave. Then something clicked in my mind. Wait a second. What if he wasnt being bashful at all? What if he was just that, you know, charmed by me? I did have my mask off.

    Wait No way

    Assorted concerning scenarios shed through my mind. Id just have to hope none of them came to fruition.

    The moment Vester left the chamber:

    Report. Analysis and Assessment of Unlimited Imprisonment isplete.

    Well, perfect. Thanks, Raphael. Lets go outside and get Veldora out of there pronto.

    Ive got some business to take care of, so Ill be gone for a bit. I dont need anyone to apany me. Shuna, show Diablo around town for me.

    Very well. Take care.

    Thank you for your consideration, Sir Rimuru.

    No prob. See youter.

    Before long, I was deep inside the Sealed Cavethe very ce where Veldora was being held, a region I didnt even let Gabil and his armye near. Unleashing the dragon in the middle of town was likely to cause some, uh, consternation, so I went down here instead. Besides, even when sealed, the area around him was so dense with magicules that people couldnt evene near the ce.

    For me, though, it was easy. It used to take several minutes to pin down the coordinates for Spatial Motion, but now it required no more than a passing thought to wrap it up. In an instant, the two points in space were connected, and a hole opened up before me. One hop was all it took to reach my destination.

    Okay. Lets review where were at right now.

    Ive evolved into a demon lord, and my skills have changed quite a bit as a result. Essentially, all those skills (Spatial Motion included) have been brought together under the same umbrean umbre called Raphael, Lord of Wisdommaking them all much easier to use.

    The ultimate skills Raphaels powers involved (quoting from him) were: Mind elerate, Analyze and Assess, Parallel Computation, Cast Cancel, All of Creation, Combine/Disassemble, and Ability Adjust. The unique skill Deviant, an old memento from Shizu, was gone, now integrated into Raphaels own abilities. Maybe that was why he was a lot more talkative than my old partner?

    Incorrect. That is unrted.

    So it wasnt just my imagination this time. And that must mean Ahhh, but lets not pursue this right now.

    By the way, Mind elerate lets me extend my rate of thinking by up to a million times. Its a little hard to picture that with words alone, but crank it up, and it feels like times stopped for you. Thanks to all these skills, I could now trigger multiple magics at the same time, with no more than a fraction of a seconds dy between them. It was virtually iparable with the Great Sage.

    The ultimate skill Belzebuth, meanwhile, epassed Predation, Stomach, Mimicry, Iste, Rot, Soul Consume, and Food Chain. Soul Consume was a new power for me. Merciless, a power I thought coulde in pretty handy, was subsumed into the othersa pity, but it was still active within Soul Consume. I still needed to break my targets heart before I could take their soul, but it was pretty handy in practice anyway.

    Another interesting thing was that Receive and Provide had merged into Food Chain. It set up this entire skill tree of sorts to tap into, with myself at the very peak. Monsters below me could provide their strength to back me up, and I could divert some of my own strength down to them. It was ridiculousand even now, it was doing its thing, granting me ess to the skills the towns monsters picked up in their evolution. I was letting Raphael take care of all that for me.

    That rounded out my skill set, and even I was shocked at how superpowered it was. Theres no way I could take full advantage of this stuff. Raphael himself was subject to Food Chain, too, cing him in the midst of an Ability Adjust. If these skills were gonna change all the time, why bother remembering them?

    But enough about me. Lets turn our attention to Veldora.

    This has been a long timeing, hasnt it? Nearly two years, in fact. But I was finally ready to keep my promise. I still needed to find a vessel of some kind for the guy, but I had a feeling one skill or another would take care of that for me.

    Im bustin you outta there, Veldora!!

    Then I ced the order with Raphael.

    The moment I did, a virtual tempest of magicules swirled around within my Stomach. If I hadnt evolved Belzebuth, Im not sure the Stomach wouldve been able to take the strain. It felt like a near-overwhelming gale had burst out of nowhere.

    I, the great and venerable Veldora, have returned!!

    Venerable? Dude, is this some new way of talking you developed while you were in here?

    Hey! I said, trying to keep things light. Long time no see! How you doin?

    You seem to be treating this great resurrection of mine rather flippantly. But it came more quickly than I expected. I had anticipated a while longer.

    Yeah, Ill bet. Analyzing the Unlimited Imprisonment took a hell of a lot of time in itself. The way I was doing it, Id probably need another hundred years or so, Id guess. But then my Great Sage kind of evolved on me, so

    Evolved? No wonder, then. Even my unique skill Investigator told me to expect another century or so. All I could do was send the information I gleaned from the inside to your Sage, but the flow of data vastly elerated itself out of nowhere, so I was wondering what was afoot. A skill evolving, though? What happened there?

    I answered the question as best I couldI became a demon lord, my unique skill became an ultimate skill, the Sage became Raphael, and Im one lean, mean, analyzin machine now.

    Ahhh I see. And youve be a demon lord in the span of under two years?! An awakened demon lord is not some imposter pushover. Even I would have problems against such a foe!

    By awakened, I assumed he meant a true demon lord. When a potential seed goes through the Harvest Festival, that apparently awakens themnot that it really matters to me at this point.

    Yeah, well, um What can I say, huh? I was always kind of like a genius, wasnt I? Even back then. No regr dude would be reborn as a slime, after all. I kept on naming people, too, and that made me evolve really quickly. I mean, really, it waseasy.

    Youve taken far too many risks, you fool. No wonder I noticed my magical energy being taken from me when I wasnt paying attention. Whenever youcked the energy to carry out your ridiculous naming sprees, you took what you needed automatically from me. Of all the foolish things! It was such a blow to my analysis performance that I feared it would extend my imprisonment. But your evolution saved us this time, then? Never did I ever anticipate anything of the sort!

    Huh? So So I survived all those epic naming sessions mainly because of Veldora? I mean, I did think it was kind of weird, pulling off all these evolutions at what seemed like a minimum of risk. Definitely gotta knock off the naming jags in the future. Hell, no wonder the demon lords didnt immediately set out to build a vast army for themselves. Now it made sense.

    But whats done is done. Lets just call it all part of the n, huh?

    I bet you didnt. Well, I nned it that way the whole time. Did you receive any gift from my evolution, by the way? The World Language said something about everyone in my spiritual genealogy getting something

    We should have been connected that way, too. But instead, I felt an audible huh? from my Thought Communication. Veldora fell silent for a bit.

    Then:

    Ah! Ahhh! So this is an evolved skill! My unique skill Investigator has be the ultimate skill Faust, Lord of Investigation! The power to reach the ultimate truth, the final goal of my boundless research!!

    He sounded pretty excited about it, dancing around a bit in the cave. I dunno, maybe hes the type whos slow on the uptake. His teacher probably wouldve written too inattentive on his report card. But whatever.

    Oh, um, thats great. A lot easier to evolve than you thought, huh?

    You fool! came the exasperated reply. Not even I was aware of such phenomena. It is not a lot easier than I thought!

    No, I suppose not. True demon lords were a rarity, after all, and I suppose it wasnt such amon thing.

    We spent the next while catching up on stuff, sharing our knowledge with each other. Really, we couldve spent all day down there, but I wanted to get Veldora out into the open sooner orter.

    Hey, so now that the seals gone and everything, you wanna go see whats going on outside?

    Ah, yes. But what will we do about a vessel to serve as my physical body?

    I think we can find a way to make that happen, but theres something I want you to promise me, all right?

    Oh? What is that?

    Your auras too huge. I want you to hold it back for me. We have human beings in town now, as well as a variety of weaker monsters. If you show up in resurrected form over there, its gonna wreck everything, wont it?

    Ah. You really have be a king, havent you? All right. You have my word!

    Obtaining this firm promise was the whole reason I went so deep into this cave in the first ce. I needed to be sure he could keep that crazy flow of magicules in check. Once I had his word, I unleashed my brand-new Enhanced Replication, or whatever it was called. This was the vessel I had in mind for Veldoraan exact duplicate of me, handsome face and everything.

    Well, huh. No wonder Vester fell for me. I had matured from before, taller and more grown-up. Bewitching, even. Must be the evolution affecting me.

    Hmm. Is that your intention?

    Yep. Use it as your vessel.

    Gah-ha-ha-ha-ha! I see! Very well, then!

    With his blessing, I transnted Veldoras spiritual bodyhis heart, as it werefrom my Stomach to the Enhanced Replication. He didnt even have an astral body at the moment, making the operation very unstable, although itd gradually rebuild itself as part of Veldoras spiritual life process. My Replication should be the final defense he needed for nowor so I thought.

    Report. I have an important development to share.

    Whatever Raphael had, it sounded important. Something to do with Veldora, perhaps.

    Report. I have confirmed the establishment of a soul corridor between my master and the individual Veldora. After consuming the remains of the individual Veldora and analyzing them, I have obtained the ultimate skill Veldora, Lord of the Storm.

    That was some pretty heady crap that Raphael was reporting on, as if it was the days weather. So shocking that I lost my words for a moment. Apparently, Belzebuth consumed the dregs of Veldora that remained in my Stomach, obtaining part of its powers for itself. This firmed up the link between our souls, transforming it into this new power.

    The ultimate skill Veldora consisted of Summon Storm Dragon, Restore Storm Dragon, and a family of storm-rted magic. Summon Storm Dragon called forth Veldora in dragon form, the way I remembered him. He was a spiritual life-form now, but once he was fully recovered, I should be able to summon him in that shape as well. I can summon only one dragon at a time; if I summon another, the first one disappears. Maybe I could take advantage of this for transport purposes? It seemed feasible.

    Restore Storm Dragon copied Veldoras memories into my own mind. In other words, if Veldora died for some reason, I could rece himor, to put it another way, the real Veldora would reside within my own soul. That was what allowed me to summon him whenever I wanted, I suppose.

    The storm magic granted me ess to Death-Calling Wind, Dark Lightning, and Storm of Destruction. These were all incredibly powerful spells, not at all the sort youd find in a grimoire down at the local library, so it was a nice bonus.

    That rounded out the set, and to sum up, it meant Veldora was using me as a kind of backup. Which I didnt mind, especially if it unlocked all of Veldoras skills for me.

    A soul corridor? Veldora asked. So all my memories and experiences are gathered in your mind, regardless of where we are in time and space. As long as you do not cease to exist, I am immortal. If I am subjected to Unlimited Imprisonment, you can simply resummon me to spring me out. I was once nearly invincible, but now I see Ive been granted eternal life as well.

    Wow. Really? Like, that totally seems like cheating. Although it assumes Ill manage to keep myself alive going forward. Still, crazy. I could create these situations, like Ha-ha! You thought you could take me? Well, check out this storm dragon I just happened to have bumping around in my pocket! Heh-heh-heh. I almost felt bad for my rivals. Talk about the ultimate ace in the hole.

    With that soul-corridor connection, changes began to ur within Veldora. With his heart linked up to my soul, he had lost all his vulnerabilities. In a single moment, both his astral and spiritual bodies were regenerated, giving him new life in his original,plete form.

    And then:

    Mnh?!

    He grunted, and then his Enhanced Replication began to mutate. It grew and grew and grew,ing close to seven feet tall. Now he was tall, well-built, supple, and quite muscr. His skin was a dark shade of brown, his hair blond, and his looks rugged and masculine. He was a fine figure of a man, one with just a few suggestions of my own facial features still in ce.

    It was kind of like if you took my external human form and made it deliberately manlier.

    I couldnt get this manly even if I tried faking it, so Veldoras will mustve been involved with this. Just like the battle-obsessed freak he was, he probably wished for something that looked strong and would hold up in a fight. Ah well. At least he didnt grow into his full, gigantic dragon form.

    This resurrection certainly seemed to fill him with joy, too. Gahhh-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha! I am fully restored!! I have obtained ultimate power! Anyone who defies me shall be in!!

    Um, hang on a sec. Thats weird, isnt it? Hes starting to sound like a viin here. And where have I heard that line before?

    Wait. Thats gotta be a famous line from the boss character in a manga I used to love

    Uh Dude. Why do you know that line?

    Gah-ha-ha-ha-ha! I was rather bored in there, so to pass the time, I analyzed your memories and read through the works I found inside.

    Um, dont you think your analysis work wouldve gone a hell of a lot faster if you didnt waste your skills on stuff like that?!

    What?!

    Huh?

    We stared at each other. It wasnt exactly an affectionate moment. Veldoras eyes swam as he considered what he had done.

    Well, regardless, I have finally been released! My thanks to you, Rimuru!

    Way to change the subject, you bastard. I swore in my heart that I would pursue this issue in detailter on.

    Still, just as I requested, Veldora was trying his best to rein in his aura. He was trying, but after having his full, vast, expansive strength restored to him, it was all gushing out like a tsunami. So I gave him a crash course in aura suppressionotherwise, Id never be able to introduce him to anyone else.

    Not like that! Try to picture it building up in a littlepartment in your body!

    Mmh? Ah, speaking of which

    Veldora closed his eyes, meditating over something for a moment. Then I noticed his aura shrink down a considerable amount.

    How is this?

    Ohhh, much better.

    Gahhhh-ha-ha-ha! I see my manga knowledge has paid off! It is as if all the knowledge of the world was contained inside those arcane volumes!

    No its not, dumbass. What a goofball, trying to act out all those crazy stories. Butwell, with a little practice, he oughtta be fine.

    Report. The Food Chain process on the monsters who share in your soul hierarchy isplete. Arge number of skills have been gifted to you, their master. Would you like me to sift through them and execute Ability Adjust?

    Yes

    No

    Now the Harvest Festival had done its work on the townspeople.

    There was no way Id be able to fully harness the dozens, perhaps hundreds of skills streaming my way. Better to have someone rework them to be as simple and easy to use as possible. I mean, really, a skills something you may or may not be able to obtain after many years of diligently applying yourtent talents. Now I had a zillion. It was just too mucha waste of power on someone like me.

    So I thought YES and the process of elimination wrapped up in an instant.

    Report. Using the unique skill Unlimited Imprisonment as a base, the consolidation process has beenpleted. The unique skill Unlimited Imprisonment has evolved into the ultimate skill Uriel, Lord of Vows.

    Wait. Waaaaaaait a second. Since when did I have Unlimited Imprisonment, too?! Because I think thats kind of an important piece of information, but Raphael treated it as a total given, didnt he? I guess hes just the kind of person to lose all interest in a solved problem, no matter how difficult it was.

    So. Lord of Vows. Or loyalty, to put it another way. The collected prayers from those who vow fealty to me. All those prayers crystallized to form this new ultimate skind the moment I obtained it, I could feel a new strength. Strength, and an unbelievably reassuring peace of mind. And why wouldnt I? This strength was proof positive of the bonds my friends and I shared.

    Buthang on. Does this now mean Im in possession of four ultimate skills? Those are some amazing toys, there. Nobodys gonna mind if I get a little carried away with them, would they?

    Ah, but I shouldnt let my guard down. Viins usually meet their tragic doom when they get all cocky like that. No self-proimed demon lord would leave themselves open like that. Whenever I do, things usually go awry, dont they? We need to proceed carefully.

    For now, lets go over our new skills.

    Understood. The forces of the ultimate skill Uriel, Lord of Vows are as follows:

    I had Raphael spell them out for me, as always.

    Apparently, this skill had merged some of my extra skills into it as well. The only intrinsic skills I had left at the end were Infinite Regeneration, Universal Detect, Universal Shapeshift, Lords Ambition, Enhanced Replication, and Universal Thread.

    Meanwhile, the skill itselfrgely offered the following four features: Unlimited Imprisonment, Control Laws, Universal Barrier, and Dominate Space.

    Unlimited Imprisonment:

    Entombs the target in aplex number of spatial dimensions.

    Universal Barrier:

    Provides absolute defense with a multyer barrier and the severing of space between both sides.

    Control Laws:

    ck fire and thunder. Magical control. Control of heat quantities and inertia. The ability to freely store and remove heat from the Stomach.

    Dominate Space:

    A movement ability, allowing the user to freely switch between spaces for which they are aware of the coordinates.

    So, kind of the culmination of a lot of skills I had gathered so far.

    I could trigger Unlimited Imprisonment any time I wanted to. It was equal to the prison Veldora had been trapped in, making anyone caught inside impossible to retrieve, by andrge. Universal Barrier automatically protected my bodyfully handled by Raphaelwithout my having to think about it.

    Control Laws seemed like itd let me engineer all kinds of phenomena through the control of magicules. The description was a lot of Greek to me, really, but for now I could have Raphael figure it out if I wanted something.

    Dominate Space, meanwhile, was about as close to instant teleportation as you could get. As long as I could perceive something with Universal Detect, I could flick myself right over there, no need to build a hole in space or anything. This included any ce I had visited before, although that required a little time dy.

    Frankly, the powers of Uriel were mind-boggling. All the offense from before, plus movement, defense, and banishmentall massively powered up. I felt safe in summarizing it that way.

    Like, Im invincible now, arent I? No, no, I just told myself Id refrain from such nonsense. No getting carried away.

    As I pored over my new skills, Veldora seemed to have controlling his aura pretty well mastered, figuring out the traits of Faust, Lord of Investigation along the way. He keeps on spouting off such incredible BS that I forgot, but Veldoras actually a lot smarter than I am.

    This Faust thing was pretty amazing, too. It epassed five skillsMind elerate, Analyze and Assess, All of Creation, Control Probability, and Investigate Truthand if you asked me to exin how it worked, Id be stumped. A couple of those skills I had never heard of before, but sadly, Food Chain wasnt in the cards for him. No need to be greedy, though. I doubted hed be able to fully use it anyway.

    So our preparations wereplete. Now, for the first time in several centuries, Veldora would be unleashed on the outside world.

    Upon leaving the cave with him, I found everyone waiting for us at the entranceand really, we were just about to have chaos on our hands. Arge number of people were assembled around the cave, and they were (to say the least) unruly.

    Some of them had already realized the legendary Storm Dragon was back to life, with one contingent wanting to march inside to save me and the other refusing to budge until I gave them orders. The arguments between them had grown heated in my absence, even as Benimaru stood silently with arms crossed.

    But I tell you, if Sir Rimuru is gone, then weve got no way to rescue Carillon, our lord. We gotta get him outta there, no matter the cost!

    How many times do I have to repeat myself? Sir Rimuru ventured into the cave of his own volition. Clearly he has some motivation for this, and it is not for us to interfere with that.

    But its been three days! If we dont do something

    All right, you mewling vermin! Will you be quiet for me, or would you like to be crushed instead?

    Whatd you say?!

    Enough, Diablo! Benimaru finally thundered. You are not mediating over this conflict at all! And its all right, Sufia. There is no doubt that Sir Rimuru is just fine. If he is in any danger, we will immediately take action. But if Veldora, guardian deity of the Forest of Jura, hase back to life, we certainly cannot afford to make any ill-advised moves.

    He distractedly scratched his head. I guess things were a lot worse than I pictured. Wow, three whole days? Between freeing Veldora and working out my skills, I mustve lost all sense of time.

    By the looks of things, the lycanthropes wanted to plunge into the cave and Diablo was trying to stop them. My demon was being backed up by Treyni and the other dryad sisters, along with Juras other native residents, although Diablo himself was trying to act as a neutral arbitrator.

    Now it was time to delve in myself. This whole quarrel was my and Veldoras fault anyway, so

    Hey, guys. Sorry if I made you all worry.

    Sir Rimuru!!

    This led to yet more gasps and shouts as Rigurd sprinted up to me.

    Ahhh, Sir Rimuru! Youre safe! We were so worried! We received word from the Sealed Cave that Veldora the Storm Dragons presence revived itself without warning. Are you all right? We heard you had ventured into the cave.

    I gave the concerned-looking Rigurd a smile and a nod to show I was fine.

    Alvis, Sufia, Phobio, and all the other lycanthropesI guess I put a lot of undue concern on you. Sorry. I shouldve exined myself better.

    N-no, Sir Rimuru. As long as youre safe, its fine.

    I was so worried, butindeed, it is fine.

    So what happened to the Storm Dragon?

    The Three Lycanthropeers seemed greatly relieved. Given how I was the key to rescuing Carillon, Im sure my absence mustve freaked them out mightily. Veldora, meanwhile, must not have liked the Sir being omitted from his epithet, because he scowled back at them. I grinned, patted his shoulder, and told him to calm down before I addressed the crowd.

    That is exactly what I came here to show you all. But before that, allow me to introduce

    I then pushed Veldora, the handsome young man standing next to me, toward the forefront.

    This is lil old Veldora in the flesh! Hes kinda shy, but make nice with him, all right?

    The entire region of town fell into silence. Everyones eyesnded on Veldora, nobody daring to say a word. In the midst of this:

    Wait a moment! Enough of that nonsense! I am not in the least bit shyI just had so few people reach my domain while they were still breathing, up to now.

    It was delivered in a peeved, dissatisfied voice, but it was more than enough to plunge the scene right back into chaos.

    The dryads were the first to recover. They all kneeled before Veldora, Treyni included, and bowed their heads.

    O Sir Veldora, guardian of the forest, how it fills us with joy from the heart to see you alive and well again!

    Gahhh-ha-ha-ha! The dryads, eh? Havent seen you in ages. Well done managing my forest for me!

    Oh, we hardly deserve your praise. It is still nowhere near enough of a task to repay the favor you showed us, taking us in after we were separated from our Spirit Queen.

    Ah, dont worry about it. So I guess you and Rimuru are working together? I intend to be just as obliged to him going forward, so keep up the good work!

    Whoa. Whats he mean, just as obliged? Were gonna have a talk about thatter on, to be sure. I had a feeling Id be taking care of azy, useless bum unless I stepped up and did something about it.

    Y-yes. Certainly. But

    Umm, if I may, piped up Doreth, youngest of the dryads, recovering from her paralysis just in time to take the words from Treynis mouth. Sir Veldora, what kind of rtionship do you have with Sir Rimuru?

    I could tell everyone was straining their ears to hear the answer. They were intensely curious about it. I could practically hear them holding their breath.

    Ah, that? Eh-heh-heh. Youd like to know?

    Dont give me that eh-heh-heh crap, man. Whats the point of acting all high and mighty here?

    Yes! By all means!

    Everyone else nodded. It served only to make Veldora smile triumphantly. You see? You guys all spoiled this dragon for so long that he thinks he can get away with well near anything.

    Weare friends !!

    Oh please. Stop. Now youre embarrassing me, too. I wanted to die of shame at the way he proudly bellowed it out, but the monsters gathered before us were now more frenzied than ever.

    My goodness! First Lady Milim and now Sir Veldora?!

    When did he ever do that ?

    Ohhh, yeah, ol Rimurus always been that way! Really cool!

    Yeah, thats sure the slime I know. Ivee to expect damn near anything from him, really

    The murmuring continued for a few more moments.

    So Er, why are you taking that form, Sir Veldora?

    Oh, this? My friend Rimuru prepared it for me. Over the past three days, he has helped me learn how to restrain my aura so I can converse with all of you without any adverse effects. What do you think? Dont you agree this is better as well?

    I do. Treyni sighed, ovee with emotion. I really do.

    This will be a great help to all of us, truly.

    You look so amazing, Sir Veldora!!

    Yes! Yes, I do, dont I? Gahhh-ha-ha-ha!

    The other dryad sisters gave Veldora just the kind of praise he craved. Well, if hes happy, Im not gonna rain on his parade.

    Heh-heh-heh-heh-heh. Well done, Sir Rimuru. You trained him to hold back that all-powerful aura of his? How fascinating

    You said it, Diablo. But more than that, hes friends with Sir Veldora? Thats what Im more surprised about.

    Perhaps, Rigurd said, but looking back, it makes sense. Sir Rimuru first showed himself in our vige just when Sir Veldora himself disappeared.

    Indeed, I had always wondered if the timing of the two events was more than a coincidence.

    Yeah, I kinda kept it a secret from you guys. I thought at the time itd take a century or so to free Veldora, and if word got out, there was no telling whod take that as a signal to attack us.

    Ah, I see

    My exnation seemed convincing enough to themand in the end, Veldora became a member of our town far more easily than Id guessed.

    Just then, Soei appeared before me via Spatial MotionI guess that was my gift to him.

    Sir Rimuru, I have returned to report on ymans activity

    Before he could continue, he realized that he was surrounded by the Three Lycanthropeers and nearly every VIP in thend of Tempest.

    Did something happen, my lord? he asked, perhaps hesitant to divulge his report in front of this massive audience. Yeah, something sure did happen, didnt it?

    Oh, nothing too serious. Your reports the most important thing for now. Here, you three listen in, too

    Allow us to, if you could.

    Yeah, me too!

    No way we arent staying involved now.

    Guess I didnt need to ask. Great! Nows the perfect time to nail down a n.

    Soei, summon all the town leaders who arent here right now! And have Yohm and Mjurran join us in the great meeting hall. Kabal and his gang, too, while youre at it.

    At once.

    Then he Spatial Motioned out of there. I was sure hed have them here in a sh. It was time for an all-hands conference.

    I couldnt overstate the importance of this meeting. The future of Tempest was riding on ita future where man and monster could live together. If anyone got in the way of that, wed knock them out of the picture, no matter what. And right now, my friends and I had the power to do that.

    First, the demon lord yman. Next, the Western Holy Church. Lets have em all ept their just deserts forying hands upon my friends. The thought brought a soft smile to my lips.

 Volume 5 - Epilogue

    EPILOGUE

    THE STRING-PULLER IN THE SHADOWS

    The anger was writ clear upon the demon lord ymans face. He hade so far, and now one n after another was falling apart on him.

    He schemed to have Carillon be attacked by Milimand then she just flew over, dered war, and flew on back. Learning of Farmuss ambitions, he ordered Mjurran to wreak even more havoconly to have Rimuru, leader of the monsters, return to the scene and erase the Farmus military from the face of the Earth.

    yman nned to use all this chaos to awaken himself and be the true demon lord he knew he could be. But none of this made sense to him.

    Damn all of them! And after that kind benefactor set everything up for my awakening

    The frustration made him grind his teeth. But his efforts werent aplete failure. Mjurran, one of his pawns, had been killed by Rimuruand he could always use that as a pretext to dere war. That was the original n, and Mjurran was always meant as a sacrifice toward that end.

    Now, though, there was another problem:

    In the end, can I actually win?

    That was a serious issue. Among the weak human states that dotted the continent, the Kingdom of Farmus was among the more decently powerful ones. For this campaign, they had a legion of nothing but knights, numbering twenty thousand stronga figure not even yman could afford to ignore. And it took just one magic-born, one Rimuru, to y them all.

    The unbelievable news left the demon lord in a daze for a few moments. Even worse, Pironthe little finger of the five fingers that formed ymans closest, most faithful confidantshad died in the midst of an espionage operation. Unlike Mjurran, the ring finger, Piron had been eminently useful when it came to infiltrating deep into human society.

    How annoying this is. Of all the coincidences, the Nuclear Cannon strike that demon deflectednding a direct hit on my own agent

    The unexpected loss of a vital pawn in his strategy irked him. But the next ebullient dispatch he received made all the dark clouds in his mind evaporate away.

    The demon lord Milim had dispatched Carillon, putting an end to the Beast Kingdom of Eurazania.

    Now, finally, yman had something to rejoice about. He hadnt managed to bring Carillon under his own control, but in terms of daunting the other demon lords, this would serve well enough. Any demon lord who didnt bend to his will was just trash in his way. Milim alone was powerful enough to overwhelm someone as strong as Carillon, and with her on his side, he doubted he needed to beef up his offenses any further.

    The news came by way of the demon lord Frey, elegantly sipping her tea as she delivered her tidings. There was no reason to doubt it. The demon lord Carillon was dead. Milim Nava had had no problem dealing with him. And now she was ymans.

    Ten demon lords controlled the vast majority of power in this world. Three of them, counting himself, were now on the same side, and one was out of the picture. It pained yman that his nned awakening had failed, but Milim had more than made up for this shoring.

    Heh-heh-heh I think we can alter my ns to point matters back in a beneficial direction.

    Oh, you think so? Well, d to be of service, then.

    With that less-than-heartfelt endorsement, Frey stood up.

    I have nothing further to reportand with that, Ive fulfilled my duty to you. Im going home, but what are you going to do with Milim? Shes so worked up about the battle that she ripped apart the magic-born sent to take care of her.

    yman responded with an exasperated grunt. Then you take care of her. Shes our friend either way.

    As I told you, Frey coldly replied, Ive fulfilled my duty. I helped you trick Milim, and I have no obligation to aid you any further.

    But yman simply gave her a thin smile. Heh-heh-heh You appear to be mistaken, Frey. Listen to me. I am giving an order to you. Go back, take Milim with you, and take care of her. Or would you like to be Milims next opponent?

    Frey gave him a stern look in response. She had anticipated this, in a way, and it didnt disturb her.

    Aha. I see. So that was your goal from the start, was it, yman?

    Haaa-ha-ha-ha! Well spotted. So I imagine I know the answer I should expect?

    All right. I dont want to wind up like Carillon, no.

    There you go. Very good. Thats very intelligent of you, Frey. I will leave Milim in your hands, then. Take her along with you. Wouldnt want my own castle destroyed in the process, now would we?

    Frey gave this an exaggerated rolling of her eyes. And you think I want my home wrecked? Not that youll listen to me

    Im d we have an understanding, then. You may go.

    The attitude indicated to the world that he no longer saw the demon lord Frey as an equal. He was calling the shots, and she carried them out. Frey voiced no great displeasure at this as she gave yman a final cold nce and left the room.

    Once he saw she was gone, yman closed his eyes and began to think.

    The situation had changed so extensively now that he would have to revise his ns. Losing his chance at an awakening hurt, but it wasnt an issue. With Milims powers, he decided, he could ram headlong into any human force and expect a likely victory out of it. Her strength would spread death and destruction across thend, reaping souls the entire way. That, yman thought, should be enough to elevate him to true demon lord status without lifting a finger.

    His original nto set up an orc lord as a new demon king, providing him with all the backing he neededwas nice, but this was much more interesting. With Milim, the ultimate trump card, in his hands, there was no longer any need to fear his fellow demon lords.

    Heh-heh Now I can finally get Leon out of the picture.

    Simply picturing it made a joyous smile creep across his face.

    But before Leon

    He would have preferred to put his own priorities first, but that wasnt going to happen. He needed to evaluate matters and see what required the most urgent attention. After all, it was what motivated his benefactor that mattered the most.

    Their enemies could be divided into three camps: the demon lord Leon, his rival these many years; the leader of the Forest of Jura, proving more powerful than he first guessed; and the ever-enigmatic Western Holy Church, along with the Holy Empire of Lubelius that existed above it.

    At the moment, direct conflict among demon lords was prohibited. The downfall of Carillon would likely be filed as yet another case of Milim going crazy. Maybe some of them would notice yman lurking in the shadows, but he didnt picture any of them making a public issue out of it. Anyone who pursued that question would quickly be making yman their enemy. These demon lords were all far too selfish to work together as a group. And if anyone did pursue him, he could handle it. The ultimate trump card made none of them seem worth worrying about any longer.

    The real issue was the Western Holy Church. ymans sworn friend Lace was still nted in their bureaucracy, and this incident provided both of them with immense backing. The magic-born Rimuru killed twenty thousand Farmus soldiers, something the Church couldnt afford to ignore. So why not pit them against each other on the battlefield and profiteer from the results? They could wait until both sides reached the limits of their fatigue, toss Milim in there, and bam theyd both be gone, practically without a fight. yman could awaken himself that way, too, maybe.

    That scenario was exactly what his benefactor wantedthe only master yman ever truly served in his life. And if yman could pull it off, he could then dere war on Leon and stamp out that anxiety for good.

    The smile on his face widened. Several mistakes had been made, but fixing them wouldnt be a problem. Now he just had to report back to his benefactor and await the final decision.

    Heughed loudly and boldly, there in his room, already picturing his lifelong dream finallying true.

 Volume 6 - Prologue

    PROLOGUE

    THE MAGIC-BORNS RUSE

    Hoo dear, nearly bit it for good back there

    Lace was muttering to himself as he appeared before his master. He clearly had the injuries to back that assessment up.

    Tough, huh? casually replied his lord, a boy with ck hair and a powerful presence.

    Well, hang on there,d, Lace whined. Tough hardly even begins to describe what I had to wade through back there, yeah? Getting inside was painful enough, but getting outoh, dear, who can say how many times I toed the line?

    Oh, I think someone like you would work it out. Even if someone killed you, Im not sure youd even know how to die.

    Oof. Youre a mean one, you know that?

    So, the boy aloofly continued as Lace cried the best fake tears he could, did you find out what lies behind the Western Holy Church?

    Um. I know this aint the kind of report I should be giving, but Well, no. Nobody can. Its bloody impossible, is what it is.

    This stone-faced admission didnt faze the boy at all. He gave a soft smile, as if he expected that reply the whole time.

    Hmm. Ever the liar, arent you? You had to have uncovered a hint or two, at least?

    Lace shrugged and sighed. Sheesh. After all I went through for my info, I figured I could name my price with ya. But you just see right through me, dontcha? Theres no beating ya.

    Hee-hee-hee. Thanks for thepliment, but my prices remain firm, all right?

    Theres no beating ya, Lace repeated.

    Oh, no need forints. Ill pay your full asking price. And in fact, our demon lord friends consciousness has taken root for a while now. Hes done a wonderful job transferring over to his homunculus.

    The boy gave Lace an amused smile as he rang a small bell to call for the woman stationed outside the door.

    Yes, sir?

    Into the room strode a beautiful womangraceful, polite, the epitome of the ssic executive secretary. Her skin was smooth, light in color, and her well-defined facial features suited the bun her blond hair was tied back in. She had blue eyes that shined like a pair of mysticalpiszulibut no matter how mesmerizing the light from them was, they still couldnt hide a vague sense of evil lurking inside.

    Huh? Ah, you dont mean?

    The sight of the woman startled Lace, but he could spot a familiar glint in her eyes. Then he erupted intoughter, realizing who she truly was.

    Well, whats with that getup, huh? Didja make a gender swap while I didnt notice? It looks good on you, I aint gonna lie, but it couldnt be much more different from before, eh?

    Enough from you, countered the woman, ignoring Laces bait. It took me ten years to obtain a body I could freely move around in. I am not going toin about minor grievances.

    Polite was no longer the way to describe her. She stood boldly, sporting an undefeatable grin. She gave Lace a friendly pat on the shoulder before sitting down.

    So if youre introducing me to this man, I suppose theres not much need to keep the act going?

    No, replied the boy, but Id like you to maintain the facade in public, please. If its just between us, I suppose theres no great need, no.

    Oh? Well, if thats what you want, boss, Ill do it. Is it all right if I ask why?

    Because youre weak, Kazalim. Your powers still arentplete yet, are they? Just watch over yman until your full Curse Lord force is back with you.

    Kazalim, the woman posing as his secretary, gave this reply a sullen nod. She had the name of a very old demon lordthe one who attempted to punish a human named Leon for dering himself a demon lord of some faraway backwater area and paid for it with his life. Once, he was head of the Moderate Jesters; now, she was a lord both yman and Lace were attempting to resurrect.

    Her overpowering strength was long gone. All that remained was a prim, graceful young woman. Just before she could be obliterated from existence, Kazalim experienced a rather unlikely series of coincidences that caused her to possess the body of this boyand just the other day, they had finally managed to transfer her astral body into a recement homunculus. The boy was her boss for now, the power from her glory days long gone. That was the way their pact worked, and Kazalim had no quarrel with it. Over the past ten years of dealing with this acquaintance, she had fully epted her ce in the power hierarchy.

    Fair enough. My power is iplete. I let that demon lord Leon defeat me, and I lost my body in the most unsightly of fashions. I know my souls settled in this homunculus, but its so fragile, Id tear it apart if I unleashed my full force. I cant really call this aplete resurrection

    Ah, is that the issue with ya? Well, if our president is callin this guy boss, then I guess youre my boss, too. Sure aint just another client by this point, no! So hopefully you dont mind if I clear the air with you guys a bit.

    You never change, the boy said. After all this time, and after you helped us revive our fallen president, you still dont trust me?

    Ha-ha-ha! Nah, nah, thats a different story. But I gottaugh at how you look now, sir. Youre this crazy beautiful woman now!

    Am I? What do my looks matter?

    Nah, I mean, the dichotomy between your speech and your looks Its funny, thats all.

    I know that, you Or I am aware of that, perhaps? If I am going to keep up the charade, I had best sound more like thedy I am.

    Uh, thats what youre concerned about? Because, I mean Ba-ha-ha-ha!

    Silence, Kazalim spat at the guffawing Lace. Ill have you know this body wasnt my choice. The boss here provided a homunculus modified with special technology from the Sorcerous Dynasty of Thalion.

    Yeah, I sure did. And that didnte cheap, either. We needed a vessel without any soul at all, or else theyd get all mixed up, and the transnt probably wouldnt have worked. The boy sneered. For that matter, if you had fled into anyone besides me, Kazalim, youd probably be too tangled up to split off at all, I dont think. All right? So I really dont want to hear anyints about how you look.

    I appreciate it, boss, said Kazalim.

    The boy still didnt seem pleased, not until Lace offered his own thanks.

    Sure. So can we move this along? I know its great were all back together again, but I want to get down to business. Tell me what youve found, Lace.

    The smile disappeared from Kazalims face as she turned her eyes toward Lace. He nodded, taking a more serious demeanor.

    Yeah, you kept yer promise and made my dreame true. I better show you a little sincerity, too, eh? So I infiltrated the Western Holy Church to find out whats behind it, but I tell you, I just dont have any idea.

    He then began to describe his findings.

    Laces mission was to find out what made the Holy Church tick. It remained an independent religion, headquartered in the Holy Empire of Lubelius, but much of its internal workings remained a mystery. It positioned itself as an advocate for justice and for the weak, enjoying tremendous influence on the Western Nationsa very inconvenient truth for the boy. That was why he employed Lace from the fixer team of the Moderate Jesters to find who they really wereand exploit any potential weaknesses forter.

    The boy was fairly convinced there was another side to them. If the Western Holy Church was really an advocate for truth, hed have to undertake whatever scheme it took to rip them away from that pedestal, but that was strictly ast resort. Now simply wasnt the time for it. The Church, after all, enjoyed the services of Hinata Sakaguchi, head of the Western Nations crusaders and the most powerful pdin the world knew.

    So, Lace continued, thanks to Hinatas absence, I managed to make it into the Church all right, but there was nothin suspicious about anything I saw inside. So I headed over to Lubeliuss holyndsto be exact, the Inner Cloister, at the peak of their holiest mountain.

    He began to gesture excitedly as he spoke. It was there, after all, where he saw the fearsome truth.

    And the most amazing thing, you know The entirend was just filled with this kind of sacred presence!

    Why wouldnt it be? the boy asked. Its a holynd.

    Whatre you, stupid? Kazalim added. Did someone erase your brain sincest we met?

    No, no, listen to me! And youre falling back in to nondy mode again, President.

    I dont need your I mean, dont worry about little old me! Just keep going.

    So Lace kept going, a little resentful at this treatment.

    A little ways from Western Holy Church headquarters was the religions Holy Temple. This was where the Papacy was located, the political arm of the Church that worked at the behest of the Holy Emperor, spokesperson for the heavens.

    It wasnt until he entered this Temple that Lace began to feel something was off. Within its chambers, he could detect a faint amount of magic that applied itself to his nervous system. It was a very ingenious spell, one he noticed only because it was automatically blocked by Falsifier, his unique skill.

    Theres a surprise, aint it? Must mean somebody here can wield spiritual magic as strong as mine

    Lace braced himself as he walked toward the cathedral.

    He already had some knowledge of the enemys organizational structureand from what he could see, the rtionship between the Church and Lubelius was very tangled indeed.

    The Church was built to worship Luminus, the one and only god in the world (as they defined it). Lubelius was the same way, which meant one could say they were allies when it came to religious issues. In terms of the bnce of power, however, the Church held nearly all the cards.

    The reason? Simple: Hinata. The Church had its knights deployed at points across the Western Nations, providing an effective bulwark to protect the weakand it was Hinata Sakaguchi who built them, and by extension the Church, into the powerful group it was today. Technically speaking, the Church worked under the patronage of Lubelius, charged exclusively with spreading the good word about Luminism. Now that their mission had extended out into doing good for the weak atrge, the rtionship was no longer as simple as that.

    More than anything, though, the real problemy with the knights Hinata herself had trained. Even Lace couldnt help but fear them a little, for their allegiance was not at all with Lubelius but solely with the one god, Luminusand with Hinata, who devoted herself fully to Luminism. That was what enabled the Western Holy Church to exist independently from Lubelius.

    And this brought up another problemLubeliuss war power resided in more than just its crusaders. Even the Holy Emperor kept an official Lubelian force, the Imperial Guard that answered to nothing but the Papacy below it, and this was another group to be reckoned with. Founded on the ideal that everyone is equal under the name of Luminus, it was a motley collection of soldiers in assorted clothing and equipment. The qualifications for joining were straightforwardbe a devoted follower of Luminism and be at least an A-ranked fighter. Thanks to these clear but fiendishly difficult requirements, the Imperial Guard was small and exclusive, packed with the best of the best in warriors and magicians, along with their servants. This force was underestimated at ones own peril.

    Hinata was listed as head knight in this Guard as well, and the Papacy listed Cardinal Nicus Speltus, a dedicated admirer of Hinata, as its chief counsel. Hinata could almost im the whole of the Church for herself, and this was the main reason why. She had control over both wings of the Holy Emperors main force and yet was exempt from having to swear her allegiance to that leader. It was thanks to this inscrutable woman, Hinata, that rtions between the Holy Church and Holy Empire were as twisted as they had be.

    And simply recalling all this advance knowledge he had procured made Lace sigh in frustration.

    What a crazydy

    The cathedral was full of spiritual force, more than enough to call forth the greatest of holy spirits. To a magic-born like Lace, this spiritual presence was supremely difficult to deal with. It dulled his senses, making him want to flee the site as quickly as possible.

    He took a moment to gather himself before deciding which way to go. Heading toward the peak of this holy mount would reportedly lead him to the Inner Cloister, where one couldmunicate with Luminus. His senses were telling him there was something to be found here in the cathedral as well.

    So, ah, now what?

    He wavered, but for only a moment. Then he strode out of the cathedral and straight for the Cloister. Spend too much time in this building, and Hinata coulde back at any moment. Now, while she was gone, was his best chance to find a hint as to what Luminus, the central doctrine of the Western Holy Church, really was.

    Ill just hop on up, he thought as he traversed the mountain path, and take a quick lil peek around.

    It was his choiceand it was a mistake. No, it wasnt fruitless; he certainly learned much from the experience. But to Lace, the danger that resulted proved far beyond hisfort level.

    Proceeding up the stone steps, Lace finally reached the shrine at the peak of the mountain. This was notably smaller than the cathedral down below, but in terms of grandeur, the two were iparable. This small structure was, in the true meaning of the term, the gods domain.

    Now, it was divine in its silence, putting pressure upon Laces mind. But even amid that solemnity, he could detect the familiar feel of magic.

    The heck? Magic, in this supposedly holiest of ces? Thats weird. Dont like that too much, no

    He could tell that Hinata, the most formidable obstacle in his way, was not here. If the magic belonged to someone else, that someone couldnt be ignored, butin Laces mindit was no threat to him, either.

    But was that the right appraisal to make? Now Lace, deep down in his heart, wasnt so sure. Come on, man. You know yourepletely hiding your presence here. Everythings perfect. If some ruffian shows up, just run.

    Bracing himself, Lace reactivated his Stealth Mode and attempted to slip into the shrine. Then he rolled right back out, barely maintaining his bnce, stymied by the vision of a beam of light piercing straight through his body.

    You insect, you mere cockroach, dirtying the throne of your god!!

    All of a sudden, the shrine was filled with an overwhelming presence, dressed in luxuriant garb that covered a chiseled, muscr figure. His short, curly blond hair shined brightly, exhibiting the full force of his will. This was a ruleran absolute rulerand what Lace couldnt help but notice first about him were the tworge fangs jutting out from his lips.

    A-a vampire?!

    Silence, insect. I will judge you myself. Consider it an honor to die here!

    The next moment, beams of crimson light danced across the peak. His path of escape cut off, Lace stood there helplessly as his body was torn to shreds.

    Lace took a moment to quiver as he retold the story.

    I tell you, it was downright scary. I thought that was it for me!

    Um, yeah, the boy replied, but why wasnt it?

    Kazalim merely smiled. Like I told you. He doesnt know how to die.

    Oh, stop phrasing it that way. Anyone should have an escape n and a decent amount of security backup during an op like that, yknow? But Im telling you, Ive just been dragged across the coalstely. Wish I could have something to brag about for a change!

    Yeah, yeah. You know youre a covert operative. If youre fixin to be the hero in shining armor, maybe look for another line of work?

    Hes right, the boy agreed. Lace, the key to your job ispleting your missions. Howgant you look doing it hardly matters, does it?

    No, true enough. Its just, if I keep this up, Im gonna start getting used to being a loser

    Whats the problem with that?

    He said it. As long as you survive and win in the end, we have nothing toin about. Kazalim hardened her expression. So what happened?

    Lace nodded at her. Right. Theres the rub. If this guy can overwhelm me that much, theres no mistakin that hes one strong dude. The question is, who is he? Whats a magic-born of that caliber doin in this supposedly high holy ce? Thats the key to all this, and it could be enough to shake the very foundation of the Western Holy Church, huh?

    A magic-born, huh? And a high-level one, a vampire, conspiring with the Church

    The boy nodded his agreement, unable to hide his surprise at this unexpected development.

    Whoever he is,mented Kazalim, he is dangerous. A man capable of defeating Lace, to the best of my knowledge, would have to be far more than merely magic-born.

    Yeah. Im with ya there.

    What do you mean? the boy asked.

    Well, not to brag, but Im not exactly a wimp, yknow? Even with the dryad I faced down before, if I seriously duked it out, I woulda won, yknow? I just fled cause I was on their home turf in the forest, and I didnt want em callin for reinforcements on me. No real point going all out to try to kill er, either. But this foe was on another level, I tell you. It didnt feel like some sub-demon lord to meit felt like a full one, through n through. Someone like me, all I could do was run.

    Dryads were extremely powerful foes in forestnds, intrinsically capable of instant teleportation through the trees. The nt Whisper skill let them share any and all information with others of their species, sending friends over to help their brethren anytime it was needed. This made them enough of a threat that Lace opted to run away thest time he saw one, even though he could likely conquer one in a duel.

    This guy, however, was different. That was a monster, Lace dered. Stronger than me, no doubt about it.

    The atmosphere in the room grew heavy.

    A demon lord, huh? What do you think, Kazalim?

    Kazalim snorted. I told you. He is dangerous. As far as I am aware, only one man could match that description.

    Oh? Whos that?

    The demon lord Valentine. One of the old guard, a man on par with myself during my glory years.

    For real? Cause if hes a match for you, I see I was totally right to flee. Lucky thing I trusted my instincts.

    Lace shrugged. He had taken pains to break in when Hinata was away, only to stumble right up to a demon lord. The irony of it made him wince.

    Hmm. A demon lord within the Church, huh? Dyou think this Valentines actually the Holy Emperor, then?

    Ooh, I dunno about that! You think a demon lord would raise a finger to protect humanity? President, what kind of guy was Valentine when you knew im?

    Kazalim closed her eyes and searched through her memories, tapping a graceful finger against her forehead as she recalled the vivid images of the past.

    This body may not show it, she said, but Ive lived through three of the Great Wars that ur every five hundred years. Three of them. You can call me one of the old guard as well, but by the time I joined that club, there were already six demon lords ahead of me

    As she put it, the demon lord Valentine had attained the title before Kazalim herself. His force was massive, more than worthy of the term vampire and the connotations of immortality weaved into it. To Kazalim, who had evolved from an elf (simrly known for longevity) to a walking dead, the thought of a vampire, the symbol of eternal life, also serving as a demon lord gave her pause.

    To tell you the truth, Valentine and I have dueled to the death a few different times. It never reached a definitive conclusion, though. Once you reach our level, you cany waste to an entirendscape without hurting yourselves at all. So instead, we adopted the tradition of talking over things and deciding by majority voteand that led to the Walpurgis system. The fact that it takes three votes to convene one is a throwback to when there were still only seven demon lords in existence. Guess nobody cared enough to change it.

    She let out an elegant,dylike chuckle. The juxtaposition between this and her other, masculine mannerisms was starting to unnerve the other two people in the room, not that she noticed. Then her face turned stony once more.

    And thats why I feel safe in telling you this. That man, Valentine; he sees humans and demi-humans as nothing more than chattel. Even if the entire world was turned on its end, the idea of him serving as guardian is simply impossible.

    Lace nodded his agreement as the boy thought over Kazalims assessment.

    All right. So maybe they forced some kind of agreement?

    Are you listening to me, Lace? Promises and agreements only work between two parties with equal force behind them.

    Yeah

    He didnt seem too married to the idea himself.

    Plus, the boy said, I find it hard to believe that someone as closed-minded as Hinata would team up with a demon lord. I wonder if what Lace ran into wasnt a demon lord at all, but some magic-born whose name we are not aware of yet?

    No, Kazalim replied, I do think that was Valentine. Those dancing beams of crimson light? Thats the giveaway. Valentine also goes by the name of Bloody Lord, and he can take blood and vaporize it into beams of magicules known as Bloodrays.

    As she put it, a Bloodray was a type of spread-fire particle cannon. By converting his own blood into magical particles, he was capable of firing it off in concentrated rays of force. The amount of magical power that process required meant it had to be a demon lord working it.

    So youre saying that Lace ran into the demon lord Valentine, and that Valentine would never willingly cooperate with human kingdoms. Wouldnt that lend more credence to the theory that the Holy Emperor is Valentine?

    Yeah, muttered Lace, that would exin matters. Id sincerely wonder how he managed to pull the wool over Hinatas eyes, though.

    Well, Kazalim stated, I suppose it remains the most convincing exnation we have. I do have my doubts and concerns about that But the important thing is, we now know for a fact that Valentine, a demon lord, was lurking inside a domain that only the Holy Emperor has ess to.

    And youre sure its him? the boy pressed.

    Im fully convinced. Laces description matches my own memory, and from what I know about him, Valentine would never willfully serve under someone else

    Yeah, there aint that many magic-born who could whip me, I dont think. But if Im dealin with the likes of this, well, I dunno how much more reconnaissance Im capable of here.

    Well, the boy said, apparently convinced, this is still pretty useful intelligence. Expertly done, Lace.

    His face shined now, revealing traces of the joy he felt now that he had a tool powerful enough to potentially take down the Holy Church. There was a powerful demon lord among his enemys forces, but that didnt seem to concern him at all. He was too busy thinking about what to do next with this intel to care. For him, formting his next n of action came as easily as figuring out the next epic prank to pull off on the kids next door.

    So thats all the info I have for ya. But speakin of demon lords, whats yman up to these days?

    The boy scowled at Laces apparently unwee question, pulling his dark, shiny hair back with one hand. Well, heined, that wound up being a total failure.

    Failure?

    Yeah. Everything went fine up until we had Rimuru, that slime you mentioned, fight against Hinata. Then it all fell apart, pretty much

    The boy briefed the others on how things unfolded. First, yman won over the demon lord Milim, thanks to the Orb of Domination the boy provided him. Once he did, they needed to test her out, to see just how deep the orb had put Milim in their thrall.

    So we tried to find a decent opponent to test her strength on. But instead of demon lords that we didnt have much intel or even a location on, we picked Carillon, since he seemed to be the least intelligent out of them all.

    Along the way, Kazalim continued, we thought we could have her destroy the capital of the Beast Kingdom of Eurazania. The city wouldve been packed with former enved humans, souls to harvest so I can be a true demon lord once more

    He and the boy exchanged nces and sighed.

    We figured those souls would energize yman, too. Two birds with one stone.

    But then Milim went out of control and dered war on the guy

    And thanks to that, Carillon and the other targets had a weeklong head start to prepare for the battlemore than enough time to evacuate the capital.

    You know, the boy reflected, looking back at it, I guess its pretty hard to enthrall a demon lord with a magical item like that. You have to apply all these conditions to it, or else itll get all messed up.

    I hope you would trust me more than that. They dont call me the Curse Lord for show, Ill have you know. That Orb of Domination was a perfectly crafted Artifact, one of my best pieces of work. It was yman who ruined everything.

    Ah, no point dredging that up any longer. Anyway, we couldnt collect any souls in the Beast Kingdom, so we decided to check things out in Farmus next.

    Farmus? That kingdom?

    Right. Thanks to that summoning ritual they invented, Farmus had a ton of otherworlders living there. I figured now was as good a time as any to pare down their forces a little. So I used a few back channels to give them intelligence on Tempest and whet the appetites of their greedy king and his advisers.

    You wouldnt believe how quickly they bit, either.

    That idea grew from Laces previous report, back when their operation to make an orc lord into a malleable demon lord ran into setbacks. The idea was to whip Farmus up into enough of a frenzy to make them dere war on the Jura-Tempest Federation. With all the high-level magic-born in their ranks, Tempest surely had what it took to take out at least a few of Farmuss otherworlders before going down for the count.

    Whats more, Rimuru, lord of the monsters, was traveling abroad on his own business, and ymans own minions had infiltrated Tempestnds. The boy had nned to use Rimuru as bait for Hinata; as far as he was concerned, this n offered the best of both worlds.

    But then, well, nothing went ording to n. I mean, that slime Rimuru actually fled Hinata with his life intact. You cant let your guard down around him for a moment. Kind of like you, Lace.

    Thanks for thepliment.

    And as if that wasnt bad enough

    By my prediction, Kazalim continued, that still wouldnt be have been enough to keep Farmus from winning the war. If the monsters lord joined the battle, that would be another matter, but honestly speaking, it didnt matter who won. Wed just work with the victors. The purpose of the war was to generate dead peoplemore souls to harvest. Then we could finally awaken our beloved yman to his true self. And then

    And then it all fell apart. The entire Farmus force was wiped off the face of the earth by a single slime.

    Its hard to believe, but its the truth, the boy grumbled.

    In all the many times Ive used my unique skill Schemer to formte a n, the clearly angry Kazalim added, Ive never seen it go quite this far awry.

    H-hang on a second! Just one slime? You pullin my leg? Did Farmus get caught that off guard, man?

    I told you, you wouldnt believe how quickly they bit. With a snap of the fingers, they had a force of twenty thousand knights and magicians on the ground. And just like that, they were all gone. We couldnt confirm any survivors at all.

    Whaa?! Thats ridiculous

    The unlikeliness of it all had even Lace at a loss for words.

    Oh, it hasnt even begun to be ridiculous. yman surveyed the battlefield after it was over, and ording to his report, there were absolutely no corpses left to be found. That could only mean a monster was summoned, or created, using the bodies as an offering.

    If I cast Creation: Golem with that number of corpses, Kazalim said, I couldnt even begin to guess what kind of monster would result. And not just corpsesthe corpses of strong, well-trained fighters, in a battlefieldden with anguish and despair. The perfect casting environment! I would expect a sub-demon lord to result from it, at the very least.

    Sounds like it. Although its the fact we couldnt retrieve those souls thats the worst of all. yman said there wasnt a single one left floating around. So once again, weve failed to awaken him to the next level.

    The boy sighed in regret. He began to wonder whether conducting all these ns in parallel wasing back to bite him. He had focused on efficiency, only to put too many things into action at onceand once one tactic came undone, it affected everything else. Maybe, he thought, I was too greedy myself.

    So youre sayin that this slime Rimuru sucked up all those souls for imself?

    Is that some kind of joke, Lace? No magic-born could do that! Not unless he is the seed of a demon lord.

    Kazalim was right. Even the most seasoned of wizards would have a hard time gathering twenty thousand souls and keeping them all under their control. Recklessly attempting that would cause the soulstent energies to unravel, quickly falling out of control. And even if it worked

    Ha-ha-ha! No, I know what you mean, Lace, the boy said. If he did snatch up twenty thousand souls, then hell have turned into one hell of a monster by now, eh? Was that what you were thinking?

    Pretty much, yeah. Just a passing thought, really. Better not overthink it.

    Laces mere suggestion caused them both tough at him. The concept was simply beyondprehension.

    Not even Kazalim knew the exact conditions required for making a potential demon lord into a true demon lord, although she could at least guess that it required a tremendous number of souls. They were currently limited to having yman experiment to see what results they got. yman had tried to experiment on the orc lord, of course, and everybody in the room knew how that turned out. And given that knowledge, the idea of something like a slime appearing out of nowhere and bing a true demon lord was beyond even Kazalims imagination.

    Lace, of course, was absolutely correct, even if none of them knew it at the time. He began to wonder what kind of odyssey yman had been on while he was running for dear life from Valentine.

    So, ah, whats yman up to right now?

    Awaiting further orders, said the boy. At this point, we cant do anything bolder than what were doing now. Luckily, Milim kept her end of the promiseshe waited a week, and then she turned the Beast Kingdom into a field of ash. So were pulling back for now, to reconsider our strategy.

    Oh? So things havent been a total failure, then?

    Underestimate me at your peril, Lace. I may have lost most of my force, but trickery remains my core asset.

    It sure is. If everything went awry, even I would blow my top a little about that! So maybe things have been dyed a bit, but we did weaken the kingdom of Farmus tremendously. That pretty much puts the Western Nations in order, so itll be simple to seize them all.

    And once that happens, reflected Kazalim, the Forest of Jura should provide a fine breakwater against the Eastern Empire.

    Ah, I see, President. Negotiate with whichever side wins. Aint no need to destroy the monster nation at all, huh?

    That, in a way, was the true worth of the demon lord Kazalims Schemer ability. No matter how things turned out, she had a knack for concocting ns where her side wound up on top. Recalling that, Lace was relieved to see Kazalim was still herself after all.

    Plus, the boy continued, with Milim defeating Carillon, weve proven that the Orb of Domination is an effective tool against this caliber of enemy. Thats all the force well need to show. Beyond that, all we need to do is see how the other demon lords fall into ce.

    Precisely. Thats why I ordered yman to refrain from taking further action. The Eastern Empires going to do something either wayand with thates our opportunity to recover some souls for ourselves.

    Uh-huh. And as long as the eyes of the Western Holy Church are on the monster nation, its more convenient for us to keep that federation around anyway.

    Lace could see the logic in this. No need for panic. Just keep your eyes on the Church and avoid conflict with any of the other forces.

    So for now, at least, were targetin the Church?

    Thats the n.

    Not that itll be easy, cautioned Kazalim. We have to consider the possibility of Hinata and Valentine working as a team. Needlessly prodding them would be dangerous.

    As she and the boy saw it, as long as the Western Nations were in their hands, the monster nation didnt have to be considered an obstacle. Plus, considering the mistakes they made, they now thought it wiser to fully gauge the enemy forces, avoiding a dual-pronged operation for the time being. For now, they were gunning for the Western Holy Churchand the Holy Empire of Lubelius behind it. Those two would be struck firstcarefully this time, making sure none of their activities were noticed on the surface. In that scenario, the monster nation was actually helpful to them. As long as they kept fanning the mes of Church doctrine, itd be childs y to keep the eyes of Hinata and her force squarely upon Tempest.

    The Church can hardly afford to ignore the presence of the magic-born Rimuru, either. With Farmus thoroughly defeated, I doubt the other nations will be so willing to take on the mantle of waging holy war. Theyll need to perform some kind of action to reaffirm their authority.

    Yeah. The boy grinned. If we can parry them and keep both sides engaged, they might even destroy each other. All we have to do is wait for an opportunity to weaken the both of them.

    They were talking about a magic-born capable of single-handedly sweeping a force of twenty thousand into the afterlife. Without Hinata on the scene, taking him on was patently impossible. So they would wait for the right moment ande up with the perfect scheme for itand the way it sounded to Lace, they already had a pretty solid idea what theyd do. Neither sounded irresolute at all about it.

    But the problem, Lace, is that your report was a littleunexpected, said the boy.

    Very much so, agreed Kazalim, also a tad indignant. Valentine being involved in this Assuming he truly is involved with anything at all. I find it hard to believe Hinata would ever cooperate with him, judging by her personality.

    It was clear from the way they phrased it that conquering the Western Holy Church would be far easier without Valentine around. It made Lace feel awkward, despite it being no fault of his.

    Well, he attempted, we dont know about that yet. But if youd just want to lure the demon lord out into public so he wouldnt get in the way of our investigations, we could pull that off, couldnt we?

    Mm? What do you mean, Lace?

    I mean, why not just ask yman to convene Walpurgis? Freys bound to join us on that, and her along with Milim gives us the three signatories we need, yeah?

    Convening the Walpurgis Council would bring all the demon lords together.

    The boy smiled a bit. I see. That would drag Valentine out of his holy domain, I think.

    Well, well! Your eyes are sharper than I thought, Lace. If we can just find the right timing to keep Hinata away from the mountain as well, your inquiry should advance by leaps and bounds.

    Huh? You want me going back there?!

    Why wouldnt we?

    Yes, why wouldnt we?

    Oh, brother, Lace thought. But the boy and Kazalim werent interested in his feedback. They had the outline of a n, and now it was time to work out the details.

 Volume 6 - Ch 1

    BETWEEN MONSTER AND MAN

    yman was never one to ce too much trust in his strength.

    He was the demon lord who took over all of Kazalimsnds. Once Kazalim was defeated at the hands of the demon lord Leon, all the people who served him came to rely upon yman for guidance. The domains of the two lords wound up being merged under ymans rule, something none of the other demon lords voiced anyint over. It all happened fairly quickly, thanks to the ever-careful Kazalims preparations in case the worst came to pass.

    This resulted in arge war chest for yman to work with, allowing him to build a first-ss force despite being a rtively new member of the club. Financially speaking, he was number one in the groupor to put it another way, yman was the demon lord who best knew how to manage his money. He engaged in under-the-table trade with the Eastern Empire and had a roaring business going with the Dwarven Kingdom as well. Taking advantage of both trade connections allowed him ess to the newest weapons and armor from both east and west.

    He took advantage of his ess to past relics and magical armor to boost his war power. It proved to be useful bait to make power-hungry magic-born do his bidding. His riches attracted them right to him, ripe for using and abusing. That was how yman preferred to do business, and it didnt mean he was stingy with his earnings. Hevished his forces with gifts, carefully meting them out so he could establish a vastwork of coconspirators in nations across the worldnone of whom even knew one anothers faces.

    Everything was going the way he nned it. His ultimate mission, to gain ess to every piece of information and ce the entire world under his rule, was already halfwayplete.

    The only thing ymancked, he knew, was power. War, in the end, was ultimately a game of numbersthat was his reasoning and also the rationale for why he never overestimated his capabilities. No matter how much power he had built up, he knew all too well that he could still falter in the end. That was how much of a shock the demon lord Kazalims defeat was to him, although yman did feel he was a little too unprepared for it.

    So he established roots at the core of each geopolitical force and gradually, carefully, expanded on them. And now, yman had new strength to tap, truly decisive strength. That was the demon lord Milimcapable of enough overwhelming violence to stand head and shoulders above the other nine. Carillon, whom yman appraised as stronger than him, barely put up a fight. She destroyed his nationpletely by herself.

    And now that he had the power hecked within himself, yman could feel his mood soaring to the skies. He had always wanted to defeat Leon, and now he believed that desire was within sight.

    Before that, however

    Heh-heh-heh. How nice to see that boy came to the same conclusion that I did. Have the hated Holy Church fight against the magic-born Rimuruthats the best way to sap the strength of both sides.

    Have them crush each other. No need to go through any pain themselves.

    To make that happen, we need more information on the Holy Churchs internal workings. Could they truly be connected with the demon lord Valentine? If we can convene Walpurgis right when we send Lace back in, theres little doubt that security will be lighter. A fine n of action!

    He brought a ss of wine to his lips, savoring the taste and basking in euphoria.

    The wine was a hundred-year-old vintage, old enough that one could almost taste the time andbor put into it, to say nothing of the aroma. Only the most carefully picked examples reached his cer, carefully stored to ensure only the highest of quality, waiting ever so patiently to be servedall this, just for the sake of yman. To him, all of this was a given. It was perfectly natural for him to believe that, for a mighty king like him, only the best would be appropriate.

    He let the aroma settle in his nose as he began to think.

    So what should be the pretext of this Walpurgis?

    It was set for one week from now, at night. It would be a new moon that night, the time of the month when the power of vampires was at its weakest. Every measure had to be taken to ensure Valentine couldnt flex his full muscle. The main question to figure out was the motivationthe reason why all these demon lords wereing together. He squinted, staring into thin air.

    If we are going to attack, he whispered lightly, now is the time. We could take this chance to seize Carillons territory as well.

    Sure, yman, but ya just got ordered to sit tight for a spell, didntcha?

    yman smirked at the voice that apparently came from nowhere. Youre here, Lace? Just as rude as always, I see.

    Dont tell me you didnt notice me. You were that lost in thought?

    Heh-heh-heh. Can you me me? I have been granted the opportunity twice to awaken to my full demon lord self, and I lost it both times out of my failures.

    Ah, no need to stew over it. The way the president sees it, the Eastern Empires gonna go on the move soon enough either way.

    Im sure they will. But you see, Lace, Ivee up with a wonderful idea. The Beast Kingdoms capital might be gone, but there are still a plethora of weaker races residing in its hintends. Perhaps I could swallow up Carillons territory before the other demon lords can, gather the survivors together, and kill them. That should be enough to trigger my awakening. A smart n of action, dont you think?

    Whoa, whoa, kinda pushing it a bit too far, eh? I mean, killing innocent people when we still dont really know what sets off the whole thing?

    yman winced. It was not the enthusiastic agreement he was expecting.

    Thats rather out of character for you, Lace. Do you sympathize for them? The weak are there to be exploited. What could make them happier than dying for my sake?

    Maybe, but you already killed thousands of human ves, and that didnt amount to nothin, either. Hows this gonna be any different? I tell ya, its not a good idea to push it right now. You needa think a little more and take your time with this!

    Lace was right. yman had a history of purchasing ves, then murdering them. The number had indeed grown to several thousand, but the effort had yet to make yman a true demon lord. Having this pointed out to him did little to change ymans mind.

    Dont be silly, Lace. I was their owner, and I am free to handle my purchases any way I like. If killing a thousand isnt enough, well go with ten thousand next. We know that human souls are required for the awakening. There is no need to restrain ourselves with the weak!

    He paused, letting his arrogant theory sink in Laces mind.

    Besides, this n of action is good for him, too. Im nning tounch this Walpurgis on the pretext that theres a new force in the Forest of Jura whose leader has dered himself a demon lord.

    Right, thats fine and all, but that aint gonna be any reason to invade the Beast Kingdom, is it?

    Oh, but it will be, Lace. One of my agents, Mjurran, was killed by someone while on a covert mission. I n to dere that it was then when I realized the demon lord Carillon had turned on me. No one should have anyint about me taking over Carillons territory to gather the evidence I need to prove it. After all, I was the one who suffered the loss.

    Lace scrutinized ymans words. Eurazania was adjacent to thends ruled by Milimhardly a ruler who cared much about things like gathering evidence. The fact that Milim had defeated Carillon was really all yman needed to back up his alibi. He could even say he sent Milim over to investigate, for that matter. That way, ymans forces could go through Milimsnd to reach the Beast Kingdom, and no one would have any reason to object. And once things were at that point, fabricating some evidence would be the easy part.

    There was nothing unnatural about any of this n. But Lace still didnt think now was the time to act.

    Arentcha panicking a little too much, yman? Not that Im gonna change your mind anytime soon, but

    Yeah, what youre saying all makes sense

    Then Lace recalled something that had nearly slipped past him.

    but hang on, shes been killed?

    He knew full well that yman thought extremely little of Mjurran, but Lace thought of her as a decent, trustworthy magic-born. In ymans bureaucracy, she was one of the five fingers, the highest echelons of leadership. She wasnt too good in a fight, but as a wizard who could handle almost any situation, she was highly valued as rearguard support. Plus, she often had handy advice for Lace and the rest of the Moderate Jesters, even if she acted like she hated it.

    More than anything, though, Mjurran hadmon sense. Lace gave her top marks for that.

    Ah yes, the unmoved yman replied. I dont know what that disappointed tone in your voice is, but yes, shes dead.

    Huh. She died, eh? Youre sure about that?

    Mm? The Marite Heart I imnted in her broke. Her real heart, which I kept here, crumbled into ash and disappeared. So yes, Im quite sure, thank you. Her role in my outfit was over anyway, so you could say it was good timing.

    The tness of ymans report saddened Lace a little. Cmon, yman, he chided, would it really hurt ya to be a little sadder when one of yer best people passes away?

    He used to be a better man that that. Ever since he reached the demon lord ranks, its like hes grown more and more twisted

    And this wasnt a phenomenon limited to yman. Well near everyone in the Moderate Jestersthe group that Lace called homeseemed to begin warping a bit personality-wise, as he saw it. Lace himself was the same. He certainly had no business criticizing yman for it, but he still couldnt shake the feeling that yman had fundamentally changed.

    Ha-ha-ha! Oh, youre too kind, Lace. Did you know that Teare said the same thing earlier? You need to treat your tools right, she told me, or else theyll fall apart. I believe she learned that from you, Lace? But that is exactly why, if a tool falls apart on you, you have to make the perpetrator pay for it. I can atone for the tool as well, then, cant I?

    The sight of ymans artificial smile made Lace give up pursuing the question any further. Yeah. Id like to keep her death from going to waste, at least.

    Of course you do. I thought you would say that.

    Another smile.

    Not quite how I meant it, yman

    It generated a wealth of mixed emotions in Laces mind. He shook it off, wondering if there were any cracks in ymans n he had failed to notice.

    But yknow, yman, about that Walpurgis Isnt anyone else gonnain atcha about it?

    Oh, they may. The smile disappeared from ymans face. Now it was twisted in unwavering confidence and warped desire. But now that I have Milim at my beck and call, I can just toss her in their direction, and thats it.

    Lace turned pale. Now wait a minute! Thats dangerous talk, there! He said theres a chance Milim could go berserk, too, didnt he? Just because the president built that Artifact doesnt mean you can get away with relying on it for everything.

    Its going to be all right, Lace. Milim fully followed my orders.

    So I heard. But she also went off script and made that crazy war deration, didnt she? Shes ancient by demon lord standards; shes got to have a hell of a lot of resistance against outside influence. If youe to rely on thatdy too much, I think its your neck on the line, yknow?

    But yman had little interest in the impassioned warning. Are you envious, Lace, that Milim is under my full control?

    No! Im saying that they call it a trump card cause you save it until the final deal!

    Enough from you. You have nothing to worry about. He wishes to see me awaken as a true demon lord. To do that, I will overrun the Beast Kingdom. If anyone stands in my way, I will show you just how easily I will mow them down.

    Hang on a sec! He and the president just told you to sit tight, didnt they? What you needa be thinkin about right now is how well navigate this Walpurgis thing!

    Trust in me, Lace. If I merely sit here and do whatever Lord Kazalim tells me to do, that will not fulfill his goals for me. Now is the time to go on the attack!

    That was enough to fully shut down Laces desperate protests.

    In the end, Lace was unable to stop yman. They were in agreement on some things, and it wasnt that yman was wildly diverging from his orders. But Lace just couldnt shake the premonition that something was up with the demon lord. So he spoke once more.

    Listen, yman. Lemme ask you one more thing: Did you really decide on this n of action on yer own free will?

    What are you talking about, Lace? There are two people in the world who can give me orders: Lord Kazalim and the one who resurrected him. You should be more aware of that than anyone.

    He was right. If yman saw nothing wrong with his scheme, Lace had no authority to intervene. He had his own work to do, infiltrating the Western Holy Church a second time.

    All right. No worries, then. I need to get goin, but you be careful, too, okay, yman? Nows not the time to be too reckless. Whatever ya do, dont letcher guard down.

    With that final warning, Lace took his leave, allowing yman to refocus on his own thoughts.

    Did he mean to use me of being under the influence of another? Ridiculous. Or perhapsis he worried that I will reap all the spoils of victory for myself, because I have Milims powers to use as I please? Hardly like him to be jealous

    yman never overestimated his own strength. The self-confidence that controlling Milim gave him, however, had emboldened him. And now, it had made him take the words of Lace, his most trustworthy of confidants, and dismiss them as mere jealousy against him.

    It was with some disappointment in his friend that he took another sip of his wine. Now, however, it was bitter. The mellow sweetness from before was nowhere to be found.

    Curse it all!

    Suddenly, yman threw the ss in his hand against the wall. His anger was making him act out, following orders given from emotions not even he could understand.

    The force of the outburst made the bottle of first-rate wine on the table shatter. But yman didnt care. Instead, to calm his nerves, he took something out from his pocketa mask molded into a smiling face.

    Dont you worry, Lace. Im going to make this awakening work, and then I will have the world in my grasp. All right, Lace? Im not going to lose this again! So this time, at least, lets all be one happy family together

    There, by himself in that room, yman reminded himself of the hopes hidden in his heartrubbing the mask softly, as if running his hand over a precious treasure.

    Right. First decision: defeat the demon lord yman. Thats set in stone. If you got someone lurking around in the darkness, trying to pull off some grand scheme, better to rub him out ahead of anything else. Plus, now that Ive dered myself to be a demon lord, I need ways to keep the other demon lords from taking action against me. Sacrificing yman should be a fine way to do that. Theres the other reason.

    As long as we dont know why Milim decided to pick a fight with Carillon, we cant really rely on what she says. Time to throw my weight around a little and keep things from getting any gloomier going forward. Besides, yman just went too far. He needs to feel the retribution. To pay for what he did.

    Moving on, our future direction. Yohm was a popr guy in Farmus, hailed as a hero by most. Well take advantage of this to have the current king of Farmus released from imprisonment and forced toe to the negotiating table. I want the kingdom to be a thing of the past by the time were done. Beyond that, we need to figure out how to deal with the Western Holy Church, as well as send out derations to the nations weve signed pacts with so theyll know our take on matters.

    We had a lot to talk about. Something told me it was going to be kind of a long meeting.

    I kicked things off by taking a report from Soei. yman was on the move, apparently, and we needed to hear all the details and confer over what to do. Thus, I was on my way to our main meeting hall, expecting to meet with Tempest leadership and the Three Lycanthropeers.

    As I did, my Universal Detect sniffed out a group of fifty or so approaching town. Huh? Oh, its Fuze, guild master from the kingdom of Blumund. Before long, our security team had us all face-to-face. He pushed through his own soldiers to see me, his face grim.

    It has been much too long, Sir Rimuru. I am only d that I made it here in time! We havee to satisfy our duty under the terms of the security agreement signed between Blumund and Tempest, and I feared I was already toote.

    He smiled as he spoke, but he still looked at me intensely, and the soldiers surrounding him looked ready to face death at any moment. Each was fully equipped, heavily armored, and prepared for war.

    Whoa. The guild master himself? What on?

    Ha-ha! No need to put it like that. Thegis is ready to take over my post, should ite to it. Ive heard many things about this town from our merchants, that sneak Mjllmile in particr. Youve been engaged with the Kingdom of Farmus, it seems

    Huh? Ummm?

    Come to think of it, I suppose it had been about ten days since we brought our visitors from Blumund back home. Did they immediately suit up ande running to our aid the moment they heard the news? Great if they did, but

    Even if weck the time to erect a defensive wall, Fuze feverishly continued, it would be best to build a circle of personnel around the city to beef up our defenses. It doesnt look like Farmuss main force has arrived yet, but there is no telling when their vanguard troops may reach us. Weve passed the date of their war ultimatum, yes?

    The steely resolve in his eyes seemed clear to me as he said his piece. Well, not just seemed. They were clear to me. He had already willed his guild masters seat to Thegis. I guess he really was here to fight to the death for Tempest.

    But umyou know Its all kinda over already. And with the way Fuze and his soldiers were all decked out in their finest equipment, ready to fan out the moment I said the word, I wasnt too sure how to give the news.

    Or perhaps you actually intend to seize the initiative and attack first? I have to tell you, Sir Rimuru, that could be a brash move. ording to our intelligence, we have confirmed sightings of an army nearly twenty thousand strong. Weck the numbers to defeat them in a frontal assault. Over the past few days, I have been working my connectionsI now have a team of three hundred adventurers on standby. They may be few in number, but I assure you they are at your beck and call. This may be a protracted war; our best bet might be to use the forestndscape to wage a guerri campaign

    Fuze was wholeheartedly devoted to us. Almost to the point where I wondered if he should be, really.

    Still, he confidently concluded, it ddens my heart to be able to fight alongside the beasts and creatures who call this forest home.

    Now it was even harder to tell him. The Tempest leaders around me were stone silent, and the contingent from Eurazania was visibly confused. This stuff was already in the past for us all. Like, I wasnt expecting them to actually lend us support! I know we had that treaty, but it had more than enough loopholes in its interpretation to let them weasel out of this stuff. But, however few, Fuze still got a bunch of fighters together and zoomed right over here. I was kinda happy to see that, but

    Ah, what a fine town this is. Beautiful buildings, well-designed houses, paved roads It pains me to admit it, but it is far more splendid than anything one could find in Blumund. I can understand your reluctance against turning it into a battlefield. But we must hold out and await reinforcements! Our king has promised to deploy our knights, and while it will take them time to prepare

    Ahhh, Fuzie, one moment?

    I hated to do it, but I had to stop him, or else we were gonna be here all day.

    Yes, Sir Rimuru? Did you have a suggestion for our strategy?

    Um, yeah, our, our strategy Like, if you wanna call it that

    Is this something to be kept secret from us? Certainly, I can understand your suspicion, but I hope you can ce your trust in

    N-no, no, Fuzie! I really appreciate what youve done, but its all over now!

    Huh? Over? How do you mean?

    Um, how to put it? Well, to sum up, I kind of killed em all!

    Um? Them all? Them all, who? What are you talking about?

    I could understand his confusion.

    I mean, um, the army from Farmus you were talking about? I killed em all!

    Wh-whaaa?!

    That was about all the utterly shocked Fuze could choke out. Yohm stepped up to give him a pat on the shoulder, while Kabal offered a few condolences of his own.

    No, I bet he wouldnt believe it,mented Elen.

    Nope, Gido added.

    Nope, indeed. It hadnt even been two weeks since that war deration. I suppose Fuze figured their main force would reach Tempest in a week, so wed buy two or three days of time in open-fieldbat and prepare for a siege in the worst case. Considering how the war shouldve started days ago, and we were totally serene about it, I figured he had to think it was at least a bit weird by nowbut seeing all of us assembled like this, he mustve assumed we were about to sally forth and attack, or something.

    In his eyes, we went from dealing with a dyed Farmus force to the war being in the books. That was a lot to take in at once, wasnt it?

    The other day, Rigurd finally began, we sent my son Rigur out to you to give the news. You two must have missed each other along the way, I fear. But it is just as Sir Rimuru says. The war is already over.

    Between his and Kabals and Elens supplementalmentary, we managed in a little over a few minutes to convince Fuze that we werent pulling an borate prank.

    You must be joking, I heard him whisper under his breath, but time heals all wounds and all that.

    The fifty fighters apanying him werent too enthused about it, either, so I ordered our soldiers to take them to our barracks and let them rest up. They looked exhausted enough to copse on the spot, limp and lifeless. Hearing that there wasnt any war to fight would cut the tension in pretty short order, I thought. They had apparently been relying on natural trails in the forest instead of the highway, in order to avoid encountering Farmus forces, and all that bushwhacking in full armor couldnt have been fun.

    So the fighters all muttered their thanks to us as they marched off to their quarters. All that remained was the hangdog-looking Fuze.

    Why dont you get some rest, too, Fuzie?

    Yes He nodded at me. Yes, this has put my mind in quite a state of disorder. If I could lie down for a bit

    But just as he was about to walk toward the barracks, another guest interrupted him with (im)perfect timing.

    Oops. Heres someone else. And who could it be but

    But? Fuze asked, stopping as he heard me mutter. He shouldve kept going. Once he saw who it was, resting was thest thing on his mindbecause standing right there was Gazel Dwargo, king of the dwarves himself.

    Something I had noticed a while ago: Having my Magic Sense skill evolve into Universal Detect had made my ability to grasp my surroundings far more urate across a much wider range. Despite how far away they were from town, I could spot the squadron of Pegasus Knights flying in remarkably fast.

    Report. Thirty knights iing. The individual Gazel Dwargo is confirmed to be in the vanguard position.

    The ultimate skill Raphael, Lord of Wisdom, gave the report as if nothing could be more trivial.

    With this upgrade in uracy, I was now able to detect and identify people I had met before. Thats incredibly convenient. Convenientbut with this range, easily enough to cover the whole town and a great deal beyond, Im starting to think this is literally too much information. To be frank, Im getting sick of all these reports, every single time.

    So could you keep em a bit more on the brief side, Sageum, I mean, Raphael? To be exact, you can report in when someones approaching only if theyre malicious or harmful to me or whatever.

    Understood.

    It felt like Raphael really wanted to say something back there, but nothing to get worked up about. Its always best to assign all the dirty work to someone else, if you can. Leave it to Raphael! Thats my motto.

    So I turned my skill down to the minimum setting as I awaited our guests. Since it was the skill performing the ID for me, I could rest assured that these were no impostors. But before I could even tell Fuze, the Pegasus Knights flitted down in front of us. King Gazel dismounted first.

    He smiled the moment he spotted me. Ah, Rimuru, nice to see you again! So I hear youve be a demon lord?

    Oh, that. I thought hed want a word about that. Didnt expect him to fly on over himself, though.

    Ah, yeah, kinda. Theres been a lot of stuff going on around here, Gazel, so I figured Id be a demon lord. I gave him an awkward grin. Not to make you feel unwee or anything, but we were just about to all meet up and discuss our future strategy.

    Well, perfect! I would be happy to join this conference, he dered, like it was his god-given right.

    It was right about then that Fuze, exhausted and ready to cry, came up to me.

    Demon lord? What in heavens is that all about?!

    He had heard our conversation from the side, and I could tell he wasnt about to let it slide. Yeah, I didnt really talk about that, either Going in depth right now would just be a pain in the ass, but Fuze wasnt going to ept a polite no, I could tell.

    Sir Rimuru, I find it hard to ignore what you just said! Because it sounded very much to me that you have be a demon lordor something to that effect?

    He was shaking from head to toe, about ready to pee his pants.

    Um, if you needed a bathroom, its down this street and

    I do not need a bathroom! I never said anything about a bathroom! This demon lord business Tell me what you mean by it!

    I suppose that feint didnt work. Fuze was clearly starting to lose his temper, and his real personality was starting to show itself.

    Oh. Um, yeah, demon lord. Well, I replied as breezily as possible, Im one of em now.

    This, sadly, didnt end the topic.

    Ha-ha-ha! Rather poor taste for a joke, wouldnt you think? I was hoping for a more serious answer from you

    Ugghh, this is such a pain. Do I have to start from the very beginning before youll get off my back? And now I could see Gazel looking curiously at me, too. So as much as I hated going through all this in the middle of the street, I gave them both a quick recap.

    Once I wrapped up, I noticed Fuze was muttering to nobody in particr, eyes zed over. His mind mustve shut off in an attempt to avoid the reality of it all. At least he wasnt lecturing me or anything. Leaving him to his own ranting, I turned to King Gazel again.

    By the way, Gazel, are you sure its all right for a king to slip out of his own kingdom that easily?

    It was a sincere concern of mine. Not that Im one to talk, but the king was being allowed way too long a leash, wasnt he? The Armed Nation of Dwargon, in terms of national power, had to be several dozen times stronger a nation than ours. Wasnt the king going out on trips whenever he pleased kind of a problem?

    Pfft. What is the issue? I have a decoy fully serving for me!

    Huh? I thought decoys were meant for, like, drawing the attention of assassins away from the real thing or something? Or were they meant for ying hooky like this? I wasnt too sure either way, but whatever. Gazel had Pegasus Knight captain Dolph with him, along with quite a number of his trustedpanions. For a security detail, it was almost too extensive.

    Regardless, Rimuru He turned his now-kingly eyes toward me. The report Vester sent me three days agothat was no mistake, then?

    Oh, you mean the twenty thousand

    Wait, Rimuru. I had heard the Farmus force had gone missing under mysterious circumstances. Do you know something about that?

    Uh, missing?

    Huh? What was he talking about?

    The way Vester phrased it, he slowly continued, a force of some twenty thousand troops simply vanished before they could reach this town. Do you have any idea what may have happened to them?

    He gave Vester a sidelong nce out the corner of his eye, the silent pressure he emitted almost making his subject copse to the ground. I joined his gaze. Vester vigorously shook his head at me.

    I received the report as well, Vester.

    This was Vaughn speaking, admiral pdin for the dwarven army and sworn friend to King Gazel; and to Vester right now, a source of terror.

    At the time, I believe you told us that the Farmus force had disappeared, and you were investigating why. The report was curious enough to us that we decided to venture over ourselves, but is this the exnation?

    His annoyance might be understandable. I had just brutally massacred a force of twenty thousand, and Gazel and Vester were trying to kind of gloss over it.

    Well, yes, um, the cause still isnt quite known yet

    Vester began choosing his words carefully, trying to guess at the intentions of his dwarven friends. He was a quick thinker like that, already trying to bury the lede on what I had done.

    Fool! I heard Gazel whisper to me. If you tell the truth here, youll be an enemy to all humanityor if not the enemy, a symbol of terror worldwide.

    Yeah, I guess so,e to think of it. Someone who can kill in the five figures on one go was scarier than a nuclear bomb, really. The fewer people who knew about this, the betterand certainly, nations and people who werent directly involved at all didnt need to hear the story. The Kingdom of Farmus attempted to invade monsternds, only to gopletely missing due to an unknown incident or incidents. That much was the truth, decent enough to spread across thend.

    Theres Gazel for you. Far more shrewd than I would ever be. Which means I now have to walk back what I just said a moment ago. Ugh.

    I didnt mind if the townspeople knew; that wasnt the problem, and it was toote now anyway. Nobody was about to go bbing it to the general public regardless. The main issue was Fuze. I gave him a nce; he was still in a state of panicked confusion.

    Ummm, Fuzie?

    Sir Rimuruuu

    So now what? I just dered to him that I wiped out the entire Farmus military by myself. Should Iugh it off as a lie?

    But as I thought about it, Fuze sighed and raised his arms up. I heard nothing. And of course, I dont think my fighters in the barracks will remember anything by tomorrow morning. Were all so exhausted right now, we must be hearing voices in our heads.

    Guess hes staying mum for me. He seemed remarkably more aged to me now, sorrowful. I suppose he found this the most convenient way to solve the problemand certainly, the best way to tie up all the strings here right now.

    Hee-hee-hee-hee In that case, allow me to visit them to make sure, Diablo offered. He had sidled up next to me out of nowhere with that smile on his face again. Funny guy. The perfect butler. You could ask pretty much anything of him, and hed do it. At the moment, he was gleefully taking care of the assorted errands I asked him to do. I think I might have heard him whisper I am quite gifted at altering memories to me just now, but lets pretend I didnt.

    Fuze had mixed feelings about it, I could tell, but he was willing to deal with it as long as his people were safe. He understood King Gazels takethe fewer people who knew, the better. When politics get involved like this, governments might not be afraid to shut witnesses up permanently, after all. Maybe its smarter to shut your eyes now and again.

    Still

    I will not question how my fighters are handled, but I insist on joining this conference of yours.

    It sounded to me like this was one point Fuze refused to negotiate on. His eyes were resolutehe mustve figured the topic of our meeting wasnt something he could afford to be in the dark on.

    All right. I shrugged. I want you to believe that Im not hostile to humanity. I wont keep you out.

    And so, Rigurd guided Fuze to a waiting room. Since we now had a dwarven contingent participating, we needed to set up arger meeting hall for everybody, and in the meantime, they could all probably use some rest.

    Hmph, grumbled Gazel as we saw them go off. You trust that man, Rimuru?

    Yeah, hes safe.

    Fuze was a trustworthy man. I was confident enough in that.

    Mm. Then I suppose the problem is those people.

    He turned his attention toward the empty space behind us. Um, or was it empty? I turned around, surprised, only to find an unfamiliar group watching us. There was a well-dressed gentleman at the lead, his face well-defined; he must have been very popr with the opposite sex when he was younger. His eyes were notably sharp, and he was nked on both sides by five or so guards, all outfitted in simrly fine gear; perhaps high-ranked military officers or the like.

    The group was clearly well trained, andman, they were right behind me this whole time, and I never noticed? What the hell happened to Universal Detect, man?!

    However, I was the only concerned witness, it turned out.

    Report. No clear hostility detected among the group.

    If thats what the somewhat pouty Raphael had to say, I could believe it. Maybe this was my fault. I did just tell it to stop giving me reports all the time. I suppose malicious or harmful is a bit too vague to make much sense of. Raphael had a right to be angry, perhaps.

    Sorry, I said to myself. Go ahead and give the full reports from now on. It seemed kind ofme, really, apologizing to one of my own skills, but I at least wanted to express my feelings.

    As I underwent this internal conflict, Gazel and the mystery group were already engaging each other.

    And you people are?

    Ah, I see its the emperor who enjoys hiding in his underground burrow! Very impressive, to see a coward like you provide backing to the demon lord like this

    The stern greeting did nothing to break the mans easygoing style. He was clearly trying to goad the dwarven king while the officers rolled their eyes at him in exasperation.

    Gazel, recognizing them all, shed a bold smile. Aha. You, then. The elf descendants whose heads are always in the clouds. Did you descend from that fancy tree city of yours, then?

    I suppose they all knew each other. Raphael was rightno malice to speak of; these two just didnt get along too well, is all. Or more like they enjoyed arguing for the sake of arguing.

    Sir Rimuru, I believe these to be envoys from the Sorcerous Dynasty of Thalion, stated Soka, one of Soeis operatives. She had apparently brought these people hereand once the man recognized King Gazel, he immediately started giving him crap.

    You never change, do you, Erald?

    Neither do you, Gazel.

    This was the way the two decided to greet each other, looks of sheer contempt on their faces.

    And that girl there is?

    Oh, hello there. My names Rimuru, and I run things around the forest alliance we have here.

    Erald, the squinty-eyed guy, had his eyes turned to me, so I gave him a casual hello. Any visitors from Thalion needed to be treated with the utmost courtesynot that I really knew anything about manners or diplomatic customs or anything. Bing a demon lords great and all, but its not like theres an instruction manual for it. Hopefully Ill track someone down who can teach me the finer points sometime.

    Upon hearing my name, Erald suddenly tensed upthen opened his eyes as wide as he could. You! he bellowed. The demon lord who seduced my daughter! I hope you are prepared to atone for that!

    He immediately began to cast what even I could tell was a vastly overpowered me spell. Yikes. Chill out, dude.

    Based on the knowledge I gathered, a me spell on such a high level was one of the most difficult pieces of magic to pull off. The whole family of fire magic upied its own branch in the tree of aspectual magic, starting with your garden-variety puff of Fire and moving on from there to Fireball and the more difficult Fire Wall and Fire Storm. The harder it is to pull off, the more of a boom it makes.

    At the very peak of this scale lies what, for the sake of simplicity, I callpounding magic. Combining the burning nature of me spells with the shock-wave effects of explosive spells, for example, can provide magic on a scale beyond either of the original two types. That was just the type ofpounding Shizu was gifted at,e to think of it. The main difference was that she relied on an elemental spirit to power her casting. Thats not easy, not unless youre as talented a caster as Shizu was, but once you have that rtionship in ce, the elemental will do most of the fine-tuning for you.

    Compounded spells on the very tippy top of the scale like this were quite hazardous, because they required you to control the magic manually. But since they were not a part of any official magic family, they offered a great deal of freedom. You had full control, juggling aspects of the spell likeunch speed, targeting uracy, size and scope of the effect, and duration. If brute strength was all you wanted, you could level a town easily enough with one.

    This, of course, came at some danger to the caster. You needed enough spiritual force to gather the required magicules together to keep the spell under control, or else it wouldnt work, letting that energy run amok instead of being consumedand potentially raze the entire area around you. It goes without saying that this sort of magic wasnt something the general public saw much ofwere talking literally military-grade stuff. You had to be at least an redited wizard to be allowed to touch it.

    It was absolutely not the kind of thing I wanted in my city, and now Erald was casting it. What was he thinking? It made no sense to me. And whats he mean seduced?

    The whole thing left me confused for a moment, but again, I shouldnt have worried. From the side came a loud bang, like someone fired off a shotgun, and then Elens distressed shouting.

    Dad,e onnnn! What are you here for?!

    She barged in, looking livid, and immediately gave Erald a bop on the head before he could react. It was enough for him toe back to his senses. I suppose he was her father, then? And judging by the chewing out Elen was giving him, he mustve been a bit regretful by now. Scary, isnt it, seeing someone fly into a rage without warning like that? He seemed like such an intellectual gentleman, like Gazel. So much for that.

    Ah Ha-ha-ha. Sorry about that, he said with a cheerful smile. I was informed that a demon lord had kidnapped my daughter, and I suppose I lost my cool for a moment.

    Yeah, but that doesnt mean you get to cast maximum-force fire magic in my town. What a loony dad.

    No, my lord, one of his men, a timid-looking assistant, coolly observed. Our reports involved far more than that, but you jumped to a hasty conclusion.

    See? I knew it! This is totally your fault, Daddd!

    I felt a little bad for Dad, visibly withering on the spot, but he had iting. If anything, I wanted him to regret it even more.

    You always were too overprotective a father, Gazel said once things calmed down.

    I am not, Erald fired back unapologetically. How can I help it? Elen is simply too precious to me.

    Yes, all children are to their parents, but Ah, this is pointless.

    The way Gazel rolled his eyes told me that Erald was known for this. You cant fix the fatherly instinct, I guess.

    Once things had simmered down between Gazel and Erald, Elen stepped up to say hello, an elegant air surrounding her despite her rough adventurers garb.

    I am sorry I have been out of contact, King Gazel.

    Ah, Ellwyn? I hardly recognized you! How grand it is to see you in good health. I see the years have been very kind to your beauty!

    Keep your hands off her, Gazel! Erald interjected, earning him another p from Elen and round of admonishment from his assistant. Gazel just shrugged, apparently used to this act. If Elens on the scene, her father just loses all sense of self, doesnt he? Not exactly the member of the intelligentsia I took him for at first. Better watch out for that.

    Sir Rimuru, this is Erald Grimwald, my father and archduke of Thalion.

    It is an honor to meet you, leader of Jura and master of the monsters. As my daughter just said, I am Archduke Erald Grimwald. Please, just Erald is fine.

    So this guys an archduke in the Sorcerous Dynasty? Thats pretty high up there, isnt it? Dwargon isnt the only kingdom sending their big guns over to see us. I wouldter learn that he was closely rted to the Thalion royal familythe current emperors uncle, in fact. That exined why he was acting so familiar and casual around Gazel. To put it simply, he was one of three most powerful people from his native country.

    I could hardly hide my surprise. Does that mean? Wow, is Elen some kind of crazy-influential fairy-tale princess?! I knew she was of noble blood, but not that much! Shes not far from the throne at all, lineage-wise, and shes working as an adventurer? Talk about being given a lot of freedom! And I cant be the only one to think itd be better to put a stop to that, not that Elen herself would likely care. I imagined she probably had people keeping an eye on her, given how sure she was that the advice she gave me on bing a demon lord woulde back to haunt her. And all that trouble she gives Kabal and Gido, too. I really ought to reward them for that next time.

    But for now

    So did you travel here just to inquire about Elen?

    I doubted it, as I sized up Erald.

    Hee-hee-hee! No, of course not. As we consider how we should interact with your nation, I wanted a chance to see you with my own eyesthis leader that my daughter seems so fond of. Given the sense of authority you appear to bring to your people, I find it hard to believe you are a slime at all But still, I feel I have a much moreplete picture of your strengths now.

    He entuated this with a nefarious-soundingugh. I suppose that overpowered me strike was his way of testing me as well. Meand Benimaru, Shuna, and Shion adjacent; none demonstrated a hint of panicit wouldnt have; they had already seen he had no intention of actuallyunching it. Given how hotheaded they all were not long ago, that was some palpable growth.

    It was clear, Shuna exined, that you had far less than the required energy needed for the spell you were casting, once I read what it was.

    Erald grinned at this, a bit ashamed that his act was spotted for what it was.

    Well, I suppose I have quite a while to go, if you can see through me that clearly!

    Not at all, she calmly replied. Between the speed at which you deployed it and the skill you showed at making it look real, it was an impressive sight to see. Considering the artificial body you possess, that level of uracy is remarkable.

    Oh? You noticed I was using a homunculus? Color me surprised.

    Yes. It seemed to me you had fused your spiritual body into it. Very impressive. It would certainly take a nation of magic-users such as yours to pull that off.

    I used Analyze and Assess at Shunas suggestion. She was right; Erald had borrowed this body from somewhere else. His officers were all real, but once you reach the higher ranks of nobility, I suppose it paid to be careful. I had thought he was rather lightly outfitted for a summit with a self-styled demon lord. Maybe the dwarven King Gazel over there was the crazy one.

    Still, it was really something. An borately fine-tuned homunculus, indistinguishable from a human being. Once things calm down, Id love to learn how that works.

    So Erald was here to size up our nation and its leaders. That and a few other things, too, Im sure, but we can tackle thatter. No need to force it out of him right this moment.

    Since hes here and all, I figured I might as well have him join the conference, so hed have more stuff to judge us with. I wanted his take on our future direction as well, and this would be a good opportunity for that. It might result in us and the Sorcerous Dynasty bing enemies, of course, but wed just have to cross that bridge when we came to it.

    Gobta ran up to inform me that the meeting hall was ready.

    I was nning to have this be a more informal confab between Jura buddies, but things had changed. This really was a summit. Usually, with things like these, youd have lower-level diplomats meet up first and agree in advance on questions to ask and topics to tackle, figuring out where there was room forpromise once both sides were aware of each others stakes. Here, though, there was no greasing the gears in advance. Wed be giving frank opinions to each other, and in the end, wed pin down our federations future. It wouldnt be going too far to call it a war of words.

    Steeling my resolve, I headed for the meeting hall, ready to emcee one of the most important gatherings Iand Tempesthad ever experienced.

    Inter years, the event woulde to be known as the Monster-and-Man Summit.

    In the hall, I found everyone standing upright, awaiting our arrival. All the main powerbrokers in the eventthe Three Lycanthropeers, Fuze, King Gazel, and Archduke Eraldwere shown to their guest seats. Once I took my own at the far end of the hall, everyone else sat down.

    The air was heavy when the talks began.

    We began by having each side introduce themselves, given the multiplerge nations now involved. Some already knew one another, but I thought it best for politeness sake that everybody was on the same page.

    So. Lets begin by having our guests introduced.

    I turned to Shuna, who promptly began reading off names.

    The Beast Kingdom of Eurazania, represented by the Three Lycanthropeers from the Beast Masters Warrior Alliance. Given that Phobio and Sufia had a slightall right, serioustendency to think with their sword-swingin muscles instead of their brains, I figured wed mostly be focused on Alviss feedback.

    The Armed Nation of Dwargon,nd of the dwarves, represented by their kin himself, Gazel Dwargo. He seemed perfectly content with me trying to cover up the whole twenty-thousand-dead thing. He undoubtedly had his own motivations for it, so I suppose I ought to keep that under consideration. It seemed like Id be able to rely on him quite a bit going forward.

    The kingdom of Blumund, represented byno one, officially, although having the nations guild master in Fuze wasnt a bad substitute. Fuze was intimately connected with Baron Veryard, one of the kingdoms top ministers, so he did have enough authority to be here and provide some valuable advice.

    The Sorcerous Dynasty of Thalion, very suddenly represented by Archduke Eralda sharp-minded, noble-looking, powerful figure, even if he was near powerless to defy his beloved daughter. If he was here to gauge the worth of our nation, I presumed he wasnt foolish enough to let Elen sway his judgment. He wasnt someone to neglectand definitely not someone to drop my guard around.

    BesidesThalion was powerful enough to take on the entire Council by itself, on the same level as Dwargon. If all went well, we could establish formal ties with them, perhaps. I didnt want to be greedy, though, so baby steps would be key in dealing with him.

    Sizing them all up like this, we had a fairly prestigious lineup here. In a way, I was d all these humans were here for it. If it was just us Forest of Jura denizens, our deliberations mightve drifted off the rails entirely.

    Next came introductions from the Tempest side. One by one, I had my top brass talk about themselves a little bit. Rigurd and the hobgoblin elders practically oozed authority by this point, decked out in befittingly regal-ish clothing and not losing out at all to their counterparts in foreignnds. More regal than myself, really. The bedrock of our whole nation.

    Once every department in town checked in, we next heard from Treyni, dryad and caretaker of the forest. Having such a lofty local presence around seemed to surprise Erald at first, but he bottled it up and nodded a greeting to her. Gazel found this more than a little amusing, even though Im sure he and his crew were just as surprised about the whole damn thing when they first met her. Ah well.

    Finally, there was the contingent from FarmusYohm, Mjurran, and Gruecith as well. I wanted to have them build a new nation for me, something I was nning to suggest at this summit. Would people be open to it? That was a vital part of the whole thing, something thatd augur the ultimate sess of this event.

    Once Shion and Diablo behind me gave a couple of quick hellos, the meet-and-greet part of the summit was over. Oh, wait. Forgot someone.

    Shuna, do we have a change of clothes for Veldora?

    Yes, Sir Veldora is

    Before Shuna could finish, a loud, hearty Gwaaah-ha-ha-ha! filled the hall. I wanted some clothing for him since being in the buff probably wouldnt impress too many visitors, and it looks like we were just in time. The doors opened to reveal Veldora, taking in the sight curiously. I stood up to greet him and exin things to our visitors.

    I have one more friend to introduce, one whose name should be familiar to you all. I know this may sound surprising, but

    The Tempestians in the audience nervously gulped. They already knew Veldora well enough, but having a legendary, viinous dragon in their presence still unnerved them more than a little bit. I could feel the electricity in the air as silence began to take hold.

    This is the Jura-Tempest Federations friend, Veldora.

    Yes, Veldora! Some also refer to me as the Storm Dragon! Although, so few have an encounter with me and live to tell the tale, so perhaps you all should consider yourselves lucky. Lucky and honored to be in my lofty presence!!

    Pompous as always, I could see, although it suited him well. But could I really trust him to behave at a summit like this? All I could picture was him growing bored in five minutes and attempting to butt in.

    For todays summit, I was kinda hoping you could join in as an adviser and maybe try to stay on good behavior. Or you can leave, if you want?

    Gah-ha-ha-ha! Why the cold shoulder, Rimuru? Dont leave me out of the party!

    Well, look, were trying to have a serious conversation here, so just try not to get in the way, all right?

    Trust me! There is no way I would ever interfere with you!

    If thats how he saw it, I had to be content with that. If worse came to worst, I could give him some of that beloved manga he took from my mind to keep him quiet.

    The hall remained quiet as Veldora and I spoke, nobody moving an inch.

    Well Hmm? Actually, Fuze and Elen had passed out on the floor. Rigurd and the other hob-gobs were prostrating themselves before us for some reason, while Gazel was shouting A moment, Rimuru, please! We must discuss this at once!! and order was generally falling apart all over the ce. The whole thing was pandemonium, and it goes without saying that the summit had to go into recess for a bit. Not that we had started yet.

    There was panic in the aisles, a lot more than I was expecting. You would think the apocalypse was here. Man That Veldora. Guess that Storm Dragon stuff wasnt just a nickname after all. I suppose I shouldve expected it. Having a catastrophe-rated monster, the highest level of danger there was, stroll into the meeting hall without warning was bound to lead to chaos. They were treated as stronger than demon lords, even.

    But think about it. If that guys gonna sow chaos sooner orter, might as well get his intro out of the way quickly. Considering my ns, I couldnt leave Veldora and his motivations out of the picture. So I wanted him here, even if it left the other guests limp and pale with terror.

    As much as Veldora was keeping his aura bottled up, some of it mightve been hitting them all anyway. Benimaru, Shion, and my other leaders shut off their auras as a habit, something we were all used to now that weaker monsters and humans were frequent visitors. Diablo, despite being the new guy, could fully switch it off without me having to ask. I was honestly impressed. He was a good model for the others to follow.

    So Veldora was still a problem in that aspect, but thanks to our intensive training, he could now adjust his aura on the fly. He proudly proimed it was like childs y to him, but it was really more thanks to the ultimate skill Faust, Lord of Investigation.

    With that, I figured hed be fine to bring out. Was that too optimistic, maybe? After all, even when sealed away, his aura was still daunting enough to keep any monster ranked B or below at bay. I ran Analyze and Assess on the magicules that filled the hall. No problems there. So the cause would have to be

    Rimuru? We need to talk.

    Gazel was there, giving me a pat on the shoulder and a threatening smile. Lets dy this summit, so I may have some time.

    He must have been serious about it, given his shouting earlier. My instincts told me not to defy him. So I dered recess and stood up. I didnt hear anyints from the gallery (not that all of them were conscious enough to voice them).

    Leaving the hall to my assistants, we moved into the reception area. I left Veldora behind at Gazels request, which I figured wouldnt be a problem. Some of the attendees, the Three Lycanthropeers included, were so keen on currying favor with the Storm Dragon that I was sure hed be upied for a least a little while.

    I was alone in the room with Gazel and Erald. Shuna was off brewing tea for the whole conference while Benimaru and Shion fought to calm things down.

    Let me just say this first, Erald began. I have been given full freedom of action by Her Excellency, the Heavenly Emperor. It is my word that will decide the position of the Sorcerous Dynasty of Thalion, and I would advise you to keep that in mind as you exin all this to me.

    The doting-father Erald was a distant memory. Here was the Thalion statesman, the face of an all-powerful nobility, and even I had to admire the dignity he held himself with. So Thalion wouldnt be willing to sweep this incident under the rug? He didnt voice any intention of hostilities against us, but depending on what I decided to do, we might be foes regardless. At the same time, I figured, he also had to clean up after Elen, what with everything shes been doing around here.

    Which meant, hey, if we arent enemies, it couldnt be a problem to ask for an alliance.

    All right. I promise Ill be honest with you as well.

    He seemed to be speaking frankly with me. I should be just as serious with him. So our confidential talks began.

    We kicked off with Gazel.

    So what did you want to talk about?

    Certainly not the weather, you fool! Not even the dwarven king could hide his shock as he excitedly half shouted at me. Why has the Storm Dragon been resurrected?!

    That was a rare sight from the normally coolheaded Gazel. He mustve really flipped his lid. I thought about talking my way out of this, but there was no point to it. So I decided to summarize thingsat least, the part about how I ran into Veldora in the cave and agreed to help him out of his prison.

    Once I wrapped up, Gazel groaned, a hand covering his face. This is beyond all expectation. You bing a demon lord is a problem in itself without this to contend with

    I thought about lightening the mood by saying Oh, no need topliment me that much but opted against it. If I was wrong, itd send Gazel flying into a rage.

    So, Sir Rimuru, is that really, truly?

    I nodded at Erald. Veldora was in human form and hiding his aura, perhaps making it a tad hard to swallow.

    I suppose it would have to be, he observed. No one, man or monster, would be foolish enough to pretend to be that terrible dragon.

    I suppose not. That must be why Elen and Fuze were so readily epting. Names held particr importance for monsters, but even a human would earn no advantage whatsoever from pretending to be the Storm Dragon. And Gazel never doubted it from the start. I asked him whyter, and his reply was simple: Because I couldnt read him. Which implied that Gazel has some kind of intrinsic mind-reading ability. Strong in more ways than one, I guess. But I digress.

    What should we do with this, though?

    Indeed, Erald said to his fellow king. And here I am, already frantic enough attempting to clean up after all my daughters misdeeds

    I suppose the two were much closer friends than they seemed at first nce.

    Do we announce this, or do we cover it up? Theres the problem.

    The Western Nations are not a concern, Erald said. Even in Thalion, I see no issue with reporting this to Her Excellency the Emperor and no one else. But

    But the Western Holy Church, yes? Secrecy will earn us nothing with them. The Church has made it clear the Storm Dragon is the one dragon type they are most hostile to. If its resurrected, they would know immediately.

    And if we tried to hide it, we would need to feign ignorance, which would be impossible to back up. Either way, he would be branded an enemy of god in short order.

    The two pondered what to do. Me? Oh, I was just saying mm-hmm or yeah now and then. Not a bad gig.

    Are you listening, Rimuru?

    Yes. Youre the one who roped us into this crisis, one that puts a great deal of trouble upon all of us. We need you to think more seriously about matters, oror I dont know what well do!

    Oops. Guess theyre pissed off. Lets just be a bit more apologetic and give my side of the story.

    Well, theres no way to fully hide Veldora, so my intentions to let the word out to the public. Theres no way my nations going to avoid the Churchs eyes anyway, soyou know. Ill figure something out.

    Hmm. Gazel nodded at me. If that is your decision, I have no qualms with it.

    A demon lord and dragon joining hands is not at all aughing matter. This has be a more pressing issue than even I had thought at first. But looking at it another way, this is also a stroke of good luck, being able to participate in this summit. I have obtained exactly the information we need to decide how our country will stand

    Erald, meanwhile, was discussing his countrys standpoint more than his own, with another one of his eerie smiles. His take: It would be foolish to pick a fight against a nation with both a disaster-ss demon lord and a catastrophe-ss dragon. Gazel agreed with him, solemnly nodding. In terms of international pedigree, Tempest couldnt hold a candle to superpowers like Dwargon and Thalion, but if you focused solely on military strength, we didnt just match these guys; we surpassed them. Gazel and Erald, in their own ways, were admitting to that.

    Should I take that to mean, I ventured, that should hostilities break out between us and the Western Church, you will take our side?

    That is what you ask? Gazel bitterly countered. Rimuru, you truly must learn how to express these things better. Thank heavens this is a confidential talk

    As he exined, just because he had no reason for Dwargon to see Tempest as a foe didnt mean he was obligated to expose his own nation to danger. That was doubly true in the case of the Western Holy Church, which the Dwarven Kingdom was not particrly connected to. Instead, all he could promise was that we could retain current rtions, with neutrality being the word of the day.

    That left Erald, archduke of a nation I hadnt even begun to try establishing rtions with. Despite the circumstances, he seemed oddly willing to see things my wayso far, at least.

    Im d to have your support, Gazel. So, um, misterum, Sir Erald, could I ask why you are being so kind to me with this?

    Erald looked simrly reluctant to put it into words. You know you can call me whatever you like here, sir or not. Just please be sure to include my name and appetion in public, Sir Rimuru. As the leader of a nation, there is absolutely no reason to ce yourself below other leaders on the recordnot unless you are eager to be the vassal territory of another nation. But to answer your question

    Funny how hes taking pains to save me from embarrassment. I guess hes got a kinder side as well. I thanked him for that, only to be greeted with a stare and a long sigh before he began to exin why he was here and what he wanted.

    It all started with Elen, his daughter. Her leaking info about how to awaken as a demon lord had led to an investigation as to who should be held responsible. It was kind of like she had created a new one, I suppose, and no nation could afford to ignore that. But then the archduke sprang into action. Someone like Erald had enough strength to kill the whole affair, and he did, making sure only the emperor knew the truth. All that remained was for him to gauge the situation and take action as necessary.

    Keeping tabs on us magically was apparently quite a strenuous feat for him, but he still managed to confirm that I had indeed be a demon lord. He couldve just yed dumb if I had failed, but once I did, I could no longer be ignored. So he was here to size me up and potentially send a force over to suppress me should things go awry.

    So, he said in closing, I wanted as few people to be aware of those facts as possible. Thus, I came out here myself.

    In other words, I supposed, if he thought I was an evil presence, he wouldve destroyed us all and pretended nothing had ever happened.

    And whats your decision, then?

    Well, as I said before, my decision for today is friendship over hostility.

    Aha. That makes sense. And being seen as non-evil made me kind of happy, too.

    A fairly obvious choice, Gazel retorted.

    Of course. Our nation enjoys freedom of religion. Our people adhere to more than only the monotheistic Luminus faith. I seek to prioritize the fortunes of our nation, rather than sacrifice myself for the sake of religion.

    Pfft. I never did like you, Erald, but we keep agreeing on these matters. My nation and the Western Holy Church do not share amon motive, either. From the very beginning, I intended to support our friends in Tempest.

    They shared a smile.

    But this doesnt mean were without problems of our own. For example, the Farmus force that Sir Rimuru destroyed. Whether it was war or not, the death toll is simply too high. Erald scowled. And to think it was my daughter who nted that seed

    So that was his real motivation, then. The problem wasnt whether I was evil or notity in whether the circumstances of the battle was known to the Western Holy Church. A demon lord who killed twenty thousand was going to look pretty damn evil to just about any sane person. It would lend valuable credence to the Churchs derations, and Id be named an enemy of god in short order.

    Now I see. The fallout from forging friendly ties with such an evil presencei.e., mecould be ufortable for any nation to deal with. Sounded rough. I began wondering what we could do about that, before Gazel grinned at me.

    Dont worry. Ive got an idea.

    Oh, could it be? The way Gazel went on about how the Farmus army went missing earlier?

    All the bodies are gone. There is no evidence. And scarily enough, there are no survivors, either, are there? He smiled. Then why not change the plot to whatever we damn well want it to be?

    Themon people, along with the rest of the world? They didnt need the truth. Just give em a nice-sounding story, and everyone will be happy.

    Hohh, a fascinating offer, Erald said, eyes shining as he went back into statesman mode. Would you mind if I contributed to that, Gazel?

    He mustve intended to fabricate a convenient story, one that ensured none of our hands were dirty. Thatd help out Elen, he no doubt believed, and somewhere down the line, itd even help Thalions fortunes. Better go all in on this, then. Besides, I had already decided to keep my nation safe, even if it meant massacring twenty thousand. Even if I have to shoulder heavier crimes, that faith of mine wasnt going anywhere.

    I suppose you have the broadness of mind to deal with whatever maye, Rimuru? Very well. A king must never live with regrets.

    Yeah, no point ruing the past. That was part of the Initiation, and I needed it.

    Im ready for anything. But whats the story you have in mind, Gazel?

    Heh-heh. Well said.

    Gazels eyes on me softened. We had little time left and a great number of details to work out.

    The chaos had subsided by the time we were back in the meeting hall. Cooler heads had prevailed, and the unconscious had been attended to. I wasnt expecting this kind of furor, but ah well. Whats past is past. Gotta focus on whats ahead. I got to discuss things with Gazel and Erald, too, and if you think about it, that was a golden opportunity.

    Fuze and Elen and the others were sprawled out on their chairs, all but lifeless.

    Are you all right? How are you feeling?

    II heard nothing about this devastating news

    You, youre just awful, Rimuru! I didnt hear anything about that. V-Veldora was your friend? Did, did you ever mention that?

    They had a lot of, shall we say, negative feedback. I mean, what do you want from me? I couldnt really say Well, I had swallowed him into my Stomach and even if I did, theyd never believe me.

    Oh, didnt I? I think I did, maybe? Well, theres no point dwelling on the past. Come on! We got a summit to run!

    I tried to give them as breezy a smile as possible. It didnt work.

    Dont gloss over it!! they all shouted in unison.

    Ha, ha-ha-ha, yeah

    I did what I could to soothe them, smiling as I kept chattering away. Whyre they acting so mean with me, though? Im a demon lord now, and theyre treating me the exact same way. Which I was d for; I didnt want things to get all distant and weird. But maybe a little more respect?

    Are you even listening to me? Elen protested. You could at least try to be a little more apologetic!

    Yeah, shes right, pal!

    This has been hard on the ol ticker,mented Gido.

    Respect seemed like a distant dream at the moment. Of course, its totally in character for them all.

    Fuze hadnt changed, either. Ah, I just How am I going to report this to my boss? Wait! Im a guild master, arent I?! He had already epted the situation, just as bold and brazen as before. I couldnt believe this was the guy who let Veldora freak him out a moment ago. If I hadnt advised him to use the bathroom earlier, Im sure he wouldve peed his pants.

    I congratted him on that. He red back at me.

    As if none of this is your fault Im going to report this in detail to my bosses, then bill you for the mental distress youre putting me through!

    And here I was expecting him to thank me for my timely advice. Now hes angrier than ever. Well, whatever. At least my joking around helped Fuze find his voice again.

    So everyone had now epted Veldora, more or less. It was another hour before we finally got the summit rolling again.

    Now we were starting for real.

    Our conflict with yman remained an internal affair for the moment; that could wait. Soei gave me a quick report, but apparently, they couldnt discover ymans main base of operations. The fact that he had an army on the move was concerning, but Soei was keeping up his watch.

    Nothing new was going to happen with that immediately, so I decided to get this summit wrapped up first.

    I decided to begin with a recap, as annoying as it was to me. We had all been through a lot, butying out everything in detail to everyone at once should save us timeter. I wanted everyone to be on the same page.

    So I began by rting how I met Veldora, dropping in my status as an otherworlder along the way. Hiding my origins seemed meaningless at this point. All of my people in Tempest knew, and I had no vested interest in keeping it from Gazel or Erald. Its not like a demon lord also being an ex-otherworlder would give them anything new to work with against me. Leon was one himself, after all.

    I gave a quick summary of the orc lord fight and how it led to us building the town here. Sharing information was important, even if doing so led people to react in different ways.

    Moving on, I shifted to my voluntary journeys in Englesia. This involved a lot of glossing over of my life there, along with the request I received from Yuuki, but I did go into detail about my fight with Hinata. Man, she was rough. If it had been anyone besides me, they probably wouldve been killedBenimaru or Soei, even. Her skills were on par with or beyond Hakuros, and she could cast magic the likes of which I never saw before. That Holy Field one was particrly nasty. I used Thought Communication to let everyone else experience my memory and recognition of it. She might have a smaller version of that in her pocket, ready to spring on single targets. I didnt think anyone in the room could do much against it, but it was better than going on nothing. The more they knew about the threat Hinata posed, the better. They might be able to escape, at least.

    Hinata Sakaguchi?

    It was Fuze who reacted first.

    She may seem cruel at first. I suppose she gives the impression of a crazed murderer to most. But ording to the information we have, shes actually a little different from all that. For one thing, shes always willing to extend a helping hand to anyone who depends on her, and anyone willing to ept her help is sure to receive itbut if you dont listen to her advice, shell never deal with you again. Whatever her motivations, though, I am assured she is a rational leader.

    He seemed to know a lot about herand was willing toe to her defense, too. I didnt want to fight her, either Its just that she didnt want to listen to my story one bit, you know? If she refuses to help people who ignore her own background and situation, that describes my interactions with her pretty well. She must have a ton of people seeking favors from her, and I can see how shed want to ignore them after a while. Pragmatic would be the way to describe it. Yuuki described her as a realist, too. Im sure Fuzes intelligence was valid. He sure seems well-informed, doesnt he?

    Gazel nodded at this. Mm. The guild master of Blumund clearly has a finger in every pie, as they say. The uracy of your information is equal only to that of my own dark agents. I will dly testify that what you heard is exactly what we have heard.

    Nice to have the confirmation. But:

    Maybe so, but she didnt listen to me at all.

    She didnt. From the get-go, I was her target. Even if someone was feeding her a line about me beforehand, it was like she was deaf to me.

    Well, Erald said, that would be because one core t of Luminism is that you are never allowed to bargain with monsters. I was surprised to hear that from him. Hinata was enough of a celebrity to even be known in Thalion, it seemed. She had a rep in ces I never dreamed of Although, I suppose any nations intelligence agency would keep tabs on the most powerful knight in the Western Holy Church. Is she famous because shes beautiful? I thought for a moment but decided it best to keep that secret.

    Following their guidance, I began to build a picture of Hinata in my mind. She was notorious for her cruel words and coldhearted actions, but apparently she had never actually broken a single t of her religion. She was the model soldier in every way, an unblemished guardian ofw and order. So why didnt she put an end to the summoning rituals taking ce worldwide? The kind of rapid-fire summons favored by certainnds bore a very high chance of bringing children over. It was evil, really, on a national level.

    On the other hand, Fuze countered, do we really know for sure Hinata is aware of all of this summoning and willfully ignoring it?

    A fair point, but

    Summoning magic powerful enough to produce an otherworlder is a forbidden, secret Art, not the kind of magic youll see in public. The Council of the West has criminalized it, and Im sure you wont find a lot of nations wholl voluntarily admit to it. Theyll just say No, we dont do that and then make it impossibly difficult to pursue the issue any further. The Western Holy Church holds a lot of sway in their region, yes, but if were talking about getting to the point of freely meddling in internal government politics, then no, its not that deep.

    Even if a kingdom like Farmus used otherworlders as military weapons, Im sure theyd just exin it away as, you know, discovering an otherworlder on their doorstep and giving them shelter. Without solid evidence, not even the Church could investigate. You couldnt reallyin that Hinata was negligent, per se.

    And that brought to mind something else Yuuki had mentioned:

    If something seems the most effective way to her, shell do it, I guess you could say, butbut it makes no sense to me, no.

    Maybe Hinata really was working to stop this, in her own way. If so, there was no point stewing about it here.

    The point is, I reflected, Hinatas a serious threat. If I could at least get her to talk to me, we could set something up where we dont have to be dueling to the death

    But if the Churchbeled me a foe of all divinity, a duel would be unavoidable. I wanted to avoid that if possible, but if it happens, it happens.

    Heh-heh-heh-heh-heh. Perhaps I could go out and take care of her, then? There is no better way to quell your anxieties for the future than eliminating the problem from the start, no?

    Wow, Diablo. Confident much? Being the new guy on the team mustve made him hungry for work. I really wish he would think more before he opened his mouth.

    Whoa, man, you realize that even I lost to Um, I mean, fought to an even tie with Hinata, right? Just because youre on the scene wont make it some open-and-shut case!

    Hes right, Diablo, Shion added. If someone like you wants to face him down, then Ill go over and finish her off first. I await your order, Sir Rimuru!

    See? First Diablo starts mouthing off, then Shion joins the fray and goes all battle crazy again.

    Now, now, Lady Shion. I do owe you a debt for teaching me the ins and outs of assisting Sir Rimuru, so I hardly wish to berate youbut I sadly cannot believe that you could defeat Hinata.

    Oh, really? So you think youre stronger than I am? Well, fine. Lets go out and settle this for

    We will settle nothing! I shouted to distract them.

    Diablo might have acted all calm and collected, but I guess he enjoyed egging people into a fight, too. He was polite to me, but that didnt seem to extend to the rest of his superiors. Pretty brazen for a new guy. And the way he provoked potential opponents was downright dangerous with the hyper-impulsive Shion.

    Gwah-ha-ha-ha-ha! So its time for me to take action, is it? Very well! Allow me to just step out for a moment

    Youre not going anywhere, Veldora! If she targets us, well deal with it then, but theres no need to take a fight to her right now. Let me just repeat, I dont want to antagonize the Western Holy Church!

    I had forgotten Veldora was seated next to me. He was ready to fly out the door before I stopped him.

    Man, all these problem children Theyre growing fast, but still, educations so important for them. Come to think of it, Benimaru and Soei werent itching to start fights at all anymore, and Geld had enoughmon sense that I could rely on him. Gabil got carried away a lot, but he still knew his ce, so he never caused me many headaches. Plus, the way Ranga practically resided in my shadow, ears perked up for mymandhe was almost cutepared to the others.

    The big issue was with Shion, Diablo, and Veldora. Any mixture of the three was dangerous. I could feel my anxieties ramping up. Better be more careful dealing with them.

    Either way, thats enough debate about Hinata and the Church. We may fight them depending on how matters unfold, but I intend to proceed with caution and watch what happens!

    So that was settled. But one thing I couldnt forget was the presence of someone maneuvering behind the scenes. Hinata knew about meshe had an informant, she said, but there werent many people out there who knew I killed Shizu. Itd be hard to identify the mole, but it had to be someone I knew. The Kabal-Elen-Gido trio; Fuze and a few other Blumundians; and Yuuki. Beyond that, the only ones who knew all lived in this forest.

    But that would mean

    Raphael was busy deriving a list of suspects for me. I appreciated his logic, but it could be someone, or something, we had no knowledge of at all. I didnt want to work with the wrong impression, and I didnt want to suspect anyone without real evidence. Better just lock that in my mind and keep my eyes open.

    What was the point behind having Hinata and me fight each other anyway?

    Was someone hoping I would dispatch her?

    Did they want to obstruct me from returning to town?

    Or did they want to lure Hinata out into the open?

    Or all of those things.

    Seriously, Raphael? Talk about greedy. There were too many unknowns, and I couldnt shake the impression that I was being yed like a fiddle. Lets just be patient for now. It can wait.

    Getting back on track, I told the assembled group about how our town was attacked once I escaped Hinataa wild, bloody conflict, engineered by a clutch of Farmus otherworlders. I wanted to do something for the victims, so I elected to make myself a demon lordbut before I could continue, Elen made the confession herself.

    And my dad already knows, doesnt he? Like, thats the whole reason youre here, isnt it?

    Wow. The way she looked at Erald with those upturned eyes. Dangerously cute. The poor guys like putty in her hands with that act.

    Elen He sighed, resigned. It doesnt matter if I know or not. Theres no need for other nations to know, too

    I could guess how he felt. This really was Elens fault. What she did went beyond rocking the boatit totally ignored the bnce in this world. But Erald had guessed this would happen. Im sure, he had said in our earlier secret talk, my daughter Elen will reveal she gave you the demon lord suggestion. The only way to stop her would be to drag her back home, and shed hate me for it. It would be a terrible n.

    He mightve tried sounding like an expert strategist when he said it, although he sounded more like an idiot to me. Hard to tell, really. But Eralds prediction was right, so maybe the former.

    I turned my eyes toward Gazel, a bit conflicted about all this. Seeing him nod back, I decided to proceed with this discussion the way we had nned.

    All right. And thanks to that, I used the assembled Farmus forces as a sacrifice, and one thing led to another, and I sessfully became a demon lord.

    That wrapped up the basic story I had. Now for the real work.

    So Right. Everything I just discussed with you is the truth, but what well announce to the public will be adjusted somewhat.

    The Tempestians in the audience seemed pretty thrown by this. To the monsters, brute strength meant everything. Something like fudging the details for the story wed give other nations mustve seemed pointless to them. But lies and deceit are what politics are all about, really.

    What is the reason for this? Benimaru asked for the group. And in what way would you change it?

    I was ready for this question. We worked that one out in advance, too.

    The way well do this is that Ill dere myself to be a demon lord, but we wont reveal that Ive actually awakened.

    This is based on the assumption that other nations have no idea what actually went on around here. Theres no way for them to investigate the facts. Every potential eyewitness is dead, and apart from those of us in the room, only three humans know the truth. Everybody knew that the king of Farmus was a greedy tyrant, so it would be easy to frame our actions as justifiable self-defense.

    By our logic, itd sound far more credible if Farmus lost following a fully engaged battle, rather than being annihted by a single demon lord. Well also say that all those many piles of dead had unwittingly opened up an awful, dreadful seal. Yes, the blood that they shed as theyy there seeped its way underground, opening the eyes of the dragon that stirred belowin other words, resurrecting Veldora.

    Luckily, the champion Yohm, apanied by me (the plucky Jura-Tempest Federation leader whos angling to be a recognized demon lord), worked together to coax the dragon to our side, at the cost of many sacrifices. Quelling the beasts anger, we agreed to worship Veldora as our guardian. Setting things up this way would establish my im to the demon lord name and neatly pin all the me on Farmus while establishing us as the good guys.

    Think about it, Gazelmented. People fear what they do not understand; they will never willfully ept it. A monster who singlehandedly destroyed an army of twenty thousand will find no one willing to believe his ims about peace and friendship.

    Fuze and Yohm seemed to understand, as much as they groaned about it. And these guys were two of my closest confidants. Someone who didnt know me? Theyd react just like Gazel said they would. I could wind up at war with all the Western Nations the next day.

    But, he continued, if we im the Storm Dragon is behind the twenty thousand missing soldiers, that would be easier for the masses to grasp. The Storm Dragon is already a living catastrophe, after all, a mastermind of all types of destruction.

    This seemed to convince the crowd. Only Veldora stayed in his seat, snickering Heh-heh-heh, call me a mastermind, will you? You are a smart man, indeed andpletely missing the point. Well, if hes happy, Im happy.

    I support this n of action as well, Erald said. Stating that my daughter helped Sir Rimuru be a demon lord would inspire nothing but fear and disdain. Much better for him to have been able to negotiate sessfully with the Storm Dragon because he became a demon lord. Hell be much more appreciated that way, I think youll find.

    He smiled, his eyes looming over the meeting hall in search of dissent. I swear, hes the kind of guy who would do anything for Elen.

    Oh, Dad Thats exactly the kind of nefarious scheme I wouldve expected from a noble as crafty as you

    I couldnt tell if Elen was praising him or making fun of him, really. It made me feel bad for Erald a bit, as I waited for the audience to quiet down.

    And thats not the only advantage for me, I said. Its important that the human race doesnt needlessly fear us, but this might also fool the other demon lords eyeing me into thinking that Veldoras the only threat, right?

    And that would give me some breathing room to work with.

    After I thrashed Farmus, the demon lord yman must be on the lookout for me, at least. If we spread the rumor that it was actually Veldora providing the big guns, I think thatd make me less of a worry to him. Gazel, king of an allied nation, wanted to have Dwargone out of this looking good. Me, I wanted the Western Nations to think nicely of me, while making anyone hostile to me underestimate my abilities and put their guards down a little. For now, it was much more helpful if they thought I was a whiny pushover than someone worth fearing.

    Besides, if word gets out that weve got the authority to negotiate with Veldora, thats gonna keep a lot of nations from messin with us, dont you think? No matter what the Western Holy Church says, I think theres a good chance theyll have trouble finding anyone to carry out their orders.

    That might be the biggest advantage of all. Even before Gazels suggestion, we needed to reveal Veldoras presence sooner orterand if we did, we might as well do it when hes at his most useful. We were nning to tango with yman soon, so deliberately antagonizing the Church right now was nothing short of idiotic. Waging a two-front war would just spread us out too thin; we had to avoid that as best we could.

    The trick here was to keep our foes as unworried about me as possible but as worried about Tempest as we could manage. I tell you, Raphael made some choice edits to what was already a killer scheme from Gazel. Sensing his, my, and Eralds motivations, he weaved them all together to get the most use out of them in this n. Amazing work. Ever since that ultimate-skill evolution, his minds been sharper than ever before.

    I see, Veldora said, nodding his satisfaction. So now you have a reason to take care of me, then?

    Oh, great. He only listened to the parts of this story he liked, didnt he? That wasnt quite what I meantbut ah well.

    Apart from him, the rest of my government seemed to enjoy the idea. I understand the merits of this, Rigurd said, looking a tad relieved as he vigorously nodded. In this case, we can continue negotiating in much the same way we have before.

    That must have been a worry for him; how this would affect future trade with other nations. He was developing a keen eye for Tempests economic development that I appreciated.

    Brilliantly done, Sir Rimuru! A truly ingenious n!

    No, Shion, I admonished, relieved that at least she understood the gist of it. King Gazel thought it up. I just made sure all our feedback was included.

    My thanks to you, King Gazel, Sufiamented, baring a fanged grin. Now when we make our move, we can expect great things from Sir Rimurus forces!

    Phobio and Alvis seemed just as eager for the idea. The Three Lycanthropeers were on our side.

    Benimarus mind, meanwhile, was already elsewhere. Heh-heh-heh Very well. So now we can focus entirely on yman? If we cant win this, it will just prove we were talentless from the start.

    Good to hear. Id need him on the field. Soei, Geld, and Benimaru were of a simr mind, ready to roll out this very moment.

    Now I had dozens of passion-filled eyes fixed upon me. I nodded back at them. I need you to wait a bit longer, guys. You can go hog wild once this summit is over.

    We had a backstoryand now that we had somewhere to start, we needed to decide what wed do next.

    I told the audience about how we had the king of Farmus and a Church archbishop in our custody. In their ce, we would support Yohm as thends new king andunch a n to build a new nation for its people.

    Now Fuze was groaning again. After falling silent for a while, I guess he had finally worked everything out in his mind.

    Gazel was simrly quiet, eyes closed. His friends were bouncing ideas off one another, but opinions seemed to be split, without any clear consensus. Even Erald offered no words, no doubt coldly considering how the Sorcerous Dynasty should react to this.

    I watched them all closely as I continued my guidance.

    First off, we would release the current king, then force him to pay reparations for invading our country. This would be a pretext, of course; the actual aim was to throw Farmus itself into a state of civil war. If the king managed to gather his nobility again and attempt a resistance, his life was as good as gone. I was dealing with a king here. I wasnt about to let him off the hook twice.

    Now, if this king meekly agreed to our demands at this point, wed dy the whole Yohm-as-king thing for a while. By Raphaels estimation, however, the chances of this were practically nil. Even if he suddenly became a king who lived up to his promises, fulfilling his obligations would be punishingly difficult. His nation had just lost twenty thousand men and women of working age, and he needed money to rebuild his power. Hed be forced to im it from the nations noble families, but they were all far too greedy to cooperate.

    No, the king would find some excuse or another to ignore the reparations entirely. Then Yohm would raise the g of resistance, staging a coup to help restore good faith in the government. It was the duty of the survivors to take responsibility for a lost war. What if the king didnt do that? What if he ordered his government to de facto shake down the nobility for money instead? Hed lose any authority he had.

    The whole reparations thing was a wedge to rip the king apart from the nobility. Once he had lost all influence with them, the internal factions of their government would undoubtedly fall apart. The kings sons were not of adult age yet, reportedly; it was easy to imagine them bing puppets of the nobility. That, in turn, would certainly lead into battles over session.

    Either way, whenever things descended into physicalbat, Yohm would step forward, and the exhausted masses would hail him as their champion. No matter which way it shook out, it all meant that the current kingdom of Farmus was about to meet its downfall. Tempest, of course, would announce its support for Yohm, a champion they had been on good terms with for a while now. Once Yohm dered the establishment of a new kingdom, we would be the first to officially recognize it and open sanctioned rtions.

    The nobility, the source of current ruling power, would no doubt form an alliance to fight back, but wed already factored that into the equation. Wed simply exile them all, except for those who offered to cooperate from an early stage. If they insisted upon meddling with us, then theyd have to just disappear, sadly. We would serve as a deterrent to any such alliance, preventing any direct military activity while we sorted out who was friend and who was foe.

    In the midst of this, we would take the time to announce new policies that would win the trust of the people, boosting Yohms poprity. Once this happened, the n was to destroy the opposing forces.

    A nation couldnt be built overnight. Even at breakneck speed, itd have to extend to two, maybe three years. Of course, Yohm might be on the throne even quicker than that, if the current king made some particrly ill-advised decisions

    That was the basic outline. It meant that, however the timeline wound up actually working out, Yohm was ultimately all but guaranteed to be king.

    Personally, I exined, I have no interest in oppressing the people of Farmus. In terms of allowing their own ruler to go around like he owned the whole world, however, Im not absolving them of guilt. They will have to put up with some tight times for a while, and Id like them to put in a solid effort at rebuilding once its all said and done.

    Everyone thought silently for a moment before Gazel spoke up. I like this. I have no objections to the n itself. However, Rimuru, the idea of Yohm bing king is another issue altogether.

    He stood up, putting the full force of his gaze upon Yohm. It was powerfully withering, even from far away. Having experienced it myself, I knew exactly how the man was feeling right then.

    Ngh?!

    Yohm let out a grunt and clenched his teeth in the process, but he met Gazel eye to eye.

    Hmph. Well, he has great willpower, at least. But what of his character? Is he prepared to feel for his people, to take up their pain and stand before them?

    A hush fell upon the meeting hall.

    Heh. How the hell should I know? Im not here to be a king cause I want to. But if I turn down this role after hes put his full trust in me, what kinda man would I be, huh?!

    Hmm?

    Im just sayin, I dont wanna convince myself I cant do it and give up before I even try. I also wanna impress the woman I love, too, Ill grant ya that, but if Im going in, Im going in at full power.

    There was no waver to Yohms voice. He was speaking a heap of nonsense, but his determination made it all oddly convincing.

    Fool, Mjurran whispered.

    But so much like Yohm, eh? the beastman Gruecith replied, grinning. You have my word on this, Dwarven King. This guys an idiot, but hes not an irresponsible idiot. Once he takes something on, hell carry it out all the way to the end. And I, Gruecith, promise Ill be there with him the whole time!

    Mjurran nodded her agreement as all three sized up Gazel.

    Is that the case? Very well, then. If you need anything, call upon me.

    Like a light switch, Gazel turned off all his intimidation, nodding at them good-naturedly. I guess they all passed his final examand if they have the Armed Nation of Dwargon backing them up, that was huge.

    I have to say, though, you found quite an interesting man here, the king added with a smile.

    He seeks the throne to impress a woman? a shocked Erald stammered.

    Nice going, Gruecith. I sure wasnt expecting you to stand up here and abandon Lord Carillon in front of us all! chided Phobio.

    It felt like a circus, really.

    Yohm, intoned Gazel once everyone was doneughing, what we seek from your nation is agricultural production. I dont want to meddle in your political affairs, but listen to this: I know Farmus can keep itself afloat through its ck-market trade in my nations manufactured goods, but I think weve recently proven that this wontst forever, hmm?

    It was true. The exorbitant taxes Farmus ced on imported goods before reselling them had made it into one of the worlds most notorious price-gouging outfits. They were not exactly one of the Dwarven Kingdoms favored customers. Now, with a new highway linking Dwargon to a vast, fresh market, Farmus was losing its previous advantage. If the kingdom wanted to survive, it needed to have something newand instead of a field where itd bepeting with other nations, itd be easier to coexist if they zed a trail into unexplored markets.

    I had heard before that the Dwarven Kingdom faced issues with self-sufficiency in their food supply, so I could easily tell what Gazel was hinting at. I was just thinking that I wanted a new import supplier of grain for our nation, something that wasnt so dependent on what naturally grew in the forest. In short, the idea made sense.

    Id like to be in on this, too. Add new grain varieties for us to your list!

    Who woulda guessed youd jump on the train, too, huh, pal? Well, Ill get on it. Were pretty developed agriculturally over in Farmus. I think itll be easier for folks to ept than youd think.

    Thus, with Gazel and me sharingmon goals, we made a preliminary agricultural agreement for whenever Yohm was crowned.

    We agreed to take a break at this point while Shuna passed out tea to everyone. Once we were done, I dove right back in to the summit, reenergized. With Yohm formally epted by the summit, our mission to build a new Farmus was now under way. That was really the trickiest part of this whole meet; the rest was much smoother sailing.

    So as a representative of Blumund, Fuze stated, I have a proposal. Listening to King Gazel and Sir Rimuru speak, I believe we might have something to offer this n as well. In Farmus, there are two noblementhe Marquis of Muller and Count Hellmanwho share an intimate rtionship with Blumund. If we could negotiate with them to join our side on this matter, I think they could do much for our cause, dont you think? I believe they will provide staunch support when it is time for Yohm to take action.

    Whether hes a Guild branch leader or not, does Fuze really have that kind of power? Fuze, perhaps sensing my disbelief, gave me an awkward grin.

    As I stated, I represent Blumund here, and you may consider me to be a part of the Blumund government. I make this proposal not as a guild master but as a public servant.

    As he exined, Fuze apparently had a seat in Blumunds intelligence departmentnot as a member of staff but as kind of an assistant supervisor to the whole outfit. Which was fine and all, but this was kind of a huge offer he was making, wasnt he? Could he really decide on this solo?

    I asked him about this, and then he gave me an even more startling revtion. While I was meeting with Gazel and Erald earlier, he had already tipped off the king of Blumund about events here and had him draw up a document providing him full representational rights. Thats the kind of quick footwork I suppose I should expect from a tiny kingdom like thatnot to mention a sign of just how much Fuze was trusted.

    As he put it, Fuze had several pieces of info that would sink the whole kingdom if they were released. Secretly, I considered making him tell me somehow. I couldnt help it.

    So Fuze had been taking advantage of his position to divert all kinds of information his wayanything he thought might be necessary, even before he heard about our ns.

    The way he described it, the Marquis of Muller and Count Hellman could basically enjoy the Blumund kings personal support. Being a powerful noble in Farmus, the marquis was in no position to offer any public kindness to Blumund, but he and their king were close friends behind closed doors. Muller, in fact, was distantly rted to the Blumundian royal family, and they had gotten along well for many years. Count Hellman, meanwhile, owed a great debt of gratitude to the marquis, making it extremely unlikely he would betray him.

    Wow, you sure you want to reveal all these secrets to us?

    Ha-ha-ha! Oh, its fine. I am sure the Dwarven King was well aware of it all before I came here. The dark agents of Dwargon are just as talented in their jobs as our own intelligence group.

    As neighbor states, Fuze must have figured the dwarves would have known a thing or two about them already. Gazel simply twitched one of his shoulders upward a bit, offering no further reply. Henrietta, the beautiful night assassin poised behind him, blinked a bit as well. Soei praised her as a talented agent, and I could believe it.

    Hoh-hoh-hoh! Oh, you are being too humble, she said. The kingdom of Blumunds bread and butter lies in intelligence. If you are posted in the center of a spy agency for a nation that treats information as sble goods, Im sure you must be far more talented than my own team, no?

    The voice was friendly enough, but her expression indicated she didnt actually believe what she was saying.

    Ha-ha! No need to be so harsh on yourself. Our fighting forces would have nothing on your dark agents, I dont think! In terms of intelligence gathering, of course, I do believe we enjoy some useful advantages.

    Fuze was just as headstrong, it seemed. But Blumunds small size allowed it to cover intel from every nation in the world, no doubt. That was the most powerful weapon it had to defend its borders with. But regardless, if Fuze said it, it had to be true. Those two Farmus nobles definitely need to be recruitedand fast.

    Did you hear all that, Yohm?

    Yep. Ill add it to the list.

    Wed sell Yohm to them first. Hed enjoy a true champions wee, and itd be an epic event. But we could work out the details at another time. Yohms team could handle that at their leisure.

    Great! So thats how Yohm the champion will gain a country of his own soon.

    Everyone murmured their agreement, Yohm bringing a hand to his head in bashful embarrassment. Ill pretend I didnt see that and dere this topic well and truly settled. Next up

    Just as I was about to proceed to the next topic, Erald apparently finished processing our discussion and burst out into hystericalughter.

    Pff! Ah-ha-ha-ha-ha! This is so entertaining! The leaders and representatives of entire nations, expressing their minds freely without doubting one another for a moment I feel almost like a fool for staying on the alert around you all!

    He couldnt help but chuckle at the ridiculousness of it all, even though the light remained sharp in his eyes. This was absolutely the face of a high nobleman, not Erald the helplessly devoted father. Archduke Erald of Thalion, a man whose position made speaking his mind virtually impossible.

    Without warning, he stood up, overwhelming the air around him. The sudden change in atmosphere turned all eyes silently toward him. We nervously awaited whatever he might say next.

    The meeting hall was silent, save for the turning of the pages as Veldora read some manga Whoa! What the hell, man?! I didnt even give that to you yet! Whered you pluck that out from?! Ah well. He had no interest in listening to anyone here anyway. As long as hes shutting up, I have noints. He certainly helped relieve my tension just now. Lets just see what Erald has to say.

    The archduke cleared his throat to return the attention to himself, then solemnly opened his mouth. Thats resilience, there.

    Allow me to ask. The man over there Fuze. Do you truly ce your trust in this monster, Rimuru?

    That How do you mean, sir?

    I mean, even if a bunch of monsters decide to go and start a country, did you have to officially recognize them? And was there any need to establish official trade rtions, for that matter? In terms of your rtive locations, you certainly could have acted with less haste.

    We

    It seemed like an honest question, not one hurled out of spite. That was why Fuze found himself without words, having trouble finding his reply.

    What I am saying is this. If I were in your position, I would engage them in trade, yes, but I would also see how the Western Holy Church reacted. Give them confidential reports, you see, and leave matters to them if there are any problems. That way, you enjoy all the profit, but you arent beholden entirely to one side should issues crop upter. Isnt that the way any smaller nation should handle matters?

    The words, and his gaze, were sharper than any sword. And Erald wasnt the only oneit seemed like everyones eyes were upon Fuze now.

    Ugh, why me? he whispered to himself, and then: All right! All right! In that case, allow me to be honest!

    Resigned to his fate, Fuze tore at his hair and began speaking loudly. His usual brazen personality was backhe was facing the Archduke of Thalion, and he had had enough of all this formal, ceremonial speech.

    Duke Erald, I was of the exact same opinion as you. I stated the same case to my superior as well, not to mention a nobleman friend. But I was brushed off

    As Fuze went on to exin, when he tried to convince his boss of this, his concerns were immediately dismissed. The reasoning: What if Tempest decides to dere war on us? This was before I visited Blumund but after the battle with Charybdis ended.

    To them, we were this nation packed with high-level magic-born, powerful enough to take out both Charybdis and an orc lord. Waging war with them, Fuze was told, would result in instant annihtion. Luminism was not widespread in Blumund; the Western Holy Church would provide little serious backup. Any unwise moves, and the country would cease to exist. Resistance, they concluded, was futile.

    So what to do, then?

    Wed earn their trust, build a mutual friendship, and find a way to coexist. We wouldnt be afraid to cooperate with them as much as possible. That was the conclusion the highest levels of Blumund government made. And I mean, your nation and the Dwarven Kingdom are powerful enough that you have all kinds of choices avablebut with us, one misstep, and its over. And if were wagering our fates here, better to trust in the monster lord than the Church. Thats basically it, Fuze exined with some chagrin.

    Thinking about it, having his exact thoughts pointed out to him made me feel kind of sorry for Fuze. It was basically admitting that the kingdom of Blumund was too puny to take up Eraldsmon-sense suggestion. Not that it was wrong, butstill, good or bad, right or wrong; that wasnt important. They had decided to fully trust me.

    It was beyond reckless Or was it, really? If it blew up in their face, that was it, but they had concluded that there was no other way for them to survive. I was as powerful as an entire army; no wonder they saw me as a threat. Better to fight with us, not against us. For a small nation dealing in intelligence and living in the shadows of superpowers, maybe that was an effective strategy. Definitely reckless, but in a way, effective, maybe. Effective against me anyway.

    Regardless, I was sure I could trust in Blumund as wend Erald must havee to the same conclusion.

    Still, that is quite the brash decision. And if I could change the subject for a moment, I understand you came here to provide military assistance to Sir Rimuru? Was that the decision of your, ah, superior as well?

    Exactly. Weve ratified amon security agreement, and Ive been ordered to follow it to the letter. Of course, even if the government broke its promise, I would havee here anyway. Im a free man, Ill have you know. The Guild is unaffiliated with any nation by designnormally, you see, itd be crazy for someone like me to be here. You could say my luck ran out the moment I was appointed to Blumunds intelligence team

    He sounded like he had no idea why he took the job in the first ce. Almost too honest of him, not that he could do much about it now. I had no idea his king was so dedicated to keeping his word, though. Complying with that agreement and bracing themselves for war with Farmus And here I thought that treaty didnt earn us much of anything. Now, I was d for it. I had real insight into how they thought of us at present.

    Sticking to promises lies at the core of any human rtionship. That applies to nations as well; any nation that doesnt follow its promises, or treaties, cant really be trusted. This whole incident had proved to me that Blumund is eminently trustworthy. They risked their necks because they believed we would win, not that even they thought Id wipe out the enemy by myself.

    Can I guess who this superior is? He sounds like quite the gambling man.

    Fuze nodded, seemingly fighting back tears of frustration as he smiled. As youve probably surmised, it is His Majesty the King.

    You know, he did seem like a pretty nice guy when I met him. Guess hes more of an expert at this whole nation-leading thing than I thought. You need the guts to go all in when youre running a country, sometimes.

    So, he continued with a sigh, thats what was going on, and his choice wound up being the right one. Never in my life would I have imagined you defeating a force of twenty thousand, Sir Rimuru. And resurrecting the Storm Dragon? Its no longer a question of trust at all, Id say. And that document giving me negotiation rights here? I think the higher-ups mayve set a new record drawing it up.

    It was like he was the sole bulwark keeping his homnd from copsing. I could understand why he was a tad overwrought.

    Ah. I see now. The tension disappeared from Eralds face as he lowered his head a bit toward Fuze. I apologize, Sir Fuze. Thanks to you, however, I fully understand the kingdom of Blumunds intentions, here.

    Sly as always, arent you, Erald? interjected Gazel. You know I trust Rimuru. Theres no need to go feeling out other nations to satisfy your doubts.

    You may say that, Gazel, but its not going to be that easy for us to forge a new pact with a nation of monsters. I have a new, and healthy, respect for the king of Blumund.

    Ha. Enough of that rot. You came here because you had the decision made beforehand, did you not? So what is your conclusion, master strategist Erald?

    Erald reacted stonily to Gazels provocationnot because he was rtively safe in his homunculus, but because he really did just have that much nerve.

    You could say I havemade my own conclusions, yes. But before I answer you, can I ask one more question?

    He turned to me next

    Dad,e onnnnn! Stop acting all stuck-up and just answer!

    Whoa! Hey,dy, pipe down!

    Yeah! The archdukes trying his hardest to look all cool for you, okay?!

    The tension in the air was thoroughly ruined by Elen and her two cohorts. So much for the master strategist, mused Gazel.

    I felt a little bad for Erald, so I decided to bring some solemnity to the environment. Meaning I unleashed a bit of Lords Ambition.

    Let me hear it, Erald.

    I could hear my government stir in their seats, even as Gazel and his friends groaned in astonishment, and Yohm, Fuze, and the Eurazania contingent began sweating. I set it to run as long as possible, but it was even fiercer than I gave it credit for. This was, after all, the merger of skills like Coercion and Magic Aura, something I could use as an attack. Misuse would be dangerous.

    Still, I thought I had gotten pretty good at acting all kingly like this. The trick was to erase all expression from your face as you spoke. Hiding your emotions and taking a dispassionate tone was enough to freak your audience out, really. Between Shizus good looks and the wispy, transparent feel of a slime, the mix gave me this perfect sort of mystique. Add Lords Ambition to the picture, and it was perfect. I didnt need anything else. If I let my emotions bubble to the surface and started acting more like myself, that mystique vanished in short order. You had to train at this, really, so as a former middle-ss schmo, I think I was doing pretty well.

    Either way, it was enough to take in Erald.

    Heh. Impressive. In that case, Demon Lord Rimuru, let me ask you: How do you intend to wield your powers as demon lord?

    Oh. That? Simple. I wanted to create a world thats easy to live in, the way I picture it. A bountiful world where people could be as content as possible. No bluffing, no dodging it; thats what I really thought. So thats what I told him.

    That kind of thing, I guess. And Im sure Ill have some stumbles along the way. Its not going to be that easy, I imagine.

    Youyou seriously believe you can build that kind of fantasy world?!

    Oops. That sounds like real surprise, there. Ive sessfully managed to shock a high noble who almost never reveals his emotions.

    Well, you know, thats what my power is for. Ideals are just a bunch of raving without power to back them up, and power is just kind of a vacant void without ideals to back it up, isnt it? And I know Im pretty greedy, but Im not into seeking pure power for powers sake with no other particr goals in mind.

    I was rephrasing a famous line or two in my mind, and I think I managed to get my point across. I mean, doesnt this go without saying? You work at something because you want to aplish something. Thats the essence of humanity, I think.

    Ha, ha-ha-ha, ha-ha-ha-ha-ha! Hrious! That is hrious, Demon Lord Rimuru! A demon lord versed in the concept of karma! I think I understand why you managed to awaken yourself now!

    I didnt stop him fromughing at me. Let him have his fun. And once he settled down, he stood up and kneeled before me.

    My pardons. Demon Lord Rimuru, as the envoy of the Sorcerous Dynasty of Thalion, I hereby request the establishment of formal rtions with your nation, the Jura-Tempest Federation. I hope to hear a positive reply from you

    The hall fell quiet againexcept for that page flipping. Better not let that bother me. If I turned toward him right now, itd ruin the entire atmosphere. The sight of a Storm Dragon lying on a bench, reading manga while sipping some iced tea he had someone make for him, would just scramble my brain.

    I was hoping we could build a positive rtionship myself. I will dly ept the offer.

    Cheers erupted, and everyone leaped out of their seats to celebrate this memorable new bond.

    Today, we weed another faithful ally.

    So we now had the beginnings of diplomatic rtions with Thalion, our third human nation. Soon, Farmus would be no more, and Yohm would be at the helm of a new nation. Slowly but surely, the map was being redrawn. Things were moving, and elerating, faster than I had pictured at first.

 Volume 6 - Ch 2

    WORD FROM RAMIRIS

    Just as the summit was winding down, and I felt it was time to wrap things up:

    Bwaaam!!

    The doors flew open as someone stormed in.

    I heard all that! Tempest shall fall to ruin!!

    There was a tiny winged gind while it was hard to believe from looks, it was Ramiris of the Labyrinth, one of the worlds ten demon lords.

    I wasnt exactly sure how to take this. Should I open my eyes wide and go Wha-what was that?!? I didnt have much time to react, because Ramiris was flying straight for me, while Beretta was kindly closing the front door behind her. Long-suffering is the way Id describe that demons bodynguage, and I bet I was right. Getting bossed around by Ramiris all day would do that to anyone.

    Now Diablo was standing in front of her, dressed to the nines in his butler-y outfit. He had been stationed behind me, quietly listening to the proceedings, but he wasnt willing to let this interloper barge in. And really, he made capturing Ramiris look as easy as grabbing a dragonfly out of the air.

    H-hey! she shouted, iling around. Whatre you doing to me?! I just love her. She doesnt act the part of a demon lord one bit, and its just adorable.

    Sir Rimuru, Diablo said, walking back to me, I have captured an intruder. What should we do with her? She raved about this town falling to ruin, but how should we address this insolence?

    I looked at Ramiris. She was batting her wings helplessly, trying to escape Diablos grasp. Gehhh! Im using my full magic force, and I still cant escape him?! This, this cant be any kind of regr bodyguard! Who are you? What did I ever do to you?!

    She never was very quiet. And no offense, but given the iparable difference in power, I didnt think Diablo would lose her anytime soon. And this was a demon lord? See, this is why I sometimes wonder if being a demon lord is anything special at all.

    Do you know this fairy, Sir Rimuru? Fuze asked. Oh, right, we were in the middle of a summit. Right toward the end, in fact. If she had onlye in a couple minutester She never was good at taking social cues like that, either.

    Yeah, I do. This is Ramiris, and she might not show it, but I guess shes a demon lord, too?

    Hey! What dyou mean, I dont show it?! I am feared as the strongest out of all ten demon lords, Ill have you know!

    She shed me the most arrogant smile possible, still stuck in Diablos grasp and oblivious to how nonthreatening she looked. The audience was nonplussed, a few givingments like Huh? A demon lord? and Someone like that?

    What? Like, whaaaat? Come on, whats your problem? Youre supposed to act more surprised! Im kind of a demon lord, guys! Ramiris of the Labyrinth, in the flesh, all right?! Why is everyone acting so uninterested?

    I mean, demon lord or not, youre kind of caught between two fingers right now. If I had to guess, everyone thinks you must be some kind of poseur, you know? Im too kind to actually voice this, of course, but

    Well, as a demon lord himself, its only fair that Sir Rimuru would be acquainted with other demon lords, I suppose

    If anything, the Storm Dragons resurrection was such a shock, I dont think anything could surprise me at this point

    Our audience was nodding at one another. I suppose that makes sense, actually.

    Ramiris, on the other hand, was less than satisfied with that.

    Huh? The Storm Dragon? Veldoras been revived? You guys are being tricked! I beat Veldora into the ground with a single punch! That guy was all roar and no bite. Besides, his eras over now. If you want someone to fear, you can start being horrified around my presence today!

    She punctuated this with a high, haughtyugh. If anything, she had an even bigger mouth than Veldora. I had Diablo hand her over to me and took her to see him.

    Veldora, you mind entertaining this girl for me? Shes a demon lord, too, more or less, so maybe shell wanna be friends with you.

    Mm? I am busy unraveling a grand riddle at the moment.

    I didnt have time for his sulking.

    Oh, that manga? The murderer was [REDACTED]. Youre good now, right? Thanks.

    With that bout of mercilessness, I returned to my seat. Veldora looked shocked, eyes wide open. Maybe it wasnt the nicest thing to do, but were in the middle of a summit. I wanted him to think about his actions a little, not let him do whatever he wants.

    Besides, the sight of Veldora had already made Ramiris faint on the spot. Two problem children taken care of in one stroke.

    So wrapping up, I wanted to go over everything we had to do.

    Benimaru, our next target is yman. I want him taken down!

    Just what Ive been waiting to hear! Benimaru gave me a fearless smile, mes dancing eerily in his eyes. The rest of the Tempestians in the audience were simrly ted; I guess theyd all be would-be warriors over time. Didnt they all just have a huge battle in town a few days ago? Ah well. High morales never a bad thing.

    As for the Three Lycanthropeers and the beastmen under them

    No need to say it, Alvis growled. We are under yourmand, Sir Rimuru. Phobio and Sufia seemed just as enthused. I shouldnt have bothered asking.

    And you think you can beat him with this team, Rimuru?

    I will. Hes riled me.

    I see Gazel gave me a wry grin. I will trust you in your word, then. And in a smaller voice that I figured only I could hear: Here I thought you were my junior training partner. Youve grown far too much

    But I do not believe you can afford to think lightly of yman, observed a concerned Erald. He holds sway over a vast army of magic-born, and rumors tell of close connections with the Eastern Empire

    That doesnt matter. War is about quality, not quantity!

    Heavens, I think I can hear mymon sense copsing as we speak

    It was, indeed, totallycking inmon sense, but it was enough to quiet him. I could tell he was interested in what I had now. I knew it was crazy, too, but I also knew I was right. Therger army usually wins the battle, but that didnt apply to this world. The orc lord was a good example of that. As long as you can decapitate the leader, it was always the more adept fighters that dictated the results.

    Besides, this time, we didnt lose out in numbers, either. I had cut it out from the summit for brevity, but Soei had already briefed me on ymans movements. Soei was still pinning down an exact number, but they were moving sluggishly and still stuck inside Milims domain. His Replication would be back here soon, though, and I could save my final decision for then.

    That strategic meeting couldeter, but for now, we needed to make sure we had the script down for conquering Farmus. Wed release the king, then have the Marquis of Muller and Count Hellman pursue his me, beseeching him to take responsibility for his failure. Depending on how he reacted, Yohm would then spring into action.

    Regarding any actual war with them, that will be our issue to tackle. For now, I want all of you to trust in me and leave Farmus for us to worry about. It shouldnt be long before Ill ask you to help us make Yohm into the champion king of a new generation.

    The audience nodded their approval. When it came to human affairs, wed make a lot fewer mistakes relying on them instead of trying to go it alone. I was looking forward to their support.

    Now, Fuze, I want you to contact Muller and Hellman confidentially.

    Sure thing, he replied.

    Again, wed likely work out the details in ater meeting, but we had a n of action now. First, wed portray things so it was Yohm and his forces reiming the king from us. Wed then have the Marquis of Muller put the king under his protection, providing backup for Yohm the whole way. And about those three POWs, actually:

    By the way, Shion, how are those three dealing with your questioning? Did they give us anything useful?

    I had forgotten about thatit didnt really matter, in the grand scheme of thingsbut I had left our prisoners in the care of Shion this whole time.

    Heh-heh-heh Of course they did, Sir Rimuru!

    Ooh. Somebody sure is confident. I had a bad feeling about that. I turned toward Yohm and Mjurran, who were supposed to be present during all the questioning. They awkwardly turned their eyes away.

    Um, Yohm began. Yeah, um, questioning? Interrogation? Either way, they talked a lot, pal.

    That they did, agreed Mjurran. But that was no questioning. It was something surreal. Im not sure you could even call it interrogation.

    I really dont want to hear anything else, thanks. Shion overdid it, no doubt about itbut then, I let her. Itd be unreasonable for me toin about it, and I had no intention to. Even if I wanted to stop her violent rage, I guess I was cooped up in the cave and beyond contact range anyway. In a way, its my fault for not being there. Lets just assume I never noticed.

    Sorry, people of Farmus. But then again, you guys struck first. Hopefully, youll consider yourselves lucky for surviving at all.

    Either way, we had three prisoners in custody, and following Shions interroum, questioning, they seemed fairly willing to talk.

    First off, Shion began, Ed, Ednoyol? Ed

    King Edmaris? whispered Shuna into her ear. Thanks for that. But really, Shion? You couldnt evene up with the kings name? I know its kind of a weird one, but

    King Edmaris had apparently made contact with a merchant, one who brought him silken fabrics from our nation and whetted his appetite for conquest. The king also feared that trade would drift over to our nation in the future, which also led to those moves on his part

    Shions rundown continued, the content of which didnt surprise me much. The only thing it made me wonder about was whether that merchant deliberately spurred Edmaris to action.

    Do we know who this merchant is? Some ck-market dealer?

    I apologize, my lord. That much we do not know.

    She looked so sad about it that I felt the need to hurriedly console her. The question wasnt that important anyway. Lets switch subjects to Archbishop Reyhiem.

    Thats fine. What about the Church?

    Ah yes! He revealed who was pushing him behind the scenes. The name was

    Its a long one, Shion. You think you got that one remembered at all?

    The core of it all was Cardinal Nicus Speltus, Mjurran said after Shion shot her a pleading look. Shion was great at extracting information from people, but anything else? Forget it. She had some kind of mental block keeping her from remembering proper names. Better give her some other assignment next time. Good thing Mjurran was around. I cant really expect much in the critical-analysis department from Yohm, either, so she no doubt provided some handy backup.

    ording to her, Nicus stated that they nned to take us all down, as a nation clearly against the will of their god. nned to anyway.

    I see, Fuze muttered. So Archbishop Reyhiem wanted all the glory of defeating a godless enemy, so he could earn extra clout with the central authorities?

    Everyone seemed to agree with this.

    Either way, we still have some wiggle room. The Western Holy Church hasnt made a definitive decision yet. Perhaps theres a way to negotiate ourselves out of being designated hostile.

    In that case, Fuze said, let me handle that.

    His approach involved taking advantage of the Councils presence. They would release a statement dering that the nation of Tempest should be recognized, putting pressure on the Church to act. Appealing to the Council would also ce the spotlight further on Tempest as a waypoint along a series of new trade routes. The fact that monsters lived there was an issue, but they were all both kind to strangers and fully capable of speech. If anything, theyd dly be your friend.

    That much, of course, we had already proven. Or really, wed made it happen through all this astonishing evolution. In so many words, our aim was to earn treatment from the humans simr to what dwarves, elves, and other demi-human races enjoyed. King Gazel would back us up as well, keeping up a lively trade rtionship with us and advertising the benefits of Tempest with more energy than ever.

    This, I imagined, would likely not be enough to make the Western Holy Church abandon their core ts. But Dwargon and Blumund already had formal trade rtions with Tempest. Not even the Church had the kind of power to annul those agreements. And with us having such deep ties with a small group of human nations like this, other countries were bound to grow curious soon. Plus, we now had the Sorcerous Dynasty of Thalion dering their allegiance. That put even more pressure on the Church to settle matters.

    Not that this is for me to say, Fuze added, but recognizing Tempest is a double-edged sword. We all need to be careful to make sure we dont identally stab ourselves in the process.

    He was right. Blumund was in the tightest spot out of them all. Dwargon and Thalion were essentially beyond the range of Holy Church influence. Both were powerful enough that they could give the united Western Nations a run for their money. Blumund, meanwhile, was a blip, all too susceptible to pressure from outside its borders.

    Except all that was a thing of the past.

    Heh-heh Fuze, was it? No need to fret. We dwarves can make runs through Tempest to ess your markets as well. And with the stronger position that will put your nation in, the Council will find it prudent to tread lightly with you.

    Gazels right, I thought. Two nations, Dwargon and Thalion, both with different cultures and technical expertise, were interacting with each other through Tempest. This town was going to grow exponentially, I was sure of itand then, a new culture would bloom. Culture and technology. The sorcerous science Thalion boasted and the spirit engineering Dwargon cultivated would connect on our doorstep, two different families of tech rolled into one. It could create an industrial revolution straight out of fantasy, and the kingdom of Blumund would have dibs on enjoying it first. Even in terms of pure ounting numbers, the potential profits were enormous.

    Meanwhile, the new kingdom of Farmus created by Yohm would be reborn as a breadbasket to the entire region, filling the peoples stomachs and nting the seeds for an entirely new food culture. Wed need to spread the wealth around, to make sure none of us waspeting with another member of the alliance in each specialtybut I was nning to attend to that anyway, on the sly. Raphael, Lord of Wisdom, had calction skills that went beyond what even quantumputing could manage. Calcting global economic effects was no sweatand at uracies far greater than even the Earth Simtor supeputer in Japan could manage. That kind of made me sound like the man behind the curtain ruling the world, but I am a demon lord, so at least itd be in character.

    I could understand Fuzes concern, too. Blumund was so tiny, it might wind up being exploited by its bigger neighbors without any recourse to turn to. Thats why it was so hard for them turn away from the Council, as friendly as that alliance was to smaller nations like theirs. Of course hes worried.

    Maybe, in the short term, it wouldve been better for them to keep dealing with the Council. Pool all their intelligence skills together, and Blumund mightve even been able to force the Western Holy Church into all-out war against us. If that was the choice they made when they first met us, I mightve been in by now. But the Blumundians didnt opt for that. They trusted me and decided to walk down the same path.

    You do the deed, and then you get rewarded for it.

    Blumund had already picked me. I didnt see any reason not to take the hint. Living together in harmony was right at the crux of my ideal, besides.

    Fuze, when you return home, I want you to tell the king that I have a favor to ask.

    A favor? Not another painful one, I trust?

    Kinda rude, wouldnt you say? Itll take a while to exin, and Ill probably fail to get the point across to you, so Ill visitter to go over it in detail with him.

    Hoh! And Im the rude one? You make me sound like some kind of durd!

    No, no, I didnt mean it like that. I just mean, you know, do you know much of anything about economics, Fuze?

    I All right. I will give word to the king and arrange a time.

    Great. I nodded.

    Blumunds role here would be to keep statistics on the amount of trade in all the main manufactured goods of the region. Id have them examine the products imported and exported from each nation, then make sure that the necessary items were shipped to the necessary ce. To put it another way, I would have Blumund be the firstrge-scale tradingpany in the world. Get it right, and thered be nothing small about this nation any longer. Theyd be a financial superpower, wielding influence beyondprehension.

    Considering Blumunds geographical location, I wanted them to be a trade hub going forward. But that would wait until everything else wrapped up. I needed to defeat yman. Yohm needed to build a new nation; Fuze and Blumund needed to use their information ess to check on the movements of the Western Council and Churchuntil we won, at least.

    My main concern was the Church. I didnt think theyd make any sudden moves, but they still needed to be kept in ce. Neither they nor the Holy Empire of Lubelius were willing to recognize our nation. I wanted to postpone any conflict for as long as I could, giving us time to prove our effectiveness and devotion tomon harmony. If we had to fight, Id like to keep it peacefulbut judging by Hinatas reaction to me, that might be tough.

    None of these problems would be wiped up that easily. Everything depended on what we did from here on out.

    So about those three prisonershmm? Theres King Edmaris, Archbishop Reyhiem, andwho was the other guy? Oh, right! The dude who survived my attack. Were we safe letting him go?

    Shion, we had three POWs, right? The one who survived all the killing? That guy has to be pretty bad news, right?

    Huh? Oh, um, yes. That terribly frightened man.

    Frightened? Hmm. Maybe he was just some wimp who managed to survive through sheer luck.

    Hoh? The final survivor? If I had to guess, perhaps Folgen, captain of their knights?

    If Gazel knew someone on that force by name, he mustve been at least a half-decent military officer. So maybe itd be risky to free him? I turned to Diablo.

    What kind of guy was he like? Pretty strong, right? You think itd be all right to let him off the hook?

    No, Sir Rimuru, he replied, smile still on his face. He is a minnow, incapable of being a problem at all. By human standards, however, he does seem rather well-versed in magic.

    Hes a magician? Maybe not a knight captain like Folgen, then.

    Do you know the name, Shion?

    Yes! Its Ramen, sir!

    Ramen. Hmm. I havent had ramen in years, actually. Nothing like a steaming cup of instant noodles during an all-night deadline crunch at work. I miss that. Maybe Ill try to fashion someter.

    Ramen? Fuze asked as I basked in fond memories of my past life. Was there someone named that in Farmus?

    It does not ring a bell, replied Erald. And a magician, you say? I am aware of a magic-born named Razen who should still live there

    Razen the champion? Mm, a man who should never be omitted from the story.

    I know that name, Phobio chimed in. It is well-known even within the Beast Kingdom. The guardian of the greatnd of Farmus and among the most intelligent of magic-born!

    Yeah, I know him, too. A human whos mastered magic up to the wizard level and beyond. Ive always wanted a chance to challenge him!

    Im sure wed win in close-quarterbat, but he is not one to trifle with, no

    All the Lycanthropeers knew him, which surprised me. There was someone like that still left in Farmus? This Ramen guy didnt matter to me, but Razen certainly needed some attending to.

    Youre sure the man we have is named Ramen, Shion?

    Y-yes, er Probably. But hes just a young man! One of the people who attacked this town. Certainly not the master magician you all are talking about!

    She sounded a lot more assertive on the second half of that statement than the first. But hang on, didnt Diablo just describe our prisoner Ramen as a magic-user? Curious, I decided to get the story from a few more witnesses.

    What we knew for sure is that our captive was a young man, an otherworlder, who had participated in the attack. Everyone was in agreement on that.

    Diablo, are you making up stories in an attempt to earn Sir Rimurus praise? Shion goaded him.

    Not at all. I would hardly expect to be heaped with adtion for having defeated someone of such low caliber. I simply seek recognition that I have carried out the work provided by the master I serve.

    Thats true. Diablo wanted me to know he was a good servant, but he didnt say anything about his opponent being tough at all. He was dissing the guy every chance he had. So

    Come to think of it, Hakuro mused, when Geld and I cornered that otherworlder, a fairly powerful magic wielder interfered. I believe that man was named Razen, actually. He had prepared a type of nuclear magic he was ready to unleash at any moment. So we let the otherworlder go, since this wizard was much more of an imminent threat.

    So it is Razen, not Ramen? Razen, this guy I wanted to keep an eye on, was involved in the battle after all?

    Report. Using certain secret rituals in the realm of spiritual magic would allow one to leap between physical bodies.

    Oh, right. That.

    Dyou think maybe that Razen guy took over the body of the younger dude?

    Wha?!

    Shion was floored. She never seemed all that sure about our prisoners name. I was fairly certain my theory was correct.

    Heh-heh-heh-heh-heh And I am sure we will discover our wards true name shortly.

    Diablo pounded the final nail into Shions coffin. It almost drove her to tears.

    Our man turned out to be Razen, in the end. Nobody named Ramen out there after all. All right? So enough bullying Shion over this. What do you want from her? Shes Shion. Asking any kind of brainwork out of Shion is a mistake in the first ce.

    But:

    You dispatched Razen himself that easily?!

    I cannot believe it. The champion who supported Farmus for centuries

    He was one of the rare humans who was equal to me as a wizard. Superior, even

    All the shocked eyes in the room turned to Diablo. If you think about it, he is kind of a mystery. Whys he so keen on being my servant? He imed to be willing to work for free, so I had no real reason to turn him down. The guy describing this amazing wizard as a minnow kind of confirms how strong he is. And this was before I named him, too

    And right now, this guy was choosing to lord it over Shion. She gritted her teeth, no doubt frustrated over how she brought this fight to him and lost big. Ah well. Nothing shoulde of it, as long as Shion doesnt go and start acting like theyre bitter rivals. Having both a talented secretary and a ditzy one on board is going to lead to a lot of jealousy, Im sure.

    Right! So lets do this:

    Yohm, I want you to take the three prisoners and do something with them for me. Diablo, I want you to join him.

    Now Diablo was looking panicked at me. I could see Shion sneer back at him, but that order wasnt for her sake. This was the result of more serious thought. I was just thinking about who I could have help out Yohms team, assuming I left Veldora to keep the town safe. Someone who was reasonably intelligent, strong enough to handle anything that came his way, and could move fast if needed.

    Soei wouldve been the best choice, but I needed him on the battlefield. Benimaru was my general fieldmander. Shion was out of the question. Hakuro couldnt use Shadow or Spatial Motion, so itd take time for him to travel anywhere. Geld and Gabil would stand out too much in human society.

    Meaning Diablo fulfilled all my conditions. He said hed lend a hand when it came time to take Farmus down, so I doubted hed have anyints. Hed have no problem guarding someone as potentially harmful as Razen, either.

    I will leave this to you, Diablo!

    Ah, I understand, Sir Rimuru!

    He gave me a delighted smile. Something didnt seem quite right about it to me, but if he said yes, then noints. Right now, Diablo was probably third in strength after Veldora and me. No matter what happened, hed have it handled in a sh.

    This job might take several years, so I hope youll be patient with it. Contact me with Thought Communication if anythinges up.

    Not a problem, sir. I will be happy to handle this mission well before the allotted time.

    He sure had a lot of confidence. This was an entire nation I was asking em to take downbut again, thats another reason I felt safe giving him this assignment. Now, with all the ns settled, we could end this summit between nationsand now I could focus my full attention on all-out war with yman without any regrets.

    To finish off, I asked if anyone else had something to say.

    A hand shot up. It belonged to Erald, who was looking expectantly at me.

    Yes? I asked.

    Erald had been waiting for this. Our nation and yours are separated from each other by extremely treacherous forests and mountains. If we could connect ourselves directly through that region, that would allow us to cut the travel distance by quite a margin. A highway, in particr, would make the trek far easier

    He shot me a nce. Ah-ha. I knew what he was getting at. If we were gonna be building a formal rtionship with Thalion, of course wed want a direct link between us. Wed have to do that, of course. Products that used to require long detours to deliver would naturally be more attractive once we had a better road. That was a part of my n from the start.

    Of course, itd also mean wed have a lot of civil engineering to docutting down trees, building tunnels, paving the roads. The budget would be huge, and maybe they were a superpower, but it wouldnt be that easy to procure a budget like that. No doubt Erald already had some ballpark figures heposed himself, in hopes of forcing the whole job upon us.

    Erald, Gazelmented, you are asking for too much. Not even Rimuru can ept such a massive undertaking so lightly.

    Well, hang on. Im pretty sure we covered all the work and expenses for the highway to the Dwarven Kingdom, didnt we?!

    Dont be ridiculous, Gazel! If it was Sir Rimuru saying that, I would ept it, but not from you of all people!

    Ah. Guess Erald knew, too.

    So if Id already epted the job from Gazel, would it be wrong to say no to Thalion? In my honest opinion, I had no problem being left to the task. A highway was a small price to pay for their recognition, really. But if I kept taking these low-paying jobs, so to speak, every country we ran into going forward might expect a simr handout. Humans are sly like that, something I was sure reminded of by my experience in Blumund. They had me right where they wanted me.

    Lets get a thing or two straight before we go any further.

    I understand your suggestion, Duke Erald. We would be willing to ept your request for a highway. However

    However? Erald nervously swallowed as he looked at me. Dont worry, man. Im not gonna ask for much.

    However, I want you to let us handle the highways security and lodging facilities. Of course, we would take payment for this, in the form of a small transport tax on top of operating expenses for those services.

    It would be like running a toll road. Wed set up stops at decently sized regr intervals where people would have to pay fees to advance. That would provide us with permanent funding. We might start in the red, but over the long term, itd probably lead to profit. Our special interests at work, you could say. On top of all that, wed keep the highway maintained for them. A bargain, really.

    I see. Impressive. And only natural to demand that much. However, I would like to have the right to negotiate this transport tax, perhaps once every few years.

    Hohh? Eralds pretty impressive himself. He immediately saw what I was trying to aplish. Of course, none of this would happen without both sidesing to an agreement. No point setting that tax too high. Ill take the offer.

    All right. Lets go with that!

    Thats it?!

    Fuze seemed bbergasted, but I let it slide. In diplomacy, the power to make a decision trumps all else.

    Geld! We got a new job for you!

    Yes sir! It ddens me to hear. We have the teamwork to handle every step of the operation, the supply lines to transport the needed materials, and people with skills that knead and control the earth. The work you provide us is our very nourishment, Sir Rimuru, the best military training ground we could ever hope for!

    Huh?! Oh, uh, yeah Thats the motivation they go with, huh? And here I thought Geld had somemon sense. Maybe not so much? It was so surprising, I didnt know how to react for a moment.

    Um, yeah. Well, in that case, we better get this war finished up so you can get to work.

    Indeed. Soon you will enjoy the results of our daily training regimen!

    Geld was really up for a fight. Im sure hell be an asset in the one against yman.

    That was thest of the feedback I receivedand thus, after several twists and turns, our summit was finally over.

    A wealth of nations came to the bargaining table today, each with their own motivations, duking it out with words in search of a world where man and monster live hand in hand. It might havee out of nowhere, but this so-called Monster-and-Man Summit wouldter wind up bing a turning point in history.

    I had once again taken a major step toward my ideal.

    With our talks between national leadersplete, it was finally time for our anti-yman strategy conference. I figured we all needed to hear Soeis report first, so I ordered the meeting hall to be set up once more.

    As I did, I had the nagging feeling I was forgetting something. And it just so happened that I was. Ramiris. What was that noisy little pixie going on about? Was she still unconscious?

    Worried, I headed over to Veldora, only to find Well, take a guess. It was Ramiris, entranced by the manga she was reading! I was concerned shed start bawling unless I gave her some attention, but I had nothing to worry about.

    Hey. Hey, whatre you doing?

    Shut up a second. Im just getting to the good part.

    She didnt even look up at me. Why was she here again? That manga had her full attention right now, but she had something important to do here, right?!

    I suppose she mustve woken up, set off to yell at me again, and then noticed the manga volumes strewn all over the sofa. They mustve captured her imagination so thoroughly she didnt even realize the summit was over. She mustve made amends with Veldora as well, because now he was happily being served by Beretta, as if that whole fainting spell never took ce. Eesh.

    I turned toward Beretta.

    Congrattions on your evolution to demon lord, it said with a polite bow. Allow me to thank you, grand master, for letting me share in the benefits of said evolution. Thanks to you, I have transformed from an arch-golem into a chaos golem.

    This evolution had imparted elements of both holy and demonic force into it. That was mainly thanks to the skill Reverser, which allowed the user to obtain two diametrically opposed essences at oncein Berettas case, aspects of both demonic and angelic power, I suppose. A new spirit core was born inside it, fusing with its older, demonic one to create a new chaos core. This let it handle holy-element attacks, something it was weaker against before.

    I couldnt have been the only one who saw that as incredibly unfair. That rock-solid magisteel body, already impervious to most physical attacks and magic, and now it was even covered for what few weaknesses it had. You couldnt ask for a better upgrade than that.

    This unique skill Reverser was something involved with me, it seemed. A lot of the panic I felt at the time mustvee across to Beretta. When I was encased in that Holy Field, my emotions when I was left powerless by the sealed-off magicules mustve affected how this power manifested itself, I think. Given that an arch-golem runs on magicules, it mustve feared that it, too, would stop in its tracks. So it came up with this countermeasure.

    Between Reverser and that chaos chore, Beretta was turning into one extremely interesting research subject.

    Report. The unique skill Reverser is already integrated into the ultimate skill Uriel, Lord of Vows. Its effect can be re-created by applying Control Laws to metallic elements. Creating a new chaos core requires providing the correct conditions and materials to

    What?!

    Raphael just chucked that out offhand, but I couldnt believe how useful he was. Thats itFood Chain! I have Food Chain as part of the ultimate skill Belzebuth, Lord of Gluttony, so I can obtain the original model for any skills owned by my friends.

    Beretta had it, too, so we talked about it for a little bit. It seemed rather satisfied with the skill and the fun it had experimenting in thebyrinth. Following its evolution, it figured something simr mustve happened to me as well, too.

    In any case, I said, Im d youre still doing well. Once this is all settled down, we should talk a little more in-depth.

    Ha-ha! I appreciate you saying that. Now I have something to look forward to.

    Yeah. Im also d youre still listening to Ramiris. Keep that up, unless she gives you any orders thatre too crazy.

    I will be happy to. I promise I will not betray your expectations!

    Great. Hang in there. By the way, whatre you guys here for?

    I shot a nce at Ramiris, still enthralled by her manga.

    We

    Beretta mustve forgotten, too. It made a beeline for Ramiris, bringing her out of her trancelike state.

    Lady Ramiris, now is not the time for this. We must inform Sir Rimuru of the news

    Shut up! Im really busy right now!

    Please, mydy, recall your goals traveling here.

    I told you! Fate has brought me and this wonderful thing they call manga together! Oh, which suitor will she choose in the end?

    You cant argue with that impassioned logic. Literally, you cant. Oh, the pains Beretta must go through. I couldnt let this go on. I had a general idea of what she was reading, sowith a sighI decided to threaten her a little. If I didnt, wed all be forced to wait until she was done with the series, and that one was an epic running over forty volumes, so even someone as calm and Buddha-like in his patience as I couldnt hold out that long.

    Hey, Ramiris? If you dont want me to spoil it for you on who she goes with, then tell me why youre here already!

    The threat produced immediate results. Right! she shouted, saluting to me and hurriedly flying into the air, not a care in the world. It couldnt have been anything seriousjust her overreacting and carrying on as always. The rest of our visitors had stopped their chatting as they prepared to leave, also remembering that Ramiris was still there. I guess they all wanted to satisfy their curiosities before going.

    The fairy noticed the attention and proudly puffed out her chest (orck thereof), crossed her arms, and gave me the boldest nod she could.

    Ill say it one more time! Tempest shall fall to ruin!!

    Wh-what did you say?! I replied without enthusiasm, following the script. She took the bait.

    Hmph! You know, she said patronizingly, that isnt something I want to happen, of course. So I came all the way over here to tell you. You better thank me!

    I tried my best to avoid all her little jabs at me. Giving them attention would just prolong the conversation.

    So whyre we falling to ruin?

    Well, before I tell you She stopped, turning serious as she looked around to size up the dignitaries around her. Then she nodded to herself. Ah, I suppose this has a lot to do with you humans, too. All rightlisten up, all of you. ymans just proposed that weunch a Walpurgis Council!

    A Walpurgis what?

    Right, a Walpurgis Council. A special meeting of all the demon lords!

    Oh. She saidunch, so I thought it was some kinda huge magic spell at first. I was nning to storm ymans domain, so if she told me that yman was attacking first, I wouldve freaked out.

    Pressing her for more details, Ramiris stated that staging Walpurgis required the consent of at least three demon lords, and once convened, attendance was very much mandatory. Absence was never forgiven. It was one of the very few things the capricious, self-serving demon lords had agreed to on paper (although this still didnt prevent some extremelyzy demon lords from sending a representative with full rights to the Council instead).

    I think I have read about this, Erald said. Once, all the demon lords came together to wage an epic battle, one that the Western Holy Church named Walpurgis, or the feast of demons.

    This was something he had apparently read in some records dating back a thousand years ago. The war was a costly one, causing serious damage and disasters across thend. Walpurgis, the term coined by the Holy Church for it, had the connotation of not just a demonic feast but one attended by those who spread chaos and destruction worldwide. These were worldwide affairs, I supposed.

    So if demon lords gathered together like this, did it mean war among themselves, or them teaming up against some other enemy?

    So are the demon lords about to dere war on something?

    No! Im a busy woman! I dont have time for wars and other annoying stuff like that!

    Ramiris looked like she had a lot of free time, but never mind. She was a demon lord, one who had been around for a long time to boot. Maybe she was part of those conferences of a millennium ago; it wasnt out of the question.

    Erald nodded at her. I believe the demon lord Ramiris is telling the truth. The war in the records I read was officially called the Temma War, the War Between Heaven and Demon. It was fought by multiple factions, all vying for power. Of course

    As he put it, these Temma Wars (or Great Wars) were triggered every five hundred years. There was a reason for that. It was because the forces of heavenin other words, the angelscame down to earth at around that cycle. These angels were kind of natural enemies to demons, I suppose, but oddly enough, they would attack pretty much everyone indiscriminately. Developed cities and towns, for some reason, were a particrly favored target. Nobody knew why, but there you go.

    That is the reason why we never left the underground, Gazel saidand maybe they had the right idea. As advanced as they were, theyd stick out like a sore thumb. The Sorcerous Dynasty of Thalion took the same tactic, building a city in the hollow of a gigantic divine treethat fancy tree city, as Gazel had mockingly called it. As superpowers, both nations spared no expense in keeping theirnds safe.

    So what about the Western Nations? The Council of the West was established to protect themselves against monsters, but also so they could survive an uing Great War. Member nations worked together, while Dwargon and Thalion basically hunkered down.

    But the angels werent the only enemy to worry about. As if responding to their descent, the monsters on the ground would suddenly explode into actionin this case, the magic-born, knowledge-bearing monsters. Some demon lords would use Temma Wars to stage invasions of human nations as well. The Great War of a millennium ago saw that happen, which led to a lot of tragedy for everyone involved.

    The humans, to their credit, werent anyone to be trifled with. That could be seen in what was likely to be thergest antagonist of the next warthe Nasca Namrium Ulmeria United Eastern Empire. The Empires thirst for power could strike anytime, anyce. If the Western Nations showed any sign of weakness, the eastern power could bare their fangs at a moments notice.

    Thus, you would have these wild, frantic world wars, with angel and demon and human brutally ughtering one another. That was your typical Temma War.

    So I guess it was kind of nder to use the demon lords of triggering them. Not that I wanted one of those, either. And whats with angels setting their sights on the bigger cities? I wanted my city to be the richest one in thend, iparable to anything elsebut maybe I ought to wait a bit. Maybe its smarter not to develop the most important facilities we needed until we had the resources to defend them. But this was all in the future anyway. Lets just put it in the file for now.

    Back to this Walpurgis.

    So what is Walpurgis, though? What do all the demon lords assemble for?

    If it didnt have anything to do with a Great War, there had to be some other motivation.

    Wait. Is it that, maybe? Like, what Milim was talking about, how they punished anyone else who dered themselves to be a demon king? Are they gonna decide wholl do me in?

    Um, well, first, I think you have kinda the wrong idea, so lemme start with this.

    What Ramiris had to say hadnt urred to me at all.

    These Walpurgis Councils, yknow; we hold a lot of them. All you need is three demon lords to agree to one, which is pretty darn easy. Back in the day, itd just be this informal chat over tea with me, Guy, and Milim But Walpurgis is just a ce where demon lordse together, catch up on news, and talk about whatevers happenedtely. Its really not a huge deal; its just that humans dont know about it.

    This sounded like quite a revtion. Maybe she saw it as nothing, but it was almost scary how lightly she treated the demon lord job sometimes. Maybe I should take what she said with a grain of salt. If I epted it as the unvarnished truth, it mighte back to bite me in the ass sometime.

    Okay, then, stupid, if its just high tea with your friends, then whys this nation gonna fall to ruin?!

    Even someone as kind as I am felt the need to yell at her a little. This kid just has no idea whats going on.

    Look, no, all right?! She waved her arms up and down. The problem isnt that theyre holding Walpurgis; its what theyre gonna talk about!

    What theyll talk about? If theyre all meeting together, its gonna be about killing me, isnt it?

    As Ramiris put it, two people agreed to ymans initial Walpurgis requestthe demon lords Frey and Milim. That triggered itand the topic of discussion: The new force born in the Forest of Jura and their leader assuming the title of demon lord. So me, then.

    So you You dered yourself a demon lord?

    I nodded. Yep. And I dont regret it one bit.

    Mm, well, thats not so weirding from you. You might have to deal with a few tricky spots, but with all the power youve got, it oughtta work out, huh?

    Ramiris made it all sound like it wasnt her problem at all. Which I guess it wasnt. I mean, I was prepared for this, but still.

    You think they wanna punish me for it?

    Thats how theyre phrasing it, she replied, but one of the unwritten rules in our line of work is that if you wanna punish someone, go do it yourself, if you care that much. Theyre holding Walpurgis this time because they were betrayed by the demon lord Carillon. Plus, yman was going on and on about how Mjurran, one of his underlings, was killed.

    What kind of line of work is demon lord anyway?

    She ignored the question.

    But apparently yman had already fingered Rimuru, so-called new demon lord as Mjurrans killer. Which meant his goal was

    Report. It is believed to be the takeover of the demon lord Carillons territory and the suppression of the Forest of Jura.

    Yeah. I think so, too. So thats why his armys en route. I guess he made the first move before we even realized it. Shrewder than I thought, I guess

    Hey! Are you listening to me? Now Ramiris was giving me an uncharacteristically stern look. Youre acting like this no big deal, but its huge! Milims already taken down Carillon, I heard, and ymans ready to send an entire army of magic-born someones way. Punishment, heckthis is war! ymanse up with an excuse to take each and every one of you down, all right?!

    The summit attendees began to stir. Having one of the demon lords taken down was serious news to the superpower nations. I suppose it would be. It could totally disrupt the bnce of power between them. And while it had already happened, the news was a total bolt from the blue for everyone else. Pretty heady stuff.

    That, and:

    Lord Carillon, a betrayer? How dare that brute use him!

    yman will pay for this. Ill crush that upstart with my own two hands!

    Whether Lord Carillon is there to lead it or not, our armies are unhurt and in full fighting shape. Well never let ymans minions seize ournd!

    It goes without saying that the Lycanthropeers had the most visceral reaction to it all. Nobody likes their master being called a backstabber, I suppose. Plus, from what Ramiris said, apparently yman was gunning for his whole territory.

    Man, we really got ate start, didnt we? I had no idea hed be moving this fast. Better dispatch him quickhe cant be up to anything good.

    Calm down a sec, Ramiris. Yes, its true I dered myself demon lord, but I didnt kill Mjurran.

    What do you mean?

    I mean that ymans telling you a pack of lies. I expected him toe out against me with that usation.

    Plus

    Wh-what?! You got any evidence to show for that?

    either way

    Um, demon lord Ramiris? Pardon me for speaking me out of turn. I am Mjurran, the magic-born servant of yman who was allegedly killed

    Im gonna crush yman.

    The moment I made him think Mjurran was dead, I knew he was going to react sooner orter. I didnt take the baityman was just hooked by my lure. The rest of the demon lords werent involved.

    The sight of Mjurran threw Ramiris for a loop.

    Huh? Wha?! Wait, so Now I get it! The demon lord ymans the real culprit now, isnt he?! I knew it!

    Good thing she recovered so fast. Too bad that was incredibly obvious to anyone else in the room. I felt bad for her, so I decided to follow up on something else Id wondered about.

    Yeah, I agree with you there, but I wanted to ask you something.

    Mm? What? Just ask Detective Ramiris here, and shell crack the case!

    Uh-oh. I wound up just egging her on, didnt I? Detective? Seriously? She mustve been peeking at whatever Veldora was reading, huh? I opted not to pursue that for now.

    How do you think the other demon lords will react to this?

    I wasnt expecting much, but figured I had to ask. She had been a demon lord for ages, so I couldnt deny the possibility that she had something to go on. The room went quiet, awaiting her response. It was a question of deep interest to everyone else, too. Too bad Ramiris was so indifferent to that.

    Huh? Well, I dunno. It was just, like, Heres what well talk about during the party, so join in, okay?

    So nonchnt with it. I shouldnt have expected anything else. Just a kid. I should be d she came over to tell me at all.

    Next question.

    Okay, so when is this Walpurgis, Ramiris? Do you know the exact date and time?

    Id want to know that before we formte our anti-yman strategy.

    Oh, didnt I mention it? Um, its gonna be three days from now, on the night of the new moon.

    Three days? Thats sooner than I thought. Gonna be kind of hard to finish him off in just three days.

    Sois this showdown gonna have to wait until after Walpurgis?

    Another issue to bring up with the gang, I guess.

    That was about all I wanted to ask Ramiris. That was all she was here for, it turned out, and it wasnt like Id be able to glean anything else useful from her.

    Then a sudden thought came to mind.

    So whyd youe all the way here to tell me?

    Mm? Well, really, its like, if you get killed, whats gonna happen to my Beretta here? So I decided to take your side on this, and thats why Im here. That kinda thing. And Im gonna build abyrinth entrance here, but is that okay?

    No, its not okay! Whered thate from?! What kind of entrance anyway?!

    I appreciated her bringing the news, but this came right out of nowhere.

    Huhhh?! Whats the big deal? Dont sweat the small stuff!

    She never was one for listening. No, she was much more for talkingand arguing her point until she got it. As far as she was concerned, this conversation was already over. Shes one of the most free n wild fairies Ive ever met.

    I am sweating the small stuff, and you should, too! And dont go around thinking that Beretta is all yours, either!

    I held my ground, refusing to let her get her way. Any entrance to thebyrinth built around here could never possibly bode well for us. And Berettas fate wasnt just in my handsit had a lot to do with the golem, as well. It wasnt something she had any right to dictate. A simple question on my part led to what I could only call an outrageous proposal.

    We argued vehemently about it for a while, to no effect, before the crowd finally broke up. I was too busy to deal with her any longer, and Ramiris, her business apparently done, went back to her manga.

    As they left, I promised all the attendees that Id inform them of whatever new information I found. They all agreed to this before they went their separate ways.

    Fuze nned to stay the night at the inn before heading home. I hope youre prepared for what lies ahead, he warned. Its your country being targeted this time. A demon lord is a very dangerous thing. I think I know how strong you are, Sir Rimuru, but

    I understood what he meant. At worst, I could wind up making enemies out of several demon lords at once. Out of the ten of em, who could I count on as nonhostile? Carillon was AWOL. Ramiris promised to back me up, so theres one. Milim Milims my biggest worry. Im pretty sure shes just being tricked, but Id still need to prepare myself for the worst.

    So if I managed topletely screw up everything, I could have eight demon lords wanting me dead. Of course, if it looked like I was gonna lose Milim before that, it was probably best to run for the hills immediately at that point.

    Oh, Ill figure something out, I reassured Fuze.

    Erald and Elen also whined at me about wanting some time to talk to each other. I agreed to have them stay for several nights before leavingnot at the inn but at our luxury ryokan-style hotel. All of Tempest was proud of that ce, and if we could earn the dukes praise for it, he was wee anytime.

    It was funny, though, seeing how different Erald the statesman was from Erald the person. He was so preupied with his daughter that I was worried shed run off on himI just had to pray he wouldnt do anything to make her even angrier.

    Gazel also opted to stay a few extra days, so I lodged him in the ryokan as well. As I guessed from seeing them speak, they had known each other for ages, even fighting in battles together. Erald mustve really been a hell of a wizard. And now, funnily enough, they were using Tempest as a new channel to build geopolitical ties with. Its always better to get along, of course.

    We really enjoyed a celebrity lineup at this summit, though, didnt we? Leaders whod hold major sway over human nations in the future. Andif you think about itI was standing on equal footing with them. Having that selfish fairy crash it at the very end made for a less-than-snappy ending, but I think its safe to say I gained a lot from it all.

    We wouldve liked to rest up as well, but that wasnt happening. I didnt want demon lords breathing down my neck, and we needed some countermeasures.

    After a meal, we all gathered again in the meeting hall. The Three Lycanthropeers and Mjurran were our only guests this time. Yohm and Gruecith were already preparing to departGruecith really wanted a seat in the conference but relented after Phobio screamed at him. They had an important job to do, so I really wanted them to focus their full attention on that. I was hoping Mjurran would join in the preparations as well, but she was the one with concrete intelligence on yman, so I had to ask her to join.

    And for some reason, Diablo was joining us. Heh-heh-heh-heh I hardly have any need to prepare, he dered, and really, I had to assume he was right. There wasnt any reason to kick him out, so I gave him permission.

    The moment I entered the hall:

    Oh! You! You! Whatre you doing? Whats the meaning of this?!

    Ramiris osted me yet again.

    What do you mean? I asked. Then she began yelling at me, her face turning red.

    Here was the basic story: During this break period, she was called into the dining hall. I had totally forgotten about this, but Ramiris had a long history with Treyni and the other dryads, who served her back when she was still Spirit Queen. Treyni recognized her at once, of course, and it wasnt long before they were all giving her the royal treatment, answering her every beck and call.

    Thats pretty great, huh?

    Yes! Yes, it is great! Really great! So Ive decided to live here, too, Rimuru!

    Guess Ramiris really likes this town. And as a lonely demon lord with no minions to serve her, Im sure the dryad kindness lifted her spirits sky-high. Between that and being guided around town, soaking up all the sights, she decided to take the plunge.

    I told you to stop making all these unteral decisions! Plus, remember, Treyni and the dryads are kind of busy managing things in the forest. They dont live with you anymore! They cant spend all day dealing with you here.

    I gave the three doting dryad sisters waiting behind her some serious side-eye as I lectured Ramiris. She wasnt interested in listening.

    Oh, dont be so stingy! Whats the big deal? If anything happens, Ill help you out of it! Ol Ramiris is the strongest gal youll ever find!

    With your help, Im headed straight for the No. Never mind. If I said that out loud, itd make her cry.

    Sir Rimuru, Treyni said, we promise to take care of Lady Ramiris. I do hope you will be forward-thinking in your decision.

    Do it for us, please! her sisters said in chorus. I dunno. Shes gonna be such a troublemaker. Well be dealing with even more humans here before long, and Ramiris flitting around will be hard to ignore.

    Hmm Another issue for the back burner, then.

    All right. Ill think about it.

    You will?! Oh, Rimuru, I knew youd see things my way!

    Lets give some thoughtter to how Ramiriss presence would impact the town. I had other issues to take care of before that.

    With Ramiris suitably cated, it was time to start the conference.

    Right. I know its tough, having all these discussions at once, but bear with me. We have two items on the agenda here: fighting yman and the Walpurgis Council. Ramiris here has just informed me that I am being targeted. First, Id like you all to hear Soeis report and discuss our strategy. Soei, give us your briefing on ymans forces.

    Sir!

    He began right after my introduction.

    While we were holding our summits, ymans army had been busy. They had stopped in Milims domain to rest and organize their troops.

    They do not appear to be led by yman himself, Soei stated. Their leader is apanied by a slew of magic-born and boasts a great deal more magicule energy than the rest of them, but even then, his force is along the lines of the Three Lycanthropeers. If that is the demon lord yman, he is far too feeble a threat.

    Man, hes brimming with confidence, too, huh?

    In terms of Lycanthropeer-level strength, I can think of three magic-born serving yman who would fit that description

    That many, huh? Yep. Hes sure a demon lord, I gotta admit. These three were three of ymans five fingers, his most favored of assistants: Yamza, the middle finger; Adalmann, the pointer finger; and Nine-Head, the thumb. Mjurran, by the way, was the ring finger. The final little finger was named Piron but was mostly involved in intelligence gathering and rarely appeared in public.

    I had been wondering about the Moderate Jesters group and their rtion to yman, but Mjurran apparently knew nothing about them. yman was never one to trust in his underlings, she exined, so it wouldnt be strange at all for him to put observers in ce to keep tabs on us during missions.

    You could call them the audience for his puppet shows, I suppose. They mightve been active without any of ymans forces knowing, like in the orc lord battle. Better make sure I dont forget that.

    So whos theirmander, Mjurran?

    The leader Soei had spotted was a thin, frail-looking magic-born. His Thought Communication broadcast a perfect image of him to all of us.

    This is Yamza. Yamza, the Frozen Swordmage. He is a cruel, unfair, merciless lowlife but a regrettably talented one. He willingly swore his loyalty to yman, and we never did get on well after that.

    So the army was led by Yamza, a magic-born and (ording to Mjurran) the strongest of the five fingers. yman had granted him an ornate, expensive magic sword with the power to freeze its targets, earning him the nickname. In other words, there was no guessing what histent skills were without that weapon.

    Yamza wasmanding an army of some thirty thousand magic-born, all with varying levels of power. By Soeis estimation, around four-fifths were a solid B rank, the rest mostly an A-minus. There were a few solid As at the top, but were still talking Gelmud level at best. That made them stronger and dicier than the Farmus army I annihted but still nothing to really break a sweat over.

    A little too weak, arent they?

    Right now, the number of refugees we had taken in from the Beast Kingdom of Eurazania had surpassed twenty thousand. Around half, ten thousand, were in fighting shape, each averaging a B rankwhich went up to A-minus after their beast transformation. It was a surprisingly powerful force. Even Farmuss most elite knight corps were lucky to average a B, and that was with assorted magical enhancements ced on them, so it said a lot about how strong Eurazanias fighters were.

    Humans and beastmen were just different, down to the foundation. We had a big force of them, but Carillons domain still had more on reserves. These were beastmen that the army recruited from nearby viges during the capital evacuation, only to have them spread out across the countryside. The most powerful officers of the Beast Masters Warrior Alliance had brought them back together, regrouped them, and sent them off to hide out at strategic points. Add their numbers up, and they, conservatively, amounted to over ten thousand themselves.

    Thus, we had a total of twenty thousand A-minus fighters on hand. Carillon really was a demon lord. What a force hed had on him.

    It is strange, yes, Alvis said. Yamza is undoubtedly a powerful magic-born, but we Three Lycanthropeers would never lose to him. And while his force outnumbers ours, we hold an overwhelming advantage in training and fighting ability.

    Yeah, agreed Phobio, if you want leadership, weve got loads of it!

    Do they think that Lord Carillon died, and well just fall over like trees to them? Sufia sniffed. No, yman cant be that much of a fool

    All seemed to believe that ymans force wasnt much of a threat.

    Benimaru wasnt as sure. One moment, though Could yman be aiming at something besides this town?

    Ah yes. Maybe we had the wrong idea. Everyone was always trying to hit this town first, so Ramiris sort of assumed yman was after me once more and flew on over. And here I was hoping wed get to strike them from both sides once the army left Eurazania. The bestid ns and all that.

    So are they marching for the Beast Kingdom?! There are nothing but refugees left there, plus over ten thousand fighters. They may be better inbat, but ymans numbers could overwhelm them!

    Right. Soei reported that they were camped in Milims domain for now, but they had already reorganized and were ready to head into Eurazania territory tomorrow or the next day. I didnt think theyd attempt a night march, but wed need to factor that possibility into the equation, too.

    I wonder if they are aware at all that we are on the lookout for yman, Geld gravely stated. I wasnt so optimistic about that. Better to assume the worst; then we can take action when it happens.

    But even if they are marching for this town, observed Mjurran, yman would never ignore danger from the rear. He would snuff out the source of that first before proceeding.

    Yeah. So would I, actually. Butsnuff it out?!

    Wait, so you meanymans intending to kill off all the fighters in the Beast Kingdom?!

    And who can say if it was just the fighters

    Understood. I have predicted the actions of the demon lord yman. There is a 100 percent likelihood that he seeks to awaken himself to be a true demon lord. I do not believe this town factors into his ns. However, to achieve this, he is likely taking the crude and uncertain tactic of hunting down all remaining life in the Beast Kingdom of Eurazania.

    Ah. So genocide, then. Im a total hypocrite for saying this, but I cant say Im a fan of his any-means-necessary approach.

    yman never left any stone unturned. I was sure hed been observing the highway leading out from this town. The moment we sent out reinforcements, he would know. And even before that

    yman is a master of intelligence gathering. I imagine hes aware that we Lycanthropeers and the main Carillon force have evacuated here. Even if we marched for home right now, it would take two days, at least

    Weve totally been given the slip. Just as Alvis said, yman had read through it all. An armyposed of whatre normally B ranks wouldnt make it in time, even if they never stopped to rest. I was intending to invest all my troops in the fight as well, but by the time we reached the battle, the Beast Kingdom would be massacred already, Im sure

    But would that genocide be enough to make yman awaken?

    Understood. Despite theck of efficiency, he would be able to obtain a vast number of souls. ymans chances of awakening are78 percent. This probability would rise if he was able to obtain more souls shortly afterward.

    Thats bad. We gotta stop himif not for all those imperiled beastmen, then at least for my own ass. That being said, Eurazanias people were on friendly terms with us, and trust is worth a lot more than money. Sometimes,passion can help you as much as the other person. Theres no need to refrain from being fully involved.

    Benimaru, stop them.

    He grinned at my fairly reckless order. You got itor I should say, leave it to me!

    Nice to see hes a man of integrity, too. Get him heated up, and he cant help but drop the formal speech. He always treats me with so much respect in public, seeking to draw a line between personal and political life, but I wish he wouldnt go through so much effort. I dont want him openly sneering at me, so at least I dont have to worry about thatnot that public derision of me is a problem in this nation.

    I suppose its kind of like if you get promoted beyond your former boss in your workce, and it gets all awkward between you two. Its just the way society worksdeal with it. So I decided to deal with it and act the part of the boss.

    Great. We will now design a defense line for the Beast Kingdom of Eurazania. I want to hear suggestions for a way to win, with Benimaru taking the helm!

    My leaders all bowed at me.

    Yes sir!

    Even the Three Lycanthropeers joined them. I guess my dignity was more than intact.

    Still, that ymans even sneakier than I thought. Scheduling Walpurgis in the evening three days from now mustve all been part of the n. Hed stage his Eurazania genocide before any other demon lord could intervene, then gleefully report on it during the event.

    It would take time to unite the scattered forces across thend; right now, any fighters in the Beast Kingdom would just be picked off, one by one. Itd be impossible to resist. And then you have all those powerless civilians being killed without a second thought

    Now that wed decided to block that, the meeting hall was buzzing with ideas. Everyone wanted to assemble a force at once and head on overbut nobody verbally brought it up. Everyone here was deeply acquainted with the importance of starting with intel. I didnt move immediately after dering wed defeat yman, precisely because I was awaiting Soeis report.

    Even now, we were having supplies gathered in the towns main square and refreshing our soldiers equipment. Kaijin, Garm, and Dold were all crafting new weapons and armor, using their respective technical skills, and all our fighters were changing into them and preparing for the battle ahead.

    No point in panicking. You had to know the enemys location, army formation, numbers, and mission. Running into the fray without at least that much wont earn you any results to be proud of.

    Now our deliberations were nearing their climax.

    So thats about the war power we have on hand. If we can have them be there in time, we can win. The problem is transport, isnt it? Theres no way to make it, so we need a way to buy time.

    Why not send the goblin riders and Gabils force in first to stage a guerri resistance? Hakuro suggested.

    No, it would mean nothing, Benimaru calmly stated. Ive examined the geography of the Beast Kingdom, and much of it is either t or features low hills. There are few natural elements to conceal oneself in. A surprise attack from the air would be effective, but a guerri force of a hundred or so simply wouldnt be adequate.

    The best ce to hide a force like this would be the fruit orchards lining rivers, but these were spread out across hilly areas with good drainage, so not as subtle as wed want. The terrain wasnt suitable for concealingrge numbers of troops.

    Since when were you looking into our geography? Sufia quietly groused. I was actually kind of wondering that myself. Benimaru probably did some research when I sent him to lead our first envoy team into the Beast Kingdom. I guess I really can rely on him to be thorough. Sufia didnt seem genuinely offended, at least.

    We have a team of approximately four hundred beastmen who are geared for speed, Alvis advised. Bird types are rare among usno more than a hundred. Sending them out in advance would be a death sentence.

    Simply being able to fly didnt shield them from fatigue, after all. If they plus Gabils team couldnt even reach two hundred, there was little point deploying them first. With the high visibility of the terrain, too, small squadrons couldnt aplish much.

    So for our strategy, we would have to go back to basics. Plow everything into doing what we could, as urately as possible. Thats it. Wed send messages out to the fighters across thend, gather up as many civilians as we could, and evacuate them out. Once they were in Tempest, the dryads protection should do a lot for their survival rate. Wed then have our speedier forces to use guerri tactics to aid in their escape. The slower armies would march as well, swallowing up the refugees as they prepared to face off against ymans force.

    That was the basic wrap-up. It was a battle against time and relied a fair bit on luck, but we didnt have any better ideas. Thus, to prevent the worst, we decided that all of us should go out on the field to fight as well.

    Our top leadersBenimaru, Shuna, Soei, Shion, Geld, and Rangahad all learned the Spatial Motion extra skill, giving them control over transport gates linking two locations together. Diablo was born with that ability, too, but he was with Yohms team at the moment. I could call him back if things got bad, but I wanted to handle this with us seven if possible, myself included. Each of us mayve had the power of a whole army, but we couldnt afford to push ourselves too far. Shuna, in particr, wasnt too suited for on-the-groundbat; I wanted to have Gabil and Hakuro covering for her, if possible.

    Guess its the only way, I reasoned. If we can help earn our forces some time, I think we can pull this off with a minimum of casualties. Wouldve been nice if we could just bring em all over there with regr transport magic, but

    I brought up that idea mainly so I could publicly shoot it down. Our problems would be solved if we had magic that could instantly transport an entire army from one point to another, but not even my Spatial Motion worked on ten thousand troops at once.

    But:

    Understood. Transportation magic allows for the transferal of materials at a low cost. It works by using a separate dimension to link two points together, but it is not effective for handling organic matter, due to heavy magicule irradiation. However, anyone protected by a Barrier would not be affected by the transport. Those are the fundamental rules of transportation magic.

    Ummm So thats the difference between teleport and transport magic? Its just that teleport costs more magicules to cast, since it includes spells to protect who youre teleporting? Wait, so

    In other words, since magic-born and monsters have natural magicule resistance, anyone capable of erecting a Barrier over themselves can be transported sessfully without issue. A full-transportation spell that included measures to protect the target would also be possible.

    So if youre strong enough not to die when exposed to a ton of magicules, you can go across this separate dimension or whatever. I guess thats the way the Spatial Motion skill works. I shouldve noticed that. Whats more, if you can fully protect whoever youre transporting, its no problem to send em over. I suppose thats a sort of teleportation, really, but wouldnt that just waste a lot of magical energy? Besides, trying to adapt that into a legion magic you could deploy on tens of thousands of troops is far beyond what I could do right now

    Understood. The spell has already been developed. I have also seeded in pairing it with the extra skill Dominate Space to greatly reduce the magical force required.

    Well, look at that! I cant believe how much Raphael has grown, developing new skills and magic without me even having to ask. I mean, my skills mustve evolved a huge amount when I awoke into demon lord form, but I still didnt have a grasp of them all. They wouldve just been going to waste without Raphael. If I had to guess, this was Ability Adjust at workbut either way, I couldnt ask for anything better. Right here, right now, it had just provided me the exact spell I wanted more than anything in the world. Noints here!

    Sir Rimuru, Shuna warned me, aware of the danger, its too hazardous to attempt transport magic on an army

    Yeah, youre right, Shuna. But just now, Ive sessfully developed a new spell!

    All our problems were cleared away. I felt bad for yman, kinda. He wouldve won if it wasnt for my evolution.

    Ohhh!

    What on?!

    Just now?!

    Everyone gave me surprised looks. I nodded back at them. The question is: Are you prepared for this? If we use this spell, we can send our entire army over there at once. But itll be the first time Ive ever used it, and we havent tested its safety at all. Theres no time to experiment with it. But do you still trust me?

    I, at least, trusted Raphael. If Raphael says we can do it, then theres no room for doubt. But what about everyone else? Do they trust me enough to stake their lives on this?

    No need to worry, Benimaru said with a brazen smile. I have given you my loyaltyand as your loyal retainer, I would dly die if ordered to do so. I know all too well by now that youd never give us a meaningless order.

    The rest of my leaders agreedeven Diablo, the new guy, was nodding with that eerie grin on his face.

    The Lycanthropeers joined them. You got my trust, Sufia dered. We cant start getting suspicious of someone whose help were askin for.

    Hes already saved me once. Our fighters know that, so I aint about to start whining now.

    Oh dear, Phobio, youre making it sound like I have no choice but to agree. But were the slowest force, and as long as we are, Ill want to rely on Sir Rimurus power to help us out. Alvis seemed a tad dubious still but not enough to turn us down.

    I nodded at them all. I hear you loud and clear! Time to turn the tables on ymans schemes. Its all up to you men and women now. Let me see some victory!

    Rahhh!!

    I was starting to see some wild, ferocious smiles. If we can all make it in time, were sure to win. Plus, no matter how closely ymans surveilling the highways, hell never notice our troops get transported in. Its practically in the bag. No wonder everyone seemed so confident again.

    So I left reworking our strategy to Benimaru. While he was doing that, Soei gave another reportthat a group of one hundred Dragon Faithful had merged with ymans force.

    One hundred? That much shouldnt be a problem, said Benimaru.

    Did Benimaru know about this group already, or?

    Soei, I meekly asked, what are these Dragon Faithful?

    The name for those who worship the dragonin other words, Lady Milim, the Dragon Princess.

    Oh, Milims people? I thought Milim said she didnt have anyone working under her. So kind of like her fans, then? Her domain, which didnt really have an official name, featured a poption of under a hundred thousand, mostly people living off thend in harmony with nature. Maybe they were acting as bodyguards to ymans force as they proceeded through their domain.

    Soei didnt have any more information yet, so we dropped the subject. For now, I ordered him to continue monitoring the yman army, as well as search for a suitable area to deploy our own forces.

    That wrapped up how wed handle the battle. Next came the Walpurgis Council Ramiris had warned me about. The Three Lycanthropeers were already gone, rying our strategy to their troops and convincing them my transport magic would work.

    Mjurran left as well, since Walpurgis was my problem, and she wouldnt have any feedback for that. Her job was to assist Yohm.

    This meant it was just the usual Tempest gang and me, which put me quite a bit at ease. There was no need to hold anything back for politeness sake now.

    If we only knew where yman was, I could just teleport right on over and put an end to this pronto, but

    If his military was in motion, that meant his headquarters had to be more lightly guarded. My leaders and I couldve zoomed right over and finished him off without having to worry about a counterattack. Of course, I couldnt afford toze out on this towns defenses while I was away, either. Better keep that in mind.

    I apologize, Soei said. There is an area in the region surrounded by a thick fog of magicules. I found it too dangerous to proceed inside.

    No need for him to be sorry. He needed to be careful in everything he does, even with a Replication of himself. Itd be a lot worse if he screwed up and the enemy found out what we were up to. ymans HQ ought to be beyond that cloudthis was already enough of a lead to go on.

    Should several of us explore the area while it is unguarded? Benimaru suggested.

    Isnt yman holding Walpurgis shortly? Shuna coldly countered. I fear we may miss him entirely.

    True, true, added Hakuro as Benimaru winced. It would reflect quite poorly on us if we underestimated the enemy force and tasted defeat. We need Sir Benimaru to keep our forces together.

    All right. Any other suggestions?

    Shions hand shot up.

    Yes?

    Why dont we storm that Walpurgis thing and sh up both yman and any other demon lords who have a problem with us?

    Her eyes were gleaming as she said it. It was my fault for letting that idiot talk in the first ce. I could feel the veins throbbing around my temples, but I held it all back. This wasnt the first time I had to deal with something like this.

    Shion, how are you going to sh them up? Can you give me something more realistic to work with?

    yman solo was one thing, but picking a fight with yet more demon lords would never work. We needed to handle them one at a time, something Shion would have to learn sooner rather thanter.

    My scolding made her visibly depressed. Eesh. Lets try to soften the blow a bit. I may not act it all the time, but I like being kind to her.

    But crashing their Council might be a good idea.

    Her face rose, full of expectant joy. She was never willing to let a bit of praise go unnoticed.

    Listen, Ramiris. You have experience with them. Do you think I could join in this thing, too?

    Uweh?! You want to participate, Rimuru?

    No, I just wanted to ask. ymans gonna be there, so I thought it would be interesting if I paid a visit as well.

    If Im being targeted, showing up somewhere yman didnt expect me ought to rock him a little bit. Resorting to violence during a Council might not be too apropos, but I could consider my options once Im there.

    Hmm I think its probably okay. But you can only have two attendants along with you!

    Any more than that would lead to trouble that all the demon lords preferred to avoid. Once, one of the newer demon lords brought along a hundred or so warriors to the Council as a show of force. This stoked the ire of another demon lord whose nation had just been razed and was looking for someoneanyo serve as a little stress relief. That newer lord wound up killed, along with all the magic-born for dessert. Ever since, it was forbidden for rtively powerless magic-born to participate, and only two guests per demon lord were allowed.

    In other words, Walpurgis Councils had ended in violence before. Which meant it wouldnt be, you know, unprecedented if I did it. Maybe I should seriously consider trying to rile yman into a fight over there.

    Well, what do you think, guys? Think itd be fun to join in?

    Heh-heh-heh-heh. A wonderful suggestion. I would be happy to join you at

    Diablo, you fool! I will be by his side, and I refuse to allow anyone else!

    There they go. Shion and Diablo, back at it again. Bringing those two along would be suicide, so I crossed them off the list from the start

    But either way, Diablo said, if we go into battle with the demon lords, as long as we can defeat them, all is well. What need do we have for a demon lord besides yourself, Sir Rimuru?

    Shion briskly nodded her total agreement. Exactly! I had thought you were an idiot, but for a new recruit, you seem to have much potential! You stated exactly what I was trying to say!

    Are they friends, or foes, or what? Whatever they were, I used to think Shion was the only one who didnt think. But no, they both agreed that killing all the other demon lords was a fine idea.

    Whyd it turn out like this? Looking around the room, I could see a few other people nodding their agreement. A few were more conservative, but a lot of them seemed more interested in spilling blood than securing a victory. The flock of war hawks in my leadership seemed to be growing. But that was just way too reckless. Better hit the brakes on this conversation.

    Whoa, whoa. No need to go crazy. We havent decided on anything yet. Besides, Diablo, I put you in charge of Farmus, so Im not bringing you along either way.

    Ah, true. I understand.

    Diablo seemed to think of conquering Farmus as a childrens pastime. I liked that confidence, but hopefully it didnt cause him to miss something and mess up the whole thing. His emotions appeared mixed to medisappointed but d to be assigned work.

    Isnt that dangerous, though? Shuna asked. There we go. Thats the kind of opinion I wanted to hear.

    It is, replied Geld. Besides, even if we dont join the Council, wouldnt it be more effective to seize ymans headquarters while he is away?

    He was absolutely right. It was better to proceed with a battle we could win without exposing ourselves to danger. Geld was as much a hawk as any of them, but he wasnt that impulsive. I was d to hear that from himbut I had my reasons to contemte attending Walpurgis, too. Something concerned me about it.

    No, Benimaru said, what Sir Rimuru is most concerned about is what move the demon lord Milim will make. It is hard to imagine Lady Milim betraying us, but we cannot deny the possibility that yman is controlling her. Perhaps she has her own motivations, but at the very least, we are sure she has defeated Lord Carillon. I think it is not a bad idea to pursue the truth of that matter at the Council.

    Exactly, agreed Soei. I wonder why Lady Milim signed on to convene the event. Perhaps she has some kind of plot in mind?

    Great to see they were of the same mindsharing both my ideas and the issues they presented.

    Yeah, itd be crazy to think that Milim would just do whatever yman wants. I mean, Milim is so self-centered!

    Are you really one to talk, Ramiris? Maybe not, but I couldnt help but agree with her.

    I find it impossible to believe that Lady Milim betrayed us, Shion concluded. I have no evidence to back it up, but thats absolutely how I feel!

    Right. No evidence. And I didnt think she stabbed me in the back, either, really. Raphaelined about ack of data to work with, but even I thought that scenario unlikely, unless there was some vast change in the state of things. Ive decided to believe in Milimbut that doesnt mean Im letting her do whatever she wants.

    I agree with all of you. Milim hasnt betrayed uswhich means something else mustve happened to her. Like Ramiris suggested, I think its a good idea to consider yman the culpritor at least the cause of this. Thats why Id like to take up Benimarus suggestion. Im thinking about joining the Walpurgis Council and seeing what I can find out in there

    Something definitely mustve happened. At the very worst, Milim might attack us the moment Walpurgis ended. That was the real cause of my anxieties, the reason why I couldnt let her be. yman alone, I could handle. Him plus Milim, I really wanted to avoid. Well, at least Ive steered this in the right direction, and we wont resort to violence as our first

    Right? Right, right! Looks like Detective Ramiris had the right hunch the whole time. So how about we just kick ymans butt?

    Oops. Maybe not. Not as long as Ramiris was here.

    Besides, what the heck is with all you guys? You have this, like, treasure trove of powerful magic-born at your beck and call, Rimuru! If you had this many, whats the big deal about just handing Beretta over to me for good, huh?!

    She was getting carried away. The strength she saw in us was giving her a swelled headand she still hadnt given up on Beretta. Which, as I noted, Beretta has a say in, too, so her selfishness isnt gonna get her anywhere.

    But she had her allies in the meeting hall.

    I see. She makes a very good point. Rightperhaps I coulde over and do a little killing?

    Whoa, chill out, Shion! And Benimaru and Soei, I see you guys packing up to leave town! Youre not going anywhere yet!

    Here we go again. Just when I was ready to RSVP for Walpurgis.

    I needed Benimaru and Soei to fight ymans forces. Wed be carrying out these ns at the same time, so I had to select the two attendants joining me carefully.

    Who should it be? I could physically feel the pressure from behind my back. It was from Shion, of course. She might go nuts if I didnt take her. It was getting harder for Benimaru to keep her calm, so maybe I should babysit her instead. Besides, ymans schemes almost killed Shionthey did kill her, in fact. She might have a chance to take revenge for that, which was another reason to take her along.

    All right. Shes in.

    I wavered a bit on the second choice before settling on Ranga. I thought about having him stand by in my shadow, but thatd put us in trouble if a Holy Field or other special barrier was thrown over us. I could feel him perking his ears up toward me. Lets go with him. Hed make a great bodyguard.

    So that was the two. They both knew Spatial Motion, so itd also be easy for them to flee if it came to that. If I tried deploying the new barrier I devised based on Holy Field, I was pretty sure thatd get us out of there safe, at worst. That was something we could rely on as we joined the Council, at least.

    But what if Milim really was being controlled? In that case, it was likely that our town was next on the list for destruction. I had to do everything I could to prevent that. I had no interest in seeing this town be scarred again.

    All right. Im gonna join in. Im taking Shion and Ranga with me. Ramiris, can you send word that Ill be at the Council?

    Sure thing! she casually replied, before immediately opening up some kind of special demon lordonly line and informing the others about my presence. It was powered by this ridiculouslyplex-looking spell, using spatial interference to allow for synchronousmunication. I looked at it, curious about how it workedand then I heard loud, haughtyughtering my way.

    Gwah-ha-ha-ha-ha! So! Finally thirsty for some action, are you? No need to hold back now, Rimuru! Why dont you and Ie along together? I will tag along with you! Those demon lords arent worth fearing for a single moment!

    Come to think of it, I had totally forgotten I had this guy, too. I appreciated his confidence, but Veldora wouldnt work, no.

    Well, hear me out, Veldora. I want you to stay here in town so you can defend it.

    What?! He looked genuinely shocked. I said I will tag along with you. With me, you will stand taller than all the demon lordsbined!

    Hey, defending this towns really important work, too. Like, the most important work. Wed have all avable forces tackling ymans armies. That just left a few of Rigurs security toons and Shions team. Defending the town only worked with Veldoras presence. With him around, even if the Western Holy Church stopped by to attack, wed have nothing to worry about.

    I tried exining all this to him.

    So you see? You need to hold down the fort.

    Mmgh

    He seemed less than convinced. Right. Maybe I should give him the real reason. But just as I was about to open my mouth, Ramiris started shouting again.

    Hey! Rimuru! I just got off the line! They said it was okay, but arent you being really mean to Master Veldora? He could just be one of my guests, then. Thatd make me feel a lot safer, too!

    That seemed reasonable, at first nce. But I could tell Ramiris just wanted Beretta and Veldora by her side so she could look supercool around her colleagues. Veldora probably thought along the same lines, too.

    Hmm? No, I wasnt interested ining so I could serve as your guardian, no.

    Uwehh?! Oh, youre so cold, wise teacher!

    Whats with that teacher stuff? Ramiris and Veldora had be manga buddies in record time, I guess. They definitely got along, but in terms of the power bnce between them, Id say this was all Ramiris trying to curry Veldoras favor.

    Well, fine. The most important thing was that my presence at Walpurgis had been recognized. That was helpful for me, although it probably had more to do with how the other demon lords didnt want to venture near humannds just to deal with me.

    Were actually nning to start spreading rumors about you, Veldora. We discussed that at the summit earlier, but you knew that, right?

    Having him be Ramiriss attendant was an idea. Personally, though, I wanted the other lords to think he wasnting, since itd put them off guard for me.

    Mm. Yes. Of course.

    Nope. Sounds like he wasnt paying attention. He was way too enthralled in his manga to notice any of our proceedings. In that case, itd be easy to trick him.

    Well, its like this: If I brought you along, itd probably make yman think, like, Oh, that Rimuru, hes a wimp just bringing Veldora along as a ringer.

    What?! Curse that yman! Ill make him pay for that! Shion cried.

    Heh. That insect doesnt know what hes waded into, added Diablo. Perhaps I shoulde over and kill him after all.

    Shion, Diablo, calm down already, Benimaru chided, looking a little angered himself. That was just an example.

    Man, its so easy to tick those two guys off.

    Yeah, like Benimaru said, thats just what Im picturing him saying. So I mean, if we bring Veldora to the Council, people will be so wary of us that itd mess up the whole point of us being there, right?

    Veldora blinked. Hohh? Ah, I see.

    Shion beamed, though I wasnt sure she had thought about my words at all. A fine idea! Well said, Sir Rimuru!

    Heh-heh-heh-heh-heh Still, he will pay for making light of you. Id love to make him atone with my own two hands, but perhaps I should let Shion do the honors?

    So youll throw the enemy off their guard in order to make your negotiations easier?

    Benimaru, at least, had the right idea.

    But shouldnt we be avoiding danger as much as possible? asked Shuna. She had a point, and Geld and Gabil nodded their agreement.

    If the enemy is going to be wary of us anyway, added Hakuro, would it not be best to focus more on our own safety?

    Soei gave this a silent nod of his own.

    I could understand everyones worries, sure. But I could cover for that.

    Its all right. I can actually call for Veldora anytime I want with the Summon Storm Dragon skill. That doesnt count as an attendant, right? So if things go bad, I can ask for his help then. Until that happens, if it does, I want him protecting this town.

    I smiled triumphantly at the audience, asking them to defy me.

    My leadership seemed impressed, at least, as did Veldora: Gwaaaaahhhh-ha-ha-ha! I see! Ill be the great hero who swoops in to the rescue at thest moment!

    Great. If youre fine with that, so am I.

    Isnt that kinda unfair?

    Dont be stupid, Ramiris. I was hoping youd call it smart.

    Ramiris may not have liked it much, but Veldora was already murmuring his agreement. Just one more push

    Besides, that gives you one more slot to fill for Walpurgis, doesnt it?

    This visibly excited her, as it did the rest of my government.

    Oh, that totally makes sense, Rimuru! So whore you gonna match me with?

    I guess she had noints. Really, I think all she wanted was a chance to show off to the other demon lords. But at least she was on my side.

    Now for thatst one. I could feel all the unpicked holding their breath, but sadly for them, I needed someone strong in that position. Benimaru wouldve been great, but hed kinda be handling a war in my absence, so I went with someone else:

    Sorry to disappoint you all, but Id like Haku

    A moment, please!

    I was stopped by the woman standing behind RamirisTreyni.

    Sir Rimuru, I hope you will give me this assignment!

    Oh, Treyni! Just look at you!

    Ramiris was already tearfully epting the offer. Well, so be it.

    All right. Ill let you go along, Treyni.

    Now we had our member assignments for the Walpurgis Council. Me, with Shion and Ranga as my attendants, and Ramiris, with Beretta and Treyni under her. Then, if we needed it, Veldora was a quick summon away.

    Lucky thing, indeed, that I was epted.

    Me and Leon Cromwell also kind of had some issues to tackle, but Id settle with just meeting him in person this time. I had Shizus request to fulfill, and I didnt want to ignore that forever, but my target right now was yman. I hadnt forgotten about the orc lord chaos or about Mjurran.

    But most of all, I was concerned about Milim. One slipup, and I might be forced to fight her next. I was prepared to face down yman, but the idea of a life-and-death struggle with Milim made me singrly unenthusiastic. Itd be great if I could get all that worked out at Walpurgis. If not, Ill think of something then.

    yman, youve made an enemy out of me. And Im not lenient enough to easily forgive someone Ive identified as such. You better be ready for me. And if youy a hand on any of my people, you can expect to pay for everything you dish out.

    Dahh Now Im starting to adopt Shions way of thinking. Still, I couldnt help but feel a little happy about it. The time for fretting in darkened rooms was over. Now we had a clear, concrete goal to reach out to.

 Volume 6 - Ch 3

    THE EVE OF BATTLE

    It turned out to be unusually easy for yman to convene a Walpurgis Council.

    The use of Carillons betrayal as the topic was important to him. The way it was exined to the demon lords was basically that Carillon vited their nonaggression agreement by invading the Forest of Jura, and Milim punished him for it. That was clearly a screen, but none of the other demon lords protested. It would all being out during the Councilbut by then, itd be over. That was ymans aim. Walpurgis would earn him valuable time toward awakening himself, bing a true demon lord, and obtaining immense powers. And Milim would be there, too. If she acted subservient to him in front of the other demon lords, thatd just prove to them all that yman was not willing to ept any back talk.

    That was his n, and to make it reality, he needed his military operation to seed. It had to wrap up quickly, before the other demon lords could interfere. He also had the perfect excuseto punish Carillon for viting that treaty, just like how the Council was convened. He just had to produce the evidence he needed to prove it.

    With everything in ce, yman immediately took action. Passing through the demon lord Milims domain, his forces pressed on into the Beast Kingdom of Eurazania. Yamza, a man faithful to yman from his very heart, was chosen to be their leader. He was the only one who knew his masters true aimsto drive his army of thirty thousand into Eurazania and im the over ten thousand souls inside before the Council began.

    These people drive me up the wall! How dare they propose that we work together?!

    The man yelling angrily was Middray, head priest of the temple built for the Dragon Faithful in their domainsrgest city. This made him leader of those who worshiped Milim as a goddess.

    But, Father Middray, failing to follow this order would put us in serious trouble. Yamza, theirmander He bore an imperial edict from Lady Milim herself, did he not?

    The simpering associate pleading his case before Middray was Hermes, a member of the priests who served this temple. He had a transcendental air about him, which most people mistook as him being spaced out and insincere. It grated on Middrays nerves.

    Silence, Hermes. I dont need you telling me that! I know it!

    Hermes couldnt help but roll his eyes at the enraged head priest, even though he understood too well what irked him. It was those magic-born who had been camped out since yesterday. They hade here, to the City of the Forgotten Dragon, without warning and promptly upied it like it was theirs all along. Apparently, they were a force from the demon lord yman, heading for the demon lord Carillons domain to investigate an agreement he had broken.

    Refusing them simply wasnt an option. Middray could rant and rave all he wanted; it wouldnt have changed a thing. There was a pretty good reason for thisthe demon lord who toppled Carillons Beast Kingdom of Eurazania was none other than Milim, the object of Hermess and his fellow priests worship. If their supreme being was involved, it was only natural for ymans forces to ask them for help in collecting evidence against Carillon. In fact, if they didnt find anything, that would put Milim in an embarrassing position. Milim herself wouldnt care, but Hermes and the others would.

    Ah, Lady Milim can be such a handful sometimes

    Her selfishness could be forgiven, Hermes reasoned, but just a littlereally, a tiny amount would be finehe wished that she gave them a moments worth of consideration.

    How dare you, Hermes! You will never cast doubt upon Lady Milims actions!

    No, I know that, but

    But its getting harder and harder for us because were always spoiling her. He didnt say it. Itd just spark another wave of anger from Middray. This is quite a handful, he thought, sighing.

    He recalled how things had spiraled downward since yesterday. The army had requested permission to pass through in advance, and even then, their high-pressure tactics rubbed the priests the wrong way. This force clearly looked down upon the Dragon Faithful; it was obvious that their requests for support werent really requests at all. They were orders, through and through.

    The Dragon Faithful that resided here, in the City of the Forgotten Dragon, numbered less than a hundred thousand in total. They all worked together in their daily lives, there being no central government to speak of. As a result, none were particrly gifted in battlethey relied on Milims protection to keep the peace.

    That, at least, was how it appeared to outside observers. But this was only half right.

    Yes, there was no government. All the crops and other goods produced were collected at the Central Temple, where it was distributed equally by the head priest. It might seem like this system would fail, encouraging people to grow unproductive andzy, but that wasnt the case. Everyone, workers and nonworkers, was guaranteed at least a certain amount of the wealthand the more hardworking would also be provided with additional supplies.

    This was simr to the universal basic ie idea that had gained traction around modern Japan. The main issue was who got to decide how much of a contribution each individual made to societyand that was Middrays job, granted exclusively to him by Milim.

    That right afforded Middray all but absolute power in this city, but he never abused that power. Why? Simple: Because the other priests who served him had the right to dismiss him from office. If he got too selfish with his decisions, hed lose his post. That understanding was what kept Middray from bing a tyrant. (Of course, they already had a tyrant on hand in Milim, and nobody was stupid enough to try to imitate her game, but still.)

    Thus, these tens of thousands of people were far better led and organized than one would expect at first. While some may think the city wascking in military strength, that waspletely untrue. The Dragon Faithful, thanks to certain local conditions, all had very strong physical skills. In addition to their organizational acumen, each adult was strong enough to almost reach C rank. Their pacifism didnt make it clear at first, but this was actually quite a formidable group of warriors.

    The priests, in particr, were in a ss of their own. There were only a hundred or so of these guys, handpicked from the best the region had to offer, and they could definitely mess you up. Their daily prayer sessions to Milim (i.e. battle training) gave them superiorbat skills, and once you got up to the level of Middray or Hermes, they were even strong enough to give Milim a run for her money. Thats why Middray was so enraged that ymans forces were treating them like dirt.

    And that wasnt this peoples only secret. The second one was the clincher.

    Another day passed. ymans army was now freely raiding the citys storehouses for food supplies. The veins throbbed on Middrays forehead as he was asked to remain patient with them.

    But why has Lady Milim not returned? he asked, trying to adjust the target of his rage.

    Well, who knows? Hermes distractedly replied. They had gone through this back-and-forth a dozen times or so, and it was getting on his nerves more and more.

    We prepared this wonderful meal for her I hope Lady Milim is not hungry somewhere out there, you see

    I doubt it, Hermes countered. In fact, he was sure about it. The wonderful meal Middray mentioned was a te of natures bounties, which in fact was a bunch of raw vegetables on a te. Thest time he had a meal with Milim, Hermes stole a nce at her, only to find hermely chewing away, all expression drained from her face.

    I could tell she wasnt enjoying it, he thought. She was just trying her best to power through it. Judging by her joy when some roasted meat was brought out, there was no doubt in his mind.

    He had suggested to Middray that actually cooking the food might please Lady Milim more, but that fell on deaf ears. It was the head priests firm belief that providing all the glories of nature, in their most natural form, was the best possible way to pamper her. Thats exactly why Lady Milim hardlyes around any longer, he wanted to say, but itd be his neck on the line if he did.

    Hermes had traveled extensively across thend, giving him insight into the cuisines of many nations. The other priests, meanwhile, didnt have that experience. They were too closed-minded to think that anything apart from pure nature would be right, so Hermes just gave up eventually.

    Perhaps, perhaps not, mused Middray. But just imagine. That viin yman, thinking hes king of the world, making Lady Milim write that edict

    It was definitely written in Milims sloppy Er, unique handwriting. They had no choice but to carry it out, but they could only go so far with it.

    Yeah, true. We cant do much if its Lady Milims ordersbut theyve emptied out Food Storehouse Number Three, too. Weve only got seven left. Thats going to make things lean until the next harvest

    Dammit all!!

    Veins swelled across Middrays bald head like the skin of a melon. It was rather clear just how angry he was. And given how he had to work hard to keep fromughing at it, Hermes was a pretty shameless priest, too.

    As they spoke, the very source of all their troubles came walking upthe general manager of the yman force.

    Feh! Keep your cool, Hermes.

    I hear you.

    You first, Hermes thought. He was hoping the man would walk on past, but sadly, he was headed straight toward them. They closed their mouths and waited for the man, Yamza, to arrive.

    Yamza was the generalmander of ymans forces, a man seen as one of the demon lords most trusted confidants. Slender in size and build, he looked light enough to float into the air, making him a fighter built for speed. Or perhaps, not a fighter so much as a swordsman. A first-ss swordsman with arms as fast as a passing gale. The Ice de, a Unique weapon gifted to him by yman, allowed him to use the aspectual magic Ice Blizzard. Between that and histent sword skills, the Frozen Swordmage was an A-plus magic-born in rank.

    Well, hello there, Father Middray. We do appreciate the provisions youre supporting us with. With an army of thirty thousand, theres just never enough to go around.

    He shed a friendly grin at them, but his eyes werent smiling. He silently, carefully gauged Middrays response. He didnt give Hermes a nce. It was amon thing to see, magic-born treating humans like second-ss citizens. Hermes wasnt a fan, but he sucked it up, just as Middray told him to. There was no point starting a fight. He saw it as just a temporary affront.

    Ha-ha-ha! Its an honor to be in your service. However, sadly, it is difficult to provide you with much more than we already have. Lady Milim would be saddened if our people dont have enough to eat.

    What are you saying?! Even that little retort was enough to set Yamza off. Your Milim was the one who stepped out of line. Were trying to clean up the mess she made, so the least you could do is show us all the respect you can!

    It was an act, of course. He was pretending to be mad so that he could see how Middray reacted. If the head priest retaliated, he clearly intended to use that as a pretext to sack the city.

    Ah, my pardons, Middray modestly began. We were thinking only about ourselves there, for a moment. We will provide you with all the cooperation we can, so please feel free to ask.

    Hermes was thoroughly impressed. All that haughty elitism, and Middray didnt let any of his anger reach his face. He kept the smile going the whole time.

    Well done, Father Middray. Your head didnt go all melon-like at all. I wouldve snapped at him long ago.

    Yamza returned his smile. I see, I see. I was hoping to hear that. We have enough people to sweep up the Beast Kingdom, but allow me to give you the opportunity to help us out. You should be able to support us with material transport, shouldnt you?

    W-wait just a minute! First you take our food, then you take our people from

    Hermes hadnt intended to resist him. He just let his mouth run off. The next instant, Hermes felt an intense pain in what used to be his left arm.

    Ah?!

    Silence, you piece of trash!

    The slitted eyes of Yamza, ced upon Hermes for the first time, were cold as ice. Holding his severed arm in ce, Hermes gritted his teeth and red at him.

    So you dont know your ce. You appear in a hurry to die.

    Now his smile was brutal in its chill, as Yamza pointed his bloodstained sword at Hermes.

    Bastard. Thinks he can tell me what to do

    Just as Hermes was about to lose his temper, he was thrown back by a force like a wild animal butting against him. This was a kick, from Middray, hard enough to nearly break the skin.

    Ah, no, my apologies for all of this, Sir Yamza. Ill teach this fool how to behave correctly, so please, by my name, I hope you will forgive him.

    Middray bowed his head toward the magic-born.

    Pfft. Always a pain, isnt it, when the people below you are such idiots? I will forgive him just this once. We will depart tomorrow morning, so I want all of you priests to prepare immediately!

    Middrays mediation was enough to make Yamza sheathe his sword. But it came at a heavy price. The Dragon Faithfuls priests, the leaders of their people, had just been forcibly conscripted.

    Yamza promptly left with nothing more to say. He wasnt expecting fighters among the Faithful; he just wanted the priests and their healing magic. And thanks to Hermess needless meddling, Yamza had everything he wanted.

    After he left, Middray sighed and healed Hermess wound.

    You utter fool. I warned you about that.

    Im sorryI just couldnt help myself

    Hermes held his arm in ce as Middray began his work, casting the holy magic Recovery on it. In a few moments, the amputated limb was good as new. The blood loss made him a little light-headed, but he could use his own Healing skill to tackle that.

    All right. Well, even if the priests are gone, our people wont be affected right away. But that man

    The anger he held back was now clear on his face as Middray red in the direction Yamza walked off to.

    He is damaging Lady Milims own assets.

    He was referring to his attack on Hermes. It was an unforgivable act of aggression, although he was now trying to sweep that kick hended under the rug.

    That kick hurt like hell, too, yknow

    But Hermes didnt bring it up. He knew Middray didnt mean ill of him. As befitting someone who worshiped Milim, Middray tended to fly into violent rages all too easily. Something you could say about everyone in this domain, really

    No, but really Do you mind if I kill him?

    Fool, the head priest promptly replied. You dont stand a chance.

    He wasnt wrong. Hermes probably couldnt even scratch him.

    Yeah. That swords unbeatable, and I think hes hiding something else, too.

    Indeed. He is the confidant of that scheming sneak yman; he wont reveal his true powers that easily. A real man would put it all on the table to secure victory, but not them

    I wouldnt call that approach very smart, Hermes thought, but again, Hermes didnt agree too often with the way people thought in this domain. So he pretended to agree and went back to work. With the new deadline of tomorrow morninging out of nowhere, he had a mountain of business to settle.

    The next morning, with two days left until the Walpurgis Council, the yman force continued their forward march.

    It was the morning after the summit. I had been working all night, and my body was giving me a lot of guff for it. Or my mind was, anyway. In reality, I couldnt have been healthier. Not needing to sleep helps a lot at times like these.

    Last night, after our conference, Soei contacted me again. He participated in the meeting in the flesh, but one of his Replications reported in this time, after collecting information from across the Beast Kingdom. Soka, and the other four people on his team, were contributing as well, providing a few more solid leads.

    The yman force, ever on the lookout, still had not moved.

    In the midst of this, they all searched for somece to deploy our own forces, but a problem arose. The fleeing residents of the Beast Kingdom were spread out all over the ce. If we wanted to rescue them, then no matter where we transported our army to, we might have some areas left unevacuated before time ran out. Thanks to the yman forces invasion route, we weregging behind schedule.

    Suggestion. It would be more effective to transport the citizens to a single location.

    Hmm. I see. Yeah, I suppose it would be. No reason why that kind of transport is military only. Dominate Space allowed me to smoothly travel wherever I wanted, including to Soei, his Replications, or Soka and the others. I could then use the new type of transport spell we devised to collect all the evacuees together.

    Thanks to that, things got very busy after the conference. First, I had Gelds army go on ahead to build a field base that could ept these refugees. I transported them over to the former location of Eurazanias capital, which Milim had turned into a vacant lot. Being a wide-open field, it stuck out like a sore thumb, but thered be no better ce to deploy arge force in.

    Then I personally went from vige to vige, transporting the refugees out. This we wrapped up before the end ofst night, which was why I was so exhaustedmentally speaking, that is.

    Phobio was with me, which thankfully kept us from dealing with any resistance, although it exhausted him as well. Performing all this teleportation, he marveled before he left, looking at me like I was some kind of fiend. How can you keep yourself together? And such borate transport magic, over and over again It seems absurd.

    Well, thats rude of him, isnt it? Of course Im tired.

    By now, Phobio should have been asleep in a room inside one of the field tents Gelds force built. But that didnt matter. Our main force would be ready soon, so I needed to perform one really big transport shortly.

    I headed for an empty field just outside town. Rigurd was there, having spent the night preparing for this. Unlike me, he was running and hopping around, a bottomless well of energy. Rigur was called back as well, and he was pitching in all he could to help Rigurd. Once they were done, it was my job to transport all the people gathered here to our Beast Kingdom field camp. Once that was over, I nned to start preparing for the Walpurgis Council two days from now.

    Upon reaching the field, I found lines of Tempestian soldiers waiting for meincluding ten thousand beastmen, led by Sufia and Alvis. Their armor was piecemeal, nothing unified about it, but that was unavoidable. We had simply provided them whatever armor we didnt need, and since many were capable of transformation anyway, this was better than confining them in full uniform.

    Next to them were my leaders, ready to serve as reinforcements. Evenpared to the Charybdis battle, our sizeand our power to wage warhad grown tremendously.

    Benimaru, noticing, stood next to me and took this opportunity to exin the evolutions that had taken ce.

    Following my own demon lord evolution, everyone else in Tempest had some change of their own. The World Language said something about everyone in my genealogy receiving gifts, and I assumed that meant everyone I had named.

    Based on what we heard from the townspeople, he said as we faced the ranks of soldiers, the men now enjoy enhanced stamina. The women report that their skin is glossier and more beautiful than before. None of that mattered to meor I should say, it was beyond myprehension, but I suppose you could say their spiritual strength has risen.

    Some, he reported, looked like they turned back the clock a few years. Everyone appreciated it. But these were the townspeople. They were holding down the fort back home. Lets see what our fighters are packing.

    Among our toons, as well, there was a litany of changes. Some soldiers learned new skills for themselves; others gained the same skill in groups, based on the unique nature of their squad. I couldnt wait to dive in and see for myself.

    We first visited a group that had been with me almost from the startGobtas goblin riders, a legion of hobgoblins led by starwolves that almost never naturally appeared unless the right conditions were in ce. But were they really hobgoblins? Thats their species, perhaps, but their essence was something wholly different now.

    Astoundingly, they had all learned the extra skill Unify. This was a rare one that let man and mount quite literally be one, turning them into mobile, high-speed, four-legged warriors. They were awarded an A-minus rank in this formthey didnt manage a solid A since they were geared mainly for one-on-onebat, but they were killers in battle. A few working together could probably beat an A-ranked magic-born.

    That was the whole gimmick with them, of course. The goblin riders were a team, guaranteed to work rapidly with one anothers thoughts and remain steadily in formation. They were keeping up with Hakuros training, after and if you imagine a hundred moving in tandem, you can see what made these Riders so fearsome.

    I definitely felt like the human-invented ranking system was doing these guys a disservice. I could expect a lot more from them than that, even.

    Next, we visited some of Benimarus personal trainees.

    Once I became leader of the Forest of Jura, we started enjoying a lot morebat-ready monsters in our midst. This included three hundred ogres, the most powerful of which were young men and women from the vige that sought my help early on. They looked up to Benimaru a lot, which affected the gifts they received.

    It was really a crazy sight to see. Some had volunteered for the force, making them named warriors from the start. They were strong enough to be considered low-level magic-born, which made them a tremendously reliable asset. Even a wild, non-sentient ogre ranked a Band these guys were both fully equipped and had learned some Arts. These were never gonna be wimpy kids.

    These ogres had formed a sort of elite personal guard for Benimaru, and each was A-minus in rank. I named them Team Kurenai, or red me.

    Now, for the fighters assigned to Benimarus main force.

    This was around four thousand hobgoblins, and their evolution was really fascinating to me. They had more or less taken on the me element, learning skills like Control me and Resist Temperature Change. Kind of a surprise. Each soldier ranked a B equivalent, and you could call them a specialized assault team.

    By the way, these hobgoblins all had a reference to the color green in their names, since their skin was green. I dont know who named them, but I really wish he thought a little more about the long-term effect with that.

    Report. They were named by you, Master.

    I know!!

    Eesh, I wasnt expecting to get dissed by my own skill here. Talk about unwanted sarcasm. Like, I cant read that far into every single thing, guys. These monster evolutions just made no sense.

    Since everybody was named green something, I named this army the Green Numbers. Might as well go with it. I wanted to go with red something since these were Benimarus forces, but I kinda liked the feel of this, too. Itd be a nice little surprise, this green force unleashing all these me attacks. I think Ill have their equipment repainted green for the battlefield sometime.

    Next up was Gelds force, a sort ofplement to the Green Numbers.

    The high orcs all evolved in the same way, earning power-up skills like Steel Strength and Iron Wall. Their officer ss also had the extra skill Control Earth, letting them mold and sculpt thend around them. Good for digging trenches in a hurry, as Geld put it.

    In addition, everyone in the army had earned the extra skill Armorize Body, making them into much more of a defense-oriented tank unit. They had also taken on a lot of my personal resistancesResist Melee Attack to start with, followed by Pain, Rot, Electricity, and Paralysis. Kabals Charus Shield, thepleted version of the one I gave him as a present, was now a Unique piece of equipment that boosted his magic resistance. Basically, whether it was melee or magic, they could deal with it. I gave half a thought to exposing them to Shions cuisine so they could gain poison resistance but quickly banished the thought.

    Still, obtaining all those shield-like scales from Charybdis was really a stroke of luck. Kurobe had made lots of copies of the items Garm had created from them, and I really have those craftsmen to thank for that.

    Now, this unit was sturdy enough that each member ranked a solid B. That, plus the Unique equipment on each one, made them impervious to any normal force. It was almost unfair how defensively able they were, and they numbered five thousand, their ranks beefed up by a constant stream of volunteers. Normally, they were involved in construction work, but when they received the call, they transformed into a powerhouse, an iron wall that no attack could pierce.

    Their official name was now the Yellow Numbers.

    Close behind them were the hundred dragonewts under Gabilsmand.

    Dragonewts were naturally gifted with a pretty decent array of skills, and they had all but breezed into the A-minus ranks. Now, with my gifts, the dragon in their blood had awakened to an even stronger degree. Each of them now had the intrinsic skill Dragon Body, along with either me Breath or Thunder Breath, giving them some much-needed long-range attacks. Gabil could use them both, which meant he really was an exceptional dragonewt, I guess.

    What I still didnt really get was Dragon Body.

    Report. The intrinsic skill Dragon Body is

    Oh, um, I didnt need the full documentation. I know now that I cant use it, so theres not much point in hearing it. Im sure Gabil and the rest will take the time to figure out how to use it best, if they want. Whats the point of having power if you never earned it for yourself? Thats what I think.

    Huh? What about me? Well, I have the ultimate skill Raphael, Lord of Wisdom. If I have a problem, Raphael will help me out. No issue there. Thats my power, so in a way, its like Im the one making the effort there. I dont think its going too far to say that.

    So! Hopefully Gabil and his team can learn how to use that Dragon Body thing before its toote! Not to throw it all on you, but good luck.

    Still, in a way, it was almost like this squads talents were going to waste with Gabil. They could fly; they could breathe fire and lightning from the air Its nuts. And thanks to their intrinsic species aspects, they were resistant to pretty much everythingscales of steel, breastte armor of magisteel. Whether by sword or by magic, no halfhearted strike was going to break their skin. Flight alone was enough to give them an overwhelming advantage, but look at that defense! Speed, offense, defensetheplete surprise-assault package, all in one.

    I named them Team Hiryu, or flying dragon. They only numbered a hundred, but they were the strongest unit in our forces.

    Last but not least, we had a brand-new unit, one positioned as my personal elite guard. Led by Shion, they were also a hundred strong,posed of the victims I revived after the battle in Tempest. There were some children, age-wise, among them, but apparently they had grown up toand beyondthe point of maturity. I guess their frustration at not being able to fight encouraged that kind of evolution? Who knows?

    As far as skills go, they all earned the extra skills Complete Memory and Self-Regeneration. Those twoplemented each other. Complete Memory meant that even if their heads were blown off, their memories remained in their astral bodies. They could then use Self-Regeneration to recover fully instead of dying instantly. This meant they had basically gained the astonishing healing skills of the Orc Disaster of yore.

    If Self-Regeneration ever evolved into Ultraspeed Regeneration, theyd be pretty much immortal. And I had a hundred of these guys. I couldnt even deal. And thanks to that regeneration, they were durable enough to take Shions ultra-intense training and deal with it just fine. As a female member put it, one who was just a little girl not long ago: We dont die or anything! I didnt have much of an answer to that, no. I wasnt sure if this was the best thing for em, but hey, have fun! Break a leg!

    Their strength was at around a rank C for now, but I had a feeling that, over time, theyd be the strongest unit in our forces. With that expectation, I decided to name them Team Reborn. They all had a whole new life ahead of them, after all.

    That rounded out the briefing.

    It felt like the effects of my evolution dovetailed well with everybodys personal efforts to bear some major fruit for us. My first impression was Wow, were more damaging than ever. The total force was under ten thousand, but we could whip pretty much any army out there. Their numbers werent as strong as the Farmus military I wiped out, but in terms of war power, we wouldve totally overwhelmed them.

    All this stuff came as a total surprise to me. Being outnumbered is still a weakness, but wed just have to gradually build that up, between strengthening our country and negotiating with others. I think a standing force of around ten thousand would be the number to shoot for.

    Plus, we still had our reserve forces protecting the Forest of Jura. They werent part of this campaignthe difference in training was just too muchbut if we could work em up, theyd serve us well enough in battle, too. Thats something to tackle in the future.

    Still, after Benimaru finished his report, I couldnt help but be amazed by the sight of ten thousand of my soldiers in formation. That, plus ten thousand beastman soldiersan army of twenty thousand, all lined up and waiting for the order to march.

    Shions Team Reborn, as my personal guard, was on standby away from the crowd. They were holding down the fort back home this time, so theyd just get in the way among these ranks.

    Sir Rimuru, Rigurd reported, everything is ready. I thanked him for his long hours of frantic work. Oh, I hardly deserve it, he said, smiling.

    So if were all set, its time to get transporting.

    Oh, um, Lady Alvis?

    Alvis is fine, Sir Rimuru.

    I was trying to be polite, but I guess I made things worse. Lets just bulldoze right over that.

    All right, Alvis. We have all your friends assembled on the other side, so I want you to ry what we talked about to them. I think Phobio should be organizing them into units, so you take care of the rest!

    Understood. I promise I will not forget your kindness.

    She bowed deeply at me, followed by Sufia and the rest of the beastmen. It felt almost oppressive, but I didnt react. That was how they wanted to show their appreciation.

    You really saved us, a smiling Sufia told me. Now we can smash up ymans forces without a second thought. Well let you have him, Sir Rimuru, so take out all our anger on him for me!

    Pretty scary face, considering that smile. Alvis was simrly ring at me, in apparent agreement. Everything was set for them; now all they had to do was go wild on the battlefield. Wed enjoy a force of twenty thousand beastmen alone, so Im not sure we needed the reinforcements, but the more the merrier. If it was just them, wed still be outnumbered anyway.

    With these extra fighters, we now had a unified force of thirty thousand to go against ymans own thirty thousand. We were even now, and we were the better-quality army. Victory was as good as ours. The only problem

    Benimaru, any issues with our operation?

    While I was rounding up beastmenst night, I had Benimaru and his team shake down our n of action once more. The gist of it hadnt changed, but since we werent spreading out our forces to collect the refugees any longer, a few details needed to be changed.

    Were all set, sir. He shot me a crafty smile. If yman is targeting the citizens of the Beast Kingdom, then retreat is certainly an effective option as well.

    Yes. I agreed with him. No need to smash right against his front line and get people killed.

    I discussed it with Sir Benimaru as well, Alvis said, excitedly ying with the staff in her hand. Weve got enough leeway now to move the site of battle, so itll be a little while before we begin

    All systems go, then. Failing toplete his mission before Walpurgis would make for one angry yman, no doubt. At the very least, hed treat his underlings even worse than usual. If their armysmander fears that and starts freaking out, the balls on our side.

    We will deploy the force at the entrance to the Forest of Jura. The wastnd that was once our home, the now-toppled orcish kingdom of Orbow, it shall be their grave.

    There was something close to sheer malice in Gelds voice. ymans scheming cost him his home nation, and now it would be the site of the decisive battle. I suppose anyone wouldve felt the hand of fate at y here.

    The strategy, as it was, is pretty simple. Wed make it look like we had the refugees evacuate into the Forest of Jura, then strike at the enemy forces trying to pursue them. Thats about it.

    Raphael provided the perfect simtion of it in my brain. Obtaining and reying the information Soei and his gang gave me, I had a picture of the future that was almost as vivid as reality. I then Thought Communicationed that to everyone else, so we could all equally grasp it.

    Our original n called for us to keep the refugees secure as we lured the enemy over, eventually surrounding and destroying the force. With this change, the faster units would serve as bait instead. That reduced the danger to the individual forces involved, which greatly boosted the chances of this working.

    The key to this was making sure they were all inside the forest before crushing them. I didnt intend to kill them all, but I didnt like the idea of them running away and attacking againter. We had to be thorough.

    You got all that, Benimaru?

    Of course. Lets give them enough hell that they never dare defy us again!

    Ooh, hes got his no-mercy face on. I like that.

    Lets wipe em out, Benimaru! Shion added, cheering him on.

    Heh-heh-heh-heh-heh You need to take out the garbage fast, you see, before it rots.

    Diablo wasalso cheering him on? Im not so sure, but whatever. They both wanted to join in, of coursethey just loooove fighting. But Shion would stay with me to prepare, and Diablo would be stepping into Farmusnd soon. They were out of the picture. Now to just leave things to Benimaru and wait for the good news.

    Right! No matter what happens, I want you to report back immediately. Im sending you off now. Win this one, guys!!

    Rahhh! Victory shall be yours!!

    And now they were all looking at me, all those many, many eyes. As I regarded them with my own golden pair, I deployed a square of magic. I spent ages practicing thisst night, so I had it down pat. Beneath the feet of all twenty thousand, a giant square drew itself inyers, from the bottom to the top. Aplex array of geometrical shapes built themselves up inside, too intricate for me to figure out. Something this size, of course, required a lot of magic and concentration. My energy rapidly drained, but based on my figures, I should manage to hold out. (Not to brag, but my magicule stores had risen exponentially, too.)

    It took around five minutes in all. Everyone stood there, bolt upright, waiting for the transport spell toplete. And then, the moment the nge of shapes within the square stacked up above the heads of everyone insidethe entire army was gone, in the blink of an eye.

    Transportplete. Looks like we got them out of there.

    Back when I was practicingst night, I was a little concerned yman had noticed all the light this was generating in the darkness. So Ibined it with a blindness bomb to sap all the light away from the magic square. You never know where you may mess updiligence is key. There was no need for that now, though, and the sight that unfolded before me could only be described as magnificent.

    Well done, Sir Rimuru. Such a beautiful spell.

    Indeed. It was so charming!

    I had earned high marks from Diablo and Shion. Diablo mustve really liked magic. Once things calm down, Id like to talk shop with him a little. Maybe hes got a spell or two I dont know about. And Ive got to help Shion stop being jealous of everyone around her. I cant afford any weird drama around here.

    Such were my thoughts as I nodded at them, and we went on our way.

    After everyone left, we were greeted by a clearly bored Veldora. Rimuru, he asked, can I go and beat em all up, too?

    I knew it. He hadnt listened to a single word I told him.

    What are you, deaf? Im trying to keep you a secret until the Walpurgis Council begins! If you go crazy out there, the secrets gonna be out in two seconds!

    Gwaaaah-ha-ha-ha! Yes, yes, of course. I almost forgot!

    Almost, my ass. I dont know what to do with this old coot. I gave him a whole bunch of manga volumes I had stored up, but will that be enough? Because Im really worried hes gonna try to pull something stupid. Better keep a very close eye on him.

    Yohm and his squad also set off that afternoon. I look forward to having them tell everyone they run into along the way that Veldora is backI told them to make sure and phrase it so it spreads as quickly from vige to vige as possible.

    The purpose for this, of course, was so yman would hear about it as he keeps snooping on us. Hopefully the news will reach him sooner thanter, I thought as I saw them off. Diablo told me to expect us back very, very soon, but how much of a pushover does he think Farmus is anyway? It almost made me worried, but I still left things up to them anyway. Everybody makes mistakes, after all, and if something came up, we could think about it then.

    It wasnt long after when Gazel set off toward the Dwarven Kingdom. His assorted ministers were livid, which made his departure a bit more hurried than I think he wouldve liked. Guess that decoy he hired wasnt up to the job, and I could guess why. I definitely shouldnt be taking any lessons from him on that front. Nobody likes being found out.

    Another day passedand while Benimaru reported that things were moving along well, we werent without our problems.

    Naturally, a group of thirty thousand soldiers and refugees is a little restricted in where it can go. These were stout beastmen, however, not humans, so I was told that they should reach their destination without too much dy. I wasnt too worried, though. I had something to deal with that.

    Right, I said, patting Benimarus shoulder. Were all ready to take in the refugees here, so Im gonna transport all the nobatants over to Tempest.

    Oh There is that, yes

    Benimaru groaned, chiding himself for noting up with it first.

    You know, though, that transport spell costs a lot of magicules. The more people youre transporting, the more it adds up. At this point yesterday, I was fresh off moving a force of twenty thousand around; I didnt really have much free energy left. I couldnt go shooting that off rapid-fire, so it wasnt like I was deliberately wasting time. Besides, this was apletely new sort of magic, one that flew in the face of conventional approaches, so wed be able to weave this into future tactics with a lot more frequency. I mean, I dont think too many people could cast that spell anyway, so that should help preserve our unique superiority.

    Regardless, Rigurd had set up the required camping quarters after I sent everyone off yesterday, so I figured we could transport the refugees alone into here. So I did it all in a snap. And none of them were nervous about it, either. I guess they were all adaptable enough that they got used to it quick.

    I let Rigurd guide them around, since that work I started yesterday was still calling my name. I really wanted to finish it up in time for Walpurgis, so I just had to hope no more issues arose.

    In the end, the day of the Walpurgis Council began without any major crisis. My work was done before lunch, allowing me to dive into the final stages that afternoon. Looks like Ill be on time. Thats a relief.

    Rimuru, is this?

    What do you think? Pretty neat, huh?

    Whatre you, some kind of genius?!

    I had enough of dealing with Ramiriss yelling at me. I didnt want to engage any longer. I had to save my mental acuity for this evening, so Id just ignore her rantings for now.

    After lunch, I worked on the final touches, then ced the finished item in my Stomach and headed over to the treant vige where Treyni lived. Veldora wanted to join me, but hed have to wait. I didnt want anyone attacking town, not that I thought they would. Right now, the whole urban area was being protected by a Barrier that Veldora put over it. That prevented any potential eavesdropping from yman as well, so him abandoning town at the moment was a bad idea.

    So I promised him next time and set off with Ramiris and Treyni. I assigned Beretta to deal with him, as much as it hurt my conscience. Hell probably be used and abused, Im sure. Ill have to reward himter.

    With a quick casting of Dominate Space, we were on our way. Once we reached the vige, we quickly spotted the insectoids Apito and Zegion. When I first saved his life, Apito was maybe around a foot long, but now he had grown to nearly twenty inches. It was great to see that guy in good health. Zegion, meanwhile, was at well over two feet and strong enough that a lot of monsters knew better than to pick a fight. Of course, there werent any monsters around here that were hostile to Zegion anyway, so theres no real way to gauge his power. I told it not to do anything too risky, so it probably hasnt. Unlike Gobta and Gabil, it knew its limits and didnt get all carried away over everything.

    Apito flitted right up once it spotted me, happily providing me with some honey. Ah, thanks! The perfect medicine. Lets have a lil taste of that Mm. Yep. That most rare of cure-allsand it tastes real good, too.

    Hey, whoa, um, Rimuru Er, Sir Rimuru? I wanted to ask you something.

    I looked toward Ramiris. She looked freaked out.

    What?

    Those insects Are those army wasps?

    Hmm? I dunno.

    You dont know?!

    Ramiris gave me the most exaggerated double take I ever saw. So what if theyre army wasps?

    (Sir Rimuru,) Apito telepathically said to me, (it is as that person says. I am a queen wasp, the highest of the army wasp order. Would you like me to summon my queendom?)

    Whoa, that sounds pretty fancy. I think we can go without that for now, though.

    (You can save it for when this vige is under attack. If you want your friends around here, Im sure you can talk that over with the treants.)

    (Ill refrain for now, then,) Apito said, wings thrumming in what sounded like a happy buzz as it flew off. It sounded quite pretty, if a bit chainsaw-like and lethal. Are army wasps pretty dangerous beasts, then? I doubt it. Apito, collecting honey for me and everything, hardly seemed hostile at all.

    Plus, Zegion was there, too, giving me a shy salute as it followed after Apito. Maybe that guy was the king of the insects or somethingit certainly felt kind of regal. I was pretty sure itd only grow in strength. Maybe evolve, even. If so, Id love to have that guy join my team.

    Turning around, I saw Ramiris with her mouth agape, while Treyni was doing her best to console her.

    Yeah, youre right. I guess they are army wasps. Plus, ones a queen.

    I heard them! I mean, you Ugh. Never mind. You can do just about anything, cant you? And that other one I mean, I really dont think it could be, but

    She wasnt making much coherent sense. I ignored her. No time to deal with it, and besides, if it was Ramiris, it couldnt be that important.

    We had reached our destinationa dryas, the holy tree that was Treynis main body.

    I took out mypleted project from my Stomach. It was an orb, dull in color. No sheen, no glow to itbut you could absolutely feel the power.

    What was I going to use it for? Well, Treyniand all dryadswere descendants of fairies, a form of spiritual life that could take on physical form bybining themselves with nts. They could freely release their spiritual bodies and use magicules to create temporary corpuses to live in. Their real bodies, however, were these dryas trees.

    The Walpurgis Council was going to be held in some kind of special dimension, so Treyni might not be able to get in. So I decided to conduct a bit ofrge-scale surgery on her so shed be able to move around in her real body. Unlike Beretta, which had no physical form in this world, Treyni had a corpus. As a result, we needed to transfer the core within her from her current body to the new one, much like a golem bing established in its own form.

    I had an idea of what this new core could be. It was a chaos core, one that can only be made with certain materials under certain conditions, and that orb I just took out would be the vessel for this core. In a way, it was like extracting magicules from the magic stones that can be taken from the cores of monsters. Its hard to make these retain no element at all, so I went through many failures before I created this. I also needed several other materials to make this orb, so I spent nearly all of yesterday gathering them.

    Making a chaos core required an equal mixture of spiritual and mystical force inside this vessel. With Beretta I couldve just filled them with both in equal quantities and densities, but it wasnt so simple with Treyni. She would have to inject the orb with her own spiritual energy herself, while I put in mystical force that had been mixed to an exactly proportionate density and size.

    Now it was time to get to work, and that meant it was time for Raphael to shine. With my signal, Treyni began to turn her body into spiritual matter and let it flow into the orb, without a moments hesitation. I injected the mystical force alongside her, not missing a beat. This was precision work, but it proceeded with no calction errors.

    The dryas lost its life force, visibly withering before me. Alongside that, the orb began to blink on and off, almost like a pulse. Light and darkness traced a spiral inside itand then, the orb began to shine a light shade of green. The flickering of life was thriving inside.

    Report. The individual Treynis element has mixed into it, but construction of the chaos core is sessful.

    It had all gone as nned.

    Okay, it worked. This orb is now Treynis main body.

    (Thank you so much, Sir Rimuru!)

    Yeah, thanks, Rimuru! Now I can take Treyni here along with me!

    You should be safe with that, yeah. But Hmm

    Treyni would no longer be separate from her main body, so she wouldnt have issues traveling across dimensions anymore. But something still seemed missing.

    Treyni, do you mind if I take this tree that used to be your body?

    Of course not. Use it however you like.

    I thanked her, then got straight to work.

    Whatre you gonna use it for?

    Youll see!

    I cut down the tree, working the wood, creating precision parts with it to form a human shape.

    (Oh! Ohhhhh! Is this? Are you gonna?!)

    Ramiris quickly understood what I was up to. She was rightI thought I would make a recement body for Treyni, using the dryas that was imbued with her magical force.

    Three hourster, the doll-like figure I had been working on all afternoon wasplete. Its core was reinforced with magisteel, the surface made of fully polished wood. It felt remarkablyfortable to the toucha very fine piece of work.

    Oh, is this?

    Even Treyni, who rarely expressed surprise at anything, couldnt hide her excitement.

    What do you think? Pretty good, huh? You can use this as your body if you want.

    I didnt need to ask. Ramiris was overjoyed, but Treyni needed no encouragement from her. She thanked me profusely and installed herself in her new body. From that moment, the wooden doll became Treynis new corpus. It was the worlds first fully mobile dryad.

    From the moment the chaos corethe heart of any monster, you could sayentered the doll, magic force surged out of it, prating and filling every grain on the surface. Then, amazingly, the white grains faded, no longer standing out, turning as intricate and detailed as human skin. Perhaps more beautiful, even. A beauty that goes beyond humanity.

    Unlike with Beretta, I didnt work from a skeletal frame for the face. I simply carved the head to look the way Treyni looked. But once her orb was in there, its expression grew as soft as anyone you met on the street. It was wood, but the mouth still moved, and the eyes blinked. I have no idea what was driving that. Because shes a monster was my only real guess. This body was kind of herself, once, so maybe it was morepatible than most cases.

    Either way, that pie-in-the-sky surgery of mine was a greater sess than I ever couldve guessed.

    And for some reason, she was stronger now, too.

    My mystical aura, injected into the orb so perfectly by Raphaels fine-tuned work, had produced a chaos orb that worked in exact harmony with Treynis spiritual force. It was the equivalent of doubling her magicule stores. I think taking in the holy and demon elements earned her some new skills, too. She struck a greater presence than Shion, who boasted the most magical force out of us all. Definitely stronger than the Orc Disaster. Not up to the demon lord Carillon, but I could feel a different type of sheer awesomeness from her.

    I think it could bring her to disaster level, the venerable S rank. Of course, shed still be Special A for now, a cmity-level threat, due to not actually being a demon lord. The Guild-crafted ranking system really couldnt deal with special-case magic-born like this. Personally Id feel safe calling her a sub-demon lord.

    Between the dryas, the doll, and the dryad, we had here a creature that was worthy of awakening into a demon lord someday. Thats the kind of powerful magic-born Treyni was nowand among other things, it let her join Ramiris on the trip.

    Ill bet even Raphael was surprised by that one!

    Understood. It was all ording to n.

    See? Totally surprised. No need to be a sore loser about it.

    Raphael had nothing to counter me with.

    With that mental victory in hand, we all said good-bye to Treynis sisters, Traya and Doreth. They had been watching the whole surgery, looking incredibly jealous. I suppose I should do the same thing for them, as thanks for all their work watching over the Forest of Jurabut that would have to wait. We could consider that after we were all back safe from Walpurgis. I didnt want to lose Juras guardians because they were too busy doting on Ramiris, besides.

    Well, we were now on our way back to town, and Id now done all the preparing I could. Looking up, I realized there was no moon in the sky, the stars twinkling at me. Today was a new moon, wasnt it? And soon, under this beautiful night sky, the bell for the first round would ring out.

    With the stars behind me, I set off for my battlefield.

 Volume 6 - Ch 3.1

    INTERLUDE

    THE DEMON LORDS

    The demon lord yman awaited the appointed hour, a ss of wine in his hand. The Walpurgis Council was tonight, and as a mixture of anger and happiness danced across his face, he thought over a few things.

    First, the bad news.

    Ignoring the warnings of his friend Lace, he had advanced his forces into the Beast Kingdom of Eurazania. But they had failed to discover even a single citizen left there. The effort had gone to waste.

    The briefing from hismander Yamza drove him into a fit of rage. But until they knew why this happened, giving further orders would be careless. Instead, yman decided to gather his forces together and carefully continue the search.

    What they found was a group of stragglers, frantically attempting to flee the kingdom. Upon being advised of them, yman immediately ordered an attack, sending scouts to the area to search for anyone else hidden nearby. They eventually found several hundred civilians in hiding, but as they attempted to dispatch them all, they immediately ran away.

    Finding this suspect, the army conducted further investigation, only to discover that arger group of some several thousand refugees was fleeing toward the Forest of Jura. The small group of several hundred was just bait to help the rest of them flee.

    Those insolent!

    Now yman knew why there was nobody left living in the Beast Kingdom. They had undergone a mass emigration to Tempest, relying upon Rimuru for their continued survival. The stragglers were also on to the yman forces activity, fleeing the area once the bait was taken.

    He wanted to have those souls safely hunted and collected before Walpurgis, but it just wasnt going to happen. He had to admit that now, and it made him deeply unhappy.

    Yamza, the Council is about to begin. I want your entire force to chase them down before I return. Kill everyst one of them and bring the survivors before me!

    I swear to you it shall happen, sir!

    He nodded, but it did nothing to overturn the fact that he wouldnt be awakening tonight. It annoyed yman terribly as he closed the magical link.

    Meanwhile, there was good news to be had.

    Using his feelers in the groundelectric signals and natural geomaismhe was constantly gathering information. Nobody had been fully aware of this power yet, giving yman free rein over a vast array of data. It was what allowed him to enjoy the alias of Marite Master.

    At the time he gained this skill, it permitted him to interact only with people or things within his line of vision. Now, however, thanks to ceaseless training and effort, it had be the keystone force of his entire empire. This unique skillManiptor, it was calledconverted information into encryptedmunications as it conducted surveince over a wide area. Deploying a member of his team to an area allowed them to function as his eyes and ears to gather intelligence.

    It was this vastwork that informed him that Veldora, the Storm Dragon, had revived. This, in itself, was not wee newsbut the human beings who had spoken with the Storm Dragon and apparently survived the experience had some very fascinating things to say.

    ording to conversations surreptitiously heard from adventurer types leaving the monster town, Rimuru, self-styled leader of the forest, hadnt defeated the Farmus force at all. The missing army was the result of the Storm Dragons resurrectionand since he had only just been reborn, the dragons stores of magicules werergely lost, emptied out as it raged upon Farmuss army. That exined why there was no massive onrush of magicules around the Forest of Jura, as one would expect from such a cataclysmic event. That these adventurers lived to tell the tale was another sure indicator.

    If the Storm Dragon Veldora was alive once more, there was no way yman, a demon lord, wouldnt have picked up on that. The rumors must have been true, thenhe lost his magic force during the battle with Farmus.

    These two pieces of news conflicted yman.

    It would be a simple matter to y that dragon right now. I may even be able to add him to my cache of pawns

    A tantalizing fantasy. The dragon has been using the town the monsters built as his personal den, it seemed, and it was hard to gather information in that areabut he felt no need for concern. Those empty stores of magicules wouldnt rebuild themselves in two or three days. After Walpurgis, hed have all the time in the world to snare him.

    And if all else fails, I can simply send Milim after him. For now, though

    It was time to concentrate on the Council.

    Or perhaps, if yman hadnt been over-reliant upon Milims strengthhe might have noticed all the points that didnt quite add up.

    The fact that there wasnt a single enemy casualty yet. The force, reportedly scattered all across the Beast Kingdom, was now gathered together. Both pieces of information were too important for someone as careful as yman to overlook. But it wasnt yman on the groundit was Yamza. And ymans mind was too full of the uing Council to notice. That was how vital this Walpurgis was.

    Out of nowhere, Ramirisa demon lord who preferred to remain incognito, cooped up in herbyrinth, most of the timeasked for Rimuru, the subject of the meeting, to be extended an invite as a supplementary condition. yman hadnt ounted for that possibility; it prevented him from making a snap judgment. But as he groused over it, the others quickly agreed to the suggestion, making it impossible to stage any resistance.

    Still, this could lead to good things for him.

    Its better this way. Now weve unmasked Rimurus true nature. I was almost fooled into believing that he leveled the Farmus military by himselfbut theres no hiding the truth.

    yman grinned. If Rimuru was joining the Council, he should consider himself wee. There, before all the other demon lords, hed know exactly how powerless he really is.

    A mere slime, borrowing the majesty of a dragon for his boasts! I hope you consider it an honor to be crushed by my own hands!

    He went back to fantasizing about his own future glories. And that was why he missed it. Those small yet ring inconsistencies out on the battlefield.

    You be careful, too, okay, yman? Nows not the time to be too reckless.

    His friends words shed across his mind. Now, a small sense of unease was taking root. The nagging feeling that he had missed something. But heughed it off.

    Dont you worry, Lace. I will win this

    He drained his winess, as if to wash the anxiety away.

    It was with a somber gloom that Frey prepared for the Council. Things were in a constant state of flux. The original n had all but gone by the wayside. She didnt expect any of this, and now it was all too unclear how things would shake out.

    But she wasnt nervous. She was aware of her limits, and she always made decisions based on cold, hard facts. That was how the Sky Queen always acted. If all went well, then fine. If notshe would have to prepare to make the right move herself.

    It all began with a certain promise. In order to defeat Charybdis, she had epted an offer from yman. In exchange, she agreed to take one request from him.

    Several months ago, Milim visited Freys domain. She didnt exactly slip in unnoticed. There was a loud bang! as she shoved the doors open and ran into the room.

    Frey didnt bat an eye. Milim always acted like this. When she felt that massive auraone Milim never bothered to hideshe knew it had to be her.

    Hey, Frey! Beautiful day out, huh?!

    She beamed at her, ying around with her beautiful tinum-pink hair to show it off. Was Frey busy at the moment? Who cares?

    On Milims hand, however, was something new. Not a ringa brass knuckle covering her four fingers. It was something far too boorish for most young women, but on Milim, it couldnt have been more perfect. It had a relief of a dragon carved into it, half aglow in magical aura, and it fit snugly in her clenched little hand.

    Mmmm, maybe a little too hot, though? she said as she fanned her face with one hand. It was obvious what she was doing. She never gave a crap about the weather.

    Oh, Milim. Havent seen you in a while. You look like youre doing well. Did something nice happen to you?

    Frey had to take the bait. Otherwise, shed have to put up with this act for the next hour.

    Ooh, you could tell? Well, just look at this!

    She thrust her Dragon Knuckleequipped hand in front of Freys face, giving her a proud little eh-hem!

    Frey glumly sighed. Oh, wow, she said, giving Milim what she thought the girl wanted. It looks great on you. Whered ite from?

    Oh, you wanna know? came the bashful reply. Oooh, I dunno if I can tell you or not Hmm, ohhh, what should I doooo?

    This Im-the-best act was grating on Frey. Despite all the years they had known each other, it still rankled her.

    Well, arent we friends, Milim? Its all right to tell me, isnt it?

    Milims eyes sparkled. Ooh! Oh yeah, we sure are friends, huh?! Okay, Ill tell you! To tell the truth

    Now that Milim finally had the invitation she wanted, she burst into a long story about the town of monsters she visited. The self-aggrandizing tale went on for a while, apanied by several wardrobe changes from the new clothes she picked up there. It gave Frey some pause. Milim loved carrying on about herself all the time, but rarely to this level.

    Once the conversation died down a little, Frey realized that now was the time to do the favor she promised yman.

    Oh, right. You know, Milim, I actually have a present for you, too. From friend to friend. Would you like to see it?

    She signaled to her attendants. They quickly brought over a tray bearing a beautiful, shining pendant, perched on top of purple satin cloth. An orb had been installed on the pendant, a jewel that even someone who knew nothing about precious stones could tell was worth a fabulous amount of money.

    Mm? A pendant, huh? Can I have it? But that doesnt mean you can have my knuckle, okay?

    Frey chuckled. Thats fine, Milim. Consider it a symbol of our friendship. And as a friend, I hope you wont be too shy to wear it around.

    Milim gave a bright nod to Freys soft smile. You got it! she chirped as she attached it to her clothing.

    Forbidden magic: Demon Mariteunching Activated.

    At that instant, the expression on Milims face changed. Her eyes zed over; the light of consciousness faded away from them. With the magic in the pendant released, a forbidden spell wormed its way into her.

    This jewel was the Orb of Domination provided by yman to Freyand having Milim put it on was the promised favor yman asked of her.

    So theres my promise. That takes care of my duty, but what will Milim do?

    Frey observed the girl. She stood there motionless, face a total nk. Then, for just a single moment, she felt like Milims blue eyes looked at her.

    There, at that moment, Milim knew something weird was happening. Maybe Yes. Indeed. I suppose it is, Milim

    The Dragon Knuckle fell out of her fingers, clunking on the ground. Frey looked at her and sighed.

    Im done, yman, she called out to an empty corner of the room. Are you happy?

    I am, the Marite Master replied, emerging from the corner. Well done, Frey. Now Ive obtained the strongest puppet there is! Ha-ha-ha-ha! This is what she gets for picking on me, calling me a young upstart. Pathetic, isnt it, Milim?!

    He punched her as heughed his nasalugh. Her face reddened, a cut appearing on her lips. The multipleyers of Barrier protecting her were gone, meaning that even she could be hurt nowespecially if it was a demon lord like yman doing the hurting.

    Shouldnt you stop that? Frey coldlymented as the half-giggling yman prepared tond another blow. It wasnt a pretty sight to see, and besides

    Pfft! This isnt the sort of weak curse thatll undo itself after a punch or two. This is forbidden magic. It includes all the magic force I can muster from my body. Dont you resent her at all, after the way she acted around all of us? Thats why you joined me on this n, is it not?

    Its not. I just fulfilled my promise to you.

    No need to lie to her face like that, you know. This girl is nothing more than a doll to us now. A pointlessly sturdily made doll, I should add. We can just fix her before she fallspletely apart.

    The veins were visible in his eyes as he kicked Milim away, Frey coldly watching the whole time. Such an impertinent man. This is how you really are?

    It was at that moment when Frey abandoned yman for good. Thus, she decided to act on her own instincts for a change.

    Listen, yman. Maybe you dont know, but Milimes with a self-defense mechanism, all right? The way she described it, at least, its called Stampede, and it puts her in an uncontroble state. Youre free to trigger that and die if you like, but try not to take me with you.

    The words were enough to restore ymansposure. He resentfully groaned. Psh. What a bastard of a demon lord this is. Very well. Using her should give my words a little more presence among us all. And you, Frey; youre a coconspirator as well. Ill expect you to work for me.

    Oh? I thought we were equals.

    Fool! Im the one who came up with this n. Youre already one of my pawns. Or would you like to engage Milim in battle?

    Are you threatening me?

    Ha-ha-ha-ha! You can take that any way you like. But if you dont want to die, Id suggest not angering me.

    It was ssic ymansometimes offering the carrot, other times the stick, but always with a heaping helping of arrogance. And its true; this was ymans n all along. That, and it was his hint to Frey that Milim had a weakness for the word friend. How he managed to learn that little tidbit, she didnt know, but all Frey did was keep her promisealthough she only did so because of one she firmly believed in.

    All right.

    Good. Just dont think about doing anything to betray me. As long as you listen to my requests a bit, I will personally guarantee your position as ruler of the skies.

    The escape route was cut off. Now Frey was ymans business associatea fancy name for his puppet. All of this happened several weeks before the Day of Ruin that visited Tempest.

    Thinking it all over again, Frey sighed.

    With Milim under his wing, yman was using her overwhelming potential violence as a cudgel to coerce her with. Now Frey was simply following orders, forced to do his bidding.

    She couldnt help butugh at how much she deserved this. She felt like such a fool for believing him. But she also had another thought. yman was a sly, conniving demon lord, never one to y down, but he also tended to overestimate his own powers. Thats why he never had a perspective on the true essence of things. Frey, luckily, was blessed with exactly those observational skillsnot a skill like breathing fire, but something she naturally picked up in her rtions with other people. The ability to see the kind of truth that someone like yman, who treated people as nothing more than useful tools, could never notice.

    So, trusting her instincts, she made a bet. And no matter how it turned out:

    I dont think youll be alive for much longer, yman.

    She began going over the procedure toe. The promise came to mind once again. It made her smile.

    The frigidnd was encased in howling snow and ice, surrounded by frozen tundra. Temperatures stayed at well below zero degrees Fahrenheit, driving away nearly all life.

    In the middle of it all stood a tall, looming castle, a beautiful, fantastical pce. A demon castle, one materialized from an unimaginable amount of magical force. It was called Icefayr Castle, and it was the domain of the demon lord Guy Crimson.

    A calm, collected man strode along a corridor inside the castle, his hair of tinum blond, eyes long and narrow. Those blue eyes were a prominent feature of his chiseled visage. His skin was fair, practically translucent, and his beauty would almost make some assume he was female.

    This was the demon lord Leon Cromwell, known alternately as either the tinum Devil or the tinum Saber, and he stalked the halls of this castle like he owned them.

    Ahead of him was arge door, decorated ornately by a master woodsmith. It led to the audience chamber where the master of this domain awaited. Leon was here to see Guy Crimson, and as he stood before the door, tworge, heavy magic-born grunted and strained to open it up.

    The demon lord Leon Cromwell has arrived!

    A beautiful female magic-born beyond the door shouted Leons name as he entered. There, he saw two lines of powerful Greater Demons lining the way ahead on both sides. Each one was a named demon, and each had been granted physical corpuses for use in this world. All of them were powerful beyond the definition of a Greater Demon, easily surpassing what a high-level magic-born could manage. They were also bedecked in a fine array of magical equipment, each having evolved in their own unique ways. They numbered two hundred or more in all, and some were even cmity-ss threats, rated Special A on the scale.

    But not even these demons could defy the figures beyondthe sheer overpowering awe exuded by the six demons that surrounded the throne in the chambers midpoint, under the watchful eye of Guy Crimson.

    These were named Arch Demons, capable of subduing even cmity-ss monsters. If anything, they could be defined as demon lords themselves.

    Amazingly, not even these demon kings were allowed to speak freely in this chamberfor there was a wall, an impregnable force, that none of them could ever conquer.

    The green-haired demon that heralded Leons arrival was soon joined by a demon with blue hair that guided him down the aisle. She was gorgeous, the personification of all human desires. Her graceful, wispy arms were hidden in the sleeves of a dark-red maids dress.

    The green-haired one was Mizeri, the blue-haired one Raine, and they were the two pirs who stood on both sides of the absolute ruler Guy Crimson, doing the speaking for him. They were both Demon Peers, superpowered creatures that each rated a disaster ssificationthe equal of a demon lord.

    Now Leon was at the throne. Mizeri and Raine nodded at him, then took their posts beside Guy as the man on the throne stood up. The only people in this room allowed to move a muscle were the two demon lords.

    It ddens me to see you, Leon, he said in a clear voice that carried across the chamber. Doing well, I hope? I appreciate your answering my invitation.

    His bloodred eyes had stars of gold and silver dancing in them, and his wavy, burning hair was a deep shade of rouge. He was about as tall as Leon, and while Leon was feminine in his beauty, Guys was more prideful and distant. He had an alluring sort of attractiveness, the look of one born to leadand conquer.

    He walked down the steps from his throne as he greeted Leon, bringing an arm to his chest and embracing him. Then, without hesitation, he ced his hand upon Leons face and kissed his lips.

    Leon pushed him away, wincing. Leave me, heined, like he always did. He red at Guy, looking genuinely peeved. I am not interested in other men. How many times have I told you?

    Ah-ha-ha-ha! Oh, you never were any fun like that, Guy gleefully replied. Id be happy to be a woman for you, if you like. But very well. Let us change locations.

    He walked off, without waiting for a response. This, too, was how it happened every time.

    Considering the arctic region he lived in, Guys clothing was quite unusual. He mostly had his clothes draped over him, revealing a great deal of bare skin. To Guy, who never felt the cold anyway, that was never an issue. He wore a near-mystical smile toplement his bewitching beauty, perhaps recalling the sensation of Leons lips against hisand then a snakelike tongue licked his bright-red lips, creating an eerie sort of irresistible allure.

    For Guy, who could adjust his gender at will, men and women were both targets of his sexual appetite. Heor she, dependingwas Guy Crimson, demon lord, master of this castle, and the oldest and strongest of demon lords. As the Lord of Darkness, he was the sole and absolute ruler of this blindingly cold continent.

    Guy pressed on ahead, not bothering to guide Leon. Leon followed behind, as if this was normal to him. No one else in the audience chamber moved until they were both gone. It was forbidden. They all bowed their heads to them, waiting for their ruler and his guest to leave.

    Once all were sure they were gone, Mizeri and Raine stood before the rows of demons. And then, a single word from Raine:

    Disperse.

    Then the two Demon Peers left, setting off to prepare tea for their guest. They were the highest-ranked among all the demons in this castle, but their sole upation was to take care of Guy Crimson. This work was prioritized above all else in this domainand so they quickly set off, not wanting to attract their masters ire.

    Following Guy, Leon stepped into the ice terrace on the highest floor of the castle. Despite being open to the elements, not a single snowke made its way inside. It was afortable, fully air-conditioned environment, and since Guy was wholly unaffected by the temperature around him, he had set this up exclusively for Leons sake. He might have been arrogant, but when it came to his friends or those who recognized his authority, he took care of them down to thest detail.

    Musing about how little Guy had changed, Leon gruffly threw himself down in his seat. It was made of ice but didnt feel cold at all. That didnt faze him, nor did the way the ice bent pliably under him, providing a soft cushion.

    So, he asked, what did you call me here for?

    An ice table appeared out of nowhere. Raine lined up two cups of tea on it, as Mizeri soundlessly stood by the terrace entrance. They were not to interfere with their masters speech, unable to speak themselves without permission. This was not at all an equal rtionship. Until ordered, they could not even allow their emotions to be shown in public. If they ever acted on their own without their masters orders, they would be provided with nothing but a quick death.

    Even Demon Peers as powerful as them both were mere tools before the demon lord. That was how strong Guy was, and that was why they wouldnt move even if Leon attacked Guy right there. His rule was absolute, and worrying for his safety was the height of disrespect. Their presences were thus ignored as the conversation continued.

    Well, as you know, a Walpurgis Council ising soon. I thought I should implore you to attend, no matter how inconvenient it was.

    Oh? Rare of you to force anything upon me like that.

    I know. Even if it means I owe you a favor, I want you to participate.

    Why is that?

    Ha! Guy smiled, enjoying this. Wary as always, I see. Very well. Let me exin. It was yman who proposed this one. A little man. But for some reason, Milims name was among the cosigners. Milim is one of the oldest demon lords, up there with me. She wouldnt lift a finger for someone the likes of yman. So I believe

    You believe that reports of Carillons death might not be entirely true?

    Oh, you know, do you? Guy resented having his thoughts guessed so easily.

    Leon paid it no mind. yman went too far, he continued. He tried to harass me without leaving any evidence behind, but Im not letting it pass this time. Whether Carillon lives or not, if Milim is taking action, that is bad news.

    Guy gave this a relieved nod. Hmm. I agree with you. This might be just another game to Milim, but I dont like to see anyone tipping the bnce of power among the demon lords. It just gives me more work.

    Waiting to make sure Guy was no longer peeved, Leon decided to tackle the question that interested him the most.

    So, Guy, do you think Milim is being controlled by yman?

    Thinking about Milim is pointless, came the blunt reply. Someone like me is too intelligent to read the behavior of a moron. That is one of my very few weaknesses. He shrugged and gave Leon a broad grin, then went back to his first question. But if you worry about it that much, Leon, should I assume you will be participating?

    Leon could tell that dancing around each other like this would lead them nowhere. Yes, I intend to. I hate working with others, but this time, I suppose I have no choice.

    Oh? Well, very good. Before then, I was hoping we could embrace each other in bedter this evening

    I have no interest in men. Or in women, unless they strike my fancy. Besides, what benefit would embracing you, as you put it, have for me?

    You dont have to start with that. If you wish, I would happily take on a womans body for you

    Guy slithered in for a hug. Leon, seeing it a mile away, dodged it beautifully. One saw this little exchange between them on regr asions.

    By the way, he said after it was clear Leon wasnt putting up with it, its rather rare for Ramiris to provide feedback to us one way or the other, but do you know anything about this Rimuru person?

    This was another topic of the next Walpurgis, something everyone had an interest in since itd mark the first new demon lord after Leon.

    The way yman puts it, Leon replied, hes just a self-styled demon lord. Personally, if he has the strength to back it up, I have no problem with him.

    Ah. So you think Rimuru is qualified to be a demon lord? I was just wondering, since Ramiris, of all people, is involved. If someones piqued her interest that much, it should be a lot of fun for me.

    Although this Walpurgis was convened by yman, Ramiris had made the additional proposal of having Rimuru himself attend. By Guys estimate, Ramiris mustve had something to say about ymans actions here.

    Ramiris? I have trouble dealing with that fairy. She makes fun of me every time we meet. Ive thought about strangling her to death countless times

    But if it was Ramiris making this request, Leon had to agree with it. He couldnt help but feel like he owed that much to her.

    Ah-ha-ha-ha! Better not. If you kill her, youd be making me your enemy, you realize.

    Im sure. I wasnt being serious. Besides, theres no way Id win in a fight against you.

    That was no lie. Leon was no fan of Ramiris and her big mouth, but he didnt actually mean her harm. And to be honest, he had no hope of beating Guy. They were both equal in demon lord rank, but the difference in strength was like night and day. Leon was closer to Mizeri and Raine than Guy on that score. There was just noparison.

    Mm? I wouldnt be so sure. Maybe youd kill me one in a million times?

    Dont be ridiculous. Im not interested in a fight Im not guaranteed to win.

    Quit being so modest. There arent many people who could wound me. The mere fact that you have a chance of killing me makes you more than strong enough, Leon.

    Pfft. The truths the truth. You and Milim are on a different echelon from us. And speaking of that

    Leon was reminded of somethingthe reported resurrection of Veldora, the Storm Dragon. And when he told that story, Leon managed to honestly shock Guy for the first time in his life.

    Just then, an icy, shrill voice echoed across the terrace, cutting them off.

    Oh my. I am very interested in that topic.

    The voice was a perfect match for the beautiful woman it belonged to. Her skin was like porcin, her eyes a fascinating sort of cold, glowing blue diamond in color. Her pearl-white hair cascaded past her cheeks, where the light-green shade of her lips drew the eye.

    She was allowed to move and speak without Guys permission, shining more beautifully than any crown jewel. She was praised as the Ice Empress by some, but to the rest of the world, she was known as Velzard, the Ice Dragonone of only four dragon types to exist, and the demon lord Guy Crimsons friend and partner. Just like Leon, she was on equal footing with Guy.

    Ah, Velzard, Leon said, dripping with sarcasm. I suppose there was a dragon type here, wasnt there?

    My, cold as always, arent we? But Im d to have the chance to see you.

    Are you? Well, its a great honor to have a glimpse at your face.

    There was little real emotion behind this exchange.

    You never did get along with each other, Guy observed with a groan. Not that he had any interest in mediating. Normally, this would kick off a series of back-and-forth put-downs, but today Velzard changed the subject.

    So the topic you were discussing? Sir Leon, my younger brother has awoken? Her blue eyes were shining as she asked for details on Leons big news. You are sure of that, Leon?

    I stopped feeling his presence two years ago, so I assumed he had met his end, but?

    If Veldora had resurrected himself, it wouldve been obvious. His massive, out-of-control aura wouldve changed the worlds weather patterns. But none of that happened. Guy and Velzard could be excused for their shock.

    Its no mistake. A spy I sent to the Western Nations reported as much to me.

    Oh? So why is that evil dragon acting so obedient? Has he weakened to the point that he can no longer replenish his magicule stores?

    And who wouldve undone the seal ced upon him? I dont think he couldve broken out by himself

    The Hero had sealed Veldora awayand Velzard had done nothing to save him from it. To her, this was a good way to teach Veldora a lesson for all that selfish rioting. She figured she would spring him out before he disappeared for good, once he was a bit more mature. But then he really did disappear, which perplexed her. It happened much quicker than she anticipated.

    As the spy put it, ymans scheming was the cause. He had impressed upon the Western Nations, and therger kingdom of Farmus in particr, to defeat and destroy the Great Forest of Jura Alliance this Rimuru character has established. The results cost Farmus its entire military force and caused Rimuru to ce his hat in the demon lord ring.

    You know much about this, Leon.

    Of course I do. Im a former human, unlike you. Ive also just recently learned that Veldora was apparently sleeping right in the middle of the most intensebat. Just before his soul disappeared for good, he was exposed to vast amounts of blood, and it awoke him. That is the truth.

    The Farmus troops were subsequently massacred by his rage, he went on to exin, although Rimuru escaped injury.

    So thats it? The seal just undid itself?

    That much, I cant tell you.

    Velzard nodded at this. Leon could be right, but a single spys report wasnt enough to make a policy decision from. The Heros unique skill Unlimited Imprisonment encased its target in a dimension of an imaginary number, shutting out any ess or interaction with the real world. But now Veldora was exercising his presence here, once more?

    Perhaps the Heros seal wasnt soplete after all

    This made sense to herbefore Leon corrected her.

    Thats possible, yes, but I have another theory. What if someone swallowed Veldora up, seal and all, and ced him in another subspace of their own making?

    Guy smiled giddily at this. Ooh, I like that! So someone did undo the Heros seal, then! The seals too interwoven with the Heros own abilities to be undone by any normal skill. Perhaps you or I could do itbut if this person exists, then he must be as powerful as us. How fun!

    It is just a possibility, keep in mind.

    And you think this person might be Rimuru, Leon?

    Exactly.

    I see, I see. Then we definitely do need to size this person up.

    Now it made sense to Guy. No wonder Leon wasnt showing his typical reluctance to attend a Council. yman was engaged in reckless violence; Milim was acting unusually strange; Rimuru undid Veldoras seal and dered himself demon lord. What if all these events were actually connected? At the very least, itd make this Walpurgis a hell of a lot of fun.

    A longing smile erupted across Guys face. You know, he whispered, why Veldora is acting so obedient, then?

    I think hes been weakened, replied Velzard. Im receiving only the tiniest of reactions from his presence. Nothing like before.

    Even as a fellow dragon type, Velzard had to concentrate to receive even a weak blip from her younger brother. If his energy had been drained, that would exin that.

    Strange that he hasnt acted out at all, though. With his personality, violence is practically what he lives for.

    Velzard was having trouble making sense of all this, too.

    Well, be that as it may, Leon matter-of-factly replied, Im not terribly interested in Veldora. If you want to try to drag an old friend of yours back here, be my guest.

    While Velzard was family, and Guy had torn his hair out figuring out what to do with Veldora in the past, Leon had no connection to Veldora. As long as this dragon didnt mess with his domain, he had no intention of being involved. Thats how dangerous Veldora was to him.

    Are you leaving?

    Yeah. Thats all you needed from me, right?

    Well, one moment. No need for all the rush. I wanted to ask: Have you made any progress in pursuing your real goal? You know, targeted summoning?

    Guy was referring to the experimentation Leon had spent much of his life working on. He was just as interested in the subject as Leon.

    Not quite yet on that, no. I changed up my n and tried having them perform summons at random, but that ended in failure as well. It just attracted too much attention, you see. I brought the theory of iplete summons to the Western Nations, but the Free Guild interfered with me. Its already a horribly inefficient way of going about this business, and itll face another obstacle in the future. Once it does, Ill just have to find another way.

    To put it in an extreme way, Leon really didnt care about the Council or the new demon lord. He was simply trying to pick out young weeds before they grew and got in his way.

    Obstacle?

    Yeah. This one apparently saved the lives of some kids who were just waiting to die. Before I could pick them up, no less.

    Ah. So they were forced into rescue before you saw any results? And youre sure youll continue being interfered with?

    Seems likely. He got angry about all these nations summoning children, so he may start applying pressure to each of them. So its time to clear out that experiment. If we go any further with it, hell find out that Im there, behind the scenes.

    Hmm. Could you perhaps rub out this hindrance?

    Guy hinted with his eyes that itd be all too easy for Leon. But his friend simply sighed.

    Well, this hindrance is the exact Rimuru we were just discussing.

    What?! Thats no coincidence, is it?

    Funny, isnt it? Leon nodded, face dead serious. Thats why I wanted to meet him for myself sometime.

    Of course, he still couldve afforded to ignore this Rimuru person, if only Ramiris hadnt chosen to stick her nose in

    All right. This seems to be getting more curious all the time. Perhaps Milim is thinking along simr lines, too. She may be a moron, but shes got quite the instinct for this kind of thing.

    Perhaps. Tonights Walpurgis could be a rather raucous asion.

    Hee-hee! No doubt about it.

    Leon and Guy exchanged smiles as the gentle blue eyes of Velzard watched over them. They proceeded to chitchat a little more before Guy changed the subject.

    By the way, I had been wondering about something else. Who is this coborator of yours providing your information?

    I dont know much about him. He seems to be a human from the Empire, and he calls himself a merchant.

    Summoning an otherworlder required vast amounts of magical energy, exacting conditions, and convoluted rituals to work. The pickier you were about who you summoned, the longer you had to wait before you could attempt the summon again. To get around this, Leon did some business with this merchant, who then conducted the summons for him.

    And this merchant can be trusted?

    Trusted? Trust never needs to be involved. All Im doing is using him.

    Ah. Well, if thats fine with you, I have noints. But be careful, all right? I dont want you dying on me.

    Heh. You, worried about me? Thats a rare sight from you, Guy. But dont worry. I have no ns to die until Im finished with my goals.

    Again with those goals. Its that important to you?

    It sure is. Id put them ahead of well near everything else in this world.

    Hmm. Im starting to feel jealous.

    Dont give me that nonsense. But I will ept your warning. See you tonight.

    With that, Leon left the terrace. Guy refrained from stopping him this time, as Leon left a single shining crystal and used Spatial Motion to set off.

    A pair of eyes watched him go.

    Talk about impatient. I know thats how Leon is

    Guy grinned a little as he spoke softly.

    It feels to me that Leon is leaving himself uncharacteristically open to attack, Velzard observed in her icy voice. Hes working with people without even knowing who they are. Should I investigate for him?

    Nah, Guy replied, unconcerned. Meddling in Leons affairs would just offend him. I dont want my friends to hate me.

    To him, Leon was a trusted friend, someone whose personality he was keenly aware of by now. He knew about Leons talent more than anyone else. If Leon wasnt looking into his cohorts backgrounds, it must have been because he saw no great need to.

    If he asks us for a favor, you can help him out then.

    All right.

    And that was the end of their conversation.

    Now the attendees of tonights Walpurgis were set in stone.

    yman proposed the Council; Frey and Milim signed on to it. Ramiris, with her additional proposal, was also attending, as was the homebody Leon.

    Speaking of homebodies, there was another demon lord whose location was aplete enigma. Guy had reached out via their specialized demon lord connection, all but demanding that ones attendance.

    Beyond that, there was his old friend Daggrull, along with Hmm. What about that other guy? He should being. Daggrull promised to bring him along. And that just left Guy himself. Itd mark the first Walpurgis in a while to have all the demon lords show up, except for the missing Carillon.

    It should be a fun one, for sure. You want to join me?

    Hmm Velzard reflected on this. No, I think I wont. Perhaps if my brother were there, but otherwise, I have no interest in demon lords.

    No? All right. Keep the lights on for me.

    I would be d to. Now, time to prepare.

    Velzard stood up, leaving Guy to brood over the uing Walpurgis as he gazed at the aurora covering the frigidnd.

    A demon lord working behind the scenes, head full of schemes.

    A newer demon lord, but one that could crumble at any time.

    An old friend who was starting to get surprisingly active, considering he hardly left the house.

    And then the potential birth of a new demon lord.

    So exciting! His heart hadnt sung like this for hundreds of years.

    He needed real change like this. Demon lords werent friends; they were supposed to bepeting with one another. There was no artificial limit ced on their numberthere were times when a dozen existed at once, even more. Whether its ten or a hundred, anything was fine. If they werent strong enough, theyd get pushed out of the picture the next time a Temma War came around, every five hundred years.

    Its just that each time that happened, this new crop would fight for a piece of the pie, and tobat this, the maximum number of demon lords was finally set at ten. The human world, once they became aware of this, started calling them the Ten Great Demon Lords. Guy was firmly against it, but it became a sort of tacit agreement among them. The humans didnt mind the demon lords picking one another off until they were a more manageable number. Ten was enough.

    But Guy figured it was time to put an end to that. The weak didnt deserve the title demon lord. Perhaps it was time for a new era of rule to unfoldone, he thought, where real demon lords held sway.

    Guy was one of the seven Primal Demons, and the first demon lord to be summoned to this world as an Arch Demon. Each of these demons had a primary color associated with them, and his was Rouge.

    He was an unnamed demon unleashed upon the world, fulfilling the wishes of the powerless human who summoned him and destroying a nation that the human was apparently at war with. He followed that up by destroying his humans own nation as well. That earned him his nameGuy, pronounced ghee. An unpleasant-sounding name, like the shrieks of the doomed and desperate as he crushed them.

    Upon being named, Guy realized he had awakened into his new ss of true demon lord. He thought it needless at first, given that he believed he was already the strongest out therebut this evolution also affected the Primal Demons Vert and Bleu, summoned alongside him as errand girls. They, too, were given physical bodies to work with, as well as the brand-new ss of Demon Peer.

    On a whim, Guy decided to make them his servants and gave them names. For Vert, Mizeri, reflecting the misery of mankind. For Bleu, Raine, the rains of blood that fell wherever he strode. They had been faithful to him ever since.

    Just after Guy awakened to demon lord-dom, another one did the same. That was Milim, a girl conceived by a human in this world and the first of the four dragon types that ever threatened it. That dragon had paid for its strange dalliance by losing the majority of his power to his own child. The act had been reviled as taboo ever since.

    Upon losing his power, the dragon type dispersed his body, came to the surface to attain a physical form, and became the founder of the dragons as they existed in this world. This led to dragon types as being defined as the self-sentient propagations of natural spirits, the prototypes, and all the dragons that existed and thrived in the world came from this first fatherVeldanava, the Star-King Dragon.

    One day, the Star-King Dragon gave his daughter a pet, a young dragon that would serve as his next incarnation someday. This pet was killed by a certain foolish kingdom that ignited Milims rage, causing the very heavens to tremble as the nation was destroyed. This made Milim awaken, and the resulting new force sent her wholly out of control, almost wiping all life away from the world.

    It was Guy who stopped her. The battle took ce over seven days and seven nights, the most severe anyone had ever seen, turning the bountiful fields of the west into an utter wastnd.

    In the end, no winner could be crowned. The battle ended once Milim regained her senses. It was Ramiris who did this, back then a leader of spirits who sacrificed her own power to neutralize Milims rage. She paid a heavy price for this. Being exposed to the auras of demons and dragons sapped her force and made her fall to the worlds surface, bing a continually self-resurrecting fairy.

    But it did the trick. It prevented the end of the world and allowed Guy and Milim toe to an agreement.

    These were the first three demon lords, and each had their own goals.

    One wanted to find the farthest reaches of power.

    One wanted to live free from all barriers.

    One wanted to promote bnce in the world.

    But that was fine. These differing goals were exactly why they could see one another as equals.

    The demon lord ranks were soon swelled by a giant protecting the gates to heaven, as well as a vampire from ancient times. A figure fallen from heaven became number six. This was the second generationnot as strong as the oldest but more than strong enough to rule over the world.

    The giants body was too imbued with the holy element to allow the seeds of demon lord-dom to take root, but he was still so blindingly strong that he got in anywayan unusual path to take. The old vampire was shrewd, sly, and more conniving than any of the othersalthough someone else was currently upying her seat at the Council for her.

    The sixth one was interesting. Definitely strong, butpletely uninterested in the world. Laziness was the watchword here. No doubt had the ability to rule thend but probably still living just as fallen as ever somewhere.

    Four out of the six demon lords at this point had awakened to the job, apart from the giant and the fairy. They had survived multiple Great Wars, polishing their skills with each oneenough so to earn ultimate skills, like Guys and Milims.

    In addition to them, there was Guys friend, Leon. Leon was a human and a former Hero. A unique upbringing led to him picking up an ultimate skill, making him strong enough even to satisfy Guys strict standards.

    That made seven. And how many of this next Walpurgiss attendees would live up to the standard of these seven? Guy couldnt wait to see.

    And then there was yman.

    That fool thought he could rule over Milim. It was just too hrious. Guy could barely contain hisughter. That was impossible. If Guy couldnt do it, there was no way someone like yman could. Lower-level skills simply didnt work on those who possessed ultimate skills. All the naturalws that ruled this world were nothing more than unique cases to them; they could easily nullify any magical attempt to cloud their minds.

    An elemental attack that struck at their weak points might have some effect, yes. But mind-domination magic? Out of the question. Anyone spineless enough to be ruled over by conditions like that would never be able to obtain an ultimate skill in the first ce.

    Ultimate skills, as the name implied, gave the wielder ultimate power to control the veryws of nature. The only way to counter an ultimate skill was with another ultimate skill. That was the absolute, unbendable rule of this world.

    yman couldnt do a thing against Milim. Milim was just having him dance on the palm of her hand.

    What a fool

    Guy shed a weak smile as he watched the events unfold.

    The era of weaklings styling themselves as demon lords hade to an end. The fakers would get sifted out; the generation of true demon lords would begin. Guy was sure of it. He smiled.

    And thus he set off for what was bound to be the most chaotic Walpurgis in recent memory.

 Volume 6 - Ch 4

    IN THE LAND OF DESTINY

    So everything was set. After giving my final instructions to Veldora, I waited for an envoy to direct me to the Council site. I didnt know where it was, so Id be going along with Ramiriswho, by the way, also didnt know.

    I asked why, and she had replied, Because someone alwayses to take me there! Which made sense, I suppose, in its own way. The way she always got lost, wherever she went, I guess its just a given that she had a guide. If someone doesnt really feel like memorizing a route, they never will, no matter how many times they repeat it.

    Either way, I figured someone would be teleporting in to guide us, so I decided to wait for that.

    It was almost an hour before midnight when I was contactednot by an envoy, but by Benimaru.

    Whats up? Some kind of problem?

    I was expecting the worst, but Benimaru instead had a request for me. Battle had just begun with the enemy, and we already had a full gauge of their capacity.

    The gifts Benimaru earned from my awakening had upgraded his ss to Oni. This was a type of spiritual life-form, along the lines of the dryadsBenimaru, in other words, had reached the same lofty heights as Treyni. Shuna, Soei, and Hakuro were all Onis as well, which put them about as high up on thatdder as you can go.

    This was wonderful, but the issue was the skill Benimaru obtained. The unique skill Born Leader was geared toward granting enhanced control over his powers, as befitting the naturally aggressive Benimaru. No matter how much of it he unleashed, he could keep himself from rampaging out of control. Its secrety in Compute Prediction, which could fully read the flow of power in his body and prevent bursts of waste.

    It was also useful in battles betweenrge armies, not just in duels. He could sense the flow of power among his forces, reading his chances for victory like a prophet. If things were looking bad for his side, he could instantly send orders to his forces and change his strategy. It was almost like cheating. In a battlefield, the correct conveyance of information meant everything, and this allowed him tomand his full army without a single mimunication.

    Right now, thebined forces of thirty thousand were under Benimarusmand, and he could move them as smoothly and easily as his own limbs. These thirty thousand elites were no also-ran army, thats for sure.

    Whats more, the Born Leader skill also came with the Inspire Forces effect, adding bonuses to the forces he led that boosted their power by some 30 percent or more. That meant the entire army was nearly a third stronger. We werent losing out in troop numbers; we had better-quality fighters We werent disadvantaged in any way. If we could get that bonus, too, then hell, all the better.

    And with all of that, Benimaru could see from the start that victory was ours. Once he did, he had a bright idea for a new strategy.

    (So thats why I wish to attack the main enemy force. Soeis ready to go as well, and so I thought that, if ymans castle is indeed beyond that cloud, we might as welly waste to it, too.)

    That Benimaru. Brimming with confidence.

    (Isnt that dangerous? Youve only barely begun fighting. We dont know how thisll turn out yet)

    (Were fine. I am stationed over here. It would be Soei and Hakuro striking the castle)

    (Wait, my brother!!)

    Shuna had interrupted our Thought Communication as she was preparing some tea. Um, this was supposed to be a secure line? She broke in there a little too easily for my tastes.

    (Er, hello, Shuna. What did you want?)

    I could hear Benimarus voice jump several octaves.

    (Dont ask me what I want, my brother! The demon lord yman is dangerous! He has the power to bend peoples minds! If Soei or Hakuro fell victim to that)

    (No, theyd be perfectly fine against)

    (You cant!! If you insist on sending them in, then Ill join them!)

    Whoa, whoa. Shunas usually a lot more chill than this. Whats gotten into her?

    Benimaru and Shuna continued to argue as I sat there in shock. As my friend in my previous life put it, theres no way a man can ever win against his younger sister. Benimaru was no longer brimming with confidence at all. The all-out assault from Shuna sent him reeling.

    The next thing I knew, Shuna was beaming at me. All right, Sir Rimuru! Give me your orders to move out!

    Um, how do I respond to that?

    I didnt want to send Shuna anywhere lethal, but she did have a point. No matter how unlikely, Id never want Soei to be thought controlled. I wanted to keep them from doing anything dangerous, but taking a castle to rob the enemy of an escape point was a ssic strategy. With yman gone for the Walpurgis Council, now would be the perfect opportunity.

    Still I mean, as long as I made sure yman didnt get away, were good, right? And its not like I wanted to kill every single one of the magic-born working for him.

    (You have nothing to worry about, Sir Rimuru,) Soei chimed in. (I promise I will keep Lady Shuna safe.)

    (And with me around,) Hakuro added, (it will be no problem to at least peek into the enemys stronghold. They might be holding Lord Carillon there. I feel we need to investigate.)

    My Thought Communication was getting worryingly busy. Shuna mustve recruited them both to convince me. It was rare for her to act so selfishly, so I could understand why they wanted her to have her way this time. The fact Carillon wasst seen being taken in the direction of ymans castle also intrigued me.

    I am terribly angered by all this, Sir Rimuru. It is hard for me to contain my feelings. What yman has done is unforgivable!

    Dahh Yeah, I get that. I know Im not the only one who felt a little helpless against him, back there. And I can see how Shuna would resent being left waiting around on the home front.

    (All right. Ill let Shuna join in. But Soei and Hakuro, I want her safety to be job one for you. And if their HQ has more defenders than you predicted, put safety first and just bring back intelligence for me. Even if you discover Carillon, dont reach out to him unless youre sure its safe. Got it?)

    (Thank you for epting her request.)

    (I will be fine,) Shuna replied. (I can simply teleport out if something happens.)

    (Indeed.) Hakuroughed. (If anyone might be taking their sweet time in there, I imagine it would be me.)

    (All of us have resistances to spirit-based attacks,) pointed out Soei, (so I imagine we will not waste much time. And with Lady Shuna there, there is nothing to be concerned about. If we do discover Lord Carillon, we will think over matters then.)

    That put my mind at ease a little. Certainly, with Shunas unique skill Parser, shed be able to identify any attacks aimed for her mindand with Spatial Motion also in her arsenal, I didnt see that much to worry about. She didnt have that much magical energy to tap, but the skills in her quiver were excellent.

    Soei was right about Carillon as well. He might not be there at all, so there was no point harping on the issue.

    (All right. You have my permission, then, but always make sure youre on top of the situation over there. Just in case, Ill have you begin operations at midnight, just after the Walpurgis Council begins.)

    (((Yes sir!)))

    So now I had a three-member team attempting to infiltrate ymans base of operations.

    It was just before midnight now, so I decided to take a moment to ask Veldora about the demon lords. I have no interest in such little gnats, he began (of course), but he still had a fair amount to say about them allexcept for Leon, who ascended to the role after he was sealed away.

    Given his penchant for violent rages across the countryside, Veldora had fought against a demon lord or two in his time. Around two thousand years ago, he attacked and destroyed a city of vampires, which naturally earned him the anger of legions of those creaturesa chase he apparently loved. One of them, a female vampire, was particrly beautiful (and beautifully dressed) and boasted strength beyond all her peers. When the dust finally settled, her cadre of vampires disappeared from the scene, and Veldora didnt know what had happened to them.

    What was her name? I believe it was Lu, erm, Lurus? Or Milus? Regardless, I never treated her that seriously, but she was a rather challenging ything for me, so I would be wary around her. She cant take a joke, do you see?

    I think that was more Veldoras fault than hers. Anyone would be a little pissed off after their homnd was burned to embers. Of course, that was millennia ago; maybe shes mellowed.

    Ooh, interjected Ramiris from adjacent to me, didja know that guy Valentines a demon lord now, too?

    This Valentine had apparently taken over the original ones role about 1,500 years ago. I can only hope times healed wounds between these vampires and Veldora.

    Daggrull, the demon lord giant, was another keen rival of the dragons. They had tussled several times, with no clear victor ever being crowned, and if Veldora bothered to remember his name, he mustve been a pretty mean match. This guy had the poweror the guts, at leastto take on a dragon type. Probably a standout among the demon lords. Better watch for him.

    Our conversation moved on to the topic of demons. Veldora had apparently dispatched several groups of demons in his timea practice he found fun, since even if you incinerated them, they always resurrected to an even stronger form over time. A bunch of great ymates for him, really.

    Not even he had fought the lord of these demons, however. This king held his domain in a castle on the frozen tundra of the northern continent, a ce so frigid that he never bothered to make the trip.

    It is far too cold up there! Whats the need for me to pay a visit? Kwah-ha-ha-ha-ha!

    That sounded pretty evasive to me, but he refused to give up any more details. No need to think about that now, though. It would be going pretty far out of his way to storm the ce.

    Yes, well, Guy isnt any pushover, Ramiris observed. Me, him, and Milim are the oldest demon lords youll ever find!

    Thats doesnt mean muching from Ramiris. Suddenly Guy sounds like nothing special at all. But ah well. Ill back-burner this guy.

    So how many demon lords does that leave remaining? I had already met Milim, Ramiris, and Carillon; we had just discussed Valentine, Daggrull, and Guy. There was Frey, the one who Phobio said had dealt the decisive blow to Carillon. There was Leon to think about, along with my current target, yman. So one more

    Mm? I couldnt say. The allegedly sage Veldora was useless.

    Oh, you must mean Deeno! Ramiris cried. Hes even more of a goof-off demon lord than I am!

    I suppose he and Ramiris were two peas in a pod, then.

    We are not!

    Ill just ignore that.

    So thats ten, some of whom had a bone to pick with Veldora. Id need to keep that in mind as we discussed matters. Many seemed far more capable of defending themselves than I thought. Using this wimp Ramiris as a baseline couldnd me in deep troublemaybe it was better to assume Milim was par for the course with them. Even after my evolution, I was leery about my chances of beating her in battle. We had sparred a few times, but she wasnt being at all serious about it. I needed more data. In sparring mode, I could totally take her on now, but I couldnt be cocky until I knew what she was more fully capable of.

    I still couldnt believe that Milim de facto approved of rubbing me out. Theres got to be something behind that. Shes not the type to backstab her friends or be mind controlled like that, and there was never gonna be any negotiating with her. There had to be some reasona reason of her devising, too.

    Well, no point dwelling on it. Ill figure it out when I see her.

    As we talked, I felt a wrinkle in space erupt out of nowhere. Herees our ride, I thought as this huge, bombastic, ominous-looking gate appeared. Pretty fancy. Me, I usually just kind of ripped a hole in time and space, so maybe I could learn from this. Once I had a concrete image in mind, itd be easier for me to whip up a gate like this next time and teleport through it.

    Regardless, the door opened, revealing a green-haired woman in a dark-red maids outfit. She bowed her head toward Ramiris. I havee to take you, Lady Ramiris. And is this your guest? Ill be happy to guide you together.

    Then she stood by the gate and lowered her eyes, eliminating her presence as much as possible. A well-trained pro at the servant biz, it felt like.

    But something concerned me. She was exuding just as much overpowering force as Diablo at his best. She was a demon, a high-level one. Regr demons could only climb so high up thetter. No matter how long-lived they were, an Arch Demon was about the most they could hope for. Anything beyond that required a certain triggerwhich, in the case of Diablo, was me naming him. This let him break out of the base demon framework entirely, evolving him from an Arch Demon to a so-called Demon Peer.

    Heh-heh-heh-heh-heh. I have no interest in strength, he had said at the time, but now I see there is always something higher to strive for. Perhaps I should try to make more of an effort at this?

    He had no interest in strength, but he had a hell of a lot of interest in fighting. As he put it, he had been too content with himself before, since bing too strong would squeeze all the fun out of battle. Was he kidding with me? Because if he wasnt, thats just scary.

    And now I had this other Demon Peer here, this maid. Or more like a maiden messenger from the underworld, I suppose. With the kind of anime and manga I consumed way back when, a maid was more a type of battle unit than anythingand with her being a Demon Peer and all, she was clearly one deadly woman.

    Oh, hey! Havent seen you in an age, Mizeri! Hows Guy doing?

    Ramiris clearly wasnt afraid of her. In some ways, it made her even scarier.

    It is not upon me to worry about the condition of my master

    Ah. Havent changed a bit, have you? Well, thats fine.

    She fluttered her way into the gate, the rest of us following behind. We had to hurry, or else wed get shut out. If I wasted any more time here steeling my resolve and wound up missing my ride there, I dont know how Id ever exin that to Benimaru and the rest.

    So this maid Mizeri works for the demon lord Guy? The lord of the demons, and one of the oldest demon lords to boot. If he recruited Demon Peers as doormen, that said a lot about his power. Probably shouldnt try riling him, thenunless the times called for it.

    But having someone as strong as Mizeri do this kind of low-end work? Talk about arrogance. Here I thought the demon lords were all I had to worry about. So much for that. Maybe I shouldve taken Diablo along after all, even if he and Shion wouldve gone out of control with each other

    Well, its toote for second-guessing. Time to put up or shut up. The worlds rulers are waiting for me beyondbut I didnt feel scared. Thats because I was one of them. One of the strongest in the world. If anything, I felt cool as a cucumber as I crossed the door.

    Benimaru grinned broadly as he surveyed the battle unfolding below him.

    It was all going ording to n. The enemy had been lured, like clockwork, right into the traps Geld setwhich could have been predicted, given how lightly they had treated the Tempest side.

    Sir Rimuru was right, he said to himself, pitying his foes. If theyve set the table this kindly for us, it would almost be more difficult to lose.

    They could pull this off thanks to the perfect control he had over his armies, but Benimaru didnt think it that impressive of a feat. As he said, they had caught ymans forcesically off guardthey expected their numbers to overwhelm Tempest, after all. They had pursued the fleet-footed beastman fighters that had posed as refugees, and now they werepletely cornered.

    Alvis flew up to the point in the air Benimaru chose to watch events from. It appears to be decided, she observed, quietly pping her wings so as not to break Benimarus train of thought. By this point, I see no way for the enemy to recover itself.

    Ah, Lady Alvis. He turned his crimson eyes to her. Enough of that ther. We havent won anything yet.

    Please, Sir Benimaru, Alvis is fine

    You are not subordinate to me, he coldly refused.

    No, perhaps I am not, but we beastmen have given up ourmand to you for the moment.

    Benimaru nodded his understanding. Very well. For this battle, at least, I will appoint you as my aide.

    I appreciate it, Sir Benimaru.

    Nowin name, at leastBenimaru hadmand of thisbined force. With the supervisor of all Eurazanias armies officially dering herself below him, Benimaru was now officially supreme leader of the entire show. There was no defying the supreme leader; in the world of monsters, the strongest called the shots.

    But despite appointing you my aide, Im not sure there is much left to do, is there? I am keeping a steady watch on matters, but victory is imminent.

    I agree with you. However, I do sense the presence of several strong members on their side.

    True, the unwavering Benimaru replied. Once the oue is set in stone, I will send Gelds troops their way.

    Hold on, Sufia interjected. I want to join in on that!

    Yeah, Phobio added. I dont want you hoarding all the action, Commander. This is thend of beastmenournd. If we leave it all to you, Lord Carillonll chew us out for it.

    Hes right! If youve left us to ensure everyone is safe, you could at least let us handle this battle.

    Sir Benimaru, said Alvis, I leavemand of the armies to you. Please allow us to target and defeat the ringleader of the enemy force!

    All three bowed their heads to him. Benimaru greeted this with a clicking of the tongue.

    So thats why you made memander?

    Oh, how do you mean? Alvis replied, ying dumb.

    Very well. I was nning to have you join the fight anyway. However, if you feel you are about to lose, retreat at once. With some of their fighters, arrogance could be your downfall.

    He had a point. Several members of ymans force remained question marks. Depending on who was paired with whom, things could be dicey in the battle ahead.

    But, Benimaru thought as he boldly smiled to himself, Im always here. As long as I can detect when were in danger, we will not lose.

    Each of the Lycanthropeers already had their targeted prey in mind, sharpening their ws and letting their proud animal instincts run wild in pursuit of these loathsome interlopers.

    The trap would go off in another few minutes.

    I wanted to ask you something else, Alvis said as she waited. What will we do with those caught in our trap?

    Kill them all, is what I would like to say Benimaru thought for a moment. But I would like to leave judgment on that to you beastmen.

    Meaning?

    Take anyone willing to cooperate with us prisoner. Sir Rimuru is a generous leader, despite appearances. He is not a great proponent of genocide, although hell dly carry it out if they take any of our lives.

    I see. In that case, let us decide how to deal with the prisonerster.

    Certainly. That is fine. I imagine Sir Rimuru probably pictures them as a potential source ofbor.

    Oh?

    You are going to rebuild your capital, arent you? Benimaru casually asked. The more able workers, the better.

    Youll do that much for us?!

    Alvis, along with her two cohorts, was shocked. Rimuru not only took victory almost as a given; he already had the script written for what came next.

    Where does that confidencee from?! Were fighting the closestpanions to the cunning, deceitful yman, and yet

    The biggest surprise of all, though, was fighting this on the assumption that theyd take prisoners. In this world, it was far easier for most people to kill in battle rather than capture. You would never find amander whod care whether a force was partially surrendering before doing them all in with ranged magic. The idea of using prisoners as abor force had never urred to anyone before.

    This shook the Three Lycanthropeers to the core. It meant that the magic-born working under Rimuru never even considered the possibility of defeat. They went into this fight backed by an absolute confidence in their victory.

    Well, Benimaru added with augh, assuming our strategy goes to n. It only terrified the beastmen more.

    And then the battle began.

    (Everything to n, Soka.)

    (Understood, Sir Benimaru.)

    With that short exchange, the yman force experienced its first casualties. They were about a hundred magic-born, led by a named one of some renown, but they all died at once, their magical cores plucked out by Soka when she appeared out of nowhere. The four team members working under him were already busy taking down the other squad captains of ymans army, only striking those targets they were absolutely sure they could defeat. That was Benimarus order, and they followed it to the letter.

    The result: The enemys chain ofmand was pulverized. Orders from above were no longer making it to the foot soldiers.

    This is a trap! The beastmen have surrounded us!

    Thats crazy! How could they?

    Retreat! We have to regroup our forces!

    By the time they noticed, it was toote. Unlike a human army, monsters tended to over-rely on their own strength and bravery; a leader to guide their instincts was indispensable. Without them, ymans army was doomed to fall to pieces.

    (Geld, you may begin.)

    (Yes sir!)

    His orders given, Geld called out the signal.

    Start it now!

    Rahhh!!

    The next moment, the ground caved in, swallowing up the enemy forces. Tempestians gifted in controlling the earth had unleashed their magic. This natural-looking stretch ofnd was actually pockmarked with pit traps, an illusion created by their skills.

    Only monsters with the power of flight could escape, and even those were quickly picked off by avian beastmen and Gabils Team Hiryu. The ones who were caught found themselves in a cavernous underground hollow, the soil liquefied beneath. They were unhurt but buried up to their waists, unable to move.

    These were monsters, of course; some used magic or skills to wriggle out of this mousetrap, falling over their weakerpanions to reach solid ground again. But the n ounted for this, too. It helped thin out the crowd. The stronger ones among the force were killed without any chance to resist; the weaker, seeing this, had their hearts crushed. The survivors would know all too well where they stood strength-wise, likely losing their will to fight. The pit trap was set up entirely to procure pliable prisoners, willing to follow orders.

    Ten or so minutes after the n wasunched, the battle was already far too one-sided to offer any hope for a turnaround.

    This This many?

    Benimaru had a birds-eye view of over ten thousand yman soldiers, cut off and plunged into the pitfalls. Gelds Yellow Numbers were patrolling the edges, surrounding all the holes at regr intervals and taking out the magic-born who managed to w their way up. The enemy forces were outnumbered, and any unexpected shows of strength were handled with Tempests superior numbers and equipment. Even the most powerful magic-born could be taken out by a handful of beastmen or Team Kurenai. Most of ymans force had marched into what appeared be a t field; the remaining several thousand were holed up in the rear, but they werent enough to change anything.

    We won, Benimaru matter-of-factly whispered.

    Truly, an amazing show, marveled Alvis.

    Heh. We were bound to win. That was why we couldnt afford to let our guard down. I have my own work to do now. Alvis, Lycanthropeers, you are free to do as you like. Take the heads of the enemy leaders!

    Thats what Ive been waiting for, man! Ill be back!

    Now we can finally have some fun! I can smell the bastard who defied me before. Think Ill go after him first!

    I suppose I will join them, too. The rest is up to you, Sir Benimaru.

    Themander nodded, face pointed straight ahead.

    Go!

    Yes sir!!

    With that, the three warriors sprang into action.

    Sufia tore across the sky, faster than wings could take her. This was Skywalk at work, an Art only a small handful of magical creatures could wield, but Sufia used it like second nature.

    She was headed for a small group at the very far end of the battlefield, unarmed and looking out of ce. They were priests, led by Middray of the Dragon Faithful. She didnt know them, but Sufias animal instincts told her that these were the strongest forces the enemy boasted.

    As she sped forth, she heard the voice of Gabil,mander of the skies. He, and the hundred members of Team Hiryu, were following her.

    Gah-ha-ha-ha! Let me give you a hand, Lady Sufia!

    Ah, Gabil. She smiled a beautiful, heroic smile. Sorry, but you might be left with the short end of the stick here.

    Wah-ha-ha! Not a problem for me. Weve taken care of most of the aerial forces, and I wouldnt want to take any more work from the flying beastmen. Where are the enemies that lie between us and victory?

    Ha! Victory is ours, yes, but I think we have to put down the people in the back, just in case things go haywire on us.

    Right. I hear you loud and clear! You get that, men?!

    Understood, General!

    As long as you dont screw up, either, General!

    Gabil snarled at his dragonewts. Their exchanges usually went something like this. Sufia chuckled at it a bit before focusing her lethal energies on the target ahead.

    Middray had set up camp in a safe spot toward the rearalthough it wasnt a camp so much as apletely different location, a medic facility built by the supply team. He hadnt asked for this battle, but being so belittled by the force all this time made him feel too embarrassed to face Milim again.

    Lady Milim will surely deride me for this, too

    The thought concerned him enough that he demanded to be stationed on the front lines. That request was turned down by Yamza, who certainly didnt do it out of concern for Middrays safetyhe just didnt want anyone else horning in on his uing glory.

    Still, victory was all but guaranteed today. Their force was three times the size of the enemys, which was not at all a coherent fighting unit. They were being forced to retreat while guarding arge crowd of refugees, rendering them incapable of any counterattack.

    Its more dishonorable, if anything, to attack an opposing force like this

    Such was the thought in Middrays mind in the days leading up to this sh. Things, however, did not quite work out that way.

    We might be in trouble, Father. The battles all but lost, isnt it?

    Mm They are weak, Hermes, too weak. I had no idea the demon lord ymans soldiers were this incapable

    They arent, Father! The enemy just had the superior strategy!

    What? Dont be stupid. We should have the power to force our way right through any of their silly tricks! If thats the weak excuse you have for this, Im disappointed in you, Hermes!

    Look, if this was just a one-on-one duel, thats one matter, but in massbat like this, the quality of your armysmand is what decides the day! That, and how well you can catch the enemy unawares. Today, that was the opposing side. They hid their war power until thest moment and even sprang a trap on us.

    Pfft. I can see that much!

    Middray was never one to use his head very much. Hermes had a habit of bringing up all these meddlesome, annoying topics with him, just because he happened to be a little smarter, and he never liked that much. Now, however, even Middray could see that there was nothing he could retort with. The scene presented to him was all the evidence Hermes needed.

    But, Father Middray

    I know. The fighters headed our way Theyre powerful. As much as I hate to say it, we are standing in the midst of a battlefield. If theyreing for us, I say wee for them!

    So it goes, does it? Very well, then

    Hermes reluctantly agreed as Middray next to him began to burn with a desire to fight.

    Here, in the rear of ymans forces, was fought the most intense and ferocious of the days conflicts.

    Landing on solid ground, Phobio silently ran forward. Discovering a group hiding in the shadows behind the battlefield, he stopped right in front of them.

    There stood a man wearing a mask of anger and a girl wearing a mask of tears. This strange duo was Footman, the Angry Jester, and Teare, the Teardrop Jester; both members of the Moderate Jesters and both here observing the battle by ymans request.

    Hey, Phobio quietly said, holding back his rage. I owe you one fromst time.

    Footmans eyes twinkled ominously beneath his mask. Oh-ho? Well, well, if it isnt Sir Phobio!

    Sir Phobio, Teare said in a chiding, singsong voice as she traipsed around him. The beastman who could never quite be a demon lord! Sir Phobio, the one who lost to Milim! Thank you so much for helping us out then!

    Heh. d you still remember me. Itd be a shame if I killed you when you had no idea why you deserved it!

    Ooooh? Whatre you angry about?

    How odd. What could this fool be so livid for? Those raging emotions are so delectable, but theres no reason for us to die here.

    Oh, not at all, not at all!

    Shut up! Maybe I was a fool for letting you trick me, but a fool like me doesnt need a reason to ask for a little payback from you guys!

    Phobio broke out his sharp ws. Teare and Footman were unmoved.

    Hmm? You want to go with us? You shouldnt push yourself like that. Youre too weak for that!

    Hohhh-hoh-hoh-hoh! None of that, Teare. Sir Phobio here is trying to make usugh with this little joke of his.

    Neither could sessfully rile up Phobio. More than anything, he regretted letting his short temper steer him straight to failure in the past. So, once the greetings were over, he quickly stepped forward and instantly closed the gap between them.

    Ngh!!

    Tch!

    Realizing their mind games had no effect against him, Footman and Teare changed their approach. Things began to move quickly. The air twisted around them, opening a portal through which a man with the head of a wild boar appeared.

    Long time no see, Footman. Remember me?

    Hoh? Hmmmmm? Ah, the orc general? My, look at how impressive youve be!

    Footman attempted to sound yful with the sarcastic taunt, but the expression on his face indicated he was in trouble.

    Despite appearances, Footman was a coolheaded, calcting typea trait Geld was fully aware of. The jester was with the forces thatid waste to the ogre vige that Benimaru and the others called home, and Geld knew his powers were difficult to ignore. Footman was on a different level from other magic-born, as far as Geld was concerned.

    Plus, there was Teare. Footmans peer in many ways. The extent of her powers was an unknown, but she wasnt one to be underestimated. Phobio might have been the ck Leopard Fang of the Beast Masters Warrior Alliance, but even with his strength, taking on Footman and Teare by himself would spell trouble.

    The beastman let the rage bubble within. Heh-heh Well done, Sir Benimaru. Not a disagreeable piece of prey at all!

    Themander, overseeing the battle from the skies, had ordered Geld to assist Phobio. He wondered why at first, seeing as it meant Geld would abandon hismand post, but now he saw that Benimaru was right. The rest of the battle had already been decided, to the point that even Gelds aides could handle it well enough. Only the top leaders among the magic-born under Rimurusmand could handle two Moderate Jesters like this.

    Allow us to assist, Sir Phobio.

    Ah, Geld. Thank you!

    Phobio wasnt turning him down. Even here, he could sense the difference inbat ability between him and this pair. To him, the best path to victory was worth choosing more than his own pride.

    So began a smaller battle between two duos, in the shadow of a small hill away from the battlefield.

    The reports Yamza received from this battlefield bewildered him. The overwhelming advantage he thought he had was just an enemy trap all along.

    He didnt want to consider the thought of defeat. It would obviously enrage yman. He had to find a way to turn this around, to snatch victory from the jaws of defeatbut he doubted he had the man power left to achieve it. He still had enough of his wits to realize that, and now he had to think of other forces he might be able to stir into action.

    The five fingers, ymans inner circle of associates, was led by the middle finger, Yamza, the strongest magic-born out of them all. Only Adalmann, the pointer finger, and Nine-Head, the thumb, couldpare with him.

    Adalmann, head of the defense forces in ymans castle, began life as a wight, a deathly spirit who resided in the Great Forest of Jura. He was a well-known bishop during his living years, but that meant nothing now. ymans ursed magic had greatly boosted his power as a monster, transforming him into a wight king that ruled over the undead. The holy force he wielded when he was alive had transformed into impure demonic power that he used to curse the living.

    But despite his vast strength, Adalmann had one weaknesshisck of intellect. The only thing he could do was follow his orders to destroy any intruders; thats why he wasnt involved in this war.

    Nine-Head, meanwhile, was a fox spirit, an extreme rarity in her field. She was still young, just three hundred years old, and only three of her tails had grown out. Her magicule energy, however, was already well past Yamzas, up to the level of yman himself. She was with him now at the Walpurgis Council, serving as his bodyguard, so Yamza couldnt tap her for backup, either.

    Itll have to be Adalmann, then

    The problem was how to call him over. Actually, no, it wasnt a problem. It would be simple to have him show up right this instant. Yamza would have to then gather up his surviving troops, flee back into Milims domain, meet with him there, and go back on the offensive. Thats the best approach, he thought. Walpurgis Councils hadsted upward of a month in the pastif all went well, he could wrap this whole thing up before yman came back. It wouldnt exactly be simple to make Adalmann move, but it wasnt impossible.

    Either way, if he stood down and epted defeat right now, it was clear Yamza would be purged. Lord yman is a vicious man. He would do away with me in no timeI am sure of it And even if I were lucky enough to survive, I dont want to turn into a soulless puppet. As much as it vexes me, I must admit defeat herebut I will reign victorious in the end!

    Yamza turned his gaze toward the battlefieldand there, he witnessed a sight that made him doubt his eyes.

    In the front was a bewitchingly beautiful woman, her hair a mix of blond and ck. She held a golden staff and was boldly racing across thend, as if no one was around her at all.

    Protecting her was a group of Carillons finest, the Beast Masters Warrior Alliance. They numbered only a few dozen, but almost no one could defy them inbat, each one bearing the strength of a thousand. There was Zol, an elephant beastman; Talos, a bear beastman They couldnt beat the Three Lycanthropeers, but they were all stout fighters, worthy of serving under the great Beast Master.

    They were also apanied by a group in crimson garb, using searing me spells to burn away the supplemental forces kept in the rear. They meant little to Yamza, but there was no doubting they were ranked above the magic-born around them.

    Things had suddenly be very bad for him.

    The unbelievable visitors deepened Yamzas gloom.

    It cant be Why are the Three Lycanthropeers here?! Have they abandoned their troops ande to provide reinforcements themselves? But how could that?

    He could hear the trusted magic-born around him shouting. Agitation was in the air.

    Theyre pointing their greatest force toward our main army?! What are the lookouts doing?!

    Allow me to interrupt, sir! We cant make contact with our lookouts. Someone has killed them all!

    What?!

    The enemy was moving so fast, they werepletely behind on dealing with them. By the time Yamza noticed that, they were already lethallyte. The realization made the blood drain from his head. There would be no regrouping noweven escape would be fiendishly difficult.

    No. No, no, no, no, no!! I may not even be able to escape here with my life!

    Yamza began to panic. If this was one-on-one, he might be able to deal with that, but he wasnt self-absorbed enough to think he stood a chance against a squadron like this.

    Buy me some time! I will return to our homnd and bring Adalmann back here. He can summon the dead to restore our forces!

    It was just a pretext. He already knew all was lost, and he had decided to run away, as fast as possible. Luckily, he had only volunteered his fealty to yman, so his behavior was not restricted the way it was with the other four fingers. Following him any farther would be suicide, and that made it easy for Yamza to sever all ties.

    Yes sir!

    We can give you three hours, sir!

    His men each gave him stern, resolved looks that did nothing to move his heart. All he could think about was how stupid they were. The next moment, he chanted a teleportation spell. But something was off.

    Itsnot working? Is this aSpatial Blockade?!

    Yes. He was already toote. The moment Yamza and his men saw Alvis, Alviss gazended on them as well, thanks to the power of her skill Snake Eyes. It was an extra skill, one that applied arge variety of ailmentsparalysis, poison, insanity, and so forthand worked on anyone caught in her line of vision. A tremendously useful skill, the only way to escape it was by either sessfully resisting it or simply weathering it out.

    And Alvis had another card up her sleevethe unique skill Oppressor. This spatial skill gave her the effects of Mind elerate, Spatial Control, and Spatial Motion, letting her impede enemy movement and give her allies superior positioning.

    A single motion from her was enough to neutralize all the masses surrounding Yamza. The more weakhearted of them were instantly driven mad; the stronger ones were still paralyzed long enough for the poison to kill them off. Some had even been turned to stone. Less than a hundred managed to emerge unscathed. Before they could put up any resistance, the unworthy had been denied even the right to stand before Alvis.

    Her Spatial Control had snuffed out Yamzas magic, having the power to both obstruct spells and fix their spatial coordinates in ce to prevent them from affecting the air around the caster at all. No magical escape from this area was possible nowthis area being the range of Alviss vision. The entire battlefield was now in her total control. Such was the power of the Golden Snakehorn.

    Realizing escape was impossible, Yamza gritted his teeth.

    He still had ast resort. But it was a forbidden one, one that hed prefer not to use. Beyond that, the only path to survival involved winning this.

    So be it. Lets show them what weve got.

    Ah, Sir Yamza!

    Sir Yamza at his finest could overwhelm even the Three Lycanthropeers!

    Let me join you, sir! Our fighting will surely please Sir yman!

    His men were ted for the fight. Yamza found it boundlessly foolish. The demon lord yman sought only two things: victory and profit. He would never ept this performancewasteful attrition, followed up by total defeat.

    The only thing he believes in is pure, unadulterated power

    No matter how faithful Yamza was to him, yman never saw him as one of his own. He was just a useful pawn, a talented minion; that was as far as the lords affection went. The Ice de had been a gift, yes, but it was simply provided in an effort to strengthen him. It was all for ymans sake.

    Still, Yamza provided him with respect and reverence, and the gifts he received in return helped. They both had amon interest. But Yamza had no intention of offering his life to yman.

    About time to head out. I have to survive this and bounce back!

    This failure would force him to go into hiding for a while. But a Special-A talent like him, a giant among high-level magic-born, would no doubt be picked up by another demon lord before long, he thought.

    (I like this,) he Thought Communicated to Alvis. (One of the greatest magic-born under the Beast Mastersmand, part of the valorous Three Lycanthropeers. Are you willing to duel with me?)

    It was a risky bet. He wanted to defeat Alvis, the strongest figure in the group, and crush the enemys will to fight. Perhaps that would be enough to change the scriptand even if it didnt end well, he thought it could give him a chance to escape.

    (Very well, Sir Yamzahead of the five fingers beneath the demon lord yman. I will show you how far out of your element you are!)

    This, Alvis thought, would prove once and for all where yman and Lord Carillon stood with each other. She promptly transported herself before him with Spatial Motion, and in an instant, ymans surviving servants swarmed over her.

    It was not what one would normally call a strategy. Beastmen are mostly simple folk, easily provoked, and this cowardly approach took full advantage of that. If they can exhaust Alvis, even a little bit, thatll make it easier for Yamza to winsuch was the reasoning behind this kamikaze strike.

    You think those tricks will work?! Alvis shouted as she turned up the intensity on her Snake Eyes. To Yamza, though, they had already done more than enough. That single instant, when Alvis used her power, was the exact thing Yamza needed for his assured victory.

    Got you!!

    In a sh, he was upon her, shing his sword at her exposed back. And just before the tip of his de reached her body

    Nuh-uh! Backstabbing someone like thats not manly at all!

    Someone had leaped straight out from Alviss shadow, babbling to himself as he deflected Yamzas sword.

    Dehh! Whore you?!

    Im Gobta! We were hiding out just in case this happened!

    As he exined that, more and more figures popped out from the shadow. They were, of course, the Unified, four-legged goblin riders, tapping their physical agility to attack the magic-born that were still moving.

    And you didnt tell me? Alvis said. I was wondering why something didnt feel quite right.

    She had actually noticed them all along. That was why she was unafraid to go plunging in like this.

    Heh-heh! Benimaru ordered us to, Gobta casually replied as he fired off a Case Cannon bolt at Yamza. He could tell the moment he crossed des with him that this wasnt a battle for him to win. So while themander was distracted by his short sword, he thought now would be his best chance. Gobtas definition of fair and square differed a bit from the normit was something he asked of his foes but never followed himself.

    Still, Yamza managed to deflect the st with his sword.

    Out of my way, weakling!

    He pointed the tip of his de at Gobta and cast a spell, sending an Icicle Lance hurtling his way. Gobta simply used his dagger to fire an Icicle Lance of his ownnot to fire back, but because he had nned for this follow-up strike from the start. It wound up saving Gobtas life, as the two magic bolts met in the air and dissipated.

    That That had as much force as this magic sword?! And without casting? Cheeky little weakling, are we?

    Now Yamza recognized Gobta as his foebut Gobta had already pretty well exhausted his arsenal. Uh-oh. I couldnt follow that counter of his at all. That ice just happened to save me, but if he stabs me with that thing, Im a goner. Probably oughtta start runnin, huh?

    Fortunately, the goblin riders had already made their contribution to this fight. No one wouldin if they retreated now. Gobta made up his mind.

    All right, lets pull

    But just as he began to make the order, Yamzas sword sailed right past his nose.

    Pyah?!

    In another stroke of luck, he had taken a timid step back just in the nick of time. It made Yamza almost lose his nerve. This little sneak made it past my attack three times? Three in a row couldnt be any coincidence, as he saw itthat supersonic swipe he just made proved that the hobgoblin before him was no also-ran.

    Heh-heh-heh Oh, how the Lycanthropeers have fallen! Sneaking their minions into a one-on-one duel!

    The boast, made with wide-open, bloodshot eyes, was part of Yamzas strategy. By his estimation, dealing with both a Lycanthropeer and this mystery intruder at once was dangerous.

    Gobta seized the opportunity. Woo-hoo! That means I dont have to fight this crazy-dangerous magic-born, right?

    He suppressed his joy just long enough to dere All right, Ill serve as an observer for this duel, then! Yep. Definitely an observer. With all his tactics exhausted, that beat just standing there and getting in the way. Rimuru could ept defeat, but he could never ept his people getting killed in action. Gobta wasnt stupid enough to volunteer to be war casualty number one for Tempest.

    Oh, you can have him if you want, Alvis yfully said.

    If I take your prey, Gobta wittily replied, wouldnt that hurt your honor as a beastman, maam? I dont need it that bad, so go ahead and fight all you want! Sorry I got in the way!

    Alvis epted the inane excuse without a word. If anything, it was the luckiest thing to happen to Gobta all day. He had dodged a bullet with this total unknown before him. Alvis had no intention of letting anyone else score this kill anyway, and he had wriggled out of a battle against a foe thatpletely outssed him.

    Whew. Thats the end of my work!

    At the very far end of the rear guard, the group of priests led by Middray was shing with Gabils Team Hiryu.

    Of course, only a few were standing by now. Nearly two hundred fighters on both sides were lying on the ground. But Middray was unhurt, his white robes free of dirt and grime, and it was clear he was still going strong.

    Waaah-ha-ha-ha! Not too shabby, you guys. I see you are the descendants of dragons!

    Middray shed a contented smile, surveying the fallen and pretending the panting and exhausted Sufia in front of him didnt exist.

    Dont you ignore me!

    Sufia, half Transformed into her beast form, had used her vastly strengthened physical skills to attack Middray. But the head priest, perhaps sensing this, had simply leaned over to one side, preventing her fromnding a lethal blow. The effort had left her wide open.

    Hyah!

    Taking the wed arm extended out to him, he tripped up Sufias legs, picked up her body, and sharply mmed her against the ground. The judo-like throw was unique to the Dragon Faithful.

    I wasnt ignoring you at all, Middray happily exined. I dont have much opportunity to use this against monsters, so this is rather fun for me. Its been ages since I had a foe so worthy of that throw.

    This was more than Sufia was willing to bear.

    D-dammit! You, you made me

    She was being treated like a ything, her face red with humiliation. But she had to admit it. Middray, this man standing before her, was more powerful than she ever imagined. Now he was surveying thendscape once again, waiting for her to stand up and ignoring her until that happened.

    Curse him, hes treating me like a second-ss fighter! And how could my Self-Regeneration fail me like this?

    It was true. Sufias skill was not healing any damage, because her physical body hadnt sustained any wounds. She was exhausted simply because her stamina was tapping out on her, and the force of each m added to the burden. He was wounding her internally, where the damage wouldnt be visible.

    But Sufia stood up anyway. As the Snowy Tigerw, she could not let this affront continue to stand.

    Imagine, a bastard like you serving yman. I thought Yamza was the best around here, but I suppose my instincts were correct all along.

    Yamza? Ah yes, sir. Yamza. He is rather capable, Ill admit, but not enough to serve as a ymate for me. I may not look it, but Ive sparred with Lady Milim on regr asions, you see.

    Milim The demon lord Milim?! So youre the Dragon Faithful?!

    No wonder, Sufia thought. They seemed so different in disposition from the rest of ymans troops. They seemed to enjoy fighting for the sake of fighting, not at all concerned with actually killing their enemies. Andpared to the other magic-born, they were all overwhelmingly strongand enjoying every minute of it.

    Ooh? Say, that dragonewt just felled Hermes! Wah-ha-ha-ha-ha, that was quite a performance!

    Hermes was tangling with Gabil, and Gabil had just knocked him down with his spear.

    F-Father, stopughing and help me, please!

    You lost, fool! Just sit there and think about what you couldve done better!

    Heughed at his associate, lying there on his back and pleading for assistance. He could tell that Hermes wasnt as bad off as he imed and that Gabil had no intention of taking his life.

    All right. Counting me, that leaves three remaining. Youmand a truly wonderful set of fighters, given how evenly we are matched. It proves youve honed your bodies and your minds, instead of relying on skills.

    I suppose I should appreciate thepliment. My name is Gabil. And you are with Lady Milim?

    Indeed! I am Middray of the Dragon Faithful.

    And I am Sufia. Sufia of the Three Lycanthropeers! I have no ear to lend to the servants of yman, but if you worship Lady Milim, that is another story.

    Mm. Lady Sufia, is it? I will make sure to remember that. So whatll it be now? I could take on the both of you at once, if you like?

    Middray calmly folded his arms, implying that he liked his chances.

    Can I ask you a question before that?

    Mm? What is it?

    I I just mean, how can a mere human be so strong? Or are the Dragon Faithful human at all? Something seems strange about you.

    Middray nodded at this, his curiosity piqued. What do you mean by human? he asked. Thats the crux of it. If you are inquiring about our species, however, the answer is simple. We are dragonewts, like Sir Gabil over there.

    What?! The same as us?

    Yes, precisely. The difference is that instead of evolving from lizardmen, we are the descendants of dragons that humanized themselves and mated with the human race. But in essence, he closed with a smile, we are the same.

    Ah Ande to think of it, my sister Soka turned wholly human in appearance.

    Yes. But almost none of us can bring ourselves back to our original shape. The priests you see strewn around us dont have any skills like Dragon Change or Dragon Body. There is hardly any difference between them and human beings.

    Middray turned his eyes toward Sufia.

    But that power is still handed down. Our worship of the dragon does not allow us to forget the blood within us. Any more questions, Lady Sufia?

    No. Human, monster, it doesnt matter. I just wanted to know if your skills were the result of a weak human building himself up to perfection. You say you are little different from humans, and if so, I must pay respect to your efforts.

    Wah-ha-ha-ha-ha! You think the same way I do. One may be born with strength, or one may acquire it. Magic-born are so weak because they rely too much on the strength theyve always had. Thats why theypare their strengths based on magicule capacity and so on. True strength cant be seen with the eye. The level of your skills is the only solid, trustworthy index there is.

    Sufia was born strong. She had more fighting skill than most monsters, through no special effort of her own. Her massive well of energy, and the surging aura it created, made even magic-born go out of their way to avoid her. Her battle senses made full use of this, and her instincts alone had brought her to where she was. Now, Middrays words made her realize how little time she had spent polishing her Arts, her learned skills.

    So you mean I can be stronger?

    Wah-ha-ha-ha-ha! Precisely. There is no such thing as an experience that can win over being in actual battle. Here,e at me! Id be happy to spar with you.

    He remained where he stood, arms crossed and standing high.

    Lady Sufia and me at the same time? a dubious Gabil asked. Are you sure you arent being a little too conceited?

    Middray just grinned at him. Hmph! I could take you on without even using my arms, little man!

    Gabil wasnt about to take that sitting down.

    Lady Sufia

    Well tackle him together. We have to admit it. Hes a strong one!

    The battle between Alvis and Yamza was about to reach its raging climax.

    The two were evenly matched, but Yamza had finally used his ace in the hole.

    Ha-ha-ha! Well performed, Lycanthropeer! Your ability to keep up with me is astounding. But now, my victory is assured!!

    What?

    Pfft! Did you think this magic sword was my only secret weapon? Yes, you may be strongstrong enough to hold me back. I will freely admit that. However! What if there were two of me?

    With that shouted question, he unleashed the magic inside the bracelet on his left wrist. This was a Doppelganger Bracelet, an incredibly valuable Artifact capable of producing a perfect copy of the wearer, right down to their clothing and equipment. Now Alvis had to fend off two Yamzas at the same timeand if one was an even fight for her, she would have to be at a severe disadvantage.

    Well? If you capitte to me now, I could be convinced to spare you

    So what?

    What did you say?

    You think that parlor trick will outss me? You really are nothing more than ackey of ymans. Quite the would-be finisher, there.

    Alvis didnt give an inch, openly ridiculing her foe.

    Then die!

    And even before Yamza could scream that at her, Alvis yed her own final card.

    Now the top half of her body was a beautiful woman, the bottom half that of arge, ck snake. This was Alviss true, Animalized form, and now she was ready to use its full force.

    Unlike Phobio and Sufia with their focus on close-quarters fighting, Alvis was usually thought to be a long-range specialist, lobbing her magic attacks from afar. In truth, however, she was a dyed-in-the-wool fighter, masterful at short range in the way anyone serving the Beast Master needed to be.

    Her fighting style, however, ventured from the beaten path. Alvis brought her staff up to her foreheadand in the next instant, it disappeared, as she grew a golden horn from above her eyes. Finally free, her aura surged outward from her, greatly amplifying her power. This was her second Transformation and her most secret of abilities.

    She stood there, her entire body protected by dragon scales. The whole space around them belonged to her, her aura producing streaks of lightning in the air.

    Wha?! Gobta spat out, sensing danger. There was no way Alvis could remain coolheaded enough to tell friend from foe like that.

    You said your name was Gobta? You have my permission to move out immediately.

    Ohhh, you dont need to tell me twice, maam! Riders, retreat!

    One shout from him was all it took to make the goblin riders flee the scene. The surviving magic-born took the opportunity to quickly surround Alvis.

    You fool! You intend to take us on alone?

    It was nothing for her to worry about.

    Is that how little you think of me? Ah-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha! Die, you mob of idiots!!

    By the time Yamza saw it unfolding, it was already toote. One magic-born before him fell to the ground, spewing blood. One turned to stone and shattered against the earth. One had his body literally rot away on the spot, until nothing but a pile of dust remained. His army was being killed, struck by ailments by one degree or another, and Yamza had no way to stop it.

    Yoouuuuuu!!

    Alvis was, in the end, best suited for close-quartersbat. The Golden Snakehorns lone horn on her forehead became a symbol of the death that permeated the atmosphereand then Yamza realized that his defeat was total.

    Surrender, and I will take you prisoner and guarantee you your life.

    Her offer was the only method of survival he had. A quick stare with her Snake Eyes hadpletely shattered his Doppelgangers body. It even had the power to destroy equipment, apparently, leaving Yamzas partner to fade away before battle even began.

    My limbs are starting to go numb. I wont be able to defend myself before long What kind of sheer strength do these Lycanthropeers enjoy?!

    It was bad luck that Yamza had to be paired with the strongest of that trio. He chose the wrong woman to pick a fight with, and he had no idea. Alvis rarely had the chance to fully exercise her power, since she was often picked to serve amanding role. As a result, she was seen as the de facto manager of the Lycanthropeers, not as a formidable warrior in her own right.

    That was Yamzas appraisal as well, and he had totally underrated her.

    The war was won. But it was not over. yman was a sly demon lord, one who would never forgive betrayal among his own armies. And just when Yamza prepared to nod his agreement to Alviss offer:

    (You know I would never permit that, yes?)

    It was ymans voice, booming within Yamzas mind. Uh? he instinctively grunted. Then his body began moving, beyond his own control.

    S-stop! Stop that! Please, Sir yman, stop this at once!

    A hand took a bluish-purple orb out from his pocket, then brought it to his mouth.

    Mmghh!!

    He locked his jaw as tightly as he could, trying to scramble away from it. It was a pointless act of resistance, and it didntst long. Struck by ymans Marite takeover, Yamzas body was no longer his own to control.

    What are you doing? a suspicious Alvis asked. But by the time she did, Yamza was busy swallowing the orb in his handa section from Charybdiss body.

    Hah? Harbhh, nnhhh Graghaghaaaahhh!!

    What on?!

    Alvis tensed up, confusedas long, thin tendrils shot out from his body toward the dead lying around him, taking in the corpses. He ballooned in size, turning into a vast, grotesque ball of flesh. Uncontroble magical energy flowed within the Alvis-dominated air, forming a hurricane-ss blizzard.

    The creature before her consumed, expanded, and burst. Having no monster core of its own, it was a self-destructing being, rampaging across thend before meeting its demise. But its temporary power was every bit as strong as Yamzasand the nature of it was deadly. Its insatiable desire to eat everything in its path was just the same as well.

    This was the forbidden tactic Yamza was reluctant to use, the intricate trap yman hadid. Charybdis had now appeared once more.

    Alviss face tightened as she threw her full force into an attack. It didnt work. No regr strike would ever pierce this constantly expanding Charybdis. Its Ultraspeed Regeneration took in the corpses around it, rapidly reforming it into a temporary body for itself.

    Ngh! This monster!

    All Alvis could do was gnash her teeth, her Snake Eyes and lightning having no effect. This monster was disaster-ss, on a level far, far above her. Even the strongest of the Three Lycanthropeers could do little about it by herself. The only saving grace was that this was a distance away from the main battlefield; there was time before this could start to affect her allies but only until Charybdis could finish creating its body.

    Desperation flew in like a violent storm. The worst part was how this monster wasnt satisfied enough using Yamza as its substitute coreit had taken in his Ice de as well, sucking up all the heat around it and making the local temperature plummet. The monster was destroying all in its path, turning its aura into an Ice Blizzard, pummeling the area with icy snow and intense wind. That was scary enough, but what Alvis feared even more was the moment when it released all the heat energy it had taken in.

    Those who can teleport out might be fine, but everyone else

    would die.

    I hate this! May all the gods curse that bastard yman!!

    Letting her true nature take hold, Alvis screamed as she continually attackedagain and again, no time in between to breathe. It was all in vain. Even if she scarred Charybdiss exterior, any damage to the monster itself was light. It just healed itself too quickly.

    Dammit! Ive just got to get everyone out that I can

    Even through the desperation, Alvis tried to take the best measures she could. To her, this meant trying to ry a plea to Benimaru to retreat everyone from the battlefield.

    In the end, however, this never happened. It didnt need to.

    Youre ignoring orders, Alvis. I told you to get out if you faced a battle you cannot win.

    There, with no previous warning, Benimaru himself appeared.

    Sir Benimaru?!

    Oh, Charybdis, eh? My offense did little against itst time, but how about now?

    He gave her a defiant smile.

    Sir Benimaru, this monster is just too

    I know. Its perfect for testing my current powers.

    Benimaru raised his right hand and grasped itboth Charybdis and his own strength. The fight was over in an instant. His feet nted on the ground, his sword, covered in jet-ck mes, shed the monsters flesh, although it did not fully slice through its freshly constructed body. But something was different from before. Unlike with Alviss efforts, the Self-Regeneration never started. Dark mes were dancing across the gash, rapidly engulfing its entire body.

    Tch. Not quite there yet. We have no time to y with here, so Ill sadly have to end this.

    He turned back toward Alvis, leaning his sword against his shoulder, seemingly unconcerned with Charybdis.

    My apologies. I was hoping we could spar once it had achieved itsplete form, but

    The gigantic beast had not taken to the air yet, but its body was already nearly the length of half a football field. Now, however, it had been fully encased in a ck dome.

    Away with you, he whispered, and then a percussive boom! shook thend.

    It was Hellre, his wide-range razing attack, this time far more powerful than ever before.

    Benimarus Dominate me gave him a full grasp of the flow of magical energy, stabbing right through Charybdiss Magic Interference and rendering its body into ash. It proved to the world that Benimarus control over magiculespletely overpowered this monsters.

    Youre kidding me!

    Alviss surprise was understandable. If his attacks worked on Charybdis, it meant Benimarus magic force surpassed the monsters. This meant that Benimaru himself was disaster ss, on the same level as Alviss master, the demon lord Carillon.

    I have some business to take care of, Alvis. Effective immediately, I hereby appoint you as my aide tomand our entire force.

    Yes, Sir Benimaru.

    She undid her Transformation to kneel down and take the post. She had more than a few questions for Benimaru, but now was not the time for them. Calming her frenzied mind, she meekly epted her orders.

    Charybdis was an unprecedented, unexpected threat, but when faced with that irresistible force, it fell without a moments dy.

    Hoh, hoh-hoh-hoh This is quite a surprise. I was expecting Yamza to turn tail and flee. But imagine, dispatching Charybdis that easily

    Mm-hmm! I kind of have an affinity for it, but not even we could pull off a kill like that.

    ymans forces are destroyed. The missions a failurethe losses immense. He should have just sat there and yed nice, the way our fellow jester told him to.

    Yes, yes. Well, Lace warned him. yman cant me anyone for it but himself.

    Footman and Teare exchanged looks as they spoke. Before them was a heavily wounded Phobio, kept on his feet by the attending Geld.

    Well need to brief him about this, so Im afraid ytime is over.

    Footman himself was unhurt. Teare wasnt, but she was still healthy enough to fight. Judging by their injuries, Geld and Phobio appeared to have lost the day.

    You think you can leave? Phobio groaned, staggering as he tried to keep himself up. I knew you guys were bad news. If we can keep you here, Alvis and Sufia will show up before long. Plus, weve got Sir Benimaru. Itll be the end for you.

    He was scarred from head to toe, but his wounds had already closed up. The speed at which they healed was mind-boggling, going well beyond the Self-Regeneration most beastmen had and almost reaching the realm of Ultraspeed Regeneration. Phobio had inherited that skill to some extent after the previous Charybdis swallowed him up.

    Just give it up already, kitty! Teare shouted as she gave Phobio a punch that sent him reeling. It didnt leave Phobio down for long. In a few moments, he was back on his feet.

    Teare was the quicker of the two, but she could never quitend a lethal blow. Phobio, on the other hand, was slowly but surely damaging Teares body. He might have appeared defeated at first nce, but the longer the fightsted, the more likely it was that itd end otherwise.

    Footman, meanwhile, was rolled up like a meatball, bounding around at hyper-speed and trying to run Geld down. Geld used his great shield to deflect his trajectory, swinging his Meat Cleaver to try to smash him up. His attempts were blocked by Footmans thickened skin, preventing him from dealing decisive damage.

    On offense and defense, it was safe to call them perfectly evenbut only because Footman hadnt begun seriously fighting yet. And now, with Charybdis defeated, Footmans recess time was over.

    Mgh?!

    Geld, realizing this, positioned himself in front of Phobio.

    What is it, Geld?

    Before he could answer, Footman began raining attacks on the both of them. These were balls of magic, each one enormous and stuffed with energya simple attack but one with enough force to alter thendscape around them. One of the magic orbs was enough to shatter Gelds shield and even smash up the armor covering his body. It damaged Phobio in the process, and he no doubt had Ultraspeed Regeneration to thank for still being alive.

    (Hooooooh-hoh-hoh-hoh! We werent tasked with taking care of you two, so well extend you the honor of letting you go.)

    (I hope youre grateful! If we were serious about this, neither of you would be in this world any longer!)

    Neither Geld nor Phobio could stand up any longer to contest them. When the dust from the explosions finally settled, Footman and Teare were gone.

    This was a total defeat, Geld groused. I thought I had some strength, but I suppose theres always someone better than you.

    No, Geld. If you hadnt been here, Id probably be dead right now. Sorry to drag you down

    Not at all. We may have lost the battle, but were still alive. As long as we win next time, were good.

    Yeah. Yeah, youre right!

    Phobio was not a weak beastman. Footman and Teare were just too strong. Strong enough that you could even call them demon lords. Perhaps Geld had more magical energy at his fingertips, but without the ability to use it shrewdly, that power meant nothing. Geld focused entirely on defense against Footman, but even he knew that hed never win in a serious fight opposite him. For now, though, that was fine.

    (Sir Benimaru, the jesters have fled.)

    (I saw,) came the Thought Communication reply. (They might think theyre letting us live. How nave of them.)

    Benimarus orders for Geld were to discover what the enemy was capable of and keep Phobio safe. I couldnt just sit there and watch things unfold, he thought, but not killing me was a bad mistake. Sir Benimaru has recorded how that battle worked outand then Rimuru will analyze it and break open the secret to their strength.

    Thus, this was a defeat with some benefits to them. Mission aplished. And if he cant win now, he can close the gap with his future training. He had hoped to settle the score with these guys for using and abusing him, but Geld simply didnt have what it took.

    But next time, Im winning, he silently resolved.

    (Ill go back to mymand, then.)

    (Please do. Theres one more dangerous element on the field right now, so Id better tackle that.)

    Sir Benimaru sure has it tough, Geld thought as he closed the link. This battlefield was full of dangerous elements, and since they had to deal with them all at once, he was forced to divvy up his armys assets and scatter them around. Benimaru intended to sort these conflicts by priority and step in himself to handle any rescues needed, but one misstep along the line could lead to serious danger. He seemed to be handling his post well, however. One would think hed focus on finding and killing Footman first, but he sessfully managed to put overall victory above his own vendettas.

    This isnt some general with a thirst for blood, I suppose. Compared to when we fought him, the growth hes shown has been amazing

    It made Geld trust in Benimaru all the more.

    It was several minutes into the battleminutes that, to Gabil and Sufia, felt like hours. But it ended unceremoniously.

    Mgh?!

    What on?!

    Huffhuff Whatwhat is the matter?

    After the second or third repetition, Sufia had learned how to roll with Middrays throws, helping recover her energy. Gabil, meanwhile, had flung his spear wildly around at this attack he wasnt used to,pletely exhausting him. Middray, dealing with them both, appearedpletely unhindered by fatigupared to sparring with Milim, this wouldnt even make him break a sweat.

    And Middray was the first to notice it.

    All forces, use your healing magics! he shouted, the casual ease disappearing from his face. Stand up! Stand up and rouse everyone around here!

    This is bad, Father Middray, Hermes said, apparently feeling much better now. This guy The reading Im getting is huge.

    I know that! This is Charybdis, the beast Lady Milim dispatched just the other day. Or is it its remains?

    Yeah It looks unstable to me. I imagine itll disintegrate before the day is through

    But this is a battlefield. If things go wrong, it could rapidly evolve. Better not to give a monster like that the food it craves.

    The fallen priests around him cast healing spells to revive both themselves and Team Hiryu under Gabilsmand.

    Charybdis? Sufia asked. The monster that used Phobio as a core to revive itself with?! I thought Lady Milim had already destroyed it!

    Yes, Gabil added, realizing this current match was over. If it was Charybdis, Lady Milim definitely killed it

    Calm down. Its not the real thing; just a fragment of its force. I think it used Yamza as its recement core

    Middray was using Dragons nce to analyze the innards of the creature. It was not as strong as Milims own Dragons Eye, but it still provided him with ample enough vision and analysis skills.

    Hermes, meanwhile, was surveying the area for any other potential threats. Looks like youre right, sir. That ass Yamza was trying to kill us, but his souls already been consumed. With how he is now, well just have to keep damage to a minimum and wait for him to fall apart, he coldly concluded.

    Did you hear that? Keep your weapons at the ready, people. And dont get greedy! If buying time is all we need, that wont be a tall order.

    Let us help you out, Gabil added, in sync with Middray as if they were old friends. We are more used to high-altitude flight sincest time. If we can catch those scale attacks before they strike, they cannot hurt us.

    Even a crazed, twisting beast like Charybdis had a tendency to chase after anything moving. A flying target, Gabil reasoned, would make the perfect lure. Sufia was also thinking unusually lucidly, trying to execute on what she could do here.

    Right, Middray began, Ill aid in the retreat so it cant feed off any of our ground forces and

    But before he could finish, things took an abrupt turn as Benimaru all but vaporized Charybdis.

    Whaton?! He just pulled off the most unbelievable thing!

    Who is that guy? A demon lord? Unless youre Lady Milim, how could some regr magic-born do that? He has to be some kind of monster

    Only Middray and Hermes had an urate bead on the situation. Sufia and Gabil saw it at the same time but couldnt parse what just happened. All they could see was that the evil aura of Charybdis had been snuffed in an instant.

    Hey, whats going on? Tell me!

    Yes. We seek an exnation as well.

    Yeah, um, Id want to exin, Hermes said, but

    I dont think we need to, Middray finished.

    Before either of them could, the air in front of them twisted and warped, revealing a magic-born with hair as red as roaring mes. It was Benimaru, sword rested on his shoulder, and he was here to take on Middray, thest threat on the battlefield.

    Well, he said with a sneer, I see youve been entertaining my friends? Then he realized something wasnt quite right about this picture. There was evidence ofbat around him, but there were no injuriesand by the looks of things, no hard feelings on either side.

    Sir Benimaru, wait! These are Lady Milims fighters, the priests of the Dragon Faithful!

    What? Lady Milims?! In that case

    Yes! They healed our wounds with magic!

    I see. It seems Ive jumped to conclusions. You seemed like such a threat in this theater, I couldnt help but be rmed.

    Wah-ha-ha-ha-ha! You didnt jump to conclusions at all. We were actually fighting, yes. And we did perform some healing, but that was to prepare for what we thought was an oing disaster. Now I suppose all that wasnt necessary.

    Ah. So what now? Are you taking us on?

    Well, what should we do?

    Because personally speaking, I would prefer not to engage inbat with Lady Milims forces.

    No, I suppose not. I can understand wanting to try it, but there is no quarrel between us. I would simply want topare our powers.

    Yes I can see that.

    The two gave each other knowing grins.

    Whoooa! Hermes interjected. Not good, Father!

    Yes, Sir Benimaru! If you hurt one of the Dragon Faithful, theres no telling what kind of cmity that would bring upon us!

    You heard her, Father Middray! Sir Rimuru is Lady Milims friend. It would all end in tragedy, I am sure of it!

    Sufia silently resented Hermes and Gabil for stepping in.

    Fair enough, Benimaru said. Besides, if I donte at him trying to kill him, I expect itll result in nothing but defeat for meand I dont like engaging in losing battles.

    Wah-ha-ha-ha-ha! Quite so. And Im not sure even I could withstand a blow like the one that buried Charybdis!

    Middray might haveughed the concept off, but he had a suspicion that he could win the battle before Benimaru had a chance to bust that out. That would result in a life-and-death duel, however, going well beyond the boundaries of a friendly sparring session. A battlefield was the wrong ce for this, and it no longer meant anything anyway.

    Thus ended the battle in the former kingdom of Orbic, while the unified forces enjoyed a near-total victory. But this wasnt the only battlefield.

    At the stroke of midnight, Shuna, Soei, and Hakuro sprang into action. They quickly discovered ymans headquarters within the wends covered by the mysterious mist and began to stealthily make their way there.

    Beyond these wends were several murky swamps, gas bubbling out from the surface. This was what created the cloud of mist, making things seem eerier than they already were. The moment they waded in, visibility plummeted to nearly nothing.

    Uh-oh. This mist is blocking our Magic Sense.

    It is, confirmed Soei. That was why we called off our investigation. With this poor visibility, anyone inside would have to rely on their own five senses to see around them. Thats what the enemy must use to keep track of what goes on in here.

    Mm, I see. So we face a brutal disadvantage.

    Indeed, Sir Hakuro. You and I can use Covert Agent to hide our presences, but Lady Shuna

    I should be fine.

    It was true. Hakuro could use his Haze concealing skill to all but disappear to the external observer, as could Soei. You could be standing right next to them and never realize it. Shuna, despite not having this exact Art, could still perfectly heal herself.

    Hmm Abination of illusory and mystical magic? It doesnt work like Haze, but it has the same effect. Well done, Lady Shuna.

    Hakuro was rightthis approach was Shunas original creation. While she wasnt quite as gifted at it as Rimuru, her Creator unique skill allowed her to conjure up her own magic spells without a recipe.

    Then we should be fine, Soei said. But I want you all to remember that Thought Communication wont work in this fog. Visibility is low, it is hard to stay in contact, and we all need to proceed carefully and cautiously. Also

    Even with Soeis Replications, Thought Communicationbased conversation would be impossible. Instead, he provided a length of Sticky Steel Thread around each of their wrists for emergency contacts. Focusing on this thread would allow them to maintain at least a modicum ofmunication, but if the string broke, that would be the end of the contact. Using it required a great deal of caution.

    Shuna and Hakuro nodded and wrapped it around their wrists. They were ready now. Lets get going, Shuna said, and the three ran off.

    Then, after several minutes of walking, Shuna stopped.

    Oh no, she whispered. We seem to have fallen into a trap.

    A trap?

    I can feel my senses going haywire on me, yes, but I dont feel any enemies around the What?!

    Before he could finish speaking, Soei felt multiple presences nearby appear from out of nowhere, virtually surrounding them.

    How on? Where were so many of these enemies hiding, such that we couldnt notice them?

    No, Hakuro! They werent hiding. We were lured right to them!

    Ah This fog. The clouds doing more than confusing our sense of direction. Its concealing the enemy and inviting us right to the middle of their circle

    I see. That exins the odd feeling I had just now.

    Youre right. The mist is triggering Spatial Interference to lure intruders from any direction to a specific ce

    Before Shuna finished exining this, one of the presences appeared. Soei and Hakuro steeled themselves toward it, keeping a watchful eye out for the still-unseen monsters in the mist, as Shuna closed her mouth and focused on ita skeleton dressed in a vestment of pure white.

    Such massive magical force, she whispered, beads of sweat on her forehead. For a moment, she thought it might have been yman himself, although she banished the thought quickly. It was past midnight; the demon lord should be over at the Walpurgis Council. Perhaps it was one of ymans five fingers, thenbut the figure before them exuded pure presence, beyond that of the Lycanthropeers and approaching demon lord level. The power of this magic-born was overwhelming; it was a wonder that it was subservient to anyone else.

    She recalled what Mjurran told her about ymans most senior leadersand that one of them was geared strictly toward defending their base.

    You must be Adalmann, then. The ruler of thisndthe wight king with power over countless undead

    Hakuro had just used Heavengaze to reach the same conclusion. But this figure was more ominous than how Mjurran described it, its force far more massive. The guardian of this wend was a wight king on the level of a demon lord.

    Soei epted Shuna and Hakuros appraisal, finding no reason to doubt it. Then, quietly, he sharpened his delike mind. No matter who the enemy is, he will kill himthat was his credo.

    But just as Soei was about to move, the wight king spoke.

    Indeed, I am Adalmann. I have been ordered to protect thisnd by the great demon lord yman. Lowly intruders like you may do nothing but humbly submit your lives to me. Do it, and I will kill you without pain.

    This was themand of a kingly figure, not the words of a foe who saw Shuna and herpanions as equals. Considering the massive, overwhelming amount of Adalmanns magic energy, anything else would almost seem improper.

    Now, all around the area, a legion of over ten thousand undead were writhing, as if attracted to the seemingly inexhaustible supply of magicules. Cracking, wrenching sounds filled the air as they moved to encircle the trio.

    We are fully surrounded, Shuna breathlessly reported. This mist is working alongside a directional barrier to prevent teleportation outside. All our means ofmunication are blocked. The only way to get out of here is to defeat this Adalmann foe.

    Then we must strike their leader at once.

    No disagreement here. A blow from me can even kill the dead.

    Hakuro and Soei had no interest in following Adalmanns advice. As Shuna exined the situation, they both went on the attack. But Adalmann simplyughed in their faces.

    Heh-heh-heh You appear not to know your ce. I generously provided you mercy, and yet, you remain foolish to the end. You will regret refusing that offer shortly.

    He breezily swung an arm. The next moment, the most surprising thing happenedthe white de of Hakuro, instantly zooming within range of Adalmann, was blocked by the knight who had appeared in front of him.

    Hakuro stepped back in shock, failing to believe that this killer blow could be parried. This was a death knight, ranked A-minus in the Guild system, but from that sh, Hakuro could sense something was off. It was a powerful monster, yes, but no garden-variety death knight could ever block a sh from him.

    You are no normal adversary. Very well. Let me give you my full attention.

    He had an urate bead on this death knight and the threat it carried for him. Its strength relied not on physical toughness but on the built-up level of its skillswhich meant Heavengaze would tell him nothing about it. So he used his own physical might to confront it.

    The death knight was silent; the corpse serving as the shell of its body was incapable of speech. But there was a blistering blue me in its sunken eyes. The light of consciousness was in there, the pride of a former human being, and it told Hakuro that his challenge was epted.

    Even after abandoning life, this death knight was a proud, noble warrior. The difference in magical energy between the two was negligible, as was their physical muscle. It marked the beginning of a sh between built-up skills, one that quickly made sparks fly.

    Before Soei, meanwhile, was Adalmann himself, an enormous shadow from out of nowhere blocking all attempts to attack him.

    Deh! Soei red at the towering shade. No A dragon zombie?

    No, Soei! Shuna could see it more fully, through the muck. Nothing that weak! Its magicules outnumber yours; it stands at the peak of the undeadits a death dragon!

    Soeis face tensed upon hearing this. He could manage this solo, but fighting this foe while guarding Shuna was a different story. The usually reliable Hakuro was too busy with the death knight. He had to dispatch this death dragon as soon as possible, or else Shuna would be overrun by the thousands of undead lumbering their way in from all sides. Now, Soei realized, was no time to hold back.

    Then, die! Mystic Thread Strike!

    Without dy, Soei dealt out the most powerful attack he could, a killer move that fricasseed the enemy with thousands of branching strings of Sticky Steel Thread, each granted the Insta-Kill effect from his Shadow Striker unique skill. They created a virtual garden of beautiful, bloody blooms, like a kaleidoscope. Even a half-spiritual life-form like an undead would be snuffed out by this spiritual body-slicing moveor so it should have.

    No! Its regenerating?!

    Soei could feel himself begin to sweat. The sixty-foot-long beasts body was ripped apart, seemingly ending the battle. But then, as if nothing was amiss, the death dragons body reassembled itself. It went so fast, even faster than Ultraspeed Regeneration, that it seemed like nothing less than immortality.

    Then let me destroy you, soul and all

    Soei, Shuna shouted out as he steeled himself, calm down! You know how to analyze your foes strengths. You should know that you cant beat a death dragon!

    But

    That dragons soul is within the magic-born Adalmann, she quietly dered. Dont worry about me; just work on keeping that dragon where it is. Ill defeat Adalmann!

    Thats too dangerous!

    No, Soei. Listen to me. Im angry.

    A cold smile stretched across Shunas face to dispel Soeis worries. They shined a piercing light, exhibiting her raging emotions. The sight made Soei m up, unable to speak.

    As the former princess of the ogre tribe, Shunas words had the power to make others do her biddingand now, that power was stronger than even the otherworlder Kirara Mizutanis Bewilder unique skill. Besides, Shuna wasnt some precious cargo that required constant protection. Soei knew that. So there was only one answer.

    Yes, Lady Shuna. Best of luck.

    She contentedly smiled. You too, Soei. That dragons all yours.

    Soei nodded back, giving Shuna his full trust, then threw himself back into his own fight.

    Shuna, left alone, didnt waver at all as she confronted Adalmann. The wight king rewarded this by ring at her.

    Hoh? And what do you intend to do, little girl? What could you do without anyone to defend you? How are you going to engage ten thousand foes at once?

    There was an odd sort of joy in Adalmanns voice. He was enjoying this, in fact. The demon lord ymans orders were absolute, but Adalmann was still afforded his own sense of free will, although his activities were limited in every other way. The only thing he was allowed full rein to do was wipe out intruders.

    ymans other minions derided him for having so much power but so little brains to back that upand it was only because he was not allowed to leave thisnd or do anything on his own volition. And it was perhaps the way that he wasnt even allowed to provide excuses to them that made people fail to realize it.

    Adalmann was less a magic-born and more a weapon, a base-defense mechanism bound to thisnd. His soul remained unbound, but his behavior was now automatic, following the orders input into him. He spoke of his loyalty to yman, but that was just an act. He had been preset to pay his formal respects to the owner of this device.

    In his heart of hearts, Adalmann wanted to be released from these bonds. That was why he enjoyed talking with Shuna. The defense mechanisms worked automatically; he had no authority to alter them in any way. The chats he had with intruders were his only hobby to speak of, the only thing no one else could interfere with. The demon lord Kazalim, creator of this structure, offered him that much mercy. Or maybe not. But Adalmann wanted to think so. That gesture, after all, was what had allowed him to live all this time, a thousand years or so, without sumbing to insanity.

    Even if it was just a measure to keep this system running longer, I have to thank him for that, at least.

    And he meant it. That was why he never spared any effort to hammer down intruders, regardless of what he thought about it. But at least he prayed, as he imagined an army of ten thousand undead preying upon Shuna, that it could be done painlessly.

    But then her voice rang out sharply once more.

    No need to worry about me. Alignment Field!!

    At that instant, the area within a three-hundred-foot radius of Shuna became holy ground, where nothing of evil alignment could tread. It was another original product of Shunas mind, using her experience to Analyze the Anti-Magic Area and Holy Field, then Fuse them together. This barrier obstructed all magicules, but it could also be set to block fire, wind, or any one of the other four major elements, making it a shockingly formidable defensive spell.

    Now we wont be distracted. If I defeat you, that will destroy the defense system with you at its core, right?

    Hmm. Impressive. And youve seen through my secret as well. What is your name, girl?

    Shuna was absolutely right. If Adalmann died, the whole base-defense system would crumble. It was structured to bind Adalmanns soul down, using it to circte therge amounts of magicules it required. That would no doubt free the death dragon serving himas well as the death knight, Alberto, who was once Adalmanns friend and confidant. Shuna had seen all that at a nce, and Adalmann offered her his honest respect for that. Respect and the ever-so-slight hope that she might be able to release him from this pain.

    My name is Shuna.

    Shuna Lady Shuna. Then let us settle this for good. If you can defeat me, I will follow your wishes.

    My, thank you for the polite request. However, all I seek is the destruction of the demon lord yman. If you stay out of my way, I could leave you alone to live on thisnd, perhaps?

    Heh-heh-heh. Im not sure thats possible, Im afraid.

    No? I thought you might be capable of conquering the ties that bind you, but perhaps I was wrong. Oh, well. In that case, she said without a moments hesitation, I will kill you as I intended to.

    If I could conquer them, thought Adalmann, I would have done it eons ago. Kazalim is a man to be feared, a foe no one can hold a candle to. The nickname Curse Lord is not just bravado. And she makes it all sound so easy

    Then the time for talk is over, he dered, still having no ill will toward her. Try to resist me with everything youve got!

    Adalmann was born a prince in one of the small nations under the jurisdiction of the Holy Empire of Lubelius. Thesends were all too weak to have their own standing militaries, instead relying on the Temple Knights sent from the Churchs central headquarters. In exchange, they were required to adopt Luminism as the state religion and provide money and qualified personnel for their knight corps.

    The Western Holy Church of the time didnt enjoy the influence they wielded now; this was before the advent of their Crusader groups. Practitioners who showed talent could be granted the name of acolyte, a nonhereditary title, but that was it. In the midst of that, Adalmann was an exceptional performerand with his elder brother taking over the country and quickly giving birth to an heir, he was free to devote himself deeply to spreading the faith, joining the Churchs missionary corps and quickly making a name for himself.

    He was devout to the faith, constantly fascinated by the divine works of Luminus. Never once did he doubt the existence of this lone, true, powerful goddess. That devotion eventually led him to learn the divine miracles of the Churchs archbishop ss, making him the greatest master of holy magic in his era.

    In time, he advanced to the rank of cardinal, the loftiest in the Western Holy Church. In the Lubelius noble hierarchy, he was no one particrly special. But he redoubled his efforts, extending his interests to magic beyond the holy spells he was familiar with. He would hold long discussions about magic with Gadora, one of his best friends at the time, as he incessantly polished his skills. The effort eventually paid offhe became an Enlightened, transcending the bounds of humanity itself.

    An Enlightened was a person who retained their human form but on the inside was a demi-spiritual being, simr to a higher-level elemental. Their powers were leaps and bounds above those of a regr human, and they were often seen as defenders of the human cause. This power quickly put Adalmann in a position of immense central authority.

    Time passed. Adalmanns intensive study continued. And eventually, he took the next step forward, to the highest peak of mankinda Sage. As he did, he was greeted with wondrous news: He would be called to the Inner Cloister, at the top of the Churchs holy mountain.

    The offer filled him with joy.

    Finally, an audience with Luminus herself!

    He always believed that Luminus was real, an unwavering belief that served as the source for all his faith. So he promptly set off for the holy mount, not believing for a moment that it would lead to tragedy. That belief, sadly, would ultimately betray him.

    The intense magical battle continued.

    Melt all and wear it awayAcid Shell!

    The aspectual spell Adalmann had just cast conjured balls of liquid in the air, each capable of melting flesh to the bone. They rained down upon Shuna.

    She didnt miss a beat.

    me Wall.

    The barrier of fire deflected and vaporized all the magic-infused droplets. Between elerating her mind to a thousand times normal, possessing superior Analyze and Assess skills, and changing the rules with Cast Cancel and Control Laws, Shunas unique skill Parser was made for a sh of magic like this. From the moment Adalmann began constructing a spell, she had a way to deal with it.

    Then how about this? Malicious dead, ept this sacrificeCurse Bind!!

    This was necromancy, an offshoot of elemental magic that took advantage of the negative energies from ghouls and the undead. Curse Bind was a particrly nasty one, summoning zombies thattched on to anything livinghuman or magic-bornand drained away their life energy.

    Even that wasnt enough.

    Holy Bell.

    Shunas refreshingly clear voice reached Adalmanns ears, and right after came the tolling of bells he was once well used to hearing. That was all it took to send the grudgeful zombies to the afterlife.

    It cant be! Why? Why is a monster wielding elemental magic?!

    Adalmanns eyes shot open at the divine miracle ying out before him. The magic was deployed all too beautifully, reminding him of his youthful days spent studying.

    This was holy magic in the air, something a monster girl should never be able to weave. The unbelievable sight made him scream without thinking.

    Shuna smiled as she decided to answer Adalmanns question, even though she had no obligation to. Do you find it strange? Perhaps you need a little more imagination. Holy magic is not the exclusive domain of humans; it will work with anyone who believes in the power of miracles, based on the strength of their belief.

    Conventional wisdom in this world stated that holy magic worked by forging a pact with an elemental spirit. This was both right and wrong. The fact that magic-born could cast healing spells indicated that holy magic was possible for them without any pact with a holy being. Most humans, and even monsters, didnt understand that.

    The sole condition for acquiring holy magic was having faithbelieving in miracles, to put it another way. Good, or evil, didnt factor into it; the strength of ones emotions was directly converted into power. That was how this family of magic worked. (This was also the reason why the Dragon Faithful that worshipped Milim could ess holy magic.)

    Hearing this terse exnation was staggering to Adalmann. II was wrong the whole time? I was betrayed. I lost my faith in the goddess Luminus. I thought I would never be able to wield holy magic again

    Luminus betrayed Adalmannor to be precise, he had been trapped by the supreme leaders of Luminism. He still didnt know why. Perhaps they feared his rise in power; perhaps it was another reason. All he knew was that Luminus, his goddess, offered him no helping hand.

    Its almostical, in a way. The Seven Days Clergy tricked me into setting off to quell arge army of undead attacking our people I never couldve guessed it was a trap. And thanks to that Gadora conducting magical experiments on me, Ive been revived as this twisted, reviled figure

    Unaware that he was being led to his grave, he waltzed right into the far edge of the Great Forest of Jura, where he still dwelled today. He was awaited by a legion of undead, led by a dragon zombie. He was apanied by Alberto, acolyte and his closest friend, along with four knights and an expeditionary force that loved him, and they fought with all their might. It wasnt enough.

    Adalmann fell to the groundand died once. But then Reincarnation, a Mysterious Art ced upon him by his other friend Gadora, activated and resurrected his so soul that had already been poisoned by the miasma across thend, the malice of the dead around him. He was reborn not as a man but as a wight, transformed into a skeleton. The metamorphosis had caught the attention of the demon lord Kazalim, and now here he was today.

    Thus, if you are incapable of handling holy magic, then I am positive you are incapable of beating me.

    Shunas words hit home like a knockout punch, reminding Adalmann that he was still in battle. Wh-why? he instinctively asked. Why did you think I was a master of holy magic?

    Because of how you look, came the cold reply. That white vestment, which only high-level bishops and above are permitted to wear. You were worthy of such fine robes, and yet, you whine and carry on about being unable to conquer such a basic bind like this. I hardly needed to examine you closely to see that you wore that robe simply out of blind attachment to your former holy magic.

    She had him pegged the entire time. He could hear it in her voice.

    Nnnhh I have let you spout far too much nonsense!!

    Adalmann flew into a ragenot at Shuna but at himself. Seeing his true heart now, something he couldnt notice until it was pointed out to him, made him both exasperated and enraged at his own spinelessness. But he could also feel an inexplicably refreshingfort in his heart, like the fog of a thousand years had finally lifted from him. He let his raging emotions drive him to cast another spell.

    I offer this prayer to my god. I seek your divine powers. May my request reach your ears safely

    Yes. I simplycked the resolve. Having my beloved friends turn into undead, I couldnt let myself die and leave them behind I wasnt good enough. Necromancy and aspectual magic cannot cleanse the undead. Who could say how many times I wished I could tap into holy magic

    Those friends were one reason why Adalmann was bound to this area. He couldnt abandon the fine men and women who died here but lived on as ursed zombies. And that intent was the bond that tied them to thisnd. Finally, just now, Adalmann realized the mistake he had made.

    So he connected together aplex seal with the bones that were his hands and boldly dered his prayer to thends above. It was an incantation, as shown by theplicated geometrical shapes that appeared in the air before him.

    This girl, Shuna I have no grudge against her. If anything, I owe her a great debt for opening my eyes. But suicide is forbidden to me. I apologize, but I will need to have you join me

    That apology came from the heart.

    The checks ced upon him by Kazalim ranged far and wide, holding Adalmann downbut if he was caught up in the fallout from an attack on the enemy, that was hardly his fault. He nned to destroy himself, taking Shuna along him, for only then could he free the people who unwittingly joined him.

    Ayered circle of magic spread out, covering Shuna and Adalmann.

    and render all to dust! Disintegration!!

    I was waiting for that! Overdrive!!

    Just before Adalmann couldplete his spell, Shuna used Parser for a Control Laws rewrite. The results wrested control of the local spiritual elements away from Adalmann, driving them haywire.

    Wh-what? You have less than a tenth of my magical energy! How could you possibly overwrite my magic?!

    Magicules and spiritual particles were controlled by magical force. Having his magic overwritten could only mean that Adalmanns force was overpowered by Shunas. To him, Shuna looked hopelessly outssed, but now, at longst, Adalmann realized he was wrong on that score as well.

    Impressive. Let me reward you by releasing you from thisnd!

    The wight was swallowed up by a flood of light, unable to hear Shunas words to the end. She had used magic on him, realizing that someone like Adalmannat least her equal in terms of holy magould collect the energy required to purify the local area. She wasnt expecting him to break out the most powerful of all holy spells, but luckily for her, she knew how that one worked. That was what made it so easy to overwrite.

    The light now permeated thend, enveloping not just Adalmann but all the other undeadcleansing them.

    Hakuro and Soei ran up to Shuna.

    I tell you, I wanted to end this sooner, but that death knight was far more capable than I estimated. You saved my life there, Lady Shuna.

    With thend fully cleansed, the death knight reverted all the way down to a lowly skeletal fighter and fell to the ground. Following Adalmanns will, it had lost any further desire to fight. The sight was enough to make Hakuro realize the battle was over. He regretted losing such a challenging opponent, but protecting Shuna took priority over everything else, and she required his attention right now.

    No, Hakuro, you were a great help to me. You too, Soei, distracting that death dragons attention and buying me so much time. If it had fallen out of our control, I doubt we could have won.

    It shames me that I could not defeat it.

    As Soei implied, the death dragon was a powerful foe, capable of healing light damage instantly and boasting an aura that infected the mind of anyone who touched it. It took someone like him, capable of controlling multiple Replications at once, to emerge from that unscathed. If anything, he deserved praise for holding out so long against a foe that shut down his decisive weapon.

    The death dragon, too, vanished upon Adalmanns defeat, unable to maintain its existence after the magicule supply that powered it was shut off. Soei didnt much like how it ended, but anything you can walk away from is a victory.

    A victory, yes, but one with regrets. The three looked at one another and sighed.

    Still, muttered Shuna, if Adalmann had engaged me seriously from the beginning, none of us would be alive, would we? I think I let my anger drive me to be a little too reckless.

    Adalmann never let up on her at all during the fight, but he also never attempted anything underhanded to snare her. If he really intended to kill them all, he couldve done so in many other ways. Shuna could see that, and it filled her with regret.

    Quite true, Hakuromented. Perhaps our new strengths have made us grow a tad conceited.

    Certainly. It is just as Sir Rimuru fretted about. There is no telling what may happen in battle. I should have gathered more intelligence.

    In the end, however, a win was a win. ymans domain had lost its main line of defense. But that didnt end things. The trio had a job to doseize ymans castle and fully neutralize the threat inside.

    Nobatantsprised the majority of the people remaining in the castle, none of whom signed any oath of loyalty to yman. The more quick-witted among them, or those who took the employment simply for moneys sake, surrendered without a hint of resistance. There were also many who were restrained in the castle by mental or spiritual bonds, but abination of persuasion and magical de-cursing on Shunas part allowed them to capture the entire castle in short order.

    With the upants neutralized, it was time to start searching. They had already confirmed that the demon lord Carillon wasnt being held here, but they wanted to seek out anything they might be able to use against yman.

    As they did, a figure approached them.

    Please, one moment.

    Mm? Youre still alive? Did you need me to finish you off?

    Wait, Hakuro. He has no will to fight left.

    It was Adalmann, and Shuna had to calmly keep Hakuro from drawing his sword. The wight fell to his knees, apanied by a single skeletal fighter.

    Please, allow me to call you Lady Shuna. Thanks to your magic, all of us have been released from the bonds that tied us here. Perhaps it was fate that kept us alive without being cleansed. I have a request that I hope you will let me propose.

    What is that? a quizzical Shuna asked, fearing this would be yet more trouble for them.

    Thank you for hearing me out. I was hoping I would be able to meet the figure that you have devoted your faith to, Lady Shuna. When I lost my faith, I also lost the chance to ever reach the heights of my power ever again. My faith in my goddess Luminus is deadand I need to find a new god for myself.

    The three each gave Adalmann incredulous looks.

    I Well, we have a great respect for Sir Rimuru, yes, but we dont worship him, Shuna stammered in reply.

    Sir Rimuru, you say? Adalmann was unfazed, still eager to sell himself. Truly a wonderful name, one fully worthy of describing the glories of my new god. We may merely be a pair of fragile undead, but I believe we may be able to offer you assistance. Lady Shuna, would it be possible to arrange an audience with this Sir Rimuru?

    Shuna wanted to remind Adalmann of the difference between blindly, unconditionally worshipping someone and treating them with respect while dealing with your problems by yourself. But she didnt. It seemed like too much to get into. Instead, she conjured up a mental image of Rimuru, the boingy slime she knew.

    Well, why not? Once he sees Sir Rimuru in the flesh, that might be enough to make him give up.

    Adalmann seemed to be the type who got the wrong impression of people easily. It would take time to persuade him to think otherwise, so Shuna figured itd be expeditious for everyone involved if she just nodded and said yes.

    Once the dust settled, Shuna was inmand of Adalmann and the several thousand undead that survived the battle (or whatever it was that undead did). ymans castle was now fully conquered.

 Volume 6 - Ch 5

    WALPURGIS

    The impossibly ornate door connected right to the meeting hall.

    Arge, round table was positioned in the center, with twelve evenly spaced chairs surrounding it. Ten demon lords were on the invite list (with Carillon absent), so two of these seats would be empty even if I took up one. Attendees sat in chronological order of their demon lord appointment, and so I was ced right in front of the doornot that I minded. My attention was focused in the room around me anyway.

    On an asion like this, I wanted to observe my new colleagues as much as possible. Of course, there were only two people here right now. One was Ramiris, at the seat of honor way on the other side. She was seated and kicking her legs around, having a whale of a time, like a kid on a car trip. I figured I could ignore her.

    No, my attention was on her right, at the seat directly facing me. There I saw a man with bewitchingly attractive red hair. A man, definitely, but there was more than a touch of femininity to his dashing good looks. His eyes were shut, but I doubted he was napping.

    One look was all I needed to know: This dude was trouble. Analyze and Assess seemed to suggest that he wasnt any big deal, but my sixth sense was giving me the eeriest vibes with him. At first nce, he seemed like an inexperienced kid, kind of magically strong but unable to control his aura. Without the Great Sages analytical skills, I mightve been trickedthat was how crafty he was at hiding his true self, feeding the people around him misinformation and making them underestimate his true skills. We hadnt even started fighting yet, and the battle was already under way.

    It made me recall the mind-reading skills of Gazel, the dwarf king. Kind of like my Great Sage, nobody would know you had that skill unless you told them. It wouldnt be until someone tried it on you that youd notice it, I think, unless it was a mind reading that went really deep into your psyche to avoid that. As long as mytent resistance didnt fail me, I was pretty sure Id be okay.

    As a result of this, hiding your skills was very important. You could also bluff people into thinking you had certain skills or deliberately mess up a skill to make them think you were inept to wield it. There were all kinds of ways to y with your opponents minds, and that was exactly what this pretty boy was doingtricking other peoples Analyze and Assess skills to mess around with them.

    My idea had always been to hide my powers, keep my aura turned down as long as possible, and give the enemy zero information to work with. This guy, meanwhile, was using his rivals data-gathering skills against them. It was a sort of screening process. He was, in effect, asking his foes Do you have the power to read me? If they didnt, they were out of the picture; if they did, hed gauge their response. If the fake info he nted into their minds was enough to scare them off, they werent worth dealing with in the first cebut if you did notice his trick, that nce at the sheer depths of his powers would make you unable to resist him.

    But think of it like this. Even the data he wanted you to know about indicated that he had as much magical force as Carillon. There was no way to guess how much he actually had. Even if you understood his game, it was hard not to let it unnerve you a bit.

    This was Guy, and he was clearly on a whole other level.

    By the time I was done examining Guy, arge man lumbered into the room, bringing only one guest with him. This was Daggrull, the demon lord giant whose overwhelming presence dominated any room he was in. He immediately walked up and mmed himself into a seat at Guys right, kicking back and putting his feet up. The empty space between them mustve belonged to Milim, indicating that the table divided demon lords into two halves based on their order, with Guy on one end and me on the other.

    I turned my eyes to him. Guy was a tall figure himself, but Daggrull was enormous, not to mentionfy-looking in his specially made chair. Even something like this chair was an opulent-looking magical item. This was Veldoras favorite rival, and the magic with which he presented himself definitely signaled to me that he could take on a dragon type.

    Plus, the amount of magicule energy on him was just ridiculous. Was that higher or lower than Veldoras? It seemed bottomless to me, but itd be hard to urately measure unless I fought him for real. Still, quality beat quantity. Just because he had a bunch of magicules on hand didnt make him seem that scary to me. The key was how well he used them. Differences in skill level were a vital aspect of any fight, of course, and a demon lord like Daggrull couldnt be that unskilled. I suppose Ill need to watch out for him, too.

    Now another one came in, a handsome, muscle-bound man decked out in some real fancy-looking threads. He was tall, if not as tall as Daggrull, and his facial features looked like theyd been chiseled. His short, curly blond hair looked wild on his scalp, perhaps representing his violent personality. To put it simply, he had Hollywood good looks, and he knew how to charm people.

    I suppose, of course, the thing that stuck out the most were the two fangs visible from his lips. He mustve been the demon lord Valentine, the vampire. He sat to Ramiriss left, so in terms of the seat order, he mustve been about as old as Daggrullthat, or perhaps he just took over for whoever he reced. Not that seat assignments mattered that much.

    What struck me more were the pair Valentine brought with him. One was an elderly man, kind of a manservant type. Definitely well-trained, unmoving and statuesque. His aura was restrained, revealing nothingthe same strategy I used. The second one, meanwhile, was an eye-catchingly beautiful silver-haired girl who seemed to shine like the sun. Her skin was pale, and she had one red eye and one blue. There was something oddly eerie about this girl, who appeared to be on the cusp of adulthood and was d in a maid-style dress. Maid dresses are like battle uniforms, as they say, and it wouldnt be odd for this girl to be pretty strong.

    And these two were both working for this guy? Thats a surprise. The girl, in particr, was just letting her gigantic aura out all over the ce. Buthang on. When our eyes met, I was struck by the most ufortable feeling. Maybe I was imagining it, but it seemed like she was changing the nature of her aura at random.

    Understood. Analyze and Assess indicates that the target likely bears more magicules than the demon lord Valentine.

    Ah, I knew it. I couldnt read her overall energy count, but its higher than Valentines, the guy shes serving. It was very cleverly concealedif you didnt have an ultimate skill like mine, youd never spot it. But again, they werent really intent on hiding itlike Guy, they wanted to assess you, see whether you spotted it or not.

    Could this girl be the real demon lord? Or perhaps the previous holder of this seat, the demon lord that retired out. Maybe this is that Milus, the vampiress that even Veldora had high praise for. The changeover happened more than 1,500 years ago, so perhaps not too many demon lords knew about thator did but were keeping mum about it. Or didnt care. Either way, better be careful.

    Valentine, the current demon lord, was no pushover himself. He had a heroic sort of ambition, even more than an untransformed Carillon, so there was no reason to doubt his strength. And if that wasnt enough, she had that freaky girl with her. If it was her domain that got burned to ash, it wouldnt be strange for her to despise Veldora at all. I resisted the urge to yell Whyd you have to piss thatdy off?!

    At least there was one saving gracewho wouldnt mind dying by the hand of such a beautiful figure? (Quite a few people, I imagine, but) Ill just have to hope she doesnt learn about Veldora and meor if she does, that I dont have to clean up the mess.

    After a little while, the fifth person showed upthis one a loner, almost sleepwalking to his post. He had two swords on his belt, but thats it. Not much of an arsenal. I got a quick nce at his eyes; they were light blue. His hair was a very dark shade of purple with silver streaks in it. He still looked young to me, maybe even high-school age, and he had well-defined facial features, although they were spoiled by his sleepy eyes and general listlessness.

    He stopped by Ramiriss seat to say hello. Yo. Man, youre still, like, the size of a bug, huh?

    Oh, you trying to start a fight with me? Like you could even handle me, Deeno.

    So person number five was Deeno. He definitely seemed cut from the same cloth as her. Neither was seriously riled; they seemed to just be screwing with each other.

    Why would I need to, dumbass? Like, its totally obvious who would win.

    Pfft! I didnt realize you were in that much of a hurry to die. Im in perfect physical form today, Ill have you know!

    Uh-huh. Hey, havent you shrunk sincest time I saw you?

    What do you want from me?! I only just got reborn recently!

    When I asked her about it, Ramiris said she had been resurrected around five hundred years ago. It would apparently take her several centuries to fully mature. This seemed to convince Deeno.

    Ohhh, thats why? Thats kinda a pain for you, isnt it? But you kept all your memories, right?

    My memories, yes. But my spirits degenerated along with my body Ooh, but Im still the strongest outta all of you! I need a handicap like this, or its no fun!

    Guy, I think Ramiris is sayin something? Did you hear her just now?

    Bahhh?! What are you, stupid? I know how to pick my enemies, all right? Im not saying I could KO Guy in one punch or anything!

    A bigmouth like her changed her stripes all too quickly. I guess that red-haired guy really was Guy, too, and judging by Ramiriss freak-out, he really was a menace. Ill just write Guy = dangerous in my internal notepad. Its little notes like these that have saved me from peril more than once. You cant underestimate the power of that.

    The two kept on talking in hushed voices so as not to rile Guy. They were discussing Beretta and Treyni, Ramiriss guests, and of course Ramiris was bragging up and down about them.

    Wha? Whys a total loner like you got attendants here? Deenoined. Youre making me look like a dweeb for showing up alone!

    Hee-heeeee! Now I can get back at everyone for calling me a little shrimp and a loner, you in particr! Waitll you see how powerless you are against these guys!

    Oh, you want us to fight? Is it okay if I rip em up?

    Huh? Of course its not okay! If you break them, Im seriously going to tell on you to Guy and make him make you pay for it!

    Its like Guy was her big brother or something. It was breathtaking how quickly she let other people do the dirty work for her.

    But really, man, these guys are the real deal. Like, I looked at em for real just now, and its like, damn!

    Beretta and Treyni silently nodded at Deeno. They were far too good for Ramiris, really.

    Right! You see? You see, you see? Now Ive got some muscle to back up my words, know what I mean? Ramiris stuck out her chest (not that she had much of one) to show up Deeno. Their upgrades were entirely my doing, but ah well.

    Beretta and Treyni remained silent. They were the perfect attendants. They didnt speak, and the dozing Shion behind me could definitely learn a thing or two from them.

    Once he finished saying his hellos, Deeno stumbled over to his seat. It was next to Valentines, making him another member of the old guard. Deeno ignored Valentine entirely as he sat downand immediately put his head on the table and started sleeping. That seemed kind of rude. Maybe demon lords didnt make it a habit to say hi to one another, and all those put-downs with Ramiris were the exception to the rule.

    Deeno couldnt have acted less interested in being here. Showing up was enough for him, it seemed, but falling asleep without even bothering to read the room was, in a way, incredibly self-centered. Fearless, too.

    I suppose that act had to be backed up with some actual ability. Hopefully. Lets go with that. He was jamming my skills a bit, so I couldnt be sure of what he had. He stared at me with his half-open eyes whenever I tried analyzing him, so he had to have noticed. That banter with Ramiris made me think he was pretty chill, but I definitely shouldnt put my guard down. Given the rapport he seemed to have with Ramiris, though, I hoped I didnt have to make him my enemy.

    The next one through the door was the empress of the harpies, the demon lord Frey. Milim told me about her, and let me tell you, she was explosively erotic. I wondered how she flew with those breasts; they must generate a ton of wind resistance.

    Oops. My minds going off track. But can you me me? That was just the sheer impact of her appearance.

    Once she stepped inside, her eyes turned first to Milims empty seat and then to me. Even the way she turned her head was mesmerizing. I mean,e on And when she passed by, oh, what a wonderful aroma she had on her.

    As I basked in this, I felt something sinister behind my back. Shion was clearly peeved. Mustve noticed I was letting that perfume get the best of me. Well spotted, Shion. Riling her any further was too scary a concept to entertain, so I reset my mind and got back to business.

    Her magicule count wasnt anything to write home aboutmaybe smaller than Shions or Benimarus. Of course, Shion could probably line up well with Valentine at this point, so Im not saying it was that tiny. Quality, not quantity. Itd be foolish to judge on this alone. In terms of chest size, meanwhile, it was really hard to pick a winner Oops. Better not think about that.

    If I had to guess, maybe she had a lot of hidden skills? That was the kind of concerning vibe I got.

    What was worth noting were her attendants. One was another big-breasted harpy, on the same level as Frey. She was young, and her body was about asscivious as theye. The other was arge man, his magical energy on par with Freys. He had huge, eagle-like wings sprouting from his back, so he mustve been a male harpy. He was a measure smaller than Daggrull but otherwise could give Valentine a run for his money in muscles and good looks, although the lion mask on his face made thetter part unclear.

    Wait. Lion?

    Report. ording to my analysis and assessment

    Yeah. No way, right? I mean, this guy felt totally different from Carillon. It had to be some other guy. I didnt need Raphael to spell it out for me. Im not that dumb.

    There was no way the AWOL Carillon would attend Walpurgis with such an obvious ploy. Hed be more careful with it, taking pains to act prudently. They say there are at least three people in the world who look exactly like you, and Im sure thats the story with this guy, too.

    As I observed them, I was struck by the odd feeling that a chilly wind was blowing over me. I turned to find a blond-haired beautying in, blessed with looks that only the gods themselves could have given her. She walked right up to me.

    You are Rimuru?

    Yeah, but

    I thought about saying Yeah, but whore you? at first. I definitely didnt know herbut then it dawned on me. There were four demon lords left. Carillon was missing, and that just left yman, Milim, and Leon. Leon was blond-haired, I think, and beautiful enough that people called him the tinum Devil Hmm

    Oh, youre Leon? Did you need something?

    Yes, I am Leon. And no, I need nothing from you. The sight of you brought back some memories, is all.

    It was him. He was beautiful, so much so that you could easily mistake him for a woman. In my past life, I probably wouldve been jealous enough to wish for him to get hit by a truck. He was formerly human, I was told, but kept a majestic presence about himthe majesty of a demon lord.

    And I brought back memories? I suppose my face was essentially Shizus at a young age. So Leon must have

    Shizus dead, Leon.

    Seeing me simply conjured up old memories of Shizu in his mind.

    I know, he coldly stated. And of course she would be. She took in Ifrit but refused to be a magic-born.

    She asked me to punch you out for her. Mind letting me do that?

    I just kind of blurted it out. I wasnt trying to start stuff; I just didnt like how Leon was talking about her. It was maybe a little too direct, but Leon handled it with calmposure.

    No, thank you. I wanted her to live as a human being. I even gave her Ifrit as a farewell gift. I see no reason why I deserve a beating for it.

    What a disappointment. I figured hed be enraged, but he just calmly fired back at me.

    But I do have a bit of an interest in you. If you have an issue with me, Ill happily invite you toe visit. You can turn down the offer, of course, if you think its a trap.

    Talk about a one-sided deal. He was basically daring me to chicken out. I had to ept it.

    All right. Ill do that. Feel free to send an invitation, if you get around to it.

    I didnt say anything more after that.

    Leon nodded, looking a little annoyed. I will. Assuming you walk out of this meeting hall alive, that is.

    With that blunt rejoinder, Leon settled down in the seat just to my left. It was his way of saying our conversation was over. For now, I was fine with that. I got to tell him about Shizu, and I now knew that Leon wasnt out to antagonize me. At least not here at the Council. He wouldnt have said yes to that invitation thing if he was.

    Maybe it was just postponing the dispute forter, but right now, I wanted to focus on yman as my enemy.

    These proceedings all unfolded in the hour after we reached the meeting hall at midnight. It looked like the older demon lords had been guided in first, with me getting a head start because I happened to be traveling with Ramiris. It wasnt any official rule, though, given that people like Leon could travel here themselves.

    All that remained were yman and Milim. And just when I thought the Council was about to begin, Benimaru tossed a Thought Communication my way.

    (Sir Rimuru, may I brief you for a moment?)

    This hall seemed like it was in another dimension of sorts, but I guess this link with Benimaru still worked?

    Understood. A soul circuit has been established with the monsters under yourmand. The link is using this to allow your conscious to interact with them.

    Oh. That sort of thing?

    I guess this soul circuit got hooked up with the gifts I handed out to everyone for my evolution. It didnt seem as robust as the connection I had with Veldora, but it was good enough for talking, at least.

    So I asked what was up. Apparently, the battle ended less than an hour after it beganincredibly lopsided and pretty much as we nned it. Our side had numerous casualties but no deaths. ymans forces had at least a thousand killed in action and over three thousand wounded. That was fewer deaths than I expected, but in this world where you can always get healed as long as you stayed alive, that much was a given.

    Still, that was a massive, overwhelming victory. We managed to take some prisoners as well, so I couldnt ask for much more.

    Yamza, the enemymander, had turned into Charybdis for some strange reason, but Benimaru was kind enough to vaporize the guy for me. Apparently. Im not really sure what all that meant, so I just kind of glossed over it for now.

    Or I wanted to. But how did he deal with Charybdiss Magic Interference?

    Understood. A number of Arts and skillsbined with the unique skill Born Leader allowed him full control over Hellre.

    Aha. So he used control beyond what Magic Interference could handle to hit it with a direct, massive wave of heat. Easy for me to say, but that has to require a hell of a lot of talent. Benimarus gotten stronger than I even imagined. Pretty hot stuff.

    One factor we didnt expect was the Dragon Faithful. They were reportedly a pretty formidable fighting force, as youd expect from Milims followers. We didnt lose anyone to them because they werent really out there seeking to killbut I guess it was my bad for not thinking about them. I figured a force of a hundred-odd was no big deal, but I was wrong. Wars in this world depended more on the powers of a few than the many, but my conventional wisdom from my old world was making me forget that.

    Lucky thing that didnt result in any major breakdowns. Id have to be more careful next time.

    Based on Benimarus report, we had a general idea of ymans story.

    The force led by Yamza was marching on the pretext of investigating Carillons betrayal. They wanted to collect evidence that he backstabbed the other demon lords, killed one of ymans top leaders, and was connected to me. Well, not collect. More like concoct.

    With our victory today, that line was cut off. I didnt know what kind of excuses he woulde up with here, but I didnt imagine they would be well received by any other demon lord. Of course, I intended to kill off yman in the end, and I was prepared to do the same to anyone who got in my way. Lets just try to steer this so Id secure victory here in the easiest way possible.

    Ill be counting on you, Raphael!

    Raphaels rarin to go, too. Thats a relief.

    Whoops, heres another report from Soei. Sounds like theyve captured ymans headquarters. Man, there is just no mercy with that guy. Hakuro pitched in a hell of an effort, too, but apparently Shuna shined the brightest in the fight.

    Also, it turns out that I now have an army of undead for some reason? I sort of missed the plot on that, and Soei was being oddly vague about the whole thing, simply stating Lady Shuna will exin the detailster.

    The most important thing, though, was that Carillon wasnt being held in ymans castle. Plus:

    (We discovered the castles treasury, so weve called upon Geld to begin the transport process. The room included some evidence linking yman to the Moderate Jesters, which I think should help your case.)

    Wow. No mercy. Were even piging ymans treasure vault. That doesnt count as theft, does it? Oh, well. No point sweating the small stuff. Well just call it collecting damages for all the trouble yman gave us. Theres reportedly a lot, which should help our own budget out greatly.

    More important, however, was that dossier of evidence. Benimaru had sent some over for me, and Soei had discovered some more. All of it was now safely received in my Stomach, and with it, I should be able to shut down the basis for any excuse hees up with. Itd be important to make myself look good around here.

    So, much quicker than I expected, we had thoroughly andpletely crushed ymans force. Itd remain to be seen how hed approach this Council, but lets try using these developments to my advantage.

    And then, just as I finished reading the reports, yman finally appeared before me.

    He was more handsome than I pictured himand high-strung. His clothing looked expensive, and I suppose he ced a lot of importance on his appearance, because he was sporting a whole array of Unique equipment that would make him a more-than-decent fighter. It certainly befitted his image as a demon lord not to be trifled with.

    What struck me the most, however, was the fox he was carrying in his arms. It was packed to the gills with magicules and mystical force, maybe even up to demon lord levels. That was one of his attendants, and I suppose a demon lords servants had to be pretty damn powerful, too.

    That, and I tried running an Analyze and Assess on him, and something interesting caught my eye there. I didnt want to coast on this just because we had upied his HQ. It was important to finish him off right.

    Anyway, Milim followed behind him,pleting the nights attendee list.

    All were real monsters, ready to burn you at a moments notice. Doing the A and A once-over on Leon produced nothing useful, either. It was kind of funny, seeing Raphael say that it couldnt analyze something. It meant he had an ultimate skill of his own, something on the same level as mine.

    Then I made a realization. Guy had let me read fake info, but was that his way of fending off ultimate skills? If I couldnt use my ultimate to analyze something, it meant the target had an ultimate, too. That may be why he was feeding me a bunch of nonsense insteadI just happened to know it was fake nonsense because Raphael was smart enough to see that. If it hadnt noticed, I could easily have been tricked.

    This meant, of course, that Guy had an ultimate skill as well. I suspected Milus (?) did, too, and Leon definitely did. An ultimate was several orders of magnitude more powerful than a unique skill requiring an intersection of ones attributes, luck, and a plethora of incidental conditions. They were rareumon enough that even a true, awakened demon lord may not have one, and all were great as ast-resort ace in the hole.

    That was why I needed to be extra careful here. That, andughit was safe to assume Guy knew I possessed an ultimate now. Big mistake. Myck of experience ying this game screwed me there. I was dealing with some of the orneriest demon lords out there; I shouldve been more on the alert.

    Still, whats done is done. It wasnt a lethal mistake, either. I just needed to figure out how to deal with it. Its easy to hide mind-reading skills, just as Gazel did. Guy still didnt know what type of skill I had, so I probably didnt need to be too hung up about it. Hell, I could even use this to make them think Im a fool. To be exact, I would direct Raphael to hide everything at all costs, but maybe show off one ultimate skill that was okay to reveal as my trump card. That way, I could still keep a few cards hidden at all times, right?

    It was a gutsy bit of subterfuge, but I was safe in pulling it off with the four ultimate skills I enjoyed. I was nning on kicking up one hell of a storm in the uing battle against yman anyway, which would make the debut of

    Suggestion. Hiding Belzebuth, Lord of Gluttony would be difficult.

    Yeah, I think youre right. It was a great offensive and defensive weapon, capable of consuming and destroying nearly any attack thrown at it. Predation was a pretty core battle tactic for me, so revealing Belzebuth seemed like a good idea. Lets go with that as my main battle weapon, keeping my other skills hidden until otherwise needed.

    I suppose Im d that I noticed the need for something like this early on. If I got out of here safely, Id need to rethink my battle tactics a little. No point being reluctant to use my skills if it wound up killing me.

    After that moment of regret, I saw one of the most amazing sights of my life.

    Move it, you half-wit!

    Out of nowhere, yman closed-fist punched Milim. That Milim.

    Sit yourself down, you stupid dunce, he said, ruthlessly bossing her around. I thought Id explode in anger, but I held it in. Not yet. Just a bit longer. I have to hold back until I have the chance to dere it all, following the rules.

    But what on earth happened to Milim? Milim the Destroyer? If it was yman being punched, well, thatd just be Milim being Milim. But this? Oh, man, I fear for his safety

    and yet, despite this bout of violence, yman didnt look like hed be decapitated anytime soon. Milim did nothing to resist orin about his treatment. She just followed his orders and sat at her seat.

    This is weird. Is she under his control after all? I may have to consider the worst-case scenario here. And to add insult to injury, some of the other demon lords, Daggrull and Deeno included, were looking simrly flummoxed at this. Guy was stone-faced; I dont know what he was thinking.

    yman, meanwhile, was looking like he was king of the world, his superiorityplex written all over his face. It made my anger burn all over again Dont expect your death to be an easy one, yman. Youll pay for hitting my friend.

    And with that oath to myself, ymans death was now set in stone. I had no intention of forgiving him, no matter the excuse. But there was no need for panic. The Council had only just begun.

    The event was attended by a total of nine people, minus Carillon:

    Lord of Darkness Guy Crimson (demon)

    Destroyer Milim Nava (dragonoid)

    Labyrinth Master Ramiris (pixie)

    Earthquake Daggrull (giant)

    Bloody Lord Roy Valentine (vampire)

    Sleeping Ruler Deeno (fallen)

    Sky Queen Frey (harpy)

    Marite Master yman (walking dead)

    tinum Saber Leon Cromwell (ex-human)

    And then, methe subject of this Council, the slime whod dare call himself demon lord.

    Raine, the maid in Guys service, made all the above introductions in her clear, loud voice.

    Leon was the one who piqued my interest the most. I seem to remember his nickname being the tinum Devil, but now he was acting all cool and calling himself the tinum Saber. He certainly looked more the part of a dashing swordsman, but who thought up these nicknames anyway? They didnt make them up themselves, did they? Well, I probably shouldntment, given my track record for naming things. Lets let that topic die on the vine.

    After the intros ended, yman stood up as the host.

    All right. First, thanks to all of you for answering my invitation anding here. It is now time to begin our festival! I hereby dere this Walpurgis Council convened!

    Thus, with the chance for cataclysmic events electrifying the air around us, the event kicked off.

    Taking advantage of his position as chairman, yman started things off by going into a speech, eyeing all of us in order and looking supremely satisfied with himself. His eyes stopped for just a moment when they reached Valentine, but maybe I imagined itthats got nothing to do with me anyway.

    Leon was seated to my left; the chair on my right was empty, and to its right were ymans and the absent Carillons seats.

    yman went on for a while, exining matters with an obvious sense of pride, and I diligently listened to all of it. Heres the executive summary:

    The demon lord Carillon enticed me into dering myself a demon lord. This allegation is backed up by the fact that Carillons armies are stationed in our town.

    He then incited the kingdom of Farmus into attacking the Great Forest of Jura, requesting my cooperation to fend them off and using that as an excuse to meddle with human nations.

    After defeating Farmus, I assumed the title of demon lord, enjoying Carillons support behind the scenes.

    This kind of unauthorized collusion vited the demon lords agreements.

    He was better prepared to make this argument than I gave him credit for. It was all a bunch of nonsense, totally ignoring the actual timeline of events, but proving that would be difficult. All of this happened at the same time as the demon lords withdrew from their mutual nonaggression agreement for the Forest of Jura, and (as he bluntly put it) there was no excusing that. As if, you know, I cared about that.

    That is the testimony I have received from Mjurran, one of my advisers. However, upon briefing me about this, she was murdered by that fool over there, Rimuru. Thus, I decided to exact my revenge.

    What is he, a thespian? If not, he missed his calling. He almost convinced me, even Almost. I mean, Mjurrans pretty alive right now.

    Rimuru was conspiring with Carillon to make an attempt upon my life. And with herst gasps of breath, Mjurran sent me a magical missive to inform me of the plot.

    He paused a moment, pretending to be ovee with emotion. His handsome looks certainly made it a moving sight, but it mostly served to rankle my nerves.

    So hes saying I tried to kill him to w my way into a demon lords seat? And it was Carillon who engineered it all? I have to say, thats a pretty impressive story to make up. If you actually knew Carillon and how relentlessly in your face and warlike he was, itd be enough to make you blurt outughing.

    ymans tales continued, meandering here and there, but basically, he was using Carillon of betraying the Council. This enraged Milim enough to destroy the Beast Kingdom of Eurazania, and Carillon was now dead. Hmm. Dead? Not missing? That seemed unnatural enough to worry me, but I kept on listening.

    Milim had taken action out of concern for yman, but he had rebuked her, since wrecking nations without any evidence was generally frowned upon. Ever since, she had fostered an affinity for yman, relying on and trusting in himand with his adviser Mjurran dead, yman decided to send out a force to secure evidence linking me to Carillon. In addition, he wished to use this Council to discuss how to handle me, after I tried to kill him and dere my rights as demon lord.

    The tale he wove couldnt have possibly painted him in a better light. I was impressed.

    But, man, he just kept on talking forever. I wanted to counter his excuses with a little logic of my own. My intention was to show my innocence, prove that my actions were justifiable, and then crush yman, after all. That was why I was sitting here politely and hearing him out, but my patience was reaching its limits.

    Could we maybe get started soon?

    Listening to his tale, I had noticed a pretty decisive hole in his logichis evidence. His entire dossier of evidence was made up of testimony, all from a single witnessMjurran, the ring finger, who had sworn absolute loyalty to yman. It made meugh. Not only was she alive, but the Mjurran-rted evidence he presented was as flimsy as a stic bag. I suppose he ran out of time to fabricate anything more substantial than that.

    All in all, it seemed like I could build a pretty credible case for myself. I already had all the evidence I needed.

    That concludes my case, yman bellowed, looking all self-important. Hopefully, everybody in the room now fully understands that Rimuru, that trifling magic-born over there, is nothing more than a chatan posing as a demon lord. I believe that a purge is in order here

    The other demon lords must have been pretty darn patient if they were willing to put up with all this prattling. Some of them had already nodded off, it seemed. I guess it was okay, as long as you didnt bother anyone. The only rule, I surmised, was that you had to shut up and listen to the guy who convened the Council to start with.

    Now we were all free to state our own opinionsand I was ready for it. Raine, who mustve been taking the emcee post, turned her eyes to me.

    We will now listen to testimony from our visitor.

    Ugh, finally. I had been patient long enough. No more of this clowning around.

    So, um, yman, right? Youre a liar.

    What?

    I mean, honestly speaking, I dont give a crap about demon lords. That story about Carillon luring me into this is a load of BS, and Farmus attacked us out of their own greed. Those two things arent rted to each other at all.

    yman gave me an irritated sneer. Ha! Who would ever believe trite excuses like that? One of my most senior advisers has been killed!

    Here we go. Just what Ive been waiting for.

    Yeah, Mjurran, right? Well, I didnt kill her. In fact, shes alive.

    Pah! Of all the ludicrous

    Whoa, whoa, hear me out. Pretty much all of that speech was based off verbal testimony and your own conjecturing. And maybe thatd be enough to deal with some rank and filer, but it wont work on me. Mjurran, your supposed tipster, is under my protection. Thats why Im not letting you mess with me, and thats why your testimony has absolutely no credibility whatsoever.

    Going into that much detail made even yman go a bit pale. But he had no intention of ceding his point.

    Heh-heh. Youre willing to stoop to such lows, then? Did you meddle with her corpse and install some evil spirit inside?

    It was a spur-of-the-moment usation but not an insane one. In a world as rich with magic as this one, you could even make the dead seem alive if you wanted. Talk about freakyand another reason why you couldnt trust oral testimony like that.

    Well, I said, I wasnt nning to believe anything you said anyway. Thats why I figured Ide over there and beat you up myself, but I wound up changing my mind. Before this Council began, my forces gathered some evidence of their own.

    I shed a smile as I attempted to show him up. This enraged him, I could tell. He was easier to toy with than I thought.

    What are you trying to say? If you want to die that badly, juste out and say it

    Calm down a sec, I said, cutting him off. I told you, I have evidence.

    I then produced several crystal balls from my pocket, teleporting them to the center of the round table and magically triggering them one after the other. Each one contained its own video image, including one featuring me fighting the orc general and another shot from Gelmuds point of view. Shuna had found them all in the ancient castle yman called home.

    One of them, meanwhile, contained footage from the battle fought just today. It was taken by Benimaru, from his vantage point overseeing the entirendscape, and it contained some really juicy stuff.

    S-stop! Stop that! Please, Sir yman, stop this at once!

    Right there, in the ball, ymans field general was screaming and being transformed into an iplete Charybdis. And that wasnt all.

    This is quite a surprise. I was expecting Yamza to turn tail and flee. But imagine

    ymans forces are destroyed. The missions a failurethe losses immense

    Well, Lace warned him. yman cant me anyone for it but himself. Well need to brief him about this

    That conversation between the two weird jesters Geld and Phobio had witnessed was all on video. Probably Footman and Teare from the Moderate Jesters, I assumed. With Laces name popping up, it had to be them. That and himI thought yman was behind all this, but it seemed like there was someone else. Maybe

    Understood. It is estimated that all of this is connected.

    I thought so. Whoever it was that tried to make me fight Hinata was also controlling yman. That exins the timingwhile I was busy fighting the Western Holy Church, this figure had yman spur Farmus intobat, and then that whole tragedy unfolded.

    Maybe I could understand all this, even if I didnt appreciate it much. But you went too far, yman. So Im taking you down. Dont resent me for it. In this world, its survival of the fittest.

    I proudly beamed at him. This is what real evidence looks like, yman.

    Having this stuff with me definitely made things proceed more quickly, but even if I didnt have it, it wouldve turned out the same way. I was gonna crush him with my own force anyway, so all I really needed was something to shoot down hisme excuses with. It wasnt a matter of good or evilit was all about keeping up appearances. Besides, I had real evidence here, and I saw no reason for anyone toin about that.

    You, you couldnt! All of this was fabricated! Fake images, built with magic, to prop up your lies! How could you be so base, you slime?!

    Lies? They arent lies, you dummy. Your armys all done. And youre joining them next.

    yman turned toward me, face scrunched up in anger.

    Ev Everyone, you cant listen to this trickster! This slime, Rimuru, is a notorious bluffer. He undoes the seal on Veldora to destroy the Farmus force, and then he parades around pretending he did the act himself. Hes just a little slime, all bark and no bite! And it is simply outrageous that he dares to deceive us all in the proud demon lord family!

    It was an impassioned speech. As if he wasnt the one relying on others to save his ass. As if he wasnt the little one. If he was acting right now, like I said, he was a pretty good actor.

    Look, yman

    This was Daggrull, his voice just as grounded and dignified as his appearance. Wasnt expecting him to speak up.

    Didnt you say just now that Rimuru goaded the kingdom of Farmus into attacking? If the news of Veldoras resurrection is true, why would he execute it in such a roundabout fashion?

    All right. Allow me to exin.

    yman looked lost for a moment but then opened his mouth again, ready tomit to this talethe story of the attempt to collect peoples souls to awaken into a true demon lord. I suppose he wanted to keep that under his hat so that the other demon lords wouldnt get the jump on him, but Daggrull had forced him to fess up.

    This low-ss, unwitting slime must have had the incredible good fortune to acquire the traits of a demon lord. But he must have let it go to his head, for he then traveled to the human realms to investigate the truth behind what he obtained. That drove him to set off a war with the humans on a whim, using the banished Veldora to stage a brutal genocide.

    He was doing his best to convince the table,plete with overblown, theatrical hand motions.

    Leaving someone like this free to maraud again would damage our very reputations as demon lords. I believe he must be purged, but what is your opinion?

    So cough up some evidence, I retorted. Not that you have any, do you? Everything you said was just a bunch of wouldnt it be nice if junk, and you still think theyre all gonna swallow it?

    yman gave me another unamused re. It didnt bother me. I was already sick of putting up with his pathetic usations.

    Ngh Why does some slime iming the might of a dragon for himself think he has the right to defy us?! There is no way you could ever be a demon lord!

    Whether Im a slime or not doesnt matter, and besides, Veldoras my friend. Im not here to listen to you go on with your bullshit, all right? Can we get to the point, please? Just admit it. Phobio, the magic-born in that video, just showed us how Charybdis was resurrected at your demand, right? As those jesters guided him to. And now one of your own men transformed into Charybdis and went insane. Thats what Im talking about when I say solid evidence. If you think Im bluffing, go right ahead, cause youll be thinking that all the way to the grave.

    I shot to my feet, kicking up the adjacent seat as I did, and tried to look as threatening as possible. Casually, I ced my hand on part of the round table in front of meand in an instant, therge table disappeared. Nothing to be surprised about. I just stored it in my Belzebuth. Now we had a decent-size space to work with.

    The chair I kicked up sailed in the direction of yman, smashing against the wall behind him with a loud crash. This didnt faze the demon lords, either. Only yman was unnerved by it.

    All of you are willing to put up with this reckless violence?! He is making light of us all. Should we not be exacting our judgment upon him at once?!

    What, all of them? I always knew he was a wimp. I walked to the middle of where the table used to be.

    Yeah, maybe youre right. Like I said, I dont care about you demon lords at all. All I want is to build a nation that I can enjoy living in. I need the humans cooperation for that, so I decided to offer my protection to them. Anyone who gets in the way of that, whether a person or a demon lord or the Holy Church, is my enemy. Just like you are, yman.

    I exined my ideals to the group with far more passion than yman could ever manage.

    What?!

    And if you call that reckless violence, I said as I sized him up, what would you call taking over someones mind while were all chatting at Walpurgis?

    Did he think I wouldnt notice? In the midst of that whole speech, that little sneak wasunching mind-control attacks at me. If I had to guess, he was trying to dominate my consciousness. Too bad it didnt work; Raphael was guarding me the whole time, so I had it fully taken care of.

    At least I had a justifiable cause on the table, so to speak. That was now in the ears of all the demon lords, and yman had already started trying to strike me. If any of them wanted to oppose me, it was now or never.

    Time to switch over to real action.

    I had asked the question to yman, but it was answered by someone elseGuy, the red-haired demon lord seated on the far side of the chamber.

    Indeed, he said with a charmingly attractive smile. In order to keep things fair, we are only allowed to appeal to others through our own voices.

    But, Guy, he is insulting us all

    Shut up, I interrupted. If you dont like it, then its between you and me, isnt it?

    He is correct, yman. If you call yourself a demon lord, then use your powers to defeat that magic-born. And you Guy looked straight at me. Do you intend to dere yourself a demon lord?

    Yep. Im already leader of the Great Forest of Jura, and as far as anyone on the grounds concerned, I am one.

    No matter the path we had to take to get there, I imagined they would all ept that Id teamed with the Storm Dragon to rule the forest. There was no point denying that Tempestians were already calling me demon lord.

    Very well. And we have an array of witnesses here as well. If you can win against yman before us, I will allow you to adopt the title.

    So beating yman ties up all these little strings, huh? This was exactly the development I hoped for.

    yman began tough, just as suddenly as he regained hisposure a moment ago.

    Heh-heh-heh How exasperating. I simply attempted a little trick because I didnt want to dirty my own hands, and now look at the storm Ive unleashed. What a mistake.

    He was smiling the whole time. Did he have a screw loose? His thin, almost inhuman smile was still clinging to life as he looked at me. And then, quietly:

    Youre up, Milim.

    Tension raced across the chamber. Even the demon lords were nervous, although some were maintaining perfect calm as always.

    My eyes turned to Milim. There was the source of ymans confidencethe belief that he had her under his control. Control that he exercised right at that moment.

    So she was?

    Wow. What a bigmouth. After everything you said, youre relying on someone else? And bringing in Milim after you punched her out to make her do your bidding?

    I tried provoking him a little, but not even yman was stupid enough to bite.

    Dont be ridiculous. I will be fighting, too, of course. Is there any issue with that, Guy?

    Not at all, yman. If Milim is aiding you on her own free will, I will not stop her.

    Thiswasnt good. yman I had a handle on, but Milim was deadly. With Guy so readily granting permission, there was no way I could dodge having to fight her. Even with what I could do by now, I didnt like my prospects against herand besides, I wanted to help her out. No, I will help her out!

    Just then, the unmoving, doll-like Milim made two fists and struck an overwrought, triumphant poseor so it looked like to me. Maybe not. It was just for an instant; I dunno.

    Man. Poordy. Dont worry, Milim, I swore in my heart. Ill get you out of there.

    Well, all right. I was nning to rescue Milim anyway, so I think Ill just undo that brainwashing trick you pulled on herby force, if I need to.

    Enough of your prattle! You will die in despair.

    The only one dyin here is you, yman. I think one of my officers would make a better match against the likes of you. Fighting you myself would just make me a bully.

    ymans face stiffened. A thick, ck aura began to float out of him, perhaps generated by his anger. You cant be a demon lord unless you know how to intimidate your foe, I guess. Not that it was that impressivebut between his rage and panic, that should open up some weak points to exploit. Shion would be fighting him in my ce, and I was sure shed be able to take advantage of that.

    I motioned with my eyes to Shion. She immediately sprang into action. In a moment, she was upon yman,unching an attack. Concentrating her aura around her fist, she used that single instant tond a good thirty or so blows on him. Then she turned back at me with a look of relief and asked, Is this all right?

    Um, arent you supposed to ask before you start clobbering? All I did was give you a sidelong nce. That was supposed to be a You get it, right? ymans all pissed off, so get im while hes off guard kind of nce. I wasnt expecting you to beat the crap out of him before I blinked again. Does the expression off guard mean anything to you?

    Wellso be it. Whats done is done. The force of the strikes propelled yman right in front of me, in the middle of the circle. You, you, you bastard! he shouted as he stood up. He was tougher than I thought.

    That ck aura around him thickened, instantly healing his injuries. It was far faster than what the orc lord could do, but that was pretty much normal for a demon lord. Either way, it made yman ept Shion as an enemy, so we were still more or less sticking to the script.

    If thats what you want, he said, then Ill kill both of you. Then the fox that had jumped down to his feet swelled up in size.

    Report. This is believed to be the Nine-Head mentioned by Mjurran.

    Oh yeah, she did say that, huh? So it was another servant of his, not some pet. Then another figure emerged from ymans shadow, wrapped in a ck robe. He had two servants, and I had Shion in battle mode. Ranga was simrly erged now, ready to pounce.

    Wait. Hang on. Were outnumbered if Milim is joining in Nah. No need to panic yet. Thats what Beretta is for Huuhh?!

    The moment we all stepped into the circle where the table used to be, it was shut away from the audience by a barrier. The area within it exploded in size, the surrounding chairs seemingly far away and distant. They must have installed some kind of enclosing barrier to protect the other demon lords.

    I kind of expected this, given that they created that whole fancy event space and everythingbut Beretta, one of my supports, didnt make it in.

    Oh, crap, I didnt see that pitfalling But just as I thought it, yman started screaming.

    Milim, kill him!!

    And she was ready to do just that.

    There was no doubting the fisting my way. The force behind it was deadly. But after expanding my senses a million times over with Mind elerate, there was a chance I could avoid it. It wasnt impossible, but I didnt have much leeway to mess up.

    A white-hot ball of energy scraped past my cheek. The speed amazed me. Even with Raphael running at full speed, I still couldnt fully avoid it. If I even thought about a counter, itd leave me open enough for a lethal strike.

    The only thing I could do, then, was try my hardest to keep up with Milim while I concentrated on breaking her mind control. Even so, my Detect Magic was telling me about events in the circle. It was almost scary, the way I could juggle all of that. Too bad I couldnt bask in it right now.

    Shion was fighting yman, but it was two on one with that ck-robed figure in the mix, so I couldnt say she had the advantage. Ranga, meanwhile, was pitted against Nine-Head, and I thought he was winning, but then those three tails on the fox spirit transformed into two magical beasts. All of a sudden, it was three on one.

    I, meanwhile, had Milim to deal with. There really was nothing I could do. Nothing, besides pray that everyone stayed alive until I could finish running Analyze and Assess on her.

    So, uh, you guys take care of yourselves! Got it?

    Beretta quickly set to action, asking Ramiris if it could join the battle. Ramiris, for her part, wasnt about to turn her toy down.

    Whoa, Guy! Im with Rimuru, all right? So I want my Beretta to be part of that, too.

    No, he coldly replied, paying her as little attention as possible.

    Why not?!

    Mm? Mere attendants arent allowed to join a battle between demon lords. This is a dispute between that slime and yman, is it not? You have no reason to join in.

    Whatre you talking about?! Milims in there, aint she?

    Oh, shes fine.

    So whats with that? Whys she fine, and Im not?!

    Guy rolled his eyes, tiring of this. Ramiris was always something of a loudmouth. Once she got started, it was hard to make her stop.

    She had never brought attendants to a Council before, so Guy realized she mustve had some reason to do it this time. Considering Milims involvement, letting Ramiris join in would just add to the chaos. He had isted the battle zone in part to prevent this.

    Because Milim likely has her own motivations for this. Now will you shut up?

    Oh, so you think theres not a thought in my mind about it at all?

    Is there? Besides Guy gave Beretta a look. Who has your attendant sworn its loyalties to? Your otherpanion seems ready to devote her all to protecting you, but Im not so sure about this Beretta. Its faithful to you, but notpletely so. You want me to trust someone so suspicious?

    He had spotted the truth. Berettas loyalties werent only to Ramiris. And as one of Ramiriss closest friends, he wasnt willing to allow an attendant who was weighing its master on the scales against someone else.

    My master is on the bnce, yes, Beretta freely admitted.

    There was Rimuru, its master. Rimuru, its creator, but also Ramiris, its current leader. She was a ridiculously optimistic, rash, curious, even cowardly demon lord, but Beretta had grown to love her. It didnt even mind all that abusive maniption. Rimuru had wished for Ramiris to be protected and for Beretta to serve her as well. There was no contradiction at all in its mind.

    There was just one thing: Beretta wanted to repay the favor to Rimuru. It was once a demon, and Rimuru had granted it both a new life and a new mission. It felt a need to make up for that.

    And if Lady Ramiris wishes to save that figure as much as I do It spoke to Guy without any fear.

    Hoh? Audacious enough to address me, are you? Interesting. May I trust this golem at its word, Ramiris?

    The fairy gave him a look that indicated no answer was needed, but she gave one anyway. Oooh yeah, yeah, of course! So you go help out Rimuru in my ce, all right, Beretta?!

    Hmm. So it will take action if you wish it to, then? Youve obtained quite a good attendant for yourself, Ramiris.

    Nah, nah, not obtained. Were friends! Me, and Beretta, and Treyni, and Rimuru, too! She smiled contentedly. Like, everyone, a whole, whole lot!

    Guy wasnt quite sure what Ramiris was trying to say, but if she was fine with that, so was he.

    Well, all right He reluctantly extended a hand to open a hole in the barrier.

    I thank you, Rouge, Beretta said.

    Sure. Dont call me that. Ill allow you to call me Guy. But I refuse to allow you to recognize another master apart from Ramiris from now on. Is that all right?

    Granting this honor meant Guy saw Beretta as strong enough to live up to his own standards. Now, he was asking it to pick a master. If it attempted to weasel out of the question, he intended to smash it up on the spot. But it immediately agreed.

    In that case, Guy, I will swear my loyalty to Lady Ramiris exclusively from now on. So please allow me to be of service to Sir Rimuru at least once.

    Guy was a tad surprised. Demons, as a rule, wanted to be recognized by their masters for their strength. Beretta, meanwhile, didnt seem to see strength as too important. Its standards had gone all haywire. It was a nonconformist.

    You are fine with that?

    Yes. Sir Rimuru has servants stronger than myself.

    That made sense to Guy. But it also confused him, someone this powerful admitting to not being the strongest out there.

    I also enjoy conducting research, Beretta continued. The research I do with Lady Ramiris on a daily basis is truly like a dream Oh, pardon me. My serving Lady Ramiris is part of Sir Rimurus request. There is no need to worry about that.

    The words reminded Guy of a demon he knew, the very definition of strange, one who pursued only what personally interested him. If they were part of the same lineage, perhaps demons with dispositions like Berettas shouldnt be so unexpectedbut the demon in Guys mind rarely birthed other family members. Only an elite few were aware of him at all.

    Let me askwhat is your lineage like?

    Beretta winced underneath its mask andughed.

    I was one of the least of the greater demons. However, I think you will find very few demons in the same family tree as I.

    A small lineage. That has to be it, then. Berettas hair was gray, the color gone from it, but once upon a time

    I see. No wonder you didnt fear me. That family always was self-centered, curious. So someone like you admits there are stronger creatures than yourself?

    Guy shot a passing nce at Shion and Ranga fighting away, then turned back toward Beretta. Yes, Shion and Ranga were powerfulbut he didnt think Beretta was at all behind them.

    I thank you for the honor, but I still have far to go. As long as the two of them serve Sir Rimuru, if I miss this opportunity, I may never have another one.

    Yes, true. I understand how you feel. You may go.

    The barrier already had a holerge enough to wriggle through.

    Excuse me, then.

    With an elegant salute, Beretta plunged in. Guy cracked a smile as he watched it go. He had an idea who this would be.

    So thats it. Youre on the move as well, Noir?!

    This was an old friend, one who went away from him ages ago. If this was the type of people he was serving now, the slime fighting Milim in front of him must be quite the fascinating figure. A nonconformist serving a nonconformist.

    He basked in joy as he watched the battle, even as he thought he could see its conclusion already.

    Rimuru was his name? I will have to remember it.

    Oh, crap. Im screwed.

    Whos screwing me? Milim, of course.

    Dealing with Milim as a foe made ymans anger seem like a toddlers tantrum. She hadnt taken the battle form Phobio saw yet, so she still wasnt going all outbut her strength went beyond allmon sense. I was already exercising everything I had. Raphael, at least, was really humming along for meseriously, if I didnt have that skill, I wouldve been dead already.

    So I was fully booked with Milim, but my fightingpanions were working hard as well. I had thought being outnumbered might sink us, but now I wasnt so sure.

    Ranga had summoned two star leaders, fellowmander-level starwolves, boosting his team so it was three on three. I guess it was possible for him to summon up to three at once, but Gobta was using the third one right now, so that was all we had on hand. Still, I think it was enough.

    Nine-Head boasted a massive amount of magical energy, but it didnt seem too experienced in battle. Ranga held the upper hand from start to finish. The two magical beasts Nine-Head summoned, however, were trickier than I thought. Analyze and Assess told me they were a White Monkey and a Moon Rabbit, respectively. They were both intelligent and capable of attacking in tandem, which made them fiendish in battle. The Moon Rabbit could control gravity, weighing down everyone in the battle zone. It allowed the White Monkey to pummel their foes and Nine-Head to finish them off.

    That was their standard path to victory, but Ranga saw right through it, breaking down their teamwork. If he used one of his stronger finishers, he couldve wiped them out instantly, but he was hesitating since Shion might be caught in the cross fire. He had the upper hand, butnding a decisive blow was proving elusive.

    Shion, meanwhile Well, she was hanging in there, out of pure fighting spirit more than anything. The ck robe was hiding an borately built magical puppet, and Im not kidding when I say it looked stronger than yman.

    Ha-ha-ha-ha! How do you like Vi, my greatest work of art? Beautiful, is she not?

    yman was boundlessly confident, and I could see why. A real tour de force, although beautiful wouldnt be my choice of words if asked. Not with, you know, all those swords and spears flying out of her. Each one of those projectiles was a Unique-grade weapon, as was her armor, but this kind of kitchen-sink approach wasnt what I would call beauty, really. Whether it was heat, electricity, blizzards, crushing, resonation, or anything else, she had a seemingly limitless supply of every attack type in the world, and she was lobbing it all at her foe.

    It was nothing to Shion, however. That was thanks to Ultraspeed Regeneration, which sucks if youre fighting someone who has it. No matter how much damage she took, Shion could instantly heal back up. yman and Vi working together prevented her from going on the attack, but that was just helping fill up Shions anger gauge. Once that blew up, things were gonna get scary.

    As I thought about that, Shion had someone join her.

    I apologize for making you wait. Sir Rimuru, please utilize my power.

    Whoa, its Beretta! I dont know how, but it mustve broken into this battle zone.

    Ive been waiting for you, Beretta!

    Yes sir!

    This needless meddling I was just about to turn these fools into a pair of bloody husks!

    Shion was acting like a sore loser, but Ill just ignore that.

    Well, dont let up. Smash them!

    Yes sir!!

    We were now fully back to the original script.

    No losing now. The path we took here got a little hairy midway, but with things as they were, our victory was unshakable.

    The only problem was Milim. She still wasnt going all out. If I could free her, wed win for sure. My qualms about the future settled, I focused my full consciousness on her. The noise surrounding me disappeared. I sharpened my mind, looking at nothing but Milim. Now, much more clearly than before, I could see the path her fist traced in the air.

    I focused, using every cell in my body for my calctions. If I lose this, itd all be meaningless. I had to do whatever it took to release the curse yman ced on her. Come on, Raphael. Analyze and Assess every inch of her for me!

    What was that? Im berating my foes for relying on other people, but using Raphael to solve all my own problems? I dont know where youre getting the wrong idea. Raphael is my power.

    There isnt a single iota of guilt in my mind!

    So, uh, yeah, go ahead.

    Understood. Conducting Analyze and Assess No results.

    Huh? Huhhhh?!

    Um, what do you mean by that? You cant seriously mean that you cant figure out the silly curses yman ced on her?

    No curse-oriented magic found. This is

    Dude, how useless can you get?!

    Whenever this happened before, I figured it was because I wasnt concentrating hard enough, but after all that effort, nothing. It couldnt even discover any curse at all. Guess I cant trust Raphael in a pinch.

    This was bad. Really, really bad. Not to sound all depressed, but the chances of me winning in a knock-down, drag-out brawl with Milim wereughably poor. Well, so be itIll just have to hold out until Shion and the rest defeat yman.

    My mind made up, I confronted Milim. I had gotten stronger. She might be both under someones control and not really trying yet, but I was certainly holding my own against Milim. In the past, Id be eating dirt before a minute psed. Right now, we were at minute thirteen or so, and I was still fighting at a full clip.

    Hey, maybe shed snap out of it if I just gave her a good sock on the noggin?

    The thought crossed my mind for just a moment, but I dunno Striking Milim kind of goes against my personal rules

    Suggestion. An energy absorption attack using Belzebuth.

    Oh? Ohhhh! That could work!!

    I immediately tried it out. Any direct strike on my body would cause damage, so I was mainly parrying her moves. I would be applying just a little bit of force from the side, enough to adjust the paths of her punches and kicks. As I did, Id use Belzebuth to vacuum up her magicules.

    This turned out to be pretty effective. Milim reared away from me, a scowl on her face. It was a teeny-tiny amount of damage, but it worked. All of Milims attacks were protected by her own draconic aura; if I could take that out of the picture just by touching it, Id gradually be able to sap her stamina.

    Would I win with this, though? That was another story. If I was focused on winning, Id need to bust out my full strength, leaving nothing behind, and even then there was no guarantee. Even if I pulled it off, Id wind up revealing all my hidden abilities to the demon lords watching us. In the big picture, thatd be a defeat.

    Right now, all I could do was chip away at her like this as I waited for her curse to be undone. Lets hope that Shion can finish off yman sooner rather thanter.

    I couldnt say how many back-and-forth exchanges we went through.

    I say exchanges, but it was entirely me defending. The rules were intenseone mistake, and youre outbut I was still fending her off.

    A roaring fist from Milim surged past my right cheek. If I didnt focus, Id never be able to dodge it. A single hit would shatter my body, no doubt. I had Infinite Regeneration, a healing skill more powerful than even its Ultraspeed cousin, but abusing it would drain my magicules too quickly. I could probably regenerate myself after being reduced to goo, but keep that up long enough, and Id run out of stamina first.

    So focus. Focus. Read ahead of Milims moves.

    Her right fist had changed in shape. A dragon-fangsh disguised as a punch. Itd nce past my cheek once again, then decapitate me with the nails on her fingers, like the teeth of a dragon. The correct way to deal with it was not to dodge but to take it from the side.

    So I took it, pushing myself with my left hand from the inside out. I could feel a burning pain sear through that hand, an explosion of energy that left it heavily damaged. And that was me avoiding the attack. Trying to take a full-frontal blow from her wouldve been crazy. Absolute power, on this level, was a kind of finisher in itself, crushing its opponent. I had just learned that the hard way, but if I didnt sacrifice my left hand, I wouldve been mortally wounded. I was fine with that, but I was really starting to resent the sheer unfairness of this.

    Then, as if reading my mind, I had an unexpected chance. Right there, as Milim lost her bnce, she forced her remaining left hand to snap off a punch.

    Here we go!

    Report. It is believed to be a trap

    Huh?! I thought, but it was toote.

    Leaving Raphaelsposed guidance in the dust, I began my attack, grabbing Milims left hand and attempting to throw her. If she was off-bnce, I thought I should be able to pick her up on my back and m her down.

    But if that was Milims trap?

    Her hand stopped dead in the air, a carefree grin on her facea total gotcha now! smile.

    Oh, craaaaaaaaap?!

    I was attempting to twist my body in front of Milim, both hands reaching out for her left arm. I could see all of that with Detect Magic as if watching it on TV, but it left me totally open. Cornered. Game over.

    Her fist moved againand just before she smashed it right against my head, something cut in between us. A dull thud rang out.

    Gnhh?! Where did thate from? That was just mean.

    I was greeted by a dark-skinned man with blond hair. Looked a little bit like me, actually Wait, Veldora?!

    He was curled up on the floor, grabbing at his head and looking like he was in at least some pain. But if taking a punch from Milim only did that to him, I didnt see much need to worry. I took the moments dy to rebnce and steel myself toward Milim.

    Hey, Veldora, why are you in here?!

    Grrnnn, what a cruel blow

    Youll be fine, all right? Whats happening in town?

    Nothing. That man, Diablo or whatever it was, came back, so our defense is as strong as ever.

    Huhhh? Diablo was back? Theres no way they couldve captured Farmus that quicklybut lets focus on Veldora for now.

    So what are you here for? If its to whine at me, then go away.

    Why are you being cruel, too, Rimuru? Ugh. Look, its about this!

    He thrust his hands out at me, as if a ta-daa! sound effect should have been ying behind him. He was holding one of the volumes of manga I gave himthe final volume of a long-running series.

    What about this? I asked, confused.

    He looked at me, positively indignant. What do you mean, what about this? The story in herespletely different from the rest of the series! Were you ying some kind of trick, taking the ending away from me?

    Ahhhhh! Yes! Now I remember. Yes, it was a trick. I kind of pulled a prank on him, the idea being that Id give him the rest of the manga if he followed my orders. Kind of like training a pet, really. I had no idea that was the series I left for him.

    So he traveled all the way here just because he wanted to read the ending? In this enclosed space in an alternate dimension? I knew I could summon Unlimited Imprisonment with my ultimate skill Veldora, Lord of the Storm, but I guess he could, too. Thatll learn me, I guess.

    But that didnt matter. Diablo was already back in town. Might as well make lemonade out of this.

    All right. Before I give you the real ending, I need you to do me a favor.

    Mm? What?

    y with Milim over there for a while. But dont hurt her.

    Milim? Ahhh, yes, my brothers only daughter. I havent met her before, but shes still just a child, isnt she? Very well. I am on my way!

    I didnt know whether it was the manga or Milim that captured his interest the most, but either way, he agreed. The my brothers only daughter bit captured my interest, but again, everything in due time.

    Milim herself was looking our way, steeled for anything, and Veldora seemed to be capturing her interest. I could see it in the twinkle in her eyes. Hopefully that meant I was safe leaving for now. Which one was stronger anyway? I was kind of interested to see, but if Veldora was stronger than me, I was sure he could buy me enough time.

    Theres just no way I cant take advantage of this chanceso with my newfound freedom, I wanted to defeat yman and settle the score for good.

    So how had things gone while I was upied with Milim?

    Leaving her and Veldora behind, I turned toward Ranga first, since things seemed the most intense with him.

    Ranga, you all right?

    Ah, Sir Rimuru! I am fine, but I have a little situation here.

    Something was up? There didnt seem to be much life to his attacks, and I didnt think it was because he was losing interest.

    Just as I was about to ask what was up, I picked up on the cause.

    (lp me. Help me. Help me!!)

    This childlike wailing was leaking out to us, via Thought Communication, from Nine-Head. The White Monkey and Moon Rabbit were merely trying to protect their shivering master, hence why they kept resisting without admitting defeat. Now I see. Lets help him out.

    Ranga, hold back the Monkey and the Rabbit. Dont let them get in my way.

    Right.

    He took the Monkey, while his two star leaders handled the Rabbit, and I walked toward the snarling Nine-Headthis poor young child, controlled by yman.

    Report. Analysis indicates a Demon Dominate curse. Remove?

    Yes

    No

    This time, at least, the curse was discovered and removed quickly. Wish I couldve seen some of that talent when I was dealing with Milim. Ah well.

    The moment I undid the magic, Nine-Head gave a joyous yelp, then settled down to sleep, no doubt exhausted. It was as cute as any baby-animal video I had ever seen; apart from the three tails and the golden color to its fur, it looked exactly like a little fox cub. Ranga was right next to me, growling as menacingly as he could, andall right, that was pretty cute, too. In a cool way.

    Keep this cub safe.

    Yes, my master.

    I gave the cub over to Ranga as I petted him. That took care of his foe.

    Next, I turned to Beretta, and that confrontation was already over. It was lining up all the Unique weapons and armor on the floor, practically beside itself with excitement.

    Hey! Heyyyy! Whatre you doing?!

    Oh yes, hello, Sir Rimuru! It gave me a joyful salute. It is a pity I could not show myself in action to you, but I have prepared some spoils of war for you.

    Spoils?

    Vi, ymans greatest work of art, had been taken apart, its pieces strewn all over the ce, and now this was Berettas gift to me. I knew it was pretty strong, but it took down that arsenal-like magic-born without suffering a scratch?

    And that wasnt even all.

    Uh, Beretta, no offense, but are you imitating all of Ramiriss bad habits or what?

    Huh?!

    It looked at mesurprised, I think. Its face was hidden behind that mask, so that was only my impression. I thought a word of advice was in order. If this keeps up, Berettas going to pick up on nothing but her negative traits.

    I mean, hopefully this is just my imagination, but what are you going to do with all that booty?

    Well, this I thought I would present it to you, Sir Rimuruand I thought you would ept it and, in exchange, provide a ce for Lady Ramiris and me to live.

    Um? A ce to live? I knew Ramiris had an urge to live in our town, but why Beretta?

    Whatmade you worry about that?

    Actually

    Berettas exnation floored meand not in a good way. It sounded like Guy cornered it into choosing a master before allowing him to enter the battle zone. Beretta responded that it would serve Ramiris after helping me out in herebut clever demon that it is, it thought about a way to wiggle out of that. If Ramiris were to move to our town, Beretta would be obliged to follow herand then it could go through Ramiris to serve me as well; that was its n.

    It was one of the flimsiest excuses I ever heard, and it wasying this out like supreme gospel. The word demon couldnt have described him more urately.

    Uh Look, Im serious, youre really starting to resemble Ramiris.

    It is an honor to hear, although it feels rather little like apliment.

    Thats cause its not! I swear, I take my eyes off you for a second, and youve grown incredibly shameless. Kind of neat to see this maturation take ce, though.

    Well, we can save that forter. Ill have to think about it. I cant set up something for you guys that easily.

    Understood, sir.

    It seemed happy enough with that. I figured we were good for now.

    That left only Shion to check up on, and that confrontation was right on the cusp of its climax.

    yman was panting for breath as he red at her, a loathsome look on his face. Shion had all but made him admit to her strength.

    It mightve appeared like they were locked in an intensepetition for superiority, but that would be a dreadful mistake. That was because Shion had Ultraspeed Regeneration, that undefeatable X factor, on her side. They were equals in strength, but Shion could keep up the fight for far longer. While they seemed an even match in each exchange of blows, ymans fatigue had begun to stand out while I was fighting Milim.

    Shion probably didnt need my aid to win this. And now that her advantage was clear to all, yman was starting to panic.

    Is that all youve got? You are far too weak to call yourself a demon lord!

    Wow, Shion. No mercy, huh? She was totally dissing yman.

    Youyouyoull pay for that! Come to me, Marite Dance!!

    The demon lord unleashed five puppets, each transforming into a magic-born that lunged at Shion. Each one was high in level, formed from a soul yman had put in a doll for deployment at any time. It was part of his hidden arsenal, I supposenow was no time for him to hold back, no doubt, so he was busting out everything he had.

    This was more than enough firepower to take out your average magic-born. But with that massive sword she loved so much, she mowed down all five with a single swipe.

    Pathetic, she said, not a hint of fatigue on her face. You never were anything special, were you? She had been fighting and fighting, and there wasnt a scratch on her. She was starting to look and act more like a demon lord now.

    yman, meanwhile, was visibly quivering. Dontdont give me that, you! he shouted out of humiliation. Its too early to boast of your victory yet! My Marite Dance will recover itself in moments, striking at you again. The real show begins now!

    He probably wasnt making that up out of spite. They really could do that. Shion waited for them, a thoughtful look on her facebut the dolls showed no sign of getting back up. There was a good reason for that.

    Panic crossed ymans face again. N-no, he whispered. Why arent they reviving?

    I could understand the shock of having your beloved tools of battle fail you like this. I decided to provide a little colormentary.

    Hmm, how about I just reveal it to you? Shions greatsword is a type called a Soul Eater. Those puppets didnt have any physical and spiritual defensive spells applied to them, right? You cheaped out on creating them, so she broke them in one hit.

    That much wasnt worth keeping under wraps to me. yman was going to be my prey anyway; if he wanted to know, then let him know.

    A, a sword with spirit-based attacks?!

    Its not that rare. Theres a human with one out there, yknow.

    N-no! Thats one of the leastmon traits, even with Uniques!

    Ohhh? Well, whats it matter? One of my friends forged it for us.

    Shions sword was a modified de created using Hinatas as a reference. It had the power to attack the spiritual body itselfnot literally eat souls or anything but deal damage to spirit-based life-forms. There were no restrictions like that seven hits thing with Hinata; depending on the force applied, it could kill instantly unless sessfully resisted. It wasnt guaranteed to kill all the time, but Shion wasnt exactly a delicate fighter, so it didnt matter. Since it dealt both spiritual and physical damage, she didnt need seven hits to finish foes anyway.

    Oh, I see. So this is Goriki-maru Version 2!

    She didnt know? I, um, Im pretty sure we went over all this when I gave it to her? Ah, whatever. Shion was never one to sweat the small stuff, so setting her up with this was the right idea.

    Hehheh-heh-heh. I see. It was the power of that sword that allowed you to fight against me. Then allow me to add that dirty little de to my collection! Take thisDemon Marite!!

    Sounds like yman had misread her.

    The ominous strings of ck light that streamed from both his hands wrapped themselvespletely around Shions body. She didnt move. Kinda wish she tried to dodge it or, you know, something, but I guess she didnt need to.

    yman, assuming Shion didnt react in time, found this much to his liking. Heh-heh-heh-heh-heh Behold, the ultimate cursing magic, with the power to rule over demon lords themselves! It seems a waste to squander it on magic-born like you, but so be it. I have some slots to fill in my five fingers, and you would be wonderful to take under my wing.

    He totally had the wrong ideaif thats what he was saying, poor guy. It wasnt that Shion couldnt moveshe just didnt move. Despite all of ymans lofty words, he was probably freaking out over why it wasnt working at all.

    Complete Memory, one of Shions skills, was the power to record memories into her astral body. Inymans terms, it let her retain her memories even if her brain was destroyed. Combine a conscious soul with a set of memories, and you could regenerate the physical body even if it was vaporized. This made Shion into a special sort of racecall her a demi-spiritual life-form if you wantbut essentially, it allowed her to think with her soul, and that meant any effect that tried to take over her spirit was neutralized. Against Shion, no mind-takeover curses could ever work.

    Hey, an annoyed-sounding Shion called out from within her cocoon of ck string, what are you trying to do with this? Its not hurting me at all, but should I wait a little longer?

    You knowand this has been something Ive been thinking for a while now, butI really wish shed stop acting like this was a pro-wrestling bout. This was supposed to be a duel to the death. Why was she deliberately letting herself get hit by her enemys moves? Shion, Sufiaand Milim, too. I just didnt understand how these war-loving freaks thought sometimes. Gimme a break.

    Raphael confirmed to me that Shion wasnt being affected at all, though. There wasnt any need to even beware of ymans secret techniques.

    Thatthats ridiculous My Demon Marite doesnt work? It has to! This cannot even be possible! Its the ultimate in demon domination! It can exact its rule over demon lords!

    It had ruled over Nine-Head a moment ago. Certainly, you could take over the mind of a cmity-level monster with it easily enough. But would it work on the disaster-ss demon lords? I think yman overestimated his own strength.

    Apparently sick of waiting any longer, Shion used his aura to rip her cocoon apart. So ridiculous, she scornfully muttered. Relying on such cheap tricks as this You dont deserve your title at all.

    yman just stood there, finally sumbing to the panic.

    Or not. What Shion said mustve flipped a switch somewhere inside of him.

    Heh-heh-heh Ha-ha-ha-ha-haaaaaaa!! I dont deserve my title? Youll regret saying that, you maggot! Yes, youll regret extracting my full strength from me!

    His shoulders were shaking as he shrieked withughter. Off went his fancy-looking suit jacket and shirt, leaving him topless. It also left assorted other items he had hidden on his body to nk against the floor, no longer of use to him. I had thought this was over, but yman still had something left to rely on.

    Suddenly, two pairs of arms grew out from his uncovered backlong, thin, and protected by a ck exoskeleton. This was his true character. Not the dolled-up form from before, but this form that evoked wild, crazed insanity.

    But yes Yes, youre right. A demon lord I am a demon lord. I focused on ease and elegance in the way I go about matters, dispatching my foes with style. But enough of that. It doesnt matter. I had forgotten about how this feels, for so longand now Im going to crush you in my hands!!

    The true nature of his rage came to the surface. All he had on him was something he kept preciously protected in his hand. A mask. A jesters mask, decorated with a smile. Without a moments pause, he put it on.

    Hoh? Looks like youve grown worthier, a happy-sounding Shion said. Im d to see that. I am Shion, secretary and personal guard to the demon lord Rimuru, and I will be happy to fight you!

    And I am the demon lordno, the Crazed Clown yman. You are dead, Shion the magic-born!

    The introductions were made. The two moved at the same moment.

    yman, in his real form, was a powerhouse,ying out the full extent of his demon lordworthy magical force against Shion. His normal arms wielded those ominous ck beams of light. The upper arms from his back wielded an ax and a hammer; the lower ones, a sword and shield.

    Dealing with both magical and melee attacks at once baffled Shion for a moment. But she was stronger. Swinging the sword she called Goriki-maru Version 2, she nged the sword out of his hand and crushed his shield. A simple, tactless roundhouse sh from above smashed through the ax and hammer yman crossed in front of him.

    That freakish force came courtesy of Shions intrinsic skill Ogre Berserker, and her frenzy of weapon breaking was the work of Guarantee Results and Optimal Action, both part of her Master Chef unique skill. In other words, yman was still no match for her. Even with all his might, she was just pummeling him.

    Now he was crossing his two pairs of steellike arms to block Shions fistsbut they, too, were smashed to ribbons. Her next punchnded squarely in the pit of his stomach.

    Orrgghhh

    He fell in agony, foaming at the mouth. There it is. The end.

    Not that its for me to say, but Shion really had gotten overwhelmingly stronger. Dying and getting resurrected like that gave her power on a scale like nothing she ever had before.

    Gerrhhaaahh?!!

    She nted a follow-up kick on him, making him roll around on the ground in agony. The mask was cracked now, revealing bloodshot eyes.

    N N-no This cant be. How couldcould II, a demon lord, yman?!

    Now yman understood the difference in power. But he still refused to ept this reality. It was devastating to him.

    May I put him out of his misery, Sir Rimuru?

    Hmm. There were a few things I could ask him, but I could predict most of the answers. Beyond that, I wanted to know about whose bidding he was doing, but was he gonna be honest with that?

    D-dammit all!! Milim! What is Milim doing?! Destroy that magic-born at once

    yman was screaming out the words now, realizing that his death was near. But Veldora was holding Milim back. yman looked at him with disbelief.

    Wh-who? Whatwhat is this? His power is off the charts!

    He mustve just realized that Veldora wasnt just another magic-born.

    Well, hes in human form right now, but thats Veldora. I told you, remember? Hes my friend.

    This silenced yman. Im sure he wanted to deny it, but seeing him spar evenly with Milim forced him to admit it. The two had been fighting for a while now, and it was turning into quite the fireworks show. Skill names flew back and forth, many of which I think I remembered hearing before, and Milim had an honest look of surprise on her face.

    Hey, is she really being controlled? Because Im starting to wonder.

    Raphaels reaction made me ponder the idea for a bit, but it was no big deal at the moment. Besides, this would be the first time shed met Veldora as a person, and it seemed like she was having a st.

    Thus, yman gave up on having Milim to rely on. Even in his panicked confusion, he managed to flee to the edge of our isted battle zone, shouting at the audience outside.

    F-Frey! Frey, what are you doing?! You and I share amon fate! Get in here and lend a hand!

    The pleading fell on cold, dead ears.

    Oh, Im sorry, yman. Nobody can go through this barrier unless Guy lets them. Such a pity.

    He resentfully groaned at this heartless reply, then turned back toward Milim, his eyes twitching and revealing the insanity inside. He mustve gotten another wild idea in his mind. A crazedugh crossed his lips as he looked at her once more.

    Kah! Kah-ha-ha-ha-ha! Milim! Milim! Follow my orders and execute a Stampede! Kill everybody you see in here!!

    Well, that sounds awful. yman just wanted to survive now, and he didnt care how bad he looked along the way. This is bad, I have to admit. Now isnt the time to sit around and watch things unfold. Back into the battle I go.

    But just as I started to run, I heard the most unbelievable thing.

    Why do I need to do that? Rimuru and his people are my friends!

    Surprised, I turned aroundonly to find Milim chilling out there, a wide grin on her face.

    Milim?! Whoa, youwerent you being controlled?

    Waaah-ha-ha-ha! Thanks a lot for getting tricked by that, Rimuru! You know someone like yman would never take over my mind!

    Wh-what?!

    I cant articte why, but I had the strangest feeling Raphael had been angry at me for a while. But back to Milim.

    So yman didnt seize your mind?

    Um, whats going on here? I felt obliged to check one more timebut Milim just gave me a proud smile. I could hear at least one demon lord in the audience say, Huh? But she didnt react at all when he punched her!

    The most surprised of all, of course, was yman.

    Y-yes. Yes! I used the Orb of Domination he gave me to put youpletely at my beck and call You killed Carillon under my orders, did you not?!

    Ohhh, yman. So shocked by these events that he has no idea what he just said. That oughtta make my video evidence more believable. After all, he just revealed that not only was he the culprit, but there was someone else pulling his strings, too.

    Yes! That! Thats what I wanted to hear, eximed Milim. Answer me, yman. Whos this he youre talking about?

    She asked the question casually enough, but she backed it up with sharp, seeking eyes. She had totally ignored ymans question, which was so like her.

    Right. So Milim wasnt being controlled, and she had her doubts about yman from the beginning? For what?

    Before I could get an answer, another voice butted in.

    Whoa, whoa, whos been killed here?

    It came from the other end of the battle zone, this low, heavy voicebelonging to the man with the eagle wings that Frey brought along with her.

    Wait, no way Like, with that obvious a costume?! And if I didnt pick up on that, does that make me?

    Whoa, why does it feel like Raphaels exasperated with me? And wasnt it about to say something to me back then? Or maybe not? Ah, maybe I was just hearing things. Lets forget about it and, um, pay more attention in the future.

    The man, Carillon, ripped the mask off his face, his awe-inspiring aura shooting out with it. With a moments concentration, he was instantly back to his original appearance. Yep. Thats the Beast Master, all right. No doubt about it.

    Wow, you were all right, Carillon?

    Yo, Rimuru. All right aint how I would describe it, but thats fine. Thank you for taking care of my forces.

    Oh, not a problem.

    After thanking me, Carillon gave yman a knowing grin. Now it was obvious that Milim was under no ones control.

    Wha? How? So its true? But Frey told me No, Frey, too? You betrayed me as well, didnt you?!

    Finally getting the whole picture, yman gave Frey a half-crazed re. She responded by pretending he wasnt there.

    By the looks of things, I wouldnt call this a betrayal, per se

    Hmm? Frey nonchntly replied. Since when were youboring under the assumption that I was your ally?

    Yikes. I knew it. Women can be so scary sometimes.

    Frey was tricking yman from the get-go.

    You, you have to be kidding me! All, all of you Youll pay; Ill make you all pay for this!

    The scream of the pitiful clown echoed across the field, and

    Shion, do it.

    You got it!

    Like a hungry dog released from themand to stay, Shion bounded off, using both hands to swing down her de as quickly as she possibly could. It was a single blow from her sword, a judging strike. yman did his best to block it, but his three pairs of arms were all sliced off, his body shed diagonally down from head to toe. It was unsurvivableand that one stroke from Shions spirit-crushing de made yman fall wordlessly to the ground.

    It was over for yman. Carillon was alive, and we had all the testimony in order. Im pretty sure I could avoid being branded the enemy of the demon lords now.

    yman was barely clinging to life. He was no longer a threat; there was no way left for him to turn the tables. Things were already set in stone, and there would be no more excuses. So, before the demon lords, he had revealed everything. And each of them might take the news differently, but regardless, their trust in him had vanished, none willing to cover for him.

    The barrier covering us was removed, and Frey quickly ran up and approached Milim.

    I believed you were still of sound mind, but I truly had my doubts at times, Milim! And you kept our promise anyway. I appreciate that.

    Wah-ha-ha-ha-sha! Of course I did. Were friends. But youve been taking care of that for me, right? Didja bring it over?

    Yes, yes, you mean this, right? I have to say, though, withstanding the Orb of Domination was simply amazing

    As they spoke, Frey took something out of her pocket and handed it to Milim. It was the Dragon Knuckle I gave her as a present. Milim epted it like a kid on her birthday and immediately put it on, beaming ear to ear.

    The rest of the demon lords, seeing this, finally put two and two together, and I could hear whispers all around the room.

    Such a cheap performance.

    II saw through it the whole time!

    Yes, I assumed as much.

    Yeah, I figured

    I dont think I was the only one Milim tricked, but everyone else found the results just as usible as I did.

    Then I heard a groan from below, like the sound of blood being coughed up.

    When? Since when were you deceiving me?

    It was yman. He was still breathing, still incapable of grasping the unbelievable reality before him. And it was Milim who revealed the cruel truth.

    Yknow, I had a real hard time doing it! With that promise I made with Frey, I had to pretend you tricked me. Then I put on that pendant and made you think it was working on me.

    You You couldnt I put my full power into it, with the Orb of Domination The perfectultimate Demon Dominate?! And youyou

    Uh-huh! Most magic like that bounces off me pretty easily, so First I had to remove all my barriers, then hold back my force so I didnt passively resist it. I had to convince you that the curse was working before your own eyes, or else youd be far too wary to believe me. So I had to work really hard!

    Wh? What? You You epted it on purpose?! My most valuable Artifact My hidden gem, the ability to control demon lords

    Oh, was that what it was? Well, too bad you could never control me!

    She stuck her chest out, looking relentlessly proud of herself.

    Yeah, really, Imented. I feel stupid for worrying about you. And between that two-fisted sports pose and the smile you had on your face, your acting abilities really suck.

    What do you want from me? I was just d to see you were all angry for me, Rimuru.

    Frey just shrugged at this. Still, she said, when yman punched you, I thought I was going to lose myposure. If you decided to fight back against him, you wouldve destroyed my home. Great job putting up with him. That, at least, I have topliment you for.

    An interesting revtion. So that wasnt the first time yman physically abused her? What a nutcase. Was he actively trying to get himself killed?

    Mm-hmm! Im all grown up now, too, yknow. So I can deal with stuff like that!

    That obsession with being grown up indicated all too well how childish she still was.

    Oh, how? Frey protested. Well, thats fine, but you couldnt have dealt with all that just because of our promise, could you? What did you really want?

    Hmm? Well, you know, I remember yman talking to me about some weird stuff before. Like, about making Rimuru into an enemy of mankind and triggering a war between humans and monsters. If he did that, that wouldnt be too fun for me, so I thought Id meddle a bit!

    Heavens. Imagine, you lifting a finger for somebody else.

    Wah-ha-ha-ha-ha! I told youIm all grown up now!

    Yes, yes, lets just call it that.

    Well, huh I suppose Milim was sharp enough to realize yman was doing someone elses bidding. So she pretended to be brainwashed in order to find out who it was? She had some kind of promise or deal with Frey, too. Lets just ignore the fact that she totally tricked me.

    The thing to focus on was: That orb didnt hypnotize her at all. She didnt struggle out of it midway; it never worked once. It was all an award-winning performance. As sheter exined to me, she had been consuming bell peppers to maintain her poker face. The nk expression that resulted from eating this detested food of hers made everyone think her mind had been erased. It wasnt enough to trick Veldora, but he yed along, enjoying thebat session as a way to get limber in his new body. Maybe he was a lot more adaptable to things than I thought.

    Like, seriously, Raphael, you never saw it?

    Oh, um, okay. Guess you did try to tell me something.

    I suppose it telling me No results shouldve been pretty bleedingly obvious, looking back. Of course it couldnt find any curse effects on her. I was just jumping to conclusions. I should really adopt the habit of listening more carefully to peoplethat and hearing them out until the end.

    I wasnt about to tell anyone about it, but, yes, I had my personal regrets.

    By the way, Carillon asked as he strode up to Milim, if I could ask you something?

    She smiled back with the Dragon Knuckle eased into her fingers. Mm? Sure! Anything!

    I just wanted to be sure You werent under anyones control? So that was all you when you were whipping the life out of me?

    Carillon was smiling, too, but I could see the veins on his forehead bulging. Yeah, Id be wondering about that, too.

    Huh?! That, um

    Its fine, its fine. It just means Im weaker than you. But, he added, no longer hiding his anger, you willfully blew up my entire nation, didnt you?

    Milim was caught off guard for a momentbefore immediately raging back at him.

    Oh,e on, Carillon! Thats the kind of small stuff youre preupied with? Whats it matter?!

    Yep, thats the real Milim, all right.

    Its not small stuff! You know I could have died back there?!

    Oh, dont give me that. Just shut up! I was so passionate about my performance Um, I mean, passionate about deceiving yman that I was trying really, really hard! Its all ymans fault!!

    His fault? Ugh Well, whatever. Not that youll ever listen to anyone elsesints

    I was starting to feel a little bad for Carillon. Seeing those tears appear on his rugged, masculine eyes, I wanted to console him as best I could. She tricked me, too, so I thought we had something inmon.

    Now, now, Carillon. Your Lycanthropeers and everyone else are safeand they all put in a hell of an effort, fighting for your revenge. It wasnt all bad, was it?

    Ah, Rimuru Thanks for the thought.

    Yeah, so dont worry about it. Besides, you can always build another town. I even had our forces capture ymans magic-born to serve as yourbor force.

    Huh? Whoa, are you serious?!

    Yep. Ill provide any technical expertise you need, and all of us at Tempest will help you out as best we can, too. So lets make it a better, happier Eurazania than ever before!

    We had time for it. Timeand funds kindly provided by yman. Considering our future trade prospects, itd be strategically beneficial for us to have Carillon owe us a favor. It seemed like a great opportunity to exploit, and I wanted to maybe make friends with more beastmen through the work, too.

    Wahhh-ha-ha-ha! Isnt that great, Carillon? You have me to thank for that, too!

    Her to thank for what, I wondered. Maybe forpletely ttening thend around the capital and thus saving us the trouble of hauling away the rubble?

    Ill really owe you one, the surprised yet thankful Carillon replied. And you know, Rimuruor maybe Sir Rimuru? I promise to you that the Beast Kingdom will never hesitate to help you out if you need it. Well be allied nations forever! And I wish you would at least pretend to regret this a little more, he didnt forget to add, turning to Milim.

    To her credit, she was back to her usual selfif Carillon and I were cool, she was cool. Thats Milim for you. Always looking out for number oneand I didnt mind, if Carillon was feeling better.

    It appeared that my promises surprised a lot more people than just Carillon. They were a shock to the demon lords assembled around us, too.

    So that was it! observed the smiling red-haired Guy. I thought leaving those magic-born alive was a sign of weaknessbut I see youre a rather creative thinker! Hardly any wonder that Noirs taken a liking to you.

    Noir? Whos that? Ah well.

    Frey was back to focusing on yman, a quiet anger enveloping her. So, yman, she said. You always were the sort to domineer over weaker people, or those who couldnt resist you. I dont think you have any right to call yourself a demon lord. I didnt intervene since Milim was trying so hardbut you know what? I was kind of angry at you, too.

    It made it clear that Frey had no interest in rescuing him.

    Yeah, I know its survival of the fittest, but you took a step too far, Id say. You wrecked my country, and I wanna see you pay for that, okay?

    Carillon did have a lot of damage to deal with. Damage technically inflicted by Milim, yes, but he was willing to shift the me to yman hereand make him suffer the consequences.

    None of the other demon lords voiced any opposition to this. I suppose yman wasnt too popr a guy in this clique. He was already corneredand now, the final moment was approaching.

    Time to finish him off.

    Feeling the life ebb away from him, ymans heart was filled with regret. Regret and the words of his friends and advisers, shing before his eyes.

    Nows not the time to be too reckless. Whatever ya do, dont letcher guard down

    Ah You were absolutely right, Lace

    He thought he was being careful, but he let power drown him. When he beheld Milims overwhelming strength, he made the erroneous assumption that it was all his to wield.

    Its just as you felt it. In the end, I was the one being controlled by Milim. I thought I was paying attentionbut she tricked me. You trusted in me, left me to rule as your demon lord, but I suppose this is the end for me

    He had ignored his friends warning. And that set these results in stone.

    Youre weaker than us, yman, all right? So no trying to pull anything weird by yourself, if you could.

    Hohh-hoh-hoh-hoh! Teare is right. Feel free to depend on us instead.

    Ah, Teare. Ah, Footman. Youre right. I forgot

    He was too focused on himself to feel it right to rely on his friends. He did file the promise in his mind, actually, but he forgot about that when it countedone of the most inexcusable things he could have done.

    I just wanted to get as close as I could to them. Of course Id take risks to achieve that. Why wouldnt I? I was part of the Moderate Jesters, too

    It was true. yman wanted the respect of his peers. He wanted his powers to be recognized, so he never revealed his Moderate Jesters side to the public. Now he realized that was a mistake.

    But it was toote

    He recalled when he first met the mysterious patron that led him to this.

    Hey. Youre yman, right?

    Who are you? Someone in a hurry to die, apparently, if you address me that casually.

    Whoa, whoa, no need to act so rmed. We have amon acquaintance who pointed me here.

    An acquaintance?

    Yeah. The demon lord Kazalim. Your creator, of sorts.

    What?

    He had intended to kill this boy with haste, but then he mentioned a name from his distant past. Now yman was interested in hearing him out. And when he did, he discovered the truth about him. His ambitions and his power.

    Im going to take over this world, yman, and I want you to help me.

    Heh Ha-ha-ha-ha-ha! I like it. So thats your request?

    Yes. A job for the Moderate Jesters.

    And what are your terms?

    How does resurrecting Kazalim sound to you?

    It was beyond all expectations. There was no reason to refuse. The powers the boy disyed to him made it clear beyond doubt. He immediately epted the job.

    I thought youd agree to it. Now the world can be ours together. Its gonna be one crazy ce for us to live in!

    Seeing this boy, living life as if it was all some kind of wonderful game, yman honestly thought he could pull it off. There were obstacles in their way, massive ones, but that made it seem all the more fun. It seemed that way, but now, his mistakes had crumbled the foundation of their whole strategy. And after the boy had fulfilled his part of the bargain and revived Kazalim

    My thoughtlessness led to this. There is no defending me to him now

    Kazalim was alive and well, and he had no way to congratte him. More just deserts for him. He had been ordered to sit tight and watch how things unfolded, and he ignored those orders for his own petty reasons.

    Thest thing he recalled were the words of the man himselfthe advice his beloved demon lord Kazalim gave him.

    yman. I see much of myself in you. And you may imitate me if you like, but do not imitate my negative aspects.

    It was wise, all too wise, and something he should have recalled quicker.

    Ah Sir Kazalim I apologize. I forgot your advice, and Imitted the gravest mistake possible

    Yes, it was ymans mistake, made in the worst possible fashion. And just like Kazalim, he was defeated in the most shameful wayby a freshly born demon lord. Karma in action, one could saybut to yman, it hurt more than anything else.

    And I even lost the army you granted me through my mistakes I cannot die. No, I cannot die yet. If I die here without atoning for this at all, Ill never be able to forgive myself

    If it hade to this, he at least wanted to pass on what he knew. The thought kindled the light of life in yman before he couldpletely resign himself to his fate.

    You are a walking dead, created by me from a dead body, but I have ced special weight upon your brainpower. You are not geared forbat, unlike Footman and Teare, but no one can use strategy and artifice tomand armies the way that you can. That, yman, is why you shall be a demon lord

    Kazalim had high hopes for him, and he betrayed them all. But if it was power hecked, all he needed was to obtain some. Then he could stand tall with Footman and Tearesurpass them, even. If only yman had some power to back up his intelligence, he couldve sprung past them all with ease.

    Yes Yes, indeed. There was no need to awaken to a true demon lord at all. So give it to me. Give me power Give me the overwhelming power I need!!

    Confirmed. Converting the soul into magical energy Sessful. Disassembling and reconstructing the receptacle body

    yman wasnt expecting the internally shouted wish toe true. But the World Language had other ns for him. Right here, at thest moment, his wish had been granted.

    So heaven hasnt forsaken me yet!

    In which case, ymans answer was obvious.

    Hehheh-heh-heh So you treat me like a fool? Well, Ill repay you for all that. For now, though, Ive got to get out of here

    He was weak, too weak to even use his voice, but ymans soul was burning brighthis life was a raging me. And now, with a coolness that was quite the opposite of what was in his heart, yman resolved to retreat. The older demon lordsGuy, Milim, and Daggrull, in particrwere too much to handle. Simply awakening wouldnt give him the winning edge against them, and now was no time for recklessness.

    First, he would report back to the boy. That took precedence over everything. The despicable slime he looked down upon was still a question mark, but even the magic-born that served him were stronger than ymanand he was on good terms with a revived Veldora, a point he couldnt afford to ignore. Anyone who survived a confrontation with Hinata couldnt have done so out of sheer luck.

    He needed to abandon his rose-colored sses and analyze things for what they were. And that was why he had to take the information he learned here and bring it back.

    Quickly, he assembled a n. His idea: to release a massive ball of magical force, as much as he could manage, and slip out of this chamber in the chaos.

    I will need to watch out for Guy

    Guy had no time to deal with weaklings. He probably wasnt even paying attention to yman any longer.

    Its all right. Ill get out of here, I promise.

    And if he could take out a few demon lords along the way, he thought as he scrambled to his feet, all the better.

    Among the demon lords watching, I was probably the first one to notice. I had my eyes on yman the entire time, never giving up the watch.

    Shion, get back!

    Quickly heeding mymand, Shion fell back to my side. Immediately after she did, the area around ymanincluding the spot she stood onwas swept over by a huge quantity of magicules. The storm gathered even more energy from the chamber, focusing itself squarely upon yman. If I had yelled out a momentter, Shion wouldve been caught up in it.

    Looks like its really happening.

    Sir Rimuru? What is?

    The sight of me keeping my cool appeared to relieve Shion. There was no reason to panic. And I wasnt panicking, buuuut

    ymans awakened. Just as nned.

    Just as nned? Well, great!

    I was d to earn Shions full trust, but I wasnt quite so assured myself. This is all ording to Raphaels n, but are we really okay with this? Cause if we lose, its gonna stop being funny real fast

    When I firstid eyes on yman earlier, I could see arge number of rifts in the air around him, as if they were attached to his soul. It was malice personified, the remains of the souls from the people he had killed up to now. But I couldnt just take them from him. They couldnt go on to the afterlife, and they couldnt dissolve into the air. If I killed yman, theyd go down with him.

    As I thought over what I could do about this, Raphael suggested a n of action: force yman into a corner and make him awaken to a true demon lord.

    Suggestion. If you use Belzebuth to consume the energy yman releases upon awakening, it will be possible to restore your magicules.

    It was easy for Raphael to say, but there was a litany of problems with that. I didnt know if yman would awaken, and if he did, hed undoubtedly be powered up. But hey, um, wouldnt he just fall asleep, like with my Harvest Festival?

    Understood. Since ymans evolution did not follow the standard procedure, the process will not be fullyplete. As a result, it is believed that he will not require sleep.

    So sort of a limited power-up, then. I guess Ill just have to defeat an awakened yman, then.

    ording to Raphaels predictive calctions, defeating him would be a breeze no matter how much he was enhanced. That was based on everything from his core strength to the power he could earn and the skills he was likely to acquire. Even at the maximum threat level, its answers indicated I was still on top of him.

    No point worrying about it, then. Just gotta do it.

    Besides, it was kind of true that my magical energy was just about ready to bottom out. I could replenish it really fast, so itd bounce right back after deploying arge-scale spell, but restoring it to full actually took a while. Although I had more energy than my awakening took, I was also using Veldora this whole time as a fuel tank to restore it. With him no longer part of me, it was natural to want to keep my own magicules topped off.

    Itd also earn me some street cred with the other demon lords. As the new recruit, I needed to seize a seat at the round table with my own power. Showing off my battlefield skill was the best way to earn their eptance without stirring up trouble in the future. If I didnt want em wheedling meter, I wanted them to think that I shouldnt be messed with.

    Lets use this awakened yman to show off my power. Itll save everyone a lot of trouble as time goes on. And the power to show off? The ultimate skill Belzebuth, Lord of Gluttony, of course.

    Hey! Rimuru! ymans awakened? I cant believe it, but look at all that force! Let me help with

    Youre fine, Carillon. Ill take him on. Im calling myself a demon lord, and I want to earn my way into the club. Im gonna dispatch him and make them all ept me!

    Carillon shrugged and stepped aside. Well, dont blow it, he said, and I definitely didnt intend to. The enemy had to be crushedthat was the only reason I needed. I was more pissed off at yman than anyone else. It was time to settle this.

    So I walked toward yman, now fully on his feet. The other demon lords were content with watching, seemingly all right with me fighting alone. I was sure they wanted to gauge what I had, so I assumed they wouldntin. Milim was brightly smiling at me, and Ramiris was happily humming to herself. Nobody was doubting my chanceswhich I took as them believing in me.

    Shion, Ranga, step back.

    But!

    Ive got this.

    Y-yes sir!

    Good luck, Sir Rimuru.

    The other lords gave them enough distance to retreat away so that I wouldnt unwittingly hurt anyone else.

    Now I was alone, and yman gave me his sickly littleugh. Heh-heh-heh, ha-ha-ha-ha-haaaah! Look at me! Ive obtained the power! You thought I was finished, you worm! Now prepare to be crushed!!

    Theughter grew louder as he looked down at me. But it was all an act. It was sad, how well Raphael had predicted all his moves.

    As it described matters, there were two potential strategies yman could take. One was a desperate bull rush to kill me; the other was to sneer at me, make me lose my cool, and search for a path of escape. Evidently, he chose thetter, and that meant I knew what hed do next.

    I grimaced at him, keeping my eyes firmly on every move he made. yman was looking for an opening. So I yed along with his performance.

    I told you, youre cornered. Im stronger than you. Give it up and tell me whose bidding youre doing.

    Of course, in my case, it wasnt a performanceit was what I really wanted from him. Perhaps that was why yman so easily took the bait.

    Heh-heh-heh Impertinent to the end, I see. Once I release my

    He kept up the act as he suddenly took action. He mustve figured I was off my guard, because he fired a massive ball of magical energy from out of nowhere. Mustve been building it up as we talked. It was a huge, superpowered st, one that contained all the energy he had just awakened into, and it was hurtling straight my way.

    yman assumed I would dodge it. That or maybe fire off a st of my own to neutralize it, although a spur-of-the-moment spell like that from me wouldnt be enough. If I jumped away, itd explode in midair; if I tried blowing it up, hed be able to escape in the resulting gigantic explosion. That, I imagine, were his thoughts.

    Too bad, though.

    Didnt I just tell you? Youre cornered. That attack wont do a thing. Projectiles dont work on me.

    Belzebuth gobbled up that massive energy st, leaving our surroundingspletely unaffected. ymans scheme bit the dust hard.

    Whaaaa?!

    It surprised yman enough to leave himself openjust long enough for me to snap my fingers. At that instant, a Barrier erected itself over the two of us, a kind of imitation of the one Guy built.

    So hes stealing my skills? a bemused but unangered Guy asked. Talk about shameless.

    Now, I calmly thought, I can consume yman with confidence. Man, my thought processes are getting more and more evil by the day, arent they? Because Im a monster, maybe? I wasnt shirking the idea of eating him up at all. Or was it because Im a demon lord now? Ah, it doesnt matter.

    Wh-what? What happened?

    yman could no longer hide his confusion. The biggest, proudest attack he had was wiped away in an instant, and his brain hadnt caught up to that yet. Like, how many times do I have to say it? Youre already cornered. The moment someone with your level of talent took me on, your future was cast in stone. Its so important, isnt it, to fully gauge your abilities against those of your opponent?

    Look, if youre gonna be serious about this, make it fast. Ill wait for you. Or were you thinking about ducking out of this chamber while that attack exploded all over us?

    It was a fully rhetorical question I was cornering him with. Talk about disrespecting your fellow man. Well, Im a slime now, so its all right.

    I mean, yman was still screwing with me. He was on high alert, watching for what Id do next, but he was still a wimp about it.

    Just as Raphael expected, getting awakened didnt do all that much to change him. He had a ton more magical energy, but that was it. Apparently, he hadnt obtained any ability to control it or new skills to take advantage of it with. His awakening was a far different thing from mine. Me, I could use Mind elerate to speed up my brain a million times until it felt like time stopped. I could even cast spells in that state, making it look like I could just think of a magic spell to set it off.

    Kneading together a big ball of magic was a terribly inefficient use of my time, so I didnt opt for that here. Unlike a full spell, which could be conceived and cast through ones will (or knowledge, in other words), controlling ones aura always led to a timeg. Of course, I could handle that because I had Cast Cancel and All of Creation. No matter how long and intricate a spell was, living life a million times slower than normal made it simple. One second, after all, now felt like two hundred and seventy-seven hours. Even the fanciest of spells could be pulled off in less than a day, so that meant I could trigger them in less than a tenth of a second. With regr magic, it was simple for me to set off multiples at the same time, even.

    Thus, if I were in ymans shoes, Id use multipleyers of magic to throw the chamber into confusion, then attempt to run as fast as I could. He didnt choose that, which meant he didnt have the strength for it. He hadnt even noticed that I built a barrier around usone that cut off any escape route. If he wanted to get out, hed have to do it over my dead body.

    Whether he was aware of this or not, the atmosphere around yman began to change.

    Hehheh-heh-heh A mere slime with a big mouth, I see. You are strong, I will admit that much. But I am capable of far more than this!!

    He had changed tactics to the first scenarioa desperate bull rush to kill me. Giving up the escape, revealing his full force to the demon lords A risky bet, to be sure, but it gave him a winning chance. Surrounded by a bunch of lords who believed that strength was everything, itd even be a chance to write off all his previous crimes.

    Assuming, of course, he could beat me.

    You seem confident in your aura-control abilities, but do you think you could deal with this? Here we gomy most powerful hidden skill! Demon ster!!

    After that long speech to throw off my game, he put his feelers to the ground, stretching them out around me, and then released.

    The attack harnessed the ley lines under the ground, stacking them together and mixing in his own magicules to amplify them, then released it as a destabilizing ray of light. That was the long and short of it, and anyone caught in it would have their arrangement of magicules thrown into chaos, destroying them from the inside. Physical resistance would be useless, and even a magical Barrier would be instantly smashed.

    This was the natural enemy of any monster, and I had to hand it to himthis was real demon lord stuff. But it didnt work on me.

    Swallow it all down, Belzebuth

    The Demon ster light beam looked like a herd of dragons rising up from the groundbut now they were caught up in a rift before they could reach me, screaming theirst as they were sucked inside. There was no escape, almost like a ck hole that consumed all light around it.

    Forget it, yman. Youre weaker than me.

    I had to crush him. Crush him and hopefully make him reveal something about his patron. The best way to do that was via terror.

    No That, thats not possible!! Thatthat was my secret weapon!

    Secret or not, projectiles just didnt work on me. Maybe if he used his head and did something tond a direct hit on me, things would be different.

    Do you see that you cant win now? So let me ask you. Tell me what you know and who youre cooperating with. Be honest with me, and Ill give you a painless death.

    Ha-ha-ha-ha-haaa! I am a walking dead! Kill me all you want; Ill just resurrect myself ande backter to kill Ounngh?!

    I punched him. Then again, and again and again, without a word. I also applied Mind elerate, speeding it up a million times for him. Raphael could influence not just my perspective but those of people around me.

    In the real world, itsted several seconds. But in ymans mind, I was continually punching him, tormenting him with pain and terror, for several dozen days. So I could carve that pain and terror into his soul. And in those few seconds, the terror made ymans hair fall out, transforming his visage into the ghastly, bony gaze of the actual dead.

    yman, I quietly called out.

    His body convulsed, then froze out of terror.

    Im going to ask you one more time. Who are you getting your information from, and how is this person rted to you? Tell me, and Ill make it easy on you.

    But yman had more backbone than I thought.

    Dont Dont treat me like a child. I would never betray my friendsand especially not my clients. That, and that alone, is the irond rule of the Moderate Jesters!

    Huh. So even viins had certain unbreakable rules.

    All right. Well, so be it. I casually changed my tone. Oh, right, I should probably tell youyou realize you arent gonna be resurrected, right?

    He had talked about doing that a few secondsor days?ago, but it wasnt gonna happen. Being consumed by Belzebuth was an even more tragic fate than being caught in the inescapable Unlimited Imprisonment Veldora was locked in.

    Wh-what? What are you talking about?

    Was he keeping up that macho act because he was counting on a new lifeter on, then? The moment he heard me, yman began to quiver.

    Look, um, what you told me earlier? About how walking dead cane alive again after they die? And thats why you wanted me to focus on killing you, so you could pluck out your astral body and try to run away. Right?

    He was an underhanded sneak, but I had to apud him for his single-minded devotion to his cause. But my observation made his face pale.

    Wh-what did you?

    He tried to cover it, but I could tell I was right. Not even I needed Raphael to figure it outbut Raphael had even more amazing stuff for me.

    Ummm, so you can connect your astral body to the ley lines here to keep your consciousness and memories protected, yeah? So even if you lose your physical body, youll never truly die. Thats why you were pretending to die there?

    Ahhh. Now I see. And just parroting out what Raphael told me made yman convulse before me. I was absolutely correct.

    W-wait, wait

    I knew his game. And now it was time to end it. I turned toward the demon lords surrounding us, ignoring the gibbering yman.

    Well! I guess I wont extract anything else from yman, so Im going to execute him shortly. Anyone have any objections? Cause if you do, Ill be happy to take you on, too.

    It would suck if someone did, but I doubted it.

    Do as you please, Guy answered, speaking for the Council like I thought he would. No one else voiced anyint.

    Stop! Wait, stop it!!

    Now yman was loudly pleading for his life, finally realizing there was no escape.

    After all the grief you gave me, Im absolutely sick of you. Dont expect your death to be all sunshine and rainbows, all right?

    With that, I ced my hand on his head. I thought Id make it quick n easy on him if he coughed up some info on his master, but yman never sang. I really wanted him to, considering what Id have to deal with in the future, but hey, Id probably manage without it. There might be some more leads in his castle to explore, and given the testimony I had that the Modest Jesters werent a monster ring, it was obvious that yman had worked with humans. I didnt know if that meant the Eastern Empire or the Western Nations, but either way, if he knew about my own movements, he had to have connections in the west. Track those down, and I should find a trail to follow before long. In a way, relying on the not-too-credible ymans testimony might just lead to more confusion.

    So. yman.

    I hope youll spend thest few moments before your soul vanishes regretting what youve done.

    No! Wait, wait! Stop!! Stoooopppp!! Help, help me, Footman! Teare, help me! I cant die yet. I cant die heeeerrrreee!!

    It was pathetic, watching him try to flee. But I wasnt about to allow it. No matter how much he carried on, none of it would ever touch my heart. Leaving someone like this alive would just be nting the seed of disaster.

    Plus, thanks to you, the navet in me just died. There was no way I could let that get one of mypanions killed again.

    P-please, Lord Kazalim, help me

    He reached out to his broken mask, clutching at it as if in prayer

    Crunch.

    In an instant, the wailing, howling, resisting yman disappeared from sight. Body, soul, and all were greedily consumed by Belzebuth. And now it was converted into pure magicules inside me, where he would get to experience the torments of hell.

    And whether a dirtied soul like hisa tainted, evil soulor a sensible, good soul, death treated them all equally.

    And for a moment, I thought I heard his voice:

    Ah, Lace. You were exactly right. I think I went a little too far. I should have waited and bade my time, like you warned me to You always were right

    Was that regret? I suppose even a viin like him feels regret. Lets hope that the death I gave him helps him get more familiar with that emotion.

 Volume 6 - Ch 6

    THE OCTAGRAM

    The moment I consumed yman, the red-haired demon lord Guy stood up.

    An impressive feat, he solemnly intoned. I hereby recognize your right, from this day forward, to call yourself a demon lord. Does anyone disagree?

    Nobody appeared to. I had passed the exam. Thats a relief, becauseto be frankgoading the other demon lords intobat with me felt like suicide. I guess I never had much to worry about.

    I undid the Barrier, allowing Ramiris to fly right up to my face, like she always did. Ha-ha! I always knew you delivered the goods when the time came for it, Rimuru! In fact, Id be happy to hire you as my apprentice!

    Uh, Im good, thanks. Find yourself another one.

    Why?! she grumped. Whats the big deal? Why wontcha just say yes like a good kid?

    Hmph! Milim proudly sniffed. Rimurus my friend. I heard he doesnt even want to get along with you!

    What? No way! Hey! Thats a lie, right, Rimuru?

    Wah-ha-ha-ha-ha! Sorry, Ramiris, you arent part of our team!

    Whaaaat? Hyah!

    Taking the bait, Ramirisunched a flying kick at Milims face. She leaned to the side to dodge it andughed even harder at her. Huh. These guys are better friends than I thought.

    Meanwhile, I noticed Veldora engrossed in friendly-looking conversation with the demon lord Daggrull, bragging about how he was training to keep his aura hidden. You see him, Daggrull? he said, pointing at me. Thats how you do it.

    Indeed, the giant replied, nodding. It was just for a moment, but I felt an explosive amount of magicules from him. Amazing he can hide it so well.

    Veldora had apparently been providing colormentary for my battle against yman. I really wish hed knock that stuff off. That was exactly why I told him to keep watch in town for me.

    Deeno, meanwhile, yawned at me, his attention span already waning now that the action was over. Well, he moaned, its fine by me. Weirdo. And a hard one to pin, too. Im never sure what hes thinking about.

    To Leon, however, none of this mattered. Heh. I dont care who bes a demon lord. Do whatever you want. Talk about cold.

    Frey and Carillon had no objections to my new title. Which left one person.

    Valentine, who had remained silent until now, lumbered up to his feet.

    Mmmm. Personally, I would never want to allow a low-born slime to ever be a demon lord, but

    Dressed as gaudily as a mighty emperor, Valentine sneered down at me. Guess he was a no, even if I was guaranteed to win by majority vote. No worries, then, I thought as I was about to turn my attention elsewhere, when:

    Kwaaaaah-ha-ha-ha! Are you insulting my friend, youckey?

    Veldora turned his casual attention on the maid next to Valentine.

    Come on, Milus, you really need to train your servants better. Want me to provide a little education?

    Whoa! Hey! What the hell, man?!

    What are you talking about? Milus returned Veldoras gaze, her voice frigid and her expression icy. I am simply a faithful attendant of Sir Valentines.

    Heyyyy, dont do that! Valentines hiding the truth, Veldora. You cant say that!

    Um, Milim? Did you just kind of blow the door open on that, or what?!

    I had a suspicion something fishy was going on with him, but I suppose I was right. This fetching young maid Milus was the actual demon lord, and now she red at Milim, attempting to stab her in the chest with her eyes.

    Ah!

    Finally realizing her error, Milim began whistling a tune to divert everyones attention away from her.

    Maybe it wouldve worked better if she could actually whistle, but no sound wasing out, and I doubted itd make much difference. Milus didnt seem the type to take a joke, and these antics werent about to calm her down.

    She looked around the chamber, thoroughly annoyed, her eyes making her look like she nned to kill us all and hide the evidence. She looked hostile and dangerous, but luckily, she decided not to take on the entire rest of the room.

    Tch. Such a bothersome, viinous dragon. How long will he insist upon meddling with me? And youve forgotten my very name, no less. How can anyone have such a gift for aggravating me?

    Now the atmosphere was very different as Miluswell, the demon lord Valentine, that isspoke. It seems that Veldora was dunderheaded enough to misremember her name entirely, which did a lot to push her buttons.

    Enough of this, she huffed. You may call me Valentine. Then, with a massive outburst of magical force, her appearance transformed, her maid outfit turning into a fancy Gothic-style dress. It was Change Dress in action, a neat trick Milim was adept at as well.

    Yep. This was the real thing. The stand-in Valentine was a remarkable specimen himself, but his maid was on another dimension. Now we were greeted by a demon lord among demon lords, the ultimate personification of strength and beauty.

    You can leave ahead of me, Roy, she ordered the kingly ex-Valentine.

    But Lady Valentine

    If Ive been unmasked in front of this many people, theres no point keeping up the charade.

    She red at Veldora yet again. Itits not my faultI didnt know, he stammered, feeling out of sorts and trying to avoid her gaze. To Milim, meanwhile, it was already someone elses problem. The topic was over in her mind. Selfish as always, I could see.

    Perhaps understanding that more than most, Valentine seemed ready to drop the subject, as peeved as she was about all this. Shaking off her anger, she stood before Roy, nowfortably back in the servant role.

    Anyway, she intoned, there is something that concerns me. When yman looked at you, his eyes stopped for a moment, did they not? He might be involved with those cockroaches that invaded my domain earlier. I want you to return home and inform my people to step up our security.

    Guess Carillon and I werent the only guys yman picked a fight with. No wonder everybody hated him. Maybe he was just trying to discover where Valentines domain wasit was still a secretbut even for a data-gathering fiend like him, sometimes it was all too easy to step over the line.

    Yes, mydy.

    Roy left the chamber alone, not questioning Valentines order for a moment. No, he had no business being on the throne at all. He really was just a political stand-in. It was, I suppose, a sign of Valentines power and influence.

    Time to switch gears. I plucked the round table out from my Stomach and set it back in ce. Good thing I thought about storing it before I smashed it up. If battle had broken out before the barrier was in ce, Im sure it wouldve been a mess. The thing looked far too fancy for restitution to be cheap.

    All the demon lords sat back down at the table, while Guys two maids prepared some tea for us.

    Ah, Leon suddenly said next to me, I just remembered. I thought I had heard the name Kazalim somewhere before, but thats the demon lord I killed, isnt it?

    I thought I was gonna spit the tea out right there. How could he be so nonchnt with that?

    You know him, Leon?

    And how could Milim not know that? The other demon lords seemed simrly unfazed, many apparently clueless about the guy. Even Ramiris hadpletely forgotten. I thought she kept her memories whenever she was reborn? I wanted to poke fun at her about it, but thatd just be mean.

    So whats Kazalim got to do with this?

    Understood. The word Kazalim was uttered by yman as he called for help.

    Oh, right, right! Now I remember. He did scream something like that. I totally remember that, so hopefully nobodys putting me on the same boat with Milim and Ramiris.

    So how is this Kazalim rted to yman? I asked.

    Kazalim is the Curse Lord, Carillon exined. You and he rmended me to this post, didnt you, Milim?

    Ohhhh, him! The Curse Lord, I remember. Huh. So thats the demon lord Leon killed?

    So she knew him by his nickname? That made a little sense. But really, its not like Leon killed any other demon lords. If I had to guess, she probably almost forgot since it was just all too boring to her.

    Right. Kazalim was a walking dead like yman, said Carillon, his voice a tad nostalgic. A unique monster, he said, evolved by himself from an elf. I was kinda friendly with him, so thats what he told me. The two of them mustve been connected behind the scenes. yman took over Kazalims old seat, besides.

    Unlike yman, Carillon didnt seem to have any bad blood for this guy. But hang on a minute. I almost let it pass, but if Kazalims a walking dead, too

    Is Kazalim still alive? Maybe he just pretended Leon killed him, and hes hiding out somewhere?

    Yeah, agreed Carillon, that might be the case. He was a really sharp guy, you know? You had to be even more careful with him than yman.

    So maybe I was right.

    Well, Leon naturally objected, I dont much like you phrasing it like I let him get away. He invited me to join his force, iming he would help me be a demon lord. Turning him down would have led to assorted annoyances, so I decided to defeat him and seize his position. Whether hes alive or dead, it doesnt matter to me.

    Certainly, I could see it if Leon just wanted to stage a disy of power without actually wanting to kill him.

    Whoa there, Leon. Thats exactly why yman hated you, you realize.

    Hmph. Do you think I care?

    Yeah, to Leon, the whole subject was just an annoyance, no doubt. I didnt realize yman was trying to put the screws to Leon, too, though. He was just trying to hit everyone up, wasnt he? I was starting to wonder just how smart he really was.

    Still, I was starting to gain a picture of what Kazalim and yman were up to. Leon had taken his seat here around two centuries ago, so maybe Kazalim got Carillon and yman into the club, then tried to earn a few more friends for himself. ymans earlier scheme to turn an orc lord into a demon lord seemed like kind of a rehash of thathe wanted more people friendly to him, so he could wield more power at Walpurgis. Trying to build blocs of voters, like in an Earth government, was a surprisingly sneaky and non-demon-lord-like move, I thought. A pretty powerful one, too.

    Among ymans allies were a group called the Moderate Jesters, I said. Those Jesters hinted that they had connections among the human world, so perhaps the resurrected Kazalim has taken human form, you know?

    ording to Leon, Kazalims body disappeared after he was defeated. If he was alive again, itd be in his spiritual-body form at first. It made sense that hed then install himself into the physical body of something else. Reviving himself within the realm of a demon lord would lead to being instantly discovered, and considering nobody had found him yet, that theory could be safely discounted.

    You might be correct, Guy unexpectedly stated. Leons attacks have the power to destroy your spirit. If anything, I would mightily praise Kazalim for surviving. Plus, even for demons like ourselves, a full resurrection from our souls alone takes hundreds of years. I doubt a walking dead could ever perform it alone. Not without assistance.

    Walking dead, unlike demons, were dependent on their physical bodies. Full resurrection from the astral body took time, and if anything, Kazalim being alive would be a small miracle. So did Guy mean to imply that Kazalim had help? It all seemed connected, but for now, we had no further evidence to go on.

    Well, either way, Ill just assume hes alive and stay on my guard for him. If I just killed yman, he might be out for revenge.

    Wah-ha-ha-ha-ha! Why worry, Rimuru? Youre a lot stronger than him now!

    Milim, I shouted, thats the exact kind of cockiness that leads to getting killed!

    Thanks to my victory today, ymans forces were out of the picture. I didnt think our foes would make any moves for a while, but we still had to keep a sharp watch out. Me alone was one thing, but I now had legions of friends to keep safe. Wed have to devote more resources to our defense and think up ways to handle the threats ahead.

    After some more chatting, the Council continued. With the one who called it out of the meeting, Guy took over in his ce.

    The main subject of this Council was Carillons betrayal and the rise of Rimuru over there, but those issues have been settled. Carillon has betrayed no one, and Rimuru has demonstrated ample power to join our ranks. Personally, Id be happy to adjourn this session here, but an opportunity like this doesnte along every day. Does anyone have something theyd like to say to the other demon lords?

    Could I, perhaps? Since were in the middle of this Council, I have a suggestion to give, or really, more a request, Frey said.

    Certainly. Go ahead.

    Frey nodded at Guy. Starting today, Ive decided to serve Milim. As a result, I want to abdicate from my seat as a demon lord.

    Well. That was a bombshell.

    Whoa, thats kind of sudden, isnt it?

    Wait, Frey! I didnt hear anything about that!

    No, because I didnt say anything about it. But Ive been thinking about it for a while, do you see?

    She squinted, as if looking at some faraway point. Then sheughed, like she was recalling something amusing.

    Frey recalled a conversation she had with Milim, the one that made her decide to ce her trust in the girl.

    Hey, Frey, you wanna be friends with me?

    Why are you asking me that?

    Well, Rimuru and I just made friends! Friends are really great. If you ever have any trouble, you both help out each other!

    Oh, really? Well, Milimif youre willing to help me out, then all right, I can be your friend.

    Really?! Oh, I totally promise, of course!

    You do? Im d to hear that. But Im a pretty wary woman, so Ill trust you only if you keep that promise.

    All right! Hooray, were friends now!

    Frey had no trust in yman. That was why she believed in Milim, putting her own safety in the bnce as she pretended to ept his terms.

    What if Milim broke that promise? What if Milims mind really was under his control? The questions worried her, but Frey still ced her chips on Milimand they paid off, big time.

    That was the reason. The reason why Frey put all her trust in Milim, volunteering to be her servant. At that moment, a lofty queen who had never trusted anyone before in her life finally found it in her to believe.

    Well, she resolutely stated, I have my reasons. But the most important one is that I think Im too weak to be a demon lord. I realized that for sure watching that battle just now; if I fought against yman, Id be lucky to even match him. As for an awakened yman, I dont see how I could win

    But, Frey, Daggrull interrupted, you specialize in high-speed aerialbat, do you not? I see no reason to depreciate yourself like this.

    Youre right. If it was in the air, I would have the advantage. But demon lords dont have the right to make excuses. Besides, I know quite well how having an advantage doesnt mean anything, at times.

    She paused to give me a look, her voice resolute.

    So Ive decided to be one of Milims followers instead. Plus, Milim cant afford to be as selfish as she is forever, can she? She needs to think about managing her domain, sooner orter.

    In other words, Frey wasnt just thinking for herself. Milim was a wild child, and you couldnt just let her off the leash. Someone to both support and keep an eye on her was definitely needed.

    Despite Freys own admission, I really couldnt see her as being that weak. If anything, she was a strategist in a different way from yman, a strange, eerie leader who never let you see what she thought about you. The type that reminded you just how formidable her sex could be.

    What would happen, though, if this actually happened? Thinking of Frey in terms of a servant, not as a demon lord, she definitely had enough power to be an aid to Milim. She didnt really have a nation of her own, but if Frey joined her, theyd no doubt have a formal territory in ce before long. Wed have to think about building political rtions soon after, and with Frey handling them, I bet the negotiations would get pretty thorny. Thorny, but still fun.

    Frey turned toward Milim. What do you think? Will you ept my suggestion?

    Ooh, I dont really like to keep a citizenry to rule over

    Wait a second, Carillon said. I got something to say about that, too. Yknow, Ive already lost to Milim in a one-on-one match. Im honestly startin to think nows a pretty good time to hang up my cap as a military leader. On paper, all us demon lords are equal. If were all facin a Hero, thats one thing, but if I lost to another demon lord, I really oughtta do away with the title, yknow? So, I dunno, it just felt absurd for me to keep calling myself a demon lord. So I think Ill join Milims faction starting today. Great to be on the team, boss!

    He wasnt asking for feedback.

    I could understand the logic. With these guys, might always makes right. Still, though I mean, Milim didnt have anyone under her, no advisers or officers to go out against this, but was it really okay for two demon lords to step down and join her side?

    Wait a minute, Carillon! That one-on-one was all ymans fault! I was under mind control. I dont know anything about it!

    Eesh. I really dont think that excuse is gonna work, Milim. I could see the other demon lords rolling their eyes at her.

    Dont y dumb with me, you. You just dered a minute ago that Oooh, nobody can take over my mind, no!

    It was a remarkably good impression on Carillons part. He had quite a talent for acting.

    Mgh?! I, um, that

    Well, that muscle-bound idiot can wait. What about me, Milim?

    Youyou arent all saying this to trick me, are you? If you start serving me, that means we cant talk all casually any longer, yeah? You wont y with me, and we wonte up with any more fun schemes, yeah?!

    Frey shook her head. No. Ill get to be together with you all the time. Well get to have more fun than ever.

    I could see the brainwashing Er, the temptation take hold. See? This is why you gotta watch out for her.

    Carillon, meanwhile, was taking the fastball-down-the-middle approach. Besides, heined, youre the one who blew my entire damn country away! Rimuru said hell help me out with that, but youve got a duty to support us, too!

    I didnt think she did, really, but Milim was always weak withplicated concepts like this. Man, he was smarter than I thought. Milims eyes were bouncing to and fro; he almost had herand then, growing weary of thinking at all, she exploded.

    Daaahhhh! All right! Just do whatever you guys feel like!

    Smoke flew from her head like an erupting volcano as she abandoned all sentient thought. Thats Milim for you. She acted all smart, but she really sucked at critical thinking.

    Are you really sure about this, Carillon? Guy asked.

    I am. Ive been thinking, too. Not about abdicating the throne of the Beast Kingdom, but about maybe building some kind of new structure with Milim at the top of it.

    Guy scoffed at this, looking disappointed. I liked you, though. In another hundred years, I was expecting you to awaken, too. Then he grinned at him. But very well! From this moment, Frey and Carillon are no longer demon lords. You are free to serve Milim in any manner you please.

    Now the abdication was official, and nobody voiced any furtherint. Myself included, of course.

    So now I was officially deemed a demon lord, one had dropped out due to brutal death, and two had stepped down to be vassals answering directly to Milim. The Ten Great Demon Lords were now eight.

    I thought this would mark the end of the Council, but there was one problem left.

    Huh, so we arent the Ten Great Demon Lords any longer?

    It was just a sidelong observation on my part, but it generated a much greater reaction than expected.

    That is a concern, Daggrull rumbled. In terms of our dignity, we will need to consider a new name.

    Huh? Its really that important?

    Fortunately, Walpurgis is still under way. We have all our demon lords here. Now would be a wonderful time to brainstorm.

    Even Valentine, the demon lord who definitely couldnt take a joke, was unironically up for it. Does this really matter, guys? I think the humans are gonnae up with one for us either way, right?

    Oooh yes, it was a real mess thest go-round. Our numbers kept going up and down, and we had to hold so many darn Councils to settle on a new name each time!

    Wha?! They trigger Walpurgises on something that unimportant?! Ramiris described them as this grand, stately event, a special meeting of the minds Oh, but didnt she call it a chat over tea at first? I was really starting not to care.

    Youre right, said Daggrull. The Ten Great Demon Lords thing stuck after the humans came up with that, didnt it? After we wasted all that time thinking something up. Well, Im through with it. I dont have the wherewithal to think about it.

    You just wanted to stop using your brain for a while, didnt you? Dont act like you were such a helpful participant up to now.

    Silence, you! All you did wasin. I dont remember a single constructive suggestion from your end! Valentine knew exactly what I was thinking.

    Whatre you talking about, Valentine? You left that whole process to Roy, did you not?! Deeno shot her down.

    Unlike Milim and Ramiris, their erudition was mainly utilized to avoid work as much as possible. Why were they spending all this time thinking up names anyway? Like, they appeared dead serious about this. Did all demon lords have this much free time to work with?

    Upon further query, I learned that the name Ten Great Demon Lords from the human realms stuck because they had spent years trying to devise something themselves. That was due to fluctuations in the number of demon lordsjust when they thought they had something nailed down, theyd go up or down a head. So they wound up just going with the Ten Great Demon Lords, even though some were less than happy with it. It was all some of the most useless trivia I ever heard.

    All right. People. Calm down. We need to show some cooperation for a change. We can ovee this! Guy had just admitted that his fellow demon lords were usually pretty damn uncooperative.

    Um, but Should we, um? The Eight Great

    Ramiriss suggestion was met with such deafening silence that she couldnt even get it fully out.

    R-right, she stammered, trying to deflect it. Guys got a good point! Lets work on this together!

    Enthusiasm for the Eight Great Demon Lords was at an all-time low. Everyone was in agreement on that, but it didnt mean we were being any more cooperative with one another.

    Wah-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha! Ill let you guys take care of that stuff!

    Im tired. Im gonna go to sleep.

    It took less than a minute for us all to fall apart. I expected it from these guys, and I sure got it. I wasnt expecting one big happy family, but it was exactly as I predicted.

    But one among us was able to cut through the awkward atmospheresomeone behind me who wasnt picking up on our impasse at all.

    Oh? If thats the problem, then my Rimurus a real professional!

    It was Veldora, no doubt growing bored and pining to go home already. Ugh. Now all their eyes were on me. I really wish he had some manga to read instead. Wait. Did he already finish reading thest volume?

    And now I could see Milims eyes fixated upon himor actually, that manga volume in his hand, like a hawk sizing up its prey. I had a bad feeling about that, but there were more pressing issues at hand.

    You know, Ramiris said with a nod, when he named Beretta, he came up with that name in no time t, too!

    Great. They were delegating everything to me. That bum Shes treating me with less and less respect over time, I swear. I could tell she was gradually going to push more and more on my te. Looking around, I could see expectant expressions all around the table. Crap. Theyve already fully surrounded me?!

    The demon lords looked at one another, then Guy stood up. Rimuru, today you stand as a new demon lord. I wish to grant you a wonderful new privilege

    Oh, um, I dont need it, thanks.

    I tried cutting him off before he could finish. He wasnt gonna let it happen. With a heavy wham, the shiny, obsidian-like, horribly valuable table was chopped right in half.

    Yes, he said as he gracefully walked right up to me, running a hand past my cheek, I will grant you the right to provide us with a new name. A very honorable position, I should say. You will ept it, yes?

    He was totally wheedling me. The gesture might have made it look like kindness at first, but his voice made it clear that no insubordination would be allowed. I looked at him, neither nodding nor shaking my head, attempting to plead the fifth.

    And you know, he whispered, half biting at my ears. His fingernails were practically screeching as they dug into my cheek. This all happened because you culled our numbers, did it not? Youll be kind enough to take responsibility ande up with a name, yes?

    An impartial observer might wonder if we were lovers sharing a special moment. We werent. He was threatening mebut if things had gone this far, I had nothing to refute him with. Its really that much of a pain?

    Well, whatever.

    All right! Sheesh. You dont have to whine so much just because you dont like it.

    Resigning myself to my fate, I grudgingly took up the post. The looks of relief on my colleagues faces spoke volumes. Some were even kicking back and epting refills on their tea, like this was already over. Well, screw them.

    Really, I didnt mind the Eight Great Demon Lords muchbut yeah, maybe its a little too obvious. I figured that was what Ramiris was about to suggest, so lets just trash that right off. The pressure to drop the idea immediately was palpable in the air. No way I wanted to have those frowning faces upon me.

    Which left Hmm. Come to think of it, its a new moon tonight, isnt it? A night sky, full of beautiful twinkling stars

    Hey, how about the Octagram? You know, like an eight-pointed star?

    It was greeted by silence, the demon lords closing their eyes and scrutinizing the word. Then they all reopened them in unison.

    Settled, then. Quite lovely.

    See? I toldja! I just knew Rimuru would pull it off for us!

    Impressive. I can see Veldoras rmendation was an apt one.

    Hmph. Well, so be it. Perhaps you are slightly talented.

    Dang! Just like that! Wow. Like, what was with all the trouble we hadst time anyway?

    Mm.

    No negative feedback. Well, great. If anyone did voice aint, I was thinking Id throw the job over to them instead. I dont know why Milims acting like she engineered all this, thoughand thats the question Id want to ask you, Deeno. What were you talking about all those times before?

    I had a lot of questions, but as a mature adult, I had theposure to just pretend my problems didnt exist. From this point forward, we would be feared and revered under a new name.

    We were called the Octagram:

    Lord of Darkness Guy Crimson (demon)

    Destroyer Milim Nava (dragonoid)

    Labyrinth Master Ramiris (pixie)

    Earthquake Daggrull (giant)

    Queen of Nightmares Valentine (vampire)

    Sleeping Ruler Deeno (Fallen)

    tinum Saber Leon Cromwell (demonoid)

    and me:

    Newbie Rimuru Tempest (slime)

    We numbered eight in all, and with those eight, we had just opened the curtain on a new era of demon lords.

    The first order of business was how we distributed our domains.

    I was granted the entirety of the Great Forest of Jura, which was a hell of a bargain, but Milim got an even better dealthe unified domains of Frey, Carillon, and yman under her rule. Rule, of course, in name only. Carillon and Frey would be handling the day-to-day management, alongside the Dragon Faithful directly serving Milim.

    ymans old domain was also something of a buffer zone bordering the Eastern Empire. Wed have to investigate how he administrated it and build defense lines as needed. Kind of a pain in the ass; someone would need to devote a lot of detail-oriented work to it. But that was something for Milim and her new government to think about. I had my own priorities to manage.

    The rest of the demon lords saw no change in territorialnd. Some simply wandered around with no home to call their own; some kept their exact location hidden; some set up fortresses on far-flung continents. It was rare for any of them to have precisely defined borders, so even if there was any change, itd be hard to decipher.

    These demon lords tended not to sweat the details, no, but they did have ways of keeping in touch. That was the function of the ring granted to each one, as a symbol of their post. Not only did they identify the wearer; they also provided for interdimensional calls between demon lords, either secret ones between two people or party lines with multiple participants.

    A pretty useful bit of magic jewelry, this so-called Demons Ring. With it, I could get into contact with them even if I was stuck inside an Unlimited Imprisonment. Id have to consider running Analyze and Assess on it for mass-manufacturing purposes, not that I was about tell these guys about that.

    ymans schemes, and the chaos he spread around the forest, were a thing of the past. I had been epted as a new demon lord. Kazalim, ymans apparent master, was a worry to me, but the demon lord drama I dealt with was now all taken care of.

    Now, I was a full-fledged vertex on the Octagram.

 Volume 6 - Epilogue

    EPILOGUE

    IN THE HOLY LAND

    Dang, Lace thought as he ran as fast as his legs could take him, I thought I was gonna die!

    Just as they had discussed, he had attempted to break into the holy domain once more, the moment the Walpurgis Council began. He was on his way to the cathedral inside the Holy Temple, headed for the Inner Cloister where he ran into a demon lordst timeonly to run into the worst person possible.

    She was none other than the epitome of strength and beautyHinata Sakaguchi, captain of the Chief Knights of the Holy Imperial Guard and leader of the Churchs pdin forces.

    Whoaaa! What the hell? This aint how the promise went!

    Lace cursed his absent client. The promise was that said client would lure Hinata out of there for him. He could already hear the guyughing and saying Oops! Sorry, sorry to him. The mere thought of it irritated him gravely.

    But now was no time for grousing.

    I do so detest insects like you. Burrowing into a holy ce such as this

    The sound of Hinatas cold voice made him feel like the life was ebbing out of him. Without another moments hesitation, Lace decided to runand he made it out, alive and well.

    His mission was a failure. The Inner Cloister might as well have been on another. But none of it was Laces fault.

    Whether the demon lord Valentines absent or not, if shes around, it doesnt bloody matter

    You expect me to beat that monster? he whispered to himself as he gave up the job. Still, he thought, Ive been doin nothin but runtely, huh?

    He wanted to give himself a well-deserved pat on the back for getting away from Hinata at all, but that didnt mean he liked it much. Given the terrible hand fate had been dealing himtely, it didnt seem smart to assume hed make it all the way

    Then he felt a rift appear, on the outskirts of the holy city, erupting into a massive wave of magical energy.

    Whoa For real?

    Lace could barely stand this any longer. That wasnt just a high-level magic-bornit was something even stronger than that. Plus, Lace was familiar with its magical wavelength.

    You little worm! Show yourself before me, now!!

    The voice of the demon lord Valentine thundered angrily, like a maelstrom of purging fire.

    Dammit! Now its a demon lord?!

    Lace wanted to wail out loud at thepleteness of his sheer bad luck. But now wasnt the time for that. He attempted to run off once more

    Hmph! Youre just as lowly as him, I see. Do you just enjoy inching around?

    then he stopped, sensing something in Valentines choice of words.

    What do you mean?

    Pfft! It does not involve you. Valentine scornfullyughed. But very well. Just a moment ago, the demon lord yman lost his life. That foolish, sniveling little maggot fled for his life, too, just like you, mewling pathetically the whole time.

    What?

    Ha-ha-ha! What, are you angry? What does it matter to you?

    Shut up! Are you fer real? ymans dead?

    Haaaaah-ha-ha-ha! So the maggots let the cat out of the bag, has he? I thought you two might be connected. By the will of the goddess Luminus!!

    Lace stood there, dazed, before Valentines loudughter. ymans death was too much for him to believe. Not that he couldnt believe it, he just didnt want to. To him, yman was a good friend andpanion, if restless and nervous.

    Whatre youughin about, ya pile of garbage?!

    Who do you think youre talking to, yougnnngh?!

    Dumbass! I told you not tough at my friend!

    Laces fists never stopped swinging. They were literally killer, both of them.

    Gnhh, dontdont you start on me, maggot!!

    His face reddened with anger and humiliation, Valentine red at Lace. No matter how much this insect hit him, Ultraspeed Regeneration made it all pointless. Death was the only way to give fools like these a lesson, as he thought it. He didnt even stop to wipe the blood sprayssprays that even now turned into a fine, crimson mist that descended around them both:

    Die! Bloodray!! Valentine cried.

    Amid this absolute barrier of gore, a torrent of visceral blood particles hurtled at the speed of a bullet towardnowhere.

    Uh-uh. Youre a dead man.

    Wha?! Valentine had no idea what happened. He bore overwhelming power, and this little maggot was toying with him. He had tried to kill him with his most powerful of skills, but for some reason, it never went off. Tonight was a new moon, the period when his powers were at their lowest point, but to a demon lord, the difference was trivial.

    There could be only one exnation: Lace was strong. And this turned out to be correct. In Laces hand, there was something throbbing.

    !!

    Yep. Thats yer core, there, your heart. Cant move, cant speak, am I right? Thats what I do.

    As Lace gave him the cruel news, Valentines body began to unconsciously shiver, little by little. It almost felt like

    Fear? Am I feeling fear?!

    You were juuuust a littlete on the uptake there. But you got it now, yeah? Im a strong one.

    Valentines face turned pale, wincing in desperation. He realized that Lace really did have his core in his hand. All was lost.

    The expression made Lace whoop in crazedughter as he crushed it with his fingers. The battle was decided in a single moment.

    Lace didnt stop smiling for a while after.

    Oooh, Footmans not gonna like this

    He had massacred all the guards who spotted him.

    Ooh, and Teares probably gonna cry, too

    He had attempted to flee straight out of there.

    And thats exactly why Imughing. Laughing at you, yman. For being such a perfect idiot.

    The Crazed Clown, in his estimation, had experienced exactly the death he deserved. Lace wasnt angry; he wasnt crying; he was justughing, inmemoration of a friend who would no longerugh with him.

 Volume 7 - Prologue

    PROLOGUE

    THE MAGIC-BORN MEMORIAL

    yman was dead. And when Lace delivered the news to the group assembled before him, the reaction was stunned silence.

    You lie! There is no way that could happen!

    This was Footman frantically shouting now, but no one could find it in themselves to see things his way. Lace was always so aloof, easygoing, never one to express any of his true emotions. But his face said it all. This was not the joker all of them knewhe was literally hanging his head in shame before them. It was all they needed to see to know that yman was really and truly dead.

    Last night, the night of that Walpurgis Council, I lost my connection with yman, Kazalim ponderously stated as Teare sobbed nearby. My connection with someone I viewed as my own child. It could only mean one thing for himdeath. I hardly wanted to admit it to myself. Even now, Lace, after what you told us, I am filled with a stubborn refusal to admit it

    This was my mistake, a boy with ck hair regretfullymented. I thought the demon lords were kid stuff. I needed to be more careful. Gather more intelligence and then take action.

    There were ten demon lords in all, looking down upon the world from atop their lofty peaks. But even in such heady territory, each of them bore different strengths and weaknesses. ymans apparently sessful application of Demon Dominate on the mind of the demon lord Milim caused him to forget that vital factand even worse, led him to believe he could rule over all his fellow lords. It was much too rash of him.

    If youre gonna put it that way, replied Lace, lightening the mood with a joking tone, Im the one who suggested it to the guy. I never thought for a moment itd turn out like this, no, not that it matters now. Plus, you have to admit ityman was too stupid for his own good this time. I told him not to let his guard down, but he got carried away with it, and it blew up on him. All there is to it.

    Lace! snarled Footman. You cant speak of him like that!

    Im only tellin the truth. He was weak, he got carried away, and now hes dead.

    Lace!!

    Letting his anger ovee him, Footman took a swing at Lace. His fist dug into the cheek of its target; Lace didnt bother to dodge it. But that was all. Lace remained where he stood, his eyes swiveling toward his attacker.

    Oh, what, you wanna go, Footman? Well, be my guest!

    He let slip an easygoing smile as he taunted Footman, all but daring him to focus his anger upon him. Kazalim saw right through it.

    Stop it, you two! she roared, halting them both. This is a sad asion for each of us.

    Shes right, the boy added. Why are you ying the bad guy all by yourself here, Lace? Thats not like you. If anyone should y that role, it oughtta be me for hiring all of you.

    Ah Now Footman realized it. Lace was goading him on purpose. My apologies, Lace.

    Nah, its fine. But you know, pnd you too, Presidentyou sure are mean, aintcha? I am trying to be the bad guy here, so how bout not letting the cat out of the bag?

    He rubbed his cheek as he continued toin. And something about the sight was soical that it really did lighten the moodif only a little.

    Back in control of their emotions, the magic-born discussed what to do next. Wailing about the misfortune of it all, Kazalim reasoned, would do nothing to realize ymans goals. Their talks grew sterner, more serious.

    I couldnt tell you what happened in there, but as the demon lord Valentine put it, yman definitely died during the Council. He didnt mention who did it, though

    Too bad I couldnt have beaten it outta him

    No, Lace. I am d to see you still breathing, at least.

    Ahh, I was just lucky. It happened to be the new moon, and bein a vampire, Valentine was at the low end of his strength. We were in a holy ce to boot. Lotsa holiness fillin up the atmosphere. Thats the only reason my attacks worked at all.

    Nobody doubted Laces words. Lace only managed to defeat Valentine, whose strength was on a par with the Kazalim of the past, thanks to several ovepping factors working out in his favor. Plus, Lace was second only to Kazalim in brute force. His role as vice president of the Moderate Jesters was no empty titlehe had the strength to back it up. That was why everyone in the room so readily epted Laces astonishing victoryand thus, the talks continued, with nobody noticing the lie lurking between his words.

    This is quite the conundrum, however

    You could say that, Kazalim muttered. We lost the base of operations we granted yman, his forces, his treasureeverything. A staggering loss.

    The boy nodded his agreement.

    Wh-what do you mean? Teare asked. Whether the demon lords killed yman or not, we still have his headquarters, dont we?

    I know that ymans forces were routed, added Footman, but we still have every chance to regroup and attack once again, no? We still have Adalmann, that crazed Saint, patrolling thends. A wight king like him is just as strong as any of usand the curse youveid upon him is as active as ever, isnt it, President?

    Kazalim exchanged nces with the boy before slowly, painfully, opening his mouth. Theplex I granted yman fell yesterday, in the course of a single evening. That slime, of all people, sent a small assault force to capture it.

    Huhhh? Lace reacted.

    No! Teare shouted.

    Youre kidding me! protested Footman. So the magic-born I saw on that battlefield wasnt even the full force at that Rimurus disposal Ah, wait a minute. He looked up for a moment. Hold on, hold on, I remember that crystal

    Right. The boy nodded. The images Lace took You saw the ogre mages in there, didnt you? I think its safe to say that each of them alone is a Special A-grade threat in the battlefield.

    Footman fell silent, mouth agape.

    Really? Teare whispered. Nobody answered.

    Regardless, reported Kazalim, that slime Rimuru was at the battle. I suppose he sprang that fight upon us as a ruse so he could capture ymans quarters himself. For a slime of his caliber, its not impossible to imagine him breaking through our defensive lines.

    Now the rest of the room was beginning to realize just how ominous the situation was.

    Which is why, the boy said, I think we need to reconsider our objective.

    With the majority of their military forces gone, he reasoned, any strategic moves needed to be avoided for now. ymans death alone was a serious psychological blow to everybody who knew him. But fortunately, they had not lost everything. They still had resources left untapped in order to spread out the risk, as well as the group they had imnted deep inside the Western Nations. Plus, the political influence they wielded behind the scenes with those two groups was still as strong as ever. Perhaps theycked physical might, but they had intelligence-gathering experts deployed across thend,ying out feelers to gauge every nations direction.

    To the boy, who had started with nothing ande this far, it was still possible to stage aeback. And that was why

    For the time being, we need toy low. Its a shame about yman, but we dont have enough power to try to exact revenge upon the demon lords. If we want to reach our ultimate goal of conquering the world, I think we need to be patient for now.

    His audience nodded their agreement.

    True enough. Weve made major strides over the past ten years. Perhaps it nted the seeds of arrogance inside all of us.

    Yep. Hence why yman got it in his head to pull all that nonsense

    Right. I hate to say it, but doing anything rash right now is likely to make things even worse.

    I hesitate to ept it myself, but I concede it is our best option for now

    The boy giggled a little as the magic-born all offered their agreement. Ha-ha-ha! Oh, cut me a break, Footman, he chuckled, patting him on the shoulder. Ive still got all of youthe best cards in my hand. I cant afford to lose you guys over some reckless shot in the dark, too.

    This was something he truly meant and also the main reason behind his decision. He needed to be sure everyone was on the same page as him, or else he feared at least one would let their anger get the best of them. Footman knew that perfectly wend he knew he had to ept it.

    I know, pal. Better to bottle it up inside for now, so we can let it fully eruptter.

    He did understand that. Losing his cool and picking a fight with a cadre of demon lords would simply spell the end of his life. He had to ept the boys reasoning.

    The boy, appreciating this, looked at the magic-born assembled before him. But hey, its no fun to be the punching bag all the time, right? Maybe we wont do anything, but we can say a lot of things. That slime took yman for everything he had, and I think I know how to get back at him a bit.

    He gave an ominous little grin.

    How do you mean? Kazalim asked.

    There is something unusual about that slime, the boy replied, grinning with glee. In just a few years, he has built up a new, and massive, force. Its hard for me to believe, and in any normal situation, wed never want to defy him. So lets wait and see a little, huh? And to do that, Ive got something I want to deploy.

    Oh, great. Lace shrugged. Another little scheme of yours? At least it beats you ordering me to pull off some other insane trick, as you usually do. Hopefully I can stay in the audience for this one, thanks.

    For now, the magic-born were withdrawing from the public eye, descending into a sort of primordial darknesssharpening their fangs for the fated day of revenge, whenever it maye.

 Volume 7 - Ch 1

    DEMONS AND SCHEMES

    Once we settled on the name Octagram for ourselves, Mizeri and Raine, the green- and blue-haired maids in Guy Crimsons service, prepared an extravagant meal for us all. They were decked out in dark-red maids outfits, and their kitchen skills, it turned out, were second to none.

    As Ramiris told me, the original purpose of the Walpurgis Council was to let demon lords hang out and swap information. As a vestige of this, perhaps, the space we were in featured a separate rooma sort of casual lounge, you could say. Attendance wasnt mandatory, and all the demon lords did their own thingsome left immediately after the meeting ended, some stuck around long enough for dinner, and others whiled away the time by chatting in the lounge.

    Me, I went for the food. You dont get a chance like this every day, and honestly, considering how much more overpowered Guy waspared with the rest of us, I wanted to see what his diet was like. The resulting meal was more exquisitely delightful than I ever couldve imagined. Each dish was an astounding new discovery, the best of its type in the whole world, and as I lingered over each one in reverie:

    Report. Component analysisplete. It is now possible to re-create the recipes ck tiger stew, grilled sage rooster, golden peach sherbet, and roast earthensleep dragon steak.

    I stole all the recipes. Is that mean of me? It seemed kind of unfair, not that I really understood what made them work. Steal makes it sound illegal or something. This was just intelligence gathering. These recipes called for meat from monsters rated A or higher, which you dont exactly see walking into town every day. But once I had the right ingredients, I think I would know how to prepare them now.

    The feast was rounded out with a bountiful selection of fresh fruit. Six of us were at the table, by the wayme, Guy, Milim, Ramiris, Deeno, and Daggrull. Valentine and Leon had left long ago.

    I took a moment to admonish Milim for tricking me as she gorged herself. She was still ying dumb, but I needed to give her a taste of reality. Meanwhile, I had Carillon and Frey promise me that wed all discuss the future at ater time. Once we cleaned up after the war, I figured Id be consulted about the uing city-rebuild work. This was going to be a brand-new nation, one with Milim at its head, and I intended to approach those discussions so they benefited me as much as possible.

    Ramiris was still bugging me about moving to my hometown. I refused her point-nk, of course, but she wasnt giving up. You could see it in her eyes. I figured Treyni would be nice enough to pacify her a bit for me, but I had the sneaking suspicion that Treyni loved spoiling Ramiris more than anything else. It seemed that was practically what she lived for, so I reminded myself not to expect much as I resolved to keep an eye on them.

    Daggrull and Veldora seemed to be hitting it off pretty well, and Guy and Deeno were engaged in friendly conversation. I decided to offer all of them some of Tempests world-famous brandy, distilled from our own wine. Part of my branding efforts, you might say. Spreading the word about how useful a nation we were would oil the gears for diplomacyter. That much is true whether youre dealing with a demon lord or your next-door neighbor.

    Not bad.

    Well, well, look at this

    Hack! Cough, cough cough! Man, thats got some bite

    It was maybe a bit too much alcohol for Deeno to handle, but Guy and Daggrull enjoyed it. So would you please not drink all of it first, Veldora? I had a pretty decent stockpile left in my Stomach, but I didnt store it in there just so Veldora could guzzle it all. And Milim immediately grabbed at the brandy, too, of course. I didnt let her have any. You know shed be an angry drunk. And considering how she tricked me, I had to put my foot down on this.

    And its fine for me, mmmmmm?

    Ramiris, meanwhile, was already preciously cradling her ss, three sheets to the wind in the blink of an eye. I let the frantic Beretta and Treyni deal with her. This was actually good for me. If she stayed sober and undistracted tonight, theres every chance she wouldve tried following me back to Tempest.

    So things were in full swing before long at this feast, and I decided to take my leave before Ramiris woke up from her stupor. It was quite an ending to the Walpurgis Councilnot at all what I expected, but Im d my worrying was all for naught in the end.

    It had been, to say the least, an eventful twenty-four hours. Walpurgis began at the stroke of midnight; by the time we wrapped it up, it was already early afternoon the next day.

    In a sh, I was back at Tempest. The trip over there was one thing, but with Dominate Space, the journey back was a snap. And unlike before, my nation hadnt fallen apart in my absencespirits were high, everything worked fine, and I was tremendously relieved. All our forces had kept their high alert going, just as I ordered. They were all more refined now, contributing to safety on the streets more than ever. I had overlooked nothing. The towns security system, modeled after the police I was familiar with on Earth, seemed to be a decent sess.

    As I observed all this, a thought struck my mind. You know, this countrys defenses alone could take out a nation or two all by themselves, couldnt they? Nearly every solder left on defense duty was the equivalent of a B rank, after all. Your garden-variety magical or paranormal beast wouldnt dare lurk nearby.

    Overall, the rule ofw and order had really taken hold around here. But that made me worry about monstersing out of the city, potentially causing havoc somewhere else. It might be better, I thought, to check up on that. So I dragged Veldora and Shion back to town, riding on the back of Ranga.

    The moment I entered the city, the local residents and patrolling soldiers immediately took a knee at the side of the road, forming a path for me to follow. It was all so expertly choreographed. I had no idea when they learned how to do it. Whats up with that? I thoughtonly to find Diablo approaching me from the other end of the path. He gave me a sincere smile, one brimming with joy, as he exchanged nces with Rigurd.

    Wee back, Sir Rimuru!

    It fills us with joy to hear of your induction into the Octagram! I am so d to see you back here safely!

    I appreciated that from Rigurd and Diablo, yes, butseriously, whats going on here? And how did you guys know I was crowned a demon lord? That had to be the first time anyone used the term Octagram in this world, too. I should knowI thought of it myself. The questions just kept piling up. Wasnt Diablo supposed to be out conquering the Kingdom of Farmus right now? Why was he here roping the entire town into doing this little dance number for me?

    Starting to feel a little ashamed about all this, I finally decided to ask. Its simple, Sir Rimuru, the smiling Diablo replied. We had asked Lord Veldora to keep us updated.

    I squinted at Veldora. He immediately averted his eyes. Dude. Come on, man. I dont know what hes guilty of yet, but hes guilty of something.

    After I put the screws to him a little, Veldora quickly revealed the truth. It turns out that he agreed to y Tempest informant in exchange for three dessert dishes at the next mend he held up his end of the bargain, telling Diablo about everything that happened in the Council.

    Now it made sensewhy they knew about me being a demon lord and about the Octagram name we had adopted. Maybe I should go so far as to praise Diablo for his data-gathering skills. Even if a person was smart enough to consider paying off someone as powerful as Veldora, only a select few would dare attempt it. Of course, Veldora deserves a lot of credit for actually agreeing with that nonsense, but still, I like this kind of proactive behavior. If all parties involved were pleased, I saw no need to harp on it.

    Still

    Veldora, do you even need to eat?

    Wh-what kind of nonsense is that, Rimuru?! Its not a matter of needing to eat or not. I eat because I want to. You hardly need to eat, either, do you?

    Gah!

    He had a point. I dont have much of a leg to stand on here. Shunas cooking had improved by leaps and boundstely, and we had a variety of desserts on offer these days. We managed to perfectly re-create the cream puffs I found in that Englesian caf, and we were even inventing things like custard pudding now. Therger array of alcoholic beverages avable also contributed to the invention of new taste-tempting treats.

    I was having Yoshida, the caf owner, help with this, developing new recipes and so forth; he readily agreed, happy to gain ess to the drinks we made. Now, he gleefully said, I think I can make a lot of things I couldnt before. We already had a few test dishesid out for our dinner tables; Veldora had tried a few of them during the celebration right after I resurrected him, and the results looked like they honestly shocked the guy.

    You sure you should be so easily plied with food like that, Veldora? And all it took to make Milim putty in my hands was just a bit of honey You know, maybe I could conquer the world with a well-stocked kitchen instead of all these military forces.

    As I thought about this, Shion and Diablo were exchanging a few words with each other.

    You did serve as Sir Rimurus guardian, did you not?

    Of course I did! And thanks to that, now we all know you arent needed as long as I am around. But what about the task Sir Rimuru gave you?

    Eh-heh-heh-heh-heh All is well. I intend to brief Sir Rimuru about it personally.

    Their smiles didnt even reach their eyes; the rivalry was still as intense as ever, I could see. If I left them to their own devices, theyd be at it all day.

    Guys, can you knock that off?

    Yes. Rigurd nodded. I am sure Sir Rimuru is tired. I believe Haruna has a meal prepared for all of you. We can talk once you are suitably refreshed.

    Thanks, Rigurd. Im loving this new air of authority youre giving out.

    So I had him lead me through town.

    Everyone we passed by was all smiles, ready to go into full-on party mode at the drop of a hat, but Benimaru and his team still werent back from their mission. The full celebration could wait untilter. For now, I could rest in the knowledge that one thorny problem, at least, was solved.

    Thus, I decided to sink into my hot-spring bath, enjoy the food Haruna prepared for me, give myself a mental recharge, and then listen to Diablos report. The battle with yman ended in total victory for me, and that just left the establishment of Yohms new kingdom and our future wrangling with the Western Holy Church to deal with. There would be new negotiations to consider shortlywith the Beast Kingdom of Eurazania, with the Winged Nation of Fulbrosia, with the Dragon Faithful who worshiped Milimbut those all looked bound to end on friendly terms, so there was no need to fret much about them now.

    So, I asked Diablo as I enjoyed some post-dinner tea, what have you been up to? I asked you to destroy the Kingdom of Farmus and install Yohm as its new king. If you abandoned that job and came back here, should I assume that to mean you need more resources?

    I was back in slime form for the first time in a while, rxing in Shionsp as I enjoyed the roundness of her breasts over my head. I think that made my question sound even more serene than I intended. If Diablo needed help, I figured someone like Soei could provide it. We had some leeway again for a change; no need to make Diablo fend for himself.

    Shion wasughing above me, going on about something like Oh, I would say being your tea fetcher is the ideal job for Diablo, my lord. Allow me to conquer that kingdom instead! and so on, but I ignored her. I just couldnt see her as up to the task. It was probably her way of lending Diablo a helping hand, but I wasnt listeningand as it turned out, it wasnt necessary.

    No, Sir Rimuru, he said as he refilled my cup, no resources will be necessary. Everything is proceeding smoothly and ording to n.

    Drinking tea in slime form was a bit tricky, so I simply decided to lie back and enjoy the aroma as I prepared to receive his report. Ahhh, bliss. A bliss that abruptly ended with the next thing he said.

    First, I restored all of them to their original condition. Reducing them to inert bs of meat was proving rather, ah, inconvenient.

    bs of what?! Whats he talking about? Shion shivered a little, picking up on my confusion. Wait, was that her interrogation method? Hoo boy. Better shut my imagination off before things get too dangerous. I had paid a visit to the interrogation room exactly once, warning her not to go too far with the three prisoners we held in there, butwell. I honestly didnt care if Shion killed them, back at that time, so I didnt push the issue too much. Bitte to regret that now, I suppose.

    Things were already looking dicey here, but I kept up a brave face, hiding my turmoil as I encouraged Diablo to continue.

    The first thing Diablo did, as he dutifully exined to Rimuru, was restore Church archbishop Reyhiem and pce sorcerer Razen to health.

    This was conducted on the way to Farmus, in two wagons surrounded by a team of mounted guards. Diablo was seated with the three prisoners in one of the wagonswell, with wasnt exactly right, because although the wagon couldfortably house six passengers, Diablo was the only visible figure inside it. The other three had been packed inside boxes on the floor. As, well, living bs of meat.

    What Shion had done was render them into a form almost too hideous to describe, something far removed from anything recognizably human. She had done so in tiny incremental steps to ensure nobody died, slowly and repeatedly exposing their muscture to the outside air, delicately scraping the meat off their bones. To put it less delicately, Shion was using those three to help her learn how to filet human beings alivewhile ensuring the subjects felt no physical pain at all. This was Master Chef, Shions unique skill, which pushed them all right up to the brink of death, only to revive them with healing potion so she could start her research over from the beginning.

    The sight and sensation of having that repeated over and over, seeing their bodies be disassembled and reassembledall painlesslybroke all three of them for good. You could see it in their anguished expressionswhen you could make out their faces at all, what with all the other exposed guts and viscera in the way.

    Returning them to Farmus like this, all of them could tell, was a bad idea. So Diablo began to put together a solution, if rather reluctantly. What a pain, he groused. Thews governing their continued existence have been so twisted and warped that healing magic hardly works on them at all. But the experience also opened his eyes to the power of arts and other unique skills, something that goes beyond mere magic. Even with his all-butplete knowledge of magic and its rules in this world, he had found a new surprise to y with. It delighted him.

    Thus, in that wagon trundling its way to Farmus, Diablo sessfully banished the remains of Shions force as it was applied to the three prisoners. Reyhiem was first to be revived, followed by Razen. Diablo had no particr order in mind for this, but when it came time to tackle King Edmaris of Farmus, he stopped.

    Oh, thank you, thank you!

    It was Reyhiem who found his voice first.

    But enough about us, Razen added. My king Please, bring my king back to what he was

    Diablo rewarded this blind loyalty with a restive nceandughed.

    Ee-hee-hee-hee-hee You, asking favors of me? You understand that the payment for this is dear, very dear?

    There was kindness to his smilebut not a shred of warmth to his eyes.

    Ah N-no, I

    Razen turned pale with fear and regret

    and then he remembered. Diablo, sitting calm andposed in front of him, was not a demon to trifle with. An Arch Demonor really, nothing even as approachable as that. An Arch Demon would be a threat, enough of one to perhaps spell doom for any smaller nation it pays a visit to. Thats how they earned their Special A rating, qualifying for Cmity status. Their magical force made any half-hearted effort at a magic barrier bend to their will. The fierceness of their aura could blow the defensive fortifications of an entire city away in a single onrush. All that, plus magical spells that crushed anything they encountered. Any adventurer who didnt rank at least an A themselves had no chance of handling an Arch Demonsimply standing in front of one would be forfeiting their lives. Even Razen would hesitate to confront one.

    But that didnt evenpare with Diablo. There didnt seem to be any auraing from him at all; he looked merely human. Only his eyes were unique. One nce, and they were unforgettable, like golden moons in the dead of night with shes of crimson red down the middle. It was rmingly eerie, but otherwise, he was no different from anyone elsemeaning he could simply walk right through any fortifications a city might use to block a lesser demons approach.

    If humans had any advantage over demons, it was in knowledge and wariness. Monsters could be intelligent as well, but the smarter they were, the more they wanted to show it offusually in the form of their aura, which they used as a sort of magicule-driven calling card. That was what made barriers sensitive to such energy surges so effective against them. But what about a monster that hid its aura? A Cmity that just appears, in the middle of the street? Razen didnt even want to imagine that scenario.

    A demon smashing through a magic barrier, while regrettable, could at least be anticipated. Itd buy you time to shore up your forces andunch a counterattack. But if that demon could ignore the barrier entirelyanyone could see that it was noughing matter. Any monster like that would be arch-demon-level or higher. That was Diablo, one of the first Primal Demons.

    But there was something even scarier than that. That was the fact that Diablo, this ancient and fearsome demon, was in servitude to another master. The master of all those monsters, with the strikingly beautiful golden eyes and silver-blue hairshining so bright that you could almost see through him. Fleeting, but possessing power beyond anyones recognition. Someone worthy of being called a demon lord.

    His mind was filled with sheer terror as he watched this lord massacre an army of twenty thousand, but when they metter, he felt a different emotion. When Razen was being taken away as a prisoner of war, the way this demon lord regarded him It was like ncing at a pebble on the road. The moment those golden eyes spotted him, Razen was practically intoxicated. Gone was the pain racking his body, the fear of imminent death. And then he understood. There are things in this world that were never meant to be touched. A voice from the heavens booming Dont go overboard. It must have warned Razen then. Dont count on your chances. Taking on a being who counts a Primal Demon among his servantsno wonder your nation has fallen. To a demon lord like that, destroying Farmus single-handed would be too simple.

    Razen remembered it all. Ignoring the lurching and jolting of the wagon, he got out of his seat and kneeled before Diablo.

    Of course I understand. And I hope I caner, that you will allow me to join you as even your lowliest servant! I swear that my body, and my soul, is yours to utilize. So please, please offer some pity to King Edmaris

    He was staking all his loyalty on this request. Diablo greeted it with a cid nod.

    Very well. I suppose even someone like you is considered rtively powerful by human standards. I am sure you have your uses. Besides, I had no intention of killing him unless Sir Rimuru ordered me to. I will be d to free him for you. But

    However, if the monarch wanted to go back to the way he remembered himself, he would have to work for it. He would need to be shown to the kingdoms nobility, in the horrifying form he was in now, to show to the world the foolishness of bending a bow against the Rimuru Diablo was so devoted to. Razen waited nervously for Diablo to continue, while Reyhiem was too terrified by the oppressive atmosphere to move an inch.

    But I will let this go just one time. Depending on your future behavior, not only your kings life, but the very breath of existence that blows over thend of Farmus may be snuffed out.

    He meant it literally. Diablos willmeaning, Rimurus willwas to be followed, or else. Razen, and Reyhiem, and even King Edmaris in his exposed, twisted, boxed-up form all knew the intent behind the statement. All three were fools, but they were not idiots. Whether they liked it or not, they understood Diablo wouldnt hesitate to act on that threat. The only way they could remain alive, it was clear now, was to give Diablo their full support.

    Of course, sir! Give us any order you seek! We will cooperate to the best of our ability!

    Reyhiem threw his head close to the floor in a humiliating kowtow, a mental hairs breadth away from licking Diablos boots.

    You have our loyalty, my lord!

    And Razen had already made up his mind. Whether the king was safe mattered little by now. The only thing that had kept Farmus, and its royal lineage, safe for this long was Razens pride in his job. Even Edmaris, in all his anguish and desperation, could see that. Now, Razen had forsaken himand thus, forsaken Farmus.

    But the king knew it was the best choice avable. Defying the demon lord meant the destruction of the nation. King Edmaris had two choices left: pledge his allegiance to the demons or attempt a resistance and be cut down immediately. And the good king was not foolish enough to make the wrong decision at a time like this. Thus, for hisst official act as leader of the Kingdom of Farmus, he made the right move.

    As the final king of Farmus, he dered, with some reluctance but still loudly and clearly, I promise I will provide any support you require, Sir Diablo.

    Diablo had pledges from all three of them. At that moment, behind the scenes, his Tempter skill was doing its work, ensuring that each one would be in his servitude.

    Dont worry, the demon gently whispered with a smile. Do what I say, and I will make sure you do not suffer for it.

    Thend of Farmus was in a state of mass confusion that day. Their lord, King Edmaris, had returned in a shocking state of affairs.

    There, in the royal castles audience chambers, the collected nobility of the nation gasped in horror. There, atop the throne, a box had been reverentlyid upon the cushion. Inside wasa cube of meat, a nauseating mixture of geometry and biology with the kings face buried in the center. It was alive, its eyes a tad ssy as it stared out of the box, but fully conscious nheless.

    Shogo! What madness is this? Why is His Majesty in such a miserable state?!

    Hear! Hear! And what of the other two? What happened to our royal armies?

    And what of Folgen?! What is our knight captain doing?! How could this ever have happened with Sir Razen overseeing matters?!

    Panic spread as the noblemen began to shout over one another, fervently trying to mask their fear. Razen, taking the form of Shogo, could hardly me them.

    Several days after losing regr magical contact, the people remaining in the kingdom were on pins and needles. Their proud, overwhelming force of twenty thousand couldnt have been defeated, but there was no telling what sort of unexpected events may have transpired. There was no way to be sure if their king was safe, evenmore than enough to fill any mind with suspicious doubt.

    In the midst of this, Razen had taken Archbishop Reyhiem back home, using a Warp Portal to transport the both of them back to the castles warp chamber. A passing sentry had noticed their limp forms on the floor early in the morning that day. It threw the pce guards into a panic as they scrambled to identify themShogo Taguchi, the otherworlder, and Reyhiem, archbishop and His Majestys close confidant. The guards helped thetter up, still confused about all this, before noticing the box the boy took great pains to keep safe in his hands.

    One of them looked inside, unprepared for the sight. He was an upper officer in the royal guard, known for courage and coolness under fire, but not even he could refrain from screaming in horror. There were strings of some unidentifiable organic matter connecting haphazardly from one section to the other, emitting a rotting stencha twisted sight, like plucking all the organs out of a body and gluing them back together at random. The sole ruler of the Kingdom of Farmus had been reduced to a sickening creature, and no one could criticize that royal guard for so rudely screaming his head off at him. Attracted by the noise, others went to look for themselves and reacted the same way; the attendants and ministers were all thrown into utter chaos at the transformation of their lord.

    Some screamed and sobbed. Some found themselves emptying their stomachs on the spot in fear. Some fainted entirely. None of them could believe this was their king. But this was reality. When they finally dared toe close enough, it was confirmed for goodthis truly was Edmaris before them.

    What are you doing?! one of the ministers shouted. We must help His Majesty!

    That was the catalyst. At once, everyone sprang into action. The sorcerers who stayed behind in the pce tested out every spell at their disposal. The high-level priests of the Western Holy Church were summoned, each attempting their own healing magic. Faced with this object of primal fear, they tried desperately to restore the king to normal, faces straining at the sickening sight, attempting to keep their wits as they continued their work.

    But nothing worked. No matter what they tried, they couldnt save their king.

    Now Shogo had regained consciousness. He was immediately called in for questioning.

    Razen felt a slight sense of sympathy there, faced with his formerrades. His fealty was squarely with Diablo, and he wouldnt hesitate to betray them now. They would all face their fates alone, based on their own decisionsbut Razen felt just a hint of pity for them. All of this was on Diablos orders, including his feigned unconsciousness. Everything was going to n.

    As Diablos servant, Razen had received a briefing on what his new master intended to do with this kingdom. He fully understood what needed to be done to achieve those aims. In a word, thisnd was to be the demon lords ything. The moment Farmus was selected as a game board with everyone here as pawns, the history of the country as an ongoing concern came to an end.

    But this was not necessarily bad news for its people. When told of the demon lords ns, Razen felt a broad sense of hope. Already in his minds eye, he could see thend of Farmus growing more prosperous than ever before. If achieving this goal meant toppling the current system in ce, then so be it.

    Calm yourselves! This is Razen inside this body. I have taken His Majesty back to safety, with the kind assistance of a champion to our cause.

    What? Youre not Shogo?

    What happened to? Ah. Yes, now I see.

    Imagine, Sir Razen inside that impudent snit Shogos body! This will take some getting used to.

    Despite the initial confusion, the people in the chamber were convinced. Razen was, after all, a great magician.

    But you fled the battle? Does that mean our forcesFarmuss forces have been defeated?!

    What happened after that? You didnt simply march back to the castle because you couldnt eradicate the monsters, did you?

    The noblemens questions grew to a torrent. They were the leaders of the nation, although many of them secretly (or not so secretly) schemed to use this war as a cover for the profits they intended to make off it. Defeat, and the financial losses that entailed, were unthinkable notions.

    Silence, all of you! We must let Sir Razen say his piece!

    It was the Marquis of Muller who finally calmed the crowd. That, too, was part of the n. Diablo had made contact with him the previous night via a connection to Fuze, guild master for the kingdom of Blumund. Things were all proceeding just as Diablo had pictured them.

    Razen began by exining how the king would be saved. A native champion named Yohm had apparently negotiated with the lord of the monsters, procuring some of their restorative potion that he would soon bring back to Farmus. Word had already been sent to the gate guards, ready to receive Yohms party at any moment.

    He then moved on to what exactly happened to the Farmus forces. He did not get very far into the tale before the chamber erupted into shouting once more. All it took were three magic words: Veldora was reborn.

    Thatthat cant be

    That evil dragons found new life in the monstersnd?

    No I thought Veldora had been eternally banished!

    There is no time to waste. We must report this to the Holy Church and have them dispatch a Crusader group at once!

    Its all over! If Sir Razen speaks the truth, we have no means of resistance. The remaining forces in Farmus hardly number enough to put up a new defense!

    Hes right! Bring our knights back here immediately!

    Indeed. If our magical link with them is cut off, we must send a messenger for General Folgen!

    Theres no time for such nonsense! We must flee thisnd before this knowledge reaches the general public, or we may lose any chance to do so!

    Chaos and terror reigned. Some professed the need to strike back; others saw fit to abandon the people outright and go into exile. Muller silenced them all with a thundering roar.

    Enough of this! Whether our knights are alive or not, the situation remains the same. Panic will aplish nothing for us, Sir Hytta. Where do you intend to flee to? That Storm Dragon is a Catastrophe for us all.

    The noblemen regained theirposure. Calmness returned for a moment, only to be shattered as Razen continued, exining what had transpired in that farawayndthe sad (and entirely made-up) tragedy of how the entire Farmus force had disappeared without a trace, following Veldoras revival.

    The tale made all the present nobility fall silent. Nobody said anything. It was entirely preposterous, so difficult to believe, for everyone. Soon, they began asking Razen questions, attempting toe to grips with the situation.

    S-Sir Razen, is all of that true? We have no idea where any of them are?

    Indeed. The battle between our forces and the monsters resurrected the sleeping dragon in his domain.

    That, that couldnt possibly be! The Western Holy Church dered him to be sealed away forever! Are you saying that was a lie?

    No. They were rightVeldora had been extinguished from this world. But the seeds of the dragon species can never be fully removed. They are simply reborn elsewhere. It surprised all of us, though, seeing this rebirth take ce so close to us and in such a short time.

    Then what happened to the survivors, Sir Razen?

    Yes! Is General Folgen still alive? How many forces can we still ount for?

    Razen solemnly shook his head. They had all died, thanks to an enraged Rimurusuch was the truth. But he had direct orders from Diablo to describe the fates of every fighter as unknown.

    What is the meaning of this?

    As I said, I do not know where they are. The knights and monsters that were fighting on thatnd disappeared once Veldora revived himself. We were all that remained

    Ridiculous!

    Just to be sure, you literally mean they disappeared? Not scattered across thend following a rout?

    Our supply teams would have been stationed behind the front lines. Surely they must be safe, at least?

    Razen fell silent, eyes closed. Seeing this forced everyone to trust him at his word. The knights were all gone. One of the ministers fell to the ground, erupting in tears. He was the one who asked about the supply teams, in no small part because his son had been sent out on one of them, his first battle experience. Keeping him away from the front had meant pulling all the strings he could, but the effort had been wasted. He had only agreed to his deployment because this was supposed to be a raid, a journey to seize the monsters assets and kill with abandon. And now this. The despair came so unexpectedly, it made him cry almost instantly.

    But even that tragedy was just one in a multitude. Approximately twenty thousand people were missing in action. It was a cataclysmic loss like none the nation had ever seenand as missing as they officially were, nobody expected them home anytime soon. They were as good as dead.

    And now all of them had connected that cataclysm in their minds with the revival of Veldora. They had all been sacrificed in order to breathe life into the dragon. To Veldora himself, that was nothing more than a hateful lie, but it was exactly what Rimuru and his advisers wanted. Diablo had just made masterful use of Razen to manipte the thoughts and minds of the Farmus nobility.

    Then, as if on cue, footsteps rang out from outside the throne room. Yohm and his team had arrivedwith Mjurran as his chief adviser, Gruecith, his main bodyguard, and the sorcerer Rommel, his personal secretary. Taking up the rear was Diablo himself, dressed in his finest butler-style clothing but oozing a very non-butler-like arrogance from every pore. This chamber was not the sort of ce someone as low-born as an adventurer could easily step into, but Razen had arranged for a guide to lead them in.

    Sorry I took so long, said Yohm to Razen, but I think I finally got the big guy to see things our way.

    He tried to hold his head high as a statesman, but his street-bred speech habits proved less simple to fix. Turning him into nobility was not going to happen overnight. His attitude alone made the other nobles question him.

    Who on earth are you?! Do you have any idea of your rudeness,moner?!

    Despite being informed that Yohms party was here to heal the king, one of the ministers saw fit to chew him out. He was aware of Yohm the champion, yes. Yohms likeness had been passed around, so the minister knew exactly to whom he was speaking. There was no mistaking his Exo-Armor, eitherbut none of that mattered to him. This was the royal castle, and the rules of themon streets didnt apply here. Yohms casual tongue was uneptable.

    This unnerved Razen. He turned a wary eye toward Diablo, gauging whether this tirade offended him or not. If the nobility was not fully prepared for this, Razen would have to shoulder the me. He could understand the ministers angerit was a perfectly normal reaction to have, as he saw itbut now wasnt the time for this. He regretted not being more thorough in his guidance.

    Lord Carlos, he intervened, please wait a moment. This group is the very one that saved us. They are the only ones who hold the key to rescuing His Majesty!

    What? They saved you, Sir Razen?

    As the so-called defender of our kingdom, Sir Razen, that hardly sounds like you. What is the meaning of this?

    Despite the noblemens misgivings, Razen was still the most powerful wizard in Farmus. There was no doubting his powers, and his track record in defending the kingdom from outside threats spread across hundreds of years. His words were not to be taken lightly, and so the nobility sheathed their swords for now. If anything, though, this response was merely a bluff in the face of the mortal danger this nation faced. If Razen had been saved, perhaps there was a way all of them could be, too.

    As Razen opened his mouth to answer the question, another voice joined the conversation.

    Allow me to answer that.

    It was Reyhiem, the archbishop. He had pretended to be himself just revived this moment toe to Razens assistance. Relieved, Razen gave him a nod, then turned to Diablo, noticing his expectant smile.

    Yes? How was Sir Razen rescued, then?

    I trust he has already told you about the Storm Dragons reawakening, Reyhiem began. The battlefield was intense, vehicles from both sides smashing against one another. Our side outnumbered theirs, but the monsters had the geographical advantage. It was a much harder battle than any of us expected, and there were many casualties on both sides.

    His voice echoed across the otherwise silent chamber as he continued, keeping a close eye on Diablo to gauge his response. The chaos on the battlefield was what revived Veldora, and when he emerged on the scene, both human and monster were sacrificed en masse.

    It was all Sir Reyhiem and I could do to keep His Majesty protected, Razen said as he nodded. He was careful to emphasize that there was nothing he couldve done to save them.

    Exactly, exactly. We were situated in the rear of the main force, watching in despair as the tragedy unfolded before us. Before the Storm Dragon, dooming our legions to death and crushing everything in his path, we all said our final prayers. But then, one rose up to stand between us and this merchant of death.

    Razen shot Diablo a nce, to which Diablo gave a self-satisfied nod back. It was just the signal he and Reyhiem wanted.

    It was none other than Sir Rimuru, the master of the monsters.

    Indeed, it was. Sir Reyhiem and I were both prepared to die, but Sir Rimuru convinced Lord Veldora to calm his rage.

    Convinced? He actually spoke with the monster?!

    It would be suicide to stand before the likes of Veldora. Being exposed to all those magicules would kill most creatures.

    How did he do it?

    The nobility was understandably surprised. If Veldora could be reasoned with, perhaps there was a way to keep him fromying waste upon thend. They looked toward Razen and Reyhiem with hopeful expressions. There was every chance that Veldora would spare Farmus, but it would be foolish to idly hope for that to transpire. But what was to be done, then? Nobody had an answer for that. Now that they knew a force of twenty thousand, including the kings personal knight corps, had been literally erased from existence, nobody was reckless enough to suggest confronting the dragon. If they could negotiate with this threat, that was the best solution for everyone.

    You are all aware, I assume, that Sir Rimuru is also the overseer of the Forest of Jura?

    Or so he ims, at least, groused a minister. Diablo greeted this with a scowl that immediately filled Razen with rm.

    It is no mere im, Minister, he said. I have personally witnessed the town the monsters built, and truly, it is more than worthy of serving as the capital of any kingdom. But we can discuss thatter. Regardless, Sir Rimuru has the dryads, the guardians of Jura, working alongside him.

    As he put it to the nobility, Rimuru used the dryads as a kind of interpreter for his talks with Veldora. That made it all the more convincing. The dryads were well-known for having the power to guard thends where Veldora slept. They were ssified as A rank by the Free Guilds reckoning, and in terms of the danger they posed, Special A wasnt out of the question. If they were serving this monster Rimuru, his powers must be at least as extensive as that. Nobody in the room had a problem picturing it. They were all high-level nobility, and none of them werezy with their intelligence gathering.

    I see

    So making him our foe was a mistake?

    The ministers recalled how eager they were to invade the monsternds. They hated to face this reality, but it was a headache they all had to deal with now.

    This is ominous, one of them muttered. If it was possible to negotiate with this dragon, then antagonizing our sole potential inroad was a grave error, indeed

    The rest of them went visibly paler. There was no way they could ask Rimuru to intervene on their part. At worst, he might even send Veldora over to Farmus to teach them all a lesson.

    Then Yohm, summarily ignored up to now, walked to the center of the chamber. Ensuring all eyes were upon him, he began to speak, his voice calm.

    Um, yeah, so listen, you guys dont have to worry about that. When I killed that orc lord, I was working with Rimuru the whole time. Hes actually a pretty openhearted guy usually, you know? In fact, hes got a pretty keen interest in working alongside humanity

    Oh-ho! Lord Carlos interrupted him, exercising every bit of his regal pretension. Then let this man stand in for us and tell him of our demands. We will give you our demands at ater time, so please retire to another room and wait for us.

    ss is an onerous thing. Whether a champion of the people or not, Yohm was still amoner, not even deemed worthy of a knighthood. Many in the room made no secret about how much they looked down upon him. Lord Carlos was an earl, among the most powerful in the Farmus bureaucracy, and the greatest example of how full of themselves the nobility often proved to be. This attitude would not normally be a problem in this chamber, butagainnow was not the time. Already, some of the other nobles were rolling their eyes at Carlos.

    Whoa, whoa, wait a sec. I said hes usually openhearted, but not right now, you know what I mean? You all probably know why.

    What?

    You dered war on Rimurus nation, right? Bad idea, my friend. Rimuru lost some of his pals in that battle. He, um Hes pretty pissed off.

    What nonsense is this,moner?! It is not your ce to question the actions of our nation! If you are on speaking terms with Rimuru, that is all we require. It is a champions duty to intervene for us. You must do something!

    Lord Carlos was acting as haughty as ever, totally ignoring Yohms pleadings. Yohm had trouble hiding his disgust. I swear, these nobles, he thought, taking pains to look undisturbed as he continued.

    Look, can you just listen to me for one moment? From the way I heard it, you didnt send any envoys, you didnt dere war or anything; you just took some otherworlders and let em go to town, huh? I went out to mediate with you guys, but when I heard all that, lemme tell ya, I was shocked. But look, Im a Farmus man. Born and raised. I dont wanna see my homnd get wrecked, so I tried finding a way to calm Rimuru down. Razen over there asked me to.

    If the nobility continued to act as despotic as they were, it was no exaggeration to say Farmuss days were numbered. Sensing Diablo behind him, Yohm could physically feel the doom over them all.

    Catching sight of Diablo taught Yohm all about what true evil was. It made him realize what a bunch of small-time bandits he and his group really were. Real evil doesnt bother to try buttering up the men in charge. They bow down to no one, staying constantly true to their will.

    Diablo was on good behavior right now only because he was faithfully following Rimurus orders. Him acting up right now would have adverse effects on Yohms future as the new king. Overly punishing the nobles would leave the real problem unaddressed, and if he simply killed them all to shut them up, itd tarnish the new governments reputation. The most ideal way to handle them was to wait until some of the more rebellious ones made their presences known. That was why Diablo stayed silent, keenly observing them all.

    If, on the other hand, the nobility decided to incur his wrath, all that flew out the window. If Diablo decided none of them were worth keeping alive, that would be the end for them, right there. Mjurran and Gruecith, serving as advisers to Diablo, were in agreement on that. Only a very few high-level magic-born could hope to corral someone as powerful as Razen. Diablo was one of them, and if Diablo wanted to take action, Farmus in its current weakened state could do nothing to resist him.

    This was much of the reason why Yohms party was far more nervous about how this meeting in the throne room would go than any of the nobles were.

    Razen felt just the same way as Yohm. It was clear that Diablo thought little of human life, and he had none of the hang-ups about noble titles andmoners the rest of them had. They were all equally worthless to himhis treatment of King Edmaris made that blindingly obvious.

    If they started flinging insults at Rimuru, master of the monsters, they had no idea how Diablo might react. Lord Carlos, hopefully, would be the only target of his rage. If he wasnt, then all intelligent life might be banished from Farmus entirely.

    Razen knew that, and that knowledge made him frantic. Assuaging the panic running inside his head, he tried his best to back up Yohm.

    Lord Carlos, that is quite enough from you!

    What? You take the side of this scruffymoner, Sir Razen?!

    I said, that is quite enough! he found himself shouting. I will not have you intrude until you understand the situation!

    It was rare for Razen to raise his voice in court. It cowed the nobility into silence, waiting to see what would happen next.

    Listen to me, all of you, he said, mentally recalling the script he was given. Sir Yohm is telling us the truth. Shogo and his otherworlderpatriots were defeated by the monster armys generals. When our forces tried to overrun our enemies, the Storm Dragon blocked us, sealing our fates. The survivors consist of Sir Reyhiem, His Majesty, and meus three only. We were held captive, and it was the good word of Sir Yohm that earned us our release.

    He continued with the tale, and no one else dared to cast doubt upon it. Soon Reyhiem and Yohm were contributing information, supported by Muller and the Earl of Hellman. Together, they all pleaded their case before the biggest and brightest figures of Farmus politics.

    So you say that His Majesty was subjected to a curse on the battlefield that put him in his present state?

    Our lord has offered peaceand the master of the monsters is willing to listen?

    Are you saying Farmus, our homnd, has yielded to monsters?

    Have we any other choice? Surely you dont intend to suggest we continue the battle. We would have the Storm Dragon to answer to.

    No, I

    The otherworlders, their aces in the hole, had been dispatched by Rimurus top officials. Veldora was on the move. The Jura-Tempest Federation, an organization they once derided as a rabble of vering beasts, wasfrom a military perspective, at leastleaps and bounds ahead of Farmus. Attempting to stage a frontal attack against this foe would be the height of folly. Everyone in the chamber had the same thoughtin admitting defeat, the king made the only decision avable to him.

    Soon, the group hade to a consensus.

    Well, if we have an offer being made to us, why not ept it, everyone?

    The majority nodded their agreement to Mullers suggestion. There were some contrarians among them, no doubt, but none of them voiced their concerns. Nobody seemed to contest the fact that this war could no longer continue.

    It was now settled. The Kingdom of Farmus would enter negotiations with Tempest. And with that decided, Diablo finally took his cue.

    Heh-heh-heh-heh A wise decision, he said as he began to saunter toward the center. In that case, as promised, I will release your king back to you.

    Who are you?!

    Pardon me, Diablo proudly stated. My name is Diablo, faithful servant to my leader, the great and powerful Rimuru.

    The assembled nobility had little idea how to address this man. Diablo seemed so natural among them that they had trouble speaking up. Only Razen demonstrated any fear of him, for only Razen knew what that name meant. The mere fact the name existed at all; that struck terror into him. Some things, he thought as he enviously looked at the audience and sighed, are better off not being known at all.

    Others, however, regarded Diablo with suspicion. These were the kings own royal guard, stationed by their lords side and keeping an eye on this interlopers every move. Finally, when he was just about to reach the throne, they stepped in his wayonly to bepletely ignored, as Diablo continued tracing a path to the gruesome box atop the seat.

    The guard was now visibly angered but nheless frozen in ce. Even if they wanted to speak, none of them could. By the Free Guilds reckoning, each knight in this guard rated an A-minusnot quite a full A but certainly above a B. One could even call them the strongest of Farmuss remaining force, left behind in the castle to keep the rest of the administration well guarded. They numbered a hundred strong, there in the chamber, and none of them could move an inch.

    It wasnt anything Diablo actively did to them. It was simple terror. Their well-honed survival instincts told every one of them how much of a danger Diablo was.

    Very good, he said as he greeted the sight with a smile. No need for anyone to die needlessly, am I right?

    So he continued until he stopped at the box that contained what was left of King Edmaris. Calmly, he took a Full Potion out of a pocket and poured it straight into the containerand without anyone noticing, he simultaneously undid the binding curse ced by Shion on its contents. The resulting transformation was dramatic. The moment medicine made contact with flesh, the king was back, in the robust shape everyone recalled. Diablos scheme was a roaring sess. This king, whose mdy had been thought of as incurable by the men assembled, was back to normal in an instant. The attending doctors and sorcerers all yelped in surprise.

    What, what is that potion?

    It is a Full Potion, he gently replied. A specially refined creation of my homnd, the most potent of all restorative treatments. We export it only to nations on friendly terms with us.

    This introduction was a key part of the n. The potion, after all, was Tempests main economic weapon.

    Full Potions were only rarely found worldwide, usually dug up from the ruins of ancient magical empires. One sip could perform miracles up to, and including, the regeneration of missing limbs. Only a Revival Elixiran agent that provided nothing short of resurrectioncould outss it. The recipe for it had been lost over time, although rumor had it the dwarves were frantically trying to re-create it. If it was being actively manufactured, people the world over would seek it.

    Diablo had previously heard, from Gabil and others, about how eager Rimuru was to advertise this wonder drug. Unlike Shion, he was an enthusiastic pupil, learning everything there was to know about Tempest in short order. Thus, despite the grimness of the situation, he didnt waste the opportunity to show off a little. That attention to detail made him stand out among Rimurus staff. It was, in a way, a rather extreme example of Diablos refusal topromise on anything he didone reason why antagonizing him was extremely ill-advised.

    Razen and Reyhiem, he knew, were scared that he might massacre everyone in the castle. But nothing could be further from his mind. Doing that would wipe out Rimurus trust in him. He had been tasked with making Yohm king of this realm, and Diablo wasnt stupid enough to risk that. In his mind, he had a cunning nthe ssic carrot and stick. Careful applications of both would allow him to manipte the minds of the ministers and noblemen gathered here. He would make them consider it wiser to acquiesce than defy him. And if any one of them was foolish enough to make the wrong decision, he would cleanse the kingdom of their presence. That was the gist of it.

    The king was back in human form, much to the astonishment of his ck-jawed audience. To the casual observer, it looked every bit like the Full Potion alone had healed him.

    How do you feel? Diablo asked.

    Edmaris, a tad pale in the face but otherwise none the worse for wear, nodded back.

    Ah Y-yes Thank you. You saved me.

    This weak reply was half honest feelings, half scripted act. Edmaris was doing Diablos bidding. Tempter, Diablos unique skill, was in the same family as Rimurus own Merciless, allowing himplete control over anyone whose spirit he had sufficiently broken. Under its influence, if King Edmaris ever attempted to defy Diablos will, Diablo would immediately be informed of it.

    As the king put on the clothing hurriedly provided by an attendant and breathed a sigh of relief, Diablo motioned at him with his eyes. He nodded back.

    Now, my liege, I have a message from Sir Rimuru, my own lord, said Diablo.

    I will be d to hear it, messenger from the monster realm.

    This was the first time the king of Farmus acknowledged Tempest as a sovereign nation. It was also a signal to everyone in the room. From this point forward, as far as King Edmaris was concerned, Tempest would be recognized as an orderly negotiating partnerwhich in turn meant Diablo was the official representative of the other side of the war.

    It was as significant a gesture as Edmaris could muster, in an effort not to get on Diablos wrong side, and thanks to that, any noblemen fostering ideas of revolt were silenced for good. Of course, nobody had any will to continue the war at this point. This deration was less for Diablos sake and more in hopes of protecting the kings own countrymen.

    Allow me to give you his statement. One week from now, my lord wishes to hold peace talks between the representatives of both nations here, in thisnd. Before we sign the peace treaty, you are asked to agree to the following conditions provided by us

    Diablo took out several pieces of parchment paper.

    You have the right to make your choices about these stiptions

    After an ominous opening, the documentid out its termsostensibly written by Rimuru, but in reality, written by Diablo. Its contents were, to be frank, revolting.

    The first article provided was for the king to abdicate and the nation to pay war reparations. The second was for the nation to surrender to Tempest and be a vassal state. The third wasnt even a choiceit simply stated that, if the first two choices were not replied to in the affirmative, the war would continue.

    These conditions may not have seemed like they altered the current situation very much. But they did. With Tempest now recognized as a state, Farmuss footing after starting a war without so much as a formal deration was shaky at best. None of its neighbors would want any part of it, and the Western Holy Church would doubtlessly have their hands full with Veldora. Nobody in the room imagined that any local power would go out of their way to help Farmus.

    It was, in other words, ckmail. A threat to raze thend, avoidable only by swallowing a litany of intolerable rules.

    Diablo read all the conditions out loud, his haughty voice reaching every corner of the room, the glee evident on his face as he enjoyed the nobilitys reactions. When he was finished, he could hear one of the ministers whisper Ridiculous in a half wail. This he ignored as he turned toward King Edmaris and bowed.

    That is all. Please have a response ready for us in a weeks time.

    W-wait a moment! That is far too little time for us to work with! At least provide us a month to

    Silence. I have a short temper.

    Butbut, sir, this is not a matter we can decide upon in the royal parliament. We must summon the regional barons and stage a vote with the entire assembly

    I said Silence. Your logistical issues matter little to me. And I will also suggest not to attempt any juvenile tricks with us. These deadline-extending excuses shall not be tolerated. If there is no reply after a week, we will take that to mean you wish to continue hostilities. I ask you to provide your full consideration of this matter.

    And with that one-sided caution, Diablo turned his back on the king and his court. He could hear someone loudly calling him a tyrant, but it didnt bother him. He simply left Yohm and his men behind and walked out alone, his work apparently done for the day.

    After he was gone, King Edmaris officially called for a session of the royal parliament, with all nobility required to be present. This was set for three days from nowjust barely enough time to bring them all together even with the aid of magic, but such were the stakes. If Diablos deadline was one week, the nation had to take action. Time was of the essence. The appeal had to be made to them all.

    At once, the kings attendants sprang into action. The room echoed with the mor of activity as they began to prepare for the meeting as Edmaris watched, exhausted.

    Do all of you understand the situation? he asked his closest ministers feebly. Before the nobles arrive, we will need to decide on a direction. I will offer my views tomorrow, at another location, and I would like to hear from all of you as well.

    There was no doubt that Farmus was hurtling headlong toward its doom. Now was no time for infighting within the bureaucracy. The parliament was going to be a wild, confused meeting, that much was certainwhich made it all the more important that everyone was on the same page beforehand.

    That, the king thought as he silently firmed up his resolve, and so we can keep the casualties as low as possible.

    The next day, the king and his group reconvened in another meeting room. These were all trusted confidants, the only exceptions being the Marquis of Muller, most powerful among the courts neutral elements, and his associate, the Earl of Hellman.

    Edmaris began by summarizing the events that led here once more, his audience silently listening on. Razen and Reyhiem had already covered this territory, but the horrifying truth of it all still crashed upon the ministers like a tidal wave.

    My liege, Muller asked, is all of this true? I mean, about Veldora being revived?

    The king nodded. It is just the way Razen and Reyhiem put it yesterday. But the sole problem I face right now is which conditions must be epted, out of the three offered. That, and I also wish to deliberate over how to handle future events.

    As he implied, nothing should be left on the table in this discussion, and soon, opinions were flying in all directions.

    The Forest of Jura that Veldora protects is a forbiddennd. Not even the Eastern Empire has tried toy hands upon it. It would be a fools errand to tackle it on our own.

    Too true, too true! There is no path to victory for us. Any further belligerent activity would spell the end of our nation!

    Indeed. The question, then, is how to approach conditions one and two

    I refuse to let us be colonized! How could we let the monsters rule over us when our own positions havent even been guaranteed?

    Thats not necessarily true. I doubt we will see any further wars, for one.

    Ridiculous! Thendholding barons of the kingdom will hardly allow such nonsense.

    It will mean civil war!

    Which, I suppose, is what the monsters want to see.

    And what of the king abdicating? And the reparations? Have you seen what they are asking for? It will copse our finances.

    Ten thousand sters The equivalent of one million gold coins. A good fifth of our annual tax revenue.

    Oundish

    But think about it. Is that not preferable to the end of our kingdom?

    That it is. They are honorable enough, at least, not to demand every coin in our coffers.

    So there is nothing to be done but ept their terms?

    I see no other way out, no.

    King Edmaris listened on in silence as his ministers and nobles deliberated, keeping his thoughts to himself.

    Beautiful As sweet as a young girl, but such an overwhelming presence in person. This Rimuru, lord of the monstershe is a fearsome demon lord, indeed. Merely thinking about him makes terror erupt from the bottom of my soul.

    There was no way the king could ever put his own majesty above him any longer. The fear in his heart made the thought of defying him unthinkable. He had been rendered helpless, a cube in a box, forced to devour his own limbs. He never wanted to experience that again, and now he had to convince the ministers to see things his way.

    In his mind shed images of defeat and the assorted types of torture he had enduredand in between, the monsters town, far more orderly than he had guessed. The birth of a new demon lord and the resurrection of the Storm Dragon. It was all the truth, and Edmaris knew it meant bitter defeat for him. Stained by greed, he had made a terrible error. If he had approached on friendlier terms, perhaps they couldve worked together in a far different situation. But the time for that was gone.

    No further errors would be allowed.

    Diablo advised him that he was free to respond to these three conditions any way he wanted. In other words, his reply didnt much matter. Diablos goals would be met either way. Instead, the king reasoned, his duty was simply to keep the fallout to a minimumand that was the approach he took as he gathered his thoughts.

    The choice for number three was a given. Further war would mean annihtion, from the king to the lowliest citizen. The second question was more worthy of debate, since it meant the peoples lives and livelihoods would be guaranteed. The glimpses he enjoyed of the monster towns skyline were still fresh on his mind. He had even seen adventurers among them, smiling andughing with their monster friends.

    Perhaps it is not so bad a fate after all

    Edmaris enjoyed the fantasy for a moment but quickly dispelled it from his mind. It could never happen. Nobody would trust in a monster; not unless they saw that city for themselves. Iughed it off as the ravings of a madman myself

    The nobility had a duty to keep their people safe. If they opted for unconditional surrender and life as a vassal state, it could overturn the entire nation. The neighboring kingdoms would resist, no doubt, and it was doubtful the resolution would pass parliament. A king had the right to force his will upon his subjects, of course, but the assassination attempts would no doubte along shortly after.

    So far, question one offered the most obvious decision. Abdication meant that Edmaris would step down, handing the crown over to someone else, and be made to swear never to wage war again. There was a demand for reparations, yes, and while there was no legal basis for that, it was difficult for him to turn it down. It would lead to a much faster, and cheaper, peace than continuing this war would.

    There was no guarantee that the monsters wouldnt pile on more demandster. But with these two in particr, he could tell they had a solid aim in mind.

    Diablo had extensively interviewed King Edmaris, and as he did, he made it clear that Yohm would be king of a newly established nation. Edmaris had three childrentwo girls and one boy, the youngest. His daughters were married off to noble families abroad, which left his ten-year-old son the only viable heir. If the king abdicated now, there was every chance of a bloody power struggle. The king even had an idea of who would aim for his thrhat would be Edward, his half brother and head of the nobility faction in this pce.

    Reading that far in, Edmaris could tell what Diablo wanted. He sought to take advantage of this potential power struggle and make the royalists and nobility fight against one another. In fact, this was bound to happen no matter what decision he made. Whatever he chose, Diablo could easily factor it into his own ns.

    The king sighed to himself.

    So it just doesnt matter?

    And if it didnt, if the results were the same regardless

    All right, everyone. Allow me to state my views.

    Just when the debate was starting to die down, King Edmaris began to speak.

    The nation of monsters calls itself the Jura-Tempest Federation. It is a gathering of assorted species of monsters, all bound together by an overseer by the name of Rimuru. I do not feel it is such a bad thing to join them in this federation

    You seek to be a vassal state?

    No, not like that. I am merely stating my belief that their nation is governed in a surprisingly peaceful manner.

    He stopped for a moment, allowing the audience to gauge just how resolute his expression was.

    This war was a mistake. It was not for the sake of our people, but of my own greed. That is why the heavens saw fit to forsake me. The price of that made Veldora rise from the dead and spread the seeds of disaster across Farmus. If I had followed the Marquis of Muller and the Earl of Hellmans advice, none of this would have happened

    My liege, please, none of this is

    We are unworthy of your great modesty, Your Majesty.

    Thank you, the king said, nodding in heartfelt appreciation. There is no longer a second chance for us. None. Thanks to Sir Rimuru, lord of the monsters, I stand here before you now. There is no next time. One more incorrect decision, and the mes of war will descend not just upon me, but upon all our people. My pride and honor no longer matter. All I want to do, at the very least, is ensure my people are not engulfed by those mes. What can we do to steer things in a better direction? What will make our people happier? That is what I want us all to consider!

    The ministers froze in surprise. Their cold, calcting king, always putting his own profit ahead of everything else, admitting to his mistakes and calling upon his advisers toe up with a better idea. Their shock was understandable. They all looked wide-eyed at their king, reflecting upon their own thoughts. The selfishness within them, as they used pride or whatnot as an excuse to protect their own assets, was now all too obvious to them.

    Everyst one of them stood up, then kneeled before their king.

    My liege, Muller said on their behalf, we apologize. We were all foolish. We must seek out a better pathfor our nation and for our people!

    The rest of them shouted out their Hear! Hear!s as their heads touched the floor.

    The talks continued well into the ensuing night, as Yohm and his team were invited to participate as advisers.

    I believe I did a fairly good job of shaking them up, Diablo reported, smiling.

    Whoa! Wait a sec! Theres so much I couldment on there, I hardly knew where to begin. But I suppose the biggest issue was:

    You showed them that thing?

    I did, sir. I thought it the best way to instill fear in their minds.

    Wow. He showed it to them. Thatmeat cube. Shion acted awfully proud about it, not that I did anything to encourage her. No crap theyre scared, man! If this was before my slime reincarnation, I totally wouldve been blowing chunks. Thats the kind of impact that thing had.

    Like, this is totally demon lord territory Im stepping into now, isnt it? I tried to keep a clean image, and now thats being reced with something downright terrifying. Whats done is done, I guess, but still. Mixing the terror with the relief seems like an easy way to earn their trust in us, at least, even if it is an approach the yakuza would use.

    I hopped off Shionsp. Some tea, in human form, sounded good. I needed to rx and switch gears a bit.

    With regards to the peace talks, my lord, I have requested ten thousand ster gold coins in reparations.

    Bpph!!

    I spat out all the tea in my mouth. Ten thousand sters? I mean, yeah, I did ask him to use reparations as a wedge to drive between the king and nobility, but that figures beyond unreasonable. It deviated so far from reality that I wasnt sure the neighboring countries would see it as fair at all. Bartering was still the preferred method of trade in this worldcurrency was the norm in poption centers like Blumund or Englesia, but over in the farming viges, people could go their whole lives without seeing anything more valuable than a silver coin. In other words, money had a lot more value here than I originally gave it credit for.

    One copper coin was about ten cents, one silver coin about ten dors, and one gold coin about a thousand. That was the general understanding I worked with, but even that only applied in the big cities. In real life, the differences were even starker. For example, your averageborer in the city earned six silver coins a day, 150 per montharound $1,500. In the viges, meanwhile, you wouldnt even make a hundred silvers a year. Thats less than a thousand to live off. The economic disparity in this ce is nuts.

    Of course, there werent as many diversions to blow your ie on. You probably werent throwing your money around all that much. Really, coinage didnt hold much purpose at all for a lot of people. To put it one way, disparity or not, your living circumstances didnt change that much from social ss to social ss. And if you consider theck of any international financial organization dictating the terms of the economy, maybe it was healthier this way anyway.

    This meant, perhaps, that right now was our best shot at building an economic superpower. Diablos a smart guy. When he heard me talking about multiple races sharing one anothers prosperity earlier, he immediately connected that to economic domination. We needed a distributionwork, one capable of bringing products from low- to high-demand areas, and coinage was a must for that. Taking control of the flow of money would let us essentially dictate the world economy.

    There were many local currencies used by the worlds nations, but in practice, the coin of the Dwarven Kingdom was the main one in use. It would be easy to build a world economic sphere reliant upon a single currency. I could imagine that being on Diablos mind as he made his moves.

    Getting back on topic, despite my initial impression, it turns out that money in this world was treated more like one copper = $1, one silver = $100, and one gold = $10,000. Ten thousand ster gold coins, then, meant we were asking for war reparations to the tune of $10 billion. This wasnt Japan. There wasnt as much stuff all over the ce, no great need for a national budget to be that massive. Thinking along those lines, the figure we asked for was astronomical.

    Dont you think thats going way too far?

    Heh-heh-heh-heh No, it is not a problem. I gave them three choices, but there is only one real answer. Question three hardly deserves debate, and neither does question two. The only real decision to make is on question one, and it is from there that their negotiations will begin, I suppose. He then added with augh, As much as Id like them to go my way on question three, however

    He was right. There was only one real choice. Would they try to talk us down on the price? Nah, they werent that dumb. They might ask for payments spread out every ten years, perhaps, if they couldnt cover it now.

    I have no intention of offering a discount, advised Diablo. Farmus will be forced to give in to our demands. However, I doubt it will evere to pass anyway. If that amount of coinage leaves their markets, the effects on their economy would be staggering.

    Yeah, Ill bet. I knew Diablo was doing this on purpose.

    I suppose what theyll decide to do is force the obligation on some third party.

    Oh?

    Here was what Diablo pictured. Basically, theyd make a deposit, then pay off the bnce with something else. That way, even if the owner of that something else refused to back it up with coin, that was no longer any of the kingdoms business. Theyd be off the hook, and if weined about it, they can turn us away and im they lived up to their end of the bargain. The approach would only work if you were dealing with a very stupid adversary, but if we fell for it, there could be trouble.

    What would we do then?

    It is all factored into the n. I am sure we can recover at least a thousand sters, and that would wrap up the first part of the operation.

    Huh? Hang on.

    How do you know we can earn that much?

    Oh, that? Simple.

    To sum up, it was because Farmus simply didnt have much immediate use for the sters. That actually made sense, if you think about it. With one coin worth six or seven figures, trying to make change for them mustve been a huge pain in the ass. It was nothing more than a hoard unless you were engineering some huge deals, and theyd likely figurein Diablos estimationthat coughing up a decent number wouldnt affect them all that much, day-to-day.

    Gold coins were what drove the national budget most of the time, so the sters were more like securities, inessible under normal circumstances. In a world without banks, you couldnt generate interest off them. So maybe they wouldnt put up much of a fight about them after all.

    Well yed, Diablo. I was willing to meet them in the middle and ask for somewhere between a hundred and three hundred sters. About $1 million per victim on our end, plus a little consideration for the roofs and stuff we had to repair. That was the minimum I wasfortable with, so if Diablo thought he could extract a thousand, then I had no problem with going to the bargaining table. A cool billion was still more than enough for anything I could imagine.

    Diablo, meanwhile, wasnt content with just that. He was also formting a n to trigger civil war inside Farmus. Scary guy.

    What more do you really need from them if were already recouping our losses?

    Heh-heh-heh-heh. King Edmaris may be freed, but he is now my willing puppet. He is under the thrall of my Tempter skill, so I can will him to do anything I want, to some extent. In other words

    With Tempter activated, Diablo had life-and-death power over the king. He couldnt fully take over his consciousness or anything, but Diablo had the right to will him dead at any moment. As long as he kept following his orders, all was well, but if he showed any signs of rebellion, Diablo would immediately spot them. He could kill the guy right then and there, and if he understood that, a betrayal just wasnt going to happen. Controlling people with terror is a pretty scary skill, huh? Everythings fine if you dont cross Diablo, but still.

    Anyway, thats how Diablo was observing King Edmariss behavior. As he hoped for, the king primarily deliberated over question one and seemed ready to abandon the throne. He had asked Muller and Hellman to call upon Edmaris to take responsibility for this crisis, but that no longer seemed to be necessary.

    I guess Diablo had been building rtionships with the royalists in the castle, toosomething that deviated from the original n a little but actually worked out for the better, as he exined it. When Edmaris abdicates, the foundation of power he built goes with himand with that, it bes easier to pin the me for everything on him. With the Royal Knight Corps dead by your hand, Diablo told me, there is no one left to protect the royal family. Right now, antagonizing the nobility spells death for Edmaris. Hell have to answer their every needat least, on the surface.

    Nobody was around to speak for the king. The nobles wouldnt hesitate to take advantage of thatwhich goes into the third party Diablo mentioned. War would be the only thing toe from that. The nobility wanted to make King Edmaris into a sacrifice, and the king was racking his brain for ways to fight back.

    Sowhat next, then? The royalists didnt have an army; they were bound to be pummeled. How can we avoid that?

    Understood. The best approach would be to bring in Yohms force and retain a cooperative rtionship. This would allow for

    Oh. Right. Yohms connected with me. Edmaris knows I want him to be king, and if he makes concrete moves toward that

    Maybe an immediate handover of the crown wasnt too realistic, but if we could frame it as Yohm saving the kings life, perhaps it could look like a ruined royal family passing the torch on to another generation.

    So the kings going to take Yohm, and us, as his allies?

    Diablo beamed. Yes. A very wise assertion.

    Oh, I was right?

    Having us as an ally would give Edmaris a force that made his Royal Knight Corps look like a bunch of kids. The nobility, carried away and assuming they had an easy win, would be ughtered at the hands of Yohm the champion.

    So should we give Yohm more resources?

    We should. Razen, who is also under mymand, has been instructed to contact us when the timees, so I hope I can count on you for that.

    Thats Diablo for you. Hes got all his men at work so he can kick back and rx. He was taking the motto Be prepared to its most elegant extremes.

    Razen, though, huh? This super-great guy, the protector of the kingdom and all that? Guess that didnt matter to Diablo. But no point dwelling on that.

    So can Yohm beat them, though? What if some other pretender to the throne forms an alliance with the neighboring kingdoms?

    I am having Sir Fuze and King Gazel pressure their governments not to intervene. I think that is a possibility we can safely ignore. If it doese to pass, however, I will enter the battle myself, so dont worry.

    All I could do was nod at his supreme confidence. Diablos totally intent on staying behind the scenes, isnt he? Crazy to think hes basically letting all these other people take down an entire kingdom for him. Raphael was also telling me the chances of an alliance were dim, so I had noints.

    I gave the kneeling Diablo a pat on the shoulder.

    All right. Ill leave that to you, then. Let me know if anything happens.

    Yes, my lord! I assure you that everything is in good hands!

    So now I had been briefed on the general outline. Just when I was checking up on the little details, Haruna came in with a new dessertsomething to apany the tea, as she put it.

    Oh, is this the green-tea custard?

    It is, Sir Rimuru. I may not be up to Lady Shunas quality yet, but I do believe Ive improved!

    With a soft smile, Haruna set the tes on the table. Veldora, who had been reading manga without bothering to join the conversation, picked that moment to join me there, as if hed earned the right.

    Hohh? Some for me, then?

    Of course, Sir Veldora.

    He gave a gregarious nod and reached out for a te of the eggy treat.

    Sir Veldora, Diablo said as he offered his own te to him, here is your promised portion.

    Gwaaaaah-ha-ha-ha! You are a man of your word, Diablo!

    Talk about a cheap bribe.

    You dont want any, Diablo? I asked, figuring Haruna could always scare up another one, but Diablo bowed politely in response. I paid my portion in exchange for the information I received. There is no need to be concerned for me.

    What a gentleman. A man of his word, indeed. Although I didnt see why custard was worth making such a big deal about. But if that was what Diablo preferred, more power to him.

    Oh? Well, all right. Still, I said, changing the subject, its funny how you came back right in the middle of Walpurgis. We mustve passed right by each other.

    He was gone when I left at midnight, after all. I figured we couldnt have missed each other by much. But:

    Oh, no, my lord. After I was done threatening King Edmaris and his court, I traveled across the Farmus countryside to investigate its financial situation. I wanted to make sure I hadnt overlooked anything in my ns, but then Sir Veldora ordered me back here.

    That sounded, um, important. Veldora rose to his feet, almost knocking over his chair.

    I, er, I have an errand to attend to.

    Hold it right there, Veldora.

    I rose quickly, grabbing him by the shoulder.

    W-wait! I can exin!

    No, you cant! Stop getting in the way of peoples work!

    I confiscated the custard from Veldoras overeager hands, ordering Haruna to exempt him from dessert privileges for a while. He could cry about it all he wanted, but I couldnt let this pass. I swear, you can never let your guard down around the guy. Maybe it was fortuitous in the end, what with Veldora stopping by Walpurgis and lending a hand, but that didnt matter. If I let this slide, who knew what nonsense could arise next time.

    Its a good thing the capable Diablo was around to handle matters, but what if Veldora had bothered one of my other friends with his self-centered requests? It made me shudder. The Storm Dragon giving out orders would mess up the whole chain ofmand I had going. Thats why I made damn sure he checked with me next time before trying anything like that.

    * * *

    Fortunately, Diablo had no other pressing business in Farmus, apart from the peace talks five days from now. He had delegated his authority to others for the rest of the work, so for now he was fine serving me. As your butler, he said, I couldnt think of abandoning your side. That made Shion wince, but I had to hand it to him.

    So about those peace talks.

    Oh, you think I oughtta attend, too?

    No sir, I can handle things well enough alone.

    I always found it reassuring during high-stakes meetings to have my boss in attendance, but to a born achiever like Diablo, it wasnt necessary. In fact, as he put it, my presence at the pce would crush the nobles will to fightI didnt know exactly what he meant by that, but I was sure things were safe in his hands.

    For now, at least, I felt assured that the whole Farmus invasion thing could be filed into a cab in the recesses of my mind.

    And then, everything went exactly as Diablo pictured it.

    All the nations nobles gathered at the pce to hold a session of parliament. This one was far more intense than thest, and the king and his ministers looked deeply troubled. Even the members of the anti-royalist contingent were visibly distressed, adding to the electricity in the air.

    We are here today, the king began, to discuss our campaign to dispatch Tempest. I regret to inform you that the Storm Dragon wiped out our forces on the battlefield. The only survivors were Razen, Reyhiem, and myself. We were defeated.

    The explosive report sent shock waves across the meeting hall. The brutal state of affairs in Farmus, as exined by the king, was unbelievable enough, but what he had to say next subjected him to withering criticism from the nobles. Which was to be expected. He was, after all, dering that he would ept the monsters conditions and offer them war reparationsto the tune of ten thousand sters.

    Thats madness! One ster is a hundred gold coins. Were going to gift them a million gold?!

    Why would we ever pay such a ransom to a horde of monsters? I refuse to let this happen on my watch!

    And even if we emptied the national treasury, would we even be able to cobble together that much cash?!

    Given the role of ster gold coins as a sort of physical bond certificate traded among nations, most realms rarely had even a hundred on hand. Thend of Farmus wasrge, indeed, but maybe they could scare up a thousand if they wanted to. If this was to be paid in regr gold-coin currency, the logistics behind the delivery gave the nobility understandable pause. If this was a nation they had formal rtions with, the debt could be paid with a broad assortment of goods, but those were terms they couldnt offer to a brand-new nation, much less one run by monsters. Either way, it was sure to be a major blow on Farmuss economy.

    Diablo knew that ten thousand sters was an impossible request. Of course the nobles wouldin about it. To them, who hadnt set foot near the battlefield, they could never truly understand the threat. There wasnt enough awareness among them that the future of their nation was at stake.

    It therefore did not take long before theirints morphed into a drive to continue the war.

    Indeed, surrendering to their forces would be absurd. We have no guarantee that our adversaries would honor their promises and keep their hands off our people.

    Our only option is to resist to the bitter end. I would dly stake my pride to say that our forces could easily defeat a dragon that has only just awoken!

    With Veldora as our opponent, the Western Holy Church will not stand by idly. I imagine the beautiful, talented Hinata will take action.

    Ah yes, the captain of the Crusaders? She is a vixen, a cold and calcting one, but we can always count on her at times like this.

    The Holy Church is known across thend for being Veldoras mortal enemy!

    Dont forget about the Hero.

    Ah yes, Lightspeed Masayuki of Englesia!

    Exactly. The strongest Hero of them all, a man who slew his foes before they even knew what happened to them. Im certain he will show Veldora in short order that Lightspeed is no mere nickname!

    Yes! Thats the spirit! Well clear those monsters away in the blink of an eye!

    The nobles were growing restless, bragging about all the impossible things they would aplish. The objective, to them, was theirs for the takingthey just wanted someone else to take it for them. The royalist ministers watching began to feel terribly awkwardit reminded them too much of when the king first broke the news to them. Some visibly reddened as they sighed in despair, while others silently reflected on what their leader must have felt back then.

    King Edmaris, to his credit, understood what was running through the minds of the nobles he had assembled. The war hawks were doggedly interested in preserving their own interests and no one elses. They didnt care about Farmus itself, nor the lives or property of the people who dwelled in it. Their supreme, serene confidence stemmed from the fact that they had no intention of really fighting for it.

    The king knew it would turn out like this. Thended nobility here had yet to grasp the reality of it all. They had tasted none of the terror; they had no interest in facing the brunt of this menace. They just wanted to stay holed up in a safe ce and make someone else duke it out. If it ended in defeat, they would all refuse to be held responsible for it, no doubt.

    And maybe they couldve gotten away with coasting like that before. Farmus wasrge, itsnd giving it several decisive advantages over its neighbors. But that wasnt going to work now. Putting the screws to nearby nations wouldnt aplish anythingand besides, their foe was a catastrophe-ss monster whoid waste to an entire army single-handed.

    The nobles rage continued, most of them shouting for the king to shoulder the me. The royal family should pay the reparations out of their own pockets; the monsters demands must be refused; Farmus must prepare itself for total war.

    In a way, they werent mistaken, but they were missing a vital point. Farmus had already lost most of its internal ability to fightsomething that, perhaps, they were refusing to believe. When this was pointed out to them, some turned white with horror, while others brazenly challenged any affront. Just as King Edmaris feared, the nobility refused to work as a coherent group.

    As the parliament grew more chaotic, Edward, the kings half brother and leader of the anti-royalist nobility sect, chose that moment to speak.

    My brother Your Majesty! Even if you abandon the throne, you cannot avoid your responsibility! Is a king as proud as yourself truly admitting defeat so easily?

    Edward, listen to me. We are pitted against Veldora, the Storm Dragon. My pride,pared with his tyranny, is a mere pile of ashes! You will never see me willing to face such terror again in my life. Or if it is such a matter of pride to you, will you take up the fight? I will not stop you! But I do believe that it will result in nothing but more blood on your hands.

    No, I My liege, if everything you are iming is the truth, are you not attempting to flee the nation by yourself?

    There is no ce to flee to, you simpleton! That is exactly why I intend to pay the money and abdicate the throne.

    Just as he aimed to pursue the kings responsibility, Edward found himself stunned into silence by his brothers uncharacteristic vigor.

    If I do not abdicate, the king continued, lowering his voice, then Farmus will be either a colony or a state at war. Are you all right with that? It will mark the end of this nation.

    Ngh But simply surrendering to this monster force

    Edwards voice slowed, his mind still refusing to ept the facts. He was interrupted by the timid voice of Lord Hellman, speaking up just as the meeting hall grew quiet.

    May I have a moment? I received these documents in the morning today. Its content is so vital to this question that I wish to share it with all of you now

    He had on him a deration from the kingdom of Blumund. In it, the nation reaffirmed its support for thend of Tempest and criticized Farmuss failed campaign. It was, in short, an attack on Farmus.

    Where does such a tiny kingdom get the nerve?!

    As if they would have said anything if we won. They think they can enjoy thestugh, dont they?

    The bad news for the fuming nobles didnt end there. The minister of trade then reported receiving a simr announcement from the Dwarven Kingdom earlier. This made even the most hardcore of the war hawks demur, their words growing weaker by the moment.

    Blumund may not be a concern, but if the Armed Nation takes action, that bodes very poorly for us. Do you think King Gazel will maintain his neutrality?

    The issue, the earl reasoned, is less that and more the power of his words. As a vital trade partner, it would be bad for us to anger their king.

    A gloomy silence fell over the meeting hallonly to be broken by a pale-faced soldier barging into the room at a full gallop.

    Sir! Weve just received an emergency report from the Guild!

    Despite the fact that a top-level legitive meeting was being held, none of the guards stopped him. That was thanks to the authority allowed by the Top-Secret Vital Emergency Transmission dossier in his hand. The prominentbel made even the most contrarian of the nobles fall silent. This level of secrecy was authorized only for Special S-grade dangers; the Free Guild had a deal with the worlds governments where impeding its delivery was a crime as serious as treason.

    Give it to us, King Edmaris tly stated. With a shaky hand, the soldier extracted a sheet of paper from the envelope and slowly read.

    The monster Rimuru, who has named himself overseer of the Forest of Jura, has reportedly dered himself to be a demon lord!

    What?!

    That!

    It is in fact good news, no? Our nation is saved!

    Yes, the other demon lords will not take kindly to this. This Rimuru fellow has sorely overreached. He will learn the terror a true demon lord brings to the world shortly.

    And if all goes well, perhaps the other demon lords will defeat Veldora alongside him!

    Cheers erupted from the nobility the moment the messenger paused to take a breath. What the soldier had to say next quickly restored the silence.

    We have word that, resisting this deration, the demon lord yman challenged Rimuruer, the demon lord Rimuruto a duel and lost his life in the process!

    Gasps filled the room.

    Haaah?

    Impossible

    Where is Carillon, the Beast Master? What happened to Frey, the Sky Queen? Are they simply letting this upstart take over the Forest of Jura?!

    The shock was real. Now their foe was a full-fledged demon lord. But as the nobility questioned what the demon lords adjacent to Jura were doing, the soldier finished reading the missive.

    Regarding Carillon and Frey, they have reportedly renounced their seats as demon lords and agreed to affiliate themselves with the demon lord Milim. The group is in the midst of restructuring itself, its eight current members naming themselvesthe Octagram!

    The anti-royalists fellpletely silent. They knew, now, that their adversary Rimuru was part of this new Octagram. Even the royalists, tipped off to this news in advance, looked tense and nervous. No matter how many times they heard it, the report was so difficult to believe that it drove them to silence as well.

    It seemed the source for this report was the demon lords themselves, who all signed a directive disseminated to the Guild. There was no questioning its veracity. The demon lords were all so powerful, there was no need for them to resort to tricking the human race to fulfill their needs.

    With a slow, solemn voice, King Edmaris spoke.

    Did you hear that, everyone? Veldora is a threat, but this monster Rimuru is another one entirely. A monster beyond all imagination, one who apparently made short work of the demon lord yman. Have we had enough debate yet? I have already made up my mind. I will abdicate the throne. It was foolish of me to proim this was for our nations sake, when I had barely any clue about the foe we prodded. It was my mistake, driven by pure greed. If only I had taken another approach, perhaps they could have been good neighbors to us.

    By the kings reasoning, his departure could help build a new rtionship. None of the nobles listening to him voiced any disagreement. Now they understood. The only way forward was to do what King Edmaris said.

    Thus, I will leave my post as kingand I wish to nominate Edward as my sessor.

    My brother!

    What?!

    Not Prince Edgar?!

    The hall was thrown into chaos once more.

    It was a given that Edmaris would give the throne to the sole prince of the nation. That was why Edward was working so hard to make his presence known. He knew Edmaris, his elder brother, had to go, and the opportunity was like a dream to himeven if Prince Edgar was awarded the throne, it was still a golden chance to state his case for next time. The prince was only ten years old, but as long as the kings brother was still alive, he would not have another regent ruling in his stead. If (Edward thought) he could nt the seeds of uncertainty and doubt in the nobilitys minds, he could make them think that he was the only viable choice for the throne, at least until Edgar reached adulthood.

    Now, that had all been taken care of for him. He smiled in front of the throne.

    We face difficult times ahead, muttered Edmaris bitterly. Edgar is still too young. He will have trouble oveing any of it.

    Reactions were varied, but a healthy contingent was already convinced. The Marquis of Muller spoke first: I believe that is the best solution, my liege.

    Edward internally gloated at this. If he had the head of the neutral factions endorsement, there was no overturning this decision. And once he had the throne, this crisis could be deftly handledsuch was his conviction. They could find one way or another to dy the payments, buying time to get their neighbors involved and go on the offensive. As the anti-royalist nobles proposed to him earlier, they could even form a cross-humanity alliance of sorts, bringing pdins and Heroes together to fight for the entire world.

    And maybe none of that would be needed at all. A new king meant a new administration, and there was no reason why that government needed to follow the old ones agreements. They could dere the debt null and void, and that would be it. If Tempestined about it, they could just keep pinning the me on Edmaris, the ex-king.

    It was a simple thing, but it was enough to convince Edward. Heh-heh-heh This nation will reach new heights of prosperity under my rule. He smiled broadly, basking in the glow of his newfound powernever realizing that this, too, was all part of the script.

    The session proceeded more smoothly from there. Problems were brought up; adjustments were made down to thest detail. By the end of the day, they had a final outline that was approved by unanimous vote for use in the peace talks.

    Said talks came all too quicklyas did the signing.

    Several dayster, the great nation of Farmus, with all its proud history, had signed an armistice and a peace treaty with the Jura-Tempest Federation. On the surface, Farmus had recognized Tempest as a nation, and while formal rtions were a ways away, they could no longer flout internationalw when dealing with them. At the same time, Tempest was not a member of the Council of the West, the Western Nations primary legitive body, so even if Farmus did stage another invasion, there was little anyone could do to legally stop them.

    Tempest had attained nation status only in the most basic of definitions. But this treaty proved, once and for all, that this new country called Tempest could defend itself. It was led by the demon lord Rimuru, who boasted the Storm Dragon as a key ally, and in just over two years, he hadid im to the entire Forest of Jura. Whatever he was, he was a nonhuman brilliant beyond any human measure. Considering that, no nation dared to open hostilities with Tempest. Compared with the potential profits waiting to be reaped, the projected losses were just too great. It could even knock out the attacking country entirely.

    From that day forward, Rimuru began to be treated as an imprable leader, a disaster-ss demon lordand thus, without major difficulty, the first part of his n waspleted

    exactly as Diablo had pictured it.

 Volume 7 - Ch 2

    ROLES TO UPHOLD

    Shuna and Soei were the first to return to town the morning after Diablos report.

    I have returned safely! Shuna proimed, rubbing her cheeks. She had apparently exhausted her magical force in battle, requiring several hours of recuperation before she could cast Spatial Motion. I could just use Dominate Space to pop myself over to where I wanted, but Shunas rtiveck of magicule storage meant she could only tap so much magic per day. Soei couldve used Shadow Motion himself, but he waited, thinking it gauche to return first despite being Shunas guard. Even now, several of his replications were patrolling ymans main baseI guess nothing too dicey was happening right now.

    And wheres Hakuro?

    I asked him to clean things up for me, Shuna replied with a smile as Soei averted his eyes. So they threw all that work on him, huh? Hakuro, unable to use Spatial Motion, didnt have much recourse if they left him alone. But I dunno, he always saw Shuna as kind of a beloved granddaughter anyway. Maybe he didnt mind that treatment too much.

    Currently, he was working with Geld to investigate ymans castle, divvy up the war spoils, andmand the prisoner-handling process. I gave him an internal word of thanks for handling all that boring follow-up for me. It must be a ton of work, but an amateur like me couldnt offer much help. I think Ill just keep mum unless asked.

    Benimaru and the others made it home by that evening.

    Huh? Whats our chief general doing back here? I asked.

    Hee-hee With the war over, there is no reason for me to stay there forever. So I gave mymand over to my talented officers, and we left the scene.

    He seemed remarkably invigorated. I guess this means Benimaru let the Three Lycanthropeers handle the rest. I could see the anguished faces of Alvis and his cohorts in my mind.

    Those two, Benimaru and Shunaguess they really are siblings, huh? They just pulled the exact same trick on their subordinates. I wish they would learn a little responsibility from someone like me

    Understood. I believe this to be the result of following your example, Master.

    I didnt ask you to believe anything! Besides, you know that has to be wrong. Did something go haywire in the circuits between morphing from the Great Sage to Raphael?

    Negative. Such a phenomenon has not been detected.

    Oh, sure. Deny it. I bet that part of its logic got extensively upgraded. Better let it slideits not an argument Id ever win anyway.

    I decided to turn my attention back to Benimaru. So is Gabil still at the battlefield?

    He is, yes. He has kindled a friendship with one Middray, a priest in the service of Lady Milim, and they are tackling the post-battle cleanup together.

    Ah. So Gelds in ymans castle, and Gabil is outside?

    Even Gabils lending a hand, huh? Between him and Geld, it was a relief to see all these people handling the practical side of warfare for me. I could really rely on em. War, after all, didnt end after you won it. Things got even hairier afterward, especially given how we captured nearly all of ymans forces alive. There were untold numbers of prisoners, on the field and in the castle, most of them capable ofbor. We guaranteed them all their lives, so wed have to step up and take care of them. At least they were magic-born, not human, so you didnt have to worry that much about upkeepalthough even they would get grumpy if you didnt feed them.

    Whether someone held a grudge against you after losing a battle or not, the victor was responsible for what happened afterward. Transporting all the POWs from the site at once was a major job. I didnt want them revolting when our eyes werent on them, so wed need guards on patrol at all times. Disarming a magic-born didnt neutralize them much as a threat, either. This world had magic and skills. Thinking about it, no wonder the take-no-prisoners approach was preferred up to now, huh?

    If only there was a surefire way to make them do our bidding

    Oh, nothing to worry about there, Benimaru said, that easygoing smile still on his face. I brought them all together and simply, ah, coerced them to see things our way.

    Um Yes. Good.

    I instinctively nodded. No need to ask what exactly they talked about, Im sure. Some of the prisoners mustve been around to see Benimaru burn Charybdis to a crisp, and once word got around about that, I doubted too many of em would want to try their luck. Besides, the Three Lycanthropeers were there, and beastmen seemed like well-qualified candidates for prisoner management.

    So I guess we wont see Gabil back here for a while?

    Likely not. He cant use Spatial Motion, so I suppose he will return with the Lycanthropeers.

    Hed fly back once things settled down, I imagined. But hang on

    Wait, the Lycanthropeers areing, too?

    Why them? They werent nning on bringing all the sheltered citizens and disarmed prisoners back here, were they?

    Well, Benimaru replied, remember how Lady Milim blew the Eurazanian capital to pieces? We were talking about housing them in our nation for the time being.

    As he put it, the beastmen were hardy enough that they could march all the way over here withoutint. Which wasnt what I was asking about, butokay?

    We really cant take all of them, can we?

    It took ages to set up campsites for the twenty thousand we took inst time. Even worse, Geld and his team of high orc engineers, whom Id usually rely on for jobs like this, were busy elsewhere. We had some extrand avablespace we cleared for future developmentbut again, organizing camps would be a huge hassle.

    We discussed that with Geld and Alvis, Benimaru exined. Weve decided to divide the prisoners into rough brigades. Theyll be sent to a variety of destinations, actually.

    Well, thats a relief. And it sounded like they were pretty carefully screening each of them. If a prisoner had a vige to return to, they were sent off by themselves. Only the beastmen seeking to learn a trade or skill woulde to Tempest. Beastmen or magic-born with muscle, meanwhile, would stay on-site and serve under themand of Gelds team, redeveloping the vacantnd that used to be Eurazania.

    With Carillon stepping down from his demon lord post and joining Milims side, Eurazania was now technically Milim territory. It was situated south of the Forest of Jura, spread out in the middle of a vast, fertilend, and ns were underway to construct a pce for Milim in the area. I had suggested to her that she ought to move her capital there, since they were building it from scratch anyway, and she instantly agreed to it. No further discussion. Thats so Milim.

    Thinking about it, though, I realized Milim didnt exactly have astaff, per se. Middray and the rest of the Dragon Faithful were her servants, in a way, butat least on paperthey merely worshiped Milim; they werent bound to her at all. Thus relocating the capital was an odd way to put it, since she didnt really have a capital to start with, but I guess it doesnt really matter.

    Carillon and Frey both readily agreed with the idea, and so we plunged into the construction of a new city. Our funding was provided by ymans hoard of gold, silver, and treasure; we had a ready group of POWborers being organized and assigned work details; and Benimaru and Geld had things going so smoothly over there, I had nothing to be concerned about.

    I was constantly amazed at their growth. Hey, Tamura! Remember me? Your boss, who had to exin everything to you fifty times and you still couldnt do it right? Yeah, I have this entire horde of monsters who do better work than you!

    The way Benimaru put it, we would be housing fewer people in Tempest proper thanst time.

    So we wont need to set up any new temporary housing? I asked him.

    No, I think we should be fine. But it will not only be beastmen; we have magic-born prisoners as well. We had best make sure everyone is aware of that and exercises suitable caution.

    I see, Rigurd said with a nod. Very well. I will exin matters to everyone.

    These guys are soooo reliable. I didnt even need to order them around; they could make their own decisions. Wait Couldnt these guys get along without me by this point? The thought made me feel a tad isted.

    One evening, a few days after Benimarus return, Diablo entered my office carrying a box painted ck.

    Our negotiations proceeded as nned, Sir Rimuru. This box contains proof of our peace agreement and one part of the reparations, totaling fifteen hundred ster gold coins.

    Oops. Forgot about that. Today was peace-talks day, huh? He said I didnt need to show up, so forgetting about it wasnt a big deal, reallybut I still felt a bit guilty. I felt like everyone else was working hard on this huge work project, and I was just sitting at my desk ying solitaire. Not that I was, but still. I didnt want to be a lonely despot, after all.

    Or that was how I consoled myself as Diablo presented the box to me.

    Ah, excellent. Thats more sters than we expected, no?

    He had demanded the outrageous sum of ten thousand. As I found outter, nobody was sure whether ten thousand sters were even in cirction worldwide. We can only create one ster gold coin per month, King Gazel imed when I asked. Our kingdom did not begin minting them until a fairly long time after our founding, so I imagine they have some rarity value! He had a pointthere were hundreds of times more garden-variety gold coins flowing around.

    And now I had fifteen hundred of them here. Over 10 percent of the entire worlds supply. It made my head swim. You could really see how strong Farmus was, being able to scrape this up.

    I guess Farmus really is a superpower, isnt it? Im impressed they collected so many.

    Perhaps. But it seems the majority of this was seized from the personal coffers of King Edmaris himself.

    ording to Diablo, most of these sters were the personal property of the king, left in the vaults with no particr use to speak of. They had the backing of the Dwarven Kingdom, were worth loads of cash, and boasted artistic value as well, so they had been the property of the royal family for much of its long history.

    Luckily, King Edmariss thought process was as I had nned it. With no knights to protect his family, he reasoned, he was bound to lose it all once the nobles shed with him anyway.

    So he cleaned out the royal vaults ahead of time. I see.

    So does that mean were gonna have civil war soon?

    No doubt, my lord, a smiling Diablo replied. The remaining bnce exists in the form of an outstanding loan, but I doubt the new king will abide by that agreement for long.

    Taking the potential new king into consideration, Diablo had gone out of his way to have Edmariss younger brother Edward take the throne, instead of the young Edgar. This was done with Edmariss agreement; everyone involved felt it was the only way forward. Normally, the former king would be rewarded with a dukedom for his service to the country, but Edmaris turned this down, renouncing his post and bing a viscount. In this role, he would be shortly moving to a small patch of ruralnd in the countrysidenot far from Earl Nidol Migams ownnds, near the Forest of Jura.

    To everyones eyes, it looked like Edmaris had lost his lust for power. In which case

    Report. The Farmus forces who refuse to pay the remaining reparations will likely move to push all responsibility for this affair on Edmaris.

    Yep. It was all going the way Diablo meant it to.

    Nidols domain of Migam is home to Yohms band, too. This way, they cane help out if anything happens, huh?

    Indeed, my lord, he replied, still smiling while Shion listened on behind me, scowling. Or maybe not listening. She probably tuned it out once she realized it was all way over her head. But I wasnt talking about her.

    Hmmm. Nidolsnd bordered Juras. By country standards, it was midsize, boasting its own Free Guild branch and a fairly decent poption. If you were going to start a popr movement, it wasnt a bad spot for it. Thats where Yohm was, and he was famous around those parts, hailed as a champion and broadly supported by his people.

    If the new king tried abandoning Edmaris, could Yohm stop him?

    He could, sir. And having Sir Yohm denounce that new king for his insincerity would no doubt lead to conflict.

    So Yohm siding with Edmaris would lead to a pretty natural sh of wills, then. Sounds about perfect. If the new king really did pay off his debt to us, itd be hard to do much else against him. Wed have to brace ourselves for the long haul, aiming to take Farmus down bit by bit. But Diablo was thinking two steps ahead of me, manipting the minds and wills of the people to gain his results. In that case, things could very likely start moving in a hurry.

    There was no doubt that the new king would try to get Edmaris out of the picture pronto. If the government was able to capture him, our ns would be ruined. Of course, we could ignore that new king and just push on in anyway, but thatde at the cost of whatever trust the internationalmunity has in us. Always have the moral upper hand. Thats how the human world worked.

    Well, keep a vignt watch, all right? Can you manipte the new kings side without getting too many people killed?

    If thats what you seek, yes. Allow me, Diablo, to handle it.

    So reliable. Hes almost scarily smart. If I left it to him, he seemed ready to aplish well near anything.

    Then do it. If youre short on war funds, you can use these sters if you want.

    I ced a thousand of the coins into my Stomach and pushed the remaining five hundred in his direction.

    Fortunately for us, all our wounded were now fully recovered. Apart from paying personal visits to their beds, I wasnt called upon to do much of anything for them. A thousand was almost too much reparation, and we had also thoroughly looted ymans home base of its valuables, so financially we were doing pretty damn well, I thought. Much of our newfound fortune would be spent on future urban development, but we had enough breathing room to provide Yohm whatever he needed.

    Despite my intentions, Diablo smiled and shook his head. I deeply appreciate your concern, Sir Rimuru, but it will not be necessary. Asid out in my n, if you can provide me with a suitable army, the rest will take care of itself. That, or if you grant me permission to wage battle myself

    Uh, no, thats fine. Ill give you all the troops you need, so instead of that, I need you toy low as much as you can, all right?

    I had reason to cut him off. I knew how much of a freaky unknown Diablo was, so I definitely didnt want to use him in the wrong ce and expose myself like an idiot. Unleashing him against human armies would be far too one-sidedall itd do was make people fear us. Wed be further away from amon understanding than ever, and I wanted us to have as amicable a rtionship as possible. Besides, we had all the war power we needed. We had no enemies; not in public, at least. Even with Gelds team tied up with engineering work, Benimaru and his army alone would be enough. Farmus, with the majority of its fighting force gone, was not a threat to us.

    So I decided to just prepare reinforcements if necessary and use this ster windfall to invest in the new nation Yohm was poised to build.

    This was enough to convince Diablo. Very well. I will remain firmly behind the scenes.

    Right. You know, Shion, you could learn a thing or two from Diablo.

    What?! When have I ever lost my head and failed to follow your will, Sir Rimuru?!

    I tried to throw a word of advice toward Shion like this now and again. She seriously never seemed to realize she did anything wrong. Yeesh. I guess thatd be a long-term project, gradually instilling in her mind that going berserk all the time wasnt such a hot idea. It made me heave an internal sigh. Something told me itd be a while before I could trust her with solo missions.

    After finishing his report, Diablo brought up another question, as if it had just urred to him.

    Sir Rimuru, the Western Holy Church has reportedly tried make contact with Reyhiem, one of my pawns. He has received a summons to visit their headquarters and exin the situation with the hostilities in Farmus. What do you think about that?

    Reyhiem? He was the archbishop of Farmus or whatever, right? Now he was just one of Diablos faithful dogs, but ignoring a Church summons sounded like a bad idea.

    Hmm If we ignored them, would that lead to trouble?

    It would. I think it best to allow him to testify to them, if only to see what the Churchs next move will be.

    Yeah Im sure theyre hungry for info, what with there being just three survivors.

    Out of the former king, Edmaris, the court sorcerer, Razen, and Archbishop Reyhiem, it made sense that the Church would want to hear from Reyhiem first. He was the only real candidate out of the three.

    But wasnt the Church monitoring Veldora? Because right now, its true that hes revived again, but the timeline were giving is a bit off from the truth. If we lied to them, wouldnt they see right through that?

    You think so? Shall I have him speak the truth, then?

    I thought about this a moment.

    The Church could very well be a monkey wrench in our future ns. Ideally, Id want to engage them in a way that didnt cause interference between us, but given their t-out refusal to work with monsters, I didnt like my chances. Not even the Dwarven Kingdom was on very good terms with the Church. The dwarves habit of treating monsters as equals vited their whole doctrinebut it hadnt erupted into war yet. The two sides were simply ignoring each other.

    Should that be what we aim for? I didnt want to trample over a millennium or so of Church doctrine, but I didnt want to unconditionally ept it, either. If they wanted all monsters to die, I wasnt about to lie on my back and wait for the dagger. I had to respect them, and we had to be considerate of each other. If one of us said something the other couldnt ept, it could lead to war, in the end. A deep understanding of each other would be a must, along with a prudent effort to keep away from any potentialnd mines in our talks.

    Of course, that only applies if the other side ys along. Otherwise, wed just be deluding ourselves intocency. If the Church branded us a divine enemy, wed have to resist thatand I wasnt afraid to smash them to pieces, if it came to that.

    For now, though

    Hmm. How about I send them a message for the time being? We seized some magic-image-recording thingies from yman, right? Id like to personally record a message with one of them. We can have Reyhiem take it over there and see how the Church reacts.

    Very well.

    Great! I will bring one over at once!

    Diablo sagely nodded as Shion ran off to fetch a crystal for me.

    A few days had passed now, after Diablo reported that Reyhiem hadmenced his journey to the Church, but we had yet to hear any response. The reaction from them was muddled confusion, and I could see why. Veldora was back, and there was a new demon lord in town (i.e., me). Figuring out how to deal with us wasnt something they could make a snap decision on.

    Well, if they didnt react to me, I didnt mind. For now, I was satisfied with sitting and waiting to see how things shook out.

    The Three Lycanthropeers arrived a whileter, along with a procession in the tens of thousands.

    They didnt take nearly as long as I thought. You gotta hand it to these beastmen and magic-born. Just in terms of their core strength, no human couldpare with them. With magicules all over this world, they could run on magic when physically exhausted and with their own two feet when magically exhausted. Their marching speed was several times what an army on Earth could manageand Im talking about all of them, down to the average beastman on the street. They really were bred for battle.

    I didnt see Gabil among them. Presumably, he was in the rear somewhere, I thought, as Alvis and Sufia came up to greet me.

    Hmm? Isnt Phobio here?

    About that, Sufia began. Phobio stayed behind to tend to the magic-born we took prisoner. He was sticking around while Geld was at ymans pce, apparently, to ensure no revolts took ce. In other words, they were pushing the boring work on him. Sorry about that, Phobio. But even if Benimaru had bullied him into that role, we did need someone on surveince. We should appreciate him for working with us instead of pushing the responsibility on someone else.

    We had, by this point, fully prepared to ept this crowd. I had worked with Kaijin and Kurobe, our manufacturing specialists, to work out how many people should be assigned to this or that department around town. These were all volunteers with a keen interest in technical work, but we could only ept so many, so we agreed to set up rotational shifts for the more popr work details.

    It might be a good idea to build a technical school of some sort around here, I thought as we quietly handled all this work. Somece where we can provide year-round instruction on what we were doing. It seemed smart to me.

    At the very far end of the procession, I finally caught sight of Gabil. I have returned, Sir Rimuru! he bellowed from the skies, not looking at all the worse for wear.

    Hey, nice to see you! You put in a fine effort at the battle, I

    hear.

    No, no, I still have so much to learn. Sir Middray, under the service of Lady Milim, practically pummeled me beyond recognition!

    Ah yes, that dragonewt with the crazy strength. Benimaru mentioned him, too.

    Yeah, well, if he worships Milim, hes gotta like fighting a lot, no doubt. You arent exactly a wimpmaybe you just arent used to your newly evolved powers yet. You got a while to go.

    I wasnt sure if thisforted him at all, but I said it anyway. He didnt look too chagrined, so I was sure he felt the same anyway.

    Ha! I, Gabil, am prepared to expend every effort to live up to your lofty expectations, Sir Rimuru!

    That statement, and that smile, were all the proof I needed.

    After I said my hellos to the rest of his force, he suddenly remembered a sheet of paper that he took out from his pocket to show me.

    Whats this?

    I received this from Lady Milim, my lord. She told me to give it to you.

    What could this be? Nothing good, I was sure. She mentioned stopping by again as we said our goodbyes after the Walpurgis Council. But sure enough, there was her childish scrawl, written haphazardly across the paper.

    This is Milim! Next time I visit, Ill be bringing along some guys who just cant seem to leave me the heck alone. I want you to teach them everything there is to know about cooking. This is an urgent request, so I figured Id ask my buddy Rimuru for help!!! Please please please!!!!!

    The urgency certainly came through in the message. These hangers-on; was she talking about the Dragon Faithful?

    Uh, did she tell you what this is about?

    A little bit. I met a member of the Dragon Faithful named Sir Hermes while I was there, and he was kind enough to discuss his followings internal workings with me.

    The way Gabil described him, Hermes seemed to have a pretty good head on his shoulders. Not battle-obsessed like Middray at all; more of a free spirit, one who had traveled to the Dwarven Kingdom and Western Nations.

    Being in the Dragon Faithful, as he exined to Gabil, meant a life of frugality. He imed that the food they present to Lady Milim isnt cooked or prepared in any way whatsoever. Perhaps they share some tastes with us. Ive never enjoyed a fish that wasnt best when it was eaten raw, you know.

    Im not so sure you guys have that much inmon, Gabil. Lizardmens digestive systems were probably just built that way. But they knew about preparing food, or at least smoking it, and they had a few non-fish staples they enjoyed as well. The Dragon Faithful, meanwhile, didnt seem like they had heard of the concept of cooking at all. I doubt they were eating raw meat all day, but whatever preparation they did seemed strictly for the purposes of avoiding contamination and nothing more.

    Uhokay? I thought dragonewts had the same sense of taste as humans.

    We do, sir, we do! Thanks to my glorious evolution, I have gained the most wondrous, expert set of taste buds. All the nd meals of my lizardman past pale inparison to the vast cornucopia of delights I can now sample!

    Yeah, Ill bet. So when you eat a good meal, you know how you kinda want to eat it againter on?

    Gabil nodded sagely, growing increasingly excited. Yes Yes, now I see your point! This is Sir Hermess way of eliminating that Dragon Faithful tradition once and for all, is it not?

    Probably, yeah. Tradition or not, I could read Milims mind easily enough. If they worshiped her as a god, though, why were they deliberately ignoring her will? Thats kind of, um, sphemous, isnt it? And why cant Milim just chat about this with them herself? Maybe, in her own unique way, she didnt want to rock the boat with them. She knew they were only acting out of virtuous intentions, so she put up with that treatment withoutint.

    In that case, well need to give them all the royal treatment, wont we?

    Oh, absolutely! A splendid idea, I think!

    Wed need to keep it casual, nonchnt, making sure we didnt act all high and mighty. Then they could naturally observe, and learn, what made Milim happy. It sounded like a tougher mission than I first thought. Better assemble my team and discuss thister on.

    So I instructed Gabil to return to his research in the cave. Vester was putting in a full effort down there at the moment, but we still didnt have arge enough team. Losing Gabils crew must have been a major blow to their progress.

    Right. I shall be off, then!

    Yep. We will also consider your reward at our next conference, so Id like to have you in attendance.

    Yes, my lord!

    Pride filled Gabils face as he flew off. He mustve just remembered that I appointed him to Tempest leadership earlier.

    A month had passed since Walpurgis, and with all the new people, things were running at a fever pitch around town. In the midst of it, Geld finally Spatial Motioned back. It was the first time I had seen him in a while, and he looked pretty beat-up.

    Iits good to see you again, Geld.

    He heaved a sigh at my pensive greeting. I have to say, Sir Rimuru, I look up to you more than ever now.

    Whoa! Whered thate from?

    There was no doubting the respect in his voice as he turned his weary eyes to me. I hadnt done anything of note recently, so I had no idea what he was talking about. What happened to him in the space of a few weeks?

    Well

    The story Geld had for me was a ssic tale of ipetence among new hires. He had organized the prisoners into groups, deploying them to this or that allied force. That much went well. After that, hemended these troops in the midst of their surveying andnd-clearing workbut certain problems quickly made themselves known.

    High orcs had no problem using Thought Communication to chat with one another, working as a team even in silence, but wed need a different n with the mix of magic-born involved here. Verbal instructions couldnt be understoodand besides, a lot of the main staff, Geld included, werent that great at making themselves clear. Its one thing to be capable of something, but quite another to exin it clearly and lucidly to others. Lots of artisans like him faced the same problem.

    This meant that as ruthlessly efficient as Geld and his team were, things fell apart when anyone else got involved. The results were boundlessly frustrating to him. The magic-born werent great fans of being ordered around, either, so even if you carefully showed them what to do in person, many of them werent interested in meekly copying your actions. Those that were, as Geld put it, still werent up to his grade of quality. I could see that. More people didnt always mean better work. Put together a crowd of idiots, and all you had was a mob on your hands. That was why education was so important.

    Show them, convince them, let them try, and praise themonly then will a man be moved.

    Thats a quote from Admiral Isoroku Yamamoto,mander of the Imperial Japanese Navy during World War II, and its something that I think anyone in a leadership position needs to take to heart. It expertly encapstes the difficulties of leading and instructing people, and it also shows that people find real pride and meaning in their work only when recognized by others.

    Listening to Gelds grumbling reminded me of the more painful moments of my office job, in my previous life. Work staff who never listened to you, people down thedder who tried hiding their mistakes, bosses who attempted to push the me on someone else. It wasnt wine and roses for me back then, either. A lot of good memories, too, but get me started on the bad ones, and I could go all night.

    And whenever I had it really rough:

    All right, Geld! Lets have a drink!

    I pped him on the shoulder. Rewarding the staff for hard work was part of any bosss job, and one way to do that was to let them vent their grievances and work out everything in their system. I needed to pay special attention to Geld, given how much responsibility he felt for his workand so we drank the night away, while Geld aired out all his pains and concerns and I carefully listened.

    I nned to assemble the leadership for a conference the next morningbut before that, I called Hakuro over for a private chat, contacting him via Thought Communication the previous night. I traveled to his quarters at sunrise.

    Sir Rimuru, he greeted me, almost choked with emotion,ing over personally to see me He didnt look as tired as Geld.

    Sorry to put you through all this grueling work.

    Oh, not at all, not at all. Weve sifted through the prisoners now, so my job is almost done. I have to say, though, Geld has it far worse. I finished transferring leadership overst night, so theres no need for me to go back over there, at least.

    Geld Yeah, sounds like he had it tough. After I contacted you yesterday, he and I drank for a while, and it sounds like hes got a lot on his mind, you know? Like, up to now hes been able to just shut off his brain and focus on his work, but directing prisoners on the job site was a huge challenge for him.

    Indeed. He would have it easier if he was willing topromise on matters, but he was always far too serious-minded for that.

    As Hakuro exined, it wouldve been easy to use force to corral this motley band of magic-born, coercing them into followingmands. But if you do that, you cant expect a top-quality job to result from it. Youd have to settle here and there, and as an artisan, those results wouldnt be enough to satisfy Geld.

    I have something else to report to you, Sir Rimuru

    But to Hakuro, that was Gelds problem. He turned back toward me.

    Whats that? I asked.

    yman, as you know, ruled over what was called the Puppet Nation of Dhistav, and where the majority of people are in the ve ss. These are entirely dark elves, no other species, and well over a thousand of them were tasked with maintaining and managing the castle grounds alone.

    Right. So?

    Wes they described it to me, Dhistav used to be home to a kingdom of elves

    Elves? The denizens of the Sorcerous Dynasty of Thalion descended from elves, too, didnt they? Is there amon ancestor here? Maybe notwere talking pretty well out of the way, geography-wise.

    and remarkably enough, some elven ruins remain in thend. The dark elves described themselves as keepers of their graves.

    Oh?

    Grave tenders? Over what sort of graves? Elves had life expectancies of who knows how long, besides.

    So youre saying there are these well-guarded, untouched ruins from an ancient kingdom just lying around?

    This was big news to me. Ruins like these were dotted all over the world, often raided by the hunter-gatherer adventurers who made treasure hunting their line of work. Most of them didnt have a very good time at it. Only a precious few ruins had been discovered at all, and those that were had already been picked clean a while ago. But if there was a brand-new cache of ruins to explore and exploit

    Hakuro, Im ssifying this discovery a state secret. Dont tell anyone about this for the time beingnot until I go there and survey things for myself.

    Yes, my lord, he said quietly, nodding. He mustve understood how vital this could potentially be.

    If I had to guess, yman derived much of his riches from the things discovered in these sites. He had to. That would exin all the Artifacts and magic items Geld told me they recovered. But does that mean we should justyou know, take them over?

    I decided to hold off on judgment for now. The secret seemed to be safe with the dark elves; word wouldnt get out unless we wanted it to. This was demon lord territory, forbiddennds that no adventurers dared to approach. Better to go slowly on these ancient ruinstrying to overextend ourselves to all of them at once was too likely to backfire.

    Everyone was now seated at our main meeting hall. I surveyed them all from my specially made slime seat.

    Um, right. Hello, everyone. As some of you already know, I have been promoted to demon lord!

    Congrattions!!

    They all shouted their tidings to me, happy and excited whether they knew or not. I was just as happy. I had safely weathered a major storm.

    It was a long journey, indeed, yes, Rigurd observed, but we have finally made it. Uh, Rigurd, it hasnt even been two years since we met, right?

    Rigur, meanwhile, was crying like a baby. Truly astounding! Seeing our leader be a demon lord fills me with so much emotion

    Shion sneered at the crowd like this was all inevitably going to happen. It is the start of a new era for Sir Rimuru!

    Though, really, it was an emotional time for me, too. The only problem left was essentially the Western Holy Church. If I could handle them, itd be easy street on the way to creating the ideal environment Im looking for.

    Brimming with confidence, I continued my briefing, going over what we decided on at Walpurgis.

    Ah, right. I didnt mention this, but its been decided that Im the official ruler of the entire Forest of Jura region. I dont think this really changes much, since its already been that way for a while. It just means that, you know, if someone invades the forestnot that they wouldwed be fighting back under my own name. Also, should we formally dere our rights to this territory, do you think? Or are we safe just leaving it be for now?

    As I spoke, the looks on my leadership grew more nervous. Some of them appeared downright terrified. What? Did I say something bad?

    Um The whole forest? Truly?

    Uh, yeah? I replied to Rigurd.

    Are you serious? Benimaru gasped. Including everything on the other side of the river?

    Errr, probably?

    He was referring to the Great Ameld River that flowed across the forest, dividing it in two. The other side borderednds under the influence of the Eastern Empire, a ce we still had little to no connection with.

    Is that a problem? I asked.

    Not a problem for us, Benimaru replied after some thought, but I dont believe the area past the river counts as the dryads domain. So far, Sir Rimuru, you are recognized as overseer only of thends that the dryads themselves have built up. To the denizens beyond the river, the advent of a new demon lord would likely prove to be quite a headache.

    He smiled the whole timesavoring the thought of mowing down any rebellious factions over there, no doubt. That wasumno. Bad idea.

    If you asked me, Kaijin rebutted, this is an astounding development. The demon lords have formally agreed that you have rights to all the forests natural resources, if Im understanding this correctly. This includes anything that anybody takes from it, over on the other side. Thats big news, pal!

    Its like he was reading my mind. He was right. It didnt strike me as anything big at first, but it had the potential to explode. As Kaijin exined to me, people had been harvesting the forests resources on the sly for a while now. The dryads were willing to let it slide to some extent, but given the general state ofwlessness past the Great Ameld, it wasmon for people to take wood or produce or whatnot from Jura to the Dwarven Kingdom, making a living off the sales. There was no regional authority to seek permission from, nothing stopping thembut now, if they wanted to do that or live in the forest, they needed my approval, and theyd have to march over here to get it.

    Um Oh crap, does this mean were gonna get more people here?

    I think it does, Shuna said, a serene smile on her face. Now that youre an approved demon lord, anyone who fails toe here and pledge allegiance to you could be legally branded a rebel.

    Her opinion had to be shared by much of Tempest, I figured. But why require permission after who knows how many years of living here? That sounded like needless bureaucracy.

    Well, why worry about that now? I mean, if theyre already residents of the forest

    No, no, countered Rigurd, a demon lord is, in a way, a projection of pure power. It is something to be proud of. To a goblin, you understand, a high-level magic-born is something of a divine presence.

    Exactly, Gabil added. Some of these uncontacted residents may seek the protection of the demon lord; others may go on with their lives without recognizing your authority. They have the right to make that decision for themselves. But even among the lizardmen I used to be with, the protection of a demon lord would have been a literal gift from the gods. Defying one was unthinkable; ignoring one, the height of folly. Compared with the risk of angering the local demon lord, it would be wholly typical for them toe and greet you instead.

    And as Shuna put it, failing to acknowledge me could even put you under suspicion. If you got attacked for it, you had no right toin. Not that Id want that, though. And besides, what if youre a monster whos never heard of me before? How would you even know?

    At the very least, Gabil said, the lizardmen areing to see you, I assure you. My father has already been told of your ascension!

    Wait. When did they decide to do that?

    You mean Abil? Hesing?

    He is! He told Lady Shion about it as well. Ah, he is counting the days before he can see you in all your demonic glory for himself!

    This was starting to sound big. Really big. The lizardmen were one of therger-size races in the whole Forest of Jura. If they took the pilgrimage to see me as a given, I assumed that went without saying for any species weaker than them. And Im sure the process would be pretty casual for anyone familiar with me, but if not, they might be showing up on my doorstep trembling with fear. Id just look like thetest local despot to them; they might freak out over making one false step and being annihted or whatever. Maybe theres something we could do to make this whole process a lot morechill?

    Still, though

    Ha-ha! Im sure Sir Rimuru would expect nothing less!

    I peered down at the triumphant-looking Shion. If she knew Gabils father was going to show up, why didnt she bother telling me? And I really didnt appreciate that grin on her face. She didnt care about this visitor at all. I swear, she looks like the perfect executive secretary on the outside, but if you want her to actually do the job, forget it.

    Ugh. Just leave her be. I mean, Im d she enjoyed hearing praise for me (even more than I did), but I knew shed take any criticism from me the wrong way, so

    To sum up, once word got around about my demon lord-dom, Id have a parade of visitors beating a path to this town, most monsters preferring to request my protection instead of risk my wrath. Wed have a hell of a lot of visitors to deal with soon, in other words.

    We would have to conduct a cross-forest survey shortly, seeking out the intelligent races. This wouldnt be a problem in areas where I was already the acknowledged leader, but anywhere else would be an uphill climb.

    But if we were gonna be busy with that anyway

    Hey, I was just thinkingwe gotta spread the word around the forest about my ascension anyway, right? So why dont we turn it into some really big ad campaign and use it to unveil this town to the whole world? Itd be easier to make everyonee over here than go reach out to all of them, I think.

    How do you mean? a confused-looking Rigurd asked me, so I went into some more detail on the idea I just came up with.

    Really, it wasnt anything difficult. This town, the capital of Tempest, was starting to be more well-known among the monsters in Jura. Koby, and the kobold merchant caravans he led, were doing a great job spreading the rumors wherever they went. At least a few people mustve been interested in visiting, and I was just thinking now was a good time to expand our poption a little. The beastmen hanging out here wouldplete their education and return home soon enough; wed need to make up for those losses, and if we were gonna keep up the teaching effort, then the more students, the merrier. Our food situation was steadily improving, and we definitely had the room for more people.

    If anything, we were starting to face a shortage of workers. There were all these ideas, all these projects to explore, but not enough people to throw at them. A big,vish unveiling could be just the thing to attract more of them. Theyde to pledge their fealty or whatever, theyd learn about the town along the way, and at least some of them would consider a permanent move.

    Two birds with one stone. In fact

    Plus You know, weve all been on pins and needles the past little while. Why dont we kick back a little bit? Lets hold a big festival to start this off!

    Wed set up a specific time for the meet and greets with me, and wed stage a city-wide festival around these to fete them with. That way, I wouldnt have to spread the meetings out over weeks and weeks. Thered be a huge feast, tooI still had Milims request filed in the back of my mind. Itd be a chance for all of us to take a breather, show off what weve done, and get everything wrapped up in one fell swoop.

    A festival?

    Wonderful! Truly a wonderful idea!

    Lets do it! It will be a magnificent event!

    My associates were up for it, at least. The town was getting experienced with this, what with the monthly feasts we already held for ourselves, and our developments in the realm of food and drink were growing moreplex andrge-scale by the day. Expanding on that, and allowing everyone to join in, sounded like a lot of fun.

    This will kind of be my public debut as well, so lets make it the biggest one we can!

    Yes, my lord!

    There were no objections. The budget? Ah, no need to worry about that. Rigurd would figure out something. We were flush for the moment, and a little indulgence wouldnt put a dent in that.

    Things proceeded quickly after that; I guess those words held a lot of sway with people. Suggestions and feedback filled the hall, much to my silent surprise, and before I knew it, we were extending invitations to dignitaries the entire world over. Was this a little hasty? Monsters were one thing, but were we okay inviting human heads of state as well?

    We had a hot spring. We had ample amodations, including a state guest house worthy of handling the highest of nobility. Haruna and her crew had already impressed super-celebrities like Archduke Erald and King Gazel. I think we ought to be fine. Even if it took shuffling the dates and locations around, or at least stepping up our security, this could be a great chance for the worlds leaders to get to know me.

    The overseer of all these people (i.e., me) had just officially be a demon lord. I could see why people wanted to celebrate that. I used to be Japanese, and Japanese people love their festivals. I figured I needed to really go all out with this and teach everyone what a real party is aboutthat and show them what a friendly demon lord I was.

    With a promise to hammer out the festival detailster, I concluded my report. We followed this up with reports from the rest of my main staff. I had a grip on everything, but not everyone on the team knew what everyone else was up toand maybe Id learn something new myself.

    Diablo, in particr, had apletely different view of the world from me. It was like he didnt know whatmon sense was. Small trifles to me could be huge, world-changing matters to him, it felt like, and if something like that came up, itd be difficult for me to handle that alone. That was why I set up these regr info-sharing reports.

    Rigurd kicked off his briefing by stating that our merchant partners had begun returning to town. Our numbers were trending upward again, likely because Fuze was spreading the word that things were safe now.

    Beyond that, none of the other nations were making any particrly noteworthy moves. My ascension seemed to rm many of them, but for now, they were likely waiting to see how Blumund and the Dwarven Kingdom would respond.

    We also had word that Elmesia El-Ru Thalion, Her Excellency the Emperor of the Sorcerous Dynasty of Thalion, had expressed a personal desire to open formal rtions with Tempest. I could practically hear her whisper so build a highway linking us already underneath those words, but theres no doubting what a useful support theyd be to us. Her statement, propagated by magic to all world leaders, had apparently led to much consternation.

    It can be said, Rigurd happily closed, that all our rtions are fulfilling their sworn duty and working hard on our behalf across the world!

    Next came Soei. I had left him to investigate a lot of things, so I figured hed have the floor for a while.

    This included the preliminary setup for the highway between here and Thalion, the advance surveying and so on before we put shovel to dirt. I had already worked out the general route from my birds-eye view over the forest, so Soei was sent out to check for nearby monster viges or other construction obstacles.

    This was something I had him do for the roads to Dwargon and Blumund as well; it was pretty important work. You didnt want to omit that stuff, unless you wanted troubleter. So far, the monsters impacted by the roads had been cooperative with us, so there were no major problems to speak of, but you never knew when wed have to eminent domain someone out of their ancestral homes or whatnot.

    Very few of them would defy my will, me being demon lord and all, but I didnt want to act that much like a tyrant, so I had to be careful. Itd be easy to just push them away by force, but I wanted to avoid that if I could. Coexistence was my creed, and that applied equally to humans and monsters. Hopefully I wouldnt run into any issues this time, either.

    I wasnt in this to demand anything from the monsters I ruled over. Anyone who wanted my protection got it, but otherwise, I didnt want to interferewell, unless they lived right in the middle of my projected road. But I wanted to avoid pointless conflict, so if they were willing to negotiate, so was I. Id be happy to make all the moving arrangements for anyone disced, should I need to. After all, any vige near this road was bound to be a resting stop, a lively ce filled with inns and taverns and travelers going to and fro.

    It wasnt all going to be smooth sailing, but itd make for a better life for the natives. Thats how it worked for the previous two highways, and hopefully it would once more.

    I did not find any hostile monsters present on or near the projected route, Soei began. When I exined Sir Rimurus ns to them, they all provided their ready agreement to me.

    Ah, good. Im d he made it clear we werent kicking anyone out of their homes.

    Thats great. In that case, make sure you wrap up the surveying and other work by the time Gelds free again.

    The rough on-site investigation work was alreadyplete. If we didnt find any more safety concerns after this, itd be time to send our engineers over.

    Well, one moment. I did discover one issue. The Forest of Jura is in your jurisdiction, Sir Rimuru, but the Khusha Mountains lie on one of its borders. The area is filled with high peaks and treacherous canyons, and at the higher altitudes, there is said to be settlements popted by a long-nosed tribe known as the tengu. That is information from the local popce, so I found it difficult to dismiss entirely.

    In thends southwest of Rimuru, the capital and central city of Tempest, there was a mountain range that spread out across the shores of Lake Sisu. These were the Khushas, an area that high orcs had migrated to in the past; a southern branch of this range was also home to the former demon lord Freys castle. It was noted for its beautiful, extended rows of towering peaks, many of which were treacherous and all but untouched by living creatures.

    The current n called for a highway to be built right up to the border with Thalion. There was a midsize town there situated between the mountains that would serve as the terminus. We wouldnt need to go through the Khushas themselves. So what was Soei worried about?

    Whats the big deal about that?

    The tengu are said to be friendly, but at their core, they are a warmongering race. Even the demon lord Frey avoided direct conflict with them. I would suggest seeking her advice about this

    Technically speaking, Soei advised me, the Khusha Mountains were outside the Forest of Jura and thus not our territory. It wasnt Freys, either, making it independent, unimednd. I couldve just used my demon lord powers to beat them into submission, but maybe itd be better to zip over and exin matters to avoid future trouble. In their eyes, they might see me as a greedy demon lord trying to expand his territory.

    Soei sounded disappointed at having to leave the decision about this to me, but I actually thought better of him for it. I was so proud of him for not forcing the issue and trying to work with the tengu himself. He was careful like that, and that made him endlessly helpful for missions like these.

    All right. So should I go and?

    Ah, one moment. If thats the issue, let me head over.

    Just as I hoped to get this wrapped up quickly, Benimaru stopped me. Whenever he casually volunteered for something like this, it always rmed me a bitbut he was right. I left the matter to him.

    Youve seemed rather friendly with Lady Alvis as ofte, my brother. I would hope you are not volunteering merely for the chance of a tryst with her? Shunamented.

    Huh? Benimaru and Alvis were that into each other?!

    What does she mean, Benimaru?

    If Shuna was telling the truth, this was serious.

    You misunderstand her, Sir Rimuru. Shuna, enough of your nonsense.

    He acted unperturbed enough. It didnt seem like he was lying to me. But lets face it. Benimaru was a good catch for any woman able to capture his attention. Anyone could see that.

    Dont worry, Sir Rimuru. Whether Benimaru is here or not, you will always have me!

    Oh, great, more of Shions nonsense.

    Huh? What are you talking about?

    Heh! Falling for Alviss trap and ready to abandon our nation, are you? Shion continued. Well, go! Do whatever you like!

    Shion, how on earth are you interpreting things that way?

    I could see veins throbbing on Benimarus head. I mean, yeah, I was kind of jealous of him, tootwo years, and I still didnt have a girlfriend to speak ofbut I didnt think he was gonna go elope or whatever. Shions imagination was a fearsome thing, indeed.

    Yeah, I really doubt that, Shion.

    You heard him, Shion. Sir Rimuru, you do trust in me, yes?

    Its not a matter of trust by now. Youre one of my closest partners.

    There wasnt a cell in my body that questioned Benimaru. He couldnt be less like my old coworker Tamura, except in how theyd both found a steady date before I ever did. But I could deal with thatter.

    This whole conversation was getting ridiculous. Right. If we keep talking about this, Shions imagination is gonna run wild on her. Benimaru, Im assigning this job to you!

    Yes, my lord, he replied with a fatigued nod. Yeesh.

    Still, Benimaru was the right man to serve as my proxy here. He was second inmand only to me, and I doubted he would underestimate any adversaries he came across. I wasnt expecting hidden mountain settlements on the Thalion border, but considering the future, it was better to work everything out with them sooner orterand Benimarus better than me at that stuff.

    There was one thing I had yet to hear about.

    Can you tell me anything about the changes in our monster ecosystem, Soei?

    I had asked him to investigate trends among the monsters in town and along our highways. A lot of residents were practically brimming with magicules; the air was pretty dense with them by now, which was exactly how you got mystic beaststheyd spontaneously manifest from pools of the stuff, and the more that were created, the more likely at least one would be harmful to us. Beasts like these necessitated a constant patrol around the forest. They were a threat to humans even at D rank or below, so we needed to be hypervignt with those guys. If one ranked B or so showed up, that required immediate attention.

    Rigur, as head of our security department, was the main man in charge of handling them. His team was experienced now, and even the newer ones could provide able service after several weeks of training. They patrolled the highways, ensuring the merchant wagons could ply their trade in peace, and they did a good job at itfor now, no problems had been reported. But they couldnt cover the entire forest, so there was no telling where a new, and powerful, creature might be lurking.

    Soei had informed me that it wasnt worth worrying about much, which was puzzling. What did he mean by that? Like, we could live safely alongside them? If they didnt harm us or the travelers, then sure, I could ept that. Any monsters intelligent enough to be negotiated with were free to live out their lives, but you just never knew when a new menace, like the A-minus-ranked knight spider Gobta tangled with, might rear its ugly head and start defending its territory.

    Thats why I was concerned with the forest outside of the highways and other areas we had popted. Those ces, it seemed to me, were more likely to house these potential threats. Soei had his Replications looking into this for me, so I was pretty sure he at least had an inkling by now.

    I did not discover anything particrly problematic, Soei coolly replied to me. If I had to name one, it would be the saber grizzly I chanced upon in the forests northwestern reaches, but I safely dispatched it.

    Hmm. Nothing problematic?

    Report. A saber grizzly is equivalent to an A-minus rank, simr to the knight spider.

    What?!

    Whoa, thats, um, thats nothing a normal adventurer could take on!

    I couldnt hide my shock. He made it sound somonce that I didnt pick up on it at first. No merchant would be able to travel in areas with freaks like those nearby. Theyd be a danger even to Gobta and his patrol teams.

    Uh, Gobta grunted, picking up on my concern, is that for real, Soei? Cause I dont really wanna deploy anyone new and untested to ces where they are. Itd be dangerous.

    I wouldnt worry. You spoil them too much anyway, dont you?

    Heyyy! Wait a minute! Maybe you wouldnt worry, but to us, if we let our guards down, were goners!

    Then go to Hakuro, Soei blithely replied as Gobta kept whining. Just have him train you harder. Youll be fine.

    Hakuro nodded at this like it was inly obvious. I felt kind of bad for Gobta, although his reaction piqued my interest. He himself didnt seem too scared of a saber grizzly. The magiculesing off him seemed to be higher than before; he was probably on the higher end of the B rank by now. But theres a pretty big jump between B and A, I figured

    Hey, Raphael, Im not misreading Gobtas power, am I?

    Understood. When Unified with a starwolf, the resulting growth in fighting level cannot be measured in numbers.

    Ah. All right. Yeah, I think that Unification was an A-minus. And with Gobta head of the goblin riders, maybe a saber grizzly wouldnt be a big issue for him. And didnt he mention sessfully defending himself against an attack by one of the yman squad leaders? Between Hakuros training and his own experience, he must have been improving, in his own way. He didnt look any different, but maybe Gobtas a force to be reckoned with?

    I smiled a bit as I reflected on this. Now, now, I think Gobtas got a good point. Just because you can handle it doesnt mean the whole world can, Soei.

    That was meant to defend Gobta a bit, but I also wanted to remind Soei not to try solving all his problems alone. If the more powerful among us use themselves as a yardstick, thatll bring a world of pain upon anyone who cant live up to that. Itd also make things more inefficient for the powerful themselves, burdening them further and ultimately leading to their ruin. I spent a few moments exining this to the team, mixing in a few real-world examples.

    I understand. I did not think carefully enough.

    Everyone is different. Soka and the rest of Soeis team were talented enough to satisfy his harsh demands, but it took a special group of people to do that. I appreciated his apology, but I hoped he kept that fact in mind somewhere. The same could be said of Benimaru and Hakuro; I wanted them to be a bit more broad-minded in how they raised the new generation. Geld and Gabil, on the other hand, thought a great deal more about the people under them, so I had less concern about them. Hopefully everyone could learn from them. Itd make for better rtionships all around.

    Meanwhile

    Although I should say that training Gobta and the rest is a great thing. You gotta make sure theyre prepared for the unexpected!

    Hakuro gave a sly grin as Gobta hung his head low. Sure, not everyone advances at the same rate or to the same degree, but training itself is never a bad thing. Its just like going to schoolits bound to help youter on.

    Convinced that Gobta was on the right track, I went back to the main topic.

    Just as I feared, we were starting to see new, and dangerous, monsters born in the forest. Our patrol teams had potions on them if worse came to worst, and the starwolves were astonishingly fast on their feet, so Im sure they could flee easily enough. But I cant expect our uing visitors to act the same way.

    If we have all these magicules pooling together, thats going to create more unusual monsters to deal with. Itll be toote for us if they kill someone. We need a n of action.

    We could try stricter patrols, but that wouldnt address the root of the problem. Wed have to keep that up forever, stressing all of us out. Unless we identified and removed whatever was creating these dense clouds of magic, Id have to keep worrying about this for all time.

    So now what?

    As I pondered over this, a helpful voice called out from an unexpected ce.

    In that case, why dont we ce anti-magic barriers over the highways?

    It was Vester. Kaijin immediately stood up to reply.

    And you know, pal, we just finished up the perfect device for that. He grinned at me. A fully automatic, barrier-producing magic generator!

    I knew he had been working on a few things in secret. But really? An automatic magic generator?

    Apparently, this was a device that automatically kept any magic spell going, as long as you told it which one. A major innovation, it sounded like, kind of an advanced version of the inscription magicdriven tools he had invented before. I guess Kaijin and Vester, chagrined at how useless they were during the whole barrier crisis we had, stepped up to try developing this. These guys are amazing. Making a working model in such a short time What are they, geniuses?

    Turns out, though, this wasnt just a couple of dudes working in a garage. Gabil was pitching in during his spare time, as well as Kurobe (who wasnt with us at the moment). Even Shuna was helping out. In a way, we had some of the worlds greatest magic wieldersing together for this project. It was kind of epic.

    Kaijin had long been devoting his days to research, leaving forge duties to Kurobe. Im sure it wasnt just research, what with his duties as head of Tempests production department, but still.

    As he exined to me, the automatic magic generator utilized the magicules naturally floating in the air. He figured we had tons of those around us right now, and that there had to be a way to harness thosehence the idea. The Prison Field covering the town worked by purifying the inner space of its magicules, absorbing them. In much the same way, monsters took in magicules from the air and produced magic crystals from them. They had researched these natural processes, analyzing how they worked.

    Another thing, one I had already mentioned, was that this nation was unnaturally full of magicules. We were all projecting pretty heavy auras even when we tried to hold them back. Even in a regr cave, the density could be enormous in areas, enough to give birth to a whole gaggle of B-plus creatures. It was all just too weird for this country. Kaijin and his team had tried to figure out what to do about this for a while, it seemed.

    So if we use this automatic magic generator, we can create anti-magic barriers?

    We sure can, Vester confidently stated. And thats not the only thing!

    They were both grinning ear to ear now. I could hardly believe these two used to be at each others throats. But anyway.

    What other use is there? I thought the barriers were the point.

    Heh-heh-heh Get this, pal! This generator includes a mechanism that collects and gathers magicules from the atmosphere. We can use this to lower the density of magicules in the air!

    Whoa! Really? I had to restrain myself from shouting with glee. Thats exactly the solution we were looking for!

    It definitely is, Sir Rimuru, Vester said. But its not without its drawbacks. It requires a certain magicule density to work; otherwise, it is too inefficient.

    Not that we have to worry about that around this town, huh, pal?

    I nodded my agreement. It wasnt a problem worth considering.

    So basically, these devices will suck magicules from the air and automatically create barriers for us?

    They could, yes, but eventually theyll run out of local fuel and fizzle out. Thats why weve set it up so you can refill their magical energy stores.

    As Kaijin put it, the area around Tempest had more magicules than it knew what to do with, but the closer you got to the Western Nations, the sparser they became. Itd be a problem if the barriers disappeared without anyone noticing it, so the devices were set up to generate magic based on its previously loaded stores as well.

    What was the fuel source? The crystals made from magicules collected from the airin other words, magic crystals. Normally, these crystals would be too inefficient an energy source to use for fuel as is. Unlike the magic stones crafted with secret Free Guild technology, magic crystals were neither uniform nor stable. Converting them into magic energy would cause a good 90 percent of their magicules to dissipate into the atmosphere.

    Magic stones were better, and thanks to the Great Sage, we had a fully optimized conversion spell driven by inscription magic. It didnt require any magic stones at all, as long as the potential output exceeded the energy needed for recovery. The technology we developed back before we could just buy all the magic stones we wanted was still paying off big-time today.

    Now, they reported, they could generate the magic with a minimum of loss, providing the desired effects even with the 10 percent of a magic crystal normally avable for use. Whats more, the wasted 90 percent wasnt gone foreverit just went back into the air, ready to be used again. As long as the required density was there, it was virtually a perpetual motion machine.

    And we could use these things in other ways. For example, how about creating a whole bunch of magic crystals, sending them to the Free Guild, and having them converted into magic stones? Then we could operate these things even more efficiently. The most important use, however, was paring down the magicule density around us. Less density meant few monsters and magic beasts to worry about; fewer great hordes of creatures stomping around. The number of unique monsters that might pose trouble for Gobtas team could potentially be reduced to near zero.

    Truly, a wonderful invention. A perfect match for one of our nations most unique quirks. I could envision a future where we couldnt live without it.

    You know, Kaijin cheerfully stated, I think weve also found a lead in extracting the energy needed to convert them into magic stones. For that, though, were gonna need some dedicated equipment. Its gonna be too hard with what we have now, so thats why we looked for a way to use magic crystals as is.

    First, they found a way to make crystals from the magicules in the air; then they developed that tech further; and then they theoretically learned how to make them into magic stones. But while the stones I purchased in Englesia helped them out a lot, they led Kaijin and Vester to the conclusion that producing our own was an uphill climb. I think I remember hearing that the process required a dedicated factory filled withrge-scale equipment. It wasplicated, high-level work, and while they had the theory worked out, applying it was a different matter.

    Well, nothing worth going crazy about. If we could use magic crystals anyway, there was no need for haste. Besides, using those crystals for fuel proved to be a lot easier than expected, they told me. All they had to do was rewrite the form for the relevant inscription magic, and boom, they had a working magic circle.

    And whats more, Vester excitedly continued, these automatic generators can cast magic besides just barriers!

    Impressively, they could handle quite a few more spells, although there were restrictions. Just ce the relevant magical inscription on a magisteel disk, pop it in the device, and you could conjure up all kinds of thingsa bit like a record yer, except it ran on magic crystals instead of a power outlet. I remember telling them about media yback devices like that, but I had no idea theyd leverage that knowledge into something magical like this.

    If they could miniaturize it down to CD-yer level, maybe we could even make them portable. Or how about the opposite, creatingrger models for tactical-level magic deployment? The possibilities seemed endless. For the time being, though, the generator was a rectangle a bit over three feet long on each side and half as deep. Kinda big. Heavy, tooenough that it took some serious muscle to lift. If we could keep them stocked with magic crystals, though, there wouldnt be any need to physically move it at all.

    Vesters proposal was to nestle these devices within the heavy stones we used to pave the highways, setting each one to maintain a magical barrier. They could carefully measure out the life span of each one, having the daily patrol teams rece the crystals to keep the barriers goingalthough no recement was needed if the local magicule density held up. As long as nothing was amiss, the devices could just be checked up on regrly and otherwise left alone.

    It seemed like a pretty smart n to meeasy to use and adaptable to a wide variety of functions. By their calctions, one generator every six-ish miles along the highway would guarantee a safe refuge across the whole area. We had patrol stations every twelve miles along the roads, so it wouldnt add much to a patrolmans daily duties.

    So what about the magic inscriptions?

    Heh-heh-heh Dolds already got the prototype done. Well have Kurobe work out the manufacturing process for the generators, so at this point, pal, were just waiting for the word go.

    My team hasrgelypleted the education Ive been giving them, so were holding fewer sses at the moment. I have some free time to work with, and I would love to take this job on, if possible!

    Vesters eyes were burning with anticipation. Research wasnt enough for himhe wanted to see these devices humming along for himself. And so did I. It looked like they could solve our magicule problem while improving highway safety. I saw no reason not to add this to our highway nning.

    Okay, Vester. I want you to begin tomorrow!

    Leave it to me, sir!

    He smiled, ted. d I could rely on him. I intended to have the high orcs left in town help with the instation. The devices were ponderously heavy to a human being, but just a bit of a lift for a monster. Itd be far more efficient that way.

    I figured that adjusting the ranges of each barrier to match the path of the highway might be the biggest challenge remaining. Vesterughed that concern away, but before he could go into detail, the friendly atmosphere was shattered.

    Gwaaaaaah-ha-ha-ha! Once youplete thatwork, I can release as much mystical energy as my heart desires!

    No you cant, dumbass! Youll kill half the popce if you do!!

    I couldnt help but yell at him for that. I really didnt need Veldoras crap right now. Vesters smile turned into an rmed, pale frown.

    I wouldnt advise it, no, a disturbed Benimaru replied. We might be able to handle it, but the rest of the city? I doubt it.

    Indeed, added Shuna, even if we moved Sir Veldora off-site, the force of the st would likely affect us in one way or the other.

    Yeah, no duh. Even the sealed-off magicules leaking out made it impossible for most people to be near him. If he started shooting out his mystical force willy-nilly, wed be awash in corpses.

    Aww, butIve been holding it in for so long Its wearing me out

    Deal with it, I snapped back.

    But why doesnt holding yours in bother you at all, Rimuru?

    Huh? Well, why dyou think?

    Me? I just shove it all in my Stomach.

    Ever since Rigurd suggested it, I had been bottling up my mystical force and pushing it into my Stomach. By this point, it was an instant transfer, preventing any of it from leaking out at all. Ascending to demon lord status boosted my magicule stores a fair bit, but it also upgraded Predator to Belzebuth, Lord of Gluttony, which vastly expanded my Stomach storage. Thanks to that, I had no desire to unleash my mystical force at all.

    You must remember, Diablo advised me, that perfectly blocking ones mystic force is intensely difficult. Even Sir Benimaru and his family are allowing a tiny amount to leak out.

    Yes, Veldora said, nodding meekly. You are an observant demon, Diablo. Come on! Tell Rimuru more about how hard this is for me!

    Diablo then exined how the demon races are particrly gifted in the handling of magic and mystical forces. That gave them perfect control over such powers, but even from that perspective, Diablo was giving Veldora an A for effort. With all the energy stored inside him, Diablo reasoned, keeping it under control was a Herculean act.

    Is that true, Veldora?

    Yes! Yes, it is! Ive been holding it in ever since you taught me how to, and I want to go blow it up somewhere!

    This, uh, might be kind of a big deal. He wasnt set to pop right this instant, but if we didnt take action, we might have a disaster on our hands. If he busted all of that out without warning, wed have acres and acres of wastndand with all these freaky powerful monsters and creatures dying en masse as a result, that could lead to the creation of another Charybdis. Talk about your Catastrophes. Whether he meant it or not, Veldora was seen as a mortal danger to the world for pretty solid reasons.

    All right. Ill think about that, so hold it in for a while longer, okay?

    Very well. I can manage that well enough, still. But try to be quick about it!

    Good. Still, does it always have to be like this? I solve that magicule-density problem, and an even bigger one immediately reces it? I let out a soft sigh. You just never know what lifes gonna throw at you.

    Soei had finished his briefing, and before long, so had my other main leaders. But just before I was ready to adjourn:

    Could I have the floor a moment, Sir Rimuru? Geld raised his hand, looking concerned.

    Whats up, Geld? If youve got something to say, go right ahead.

    He didnt seem that troubledst night. It probably had to do with the magic-born prisoners, the source of all his recent stress. I wanted to help him if I could, but

    I was hoping, he began, to tell my fellow orcs about your ascension to demon lord. Would you mind if I traveled to the viges of my countrymen, practicing my Spatial Motion as I did? Things appear to be calm across thend now, so I may perhaps find otherrades interested in serving you.

    Come to think of it, hes been so hard at work here in town that I dont think hes had the time to visit the high orc viges. I had been hearing about improvements he made to our food situation, but beyond that, I honestly hadnt been giving him much attention. He deserved this, I thought. But:

    Geld, if you find anyone willing to join us, Id like you to send them to this town first.

    Why is that, sir?

    Well, I appreciate your interest in adding to your own forces, but I think its important theyplete their education here beforehand.

    That was my backstory. High orcs like Geld could use Thought Communication to instantly get up to speed on work duties. That was a massive advantage to them and one of the reasons Geld was such a major contributor to our cause.

    But we could begin work at once Between building these highways, constructing Lady Milims castle, and everything else, you needbor that can move as quickly and fluidly as your own arms and legs

    Which, by Gelds logic, meant the more high orcs around, the better.

    No. We have all those prisoners to work with, dont we? So you go lead them and build them up for me.

    But

    Geld, I know what youre thinking. Your suggestion would be the most efficient way, I wont deny that. But I want you to aim higher.

    Higher?

    Yes. Theres no doubting that Thought Communication is an incredibly useful thing. It cuts down on mistakes, and theres no reason to deliberately shut it off. But if we give preferential treatment only to races who can use that, what happens to the prisoners? Are we just gonna have them mopping floors and doing other menial tasks?

    We

    The suggestion seemed to help Geld reach the same conclusion I had. Going forward, we clearly needed more workers. Thats why we had to train those prisoners now, while things werent too rushed. Thats the iron rule of businesswork when you have to; train when you dont.

    Plus, if I let Geld practice favoritism with his own species, that could lead to all kinds of discrimination I really didnt need around here. I was aiming for a paradise enjoyed by a diverse number of races, so there was no way I could allow that stuff. We were at a vital turning point in a number of ways.

    Also, Geld, youre definitely a talentedmander. I think if I put you in charge of this diverse group of magic-born, thatll polish your skills even further.

    I?!

    Our construction schedule is full, certainly, but theres no need to panic. Just use the experience youve built and lead them with your own words. And

    I took out a sheet of paper and handed it to Geld.

    This is!

    I want to leave this construction job to you. Thats just the foundational blueprint, but I firmly believe youre up to the task. Are you up for it?

    Sir Rimuru

    This blueprint was for a gigantic structure, one I had been crafting here and there in my spare time. I showed it to Milim and the rest, tooFrey was impressed with how high it went, while Carillon rumbled his approval of the sheer majesty of the thing. Milim, meanwhile, simply loved it. This meant that all the guests whod stay here would have no problem with italthough, this was an investment in the future, provided de facto free of charge to them, so I didnt want to hear anyints anyway.

    The building was inspired by what I saw in Englesia and my drive not to lose out to them. I was picturing a skyscraper at first but changed my ns after I thought something more original and suitable for this world was in order. That was what I was leaving in Gelds able arms.

    Not that wed be hands-off, of courseGeld needed some follow-up from me, lest the weight of the job crush him. My eyes turned to Kaijin; he smiled back. Smart of him to pick up on a slimes gaze. But maybe I shouldve held this meeting in human form; not everyone can notice that so easily in my regr shape.

    Leave it to us, pal. Ill give Geld all the backup he needs, and Ill take Mildo along, too, so you can have him handle your little city nning project, huh?

    What about your current work?

    Ah, thatll be no problem. Our research has settled down a bit, and were educatin the next generation. I think Im safe leaving town for a while.

    Good. My small concerns were being whisked away by bigger issuesones I was far more excited to tackle. No way Geld would mess this up.

    Im sure youll be fine. Let me see you handle this and grow even stronger than before. Ill be happy to talk things over if you have any problems, though, so dont get too worked up about it, okay?

    B-but! Geld looked frozen, his back nailed straight up. With a job asrge as this one, what if I fail at it?

    Its fine, its fine! Even if you do, thats still gonna be vital experience for you. Nobodys gonna die doing this, and its not like itll cost any more than a typical city if it goes haywire on us, right? We can always earn it back.

    He was serious-minded, he always put in a full effort, and he always took responsibility for his actions. That was why I had to say that. Itd have the opposite effect on someonezier and less motivated than him, but it was just the advice Geld needed right now.

    Yeah! Hes right! I mean, look at me! Last time

    Last time you did what, Gobta? Minding to my officeter to tell me in detail?

    Gehh! Was this whole thing a trap for me?!

    Ugh. Gobta always wants to show off like that. At least he helped Geld loosen up a little.

    Heh Heh-heh-heh-heh. Thank you, Sir Rimuru. I suppose I was so afraid of failure that I let the little details overwhelm me. Please, allow me to take this on and live up to your expectations!

    Good to hear. Youve got the job!

    It was good to hear. Geld gave me a refreshed smile, his mind clear of concern.

    Why does he get all the attention? a clearly jealous Shion asked.

    Its the right person for the right ce, I replied. You have your own work, dont you?

    Ah yes. Cooking!

    No, you idiot!

    Mmmm Well, we all have a few things on our tes, but in your case, I wouldnt say cooking is one of them.

    I tried to be as indirect as possible. If she had one single job, I suppose itd be protecting me and this town. I mean, she had her own good points, too. Were all good and bad at different things. No need to freak out about it.

    But look, Shion, Benimaru said, getting ready to end the conversation, you have an almost unfair amount of strength, enough to even beat me depending on the circumstances. So when Im gone, please keep Sir Rimuru safe and sound, all right?

    Our reporting was just about done. I could have wrapped things up there, but while we had the chance, I figured wed listen to an update from Diablo about his own work.

    Very well, he said with a respectful bow as he began.

    His update on worldwide trends and how they influenced us was the same as Rigurd and Soeis. He must have picked up on the same info, but a little confirmation was always nice. Itd all tie in with establishing Yohms im to the throne eventually.

    He also told us about Yohm, the man who would be king. He had no education on how to act like a noble, much less king, so there was no way he could negotiate directly with all those high-borns. Instead, Edmaris, the former king, had joined Diablos cause and was in the midst of providing a crash course to the guy. Sounded good to me. With Diablo watching, I doubted the former king would try any funny stuff. Depending on how things worked out, it might be pretty neat to befriend Edmaris and take advantage of him. That would probably help Yohm out as well.

    So as I listened to Diablo brief the rest of the room, I made a mental note to go see this man Edmaris for myself sometime.

    The new king, to no ones surprise, was lurking around behind the scenes.

    Itll be a while before he makes any moves, though, right?

    At least several months, I figured, before he could regroup his forces and take real action. But Diablo disagreedor at least had an answer well beyond my own imagination.

    Heh-heh-heh-heh I would like to have this done sooner rather thanter, so I am taking measures that will encourage him to hurry it up.

    Huh? He was smiling at me again. Do we need to prepare for something?

    No problems there. I have let Sir Benimaru organize the forces we will deploy when the time is right.

    Yes, Benimaru casually replied, we are all set to go there. One force that will mingle with the general public and make its presence known, and one force operating in the shadows. Both are ready for action. The selection process was quite a pain, actually. Nearly everyone volunteered for this mission.

    They all seemed so informal about it, like they were figuring out what time to meet at the park for a pic. Its a little more important than that, I thought

    However, Diablo said as his smile faded, there is a I wouldnt call it a problem, but something that does concern me slightly. I didnt report it since it was not worth reporting at the time, but Reyhiem has yet to return.

    Ohhh, right. I thought I was forgetting something. I sent a rather pointed message to Hinata, and I still hadnt received a reply.

    Thats the archbishop we let travel to the Holy Church to report to them, right? Did he not make it or something?

    No, he had reached the Englesian capital apanied by my agents, crystal ball in hand. There is a preset transport gate there that leads directly to the Church headquarters in the Holy Empire of Lubelius, so he should have arrived safely.

    The road from Farmus to Englesia was a two-week journey by wagon, hugging the coastline the whole way. Adding Lubelius to the trip would tack on another three weeks or sobut this world has magic. Between the two nations was a pair of transport gates, special magical pathways. Go through one and traverse the alternate dimension inside, and you can travel from one end to the other in an instant. Only a small handful of elites even knew about these gates, but Reyhiem, as an archbishop for arge nation, would likely be one of them. No doubt he had ess, too; once he entered Englesia, he reportedly made a beeline for the capital.

    He had absolutely used the gate there. The greater demon Diablo summoned to tail him said so himself. The city had a barrier over it, so a greater demon breaking in could cause a furor, so he simply watched Reyhiem go inside the gate and reported it back to Diablo.

    And he hasnt left the capital since?

    No. Weve kept the city under watch, so we should be briefed once he does emerge from it

    but that hadnt happened yet. Reyhiem must be stuck in the Church. I began to fear the worst.

    Did they kill him to shut him up, maybe?

    I have not detected any such thing as of yet. My Tempter skill can seize the soul of anyone it has thrall over the moment they die.

    If there was no soul to harvest, he must still be alive. I was starting to get a little scared of Tempter, but never mind that.

    I imagined Reyhiem wouldve been safe in Lubeliuss capital, what with the Temple Knights undoubtedly guarding him. But he still wasnt back. The Churchs inquiry couldve just been taking a while; maybe this wasnt cause for rm yet, but it did bother me a little. But hey, if hes alive, then fine. As long as they didnt kill him and me us for it, its all good.

    So we still dont really know what the Western Holy Church is up to?

    No sir. They may try to interfere with my ns, but at the moment, it is difficult to say. I will be sure to remain on high alert and deal with whatever we discover.

    Good. A little daunting, though. Theres too little intelligence to read the situation very well.

    If we had enough info, I couldve just left it all to Raphael, besides.

    My apologies, my lord, Soei stated, looking frustrated. Attempting to infiltrate Lubelius is, sadly, a dangerous proposition

    Oh, no, no, youre fine! Pushing yourself too hard never aplishes anything!

    If we were going to sneak into the nerve center of the Holy Church, sworn enemy of monsters, Soei himself would be our only candidate. Even then, if Hinata was there, Id be sorely anxious for him. Soka and the others wouldnt have a chance; theyd be discovered and executed in short order. I had strict orders in ce not to go overboard with this kind of thing.

    Still, though

    You think were gonna be enemies now?

    The message I recorded painted a picture ofin so many wordsputting the whole ruckus from before firmly behind us. I taunted them a tiny bit, too, but hey, I needed to have a little fun, right? Or not? Maybe that was a bad idea, but it was out of my hands now. No undo button to press.

    The overall message was friendly, though, so I was pretty sure thats how theyd take it. Hinata was intelligent enough to make the right decision, I believed. If she opted to live alongside us without hostility, thatd be the most ideal thing.

    For now, outside of the Octagram, the Church was the biggest threat out there. The Eastern Empire seemed kinda fishy, too, but they were unlikely to take action for now. If the Western Holy Church could do the same for us, Diablos ns were all but aplished already.

    That is a thorny question, Benimaru said. Personally, I would prefer to have this dispute firmly settled, rather than leave any grudges behind.

    I appreciated his feedback, but if we were defeated, it was all over, so lets keep it peaceful, okay?

    Shuna gave me a thoughtful look. You know, Sir Rimuru, we were attacked while you were fighting the Saint Hinata. These attacks were undoubtedly timed, and someone needed to n that out in advance. Plus, yman himself hinted at the presence of someone behind the scenes

    She helped me recall someone I really shouldnt be forgetting about. The big man upstairs.

    Him, huh?

    Yes, said Hakuro, bitterly nodding. And now that we know this someone exists and is trying to entrap us, we will need to consider his uing moves as well. Now is no time to let our guards down.

    No, Shuna said, nodding with the crowd, no time to let anyone escape our attention.

    Yeah And if that guys involved, Hinata might take action, too.

    But something didnt seem right to me. You know that feeling? The suspicion youre overlooking something? And then it struck me all at oncethis thing eating at me.

    Say, what if Hinata didnt attack me on her own volition? What if she was asked by someone or ordered to?

    How do you mean?

    Given the timing, Shuna asked as she traced my line of thought, isnt it clear Hinata is connected to this other person?

    That only strengthened my suspicion.

    Well, honestly, I really dont think Hinata was taking orders from someone, but what do you think? Even if she was connected to that someone, dyou think shed take orders from him?

    ?!

    I heard a couple gasps from the audience.

    That woman didnt bother listening to a word I said. Why would she listen to a request, or especially an order, from anyone else?

    Good point, pal, Kaijin replied. Shes captain of the Crusaders; who would she ever take orders from? The only one shed ever listen to is the god Luminus herself. I mean, everybody knows that not even the Church leader can corral her; am I right?

    If Hinata answered to nothing but divinity, that put her at the top of the Churchdder. That eliminated the operating on orders idea.

    Yeah, you see? She sure didnt listen to me at all. I really cant imagine her taking orders.

    Which meant, if you looked at it the other way, if we could convince Hinata fighting was a bad idea, we didnt have to sh with the Church at all.

    Orders from no one, huh? mused Benimaru.

    So, added Shuna, the attack timing was just a coincidence?

    Or something the Church took very keen advantage of, Diablo muttereda very demon-like theory, but it made sense. I couldnt imagine Hinata being taken advantage of, but it was still a possibility.

    Perhaps Diablo is right, and someone was inspiring Hinata to do what she did. The mystery mastermind may be involved, too. But

    But you doubt said mastermind was in a position to order her around?

    Exactly, I said, nodding at Diablo.

    Benimaru closed his eyes, considering my suggestion. So this mastermind drove Farmus to action, manipted yman, and tried to destroy our nation. But he didnt have that kind of free control over Hinata, then?

    Does that mean, Sir Rimuru, you dont expect any moves from the Western Holy Church at this time?

    Thats the thing, Diablo

    I couldnt answer his question.

    From her point of view, it shouldve been clear to Hinata that we, and the Church, should avoid being enemies. I clearly stated that in my message to herI didnt want to oppose them at all, and since we had a disaster-ss threat in me and a catastrophe-ss one in Veldora, Hinata couldnt be stupid enough to take on Tempest. Just look at the stakes; she would aplish nothing. Even if she won, all shed earn from it was more fame, and that wouldnt nearly make up for the massive losses the Church would face. It just wasnt sane to wage war if you had nothing to gain from it. Hinata didnt like listening to people, but she had to see that, at least.

    But I still had my concerns. There was this certain annoying dragon thing next to me mumbling Luminus This gods name was Luminus? I feel like Ive heard that before and so on, which kept interrupting my train of thought, but I still had my concerns.

    Hinata told me that we were a bother to her. Thats because the teachings of the Holy Churchof Luminismdictate that life alongside monsters is impossible. But that might not be the whole story

    Why did Hinata call us a bother? Because Luminism refused to acknowledge us. But if that was the only reason, it just didnt seem rational of heror to put it another way, it wasnt like Hinata at all. There had to be something else. And while this is the exact opposite of what I just said, what if there was some mastermind behind it all? Someone besides Hinata, who also sees us as a bother to their ns? What would that someone want?

    Report. There is an increased possibility that multiple motives are at ce. All these events are interconnected. However, it is estimated that they are not all urring by the will of a single entity.

    Um, meaning?

    Understood. Considering the nations, people, factions, and other factors involved, several goals can be categorized. These goals may seem to match one another at first nce, but several contradictions are present as well. It would be unnatural to unify everything under the banner of a single mastermind.

    So its not just one mastermind. Thats the core of it, and hearing it that way, it made sense.

    yman was being controlled by another part of the cabal, then? Ah yes. That did make sense, if you thought about it. They simply worked together for amon goal; yman wasnt following any specific orders or anything. Maybe they were just giving each other little suggestions or shoves in the right direction. In fact, Hinata might not have been involved with him at all.

    It did seem more natural to assume more than one yer was running around. Plus, if these factions changed, some yers may no longer want to put up a fight. Thats how international politics worked; it wasnt something that operated on passing emotions.

    So

    To yman, we were nothing but a botherbut at the same time, he tried to take advantage of us. He wouldve loved it if Hinata and I knocked each other out.

    To Farmus, I, as overseer of Tempest, was a bother. They didnt want to destroy us; they wanted us to fall under their rule. They hoped Hinata would take me out and wouldve loved it if she had.

    So where does Hinatas heart lie? In terms of being a Luminism adherent, she wasnt about to ignore a monster nation.

    These were the three frames of mind that drove the whole situationand in the end, I fled from Hinata, Farmus retreated, and yman died. Which brings us to now.

    The situation that attracted these masterminds in the first ce had changed. yman was gone, and the person behind him mustve been busy reconstructing what little fighting force he had left.

    Would this guy still want to directly fight me?

    Understood. The possibility of taking such action is likely low. If the masterminds powers exceeded ymans, he would have be involved well ahead of when he did. Even if he was preserving his own powers this entire time, involvement would mean little by now, after such a grave strategic defeat.

    So theres no reason toe after me. Not like this guy in the shadows would decide to go reveal himself now, long after the fact. Whether he wanted to make aeback or not, he knew a frontal assault on me definitely wasnt the way to do it.

    What about the other factions?

    King Edmaris was off the throne, his ambitions crushed. The new king was doingsomething, and there were those among the administration who certainly wished us harm. We were a bother to them, no doubt, and there was a good chance they hadnt given up on taking us out of the picture. But Diablo was watching them. If they were trying to be a new mastermind, they were sure taking their time with it. I doubted they were a threat, although you couldnt dere them down for the count. Maybe someone among them was hiding a darker, more sinister aspect. This is why dealing with human beings is such a pain sometimes.

    The Western Holy Church was beingpletely opaque. Judging by Reyhiems missing-in-action status, things mustve been pretty chaotic in there. Was Hinata struggling to cope with this, too? If she didnt have a clear and present reason to oppose us, there wasnt much reason to take action. But what if she does take action? Itd mean something was forcing her hand.

    Report. It must not be forgotten that there is a high possibility of multiple people working in the background.

    Yeah. Good point. And if there were, whether Hinata wanted it or not, things could keep on moving forward. Guess optimism right now wasnt such a good idea.

    Perhaps, because there are multiple interests at stake here, we should work on the assumption that it is not solely Hinatas decision to make?

    Diablo mustve arrived atrgely the same conclusion I had.

    Well said, Diablo. I was just about to say that myself.

    It was Raphael who saved my ass, of course, but no need to reveal that much. Maybe Diablos a hell of a lot smarter than I thought? I was using Mind elerate to rev up my brain a million times ahead of normal, and Diablo had arrived at the same conclusion at roughly the same time. Without Raphael, Id be eating his dust.

    Heh-heh-heh-heh In that case, we had best keep a close eye on the Western Holy Churchs meddling this time, as well.

    He pretty much was already, I knew, so maybe the warning I was about to make didnt really matter. Still, the rest of my team deserved to hear it.

    We might just be making a big mistake, though.

    How so? Benimaru asked. The rest of my cab was watching me closely, too. I definitely needed us all on the same page here.

    Like Diablo just said, there might be more than one man upstairs. Chances are that the current status quo is the result of multiple interests working on the same ying field. This time, too, different yers are after different goals, so we shouldnt assume our opposition is all gonna act the same way, you know?

    My team nodded their approval. If that exnation was enough to get my point across, theyre pretty damn quick on the uptake, too. Except for Gobta, given how he was napping at the moment. That was almost a relief to see. Hes still getting punishedter, though.

    And you think these multiple interests are linked with the one yman spoke of?

    I dont know, Benimaru. But we cant decide on anything yet. Working on unfounded assumptions when theres not enough data is dangerous, I think.

    I shrugged. Being in my slime state, it just looked like a few ripples pulsing across my body.

    Thatd make sense, though, Kaijin added, convinced. Like, if Hinata was moving based on obligations, not necessarily orders.

    Heh-heh-heh-heh In that case, I will investigate further. It was the merchants who provided Edmaris and his ministers with their information, but thinking about it, that should have raised my suspicions.

    That struck a chord.

    Hang on. The merchants?

    Is something bothering you, Sir Rimuru?

    Well, I mean, Farmus invaded us to boost their coffers. War has a way of moving money around, and you always have people trying to profit off it. Maybe some of the merchants are working behind the scenes to get a piece of that action?

    I see

    That was another point wed overlooked. Our enemies might not be vast nations with huge armies at their control. Ultimately, both now and in the distant past, it was greed that led to animosity between peoples. And as long as money could be exchanged for power, the merchants needed to be monitored as well.

    I leaped off my seat, taking human form and surveying the audience. Then I began to hand out orders.

    Shuna, examine the ount books we recovered from ymans castle and see which merchants were frequent visitors.

    Yes, my lord.

    Diablo, pin down some of Farmuss civil servants and figure out which merchants they have the closest ties with.

    At once, my master.

    Benimaru, I want you to double-check your selections for the force were sending as Yohms reinforcements. Theyll need to be prepared for anything.

    Not a problem.

    Rigurd, Im leaving you in charge of town. Were going to hold a festival for the ages, so get the ce prepared for it.

    No need to tell me twice!

    Geld, dont worry about any of what we just talked about. Just focus on your own work. If we get in serious trouble, welle to you then, so just trust me for the time being, okay?

    Of course. Nobody in this realm would ever distrust you.

    Hakuro, you assist Benimaru. Gabil, work with Rigurd. Rigur, shake down our entire security system. We need to be prepared for all the races well be hosting soon!

    On it!

    Yes sir!

    All set!

    And, Shion, um You be my guard! Yeah, that!

    Absolutely!

    Clearly, I was on a roll. I gave Ranga a pat on the head as I smiled, satisfied. This should work; everyone can handle their own business now.

    And what of myself?

    Oh yeah, uh, Veldora, stay out of everyones way.

    It shall be done!

    I doubted it. Him, Ill need to keep a personal eye on. Oh, and

    Gobta, I know youre tired out, bute see me in my office.

    Gahh!

    Seeing my smile first thing after I shook him awake mustve spooked him a little.

    Ah well. Even after bing a demon lord, these meetings never seemed to change very much.

 Volume 7 - Ch 3

    THE SAINTS ANTICIPATION

    On that day, the world knew true terror once more. Veldora, the Storm Dragon, was reborn.

    It had been formally revealed by the Western Holy Church, not long after the Guild announced the most recent missive from the demon lords. They had gone from ten to eight, forming an Octagram, and this alone was enough to spread chaos worldwide. It wasnt long before the kings of all nations were faced with vast, headache-inducing changes in the world situationchanges that would continue for days on end.

    The Western Holy Church itself was experiencing unrest like none in recent memory.

    Several days after Hinata Sakaguchis battle with Rimuru, contact with Archbishop Reyhiem was cut off as he apanied his kingdoms military deployment. He was required to submit regr reports, and if those reports were missing, something must have been going wrong with the Tempest invasion.

    When informed of this, Hinata immediately decided that a personal visit to Tempest was in order. But just as she did, she received a divine missive to guard the cathedral instead. Veldora, the Storm Dragon, was the reason. Thus, despite expecting her Crusader forces to assemble before her shortly, she was prevented from deploying when she wanted to.

    Exactly who this proved to benefit the most was a question worthy of debate. An unprepared Hinata challenging Veldora to a duel would surely result in defeat. If she was aware of the dragons presence, however, and could devise a lucid strategy for invading Tempest, that nation could very well be taken while Rimuru was still absent.

    Tempest was Hinatas ultimate goal, not Veldora, and with the powers she had on tap, she could have made simple work of it. The ball was in her courtbut only if she gave due consideration to Veldoras subsequent moves and Rimurus own reactions to them. Either way, though, both sides managed to avoid the worst for themselves.

    It was a city enveloped in a calming light, a holy metropolis protected by a divine barrier.

    This barrier had been the subject of research over many years, adjusted and perfected until it boasted the highest level of protection in thend. It prevented all outside enemies from invading, dutifully fulfilling that obligation for the past thousand years. It was, in a way, the personification of the prayers of everyone who lived inside it. It could even block out the sun itself, automatically adjusting the light levels inside the bubble as neededbrighter by day, dimmer by night. The temperature inside was kept at a near constant all year, producing cooler summers and warmer winters, while thepartmentalized farnds inside could produce seasonal crops at almost any time.

    It was a utopia, one whose residents never had to worry about starvation. Every child received a level ofpulsory education, and every adult was provided with a job. Its society had achievedplete harmony, its paradise monitored by thew and order that ruled over it.

    This was Lune, the Holy City, capital of the Holy Empire of Lubelius. The day after thest Walpurgis, Hinata was walking the path toward its main cathedral. The surrounding air was pleasantly warm, tempered by the solemnity of the atmosphere. Thisnd was a bountiful one. No one starved; there were no beggars at the side of the streets. Everyone was provided a suitable role, carrying it out to the fullest. They all awoke to the same bells and slept at the same time. The more capable of theborers assisted the less able. And all was managed in perfect harmony, guaranteeing the happiness of every citizen that lived and breathed inside.

    It was an ideal, equal society, one granted under the name of their god, and the city spread out before her eyes was thepleted, physical form of that ideal.

    Hinata observed the faces of the people passing by. They were all smiles, each looking calm and serene. But something concerned her.

    To her, this holynd was truly the ideal city. It was her lofty goal to make the Western Nations, and eventually the whole world, a peaceful, war-free society. She craved and where the strong no longer had to prey upon the weak to survive. Reality, however, was all too bleak. The Kingdom of Englesia and the Holy Empire of Lubelius were far, far too different from each other. It made Hinata doubt herself every time. The freedom of Englesia, the harmony of Lubelius. Two nations that seemed to contradict each other in every way, from their political systems to their core principles.

    And nothing made the difference as stark as the looks on the children in eachnd. She could hear some of them near the educational facilities built adjacent to the cathedral. A few of them, perhapste for ss, were running down the pathway toward the building, the faster ones pulling the arms of theggards. It was amon sight, certainly not cause for rm. But Hinata could spot the disparity present in the picture.

    What was Englesia like? She recalled what she saw there. It was morning at the time when she spotted children smiling as they wriggled past the school gate just before the morning bell. Anyone caught dawdling before it was closed would no doubt face a lecture from their instructors shortly. Here, though, those who made it in time taunted the stragglers, beaming proudly. Now what would have happened if they tried running hand in hand, like in Lubelius? The answer was cleartheyd all wind upte, facing the headmasters wrath. She knew this was a silly yardstick to makeparisons with. The kids could avoid all this if they just woke up a few minutes earlier. But she couldnt stop thinking about it.

    Where was the difference? Were the faster kids bullies? No. They picked on the slower ones, but there wasnt any air of superiority involved. Even the stragglers shed embarrassed smiles back at them. Even with those stern headmaster lectures, they still seemed to be having fun with their lives. But what would happen over on Lubelius? All the children running to ss wore the same expression. That calm, serene smile of satisfaction, just like the grown-ups. That total disinterest inpetition or personal expression; all the same face.

    A fully managed society can provide happiness, but it cannot provide freedom. They were all equals, carrying out their appointed tasks, the haves providing ample support to the have-nots. Thisnds people fullypleted it.

    That was Hinatas goalcreating an equal, conflict-free society. A world where no children would ever be abandoned by their parents, where everyone was allowed to live in happiness. It was an ideal, Hinata knew, not a realistic concept. But whenever she felt ready to give up on it entirely, the sheer idea of Lubelius presented itself to her. Competition bred conflict, andpetition did not exist in this fully managed society. It was, in other words, Hinatas ideals put to action.

    The Holy Empire of Lubeliuss political system was fairly close tomunism. With their god the head of state, they had established total equality among all members of society. This god was the Papacy, the organization that represented the Holy Emperor.

    Communisms greatest weakness was the unavoidable presence of a ruling ss above everyone else. The government was forced to sing the praises of equality while actually maintaining a hierarchy in practice. If corruption began to rot the upper ss, it was difficult for the masses to rectify that. It would lead to unequal distribution of goods, expanding the disparity.

    Divinity was Lubeliuss solution to this problem. The Papacy was, by definition, a superior existence from the very beginning, so inequality among the people would theoretically not be an issue. The rulers, of course, handled matters like diplomacy with other states, but under their god, all were equal. It was a con, yes, but a con that had served as reality for the Holy Empire over a millennium of history. It had served as an ideal like none could before it, and there was a good reason for it

    Luminus, the god ruling over all of this, was actually the demon lord Luminus Valentine.

    Luminus Valentine, the absolute monarch, the flesh-and-blood demon lord, the Queen of Nightmares and ruler of nightand the only adversary Hinata had ever lost to.

    In front of an absolute ruler, all people held equal value. To Luminus, this concept of a fully managed society was akin to a farmer taking care of his livestock. But this was exactly why the whole utopia worked at all.

    As vampires, Luminus and her kin didnt tear people apart to live off their flesh. All they needed was a little blood to ingest, using the life force inside it to sustain themselves. The higher the vampires rank, the less of this blood they needed as they lived their eternal lives.

    It was said the blood of those they preyed upon tasted sweeter the happier the donor was. Compared with other nations, people had it pretty good here. If a donor gave up a lot of life force at once, that would be a problem, but Luminus ced strict prohibitions on that. Thus, order was fully kept in this nation, since the lower-level vampires had no way to defy the will of Luminus far above them. Everything was equal, far more so than the Western Nations could ever manage.

    It was what made Hinata believe in the equality ever present in Luminism, using justice as her credo when she joined the Church. Now she was one of its most fervent missionaries, believing its core ts to be absolute. As a pdin, tasked with providing equal salvation to the people, she wanted justice to prevail with anything she did.

    Shizue Izawa, her teacher, was far toox byparison, and the structure devised by Yuuki Kagurazaka, the boy from the samend as her, was too fantastic a dream to be treated at all seriously. It simply handled issues as they arose, failing to offer any real preventative measures. Seeking to improve oneself was audable endeavor, and she had kind words for the Free Guilds cooperative approach. But given its reliance on fees in exchange for work, equality seemed like a lost cause with them.

    Thus, Hinata left the tutge of her teacher. Shizue told Hinata to count on her if she ever lost her way, but that wasnt going to happen. That would be depending on her too much. If she kept depending on Shizue, Hinata vaguely thought, itd ruin her.

    The only thing she could rely upon in this world was her own power. Thus, Hinata sought the kind of power that nobody else could ever hope for.

    She had a natural fear of carrying anything precious with her, lest she lose anything else. She didnt deal with other people; power was her only desire. She had be a pdin a mere year after joining the Western Holy Church, then its corps captain less than two yearster, building up what wasuded as the most powerful Crusader group in history with her own two hands.

    But the higher she rose through Church ranks, the more she saw what it really was. And then she found whaty at the essence of Luminism. The Holy Emperor Lubelius was actually a vampire by the name of Louis. Even more shocking to her, this Louis was the elder twin brother of none other than the demon lord Roy Valentine. Conspiring with a demon lord to retain your powernothing could have been more ridiculous, more contemptuous of its people.

    It enraged Hinata when she learned of itenough so that she went into the Inner Cloister alone to purge both Roy and Louis. The resulting battle left her with mortal wounds, forcing her to lie there and wait for her death. There she was, with her little sense of justice, her weak power, unable to save anyone. The benevolence of choosing whom to save, because you cant save them all. It seemed soical, so pointless to her.

    Hehheh-heh-heh So much for me. The weak are always doomed to die weak. But at least I rid the world of one obstacle

    But even soHinata believed she didnt make the wrong decision. She reduced the amount of evil in this world; she had nothing to be ashamed of. That, by itself, left her satisfied.

    As her sight grew dim, Hinata could hear the sound of light footsteps. She thought it was her mind ying tricks on her, but then a clear, refreshing voice serenaded her.

    I could hear this racket in my own bedchamber. What are all of you doing?

    Before her was a radiant young girl with silver hair. Her heterochromatic blue-and-red eyes shone eerily, coldly looking down on Hinata and the others on the floor. The aura floating around her was on another level, making Louis and Roywhom she had just fought to the death and beyondlook like children.

    ?!

    Hinata, face-to-face with death, was overwhelmed by her presence, this beauty beyond all humanprehension. This clear, transparent presence, so far away from her.

    She had the dignity of the upper ss, the air of someone used to ruling over others. Good and evil seemed like trifles when presented to her. And as if to prove that:

    And you two think you can die and leave me behind?

    The waves of force emanating from her revived Roy the demon lord and Louis the emperor, despite the lethal blows Hinata knew shednded. It was a supernatural power, one Hinata had no knowledge of.

    Its over Everything I have done

    Despair filled her heart, as the me of life began to flicker away

    And you as well, human. You will not be allowed to die with that pride in your mind. What is justice? Justice is not about crushing evil. Who do you think you are, deciding whether I engage in evil or not? There is no such thing as a justice that can satisfy all forms of free will. It is arrogant to think you can do otherwise. Am I wrong?

    The words beat against Hinatas eardrums as a warm light descended upon her, saving her life. There, as her wounds seemed to magically disappear, the girl spoke.

    You have one week. If you are powerful enough to defeat my closest confidants, you can certainly ovee the Seven Days Trial. Only then will I seriously deign to engage you.

    She took the trial. Shepleted it, Usurping the powers of those she studied under to obtain superhuman strength.

    And then, wagering her life for the attemptshe lost to that young girl, Luminus Valentine, and capitted to her.

    But even with that defeat, the sword refused to break. Instead, it grew more flexible, strongerand with it, Hinata was reborn, as a divine sword, the right hand of divinity, the yer of all travails.

    To Hinata, the presence of Luminus was all that mattered. Luminus was the key to an equal, fair society, and losing her would mean the destruction of all order. Maintaining a utopia required constant effort and resolve, and along those lines, Hinata was a double-edged sword. If Luminus ever became the enemy of humanity, Hinata would have to y her with her sword. It seemed impossible, but she was resolved to do it. That was why now, even today, she continued to put herself up to the trial.

    Soon, Hinata had reached her destination. There, waiting for her, was Louis, the Holy Emperor who was now a kindred soul. He had unbelievable news for her.

    My brother diedst night.

    Last night.

    Hinata had chased off an unknown intruder in the cathedral that night. She was meant to meet with someone else, but after Luminuss missive made her cancel all that, she changed her ns. That, fortunately, allowed her to end the night without dirtying the holynds with anyone elses blood. Or so she thought.

    Youre joking, right? Roy is a demon lord. He was at the Walpurgis Council.

    I speak the truth, Hinata. Roy returned earlier than Lady Luminus, and the intruder you let escape ran into him first.

    No. That intruder fled the moment he saw me. He was so fast that I wasnt able to give chase, but

    Indeed, perhaps you thought it was just a diversion. Lady Luminus charged you with defending the holynds, not with killing intruders. That is the job of our Imperial Guard, as worthless as they have just proven themselves.

    The guard that Im chief knight of. But Roy, being killed by someone on that level? Whos the worthless one now?

    Sheughed boldly, right in front of the Holy EmperorRoys elder brother.

    Luminus Valentine was the true demon lord, the twin brothers Louis and Roy her close confidants. Louis ruled the external world as its Holy Emperor, while Roy ruled behind the scenes as demon lord. Luminus, meanwhile, governed over everything as a god.

    This was the world they had pursued. It was also why Luminus preferred a policy of insr government, locking herself inside the Inner Cloister and never revealing herself in public.

    Roy, serving as her demon lord representative, had been more than powerful enough to sit alongside the other nine at the table. Simply being born a vampire made him the equivalent of a B, ranking-wise. His muscr strength, durability, reaction time, and everything else were several times better than what a human could muster, and his race gave him a multitude of excellent skills, including Steel Strength, Self-Regeneration, Shadow Motion, Paralysis, Charm, Coercion, Transform, and more. There were few vampires in the world, but even among the so-called high-level magic-born, they were a head above the crowd in fighting ability.

    Louis and Roy were elder noblemen, both in the service of their leader Luminus since ancient times. Their powers were monumental, it went without saying, and Hinata was fully aware of that. Having fought them both once, she had no doubts. This only meant one thing: Whoeverst nights intruder was, they mustve been unbelievably powerful.

    But it doesnt really matter, does it? Hinata whispered. As long as Lady Luminus is safe. Not that anyone need worry about her

    Not even Hinata could fully gauge the depths of the demon lord Luminus. She was beyond all imagination, a supreme being that served as both an ideal goal to reach and a potential opponent sometime in the future. It would be impertinent for Hinata to even bother worrying about her.

    Roy, meanwhile, was worth about as much as a pebble on the street. Not to offend Louis, but it didnt really matter whether he was killed or not. He was weak, he died, and that was that. As far as Hinata was concerned, that was his own fault.

    It does matter. We let Roy exercise his violent streak as a threat to make people adhere to Luminism. With him dead, there is a chance peoples faith in our creed may dwindle. The evil dragon Veldora is alive once more, and yet, the Forest of Jura still remains stable as well.

    You have a point

    Hinata could guess why. It was that slime she let slip through her fingers. This, she had no excuse for. It was fully her mistake, and nobody was more aware of that than she was. It was her choice to letst nights intruder go, but that slime, Rimuru, she wanted eradicated from the world for good. She couldnt help but praise him.

    I can hardly believe he managed to escape that ce. I knew you were a careful one, Rimuru, but that was nothing I could have imagined

    I cant speak about the dragon, but I imagine the forest is stable because of that slime, Rimuru, I let escape.

    Mmmm. I conducted some of my own investigation, and it has been confirmed that the Kingdom of Farmuss forces have been annihted. Counting the time back from Veldoras resurrection, it had to be the work of that Rimuru. Quite an adversary for you, wasnt he?

    I suppose the moment I saw him, encased in that Holy Field, was the best chance I had of defeating him.

    You didnt give him some discretion, perhaps, after he imed to be from your realm?

    Of course not. Lady Luminuss aims are ipatible with that slimes. I know where hesing from, and leaving him to his own devices would only wreck our ns. Thats why I chose to ignore what he had to say and instead tried to destroy his town

    So the angels will be moving soon enough.

    They will. Theyre safe for now, but if they keep developing the town at that pace, they absolutely will.

    That would be distressing. We arent ready for them yet. Id like to ensure that our victory in the next Temma War is absolute.

    I know. We need to tear those angels limb from limb, and thats why we cant afford to speed up the timetable.

    Louis nodded.

    Whenever the cities of the world developed past a certain level, the angels began to attack them. Why, nobody knew, but their actions followed a set recognizable pattern. When it happened, countless numbers of innocents diedand tobat them, Hinata had expanded her forces and devised a way to knock thempletely out of the picture. Her proselytizing for Luminism was also a way to help people work together, making their harmonic cooperation a palpable force to work with. That, she believed, was the best way to follow the will of Luminus, her god.

    Rimurus behavior was getting in the way of thatand now that she knew Rimuru was the cause of Shizue Izawas death, she had personal issues with him. There was no reason at all for her to cut him any ck. With him were his monstersintelligent, rational, and understanding of humans. It pained her a little to involve them in this, but Luminus called them her enemy, and her will was thew.

    Victory in the Temma War was of utmost priority, and to earn that, Hinata wouldnt hesitate to do what must be done. She was cold, pragmatic, and above all a rationalist.

    But perhaps your failure will turn out well in the end.

    What do you mean?

    The Western Nations will likely band together to deal with the threat in the Forest of Jura. With Roy gone, what better foe to unite the human race against?

    Do you think so? I doubt itll go that easily.

    But did he have a point? Maybe, Hinata thought, it was a good thing after all. A stable Forest of Jura was what they wanted, and if they sought to live alongside humanity, that was all for the better. But if Rimuru really did massacre the Farmus force, he was clearly a threat they couldnt afford to overlook.

    Still

    You know the Eastern merchants who brought me information. We were nning to meetst night as well. If it werent for Lady Luminuss order, I wouldnt be here right now.

    Oh? Rather good timing, then.

    Almost too good, isnt it? Those merchants were trying to use me. If you think about it, maybe keeping Rimuru alive and present was the right answer, not to make excuses.

    But the nail that sticks out gets hammered down. They may have survived the Farmus invasion, but the resurrected Storm Dragon was bound to attack Rimuru before long. Plus, Rimuru was calling himself a demon lord, apparently, which invited the rage of the other ten and earned him a ticket tost nights Walpurgis.

    I would imagine so. Until we are fully ready, Id prefer to use thatnd as a bulwark against the Eastassuming Rimuru survived the Walpurgis Council.

    Right. Do you think hell make it through?

    Lady Luminus will return soon. We will know by then.

    Having to tell her of Roys death is a depressing thought.

    Shell be in a bad state, Im sure.

    She was a lot kinder to him than I ever was

    Mmmm. I suppose Im not very kind myself. My own brother is dead, but I dont feel sad about it at all.

    Hinata just shrugged at Louis. They stopped talking, waiting for Luminus. Before very long, a herald arrived.

    Stand back! Lady Luminus has returned!

    In a sh, the cathedral became a hive of activityand soon, Hinata and Louis were going to face a conversation they never expected to have.

    Now they were at the Inner Cloister, a sacred mountain looming in the center of the Holy Empire of Lubelius. The Holy Church headquarters was at the foot of it; proceed straight through its grounds, and youll find the Holy Temple, which houses the cathedral that connects to the mountains entrance. Beyond it and up the path, the Inner Cloister loomed ahead.

    This was the holiest and most forbidden ce in all of Lubelius, even more so than the Holy Emperors official chambers.

    Rxing there was the demon lord Valentineor rather, Luminusas she recounted the previous nights events, clearly peeved.

    So thats all of it. That annoying dragon simply insists on getting in my way at every possible moment!

    Hinatas first reporting of Roys death only added to her anger. Such a stupid child, she murmured in reply, betraying no emotion whatsoever as she entered the Inner Cloister, just as regal as always. She seemed coolheaded enough as she described the Walpurgis Council, but when she reached the point where Veldora revealed her true identity, her well-defined, beautiful features reddened with anger. It was overpowering to her audience as she let out all her pent-up emotion.

    And look at Roy, too! I couldve revived him as long as I was within sight of him, but noooo

    My brother is happy, Lady Luminus. That is all that needs to be considered

    Silence! This sounds like I practically led Roy by the hand to his death!

    No, mydy. It is my brother Roys fault for failing to live up to your expectations.

    But

    If any one factor was involved, it was bad luck. Everyone in the Cloister knew it wasnt their fault.

    I apologize, Hinata said. I let that intruder go, and Roy

    So be it, replied Luminus, face tightened as she looked at her and Louis. You merely followed my orders. I am the one who deserves the me. But we dont have the time to mourn for him now. The dragon is revived, and we have a new demon lord in Rimuru. That is the undeniable truth, and we must decide how to handle it.

    Yes, mydy.

    I understand.

    Hinata and Louis nodded. This question would decide the entire direction the Holy Empire would go in the future.

    I would like to defeat Veldora for you, Hinata offered.

    Hinata, Luminus coldly replied, you have grown stronger, yes, much stronger than when you fought me. You are well past the Seven Days and on your way to equaling my level. But even if you can defeat the demon lord Rimuru, you will never defeat Veldora.

    She is right, Hinata. That is how fearsome a presence the dragon is. A true Catastrophe.

    Louis, who was there for that dragons previous rampages, agreed readily with Luminus.

    He is that powerful? But didnt the Hero seal him away?

    If a human did it once before, Hinata reasoned, it could always happen again. Luminus and Louis immediately brushed it off.

    Look, Hinata. That dragon is a form of natural energy in itself. Perhaps you could use magic to quell a raging gale, yes, but that dragon has its own free will. It cannot be cut with a sword or affected by magic. When he flies into a rage, the shock waves will ravage the earth, far more so than any of our puny magic.

    The thought seemed to genuinely dismay Luminus. Louis nodded in agreement, his face pale as if he had just recalled an ugly memory.

    It was truly a nightmare, he said. Ah, that ever so beautiful Nightrose Castle, turned into an unrecognizable pile of ashes

    Dont remind me of it, Louis. That castle was the culmination of vampire knowledge and science, and now it exists only in our memories. There is no use in craving what we cannot have.

    Quite true.

    The exchange taught Hinata just how dangerous this Veldora was. Butif ites to it, she quietly swore to herself, I will kill him.

    Then she realized something else. The whole reason the Inner Cloister was atop this holy mountain. It was to prepare for a potential Veldora attack, wasnt it? So she could constantly observe the skies and stop him before he arrives. Nightgarden, the main city in the Holy Empire, was located entirely underground for that reason as wellto prevent dragon invasions, to keep the casualties to a minimum in a fight. That was how wary Luminus was of this Storm Dragon.

    Hinata, please restrain yourself. I do not wish to lose you, too.

    And if Luminus put it that strongly to her, she had no option but to nod back.

    Now, her mishandling of that encounter with Rimuru was sticking in her throat like a sewing needle. Labeling him a monster and ignoring his attempts at conversation were both mistakes. Not in terms of what her faith taught her, or so she wanted to think, but still, her actions had led directly to this current situation. If that was what the Eastern merchants had wanted, then Hinata had fallen for it hook, line, and sinker.

    How distasteful. Giving me that information when they knew exactly how I would react. Or perhaps they have an informant of their own?

    It was hard for her to believe, but Hinata could imagine someone in the Church working with those merchants. They may know all about their preparations for the angels by nowand maybe that was why they pointed her in Rimurus direction, to take him out for them. A mole in the Church had to be something for considerationbut for now, such a thought had to be left to simmer. There were other problems to deal with.

    Very well. Butwhat will we do about Rimuru now, as demon lord?

    We have no choice but to let him be. The Church has yet to dere him a divine enemy yet, fortunately.

    No, but

    Is there a problem?

    There is. I fear the city and highways the monsters are building could cause the angels to invade more quickly.

    Ah yes, there was that. Having those little insects flitting around is annoying enough, although making the demon lord Rimuru and the Storm Dragon Veldora our enemies would be much worse. But if they attract more attention for us, theyll be the angels main target, I imagine. Either way, not much point thinking about it now.

    To Luminus, the angels were all but worthless. Hinata, understanding that, voiced her agreement.

    Beyond that, there was another problem:

    There is also the fact that their town It turns the concept of monsters being humanitysmon enemy, one of Luminisms core ts, on its head.

    The question made Luminus visibly scowl. She mulled it over a moment. This was no longer an easily quashed threat, but if they let their religious ts be defanged like this, they would lose their validityand their appeal to the masses. The faith they had spent thest thousand years building would be lost, and that could not be allowed to pass.

    Perhaps, Louis suggested, he could serve as a useful aplice for us? As an evil demon lord?

    It was a thought he had shared with Hinata earlierlet Rimuru serve as a propaganda heel, much like how Roy acted as demon lord. But as Hinata expected, Luminus was less than enthusiastic.

    That could not happen. Rimuru, this new demon lord He just wants to have fun living in his own little nation. Thats all. Hes going right up to our faces and dering that hell give the humans all the protection they want. Because he needs their help. He said it himself. Anyone who gets in the way of that, whether a person or a demon lord or the Holy Church, is my enemy.

    She let out a forlorn sigh.

    If only he wasnt mingling with the human race all the time, Louis, that would be such a good idea, she said with frustration.

    And Hinata realized, once and for all, that Rimuru wasnt lying. He really was a transfer from another world. But it was toote to act on that.

    She was fully aware that she had acted on incorrect assumptions, fueled by herck of interest in listening to others. It was a bad habit, and it just blew up in her face big-time. At least nobody seemed to know that the god Luminus was the same person as the demon lord Valentine yet. If worse came to worst, only her own life would be forfeit.

    For now, then, all we can do is sit and watch.

    Youre right. Simply hold ourselves as we always do. No brash moves. The more excuses we make, the more we may entangle ourselves. Our only responsibility is giving our faithful across the world the truthVeldora, the Storm Dragon, is back.

    And what about Rimuru?

    As Hinata brooded, Luminus and Louis were already deciding on their future policies.

    Yes Well, Rimuru seems the sort of leader open to political exchange. We could deceive the Western Nations easily enough. Are you fine with that, Hinata?

    It was a question, but Luminus meant it as predecided policy.

    I am.

    Would he bear a grudge against you?

    A little. I did try to kill him.

    Ah yes, you did. But Rimuru is not stupid enough to hold that against us to the point of bing enemies.

    Such was the will of Luminusa leader who didnt even mind if Rimuru knew her true colors. But Hinata was unconvinced.

    I will keep that in mind, Hinata said, attempting to hide her real thoughts as she left.

    A little over a month passed. Hinata spent it tirelessly at work. Her pdins were busy building a line of defense against Veldora, while the Imperial Guard was out gathering intelligence for her. Those merchants from the East, once a vital part of this spywork, could no longer be trusted, and so she decided to rely only on info she could personally gather herself.

    Now it was time for the empires monthly conference between both major groups of the Papacythe Crusaders, the pdins under Hinatas direct control, and the Master Rooks, the Imperial Guard forces serving the Holy Emperor. They were both the pride of Lubelius, with Hinata Sakaguchi standing at the very peak.

    She served as the conference speakerHinata, chief knight of the Master Rooks and captain of the Crusaders, not to mention the strongest knight in the nation. A high seat was prepared for her; all the other attendees chairs were situated in a semicircle around her.

    To her right were six people representing the Crusaders. First was Vice Captain Renard Jester, known as the Noble of Light, a pdin with a soft, intive expression. Next to him was Arnaud Bauman of Air, the manuded as second strongest only to Hinata. He stood head and shoulders above the rest of the troop leaders, serving as a sort of assault-team specialist for the Crusaders.

    Following Arnaud were four othermanding officers: Bhus of Earth, arge brooding man gifted at smashing his magic-infused Holy Mace into his foes; Litus of Water, a beautiful healer and elementalist who employed the holy spirit Undine on the battlefield; Garde of Fire, a tall knight and conjurer who wielded his ming Red Spear; and Fritz of Wind, a magical fighter as talented in wind magic as with his twin swords. He was a tactical trickster, a rarity among the high-minded Crusaders he served alongside. Fritz never wore his uniform up to the prescribed code of perfection, but no one admired and respected Hinata as much as he.

    Each of thesemanders led a team of twenty or so pdins, while Arnaud served as their overall leader. The five seated here were the best among the hundred and ten or so pdins, and there was no doubting their talents.

    Contrasting with them, on Hinatas left side, were the Master Rooks, a much more ragtag assemge in a motley variety of uniforms and armor. They numbered a mere thirty-three but still formed their own division, for each one was a powerhouse in battlerooks, as the Holy Emperor proudly called them. They all ranked at least an A on the charts, and a few of them were even champion level, a Cmity on the threat scale.

    A few were particrly notable. There was Blue Sky Saare, who looked like an innocent boy but was older than anyone else in the room. He was the chief knight of the Imperial Guard before Hinata took the role.

    Then there was Giant Boulder Grigori, Saares right-hand man, whose Impervious skill granted him astonishing physical resilience. His muscles were his weapon, and they were harder than most types of metal, making him an impregnable fortress of a man.

    Last but not least was Raging Sea Glenda, who was newer to the fold than Hinata but had made a serious name for herself in recent years. Notable for her spiky red hair, she was a wild woman, an ex-mercenary whose fighting skills were still veiled in mystery. Only Rama, the person who had ceded his post to Glenda after she defeated him, knew about her full strengths. This trio was known as the Three Battlesages, and they sat together opposite the six pdins.

    The nine were all literal superhumans, far beyond the framework one would think the human body could provide. They all were certified Saints, a sort ofplement to a demon lord, and with Hinata, they were collectively known simply as the Ten Great Saints.

    Whenever a person engaged in grueling training in one subject or another, they would asionally evolve into a higher form of existence uponpleting such a trial. Aplishing this made them Enlightened, greatly extending their life span and transforming their physical bodies into something like a half-spiritual life-form. They were released from flesh and blood, in other words, and thus the amount of energy Enlightened individuals could work with was enormous. Their brute and magical strength was powered up to levels beyondpare, letting them be the equivalent of potential demon lords.

    They were the guardians of humanity, the servants of divinity who evolved the correct wayeven if this was only by the standards of certain people.

    They all sat there quietly, awaiting Hinatas arrival. Several pdins were stationed behind eachmanding officer, the rest of the two divisions remaining on their feet in their assorted gear.

    Soon, the heavy door creaked open.

    Sorry to keep you. Let us begin.

    With that, the meetingmenced.

    Behind Hinata, shaded by some bamboo blinds, the Holy Emperor Louis was taking in the joint conference at his seat. But just as proceedings were set to begin, Saare immediately threw them into disorder.

    Whoa, whoa, where do you get off beingte? Not only did you fail to keep Veldora from waking up, you even let a new demon lord be born. And youre the fool representing us? If this is a joke, Im notughing.

    Even though Hinata was the acknowledged leader, not all her soldiers were particrly enthusiastic about the orders they carried out. Saare, having lost his position as their leader, was the head of the anti-Hinata faction.

    Over the past month, both divisions had been sent off worldwide by Hinata on a wealth of missions, bringing back assorted intelligence and confirming that the rash of recent cataclysmic events were all connected. The ascension of Rimuru, the Storm Dragons revival, the Walpurgis Council, and the recent turbulence in the Kingdom of Farmusall these happenings had their origin in Hinata reaching out to Rimuru, and Saare wasnt shy about implying as much.

    You are being rude, Sir Saare, a bemused Renard coldly stated.

    Arnaud nodded to his fellow pdin. Hes right, boy. If you have an issue with our captain, Id be happy to work it out with you.

    Oh, Grigori fired back from his seat next to Saare, you fancy-pants knights wanna start a fight with us? Awfully pretentious of you, considering you only act that way around opponents polite enough to lose on purpose!

    What?

    You seem interested in a quick death.

    The meeting had grown almost immediately intense. Hinata took the opportunity to cool it down.

    Enough foolishness. Nows not the time for allies to be squabbling with each other. Saare, if youd like to take my ce up here, youre wee to my seat anytime. Ill need to test you out first, though, keep in mind.

    That was enough to bring silence back to the room. Her words went beyond mere frustration and well into the realm of murderous intentif they kept carrying on, she was fully prepared to start shing away. The audience was smart enough to pick up on that. It was rare for her to show that much emotion, forcing even Saare to admit that any more prodding would be dangerous.

    Instead, he just red at her in frustration. Pfft! Ill keep that in mind.

    He had already lost to her oncea battle he never should have botched. In his eyes, Hinata was the clear underdog, but the results proved the opposite. The memory of that day kept him from making any unwise moves. Until she could probe and reveal the secrets of Hinatas strength, he knew victory would never be his. So he did her bidding for now, uninterested in waging a war he couldnt win.

    With Saare calmed down, the joint mission finally began.

    Reporting, said Litus, freshly returned from field work around the Forest of Jura. The forest was a perfect picture of peace. Despite Veldoras resurrection, I spotted groups of merchants entering and exiting the area.

    The caravans from Blumund were streaming into the Tempest capital of Rimuru on a near-constant basis. The nations trademark healing potions were hot sellers, but merchants were also standing in line for rare goods like silk fabric and weapons made from monster-derivedponents.

    How is that working? Are they engaging in trade with the demon lord?

    We should think about Veldora first. The records say he is extremely belligerent, causing a swath of destruction wherever he goes, but I havent seen any sign of that yet.

    Hinata raised a hand to wave the questions off. Let us hear the report to the end.

    Very well. I spoke with the merchants, and they said the kingdom of Blumund had dered full and open rtions with Tempest. This includes a security guarantee, and Blumunds citizens are allowed toe and go as they please. The highway connecting them to Tempest was also kept in neat and clean order; even the animal droppings are briskly disposed of. There was no sign of monsters nearby, and overall, I believe this security agreement is legitimate and active.

    Did you travel down this highway?

    Yes. I wanted to see it for myself, so I disguised myself as a traveler. There are peacekeeping sentry posts at regr intervals along the road. When I reached town, I found it to be far more advanced than I expected. The concentration of magicules in the air was understandably higher than normal, but it was still below levels that would affect average people. It gave me the impression that Rimuru, true to his word, really does seek amicable rtions with humankind.

    I see. And what about Veldora?

    Well, yes, about that

    What is it?

    I was unable to confirm his presence. Entry into the Sealed Cave was forbidden, and I failed to find any other spots the dragon might be lurking in.

    Hmm.

    Hinata gave a cid nod to Litus as she finished her report.

    If we cant confirm Veldoras existence, Fritz asked, could the news of his revival be a mistake?

    Hinata shot him a look to silence him. Luminuss divine missives are never wrong. At least we are surer of Rimurus activity now. Let us move on.

    She kept the meeting going, having each attendee report on what they saw and heard, ensuring everyone had all avable information at hand before they began to debate.

    So things were tranquil from start to finish during my time in Englesia. If their rivals at Farmus were to fall, I believe they would take the opportunity to expand upon their current power.

    The briefings continued. Master Rooks members had free rein to visit the Western Nations, as well the right to give orders to the Temple Knights stationed within their borders. They outranked even the local Temple captains, after all, and while they customarily acted only on orders from Lubelius (for the sake of maintaining a simple chain ofmand), the Master Rooks couldmand them directly in emergency cases. This allowed them to operate practically above thew in the west, obtaining even some ssified information with ease.

    This was one difference between them and the pdins. Thetter enjoyed simr unfettered travel ess to foreign countries, but they were barred from giving orders to the Temple Knights. The organizations were two different entities, although some Temple Knightster moved on to be pdins. It was up to Hinata to utilize the pluses and minuses of both groups, deploying them where they would help the most.

    Saares turn came at the very end.

    Listening to all these reports, he said, I think Im starting to see what Hinata is trying to find out. My turns next, and Im guessing my reports supposed to be the clincher, huh?

    Thats right. I gave that job to you because its the most important one. Id appreciate it if you got on with it.

    Ah-ha. Well, the current news from Farmus King Edmaris has abdicated the throne, and on the surface, it appears that the transfer of power has taken ce peacefully. But Edward, the new king, is busy assembling an army of talented mercenaries, and in response, the nobility is starting to get frantic, too. It looked to me like the signs of a looming civil war.

    Despite reports of Rimurus ascension being all over the news in the Western Nations, Blumunds trade with Tempest was giving that whole nation a shot in the arm. Meanwhile, things couldnt be more chaotic in Farmus. The nobles were working in a hundred different directions, many of them trying to shore up their military might in a hurry. Some had even made inroads with the Western Holy Church and the elders that led the Council. It wouldnt be long before the swords came out. The impact on the people was already enormousprices rising, distribution falling behind. Losing twenty thousand troops had even led to a government-mandated conscription. Amateur soldiers wouldnt be much help in battle, but Farmus was so cornered that they had no other choice.

    It all pointed in the same direction: civil war. The surrounding small kingdoms had no consensus on how to respond to this, but all of them were on high alert against Farmus, smelling the tension in the air and fortifying their borders to ensure they didnt get involved. They all expected the fateful day toe before long.

    That alone, of course, isnt enough information to make a conclusion on whether the demon lord Rimuru is involved with this.

    True. So?

    So I went down the list of everyone King Edward made contact with. Important Council leaders; Free Guild management; some merchants from the East; even our own soldiers. Hes been busy.

    Is he trying to shore up his military?

    Bingo. Thats exactly it, Hinata.

    Well, its settled, then. This new king has no interest in paying war reparations of any kind. No demon lord would let that p in the face go unchallenged, and I doubt Rimuru is foolish enough not to expect that from him.

    Hmm. So do you think this is all part of our new demon lords ns?

    Yeah. Hinata nodded.

    Its almost funny how all the pieces are falling into ce. Based on what we can infer from this, it all seems to be gearing toward some kind of predestined conclusion Someones definitely pulling the strings from the sidelines.

    The more she heard, the more convinced she became. Who was it? There could be just one answeryman, that swindler who skulked around the Western Nations for years, was gone, and the only one who could even begin to imitate him was Rimuru, this new member of the cast.

    I dont like this. You cant let your guard down around him. Hes intelligent enough toy out these thoroughly prepared strategies. Maybe he really was Japanese once

    Looking back, as she calmly reevaluated Rimuru, this was all caused by her believing those Eastern merchants in the first ce. They had built a rtionship of trust over several years, and shepletely fell for the line she was given. It was a fatal mistake, and she regretted itand the worst part was that most of the intelligence the merchants gave her was urate. Only when the topic turned to Rimuru did the truth start to bend a bit. These little lies that were impossible to independently confirm, and Hinata had let them trick her. If she had believed Rimuru, back when the two of them were at the same location, maybe things would have developed differently. But, she reasoned, she couldnt dwell on the past.

    Then she noticed something about Saares report that interested her.

    Saare, you said Edward made contact with merchants as well? What did they tell him?

    Mm? Why do you care about the merchants? The demon lord painted a picture for us to fall for, and thats that, right? I think what we need to talk about is our future direction. What steps should we be taking right now?

    We do need that, but I still want to know. Tell me.

    Pfft. I thought money was the only thing those merchants ever talked about.

    Not so. They just have an instinctive habit of turning the conversation toward whatever will make them money. One of them got me, too, so you all need to watch yourselves. So what did you learn from them?

    Huh. Thats pretty impressive, if they managed to use a woman as calcting as yourself. Hmm I cant really think of anything in particr they said. Oh, hang on Theres amercial zone in the area you covered, right, Glenda? Merchants from the East and West intermingle in there. Did you hear anything interesting?

    Saare may not have liked Hinata much, but he was still loyal to his mission. He knew and acknowledged her talentsthe leadership that helped her craft the Crusaders out of a ragtag bunch of knights. She was merciless against the monsters; she put everything on the line to keep people safe. Somewhere in his heart, he appreciated that. That was why he followed all of Hinatas orders to the letter, never hiding anything he learned from her. He may have had a few ideas on how to seize his position back from her, but he had no intention of dragging her down. He believed in the meritocracy, and for better or worse, he was earnest in everything he did. Hinata knew that as well.

    Glenda, meanwhile

    Well, as far as I know, there wasnt anything suspicious going on.

    had no problems telling barefaced lies. As a mercenary, she was well versed in navigating the underworld, experiencing untold amounts of mortal danger. Something about the tension in the air smelled like good money to her. Faith was one thing; making a profit was another. That was how Glenda worked, and while people saw her as a devout Luminist, that wasnt the whole truth. What Glenda really wanted was the power that Luminism had across the world. Sometimes it was money, sometimes intelligence, sometimes war power; but Glenda needed it all. Her current position gave her open ess, and she never, ever wanted to lose it.

    This was why she was hiding things from Hinata, including a meeting with merchants from the East in the verymercial zone Saare mentioned. She had also made secret inroads with one of the Council elders. She paid them money, and in exchange, they would spread false rumors around for her. Not now, but when the time was right for her.

    For the time being, she couldnt afford to have Hinata questioning her motives. Hinata was cold, unforgiving, and merciless to her enemies. She never left herself open to attack at any moment. But at the same time, she was open-minded, almost soft on her alliesor, to be more exact, Luminists. To her, fellow followers in her chosen faith were like family. That was extensively clear to Glenda. That softness let Hinata forgive Saares back talk; that softness made her fail to notice the people trying to betray her. And soon, Glenda thought, that softness was going to cost her the position she had worked so hard to achieve.

    If youre that interested, though, I could give it a more thorough look through, Captain.

    Will you? Thanks. Just dont let the merchants fool you, all right? Dont let your guard down.

    Sure thing. I got a few connections, so I should be able to get some details.

    Glenda had the bad habit of making promises to Hinata without giving them much real thought. She had no idea her ready agreement let Hinata read fairly deeply into her mind.

    Taking a moment to carefully observe Glenda, Hinata sighed to herself.

    She must really think Im that stupid. Perhaps shes under the mistaken impression that Im soft on my people?

    If that was true, she thought, then it really was a pity.

    Glenda had one thing wrongHinata wasnt one to think of herpanions as that important. She considered them pawns to y for the sake of Luminus, and that was why she treated them so preciously. They all belonged to Luminus, and she wasnt allowed to waste them.

    The Crusaders she had raised to serve as her arms and legs had absolute faith in her; they were basically Hinatas personal militia, and she trusted in that faith. The knights of the Imperial Guard, on the other hand, often engaged in intolerably selfish activity. She let it slide only because they, too, had faith in Luminus.

    Saare was the epitome of that, mouthing off at Hinata and trying to rebel any way he could. But both she and Saare knew this was just a front. He was a whiner, but he always followed orderswhich, in a way, made him a breeze to handle. Plus the fact that Saare didnt know who Luminus was. Not just him, either. Nobody besides Hinata was aware that the god Luminus was an actual person.

    I almost feel bad for them. They have no idea, just as I didnt

    Glenda had real ambitions. She had looks, talent, and an abundance of confidence. She must really believe she has what it takes to topple me, Hinata thought. She might even be trying to curry favor with Louis, the Holy Emperor, for the cause. She didnt know he was a vampire, so it was only natural that shed try buttering him up for the sake of pushing Hinata away.

    Well, shes free to do what she wantsbut

    But if she was betraying the cause, that was another matter.

    Hinata never voiced a word ofint about what the divisions she oversaw didas long as they never crossed her or Luminus. But with a suspected traitor in their midst, Glendas behavior was turning problematic. Hinata didnt intend to hold a purge right this momentfor all she knew, someone might be taking advantage of herbut she needed to be on her guard.

    Im starting to see a breakdown in discipline. Maybe its time to teach them a lesson and set them back in line.

    The thought depressed Hinata. But there were more urgent issues. She mentally switched gears and spoke.

    All right. Everyone has given their reports. I trust that everyone understands the current situation now.

    Yes, his assistant Renard said. The resurrection of the Storm Dragon has had less of an impact than expected, the only casualties so far being the deployed Farmus military. However, since this is likely a cover story spread by Rimuru, the real number could be zero.

    If thats how it is, added Saare, I want to hear from Archbishop Reyhiem, who survived it. We know Veldoras back, and Im intensely curious about what happened on the battlefield.

    I thought so, too. Ive already called for him. He should be here soon

    Hinata had already contacted Cardinal Nicus, directing him to bring Reyhiem to her. He was there for the defeat and probably saw Rimuru with his own eyes. Besides, given the several days worth of apparent time between the advent of Veldora and Farmuss defeat, the rumors going around the neighboring states about Veldora destroying all those forces were pretty unlikely. As a survivor, Reyhiems testimony should be extremely useful. He was supposed to arrive this morning but was apparently behind schedule.

    I look forward to it. I cant wait to hear what he has to say.

    Maybe he knows something about Veldora, too.

    There were rumors of the demon lord Rimuru negotiating with Veldora and calming his rage, Arnaud added, but Im not sure what to make of that one, either. Hes revived, yes, and hes been lying low so far, yes. With that in mind, it seems rather usible.

    Everyone nodded at this. Silently, they had all concluded that the Storm Dragon and the demon lord were involved with each other. In that case, Hinata saw no reason to hide what Luminus already told her.

    Yes. That much is true. I can say to you now that among the missives I received from our lord Luminus, there was one about how Rimuru is controlling the Storm Dragon. As a result, she said, we must noty hands on the demon lord Rimuru at the moment. Please bear that in mind.

    Y-you mean?

    Hinata stood up. Ill be blunt, she said in her most authoritative voice. In this instance, we must remain undercover. None of our dealings with this demon lord muste out to the public.

    This was, in essence, an order for everyone to keep their hands off Rimuru. It surprised them all.

    What?! You want us to simply ignore all the theatrics hes pulling over in Farmus?!

    Demon lords are untouchable as a rule, yes, but only in the public eye, if you recall. Theyre no match for any of the Ten Great Saints!

    Saare had a point. Humanity wasnt totally helpless against the S-ss threat of the demon lords. They had built up enough force to fight back with, if necessary, and those were the Enlightened sses, the Ten Great Saints being among them. Arnaud, Renard, and Grigori could each defeat a Special A-ranked foe, Hinata thought, and even among the Ten Great Saints, Saare was outssed only by Hinata in force. Against a demon lord, Saare wouldnt be that much of an underdog. You almost never saw storybook-style one-on-one duels in real life anyway, but if it turned out that way, she figured itd be a close battle. If it was yman, that Western Nations sneak, the odds were even in Saares favor.

    However, that only applied to the would-be demon lords, those strong enough for the role but not yet ascendant. Against a real demon lord, none of the Ten Great Saints had a chance in the end. To Hinata, who knew Luminus intimately, that much was obvious.

    And Rimuru, too

    Farmus, and other nations its size, were home to extensive systems that summonedrge crowds of otherworlders and raised them to be fighters. Many criticized it as a vition of human rights, but when faced with themon threat of human-destroying monsters, real needs tended to get in the way of noble intentions. Their numbers included Razen, the royal sorcerer who reincarnated himself all the way to magic-born status, and thetemander of the Farmus Royal Knight Corps, Folgen. That mammoth amount of force was directed straight at the demon lord Rimuru, and they lost. Between that and Luminus telling Hinata the tale of how Rimuru killed yman instantly, nobodyTen Great Saints or notheld a candle to him. Not unless they evolved further, in the real meaning of the term, and became true Saints. Like Hinata had.

    Right now, if all ten took on Rimuru at once, everyone except Hinata would lose. She didnt want to see them waste their lives on the effort. Plus

    You know, though We have both this demon lord and the Storm Dragon to deal with now. There is no doubting that any wrong move might lead to further chaos.

    As Renard calmly pointed out, Veldora was cooperating with Tempest. Lubelius could plunge all its forces into Tempest, and there was still no telling who would win.

    But we cannot allow the demon lords to do whatever they please in the domain of humans!

    Grigoris shouting brought the heated debate back to silence. It was, in a way, a summary of what every attendee was thinking to themselves. All eyes turned to Hinata. She remained calm, unaffected, as she looked back at them.

    The missives of Luminus are absolute. We are not allowed to defy them.

    Come on! Is she telling us to let Farmus be razed to the ground?

    No, Litus. That nations main problem is the uing civil war. Its people, not its nobility, must be protected. You need to pay close attention to the area, ensuring none of the sparks affect the people of Farmus or its neighbors.

    Meaning?

    We may see some changes in heads of state, but interfering with that would be meddling in internal affairs. Thats the excuse they always used whenever we tried putting an end to their otherworlder summoning projects, as Im sure you remember. Its worked before for them, and they all but assume itll work again.

    Hinata even let out a smile as she coldlyid out the facts.

    In that case, Grigori asked, should we just sit here and tolerate whatever Rimuru cares to do?

    Yes. We should. The demon lord has dered his disinterest in hostilities with the human race, and there is no further reason for us to be hostile in return. Archbishop Reyhiem of Farmus was part of the invasion team, and I myself attempted to defeat Rimuru. We have both failed. And now that he likely sees us both as enemies, Im not sure there is another option for us besides keeping quiet.

    But those are the mistakes of the Western Holy Churchand of yourself! It is not the mistake of Lubelius! Grigori bellowed.

    Hinata stood strong, her smile turning frigid. Exactly. And that is why you need to stay hands-off. If worsees to worst, I will dere that it was the arbitrary decision of the Western Holy Church to act against him In other words, me.

    Wha?!

    Lady Hinata!!

    The pdins voiced their objections as Hinata addressed the Master Rooks. Even Saare found himself unable to answer.

    Calm down. I doubt he wants to wage war with us as well.

    The statement offered nofort.

    Cmon, Hinata, you really trust him that much? Saare asked.

    I know this sounds unlikely from someone who tried to kill him earlier, but yes, I think we can trust him. He told me himself that hes also an otherworlder. I ignored it at the time, but it seemed he was trying to avoid conflict with me.

    An otherworlder?! So he was reincarnated as a magic-born, like the demon lord Leon?

    No. ording to what he said, he died on his home and was resurrected as a slime on this one.

    Are you kidding me?

    You should know how much I dislike jokes, Saare.

    Pfft. But Ive never heard that pattern before. There are cases of people being reborn, yeah, but thats just a matter of retaining your memories from your previous life. But crossing worlds while doing it? Maybe, but

    I havent heard of it, Renard said, consulting his own memories.

    But what are even the chances of being reincarnated as a slime? Arnaud asked. I mean, what if that happened to you, Litus?

    Lituss well-defined face twisted into a grimace. I wouldnt want to imagine it. If I cant even speak thenguage, how could I exin to people what Im thinking? Given the literacy rates around the world, Im not sure I could even convince people that Im not a dumb animal. Slimes arent supposed to talk.

    No speech, no arms or legs. Even if you shared anguage, you wouldnt be able to use it. Thinking about it, Litus even began to pity Rimuru a little.

    Yeah.

    True

    I had dismissed his talking as the ravings of a monster, Hinata said, but I think he was probably telling the truth the whole time. At this point, I do feel I was a bit needlessly rough on him.

    If Rimuru wasnt lyingif he was trying his hardest to be honest with herHinata realized now that he probably hated her guts for not making even a perfunctory effort tomunicate.

    Well, who can me you? Saare reasoned. Hes a monster.

    Yes, Renard said, and our faith forbids contact with them.

    Both of them likely wouldve done the same thing Hinata did in that situation. Their faith did not deal in gray areas. Lending an ear to a monster was unthinkable, and if Hinata did do that, it would lead to serious questions.

    Plus, I was told that Rimuru was the one who killed my master

    What do you mean?

    Ive talked about it before. Those Eastern merchants were using me. They told me that the monsters were transforming into people to eat their way into other nationsforming their own country and tricking the ones around them. They also said Rimuru, the named monster leading them, killed my master. I immediately resolved to kill him.

    Saare dejectedly shook his head. And you let him get away. Maybe thats not such a bad thing now, huh?

    He was right. By this point, it was clear this tip Hinata picked up from the merchants had given her nothing but trouble. She knew it, and she also knew that no matter how her encounter with Rimuru ended, shed still be dealing with tons of fallout.

    I tell you, though, he has a natural talent for fleeing. And now hes a demon lord. Hes undoubtedly evolved, so taking him on again couldnt be a good idea.

    No one objected. The missive was given; there was no use trying to argue this on religious grounds. They would have to make an attempt at reconciliation.

    So what are you going to do? Renard asked.

    I cant do anything, Hinata calmly replied.

    If this was a human being, she would readily risk her life to fight him. But if the demon lord Rimuru wants to build rtions with other countries, Hinata was ready to silently ept that. She had no intention of turning her back on the will of Luminus. If Rimurus actions start diverging from his words, on the other hand, thats another matter.

    Then what if Rimuru sees you as his enemy?

    Yeah, you did try to kill him. Now that hes got a bunch more power, maybe hell try to get back atcha, huh? I wouldnt me the guy.

    Hinata brushed off the concern. I told youIll just say it was all my own selfish decision. But before we engage in any hostilities, I want to try going over and talking with him. If need be, Ill give him an apology, too.

    She made it sound so casual, the way she put it, but nobody in the joint meeting could let this pass.

    Thats crazy!

    Its incredibly dangerous!

    The demon lord might set a trap to kill you when he has the chance, Lady Hinata!

    Yes! And even if he doesnt, what if all his legions of monsters descend upon you?

    Calm down. Im not saying Ill simply waltz over there tomorrow. I need to make sure I correctly understand Rimurus mind-set first

    But as she attempted to simmer things down in the room, Hinata personally didnt expect much of a problem. The reports all painted Rimuru as a pretty softhearted person. In her brief experiences with him, she saw nothing that made her question this. If they could both speak frankly with each other It was a selfish hope, she knew, but it seemed worth pursuing.

    It was hope, however, that could never be fulfilled. Among the tangled desires of so many yers, all at the mercy of their own motives, things were now moving in a worse direction than even Hinata anticipated.

    There was a knock on the conference-room door. Come in, Hinata curtly replied, assuming it was finally Reyhiem. The guards on the other side obliged, opening the heavy door, and inside strode exactly the man she expectedCardinal Nicus, one of her most trusted of friends, and a nervous-looking Archbishop Reyhiem behind him.

    That much had all been scheduled in advance. But it was the group filing in behind them that made Hinatas eyebrows arch upward. The Seven Days Clergy was here.

    (Good to see you again, Hinata.)

    (Are you in good health?)

    (What are you looking so surprised for?)

    Hinata couldnt hide her astonishment. Why are all of you here? she unconsciously whispered. The normally staid cardinal was looking nervous himself, and Reyhiem was white as a sheet.

    Who are these guys, Hinata? Saare asked.

    S-silence, Saare! Nicus hurriedly replied. You are in the presence of the Seven Days!

    Nicus sat up straight, startled. The Seven Days? The ones of legend?

    Exactly, Hinata admittedand when she did, everyone in the room stood up and saluted.

    The members of the Seven Days Clergy were all wise and well trained, surpassing the realm of Enlightened and charged with training the next generation of Heroes. Their existence was the stuff of legend, shrouded in mystery, and they never went out in public, content with being discussed in the context of fairy tales. Not even the pdins knew about themonly a few directly interacted with them, including Hinata and Nicus. One had to be at the very top of the Western Holy Church to be introduced to them.

    This was the group that administered the Seven Days Trial undertaken by Hinata, a test to help determine the next Heroes and champions of humanity. This responsibility made the Clergy a vital part of the Church.

    But Hinata hated them. They were top-level advisers to the Church, ordered by Luminus to oversee the organization and educate its staff. However, before Hinata took up her post, the Crusaders were an organization in name only. To her, it was sheer negligence.

    Looking back, I shouldve stripped them of their powers when I had the chance.

    Hinatas unique skill Usurper worked in two ways. One, called Seize, took away its targets skills; the other, called Copy, let her learn them for herself. During her Trial, she thought of the Clergy as legendary contributors to the Luminist cause, so she naturally exercised Copy to learn from their powers and improve herself. One could call her an apprentice to the Clergy along those linesbut the Seven Days were not having it. They shunned Hinata for daring to rise above them, interfering with her in any way they could find.

    This was a crafty group, one that had lurked in the darkness of the Church and called the shots for an untold amount of time. But there was nothing productive in their actions. And once she took the Trial and realized that, Hinata immediately judged them to be useless relics, took their skills, and left. Now she was using what she learned to train Arnaud and the rest of the divisionmanders.

    I wonder if thats why Luminus had me take the Seven Days Trial in the first ce

    If she did, she had to hand it to Luminus. Such incredible wisdom. To her, the Clergy had inly abandoned their mission to train the next generation, instead focusing on covering their own backs. But if Luminus let them dodder on, there must have been a reason for it. That was why she never defied them. Not in public.

    Once everyone was seated again, Hinata addressed the group.

    So may I ask what brings you here today?

    (Hee-hee-hee! No need for rm.)

    (No, no. Archbishop Reyhiem here has brought back some information about the demon lord Rimuru, has he not?)

    (We were simply interested in hearing about it ourselves.)

    The voices echoed around in her mind. The Seven Days Clergy used Thought Communication to answer her. She sized them up again.

    There were three of them presentnot the entire contingentand in her judgment, these were the most corrupt ones out of the entire group.

    Among them was Arze, the Tuesday Priest who governed fire. His force was like a disposable lighterpared with Shizue Izawas. He had nothing to teach, and Hinata didnt even need Usurper toplete his trialbut for some reason, he mustve assumed she was incapable of Seizing his skills. That made him look down at her constantly, which rankled her.

    The other two present, Dena, the Monday Priest, and Vena, the Friday PriestHinata couldnt guess at their motives. Helping Arze out, probably.

    What a chore. Luminus ordered me to make this as quick and painless as possible, too

    Hinata grew nervous. Rimuru already had a poor impression of her. If she let this Clergy get in her way here, she might never be able to reconcile with himbut as long as she didnt have a bead on their goals, she had to focus on Reyhiem. She turned off her mind as she lent him an ear.

    I was foolish, Reyhiem began. We challenged a foe that was fearsome, far too fearsome for any of us. He is a demon lord, beyond a shadow of a doubt. Through our own foolishness, we have engineered the birth of a new demon lord!

    His memories of the event put him into a frenzy, his eyes bloodshot and his voice raised to a near scream. He continued, recounting the events that led to this birthhis misguided deeds, allid bare without omission. It wasnt on someones orders; he was being driven by thepulsion that he simply had to do it. He needed absolution for his sins, if he ever hoped to be free from his pain and forgiven by his god.

    As he told the story, the pdins began to murmur among themselves. The sheer force of this adversary, beyond allmon sense, made it hard for them to contain theirposure. Neither an anti-magic barrier nor a long-range, magic-specific defensive wall was enough to stop these monstersnot even a holy barrier could mount any defense against those shes of light.

    But Hinata stayed resolute. Based on Reyhiems testimony, she surmised it was an attack involving concentrated sunlight. And as if to back up that theory, the Seven Days Clergy began to provide their ownmentary.

    (Hmm. Perhaps this is sunlight magic, the kind Sir Gren was always so gifted at.)

    (Light-bending magic? Wouldnt an anti-magic barrier shut that down?)

    (And Grens didnt have that much force to it.)

    Gren, the Sunday Priest, was head of the Clergy, his magicmanding light. One of his spells concentrated sunlight in a simr way, and while the Clergy was on the wrong track with their theories, if they and Hinata had the same impression of this, Hinata assumed she was right.

    Idiots. Its not directly bending the sunlight with magic; its reflecting the light off something else to focus it into a beam. Otherwise, a barrier couldve easily blocked it. Were water and wind elementals cooperating with him, then? But that would take a lot ofplex calction

    But she had nothing to fear. Once she knew the trick behind it, it was easy to counter. Just put up a protective film to diffuse the heat and scatter dust in the air to refract the light, and the threat was neutralized. If sunlight was the only thing it harnessed, the attack was full of holes to exploit. To Hinata, the attack was worthless.

    As far as I can tell, he was using his scientific knowledge from the other world for that attack. No wonder people here couldnt deal with it. They couldnt even understand it. Using it to poke holes in their magical defense was smart, though. Not a stone unturned

    It took a lot ofputing power to engineer that attack, as well as multiple ongoing spells at once. That was a serious threat, but now that Hinata knew what it really was, it didnt seem that fearsome any longer. But Hinata was making her conclusions too quickly. Reyhiem wasnt done talking. There was more The main course, in fact.

    One moment. That mystery attack was a dreadful thing. Sir Folgen was helplessly killed; Sir Razen could do nothing against it. Nearly ten thousand of our finest knights were felled by it, I think. But

    He paused here, nervously swallowing, sweat running down his head, trying his best to hold back the terror.

    The real horror came after that. The next moment, the battlefield wentpletely quiet.

    Some were unconscious, fatally hurt; others were wounded and screaming on the ground; still more were healthy but wandering around, scared out of their wits. The cacophony they all created together set the battlefield to a frenzy. And yetthe very next moment, Reyhiem said, all the noise was gone.

    What do you mean?

    I mean exactly what I said, Lady Hinata. At that moment, the surviving members of that twenty-thousand-strong force died. Only three remained alive: Sir Razen; Edmaris, the king of Farmus; and me. Seeing it made me lose my sanity. I was so stricken with fear that I fainted.

    At Reyhiems tale, a simr silence fell over the holy cathedral. A single monster killed a force of twenty thousand in an instant. The truth of that could hardly bemented on in words. And amid the solemn tension, everyone was recalling the same legend in their mindthe tale of a single personying waste to an entire city and bing a demon lord.

    Then Hinata recalled something Luminus herself told her.

    The precursor to the Western Holy Church wasunched a good dozen centuries agolikely longer, but that is as far back as the records exist. Its people, however, had first moved here two millennia ago, driven away after Veldora destroyed their kingdom. The dragons strength and immortality put them beyond hope; trying to engage it would only add to the dead.

    To the vampires that called this ce home, Veldora prancing around and destroying humanity would lead to food shortages. The purest of high-quality vitality could only be obtained from human beings, and while Luminus and her family were safe, this was a matter of life or death to the lower-level vampires. Thus, Luminus was forced toe up with their current co-op approach to protecting humanity. She rescued them, really, and now they worshiped her as a god.

    And it was all the fault of Veldora on the rampage. He was worse than any natural disaster, a threat impossible to prepare fora Catastrophe. That ssified him as Special S on the scale, something humanity just couldnt deal withbut he wasnt the onlyrge-scale destroyer of worlds. The only creatures in the Special S rank right now were the four dragons known to exist. But thats only the public story. In mythology, meanwhile, there were records of two demon lords exacting a simr campaign of death and madness. These were Guy Crimson, Lord of Darkness, and Milim Nava, the Destroyer. Demon lords all got an S rank, but there was disparity in these rankings. Some creatures, like these two, could be rated Special S behind the scenesand as Luminus exined, it happened when a potential demon lord was awakened by engineering massive destruction, taking in the souls of the resulting dead. Evolution beyond imagination would result.

    The term demon lord technically referred to the true ones who underwent this evolution, and even then, it could take ce across several levels. It left some demon lords as powerful as dragons, and Luminus wondered if Guy and Milim had evolved beyond that. Even Luminus, as a true demon lord, had no chance against them. If I fought Milim, she told Hinata, maybe I could outwit her. Maybe itd be a good fight, if it came to that. But Id never win in the end. And what about Guy? Ha! It vexes me terribly, but it would be hopeless. Hes in his own world.

    Someone as self-confident as Luminus, whose powers Hinata couldnt even begin to fathom, describing Guys force as belonging to another dimension. It made Hinata thinkabout Guy, and about Milim, who actually faced off against him once. It was hard to imagine.

    Thats what the Special S ranking was for. If all of humankind banded together, maybe they could deal with such a monsterbut even that was wishful thinking, because it assumed the presence of a Hero in the human ranks. There was no Hero right now, and thus no chance.

    Plus, the current lineup of demon lordsthe Octagramwas on its own level of danger, Rimuru included. Luminus believed Rimuru was still in the midst of awakening, and Reyhiems words were more than enough to back that up.

    Soon the others began to recall the story of the true demon lords, those fearsome presences. They were not revealed to the public lest panic resulted, but they were real, and they were threats.

    When the first dragon lost its power, it showed no signs of regenerating itself for some reason. Out of the other three, one had been sealed away until just recently, but now he was back and supporting Rimurua demon lord who massacred a force of twenty thousand by himself. This wasparable to what those other two demon lords did long ago. The structural destruction wasnt there, maybe, but the number of souls he obtained had to be staggering.

    A heavy silence filled the room. It was clear nobody wanted to admit that a demon lord, in the real meaning of the term, had been born. There was an overwhelming difference between a potential demon lord and a true one, and everybody in the room understood that.

    Finally, it was Hinata who quietly broke the silence.

    I see. So we should assume the demon lord Rimuru has been awakened

    The words cut like a sharp knife through the silence, lighting a fire under those who could no longer tolerate the stillness.

    I suppose we should. Now what? If we leave him be, hell be a threat beyond anything we can handle, wont he?

    Calm down. Rimuru is a former human. If he seeks to live alongside humanity, there shouldnt be any need to fight him.

    Right. We need to see how he reacts.

    But we know for a fact that he mowed down twenty thousand knights without hesitation! He is clearly a threat. Are you sure we should simply believe him?

    That finalment from Renard summed up everyones thoughts. Thats how many wars beginthe mind ying tricks, stirring fear of a potential opponent. That was true enough even among the human race; if the adversary was a demon lord, it was going to be hard to trust him. It wouldnt be an issue if that adversary could be hunted down at any moment, but Rimuru was growing more powerful at a rapid pace. To the pdins guarding humanity, and the knights serving as the Holy Emperors de, they needed to entertain the idea of tackling him before he grew truly impossible to handle.

    But Hinata stuck to her guns. Silence, everyone, she firmly stated. The missive is absolute.

    Nothing anyone could say would change her mind. As captain of the Crusaders and chief knight of the Imperial Guard, she guided the hearts and minds of the Holy Empire of Lubelius. She had to be a model for every citizen, a firm leader for those who served under her. Her mind would change only if it did so within the will of Luminus. That was what made her so unwaveringly resolute.

    And with that, the joint session would end, everyone returning to their intelligence-gathering duties. Or so it should havebut evil has a way of appearing from the most unexpected of crevices.

    (Ah, Reyhiem, did you have any other messages for us?)

    Just as Hinata was going to end the meeting, the Seven Days Clergy finally spoke up. It seemed to jog Reyhiems mind, as he took a crystal ball out of his pocket and reverently handed it to Hinata.

    II actually do have this. Its said to be a message from Demon Lord Rimuru to you, Lady Hinata

    A message?

    She epted it, eyeing it with suspicion. A message from Rimuru was likely something she couldnt afford to ignore.

    This crystal ball, provided by Reyhiem at the prodding of the Clergy, was a highly valuable magic item. It allowed anyone to record moving picture images, making it a useful way to transmit messages. It also saw use in international negotiations, seen as a more trustworthy piece of evidence than a written letter.

    Regardless of where Rimuru managed to procure one of these, Hinata immediately tried ying it back. Given all the dignitaries on-site, it could be a great chance for everyone to see what Rimuru looked like.

    But that wasnt the end of it.

    The image showed a beautiful girl, but it wasnt a girl. It was the demon lord himself. His face, reminiscent of Hinatas teacher, Shizue Izawa, looked at the viewer coldly, without emotion. The sense of presence he had came across at full force through the video image.

    Hinata blinked at it. What a surprise. Like a different person from a few months ago Her eyes met with Rimurus in the image. Was that a coincidence, or? She began to realize just how nervous she was. Rimuru, a fellow countryman. A softhearted demon lord. Maybe her sentimentality was making her underestimate this threat. Logically, she knew that. And as if to back up that suspicion

    Ill take you on. You and me, in a one-on-one duel.

    That was the entire message. So incredibly simple; no room for misunderstanding. Everyone viewing it took home the same message: Rimuru is enraged. He killed yman for getting in his way, and Hinatas up next.

    For a change, even Nicus looked perturbed. Wh-what should we do, Lady Hinata? But before she could answer:

    Lady Hinata, your orders! I will dly lead a force to crush this demon lords ambitions!

    Arnaud, ever the hot-blooded military man, pushed the issue. The debate was now in full swing again.

    Come on, chided Saare, giving Arnaud an astonished look. Youre a master swordsman, sure, but dont you think your brain could use some work?

    What?

    Didnt Hinata just spend the past half hour saying hands off? We touch him, and the other demon lords arent gonna take that sitting down. Plus, if hes a fully awakened demon lord, itd be even more ill-advised to prod him. I think we should just chill out and ept our opponents request.

    Hes right, Arnaud, Litus said, nodding in agreement. If we have Veldora to deal with as well, we have no chance of winning. Victory would onlye with losses that would be impossible to take. If the adversary seeks a duel, better for all of us if we have Hinata ept it.

    A full sh of forces would result in what had to be staggering casualties with no guarantee of victory. Having the most powerful knight in the Holy Empire take the lead instead seemed far more ptable. If anything, the idea filled Saare and Litus with optimism. There was no doubting Hinatas victory now.

    Hinata, meanwhile, weighed her options.

    Arnauds offer of a full battle force was out of the question. Getting her nation involved would escte into the total war that Litus feared, likely dragging in the other Western Nations and developing into a world war. The masses they swore to protect in crises like these would turn into a severe disadvantage; it would go against the desires of Luminus. Veldora, too, was a menace. In terms of keeping losses to a minimum, Rimurus offer of a duel couldnt havee at a better time.

    But:

    How should I take this?

    It gave Hinata pause. Looking back, she was extremely lucky she hadnt invaded Tempest without fully grasping the situation there. She had Luminuss great wisdom to thank for that. If their opponent had ascended to true demon lord-hood, things like the number of soldiers on the field no longer held meaning. No matter how tenacious they were, unless they met a fairly lofty bar, they were useless. The disaster that befell Farmus was proof enough of that.

    Butno. When Rimuru fought Farmus, that must have been before he ascended. It was their defeat that generated the necessary number of souls for the job. He had wiped out twenty thousand without even being awakened.

    What a monster, truly

    Reflecting on her battle with Rimuru, she didnt think he was capable of something like that. Perhaps he had been restraining himselfbut now, he wanted her dead, no doubt.

    But if he hated her, why go through the trouble of challenging her to a duel for revenge? It seemed unnatural. If he felt Hinata and the Western Holy Church were a thorn in his side, it was a strange time to act on that impulse. If he was foolish enough not to see that, he wouldnt be going through all this undercover skullduggery against Farmus.

    Perhaps there was some other reason.

    Its unnatural of him, yes. Has something changed? Did the ascension to demon lorde at the cost of his humanity?!

    Acquiring that much power at once would crush any human beings soul. She saw for herself how much trouble Shizue had containing Ifrits berserk force. Itd easily drive anyone madespecially if he was now a true demon lord.

    But maybe not. Hed have no reason to ally himself with the human nations, then.

    Luminus told her that Rimuru swore to keep humanity safe. If his human heart was a thing of the past, his deration to build his own city no longer made sense. There wasnt enough information to work with, Hinata thought. Her Measurer skill wasnt producing any answers. It seemed like the truth was still hidden somewhere.

    Besides, this whole crystal ball gambit was weird in itself. It could store many hours of footage if necessary, but his message was only a few seconds long. She couldnt shake the impression that some ulterior meaning was lurking behind it.

    Plus:

    The Tuesday Priest just let on that he knew Rimuru had something for me. Why?

    Reyhiem had filed his report. He hadnt said a word about Rimurus message. But Arze had asked him Did you have any other messages for us? and Hinata had picked up on his unnatural choice of words. The seeds of doubt were beginning to bud in her mind, although she swallowed them up and refused to let them sprout upon her face. Instead, she simply continued measuring her position, letting no stone go unturned.

    Unfortunately, there was just too little data to work with. She could try crunching the numbers and guiding herself to a solution like she always did, but it wasnt leading her anywhere this time.

    Ah well, she concluded with a sigh. If hes calling me out, I suppose Ill have to go exin matters to him in person.

    If Rimuru wanted it, she wasnt that hesitant about a duel. But was there really no chance to talk things out? She wanted to be fully sure of that first. If she could meet with him, shed have her answer. It seemed smarter than just fretting to herself.

    Either way, if this is what itse to, its up to me to settle it.

    It is too dangerous! Nicus frantically protested. There is no need for you toe out yourself! Not with the barefaced malice he clearly has for you!

    It wasnt enough to make Hinata change her mind. Well never know that for sure unless we work out his intentions, will we? Plus, there is my apology to think about. Isnt it wiser to meet with him once and try talking matters over?

    She had hoped this would put an end to the debate. But once again, as if waiting for the right moment, the Seven Days Clergy spoke up.

    (Heh-heh-heh. That is your decision? Very well!)

    (May the protection of the god Luminus safeguard you.)

    (The demon lord Rimuru is a threat, yes.)

    (But even if your talks turn sour, there is no need for concern.)

    (You certainly have what it takes to defeat him.)

    (But, Hinata, you are forgetting something.)

    (Indeed. The presence of that dragon.)

    (I fear not even you could defeat such a menace!)

    (Do not overestimate your strength, Hinata.)

    (No attack would ever faze that dragon.)

    (But take heart, Hinata.)

    (We will leave you with this.)

    (It is called the Dragonbuster!)

    Ugh. Can they be any more shameless about it? All I said was Id talk with him, but theyre already pushing me into trading blows. And their goal is to have me take care of Veldora, right? Or is it?

    The Seven Days Clergy was a band of ex-humans enjoying Luminuss personal approval. Their faith was strictly for her. Hinata could understand if they wanted her to eliminate a dragon Luminus was so clearly concerned aboutbut she already knew that wasnt the only motivation. They were afraid. Afraid that Luminuss affections would turn away from them and toward a new prodigy. That was why they were so unenthusiastic about training the younger generation. Why they actively schemed to eliminate anyone in their way.

    Those fools. They mean nothing but harm for Luminus

    But Hinata did nothing to defy them. That was Luminuss decision, and Hinata was in no position to take action. Instead, she retained her calm.

    I will dly ept it, she intoned as she took the Dragonbuster from Vena, the Friday Priest. He and his co-conspirators gave her satisfied nods.

    (I hope things go well for you.)

    (If worsees to worst, that sword shall protect you.)

    (And if the effort ends in failure, the responsibility will fall on your shoulders.)

    And with that, the Clergy took their leave.

    Lady Hinata

    The pdins attempted to plead their case. She waved them off, turning a quick nce toward Louis behind the curtain.

    All right. You have your assignments. This joint session is hereby adjourned.

    The Three Battlesages sat there, tongues silenced despite whatever they had to say to her. The pdins meekly epted it, respecting their leaders choices.

    Hinata awoke from a light sleep.

    All that self-absorbed reflection on her memories must have made her fall asleep. She could detect the aroma of coffee as her consciousness began to focus. Nicus, ever so gantly ingratiating himself with her, could be seen preparing breakfast in the adjacent room.

    Ah, are you awake?

    This was Cardinal Nicus Speltusa man who, Hinata felt, was best described as unusual. He was a trusted adviser of the Holy Emperor, the supreme leader of Lubelius, which put him at the very peak of power in thend. But when dealing with Hinata, he was as steadfast and loving as a puppy.

    Come, breakfast is served. Would you like to eat?

    It was almostical. Hard to imagine someone like him preparing breakfast for another person. To anyone else who knew him, Nicus was a devil in a Saints mask.

    Yeah. Thanks.

    Nicus happily nodded back.

    It was the first meal Hinata could honestly say she enjoyed in a while. Her work had barely given her time to sleep as oftebut now it wasing to an end.

    Are you leaving?

    Yeah. Thats my job.

    But it was I who ordered Reyhiem toe here

    And Im the one who let you do so withoutment. You dont need to concern yourself about it.

    Is there any way to convince youah, not to?

    Enough already. Stop worrying. Its not guaranteed to be a fight yet.

    And if it was, it wasnt guaranteed to be a defeat. Hinata still had a trick up her sleevenot some silly Dragonbuster, but something much loftier, nobler. Besides, Luminus had personally told her to restrain herself.

    She had zero intention of dying. If it came to blows, whether Rimuru was ascended or not, she believed he was still a defeatable targetfor now. There was nothing to worry about. She wasnt 100 percent sure of victory, but she had a lot of experience with taking on targets bigger than her. Plus, she even had more than one ace up her sleeve. It was such a lovely morning. It didnt need to be marred with such gloomy talk.

    Itll work out fine, Nicus. Like it always does. You dont need to worry about a thing.

    She smileda small, gentle smile. The first one with no careful calction behind it in a while.

 Volume 7 - Ch 3.1

    INTERLUDE

    A PRIVATE CHAT

    The kingdom of Seltrozzo was a small realm, nestled along the northern coastline between Englesia and Farmus. It was currently providing the stage for a ndestine meeting that would change history forever.

    So how did it go?

    Just as we figured. Our covers still intact.

    Heh-heh-heh That witch may have a sharp mind, but maybe shes nothing too scary after all.

    I wouldnt be so sure. Strength-wise, theres no downying it. Shes the best in the West.

    Indeed. Ill-advised artifice is powerless against brute force. I would rmend all of you to never forget that.

    Here, in arge, firelit room in a realm kept cool all year by the blowing sea breeze, the Five Elders had gathered. Their dress was ornatesome crafted with Tempestian silk, still a rarity to obtain. It was iid with anti-magic Artifacts, providing a full defense against any unexpected strikes. It spoke volumes about the groups financial backing.

    The room had, of course, been fully sealed off from the outside world, reinforced and designed to withstand magic up to the nuclear level. They even had stout, A-ranked knights standing guard in the middle. All of them were seated in a row, and with them was Glenda, the wild beauty with the spiky red hairthe Raging Sea, one of the Ten Great Saints and Three Battlesages. Her main source of employment came from these Five Elders, the Councils powerbrokers.

    One of them, d in a loose white outfit, had eyes as sharp as a hawk, his presence dominating the roomwere it not for the charming, doll-like little girl seated on hisp. She was maybe not quite ten years old, her hair a silky blond, her lips a light shade of pink. At first nce, it looked like an old man babysitting his granddaughter, as much as the sight shed against its surroundings. But nobody brought it up. They let the man do what he wanted, as if this was a givenfor that man was Granville Rozzo himself, head of the Rozzo family and mediator of the Five Elders.

    The Rozzos of the Western Nations were a family of rulers. Seltrozzo was their exclusively owned domain, and family members could be found among royalty in Farmus and Englesia as well. The establishment of the Council of the West wasrgely the result of their tireless efforts, and while Council seats were theoretically selected by its member nations, most were taken by those under the patronage of the Rozzos. Their power extended far beyond their diminutive borders, outssing entire nations on the international stage. They could safely be called the de facto rulers of the Western Nations. It was even their funding that let Yuuki Kagurazaka establish the Free Guild.

    Granville was their leader, and nobody here was going to criticize the leaders behavior. He gave the girl on hisp a reassuring pat on the head as he solemnly spoke.

    Very good. A thin smile came to his lips. But Sir Damrada, I fear your lies have been uncovered, havent they?

    This was in reference to Glendas report that Hinata had discovered she was being taken advantage of. The question was addressed to Damrada, dressed all in ck and covering his face with a broad, umbrelike hat. He, too, held himself like high nobility, although his clothing was rare in these parts. He was not from the Western Nations.

    Heh-heh-heh I dont see a problem with that. We may have lost Hinata Sakaguchis trust, but we earned a great deal in returnyour trust, my good man Granville.

    Ha. You say that, even though the East hase here to spread division in the West and make money off the ensuing weapon sales. Then the Empire will wait until were exhausted to take action, yes? Trust hardlyes into it.

    Well, well, well. I should have expected such fine insightfulness from you, my good man.

    Are you denying it?

    No point in doing so, is there?

    Heh. How kind of you to say. But back to the main issue.

    Yes.

    We both agree that Hinata needs to be eliminated, am I right?

    Of course. It goes without saying that Veldora, the Storm Dragon, was the Empires greatest impediment to its western expansion. Now they say he has been tamed by the demon lord Rimuru. Whether that is true or not, it is safe to say now that the dragon can be negotiated with. That opens an opportunity for us. The next issue is the threat of the Western Holy Church. They are the glue that holds all these nations together, and with that, the Empires full strength would not be enough to seize the West.

    Oh? So we hardly merit notice from you?

    I dont mean that at all. All five of you are intelligent and understanding of your interests. After the Empire takes over the West, I hope we can continue to work together to control its economy.

    Work together? Are you asking us to lead the Empire directly to our doors? Dont make meugh.

    Heh-heh-heh. The Empire is a powerful thing, you know. It will be difficult but not impossible. Are you opposing us?

    Such insolence from a mere weapons merchant!

    It was Glenda who finally took verbal offense to this. She took out an unfamiliar weapona pistolfrom her clothing and pointed it at the merchant.

    Damrada was unfazedand not because he was unaware of what that weapon could do.

    Heh-heh-heh A pistol? He sounded less than impressed. Im surprised to see them here, in the West.

    Oh, you know what this thing is? It doesnt seem to bother you too much.

    Of course I know it. Do you think the West is the only ce one can find otherworlders? And remember, I deal in weapons. It is my job to be familiar with every type of weapon out there. The one you are pointing at me ismon in mynds. They are being manufactured in great quantities.

    The Five Elders couldnt hide their surprise at Damradas disinterested exnation.

    What? In great quantities?

    You Eastern traders are shrewd, indeed

    Truly, there is no telling the strength of the Imperial forces. It may be no match for monsters, but against a person, this weapon is all but unstoppable.

    Damrada was not a man who lied. What he did do was take advantage of the way he was interpreted, leading people to misunderstand his words. Anyone who dealt with him was advised to be on their guard, and if you dissected his sentences, it was clear to see the malice dripping off them. Here, Damrada was giving them a warningbetter to work with the Empire, not oppose it.

    But youre right. We are understanding of our interests. And as you say, it is best to put our heads down and work together for now. Granvilles solemn voice restored order among the elders.

    Are you sure about this, Sir Granville?

    Enough, Glenda. Our goals were the same from the beginning. Now is not the time for hostilities.

    Glenda did not challenge him further. Granvilles decisions were final. And Damrada had a lot to listen to, in terms of what it meant to everyone involved. He was the powerful leader of a weapons trading firm, much like the Rozzos, who earned political rule through their financial power. If the situation was different, they would be in more directpetition with each other. But not now.

    Heh-heh-heh Well said, my good man. That may not always be the case, but for now, we arerades.

    Indeed. Farmus and Englesia achieve bnce by retaining their own powers, and I do not wish to tilt the scales. It is unclear what motivation Rimuru has for toppling Farmus, but I do not want thatnd to be ruled by a demon lord.

    I can understand that, yes. It pains us, as well, to lose the trade route through Farmus from the Dwarven Kingdom. The demon lord yman was a valuable trading partner to us, and I cannot say I appreciate Rimuru defeating him. I will be d to work with you. So

    He paused.

    So you want us to handle Hinata? offered Granville. No need to worry there. We set a trap for her, and shes already stepped in it. Now all we have to do is rile Rimuru into taking care of her for us.

    Yep, added Glenda. No doubt about it. Hinata saw Rimurus message, and it sent her marching right to Tempest. Now we just have to turn that demon lords anger toward her.

    I am d to hear that. But why are you so intent on eliminating Hinata? I would think a Saint like her would be more useful alive than dead.

    Damrada turned toward Granville, attempting to decipher his feelings on the subject. Granvilleughed him off.

    Heh. Its simple. That woman is too strong. It is no exaggeration to call her the strongest knight in the West. The magic-born Razen, Grand Master Yuuki, Lightspeed Masayukishe stands above even those champions. You understand that, and thats why youre trying to use us, no? Am I wrong, Sir Damrada?

    Hehheh-heh. Yes, she is truly frightening. Too much to handle, you would say? And that is why you want to take this piece off the board. It makes sense.

    The two of them exchanged a nod. As alike as they were, one nod couldmunicate much between them. Thus, without any further discussion on the topic, the group moved on to determine their work assignments.

    Damrada promised to eliminate the demon maneuvering behind the scenes in Farmus. He ordered Glenda to set the Temple Knights stationed in the nations surrounding Farmus to action, also promising to work with the new king, Edward, and chase down the Rimuru-aligned faction supporting Edmaris. Then he would spread rumors that Hinata was traveling to Tempest to defeat Rimuru, pinning him down and making it impossible for him to send reinforcements to othernds. As long as they could take care of that demon calling the shots, it would be easy to make Yohm and his band disappear. And by that time, Rimuru would have no choice but to defeat that troublemaker Hinata.

    But what if Hinata Sakaguchi actually defeats him?

    That could be helpful to us as well. But dont worry. Rimuru is not like the other demon lords. He is a dangerous element, one we will have to take care of sooner orter, but with Veldora on his side, killing him would be ill-advised. We have other ns in motion.

    Heh-heh-heh I will leave that in your talented hands, then.

    Certainly. Just dont mess up how you deal with that demon, all right?

    I need no reminders, Damrada said. I am sure the Western Holy Church has demon experts on their side as well, but the East has a much more extensive organization for that. Not even an Arch Demon will be a problem for it.

    Very good.

    In that case, I had best be going.

    Granville nodded as Damrada gave a small bow and left the room.

    Only the Rozzos and their bodyguards remained. Once they were sure Damrada was gone, Glenda let out an exaggerated sigh.

    Malice! That is all that merchant gives us. Treating us like children It drives me crazy!

    Granville gave a cold look at the door. Heh Dont be that way, Glenda. Even with that attitude, weve been treated with the greatest of respect.

    But, Sir Granville

    Glenda, he calmly chided, you dont know who those people really are. Hinata knew them well enough, yes? Merchants of death, peddling weapons behind the scenes. She let that slide because they were useful to her out in the open, but if she knew their true nature, she would never associate with them.

    Their true nature?

    Yes. They are part of an underground organization known as Cerberusand Damrada the Gold is one of their leaders.

    The rest of the elders nodded in agreement. They knew who they were dealing with, which was why all five were in attendance. Glenda could understand their concern.

    Huh. Ive heard of that group How they rule the underworld in the East, and so on. No, challenging them wouldnt be a great idea, huh? I look forward to seeing what theyre capable of.

    She shed a wild grin as Granville nodded at her and stroked the blond hair of the girl on hisp.

    Heh-heh-heh This may not go so easily for you, Damrada. The demon you are dealing with is no mere Arch Demon.

    There was real mirth to hisugh. His research showed that the demon was so strong that not even the magic-born Razen would be a problem for him. It was a good chance to test out the skills of Damradas group, but they needed to consider what to do if he was defeated.

    If ites to that, I could step up

    Hmm. I imagine he wont be a problem for you, but just in case, Id like to get the other Battlesages involved as well.

    Yes. Good point, another elder said.

    The demon lord Rimuru needs to be weakened in any way possible. A demon that dangerous must be addressed at once.

    And even if we fail at that, we need to do whatever it takes to ensure the victory of Farmuss royal force.

    Yes, said Granville. That demon cannot make any grandiose moves. If he throws his power around on the public stage, it will be harder for him to keep other nations from talking. The more dangerous the threat, the more terrified politicians youll find screaming for his head. You know what your job is, right, Glenda? I want you to use Cerberus to check that demons movements.

    If Damrada and his men could kill the demon, then great. If they couldnt for some reason, he was helpless anyway, surrounded by hostile royalist forces. Itd be easy for Glenda and the ex-Battlesage Rama to rub him out personally, but as long as they could keep the demon from taking action, mission aplished. Yohms force could never take on the federated forces of Farmuss new king.

    To achieve this, Granville saw fit to take every possible precaution and bring Saare and Grigori, the other two Battlesages, into the mix. Their formation needed to be rock-solid.

    You got it, Glenda said with a proud grin. Glenda Attley is on the job.

    Having a family name despite not being nobility was unique in thesends. It was because Glenda was not from here at allshe was an otherworlder summoned on the sly by Seltrozzo, or really, the Rozzo family itself. She was an ex-mercenary who learned military tactics during a stint in the foreign legion of an undisclosed nation, and her skills, honed by her worldwide travels, were exemry. She wielded the unique skill Sniper, which let her handle all types of guns and projectile arms with ease, and she was also a giftedbat fighter and assassin, using a knife as her weapon of choice.

    She was a born predator, one whose faithfulness to Granville was etched into her soul when she was summoned. In her eyes, even Hinata, Lubelian survivor of ten years of warfare, was a mere child. Glenda had a war-torn upbringing in her world, and a where a woman can be top of the heap just by gaining a little power at age sixteen or seventeen was a paradisepared with the hell she went through. But that, sadly, was based on the assumption that this world was fair to all its people. It wasnt, in reality. That was why people prayed to gods, after all; it was in the teachings of Luminism. But even after attaining a position in the Three Battlesages, she had forgotten about that.

    Right. In that case, I will have Blood Shadow stir Saare and Grigori into action. Make sure you do your part as well.

    Blood Shadow was the Rozzo familys darker side, a group of battle-hardened fighters who were open to any type of work given to them. It was familiar to many otherworlders, Glenda included, bound by contract to fight for the sake of the Rozzos.

    Glenda nodded. Youre going to use them? All right. All for the sake of the familyand my freedom.

    Mmmm. You may go.

    With Granvilles order, Glenda left the room, a fire burning in her eyes.

    The fire in the hearth burned a shade of red, crackling to life as it grew brighter.

    Is all of this good for you, Maribel?

    Yes. Very much so, Grandfather. Deploying this group will prevent both of them from taking action. Rimuru will be too busy dealing with Hinata to help Farmus, once the Western Nations intervene to put an end to the civil warin the name of Edward, of course. Then hell be indebted to you, wont he?

    Thats exactly right, Maribel. And I refuse to allow anyone to mess with the sandbox we rule over!

    Were it not for the demon lords shadow cast over the Farmus conflict, he could have given support to both sides and turned the fight into a stalematebut that had the potential of gifting Englesia too much power. A single force dominating over thend was not the will of the Rozzos; instead, Granville maneuvered to retain an ideal bnce.

    For the Rozzos, the blond, lovable Maribel said, the world!

    For the Rozzos, everyone else shouted back, the world!

    This was the center of the worlda world that the Rozzos sought to bringpletely under their rule. And under the cover of the Council of the West, this desire was beginning to take real shape. To grow steadilyand growrge.

 Volume 7 - Ch 4

    THE SECOND CONFRONTATION

    The highway to the Dwarven Kingdom wasplete, and we had a timetable in ce for the road to Blumundbut I just kept getting busier and busier. We needed to establish a new highway to the Sorcerous Dynasty of Thalion, and Milim and her people needed an entire city nned for them.

    There was a ton to do, and in the process, we were also developing a massive festival and hatching a scheme to conquer the Kingdom of Farmus. I knew bing a demon lord would put a bunch more stuff on my te, but this was pushing my workload to the absolute limit.

    And in the midst of all this, I received terrible news from Soka: Hinata Sakaguchi was on the warpath, and she was headed straight for me.

    As Soka stood there, panting as he reported back to me, I brought a hand to my head. I was nning to inspect our forges today, but instead, I canceled that and headed to my office so he could fill me in on the details.

    Apparently, he told me, she was traveling totally unapanied.

    Alone?

    Yes, he said, looking straight at me. Nanso reported from his viewing post outside the Lubelius barrier that he didnt see anyone leaving the holy city. Only Hinata, who you told us to keep an especially close eye out for, was seen in Englesia.

    Soeis guidance had turned him into a master of espionage. If thats what he said, it had to be true.

    Wait a moment!

    Then Toka, another guard under Sokasmand, jumped out from his shadow.

    Weve detected new movements.

    What happened?

    Four pdins have appeared to join Hinata, Sir Soka!

    Just four?

    Yes sir, but all appear to be very powerful. They used some kind of magic to shake us off their tail almost immediately.

    Toka looked chagrined as he gave us the news. Hmm. What was that all about? Did she leave without telling anyone, and they came running after her? Seemed doubtful. Were they staggering their deployment in anticipation of being watched? No, theyd be a lot more careful if those were their tactics.

    I couldnt say, but I had to hand it to Hinata. Always one step ahead of me. Shrugging off anyone whod drag her down and attempting to strike us with only the best people she had? Maybe she thought that anything less would just get in the way.

    So

    I guess Hinata wants to fight us, huh?

    I didnt want to think aboutbat with her very much, but itd alle down to the actions she chose to take. I doubt Id lose to her that easily now, but I couldnt trifle with her. I was hoping my message would open her mind to the thought of talking things over, but

    Thats unclear. She was carrying this odd-looking sword, however, so I doubt she ising on friendly terms.

    Hmm. Shes armed, huh? Well, being armed was a given in this world, and its not like she wouldve marched to a demon lord empty-handed. Itd be rash to assume this meant she was in a fighting mood.

    I dont know Thats not enough to make a decision.

    The Crusaders were fully armed as well

    Oh, really? Like, full-on?

    Yes! Full-on, sir!

    Hmm. Full-on. Well, with those pdins joining Hinata ready for battle, I had a feeling a fight wasing up. It disappointed me. I was no fan ofbat here. The move indicated that we were a thorn in her side, and she wanted a way to deal with it. But what did she want after that? If we didnt try to understand each other, then one side would have to be eliminated. Itd be a huge, life-and-death struggle.

    If Hinata declined to talk to us, wed have to force our will on her in any way possible. She refused to look at the matter from our perspective; she refused to lend an ear to our words. I cant really call that the high road, in any real way. Didnt Hinata get that? She had never really listened to me since we first met, but I didnt think she was that close-minded.

    Was her Luminism the cause of it? Maybe she didnt see why a monster like me deserved to be listened to. Im sure her faith served her well in many aspects; it was important to her, but I wasnt so sure blind belief was in her best interest. Anyone living in modern-day Japan would feel that way, given all the blood thats been spilled in the name of religion. Its important to use your eyes and earsand think with your own head. Otherwise youre just shutting off your mind, right? Its stupid.

    Regardless, it was up to her to use the information she had at hand. What would she decide on? How would she act? That was all her problem. If Hinata decided to be hostile to us, I was ready for it.

    Bad news alwayses in waves.

    I shook my head, trying to readjust my thoughts. Oh well. Ill gather my staff and work out a n

    With Hinata potentially attacking soon, we couldnt afford to be idle. Even if there were only five of them, those guys were nothing to sniff at. Whenever a demon lord was defeated, it was almost always by a Hero and their handpickedpanions. I hadnt set out to be a demon lord myself, but now that I was, I wasnt going to sit here and let myself be defeated. We needed to decide whod tackle those four pdins while I engaged Hinata.

    Then Diablo appeared, a rather somber look on his face. Sir Rimuru, I have a report, he said, having trouble getting the words out.

    Whats up? Do we have a problem?

    It had to be that. Diablos usual confidence was nowhere to be found.

    Yes, we do.

    What is it?

    Reyhiem is dead. I am unsure of the cause, but he was likely killed. He was in perfect health thest time I saw him, so it was either an ident or murder. He paused, looking apologetically at me. This was my fault, Sir Rimuru. After all your concern about him being silenced

    I did say something offhand about that, didnt I? I didnt think itd actually happen.

    We had no idea what had taken ce; it all happened inside the barrier that covered the Holy Empire of Lubelius. Given the situation, however, Diablo seemed pretty convinced that he was killed. Things were starting to seem far more serious.

    There are rumors spreading around Farmuss neighboring nations, he bitterly continued. They speak of a demon scheming to kill the archbishop. Someone is using magical means to disseminate the news, and the Temple Knights have been deployed in response. Once they are finished preparing in a few days, I believe they will join the forces of King Edward

    This was not at all part of Diablos ns. In fact, it could have a seriously adverse effect on them. And of course its all happening just as Hinata goes on the move. No doubt about it

    Understood. It is thought that everything is connected.

    Yeah, even I can see that. Did Raphael think I was so hopeless that I wouldnt, or what? Come on! Heh-heh Raphael can be such a pain sometimes.

    But this was thest thing I needed. The Holy Church hadnt marked me a divine enemy yet, but that was probably just a matter of time now. And once the official decree was sent out, itd be impossible to avoid all-out war. They arent gonna say Oops, our mistake and take that back.

    So I ordered Soka to assemble my staff. All I wanted to think about was developing my nation. That no longer seemed possible.

    It was time for an emergency meetingall hands on deck, except for Geld.

    Are you sure we shouldnt call for Geld as well, Sir Rimuru?

    Yeah. Hes working hard on his project for me. This is a problem between Hinata and me. Whether it turns into a fight or not, we dont need a huge army.

    This wasnt some frantic border defense. It didnt seem right to counter a team of five with our entire military. I mean, with the huge gaps between the weaker and stronger inhabitants of this world, numbers didnt seem to even mean anything a lot of the time. The pdinsing our way would each be ranked an A or higher, so wed need our main team on the front lines to fight back.

    Besides, calling Geld and his entire team back here would be a logistical nightmare. I could use my transfer magic to bring them back, but itd take too much time to get them were they needed to be. We would need someone to watch the prisoners, too; we couldnt afford to be haphazard with that.

    epting my reasoning, my staff sat there and listened to Soei ry the situation.

    All right. First, a party of five led by Hinata, captain of the Crusaders, is traveling toward Tempest. Herpanions are all high-level Crusader troops, and they sessfully eluded the attempts of Sokas team to track them.

    Soeis briefing sent murmurs across the audience. Soka and his men were all A level or so, too, and they still couldnt keep up. That showed the kind of threat we were dealing with. They probably wouldve managed it if they were up in the air, but flying would make them too conspicuous. They were right not to push their luck, and thanks to the alertwork we had built around town, Soei was already staying abreast of Hinatas progress. Information is key to any strategy, as was making ample preparations so you didnt have to freak outter.

    I had to hand it to Soei, though. His intelligence-gathering skills were phenomenal. Hiring informants to feed him data, disguising his own Replications to send out on the field I had taught him a bit about the ninjas from my world, and hed inly been developing that in his own style. I had called him my shadow, and it turned out he was an incredible fit for the job. Between that and the practical instruction I had Fuze give him, he was a professional spy by now. If everyone could take the weird Earth stuff I told them and leverage it to this extent, Id never have anything to worry about.

    Soei was training and educating Soka and the rest of his team, too, even using locals to gather information for him. By this point, he could handle all of that without me directing him to. Seeing him there, providing his briefing like it was his duty, made me feel proud.

    The Temple Knights in the Farmus area are being deployed to the border areas of its neighbors, effectively forming a ring around the nation. They are moving quickly, in small groups, and I believe they number over thirty thousand. Their mission is to destroy the demon, and they do not appear interested in meddling with the civil war itself. If this keeps up, however, we cannot expect much support for Sir Yohm from any of the powerful nobles in and around Farmus.

    Diablo grew notably paler. He had picked up on this same information, though, and it didnt seem to surprise him. There was no doubting which demon was being referred to, and he was probably dying to know how word got out about him.

    Thirty thousand, though Funny how all these knights from the surrounding nationsa few hundred here, a few thousand therecould turn into such a big force. That couldnt be ignored, and they could also be indefinitely supplied from the viges. If this turned into a war of attrition, Yohms side would have the disadvantage.

    However, the kings of Farmuss assorted neighbors are not following the Western Holy Churchs lead. None of them have mobilized their armies. It would seem the Church has its own internal factions as well, whichplicates the chain ofmand in the area. It would be easier to grasp the situation if we had a better idea of their internals

    Soei shook his head, a little ashamed at the informationcking in his report. Yeah, theyre kind of a mystery group, arent they? Even Yuuki imed not to know much about them. Plus, the Temple Knights seemed to be lower on the totem pole than the Crusaders.

    We should have asked Reyhiem about this, a dejected Diablomented. He was always pretty self-sufficient, never bothering to ask for feedback from someone he saw as lower than him. That came back to bite him here.

    Exactly! This is your failure, Diablo. Itd be better for all of us if someone more experienced, like me, tookmand!

    Shion preyed upon the chance, of course. She must have hated seeing the new guy get a big job like that. And as ready as he usually was to fire back at her, Diablo remained silent this time. Ah well. Maybe Ill ask her instead.

    Actually, Shion, if I let you handle the Farmus invasion, what would you do?

    MaybeI mean, its not impossiblemaybe she actually had a decent strategy in mind.

    I would lead an army into the kingdom and kill everyone in the noble sses, Sir Rimuru!

    Maybe not.

    No! No, all right?! You dumbass!

    If we killed everyone in the ruling ss, the power vacuum would lead to aplex, multisided civil war. Without someone to support, youd have all kinds of would-be warlords vying for power. The best way to keep casualties to a minimum was to retain the current system, rece the figurehead up top, and slowly let the new one take hold. That was why I had the more intelligent Diablo handle this. Shion just wasnt up to it.

    No? All right.

    Even she must have realized how foolish it was. She fell silent, standing up straight behind me. I wish she hadnt bothered to say it if she was aware of how stupid itd make her look, but I wasnt sure she really wanted Diablos job anyway. Or maybe this was her way of helping Diablo put this behind him.

    Either way, Diablo was still my man for this.

    Look, Diablo, everybody makes mistakes. Not even I thought Reyhiem would get himself killed. Plus, is it really that big a deal youve been found out?

    Wha? But, Sir Rimuru? With all this talk about a demon on the loose, I could hardly

    His concern mainly seemed to be about getting relieved of his position in this drive.

    Listen. When you make a mistake, its vital to think about how you can make up for it. Anyone can just throw it in and say I quit if they mess up, all right? Thats the easy way out! And besides, the general public already knows Yohm is connected to me. Youre a demon, but youre also a member of my staff. Who cares what people around Farmus are saying? What matters right now is who killed Reyhiem, right? If we can prove it wasnt you, then were all good. You dont have to dwell on it that much.

    Im literally a demon lord. Of course Im going to have a demon or two on my payroll.

    Youre right, said Shuna. And I doubt you wanted to rece him with Shion anyway.

    Youre wrong, Lady Shuna! If it were me, I would turn the Kingdom of Farmus into a wastnd of

    Shions voice trailed off as Shuna gave her a withering stare. Those eyes were just too sharp for her to deal with.

    He wasnt going to, Shuna continued in her strong but stern voice. I appreciate your encouragement, Shion, as clumsy as it might have been. We are all part of Sir Rimurus staff. We cannot allow small mistakes to plunge us into depression.

    Lady Shuna, you are making too much of this demons meager talents. As first secretary, I was simply teaching this upstart about the gravity of my post!

    The sneer she gave him had a little bit of shame tossed in. Maybe that was meant as encouragement. A little hard to follow, but thats Shion for you. Shuna picked up on it better than I did. Sometimes that dunderhead can be really smart.

    Well, Benimaru said, there you have it. The need for reinforcements will depend on our strategy. If worsees to worst, well bring Geld back, and Ill take the front line.

    Numbers didnt concern him very much. What did was how they were going to use their forces. There wasnt a trace of doubt on his face; he looked like he was ready to take on every Temple Knight on the. I was d I could trust him.

    So you want me to continue with the current n?

    Of course, Diablo. Im gonna have my hands full with Hinata, so its your job to handle the Farmus takeover. Im the one who gave you permission to send Reyhiem out in the first ce. Im partially at fault, too. So I want you to see this to the end for me, all right? Or is it starting to look like that wont be possible? In that case

    Oh, no, not at all! You were kind enough to give me this work, Sir Rimuru, and I hope you will let me take it to its conclusion.

    Can you do it?

    Heh-heh-heh-heh-heh Of course!

    Good. I know you can make up for this.

    Diablo nodded, his ease and confidence returned. He ought to be fine now.

    Sir Rimuru, Shuna said as she smiled at this, I have a suggestion.

    Oh? I dont hear suggestions from you very much. If you want to say something, go right ahead.

    Why dont we try seeking the advice of Adalmann? He was part of the Holy Church, albeit several centuries ago.

    Adalmann?

    Understood. Adalmann is the wight king who defended ymans castle

    Ohhh! Right! The undead guy Shuna made friends with. I think hes just a regr wight now, what with his power gone. He looked totally wowed when we met, going on about how much of a god I am or something; I guess hes the type to go all-in on an idea once it creeps into his head. If he was part of the Church, maybe he knows something about its inner workings. Things must have changed between now and then, but theres no harm asking.

    Thats a good idea. Lets bring it up with him.

    At the moment, Adalmann was working with Gabil, handling research and security duties down in the Sealed Cave. I sent a Thought Communication Gabils way, ordering him to send Adalmann up at once. He was with us in seconds, using teleportation magic to whisk himself to our meeting. Even as a wight, he apparently could still cast the magic he learned during his living days, and it was pretty high-caliber stuff. In terms of magicules, he may only rank a B, but you couldnt afford to downy his strength too much. Hes intelligent and magically gifted enoughmaybe I should give him some better work.

    Of course, he was basically a walking skeleton, and his force of undead was weak against sunlight and incapable of speech. You couldmunicate with them, more or less, but work around town might be a little tough. Lets think about thatter, then.

    Regardless, it was time to listen to him.

    Being granted with the tremendous good fortune of an audience with you, my lord, is the greatest honor that

    Enough!

    He had been heaping praise upon me the entire time I was thinking about him. I was ignoring it, but it didnt seem to be ending anytime soon, so I finally yelled at him to shut up. Pretty intense guy. Shion liked him (You have potential, I see!) and Diablo gave him an approving smile, but the rest of my staff were a little put off by the disy.

    Thats good for now, Adalmann, Shuna said. We all know you are happy to see Sir Rimuru, but we are short on time right now, so please go on with your business.

    Thanks, Shuna. If it wasnt for you, he might start openly praying to me next. With that kind of dogged faith, no wonder he was so strong. It kind of made sense.

    So on to Adalmann

    It turns out that he was actually a Holy Church cardinal, one of the highest positions in the whole bureaucracy. Lubelius wasnt a real powerhouse of a nation at the timethe Church wasnt the juggernaut it is nowbut we still learned a great deal from him.

    First, he told us that the Holy Empire of Lubelius is a religious state with the god Luminus at the peak. The Holy Emperor was considered the official spokesperson for this god; her identity and appearance was unknown. The imperial throne may or may not be passed down from generation to generation, but Adalmann, at least, never saw that happen.

    The nations day-to-day operations were handled by the Papacy, the main ruling authority. In Adalmanns time, the entire Western Holy Church was merely a division of this Papacy. The Church began strictly as a missionary group to spread the good word about Luminism, he exined. It had no standing army at all.

    However, due to the danger involved with their field work, the Papacy formed the Temple Knights, working out agreements with the worlds nations to build troop stations in their area of activity. They all weed the Knights (especially since the Papacy was paying the tab) and promised to cooperate with them. Protecting the Luminus faithful from monster threats also helped keep the general public safe, so their generosity was understandable.

    As these rtionships with foreign countries grew, there naturally began to be friction in certain areas. That created a need for the Master Rooks, a division that worked under the more direct control of the Holy Emperor. I call it a division, Adalmann said, but in the beginning, it was a small handful of people. They all boasted tremendous strength and had the right to give orders to the Temple Knights. As a group, they pledged their loyalty strictly to Luminus and the Holy Emperoreven the most powerful consuls in the Papacy could no more than request their services, not order them.

    These consuls were the politicians of Lubelius. If not even they could order this division around, they had to be powerful, indeed.

    By the way, my friend Alberto was invited to join this division once. He turned it down so he could serve as my aide in the Holy Church. The Holy Emperor rewarded him with the title of acolyte.

    His jawbone cked up and down in a show of what I assumed was pride. Alberto was the death knight that gave Hakuro all that trouble, if I recall. He was now just a skeletal fighter, but between his sword skills and possessing a monsters strength, hed give anyone a run for their money.

    However, I understand that things are quite different around the group now.

    Oops. Adalmann still wasnt done talking.

    ording to him, the biggest difference was the power the Church had acquired; their Crusader pdin corps gave them a much greater say in matters. Papal consuls were nowrgely picked from the Holy Churchs cardinals, putting them in a much safer position than before. The Seven Days Clergy had a lot to do with that.

    When Adalmann was there, this Clergy also worked as consuls, enjoying powers second only to the Holy Emperor. They were ordered to rebuild and shore up the Churchs position, and the changes they enacted created the Church structure we know today.

    This Seven Days Clergy sounded kind of fishy to me, though. It sounded like they were the ones who tried to run Adalmann and his friends out of the Church, and he was clearly still no fan of theirs.

    Although the Crusaders performed few noteworthy feats under the Clergys direction, Hinatas training had helped them grow into the strongest of knight corps. This was how Lubelius had acquired both the Master Rooks and the Crusaders for itself.

    You seem to know a lot about this, Adalmann. Werent you in ymans domain by this point in time?

    Adalmann gave this question a ckingugh. The demon lord yman saw the Western Holy Church as his enemy. He feared its power to make war and gathered as much intelligence as he could about them. I was a leader in their bureaucracy, so even if he didnt ept my feedback, he still provided me with the information he had.

    That made sense. ymans near-obsessive wariness had unexpectedly helped us out.

    Please, my lord and savior Rimuru, be careful. Lubelius is home to a group of Enlightened known as the Ten Great Saints, a cabal that even yman was afraid of. I must advise you not to let your guard down.

    He also mentioned the Three Battlesages, a group within the Master Rooks that was also Enlightened ss. This trio, along with sixmander-level knights and Hinata, formed the Ten Great Saints. An Enlightened was a human with powers on the same level as a would-be demon lord, and if they had ten of those, no wonder they kept yman awake at night. It seemed pretty likely that Hinatas fourpanions on her current journey came from this group. Bringing regr soldiers along would just guarantee their deaths; better to presume that the top brass would be knocking on our door. Plus, if the Temple Knights were being mobilized, it was safe to assume the Master Rooks were, too, along with the Three Battlesages.

    My lord, please allow me as a former Church cardinal to attempt to reason with this Hinata woman! I will dly convince her to abandon her faith in the Church and turn it toward you instead

    Ah, wait, wait. I dont need any of that, so you can go.

    I put a stop to Adalmann before things got any weirder. In a way, he was even worse than Hinataonce his minds made up, theres no derailing it. Talking with someone like him rarely results in anything useful.

    I see A wonderful idea.

    Heh-heh-heh-heh-heh Ah yes, there is always that approach!

    And of course Shion and Diablo loved it.

    What are you two idiots talking about?! If we try to pull that crap on her, things are gonna get even moreplicated!

    Talk about being cut from the same cloth. I was starting to wonder if they actually liked more than hated each other.

    With Adalmann gone, it was time to return to the topic at hand. We had all the info we needednow to devise some actual policies.

    First, I wanted to have some kind of throwaway piece I could use to gauge my opponents power. Who would work for that? I could sense Veldora eagerly staring at me. No, Veldora, not you. Thats too much.

    Veldora, you

    Ah! Finally, my turn in the spotlight? At your service!

    No, Veldora. I want you to man ourst line of defense.

    Whaaaat?

    Did you hear me? Thestlineof defense. Doesnt that sound cool? Youre the only person I could imagine for the job.

    Mm, of course, of course. I thought so as well!

    He nodded proudly. Great. Good thing I could corral him before he went berserk on me. Veldora would never lose in battle, but sending him out just wouldnt be the right thing to do, I thought. I hadnt given up all hope of talking things over with Hinata, so I couldnt just whip Veldora out at first sight, or even as primary backup.

    With Veldora cated, it was Benimaru who spoke next.

    First, I will announce my assignments for Sir Yohms reinforcements.

    Mm. Good. Benimaru was turning into quite themander. He had gained a lot of experience in that previous battle, and unlike Shion, he wasnt letting it get to his head any longer. Now he could correctly analyze the data at hand and determine the differences between the two sides. I was still themander in chief, but by this point, he was better suited for the job than I was. I mean, hell, I didnt really want that work anyway. Lets hope that Benimaru can grow into the role.

    With his loud, deep voice, Benimaru announced the assignments. The reinforcements would consist of one hundred goblin riders, led by Gobta; four thousand troops from Benimarus Green Numbers, along with a hundred members of Team Kurenai to lead them (the remaining two hundred Kurenai members would stay back to protect the town), and a hundred fighters from Gabils Team Hiryu. That was a force of 4,300 in total.

    That is all. This will mean fewer troops guarding the town, but we have lycanthropes among our fighters now, as well as Sir Veldora, so I dont anticipate that being a problem. Any feedback?

    Whoa! Uh, me?!

    Is there a problem with that, Gobta?

    Nnnnno.

    Benimarus eyes were enough to mp Gobtas mouth shut. Doofus.

    Hakuro will be the suprememander of this force, but dont worry. If anything happens, I will use Spatial Motion to back you up at once. Just keep in mind that theres a good chance I will be fighting Hinata Sakaguchi myself. This might make it impossible to contact me, so try to follow Hakuros orders as closely as possible!

    Understood, sir, said Hakuro.

    It shall be this battle, this very battle, where my name will shine! cried Gabil.

    Yeah, yeah, all right, murmured Gobta.

    Hakuro and Gabil were raring to go. Gobta frankly worried me a little, but he had a knack for working through crises, so he ought to be fine, I think. Maybe.

    Hmm. I still worry, though. Ranga, are you awake?

    I addressed Ranga, currently sleeping in my shadow. He spent almost all his time in theretely, in part to guard me, but his magicule energy had been expanding in the weirdest way. He probably needed more exercise.

    Will I be deployed, Master?

    Yep. I need to get you running around now and then, you know? Follow Gobta and keep him safe!

    I shall! A little wake-up exercise would be very kind to me.

    Weird. I was getting the strangest feeling that unleashing this guy was gonna be seriously bad news. For our foes anyway.

    Oooh, yeah, if Rangas joining me, Ill be totally fine!

    Now Gobta was showing some more enthusiasm. Looking out for number one, arent you?

    Ranga, dont take any reckless risks. And try not to kill your opponents, all right?

    It shall be done! Lady Shion has taught me how to restrain myself!

    Um, great

    Now I was really worried. I thought he was just spending all day sleeping in my shadow, but he was doing that, too? Having Shion as his teacher filled me with anxiety, but hopefully itd work out fine. Weve got potions, I guess.

    Benimaru offered no objection, although his eyes indicated he thought I was spoiling Gobta. Thus, with a delighted howl, Ranga curled up next to Gobta. Lets just hope anyone who crosses him lives to tell the tale. I almost wanted to wish my opponents luck.

    We had our force assignments. Now we had to discuss the reinforcements Farmuss new king was receiving.

    So, Diablo, tell me how you intend to proceed.

    Thank you, sir. I was expecting reinforcements, but thirty thousand is well beyond my projections. My original n assumed a force of approximately ten thousand fighting for Edward.

    His new ns began with having Edmaris send a letter to the new king once he began moving these troops around, asking him to exin his actions. Edward was no doubt nning to shift responsibility for the reparations to Edmaris, and I wanted to keep that from happening. The new king would no doubt say that any agreement Edmaris signed was null and void. That wouldnt pass muster with the Council if Farmus was part of itit barely did with us, in fact.

    No, his n likely involved executing Edmaris and reneging on his promises to us. Wed then be angered enough to stage a military operation, and then the Western Nations would join together to resist usthat kind of thing. To prevent that, Edmaris had been rescued by Yohms squad. He was lying low in Migam at the moment, which was just what we nned. Yohm had a force of about five thousand over there, and the original n called for us to teleport 4,300 more to Migam for him. Thats not a huge difference, but the psychological effectthe terror of having a brand-new army appear out of nowhere behind the first onewould turn the tables during battle.

    But now that Edward had started assembling reinforcements, we couldnt use that. If we waited for him to get his whole force together, wed be faced with a four-against-one disadvantage in numbers. The sooner we acted, the better.

    It seems to me, concluded Diablo, that Edward is waiting for reinforcements he can use to strike Edmariss domain.

    The n at this point had been to defeat Edward in one decisive battle or another, then have Edmaris endorse the champion Yohm as king instead of reiming the throne.

    Currently, Edward has ess to a force of twenty thousand, Soeimented. Give him three more weeks, and the full force of forty thousand will be assembled. Thats more than enough to take Migam, as weak as its rear guard currently is.

    So the longer we wait, the worse things will get. But if we go all out right now, its going to be full-on, blood-soaked war. Farmus had already lost twenty thousand troops; a dragged-out war would cause untold damage.

    So what then?

    This is just the worst. We could always just give up on this, you know. If I forgive the remaining debt they owe us, we can avoid war that way, right? Thatll eliminate the whole pretense for fighting us in the first ce.

    We cant! If we do that, Sir Rimuru, you will look like a big pushover!

    I wouldnt want that, no, but weve already profited from this big-time. Wouldnt it be easier if we just stepped on the brakes and waited until after weve handled Hinata to deal with it?

    As far as I was concerned, we were paid more money than I ever expected to see from them. Cutting our losses now would still put us way ahead, and I felt that waging a war on two fronts would be too risky byparison. Shion did have a point, though. Demon lords have a vested interest in being feared.

    Heh-heh-heh-heh Abandoning this n would be unthinkable. Sir Rimuru, you are willing to let me handle this, yes?

    Yeah, but I dont want people to keep dying on my watch, whether theyre involved with it or not

    That will not be a problem. If that is your will, sir, then it is my duty to abide by it. It will be a simple task for me.

    I was seriously considering calling the whole thing off, but Diablo hadnt given up at all.

    What are you intending to do?

    I will find the culprit, he quietly replied. The evildoer who tried to pin the crime on me.

    Wow. Hes pretty angry.

    Destroy the demon, they say? He gave me a little grin. Well, if they want me eradicated, I will dly serve as their opponent. Somewhere, among this thirty thousand, there could be someone involved with the culprit. I will give them a gentle interrogation.

    Uh-oh. There wasnt a shred of gentleness about that. And Diablo sounded like he was ready to take on thirty thousand Temple Knights by himself. Better rein him in a little bit

    I see, Benimaru said as I stewed over this. If you came out to engage them, wed have nothing to worry about. But dont kill any innocents, all right?

    There is no need to remind me. I will never defy Sir Rimurus will.

    Fair enough. In that case, Hakuro, can you suppress the new kings soldiers without killing any of them?

    It shouldnt be a problem. It would be easier to stage a surprise attack to end things quickly, but that would provide no training for us.

    True. Gabil, were going to need a great deal of potion.

    Certainly! I will be sure it is ready.

    Huh? Um, hello? I was being left in the dust.

    Shion smiled at me. Looks like the Farmus invasion is in good hands, Sir Rimuru.

    Uh, yeah Yeah. Good luck, guys

    Yes, my lord! they all replied.

    With that, the conversation was over. Couldnt argue with that.

    I didnt like how that was handled very much, but either way, our discussions shifted over to the next issuewho would handle Hinata and her party.

    So about the party of five, Benimaru said, looking at me. All right. Time to take the initiative on this one! But just as I was about to speak, Soei suddenly stood up.

    Sir Rimuru, he said in a strained voice, we have an emergency. The Crusaders have begun to move

    The room fell into a panicor at least, I did.

    Is something up with Hinatas team?

    No. Hokuso, monitoring Englesia, reported to me that he sighted a hundred mounted knights departing at this very moment

    What?!

    They are half a day behind Hinata, but at this rate, they will catch up with them before long. They are headed in the same direction, at least, so it seems fair to assume they areing our way.

    Hinata was moving along at a regr, unhurried pace, although her four pdins had used magic to catch up at full speed before slowing back down. There had reportedly been some dispute among the group when they rendezvoused, but they remained together, a team of five bound for our city. They were still in Englesiannds, headed toward Blumund, but only at a rtively slow speed. If those hundred knights wanted to catch up with them, they couldhowever, instead of using the highway or anothermonly used route, they were reportedly more likely to abandon their horses and take the old path into the forest instead.

    So they arent trying to meet up with Hinata?

    Their motives are unclear. It will take no less than two weeks for Hinata to arrive, and the knights behind her are likely going to take about the same time.

    Soei, who was as confused about this as I was, ordered his force to tail them. We would just have to wait for further reports. Out of the frying pan and into the fire, huh? Except I had the impression we hadnt left the frying pan at all. I really didnt like this, but no point whining about it. Things were rapidly changing.

    My staff began to debate among themselves. I listened in, thinking over my options.

    There were five Enlightened to deal with, Hinata included, plus a hundred pdins doing who knows what. This hundred was far more of a threat to us than the twenty thousand members of Farmuss militaryhell, Hinata alone was way worse. Thats just the way things worked in this world. Strength in numbers meant nothing against strength brought to loony extremes. No matter how many nameless Mohawk-wearing punks you lined up in a row, they werent going to beat the Fist of the North Star.

    I wasnt nning to go out there alone. That seemed kind of suicidal to me. Sowhat?

    Why not just kill them all instead of fretting about it?

    I probably dont need to say who suggested that. Lifes so easy if you never use your brain at all, isnt it? Just focus on the results; dont think about whether you can or cant do something. Of course, thats probably how she earned that freaky unique skill of hers, but still

    This would be exactly the kind of thing we could call upon Geld for, Hakuro noted.

    Ah, he has his own tasks to deal with, reasoned Benimaru. We must handle this ourselves, unless there is truly no other recourse.

    I hated to hear that, but they had a point. Should I really be so stubborn about keeping Geld out of this? I mean, were only talking a hundred or so people. There was no point deploying a massive force against it; it was already clearly something only our strongest people could deal with.

    If I was going to handle Hinata, someone else needed to keep the other four down for me. Itd be great if Hinata agreed to my one-on-one offer, but taking on five people at once by myself was way too risky.

    Understood. It will not be a problem. The sole concern is the subject Hinata Sakaguchi.

    Um, thats kind of the problem here, man! Are you feeling all right? Youre starting to seem a lot less reliable than the Great Sage was.

    The whole reason I was stewing over this was because I didnt want to have anybody killed. If I went with massive numbers to tire out the pdins, victory was assured, but itd result in tons of casualties. We had all kept ourselves alive and well up to now; itd be ridiculous to stop that streak now.

    Butthis was Hinata we were dealing with. Shes seriously bad news. I focused squarely on running away thest time we tussled, but if I had truly tried to fight her, I almost certainly would have been dead. Even though she wasnt even giving her full effort.

    Right now, I was the only one of us who could give Hinata any kind of challenge, and if it was a one-on-one duel, I didnt think Id lose. If she was paired with her pdins, though, I couldnt be so sure. Striding in with too much confidence could get me killed. Those hundred other pdins were another issue, too; how should we handle those? If she just wanted to talk with me, she wouldnt have taken this many people with her. And given how she was going out of her way to avoid notice, youd have to be silly not to be rmed.

    Wait! Veldora suddenly belted out. I know! How about I just happen to test out my dragons breath when they arrive? Well simply pretend it was a misfire and I wasnt aware anybody was near me!

    Can you shut up one second? Youre the final defense line, and I mean the really, really final one, all right?

    I swear. He was like a bratty kid sometimes. If Hinata did want to talk, and we pulled a stunt like that, itd blow the whole thing. There was no telling how much damage that breath would cause, either. It was too scary to think of. Itd be happier for everyone, us included, if he stepped away from the battle. His n did make sense if we were in this to kill, but I had to know for sure what our opponents wanted first. We couldnt leave them to their own devices, though, because a few pdins were all itd take to build another Holy Field over me. They had to be watched but not killed.

    Pdins were positioned as the guardians of humankind, protected by the elemental spirits. In this world, monster-based mayhem was noughing matter. It was a daily threat to ones life. The pdins Hinata trained grew up knowing that fear, as they patrolled the viges and frontier towns they offered their free protection to. Many people owed their lives to them. The Crusaders held a special ce in the hearts of those survivors, along with Luminism. Their strength was top-shelf, each one ranking an A or above, and wed take serious casualties in a frontal assault.

    But that wasnt the problem. Killing these knights, these fighters with the hopes and prayers and anticipation of the weak and helpless heaped upon their shoulders, would undoubtedly be the source of untold headaches toe.

    If it wasnt for Luminisms stance that monsters were themon enemy of humanity, maybe we couldve talked this out. I hadnt abandoned that hope, but I couldnt be too confident that this attempt would work out any better than thest one. To them, we were simply evil, and they didnt negotiate with evil. And I could understand their thoughts. Some of them must have survived their own viges being destroyed, their parents being killed. Being tricked by the wrong adversary meant the loss of lifenot just theirs, but those of everyone who needed protection behind them.

    Even now, there were wild monsters causing havoc everywhere. Their numbers had gone down in thends around Tempest, but in other realms, they were still appearing from the woods and going berserk. If we wiped out the pdins, who would keep the countryside safe then? If you think about it that way, I wasnt so sure we should just wipe all these guys out.

    If Hinata had just opened up and talked to mest time, there wouldnt even be this whole misunderstanding. Sadly, though, she didnt. Because Im a monster. She was stubborn like thatstubborn enough that, even after that message I sent, she brought a whole force along with her.

    Concern. Some factors seem unnatural about that. There is likely a high possibility this pdin activity goes against Hinata Sakaguchis desire.

    Huh? So there is room to talk, then?

    If I put my foot down and dered her an enemy, there were a million and one ways I could defeat her. But as long as I didnt know what they were up to, it was all but impossible to figure out our best move. There were a few reasons for that, but if I had to pick one, I guess it justes down to the fact that I didnt want to kill Hinata. Shizue was worried for her, too, and now that I had taken on her will, I didnt want to resort to violence.

    Ugh! And this was all because of how headstrong she was. So annoying.

    Either way, though, if talks failed, we wouldnt avoid a fight. If that was how it turned out, we were at a disadvantage, really. We were dealing with an anti-monster expert, nobody we could afford to trifle with, and I was certain that I wanted to avoid casualties on either side.

    We would need to assume the worst in our approach, no matter what they did. If talking didnt work, I wanted it to be a duel between Hinata and me. That was exactly what my message said, so that shouldnt be a problem. They might be considering a more full-on battle, but if they were, they were gonna do it on my turf.

    If we could spring a trap or something on them, that could buy time enough for me to defeat Hinata. It was a pain to think about, but it had to be done.

    All right. Ive got it sorted out. We need to consider the future here, and along those lines, I want to do our best to avoid killing any of the pdins as well.

    That was the direction I wanted to go withassuming talks failed, of courseand it ignited some more debate among my staff. Itd be a terrible waste if we took casualties of our own in an effort to avoid hurting them. We had to work out the best possible approach, and the surest way was for me to beat Hinata and break the pdins morale. As a result, our primary focus was earning as much time for me as possible.

    So why dont we just sh em all up and silence them that way?

    I was joking, Shion said with a cough. Is she really all right? The way she acts rms me almost as much as Veldora.

    Basically, she continued, you want to maintain the battle, without killing any pdins, and without losing anyone on our side. In the meantime, you will defeat the enemys leader. Am I right, Sir Rimuru?

    Yeah. Thats what it is. Im d you get it.

    Oh, so she did follow me. I was seriously worried for her sanity for a moment there. And if she got it, I was sure the rest of my staff did. But just when I breathed a sigh of relief, Shion confidently beamed at me.

    In that case, I have an idea!

    Uh-oh. I began to feel anxious, for reasons I couldnt put into words.

    What is it?

    There just happens to be exactly one hundred members in Team Reborn, the group I lead. They would certainly be up to the challenge. Id like them to engage the pdins!

    She looked defiantly at me.

    What are you, crazy?! Team Reborns only about a C-ranked threat level! Theyre not gonna be up to the challengeno!

    I wanted to know where Shions confidence came from. They may have matched numbers-wise, but in terms of strength, it was like night and day.

    There are some issues with that suggestion, yes, but I think it would be an effective idea.

    Surprisingly, it was Benimaru who defended her. Everyone in Team Reborn had the extra skill Complete Memory, which made them hard to kill with regr attacks. It was unlikely, he said, that our foes would break out their worst, most soul-crushing attacks on the first salvo against a weaker force. As he put it, their weakness would put the pdins off their guard, giving us a hole to plunge through. If buying time is what were looking for, they might actually be well suited for that.

    He was starting to convince me. If the pdins didnt have any way of directly attacking the souls of their foes, Team Reborn would even be at an advantage. It could make things a lot easier than if we sent any other force their way.

    Benimaru is right! Shion bellowed. And also, Sir Rimuru, I have been carefully training them all. They have sessfully acquired Cancel Pain, of course, and they also resist poison, paralysis, and sleep. When ites to tenacity, at least, they wont lose out to anybody. Hakuro said so himself.

    Hakuro was nodding at her. It mustve been the truth, but I thought Id check to be sure.

    How did they acquire those resistances, by the way?

    Well

    Her reply surprised me. Apparently, she asked Kurobe to make them all weapons that inflicted their targets with status ailments, then had them use those weapons while training against each other, building up their natural immunity. They werergely immortal, so theyd never go easy on their sparring partners, and it was so hard to knock them out entirely that battles tended tost forever with them. In the simted fights they carried out, it was more a matter of whoevers left standing is the winner.

    And if Team Reborn is in danger, Sir Rimuru, I can send Team Kurenai in to help them out. Are you up for that, Gobwa?

    Benimaru was talking to therge, attractive-looking ogre guarding the door for us. She came over to me, kneeled, and bowed her head to us both. This Gobwa was the squad leader of Kurenai, apparently. She mustve been a goblin at the time I gave that name to her, but youd never believe it nowat this point, she was an elite officer, dressed in a striking scarlet-red uniform.

    Sir! she said, puffing out her chest. I have been training our squad just as hard as Lady Shion has. Please allow us to serve your needs on the field, Sir Rimuru!

    Her eyes were sharp, giving her a strong presence. She was also an A rank, maybe higher, which made her at least as strong as Soka. I guess Benimarus been raising some real talents of his own.

    They may not be an even match for the pdins, Benimaru said, but my fighters are talented, indeed. Two of them could engage one of the pdins long enough to allow Team Reborn time to escape.

    Dont be ridiculous! My team can neutralize the pdins all by themselves!

    They started bickering. Both of them were certainly ready for a fight, at least. Maybe itd be worth leaving this job to them.

    All right. Shion, I ept your offer. Gobwa, you handle the rest.

    Y-yes sir! dly!

    Gobwas cheeks reddened as she replied. It mustve been exciting for her, which was fine by me. Itd be more ideal if I didnt need to use them at all, but regardless.

    Remember, Shion, dont send them out until were sure that the talks are a nonstarter, all right?

    Thats fine! But if our foes make any suspicious moves

    Yeah, thatd be a different story. I forgot about the need to interfere with them in advance, lest they toss a Holy Field our way.

    If they try anything funny, dont be afraid to hold back then. Check with me via Thought Communication first, then take action!

    Roger that, Shion replied, giving a satisfied nod as Benimaru ordered Gobwa back to the door.

    So we now had Team Reborn assigned to dy the Crusaders and Team Kurenai providing emergency backup, about three hundred people against a hundred pdins. I was happy with that. Now we just had the question of who would handle the four saint-ss pdins apanying Hinata.

    First off, who among us was powerful enough to handle them? By my estimation, the group included Veldora, Ranga, Benimaru, Shion, Soei, Geld, Gabil, Diablo, and me. Hakuro had the sword skills to keep up as well, although his magical strength wasnt quite up to everyone elses level. Shuna I wasnt sure. A magical fight was one thing, but against a close-range expert, I didnt like her chances. The Ten Great Saints were reportedly on a level with a pre-ascended demon lord or Orc Disaster; thatd be a lot to ask from Shuna.

    So counting Hakuro, ten people. I was handling Hinata. Veldora was out of the questionI didnt want him going out of control on me, so he could focus on town defense. I mean, for all we knew, there could be yet another enemy force on the move that we hadnt noticed yet. We needed our defense to be as solid as possible. Geld, meanwhile, I didnt want to bother if I could help it.

    I wanted to have Diablo, Ranga, Hakuro, and Gabil focus on Farmus, not this fight. Which left:

    So the only people I have free are Benimaru, Shion, and Soei, huh?

    Ideally, Id like one fighter per adversary, but I was short one body. So now what?

    I will join the battle, of course, Benimaru said. This was exactly why he let Hakuro lead Yohms reinforcements. I couldnt have him miss this one.

    I will stay as well, Soei added. My Replications can handle my intelligence duties well enough, and Soka and the others are proving fairly useful by this point.

    Me too! shouted Shion. As your secretary, Sir Rimuru, I will forever remain by your side

    Report. If there is an Enlightened-level fighter among the hundred pdins, attempting to buy time with them may prove impossible. It would be safer to devote some of your war power to them as well.

    Ohhh. Yeah, theres always that concern, too. Thanks for the actual useful feedback! I knew I could rely on Raphael.

    Hang on, Shion. Theres something I want to ask Soei first. Do you know if there are any Enlightened among the pdin force, separate from Hinata?

    Soei closed his eyes for a few moments. My apologies, he replied. All of them are at least an A rank, but none particrly stood out from the pack in my perception.

    With monsters, it was pretty easy to figure out, what with the way they let their aura hang out all casually. The stronger they were, the more you could feel it from them. But with (for example) Hinata, she didnt feel different from any other human being. I couldnt pick her out at all, which was what made her strength so surprising. Ah well. Wed find out quick enough in battle

    anyway.

    Just in case, I want Shion to monitor the group of pdins. Well have hermand both the Reborn and Kurenai groups. Is that all right, Benimaru?

    If that is your decision, it is not a problem at all, Sir Rimuru. Soei and I can each engage two of Hinataspanions.

    Talk about confidence. To Soei, this all seemed perfectly natural.

    One moment, Sir Rimuru, said Rigurd. Perhaps this would be a good opportunity for me to join in? I am content with arranging our political system around town, but even I want to smash some heads sometimes!

    In that case, I, too, am avable, added Shuna with a smile. Look, you arent suited for close-quartersbat, all right? Its gonna be too dangerous for you.

    And so am I. I dont want Gobta to hog the spotlight forever!

    Now Rigur was throwing his hat in the ring. He and Rigurd were both past the A rank, but neither was anywhere near demon lord status. It would be throwing their lives away.

    Hang on, hang on. I think this is a little too dangerous for you all.

    But we dont have anyone else, do we?

    With us involved, Benimaru said, that will be more than enough.

    Perhaps, countered Rigurd. I know your team is powerful, but it would be best not to underestimate our foes, wouldnt it? Allow Rigur and me to take this responsibility

    The debate was starting to heat up. All this worrying might be for naught if a fight didnt break out in the end, but I wanted to tackle this with as much confidence as possible. If we were going to pull out all the stops with this, maybe we should call back Geld after all, just for that one day.

    I was pondering this as I tuned out the endless debate my staff was having when there was a loud noise on the other side of the door.

    I told you, I could hear Gobwa say, we are in the middle of a meeting

    Yes, and we want to be part of it!

    Stop being so belligerent, Sufia. Come on,dy, all we want is to repay a favor we owe him, okay?

    It was Sufia and Alvis, two of the Three Lycanthropeers. The door was finally opened to them.

    Hey. Sorry to barge in. I saw that bony dude runnin around just now, but whats up with that? We wanna join in, too, Sir Rimuru.

    Demon Lord Rimuru, please forgive our sudden visit. Sufia is being rude as usual, but we truly to seek to support you. Please, allow us the chance to repay the favor you gave to us.

    The two of them were in front of me, kneeling. Well, not directly in front of me, since Gobwa was still trying to drag them out by the ear. Benimaru raised a hand to stop her, finally allowing them to approachbut now it was Diablo standing between them and me. Benimaru seemed to trust them as well, but either way, a few people here were kind of antsy about them being close to me. Diablo, in particr, eyed them with open suspicion. If I ordered him to, Im sure he wouldve chopped off their heads in an instant.

    Sufia and Alvis contrasted starkly with each other, but on this point, they were two beastmen of the same mind. They pushed their way in here, knowing it would offend, and asked me to let them help out. The cold treatment from some of my staff was something they seemed to expect.

    Benimaru, Diablo, both of you, step back.

    Understood.

    Yes, Sir Rimuru.

    As they returned to their seats, I had chairs set up for Sufia and Alvis. After a few moments to ensure everyone had calmed down, I continued.

    So you want to help us?

    Yes, Sir Rimuru. We are dealing with some of the Ten Great Saints here, right? It seems you need someone to stop them in their tracks, and we want to be the people who do that for you.

    Yes! Combats pretty much the only thing I can do, yknow. Well never be able to repay our debt to you otherwise. Please, use us freely!

    I thought about this. Force-wise, this was not a problem. But if either of them got hurt, how would I ever exin it to the (ex-)demon lord Carillon?

    Are you sure you can volunteer for that without Carillons consent?

    Of course! Lord Carillon is always quite tolerant of things like that.

    And our lord seemed concerned about repaying his debt to you as well, Sir Rimuru. If we dont step up here, I am sure he would lecture us about it.

    Hmm Frankly, I appreciated this offer a lot. Having these two around would put my mind at ease quite a bit for the battle.

    I agree, Benimaru added. I believe we can trust them.

    When Im gone, Shion asked, will you be able to eliminate anyone getting in Sir Rimurus way?

    Absolutely, Sufia casually replied. Those two did seem to get along pretty well with each otherand I wasnt hearing any no votes.

    Can you do it?

    You can count on us!

    Thank you for your kind words!

    I hated to rain on Rigurds parade when he was all revved up like this, but I needed someone to lead the people in town. When it came to fighting, I didnt haveplete confidence in him, either. But with Sufia and Alvis on our side, we couldnt be much better prepared for Hinata and her forces.

    It was hard to call what we had cobbled together a strategy, but either way, we had something to work with. Now my staff was discussing the details with one another, checking to make sure there werent any holes in our n.

    I closed my eyes and tried to guess at Hinatas behavior again. Raphaels calctions told me this approach was the most likely way to avoid casualties. You could say that I had nothing to worry about, but I was still hung up on a couple of issues.

    One, this whole thing would be so much more in the bag if I either gave up on conquering Farmus or called Geld back here. I was going through with this anyway for reasons I suppose you could call purely egotistical. That was why I had to aim for aplete, wless victory.

    If Hinata agreed to talk, then fine. If not, wed duel it out, one-on-one. We were fully prepared for that scenario, albeit with one considerable pitfall: What if I lost? Then everything would be meaningless. Raphael seemed to have little doubt about my victory, but if I blew it, that would tank this entire operation. Could I really trust Raphaels calctions? I had a suspicion that Raphael tended to err on the side of overconfidence, and it wouldnt be the first time, either. It believed too much in meit wasnt overrating my chances, was it?

    I couldnt banish that thoughtbut I had to do this. Thats how its always been, and thats how it always will be. Whether I fully believe in myself or not, all my friends certainly do. I just have to stop wavering and press on.

    Im going to say this one more time. If, at any point in this battle, it looks like well have trouble keeping ourselves afloat, I want you to immediately focus on annihting the enemy. The lives of our allies have to take first priority. You need to understand that all this means nothing if any of you get yourselves killed. I expect everyone to make it through this alive, just as we always do. Dismissed!

    Yes sir!!

    If we were too reluctant to pick off a pdin, and it got one of our friends killed, itd make all of us look silly. I wanted to be sure everyone was fully aware of that. Seeing them all voice their agreement, I reciprocated with a satisfied nod.

    Now to wait and see what Hinata tried.

    The journey to Tempest was proceeding along well for Hinata.

    A quick trip through the transport gate was all it took to go from Lubelius to Englesia, but from there, she had to do it the normal wayand without any recement horses, so frequent rest breaks were a must. She was used to marches like this, so she kept her own gear to a bare minimum. One horse and a sleeping bag, which she kept filled with emergency rations, a pot, and so forth.

    The trails werent blocked by snow or anything, but the seasonal weather still precluded her from making this trip with haste.

    She had rendezvoused with four of her pdin subordinates soon after departing. It had been a surprise at first, hearing hoofbeats from behind and spotting four familiar facesArnaud, Bhus, Litus, and Fritz, her pdinmanders. Renard, the vice captain, was holding the fort while Hinata was gone, and since having all themanders away from Lubelius at once was not an option, they drew lots and picked Garde to stay behind.

    What are you doing? she had asked them.

    We would ask you the same question, Lady Hinata. Attempting to get a head start on us?

    A head start on what? I am merely going there to talk.

    Oh,e now. You know, you sound less than convincing given how clearly you are equipped to wage war.

    Yes! And we have no interest in standing atop your sacrifices. Our gloryes only when we serve under you.

    Indeed. And besides, that message didnt insist upon you traveling alone, did it?

    Hinata rolled her eyes and sighed. I know, I know. But this is a demon lord, all right? Im the one who riled him up. This is my problem. You have neither any responsibility nor any involvement in it. Return to our homnd at once.

    But Arnaud and the others ignored the order. She was eventually forced to say Whatever and allow them to join her.

    The road this band of five chose was maintained, but it had seen better days. Inns were sparse along the way, and at this time of year, no-vacancy signs were a frequent sight. They would be forced to camp out, and even though they werent running into monsters, camping out in the cold of winter with nothing but emergency rations took its toll on Hinata and herpanions.

    By the time they reached Blumund ten dayster, they had exhausted a worrying amount of their strength. They decided the time was ripe for a night indoors, for a change.

    This town has certainly changed, Arnaud said after the five of them each rented their own room and assembled down at the dining hall.

    Hinata felt the same way. Litus had said as much in her report, but seeing it with her own eyes made the difference exceedingly obvious.

    After changing and resting up a bit, they decided to go explore town. The markets were packed with people, despite the winter weather, and all sorts of strange and unfamiliar merchandise was avable. The backward country atmosphere Hinata felt thest time a mission brought her here was now considerably weaker.

    And did you see the people? So much more variety to the clothing around here now. Some of them had the kind of fancy outfits you normally only see in Englesia.

    Yeah, and those weapons and armor I think some of it is monster-derived. Real high-quality stuff circting.

    Arnaud and Bhus had trouble believing their eyes. Hinata could see why. It wasnt up to the standards they enjoyed as pdins, but everything they saw was almost too upscale for a small country like this. And all the merchant stalls! In a world where many shops closed for the winter season, the sheer number they saw was an extreme rarity. If they were open, that must have meant customers were aroundand that must mean that, even in winter, this little backwater town was entertainingrge numbers of merchants and adventurers.

    Is this Tempests influence at hand? Fritz asked, gauging Hinatas response as he did. All this development must havee after trade rtions were opened up with Tempest. That was the only reason he could think of. It also meant thatrge numbers of people in this town were not only ignoring the teachings of Luminism, but actively flouting them.

    All this prosperity, whispered Litus, clearly shocked, by doing business with a demon lord?

    Hinata, deep down, had to agree with her. This wasnt normal. For him, though; for someone like Rimuru who came from the samend as her, maybe this wasnt so strange at all.

    For example, the menu on the wall of this dining room.

    Have you decided? an attractive waitress asked them.

    Hinata was ready for her.

    Ill have the ramen, please.

    The ramen! Thats been gaining an audiencetely. Ites in miso, shoyu, and tonkotsu vors, each avable in a lighter or thicker broth. Do you have a preference?

    Six types in all. This wasnt some misunderstanding. Ramen, here, definitely meant the meal she was familiar with.

    Tonkotsu, please, on the thick side. And one side of gyoza and rice to go with that.

    Excellent! You certainly know your food, maam, if this is your first time here. And you guys?

    Herpanions watched in awe as she ordered without hesitation.

    Um The same.

    M-me too

    Yeah.

    And I, as well.

    None of them knew what any of it was, so they just followed their captains lead.

    Lady Hinata, could you tell us what thisramen is?

    You do know, right?

    Yeah. It Well, it might be a tad difficult for you guys to eat.

    What?!

    Tension raced across the table.

    Dont worry. I only think it will take some practice before you can eat it correctly.

    Hinata was just worried about the chopsticks. Did Arnaud and her otherpatriots know how to use them? Did anyone in Lubelius, for that matter? Her friends, meanwhile, were now scared Hinata had made them order something on the level of monkey brains.

    After a short wait, the bowls came out. It was ramen, no doubta nostalgic sight for Hinata, a totally unfamiliar one for the rest of the table.

    Brushing her hair back with one hand to keep from dunking it in the soup, Hinata picked up a pair of disposable chopsticks, snapping them apart.

    Theyre even the kind you break Is this what theyre focusing on?

    Could Tempest really poprize chopsticks so quickly that they were already spreading to their neighbor countries? It unnerved her a bit, but the steaming ramen in front of her diverted her attention.

    She put her hands together in a small prayer before picking up a renge ramen spoon off the stack and sampling the soup. It was definitely tonkotsu pork broth, on the thicker side. She had no idea where they got the dashi soup stock from, but it perfectly re-created the heavy, vorful taste she remembered.

    Then she picked up some noodles, brought them to her mouthand half spat them back out.

    Are you all right?!

    Arnaud stood up. Was it poisoned, Lady Hinata?!

    Quiet. Just calm down and eat.

    Hinata picked up some noodles againthis time, cing them on her spoon and blowing on them a bit first. She wasnt used to food served at this temperature. It was almost cutesy of her, especially given her usual frigid demeanor, but she was too focused on the noodles in her mouth to care.

    Good body. Good taste. The savory broth had soaked into the noodles well. It was excellent. She never thought shed taste this again, but it was a perfect re-creation.

    Silently, Hinata concentrated on her meal, Arnaud and the others carefully watching her every move. Soon, they tried imitating her.

    Agh! Hot!

    Mmmm! Wow, what is this?!

    The soups great, too!

    Incredible! Ive never eaten anything like this before

    They were struggling mightily with their chopsticks as they challenged themselves to the ramen, but their reactions were like nothing Hinata expected. To them, whose diets revolved around the staples of hard bread, salty soup, and fresh sds, this ramen opened up an entire new universe of taste. It was a revolution for their taste buds.

    And look at this rice! This rice they ordered simply because Hinata did. It was a perfect apaniment to the ramen, growing sweeter in the mouth the more you chewed on it and filling your stomach in the most satisfying way. And the gyoza Oh, the gyoza! The contents spread across your mouth when you bit into them, the aroma wafting all the way up your sinuses. It was a symphony of vor, yed by arge variety of ingredients and performing in exquisite harmony with the rice.

    This is so good! Arnaud half shouted. I cant believe this!

    Compared with the portable rations of thest ten days, this was heaven. It wasnt long before a single gyoza dumpling remained. Fritzs chopsticks began to drift toward itonly to be deflected away by Hinatas with a dry tssh! sound.

    Thats my prey, Fritz. I wanted to save it forst. No stealing.

    Fritz felt a shiver go down his spine. She was ying for keeps.

    S-sorry, Lady Hinata. It was just so good, I couldnt help myself

    You could always order another te, an appalled Hinata repliedand right on cue, her fourpanions began shouting for the waitress. But then, tragedy struck.

    Oh, Im sorry, guys, but that was thest of our supply for the day. The waitress delivered the devastating news. You know, this ramen is actually a new offering from us. We only started serving itst weekand just between you and me, I heard it got its start as a fervent request from the demon lord for his dinner. Theres a merchant named Sir Mjllmile whos one of the bigger names around this town, you see, and he purchased this ramen directly from the demon lord himself. Can you believe that? Its not selling that well yetits pricey, and theres kind of a learning curvebut once you try it, you just cant get enough!

    Considering this was just between you and me, the waitress was loud enough to be clearly heard across the entire dining hall. The act fascinated Hinata; no doubt she was instructed to advertise it to her regrs like that. Building a faithful base of repeat customers would allow them to create more of it in bulk, establishing it as a full-fledged product. She could spot a few people in the hall curiously eyeing her table. Watching her consume that bowl so expertly probably made them want to try it themselves.

    She took in thest of the soup as they chatted.

    Thanks. That was very good.

    Hinata paid for the meal and stood up. Herpanions, seeing this, scrambled to slurp up the remainder of their soup.

    No rush. Im just going back to my room. Also, heres a word of advice: If you drink all the soup, too, youll gain weight.

    Litus was the only one who stopped eating.

    Huh? But You did?

    Im naturally skinny.

    And with that warning, she left. She could feel Lituss hateful gaze pointed at her, but she was too happy and sleepy to turn back around.

    Lets go.

    The group was back on the road the next morning, fully rested and recharged. They would need it, because navigating the treacherous roads into the Forest of Jura took a lot of willpower.

    Hinata was all smiles as she set off with them, but it wasnt long before that enthusiasm evaporated.

    Whats all this about?

    This is so easy, it almost bores me.

    Yeah, and just look at this highway! Its as neatly paved as the streets of the Englesian capital. This is crazy!

    The surprise around the party was understandable. The road was paved in stone, not a single puddle of water to be found. It was even lightly banked around the turns, and gutters had been dug on both sides. The winter weather hadnt frozen the path at all, ensuring the easiest possible journey.

    I dont even think there are any monsters nearby. There werent too many out in the open forest, either

    Litus, who had staged a short expedition into the unexplored woods, couldnt help but be astonished. She was rightthe barrier deployed over the entire highway was a shock to see in action. Magical devices had been installed every six or so miles to power it, preventing any nearby monsters from wandering the roads. This made the journey vastly safer, and they saw more passing merchants traveling down the road as they pressed on. Those merchants mustve been responsible for breathing so much life into Blumund right now.

    If theyve devoted this much time and effort to constructing a road like this, I wonder what we should expect to find in the monsters homnd up ahead.

    Nobody responded to Arnaud. He was just stating what everyone else was thinkingand they all wanted an answer just as badly.

    That merchant said you could take this highway mounted easily enough. He was right.

    Yeah. I thought our horses would be a bother in the forest, but I suppose we had nothing to worry about.

    Hinata had heard reports about therge-scale construction project Rimuru was carrying out in the forest. Seeing it for herself, however, made it hard to hide her surprise. The Forest of Jura, so forbidding to humans for so many years, was now as essible as a city park.

    So the party proceeded along for a while, until they spotted a group of hobgoblins riding wolves up ahead.

    Did they notice us?!

    Hold it, Hinata calmly said. I dont think so.

    She was right. They could hearughing. It sounded like the hobgoblins were merely chatting among themselves. It was a straight path ahead, so they had noticed Hinatas party, but they just waved and approached in a friendly manner.

    Hello! We havent seen you before. You dont appear to be merchantsare you adventurers, then?

    More or less, yes.

    Ah, very good! I wish you good luck on your mission. Now, Im sure youll be just fine, but there are a few things I need to warn you about.

    The hobgoblin changed his tone, then outlined the rules all travelers needed to follow on the highway:

    No garbage dumping.

    No fighting on the highway.

    Use the drinking fountains located every six miles on the highway when camping overnight.

    For added safety, take advantage of the patrol stations located every twelve miles on the highway.

    If you have the money for it, inns are located every twenty-five miles.

    If you see anyone in trouble, report it to the nearest patrol station.

    and so on.

    Also, youll see a glowing stone tablet every six miles, but please dont touch them. Breaking them will lead to severe penalties.

    It was those glowing stones that kept the barriers running, he exined. They were these little glowing spots among the gstones forming the road, which also helped travelers find their way in dark nights.

    All in all, the rules went into so much detail that the party could hardly believe they were enacted and enforced by monsters.

    All right. Thanks for letting us know.

    Oh, its fine! Youll see people like us patrolling the highway, so let any of us know if you run into trouble.

    With that, the hobgoblin security detail darted down the road, leaving a dumbfounded Hinata behind.

    Um, Lady Hinata

    Hold it. Can you remain silent for a little while? I need to think about something.

    Arnaud and the others obeyed. The party traveled in silence for the next hour until they stumbled across a drinking fountainon the exact mile marker the hobgoblin said theyd find it at. These markers, located at every mile along the highway, began at zero on the western entrance to Rimuru (the capital) and counted upward from there. Each one provided quick guidance on how much farther the nearest water, patrol station, and inn was.

    Hinata, recognizing these from the trips she had taken on Japans expressways, immediately saw the value of these markers in a pinch. If you needed help and werent sure whether to keep going or double back, these provided instant guidance on what to do. It spoke volumes about how much this highways designers cared about traveler safety.

    Its worth noting, by the way, that miles did not originally exist as a unit of measurement on this world, but Rimuru ignored that and simply used a system he was already familiar with. The inns were spaced every 25 miles based on the assumption that the average person could walk a little over three miles in an hour and manage that for eight hours a day easily enough. Merchant wagons went about as quickly as a grown person on foot, so as long as you werent in too much of a hurry, it was easy to organize a trip that gave you an inn to rest in every night.

    Clearly, someone had devoted a lot of thought into designing this. There was no doubting it now. Rimuru obviously craved interaction with the human race.

    The journey beyond Blumund went far morefortably than the one before it. The drinking fountain the party found themselves at was just thata clean source of drinking water, avable to anyone for free. It was almost a dizzying sight to them. Seeing the very modern-day-Earth concept of free water applied to a forest as hazardous as this one made most of the party wonder what Rimuru could possibly have been thinking.

    These fountains were paired with cooking pits and cleared-out grassy areas for those putting up tents nearby,plete with benches made of sawed logs and roofed areas to get out from the rain. It was a campsite, just like any one youd find off your local highway.

    Between this and everything else, the Forest of Juraonce seen as a forbidden holy sanctuary by the rest of thewas now calm and essible enough for just about anyone. This forest that was supposed to be crawling with all kinds of horrid monsters; the kind of ce where if you were an adventurer ranked B or lower, one false move could spell death.

    This wasnt the domain of human beings. It was an Eden for monsters. And developing it to the point that it was open to anybody Hinata hadnt even entertained the concept. It wasnt a matter of whether it was possible or notit was just beyond her imagination, and probably that of fellow otherworlder Yuuki Kagurazaka, too. All that effort they had expended protecting humanity from the threat of monsters, and he made it look this simple?

    Youve got to be kidding me, Hinata thought grudgingly to herself. Now at least I understand what Yuuki mentioned to me.

    She recalled a meeting with Yuuki at one of her favorite cafs in Englesia. They regrly met to exchange intelligence, and this time, the topic of Rimuru came up. Apparently, Yuuki said, Rimuru was earnestly serious about creating and developing a nation of monstersand not only that, but he was sending out feelers toward the Western Nations, in hopes of getting friendlier with them. And that new brandy cake they were enjoying at the caf? Readily avable for purchase from Rimuru, who had invested in producing a wide variety of fine liquors.

    Hes like nobody else out there, Yuuki hadughed as Hinata took little bites out of her slice, savoring each one. Its like he does it all and makes it look easy, you know? And hes got insight way further into the future than I do. I think thats why hes putting so much effort into bringing little treats like that cake into this world.

    He warned her that hostilities with him would be ill-advisedwhich in turn suggested the Free Guild was siding with him. She let that slide withoutment at the time. But now:

    He was right, she thought as she watched some merchants gratefully taking advantage of the fountain near her. Theres no way hed focus on these little things unless he really could do it all.

    Two hours after leaving the fountain, they sighted an inn, thest of seven built along this highway. Hinatas party decided to spend the night here, and before long, they were situated in the dining hall.

    All right, she said once they were seated. I want to hear your feedback. What do you think of what we saw today?

    Arnaud, representing the rest of them, spoke first. If Imay be honest with you, Lady Hinata?

    Go ahead. Thats what I want to hear.

    Judging by this highway alone, I think the demon lord Rimuru must be an incredibly gifted leader. The sense of security his patrolmen give this road must attract all kinds of travelers. I cant see much of a future for the businesses lining the route through Farmus.

    Indeed, rumbled Bhus, monsters are not the only threat out there. You have bandits targeting merchants; you have illness; you have the potential for injury; you might break an axle and be stranded. Such things happen often, and having more people up and down the highway can do much to keep people from worrying.

    True, replied Litus. If youre somece where you can expect help if you need it, that really puts your mind at ease.

    And you can save money, Fritz added, because you no longer have to hire a personal guard detail. That alone Its big.

    The praise for Rimuru was glowing all around.

    He seems to be more devoted to his rule than a lot of the barons you see out there. His title might be demon lord, but if thats what he is, hes a damn benevolent one.

    Yeah. Theres a lot we could learn from him. Including a few things our leaders in Lubelius would be advised to implement.

    Im just d the divine-enemy deration never came down.

    Now well just have to see if hes willing to ept your apology, Lady Hinata.

    Hinata nodded her agreement. Ill have to be as heartfelt with it as I can. If he still wants to duel with me, Ill have to ept, but

    But she had her doubts. Why would he seek a duel at this point? Whether he forgave Hinata or not, she didnt see why it called for another fight to settle. Rimuru just didnt seem to be the kind of person to show off his newfound demon lord power like this.

    Even with those doubts in her mind, Hinatas journey continued apace. They took advantage of an inn on the seventh day as well, and this one was already as ornate and luxuriant as any youd find in Englesia. There was even a vast public bath, the perfect ce to soak after a long journey.

    Whats more, these inns always had at least a few people recruited from Blumund working for them. Trading money for services was still kind of a novel thing for the monster staff, apparently, so her party often saw a human employee providing on-the-job guidance. It was, in a way, an ideal cross-species rtionship, and it was more than enough to make Hinata see the need to reconsider Luminisms teachings.

    They would arrive at Rimuru, the capital, the next dayand with that, an encounter with the demon lord himself.

    I hope we can work this out with words instead of swords

    She knew it was a selfish thought, but Hinata really meant iteven as a vast web of intermingled bad intentions schemed to prevent it.

    Hinata, still trundling along, was due in this evening, ording to thetest report from Soeis team. She had spent two weeks on this journey, making zero use of teleportation or other magical means to speed things up.

    Thank you. Its so vital to have this sort of intelligence early on. Keep it up.

    This is nothing, Soei said, quietly epting my praise. We will redouble our efforts.

    Hes literally a shadow. I mean it. And when someone as handsome as he is pulls that off, you cant be jealous of that. He looked great.

    I should note, however, that when he gave me an urgent report from the inn Hinata first stayed at, he suggested poisoning her to take her out of the picture sooner thanter. I gave him a few not-so-nice words about that idea. It still felt to me that Hinata was here to talk, not fight, as much as we still needed to remain on guard. Something about the way she stayed at every inn along the way, totally unhurried, seemed almost too bold to me.

    Could this be a diversion? Benimaru suggested. A diversion? Was she deliberately drawing attention while that separate forceunched a surprise attack? It was possible, I guess. This was Hinata we were dealing with. As coldhearted as she was, Im sure no method of securing victory was below her.

    What are the hundred other pdins doing?

    They continue to lie low along the old path, sir. If we hadnt spotted them just when they departed, Im not sure we would have noticed them at all.

    These guys, meanwhile, were in full-on military mode. Hinata was looking more and more like a lure. Either way, though, we couldnt rx. Shion already had her force deployed; if these pdins made any moves, things would start happening quickly after that.

    Given Hinatas strength, her serving as a lure wouldnt be strange at all. Im the only one who can handle hereven now, Benimaru, youd probably be in over your head. If I had to guess, Im willing to bet she thinks she can beat all of us together.

    Heh. Thats quite a lot of confidence, believing such nonsense even after she knows you. I could only call it foolish, Soei said with a thin smile, although to me, that assertion was the foolish talk.

    But who knows? She would only know me from before my ascension, but I knew just how capable she was. Looking back, it was tantly clear how easy she was going on me back then.

    We better not let the pdins fan out, then, noted Benimaru. If they build a Holy Field, that will put us at a huge disadvantage.

    Soei nodded at him. True. If so, we will need to contact Shion out on the field and try to have her eliminate them as soon as possible

    He paused mid-thought and then told me the one thing I didnt want to hear:

    Sir Rimuru, were detecting movement. They have attempted to fan out and cover the four cardinal directions around town, but Shion has intercepted them. Battle is reportedly underway.

    So Hinata chose to fight. Ah well. If she wants to be my enemy, Ive got a n for that.

    Putting the inn behind them, Hinata and herpanions prepared for the days journey ahead. They would likely reach the capital of Rimuru that evening, and the tension was written on everyones faces.

    Well, here we are. I dont know if well actually see him today, but be prepared, all right? Even if this does end in a fight, I dont want youying a hand on him.

    But

    Thats an order. Theres no further point to being hostile toward the demon lord. Ill go in, Ill take full responsibility for all this, and then well talk things over

    Before she could wax poetic about her desire for peace, she was interrupted. An emergency message had just been magically sent to her.

    (nally, we connected to You hear us, Lady Hi? The Three Battlesagesen route to)

    It faded in and out, but the urgency and the identity of its senderCardinal Nicus Speltuswere both obvious. Something must have been jamming it.

    Hinata tried to send a message back(What is it? What happened?)but she could sense the transmission dissipating into the air before it got far.

    (Beware the Seven Days)

    And with that final message, Nicuss presence disappeared. Something must have happened, Hinata realized.

    Was he trying to send a message to me over and over before he finally seeded? Maybe whatever happened, happened well before now. But the Three Battlesages are joining in? Wait, were they part of the chaos in Farmus?!

    The blood drained from Hinatas face as she crafted another magical transmission, this one pointed at Holy Emperor Louis.

    (What is it? Thats a rather poorly formed spell you used. Has something gotten you flustered?)

    The emperor sounded serene as usual. That was a relief to Hinata.

    (Yes. No time to exin. Im just going to ask this right out: Did you order the Three Battlesages deployed?)

    (What? I did nothing of the sort. Did they?)

    (Yeah, I didnt think you suddenly took an interest in human nations. I was on orders from Luminus to keep them on standby, and theyre not the sort of people to work on their own volition. Somethings going on.)

    Louiss main interests in life were Luminus and the city of Nightgarden. This was why Hinata called the actual shots around Lubelius. The Battlesages werent afraid to voice their discontent, but Hinatas orders were always followed. It was hard for her to imagine them choosing now, of all times, to defy her.

    So yes, something must have happened. Or someone was feeding the Battlesages a line.

    Seven Days?

    She was now sure about the bad feeling in the pit of her stomach. Immediately, she resolved to return home. A little transport magic would help make up for lost time. She really wanted to be fully refreshed and ready for the potential battle against Rimuru, but now was no time to whine about that.

    But the clock was already against her.

    (Yeah, it looks like it. Ill need to)

    An audible thunk of dull pain ran across her head as her link with Louis was cut off. Some kind of force field covered the area around her, blocking the casting of magic. As it did, she could sense arge battle unfolding not far away, making the very air shimmer.

    Wha?! Is thatRenard?!

    Arnaud, watching over Hinata, quickly expressed his surprise at these sudden events.

    Lets go!

    Things were moving fastand not in a good direction. She hadnt even encountered Rimuru yet, and the situation was rapidly deteriorating. Unease filled her mind as she ran at full speed for the battlefield.

    Hearing that Hinata was making contact with someone, I chose to block her signal. Once I did, she reportedly began running for the battlefield at full tilt. That would nip in the bud whatever she was scheming.

    Now, though, it was certain.

    That was Hinatas doing, huh?

    It would appear so, replied Benimaru. The way she immediately changed tactics once she knew we were on to her Shrewd as always.

    Well, lets follow the n. Hinata and I are gonna work this out, just the two of us.

    Roger that! I will let no one interfere.

    Yeah. Keep the pdins at bay. Lets move!

    Yes sir!

    With a quick, reassuring nod to Benimaru, I turned into my human form.

    Good luck to you!

    Shuna waved as we all set offBenimaru, Soei, Alvis, Sufia, and me. Bracing myself, I cast Dominate Space and popped over to Shions location before Hinata could reach it. I appreciated her holding her own out there, but against a pack of Crusaders, Team Reborn would face an uphill climb

    or so I assumed; and sometimes, I assume wrong.

    I had no idea what was going on. I thought I was going out of my head. How did this happen?! The sight before me made mepletely lose my sense of speech.

    What was I seeing? Well, it was Shion, arms folded in front of her, issuing orders to Team Reborn. That much was finepart of the n. It was the way they fought that was the problem. In a good way, it waspletely unexpected.

    What in the?! Our attacks dont work on them!

    These arent undead! What is the meaning of this?!

    The pdins sounded just as shocked. The one who asked that particr question would never receive an answer, as a Reborn member took him down with a quick dagger strike. The Reborn had used his own body as a feint tond the attack, making the most incredible use of his immortality.

    But I knew it couldntst. The pdins would regroup soon, and then itd be a one-sided matchor so I thought.

    Again, my predictions were turned on their head. Less than three minutester, our foes were almost at the breaking point.

    As I thought, the pdins did rally, sessfully closing the distance between them and Team Reborn without a challenge. Given the difference in core strength, they mustve figured being immortal wouldnt be enough to make them unbeatable. So they attempted to pin them down insteadbut it didnt work. sh em up all you want; the Reborn guys immediately heal, something the pdins couldnt manage. As soon as they fell, they were quickly bound up by the Team Kurenai members on standby, ensuring they were out of the fight.

    Hee-hee-hee! said one of the Reborn, a small child, as she half taunted one of the captured pdins. Yknow what? This knife has this superstrong sleep medicine rubbed all over it! The moment wend a strike on you, we win!

    I wasnt a huge fan of her spoiling the whole trick, but ah well. Shes just a kid.

    Report. The subject Gobwe is older in years than the subject Gobta.

    Dude. Really? Man, I have the worst trouble telling these monsters apart. I know Gobtas evolved way past from when I first saw him, but looks-wise, it was that exact same dopey face. So should I expect some kind of breathtaking transformation from him in the future?

    Either way, seeing this tiny girl lecture a pdin before my eyes almost made me chuckle a bit. This wasnt an uphill battle at all. If anything, for Team Reborn right now, it was a pretty steep downhill one. Unless the pdins were careful enough to bring an antidote along or had a natural skill to resist poison, there was no resisting this sneak attack. Itd only work once, of course, but damn, was it effective.

    Still, it was rapidlying to an end. There were yet more pdins in the group, and they werent going to let up now. Trickery like this wouldnt work so easily against such overwhelming forceand now that theyd seen how the trick worked, we couldnt expect an encore performance. The only reason Team Reborn couldnd those little nicks and cuts was because the pdins let their guards down after ripping them to shreds, after all.

    Still, those nicks and cuts had sessfully knocked half of the enemy out of the battle, and that was more than praiseworthy. Talk about overachieving. Now to return to the original n, which called for a protracted battle of attrition as the pdins No, I was being proven wrong again.

    Shion gave the figures in front of her a signal with her chin. It was targeted at Gobzo and Gobwa, who looked at each other, then Shion, incredulously.

    You wish for us to join in?

    Arent you going to join?! Gobzo asked. Cuz if its just us, I dont think itll be easy to beat those guys!

    No, Gobwa exined, I think its all right if we dont win, as long as we can buy some time

    Huhhh?! I thought we were ordered to win at all costs!

    Gobwa, standing guard by the meeting-hall door, knew what we had discussed in there. Gobzo didnt and was totally floored by the news. Something wasnt adding up here, was it?

    Um, Gobwa asked Shion, sensing Gobzos disquiet, during our strategy meeting, we were supposed to be on standby, werent we?

    Yeah. They were. I thought something was weird about it. Good to hear my mind isnt ying tricks on me. But Shion wasnt having it. What are you fools talking about?! she roared. We have victory within reach; cant you see that?! Securing victory against a stronger foe is how you can climb over the wall to the next level! Youre being given a golden opportunity! You should thank me for this!

    Iwasnt sure if I agreed with these statements. Victory was within reach, but our foes were stronger? A bit contradictory, isnt it? But Gobwa was convinced, a twinkle appearing in her eyes as she smiled defiantly.

    Yes. Yes, youre right. Allow Team Kurenai to seize this opportunity!

    Gobzo, meanwhile

    Uh, ummm Isnt that, like, ignoring orders or something?

    It took a lot of guts to ask Shion that question, but Shion immediately shot him down. Youre still here?! Either you do what youre told, or youll be the test subject for mytest kitchen delights. Is that the decision you wanna make?!

    The threat was all too real to Gobzo. Whether he was convinced by her arguments or not, he dove straight into battle.

    I cant say he was wrong. But it was weird. The way the other two framed it, this was now all Gobzos fault. Gobwa, as befitting one of Benimarus fighters, was always ready for a scrap, which made it easier to convince her. Gobzo, despite his ck-jawed look, was a far more honest, upright person. Unfortunately, that often drove him to say things he was better off not saying, which always blew up in his face. Maybe he had iting sometimes, but if he did, he never realized it. Still, he seemed pretty content overall, so I opted not to intervene.

    Are you sure this is all right, Benimaru?

    Benimaru shrugged back. No, but ying it by ear is sometimes a necessity in battle. Shion, in particr, has a keen instinct for this. She gives orders like that because she senses victory, I think.

    True. I had gone for a more passive approach, asking them to buy time because I thought they couldnt winbut if we could neutralize this threat with no casualties, no need to go easy.

    I turned my attention toward the battlefield.

    Things were really starting to ramp up. Team Reborn was taking on the remaining fifty pdins, two team members per opponent with one Team Kurenai fighter providing backup. In a full-on battle, Kurenai fell behind the pdins in strength, but not by an insurmountable gap. The pdins were ranked A, but the lower end of A, while Team Kurenai was about as close to A as you could get without crossing the line. With the right support, it could actually turn into a decent fight.

    Plus, Kurenai had backup on-site, substituting in if one of their team fell or was growing exhausted. We had all the potion we needed, so the cycle could keep going semi-perpetually.

    What a powerhouse they are, marveled Alvis. Imagine, another force of that caliber serving your nation? Her eyes were not pointed toward Kurenai, but Rebornbattle hardy (immortal, you could say) and ready to fight for as long as it took.

    Yeah, Sufia replied with a nod, theyre trouble. Not even decapitation can stop em. I bet theyd give us a workout.

    They had high praise for Team Reborn, and even I was fairly surprised. The pdins, meanwhile, had no backup support. If this keeps up, we might even have a chance at this.

    Yeah, I wasnt really nning for this, but

    I vaguely nodded back at them.

    Shion, meanwhile, licked her lips as she appreciatively watched the battle unfold. I caught a glimpse of the wet sheen on the tip of her tongue. She turned toward me, sensing our presence, and gave us a broad grin. It was hard to imagine it, really, given the mask of terror she gave Gobzo a second ago.

    The n is working, Sir Rimuru!

    What are you, nuts? This wasnt the n at all!

    Your praise is such an honor, my lord!

    I wasnt praising you

    Now, I must go!

    With that, she nted her feet on the ground and took off like a bullet, leaving me in the dust.

    Uh, go where?

    She was like the wind, using her extended senses to weave effortlessly through the twisty trees. The elemental spirits infused her body as she zoomed headlong through the forest.

    Upon reaching a clearing, Hinata encountered five high-level magic-born. They had spotted hering, but their eyes were focused on a much more faraway sight. Following their lead, Hinata spotted her people, the noble pdins, facing what could soon be a bitter defeat.

    She painfully sighed, holding in her emotions. The defeat didnt anger her. What did was the way this whole thing broke down into hostilities so quickly. With battle underway, negotiation could no longer be hoped for. Whatever kind of internal subterfuge was going on with Hinatas side, that wasnt Rimurus problem.

    Rimuru, meanwhile, just stood there, watching the battle as calmly as Hinata. Both of them were quietly thinking to themselves, gauging the forces of their opponent.

    On Rimurus side were four powerful magic-born, plus a woman in a suit emitting an eerie aura. The two women in front appeared to be lycanthropes, former servants of Carillon, judging by the reports. It seemed likely they were part of the famed Three Lycanthropeers, of the former Beast Masters Warrior Alliance; their mere appearance drove run-of-the-mill magic-born away from them.

    But the other two figures lined up with them were no pushovers, either. On one side of the lycanthropes, there was a dashing figure with red hair and two ck horns. On the other was a young blue-haired one with a single white horn.

    The Three Lycanthropeers? Arnaud promptly whispered to Hinata when he caught up to her. And are those ogres No, ogre mages?

    Hinata kept her eyes on them. No. Theyre oni.

    Oni?

    Ive heard of them. Monsters whose magical powers put them on the level of regional gods. Some pagan religions even worship them as deities, I read.

    Yeah. Theyre part of the evolutiondder up from ogres, but only a very few of them ever reach that level. But here they are, right in front of us. Consider each one to be a Special A-ranked threat.

    This was demon lord territory, and they were uninvited guests. Arnaud and the others were all too aware of that. Hinata, meanwhile, was worried that even Special A might be selling them short a little. That red-haired one, in particr, seemed to have more force than a would-be demon lord. If they ever came to blows, she would want Arnaud and at least two othermanders on her sidebut they had four magic-born, and there were only four Crusader officers to go around. That couldnt be a coincidence; Rimuru must have arranged the numbers that way.

    And then there was the demon lord himself. His presence was overwhelming, nothing like their previous encounter.

    Ill take you on. You and me, in a one-on-one duel.

    The words shed back into Hinatas mind.

    Yeah Yeah. You wanted a duel with me, didnt you? Because you didnt want any distractions?

    If thats what it came to, she at least wanted him to take her life and spare her soldiers. No She wanted him to win, and win overwhelmingly, then ept her apology.

    In secret, without telling a soul, she prepared herself.

    She noticed the female magic-born in the suit begin to move, letting out a concussive wave of force as she flew toward the faraway Renard. Rimuru was there, watching her goand when he was done, ever so slowly, his eyes turned toward Hinata.

    Their eyes met.

    Oh, brother. I mean, seriously, oh, brother. But everything was still within what we predicted. No issues so far.

    So I turned around. Hinata was standing there, looking cool, collected, not even out of breath. She mustve been watching the battle, just like I was. Her gaze met mine. We just stood there a few moments, staring at each other. I finally spoke first.

    Well, Hinata, now youve done it. I imagine you dont need to be reminded, but this is my territory. The moment you staged military action within our borders, that was enough to make me assume youre hostile. Im a nice guy, but not nice enough to allow you to strike at us first, you know?

    Which, well, if we got into a who shot first argument, then the truth was murkier. But that doesnt matter! We were guaranteed to lose if theyunched a Holy Field, so of course I was gonna send Shion out ahead. If Hinata started whining at me about that, she was barking up the wrong tree.

    Yes, Hinata calmly replied, that much I can tell. I have no idea why Renard disobeyed orders, either.

    Talk about shameless.

    Oh, sure. You killed Reyhiem so you could pin the me on us, didnt you? And now Farmuss new king has all the momentum in the world behind him.

    Killed Reyhiem?

    Yeah. Archbishop Reyhiem. You called him back there, remember? All I did was give him that message for you. Nothing else.

    For just a moment, Hinata looked thoroughly confused, but beyond that, her expression was a mask of indifference. Her cold eyes drilled into me, sizing me up. She may have been beautiful, but that only added further polish to that numbing look.

    Oh I see, she whispered.

    You did get the message, right?

    Yes. I did.

    And this is your answer?

    Wellnot exactly, but you wouldnt believe me if I said that, would you?

    Not exactly how?

    Oh, I could. But before that, you have to order them to cease hostilities and return home.

    I pointed at the pair locked inbat with Shion. She looked where I was pointing, then softly shook her head.

    I dont know if I can. I think its going to be over before I step in.

    Good point. That wasRenard, right? He was the strongest dude on the field, and Shion wasnt holding back against him. And someone else, toonot quite as strong as Renard, but still up there. I assumed they were both among the Ten Great Saints, but Shion was taking them both on, letting her inner monster shine. Geez. If thats how thick its gotten, we dont have much choice except to let them duke it out till theyre done.

    It peeved me a little to ept Hinatas excuse, but I didnt think shed be able to satisfy my conditions.

    What are you talking about?! one of the younger knights shouted with resentment before I could speak. If Lady Hinata calls our forces back, what will happen to her? Youre the one who called her here; how do we know you wont do anything to her?!

    Sounds like they had no intention of talking this out from the beginning

    Silence, Benimaru replied. The only people with permission to speak here are Sir Rimuru and Hinata Sakaguchi. You were not called here. Know your ce.

    What?

    The knight was unfazed. The next instant, a sh of swords erupted in front of Benimaru. One of them, belonging to the knight called Arnaud, was breezily deflected away by a casual swipe from Benimarus de.

    Not a killer blow, was it? A smart choice. If you were intent upon killing me, youd be on the ground right now.

    I didnt want to get in the way of Lady Hinatas negotiations. I was just prodding you a bit, although I wasnt expecting you to react. I dont want you to have the wrong idea.

    The only one with the wrong idea is you.

    Heh-heh. How about we continue this conversation away from the action?

    Very well.

    Arnaud gave him a smile, although I could see a vein throbbing over his temple. He can dish out the trash talk, I thought as they walked off, but he certainly couldnt take it. Out of the four members of Hinatas entourage, that Arnaud guy was undoubtedly the strongest. That was why Benimaru chose to take action. Perfect. I was certain Arnaud would upy him well enough without any murder involved, just like I liked it.

    Hinata just watched them go, rolling her eyes instead of trying to stop him. She must have noticed that Arnaud was no match for Benimaru, but she let him go anyway.

    All right, Alvis said, you all could use some entertainment, too, no? I would be d to upy your time for a while, so we dont get in Sir Rimurus way.

    Yeah, added Sufia, Ive always wanted to test out the might of the Ten Great Saints!

    They set off. Maybe this was their motivation all along; I dont know. Sufia was kind of a war maniac like that.

    Let me join you.

    Very well Ill take you on.

    The four tramped off. All that remained was Soei and the lone female pdin.

    Shall we?

    I suppose so, she said, no doubt reading the atmosphere on the field.

    This, um, wasnt exactly what I had nned. I mean, they didnt have to physically march off like that. Except for Benimaru, those three pairs acted more like they were pairing off for dates than fighting. You dont have to exchange blows, guys. Sheesh.

    Besides, Im fighting a woman myself. The most beautiful one, no less. Not that Im getting much enjoyment out of it.

    All joking aside, we were now left fully alone. I suppose this was inevitable.

    It was time for my rematch with Hinata.

 Volume 7 - Ch 5

    HOLY AND DEMONIC COLLIDE

    The battle began.

    Renard was the vice captain of the Crusader forces,manding them as they caught up with Hinata on her journey. He himself wasnt a pdin, exactlyhe was a Holy Wizard, a master of sorcerous magic. That was a special ss, one that only those who mastered elemental, aspectual, and holy magic could im to be.

    And yet, Renard was just as adept with a sword, using his own to lead several missions. Even hiding his Holy Wizard side, he was stilludable enough as a pdin to serve as amander and eventual Crusader vice captain. It all came down to his talentsthose beautiful sword skills. If Arnauds sword was a blunt weapon, Renards had a softer touch. Both were exemry fighters, but Arnaud had a slight edge, thanks to the tenacity that never failed him in battle. In a knockdown drag-out against a formidable monster, beautiful technique was often less important than brute force. That difference earned Arnaud the crown among his peers.

    But thanks to that genius-level magic skill, Renard had proven himself more than worthy as a spellcasting swordsman. His physical technique wasnt quite up to Arnauds standard, but if he fought in a more standard magic/sword hybrid style instead of hiding the sorcery like he usually did, he was just as phenomenal a talent. In fact, as Renard himself gauged it, he could probably outss Arnaud in strength.

    To a pdin, however, ones proficiency in aspectual magic wasnt really part of the evaluation. It was more of a given, with some pdins even capable of fusing their own elemental spirits with aspectual magic tounch powerful spells with no casting time. Aspectual magic, by itself, took longer to cast than spirit magicand while it was often more powerful, in close-rangebat, speed was the most important priority.

    Renard was no exception to that maxim, hence his focus on sword skill. True strength, as he saw it,y at the end of his quest to master the de. Adding holy elements to his almost divinely quick thrusts allowed him to slice though pretty well anything, as he saw it.

    This thought was with him ever since an experience that still rang vividly in his mind. Back when he was a student, he studied abroad in a small nation that fell under the threat of the demon lord Valentine. It was Hinata, freshly ordained as a pdin at the time, who came to the rescue; and in a word, she was strong. A single swipe of her rapier obliterated waves of teeming monsters. Even demons several times a humans size were helplessly mowed down. Hinatas arrival saved that nations people from the desperation they faced, and ever since then, Renard found himself attracted to the charms of the sword.

    Even as he polished his spirit magic skills, he constantly recalled Hinatas rapier in action, attempting to emte her in his daily training. Once he had gained a mastery of magical arts, he returned to his academy in Englesia, learning about aspectual magic as he awaited a chance to move to the Holy Empire of Lubelius. This was a difficult task for outsiders, but his adherence to Luminism and proven skills as an outstanding talent earned him a nod from their government.

    He pounced on the offer, even though it meant cutting ties with his family. Uponpleting the move, he took up holy magic and earned a spot as a trainee pdin. The spirit he forged a pact with was affiliated with lightas pure and unblemished as the soul of the one they called the Pdin of Light.

    After joining the pdin guard, it tookparatively little time for Renard to be Hinatas personal aide. He took the initiative to volunteer for any mission, no matter how reckless, and the results he provided his newly adopted nation made his qualifications eminently clear.

    Hinata could count many people as her rivals: Arnaud and Fritz, both of whom arrived at the same time she did; even Cardinal Nicus, who was just as coldhearted and crafty as Hinata herself. As for her admirers? There was no way to even begin counting them. Being an aide to such a pdin was a source of boundless pride to Renard.

    And yet

    (Renard, there is something I want you, and only you, to know.)

    Right after Archbishop Reyhiems sensational murder, Renard was beckoned by the Seven Days Clergy. There, he had an unspeakable truth revealed to him.

    (Hinata, you know She was involved, shall we say, with the demon lord Valentine.)

    (We were about to kill Valentine, you see, but before we could, he revealed that to us as he begged for mercy.)

    The revtion made Renards head go nk. Hinata, this woman he looked up to so much, in a liaison with Valentine. It meant she was pulling the wool over his eyes this whole time. If it was true, it was a betrayal the pure-minded Renard could never allow. It seemed impossible that the Clergy, these great heroes, would be lyingbut it seemed just as impossible that Hinata would deceive her own pdins.

    Perhaps, though It is true that Valentine has been inactive as ofte. Lady Hinata should be more than powerful enough to y him, but shes shown no interest in that at all

    Hinata had enough force to dispatch ValentineRenard was sure of that much. The Battlesage Saares briefing made Hinatas victory all but assured in his mind. She must have her own motivations, of coursebut the thought still troubled Renard.

    The Clergy continued:

    (Of course, it may have been a desperate lie from Valentine. But thats not the end of the story, you see.)

    (As hard as it is to believe, we have seen signs that she has attempted to connect herself to the demon lord Rimuru.)

    (Would it not be unthinkable, normally, to see someone like the good Archbishop Reyhiem killed in this holynd?)

    But! Renards mind was a whirl of confusion. But Lady Hinatas faith is more stalwart than anyone I know. How could she betray us, to say nothing of our god?

    (Yes, theres the rub, Renard. We, too, have our suspicions about that.)

    (But perhaps it is the other way around. Perhaps it is Hinata who is ying an intricate game against usand Luminus. We cannot call it an impossibility.)

    (There is one way we could settle these doubts for sure)

    Wh-what is it?! Renard half shouted, epting the bait.

    The Clergy was silent for a moment before continuing. (If we tell you, there will be no turning back.)

    (This is not a question we can afford to make into a public matter)

    (Not until we prove Hinatas innocence.)

    But Renards mind was already made up, led expertly into the trap the Clergyid for him with their words.

    I ept the risk. I promise I will prove to the world that Lady Hinata is innocent!

    (Mm, yes)

    (You will help us then, Renard?)

    (It will likely be a dangerous task.)

    Renard simply looked on, waiting for them to continue.

    (Defeat the demon lord Rimuru!)

    (Do that, and we will have our answer.)

    (If Hinata is connected to him, she will no doubt stage a desperate rush to stop you.)

    This was enough to throw even Renards confidence.

    But But Veldora!

    This response was what the Seven Days expected.

    (Do not lose your resolve.)

    (Calm yourself and think.)

    (Has the evil dragon truly awoken? Dont you think all of that is simply wishful thinking?)

    This reminded Renard of a key fact. The only people who imed to know firsthand that Veldora was back were Hinata and the Holy Emperor.

    So you are saying Veldora remains asleep?

    (That is highly probable.)

    (Not even Reyhiem personally witnessed the dragon, as we understand.)

    (It may even be the case that Hinata is deceiving the Holy Emperor himself.)

    A whirlpool of doubt began to spiral around in Renards mindjust as the Clergy wanted.

    (And Hinata has already encountered Rimuru once.)

    (We believe that was the moment when she fell under the demon lords spell.)

    (If she has been doing Rimurus bidding ever since)

    The scales in Renards heart began to tilt. Yes, he naturally began to think. Hinata needs to be saved. And I am the only one who can save her.

    Indeed. Yes, I am sure you are not mistaken! Lady Hinata would never willfully deceive us. If she is unwittingly doing someone elses bidding, that would clear her of any doubt on your part, correct?

    The Seven Days Clergy nodded their heads solemnly.

    (It would. If you are able to do so, there would be no suspicion.)

    (But it will be dangerous!)

    They seemed to be testing Renards resolve. They didnt need to.

    Then please, allow me to take on the task!

    His mind was made up. Hinata needed his salvation. And if she had been deliberately lying to all the pdins that served herhe wasnt afraid to strike her down, should ite to that.

    (Very well. It shall be yours to handle.)

    (Your resolve is strong, we see.)

    (Do us proud, Renard!)

    Thus, he set off, in direct vition of Hinatas orders.

    By the time he was inside the Forest of Jura, Renards suspicion had grown to indisputable fact in his mind.

    Veldora resurrected? Nonsense. There were far too few magicules in the air to make that an even remote possibility. Which meant that Hinata had most likely betrayed all of Luminisma fact that Renard hardly wanted to consider, even as he continued his undaunted advance.

    And then, just as he fanned out the troops under hismand and attempted tounch a Holy Field, he was attacked by monsters, as if they had waited for that exact moment to strike.

    Could it be that Lady Hinata has sold us out? hispanion, Garde, asked. That she learned of our actions and tipped the demon lord off to them?

    (If Hinata is connected to him, she will no doubt stage a desperate rush to stop you.)

    The words of the Clergy rang in Renards mind. But now was no time for measured thought. He instantly sent the order to fight back, and with that, the battle was on.

    Their enemies were stronger than expectedbut as it turned out, he had not seen them all yet. Just as Renard was beginning to sense his position was in danger, out came the onithose detestable, nightmare-like presencesfalling out from the sky. They hit the ground, crushing it like an explosion and sending plumes of dust into the air.

    We got some big fish here, observed Garde as he readied his spear. Renard nodded back at him, then calmly gave his orders. Apart from the two of them, there were four pdins nearby, the rest of the force engaged with other monsters. In a moment, these four finished their preparations as ordered. The entire group was enveloped in light, forming a powerful defensive barrierspiritual armor, the ultimate in protection for a pdin.

    This armor came in the form of holy mail, light as a feather and imbued with the power to summon the spirits each pdin had forged a pact with. This granted them unfettered ess to these spirits powers, and whats more, the evil-quelling abilities added to their weapons neutralized all resistances in their foes, letting them strike for damage at every opportunity. All of this consumed a great deal of energy and thus could not be manifested for very long, but with it, the pdins were the true natural enemies of all monsters.

    Readied for battle, the four pdins spread out in all directions, focused on their targets. They would be deploying a simplified Holy Field, and not a moment too soon, because the enemies they detected ahead were almost uncannily powerful. In particr, the magic-born standing before them had a gigantic amount of magical energy, like none he had seen before. It was an A rankand on the higher end of that scale. Not Rimuru himself, no, but likely one of his closest associates.

    It was, in Renards mind, an appetizer before the main dish of the demon lord. He wanted to end this fast so he could move on to the biggest fish in the pondand so he opted to leave nothing on the table for his first strike.

    Launch the Holy Field toward the target!

    But hisck of foresight would cost him. The order wasid out before he had a full grip of his adversary.

    The four pdins sprang into action, deploying the holy barrier. The execution was perfectnothing could have broken out of it from the inside. But it was notplete, a quasi-barrier with a short range and less of a weakening effect on monsters. It could prevent a foe from taking action, but could it fully block attacks from beyond the barrier? That was an open question.

    This barrier was deployed in the shape of a pyramid, about fifteen feet to a side, but it left open the possibility of the targetunching arge-scale spell before all its magicules were banished. In such a case, perhaps the attack could reach outside the barrier after all. That was one reason why most barriers were built to be muchrger than this. But to be fair, even this quasi-barrier could fully prevent magicules from crossing over. It was a pdins killer move, one that not even the higher-level magic-born could break through.

    Thus, Renard ordered his team to deploy the barrier, keeping a careful eye on all of them. The purifying light surrounding them wouldnt be enough to kill a target like this, so a stout defense was a necessity. They could attack the foe from the outsidebut theyd need to be sure what he was first. If it was one of the rarer types that could deflect damage, care would be required to avoid a massacre. They couldnt afford any mistakes.

    As the pdins wrapped up all their preparations, the dust from thending finally dissipated. There, in front of them, was a single monster, a slender, tall female with long, purplish hair tied back. On her forehead was a single horn, jet-ck in color, and the strange suit she wore struck the curiosity of anyone who saw it.

    Her violet eyes turned toward Renard.

    My name is Shion, first secretary for Sir Rimuru. My leader has the following message for you: Choose between submission or death. I am sure you are all intelligent enough to know what those words mean. Drop your weapons and surrender to my forces at once! she dered haughtily.

    The monster calling herself Shion gazed down like some sort of deity as she spoke. Her emphasizing the word first was noticeable across the whole of the wood.

    Renard sized up his foe, judging her abilities. He had thought her magicule count put her in the high As, but now even this seemed like folly.

    A terrific sight. Special Aor perhaps she could even be a demon lord, if everything came together just right.

    Judging by the horn, she was an advanced member of the ogre family. An ogre mage or maybe higher An oni, Renard thought, a mere hop, skip, and jump away from demon lord. And a named onidefinitely a Cmity of a threat, or worse. Disaster, even, should she ever take that plunge into lord-dom. At least one oni of the past, he knew, held a force that was divine in nature, giving them control over nature itself. They were less monsters and more lower-level gods.

    He was inly right to have his team treat her with extreme caution.

    Hmph! Sorry to disappoint you, Shion calmly replied, but I am no god, as much as I may resemble one. I am an oni, and something tells me that you think Im a lot nicer than I truly am.

    Niceness is something nobody facing Shion would use her of right now. They had no idea what made her entertain that notion, but really, it was just Shions way of warning them.

    An oni? Perhaps there is not much difference, no, but it matters not to us. Divine or not, you are nothing but an evil monster in our eyes. The only god in our dictionary is the one god Luminus!

    This was the core t of the Holy Empire of Lubelius, and it was not to be defied. They would never recognize another god, even one with some degree of regional support among the people. If they do not dere themselves to be gods, then fine, but if so, they must be destroyed. Plus, this was just a monster. No matter how much power it wields, there was no need to go easy on a minion of a demon lord.

    It was this belief that made Renard respond the way he did. Shions retort to this was entirely unexpected.

    I dont care about your god! You have your choice, now give me your response!

    Submission or death. The non-offer rankled Renard deeply.

    Silence, evil beast. The world shall be purified of unclean creatures like yourself!

    Enraged, he ordered his pdins tounch a Holy Cannon barrage. One of the few offensive spells in the holy-magic family, it worked on the magicule level, dissembling the particles to rob monsters of the very essence that formed their bodies. On a human target, it would merely knock them unconscious with its force; on a monster, it would wipe out their very existence. While it didnt work on targets imbued with holy elements, monsters were particrly weak against it, for unlike the natural elements of earth, water, fire, and wind, the darkness element was incapable of canceling out the holy element. Without angelic holy magic, it was impossible to block the Holy Cannon.

    epting Renards order, the pdins went on the attack, firing bolts of holy energy from all sides toward Shion. But she just stood there serenely, the massive de in her hands deflecting all the energy away. Then, with a dejected why-dont-they-listen-to-me expression, she turned to Renard once more.

    Is that your answer? If you refuse to submit, then that means its time to die!

    Even Renard was shocked. But he wasnt about to submit to this. Whether this was some local god or not, she was already inside the Holy Field. All they had to do was keep that barrier going, wait for the target to falter under it, and strike the final blow.

    But even as he thought that, Renard had to offer Shion praise for her masterful sword skills. She had to be at least a bit weakened by now, but the speed of her moves was every bit a match for his own. Not even he could hide his surprise.

    That de, whatever it was, had the ability to deflect holy energy, which was extremely unusual. Given Holy Cannons magicule-corroding effects, any demonic de offered up against it should have disintegrated into dust. But thatrge sword looked as fine as ever.

    Then one of the pdins handling the barrier and offense let out a pained groan. A Holy Cannon bolt had struck him.

    No! Can anyone even do that?!

    Renard was shocked. Here she was, apparently taking this holy energy within herself, focusing it on her sword, and literally firing it back at her foes. From amon-sense perspective, it was absolutely impossible, requiring precision on the level of single instances in timeand Shion was pulling it off without breaking a sweat.

    Hurriedly, he stopped the attack. The pdin, fortunately, was still conscious, albeit rattled. They would just need to stay calm and figure out another approachbut this move had rattled them all. Attacks going through a Holy Field and striking them were beyond their imagination, an unthinkable circumstance for any pdin. Renard had to bottle it all up as he pondered his next move.

    Shion, for her part, was rmed (or really, annoyed) that she wasnt seeing the full effect she intended. She had made a clean hit on that pdin, but the damage was negligible. It made her realize that whatever this attack was, it was much less effective on humans than monsters. She had underestimated her foes, and now she was inside this barriera clear mistake.

    But she was expecting this from the start. She had her own ideas about this, and if anything, this was exactly what Shion wanted.

    This binding force was something akin to the Holy Field Rimuru warned her about. It was simr in nature, and the magicule count inside it was beginning to fall. Soon, before very long, Shions own force would be affectedand the Spatial Motion she surreptitiously tried out a moment ago was blocked.

    Still, this had all been factored into her n.

    Hey Hey. She suppressed her anger as she forced a smile. Surrender now while Im still being nice to you.

    It was incredibly haughty of her, not to mention nothing thatd ever shake the will of a pdin, but she was dead serious about it. That, of course, didnte across.

    Fool! Garde shouted back. Enough of that bluster! You cant do a thing, locked inside that barrier!

    This howling did nothing to ease Shions frustration. She was almost ready to explodeand given how short her fuse usually was, she thought she was doing an exemry job at keeping it together. It may only be a matter of time now, but still, Shion continued trying to reason with them.

    Look, Im being fully honest when I say that Sir Rimuru ordered me to avoid killing you as much as possible. Right now, I can promise you that I wont hit anyonein fact, I can even let you try some of my famous cuisine! A wonderful idea, wouldnt you agree? This is yourst warning. Whatll it be?

    Her proposal was far too haughtily given for anyone to ept. The Holy Fields effects only umted over time as it purified the magicules caught inside. No magicules means no magic, no mystic arts, no divine force, no magical maniption, and nothing that impacted thews of nature. Only the special skills one may or may not have escaped its effects. To the pdins surrounding her, Shions bluster merely sounded like a barrage of poor excuses.

    But it must be noted that the Holy Field was not a defensive barrier. It wholly shut off all magicule interaction but offered no resistance to objects or blunt physical energy. If you triggered an explosion inside the barrier, for example, itd still send a shock wave and shrapnel outside of it. The pdins, fully aware of this, were approaching this battle in full armor for a reason.

    We in the pdin force, Renard replied even as he failed to fully calm his anxiety, do not negotiate with monsters. I see no need to discuss matters with you further!

    That was enough to push Shions patience over the cliff.

    Well said! Have it your way, then, and prepare to be subdued with a maximum of terror!

    Then she smashed her de to the ground. The force of it ripped through the air, filling it with dust and rocks once more. She grabbed bunches of them at once, hurling a fistful at the knight in front of her.

    Ah?!

    A single momentand then a mighty roar, as a small explosion erupted in front of the pdin. The thrown rocks collided with the knights shield, pulverizing it into scrap metal. The force of it was astounding. This was her in a weakened state. If it wasnt for the Holy Field, things wouldve been even worse.

    Dont let up! Focus on your spiritual armor!

    Yes, Garde added, keep it up! Consider this a demon lord were facing!

    The hapless, defenseless pdin hurriedly rebuilt a shield of light for himself, as Shion balled her fists and stared at them all. Undoubtedly, she meant that to finish him off, and seeing it fail enraged her all over again. The gap between that and her apparent intelligence and good looks was hard to swallow.

    But at this point, even she had to realize this was going nowhere. Swallowing her anger, she spoke to Renard once more.

    I have an offer.

    We do not negotiate with monsters. I just told you that.

    Just listen to me. Like I said, I have orders not to kill youbut as part of that, I need to show you how much more powerful we are than you.

    I tried to go easy on those stones I threw, but thats far more difficult than it sounds. If I go any further with you, I think I might wind up killing one or two of you

    Thats a bluff!

    Dont listen to her! This is a monster tactic, meant to throw us into confusion!

    Shion smirked upon seeing the pdins instinctual response. Ah, good, Im d youre catching my drift here. So my offer

    Dont let her deceive you, Garde interrupted. Let her sweet words enter your ears, and

    Then, for just a moment, he felt something intensely hot around his right ear. Then came the impact, followed by the sound of the air being ripped apart behind it, rupturing his eardrum. Perhaps it was only his regr mental and physical training that saved him from a concussion.

    Wh-what was?!

    Turning toward Garde, Renard was shocked to find arge tree behind him torn away from its roots, sending splinters flying as it tumbled to the ground. It made him forget how to speak for a moment.

    Ah!

    Garde, blood dripping from his ear, realized what had just happened. Shion had tossed another stonein essence, thats all it was. But the fist-size stone she chose had brushed past Gardes head at supersonic speed before smashing into (and through) the tree. She hadnt missed her target, of course. That ear was her target, and she nailed it.

    Do you even need your ears, if you dont bother using them? Now shut up and listen.

    The pdins did as they were told.

    You freak of nature Garde cursed her under his breath, but he couldnt will himself to move. Even Renard realized by now that Shion had to be listened to. A direct hit by one of those could potentially kill one of his men. Not even spiritual armor was a bulwark against all physical force. With Shions full strength now demonstrated, they had to admit that this wasnt a bluff at allif she could fire bolts off faster than Garde the Battlesage could react, it was doubtful the rank and filers could fare much better.

    Yes. Hear her out. The longer this dragged on, after all, the weaker she would be. Renards choice was clear.

    All right. Lets hear your say.

    Shion gave him a satisfied nod, smiling defiantly. Good. Listen to me. I want all of you to hit me with the most powerful attack you have. I promise you that Ill take it squarely with my own body. If I stay standing, I win, and you submit to my forces. Sound good?

    Renard gave the utterly confident Shion a look of disbelief. Then a small doubt raised itself in his mind: Does she really not want to kill us at all? Because that was exactly how Shion had been acting this whole time. What for, though?

    But Renard didnt have time to think about it. Garde, half-deaf, was already pointing his rage at her.

    All right. Well take that offer. Men, sync up your spiritual force with me. Renard, you take control of it! That monsters too dangerous to keep alive!

    Hearing his own name, Renard snapped out of it. W-wait! We need to talk it over a

    Silence! Lets do it!!

    The other pdins began to pool their forces together as instructed, a torrent of holy power right at the apex of the Holy Field. This was then reduced to pure magical energy, amplified by an injection of Gardes own strength. Without Renards guiding hand, the force of these four pdins would fall out of control.

    The midst of battle is no time to wallow in uncertainty. She deliberately requested this from us. She cantin about whates of it.

    If she wanted their full strength, he wanted to stake his pride as a pdin to provide it. Calling this a cowardly movesix fighters piling up against onewould be a cop-out. Against a monster, victory was the only thing that mattered.

    All right, Garde. Ill guide it.

    Right! Here we go! Infernal me!!

    With a spiritual force that zed like a pyre from the underworld, Garde controlled the towering mes. This was an ultimate form of spiritual magic, borrowing the powers of an elemental lord for the job. It was more power than Garde could control by himself, and now it was all being mmed down into Shions body. It was even more powerful than Nuclear Cannon in terms of heat, a pure wave of destructive energy powered by the spiritual particles that formed magic itself.

    As for Shions response:

    Hee-hee-hee! That certainly fit the bill! Not the attack I was expecting, but so be it. This ought to be the best way to strike fear into your hearts!

    She beamed with glee as she readied her enormous de. The next moment, she mercilessly cut right through the Infernal mea side effect of her Master Chef unique skill.

    Although Shions behavior usually indicated no rational nning whatsoever, she had been utilizing multiple skills to produce this moment. First, she invoked the extra skill Multyer Barrier to protect herself, keeping All-Seeing Eye and Magic Sense active to probe her opponents for weaknesses. Then, using Master Chefs Optimal Action skill, she read the flow of those heat waves in a single, natural motion, cutting through them to avoid the direct attack. That, of course, didnt mean the attack failed to burn her skin off and put her in a terrible state. Ultraspeed Regeneration, however, made that no sweat for Shion. Her skin instantly began to fix itself up, returning to normal in the blink of an eye. As brash and reckless as her actions seemed, they were all based on sane, evenudable, logic.

    A promise is a promise. Surrender to my forces and release this barrier.

    Nobody found a ready response to Shions deration. The pdins just nervously nced at Renard and Garde. Seeing such unrealistic sights in rapid session froze their brains. Their pride as pdins had just been crushed.

    Only Garde remained unconvinced.

    Dont trifle with us, monster. As long as that barrier remains in ce, you arepletely helpless! It peeves me to suggest this, but Id say we should turn this into a battle of endurance!

    G-Garde?!

    Renard was shocked. Garde was a man of reason, even if his anger sometimes got the best of him, but here he simply didnt know when to quit. As a pdin, that was perhaps the right choice, but it didnt seem at all like the Garde he knew.

    But time had run out on that proposition. Shions aura surged, projecting danger across the woods.

    Ha! You still refuse to ept it? I really will need to kill you now

    Renard shuddered. All that force?! If this monster willed it, we would all be dead in an instant. Holy Field or not, we cant anger her

    We cant anger her! Stop with the provocation! Put your weapons down and

    You fool! A pdin never epts defeat! Have you forgotten that as well?!

    Garde promptly shot him down. This disy from him was unimaginable. If anything, he seemed like a different person.

    Y-you

    But before Renards confusion could fully transform itself into doubt, he was interrupted.

    Hngh!

    With that grunt of forceapanied by a sharp kreeeeen echoing across the skyShions de cut through the barrier. The Holy Field, the source of confidence for all pdins, was shattered.

    N-no

    That is a holy barrier!!

    Is thissome kind of nightmare?!

    How can a monster destroy a Holy Field?! It blocks all magicules!

    The pdins murmured among themselves, their words and faces full of gloom. Shion, on the other hand, treated all of this as the obvious result.

    I knew it. Its not a dense Multyer Barrier at all; its just a Special Barrier modified to change the rules a little bit. Modifying thews of nature like that happens to be a specialty of mine. Im good at cooking that up, you could say!

    Renard had no idea what any of that meant, but there was no doubting what she just did. Using Master Chef, she had modified the results the Holy Field projected on the world. Rewriting the cookbooks, in a way, overwriting the barrier with something more to her liking.

    That was the Guarantee Results skill, the most valuable tool in the Master Chef arsenal and the main reason why her food had gotten much better as ofte. It was perhaps a waste of such a powerful skill to reserve it for the kitchen primarily, the way that she didbut now, in dramatic fashion, she had just showed off its battle applications.

    The final results: four pdins, plus two officers, struck dumb with fear. What possible way was there to defend against an opponent who was free to get the results she wanted just by thinking about them? It was useless. The only way to counter that was to overwrite her will with an even bigger onebut that assumed you could mess around with thews of nature in the first ce. If you didnt wield that kind of power, there was nothing to be done.

    Renard, genius that he was, immediately realized what this meant. The fear was numbing to him. Just as Shion predicted, terror had overtaken his heart. But as the leader of this squad, he refused to give up hope. If fighting meant destruction, then best to surrender and find a way to stay alive.

    It cant be Its ridiculous Howhow can this monster?!

    As Garde babbled helplessly by his side, Renard made his decision, his voice wobbly, as if waking up from a dream.

    We surrender. I only hope you will offer fair treatment to my forces.

    Finally, mercifully, Shion gave him a broad grin. For the first time, Renard looked right at her. That firm, guileless grin.

    Then, mulling over his own words, he regained his calm and reflected on the days events.

    It seemed certain that this monster Shion really wasnt interested in killing them. That wasnt Shions will, but that of her master, the demon lord Rimuru. This made the story of Rimuru ordering a demon to kill Archbishop Reyhiem seem a little unnatural to him. Ande to think of it, the whole reason Hinata traveled here was in hopes of building a friendly rtionship with Rimuru. Why would the demon lord himself seek to interfere with that? If he was trying to plunge the world into war and chaos, it would make sensebut looking at Shion here, Renard could tell that wasnt the case.

    Which meant:

    Wait. Am I the one being used here?

    Hearing that the demon lord Valentine, the nemesis that snuffed out the lives of so many of his fellow ssmates, was connected to Hinata had made him lose his critical thinking skills. Had that been used to trick him? By who? The Seven Days Clergy, of course.

    Reaching this point in his mind, Renard felt the blood drain from his head. Now, he realized, the force he captained was nothing but a hindrance to Hinata and her mission. Stealing a nce, he could see her facing off against Rimuru right now, and neither side seemed in the mood to talk. It was the calm before the storm.

    This, this is I am so sorry, Lady Hinata! Thanks to me, any attempt at negotiation was

    Now Renard knew the truth. But the truth arrived toote to do anything apart from watch the battle. There was no room for him to intervene.

    And then the battle started, Hinata and Rimuru crossing swords before Renards eyes

    It was a stroke of luck that Hinata Sakaguchi ran into Shizue Izawa. Even if it was just for an instanta mere monthshe was the only person that Hinata ever truly opened up to.

    In that short period, Hinata had learned all of Shizues sword skills, and when she was done, she left. Hinata was afraid of being rejected, and in the end, she was afraid shed lose the warmth she had managed to gain this one time. She was fully aware of how awkward this was, and she did it anyway.

    She had killed her father for the sake of her motherbut all it did was break her mothers heart. Despite it all, she loved her husband. Perhaps her mother got into religion because she needed prayer in order to deal with it. But there was no eradicating unhappiness from the world. That was the natural, obvious truth. Trying to make it all go away would aplish nothing.

    Hinata didnt want to admit that. She wailed at the unfairness of reality, dreaming of a world where everyone could live in peace.

    What if her mother prayed to make up for her daughters crimes? If that was the case, did her mother really hate her? Just imagining it racked Hinata with fear. Thats why she sawing to this world as such a fortunate thing. Her being here freed her mother from the pain, no doubt, and Hinata wouldnt have to go crazy any longer. She could just go on and on, like a machine, and not worry about anything.

    Such were the kinds of fantasies Hinata lived with.

    That was why Hinata could never ept Shizue. If she did, and wound up hated for it, Hinata would likely make an attempt on her life. She knew that full well, and it drove her to leave before it happened. The only broken one here, she thought, is me.

    The power she gained allowed her to live in a world full of despair, one where people could take other peoples lives all too easily. But in the midst of it, she came across a scene that proved a shock to her. One where a cmity-ss monster attacked, killing many, while others fought to keep children safe. None of them fled, as they formed a human shield to protect them.

    And here she thought the world was full of nothing but people who cared only to keep themselves alive. It left an impression on her.

    In this world, those who fight were called pdins. Individuals who put their bodies on the line for other people, even it meant the ultimate sacrifice. People who patrolled the area around this city, shouldering the duty of protecting humankind.

    That way of life resonated with Hinata. She decided to be a pdin herself, taking advantage of her own power. If she could devote herself fully to battle, there was no need to worry about anything else.

    Thus, Hinata found a way to atone for her sins. And now, ten yearster, Hinata was another protector of humankind.

    The days were packed with monsterbat. She couldnt really say when these constant moments, the same thing happening over and over again, began to bore her.

    Once she became captain of the Crusaders, the measures she enacted had reduced casualties down to astonishingly low levels. They could make urate predictions of where monsters would appear, and how much damage theyd cause. They worked better as teams now, revising their patrols for optimum efficiency. Reworking the system had reduced the mayhem, producing results that were nothing short of impressive.

    Hinata could point to that as the reason the knights trusted her so much. She had tough at the irony of her behind-the-scenes connection to the demon lord Valentine, but she could see that was the best, most rational way to keep the peace in thisnd.

    She didnt let it bother her. She had no regrets. Under the god Luminus, all were eqund only in a fully managed world can people enjoy true happiness.

    Now, though, the situation was poor. Laughably poor. But it had also led to a breakthrough.

    There was no longer any room for negotiation. She had to win, or else she wouldnt even have the chance to exin her actions. It didnt seem like he was willing to listen to her, perhaps as payback for ignoring him so willfullyst time.

    The shoe really is on the other foot this time around

    Hinata chuckled at herself. Things had changed so much that she began to miss those days of boredom.

    There isnt a single shred of kindness in this world, is there?

    She could whine about it all she wanted, but her mind was already made up. There was no point worrying, or even thinking, about it. Victory was the only way she could break out of this. Were her beliefs right or wrong? That hardly mattered any longer, as her mind shifted solely to how she could win this.

    Hinata sized up Rimuru. Arnaud and the others had moved away with their own opponents; it was just the two of them now.

    Silently, she invoked her Measurer unique skill to look him over. He may as well have been a different person from before. Rimuru was a demon lord, and there was no telling how deep these waters went.

    Oh boy. Look at all that growth. The idea of him warring with humankind makes me shudder.

    If not even Measurer could fully gauge him, it meant Rimuru was either at her level or higher. She moved on, invoking Usurper, her other unique skill and the one absolute advantage she could always enjoy over those superior to her. It let her effortlessly see through and steal the targets skills and artsand while that didnt mean she could use them all to their full potential, taking away the skills her opponent worked so hard to obtain was, in its own way, a cruel and merciless gesture.

    If the target was below Hinata in skill, the evaluation results provided were always not applicable. It meant she couldnt take that targets skills, even though that had no effect on her eventual victory. If the target was better than her, Usurper could either fail or seed. Ending with one of those results meant this was a pretty strong foebut sess meant she knew all the targets skills and arts, and if it failed, she could just try again, as many times as she wanted. No matter how formidable the foe, she could always make the skill seed given enough tries. It was just a matter of staying on guard, buying time, and waiting for the right moment. Pull it off right, and Hinatas victory was assured.

    When she fought Rimuru for the first time, Usurper came back with a not applicable for her. It convinced Hinata that she had nothing to worry about. She totally downyed his chances, and while having Ifrit summoned on her was a bit of a surprise, it still wasnt a serious problem. She had honed her skills to the point that she had Force Takeover, a rule-breaking skill that was fully effective against weaker foes.

    Forcing her to turn to that, Hinata had thought, was impressive of Rimuru. But that was all.

    Hinata thus invoked Usurper as a starter, just to see what kind of enemy she was dealing with. This time, though, it failed her. The skill went through the motionsand once it was done, the result it returned to her was blocked.

    That was the second time she had seen that. The first was against Luminus Valentine.

    So youre in the same lofty heights as Luminus?

    Hinata was impressed. And in such a short time, too. Trickery wasnt going to achieve much here.

    She took the hefty Dragonbuster sword off her back and tossed it aside, realizing it would be no help at all to her. Instead, she drew the weapon Luminus gave herMoonlight, a legend-ss de. Protecting her was her Holy Spirit Armor, the original that was granted to her other pdins in spiritual form. It was one of the Western Holy Churchs greatest countermeasures, an item wielded by the great Heroes of the past, built for tackling dragons and monsters. Only those truly beloved by the spirits could use it.

    The light shrouded Hinata, settling itself into the shape of glowing armor over her form. Now she was free of all restrictions and stronger than an Enlighteneda Saint in terms of force. Now, it was a sh of power against powerand she was willing to put it all on the line.

    The boring routine her life had be had just reached its end.

    Waging war without any hope of winning was the work of a madmanbut here, Hinatas heart was singing. She smiled a little. Rimuru asked if she had received the message, which meant he was ready to settle this with a duel.

    I suppose I can absolve myself with a victory here

    Her mind and heart made up, she let it beat out its fric rhythm as she pointed her de at Rimuru.

    Hinata pointed her sword at me.

    She heard the message, and she still decided to tangle with me? I thought she wanted to talk when she threw that weapon away, but I guess notshe just whipped out an even meaner-looking one, eyes boring down upon me.

    Ah well. Lets win this and have her give me the story then.

    Facing off against her like this, I couldnt help but remember that thisdy had no weaknesses at all. Out of any existing weapons in this world (the ones I had seen anyway), this had to be a far cry above anything else.

    I took out my katana to address it. If I knew it was gonna shake out like this, I shouldve had Kurobe finish up that katana I had cooking for my own personal use. One had been sitting in my Stomach for a while, steeping in a steady stream of magicules and now a healthy-looking shade of ck from tip to handle, but it was in Kurobes workshop right now. I had waited so long for it, I figured there was no major rush. Faced with Hinatas de, though, this substitute I had in my hand seemed a littlecking. Better keep it within my aura for protection and try to avoid a lot of swordy.

    So I had Uriel take control of my Magic Aura skill, covering the de in dark, thundering me. All set now. Lets see what Hinata does.

    We kicked off with a few ultra-high-speed exchanges. It had only just started, and she was going all out.

    The speed of Hinatas sword was staggering. Mind elerate raised my brainsputational speed to a million times normal, and it still just barely let me react. It even reminded me of my fight against Milim. But I wasnt losing. Id deflect the blow, then return with a sh of my own.

    We had exchanged a few blows at this point, but none of us hadnded a strike. No grazing blows to my body, either, which I was d for. We were testing each other out, but I still couldnt fathom what she was capable of. Even with the support of Raphael and the power of a demon lord, nothing. She has to be some kinda monster. Frankly, I thought I was gonna overwhelm her a little more. I mean, yeah, shes strong, but as a true demon lord, I figured thatd give me a decisive bodily advantagebut we were even.

    Hinata, apparently reading the path of my sword with robotic precision, always lunged in at just the right moment. There were no extraneous movements in her flow, and even when I shed back, shed just shrug it off and give me a flurry of sharpened blows, poking at me in search of weaknesses. The old me wouldnt have had a chance, I betmeaning, in other words, that Hinata wasnt really tryingst time. Lucky me, I suppose.

    I couldnt hold anything back here, either, then.

    Guess hes not ying around, Hinata thought.

    She had hoped to overwhelm him with her sword, making him ept defeat at an early stage. But Rimuru was easily her equal. It had taken her ten years to polish her sword skills, and he was countering all of them.

    The human body has its limits. Only by using magic and skills and arts to their fullest could you finally duke it out against monsters. And Rimuru didnt even need to breathe. His endurance would never wane, his muscles never ache, and no magic healing was required to ensure that.

    Heh-heh Standing in the same ring like this makes me realize all over again how unfair this is

    She understood the disadvantage she faced from the start, dealing with monsters. Survival of the fittest was the rule ofw in this world, making it vital to set up all the conditions you needed for victory in advance. She revved up Measurer, speeding her mind a thousand times, even pushing it past the limit as she gauged her surroundings. It ced maximum pressure on her brain, even bursting capiriessomething she handled with self-regenerative magic before the enemy could enjoy a single glimpse of weakness.

    In this state, the world seemed to be frozen to herbut it still wasnt enough. She used Measurers Compute Prediction skill to figure out the paths of Rimurus attacks. That was how cornered she felt. Every arrow in the quiver needed to be usedbut Rimuru still looked like he was taking it easy byparison.

    She wiped away the drop of blood that just dripped from her nose, ensuring it wasnt noticed by anyone, and gathered her breath. If this went on for too long, defeat was guaranteed. Even in her present Saint-level status, Hinatas human body limited her. If she wanted to be a demi-human spiritual body, she still had one more wall to ovee.

    Usurper, her main lifeline, was blocked and useless. The one advantage she could always count on against stronger foes was gone. Instead, she had to overwhelm Rimuru with all the technical skills she had cultivated over the yearsand this was the result?

    The sword Luminus granted her housed a scary amount of power. Using her magic force to impart an aura into it let her pelt foes with the kind of lethal damage basic regeneration skills couldnt cope with. Even foes with Ultraspeed Regeneration could be cut in half with this thing.

    If she could just take an arm off with it, Hinata thought, this would be over. No killing. If she could have Rimuru ept her victory, then itd be settled. But she just couldntnd that strike. Rimurus masterful grasp of the air around them, plus his honed physical skills, let him urately predict every motion of her sword.

    I cant get over his growthbut only in terms of physical ability. Im not so sure his technical skill has kept up

    He had evolved, and greatly so, but his innate talents hadnt changed that much from before. Even if he could steal arts the way Hinata could, all that involved was grasping the fundamentals and having your body remember the moves. Making full, actual use of them took years of repetitive practice. That had to apply to Rimuru just as much as it applied to herand she was counting on that for her victory.

    This mighte down to fighting experience, and Rimuru was sorelycking there. Hinata could see that, and so she switched tactics, alternating her tempo to throw him off guard. Feinting, in other words. Taking full advantage of her polished skills, she did her best to lead Rimuru to his doom

    Suddenly, Hinatas sword began to speed up.

    Her sword skills seemed to change gears every other moment. My brain was going a million times faster than normal, but it was like shed have her de here, then the next moment, bam, its there, like a jittery online video.

    This isnt funny, I thought as I did my darnedest to fend her off. It was Hinata Sakaguchi in full swing. I knew this already, but they didnt call her defender of humankind just to be nice.

    So I kept watch over her as we continued to exchange flurries of blows. She had a bit of a smile on her face, watching me as if her victory was assured. She didnt need her eyes to pull off those moves. They were focused right on me, like sensors tuned to pick up on everything in the area, detecting attacks. The core of her body remained firm, keeping her in a natural position that could handle any advance or retreat. None of her moves were forced; she could pull off a variety of attacks from a rxed neutral position without any windup required.

    How she was reading all my attacks, I didnt know, but I was clearly an open book to her. Meanwhile, I was watching her attack motions, then using my physical gifts to find a way to dodge. It wasnt exactly smooth-looking, no. I was being toyed with, and if this kept up, I was guaranteed to lose.

    I was pretty sure I was more physically gifted, but for some reason, she knew every attack before I unleashed it. As a technical fighter, she was clearly better. In this battle, she wasnt letting her guard down at all. Everythingthe atmosphere, her personalitywas different fromst time. And those strikes,den with as much force as they were, were bound to sorely damage me if they hit.

    Understood. The blow would not be lethal, but it would drain arge amount of magical energy.

    Yeah, see? And not being lethal was great and all, but one poorly parried strike, and I was gonna pay dearly for it. A few in a row, and Id be in danger.

    ording to Professor Raphael, that sword of hers had some kind of special force as well. Its wavelengths could change the localws of nature, letting it break through my Multyer Barrier. For real? It cant be. But I doubted Professor Raphael was wrong.

    Oh? Sorry? Something up?

    Report. Next attack iing.

    Oops. No time to be lost in thought. Hinata had a sharp sword on her, and she worked it freely, moving from jabs to sweeps in a single, dance-like motion. She was nothing if not steady, shunning all magic or fancy moves and relying on textbook swordy to engage me. To be honest, the only other person in this world who could take on Hinata in a swordfight was Hakuroand unfortunately, Hakuro would probably lose. The difference in potential was just too great.

    Looking at it like this, Hinata was truly abat genius. No half-hearted attacks would ever work on her. For example, summoning a Replication of yourself to fight her was pointless, because ultimate skills could only be used by the original body, while Replications could only use up to unique skills. Hinata would just mow those clones down pronto. Even if you took Soeis approach and assigned each copy only the skills they needed, that gave you no freedom to change your tactics midway, which meant youd never keep up with her.

    Tricks like that could leave you open, which was taboo. Perhaps it wasnt the most exciting strategy, but itd be wisest to wait Hinata out until she got fatigued. Fatigue never happened to me, after all. But now look at hershes speeding up her shes!

    Wait, no. Hang on. I cant read her anymore. I was watching her motion, taking evasive action, but now she was pursuing me with follow-up strikes, anticipating where Idnd each time. Wait, this cant be right

    Understood. You are being lured into the area she ns to attack.

    Ah, that makes sense. Wherever I try to escape to, Hinatas always there with the perfect attack. In other words, she can make me go wherever she wants?

    My clothing got ripped. The grazing blows were starting to pile up faster. Oh, crap. This is really, really bad. Professor! Professor Raphael!!

    My only chance was to have Raphael bail me out. Isnt there anything we can do? Think, dude!

    Report. Predict Future Attack learned. Use this skill?

    Yes

    No

    Whoa. d I asked. This guys unstoppable. I always knew the prof woulde through in a pinch. I had trouble figuring out what it said out of nowhere, but that sounded like one hell of a skill I just acquired, so

    Report. It was not acquired. It was learned.

    Um, okay? I dont care, I grumbled to myself.

    As the professor put it, observing Hinatas movements, it reasoned that she must be predicting my attacks in order to dodge them all so well. Meaning it had learned from watching her during our battle together.

    Wait, it can do that?!

    Understood. Yes, it is possible.

    Huh. Guess so. And I really did have the skill now, so it wasnt lying.

    I immediately used that skill, and when I did, I could see streaks of light in my visionprinted into my brain, if you willlike any of my other senses.

    One of them was glowing. I brought my sword up to block its trajectory, then marveled at how effortlessly it let me block Hinatas de. Those light streaks must represent the shes and thrusts currently possible from my adversarys position, with their projected paths. A few more repetitions, and I noticed that some of these streaks were ck in colorthis meant unpredictability and a more threatening strike down the road. In other words, I suppose, all her feints and low-level attacks could now be pre-calcted, but a master like Hinata couldnt be predicted all the time.

    This pre-calction wasnt even the scary part about this move. Thaty in its uracy. The streaks of light didnt represent possibilities; if the prediction was sessful, there was a 100 percent chance of an attacking down that way.

    And if that was the case, Hinata was no longer a threat to me. Her feints were no longer feints; they were just another step down the road to perdition.

    I won!

    And with that newfound confidence, I let my body flow and followed Predict Future Attacks guidance, attempting to wrest Hinatas sword from her hand

    It was instinct, a baseless hunch in her mind, and it told her that letting her sword continue along this way would be a fatal mistake.

    Hinata preferred a logical approach to battle. She never engaged in behavior that ran counter to the evidence at hand. But this time, she believed in her sixth sense. That saved her. It was only a feint, luckily enough, and she could force her de away from its pathor really, she shoved her own body in the way, making contact with Rimuru and exiting to a safe distance.

    Rimuru looked a little surprised at this but readied his de once more, waiting for her. Hinata did the samebut something was different. Now, Rimuru seemed like a different fighter from before. She attempted a feint. He ignored it, letting the sword whiz by like it didnt even register, and shed at Hinata instead. There wasnt a moments hesitation, as if he knew exactly what Hinata would do next.

    Was that a coincidence? No Its even more urate than my Compute Prediction

    It was disturbingly close to predicting the future. She felt like he was almost perfectly reading her thoughts.

    The speed hes growing at is incredible. I may outss him in sword skill, but histent ability more than makes up for that. Nothing half-hearted will work against him. And if it doesnt

    Coldly, impartially, Hinatapared herself to Rimuru. At that point, she realized, her chances of victory plummeted a shocking amount. She had hoped for a quick resolution, as more time would just shore up her opponents position, and here was the result. If she wanted to beat this guy, she now realized, she had to throw away all niceties, any effort to go easy or not actively kill him.

    There was only one answer left. To break out a move she normally never showed in public and to grasp victory with it.

    She kept her distance, aiming for a fresh start to work with.

    It looked like things werergely settled around them. Everyone was stopped, as if time was frozen for them; they were all focused on Hinata and Rimurus battle. The two of them couldnt even attack each other any longerthey could both read so far ahead in time, they could predict the results before they took action.

    Time passed.

    Rimuru, I have a proposal.

    What is it?

    Lets settle this with the next strike. I have a finishing move, and I intend to put all my power into it. If you can withstand it, you win. If not

    I lose?

    Hinata nodded. But let me warn you in advancethis move is dangerous. Are you willing to ept this?

    She thought he would. And now that Hinata had kindly provided this warning, Rimuru was no longer in danger of dying from the strike. It meant Hinata could use it without any regrets. If she did kill him, the high-level magic-born under him would turn into berserk menaces, striking at all humankind without prejudice. Hinata, her strength exhausted, would be killed at once, followed by all her weakened pdin fighters. To avoid that, Rimuru needed to be kept alive.

    This move was called Meltsh, part of the Overde family, and normally, shed prepare it on the sly, not letting anyone notice it in advance. It was abination of magic and swordy, and its force was massive. There was no way to temper it in a feeble attempt to reduce its lethality. Thats why she could only rarely use it.

    Besides, if I showed this to you, youd just copy it like it was the easiest thing in the world, wouldnt you?

    She had reserved Meltsh only for foes she intended to kill. Revealing it to Rimuru, who could learn anything after a single repetition, frustrated her. But so be it. Nothing else was holding her back.

    I need to settle this here!

    The only way to make Rimuru admit defeat was to show him just how overwhelmingly outssed he was.

    But let me warn you in advancethis move is dangerous. Are you willing to ept this?

    She mustve been pretty darn confident about this finisher of hers. But it didnt make sense to me. Why would she give me advance warning?

    Understood. No desire can be detected on Hinata Sakaguchis part to kill you. If she is cautioning you, it indicates just how dangerous a move it is.

    I see. She doesnt want to kill me.

    Wait, what? Didnt shee to do just that? I mean, yeah, something about this did seem kinda weird to me. Toote to stew over it now, though. Thered be a lot more timeterall the time in the world, in fact, once I win this.

    Sure. I ept your challenge.

    Hinata smiled at me. Heh-heh I thought you would.

    There was something really pure to that smile. It made her look younger than her yearsin fact, she could almost pass for being in her teens. It felt much more natural than the usual, battle-hardened Hinata I was familiar with. This wasnt some grin of cruelty, no derisive snickering. Maybe this was the real Hinata.

    But no hard feelings after this, okay? I warned her. If you lose, promise me you wont mess around with this nation any longer.

    Hinata gave me a quizzical look, then nodded, shaking off her indecision. All right. I promise. I agreed to this duel because you requested it; I want to discuss the future with you as well.

    She seemed up to the thought, at least, but hang on. Something she said didnt seem quite right.

    You epted it because I wanted it?

    Yes, she nodded. I received your message.

    My message had started with a few polite greetings, then moved on to the topic of Shizue and the children stranded on this, in an attempt to ease our misunderstandings. In addition, I offered her a forum where we could discuss our issues calmly with each other. In the end, I capped it off with this:

    So I hope you will agree toe to the bargaining table, but if Ive failed to convince you, Ill take you on. It can be you and me, in a one-on-one duel, so nobody else will have to be involved. If possible, though, Id like to end this with verbal discussion, not physical destruction. So give it all the thought you need, and Ill be waiting for whatll hopefully be a positive response. For now, see youter.

    Or something close to that anyway; I forgot the exact words. I definitely wasnt gunning for a duel; its just that Hinatas so stubborn that I figured I should throw that in or else shed tune the whole thing out.

    Here I go.

    Whoaaaa!!

    Oops. As I was pondering all this, Hinata had readied herself for the strike. We definitely still had some misunderstandings between us, but with things how they were, I could say nothing to stop her now. It was crazy, how focused she looked; no words would ever reach her brain.

    Ah well. If I hold out, I win. Simple.

    It appeared that Benimaru and the rest had secured victory while I was busy. Some of them were lying on the ground, some seated, and few had the energy to do much else. Only Benimaru and Soei looked like they had any gas left in the tank. Even the Three Lycanthropeers were as spent as the pdins; I guess they never got around to Animalizing for this fight.

    Soei, though What was he doing? The female knight he was engaged with seemed to be unhurt, but for some reason, she was looking at Soei and visibly blushing. I could see her fidgeting nervously on her feet, even, which only added to the mystery. It was like she had a crush on the guy or something. Whats up with that? Arent we kind of all locked inbat right now? Ill need to inquire about thatter.

    Then we had Shion. She mustve totally stormed through her battle, and she even had pdins meekly following behind her. Prisoners? Some of them looked wounded, but none fatally. A little recovery potion, and wed be all good. Id need to dole out some praise for that performance.

    That just left Hinata and me. And we were just one attack away from wrapping up.

    Benimaru.

    Yes?

    If, by some chance, this fells me, youre taking my post.

    Ha. Surely you jest. Nobody here would ever doubt your victory, Sir Rimuru.

    I shrugged at his cheerful evaluation. Yep. I had people here that really loved me. Unlike my stash of special videos I kept in a hidden directory on myputer back home, this was one treasure I couldnt afford to leave behind. I wasnt that irresponsible.

    All right. In that case, wait for my victory right there!

    Yes sir! Be brave!

    I nodded and turned my gaze to Hinata.

    Looking around, it seemed to Hinata like the stage was set. She could see her exhausted squadmates nearby, but they appeared to be receiving better treatment than shed expected. Prisoner abuse must have been strictly prohibited.

    As it would be, I imagine. Judging by your disposition, I suppose I should have believed you from the start.

    The thought certainly took some time to ur to Hinata, but it was a sincere one. And it still wasnt toote. She could just win this fight, and they could build a new rtionship.

    She corralled her rising excitement, turning it into a prayer as she began to chant a spell in her clear voice. That wasnt strictly necessary, but she wanted to show it off to Rimuru. If he was going to steal it anyway, she wanted to be sure his copy was a perfect one. This was a Disintegration spell, and now its force was gathered around Hinatas left hand, letting out a blinding light. Glowing particles fluttered around it, creating an otherworldly sight, and then she imbued her Moonlight sword with this mystical force, as if gently caressing the de with one hand.

    Now everything was ready. Her sword contained the strongest magic possible now, and there was nothing it couldnt sh through.

    Are you ready for this?

    Bring it!

    Here we go Meltsh!!

    Hinata, a glowing orb of light, lunged for Rimuru.

    A bright light. Not the glint of a sword, but her entire body, with shiny particles shooting out of it, as she advanced at a superhuman speed that went way beyond what I expected.

    The sword she wielded had the power to dispel and evaporate all types of evil.

    Report. Unable to defend. Unable to evade!

    I had never heard Raphael sound legitimately panicked before. Even with my senses enhanced a millionfold, the light looked like it was going at regr speeda sign of just how fast she was going.

    Between the distance, the angle, and the timing, Hinata was aiming below my stomach. She must have figured I wouldnt die if my head stayed intact, but even if she didnt intend to kill me, this move was way too dangerous. I couldnt evade it, Multyer Barrier was meaningless, and that light was spiritual in nature, evil-dispelling, capable of tearing down anything it touched. The moment we made contact, it would sear through my body.

    Report. It is suggested to sacrifice your ultimate skill Belzebuth, Lord of Gluttony, to cancel out this attack.

    I knew I could rely on old Professor Raphael at a time like this.

    As much as I hated to let go of Belzebuth, I didnt have much choice here. Out of all the suggestions it had, this was the most likely one to work, so there wasnt much point wavering on a decision. At this speed, besides, aiming practically didnt matter. Its not like I could adjust my trajectory midway.

    Raphael used Predict Future Attack to calcte the point Hinata aimed at, activating Belzebuth at that exact spot. The moment her sword hit me, Belzebuth would swallow it all upor so the n went.

    Pretty simple. No reason to waver. And in another few scant moments, Hinatas skill crossed paths with Belzebuth.

    The result? Well, I survived. I thought I wasnt gonna for a second, but I did.

    Heh-heh-heh Ah-ha-ha-ha-ha!

    I could hear Hinatasughter ringing in my ears as I was lying there on the ground. All the magicules in the area had been purified; Universal Detect wasnt working for me, making this the first time in a while that I heard using my actual eardrums. It was more unnerving an experience than a nostalgic one.

    My body couldnt move. Canceling out Hinatas strike consumed a vast amount of magiculesin terms of damage, it probably wiped out over 70 percent of my store. Which, hey, its fine as long as Im alivebut what a scary attack she had up her sleeve. If she busted that out without warning me Well, just thinking about it made a chill run down my spine.

    Im impressed. In the midst of that, you took the attack full-on? On purpose?

    Huh? Whats Hinata talking about? What kind of idiot would intentionally take an attack like that?

    Um, hold on

    Perplexed at Raphaels suddenly odd behavior, I decided to ask it a question. But the prof was silent. Hiding something, likely.

    Well, if you took it and lived, I lose. Its not like I can fight beyond this.

    The protective light around Hinata disappearedor fizzled out, really. She was spent. Even that amazing sword of hers was gone, gobbled up by Belzebuth. She could no longer offer any more resistance to anyone. Only her dignity was intact, her head held high, as she waited for my reply.

    Yeah. Well call it a win for me

    The battle was over. But the problem hadnt been solved.

    As I attempted to dere victory over Hinata, I spotted something out the corner of my eye. Hinata noticed it, too, and turned toward it.

    Up ahead,ing our way, was arge sword.

    Report. Thought interference and magicule instability detected on target. It will explode soon.

    The target was the great sword itself. If someone was interfering with it Was it an attack aimed at us?!

    No! Are these the depths youll sink to, Seven Days?!

    Hinata screamed out as she stood in front of me. I was still immobile. And then, the promised explosion. And then I could see Hinatas body slowly crumple.

 Volume 7 - Ch 6

    GODS AND DEMON LORDS

    In thend of eternal night, within a burial chamber unknown to the world, encased in a casket of ice, there was a beautiful, dark-haired, naked girl. A figure was in front of her, also nude, as she embraced the casket with an eerie smile on her spellbound face. Her skin, as pale as the white-hot sun, burned a shade of red as she let out a satisfied sigh.

    Ah So beautiful Ah

    Beholding this girl in the coffin, and showering her with love, was the secret delight of this charming silver-haired figure, her red-and-blue eyes flickering as they let out their ominous glow. They brought out her traditional beauty, enhancing it to another level. But what struck any observer of her the most were the two prominent white canines jutting out from both sides of her lips. Whenever she opened those lips, her bloodred tongue and milky-white fangs would bare themselves.

    This was the demon lord Luminus Valentine, Queen of Nightmares and ruler of the night.

    Whenever she touched this casket, it left a burn-like mark on her beautiful skin. It was an ark, a pure block of holy force, and thus damaging to Luminus. As a vampiric demon lord, this whole casket was like poison to her. But she didnt let it bother her. Even the bruising was bliss itself.

    Even a demon lord with Luminuss powers was incapable of breaking the casket. So instead she lovingly caressed it, hoping for the day when shed finally be able to release the girl sleeping inside

    One of her trusted associates made contact with her.

    I apologize for interrupting your fun, but there is something I wish to inform you of.

    It was Louis, the one she had enlisted to be Holy Emperor of Lubelius. The sound of his voice annoyed her, but she put up with it. It was rare for him to speak up like this, and she could easily imagine it being an emergency.

    Oh. Louis? Did something happen?

    Hinata has moved to defeat Rimuru, the root of all this evil. I tacitly allowed her to do so, but things have apparently grownplicated.

    How do you mean?

    Louis gave her the truth, as revealed by his own investigations.

    Ah No time to rx, then.

    With a weary sigh, Luminus removed herself from the casket, left the burial chamber, and called for a servant.

    Gunther!

    Yes, mydy?

    Gunther was an elderly vampire in Luminuss service, a butler who had joined her at Walpurgis. Now he emerged from the darkness, one of the Three Servants under her control and almost on her level of power. Louis was her point man on the emperors throne, Gunther within the city of Nightgarden, and thete Roy her stand-in demon lord as a deterrent against outside propaganda. All three were also Luminuss bodyguards; Luminus was currently in a burial chamber situated deep inside Nightgarden, and Gunther was keeping watch over her nearby.

    With a measured hand, Gunther assisted Luminus with her clothing. The fact that she preferred the ceremony of manually putting on her outfit over some instant magical transformation was a telling indicator of her form-over-function tastes.

    Honestly, Gunther griped at Louis as he helped her change, bothering her with such trivial nonsense

    My apologies, Louis replied. But if we leave things be for much longer, we run the risk of losing your beloved Hinata as well, I fear.

    Such silly concerns! Although, if it is the demon lord Rimuru she crosses swords with, prudence would certainly be in order

    Ie to you both now because I dont want them to cross swords. If Hinata is killed, what would Luminus?

    Louis, Luminus grudgingly interrupted, thats enough from you. You too, Gunther. A single appearance from me is all this needs, no? Then we can eliminate the source.

    The Three Servants hated it when one of them horned in on the territory of another, which was a source of frustration for Luminus. Louis knew that, which was why he deferred to Gunther this time.

    Yes, mydy.

    I apologize

    The two of them bowed their heads meekly. Luminus gave them a snort.

    With Roy gone, Ill need to rejuggle your assignments. Right now, though, I dont have the time for it. Both of you, follow me.

    She began to walk, in all her solemn majesty. The two magic-born were ready to follow her.

    Yes, mydy.

    Allow me, mydy.

    Then Luminus stopped for a moment, turning back toward the casket her beloved slept within.

    Wait for me, all right?

    She then whispered the name of the precious girl inside, before grimly caressing the chambers door and closing it behind her.

    Soundlessly, shut away by Luminuss massive magic barrier, the chamber slipped down into true darkness.

    Damrada the Gold, one of the leaders of the Cerberus secret society, had finally made it back to Farmus from his ndestine meeting with the Five Elders. He was now in Migam, out in the countryside, and given how well he knew the money-hungry Earl Nidol of Migam, he hadnt forgotten to cate him with enough presents to earn his trust.

    This time, as well, a little bribe was all he needed to allow a protg of his to reside within Migam. Edmaris, too, was there now in an undisclosed location, and Damrada knew this domain would be the eye of the storm before long. Edward, the new king, had dragged a force of twenty thousand toward this domains bordersDamrada knew that, too.

    His spreading the word that the hero Yohm was keeping the old king, Edmaris, safe was enough to convince Edward that the two were conspiring against him. That armistice, after all, was unterally signed by Edmaris. There was no need, Edward had made it very clear, for the new administration to honor it. And as Edward told his people, he had attempted to reason sincerely with them, only to have Edmaris and Yohm raid their royal coffers and steal away their money.

    To Farmuss urban dwellers, far removed from the bordends, a hero incapable of anything exceptbat wasnt that worthy of their appreciation. Being so safe in their cities, after all, made them underestimate the need for such stout defense. Some even questioned the need to keep people like Yohm and his force fed on the public dime. It was funny to see how such arge swath of people failed to realize that safety came at a price.

    In the midst of this, the announcement that the hero Yohm and the old king, Edmaris, had embezzled the reparation funds infuriated Farmuss upper ss. More and more of them volunteered their support for Edward; nobody doubted his moral superiority on this question. And with that support egging him on, Edward had deployed his troops.

    If current trends continue, it wouldnt be long before Yohm and Edmaris were arrested on trumped-up charges and executed. They wouldnt be willing to ept that, of course, which meant war was on the horizonjust as Damrada drew it up.

    Yohm had only about five thousand troops here in Migam, but they had been taking in reinforcements for the past three days.

    Hmm So Rimuru hasnt abandoned Yohm after all. How terribly naive of him. Now Hinata the Enlightened has a better chance of victory than ever before. Perhaps now is the time to move

    This, too, was within Damradas realm of imagination. On a wholly personal level, he would love it if Hinata could be taken out of the picture for good. It was likely that she knew she had been taken advantage of by her lies, so it was best to eliminate her before she got in the way. Damrada doubted shed ever forgive him for it, and he needed to keep that in mind during his operations in the Western Nations.

    For now, though, he would have to leave Hinata in the hands of the Five Elders. Any more direct intervention with her would be too dangerous.

    Ah well. Not like this mission will end in failure

    The leader of Cerberus ordered him to trigger a war in this region. Nothing else. As far as Damrada was concerned, his job was already done, so itd be a smarter bet to pull out before Hinata got back. But there was just a bit of unfinished business left. Damrada didnt care who won between the hero and the new king, but if he wanted to secure future profits, he had a promise with the Five Elders to fulfill. The demon had to be killed.

    This, however, was where his ns began to go awry. Earl Nidol Migam had tipped Damrada off on an internal meeting held in his domain, and judging by the report, this demon was aiming for a quick end to the battle as well.

    What would this mean to him? It meant that the new king and the demon wanted twopletely different things for Farmus. Edward had no intention of hostilities against Rimuru. The monster forces clearly outssed his, and there was no way Farmus could beat Tempest alone. But despite that, Rimuru had still sent reinforcements to the hero Yohm. That indicated to Damrada that he wasnt afraid of war, should ite to that. All that talk about a just cause was turned on its side the moment the demon lord sided with Edmaris. He had changed his mind, it seemed.

    This gave Damrada some concern. In the midst of his investigations as he sought the demon, he hade to learn that the magic-born Razen was now serving the demon Damrada was trying to kill, not Edmaris. Which meant

    Was it that demon who defeated Razen, not Rimuru himself? This is no Johnnyetely demon given physical form on this world, then. Perhaps an older demon has been revived

    The thought made him grimace. There wasnt enough intelligence to work with; not even the Cerberus leader provided any information about the demon. This adversary, he reasoned, would have to be considered at least an early-modern Arch Demon, possibly older. The strength of this type of demon depended greatly on their age, and while modern ones were one thing, early-modern Arch Demonstwo or three hundred years oldwere a cmity-ss threat. A medieval one, pushing nearly a millennium in age, could be powerful enough to serve as a demon lords aide. It was apletely different level of strength from some lower-level evolved demon. If an Arch Demon like that was on this world, it was devastating news, a threat to humankind as an ongoing concern.

    It was worth noting that human beings had only sessfully summoned demons up to the medieval level of age. That was as far as the records showed, and it made sense, because anything more powerful than that would mean the end of the summoners souls. Theyd be immediately consumed. That was why the Eastern Empirestest research regrly called for limitations on demon summoningalthough it took a hero-ss summoner to make an Arch Demon do their bidding in the first ce.

    The magic-born Razen, though? Damrada murmured.

    Yes, Razens name was known far and wide across the Empire. Power like his was easily the match for a medieval-aged demon. If there was a demon out there who could defeat the likes of him

    Plus, the Five Elders seemed to be fairly tantly scheming with one another. That piqued his curiosity a bit as well, but his instincts told him this was one wasps nest he was better off not prodding. Best to make good my escape, he thought, before I am caught up in anything else.

    Is something the matter, Sir Damrada? his servant said, responding to the words he spoke to himself.

    Damrada weakly smiled back. Heh-heh-heh This is too hot to touch. No more of this. We have word to lie low for now, and Id consider it wise to heed that advice.

    Pardon?

    We are retreating. Leave two or so observers behind and order everyone else to leave this nation.

    Yes sir. What about you, Sir Damrada?

    I will extend my formal greetings to King Edward, then pay a visit to Tempest.

    But I thought you were advised to lie low?

    Hmm? Heh-heh-heh Oh, I will. For now, I will cease my behind-the-scenes maneuvering, in favor of other advances. Theres now against a proper merchant requesting an audience with the demon lord Rimuru, after all, in order to improve his business.

    I see. Very well. And what should we do with the six Contractors we brought over from our homnd?

    Well bring them to the new king. They will be a fine souvenir for him.

    So itll all be pushed on King Edwards shoulders, then?

    If you want to put it that rudely, yes. Itd be a favor to Edward, all while I fulfill my promise to the Five Elders.

    These Contractors were an Eastern Empire organization that served roughly the same purpose as the Western Nations Free Guild. They were a group that assigned work to specialist professions, including demon hunters who worked full-time pursuing the demons of the realm. Only the best, most experienced monster fighters would be granted a license for this profession, and Damrada had paid a princely sum to bring six of these demon hunters with him. He had hoped to use them as advertising for Contractors atrge, but now he sensed that things were too dangerous even for them.

    But do we really need to be on our guard this much? We havent fully made back our investment yet

    Well see, well see. I may be overthinking it, but I like to trust in my instincts. Im also not enough of a fool to lose my life when I shouldve been cutting my losses.

    Ah. Yes, my apologies for doubting you. In that case, I will begin preparing for our retreat.

    Good. And I will prepare another present for the new king.

    The servant left the room. Preparations went quickly after that, and before much longer, Damrada had put Migam behind him. He was right to do so, for if he had dawdled any further, he might have had an angered demon trying to kill him.

    Edward, newly crowned king of Farmus, was beside himself with excitement.

    The nobility across thend was falling over themselves to pledge their support to him, expanding and strengthening his forces. It surprised him to see the hero Yohm side with Edmaris, his elder brother, and when Rimuru sided in turn with Yohm, he feared his entire n would fail. But the heavens hadnt abandoned him.

    With Archbishop Reyhiem dead, the wheels had begun turning. Hinata herself was off to y Rimuru, he had been informed, with the Crusader forces in tow. Even better, the heroes of the Holy Empire of Lubeliusthe Three Battlesages, the royal officers second only to Hinata in strengthhad offered their support to Edwards cause, deploying the Temple Knights for the effort. The divine-enemybel hadnt been formally announced yet, but given this deployment, it had to be a matter of time.

    The Temple Knights were assigned the task of defeating the demon who killed Reyhiem, but that was just a convenient excuse. In Edwards mind, they were actually aiming to mount a resistance against the demon lord Rimuru, armed with an enormous force that was essentially the federated armies of the Western Nations. That was why he granted them safe passage through hisnds, as well as the right to engage in any military activity they saw fit.

    He had no intention of tangling with Rimuru, but under the circumstances, that didnt matter. There was no way Hinata would lose to the demon lord, and with thisrge a force, he reasoned, defeating the Tempest forces wasnt an impossibility at all. Veldora remained a concernbut with a dragon that finicky, thebined forces of the Western Nations ought to be able to seal him up once again.

    Now he needed a just cause to link all these efforts together, and that was already taken care of. A powerful merchant from the East had visited him, bringing a letter from Earl Nidol of Migam. It was a request for help, and it instantly solved all Edwards problems. It didnt take long for him to reach a conclusion.

    With reinforcements flowing through the border from all sides, it might be best to use Migams rescue as an excuse to deploy my own.

    A full-on war wasnt in his ns, but deploying his force outside the city walls should prove enough of a deterrent. There was nobody around Edward to warn him otherwisewhich he woulde to regretteras he sent out the order.

    In Glendas eyes, the n had gone seriously out of whack, but that sort of thing was a given on the battlefield. She just had to adjust her tactics, make things work more her way, and shed be fine. Looking at it that way, things didnt seem so bad to her. Arge number of nations were taking an interest in their moves, and a virtual army of journalists were here to see her in action.

    Everything was set up just as she wanted it. Rimuru not focusing exclusively on Hinata was an unwanted surprise, but as Glenda saw it, it just meant he spread out his forces too wide for his own good. It wasnt a problem.

    Damrada had fled the country, but he had left a team of anti-demon experts with King Edward as a symbol of goodwill, each one battle-steeled and ranking an A or better. She figured they could be trusted to do their job.

    No reason not to sacrifice them, if we need to, Glenda idly thought. No matter how it turned out, she optimistically believed that the demon would be out of her hair. That breezy mood didntst for long.

    Heh-heh-heh-heh-heh

    Diablo, the demon in question, let out an evilugh as he spread his batlike wings, looking like a sign of the apocalypse as he surveyed thend below. He was searching for the traitors who outed him, causing shame and embarrassment in front of his beloved Rimuru, and he wasnt in a forgiving mood.

    Not once in his life had he ever felt anything resembling fear. But the mere thought of being relieved of his work duties made him quiver. Picturing Rimuru staring at him and saying All right, you can go away now sent shivers up his spine. The terror tore him apart.

    Now Diablo had to pay back the people responsible for that feeling. He contemted what hed do once he tracked them down. It made the smile even broader.

    Then he found Edward, the new king, at the rear of the forces. With him were several others who stood out of the crowd strength-wise, at least somewhatenough so that they could at least go toe to toe with Diablo. Part of the Ten Great Saints, perhaps?

    Rimuru instructed him not to kill anyone who wasnt involved. If they were involved, that didnt applyat least that was how Diablo and Hakuro, his overseer, had interpreted the missive. Any troops not defending themselves would be let go, of course, but if they attempted to fight him, that was another matterespecially if they decided to initiate hostilities themselves. Then, there was no need for mercy.

    Resisting the urge to greet this new king at once, Diablo sent a Thought Communication, reporting his findings to Hakuro.

    (Sir Hakuro, I have found one standout among them headed your way. He should keep Sir Ranga upied, I would imagine.)

    (Hmm. Roger that. Is it better not to kill him?)

    (Yes. I believe he is rted to Lubelius, the origin of those rumors against me. Capturing him alive would make him a useful pawn in our negotiations.)

    (Very well. I will inform Sir Ranga.)

    (Also This target is leading approximately five thousand troops. By the Free Guilds ranking, this includes several fighters graded at least an A.)

    (Hmm. Perfect, then. Lets point Gobta and Gabil at them.)

    (Yes, a fine idea. I am sure this is a battle they cannot lose, but)

    (No need to worry. I will be watching them, so feel free to do whatever you like.)

    (It relieves me to hear that from you. Excuse me, then.)

    (Dont overexert yourself.)

    With his report given, there was now no need for restraint. He flew down toward his prey.

    The sight of Diablo swooping in from out of nowhere froze the blood in Edwards veins. Saare, enjoying a cup of tea with him, was barely able to react at all.

    Hello there. I believe we have met before, King Edward? My name is Diablo.

    He gave them an elegant bow. Before he could even finish his greeting, Edwards knight captain was barking out orders.

    Fan out! Take defensive positions! Protect King Edward!!

    The royal guard jumped into action, grabbing Edward and trundling him toward the rear. The guard instantly formed a line of defense to cover Edward and create a wall of humanity between the devil and the king. Diablo took his time to react, simply standing there while all these troops scurried around. As far as the demon was concerned, his target was in sight. The hard work was all done. There was no reason for undue haste.

    In another instant, Diablo found himself surrounded by Saare and his forces, covering therge, opulent royal tent the demon hadnded in front of. He looked at them all, enjoying the sightbut although nobody noticed it, his eyes were burning with rage.

    Soon, a group of journalists was on the scene, curious to see what was going on. Diablo kept smiling.

    I will not harm any of you. Just stay over there for me, please.

    Then, with a snap of his fingers, the press corps was covered in a barriera bit of helpful consideration on Diablos part, to ensure against coteral damage. He also meant to suggest that exiting the barrier would be seen as hostility punishable by death, but the journalists (luckily for them) never even entertained that thought.

    By the time the forces were all in position, Edward had regained some of hisposure.

    Well, well! The agent of the demon lord Rimuru, then? May I ask what brings you here?

    The greeting may havecked much in the way of royal majesty, but it certainly seeded in sounding pompous.

    Heh-heh-heh-heh-heh Oh, just a warning for you.

    A warning? What kind?

    Send your troops back immediately and hold talks with Sir Yohm. Then you will not have to taste the kind of fear you are better off not knowing about.

    For appearances, at least, he began by rmending talks. That, however, was not what Diablo really sought. If anything, itd be a pain for Diablo if Edward actually agreed to them.

    Ha-ha-ha! What a strange proposal this is. Besides, all of this began when my brother embezzled the reparation money from our ounts. We are simply trying to recover these funds, in a gesture of sincerity toward your nation. I see no need for you to meddle in our affairs!

    I see. So youre stating your intention to adhere to our peace ords?

    Of course Although I now see there was no need to. I was almost tricked myself!

    Meaning?

    Hmph! Enough ying dumb! You are conspiring with my brother Edmaris to charge us for double the reparations, are you not? Dont think I havent seen through your little schemes!

    Nothing to defend yourself with, is there? Whether he calls himself a demon lord or not, this Rimuru fellow has already demonstrated just how shallow he is to me. He seeks to plunder us, by fair means or foul, and hes spreading the seeds of war across thend, is he not?

    But what a pity, isnt it? You may have killed Archbishop Reyhiem in a bid to keep him quiet, but his words are recorded right here!

    Edward took Diablos silence as an invitation to chatter on and on. The crystal ball he took out was held high above his head, ensuring the press on hand could see it. It depicted a very haggard-looking Reyhiem, perhaps after a torture session or two. I had no intention of betraying you! he shouted. Please, please forgive me! One could tell any viewer that this was footage of Reyhiems final moments in this world, and theyd believe it.

    And what does this piece of evidence prove? Diablo asked.

    Edwardughed back, clearly considering it a foolish question. Dont you see? Lady Glenda over there brought this to us. You infiltrated Lubelius and killed Sir Reyhiem, did you not? Perhaps you thought mere threats would cow him into doing your bidding, but his faith outssed your terror! So you feared him telling the world about your crimes, and it led you to do this!

    He looked down at Diablo, all but daring him to respond. Diablos smile remained intact.

    How impressive. A mere human being able to ovee his fear of me? Thats a rather funny joke.

    Dont dodge the question! Youve seen the evidence against you; you cannot merely talk your way out of it

    Enough. Silence.

    Diablos quiet voice cut off the new king as he was trying to show his full dignity to the press. For a single moment, his smile disappeared. Recing it was a hideous, barren, unfathomable terror.

    This charade is over. I cannot enjoy a battle of wits if you neglect to bring any with you to the contest.

    The words were enough to freeze Edward where he stood.

    I had thought about exining the truth in detail to prove my innocence, but I see that would be a waste of time. Humans are wired, after all, to believe only what they want to believe. But there is an easier way to prove my case

    Wh-what are you saying?

    The change in Diablos attitude intimidated Edward. Only now did he realize that this approach of his might not have been the most intelligent idea.

    You would like me to prove my innocence, Diablo continued, wouldnt you? If anybody here is able to ovee their fear of me, I will dly admit defeat. But let me caution you: I have never been defeated before. If you seek to defy me, then be prepared to face the consequences.

    His voice was just as calm as always. But within those golden eyes of his, a pair of crimson pupils burned with rage. If this were only for himself, Diablo couldve still held himself in check, but Edward had decided to cruelly nder Rimuru as well. And at that moment, Edwards luck ran out.

    K-kill him! the fear-stricken Edward shouted. Engage this demon menace at once!

    The demon hunters mixed in with the soldiers guarding the king were waiting for this order. They all simultaneously leaped out and attacked Diablo.

    Ovee our fear of you? Too easy! You might think yourself invincible as an Arch Demon, but we stumble across demons like you in our homnd all the time!

    No demon can survive for long if you pulverize their physical form! That applies just as much to an Arch Demon!

    Weve done our homework on how to handle demons like you. Dont count us humans out!

    The hunters worked in tandem as they shouted at him, going into a lethal formation. They had aser focus on Diablo, despite what their bold insults would imply. Diablo, after all, had a name, and a named Arch Demon was a level above the norm threat-wise.

    What? No response, then?

    All bark and no bite, eh?

    Swinging Specialpound-alloy chains imbued with the holy element, they pinned Diablo down, binding his arms and legs. Their very first move had seeded, and it made them let up on their caution just a bit.

    The Eastern Empire, for better or for worse, had more experience with marauding demons than the Western Nations. This was supposedly because of a demon stronghold in the East that held sway over a gigantic amount of power, but either way, it also meant that demon hunters really were well-trained fighters in the art of anti-demon tactics. An Arch Demon was strictly the stuff of legend in the West, but eastward, they had conducted extensive research on demons, dividing them into categories anding up with strategies for each type.

    The leader of the demon hunters had pegged Diablo as a medieval-age demon, but considering his named status, it seemed sounder to treat him as an ancient one instead. A member of the demon nobility, gifted with massive power, intelligence, and perhaps even a vast army of kin. The threat could not be underestimated.

    But the leader still believed in their chances at victory. He had experienced several Arch Demon fights himself, and he never doubted the decision-making skills he learned from those battles.

    Are you ready, then?

    That was why Diablos question seemed so befuddling to him.

    Wh-what?

    I mean, if you have made your preparations, I would appreciate a starting signal.

    The leader failed to understand what the serene demon meant. Huh? He hid his concern, trying to sound as defiant as possible. Are you saying you wont get in our way, no matter what we do?

    Why would I? With all the effort you are clearly putting in, I dont want to interfere, you see. This will just make the fear that much more vivid.

    Hehheh-heh Dont toy with us, demon. Your arrogance will be your end!

    Diablos joking around sent a slight chill across the demon hunters minds. Demons like him often looked down on people, overestimating their own skills. With that knowledge in mind, Diablo wasnt venturing far from the typical demon script. This time, though, he was delivering these lines while already chained to the ground. Even a seasoned demon hunter would be put off by this much confidence.

    Still, these were professionals. They didnt dy a single beat, executing on the training routines they repeated day after day.

    You shall regret your arrogance in hell! Vanquish him now! Thunderbolt!!

    As King Edward, journalists from nations worldwide, and Saare and the rest of the Lubelian royal guard looked on, Diablo was roasted by blinding shes of electricity.

    How about that! What does natural, non-magicule-infused lightning taste like to you?!

    A demon like you is protected byyers of barriers, we know. But too bad for you! With our Imperial technology, we can break right through your defenses!

    Demons must be granted physical form to impose their will upon this world. With your body destroyed, there is nothing you can do!

    The demon hunters seemed to treat their victory as a given. Any magicule-driven force could be easily blocked by a barrier built for the purpose. In response, the Eastern Empire had researched weapons that didnt rely on magic to work. This lightning trick was one of them, thetest in anti-demon tech, and hearing that made Edwards terror ease a bit.

    Wonderful! he shouted, relieved. Truly, you are the heroes of the East! I must raise my reward for that merchant!

    His face was twisted in glee as he looked at Diablo. The lightning was roasting the demon alive Or was it? The shes of light had fully enveloped his body by now, but that smile was still on Diablos lips.

    Only Saare and Glenda picked up on this at first. It worried them. The demon hunters leader, however, was puzzling over something else.

    This shouldnt be happening. This shouldnt be happening! Why isnt there a single burn mark on his clothing?!

    Then he saw it. That evil, evil smile.

    Y-you!!

    Heh-heh-heh-heh-heh. A rather meager effort. Too meager, in fact. You thought this would suffice against me? After all that hard work, I cant help but call it a disappointment.

    Diablo casually brought an arm up. The moment he did, the chains binding him shattered.

    Whoa!

    Nngh!!

    With unbelievable force, Diablo ripped the reinforced-alloy chains off his body.

    Y-you monster!!

    Heughed at the words of shock from the leaders mouth. Right, then, Diablo said, as if nothing had just happened. Now for the selection test.

    W-wait! This is insanity! Why didnt the lightning work on you?!

    Out of disbelief, or perhaps to divert his impending terror, the leader had to ask the question. Diablo was kind enough to provide a detailed reply.

    Why, you ask? Its simple. I am equipped with a strong resistance to natural influences, electrical discharge included. Your attack just now was such a meager strike at me, it didnt even merit building a defensive barrier to counter it. Is that satisfactory?

    The leader began to visibly shake. If anything, that was brave of him. The rest of the hunters, realizing the portent behind Diablos statement, had already fallen screaming to the ground.

    Aaaahhhhhhh!! Get away! Stop! Get away from me!!

    Nnoooooooooo! H-help me!!

    These were first-ss demon hunters, fearless, battle-trained warriors. And they werent alone. Except for the protected journalists, everybody witnessing this scene felt their spines freeze solid. Edward fainted right where he stood, foaming at the mouth, and so did his royal guard.

    What just happened? The leader could see it well enoughthis overwhelming terror, the sheer pressure this demon was sending their way. To put it as simply as possible, all Diablo did was unleash the full brunt of his aurabut that aura was daunting enough in itself to kill.

    Oh? So only three of you passed the test? Well, I suppose you do deserve praise for withstanding my Lords Ambition. You hereby have my permission to engage me.

    Hearing this, even as he felt the terror closing around his throat, the leader turned around. There, just as Diablo promised, were the two others left standingSaare and Glenda, the young man and the wild beauty.

    The sight of them seemingly unfazed helped the leader rally his exhausted mind. Its all right. Its still all right. The Battlesages didnt let us downtruly the heroes of the West. My hunters may be done for, but with these two on hand, victory could yet be ours

    Encouraged, the leader turned back toward Diablo. Heh Heh-heh. Yes, you are every bit your demon lords servant. Youre just as good at bluffing as he no doubt is.

    Bluffing, you say?

    I do! You called that Lords Ambition just now, didnt you? It takes a demon lordss monster to wield that skind if Arch Demon is the highest level of the demon races, it is impossible for you to be a demon lord! That proves you are a liar!

    In the East, this fact was considered highly ssified research. Demons, he knew, had an upper limit to the amount of magicules their bodies could store. This was a set number across all of them, even though they could differ in other forms of strength. Older demons would have more experience in battle, allowing them to form better strategies for conserving their magic and squeezing everything they could from it. This was also one reason not to fear demons as much as people often did, for if you knew your enemys magic limit, you could work with that, no matter how they tried to spin it. Knowledge is power, and having the right knowledge can keep an obvious bluff from clouding your mind.

    I see. That is both correct and incorrect. It is true that demons like myself are limited in our magicule count. However, it is possible to evolve to the next level, assuming the right conditions are met.

    Huh?

    I think the Red would be an example famous enough for you to be aware of?

    The Red? What do you?

    And then a certain demon shed across the leaders mind. One so famous, his entire existence was the exception that proved the rule.

    It would be simple enough to obtain the title of demon lord, you see. All it takes is for one of us to build our strength up to the maximum level, then live for at least two thousand years. One hardly needs to even work for it.

    Diablo made it sound easy, but in reality, it was fiendishly difficult. As a spiritual life-form, demons naturally enjoyedbat. Even if they were never summoned to the physical realm, battle was a constant part of life in the spiritual one. Losing a fight over there would dock magicules off your upper limit, which meant that some demons actually devolved over time. Reaching ones maximum, then maintaining it for two millennia, basically meant evolving into an Arch Demon and building an unbeaten record that entire timenot even a single loss.

    The demon hunters leader wasnt aware of that per se, but even he had a hunch that Diablo was heavily downying the stakes involved. But the offhand reference to the Red was what attracted his attentionDiablo was speaking of that absolute ruler, the famous demon, as if they were casual buddies.

    It couldnt be. Out of all the things, it couldnt be that

    Demon society worked in a strictly hierarchical rtionship, ording to a theory first advanced by Lord Gadora, the great sorcerer from the Eastern Empire. This hierarchy was punishingly strict in nature, applied equally both to the Primal Demons and the higher-level members of each demon type. A lower-level one referring to a higher-level one without some term of respect was as unthinkable as the end of the world.

    But perhaps the White would be more famous in the East, where you grew up? I observed her using Lords Ambition over there just the other day

    The remark cleared the haze from the leaders mind. He recalled the events of several years ago, just before nc, the fearsome Original White, took form in this world. They called the event the Bloody Shore, and if it had turned out the wrong way, it wouldve marked the birth of a second Guy Crimson, disrupting the bnce of demon lords and dooming the to chaos. The Empire used its clout to bury the events of that day, ensuring the public didnt know about them.

    The leader turned pale. Now he knew. The demon that casually called them Red and White had to be at least as powerful as the one that caused the Bloody Shore.

    That, that, that just cant bepossible! There Theres just no way for us to win! Its ridiculous. How could any of this happen?!

    The leader screamed internallyand then, all too easily, something snapped. Demon hunters were professionals, not thrill seekers. They didnt risk their necks over a job unless the money was right. If it involved protecting their own family, that was one thing, but nobody wanted to die in a faraway foreign country like this. And now that the leader understood how desperately outssed he was, he abandoned all resistance as futile.

    Please, save me! He let go of all shame and honor, pleading with Diablo. At least spare my life Help me, please!

    Diablo rewarded the disy with a gentle smile. Oh, whats wrong? You passed the test for me. Why dont we have some fun? Dont you want to find out whether Im bluffing or not? You should see it for yourself.

    The leader was desperate. There was no more doubting Diablo. He realized fully now that this was a supreme danger to himself and the rest of the world. Bluffing? Dont be ridiculous.

    P-please, forgive me! I only came here for the money. I swear I will never defy you again! Ill never do anything to interfere with you. If you order me to slit the kings throat while hes still unconscious, Ill do it for you right now! Please! Anything for my life!

    The pleading was taking on a pathetic tone. It turned out to be worth it.

    Hmm. In that case, you may leave. Go into the barrier the journalists are in, and take all the other people strewn around here with you.

    The leader immediately obeyed. Without hesitation, he shook his fellow hunters awake, ordering them to fetch the fallen knights for him. The king, he personally hefted over his shoulder before fleeing into the barrier. None of the journalists chided him for it. They were too busy watching over this bizarre turn of events, holding their breath in anticipation.

    The area in front of the tent was much cleaner now, as Saare shed a defiant smile at Diablo.

    Hmm Impressive. I find it hard to believe youre merely a cmity-level Arch Demon.

    Oh? You werent fleeing me?

    Fleeing? Such an amusing remark. My name is Saare. I directly serve the Holy Emperor of Lubelius as part of his Imperial Guard, a member of both the Three Battlesages and the Ten Great Saints who stand in opposition to this demon lord of yours. But who are you?

    As I stated earlier, I am called Diablo. That is my name, as granted to me by the great and powerful lord Rimuru.

    And you still arent going to reveal yourself?

    Saare attempted to keep himself friendly and at ease, even as the humiliation was making him reach his boiling point inside. All Diablos talk about people failing to ovee his terror was a direct affront to himbut he kept his thoughts rational. He wasnt the kind to let pointless anger cloud his self-control, but in his mind, Diablo was acting far too disdainful with him.

    Those demon hunters from the East were a joke, bragging about how professional they were but forced to beg for their lives at the end of it. Saare had let them keep up their act, since Glenda had suggested using them as sacrificial pawns, but this performance was far below his expectations.

    Internally, he sneered at the demon before him. I shouldnt have expected more from private citizens. We are tasked with guarding the Holy Emperor and the god Luminus herself. We are far more prepared to battle than they would ever be!

    Despite that, he kept himself on a higher alert than usual. Grigori wanted to fight as well, he recalled, but it looks like the prey chose me instead. In which casetime to make him regret his arrogance.

    Diablo was an unknown name, not mentioned in any of the ancient texts he was familiar with. It meant this was no great demon, nothing to pose a threat to him. Red, Whiteall that pretention. Whats there to be so afraid of? If this was a still-unnamed Primal Demon, all bets are off, but

    He could tell his foe was no regr Arch Demon, but to Saare, this didnt seem like much to be concerned about. It was the sort of confidence that only the truly ignorant could have. He just knew too little about demons.

    In his eyes, if this one wasnt going to reveal his true nature, hed just have to rip the disguise off by force. Saare, after all, had enough power to fight a demon lord alone. Valentine may have escaped at the end of their battle, but he was a hairs breadth away from ying him. A mere Arch Demon wasnt cause for rm at all.

    That exined why Diablos attitude irked Saare so badlybut Diablos next statement made the Battlesage doubt his ears.

    Reveal myself? Ah yes. I have so little interest in strength, I forgot to mention it. Indeed, as you say, I am not an Arch Demon. In fact, I havepleted my evolution to Demon Peer. Rather simr, I think youll see, he casually added, but do try to remember the difference.

    That much really didnt matter to Diablonot as much as his name did. It was a trivial matter to him, but a massive crisis to Saare.

    He couldnt believe it. He didnt want to believe it. What did the

    demon before him just say? A Demon Peer? That waspurely the stuff of legend, unofficially ssified as a disaster-level threat, and its force far exceeded anything else in the demon family. Not even a higher-level spirit could hope to catch a whiff of that kind of power. It would take multiple elemental lordss creatures to deal with it.

    Only a few very old tomes had examples of one interfering with this world, but it proved that they did exist. Just look at the strongest demon lord that ever walked the earth

    Oh.

    Now it made sense to Saare. A demon who had lived for millennia and be a demon lordss presence, like Diablo mentioned, could evolve into a Demon Peer via some kind of trigger. Of course that evolution would boost his force to such dizzying levels. The Reds magicule count had ballooned to several times that of a regr Arch Demon, and he had all those extra years of experience, too. Truly, there was no limit to his strength.

    The demon hunters leader, warily eyeing these events, had fallen unconscious the moment he heard the words Demon Peer. He was oveenot with fear, but with relief. If he had actually fought that demon That was too much to even consider. And the joy he felt, avoiding that fate, literally knocked him unconscious.

    Nobody could me the guy. Even Saare was taken by an all-epassing desire to run away. And the scariest part? Some fool out there was insane enough to give such a rare Arch Demon a name.

    What in the name of Luminus could Rimuru have possibly been thinking?!

    Saare could feel a cold sweat erupt from every pore in his body. His instincts were sounding the rm bells, the easygoing attitude of a moment ago now barely a passing memory. He knew how impossible this was.

    If Diablo had given his name without hesitation like that, it meant there really was someone out there who had granted it to him. A masterless named creature would never be so eager to share his name, since it would expose him to falling under the control of someone else. It proved that the demon lord Rimuru really was behind this.

    But could Rimuru, freshly ordained as a demon lord, even have the energy needed to name an Arch Demon?

    There wasnt much point pondering that question, but Saare couldnt help but wonder. His mind was just attempting to escape reality at this point.

    Then he felt something in motion next to him.

    What are you balking for, Saare?! Lets you and I take out that sexy-looking demon together!

    Glenda was virtually screaming at him.

    No! Glenda, wait!

    Saare was already toote to stop her. Like the wind, she strode forth, sneaking up to Diablo without a sound and thrusting her ck-ded knife at him. It plunged straight into Diablos undefended heart.

    Ha! No threat at all!!

    Glendaughed. She could tell that hit home. But sadly, Diablo had no intention of dodging that from the start.

    Heh-heh-heh-heh-heh That is somemendable physical ability. Unfortunately, he tly stated, physical attacks do not work on me.

    That was the truth. Diablo had acquired a trait known as Cancel Melee Attack.

    Glenda quickly leaped back a safe distance. Pfft! What a pain! Then, ignoring Saares warning, sheunched a barrage of quick attacks. Even she could tell he was a formidable foe; she no longer openly berated him like before, and she was treating this like a battle against a full-bore demon lord.

    But it was all mere sport to Diablo. He was in a realm of his own, power-wise, and nothing Glenda busted out could ever affect him.

    Now Glenda realized thisor to be exact, she had sensed as much from the start. Her real goalsy elsewhere.

    Saare, resigned to his fate, steeled himself. Unable to abandon Glenda, he joined the battle, unleashing his spiritual force and boosting his physical skills to the max. Wielding the Demonyer, a Unique weapon obtained through massive amounts of capital, he shed at Diablo. It didnt work.

    Dammit! shes dont work on him?! Glenda, buy me some time so I can unleash my holy magic

    Reasoning that only his strongest magic would knock this menace out, Saare asked Glenda for a hand. Glenda had no response. Diablo spoke in her ce.

    I believe your femalepanion just fled?

    Saare had trouble understanding this at first. Turning around, disbelieving his own ears, he couldnt find Glenda there. Diablo was right; she had fled the scene long ago.

    Damn herrrrrrr!! he screamed at the top of his lungs. It didnt aplish much. Glenda decided unterally to start this battle, and then she left Saare to deal with the fallout. It enraged him, but Diablo was right there, sporting his evil grin. It was time for Saare to worry about his own hide, not hers.

    I can do this. I have to do this! I need to keep this going until Grigori returns!

    With his hopes now pinned on his other stalwartpanion, Saare roused his spirit. Grigori had gone to the city to lure the demon over to him. Their target was right here, and thus he should be back shortly. Believing in this, Saare plunged himself into this desperate battlea fleeing wish that never had any hope ofing true.

    As Saare faced these insurmountable odds, Grigori of the Three Battlesages was in a desperate situation of his own.

    There, as he ran across the battlefield, he was greeted by a cmity from the skies. It was the mercenary force Yohm had brought on, seemingly fighting to protect the city gate. They were doing what seemed to be a fine job, fending off Farmuss vanguard force.

    This wasnt the prey Grigori was supposed to be targeting. He had no interest in Farmuss internal strife; it had nothing to do with him. He was only after the demon who killed Archbishop Reyhiem, and his intelligence stated that hed be found working undercover in this town.

    King Edward was apanied by those specialists from the East when I saw him, he had thought. Unless they run off on him, I doubt Ill have much work to do

    But now Grigori was faced with a much more present threat than a demon. It was a gigantic, fearsome wolf in his way.

    The wolf, of course, was Ranga, wagging his tail with glee as he sprinted across the heavens. He was light, as light as a feather, and now his feet werent kicking against the ground at all. This was Skywalk, a technique only a small handful of magical beasts could hope to learn, and he had acquired it all too naturally.

    To Ranga, however, this was a trivial detail. The waves of power released from his body were bringing him pure joy as he whirled around, feeling himself fill up with magical energy. His legs, covered in jet-ck fur, were crackling with gold-colored lightninghis aura releasing electricity into the air, whether Ranga meant to or not. It was being controlled by the shining gold horns on his head, radiating a force like a crown, even as the lightning-infused fur shone ck like a robe of darkness. He was the king of wolves, and now he had every bit of the majesty that title entailed.

    Now he approached the speed of sound in the air, as he instantly sighted the group Diablo tipped him off about. Another moment, and he was back on solid groundright in front of Grigori.

    Apanying Grigori was a small handful of the Lubelius Imperial Guard. The other five thousand with them were the second wave of Farmus knights sent by Edward as reinforcements.

    One of the Farmus generals, an inexperienced member of the nobility, nervously approached.

    S-Sir Grigori, your orders?

    Hell if I know, he thought.

    All of Farmuss top-notch knights were long gone, erased from the world during the previous attempt to invade Tempest. What remained were the also-rans, the fighters whose skills and brainpower werent enough to join inst time. None of them could think for themselves; they relied fully on Grigori, this wonder child from exotds, without even the slightest sense of shame.

    General Gaston, you tackle the forcesgging behind us. You saw them advancing from the ground and the sky, right?

    The observation made Gastone to his senses. Very well. What about you, Sir Grigori?

    Me? Isnt it obvious? I gotta take that guy on. Python, Garcia, you two join

    Join Gaston and keep him guarded is what Grigori wanted to say, but he was interrupted by a dark gale-force wind rushing by.

    Wha?!

    At a speed that only Grigori could react to, Ranga charged right into the forces Gaston led.

    Dammit! Grigori shouted. That stupid dog!! He thrust his halberd forward with all his might; Ranga easily leaped out of harms way, then began exercising free rein to wreck the whole troop. Leaping up and down, he kept attacking and attacking, piling up the casualties. Neither Python, nor Garcia, nor all of their manypanions could avoid the feast of violence, sending them all crashing to the ground.

    And before long, those fangs were being bared at Grigori himself.

    Gobta and Gabil were chasing Ranga as fast as they could.

    Come onnnn, Ranga, youre too faaaast

    Indeed. I fear there will be no assignments left for us at the end of this.

    My brother, interjected Soka, please, enough whining. Continue the chase.

    They were all bickering at one another just like usual, but everyone knew they were good friends. Only the three of them thought they were hiding it.

    Right! bellowed Gobta. Here we go!

    Got it!

    Gobta triggered Shadow Motion, apanied by a hundred of his goblin riders. Gabil flew ahead, a hundred members of Team Hiryu joining him. Soka, meanwhile, returned to Hakuro to give the fieldmander his report.

    As the first person on the battlefield, Gobta was greeted by the sight of heaps of soldiers lying in what felt like a single spot. The knights still in the fray were in a loose circle around Ranga, keeping a prudent distance and praying that Grigori could defeat this beast. The downed knights were all the talented onesor at least, those courageous enough to engage Ranga and keep Grigori guarded. They paid for that dearly, all gathered together in a heap because Ranga was using his front paws to toss them over there, ensuring he didnt identally trample them to death.

    The faces of all the praying knights were strained with despair. Their cheers, loud and enthusiastic at first, were now reced with stony silence. Grigori was already covered from head to toe in wounds. Victory, at this point, would be a dream wrapped within a dream. Even with Impervious, the steel-like protection covering Grigori, in Rangas eye he was just a slightly tougher chew toy than usual. The fact that he couldnt be knocked out simply meant he had to endure the pain that much longer.

    Whoa! The sight half panicked Gobta. Thats, uh, thats a bad wolf, Ranga! Hes gonna die if you do any more of that!

    Yes, Gabil agreed, we must heal him at once!

    The order made Ranga freeze in ce. Noticing the sorry sight around him, he hunched over, tail pointed straight down, shrinking down in size.

    Um Right. But doesnt this human wish to y for a while longer?

    Grigori was unconscious, a broken halberd still in his hand, as Ranga ruefully prodded him with a paw. It was just too pitiful a sight for Gobta and Gabil to stand. Just imagining themselves in his ce

    Um, no, no, I dont think so, Ranga

    No, indeed! Best stop this for now, or else Sir Rimuru will never let you hear the end of it!

    The mention of Rimurus name forced Ranga to give. Looking at the two of them with his sad eyes, he finally gave up.

    Oh no. Hell be angry at me

    The freed Grigoris face was caked with drool, his limbs going off in assorted slightly off-kilter directions. Just slightly, mind you, but still in no angle the human body was designed for. He was pretty seriously banged up, in other words, and it was a wonder he continued to draw breath.

    But Grigori survived it all. And with the healing potion Gobta provided, he made a full recovery before the sun set on the day. His body may not have paid the price for the experiencebut his self-esteem certainly did. Inter years, he came to be known in his homnd as the Canophobe Crusader, for reasons he refused to divulge to the general public.

    For the remaining forces, Gabil promised not to pursue them further if they retreated, an offer that General Gaston immediately epted. Word was quickly sent to the battered and bruised forces still attacking the town gate.

    So ended the siege of Migam before it really began. And as he left the scene, Gaston could be heard shouting Beat them? How could we possibly beat them?!a quote that became far more famous worldwide than he probably intended.

    Come on, Grigori! Come on! Get over here!!

    Saare couldnt have wished that any harder for himself. But he was in luckGrigori wasing, draped over Rangas back. In fact, Saares wish was about toe true in just a few more moments. Grigori probably wasnt going to provide the services he was looking for, but for Saare right now, ignorance was bliss.

    Besides, he reasoned, this Diablo was just too ridiculous a demon to deal with. Here he was, one of the most powerful human beings on the, and not even he could fully plumb the depths of this guys force. There was no doubting Diablo now. He really was more powerful than the demon lord Valentine. Why would he bother going out of his way to kill Archbishop Reyhiem? A few well-nted threats from Diablo, and he could get literally anyone to worship the ground he walked on.

    So why did I even have to deal with this?

    Saare was still expending every effort possible to fend off Diablos barrage, but he knew the end was near. His endurance, and his mental acuity, were about to be exhausted.

    Heh-heh-heh-heh-heh Come on. Put in some more effort. Show me an interesting skill or two.

    And the demon was gleefully enjoying the sight, too. Saare just wanted to cry. From the bottom of his heart, he wanted to go home.

    He had been praised as a genius. He was long-lived, thanks to his elven blood, and his dauntless effort helped him sharpen his fighting style to a fine point. His reward for this was the unique skill All-Rounder, which let him fully understand and acquire an opponents art after seeing it only once. It worked on the same principle as Hinatas Usurper, just geared specifically toward arts.

    It went without saying that actually using these arts required superior physical ability. Saare knew that well, and thanks to that, he had mastered a wide variety of skills, includingplex magic/artsbinations that were among the trickiest moves out there to perform. Adding magical effects like that to his own aura unlocked ess to some incredibly powerful sword shes. Thus he preferred to use Spiritsh, a basic Battlewill move and also the ultimate way to enhance ones physical ability. To this he would add whatever element his current foe was weakest against, letting him unleash a strike that could rip through almost any enemy.

    That was a source of pride to Saareand none of that worked here. Before he could even deploy the magic, Diablo analyzed its structure and disassembled it. It robbed Saare of his ability to bend thews of natureand without that, there would be no miracles today. Instead, giving up on magic, he opted instead to just fight with the Battlewill art Aura Sword.

    Dammit, he bitterly whispered.

    The most frustrating thing about all this was how Diablo wasnt even seriously trying yet. He could tell. The difference in magical skill alone was likeparing a grown adult to a newborn. The same was true in physical strength. Only in tactical skill, something that could be learned on the battlefield and nowhere else, could Saare safely consider himself closebut even then, Diablo was already closing the gap within the space of this fight. The speed of his growth was dizzying. If he wanted to, Diablo couldve easily killed Saare right now.

    And if hes not, that must mean

    Diablo had no intention of ending his life. Which meant that someone else out there must have killed Reyhiem. But who?

    Yes. Hinata never wanted to be involved with all this, and the incident urred after she leftas if aiming for that exact moment. Its so

    so suspicious. Wait. Not even suspicious. It had to be the Seven Days Clergy behind this. Saare was sure of it. And just then:

    (Saare, wevee to give you aid.)

    (Rejoice! We shall destroy this demon together!)

    (Hold the demon back for us. Our magic will take care of him.)

    The air warped behind him as Saare felt a new presence, one bearing a stupefying amount of force. They were the members of the Seven Days Clergythree of them in and despite the way they put it, the magic they were attempting to cast was far too dangerous to use in this space.

    A good criminal always knows how to destroy the evidence. And in this case, the evidence was anyone who knew that Diablo didnt kill Reyhiem. Which included the journalists on hand. They werent idiotsmany of them hade to the same realization as Saare by now. It was the whole reason Diablo kept them around.

    So if the Clergy wasnt aiming for Diablo at all

    Run! Get away!!

    Just as Saare turned toward the press and gave that warning, a massive fireball engulfed the entire area.

    A white-hot bolt of force prated Hinatas chest.

    Hurriedly, I came over to help her up.

    Hey, you all right?

    Ngh Gaaah!

    She was coughing up blood. But through the pain, she still brought a hand to her chest, attempting to cast a spell. It failedas it would, given that she couldnt speak any longer. Instead she eased herself down, lying limp in my arms. The blood from her began to stain my clothes a bright shade of crimson.

    Unless I did something, Hinata was going to die without ever knowing what happened. We could work out the timeline that led to thister. I took a potion out of my Stomach and sprinkled it over her chest. But while this would normally begin the healing process immediately, nowof all timesnothing happened.

    Understood. The subject Hinata Sakaguchi possesses high resistance to magic. Her body automatically disassembles magicules, neutralizing their effects.

    It cancels out magic?

    M-magic wont work on Lady Hinata, her assistant Arnaud said, shaking his head as he ran up to me. Any recovery magic has to be holy in its alignment, or else it will be neutralized on contact

    Ah. So holy magic, which didnt work through magicules, was okay? A lot of good that did me. These potions were useless, then. In that case

    In that case, dont just stand there. Cast some holy magic on her!

    We needed something more effective. Hinata was still alive. If we used holy magic to heal her, she ought to be able to recover.

    After I shouted at them, Arnaud and the other pdins began to act. But they couldnt move. Something was blocking thema ring of light, binding all the pdins. A group of people, each bearing a huge amount of power, had used a high-level teleportation spell to jump into our area, restraining Arnaud and the rest.

    The two mystery visitors kneeled before me.

    (Demon Lord Rimuru, it is a pleasure to meet you. We are members of the Seven Days Clergy, and we havee here to punish Hinata Sakaguchi for viting our orders)

    It sure was brazen of them.

    Hinata was on the ground, barely conscious; Arnaud and the other pdins were all tied up; and then these guys show up. And I had heard of the Seven Days Clergy before. Adalmann didnt seem to appreciate them too much. Very suspicious. I wanted to learn more from them, but things were kind of urgent right now.

    I dont know whats going on with you guys, I said, trying to sound as annoyed as possible, but dont get between Hinata and me. We already settled things between ourselves, so Im not gonna let her die.

    The Clergy raised their arms up high, making their disagreement clear. (Unfortunately, we must insist. Hinata, the woman there, has ignored the will of the god Luminus. This is sphemy, and we must issue divine punishment in response.)

    The gall of these guys. They teleport right into my backyard and think they can just say anything they want.

    B-but!

    Please, forgive Lady Hinata! She had her own motivations for this

    The Clergy had no interests in the pleadings of the pdins.

    Dont give me that crap! one of them suddenly shouted. You tricked all of us, didnt you?! You wanted Lady Hinata dead from the start!

    This was the captain of that band of a hundred, the one whod faced off against Shion. Then, suddenly, things began to get a little hecticby which I mean, the pdin standing next to him took out his sword and plunged it into that captains body.

    Wha? Garde, y-you the captain gasped.

    Such insolence, Renard. I refuse to allow you to speak so ill of the Seven Days. You were conspiring with the rebel Hinata all along, werent you? Youre the one who tricked us!

    The shouted usation created a stir among the rest of the pdins. They had no idea who was telling the truth, I figured. That was how much political power this Clergy mustve had over them. But that wasnt true, was it? I mean, that heat beam or whatever came from Gardes direction. Which meant

    Well, it meant I had no idea what to do next. Things were so chaotic, there was no hope of putting them back in order. I wanted to take Hinata back from the brink of death, but the Clergy was in my wayand now Renard was betrayed by his own men and in mortal danger himself. And then the Clergy says they want Hinata dead for defying them, although they dont seem to be hostile to me.

    So now what?

    Job one was to save Hinata. Shizue asked me to, for one, but beyond that, I think we were just a few steps away from working everything out with each other. If we could make up, I figured that could lead to friendlier rtions with both the Western Holy Church and the nation of Lubelius. Abandoning her was never an option for me.

    Look, Ill hear all of you guys outter. This is my nation, and you need to follow myws while youre here. Um, youre Arnaud, right? Cast your healing magic on Hinata now.

    My nation didnt havews, really, but I still had executive power, and I meant to wield it. But the Seven Days Clergy wasnt impressed.

    (We cannot allow that. The followers of Luminism have sworn absolute allegiance to the god Luminus. Even if the demon lord Rimuru wishes it, no one here will execute your request.)

    They were keeping all the pdins from doing anything. It was so annoying. There was no time to try reasoning with them. I thought about forcing the issuebut just as I did, Diablo sent me a Thought Communication.

    (Sir Rimuru, I have an emergency report)

    (What is it? Keep it short; Im kind of busy.)

    (Pardon me. I have discovered Reyhiems killer. It is a group known as the Seven Days Clergy; they appear to have devised all these events behind the scenes.)

    (Hohh)

    (I am faced with three of them right now, and I fear that leaving them alive might cause harm for uster)

    (Can you provide evidence that theyre the killers?)

    (We have a press corps full of journalists from around the world here as eyewitnesses, my lord.)

    (All right. Permission granted. Rub em out.)

    (Yes sir!!)

    What impable timing! Diablo definitely earned a nomination for Most Valuable Butler with that show. I had no idea how he had engineered this to work out so well, but I guess I had the right man for the job.

    This solved a lot of riddles on my end. So the Seven Days Clergy were the bad guys here? Their motives were unclear to me, but I guess they were after Hinata, not me. They wanted her dead, presumably because shed be trouble for them aliveand since shed be too formidable a foe for them, they had hatched a scheme to turn the rest of the world against her.

    The dude who just stabbed the pdin Renard must have been connected to them, tooor maybe he was a Seven Days member himselfbut either way, this Garde guy was the real hit man here. He mustve wanted a clean kill, but performing the crime right in front of me was a mistake. My Universal Detect was in operation, so doing the deed with me around was like shouting Im the killer! as you pulled the trigger.

    I suppose these were the guys who fiddled around with my message for Hinata, and I had to assume they interfered with Diablos ns, too. These were the culprits, and no one elseand now that I knew that, I didnt have to worry about hurting my rtionship with Lubelius.

    This was my nation.

    Originally, I had thought it best to leave them alive, but they had been a thorn in my side as well. I didnt see much need for that now. If they were going to run on me, lets just kill em off instead.

    So leaving Diablo to take care of his own business, I began to take matters into my own hands. Time to let off a little steam.

    Benimaru! Soei!

    Sir! they both shouted.

    Capture those two. If they resist, take any measures you deem necessary.

    Just what I was waiting for!

    As you wish, Sir Rimuru.

    Benimaru and Soei came for the Clergy, who immediately shot me a pair of dirty looks. I didnt let it bother me.

    Shion!

    Yes, my lord!

    You take care of Garde over there for me.

    !

    Watch out. He might be a Seven Days guy in disguise.

    I see! Then let me show him the deepest pit in hell and expose him for what he is!

    She gleefully readied her massive sword. This time, I didnt stop her. Hell, I was hoping to see that sucker.

    (Hehheh-heh Well, look at this!)

    (Are you quite sure? It will mean all-out war against us.)

    Those two could babble all they wanted. If I let them be, itd be even more trouble for uster And if I was gonna take action here, better make it count.

    Sorry, guys, but you went too far. I guess you tried pinning the me for Archbishop Reyhiems murder on me, but Ive seen right through all that. If youre picking a fight with me, I assume you know whatsing for you, yeah?

    The pdins exchanged confused looks. A few of them, at least, seemed to see things my way. Arnaud, meanwhile, with an enraged expression, already had his sword pointed at the Clergy. But the pair didnt look daunted. In fact, they wereughing in our faces.

    (Heh-heh-heh! I didnt think we would be found out.)

    (Wah-ha-ha-ha-ha! But the Saint is already dead! Demon Lord Rimuru, you and Hinata both exhausted your strength in that battle, didnt you?)

    (We wouldnt dream of missing this golden opportunity!)

    (And if all of you know the truth as well, you will die with your demon lord!)

    At least they werent making any more excuses. The Seven Days Clergy fully admitted to it,ughing the whole way. Such a vulgar disy. It almost made me sick. There was no value in keeping them alive at all.

    Benimaru, Soei, and Shion each sized up their prey. But it turns out the Clergy was craftier than I thought.

    (Fools! Imend you for exposing us, but everything has already been ounted for.)

    (We nned to kill all of you from the beginning!)

    (Heh-heh-heh Let us begin!)

    With that, the two of them leaped back and floated into the air. Garde joined them, revealing his true colors before Shion could reach him. Then, with the three of them grouped together, they constructed arge-scale magic circle on the ground. This was dangerouscertainly beyond what a human of regr intelligence could handle, and certainly something that required advance preparation. Inside this circle was us, two of the Three Lycanthropeers, and the pdins. They intended to kill us all and make sure no evidence ever saw the light of day.

    Hellre!!

    Demonwire sh.

    Dark pyres of me shot out toward the trio, apanied by a torrent of Sticky Steel Thread powerful enough to break through sheet metal. But the only sound anyone could hear was high-pitchedughter.

    (Ridiculous! You waste your time! This magic circle deflects all non-holy strikes! Any magical attacks from evil creatures like yourselves could never prate it!)

    (Wah-ha-ha! Such utter fools. Our knowledge has been built and refined over centuries. It will never lose out to the brute force of some arrogant monster horde!)

    Theughter echoed above us, but I was too busy keeping Hinata alive. She had a temporary heart, made from my own body, but it took up a ton of magicules. I wasnt used to pulling this off, and it wasnt exactly a verypatible donor organ for her, so it wasnt working as well as what I concocted for Mjurran.

    Then Shion charged forward, ready to push all my concerns away.

    Shut up! That means nothing in the face of my Goriki-maru Version 2!!

    She wasnt making much sense, but she made a mad dash for the Clergy, muscle memory winning out over her brain. It would have struck most people as idiotic. But Shion was on another level today.

    (Ha-ha-ha-ha-ha! You imbecile! What could that sword possibly?!)

    There was an audible ripping sound, out from the air in front of the sneering Clergy.

    (N-no!)

    (Shes going to break down the magic circle?!)

    (So be it! We must release it now!!)

    Shions nonsensical attack was pure brute force, something that didnt care much about elements or attributes at all. In addition

    Understood. She appears to be using Guarantee Results, part of her Master Chef skill, to alter the space around her.

    This is just crazy. I can only hope she doesnt start using that stuff on me.

    Report. While the possibility is slim, the subject Shions attack might be effective against you as well.

    Aw, crap, really? Better make sure I never piss her off again.

    This had taught me all over again how amazing she was, but sadly, even that couldnt stop the Seven Days Clergys attack.

    Report. Attack iing.

    Their broad-range annihtion attack wasplete. Crap. What should I?

    Report. It is not a problem. The magic circle has already been analyzed.

    The cool, refreshing voice of Raphael calmed my frayed nerves. Okay, uh, great. No problem at all, then. This magic circle looked kind ofplex to mebut ah, I guess it was childs y to the wise master here. I hated to dent the Clergys confidence and all, but I guess a riled Raphael could still outwit them.

    (((Prepare to meet your doom! Trinity Break!!)))

    Three voices chanted in unison tounch the spell. But all that effort was already in vain.

    Report. Runching the ultimate skill Belzebuth.

    Just as the professor reported that to me, Belzebuth swallowed up all the droplets of murderous light raining down from above. In a moment, they were all gone. Yikes. Set this thing to full st, and it was a real monster. Even the pdins stared wide-eyed at me, shocked at the sight of all those missile sts disappearing before their eyes.

    Butwait a second. Didnt I sacrifice Belzebuth when I fought Hinata just now?

    Understood. The ultimate skill Belzebuth, Lord of Gluttony, was indeed sacrificed, but a copy had been backed up, so it was not a problem to reactivate.

    Huhhh? Backed up? And why was Raphael using the past tense there? You gotta tell me about this crap, man! I thought I had lost that thing forever. The professor acted like this was all settled history, but I wasnt sure I was willing to ept that.

    Report. Rise in holy force detected. Main attack iing.

    Oops. Thatst strike wasnt the main one?

    (((Face your ruinous end, demon lord! Trinity Disintegration!!)))

    Whoa, crap! Belzebuth aint gonna cut it now.

    Report. It is not a problem. Invoke Absolute Defense from the ultimate skill Uriel, Lord of Vows?

    Yes

    No

    Hey, hey! Theres the professor I know. Thats another yes, but Hang on. Again, something didnt seem right.

    But even as I pondered this, the first Absolute Defense wave activateda single, thin, transparentyer covering my skin. This was all it wasand this was all it took to perfectly disable Trinity Disintegration.

    Right. Yeah. Thats the thing. That was definitely the first time I used that move. I had been using Multyer Barrier up to now, not Absolute Defense.

    Taking advantage of my Mind elerate speedup, I finally asked Raphael the question on my mind. Hey. Why didnt you activate that earlier? I couldve blocked that strike on Hinata with that thing!

    The response was enough to push my frustration to the brink.

    Understood. This is because the ultimate skill Uriels Absolute Defense may still be prated by spiritual particles on asion. As a result, it was determined that invoking it would be meaningless.

    Raphael made it sound likemon sense. I swear, you dont have to be such a perfectionist about this stuff

    The behavior of the spiritual particles that magicules were made of was apparently difficult to predict. They ignored time and space as they moved around, cutting straight through well near any barrier. The near-random elements that controlled their movementsthe forces of nature that governed over these particlesmade it impossible for Absolute Defense to handle them, unless you knew how they worked.

    And yet, here I was, perfectly safe after that barrier just trounced Trinity Disintegration. Whats up with that? Did Raphael fully predict things this time?

    Understood. In the previous Meltsh attack, Belzebuth both canceled out the strike and invoked Predation on it. This made it possible to gather enough information to sessfully recognize the random elements involved. As a result, it became possible to predict and defend against holy attacks. In addition, you have also obtained the holy sword skill Meltsh.

    Hmm

    What? Wait. Waaaaaaaaaiiiit. Huh? So you mean you sucked up Hinatas sword on purpose back there?

    Dude, dont m up on me, you bastard! I can totally picture you reacting like Oh no, Rimuru got me just now! Your silence is telling me everything I need to know!

    Although Wait a second. I know Raphael isnt the type to take dangerous risks, butcould I have, like, survived a Meltsh blow without having to cancel it out with Belzebuth?

    Understood. Of course. You lost a great deal of magical energy, but your material body could have been instantly reconstructed with Infinite Regeneration.

    So what were you so freaked out about? You didnt just want to consume Meltsh so you could analyze it, did you?

    Oh, more of that, huh? Bastards getting better and better at dodging my questions. Moremalicious, you could say, or humanlike. You could tell me the guy was a living being, and I think Id believe you.

    ButI dunno, I suppose I wouldve wanted it, yeah. Wanted to withstand that attack, wanted to use it myself Did it take that moment of desire to act upon it that quickly? What a crazy ability I had. It almost felt like it was going to waste on a bum like me.

    Negative. I exist only for the sake of my master.

    Pretty fast replying to that one, huh? Pfft. Thanks. Keep up the good work, partner! Just try not to keep any secrets from me.

    Thus, within the dted time Raphael and I bickered with each other, our entire conversation ended in a single real-world instant.

    (No! That couldnt No!!)

    (It is impossible. Such a ridiculous feat should never happen!)

    (There could be no creature in this world who could withstand a direct st of Disintegration)

    And so on and so forth.

    All three of them were mightily confused, andyknow, I could see why. Even I thought it was kind of freaky, and I allegedly cast it. The ultimate in holy magic, cast in triplicate no less, and I blocked it like a spit wad. If I were them, I probably wouldnt want to ept it, either.

    But thats reality for you. Its what you get for making meor, I guess, Raphaelyour enemy.

    All right. Now its our turn.

    Benimaru, Soei, and Shion nodded.

    Your fancy magic circle seems to have disappeared, Benimaru said, a ball of flickering ck me in his hand. Think you can withstand this a second time?

    The Seven Days Clergy visibly recoiled at the sight of this. Their hand was fully yed, and they had nothing left to counter with.

    Shion shed a fearsome smile as she sized up her prey. You cant escape us, you pile of garbage. Prepare to die!

    Soei was silent, watching the Clergys movements with an unblinking eye. Alvis and Sufia, the Lycanthropeers, were watching over the pdins, making sure none of them stepped out of line. There were unlikely to be any more real threats among them, but no harm in being sure. Not like any would-be assassin among them could do much of anything now.

    (Ngh)

    The Seven Days trio had now been herded into a single location. But they still refused to give up.

    (Think this over carefully! We are the guardians of humankind! If you kill us, the followers of the god Luminus will not take it sitting down!)

    (Exactly! Luminuss rage will burn all of you to ashes!!)

    (We will step back this time. Now that we know you are not evil, I am sure talks will proceed smoothly with the Western Nations. You will be good neighbors to each other)

    With a mix of intimidation and ttery, they deigned to negotiate with us. This was really starting to piss me off. It was time, I thought, to end this

    I seem to have caused quite a lot of trouble for you, Demon Lord Rimuru.

    but then a cold, bracing voice echoed over us as a massive gate appeared, cutting through the air. The door opened, revealing a beautiful young woman. Between her unique silver hair and her heterochromatic eyes, there was no mistaking itshe was the demon lord Valentine herself, and I probably didnt need to ask why she came.

    (Gahh!)

    (My Mydy?!)

    (What are you doing in a ce like this?)

    The Clergy visibly withered in her presence, cowering in fear. Then they kneeled before her.

    Well, then. I guess Valentine was actually the god Luminus this whole time. The realization struck me dumb.

    Diablo, almost shaking with glee, let out an evilugh.

    (All right. Permission granted. Rub em out.)

    With those simple words from Rimuru, he had full permission to do as he pleased. He wanted these fools eliminated as quickly as possible, yes, but before that, there was some business to take care of.

    He turned toward the press corps. Now, everyone, are you all right?

    The fireball was blocked by the barrier Diablo built, keeping all the journalists unscathed. This barrier also kept all the demon hunters, as well as King Edward and his knights, safe from injury. Nothing based on magicules, including aspectual and spiritual magic, could prate it.

    (Tch. Annoying little demon. You are capable of that much?)

    (A fearsome foe, indeed. It is time to show off our own holy force)

    (Prepare tounch!)

    The Clergy, expecting to wrap this whole thing up in a matter of seconds, had to be surprised. No matter how powerful this demon was, destroying his physical body would eliminate any influence of his on this world. The moment he could no longer maintain his magical form, it was back to the spiritual realm for him.

    Anticipating this, the Seven Days Clergyunched an ultimate-ss magic the moment they arrivedNuclear me, part of the nuclear family of aspectual magic. Three people were required to carry it out, the force of it being too much for one, and it rained unquenchable hellfire upon its target. Against Diablo, however, it was powerless.

    Overwhelmed, the Clergy quickly opted for their final weapon. Defeating someone as powerful as Diablo required holy force, and nothing else. Their minds made up, they decided to bring out their finisherTrinity Break. It was the same move theirpatriots tried against Rimuru, and while it took some time to prepare, they could be protected by a barrier during casting, keeping them safe. Whats more, the Trinity Disintegrationunched at the end of this spell was the most powerful of all holy magic, capable of reducing anyone and anything to itsposite cells. No matter how great the monster or magic-born, from demon lords on down, this attack could never be resisted.

    It was thus with total confidence that the Clergy uncorked this spelljust as Diablo began negotiating. Not with Seven Days, but with the press.

    Did you see that attack? he gently asked. It seems clear to me that they made an attempt on your lives, didnt they?

    Even Saare, enemies with Diablo until a moment ago, couldnt deny it. The journalists certainly didnt. They all nodded their understanding. The guardians of humankind, the great heroes, the Seven Days Clergy of legendeveryone there knew of them. Diablo was telling the truth; they were sure a moment ago that theyd be breathing theirst. The Clergy would bury them all, Diablo included, and then theyd pin the me for it on the demon.

    But there is no need for rm. I will protect you all.

    To the crowd, Diablos smile looked like the reassuring countenance of a benevolent god. They believed him. If he was powerful enough to shrug off a Battlesage like Saare that easily, beating the legendary Seven Days didnt seem so fantastical, either.

    What, what do you want from us?

    Oh, money?

    Some among the press worried about what Diablo would desire in return. Demons never work for freethey always demand something back, and Diablo was no different. Hed never provide a service for no reason, unless he was doing it for Rimuru.

    Heh-heh-heh-heh-heh I appreciate your understanding. I seek only one thing from all of you

    His demand, given with a smile, was this: Report his innocence to the world. The journalists, hearing this, breathed a sigh of relief. They were expecting a cruel, merciless demon, but the truth was something else entirely.

    If Saare, one of the chief officers in the Holy Empire of Lubelius, was caught up in the Clergys dra, it meant that group had to be conspiring on an impossibly high level behind the scenes. The journalists were being used, too, and once they knew that, there was no reason to turn down Diablos request.

    Of course! Let us spread the word far and wide!

    Yes, we will write whatever you want! All about your glorious deeds!

    That we will. So please! Please, help us!!

    There were nearly a hundred members of the press there, and all of them promised their loyalty. The unique skill Tempter was faithfully doing its work on them. Betrayal would not be forgiven. The pact had been forged.

    Heh-heh-heh-heh-heh Very well. Then I promise to save all of youbut not you.

    The demon pointed at Edward, only now recovering from his fainting spell.

    Wh-why?! What did I ever do?

    Silence! he spat out. You openly mocked the great Sir Rimuru, a crime worth a thousand deaths. It is time for you to realize that saving you is worthless.

    Edward racked his hazy mind for some way out, but none came. The only thing for certain was that, if things kept up, he was going to die. He looked toward his knights; they averted their eyes. Defying the will of a monster like that, or the heroes of legend, was not conducive to their health.

    Please Please, if you could, allow me to live

    All that remained was to attempt a teary-eyed round of begging. It failed to bend Diablos heart.

    Heh-heh-heh-heh-heh Feel free to continuementing your foolishness as you depart this realm.

    None of the press lifted a finger to help Edward. What could they do? Edward was the cause of all this in the first ce; nobody was going to step in for him now and face that demons wrath.

    The king, realizing this, started crying. Ill give you everything. My money, my position My, my throne! Ill abdicate and give you everything

    Diablo paused, apparently giving this offer some serious thought. Come to think of it, he said, lightening his tone, the hero Yohm is guarding Edmaris at the moment, is he not? I believe he is the only one qualified to truly lead thend of Farmus, but what do you think of that?

    Edward knew that. His mind, racing at speeds higher than he ever felt in his life, was sure of that.

    II agree with you! He has great potential. I would dly announce him as my sessor

    The answer was a source of great satisfaction for Diablo. The journalists could sense it as well. A couple of them even began tough.

    Ha-ha-ha The birth of a hero king, is it?

    This is the news of the century

    Diablo nodded contentedly. Now the table was set perfectly. A few of the details had gone awry in his n, but the results wound up more than satisfactory.

    Now all that remained was to sweep up the garbage.

    The time hade.

    (Hmph. Are you ready for this?)

    (In just a few more moments, a rain of light will cleanse this realm of evil.)

    (Enjoy what few remaining seconds you have left to)

    The Clergy had been watching these events from afar, assured that their uing spell would win the day for them. What arrived instead was a single moment of despair.

    Am I ready for what, exactly? Dont make meugh, you scum. You meddled with my ns and shamed me in front of Sir Rimuruboth serious crimes. You will taste the fear and despair I felt many, many times over.

    There wasnt a trace of a smile on Diablo as he regarded the Seven Days. His face was expressionless, the beauty to it only adding to the fear factor.

    (Wh-what?)

    (What are you saying?)

    (Have you lost your mind? This spell could never)

    The Clergy was cut off by a snap of the fingersand then the world was enveloped in horror.

    Enjoy the sensation of powerlessness in a crumbling world! Moment of Despair!!

    This was Diablos power, taking advantage of Tempting Worldone skill in the Tempter repertory. Normally, it worked directly on the targets subconscious to affect their mental state, but Diablo had improved on it. It let him materialize a virtual world for its hapless victim, then exercise absolute control over that world. Diablo could even dictate who lived and died in this virtual realmand then, with the help of the Truth Twist skill, he could switch out that pretend world for the real one. The phantoms and monsters crafted by him would take on real form in the physical ne.

    It was as unfair a skill as it was inhumane. Breaking out of it could only be done with sheer willpower and a well-trained spiritual bodybut almost nobody could defeat the spiritual life-form of Diablo in that contest, and not even the Seven Days Clergy was an exception.

    (What, what is this?!)

    (Our, our magic is disappearing?!)

    (N-no)

    The three of them struggled in abject surprise, but there was nothing they could do. The clock ticked on their personal hend after a short while, their world copsed.

    Enjoy reflecting upon your foolishness in the deepest pit of hell

    It was time for the final flourishEnd of the World, the final snuffing out of the Tempting World he created, taking everything inside with it. It swallowed up the Seven Days Clergys full despair, taking it all the way to the final second

    and then the promises made in this battlefield were safely carried out.

    Having the demon lord Valentine, er, Luminus show up was kind of a surprise, but now someone else wasing through the door. This was the so-called Valentine from Walpurgis, right? The stand-in for Luminus?

    The three Clergy members here paled in his presence as they kept kneeling before Luminus. They had no interest in fighting any longer, trembling likembs waiting for their judgment. So what would Luminus do? The way she apologized for causing me trouble, I suppose she wasnt here for a fight, either.

    But then the former stand-in opened his mouth. Stand back, hemanded, his voice projecting far and wide. I am Louis, the Holy Emperor, and the presence you see here is our godLady Luminus!

    The pdins promptly fell to their knees. It reminded me of a certain retired lieutenant generalnot that I said that to anyone. Instead, we decided to watch what would unfold, as confused as we all were about it.

    Buta demon lord serving as a god? What kind of a joke is that? And that stand-in was the Holy Emperor? The propaganda getting thrown around was so ridiculous, I hardly knew what to make of it. Thinking about it, though, maybe this was the most effective way for her to position herself

    Affirmative. It would allow you to create the most efficient environment for ruling over the species of humanity.

    Hmm. Yeah. But I wasnt suggesting we copy that, all right? Dont let me be misunderstood on that. Otherwise, I was scared of what Raphael might decide to try next.

    Hinata, Luminus said as she approached her knight, still cradled in my arms. I told you to restrain yourself, but you decided to venture here anyway

    She lifted a hand into the air.

    May your heart be revived. Resurrection!

    This was Resurrection, the miracle of god, in action. Before my eyes, the hole from Hinatas back to the left side of her chest began to close up. This was even faster than my own recovery potion. Which

    Wait a sec. Why did a demon lord wield holy energy like this?!

    Understood. The miracle of god refers to the efficient utilization of spiritual particles. These particles cannot be intervened with normally, but I have discovered a way to do this. This will be analyzedter

    I didnt really get Raphael, but I guess the wise master had a nice new project to tackle. That guys so helpful. Lets leave the job to it for now.

    Nn-nnhg Master?

    Oops. Hinatas back awake.

    Hey. Quit babbling, I said. Whats this master talk? Who?

    I couldnt help but needle Hinata a little. It was funny to me. None of her usual grimness. She looked almost innocent now. She got summoned to this world during her high school years, right, and now shes spent the past decade or so here? That put her at around

    but before I could finish the thought, her eyes bored into me, just as icy as I remembered.

    You.

    Yes maam.

    You werent thinking something rude just now, were you?

    No, not at all.

    Oh. All right. So how long do you n to cling to me?

    Cling? She makes it sound so dirty. I was helping her this whole time, too. But now didnt seem like the right time toin about it, so I better just shut up and apologize. Sometimes, as you learned over time, losing was the best way to win.

    Oh, excuse me! Not that I minded it particrly!

    Hinata jumped away from me. Then she looked down at her chest. There was a hole in her clothing, revealing the pale skin below.

    Huh?

    Crap. She wanted to kill me with every fiber of her body now. Did I step on andmine there?

    Has anyone ever told you, she asked as she glowered at me, that yourepletely tactless?

    Youre the one staring daggers into me right now. Why do you have to be so stubborn? You never listen to people!

    I didnt mean to mouth off like that. That was a mistake. Hinatas beauty turned into a mask of angry rage. I could hear her give me an exasperated tch. But she simply took a breath, bottling it up, and shed me a smilewhich was scarier, in a way.

    Look. Im just shortsighted sometimes, thats all. You are tactless, arent you? I bet you had trouble getting dates your whole life.

    Her words pierced straight through my heart. A critical hit! Shut up,dy! Quit making me remember my forgotten past!

    II did not! People thought I was considerate and reliable!

    Oh? Well, great, she replied, giving me a look of pity as she chuckled. God, I hate her. Right at the end, she beat me good. I won the battle, but now I felt like such a loser. And, oh, wait, I never dered victory anyway

    Leaving me to deal with my shock alone, Hinata used her own healing magic to take care of Renard. Her spell did a hell of a job as well. I thought Luminus mightve helped him out, but she couldnt have cared less. I guess shes the type to pretend people didnt exist if she wasnt interested in them. Hang in there, Renard. Guess hes got it worse than I do, in a way.

    By healing Hinata, Luminus had restored the pdins confidence in her. Some of them knew the Holy Emperor Louiss name, too, and none seemed to question his presence here. Seeing Renarde back to life sent up a cheer among the troops, many shouting Lady Hinata! and crying their eyes out.

    She punched out one dude she caught staring at her chest, though. Thats Hinata for you. Cant let your guard down. Whats she talking about, being shortsighted? Its not like she didnt have Magic Sense on all the time. But I guess she was particrly sensitive to the wandering eyes of men, huh? Better be careful. Kinda toote for me, but

    After themotion calmed down a bit, Luminus slowly opened her mouth.

    Now Seven Days Clergy, what excuse do you intend to make for this?

    We all looked on, wondering how she was going to handle this. Then I got another message from Diablo.

    (The job isplete, Sir Rimuru.)

    (Good. How did it go?)

    (Heh-heh-heh-heh-heh! All ording to n.)

    He sounded pretty happy with himself. Guess there were no more problems on his end.

    (Excellent. Report back here to me once things settle down.)

    (Yes, my lord. I look forward to it.)

    Diablo closed the Thought Communication and went back to work. I guess he was no longer med for that murder, thenwhich meant I didnt need to intervene in how Luminus decided to handle these Clergy guys. They were certainly a pain in the ass, but she had just apologized to me for it. Any further meddling would justplicate matters. Better just sit here and think about how to improve our future rtions.

    As I thought that, Luminus made her decision. She was judge, jury, and (as it turned out) executioner.

    I sentence all of you to death. At least allow me to guide you to your end by my own hand

    (Havehave pity on us!)

    (It was only for your sake, Lady Luminus)

    (I swear by our years of faith to you, please)

    They clung to her in the most pathetic way. She didnt let them for long.

    Death Blessing!!

    She spread her arms wide, and then the hand of an unseen god wrapped itself around the Clergy. It was, I suppose, one final act of pity for her servants.

    A warm embrace of pity is all I could call it, but apparently it was much crueler than that, turning the living into the dead as it did. It was my first glimpse of the extent of Luminuss power.

    Thus, painlessly and all too easily, the Seven Days Clergy, who had attempted to trap us all in their cruel schemes, met their end. It came so quickly, I have to say. And here I was bracing myself for full war against the Holy Empire. Instead, it was now time to negotiate our future rtions.

    It wouldnt do to stand around outside like this, so I decided to change locations, staging a sort of victory march back to town as I guided Luminus, Louis, and Hinata along.

    Soon, I spotted Veldora back in townand then I remembered.

    Oh, uh, sorry, the final defense line turned out to be unnecessary.

    Aw, dammit! I was waiting here with bated breath, all this time

    The news didnt exactly thrill him, but hed have to deal with it. Thus, everything was settledor so I hoped. But the moment Veldoraid eyes on Luminus, he dropped another bombshell.

    Whoa!! You! I remember you! I know I do! Youre Luminus, the demon lord Luminus! That vampire whose castle I blew to splinters! Wow, Im d I remembered! Otherwise, itd be bothering me all day

    He was stopped by the tip of a sword Luminus produced out of nowhere tapping against his neck. But, like, toote now, huh? He just went and proved to the world that the god Luminus was the demon lord Luminus Valentine.

    The pdins were, uh, nonplussed. They fell silent, unable to parse this all at once. Hinata, apparently aware of this before now, put a hand to her forehead and sighed, while Louis just stood there like he was above it all.

    Hoo boy. Time and time again, Veldora proved himself the biggest troublemaker I ever knew.

    We all had to team up to restrain the enraged Luminus after thatThis ursed lizard! Getting in my hair every single damned time!!but thats a story for another day.

 Volume 7 - Epilogue

    EPILOGUE

    A NEW RELATIONSHIP

    Deep inside the Inner Cloister, Gren, the Sunday Priest of the Seven Days Clergy, was waiting for hisrades to return from their mission. There had been someplications with the elimination of Hinata, leading to an emergency request from Arze. Failure wasnt an option here, so Dena and Vena went out to join them.

    That woman has too keen a mind for her own good. We need her out of the picture before she obstructs our ns any further. We must use that demon lord, that god Luminus, if we wish to be the true rulers

    Gren had served Luminus for several hundred years with that secret ambition in his mind, weeding out anyone too talented (and therefore dangerous) for his liking. The fellow Clergy under him did their jobs well, portraying him as a loyal servant to the faith, and it was easy to make them move on his behalf. Luminus liked him, and if he could appeal to peoples sense of jealousy about that, they did whatever he wanted them to dojust as he knew they would this time.

    Arze was on his way to assassinate Hinata, disguising himself as the pdin Garde after the original one had been dealt with on the sly. Everything was in ce. The disguise was the product of Denas own sorcery; nobody could see through it.

    The Dragonbuster he gifted Hinata was equipped with a device that caused it to self-destruct anytime he wanted. If it broke right when the demon lord Rimuru attacked her, that would be enough to ensure her defeat. But she didnt use itand even worse, she started with a leg up in the fight.

    Hearing that, Gren decided a change of ns was in order. If Rimuru killed Hinata, then great. If he didnt, Arze could seal the deal instead. Then the Clergy could move to kill any eyewitnesses and assuage Rimuru, earning his trust and ensuring things would go in the right direction.

    But the problems just kept piling up. The demon in the Farmus province of Migam proved much stronger, and craftier, than predicted. Throwing that strength aroundthat forceful, almost unfair strengthhad nted doubts in the minds of the journalists Gren went through the trouble of assembling for the event.

    A frantic report from the Saturday Priest, Zaus, who was observing the fray, convinced him to send out the Wednesday Priest, Melis, and the Thursday Priest, Thalun. The witnesses all needed to be killed, and the entire crime had to be pinned on the demon. Framing it as divine punishment for the demons unspeakably cruel actions would be enough to paint the Seven Days as the just side of this conflict. Just put it all on the demon, not on the demon lord Rimuru, and all was well.

    If negotiations proved difficult, thats where the god Luminus woulde in. Rimuru was keen on establishing a foothold in the Western Nationsif he was dered a divine enemy, hed be effectively shut off from that. The Clergy had more than enough bargaining chips to work with.

    Gren had the situation read perfectly. There was no doubting the sess of his n. If there was any loose end to it, ity in that demon Diablos insane amount of powerbut Thalun was second only to Gren himself in force, and with him on the scene, Sunday was positive that victory was theirs.

    But none of them hade back yet.

    What could they be doing? he asked himself, the question appearing on his lips. Nobody was around to answerexcept someone was.

    Whatever is the matter? You look very peeved about something.

    (You Why are you here?)

    Surprised, Gren turned around. Cardinal Nicus, Hinatas close confidant, had entered the room without permission.

    Well, Ive made quite an interesting discovery, you see.

    (A discovery?)

    Yes. This.

    Nicus took out the crystal ball containing Rimurus message.

    (And what?)

    Ive found evidence this has been tampered with, he replied. Interrupting a legendary hero was frightfully rude of him, but Nicus didnt seem to care at all. A visibly annoyed Gren looked at the crystal; it was ying the full message, including the parts he thought he deleted.

    (?!)

    Picking up on Grens disturbed reaction, Nicus continued. I have to say, I dont care very much about what your objectives are. I dont even care if you use the favor you enjoy from our god Luminus for your own aims

    (What are you talking about? Our god is a concept. A concept that lies in the hearts of us all)

    Dont try to trick me. I realized ages ago that the god Luminus exists. Lady Hinata kept it a secret, so I simply followed her lead. But as I said, I truly didnt care.

    Nor did I care about how you tried using this god, Gren could almost hear Nicus saying to himself. He opened his eyes wide; Nicus returned the gaze with a thoughtful-looking expression, his eyes as eerie and his emotions as opaque as the waters of a marsh.

    (You)

    Elders as destructive as you have no ce in this world. Disintegration!!

    (No?!)

    Gren had no time to say anything else, his face frozen in surprise as he disappeared into the storm of light particles and faded from sight.

    ursed insect. You thought Id let you do harm to Lady Hinata?

    With those parting words, Nicus returned to his study as if nothing was amiss.

    The good cardinal was more than just Hinatas confidant. He was also her biggest fan in the world. And to him, all this religion was another way for him to stay connected to her. This made him a heretic, a nonbeliever at the highest echelons of the Papacy. His faith was directed toward no god at all, but a single mortal woman.

    Inside a warm, firelit room, Granville Rozzo sat on a heavy, padded chair and meditated.

    Nicus Curse you

    He opened his eyes, the blinding light of the Disintegration burned into his mind. As well it should. For Granville Rozzo was none other than Gren himself, the Sunday Priest and leader of the Seven Days Clergy. He had the ability to send his spiritual power into other people, possessing their bodies, and he had just transferred himself to another host the other day. Now all that effort was wasted.

    Todays experience was a chilling one, even for him. If that had been his actual body, the cardinal really couldve ended his life. That only added to Granvilles rage.

    But perhaps the time was ripe to pull out anyway.

    As he opened his eyes, he sensed Glenda approaching his mansion. It meant things had not gone ording to n. It was all a failure.

    The moment she stormed into the room and saw Granville, Glenda began shouting.

    Sir Granville, we couldnt do it! Theres no way I could handle that monster! Its crazy!

    She looked exhausted, like she ran all the way here from the battlefield. There was no doubting her. It was the truth.

    What about the other Battlesages? If you took him on as a team

    No, I tell you, hes just not on that level. In battle, you know, my nose is highly sensitive to the smell of death. I decided this was all trouble for me, so I pushed the battle on Saares shoulders and ran off. That guys a demon lordss foemaybe even stronger, for all I know.

    It sounded like an exaggeration to Granville, but he had still received no contact from his Seven Dayspanions. He even sought out their presences, somewhere in the battle over there, and found nothing.

    No

    As much as it shocked Granville, it was the incontrovertible truth.

    Several dayster, the spies he had deployed across thend informed him that King Edward had been deposed. The journalists on the scene were all safe at home, reporting their ounts far and wide. There were even rumors from Blumund that Tempest was nning a grand festival for themselves.

    Putting all these reports together, the only conclusion to make was that Granvilles n had failed. The Seven Days Clergy, Granville included, were no more; the good name of the god Luminus could no longer be leveraged.

    Then his beloved Maribel gave another prediction:

    Its dangerous. Too dangerous. That town is too dangerous!

    Granville failed to understand what this meant.

    You mean the angels attack?

    No. No, Grandfather. That demon lord seeks to rule the world through economic policy.

    Ruling the human realms through their financesthat was the aim of the Rozzo family, the exact n Granville had underway this very moment.

    He couldnt be

    Its true. Its really going to happen. Thats whywe need to crush him.

    Maribel wasnt one for lyingat least, not up to now. It made her suggestions worth listening to all the more.

    I see. Well, if thats what you say, Im sure it shall be so.

    After all, Maribel was both Granvilles direct descendant

    It will. Next time, for sure, it will happen. I swear it on my name as Maribel the Greedy!

    and a reincarnated girl. The future hope of the Rozzos, gifted with knowledge of the other world and an umon amount of power. As long as she lived, Granville thought as the mes of ambition began to burn anew, the family would never be defeated.

    It didnt exactlye easy, but I patched things up with Luminus and cleared up the drama between myself and Hinata. In exchange, as a sort of apology, they agreed to send out a Western Holy Church missive dering us to be harmless.

    All this came about because of how hard it was for us to understand each other. Im sure it wouldnt be thest time, either. But I think this was also a lesson for both sides, a trial we should strive to ovee and improve ourselves with.

    The asion also led us to reconsider the rtionship between Tempest and the Holy Empire of Lubelius. For the time being, we agreed to sign a nonaggression treaty and give tacit consent not to meddle in each others affairs. The whole, uh, thing with Veldora was an outstanding issue, but it was no skin off my nose, really. More of a personal problem. Veldoras, that is. Not a Tempest matter Thats my story, and Im sticking to it.

    Luminus was clearly reluctant to leave it at that, but I promised her that I wouldnt intervene in anything involving the guy, and she grudgingly agreed to that. Besides, I had the ultimate skill Veldora, Lord of the Storm, on me, and as long as I did, Veldora was de facto immortal. Even if something popped up, I didnt expect any problems.

    Understood. There will be no problems.

    Good.

    So yeah, it was pretty much selling off my best friend, but I served Veldora up as a sacrificial pawn to quell Luminuss rage. I thought I heard something along the lines of Nraaahhh! Are you abandoning me?! from him, but Im sure I was just imagining things. It was kind of his fault, besides, and I cant babysit him through every little thing. Kind of sad, maybe, but its all part of growing up.

    Thus, with a small sacrifice on my part, we had regained our peace. I had no idea how this got worked out so fast, but Yohm was even ascending to the throne. That whole bit was going along great, I heard; all that remained was to wait for the big coronation day. It felt nice, seeing every one of these problems fall all at once like dominoes.

    And from that day forward, we were formally epted by the Western Nations.

 Volume 8 - Prologue

    PROLOGUE

    A STATUS REPORT

    You are quite a spiteful man, Granville. I came very close to dying, Ill have you know.

    Dont be absurd. You fled before you could even get involved, didnt you?

    I had no choice. Did my protg deliver the news to you?

    More or less, yes

    That demon was more of a monster than I ever imagined. The Empires regr forces would hardly stand a chance. We would need the most powerful army I know, the Imperial Guard, to defeat him. But enough about that

    Damrada and Granville were seated facing each other, each sizing up their partner as they calmly chatted. In Damradas eyes, their n had failed. Thus, he felt it prudent to keep his distance from the Rozzo family until the heat died down a little. If their scheme had worked, that would have given them an advantage in the negotiations, but if not, he was likely to face demands he found singrly unreasonable. Right now, he simply wanted to cut his losses and move on.

    But things had changed. On his way to Tempest, he had received a magical call, reporting the news to him:

    Hinata is defeated. She and the demon lord Rimuru have agreed to terms.

    Damrada had pictured this happening. But it was still the worst possible oue imaginable. Hinatas survival made it harder to do business in the nations where the Western Holy Church held sway. If she had made peace with Rimuru, it was unlikely anyone could rile that demon lord up once again to kill her. Damrada and Granville joined forces on this scheme because they both stood to gain from it, but it was now safe to say the whole thing failed miserably.

    Although, depending on how you view this, you could call it fortuitous

    Their strategy had failed, but to Damrada, this was at best a ncing blow. It meant losing part of their foundation in the Western Nations, but there were other trade routes. Cerberus was a group as enormous as it was shadowy, operating several different trade organizations as fronts for its activities. Furthermore, Damrada had no personal interest in whether Hinata lived or died. Granvilles failure was therefore not all that irritating to him. And thanks to that, Damrada was currently trying to work out his and Granvilles future rtionship to his advantage. After a hasty change of ns, Damrada hade to meet with Granville once again.

    But what about you, Granville? Were you all bark and no bite? Not only did you fail to take care of Hinata, her connection to Rimuru is even stronger than before

    Blind to his own involvement in their failed strategy, Damrada moved to criticize Granville instead. But Granville himself was likely expecting as much.

    Yes, Granville replied. I must admit to that. There will be no rebncing the scales now. Farmus, for all its history, has fallen, and I imagine a new nation will rece it. It is exactly what Rimuru wanted, and it means your project is in shambles.

    He didnt hesitate to agree with Damrada and went on to expound on his own theory before getting right to the point.

    Damrada, well aware of the current situation, chose to respond with silence.

    So what will you do?

    What do you mean?

    Rimuru seems to want the Forest of Jura to be the financial center of the world. We of the Rozzos will not stand for that.

    Mmm

    Damrada coldly calcted how to respond. He had no intention of deliberately getting on the Rozzos wrong side. As far as he was concerned, if they could both just put this state of affairs behind them, all was well. And Granville, to his credit, seemed to be of the same mind, going ahead of Damrada and turning his eyes toward the future.

    So what would quarreling with each other aplish? Now that a fight between the demon lord and Saint Hinata is unlikely to happen, any further public activity would be ill-advised. The same is true for your side, too, is it not?

    Granville seemed to be reading his mind. Heh-heh. I see there is no outwitting you, my good man. No, there is no point trying to assign me for this failure. The Five Elders have been more than kind to us up to now, and I know this remains the case. We may not have been able to profit off a potential war, but so be it. As long as we remain alive, other opportunities wille.

    Well said, Sir Damrada. I do appreciate how quickly you understand me. Let us continue to work together to block this new economic threat before it begins!

    It went without saying that Damradas mission was to protect his interests in the Western Nations. Maribel, Granvilles treasure, had predicted that this nation in the Forest of Jura would potentially be a financial juggernaut. If it did, that would inevitably weaken the Rozzo familys influence on the world.

    Granville would never allow cracks to open on the system of rule his ancestors spent thousands of years building up. That was why he wanted to interfere with Rimuru, to crush his ambitionsbut without his status as part of the Seven Days Clergy, he could no longer use the name of the god Luminus to his advantage. Thus, no matter what it took, he needed support from Cerberus. The other Five EldersGranvilles descendants andradessupported him on that, applying pressure to the Council of the West and ensuring that the postwar cleanup over on Farmus took as long as possible. They couldnt stop that country from crowning a new king, but they could do whatever it took to dy the inevitable.

    The Rozzo family still had a few aces up their sleeve, but it was too premature to use them. Better to take advantage of Cerberus instead, Granville thought.

    Ah, one moment on that

    But Damrada wasnt ready to agree with him. The Rozzos, and the Five Elders they controlled, were excellent business partners; he truly had no intention of doing away with their rtionship. But thinking this meant Damrada was theirpdog would be a mistake. He was a merchant, motivated by money, and he had a flexible mind. Cerberus had grown fabulously rich thanks to the exclusive control it held over trade between the East and West, yes, but the arrival of a new customer to work with was nothing that hurt Cerberus. The Five Elderss loss of influence over the Western Nations was no business of theirs.

    I truly do desire to maintain friendly rtions with you and your family. However, Im afraid I cannot readily agree to your suggestion. After all, our organization has no reason to be hostile to Rimuru.

    How dare you!

    Heh-heh-heh As you yourself said, now that Hinata knows me, any further activity in the Western Nations is out of the picture. Instead, I will return home and provide you with someone else.

    The message Damrada gave was clear. If Granville had eliminated Hinata as promised, he could be more active right nowbut that hadnt happened.

    For now, we will continue our transactions as before. As for this incident, I suggest that we should just forgive and forget.

    Damrada stood up. Granville had misread him, and he could no longer force the point. The Cerberus group had an iron grip on the Eastern Empires underground. Angering Damrada, one of their bosses, enough to sever their rtions for good was too much of a loss for the Rozzos to bear right now.

    Very well. We will handle it ourselves, then, so I do hope you will at least refrain from interfering in the matter.

    That much goes without saying, Damrada replied with a smile. Look back at our previous dealings. You are safe trusting us.

    With a polite bow, he left the room.

    From start to finish, Damrada had been sincere in everything he said. On the surface, he was the very picture of an honest merchant. But if Hinata had been killed as nned, he would have reached out to Rimuru long ago, pitting the Rozzos against the demon lord and profiting off the eventual sh. But an impartial observer never would have suspected any of that. People called him Damrada the Gold for a reason.

    But Granville was a sly old dog himself. He had a (mostly) urate grip on Damradas motivations. Yes, he was unlikely to interferebut he didnt say anything about not courting Rimuru. He had told no lies, which was the minimum anyone would want to see from a merchant, but Granville was the leader of a family who ruled over much of the worlds business. Damradas attitude wasnt something he was willing to abide.

    I detest him so much, Granville whispered, now alone in the room. He thinks he can take advantage of me? Once this matter is done with, youre next.

    The humiliation in his eyes darkened into surging rage

    And that was how things worked out with the Five Elders, Damrada reported to the boy sittingfortably in a chair.

    Ah. Well, Im d matters have been settled with the Rozzos the way you wanted them to. Now we can continue to use them as a point of contact for negotiation.

    Damrada was the height of arrogance while dealing with the Rozzos. With this boy, he was far more self-deprecating. It was to be expected. After all, this boybroadly nodding his approval at Damradas reportwas both his master and the leader of the Cerberus group.

    Quite true. But curse those rats! Pushing a monster like that on me without even informing me about it

    Ha-ha-ha! That mustve been quite an adventure. But at least you were able to step back at the right time.

    Heh. Yes, that was quite a stroke of luck. His name wasDiablo, if I recall. A fearsome demon, one who might even be the equal of nc over in the Empire. Rimuru himself is far from the only threat.

    Yeah I got a feeling Rimurus gonna grow stronger before we can get ourselves fully back in order.

    I agree. That demon lord has the uncanniest luck working for him. Hes assembled quite a number of magic-born, and hes even tamed the Storm Dragon himself

    To tell the truth, I think a frontal assault would be a pretty bad idea.

    Iwouldnt go so far as to call it unwinnable. But no, I doubt Cerberus would survive when the dust settles.

    Well, no point fretting about it. Weve got time to work with. We can think about it.

    That we can. Things will remain rather chaotic for a while toe. Joining in the fray could burn us badly.

    Mm-hmm. I used Hinata to get back at em a little, but that sure didnt work out, huh? Its too dangerous to make any other moves. Better toy low for a while.

    The boy smiled, not seeming to care too much. Damrada thought things over as he returned the smile. Then, he seemed to remember something.

    Still, he glumly stated, I have to say, the Five Elders were all bark and no bite. Going on about how they would destroy Hinataand look how that worked out, huh? With both surviving, Im sure theyll work out their misunderstandings. That could end the whole rift between Tempest and the Holy Church before too long.

    I thought that would happen, the boy replied with a chuckle. Rimuru is too generous to humankind. I didnt think he had it in him to kill Hinata. I was kind of hoping that generosity would spell his downfall, sooner orterbut perhaps he wasnt that generous.

    I think the Five Elders were aiming to conspire with Rimuru so they could keep a lid on the Storm Dragon.

    Well, if that was all it took, we wouldnt have any problems right now. I had you keep close tabs on them precisely because I figured theyd screw it up.

    Ah, I see. But that saved me in the end. If you hadnt contacted me, sir, I wouldve had to duel Hinata herself in front of Rimuru.

    Perhaps, with some more luck, he wouldnt have blown his cover. But he wasnt optimistic about his chances fighting Hinata. He deeply appreciated the boys advance warning about the danger Although, of course, the danger only came about because of the boys orders. If Hinata hadnt been fed false information, Damrada never wouldve been revealed at all.

    Still, this was nothing that troubled Damrada deeply. The orders of the boy who led Cerberus took precedence over everything else. His mission, after all, was no less than to conquer the entire worlda goal Damrada shared. He adored the boy. With him, he felt, this childlike dream of world domination could really happen. That was why he never questioned any of the orders he received.

    If I had lost you, the boy casually said, my n wouldve been sabotaged beyond repair.

    Well, Damrada replied with a bold grin, at least I managed to escape for you.

    One did not be the leader of Cerberus solely through business acumen. It took real talent to make the powers that be in the underground bow to you.

    The boy, perhaps knowing this, let a devilish grin creep onto his face. Ha-ha-ha! But dont go all out or anything, all right? Because thats the absolutest resort. So lets just sit and watch a bit. I look forward to seeing how this struggle ys outespecially since theres no real power involved.

    Going all out, as he put it, meant calling upon every asset Cerberus had on hand. That required bringing the two underbosses not in the room, people directly below the boy himself, into the fold. There would be nothing covert about the results. It could lead to a full-blown war that involved all the Western Nations.

    Damrada nodded at the boy, knowing that wasnt what he wanted. In that case, he said, it might be best for me to return to my nativend.

    Yeah, probably. You said she didnt see your face, but this is Hinata were talking about. Shes probably got her sights on you, and that makes open activity difficult. No, better to have someone else step up. Although

    Damrada knew what the boy was getting at. Cerberus had three underbossesDamrada and two othersand one of those two was a problem.

    Lets not ask Vega to fill in for you, huh?

    Very well, a convinced Damrada replied. In that case, Misha, then?

    Yeah. Lets go with that.

    The bosses were nicknamed the Gold, the Lover, and the Power, the three symbols of a mans greed. Misha, the Lover, was someone you never wanted to let your guard down around, but she at least listened to reason. Vega, the Power, was a handful. He was a living, breathing personification of violence, as his name suggested. Damrada could do nothing to sway his mind; he only listened to direct orders from the boy, who knew that well enough and didnt want Damrada to deal with him.

    That sounds good, sir. So how should we wind down the ve trade I had been working on here?

    Oh, right, there was that, wasnt there? The Orthrus ve Market always was a pain to deal with. Lets shut it down. I never liked very anyway.

    Mmm. I have no objections, but are we just going to release all the rare monsters we circte around Mishas Echidna Club?

    No, anything designated confidential should be treated the same as always. We still have a link to the Rozzo family; we might as well use it.

    Very well. Ill leave the rest in your capable hands, said Damrada before he took his leave.

    The boy closed his eyes, gleefully moving the mental chess pieces around in his brain. Then he heard the tapping of footsteps. His lips curled into a smile as he spoke to the woman behind him, a secretary.

    You were listening, werent you, Kazalim?

    I sure was, Boss. Why are you intent on dismantling Orthrus now?

    This was Kazalim, a trusted confidant and adviser to the boy.

    Its simple. I thought Id let him y the good guy on this.

    Is that the only reason?

    Do I really need to say the other one? That slime controls the entire Forest of Jura, from one end to the other. If we go monster hunting in there, wed get crushed. So why dont we dissolve Orthrus now while itd be to our advantage?

    Yeah I suppose. We just need to protect our core assets, huh? Like a lizard thats lost its tail.

    Right? So can I leave the arrangements to you?

    Let him y the good guy Oh, him, you mean? Youe up with the most interesting ideas sometimes, Boss. All right. Ill take care of it.

    Thanks, Kazalim.

    Of course. Also, not to change the subject, but can you call me Kagali?

    The boy turned toward Kazalim, eyebrows raised. Oh, youre finally going through with it?

    Uh-huh. With yman dead, its time to step up. Until I have my revenge against Leon, Im putting the demon lord Kazalim name on ice.

    Sure thing. In that case, get to work, Kagali.

    Yes sir.

    They gave each other a nce and grinnedopening the curtain on a new age of chaos.

 Volume 8 - Ch 1

    RECONCILIATION AND AGREEMENT

    Things became much, much harder after all that. Getting everything settled was more exhausting for me than fighting Hinataa fact I made sure remained a closely guarded secret.

    What had happened? Well

    .........

    ......

    Luminus, the single god worshipped by the Western Holy Church, was none other than the demon lord Valentine. Her real name was Luminus Valentine all along. She had been using a trusted confidant as a stand-in, giving him her name, Valentine, so he could fully y the part of demon lord in her stead. That, of course, was all in the past, now that Veldora had so breezily blown her cover at thest Walpurgis Council.

    The Crusaders, the team of pdin knights led by Hinata, stood in opposition to the demon lord Valentine, which earned the Empire the support of the general public. The entire setup was wholly contrived, something Hinata knew all alongbut whatever rational sense the arrangement made, why did she go along with it?

    It was out of my hands, she said, sighing. Lady Luminus defeated me when I tried to put a stop to things myself. Not that she was much interested in the peoples support in the first ce

    She must have sensed my skepticism. Reluctant or not, apparently Hinata was incapable of defying Luminuss will. She did, however, extract a promise from her that no civilians would be harmed in the process. As long as she stuck to that, Hinata was willing to hold up her end of the bargain.

    But as the man who was with her then exined, this ploy wasnt Hinatas doing in the first ce.

    No, I was the one who came up with the n. My brother Roy was all for it. Lady Luminus had little to do with it, and Hinata was so against it at first that she tried to take us all down. If anyone has an issue with it, they shouldin to me, not her.

    This was Louisthe Holy Emperor, as he called himself.

    All right, soum, Your Majesty? Mr. Emperor?

    He chuckled. Just Louis is fine, my demon lord. Even though the pdins were right in front of us, he apparently didnt have much time for formality. Given how I was a demon lord just like his boss, Luminus, I suppose being casual with people like me came naturally.

    Louis then embarked on a recap of recent events, loudly enough for the pdins to hear.

    So the Valentine I met at Walpurgis was your brother?

    Indeedmy younger twin brother, to be more precise. Unfortunately, it seems he was killed by unknown assants on the way home from the Council.

    Huh? Killed?

    He didnt look or sound too broken up about it, but this news was kind of a surprise. I mean, stand-in or not, that demon lord Valentine was clearly a powerful dude.

    Yes. Roy had a tendency to be overly confident; he must have left himself exposed. The Western Holy Church has many enemies. There are quite a few nations who see the Holy Emperor Lubelius as an eyesore. I imagine one of their assassins must have caught my brother unawares. Its a great disappointment.

    Despite hisck of grief, Louis didnt seem wholly unmoved by the loss. Louis was pretty strong, too; I could see that much. But if his demon lordss brother was now dead, he must not have been too optimistic about his own future.

    Id been enlisting Roy to work with the new recruitstely, for on-the-field training, said Hinata. One time, Saare actually managed to overpower him in battle, so hed clearly been off his gamebut we still need to watch out for whoever killed him. Not that any of that matters to you, I assume.

    She had a point. Roy had left hardly any impact on my life at all.

    Now, at least, I had a handle on Louis, Valentine, and Luminus, as did the Crusaders listening in on us. This was all news to them, and they were all shocked into silence.

    Now Hinata turned to her soldiers. All right. You all heard us. It wasnt my intention to deceive you, but I suppose thats how this worked out, isnt it?

    L-Lady Hinata

    She raised a hand to stop the question before it began. I couldnt tell any of you, she coldly continued. We needed to have as few people in on the n as possible. If any of you revealed it, we wouldve been forced to execute you.

    Wow. Not mincing words, huh, Hinata?

    Heh Heh-heh! Well, you wont trick old Arnaud here. The godor should I say, the demon lord Luminusthreatened you into doing this, didnt she?

    This Arnaud guy was awfully brash. Hinata, however, swiftly shut him down. No. I told youour citizens are under the protection of Lady Luminus. Thats the truth. So Ive chosen to carry out her will, as long as she remains friendly to humanity. You will not insult her around me, Arnaud.

    She shot her steely-eyed pdin a re. I could see where this misunderstanding came from. No wonder Shizu had been concerned.

    Hey, now, I said. Cmon, Hinata, why dont you try being a bit kinder? Thats not nearly enough exnation for them.

    Im sorry, does this involve you?

    Her re was on me. Clearly, she wanted me to knock it off.

    I kind of think it does, doesnt it? Because itd be kind of annoying if you guys started infighting with each other here.

    I dont need your concern, thanks. Besides

    There is no need to worry, Arnaud said, cutting her off. You have fully earned our trust, Lady Hinata!

    Arnaud is right, hispatriot Renard echoed. Good demon lord Rimuru, we are led by Lady Hinata, not Luminus. There is no disagreement that could possibly separate us.

    They mightve all had their own thoughts about it, but none of that trumped the faith they had in Hinata. Having a trust-based rtionship really is the most important thing, isnt it?

    Well, all right, I said, nodding.

    Besides, after watching that Arnaud pointed up, pausing. I knew what he was getting at. There, in the air above, Luminus and Veldora had just engaged in a battle that was nothing short of breathtakingas much as I wished they hadnt. I kept everyone on the ground safe through Uriels Absolute Defense skill, but they fought over such arge range, I couldnt say if thered be any outside casualties. Anyone who had seen Luminuss ferocious attack would be just as flummoxed as Arnaud.

    Frankly:

    Looking at that battle, I can understand how Lady Hinata was defeated.

    No, she certainly doesnt call herself a god for show. If she turned her back on humanity, thered be nothing we could do about it

    To the Crusaders, the sight of it was far more convincing than any speech I could have given them.

    Well, Louis said, there is no need to concern yourselves about that. Lady Luminus is a generous god. She has no interest in tormenting those under her divine protection. Why else has she proven to be so friendly toward the humans who do not try to defy her? Of course, no one here is allowed to divulge her true identity, but

    Maintaining confidentiality about the whole demon lord thing was top priority to him. It was Veldora who blew her cover anyway, so I saw no reason not to cooperate with that effort. And the other pdins seemed convinced this was a valid thing to domainly because Hinata wanted it, as far as I could tell. They must have loved her a lot more than I thought.

    So I didnt think I had anything to worry about. Which was good. Because in my eyes, Hinata tended to be too terse, too blunt, too easily misunderstood for her own good

    Were you thinking something rude about me again?

    Huh? N-no, I wasnt

    Does she have ESP or something?! Shes got to be reading my mind

    Incorrect. No influence of that sort detected.

    No, Raphael? Then maybe she just has the uncanniest sixth sense ever. Better watch what Im thinking around her.

    At that very moment, he came onto the scenefalling at terminal velocity from the sky, of course, and making a small crater on the ground. He stood right back up, though, none the worse for wear, and ran up to me. It was Veldora, obviously, and now he was sidling up behind me, using me as a shield as he red up at the sky. Ahead of him, up above, I could see a beautiful silver-haired young woman, a mask of rage on her face as she floated in midair.

    R-Rimuru, give that pigheaded woman a piece of your mind! Im giving her as generous an apology as I can, but she refuses to listen!

    Uh, yeah Sure. But can you please stop bringing me into this? Seriously.

    This time, at least, it waspletely Veldoras fault. Has it never not been, if you think about it? He hadnt even been resurrected for that long, and already I felt like hed been a huge thorn in my side.

    I had been watching them, but the method Veldora chose for his apology only served to rile up Luminus. She was trying to put her sword away, and then he went off like Kwah-ha-ha-ha! I had no bad intentions back then. Call it a youthful mistake and forgive me with your most generous of hearts! That was easily enough to set her off.

    Bring that lizard here, she ordered me, in a voice thatd make your hair stand on end, as she red behind me at Veldora in all his haughtiness. Frankly, I didnt want to get on Luminuss bad side over something like this. I knew exactly how she felt. That was no apology at all. Veldora ought to be taught a lesson over this, I thought. So:

    All right.

    Without hesitation, I grabbed Veldora by the neck and presented him to Luminus.

    Gehh?! Rimuru! Youve betrayed meeeee!!

    At a time like this, its important you get your message across. I needed to make sure everything was crystal clear to everyone about this, if I didnt want Luminus to have any lingering resentments.

    She gave me a surprised look, then let out a smile cold enough to freeze blood. Yes. I am d to see, Rimuru, that you possess great senses of perception. Unlike that lizard over there.

    Oh, its nothing that great. But I know hes been a real thorn in your side this time. If you agree to forgive him afterward, you can feel free to rake him over the coals as much as you like.

    Luminus grinned and nodded.

    Mmm. I will give that some thought.

    That seemed to smooth things over with Luminus well enough. Veldora was shouting things like Wait! Doesdoes my opinion not matter at all?! as she dragged him away, but neither she nor I was paying attention.

    Time to let off all the steam Ive been building up Embracing Drain!!

    Gaaagghghhh!!

    It looked like Luminus was giving Veldora a hug, but there was certainly no sweet sentiment behind it. It was really more of a bear hug, despite the height difference.

    Youd think that wouldnt be enough to hurt Veldora much, but

    Understood. She is absorbing the magical energy from the target, while injecting it with signals of intense pain and difort. These signals likely install themselves into the soul of the individual until cut off, regardless of Cancel Pain possession.

    * * *

    Um So to a spiritual life-form like Veldora, this attack hurts, then? In a way, this seems a lot more effective than just destroying him. With the near-infinite stores of energy Veldora had, no amount of energy draining on Luminuss part would kill himbut she could wear him out. Adding pain and difort to the mix would make for a punishment hed not soon forget, I imagine.

    Luminus kept going with that attack for a decent amount of time. Veldora started crying out, tear-filled eyes longingly staring at me, but I watched silently and offered no mercy. This was for Veldoras sake Or really, if sacrificing him was all it took to make Luminus feel better, Id say I got a bargain. Call it a political transaction. Forgive me, Veldora.

    Well, an expressionless Louis observed, at least Lady Luminus seems to be enjoying herself. Itll let her work through all her negative emotions as ofte. I couldnt be happier.

    Yes, Hinata said, nodding. Given we dont know who killed Roy, we dont want any needless hostility right now. By the way, just to be sure, that guy over there Is he?

    She looked at Veldora, a tad unsure of herself. Oh, right. We hadnt made introductions yet, huh?

    Yeah, thats Veldora. Kinda hard to tell when hes not in dragon form and all, but its definitely him. I think hes kind of busy right now, but Ill introduce you to each otherter.

    W-wait, Rimuru! N-n-now! Introduce us no

    Hmm? Still havent had enough, eh?

    Worrrgghhhh!!

    Poor guy. It was his fault for trying to escape Luminus. I could tell she increased the voltage or whatever just now. Loose lips sink ships, and so on.

    So this was the Storm Dragon who Lady Luminus feared so much? Certainly, the amount of sheer power is astounding, but

    Hinata looked disappointed. Who could me her? Right now, Veldora was little more thanic relief. No sort of draconic majesty whatsoever. It was hard to believe this was a Catastrophe-level monster straight out of a nightmare. The other pdins mustve thought the same thing, because they couldnt have looked more confused.

    II cant believe it

    That? Thats the Storm Dragon we were told such terrifying tales about?

    Surely you jest? I honestly feel a little sorry for him.

    I think the form he had taken was tricking a few of the pdins, to be honest. Plus, Id based my own Replication on a younger Shizu. So simrly, if Veldora kept his mouth shut, he looked like a pretty handsome young man. If a guy like him was shouting for help with that desperate plea in his eyes, itd move the hearts of untold numbers of women.

    But dont be fooled. Indulge him just a little, and hell walk all over you. I needed to teach him some firm discipline right away, or else wewell, really, Iwould pay dearly for itter.

    Report. The aura of Veldora the Storm Dragon, previously in danger of spontaneouslybusting, has fallen back within the threshold of stability.

    What?! Wait a second. Did Raphael predict Luminus would do that, too? No way. That was a bit much for even me to swallow. Itd be impossible to read that far ahead. No need to give him that much creditthe fight with Hinata had followed Raphaels n so closely, though, I couldnt help but feel that way.

    I shook my head, banishing the thought.

    Right. Id say its time to head out. I know weve had a few misunderstandings, but once things calm down, Id like to discuss our future ns.

    With that, I guided the pdins back to town.

    .........

    ......

    Rigurd was waiting for us at the gate, panting. I had sent Soei on ahead to send the news, and he had just now run out to greet us. He didnt need to do thatI was sure I gave him ample warningbut the guy just likes to run, I guess.

    On behalf of the city of Tempest, he said with a friendly smile, I wee each and every one of you!

    Nice smile there. He mustve learned it as part of his diplomatic efforts, and it put a professional service worker to shame. I appreciated it, especially given how we had our swords at the ready against these guys not long ago.

    We will prepare meals for all of you, so please let us know if there is anything youd prefer not to have.

    I had to hand it to Rigurds zeal for studymaking sure to check if anyone had any allergies or religious reasons to avoid certain foods. He mustve been roping in adventurers and merchants while I wasnt paying attention, learning about human culture and thought. Would anyone believe that this guy used to be a helpless goblin?

    Oh, um, there is no need to go out of your way for us

    Hinata looked a bit awkward about this, preparing to turn the offer down, but we needed to talk about our future rtions. It was already evening by now, so that talk would likelye the next dayand since they were here anyway, I couldnt ignore a chance to advertise our city a little.

    Ah, dont worry about it! We can talk in more detail tomorrow, so for today, lets treat ourselves to a peacemaking party!

    Oooh, a party! A fine idea. And with that wille fine drink, yes?

    Veldora, looking none the worse for wear after Luminuss punishment, was naturally the first to react. He was in fine shape, after all, not that I had been concerned.

    Hmm If this is a feast, I imagine I am invited as well?

    Whoa! Luminus, out of nowhere, was standing right next to me. And she was invited, of course, but were things really square with her and Veldora?

    Well, sure, but um What do I call you? Lord Luminus?

    Dont be weird. Luminus is fine.

    I suppose it was. We were fellow Octagram members.

    All right. Luminus, then. And youre safe calling me Rimuru, too. But about Veldora

    I will not forgive him. That much is certain. Ivee here today to atone for what my servants have done. In deference to you, Rimuru, I will give the lizard his full punishment another day.

    Oooh. Shes just calling me straight Rimuru. I thought shed act more high and mighty, but I guess shes a lot more unaffected than that.

    I was thinking about how I might just get along with her when Veldora started acting out again. And Luminus took the bait, of course.

    What?! Ive had more than enough punishment!

    Silence, you! Ive already given you my concessions. Or if youd prefer, we could settle this right here!

    Kwah-ha-ha-ha! Very well! Allow me to show you the sheer scale of my might

    They fought like cats and dogs. I wasnt so sure they were enemies at all, really. Maybe the term frenemies was invented to describe this.

    Stop it, you idiot. No violent rages within city limits.

    I had to put my foot down. Otherwise, theyd be apt to tear the whole ce down.

    Luminus, at least, seemed to be happy, no doubt appreciating all the magicule energy she had sucked out of Veldoras body. It seemed like she was letting bygones be bygones for now, so maybe it was best not to needlessly prod her. If shes joining in the party, lets give her the time of her life.

    So about this party I wouldnt expect the kind of first-ss dining youd get at Walpurgis, but are you okay with that?

    Luminus nodded, thankfully. I did not attend thest one because I had a bad feeling about itbut that was not the only reason. My own team of cooks produce delicacies simr in quality to what you found over there. And eating is already optional for me; one simply gets bored of it over time. But you have rare and umon spirits here, no? Given how that lizard is already licking his lips, I must have a lot to look forward to.

    Lady Luminus, do you not feel that is too careless of you? an elderly servant of hers interjected.

    I say elderly strictly in terms of outward appearance. He had extraordinarily good posture, and from the general aura he presented, I could tell this wasnt some guy off the street. No, this servant was moreparable to Louis, standing adjacent.

    Luminus gave this servant a dissatisfied look. Why do you insist on opening your mouth constantly, Gunther? This is exactly why I didnt want to take you.

    Because it is my duty, mydy.

    Well, enough of that. Rimuru seems like a sensible person to me. Im not about to settle things with Veldora right here. Theres nothing you need to worry about.

    But

    I said enough! You have no right to boss around a demon lord as old as I am! I bid you to go back ahead of me!

    Gunther gave a tired sigh to this show of force from his master. But he couldnt defy her. After a few moments of thought, he carried out her orders.

    I will return now, in that case.

    Luminus smiled. Very good. Thank you, Gunther. You worry far too much. We have Louis and Hinata here.

    I cannot help but worry about my princess, he replied, looking at Louis. I leave her in your hands, Louis.

    Understood.

    Louis wasnt too enthused about this, either. His expression didnt change, but I could sense it anyway. Maybe Luminus was in the habit of using and abusing them both on a regr basisor at least, thats what the conversation suggested to me.

    Regardless, Gunther vanished the moment he heard Louiss reply. Once she was sure he was gone, Luminus brightened up.

    And now that Ive swatted that bothersome gnat away, we have a party to enjoy!

    Thus, Hinata and everyone under her on hand was joining the feastwhether they wanted to or not. Nobody dared voice any disagreementnobody was foolish enough to rile Luminus. That was how spectacr her fight with Veldora had been, really. It mightve been a little light sparring from their perspective, but if any of the pdins got too close, it wouldve spelled disaster for them.

    Its a good thing I was around to stop them just now, or the fallout around town wouldve been catastrophic. Some of them had turned pale, contemting what they had just narrowly avoided, while others hadnt even realized the gravity of it all yet. Whichyeahif you were a pdin, todays myriad of events mustve been mind-blowing. My battle with Hinata was superhuman enough as it was, but then we extinguished the Seven Days Clergy, and then they found out the god they worshipped all along was a demon lord Then, to cap it off, the Veldora fight. It seemed to me that their faith in Hinata was the only thing that allowed them to keep it together, but this would take time for them to fully ept.

    But hey, lets all rx for today, okay?

    Rigurd, perhaps picking up on this, pped his hands a few times and began barking out orders, sending the townspeople around him scurrying in all directions. Some collected everyones horses; some approached the pdins to ept their weapons and armor; some gave out potions to the wounded. And I guess the pdins really did believe in Hinata, because once she handed her gear over, the rest all followed. Some were even trying out our recovery potion, acting shocked at the results.

    I thought this was going to be harder, for some reason. But this was actually pretty chill.

    Now, it will be some time before the meal is ready, so why not take a bath first to take the grime off your bodies? We have rooms prepared for all of you, of course, so you may feel free to rx as well.

    The pdins didnt seem to understand what any of that meant.

    I knew the people of Englesia were in the habit of bathing regrly. I think the words used were all familiar to them. Hinatas team members were using inns along the way, apparently, and they all definitely had baths. Perhaps they never imagined monsters wanting a dip now and then, too.

    Well, prepare to be amazed, guys! The baths we got here will beat anything youll see in your capital, trust me. Really more of a hot spring, in fact, and Ive got everything from arge pool-like room to private open-air baths. Just like a hot-spring-resort town back in Japan, Ive got all kinds of different types to try out. It makes for killer advertising, and besides, it just feels good when youre all tired out.

    Theyd also need some new clothes to change into, wouldnt they? The simple gear under their armor was battered and torn, a hopeless mess after all the fighting theyd been through. A change of clothes should be good PR, too, I thought. Maybe some of the hemp-based jinbei shirt-and-shorts outfits wed just developed? We had the more kimono-like yukata for the women, tooin a pretty broad color selection, even.

    Oh, dont you worry, Haruna told me with a grin. Lady Shuna is already underway with preparations.

    I guess I had nothing to worry about. Lets get going, then.

    All right, everyone. Please, enjoy our baths, the pride of our nation. The water is all pumped in from a natural spring, and I guarantee youll find it rejuvenating. Does absolute wonders for your skin, too.

    The salesman side of me was in full swing. Luminus swiftly took the bait.

    Ah, a bath? And good for the skin? Fascinating. I imagine you have saved your finest private bath chamber for me, yes?

    Um, private chamber?

    And then I remembered. In the Dwarven Kingdom, as advanced as their tech was, personal steam baths were themon custom. They didnt have bathhouses meant for use by great numbers of people at once. Englesia had public facilities like that, but Blumund didnt. If themon people wanted to keep clean, after all, there were household magic spells for that, no water required. Every town had people whod cast them on you for a nominal fee.

    What all this meant was that, in this world, theres nomon, unified custom of drawing a bath and just soaking in it for a while. A private bath was a grand luxury, something that would only be possessed by the upper ssand even then only in nations with arge poption of otherworlders. I kept forgetting that, given how my home nation installed baths even in one-bedroom apartments.

    Luminus mustve been anticipating some noblemans grandiose gilded chamber of delights, but I was gonna have to disappoint her. There was no telling how angry shed be if I just guided her to our regr baths without exnation. I decided to address her misconceptions before anything else.

    No, um, we have baths that everyone can go in. Separated by gender, of course, but theres also a mixed bath if thats more of what youre into?

    I thought that wouldve been enough. But others reacted before her.

    ?!

    What was that?!

    Ah-haaa

    Arnaud and the other male pdins had stars in their eyes. Heh-heh. Mustve piqued their curiosity.

    Well, if youre interested, right over there we have

    I stopped midway. Hinatas frigid stare was pointed right at me. She wasnt falling for it.

    Lady Luminus, lets go to a womens bath. This will be my first hot spring visit in a while, so this is a very exciting opportunity.

    Oh? Well, if you say so, Hinata, I will not stop you.

    I expected as much. But ah well. And here I was hoping I could join Hinata and Luminus for a Wait, hang on. I shouldnt give up yet, maybe. Arnaud and his cohorts looked profoundly disappointed, but it was a fools errand to expect the women to join the men in there. But what if it was just me?

    All right, I said, giving the pdins a suitably sheepish look, let me guide you to the womens bath.

    I tried to walk away as casually as possible. But it wasnt going to be that easy.

    Wait one moment. Why are you trying to take us there?

    Why? Youre gonna need a guide, Hinata.

    No need to panic yet. Just keep calm. Make it seem natural.

    You dont know the way there, do you? We have baths with differentpositions of minerals and stuff. Theres even a sauna. I just thought itd be prudent to exin how it all worked.

    I had once guided two of the Three Lycanthropeers through it all, I exined to them, after theyd expressed an interest. They loved it, so that was now the custom I took.

    So yeah, I thought I could give you a better picture of how great all this stuff is, you know?

    Let me handle that, Sir Rimuru!

    I really didnt need Shions support right now, thanks. Gotta take a firm stand.

    Oh, I dunno if I can rely on you alone, Shion.

    What?!

    But hey,e on! No need to be a stick in the mud. Ill even join you in there.

    I tried to sound as chill as possible. Now my going around the womens bath wouldnt seem odd at all. Hee-hee-hee Perfect. The perfect n. Now I could join her in the

    No, wait. You used to be a man, didnt you? Why are you acting like itspletely normal for you to join us in there?

    Erk.

    She saw through it?!

    I shouldnt be able to sweat, but I swore I could still feel a cold sensation running down my back. Luminus joined Hinatas skepticism, giving me a Hmm? and a focused look.

    Well, no, I mean

    I was starting to panic, but before I could formte a coherent thought:

    What is the matter with it? Sir Rimuru is Sir Rimuru!

    Shion, the one person I thought I couldnt count on here, swooped in to back me up. Thats right! Keep it going! I tried to mentally encourage her, butin the endShion was Shion, too.

    But you can guide us around, too, right?

    Of course!

    In that case, Id like to ask you a favor, would you mind?

    But

    Wouldnt this be a good opportunity to prove to your leader that you can be relied upon?

    Oh, I see!

    In distressingly short order, Hinata had cajoled Shion to join her side. Even worse, the two Lycanthropeers joining us chose that moment to speak up.

    Dont worry, Shion. Well be there, too, so if you forget anything, we can help!

    Quite so. Weve be regrs at this point, so we know how it all works.

    Sir Rimuru, Shion replied, her mind made up, please let me handle this!

    Uh Sure. Make me proud.

    Aw. And here I was hoping to get a look at Hinatas lovely naked bodybut at this point, giving up was the only option left. I had just lost the chance of a lifetime, and I had to face up to that, as much as it distressed me.

    Pulling myself back together, I turned toward Benimaru.

    Pfft. Ah well. Ill pay the mens bath a visit for the first time in a while.

    Thats one thing I like to give myself credit formy ability to mentally switch gears fast.

    Okay, who wants to scrub my back? Nothing like letting water from deep in the mountains take the sweat and fatigue away.

    Allow me, sir

    Benimaru and the gang loved the hot spring wed all built together. Going in as a group now and then wasnt such a bad thing.

    Kwah-ha-ha! Will you do my back then, Rimuru?

    Why do I have to do something like that?!

    I had no interest in dealing with Veldora. Brushing him off, I took the lead as we all headed over.

    The majority of pdins were male, nearly a hundred in all, but that was no problem for my main bathhouse facility. If there was just one room, that would fill it up, but we had several, allowing them all to bathe at once. I could tell some of them were nervousit mustve been exciting for them. Id love to give em a bit of a shock.

    As I walked on, thinking this over, I ran into Shuna.

    Ive prepared the clothingbut why are you together with the gentlemen, Sir Rimuru?

    The question was casual enough, but her eyes werent smiling. It gave me pause.

    Oh, I just thought Id join them in the baths.

    Shuna gave me a cute little grin. Uh-oh. Doesnt that mean shes incredibly angry?

    How do you mean? she asked, sizing us up before squaring her gaze upon Benimaru and Soei. Im sorry, Sir Rimuru has an errand to handle, so Im afraid he cannot join you. Also, Benimaru and Soei, I would like to speak with youter.

    Er, um

    The two fell silent under Shunas pressure. I wasnt sure what this was about, but they mustve felt it wise to avoid stoking her rage any further.

    Me, meanwhile? I was being assigned to the bath in my detached house. How could it be? What set off Shuna like that? I had no idea, even as Shuna pointed me straight back home.

    After wrapping up a quick bath, I decided to check on how our prep work was going.

    Wed be using the banquet hall for the festivities. With all the events wed been hostingtely, I had this hall hastily built for us; it had only just beenpleted. Basically, it looked like a circr domed stadium, about the size of a gymnasium inside. Internally, it was wide open, the floor lined with tatami mats. It was meant to serve as an evacuation site in case of emergency, so it could hold a fair number of people. We had a lot of space to work with, so we used steel frame to construct a building of a decent size and sturdiness, but over time, this was going to change to magisteel. Our nation, and all the powerful magic-born living in it, had a lot of natural advantages like that.

    As I thought about this, food began to be delivered on serving trays, on a set of intricate-looking bowls like youd see in a fancy restaurant. I had shown them how to knead y into bowls like that, but then the children started imitating me, and nowadays you saw a lot of really impressive pieces. For colors, they made dyes out of herbal extracts or mixed weird ores into the y, resulting in some dazzling work at times. The childrens output was being used in the homes of families across town.

    Its important to experiment with a lot of things, right? You never know whats going to stick. The trays themselves were intricately detailed as well, made by Dold using processed wood from other projects. The kids started imitating that, too, and these days, handicraft sessions were part of regr recreation in Tempest.

    Looking at it this way, from hot springs to the containers the food came in, my personal tastes were starting to show their presence everywhere. Compared with those first few days of chewing on grass, life had be unbelievably better for me. The food itself was really enjoyable now, too. I guess its easier to strive for something if you really feel like itll benefit you personally.

    The main dish on tonights menu was tempura. Excellent. I mean, progressing this far was seriously moving to me. It looked perfect; it tasted amazing. All the work of Shuna in the galley. Definitely not Shion, it went without saying. Whether Shion had the Master Chef skill or not, one look at her attempts at cuisine and you knew she couldnt be trusted with the responsibilities of a kitchen.

    This tempura had alsoe about after I showed my memories to Shuna and we developed eachponent, piece by piece. And that wasnt all. Fried chicken, hamburger, steak, croquettes, fried shrimpI loved it all, and it went without saying that Milim did, too.

    For someone like me, not that well versed in cooking, trying to exin the difference between fried shrimp and tempura was quite a challenge. In simple terms, all youre doing is taking shrimp, coating it with batter, and frying it in oilbut the batter makes all the difference in texture and taste, you know? Frying can be done in a bunch of different ways, too, and trying to re-create that based on my (hazy) memories of look, and feel, and taste, proved fiendishly difficult. It took work, and now, thanks to Shunas efforts, it hade all the way here.

    Englesia had a lot of good food to enjoy, but nothing Id describe as Japanese. Guy Crimson had prepared a Western-style full-course meal for me, but I just didnt see a lot of Asian influence in this worlds cuisine. One reason for that: Few of the Western Nations bordered an ocean, so seafood wasnt in plentiful supply. Attempting to preserve the freshness of ingredients with magic, it was exined to me, took a massive investment that few were willing to make. Thus, even if you had otherworlders who ran kitchens back in Japan, they couldnt do much without the right raw materials.

    That made me recall the Japanese otherworlder, Yoshida, who ran that bakery and cake shop I liked in Englesia. Hemented how he used to enjoy making drunken cakes with gin, bourbon, and so on, but just couldnt find anything like that in this world. I remember how excited he got after I told him Id throw some his way.

    Thinking about that made me realize just how blessed I was over here. Just because you have a recipe doesnt mean youll pull it off wlessly on the first try, after all. And with Japanese cuisine in particr, tracking down ingredients was a challenge. Id do things like go to the sea and capture a bunch of different fish species to try to find an equivalent to make bonito kes from. Having a skill like Spatial Motion made it possible to transport goods in as fresh a condition as possible, which greatly expanded what was avable to us. (I wanted to build a transportwork that wasnt so dependent on magic skills, but that was a topic for the future.)

    Cuisine, after all, is culture itself. If a nation doesnt have a vibrant, expansive food culture, then if you ask me, whats the point? Out of the three basic needsfood, clothing, and shelterfood was number one by far to me, although your mileage may vary.

    This was why I was expending (some would say wasting) a lot of energy developing new dishes. Wheat-based grain was easier than I surmised at first. I saw loaves of white bread in the Englesian capital; if you were well-off enough to afford it, it seemed like a daily staple. Studying the production process for that got us bread in Tempest in rtively short order.

    Right now, the main issue to tackle was white rice. We still hadnt engineered something up to snuff taste-wise. Compared with what one saw in Japan, painstakingly curated and improved since ancient times, the quality just wasnt there. That was expected; I wasnt anticipating a sudden breakthrough for this one. Raising nts with magic, at least, sped up the harvests quite a bit, although research was still at a halt right now due to the winter season. For the moment, we just had a few experimental rice nts growing indoors, managed by researchers. Real results seemed like theyd be a while toe.

    I actually did have a solution for this, though. When I asked Raphael about a potential answer, it gave it to me right offbasically, use Shions Master Chef skill to alter the resulting rice. Tinkering the final nt rather than the initial seeds, after all, made improving the quality quite a bit easier. But was that really the right thing to do? It wasnt like anyone else could copy this method, and it seemed kind of ethically suspect to mebut given how much I relied on just that method to fine-tune our alcoholic drinks, I was in no position to moralize. Put my conscience and my appetite on the scales, and thetters gonna win every time.

    Since we couldnt ask Shion to alter every harvest for us, our research continued. But I did have her engineer a small supply of lovely white rice, though. Just a bit. Mainly for my personal consumption. Shion was more than d to help, so I gave the bag to Shuna and had her steam it up for special asions. asions like this one. I was entertaining a demon lord. Lets live a little.

    If I wanted to make our rtionship a good one, I had to demonstrate how useful my nation could be. The carrot and the stick. When someone you dont like treats you well for a change, your impression of them goes up much higher than it does with someone youre already on good terms with. Imagine the exjuvenile delinquent who volunteers to help out kids for charitythat kind of thing.

    Maybe a little show like that could turn Luminus and crew to my side. I wasnt sure the pdins would be that gullible, but appealing to peoples stomachs is a pretty ssicand effectivestrategy to take. It was a tad underhanded, but it was also a great excuse to turn this evenings feast into an extravaganza. And sure, the white rice might disagree with their ptesthat particr element of our cuisine is more for me as a Japanese personbut I bet Hinata would appreciate it. It sure wowed me after going without it for a while.

    Plus, who doesnt like tempura? Nobody, thats who. It was already a hit with the adventurers and merchants; Benimaru, in particr, was actually a huge fan. Clearly, there were no obstacles to its eptance in this world.

    As I reflected on this, the serving trays were all put in ce. Now we just had to wait for the pdins to get out of the bath.

    The ce settings were lined up in the shape of the letter C, with three seats at the centerme in the middle, Veldora and Luminus on either side. It gave me a view of everyone at the banquet, with the pdins and our citys officials facing each other along the arc. This had the nuance of an informal gathering, so I wanted to be sure people could all see one another.

    Soon, the pdins were ushered into the banquet hall. They had juste out from the bath, wearing the yukata and jinbei prepared for them. It mustve been a novel experience, but they lookedfortable for the most part. Youd be hard-pressed to find something even more rxing to wear around the house, after allkind of like lounging around in sweats all day.

    They all seemed a bit on edge as they were guided inside. Theck of tables and chairs must have thrown them, not to mention the custom of taking off their footwear before going up on the tatami floor. The goblinas guiding them along were in their element, however, demonstrating some pretty surprising elegance. Vester mustve been teaching them well. I could tell some of the pdins werent sure what to make of them.

    Luminus sat down first, the picture of high society as she settled next to me. Louis was next, a practical mirror image of the former demon lord Roy and every bit as dignified as his papal rank suggested. Third was Hinata, who (after sitting down) looked at me, determined.

    I have to apologize for all the trouble weve given you. What happened today, as well as thest time we met, was thanks to my own poor judgment. It wasnt an order from Lady Luminus, and my pdins are not responsible for it. I dont know if you can find it in yourself to forgive me, but

    Whoa, stop right there!

    I had to stop her before she started kowtowing to me on the tatami. Our first encounter? Yeah, that was all her fault. But our most recent rumble was all a misunderstanding, the Seven Days guys pulling the strings behind it, and Luminus had already taken care of them. And with Diablo wrapping things up over in Farmus as well, I saw no reason to keep dragging out the issue.

    Thats why I stepped up to interrupt her. But then I made an astonishing new discovery. I I thought I could see itthe smoothly undting twin peaks, unfolding underneath her partially opened yukata!! Slightly flushed after the bath and so supremely captivating!

    I hadnt deliberately tried for that, but man, talk about good timing! Was this Raphael at work?

    Understood. That is not the case.

    That reply sounded a little cold to me, but it didnt matter. Oh, man. I was starting to fedventurous. Now would normally be when I began sporting wood, but that thing was long gone. Ah well. A man never leaves his sense of adventure behind! Good thing I dont get nosebleeds in this body, either.

    A yukata, though, huh? Wow. Talk about packing a punch. A woman, fresh from the bath, in a yukata. Theres just no beating that. And if that woman was as beautiful as Hinata, the fearsome synergy that results

    Well, she got me. I gave in. Defeated. Id forgive her for anything shed done. In fact, I already had.

    Sir Rimuru, where are you looking?

    Shuna had paused her serving, looking at me with a smile. It was strange. Her voice sounded so gentle, but something about it seemed as frozen as ice.

    No, no, nowhere! But, Hinata If that misunderstandings all cleared up, then were all good, I promise! If you could just drop your prejudices against monsters, then all the better!

    Hinata appeared lost for a moment at my forced change of subject, but then wordlessly nodded.

    I knew I was asking a lot, really. A monster, in essence, was kind of like a violent offender with a gun in his hand. If you believe one without question and innocent people get killedter, you have to recognize that you set yourself up for failure. Maybe we could speak to each other, and maybe that didnt mean we could really understandbut this town could make it work. People were believing me and trying to y nice with humanseven after Shion and Team Reborn had been killed by human hands.

    I mean, I know you wont trust me that easily or anything. You never know what the other sides really thinking, and I guess some monsters can be a lot slyer and more conniving than others. If youre a defender of humanity, you cant afford to be tricked all the time.

    True. Conversation is the first step to amon understanding, but it can lead to some dangerous transactions. You run the risk of makingmitments that bind you, heart and soul.

    Yeah, I bet. But if you can at least not dere that all monsters are evil, were totally fine with that. And if you got a monster youre iffy about, well take em in. If human society cant ept em, theyll be fine here.

    That was about the bestpromise I could give. Any monsters deemed suspect could easily be taken into Tempest. Here in town, at least, we could be sure they wouldnt cause any troubleassuming we could reason with the guy anyway.

    All right. I dont think our thoughts are going to change if I snap my fingers, but I will prohibit my ranks from condemning all monsters as evil. Is that all right with you, Lady Luminus?

    I care not for such trivial matters. But if it leads citizens to doubt their faith in me, I will not stand for that.

    Very well. I will observe that as our first priority.

    Luminus seemed convinced. Given how the Holy Empire of Lubelius was wholly built around the peoples faith in the god Luminus, any cracks in that faith could affect the entire foundation of that belief. That religion holds great sway over the Western Nations. I could understand Hinatas caution.

    If anything, though, I feel like Luminus underestimated the influence she had on people. She goes on about how she will not stand for things, but then she acts like shes above it all and none of it matters. Maybe being bandied around as a supreme being wasnt Luminuss intention at all. I could just have been overthinking it, but it seemed like Louis was the de facto head of government, and Hinata did pretty much all her errands for her. Even all this drama was perpetrated by the Seven Days.

    But Really, though? An old demon lord whos ruled in the shadows for so long was really just azy girl palming off responsibility on others? No way, no how. She reminded me of the style I was aiming for with TempestLet the king reign, not governso I couldnt help thinking about it.

    Now Hinatas eyes were turned toward my officials. I must thank all of you as well. I promise I will not treat you as hostile enemies simply for being monsters.

    She bowed her head deeply, and the other pdins hurriedly followed her lead, shouting Were sorry! together.

    Please, think nothing of it, Rigurd said. Were it not for Sir Rimurus orders, we would have considered humans our foes as well.

    In other words, my orders had changed their minds. For a goblin whos just trying his best to stay alive, Im sure anyone who doesnt look like you is an enemy.

    I am just d you arent against us, said Benimaru with a bold grin. I saw your battle against Sir Rimuru, and I doubt even I could have defeated you.

    The fact that his attention was devoted tobat was certainly very Benimaru-like. Soei nodded his solemn agreement next to him.

    The world of monsters has always had a broad survival of the fittest streak to it; if youre deemed the enemy and killed for it, its your own fault for being weaker. Thats how Soeis mind worked, and he had no particr grudge against the pdins.

    Shion, meanwhile, was dubious. Hinatas apology must have confused her.

    Here, Shion, you forgive her, too. I understand your pain and anger, but its not like every human being on earth is evil. You have some bad guys and some good guys. Thats all there is to it. And monsters are the same way; you have to get a closer look if you want to really know anything. Plus, humans are capable of oveing their mistakes. And not just them, either, right? Us too. Whats important is whats in your soul, isnt it?

    Instead of dividing all living things into humans and monsters, it was more important to see how they lived, what existed in their souls. I wanted Shion to understand that, but my pleas seemed to just unnerve her even more. Humans, I suppose, really were evil to her. I just didnt want her to think they were all that way. She was following my orders for now, but theres no telling when her frustrations would explode. I couldnt have that. Instead of just following my orders, I wanted her to move and act on her own free will.

    But perhaps I was too worried. In a single moment, Shion threw away all her hesitation. She never was one for thinking about matters too deeply.

    All right! she blurted out. Just like you, Sir Rimuru, I will judge good and bad people based on their souls!

    She beamed, as if unshouldering some heavy burden. Maybe she had just climbed over some kind of tall barrier in her mind. Its not like I could see anyones souls, exactly, but if that won over Shion, then great.

    Team Reborn didnt seem to have any issues, either. There was no apparent bad blood with the pdins, and like Shion, I think they had it in them to judge people on their own merits. Nice of them. I sure was proud.

    So then it was settled. I epted the apology and let the mistakes fall into the past. The borderline between forgivable and unforgivable was always tricky to discern, but we had made up well enough this time. If you can speak the samenguage as the other side, its always possible for both of you to ept each others feelings.

    But enough of this gloomy stuff. All this food we prepared wouldnt be nearly as good coldand considering Veldorasck of a role so far, keeping him waiting any longer would just piss him off and make my life a hassle.

    He wasnt supposed to require food at all, I didnt think, but from the moment of his resurrection, he had been demanding it for some reason. His love for cakes and such was alreadymon knowledge, but he whined at me a lot about other types of cuisine as well. I knew he was revved up about the feast we had for tonight. Lets get him involved.

    But before that, a toast. I made one up on the spot to get things started.

    Well, heres to the battles weve all foughtand all the ones toe. Cheers!

    A nice, cold mug, straight from the hot bath. No better moment in your life. And I was prepared, of coursewe had all the treasured liquor my nation had to offer, and there would be no holding back. No mistake about it.

    Wine was the staple drink in Englesia, I had learned. Beer existed, but it just wasnt very good. Itcked carbonation and the aroma from the bubbles, and being served at room temperature did it no favors, either. My nation had conquered all those problemsdont let anyone tell you I didnt have a passion for food. After all this research, day and night, our selection of offerings was now far more robust than it was when I first visited the Dwarven Kingdom. Sheeshits almost like I say something, and they immediately begin development on it. Was this because I was a demon lord now? Actually, I guess it was kind of always this way

    Well, regardless, my beloved monsters were doing their very best for me, and as a result, my diet was now no different from when I lived in Japan. The food in Tempest is seriously good, trust me. I figured the pdins would be blown away, and I was right.

    We kicked things off by having a group of women, all well versed in holding banquets like this, pour drinks for everyone. The first mouthful was a surprise to them, I could tell, but the moment they tucked into their food, they paused and looked at the others around them to gauge their responses. The taste must have astonished them. I grinned to myself, relieved.

    Tempura was the main dish, but we also offered seafoodsome freshly prepared sashimi. We had found something close to soybeans, so we even had some ersatz soy sauce to go with itanother fruit of Shunasbor. It wasnt a perfect match vor-wise, but you wouldnt notice unless you knew the real thing. To someone trying it for the first time, this was what it was supposed to be. Soy sauce came in all kinds of varieties anyway, so maybe there was something like this produced by some local outfit in Japan, for all I knew. Either way, I was more than satisfied.

    Preparing sashimi had be a specialty of Hakuros. He wasnt with us tonight, but a number of chefs had been training under him. That whole processdeveloping the next generation of kitchen staffwas going pretty well, too. You could see them improve as time passed, their offerings growing more diverse and mouthwatering by the day.

    It was an entirely Japanese-style meal, but nearly everyone in the hall seemed to enjoy it. Hinata, in particr, looked like she was having a life-changing moment, putting her inexperienced pdins to shame as she expertly used her chopsticks to eat. Then she turned to me, likely noticing my attention on her.

    Dont you think this is going too far?

    Too far how?!

    I wasnt expecting thisint. It kind of annoyed me, so I fired back. This triggered a rant that must have been building for a long time.

    We stopped at a tavern on the way here that had ramen and gyoza dumplings. You offer free fresh water on the highway. This is supposed to be a remote forest, and yet youve built these enormous bathhouses. And now this! How did you even find fresh sashimi in the middle of a huge forest? And going out of your way to find these wild nts for tempura Dont you find that crazy at all?!

    I had definitely broken her cool facade. Man. Wasnt expecting that.

    Well, um, I wanted to eat it, so

    What?

    I I mean, I wanted to eat it, so I tried remaking it for myself. And the sashimi You know, were on good terms with the Beast Kingdom of Eurazania, and theyve got a coastline, so I had some fish brought over. We dont really have the logistics for refrigerated transport yet, though, so that kind of things still skill-dependent. But whats the harm in splurging a little bit?

    Skill-dependent?

    I gave her a reassuring nod.

    The skill in question was Gourmet, a unique one possessed by Geld that granted him a Stomach to pass items between high orcs. Food couldnt be ferried around with teleportation magic, but skills didnt have any such restrictions. Of course, we still only brought enough over to cover this banquet; the high orcs were too busy with construction projects across the forest to handle every passing fancy of mine. A few of them taking some R & R in town had offered their personal support for the project, but my reliance on individual skills for the job was a weak point I intended to address in the future.

    Hinata listened to my defense, looking a bit exasperated. Right. She sighed, resigned. With a skill, you could transport that stuff without altering it at and you have a lot of people in this nation who can handle the job. I just cant believe youre using all this for yourself, as if its the most obvious thing in the world.

    That sounded a bit rude to me, but ah well. I suppose I had answered Hinatas question, but I didnt really see what her problem was with it. If somethings avable to use, why not use it?

    Well, interrupted Luminus, what is the harm in it, Hinata? No matter the story behind it, there is no doubting how delicious this all is. I, for one, am very impressed.

    She had a cup in her hand and looked to be well on her way, alcohol-wise, as she scarfed down another piece of tempura. She was grabbing them with her fingers but still somehow managed to look elegant doing it. Which was fine. If you werent offending anyone, you could eat any way you liked. You cant force chopsticks on someone who has never seen them before.

    And speaking of which, that was actually kind of a thorny problem. Benimaru and the other ogres could work with chopsticks just fine, and the monsters of Tempest hadrgely learned by watching us. This wasnt the case for the merchants and adventurers who came from foreignnds. I was contemting inviting nobility from across the world to build ourselves into a travel hot spot, so I wanted to be sure chopsticks remained an optional selection for them.

    Along those lines, Luminus was proving an interesting research subject. You could use a knife and fork, a pair of chopsticks, or your fingers, and while hot food required chopsticks, she otherwise had no qualms about eating with her hands. Different types of food were eaten in different ways, after all, and there was no reason to put our visitors off by insisting on some foreign way of eating. Maybe its best to just say Hey, we can eat this way, too, then wait as the habit gradually takes hold.

    Do you like our offerings? I asked Luminus.

    I do. Very much. The food is extraordinaryand the drink as well.

    The observation made me realize that Luminus was downing the alcohol at an rming speed. Milim was pretty strong, but Luminus was a powerhouse, knocking back any cup offered alongside her tempura.

    d to hear. But try to go easy, okay? Too much isnt good for you.

    Fool. I am impervious to all poisonsalcohol is no danger to me. In fact, at the moment, I am trying my hardest to lessen the effect of Cancel Poison so I can get drunk off this!

    I suppose my warning was pointless. But weakening Cancel Poison?

    Y-you can do something like that?

    Of course. Stop ying dumb.

    She mustve thought I was kidding, but I insisted she teach me how that worked.

    Oops. Sounds like Raphael is in a huff about something. Ignoring it, I followed Luminuss instructions and attempted to shrink down my own resistances. The moment I did, I could feel the intoxication sneaking into my mind. Yes! Yes! This is what drunkenness feels like!

    Kwah-ha-ha-ha! You couldnt even do that, Rimuru? I mastered that much eons ago!

    Veldora seemed proud of himself. I didnt know where he practiced it, but he was now in a marvelous state of inebriation.

    Right! I shouted. Another round!

    Yes. Let me join you.

    Silly boys. Luminus sniffed. But if you two insist, I suppose I will have a refill as well.

    Now things were heating up. I could almost hear Shuna rolling her eyes as she said Oh, Sir Rimuru, but she still grinned and poured out the drink. We were all much less formal now.

    All the adult beverages we made locally were on offer, along with fresh water and as many ice cubes as you wanted. There was juice and tea avable for the nondrinkers, too. Haruna was keeping Veldoras cup full, while Louis did the same for Luminus. There was a drinking contest brewing between Benimaru, Shion, and Soei, as well as among the Lycanthropeers and between Arnaud and his fellow top pdin officers. Those pdins were pretty snooty at first, but once theirmanding officer Arnaud began sampling all the wares on hand, they loosened up considerably. Some were now amicably chatting with Rigurd and the rest, and a few of them asked the waitstaff for more food.

    One demonstrated interest in trying some of the food the monsters on hand were enjoying. Fritz was his name, I think, a Crusadermander alongside Arnaud and one of the Ten Great Saints. Nicer guy than I thought at first blush, I guess. Expressing an interest in what other people are eating is the first step toward understanding them. It was a nice sight to see.

    But that was I thought for a moment. The drink was starting to make it tough. Hes talking about that ck rice, isnt he?

    This ck rice was made using a type of nt raised on magicule waterthe highly magical water found inside the Sealed Cave. I suggested trying that out as an experiment, and it resulted in rice that looked like an octopus squirted ink all over it. For someone like me, who enjoyed his rice hot, white, and fluffy, it looked absolutely grossbut it tasted good. Really good, in fact. It was also packed with nutrients, surprisingly, so we called the crop ckspell rice and moved into full production of it.

    It was now a staple of Tempestian cuisine, but I was pretty sure there was some kind of issue with it I was forgetting

    Whoa! I shouted, rmed all the way back to sobriety. That stuffs poisonous to humans!

    Unfortunately, I was toote. Fritz already had some in his mouth. And his first reaction:

    Why, this This is restoring my magical force!

    Um, do you feel all right? Not sick or anything?

    A weaker being taking inrge quantities of magic could have hazardous health effects. This ckspell rice was packed with magicules, which meant it was toxic to those with less-than-robust constitutions. Of course, it could also be a medicine in the right dosageand like I said, potentially a dietary staple. Nobody in Tempest would have an issue with it, but I still hadnt tested out what it did to humans. Finding test subjects wasnt exactly easy.

    Fritzs reaction, however, was unexpected to me. I assumed itd be harmful to Homo sapiens, but maybe its beneficial to you if you have enough magical force?

    Understood. The subject Fritzs magic powerrecovery effect has been confirmed. Those with resistance to magicules seem to be able to convert them into energy.

    Ah, I see. Maybe eating this now, after exhausting his magic in that huge fight, made it all the more effective.

    The other pdins, seeing this, immediately mored for tastes of their own. Having a few pints in you could be a dangerous thing sometimes; none were afraid of the side effects. So I agreed.

    Hinata gave the ckspell rice a funny look, likely reacting the same way I did at first. But without furtherint, she sipped from the bowl of chazuke, consisting of the ck rice with some tea poured on top of it. I also offered it in rice-ball form for those who wanted something a little heartier. Both selections were huge hits, and a second round was carried out to the party in very short order. Considering that I busted out my personal stash of white rice for this event, it was funny to see the ckspell rice be the toast of the night insteadbut hey, if you arent conditioned to be turned off by the color like I was, it mustve been much more eptable.

    So now I knew what this new breed of rice could do, and between that and all the other food and drink, I thought we were making a pretty good impression. I was starting to see monsters and pdins chatting with each other, taking advantage of the opportunity presented to them. Shion was even engaged in an impromptu arm-wrestling tournament with three of the pdinsdominating them, by the looks of it, but her opponents were all smiles regardless. I liked the trends I saw. Alcohol yed no small role in it, perhaps, but if this became the natural flow of things, it wouldnt be long before were all on friendly terms.

    Good things to eat, enjoyable days to spendthat was my goal, and I wasnt afraid to strive for it. If I have any job here, I suppose, its to make sure this sight doesnt go extinct. It gave me new resolve.

    Then:

    What are you doing, Rimuru?! Drink up, drink up! Let me fill your cup!

    Yes, yes! You have the demon lord Luminus apanying you! Let us enjoy this evening as much as we can!

    Wh-whoa, I said, chill out, Veldora. Also, arent you a vampire, Luminus? Why are you eating and getting drunk and?

    Silence, you fool! Once you grow powerful enough, even a vampire can gain sustenance enough from regr food. Now hurry up and empty your mug!

    That wasnt what I was getting at, but she was in no mood to listen. So there I was, two drunken louts on both sides of me, feeling that newfound resolve disappear from my mind.

    Guys! Hey!

    Before I could stop them, they were taking shots from the sake we brewed from the ckspell rice. Slow it down, you two, I thought I heard Hinata curtly whispering at themshe had a faint smile, though, so maybe the booze was giving me auditory hallucinations. She was kind of cute, actually, when she smilednot that I was gonna tell her.

    Morning came. God, my head hurt.

    Understood. Of course it does. This is the bacsh after deliberately weakening your resistances.

    Thanks for the feedback, man. Raphael sounded a bit peeved, but I was sure I was imagining it. Nobodys skills get mad at them.

    I shook the mental cobwebs away. Today we had an important meeting to conductone that could decide how Tempest and the Holy Empire of Lubelius dealt with each other going forward.

    I was now seated in our usual meeting hall, soldiering through my headache.

    Honestly speaking, if things had turned out differently, we mightve been fighting both Lubelius and the Western Nations affiliated with it. The Papacy had given the Temple Knights stationed in Farmus permission to act, and if worse came to worse, the casualties on our side wouldve been eye-popping. If you thought about it like that, we couldnt afford to be too chill here.

    On the other hand, though, I was done punishing Farmus. Not a single one of the Temple Knights who conspired against us was breathing today. We had a duty to govern over there, so I wasnt exactly an impartial observerbut Hinata had already apologized to me, and the masterminds who schemed against us were already gone. If we could build friendly rtions, we were golden. There wasnt much point asking for reparationswe already had plenty of that from ymans and Farmuss coffers, and Farmus was physically far enough away from us that annexing it or making it into some kinda colony was too much of a pain. If the other side had admitted fault, money honestly wasnt as important to me as working to build rtions.

    In time, Luminus and her people entered the hall.

    Tempest was represented here by me, Shion, Rigurd, and Benimaru, along with Rugurd, Regurd, and Rogurd, the government ministers of justice, legition, and administration, respectively. Veldora was there, too, but safely ignorable. He had some manga to read, and I doubted hed even bother to pay attention.

    From Lubelius, meanwhile, we had Luminus, Louis, Hinata, and the five top pdin officials. I had them all make their formal introductions. There was Vice Captain Renard, the Noble of Light. There was Arnaud of Air, the strongest of the force after Hinata, and under him was Bhus of Earth, Litus of Water, and Fritz of Wind. I had us all seated facing one another, and with that, the proceedings began.

    I wanted to start with a brainstorm session to see what each sides takes were on this situation. Along those lines, I created a list of issues affecting all of us and passed them out to everyone to kick things off. This was just to ensure we were all on the same page; I didnt want to turn this conference into a me game, so if we disagreed on how we saw matters, I wanted it fixed as soon as possible, and so did Hinata.

    Our respective stances were about what I figured.

    To us, of course, the whole story began with Farmuss invasion of ournd. Our view of this hadnt changed; all we did was respond to moves made by the other side.

    On the Churchs end, Hinata told us that problems actually began before Farmuss request to them. Essentially, acknowledging the existence of a nation of monsters went against the teachings of Luminism, a pressing issue that threatened to cast doubt on the faith of its believers. Leaving this unaddressed could trigger internal revolt and weaken the foothold the Western Holy Church had on the region. Thats why they had to destroy the monster nation, and that was why they needed a just cause, a good reason to conquer us.

    That was the situation when we received the request from Archbishop Reyhiem, who was in Farmus at the time, Hinata exined. Cardinal Nicus gave his approval, and I had no objections to itand besides, I still wanted to get back at you.

    She intended, in other words, to take advantage of Farmuss greed and seize the opportunity to annihte us and gain revenge.

    Was that about Shizu?

    Yes, it was. I suppose I was just being used, though, looking back. I dont know who is operating behind the scenes, but there are definitely Eastern merchants involved.

    Merchants? I knew it. yman had a merchant or two he was particrly close to as well. Given how well armed Geld and his orcish army was, I assumed they were connected to one nation or another. I guess it was the East, then.

    I nodded, convinced. Judging by the ount books I had Shuna look into, yman was dealing in a vast amount of merchandisemainly goods from the Empire, originally crafted in the Dwarven Kingdom. That wasnt suspicious, since the Empire and kingdom had regr trade with each otherbut there were no records at all of the middlemen involved in this. Shuna was thorough in her work, but she couldnt find any of them, even after we asked the assorted officials we took prisoner. yman was careful, no doubt drumming it into his force that no evidence should ever be left behind. We found absolutely nothing on the Moderate Jesters, either, the group closely affiliated with him.

    Still, we could make educated guesses about who was involved. In ymans castle, we found a collection of artwork, rare magic items, and other such goods, brought in from around the world. The weapons and armor we discovered, however, were chiefly hand-me-downs from the Empire. They had teleportation magic, so they couldve procured weapons from anywhere they wanted, but they got almost all of it in from the East. That suggested close connections, and while the evidence was circumstantial, it was still persuasive.

    That and their food supply. ymans bases across thend held enormous stashes of fruit, bread, dairy, and luxury goods like alcohol. Being organic, they couldnt be teleported; physical transport was a must with them. ymans domain, the Puppet Nation of Dhistav, apparently used vebor for most of its agricultural output, but not everything we found in these stores was domestically producedording to Shuna, some of it had to be imported from beyond their borders. The only real candidate for this was the Eastern Empire, adjacent to Dhistav. Milims domain, after all, was self-sufficient to the point that she barely even considered international tradehell, she and the exdemon lord Carillon didnt even have currency to exchange.

    So I had my suspicions that yman was linked to people from the Eastern Empire.

    Thats right, Hinata said. They told me you killed Shizu, and you happened to be stationed in Englesia. Thats why I took the initiative to kill you.

    Yeah. You couldnt have picked a worse time, either. Even now, it still pisses me off when I think about it.

    Hinata shivered a bit. Arnaud and the other pdins looked simrly cowed.

    Enough coercion, you upstart brat. I can feel the Lords Ambitioning from you.

    Whoops! As Luminus just pointed out, a bit of my aura was leaking out. I was pretty good at keeping it perfectly under my control, but I guess it gets kind of loose whenever Im angry.

    So, I began after apologizing, its pretty clear an Eastern merchant or merchants is behind this. Do we know any names?

    I know one. He called himself Dahm, but Im sure thats an alias.

    An alias? Probably so. But the name didnt really matter. What did matter was narrowing the culprit down to the Empires merchant ss.

    So this merchant was connected to yman, and Im willing to bet he and his people are the guys who set Farmuss King Edmaris on us, too.

    No, theres no doubting that. Reyhiem made that much clear enough in our questioning.

    I nodded. Okay, so its clear yman was controlling Farmus from behind the curtain. Not in a cooperative kind of way, either. It seems more coercive to me.

    And you think the Eastern merchants were his boots on the ground? Benimaru asked.

    And I suppose I was just another cog in the machine, whispered Hinata.

    I could sense her anger. The question was: Who drew up the ns?

    Well, based on how these merchants were involved with every step of this, Im sure this was more than just a convenient business rtionship. yman was trying to ascend to true demon lord level. Farmus was trying to take ournd for its own expansionist purposes. And someone, we dont know who, was engineering it all.

    Someone, huh? The one yman mentioned?

    I nodded at Luminus.

    What do you mean?

    Benimaru and the others already knew about this, but the humans in the room didnt. Realizing this, I gave them a quick recap.

    Well, it looks like yman was doing the bidding of someone else himself.

    Yes, Luminus added, and he refused to divulge this someones identity until the very end. Impressive for someone as small-minded as him.

    Oh

    Could this someone be the Seven Days, then?

    The idea came to me suddenly, and when I gave it voice, it felt even more usible. But Luminus shot me a dirty look.

    What? Are you using the Seven Days of taking action unbeknownst to me?

    She might have wiped them off the by her own hand, but I guess she didnt like people second-guessing her staff. That was fair. I was about to apologize when her associate Louis spoke up.

    Hmm I cannot fully deny that possibility, no.

    Now youre spouting that nonsense, Louis?

    Her ire had turned on Louis, though he appeared unbothered.

    Lady Luminus, please, listen to me. The Seven Days Clergy craved your affection. Im sure you sensed that?

    How do you mean?

    I am talking about the Love Energy, the energizing kiss you give in a special ceremony. Thest time you did that for them, it was over a hundred years ago. At one point, it was a weekly rite, but the intervals between them grew longer and longer over time. Did you not notice?

    Luminus gave Louis an unpleasant look. Aha. Yes, my eternal youth tends to make me forget, but they all were human. Without my energy, they may not die, but they would certainly grow old.

    Exactly. That was why they worked so fervently to ensure no other favorites besides them ever appeared.

    As Louis frankly put it, the Seven Days were once a very special presence in Luminuss life. But as humans, they couldnt live forever. This Love Energy rite mustve been how they overcame that.

    I subsequently imagine that they must have tried to curry favor with you. It wouldnt be strange at all to imagine them working with the Eastern merchants to secretly entice yman into action. They werent about to let yman get a leg up on themespecially Gren, the Sunday Priest.

    It was just a passing thought, but it kind of surprised me how well these puzzle pieces fit together. Scary stuff. Im shocked at the sheer well of knowledge flowing out from me.

    Raphael sounded like it wanted to say something, but Im sure I was just imagining things. Maybe it was just envious of my genius, or maybe it thought Id stolen its thunder because I didnt ask any questions of it.

    Do you think, an exasperated Hinata asked, the Seven Days thought I was a thorn in their side because of that?

    Sounds like it. They probably intended to help yman ascend, then have you get killed fighting him. They could never have defeated you, after all, so I dont think they had much other choice.

    It wasnt a totally far-out concept. Step one, have yman defeat Hinata. Step two, either kill off yman somehow or operate him like a puppet. I couldnt say what they wanted to do with him, but ymans faith in them was genuineif they could get Hinata out of the picture, yman would do anything the Seven Days wanted. Meanwhile, theyd have Farmus wipe us out and firm up the foundations Luminism worked with, naturally making sure everyone got to share in the resulting profits. A nation as big as Farmus mobilizing would mean big money for Eastern armor and weapon dealers. Plus, more than anything else, the Seven Days would be back on Luminuss good side.

    I didnt want to jump to conclusions too early, but the possibility of all this seemed worthy of consideration to me.

    So you think they pitted me against you in hopes Id be defeated? Hinata asked, interested in Louiss theory. Between that and protecting the ts of Luminism, I suppose itd be two birds with one stone.

    This gave me another idea.

    But are we really sure the Seven Days were behind that?

    Theres no doubting it, replied Renard, seated next to Hinata. It was the Clergy who introduced us to those merchants in the first ce.

    That certainly cast more suspicion on them. Having such a heroic band make the introduction, nobody would ever doubt their intentionswhich would make it easier for the Clergy to reach their goals. Im not sure theyd thought it out all the way like that when I fought Hinata for the first time, but the second? They definitely wanted me to kill her. Those conniving bastards. It scared me a bit, but they were all gone anyway, so it was water under the bridge.

    But hang on. There were seven people in the Clergy, right? Isnt one of them still left?

    Hinata seemed pretty at ease as far as the Clergy were concerned, but thinking about it, this wasnt over yet at all. Whoever the final survivor was had to be up to their ears in this. It unnerved me, but Hinata just shed me a cold smile.

    Ha-ha! Nothing to worry about there. Nicus contacted me from his sanctum to say the final one had also been eradicated. It happened after they discovered that the crystal ball you sent had been tampered with. That was enough evidence to execute him.

    The thin smile that apanied her words would be enough to make anyone feel threatened. The sight of this beautiful woman talking about such sinister conspiracies was probably one reason it was easy to get the wrong idea about her. But anyway.

    Okay, but who was thisst guy?

    I hated to think it, but it wasnt Gren, right? The Sunday Priest fabled to be stronger than even yman? Because if so, it meant Id need to keep a careful eye out for this Nicus guy, too.

    I was told it was Gren, the Sunday Priest and chief of the Clergy. He almost never took the initiative on anything by himself, so it made sense he was thest one left.

    Luminuss ears perked up. Oh? Old Granville was defeated? Nicus That cardinal was infatuated with you, wasnt he? How did he do it?

    It wasnt the most heroic approach, Louis replied, but he had a Disintegration spell set up in advance, and it was enough of a surprise move to do him in.

    Ahhhh Granville must have aged terribly, if he fell for a trap like that.

    She sounded sad about it, but my mind was on other matters. Unfortunately, it seemed that I would need to add a new entry to my mental list of people to watch out for. It mightve been a surprise move, but I couldnt let my guard down. Disintegration was lethal against most people. Cardinal Nicus Lets remember that name.

    By the way, Lady Luminus, by Granville, do you mean Gren?

    Hinata had a thoughtful expression. The name Granville must have rung a bell.

    That I do, Luminus replied. His real name is Granville. He was known as the Hero of Light in his glory days. He even fought me once.

    For a god, Luminus acted so oddly innocent at times. I mightve been imagining it, but sometimes it felt like she was trying to act all high and mighty and not quite seeding all the time. Was all this, you knowan act?

    Then I felt it: her eyes, dead upon me.

    Yep, I was just imagining things! So much for that suspicion.

    Did he? I-Im sure it couldnt be, but

    Hinata seemed to have an idea in mind, but she must not have been fully sure about it, because she went no further.

    He was pretty strong in the past, she instead recalled. Up to my level, in fact.

    You could say that, answered Luminus. Anyone who calls themselves a Hero usually finds themselves bound by fate soon enough. Perhaps he resented me, somewhere deep in his heart.

    Perhaps, indeed. Just like Milim told me, Heroes and demon lords often intertwined. Granville was defeated by the demon lord Luminus, opting to swear his allegiance to her instead. Deep down, though, he mightve had mixed feelings about herfeelings he couldnt escape from, even after bing a living legend who brought many champions in their own right into the world. But at this point, it was all just guesswork.

    Well, I said, thats a relief, at least. It means that everyone who picked a fight with usyman, Farmus, the Seven Days Clergytheyve all met their end.

    Benimaru and my other officials nodded their agreement. Alls well that ends well, Rigurd eagerlymented with a smile.

    You said it, I replied, returning the smile as I felt the tension escape the hall. We had to deal with a lot of dangerous foes, but at this point, most of the problems are safely behind us. But I sure dont want anyone controlling me behind the scenes. If we hadnt noticed these merchants scheming in the shadows, I honestly wouldve started to suspect Yuuki.

    Yuuki was pretty suspicious. When it came to humans in Englesia with deep ties to Hinata, Yuuki was the prime candidate. I felt bad about it, but I couldnt take him off the list.

    Yuuki? Renard asked. Yuuki Kagurazaka, the guild master?

    Yeah, I answered with a nod.

    Thinking about it impartially, it made sense. He was the prime suspect at the time. But Yuuki had no reason to have Hinata and me fight each other. If there was no motive, it was pretty hard to picture him as the culprit.

    On the other hand, maybe someone was deftly scheming to frame Yuuki. The Eastern merchants could pull that off well enough, I thoughttheyd proven more than capable of carrying out multiple operations remotely at the same time. If the Clergy were the main bad guys, the merchants would have a motive to take the heat off them a little. It made sense.

    But:

    Yuuki, a suspect? Cant say thats out of the question, no.

    Right when I had convinced myself, Hinata threw me with that observation.

    Whoa, youre doubting someone from your own homnd?

    Hmm? Im only considering every possibility. For that matter, it may be a bit early to assume the real mastermind is gone. The Moderate Jester that killed Roy is still on the loose, and those Eastern merchants still have deep roots all over the Western Nations.

    It felt like she was sshing cold water on me. She was right. It was too early to breathe easy. I braced myself anew.

    Yeah I guess youre right. Its not over yet. We cant afford to be too optimistic.

    No, we cant. Wed better inform everyone about this.

    Benimaru nodded, while the pdins facing him looked simrly convinced.

    As Hinata said, I continued, its very likely that the person or persons behind all this is still around. I know I said the Clergy might be the main bad guys, but that was just a passing idea more than anything. Its no good to throw me around without any conclusive evidence. Lets keep a close eye on this as we go forward.

    Everyone murmured their agreement at this conclusion. No, it was a bad idea to cast judgment without merit. I was fairly confident in my supposition, but Raphael didnt offer its agreement. It didnt disagree, either, though, so I think the possibility was there; I just didnt have the evidence to be sure. For now, Id have to trust in Raphand with the pdins happy with this conclusion, I thought it best to leave it at that.

    That wrapped up our recap of past events. We knew we had to investigate the possibility of another mastermind out there, but that could wait forter. Today, we were here to figure out how we needed to work together to bury the hatchet for good.

    It was at this moment that Shuna brought in coffee and snacks for us. It seemed that scones and French fries were on todays menu. I had to hand it to her; she demonstrated impable timing. I immediately tackled my te as the pdins sat there figuring out what to do.

    Oooh, snacks? Ill take a double portion.

    And of course, Veldora chose this moment to finally delve into the conversation.

    Very well, replied Shuna, well used to this act.

    Mmm, this is good.

    Hinata was sampling her te as well, which was enough to set the pdins to action. After our previous talk, we all needed to kick back and rx a bit like this.

    A few minutester, I suddenly spoke up.

    All right. So about our future rtions

    Ah, before that, Hinata interrupted, I want to make one thing very clear to all of us. Should I assume youve epted our apology for all these events?

    Sure. I want us to be friends as nations going forward. I dont intend to drag that problem along any further.

    This wasnt my sole decision. I came to it after discussing matters with Benimaru and my other officials. There was no need to fight any longer, and all our misunderstandings were now worked out, so I felt it was time to make a deal.

    But Luminus wasnt convinced.

    Absolutely not. I hate owing anything to anyone. This entire incident was clearly our fault, and I wish topensate for it in some way. We can strike a deal after that is done.

    She gave Veldora a hateful re. Basically, I suppose, she didnt want Veldora to feel like he could ask her for somethingter.

    Yes, replied Hinata, and if that is Lady Luminuss will, then I must say that it troubles me to put you through such pain and not make up for it. I want to show you as much as possible that I am being sincere.

    Okay, sure, thats great, but what kind ofpensation are we talking about? Because if Luminuswell, Lubelius as a nation, reallyif they were willing to acknowledge us as a nation, then I was good to go. Combine that with an oath of non-hostility, and what more could I ask for?

    Hmm Well, how about you formally recognize our nation, and we open up diplomatic rtions?

    Luminus casually nodded. Fair enough. Although, I wont expect us to be fast friends. And I will need to settle the score with that lizard sooner orter.

    Pretty much all of Luminuss smoldering anger was pointed right at Veldora. If it really, really came to it, I was willing to offer him as a sacrifice. If that was enough to usher in a century-long era of peace, it was a dead simple decision to make.

    Wait a moment, Rimuru, I heard the dragon ask. I hope you are not picturing anythingcruel for me.

    Just your imagination, Veldora. As long you act smart and mature, theres nothing to worry about.

    No, I know what youre thinking when you talk down to me like that. It usually means youre up to no good!

    Tch. Hes getting sharp. But not as sharp as me.

    Now, now Here, Ill give you my scone, so y nice with Luminus, all right?

    What? Well, in that case, I will do my level best. Although if I ever truly willed it, itd be childs y to make Luminus recognize my vast strengths! Kwaaaaah-ha-ha-ha!

    You see? Dealing with him is so simple. Luminus audibly sighed, but it looked like she would remain true to her word.

    Dont get cocky with me, you! For now, though, let us call a truce. I will open international rtions with you for a period of one hundred years. I think that would serve amply well as an apology?

    Well, that came more easily than expected. Like, really? Were good? Benimaru, Rigurd, and the rest of my team looked just as shockedto say nothing of Hinata. I doubt anyone expected this.

    So, ventured Hinata, youre willing to open diplomacy with Tempest, if not necessarily go all the way with a nonintervention treaty?

    Quit pestering me about this. Ive said what I meant!

    With that, she reached for a second scone, content to let someone else work out the details.

    I suppose, Louis dryly stated, we will have to carry out her will

    Diplomatic rtions? Are you sure?

    Renard, however, seemed unconvinced. He appeared ready to bring up an issue but not quite sure if he should go through it. He gave Hinata a quick nce, receiving a nod in return.

    Whats the issue? chimed in Fritz. If Sir Rimuru and his nation were truly evil, we would have been wiped off the map long ago.

    True, Arnaud said. I can trust in Sir Rimuru, yes. We need to cast off our prejudices against monsters.

    I agree with them, added Litus. Sir Soei was such a gentleman to us.

    Even the notably taciturn Bhus was nodding. Renard, hearing them all, hesitated for a moment. As vice captain of the Crusaders, he couldnt give his ready agreement just yet. If anything, this choir of support only firmed his resolve.

    Yes, but there remains one problem. How will we exin this in the framework of our faiths teachings? Because depending on our approach, the Western Holy Church may face an onught of criticism, and I cant allow that to happen.

    Their faitha faith that refused to ept the existence of monsters. Yeah, if they epted me now, itd be like, hey, what about all the teachings from the past X number of centuries? I thought we were close to solving all our problems, but I suppose it neveres that easy.

    But as I worried over this, Luminus dropped another bombshell.

    Dont be silly. Those teachings are nothing I established. I dont see why failing to protect them qualifies as betraying me. Those were meant to be guiding principles for those lost in their lives. Really, theyre only a bunch of rules thought up by the leaders at the time.

    This came as a shock to all the pdins in the room, Hinata included. What?! she shouted. Ive never heard that before

    Ah yes, Louis ndly replied, I suppose you might not have. The original texts defining the faith are open to anyone who might want to browse, but the first written drafts theyre based on have been lost long ago. If you read through those, then youll see how those ts were crafted.

    As he put it, the doctrines of Luminism were put in ce to protect those who worshipped Luminus. She, Louis, and other high-level vampires were one thing, but the lower ones lived off human blood, and the blood of those who lived happy, contented lives was apparently more attractive to them. In the bad old days when monsters ran roughshod over the world, the human race had its hands full just surviving, which meant the poor quality of their blood created its fair share of problems among the vampiremunity. In response, Luminus took advantage of a move she had nned to switch gears and offer her protective hand to the humans. (This move was caused by Veldora, apparently, but I opted against asking for details. Itd just be stirring up a hos nest.)

    Protecting the defenseless allows them to lead happy lives. By spicing up their lives with fearsome demon lords, followed by the relief of being protected from them, we ensure they can savor as much happiness as possible. The citizens of Lubelius are kept safe under the name of their god.

    Humans, to put it in a rough way, were kind of like livestock to them. Vampires lived off their bloodbut as it was described to me, they needed rather small quantities, enough that the human victim wouldnt even notice. There were far more humans than vampires out there, so it made sense. A little blood donation now and then ensured a life free from existential threats. A real win-win situation.

    So did they write the holy scriptures of Luminism to help keep needless ughter by the monsters at a minimum?

    Thats right, Louis said to Hinata. Precisely.

    To me, the most important thing is the faith itself, added Luminus. All of you hereyou can cast your holy magic thanks to the faith you have in me, correct? That is how the arrangement worksit is an absolutew. It is my familys duty to protect my people, and to me, the rest matters little.

    So to sum up, the faiths refusal to ept monsters stemmed from a need to grab the hearts of the people and bring them into the faith. No, maybe that t doesnt need to be so strictly enforced. Bending too much along those lines would cause chaos in the Western Holy Church, but there was no need to go that far. Basicallythe way I was reading thisif the people here could find a reason to ept us, the rest of the kingdom would fall in line.

    It sounded like we had an agreement, then. But Renards frown said he still wasnt convinced.

    I understand, then, that our doctrine is not based on the will of our god, Lady Luminus. But practically speaking, that is the exact doctrine all of us have spent our lives following. I fear that simply doing away with it would create issues

    He had a point. Completely ignoring everything built up to now would lead to a huge bacsh from the faithful, not to mention the current Church organization. Even if Luminus herself came out in public to appeal to the masses, there was no saying if anyone would believe it was herand there was no way Luminus would do anything that proactive anyway. There was every chance of rifts forming between the pdins assembled here and the more hardcore factions of the Church.

    But we have to do it, Hinata solemnly said to the troubled-looking Renard. I was hoping we could keep silent on this until things settle down, but we have a force of a hundred pdins here, and Im sure the other nations are aware of us. Plus, those journalists were there to see a Battlesage be defeated, werent they?

    Her gaze went from Renard to me. She was right. Diablo said he had defeated a man named Saare, one of the Three Battlesages. Another one was on the scene but apparently fled in rapid order. If the press saw all that, it could ruin this forces reputation as protector of humanity. If rumors started spreading that the pdins were defeated, it could lead to all kinds of needless confusion. Diablo said it was possible to coerce the media, if need be, but Ugghhh, what a pain.

    Okay, well, how about we just say Hinata and I dueled to a draw? Then we signed a truce after discovering the Seven Days Clergys scheme. People already know Im a slime for the most part, but if we spread the word that Im an otherworlder, you think that would be a bit more convincing?

    I do appreciate that proposal, Hinata said, but are you fine with that? Wouldnt a demon lord fighting me to a draw affect your reputation?

    My reputation? Do I have much of one, really? I feel like Ive done nothing but get yelled at by Shunately. Whenever problemse up, I toss them right into Rigurdsp. For the most part, my main responsibility in towntely has been joining Gobta on his assorted jaunts. I didnt think a draw or two is gonna trash my rep that much.

    I dont see the problem. I mean, hell, you can say I lost for all I care.

    Who won, and who lost, didnt really matter, I thought. But everyone on Hinatas side stared at me in shock.

    Um, look, in all of history, theres only been a tiny handful of times when a human defeated a demon lord, you know? If you just say Oops, I lost like that, that really will wreck the bnce of power around here. Itd create trouble for you.

    Sheshes right! bellowed Renard. You are still just a fledgling demon lord. Let another force push you around right now, and that could invite interlopers aiming for your head!

    I suppose they are worrying for my sake, but I dunno

    Benimaru, can you think of any rival forces who might try to interfere with us at this point?

    None, sir. If anyone was foolish enough to try, I would twist their heads off with my bare hands.

    d to hear.

    Diablo seemed to be doing well over in the Western Nations. Rescuing the journalists lives let him proceed with his n, even if it had involved a bit of extra force. It wouldnt be long, he said, before reports would go around about Yohm being crowned the new kingand the smaller nations surrounding Farmus would pitch in to support this.

    Assuming all went to n, the only individual nation who could possibly try to tangle with us was Englesia. With Luminus giving us a hundred-year truce, the Western Nations were as good as ours, really. The same was true of the demon lords. Me killing yman was one ster performance. If we spread rumors that I lost despite looking perfectly healthy to everyone, Im not sure people would believe them. If anything, they might grow more careful dealing with me, fearing a trap or something.

    You sound pretty confident, Hinata said. Well, in that case, I dont have any objection. If anything, Ill be d to take advantage of it.

    Yeah! Lets take this opportunity to announce to the world that the Tempestians arent evil at all!

    Very true. Everyone heres so nice to us! Its so hard to believe they were all goblins and orcs not long ago.

    There had been some internal debate over whether demi-humans counted as monsters or notbut nowadays, I think thats far too narrow a view to take. Its just prejudice talking.

    You said it. Demi-humans are a formidable foe against humans, but dwarves, at least, are certainly human. If we started calling them monsters, then itd be impossible to tell spirits apart from monsters, either.

    Ogres and lizardmen had normally been treated as demi-humans up to now, too, but thanks to their hostility against humankind, they had been branded as monsters. Oni and dragonewtsthe next evolution up from each respective racewere treated not as monsters, but as local gods. All that really mattered, in the end, was whether you were friend or foe to humankindand that meant it was hard to interpret Luminist doctrine as a carte-nche condemnation of all monsters.

    Well, I said, we have formal rtions with the Dwarven Kingdom. Why dont we mix King Gazel into this and sign a hundred-year friendship treaty? If we can get him to guarantee that we wont attack people, that ought to change a few minds, right?

    Hinata thoughtfully nodded, reaching her own conclusions in her mind. Yes If we can just build a little trust, that would make it easier to convince people. Plus, with things as they are, its probably about time to purge all the people who were poisoned by the Clergy.

    The Western Holy Church was hardly a monolith. Norge organization is. And with Hinata putting it in such cold, blunt terms, all opposition was silenced. I guess she wanted to use this chance toy all the guilt on the Seven Days Clergykind of dirty, I thought, but that was a Lubelius issue. Certainly nothing I had a right toment on. We then began to work out some of the smaller details.

    For our future interactions, it was agreed that Arnaud and Bhus would stay here in Tempest. Theyd go back home to prepare first, then return with a few civil bureaucrats in tow. I was nning to build a Luminist church in town in the meantime for their use, and I didnt see it taking any longer than a couple weeks. Maybe wed start to see some Luminists around here once we were done.

    I was honestly a little anxious about allowing full freedom of religion, butahhh, Im sure wed figure it out. Monsters, frankly, are atheists. There was no such thing as a single god that was widely recognized by everyone across the world. My conventional wisdom from my own didnt apply, really. There was religion, yes, but it was usually more like paying your respects to the local deity than anything very ferventand these deities could quite literally help you out if you prayed to them, because, like, they were right there. The Dragon Faithfuls rtionship with Milim is a prime example.

    Along those lines, Luminism was really nothing more than the biggest yer in an extremely crowded arena full of religions like that. The Crusaders served as Luminuss servants, protecting the weak and earning new adherents to the faith. So if you look at it that way, I could see a church in Tempest as a kind of center for Western Holy Churchstyle support of the vulnerable. You gotta help out your neighbor and all that, although I doubt they could offer much help to us. Itd at least mean we could fight alongside pdins if some kind of threat appeared.

    There was no real reason not to take this opportunity. Wed keep close tabs on the local church, of course, but I figured we could grant them a certain amount of freedom. That was themon ground we found.

    That was the end of the tough stuff. We had a deal with Luminus, more or less, and we had managed to get Lubelius to recognize us as a legitimate nation. That was more than enoughpensationnow, if we could just keep interacting and getting along, itd be perfect. Id like to use our century-long time limit to build a deeper understanding of each other, and that meant wed be interacting regrly with the Crusaders.

    The first effort along those lines involved providing skills and tech to each other. The battle earlier had smashed up a lot of the pdins weapons, so they needed someone to repair them. We offered our skills in response, but that was kind of a frontwhat we really wanted to do was see what their weapons were capable of.

    This allowed us ess to one of those strange light-based suits of armor I saw. As Raphael put it, it provided the wielders magical force to a spiritual life-form, letting them manifest it into a physical object. The one gifted to us had been overused and broken, so we traded it for a new Garm-produced armor set. The pdins, still feeling a bit indebted to us, dly let us have it as part of their general apology, and while I expected Hinata to whine about it, she was actually fine.

    I decided to reciprocate by giving her a sword I had made.

    The sword Hinata used is called Moonlight. Luminus gave it to her herself, and it housed untold amounts of powertoo much, really. I asked her, and she called it a Legend-ss weapon, beyond even the Unique level that I thought was the highest.

    Kaijin and Kurobe taught me that magisteel can evolve over many years, allowing well-worn, first-ss weapons and armor to continue honing and polishing themselves. This evolution can provide a massive boost out of thin air, something proven by the way ancient weapons found in ruins sometimes boasted out-of-this-world abilities that modern technology couldnt replicate. This was the so-called Legend ss, and apparently they were usually kept away from general ess.

    It was Kurobe and Garms goal to craft equipment along these lines. They stared at Hinatas Moonlight, transfixed by it. I hope theyre up to the task.

    The thing about a sword this all-powerful is that you can really only use it when absolutely needed. If you decided to whip it out on the street in the afternoon, you could raze the entire city block to rubble before you realized what was happening. Itd be like carrying a machine gun instead of a pistol for self-defensejust not the kind of thing youd go bandying around every day.

    It was the equivalent of a pistol that I thought about gifting her, and she liked it much more than I anticipated. It was a new version of the broken rapier I had consumed earlier, analyzed and improved for her. It was in the Unique ss feature-wise, and Im sure it felt the same way in her hand. I even re-created the unique ability it had to always kill its target on the seventh attack.

    They also gave me a broken longswordthe Dragonbuster is what they called it. It was even more feeble than I thought, and I wasnt really sure you could y someone like Veldora with it. I also inquired about her Holy Spirit Armor, but she sadly replied that she couldnt show that to me. It was an original, one-of-a-kind piece made just for Hinata, and I really wanted to analyze it, but

    Report. It has already been analyzed and assessed from the information gathered during battle.

    Whuh?!

    M-man, does anything ever get by Raphael? Should I start calling it Professor or what?

    Oops, got on its bad side again. Better just give it my thanks and move on.

    I really had no idea, though. This is a huge feat. I cant get enough of that guy. ording to it, we could take the assessment from some inferior spirit armor, thenbine it with Hinatas battle data to re-create Holy Spirit Armor. This belonged to the holy element, but you could also tinker with the fundamentals of it to turn it into a demonic piece.

    Sorry, Hinata. I guess this Holy Spirit Armors a national secret, but a quick bit of Analyze and Assess and its mine. I would need to think about who to grant it to, though. It seemed kind of difficult to use. Now, though, our battle gear would be more polished than ever before.

    Between this, that, and the other thing, we were now even with each other. It was evening, and with the days work behind us, I figured the pdins would hit the trail soon, but I thought Id at least be polite and offer them one more meal.

    Hey, uh, its gettingte, Hinata, so why dont you and Luminus save your departure for tomorrow?

    It was kind of silly. Luminus could go home with Spatial Motion anytime she liked, and Im sure Hinata had a Warp Portal set up somewhere in Lubelius. The same was true of all the pdins, each one an A-grade fighter; Im sure the journey home was no great effort to them. I imagined theyd just say Sorry, but our works done here, nice knowing ya and be on their way.

    Sorry, but

    Yep. There it is.

    if you insist on it, would you be willing to host us this evening?

    Ah yes, I did like that hot spring of yours, and the food was simply excellent. What fun will we have tonight?

    Huh? Huhhhh?

    I suppose neither Hinata nor Luminus was in any hurry to go anywhere. The pdins saw this, of course, and now theyd all need quarters for another night, too. They were all smiles now, chatting over what could be on the menu tonight. I wanted to ask if the Crusaders were really a bunch of freeloaders like this all along, but it was toote to whine about it. If they expect that much from us, lets give them the time of their lives.

    .........

    ......

    Okay, todays banquet will feature sukiyaki, a big bowl of beef simmered in vegetable broth!

    Yeaahhhhh!!

    I wasnt sure what this feeling in me was. The pdins and my staff, mortal enemies until the previous day, were now salivating over the hearty meal theyd share shortly. They were happy, no doubt about that But part of me wondered if this was really the right thing for them. I guess there were no rules about religious figures giving up meat or whatever in this worldit was hard enough to keep yourself fed at times without inventing restrictions for yourself.

    So we decided to treat them to the cowdeer and chiducken we had started to raise, pairing their meat with some fresh-picked veggies. Tossing all that into a pot of boiling broth would be perfect, and Shuna knew exactly how to pull it off. First, she used chiducken bones to make a soup stock, using the meat on them for sashimi purposes. Then, for the main course, she butchered up some marbled cowdeer, making for some downright decadent hot pot. After that, all she had to do was remove the poison from the chiducken eggs and pass them around to everyone. There was no way this wouldnt taste awesome.

    Okay, heres to our future friendship. Cheers!

    Cheers!!

    We also had more fresh-cooked rice, the big hit of the previous days feast. Ignore the ck color, of course. My beloved white rice would just go to waste on these guys. Hinata was staring longingly at my personal rice bowlst night, though, so I gave her a servingfrom one otherworlder to another. When ites to rice, in white is where its at, although Im no stranger to assorted seasonings, too. I was also getting some rice in from Blumund that I had them test out for me, but it still needed some improvement. It was a wholly different beast from the white rice before me.

    White rice, though Dont you find this almost selfish, in a way?

    I wasnt sure what Hinata wasining about. Her voice was even shaking a little. What was she, jealous?

    Well, if you dont like it, Ill be d to take it away

    Im not talking about that, she snapped back, protecting her bowl with her life. Geez, dont get too worked up about this crap. Not that Id say that to her. I just mean Being able to so perfectly re-create food from that other world? Its more exasperating than surprising, in a way. I cant believe youve created such a life of luxury for yourself, in the space of just two years. Just casually achieving all these things none of us ever wouldve hoped to manage

    Hey, praise me all you want. Im here all night.

    Dont be stupid. I mean, I heard stories about you from Yuuki, but I took them all with a grain of salt. He was just rying the reports he heard from his spies, after all. But this She shrugged. I dont think Id ever believe it if I wasnt seeing it with my own eyes.

    I wasnt sure how to respond. I was nowhere near the finish line.

    Well, Im far from done yet. Transports still super-slow, and it takes forever to transmit information from one ce to the other. With magic, though, it was straightforward enough to improve our food and living conditions, more or less.

    More or less? Thats how you describe re-creating all this delicious food? You realize it makes you sound like youre ridiculing all our hard work and sweat up to now?!

    I managed to set her off again. But really, if I was satisfied with this, then Id never develop things any further. Im a king, pretty much, and a king needs to be at least a little greedy. Not king so much as demon lord, but same difference.

    Well, I mean, were pretty good in the forest food-wise, you know? The real issue is the culture. Theres just way too little entertainment. I want to build the foundation for things likeyou know, manga. Like what Veldoras reading.

    Entertainment? Do you realize how harsh a world this is? A world where the majority of people have to fight tooth and nail to see another day?

    Yeah, I know. And thats why were gonna make sure monsters and things are no longer a threat. I mean, Im just gonnae out and say this cause theres no point hiding it, but were trying to install Yohm as king, build a new kingdom from his domain, and use that to draw the Western Nations into our sphere of influence.

    Just what exactly are you nning? Id like to know more details.

    Does she? Well, lets tell her.

    Im thinking about a lot, actually. For starters

    I pecked at the hot pot as I exined my vision of the future to her.

    Our current project involved getting the human world to recognize us, and this was already halfway done, with the leaders of many nations aware of who I was. Id received reports of apparent spies going in and out of Tempest, so Id taken a few measures to show them how harmless we were. The merchants and adventurers were spreading rumors of their own, and before long, even themon people would know we could coexist with them. Itd take time for that to really take root, yes, but we were on the path. No need to hurry it along.

    After that came our road infrastructure. This was also well underway, as we had worked to build safe, efficient trade routes across our territory. Highways to Blumund and the Dwarven Kingdom were now open, and ns were in progress for a new road linking us to the Sorcerous Dynasty of Thalion. There were no paved roads to Eurazania at the moment, so I thought we could tackle that afterward.

    Running in parallel with all this was experimentation withmunication methods. I didnt know how radios and stuff worked, so I had to give up on that. Raphael could tell me if I asked, but I didnt have the brainpower to help everyone else understand it. Kaijin and the three dwarven brothers might, maybe, but I didnt want to rely on them for everything. Thus, I decided to leave that issue to the next generation and build schools to provide education for our children. These were simple one-room affairs for now, but I was having them learn basic reading, writing, and arithmetic. Before long, I intended to bring in some humans to provide more in-depth instruction.

    But getting back to the subject, themunication crystals that served the world now could only be used by the magically inclined. They were magical items themselves, which meant they were vulnerable to theft. That was hardly a theoretical problem, and more to the point, if you needed to send out an emergency message, youd never know if a wizard was nearby to help.

    We needed a system that anyone could use and where theft wasnt an issue. It seemed beyond all probability, but it was actually pretty within reach. My idea involved the use of Sticky Steel Thread and magisteel. I tried the first out with Soei, but my transmission skills over the thread were honestly pretty astounding. Since it worked with magicules, you could get your voice and thoughts across with remarkable rity.

    Magisteel was packed with those same magicules as well, so I thought it could workrgely the same wayand after some experimentation, it did. What we could do is work magisteel into wires about a half an inch thick, run them through the dimension used by Shadow Motion, and connect the worlds cities together with it. That alone wouldnt aplish anything, but attaching thiswork to the device Vester and his team were developing could convert waves of passing thought into real-life sights and sounds. This device required no magical force to use, so I wanted to get it running as soon as it wasplete. In the meantime, we needed to gather the requisite amount of magisteel and get ready.

    With the amount of monsters we had in this nation, regr iron ore kept in storage would transform itself into magic ore. This could then be processed into magisteel wire, with Shadow Motion practitioners doing the wiring work. Nothing would really serve as physical obstacles to thiswork, so instation wouldnt be that terribly difficult. Once we really had the ball rolling, I also had ns to expand thework from the cities to the smaller viges. Now all we had to do was develop the necessary receivers.

    Really, as someone who had lived in a data-driven society,munication speed was seriously important to me.

    What do you think? Thatll be super-useful when its done, wont it?

    I couldnt help but sound a little full of myself in front of Hinata.

    Once thiswork wasplete, it was time to start transmitting entertainment and nurturing a nascent culture. There were so many dreams I had and a mountain of things left to doand if I wanted to get any of it done, I had to provide safe andfortable lives for my people.

    Somewhere along the line, the meeting hall had grown quiet. The pdins were frozen in ce, perhaps enraptured by my speech. My own officials, meanwhile, were practically smoldering with anticipation; listening to me inspired them more than ever before.

    Then Hinata rolled her eyes. Look, she muttered. That kind of information is normally kept confidential by governments, did you know that? I mean, matters rted tomunications, in particr You just dont go telling that to outsiders. Not that Imining, but

    Hmm. If you phrased it like that, then okay, maybe that was a mistake. Maybe I got carried away and said a little too much. Must have been the alcohol talking.

    But even considering the possibility was a mistake. The moment I thought Uh-oh, did I screw up? Raphael jumped to conclusions.

    Report. Resetting Cancel Ailments. This resistance cannot be adjusted for the time being.

    Wh-what?!

    But it was already toote. Even worse, a reset wasnt something you could do all the time. Whether I wanted it or not, the poison was being cleansed from my body. But booze isnt poison! I thought to no avail. My skills were just merciless.

    Of course, I suppose this happened because I still had a pounding headache from getting wildly drunk the day before. I cut a little too loose for my own good, and that was the cause of it. Maybe Id be more tight-lipped toward Hinata if I wasnt inebriated. Lets just call it my just deserts and move on.

    I nced at Hinata, just in time to see the jolly man next to herFritz, was it?steal a piece of top-grade beef from her te. Looks like Im not the only guy in this room who yed with alcohol a little too much.

    Now, now, whats the big deal, Lady Hinata? That just shows how much he trusts us! Oh hey, and if you arent eating that, Ill take the rest!

    I think he was a top officer in this force. He certainly robbed Hinatas te with lightning-fast dexterity, at least. Still, it must have taken a few drinky-drinks to decide it was worth the risk.

    The moment Fritz tossed the morsel into his mouth, I could see a vein throb in the vicinity of Hinatas temple. Her natural paleness made it all the more visible, although it wouldve been impossible to miss no matter what color her skin was.

    Fritz Were you looking to die today?

    Um? Lady Hinata, youre looking soserious

    Now Fritzs mind was perfectly clear, as he shot to his feet and attempted to run for it. But he couldnt escape Hinata, who promptlynded a chop on his jaw that instantly sent him to the floor with a concussion.

    Let this be a lesson on how to enjoy a drink responsibly.

    The next day:

    Back to our conversation yesterday, you realize that if you draw too much attention with all of that, the angels are going to attack you, right?

    Hinata blurted it out just before leaving, as if she had just thought of it. It wasnt really the kind of thing you could bring up at the drunken, festive feast we hadst night, but since we werent going to be strangers any longer, I suppose she thought it important to mention.

    Erald and Gazel mentioned those guys to me beforethe angelic army. Each one of these angels or whatever, ording to Hinata, was a B-plus threat, and they had a force that numbered a million strong, all ready to swarm me. It was quite a bit beyond what I pictured, and that was just the infantrythere were captains andmanders above them, with a full chain ofmand between. The generals in their forceyes, there were generalshad even tangled with demon lords, if you went far enough back in history. Their ability in battle was a question mark, but if they were a good match for a demon lord, they mustve been pretty strong.

    The angels targeted monsters and cities with advanced civilizations. Not even the Western Holy Church saw them as allies of humankindwhich made sense, given that their god, Luminus, was actually a demon lord.

    To me, Luminus told me, they are little more than annoying flies. I would love to do away with them all, but then everyone would know my identityand that lizards already betrayed me to the pdins, as you know.

    The pdins, by the way, had sworn to keep this revtion a secret. Hopefully, theyd be a bit more amodating with one anotherand mein the future.

    Yeah, Ive heard about these angels. If they are out to poke at me, Im ready to fight back.

    I had no intention of holding back, no. That angel force was free to think and do whatever they wanted, but if they thought they could force their will upon us, fending them off would be my only choice.

    Hinata chuckled at me. I thought you would say that. We might even be fighting on the same side, when the timees.

    That you may, and that we may, Luminus said. I have no intention of watching my city be destroyed a second timenot by those flies and not by that lizard. Rimuru, unless you enjoy having me as an enemy, I would rmend giving your lizard a strict education.

    This has been a very useful meeting, I thought as they departed. I think we could build a pretty friendly rtionship with Hinata and her forces, to say nothing of Luminus. The battle between us, Lubelius, and part of the Western Nations was over, and Id say every side walked away happy from it.

    Before long, and with next to no warning, Lubelius would give the Dwarven Kingdom more than tacit approval and officially recognize the nation as and of humans it could potentially be allies with. They also formally announced diplomatic rtions with the Jura-Tempest Federation, a nation of monstersone that included a nonaggression pact, albeit one with a time limit.

    Now, in one fell swoop, both demi-humans and monsters had been granted eptance by human minds. It was time to explore how to build our rtions from there.

 Volume 8 - Ch 2

    THE INVITEES

    You could try hiding it all you wanted, but it was doomed to spread. In short order, the rumors had reached the ears of leaders in the nations surrounding the Forest of Jura

    Hinata, the Saint, was defeated by Rimuru, the demon lord.

    The news came across several routes, delivered with careful precision, ensuring it would reach the people it was intended for. It sounded so eminently usible, and of course, someone was behind its spreadingbut in another moment, the word had traveled so far that nobody would ever know who.

    No matter how secret the Crusaders invasion was, there was no way to keep everyone in the dark forever. The reason was obvious: Tempest was now the center of attention, and to the nations that had rtions with it, they had to be constantly vignt about intelligence collection. The Crusaders deployment to Tempest was an open secret by this point, and that helped make this new rumor seem even more believable. And this news was interpreted in many different ways by many different people. Some feared the demon lord Rimuru. Some angrily dismissed Hinata as a feckless fraud. Others proceeded with caution, trying to decide how best to keep their homnds safe.

    But along with these flowing rumors, news was alsoing from official sources: Hinata, the Saint, and Rimuru, the demon lord, fought to a draw. The result of this: a truce between Lubelius and the Jura-Tempest Federation, along with the signing of a nonaggression treaty.

    Things were gettingplicatedand that wasnt the only problem giving world leaders headaches. Those very same leaders were receiving invitations from Rimuru himself, the demon lord at the core of this crisis.

    None of these nations were about to ept the Council of the Wests official announcement as the whole story. It would turn allmon sense on its headand alter the fabric of the world itself. Every leader could smell it in the air, and even if theycked the whole story, they knew that the pdins had suffered no casualties. That told them everything they needed to make a decision.

    And in the midst of all these wild, twisting motives, the Western Nations were about to experience earth-shattering change.

    In a corner of the Dwarven Kingdom, the Armed Nation of Dwargon, a group of ministers and top officials had settled down into a meeting.

    Ah, now hes done it. The dignified voice of Gazel Dwargo, the Heroic King of thend of dwarves, rumbled through the chamber.

    The kingdoms dark agents, theirwork of spies, had been busytely. Intelligence was flowing like a torrent, and their agents had to spend sleepless nights analyzing it all, deciphering recorded images and crafting dossiers from the finely mined details. Multiple copies of these reports were written out for the ministers, and with all the data involved, the number of pages in each one stacked upward and upward.

    It was grueling work, but it was still better than the situation a few months ago, back when that slime Rimuru became a demon lord and immediately pivoted into a duel with yman. The dark agents, the agency behind them, and Gazel and his officialsthey had all suffered terribly from ack of sleep. Compared with those days, this was a walk in the park.

    Hehheh-heh-heh. I find it hard to believe, but believe it I must. It would appear your sparring partner has defeated the Saint.

    You are being disrespectful, Vaughn, chided Dolph, the hardheaded captain of the Pegasus Knights. This is a public meeting hall, not your personal chamber. Remember where you speak!

    Vaughn shrugged and gave him anguid nod before turning a more vengeful eye toward the ministers and coughing once.

    Do not berate him too much, Dolph, King Gazel said. I am as surprised by this as anyone. I am sure Vaughn couldnt help butugh.

    The assembled members had no choice but to ept this. The news had shocked them all. Now was no time to go on about Vaughnsck of decorum.

    The reports in their handsid out all the details behind recent events, and it was a roller coaster of a read from start to finish. Over a hundred Crusaders, the strongest force among humankind, had staged a ndestine violent assault on the nation of monsters. Even Henriettas dark agents, the pride of Gazel, had only picked up the news the other dayor really, only found out once battle began. And if the dark agents knew, there was no doubting every other nations secret service did. Tempest, after all, was crawling with spies. Rimuru seemed to be aware of them, but essentially left them be, perhaps to better advertise his moves. Once full-borebat began, even the most amateur intelligence organization would know what was going on.

    In the end, the Crusaders lost. The demon lord Rimuru had wonand without killing a single one of them. The dark agents sadly failed to witness the battle for themselves, but that was the report they gave.

    But Your Majesty, Henrietta said, I saw it happen myself

    As she exined, she was around to see the fight eventually devolve into a one-on-one duel between Hinata and Rimuru. However, due to an onrush of out-of-control magicules, the dark agents were blocked from magically eavesdropping on the event.

    We also detected a powerful aura surrounding the area, and we believe that was the cause of this.

    So someone triggered a magicule storm powerful enough to block all monitoring magic?

    It was not a magicule storm, Lady Jaine, so much as a sh of opposed energy waves triggering a jamming signal.

    Hmm, mused Jaine, the elderly arch-wizard of the kingdom. So you didnt see how this duel ended yourselves? Why are you so sure Hinata lost?

    Hinata, all-powerful head of the Crusaders, required no introduction to Jaine. She had personal insights into the Saints strength, and she found it hard to believe Hinata tasted defeat.

    I can only offer circumstantial evidence in my defense, replied Henrietta. But after centuries of refusing to side with monsters, the Western Holy Church has overturned its own doctrine. Theyve even sent us word about opening official connections with us, the dwarves. The nation of Lubelius is also moving to establish rtions with Tempest. Word of this has been sent to governments worldwide, and we are now awaiting the official promation. These are drastic changes, and I believe they offer the clearest evidence yet that Hinata was defeated.

    Mmmm. Certainly, if those human-supremacist blockheads so quickly changed their tune like thatI suppose it means something must have forced their hand. But King Gazel, you know this means theres a greater chance than ever that the demon lord Rimuru has grown more powerful than you, do you not? Jaine seemed to find even asking the question painful.

    Hinata, the Saint, and Gazel, the Master of the Sword, were an even match, whether Gazel wanted to admit it or not. If Hinata just lost, simple logic dictated that Rimuru now outssed Gazel.

    Ridiculous!

    How dare you insult His Majesty, Lady Jaine!

    The ministers howled at Jaine, but she refused to budge. As far as she was concerned, the truth was the truth. And Gazel agreed.

    That much growth in the space of a few months? Vaughn casually asked. The question was greeted by a snort from the king. Its no longer a matter of growth, my good man! he thought.

    Even thest time they met, something about the demon lord Rimuru seemed strange. This wasnt some gushing geyser of pure force in front of himeverything was calm. He couldnt feel a thing. Gazels own powerthe unique skill Tyrant, which let him see through everything, even other peoples thoughtsgave him no insight at all into the creature. It meant Rimuru was able topletely restrain his force. Maybe he didnt know everything about the oue of the duel, but Hinata surviving the ordeal was an achievement in itself.

    It is likely so, he said, considering this. The evolution into demon lord means his powers now rival mine. Him defeating Hinata wouldnt be unusual at all.

    B-but, Your Majesty! You, the hero of generations, on an even keel with a monster born but a few years ago

    I agree wholeheartedly. Surely my liege must be mistaken?

    And even if it is so, wouldnt that make the demon lord Rimuru far too dangerous?

    The ministers were uproarious once more. Gazel sighed to himself. If that was how the logic went, Rimuru was far from the only threat.

    He looked down at his dossier. In it, the dark agents described how the officers under Rimuru fought against the Ten Great Saintsand ording to their report, not one of the monsters fell. Each one scored aplete victory, some of them even overwhelming several Saints at once. It was amazing news, and if it could be believed, there was no denying that Tempests overall ability to wage war surpassed Dwargons.

    The magically recorded video evidence from the battle was hazy at best, making it hard to discern much detail. That was a shame, given how these devices were the height of dwarven technologybut with the unstable magicules in the air, they failed to function properly. Only the visual images survived, the audio failed to be recorded, and the quality of this imagery made it impossible to analyze the subjects abilities. You could barely make out what was happening, as valuable an asset as this evidence was.

    Still, Gazel could make out a few familiar figures in the imagesthe magic-born he had spoken with before.

    Theyve grown stronger. Our full force may not be enough to defeat them now

    Some of the minsters were prattling on about the potential danger, others loudly disagreeing with them. They were both correct, most likely. Gazel tuned out the noise, pondering to himself. Maybe, he began to think, he should have wiped him out before he became this much of a threat.

    No. Rimuru was a monster with reason. He hoped for amicable rtions with human countries. The town he built, the people he saved, the nations hed connected with were all ample proof of that. If Rimuru was this unthinking brute who couldnt empathize with people, humankind would be exposed to unprecedented threats right now.

    But theres no need to worry about that. Heh-heh-heh He wouldnt ever think about wiping out humankind. Not Rimuru!

    Gazel was convinced of it. Rimuru killed the demon lord yman; he did not kill Hinata. That alone indicated to Gazel that Rimuru went out of his way to avoid antagonizing humankind. It was easy for him to drone out the ministers concerns withughter.

    Heh-heh-heh. No need to worry! I will remind you that Rimuru remains my erstwhile partner in the martial arts. It would also behoove you to remember that we have backed the nation of Tempest earlier than any other nation. From him, we have earned the most trust he has given anyone. Do you intend to do away with that trust and doubt his intentions?

    He red at the ministers, using some of his majesty to cow them into submission. It did the trick, restoring them to civility.

    Y-yes Think of it that way, and it would be foolish to abandon our trade with them

    Quite. The goods we take from them have immeasurable appeal. And weve even transferred recovery potion manufacturing to them.

    Whether in the form of technology exchange or anything else, a rtionship must be based on trust. Why is there any need for us to panic?

    Yes, no need to worry at this point

    They nced at each other and smiled somewhat sheepishly. Gazel grinned at them.

    To the Dwarven Kingdom, which valued fairness as a core t, being a demon lord was no reason for discrimination. All the ministers seemed to remember that now, and Gazel was d to see it. Yes, Rimuru had obtained astonishing strength, but looking back at past events, there was no doubting his trustworthiness as a person. They were still building a friendly rtionshipkeeping that going was the obvious choice.

    Besides, Rimuru said he was an otherworlder, bringing with him knowledge of others and the drive to bring it to life with his vast litany of skills. The fact that he was pushing all this development forward mainly to satisfy his own self-centered cravings for luxury was nothing short of fascinating.

    Plus, his followers always carried out his orders with a smile, no matter how oundish. Tempest and the Dwarven Kingdom were already connected with a highway, winding its way over mountains and through valleys and providing safe passage for anyone who used it. Rimurus monsters zed that trail, and all it took was an idea and a simple word or two from him. Things that otherworlders of the past abandoned as being too costly orbor-intensive were no obstacle to Rimuru. He had the core strength needed to brute-force it all to life.

    He had a drive, a drive backed by an army of loyal monsters. How envious I am, Gazel mused. No matter how difficult the problem, Rimuru could just offhandedly say Figure it out! Good luck! and his monsters would do their level best. They all assumed that was normal; none doubted him. Maybe it was that slimes most fearsome asset of allthat genius-level ability to trick people into doing his bidding.

    For better or for worse, this demon lord was an entertaining one.

    And perhaps hes been tricking me, too, this whole time

    But, Gazel reasoned, that was just fine. If Rimuru was pursuing the kind of world he saw as ideal, what would result from that? Gazel was keenly interested in finding out. He wanted to see it. Itd trigger a Temma War, a struggle between mortals and angels, and Rimuru knew that. But hed probably just fight back. Tempest had a terrifying military force backing it upperhaps terrifying enough to fend off a horde of angels. And Gazel was willing to cheer him on.

    The demon lord Rimuru and I may not be rted by blood, but we are brothers, he growled, his voice dominating the meeting hall. As long as he does not lose his heart for humanity, let us provide him with as much support as we canand let us wee a new era and the budding of a new civilization. If anyone objects to this, let them speak now.

    That was, in effect, the king of the dwarves announcing his decision.

    Vaughn, the admiral pdin on the force, smiled. Youve got me on your side, King Gazel. Youre the boss!

    My lord, stated the night assassin Henrietta, I will always serve as your shadow and follow every whim of your heart.

    Yes, do what you like. I am old, with little time left to live, but if myst few years may be happy ones, I will follow you as far as you may go, my lord.

    Jaine still looked pretty healthy, despite her words. This was just her way of saying that Gazel enjoyed her support no matter what happened.

    Finally, Dolph, leader of the Pegasus Knights, sighed and shook his head.

    If thats what you all have to say, I suppose Ill have to clean up the mess that results. Youll need someone to keep him in check, wont you?

    That was his role, most of the time, and Dolph didnt resent it.

    The heroes of dwarfdom were in unison, and a new policy was forged. But while nobody would defy their supreme leaders decision on the surface, some of the ministers were still of different minds. They would nheless offer their support, hiding their own intentions under the protective front of the administrators decisions.

    There was just one reason for that: As part of a nation leading the world in technology, something about budding new civilizations struck a chord with them. Toiling away at their research, making only piecemeal advances, offered no hope of major developments. This demon lord, meanwhile, was pushing the envelope and demonstrating zero fear of anyone stopping him. Vester, their former colleague, reported as much to them, and some in the room had started to envy the freedom the man enjoyed.

    How dare Sir Vester just leave and join that band! Unforgivable!

    Yes! Did you hear about the new barriers built on the highways to ward off monsters?

    And the lighting, too. I hear of newmunication devices under development as well.

    Potions werent enough for him, were they? I cant believe how jealouser, how outraged I am!

    It was starting to be clear where the ministers hearts and minds truly were. Gazel snickered, then cleared his throata signal for everyone to stay quiet. The ministers eyes focused on him.

    Our conclusion is clear. Our nation must trust in the demon lord Rimuru and walk forward in unison with him! Let us receive the fruits of theirbor, keeping the technology they develop for ourselves. Thus, if they ever are defeated by the heavenly army, that technology will never be lost! Such is the will of the Armed Nation of Dwargon!

    Nobody was ever going toin about that. King Gazel always prioritized his own nation above all else. The ministers bowed their heads at once, expressing their agreement.

    Heh-heh-heh Not letting go of the goods, huh? I appreciate how you arent couching it in rosy vocabry, at least.

    Vaughn was speakingor muttering, reallyfor most of the people in the hall.

    It wasnt long before the conference ended, with the final item on the itinerarythe eptance of Lubelius requesttreated almost as an afterthought. Now the bureaucracy would go to work, drafting up new treaties with both Lubelius and Tempest. It wouldnt happen overnight, but the three of them, plus the rest of the Western Nations, would all need to prepare together for the Temma War. There was no way of telling yet whether this was the right move, but at the very least, Gazel was content.

    Once things settled down a bit, one minister raised his hand.

    Your Majesty, a word?

    Gazel, preparing to leave the chamber, settled back in his seat and eyed him.

    My liege, we have received a letter of invitation from Sir Rigurd. It seems that Sir Rimuru is holding an event to officially mark his debut as demon lordand he seeks your attendance.

    His debut? What could that be about?

    The minister was just as in the dark as Gazel. He blinked helplessly a couple times, giving the other ministers enough time to raise yet another hue and cry.

    Just a front, Im sure. He no doubt bids you to be present so he can boast to the world about how friendly we are with him.

    I think that boat has long left port, good sir.

    Ah! Wait, I have heard of this! Vester sent word that the monster nation wishes to hold a grand festival to shore up its public image. He himself is serving as an adviser to their administration, and they are preparing quite a number of festivities for the asion.

    Vaughn gauged the ministers, a thoughtful look in his eyes. How interesting! I do recall how wonderful their amodations were. I was allowed to bask in a hot spring, the food was excellent, and the conduct of their servants impable. I knew Vester was training them, but inly he did his job well. And I can imagine how grandiose these festivities might be!

    He certainly sounded enthusiastic about it to Gazel. If the king turned down the invite, Vaughn seemed likely to go in his stead.

    Heh-heh-heh That sly fox. I dont know whats motivating him, but he just doesnt know how to settle down and lie back, does he?

    Gazel thought the demon lords aim was to gain the confidence of the Western Nations, but this new act seemed to defy exnation. Thats what made it so interesting to him. He found it difficult to stifle theughtering up his throat. Maintaining decorum around his ministers was such a stress at times.

    Curse you Setting just the sort of trap that would torment me the most Relentless!

    The irrational anger was enough to kill Gazels urge tough.

    What is your bidding, my liege? a minister ventured to ask the silent king. Sir Rigurd sends word that, while attending may pose some difficulty for you, if you are able to grace them with your presence, they will provide you treatment truly befitting a king. Simr invitations have apparently been sent to leaders around the world, and there are only a limited number of seats avable. He also warned us to reply as quickly as possible, as Tempest will be crowded on the dates of the event.

    It sounded polite enough, but it was no way to talk to the ruler of a great, powerful nation. The minister knew as much, fearing how his lord would respond as he spoke. But it was nothing that fazed Gazelif anything, it perplexed him that anyone thought it would. His Tyrant skill made it easy for him to read the minds of his ministers, so he smiled a bit as he attempted to correct them.

    Let us ept the invitation, then. I look forward to touring Tempest anew.

    My liege! No matter how friendly Sir Rimuru is with you, I seriously question the validity of this event. We do not know what manner of entertainment there might be, but surely they could prepare a seat for you any time they wanted!

    Indeed. And they did not specify how long the invite list was, but do they think the worlds great leaders have all the time in the world on their hands? No, they will not ept such a sudden request so readily.

    And Your Majesty personally traveling to the event presents some serious issues, if I may say so!

    The ministers werent in the wrong. But Gazel paid them no mind.

    I am not so sure about your concerns. If anything, this move shows supreme confidence on his part. You see, my minsters, you only know of him from the time he traveled to our gates. Now, as a demon lord, he is another creature entirely. This is the Rimuru so confidently holding this event, and it will no doubt be quite a fascinating one. Besides, I am sure many of us would like to explore the internal workings of Tempest, now that it has be a great military power. If they are sending out invitations, I have no doubts that many will be epted. Just as Vaughn said, the lodging provided is superb, and if they want to establish a guest list sooner rather thanter, it must surely be so they can provide the best service possible to their visitors.

    Very true, Vaughn agreed. He certainly did strike a bolder image as demon lord. Very few people indeed could get away with treating Sir Rimuru like a fool nowadays. And I cant help but wonder what sort of festival the monsters would want to hold. Whether representing our kingdom or not, I most certainly wish to participate.

    Vaughn had intended to be a part of this from the moment he heard of it, perhaps expecting to ask Vester for an invitation. Gazel certainly didnt want him to have all the fun. He knew full well the ministers would be dead set against their kings attendance, though, so he searched for a method to make them see things his way.

    Besides, I am Rimurus partner in battleand as such, I must guide him to ensure he is not being ridiculed by his own people. I must make it known to his neighbors that we of Dwargon are the first nation to make friends with Tempest.

    Some of the ministers began to understand Gazels true intentions.

    Ah Y-yes, yes! We have the closest ties of all to Sir Rimuru, and we should be sure other nations are aware of it.

    Agreed. I understand that those scoundrels in Thalion are attempting to butter him up, now that he is a demon lord.

    Now would be a good time to show His Majesty in close consort with Sir Rimuru. It would do wonders to keep our rivals in check.

    So far so good, thought Gazel. He opened his mouth a little, preparing to conclude this debate, when:

    I fail to see why we are even discussing this. We know full well that if we defy His Majesty, he will simply slip past our borders again. Instead of that, I feel it far safer for Dwargon to provide its full support to its leader.

    This was the chief elder of Dwargons senate chiding the ministers, a man who rarely participated in public debate. The time Gazel employed a body double to escape the kingdom undercover still grated at him, apparently.

    Oh, brother. Well, at least I can join in the festivities now

    This wasnt exactly the way Gazel meant to gain support, but it was good enough. It kind of put him off a little, but he was willing to ept it.

    Now, the Dwarven Kingdom was 100 percentmitted to the Tempest invite, no matter how bewildered the ministers were by it, and with that, more and more people in the hall began expressing their desire to join in.

    Before long, Gazel had quite another problem: How am I ever going to pare down the list of attendants joining me?

    On the grounds of the royal pce of Thalion was arge, impressively beautiful garden, expansive enough to house a variety of nts and creatures rare to find in the wild. This park was personally funded by the emperor, who enjoyed a vast fortune thanks to the many streams of revenue she enjoyed. A very small percentage of that ie was all it took to keep this masterpiece of natural beauty going. And not just the gardennothing in and around the pce was funded by tax revenue. That was how impossibly rich the head of the Sorcerous Dynasty was.

    Two people were currently rxing within these gardens. One was Archduke Erald Grimwald, father of the adventurer Elen and one of the nations most powerful officials. Facing him was the only person in Thalion who wielded more authority than heEmperor Elmesia El-Ru Thalion herself.

    On paper, the emperor was of ambiguous gender with beautiful features that were only vaguely feminineat least, that was the act she put on. In truth, Elmesia was female through and through.

    Her age, however, was unknown. She was among the most pure-blooded of elves, meaning her elven qualities were stronger than most; she simply didnt age. That made her a living witness to history, and asking how many years she had lived was a taboo. She looked elegant and noble, but she still hadnt lost her youthin fact, herpact frame could cause one to mistake her for a child. Her jade-green eyes were sharp and intelligent, and her vibrant skin was like a fresh coating of snow. Her long silver hair shone as it flowed down her head, brushing past the light redness of her cheeks, and her unique, pointed ears poked out from underneath.

    In short, she was the epitome of harmony in motiona high elf, one of the most supreme beings in thend.

    The archduke found himself smitten for a moment at this beauty but quickly regained his senses. His wife and daughter would be furious with him if he didnt. Clearing his throat, he turned to the exquisite wood-carved seat Elmesia was sitting on.

    Your Excellency, the nation of monsters I have reported to you about has sent me an invitation.

    Erald took a letter out from his pocket, presenting it to her. He had already checked it for traps or hidden poisons, and he knew what it read, but he did not say it out loud; he was fully aware of how the emperor disliked people telling her things before she could see them for herself.

    But he had his concerns. I truly never expected that slime would ever be recognized as a demon lord. But even if he haswhy would he call someone like me to this coronation of sorts?

    The letter Erald presented to the emperor was, in fact, addressed to him. There was no need to show it to Elmesia. But as the letter put it: Please reply if able to attend, providing the number of participants you wish to bring. He interpreted this to mean he could bring as many plus-ones as he felt like. But who should join him? That was the rub. Some bodyguards would be a must, but the archduke could hardly show up alone. Many of the nobles he had previously reported his travels to expressed keen interests in visiting for themselves.

    With Tempest bing a new trade partner, courtly circles across the Sorcerous Dynasty were alive with talk of this newnd. And the fascination was hardly exclusive to the nobility. When the emperor received the initial report of Eralds audience with the demon lord Rimuru, her eyes had been cold and focused as she gave her response:

    Hmm. So you went off to this fabulousnd all by yourself? Well, werent you fortunate, Erald. I imagine it was quite the exciting experience. And why did you leave me behind, hmm? Even naming yourself my representative and establishing ties with them, no less? If our business with them was that important, I would have liked to involve myself with it, wouldnt you agree?

    She had a point. But Erald came to Tempest on the pretense of rescuing his daughter, and what he found was a literal nation of monsters. He may have transferred his spirit into the body of a homunculus, but there was no telling what could have befallen him. There was no way he could have guaranteed Elmesias safety if he took her there.

    But the emperor gave him no quarter. If that is the charming sort of slime you met, I wish I could have seen him for myself. And meeting with a demon lord so soon after his birth? Why, Ive lived for many, many years, and not even I have been graced with that opportunity. And look at you, hogging it for yourself! Does the term abandonment mean anything to you? Imagine, being treated this way by my own people. What a pitiful leader I am

    She had continued in this vein for a bit longer before wrapping it up like so:

    Ive never been so enviousum, so offended in my life, I dont think. You, taking in all this exciteahhh, risking all this danger and going off by yourself. It is scandalous!

    Elmesias rebuke was really more whining than scolding. Most of her vassals only knew her unreadable mask and assumed the heart beneath was just as icy; she only showed this side of her personality to Archduke Erald and one other, although Erald took the brunt of it. If only they knew whats actually underneath, he always thought.

    However, thanks to the emperors pouting, the budget for this effort had been frozen, their ns to share technology with Tempest dyed for the time being. Erald wanted to soothe her hurt feelings about it all so they could get the ball rolling on the tech swap again. If he decided to join the festivities solo without informing Elmesia, hed most certainly be inviting her rage upon him. By that point, he feared, the frozen budget would be the least of his worries.

    This demon lord coronation was, in its own way, a show of force. It was devised to disy Rimurus strength as demon lord to the nations around him. They would be holding a festival in conjunction, along with assorted unspecified butrge-scale entertainment. There was no way the eternally bored Elmesia would pass up an opportunity to attend such an exciting-sounding event. Erald knew shed sniff it out, then interrogate him about not reporting it to her. The potential consequences for her wrath were beyond imagination.

    Thus, Erald opted to hide nothing and just show her the letter.

    Now she lifted her head, fresh from reading it. Erald sat up straight in his seat.

    So what do you intend to do with this? Elmesia asked.

    Do what, Your Excellency?

    He was buying time, but Erald knew what Elmesia meant. He knew, but he couldnt say it himself. If the emperor was going to join the festivities, this was now an official state visit, and that took the entire administration to prepare for. It was too significant a thing for Erald to suggest from his own lips. He wanted to be sure anything that came from this meeting was, first and foremost, the emperors idea.

    Mmm, ying dumb, are we? Do you know, Erald, of the sweet pastries we procured from that man Yoshidas bakery? Theyre far tastier than they used to be, arent they? Could you venture a guess as to why?

    Erald fell silent. This change of subject was unexpected.

    Or are you saying a strategic genius such as yourself is oblivious to the goings-on in the streets? What a disappointment.

    I apologize, Your Excellency. By Yoshida, you refer to the baker who runs the establishment in Englesia you enjoy so much? I believe the kingdom provides for his personal safety as an otherworlder, despite hisck of fighting skill. I was unaware that his work was distributed to Thalion, but how is that rted to Sir Rimurus invitation?

    If you didnt know something, better to be honest and ask. Maybe you cant get away from that if youre dealing with a stranger, but Erald was intimately familiar with the emperorshe even let him look at her unobscured face, a right granted to a tiny handful of people in Thalion.

    You truly im not to know, then? Ellwyn brought some samples back several years ago as a souvenir. I suppose she didnt see fit to give you any.

    She what?!

    The revtion that his own daughter declined to save any for him hurt harder than expected. Elmesia was clearly gratified to see this.

    All right. Seeing your expression is all I need. Let me tell you, then. Yoshida, it seems, has found a new source for his ingredients. Its allowed him to greatly expand the diversity of his wares, and the quality of his work has improved to match. In addition, in exchange for some mary support, hes been willing to send a supply of his goods to us.

    Erald was well aware of Kaoru Yoshida. Like his fellow otherworlders, hed been the subject of much investigation and eventually pinpointed in the capital city of Englesia where he was running a caf and sweet shop. He was said tock any special skills, although that was unconfirmed. His talents as a pastry chef, however, were undoubtedly top-of-the-line, enough so that he counted the grand master of the Free Guild as a grateful client. There were even rumors of Hinata, the Saint, sneaking in after closing hours to avoid attracting a crowd.

    Thus, Erald already knew him as a sessful tradesman, but Elmesia wasnt done speaking yet.

    So you know I invited Yoshida here once. Ellwyn, you see, brought along the most tremendous cake Ive ever had. I was hoping I could have him be the empires official dessert specialist. But he turned me down. No matter how much money I stacked on the table, Yoshida refused toe here

    The way she put it, Yoshida wasnt the kind of man who was moved by money. Instead, she made do with having a small selection of souvenirs purchased for her. Your Excellency, what are you doing?!! Erald resisted shouting the thought out loud. But she still wasnt done.

    Recently, Yoshida apparently sent word that hed be closing soon. Im not sure if hes moving or opening up another location But losing my dessert supply during his hiatus would be a nigh unbearable blow, wouldnt it?

    Not especially, no.

    Hmm. Thats what you have to say to me? Ellwyn is quite fond of that bakery, you know. If their wares remained easily obtainable, Im sure shed be d to ferry my orders back here.

    Wh-what?!

    Oh, yes. She alreadyes back here for our regr tea parties.

    This was monumental news. Erald thought his daughter hadnte near Thalion for years. Elmesias revtion was a heavy blow. He already knew the two bodyguards assigned to her werent exactly the most reliable agents out there, but he hadnt heard a word of this from the other observers he had hired to watch over her. He resolved to rake them over the coals about thister, but for now, he had to press Elmesia for more.

    This is grave news, is it not?!

    Oh, yes, it is! But Ive used some of my authorityand fundsto obtain some rather interesting information.

    What is it?

    Well, of all the ces, it turns out that this baker is seriously considering a move to the nation you visited, Tempest. So tell me, what were you doing over there?

    This actually jogged Eralds memory a bit. Every meal he had at Tempest was a delight; his daughter Elen practically wept tears of joy at first sight of their dessert selection. He even recalled her jumping up and down: Ah, Shunas perfectly re-created that new recipe! and the like.

    Ahhh Was that what she meant?! Erald cried as the pieces fell into ce.

    Elmesia sighed. Are you sure you still have all your marbles, Archduke?

    Erald wasnt so sure any longer. II am sorry, he apologized, and he was entirely sincere.

    Now he saw what the empress was displeased about. She suspected that Erald was hoarding all the sweets for himselfsomething he never wouldve done, even if it was for his daughters sake.

    Nothing is ever too good for your daughter, after all

    Now, at least, Eralds name had been cleared. Instead, Elmesia was now busy yelling at him about being totally oblivious to everything. Erald dutifully epted it.

    But, Your Excellency, how will we respond to Sir Rimuru?

    Elmesia gave herpanion a satisfied grin. Yeswell

    She was acting all stately about it but didnt seem too interested in giving an answer. It irked Erald, but he wasnt foolish enough to offer his own words. As stated, the emperor visiting a foreignnd was a national-level project. If Erald brought up the idea first, he could see himself being shouted down by criticism. People would get in his way; itd turn into a big mess.

    The Sorcerous Dynasty was established by the emperor Elmesia, its sorcerous sovereign, and the thirteen royal families and other rulers under her gave her their total loyalty. In general, each family was responsible for governing their own fiefdoms, while the imperial court ran on the taxes they provided. None of the royal families had their own standing armies; all of that was concentrated on the empire side. The emperor was Thalionsmander in chief, responsible for arbitrating across fiefdoms and nations. Erald was born into one of these thirteen families; his mother, Ellis Grimwald, was the matriarch who ran it. This Ellis was also the grandmother of Elmesia herselfthe only other person in Eralds life he was forced to submit to.

    Eralds elder brother, the father of Elmesia, had been killed in battle with monsters. It was an event that happened both before Thalions founding and well before Erald was even born. It made Elmesia his niece, even though she had lived far longer than himanother reason he owed her at least some respect.

    What about the other royal families besides Elliss? They were, to say the least, often very peculiar. Some holed up in their domains, refusing to take any part in imperial administration, while others took advantage of their posts to actively participate in internal politics. Elmesia never made any policy statements herself, so a number of local nobles struggled to gain power for themselves instead. As archduke, one of Eralds tasks was to keep an eye on people.

    That was why he had to be careful here. If this was just a pleasure trip, that was one thing, but many people would fault him for organizing a journey to a literal monster den. It could give them an excuse to strip him of his position. He personally doubted it, but some of the nobles might have even been scheming to eliminate the emperor from the picture entirely. To keep that from happening, he knew he had to be thoroughly prepared.

    Aw, you worry too much, Erald.

    Y-Your Excellency?!

    No matter what those little fish think, none could ever exact revenge against me.

    Elmesia was changed now. She looked, and felt, like a ruleran emperor with absolute power, one who never allowed rebellion even once in her life. As long-lived as she was, all the great kings and leaders of the worldeven Erald himselflooked like nothing but a street gang formed of children.

    Erald tensed up and nervously swallowed. He could speak frankly with her thanks to sharing a bloodline, but technically speaking, she was far, far above him. He wasuded as a champion of the people himself, but Elmesia was on a whole other level. It was impossible not to be nervous around her.

    That demon lord His name was Rimuru, yes? she said. We cannot let our guard down.

    How do you mean?

    She was stating the obvious. He was strong, obviously, and you couldnt discount the leadership he showed guiding his monsters. And there was never a demon lord who tried to build cooperative rtionships with the nations around them before. But Elmesia wasnt one to verbalize such an obvious pointhence why Erald asked for rification.

    Hee-hee This Rimuru; he rather easily epted our request to build a highway to Thalion, didnt he?

    Yes. He asked for rights to things like tolls and customs fees, but he epted the full construction job on his end.

    And theres the issue. Those rights could grant him an absolute fortune. Cant you see that looking at me, Erald?

    She was back to her usual casual self. Erald knew what she meant.

    Ah, those revenue sources?

    Erald, too, realized early on that Rimuru was aiming for exactly that. That was why he thought carefully before giving him those rights. But now Elmesia was giving him a supercilious chuckle.

    You have a lot to learn, still. Long-lived species like ourselves can n matters so we profit in the long term. You do realize that, do you not?

    Of course. I made my decision after judging the passage fees the demon lord Rimuru could charge versus the money it would take for us to build the highway.

    By his calctions, any tolls theyd pay would be far cheaper. Attempting to build a paved path through the Forest of Jura, as monsterden as it was, would require countless years and a massive budget. The Khusha Mountains at the forests border were ruled by the organized, warlike tengu. Working with them would be a slogand once you were done with them, there were hundreds of other monsters and magical beasts to deal with. Even discounting them, theplex geography posed a major problem. Itd require tunnels dug through mountains, bridges strung across canyons, and workers whod need round-the-clock protection the entire way. Itd be a century-long project, and while that wasnt out of the question for an empire with Thalions resources, it was doubtful theyd ever see a return on their investment.

    With all that in mind, Rimurus offer was music to Eralds ears.

    How naive of you, Elmesia said, shattering Eralds confidence. Certainly, crafting a highway in the forest is a daunting task. It has never been tried before because there was no benefit to it.

    She began guiding Erald through the issues involved.

    Just as he thought, there would be no profit from the project. It was rife with challenges, and there was no point to having a road through the forest anyway. But that was in the past. Before, the highway wouldve had to go all the way to the Dwarven Kingdomnow, all it had to do was reach Tempest, the new nation in the middle of the woods. Also, there was now a purpose to the highwaytrade. Working with the dwarves could have improved Thalions technology, but there were too many obstacles in the way to achieve that. Now, with Tempest on the scene, things had changed.

    The southern demon lord domains are ruled by Milim, alongside Carillon, the Beast Master, and Frey, the Sky Queen. With all the military might they boast, they are set to be dazzlingly prosperous. Beyond that, we have the Western Nations to the northwest and the Armed Nation of Dwargon to the north. This new nation, Tempest, is nestled right between them, is it not?

    It is, yes.

    Erald felt he understood what Elmesia was driving at. He still didnt see how that meant he had erred. Things change over time, after all. Thatnd had no value up to now, but as Elmesia pointed out, it now had boundless potential. Situated at a key location between multiple forces, it was bound to be a meeting point for all their culturesand it was destined to grow rapidly. That was what the demon lord Rimuru wanted, and this was why Eralddeftly realizing this ahead of the crowdwanted to firm up rtions with him. But building a road to this new nation, as he knew full well, was a high-cost, high-risk endeavor.

    I decided that instead of embarking on a project that would require military support to back it up, it was better to secure profits through payment of their usage fees.

    He was confident he did the right thing. But the response failed to wipe the smile off Elmesias face.

    You arent incorrect. We havent sustained any losses, and normally, I would congratte you on a job well done. Buuuut, he is just as long-lived as us. A demon lord, remember? And if you sign an agreement with no binding time limit, you need to think much more carefully about it than that. I give you eight points out of ten.

    ?!

    What we should have done is lend a hand in the construction effort. We should have selected personnel and built our own teams to handle the roadwork. They, meanwhile, could have focused solely on security. If we gave them at least a token effort at cooperation, that would have made our fee negotiations much easier.

    !!

    From now until the end of time, the demon lord Rimuru would hold all rights to the highway. And given theirck of cooperation at the beginning, these conditions would be frustratingly difficult to overturn. This was a demon lordany attempts to coerce him with force would be the height of folly. Elmesia was right, and Erald, with his single-minded focus on profits, was wrong.

    This is why I always use you of being stubborn, Erald. You may be smart enough to notice when the tides are changing, but you cant hold on to your preconceptions like this.

    Erald was forced to admit it: She was right. The construction work would be dangerous, but if he had considered thatpromise option, the costs wouldnt have been too high to consider. And bringing in people from Thalion could have led to the sharing of technical expertise, which would allow the empire to take in Tempestian know-how for itself.

    What have I done? I failed to read that far into it

    He could practically see Rimuru gloating in front of his face. But it was far toote to linger on the issue.

    So about my response to this invitation

    Elmesias face grew sterner. Erald sat up, nodding at her.

    Between the sweets shop and the highway, its clear Rimuru is well versed in human customs. Theres no doubting his status as a former otherworlder, but now he possesses the power and authority to utilize his knowledge and experience fully. Demon lord or not, he is truly extraordinary. Grand Master Yuuki Kagurazaka and Captain Hinata Sakaguchi, both disciples of the Hero Shizue Izawa, may hold considerable clout in the Western Nations, but neither is a match for Rimuru. If we want to be on good terms with him going forward, we cant afford not to attend this. We never had a choice from the beginning.

    That was the emperor Elmesias decision. Erald had no reason to disagree, although he still had his anxieties.

    I understand, Your Excellency. I will ensure no one impedes your participation. However, there is no guaranteeing your safety in thatnd. We must choose our attendees carefully.

    They knew Rimuru had engaged in armed conflict with the Crusaders not long ago. The battle, which ended overwhelmingly in Rimurus favor, reportedly featured far fewer casualties than what the world saw in Farmuss invasion. It showed how confident the monsters were in this fight, although some criticized the demon lord for going easy on his foes. For someone who knew the inside truth, it was enough to make you swear off attacking Tempest forever, but there were plenty of clueless people out there looking to test their strength. This wouldnt discourage them, and Erald was concerned Tempest would see more conflict going forward, not less.

    Its doubtful any of it will affect Rimuru himself, butw and order may fall apart in the forest soon. We can defend ourselves, but taking our sole emperor there?

    Elmesias decision was final, and it was his job to ept it. Itd involve a lot of hard work, but he needed to be sure they were ready for anything.

    Fine. Then let us deploy some empire-affiliated forces. Id like you to choose several from the Magus to guard me.

    The Magus were a group of high-ranking military officers called the Knights of Purity and vested with the full authority of the emperor. They acted as her mediators, and their ranks were open only to those who could trace their bloodline far back into nobility. The Magus were hailed as the strongest force in Thalionand yes, Erald was part of them. Now the emperor was asking him to deploy a group who was kept a strictly guarded secret from other nations. It was a job he approached with dead seriousness.

    Very well. I will send out the word at once.

    The visit to foreignnds was set in stone, with word quickly being reported across the empire. Soon, Archduke Erald would find it fiendishly difficult to get a decent nights sleep.

    In the headquarters of a tradingpany in the Kingdom of Blumund, Gard Mjllmile was starting to wonder if this constant stream of visitors would ever end.

    As a merchant who held sway over a litany ofmercial ventures, Mjllmile had a knack for urately judging people with a single nce. Some people came to him purely in search of money; others arrived seeking new business ventures. asionally, hed see nobles whod fallen on hard times, approaching him with all manner of fishy-sounding offers. He was sick of dealing with them all, but sometimes hed actually see people with real, concrete money-making ventures for him. That was why he refused to leave this job to someone else.

    These facts were on his mind as he shooed away yet another chatan and asked the next client toe in. This was a well-dressed man, but Mjllmile wasnt fooled. The fabric of his clothing was of decent quality, but the style was outdated. He couldnt afford a custom outfit in thetest fashion, so he was making do withst years model. No, this man wouldnt be worth his time. He was one of those hard-luck nobles, and he had already approached Mjllmile once before, attempting to palm off random junk as pricey antiques hed let him have for a song.

    Doubtlessly, he was here on another get-rich-quick schemebut still, he was of noble blood. Mjllmile had checked into him enough to know that for a fact, so he couldnt just show him the door on sight. That sort of behavior could lead to lse-majest, and then hed have to worry less about his financial ledgers and more about his life. It made the job tricky for him, to say the least.

    Ah, here we go again. The two of us, trying to outfox each other

    So Mjllmile heard him outand just as he thought, the story made him wish hed hidden under the table. This man (the Viscount Cazac was his name) was seeking a financial investment so he could use ves to open a shop for him. The merchant saw, to be brutally frank, no chance that it would ever seed. Employing attractive female ves wouldnt be nearly enough to make the business work. Cazac needed to thoroughly analyze the market, his client base, and his potential location, not to mention employee costs.

    Telling him all this, of course, was like exining calculus to a pig.

    Huhhh? Why cant you decide on a location for me? And you speak of employee costs? Now what sort of fool pays their ves?!

    The viscount wasnt interested in hearing any of Mjllmiles objections. Payment wasnt exactly what he meant, only that ves need food like anyone else. And clothing, and a ce to sleep. Not to mention the up-front costs for them would be far from trivial. If you wanted a ve attractive enough to catch the eye of most people, the money youd need to expend on the search could buy you a decent house. Itd be a far more effective use of funding to just hire part-time staff, much like Mjllmile did with the public-fronting stores he ran in Englesia.

    As he saw it, all beauties age over time, and thus it was too difficult to make back your investment on forcedbor in situations like that. If you were aiming for quick profits running a sexually themed establishment, you needed to be even more carefulying the foundations, or else your ce would be a hive of diseasewhich, again, would make both Cazac and Mjllmile criminals.

    The merchant sighed to himself. There was no way in this lifetime that hed ever ept such a hazardous proposal.

    Yes, indeed, my good viscount, you have a discerning eye. I must take my hat off to your wisdom. However, regarding the ves you mention, I fear it may be difficult to procure them at this time, would it not? Human trafficking is banned in this kingdom, and even if you turn to the illegal trade, I fear you may not find the quality you are looking for, you see.

    He tried his best to make his rejection sound as inoffensive as possible. It didnt work.

    Ahwell, about that. I actually have an in. Ill tell you about it, too, if youre willing to invest. But you know, I have to keep this discreet All Ill say for now is that theres a certain elf in the picture.

    The way Cazac never missed an opportunity to put on airs rankled Mjllmile, but he had the willpower to retain hisposure. A master merchant like him could never physically reveal his disdain for his customers. Anyone who did was below third-rate in this trade and incapable of ever pinning down arge-scale deal.

    But this elf-ve talk piqued Mjllmiles interest. If he was telling the truth, that was beyond a luxurymodity. But even before that, Mjllmile was a man with some influence in the underground, running a not-so-legal outfit and not afraid to engage in some dirty work now and again, albeit no more than he knew he could get away with. That was why he instructed his staff in this outfit to never stray past that one, final line in their work, even though he knew hed get off scot-free as their boss either way.

    Mjllmile knew full well just how dangerous elven ves were.

    An elf? Only serious organized crime would get mixed up in that!

    Elves were exceptionally long-lived. Many boasted mesmerizing beauty. They were intelligent, and most of them were well versed in magic. If an elf had been enved, it must have taken some extremely underhanded means. Enving an elven citizen of the kingdom was impossible So did they find one hiding in the forest, or?

    Mjllmile had an idea what this could be. He had heard about monster hunts, where rich people seeking exotic pets hired hunters to capture monsters in the forest. But if a demi-human had been snared by one of these huntersand an elf, no lessquite a few nations would never let that go by withoutment. The Dwarven Kingdom would immediately look into it, and the Sorcerous Dynasty of Thalion was even ruled by an elf. If word of this got out, itd be a huge controversy. This wasnt a small-time pickpocket or fraud; it was the kind of thing that could trigger an international standoff.

    If he was dealing with a noble with no qualms about sticking his hand into the fire like this There had to be something backing him up. Something huge, fearsome, and not afraid to kill for profit. Mjllmiles nose told him that getting involved would be dangerous.

    His mind raced, thinking of a good excuse to turn down Cazacs offer. He came up with nothing. But just as he was at his wits end:

    Yooooo! Mollie! Doing well?

    Someone opened the door and stepped right into their meeting, a beautiful young girl (or boy?) with golden eyes and silver hair that had a tinge of blue.

    Who are you, and how dare you interrupt my important business meeting?!

    As Cazac bellowed at the boy, Mjllmile realized who the intruder was, stunned. There was no way he could forget that face, the face of the champion whod saved his lifethe demon lord Rimuru himself. He knew this was the leader of that nation of monsters, and hearing he had be a demon lord shocked him to the core. But he really did it. He was part of the Octagram, recognized by his fellow demon lordsand for some reason, he seemed to take a liking to Mjllmile.

    Theyd often meet up, asionally working together on potential new business ventures. Recovery potion sales, for example. Mjllmile was still the exclusive vendor around here, and he was now earning stable profits from his work. Just as things settled down with that, Rimuru approached him about developing a new type of food, ramen, brought in from his own world. This was already on sale in a handful of restaurants, and the feedback was encouraging so far.

    Now, more recently, Rimuru had had him taste test something called a burger, talking about building a chain of restaurants specializing in their production and sale. Mjllmile had agreed to test the concept, and right now he was busy assembling and educating a staff, as well as finding a location and outfitting it with everything needed. He had wanted to report back to Rimuru about his progress, but his demon lord duties kept him fiendishly busy. It had been about a month since theyst spoke.

    Well, well! If it isnt Rimuru! I thought you said you were too caught up in this or that crisis toe visit?

    Mjllmile, surprised at this sudden appearance, couldnt help but ask. After all, Rimuru had a thundering horde of Crusaders to deal with at the moment. He even advised the merchant to avoid Tempest for a while, as itd be too dangerous for him. Fuze, guild master for the Kingdom of Blumund, was still cursing himself over his failure to stop Hinata, the Saint. So why was the lord himself here? All these thoughts immediately pushed Viscount Cazac out of Mjllmiles mind.

    Stop! Please, stop! The master is seeing another visitor!

    He could hear the voice of one of his servants, someone too new to know who Rimuru was. Upon catching sight of him, the servant stopped in his tracks and just stared at him, ck-jawed. It was a rather pathetic sight to seebut Mjllmile couldnt me him, since he himself might be doing the same if he didnt stop himself. It was fine if they were talking or scheming over something, but when Rimuru was his normal self, he was just so touchingly attractive, apletely different person.

    Rimuru, you said?

    Mjllmile ignored Cazac. Rimuru, finally noticing him, gave him an awkward look.

    Oh, sorry. I didnt know you were busy. Ill be waiting over at your manor, all right? See ya!

    The sound of Rimurus voice brought Mjllmile abruptly back to consciousness. He began to feel honest pity for Cazac, the viscount who told a demon lord How dare you to his face.

    If Rimuru wasnt so easygoing, I doubt the viscount would be breathing right now

    What you dont know cant hurt you, as they say, although Mjllmile wondered if he should make an exception at the moment.

    But Cazac spoke up again, his voice raised. Look, you little boyor girl? What are you, Mjllmiles mistress or the like? Do you realize youve both interrupted my meeting and listened in on confidential information? Do you understand the consequences of your indiscretion, hmm?

    Oh, by the gods, what is he saying?

    Mjllmile, seeing Cazac eye Rimuru up and down with lecherous intent, could feel his heart stop.

    Oh, I apologize about that, sir. Nobody stopped me from barging in, so Sorry.

    Rimuru was cheerfully apologetic. But Cazac was too high-handed to forgive him.

    Hmm You know, I like your face. Look, you could use a little instruction on how the world works, Id say. How would you like me to look after you?

    Great. And now this.

    Why do I have to deal with these utter fools, day in, day out?

    Mjllmile was beyond exasperated and well into the realm of anger. Life seemed too ridiculous to be worth it at the moment. He could handle the scorn of bush-league nobility. But treating Rimuru, a man he owed a life debt to, like some harlot was unforgivable. Cazacs behavior had crossed the line and then some.

    Yes, picking a fight with a noble would put Mjllmile at a disadvantage, in the eyes of thewbut did that mean he should just sit there and take it? No. He was willing to be modest with rabble like this because itd be a pain for him otherwise, but open hostility deserved to be treated in kind.

    The merchant steeled himself.

    Cazac, you are being rude to the individual who saved my life. Why does some viscount think he can get away with riling me?

    Wh-what?!

    There will be no more business between us. I dont want to see you in here begging me for anything again!

    H-how dare you! A merchant, rebelling against nobility Mjllmile, have you gone mad?!

    Hmph! Anyone willing to work with criminal groups and trigger cross-border crises is nothing but trouble to me. Youre liable to bring those kind to this city, too. Better to stamp out that pestilence before it can happen, Id say.

    M-Mjllmile! After all the favors Ive done for you Ill make sure you regret this!!

    With that, Cazac stormed out of the office, spotting the servants who hade in to see what the racket was about and figuring now was a good time to leave.

    Pfft. This child, thinking he rules the world

    Uh, Mollie? You sure youre okay with riling that guy?

    Rimuru, meanwhile, was as breezy as always. He really is like nothing on this world, Mjllmile thought as he rxed. Its just as I thought when I heard of his ascension. He never changes

    He then dismissed all the other potential clients in his waiting room. In this world, there were certain opportunities you couldnt afford to miss. He wasnt foolish enough to misread the truly important things. He was a capable merchant, and he understood the importance of finding diamonds in the rough. But he also knew that some things were vital enough to abandon everything else for.

    And really, he couldnt find it in himself to make Rimuru wait any longer. Not because Rimuru was a preferred, profit-making customer of his. He knew Rimuru helped him out in his time of greatest need, and he thus felt an obligation to never betray him. To him, there was no such thing as a job more important than dealing with Rimuru.

    Has hee up with another scheme? he thought, growing excited as he instructed his staff to handle all other pressing matters for him. But in just a few moments, Mjllmiles frustrating days of listening to endless strings of confident men and swindlers woulde to an end, marking the start of a new chapter in his life.

    Mjllmile guided me over to his manor. When his butler caught sight of us, he almost fell over himself bowing to greet me. Id been here several times before, so he must have recognized me. I keep telling him he doesnt have to do that, but ah well. Mjllmile, meanwhile, paid it no mind, smiling ear to ear as he gave instructions to his servants. I imagine hed provide the same tea and snacks he always did.

    Um, sorry, I said. I guess I kind of interrupted your work?

    Mjllmile chuckled. No, no, Rimuru. I had wanted to cut ties with that dunderhead for a while now. He kept barging into my office with all these outrageous schemes, using his noble title to bully me around

    He winced, then exined the whole story to me. So that freaky-looking dude back there was nobility? I could fully extinguish my aura at this point, so I didnt need a mask or anything when traveling to human towns. I broke the thing when I ascended anyway, but I still kept it in my pocket, unrepaired, for the memories.

    Thats why the guy mustve thought I was female, but I wasnt about to be upset about that. I knew how to read a situation and go with it, unlike Veldora and Shion, and I went easy on him because he acted pretty high-born. That was the right decision, I guessbut if Mjllmile wanted him out of his life anyway, maybe I shouldnt have bothered.

    But what if the nobles start getting hostile with you? Wouldnt that make life difficult?

    It would, but that man, Cazac, is nothing but a parasite. Today he came in saying he wanted to deal in ves. An elven one, even

    Elven?! I fired back, surprised. I saw a bunch of elves in that Dwarven Kingdom nightclub. Elen had some elven blood in her, too. They were treated as demi-human, not monsters, and very was likely ouwed around here.

    Uh, MollieI had taken to calling him that; Mjllmile was a mouthfulMollie, wouldnt that be a?

    A crime? Yes, very much so. He was asking me to be an aplice to a crime. And Ill admit, Im not exactly clean as a whistle, but not even I am brazen enough to enve an elf.

    Ah. Whatd happen if people found out?

    Good question. Cazac has his viscount title to fall back on. Blumunds a small kingdom, but that means the noble ss isnt that extensive. Even someone like him has a fair amount of clout.

    He was a viscount? No wonder he kept insulting me like that. That would put him above the Baron of Veryard, Fuzes friend, and I can see why itd be so much trouble for Mjllmile.

    You sure youre okay, then?

    Bahhh! They call me the King of the Dark City, you know. Dont worry about me. Ive got enough strength to look out for myself!

    The King of the Dark City? Did Blumund even have a city like that? Maybe he was referring to the poorer districts of this nation, but even that was heavenpared with the kind of ce Yohm grew up in. When it came tow and order, Blumund was on the rtively decent side. Id take his word for it, though.

    Uh, you really ought to be more careful than that. Ive got a big job I want your help with.

    Thats right. I had been in talks with him about all kinds of matters. If he picked a fight with some noble punk and it got out of hand, thatd be trouble for me.

    Wah-ha-ha! Its fine, its fine. When ites to good fortune, youll find none better than ol Mjllmile here! Look at the rtionship Ive built with you, for starters!

    Theres just no fazing him, is there? Thats what I like about him. But I couldnt afford to wait until after something happened. Maybe I should bring on a bodyguard or two for him, I thought as I watched himugh it off.

    So, Rimuru, what brings you here today?

    I recalled what we had to talk about.

    .........

    ......

    We were nning to hold a grand festival, attended by the monsters of the Forest of Jura and all the world leaders from the human realms. We called it the Tempest Founders Festival, and we had already picked the dates for it.

    With things patched up between Hinata and me, all my anxieties were gone. The date of Yohms coronation as king had also been decided, and we had sent word to all the neighboring countries to help that n along. Rigurd and his team were busy writing up invitations to the leaders we wanted there, but they werent the only ones in full work mode. News of the nationwide festival had riled up enthusiasm across all my domains monsters, and each of my administrations departments was formting ns to wow them during the event.

    Look at Shuna, for example. She intended tounch an entire lineup of new dishes to impress our guests, as well as open Tempests first caf, offering a variety of colorful cakes. Yoshida, whose caf in Englesia was now a favorite of mine, was assisting in the efforthe had once turned down every offer I sent him, but the moment he set eyes on Shuna, I could see him start to get fidgety.

    Be Before I opened this caf, I enjoyed the support of a great number of people. Id be happy to help you, too, but I cant really leave here

    I hope you will reconsider, Shuna said with a polite and elegant bow, one hand over the other. It was a little show-off-y but powerful enough to shake the heart of any man. I figured itd work well enough, but:

    Mmh Flirting wont work on me, you know. If you want to convince me, do it in the kitchen! If you can wow me with your culinary skills, I would be d to consider it.

    Thanks to Yoshida, this was now a cooking battle. Nothing worth worrying about for Shuna, though; anyone could recognize her cuisine was first-rate.

    Shuna, give him everything youve got! Make this cocky baker beg for mercy with something spectacr!

    Yes, my lord!

    Whoa, whos being cocky now?!

    I ignored Yoshidasining; Shuna was ready to go. Yoshidas own skills had lit a fire under her.

    With the caf kitchen left to her, Shuna began cooking up the dish nearest and dearest to her hearttamagoyaki, a rolled-up scrambled egg. Simple, yes, but ones ability to execute it perfectly was the ultimate way to test a chefs acumen. Yoshida eyed the results ced on a dish, then nervously swallowed before silently stabbing it with a fork and bringing it to his mouth.

    It Its amazing!

    A one-hit KO.

    Thank you very much, said Shuna, smilingand that smile was the final blow. Yoshida finally gave in, roundly defeated in heart and taste buds.

    Pfft. Well, you got me! But this is a special favor, all right?

    It was funny, watching this burly middle-aged guy act all shy around Shuna. He was practically falling over himself for this fetching young woman with light-pink hair. I think he was smitten from the very start, actually, but better not to say that. If he wanted to y it cool, itd be mean to stop him.

    So Shuna and Yoshida were now a pair in the kitchen. I had no doubts they and their work would be a star attraction at the festival.

    Next, we had Gabil. The dragonewt was working with Vester to build a presentation devoted to the history of healing potions. They intended to keep the core fundamentals of their research a trade secret, but they wanted to use this pavilion to recruit new people interested in joining their team. They had enough staff for now, they said, but just wanted to find potential hires with the kind of passion they wanted.

    Garm (eldest of the three dwarven brothers) and Kurobe nned to show off their own wares at the event. Their pavilion would be alongside Gabil and Vesters, and already they were talking aboutpeting to see who attracted therger crowds. d to see they were using this festival to have a little fun.

    Kaijin was also set to return the night before the bash. I told Geld to take a break during the event, so construction should bergelyplete before then. I informed my staff that our prisoners of war deserved a little celebration as well; theyd be enjoying a feast over in their own facility. A few people would have to work during the holiday, but we made sure to amodate their schedules so they could trade off days and not be stuck on duty the whole time. The festival would continue for about a week, so I wanted everyone to get in on the excitement.

    Come to think of it, Shion was nning something, too. She was very confident about it (Hee-hee-hee, I hope youre looking forward to it, Sir Rimuru), so I was half-excited, halfscared shitless. Thatand Veldora was rming me with his suggestions again. Better do something about that before he starts freaking people out

    Looking at all these people, I figured I should probably pitch in somehowwhich brings us to the involvement of my old friend Gard Mjllmile.

    .........

    ......

    A manor servant brought me some tea. I hade here many times before, so he was used to me and provided a couple of the cookies I liked. Taking a sip of the drink, I grinned. It was just as tasty as always, helping put my mind in a better ce. Time to move on to negotiations, then.

    Anyway, Mollie, Ive got another job for you. Dont worry; its an easy one this time, I promise.

    Oh, another bright idea of yours? You always bring such fascinating projects to the table, but they certainly require a lot ofstart-up work, to say the least.

    He grinned at me. Despite hisint, it was clear he was interested in what I had to offer him.

    My project to bring fast food to this worldburgers, the whole bitwas still underway. I had handed my outline of what needed to be done to Mjllmile, and he was in the midst of executing it. The n had been on the back burner for a while, what with Hinata marching on me and everything, but I wanted toe over and see how it was going, as well as talk about putting up a satellite location in Tempest in time for our festival.

    Hee-hee! Oh, dont be a stick in the mud, Mollie. You know our recent project? Before weunch in Blumund and Englesia, Id like you to maybe open up a test location in my nation first.

    Oh? You know, I actually appreciate that offer a great deal, because I was just thinking about where we should train our staff. But if youre proposing that, have you worked out your differences with the Crusaders?

    He looked a bit concerned. I must have left him too long without updates. Although I didnt intend for it to turn into a fight, we had certain Luminism doctrine issues to deal with. If we were going to continue dealing with the Western Nations, we couldnt afford to ignore the Holy Church issues. Now, however, that was all taken care of. We had nothing left to worry about.

    Hee-hee-hee Yeah, I worked them out, all right. Hinata and I made amends peacefully, and I also worked things out with Lu

    Lu?

    Lu Loose ends! We managed to set a few ground rules and tie up any loose ends, thats all. Everythings peachy keen now!

    Ahhh, I see! And here I thought the Western Holy Church was a much more intimidating group to work with. d to see theyre more reasonable than that. Maybe I was too worried for my own good!

    Mjllmile gave me a relieved smile. I politely smiled back, sweating on the inside about the mistake I just barely avoided making. If I had followed through there and said Luminuss name, thered be hell to paywhich I could deal with, but what if she decided to rub out Mjllmile as well? I was inviting both Luminus and Hinata and her Crusaders to the Founders Festival, so Id better not shoot my mouth off before thennot that I knew whether the demon lord would deign to grace my little event with her presence. Shed probably be like Why would I ever let myself be seen among the rabble? or something. Im sure shed be an incredibly demanding visitor if she showed, so I honestly didnt mind if she declined. Though, maybe I ought to encourage her to attend? I dont know.

    In that case, Mjllmile happily eximed as I thought about this, let me show you the results of our training so far!

    There was no point wondering about whether shede. I needed to consider my own program for now.

    Oh, has it been going well?

    Nothing less than perfect! Weve trained them to the point that everyone can perform their tasks on the same level.

    Ah, I knew you wouldnt let me down, Mjllmile!

    We grinned at each other. It sounded like making our debut at the fest wouldnt be an issue.

    So can we put up a storefront offering burgers, hot dogs, fries, and the drink lineup we talked about?

    That we can. And I think we can attract customers with those beef skewers dipped in the secret sauce you talked about. Pairing them with a rice bowl will definitely improve our bottom line.

    Its been getting good reviews?

    Mjllmile briskly nodded. Its be a low-key staff favorite, thats for sure.

    Making yakitori skewers out of cowdeer and chiducken seemed to satisfy people.

    Great! Lets add that to the menu, too. Do we have enough employees to work with?

    Well, for the moment, Im thinking we couldunch with upward of twenty locations. But starting that big would take a fair amount of money. Wed need backup personnel, which Im training right nowthats a necessary expense, the way I see it. So along those lines, if we can deploy more gradually, say five locations at a time, thatll put us well within budget.

    Thats Mjllmile for you. He fully understood my proposal, and already he was working out any staff issues involved. In that case:

    All right. Well, sorry to trouble you for this, but can you bring over around five of your best employees?

    Five? What did you want from them?

    Well, Ive got this friend of mine. His names Veldora.

    V-Veldora?!

    Yeah, and hes, like, superworked up about opening a hibachi booth at the fest.

    Er, is he?

    Mjllmile seemed to be growing visibly paler as I exined. It worried me, but I soldiered on.

    So you know, itd be way too dangerous to leave him running that by himself, right?

    II would say so, yes

    I beamed at him. So thats why I want five of your best staffers to help him!

    Mjllmile, watching me gleefully dump all the responsibility on him, turned his eyes toward the ceiling. Would you be able to guarantee theer, safety of this staff?

    Of course! Whenever they have any problems, they cane right to me. If Veldora starts getting all uppity, Ill put im in his ce.

    I trust you will, yes, but Um, we are talking about the Veldora, yes? The Storm Dragon?

    I suppose we were. Guess Mjllmile knew the name, didnt he?

    Is that bad?

    Ahhh Bad may not be the correct term. I just wonder if the crew will be, too, well, petrified to get any work done

    Hmm. I shouldve known. Yeah, if you havent met Veldora, you must think hes crazy scary, huh? Catastrophe-ss, and all that.

    Wellmaybe thats not a good idea, huh?

    No, perhaps not If he could at least assume another name for himself, temporarily, our staff could work for him unawares

    Aha!

    Yes! Brilliant, Mollie! Lets give him another name so nobody knows who he is!

    Huh? Youyou can do that?!

    Sure. If he whines about it, Ill just tell him he cant do the hibachi thing at all. Right, lets do that. And Ill pay a special bonus to the five people you pick for me, so let them know Im counting on em, okay?

    Whether Mjllmile was keeping up with me or not, I considered this problem as good as solved. Veldora was being as selfish as always, but we were entertaining world celebrities here. Embarrassment would be the least of our worries if he gave all our guests food poisoning or whatever, so I couldnt rest easy until I knew there were people who could watch over and direct him. I didnt want to dismiss him out of hand, but I was too nervous to let him off the leashpletely, so its a lucky thing Mjllmile had the staff trained like I asked him.

    He looked like he wanted to tell me something, but probably nothing important. The ball was in his court now.

    Rimuru looked supremely happy with himself at resolving this issue. Mjllmile, meanwhile, felt like someone had just thrown a lit bomb into hisp.

    L-Lord Veldora?! I knew the seal had been undone, but he wants me to deal with him?!

    This was a major headache in the making, for sure.

    Rimuru was talking sense at first. Building a stand for the festival would be a good training opportunity. But if they were babysitting Veldora as well, that was another story. Mjllmile wondered what the hell he had just gotten himself into, but as he observed the smiling, carefree Rimuru in front of him, he decided to take the Ah well approach. Ever since Rimuru saved him, he had tried to live life with no regrets. He mightve been conniving and obsessed with money, but he was nothing if not brave.

    But a festival, though, eh? If were talking arge-scale event, I imagine you must have people jumping up and down to join in. A good opportunity for a merchant like myself, hmm?

    He had reason to think so. Many people, merchants and adventurers in particr, were now filing in and out of Tempest. It was starting to get heavily advertised; Mjllmile was sure they were attracting curious travelers from the nearby towns and viges. That was exactly the kind of situation a merchant stood to profit from.

    Oh, youre interested? Rimuru took a sip from his tea, apparently picking up on Mjllmiles muttering. You know, to tell the truth, Im still wavering on a few things with this festival. I know youve helped us decide on some of our attractions already, but Im still trying to think of a big, shy centerpiece for the event.

    A centerpiece?

    Yeah. Basically, my n is to turn our town into a kind of health resort. Weve got our hot-spring infrastructure in ce, along with lodging and guest houses suitable for royaltybut I feel like were stillcking in entertainment.

    I see, Mjllmile replied, figuring it wouldnt hurt to hear him out.

    As the excited Rimuru then exined, Tempest already boasted a healthy amount of high-end amodation. Mjllmile had stayed in it before, so he knew that much. The rooms on offer ran the gamut, providing a selection of things to enjoya nice meal with a fine view of the gardens, an open-air hot spring to rx in, and so on. In the smaller nations of the world, itd be hard for even the nobility to maintain their own private baths. That went double if there wasnt any water service, forcing you to physically dump water in a tub and heat it up manually.

    To Mjllmile, who took that for granted, a facility with a hot spring you could enjoy any time you liked was nothing short of mind-blowingbut apparently Rimuru wasnt satisfied with just that.

    I understand all that, he said, but if you already have good food and rxing spaces, how much more of a resort do you need?

    Rimuru shook his head. You arent thinking big enough, Mjllmile. Me, I think that wont be enough on its own. Id like some kind of project that everyone can have a little more fun with. Like, for example

    What Rimuru thenid out for him was aplete recreational tourism strategy for the Forest of Jura. Theyd provide travelers with day-long walking tours deep into the forest, apanied by a guide/bodyguard. Theyd hold fishing tournaments at the nearby canyons, hunting tours amid untouched natural reserves, and so on and so on. All the needed equipment would be avable to rent for anyone interested.

    That does sound exciting. Itd certainly attract the kind of nobility with all the time in the world on their handsand for those with more active work lives, itd be a fine way to rx.

    Right, you see? Thats what Im hoping for, but Im just wondering if theres something we can get everybody in on, you know?

    One of Rimurus aims with the Founders Festival, it seemed, was to encourage repeat visitors to Tempest. He wasing up with all kinds of things to keep travelers engaged and interested in the area. Mjllmile was both amazed and exasperated. How many years ahead was he even thinking?

    Well, why not use Englesia as an example to imitate? The theater is quite popr over in their capital, I hear. They hold operas and stage ys nearly every day of the year there. You also see fighting tournaments held live at the arena

    Oooh! Oh, yes! Where the Hero Masayuki is, right? Isnt he really popr?

    He certainly is. Lightspeed Masayuki, as they call him. Hes dominated the tournaments for years. Im actually rather a fan of his.

    You are?!

    Even a hardened merchant like Mjllmile had his sports allegiances. He began giving an in-depth exnation of the tournament system to Rimuru, failing to notice how he began to yawn almost instantly.

    So really, nobodys seen a mans sword sh that way before. Hence the name Lightspeed, as you see. asionally, they hold to-the-death battles with captured monsters, but the Heros fightingpanions are pretty strong themselves. Ive been in the audience for some real white-knuckle matches myself. And if you had a spectacle like that Ah, but Im sorry. Ive been talking for far too long. Bute to think of it, isnt your staff pretty strong, too, Rimuru? Whos the strongest out of?

    Whoa! Stop right there! I cant let you go on, Mjllmile.

    It was obvious Mjllmiles interest would shift over to Benimaru and the rest of Rimurus officers, sooner orter. He had met Rigurd and the others several times, and to him, their muscles couldnt have been just for show. Between them and all the other powerful magic-born he saw around town, he couldnt help but wonder who was champion among them all. Now seemed like a good time to ask, but Rimurus reaction was chilly.

    Listen, Rimuru said, voice lowered. Between you and me, if you start talking like that around them, its gonna cause some serious disputes, you know? Theres this pdin named Arnaud, and he actually asked the same question back when we were all negotiating earlier. It led to the most insipid argument you ever sawthey were all trying to rank themselves on some impossible-to-understand scale, and it was starting to get pretty heated before I stepped in. I was lucky enough that only part of my staff was there, but seriously, better avoid topics like that. Its a real powder keg with those guys.

    The one official whod likely pitch the biggest fit of all about the question wasnt there, Rimuru said, so hed managed to talk everyone down from their fervor. Hed been trying to avoid such delicate questions ever since. If his main staff ever got into a real fight with one another, it could affect everything hed striven to build for his town, and he couldnt afford to risk that.

    I I see. My pardons, then.

    Thats okay. Just be careful around them. But I do like your point of view here

    Rimuru didnt seem overly concerned about the issue, unlike Mjllmile. Id say hes a little skewed, too, he thought as he waited for Rimuru to continue.

    There is one vacant section of town. Perhaps we could turn it into an opera house, huh? Maybe thatd encourage people to be ywrights, and thatd lead to some new forms of entertainment. And an arena, huh?

    He looked at Mjllmile, and the merchant could almost see the gears turning behind his smile. Great, he thought. Hes got some grandiose n in mind again. Why does he always have to look like that? Hes good-looking enough as long as he keeps his mouth shut

    Mollie!

    He shuddered. The moment hade. Y-yes?

    You know a lot about battle tournaments, right? Rimuru stood up and then sat next to Mjllmile, voice as ingratiating as possible as he practically whispered in his ear. How bout we hold one, then? Can you arrange that for me?

    N-now, wait just a minute! Thats a lot to put on my te out of

    We can build the arena for you. For now, I just need you to handle the show aspect!

    Mjllmiles objections fell on deaf ears. There was no point resisting him any longer.

    Theres just no beating you, is there, Rimuru? Every single time. All right. I promise Ill do my best for you!

    He showed a bit of a smile now. Honestly, Mjllmile didnt hate this. In fact, being assigned such a vital mission was like music to his ears. What did he need to put on a show like that? Hed have to both research it and put his thoughts into action. Never in his dreams did he ever think hed be entrusted with such arge-scale event.

    Well, Im in deep now! I Ill never get this chance again!

    He didnt even care if he messed this up. Based on all the business partners he ever had, he knew this man, Rimuru, wasnt the type to get angry over one failure or the other. He brought ideas into fruition fast, and he could be trustedthe most important thing to any merchant. If he said hed build an arena, hed build an arenaas unbelievable as it was to Mjllmile, he could give his monsters any orders he wanted, and theyd be able to pull it off for him.

    He may not look it too often, but Rimurus a demon lord. As long as his ns are sound, itd be simple for him to assemble everything he needed. And now hes relying on me

    Good to hear, Rimuru replied blithely as Mjllmiles emotions ran wild. And I know were trying to get lots of world leaders, but make sure regr people can join in the fun, too, okay? You cant make a profit if its not open to the general public, after all. I saw that in Englesia.

    The general public?

    Yeah. Im going to build a coliseum capable of holding fifty thousand people or so. Like I said, theres some vacant space to work with. If we build that fast-food stand we were talking about nearby, that ought to goose our profits, wont it? We could have people go around selling food, and besides, the more foot traffic passing by, the more customers well get, right? What do you think, Mollie?

    Rimuru was picturing entertainment for the massesand taking the masses money. A fifty-thousand-seat coliseum wouldpare to Englesias pretty favorablyin fact, itd be five times that arenas size. It showed how serious Rimuru was about this.

    You see, we can have some standing-room sections that well let people into at no charge. Meanwhile, we can direct rich people to the reserved seats and charge them appropriately. And then well have royal boxes for the nobility with more money than sense. Well also need seats for special guests and invitees and things. Id like you to figure out the ratios we need for all these seat types, if we want to make as much money as possible.

    Once again, he was leaving it all to Mjllmile with a smile. Not even Englesias arena allowed the farmer and citizen sses to watch arena events for free. Mjllmile could see the logic to it.

    I see I thought fifty thousand was too high a number to aim for, but if thats what youre picturing

    Right. Its important that we attract peoples interest with this stuff. And if we pack the standing-room sections, wont that make a reserved seat look more attractive if you can afford it?

    I bet it would. Better to reserve a spot instead of vying for space you dont know will be avable. Thatll naturally make the seats more valuable.

    This was apletely different approach from the arena in Englesias capital, which was chiefly a diversion for the upper sses. The aim here was to build buzz and pack as many people in as possible. It sounded deeplypelling to Mjllmile. If admission was free, farmers and fieldborers woulde over to see the show when work didnt upy themand when they spread the word about what they saw, thatd attract the middle sses from neighboring nations.

    Besides, having tens of thousands of visitors would no doubt fill up the inns along the highways to Tempestitd be kind of neat to build the fast food establishments Rimuru described at stops along the way. When they arrived, of course, theyd need somewhere to stay. And if it could help advertise their food, their lodging, their baths, and so on, the arena wouldnt even need to make a profit. The business all these fans would bring to town could more than make up for it.

    I gotta hand it to you, Rimuru. You had this all nned out from the start, didnt you?

    Huh?! Um, yeah, kind of? Of course, yes!

    You have enough hotel rooms for it, I think. The issue bes how to attract guests on a regr basis. Well need to think about boosting our profit marginster, but spreading the wordes first, I think. And thats what youre counting on me to help with?

    Y-yeah. Pretty much.

    I see, I see. You want me toe up with the kind of entertainment thatll bring people back again and again. Something thatll make them contemte another visit, even if this particr battle tournament turns a loss. If we do that, youll consider this a sess?

    Thats exactly what Im saying. Im impressed you understand me so well, Mollie. Youre the only man I can trust with this job!

    This jobfind ways to attract people to Tempest, using a battle tournament as baitexcited Mjllmile to the core. And really, Rimuru had all but worked it out by himself before throwing it in hisp. He had to resist the urge to shout out loud with excitement.

    Hehheh-heh This is just too much

    Hey, its best to leave things like this to a professional, right? Dont tell me you dont feel up to it, Mollie?

    Ha! Ha-ha-ha-ha-ha! How harsh of you. I never realized you had such a mean streak, Rimuru.

    Ha-ha-ha-ha! Right you are! But this is a piece of cake for you, isnt it?

    They bothughed loudly at each otherthen exchanged sly nces.

    You realize how much money is going to change hands here, hmm? Im sure you do.

    Heh-heh-heh-heh Not to worry. You have Mjllmile on your side, and ounting is my middle name. Just watchIm going to give you exactly the results you want!

    Im sure you will. Counting on you is the smartest thing Ive ever done.

    Rimuru was right. This tournament would take a lot of money. He honestly scared Mjllmile sometimes. He began to wonder just how far ahead he was thinking. The thought gave him vague fears, even as his mind filled with wild dreams.

    Now, along those lines, I think Ive stumbled upon a new way we can use your healing potions. That medicine can heal you as long as you are not killed instantly, yes? That means ourpetitors can fight with no small level of intensity, I assume. Plus, if a fighter is injured in one match and appears good as new in the next one, that would certainly make for some good advertising.

    Wha?!

    Oh, did you not think that far?

    N-no, um, I did. Its just that, you know, I wanted to see if your thoughts were any different from mine.

    Ah, I see! Yes, Im sure youve already considered that much, Rimuru, heh-heh-heh But Im not done yet!

    Mjllmile began toy out idea after idea for him. This turned into a volley of brainstorming andpliments on the ideas. One concept was advertising the healing potion at the tournament, then selling it on-site to adventurers. Another involved weapon and armor rentals and sales.

    Even Kurobes failures at the forge are pretty off the charts when ites to raw power. We cant sell those to just anyone, but he has a workshop full of apprentices these days. Offering their stuff shouldnt be an issue.

    They decided to give it a shot.

    Another idea thrown around was state-run betting operations. This also existed in Englesia, where even simple pick em bets wereting huge amounts of revenue at the arena. They could do the same thing pitting warriors against captured monsterswhich had its risks, of course, but Rimuru had a small army of powerful fighters at this point, so it wasnt nearly the hazard Mjllmile pictured. Maybe they could even offer training courses for beginner adventurers, reserving part of the arenas space as a dojo of sorts. The lessons would be paid, of course, but theyde with qualified instructors to guide newbies through the basics.

    The ideas came rolling one after the other from Mjllmile. As long as Rimuru was providing his full support, he felt like hed never run out of them. He couldnt stop thinking about how huge his role was, dreaming up possibilities and being responsible for making them happen. It was a bit daunting, but far more than that, exciting.

    Ill do it, he said with a shiver. Ill do it all for you! My merchants soul is telling me were going to make a massive pile of money on this!

    Excellent! I love that confidence of yours, Mollie! And I know you got what it takes to give me the kind of revenue I want!

    Rimurus praise embarrassed Mjllmile a bit. But he wasnt done yet.

    Also, um, if youre interested, of course, if this whole tournament turns out well, you wannae live in my town? I could make a trade department for youor maybe a PR firm or general financial office. It doesnt matter what we call it, actually, but I could let you run it all. I got a pretty big poption to govern these days, and once the tournaments over, I think its high time we reorganize our administration. Im sure everyone will agree to it, as long as you can pull this off. What dyou think?

    Rimuru sounded like he didnt doubt Mjllmile at all. It made his heart dance. The question What dyou think? plucked his heartstrings like a master harpist, and the melodies echoed over and over through his mind like a concert hall.

    He gave him a strong nod. Theres just no beating you, Rimuru. Or should I start calling you Sir Rimuru? I promise you, Sir Rimuru, Ill do whatever it takes to seed and join your team!

    There wasnt a moments hesitation. How could there ever be? This man has counted on me so far, he thought. I cant let myself mess this up!

    As advanced as he was in age, Mjllmile was now captive to the burning fires of excitement and hope and dreams in his heart. He could barely stay seated. He wished he could bottle this feeling up in a jar and keep it nearby forever.

    You dont have to exaggerate. Rimuruughed, but the more they got into details, the more Mjllmile felt like he was going to jump out of his skin. Pulling this event off, and bing Rimurus trusted associate, was his new ambition in life, and he was ready to fight tooth and nail to make it happen.

    Once Rimuru left, Mjllmile called over his retainers and servants.

    What did Sir Rimuru want from you, Sir Mjllmile? asked Bydd, the former C-level adventurer who was now the merchants personal bodyguard.

    Bydd, Mjllmile replied with an ted nod, things are about to get very busy.

    Oh, did he give you another impossible task? I like all the ideas he has, but I wish he understood how much he puts you through the wringer, huh?

    Heughed, but he didnt really mean it. Just like Mjllmile, Bydd owed Rimuru his life. He was one of the demon lords greatest fans, and while he described it as a wringer, Bydd probably enjoyed the wringing more than anyone else.

    Mjllmile chuckled back at him. Bydd, this is gonna be nothing like youve ever seen before. Everything Ive done up to now was like selling pencils on the street cornerpared with whatsing. Ill be wagering my destiny on this one.

    He already looked like a mob boss, but Mjllmiles smile only added to his foreboding presence. His retainers were used to it, but none could hide their surprise upon hearing this deration.

    What dyou mean by that, Boss? his chief butler asked. His boss gave him a quick recaprunning a battle tournament alongside the Founders Festival, together with a test run of their uing fast-food concept. The festival itself would be a show of force for the newly ascended Rimuru, an effort all of Tempest was pitching in for, and the scope of it was likely beyond even Mjllmiles imagination. His excitement at receiving such a vital assignment was in as he exined to the staff.

    Thus, Ive decided, he concluded, that I want to be part of Rimurus team. No matter what, I have to make sure this is a huge sess!

    His servants began to chatter among themselves. Mjllmile, it seemed, had no intention of returning to Blumund. It caused quite a stir.

    Heh-heh You aint nning on going alone, are you, Sir Mjllmile? Maybe Im just some punk off the street, but Im still your bodyguard. The gang I got under me practically worships Sir Rimuru. Take me along with ya!

    You wouldnt be able to guard so much as a flea over there.

    Aw,e on!

    But if you would like to assist me in other ways, I suppose I could bring you alone.

    Sure thing, Boss! Ill do anything for you! I aint exactly intelligent, but I got street smarts, you know.

    Bydd likely did, given his swindler past, although it left Mjllmile less than convinced.

    Bahhh, all right. The more the merrier, I suppose! And I bet that gang of yours could provide at least a little security, if they know theyll get a meal out of it. Lets take em along. Now, he continued, turning toward his retainers, what about you? Youre free to continue using this manor if you like.

    Let us join you, sir! they said in near unison. There was no hesitation among them; after all, Mjllmile had trained them. Nothing was keeping them in this nation.

    It was decidedand now, the real work began. As a full-fledged citizen of Blumund and member of the Free Guild, Mjllmile had the freedom to travel to other nations. But as a man who believed in fast action once he made a decision, he felt a duty to the business he had remaining in town. There was no need for anxiety about the future.

    You, he said, pointing out one of his most talented employees. Youve proven yourself qualified enough. Dyou think you could run things here for me?

    S-Sir?! This is so sudden

    Well, I mean I appreciate that youd like to join me, but think about it. Well be startingpletely from scratch in Sir Rimurus domain. Im nning to be a big sess and win over his trust, but I dont want you to run that gauntlet, too.

    This was a cover story. In truth, he didnt want to sell this manor and lose his base of operations in Blumund. Ideally, a few of his people would remain here, keeping the lights on whenever his work brought him back.

    The leader he picked, a man named Bach, was brought here by his father, a rtive of Mjllmiles whod asked him to train his son in the business. He proved quick-witted enough to live up to his end of the bargain; however, Bachs family had faced difficulty after his fathers business failed, leaving him with nowhere to return to, so Mjllmile decided to formally hire him as head clerk. At the moment, that family was living off Bachs ie, and Mjllmile felt too guilty about having him go off on this risky venture. He had noint about his work; no doubt the business would work fine under his watchful eye.

    B-Boss I couldnt be happier to receive this offer from you. But I hoped that we could perhaps join you

    Bach, no doubt, was too young to readily ept this. He was reluctant to go fully independent yet; perhaps he thought he still had things to prove to Mjllmile. It was cute of him, but Mjllmile didnt like it. If Bach wanted to stand out on his own, he had to be let out in the wild sooner orter. This was a golden opportunity.

    Bach, I am not your father. Im offering you a position running this business, but Im not giving it to you. Listen: Even after I leave here, you better not do anything that puts this business on the rocks, all right? In fact, once youre able, Id like to see you buy this outfit out from under me! So make it a big sess and bring your parents back here someday, all right?

    He gave him an affectionate smile and patted him on the shoulder. It was a tender moment, even if he still intended to work out a contract with Bach and keep a piece of the proceeds. He was a merchant, asionally a hard taskmaster, but never a phnthropist. Besides, he reasoned, if he cant even pay me for my share of the business, hed never have what it takes to seed in the first ce.

    Thank you, Bach said, choking up a bit, thank you I promise you that Ill make a man out of myself and repay this favor!

    I hope you do, replied Mjllmile, smiling ear to ear.

    Now he went to work, choosing who to bring and who to keep behind.

    If you ever have any problems, he advised Bach, tell me about them, and Ill help. But I believe in all of you. I know youll do just fine. Dont disappoint me!

    The group remaining in Blumund all nodded at him. Mjllmile had trained them thoroughly; none of them would fall out of line. Even if they were dealing with high nobility, he was sure theyd never do anything ill-advised.

    Youve taught them all well. Rest assured they will not let you down! Bach said in return.

    Well said. Also, while Im sure youre aware of this

    Do not worry, sir. I promise we will maintain the sales markets youve built up here. If you ever need ess to them, well give you first priority.

    Good. I hope you will!

    Just in case, Mjllmile wanted to be sure he got first dibs on any goods he might need. He always kept an eye on every facet of the situation, and Bach was in perfect sync with his thoughts.

    Hes still a little green, but hes starting to look the part, at least

    Now he was sure Bach wouldnt let him down.

    Thest of his affairs were now squared away, and it was time for Mjllmile to make the journey to Tempest with his retainers in tow.

    Leaving Mjllmiles house, I breathed a sigh of relief. So d he said yes to that. He seemed ready to take the invite, too, so I should be expecting him shortly.

    One thing I couldnt say about my monsters is that any of them were good on financial matters. I was having Shuna handle the ount books for us, but she couldnt do that forever. A vige is one thing, but a full-fledged nation is another; Shuna would be in over her head. Lilina in the management department and Vester from the Dwarven Kingdom were helping, but Im not sure even that would be enough.

    Thats why Mjllmile came to mind. His brain revolved around money in ways few people ever experienced, he had connections with nobility, and he was running businesses in multiple countries. It seemed a waste for him to remain a merchant forever; I was sure hed be a great help to me. Besides, we had a good working rtionship. If he could handle finances for us, maybe hed allow me a little more spending money to work with. I had been running a few side hustles with him before, but now I could picture that extra ie ballooning.

    I mean, our treasurys pretty well-endowed, you know? But taking money out of it for myself, despite not paying any sry to my staff, seemed kind of low. Everyone always said Oh, its all yours, Sir Rimuru, but that just made me all the more reluctant. It felt wrong, and I wanted that money to help with expanding our nation.

    Still, I needed some of it. I wanted to take people like Gobta out at night every now and then, even if I didnt have much interest in it. Veldora was whining at me about that, too, and you know how you go through cash pretty quick at nightclubsnot that I had much interest, that is. (No, really.)

    But while it was a drop in the bucket for our treasury, if it was my personal money, Im sure Gobta and Veldora would burn through it like it was nothing. Plus, Shuna usually provides me with money, but if I tell her where Im going, she snaps that wallet shut, and I cant really tell her its my money then, so

    This was why I was running a few side jobs for extra spending cash. And with my future expansion, I had a feeling money wouldnt be a worry for much longer.

    That battle tournament was a pretty neat idea, too. Mjllmile is such a talented guy. I wasnt sure how he would take it, but he demonstrated some real enthusiasm as we brainstormed the n. It barely took him a moment to suggest running a tournament to attract visitors, then take advantage of the crowds to sell potions and equipment. Hes got a forward-looking eye and a knack for great ideas, thats for sure.

    Once I get back, Ill need to get ourselves an arena to work with. Geld was busy with urban-nning work over in the Beast Kingdom, and Mildo was supporting him. Without our two main building specialists, Id have to oversee the operation. But thats fine. After running all these construction projects, one after the other, we were starting to build a well-trained staff, enough so that I was mostly giving orders and not doing much else. I knew about this craftsman named Gobkyuu, who worked under the tutge of Mildo, and he was involved with town architecture enough that I thought an impressive circr arena would be in his wheelhouse.

    The job would normally take a decade or so, Id imagine, but if you run the job with monster muscle, I thought we could cut that down a lotlike, down to maybe the two months or so we had until the festival. Even I had to admit that was far too little time to get everything done, so for now, I at least wanted the central fighting stage to bepleted.

    But how would we design it?

    Understood. From my masters memories, I have found the Colosseum of Rome. Building blueprints using it as a base Completed.

    Well, that was easy. I had some paper on hand, so I drew up the ns, adding my own style to it. This alone would normally take several monthssurveying the site, calcting soil strength, that kind of thing. You could often spend a whole year on that kind of preliminary stuff. And here I was, drawing up blueprints thatd normally take several days at aputer on our equivalent of a cocktail napkin Raphaels support helped a lot even with detailed work like this. It honestly felt unfair to me, but I had no ns to give it up, so

    Now I had my ns. Next Id have to discuss them with Gobkyuu But before that, while I was here in Blumund, I may as well stop at the Free Guild. I could forward the ns over to Gobkyuu in the meantime; once I was free, I could assemble a team of craftsmen on-site to get down to business.

    Ranga, you there?

    Here, my master!

    He popped his head out from my shadow. With things settled over in Farmus, everyone except Diablo was back home, with Ranga lurking in my shadow like it was his personal den. I gave him the arena blueprints I had just whipped up.

    Take these to a craftsman in town named Gobkyuu. And can you tell him well meet up at the west gate once Im free?

    Very well. But are you not returning, Sir Rimuru?

    No. I wanna see Fuze first, while Im here.

    Will you not need a bodyguard?

    He looked a bit nervous, tail down. But I wasnt concerned. I am a demon lord, and I had Absolute Defense activated. If I ran into an attack that could prate that barrier, I wouldnt be safe anywhere in this world.

    Ill be fine! Well just chat a bit, and then Ill head back. But I should be concerned about Mjllmile, huh? Hes gotten kind of tangled up with this one bottom-feeder noble, and theres no telling what the fallout from that is gonna be like.

    Ah, that vulgar man from before? Would you like me to snuff him out?

    Please, no. Doing that in a foreign city is how you trigger a diplomatic crisis.

    You know, I think youve been hanging out with Shion too long. Youre getting too aggressive for your own good. I think you need to learn some moremon sense.

    II do?!

    Ranga looked shocked. He must not have realized it.

    Look, are you really sticking to what I told you back at thest fight? You werent going too far, were you?

    II would never do that, my master!

    He looked uncertain, and I was starting to get suspicious. Gobta and Gabil, I recalled, would only say things like Oh, uh, he was fine! and Y-yes, having Sir Ranga at our side was a tremendous boon! when I asked for a report. It sounded fishy, but I never followed up on it. It just seemed like an invitation for further headaches, and I was leaving that to Diablo anyway. If he had noint, I just assumed all was well.

    Maybe I was just kicking the issue down the roadbut ah well. If there really was a problem, I wouldve heard about it. Better trust in Ranga for now and make sure Shion doesnt poison his mind any further.

    I patted Ranga on the neck. Um, Ranga, buddy? Seriously, dont do anything crazy, okay?

    I wouldnt dare, he replied, solemnly nodding.

    Good. Now go ry that message, okay? And if anyones free on our security team, Id like them to guard Mjllmile for me. Check on that, could you?

    Yes, Master!

    He disappeared back into my shadow.

    So now Mjllmile was under guard, albeit behind the scenes so he didnt pick up on it. I didnt know who woulde to guard him, but there werent that many people on the security staff Id trust with solo duty. The new guys were out of the question, so itd have to be at least a seasoned sergeant-ss officer. Here, sergeant refers to a sort of team leader, the head of the groups of five that the force usually operated in. They were usually around a B rank in adventurer pance, more than qualified enough for bodyguard duty.

    I could personally keep tabs on Mjllmiles whereabouts once he was in my town, but in the meantime, if something happened to him over here, Id find out immediately. Thus, I felt safe in saying hello to Fuze for a little bit.

    So I headed into the Free Guilds headquarters in Blumund. Last time I was here, I made more of a ssh than I meant to, so I was worried about a repeatbut despite a few threatening res, I made it to the reception counter without a peep. I was wearing that mask the previous time, wasnt I? Maybe nobody recognized me. But hey, if they wouldnt let me see Fuze, I could just leave an invitation letter for him and head back home.

    Hey-yo, Im Rimuru, but can you take me to see Guild Master Fuze? Oh, heres my ID.

    I burped the card out of my Stomach and handed it to the woman at the counter. That little girls an adventurer?! I heard someone exim behind me, but no matter. I was used to it.

    Thedy remembered me, at least. Ah yes, Rimuru! Its good to see you here again. How have you been?

    Mm? Oh, great, great! Youre looking quite well, yourself

    I sure am! And I see youve passed the examination over at HQ and made it to B-plus, huh? Well done! You have my respect!

    Oh yeah, I did, didnt I? I really wanted to score an A, but I got kind of busy, so

    Or really, it was too much of a pain in the ass to bother. Being ranked B or higher gave you a lot of perks, but it also came with more responsibilities. B-plus was enough drudgery to deal with, so I figured I could earn my promotion only when I really needed to. Not like it was a sried position or anything. Like a volunteer fireman, Id be tapped for duty whenever certain kinds of danger came along. In exchange, I got easier admission into foreign countries, as well as free food and boarding at Guild branches. I appreciated the perks, sure, but I didnt really like being forced to do anything.

    But why rain on peoples parade?

    Oh, Im sure youd pass with flying colors, Rimuru! Ill be cheering you on!

    You think? Well, thank you! Ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha

    I sure cant resist a youngdy looking at me with those sparkling eyes, no At least, not until she drops a bomb on me.

    By the way, Rimuru, it must be annoying to share a name with a demon lord, isnt it? If you like, you could take advantage of our Renaming System to change your name in the Guild archives, if you find its causing you trouble. Thatll let you conduct Guild activity in areas where your face isnt well-known yet, albeit at one rank grade below your current one. What do you think?

    Oh, crap, I forgot! Here I am, a demon lord, and I went and put that same damn name on all my paperwork! And now that Rimuru Tempest, the Newbie in the Octagram, was a household name around the world, I guess being Rimuru the adventurer would present a few issues. Time to retire from the Guild, maybe? If I really needed to work as an adventurer, I guess I could consider that Renaming System. Itd be starting at the B rank, but thats good enough for me. Pretty helpful system, there.

    Thanks for telling me about that! Ill keep that in mind. Now, do you think I might be able to see the guild master?

    Right away. And yes, feel free to ask anytime!

    It took a little conversation, but she let me right in. I could hear shouts of Are you kidding me?! and Who the hell is that girl?! among the rabble behind me, as well asmentary from a few people who mustve seen me herest time.

    Oh, no way! I never knew she was so cute?!

    Unbelievable Thats the face of a person who swatted down a Lesser Demon like a mosquito?

    And she had the same name as that demon lord, huh?

    You think it might actually be him?

    Ha! What are you, stupid?

    Ha-ha-ha-ha! Yeah, yeah

    Sounds like more rumors would be spreading soon. Although, maybe I had less to worry about than I thought. Sharing a name didnt seem to arouse too much undue suspicion. Maybe the name Rimuru wasnt that umon after all.

    So I breezed into Fuzes office. The first thing he did upon seeing me was bring a hand to his temple. I ignored it.

    Hellooooo! Im back to pay a visit! Something up? Why the long face?

    Well, things were pretty slow for a while, until this demon lord came out from nowhere

    Whoa, really? Sounds like bad news. You sure you should be chilling out in here?

    Im talking about the demon lord here in front of me. So what is it this time?

    Oh? Well, you better feed that demon lord some tea, shouldnt you? I think hed enjoy a little bit of cake, too.

    Cake?! You think I can pull that kind of luxury out from under my hat?! I swear, whys a demon lord like you just gallivanting around without a care in the world?

    Fuze poured out some tea as heined. He was diligent like that. I thanked him and took the cup, sipping from it before we got down to business.

    So Im sorry about everything that happened, Sir Rimuru. I tried putting pressure on the Western Holy Church, but it didnt work too well, and then the Crusaders got deployed

    Nah, I doubt you couldve done anything to stop them. There was this band called the Seven Days Clergy masterminding the whole thing.

    Wha?!

    Yeah, thats probably why Hinata never listened to me when I tried pleading my case.

    The Seven Days? That legion of great heroes, tasked with protecting humankind?

    Apparently, yeah. They snared her, too, butalls well that ends well. We worked out all the misunderstandings, I think. But there was one casualty, unfortunatelyamander named Garde is missing in action.

    Garde of Fire, Fuze muttered with a frown. Hes one of the Ten Great Saints, the protectors of humankind. Quite gifted with a spear and me-based spirit magic, albeit not as gifted as Shizu was

    I didnt know Garde personally, apart from how he was after the Clergy got to him. I couldnt say anything about his personality, but apparently he was a well-known name, at least. Someone as well-connected as Fuze would certainly know him. I described him as missing, but killed, I suppose, was much more likely. Hopefully hes in a better ce now. I felt bad for him.

    Moving on, I gave Fuze a recap of recent eventsincluding the Walpurgis Council, since I knew he was concerned about that. There were now eight demon lords united under the name of the Octagram, and I covered all of that, along with my conflict with Hinata and the fall of Seven Days. I made sure, of course, to blur the true identity of LuminusI had a reputation for bbing when I shouldnt, but I wasnt dumb enough to let that vital a secret out.

    I see You know, no matter how much we tried to make contact with them, they always just tly denied us. The Churchs Blumund branch was a nonstarter, so I sent someone over to their headquarters, and they still said we couldnt meet with anyone at the level of minister or above I had no idea the Clergy was behind all this.

    Yeah, Hinata said the same thing. The only thing uniting them, as she put it, was Luum, the god Luminus. Their faith, you know; that was the real thing.

    Humans are inherently weak, after all. They cling to the godsand their strength.

    Would you include yourself in that, Fuze?

    Ha-ha! No, not me. When my strength fails me, Im prepared to call it a life, so to speak. Id hope for a miracle, of course, but I cant pray to a god Ive never even met before.

    Sounded like Fuze leaned toward atheism. Of course, this was a world where a real-life monster with superhuman powers could get worshipped as a god by the locals. They, at least, you could meet up with and see for yourself. That mustve made them seem more reliable. Even Luminus only offered protection to the people she knew, at first, and she didnt figure in Fuzes life at all. He just relied on himself insteada little self-serving but certainly easier toe to grips with.

    Yeah, well, I can certainly understand why people want to pray to a higher power. But in life, you get what youre dealt, you know? Anyway, regardless of what Luminus may or may not bless us with, the Church and I are even now, and thats all I need.

    Knowing Luminus personally taught me just how meaningless praying to her wasbut not much point saying that. Sometimes prayer really can give a person strength. It wasnt for me toment on.

    Fuze smiled. Very true. Its a load off my shoulders as well.

    I got the feeling he was depressed about failing to stop the Church after I asked him to put the screws to them a bit. I just appreciated him looking out for me.

    We chatted for a while more over past events before I stood up, recalling something.

    Anyway, I better get going soon, but I want you to take this.

    I removed an envelope from my pocket and handed it to Fuze. It contained an invitation to the Founders Festival I was nning; we had gotten so caught up in conversation I had almost forgot about it. This was why I came here today, after all.

    Whats that?

    Well, Im gonna be holding my demon lord coronation soon, and I figured itd be a good opportunity to advertise my town to the world. Were calling it the Founders Festival, and the way I picture it, its gonna be a huge st. Were sending invites to all the royalty and nobility in the region, and Id love for you to attend, too.

    Huhhh?! Wait a minute, Sir Rimuru. What would inviting someone like me aplish?

    No, no, its no big deal! I have an invite here for the king of Blumund, too. Can you make sure he gets it?

    Well, couldnt you give it to him directlyhmm? Maybe not, eh?

    Nah. I gave the dwarven king and Archduke Erald their invites personally, but I dont have many contacts in the other nations. I smiled. Ive met your king once, but I dont think a demon lord would be invited to his throne room, would he?

    Its distressing enough for a demon lord to be in Blumund at all. Fuze snickered back. But thank you for this. Ill be sure this reaches the king.

    My errand was now done, and I was about to depart but was stopped at the door. Oh, right! I needed to mention that the grand master was concerned about you. Negotiating with the Western Holy Church was a huge headache for him, so Ill be sure to say youve worked things out.

    Yuuki was worried? A lot had happened since west met. I was starting to miss him.

    Ah yeah. I must have put a lot on his te.

    Oh, not really. The Guild has no interest in making an enemy out of the Church, after all. If you were able to settle your differences without a fight, we couldnt ask for anything more.

    That was nice to hear. But I still felt like I owed the Guild something.

    I know! I think Ill invite Yuuki, too. You think hed mind?

    Hmm, hard to say. Not that I can speak for him, but he is a busy man. Im not sure if he can make the time for it or not.

    Well, I can give him an escort to and from the event, so Im sure he can attend at least one day, you know? If not, I can stop by to see him sometime soon. So give him this for me

    As Fuze watched, I wrote out a letter to him and included it in the envelope with the invites. Fuze winced at me a little as he epted it.

    Sir Rimuru, where did you get that paper from? Actually, on second thought, dont tell me. Cant you magically send it to him yourself? Ill do it, but

    He looked tired. Maybe I was asking one too many casual favors.

    Ha-ha-ha! Sorry about that. Thanks.

    Sure thing, Sir Rimuru.

    Oh, and Milimsing, too.

    I felt it best to be just as casual with that bombshell as he took the envelope.

    Milim? Oh no

    Okay, see you there!

    With a smile, I half ran out from the office while he shouted after me: Wait! You dont mean that Milim, do you? Heeeeey!!

    Lets just pretend I didnt hear.

    As I escaped from the Guild building, a man leaped out from behind a corner at me, taking a respectful knee.

    I, Gobemon, am here at your summons, Sir Rimuru!

    This man was one of the hobgoblins I named. Pretty ambitious guy. I think Rigur told me he and Gobta were fighting for the vice captain spot back when he was running our vige forces. He had the strength to back that drive, of course

    Hmm? Hey, werent you a lieutenant? You went to another unit after Gobta started captaining the goblin riders, didnt you?

    A lieutenant, in Tempests armies, was an officer who could be assigned a unit to lead if needed. They didnt necessarily have one to lead, which meant that captains were naturally above them, but it was still a much higher rank than the sergeants leading teams of five to ten people.

    Yes, my lord. I was never one to serve below others, you see, so I thought I would work as an individual for now. Someday soon, Id like to assemble my own directmand and lead a unit myself.

    Hmm. Sounds like hes got some real backbone. He gave up his chance at vice captain of the goblin riders because he didnt want to serve under Gobta, after all, so he mustve had some pretty high aspirations.

    Do you? Well, keep up the good work. Now listen, Mjllmiles someone very important to me. I need you to keep him safewithout letting him notice, if possible. I think you could learn a lot from the way he sways peoples minds. His financial acumens enough to move the folks around him, but its not just that. Think of it as a case study while youre guarding him.

    Yes sir! I will keep that in mind as I execute my duty!

    Gobemon was up for it. The way Benimaru described him, he tended to rely too much on his own abilities, downying the strengths of the people below or alongside him. Thats one reason he failed to reach captain, despite being much more physically gifted than Gobta. If he could learn to be more of a team yer, that captains job could be his before long. I hoped he could grow into the rank.

    If you can carry this out and learn something from it, report back to me afterward. Ill give you this katana of mine as a reward.

    Kurobe had contacted me earlier to report that my personal sword wasplete. I wouldnt need this one any longer. It was just a temporary weapon, but it was synced up with my aura well enough that I liked the results I got from it. I brought it in for maintenance after the Hinata battle, but Kurobe was pretty impressed by what he saw. I figured it was a nice enough carrot to dangle.

    Gobemons eyes opened wide with excitement. Y-you will?!

    Sure. I think youre gifted enough to make use of this. But stay diligent, all right? Prove to me you deserve it.

    Yes sir! I will live up to your expectations!

    He immediately went into Mjllmile guard-duty mode. That was almost too sly of me, offering that sword to him, but hopefully I got my point across. You had to earn the trust of your subordinates. Like how people used to think about obligation and duty, if you didnt look out for and provide service to each other, it would wreck the whole master-servant rtionship. I know Im not exactly a ster example of the ideal boss, but still, I hoped Gobemon would answer my call in his own way.

    I had now distributed all my invitations. Now we just had to prep for the big day. It needed to be a festival like none before. As I thought over everything we needed for it, I could already feel my heart racing.

 Volume 8 - Ch 3

    THE PREPARATIONS

    In a hastily prepared meeting room, two suspicious-looking people sat quietly. Or not exactlyupon closer inspection, there was also a third, smaller figure, a foot or so tall, with dragonfly-like wings on her back. The two other people in the room were seated facing herRamiris and two of her servants, Beretta and Treyni.

    The small pixie bashed a fist against the small desk in front of her.

    This is exactly why I thought none of this was working! she groused, rubbing her hand. I told you we needed to move outta here!!

    Correct as always, Lady Ramiris, Treyni agreed, watching her affectionately. Truly, a most brilliant idea!

    Right? Isnt it, though?

    Ramiris gave Treyni a satisfied nod.

    Beretta was less than convinced. One moment, please. Brilliant though the idea may be, where do you intend to move to? And could you exin why?

    Why do I have to do this? he thought. Treyni, his colleague, was a thoughtful, detail-oriented, hardworking woman. She had a good reputation among the spirits, allowing her to manage Ramirissbyrinth all by herself. That was something Beretta couldnt do, and there was no doubting her usefulness to Ramiris. But there was an issue: Treyni, ever the loyal servant to Ramiris, spoiled her far too much. She agreed with everything Ramiris said, never doubting it for a moment. Someone needed to stop this before it led to trouble.

    The ex-demon Beretta couldnt help butugh at himself a little. Oh dear I am not here serving Lady Ramiris because I want to serve that role

    To someone like him, who did enjoy Ramirisspany very much, getting bossed around all the time wasnt a concern. What did concern himalbeit only slightlywas how his lone coworker here was an unabashed yes-man. Unfortunately, it was an irond rule of life that the hardest-working people tended to be the ones who lost out in the end. If you blow the whistle and warn about the dangers ahead, its usually your job to clean up the mess that resultssomething Beretta was about to learn the hard way.

    Great question, Beretta! Listen, arent you bored being in here at all? Theres nothing to do for fun in this ce. The only diversion we have is building golems, and thats about it. Barely anyone evenes to visit us! But over there, theyve got all kinds of stuff. So I figure, you know, Ill just invite myself over!

    Ramiris put forth what she mustve thought was a convincing case. It just made Beretta sigh inside. He wasnt dead set against it himself, but he remembered what the demon lord Rimuru was like and suspected getting his permission would be a problem. If she tried moving there now, he could easily envision her getting thrown out on her ear. Treyni must have known that, but all she had to offer was her unequivocal agreement.

    But, Lady Ramiris, didnt Sir Rimuru already turn you down once?

    Beretta had to say it. She had already tried it. Without a better excuse, all shed do was incur Rimurus wrath. Maybe Ramiris was oblivious to this fact, but to Beretta, that was the biggest problem of all.

    Come now, Beretta, his unreliable coworker said. Youre overthinking this! Sir Rimuru is such a nice young man. Hed never be cruel enough to deny the dreams of someone as cute n lovable as her!

    Treyni was being far too optimistic. If Ramiris wasnt involved, Treyni was a capable woman of action, but there was no counting on her now. So since the other two people in the room werent using their brains, he tried to find a good way to navigate this. After all, he wouldnt mind living alongside Rimuru, either.

    I suppose thats why I find even a situation as ridiculous as this exciting

    And it was a lucky thing he had a mask on, because under it was a smile almost childish in its glee.

    After I saw Gobemon go, I headed back to Tempest. I had been using Dominate Space to travel as ofte, which allowed me to instantly transport myself to anywhere I had visited before. It consumed a nontrivial amount of magicules, but it was fairly trivial for me considering the energy I had to work with. I was free to use it as much as I wanted now, which made travel pretty simplealthough I still tried to regte my use, since Id look some if I abused it and went into sleep mode as a result.

    The moment I was back, Ranga sent me a Thought Communication.

    (Master, Gobkyuu and the craftsmen have gathered at the western gate. However)

    He didnt finish the sentence. What happened? Concerned, I headed for the gate, using Dominate Space despite promising myself toy off a moment ago. Activating Universal Detect to gain a broader vantage point than what my eyes could give me, I spotted Ranga at the siteand if my destination was within sight, Dominate Space made it easy to rush over. Just a matter of changing my coordinates, really. Really convenient, but kind of hard to use in battle, since it takes a little time to set off. Im always scared of leaving myself open like that. Besides, Im trying to conserve it, remember?

    This, on the other hand, was an emergency, so I reappeared right next to Ranga. We were outside the west gate, and immediately I spotted Gobkyuu arguing with someone. Universal Detect already told me who it was.

    No, you see, like I just said, were officially taking over this ce!

    Oh no

    I took cover, listening in on the conversation.

    I know what you said, maam, but we cant really ept that, do you understand? Im going to ask Sir Rimuru now, so if you could just wait here and keep quiet for a little while

    No! Weve already abandoned our previousbyrinth toe here! Are you going to kick out a poor, homeless woman with no ce else to go?

    N-no maam, I This area is officially the territory of the demon lord Rimuru, you see, so you will need to obtain his permission first

    Pfft! Cant sob story my way in, eh? In that case, Ill have to resort to force. If you keep nitpicking every little thing, you know Beretta here isnt gonna take that lying down Ahhh!

    I couldnt stand any more of it, so I sneaked up to the problem child in front of me and captured her in my hands. Taking a look at her, I confirmed it was Ramiris.

    What are you doing?

    Um Hey there, Rimuru! Hows it going?

    She was avoiding eye contact, clearly understanding she was in big trouble. Whatever she was up to, the small hut behind us clearly had to do with it. Ramiris was iming the structure as her territoryshe had to be hiding something inside. But how did she even bring it over here?

    Lady Ramiris! Ive brought over some new wood!

    The riddle was solved by Treyni,ing over with an armload of wooden beams.

    Um, Treyni, whatre you up to?

    Ah! Um, Sir Rimuru! I trust all iswell?

    She froze the moment she saw me. Did it not ur to her that building a hut right in front of the town gate might get spotted pretty fast?

    Can I ask whats going on, Treyni?

    W-well, this Its not what it looks like. L-Lady Ramiris did nothing wrong, um

    The Treyni I knew always had this air of authority. Serving Ramiris hadpletely torn that apart. Like master, like servant, I guess. The only person here who could guide me through matters was likely Beretta, who was currently kneeling before me.

    Beretta, exin.

    It always has to be me, doesnt it?

    Resigned to his fate, he relented.

    It all began, he said, with something Ramiris told him.

    Beretta, you traitor!! Ramiris shouted, freed from the prison of my hands, but I ignored her.

    ording to Beretta, Ramiris absolutely insisted on moving to my town, with Treyni in full agreement. I nced at Treyni; she was staring into space and looking supremely awkward. Apparently, she spoiled Ramiris at all times, which I could see from thest time we met, so I believed it. Neither she nor Beretta would dare defy thisdy, so they were all but forced into this would-be invasion of mynd.

    And also, as Lady Ramiris stated, we came here after sealing off the entryway to thebyrinth we called home before.

    Right! Exactly! Soe on! If you kick us out, well be homeless, Rimuruuuuu!

    She tried to sound as forlorn as possible, despite this being entirely her own doing. Oh, poor, poor Lady Ramiris, I heard Treyniment. Please dont keep encouraging her

    Either way, though, now I knew the situation. This wasnt Gobkyuus fault at allit was all on Ramiris and her servants.

    Sorry you went through that, Gobkyuu.

    No, no, we were fine, but the gate guards had the worst of it

    He eyed a nearby hobgoblin by the gate, sleeping soundly.

    Um.

    Yeahhh, uh, sorry. I got a little excited

    That wasnt Lady Ramiriss fault! That guard was saying terrible things to her, so I used magic to put him to sleep for a little while.

    What had gotten into Treynis mind anyway? She really did cast a spell, I presume for Ramiriss sake. No wonder Beretta looked so guilty at the moment.

    I would listen to Ramiriss and Treynis excusester. I wanted to learn more from Beretta, but he didnt have much else to offer. They showed up here, Treyni brought in wood, and Beretta fashioned it into the log hut before me. Apparently, they had been interrupted just as he began work on a terrace in front of the door. This hut was meant to be the entrance to a newbyrinth.

    It certainly wasnt the first time Ramiris had demonstrated a desire to move here. This hutwhich served as an entrance to her full residencewas all the real estate she really needed.

    Okay. So you tried building it here, and the gate guard stopped you. He was getting in your way, so youmanded Treyni to put him to sleep, and then Gobkyuu and these other craftsmen spotted you. Do I have this right?

    Um No, thats not Well, not exactly the case, I dont think Maybe?

    Okay, so I do. Ramiris

    Um Ha-ha-ha-ha

    Ramiris must not know the meaning of the word no. She knew this was my territory, as recognized by the other demon lords, and that what she did was tantamount to staging an invasion. If war broke out over this, shed have nothing to whine about.

    But I paused a moment to think it over. Having this hut presented to me gave me an idea. Perhaps I should encourage this. Maybe give her permission to make abyrinth here, even.

    My conversation with Mjllmile shed before my eyes. We needed attractions thatd keep visitorsing again and again. These could be theaters, arenas, health spas, you name it, but I was still fishing around for other ideas. Do the same thing enough times, and youre bound to get bored. We wouldnt hold daily arena battlesI figured the tournaments would be more seasonal, maybe four a year. We could hold beginner-level matches daily, like with horse racing, but I didnt see that attracting the connoisseurs among the nobility. Wed mainly be appealing to mass audiencesor maybe the adventurers stopping by.

    If this town turned into the trade ma I was nning, waves of merchants would be visiting, with adventurers serving as bodyguards. I wanted Tempest to turn into a base of operations for people like that. Adventurers could make money in assorted ways, one being monster hunting. Perhaps we could build abyrinth for them and release some monsters inside? Would that attract a decent amount of daily traffic? Abyrinth is a dungeon, after all; if we invited people to help clear it out, that might attract adventurers with apletist bent.

    This could work.

    I looked at Ramiris, still smiling awkwardly up at me. I wasnt too sureokay, I waspletely sure I couldnt trust her, but maybe we could make something out of this. It was time to talk things over.

    First, I asked Gobkyuus craftsmen to dismantle the hut for me. Since we already had the materials and everything, I decided to have it relocated for use as a break room for the gate guards.

    Next, it was time for a strategic conference. We filed into the usual meeting hall, Gobkyuu in tow.

    Um, what is going to be the, er, happening to us?

    Ramiriss anxiety was making her less and less coherent. Her eyes were fixed on me now, gauging my temper.

    You dont have to be so nervous. If youre trying to be polite, youre failing miserably.

    I didnt intend to do anything to her, no. If she was willing to ept my offer, I was willing to overlook her excessively bold overtures. But before that, we had to go over a few things.

    Gobkyuu, I was thinking we could build an emergency shelter space under the arena. Is that possible?

    Im not sure itd be safe to have one directly under the arena stage, no matter how we try to work out the structural calctions. Any empty space under the floor would cause a cave-in at the first shock wave. But if we move this space a little, I think we can avoid that problem.

    All right. Id also like to have a door built down there.

    ?!

    A door, sir?

    Right. Make it thick and heavyand maybe put a bunch of carved stone tablets around the frame and stuff. It needs to look foreboding.

    Would there be another shelter beyond the door?

    Nah. No need for that. We just need the door, is all. Right, Ramiris?

    R-Rimuru?! Are, are you saying thatthat?

    Gobkyuu was questioning my sanity, while Ramiris buzzed happily in the air next to him.

    My proposal was simple. Basically, I wanted to have Ramiris build a dungeon and let her manage it. If she was gonna build an entrance in a simple wood hut, better to give her something that looked more the part instead, right? And given how all good dungeons extend deep underground, having it beneath a battle arena just seemed right to me. We could use the arena to train rookies during the off days, and I nned to have a potion shop on the premises. If we ran a dungeon on-site as well, I bet a tavern for adventurers looking for a quick pint on the way back from work would be a big hit. Wed make money off them, and Ramiris would have a home, a job, and a little spending money from me. Itd require mutual cooperation from both of us, but I thought it was a pretty neat idea.

    Once I finished exining all this, Ramiris burst into a flurry of shouting.

    Wh-what?! Soso do you mean that, maybe, not only could I build abyrinth and live here, but youll even give me a full-fledged job?!

    I guess so, if youre willing to ept that.

    Huh?! Okay, okay, so youre saying that, uh, I no longer have to be the jobless shut-in people use me of being?!

    The proposal mustve been a big shock. She opened her eyes wide, babbling on like she had been struck by lightning. Im so d, Lady Ramiris, Treyni whispered, eyes welling up. Beretta, oddly enough, seemed to be smiling at meI wondered if that fatigue I felt before was just an act. Did he want this? Maybe, maybe not, but either way, if hes happy, no worries.

    After calming down a bit, Ramiris swallowed nervously. Um And youll give me an allowance as well? she carefully asked. Do you really mean that?

    She mustve been afraid Id take it back. Id never do that. Im not that much of a sadist. Although, I couldnt give her an exact figure on her allowance yet, since that depended on sales proceeds. Better put her mind at ease for now.

    I really mean it. But I dont know how much profit well make until we get things going. How about we say you get twenty percent of the profits after I deduct advertising expenses, rent, and other needed expenses?

    How, er, how much do you think that would add up to?

    Well, if we can attract, say, a thousand adventurers in a day, that could you as much as two gold coins, maybe?

    Gahhh!! That much?!

    Thats just an estimate, keep in mind. Theres no guarantee itll work out that way. None of what I say means anything until we see some real, paying customers. But if youre nning to live here anyway, its not a bad deal for you, is it?

    Ramiris bobbed her head. If she was going to squat on my property either way, shed be maintaining herbyrinth no matter what I told her to do. Itd be smarter for her to listen to my offer, for sureitd grant her permission to stay and be a way to make money. Really, she only had one choice.

    Thus, shetched on to my head and did a little dance of joy. I took that as a yes, and I was sure Beretta and Treyni wouldntin. In fact, they were smiling at Ramiris, who was currently busy tripping off to her own little world.

    Eh-heh-heh Im gonna be filthy rich now! No more ungrateful bums calling me a deadbeat and a destitute demon lord!

    Ah well. No harm in that. Itd certainly do nothing to damage the faith her two servants had in her. Her sheer enthusiasm for the offer made me wonder just how often she had been picked on in the past. She was more excited than I was about it, so I doubt I had to worry aboutpliance.

    Whats with her obsession over money, though? I didnt think a lust for riches was amon trait for a demon lord, myself excluded. Was herck of a decent job the main issue? Herbyrinth wasnt exactly teeming with visitors. She must have been lonely, with way too much free time on her hands. Itd be great if we could attract crowds of adventurers to this dungeonfor my sake, as well as hers.

    We better work out a n of action fast.

    Calling Ramiris back from her mental head trip, I decided to have her help rework our arena ns with Gobkyuu.

    The way I saw it, we should expand the open area outside the western gate, where the highway ended, and build the arena there. There was ample pasture space for travelers horses, as well as a vast tract of emptynd to work with.

    Sometime in the future, Id like toy rails on top of the highway and run trains up and down it. Ever since I decided to target noble customers for this, I had been considering what to do about our transportation issues. If I could guarantee safe passage for them, I thought itd be much easier to attract richer tourists. But that wasnt the only goal. A rail system would make it possible to transport vast amounts of goods in one go, improving convenience and greatly contributing to town development.

    That was what I had in mind for the towns future expansion, so I wanted a spot for the arena that wouldnt get in the wayter on. I could establish a rail station near the spot, hopefully within an hours walk of the gateany farther would be asking a lot from our tourists. Having the arena within walking distance of town also made it possible to offer more hotel options in a smaller area. Unlike my old world, people here did a lot of their traveling by foot. If a journey was up to around six miles round trip, most folks wouldnt hesitate to hoof it, so a little distance wasnt a daunting obstacle.

    Those were my thoughts behind my proposal for a location, but Ramiris had other ideas.

    Why, though? Didnt you have empty space within town limits?

    Yes, but its upied by beastman refugees right now. We have streets of temporary housingid out for them. I cant build an arena over that.

    No, added Gobkyuu, we cant throw the beastmen out of town. I think development will have to wait until after Sir Geldpletes work on the new Eurazanian capital.

    Okay, well, how about we just move them into mybyrinth? I could transnt the entireyout of that area inside it, so it wouldnt be too much of a burden on them.

    That sounded, to be frank, absolutely bonkers. Gobkyuu and I exchanged nces, unsure we were hearing correctly.

    Er, you mean wed move the inhabitants in there as well?

    Um, I cant move living things around without permission, no. Theyd need to willingly go in there for me. But anything inanimate or unconscious? I can whisk it all right over, no prob!

    Are you serious? So you can move all the beastmens houses and belongings inside yourbyrinth anytime you want?

    Yep! You got it!

    She sounded proud of it, as she should. Thats the kind of skill anyone deserved to brag about.

    Pressing her for more detail, I learned that this was Mazecraft, one of Ramiriss intrinsic skills. As the name suggested, it basically made Ramiris the supreme god of anybyrinth she created. It worked over astonishing distances, too, even affecting people and things near the maze entrance. She could even take the weapons and armor off people close by.

    It was a crazy power to think of, but it did have its limits. If the targets equipment had its own consciousnessa sword infused with its users magic, for exampleRamiris couldnt affect it. You werent exactly stumbling over sentient objects like that every day, though, so if you picked a fight with Ramiris, youd better be prepared to get stripped naked first thing. Maybe she really did deserve the demon lord moniker.

    Wow I mean, honestly, I thought you had, like, zero ability to defend yourself in battle.

    Sheesh, way to be super-mean! Youre talking to the woman they call the strongest demon lord in the world!

    Cmon, Ramiris. Calm down. Tell me what else you can do with it!

    Upon further prodding, she revealed some more details behind her abilities. Essentially, I had five questions for her:

    1. How many floors down can you build your undergroundbyrinths?

    2. How many days do you need to build them?

    3. What kind of monsters are inside?

    4. Can you change their internal structure at will?

    5. What happens if someone dies in there?

    For a change, Ramiris gave me sincere answers to all of them.

    For question one, there was no strict floor limit, but realistically speaking, she could max them out at around a hundred.

    As for question two, one floor takes approximately an hour toplete. This figure remained steady for subsequent floors, so a hundred-floorbyrinth took around a hundred hours toplete. Any floors beyond that consumed exponentially greater sums of magical energy, hence the answer to question number one.

    For question three, you wouldnt find monsters, let alone insects or other creatures, just arbitrarily inhabiting abyrinth. Her previousbyrinth had monsters in the form of spiritsspirits who remained as part of the floor structure, partitioned off from the physical world but able toe and go as they pleased.

    However, it was possible to seed abyrinth with monsters for adventurers to test their skill against. Fill a maze with magicules, and monsters would spring to life from them. Adjusting thebyrinths magicule density made it easy to predict the strength of the monsters who resulted, as well as restrict monsters to a certain floor or floors. That made it possible to fine-tune abyrinths difficulty level with some precision. I had an idea of how this magicule infusion process worked, so Id give that some thought once I had the right container for it.

    Regarding question four, the sheer power of Ramiriss Mazecraft skill meant she could change the entire structure of a floor in about an hour, although floors could not be edited for twenty-four hours after thest revamping.

    There were conditions, of course. She couldnt make somethingnts or other organic matter, for exampleout of nothing, so structural changes would chiefly result in staid-looking mazes of nk walls. However, if you simply wanted to redecorate a floor with some materials at hand instead of changing its structure, that wasnt too terribly difficult.

    It was also simple enough, by the way, to rearrange abyrinths floor order. This, too, was set in stone for twenty-four hours afterward, but that made it no less useful a tool.

    Andst but not least, question five. Astonishingly, this depended entirely on Ramiris. If she was keeping tabs on things, she could snap her fingers and resurrect the dead inside herbyrinth. I was just wondering how she handled the corpses of monsters and hapless adventurers, but this sounded like nothing short of voodoo to me. Apparently, she wasnt sure what happened to monsters born inside thebyrinth, since she had no examples to work with yet, but she had already resurrected quite a few adventurers in the past.

    This was why she emphasized not being able to move organic creatures inside without permission earlier. This permission was nothing too formal; what mattered was that the subject in question knew he or she was going into thebyrinth. Without that understanding, any visitors would be refused entry. In other words, when I went into Ramirissbyrinth a while back, that was because I actively tried to do so. If I was carrying a sleepingpanion on my back as I ventured inside, we wouldve been blown back at the entrance. (One exception to this was infants. Children young enough to not have their own free will yet were essentially treated as things by this rule.)

    You could drag someone kicking and screaming into abyrinth, but only at a great burden to Ramiris, so it was impossible if she resisted you at all. You wouldnt want to try it, is how she put it to me.

    So there you have it. Essentially, anyone who goes into abyrinth was under the tyrannical rule of Ramirissomething they agreed to the moment they stepped through the entrance. If they epted the rules, Ramiris would keep careful tabs on their status.

    And you know how much we like ying pranks, dont you? she said, puffing out her chest. I just like surprising people and seeing their reactions. If they died, you know, thatd kind of weigh on my conscience. So I do what I can to keep em alive and set them back on their way.

    Sometimes, thered be an unlucky subject who really did die on Ramiris, but it sounded like those deaths urred outside of herbyrinth. At the very least, she didnt want to kill me when I was in there. That golem who looked ready to stomp me to oblivion was only there because she knew she could fix me up, good as new, if called to. That made sense to me, although it seemed to lower the stakes of what I went through quite a bit.

    So if a band of adventurers goes in on a monster-hacking run, you can revive them if they die?

    Yep! Once theyre booted out of thebyrinth, I can resurrect them like nothing happened. Its a bit tougher if were talking a whole party at once, though, so we might need to send them in with some of my revival equipment.

    Equip a specified item from her Mazecraftbyrinth, and dying would just transport you back outside intact. That solved my safety concerns, which was really the biggest problem.

    Excellent! Thats wonderful, Ramiris!

    R-really? You mean it? Im really that great, arent I?

    You sure are! Our ambitions are as good as aplished!

    They are? Yeah, they are! I was just thinking that myself!

    We looked at each other and nodded.

    Ill be counting on you, Ramiris.

    And Ill hold up my end of the bargain! Itll be nothing but smooth sailing ahead!

    Smooth sailing, huh? Hopefully the boat isnt made out of mud. We couldnt shake on the deal, given our size difference, but I think our minds were linked up well enough anyway.

    epting Ramiriss offer, we decided to build the battle arena in the empty space on the southeast side of town, a dungeon spread out beneath it.

    Our theater, meanwhile, would be put up on the northwest side, near where all our high-end spa facilities were. We had actually put up a gym, a museum, and so forth among all the luxury lodging over there, so all we really had to do was refurbish a previously built structure for the purpose.

    So the dungeon and theater were in ce, but we still had no arena. Geld wasnt around, but Im sure I could rely on Gobkyuu and his crew. With them, wed doubtlessly have something in ce by the Founders Festival

    Im not sure we can do this, Sir Rimuru.

    Oh, no? Yeah, guess not. I mean, any normal project like this would require several years of work. Asking for a finished arena in a month or so was kind of insane. Even with monster-level muscle on our side, I wasnt so sure we could do it, either.

    Yeah All right. Let me lend a hand, then. Ill help move dirt around and process the metal infrastructure.

    I may not look it, but I did used to work for a general contractor. I didnt have that much on-the-field construction experience, but with what I learned imitating the veterans, I wasnt a total amateur. Besides, I had Raphael.

    Me too! Let me help!

    In that case, allow me to help, too.

    As you wish, Lady Ramiris.

    I suppose that meant I had the support of Ramiris and Beretta and Treyni, too.

    Lets get right to work. I opened up my blueprints among the tents that lined the area.

    Hmm All right. I dont see a problem with this.

    Great. Better exin things to your beastmen, then.

    A lot of our nations beastmen were out working on remote projects, so I decided to give Alvis and Sufia the full exnation for now. We would meet together this evening.

    If that is what you seek, Sir Rimuru, it shall be done.

    It sure will. Weve got no right toin!

    Once I exined my whole n to them, they epted with surprising speed. They also stated that I wouldnt need to exin it again to the other beastmen.

    Um, really?

    Sure, Sir Rimuru, Sufia said. Youve given us all food to eat and a ce to stay. Wed all be d to help out with building this arena or whatever.

    Besides, Alvis added, I hear that Sir Carillon will be involved in the festival youre holding. We all would be delighted to help you out. I am a tad under the weather, so I will leave the rest to you, Sufia.

    You got it!

    So Sufia would lead the beastmen on this joband once that was decided, things proceeded at zing speed. One order from Sufia was all it took to get the beastmen out of their tents. As they all lined up in formation, Ramiris nimbly transported all the tents into herbyrinth. We now had arge patch of emptynd to work with.

    Still a little wowed by this feat, I used Belzebuth, Lord of Gluttony, to consume parts of the lot I didnt need and pare it down to a square, t expanse. The steel framing came up soon after, and once it did, Gobkyuu and his crew stacked up preprocessed stones to fill in the walls. Within the day, we had walls so hardy that not a single hole could be found in any of them. This gave us a sturdy-looking underground space with arge door in the front of it. For someone from my modern era, the whole thing was wrapped up with unbelievable speed.

    W-wow, Ramiris gushed. My new castle Oh, right! If you touch this door, itll take you to thebyrinth floor where the tents are!

    We all took a trip inside. There, we saw the beastmens living space, exactly as it looked up on the surface. Alvis and Sufia couldnt hide their astonishmentespecially since the air was kept refreshingly cool down here.

    Do we even need these tents now, I wonder?

    I dunno, yeah. I assume it doesnt rain in here, so I bet we could just sleep on the ground

    They didnt seem at all dissatisfied with this. I could see them and the other beastmen experiment with going back and forth between the real andbyrinth dimensionsall it took was a moments thought for them.

    So does it get dark in here at night?

    Sure does, replied Ramiris. Were linked to the outside from here, so I can even make it rain if you like!

    Man. She could do just about anything, huh? But it wasnt like they were farming crops in here, so I just asked her to set up a normal day-night cycle for me. This whole space seemed a lot more useful than I guessed at first; I bet I could adapt it to other needs, too. Wed have to brainstorm some ideas.

    Apparently reassured, the beastmen went off to help with the outside work. Theyd pitch in with the arena, evidently, under themand of Gobkyuu. A lot of them were women and children, but thats beastmen for youthey all wanted to work, and each one was stronger than a human, at least. Gobkyuu was giving them the basic manualbor jobs, it looked like, but better-trained beastmen were on-site as well now, aiding in construction.

    Treyni was supplying logs for the building (dont ask me how she got them), while Berettas precision carpentry turned them into usable boards. He could even cast a spell to dry the wood, which shed the time involved dramatically. I thought I had abandoned mymon sense long ago in this world, but it was sights like these that asionally made me think Wow, I really am in a whole different world, huh?

    If this keeps up, we truly could make it in time for the Founders Festival. I had spit out thend I ate earlier to create a small mountain, too, so perhaps we could use that as a field feature in the arena. It should work great.

    Leave the rest to us, Sir Rimuru! said Gobkyuu.

    I nodded, full of excitement over the arenas imminentpletion.

    With the main construction now in full swing, Ramiris had been left to her own devices. She needed a job, if only so she wouldnt start pestering everyone else. And what was she good at? Why, expanding thebyrinth, of course. Better use her while I got her.

    I gotta say, Ramiris, your Mazecraft skill amazes me.

    She had transported everything within a pretty broad stretch ofnd in the blink of an eye. I didnt want topliment her too much, but I had to hand it to her here. Thebyrinth itself was pretty amazing, too.

    Hee-hee! Aw, its nothing! But right now, though, its only this room, the deepest depths where my spirit friends live, and a connecting corridor. Ill have more levels for you tomorrow!

    It took one hour to build a level, right? Building a vast undergroundbyrinth that went down a hundred floors would be a pretty tall order even on modern-day Earth. Building up, after all, is a hell of a lot easier. Ramiriss skill, though, made that possibleand suddenly, some pretty fantastic dreams seemed within reach.

    Okay, lets go with your limit, then. One hundred floors.

    Huh?! Do you need that many?

    Yep. I want to fill it up with traps, and I want enough space to gradually up the monster-challenge level as you go down.

    I mean, thats fine by me, but can I ask you something?

    What?

    I was just wondering: How do you n to expand the number of monsters in there? Are you gonna catch them somewhere?

    I suppose her question made sense. Itd take a lot of monsters to fill a hundred levels. But I had an idea. Lets tell her a little about it, at least so shell cooperate with me.

    Well, between you and me

    I let her in on the secret of how I wanted to structure this dungeon. As she listened, I could see her eyes begin to twinkle.

    Wait, soso

    Rightright. So then, Ramiris

    We began offering suggestions to each other as we whispered. This was getting exciting. And given it was the two of us involved, we naturally began to go off on tangents we never should have. Before long, we had worked out the concept for our Advanced Dungeon, as we called it. I honestly wondered if we could get away with it, but theres no turning back now. We had to do itand Ramiris was itching to start, promising me that shed build thisbyrinth with everything she had.

    You can take your time and rest along the way, okay?

    Ha! Theres no way Ill take a rest after hearing an idea like this! Im gonna do it, lemme tell ya!

    I was just trying to motivate her a little, but I guess I got her really riled up. Im d she liked the romance of the idea, at least. I was just as excited. It was like a fantasye alive.

    Well, do your best. Ill get everything we need ready.

    All right. Good luck, Rimuru!

    You too, Ramiris.

    We wererades in arms now, grinning at each other.

    Exiting thebyrinth, I found the sun was already about to set. We mustve been talking for a while. Work had finished for the day, with crews cleaning up and starting to cook dinner. I didnt want to bother them, so I told Gobkyuu and Sufia that Id see them the next day and took off.

    My next stop was Kurobes workshop so I could have him give me some of the weapons and armor he couldnt sell on the marketstuff that was more to his personal tastes. The southwest side of town was currently an industrial kind of area, and Kurobes ce was there, along with workshops owned by his apprentices. There was also dorm space for the newer pupils without their own sites yet, along with lines of warehouses. There were inns and restaurants for all these craftsmen and apprentices, of course, and overall it was a fairly lively ce.

    Kurobes workshop was dead in the middle of it, and when I popped in, he warmly greeted me, showing me to his storage building after wrapping up dinner.

    Right here, Sir Rimuru. The stuff I have locked up in this warehouse is all pretty uniquenot the kinda thing anyone can handle easily, you know. Are you all right with that?

    I nodded my approval. Kurobe was rightnot all of it was very user-friendly or essible. Some of it was locked up because it was too powerful, but a lot of it was just a total handful to use. The armor was a great examplelike the suit of mail that sucked the wearers magical force to erect a magic barrier. That might sound useful, but it continually sapped your power whether you wanted it to or not, eventually killing the hapless owner. Great defense, but a pretty damn pointless piece of equipment.

    There was also a sword that attracted all magicules in the local area like a ma, making it impossible to cast any spells, and transformed them into explosive force. You definitely got a bang out of it, but it didnt exactly spare the wielder from the st. Id be way too scared to use that thing or the suit of armor that granted the wearer extraordinary physical strength for a limited time. Once that time expired, your muscles all ruptured, rendering you motionless and dead unless you had healing magic on hand

    So basically, you had a room full of equipment that could kill you if you werent paying attention. I doubted anybody in town was dumb enough to try any of this unevaluated stuff outespecially because I didnt want to take responsibility for the falloutbut I thought itd all work just fine in Ramirissbyrinth.

    Yeah, its fine, I told Kurobe. These actually seem really valuable if you take into ount all their different features.

    This was decent stuff, after all. Much of it was valued at Rare or above, with a few Uniques scattered here and therein the same lineup as the Scale Shield and Tempest Dagger I gifted Kabals party.

    I picked up one of the itemsthe Tempest Swordas I turned to Kurobe.

    It seems like kind of a waste, doesnt it? Keeping all this high-quality stuff in here just because its still in the test stage. Dont you want to pair some of it with the kind of people who could really take advantage of it?

    I was trying to lead him to the answer I wanted. Kurobe took the bait.

    Oh? Well, you can take whatever you like from here.

    I wasnt tricking him, exactly, but I did feel kinda bad about it.

    Soon, Kurobes warehouse was a fair bit emptier. Now I had a set of weapons I could popte the treasure chests in thebyrinth with. Theyd be obtained by adventurers who earned the right to them by reaching the level I put them in, so I didnt lie to Kurobe at all. No need to look a gift horse in the mouth.

    Still, I was amazed at his sheer output. There was more here than thest time I had stopped by; Id say it was at over a hundred items now. Much of it was dicey, yes, but some pieces were just difficult to master. The onemon link among them was that they were all superior to anything youd see in the capital at Englesia, the kind of thing youd normally only see at auction.

    During the Harvest Festival that marked my ascension to demon lord, Kurobe received the unique skill Mastercraft. This was a force that stacked on top of his previous Researcher skill, polishing it further. By this point, he was way past Kaijin. Whenever he got serious about a project, it wasnt umon for a Unique-grade piece of equipment to result. Rare level for sure, at least. That was much of the reason why only his apprentices work appeared at public showings.

    Gotta say, though, Im impressed. Ive learned forging myself, but no way could I make any of this.

    Heh-heh! High praise from you, Sir Rimuru. Oh, but lemme give you this before I forget.

    Suddenly serious, the ever-modest Kurobe returned to the tatami-mat room in the rear to fetch something.

    Whats this?

    Well, its something Ive made you wait far too long for.

    He handed me a long, straight sword, the de a jet-ck in color. Not too long, but not too shortmade just for me, at truly the ideal length.

    So this is

    Yep. My greatest masterpiece yet.

    At first nce, the only unusual thing about the sword was its ck body. There wasnt some ultra-powerful aura shooting out; it wasnt generating its own magic or anything. But thats what I wanted. This des focus was squarely on durability. Itd never break, never bend, and would fully adjust itself to my magical forcewithout wreaking havoc around me, like with Hinatas Moonlight sword. It allowed me to be wholly unrestrained in a fight.

    Well done. Youve made me proud, Kurobe.

    Im just as proud of it as you, trust me on that. But the sword isntplete just yet. As you know, my weapons usually have a hole at the base, the way you suggested they should.

    I looked at the base. Oh? I dont see any here.

    No. The other weapons get that hole when theyreplete, but not this one. Because once it limates to your magic force, itll growand evolve. And despite that, I built it so itll always look like just another sword otherwise.

    He had a right to be proud. As he put it, this sword in itsplete state could be a piece of Legend-ss materialnot that it felt that way presently. The other equipment in the family was still under development, and the magic crystal meant to go into the hole he mentioned wasnt done yet. No point having a hole if there was nothing for it yet. I would just look forward to that forting moment.

    I left Kurobes workshop with a spring in my step. I had my own sword, and I also got all the other stuff I wanted. Now I could seed those treasure chests and spread them all around the Dungeon. Itd be kinda fun to insert boss monsters to protect the particrly nice pieces, too. This was almost like designing a real-life dungeon-crawl RPG, and it was unbelievably exciting.

    Yeah, you could probably make a mint selling these test items and failed experiments at auctionIm sure Mjllmile or Fuze could hook me up with the right people for that. Itd be a surer way of earning ie, but I didnt want that. The key here was to get humans interacting with monsters. I wanted to bring people over here and have them experience everything that made Tempest greatand if they liked what they saw, Im sure they woulde back. This was just one part of that effort.

    Plus, this wasnt just a matter of bribing adventurers with loot and sending them on their way. I already had the next step of the process in mind. Lets say you have someone hacking their way through the Dungeon, collecting assorted items and bringing them back to the surface. Using non-appraised weapons or armor, I had heard, was considered extremely dangerous. Thats where my little friend Assesses in. This stuff was made in Tempest, so I naturally knew all about their traits and features. A lot of it would be quite useful to adventurers, assuming you used it rightyeah, some of it was downright dangerous, but wed offer a buyback service for that.

    Moneys meant to be circted, not kept in a vault or whatever. As long as we purchased the materials we needed and paid for necessary upkeep, we could give back the rest to the adventurers. Word would spread about this over time, and I was sure itd make ournd famous. Besides, filling adventurers wallets would improve the outlook for our inns and lodging houses. More peopleing to Tempest meant less downtime for ces like that, which was importantfor business and for advertising.

    So the southeast side of town would have a battle arena, with Ramiriss dungeon underneath. On the southwest, wed have discount inns and hostels. Unlike the high-end facilities to the northeast, wed keep things cheap down there, attracting primarily adventurers to help delineate our offerings. Their location would be convenient to thebyrinth, and I was positive itd be a booming sess.

    I was worried at first when Ramiris talked about moving here, but maybe that was the right thing to do all along, huh?

    We also nned to have at least one or tworge-scale events at the arena each year. Mjllmile was no doubt filling in the rest of the years schedule with other things, toomilitary training, test-your-mettle events for adventurers, and so on. There could be a lot of demand for that kind of thing, I thought. We could have people try to use that training in the Dungeona kind of standardized exam, you could say. If you cant die in there, you could try some crazy stuff youd ordinarily never dream of attempting.

    Realizing how many options were open to usnot justmercial, eitherI decided to talk with Benimaruter about them.

    I had my seed items, but it was too early to focus on the Dungeon; that could wait until it was done. For now, I wanted to wrap up talks with the one person we needed for the final touches, the whole cornerstone of this schemeVeldora.

    I found him rxing in my little house a bit removed from town, a nice little Asian-style teahouse. Theres actually a secret to this buildingbut Ill go into thatter. Veldora was treating the ce like he owned it or something, which I didnt mind that much, bue on, man.

    Yo, Veldora. Can you do me a favor?

    Mm? What? I am busy.

    Yeah, busy reading manga, maybe.

    Ah Too bad. I thought this was a pretty neat offer, too But if youre busy, then oh well. I just figured we could use your aura to Oh, right, sorry. Youre busy. Never mind.

    I pretended to walk away. Leaving what was supposed to be my own house was a little weird, but well, I had lots of ces to sleep. Besides

    Oh, just one moment. I am busy, yes, but if you insist upon it, I will lend you an ear!

    Great, I hooked him. As gullible as always, I see. Like taking candy from a baby. I should start calling him the Gulli-Dragon.

    The rest would now easily fall in ce. I stood tall, looking as haughty as possible.

    Well, I started, trying to sound suggestive, I was thinking about providing a den for you to live in, sort of.

    Wh-what?! My own ce? You mean it?!

    I really got him now. He took his eyes off the manga he was reading, watching me curiously.

    Yep. All for you. But if youre too busy right now

    Waitwait! No need to be in such a hurry. Were friends, are we not? Id be d to put your requests at the top of the queue! Kwaaaah-ha-ha-ha!

    I had Veldora excited now. Perfect. Might as well go through with the pitch. He almost never listened to people, so these preliminaries really were necessary. A pain in the ass, but I just considered it a little ceremony I conducted to help him be useful for a change.

    Mm, yes, what are friends for, after all?

    Precisely. Tell me what you want!

    Well, Ramiris is moving into town, and were gonna build herbyrinth right underneath the arena. So

    Oh, Ramiris? Veldora replied, picking up on what this meant. Her powers are a bit of an unknown quantity to me. I understood them as creating paths that led you to the same spot, no matter where you were. Does she twist and turn these paths around to create mazes?

    Right. And she can add more floors to these mazes, so I want to fill them with tricks and traps and stuff.

    More floors? That little girl was more powerful than I thought, then.

    Now Veldora was looking serious, engaged. So gullible.

    I then regaled him about the entire story behind our dungeon n. But itd be boring to just have a in oldbyrinth, right? Thats why I want to make it into something really greatlike, great enough to be a huge attraction. I was just talking with Ramiris today, but shes busy adding levels to herbyrinth right now.

    Oh? And how does that connect to me?

    Well, Im thinking we need an overlord to govern the dungeon.

    Anoverlord?

    Ramiris and I will manage the dungeon itself. On the hundredth floor, at the bottom, theres a door that leads to the spiritbyrinth thats Ramiriss main residence. Dont you think a door like that needs a guardian, Veldora? Like, the strongest guardian in history?

    I do! I do! Yes, well said, Rimuru. And you would like me to take this role?

    Just as I thought, hetched on to the offer. The word strongest (when pointed at him) usually made him melt, so I knew uttering it would have the desired effect.

    Thats right, Veldora. And if youll take it, youll get another bonus out of it, too.

    Oh? I was already waiting to say yes to you. But lets hear what thisbonus is.

    Heh-heh-heh. The bonusor really, the gist of the whole thing.

    So youve been wanting to let off your aura for a little while, right? You said you were about to hit your limit or whatever?

    Ah! You mean?

    Yes! In thebyrinth, youll be free to unleash it all you want. You can go back to your normal dragon form, even.

    Ahhhh!!

    Just imagine, this divinely cool dragon lurking deep in the depths of a forbiddingbyrinth

    Meaning myself? he interrupted. So Ill be allowed to use my full power on anyone who visits? All Kwah-ha-ha-ha-ha, wee, you insects and so forth?

    inly, he loved it. The lethargy of a moment ago was gone. Dangling that bait in front of him got him monstrously excited. Now for one final push, I thought, as I recalled a little something Ramiris and I had discussed.

    Ill even put some units in ce for you to fight off the adventurers with. Thats rightIm gonna re-create that game you wanted to try out. Sounds like fun, doesnt it?

    This, in a nutshell, was what I wanted to makea real-time (also, real-life) strategy game set in a dungeon. The idea came to me out of nowhere as Id talked with Ramiris. Id have units (monsters) in ce to tackle adventurers, along with bosses to protect the loot chests. The Dungeon would be filled with Veldoras magicules, growing thicker as you approached the hundredth floor. The force in the air would be pretty thin up top, so youd only see minion-level monsters at first, but the deeper you got, the more higher-level foes youd find patrolling the halls. Even in his former prison, enough magic leaked out to create tempest serpents (rank: A-minus) and other powerful creaturesI couldnt even imagine what hed create at this point.

    Frankly, the whole gate guardian thing didnt matter to me; I didnt really expect anyone to make the hundredth floor in the first ce. The key to all this was getting Veldoras aura released. It felt to me like I couldnt get away with making him keep it in much longer, but if I just left him to his own devices, he might decide to blow it all out in some empty corner of the world. I couldnt take my eyes off him for a moment, because if he erupted closer to town, maybe my administration and I could withstand it, but nobody else would. With enough magicule concentration, anything below a B in rank would die.

    I found it dangerous to rely solely on Veldoras willpower to keep us safe, so Ramirissbyrinth was really a lifeboat in the nick of time. It was apletely sealed space, something I confirmed when I explored it myself earlier, so there was no worrying about magicules leaking out. Veldoras full aura unleashed shouldnt faze it at all.

    Even in the Sealed Cave, itd be impossible to resist the aura of a fully revived Veldoranot that Id bring him down there now, what with our research facility and all. The Dungeon was perfect for him, and for the purposes of my true goal. I wanted him to whip out that aura and go to town with it.

    My true goal, you see, was to use therge, dense cloud of magicules hed create and generate monsters with it. The whole n rode on that ideaVeldora releasing his aura, and me making good use of it. An excellent n, if I do say so myself. Two birdsno, three birdswith one stone. Not only would it keep him from crashing my house uninvited, itd also make him useful as a magicule generator for my new monster factory, giving him a job to do so he wouldnt be such a freeloader. Not that I thought anyone would actually make it all the way to his floor, though

    But what did he think? Veldora stood up, cing his manga in a pocket, then extended a hand toward me, offering to shake.

    I like it. I like this very much, Rimuru. We will have adventurers dispatch these units, so they can stand before me, and I can deliver them divine justice. They may try to run from me, of course, but I will never allow them to. Perhaps I could bellow something akin to Bah-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha! You cannot escape me! Didnt you know? There is no fleeing the Storm Dragon! I always wanted to try saying that, and now Ive got the chance, dont I? Ahhh, I cannot wait to begin!

    Um, yes

    His imagination was already running wild. I nodded back at him, but now I worried that Id egged him on a little too much. Is this gonna be okay? Like, theres really no way someonell reach Floor 100, right? I was a little concerned about that, but I needed to push this n forward.

    Well, youre the only person I could ask to do this. Are you in?

    Of course. Rimuru, youve done well to reach out to me. Truly, it is a task only I am capable of.

    He gave me a firm nod. Im so d hes really that stupid. His cooperation, and his reaction, were even better than I thought possible.

    The next day, Veldora and I went to Ramiris.

    Construction of the arena began early in the morning, and the site was alive with activity. Some of the beastmen that were out on training hade back to pitch in, following Gobkyuus orders as they ran to and fro. I didnt want to wreck their concentration, so we headed for thebyrinth.

    The moment we entered, we emerged in the room Ramiris was in. As she promised, she had been busy expanding the Dungeon.

    Hello, Ramiris. Doing well?

    Ahhh! Hello, Master! Its good to see you again. Im doing fine!

    Ramiris looked a tad fatigued but eminently satisfied with herself. I advised her not to overdo it. She was now seated on Veldoras shoulder; I was d to see they were still getting along.

    I was d, but it was also a problem, because the sight of Veldora was making Ramiris totally forget my advice.

    Just leave this to me! Ill do it! I can totally pull this off, guys!

    To calm her down a bit, I decided to start with breakfast.

    After that, I asked her about her progress. For now, she had expanded thebyrinth down to Floor 15; at the current pace, shed reach one hundred several dayster. I could decorate the interior along the way, so there was no need to hurry her further.

    The subsequent floors will formte themselves at this point, she said. Ive got nothing to do right now. Would you like to mess around with the floors that are done?

    Apparently, the floor-making work would proceed on its own, as long as Ramiris had remaining magic strength.

    All right, how about we set up Veldoras room first?

    The domain of Veldora would be on the bottommost floor. I wanted to get it all set up for him, if only so I could kick him out of my ce pronto. For now, that floor was still an empty spaceno walls, no hallways, no stairs; just a door in the middle of nothing.

    Wow. Literally starting from zero, huh?

    This is my room, Rimuru? Because it reminds me of my time being sealed away

    Veldora wasnt a fan. I saw his point. Id feel kind of bad for him like this.

    Not to worry, Master! Ramiris smiled at Veldora. I can add stairs and other things easily enough, just by thinking about it.

    All right, I said, how about we all use Thought Communication to figure out what we want this ce to look like?

    We connected our minds together, and I showed them what I was currently picturing.

    Oooh! Yes, yes! Quite fine, Rimuru! I knew you were better than that. I suppose I am in good hands after all!

    Sounds like Veldoras all for it. Think you can make it into this?

    You got it! This much isnt a problem.

    Ramiris wasnt kidding. In another instant, the space transformed. We were quickly surrounded by walls of thick stone, forming arge chamber with several smaller roomsing out from it. The main chamber was a square three hundred feet or so on each side, impassive and looking every bit like a boss room. She did it up exactly like I pictured it in my mind.

    Whoa! This is perfect

    That it is, Ramiris. I am eminently satisfied!

    Hee-hee! d you like it! Yes, I really am that good, yknow!

    Ramiris didnt getpliments often enough, I guess, because she looked beside herself with joy. I really was impressed, though. If you tried to physically construct this, itd take decades, not even yearsand she was done in an instant. Plus, since this whole space was under her jurisdiction, she could customize it pretty freely. Astounding. I really started to see her in a new light.

    But I couldnt marvel at her forever.

    This chamber was meant to be the reception area for any adventurer who made it here. But it wasnt just that. In reality, it was a spacerge enough for Veldora to return to his original form. He needed to be able to fully rx and getfortable in this space, or wed never get anywhere. Of course, looking at himtely, he was chill enough in pretty much any physical form, I felt If anything, being human made it easier to y games and read manga. He liked that form enough to use it to hang out uninvited in my home, after all. Maybe wed need to build a human-Veldora room, too.

    In the chamber was two doors, arge one that connected to the upper floors and another that connected to his private chambers. Ramiris did such a good job crafting my vision, it was literally just as I thought itd be.

    Hoh? This is my room?

    Letting the curious Veldora look around a little, I took out a set of furniture from my Stomach. Deftly, Iid down a carpet woven by our towns goblinas, cing a handmade desk and chair set on top of it. There was also a sofa in case he wanted to lie down, as well as a bed that I wasnt sure would be used very much. The ce lookedfy enough to me, and I even copied some manga I knew Veldora would like and filed it all into a bookshelf on the wall. The main chamber was dark and foreboding; this one was a cheerful little studio perfect for young, urban singles.

    Oh, how nice! chirped Ramiris, looking a bit envious. Id like some furniture like this, too, yknow.

    I promised Id bring her some next time I stopped by. I wasnt sure what to do about sizing it for her, but judging from how Ramiris was already spread out on the sofa and reading manga, I guess I didnt need to worry And whoa, theres Veldora sprawled in bed and doing the same thing. Guess I made him happy. If anyone saw him in here, the solemn majesty of the main chamber would totally go to waste. I really hoped no adventurers would see him like this, as unlikely as thatd be.

    Well, no need to go overboard. We spent the afternoon getting Veldoras room in order before wrapping up the day.

    One weekterthe pace had dropped a bit toward the endthebyrinth wasplete down to the hundredth floor. The interior, as I directed, was made out of blocks whose structure could be altered freely, allowing us to switch the paths around once every few days. This way, even if anyone memorized the way down, theyd have to start all over next time. Im talking truly demonic difficulty here. Selling maps would be sacrilege, I thought. I wanted this to be a true gauntlet, and this way, itd be a new quest every timealways fresh, retaining its difficulty, never getting boring.

    As a kind of fail-safe, I did provide save points every tenth floor. It turns out that Spatial Motion was possible in Ramirissbyrinths, under certain conditions. This wasnt affected by the local magicules, amazingly. It made it possible to do things like transport food in and outsuper-usefnd it also worked on people, letting them freely travel back to these preset locations. In other words, save points, through and through. Reach one, and you get to start from there next time.

    It works on your fellow party members, too; you could cheat a little and bring someone below where theyve been before. There was some debate about that quirk, but I decided to go with it, see how people used (or abused) the feature, and adjust as needed. Besides, even if you cheat your way down a few floors, youll still have to deal with the challenge waiting down there. Theres a boss stationed at every level, guardians that work along the lines of the local boss warlords dotted around the Forest of Jura. I was thinking of making the ones located before save points particrly powerful; if you wanna take those guys down, save points werent going to help you.

    Basically, someone would need to be strong enough to reach a save point in the first ce before they could take others down there, so I didnt think anyone would try anything too stupid with them. If a problem came along, we could always reconsider. We had some nice bonuses in the treasure chests, after all, so I hoped our visitors would try hard to defeat the bosses on each floor.

    Was it okay for our bosses to kill (or be killed), by the way? Sure, that was another key point. Ramiriss Mazecraft had the power to revive life itself, resurrecting any adventurers who came into the Dungeon. This could be done only with the subjects permission, but as long as he or she existed as a consenting part of Ramiriss realm, it was all good. Ramiris was, in essence, the eternal leader of anything made with Mazecraft. If she was killed, the whole thing would disappear, but otherwise, any of her servants could get revived at a save point, and a servant was anyone she had forged a pact with or otherwise agreed to the presence of. I still couldnt believe the power of this skill.

    Now I see why she wanted Beretta so bad. Ramiris was no big deal out on the surface, but in her world, she was invincible. Its just that the invincibility only worked on people who were part of that world. It didnt work on golems with no free will, including that Elemental Colossus that vanished. Beretta, meanwhile, wasnt just a puppetand that meant he was invincible, now that he served Ramiris. She had Treyni, too, now, which made me begin to wonder if I should start worrying about them. Treyni was kind of strong, after all, and if she couldnt be destroyed, not even Benimaru or Shion could beat her. Beretta and Treyni were still outside, beavering away at the arena construction work, but still

    Thanks to Ramiriss hard work, thebyrinth was smoothly approachingpletion. Once things calmed down a bit, Id need to talk to her and her servants about keeping the maze defensible. But thatd beter.

    Ramiris, did you make the thing I asked for?

    Oh, this, right? Here it is.

    This was a resurrection item.

    In order to receive the immortal attribute within a Mazecraft world, you needed to give your express permission. But we nned to have tons of people storming in, and if it was open to the general public, itd be a pain to get everyones agreement on paper. Maybe Ramiris could keep track of a small handful of visitors, but if multiple parties were running around at once, she couldnt keep up.

    Thats why I asked if there was a disposable item for single-use resurrection purposes. What she gave me now looked like a regr old armlet, knotted together like a friendship bracelet.

    Did you check to see if this works?

    Sure did! I tried it out on Berettast night!

    Whoa, what are you doing to him?

    Apparently, Beretta willingly agreed to this, his reasoning being I am a demon, so even in the worst case, I will not truly die. I know I asked and all, but this was ridiculous. Thanks to that, however, I knew we had a working bracelet. Treyni had taken Berettas core out of his body, and within ten seconds, the corpse was transported out of the Dungeon and fully revived.

    Perfect. I appreciate Beretta being brave enough to try it.

    Ramiris smiled and nodded. Oh, yes! This was the first disposable item I ever tried to make, after all. I figured it was possible, but Im just d it worked!

    This was her first time? So what if it didnt work? I shuddered at the thought. She couldve at least tested it on animals or something. I wish she wouldnt be so rash.

    Regardless, we now had Resurrection Bracelets. Ramiris reported that shed also prepare return whistles that brought you back to the surface in an emergency. We could sell both of these at thebyrinth entrancebuy them or dont; its your choice. Dont me us if you die or get lost down there, though. Me, Id definitely buy em. We could work out the prices wed chargeter, but for now, we were all set.

    If you think about it, though, these Resurrection Bracelets are just Ramiriss power in a handy physical form. All it did was put you back at the Dungeons entrance in the state you entered it in, assuming you died within thebyrinth. I think wed better carefully exin to customers that it wouldnt revive you just anywhere in the world. Some people out there, you know, its in one ear and out the other. If they die outside somewhere because they assumed the wrong thing, thats their problembut Id still feel bad for them, so I ought to make sure I get the message across.

    So the basic framework of the Dungeon wasplete. Not bad for a single weeks work. I asked Raphael out of curiosity if it could make something like this for me, but:

    Report. The subject Ramiriss intrinsic skill Mazecraft cannot be replicated.

    It sure didnt take its time providing that answer. No, only Ramiris could do this, and really, I ought to thank her for camping out on my doorstep.

    Great job, Ramiris. Now we can finally move on to part two of the n.

    She flitted her wings as she replied, Hee-hee! Of course! Im a hard worker when I wanna be, yknow!

    I turned to Veldora. Well, sorry this took so long, but I think its time for you to let your aura out.

    Ahhh, the time hase, has it? Kwah-ha-ha-ha! I am ready!

    Yes, the moment was here.

    The Dungeon had ducts and stairways connecting all one hundred floors to one another. How did they keep things ventted all the way to the bottom? With magicand thats the best answer you can get from me. Maybe we didnt need those ducts at all, but they were there to ensure magicules would make their way to each floor. And that rush of magicules would happen once Veldora came to that central chamber in Floor 100, assumed his original form, and cut loose.

    All right. Here I go. Hraaahhhh!!

    I didnt need the theatrical shouting, but I suppose he felt better that way.

    Instantly, a spectacrly evil aura engulfed Ramiris and me. I had enclosed us in an Absolute Defense barrier, just in case, but for a moment, it felt like a bomb went off in front of us.

    Phew Sh-sheesh, that was dangerous, a shaky Ramiris said. If you didnt protect me, I mightve been blown right outta here

    Yeah, that was stronger than I thought. The shock wave was packed with an intense concentration of magicules, easily enough to kill a normal person.

    Kwaaaaahhhh-ha-ha-ha! Make way for Veldora!!

    The boss chamberer, sorry, Veldoras undergroundirwas prettyrge, but with the Storm Dragon back to his normal size, it actually seemed a tad cramped. I hadnt seen him in dragon form in a while, and the sight was just as stately and magnificent as I recalled.

    Seriously, if he would just keep his mouth shut, hed be so majestic.

    Ahhh, such a relief! But oooh, what an onrush that was. If I did that outdoors, there might have been a little trouble!

    He made it sound so casual, but that scenario wouldve been a disaster. And if it was such a relief, why were there still magicules coursing out of him?

    W-wow, Master I didnt think youd wreck thebyrinth itself

    Ramiris was right. The explosion had caved in the walls a bit; the internal pressures had been too much to withstand. And this wasnt even him attacking!

    Guess you really were holding in a lot, werent you? Can you maybe, you know, loosen the valve on it a bit now and then, so it doesnte to that again?

    That was just the magicules mixed in with the aura st, after all, and they came in dense. Veldoras total energy count mustve been off the charts. No wonder releasing it was so dicey. Definitely gotta vent a bit more often than that from now on.

    Then I was struck with a brilliant idea. Why dont we build another room in Floor 100 to serve as storage? We could put in the iron ore and so on that we get from the mines, then infuse it with magicules to transform it into magisteel ore in a sh. That stuffs worth its weight in gold, far more in demand than regr metal ore, and it could be a huge resource for us.

    Ramiris, can you make another room connecting to this chamber?

    Sure! No problem!

    She was already hopping to it. Next time I stop by, Ill bring in some of the metal ore we have in storage around town.

    As I schemed internally, the magicules gradually began to distribute themselves around the Dungeon, just as nned. Most floors still didnt have walls or internal structures, so there was nothing stopping them from diffusing into every corner of thebyrinth. The magicule count on Floor 50, even, still surpassed what you saw in the deepest part of the Sealed Cave.

    Now wed just have to wait for monsters to start appearing. At this rate, I could expect some real juggernauts.

    Veldora spent the rest of the day releasing his magic and chilling dragon-style in hisir, and the next day, I brought Beretta and Treyni with me.

    Ah, Rimuru, he purred to me,st night was the most enjoyable one for me in ages.

    Oh? Good. Keep releasing as much as you want from now on, okay? No holding back. Just never do it outside of here, okay?

    Kwah-ha-ha-ha! Oh, I understand.

    Did he? I wasnt sure, but I had to take him at his word.

    Discussing matters like this would be awkward, so I had him go into human form for a moment as I exined the current situation to Beretta and Treyni. I wanted to get right to work, but before that, I needed to make one final check with Beretta.

    Beretta, you swore to Guy that youd serve Ramiris, correct? You still feel the same way now?

    He gave me a surprised look. I wondered if, under the mask, his expression actually changed a bit.

    Sir Rimuru, I apologize if this is rude, but as I stated before, I wish to serve both you and Lady Ramiris.

    Yeah, I remember, but doesnt that go against what you promised Guy?

    It does. I was alone at the time, and

    No, no, dont worry about it. Ramiris wound up here in town anyway, just like you wanted. Shes gonna help run thisbyrinth for a while, and I expect youll be happy to help us out, right?

    Of course!

    Great, then serving her is pretty much the same as serving me anyway.

    I had been thinking about this ever since I heard about thatthe idea of having Beretta just switch his allegiances to Ramiris, if he wanted to. Thats what he promised Guy, likely the strongest of all demon lords, and I dont think Guy appreciated people who broke their promises to him.

    If that is what you wish, he briskly replied, then I will work under Lady Ramiris.

    Wow. Everything turned out the way he wanted, didnt it? Ah well. I wonder where he learned to scheme like that

    Understood. The answer, of course

    I didnt need to hear that. Raphael just doesnt let up, huh? Who does it think it is? Ugh. Maybe Raphaels the real schemer here.

    It sounded a bit sulky about that, but I wasnt about to start caring.

    Excellent. From now on, Beretta, you will work as Ramiriss servant!

    And her servant I shall be, but I still remember the great debt I owe to you, Sir Rimuru. If you seek anything from me at any time, please, just say the word.

    I will. Thanks.

    I then undid the master lock set in Berettas core, handing the role over to Ramiris. With that, I could only take credit for creating him from now on. Id get to give him orders again if something happened to Ramiris, but otherwise, Ramiris was his sole master. That came as a relief. Now Guy had nothing to whine at me about, and I could certainly trust Beretta to keep Ramiris safe.

    Besides, thisbyrinth was proving useful in many more ways than I originally guessed. On the surface, it was advertising to get adventurers to visit town. Underneath, it helped Veldora let off steamand generate the massive magicule counts needed to turn metal ore into magisteel ore as a byproduct of the process. The maze would be a great springboard for future research into the nature of magicules, and all in all, this was a much more vital asset for Tempest than I thought at first. Treyni protecting this asset alone made me nervous, so having Beretta around put my mind very much at ease.

    As for Ramiris herself, the new master of Beretta Well, this sudden event was making her weep tears of joy.

    My little Beretta, now my full proper servant? Now Im no longer all by my lonesome forever?

    Um, Lady Ramiris, you have me as well?

    Oh! Yes, I do, Treyni! Were turning into a really big family now!

    She loved the concept, darting around and flying circles around Beretta. Treyni watched on with a warm smile. Being alone mustve pained that demon lord for a long time, huh? Her family was just two people, still, but it mustve been big enough by her standards?

    The sight worried me. I could rely on Treyni well enough, but she spoiled Ramiris way too much. Itd be a tough job, I knew, but I wanted Beretta to be the one sane person keeping this crew together. He had his conniving side as well, but I was sure he wouldnt let me down.

    Beretta, dont worry about me as much. Take care of Ramiris. Protecting her is job one for you now.

    Yes sir! I swear it on my life!

    Ill trust him on that. Hes trustworthy enough. Ramiris and Treyni alone might find it rough going, managing all the monsters well find in this mazewith Beretta around, all problems are solved.

    This was perfect. Veldora and I watched as Ramiris carried on with her little happy dancesilly, but charming in a way.

    With the master-servant rtionship set in stone, Beretta was now immortal inside Ramirissbyrinth, no Resurrection Bracelet necessary. The same was true of Treyni. Resurrection Bracelets and return whistles were temporarily infused with Ramiriss skills, but as her servants, the two had no use for those items at all. They were free to revive themselves at any of the pre-positioned save points avable, so they wouldnt be flung out of thebyrinth after every death. In addition, they could teleport, more or less, between any save point in the Dungeon.

    In some ways, it felt like Ramiriss Mazecraft was more beneficial to her servants than herself. I mean, being able to resurrect yourself as many times as you like Thats downright scary. She had only two people working for her now, but what if that number started going up? Thebyrinth was going to be teeming with monsters shortly; if she had full control over them, theyd be a virtual army for Ramiris. There wouldnt be any calling her a pip-squeak thennot without serious consequences! And oh man, what if they had the immortal attribute, too? You just couldnt downy this threat.

    Really, in terms of the defense it offered, Ramiriss skill couldnt be more superior. People just never worried about it because, you know, this was Ramiris were talking about. No big problemjust a lovable, lonely, tiny pixie. Im sure shed never even think ofmanding an unstoppable army of invincible monsters or anything. Probably.

    Now on to the next stepthebyrinths internal structure. With a hundred floors to fill,ing up with a maze for each one seemed daunting, but wed just have to plug away at it, I suppose. Its not like the maze itself was the main challenge to visitors.

    The first floor of thisbyrinth was basically a square, about eight hundred feet to a sideroughly the size of Tokyo Dome, although the Dungeon as a whole gradually got smaller as you went on, forming a sort of inverse pyramid. With Veldora releasing his aura at the bottom, I wanted a structure that got the magicules distributed as efficiently as possible. We were free to adjust the size of any of the floors, however, so we could change anything that didnt work. It was really an anything-goes kind of thing, beyond the realm of allmon sense. Better not think too carefully about it.

    Into thisbyrinth, we could install the following traps:

    Poison arrowsVenom-tipped missiles that fly in from out of nowhere

    Poison swampsVicious-looking and causes damage and status ailments if you fall in

    Rotating floorsConfuse your sense of direction. Mapping is key, people!

    Moving floorsRunning by themselves. Pretty scary.

    ded wiresStrung at neck level along the path, neatly slicing off your head if you walk through without noticing. Lethal if paired with a moving floor.

    PitfallsCauses falling damage and pangs of fear once you see whats waiting for you down there

    Mimic chestsThink you found a treasure? Sorry, its me!

    Exploding chestsThink you found a treasure? Kaboom!!

    Magic roomsHello! About time some prey stepped in.

    Closed roomsStart a fire inside one, and

    Dark levelsItsmon sense to bring a torch with you, right? If you didnt, I can sell you one at an exorbitant price.

    Low-ceiling levelsYou sure dont want to run into a monster when youre crawling on all fours

    Levels with special ground effectsWhoa! Whats a volcano doing in thisbyrinth?!

    and so forth. Combine them, and you could implement pretty much anything imaginable.

    Nice work, Ramiris. You can craft these kinds of traps with your skill?

    Sure can! As long as its within thebyrinth, I can set up nearly anything!

    She was probably right. We were on the hundredth floor right now, but theposition of gases in the air was little different from the surface. Everything she aplished with this reminded me once again of the power of Mazecraft.

    By the way, she asked, whats this closed room thing? Does that count as a trap, really?

    I gave her an evil grin. Well, in the air, theres this gas called oxygen. People, and most living things really, breathe this to bring it inside their bodies, although sometimes you see exceptions like me or Veldora. If theres very little oxygen in the air, taking a single breath could asphyxiate youand maybe even kill you instantly. So you gotta be careful in rooms like that. Thats the golden rule.

    Simply sealing off a room is not terribly dangerous, but if you start a campfire or something, you could drain all the oxygen from the space and even rece it with poisonous gases. Best not to leap right into any old room you find inbyrinths or hidden areas, you know? You need to analyze the atmosphere inside first, asking whether theres poison gas and measuring the oxygen content. Thats Adventuring 101 right thereif you cant do that, youre not gonna live for too long. This world runs off magic, so you ought to at least have wind-based magic to circte the air around.

    I exined all this to Ramiris in the easiest terms I could think of, but she didnt really get it.

    My. Certainly sounds like a mean trap anyway. If it doesnt affect us, I suppose I dont have to worry about it. But you Youre scary sometimes, you know that? Youve always given me that impression. But youre still a great guy to have around! I sure never wouldvee up with this

    Once she knew it couldnt hurt her, she was all smiles. I appreciated thepliment, although it embarrassed me a little. A fellow gamer back in my old world would be well used to traps like this. But this was real, not some theme-park attraction. It put real lives on the line. I had no idea how many days itd even take someone to conquer a dungeon like this. Was it possible in two or three? Plus, if the walls and geography were constantly changing, youd probably opt to storm multiple levels at once to reach the save point at every ten floors. Someone like meinvincible to poisoning, no need to breathe or eat or sleepcould treat it like a footrace, but normal people couldnt. Even heroic champions needed to rest now and then.

    I had to admit, thisbyrinth was starting to look pretty forbidding.

    Hey, you think this dungeon might be a touch too difficult?

    Really? Veldora replied. I fail to see the problem.

    Yeah, Rimuru! This is no big deal at all!

    Ramiris and Veldora were justughing it off. Maybe Im fine after all, I said to myself as I switched my focus to maze design.

    Several days passed. Ramiris buzzed around, crafting all the traps wed need, and Beretta and Treyni installed them for us. Veldora and I, meanwhile, brainstormed ideas for the mazes,ing up with several patterns and setting them up so we could easily change them in and out. Things were going smoothly, but once we began considering the ground effects we could add to floors, Ramiris brought up an issue.

    Oh, no, I cant do that. I dont have the massive amounts of energy itd take to keep it all going!

    She quickly threw in the towel, and she had a point, admittedly. Basically, I was picturing floors where youd potentially run into natural disastersfires, floors covered in ice, howling winds. I guess volcanoes were asking a bit too much. I was assuming we could do anything with magic without considering the practical issues.

    Yeah Sorry, Ramiris, I apologized, throwing in the towel. I probably went too far

    Well, how about we find some Fire or Frost Dragons, tame them, and bring them in here? I could even catch em for ya!

    This voice sounded familiar to me. It belonged to someone who shouldnt have been here. I turned around to find a pair of tinum-pink pigtails framing a face staring right at me. It was Milim.

    Uh What are you doing here, Milim?

    This was, I remind you, the hundredth floor, the bottom of a freshly designed dungeon. It wasnt open to the public; there shouldnt have been any way to get inside. So why was the demon lord Milim grinning at me in here? (Raphael apparently noticed her but didnt report to me about it because she didnt pose a threat. I know I gave the initial order, but maybe I should reconsider. Raphael was so inflexible like that. It annoyed me.)

    But that could wait. I had Milim to deal with.

    Ha-ha! She met my eyes as she stood proud, sticking out her nonexistent chest. You looked like you were doing something interesting here, so I stopped on by. You got guts, yknow, trying to shut me out of the fun!

    Her wardrobe was as revealing as always, but it actually covered more of her body than before. Shuna and the goblinas had been designing her outfits, so maybe shed developed a shred of fashion sense. The massive Dragon Knuckles dully shining on her hands didnt match too well, though.

    Very Milim-like was all I could say. She really was still a kid. But I didnt mean to keep her away from the action. If she wanted to help out

    Heh. Milim, huh? Veldora gave her a nce. This is noble work, performed by grown-ups; it is far tooplex for children like you. This is not a yground. Stay out of our way!

    He shut her down before I could even respond. This was work, more or less, but it sure didnt feel that way to me.

    My master is right! shouted Ramiris in a fury. Were on work duty right now, so go away and bother someone else for a change!

    s, Milim simply snatched the pixie out of the air.

    Ramiris needed courage to try that with her, but she also needed strength to back it up. Im sure not that brave.

    What do you mean, it looks interesting? I retorted. Im nning a huge festival, remember? And Im even gonna amodate the request you gave me in your letter, too.

    Huh?! You didnt ignore my letter?!

    Of course not. Im inviting demon lords to this event, yknow. Im not about to piss them off for no reason.

    Milim looked a bit peeved, although contented that I didnt forget about her request.

    Wait a minute, Rimuru! Ramiris shouted, livid about this treatment at Milims hands. Im a demon lord, too, you know! Part of the Octagram with you and Milim!

    Oh yeah, Ramiris, I didnt even need to send you an invite, huh? Not after you decided to just up and move here!

    What? You moved here? Wait a second Ramiris, are you living with Rimuru?!

    Ramiris began to a panic a bit. Y-yes! Yes, I moved here, okay? So the invitation doesnt even matter! Im not alone any longer, and Im living with Rimuru and everything, too!

    Great. Panic or not, that statement was bound to be misunderstood.

    Aw, thats no fair! I wanna live here, too!!

    Ha-ha! Tough luck! Ive got a job here, remember? Im helping out Rimuru! Im not some overbearing, unwee houseguest like you!

    What? How dare you say that! Why, I oughtta

    Milim was ready to duke it out right now. Ramiris, despite how hopeless her chances were, refused to stand down. Me? I just watched it unfold.

    Fortunately, this was just a verbal spat, limited to the two trading insults with each other. Neither had the vocabry for this kind of contention, which made it kinda cute in a way. Ramiris asionally entuated her disses with a flying kick to Milim, who kept trying to grab her out of the air. It was kind of like a game of tag, and from the side, this almost looked like they were ying at recess. Apparently, theyve known each other for a while, so perhaps this was just their way of expressing affection.

    Their squabbling came to a close within moments, howeverShuna had just arrived with some sweets in tow, took one look at the two demon lords, and shot them a firm rebuke.

    No sweets for anyone whos bickering!

    That immediately shut them both up.

    A couple slices of caketer, and everything was roses. They were awfully chummy nowbut more importantly, I needed to grill Milim over why she came here in the first ce.

    So, Milim, what are you doing here? I asked.

    Hee-hee! I told you! You looked like you were up to some fun stuff!

    Um, is that really it?

    Uh-huh. But now Im really d I came. This cake tastes so good, and I like what youre doing with thisbyrinth. I had no idea Ramiris could make herself so useful!

    Ha! Sure showed you, huh? Ive got untold powers at my disposal, you know. You just never noticed!

    You didnt, either, Ramiris, I thought. Butman, Milim really has a keen nose for underground scheming like this. You literally cant hide anything from her. She had two exdemon lords in Carillon and Frey to deal with, but she still had the time and wherewithal to look into stuff all the way over here. Logic just didnt work with her. She shouldnt be able to get in here, but maybe it wasnt unusual at all for Milim. Maybe I shouldnt have been surprised.

    All right. We have had our dessert How about we get back to work? You can enjoy this, too, Milim, if you stay out of the way.

    Veldora was being unusually mature and amodating. Come to think of it, a fight between him and Milim would be a serious problem. Milim was going easy on Ramiris, I could tell, but itd be a different story with this dragon. If they started to tangle, this wholebyrinth would fall apart. Good thing she was on Veldoras good side for now.

    Noint there, Master, Ramiris said. She and Milim actually got along pretty well, in my eyesthat fight just now mustve just been some friendly teasing.

    All right! eximed an excited Milim. I wont get in your way. Gimme all the work you want!

    I figured I was safe in epting that offer, but one concern remainedsomething I needed confirmation for.

    Well, I dont mind if you join in, but

    Great! This looks like so much fun! I wish you called for me back when you were nning it!

    Right, right. But Milim, what about the people working under you? Did you get permission from Carillon or Frey toe here?

    She was a free spirit, to be sure, but she was also a demon lordone with two exdemon lords in her stable and all of ymans oldnd to rule on top of her own. Even with Carillon and Frey running things in her territory, she had to be a lot busier than before. Did she really have the time to go poking around my domain for fun?

    Huh? Me, you ask? Hey, I got talented people working under me, so I got time for projects like this, yeah. Id just get in their way if I bothered them. Besides, I had a fully valid motive for this na desire to attract more visitors to Tempest. This wasnt ytime for me, I promise.

    But who cares about me? Milim was the issue right now, and my question had just caught her out.

    Wellyknow. Im really smart and stuff, so Not like I ran away from my ce cause I dont like studying or anything!

    Aha. Frey mustve been researching the state of Milims domain and teaching her about it. That mustve bored her so badly that she fled her own country.

    Wait, no! she blurted out before I could even answer. Dont say it! Im staying here and helping you, and thats that!

    Sharp as a tack, that girl. I should really contact Carillon or Frey about this, butah, who cares? Not like theyll get angry at me. Ill just pretend I didnt know any better.

    But back to what she said earlier

    All right! Thats your mess to clean up, as far as Im concerned. Youre the one whos gonna get yelled at, not me, I said to her. But what about those dragons you mentioned? You said you could bring them over and tame them? Is that really possible?

    Huh?! Y-you really think theyll be angry at me? Um Eh, whatever. Its not an adventure without a little danger, as they always say!

    She was acting like a child willing to do anything to avoid doing their homework. But that was the path shed decided to take, and I suppose it was my job to watch over her. She mayve been conflicted over it, but she elected to goof off anyway.

    But dragons, huh? Sure, you can tame em. I can do it for ya, if you want!

    Now her mind was entirely on our project, talking about taming dragons like it was catching butterflies with a. I couldnt ask for anything better.

    Youll do that for me? So what types of dragons are there? Will they be anything like Veldora, or?

    Hey, if shes offering, then Im happy to take her up on it. I kept my questions pretty casual as a result, but Milim and Veldora were quick to respond almost in unison.

    Um, Rimuru, those are twopletely different things.

    Very different, Veldora intoned. I will not allow you to bunch me in with those lizards the way Luminus does!

    They both had strong objections that then segued into an equally intense exnation of the nitty-gritty of dragonkind.

    The draconic species of this world is nothing more than monsters created from broken-down elements in the body of Veldanavamy elder brother, the Star-King Dragon, and the most powerful of our kind, Veldora began.

    Basically, the difference between regr dragons and Veldoras kind involved the difference between a material life-form and a spiritual one. Regr dragons, as monsters, have a physical presence in the world. They were called dragons since they resembled the ones of myth and legend, but in essence, they were closer to dinosaursbig, mean lizards.

    There were only four True Dragons in the history of the world, three of which currently existed. The Star-King Dragon VeldanavaVeldoras older brother and Milims fatherperished following certain unspecified events, and he hadnt shown any signs of reviving ever since. Dragons had eternal life, so something really serious mustve gone down with that guybut that was outside the scope of this conversation.

    Veldanava was the origin of the monsters known as dragonsor to be exact, the Spirit Dragon that he gave Milim as a pet. With what I heard from Elen before, I suppose this Spirit Dragon died and subsequently became a Chaos Dragon, and then the essence of its body spread far and wide. The remnants of this essence were still birthing Lesser Dragons to this day in areas with high magicule concentrations; if you had enough bits from the Spirit Dragon to work with, they could even create Arch Dragons.

    The most powerful among these Arch Dragons were called Dragon Lords, which came in four types depending on the element it was affiliated with. These Dragon Lords, who boasted human-level wisdom, had spent several centuries as Arch Dragons before making the evolution, and with their strength, they could tap into some of the powers of the original Spirit Dragon. With their extended life spans, Dragon Lords were a step closer to spiritual life-forms, although they couldnt resurrect themselves from death the way Veldora and his ilk could.

    The Sky Dragon I defeated a while back was one of these Arch Dragons, ssified as a Cmity-level threat. A Dragon Lord would be even stronger than that, maybe up to a demon lords powersabout as strong as yman or a high-level spirit. That level of magicule energy should be more than enough to wrangle the floor effects I wanted for thisbyrinth of mine.

    Whoa, whoa, whoa, Milim interjected. I may be incredible, but not even I can tame a Dragon Lord!

    Getting an intelligent being like a Dragon Lord to cooperate with us would be pretty fruitless, now that she mentioned it. Maybe we could get one to agree to the job if we asked them nicely, but it wasnt that worth it to try, I thought.

    Guess not, huh? So whatd you mean when you said you could catch one?

    Well, there are some Arch Dragons with elemental attributes to em, even if they arent quite Dragon Lords. If we catch some and let them run free in this dungeon, theyll eat up the magicules and change thendscape around them, I think.

    I see. Dragons were in the habit of creating nests for themselves, so wherever they decided to set up shop, theyd transform the local environment for us. We had tons of magicules for them to chow down on, so no issues there. Lets go with Milims offer.

    All right. Can you do that for me?

    You got it! Ill grab you one from each type, right on the cusp of bing a Dragon Lord.

    As she exined, dragons derived from that original Spirit Dragon came in just four types. At the top of the pyramid, you had your earth, water, fire, and wind Dragon Lords, with the element-infused dragons below them. They also came in four types, known as Earth Dragons, Frost Dragons, Fire Dragons, and Wind Dragons, respectively. The Sky Dragon I tangled with was a rarer case, a would-be evolution into a Wind Dragon that missed the mark for some reason. There was no sky type to these guys, unlike with elemental spirits, although there were other variations and special typeslittle things that asionally made the resulting dragon unique, kind of like with humans.

    This sounded like the perfect engine for giving ourbyrinth some nature-based spice. Lets put those dragons in the deeper floors once Milim picks them up. These element-infused dragons, by the way, were stronger than offshoots like the Sky Dragon, maybe a Special A in terms of rankingnot a match for Charybdis, but still packing a big punch. I hadnt really thought about it, but I supposed one of those rarer offshoots would be a good, even match for six pdins. Upgrade that to an element-infused one, and youd need a whole Crusader toon to stand a chance, apparently But hey, this is my dungeon, and I get to decide what goes in there.

    With spirits, the five elemental attributes work like this: Earth is strong against sky, sky against wind, wind against water, water against fire, and fire against earth. This, however, didnt apply to dragons. Battle experience was more important than elemental attributesin essence, older dragons were stronger than younger ones.

    As a result, I decided to order the elemental floors like so:

    Floor 99: Fiery Hellscape

    The final challenge, encased in raging mes. Fire-resistant equipment is a must. What could be waiting beyond?!

    Floor 98: Icy Grave

    Keep moving or die instantly. Will your cold-resistant equipment be able to save you from this?

    Floor 97: Electric Skies

    Lightning rains down from above. Only luck can decide whether youll survive or get singed!

    Floor 96: Raging Earth

    A punishing quake sorely tests anyone who makes it this far down. Behold the blind rage of the dragon!

    These four element-themed floors would serve as thest challenge before the final boss, Veldora himself. It was perfect. I saw absolutely no way anyone could beat it.

    Not bad, Rimuru!

    Heh-heh-heh cing those half-breeds ahead of me, eh? I imagine youre trying to put adventurers off their guard with those also-rans before encountering my full might!

    Aw, why does Veldora get the coolest part? You oughtta put me in as that final boss thing from time to time!

    All three seemed to like the concept. Good to seebut we still needed to get those dragons worked out for it. ttering Milim ought to ensure shell get the job done.

    Youve already got a vital role in this, Milim. If it wasnt for you, this final set of traps never wouldve existed.

    !

    Hes right, Milim! eximed Ramiris, probably picking up on my intention. I really hope you can get some strong, mean-looking dragons for us!

    No problem, guys!

    She looked motivated enough. That was good. If I had the dragons, I had the traps I wantedand the way Milim described it, the dragons would do all the interior decoration work for me.

    Not long after, Milim set off to capture the dragons, thetest members of Ramiriss rapidly expanding band of underlings.

    A few days after Milims sudden visit, I had the traps set up across all the floors. The only thing left to do was wait for Milim toe back with those dragons.

    Man. Beretta and Treyni, you guys did a hell of a job.

    Oh, no, Beretta said, taking a step back and being modest as usual. This is all for you and Lady Ramiris.

    Exactly, said a beaming Treyni. It is a joy to work for the sake of my master.

    Ramiris herself was sitting on Treynis shoulder, and Treyni looked ready to carry out nearly any order she gave her.

    That wrapped up the bulk of the work

    By the way, Sir Rimuru, I still have these with me

    but then Beretta took out a Unique-ss weapon and armor set.

    Those?

    I received them from a golem in the service of yman. I was unable to give them to you earlier, but I thought, perhaps, they would make good loot for a treasure chest or two

    Oh, right. ymans greatest masterpiece, or whatever it was? Vi, I think was the name. Beretta stripped all the weapons from it, and he meant to present them to me, but I turned them down. He wanted to pay me off with that stuff so they could move here, after all, and I wasnt up for that.

    Werent you going to offer that stuff to Ramiris?

    Ha-ha! Ramiris said, butting in. Theres no way I could use it right, and I dont really care about it anyway. I think its a pretty fancy piece of weaponry, but thats about itnot much else you can do with it. So I talked to Beretta to see if we could make better use of it!

    Are you sure about this? Because itd be worth a lot if you sold it.

    Its fine, its fine! All part of my job! And Im gonna make a ton of money before long, so why quibble over the little stuff? Besides, we finally have somewhere to live!

    So the weapon and armor were mineand thus, I decided to put them to work for me.

    It was time to put the treasure chests in ce and see how thebyrinth was shaping up.

    From Floor 1 on down, we checked our work. That topmost floor was kind of a demo of things toe. I made it so even beginners could proceed without too much hassle; the chamber and its hallways were broad, wide, and hard to get lost in.

    Still, eight hundred feet to a side was big. I worried that people would spend all afternoon mapping out every nook and cranny, only to be rewarded with nothing. That might cause people to start dissing the maze, but with all the weak monsters prowling around, I figured thered be enough excitement for everyhe magic crystals and other useful stuff they dropped would make it worth novice adventurers time.

    I intended to buy this loot from those adventurers. There wasnt a Free Guild post in Tempest, so the nearest one would be Blumunds. Going all the way there could be a tall order for some people, so I thought we could function as a pseudo-Guild, epting their loot for discount prices and pocketing the difference to cover expenses. Or could I talk with Yuuki about building an official Guild post here? Maybe, but until that came up, wed kind of function as them with thisbyrinth.

    This was the basic scheme of things up to Floor 5; the mazes gradually got trickier, but otherwise, no difference. Floor 6, though, is where things got tough. The traps would make their debut here, although nothing truly vicious up to Floor 9, so nobody would die from them (probably). A seasoned adventurer would cruise past them. If I made things too hard too fast, itd discourage repeat traffic, and that was out of the question. I wanted to be kind with the first nine floors design.

    That all changed with Floor 10. Here, I ced a single monster who was, shall we say, kind of strong. In other words, this was a boss room. Defeat it, and a door would open to the floors below.

    What kind of monster did you go with, Rimuru? asked Ramiris.

    Ill decide on that once I see how these guys are spawning, but We havent seen any so far, have we?

    No, we had yet to encounter a single monster, all the way down to Floor 10. Veldora released his aura a week and a half ago, but it still hadnt resulted in any baddies.

    Understood. Even with his aura hidden, monsters can still detect the presence of the subject Veldora. Few would want to approach him.

    Oh. I see.

    I guess monsters born from the magicules you released can pick up on his presence. Theyre too scared to go near him.

    What?! So thats why! said Veldora, convinced. No wonder I never saw many in my presence inside the cave I was sealed in.

    I think its more like the weaker monsters literally couldnt take the heat from him. But regardless:

    Well, Ill figure something out. One way or another, I want just a kinda strong monster in here, ranked B or thereabouts.

    Hmm All right, said Ramiris. I dont want any unintelligent beings among myckeys, but if you find the right monster, bring it in here and put this cor on it!

    I epted the cor, which apparently let the wearer be resurrected even if they hadnt forged a formal pact with Ramiris. That helped a lot. It meant I didnt have to find a recement every time someone killed the guy.

    Wow, convenient. Thatll save us a lot of trouble.

    Right? Remember, in thisbyrinth, what I say goes!

    It probably did, too. Her skill let her change the effects of pretty much any item in here. I realized once again how much of a pity it was that I couldnt learn it for myself.

    That took care of the boss issue. The boss room formed the entirety of Floor 10, making it perfectly safe after the battle was over. Beyond the roomy a save point and a simple stairway down. And lets not forget about the treasure chest! The one in the boss room had no trap installed, but I did carefully adjust the rates at which youd find certain weapons or armor inside. In subsequent floors, however, thered be both hidden chambers and chest traps.

    Mimics would debut in Floor 20 and belowpretty diabolical, but thats the thrill of abyrinth like this. Being able to experience something like this in real life was something I thought I deserved praise for.

    But it wasnt all threatening stuff. With abundant magicules all over thebyrinth, the swords andnces found inside could start to get a bit magical themselves. Getting your hands on stuff like that was worth risking your neck a little, I thought. With a Resurrection Bracelet, nobody was going to die, so I figured revving up the difficulty would make it more fun and exciting. I couldnt wait to see how the adventurers would react to all this.

    Finally, we wrapped up our inspection of the first ten floors. Well, now what? Should we set up somece on this floor where you can sell the stuff you found or put it in storage for safekeeping?

    Oh? Do we really need that? Because then we wouldnt be able to sell any return whistles.

    Ah. Right. Ramiris actually had a great point. She was always sharp with issues rted to money, I guess.

    True. Not much point putting ones up in floors with save points. How about safe zones starting in the middle dungeons, say one every five levels?

    Oooh, that could work!

    We could offer storage for items found, sell healing potions at marked-up prices, and offer some simple fare to eat. Thebyrinth could have doors at regr levels that connected to a single zone, so we wouldnt need to construct separate zones all across the maze. It wouldnt be that much work to implement. Would more people opt to go outside when they needed a break, though? Itd depend, I suppose. Return whistles were meant as insurance, after all, so maybe we could price them on the higher side. I decided to reconsider that once thisbyrinth made its debut.

    As we chatted about this or thatbyrinth-rted issue, we continued to inspect each floorand as we checked out all the little details, thebyrinth slowly approachedpletion.

    Finally, we were done with the hundredth floor, generally satisfied with ourselves. To be frank, thepletebyrinth ventured far beyond mere viciousness.

    Based on the skills of the average adventurer, low-level monsters and abyrinth would provide enough of a difficulty level. Adding crafty traps and a legion of upper-level monsters, the term vicious seems rather tepid a description.

    Sorry? I didnt hear that. Raphael sounded a bit exasperated with me, but Im sure, of course, that I was just imagining it.

    Id learn not muchter that I definitely wasnt imagining it. Between working out monster cement and boss setups, I suddenly realized that thebyrinth was now full of monsters. Tons of them.

    Wh-what in the?!

    Well, toote now. This difficulty-bncing work wound up biting me in the ass, which I suppose I deserved. But no worries. Its important to leave little mistakes like this behind you.

    There was still plenty left to do, but I decided to leave the rest to Veldora and Ramiris, who were now even further motivated. Milim was kind enough to fetch those dragons she offered to bring in, and we released them on the appropriate floors, adjusting the atmospheric magicule count as needed. The dragons helped cull the excessive numbers of monsters being generated, too. We still only had our bosses worked out down to Floor 30, but that would do for now.

    The coliseum up top was still under construction, but the framework was gettingpleted at speeds I couldnt believe. It should be done in time for the Founders Festival, once the snow thawed. Thebyrinth below, meanwhile, was turning into a more splendid attraction than I had guessed. You needed to buy a Resurrection Bracelet to enter, but once you got one, I was sure youd be addicted. Hopefully it would remain one of our citys main draws as long as I hoped.

    There were still a lot of ideas left to implement, but for now, this was fine. I shed an evil grin at the others, sharing a nod with them. We had ourbyrinth all prepped and ready.

    Before long, our town started to see some new faces. The snow was melting away, and once it did, we began to see visitors from all over traveling to the Forest of Jura.

    The Founders Festival was near.

 Volume 8 - Ch 4

    THE AUDIENCES

    With everything running on schedule (to some extent), I returned to town. Veldora and Ramiris stayed in thebyrinth, and Milim was helping them out now that her dragon-wrangling work was done. The thought struck me that Milim might have to, like, go back and run her domain sometime, but I let her be. She was the one whod get chewed out over it, not me.

    Looking at the traps Iid, the three of them apparently had someints about the areas they were allowed to work out their final touches in. Until Floor 30, I really didnt want a lot of traps. Itd be pointless to sprinkle a bunch of dinky ones around, and if they got too sadistic too fast, adventurers would just give up. If they gave up too early, of course, theyd stoping.

    Thats why I personallyid out the traps for everywhere between Floors 1 and 50. Ramiris and Veldora were allowed to handle only the deeper levels. I suppose, though, that witnessing my cruelest traps mainly inspired them toe up with even more insidious ones.

    Yknow, Rimuru, I think I had the wrong idea, said Ramiris. Traps arent meant to be installed one at a time, are they?

    No fair! Let me invent some!! whined Milim.

    Yes, perhaps I was so focused on my overall might that I overlooked how best to install these traps, said Veldora. Lets approach this a little more seriously, then.

    I mostly let them be. I didnt have the time to deal with all this selfishness. Ramiris was allowed to do whatever she wanted with Floors 51 to 60; Veldora, Floors 61 to 70; and Milim, the trickiest part of thebyrinththe dragon chambers on Floors 96 to 99. The floors might turn out ridiculous, I knew, but I doubted any adventurer would make it past Floor 50 for a while toe, so I didnt see the problem.

    Floor 95, by the way, was where we decided to ce the beastman refugee camp. Id been considering putting some (very expensive) lodging down there for rest purposes as wenother idea I filed away for the future, after I saw how things went. As for the remainderFloors 71 to 94I left those in their default, untouched state for future purposes. They were fully infused with magicules, so you might see monsters show up down there, but otherwise, nothing of note. Everything else, the three had free rein over.

    A few days passed. While I was scanning the buzzing city streets, I spotted Mjllmile and his entourage heading this way. That was quicker than I had expected. He mustve packed up ande over in a hurry.

    Sir Rimuru! I do apologize we didnt make it here sooner. Im ready to begin at once!

    Ah, Mjllmile, thanks so much foring! Let me guide you over to your home here.

    I took him over to a residence we had only just recently built. I had asked Rigurd to get it done for him in advance, advising him to make sure it was move-in ready. I loved that guy. So well put together. Ask him to do something, and hell never let you down. I also wanted Rigurd and Mjllmile to say hello to each other, although Mjllmile already knew Rigurd from their healing potion business. Leaving the guide goblins and Mjllmiles servants to the house, I went with him over to Rigurds office.

    Excuse me, Rigurd.

    Oh, Sir Rimuru! And Sir Mjllmile as well. What brings you here today?

    He must have been busy, but Rigurd warmly greeted us nheless.

    Ah, Im sorry its been so long, Sir Rigurd! Your boss Er, Sir Rimuru here has always been kind to me in our business ventures, but today

    Before I could exin matters, Mjllmile skillfully took over the role. We moved over to the parlor, quickly getting down to businessthe state of arena construction, the lodging on the southwest side, the stalls wed build around the arena site, and more. We also talked about the freshly built Dungeon and using it to attract adventurers to town.

    So the Dungeon is all ready to go. Its notplete yet, but I think we can run it right now without any problem. The coliseums going to need some more time as well, but the main stage isplete. The VIP seatings done, too, all fancy and stuff, so I figure we can have the regr audience sit on sheets in the grandstand for now. Or make it standing room only if need be.

    We were short on time, so I had been procrastinating on that issue. The arena structure was still bare-bones, but I figured that could wait until Mildo returned. Even iplete, I think it had style, and I was also making sure it was safe to use.

    Rigurd and Mjllmile listened to my exnation with rapt attention, and we quickly lost ourselves in discussion. Rigurd epted the job of educating our citizens, ensuring they were fully able and ready to handle the people whod being in soon; meanwhile, Mjllmile had his own ideas for the arena and dungeon we had nned out, as evidenced by hismendably confident smile. We discussed it all, pointing out ws and trying to correct them, figuring out what we needed and what had to be on-site.

    Its a tremendous relief to see Sir Mjllmile with us on this, a smiling Rigurd said.

    Yeah, isnt it? Hes a pretty useful guy, you know. If this Founders Festival ends well, Im thinking about making him into our nations chief financial manager.

    This was important to me. I wanted him in charge of our countrys finances, and I also wanted him running our newmerce and publicity departments, doing all he could for Tempest. Rigurd nodded at this, promising to personally select the staff whod work under him. We had been asking the inns along the highway and such to keep track of their own ounts, but this was still an uphill process. Literacy rates had gone up thanks to Vester, but not everyone could read, write, and do sums yet. If we wanted to keep this nation going, wed really need people like Mjllmile. Rigurd, to his credit, seemed to understand that and was epting to Mjllmile joining my administrationand not just because I wanted him there. Maybe he knew that numbers were a weakness of ours. He seemed to wee him, even, outside of our current festival ns.

    I see. That sounds like a splendid idea!

    No, no, I still have much to learn. But I promise you that I will tackle our issues with every bit of strength I have!

    He was sounding modest, but I knew he had his heart set on this post from the outset. He had ambition, and as long as the Founders Festival worked out well, Id have no qualms about appointing him to the roles I hadid out.

    However, I said, youll still need to perform well for us. The others wont ept you otherwise.

    Indeed, replied Rigurd, although I am sure one word from you would be enough to convince them all

    Id like to avoid that. Honestly, if anything, I feel like Im too involved in this stuff right now.

    Maybe so. And the very fact that noncitizens of Tempest can take top administrative roles will serve as fine advertising. To achieve that, however, Sir Mjllmile will need to put up results that everyone can appreciate.

    You said it. Sorry to put all this pressure on you, but can I count on you for that, Mollie?

    That would be the tricky part. If this was just about strength, or something simrly easy to grasp, the monsters would easily be convinced. Diablo was a prime example; when I appointed him my second secretary, nobodyined about that at all. (Okay, Shion did, but thats because she cant take a hint.) Diablos strength was undoubtedly second only to mine; youd have to be silly to pick a fight with someone like that.

    In other words, when it came to military roles or the like, pretty much anyone could be an officer if I recognized their talents. If theyre strong enough for the post, were all good.

    That wouldnt work with the more bureaucrat-type positions. I imagine most governments have examinations and stuff for those posts, but sadly, we hadnt reached that point yet.

    Id dly wee experienced people like Vester, but again, they needed to put up achievements. Even Vester was still technically just a consultanta visitor, if you will. I wanted to give him a promotion to an administrative job, but first I wanted Mjllmile to prove himself at his. If possible, Id like them both to y a simultaneous role in our new system of government, bringing them on as ministers.

    But Mjllmiles confident smile banished my concerns. Heh-heh-heh Sir Rimuru, I hope you wont underestimate me that much. Just watch as I satisfy your expectations and make this into a massive sess!

    d I could rely on him. He didnt run the underground scene in his hometown with his mouth alone. That brazen attitude put my mind at ease.

    Heh-heh-heh Mollie, you have earned my trust. Make me proud!

    And even if you do make a mistake or two, Ill make sure it bes a sess in the public eye. Anyone who defies Sir Rimurus will shall face the might of my iron fists!

    Um, Rigurd, you cant do that. Thats why I want Mjllmile to do well for us, all right?

    Never fear. I will leave no evidence

    You are quite an impressive official, Sir Rigurd, murmured Mjllmile.

    No, please, I mean it. If you do anything, youre on your own, all right?

    Still, we exchanged dark smiles with each other. Rigurd and Mjllmile werent unfamiliar with each other; I trusted they werefortable with this rtionship. Knowing that helped me rx. And really, I didnt care why people decided to ept Mjllmiles presence, as long as they did.

    Now, to go back to our respective groups and prepare for the Founders Festival. Things were humming along now.

    That night:

    This is insanity This must be insanity! This is far posher than even the grandest lodging in Englesia!

    Mjllmile began shouting the moment he entered his new residence. He must have liked the ce. I was happy.

    There is running water, magic-driven burners, baths, and these toilets. Every advanced piece of equipment this town has to offer is avable to us.

    The ted servants report almost made Mjllmile faint on the spot.

    R-Rimuru Er, Sir Rimuru? Are you sure all this luxury is suitable for me?

    Hey, man, this alles standard in Tempest.

    Of course, given the servants he brought along, Mjllmile was living in arger mansion, not your normal kind of ce. I had taken note of his residence in Blumund and made sure we had something simr for him here. There were ten individual apartments, rooms with small kitchens and toilets. These were linked by arge shared bath and a dining hall, allowing Mjllmile to share this home with a decent number of servants.

    You needed this, right? This was cheaper than building separate homes for each of them, too. If anyone wants their own house, theyre free to save up for one.

    I couldnt build homes for them all, so I kind of reused a building we had set up for an administrator-level resident, but everyone seemed happy enough with it. The house came at no charge, tooI mean, with all the money I had made off Mjllmile, I really couldnt charge him. And that money was gonna keep flowing, too. This was a necessary expense, you could saya steal, even.

    Y-yes, true But this is the standard you enjoy here? Then what about the more economical lodgings in the southwest?

    Yeah, they dont get individual baths in the rooms, but they do get toilets. Theres a low-cost public bath nearby, and some of the inns have their own baths for free.

    I see Yes, you did talk about making this town into a kind of health resort, didnt you? Now it makes sense to me. So you offer this level of services to even themoners, not just the nobility or well-funded areas? Yes, we certainly can expect some adventurers here!

    Pretty easy living, huh?

    Not just pretty easy. This is the best youd find all around the West. If adventurers can find a steady ie in this town, were gonna have a lot of excitement pretty soon.

    Hmm

    ?! Ah! Right! Yes, Sir Rimuru!

    Er, what? Mjllmile was shouting at me again. I had no idea about what.

    Thats what the Dungeon is for! Well done, Sir Rimuru! I couldnt be more in awe of you right now!

    Oh. Um, yeah. Definitely.

    Whats he talking about?

    The adventurers can hunt the monsters in thebyrinth. I thought this was a bit of charity for adventurers short on work, now that the Forest of Jura is more stablebut heavens, you had thought that far ahead?

    Ch-charity?!

    I mean, yeah, there arent as many wild monsters around Jura as there used to be, butlike, the Dungeons just a fun attraction, so

    This can work. This can really work! Were seeing more adventurers out of a job, what with monster counts dwindling and all. Perhaps some can use the Dungeon as their workce. Plus, well be selling healing potions and adventuring gear nearby, right? Picture this: What if this town isnt just a tourist site or health spa, but somece where they can permanently reside? With all these inns providing fantastic service, a coliseum attracting tourists, and a dungeon providing thrills and a potentially decent wage

    Umwas that what we built the Dungeon for?

    I did intend to offer money for whatever the adventurers earned in there, but that was kind of like offering buybacks on carnival prizes. But was Mjllmiles line of thinking worth hearing out?

    Wow, Mollie. You only just came here today, and you already worked it out?

    Ah, of course, sir. If theres money to be sniffed out, Id never lose a single coin to you!

    Heh-heh-heh Youre incorrigible.

    Ha-ha-ha! Ah, dont be silly. It wouldnt be possible without you!

    But thinking and doing are different things, of course. I was hoping I could leave you to work out the rest of the n

    Oh, would you? Id be d to help!

    I guess the n was now to let adventurers work in the Dungeon, and Mjllmile was kind enough to ept the job. He already had a ton on his te, I knew. Talk about energetic.

    But Hmm. I didnt think that far, but I totally overlooked the idea of adventurers living here. To me, the dungeon attraction was kind of a gamblemaybe some customers would make money off it, but the majority would leave with their wallets pretty thoroughly emptied. But have a permanent group of adventurers hunt monsters in there? Theres no stopping Mjllmiles imagination, huh? I love getting his insights.

    Unlike forest creatures, there was no chance of overhunting and wrecking the ecosystem. Much better, really, to have the hunters cull the monsters numbers before they multiplied too much, then buy the materials they harvested from them. With Veldora around, there was no need to worry about where the magicules woulde fromthe monsters would be constantly replenished.

    This actually might be a brilliant idea! Itd give adventurers money to go spend around the city and help fill Tempests coffers, which would allow us to provide more support to them. We could process the materials they hunted for us, and I suppose we could even export them to other countries. Magic crystals could be shipped off as is, although we wouldnt export them allwe had our own uses for them.

    Maybe this would be the tipping point that made the Free Guild build a post in town, too. We could give them exclusive rights to the dungeon business, so we werent inpetition. And if they paid the adventurers directly, I thought, that would also open ess to foreign capital for uscapital we could use to import goods from other nations. With imports cut off from Eurazania at the moment, I wasnt sure the produce and grains we farmed would be enough to keep the adventurers full, so some imports might be necessary.

    Besides, I wanted Tempest to be a trade hub; that was part of the idea from the start, and I needed to think of ways to moverger amounts of goods and money around. There were ns in my mind. That was why I made sure the highways were designed to be pretty wide, after all. Wed paved only half the width of the roads; the other half was bare earth. I nned to put rails down on thatnd someday, and with the rails woulde freight trains.

    After that, I suppose it alles down to advertising.

    Mjllmile pulled me back down to earth before I floated off too much into fantasizing about my dreams. No, no need to go too crazy yet. Itd take time to develop rails, much less the trains thatd run on them. First, we needed to pull off this massive party without a hitch and make a good impression on the world.

    Youre right. This isnt advertising, exactly, but Ive sent out invitations to world leaders. Journalists from several nations are working with me as well, so I think we should see a pretty decent turnout.

    Oh? Good to hear, Sir Rimuru. I was just thinking that wed best start negotiating with royalty and nobility before the winter thaw if we want them to join in, but youve already nned ahead, eh? In that case, Ill contact therger merchant operations I work with and let them know about the festival.

    Could you do that?

    Certainly. Im already prepared to, in fact. I intended to send out messengers once I scoped out how things were in Tempest.

    Mjllmile grinned at me. He was so useful.

    Ah, my hat goes off to you, Mollie. You never leave a single stone unturned, do you?

    I could say the same of you, Sir Rimuru! The foresight youve shown with all this is a far cry from anything I could ever manage.

    Another exchange of knowing smiles. I think Mjllmiles far more of a schemer than I ever was, but Ill take thepliment.

    Sir Rimuru, he continued, turning more serious as he stood up, there is no way this n of yours could possibly fail. If you have what it takes to build a nation up this far, Im sure you could guide just about anyone to sess!

    Im not sure about anyone, but he did help put my mind at ease. I suppose Mjllmile was impressed enough by our towns food, environment, and creatureforts. Thats why he was reacting that way, and perhaps it was a sign of our future promised sess, even.

    I stood up and extended a hand to him. Im counting on you, Mollie!

    Certainly, he replied, gripping it in a handshake. From that moment, I was sure we had it in the bag.

    That night, we held a big dinner at Mjllmiles mansion. Afterward, he and I were rxing together over some tea when he whispered something to a servant and had him go fetch someone. This someone, or rather someones, turned out to be Bydd and Gobemon.

    I had thought Gobemon was staying undercover as he kept watch over Mjllmile. If he was here, had he introduced himself to the guy or something? And that wasnt even my main concern.

    Sir Rimuru, I understand that kind Gobemon here was sent to protect me?

    I thought about ying dumb for a moment, but I guess Mjllmile already knew he was here on my orders. No point trying to hide it.

    Well, yeah But, Gobemon, uh, whats up with your arm?

    I kinda had to ask. Half of his right one was missing, ending at the elbow.

    S-Sir Rimuru! Mymy sincerest apologies! He kneeled down, head virtually to the floor. I made a terrible mistake and exposed my identity to Mjllmile. This arm was my punishment, you see.

    I turned to Mjllmile for some kind of exnation.

    Now, now, Gobemon. Go on, lift your head up. Have some tea to calm you down.

    He sat Gobemon on a seat and offered him tea from a servant. Once we were all in ce, he turned to me and went into the story.

    It turned out that Mjllmile had, indeed, been attacked several times since our meeting. Mjllmile, being no fool, ordered Bydd and the rest of his security detail to redouble their efforts, but there were a few close scrapes that were foiled thanks to the assistance of an anonymous bystanderGobemon, in other words. There were considerably more assaults than I had nned for, and I guess thats how he got spotted. Mjllmile apparently figured he mustve been with me and kept pretending not to notice out of politeness.

    And then it happened. Viscount Cazac, whether he lost his temper or whatever, decided to get serious.

    So I left my business to a trusted associate and left for this country. Once I reached the highway, I assumed I was safe and nobody would try to touch me. But

    The highway was full of adventurers, traveling merchants, and patrolmen. I had teams clear the roads daily to keep them free of snow, so the winter hadnt slowed the flow of people much. An attack in such a well-traversed area was unthinkable, and even if it happened, our security team would be right on the scene. Someone like Mjllmile, who traveled the highways frequently, was fully aware of that.

    But as if to prove his confidence was misced, his party came under attack at a vige near the far end of the highway.

    A vige? You mean the one where Bydd tried to rip Um, where Bydd and I first met?

    Yes! The very same, Sir Rimuru!

    Bydd might have been Mjllmiles bodyguard now, but when I first met him, he was a pretty low-end swindler. It wasnt worth bringing up past drama, though, so I glossed over it. He had shown up to help defend Gobemon, and now they were both behind Mjllmile as he exined matters.

    As Bydd then exined, they were osted by a wagon painted ck, out of which popped monstersseveral of them, all ranked B. As an exC fighter, Bydd and his team couldnt do much, and they were all about to say their prayers but still did their best to evacuate the vigers and buy some time. Then Gobemon showed up.

    Yeah, that Gobemon guy saved all our lives, man!

    That he did, Mjllmile added. Not just me, but everyone who was there owes him a word of thanks.

    But I still failed

    Gobemon didnt seem interested in thepliment. He wasnt the sort to lose out to this monster band, and apparently he had dispatched them in short order. He then attempted to capture the criminal leading them, only to go eye-to-eye with a basilisk, a B-plus threat. It spewed petrifying gas at Gobemons right arm, and he hurriedly amputated it himself before it spread any further. That bought the ck wagon enough time to speed off.

    Failed? Meaning you didnt catch the guy behind it?

    Yes, but I let Mjllmile notice me

    Thats what hes talking about?!

    I dont really care about that. Your bodyguard duty was the more important thing. Plus, like, fix that thing, dude!

    I extracted a potion from my Stomach and attempted to hand it to Gobemon. He bit his lip, refusing to take it.

    No, this injury is the result of my inexperience. I was unable to defeat the basilisk by myself andpelled to seek the aid of Bydd and his team. It was terrible of me, and while missing an arm presents its difficulties, it will grow back over time

    What a stubborn goblin. Or proud, I guess you could say, but he was trying to do way too much by himself.

    Gobemon, are you embarrassed that you needed Bydds help?

    Wellmy job was to guard Mjllmile, but I exposed him to danger instead

    Hang on, Gobemon. Youre misunderstanding this.

    Am I?

    Yeah. Youre trying to do everything alone. Thats the difference between you and Gobta.

    That summed it up, reallythe ability to work with the people underneath them. Gobta never tried to do all the work himself. Even when fighting powerful monsters, he was always issuingmands to his team. For the easier jobs, he barely even lifted a fingeror maybe he was just deliberately beingzy, much of the timebut in terms of encouraging growth among his team, Benimaru called Gobta a bettermander.

    With Gobemon, if a strong monster reared its ugly head, hed leap right in front and try to fight it. I could understand his line of thinkinghe was talented, so this would make things fasterbut doing that aplished nothing for the rest of his team. And what if Gobemon fell? Itd leave his troop defenseless. Id be deeply concerned about their chances of surviving the encounter.

    That was the reasoning behind Benimarus evaluation, and thats why I wanted Gobemon to learn how to rely on others. Mjllmile was great at handling his people, and I thought using him as an example would help Gobemon grow a little.

    Thats exactly why you need to learn how to trust in your friends more. Im not saying to throw them recklessly into danger. Im saying that you need to conserve a little bit of your strength and give them a hand if things get hairy.

    II

    Everybody knows how strong you are. But thats not enough to lead a unit.

    ......

    Gobemon hung his head, and I took the opportunity to throw the healing potion at him.

    Ah?!

    The fluid spilled all over his right arm, which visibly regenerated before us.

    Gobemon, I want you to stay with Mjllmile for a while. You can train Bydd and his men if you like, or just chill out and rx for a bit. I doubt Mollie needs anyone to guard him in town, so take a moment to reevaluate yourself a little, all right?

    L-Lord Rimuru

    Because, I mean, none of us can really do anything by ourselves, okay? I think you learned that with your mistake there. Just think about what you should do next time, and youll find the answer, okay?

    I smiled at him, took the katana off my belt, and presented it to him. He froze, eyes wide open in surprise.

    Take it.

    B-but My mission

    Look, you got Mollie here in one piece, right? Ill be expecting even bigger things from you now. Treat this sword as a mirror into your heart, and use it every night to try looking into yourself.

    If Gobemon could get over his arrogance and pride, wed be able to rely on him more than ever.

    Yes sir! Your loyal servant Gobemon shall live up to your expectations!

    There was fire in his eyes. He always was a goblin of ambitiongiving him a goal to strive for should make the growth process go faster. I was sure hed live up to every bit of my expectations.

    All right, Mollie, you mind taking care of Gobemon for me?

    Ha-ha-ha! I dont mind one bit. I was just about to ask you the very same favor! Bydd, weve got Sir Rimurus permission. I hope youre ready for some training from Gobemon!

    Looks like he was already wee on the team. Gobemon was now a sort of houseguest of Mjllmiles, free to do whatever he wanted.

    Once I left the mansion, I looked at the night sky. The assorted constetions up there were twinkling bright, although none looked like what I saw on Earth.

    I wondered about that attacker, though. Was it really Cazac behind that? I doubted a nobleman on the level of a viscount had the resources to stage an assassination attempt with multiple monsters. And B rankers were one thing, but B-plus? Itd be impossible to tame one of those guys unless you were some kind of tycoon from a wealthy nation

    Wait a second. If you wanted to tame a B-plus monster, would money be enough to achieve that?

    Understood. Thegis, a summoner rated A-minus, once summoned a B-plus Lesser Demon. It is not out of the question for someone to tame a basilisk.

    Ahhh, summon magic could do the trick, huh? Thatd sure be quicker than carting the monster around on a wagon. But while Shunas barrier kept external magic from entering town, the highways were wholly unprotected.

    Better beef up our security, I whispered to myself as I set off.

    Mjllmile had been gracefully epted by the residents of Tempest. I introduced him to my administration, and Rigurd ryed word of him to the others, but really, it all went surprisingly smoothly. Looking at the way he worked for me after that, I could see why nobody wasining. In no time at all, he had a firm grasp of the people and resources he had at hand, delegating duties to both man and monster. Between them and the servants he had brought along, he had a full organization set up in no time whatsoever. Capable people are just different like that.

    As he managed this newpany of his, Mjllmile used his connections to send out invitations to VIPs worldwide. Powerful nobility from the inner countries, the wealthier merchants from each key city, the movers and shakers over in the Englesian capital, that kind of thing. Once the snow melted, the Founders Festival was going to be evenrger in scale than I had first envisioned.

    Of course, his organizational skills were also pointed in other directions: the performances for our new theater; the format and rules for our arena battles; the admission fee to the Dungeon, along with prices for the items we sold there; inventory and sales approaches for the stalls around the arena site. I was shocked this was a first for him; he seemedpletely in his element as he arranged all this. I introduced him to Veldora, too, and he agreed to work out the guys hibachi-grill concept with him.

    I definitely made the right choice. Out of all my crazy ideas, hiring him was probably the smartest one. Without his talents, there was a pretty high chance the whole thing wouldve crashed and burned. No way Id ever be this nimble with things. I was lucky to run into this guy, and as I watched him do his magic, I couldnt help but feel exhrated.

    Time sure flies sometimes, doesnt it? The whole town was in a festive mood now, the streets alive with energy and enthusiasm.

    Arena construction was proceeding well. Gobkyuu was proving an excellent foreman, and everything was still on schedule. Mildo, youngest of the three dwarven brothers, was also back from his break and adding his own touches to my blueprints. Now there was an aesthetic, even artistic value, to the structure. He was a real artist, indeed, and I sure wasnt, so this was a huge help. I was sure itd be more than enough to wow those jaded nobles. Plus, Mildos touches even looked like theyd be done in time for the first battle tournament.

    Mjllmiles staff also had their stalls open, selling to the workers in the area for practice. This was going well, too, generating business at a pretty decent clip. Neither of us anticipated any problems, which was a relief. The Dungeon, meanwhile, was in Ramiriss and Veldoras handsI wanted to be more involved, but I was rapidly running short of free time.

    Now the various leaders of the Forest of Juras monster races were assembling in town to celebrate (or maybe probe into) my new title. We had a series of audiences with each contingent scheduled across several days.

    They wanted to dere their fealty to the demon lord in hopes of obtaining protection in returnbut if they saw that the demon lord didnt have that kind of power, theyd no doubt bare their fangs at once and start rebelling. Under a powerless demon lord, thered be no prosperity, only a straight, downhill road to oblivion, and they knew it. Taking action to avoid such a fate was a matter of course.

    Until fairly recently, the whole of Jura had been protected under Veldoras absolute, irresistible power. That made the Forest an impregnable fortress, but now it was under the rule of a new demon lorda freshly ordained one, whose priorities and policies were still a question mark. Thatd unnerve any of the monster leaders, I was sure.

    So. Here I was, in the audience chamber we set up, being enshrined on my little tform, in full dress. As a slime. It made me feel like some kind of table decoration, a conversation pieceid out on a divine altar.

    I suggested just putting one of my Replications up there, but my team of advisers just smiled and said no. They had a knack for working together against me at times like this. My only guess was that they were using Thought Communication to talk to each other behind my back.

    So I let them do what they wanted with me, and they dolled me up so much that I couldnt even move. They even prepared special slime clothes for this day. It was exhausting. Several outfits, changed daily for meor maybe even morning, afternoon, and evening; I stopped paying attention. I wished theyd knock it off, but they kept talking about how I had to strike a dignified posewhich indicated to me that my slime form didnt look dignified at all.

    Ah well.

    Everyone participating in this presentation ceremony was dressed like they were members of a military honor guard. Every button was polished, not a wrinkle in sight. The pressure was intense, and in the midst of this oppressive atmosphere, Rigurd and Rigurjust as smartly dressedwere dealing with the envoys. I looked down at them, as instructed to do, without saying a word. Me speaking would ruin the effect anyway, so I was d I didnt have to.

    Benimaru and Shuna stood guard over me on both sides. Behind me was Shion, Soei, and Gabil, in a neat little line. Ranga, as always, was holed up inside my shadow.

    Over to the right was Gobwa and another hundred-odd members of Team Kurenai; the other two hundred were patrolling the city streets. They were all more powerful than our normal security team, so I took this measure so they could quickly handle any weirdos who showed up during the event. Shions Team Reborn in inclothes, meanwhile, was also keeping an eye on the town, ready to address any re-ups before they got out of control.

    Diablo and Hakuro, by the way, still werent back from Farmus. ording to Gobta, Ranga, and Gabil (who came home before them), they said theyd wrap everything up before the Founders Festival. Apparently, they were pretty disappointed that they couldnt see me make my royal debut like thisbut they had Yohms own coronation to handle over there. With it, Farmus would be reborn as a new country, and Im sure they had a million things to do, so I couldnt me them for missing out. Even Diablo was showing up here only on rare asions, and Hakuro didnt have ess to Spatial Motion, so I hadnt seen him at alltely. Id definitely need to thank them once theyre back.

    I wasnt the only one suffering right now. It was all so tremendously embarrassing, but I resolved to put up with it and get this stupid, exaggerated, bombastic presentation ceremony over with.

    What was funny was how each of the monster races reacted to me. I had nothing to do, so I sat there like the conversation piece I was and looked down at the assorted monsters giving speeches.

    Generally, the monster reactions were divided into three campsworship, observation, or fear. On the observation side were a few people who openly looked down on me. The new guys from the other side of the Great Ameld River were particrly notable on this front. But it was no big problem. Show off some of my strength, and Im sure theyll acquiesce to me.

    The monsters who feared me, however, were the real issue

    Here, for example, was a contingent of rabbitfolk in front of me right now, a race of demi-humans who were honestly pretty cutehuman, basically, but with long, pointy rabbitlike ears. Unlike lycanthropes, they were degraded beastmen, unable to transform and possessing the same amount of strength as an average human. The equipment they had on didnt look too sturdy, either, but they were all gifted in the Detect Danger skill, which Im sure was a must to survive in the Forest of Jura. My own cutesy exterior must not have fooled them at all.

    Um, tha-thank you for i-inviting us here today

    Dealing with someone who was petrified of you was kind of tough. Some of the rabbitfolk were visibly quaking, so we had to calm them down before they could begin.

    Very well, echoed Rigurds voice. You are hereby granted an audience with our ruler, the great demon lord Rimuru. Lift your head up!

    The rabbitfolk leader didnt move. Or maybe he couldnt. This darling little slime was simply too much of a threatening presence to look in the eyenot that I had eyes. But that wasnt the issue. I didnt want to oversee a reign of terror with these guys; I wanted a frank and open rtionshipbut to races like this, a demon lord who looked wimpy on the outside was nothing short of horrifying. Too much of a gap, I suppose. We had worked hard with guys like these, earning their support for our transportation and logistical efforts all over the forest. Maybe it wasnt possible from the outset, but I really wished I could interact normally with them sometime.

    The halflings and kobolds were like this when I firstunched the federation, although the kobolds started trusting us once we agreed to let them continue their merchant trade. Koby, their representative, and I were old war buddies by now, constantly sharing potential business leads with each other.

    These rabbitfolk were equals to me, and so was every other weaker race in the forest. Id just have to stick to my guns and try to exin that I didnt value my citizenry strictly on their ability to fight. Maybe they wouldnt believe me at first, but we could work it out. So I sat, looking at the twitching ears of the rabbitfolk kowtowing to me.

    There is nothing to fear. Sir Rimuru is a fair, generous leader, one who says he will treat everyone in his domain as equal. Please, feel free to share a few words with him, intoned Rigurd.

    The representative finally held his head up. He was young and fairly handsome, but there were deep rings under his eyes. Out of overwork or nervousness?

    OO great demon lord Rimuru, please ept the sincere loyalty of the rabbitfolk

    I gave him a firm nod. It seemed to relieve the guy. I could practically see a literal weight lift from his shoulders.

    See? Rigurd beamed. I told you. There is no need to be nervous!

    Haha-ha! Um, Ive actually brought my daughter along, but she got so restless once we entered town, Im afraid Ive lost sight of her

    Ha-ha-ha! Yes, the whole towns in a festival frenzy right now. I can imagine a young girl would let her curiosity get the best of her!

    Ah, this is so embarrassing I let her out of my sight for a single moment, and she runs away to who knows where. I had wanted to leave her behind in the vige, lest she offend Lord Rimuru, but she insisted

    This leader mustve been panicking about his daughter causing some kind of ruckus in town. So all those nerves werent just from being in awe of me? Thats good to know. I didnt want the weaker races any more scared of me than they already were. But a young rabbitfolk girl, huh? A prettyss with rabbit ears would be a sight to see, I bet. Hopefully Id get a chance.

    As I thought over it, I began speaking a bit more honestly than I perhaps should have.

    If shes that curious, then she must be taking in all the trends and different things around here, isnt she? I bet shell make a wonderfully reliable sessor to you.

    The directpliment from me visibly moved the leader.

    Suchsuch kind words, my lord! If I have the chance, I would be delighted to introduce my daughter Framea to you.

    He bowed to me. It seemed like we had broken the ice a little. Rigurd then briefed him on political matters a bit, and they agreed on the spot that the rabbitfolk were officially part of my domain. He bowed several times again before finally leaving the altar. Hopefully, I thought as the next visitor was brought to me, thisll show people that Im not such a scary guy.

    This visitor kneeled before me, turning an eye toward the other monsters seeking an audience. I knew this guyit was Abil, Gabils father and chief of the lizardmen. Seeing him reminded me of the good old daysor it would have, if he didnt look virtually like another person by now. He had transformed into a square-jawed warrior in the prime of his life. Giving him a name mustve evolved him to this pointto a dragonewt, one far closer to humanoid than before. Gabil sure didnt change that much, but Soka had gone almost entirely human, so maybe it depended on what the individual wanted.

    It has been far too long since west spoke, Sir Rimuru. It pleases me greatly that you have risen to demon lord, er, the status of demon lord, and all of us er, are

    Abil was acting oddly stiff. He was probably more on the worship side of matters. Gabil himself said demon lords werent that worth freaking out about. He already shouldve known what I was like, so why all the nerves?

    I tried to be informal with my response. Hey, Chief. Good to see you again. No need for the formalities here. Were all part of the same federation, right? Keep up the good work.

    Benimaru snickered, and Shuna sighed at me, but I didnt care.

    It is not that simple, Sir Rimuru. As a demon lord, you have grown into something extraordinary. You are not only our lord, but the de facto ruler of the entire Forest of Jura

    As always, Abil was too serious for his own good. But thats what I liked about him.

    All right, all right. There arent any other races in this chamber were in right now. You dont have to be all nervous. Your son, Gabil, is working hard under my leadership. Hes be a full-fledged part of my administration. I couldnt have done this without him.

    I decided to name-drop Gabil to ease the tension a bit, reminding Abil of his son and indirectly hinting that he ought to let him back into the family already.

    Ah, there is no fazing you, Sir Rimuru. So that no-good son of mine has been of service to you? Hes such an incorrigible fool, so

    He mustve noticed my intentions. The fact of the matter was, Gabil had still been kicked out of Abils family, so he mustve thought it improper to ask how his son was doing without some kind of prompting. Now that I brought him up, that wasnt an issue. I could already see his usual bold attitudeing back.

    Incorrigible? Hardly! Im having him lead our research and development department, and hes doing an excellent job for me. Arent you, Gabil?

    Wha? Ahyes !!

    Gabil, meanwhile, was frozen solid through all this, blushing all the way back to his ears, and when he was suddenly expected to join the conversation, his voice cracked.

    That stupid kid of mine

    As Gabil continued to work himself into a panic, I unleashed just a little bit of Lords Ambition. That was enough to turn everyones attention back to me.

    Abil, chief of the lizardmen Though I may be demon lord, I request your continued support as a member of my federation.

    It shall be done! By the name youve given me, I will never forget my allegiance to you!

    He bowed down, head nodding deeply at me. He was the ssic noble warrior, and he looked the part, even in this strictly formal setting. I nodded back, then nced at the still-panicking Gabil.

    ?!

    He can be so dense sometimes. I guess he didnt see what that nce meant. Im sure it wasnt because I was in slime mode and didnt have eyes, either.

    Rigur, exasperated, jogged over to Gabil and whispered in his ear. Sir Rimuru would like you and your father to speak to each other privately. If he doesnt let you back into the family now, you wont have another chance for quite some time toe, you realize? And having an estranged son aplishing so many great things puts Sir Abil in a delicate position, too, no doubt

    Nice one, Rigur. Way to perfectly understand what I meant, unlike Gabil here.

    The step-by-step exnation finally shook the fog out of Gabils brain. He saluted me, still a little flustered, and apanied Abil out of the chamber.

    Next up were the assorted high orc tribal chiefs, each with a little entourage along for the ride. They mustve trusted me enough to not bring guards in; the entourages wereposed of children and grandchildren. With their food situation much improved, life had inly gotten a lot easier for them. They were fathering children now, and these children were themselves high orcs, which surprised and ted them so much that they wanted to show them off to me.

    Well, why wouldnt they be high orcs? Apparently, that wasnt as much of a given as I thought. Normally, theyd just be regr orcs; the mutation into high orc was seen as a one-and-done kind of thing, generation-wise. With birth rates going down among them, theyd be able to devote more time and effort into raising each one, I imagined. I wanted to be sure of that, so theyd be the next generation of manpower for us. Children really are treasures, thinking of it that waya fact that remains true no matter what world, or species, youre talking about.

    I was a little concerned about how their names were being passed on, but apparently it was going well. I had given those names almost at random, but I guess they all sounded natural enough to them, sogreat? Its all about getting used to it, I suppose. Call someone anything long enough, and its bound to stick. They didnt really need names anyway, so maybe I was over-worrying it.

    Fully reassured, I saw off the high orcs and their entourage.

    Next came the final group of the daythe treants, the other major yers in the Forest of Jura Alliance after the lizardmen and the high orcs. Actually, the only individuals who made an appearance were the dryads Traya and Doreth, Treynis younger sisters. But hey, treants cant move anyway. No helping that. Besides, the dryads acted as the treants representatives, so no issues there.

    I had been visiting the treant colony on regr asions; Zegion and Apito had been keeping it well protected, and we were receiving regr shipments of high-quality honey from them. Thus, the atmosphere at this audience was pretty casual.

    Charmed to see you again, Sir Rimuru. Congrattions on being appointed a demon lord.

    We hope you will continue to provide us with your benevolent protection.

    They both smiled at me without hesitation. That saved me a lot of trouble.

    So we filled each other in on recent happenings. For now, nothing was particrly amiss. The only real concern to report was the thinning out of magicules around the Forest of Jura, which made transport a tad inconvenient.

    They both looked exactly like Treyni, and I could feel vast amounts of magical force in them, but apparently they were still affected by the lower magic concentrations around them. In fact, Doreth did look a little thinned out to me.

    Hmm I didnt think that far. Thats probably the magic barriers along the highways doing their work. Better think of something for that

    Oh, no, its not that serious a problem.

    We sisters use magicules to form the magical bodies you see before you, and they are merely more susceptible to the barriers, is all.

    But outside of that, Sir Rimuru

    We have important matters to discuss!!

    They didnt see it as important. Very few creatures around Jura would be affected by magicule concentrations like that, dryads and treants among them. Thus, since they were thest people I was seeing today, I offered to continue our talk in a private room that night.

    .........

    ......

    The moment I entered the room, the two spoke in unison.

    So what we wanted to talk to you about

    We wish to serve the beautiful fairy queen just as our great elder sister does.

    You know, now that I think about it, I dont like that fairy queen name. It was overblown, way too fancy for such a teensy little thing. And beautiful? I recalled a smiling Ramiris in my mind. No way. Not beautiful. We were picturing totally different things, I was pretty sure about that. If Ramiris was beautiful, you could describe Shizu, the base for my own looks, as a goddess. Im used to it now, but even I was a bit taken by my own appearance in the past.

    Benimaru and Shion, who joined me in here, seemed to agree with mebut Traya and Doreth paid them no mind.

    This is not just our opinion, but that of all the treants.

    And we hear that, in this very town

    Lady Ramiris has built her residence.

    If so, we can only hope to be of some service to her

    In their uniquely sequential manner of speaking, they begged me to let them serve Ramiris. If they had already requested a different master, thatd make it hard to ask them to serve me, I suppose. Besides, Treyni, their big sister, was already Ramiriss. I had no real reason to be opposed.

    Um, you wanna ask her?

    What?!

    Is that all right?

    The reaction was swift and forceful.

    So off we went to Ramiriss ce, where we found Beretta silently working and Treyni falling over herself to cater to the fairys whims. Man, Beretta must have it pretty tough.

    But as I thought that:

    Ahhh, Lady Ramiris, you are so ravishing

    As beautiful as alwaysand so elegant! The perfect master for us to serve!

    Just as before, Traya and Doreth were crying their eyes out over her.

    Treyni just nodded in response. I wasnt sure who they were talking about at this point. Elegant was one of thest words Id ever use to describe her.

    Did you hear that? Ramiris huffed, tossing her head. Heyhey, did you hear that? Better not look down on me any longer, you hear?

    Man, shut up. Now she was flying around the room, lording it over us as best she could with her size. Ah well. Everybody likes apliment. But judging by this, the answer to the dryads question seemed pretty clear.

    Well, Ramiris? I think all the treants want to serve you, too, not just these two.

    Huh? But

    Ramiris gave me a hesitant look. I suppose she still felt like a freeloader in my city. So I threw her a life preserver.

    How about we have them move into yourbyrinth? We moved the beastmens camp without breaking a sweat, so could it be much harder to move the treant colony?

    Or did the distance involved create an issue? I felt like she said she could build a corridor into the maze from anywhere she wanted

    Are you sure? She beamed, nodding at me. In that case, Ill head out as soon as tomorrow! Expanding thisbyrinth was a snap when I borrowed some power from my master, and I feel like Ive gained some power, too. Itd be kind of fun to make some of the empty floors into a jungle section!

    That part about borrowing power from Veldora concerned me a little, but whatever.

    But as creatures who live in the Forest of Jura, shouldnt they be ced under Sir Rimurus rule? Treyni pointed out.

    She must have been worried about that. But there was eager anticipation written all over her face. Clearly she would love to live with her sistersand like Ive said before, I had no reason to deny them. Ramiris did rule thebyrinth, a unique space with her living quarters and a zone left to my management. For the parts under her control, perhaps I should recognize them as extraterritorial from Tempest.

    I exined this to them, showing how I wouldnt question their moving here. Her rule over thebyrinth was unstoppable, and besides, itd be nice for them to be reunited with their original master.

    We, the treants and dryads, wish to reposition ourselves under the blessed protection of Lady Ramiris.

    We know it is selfish of us, but would we be able to receive permission for this?

    Theyd have it, of course.

    The treant colony would be ced on Floor 95, the level on which the beastmen camp was located. It was thergest floor innd area, a circle with a radius a bit over three miles, so we had space to work with. I was intending to build the rest stop on that floor, too, so this worked out well for that, too. People talk about how refreshing a walk in the woods is, and I didnt want our resting post to be this depressing, clinical thing.

    Moving day went pretty fast. It was more of a moving moment, really. Ramiris just opened a door to thebyrinth at the treants location, then moved them right inside. The actual process took a few hours, but all it took was opening a door next to each treant, so it was pretty straightforward.

    Now Ramiris had an even greater domain to rule over, and I had a more stablebyrinth to work with. Managing the magicules was much easier now, to say nothing of the air conditioning, and the treants couldnt have asked for anything more. Thanks to the high levels of magic concentration in the air, they were all brimming with energy.

    None of the beastmen living in their temporary quarters had anyints, either. Treants are generally pretty chill, usually asleep and looking like in old treesand besides, the beastmen would be going back to the Beast Kingdom sooner orter, so they didnt mind having some neighbors for the time being. If anything, they weed them, since it made the whole floor morefortable to live in.

    They had also extracted a promise from the dryads to help maintain thebyrinthor really, the dryads volunteered to help. Weve had a paradise made for us, so that much would be simple, Treyni said. Her sisters, and the other dryads, all nodded their agreement.

    .........

    ......

    With that, we had a small forest vige in thebyrinth, along with some very unexpected helpers.

    Floor 95, being a multiple of five, was a safe zone. Since we had a bunch of extra floors anyway, I decided to use Floors 91 through 94 as a storage site, a greenhouse for gardens, and a processing facility. To be more specific, Floor 91 would contain storage for metal ore; Floor 92, a nt for producing magisteel; Floor 93, a garden; and Floor 94, another facility for producing honey. There was also free passage all the way to Floor 95, which made movement easy, and the save point in the center of 95 included doors back to other floors above and a single, foreboding stairway going down.

    This was a pretty convenient setup, one that cheerfully ignored all thews of physics but still seemed to work just fine.

    By the way, defeating the boss at Floor 90 granted you ess to stairs down to Floor 95if you somehow made it this far, I was happy to give you a bit of a shortcut. Your final, hellish challenge would begin on Floor 96, and before journeying onward, youd naturally want to rest up and inspect all your equipment. I made sure to put up a door before the stairway down, along with a notice exining the dangers below, and I also nned to provide an inn and weapon/armor shop near the door.

    This inn would be connected to the other safe zones in thebyrinth. The doors were all connected, which helped with this setup a lot. The shop, meanwhile, could offer valuable equipment not avable anywhere else, all lined up in front for sale. We were unlikely to see much in the way of customers, so I imagined the shop would be more of a hobby of mine than anything else.

    I fantasized about putting some of my own creations in the shop down there as I decided to discuss my idea with Mjllmile.

    So after talking to monster species all day in the audience room, I spent much of the evening helping Ramiris and her new subjects with their move.

    This new floor we built would eventually blossom into a forested city of its own. We called it Labyrinth Citya final oasis for those who made it through the Dungeon, a fantastic town that granted visitors more power than they ever thought possible

    but at that time, I hadnt imagined that far down the line yet.

    My itinerary for the following day involved meeting with the rtively stronger species, including the biggest factions in my recently conquered territory. Guess most of em will be in the observing camp again, I thought, only to notice amotion in front of my audience chamber.

    A couple of different factions were having a verbal argument. Shuna was staring at them, scowling, while Shions eyes were shing with barely repressed rage. Hoo boy. Hopefully this all works out

    These were the bovoids and equinoids. They had each brought along about a dozen warriors, currently attempting to intimidate one another. It turns out they didnt get along too wellin fact, they had been at war for over a century. They were fighting to see who would get an audience with me first. I guess they thought being granted my protection ahead of their rival would give them a leg up, but I really didnt want to get involved. It was all just an annoyance to me.

    The two races stood by the door, keeping each other at bay. The situation looked ready to devolve into physicalbat at any momentand given their positions high up the Forest of Jura food chain, they were both intimidating presences.

    A magic-born with bullhorns spoke to me first. Ah, the demon lord! If you want a stout ally in battle, turn to us first! Let the bovoids join your side, and youll get to strut around the forest with authority! And once we wipe out those wimpy equinoids once and for all, you wont find any race in the forest to defy us!

    He certainly was bold, making this promation to me without a hint of fear, and he had the strength to back it up. He had more magical energy to him than the ogres and lizardmen I first ran into, thats for sure. Conservatively, Id say there were a few A rankers in the group. Youd need that kind of force to wage a hundred-year war, and in terms of pure fighting ability, they may have been the best the Forest of Jura had to offer.

    But before I could answer, one of the equinoids erupted in anger. Hmph! Fool! Any demon lord would have the perception to see that pairing with the equinoids is clearly the decision to make. Well destroy any race who dares to im otherwise, from those bovoids on down!

    Pretty harsh words. These guys sure were hotheadedand exhausting. At least the rabbitfolk were smart enough not to be fooled by my slime exterior.

    Buthold on. Yes, they were exhausting, but the moment Iid eyes upon them, I came up with an idea. Whatbyrinth wasplete, after all, without a minotaur or two?

    Those creatures were celebrated in Greek mythology, hailed as the stuff of legendbut in the early twentieth century, when people discovered the ancient temple of Knossos in Crete, they found aplex maze of passages, along with an underground section that suggested thebyrinth really existed. Maybe there wasnt a bullheaded maze guardian inside, but there were many bull-themed frescoes and such inside. Even back then,byrinths and minotaurs went hand in hand with each other.

    AndI had to say, the bovoids before me appeared exactly how youd expect a minotaur to look in real life. Their leader, a measurerger than the others, practically oozed with evil energy. Ourbyrinth was a little sparse when it came to bosses. I only had creatures selected for Floors 10, 20, and 30but this leader guy, I thought, had what it took to upy Floor 40 or 50. I wanted him, no matter what. I just couldnt fight the feeling.

    Unfortunately, these monsters didnt seem like theyd be too loyal to me. They probably just thought of me as a nice patron, or employer, to have. It was clear they wanted to leverage this rtionship so they could annihte their current foes. If I was honest with myself, that was the only conclusion to make.

    So I busted out just a little Lords Ambition on them. If they saw how awesome I was, maybe theyd get in line and Whoa. They didnt seem to notice at all. I was right in front of them, and theyre still ring and yelling at each other. Should I take more drastic measures and tame them down?

    But as I weighed my options, a clearly miffed Rigurd stepped forward. How dare you show such rudeness before our lord! I see that I, Rigurd, need to show all of you your ce!

    He was normally quite gentle, doggedly pursuing administrative tasks around town, but I knew Rigurd had secretly been working out. He was stronger than the younger guys, at least, like Gobta and Rigurand given his performance against the pdins when they attacked, he definitely had something of a warrior inside him. The way I saw it, he was stronger than the leaders of both factions here.

    What? Look at this bureaucrat who thinks hes the lord of all things!

    We dont need some demon lord flunky to bad-mouth us!

    The leaders quickly barked back, while their younger hangers-on bleated their agreement.

    Ive had people look down on me before, but I dont think Ive ever been treated this badly. Just a little Lords Ambition was enough to humble everybody before these guys. They were just so worked up, oblivious to what was going on around them. I thought being dissed was better than being feared, but if it gets this bad, I might have to reconsider.

    Still, a little lesson ought to help them see the light. Rigurd looked at me. I nodded, just about ready to give permission, when:

    Wha?!

    What on?

    Oh dear, some trouble?

    Hmph. Not a problem.

    We felt a tremendous wave of pressure from outside town. Someone had broken through Shunas barrier around it, and soon we felt the massive aura and vast magical energy of a monster No, likely a magic-born. Judging by this act, we doubted this guy was here to make any friends. The bovoids and equinoids might not have noticed my Lords Ambition, but they sure noticed this, judging by their panicked gasps.

    Such power

    Wh-whoa, Demon Lord, are you getting attacked by another of your kind?

    Up until now, the Forest of Jura had been protected by a pact between the demon lords. These guys here talked a big game, but they were in way over their heads. Against a real threat, they had to face up and admit how powerless they really were.

    I no longer had time to deal with them. I hated to throw out the idea of having them serve as bossesit just felt so epic to mebut there were other things to do. Instantly, I transformed into my human form and shouted Lets go! to Benimaru and the rest.

    Yes sir!

    As you say.

    I ran toward the source of the disturbance.

    .........

    ......

    Upon reaching the site, I saw ten or so members of Team Kurenai surrounding three men. Several security guards, gatekeepers, and Team Reborn troops were on the ground.

    Oops, I saw Gobzo among them. I was sure he gave them a fight, but it was crazy to even fight them at all. Meanwhile, the survivors were busy directing the townspeople and visitors to evacuation sites. They were acting just as theyd been trained to, which was nice. Things werent too chaotic yet, but I hated to see casualties this early on.

    I turned to the three men behind this. One was tall, well-formed, and wore an earring. The second was enormous, a virtual b of meat, and sported a nose ring. The third was smaller, but his frame going beyond merelyrge and venturing into heavy territory, and he had a lip piercing. They sported colorful hair in strange styles, which only added to their stereotypical street-punk look.

    You realize youve perpetrated this violence in the domain of the demon lord Rimuru?! shouted Shion, who had been following behind me.

    The earring guy stepped up, grinning fiendishly. Outta the way. Im not here to deal with minions. We wanted to rub out yman and seize his demon lord spot, but you got in our way, and were pissed off about it. I aint here to kill for fun, but mess with us, and we aint gonna go easy, all right?

    He was being rude and intimidating, but looking around me, I realized nobody was dead. Judging by the difference in magic force, if they hadnt been going easy, even Team Reborn wouldve been wiped out. He mustve been telling the truth, kind of.

    Maybe they werent as bad as they lookedbut if they wanted a fight, theyd get one. We were in the middle of my public unveiling as a demon lord. The Founders Festival was just around the corner, and we had merchants from all the world over going in and out. Itd be tough to let an incursion like this go withoutment.

    It was annoying, but so be it. Ill just have to take them on

    Wait, Sir Rimuru. Let me handle this.

    Shion stopped me from stepping forward. Benimaru was trying to step up, too, but I guess they had looked at each other and silently decided which would go first. The casualties among Shions forces were the likely decider.

    Oh, you one of the demon lord Rimurus aides? Dad told me about youthe ogre woman who whipped ymans ass? I like it. Lets warm up with you first

    Wait, Big Bro. Can we take her? You can have the demon lord.

    Fwehhhh-heh-heh! Yes, yes! Im getting hungry, you know. I could use a girl or two right now!

    Sounded like they were all brothers. The earring guy mustve been the eldest, and their dad told them about not just me, but Shion and ymans battle. Their father mustve been either a demon lord or a close associate, but judging by their energy levelseach equivalent to a pre-awakened ymanI assumed the former.

    But who? I immediately crossed Guy, Milim, Ramiris, and Luminus off the list. That left Daggrull, Deeno, or Leonbut thest two seemed pretty unlikely. Was Daggrull my prime suspect?

    Shion, meanwhile, took a step forward. Silence. Sir Rimuru is busy with his audiences right now. To save on time, I will handle all three of you at once.

    Huh?

    Whoa, are you picking on us?

    I wanted to go easy on a girl, but forget it. Im gonna make you cry, I swear.

    Fweh-heh-heh, that sass is like a punch in the gut. I bet youre gonna make me feel the fullest Ive been in a while!

    I groaned. Taking on three foes more powerful than you at the same time was insanely reckless, even by Shions standards. I tried to stop her, but this trio was already far too worked up to call time-out. Why does Shion always get so freaked out like this?

    B-Benimaru?

    Just let Shion do what she wants. If were going easy on them, Shion is more suited to that than I am.

    His casual response stunned me into silence. Guess Id just have to give up. I decided to believe shed win and just let her have her fun.

    That said, I didnt want my town wrecked. I suggested that we all move elsewhere, and surprisingly, the trio agreed to it and followed me, curiously checking out their surroundings as I led them into our freshly built battle arena.

    Whoa,dy, earring guy said. You got guts, Ill admit that, but if you wanna take back what you said, nows the time.

    Let me show you magicules arent the only deciding factor in a battle! she snorted back.

    I remember a certain red-colored ogre saying something simr a while back. But regardless, we now had an audience of rubberneckers here in this arena, ready to watch Shion fight off these three would-be pretendersing for my throne.

    Shion wiped the floor with them.

    The fat guy with the lip piercing moved far more nimbly than looks would suggest, charging at Shion like a cannonball. Shion just kicked him away and sent him flying straight into the earring dude. Then, seizing that single open moment, she plunged her fist into the stomach of the nose-ring man, too stunned to react in time. Grabbing earring man by the arm and cor, she executed a perfect judo throw on him, smashing his head against the stone floor. Hey there, motionless.

    Arrrgh! What did you do to my brother?!

    The fat man with the lip piercing grabbed Shion from behind, attempting to lift her up. Shions brute strength stymied him.

    Wh-what the?! But Im so much stronger than you!

    Shion red at the man and snickered. Shifting position, she locked arms with him, and the test of strength began.

    Hnnnnnnggghh

    Snap!

    Sadly, it wasnt long before the fat mans arms both bent in ways they shouldnt have. They were all magic-born, so I figured theyd be all right, but judging by the way he was screaming and writhing around, it mustve done a lot of damage.

    But Shion didnt even take a moment to marvel at her work before another pistonlike fist mmed home. Before the fat man could shout anything else, shended a one-two finish on him like none other. The earring guy attempted a screamer of a kick on her body, but Shion simply bent backward and let it whiz past her. But the guy was smiling. His leg, still in the air, came down like a vicious battle ax, aimed squarely at Shions head.

    There was a loud, dull thuddd! Shions stonelike head had just shattered the mans leg. She executed a low kick to shatter the other one and sent him crashing to the ground. Without missing a beat, Shion straddled him,nding a flurry of punches on his head and body.

    That sealed the deal.

    Without even needing to take out her enhanced Goriki-maru sword, Shion had beaten the crap out of those three guys. Clearly, she had grown stronger. Smashing these opponents, all of whom equaled or beat her in magic force, didnt even quicken her breathing. And she took all three down at the same time, no less.

    B-Benimaru?! Shions?

    Yes, this is quite a surprise. I see she went quite easy on them after all.

    Thats not what Im talking about! This isnt Milim there, on the arena stage! Benimaru clearly had a different definition of going easy than me. That wasnt at all what I meant, butah well. No point wasting my breath.

    Seriously, though, Shions amazing. No joke. She just proved that you can easily overwhelm an opponent otherwise your equal through prudent use of your magical force. Whipping yman mustve helped her grow a lot. Benimarus non-reaction to it indicated he was expecting this all along, too.

    I didnt like it much, but Shion was now as powerful as an exdemon lordand by definition, Benimaru as well. Hell, maybe even Soei and Geld. Or maybe Im overthinking it? Watching Shion grow must be wrecking my mind or something. Or not. Better stop thinking too much about it.

    Im sorry, was that not enough?

    Shion must have been taking my disturbed look wrong, as she eyed the three heaps sprawled on the ground.

    No, no, thats fine! I hurriedly shouted. That was more than enough, yes. And if you guys have had enough, then stop getting in our way! Also, the other demon lords are even worse than that, so try not to fall out of line again, okay?

    The earring guy (the first to regain consciousness) rapidly nodded. That advice was for their own good, really. I guess they got cocky enough to think they could take on a demon lord, but good thing they picked me first. If they went to someone else, their punishment wouldve been a lot harsher than Shions.

    You guys are even stronger than Dad said, the earring guy muttered.

    So Rimuru himself is?

    Yeah Hes even better.

    Fwehhh-heh-heh! Im getting hungry.

    Now all three beheld me with respect. One of them was still acting a little strange, but no point worrying about it. I really didnt want to bother with them any longer, but I felt it prudent to at least look into their backgrounds.

    So who pointed you here?

    I hoped they would be honest with me. I didnt have to hope for long.

    Ah yes! Were the sons of the demon lord Daggrull. I am Daggra, the eldest.

    I am Liura, the second oldest.

    And Im Chonkra, the youngest!

    Just as I thought.

    Um, you sure you want to be so open with your identities like that?

    Sure, Daggra replied. Dad actually ordered us to go train under you, the demon lord Rimuru.

    We kind of caused a ruckus back home, and he got royally mad

    Fweh-heh! So he kicked us out!

    That wasrefreshingly honest of them. So basically, Daggrull had had it up to here with his problem children, so he was forcing them on me. What the hell? Its not like we knew each other that well or anything. Where did he get off?

    But maybe I could make him owe me a favor now, huh? Its not like we were that stable of a presence yetI didnt think it wise to make an enemy out of one of the strongest people in the world. Plus, while I didnt want to spend another minute with these guys, I had the perfect drill sergeant in Shion right here. Id seen her train Gobzo and the others, but she was so mean to those guys (way worse than Hakuro, even) that it had taken me aback a bit. If I left them to her, I figured theyd get sick of it and run awayand if they did, hey, Id held up my end of the deal. Daggrull would have no right toin.

    All right. Lets have you train under Shion, then.

    I gave Shion a nce, knowing shed probably hate it but hoping she would take this ticking time bomb off my hands. But Shion nodded back at me with an evil grin. Wait a minute. This wasnt what I expected.

    Hee-hee-hee I have received my orders from Sir Rimuru. And trust meI, Shion, can even take a pack of weaklings like you and build you into first-rate warriors. You may follow me with confidence!

    I-Id hope for nothing else!

    Yeah! Were gonna do our best for you,dy!

    Me too! But can you give me something to eat first?!

    I was expecting some sass back, but Shion was pretty up for it. Which, okay, if shes cool, Im cool. I decided to head back to the audience chamber, hearing cries like Let us call you our teacher No, our master! and Ill expect all of you to follow mymands to the letter! behind me. I figured Id just ignore them for now.

    .........

    ......

    Back at the chamber, the bovoids and equinoids were now kneeling before me, visibly quivering. The younger fighters were following their leaders example, prostrating themselves as well. The high-and-mighty attitudes of the past were gone; now they reminded me of some of the weaker races I saw the previous day.

    Wewe were awaiting your return!

    Our loyalty shall forever be with you, Sir Rimuru!!

    I wondered what made them have a change of heart like that. Its certainly a new attitude,ing from them. I climbed up to my throne, reverting to slime form and expecting them to get huffy with me again, but they didnt.

    Do you mean it?

    Ofof course, my lord!

    Please, use our powers however you like!

    I guess this was a sincere change of heart. Judging by how frantic they looked, they really were trying to curry as much favor as possible with me. That little bout just now mustve shown them how scary Shion can be, huh? In that case, no need to hold back. Id have no qualms with taking advantage of these guys. They had been fighting for a century, which was really something I didnt need in my domain, but I suppose that meant they lovedbat. Would anyonein if I just moved their battlefield into thebyrinth?

    Well, by the looks of things, you guys have more power than you know what to do with. How about I prepare an arena for you guys to duke it out in?

    Y-youre going to forgive them? a saddened Rigurd asked. I was thinking I could provide them with their divine punishment for you, Sir Rimuru

    Yeahhh I had forgotten, what with all this nonsense going on, but both races had pissed off Rigurd pretty good. But I thought it better to give them a chance and see if they could be useful.

    Now, now, Rigurd. They were just ignorant of us, I think, so why not forgive them just this once? If they try that stuff again, though, go right ahead.

    If you say so, sir, I have noints. How good for all of you, hmm? If Sir Rimuru wasnt such a forgiving lord, you may all have breathed yourst just now. If you dare to defy us a second time, all that awaits is your final destruction. Give up your resistance and know your ce!

    I was d Rigurd got me, at least.

    Yeah, you guys are lucky, chimed in Shion, who was already back from the arena. If it wasnt for those unwee visitors just now, I wouldve joined with Rigurd to do you all in. Why, for all the unbearable things you said, I would have plucked your tongues out so you could never speak again! So thank Sir Rimuru for his mercy, and try to show some obedience from now on!

    The bovoids and equinoids all nodded, shaking uncontrobly. Wewe promise well live up to your expectations! Please forgive our disrespect! And given how they were acting, I could believe they wouldnt try it again.

    If you swear loyalty to me, I will consider it. First, though, stop your fighting and be quiet until you hear from me.

    I didnt need to speak to them directly, but I thought it best to be doubly sure. I wanted to invite the bovoid leader overter under one pretense or another, so I could negotiate with him about working in thebyrinth. Given the (unintentional) fright we gave them, he ought to be cooperative.

    Really, the chance at getting such a great boss for my project made all the stress of the day just fly out of my mind.

    The audiences went smoothly after that. Rumors of Shion taking control of Daggrulls sons spread like wildfire, enough to make even the powerful bovoids and equinoids lie low, so nobody was looking down on me now.

    I was hoping things would end on a high note, but

    Soon after, an elder from the elven race and a few of his men arrived. I say elder, but he looked like a regr young man to me. No women were among them, which was kind of a shame, given how gorgeousdy elves tend to be.

    Elves, of course, had a reputation for living practically forever. Both they and dwarves were originally spirits brought to physical life (or fallen from higher nes of existence), who became fairies and were eventually granted material bodies. Apparently, you could trace the genealogy of goblins back to the fairies, too: Fairies bearing the earth element eventually became dwarves; those with the water element became merfolk; fire became goblins; and wind became elves. Their ancestors were the results of fairies intermingling with creatures from other races long ago.

    Apparently, goblins had little in the way of fairy blood left, which made their livesparatively short. Even ogres, the next evolution up from them, only made it up to a hundred or so. When you got to ogre mage level, that reenergized the power from your spiritual ancestors, giving you skills that bordered on the divine.

    But back to elves. Their lives were said to span between five and eight hundred years. Even elves with human blood mixed in could make it up to almost three hundred. This could vary a lot, though, since the more fairy blood you had in you, the longer you tended to live. Elves grew into maturity around the age of twenty, and beyond that, the passage of time simply did nothing to them. Only when on deaths door did they suddenly begin to rapidly age, and in about twenty years, infirmity would finally take their lives.

    Staying young for a few centuries might sound like a dream to most humans. But another trait of theirs was how you never really saw them produce a lot of children. Living such long lives, they didnt have much of a natural inclination to keep their bloodline going. Thats why they still numbered rtively few. (Bear in mind, of course, that I learned all this from thedies at the Night Butterfly, a nightclub in the Dwarven Kingdom I was well familiar with, so I couldnt say how much of it was true.)

    By the way, fairies themselves still existedthey were prettymon monsters, actually. These were smaller spirits given monster form by the effects of magicules around them; they were about the size of Ramiris and had a reputation as pranksters. They had intelligence, but they couldnt procreate and didnt live long. The personification of a major spirit was a far cry from them, enough so to be ssified as a different monster entirely.

    Ramiris tended to be bunched in with these fairies, but she was actually something different. She was fallen from an upper-level existence known as a spirit queen, which meant she mayve been higher up the evolutionarydder than the ancestors of elves or dwarves. It sounded like she went through an eternal pattern of reincarnation, although it didnt seem like she understood the process herself too much

    But Ive gotten way off track. I lent an ear to the elder.

    It is an honor toy eyes upon you, he said with a salute. We havee here today to celebrate you and offer our heartfelt gratitude

    Normally, this would be the time when theyd offer their loyalty to me. Some of the racesthe initial entries into the Federationeven expressed their thanks at their safety being guaranteed. But this was the first time I had ever met this elder. I wasnt sure what he had to thank me for, so I had Rigurd ask for me.

    Ah, that would be

    As the elder put it, it had to do with the bad blood between the bovoids and equinoids. It turned out the biggest victims of their hundred-year war were the elves.

    ording to him, elves, a race that lives off the blessings of the forest, fear the expansion of war zones more than anything else. To protect their hidden enves from outside enemies, the elves install barriers that scramble ones sense of direction, but these barriers had fallen with the trees in the midst of the wars. Directional confusion didnt mean much, after all, if the enves were in in sight.

    They tried to move their settlements, keeping casualties as low as they could, but the war kept growing bigger and bigger. It made the forests animals and monsters flee for their lives, it razed the local fruits and vegetables before they could be harvested, and some elves even resorted to taking work in the Dwarven Kingdom. (I guess that was what thedies at the Night Butterfly were up to.)

    Over time, the loss of poption grew to be a crisis, making it hard to keep the enves going. Some of the elves considered making yet another move elsewhere, but asrge as the Forest of Jura is, it wasnt that easy to find a suitable destination.

    Thus, the elder continued, we considered appealing to those violent thugs to see if we could reach some kind of agreement. But before we could, my lord, the events of just now transpired. Now all we need is somewhere to move to

    Hopefully, as he said, that would convince the elves who left toe back.

    This gave me an idea. Somece to move to? Yeah, I got that. Right here in town.

    There were fewer than three hundred elves in the forest. At one point, there was a lot more, enough to build a prosperous kingdom in ancient times, but those glory years were long past. The elves were forced to turn nomadic, spreading to the four corners of the worldbut regardless, I knew a ce that could fit three hundred just fine. Remember that little forest I had just built down in Floor 95 of the Dungeon? There you go.

    I could even put them to workhelping Apito run our honey operations, cultivating rare nts that only grew in magicule-rich forests, maybe running the inn I nned to open on Floor 95. They could run the weapon shop down there, and if any monsters appeared on that floor (not that I expected it), itd be great for this town to have a little elven protection. I heard that elves and treants got along well, so I doubted Treyni or the others would be against this.

    Plus, with all the jobs on offer, I figured itd help attract the more distant elves back here. Maybe thedies from that nightclub would venture back, tooand then I could build an elf-run VIP room down there, maybe?!

    Yes. This was excellent. There was already a tavern in town, but that was more of a gastropub geared for adventurers. If you wanted somece for a quiet drink and rxation, youd have to go to our administration-exclusive dining halls. Im sure Shuna would be d to serve me in my own room, but I didnt need alcohol that badly. Im just talking about, you know, taking a breather. Its not that having Shuna around would make it impossible to rx or anythingor impossible to BS with Gobta, or have private discussions with Mjllmile, or whatever.

    No, really!

    Im just saying, if we had something like the Night Butterfly on the ny-fifth floor, itd be useful for a lot of different situations.

    I decided to offer this idea to the elder at once. Elder, I think I know somece thatd be able to ept you

    When Rigurd realized I was speaking, he took a step back and listened. I dont how he got trained to do it, but he could calmly handle just about any situation by this point. If I ever went off script during an event like this, he could keep up without any nk stares. I loved that.

    Ah! You do, Lord Rimuru?

    Mm-hmm. If its about three hundred of you, wed be able to fit you all in

    .........

    ......

    Thank you so much! I will inform my people of this the moment I return.

    Great. Ill get it all set up so its avable for move-in when youre ready. But do you mind if I ask a favor in return?

    Of course not, my lord. If our powers can be of help to you, nothing could make us happier!

    The elven elder was even happier about it than I thought. Itd save them from having to wander the forest in search of a safe haven, which Im sure came as a relief. It sounded like he was sending an envoy over right now to get people ready.

    So now we had elves moving into ourbyrinth.

    I figured that was the end of the conversation, but one thing did concern me. The elder mentioned that elves had been leaving their enve to work and noting back. With a race as tightly knit as the elves, it seemed odd to me that any of them would abandon their homnd. Some elves even reportedly went out hunting and never returned, which disturbed me.

    Elves could be very individualistic by nature, the elder said, so perhaps a passing whim drove them away from home. But then I remembered what I heard in Mjllmiles shopthe proposal from Viscount Cazac of Englesia. A ce that dealt in elven ves, wasnt it?

    Maybe it wasnt a matter of these younger elves choosing not to go back. If my hunch about the criminal group Cazac was fronting turned out to be true Well, hopefully it wasnt, but if it was, that would be a big problem.

    My dream ofunching an elf nightclub was so close at hand. Seeing the elder off after we said our goodbyes, I thought that Id better investigate this thoroughly.

    Thus, I gave Soei behind me a Thought Communication message.

    (Soei, I want you to investigate a man named Viscount Cazac in Blumund.)

    (Yes, my lord!)

    In a moment, he sent out a Replication of himself, beginning his work at once. That should be enough. Hed probably find something out before my audiences were over.

    Ill probably want to ask Mjllmile what he knows about criminal ve merchants, too. If it turns out Cazacs involved, thered be no mercy for him. It was an affront to the deep love I had for elvesa love that drove me to open my very own elven nightclub. I wasnt about to let anyone keep me from that dream.

    The long, long audience period was finally in itsst day. Once I was through this, Id kick off the Founders Festival in three days.

    No problems of note urred after the elven contingent. It was going smooth as silk, and there were no major issues among the monsters staying in town. The little scuffle with Daggrulls kids was the talk of the town in pretty short order, which probably kept anyone who wanted to show off their strength in line.

    Geld had taken some time off, which let him return to Tempest a few days ago, and Diablo and Hakuro also arrived back the previous day.

    Ah, Sir Rimuru! You are as stately and dignified as always. My heart bursts with joy at being able to see you again!

    Diablo was buttering me up once more, punctuating the ttery with his usual ominous snickering. There was nothing dignified about a slime, so I reasoned that he probably needed sses or something. I wanted a report from him, but that could waitwhich disappointed him, but I needed to keep today free for an important discussion.

    That was how major todays visitor was to me. No letting my guard down around them, thats for sure. As I saw it, itd be my toughest audience yet. That was why I had my whole crew in attendance for todays sessions.

    Right now, this entourage was being weed into town by Benimaru, my right-hand man. (This should also say something about how crucial this was to me.) Already, on the other side of the door, I could sense a violent force approaching like a tidal wave. The rumors, I realized, were true.

    The door opened, revealing a posse d in full armor. These were the tengu, an independent force residing in the Khusha Mountains on the horizon of the Forest of Juraoutside my jurisdiction. While Benimaru had met with them once before, this was less of an audience and more of a summit between two factions.

    Standing in front of this armored crew was a beautiful young woman. The tengu were humanoids known for their almostically long noses, but this girl looked like any normal human. Tengu, bearing the same name as the figures of Japanese mythology, were apparently a hybrid species between angels and wolfmen

    Report. To be more urate, they are not a hybrid. They are angels incarnated into the bodies of wolfmen.

    Righta type of incarnation. That.

    Wolfmen were a type of beastmana proud, isted race who held an almost divine presence in peoples minds. Thus, calling the tengu long-nosed was often more a metaphor than anything else, a way of referring to the supernatural sense of smell they boasted.

    Now then, for this species worshipped as the gods of the mountains

    Report. To be more urate, they are not a species. They are a group born from a single individual, much like the subject Ranga.

    Um, sure. Right. Honestly, I dont really follow it all, but anyway, a bunch of crazy-powerful gods decided to create a bunch of crazy-powerful wolfmen, and then an angel incarnated themself in one, creating a new sentient species. The single individual that led to this species was the tengu elderthe mother of the girl before me. And since creating all these children apparently weakened the elder to the point of powerlessness, this girl was essentially the tengu leader.

    This is why its more urate to call this a summit. And not even that fully described how important this meeting was.

    .........

    ......

    Benimaru hade to the tengus domain once. They had been kind to us at times, permitting the migration of high orcs through their territory, but they were also proud, and if I floated the idea of enforcing my rule over the mountains to them, itd almost certainly result in war.

    I, of course, didnt want that. I didnt see any need to fight this race revered as mountain gods. Benimaru understood that, so he was on strict instructions to just get their permission to build a highway on theirnds between Tempest and Thalion.

    The negotiations went sessfully, Benimaru had said when heter reported back. Everything went well with them. Not even the tengu can afford to ignore you, Sir Rimuru, so they mentioned ns toe see you sometime.

    The news sounded good, but Benimaru looked exhausted.

    You sure there werent any problems?

    No, not exactly, but

    He was dodging the question. And Alvis, whom I sent along with him, had seemed off her gameor at the very least, miffed about somethingever since she got back. It seemed like something I was better off not asking about.

    So I decided to force it out of Benimaru anywayin private, over a few drinks, since he didnt seem interested in telling the rest of our administration about it. The way he described it

    Benimaru had headed over to the tengus hidden homnd with Alvis and a dozen or so members of Team Kurenai. The journey over went smoothly, but in front of a cave near the peak of the Khusha Mountains, they were stopped by a young tengu warrior, dressed in white with a katana on his belt. On his back were two white wings, and he also bore a tail and doglike triangr ears.

    Based on the refinement of his posture, he was clearly trained in battle, Benimaru thought. Speaking with him, they asked for permission to go through the barrier ced within the cave. The warrior agreed but allowed only Benimaru and Alvis to follow him inside.

    On the other side, they found a flowery paradise. It was neither hot nor cold, the temperature always pleasanta beautifulnd, befitting the powerful race who called it home. In the courtyard they were taken to, Benimaru was greeted by a beautiful womanone who looked human, unlike any of the other tengu. Her hair came down to her shoulders, pure white at the roots and fading into a crimson red around her ears. Her small, soft lips were the color of cherry blossoms, but her long, sharp eyes were the eyes of a wolf, watching Benimaru like a beast sizing up its prey.

    Benimaru realized he couldnt let his guard down. Themanding presence she had over the room was reminiscent of the demon lord Carillonor perhaps even stronger than that.

    My name is Benimaru. Ie on behalf of the demon lord Rimuru.

    Wee, kind messenger. I am Momiji, daughter of the tengu elder. What brings you to us? Are you aiming to take over thisnd? the girl asked with a beguiling smile.

    Her words were poison-tipped. Benimaru could tell he wasnt wee at all. But he didnt let that bother him.

    I have no such intentions. What we seek is permission to venture over the Khusha Mountains along the border with the Forest of Jura. And, if possible, wed like to request permission to dig a tunnel into this mountain.

    Hmph. No ambitions of and grab, then? You may pass through the mountains all you likebut what is this tunnel you speak of? Momiji seemed less than enthusiastic about this conversation, but the word tunnel piqued her interest.

    Benimaru didnt know a great deal about it, either, apart from my vague description of boring a hole into the mountain. In fact, the idea had already been shot down by my team. A tunnel would be the shortest route between Tempest and the Thalion capital, but the highway would only lead to the nearestrge town on the Thalion border, so no tunnel was strictly needed. Benimaru knew that, but he wanted to bring up the concept in his negotiations regardless.

    A tunnel involves digging a hole in the mountain to allow passage through to the other side. If you do not wish to permit this, we will not

    Wait. Dig a hole in the mountain? Are you quite serious?

    I am. Thats what the project n called for. But no tunnel is necessary for the route we have now, so I only wanted to ask in case it does be necessary in the future. If you dont like it, I will not force the question.

    To a race who treats the mountains as divinity, digging a hole through one was seen as anathema.

    That is very ill-advised. You are free to let a slime be a demon lord, but as long as you do not interfere with us, I see no harm. I am even willing to shut my eyes to that vering half-snake youve brought along with you. But if you wish to make a mockery of our glorious mountainsthat I cannot abide.

    As if to prove the point, Momiji stood up.

    Benimaru had no intention of making an issue out of this, but now it seemed like the discussion was over. Had he failed? He stayed in his seat, reasoning that any reaction would force the other side to up the antebut not everyone was willing to remain silent.

    A vering half-snake? Are you talking about me?

    A fuming Alvis leaped out of her chair instead, staring Momiji down. The two seemed ready toe to blows at any moment.

    Whoa, stop

    Just as Benimaru spoke, Alviss eyes met Momijis. Her extra skill Snake Eyes could cause paralysis, poison, insanity, and many other ailments. But none of that fazed Momiji.

    Such a silly move, she said as she took out a folding fan with both hands. Mere status ailments wont work on the daughter of the tengu elder.

    Tengu are half-spiritual life-forms and as such bear a high resistance to status ailments. In addition, Momiji had the extra skill Godwolf Sense on at all times, giving her information beyond what her five senses provideda sort of powered-up version of Magic Sense that picked up on illusions and illusory magic. Thus, sneak attacks like that didnt work on her.

    Then it was Momijis turn. She brought her fan down on Alvis in a sort of dance. Alvis blocked the first blow with her golden staff, but the second one hit her on the side and sent her flying to the far end of the open-air courtyard.

    Kffhh?!

    Momijis moves were simple but refined. The blow had shut the fan; now she reopened it, elegantly hiding her lips with it.

    Are you done? I see the Lycanthropeers are all bark and no bite.

    You better not rile me, country girl. I went easy on you because we were here to negotiate, but perhaps I didnt need to? replied Alvis, her pride hurt.

    She stood back up, her wound already healed, and red coldly at Momiji. Her presence was formidable indeed, as befitting one of the most powerful magic-born in Eurazania.

    Went easy? I was going easy on you. Its taken quite an effort to avoid killing an envoy like yourself, Ill have you know. Or do you want to make me truly angry?

    It felt like their face-off was literally freezing the air around them. The younger tengu warriors at the side of the courtyard tensed up as the concentrated auras filled the area. And in the midst of it, Benimaru sat drinking his tea, musing about how this had gone beyond the realm of a gaffe and into truly painful territory.

    Yes, you may be strong, but if you think a little girl as inexperienced as you in battle has a chance, think again.

    Would you care to try? I was hoping to build some battle experience, as you so kindly pointed out. I think you would make a fine test case!

    The stare down grew ever more heatedand then they both moved at once. The next moment, a sh of light streaked through the air, and the fan flew out of Momijis hand. Silence fell over the courtyard. Faster than anyone could have reacted, Benimaru stepped into the fight.

    Enough, he nkly stated. I apologize for her offense, but I really cant have mypanion killed.

    S-Sir Benimaru?! You thought I would lose?!

    Yes. If I didnt stop you, you wouldve been cut in two.

    Nonsense! Momiji said. I put none of my force into

    No. Youre careless with holding your aura back. You put too much power into it.

    II didnt

    I I lost?

    Both Momiji and Alvis fell to their knees. As they did, the doors on one end of the courtyard opened, revealing arge, beautiful, canine-eared woman. The young tengu in the audience kneeled before her.

    M-Mother?!

    The tengu elder smiled at the panicking Momiji, ambling over to her daughter. When she reached her:

    You fool of a daughter!

    The roar echoed like a thunderp.

    In another few moments, the group had relocated themselves to an inner chamber, one in the ssic Japanese style with tatami mats and t floor cushions for kneeling on. A door ahead led to an alcove, allowing the ill tengu elder to take a rest whenever she needed. The elder had seen fit to give Momiji a rap on the head for her insolence; she rubbed it tearfully, dissatisfied with this treatment but unwilling to risk any more disobedience around her mother.

    No, no, theres no need to go that far. We simply wanted to introduce ourselves

    Benimaru had yet to aplish what he set out to do, but this was no longer an atmosphere for casual talk. Plus, with Alvis as dejected as she was, he sensed that overstaying his wee would be supremely unwise. But the elder had other ideas.

    Hee-hee-hee! Dont worry about it, boy. That was quite some swordy you showed off, by the way. Thats the Haze style, aint it?

    How did? Ah, no, I do have some idea. Momijis dancing did resemble my own sword style in parts. Could it be, perhaps?

    Yes, Ive studied Haze as well. From my master, Byakuya Araki.

    Wha?!

    Benimaru was shocked. The tengu gave him a satisfied smile.

    My name, you see, is Kaede.

    With that, she began telling a story of her past. Over three hundred years ago, shed been spending her time in thend of the ogres. She had been on a journey, hiding her true powers, but then she encountered Byakuya and became an apprentice on the ways of the sword. But Kaede wasnt alone. She trained alongside someone elsea born talent, living by the sword, and Byakuyas own grandchild.

    It pains me so much that I am unable to give you a name, Byakuya had often said.

    Naming monsters willy-nilly, it seemed, coulde at the risk of ones life. As a human, naming this grandchild of his wouldve surely killed him. Kaede didnt have a name at the time, either, so she didnt understand what his hang-up was about it, but now she had an inkling. If you love someone, after all, you want to leave something behind for them. It was natural for monsters not to have names, but for humans, it was the opposite.

    Time passed, and Byakuya grew old and passed away, leaving behind his ogre grandchild who had be a virtuoso with the swordenough to challenge even Kaede. In terms of technique, she lost outpletely. She was smitten, and underneath arge maple tree, she confessed her love. Then, after a single night spent together in bliss, she left the ogre homnd.

    The Forest of Jura had been known for its unstable weather, but this tree was arge, broad maple, one that shone with bright-orange leaves in the fall. It had be a symbol of the ogres homnd, and Benimaru knew it wellproving to him that her story was true

    Wait a minute. Are you saying that Hakuros?

    and shocking him in the process.

    Hakuro, you said? Ah, so the Sword Ogre I trained with has gained a name? My Im surprised to hear hes even alive.

    She smiled at the thought, shaking Benimaru down to his very core.

    Whoawhoa Is Hakuro aware of this?!

    His mind was swimming with all kinds of questions. But the greatest shock of all was yet toe:

    Well That is a relief to hear.

    ?

    Because the fine young man Sir Hakuro raised is going to be the future groom of my daughter.

    Bppht!!

    Benimaru spit out the tea he was drinking to calm his nerves. He was normally cool andposed, but here in thend of the tengu, everything was shaking him to the core. And he wasnt the only oneAlvis, next to him, was staring nkly into space as the teacup slipped from her hand.

    Momiji blushed intensely at the news and looked at Benimaru, then Kaede. M-Mother?!

    Flustered, she attempted to shut her mother up, but it was no use. Kaede casually raised an arm to hold her daughter back as she addressed Benimaru.

    Now, Sir Benimaru, regarding your request earlier, I will be happy to ept it. In fact, I am prepared to acknowledge the rule of Sir Rimuru over ournds. However, thates on the condition that you ept my daughter as your spouse. I doubt you will need much time to think it over, but what do you say?

    Benimaru froze. Such a dramatic question, posed so casually. He did need some time, as it happened. Fortunately, Momijithe other rted party in this questionstepped in to rescue him.

    Wait! Wait! I know youve epted him, Mother, but I havent yet! Yes, perhaps hes stronger than I ambut if so, then I dont want you to force him into this. I want to win his love first. Dont you always say, Mother, that a truly good woman is one who makes her sweetheart turn back toward her?

    She hid her reddened face behind her fan and all but ran out of the room, fleeing the scene. Kaedeughed heartily at her behavior.

    As Alvis regained her senses, Benimaru could feel embarrassment creeping over him at Momijis reaction.

    Yknow, Hakuro could stay calm through anything As sudden as this proposal is, if thats all it takes to throw me, I still have much to learn

    He took the moment to reflect.

    But still, this is way too sudden

    In the end, it was agreed that he would bring the question of Momiji back home to think over. This was all entirely Kaedes idea, and she had no interest in forcing anyone into it. It was something she thought itd be nice to see, and if it actually happened, why, all the better. As for the rest of Tempests demands, shergely agreedthe tunnel through the mountain was still an issue, but she gave them permission to construct the highway to Thalion any way they pleased.

    But their talks didnt end there. Apart from potentially marrying Momiji off to Benimaru, Kaede also expressed an interest in building a constructive rtionship between the demon lord Rimuru and the tengu race.

    It may not have been obvious, but Kaede suffered from an illness. At least, that was the backstory; the truth was a bit different. She did indeed lose the majority of her remaining power bringing Momiji into the world. The birth and the subsequent naming of the child took ce fifteen years ago, and it consumed nearly all the force of a woman onceuded as the goddess of the mountains. Death would being for her sooner rather thanter, and that was why she wanted to find someone to back up and support her dear, inexperienced daughter. Benimarus visit was a coincidence, but to Kaede, he brought hopea final hope, gifted to her by her former lover Hakuro.

    If he turns me down, so be it, thought Kaede. Youre still there, arent you, with Sir Rimuru? I thought you would die before I did, but I see I was very happily mistaken. And wont seeing Momiji remind you of our own past a little?

    After some contemtion, Kaede agreed to postpone any concrete marriage ns. And with that, Momiji herself made her way to meet with the demon lord Rimuru in person.

    It was a pretty headache-inducing taleand one representing the greatest danger Benimaru had experienced in his life. He described it as scarier than the first time he met me, which I wasnt sure how to take. Maybe that was just his sense of humor.

    Regardless, this was why Momiji had been sent here. If shended such a clean hit on Alvis, you wouldnt want to underestimate her in battle. Honestly, I was d she wasnt hostile to us anymore.

    But really, I couldnt dodge the real question any longer.

    Hakuro had a daughter all this time? No way.

    I was in a panic over it, worried that itd balloon into a huge issue, but there wasnt much to be done about it until I met her. Besides, this wasnt something Benimaru and I could solve alone. We needed to hear from Hakuro, who had just asrge a stake in thisbut I didnt want to hurry him over here needlessly, either. So I decided to shelve the issue until he came back.

    Ande back he did, the previous night, after his journey to Farmus. The three of us held a little chat. I had no idea what the tengu would demand from us or what would happen with them at all, so we decided to save their audience for the final day. I was nning to call for Hakuro if he still wasnt around by then, but fortunately I didnt need to. Not that his timeliness solved a lot of problems, either.

    Benimaru and Momiji marrying was strictly an issue between the two of them. I didnt mind if they said yes; it didnt really seem to affect me at all, but

    Wait just a minute! Benimaru began. II have my own issues to think about, you realize!

    What do you mean? Hakuro countered. Do you not like my daughter?

    I am not saying that! Besides, why are you acting like a father now? Youve never met her in your life. You didnt even know she existed!

    Well, now that I do, I have a certain responsibility for her, do I not?

    Hakuro seemed to be relishing Benimarus consternation. It only made the problem worse. We kept talking all night, but it never really came to a conclusionso here, in the audience chamber, I was going to be forced to wing it.

    .........

    ......

    The beautiful girl sat down on a hastily prepared chair in front of me. The colorful white-to-red gradient of her hair was indeed beautiful. This was the Momiji I had heard so much about, representing the tengu elder here. She gave me a haughty look and began to speak.

    Demon lord Rimuru, it is good to meet you. My name is Momiji, and I havee here on behalf of the elder of the tengu race. I look forward to working with you.

    Youre very kind. My names Rimuru, and Ive be a demon lord. Im in human form now, as you can see, but Im actually a slime. In general, Im pretty much a pacifist, so if you have any problems, dont be afraid to hit me up.

    There is no need for such concern. The way you have conquered the Forest of Jura was breathtaking to witness. We recognize you as the ruler of the forest and look forward to being a good neighbor to you. However, we will not allow you to interfere in our affairs.

    She was saying that in front of all my officials. I could see Shions eyebrow twitch a little, but luckily no one reacted further. I hadnt exined the full story to her yet, so she actually stopped herself that time. That was a new change in her, as ofte; she no longer responded to small things in her usual exaggerated fashion. That was a good trend to see, if a little creepy. Hopefully she wasnt just bottling it all in, only to have it explodeter.

    Momiji, meanwhile, was waiting with bated breath to see how Id reply. She put up a bold, dignified act, so you wouldnt notice unless it was pointed out to you, but Im sure her nerves were killing her. She must not have been sure whether I was friend or foe yet.

    Dering her allegiance wouldve been fine, I thought, but the pride her race had in themselves must have forbidden that. A young, inexperienced ruler faces doom if people look down on them, after all. I can understand thateven though it seemed like Momiji had the support of the younger tengu warrior sses.

    All right. I understand. Certainly, we dont have any interest in unduly interfering with you, either. As I think Benimaru here exined to you, we just want to build a highway around the base of the Khusha Mountains. Also, just to be sure, you recognize the rights of the high orcs who have already moved into the mountains, right?

    Yes, that is not a problem. I make no exclusive ims to the right to enjoy the mountains blessings. You may mine the ore as much as you wantwe have no need for it. We only wish to be left alone.

    Um

    The mountainous areas were considered part of the Forest of Juras territory. I had braced myself for some sort ofining about that, but I guess its not a problem. So what were the tengu so on edge about? She acted pretty prickly toward Alvis; was there a fight between them and Carillon during his demon lord days? I decided it was safest to just ask directly.

    Um, so I dont know what youre so on guard about, but we really have no intention of starting a conflict with you, so?

    You want me to believe that?

    Yeah. I mean, have I said or done anything to make you suspect Ive got my eyes on expanding my territory?

    Momiji eyed me carefully, judging my intentions once again.

    You associate with that crafty bird woman Frey. Thats all the evidence I need to recognize your ambitions! she retorted.

    I can safely say I did not see that oneing.

    Whoa, time-out!

    What does time-out mean?!

    It means stop! We need to discuss some things!

    I called my administration over. Momiji agreed to thiswith someints, I think, but I wasnt really paying attention.

    What do you think of that? I asked once we were all in a circle.

    The former demon lord Freys territory is connected to the Khusha Mountains, Soei quickly replied. I could imagine some conflicts with the tengu erupting along those lines.

    I consulted the world map in my mind. True enough. The tengu settlement was outside the Forest itself, so fighting for it wouldnt vite any nopete contracts. They mightve tried to invade at one point.

    But why, though?

    I cant think of any reason, Benimaru said. He must not have noticed anything amiss during his visit.

    I have heard rumors. It is said that Frey likes high ces. As her second name of the Sky Queen suggests, perhaps shes endeavored to move her capital to the tallest ce within ess to her? Hakuro offered.

    That didnt sound quite right to me. Benimaru himself said the tengu stronghold was an idyllic enve on the other side of a cave at the peak of a mountainin other words, a small ne of space on another dimension. Thats not the kind of thing Frey would want.

    Hmm

    We all murmured to one another. Then:

    Will you stop ignoring me?!

    Whoa!

    I leaped up at the sound of someone shouting in my ear. Momiji was there, fuming and sick of waiting any longer. This time, I definitely couldnt tune her out.

    I gave up and sat back in my seat, facing her.

    Let me ask you a question. Does Frey have ambitions on tengu territory?

    Huhhh? Of all the stupid things to ask She rolled her eyes, then realized I was being serious. Youre kidding me, she muttered.

    It sounded like we werent on the same page at all here, so I decided to let her tell her side of the story.

    As she put it, Freys aim was to capture Elmin Thalion, capital of the Sorcerous Dynasty of Thalion. She wanted it not for its territory, but for its height.

    I sure wasnt expecting that. It was very in character for her, but I couldntugh about it.

    In terms of size, Thalion was a huge country. Frey didnt have the military resources to overwhelm it. However, while the nation enjoyed a geographical advantage against ground-based armies, against Frey and her aerial forces, they would face tougher going. Tactically, they were an even match, but Frey refused to let her ambitions stay just ambitions forever.

    That was why she had turned her attention on the tengu. She wanted to bring them under her rule, shoring up her resources for ater assault on Thalion. But the tengu were too proud for that, not ready to so easily ept Freys demands. Thalion, expecting this, hoped for the two sides to erupt into conflict with each other, which would take the heat off them and also let them profit from the ensuing war.

    Frey was fully aware of that, however, and that stayed her hand. The result was this three-way dtente that, frankly, looked pretty twisted to me.

    While all that was going on, I fought against yman, and once the dust settled, Carillon and Frey gave up their posts and resolved to serve the demon lord Milim. It was the birth of a new superpower, one the tengu alone could never fend off, and now their government was in a heated debate over how to hold themselves going forward.

    And then Benimaru came along, taking one of the Three Lycanthropeers with him. Bad idea. Momiji mistook that as my attempt to silently apply pressure on her.

    Hows Frey beentely? I asked Geld. As the person responsible for building a new capital city, he had been taking orders from Frey, making him the most familiar with her out of our little group.

    Well, Sir Rimuru, Lady Frey seems tremendously satisfied with your ns. As taciturn as Mildo is, the two have gotten along well, and shes been participating in some very detailed nning meetings.

    Frey found a way to make Mildo talk? Thats impressive.

    All right. So has she lost interest in Elmin Thalion?

    Lost interest? Id say her interests lie inum

    In?

    Well Lately, I havent seen Lady Milim around. Lady Frey had been teaching her about governance and the like, but apparently she ran off on her unawares.

    Oh, right. Im pretty sure I know where she is. For the sake of this conversation, though, lets pretend that I dont. Let sleeping dogs lie, and all that.

    As a result, Id say that Lady Freys primary focus at the moment is figuring out where Lady Milim went, concluded Geld.

    The gigantic capital building project, skyscrapers and all, hadpletely charmed Frey. It turned her interest away from any other potential capital she could conquer; they all paled inparison. Milim, as Geld put it, was the bigger issue. And Momiji, listening to all this stuff going against what she imagined, was stunned into silence, unable to figure out how to react.

    I couldnt me her. Thats reality for youa force who you assume wants you and your people dead, and all of a sudden, their focus is on something else entirely. If it happened to you, youd probably want to run away from reality, too.

    All right. I understand. So there you have it. If you recognize all that as the misunderstanding it was, Im cool with that.

    It could be said that tengu were not terribly wise in the ways of the world. The worry that they were surrounded by enemies had clouded Momijis judgment. Based on her situation, I could see why she made the decision she did.

    So I was imagining it all along? Mother did say I was overthinking matters

    She slumped back in her chair, the strength drained from her body. It was a lesson for all present: Jumping to conclusions can bite you hard.

    With that behind us, our talks quickly came to a close.

    Since Momiji was still a little out of it, one of the tengu warriors looked over the pact we were to sign in her stead. I thought these were bodyguards, but I guess they served as government staff, too.

    The tunnel question would be saved forter. We wouldnt be allowed to start on it, I was told, until we could prove it was safe. That made sense to me, so I didnt make a big deal out of it. We needed to talk to Thalion about building a tunnel anyway, and it wouldnt really get underway until we finished developing trains, so there was no need to set anything in stone quite yet.

    The tengu didnt want us to interfere with them because they mistakenly thought we were prepping for an invasion, but now that wed addressed that misunderstanding, nothing stopped us from having normal rtions. So we agreed to help each other out, in case something ever happened.

    So is that all?

    Yes, the tengu aide said with a bow. My thanks to you, Demon Lord, for allowing us to conduct such constructive negotiations.

    So things were square with Momiji. Our pact was signed. Now we needed to talk about Momiji and Hakuros rtionshipand Benimaru and Momijis potential marriage. We failed to reach a conclusion on thatst night.

    Momiji started the day hostile toward us, but that had presumably changed now. Should we maybe work this out just with the people directly involved?

    As I debated with myself over how to broach the topic, the tengu aide took out a sealed envelope.

    There is also the matter of this. Our elder, Lady Kaede, has this letter for you, Lord Rimuru.

    He respectfully handed it to me. Rigurd epted it, and Shuna handled opening and reading it. It began with the sort of verbose, convoluted greetings you often saw in royal correspondence, probing me a bit to guess at where my disposition was, but grew less formal as it went on. Shunas face contorted in confusion as she read on.

    I know things areplicated, and there have been a few misunderstandings, but I hope you will treat my daughter well. I remind you of what she told me about making Sir Benimaru turn toward her. I am sure she is not against the idea

    Wait, are you sure this letters for me?! It really doesnt sound that way! If I had known it contained stuff like this, I would have dismissed my staffbut it was toote for that now.

    M-Mother?!!

    Momiji leaped back to her feet, snatching the letter out of Shunas hands. Rude of her, but Id just pretend I didnt see it. Couldnt me her. If I were Momiji, I dont know what I wouldve done, either. This goes beyond infamy and straight into humiliation.

    So So there were two letters?! Mother, why cant you be more careful?

    She slumped back down again. Aha. Kaede mustve put a message for Hakuro in the letter to me. The tengu aides surrounded Momiji, trying their best to assuage her, but it only had the opposite effect. Times like these, its best to just leave people in peace.

    Heh-heh Thats just like her.

    Hakuro, smirking, walked up to Momiji, taking the crumpled-up letter out of her hand and giving her a nod.

    I see She has a great deal of strength but is stillcking in technique. As a fellow student of the sword, and as her father as well, I hope that the Sword Ogre will deign it worthy to offer her training and instruction. From your ever-loving Kaede. So she still likes me, eh? Heh-heh! Ah, how lucky I am to live to see this day.

    His smile couldnt have been more sincere.

    F-Father?

    Mm-hmm. My name is Hakuro, and I am your father.

    Father!!

    Momijis dark eyes, reminiscent of Hakuros, teared up as she hugged him tightly. Father and daughter were reunited. The girl, no longer wary of us, would never doubt Hakuros words again.

    I must warn you, Momiji, I am a hard taskmaster on the training grounds.

    Yes

    But I want to see you ovee your challenges and win the heart of Benimaru!

    Yes, Father!

    Um, what?

    Here I was, nodding my approval at this lovely little family reunion, and now the conversation was going kind of haywire. Talk about bridging a major gap. Hakuro, usually gruff and reserved even in the best of times, suddenly had a daughterand it turned him into a weepy, doting parent.

    Uh, Hakuro

    Benimarus words failed to reach him. He and Momiji were in their own little world.

    Oh, now I see, Shuna murmured.

    Everyones eyes turned toward her. She paid it no mind as she addressed Benimaru, who was looking straight at her.

    My brother, I have a message for you from Sir Alvis.

    What is it? a pained-looking Benimaru said.

    I could get how he felt. He mustve been thinking Please, lets do thister, but Shuna was staring at him with a distinctck of emotion in her eyes.

    The message, given with Alviss ent, was this:

    Sir Benimaru, I have made up my mind. I intend to defeat Lady Momiji in battle and take the right to be your wife for myselfbut even in the worst-case scenario, I could always be a concubine, couldnt I? Either way, I refuse to give up, so prepare yourself!

    My staff chattered with one another, their curiosity raging.

    Benimaru just crossed his arms in silence. Im sure he wanted to bury his head in his hands, but I have to give him props for not doing it. Or maybe its more like he was frozen in ce, unable to move or speak. Unbeatable in battle, maybe, but powerless against threats like thesewed just discovered an unexpected weak point of Benimarus.

    Sorry, man. As someone without much experience in lovenot zero experience, but not muchI doubt theres much I can do to help.

    Man, lifes sure hard when women are attracted to you, huh? I tried.

    Sir Rimuru, Gobta said reproachfully, are you serious? Because I think you face some of the same issues

    Dont be silly, Gobta. Im genderless now, remember?

    Eh-heh-heh-heh-heh I have no interest in silly romance. To me, Sir Rimuru is everything.

    I didnt ask you, Diablo. If you have no interest, then leave me alone, okay?

    But even as I thought this, I could hear my staff gossiping.

    Sir Benimaru is rather popr, is he not? I believe some of the people under my sister Sokasmand had taken a liking to him, too, butpared with Lady Alvis and Lady Momiji, Im not sure I like their chances.

    You mean Toka, Gabil? And maybe Saika?

    Right, right. Theyve already given up on you, Sir Soei, what with Soka staking her im already

    Oh, dont be silly!

    No, its true!

    Wow, its like a harem, huh? Im so jealous!

    Come to think of it, Gobta had a point there, in the end. I began to wonder if this was the start of an envious romantic rivalry between Benimaru and him. But still, Alvis was a beautiful, reliable woman. Momiji was a little headstrong but still a nice little-sister type. Between them and all the other girls aiming for a chance, Gobta was rightBenimaru did have something of a harem going. Not that he wanted one

    A harem, eh? remarked Gabil. Yes, that would make anyone jealous.

    Well, not so fast, Soei replied. Benimaru is something of ate bloomer. I would not call him particrly adept with the opposite sex. He acts tough, but Im sure he is just as confused as all of us.

    My thoughts were exactly the same. Having all this attention would be nothing but trouble for Benimaru. Shuna was watching him, too. I had a feeling Benimaru cared a lot for her sister, so Im sure he was sensing danger from her and her overbearing ways right now.

    But I think its nice, Geld said. As manly a man as Sir Benimaru is, its only natural the women around town would love him. Lady Alvis is leader of the Three Lycanthropeers, and I suppose Momiji is the daughter of Hakuroboth worthy partners. I have a lot to learn from him.

    He certainly seemed enthusiastic about the idea of Benimaru finding a wife, harem or not. Geld himself cared more about his work than chasing women, so I wasnt sure whether he really meant the part about having a lot to learn.

    Besides, Geld was already pretty popr. As quiet, serious-minded, and responsible as he was, he had a fan base among not just high orcs, but other races as well. If he got off his ass and did something about it, hed have a partner in no time.

    Oh, no, you are doing well enough for yourself, Sir Geld! Like I said before, Toka and the others never give me a second nce For some reason, only the men show me any kindness in my unit, Gabil insisted.

    Geld nodded sagely. You just need more chances to encounter women. I understand that a little. He mostly worked on construction sites manned by burly male workers, so I bet he did.

    Someone like me with no genderor maybe an amphibian where gender was just a messy topic to begin withwas one thing, but building a work environment where women could participate equally was probably important, huh? Itd help encourage the men more, maybe. Id have to think about that.

    Well, I should say, there are a few female dwarf apothecaries in my workce. We do exchange some pleasantries, but

    Oh? No problem, then, right?

    No, that is a problem. Those are two totally different monster races. You arent okay with anything that breathes, are you, Gabil?

    No, a big problem. They told me that going out with a lizard was physically impossible! Im just so unpopr with them

    Oh

    ......

    Well. Dont know what to say about that. Sounds like the species difference wasnt the only wall to ovee there. Gabil may want to explore other avenues.

    And yet, they keep inviting Nanso and Hokuso out to eator for dates in the forests. It happens all the time! I find it so frustrating

    Oh, so the species thing didnt even function as an excuse, then?

    I, um, Im not sure what to say

    Geld was out of words, unsure what else he could do tofort Gabil.

    Yes Thats why Ive been thinkingtely that I should take more of a human form. My own dad transformed into a tall, dark, handsome person, so I wonder if I have a chance at that, too!

    Doubt it. Besides, its not about looks. I looked like a pretty nice guy myself, but I went almost forty years without a girlfriend!

    The real key is

    Dont be ridiculous. You need to get up and do something.

    Right! Thats correct, Soei! Sitting around all day and whining like Gabil wont win anyone over. Stop pretending someones going to pop out of nowhere and confess her love to youand start going more on the offensive! Too bad I didnt realize that until after I became a slime, but

    W-well, yes, of course, but

    Soeis right! I heard those dwarves talking once, and they were saying all these nice things about one of your men, Gabil. All like Oooh, isnt Gazatt so cool? and Oh, you think so, too? and Hes the ssic strong, silent type, huh? and Hes cute, kind of like my pet lizard. They were crazy for him! So I really dont think its just about looks, Gabil!

    Wow, Gobta. Way to throw him under the bus.

    Gazatt was one of Gabils underlings, part of Team Hiryuquiet and handy with a spear, but not exactly the sharpest nail in the box, so he was mainly tasked with guard duty for our researchers and pharmacists down in the Sealed Cave. He was a former lizardman, of course, and even now as a dragonewt, his looks, much like Gabils, were more reptilian. As cruelly as Gobta put it, it definitely proved that looks arent everything.

    Besides, women can be easier to attract than one would expect, Soei added.

    They can?!

    Very much so, he said, half-chidingly. Ady knight from before, for example. I am unsure how she got the idea, but she seemed to have quite an interest in me.

    R-really?! What did you do?

    Oh-ho?

    How very interesting!

    Tell us more!

    This was enough to even arouse my interest. Whichdy knight was this? Wait, wasnt he up to something with Litus, one of the Crusader pdins? What was up with that? I meant to ask, but it kind of slipped my mind. I spotted her looking at Soei and blushing, so I feared the worst, but

    You want to know, too, Sir Rimuru?

    Of course I do. And that report you made that one time

    Ah yes, that. You see, I took some Sticky Steel Thread and

    He was stopped mid-sentence by a feeling of impending doom from behind us, followed by an almost deafening clearing of the throat.

    Ah-hemmm!!

    Our little whispered chat was over. We immediately shot straight back up, faces serious. Sensing the danger, I slipped back into slime mode and attempted to escape the front line but instead found myself lifted up by a thin, pale arm.

    Enough joking, Sir Rimuru. Dont we have my brother to talk about right now?

    Ah yes. That we do. We got a bit derailed, didnt we? And we sure couldnt afford to piss Shuna off anymore. Right. We needed to get serious about this.

    Anyway

    Well, not that thinking about this issue would get us any closer to solving it.

    What do you think about this, Benimaru?

    Hmm Personally speaking, I do feel this is all going too fast. However, one thing I can say for sure is that one spouse is all Id like to have.

    Yeah, fair enough. Being asked out of nowhere to marry would knock anyone for a loop. I know itd throw me off. The past is one thing, but we live in an era where youre free to love whoever you want. Besides:

    Besides, for higher-level magic-born like ourselves, siring a child is not a simple task. Some people have many wives and they impregnate each, who mustpete with one another to give birth, but I have little interest in that approach. I do not intend to keep any concubines.

    Momiji watched Benimaru starry-eyed as she spoke.

    So no harem, then?

    No harem, it sounded likeor no polygamy, to be exact. No real reason to adopt that in Tempest, unless we were forced to because of a glut of widows or something.

    I was hoping that was the end of the topic, but it was really just the beginning.

    All right. In that case, I ept Alviss challenge. I promise you, I will earn the role of Benimarus wife with my own two hands!

    Momiji all but shouted this deration out to the world. I wasnt sure this is how love worked, exactly, but Benimaru seemed to have given up and didntment on it.

    What do you think of that, Sir Rimuru?

    What do I think of it? All I can say at this point ishey, whatever.

    Well, theres no problem with it, is there? I dont want any to-the-death duel or whatever, but if its more like vying to woo him, sure, thats fine. If hes not up for it, well need to end it, but

    As long as it didnt venture into stalker territory, I was cool with it.

    Very well, Shuna said with a smile. In that case, do as you like.

    I had a bad feeling about that the moment she said it.

    I can beat you, Lady Shuna!

    I look forward to seeing you try, Shion.

    They both smiled at each other. I wasnt exactly sure what this meant, but I hopped out of Shunas arms anyway, sensing mortal danger.

    I should note, by the way, that the previously reserved and hesitant Alvis got seriously aggressive from that day forward, attacking Benimaru from every possible angle regardless of how it made her look. Momiji, of course, followed her every step of the way, resisting her efforts. The other women coveting Benimaru, of course, didnt take this lying down and immediately threw themselves into the fray. To say the least, things got intense.

    It kicked off the start of a new tradition in Tempestthe idea that, if you love someone, prove it to them with your own might. Love on the battlefield, I suppose.

 Volume 8 - Epilogue

    EPILOGUE

    THE FINAL BRIEFING

    It was evening by the time we wrapped up our talks with the tengu on the final day. After an earlyish dinner, we decided to hold our first administrative meeting in a while.

    Since we had all my officials here for a change, I figured itd be a good chance to brief each other on recent events. We also had a few visitorsVeldora, Ramiris, and her servants Beretta and Treyni. Milim would be officiallying to town three days from now, and I guess she was really starting to feel the heat from Frey, so she decided to head back home in the meantime. Smart girl. I dont know how pissed off Frey was, but if Milim stayed here for much longer, I bet the answer would be very, and I didnt want to be caught in the cross fire.

    Plus, we had another new face:

    Now, before we begin this conference, theres someone Id like to introduce to you all. This is Mjllmile, or Mollie, and I am considering a government post for him. Hes been intimately involved with arrangements for the Founders Festival in three days, and if it turns out sessful, Id like to name him chief of our financial affairs. I want all of you to treat him well.

    I had wanted to do this when everybody was around. Plus, I wanted Mjllmile to handle the final pre-festival briefing for me.

    Er, my name is Gard Mjllmile. Sir Rimuru has been kind enough to give me a crucial duty in the uing festivities, and frankly Im rather tense, but I hope I will earn good favor from all of you here today.

    As an ever-so-slightly overweight fellow, Mjllmile didnt look tense at all. Still, it mustve taken guts, introducing himself to a room full of monsters. Even he gets nervous sometimes, I guess. Dealing with mafia types in the big city was probably a far cry from going face-to-face with high-level magic-born like us.

    With our introductions now concluded, I jumped right into the topic at hand.

    All right, Mollie, if you could go over how things are looking for us right now

    Yes sir. If youll excuse me, then

    Taking my cue, Mjllmile got up from his seat next to Rigurd and went over our preparations for the Founders Festival.

    Two days from now, on the night before opening ceremonies, we would be holding a citywideunch party. This would be open to everyone, including not just event invitees but the merchants (and the adventurers bodyguarding them) visiting town, with free food and drink for all. The news had already gone out, of course, and I heard about farmers and the like from nearby cities traveling over for itthe exact sort of tourism I wanted to attract, so I wanted to be damn sure they had a great time.

    In the reception hall, meanwhile, wed hold a ptial banquet for the visiting royalty and nobility. Everything served here would be a tandem effort between Shuna and Yoshida the baker; they were debuting a lot of new dishes, I knew, so I couldnt wait. This would be a standing buffet-type thing, since I wanted guests to enjoy smaller bits of as many different kinds of food as we could offer.

    Then the Founders Festival officially began. On the morning of the first day, I would hold a speech. Yes, yet another speech, but I needed some kind of event to officially proim that I was a demon lord, so this was kind of unavoidable. I suggested skipping this, since everyone knew already, but my advisers all just smiled and said no.

    Right after that, wed kick off the battle tournament at the coliseum. I, however, would not be in attendance. This festival was meant to help VIPs from other nations get to know Tempest, so I couldnt just sit around watching the preliminary rounds all day.

    Instead, my itinerary included a seat at our newly refurbished and extremely fancy-looking theater. Nobodys told me what kind of performance to expect, which made me a bit anxious, but Mjllmile seemed really enthusiastic about it. I feel this will be a chance to show the world that you are a cultured demon lord, hed said with a grin.

    Shion was smiling right along with him, which did nothing to calm my nerves. But no point stewing over it. If it had Mjllmiles stamp of approval, Id have to trust in him.

    After lunch came a technological exhibition, including panels like Gabil and Vesters history of healing potions, Kurobe and Garms grand tour of their weaponry, and so on. This would take ce at our museumwhich, like the theater, would be open to the general public from day two onward; for today, it was open to nobility only, so they could take their time with everything on disy. I thought that staggering the schedules like that would be best for security purposes.

    Speaking of day two, thats when Id begin to take in the battle tournament. Later that afternoon, Id also hold a series of chatsor to put it another way, it was some unscheduled free time for me. Basically, Id be in my VIP box at the arena, and if anyone wanted to talk to me, Id take their questions one by one. Mjllmile was arranging all that for me, so really, itd just be a pleasant distraction as I took in the tournament. Everyone who received paper invites would have a guide provided for them, and theyd be free to enjoy the fest any way they wantedperuse the stalls, enjoy our luxurious hot baths, or check out the tournament themselves.

    Then, on day three, wed finally open up our long-awaited Dungeon. The final matches of the tournament would take ce that morning, and in the afternoon, youd get to watch as adventurers tried their hand at conquering thebyrinth.

    Youvepleted quite an impressive coliseum while I was gone, marveled Geld, no doubt impressed that there was a whole generation of talented craftsmen below him now.

    That we have. You and Mildo have a great apprentice in Gobkyuu. Its a perfectly sound structure; you wouldnt even know this was a rush project. If our top magic-born fought in here, Id be worried, but any fights betweenpetitors ranked below A shouldnt be a problem.

    In terms of safety, the arena could juuuust about withstand a high-level spirit like Ifrit raging inside it. Which, I mean, if someone focused the full brunt of their attacks on the arena itself, I couldnt do much about that, but Id be there for the main battles, and I nned on putting a light Absolute Defense barrier over the stadium. Barring a catastrophe, the audience would be perfectly safe, probably.

    Kwah-ha-ha-ha! And Ive discovered the ultimate in gourmet bliss with my hibachi grill. It will be a cant-miss delight, trust me on that!

    Oh, I almost forgot. He really wanted to run a stand, so there wasnt much to do for it except let him participate in disguise. Its funny, thoughsomewhere along the line, Mjllmile and Veldora had really started to get along with each other. All the impossible demands I had given them, and it looked like he was now fully used to things. Amazing. This guy may be more of a monster than I thought.

    That was all for Mjllmiles rundown. Diablo, Hakuro, and Geldwho werent around for all the lead-up worklistened intently to it all, no doubt saddened that they couldnt be a part of it. I should probably give each of them a reward of some sort. Gelds could wait until he was done with his current job, but Diablo and Hakuro had wrapped up theirs with flying colors.

    Making a mental note of that, I turned to my officials. So far, everythings been going smoothly, I said. Have any of you run into any issues?

    If nobody had, I was going to turn it over to Soei, but

    Yes sir!

    That was Ramiriss cheerful voice sounding out as she raised her hand. Ramiris, huh? Im sure its nothing serious, then.

    Whats up, Ramiris?

    Well, um, I got a problem?

    Yes? What is it?

    Okay, well, you see, its about the bottom floors of the Dungeon

    She fell silent, ncing at Veldora.

    Kwaaaah-ha-ha-ha! Yes, erm, it is nothing serious. You recall the forest installed in Floor 95 of thebyrinth? Well, for some reason, it has started growing its way up into higher floors, and it now covers everything up to Floor 71! Veldora said.

    He sounded so casual about it, too. Floors 91 to 94 were thankfully sealed off, so they apparently werent affected. But the rest of the levels were now lush forest, thanks to the nt life making its way up the magicule venttion ducts.

    Uh, thats gonna be a pretty big pain in the ass to clean up, isnt it?

    It sure is! Thats why Im bringing it up with you! Ramiris cried.

    I hated to say it, but she had a point. Eesh. If this was anyones fault, it was Veldoras.

    And erm, we do have one more small issue, the dragon added.

    What would that be?

    I really didnt want to ask, but I had to. But what Veldora gave me went far beyond my expectations.

    My boss-level monsters are missing. That was what I wished to discuss.

    Ah. Well, at least he wasnt bringing up something stupid. Apparently, this creeping forest was sucking up the magicules in thebyrinth before those monsters could be spawned. As a result, we werent seeing monsters worthy of being deemed bosses of the lower dungeons. We did have a single tempest serpent born (rank: A-minus), but I already designated that the boss of Floor 40. It was Veldora and Ramiris, after all, who said they didnt need small fry like that in their domains. If they wanted it back now, forget it.

    Also, Im thinking about making a new Elemental Colossus, so I want you to get the materials for me!

    Yes, and I want you to employ monsters worthy of serving as my bosses. And clean up the forest for me.

    ......

    Ramiris, I could at least lend an ear to. I was only nning to open everything up to Floor 50 for this unveiling anyway, so I figured we could manage. But I really didnt have time for Veldoras selfish demands. Wed have time to worry about thatter; for now, hed just have to take care of things himself.

    I was just about to turn him down when I heard three voices at the same time.

    I think we have the perfect person for the job, actually.

    Sir Rimuru, why dont you let them take care of this?

    My master, I can think of someone suitable

    It was Shuna, Treyni, and Ranga.

    Shuna suggested that Adalmann the wight would work as a boss; Gabil rapidly agreed with her. Adalmanns forces are weak against sunlight, she reasoned, so they would thrive in cave-like environments. I think thebyrinth would be perfect for them.

    Indeed, while Adalmann could leave the cave in the day, none of his forces could. I heard they liked to wander outside at night, much to the consternation of passing merchants. I had a stack ofints from them in my office. Yeah, if I ran into a walking skeleton in the dead of night, Id probably pee my pants, too. Putting them down in that maze seemed like a good idea.

    Besides, Shuna glumly continued, he is a little pushy. Praising you as a god and everything

    In Adalmanns eyes, I was a god, and Shuna my shrine princess. That was pretty annoying, yes.

    All right. Well stick Adalmann in Floor 60 as the boss. And Ramiris, Ill get some stuff to make an Elemental Colossus with. Have Adalmann help you out.

    Are you sure?

    Yeah. Hes got a lot of intelligence, if not much else. He ought to help out with your research.

    All right. Thanks, Rimuru!

    So we had bosses for Floors 60 and 70.

    Now it was Treynis turn, and she suggested leaving Floors 71 through 80 (where the vegetation was still rtively sparse) to Zegion and Apito. Those two can summon their underlings, she said, so they should be able to reim those floors in quick order. Plus She shed a look at Ramiris. I think that Zegion would make a fine boss for Floor 80, she said, smiling. Hes done a wonderful job protecting the treant homnd up to now.

    I see

    That sounds like a splendid idea, chimed in Veldora. I would be happy to train him up to a fighter worthy of making Floor 80 proud!

    Yeah, Zegion was definitely a lot stronger than one might guess. Definitely stronger than a tempest serpent, or at least he was thest time I saw him. But this is still Zegion were talking abouthes just a bug the size of a squirrel or something, you know? Im not sure how much you could train up something like that, but oh well. I already knew Veldora was a weirdo, so I could just let him do what he liked.

    Okay. Lets go with that.

    Then for Ranga.

    Master, the fox spirit I have been tending to has awoken and ims to be gifted at clearing out forests in any way requested. I would suggest epting the offer, perhaps, he said, poking his head out from my shadow.

    And sitting between his ears was what looked like a fox pup with four golden tails swaying behind it. So cute.

    Wanna try it?

    Indeed, I do, sir! The fox nodded, eyes gleaming at me. Again, sooo cute.

    Essentially, this kits offer was to ze animal trails through the vegetation, creating a sort of maze with them. If that was what it wanted to do, I saw no reason to say no. If it proved not up to the task, I could just raze the forest then.

    Okay. So

    Then I noticed a problem of my own. This fox, nicknamed Nine-Head back when it was under ymans control, still didnt really have a name.

    Well, wait. Before that, lemme give you a name. From this day forward, your name is Kumara.

    It was totally casual, like giving a dog a name. But I wasnt stupid. I had learned my lesson by now, and I wasnt gonna have all my magical energy sapped away this time. No, this time I could control Wait, whooaaaaaaa

    I was suddenly seized by a flooding sort of lethargy. This was soon followed by panic.

    Report. This is the effect of the naming. Since the subject, Kumara, held a vast amount of magicule energy, more energy is being consumed thanoriginally surmised.

    I was tricked by this tiny fox pup in front of me, but Yeah, its actually one of the rarest, most high-level monsters out there. I, um, may have dropped the ball there. Plus, the moment I uttered the name, Kumara started growing fastnot in size, really, but in number of tails, which went from four to nine in a hurry. It had only three during the fight with Ranga, and each of those tails had its own special ability.

    In a way, what I had doneI supposewas summon not one, but nine different magical beasts at the same time.

    My deepest thanks, Sir Rimuru!! I shall do all I can!!

    Ah well. No point dwelling on the past. I managed to avoid slipping into unconsciousness, so I guess Raphaels calctions were close enough, even if it wasnt quite as expected. Not much surprise in its voice anyway. It mustve assumed itd hand over this level of magicules to the little fox from the get-go. Otherwise, Kumara wouldnt have grown exactly nine tails like that.

    ......

    Cmon, dont y dumb with me! I can see through you well enough.

    Thus, I decided to leave Floors 81 through 90 to the overjoyed, scampering Kumara. Its not like this zone would see a swell of adventurers from day one; I bet Kumara solo would make a fine boss.

    That wrapped up Ramiriss and Veldoras issues.

    I was d to see the rest of my staff was pretty excited about the Dungeon, too. Its sess was really important to me; I wanted to be sure its operation started on the right track. I gave Kumara a pat on the head.

    With all the reporting on the Founders Festival done, I wanted to listen to Soeis recent findings.

    All right, Soei, the stage is yours.

    Yes sir

    What he had for me was quite a surprise. It turned out that a Hero had taken down the entire Orthrus ve Market organization. Its exposure and downfall had already led to severe consequences for certain nobility around the worldincluding that Viscount Cazac guy, who was now in the custody of the Blumund authorities.

    Even Englesia is alive with rumors of the affair. Orthrus had connections with virtually every nation in the world; it was an armed group who held possession of a great number of battle ves, including magic-born and magical beasts. Their military power was equivalent to that of a small country, but its said a Heros band was all it took to destroy it

    Soei smiled a little. This HeroLightspeed Masayuki, a name familiar to mewas now beinguded as the strongest man in the Western Nations, a reputation no doubt buoyed by the news of my victory over Hinata. Did this mean anyone who lost to a demon lord wasnt worth pinning the hopes of humankind to? I felt like I did something bad to her now. Hope she doesnt take it personally.

    But back to Masayuki. There wasnt a lot of hard intel on this guy, so we didnt know much about him. However, he was confirmed to have destroyed Orthrusand freed the elven ves they were holding.

    Several elves were among the ves, and it seems Masayuki is now apanying them back toward our nation.

    Sounds like I owe him a word or two of gratitude.

    But there was a problem.

    What should we do, Sir Rimuru? If you like, I could dispatch him before he causes any trouble for us

    No, better not. Lets try talking with him first.

    All right. Anyone who professes to y a demon lord needs to be taught a lesson, in my personal opinion, but

    Yes, as could be surmised from this conversation, there were rumors in the Western Nations that Masayuki intended to topple me. Soei already had an inhumane-looking smilejust imagining what hed do with the guy, no doubtbut he still followed my orders.

    Butman, I really didnt wanna have to face a Hero right in the middle of the Founders Festival, one of the most important events in the history of Tempest. I was worried the battle-obsessed members of my staffShion and Diablo, to say nothing of Soeiwould defy orders, run off, and do something terribly unwise.

    Let me take care of Masayuki. Absolutely no touching him, you got it?

    Yes sir!

    Well, at least they knew how to say yes sir in unison.

    But with three days to go until the Founders Festival, I now had a thorny problem at hand. It was like rain on my parade, and it made me feel a lot gloomier about the future.

    But not long from nowa massive, intense party was about to kick off and throw all my trivial worries to the wind.

 Volume 8.5 - Ch 1

    Psychidae Gobta

    Or Gobta in a cocoon 1

    Hi everyone, this is Gobta!

    Right now, Im under Rimuru-samas punishment. Its called a Psychidae Hell, being tied up by wires and hung under the ceiling.

    Despite how it sounds, there isnt any pain or suffering involved. Right now, I am able to rx my body and stay in a rtively free state. This is surprisinglyfortable. And since the wires are flexible, my body can in fact move. However, the wires wont break regardless of how hard I struggle, and all I achieved by moving so much is causing myself nausea. So, Ivee to realize that its perhaps better to just stay still and be quiet.

    My mind now focuses on something far more heart-breaking than the fact that Im all alone here. Rimuru-sama and the others went to the Night something club without me! This is taking things too far. I wanted to go as well

    Instead, I really have nothing to do now

    I suppose its rather impossible for me to escape by myself, my only hope is to summon one of the direwolf buddies to save me. But, how is it possible for me to do that? Not even Captain Rigur can pull it off. I really shouldnt have to worry though, because if I was left like this it must be simple to do. This is probably Rimuru-samas clever challenge. He is so mean though, I only overslept a little But Ill probably make Captain Rigur and Chief Rigurdo mad by saying such things. This better not get out to them.

    Although Iin, there isnt really any pain or displeasure, aside from being bored out of my mind. At the end of the day, Rimuru-sama is still very kind and gentle. I suppose thats why everyone adores him.

    Mah, he will probably let me get down by tomorrow when he returns, I just have to endure for the night.

    ***

    This is really strange.

    A whole night has already passed and its morning now, yet Rimuru-sama and the others havent returned. Did something happen? Maybe they are just going sight-seeing or are spending the night somewhere else. But honestly, Im beginning to feel hungry. I really hope to be back home soon.

    ***

    This is really bad Its been three days yet Rimuru-sama and the others still havent returned. Thats worrying, butright now Ive got no time to worry about others!

    Right now, I am facing a real crisis. Even though its pretty terrible to have an empty stomach, a far more pressing issue hase up.

    piii ~~~~~~ guruguruguru

    My stomach hurts I was able to keep the pee in, but now Im faced with a number two. While under attack from both, I feel as though my psyche is being trained to the extreme.

    AlsoAhh! Right now Im dangling in a living room with a fur carpet just below my feet. It would be another thing if it were a carved stone floor, but if I get such an expensive looking carpet dirty, even Kaijin-san would be mad The same goes for Rimuru-sama, he will probably be furious at me for causing havoc in the room, someone who has never really paid any attention when he exined stuff like going to the restroom and taking showers.

    It would seem, right now, that my situation isnt only making me ufortable, but putting me in danger. So then what should I do No, its not just a little this is bad

    My body started convulsing while I struggled to endure, causing the vibrations to pass onto the wires, starting very subtle oscitions. If this continues, it is only a matter of time before great tragedy strikes. It seems impossible to cut the wires loose, so I have to wait for Rimuru-sama to return. No solution now; Impletely out of options. The sweat that had built up started flowing down, getting into my eyes and blurring my vision. If there is no way out, then I should just give up, and let it all out

    No, wait a second? Speaking of which To the desperate me, I heard voices akin to heavens call:

    If you ever feel like giving up, just try summoning your buddy to save yourself!

    Thats true, Rimuru-sama did say that. Im definitely being tested! And knowing this, I must be able to summon one in an instant.

    Buddy, pleasee! If you donte quickly enough, something horrible is going to happen!!

    I called out in my heart, and with that I felt the transmission of the message to the direwolf, who had not experienced this before.

    Seems to be working!

    And so, I kept calling after my first attempt and was able to grasp the connection of consciousness by the third time. If thats what it takes, then itd be a lot simpler since my psyche has already been tormented to its limit at this point.

    At longst, I was able to sessfully summon the buddy before reaching my limit and let it carry me to the toilet.

    But what happened next in the toilet when I released everything and gradually lost my power is a secret.

    Luckily, all of this happened days before Rimuru-sama returned, giving me enough time to clean up any and all traces. Due to actually managing to summon apanion, I was quite surprised by myself, which cheered me up a bit.

    But this is certain, I don''t n to tell anyone at all that I had almost failed in doing so. Im taking this secret to the grave.

    The hardship behind my sess, that was its story!

 Volume 8.5 - Ch 2

    Night Butterfly

    The body of a slime is surprisinglyfortable. It isnt hard to move around, nor do I ever feel tired. To the care-free me, there is no inconvenience at all.

    However, I encountered a huge problem

    I came to the famous hostess club known as the Night Butterfly. As a token of appreciation, Kaijin-san brought me here. Although I wasnt really interested, I couldnt say no given how persistent he was.

    Its true! I really have no interest. It was just that Kaijin wouldnt back down Alright, Ill admit it. I do have some interest. Its been a long time since I could drink with beautiful Onee-sans, so Im pretty pumped to go to the club.

    BUT!!

    No matter how much I drank, I just couldnt get drunk. Now believe me, it was an incredibly serious problem. Kaijin had gone through all the trouble of bringing me here, being like this surely would cut the fun in half. I tried my hardest to get drunk, but since I couldnt even taste the drink, this seemed like a futile effort. I was determined and steadfast in my resolve, but it was no use.

    However, drinking is not the only fun thing to enjoy here. I am the type of man (slime) who is quick to adapt and wont give up before the first tiny obstacle thates my way!

    Its precisely for that reason, that I was intent on letting the Night Butterfly live up to its name. I want to enjoy ying with the elven Onee-sans who are renowned for their beauty.

    But there is now another issue. Although I previously didnt have a problem with my slime body, I now have a massiveint. The issue this time isI dont have hands. Its rare to have so many elven Onee-sans in one ce, it would surely be a huge problem if I couldnt touch them.

    I am being held by a tender and slim arm while being crushed by ample bosoms.

    This feels so good! Did I die and go to heaven after all!? I could shout with joy in this type of heavenly situation But its saddening that I cant do anything further due to my tragk of hands. I think back to all the monster Ive preyed upon prior to this day. Hands, tentacles, I put all of the mental energy I could muster into channeling my thoughts in an effort to produce these appendages.

    It is times like this that I need my unique skill Great Sage the most, and gave it the order.

    However

    <></answer.>

    Its futile!! What type of Great Sage is this?! Completely useless in my hour of need.

    But, meh, the monsters Ive preyed uponsnake, centipede, spider, bats, lizards, wolvesnow that I think about it, none of them had what it takes to create what I need now. With a heavy heart, I regrettably came to terms with not being able to squeeze any breasts.

    BUT! Im not the type of man to give up here.

    Even if I couldnt squeeze anything, I could still enjoy the sweet fragrance of these elven Onee-sans. Being surrounded by their bountiful bosoms and enjoying such heavenly fragrance. This truly is the greatest meaning in life for a man.

    So let me enjoy it already.

    I drew in deep breaths of the air around me and reached the world of fragrant attar. For now, my skill Keen Smell acquired from the direwolf alpha has been put to great use. Im exceedingly satisfied with the aroma of Elven beauties and wanna learn more about it.

    <></answer.>

    STOP! NO, Thats not at all what I meant!!

    I dont want to know these details Doing so would diminish their pure beauty. For real, is the name Great Sage just for show? What a useless skill.

    So, I exined to Great Sage in detail, that I actually just want to take in the wonders brought by the fragrance but knowing too much is definitely not allowed. Certain things were perfect at just the right amount, as with all things in life, there are lines that shouldnt be crossed. Even if one wishes to know, one shouldnt know, even if one wishes to see, one shouldnt see.

    That is the quintessential state called, Gokui (ultimate state) 2 . Humans would lose interest in things if they knew too much. Therefore you had to approach the limit, but then restrain yourself from going any further. One might say it is the art of only getting a brief glimpse of something. By subverting your intellectual curiosity, you can amplify the excitement. Its an adult thing that only professionals can grasp.

    I exin these things triumphantly to Great Sage.

    << Answer. Understood>>

    Really? It may be a Great Sage after all. My passion must have reached it on a deeper level, allowing it to understand this marvelous concept.

    Equipped with this deep knowledge, the Great Sage did a fantastic job. Letting me sense things right up until that point when it almost became unbearable. To be precise, I was able to interpret their emotions just by their smell alone. It may have only been surface level feelings such as joy or anger, but nheless such information is priceless in this hostess club.

    For that reason, I managed to secure my position as king in the club. The effect not only affects smell, but also eyesight. Everything around me that I normally cannot see, is recreated as images in my head. It is surprisingly difficult to recreate the function of eyes alone, but using Magic Perception to construct the image not only costs little magicule, but also expanded my field of view. Using this to my advantage, I can see where humans normally couldnt, this includes peeking underneath skirts. However, the elven Onee-sans seem to protect their golden triangle (thighs), not letting me see anything of note in the urately recreated images.

    As expected from the Great Sage What a terrifying existence.

    And so, my endless pursuit within the hostess club continued, at least until the clueless intruder showed up.

 Volume 8.5 - Ch 3

    Daily Life of a Certain Group of Adventurers

    Cabal, Elen and Gido staggered down the road.

    Their faces looked utterly exhausted as they stopped in front of the building they were intimately familiar with. With feeble arms they weakly pushed the door open and entered. This was a cheap inn that also functioned as a pub. To the penniless three, this was their favorite spot.

    The three regrouped at the pub after confirming their rooms. Then, letting out deep collective sighs, they opened their mouths and let a tidal wave ofints gush out.

    So, didnt I say not to do it at the time!

    Thats right, I totally said that I had a bad feeling about it!

    Nothing we can do about it now! Well we definitely didnt expect to encounter a mutated twin-headed Python on a contract to eliminate serpents!

    But, but, we had already put in the effort to hunt four of them

    And there was only one more left

    Its good enough that we were able to get negotiations to the point of at least not failing the contract

    Cabal threw out the final statement, he didnt see a point in continuing this argument. He would have liked toin like the other two, but given his role and responsibility as the party leader, he had epted his job of listening to everyonesints.

    Ale was served as the three were still caught up in their grumbling. Seemingly in an effort to wash away their frustrations, all three downed the ale in one go. While they may not have failed the contract, the payment was cut in half, and the cost for repairing their gear was sky-high due to the corrosive saliva the twin-headed python spat on them during their escape. The more they thought about it, the worse their losses seemed to get. Theyd probably fall into despair without these drinks. Although they want to buy new equipment, theyck the funds to do so, and had to settle for having their gear repaired.

    AHHH I want to have dwarven equipmentbut even the cheapest ones cost several gold coins

    Thats way too luxurious, Cabal. I also want new mage robes, but for now we have to endure.

    We sure are poor. We should feel lucky that we were able to just survive this time.

    Thats true. Because we had escaped from the twin-headed python we were able to report about it, that led to the dispatching of the kill squad. We should be happy that the residents there were not affected, right?

    Right, right. Its definitely not an issue that we already spent all our savings on repairing gear.

    Just as Cabal was going to be optimistic after hearing Gidos response, he was immediately brought back to reality by the words of Elen, and proceeded to plunge into depression. To lighten up the atmosphere, Cabal was about to suggest that they drown their sorrows in drink, go to sleep, and then start working hard from tomorrow onward! But instead:

    Hey, have you heard?

    Huh, you mean the vi located in the mountains in front of Kiana Vige, right? It seems that theres a contract of 10 gold coins on it.

    The three overheard this from the drunkards chatting next to them. They seemed to have been drunk at just the right time, so that they didnt think to keep their voices down. All three instantly sobered up upon hearing about the 10 gold coins and focused on eavesdropping seriously.

    The payment seems to be 10 coins or so if anyone ys the monster.

    Hold on, hold on, that sure is exceptional pricing. But why is the bounty so high?

    It seems that the warrant isnt issued from the guild. You get a bonus from the agency issuing the contract.

    If thats the case, wouldnt it be impossible to know the power of the monster? Surely there isnt any idiot who would actually take the deal, right?

    Ten gold coins can be a very attractive price, but Kiana Vige is still quite far. Having to set out on the journey without even knowing the details of the contractregardless of how you see ityou probably wont take it, right?

    Thats right. Its much wiser to make money bit by bit.

    The menughed as they said so, setting the matter concerning high bounty contracts aside and started boasting about each others grand visions.

    Cabal, Elen and Gido looked at each other.

    You now, weve been quite free since thest contract

    Yeahand its about that time in the year to try out mountain cuisine

    Isnt it nice to asionally visit mountains to train your body and soul?

    The three nodded at each other in agreement. Their eyes filled with desire, and its clear that they had no concern for whether it was dangerous or not.

    ***

    Cabal, Elen and Gido desperately sprinted at full speed. As they were about to reach the exit that thing appeared in front of the door. A lesser demon. It was of B+ Rank, yet to the trio, who were rank B, it was an opponent that they had a 50-50 chance of winning against.

    ording to the Guilds principle of distributing contracts based on level, opponents up until the same level as the adventurer could be considered on par. However, if one challenges an opponent higher than ones level, to say there is no guarantee of victory would be an understatement, rather, it is a suicidal act.

    How did the situation turn out like this? It all started when

    ***

    After resting for one night at Kiana Vige, the party set out to visit the vi in the mountains. That was where the three decided to take up the contract, and since the night had already set in, they were thus invited to stay at the vis guest room. It was not until they sat down for dinner with the vis owner that they realized it was a trap.

    We are truly sorry for the trouble, but is it really okay to treat us with such a feast?

    All of the dishes taste amazing~!

    You may rest assured if you leave the Giant Ghost Bear in our care, we will handle it for you!

    Hahaha, oh my, youngsters these days sure are eager. Please enjoy the meal to your hearts content, there is plenty more!

    Thank you very much!

    Indeed, these are truly delicious~! Could it be that he is trying to feed us well before eating uster~?

    Hahaha, huh? Haha, wait, what did you just say?

    Well trying to feed us well and eat usyou know, something like that?

    The owner showed a twisted smile regarding Elens joke. The expression was so unnatural, that Elen, who just wanted to joke around, could only respond with a forced smile.

    Could it be. That~It wasnt a joke?

    Fufu, FUHAHAHA! You feeble mortals have done well in seeing through my act. Although it has not gone quite ording to n, I shall now kill you all and take your flesh!

    As he finished his sentence, the owner revealed his true form. Witnessing the revtion, the three knew they had to get out of there quickly. Thats how the threes grand escape began.

    ***

    After running all over the ce, their flight apparently came to an abrupt end as all three got stuck at the gate.

    Ah, we should ept our fate at this point! Lets just kill it!!

    Lil sis, thats easier said than done Oh well, I suppose it cant be helped.

    Hey, hey, Im supposed to be the leader, no? ITCANTBEHELPED, let me show you how its done then!

    The two men became determined as well following Elens promation and decided to fight all out bearing the resolve of suffering bankruptcy (or death) when this was over.

    Guu, thats impossible How You lowly humans could harm me If only Id been fully incarnated

    The lesser demon was destroyed following its final words.

    It would seem that it wasnt fully destroyed, but only unable to maintain its flesh. Nheless it could be called a victory for the trio.

    We, we did it! We beat the lesser demon!

    So we did~! I knew that we can do anything when determined~!

    Thats great. Really great. I was convinced that I was a goner until now!

    The cheering trios expressions changed immediately after noticing the approaching mes.

    Oh shit! That bastards fireball has lit the vi on fire!

    OH NOOOO~! We will get burnt to crisps if we dont escape fast enough~!

    Dont just stand there looking shocked, get out of here now!

    The three of them frantically began their escape, again. Luckily the gate was broken during the battle, so they managed to flee to safety  however

    Speaking of which the 10 gold coins as our payment

    Zip it! We are here to train our body and mind right?

    Indeed we did, and the vi is also destroyed, so this time

    AHHHHHH! So, we wasted our effort again!?~ I thought it was about time we got to enjoy a more elegant lifestyle~! And I wanted to buy a prettier robe using the reward~!

    Thats why you should just zip it! This can only make our situation sound more tragic!?

    Well, this really fits our style though. We are lucky enough just to have survived!

    Really, this again We are always talking about the same thing every single time~

    Although, despite all of theirints, the three looked cheerful as ever. This was just part of their daily life, and the three knew from experience, as long as they live there will eventually be something good in life.

    After reporting to the nearest guild, the three stopped by the pub to kill time. Following this, the three were summoned by the guild master.

    ***

    The three entered the room nervously.

    It would seem that you were once again blinded by greed and didnt see how dangerous the job you were taking was, the Guild master started scolding them faster than Gido could close the door.

    No, due to not having epted the contract at all, this is simply a vition of guild rule, please forgive us! Cabal desperately eximed. However, Cabal was immediately met with the guild masters smirk as an answer, who then continued: Oh whatever, you all must have learnt a lot just by surviving.

    The three were confused by the guild masters reaction  perhaps hes in a good mood today, or so the three tried to reassure themselves

    BUT, youre all too reckless! Blockheads!!

    And so they were lectured by the guild master who is more horrifying than an ogre. The supposedly busy guild master went on lecturing them for hours. The three were on the verge of crying due to such rotten luck.

    To the three, the guild master said atst: However it is just as you reported, the twin-headed serpents have been found in the forest far from the vige. It was because you had lured it to there, is it not? Great job. Apart from that, it is good that you were able to escape. Please recognize the difference in levels in the future and stop being so reckless.

    No, it was just because we were so caught up in escaping that we ran towards the opposite direction of the vige on ident.

    Yes, yes, we were so scared at the time~

    It was our mistake, if we were to escape back to the vige, there were still soldiers waiting there.

    The guild master gave them a look saying Yeah sure, thats definitely how it went down, as if he had seen through the three who were trying to get past the situation by saying so. With that, he turned his eyes back to his documents. This is how the guild master expresses his gratitude.

    The three saluted and left the guild masters office.

    ***

    A few dayster.

    They happened to pass by a certain vige due to work.

    Ah, its big sis and her party! Thank you so much for defeating those scary monsters! Kids shouted as they ran over to the three and surrounded them. Those smiles were filled with happiness. The expressions they once saw when they visited the vigest time, the weeping faces of children worrying about their parents, are a thing of the past.

    To me, the best rewards is to see these smiles, or so I think asionally~!

    Well, it sure aint bad.

    Thats true, there are things more valuable than money!

    The three were ovee by the kids joy and couldnt help but smile as well. This wont take up too much time.

    And then the three, as usual, moved on their way.

    Their adventure has only just begun.

 Volume 8.5 - Ch 4

    Dress Up

    Or How I stop worrying and love the cross dress

    On that day, the female residents continued their work nervously without a word. They all unconsciously steered their eyes towards that certain building as if something was on their mind. Inside the building, thedies were cautiously holding an earnest discussion.

    Well then, Haruna-san, I imagine there is no dy to the preparations?

    Yes, Shuna-sama. Everything is proceeding ording to the n.

    Surely everything will go smoothly with her handling it. Shuna nodded in response, a satisfied look on her face.

    Shion, any problems on your end?

    None, Shuna-sama. I can handle this!

    Is that so. Well do remember that your role is essential for our n to work.

    Of course! Please dont worry!

    Unlike how Shuna felt about Haruna, she sensed certain unease regarding Shion. Yet, this operation couldnt bepleted without Shions assistance. Feeling conflicted, Shuna still responded to Shion with a nod. The three looked at each other once more beforemencing their respective duty.

    ***

    It was a bright and sunny day. I (Rimuru) bumped onto the street to inspect the progress of the town construction. Due to not being with Shion for the day, I had to walk on my own feet for quite some time toe. Well, slimes dont have feet, so its more like moving forward akin to waves  which doesnt really matter. Whats important was being able to enjoy a casual stroll.

    However, the pleasant time came to an abrupt end.

    There you are, Rimuru-sama! Shion came running over and gave me a hug, rubbing her face against me with a smile. I didnt give it a second thought, considering this happens all of the time, but could it be that she mistakes me for some kind of pet? Meh, the feeling of bosoms is reallyfortable, so I dont intend toin.

    With that being said, it wouldnt be good if this continued. So, I made my escape from Shions breast by transforming into human form, but not without feeling a shred of regret.

    So, it appears that you are looking for me, is there something wrong?

    Oh yes! Shuna-sama told me to call Rimuru-sama

    Hmm? Shuna is looking for me? I see, Shion has been absent due to being called by Shuna. That makes it a more understandable situation.

    Alright, lets go see what she needs.

    Yes!

    Just like that, I cluelessly walked towards where Shuna was Well thats where my mistake began, I didnt have any reason to take notice of it

    When I entered the room, Shuna greeted me with a smile as usual. I recall that it felt as though all of the females were extremely nervous when I entered the building. I must be imagining things, Shuna has been acting the same as usual.

    Here, have some tea!

    At that point, Shion entered, carrying the tea utensils.

    I gave my thanks while trying to prepare some tea

    Oh! Im R E A L L Y S O R R Y!

    Shion said so with an Oscar worthy expression while pouring the tea onto me. Even though I had heat resistance and didnt feel any heating from the tea, I still shouted so hot!? without thinking. It turns out that the tea really was cold to begin with. Could it be, that they intended to pour it on me all along? I nced at Shion with doubt in my eyes

    The door suddenly burst open. Ayyya Rimuru-sama! You will catch a cold if you stay in those clothes! Haruna rushed in while shouting.

    ITS A TRAP!

    It was already toote by the time I realized it.

    W-wait a second! You guys, what do you all n to do!?

    Ara ara, this suits you really well!

    This one here also suits you well, Rimuru-sama!

    Please try this one here as well! This is my best work yet, I made it while thinking about Rimuru-sama!

    W-Wait up you guys! Please follow some order.

    My clothes were stripped instantaneously by the handsing from all directions. What happened next, was the grand dress up party. The clothes put on me wereSailor outfit, Miko dress, Army suit and Queen-like corset etc.

    It makes sense that they have ess to the memories of these, given they are styles originating from my sketches. It would seem that when the femalesid their eyes upon them, their creativity ran wild. This mistake was on me for not getting rid of the wood block I had sketched on. Even so, I feel like Im being exploited like a dress up doll, having to y along with them until they were satisfied. Shion put her heart and soul into this fashion show with dazzling eyes while Shuna recorded the point of improvement. I had given up entirely from the start, knowing that there was no ally among this crowd.

    A hard lessonIf I ever wish to go about things in a carefree manner, I must ount for karma striking back one day!

    And all thanks to my sketches, I can expect plenty more bizarre outfits to be created. Because of that, this ce soon became known as the holynd for tailors. But thats a story for another day.

 Volume 8.5 - Ch 5

    Hot Spring

    Alright, this may seem sudden, but its a matter concerning the region to the west of the wends that the lizardmen inhabit.

    There you will find a vast underground cavern, the naturalbyrinth formed by an active volcano. Itsplex interior structure is made up of countless winding roads, spanning an area so immense, that even the lizardmen are unable to fully grasp it.

    Should you choose to explore one of these paths, you may be led to a frozen cave world, whereas another may lead to a world of burningva. There also seem to be hidden paths that lead to magical hotspots, though they are deemed too dangerous to traverse.

    However, thebyrinth isnt the focus of this expedition. Rather, its the existence of the active volcano. Because of that, there may be hot springs there as well  or so I thought.

    ***

    Everyone! I want to take baths in hot springs, so how about it?

    My voice echoed in the meeting room, though my thoughts didnt seem to resonate with everyone too well.

    I meana hot spring is just hot water, right? You can just wash yourself in the river.

    Hmhm, in Dwargon, hot spring water is channeled into the bath house, but I didnt think much of it.

    The dwarves Kaijin and Garm seemed uninterested, Dold and Myrd also nodded in agreement with Kaijin. Hot springs dont seem to be anything special, well that view isnt necessarily wrong. But my vision ispletely different from the dwarves.

    Hot Spring? What is that supposed to be?

    Seems to be a ce umting hot water boiled by a volcanos extreme heat, right? Hearing Benimarus question, Souei gave a quick answer, he is surprisingly knowledgeable. Anyway, regarding those who have no interest in hot springs, I need to make them understand the beauty of bathing.

    In terms of hygiene, bathing at a bathhouse can prevent disease; more importantly, as a former Japanese Ive made up my mind to promote bathing culture and am looked forward to enjoying it for that reason. But I suppose that goes without saying.

    Yes! Although notpletely correct, there are also hot springs without a volcano, but well put that aside; As Souei said, hot springs heated by volcanoes are the goal of this expedition. By heating the water underground, a variety of minerals get dissolved in the water, which Ive heard are very good for your body. I would even go so far as to say that it is the best cure for a tired body afterbat.

    After emphasizing that part, Benimaru also seemed intrigued.

    Sounds pretty good, it would be interesting to try it out.

    Incredible, Rimuru-sama, you sure know a lot.

    It seems they have be interested in my n, so now all I have to do is to convince the dwarves.

    Moreover, imagine this: you have to wear some clothes while bathing in the river, right? If youre only taking a bucket shower you wouldnt take off all your clothes, but if youre bathing in a hot spring then it ispletely reasonable to take off all the clothes.

    No, even so

    Were fine with just a normal shower, right?

    Eh, I really dont get this bunch. Whatever you guys wish, but at least try to use your imagination a bit, like

    Ah!? Before I could describe things in detail, Kaijin seemed to have realized something. Could it be! Master, to think you are

    After Kaijin, Garm also figured out what I was trying to say.

    Fufufu, it seems you all have noticed. It is precisely that, my friends. It should be heavenly for you guys, dont you agree? My words made everyone slobber over the prospect. Their eyes now glowing with enthusiasm, it was the pr opposite of their previous attitude.

    Besides, the beauty of hot springs lies in the tradition of mixed bath

    Young master, allow me to help!

    Of course, we are allpanions!

    Hmm thats how it is!

    !!

    The dwarves were now fully on board with the n. Benimaru seemed to be on the fence about it, while Souei showed a disinterested expression.

    And so, the operation bringing hot springs to Tempest State had been initiated.

    ***

    So why is bathing not possible? No, it doesnt mean there is no way to bathe, its a far simpler problemthe expenses are way too high. Therge amount of firewood required to heat a hot spring is unaffordable. Although we already collect scraps and woodchips left over from all of the construction projects, there is no way this would be a sustainable source. Even though we collect branches from the forest, cooking also requires fire, so it would seem irresponsible to waste firewood on bathing.

    Now that the on-site investigation has beenpleted, weve discovered the most suitable source with the right temperature.

    Now its time for me to utilize my skills, using Shadow Step to connect Tempest State and the hot springs utilizing pipelines out of magisteel. Normally, working in the shadow space forces you to hold your breath, which isnt a concern for me. The real problem Im facing here is the nightmare of routing all of the different pipelines within the shadow space. Luckily for me, I could leave it all in the hands of Great Sage, who made quick work of this issue.

    The dwarves decorated the bath house with ornately carved marble. The words Mixed Bath must have given them plenty of motivation, since the final result looked extremely high-end. At a nce, one can already feel the luxurious atmosphere radiating from the elegant construction.

    The hot springter became a famous attraction for visitors from all around the world, but thats a story for another time.

    Eh, so what happened to Mixed Bath? Well, there isnt such an amazing thing in this world.

    Oh wow, you did a tremendous job, as expected of dwarven craftsman. Now that the FEMALE ONLY side is finished, I hope the male only side youve nned to make will turn out just as exquisitely, Shuna said with her most charming smile, immediately shutting down any room for discussion.

    Benimaruforted the dwarves by saying things such as its good enough that we got hot springs. So they will continue to build the male only bath house enthusiastically.

    By the way, since I am a slime, I get to move in the female only side to my hearts content, but that doesnt have anything to do with them.

 Volume 8.5 - Ch 6

    A Pink Scenery

    Or My Rimuru cant be so perverted

    Beyond a cloud of hot steam, there exists a heaven on earth where everyone hopes to enter, the ideal ce.

    Cabal and Gidos envious res are already quite annoying. But not only Cabal, Kaijin, as well as Garm, one of the three dwarven brothers, also disy an envious look. These guys They just dont know when to give up. And no matter how many times I scold them they just continueing back. As a result, they will continue to receive cold stares from Shuna, followed by beatings from Shion until they give up.

    Damn it! Master is so cunning.

    Right Even just one look would

    Cabal and Gido shed tears of regret while the dwarves gave them somefort. This has repeated for countless days. While their guts may bemendable, I could only remain silentafter all, I was currently heading towards

    I was carried into one of the two separate rooms while held in Shions arms. We were at the hot spring, of course.

    Yes, in order to heal from the days hard work, Shuna and Shion brought me to the female only hot spring. I think you get the idea why the others were so relentless in their attempts at getting in. The threedies surrounding me, are Shion, Shuna and Elen, beauties and cuties (Bijin and Bishojo). The three,pletely naked, entered the bath with me. There is no better ce on earth, this is truly a feast for the eyes.

    And today theres another guest, Demon Lord Milim is joining us.

    WHAHAHA! I didnt expect such afortable spot, this truly is a great country! Milim shouted while running around naked.

    Worried that she might slip and hurt herself, I reminded her to slow down. At first nce shes an absolute cutie, however once she does or says anything, her remarkably childish demeanor bes readily apparent. I suppose thats Milims charm

    Nheless, theres no doubt that she can be called a Bishojo and I, I am grateful for my good luck every day.

    ***

    The hot spring is wonderful. Thanks to it, I get to enjoy all kinds of positive effects it has on me, so it is only natural that I would drop by on a daily basis. I may have been a guy before, but Im a slime now. Even when transforming into my human form, I still have no clear gender. Therefore, there is clearly no problem with me entering the female only bath house.

    Today were having Milim over, which has tainted our normally serene and peaceful atmosphere with noise and excitement. Nheless I feel calm and collected, as though Im merging with the surroundings leaving my body to the mercy of Shion and Shuna.

    With a pwa~pwa I got covered in suds, followed by the puyo~puyo of me getting rubbed, they cleaned my body carefully. It is sights like this that make up our daily routines at the hot spring

    Even though I dont appreciate art as a hobby, the sight in front of me still gets my heart pumping fast. Shion has beautiful toned muscles, and her giant, soft, mature fruit (bosom) ( ? ?? ?) grows there.

    While having a slim figure, Shuna has soft porcin skin, and although her mystic fruit are notrge in size, their beautiful shape is arguably ideal. Two pale red fruit protrusions adorn her tender white skin. Their existence envelops my mind in its entirety.

    Both are great, extremely wonderful.

    When ites to Elen, who is constantly looking back and forth between Shion and Shuna, thenparing it with her own body, she still has much room to grow, but I wouldnt be too pessimistic about that. This may be her biggest concern at the moment, but if only that was my biggest worry, I couldnt help butugh.

    Then, its back to the care-free Milim.

    WHAHAHAH! She wasughing hysterically while swimming in the hot spring, full of energy.

    Little kid huh. Mental age of a toddler, probably. But I would like to stressplease stop using me as a kickboard!

    Wait, I can actually float right? Even though I can float, I feel theres probably something wrong about this. Although it sounds amazing and enviable to be used as a Bishojos ything, theres no way I could agree to this treatment

    I was in the middle of appreciating the beautiful situation, when suddenly I was getting slimehandled in such a way It took me a moment to even process what was happeningI thought I would drown No actually, there is no need for me to breath so what was I worrying about?

    Shion rescued me from Milims clutches and continued to wash my body as usual But as Shion tried to apply the soap Shuna had specially prepared, Milim robbed me from Shions hands again.

    Oi, what are you I was appalled.

    WHAHAHA! Without answering, Milim started stretching me and rubbing herself against my body.

    Oi! Dont use me as a towel!! I shouted unwittingly. I escaped from Milims hands in panic, brushed off the soap bubbles and rushed into the hot spring to draw a safe distance away.

    Chee, Rimuru is so selfish. Milim pouted regretfully. Hold on a sec, this ispletely different from being selfish, right? I must stay vignt and not show any opening for her to sneak up on me.

    However

    For the time being, I started to keep an extra eye on Milim, and her alone. Shion and Shuna started to stare at me, like eagles watching their prey, which I failed to notice at a time when all of my attention was on Milim.

    And so When I finally did notice, my body had already been used as towel by Shion and Shuna. This is kindano, surprisinglfortable, but Ive made up my mind to keep this a secret for life.

 Volume 8.5 - Ch 7

    Fishing

    On that day, Milim couldnt keep her cool since the morning. Or rather, she hade to my room at the crack of dawn to hurry me up.

    Dont worry, even though I wont get mad since I dont need to sleep in the first ce, but youre really pushing it with your antics this time.

    What are you talking about! I also only needed a little bit of sleep. Thats all fine, so can we get going now?

    Calm down you, thats not the problem at hand! We may be good to go, but its still the middle of the night. Even if we go out this early in the morning, Mister Fish may still be asleep. Im trying to persuade Milim, since tomorrow, or rather today, we had made ns to sneak out of town and go fishing. Milim has been looking forward to it way too much, and the only thing she could do was toe looking for me, to get things started.

    The way she acts barely resembles the staidness one expects of a demon lord, instead shes quite the stubborn brat. To be honest, Im not sure whether Mister Fish is still asleep or not, but either way I was able to convince Milim to stay.

    Two hourster, it was finally time to set out as nned, apanied by a happy Milim. Having a body that does not require sleep really helped me when coping with the overly energetic Milim. We snuck out of my room and exited the building. Outside of town, we found Gobta waiting for us as promised.

    Youre pretty early, I also just arrived.

    Yeah pretty much, though Milim has hurried me many, many, many times

    I see

    Gobta nodded and seems to be able to sympathize with me.

    WHAAAA! Come on, lets set out now. Ill show you guys my real power in this thing called fishing. With Milim making such a boisterous statement, I get the feeling she may have misunderstood something? Im a bit worried about what would happen if she gets annoyed and starts to make a scene.

    Milim  I suppose it will be fine if she catches anything, but if not, she may get bored easily.

    Is there really no problem? Gobta seemed to express the same concern.

    Probably. There isnt much use to think about it, if it doesnt work we would just have to call it early.

    Sounds about right. Then we should be on our way.

    And so, we set out to the sea for the main event  Fishing.

    ***

    By that time the sun shone with a bright smile. We had reached the seaside. It is my first time seeing the sea in this world, it appears to not be notably different from the earths oceans. Apart from some additional sea creatures, the ecosystem seems to differ slightly as well. But its basically the same. We found a stone bank and set up our spot for fishing.

    What do we do with this?

    Ah, so you need tobine it like this, and then hook the bait on it.

    I decided to teach the first-time fisher Milim, who was very excited for whats toe, the basics of fishingfrom rodposition to bait hooking. Gobta took out his own fishing rod but was immediately halted by me. Its a self-made fishing rod, consisting of a short branch with some fishing line tied to the end of it. This crude thing is hardly fit for use in the sea.

    Wait a second, that is for river fishing right? It would probably be too much to be used in the sea. Try this one instead. I handed over the rod broken by Milim during the prep phase while saying so.

    Yahoo~! This one is the real deal! Gobta eximed, excitedly holding the rod I handed to him.

    If you like it you can keep it. I still have one more ready.

    Really! Superb!

    Gobta started fishing happily. Milim also threw her bait, not wanting to be defeated. This must have sparked herpetitive spirit to face off against Gobta.

    Lets see how it works out

    A few hourster,

    Milim was astonishingly more patient than I expected. Its probably because she caught two small fish and had her interest bolstered.

    You guys must be hungry? Its about time to make a meal. Thus I dered it to be time for a break. As soon as I said this, the (ungodly) sight of Milim rolling the bait used for fishing into a ball and eating it, was burned into my memory.

    Ugh, its disgusting.

    No shit!

    I was under the impression that it must be delicious because its made by Rimuru, but Milim scowled at me resentfully while saying so.

    What a preposterous thing to say! Why would I bother to season the fish bait?! I promptly prepared the sandwiches before Milim could get mad and distributed them among our party. After that we continued fishing until three in the afternoon and enjoyed a long-overdue vacation.

    By the way, I caught the highest amount of fish. Originally Gobta was supposed to take second ce, however I gave Milim 10 fish out of courtesy, reversing their final ranking.

    This is supposed to be my first time fishing in the sea Etc. etc, Gobta bemoaned sadly. At least this oue is way better than Milim throwing a nasty temper tantrum. Well, at least thats what I though

    WHAAAA! Well then, lets step it up next time!

    Exactly what I had in mind!

    Milim and Gobta already made promises for a rematch.

    ***

    And so, we returned to the town after a fun day. But the situation in the town seems a bit strange, everyone appears to be out looking for someone.

    They seem to be looking for someone, could it be us??

    Hmm, that would be strange. I remember leaving a memo so that they dont get worried

    Memo? Speaking of forgetting stuff. Look, heres the thing you dropped, Rimuru sure is easily panicked! Milim responded to me proudly while holding what is undoubtedly my memo. Milim, for crying out loud, what have you done!? We were just supposed to sneak out

    Hey!? Thats exactly it!!

    Wait, this is a terrible situation! Who could me everyone for panicking!

    I stared at Gobta, both of our faces turning white as the color drained out of them. Not only did we sneak out, we didnt even leave any method for them to contact us We are definitely getting scolded

    And after that

    Shion and Shuna scolded us all harshly with bloodcurdling expressions on their faces once they found us.

    And after that, for a while, going out without informing others was prohibited. But thats a story for another day.

 Volume 8.5 - Ch 8

    Gobtas Training Day

    Morning! This is Gobta.

    Today Im going to talk about the old mans no, Hakurou-senseis training. At the beginning of the training, he taught me about Danger Detection.

    Gobta, the important thing is to never allow a sneak attack to take ce. If you learn the skill Magic Perception, then it should be alright. Theres still a long way for you to go. So for now you should learn to sense the atmosphere to detect danger.

    Even though I was lectured so seriously, I was stillpletely lost on the subject. Huh~hmm, Is that so? And so I decided to let this pass in one ear and out the other

    Siiia!

    I immediately felt a sharp pain on the back of my head after hearing the sound. Ayaa! Tears filled my eyes at the sudden pain.

    Wait, Sen-Sensei! What have you done?

    I heavily regretted ever asking this.

    You idiot, do not get careless! Before you learn to detect danger around you, you better believe I am always aiming at you. If you dont want anymore painful memories, youd better keep an eye out and be aware of all attacks!

    I could tell that these words were gonna cause me a lot of trouble.

    This Old Man, hes not kidding around!

    One look into his eyes immediately dispelled any thoughts I had aboutining. What stared back at me was a grin that could only belong to a devil.

    Do be reassured. This Wooden knife can only double the pain, but its physical damage is in turn reduced And I would not use my full force, one or two whacks wont kill you.

    Oi oi, this reckless old man has gone mad! Once or twice wont matter, but it would probably be horrible after a couple more?!

    Wait!? That means if I get hit multiple times

    Listen well now Gobta, you dont want to die, right? Then you have only one answer! Master it and show me. First detect my killing aura and prove to me your Danger Detection!

    s my doubts werepletely ignored, and Haruko-sensei promptly left after making such a one-sided speech. From that day onward, every single day of my life was spent in constant peril.

    ***

    For real now, what kind of sick joke is this!

    I rubbed my head in pain andined again.

    He told this to me

    I see, Hakurous training can really be tough.

    Souei-san thinks so too? That old man really has no idea how to cut anyone some ck, does he?

    Although I would agree with that, are you sure its alright for you to be so careless?

    Of course. Surely Souei-san would be able to sense that old man approaching? Then, it must be safe here!

    Hmm!?

    Though I may be incapable of doing it myself, I could rest assured, knowing the people around me were powerful enough to cover for me.

    Its a wless n, if I do say so myself.

    Besides, how could Danger Detection be such a simple skill to learn? It is just him swinging a wooden sword over and over every day. It sure is hard for those who are getting hit. How did Souei-san and your friends make it through?

    Hmm. In the case of Benimaru, he was able to learn Magic Perception while on the stage of learning Danger Detection, and began swordsmanship training without enduring much hardship. I also sensed the aura quite naturally and moved on to the next level.

    I see then I guess you wont be able to help me out here

    If thats what you are looking for, perhaps Shion can give you a hand.

    Is that so? Then I shall go get some advice from Shion-san!

    Ahah. You should be more cautious before going

    Using the prodigies Souei-san and Benimaru-san as a reference doesnt work for me. If it is Shion-san, she must be able to understand my hardship. I should go seek her guidance.

    After parting with Souei and heading towards the canteen where Shion-san was located For some unknown reason, Souei-san sent me off with a pitiful look in his eyes. This kinda bugs me.

    Meh, its probably just him reminiscing about his past training

    Is the conversation over, Gobta?

    Piyaa!?

    I was too nave. Ive been betrayed!

    Souei-san must have noticed it mid-conversation.

    Who did you call an old man, you idiot!

    I saw the wooden swording down the moment I heard the shout. Could this be what Danger Detection is about? But it was already toote. Unable to avoid it, I suffered another round of beatings from Hakurou-sensei.

    What I learnt was that relying on others ability is dangerous. Thats the lesson of the day.

    ***

    After that ordeal, I was able to learn many meaningful things from Shion-san.

    Its not asplicated as you may think, Gobta. Ive got a bad feeling about this. If you get that feeling, youll know what to look out for. Just keep practicing that and youll get it in no time! Anyhow, there is something else important

    She gave me this advice with a smile. In simple terms, I suppose you could call it my sixth sense. Thats how I understood it, so far.

    Im very confident in my cooking today! Please Gobta,e try it out and tell me what you think!

    This is bad.

    This is REALLY BAD!

    A dangerous aura (smell) slowly spread that put Hakurou-senseis training to shame.

    Now, for real! I am experiencing Danger Detection.

    <<confirmed, extra="" skill="" danger="" detection="" acquiring="" sessful="">></confirmed,>

    Wow! Is this Real?! I was able to achieve the goal through unexpected means. Nice job, Souei-san, your tip worked out in the end.

    But.

    It seems like eating that thing would definitely be dangerous, so I gotta run right now!

    Well then, see you next time!

 Volume 8.5 - Ch 9

    Milim and Honey

    Milim Nava was a demon lord.

    In her long and tenacious life, she was never defeated. To alleviate some of the boredom in her life she visited a town and encountered a monster. Even though it had overwhelming magic power and magical ability, it posed no challenge in Milims eyes.

    After greeting each other, Milim decided to observe its attitude. What followed, was a one on one situation against that monster, Rimuru. She wins if she can sustain the opponents attack, the matchs rules were that simple.

    No matter what kind of attack, even a sneak attack, none of it will work on me!

    Milim was filled with confidence, her excitement only growing by the second at the thought of what unexpected thing may happen.

    Well then, what type of attack would he use to cheer me up?

    Rimuru in human form charged towards Milim without hesitation. Milim was absolutely thrilled.

    Then, Eat This!

    Hmm!?

    He had thrown a water ball. Oddly enough, there wasnt any sort of power put into it.

    Could it be poison? Now that would be a boring trick

    Milim hasplete resistance against poison. To think this monster called Rimuru had decided to use this type of trick, he clearly wasnt as interesting as she had expected. Milims disappointment was immeasurable and she was left feeling rather lonely.

    Ive lost my interest, Ill just beat up this guy. Ill be sure to make Karion regret this

    As these thoughts passed through her head, she licked the goo left behind by the ball, which had harmlessly sttered on her mouth. In that moment, a shock jolted through her body.

    What is this!? This is so delicious!!

    What leaked from that water ball overwhelmed her with a sensation of sweetness she had never experienced before, to the extent of numbing her body.

    Kukuku, what will you do now Demon Lord Milim? If you do anything to me now, the truth about the water ball will be lost forever

    Rimurus voice reached her ears, but Milims mind was busy elsewhere. She analysed this delightful sweetness and already figured out what it was. Containing numerous nutrients and likely distilled from nectar  its got to be honey. With Milims skill Milim Eye (Dragon Eye), analysing theponents was a piece of cake.

    The difficulty in refining the honey to this level is what made it special. It definitely wasnt any ordinary honey, there were some miraculousponents within in.

    This isnectar? But how is it made to be so tasty and sweet?

    This sensation on the tip of her tongue, the sweetness was top notch. Honey like this is capable of restoring any abnormal status, and even healing incurable diseases within an instant.

    This among other things exemplified the extremely high nutritional value of the honey. From what she could imagine, Rimuru most likely employed a highly capable monster for refining and collecting nectar from the blossoms of rare flowers. But she had no idea what monster would spend that much time and care on producing honey

    In other words, it was a first for Milim, who lived unimaginably long, to experience such deliciousness. As a result, the final verdict of this confrontation evened out to a draw.

    Anything other than victory was rare in Milims longsting life. However, she regrets nothing there. On the contrary, she now felt an unprecedented sense of excitement.

    Well, then from today forward we are friends.

    Rimurus words kept echoing in her head.

    Wha-HAHAHA, her facial expression distorted, unable to hold down this irrepressibleughter.

    Friends huh, thats a really nice reply!

    To Milim who is considered the strongest, it was rare enough for an equal to exist. Most of the people felt nothing but fear towards Milim, and so the notion of making friends never urred to her. But this monster named Rimuru seemingly couldnt care less and announced it so frankly. Milim was truly happy about that.

    And so Milim got a friend and said farewell to the boring days.

    ***

    Many different dishes are produced where Rimuru resides. Every day she gets treated. The Worshippers of Milim are simple people, their cuisine emphasises the natural taste of ingredients and focuses on raw dishes. Thus, Tempests elegant dishes with borate recipes are all new to Milim.

    In truth, Milim once thought that eating waspletely unnecessary, which turned out to be a huge mistake.

    Tempura, burgers, steak and croquettes, as well as ebi fry. Here, there truly is a diverse cuisine. Its so good that it makes Milim regret not having given more thought to what she ate earlier.

    The meals here are truly all delicious!

    I know that already, so please stop eating sweets while having meals.

    Why?

    Thats basic manners. If you dont pay attention to the foods taste while eating it, wouldnt that be disrespectful towards the chefs?

    Alright I got it. Hang on, what are you eating there?

    Milim stared at the white, fragrant dish that Rimuru was eating.

    This is dessert, some freshly made pancakes!

    WHAT! So dessert is different from sweets?

    Totally different, its fine because it helps to refresh the taste buds after a meal.

    Ohhhh! Milim shouted then finished dining. She finished pretty early, but that was because she picked out all of the tasty food, leaving behind only bitter vegetables.

    Uwah, they are still quite bitter.

    Dont just leave the vegetables, you have to eat it with the food. Thats what happens when you leave out the things you dislike.

    That doesnt matter, please give me some of those pancakes!

    Alright I get it. We can add some syrup to make it taste better, which one would you like?

    In front of her were different jams and honey. Milim grabbed one of the bottles without hesitation.

    You sure like honey.

    WHAHAHA! That is most certain!

    The pancake covered in honey didnt betray Milims expectation, it was as delicious as she imagined. Milim thought to herself as she ate thest piece.

    Although the sour and sweet jams taste nice too, theres no doubt honey is better  Its number one!

    Of course it is.

    Because to Milim that honey is the taste of happiness. And with that, another day begins, another happy day.

 Volume 8.5 - Ch 10

    Geld and Work

    My name is Geld. I am the one who inherited the will and name of the orc lord. We failed in our conquest and now serve under the reign of Rimuru-sama. That is most fortunate in hard times such as these. After surrendering we were not being treated like ves nor spent the days in misery. Instead we received mercy beyond our imagination and were treated with kindness.

    This ushered in days without starving.

    To me, who was granted the inheritance of the name Geld, Rimuru-sama was our enemy at the time. Rimuru-sama granted me a name and work. He shared with us a piece of his great power as well. And it is because of that, my brethren received strength to survive in this cruel world. Brethren dispersed in different locations, having their own ce of residence, devoted to their duties. Even though there were many difficulties during the start. Everyone is now able to help and connect among others to continue making a living. All of these events have been ording to Rimuru-samas will.

    Connecting roads, town to town, vige to vige, tribe to tribe. In the mountains thatcked food, we constructed mines. Fish from thekes, grains from wends, wild vegetables from the ins. And receiving plentiful gifts of the Forest. Exchanging them based on the needs of other parties. These roads are built for that purpose.

    Improving the efficiency of transportation will undoubtedly eliminate starvation as well. To us who were once forced to the brink of extinction, our life now is undoubtedly fulfilled, its like a dream. After all, we have a variety of food sources and they get distributed equally among the tribes.

    As long as one works, ones life is ensured. Knowing this, I dully yet uprightly continued working. One who does not work wont get anything to eat, these are the words of Rimuru-sama. Food can be guaranteed through working. What a wonderful thing. In the past, people were overburdened, in fear of going hungry and not even having the strength to work. And now, we are able to stay full just by working. You cant evenpare the two.

    We are the fortunate ones, this has carried on from the moment we joined. This happiness, I must protect it to the end  Indeed, tis my heartfelt promise.

    ***

    Hey hey, you are overworking yourself Geld-kun?

    Is that so Rimuru-sama? Although I hardly feel that way

    That being said, you are already working on street cleaning for the Dwargon residents, training of soldiers and connecting roads among different tribes in Jura Forest thats way too much work!

    Hahaha, there is no need to be worried. Also, most building rted work is under Myrd-samas supervision as well.

    No-no-no, I know about that. Im not only worrying about the supervision, but the crew as well. Youve realized that the orcs with us have been overworking themselves to the point of fainting, right?

    Please be reassured, we are not that weak. It is simply a difference in training method, more importantly, we feel happy about work.

    You Idiot! My point is that overdoing anything is bad news whether you are happy or not.

    He got mad at me. Indeed, once being told so, I can see the tired expressions on everyones faces. It may have been due to my good regenerative ability that I havent noticed the mounting fatigue. At this time, Rimuru-sama continued: Besides that, you have to find other values in living aside from work, try to explore some other interests. Like fishing, painting, crafting, etc. Your fingers are quite agile, it may also make you happy if you went to help Kaijin with some crafting, no?

    Craftinghow about that? Although I dont have much interest in fishing or painting, crafting does spark my curiosity. Rimuru-sama showed me some very well-made humanoid dolls.

    This was the magic doll made for Demon Lord Ramiris. It has joints and is capable ofplex actions. Isnt it interesting? You should try it out too. Looks fun, right? And besides that I also have

    Rimuru-sama kept on talking and showed me a selection of dolls, saying that there were ns to make even more models in the future. Theres also horse carriages and buildings among other things Ive never seen before.

    However, Im most interested in the one that looks like a rectangr box with multiple wheelsI think its called a train or something.

    This is a train alright, when you drive it on a prepared road, you can travel to a destination at a fast speed.

    Rimuru-sama smiled and exin it to me. In hearing the n, a doubt within me is answered. I have always been puzzled about only applying stone on half of the road that we built across the majority of the forest. So it must have been because one day we willy train tracks on them to allow trains to run on them. Rimuru-sama pulled out a model of the train track and ced a model train to run on it.

    Just like this, but before the actual thing is constructed, why dont you try experimenting with the model, wouldnt that be interesting? If its you, surely this can also act as an enjoyable hobby.

    What a novel idea, I thought to myself. To be really interested in your workas expected of Rimuru-sama. In the near future there is new work, but also fun awaiting me. I became quite motivated being told so.

    And then

    I am now contented. The starvation is long gone, in its ce my heart is overflowing with fulfillment. It is a delight to work for and serve the great master. I also developed new interests and before long, theres work awaiting me.

    What satisfying joy this is.

    Rimuru-sama not only stopped the hunger, but also brought fulfillment to our hearts. As expected of Rimuru-sama. On that note, I also swear higher loyalty towards him.

 Volume 8.5 - Ch 11

    Fine Foe

    Gabil gradually felt enraged as he grew Hippocout grass in the cave every day.

    Aiyi, speaking of Souka, rumor has it that shes improved greatly as ofte. Wouldnt she one day be stronger than me if this continues?

    Thats true, Souka-sama was already a capable warrior worthy of being the captain of Abil-samas elite bodyguards, and has since be a force to be reckoned with, next to Gabil-sama. With her training under Souei-sama, her current level of ability makes her barely recognizablepared to her past self.

    Indeed. Her performance against the megalodon during the Charybdis crisis was fantastic. This and that may all be thanks to Souei-samas training.

    Gabil agreed with the words of his subordinates. They had no problem at all acknowledging the power of Souka, who is from the same n as them, and thus simply expressed their opinion to each other.

    Thats gotta be the case. But it cant be helped that we havent been put in more important roles. We are still outsiders and were once hostile towards Rimuru-sama. We should be grateful for being epted aspanions. Moreover, Ive started to gain more interest in the cultivation of this Hippocout grass

    Thats true.

    Indeed, indeed.

    Gabil basked in the support from his subordinates, then eximed what had been irking him: However! Souka not only received the important task of espionage, she is also gaining strength at the same time! This may not be good. If this is to continue, I may lose my dignity as her senior, further deepening my shame before her! Dont you guys think that in order to be ones senior, one has to be stronger as well?

    Ga-Gabil-sama

    Perhaps you are thinking too much

    No, no. The monsters in this cave are unable to pose any threat at this point. If we continue to live like this, we may lose our sense of crisis awareness. My spear-work may also get dull over time. At least thanks to Rimuru-samas grace in dispatching Hakurou-dono as our instructor, our basic training and troop formation exercises are on point But this is not nearly enough! Isnt there anything else significant enough that the likes of us could be of use?! Especially in this town where you cant shine if you are a master of none

    Regardless, Hakurous weapon of choice is the sword, thus I have no way to improve my spear-work, other than working hard on my own, Gabil thought to himself.

    Indeed. Setting us aside, the monsters in the cave are hardly any threat to Gabil-sama

    Hn-hmm Souka-sama receives Souei-samas abusno, guidance and has been steadily improving. Nansou, Hokusou, Touka and Saika have been thriving as well. Presumably, whats necessary is an opponent of simr strength, at least thats what I think will work.

    Indeed, yes. My ability is undoubtedly a bit higher than yours. But, an opponent, hmm

    These whispers andints swirled around Gabils party.

    Meanwhile, someone was giving them a cold look. That would be Vesta. From his point of view, them bragging about the monsters in the cave beingughable, was proof enough that they were plenty strong.

    And since theyve already be this strong, whats the point in pursuing more strength?

    Plus, before that

    That nonsense can wait, could you guys start separating the Hippocout from the weeds instead

    Vesta thought to himself and sighed internally.

    ***

    Gabils party reignited their discussion during break time.

    A man approached them while they discussed.

    Hu-Hu-Hu, Ive heard of yourints!

    It was Gobta. Vesta half-telling, halfining told Gobta about Gabil and their concerns during a meal.

    Oh-oh, Gobta-dono. I see you are able to get inside without even using the magic circle. It would seem your ability has grown quite a bit.

    Of course! When spending time with that old man its inevitable, no matter how bad it is, Gobta said with pride.

    So, what seems to be the issue? Gabil asked. Gobta cut to the chase with his question: I heard you were looking for a rival. Allow me to be Gabil-sans opponent.

    What!? Gabil was shocked by this response, yet upon second thought, it didnt seem to be such a bad proposal. Based on pure strength, Gabil was no doubt stronger, yet Gabil had always been defeated by Gobta so far. This could be attributed to Gobtas wit and adeptbat coordination, which Gabil himselfcked. Gabil was well aware of his shorings. He also received the advice that having technique is far from being strong. At the point between life and death, the inability to react can be lethal from Hakurou. Recalling this, Gabil thought to himself that he could leverage Gobtas bizarre fighting style to help him improve his reaction speed.

    I understand now, that sounds like a great proposal, however, Gobta-donos job

    Just call me Gobta. Im in this to learn how to wield a spear, and since I went through quite a lot of trouble to get this weapon from Rimuru-sama, I want to practice and master it as well.

    Gobta showed off his kodachi. Despite being a kodachi, it was a magical weapon that would transform into an ice spear upon being covered in water. Gobta was unable to master the way of using a spear himself, hence why he was looking for a training partner.

    Very well, Gobta-dono. No, Gobta, from today onward, I shall teach you the art of the spear, and in return

    Ill be Gabil-sans opponent and teach you the ways to fight dirty.

    Hmm! I look forward to training with you, Gobta.

    The feeling is mutual!

    With a firm handshake, a new friendship was born. One that would develop into a secret,petitive rtionship.

    All the while Vesta shot an ice-cold look towards the two from a distance.

    Gabil-dono is such a simple man. And what in the world is the ways of fighting dirty  his eyes were burning with a desire to argue

    But Vesta who had since learnt to read the air remained silent on the matter. Among the three, there is no doubt that Vesta is the one who had matured the most.

 Volume 8.5 - Ch 12

    Roads of Delicacy

    Garde Myourmiles is a famous merchant.

    Not only that, he also happens to be the head of the Brumund Kingdoms underworld. Hes an arrogant man, strict with his money, and refuses to stoop to ttery, even with the most prominent noblesthese kinds ofments about him aremon across Brumund Kingdom, and are even known to the people of Ingracia.

    However, in reality, Myourmiles is hardly a cruel and ruthless man. He has a surprisingly loyal and caring personality. He offers work to orphans and those in poverty to ensure their basic welfare. To allow debtors to work for what they cannot pay backas Myourmiles puts it. Speaking of which, it is Myourmiles whos been organizing extra work for those who cant work for the Freedom Association.

    It is Myourmiless true character that puts him on good terms with many influential people, including the nobles of Brumund Kingdom.

    To facilitate his future business deals, he has made favors and indebted others on many asions. By leveraging his rtionships skillfully, its a piece of cake for him to earn favors from the nobles through debt collecting. Because of this, Myourmiles has been able to firmly umte power and strengthen his territory. Through this, he was able to earn his ce and voice in Brumund Kingdom.

    Ivee to Brumund Kingdom to meet this prominent businessman Myourmiles. Ive got two goals in mind this time:

    To get more manpower in order to officially set off the hotel operation, and additionally, letting him help me collect food ingredients. In terms of manpower, the goblins under my rule are well trained in customer service due to Vestas guidance. The quality of their service could probably satisfy high-ss visitors such as Duke lude or King Gazel.

    However, the money-managing staff fall short due to theirck of talent. It will take at least a couple of months to even teach them elementary arithmetic. Its a time-consuming process for these guys, so they cant just pick up skills by studying in their free time during work. But its only natural, considering that these monsters have never needed to study before in their life. Theyre a bunch who have good muscle memory but arecking in brainpower. The capable ones can simply obtain skills by feeling like doing so. Those who arent as capable have to learn through doing hard work themselves, and gaining experience manually. As thetter method would undoubtedly be met with failure, we realized we would need to find backup personnel.

    And so I decided to pay a visit to Myourmiles since hes well-known among merchants to be good at ounting.

    However, the real goal of my visit is to get him to help me gather new ingredients in order to develop new meals that we can bring to the market. For instance, the ramen from ourst meeting. Not the instant noodle typebut the real deal.

    Cake exists in this world as well. If Im thorough enough, I can find it somewhere. Im hoping Myourmiles can find out about this type of stuff for me. If all attempts fail, then it would be time for Raphael-sensei to do her thing.

    <></answer.>

    Fufufufu, thats what Im talking about,

    INCREDIBLE JOB RAPHAEL-SAN.

    The ingredients needed for ramen started to show up in my head non-stop. They have all been marked with their ces of origin with perfect uracy. The only thing left to do is collecting them.

    But thats the problem. Residents in my country do not have permits to enter other countries. Although Im fine, being an adventurer, no one else can go and import foods to my country.

    This is another significant challenge. So Ivee to discuss with Myourmiles about it. I quickly headed to his shop in Brumund.

    Myourmiles-kun, Ivee to y~! I greeted rather casually, lifting the curtain and entering the rather luxurious entrance. But at that instant

    Oi brat, where do ya think youre running into? My greeting only attracted a yakuza looking clerk. A few others like him showed up from the back of the shop after hearing noises up front.

    Ehh, isnt this strange? I came in casually because Myourmiles said, You can drop by anytime you want, Rimuru-sama!

    Myourmileskun??? My ass! You goddamn brat, how dare you address Myourmiles-san in that manner!

    Oi, dont you know youll get your ass kicked with that kind of attitude?

    We wont let it slide even if ya start to cry, ya bastard!

    They all shared the same mean expression and hollered rude things at me. Are they all some kind of street thugs? I kind of want toin.

    Aiya, Im truly sorry. I was told to drop by anytime so

    You piece of shit! Myourmiles-san wont ever give a brat like you a second look!!

    Hehehe, mah, she looks pretty cute though; are you nning on tricking Myourmiles-san?

    Sorry kid, that guy likes women who are busty and tight in the right ces! He wont ever take you with just a pretty face.

    You really shouldnt go tricking people. But, we wouldnt mind having some fun with you.

    My words were being drowned out by the clerks jeering, and Im getting angry, not to mention some of the thugs giving me disturbing looks at the wrong ces.

    Fellows, Im Myourmiles-kuns friend, you know?! Also, Im a man, not a woman. And Im not nning to trick him in the first ce! I straightened my chest and announced this to stand my ground. Mah, though I was going to borrow some money from him this time

    However, this would be a great deal for him as well. Myourmiles seems to have earned great profits through the healing potion trades, which was an idea I came up with, for him to make money. Through the sale of healing potions in the country he got to develop new industry in the local area. And through these new industries he came up with new merchandise.

    To put it nicely, Im here to persuade him into financing me, in other words, to try and trick his funds. Id be happy, Myourmilesd be happy. And so we may make a lot of money with this idea and keep a win-win rtionship in mind. Normally, chance to make some money would probably make one suspicious. I would definitely say no to that. Absolute money maker!, If anyone ever says that, they are 100% instantly considered con-artists.

    HOW-EVER!

    This time, its truly profitable. It will definitely make money since even Raphael-sensei agrees it will be lucrative. This time, I will definitely convince Myourmiles and make him ept it. This is absolutely not fraud, my conscious does not hurt one bit. Therefore I was about to respond with righteous indignation

    Zip it! Who are you trying to fool here?

    Talking apparently wont work, ya want me to use my buddy here to sort things out for you?

    These people wont even listen at all, and there stands a guy trying to intimidate me with a sword sheathed around his belt.

    Ah ah, this is really I sigh internally.

    It really cant be helped since Im not familiar with Myourmiless underlings. It would seem that Ill only be able to get through to them using brute forceright as I was about to give up, someone familiar entered from the back of the shop.

    Oi, what the hell are you all fighting over in the front of the shop?!

    I turned to the direction of the voice, there stood a man I missedit was Bydd. The man Cabal met in Blumund, the man who once was a conman. After he was hired as Myourmiless bodyguard, I met him again in Ingracia Kingdom Looks like our fates intertwine once again, it would seem he has been formally employed by Myourmiles after that.

    Yo, isnt this Bydd, how are you doingtely?

    Ah? I-Isnt this Rimuru-sama! Yes! Thanks to you I, no, I 3 have been doing great! It only matters that Rimuru-sama looks so energetic!!

    Bydd straightened himself upon seeing me and saluted with a 90-degree bow, demonstrating great respect.

    What a dramatic guy.

    Thats great to know. Speaking of which, these guys wont let me into the shop and its been a pain. Can you convince them that Im actually Myourmiless friend?

    Bydd shouldve been a D+ adventurer, I heard afterwards that he got leveled up to Rank C. So I suppose hes more sensible than these guys here. I was asking him to help with that in mind and it went even smoother than I had imagined.

    Y-you guys, do you wish to ruin this store!? That is THE Rimuru-sama!!

    These fellows who were upset with me a moment ago all started to tremble on the spot after hearing Bydds shout. Everyone began to line up, imitating Bydd, and apologised profusely to me.

    We are t-truly sorry!! Please forgive us

    As they shouted out the line, they all bowed deeply to me. There were tears in everyones eyes. A bunch of grown ass men all trembling out of fear. I initially thought they were just afraid of Bydd, but it would seem they have realized who I am. I didnt expect to scare them like that but after all, I am a demon lord these days. Myourmiles must have learnt that and told these guys. Then it wouldnt be strange to tremble upon hearing my name alone. If I had known that, I should have just told them my name. With this crowd, they wouldve probably just let me pass after hearing it.

    Ill give these assholes a good lesson afterward but please do forgive them this time.

    They lowered their heads as he said it, so I had to agree with him immediately. Yet still, with my pardon, those guys looked as if their heads were about to be served on a te as they were taken away.

    Th-that person is the demon lord

    Thatspletely different from Myourmiles-sans drawing, no?!

    Youre kidding, right? Tell me its all a lie

    A-are we getting killed?

    etc.

    I seem to have overheard some bizarre things from their crying, but I would ignore it for now.

    ***

    Hey, hey! Rimuru-sama! Its an honor that you have visited us!

    Dont be so formal with me, Myourmiles-kun! We go way back after all!

    Myourmiles happilyughed along hearing that. His enormous, obese body, a symbol of his wealth, jiggled with hisughter. But, he is truly an ace merchant.

    Hahaha, it truly makes me happy to have you say such a thing. So what has Rimuru-samae for this time? he asked and immediately switched to a more nervous look. So I also entered negotiation mode with a grin.

    As a matter of fact, Ive brought something highly profitable for you this time.

    Oh? And what could that be?

    So basically

    I exined to him in detail while sipping the red tea served by the female clerk from his shop. Myourmiles showed an awkward expression and fell silent after hearing about the development of new merchandise.

    Given it is orders from Rimuru-sama, whos taken good care of me in the past, whether its selecting credible talents or purchasing food materials I would happily take the jobs. However, to find personnel for R&D of new merchandise, that would be

    Myourmiles is a merchant so having him innovate on new food ideas would probably be hard. Even if hes good at transforming the new products intomercial merchandise, to develop new merchandise seems far beyond his abilities. However, my goal is only to get the ingredients for the food. After which, we will be taking over.

    No, no. Well cover that part, Myourmiles-kun. I only hope you can transport the ingredients to my town. After the new products areplete, Im nning to supply them to hotels along the road to Brumund. So Ill have to rely on you again for the supply of the ingredients by that time.

    I see In other words, if Rimuru-samas n works out, I would get to add new merchandise in my trade. Is that so?

    That is exactly the case. If the new merchandise gets poprized, you can also sell them in other stores you own.

    What! But, wouldnt that cut Rimuru-sama from the monopoly

    About that, didnt I just mention getting financing? Since youve contributed marily already, it is only reasonable to share the profits in return.

    Im not done as soon as I return the money once the business bes sessful. I made sure to borate on that point. Myourmiles also seemed to gradually gain more interest, listening and nodding as I go.

    I understand now. Very interesting! Then allow me to assist you!!

    Myourmiles then promised me a n of financing. Hes easier than I imagined.

    Kukuku~ Myourmiles-kun, you are too easy.

    Now that the important business is done, I have to ask about something else: Speaking of which, Ive been curious for a little while

    Myourmiles stopped and turned as he was handing over the contract to confirm with me.

    Is there something wrong?

    Yeah, about that. Theres a painting over there on the wall, is that a painting of me?

    In that reception room filled with expensive yet tasteless furniture just to show off his wealth, only that painting adorning the wall seemed unique and out of ce. The painting depicts a beautiful female confronting a dragon, whose appearance seems way too mature and doesnt match me at all.

    Kufufufu, its exactly that! It was painted by a famous artist ording to the scene where you saved me in Ingracia.

    I seem to have flipped a switch on Myourmiles, who started to prattle on and on. It would seem he has utilized magic to extract his genuine feeling during that time in order to never forget the gripping sensation. But seriously, this exaggeration is a bit over the top.

    Ehh, but my appearance originally belonged to Shizu-san. So I cant really deny when being called a beauty, but being drawn like thisit makes me look like a goddess glowing with holiness.

    Oh well, isnt this a little too exaggerated?

    Not at all! I think this is hardly sufficient yet!

    So I got in a bad spot upon pointing it out, having been refuted by Myourmiles and had him recalling details of his situation at the time enthusiastically. The female clerk seemed rather ustomed to the situation as she came to refill the red tea, it would seem this type of activity is rather mundane.

    On second thought, even if I gave my name to those thugs looking after the shop, they probably wouldnt have been able to tell I was Rimuru from the painting. After all, if they are used to looking at the adult version of me in the painting, they probably cant imagine the real Rimuru being someone who looks like a kid. Never mind, theres no use concerning myself with that. I should try to show others my current appearance more from now on so they wont mistaken me again.

    Myourmiles fulfilled the contract and purchased massive amounts of food ingredients from different countries. I cant say it didnt expect this, but I couldnt find cuisine resembling ramen anywhere.

    So lets proceed as our deal states and develop some new recipes. More and more precious and unique ingredients are being imported. My most loyal and proficient chefs will be expecting them at the brand new kitchen.

    Among them is Gobchi, whos been training under Shuna from the start. He was extremely upset when his kitchen was wrecked by Shion, and I was able to bait him into my scheme under the condition of building him a new one. These recipes could easily be recreated if I asked Shuna for help. But thats if we choose to rely on Shunas cooking, there will be too much of a burden on her at the end of the day. So this time I decided to bring in my own research and development team. Definitely not hoping to earn some extra cash for myself.

    So, what type of cuisine are we making, Rimuru-sama?

    I grinned and handed the product to Gobchi after he asked.

    It was a bowl of Ramenpleted within my Stomach.

    I-is this !? Gobchi swallowed his saliva as he stared at the ramen.

    Try it out.

    Yes sir, here I go then Gobchi started to taste the ramen upon finishing the sentence. Hes rather handy with chopsticks, likely due to observation of my usage. Gobchi nodded strongly to me as he took each bite of the ramen and let its taste sink in.

    This is amazing, Rimuru-sama! This thing will definitely win everyones heart! He eximed with joy on his face.

    Right? Isnt it delicious?

    This is beyond delicious! So, how in the world do you make this?

    Ha~Ha~Ha, that would be your job to find that out!

    Aiii? Gobchis face froze with confusion hearing myughing answer. He doesnt seem to catch what I mean and kept on blinking as he thought. That was precisely my intent after thinking it through. It would be meaningless to just produce it with my ability. We have to find out the recipe step-by-step. This is precisely why Ive summoned you. But your surprised look is really giving me a headache now.

    Listen Gobchi, you can use this kitchen to your hearts content. You get to use everyone of the ten disciples here. And so I hope you are able to find out a recipe of ramen avable for everyone with this bowl as reference, I told him while teaching him all I knew about making ramen. How to make the noodles, how to cook the broth as well as other general information regarding making ramen. Sadly Impletely ignorant on the details of this process, so Ill have to rely on Gobchi and his crews efforts.

    In other words, there are things that even Rimuru-sama doesnt knowno I get to do whatever I want, right?

    Thats right. Ive given you apleted version, you just go ahead and research it as a reference to whatever end you wish.

    Although I feel conflicted in my heart, given how reckless this is, I still felt justified saying so. After all, this is the most crucial part of the n, Id have to go through with it regardless of how much of a mess it may lead to. I n to recreate even more cuisines from my original world. Ive merely chosen ramen as step one of my grand scheme 4 . I cant just give up now!

    Gobchi seemed to have read the air and answered as Id hoped.

    I understand. If its Rimuru-samas request, I shall attempt it with all my efforts!

    Oh oh, you are truly reliable. Good luck, I have faith in you!

    And so Gobchi readily agreed. He obtained a new kitchen built by Geld and helped facilitate both my interests and businessno, newmercial endeavour, he seemed rather overjoyed by it. Thank you Gobchi. From now on he will probably work very hard as well, and I only need to wait for results.

    After which, things went smoother than I had imagined. I was able to push the responsibilities entirely onto other peopleingredient purchasing to Myourmiles and the specific culinary details to Gobchi. Myourmiles didnt seem to care about the budget while Gobchi didnt seem to care for sleeping.

    What about me?

    My job is to be everyones back-up (cheerleader). y cute and poke at Myourmiless fat tummy for more money, singing a song to support an exhausted Gobchi. As soon as the two showed a smile, one would spit out the money while the other would jump up and continue working.

    Atst, the three vours of ramen including soy sauce, miso and pork bone were sessfully recreated, alongside the choice of thick or light broth. Other merchandise such as dry-fish broth and white chicken broth were also sessfully developed.

    Amazing! As expected from Gobchi!

    Hmm, this is indeed delicious. As expected of Rimuru-samas food suggestion.

    I was highly satisfied and gave out the passingment. Now this will definitely work well as a merchandise for trading. Myourmiles whod been called to taste-test the food also seemed satisfied,memorating its deliciousness.

    Thank you gentlemen! Im now very confident in making ramen.

    Hmmhmm, with that spirit Ill rely on you with the remainder of the n.

    Yes siah, HUH? Hasn''t the development of ramen ended already?

    Thats true, Rimuru-sama. We already have so many varieties, it would be more than sufficient to open shops with these, right?

    The two express doubts as they both thought the n was over.

    Too nave~ How could my ambition be ended with just ramen?

    Ku~ku~ku, you guys are way too nave. Who ever said that this was the end of my n?

    AH?

    But

    I interrupted the two with my next ambitious product. The king of home-cooking restaurants, cuisine well known around the worldHamburgers!

    Th-This is! Gobchi seemed highly motivated once again upon seeing the new dish.

    Huhuhu, Gobchi, the recipe for this food is not challenging at all. However, it is extremely difficult if you want everyone to make the same vor of it.

    And what do you mean by that?

    For now, figure out some way to train your men in making it with the same vor! From there, let them develop hamburger meat unique to their own shops.

    I see! You wish to have my disciples run their own shops and allow them topete among each other, right?

    I give him a smile after hearing Gobchis response. It would seem that you have noticed, Gobchi. The more people capable of making the dish, the further the relevant food chain would spread across the world.

    I understand! Allow me, Gobchi, to do it!!

    Very well, I nodded in response. With Gobchis correct interpretation, he may have also sparked ambition in creating his own shop. However, Myourmiles who overheard our conversation

    Does this mean I have to invest more money

    His face turned pale as he realized he was going to increase his budget again.

    But, you dont need to worry: Kukuku, Myourmiles-kun, please be reassured! Those fully-developed ramen have already been on sale! Not only within my nation, it has been gaining poprity across the travelling hotels along the roads. I think its also about time to promote it in Brumund Kingdom.

    S-So!?

    Thats right, it means its about payback time.

    Ohohohoh, truly, as expected, Rimuru-sama!

    Indeed, indeed!

    Kufufufu, so it will all be fine under Rimuru-samas care? I understand, please allow me, Myourmiles, to handle the preparation for the next round of opening the Hamburger shops.

    I was able to sweep away his concerns with one smooth talk. In this way, I was able to seal the next deal with Myourmiles as I returned the initial fundings. After which, we generously poured in Myourmiless funds like flowing water and developed new products one by one.

    Weve also encountered a crisis mid-wayour information was leaked to Veldora and we were forced to teach him how to make teppanyaki. But thats an interesting story to tell another time.

    Even if there were losses, they were expenditure on Myourmiless tab.

    And I still continued pushing forward ns without any fear of failure

    At longst, we were able to develop a diverse menu of dishes. With different hotels adding to thepetitions, the sales kept on growing higher and higher. The initial losses sustained by Myourmiles were alsopensated with these numbers.

    Kufufufu, I cant seem to stop. The money we can make just never seems to go away!

    Am I right, Myourmiles? Everything is ording to n!

    Please allow me to remain in your care in the future as well, Rimuru-sama!

    Most certainly. But in return I hope you would understand, right?

    Of course, of course. I wont slip a word out, whatever you wish juste and ask me.

    Hmm, arent you the obedient type? Ill take good care of you in the future.

    Yes! Yes! Doe to me if you ever need to discuss any more deals!

    I tucked the little bag handed over by Myourmiles into my pocket with a nod. Theres no need to confirm the content, it was definitely the usual stuff.

    Ha! Ha! Ha!

    Ku! Ku! Ku!

    Iughed along with Myourmiles, and Gobchi on the other side was happily examining the cooking machines he received. It was a reward I told Myourmiles to prepare for him. Not only did I eat delicious food, but it also got my wallet full. Myourmiles was able to take over these new rising trades and profit through the prospering business. Even Gobchi seemed overjoyed, surrounded by all the precious food ingredients and cooking machines collected from around the world. As nned, everyone got joy out of it.

    All the new cuisines born from the incident were all supplied to the hotels along the roads to the Brumund and Ingracia Kingdoms. Apart from that, the road to Dwargon also experienced a simr development. From some point in time and onward, travelers started showing up in the hotels just to taste the food. Then on these roads, chefs and food-enthusiasts from different nations gathered due to their reputation, causing the streets to be upied fully by different food vendors.

    In the future, these roads were named Roads of Delicacy.

    Such is the origin of the naming, but I, at the time, would have no idea about that.

 Volume 8.5 - Ch 13

    Rimurus Notebook

    A certain location holds a small journalRimurus Notebookwhich was considered a valuable document containing records of events portraying that period of time surrounding the demon country''s founding. 5 Among experts, whether the artifact is authentic or forged has been a famous controversy even to this day. But there is good reason for it.

    ~Everyone was overjoyed about the fact that I have awoken by evolving into a demon lord. Since they decided to turn this day into a holiday in Tempest State, Id best record everyones status before I forget~

    This documentrecords of the Tempest Resurrection Festival documented in Rimurus Notebookbegins as such. Though its written by a domineering demon lord, it has a rather casual writing style, almost like a diary to record whatever entered his mind. The following will also contain things added to the narrative whenever he felt like doing so, expressing feelings no different from ours.

    What would you feel after reading this? Perhaps you would also feel a sense of care towards the demon lord. Thats exactly the type of reaction I hope to get. Since theres no need to continue this tangent, I will now introduce you to its contents.

    ***

    ~Its not Dong~Dong~Dong, but sh, Pierce, Roll

    Those were the sounds of Shion cooking.

    What horrifying travesty lies beyond the kitchen door

    Cooking.

    The word echoed in the deste atmosphere. I nced at Benimaru. His face has turned blue. His menacing aura was nowhere to be found. It was as if he had given up on everything, like a criminal about to be executed.

    Im just gonna let Benimaru sit here while I attempt to leave in silence.

    But

    Ri-Rimuru-sama. This is ve-very dangerous, isnt it nowEh, AHH! He ran away!!

    Benimaru ran after me with tears in his eyes. Damn, it would seem Ive been noticed. That being said, its equally horrifying to just sit there and wait for Shion to finish cooking.

    Do you want toe along?

    Please allow me to apany you!

    I dont even have to listen to whates next. Id rather go with Benimaru to check on the smiles of the ones who got resurrected and quickly forget about our imminent death sentence.

    As I walked out of the kitchen, I received appreciation from my subordinates who noticed me. Everyone passed on the good news with smiles on their faces, and I spent a good amount of time exchanging greetings one by one.

    Once that was done, we visited Kurobees workshop. Incidentally we saw Hakurou there as well. Tonight everyone will dine togetherin other words, a feast will be held. It would seem that he hade to deliver the message. Since Kurobee has been spending most of his time alone in the workshop, I decided to invite him andter introduce him to the neers, but that seems to have been unnecessary. Aside from myself, there are people who do care for Kurobee. Knowing that fills me with a sense of joy, even though it was to be expected. So I decided to take the opportunity to chat with Kurobee a bit more.

    Thanks to Rimuru-samas evolution, I also gained some skills. With these, I am nning to revise everyones weapon. Since Rimuru-sama has now proimed to be a demon lord, there will probably be more armed conflicts in the future, Kurobee announced with a smile. Truly a reliable man.

    It would seem Kurobee has gained Unique Skill Godly Craftsman on the basis of Researcher. That symbolized Kurobees resolve, he will put his heart and soul into producing armaments.

    Ivee to have him check on my sword. On top of that, in order to reflect upon the miscalctions with regards to the Farmus invasion, I have decided to retrain everyone. So, in order to be better equipped to respond to all sorts of situations, I asked him to make more varieties of weapons. Hakurou pointed to all sorts of bizarre weapons on the wall as he said so. There were scythes suitable for the Grim Reaper, 6 and two-handed great-swords; There were also moremon weapons such as sword breakers 7 , axes and spears. As for weapons requiring more techniques to wield, there were poles, ded knuckles and nunchakus. There are even weapons as hard to wield as kusarigamas 8 . It would seem he really has dedicated himself to passing on all his weapon techniques in order to cope with all situations. Speaking of which

    I want to craft a kitchen knife for Shion, could you help to make it?

    Of course, Shion just wouldnt let go of her odachi so its just about the right timing. While she holds onto a kitchen knife, I would be able to improve upon her odachi.

    Im relying on you. Also, you should add on her de I told my ideas to Kurobee, he also expressed an interest in the modification. As I was exining, Hakurou passed me a ss of wine and somehow a drinking session started without me noticing. And because of that, I began to loosen up and give out all kinds of weapon proposals. Most of them would probably turn out to be the results of fantasy and difficult to be of any practical use.

    Even though I wouldnt get drunk, it still warranted a reminder to myself to reflect upon the fact that I could lose myself in a good atmosphere. Benimaru was also participating in the weapon upgrade and handed his tachi to Kurobee. However, its an issue of whether Kurobee is gonna be able to remember anything after getting sober. Oh well, thats his problem.

    We proceeded to the town square after leaving the workshop. There, the people were working non-stop on the feast preparation. Among them, we encountered a party that was gearing up to leave the town.

    Ah, Rimuru-sama! Congrattions on your evolution! I also feel like I got a bit stronger after that!

    Oh, Gobta. That would be pretty good. Speaking of which, theres a feast tonight so where are you heading to now?

    Ahhh, Ive been asked by Shuna-sama to visit the sea

    Aha?! The sea!?

    Gobta was heading to the seaside to collect fish for the feast. Thest time we visited the sea, the fish we brought back were made into sashimi. It would seem she asked Gobta to help bring the top-tier goods, so they mustve decided to put it on todays menu.

    Thats not it, rather say Im being requested to go

    A second, Gobta-san. If you continue this, it probably wont end well.

    Y-Yes. Thats it, well be back soon!

    Gobta stopped just before announcing whatever he was going to say after hearing his second-inmands reminder. Mah, it is understood without saying. Shunas request, rather than being called a request, its more of a forcefulmand. Someone like Gobta wouldnt be able to resist that.

    Ok, Ill be looking forward to that. Catch something big to bring back!

    Understood. Leave the rest to us!

    With that being said, Gobta is pretty fond of fishing regardless. I bear some regrets in not being able to prepare the feast with everyone. However, collecting the ingredients for the main course is an important task to hand to Gobta. He probably feels pretty happy in his heart despite theints.

    As Gobta prepared to leave, there came another person holding a bag dripping with blood. The distinct swell of the bag, its dangling weight and smell alone made us feel dizzy. I turned to see who it was, and it turned out to be Gobuzo.

    So its Gobuzo. Its great that youre looking well but What is that? I asked, subconsciously sensing an ominous aura emitting from the bag.

    Huh? Isnt this Gobuzo? What is this all about?

    Before Gobuzo could answer, Gobta and I both started to notice following my question Gobuzos answer confirmed my prediction, a truly horrifying sense of foreshadowing arose.

    Ah, Rimuru-sama! And Gobta-san? I was told to bring Shion-sama her cooking ingredients.

    Hold on a second.

    Just, hold on for a while.

    Go-Gobuzo-kun? Whatever is inside that bloody bag, coulditbe the ingredients?

    Y-yeah Gobuzo. This-this is way too early to deliver right? Show us whats inside the bag for a moment. Benimarus face also gradually turned blue again, and demanded Gobuzo open the bag. What rolled from it wasthe head of a Ushiroku 9 . A mighty one at that, with a pair of strong horns.

    But!! The problem here isnt whether its a mighty beast or not.

    Hold on a sec! A Ushirokus head ispletely inedible, right?! I couldnt help but scream.

    And Mr. Ushirokus head, could you please stop looking at me with disappointment. It must have been severed in an instant and transported here directly, now lying there, its eyes staring deeply into mine. Thats pretty horrifying when you think about it. Thats a feeling I would never have imagined to be experiencing on the day of a feast. This is probably what eating raw means, but even then, neh

    So its true then? Earlier, Shuna-sama said the same thing to Shion-sama, but it only seems to have emboldened her

    Its as Gobuzo said. I also recall having been warned by Shuna about this being inedible. But because of that, Shion had been prettypetitive about it.

    An Ingredient that even Shuna-sama cant handleI shall make it work then!

    The suddenly invoked vanity drove her to order Gobuzo to bring her the ingredient.

    This is bad Shion is probably going on a rampage right now.

    No way So it was me who was going to eat this

    Benimaru looked dead inside. And it would seem Gobta had also sensed the danger of the situation seeing Benimaru like that.

    We-well, we have our own mission, so! Gobta didnt waste any time fleeing from the situation after interjecting. They slipped away so quickly that even Benimaru wasnt able to stop them.

    I see Gobtas leadership skills have also improved.

    I agree. That bastard really only has exceptional skill in detecting danger Benimaru agreed in pain.

    But in turn, this means there was no chance of Gobta getting involved in this whole mess. So we had to deal with the Ushiroku ourselves. Benimaru peeked at me and patted Gobuzos shoulder with determination. And

    Rimuru-sama is also very much looking forward to Shions cooking. But he is feeling like having some vegetable soup today. Tell Shion I said that.

    What the?? Bunch of nonsense

    Oi! Benimaru you bastard! This has nothing to do with me, right!?

    Please dont say so without giving me a hand!

    Dont get me involved! Weren''t you the one who tried to trick me before!?

    Its as you said, and Ive been reflecting on that. However, this may be too much, no!?

    Benimaru was of course referring to the Ushiroku head.

    Mah That is definitely not happening.

    Right?

    We looked at each other and nodded.

    Gobuzo, allow me to return that.

    AH!? If I did that, Shion-sama would be mad at me. Ive been selected as a member of Shion-samas new toon, so I dont want to disobey her order

    Gobuzo wouldnt ept it even if it was an order from Benimaru. Its true that Gobuzo can refuse the order from Benimaru, who he doesnt directly serve. But even so, hes got balls, disobeying an order from my direct subordinate. Gobuzo may not look the part, but he is surprisingly bold. That would normally be a good thing, but not in this type of situation. It cant be helped, I guess Ill have to intervene.

    Ah, how do I put this? Gobuzo-kun, please return this. As Benimaru said, Im feeling vegetable soup now. So just deliver the message to Shion. On top of that, Ill gift you this as a token of my appreciation. I began to negotiate with Gobuzo out of pity for Benimaru. And so I ced the kusarigama, which I took from Kurobees workshop out of interest, in his hand for him to hold onto.

    This is a weapon named kusarigama, Gobuzo. Its a difficult weapon to wield, but it shoulde in handy for Gobuzo-kun whos gained Extra Skill Perfect Memory and Automatic Regeneration, I said as I handed it to him, and Gobuzo was extremely moved.

    Understood! Gobuzo will obey if it is a request from Rimuru-sama!

    Mmm-hmm. Its good that you understand. When you are skilled with it, Ill request a better kusarigama from Kurobee. Good luck with your practice!

    Yes sir! Gubuzo seemed delighted and proceeded to return the Ushiroku head. Crisis averted. Although now Benimaru owns me a favor, I wouldnt even want to think about the fact that I have to return and taste Shions cooking.~

    "Sympathy Wont Help You

    For real, it is truly unpredictable how fashion would develop one day. But that just makes life more interesting. Speaking of which, Gobuzo was able to sessfully convince Shion after we parted. Benimarus line of Rimuru-sama feels like vegetable soup was the most decisive point. I had to agree to that given its the original ending.

    Thats fine and all, now heres the story of Gobuzo.

    ~Im surprised you have helped me with collecting information on Rimuru-sama, nicely done Gobuzo! Shion said happily while offering a proposal to Gobuzo. That is, acquiring Pain Resistance. Its a necessary skill if Gobuzo would like to learn to use a kusarigama. It is probably unavoidable for Gobuzo to add a few scars on himself since hes not exactly an agile individual.

    In addition, what Shion taught him was impossible without Extra Skill Perfect Memory and Automatic Regeneration. To gain resistance to the feeling of pain by hurting oneself deliberatelythats the best way I could put it.

    I getting hit by Shion That would probably feel nice!

    Thats the spirit, Gobuzo! Work hard to improve.

    While Im not sure whether such an exchange actually took ce, from that day onward, Gobuzo has been sticking a knife in his forehead.

    What in the world is that idiot doing!? And it looks really stupid as well. But nheless, Gobuzo did in fact gain Pain Resistance, and it is also a fact that this led many others to imitate this idiotic act.

    Thats way too dangerous. I decided to add this to my list of banned techniques and stopped it from spreading.

    As such, those who came by wanting to learn how Gobuzo gained pain nullification will never be able to find out. It shall remain a secret to everybody; there are things better left undiscovered in this world.

    After Gobuzo left, I was introduced to the three Beastketeers.

    Benimaru summoned them here to greet me. Their greetings seemed to be even more enthusiastic than before.

    Well, if Rimuru-sama can gather powerful majin such as Benimaru-sama and Shion-san, theres no need to doubt the power of Rimuru-sama, Alvis asserted tteringly, while Benimaru showed signs of fear as he still couldnt get Shions cooking out of his head. Would her view change after seeing him in that state? Although Im a bit intrigued, but s. Even I fear Shions cooking, so its not my ce to mock Benimaru.

    I went to check on the beastmens temporary residence apanied by Benimaru and the Beastketeers after that. That also encouraged the people setting up tents and distributing resources. Additionally, I came to memorize the beastmens faces to foster a better rtionship in the future, living under the same roof.

    The beastmen were building their tents at the designated refuge area underground. Allbor forces were working together under Geldsmand. Motivated by tonight''s feast, theyve decided to finishying out the bedsheets by the end of the day. However, there seemed to be a few people with new wounds all over

    These guys wont listen to me, so I had tomunicate with them through my fists.

    In other words, they got beat up due to disobeying orders, ording to Geld.

    Elephant beastman and bear beastman, such men who were bigger than himself, worked as Gelds hands and feet. Thanks to that, the operation seemed to be proceeding faster than expected.

    It would definitely be faster if we did the job entirely on our own, but the beastmen wouldnt remember how to do it without us instructing. So I had to teach them a lesson, Geld said as if it was natural.

    Zoir and Talos, who are quite strong within the ranks of the Beast Kings army, can barely put up a fight against Geld-san over there.

    Indeed. But this would make things simpler. Since we always follow the strong due to our instincts.

    ording to Alvis as Suphia, the beastmen society is a total hierarchy. For that reason, they would follow the instructions of the strong when in this kind of situation. The unease brought about by the disappearance of Karion led most beastmen into a state of frenzic rage. However, they would regain their rationality upon being defeated by a more powerful existence. Like that, things progressed smoothly once they came to obey this natural hierarchy.

    That, plus Gelds strong leadership. He was able to see through the beastmens characters and turn them into his troops. In order to perform more efficiently, he turned his own subordinates into overseers of their own operations. As expected of Geld. Such techniques of troop maneuvering wouldnt be essible were it not for Gelds daily involvement in construction work.

    Nicely done, Geld. At this rate, you should be able to finish by the evening.

    Indeed! We would definitely catch up.

    What a reliable man.

    And speaking of being reliable, my attention turned to some else. The one whod been distributing healing potions among the injured beastmen. The one giving them potions was Gabil. Gabil had been surprisingly well-rounded in doing those types of things. Perhaps it is also a talent to be able to befriend any race.

    Gabil, do you have any concerns? Is there enough medicine?

    I-Isnt this Rimuru-sama! No problem at all. Our productiontely has also increased so theres still plenty in stock.

    Is that so? Good work then! Im relying on you in the future as well!

    YES SIR! ILL SERVE YOU WITH MY LIFE!! Gabil answered, almost nning to kneel before me. It would seem hed lost his smugness as ofte, perhaps its about time to give him a promotion

    Next time, Ill grant you a vacation. You should go visit your father and prepare a report on that.

    B-but Ive cut my ties and been chased out of my home

    No need to worry, just visit with Souka under my name as a messenger.

    Oh, OH, OH!! I like this, thank you so much. Please do entrust this duty to me!! Gabil happily epted and went back to work. The three Beastketeers stayed while having high hopes for tonights feast. Our party then parted.

    After the inspection, I returned to my room.

    On the way, I started chatting with Benimaru.

    I think its about time to raise Gabil to a higher office.

    Ah, I think thats a good idea as well. He seemspetent power-wise, and although that guy is still the same in terms of personality, theres nheless a lot of hope in his future.

    So its decided If necessary, I should also mend the severed tie within the Gabil household.

    Hmm, as our officer, it would be bad for our image to have a severed tie with a monster n chief. We better talk to Abil and mend the rtionship between the two.

    It should happen, if only for that reason. But it sure is concerning. If other countries get the false impression that the Lizardman tribe have bad blood with one of our civil officials, it would probably put them in an awkward spot.

    Benimaru seemed to have caught up to me. It does help a lot that we are able to engage in the proper topic so fast. Deep down in his heart, Gabil presumably also wished to make peace with his father. Besides, it really wont be productive to continue this broken rtionship. As for the Lizardman n chief Abil, if his kid was able to be an officer under a demon lord, it should be sufficient reason to reconnect with Gabil.

    The problem here is that both Gabil and Abil are being stubborn. If we dont arrange Souka to mediate prior to the event, they may end up in a fight. Its better to arrange things first and execute with sufficient preparations.

    So I should ask Souei to help. Since he has already met Abil, it would be alright to let him negotiate.

    I left with Benimaru, keeping this strategy in mind.

    ***

    Id say that captures the essence of this book. Although the story does continue, we have limited time. Regrettably, the introduction shall end here. For those interested in what I have introduced, please consider purchasing a copy of Rimurus Notebook.

    If youve read it, you should have sufficient reasons to understand how much the Great Demon Lord Rimuru cherishes his subordinates. To the Demon Lords subordinates, to his people, Demon Lord Rimuru is not a symbol of horror, but an existence that parallels parenthood. That has not changed from then till now. 10

    Knowing that the underling Shion was not good at cooking, both still decided to eat, his subordinate Benimaruing to his aid.

    Supplied Kurobee with ideas for new weapons when hes troubled with innovating.

    Enjoyed fishing alongside Gobta and his subordinates.

    Discovered and inspired the future martial artistKusarigama Gobuzo.

    Helping the Beastmen in their time of need without asking anything in return, as well as being able to sign a permanent non-aggression pact with their nation.

    Listening to the subordinatesints while helping to solve their issues.

    But it wasnt easy at all to help all of them resolve their issues.

    That demon lord, the more you try to learn about his personality, the more understanding you feel towards those close to him. Especially the part about tasting Shions cooking, thats not something just anyone could do.

    Aya, my apologies, I may have gotten a little bit too emotional.

    As I was saying

    Even though this feeling of friendliness may be strategic propaganda by Demon Lord Rimuru Youll be the judge of that. Hopefully you will be able to make the proper judgement after reading this. Could it be, that hes trying to deceive humanity, or perhaps, trying to fit in human society from the bottom of his heart? You will more or less get a peek into the Demon Lords mind after reading this book.

    With that, I hope everyone would be able to see what Demon Lord Rimuru is truly contemting and wish that one day, the discussion of such a topic will end with the book. With the hopes of freeing people from suspicion, I hereby promote this book.

    <<written by="" one="" who="" wants="" to="" know="" more="" about="" the="" great="" demon="" lord="" rimuru="">></written>

    Done and dusted.

    Given I have promoted the product on a huge scale in this way, record-breaking sales are definitely expected. Bing a best-selling work, Im counting down the days before Im called a writer-sensei. I believe the journalists gathered here would also be able to understand my feeling. Or so I thought

    As I finished introducing the content of the book, the journalists at the conference all started expressing unbelieving doubt.

    Ayyy, we are truly sorry. But your words are a bit different from the content in the book

    What? Different from the content? Iid my eyes on my notes as I heard the reporters doubts, and there it does record my real actions. Yeah, my actual actions.

    Oi, why is it real!?

    I remember I changed the narrative for the better, but howe my actual records of actions are documented? Its something I cant solve even by shouting out loud.

    <<due to="" the="" inuracies="" in="" narratives,="" ive="" conducted="" revisions="" content.="">></due>

    WOW, so you are the criminal!!

    What-What in the world have you done!?

    Excuse me, is this true? So whats written in your documents are the real records?

    Ah, no, about that.

    This is bad.

    VERY BAD.

    I had the illusion of having cold sweat, even with a non-sweating body.

    And, we had no idea this book even existed, so where do we get to read it?

    Ah, did they just ask that? That is true though, since the existence of my study is not known to any. After all, I was only going to promote it from now on. At the moment my original draft has been stored in my Stomach and theres few who can actually ess it. In other words, only I have ess to it.

    As I was thinking about excuses, the other reporters also started to join themotion. It would seem trying to y dumb would backfire with this one. I was going to earn some quick cash while enhancing my personal image, so it would seem I have to give up for the time being. It cant be helped, it was time for my strategic exit.

    I cant believe that my precious n to improve my public image just got hindered in such an unexpected fashion. Its my fault for not bothering to report, contact, and conference.

    Fu, FUHAHAHA! It would appear that I have been exposed. See you all another time then, my fellow friends!

    While making that overt announcement, I scrambled to snatch up all of the demo material I had just handed out, and used Teleportation to make my instant escape. And so the n to sell Rimurus Notebook ended in failure

    It turns out that I missed one of the notebooks, leaving it behind

    That notebook was the copy that became famous for the times toethe existence known as Rimurus Notebook, and I wouldnt have any reason to know about it at the time.

 Volume 8.5 - Ch 14

    Defeat of the Holy Knights

    (Spoiler for Light Novel Volume 7)

    Upon arriving at the capital city Rimuru of Tempest Federation, a drastic change in the situation had taken ce. There was a sudden surge of fighting spirit indicating a huge battle. One of the parties gave off a rather familiar aura. It belonged to the Holy Knight Order vicemander Reynald, who was supposed to be defending the nation (Ruberios) while they were out.

    This came as a tremendous shock to the Holy Knights, who had just recently gained hope in being able to resolve the conflict with Rimuru peacefully, after weeks of travelling. But regardless of the situation, they needed to go confirm the situation first.

    Lets go! Hinata shouted and led the rest of the Holy Knights to the battlefield at full speed. There, they witnessed a one-sided sh on the so-called battlefield. There were five greater majins with overwhelming power next to her. The one that stood out with unparalleled power, it was the majin that resembles a young girl with moon white hair.

    That majin was the target of this mission. The leader of the Tempest Federation, newly appointed Demon LordRimuru, thats it alright.

    The proof being that Hinata, who the knights trusted, had since fixed her sights on that majin without moving. It was definitely warranted to be on full alert against against this opponent, even ignoring all the fierce exchanges taking ce behind them.

    Regarding that incident, the Holy Knights got a good strong taste of reality.

    ***

    Rimuru was the first one to speak.

    You sure are bold, Hinata. Regardless of whatever reason you may have, this is still my territory. We could confirm your hostility by this unannounced military activity alone. So I wont be nave enough to sit around for you to strike first.

    Thatsa misunderstanding! Arno, one of the Holy Knights, thought. But theres no way he could have proven it here. Although Hinata had also already realized that, she still wanted to resolve the misunderstanding through negotiation.

    But it wasnt going as well as expected.

    Reynald and the rest are still fighting in the distance, if this is how it would go on,bat is the only way out. Then, what could we do?

    Arno tried his hardest thinking about a solution while listening to Hinatas attempt at negotiations.

    We shouldnt just be wary of Demon Lord Rimuru, Arno thought to himself. The other four majins. Every one of them gave off a fierce aura unique to the strong. Although Hinata mentioned that those are threats of A+ level, her phrasing was likely wrong. Since the only things more dangerous than that are the demon lords and true dragons.

    To be specific, even a cmity-level monsterCharybdiswhich can rival or even exceed the strength of demon lords, is only categorized as Special Rank A. It is simply a rank made to fill the gap between these vast power differences.

    Besides, hisrade Ritase was able to summon a Special Rank A greater Holy Water Maiden Undine. Having said that, if you asked her what her chances were in a fight against Charybdis, the odds would be pitifully low. Even if the ranking is the same, there is still an absolute power gap present.

    And then, the majins in front of them

    They weren''t joking around, their strength clearly written on their faces. Even though they didnt stand as tall as something like demon lords or Charybdis, these were still difficult opponents. Two of the Three Beastketeers, who were trusted aides of ex-demon lord Beast King Karion; those two are the strongest individuals within the ranks of the famous Beast King Battalion. Their strengths were no small feat.

    And the other two majins had been identified as kijins by Hinata. Those are powerful monsters worshiped by primitive tribes. Between them, especially the red-haired one seemed most unusual. It gave off a special aura among the four.

    Even with Arnos eyes he couldnt see through its strength.

    This is gonna be trouble. How are we supposed to beat majins with such power? No way we can do it

    The number matches up as well.

    Theres no better way to be sure of their strength than confronting them directly. If they are lucky enough, they may even win.

    These were resolves held by every one of the Holy Knights, so there was no need to make up their mind at this point.

    But this time, victory is not a necessity.

    Theres no need for further confrontations other than against Demon Lord Rimuru, ording to Hinata.

    Right now the situation is rather hard to resolve, but if its Hinata She definitely will be able to convince Demon Lord RimuruArno decided to ce his absolute faith in Hinata.

    Then, what would his duty be? It was to buy time.

    Arno was in a party of four.

    Same number as the majins they were against. They would more or less be able to buy some time if they took on one each. Arno decided to take action and interjected Rimuru and Hinatas conversation.

    What are you talking about! If we were to withdraw our forces in this situation, what would happen to Hinata-sama? You are the one who called Hinata here, whos to guarantee that you wont harm her!

    Whatever excuse would suffice for now. Arno shouted while thinking that to himself one-sidedly. As expected, one of Rimurus subordinates made a move. It happened to be the red-haired one that Arno thought was the most dangerous.

    What good timing. Please be my opponent now!

    It was a majin worthy of battling Arno, whose strength was only second to Hinatas within the order.

    Regrettably, if ites after anyone else, they probably wouldnt even be able to buy time.

    Arno pulled out his sword and prepared a swing at the redhead.

    No killing intent, I see? Good call. Just now if you intended to kill me, you would be lying on the ground by now.

    Of course. Arno had no intention to kill the redhead in the first ce, he only wanted to distract the majin away from Hinata.

    But what he said upset Arno. Sure, Arno recognized the redheads strength, but he was upset that he dared to treat him as some lower existence and made such an arrogant remark.

    But I wouldnt know what would happen without a fight.

    I wouldnt want to get in the way of Hinata-samas negotiation, he retorted, his eyes fixed on the redhead. So I decided to make some threat and got this reaction. But it would be rather boring if Im just misunderstood like this.

    But the redhead really wasnt taking Arno seriously.

    You are the one whos misunderstanding.

    He seemed to have little interest for Arno while saying so. That attitude was starting to piss Arno off.

    If our strength is simr, victory would depend on luck, Arno thought to himself. He wont go down without a fight against such an arrogant opponent, even if they are strong.

    Huhu, then lets have a little chat somewhere further away.

    Very well.

    Since we are going to spar one on one, the oue would be the same even if our intents differ. With that thought in mind, Arno decided to get a little more serious with the redhead.

    ***

    Arno had left.

    The two Beastketeers took the initiative to act next.

    Arent you guys feeling bored as well? If you dont want to get into Rimuru-samas way, we could go for a little spar.

    Ah, ah. The power of the Ten Great Saints, thats what I happen to want to get a taste of.

    They made their proposal to Fritz and the others, showing their beastly teeth with a provoking smirk.

    Good grief, I understand what Arno is nning now. Hes trying to distract the majins to battle in order to let Hinata focus on dealing with Demon Lord Rimuru

    Saint of Earth Bhus correctly interpreted Arnos thoughts.

    So had hispanion Fritz, who arrived at the same conclusion.

    Well then, allow me to oblige, Bhus responded.

    Well, it cant be helped, Ill join you then, Fritz added and stepped forward.

    As expected of Fritz. Even if he likes to talk nonsense most of the time, hes definitely reliable under these circumstances, Bhus thought to himself. But he became speechless once he heard Fritzs follow up line.

    Neh neh, big sis, arent you a lovelydy? Lucky day for me! Ah, my name is Fritz, what about you? You have one, right? Wont you tell me now?

    He couldnt believe Fritz addressed the Beastketeers like he were flirting with some girls on the street.

    I-idiot! How could he do something Actually, hold on a moment?

    At first Bhus had been rather confused by his colleague''s frivolous attitude, when he suddenly realized something. Although he was pretty confident that they were indeed from among the Beastketeers, they hadnt announced their names to confirm it yet.

    He is trying to get the identities of the opponents, I see now. You really are a clever man, Fritz.

    But that was probably just a misinterpretation on Bhuss side. He decided to y along after recognizing Fritzs wit.

    Ladies, I apologize for my colleague''s intrusion. Sorry for thete introduction, my name is Bhus. As you may have inferred, I am one of the Ten Great Saints, and the captain of the Holy Knight Order. I would be looking forward to our duel, but before that could you share your names with us?

    Bhus asked for the opponents names, subtly following Fritz''s lead. The one who responded to his words was the beauty with devilish straight white hair and cat-like eyes.

    Fufu, interesting. My name is Suphia. White Tiger Fang Suphia! As you may have figured out, I am one of the three Beastekeers. Let me have some fun with you now, Ten Great Saints Bhus!

    Suphia introduced herself while stepping in front of Bhus on her elegant limbs.

    The tiger has chosen her opponent.

    Bhus grasped the situation and tightened his grip on his holy battle pole infused with magical power.

    It would be great if I could meet your expectations.

    He, he, no need to be modest now. Ill even spare your life if you could satisfy me. So how about showing me what youre made of?

    Cease your howling. Ill have you taste the strength of humanitys guardians, Bhus shouted.

    At the same time

    Of course its just as Hinata-sama has expected. It would seem Demon Lord Rimurus party has no intent to confront us.

    He suddenly realized it. In addition to an overwhelming sense of reassurance, his resolve as a Holy Knight burst out of his heart. Since the objective was to buy time, theres no need to fight to the death.

    However, it is precisely for that reason, this momentnowhe should fight with all his strength, Bhus thought.

    Servant of the Western Saints Church, the Holy Knight OrderSaint of Earth Bhushere to receive you!!

    Come at me!!

    Bhus engaged inbat with Suphia the Beastketeer

    ***

    Fritz tried to confront the fear that had arisen in his heart.

    This is bad. Bad, bad, horribly bad. Its Really bad. This is really overwhelmingly horribly bad!!

    He had to move out since Bhus already took action, but should he leave Hinata or not? Fritz faced a dilemma.

    His feeling upon seeing Demon Lord Rimurufear.

    Impossible, at a nce he could undoubtedly be categorized as among the strongest. Arnos faith being as strong as steel, he still believed in Hinatas victory.

    Of course, Fritz also had faith in her. But even so, his instinct told him there was no way things could be easily resolved if Hinata had to fight that demon lord. Without much proof, Fritzs sixth sense often came to be useful in situations like this.

    He could understand Arnos thoughts, but now since Bhus had gotten involved, Fritzs course of action had already been decidedto fight one Beastketeer and buy time.

    Arno confronted the redhead whose threat was only second to Demon Lord Rimuru.

    Then

    The rest of the majins should have been on equal terms against Fritz and the other members of the Ten Great Saints.

    Although the blue-haired majin, who had little presence among the rest, had caught Fritzs attention for a whilehe possessed the least amount of magicule among them.

    So itll be fine. If its Ritase who can summon spirits, she would have an advantage when fighting by summoning Water Maiden Undine. At least she wont lose. And with Fritz and Bhus, it would at least be a draw against the Beastketeers. The problem is whether Arnono, its no use to think this hard right now. Arno is stronger than me so it wont be of help even if I worry. Instead I should think of a way to deal with the situation

    Fritz was thinking really hard. He had faith in hispanions, so he would instead prioritize how to achieve victory himself right now. At that moment, Fritz had an epiphany. This was no ce to hesitate. Fritz made up his mind and spoke to one of the Beastketeers with a sarcastic tone.

    Neh neh, big sis, arent you a lovelydy? Lucky day for me! Ah, my name is Fritz, what about you? You have one, right? wont you tell me now?

    The vulgar greeting that Fritz came up withit was to confuse his opponents. Then he would be able to distract them and make his first strike count.

    Even if he was called despicable, as long as he wins it counts. Fritz had his own style, taking all factors, not only strength, into ount in an attempt to turn the tide for himself. But he wasnt attempting to identify the opponents like what Bhus thought. It may seem frivolous, but Fritz had no time to consider that. Thats how Bhus, unbeknownst to him, decided to lead the conversation under the impression that he was taking care of Fritz.

    Sorry for the trouble, old man. But does it make me more idiotic this way?

    Fritzs chances of victory increased despite it not being his intent. Bhus then began to fight fairly as a Holy Knight of the church. The opponent mustve been expecting the same from Fritz because of that.

    The name is Alvis. Golden Snake Horn Alvis. Sadly youre not my type.

    Ayyy, thats a real shame. Then, what happens now? Should we begin?

    Fritz sighed as he gazed at Alvis, a seductive beauty with golden and ck hair floating around her head. Although her eyes were beautiful like jewels, deep down that snakes pupils seemed to hide a bottomless abyss. Fritz was disappointed that Alvis had not let down her guard one bit. The air surrounding her was cruel and cold, and she didnt make a single move upon hearing Fritzs words.

    But its only natural; this is after all a monster whomands the Beast Kings army, no way that it will be careless that easily

    That strategy may have failed, but it was nothing to worry about. The scheme to distract an opponent is multifaceted; Fritz had prepared a set of tricks he could link togetherbut while considering his next move, he experienced a sudden burst of incredible magicule. He turned his eyes wide towards its source; an earth-shattering shock wave hit him at the same time.

    Ara ara, thats Shion-sama. Shes as reckless as always

    Even though he heard Alviss words, Fritz did not feel there was any time to be concerned about such issues.

    Y-youve got to be kidding!? T-thats Geralds Inferno Spirit me!

    Fritzs Magic Perception sensed the casting of his colleagues most powerful magical attack. To hisplete surprise, the majin named Shion was able to endure itpletely.

    Or rather, she straight up cut it in half.

    Fritz froze in shock at the abnormal sight. That was tactical nuclear strike magicsomething more powerful than even Heat Disintegration, thats likely one of the most powerful magics doable by humans, and even stronger than ultimates of elven magic

    However, such an act appeared to have been handled with ease by a majin who wasnt even a demon lord.

    Thats something Fritzsmon sense couldnt process, an abnormal situation. Yet, such unrealistic sights continued. The sounds of fierce shes between weapons filled the air. The strong wind invoked by the battles decimated the nearby vegetation.

    At that moment, Arno of the Holy Knight Order had been dominating the red-haired majin with his swordsmanship.

    And he very much should be.

    Ah, Benimaru-sama is truly magnificent. Hes so eager to study, even about that persons sword art.

    Huh?

    Fritz heard the whisper of the seductive woman, Alvis, in front of him. He couldnt understand the meaning of her words. The red-haired majin, Benimaru, could only defend against the barrage of elegant yet furious sword shes. Yet Alvis was watching Benimaru without worrying about his chances of triumph.

    What are you talking about? Its obvious that it has been Arnos one-sided attack no matter how you look at it.

    Learning about sword art? Theres no way he has that time to spare. He wonte out in one piece if he looks down on a genius such as Arno like that.

    Thats how it should have been.

    But the problem for Fritz was Alviss silence. She only responded to him with a cold nce. The sword and tachi came in contact without a moments break. As the weapons danced back and forth, sparks flew as the two des shed.

    Alvis simply watched the spectacle in silence. Before Alvis turned her eyes back, Fritz couldnt move, his hands tightly sping his sword. In hindsight, she was full of openings, but Fritzs sixth sense warned him that it was obviously a dangerous temptation. As long as he could buy some time, there was no need to rush an attack.

    Fritzs head was spinning; he decided to simply apany Alvis in her observations. Momentster, Alvis, whod been staring at Benimarus battle, suddenly seemed to have lost interest and set her eyes back on Fritz.

    The battle is over. Of course that man couldnt rival Benimaru-sama.

    No, that would mean Arnos strength in

    Arno should have had the upper hand. Yet even so, Alvis announced Benimarus victory herself. Fritz was enraged by this and barely managed to contain the anger in his heart when responding to Alvis. Yet he was stopped by Alvis with a raised hand.

    You are wrong, thats simply how it looks. The battle wontst any longer, and surely you wont be satisfied with just arguing. How about you and I just spend the time together seeing Benimaru-samas battle to the end.

    Even though Fritz still couldnt ept what she had said, it was his intent to request that as well. He only said this partially out of anger and partially to provoke his opponent: Well, it wont matter since Arno will definitelye out on top. Is it alright if the tide turns on onee-chan like that?

    Yet Alvisughed at Fritzs provocation, Then

    Benimaru-sama, as a matter of fact, could incinerate the whole area here. Right now hes only sparing you all for the convenience of his sword practice. If he were to fight seriously, your friend Arno-kun would likely have been wiped off the face of the world already.

    She wasnt saying this to mock Fritz, he realized they were words of pity. It began to dawn on him He had the illusion of cold sweat flowing down his back. His heart was ensnared by fear.

    Thats just fear-mongeringmy usual tactic. To make me lose my cool and fight without my full strength Ive heard rumors of Golden Snake Horn Alvis being an intelligent strategist. It wouldnt surprise me if she were to use psychological tactics to shake me

    Even if it was a lie, Fritz convinced himself to believe it. Theres no way he couldve admitted that someone would go easy to avoid casualties when confronting them, the strongest existence among men, the Holy Knight Order. It was Fritzs sincere conviction.

    Yet the ruthless moment of truth finally arrived

    Fritz didnt know whether this majin named Benimaru was actually good at using me or not, but his swordsmanship was definitely on par with Arno. He was able to evade every fierce attack by Arnos sword using his giant tachi.

    Fu, fufu, it surprises me you are able to evade my attacks to this extent, neh. And deflecting all of them, its almost as if you are shing down water.

    That is only natural. My master in sword art taught me the ultimate zone is detecting the flow. If you carefully listen to your swords sound and be one with the sword, you can see that flow as clear as day. Ive yet to reach that realm, but Ive seen through your sword style.

    Dreadful, truly horrifying. It doesnt seem that you are bragging either. If thats the case, Ive also made up my mind. Behold, I shall demonstrate why I am called the strongest among the Holy Knights

    The fight between Arno and Benimaru entered its climax under Fritzs and Alviss observation. Fritz had only heard of Arnos secret technique, he never had the chance to witness it in real life.

    The invisible sword technique that is said to be able to cut down any monster in one sh. It is the strongest sword technique wielded only by Arno, the one adored by five elemental spirits, and whose strength is only next to Hinata.

    Behold the magic purifying shine and etch it onto your body. Take this, Five-elemental Spirit Sword!!

    Arnos beloved sword radiated five brilliant beams of light. Earth, water, fire, wind and air, the spiritual lights of five different elements. These beamsbined and unleashed a killing blow that was impossible to defend against.

    The shining de hurtled towards Benimaru.

    Is this Arnos ultimate Eeh, I thought he would never show that in front of others. Cant believe hes been pushed to this point

    Fritz thought so while confirming his friends victory.

    However!

    NavePulse sh of Flowing Water!!

    The majin Benimaru raised his tachi and swung down unfazed. As a result, Arnos shining blow was received gently by Benimarus tachi, flinging his sword into the air with a resounding ng.

    Fritz wasnt able to see a thing, but it was possible to infer what happened. To put it simply, Benimarus technique was able to destroy the power of Arnos attack. Its shock wave propagated towards Arno. He saw it and made the split-second decision to release his sword out of fear that the wave would harm his sword-holding hand.

    Fritz couldnt imagine anything else and had to believe that.

    In other words, this bastard called Benimaru even mastered a better sword art than Arno!?

    He couldntugh at it even if it was a joke. This was all a nightmarish experience to Fritz But it was all reality.

    I told you, your technique has been seen through. Your sword art is still amateurish. Its capable in terms of power, but it is pointless if you cant hit your target with it. Id advise you to understand that point, Benimaru told Arno and sheathed his tachi.

    I-Ive lost

    Arno fell to his knees on the spot after admitting his defeat.

    After witnessing the result, Alvis turned towards Fritz.

    Well, I told you so, didnt I? There is no need to ever question Benimaru-samas victory. But your friend did try his best. Then, what do you n to do now?

    Alviss seductive eyes shone with a light of curiosity and intrigue. She asked while observing how Fritz would react. In response, Fritz

    I cant believe Arno has lost This is way worse than I imagined. It still depends on how Hinata-sama and Demon Lord Rimuru would resolve everything, but Id better make up my mind here. These people are not nning to kill us. But since the fight was started by Reynald, theres no way we could just resume a friendly negotiation. But even so it doesnt seem to matter much if I begin to fight as well

    Deeply shaken, he observed his surroundings with Magic Perception. Arno was defeated, just as hed witnessed. Reynalds side also seemed to be concluding as more and more Holy Knights had fallen. Aplete defeat. Bhus on the other hand was putting up an equal fight against Beastketeer Suphia.

    And Ritase

    Shed been tied up with some unknown things, and her cheeks were blushing scarlet. The blue-haired majin next to her seemed to be protecting her in the midst of some battle. The ones exchanging blows arethe blue-haired majin and Water Maiden Undine.

    Could that be the Clone skill? If thats the case, it would make sense why his presence is barely felt.

    What surprised him more was the dominance expressed by the majins Clone over Undine. Its blows dealt by the hands of the Clone, which should have been constructed using magicule, were effective even against greater spirits that have resistance against physical attacks.

    Which means the true body must be even stronger.

    It would seem that Fritz had underestimated the threat of this blue-haired majin purely based on the magicule of its Clone. In other words, he had misjudged the majins strength from the start, a ssic blunder on Fritzs part.

    Has Ritase also been defeated as well? Uncle Bhus seems to be barely managing a draw. The only one remaining is Hinata-sama

    Her battle with Demon Lord Rimuru was something beyond Fritzs understanding. Those were speeds unfathomable to amonereven Magic Perception was meaningless in interpreting the ongoing battle, whose speed had exceeded the processing power of the human brain. Fritzs concern for her would be meaningless regardless.

    I seem absolutely outmatched by sheer strength.

    He wouldve probably only hindered Hinata rather than giving her a hand. That being the case, there was only one thing Fritz could do. He spoke to Alvis whod been awaiting an answer.

    Although I dont think theres much use in trying to fight, do you mind spending some time with me? I would be ashamed to see my friends again if that were not the case, wouldnt I now?

    Fritz had dignity too.

    Even if victory or failure pose no purpose, the battle itself may hold some meaning, Fritz thought.

    At times like that you just have to act like an idiot, huh Fritz

    Hinata would probably tease him with such a line.

    Yeah, yeah Yeah, Fritz thought to himself.

    But he embraced that part of himself wholeheartedly.

    Fufufu, alright then. You are beginning to impress me, Holy Knight Fritz-dono.

    Im most grateful. We have much to learn from each other now, BeasteekeerGolden Snake Horn Alvis-dono

    A tiny smile emerged on Fritzs lips before he dove into the battle against Alvis.

 Volume 9 - Prologue

    PROLOGUE

    THE LIGHTSPEED HERO

    Masayuki Honjo is a Hero. It wasnt a name he gave himself, but for whatever reason, that is what the people he encounters call him.

    It hadnt even been a year since he came to this world that made no sense to him. But already, Masayukis name had spread across the Western Nations; now, nobody failed to recognize it. And his true, unvarnished reaction to this was: Why did this happen?

    To find the answer, we must go back over a years time.

    Masayuki was on his way home from school, walking with his friends, when he spotted a beautiful woman with long blue hair. She was like a goddess from Norse mythology, one who would make models and celebrities turn pale, and her hair color was striking enough that it caught his eye even from a distance. If Masayuki had never seen anyone so beautiful before, it was a given that shed also be the target of attention from everyone else around her.

    Hey, check out that hottie over there, he said to his friends, being as honest with his feelings as any male teenager would. But there was no response. Surprised, he turned aroundto find a totally unfamiliar world spread before him.

    Huh?

    His body, and his brain, instinctively froze.

    Wh-wheres my teacher?! Whats going on here?!

    He treated his homeroom teacher like an idiot most of the time, but he called for them inside his mind anyway. It aplished nothing. All he could do was stand there, at a total loss.

    Sitting at the lip of a fountain in a town square, Masayuki stared into space. Some time had passed; he was calmer now, realizing nothing could be done and wondering how this could have happened. Looking back, that woman was terribly suspiciousthat much of a beauty, but for some reason, nobody gave her a passing nce. It wasnt exactly decisive evidence, but thats what Masayukis instincts told him.

    But the girl wasnt here. He tried looking around, but there was no sign of her anywhere.

    Doesnt the girl causing something like this usuallye with you? I meanlike, holy crap, is this for real? Its not some prank? Im really off in some other world?

    It would certainly make things easier to grasp if someone in on all this was next to him. But Masayuki enjoyed no such convenience.

    It was almost sunset. He hadnt eaten anything since lunch, and he was hungry. Wait a minute, he thought. This is a town. He counted himself lucky they hadnt transported him to a forest or monsterir or whatever, but how unkind could you get?

    Like, normally, wouldnt a king or someone be waiting for me to exin what the hells going on? he grumbled to himself, recalling the web novels he enjoyed chatting about with his friends. But reality can be tough.

    There was no point whining about it, so Masayuki looked back at himself once more. His name was Masayuki Honjo, age sixteen, and he had just made it into a fairlypetitive high school. Hed taken that asion to reinvent his look, modifying his school uniform a bit and applying a light-blond dye to his hair. His face was well put together; there was apparently some Russian blood in their heritage, and his mother had beautiful good looks as well. That was probably why his features were so striking, he thought. Not only that, going blond made him stand out quite a bit. He was on the upper end in terms of poprity at school, and despite not being too physically strong, he still struck a presence around ss.

    That, and he had a secret hobby: manga and anime. He never breathed a word of that at school, but practically speaking, he was a pretty hard-core (if hidden) otaku. Maybe that was why, being thrown into this inexplicable situation, he really wasnt panicking that much

    As he took all this into consideration, he checked his uniform and his bag. In one pocket was his wallet, which contained one 10,000-yen bill, three 1,000-yen bills, and some spare change. His textbooks and such were all in his desk or locker at school, so the only things in his bag were a brand-new issue of a weekly magazine, plus his phone and a piece of chewing gum. He had emptied it out at school so it wouldnt be too heavy on the way home, and he was paying big-time for it now.

    Man. Masayuki sighed to himself as he gauged his possessions. If I knew this was gonna happen, I woulda prepared a little more

    His disaster-preparedness kit, tucked into a corner of his room, had everything he wouldve wanted inside. If hed had it with him, hed be fine on his own for around three days, he supposed. Having a Swiss Army knife on hand, at the very least, wouldve made him feel a bit more secure, although he wasnt sure how far a knife would get him around here. Either way, he had nothing very useful on him, except maybe the gum. Masayuki unwrapped the piece and put it in his mouth, hoping to stave off the hunger. Now, the sad truth was that he had literally nothing.

    Over the past few hours of staring into space, Masayuki had noticed something. The people passing by, talking around him, spoke what sounded likeplete gibberish. This was a different world, with a differentnguage, and even getting food could be an uphill battle.

    They ramped up the difficulty way too much on me, manbut oh well. At worst, I could try negotiating with people. Maybe trade my phone and bag for some food

    His mind made up, Masayuki stood from the fountain. He couldnt be sure what this nation was like in terms ofws or safety, but he concluded that, if there was some kind of public institution he could get help from, that was probably the best. Before that could happen, his top priority was survivnd that meant getting some food, at any cost. Not knowing thenguage was devastating, and right now, he could easily see himself starving to death. Water, he could figure out; food was another thing entirely.

    The concept didnt thrill him, but maybe he could go look for discarded scraps somewhere. He needed to find a ce with lots aroundrestaurants, produce stores, that sort of thing. Hed already over the past few hours disposed of any pride he had. Masayuki was flexible that way.

    So after walking for several minutes, Masayuki sessfully found himself in front of a restaurant. It was no grand feat; he simply let the sweet aroma guide him there.

    Right. Time to negotiate. Im assuming asking for a job isnt gonna work. I cant even talk with them

    Thenguage barrier was just too high. Masayuki had consumed a lot of media in the isekai or otherworld genre, and it felt to him that the protagonists there often didnt have problems withmunication. Looking back, that seemed suspiciously helpful.

    Im not asking for some kind of video-game cheat or whatever, but I wish they at least allowed me tomunicate

    But there was no one he could grumble about it to, so Masayuki approached the restaurant door, trying to open it. Before he could, it opened from the other side, revealing a loud mor within.

    ?!

    Masayuki took a step back in surprise and found something softe running into his arms: a cute, petite girl looking a little scared of something.

    Huh? Am I already in trouble here?

    He hoped not, but he was right.

    ??!

    The girl was now clinging to him, talking rapidly in an unknownnguage. All Masayuki could do was give her a vague sort of smile and nod. Seeing that, the girl quickly breathed a sigh of reliefand then, for some reason, started to blush, her attention entirely focused on him. If it ended there, it would have been fine, butof courseit didnt. There was a man nearby, a big, muscle-bound brute of a man, and he was headed straight for the woman in Masayukis arms.

    Whoa, if this goes wrong, he might kill me

    Masayuki couldnt be med for instinctively thinking that. He was a bit over five and a half feet tall, and this giant was a good head above him. The mans face was reddened, perhaps out of drunkenness, and he had a longsword hanging off his belt. Even without a weapon, there was no way Masayuki could take him. It wasnt a wild stretch of the imagination to picture himself being beaten to death.

    He thought about fleeing, but the girl was still draped across him.

    Its over. Its totally over

    The smile was still on his face, but he was frozen, knees shaking. The fact that he didnt lose control of his dder, he thought, was worthy of praise.

    But then a strange voice spoke into his ear.

    Champion-like heroic behavior detected. Unique skill Chosen One unlocked. Deploy this skill?

    Yes

    No

    Um, okay?

    Masayuki wasnt too sure about giving consent to this. But the choice would prove to decisively change his destiny for good.

    Confirmed. Acquiringnguage skills via Chosen One Acquired. Also deploying Heroic Aura and Heroic Compensation.

    A cavalcade of unfamiliar terms shed across Masayukis mind.

    What? Whats going on?

    He struggled toprehend the events happening to him. But there was no time to ponder over them.

    Here, whats the problem, kid? You thinkin about getting in my way?

    Suddenly, he could understand the giant. That was the power of that Chosen One skill hed just awakened to, but Masayuki had no time to bask in it. The important thing was getting out of this scrape. One poor choice, and his life was likely over. He thought about going onto his hands and knees, swearing up and down that he meant nothing of the sortbut before he could, the girl in his arms spoke up.

    Yes! This person said hell help me!

    Did he now?

    He could see a blood vessel throb over the giants temple. His muscles seemed to visibly swell, making crystal clear how powerful this guy was.

    Oh man, he doesnt even need to use his sword. One punch, and its over

    The fear was strong enough that it gave Masayuki a cool head to think with. But he just couldnt figure out how to escape this alive.

    Well, how about that? roared the man. In that case, lets see you defeat me and protect this girl!

    A cheer arose from the passersby and restaurant patrons who had formed a circle around them.

    Whoa, whoa, hes pickin a fight with Jinrai the Mad Wolf!

    Think thats a good idea? Hes gonna kill ya!

    Yeah, Jinrais been furious ever since he failed his B-rank exam. Kacha knows that, and thats why she cut him off the ale!

    Ahhh, makes sense. Getting the cold shoulder from a girl he has feelings for mustve put him over the edge. Aint no stopping him now

    Well, someones gotta! If an adventurer kills a guy in the middle of town, thats serious! Somebody inform the Guild!

    They already did. But why dont you stop him, if thats what you think?

    Are you crazy? Jinrais ranked C-plus, but hes easily worth a B or higher! He failed the exam cause he got points taken off for behavior, but in strength alone, hes a powerhouse. I could never beat him!

    Presumably these were coworkers of Jinrai, the giant before Masayuki. Listening to them inspired feelings of both hope and despair at once. Someone was off informing the Guild of this; if he could stall long enough, maybe help woulde. On the other hand, he had no idea how long itd take, and nobody in the crowd seemed interested in lending a hand. He had to buy time, and he had to do it soloand to Masayuki, that sounded like a death sentence.

    And look at Kacha, one onlooker muttered. Whats she doing, getting some passing kid involved?

    Yeah! Why me?! Masayuki protested to himself. But he was the one who had nodded to a question he didntprehend. Hed put this on himself in the end.

    You ready to go?

    Of course he wasnt. But it didnt look like hed be given any more time. Still, if he was going down, he at least wanted to look cool while doing it. He had reimagined his look for high school, but he wasnt some street delinquent. His hair was dyed, but it wasnt like he was any good in a fight. He had gone to some kendo sses in the past, but that wasnt going to help nownot when he didnt even have a piece of wood to battle with.

    But one thing Masayuki was good at was bluffing.

    The bigger they talk, the harder they fall, yknow. You sure youre ready for this? After picking a fight with me?

    He didnt hesitate to grandstand here. There wasnt any reason not to. He already assumed a single punch would end this. If this bought him some time, perfect; if not, hed be lucky to get out of it alive. His legs werent even shaking any longerhis fear must have frozen them in ce.

    You got guts, huh? Great. Then I dont need to hold back, either.

    Jinrai stared Masayuki down, a ferocious-looking smile on his face. Subjected to his threatening gaze, Masayuki immediately began to have regrets.

    Lets just run now Oh, but that girl Kacha is behind me

    Hey, can you give me a little more space?

    Okay! That guys always looking at me with those leering eyes! Teach him a lesson for me!

    Masayuki was trying to secure an escape route, but Kacha mustve assumed shed get in the way of his fighting. She finally took her arms off Masayuki and joined the crowd gathering around him.

    Oh. Im surrounded anyway. So much for that

    Messed that one up, he thought. Jinrai hadnt touched him yet because Kacha was draped all over him. Brushing her away because she blocked his escape served only to shorten his life.

    Heh-heh

    Jinrais grin widened. There was just one option left. Hed have to use the gum in his mouth as a smoke screen somehow and escape in the confusion.

    Champion-level forward-facing courage detected. Unlocked the powers Heroic Charm and Heroic Action from the unique skill Chosen One. The subject Masayuki Honjo has now fully unlocked the unique skill Chosen One.

    Uh, no, I tried running away!!

    Masayukis inner voice was ignored. But what was this voice thatd been running through his mind? He wasnt sure, but without much idea what he had fully unlocked at all, he decided not to think about it. A unique skill certainly sounded fancy, but if hed obtained it that readily, it must not have been anything too powerful. He wasnt that interested in itreally, now wasnt the time.

    He had no interest whatsoever in facing forward against Jinrai. He was intending to spit his gum in his face and runabout the most cowardly approach possible. It was unclear how anyone could interpret that as courageous in any way, shape, or form.

    But despite his thoughts on the matter, things kept on happening to him.

    Ngh! Whats thisfeeling overpowering me? Youre no kind of weakling at all?!

    Jinrai, brimming with confidence a moment ago, was now visibly sweating before Masayuki. He was chewing his gum, an unconscious attempt to keep calm, but it only disturbed Jinrai even more.

    You, youre casting some kind of arcane spell?! Well, I dont care who you are! I-Im gonna kill you!!

    With a shout, the enraged Jinrai went at Masayuki. What happened next, he couldnt quite keep up with at first.

    ?

    He stood there, unable to parse this. Jinrai was just a step away, winding up to punch him. Masayuki groggily gave him a nce. His foes gigantic fist was headed straight for him.

    Oh crap, this is it!

    He closed his eyes and ducked, trying to dodge it. There was no way hed avoid it in time, he knew, so he just wanted to brace himself for the pain ahead. But the worst-case scenario he pictured never came to pass. Yes, there was pain, but just a little twinge on his forehead. It struck him as odd. Gingerly, he opened his eyes. There, he saw a toppled Jinrai, faceup on the floor andpletely unconscious.

    Huh? Masayuki grunted,pletely unaware of what had happened. However, his asinine utterance was drowned out by the cheers erupting around him.

    W-wow! He didnt even need both arms to beat the Mad Wolf!

    I cant believe it. Did you see how he moved?

    I did He dodged that swipe by a hairbreadth, then mmed his head right into his chest. What a master!

    Who could that kid be anyway?

    The crowd of onlookers was murmuring all around him. This was, however, due to thebined effects of Masayukis Chosen One skill all working in tandem.

    Heroic Aura:

    An overpowering aura that can be unleashed by champions. Also acquired by Gazel, king of the dwarves. Lesser enemies will be frozen on the spot, awed by this unique aura and ready to take orders from its wielder.

    Heroic Compensation:

    Grants the user immense luck, making all regr attacks critical blows. The effect is applied to anypanions of the user as well. Also has the effect of making anything the Chosen One says and does interpreted in a positive light by the people around thema starkly powerful effect.

    Heroic Charm:

    Rouses the hearts of anyone watching the user in action, reducing their fear and stimting their bravery. Anyone affected trusts in the champion, seeking to travel in their path. As another effect, anyone defeated by the champion will join their side and be theirpanion. This effect also applies to all non-undead monsters.

    Heroic Action:

    The users activities are all the first steps to bing a champion. They provide guidance for theirpanions, eventually earning them all praise. Further

    That was the gist of what the unique skill Chosen One offered. It was actually one of the rarest of all uniques, a superior skill that ranked up there with the ultimate in superpowersalongside skills like Absolute Severance and Unlimited Imprisonment, as wielded by the Heroes of the past.

    Jinrai mayve been strong enough to call the shots around this town, but he was powerless against Masayukis skill. Unfortunately, Masayuki himself had no idea about any of this. He had just fully unlocked one of the most fearsome uniques anyone in this world could ever dream of, and he was clueless about it.

    He was clueless, but fortunately, that was all right. Chosen One was a passive skill. Masayuki wanted to be a hero, and now that Chosen One was his, there was no stopping it. And whether he wanted to or not, Masayuki was hurtling toward a new, heroic destiny at unstoppable speed.

    Yes A blond-haired Hero

    It must be. I have heard of this

    Ah yes, there was a Hero like this in the past, no? I heard he went missing.

    Has he been revived?

    The rumblings had grown into a roar.

    A Hero?

    A Hero, you say?

    It couldnt be

    But look at that strength! It must be so!

    He couldnt be sure whod said it first, but the crowd was quickly growing convinced they had a Hero in their midst.

    This hairs just a dye job

    But by the time Masayuki realized, it was already toote. There was passion in the crowds eyes; they sparkled, as if transfixed on someone they looked up to.

    Huh? Um, you have the wrong person

    He hurriedly tried to deny it but was drowned out by a loud, rumbling voice at his feet.

    Fall back! All of you! How dare you act so flippantly toward the Hero who bested me with such ease!

    Jinrai, the giant of a man Masayuki had defeated out of pure luck, stood up and started shouting at the crowd. He turned toward Masayuki, dusting himself off, and bowed to him.

    Please excuse my rudeness from before. I had no idea you were a Hero.

    No, Im telling you, Im not

    My name is Jinrai. Im something of a well-known adventurer around these parts; people call me the Mad Wolf. Guess I let my fame get to my head a little, eh? Sorry about that. Facing the brunt of your skills, Hero, taught me just how much I have to learn. Could I humbly ask you to let me join your side?

    He bowed his head even deeper. Masayuki couldnt begin to deal with this. Here was this monolith-like man, begging him to be hisckey, and he had no idea what to do about it.

    Well actually, Im really not a Hero or anything

    Oh, are you trying to keep the fact a secret, perhaps? What shall I call you, then? I would love to hear your name as well.

    Jinrai grinned at him, turning a deaf ear to Masayukis desperate denials. There was nothing Masayuki could do. The crowd, shouted down and silenced by Jinrais roaring, nervously watched them both. Well, he thought, whatever.

    My names Masayuki. Just Masayuki is all right. Ive just arrived in town, and

    If Jinrai was being this subservient to him, he thought, maybe he could earn a free dinner out of it. Plus, if he kept ying dumb, maybe Jinrai could fill him in on this world a little moretwo birds with one stone. But, once again, events were moving far more rapidly than what hed expected.

    I understand, Jinrai replied with a knowing smile. Then he came closer, bringing his lips to Masayukis ear. Youve only just revived, havent you, Sir Hero?

    Huh? Masayuki thought at first. But this was one misunderstanding that was best taken advantage of. It didnt seem like Jinrai was much interested in his protesting, besides. Plus, he reasoned, maybe its better to frame it this way anyway. Itd probably kill this guys pride if he lost to some kid, but losing to a Hero is different.

    So Masayuki stopped bothering to plead with people not to call him a Hero. This turned out to be a dreadful mistake. Why? Because it gave birth to the legend of Lightspeed Masayuki the Hero.

    In short time, Masayuki was taken in by the representatives from the Free Guild, who had quickly run to the scene and transported him to the capital of the Kingdom of Englesia. There he met Yuuki Kagurazaka.

    Youve had it tough, too, huh?

    Hearing that almost made Masayuki cry, despite himself. But as he learned, this boy Yuuki had lived in this world for nearly ten years now, older in age but still childlike in appearance. Based on his actual age, he wouldve been transported here back when he was in middle school.

    Its been even harder for him, huh?

    Masayukiposed himself. Now was no time for crying. If anything, he was inspired more than ever to do his best.

    After discussing matters with Yuuki, Masayuki decided to try bing an adventurer. He had a usefulpanion in Jinrai for this, and Yuuki promised to make arrangements on his behalf as well. Masayuki, not wanting to be a burden on Yuuki forever, figured that adventuring was the easiest way for him to be independent.

    Im not sure how it happened, Masayuki said, but at least I know how to speak thenguage. Compared to you, I guess I mightve lucked out a little, huh?

    You absolutely did! I cant even tell you how hard it was at firstbut I had a teacher in my own life, too, so it wasnt that painful. Thanks to having magic and everything, its actually pretty easy to pick up the spokennguage.

    That much, Yuuki exined, could be learned through magic, although learning how to read and write had to be done the traditional, painstaking way.

    The Guild leader looked through a set of documents, introducing Masayuki to people who could be potential workpanions.

    Ah, this reminds me of Bernie. He learned how to speak magically, too.

    Bernie was a young man, a graduate of the Englesia Institute, and another otherworlder Yuuki had harbored for a time. A native of the United States, Bernie could speak only English at first, which made evenmunicating with Yuuki slow going. With the right sort of magic, however, things were sorted out quicklyand the experience made Bernie interested enough in magic that he wanted to study it in school. Now he was a freshly minted adventurer, one looking for fellow party members to work withand Masayuki and Jinrai seemed to fit the bill perfectly.

    So they became a three-man adventuring team, a job Masayuki grew proficient in with overwhelming speed. By the time half a year passed, their party was being called Team Lightspeed, already the stuff of lore. Jinrai was ranked C-plus, but as one onlooker said in their first encounter, he was really more B-level in terms of skill. His strength, paired with Bernies magic, made it possible to handle hunting runs at a stable clip.

    Masayuki had learned kendo, but only at the most casual of levels. He was an amateur, but an amateur with Chosen One in his arsenal. The skill applied itself to hispanions as well, which meant every attack they dealt outnded critically. As a result, anyone with Masayuki was always performing above their regr abilities; Jinrai could even give you a performance that overcame the barrier to rank A. It also made it harder for enemies to hit them, an extra blessing that made them all but unbeatable.

    But that wasnt even the best part about Chosen One. Astoundingly, anything and everything Masayukispanions did was treated as Masayukis own aplishments. All praise and adtion for Team Lightspeed was heaped upon the shoulders of Masayuki alone, leading him to acquire the Lightspeed name for himself over time.

    His participation in a battle tournament held around that time in Englesia helped to further the spread of that alias. He joined it so he could use the prize money to shore up his equipment, but he barely broke a sweat all the way to the winners podium. Simply unsheathing his sword would make his opponents give and plead for mercy. The crowd assumed Masayuki hadid down some kind of lightspeed attackhe never did, but they didnt understand that, and having the name Lightspeed Masayuki only further encouraged them to overrate his skills.

    This was all thanks to Chosen One, and while Masayuki was aware of that, there was no stopping now. Or, to be more urate, he didnt know how to stop it. It was impossible to resist this skill unless you had a unique skill of your own, and since Masayuki couldnt deliberately turn it off, it was a given that the rumors would keep spreading. It gave Masayuki a stomachache thinking about itbut it didnt do anything bad for him, either. So he decided to just give up, at least pretend to live to the expectations of the people, and keep ying the role of a Hero.

    By this time, he had been joined by a fourthpaniona young girl named Jiwu. Gifted in fairly high-level spirit magic, she had followed the rumors to Masayukis doorstep. Shed rebuked him at first, assuming him to be a viin calling himself Hero for nefarious purposes, but over time, she grew to trust him. And despite her peculiarities, the healing spells she cast made her the keystone of the partys exploits.

    Thus Masayuki and hispanions continued their steady advance at virtual breakneck speed. He was now an A-level adventurer, still undefeated in battle sport, and after less than a year of life in Englesia, he was part of the Hero echelon.

    It had been, to say the least, an eventful year.

    This was all still something that shocked even him, but by now, Masayuki had grown ustomed to being called a Hero. I guess its true, he detachedly thought. People really can get used to just about anything.

    But despite all the adtion, he still kindled deep-seated doubts about himself on a daily basis. And before long, he was facing a major turning point in his life.

 Volume 9 - Ch 1

    THE EVE OF THE FESTIVAL

    This time, it was Yuuki himself giving orders to Team Lightspeed.

    Recently, an enormous ve market had been uncovered in Bachia, one of the smaller kingdoms that ringed Englesia. Fortunately, a runaway ve had contacted the relevant authorities for help, and now they needed to form an expedition to investigate. But while Bachia was small, there was a chance this market was backed by the kingdom itself. The assignment was ranked a B-plus or greater in difficulty, not the sort of thing your average brawling adventurer could tackle.

    I wanted to turn this down, Yuuki admitted to Masayuki, but I cant say no to one of my sponsors. As famous as you guys are, Id like you to act as a lure.

    Sending the investigation team in without support was likely not going to be sessful. So, Yuuki exined, he wanted Team Lightspeed to join them on the expeditionand while the team collected evidence about the ve market, Masayuki andpany could stay active in public, ensuring the Bachian governments attention stayed on them. An A-ranked team like Masayukis couldnt be refused entry by the kingdom, and with the investigation team doing the nitty-gritty detective work, the party would strike a nice bnce between brains and brawn. It didnt seem too tricky to the Heros ears.

    Masayuki, lets give these people a hand. Why, a nation that small could dere war against us and wed still win!

    Jinrai was alight with the burning me of vengeful justice. Ever since Masayuki had beaten him, he had be more refined, gentlemanly, a far cry from when theyd first met.

    Yeah, Bernie added. Theres no way we can let very happen in this day and age. With Masayukis strength, we can put things right fast.

    As an otherworlder, Bernie had some kind of unique skill as well, making him resistant to Masayukis Chosen One. That didnt stop the man from respecting him nheless. Masayuki couldnt guess whyespecially given how much he likedining to Bernie about the issues in his life. But despite that, Bernie trusted and helped him in innumerable ways. His impartial impression of Masayuki felt like a cherished dose of reality, one he referred to often. And if Bernie felt that way about this, the decision was clear.

    Jiwu, meanwhile, was more curt.

    Right. If Sir Masayuki says yes, I will join him.

    She had a blind, incontrovertible faith in him, it seemed, almost never voicing a contrary opinionand she had just made it unanimous. It wasnt much longer before they set foot in Bachia.

    They were in an ornate reception hall, the site of a ball attended by nobility not just from Bachia but other nearby kingdoms. And Masayuki, an invitee, was being faced with a situation so terrifying, he would do just about anything to escape it. The ve market did exist hereand hed just gotten to witness it for himself.

    Give me a break. Isnt that the investigators job?! It almost made him want to cry. Not again

    He was on his way back from a small journey to find a restroom when he heard a soft voice from a room he happened to pass by. He didnt intend to peek inside, but he took a nce anywayand Braeber, the earl serving as Masayukis tour guide, was there.

    They locked eyes.

    It happened in an instant.

    Um, are you?

    Well, this certainly isnt helpful, Braeber said, still smiling. If you heard me, I suppose there is little I can do. I had a muscr soldier standing guard at the door, but I certainly didnt expect you to defeat him. I should have expected as much from the Hero, shouldnt I?

    Soldier? What soldier?!

    Whoa, wait a?!

    He was about to lodge aint but got cut off.

    Ahhh! The Hero has gone mad! He must be stopped! Everybody, after him! We must subdue him!

    Much to Masayukis shock, the man Earl Braeber was talking to grabbed the sword he was leaning againstand shed the earl down with it. Then the man tossed it away and began screaming, attempting to frame Masayuki for the attack. What ensued next was predictable. A dozen or so soldiers flocked to the scene, carefully eyeing Masayuki and hispanion Jinrai.

    Well, Jinrai said, his fiendish face twisting into a smile, look what the cat dragged in. Masayuki doesnt need to waste his time with you lot. Let me dispatch you all!

    Jinrai went on the move. And with the Chosen One support Masayuki provided, his performance in battle ventured into the realm of superhuman.

    Tch! Monster! But my enemy is the Hero who tamed that beast, for getting in my way!

    Gohsel, the marquis who had just struck down Braeber, gave Masayuki a loathsome scowl.

    You see the tide of this battle. Give it up and surrender

    Considering how Jinrai was systematically destroying the gaggle of soldiers who poured in from the adjacent room, Masayuki figured the fighting was done. He was wrong.

    Heh-heh-heh How kind of you to offer, Hero. But if anyone was witness to this schis travestyall of them would side with me!

    Then Masayuki recalled Earl Braeber, still on the ground. He could hear footsteps; more people wereing toward themotion.

    st! This is bad news, Masayuki

    They were in the Kingdom of Bachia, and while the Heros name was known worldwide, Masayuki was still just a guest. Marquis Gohsel was a figure of power and authority here; between him and Masayuki, he would be the more trusted of the two. Thats why Gohsel was acting so confident right nowand why Jinrai was biting his nails. But Masayuki didnt fret for a moment. Internally, he was annoyed, but already, his instincts told him things were going just like they always did. His skill, Chosen One, always had a knack for bending situations in ways that made him the hero of the day.

    And it happened again.

    Soon, the room was awash in curious rubberneckers, including a few Bachian noblemen and foreign dignitaries. The marquis had been standing triumphantly in one cornerbut now shock was racing across his face.

    Ahahhhh. What, what has be of me?

    With a groan, Earl Braeber regained consciousness.

    Sir Masayuki, this is a valuable witness, is he not? He was still alive, so I healed his wounds.

    Jiwu, who had slipped in at some point, had cast healing magic on Braeberand now she was looking right at Masayuki, fishing forpliments.

    Hey there, old man, Jinrai thundered, turning toward Braeber. Lucky for you, Masayukis such a forgivingd, huh? If you tell the truth to everyone right now, Ill make sure ve tradings the only crime you get charged with. But if you try to keep anything secretI imagine that man over theres just gonna sh you down again, wont he? So whatll it be?

    The vicious smile on his face told Braeber everything he needed to know. He thought for a moment, calcting, then resigned himself to his fate. Hanging his head, he began his confession.

    What the devil is happening in here?

    And the king of Bachia chose that exact moment to step in. As the nobility fell silent, things resolved themselves quickly. It all happened exactly how Masayuki had predicted it would.

    Things got even more heated.

    Military police quickly stormed the residences of Earl Braeber and Marquis Gohsel, uncovering evidence of their ve trade. It revealed a scandalGohsel was one of the leaders of an organized crime ring. And not only that: Their headquarters was right here in Bachia.

    The news weighed heavily upon the king. Orthrus, the ve-trading group whose sphere of influence wasrgely in the Western Nations, was using this small nation of Bachia as a front. It was a sad state of affairs, one the king refused to ignore.

    Orthrus dealt in much more than just ves, however. They ran a diverse business, handling weapons, armor, mysterious potions, drugs, monsters, magic items, even arcane Artifacts. They were too powerful for a small kingdom to toppleand so Bachias king had enlisted the Free Guild for help. And if the Free Guild was involved, Team Lightspeed no doubt would be as well.

    A person can grow used to extraordinary events all too quicklybut really, Masayuki could predict all of it. Ahhh, I figured this would happen, he thought as he epted the kings request.

    Before long, arge number of adventurersincluding Masayukis A-rank partygathered together for an operation to sweep up Orthrus. Counting the support troops from Bachia, they numbered over two thousand in and once Chosen One had sunk its teeth into all of them, they exhibited astonishing force.

    Orthruss base of operation had several hundred members on standby, including multiple A-grade fighting forces and a few captured magical beasts. This made them as powerful as a country themselvesbut with Masayuki and the assault team he led, Orthrus was thoroughly andpletely cleansed from the nation. Masayuki himself hardly had to do anythingor, to put it another way, his mere presence helped everyone shine, whether he knew it or not.

    Thus, without a lot of work, the operation was a sess, and the notorious Orthrus was smashed for good. Once again, things turned out well without Masayuki lifting a finger, and thistest feat meant he was famous not only in Englesia but all the way to the far edges of the Western Nations.

    As usual, things went off without a hitch. It mightve been nice if the story ended therebut this particr mission left a certain problem behind.

    Among the ves released and put into Guild custody were mixed in monstersincluding some ferocious magical beasts, which were killed on the spot. However, some of the ves couldnt be dealt with so swiftlynamely, the elves.

    The issue of what to do with them soon arose. The elves wanted to return home to the Forest of Jura, but the Guild couldnt just drop them off and send them on their merry way. Certain geopolitical issues were involved. Jura had only juste under the jurisdiction of the demon lord Rimuru, and if the enved elves sought Rimurus help, there was no guessing how he would respond. Perhaps hed retaliate against Bachia somehow. The Western Nations knew about the disastrous scene over in Farmusand if a nation that big could fall, there was no way one as tiny as Bachia could defend itself.

    S-Sir Masayuki, please, please do something!

    Their king, a dignified man usually, was all but pleading for help in his private chambers, away from prying eyes. Masayuki, feeling too guilty to turn him down, agreed. It cant be that big a deal, he casually thought. All Im doing is taking the elves to Tempest.

    That was the start of his mistake. For everyone who heard that the Masayuki was traveling to Tempest took that to mean the Hero was finally sallying off to y a demon lord.

    The rumors spread like wildfirebut Masayuki didnt take them too seriously. His mind was used to the routine, and it told him that, like always, itd turn out just fine in the end. Certainly, Chosen One was a unique skill to be feared when set off; there was no doubting that. But no matter how strong you are, theres always someone stronger aheada fact Masayuki was too proud of himself to remember.

    Right, Masayuki said through his magic link. In that case, well meet over there.

    He was submitting his report and discussing future ns with Yuuki. Due to the multipleyers of barriers protecting Englesia,pleting a magical link like this required sending your thoughts encrypted through certain wavelengths. It wasnt something you could pull off on short notice, so they had agreed to reach out to each other only at certain times.

    So Masayuki shut it off and sighed.

    Yuuki worries far too much.

    You said it. Jinrai nodded. If you wanted to beat a demon lord, Masayuki, that couldnt possibly be a problem for you.

    Bernie was less optimistic. Ill remind you that even Hinata the Saint could only fight this Rimuru to a draw. Itd be wise not to let your guard down.

    Masayuki gave this a vague nod. It made him think a bit. Things had gone swimmingly up to now, but really, he hadnt done much at all. He didnt know Hinata; they had never met, but Yuuki had nothing but praise for her, and Masayuki respected him. If she couldnt beat this guy, maybe he was a lot tougher than Masayuki thought at the moment. It gave him pause.

    Yeah, youre right. Everyone says Rimuru wants to make nice with people. We probably shouldnt go in raring for a fight.

    Ha-ha! Sounds to me like this demon lord knows his days are numbered!

    Demon lords are evil, in and simple! said Jiwu.

    Well, Bernie added, well have to see how he acts and decide based on that. But if the Saint and the demon lord have reached an agreement on matters, then only you, Masayuki, are qualified to be a true Hero. You had best act carefully along those lines.

    Masayuki nodded. Yeah. With all your help, I bet I could beat him, but lets take things slow and steady, okay?

    The question of whether to fight Rimuru would be left forter. For now, they would wait and see.

    In the eyes of Masayuki, all three of hispanionsJinrai, Bernie, and Jiwuwere utter beasts. He himself was nothing to write home about, but he couldnt imagine anyone from this trio actually losing a battle. I mean, he reasoned, if I actually got in a fight, I guess Id win somehow, but its not like I got a grudge against this Rimuru guy or anything No point trying to start trouble.

    So as they packed up and set off for Tempest, he was pretty optimistic about how this trip would go.

    Even after all those royal audiences I gave, my schedule was just absolutely packed. Now I was entertaining human guests.

    At the moment, our nation was receiving delegations from all around the world, one after the other. Some of the earlier parties arrived a good week ago, I heard. And not all of them received formal invitesthere were also merchants, picking up on the rumors and bringing even more energy to town. Previous visitors were showing them and other new guys around, acting all proud of themselves, and even the nobler dignitaries and royal families stopping in looked around in wonder at the unfamiliar sights. It seemed, at first nce, that my expectations had paid off and our n to make this a tourist hub was working.

    Still, our town was onlyrge enough to lodge maybe three thousand nobles at best. Formoners, that number was more around ten thousand, but in terms of higher-end amodation, there wasnt quite that much. The service and the dining we had to offer werepletely different, and considering we had people in royal lines of session showing up, we had to consider security as well. Thus we made sure each noble was given ample space to work with.

    Given all the dignitaries we invited, we had banned the general public from our luxury inns, whether they could afford a suite or not. Some of the richer merchants in town could, but I was worried about offending them if we were too busy with nobility to offer good service. But apparently, I didnt need to worry. Mjllmile was on it, making sure all the more powerful of the merchant ss were set up to their satisfaction.

    Great job, Mollie.

    Heh-heh-heh! Ah, Sir Rimuru, this much is simple to provide. You have Sir Rigurd and everyone else in town to thank for making a habit of being so thorough with their work!

    Mjllmile was a really reliable guy. It went without saying that Rigurd, Rigur, and everybody working under them deserved great praise, but when it came to good customer service and satisfied lodgers, Mjllmile was my go-to man. All things considered, I figured we were off to a pretty good start.

    Okay. Keep it up!

    That I will!

    Leaving the rest to Mjllmile, I resolved to devote myself to our most important of visitors.

    We were in our meeting hall.

    Shuna and Shion were busy with all sorts of prep work. Catering for such arge crowd, after all, meant careful advance preparation. And Gabil and Kurobe were just as busy, performing final checks on the exhibits they had going. Since I wasnt dealing with monsters right now, I didnt need to put on such an overpowering I am stronger than you actthus I figured we didnt need my entire staff on hand. And given theck of a strict species-based hierarchy, things didnt have to be nearly as solemn and pretentious.

    I was, obviously, in human form, dressed to the nines in order to express my force and financial wealth. That part, frankly, I didnt care about. Being a slime wouldve been a lot easier, but Id given up on pushing that. On that note, none of my advisers was willing to budge.

    The nobility from the Western Nations were inoffensive enough in their greetings to me. The king of Blumund arrived in the midst of our hellos, looking like the same nice, approachable middle-aged man as everthe kind of king youd expect in an illustration from a book of fairy tales.

    Next to him was his queen, beautiful and still looking young. I didnt know her age, but apparently they had been married over twenty years. At first nce, they didnt look like the best of matches, but they were a loving one, and the people of Blumund were great fans of them both.

    I must apologize for not thanking you sooner, he told me. You winning over Marquis Muller and Earl Hellman, as well as applying pressure to the Western Holy Church, helped us all a great deal.

    It was this mans consent that had allowed Fuze to move so freely. I could have pulled off that n only because of the promises he kept. And thanks to his singing my praises far and wide, my reputation actually didnt seem that bad. Judging by the increasing number of merchantsing to my nation, the Kingdom of Blumund certainly proved influential to me.

    I gave the king thanks, but heughed and waved it off. No, no, Sir Rimuru! Theres hardly any need to thank me. All we did was live up to the terms of the treaty we ratified. And did Fuze tell you, by the way? I had staked quite a bit on you. Our nations fate, in fact, is now tied in with yours. And I did this because we do stand to profit, of course, so theres no need for further thanks!

    He gave me a gregarious smilebut I could tell the king of Blumund could not be taken lightly. He just said, to my face, that he had his own interests in mind. The idea of requiring further thanks made himugh.

    Still, I said, I am happy to see that you trusted in us.

    Showing gratitude is always important. I didnt mean to keep banging on this point, but I wanted to bring it across.

    I truly wonder if you really are a demon lord sometimes, the king replied with a snicker. Then he rposed himself and looked me in the eye. And I do understand that our Viscount Cazac caused you quite a bit of trouble. Im quite d you were able to rescue your countrymen from him.

    Ah, Viscount Cazac. It was mostly Mjllmile hed caused trouble for, though. And if I had to guess, that Orthrus gang had been operating in the Forest of Jura well before I became demon lord. But it was a stain on the reputation of Blumund, I suppose, although it really all came down to the viscount himself.

    He was just a patsy, really. A horrible man. It wasnt like hed personally cracked the whip or anything, but a crime is a crime, as much as Cazac apparently crowed about how the nobility can treat low-born monsters any way they want without penalty. Expecting to get off scot-free was far too selfish.

    Well, with everything fully settled now, I have no interest in dragging that case any further, I replied.

    I appreciate that!

    So what will you be doing with him?

    As part of Blumunds nobility, I couldnt prosecute him under my own rulesbut no punishment at all was uneptable. I didnt want to make this a huge incident, but whether or not I did anything depended on the king of Blumund. He, fortunately, understood this.

    Cazac no longer holds a noble title, he said, voice turning low and ominous. Given his ties with international criminal gangs, its fair to say hes forgotten his duties as a nobleman. I would hardly abide the likes of him referring to himself as Blumundian nobility. Thus, he has been stripped of his titles and exiled from ournds. The House of Cazac is no more, and thus I consider the case to be closed.

    No problems there. It almost seemed too harsh a penalty, but then, ve trading vites internationalw. Treating him with kid gloves could even make Blumunds king look like a pushover. Thinking of it that way, the punishment felt almost merciful to me. Cazac had been a noble his whole life; finding another life for himself would doubtlessly pose difficulties. Without his name, fortune, or even a familiar homnd, I didnt envy the path this man had ahead of him. But if he could stay alive, maybe he could turn over a new leaf. The punishment fit the crime, certainly, and I had no objection to it.

    Very well. I am willing to ept that punishment.

    A relief to hear! Is it safe to say that our treaty remains in effect, then?

    Id hope for nothing else. May we remain partners for years toe.

    We exchanged a firm handshake. The incident was behind us.

    Now it was on to the main subject. The kings face brightened as he immediately got down to the business on his mind.

    Sir Rimuru, I heard the news from Fuze. He spoke of some grand operation you had in the nning stages?

    Apparently, he wanted to hear more about the outlook on the future Id given Fuze.

    Well, thats something involving much more than just your kingdom and mine. Im hoping we can assemble representatives from all the nations involved for further discussion. I intended to travel to you to discuss it in detail, but

    Oh-ho-ho! No need to be so secretive. Fuze gave me a short rundown, but it sounds like something that could very well affect our position in the world. I could hardly leave the matter to my bureaucracy.

    In that case, I could go into some detail

    The official discussion was nned for another day. For now, I gave the king my basic ns for turning Blumund into a distribution hub for the world atrge. But:

    I see. Hmm, hmm

    My lord, this sounds like a proposal we should move every mountain to make a reality, doesnt it?

    I had given only a quick rundown, but the king had a different look about him by this point. The real him was now on the surface, revealing a man burning with ambitionand his queen, who hadnt spoken until now, had just as much trouble hiding her excitement. It seemed this woman was as equally astute as her husband. No doubt my pitch was all shed needed to urately calcte how much profit was on the table.

    Blumunds king wasnt their only leader I should watch out for. Here we had a king with a gamblers penchant for snap decisions, along with a calm, collected, and calcting queen. Their powersbined mustve been what had made this small kingdom so continuously influential.

    Of course, I cautioned, this only happens after the Founders Festival is a resounding sess. Its still three days before it begins.

    Oh-ho-ho! Im sure there is little to worry about. Why, it hasnt started yet, and just look at how lively things are! And I can only imagine how many nobles worldwide are making the journey over here.

    I can only imagine, echoed the queen. But as you said, Sir Rimuru, there is no need for us to hurry matters. A n like the one you proposed will require an agreement from all the nations involved. In the meantime, we will work with our own government to ensure a consensus on this matter.

    Mydy is right. It was simply delightful to hear such a fine proposal from you, Sir Rimuru. Now, shall we be on our way?

    I hope the Tempest Founders Festival is a resounding sess, the queen closed as she and her husband got to their feet. They had no intention of acting all pompous and wasting my time talking in pointless prose. They had what they came for, and now they were done with me. I liked them for that. It was much easier to deal with.

    Thank you, I replied. Please enjoy our nation to the fullest.

    We certainly intend to! the king shouted as they walked away, to which the queen added, Yes, I can hardly wait.

    The day after I spoke with Blumunds royal couple, I was greeted by another big nameGazel, the dwarven king.

    Well, Rimuru, here I am! he said as he sat across from me with an audible whump. My first journey by carriage in far too long! Im exhausted!

    Imposing as always, to be sure. He was already reaching out for the tea and snacks on the table, like they were his God-given right.

    Whoa there. Dont take mine, too, all right?

    I was a little slow on the trigger. In an instant, thest doughnut on the table was up and into his mouth. I had been looking forward to that. Who knew he had a sweet tooth to go with his tremendous drinking habit? Theres just never any underestimating him.

    Ahhh, no need to sweat the details. If such trifles still bother you, you have much left to learn, mm?

    Much left to learn how? Youre the one stealing my doughnuts. I stared at the self-serving Gazel, but he gave me no quarter, returning the gaze.

    And thanks to the chiefs raising a hue and cry, we had a whole caravan of carriages. The length of it was ridiculous. And its all your fault, Rimuru!

    As he exinedin great detailthe journey here from Dwargon normally took a day on winged horse. Since this was an official state visit, however, he wasnt allowed to go with the Pegasus Knights alone. It wasnt just because of security concerns, either. Gazel would be seeing nobility from around the world, and as king of the mighty nation of Dwargon, he needed to show he was a military power. This meant having to pack multiple changes of clothes and such, along with administrators and attendants to help dress him properly. It made his entourage a more than decently sized crowd.

    If you travel as a king, you need a royal amount of preparation. Having a paved highway to travel on was certainly a boon, but the past few days of travel were just murder on me.

    That must have been why Gazel kept skipping out on his kingdom to travel as light as possible. Ande to think of it, Soei had reported that the highway from Blumund was jam-packed with carriages and the like, enough so that the watch needed to y traffic cops for a while, and all the inns along the way were booked solid. Which was great, in a way, but it also reminded me of the need for arger-scale transport system. Cars in Japan these days, after all, break down very rarelyand if they do, you can call for roadside service and get it handled in no time t. In this world, though, if you break a wagon axle or something, youre in trouble. Simply carting the vehicle out of the way of traffic is a painstaking ordeal. You also had horses to take care of, and overall, the whole thing was rife with pitfalls. I deliberately nned for wide highways in anticipation of this, but it still didnt solve the problem. I was gathering info on these incidents so we could tackle them in the future, but judging by Gazels tale, long-distance travel as a noble was an extremely arduous undertaking.

    It seemed the traffic jam had mainly been caused by far more nobles deciding to participate than Id nned for. Ill need to consider things like that more next time. Itd be nice if we could develop trains and make all of this a lot morefortable, fast.

    But regardless.

    You know, I didnt expect to see you here at all. I figured youd send an envoy instead.

    It was true. I really hadnt. So I was honest with him, hoping hed take the hint to stop griping at me. It didnt work.

    Pffft! You think I would do that? When I know youre up to some kind of scheme again? I cant sleep at night until I see what it is with my own two eyes! And alsoI have a question for you.

    What?

    So you fought Hinata Sakaguchi? The whole draw thing Thats a lie, isnt it?

    I figured he knew that, and he did. He was aware Id fought her, and he didnt believe the official results one bit. By the looks of things, he assumed I beat her.

    Well, you could call it winning the battle and losing the war, but yeah, I won.

    I exined to Gazel how it had all worked out in the end, warning him to keep it under his hat for now.

    Unbelievable. That woman, of all people Frankly, shes stronger than I am. Her swordsmanship, for onebut even in overall strength, Id lose. You really beat her?

    This was some real talk from Gazel. I guess Id impressed him. As a Hero King, Gazel would never get a chance to spar with Hinata, so he used hiswork of spies to analyze her strength instead. The conclusion he made from their findings: Hed be on the ropes. Hearing Id won mustve sincerely surprised him.

    Luck had a lot to do with it. I mean, she really was a lot stronger than yman, and he was a demon lord. I think the skills Im blessed with had a lot to do with it.

    Lets be straight: If I didnt have Raphael, Id have lost. And Raphael is a skill of mine, but hes also managing all my other skills. If he hadnt harnessed some powers I wasnt even aware I had, theres no way I couldve beaten Hinata.

    Ha! Luck is as important a strength as any other. Im d to see my old sparring partner seed, but I hate to admit how inferior I am that readily

    Well, what do you want me to say? With my own real powers, I cant even beat Hakuro yet.

    Ahhh, youre as strange to me as always, arent you? Real or not, those skills are part and parcel of your battle strength, arent they?

    He looked a bit exasperated, but I really meant it. Without Raphael, I think my best match for a sparring partner would be Gobta, actually. Not that Id tell anyone.

    Well, whatever. So, he said, erasing his scowl and giving me a serious look, what are you up to this time?

    This was his way of switching to his main subject, apparently. I had no idea what it was.

    What do you mean?

    What do I mean?! The Western Holy Church sent us a missive asking to open a channel for future negotiations! They used to ssify us as a nose away from monsters! Whyd they overturn their doctrine like that? It was so sudden, I just know you have to be behind it!

    Ah!

    Gazels shouting reminded me of my conversation with Hinata and her people. Yes, I had suggested that she could get King Gazel involved. The Dwarven Kingdom had retained its neutrality for a thousand years. You could ce boundless trust in them, and even the most orthodox adherents of the Church couldnt seriously think dwarves were the same thing as monsters. Some, maybe, but it had to be a tiny minority.

    That was my motivation behind the suggestion to Hinata, but I forgot to, um, actually ask King Gazel for permission to do that. Or, really, I didnt think I needed his approvalI wasnt expecting him to get this riled up over it. Best to y dumb for now. I doubt Hinata explicitly said it was my idea.

    Ohhh? Well, um, I have to say, its the first time Ive heard about this. But you know, I think duking it out with Hinata has helped us develop a sort of friendship. Thats how we reconciled things, besides, and we agreed that well try to stay on good terms in the future. So maybe that got them in the spirit, huh? Like, it inspired them to make some official overtures with you, too?

    Hohh?

    Gazel raised a doubtful eyebrow. Its times like these that I seriously wished I was in slime form. I thought I could feel a cold sweat running down my back, even though I dont actually sweat.

    Caution. The subject Gazel Dwargo is applying Read Thought to your surface mentality. This is being permitted due to ack of perceived hostile or malicious intent. Block this skill?

    Yes

    No

    Yes! Yes, yes, a thousand times yes!! If its something that important, then just tell me, Raphael!!

    But that exined things. I had thought it was a little strange before, but Gazel can read peoples minds, huh? No wonder Ive always felt a bit odd around him, like he was probing my brain for answers. Between his urate reading of my actions during battle and how he always seemed a step ahead of me in our conversations, it only made sense he was doing that.

    The Great Sage evolving into Raphael mustve helped me recognize the Read Thought when Gazel pulled the trigger on it. It didnt seem to be active all the time, thank heavens, but who knows how much info he took from me just now

    I gave Gazel a nce. He grinned back at me, a blue vein visible on his forehead.

    Hehheh-heh. You saw my Read Thought, did you? Well, I apud you for it, but if you blocked it, that must mean youre thinking something evil, I presume?

    N-no, no, I, uh, dont think so?

    You fool! I caught a glimpse of you there! It told me you thought it best to get me wrapped up in this!

    Crime never pays, I suppose. He then more or less forced me to confess exactly how my conversation with Hinata had gone. And then:

    I see. So the Seven Days Clergy was behind their humans-first policy

    Yeah. And I think Hinatas people are thinking about purging the Church of anyone poisoned by the Seven Days thinking. Given how theyre all dead, Im sure she can sniff out their sympathizers well enough.

    I went over the internal dealings I had seen in the Western Holy Church and Lubelius, carefully leaving out Luminuss real identity. Gazel nodded and pondered for a minute.

    I imagine you are right. In which case, it would be foolish to turn this down, then?

    He had decided to ept Hinatasor the Churchsrequest.

    I thought you would say that.

    Enough from you. Doing my diplomacy for me, without permission But oh well. No need to be a stick in the mud during this festive asion. Youve given me only the best seats, I am sure? I might as well enjoy what youve got for me.

    After that fit he threw, he was willing to give up the subject for now. I figured he was happy enough with how things turned out, but I wasnt stupid enough to let him know that. I had word that Hinata and her pdins would be at the Tempest Founders Festival as well, so I figured it best for them to meet directly and work matters out. Gazel no doubt had some of his own advisers to deliberate with, too.

    So I promised him wed set up discussions after the festival. He was soon on his way.

    It was now morning, three days since Diablos return. Yohms band was here, and he picked the exact right moment to show upwe were actually holding a preopening feast this evening, the festival itself finally starting up tomorrow. Before then, however, we were at the usual meeting hall, Yohm and a few of his closer advisers seated across from me.

    Hey, pal! Its been forever and a day, aint it? Well, guess what? Im royalty!

    His clothing certainly had a few more bells and whistles on it, but the person inside hadnt changed. He was just as brazen as always, greeting me with a defiant grin.

    I smiled back. And clothes certainly make the king, dont they, Yohm? Thanks for all your hard work.

    Ha! Hell, thank you! Youre the one who took some grubby bum off the street and elevated im up to king, he said with a smile, so I hope youre gonna see this to the end, yeah? Im all in on what youre aiming for, so dont leave me hangin halfway.

    Just as he promised, Yohm had be a fine king for meand with Diablos behind-the-scenes work, he now had a firm grip on the throne.

    Farmus, a nation with a long, illustrious history, had fallen. In its ce was born a new kingdom, with the champion Yohm as its epted leader. It was a nation reborn from the threat it once was, so Diablo thought fit to change its name to Farminus. To cement this, he also had Yohm style himself as Yohm Farminus.

    Next to him in the meeting hall were two magic-bornMjurran and Gruecith. They were his constant bodyguards, and I had no doubt theyd keep Yohm safealthough Mjurran wasnt really a bodyguard at all, of course.

    Lord Rimuru, let me reintroduce myself. I am Mjur Farminus, wife of the king. It is good to see you again.

    Perhaps noticing my eyes on her, Mjurran lifted up her dress a little and curtsied. It was beautiful, enough to make your garden-variety rich heiress nch.

    You fit into the role of queen like a puzzle piece, Mjurran.

    Yeah, doesnt she? Yohm said, beaming with pride. Shes educated and all, unlike me.

    I do have some experience in this, shall we say. yman was such a stickler for etiquette and manners

    There was no doubting that yman held himself well, or at least had a thing for noble trappings. Hed festooned his castle with ornate furniture and artwork, and Im sure he was just as fastidious with his own staff. Looks like that helped us out in the most surprising way with her.

    Yeah, well, its an experience for all of us. I mean, ruling a nations been hard for me, too. A little bit ago, I had to formally greet every species in the Forest of Jura, and it nearly killed me. I felt like some kinda sacred idol.

    Oh, I hear ya! I have all these nobles requesting audiences with me, and some of those idiots are already forming factions and trying to start something. What a headache, I tell ya! At least that old man Razen, our magic expert, is handling all that pretty well.

    Razen himself was not here. Things were still less than stable around their nation, and he was busy darting to and fro, attending to postcivil war matters. I feared for a moment hed betray usbut looking back, he was only under the effects of Diablos Tempter spell, so no worries there. The retired Edmaris, meanwhile, had disguised his identity and was now serving as an adviser, making up for Yohmsck of experience and education and helping out in assorted areas of politics.

    And as for Gruecith the magic-born:

    So youre head of the Knight Corps now?

    I sure am, Sir Rimuru. I turned the job down, but he never listens to me

    Yohm had all but forced Gruecith to take a role in government. He certainly had the muscle for it, and none of the remaining knights voiced anyint, so the fledgling nation of Farminus wanted to appoint him head knight, hoping to keep such talent from straying off. Hed balked at first, enjoying the new freedom in his life, but after Mjurran begged him as well, he found it impossible to refuse. Was Gruecith gonna be all right doing that? I didnt bring it up. He didnt seem that reluctant.

    I still consider myself part of Lord Carillons Warrior Alliancebut for now, I dont mind babysitting this idiot.

    Shut up! Youre the idiot!

    No, those two hadnt changed much. And the sight of Mjurran wincing at them took me back as well. It was a familiar act, but this time, someone interrupted it.

    King Yohm! Captain Gruecith! Youre being terribly rude to the demon lord!

    The loud voice came from what looked like a grade-school boy, a very handsome and intelligent one.

    Ahhh, Edgar, youre always so serious

    Ha-ha-ha! And why not? Hes far better put together than you. What more could we ask for in a crown prince?

    Captain Gruecith! This is not the time for joking. I am trying my best to serve as King Yohms attendant, making sure he bes a good, just king!

    Edgar, son of the previous king Edmaris, glowed red with embarrassment. He was still just ten years old, but well put together was an understatement. By the looks of things, he was already used to being the butt of their jokeshaving to deal with such mean grown-ups at his age had to be difficult. At least Yohm and Gruecith seemed to care for him, as much as they carried on.

    I wouldnt have minded more of this pleasant small talk, but it had to end sometime. They were all tired from the voyage, and Id have other VIPsing for the preopening tonight. I suggested we could continue this conversation with some drinkster, and Yohm readily agreed.

    So, Yohm, as thanks for keeping your promise, I have a present for you. Diablo

    You mean this, Sir Rimuru?

    Before I could finish, Diablo realized what I meant and picked up a certificate we had prepared in advance, kindly providing it to me. I handed it to Yohm.

    Hey, whats this, pal?

    Yohm wasnt particrly great at the whole literacy thing, either, so he quickly tossed it over to his assistant, Edgar. With a nod, the boy read itand then his eyes bulged out of their sockets.

    You, youre forgiving the rest of the reparations?!

    Yep. Dont really need any, now that Yohms king.

    They had already paid us 1,500 ster gold coins in reparations. The total sum of 10,000 sters wasughably astronomical, and now that our mission was aplished, there was no need for that money anyway.

    Yohm looked at the shocked child with a smile. Heh-heh! Well, I dont really get what that means, but there ya go, Edgar.

    He didnt know, but Edgar sure did. No doubt itd be another gold star for Yohms reputation.

    Thus I became known as a personor a demon lord, I supposewho was willing to bargain a bit when it came to reparations.

    My talks with Yohms group were over. They all left the meeting hall, dragging a still-petrified Edgar with them.

    It was afternoon now, and I was no longer quite so busy. Visitors were still swarming in, but they werent eager to talk right now, eithernot when there was this evening to prepare for. A lot of them certainly wanted to see me, and I agreed to, as long as they were willing to wait until after the festival.

    I finally had some free time as a result, so (as I promised) I decided to travel to Englesia and pick up Yuuki. I could stop by the school there and take the kids as we festival like this, I didnt want them to miss out on the fun.

    The streets of Englesia were a nostalgia trip for me. It had been only several months since I left, but recalling life here naturally dissolved any tension from my face.

    I couldnt help but travel to the Free Guild headquarters in the middle of the city. Through the modern automatic ss door, I entered an air-conditioned chamberand the moment I did, I was greeted with sharp-eyed stares. Only adventurers ranked B or higher were allowed in here, and this crowd looked the parttough, seasoned, and not to be messed with. Looking around the chamber, it was clear nothing had changed. It made me happy.

    A few of the men were openly appraising my appearance. Given they were here in the middle of the day, they mightve been preparing for some big job or another.

    Whos that?

    Havent seen im around before. Is he new? Hey, you know him?

    Uh-uh. You think I know anyone that pretty?

    These whisperings werent exactly wee news. Less than a years time, and theyd already forgotten about me? But then I noticedI didnt have that mask on now, did I? I could fully control my own aura, so I went barefaced, since there was no longer any need for it. I had considered a disguise, but it was toote now.

    Fortunately, I was dressed in my old adventurers garb, so as long as I acted the part, nobody would realize Im a demon lord. Besides, Shuna had expended untold efforts sewing the demon-lord outfit Id wear for official audiences. It was incredibly gaudy, decorated up and down with nothing but the finest outrements, and she even knitted a full-on coiffure to top it off, so itd look nothing like what Im sporting right now.

    There were still rtively few ways to record things around you in this world anyway. Its not like people far and wide would know what I look like as a demon lord. Maybe I shouldnt bother worrying about it. For now, lets go with this.

    So I strode up to the reception desk. A man walked in front of me, blocking my way. I was struck by the weirdest sense of dj vu.

    Hold on. I dunno what kinda backwater you earned your B rank in, but you think you can juste in without a word to the vets around here? Dont ya know its the polite thing for a new adventurer to give his name first?

    Actually, it wasnt just dj vu. I pretty vividly remembered him. This guy was Grass, friends with Kabal and his crew, and he had whined at me about proper greetingsst time, too. He mustve lived his whole life like he was captain of the football team.

    Ummm, youre Grass, right? Youre always hanging out here at HQ, arent you? Dont you have any work to do?

    Huh? You know my name? So

    Mines Rimuru, I said, cutting him off. I was with Kabals party, remember?

    I mean,e on, Grass. I know that mask is gone, but my voice is exactly the same, okay? Why isnt he picking up on that?

    Huuuh?! Uh, RRimuru?

    Mm-hmm. And this is the first time youre seeing my face, but at least recognize my voice, man.

    N-no, um, but Huh? Is it me, or were you kinda smallerst time?

    My name instantly threw Grass into flustered confusion. I beat him rank-wise, so in his football-captain mind, I was above him. Adventuring wasrgely a meritocracy anyway, so acting superior based on age or years of experience wasnt really a mainstream trend. If a new guy helps you out, youll naturally respect that and help him back in kindbut a lot of adventurers didnt see the need to be friendly to total strangers, either. Things changed if you were in a party, but in terms of social cliques? That was nearly all based on rank.

    Yeah, I grew, I said in a huff. More evolved instead of grew, but I didnt need to be that honest. It seemed to convince him.

    Oh. I get it. But, man, Rimuru, you sure got pretty hot! You must be well near invincible by now, huh? Getting to see that sweet face of yours Im so moved!

    He was standing at attention now, like he did with Kabal, as he bowed to me. He always was a snake that way, but I couldnt hate him for it.

    Yeah, yeah. But whyre you always here? Arent you employed?

    Heh-heh! Aw, dont give me that. This is kinda part of my workIm educating the new adventurers. Theres a lot of barriers you encounter in the B rank, as you know, and my jobs to approach any brash new guys and take em down a notch, that sort of thing. See those guys over there? He pointed to the group looking at me earlier. Theyre doing the same thing. We all hang here at the HQ in our downtime.

    The group stood up straight and nodded at me.

    Forgive meI didnt realize you were Rimuru, a B-rank adventurer, one of them, the apparent leader, said.

    I nodded back at him. I didnt think I changed that much

    Oh, no, you have! Now that I know, I just realized you got the same outfit on, but otherwise

    Yeah, totally. That face is just Wow. What a standout

    Is it really? That much?

    All right, all right. Should I put on the mask?

    Doing that was kind of a pain, but I didnt want to go through this every visit. I created the mask from my Stomach and applied it to my face, the adventurers looking a little disappointed for reasons I couldnt fathom.

    So, yeah. Keep up the good work, guys. Dont torment the newbies too much.

    With that, I headed for the front desk.

    Giving my name to the clerk, I had her take me to Yuuki. He was expecting me, apparently, so it didnt take long.

    Hey, Rimuru! Long time no see! Sounds like youve been through a lot, huh?

    That doesnt begin to describe it. I got attacked by Hinata, the Farmus Army invaded us, and then the demon lords summoned me Just one thing after the other, you know? A lot is the understatement of the year.

    Ha-ha-ha! I figured youd sum it up like that, Rimuru.

    Yuukiughed it off, but it definitely was a lot. He understood that, Im sure; he was all smiles, but there was a touch of gratitude to his voice.

    But, hey, at least Im good with Hinata now. Alls well that ends well, right?

    Sounds like it. I met her a few times to exchange information, and I told her a lot about you as a person. You know how, like, suspicious she is of people.

    Oh, believe me, I do. She barely listened to a word I said.

    Right? Shes the kind of person who only believes what she sees and hears for herself. Its always been that way with her, and let me tell you, its not been easy.

    We chatted along these lines for a while. Im sure it wasnt easy for Yuuki. Hinatas thought process can be a total mystery sometimes.

    Not that I can really talk about that with anyone but you, Rimuru

    Hinata had a lot of followers. If Yuuki startedining about her to the wrong person, shed know almost immediately. Not that gossip is a good thing. Ill want to be careful about that.

    But it was time to cut to the chase.

    So what do you think? If youre busy, I wont force you, but would you like to check out the festival for two or three days?

    Ha! Of course Im going. Why do you think I tried so hard to get ahead on my work? And Ive got people here I feel fine leaving this ce to while Im gone. Give me one moment.

    Yuuki stood up and went out of the room, calling for someone. I rxed with my tea for a moment, and he was back shortly with a woman.

    Let me introduce you guys. This is Kagali, the vice master of the Free Guild. Shell be running it while Im gone.

    She was a beautiful woman, very graceful on the outside, and the business suitlike attire she had on fit her to a T. Her eyes were blue, her blond hair tied in a chignon, but her ears were the real standoutlong and pointed. She had to be an elf.

    Hello, Rimuru Tempest. Or should I call you Demon Lord Rimuru? My name is Kagali. It is an honor to meet you.

    Thank you. This is my second time here, but I dont think we met the first time, did we?

    I recalled the secretary who had given us tea, but not this girl. If she was the number two official in the Free Guild, I wouldve expected an introduction soonerbut there was a reason for that.

    Hee-hee! No, you wouldnt have been able to. Ive only returned here recently. My passion is exploring old ruins, and Ive juste back from mapping out theplex at Soma, one of thergest in the west.

    It turned out Kagali was one of the worlds greatest active explorers, lurking around this ruin and that since before Yuuki had founded the Free Guild. Her name was not that well-knownshe hadnt taken part in the Society of Adventurers, the precursor to the Guildbut Yuuki had scouted her for her clear talent nheless. The Guild, after all, wasnt just about fighting. That was Yuukis philosophy, which was why he had given an exploration expert like Kagali such a high position on the org chart.

    Thanks to that support, Kagali had just pulled off a monumental feattheplete mapping of the ancient ruins at Soma. This put her name up in lights for much of the world, quelling any dark murmurings of her being Yuukis hanger-on. Now she was a vice master anyone could respect.

    Just because its mapped, of course, doesnt mean all its mysteries are unraveled, she exined. It just means theres a visual guide to follow to the bottom. Theres still so much left to unravel.

    Yep. We can leave that job to the exploration-oriented adventurers. And with the map Kagali left for them, I think theyll make some serious progress.

    Theres the Guild philosophy at work againinstead of leaving everything to a single exceptional talent, they can bring on teams of people for the excavation work. Itd help younger members gain experience, too, killing two birds with one stone in a way.

    So Kagali was now working here at the headquarters, helping educate the B-rank and higher adventurers. Given that she got a cut of the proceeds whenever the Guild sold the relics found by explorers, her take-home pay mustve been astronomical.

    Huh. You can make a lot of money from ruins, cant you?

    I have to admit, she replied, you can. Although money isnt my main motivation; this is more my lifes passion. I have auctioned off things I excavated in the past, however, to pay for my expenses.

    Yep. Sounds like lucrative, if backbreaking, work. And speaking of ruins

    I wanted to askwhos got the rights to these ruins? Is it whatever nation theyre located in?

    Mm Yuuki paused. Thats a hard question to answer. In the case of the Somaplex, thats managed by the Free Guild. It was discovered in a somewhat tricky locationa desert region called the Barren Lands, farther west from Western Nations territory.

    Yes. To be more exact, the Barren Lands are located right up against the domain of the demon lord Daggrull. Thus, the area is not under governmental jurisdiction at alleveryones too afraid toe near it. Ruins in unaffiliatednds like these dont have anyone who cany im to them.

    Oh Well have to be careful with those, then

    Hmm? Something bothering you about that, Rimuru?

    Yuuki must have picked up on my reaction. I needed no reminding of what that something was. It was the assorted unknown ruins near ymans castle, no doubt packed with magic items. I was sure exploring it would reap a huge harvest for us, but there was one snag: Who would the items we dug up really belong to? And what if those ruins invited unscrupulous, profit-seeking adventurersor worse, out-and-out criminals? The potential for discovering untold treasure was tempting, but even more important to consider was that treasures historical value. They provided leads we could follow to learn about the ancients and what they did.

    Its only natural, I suppose, to romanticize about ancient times. If we let just anyone go in the ruins and vandalize them all they wanted, we ran the risk of losing irreceable artifactsthat was my main fear.

    There was no need to hide this fear, so I decided to bring up the topic with Yuuki. We had an expert explorer on hand, besides.

    Well, actually, theres anotherplex of ruins in ymans old domain.

    There is? Youre sure of that?!

    Kagalis eyes instantly fixed upon me, like a predator aiming for the kill. It was quite the onrush, and it honestly surprised me a bit.

    Yeah. yman had this vast fortune and collection and stuff. He handed out magical weapons and armor to his forces like candy. Im thinking he harnessed the things he found in that ruin to finance it. The thing is

    Yes?

    I paused for a bit, unsure, before continuing. This might be rude to say to someone who makes exploration their profession, but Im not really interested in plundering ruins just for the treasure. I want to know how the people there used to live, what kind of culture they had, and why their cities fell. I think ancient people deserve at least that much respect, so we dont let the past go to waste.

    This was just me being sentimental, I knew. It wasnt that I didnt care at all about treasure; there were just more important things. That was why I ordered that ruin closed to outside visitors for now.

    Youre more of a romanticist than I thought, Rimuru.

    What do you mean, more than I thought? Ive always been this way, Yuuki.

    Ha-ha-ha! Yeah, youre right. He smiled at me, convinced. Youd have to be, toe up with an idea like building a nation of monsters.

    Kagali, for her part, mulled this over for a bit before nodding. The predatorial drive in her eyes was gone, the intellectual spark now firmly back.

    I see Certainly, thats a perspective I did not have. But I understand it. I am not a fan of seeing ruins get vandalized myself. We need to build the right sort of expedition team before we send them to Soma, of course.

    Maybe the romantic part of my thoughts didnte across, but at least she saw the need to keep the ruins protected. Hopefully she could lead that effort. She certainly seemed like the right fit.

    So that just left one problem.

    Right. Well, the problem is, Im the sole person responsible for caretaking ymans territory. The demon lord Milim will eventually annex thatnd, but for now, its being run by us, the people who defeated yman. I think its fair to say he kept those ruins in pretty good shape, so I dont want to be the one who messes them all up. I think Ill have to bring this up with Milimwe need to make sure were thorough with handling them.

    Oh, you arent going to rule that territory yourself?

    It might be too much for me. It borders the Eastern Empire, and I dont really feel likeum, I mean, having to run a border defense line against them is a pretty tall order. We cant devote that many forces to it.

    ymans domain was a buffer zone with the Empire. It contained a road known as the Valley of Death that wound its way through rugged mountainsa dirt path, not paved at all, but it still provided passage between ymansnds and the Empire. The area was packed with undead creatures, but there was also evidence that ymans forces made regr use of the trailsuggesting that the Empire was carrying out some kind of n of action through his domain. It wouldnt hurt to be on our guard about that.

    We could deploy the army over there, but were running short on personnel right now. Managing the whole of the Forest of Jura took a vast amount of work. I was thinking I could leave ymansnd to Milim, and if the Empire ever made any moves, Id just let Milim handle everything.

    So if we wanted to explore those ruins, wed need the demon lord Milims permission? Yuuki asked.

    I suppose so, yeah.

    Ah I have a keen interest in them, but do you think wed be able to avoid interference? inquired Kagali.

    Oh, Im sure shed say yes if we askedbut knowing her, I guarantee shell want to go in, too.

    That

    I was sure that condition would make any would-be explorer hesitate. The general public, after all, feared Milim deeply. Kagali seemed disappointed, but she shouldnt give up yet. Milim would definitelye along, no doubt about thatbut if Im there, too, whats the problem?

    But, you know, I was nning to explore those ruins anyway, so having an expert like you along would certainly put my mind at ease, Kagali. And since weve introduced ourselves to each other, maybe I could pay you through the Free Guild to help with that effort? What do you think?

    Meaning that youd have the right to whatever we found, Rimuru?

    Well, we can talk about that. I have a museum in my capital, so Id prefer to put it on disy there rather than sell it off. But its still gonna be Milimsnd, so well have to discuss matters with her, too. Its hard to make a decision either way right now.

    I see. But youre definitely gonna stage an expedition sometime?

    Yep!

    Indeed, Kagali chimed in, if I dont have to worry about expenses, Id be delighted to take that offer. And if you can handle negotiations with Milim for me, Id have no reason to say no.

    It looked like Kagalis interests werent strictly about profit, either. She had an intellectual bent as well, and if she did, there were no issues between us. So it was decided: Shed organize the team, and Id talk to Milim and convince her this was a good idea.

    Does all that sound good to you, Yuuki?

    Sure! The Free Guild would be happy to help!

    Now Im looking forward to this. Ill begin making arrangements for this while I run operations in Master Yuukis absence.

    Ah, right. Wed gotten a little sidetracked, but I was here to invite Yuuki over.

    Thanks very much, Kagali. Sorry youre staying here while we get to have all the fun, I guess.

    Hee-hee-hee! Oh, I dont mind. Enjoy yourselves to your hearts content.

    Thanks. The Guilds in your hands!

    After saying our good-byes, Yuuki and I left the Guild headquarters. I hadnt expected this, but now we had the ball rolling on exploring those ruins. I really wasnt sure who to enlist for that effort, so having an expert oversee operations was reassuring. It wouldnt be until things calmed down after the Founders Festival, but I really couldnt wait to see what we found in there. We could all stand to learn a lotmaybe itd even give me some hints for the underground Dungeon wed built back in town.

    Such were my thoughts as I took Yuuki along to my next stop.

    I removed my mask outside of the HQ. Given that I no longer needed to hide my aura with it, I only really required it in ces where revealing my face would cause trouble.

    Yuuki, carrying arge knapsack, was eager to talk to me. Receiving that written invite, he mustve had time to prepare in advanceand given the size of his bag, he mustve been nning to stay at least a few nights.

    So are you gonna bring the kids along, too?

    Yeah. Now that Hinata and I are even, none of em has any reason to be against me. There might be an issue or two with them being over there, but we got some pretty serious security, so

    We had to, given all the dignitaries we invited. And if we could keep all of them safe, there was no reason we couldnt protect those five children, either.

    Okay. In that case, go right ahead. Yuuki smiled. Theyre a lot more devoted to studying these days, so maybe theyre due for a break and a reward.

    I didnt send any advance notice to the kids. It would be aplete surprise to them. I kept quiet until I was sure itd be okay to invite them, and hopefully theyd forgive me for that. I knew they really needed some more advance notice, but depending on how things went, I mightve had to say no to them. No point in revving them up and disappointing themter if things went awry.

    After walking for a while, we came to a familiar schoolhousethe imposing home of Englesias Free Academy. A word with the gate guard, and we were taken insideI was with Yuuki, the schools honorary chairman, so it took no time at all.

    We were soon greeted by the vice principal, who guided us into a ssroom.

    Hey, guys! You all doing well?

    Before I could finish saying hello, Alice tackled me like a lineman.

    Ugh! Mr. Tempest! Youve been gone for so long!!

    I didnt think I had been, but maybe that was just my grown-ups perspective? Children have a different sense of time than we do. I guess this mustve been hard for them.

    Shes right. You promised me youde in regrly to visit!

    Yeah! Gails telling the truth! I thought you forgot all about us!

    But Im d youre here now, Mr. Tempest!

    Gail, Kenya, and Ryota all gathered around me, expressing their joy even as theyined to me. Chloe wasnt far behind them, grabbing on to me and smiling.

    Wee back, Mr. Tempest!

    Youre as popr as ever. Yuukiughed as he watched. Im a little jealous.

    Oh, Yuukis here, too!

    Are you gonna fight me today like you promised, Yuuki?

    Me too!

    Right. Our spirit force handlings improved a lottely.

    Noticing Yuuki made the childrens smiles grow wider. Kenya was even challenging him to a fight, and Ryota and Gail werent far behind him. If they had their powers more under control now, I was sure they wanted someone to test them out on. But we were here for different reasons.

    Ah-ha-ha! Youd need to train another hundred years to beat me. Ill fight if ya want, but not today, all right?

    A, why not? Kenya protested.

    Sorry, I said, but theres no time for that today.

    What do you mean? a confused Chloe asked.

    I looked right back at her. Well, I wanted to invite all five of you to my homnd. Were holding a big festival starting tomorrow. If you dont want to go, thats fine, but

    Hurry! We gotta get ready!

    All right, Ken!

    Whaaaaa?! Why didnt you tell us sooner?! This is huge!

    Yeah, Mr. Tempest! How can you just say this out of nowhere?!

    Um, um, I cant wait!!

    The children immediately sprang into action, not waiting for the rest of my speech. They didnt waste a moment of time. The decision was unanimous.

    All you need to bring is a change of clothes, guys! I shouted as they scurried off. There was no response, all of them departing like a storm and shouting the whole way.

    The teacher presiding over ss at the time was understandably a little confused as he watched us. Thats quite a surprise to see. He sighed once they were gone. Theyve never been quite that friendly to me

    Ah-ha-ha! Youre doing a great job with them. Theyre a little better now, but it takes a rare teacher to wrangle the likes of these kids.

    No, no, I suppose its only natural that you need to prove your strength for them to listen to you. I hate to say it, but I think I might actually lose to them if I dont pay attention. Theres no doubting the power they pack, no. By the way

    The teacher didnt look familiar. He mustve been hired on to rece me.

    Oh, Im sorry. My names Rimuru, and I was teaching them before you. Sorry to interfere with ss.

    Ah, you are Rimuru! I surmised as much when the children called you Mr. Tempest. My name is us, and I was hired by the academy as your recement. He gave me a bitter smile. And dont worry about the ssthe vice principal warned me in advance that we may be canceling it for a bit starting today.

    As Yuuki exined, us was once an adventurer, a hunting specialist with a rank of A-minus. He was now approaching fifty and considering retirement before very long.

    Wait, you said you might even lose to them? Theyve gotten that strong?

    Well, what did you expect? They take pride in the fact that you trained them, sir.

    Yeah, Yuuki said, if they snuck up on me, maybe Id even lose.

    They mustve grown a lot. That was impressive, especially in such a short time. It gave me something to think about, as a resolved-looking us turned toward us.

    Sir Yuuki, I have a request.

    Mm? Whats that?

    Its something Id like to ask Sir Rimuru as wellbut at this rate, I can see myself as no longer able to win against them before long. Its an advantage that goes beyond any technical skill they have. But letting them slide by with just this much wouldnt be good for them. I think they need an adult who can serve as a kind of wall for them.

    How do you mean?

    Its simple, Sir Yuuki. These children still have the potential to grow. I dont want them defeating me to make them arrogant, and thus, I was hoping we could provide someone who can train them in fighting technique.

    I get it. us really seemed to be looking out for these kids. Each one was housing a high-level spirit inside themspirits that neutralized the magicule energy granted to them in the crossing from their world to this one. As they grew, however, they became able to control and harness these spirits powersand unleashing this extra energy would make it simple to cast spirit-magic spells, for example.

    They really could be talented elementalists, the way Shizu had. Kenya even had the potential to go Hero-level, just like the light elemental we met said. With the right instructor, fabulous powers would be far more than just a dream to him. Like us suggested, he needed a gifted teacher to guide him along. But:

    All right. So well want a good teacher along those lines, huh? But if were talking someone stronger than you, us, itd have to be a current A-ranker. Hiring someone that far up as a teacher might not be possible

    Yuuki was right. That was a problem. A retired adventurer would be d to ept a steady job like that, but an active one could earn a lot more money taking challenging jobs than watching a ssroom of kids. The Guild, too, had a mission to keep people safe; theyd naturally prefer their top talent to be working in the field for them.

    I imagine not, us said with a sigh. If were looking for someone ranked A or higher willing to work as a teacher, well, I sure cant think of anyone. I can certainly teach sswork and adventuring skills well enough, but

    He understood full well that this was a big ask. And, yeah, recruiting adventurers to teach mustve been a pretty tall order. So I made another suggestion.

    In that case, you know, Im nning to start a school of my own back home. We got a lot of B-ranked dudes over there, and I could probably have Old Man Hakuro, my own teacher, serve as an instructor. When ites to swordsmanship, at least, hes better than I am, so Im sure he could teach them that much.

    Hakuro would be just finewhen it came to sword skills. The children needed more instruction than that, of course, but

    Whoa, Yuuki marveled, that actually sounds great! Would you mind taking over custody of them for a while, then?

    Yeah, thats another idea. But theyre still gonna need to learn life skills for human society from somewhere.

    Children learn a lot of these skills interacting with one another. Robbing them of that chance, I worried, could stunt theirmunication skills as they grew up. Wed be seeing more and more adventurers in Tempest over time, and their own children would probably be attending this school I picturedbut that wasnt likely to gain major momentum for another few years. Until then, theyd have to live in an environment with no other human children, and that struck me as problematic.

    Oh, because its nothing but other monsters instead of human kids?

    Yes, that could be an issue

    Yuuki and us had the same misgivings, nodding their agreement. I was d we were on the same page with thisbut I couldnt rest easy yet. There was something else on my mind.

    Which, I mean, they could just travel to Tempest for instruction in battle. We have the teleportation magic for it; they coulde over a few times a week if you like. But given their background, I think they better get some instruction in elemental spirits as well.

    This wasnt a problem, exactly, but still not something I wanted topromise on. The elemental spirits within them helped protect their lives, to arge extent. If they wanted to harness their powers correctly, theyd need more core knowledge about themknowledge I simply didnt have. Not to put too fine a point on it, but everything I knew about this world was gained strictly off my own experience. Me trying to exin elementals would be like you or I exining how to breathe through words alone. I could go over logical facts and stuff, but I couldnt impart the real essence.

    I was reminded of the way Hinata and her pdins fought, a fusion of sorts between spirit magic and swordsmanship. It was a unique approach, and mastering it must require a deep understanding of spirits. If they could impart that to our kids here

    And, you know, when I think about spirits, I think of the pdins. Should we ask Hinata?

    Hmm I was thinking the same thing, but Hinata can be kinda scary, you know?

    Welltrue.

    Shed never allow the kids to take advantage of her, thats for damn sure. But Im worried shell be a little too harsh on them.

    Thats hard to deny, yes.

    Yuuki and I looked at each other and sighed. But wed need to save this discussion forter. I could already see the children running back to us, luggage in tow. It was festival season. No point in pondering these thorny issues when theres so much fun to be had. For now, I could ask Hakuro about instructor work and worry about other matterster. It was procrastinating, I know, but wed figure something out.

    So, following the same thought process I usually turned to for issues like these, I mentally switched gears and quit my worrying.

    Leaving the main gate into Englesia, I set up a transport gate in a secluded location. This wasnt magic, technically, so I could deploy one without any magic circle required. Yuuki looked at me rather coldly about that, but the kids were used to it.

    Mr. Tempest, if its that easy for you to use these gates, thene visit us more often!

    It was Kenyaining, and he was absolutely right. I apologized profusely to him. With all the stuff thatd happened, itd been hard to find free time and I couldnt really guarantee anyones safety, but no point telling him about that. Itd just make the kid all anxious. So, while dancing around the subject a little, I promised to go back to see them more often.

    On the other side of the gate, I took Yuuki and the kids straight over to my favorite lodging in towna private area, separate from the four-star nobles amodations and reserved for our top officials. Yuuki went off to his room, and as he did, I turned toward the children.

    Im sorry, guys, but I still have some work left. Youll have to wait until tonight to see me, okay?

    Aww!

    None of them was too excited to hear this.

    Quiet! I took a pendant out from my pocket, silencing them. I thought we could use this to y a game, but?

    That lifted their spirits. They were eager to hear more, and once I was sure they were, I began to exin.

    You see this pendant here? Its kind of a free-pass ticket to all the booths and stuff in the festival, starting tomorrow. Carry this around, and you can eat and drink all you want in the stalls, and youre free toe and go through any of the event halls you like. But just remember, theres an upper limit of one hundred silver coinsuse that up, and its game over. Youll have to go back to your rooms then, and Ill give you homework as punishment. But if youve been doing your work up to now, Im sure youll be smart enough to stretch this out for three days. Sound like fun to you?

    I knew from the start that I couldnt watch these kids all day, so I thought up this tactic for them. Thats what you normally did with kids at a fair, right? Give them an allowance and let em run free. I felt bad about not taking them around, but I figured the kids would have more fun alone anyway. And with Soeis agents deployed across town, theyd have no trouble keeping tabs on them.

    This way, at least, I could let them loose on the festival without major concern. And, really, one hundred silvers was a crazy-generous budget. Most of the stalls and attractions didnt even charge you one silver; youd have to make a concerted effort to spend that much in three days. I called it a game, but really it was just a premise Id invented to set them on their way.

    Lets do it!

    I bet theres all this rare stuff to see Cant wait, huh, Ken?

    Yeah, I cant!

    Thank you, Mr. Tempest.

    Um, Ill buy something for you, Mr. Tempest!

    They were up for it, all bursting with anticipation. I gave them the pendant, returning each of their excited nods. Its always fun, I think: that anticipation before a big event. I also thought about telling them Ramiris was in town but decided against it. I nned to introduce them after the fest anyway, so no need to hurry things. Besides, all the kidsKenya and Alice in particrwere already busy nning out the next three days of fun. The servants at our lodging would take care of the rest of their needs, I figured.

    Okay, guys, if you need anything, just ask the hostess in charge here, all right? And I doubt youll need to, but if you have to contact me about something, just hold that pendant tight and think hard about me. Itll trigger a messaging magic.

    Okay! they all shouted back. Good to see them so eager. And with that, figuring I would be in their way beyond this point, I left their room.

    Now I had wrapped up all the necessities.

    I had a little time before the preopening, so I thought I would take a quick break in my room before it beganbut the world had other ns for me.

    Sir Rimuru, the Hero Masayukis party has arrived outside of town.

    Soei quietly appeared to whisper the news into my ear. A Hero, huh? What kinda dude could this be? I thought over the possibilities as I came by to greet him.

    As I did, I could see several elves getting jostled around on arge wagon. I had heard they were freed from that Orthrus ring, and I guess the news was true. It was a pretty fancy wagon, toothey mustve been treated well post-rescue.

    On another, smaller covered wagon was a boy with blond hair, sitting in the cabmans seat with another man holding the reins. Was that Masayuki the Hero? He looked Japanese to me, but with the rounded lines to his face, there mightve been something in his blood from elsewhere. That sort of pop-idol look, you know? Silky blond hair, almondlike eyes with double-fold eyelids His face was childish, but he just projected this aura of coolness.

    The girls mustve loved himbut frankly, he didnt look very powerful to me. You cant judge a book by its cover, though. He was definitely an otherworlderI could see it in the faint Heroic Aura he emitted. It was meant to be intimidating, but it didnt work on me.

    Bracing myself, I retained my cool as I turned my eyes toward Masayuki. The party mustve noticed me just then, slowing down anding to a stop in front of me.

    Youre the demon lord Rimuru? Funny to see you personally greeting us at the door!

    Well, Sir Masayuki is a renowned Hero. Not even a demon lord could afford to ignore him.

    Hee-hee-hee! What dyou think, Masayuki? Wanna settle things right here n now?

    Sheesh, that was sure friendly of them. I was d theyd rescued those elves, but what did I do to deserve getting dissed like that? Well, gotta bottle it up. Anger right now would be ill-advised. I was trying to frame myself as a helpful, harmless demon lord, on good terms with Hinata and everything, and no way I could let that effort go to waste.

    Ha-ha! Harsh words from the Heros friends! Well, out of appreciation for you rescuing our countrymen the elves, you are free to enter and stay in this town. I could even prepare a house for you, if you want, and feel free to stay as long as you like. But just so were clear, Im not interested in settling anything right now, all right?

    There were merchants around us. I decided to take a friendly, humble route. It didnt exactly provide the results I wanted.

    Ha-ha! Look! The demon lords afraid of you, Masayuki!

    Therge, seminude man who took the reins roared inughter as he looked down at me.

    I understand you are seeking friendship with us humans. But Im unsure how much I can trust this. The rumors say that youre the one who schemed to topple the government of Farmus. Perhaps youve managed to trick Hinata the Saint well enough, but dont expect to be so lucky with Masayuki here.

    Talk about turning a deaf ear. They were hell-bent on making me out to be the viin, it looked like. But oddly enough, the Hero himself still hadnt said a word. He had tried to, but every time, one of hispanions would speak up first. To be honest, they were acting more like groupies.

    Hmph! The evil must be dispelled, if you ask me. Sir Masayuki, defeat this demon lord at once and bring peace to

    Guys, Im telling you, weve already got peace.

    The nearby merchants were giving me confused looks, no doubt totally lost. If I didnt put my foot down, I felt like there might be repercussions. But I couldnt really stage a fight here Before I could get too worried, however, someone tossed me a life ring.

    Whatre you guys doing?

    Yuuki, in a fresh set of clothes, had already heard themotion.

    Oh! Yuuki!

    For the first time, Masayuki spoke upand from the sound of it, he had been hoping for divine intervention as well. But hispanions werent having any of it.

    Well, hello there, Yuuki! Whys the master of the Guild himself keeping tabs on a demon lord?

    Im not, Jinrai. Guys, Rimuru seriously wants us all to get along, okay? And as proof of that, Ill point out the fact that youre all still alive.

    So therger guy was named Jinrai. Yuuki exined to him about how Id fought Hinata to a draw and that Im not a bad demon lord. It didnt convince all of them.

    What do you mean by that? The way you describe it, are you implying that Masayuki is weaker than Hinata the Saint?

    Dont be that harsh with him. A mere demon lord could never stop Sir Masayuki. And even the guild master could never be forgiven for insulting him this way!

    Masayuki himself was still silent. He sure had some extreme fans.

    Yeah, Yuuki. Like Bernie and Jiwu said, dont treat Masayuki like a fool, all right? I dunno how strong Hinatas supposed to be, but a draws the best she could do against this guy? In that case, its time for the headliner to make his debut, aint it? Masayuki could whip this demon lord easy!

    Theuded Hero looked like he wanted to be somewhere else right now. Maybe he didnt seek conflict with me at all, then? Yuuki, realizing this himself, stepped up to assuage his friends.

    Guys, guys, calm down. Like I told you, Rimuru isnt hostile against us. Theres no point fighting him.

    But hes a demon lord, aint he? Who knows when he might hatch some nefarious scheme! And with the Western Holy Church sitting on the fence, aint it about time Masayuki shows everyone just what kinda Hero he is?

    No, Im telling you

    Hmm. I see. I could understand where this guy Jinrai wasing from, actually. I was a demon lord, and he didnt trust me. And sure, if you werent familiar with me yet, maybe youd feel the same way as Jinrai did about me. I still didnt know what the so-called Hero thought of all this, but at this rate, wed nevere to terms.

    So I decided to ept the challenge. But:

    All right. In that case, Ive got a suggestion. Were nning to hold a battle tournament at the festival starting tomorrow. If you enter it and emerge as champion, Ill dly ept your challenge! That, and youll be able to prove your strength to everyone there. Not a bad offer, right?

    Ill take the challenge, but before that, I wanted Masayuki and his team to enter the tournament. Itd help me learn how they fought, and for that matter, it might show that I shouldnt bother with them in the first ce. A pretty shrewd idea, I thought, although I wasnt sure which of them would get to fight in the arena yet. I had nned to restrict thepetition to fighters ranked below A, as I was still a little anxious about the arenas structural integrity. It did just fine against magic from high-level elementals, which was special-A stuffbut hey, if it crumbled, wed just build it again. As long as we made sure no onlookers got hurt, us duking it out there shouldnt be a problem.

    Oh? Youre in that much of a hurry to embarrass yourself in public?

    What do you think, Masayuki?

    You should ept the offer. Itll help spread your name far and wide! Yes, lets prove youre on the side of justice, in front of the very people you must keep safe!

    Um, yeaaah

    Masayukis attendants were all gung-ho about it. Masayuki was not. His eyes darted around, seeking an escape. Was this dude really all right? This wasnt, like, just a huge bluff or something, was it? Nah, it couldnt be. This gang apparently crushed Orthrus, which Soei described to me as one seriously dangerous organization. Thats not the kind of feat you could bluff your way through. Even if he was a big faker I mean, hell, he could say no anytime.

    Well, all right. I ept your invitation.

    Ah. Guess I really was overthinking it. After a few moments spent in thought, he said yes.

    Whoa, you sure about that, Masayuki? a worried Yuuki asked.

    The Hero smiled slightly. Oh, Ill figure something out. It ought to be just fine. It always is.

    Thats a lot of confidence! Especially considering Im right in front of him.

    Very good, I replied. And this being a tournament, theres not gonna be any killing, all right? Keep that in mind for me.

    Hmph! Who do you think youre talking to? Lets go, Masayuki. Wed better rest up for the big day tomorrow!

    Yes, Masayuki. Considering all the onlookers here, no way this demon lords going to chicken out now!

    And dont worry. Well keep a close eye out for anyone trying to poison or assassinate you.

    A-anyway, we ought to get going. Better find out when the tournament begins.

    Rimuru, Yuuki said as they left, you arent really going to fight Masayuki, are you?

    Ummm I dont know yet. I mean, do you think he could win the tournament?

    Thats what Id like to know. Yuuki sighed. Hes won a couple Englesia battle tournaments in a row, and honestly, Ive never heard of him losing against a monster before. A lot of his strength is still an unknown to me.

    I could read it on his face. This was something he did not want to deal with.

    Well, whatever happens happens. But lets give this a positive spin, huh? Having a bona fide Hero in my tournaments a mark of prestige.

    Its all about perspective. Yes, this was a thorn in my side, butpared to conferring with demon lords or fighting Hinata, it didnt strike me as that depressing. Wed need to think of some measurester, but I saw no reason to dwell on it any further.

    And then evening cameand with it, an ornate reception hall packed with dignitaries from all over.

    We had tons of nobility in there, all dressed to the nines in their shiest formal gear. There were more men than women, by the looks of it, but I guess I had earned the trust of quite a few nobles, because I saw some with their spouses and children. There was even a young doll-like girl with blond hair among them, making for quite a spread of ages.

    Tonights n called for a pretty loose invitee list. Anyone coulde if they liked, and wed be serving them buffet-style, with a variety of food spread out on the table and invitees free to pick and choose. Plus, there was something you wouldnt see in any other countrya section of the chamber decorated Japanese-style, with tatami mats on the floor. This took up about half the room, with invitees obliged to remove their shoes before stepping on it.

    This wasnt a tradition many guests were used to, so the tatami section was still sparsely popted. But it wasnt empty. I saw a few people trying the space out, rxing on new and unfamiliar zabuton floor pillows. King Gazel was one of them, and this wasnt his first time, so he was well used to it. We spoke for a bit. Apparently, hed gone around town this afternoon, seeing how it was developingthe sewage treatment facilities, the rails we were constructing, and so on. He spent a while gazing at all the buildings and entertainment we had built, much of it based on my own whims.

    What will you be doing with those rails, if I may ask?

    Well, on that topic, I actually had some things to discuss with you. Im thinking about developing these new vehicles called trains, and Id really like you to join in.

    Hohh? Well, if its my beloved sparring partner asking, Ill dly ept.

    That was fast. I guess seeing those rails convinced him it was worth signing on for. If anything, I bet he wouldve insisted on joining, even if I told him he couldnt. No need for that, though.

    Scuse me, I heard someone say as he sat nearby. This was Yohm, another familiar face, and he just whumped himself down right in front of King Gazel, who greeted him with a grin and deftly poured some wine into his cup. It was surreal to watch the king of a brand-new nation chatting with someone like Gazelno doubt the sight would make some people rethink their opinions of Yohm.

    The three of us chatted about this and that awhile. Gazels main purpose here was to show people that we were friends. The more intelligent people watching us would have to raise their opinions of Yohm and me. Here, theyd think, were two people the Dwarven King obviously respectedand that, in turn, would give us more leverage at the bargaining table. In effect, Gazel was providing support fire for us.

    Of course, I was sure hed scrutinized what we talked about before, making calctions to ensure the Dwarven Kingdom stood to profit from it. But I still definitely appreciated it. It reminded me all over again that in Gazel, I had a trusted confidant.

    Some of the attendees had a chance to try out ourrge public bathhouse before the party. It was generally warmly received, the bath attendant fielding all sorts of questions.

    Bathhouses already existed in therger nations of the worldthe novelty here was the hot-spring water itself, I assumed. We kept careful tabs on the healing properties of the minerals and such it contained, so now it could be easily replicated. A number of nations asked if we could bring a bath like this to their homnd, and I nned to reply to this customermentary at ater date. My answer was always going to be sorry,e visit us again, but regardless.

    A few of our bath customers were in the tatami space now, rxing in the light yukata kimono wed provided. They were quite muscr folks, discussing with one another what they had seen and experienced. One of them wanted to speak one-on-one with me, but I just didnt have the time to get to everybody in the chamber. I thus reached out and greeted those I was able to timing-wise as I made my way to the seat of honor.

    Many of the people here were seeing me for the first time. I felt a lot of curious gazes upon mepeople who turned pale upon learning I was a demon lord and people all the more curious and observant upon hearing the news. I was still not used to so much attention at once, so I gave them all quick hellos before reaching my seat. It was time to officially get this party started.

    Ummm, first off, thank you foring here today. My name is Rimuru, and as you all know, I have recently been appointed a demon lord. However, tonight isnt the night for intense political discussion. I hope that all of you here will enjoy the food of our nation that well present to you tonight. I was never one for long speeches, so lets begin!

    Everything was set to go. Food is an integral part of good hospitality. Hopefully the sincerity behind it came across to everyone.

    Each table had a waiter attending to it; Vester had drilled them on how to divvy up the avable food upon request. What he taught themabout how everything came down to providing the best possible experience for our guestswas about to be unleashed on the public.

    My speech over, I lifted my cup in a toast. The eve of the festivities was underway.

    The cold beer, for one thing, led to loud cheers and apuse. I figured it would. If your alcohol consumption involved not much carbonation, Tempests beer mustve been a huge surprise. I mean, its ice cold. I instructed everyone thoroughly on Japanese-style service here, chilling the sses and everything. I couldntpromise on that, for my own sake.

    Even better, I had lovely elven girls pouring for me. No one was forcing them to, okay? Theyd personally volunteered to help out, and we were letting them. And they were a big hit, too. Having such beautiful elves going around the hall with drinks, wearing yukata, was no doubt quite attractive to people only familiar with women in dresses. And the way they greeted youwith a polite seated bow on the tatami mats, three fingers of each hand on the floorhad a kind of universal attraction among men, no matter where they came from. A lot of them were blushing, and not because of the booze.

    I mean, you know how breasts can look under a yukata. Hee-hee-hee. Just as I calcted.

    But, ah, the ultimate blending of Japanese and Western styles! Seeing people in yukata dotted among all the nobles in formal wear was something different, definitely. Something you could see only here. Things were getting a little hectic at this party, though wed expected as much. Really, the party itself was a crazy idea from amon-sense perspectivebut why let it bother me? I treated it as perfectly normal as I watched the other guests.

    The tables were lined with thetest and greatest work from Shuna and Mr. Yoshida. It was all excellent; I could guarantee to everyone attending that they would enjoy it. You had smoked chiducken and vegetable sandwiches, cowdeer steaks, sauted veggies with red bean paste, karaage fried chicken, and roast-beef sd. For pte cleansers, we offered assorted fruit sorbets, and there were even a few dishes from the Walpurgis I attended, like ck-tiger stew and grilled sage rooster. Tracking down those monsters wasnt easy, but with the leads I had beforehand, we managed to procure them over the course of three days.

    This food, made with the finest and rarest of ingredients our nation had to offer, seemed to fully satisfy the ptes of our noble attendeesall of whom were dyed-in-the-wool gourmets, no doubt.

    And that wasnt all.

    Arge fish was brought into a corner of the hall, on the border between the Western and Japanese sections. The monster was called a spear tuna, bearing a solid-looking exoskeleton and a sharp, spear-like head. Even without the horns, it was over thirteen feet in length and looked viciously mean from nose to rear fin.

    Why did we bring in such a behemoth? Because despite its appearance, this fish had the nicest, most well-rounded taste to it. The armor-like exoskeleton hid lean red meat, simr to tuna. I happened to catch one during a fishingpetition with Gobta, and all I can say is, good thing I bothered to run Analyze and Assess on it before tossing it back. It told me that the fish was both nonpoisonous and packed with nutrients. Pour a little of our soy sauce on it (now ready for practical use), try it out, and Well, it was good. Really good. The experience drove me to show it off to the crowd at this party.

    Id actually caught this guy myself. I had grown pretty adept at moving in the water by now, and it was a good experience for me. Id have someone else handle that next time, of course, but either way, this was a freshly caught spear tuna. Meanwhile, Hakuro cut and trimmed it for me. The first time, he used a well-honed long knife from Kurobe to dice it up and present it in pieces, arranged all lifelike on the table. This time, however, hed be performing for a crowd, so he took his time, slowly slicing up the body. Deftly avoiding the spear tunas solid exoskeleton, Hakuros knife ran through it like butter. It was the most artistically beautiful dissection I had ever seen; even Shuna was surprised at his dexterity. Put a knife in his hand, and he truly had the air of a craftsman.

    Shion, behind me, really wanted to help out with the knife I had gifted her, but I dissuaded her from the idea. The reason should be obvious. I couldnt feed inferior goods to a group of world dignitaries. This wasnt something I could joke around with. Shion was my secretary-sh-bodyguard, and I wanted her to stick to that.

    How did the crowd respond? Well, more than a few were surprisedeven scaredof the vicious-looking sea creature when it was first brought in. But as Hakuros trimming unfolded, looks of joy started to creep over their faces. Then the head came off, the body was cut into four sections, and the dishes slowly filled up with the resulting sashimi pieces. In the center were the fattier cuts of white sashimi, the red pieces fanned out around it. The mere sight of that made me salivate, but the crowdmost of whom had never had anything like this beforewas a little more nervous.

    As they continued to watch, Hakuro began to make sushi out of some of the pieces. This feat, I wasnt expecting.

    White rice, cooking sake, vinegar, mirin, and soy sauce. We had all of those now, and they added incalcble depth to our cuisine, as was clearly being demonstrated here. But, man, I never thought Id get to eat real sushi in this world. Apparently, Hakuros grandfather had told him about it when he was young, butwhew. I sure felt for that guy. Coming to a world like this, and all he could think about was sushi, this thing hed never enjoy again in his lifetime. He mustve had so many regrets.

    Compared to him, I had it damn lucky. Like Hinata told me as well, trying to replicate Japanese cuisine in this world was, to say the least, a challenge.

    Hakuros granddad, though, huh? I remember him described as an otherworlder named Byakuya Araki. Did he live back in, like, the Edo era, maybe? Samurai and shoguns and so on? I doubted he was a sushi chef himself, but when could he have been born?

    But, ah, it doesnt matter. Gotta live life in the now.

    The buffet table was alive with chatting guests. The food was a hit, everyone raving about it. Shuna and Yoshida had given everything they had to their team-up, so Id say they deserved all the praise they got.

    On the other hand, the sashimi and nigiri sushi Hakuro made for the crowd was still being wholeheartedly ignored. Maybe the terrifying sight of that spear tuna was a little too stomach-churning to whet their appetites. I spotted at least one show-off telling his friend, Good heavens, thats an A rank, and so on. Theres one trivia whiz in every crowd, isnt there?

    Butcmon. It was freshly cut sashimi; there was no way it could taste bad. I wished they wouldnt act so boorish and give it a try, at least. In this world, you could detect poison in food without eating it first, so everybody here knew that wasnt a concern. The visuals mustve convinced them this was some kind of low-grade garbage food.

    Well, if nobody was willing to step up to the te, it was time for me to lead off.

    Ill take one.

    By all means!

    Hakuro was kind enough to whip up a new piece of toro fatty tuna for me. I ced some soy sauce on it and popped it in my mouth. Thebination of fragrant wasabi and the tunas melt-in-your-mouth umami came together, forming an explosion of supreme taste.

    It was so gooooooood!! So good. I mean, Id been to crazy-fancy ces in Ginza before, and Id never had anything at this level.

    This is amazing, Hakuro!!

    That it is, Im sure. I was concerned such fine fish may notst long tonight, but I fear the audience reaction is a tad disappointing. It will be something to look forward to over drinks tonight, though, no doubt!

    Hakuro and the rest of the staff would eat after the guests left. He mustve been hoping for some spear tuna to enjoy with his saketer. And he was rightthe snub from the guests was a pity, but if hed made this for himself anyway, then no harm, no foul. In fact, he almost seemed to want them to hate it.

    Unfortunately, it was Hakuro who had to be disappointed.

    Would you make me a piece of tuna underbelly without the wasabi, please?

    Well, well, whos this? Someone with a lot of guts, asking for the ootoro, arguably the best part of the whole tuna. And no wasabi?!

    What are you, a child?

    Oh, shut it. I dont like that sting in my nose.

    It was Hinata, dressed in a simple night dress and acting a little too big for her britches for my taste. Ordering sushi like it was her divine right!

    Too bad there isnt a little more variety.

    And now she wasining about that? First no wasabi, then arger menu? Okay, Ill grant you that not everybodys on the wasabi bandwagonit can be tough if youve never had it before. I asked for no wasabi up until around middle school age myself. But as a grown-up, a real connoisseur knows how to enjoy the vor of the wasabi as part of the package.

    What do you mean a real connoisseur? Whats that even matter? If it tastes good, it tastes good.

    She was chortling at me nowbut she was right. Goddamn it. Why does Hinata have to be so rational about everything?

    So she picked up the te from Hakuro, beaming. Slowly, she ced a piece inside her mouth, closing her eyes.

    Thisreally is excellent. First sashimi and then sushi It rankles me, but I have to respect you, Rimuru.

    Sounds like a satisfied customer. She savored the tuna, a look of joy on her face.

    Right, said Yuuki,ing up from behind, Ill have one, too. Oh, and with wasabi, because Im not a kid.

    Given the jab at Hinata, he must have been observing us for a while. I knew he had sampled quite a bit from the buffet, but he mustve still been just as hungry. Taking a te from Hakuro, he finished off the contents fast, no doubt waiting for this moment.

    Whoa. Its just melt-in-your-mouth! Man, getting to eat sushi this good, over here Its honestly kind of moving.

    He was already reaching for the sushi as he spoke, a smile on his face.

    It certainly is different from freshwater fish, countered Hinata, is it not? You know, I asked the Free Guild for fish like this, but they turned me down, and I cant magically transport them to me. I had given up on it. But this definitely brings a little more joy to my life.

    Apparently, Hinata had missed seafood so much that shed asked Yuuki to bring some over to her. That, however, was logistically difficultthere were so many issues to deal with, they couldnt find anyone to tackle the job. Hinata mustve brought that up to get back at Yuuki for his wasabi jab.

    Well, I couldnt do much about that, Yuuki replied with a pained grin. The northern seas are too full of giant fish to be safe, and the south is too far away to make transport very efficient. And you cant make a profit off seafood if youre shipping it in just from ind waters.

    He was right. Logistics in this world were still pretty weak. As I expected, inders had almost no chance to sample fresh fish. Getting seafood to them was just too difficult. Wagons could carry only a little at a time, and temperature control was a major hassle. Youd have to either bring along a sorcerer or have vast quantities of ice avable in each townand even then, there was no telling if you could maintain freshness from the shores all the way to ind cities. Youd have to be pretty rich to have a chance at a fresh fillet, and in fact, the idea probably wouldnt even ur to you in the first ce. The concept of fish in stews and such existed, but again, the problem was supply.

    This, too, was just what I pictured. Thus, I wanted to take this opportunity to tell the world about the delicacies they could enjoy only in my nation. Id build more of a distributionworkter, but until then, I wanted Tempest to have a monopoly.

    Whether they were put off by the spear tunas appearance or hesitant about exotic food cultures, nobody had touched the sushi or sashimi. But now, with both Hinata and Yuuki singing its praises, the tides were about to turn. A man stood up from the corner King Gazel was upying and came over.

    Sir Rimuru, can we have some as well? he asked.

    If I recalled correctly, this was Dolph, captain of the Pegasus Knights.

    Certainly, go ahead. Ill have it brought over.

    As if onmand, Hakuros hands began moving at astonishing speed. The tes were quickly lined with fresh-made sushi, sashimi, and osuimono, a light seafood broth. These were brought over by our elf-girl waitstaff, all arranged in a neat row in front of Gazel, Yohm, and the others seated on their pillows.

    Now, for the big moment. How would they react?

    Mm. Excellent as always.

    Kahhh! This is good!!

    With a swig of chilled sake, Gazel grabbed a piece of sashimiand it certainly didnt seem to disappoint him. Yohm, meanwhile, was enrapt at his first bite, expressing himself in his usual honest (and very un-noble) way.

    The rest of their friends had simr praise for it.

    I had no idea that monster fish could be so delicious!

    I thought fish wasnt good for much of anything apart from grilling

    Hey, if it tastes good, it tastes good, you know?

    Yes, and certainly Sir Rimuru has never brought us anything short of excellent!

    Good, good. d I had everyone satisfied. And even better: Arge number of people were observing their reactions.

    Me too! Id like to have some!

    The moment one noble shouted that, a mad dash of orders for Hakuro ensued. Now it was a big hitone that made Hakuro happy, if a little regretful. Yeah, I wasnt so sure hed have something to enjoy with his sake tonight after all. I actually have another spear tuna on handlets surprise him with it afterward.

    After Hinata and Yuuki kicked off with their light banter, they were exchanging heated opinions about every other topic in the world with each other, drinks in hand. It was hard to tell if they liked or hated each otherbut their little debate over wasabi had turned this offering into a sess story. It wouldnt be nice to interrupt them now, so I resolved to thank themter.

    So the party continued. So far, Id call it a big sess. All the food, Western- and Eastern-style, was earning raves. This was ae if you like thing; nobodys attendance was required, but a lot of people showed up anyway. If we kept up rtions with them all, Id have to be sure to dangle these foodstuffs in front of their eyes and tell them we could get a regr supply going.

    This much, too, was as Id nned it. This kind of on-the-ground PR was my job. Im not just here to live it up and dine on the hog, no. Im not extravagant and selfishthat was all prep work for a chance like this!

    But enough excuses.

    In that way as well, the event was proceeding as nned. But then:

    U-urgent news, sir!!

    A soldier burst into the room. I guess we had a problem.

    As one would expect, there were guards posted all around this reception hall, including the personal bodyguards of the political figures inside. The area around the building was thus full of people, and if there was an issue out there, it was likely to be a serious one.

    Whats up? What happened? I spoke slowly to the soldier to calm him down. Id love to run out and see things for myself, but I couldnt act agitated right now. But before the soldier could answer, arge contingent of bodyguards from all manner of nations tore into the room at great haste.

    Seriously, what was going on here?! Our security program was supposed to be perfect. If we had an incident on our hands, something seriously went wrong. I didnt sense any particrlyrge aura approaching; this wasnt a monster attack. If it was, it wouldve been detected sooner. Milim and Carillon were a bitte, but their arrival wouldnt trigger a panic like this.

    So what could it be?

    The soldier turned toward me. Arge flying object has flown in! Its outside of town!

    As he spoke, the other bodyguards were giving their own reports to their respective bosses, shouting in loud voices.

    Reporting, sir! The emperor of the Sorcerous Dynasty of Thalion has appeared!!

    Its an emergency! The Heavenly Emperor, Elmesia El-Ru Thalion herself, has set foot upon thisnd!!

    Her Excellency the Emperor and her entourage are walking toward this reception hall!!

    I was freaking out for a moment, but to sum it up, this was just the emperor of Thalion arriving a littlete.

    Whew. Thats a relief. I was wondering what was up.

    I breathed a sigh of relief. But Gazel, who deigned to get up from his seat to approach me, was sighing for other reasons.

    Just as thoughtless and ignorant as ever, eh? What else would happen if Emperor Elmesia left her borders? I know were all trying to gauge one another at this eventeven mebut the emperor herself is simply too much to handle. I am sure even those not in attendance tonight are hurriedly sending missives back to their homnds.

    What do you mean?

    I wanted more details, and Gazel was just waiting for the chance to give me some. He just loves to go on about all his knowledge in front of me, like some kind of geniusbut it did help me, I realized, so I resolved not toin too loudly.

    As he put it, the Sorcerous Dynasty of Thalion was arge country, one as strong as the Armed Nation of Dwargon, despite being fully independent with no involvement in the Council of the West. Plus, as the term Dynasty suggested, it was a federation of thirteen distinct kingdoms. In terms of power, the Council of the West was definitely the biggest force out therebut given its parliamentarian system, it couldnt immediately carry out policy at a moments notice. Dwargon, on the other hand, was a monarchy under Gazel, so while it fell behind in overall power, its statements still held sway with the Western Nations. The same was true of Thalion.

    Elmesia holds immense power in Thalion. Shes hailed as a descendant of divinity, and shes the one who dered herself Heavenly Emperor in the first ce. I dont know how divine she is, exactly, but its absolutely true that Thalion was founded by a high elf named Elmesia. That womans been around for longer than Thalion itself.

    It wasnt even remotely on the same scale. Dwargons history extended back for a thousand years. Compared to that, it was said Thalion could trace its roots back over two millennia.

    Do you see what I mean now, Rimuru? Even I have to be respectful to Elmesia. And imagine if you were a human, with your short life span. Why, you would never have a chance to meet her in your life, even if you wanted to!

    Given Gazels obvious distaste for her, Elmesia must have been one tough cookie to deal with. Hmm. I meant to invite only Archduke Erald, I thinkbut I guess wednded someone even bigger.

    Yeah, you know, I guess its important to write a name down on your invitations, isnt it?

    I dont think thats the problem, a peeved-looking Gazel replied. But she was here, and I had nothing to counter him with. Wed just have to give her the best service we possibly could.

    As we spoke, amotion erupted near the entrance.

    Looks like shes arrived.

    Stay on your guard, Rimuru. Think of her as the slyest old fox youll ever see.

    If thats how Gazel put it, I suppose Id have to resign myself to some seriouspetition. I gave him a powerful nod, showing him I was ready to ept this.

    The hall was in a furor. As I suppose it would be. Here, after all, was an emperor of a vastly powerful nationone who apparently hadnt even made a public appearance in decades. Most everyone in the room would normally never get a chance to see her their whole lives.

    Elmesia El-Ru Thalion, the leader who dered herself Heavenly Emperor, solemnly strode inside. Everyone there no doubt thought of her as the personification of beauty. They all watched her silently, captured by her presence. Even me, I thinkespecially since, externally, she looked like such a beautiful young girl. Her skin was like fresh snowfall, her hair a shiny silver. Her ears were long and pointed at the ends, her prating eyes the color of jade.

    She was female, judging by what Gazel saidno denying that. Are high elves purebred from the fairy races, then? If not, then they must be closely rted. Fairies came in all sorts of types, I suppose, but some were descended from the high-ranking spirit sses, and maybe this Elmesia was an example of that, a menace from ancient times. No wonder Gazel was wary of her.

    And we had to watch out for her entourage as well. Each guard practically oozed power. They were dressed in ceremonial gear, but even that stuff was all magically charged. All Legend-ss, Im sure. It was strength on the level of Hinatas sword, Moonlightand it wasing from their clothing. They had to be at least as strong as Arnaud and the pdinsor maybe, judging by the quality of their gear, the emperors guard was even better.

    Its a big world out there, I thought.

    Then, waving a hand to keep the guard at bay, the emperor stood before me.

    I have epted your kind invitation, she said in her clear voice. It ddened me.

    That voice was enough to make all the invitees here melt, it looked like. One might confuse it with a charming magic, but it wasnt. Her voice really was just that mesmerizing.

    Its an honor to meet you as well, I said, returning the favor before her.

    Then Elmesias jade-colored eyes looked at me.

    Warning. Spiritual Interference detected Blocked. This was likely not an attack but a natural side effect of Heroic Aura.

    Oh man. Thisdys Heroic Aura on a level that even beat Gazels. That means she was at least as powerful as him and quite likely even more so. Demon lordlevel, perhaps? It seemed like a keen idea not to get on her wrong side. This was a peaceful invitation, and I wanted to appeal to her with everything I had so we could build a friendly rtionship.

    Now, we have some food prepared for all of us, so I hope you will enjoy the remainder of the evening.

    Yes, I am most pleased to see so much careful attention paid to these proceedings. I do look forward to the festivities beginning tomorrow, and I hope they prove to be eminently enjoyable. Also

    Elmesia had a calm,posed smile on her face as she spoke. Then she brought her face closer to mine. Doesnt have to be today, she whispered so only I could hear, but I want you to make some time for me, yknow. Theres something I wanna discuss frankly, in a more rxed environment.

    It was a markedly more casual way of speakingElmesias true colors showing, I imagined. As someone still getting used to ying the role of a stern, dignified demon lord, it made me feel an affinity for her.

    All right, I replied. Ill let you know when I work out a time.

    She nodded, smiling, then returned to her ring of guards. She kept the smile up, as people mored around for a chance at winning favor with her while she headed for the buffet table.

    By the way, I was surprised to see that Erald, the archduke I did invite, was nowhere to be seen. But then I matched eyes with one of her guards.

    Whoa, its him?!

    He looked so imposing that I totally ignored him at first, but I guess he was here. We exchanged nces and nods, but I definitely wanted to give more formal helloster.

    It was only a short exchange, but it still exhausted me. Fortunately, Elmesia was now distracting peoples attention away from me, so I decided to kick back in the tatami-mat section. I had assumed this would be a chill little open-invite event, but now I had some real power brokers in here.

    Man, Im beat.

    About to get swallowed up, arent you? Better keep yourself sharp, or else that old f

    Gazel stopped himself, taking a swig from his chilled sake to change the subject. Im guessing the even chillier stare from Elmesia was the reason. Im sure I wanted to know what he almost said there, although I could venture a guess. Good thing he didnt finish the sentence. Elves have pretty good hearing, and loose lips sink ships, as they say. Ill need to be careful, too.

    But regardless, time to unwind. I toasted with Gazel and Yohm, opening things up with some chitchat. Unfortunately, I couldnt rx for long. There was furthermotion at the entranceanother celebrity appearance, by the sound of it.

    Looks like shes finally showed up.

    She sure has, I replied to Shion with a nod. I was worried shed be toote before long.

    I prepared to give my good-byes and stand back up.

    Oh, Milims here? Yohm said, recognizing her. Man, shes painted up all pretty tonight, huh?

    Ever since they had a bit of a tussle, Yohm had kindled something of a dislike for Milim. The fact he managed to keep it just to dislike probably spoke volumes about his personality. No way any normal person could speak of a demon lord as painted up like that, I dont think. I really had to hand it to him.

    I see. Bring in the demon lords, eh?

    Gazels eyes were sharpened on Milim as well, but it took Yohm to tell him who she was. But Im sure a few other faces by the door were more familiar to him. After all, she was being led in by members of my own staffBenimaru, Diablo, Geld, and Gabil.

    Now the dwarf king looked nervous. And why not? This quartet was guiding ten people inside, Milim included. She was taking the lead, with two attendants on either sidea bald man named Middray, the head priest of the Dragon Faithful and a fighter worthy enough to earn praise from Benimaru. The other robed attendant was more easygoing. That mustve been Hermes, the guy Gabil had fought against.

    Behind this trio were two former demon lordsCarillon the Beast Master and Frey the Sky Queen. Carillon looked just as majestic as always, and Frey was in a dress I could describe only as provocative, turning heads all across the hall. Both of them, to be sure, struck an almighty presence.

    Trailing Carillon were the Three Lycanthropeers. Say, this was the first time Id seen Phobio in a while! He looked a bit thinner than before, but I was d he was well. Frey, meanwhile, was attended to by a pair of beautiful identical twins, their blond-and-silver hair suiting them well. I had heard of themthey were the Twin Wings, her closest servants. I hadnt realized they were actual twins, but I was sure they were two powerhouses in a fight.

    In this group, we had a set of massively powerful rulers, all dering Milim to be their new queen. Nobody could hide their nerves around them, and I could see why.

    Yep, I told Gazel as I stood up to greet them. Im gonna go say hello.

    The moment Milim saw me, she burst into a broad smile.

    Hee-hee-hee! The days finally here! she shouted. Cant wait to see the kind of food thatll make Middray moan with excitement!

    Not a problem, I replied, voice low. But isnt anyone angry with you?

    Milim had spent much of the lead-up to this festival poking around my Dungeon and generally avoiding Frey as much as possible. She had been here in town until yesterday, in fact, and they were allte arriving today. This suggested Frey was livid with her, and I was concerned about that.

    Oh, um, no worries there, she whispered back. I emphasized to Frey that Ive built up my self-awareness as a ruler, so I was out protecting my territory the whole timeand she believed me!

    Judging by the sweat running down her face and the way her eyes darted around, I had trouble believing her. Frey was an intuitive woman. Milim had been busy protecting thebyrinth floors I assigned to her, not any of her ownnds. If Frey finds out, then I could be dragged in through no fault of my ownbut for now, Id just have to believe in her. Id have to, but no matter what, I wasnt involved, okay? Even if it means ditching Milim at the side of the road.

    Thank you for inviting me today, Frey said after I was done with Milim. I apologize for our tardiness. Then she looked into my eyes. Lady Milim, she furtively continued, our new master, was absent from my sight until this morning. It took some time to fit her for her ceremonial wear

    Ah, ah-ha-ha, yes, I see! Well, I certainly dont mind it at all, so please enjoy yourselves for the next few days.

    I turned my eyes away from her prating gaze, talking my way out of my imagined predicament. As a slime, if I ever got nervous, itd never be discernible on the outside. Now, I feared my eye movements made my inner intentions bleedingly obvious. Whenever I dealt with anyone as intuitive as she was, I could never afford to look them in the eye.

    Oh, of course! Here I am, leaning on you to build an entire new city for us, and now youve even invited me to this grand event I have so much to thank you for.

    Frey smiled. The thanks helped me loosen up a bit. That was all it took to create new problems for myself.

    Well, I hope our food here is to your liking. And ah yesare there any ingredients you cant have? We do have chicken on the menu, but if thats a problem

    It was only at that point that I realized the mistake I was making.

    Chicken?

    Tension cut across the air like an icicle. Oh no, I thought, but it was toote.

    Ah

    Sir Rimuru, are you equivocating myself with livestock?

    Ummm, no, I didnt mean to

    Frey was still smiling. The Twin Wings around her all but snarled at me. What a mistake. What did I just say? Loose lips do sink ships. They had just sunk mine.

    But as I agonized over how to react:

    Pffft! Bwah-ha-ha-ha! Oh man, Rimuru, that was great! Youre just the most incredible man ever. You, calling Frey a bird Thats just brilliant!

    Carillon, failing to read the room one bit, burst out inughter.

    Yeah, Milim respectfully added, I could never do that.

    Stop it, guys. Quit giving me those sparkling, wonderden eyes of yours.

    May I ask whats so funny, Carillon? And you too, Milim?

    Now Frey was annoyed. I was clearly at fault.

    No, no, Im sorry. That was a mistake on my part. I just thought you may not like poultry, but I see I was overthinking matters.

    At a time like this, a humble apology is your best bet. Trying to cop an attitude could lead to even worse disagreementster. So I tried to calm Frey down as best I could, bowing my head despite everyone around me.

    She reacted to this with a look of surprise. Hee-hee! Ah, Sir Rimuru, youre exactly the sort of person I hoped you might be. I realized you didnt intend to insult me, but I just wanted to test your reaction. Now I know. Seeing how you hold yourself has doubtlessly helped Lady Milim grow and mature as well.

    Theposed smile returned to her face. Milim was no longer a tyrant. She wasnt exactly a benevolent ruler, no, but at least she was willing to listen to people a little moreand Frey mustve thought I was the reason, so she used my mistake to test me a little. She mustve hoped I was an example for her to follow.

    Bowing to her, then, was the correct answer. If Milim was imitating me, after all, I shouldve expected Frey to test me. If I was a bad example for her, after all, she might have kept Milim from visiting me. I had to hand it to FreyI thought she was a scary big-sister type, but she really was looking out for Milim.

    As for bad examples

    By the way, Caaaaaarillon? What exactly was so funny again? Would you mind exining in a way I would understand?

    A wave of pressure crashed on Carillons head. I could almost hear the sound of twisted metal when it hit home. Frey descended upon him with lightning speed, her graceful hand palming his entire head. In terms of muscle, Carillon could win out, but this eagle-like grip was definitely something Frey had over him.

    W-wait a sec! Ow, ahhh, seriously, ow!

    Freys arm was stiffened from her elbow to her fingertips. Her fingers grew into talons harder than steel, expanding in size as they dug into Carillons head. Yeah, I bet that hurt.

    No, that Really, I cant take any more! Im sorry, Im sorry! Please forgive me!!

    Despite their masters shouting, the Three Lycanthropeers didnt move a muscle. Phobio fidgeted a bit, clearly worried for Carillon, but the other two just gave the exdemon lord exasperated stares. Yeah, Carillon could no doubt hold out a little longerand given his obviousck of regret, he probably had iting, too.

    Are you watching, Milim? I asked. If you do something bad, you apologize. Thats the correct choice, isnt it?

    Yes, I agree! And for that matter, Ill try not to get you angry in the first ce, Frey!

    Milim understood what I was trying to tell her. She could y till she was pooped in the Dungeon, but moderation was key. Take care of everything that needed to get done first, and that made your subsequent recreation all the more fun. If you could aplish that, then greatjust watch you dont cause offense like Carillon.

    Whoa! Come on! Hey! Stop chatting over there and help me!!

    Milim and I nodded, the struggling Carillon serving as a fine example of what not to do.

    Dont just ignore me! O

    His voice was fading from my ears. Thanks, Carillon, I thought as Milim and I waited for Frey to cool down. Well never forget your sacrifice.

    Even as this little fracas was taking ce, Shuna was fully carrying out her duties for me.

    All right, herees more food! she said with a smile as she brought out all sorts of dishes, the crowd cheering her on.

    Putting Carillons sacrifice behind us, we all moved on. Hey! he protested as Frey finally released him. Milim! Rimuru! I was screaming at you to help me!

    Oh, stopining! Youre totally fine!

    Yeah, I agreed. Frey wasnt really serious, so it wasnt that big of a deal, was it?

    Carillon was clearly unharmed, so I felt safe saying that. Apparently, I was wrong.

    No, it was! From the moment she put her ws around my head, that knocked out all my skills. I think thats Freys unique skill or something. If she used that on the likes of me, then it must seriously be love!

    I really didnt think so, but I didnt tell him. Shunas cuisine takes precedence right now. The dishes were all ced on a single round table. Our attendants had reserved this set for Milims party.

    Thanks in advance for this, Milim said to Shuna. Middrays a pretty stubborn guy, so I want something that knocks him on his butt on the first taste!

    Hee-hee-hee! I understand, Lady Milim. Enjoy!

    Shuna smiled, putting Milims mind at ease. They had taken a liking to each other, so Milim looked even more reassured than when Id spoken to her.

    However:

    I have to say, Lady Milim, I am not impressed by you being taught all these sphemous ways

    The moment dinner was served to Milims servant Middray, he immediately started chiding me. This was exactly who Milim was talking about in the letter she sent. Hermes, meanwhile, was looking at me, hands sped together in a prayerful apologyhe mustve been worried Middrays words would anger me. The long-suffering type, I guess. I liked that.

    Watching us from afar, meanwhile, were the now-well-fed nobility, busily chatting with themselves. It was chitchat, yes, but it was noble chitchat. Info gathering was the name of the game, and right now, they were more interested in our exchanges than their own conversation. The question on their minds: How would the demon lord Milim and her people react to the food they considered so tasty? Especially given how one of them, Middray, already demonstrated so little understanding of our efforts? Some would no doubt conclude that, while having different values wasnt necessarily a bad thing, humans dealing with magic-born would remain an uphill battle.

    If that happened, then so be it, but I figured we were fine. Hermes, Milims other attendant, apparently wanted to spread the general concept of cuisine among the Dragon Faithful, besides.

    So I decided to engage Middray. sphemous? I asked.

    Hmph! Since ancient times, we have deemed it proper to praise the blessings of our foodstuffsand to enjoy them as is, in their natural form. And now I am presented with this

    It was a sd with dressing. That was no good. Neither, it seemed, was potato sd, since it meant mashing the potatoes and defiling their original form.

    And what manner of behavior is this? Grilling meatall right, fair enough. But why do you then stain it with this mysterious liquid? It is deplorabletruly deplorable!

    Middray mustve been angry, because I saw a throbbing vein on his forehead as he red at me. This offended Shuna enough to wipe the smile from her face, and she red right back at him. Hermes, noticing this, grew pale and started bowing profusely to Shuna and mebut Middray, not bothered by this, kept right on going.

    What sheer disrespect for our natural blessings! I was prepared to ept whatever you choose to do within your own territory, but now you are getting Lady Milim involved? Outrageous!

    He pointed out the hearty soup and bite-size cream croquettes on the table as he lectured me on his food theories. The sheer force he put behind each word certainly made it clear why Milim asked me for help. Trying to reason with him was exhaustingor, really, stultifying. He was the type who believed he, and only he, was correct, refusing to lend an ear to anyone else.

    But that would end today. Itd be one thing if their ptes evolved differently from ours, but the only issue here was Middrays way of thinking. And it wasnt just a wrong assumption of his or anythingthere was just nothing correct about his theory at all. I mean, Milimthe figure he worshippedcouldnt wait to chow down on this. She was pouting, like a dog ordered to wait for a treat.

    It was time to finish this. I knew I had it in the bag. If I got Middray to say, This is good, I won. Just one spoonful of anything from Shuna would seal the deal once it crossed his lips. Thus I was optimistic about thisbut then reality came along.

    I absolutely refuse to recognize anything even close to this!!

    Middray was still enraged, uninterested in a single morsel. My victory rode on the assumption that hed at least try something, but if he wasnt up for that, it meant Id lose without a fight.

    Milim gave me a concerned look. Hermess gaze was skyward, wondering where everything went wrong. With all the yelling from Middray, we were starting to draw arge audience. Even the lower-ranked invitees, the kind who failed to get an audience with Elmesia, started gathering to see how this would turn out. If I lost this verbal sparring match in front of this crowd, the fallout might affect a lot more than my street cred.

    Rimuru, a worried Milim said, I didnt expect Middray to be so stubborn about this. Should I maybe ask him to go to another room for now?

    Yes, added Hermes, Im sorry about our head priest. Hes always a little hot under the cor, but hes really not a bad man I didnt expect the topic of food to enrage him so much.

    Hmm I thought a taste would change his tune, but I underestimated him. I dont want to force the issue, so I dont know

    I mean, we didnt have to work this out today. The festival only truly began tomorrow, so there was no need to rush things. So I decided to learn from my mistake, think of a better way to deal with Middray, and move on.

    But someone wasnt willing to let this slide. The hall echoed with a loud wham as Shunaa smile of a very different sort on her facemmed her hands against the table in front of Middray. The head priests eyes shot openout of surprise, not pain. I could see why. Shuna had reacted incredibly fast. Even if you were prepared for it, not many people couldve reacted in time.

    Wh-what are you doing?!

    Silence!! a ssy-eyed Shuna shouted, taking a bowl of stew and thrusting it in his face. See all the ingredients in this stew? This is what Sir Rimuru sees as their ideal state!

    Um What? Whats that mean?

    Under Sir Rimuru, she continued as I sat there stupefied, there are gathered lycanthropes, there are harpies, there are the magic-born who once served yman There are even dragonewts like yourself. Any one of those races alone would be powerful, I am sure. But bring them all togetherand they will enjoy even more power than ever before. Please try this.

    With unexpected force, Shuna made Middray grasp the spoon. Swallowed up by the momentum, Middray meekly brought it to his lips. And here I had given up. Shuna made it look so easyand once we reached this point, the results were just what we expected.

    !!

    Abject surprise crossed Middrays face.

    Wh-what is this?!

    Well? Its good, isnt it? said Shuna. This is called harmony. Each individual ingredient tones itself down in order to form aplete overall taste. Thats the fervent hope contained in this stew.

    Oh. And here I thought it was just a nice bowl of soup.

    It Its good. Better than any kind of vegetable Ive eaten before This single spoonful has so much depth to it

    Yeah, I could imagine. Compared to raw veggies, Shunas cuisine is always gonna take the prize. To Middray, it mustve been an unprecedented, revolutionary discovery.

    Um, a red-faced Hermes said, I would appreciate it if you could stop looking at me like a poor beggar on the road Very clearly, he didnt want people to think he was like his boss. Id probably say the same thing. I knew all about people trying to do the right thing and their bosses shutting them downand those very peons being held responsible anyway when things went south. I felt bad for him, so I gave him a reassuring nod for his troubles.

    Even as Hermes and I exchanged nces, Middray was finishing off the bowl of stew. If you understand now, a much sunnier Shuna told him, then very well. But please remember this: Cuisine is about far more than this single bowl.

    After that stew, Middray seemed much more receptive to her words. What do you mean? he asked back, face serious and thoughtful.

    If this stew, she replied, is like thend Lady Milim rules over, then this loaf of bread is the Kingdom of Blumund. This steak is the newnd of Farminus. If this foie gras terrine is the Dwarven Kingdom, I suppose that makes the seafood here Thalion. You canbine them in many waysbut no cuisine can survive on a single te. And nations are the same way. Its the broad, deep connections among them that make them more bountiful and satisfying. That is the world Sir Rimuru seeks.

    The smile on Shunas face came from the heart. Middray must have felt something from it, because now his eyes turned to the other dishes on the table. He thought for a moment in silencenot just him but everyone watching from afar.

    It It is?

    Sure, diplomatic rtions certainly are important, I replied.

    Indeed. But I did not know that His Majesty, the Demon Lord Rimuru, had such thoughts

    How wonderful! And even the best of cuisine can be ruined with the wrong amount of salt. Instead hes bringing different dishes together to form aplete full course, then? A truly fascinating concept!

    Now the crowd excitedly talked among themselves. I, um, couldnt say I thought about it that way, nobut Shunas forceful persuasion must have spoken to their hearts in grand fashion. Considering the totalck of theme to the buffet food, it was really a stretch, but it worked.

    Honestly, Shuna had impressed me just now. Not only her speech but the glorious food that did so much of the talking for her. People like Middray, afraid of values different from their own, now found it in themselves to dream of a future where humans and monsters worked togetherall thanks to the example of harmony within cuisine.

    Also, Shuna added, note that it takes more than simply tossing everything into a bowl and mixing it up. Her eyes turned on Shion behind me for just a moment, and Ill just pretend I didnt notice that, thanks. So now that weve convinced you, bear in mind that most foods best while its warm. Lady Milim, Lord Carillon, Lady Frey, and all their attendantsplease enjoy it before it gets cold.

    Her words were like a starter pistol to Milims ears. She immediately dove in.

    Yes! This is great!!

    That, plus her wide grin, was the answer she had for us, loud and clear. No need for grandiose vocabry with her. One look at that face, and it was easy to understand.

    Isee. I have been mistakenand Lady Milim waited so patiently for me to realize it

    The message came across to Middray, too. After far too long, he had finally seen the light.

    Now, Sir Middray, no need to feel depressed. Youll just make things gloomy for the whole table. Lets enjoy it while its hot!

    Hermess advicenot advised for the current situation, although he likely knew that full well and said it anywaymade a vein throb on Middrays head once more.

    Youuuu

    Um, what? Why is your head looking like a melon?

    Wah-ha-ha-ha-ha! Why be angry, Middray? Hermes is right. Besides, if you dont chow down soon, Im gonna eat it all instead!

    Pffft. Count yourself lucky today, Hermes. On behalf of Lady Milim and this fine food before me, I will forgive this affront!

    Smiles andughter filled the scene, as if everyoneman and monster alikeshared in the same heart.

    Youve got some little sister, I remarked to Benimaru when we happened to make eye contact.

    Dont I, though? Im so proud of her. He nodded back, like this was a given. Shuna, who mustve overheard us, blushed a little and headed to the back room.

    The feast was set to run from six to nine p.m. that evening, but we wound up extending it another two hours. One reason was all thetersthe VIPs and such who had snubbed the event at first but ran over once news of Elmesias appearance spread. The other was the, shall we say, excessively healthy appetites of Middray and Carillons band. It was a long time before they finally said no more, for sure.

    But the reasons dont matter. In the end, it was a huge sess. And so the preopening feast, despite a few unexpected bumps along the way, came to a close after providing results beyond what even I expected.

 Volume 9 - Ch 1.1

    INTERLUDE

    A LATE-NIGHT MEETING

    At midnight, after the banquet wrapped up, we held an impromptu emergency meeting.

    Right, I said, looking at the attendees. Sorry to get all of you here thiste. I know were tired out, but just hang in there a little more, okay?

    First, I wanted to thank Shuna for tonights performance.

    Shuna, you really helped me out. Your food was excellent, and you even seeded where Milim failed and convinced Middray to change his mind. Seriously, thank you.

    Shuna gracefully smiled back. No, she demurred, our menu seeded tonight thanks to the support Mr. Yoshida gave me. Besides, Sir Rimuru, considering the great praise you had for Hakuros seafood, I feel like he stole the show.

    When it came to preparing fish, cutting sashimi, and even whipping up sushi for hungry customers, Hakuro was far better than Shuna. It was almost like a second calling for him, so I didnt think Shuna was slumming byparisonbut she seemed a little peeved nheless, although she did ept my earnest thanks.

    Next, I addressed Mjllmile, my main man behind the scenes.

    Mollie, how are the merchants doing? You run into any problems?

    A wide variety of products and goods was flowing into town from nations worldwide, for sale or use in our many pavilions. Rigurd and Lilina were managing it all, and Mjllmile was tasked with handling the merchantsing to town with it.

    Its been nothing but smiles from them so far, sir. Seeing a town as majestic as this for the first time is dumbfounding all of themand our attendees tonight were smacking their lips at the spread. Were seeing a great deal of farmersing from nearby nations as well, so I think our efforts are really paying off. Theyre bringing a lot of fine goods, too, and I think we can build rather good ties with them

    Mjllmile nced at Rigurd, who nodded back at him.

    Yes, as Sir Mjllmile said, theyre bringing fresh fruits and vegetables, smoked beef and fish, and assorted rare handicrafts. Some are bringing livestock with them as well. I think were well prepared for the festival along those lines.

    Rigurd seemed assured that shortages wouldnt be an issue.

    We n to use some of these imported goods, Lilina added, for our meals at the evening banquets starting tomorrow.

    Ah, that shouldnt be a problem, should it?

    No, I dont think so. However No, no, itll be fine.

    Hmm? Mjllmile seemed about to say something before he mmed up. If he had qualms, I wished hed follow through and talk about them.

    Whoa, whoa, say whatevers on your mind, all right? Because if you stop yourself midway, itll weigh on me even more.

    Benimaru and Soei nodded in silent agreement. The pressure made Mjllmile scratch his head before he spoke again.

    Well, it may just be my imagination, but I am recognizing rather few of the tradespeople working here alongside therge merchants I have close ties to. I have a knack for remembering peoples faces, you see, so it made me curious. So I did a little research

    As Mjllmile put it, while it seemed odd at first, there was no actual problem to speak of. Hed asked some of his merchant friends, and theyd replied that, yes, there had been some new blood entering the business. But none of them had heard any scuttlebutt about these tradesmen; they were model businessmen, offering quality products at low prices. Mjllmile said his friendsughed at him for worrying too muchand when he himself called on a few of these unfamiliar faces, they were all affable and sociable with him.

    Perhaps, he reflected with a grin, being given such arge task has made me a tad high-strung.

    Hey, are you really all right? Its not too much work, is it? I dont want it to affect your health

    His workload had ballooned to epic proportions as ofte, indeed. This time, though, he really didugh off my concerns. Ha-ha-ha! No need to worry. But I have even more important news for you! It turns out that the Hero Masayuki intends to join the battle tournament tomorrow! The whole towns alive with rumors about it. People are already cing bets at the taverns.

    As Mjllmile put it, he was too excited about the work he tackled to grow tired of it. More pressing to him was the news that Masayuki had decided this past evening to join the fight.

    Exactly, interjected Soei. That is why I wanted all of us to discuss this matter.

    The group that came to greet Milim outside of town apparently hadnt heard the news. Benimaru, among others, turned his eyes to Soei, silently asking for some detailsbut Shion answered first.

    That boy drives me up the wall! He went on about how hed defeat Sir Rimuru, among other nonsense. I wanted to dispatch him myself, but

    Yes, Soei replied, and I stopped you. There were people watching. And if you cause trouble right now, it could affect the whole festival.

    That exined why Shion was being rtively well-behaved. I thought she was maturing a bit, but we couldnt let our guard down yet. Good thing Soei was around.

    Well, Im d you were there to do that. He was with my friend Yuuki, besides. And if people spread rumors that I picked a fight with a Hero at the entrance to town, thatd invite all sorts of suspicion I dont need.

    I sighed as Benimaru nodded his agreement.

    Quite true. Shion, can you please keep your head cool for us?

    Ha! You dont need to tell me. I was just a little riled; I didnt n to actually start a fight.

    Keh-heh-heh-heh-heh I fully understand you, Lady Shion. You cannot stand by idly while someone belittles our master, right? And you, Sir Benimaruif you were there to see it, would you have reacted in another way?

    No, Diablo. I am always fullyposed.

    Benimaru paused a little before answering, eyes darting around. I wasnt sure I could count on that.

    So, Diablo continued, are we here to discuss what to do with this Hero? If you can leave matters in my hands, I could have him vanish without a trace before the sun rises

    Whew. Scary. And I knew he meant it and could pull it off without a second thought.

    Were doing nothing like that. Nothing hasty, all right? No matter what.

    After making sure everyone was clear on that, I moved on to my main concern tonight.

    So this is the question: Can anyone here on my staff join the battle tournament starting tomorrow?

    This offer wound up being one powerful bombshell.

    Hohh?

    Benimarus eyes lit up.

    I see

    Shion shed a fearless smile. It seemed like they were conspiring over something; should I stop them? Maybe turning the topic toward fighting made them forget their promise from a moment ago.

    Keh-heh-heh-heh-heh. Interesting. Truly interesting.

    Diablo, too, was grinning from ear to ear.

    I would be d to offer myself. My skills should prove useful.

    Even Geld was ready to go. And the little snicker from Soei told me he, too, was volunteering. Hakuro, too. He remained silent, but I could tell he was getting fidgety. At least Gabil, with his own presentations to run, had no choice but to bow out, as chagrined as he looked at this prospect.

    So yeah, about what I figured. The only one who didnt react was Ranga, and thats because he was sleeping in my shadow. That was fineI didnt want him to join in anyway.

    With a cough, I quieted the crowd before they started arguing over who deserved to sign up.

    Hold on. There are agents all over town right now. Do you really need to go all out in the battle arena? You dont, do you?

    Keh-heh-heh-heh-heh. I hardly need to, to trample over our foes

    Whoa! Easy. Let me just say in advanceBenimaru, Shion, Diablo, Soei: All of you are out.

    Wha?!

    What do you?

    I raised a hand to quiet their protests. First, Soei, youre our Covert Agent, all right? You cant fight while youre running surveince amid the crowds.

    The thought didnt seem to have urred to Soei until now. It mustve convinced him, though, because he fell silent after that. At least he didnt suggestpeting in disguise. But just to seal the deal

    Instead, I have a new job for you.

    A job?

    Yeah. Im leaving all spy operations in our nation to you, but Im also officially appointing you the head of what Ill call the Oniwaban, our intelligence operation.

    This was the name of the group of secret agents who patrolled the streets of old Tokyo during the samurai era and reported news back to the shogun.

    In addition, I am assigning the name Kurayami to your personal team. That includes Soka and your other agents, but dont let those trainees of yours call themselves that yet, all right?

    Yes, my lord! Thank you very much!

    That wowed Soei more than I expected. It was basically a pretext to keep him from joining the tournament, but if he liked it that much, superb. Soei was overseeing several hundred people these days, besides, so if he liked to assemble his elites under the Team Kurayami name, all the better.

    That left three other people to handlethe three strongest members of my staff. Letting any of them join the tournament would be nothing but troubleand, knowing that, I already had ns worked out for them.

    Okay. Everyone else, listen up. Im establishing a newmittee thatll be responsible for handling our dignitaries from the Western Nations. Im going to call it the Big Four.

    The Big Four

    Heavens

    I see

    It brought all three to rapt attention. Talk about taking the bait.

    The three of you are far more powerful than the rest of my staff. Thus Id like to name Benimaru the head of the Big Four. Out of the other three posts, Id like to name Shion and Diablo to two of them.

    Benimaru had the most leadership skills out of the three. He was, after all, a man who could substitute for me when I needed it. He was uniquely qualified to lead the Big Fourwhatever this shadowy cabal was supposed to be doing. I tried to make it sound important, but the post was purely ceremonigain, a pretext to keep them out of the tournament.

    Me as leader I humbly ept this post!

    Great. Hes on.

    Im not sure I agree with Benimaru as leader, but hopefully you will reconsider after seeing my performance on the job. I will be happy to call myself part of the Big Four, Sir Rimuru!

    Shion was happy enough with it, too. I wasnt sure why the post gave her so much confidence, but if she was cool with it, wed just leave her be.

    The Big Four? I aim to be strictly number one with you, Sir Rimuru, but I am still a new participant in your endeavors. I know it will not do to be greedy. For now, I will do whatever I can to approach your glory, Sir Rimuru!

    Hmm. Was that a yes? Diablo could be such a handful sometimes. Regardless, they were all Big Four material now.

    Thank you for epting my appointments. Now, you may be wondering why I banned you from joining the tournament, but your Big Four posts are actually rted to that.

    How so, sir?

    Well, you see, Im having trouble picking someone for the fourth and final spot. I thought Soei would work well, but hes our Covert Agent and it wouldnt do to expose him in public, so I fear hes not quite the right fit.

    I gauged my audiences response. They seemed convinced enough. I saw a few nods.

    Thus I thought we could have a friendlypetition. The rest of you here may join the tournamentand whoever wins the championship can call themselves one of the Big Four, in both name and substance. How about that?

    I pressed them for an answer. The meeting hall grew silent, everyone gauging how everyone else would approach this. But then I heard something unexpected from the crowd.

    Hmm I wanted to join, but tomorrow I must meet with Momiji for an outinger, so I may guide her around town But, ohhh, if you order it, Sir Rimuru

    Hakuro, the guy I was counting on the most, recused himself out of nowhere. Someone as technically skilled as he was would be perfect for the job, but I guess the timing just didnt work outand I wasnt about to order him to the arena. He really wouldve been the best person to gauge Masayukis talents, but if I got in the way of a day out with his own daughter, hed hate me for it.

    Oh, no, thats quite important, Hakuro. If you break your promise with Momiji, she may never speak to you again.

    Um, well

    I had a boss once who ditched an outing with his daughter for work reasons. He wailed about how it took a week before they were on speaking terms again. And here, meanwhile, we had a father and daughter who had only just reunited! If he broke a promise that early on with her

    Besides, youre more like Benimarus military adviser than Big Four material. A vice general of sorts. Theres no urgent need for you out there.

    Hakuro nodded, the praise deeply moving him. Thus, for his own sake as well, I excused him from the tournament.

    So which candidates remained?

    I have our science presentation to run,mented Gabil, but Sir Geld is stronger than I regardless. I will dly leave this to him!

    Yeah, Geld was myst bet, wasnt he? Gabil, busy with his own work, regretfully had to declineinstead, he was cing his hopes and dreams on Geld.

    Very well. I will tap my full strengths to prevent the victory of this upstart Masayuki!

    He briskly nodded, answering the call.

    I had no issues with Gelds strength, of course. But as part of the Big Four? And all the mor and glitz that suggested? I wasnt wild about that. I appointed Benimaru to lead the two problem children under him, but it seemed kind of mean to Geld to have him take the rear. But Id worry about thatter. For now, if he could just spar with Masayuki and see what he was capable of, perfect.

    As I thought about this, Rigur suddenly stood up and spoke.

    I can think of someone else suitable for Big Four membership!

    Yes, you never knew what could happen in a tournament, depending on who you got paired with. Maybe having more than one participant on our side would be preferableand if it was an A-ranker like Rigur making the rmendation, I could rest easy.

    Um, sure. I think Geld will be just fine, but who do you suggest?

    Sadly, my security duties prevent me from joining, but there is someone second only to me in terms of strength

    Second to him? Oh crap

    and that is Gobta!

    Oh, great. Him. Just as I feared. But the suggestion made Rigurd nod vigorously.

    Yes, Id have noint with Gobta representing us.

    Come on.

    Hee-hee! He has proven to be quite a fine apprentice of mine. Hes quick on his feet, and there is a vivid crispness to his moves. His core physical strength has not grown with his other traits, but using this tournament as an opportunity to grow could prove very exciting for him.

    Even Hakuro was pushing for him. My core staff had no reaction.

    I thought about asking the man himself what he thought about it, but

    Zzzzzzzz

    Ah, good. Rarin to go. No issues, then. Gobta was in the tournament.

    I wanted to end our meeting there, but someone else spoke up before I could.

    Master, I would like to join this test of skill as well!

    Ranga, who had woken up when I wasnt paying attention, popped his head out from my shadow, wagging his tail.

    You really cant, Ranga. This is mainly about armedbat, you know

    Ah yes, Mjllmile added. We do have at least one summoner in the mix, so a summoned creature or two is not out of the question, but I still think Sir Rangas participation presents a few issues

    This tournament was a test of strength and skill, and there was no questioning Rangas qualifications there. But his entry would deviate from the spirit of thepetition a bit too much.

    Ranga looked reproachfully at Gobta as Mjllmile echoed my judgment. I knew he was downhearted, but I couldnt help him. I had to reluctantly put my foot down.

    In that case, I will give Sir Geld and Sir Gobta a bye in the first round and ce them in the quarterfinal seedings. We have over two hundred participants in this tournament, so I think well begin by dividing them into six groups and staging a battle royale for each one.

    Wow. Over two hundred sounded like a lot.

    Tomorrow was the qualifiers, and the eight people who emerged at the top of them would make it to the elimination round the next day. The n, at first, was to divide the participants into eight groups and have each one duke it out all at once, the winner earning a quarterfinal seedwe couldnt devote a huge amount of time to the first round, after all. With Geld and Gobta guaranteed spots in the quarterfinals, however, wed whittle that down to six bouts.

    All right. Ill be guiding visitors around for much of tomorrow. Mollie, keep up the good work with this tournament.

    Im on it, sir!

    I nodded back. That was good to hear. I knew I could rely on him.

    And one more thing:

    Diablo, youre pretty well-known to the international press by now, right?

    Yes, my lord. Ive invited them to the Founders Festival and am preparing measures to have them paint us in a positive light.

    I was always impressed with Diablos thoroughness. There was no need to hide the guy (or his powers) any longer. In fact, a scary demon serving as referee for this tournament might even improve his reputation a little.

    Well, sorry for the trouble, but I want you to referee the matches. If I got Masayuki, Geld, and Gobta in this, Im a little worried about having a hobgoblin as ref.

    Keh-heh-heh-heh-heh Certainly!

    Perfect. If anything weird happened in the arena, I was sure Diablo would work something out.

    Right. Sorry to take up all of your time. I know itste, but for now, get as much sleep as you can!

    Yes, sir!

    This time, for real, the meeting came to a close. We all needed to get some sleep. The real thing was starting tomorrow.

 Volume 9 - Ch 2

    THE FOUNDERS FESTIVAL

    Following my audiences with the monster leaders of the Forest of Jura, my discussions with Western Nations representatives proceeded without a hitch. Wed talk details with them at ater date, but for now, all signs looked pretty good.

    The rather bizarre banquet wed held the previous night also went smoothly, even with the movers and shakers from all over the world attending. Really, it was a coup for us. But for the most part, I spoke only with people I already knew beforehandRigurd and Mjllmile were handling the more practical side of things, talking to people and summarizing what they said for me. They also made it known that visitors shouldnt try indiscreetly talking to me while I went about my business.

    Great job, guys. Talk about capable. Because, honestly, if someone went right up to me with an offer, I might very well just say all right, sure to them, and who knows what kinds ofmitments Id be beholden to then. Having a cushion against that was extremely helpful. I mean, if itd help build rtionships with other countries, I wouldnt hesitate to offer as much support as I couldbut it was safer to be conservative until we had a better gauge of the other party. Basically, stop being such a yes-man to everyone I see.

    Besides, the facts were that we had a personnel shortage. Once the excitement from the festival died down, we had a mountain of projects to tackle and a herd of issues screaming to be addressed. Whether we could cover them all or not, wecked the government infrastructure needed to fine-tune and execute on them. If I threw even more work on everyonesps right now, wed just drown in it all.

    Rigurd and Mjllmile were even better at processing this than I was. Their expert handling of any issue I ordered them to look at was making mecent, despite myself. I even kept them upte forst nights meeting. From now on, I resolved to myself after the emergency conference endedte, I couldnt let them spoil me.

    Today, then, my mission was to act like the national leader I was and give our visitors the best service I possibly could.

    So here we are now, a bright, sunny day. The Tempest Founders Festival was here. If it was raining, I wouldve blown the clouds away and held it regardless, but

    This was Rimuru, capital of Tempest. The northern zone of the city named after me was where most of our government agencies were located, and atop the balcony of the main assembly hall in the middle, I looked down at the people below. Ahead was the main street, extending out from this building and across the whole of town, and today it waspletely full of people. There were my peopleformer monsters, more appropriately called demi-humans these days. There were magic-born gathered from all across the Forest of Jura. There were merchants from nearby nations, along with the adventurers serving as their bodyguards. There were even farmers stopping in, hoping for a taste of the excitement.

    They were a melting pot of races and species, numbering over a hundred thousandand right now, they were all spread out before me. Slowly, gradually, it made me truly feel I had done itI had created a nation where man and monster could coexist without conflict. The feeling filled my heart, piece by piece. Itforted me.

    Now it was almost time. I stood up and ced a hand on the mic.

    Ladies and gentser, gentlemen, I am the, um, almighty demon lord

    Ugh. Screw this. A formal policy speech was asking a little (actually, a lot) too much from me. Instead, I opted to wing it and give the crowd my honest feelings.

    Im the demon lord Rimuru. Good to see you all. So, um, Im d you all epted the invitation to my country here. Some of you are visiting for the first time, but I dont want any of you to be anxious. Its trueI am a demon lord, but I have no intention of being hostile toward any human. My hope is that I can build a nation where all of us can get along together. I believe that, instead of people and monsters fighting, if we join hands and work together, a better future is waiting for all of us.

    I gauged the reaction as I spoke. They all seemed to be lending an attentive earmy own subjects, of course, but also the peasants just here for fun. Sensing I had some momentum, I continued.

    I am sure some of you are wary of me because Ive be a demon lord. Thats only natural, of course, but I honestly want you to believe in what youre feeling. I have no interest in forcing my will upon any of you. If you think you can believe in me, Id be happy to hear that. But if you dont, Im not going to dwell on it. Trust isnt created overnight. Im not going to press you for a conclusion on that, because I feel trust is something we earn by building it up over the course of our rtionships.

    Rome wasnt built in a day, as they say. Trust is a gradual process, and thats fine. Itll depend on them, I suppose, to ept me for what I really am.

    Next, I wanted to reveal my true intentions to my fellow rulers, the royalty and nobility in the audience.

    To all the nobles here, when you return to your homnds, I ask you to be honest and rte everything you see to your countrymen. We have already established friendly rtions with several countries. Even if you dont trust us, are those other nations worthy of your trust? If you are biased against me because I am a slime or a demon lord, I hope that you cast that aside.

    That, of course, would be up to the nation in question, not the individuals who make it up. The feelings of the people in the audience may not be the real issuebut Id still like to believe that what I said had value.

    But I also needed to give a warning, just to prevent a second Farmus from happening.

    Personally, I have no intention whatsoever of waging war simply because someone will not join hands with us. However, if you try to push unequal treatment on us because we are monsters or attempt to wage a war in order to eradicate us, we will not show you any mercy. I think all of you can understand that much looking at the recently destroyed Kingdom of Farmus.

    Those, too, were my thoughts on the matter. It could be construed as a threat, but it was how I honestly felt. I didnt like war, but I had no qualms about waging it. If a ruler ever shows indecision, its their defenseless civilians who wind up getting dragged into it. The entire role of a nation is to protect the lives and fortunes of its citizens. I had monsters gathering here because they relied on me, to say nothing of the people whod be moving in before long. Keeping them safe was the most important job I had.

    A world without military power would be an ideal one, but that was an impossible fairy tale. People are free to dream about it during peaceful times, but rulers dont get that luxury. At a bare minimum, a nation is expected to be prepared to deal with any situation that could arise. That was why I wanted to address the ruling ss listening to me, while I had the chance.

    To wrap up:

    And to all the merchants, adventurers, and regr peasantry gathered here: I swear to you that I will noty a hand on any of you. I mean, unless youmit a crime or something, but otherwise, no. My nation is facing ack of workers. We have many jobs that need to be filled, so if you seek work, I would like all of you to consider moving here. Wherever people gather, new opportunities, and new chances, are bound to follow. As a rule, we guarantee your right to free expression. This includes free speech, as well as the right to choose the job you want. You do, of course, still have responsibility for your words and actions, but regardless, it holds true. If this sounds like a nation youd be interested in, then by all means, give some thought to what I just said. Going forward, our nation is nning a multitude of events. The Tempest Founders Festival starting today is only the beginningand I hope all of you enjoy it!

    After that appeal to themon man, I ended my speech. Was I being a little too honest? Ah well. Im just an ex-employee at a contractor anyway. Getting this promotion out of the blue doesnt mean Im suddenly capable of looking and talking like nobility.

    But despite that, the crowd listening to me erupted in apuse. Not only my citizens, but I could see visitors from other nations, too, whooping and hollering. A few of them looked pretty unconvinced still, but by the looks of things, Id say a solid majority believed in meand, by extension, my country. For now, I was happy with that. Itd be creepy if I received 100 percent support from the start.

    I had given them my honest feelings. Now Id have to wait and see how people reacted to them. But either way, the speech was a signal that the Tempest Founders Festival was underway.

    My speech wrapped up, I went down to the first-floor hall. There, I was greeted by my kids, dressed in a new change of clothes.

    Hey, Mr. Tempest, youre the king of this country?!

    Oh, um, didnt I tell them?

    You didnt know that, Kenya? Well, its not toote to realize how great a person I am. How about treating me with a little more respect?

    Why would I?

    Okay, Mr. Tempest! Lots of respect!

    As I prodded Kenya a bit, Alice gave me a big hug. Me too!! Chloe shouted, adding herself to the pile. Iughed, patting their heads as I gently peeled them off me. Alice and the others werent pleased, but I had only one body. Theyd need to realize that before they started fighting over me.

    But its still a huge surprise, said Gail, Ryota nodding with him. I mean, I was kinda suspicious yesterday, but

    Oh, dont worry. I didnt be king until after I left you anyway. See why I was so busy now?

    Well, yeah Thats a pretty good excuse, but

    Kenya still wasnt too satisfied with this, but at least he was thinking a little about it.

    So I guess we still wont see a lot of each other, Mr. Tempest?

    Ohhh, Ille over when Im free. Really, despite the looks of it, Im more decoration here than anything.

    Whats that mean? Are you a big shot or not, man?

    I tried to smooth things over with Kenya as much as I could as I went over our rules for this event.

    Okay, listen, guys. At a festival like this, its easy to get excited and cut loose a little too much. So dont get carried away, and dont get in a fight with anyone, all right?

    Okay!!

    Thats the spirit.

    Do you have your handkerchiefs, your tissues, and your pendant?

    Of course!!

    Their responses, at least, were always snappy.

    I couldve asked someone to chaperone them around, but my own staff members were already busy. Diablo was at the coliseum handling referee duty, Hakuro was having some family time with Momiji, and Benimaru was guarding me.

    You sure you dont want Momiji spending time with you instead of her dad?

    Please, sir. Its still too early for that

    Benimaru seemed eager to run away from that question, didnt he? Ahhh, I guess wed just have to wait for time to sort it out.

    Anyway, Shuna was running a caf for the festival, and Shion mustve had some business as well because I hadnt seen her since morning. That, in itself, was cause for concern, but I wanted to believe she was fine.

    Soei was running town security undercover, though, and I was sure hed alert me if any trouble happened. His team was keeping an eye on the kids as well, so I didnt see too much need for worry

    Hey, whats up? Something bothering you?

    Just when I thought there wasnt much need for worry, someone came up to me. It was Hinata, in street clothes and standing there with her rapier by her hip. She had a sleeveless dress on, in a navy-blue color that ventured close to ck, and her armpits and chest lurked just barely out of sight, giving her an inexplicable sort of attraction. The belt her sword hung from entuated just how narrow her waist was.

    Yep. A sight for sore eyes. I wanted to stare at her some more, but then she shed an icy look at me, so I coughed and looked away.

    Hey, Mr. Tempest!!

    Whos that woman?

    Alice and Chloe shouted at me, both a little put off.

    This is Hinata. Shes really strong, you know. We fought to a tie once.

    Huhhhh? A tie against that old?

    Before Kenya could finish, the tip of her rapier was against his throat. I didnt even see her draw it, and there it was, maybe a millimeter away from bare skin. The slightest movement from Kenya would skewer him.

    What were you about to say?

    Um, uh, I just meant you were really beautiful, he managed to blurt out as he shivered, tears in his eyes.

    Ken

    Ryota wanted to help him but couldnt even move. A mere look from Hinata nted his feet to the ground. Gail, too, was frozen solid, boundlessly fascinated as he was. I could imagine why. Even I was scared of her, so Ryotas and Gails reactions werepletely understandable.

    Dont be rude to her, okay, Kenya? She was an apprentice to Shizu, too, you know. That makes her your senior, like with Yuuki.

    Kenya gave me a I wish you told me sooner look. I understood how he felt, but really, this was his fault. It happened right after I told him not to get carried away or start fights, so really, I have to say he deserved it.

    Shizus apprentice Wait, no way!

    The girl who got stronger than Shizu in just one month?!

    Hinata Sakaguchi, captain of the Lubelius Crusaders?!

    Wow! But is it really you?

    Why didnt you tell us sooner? Come on

    With a light ching, Hinata put her sword away. Kenya promptly fell to the ground, too unnerved to get back up.

    I thought I was gonna pee my pants, he said, a little pale.

    Gross, retorted Alice.

    Look, I was scared, all right?!

    But I think that was your fault, Kenya.

    Kenya fell silent. He knew Chloe was right.

    But did you really fight to a tie with Hinata, Mr. Tempest?

    I gave Gail the honest answer. Pretty much. One side ran off before the battle could be decided, so definitely a draw.

    Wait, you ran, Mr. Tempest?

    Did I say who?! Damn, theyre sharp.

    Ill leave that to your imagination, I replied, trying to salvage my image. It wasnt a lie, and I think I had revealed enough of the truth anyway.

    The children looked like they had more questions, but Hinata cut them off.

    So what were you concerned about just now?

    I recalled thinking about who I might be able to leave the kids to.

    Well, these kids are about to hit the town, but you see how crowded it is. I need someone to watch them

    Oh? Well, I can babysit them.

    so I was just figuring out who to Huh?

    What did she just say? Hinata would watch the children? If that was a joke, it wasnt funny.

    What, are you saying Im not good enough for that?

    No, no, not at all

    She was staring at me. So scary. Now I was impressed Kenya didnt piss himself. He deserved more praise.

    And you wont say no to me, either, will you?

    No, of course not!

    Ken

    Absolutely! By all means!

    You too, Gail? Well, all right.

    Kenya and Gail immediately fell to her will. Ryota, seeing their reaction, didnt hold out much longer.

    I cant believe Im getting to be with you, Hinata! I look up to you so much!!

    Alice was fangirling out, too. She looked up to Masayuki, too, shed mentioned earlier, and I suppose Hinata was like a pop star to her. And noints from Hinatashe was already getting attached.

    As for Chloe:

    I like you! You kind of remind me of Shizu!

    She gave Hinata a hug, all smiles. If Chloe liked Hinata, she must really be a good person inside, huh? A little scary around the eyes, but that didnt affect Chloe much. And unless I imagined it, I thought I saw a bit of a smile on Hinatas face as well. In the blink of an eye, she had captured their hearts.

    Right, lets go. Why dont we check out the food stalls first? I heard they have yakisoba noodles and grilled corn.

    Okay!!

    What leadership. It was astounding.

    I could only assume the children would be fine under Hinatas care. It filled me with relief, even as Hinata came up and whispered in my ear.

    Ill watch them for you, but you handle Lady Luminus, all right?

    Huh?

    I hadnt seen herst night, but Luminus was here after all?

    Oh, did she decide to pay a visit?

    You invited her, didnt you? I saw her gleefully preparing a maid outfit for the asion.

    Amazingly, Luminus had disguised herself as a pdin alongside Arnaud and Bhus to partake in the festivities. For the first day, shed be joining the group of royalty and nobility on the tour of the premises Id be giving. Pdins qualified as nobility, as the rule went, so she was perfectly fine being mixed in with the tour.

    Very shrewd of her, I guess you could say. She even stayedst night in the brand-new church I had built in this nation. I had no idea at all, which just shows how well she had concealed herself.

    Thanks in advance, Hinata said as she went off with the children. Suddenly, I felt like I had much more to worry about. Hinata was practically skipping down the street, meanwhile. She got me again, didnt she? I knew it.

    The moment Hinata was out of sight, I felt a light p on my shoulder.

    Well, well, Rimuru! I dont think Ive ever seen Hinata smile before.

    It was a smiling Yuuki standing there, dressed not in a fancy suit but in a uniform that looked like a modified school outfit. He was here to take me to our designated meeting point for the tour.

    Yeah, I never wouldve guessed shed be interested in watching the kids. I figured shed tell me to shut up and storm off.

    Oh, I dunno about that! You might not guess it, but Hinatas pretty good at taking care of people. It is a surprise, though. And she looks really great in that dress. Apparently, she bought it in town here. She looks kind of like a pretty, fashion-conscious college student, huh?

    So that was from Tempest? I thought I was mistaken, but I guess I wasnt.

    In that case, Hinatas gotta be loaded, cause lemme tell you, that dress doesnte cheap.

    It was made from hellmoth silk,fortable against the skin and granting the wearer the effects of Cancel Temperature. It also offered pretty decent defense, reducing damage better than your bog-standard leather armor. But it wasvishly expensive. We had a steady supply of silk fabric, but it still wasnt nearly enough, and each piece had to be handmade. Between the scarcity andbor involved, we all but had to charge an arm and a leg for it. It was boutique shopping for nobles, not the girl on the streetand Hinata had bought it at first sight yesterday without hesitating. If shed already had it tailored to her size, then clearly money was no object with her.

    Not that Imining. Always nice to have a free-spending customer.

    Well, its a big party right now, so maybe shes loosening the purse strings a little? She was looking around town all excited yesterday, too.

    She was?! Maybe I was even more mistaken than I thought. She was really looking forward to the Founders Festival, wasnt she?

    Oh. And thats why she was palming Luminus off on me. So she could really cut loose, huh?

    What was she looking for yesterday?

    Oh, just checking out what stalls you had, I suppose. She went on and on to me about how you had yakisoba and roasted corn, for one.

    She did? Um

    So Hinata had been casing the festival grounds yesterday. She certainly wasnt messing around, was she? To her, this event was like a battle she wanted to plunge right into the middle of, heart and soul.

    Indeed, we had all kinds of stalls lined up in rows around the coliseum. The fast-food outlet (or what youd call fast food in my previous world) was part of that. Mjllmile had made all the arrangements for it, and we had the whole menu ready for todayburgers, hot dogs, fries, and a selection of juices.

    And that was far from all. Yes, there was yakisoba and corn, but also cowdeer kebabs and other local favorites. We even had shaved ice on offer, although it was still a little too early season-wise. Come summer, thatd probably be a top seller. I made sure the ice was shaved into thin, tiny strips so they gently melted in your mouth, and there were gobs of sweet syrup poured over every bowl. It was truly a treat that reigned supremeand I know, because I tried it myself.

    Take a walk down there, and you were greeted with the fragrant aromas of cooking soy sauce and sugary fruit vors. Lots of people were working hard for this day, and it showed. Id used Thought Communication to send images of the food I had in mind to everyone involved, and the able hands of Shuna and her staff had made most of my suggestions a reality. Then Mjllmile worked out all the logistics for the food stallsand, for some reason, Veldora was opening a grilled-food joint of his own.

    Hinata, ording to Yuuki, had checked out the whole scene yesterday, deciding exactly where she wanted to visit.

    Wow. Hey, maybe Hinatas a bigger fan of junk food than she looks, huh?

    Hey, join the club, he replied. Youre right, though. Its kind of surprising.

    Learning this unexpected fact about Hinata was a wee surpriseI think. At the very least, I knew now she wasnt afraid to toss big money around on a whim, so shed definitely be a favored customer of ours. I was a bit worried, though. Hopefully she doesnt set a bad example for the kids

    So I headed to the reception hall with Benimaru and Yuuki. By the time we did, Rigurd was already going over todays schedule with therge noble contingent on hand.

    Ah, Sir Rimuru! That was an excellent speech earlier!

    Um, was it? Seeing Rigurd look so happy about it warmed me up. Guess it didnt go so badly after all. Good, good. I returned Rigurds smile.

    Now, everybody, let me guide you to our first attraction of the day!

    He began to walk off, leading the group to our first stopa building right nearby the reception hall. This was our concert hall, its interior remodeled at breakneck speed, but the results looked better than I expected. The high-quality seats were lined up in rows oriented based on our acoustic calctions. Our visitors each sat at their assigned chairs withoutint.

    Compared to Japan, I couldnt help but be biased against this worlds level of culture. Im sure people on the other side would think the same of me, but regardless, those were my feelings. There was a robust art scene, and this world didnt lose out to my old one much in terms of painting or musicbut that applied only to the noble ranks. It served as a diversion for them, something on which tovish money and time. Whenever a city developed itself to an advanced enough level, the angels would start attacking itand thanks to that, the ruling sses tended to iste and conceal scientific research to some extent. Art was the same way, and generally, patrons of the arts saw such work as something tomission and enjoy strictly for themselves.

    Personally, I think culture is something nurtured by all of society. Theres genius lurking all over the world, and in such a close-knit art scene, that genius is not only hard to dig up but may likely not be discovered at all. Art, and creative activity, can be enjoyed only when one has room for it in their lives. Its almost too extravagant to expect that much from this world, but I wasnt willing to give up. I wanted to search far and wide for that hidden genius, and to achieve that, I needed to start by spreading culture from my own nation. This concert event today was our first step.

    A lot of musical instruments in this world resembled the ones I was familiar with. We even had a piano, surprisingly enoughfound in ymans mansion, of course. That demon lord was living a stereotypical life of nobility, and we uncovered arge cache of instruments in one of the many ornately decorated rooms in his manor.

    There were many among the monster races with an ear for music. There was a tradition for yearly festivals, for one, featuring flute- and drum-based rhythms. And thanks to lending those instruments to the more musically inclined among my people, we were starting to see some budding prodigies.

    I had given some practice instruments to those interested, teaching the basics of reading sheet music. That was about as far as my own expertise went, but then my good friend Raphael stepped up. Between the music textbooks I had in Japan and the instrument-rted knowledge from the library in this world, Raphael was able to cote all those data and put them together in a single volume. The guy was even able to rebuild knowledge I had long forgotten. I couldnt be more grateful.

    After that, of course, itd alle down to the monsters own efforts. Its really trueif you like something, you get better at it. And in a sh, we had monsters picking the instruments of their choice and improving at them by leaps and bounds. I also had some sheet music re-created from what I remembered from my pastI dont have perfect pitch or anything, but it didnt matter to Raphael, who edited and arranged everything just right. Id worry about infringing on someones rights, but copyright organizationsand the concept of copyrights, for that matterdidnt exist in this world. If someone finds out, hopefully theyll turn the other cheek for the sake of our cultural expansion.

    Violins formed our main inventory, apanied by trumpets, kettle drums, and so forth. Finding a piano was itself a surprise, but seeing monsters y it like it was the easiest thing in the world was positively moving. I suppose you could debate whether a piano belongs in an orchestra or not, but I didnt lose sleep over the question. If there was demand for the piano as a way to express yourself, no need to deny it.

    I personally had no musical talent, so I just let the monsters do what they wanted. The results had been personally guaranteed by Mjllmile, and today, Id be hearing them for the first time. Excitedly, nervously, I waited for things to begin.

    Once everyone was in their seats, the lights slowly began to dim as the curtain rose. It revealed a group of performers, all dressed in the same formal weara hodgepodge of races and species, each with the instrument of their calling; some humanlike, others closer to animals, but all brimming with confidence and pride in their instruments. A halfling, apparently the conductor, advanced to the front of the stage, giving the audience a deep bow.

    That, I think, was the boy who hade wailing at me once, crying about how there was no work he could do. No, I said, of course thats not truebut he was too weak for construction work, he wasnt good at math, and he tried farming but didntst long. He then volunteered for our armed forces, but he wasnt very good in a fight, either.

    The thing about him was, he was great at motivating other people to perform. He had a repertoire of songs hed sing to help people unify ande together. I think I wound up rmending him to the military bandand while I was at it, I gave him the name of Baton.

    Baton now lifted his head, his face colored with intense passion. He turned to the stage, taking in the curious stares from the upper-crust audience. He was small, but his back seemed to loomrge from my vantage point.

    There was a pause.

    Its always so fortunate when you can find what youre truly good at.

    The conductors baton rose, and then the music began. It started with an easy, gentle melody but then transformed, growing solemn and grave. Under Batons conducting, the musicians moved in perfect harmony, each of them having discovered something they could be proud of as well.

    The music they yed charmed the hearts of listeners, making them wonder if this exact moment was the best in their whole lives. It was ssicalin terms of being from olden timeswith the nuance of spanning generations to be recognized as a masterpiece. Some pieces soothed the heart; some sent it soaring to grand heights; some stirred up your courage. One masterpiece came after the other, created by this small band of geniuses. This group, some of whom werent even literate, worked so hard to study the musicand now the fruits of theirbor echoed beautifully across the hall. Nobody would dismiss them as useless now, and if anyone did, I think Id punch them out. Thats just how wonderful their ying was.

    I had gone to ssical concerts maybe two or three times in Japan, but these guys didnt lose out to them at all, no. I never expected to see music yed at such a high level over here. Yuuki, too, closed his eyes and listened; Im sure it was nostalgic for him. I almost wanted to start bragging to him: See? What do you think of that?

    As I thought about this, the sound came to a close. Then the next piece beganone of my favorite anime opening songs.

    Youre kidding me. They shifted gears from ssical to anime? Like it was the most natural thing in the world? And that was followed by a pop tune. Yuukis eyes were no longer closedthey were open and staring right at me. Stop that, man. Im not the culprit here. After all, the guy who read my memories to create that sheet music was

    Understood. My selection prioritized those pieces in my masters memory data, which provided him with the most psychological satisfaction.

    Raphael seemed a little too proud in that reply. But I couldnt make any excuses. It was going so well, too! Now the effect seemed kind of ruined. I mean, I liked these songs, yes, but hearing them yed with such solemn grandeur in a concert hall just didnt seem right at all. Yuuki, no doubt thinking the same thing, began to snicker a little.

    But it was only Yuuki and I who felt jarred by this. It made sense if you thought about it, but everybody else in the audience was listening to this music for the first time. Theyd have no idea where it came fromand Raphaels musical arrangements were a perfect match for the scene. Theyd have nothing to be suspicious about. And whether they were used to the ssics or not, I could tell they were enrapt with all this new music they were experiencing.

    The orchestral pieces dominated the hall, and the crowd was perfectly quiet as they sat there at full attention. The music from Beethoven, Mozart, Chopin, Tchaikovsky, Wagner, and other anonymous geniuses was charming the nobility of this world.

    I had to call this concert a great sess. Anyone in attendance for this performance had to admit iteven if yed by monsters, these tones, these melodies were sheer beauty. Even the anime tracks, in their capable hands,pared favorably with the historical ssicsand the pop music grabbed your heart like its supposed to; the rock revved you up like its meant to.

    Thus, with enthusiasm taking hold among the audience, the final selection came to a close.

    Its over?

    The concertsted only sixty minutes, but it felt so packed, like an eternity had passed. We had nned to end things here; Mjllmile told me he had arranged for an hour-long set in the morning and afternoon. Much of the audience wouldnt know a great deal about music, so we opted for shorter sets to keep their attention, without an intermission. This was an experiment for all of us, so we put these measures in ce to keep the procedure as simple as possible.

    I was only briefed on this; the details were all worked out by the people in front of me. I was proud of them. Standing up tall, I was about to celebrate their sess with as much apuse as I could musterwhen Baton bowed and swung his directors stick.

    Instantly, all the lighting was extinguished. The crowd began to nervously murmurbut itsted only a moment. Then the spotlight was turned on a single onstage figure, a touchingly sweet woman with light-pink hairShuna. She was in a sleeveless party dress, bursting with an allure you didnt often see from her. And there was another with hera beauty with purple hair, lit by another spotlight. Was that Shion? I didnt recognize her at first, what with the slip dress she had on instead of her usual business suit.

    Shion stood there like a fantastic vision, as if lit by the moon. Her dress took on a transparent feel depending on the light, revealing a sexier side you didnt often feel from her. She really was a dignified beautyuntil she opened her mouth, at leastand this presentation further entuated that beauty.

    They went up to the front, in their respective spotlights, and bowed deeply. That alone captured your attention, like a fine work of artbut seriously, what were they about to do here? I hated to think it, but

    The spotlight moved, and Shuna moved with it to the pianoone that sat in ce, untouched, the whole performance. Shion, meanwhile, picked up a violin. There was no longer any doubt. They were about to y a duet. Shuna, maybe I could picture as a pianistbut Shion at the violin? Were we really safe, having her y in front of such an influential audience? I recalled the assorted disasters she had engineered with her food in the pastif her musical skill matched that, it could spell doom for us all

    Or maybe not? I mean, there was no way Shuna would allow that. And Mjllmile seemed so confident, too, didnt he? He was virtually staking his life on this whole event, and I doubted hed let Shion throw a monkey wrench into the works.

    Lets believe in them. I closed my eyes, still a bit wary as I waited for the performance.

    It began with a slow piano tune apanied by an intense, impassioned violin melody. Then suddenly, the tone changed. In a way, it felt more like a duel than a duetbut the extreme force behind Shions melody seemed to reflect her own disposition, and Shunas piano ying (much like Shuna herself) gently enveloped it. The intensity and softness intermingled, entuating each other in impressive harmony.

    Ahhh This was good. I drowned in the waves of profoundly expressive sound, shaken to my soul. This was different. It wasnt something you could aplish with stopgaps. This was the result of innate discipline. It made sense, given Shunas roots as an oracle and Shions role in protecting her. Music is an indispensable part of any religious riteand maybe thats why Shuna and Shions melodies seemed to hit me right in the heart.

    Silence. The dreamlike moment was overit seemed like forever, but not even five minutes had passed.

    When I snapped out of it, I attempted to give them thunderous apuse. But before I could, I heard stato pping break the quiet. Darn. I was hoping to be first, but I had the rug taken out from under me. I joined the pping, craning my neck to see whose lead I was following.

    Shockingly, it was Luminus, disguised as a maid in the employ of the two pdins in attendance. She heartily apuded the performers, looking gloriously satisfied. I tried to keep upand soon, other pping ovepped with ours.

    The reaction was cacophonous. Elmesia, Heavenly Emperor of Thalion; Gazel, king of the Dwarven Kingdom; all the nobility of the Western Nations; Milim and Frey Even Middray, a man I wouldnt expect to be very cultured. They all stood up and sent out their apuse. This tradition of pping was the same in this world, it seemed; I wasnt sure if a long-gone otherworlder had brought it in or if it was just always that way.

    What I did quickly learn, however, was that this world didnt have a custom of giving encores. Public artistry in itself wasnt amon thing, so I suppose that should have been obvious. Thus I assumed we were done here, but apparently not. Darkness fell on the hall once more, before the entire stage was relit and the orchestrawith Shunas piano and Shions violin this timeyed one final song to round things out.

    Music, and art in general, has a way of tearing down barriers. Seeing this concert unfold, I wanted to believe, for just a moment, that therere things out there that everyone in the world truly can find wondrous.

    The concert was a monster hit. It was the only topic on visitors lips as we retired to the reception for a light lunch.

    Wasnt that just wonderful?

    Ah, what can I say?

    I had my eyes closed, taking it in from start to finish!

    Me too. And who cares whether it was man or monster? Those melodies are still in my ears!

    Indeed. Quality is quality. Thats all there is to it.

    Based on my eavesdropping, it sounded like high praise. And at least one member of the crowd was going up to me now.

    Um Sir Rimuru, I would very much like to hear this performance again. What can I do to gain such an opportunity, if I could?

    Well be holding the concert regrly over the next three days, I told him, but I suppose we should consider a more regr performing schedule. Our song repertoire wasnt that vast yet, but I was sure itd grow going forward. Having more chances to show it off would provide more practice motivation, besides.

    That was a fine performance, Luminus whispered to me as we passed by in the hall. I enjoyed it more than I expected to.

    Quite apliment, I thought; she didnt strike me as the sort to offer praise freely. I should probably consider that a five-star review.

    Shion was certainly a surprise, Imented to Benimaru.

    Im sure she was. But Well, despite all appearances, Shion has always had a good sense of rhythm. She certainly seemed extraordinarilypatible with that violin instrument as well. And Shuna, too I didnt know she could y piano, but she always did enjoy singing. It does not surprise me.

    It all made sense to him. He apparently knew they were good singers, ande to think of it, I remember them breaking out a happy tune or two as they went about their business. It made me realize, despite my intentions, that I still didnt really know everyone very well.

    After lunch, we had our science presentation scheduled for the afternoon. I followed Rigurd as he guided the crowd of nobility, still keyed up from the mornings events. We passed by the concert hall from before, this time heading straight for the museum. Our destination was the historical archives inside, as much as it seemed odd for nobility to be in there.

    Gabil and Vester awaited us at the entrance. Being a former Dwargon minister, Vester was immediately recognizable to a few in the crowd, eliciting murmurs of surprise. Vester himself paid it no mind, shing a smile as he greeted the tour.

    The two of them guided us into the building.

    Inside this case is the first healing potion that Sir Rimuru ever created. It is aplete extraction from hipokute herbs with all impurities removed. It boasts ny-nine percent purity, and while it is not quite up to the level of a Revival Elixir, its healing qualities are equivalent to a Full Potion.

    I listened to Vester talk as we went along. Then I realized we had made a mistake. Vester was offering valid, thorough guidance, yes, but to those without scientific knowledge, it mustve been incredibly boring. I could already see a few people tuning him out, staring at the ceiling.

    That, and we had scheduled this all wrong. If we held the tech demo in the morning, everyone would be awake, refreshed, and perhaps more open to this guided tour. I didnt think wed have so much disengagement anyway. But thanks to the thrill of that morning concert, all this scientific mumbo-jumbo must seem like such a letdown. Besides, think about it. We were entertaining people from royal courts and noble mansions. They might care about the things we produced, but with most of them, they couldnt care less about how they were made.

    Vester mustve picked up on this. He snickered a bit.

    Ah, but I see I am bogging all of you down in needless detail. Lets turn our attention elsewhere, then, and stage a scientific experiment.

    He exchanged a look with Gabil, who nodded back.

    In this experiment, we will pursue what healing potion is, exactly, as much as we can. Diluting this Full Potion to twenty percent strength creates High Potion, used to treat serious injuries. Dilute this further, and you create twenty doses of Low Potions. That should show you just how effective a Full Potion can be.

    Gabil lined up bottles of all three potions on a table. If any of us is currently dealing with an injury, he said, we would be able to test out the effectiveness of each potion, but it would be barbaric to hurt ourselves for the sake of experimentation. Thus we havee up with rather an interesting experiment.

    As he spoke, Vester brought in a broken sword.

    So will a potion fix this sword? asked Gabil. Does one of you have the answer to that question?

    Rubbish! Hipokute herbs only work on living things!

    The shouted reply came from a man dressed in magicians garbperhaps the court sorcerer for one kingdom or another. He totally dismissed the idea, and it looked like he had the intelligence to back up that answer.

    Gabilughed and nodded. Yes, of course. At the very least, there is no way this Low or High Potion could ever be effective against a sword.

    That much was obvious. There wasnt much need to stage an experiment. What was Gabnd Vester, for that mattergetting at with this question?

    So the question is, how far does that rule apply? What do all of you think?

    More protests from the crowd. They must have thought Gabil and Vester were treating them like idiots. Things were even getting a little raucousI know this wasnt what they were expecting, but sheesh, pipe down.

    But how far could you apply healing potions, huh? Well, they worked on people, of course, as well as animals, nts, and monsters. Wheres the threshold, then, the boundary between effective and ineffective? This was actually kind of fascinating. Is being alive or not the main thing? Probably not. It was the presence of a consciousness that likely made the difference.

    Report. nts have a consciousness as well. A consciousness has its roots in the soul, a collection of the spiritual particles that form magicules. Its presence, orck thereof, is thought to be the difference.

    Right. nts have willsmaybe theyre not fully sentient, but they have a desire to keep living. But swords dont have souls, and therefore no wills. Theyre just things, so obviously

    But hang on. Something just urred to me. Didnt Kaijin say that swords do have wills of their own? No way?!

    Heh-heh-heh I would like to know as well. And the desire to know provides the entryway to new discoveries.

    Indeed. And trust me, I ordered him to not conduct this ridiculous experiment at first. I called him a fool in my mind, for that matter. But I was the only fool in the room. I was so bound by thews ofmon sense, I forgot my original drives as a researcher.

    Vester smiled warmly as he sprinkled some Full Potion on the broken sword. Thenjust a little, but enough so that everyone could seethe sword reacted.

    ?!

    And here is the answer. While it does not fully rebuild the sword, we are clearly seeing the early signs of repair here.

    R-ridiculous

    I cant believe it. Healing potion could be used for this?

    The tour group couldnt hide their astonishment. I could see why. It flew in the face ofmon sense; youd have a hard time not being surprisedand that included me. I had no idea they were conducting experiments not even I could anticipate the results of. They didnt give me any report on this, which only added to the shock.

    Of course, you will only see these effects on arms and armor that matured past a certain level. The weapon must be made of magisteel, at the very leastand it will not give a reaction unless it has been used regrly by its owner.

    Ah. So itd have no effect unless the sword had a will instilled in it.

    Why, Gazel asked Gabil in his low, stentorian voice, did you want to know something like that?

    Its simple, my lord. I found it difficult to believe that nts and vegetation growing in the wild have wills of their ownbut after experimentation, we found that healing potions work perfectly fine on them.

    Now that we had Full Potion mass manufacturing underway, there was a decent quantity to work with. Thus they had been trying it on all sorts of things. Certainly, the desire to learn was the first step toward new discoveries. I recalled the experiments we did in grade school science ss, challenging ourselves to do things that seemed pointless at first. Gabil had that same spiritthe first things to just try it out.

    So it worked on nts, restoring damaged tree bark and producing new buds from broken branches.

    I then remembered the existence of dryads, Gabil said. Vegetation may have only a weak consciousness at first, but over many months and years of life, they can evolve into powerful monsters, can they not? But as I thought, this may only happen under certain conditions.

    Around half the audience was taking a keen interest in this exnation. Id expect the more quick-witted among them to be fascinated, yes. This was the kind of research Id normally want to keep confidential, after all. Should I let Gabil keep going? The thought, as mean-spirited as it felt, crossed my mind, but I hurriedly brushed it away as I listened on.

    The only things that react to healing potion are those already intertwined with magicules. Things with no magicules to them at all show no reaction in our testing. What this means is that magicules house consciousness itselfor, at least, the two are deeply rted.

    Yes. And when Sir Gabil presented these data, it led me to reconsider my thoughts as well. Soon, a question arose in my mind: What are magicules?

    Magicules were one of this worlds unique substances, freely spread around the atmosphere like oxygen. They were the engine for all kinds of mysterious forces, and people could wield them to do their bidding, to some extent.

    So we have a sample from a certain nt here And over in this other room, I can show you an erged picture of it.

    We followed Vester to another room, arge, spacious chamber with chairs lined up in rowssomething like an AV-equipped college lecture hall. It had a projector, still in the trial testing phases, and there was a stretched-out white sheet on the wall to serve as a screen. Gazel curiously observed the projector but remained politely quiet about it, realizing now was not the time. Thats Gazel for youmature enough to pick the right time and ce.

    Once everyone was seated, Gabil turned on the projector, a device with light-based magic inscriptions that let it project color images on the screen. The chambers lights dimmed as the image appeared, surprising a few in the audience.

    Take a look at this image, Vester said, ignoring the chatter. It shows the structure of the nt sample you saw before. And this is the structure of some grass, the type you see growing anywhere

    He ced the erged images next to each other. I didnt get why Vester was acting so haughty herea certain nt and so on. Whats his aim?

    Are they not the same? I dont see any difference

    No, me neither. Why arent they the same?

    The voices in the crowd were met with wide agreement. A few of them werent as surethat part is different; no, that part isbut I doubted any of them were on the mark. So what was the answer?

    Now, lets erge these further.

    What do you think? They look just the same, dont they?

    Vester and Gabil shed viinous smilesand then they revealed the trick.

    The nt in the first picture is hipokute herb. The second one is a simple weed we picked from awn in town. Do they look the same to you?

    Vesters question made things begin to dawn on some of the audience. What they saw unnerved them. Hurriedly, they spoke up.

    They arent the same. The difference is clear if you look closer!

    Thats mean of you, Sir Vester. How can we tell the difference just from those images?

    Hipokute was a rare herb. Id dined on quite a bit of it in the cave Veldora was sealed in; its famously the core ingredient of healing potion. Most would assume its structured far differently from the grass you step on every day. But a few people, myself included, found Vesters question very disturbing. Gazel was one of them; I could see the blood drain from his face.

    We were showing that hipokute and regr grass were both structured in the same wayproof that, essentially, they were the same. It begged the question of what, exactly, constituted a rare herbwhich, in turn, had the potential to overturnmon sense itself.

    Vester lifted his arms up high, that sinister smile still on his face.

    Quiet! Quiet, please!

    He and Gabil waited for things to settle down. When they did, he ced a series of images on the projector.

    Squeezing the extract from hipokute andbining its magicules together creates healing potion. The level of this fusion process, as you all know, depends on the properties of the extract producedand while we cannot go into details, we have sessfully refined this extraction process to a purity level of ny-nine percent. That is how a Full Potion is made.

    Through a variety of images (while still hiding the core technology), Vester exined the potion-making process.

    Now we move on to hipokute leaves. Grinding these leaves andbining their magicules produces a salve that can close wounds, although the effect is not dramatic. This makes sense, since these ground leaves are simply the leavings from the extraction process.

    An image of a leaf filled the screen. The leaf was shown being ground, then mixed with the extract from before to create an ointmentthe basic process behind it. Nothing unnatural. I didnt get where Vester was going with it.

    Now, everyone, look at this image.

    On one side, you had leaves from hipokute herbs grown in our cave; on the other was regr grass. They looked totally different. There was no way theyd have the same organic structurebut as the images shed by, changes began to ur on the hipokute side.

    Do you see? I only came to notice out of sheer coincidence. Sir Rimuru has ordered me to work on our hipokute cultivation project, but one day, I took an interest in the strained leaves from our extraction process. Making ointment from it is well and good, but it has to be kept under exacting conditions or it quickly loses its effect. Plus,pared to the liquid extract used to make potions, its effect is extremely weak. I didnt give it much thought, since we had other uses for the extract, but if you think about it, do we really need this ointment? So as I said, I began to look at the strained leaves

    And then Gabil realized that the shape of these post-extraction leaves, now free of magicules, was different from the hipokute currently growing in the cave. Shocked, Gabil decided to take more detailed records, resulting in the images he was showing us now.

    So at the conclusion of all this, weve found that, technically speaking, there is no such thing as a hipokute nt. The nts we call hipokute are actually mutations

    Yes! eximed an excited Vester. And its not that hipokute grows in magicule-rich areasits the magicule concentration itself that causes this mutation and creates hipokute from simple grass!

    I could see why he was excited. Everyone who heard him immediately began talking.

    That Thats a major discovery!

    S-Sir Vester, this is not the type of thing to announce in a ce like this! There could have been some more appropriate asion You must contact a scientific society or the like at once and follow the proper announcement procedure!

    It was chaos inside the room. Even those who didnt take much interest before couldnt stay silent nowand the audience members who had been paying attention from the start were even more astounded. It was beyond anything they imagined, and the not the type of thing to announce remark symbolized just how much it roiled the crowd. Gazel, too, had his eyes wide open, and even Elmesia and Erald were discussing matters with each other.

    I was surprised, too. I never gave it much thought before, but the way they put it, it made sense. It was pretty obvious, in fact. I doubted Veldora just happened to be sealed off in a cave full of hipokute herbs. If that was the result of a mutationor a nt evolutionthat was more convincing. And once all the magicules were extracted from this nt during processing, its shape went back to the in old grass it once was. The dried, strained samples projected on the screen made it obvious that they shared the same organic structure as regr grass.

    In which case, no wonder Gabil thought potions could heal swords. Metal might mutate into magisteel ore, just like grass mutated into hipokute, and it was that ore that was processed to make magisteel weapons. Put the pieces together, and anyone would wonder if healing potion could work on magisteel as well. The result: the experiment we saw earlier.

    My original question, Vester continued, of the exact nature of magicules remains unanswered. Monsters, and magic-born, are exposed to the effects of these magiculesthat much is evident. But what about demi-humans? If you took all the magicules out of their body, would they go back to being humans? I have boundless questions along these lines, but investigating them could prove fiendishly difficult.

    Despite this, we intend to continue our research. And in thisnd, where some of the worlds greatest minds are gathering, we promise to keep pursuing the answersand with that, we close our science presentation.

    To everyone who came out to attend

    Thank you very much!

    Gabil and Vester bowed and spoke in perfect sync. They mustve worked the presentation out in pretty deep detail; I dont think this was the first time theyd run through this lecture.

    The content, however, was excellent. I had left it all to them, but it really grabbed your attentionand whats more, it spread the word about great discoveries while keeping all the key parts a secret. Most important of allwe didnt have to worry about anyone copying our technology with what we revealed. Changing the nature of nts with magicules was a grand discovery, but it wasnt something other nations could easily replicate. They could experiment with it, but it wouldnt let them mass-produce hipokute or anything.

    Our position of superiority remained firmand our research continued. As Gabil said, great minds were gathering here, and wed have more before long. In and so blessed with magicules as this one, we could do all the experimentation we wanted.

    Overall, this scientific presentation was a major shock to the attendees. After a morning spent enjoying fine music, this afternoon stimted their intellectual curiosities. Id leave it to the audience to decide which was more enriching, but given how much interest both events generated, Id definitely call them a sess.

    A lot of the audience seemed bored at first. I worried that we should have swapped the order out, in retrospectbut it appeared I was worried over nothing. In fact, maybe this was the right order after all. We certainly fulfilled our main goal of making the movers and shakers in the audience interested in us. I internally resolved to give Gabil and Vester unbridled praise the next time I had a chance.

    After the presentation came some free activity time. A number of our VIPs would rx at our salon, while others would peruse our food stalls incognito. A few would savor the hot-spring bath, and others would enjoy checking out our amusement facilities. Each one of them had their own guide, so they were free to pursue their own interests. They were all abuzz about the concert and science presentation, too, reportedly spreading praise about them to everyone they spoke to around town.

    As I watched them take in the festival, I saw Arnaud and Bhuse up to me, looking concerned. We need to talk, Arnaud whispered to me. It sounded like something important, so I brought Benimaru and Shion along and guided them to a room in the reception hall.

    There we saw Luminus. Id suspected we would, given how agitated the pdins seemed, and I was right. She was in her maid dress, seated with her legs crossed. The juxtaposition of her pale skin and the ck garter belts and stockings was, frankly, hot. Arnaud and Bhus stood bolt upright behind herthe sight of them serving this maid was a surreal role reversal, but it actually fit her well. Luminuss powerful aura at work, I imagine.

    Now, she began before I could talk or even sit down, we have a treaty of nonaggression in cebut that will not be enough.

    I always knew she was impatient, but not this impatient. Exasperated, I helped myself to a chair. Something told me I wasnt about to get invited to a seat.

    Not enough how?

    How else? Itcks interaction! If we cannot make contact with each other, how will we ever have interaction?

    Um, I dont see why we cant?

    I organized the situation in my mind as I thought over what Luminus meant.

    As she said, there was a nonaggression pact between the Holy Empire of Lubelius and Tempest. The Western Holy Church was a part of Lubelius, which also helped boost our position with the Western Nations. I really appreciated that, but in terms of interaction, she was rightwe had virtually no diplomatic rtions. We were just too physically distant from each other. There was no national-level trade. Any cirction of goods was left to market principles, with whatever merchants or nations wanted to be involved.

    We werentpletely cut off from trade, though. I had actually asked Mjllmile to send a few traveling peddlers in their direction. Why wait for Lubelius when we could take action ourselves? We were conducting basic market research, and I had already gotten a report of products and goods that the Holy Empire specialized in.

    That report told me that Lubelius was an agricultural giant, producing great quantities of crops (primarily wheat) and exporting much of it to the Western Nations. I looked at a sample, and it was very high-qualitytasty, too. I was hoping to import some, in fact, but as mentioned, the distance involved made it tough. Before we started talking about more formal trade, I wanted to see that problem dealt with first.

    So thats where we were now. I wanted to deepen our rtions in the future, but if you asked me what could be done right this minute, I couldnt give you anything.

    You inconsiderate clod. Or are you toying with me?

    No, no, thats not it at all!

    Luminus gave my harried reply an irritated sigh. When I say interaction, I mean cultural interaction. Frankly, I underestimated all of you. The people under our protection in Lubeliusck a great deal in the way of artistic talent. Meanwhile, although I expected little, your musical presentation earlier was impressive. I have reconsidered my views of you today.

    Whoa. Heaps of praise. She had a few kind words for me as we passed each other earlier, but I guess she really did like the concert. That, and now I understood her. Todays musical performance finally made her recognize our talents. I imagined Luminus had some kind of musical band, and presumably she was talking about an international exchange with its members, to help improve both of us.

    There are some among the vampires who are artistically inclined. They carry on the heritage of our old music while working on new creative endeavors, buttely theyve been stuck in a rut. I think some input from visiting creators of your realm would be a fine catalyst.

    I had it right on the mark. And really, I appreciated the request. An experience like this always enriches the heart and mind. And if you want to improve your cultural activity, interacting with other people was the best inspiration you could feed on.

    I like that idea! We couldnt ask for anything better.

    I had no reason to turn her down, so I readily agreed. Looking at our future rtions, besides, it was bound to have more positive impact than bad.

    Very good. I will make sure things proceed along those lines.

    She gave me a satisfied nod. Just as she did, an elderly servant ced some tea in front of us. Gunther, I think his name wasjust as strong as Louis Valentine but also one talented servant. Diablo was the same way,e to think of it. Who knew that butlers were such lean, mean fighting machines in this world? And now other servants were bringing drinks to Benimaru and Shion behind me. They werent dyed; it was just that the impatient Luminus summoned me so quickly that they couldnt keep up.

    Luminus gave them a cold noda sign of a strict master-servant rtionship, I thought. But:

    Isnt that great? Now you can enjoy that music, too, soon.

    It sounded pompous as she spoke to her attendants. But they didnt take it that way, saying, Thank you very much and I look forward to it! in return. They looked happy enough to me, so they definitely meant it. Their attitude to Luminus was based on respect, it seemed, not fear. I found it odd at firstand then I looked closer and realized they were all vampires.

    Their auras were wholly shut off, their powers restrained to the point that they were indiscernible from regr people. They were high-level vampires, I imagined, given how close they were to Luminus. Just the few of them here alone could easily topple an entire nation, Im sure, and here they were serving tea to us. The world can be one irrational ce sometimes.

    Now, Gunther, carry out the necessary details when we return to Nightgarden.

    Yes, my lord.

    Luminus nodded and took an elegant, silent sip of teaa beautiful showcase of manners, one youd want to teach to a debutante.

    Ah yes, she brightly said as I stared enrapt at her, that scientific presentation was quite interesting as well. Dissecting the effects of magicules is quite a fascinating idea toe up with. There are those on my staff with a rather odd interest in research. I was thinking we could send them here, but would you mind that?

    I asked for some more details. The way she put it, there was still little in the way of cultured civilization among the humans who lived on the surface of Lubelius, but the underground maind boasted a fairly decent level of technology.

    Oh? Thats surprising. I thought you wouldnt be so secretive with all that.

    I dislike causing trouble for myself. If we were too conspicuous, we feared that ursed lizard would find us, remember. I hardly want the angels interfering with us, either. Thats why Ive had all our major research moved underground, until we can fully eradicate them.

    She seemed proud of herself.

    The way she framed it, Luminus was the most powerful political ruler among all the demon lords. She was a vampire, so essentially immortal, with a life span transcending even that of elves. The more powerful among her kind didnt even need to eat, capable of sustaining themselves via minute doses of life energy from human beings. There was no doubting the fact that vampires sat at the top of the food chain.

    But even they had their deficiencies. Vampires were called rulers of the night for good reasonthey could wield untold powers in the darkness, but exposure to sunlight wiped them off the. It was a huge weakness, but even with it, they remained incredibly dangerous. But again, the more powerful among this advanced racesome among the noble sses under Luminuscould apparently ovee this weakness against the sun. These were called oveers, and they could pretty much go around by day and do whatever they pleased. There were very few of them, which was a good thing, since a vampire without weaknesses would be a nightmare for humanity. Definitely a Cmity-level threat, if not as much a one as Louis or Gunther.

    The servants here were oveers as well. They served Luminus as a sort of hobby, it seemedwith, of course, a heavy nuance of being her bodyguards. Being an oveer meant having no weak points and therefore a lot of free time on your hands; that was why so many of them enjoyed making assorted things for fun. Theyd craft all sorts of junk, in fact, hoping to win Luminuss affections.

    To be honest, she said to me, its dreadfully irritating. I have ordered them to develop something more useful, but theyre too fixated on their own ideas, I suppose. Theyve made no progress whatsoever. I would love for you to take them in and give them a little education.

    Hmm I wouldnt mind that, but

    But of course Id have qualms about the whole thing unless I got to meet Luminuss candidates. Being an oveer meant enjoying life in the ruling sssomeone like them traveling to Tempest for study could lead to problems I had no way of predicting in advance.

    Luminus, perhaps seeing my indecision, made another offer. Im not asking you to work for free, of course. Perhaps I could offer a skill to you.

    A skill?

    Yes. The secret skills of faith and favor.

    Whats that? Sounds really cool! Or at least cooler than the kinds of skills I came up with for myself, such as relearning how to get drunk.

    What are those?

    Oh, its quite simple. She gave me an evil,cent smile. It allows those faithful to you to harness some of your powers.

    Whoa. That sounds dangerous. If she taught me this around all these people

    Report. Luminus has used Spatial Severance to iste your location.

    Raphael neatly pointed it out, cutting me off before I could get worked up. Ah. That would exin why I couldnt hear anyone besides ourselves right now. She really was a pir among the strongest of demon lords; setting off skills just came naturally to her.

    So youll teach me this in exchange for allowing your students toe here to live for a while? Am I understanding that right?

    You are. I would be happy enough to have a cultural exchange with our musicians alone. In a way, this is my token of thanks to you.

    She didnt appear to be lying.

    All right. Ill take your offer.

    Hee-hee! Then we have a deal.

    We did. Shed have her musicians trained here, and Id have my secret skills of faith and favor.

    To put it very simply, these skills were the principles behind all holy magic. It involved me using my name as a vessel in order to cast spells. Hinata and the pdins, for example, could wield holy magic by using Luminuss name as a vesselborrowing a bit of her power with each use. If I could learn the trick behind it, more of the people under me could gain ess to holy magic.

    Surprisingit seemed like I was getting a lot out of the bargain. Luminus being Luminus, of course, I knew she had calcted all of this.

    That sounds great to me, but are you sure about this?

    Oh, I dont mind. You were likely to discover the truth of it for yourself in a few years time anyway. It is best to take advantage of information while it is still valuable, is it not?

    Ah, I thought. All right. And judging by Raphaels pained silence, it wouldnt have even been a few years. We were researching the nature of magicules, and after Hinatas battle, we already knew the existence of spiritual particles. Put those together, and the truth wouldvee to us naturally. Well, not to me but to Raphael, certainly. And Luminus, spotting this, simply offered it while she was still able to extract something from me for it.

    Well, even so, I appreciate it, Luminus.

    As long as you keep your side of the bargain, all is well.

    Attempting negotiation with Luminus was still too heavy a task for me. This time it didnt hurt me, but Id have to think things through more carefully from now on. I mused over this as I shook hands with her.

    Thus our budding orchestra would be traveling to Nightgarden shortly, while the noble oveers serving Luminus would being here for research purposes.

    Once Luminus deactivated Spatial Severance, we rxed a bit, as if nothing had happened. I kicked back and enjoyed my tea, listening as Luminus gave me her review of the mornings concert. It seemed like she was more enthusiastic about exchanges of the musical, and not scientific, sort. Most of her questions involved our orchestra and when we could get them over to her.

    Then, at the end:

    By the way, Rimuru, there were some rather disagreeable people among the dignitaries you invited. Were you aware of them?

    She acted casual about this, her tone unchanged. I wondered what she meant for a momentbut it had to be her way of warning me about something.

    I guess it wasnt my imagination after all.

    Ah yes, that pair?

    Mm. If you dont shirk your duty and keep your wits about you with them, then very well. But I do hope you will make efforts not to denigrate the good name of the Octagram.

    That was her way of signaling the end of our conversation. I nodded at her and took my leave.

    After my spontaneous conversation with Luminus ended, it was time for dinner.

    For whatever reason, Yuuki, Hinata, and I were assigned to the same table. They were all smiles with each other, busily discussing the days events and virtually drooling at all the food brought in. I could hardly wait to dig in myself as I listened to their reflections. There were two choices avable for the evenings courses, Japanese and Western; Hinata went for Japanese, while Yuuki and I picked Western.

    I tell you, Yuuki began, that was a seriously incredible performance. You really shouldve checked it out, Hinata. The food stallsll be openter, you know.

    Dont tell me what to do. I achieved what I set out to do today. Whats the problem? Besides, the takoyaki was so good, and

    Her voice went down to a whisper and she started making excuses.

    But really, though. You guys went with Alias?

    I averted my eyes from Hinata, pretending to have no idea what she was talking about.

    But no, I mean itits really worth listening to. I mean, I quite liked that one song already, but hearing it arranged for an orchestra It just blew me away.

    Nice one, Yuuki. His unbridled praise for Baton andpany had sessfully diverted Hinatas attention.

    All right, all right, she said, not sounding that peeved. If youre going on about it that much, Ill take the kids there tomorrow.

    Hinata, for her part, seemed to make the most of today, throwing her money up and down the festival, much to my appreciation. Clothes, weapons, armor, magic itemsshe bought it all, and at marked-up festival prices, too. She also made her way up and down the food stalls, and honestly, I think she took the kids just as an excuse to stuff herself. They loved her, though, it sounded like, so I couldntin at allespecially since shed already volunteered to watch them the next day.

    Personally, Im more interested in that research into magicules, Hinata continued, lowering her voice again. Healing potions dont really work on me, you know, because my body breaks down the magicules And actually, there are some healing magics that work on me and some that dont.

    She had apparently done a bit of research of her own, to see if there was any potion out there that worked on her. Having the ability to annul magic applied to her sounded good on paper, but the more you thought about it, the more inconveniences it created.

    Yeah, you know, I havent thought about it, huh? Im affected by magicules, too, I guess, so

    When you jump between worlds, you take in a vast amount of energy. Sometimes these manifest as skills, and sometimes it results in nothinglike with you, Yuuki. But youre rightyoure still affected by them. You havent grown at all, for one

    Whoa, whoa, dont put it that way! I havent grown, no, but Ive done a lot in my years here, you know?

    I know, I know. You dont have to get worked up every time I mention it. Im just picking on you.

    Maybe Hinata was just picking on himbut with those imposing eyes of hers? When she said stuff like that with her sharpened re and joyless face, it really didnt sound much like a joke.

    All right. But you know, Rimuru, Im fascinated by the directions youre taking your research here.

    I appreciated thepliment, but Yuuki was really thinking too much of me.

    No, no, that was really all Gabil and Vesters own work. I only learned about it the same time all of you did.

    Oh?

    Didnt you order them to do that research? Hinata asked. And you let them announce it to VIPs from around the world without even knowing what it was?

    They both gave me incredulous looks.

    Um, this soup is good, huh? I ventured, fleeing reality while I fished for an excuse. But look, what could I do? I want them to be independent!

    Not having any other ideas, I tried being more forceful in my approach. It didnt work. They just red back at me.

    All right, I kind of regret that. I was really busy, but maybe I shouldve at least heard what it was first

    Toote now, of course.

    Man, Rimuru. You sure are something, you know that?

    Honestly. Sometimes, I seriously think hes a real big shot. Sometimes.

    That did not sound like praise to me, but ah well. Even I had to admit, it was kind of a slipup. The presentations content was great, but I got a bit nervous in the middle of it and Gazel admonished me about it as welready, I wanted to be more careful next time. Didnt think Yuuki and Hinata were gonna rake me over the coals about it, too, though

    Fortunately for me, the conversation drifted back into small talk as the dinner continued.

    Thus the first day of the Founders Festival closed torgely excellent reviews. It really felt like a strong start to me, and I had no doubt in my mind that itd end a great sessnot knowing, of course, that Id learn in short order just how naive I was.

 Volume 9 - Ch 2.1

    INTERLUDE

    A PROBLEM ARISES

    We were all in the meeting hall for a regr update, waiting forwell, Mjllmile was thest straggler, wasnt he? It was nine in the evening, right after dinner ended. The festival was still in full swing outside; we could hear flutes, drums, andughing from afar. The official closing time was ten p.m., so this was fine; the lodgers in our nobles amodations could shut the windows to cut off all the noise. We wanted to be sure noiseints were never an issue with that building.

    So as much as I wanted to tour the evening market, I wanted to get this meeting over with earlier than thete hour Id kept everyone up untilst night.

    Shuna, Shion, good work today. That performance was amazing. I waspletely surprised.

    Hee-hee! Weve been practicing on the sly, Shuna said with a grin. Ive always been a good singer, and I think Im a rather good fit for that piano instrument. The two songs I yed are all I know, though

    If she could y that well after starting so recently, Id say a good fit is an understatement. But indeed, if she had to squeeze practice time into the nooks and crannies of her busy schedule, I could see why she had to focus on a limited song pool.

    The same went for Shion, too. She smiled at me.

    I kept my practice hidden alongside Lady Shuna as well. I wanted to surprise you, Sir Rimuru, and I think we seeded!

    There was something beautifully dignified about her ying the violin. I honestly needed to give her some praise.

    Yeah, you looked great. Youre gonna keep it up, right?

    Yes, of course! Id like to get to the point where we can y all the songs you remembered, Sir Rimuru!

    Ill look forward to that. Theres a lot Id like to hear from you!

    Shions never seemed more trustworthy to me than today. She could be a disappointment most of the time, but right now, she was shining.

    I then moved on to Gabil.

    Gabil, your presentation was also received favorably. Yuuki was shocked by it, and King Gazel took quite an interest as well. They said that we perhaps revealed a little too much to the public, but I think that was fine.

    Ha-ha! Thank you very much! A lot of it was Sir Vesters doing, but I took the initiative to do the best job I could on it. And conducting those experiments did more than just satisfy my intellectual curiosityit made me want to rte those feelings of mine to everyone else. Perhaps I went a bit overboard with it.

    No, no, Im not criticizing you. Your research surprised me as well, but the content was really interesting. I think our visitors were just as engaged, too. More than enough of a sess.

    Gabil breathed a happy sigh of relief. He mustve been pretty nervous.

    Tell Vester I said the same to him, all right?

    Absolutely!

    Vester was likely drinking with Gazel as we spoke. The king might be a bit angry at him, but Vester would probably treat that as high praise. To him, Gazel was eternally worthy of his respect. During this festival, at least, they should be able to enjoy themselves without worrying about things like rank or position.

    Diablo also updated me on arena goings-on.

    We have our six remaining seed slots filled, sir, but none of them would be a concern if I was part of the tournament. I watched the Hero in action as well, butheh-heh-heh Yes, he certainly has some fascinating tools to work with. Should I take care of him before problems arise?

    I told you we werent doing that!

    As you wish. I think any further briefing on the days events would spoil the fun for you tomorrow.

    Diablo didnt see any issues. Counting Gobta and Geld, our eight tournamentpetitors were locked inand if nothing concerned Diablo, I didnt need to hear anything else. With the right seedings, we could see some pretty neat battles. Ill take Diablos advice and wait for the fun tomorrow.

    Soei spoke next, telling me that the kids spent the day enjoying the festival. Theyd paid a visit to the tournament preliminaries, cheering on Masayuki, then purchased arge amount of food and souvenirs. Geez, Hinata You sure thats how a guardian should act? Hope the kids dont all wreck their stomachs. Now I was a little worried about how things would work out tomorrow.

    So we conversed some more while waiting for Mjllmile. Barring any problems, wed be done with this meeting in under half an houror so I assumed, but given the way Mjllmile rushed into the hall, pale as a sheet, I had to dismiss this as optimistic.

    S-sorry to make you wait, he stammered, and based on his bodynguage, I could only assume something serious hade up. He was normally so unfazed, brazen even, but now he couldnt hide his panic.

    Shuna offered him some chilled tea, and I waited for him to catch his breath before speaking up.

    So whats happening?

    Im deeply sorry, sir, but we have a serious problem. Heres the thing: Were out of money.

    It seemed that the tradesmen were all hounding him for payment at the same time, and he had spent the past little while trying to deal with them. Out of money? Youre kidding me. We had all kinds ofvish fixtures from Diablos manor, not to mention all his gold and silver, and besides, Diablo had taken 1,500 sters in restitution from Farmus. If we dipped into that, we could hold a hundred more festivals like this and still have money left over.

    About that, he replied when I brought this up with him. Its not an issue of budget, Sir Rimuru. Its that we cant convert ymans assets into moneyits not in themonly used currency of the world. Gold coins from ancient kingdoms have great artistic value, and I know theyre circted around the Eastern Empire, but

    But while they might be used over there, they werent recognized as legal tender. The tradesmen could always have them converted, but this apparently wasnt to their liking. They wanted real gold coinage, as minted in the Dwarven Kingdom.

    So I paid them in regr gold coins at first, but partway through, I realized something had gone wrong. But by then, it was toote

    Once our own vault was exhausted ofmon Dwarven gold coins, Mjllmile dipped into his own fortune to handle payments. But even that was limited, so he consulted with some of his closer merchant friends to figure out what was going on. What they revealed was astonishingording to them, the new, unfamiliar tradesmen these shopkeepers had started working with demanded payment only in themon currency.

    In international trade, it was considered reasonable to make pure barter trades, one sides goods canceling out the cost of the other sides. They could also enact IOUs, contracts to handle paymentter instead of exchanging cash on-site. Payment would be needed sometime, just not right at that momentonemon custom to cover mary losses in this world, where the concept of charging interest was still in its infancy.

    However, our nation hadnt built the trust to back up that custom yet. If our partners demanded cash, our only option was to pay them in cash.

    Mjllmile understood this well enough. That was why he so carefully managed our budget for this festival, meticulously selecting the merchants he worked with. He was apparently counting on morerge-scale trade with a smaller number of partners, which would allow him to break down the sters in our vault and use the resulting gold coins to pay out his other debts. Even if that didnt materialize, he had known the main sellers at the festival for years, andnot that it was an excuse, buthe figured theyd be willing to work with him a little more. He thought IOUs or payment in ancient gold pieces would be eptedbut the tradesmen working under the merchants balked at it, and that put even Mjllmiles closest merchant friends in a bind.

    I see, Diablo said, nodding. Something tells me this is being engineered by someone.

    And I agree. I never expected someone to meddle with us like this

    So Mjllmile thought this was deliberate, too? But who would do that?

    I am sorry, Sir Mjllmile, Rigurd rumbled. Putting you through all this without even realizing it

    Rigurd, too, was busy handling our foreign visitors. If he felt responsible for it, its because he realized this was a bigger problem than just one man. No, it was no mistake on Mjllmiles part.

    So someones trying to ruin our reputation, then?

    I would imagine so. The international rules set by the Council of the West stipte that payments must be made with gold coins minted in the Dwarven Kingdom. Different rules apply in different nations, but under the Western Nationsws, the tradesmen are making a perfectly valid im

    If these people were part of the Free Guild, we could get that organization involved. They received favorable treatment in customs-rted matters, and our nation had a fairly good rep with them. But these were merchants from nations affiliated with the Council, and while they came from different countries, they had to work by international ruleson the surface, at least. Us saying well, we go by these rules wouldnt be very readily epted.

    But even before thatwhat if all these tradesmen were colluding to cause problems? If so, taking a my-way-or-the-highway approach would be even worse. It could be just what they wanted.

    If we force our rules on them, would that cause a bacsh with the Council?

    Itd be another matter if we were already part of the Council, but if were thinking about joining it in the future, this would not paint us in a good light, no.

    Normally, payment in ancient coinage wasnt a problem. But if someone wanted to mess up our reputation, what then? It almost felt like someone was testing us, seeing if we intended to follow international rules.

    Did someone from the Council do this?

    I dont know who it is, but its someone high up, yes. Someone with the ability to build connections with merchants far and wide and nt them among the tradesmen supplying us. Because pulling something like this, youd need to resign yourself to enduring some losses. That takes guts, and it tells me this is about more than just tarnishing our reputation.

    Mjllmile wasnt from arge country, but he was still well versed in the underground economy. If he said this was someone high up, someone we couldnt trace, it had to be seriously bad news.

    So we cant force our own rules on them? Shion asked.

    I nodded. Right. Youve gotten pretty clever, Shion. If we do force our rules on them, theres a chance the Western Nations wont count us as allies. And since we want to y nice with humans, we have to avoid that at all costs.

    But wasnt it your n to build an economic bloc with Thalion, Blumund, Dwargon, Farmuser, Farminus, and the demon lord Milims domain? If Tempest is located in the middle of that, wouldnt ignoring us lead to even greater losses for them?

    Whoa! Is this really Shion?! Because Im honestly surprised. She fully understood my thoughts so much, I genuinely wondered if this was a body double of some sort. Her sharp analysis was right on the mark.

    Keh-heh-heh-heh-heh You truly are worthy of being head secretary, Lady Shion. You are correct.

    Arent I? So why would they try meddling with us? If they cant ignore us, wouldnt it be better to try building trust with us?

    For once, Shion wasnt spouting off random junk. She really got the gist of this. Astounding. Plus, that was exactly the question on my mind.

    People can be very strange creatures, Diablo replied. They all must work together to survive, and yet they cant resist building ss systems among themselves. And if two groups of them live next to each other, they continually squabble until one proves itself superior to the other. The weak and pitiful fear nothing more than losing their own vital interests. And in this case

    Hmph, Benimaru grunted. Are you saying that the Councils worried that our economic alliance puts them in jeopardy?

    Exactly.

    Diablos exnation was certainly easy to grasp.

    Benimarus question assured me of it, and the rest of my staff seemed convinced. A few of them were already getting worked up over it. Comical, a smiling Diablo stated. These foolish rulers, incapable of understanding their position, refusing to ept Sir Rimurus kindness They should all crumble to the ground.

    It was a little extreme, I thought, but Shion still nodded. Hee-hee! So the vice secretary agrees?

    I was d to see them cooperating, and I was really starting to see Shion in a new light, although I suppose at her core she wasnt much different.

    Thats not gonna happen.

    They both gave me disappointed looks. Theyre so predictably alike with stuff like this.

    Either way, Soei said, we cannot let this go unaddressed. Would you like me to thoroughly investigate these tradesmens past employers?

    Wed probably need to. It might just turn up something. But thatd have to wait until after the festival. For now, it was likely best to avoid rash action, just so we could handle anything that came our way. Once we overcame the problem at hand, then we could figure out who was behind it.

    Thats important, yes, but hold off for now. Mjllmile, when is payment due for these people? Can you hold them off until then?

    First, I wanted to show them wed stick to Council rules. If we couldnt avoid breaking them, wed deal with matters then. It wasnt like this would turn into war or threaten anyones lives. I didnt think it was too urgent.

    Yes, well, theyre all enjoying the festival as well, so they are willing to wait until the day after it closes. My own friends have been talking with them, but thats as far as they were willing topromise with us

    The day after it closesso three days away. We had two days to work with, essentially.

    And said friends are also helping me raise money at the moment. Theyre able to exchange ancient coins for Dwarven ones, at something of a loss to us, but as for whether they cane up with cash funds quickly enough, thats an open question

    Sounds tough. I bet it was. Just taking it over here by wagon would be difficult enough. One of my staff could use Spatial Motion to hurry up the process, but scrambling around the world in search of gold pieces that may not even exist seemed ineffective to me. Besides, for all I knew (though I doubted it), maybe our foe was trying to lure my main advisers out of town. Again, rash moves were ill-advised.

    Wait! Werent there gold bars among the goods wed imported from the Beast Kingdom? Could we use those to manufacture fake coins? My Analyze and Assessdriven copies would be exactly like the real things, right? Nobody could ever tell them apart, even with the Dwarven Kingdoms technology!

    Understood. This is not possible. Dwarven coins are inscribed with a magical serial number that would make counterfeits easily identified.

    Oh.

    I took a gold coin from my Stomach and looked at it for a moment. Raphael was rightthere was a number inscribed on it. I could make an exact copy well enough, but two coins with the same number would be enough proof that at least one was a fake. Besides, um, wasnt counterfeiting punishable by death in most countries way back when? No wonder this world used magic and technology to regte their coinage. I suppose theyd have to, to sustain a de facto universal currency like this.

    So we cant make our own coinage, and we likely cant buy enough in time

    Everyone nodded at me.

    Well, even if it means taking a loss, can we pay them with pure gold, via the bars we have?

    Wouldnt the merchants be d for that, at least?

    I imagine the more intelligent merchants would take that offer, but I have to say no to that!

    Mjllmile was having nothing of it. I asked him why. It seemed like a good idea to me, at least.

    Its because then theyll see what kind of footing were on. Every time we negotiate with a nation afterward, theyll look back at how we dealt with this matter, and theyll see that if were presented with an impossible quandary, well try to force a solution even if it means taking losses. And once we gain that reputation, people will deliberately give us unfair offers. They wont see us as an equal trading partner. You can be sure theyll serenade us with their flowery words all day, but

    Mjllmile smiled a bit. But he was right. Show weakness to a merchant, and theyd fleece you dry. He sure would, I knew.

    Regardless, Ill try my best to assemble the coinage we need in the scant two days ahead. Fortunately, our visitors have been very generous to us so far. We might just be able to go on the offensive at the end of this!

    Thank you.

    For now, at least, there was no clear solution. Our only real choice was to remain defiant. We couldnt do anything too bold, and if it came to it, wed just have to force our rules on them. Nothing told us we had to respect every singlew people put upon us. This is Tempest, and weve got our own way of doing things. I mean, sure, if we could respect everybodys regtions, that was the best thingbut either way, we couldnt let those tradesmen go home empty-handed. Wed force the issue, but wed do it fairly. Even if they didnt like ancient coinage, or IOUs, or payment in barter, I didnt think they had any right toin.

    Well, no point worrying too much about this. This is our nation, and if worsees to worst, well make them follow our rules. So dont overthink it and just do what you can!

    You got it.

    Mjllmile brightened a bit, apparently relieved. I dont know what the Council will say to us, but lets be optimisticby then, well know who this enemy is, at least. Or maybe not an enemy, really, so much as someone feeling us out. It was too early to call them an enemy.

    Right. Meeting adjourned! Good job, everyone!

    And with that, this evenings progress report was a wrap.

    Procrastinating on our problems created some annoying issues for me, I felt, but it wouldnt do to fret about them too much. It looked like Mollie was really getting eaten up over it, so I figured Id shoulder some of the load for him.

    Wanna head out for a little while, Mollie? And you guys, too.

    None of the men in the room was going to say no. A few of them, like Benimaru, were already in their yukata and ready to have some fun.

    Ah, but I need to start raising money

    Oh, quit worrying about that for now! If its not there, its not there. If you get so worked up that it knocks you out, thatd be an even bigger problem for us!

    Mjllmile snickered. Ah, I could never say no to you. Well, all right! I, Mjllmile, am ready to take your offer!

    So I managed to drag Mjllmile with me to the festival for ate-night run. That ought to help him mentally rechargefrom the heart, too. Dont party too much, Sir Rimuru, I could hear Shuna say as we set off. And you, too, my brother

    Oh, and by the way, I saw a silver-haired girl have a verbal argument with the proprietor of a certain takoyaki stall that hade up in conversation earlier. But let sleeping dogs lie. Ive said that many times before, but if you stick to that rule, you really do avoid a lot of danger and trouble in your life.

    Thus I gracefully let them carry on and had my fill of everything the night had to offer.

 Volume 9 - Ch 3

    THE BATTLE TOURNAMENT

    I had way too much to drink.

    As a rule, I can drink as much as I want and never get buzzed off it, but that problem was ovee by toning down my Cancel Poison ability a little. That was a trick Luminus had taught me, and at a festival like this, let me tell you, I was treasuring it. I used that trickst night as well, distracting Raphael just long enough to pull it off and enjoy the pleasant feeling of drunkenness for a while.

    The result was this very unexpected headache. Can I do anything about this?

    Unfortunately, your Cancel Pain ability has also been weakened. The pain is likely to continue for the time being.

    Oh,e on, that is so on purpose

    I knew how angry Raphael wasst time. I bet its even worse now

    Understood. This fact cannot be confirmed.

    Its a fact, huh? And why isnt Cancel Pain working? Its got nothing to do with any of that! Its crazy!

    Myints apparently werent making it to Raphael. I was not-so-graciously ignored, and so I had to fight that headache for a while afterward. I regretted ita littleand vowed to be more careful next time. Of course, I think that every time, so Ill probably make the same mistake again soon.

    Im sorry.

    I know I did this, so please ease the pain a little!

    Raphaels exasperation was loud and clearbut after a little while, the pain went away. Lets try being a bit more careful, for real, next time. Food, after all, can be a sort of poisonnot eating it will kill you, but eating too much can wreck your body. Drinking, then, is the same thingor was that stretching it a little too much? I mean, I should just sit back and enjoy the buzz a little more instead of trying to force mattersbut I just cant help but try keeping up with my friends.

    After I stopped by a few ces with Mjllmile and the gang, I decided to go on an inspection of the members-only, elf-run club on the ny-fifth floor of the Dungeon. This was the fanciest club in our nation, passing itself off as a ce where only the truly elite gain entry.

    For now, it was open to our foreign dignitaries for advertising purposesand that turned out to be not so smart of an idea. The ce was hopping, full of people who couldnt forget the music they experienced that day and people arguing over the new potion discoveries they just learned about. Gazel and Vester were among them, and once we were spotted, I had to hang out with them for a while. We hit it off, drinking and talking well into the nightand all the praise heaped upon my friends spurred me to get really drunk. I regret that now, but I think anyone there would understand.

    And I wasnt the only one. All the other dignitaries were the same. Which, hey, they paid big money for the privilege, so its all good.

    Besides, something else good came from it. A drunken Gazel offered to help me with the gold coins we were missingand then Archduke Erald came along and promised hed bring our predicament under consideration.

    It was all thanks to the power of alcohol.

    And so, with somewhat fatigued faces, all of us prepared to tackle Day Two of the Founders Festival.

    We were at the newlypleted coliseum, a gigantic arena thatfortably seated fifty thousand. A roof that jutted over the stands kept direct sunlight from hitting them, extending in a U shape across the arena. It wasposed of a thin, membrane-like sheet stretched over a framework that looked like the wings of a dragonwhich, really, was designed that way because I thought it looked cool. I wanted something all ominous like that. It really was there to block the sun, but that wasnt what anyone in attendance thought. They looked up at the eerie sight, telling one another about how surprised they were. It even got some of our weirder attendees oddly excited.

    The stands were full now, not an empty seat in the house. Mjllmile had worked to get people into the coliseum, and now his efforts were paying off. He didnt leave a single stone unturned. He mightve been down in the dumpsst night, but there was no doubting ithe was a damn capable man.

    The t arena space the stands surrounded was ourbat zone, the floor built from gigantic stones carved and buried in the ground. These hard rocks, each around six feet square, were ced in neat tiles to form the foundation. The spaces between them were filled with cushioning that also glued them together, forming what looked like apletely smooth rock surface.

    I had crafted this in the short time we had to work with. Regr rock is over three hundred times as solid as concrete, but the type I used here was infused with a great deal of magicules, upping that hardness to ten thousand timesextending six feet into the ground. Not even a nuclear shelter could give you that kind of sturdiness. I havent actually tried it, but I bet it would withstand a bout of nuclear magic without a problemand it was impervious to both magic and physical attacks.

    Around this rock-floor arena were two defensive barriers. The first one was arge magic circle that covered the floor and extended out below the standscovering the whole ground area so we could use this arena for battle trainingter. The second one was a circr zone one hundred and fifty feet in diameter, where spectators could easily see it. It was within this magic space that the fighting would take ce in this tournament.

    The purpose of these dual barriers was to ensure the arena stayed intact and keep stray fallout from hitting the stands. The first one blocked magicules from getting in or out but didnt block any abilities unleashed inside it. This created fears that a powerful-enough spell could impact the area around it, and thats where the second barrier came in. If things really got hairy in there, I could invoke Uriel, my ultimate skill, and use it to trigger Absolute Defense. I really didnt want to show it off in public, but it beat having to deal with injured spectators. The skill triggered in an instant anyway, so I doubted anyone would even notice.

    With all these precautions, I figured we were set to go. The two barriers alone should handle matters well enough. When my own staff fought in the arena, all bets were off, but the other fighters who qualified for today wouldnt have enough firepower to break through them. Then again, I wasnt expecting Masayuki the Hero to join in

    Passions were high in the coliseum. Why wouldnt they be? The battle tournaments in Englesia were massive events, held every year and featuring contests divided by adventurer rank. In a world without many good entertainment options, a spectacle like this was a festival in itself. However, it wasnt actually open to themon sses. Only the monied were allowed in; the others had to sit tight and await the results. Some people would try getting a peek of the action from atop a roof or column, but I was sure it wouldve been too far away to see much.

    Compared to that, our coliseum had tiered seating, providing space for all the throngsand there were even giant screens on all four sides showing the action, a nice extra service. Optical magic was inscribed on these screens, making erged imagery like this a snap. Some of the attendees at yesterdays presentation mustve guessed it was an adaptation of the projector they saw previously. The screens here were drawing even more interestagain, great PR for us.

    It was important to cover all the little details like this for our sales pitch. Thats the first step to sess, one of the lessons I learned during my time working for apany.

    So essentially, you could see the action from any seat in the arena, and the screens were there to give you a close-up vantage point, so I didnt think wed be disappointing anyone here today.

    And now thepetitors were approaching the center of the stage, forming a line that faced the VIP boxes we were seated in. The screens showed each one in turn, in enough detail that you could gauge their facial expressions. They all certainly looked unique in their own wayand I knew at least a few of them. Gobta and Geld, of course, but that wasnt all

    I basked in the surprise as the introductions began. Each one would get their own little intro, the screens changing their viewpoints to offer a close-up view of the fighter being described. The announcer was Soka, a dragonewt working under Soei, and she began by announcing the six winners of the battle-royale rounds.

    First, our most poprpetitor! Winner of the first battle yesterday, his name is Masayukiiiii the Herooooo!!

    She was really getting into it, standing right in front of thepetitors with her face unmasked. This wouldnt affect her work as a covert agent of ours, would it?

    Not a problem, Soei, on standby next to me, said when I asked. She is disguised when on duty, and Soka is particrly gifted at concealing herself. Besides, we need someone among our ranks to serve as a known figure, for the purpose of public events.

    If that was his take, I saw no need for worry. She clearly had a gift for emceeing anyway.

    No one has seen his graceful sword skills in person. Why? Because the moment he takes out his de, his opponent is already dead!

    So how did he win anything up to now? You could get away with that kind of hype in a street fight, maybe, but Masayuki was winning big tournaments, right? Maybe he would finish off apetitor in one blow, but could he trick an entire audience like that?

    How did his fight go yesterday?

    To be honest, there was little we could learn from it

    As Soei put it, Masayuki hadnt even unsheathed his sword. Some of his friends were among those fighting in his round, and they apparently dispatched all the other fightersa good fifty of thembefore conceding victory to Masayuki. There was no chance to gauge his skills at all. If he had thisrge a fan base, he clearly had to have some abilitybut I still couldnt shake the feeling this was all a big put-on.

    Ah well. Well see what hes really made of in the match today.

    With his overwhelming force, hes be a household name, dering himself a Hero at his tender age! But what does Masayuki have in store for us today?! Many are those charmed by his sweet face, and many are the women who swooned after one nce from him! Now its time for all of us to count our blessings, as were about to see him break out everything hes got!! Its Ma! Sa! Yu! Kiiiii!!

    Yeaaaaah!! the audience shouted, buying into Sokas hype. Masayuki was hugely popr, wasnt he? ButI mean, really? Hes actually that popr? Also, did Sokae up with that script? If so, shes got a hidden talent. Half of that was pure garbage, the other half bare-faced praise. Where did Ma! Sa! Yu! Kiiiii!!e from anyway? It all but melted my brain as I was listening to it. And it had to be hard for Masayuki, toowhat if he got touted like that and lost in the first round? Id be too ashamed to show my face. If anything, it was a really mean-spirited way to introduce him.

    It had to be Soka backhandedly mming him, I thought. No wonder she was Soeis closest assistant. Malicious.

    The next contestant was Jinrai the Mad Wolf. He had a grizzled-hero feel, and despite his shabby equipment, he just looked like a badass. One of Masayukis friends, too. By the looks of things, he wasnt an A rank in terms of strength, but I still felt like you couldnt go easy on this guy. There was a secret lurking around him, if you asked me, and I decided to keep a close eye on his match.

    Contestant number three was a man named Gaiye the Flowing Swordsman, whose skills with a de were his main draw.

    He dances like a seasoned performer during battle, stealing the hearts of all who watch! Will he show us his graceful moves today, as the blood sprays around him like crashing waves?!

    Whoa! Scary! Dancing around spraying blood is kind of twisted, isnt it? He didnt look as muscr as Jinrai, but depending on those sword skills, maybe he could rank an A? He didnt look like that much of a threat, but Im sure he was a talented adventurer.

    The fourth and fifth contestants were familiar to me. They were the chiefs of the bovoids and the equinoids.

    Um, why are they here? I asked Soei.

    Well, there have been some rumors spreading around

    Rumors?

    Yes. You know, your offer of naming the champion one of the Big Four

    What?!

    For whatever reason, word had gotten outI figured Gobta or someone mustve bbed about it. As a consequence,rge number of monsters had requestedst-minute entries in the battle-royale matches, apparently, resulting in over three hundredpetitors and one raucous time at the arena yesterday. This included the bovoid and equinoid leaders,peting against each other as much as the rest of the crowd, and they were both lucky enough to reach the quarterfinals. Or maybe luck wasnt involved. They were both formidable creatures, easily worth an A rank, and an adventurer off the street probably wouldnt stand a chance.

    Still, really, both of them?

    There were a few monsters ranked A-minus in each of their preliminary rounds, apparently, but they literally trounced them all, throwing them around like rag dolls. Thats what being such powerful bovoids and equinoids got for you. Or to be more specific:

    The winner of the fourth preliminary, Boooooooovix!!

    Ah, right. Id named the leader of the bovids Bovixand to keep from ying favorites, Id also named the equinoid head Equix.

    This was, of course, so I could have them serve as bosses inside mybyrinth. I wanted one of them to rule the roost down on Floor 50 or (as I suggested to them) maybe even swap duties regrly. They said they had sworn their faith to me, so I didnt hesitate to put them to workin exchange for naming them.

    I was used to how this process worked by now, so I tried to hold back my magicule energy as much as I could when naming them, but they went and evolved on me anyway. Bovix was now a tauroid, while Equix became a centoidand given that both were A-ranked before, they had be far stronger than I expected.

    Plus:

    Question. Am I allowed to apply an experimental Skill Gift to the subject Bovix?

    Yes

    No

    Raphaeler, Professor Raphael seemed awfully excited about the idea. Apparently, in addition to Combine/Disassemble and Ability Adjust, there was a high chance that Belzebuths Food Chain ability could be reversed to grant a skill to a named target. The conditions andpatibilities involved were a bit tricky, but Raphael was eager to try it out, so I thought yes to myself.

    Report. Granting the extra skill Ultraspeed Regeneration to the subject Bovix Granted.

    The professor pulled it off.

    Bovix had already received the extra skill Self-Regeneration when he evolved, and Raphael just applied Ability Adjust to that. What a surpriseand, in much the same way, Equix just acquired Magic Interference, granting both of them a unique addition to their arsenal. It was clear that Bovix could be a melee-attack specialist now, while Equix would focus on magic attack.

    And Raphaels experimentation didnt end there. The guy even managed to give them an ability I had never heard of before

    the Unique Gift known as Determiner.

    This gift allowed the user to create a space that restricted the powers of the target, a sapping skill that sort ofbined the ultimate skill Uriels Unlimited Imprisonment and Dominate Space. But it was an inferior versioneasily resisted; the space it created was readily canceled out by the target. Not very restrictive at all, really. But if the caster was vastly stronger than the target, they could still drag them into a dedicated space where theyd have the advantage in battle, so a little innovation could still make it useful.

    Itd depend on the opponent, really. In an evenly matched battle, itd never seed but could still trick a foe if you used it right. In fact, you might even be able to use it as a defensive barrier to reduce that foes attack. And if you built a space around yourself where magic was prohibited Hmm. You could do some really neat stuff with it. Equix would be working in thebyrinth, too, so maybe he could use this skill to dangle some bait in front of adventurers, offering to make more treasure chests appear or whatever.

    With this skill, the pair looked more like boss-level foes than ever. And they joined this tournament only because they were attracted to thepletely cosmetic title of Big Four?

    So yes, apparently they had a bet going with each other. Whoever won it joined the Big Four, and whoever lost became the boss of Floor 50.

    It gave me a headache, reallybut then I suppose those two were a perfect fit for this tournament.

    Next, we have Bovixs eternal rival, Equix!! Theyve fought for a hundred years, and still their conflict continues! Will we see a final resolution here in the arena?! Theirbined powers will soon summon new winds of carnage,shing across the entire tournament!!

    Soka nimbly weaved together the words. She was loving this, and clearly she had a talent. She had good looks, too; the audience seemed to like her. There was the tail and wings and horns to consider, but that didnt get in the way of being cute, really.

    And whats more, either Bovix here or Equix here will be one of the masters of the Dungeon, scheduled to open in town tomorrow!! So behold their strength todayand if you feel worthy of the challenge, summon your courage and plunge into thebyrinth in search of fame and fortune!!

    Actually, she was beyond loving this, advertising thebyrinth for me and everything. Tomorrow was its grand opening, and much of the audience probably didnt have any idea what it was yet. And given how strong this pair was, would there be anyone stouthearted enough to tackle it? I feared this was a tactical blunder on our part, but then, many adventurers in this world did tend to overestimate their abilities. Lets hope a lot of them will dive in, attracted by all the money and prizes. Mjllmile had all kinds of ns underway for it. It ought to be fine.

    So which of them was going to win? Depending on the draw, they might never actually face each other. After all this buildup, if one of them got whipped here, itd sure make us look prettyme. A lot would depend on the battles to unfold today, but if they didnt pan out, people might think the Dungeon was a big pushover. Wed have to tackle that possibility if it happened. Besides, if people thought theyd have an easy time in there, thatd just attract more challengers looking to strike it rich.

    No need to rig the drawing, though. Lets just see how it works out.

    Still, Equix was the fifth challenger. That left three to go, and just one from yesterdays rounds.

    Moving on, our fifthpetitorthe mysterious masked man who showed unbeatable strength yesterday! Under his lion mask, he remains anonymous; is he a defender of justice or a servant of evil?! And how will he charm us all on the battlefield today?!

    Pfffttt!!

    The moment Iid eyes on Lion Mask, I spat out the juice I was drinking.

    S-Soei! Is that?

    Yes, there is no mistaking him

    He didnt name him, but Soei was just as sure of his identity. Didnt Diablo tell me none of them would be a concern? What is he, blind? That, or Diablo was being way overconfident.

    But forget about Diablo a moment. I could see a trio in the arena cheering Lion Mask on, tears in their eyes. One was tall, with a tensed-up body, a gentle face, and an earring. Another was a huge pile of muscle with a nose ring, and the third was short, squat, and straight-up fat, with a pierced lip. They had wild hairstyles in funky colors, andwell, why beat around the bush? These were Daggrulls sons.

    You could tell because they had clothing on with slogans like SHION FAN CLUB!! and SHION 4 LIFE on them. Thats them, all right. Ever since Shion beat the crap out of them, theyd be her biggest fans. Maybe this was some form of masochistic fetish theyd developed after getting their asses handed to themI dont know; thats not a world I want to get intimate with.

    I wanted to ask if they were feeling all right, but I suppose that if you didnt know Shion, youd see her as this cool, intelligent beauty. Thats how I had thought of her at first, too, actually. But ahhh, who cares? Let them be. Its a matter of time before they learn the truth and their dreams are shattered, but that was the life they chose. We had agreed to keep a half-hearted eye on them and put them under Shions training, but

    Hey, Soei, why is that trio cheering for Lion Mask?

    Because they all lost to him yesterday, I would imagine.

    Aha.

    They mightve looked like jokes, but they did have the magical energy of a former demon lord. Shion had whipped them thanks to theirck of battle tactics, but they werent pushovers at all. In fact, they probably still ranked above the recently evolved Bovix and Equixand if this masked fighter beat all three of them at once, there was no longer much doubting his identity.

    How disappointing. Ill need to work them harder than ever now.

    Shion seemed angry at them, but honestly, I had some pity for the brothers. They messed with the wrong guy, is all. They were too cocky for their own good, Im sure, but against a former demon lord who still packed one of the meanest punches in the world, it was like a grown-up pitted against a team of kindergarteners. Itd be crazy to expect them to win.

    Still, though All three of them getting thrown into the same match? Against that monster? Talk about bad luck on all sides. One of them couldve had a chance at the grand prize if things had worked out otherwise. But Shion was revving to train them more than ever now, so lets look forward to that.

    Ahhh, and Ive just received a message from a certain anonymous fan. It says: I cant be here, but you better do your best for me! I know you know this, but dont let anyone discover your secret identity, no matter what! Good luck!! Whatever could that mean? I dont know, but it sounds like a nice message of support for Lion Mask!!

    Of course she knew. Soka knew, and she was enjoying it. Had Milim gotten in touch with her at some point?

    Right nowording to what shed told me, at leastMilim was busily applying the final touches to thebyrinth. I let her go, since it beat her getting in my hair over here, but I never thought shed meddle with me like this. I hadnt called Veldora over here, either; he should be with Milim and Ramiris right now, having fun building the Dungeon and losing all sense of time. I didnt want him getting too excited and razing the ce, which was one reason I didnt invite him. Milim throwing an underling into the arena was a surprise, but Veldora, at least, didnt have anyone like that to turn to.

    So who would win it all here? Lion Mask had a massive strength advantage over anyone else, and while Geld couldnt match that, I figured he had the best chance at him out of anyone. I wanted him to win, but itd be an uphill battle, huh? At least Lion Masks victory wouldnt lead to any problems, unless there was some kind of double-KO situation with Geld. I also wanted to see what would happen if he drew Masayuki. The Hero had to fight sometime, after all, if he wanted to win, right?

    Either way, good luck to the guy.

    Those were the six qualifiers from yesterday. That just left the special entries.

    And now to introduce the strongest of the strong! The greatest among the government officials of Tempest, two titans joining us in the coliseum! Each of them boasts the offensive force of a thousandand if they win, theyve been promised a position in Sir Rimurus vaunted Big Four!!

    The rumors had already spread like wildfire, but hearing the term Big Four get bandied about was honestly embarrassing. For Shion, though, it was a badge of prideand I could see the monsters in the audience looking at Gobta and Geld with awe. Everyone seemed to see a lot more value in the Big Four than I originally envisioned.

    First, the elite fighter whose aloof demeanor makes all the girls go wild, the warrior captain who takes his genius in strideGooooobtaaaaa!! Ladies and gentlemen, what are we going to see from him today?!

    Aloof? Are you sure youre using that word right? And Gobta was visibly pale up there on the arena floor. I thought I could hear him internally shouting, Im outta heeeeeere! I could see why. He waspletely outssed by Lion Mask. If they were to face each other in battle, hed be beaten beyond half to death even if the guy went easy. Sorry, Gobta. I wasnt quite expecting this. If you want to resent anyone for this, resent Milim for putting her ringer in on a totalrk.

    But maybe Hey, if Gobta really strove for it, maybe he could tap into some kind of hidden strength, you know? For all we knew, he might suddenly awaken to amazing powers, the likes of which not even Ive spotted on him so far.

    This ought to be fun! I could see the path ahead for Gobta was just beginning.

    Anyway, that just left Geld.

    And with the warm-up acts introduced, I now present to you the star performerSir Geld, the high orc savior!! The guardian angel of Tempest, his iron-wall defense repels all would-be attackers!!

    Whoa there, Soka. Did you really call everyone up to now, Gobta included, warm-ups and give Geld more of a straight-up intro? Hed been a top official of mine for a while, yes, but You know, Gobtas an old veteran by now, too. I guess its just a matter of status. If Gobta somehow wins this, maybe Soka would start treating him a little differently.

    Now we have all eightpetitors in the ring! Whos going to reign supreme? The fateful moment is about to arrive!!

    Oops. If she was done introducing everyone, it was my turn to step up and give an intro. I forgot I was supposed to say some opening words in front of the fighters. But I didnt want to look like I was panickingthatd just be sad. Rigurd was taking care of our dignitaries for me, so I left Benimaru to guard them, ordering Soei to watch over the whole of the arena for me.

    Then I stood up and headed over, trying to act calm andposed as I used Dominate Space to connect a path from the VIP seats to the main arena. When I passed through to the other side with Shion, I was greeted by deafening apuse.

    Raaahhhhh!!

    The sight of me filled our residents, and those from nearby nations, with excitement. I had to respond to them. It gave me a little stage fright, but I worked hard to act all high and mighty, like a demon lord should. Taking the mic from Soka, I turned to thepetitors.

    Fighters, if you survive through the end of today and win the final round tomorrow, I will grant you the glory of my nation

    Does that work? I kept my pace slow, giving my best shot at a voice of authority.

    Next up, I suppose I ought to give a little encouragement to each of the entrants.

    Masayuki the Hero Win, and I will invite you to challenge me.

    Wed already worked out that promise. Masayuki didnt look the least bit happy about it. In fact, he winced, as if to say, What do I get out of that? Nope. It just didnt seem like he wanted a fight at all. I couldnt hate him for that.

    My eyes went from him to the next fighter. Mad Wolf Jinrai, right? Masayukis friend.

    And youre Mad Wolf Jinrai, correct? Do you have any requests?

    Soka deftly brought another mic to Jinrai.

    Oh! I wasnt expecting you to talk to me, too. I have only one hope, and thats to help Masayuki. Sorry, but theres no way Im gonna be champion. But instead of that, Im sure the Heros going to defeat you for us!

    Um, okay. If Jinrai draws Masayuki, then that battles pretty much decided already. No, I guess hes not gonna win.

    Very well. In light of your sportsmanship, no matter what results we see, I will prepare a new weapon and armor set for you. Please consider it a token of my respect for a gant warrior.

    Given the asion, I figured a reward along those lines was suitable. Masayukis band joining the tournament certainly put a lot more butts in our seats. I wanted to repay him for itbut more than that, I wanted to impress the world with how bighearted I was.

    Hmph! Well, if youre givin, Im takin, but dont think you can win me over with bribery, okay?

    With a final snort, he handed the mic back to Soka. He had a lot of sass, but I thought my kindness came across to him. He wouldnt have epted it at all otherwise.

    Next I faced Gaiye the Flowing Swordsman. He spoke first.

    Demon lord, I am far more powerful than that Hero over there! If I win, youll fight with me, wont you?

    Um? That came out of nowhere. I was a terrible ad-libber, so I wasnt sure how to respondbut then I received some unexpected help.

    That is very rude to Sir Rimuru. If you insist upon it, then I will be d to engage you after you emerge as champion. Win against me, and I will make the request to Sir Rimuru himself.

    Diablo, our referee at the side of the arena, shed a cold smile as he spoke to Gaiye. Whew. Yeah, lets just leave this to Diablo. I didnt need any more trouble in my life.

    At the moment, I said, Ive made a personal promise to the Hero. But if anyone else here wishes to challenge me, I invite you to defeat a Big Four member first to prove your strength. Do that, and I will dly ept your request!

    This Big Four concept was proving kinda versatile. I could use it in all kinds of ways, this one included. The more you know.

    Soka finally got around to giving Gaiye a mic.

    Heh. A fine way to dodge the question. So be it. To the Hero, to that demon, and to you, demon lordknow that you will all be bowing to me soon!!

    Hoo boy. Talk about being in way over your head. He should really save that talk for after he wins. Better end this conversation before Diablo loses his temper.

    Flowing Swordsman Gaiye, if you should emerge as champion, I will grant you the special right to challenge me. Hows that sound?

    Screw it. Lets move on. Hes not gonna, after all, so no need to overthink that promise much. I could hear Gaiye snort and say, You better keep your word, but my eyes had already turned to Bovix and Equix. The two of them promptly took a knee.

    I expect big things from you both. Even if you fail to win in this arena, remember that you will be rulers of your domain in thebyrinth. Do not disappoint us.

    Did that sound good? It came across a bit like a threat, but I couldnt have abyrinth boss fleeing for his life in public. They were free to lose, but I wanted them to show off at least a little before they did.

    Yes, my lord! By the name you granted me, I, Bovix, swear I will not stain your reputation as I give everything I have to the battle!!

    And I, Equix, promise you we will honor your glory. As members of this great nation, we will bestow great prestige to it in our fighting!!

    Good, good. A little stiff, but at least they were prepared for battle. And even if they lost, they could take turns guarding the area halfway down the Dungeon. I didnt think either of them had a chance here, but lets just make sure they dont embarrass themselves.

    Which brought us to this guy.

    Uhhh, Lion Mask Dont be too reckless up here, okay?

    Whoa, whoa, thats all you got for me? Be serious!

    I am serious. So, um Yeah!

    There was nothing I could say to him. I could ask him to withdraw or wish him good luck, and itd all just seem so weird. Id be willing to cheer for him depending on who he drew, but if he got paired with (for example) Gobta, thatd be a nightmare. Masayuki would be a perfect opponent for him, but I wasnt gonna pin my hopes on that.

    If his identity got exposed somehow, thatd shake peoples faith in all of us. Itd be a huge wasted opportunity. Honestly, I couldnt do much apart from hope for the luck of the draw.

    Onward.

    Gobta! Great job making it this far!

    Um, I had a bye

    I just know you can win this! I believe in you!!

    I gave him the best pep talk I could,pletely ignoring his response. Nowhere to run for him. I was sure hed do his best to win, in his own way.

    And that just left Geld.

    Geld, youre a strong orc. I want you to use that strength to the hilt in this tournament!

    Yes, Sir Rimuru!

    I expected big things from him. Wish I heard some of that from you, I could hear Gobta say, but I was done with him. Geld was more the strong, silent type, so we were finished in short order. The rest, I was sure, hed demonstrate with his actions.

    After that, it was time to draw the matchings for the tournament. Wed be staging the quarter- and semifinal matches today, with the championship fight ted for tomorrow. That meant six fights today, and we werent going to hold a third-ce match, so tomorrow would consist of a single bout.

    Thepetitors all drew numbers at randomMasayuki number three, Jinrai number four, Gaiye number five, Bovix number one, Equix number two, Lion Mask number eight, Gobta number six, and Geld number seven. These were then put in a bag and picked, one at a time, the resulting pairings being added to an onstage bracket.

    The results:

    Match One: Bovix vs. Equix

    Match Two: The Hero Masayuki vs. Mad Wolf Jinrai

    Match Three: Flowing Swordsman Gaiye vs. Gobta

    Match Four: Geld vs. Lion Mask

    This drawing waspletely fair, so I couldntinbut damn, Masayuki was lucky. That was basically a bye he drew for the quarterfinals. Meanwhile, poor Geld, huh? Facing Lion Mask first thing and all. Could he win? I was honestly interested. It was definitely an exciting matchup, even though I couldnt wee it with open arms.

    In terms of testing out Masayuki, it was pretty much the worst drawing possible. Whoever won Match Two would be facing him in the semis, and Bovix vs. Equix would be a hell of a match, too. The problem was, it was too good a match, one bound to exhaust both sides and leave the winnerpletely out of gas against a fresh, untouched Masayuki. Meanwhile, the top fighter from Matches Three and Four would go on to the finals, but if we wound up with Gobta duking it out against Geld in the semis, theyd also be too tired to thoroughly test Masayukis skill. Plus, Lion Mask was in the mix, and him versus Geld was, as I said, a fight up there with Bovix vs. Equix in excitement.

    I didnt know how serious Carillum, Lion Mask was about this tournament, but Geld did have a lot of strength by now. Having them both fight each other in the first round? I just couldnt believe that draw. It was like destiny itself arranged things so Masayuki would have as easy a time as possible.

    Well, no point whining about it. I could make all the predictions I wanted, but nobody knew how this would turn out. And while I pondered that, the first match was already about to begin

    The other fighters stepped out of the arena, moving back to their waiting area. Bovix and Equix stood at the center, staring each other down and talking trash.

    Hey there, Equix. We should have settled this score long ago, just the two of us. Our fates have intertwined for far too longI hope youre ready to end it here.

    Dont be stupid, Bovix. I, Equix, am the only one worthy to serve in Sir Rimurus elite Big Four! Itd be far more suitable for you to hole up in thebyrinth, enjoying your retirement.

    Silence! Why would the likes of you ever deserve to be in the all-dominating Big Four?!

    Without warning, their battle began.

    They were both close-quarters power types, ax and shield against spear and shield in a pitched battle. Seeing them fight, you could tell they were melee types, not the sort to cast magic or other arts. Bovix hefted hisrge ax upward, swinging it down toward the floorbut it nged against Equixs shield as he pushed it back. It brought Bovixs body down, and Equix wasted no time advancing with his spearbut a nimble backstep from Bovix had its tip whistling through thin air.

    The battle continued for a good twenty minutes, an edge-of-your-seat bnce between offense and defense that showed no signs of letting up. They had fought for the past hundred years, and this duel didnt look like itd end any sooner. The breathtaking monster battle kept the crowd rapt with excitementafter all, one rarely if ever had a chance to see two monsters of their level fight from such a close distance away. Normally, you could go your entire life without witnessing a duel between two A rankers like this.

    They were evenly matched, and that was why the battle extended so long. It was fun to watch. But it came to an abrupt end.

    Its over!

    Bovix moved to finish things, throwing his great axa projectile attack that could pulverize boulders, capable of breaking both its target and the weapon they were holding. Equixs left arm exploded off him, flying through the air. He had sacrificed it to stop Bovixs throw.

    But he just smiled. That was exactly what Equix wanted, and in a single moment, he closed the gap between him and Bovix. Bovix was no doubt expecting Equix to dodge his ax entirely, and this new move left him unprepared for this assault.

    It ends here! Take thisEquine Spear il!

    Equix was at his chest, and the flurry of spear strikes he unleashed was impossible to avoid. With no way to dodge them, Bovix suffered a session of stab wounds all at once. Equix was willing to literally give an arm for this victory, and now he had itor so he thought.

    Not so fast! Lightning Horn!!

    With a roar, Bovixnded a headbutt on Equix with his horns. Lightning crackled up and down them as they extended out twice as long as before. They were vicious weapons, and they tore into Equixs right eye and arm. That settled the battle. The spear fell out of Equixs useless limb as electricity shot through where the horns had stabbed him, searing his wounds. It almost looked like the blood was being boiled out of him.

    Equix had gained the Self-Regeneration skill during his evolution, but the lightning damaged him far faster than he could heal himself. Bovix, meanwhile, had Ultraspeed Regeneration, and the massive holes in his chest and stomach were already closing up.

    The battle was his.

    Injuries thatd normally cause instant death were no problem with Ultraspeed Regeneration. And with Self-Regeneration, even Equixs many wounds were starting to heal themselves. By the time they left the arena, they were both back to normal, Equix already groaning about how hed get him next time. d to see he was well.

    But it was over. Bovix was the first to advance, his masterful fighting earning him cheers from the crowd. What a way to kick off this tournament.

    Seriously, though. Seeing it in action again, Ultraspeed Regeneration was almost like cheating.

    Equix no doubt used the tactics that had served him well in the past. That onrush, followed by a flurry of spear stabs, wouldve ended most contests. That was why he didnt fear those obviously fearsome horns for a moment, and that cost him dearly. I hoped this taught him a lesson. Hed need, I thought, to be more careful, eyeing his foe and figuring out where his aces in the hole were.

    Match Two pitted the Hero Masayuki against Jinrai the Mad Wolf, and as everyone knew in advance, it ended with a forfeit for the Hero. The two of them just shook hands in the center of the arenaand that triggered wild cheering and apuse.

    It made no sense. Why would a handshake whip the crowd into such a frenzy? I could hear them shouting, The Hero has done it again!! and so forth. Why was he so popr? It was alien to me.

    Ah well. I resolved to stop thinking about things I couldnt change. On to the next fight.

    Match Three was the Flowing Swordsman Gaiye against Gobta. How would it turn out?

    By the looks of it, Gaiye qualified for the rank of A, if barely. His weapon and armor were all Rare-level goods, proving that as an adventurer, he was among the best in the businessbut Gobta had a set of Unique-ss armor. I didnt think he was Gaiyes match in skill, but add all their traits together, and you had a pretty decent matchup.

    Ready? Andbegin!!

    The battle started at Sokas signal.

    Hah!!

    With a short breath, Gaiye nted his feet down and thrust his sword. It was a sharp thrust, and I saw where the flowing part of his nickname came from. Excellent work. But Gobtas chest guard blocked it.

    What?! Such fine armor for petty infantry?!

    Gahhh! Thatthats too fast!!

    This happened just after the starting signal. Gobta didnt even have enough time to remove his dagger. Goddammit! I said to myself, scolding him. Youre leaving yourself far too open! Gobtas armor staved off the blow, but it wouldnt next time. It was Gaiyes excessive self-confidence that saved him there, but next time hed clearly go for a joint or some other unprotected spot.

    Pffft! How about this?

    He unleashed a dancing sh, striking at Gobta multiple times. Gobta managed to dodge them all, already at the end of his rope and practically on the verge of tears. By the look on his face, he was probably aiming to get run out of the ring and disqualified. Victory was quickly off the table; he was just trying to protect himselfand that mightve been the right answer, but I wish he couldve tried a little harder. Given how interesting a match this looked like on paper, Gobtas reaction was a disappointment.

    I thought that settled it, buttantalizingly enoughthe battle just refused to end. Gobta kept sidling over to the edge of the arena, and Gaiye kept cutting him off.

    Is he toying with him?

    He doesnt seem to be a very nice person, no. Gobta is hardly gant himself, but I find this mans behavior quite distasteful.

    Shion and I were in agreement. Hmm Now I kind of wanted Gobta to win.

    Ha-ha-ha! Think you can run from me, you peon?!

    Gaiye fought with a bastard sword, its length somewhere between short and long. He also had a gauntlet on his left hand that hended punches with, no doubt to devastating effect. It was an unusual fighting style, and when he came at you with both arms raised, it was hard to guess exactly what hed do. To Gobta, who learned more standard swordsmanship, it was no doubt a tricky foe to juggle.

    Still, Gaiye nevernded any decisive wound. The only real blow so far was the very first one on Gobtas chest te.

    Gobtas being very observant, Shion remarked. You wouldnt be able to dodge those sword strikes for so long unless you could keep up with how he moved his weapon.

    She had high praise for him, and so did I. He did take a few punches, but any sword shes were always met, and deflected, with his dagger.

    All right! Come on, Gobta! Stay focused! Show me whats in you and beat this guy! Ill give you a raise in your allowance! And, um If you win the whole tournament, Ill give you that new fishing pole you wanted!

    R-really?! Then Im pulling out myst resort, okay?!

    If he had ast resort, I really wished hed used it sooner But regardless, my encouragement seemed to do the trick. He actually wanted to fight. I wasnt exactly thrilled with resorting to bribery with him, but with someone aszy as Gobta, that shouldve been my first tactic. I mean, I already had Geld in there; I didnt expect much out of Gobtabut with things as they were, I really needed a full effort from him.

    Gah-ha-ha-ha-ha! Dont try to look smart around me, peon! The likes of you could never beat the strongest out there!

    Gaiye continued to give chase,ughing the whole way. He was no doubt sure of his victory, not even bothering to keep an eye on Gobta. But now Gobta was prepared to do anything to winand thus, Gaiye was doomed.

    Summon! Okay,e on over!

    Gobta was head of the Goblin Ridersand, of course, that meant he could summon a starwolf and Unify with it. This gave him magicule energy on the level of an A-minus monster,bined with the sword skills drummed into him by Hakuro. Against someone like Gaiye, he could more than hold his own.

    Again, though Why didnt you just do this first, man? Damn it, Gobta! He just wanted to lose this ASAP, I knew it.

    But at least now he was serious about

    Huh?

    Wha?

    Summoning, eh? But a dark direwolf is no threat to

    Then Gaiye fell silent. The dark-colored wolf Gobta had summoned had smashed into him at top speed. The swordsman was wrongGobta hadnt summoned a direwolf of any sort, a C- or D-level threat at best. Instead, this dark wolf, wagging his tail and pinning Gaiye to the ground as he licked him It couldnt have been anyone but Ranga.

    Ranga Whatre you doing?

    Tch Quite a tactic. I must hand it to Ranga. Hes be quite the schemer.

    I dont think so, Shion. I really dont think so. Gobta looked just as surprised as us, so I didnt think he meant to do that. This was purely Rangas doing; he must have barged into Gobtas summoning without asking. And here I thought he was sleeping in my shadowI had no idea hed hatch this sort of n.

    Soka ran up to Gaiye, then turned toward Diablo. Gaiye is unconscious. A brilliant move. I think the battles over.

    Diablo the referee, his face deadpan, ruled this a valid attack. He had to have recognized Ranga, right? I mean, I knew he was in his smaller, regr-wolf size, but Oh well. They got along, that much I knew.

    And the winner is Goooooooooob-taaaaaa!!

    Sokas promation was drowned out by the cheers. Given theck of booing from the crowd, everyone mustve epted summons as fair game in this match.

    Really? whispered Gobta. Nobody heard him in the roar.

    But, um, can we really get away with this?

    Summoning magic is explicitly allowed in the rules. I would think it is not a problem.

    Well, if Rigurd thought so, then all rightbut Ranga decided to join in, huh? Hmm. Are you sure this isnt an infraction? Because up to now, Id given Gobta zero chance of winning his first roundbut with Ranga, there was no telling any longer. Considering my initial goal of testing out Masayukis skills, maybe this was a blessing in disguise.

    Right! Time to stop worrying about it. I defiantly decided to let it go.

    Match Four, Geld vs. Lion Mask, was another one worth watching.

    Heh-heh-heh Nice to see I can kick ass for the first time in a while, huh?!

    Lion Mask was certainly ready for this.

    Being able to cross arms with such a vaunted warrior is a very unexpected surprise. I will make the most of this chance to fight such a seasoned opponent and tackle you with everything I have.

    With that, Geld removed the top half of his armor and readied his fists.

    Hohh! You want to fight barehanded? Nice. Thats another one of my specialties.

    He took his own stance against Geld.

    What followed was one for the ages, a battle that was sure to go down in the history of this tournament. It was fist against fist, generating great shock waves of force that sent howling winds across the arena.

    Geld didnt use kicks at all, battling exclusively with punches and throws while shuffling his legs to maintain bnce. No matter what attack was thrown at him, he didnt waver at all. It was What do you call it? The peekaboo style, a term I remembered seeing in one boxing manga or another. At the same time, the punches he threw as he looked for openings, even the ones meant to keep his opponent in check, had the power of a cannon tucked inside. That was thanks to his lower body, the base of the cannon, transferring all the kic energy in his body to his fist. But his fists werent his only threathe had shoulder attacks, and if they got caught in a grapple, he could perform throws.

    Lion Mask, meanwhile, was an all-around fighter who couldunch just about anything at any time. His arsenal was extensive, his physique virtually the equal of Gelds; there would be no overwhelming him with power. In this world, magicule energy meant a lot more than external looks, so Lion Mask may as well have been stronger than Geld.

    But not even he could stay on the attack for long, a testament to Gelds superior defensive skills. Kicks that could crush rocks mmed against his arms, attempting to throw him off bnce, but Geld paid them no mind. So Lion Mask attempted every other trick in the bookjabs, chops, roundhouses, and ax kicks from all directions. All this at speeds that fooled you into thinking there were multiple Lion Masks. The flurry of attacks all nimbly hit home, but none of them affected a defense-focused Geld.

    Ha! Man, this is fun! Youre taking my blows like theyre a passing breeze!

    Heh-heh-heh I am the one who should beining, Geld replied, frustration in his voice. You give me no chance to counter you. Your attacks seem rough, but each one is well refined

    He was holding out well enough for now, but he mustve felt that things would only go downhill from here. Lion Masks strength was the real thingand there was no telling how deep down it went. The way hed unleash blows that cut through his armor, far enough out of range to avoid countersit reminded me of an attack helicopter. It was clear who had the upper hand, but it took more than strength to decide a battle. Sometimes, luck yed a partand who would Lady Luck smile upon today?

    The crowd was growing more passionate by the moment.

    Wh-whoaaa!!

    Wow, what is? What is that?!

    Someone shouted at the top of their lungs, a bag of fries from the food stalls in one hand. Others were excitedly cheering, their faces reddened from the beer they were drinking. The crowd knew just how amazing these fighters were, and it made them roar their approval. Geld, the calm, reserved professional, against Lion Mask, whose aura just made you want to worship himthis fight definitely made a known name out of the two of them.

    The blows they exchanged were devastating, but they didnt seem any closer to resolving this. It was two steps forward, two steps back, both fighters keeping it even as time wore on. The same held true after half an hour, an excited Soka offering hermentary the whole way. Even Diablo kept close watch over them, eyes deadly serious.

    Twenty minutester:

    Youve done well to hold out against me this long. Mypliments to you!

    Heh, heh-heh Itit is an honor, receiving such praise from such a lofty figure

    Enough ttery. But let me ask you something.

    Anything.

    Why arent you using any skills?

    Isnt it evident? Because you still have not shown your true self to me.

    Heh-heh Ha-ha-ha-ha-ha! You call me a lofty figure, but you were aiming to win? Interesting. I cant show you my full true self, but I can show you some real moves!

    They spoke as they kept up the onught. The audience couldnt have heard it, but I picked it all up through Diablos ears. Geldsck of skill usage was a mystery to me as well, but that was why? Geld wanted to fight against Lion Mask and notch an unconditional victory?

    Lion Maskor, lets just say it, Carilloncould Animalize at any time to unlock his full force in battle. His current form was just a temporary one; he couldnt tap his full potential like this. Geld knew it, and that was why he fought strictly with his own body, not resorting to Protector or Gourmet even once. I was sure he didnt want to get that serious with the fight in public, of coursethat anonymous letter read in the introductions all but ordered him not to.

    Carillon was no doubt in agreement, and if it meant revealing his identity, then going all out in this arena was off the table. Even so, he was strong. Your average monster or magic-born didnt stand a chance; he could even conquer high-level elementals.

    Despite that, Carillon was beginning to get a little serious.

    Lets go!

    Yeaaah!

    A golden burst of mystical force shed for just a moment, focusing itself on Carillons right hand. The fist plowed into Gelds arms, leaving afterimages behind. The force was shuddering, exploding against both his arms, sending them flying away from the now-exposed pit of his stomach. It was one of his weak points, and Carillon wasted no time throwing a right jab straight at it. The shock wave coursed across Gelds body with an energy that was physically destructive.

    Well done This is the end for me

    Geld staggered back. But he did not fall. He was trying to make his way outside the ring boundary. Diablo ran over to prop him up, looking toward Soka.

    Its over! The winner is LiooooonMaaaaaaaask!!

    Massive cheers. Massive apuse. The crowd didnt hold back for a moment, screaming their praise at thepetitors.

    I call that Lion Cannonfist. You should be proud, Geld. Not only did you take the full brunt of one of my secret moves and surviveyoure still able to walk.

    Heh! Heh-heh-heh I would love for us to fight no-holds-barred sometime.

    So would I. I havent had a scrap this fun in a while.

    Geld and Carillon both nodded, each treating the other with respect. I could tell they had a deep, heartfelt connection now. Neither of them thought this was the endand it wasnt. If they both got serious and used their full arsenal of skills, the whole match wouldve been different. But the win went to Carillon this time, and Geld was out of the tournament.

    Still, I wanted to tell Geld that I was proud of him. These cheers right nowthis was what it was all about. Thats how amazing a bout this was. I pped as loudly as all the others as Geld left the arena.

    The quarterfinals were in the books, and it was time for an intermission. The semifinals would take ce after the lunch hour.

    A lot of the next round woulde down to how fatigued the winners from thest one were. We had healing potions for all thepetitors, so their physical injuries were healed, but you couldnt tell how they were doing magicule-wise from the outside.

    With the mornings excitement still on everyones mind, the fifth match of the day was about to begin.

    In the center of the arena, Masayuki and Bovix faced each other down, ready to fight for a berth in tomorrows final. The big question for this bout: Were Masayukis powers real, so to speak? Because unless my mind was ying tricks on me, it looked like Masayukis knees were quivering a bit. Trembling with excitement for the uing bout, maybe? And the sweating down the back of his neck was almost like a river. Was he really as powerful as Hinata? I just couldnt convince myself of that.

    As I observed him, Bovix helped himself to Sokas mic.

    So youre the Hero who picked a fight with Sir Rimuru? A pity, then, you so fail to realize your ce.

    He was taunting Masayuki. But the Hero just gave him an aloof smileor, to put it in a lessplimentary way, his mouth gave an odd twitchand let it slide. Then he extended a hand to Soka, asking for a mic.

    Heh. Your fighting was a marvel to see.

    Um Yes.

    He wasnt taking the bait. In fact, he was praising him. Masayukis more mature than I thought.

    But that makes it all the more a pity.

    A pity? What is a pity about it?

    The Hero didnt seem in a great hurry to start this match. What was he going to say next?

    If you were in peak shape, it wouldve been fine for me to fight with my full strength. But you used the majority of your endurance in the previous round, didnt you? I just find that to be such a pity.

    I wasnt expecting him to announce that hed not fight all out this round. It seemed like a sincere gesturethat, or maybe just making excuses?

    What are you?

    I, um, I just mean, if I fought and beat you right now, I wouldnt get any joy out of it.

    Ive heard the demon lord Rimuru appointed you one of the masters of thebyrinth hes prepared? I guess youre more interested in joining the Big Four, but

    Fool! The role of master of Floor 50, the midsection of the Dungeon, is a great honor for myself and Equix! But it will not prevent me from aiming for even loftier heights

    Oh? Well, sorry to say, but the way I see it, Geld yesterday looked far more suited to the Big Four than you strength-wise

    Nnnnnngh

    First he praised him; then he dissed him. What was Masayuki thinking?

    If I fight you now, Im likely gonna win. But at your full, rested peak, I dont know how itd goespecially down in thebyrinth, your home turf. I just think, you know, itd be such a waste if we had to settle this right now.

    Nnnnnh?!

    Whoa, man. I hate to think this, but does Masayuki have no intention of fighting at all?

    Ill be tackling the Dungeon here, definitely, no matter how my fight with the demon lord works out. You know? So what do you think? You can get back to full strength, I can meet you down there, and you can try to fend me off.

    Now I was sure of it. Masayuki was acting all breezy and self-confident, but to me, it looked like Bovix was scaring the crap out of him. Was he trying to sweet-talk him into conceding right now? I had ordered Gobta and Geld to weigh Masayukis talents for me, but Bovix didnt know that. Maybe

    Hnghheh Gaaa-ha-ha-ha! Yes, I fully understand what you mean! And it is truejust as you surmised, I have no strength to spare right now. I defeated Equix by only a razor-thin margin, you see But very well. I will trust in you and wait down in mybyrinth!

    Dahhhh, I knew it! Bovix actually said yes to him! And even worse, he was grinning like an idiot as he shook hands with the guy! And the crowd was going wild for it, of course. Youd think someone dering he had no interest in fighting would be greeted with boos and jeers, but for reasons I couldnt guess, they loved every bit of this. I heard people praising Masayukis magnanimity, Bovixs wisdom for admitting his disadvantage, and all kinds of other strange things, across the whole coliseum.

    It made no sense. I really had no idea what was going on. It was so clearly a bluff, but the audience thought it was a genius stroke. I guess he just got some kind of weird charisma

    Wait a second. If thats what Im thinking, maybe Im getting hoodwinked with everyone else. Was this all just an act? If he wanted to avoidbat with Bovix because he knew Id be here and wanted to hide his abilities from me, I suppose that did make sense. I couldnt let my guard down yet.

    So Masayuki was still in the running, already qualified for the final. Gobta and CarillonI mean Lion Maskwere fighting in the second semifinal match, and I didnt need psychic powers to know how that would go. How well could a teenage hero manage against a former demon lord? Thinking about it that way, maybe this wasnt such a bad thing.

    It helped reassure me a little, at least, as I watched Masayuki leave the arena, nketed with apuse.

    Now for the final bout of the day: Gobta against Lion Mask.

    This one was pretty much over before it began, but I still wanted to cheer on Gobta as much as possible. I did promise that fishing pole if he won it all, and let me tell you, I was proud of that pole. It was a new model with a reinforced reel, designed by me so I could catch up with him in our informal fishingpetition. I wasnt about to give it up that easily. I could make another pole with little trouble, yes, but its about thepetition. Gobta wanted it, and that gave him the motivation he neededwhich was great for me, so I had to root for him.

    I mean You know. Lion MaskCarillonwas so gonna win. He was probably gunning for the championship; if not, he wouldve bowed out after that intense fight with Geld. Thatd sure help quash my anxietyabout Masayuki, I mean. Carillon would be the perfect candidate to test him out with. I wasnt sure I could count on Milims underling to pitch in for me, but right now, I felt there was nothing to worry about. He could get easily distracted, making me worry he might cut out of this tournament on a whim, but now it was clear I was too frazzled for my own good.

    Geld and Carillon didnt knock each other out, and now all my worries were in the past. The rest, I figured, I could leave up to him.

    But, as if reading my mind, Gobta was here and absolutely burning with passion. Why is he always running contrarian to my needs? He never puts in an effort when I expect him to Whoa. Wait. I was supposed to be cheering for him. Carillon was gonna win, but I couldntugh at Gobtas efforts, either.

    I turned my eyes to him. Gobta, who had summoned Ranga from the beginning this time, had his back turned to me. Oh man, he was just gonna rely on him again, wasnt he? Thats why he acted so confidenthed just have Ranga fight for him. Not only was it legal, if Gobta wanted any chance of victory, that was his only strategy.

    If I had to guess, Ranga was stronger than Geld. Carillon in no-holds-barred mode was one thing, but this stunted version of him? I thought Ranga had a decent shot.

    Which Hang on. If he did win, what then? If, on the tinyIm talking microbe-sizechance Gobta won, then he could reveal Masayukis powers for me, and my original n would finally pay off. In other words, it didnt really matter who won here, as far as I was concerned. Leaving matters to Gobta concerned me a little, but hey, what happens, happens.

    So I started cheering my head off for Gobta.

    The match began.

    Im not the hobgoblin I usually am today!

    Then why were you running from yourst opponent?

    Dont make meugh, kid. Listen, before anyone gets hurt, why dont you just hurry up and forfeit

    Okay, Ranga, youre up!

    At once!!

    Brushing aside Carillons offer, Gobta made the first move. He and Ranga worked as a well-synchronized team; they must have strategized a bit over lunch. He was serious. He really wanted to win.

    He did, but

    Tiger Talon!

    Sharp, delike ws grew out from Carillons feet. He unleashed a tornado-like jumping roundhouse, aimed at both Gobta and Ranga. His long, sharpened ws offered no clue about their trajectoryand even if you dodged them, their tips emitted some kind of vorpal wave that cut through any target they faced. This skill was just something for Carillon to y with, but to Gobta, itd probably make his life pass before his eyes.

    Byahhh?!

    Gobta fell off Ranga. I knew it. This was just asking too much. He frantically mbered away, attempting to scamper out of Carillons sightbut nobody had any right tough. I mean, yeah, the crowd was allughing, but they could do that because they didnt realize how fearsome Carillon was. Just facing him up and attempting a frontal attack deserved to be praised.

    But Carillon left him alone. Or really, he had tobecause Ranga, freed from the weight of Gobta, was now snarling at him. He was currently the size of arge dog, but even so, his teeth and ws were sharp enough.

    Tch!

    Carillon stopped those fangs with his left arm, letting it be sacrificed to his bite. Then he brought the arm straight down, sending Ranga crashing toward the ground. But Ranga didnt relent. With a spin, he kicked against the stone floor and out of harms way.

    Wh-whoaaa Thats some wolf there.

    Yeah, but arent dark direwolves ranked C at best?

    Oh, you mean the monster Sir Gaiye mentioned? But is that really a direwolf?

    The crowd was already stirring, astonished at Rangas moves. Some of them were already conjecturing on what he could be. Hes a Tempest Starwolf, guys. Special-A grade and not the kind of thing youll see raiding your garbage at night.

    Elephant Stampede!!

    Carillon broke out another attack. The aura kneaded into it smashed into the ground from the skies above, like random lightning strikes. There mightve been room to escape in an open environment, but not in this arenaif a ring-out counted as a loss, your only choice was to take the blow. Or so I thought. But Ranga fled right away from it.

    Huhhh?

    Carillon was the most surprised of all. He probably didnt expect Ranga to just give up the match. It disappointed him a littleand for just a moment, that left him open.

    Yeah, right there!

    Ah!

    Was that Gobta talking? And that ck shadow setting off on cueit was Ranga. Just when I thought hed fled outside the arena, he jumped right out of Gobtas shadow, like nothing was amiss.

    Werent you out of the ring?! Carillon shouted.

    Keh-heh-heh-heh-heh A resummon is not against the rules.

    Diablo shot the exdemon lord down. Carillon blew it. Yes, Ranga was much stronger than Gobta. In Carillons eyes, Ranga needed far more attention paid to him. But his opponent was Gobta, and as long as he didnt step out of the arena, he hadnt lost. It was an underhanded move, but ever since this match began, he had been toeing the boundarythis was what hed aimed for the whole time: ying the fool while hungrily striving for victory.

    This was how hed do it, and the results changed the tide of the match.

    A fang brushed past Carillons head. The attack caught him off guard, and he dodged it by a hairbreadthor maybe not. I thought hed fully avoided it, but then Carillon brought a frenzied hand to his face. Just as he intended to, Ranga had struck a sessful blow.

    The attack took its toll, too. Carillon was on his guard, of course, but he mustve been confident that he could weather any blow as long as it wasnt a direct hit. Instead of clumsily staggering back to dodge Ranga, he dodged just barely enough to segue to his next movea simple choice for someone as dominant as Carillon. As a masterful lord of the battlefield, he had to make it look easythats how he thought, and his powers made that naturally possible. Thats why he had the strength and agility to dodge the attack that came after Rangas surprise reappearance.

    This time, however, Ranga wasnt aiming for Carillon at all but the mask he had on. With his honed instincts, Carillon decided to do the bare minimum necessary to avoid taking damageand that let Ranga bite right through his mask.

    Now Gobta was all smiles. Sweet! Right on target! he joyfully shouted. Then he whipped out his dagger andunched a shot of Icicle Lance.

    Take this!

    Y-you little sneak!!

    The bolt wasnt meant to topple Carillon but to rip the mask off him. Likely realizing this, Carillon fought back with both hands over his faceand that gave Ranga free rein to attack. And with his hands essentially tied behind his back, fending off the starwolf was a herculean task.

    So dirty

    What a cowardly way to fight

    Fight for real, you bastard!

    The spectators werent exactly satisfied with this. But Gobta didnt care.

    Shut up! In this world, might makes right! Sir Rimuru said so himself!

    He was ying to the audience now, shouting right at them. I really wished he wouldnt drag me into this

    Tch. I can see why hes aiming for a spot in the demon lords Big Four. Fighting like that, and not being ashamed of it for a moment.

    Yeah. In fact, hes acting like this is apletely normal tactic!

    He looks kinda dopey, but hes sharp, you know? He was aiming for that from the get-go.

    Ahhh, I bet the demon lord suggested it to him. I mean, check out that stupid-looking face of his. You think he couldvee up with that?

    Scary, isnt it? A demon lord capable of bossing around the Big Four

    Great. Now the crowd was making me out to be some trans-dimensional mastermind. Its all Gobta, okay? All his fault. And I really didnt need a Big Four who required my constant input in order to function, but the crowd would never get that. It was just sad.

    Now Gobta and Ranga had the initiativeand when Carillon finally took a step outside the ring, it was over.

    Curse him! All right. Youve outwitted me this time.

    I could tell he was furious, but he still had his reason with him. Better to bow out, he thought, than to continue this farce any longer. And he was probably rightif it became known that a former demon lord lost in a tournament like this, itd spark an international furor.

    Of course, he did lose only thanks to a publicly announced message from a certain anonymous benefactor. Without that, I doubted this strategy ever wouldve urred to Gobta.

    Stunning! Absolutely stunning!!

    Sokas shouting revved up the crowd once more. I heard cheering, shouting, evenughter. Everyone had their own takes, but either way, they truly enjoyed this fight.

    Did that man really need to conceal his face so badly? That seemed rather exaggerated to me

    Sounded like some of them were even advocating for Gobta. He was definitely the heel of the day, but between his lovable face, his nimble moves, and everything else, nobody could find it in their hearts to hate him too much.

    The crowd was happy, for sure. Geld and Carillons battle was praised for the high quality of itsbat; with this one, people would be talking about Gobtas antics for a while toe.

    This worlds starved for entertainment. Instead of the rule-bound tournament at Englesia, the anything-goes atmosphere of this one seemed to grab peoples hearts a lot more. It was objectively a terrible bout, but in the end, I guess it kinda worked.

    Later:

    As punishment for joining a match without permission, I forbid you from lurking in my shadow until further notice!

    Ranga, trotting up to me with his tail wagging, mustve assumed I would praise him for a job well done. This was a shock to him, but I honestly wondered why he thought Id like it. Butwellthose pathetic, sad eyes he gave me They tugged at my heart, I guess.

    Ranga, I know I gave you that punishment, but my final decision depends on tomorrows contest.

    !!

    Youre theoretically being summoned by Gobta, so listen to what he says and try not to do anything reckless, all right?

    Yes, master!

    Ranga and Shion were good friends, and I think Shions influence made him go overboard at times. I had to put my foot down here, or I couldnt guess what kind of terrifying things hed try next. If he remembered his role as Gobtas summoned beast, everything should be fineat least, he wouldnt overdo it against Masayuki, I thought.

    Gobta, I want you to work with Ranga and give me a hundred percent in the final tomorrow!

    You got it!

    Perfect. I was sure Gobta would have no problem gauging Masayukis true might. The worst-case scenario I pictured involved Ranga going into full beast mode in front of the crowd and then having Masayuki beat his ass. That meant Id have to step into the ring, and I doubted we could talk things out then.

    I really wished we knew more about Masayukis skills in battle. That worried me. Still, I hoped we could settle this without conflict. If Gobta could win, we were goodbut that all depended on tomorrow.

    Thus, despite a few unexpected twists and turns, Day Two wrapped up in an orderly fashion. Todays six matches were over, which left only the finals tomorrowa, shall we say, quite unexpected matchup between Masayuki and Gobta.

    Once the arena emptied out, the night stalls reportedly saw massive profits. The fanboys were crazy for Masayuki, so-called hard cores were devoted to Geld or Carillon, and a few dyed-in-the-wool arena-battle nerds tossed their hats in with Gobta. They were all smiles with one another on the streets, talking excitedly about the days bouts.

    The same was true at our own dinner, spent enjoying a multicourse meal at our tables with the other VIPs. All anyone wanted to talk about was todays tournament. Apparently, that Gaiye dude was pretty famous; Gobtas beating him very suddenly made him the focus of attention. A lot of people had high expectations for the final tomorrow, and my own table was no exception.

    That was sooooooo great!! Just seeing Sir Masayuki stand there looked so crazily cool!!

    You think so? I like Mr. Tempest more!

    And Geld was so awesome. Talk about letting your fists do the talking!

    Yeah! When Lion Mask did that all-out assault on him, his face didnt even move an inch!

    Exactly! And Lion Mask was fierce!

    That barrage was something, huh? I was amazed. Just one cool move after another. I wanna learn some of them!

    You too, Gail? So do I!

    Yeah, me too!

    Alice was all Masayuki. Chloe didnt particrly care. Kenya and the other boys thought Geld was cool under pressure, but Carillon was the more popr choice. He was kind of like an action hero, actually, what with the Lion Mask bit.

    Watching them carry on, I eyed the food on the table with anticipation. Instead of multiple courses, we were all being treated to a fried-shrimp special, along with meatloaf steak and cream-filled croquettes. A very kid-friendly menu, in other words, although I was definitely a fan, too.

    If we were nobility, wed have servants carting all of this over, but tonight we cut that out. Each table was separated by noise-dampening partitionshaving to worry about manners every single meal was exhausting, so I had us go with this setup on Day Two. That let us chat all we wanted as we enjoyed dinner.

    The kids were abuzz about the battle tournamentand if they were that excited about it, Im sure ticket sales were through the roof. I had my concerns about tomorrow, but no point worrying too much about that.

    I could see Carillon grinning at me from the next table over, no doubt hearing the kids carry on. Milim was there, too, looking a bit more peeved. Guess that noise dampening didnt work too well after allthey heard every word from us, although the opposite was also true.

    Heh-heh-heh! d everybody saw how cool I was. Your kids there have good taste.

    Dont be silly! How can you be cool if you couldnt even win the tournament?

    Oh, dont be that way, Milim. I wanted to keep things nice and easy, all right? Nice and easy.

    Pathetic! Have you forgotten your pride as a former demon lord?

    Ha-ha-ha! Of course not. I got to take on a foe Ive had my eye on for a while, and I didnt care about winning anyway.

    Im quite jealous, I heard Middray add.

    You said it! I shouldve just disguised myself and joined in instead

    Dude, if Milim asked to join, I wouldve stopped her at all costs.

    Whoa there, Milim. Thats way too reckless.

    Hes right, Lady Milim. A demon lord as brimming with grace as you would never be able to hide her identity.

    Carillon and Middray agreed with me, at least, immediately trying to dissuade Milim of the idea. I didnt think she was brimming with grace, but oh well.

    Ah, whatever. Lets all watch the final match together!

    Oh? Are you done with yourbyrinth work?

    Its all perfect! So Im gonna go around with Rimuru and his gang tomorrow!

    Would I be able to join you? I heard Frey ask.

    Ill pass, said Carillon. My staff invited me out. Its too bad I didnt make the final, but I want to take my time and look around town tomorrow.

    So Milim would be watching, too. Carillon nned to go out with his Lycanthropeers, and I suppose Frey would be keeping an eye on Milim. Good thing there was only one round of the tournament left. Milim was excited for thebyrinth opening as well, so I figured we didnt have to worry about her.

    But if it was that engaging of a tournament, perhaps I should have joined in?

    Ha-ha! Actually, what were you doing all day?

    Hee-hee Middray was in the concert hall the whole time.

    So was Frey, it seemed, if she knew he was there. If they liked the music that much, I was sure the orchestra would be delighted to hear that.

    Huh? You mean that stuff that put me to sleep yesterday?

    Carillon A barbarian like you wouldnt understand high art, I suppose

    Whoa, Frey, dont talk to me like that!

    Hey, which stuff was this?

    Music, Milim. Remember thatrge band of musicians yman was so proud of, who yed such beautiful music? Well, theres a band just like that here.

    I think this bands better than ymans, but

    Oh? So you know that much about music after all, Carillon?

    That doesnt sound like much of apliment to me, Frey!

    Well, no, its not. I didnt mean it as one.

    You people just treat me like crap

    Ill have you know, Luminus herself spent the day at the concert hall as well, in the best seat avable. I doubt someone like you could fully understand that music, is all Im saying.

    Really? Luminus? Wait, shes here?!

    Hey! I like music, too, you guys!!

    Certainly a lively conversation. I was d they were having fun.

    As I listened in on the other guests, Hinata leaned closer to me.

    So? If you do wind up fighting that kid Masayuki, whatre you going to do?

    Way to drive to the core of the issue, huh?

    Huhhh? Youre fighting Sir Masayuki, Mr. Tempest? I know youre strong, but I dont think youre that strong!

    Sure he is! I think hes way stronger!

    The kids promptly began to argue over whod win in our theoretical fight. Alice and Kenya sided with Masayuki, the others with me. That gave me a one-vote advantage, which I thought I could gloat about, but:

    Oh, whatever. To be honest, not even I have a good gauge of Masayukis strength. You should be wary of him, though, of that much Im certain.

    That sounded like a warning. She didnt go into great detail, since doing so would reveal several of her own skills, but apparently she had done some investigation into Masayuki. The results told her that even she would find him a difficult challenge.

    Of course, she said with augh, I still think Id beat him, nine times out of ten

    Then things got worse.

    Oh yeah, I dont think you could lose to anyone, Hinata!

    Uh-huh. I hate to say it, but youre amazing.

    I dont think anyone in the world could beat Hinata!

    Me neither

    No doubt about it. Not even Lion Mask could put up a fight against her.

    It was unanimous. Hinata was stronger than Masayuki. Me against him was a split decision, but Hinata against him? Five to zero. I was honestly hurt for a moment.

    Well, I grumbled to Hinata, I do think Masayukis interested in hearing me out, unlike some people. I dont think Id have that much to worry about.

    In what way?

    The air suddenly froze between us. That was and mine. One that was in as day, and Id stepped on it anyway.

    Oh, um, nothing. Never mind.

    If youre calling me out, Ill fight you anytime.

    Man, what a temper!

    Realizing my mistake, I managed to cate her with the n I was going to enjoy for dessert. A devastating loss for me. Loose lips, etcetera.

    But youre right. Masayuki seems open to reason. Yuuki said he was his guardian, so if need be, I can talk with him. But we may not need to.

    No?

    Meaning, maybe hell lose tomorrow.

    Hmm, I wont deny that, but this is Gobta were talking about Hes got a knack for screwing things up right when it counts

    He was pretty strong, if hed only take a normal approach to things. But he kept getting these crazy ideas in his mind midway, and that put everything off-kilter. Thats just who he was. And what if he tried something crazy in the final?

    Hmm?

    For a moment, it seemed like Raphael was about to say something. Did I imagine that? Ah well. Im sure it was nothing important.

    But we were talking about Gobta vs. Masayuki. Gobta, with Ranga, seemed to have a clear advantage. If Masayuki could beat Ranga, that definitely made him a serious threatbut somehow, I just couldnt see the kid like that.

    If you ask me, though, I think Gobta has a lot of potential.

    Oh, sure, I said. Ill grant you, he has a lot of good sense. But You know. Hes Gobta.

    Gobta, with a bad habit of doing something stupid and losing a fight he couldve won.

    All right. Well, Ill be looking forward to tomorrow.

    With that, she ended the conversation and took the kids out to the night market. Please, I begged her in my heart, please dont spoil them too much

    Hinata was concerned for me, in her own way. I appreciated that.

    If Gobta lost, wed work something out then. I was prepared for it, and I didnt think anything too bad would happen as a result. For now, I really ought to enjoy the festival.

    We had tons of problems and tons of things to do, but these days really seemed fulfilling to me. I felt happy. So it was time to switch gears. I promised Gazel I would meet with him, and it was time to follow through on that.

 Volume 9 - Ch 3.1

    INTERLUDE

    THE MIDNIGHT CONFERENCE

    I entered the reception room with Benimaru, Shion, and Diablo. Mjllmile was already there, tension writ upon his face. Shuna was taking care of all of us, preparing some drinks once we arrived. His Majesty should be arriving soon, she saidand just as she did, the door opened and Gazel himself appeared.

    Did you wait long?

    No, we only just arrived, too.

    With a few short greetings, we took our seats.

    So let us begin with my conclusion. I ced a contact early this morning asking my men to assemble all our current surplus coinage. This resulted in just a little over fifteen hundred gold coins. I cannot collect more from these people, so consider that the most I can provide by tomorrow morning.

    Compared to all the gold coins in cirction, this wasnt very muchbut as Gazel put it, that was the most they could provide without affecting the Dwarven Kingdoms own economy.

    I had asked him the previous night for help making change out of our ster gold coins, and he had agreed to help.

    Thanks a lot. Thats actually more than I expected. Sorry to put you through that.

    Mm. Ill have it sent tomorrow morning via Heavenly Transport, so youll have it by evening.

    Fifteen hundred gold coins was a nontrivial amount of weight. I hated to put them through the trouble of delivering them, and with my Dominate Space skill, I could always just stop by Dwargon to grab them. Thatd be safer and surer, besides.

    You know, I can just go pick them up for you. Im the one asking for them anyway.

    Oh? Ah yes, you have Spatial Motion. That would reduce the chance of a mistake, yes. All right. I will contact them. That leaves the main question to discuss: Will this be enough to pay off your merchants?

    Hmm, well

    It was close, very close, but not enough.

    This being the first year of the Founders Festival, we were sparing no expense tounch the event. This resulted in a need for more gold coins than expectedover 3,000 in all. In my mind, this converted to around 300 million yen. A staggering figure, given the scope of this worlds economy.

    We had the money to cover this in our vault1,500 ster gold coins. If you exchanged these, theyd break down to 150,000 regr gold coins. This was why I didnt hesitate to blow 2,000 or 3,000 on this festival. It wasnt that wecked the funds; if we could break down the sters into regr gold coins, payment was easy. But since we were dealing with newer, small-scale tradesmen for many of our services here, that just wasnt possible.

    As a result, we needed regr gold coins in our vaultbut Tempest was not at the point where we could institute a currency-based financial system. There just wasnt much gold coinage floating around yet. Silver coins of all sorts were everywhere, but Dwarven gold coins? We had fewer than a hundred of those.

    To this we could add my personal stash of 300, plus the 1,000-ish Mjllmile managed to put together. Around 1,400 in all. That, plus Gazels promised funds, didnt make it to 3,000.

    Not enough?

    Based on the ounting in my head, well want a few hundred more.

    Thats the ounting you ran this festival on? Why, Im amazed you ever got it off the ground!

    Yeah, I kinda made things up as we went along. We didnt have much time to set it up, so what could I do?

    I dont even know how to begin lecturing you.

    Gazel let out a long, theatrical sigh, his eyes despondent. I mean We were all really into it, you know Nobody said no to me Right? But if I told Gazel any of that, I knew he would explode. The king, without some drink in him, could be kind of scary at times. I was intelligent enough to avoid excessive talk when he was like this.

    In that case, perhaps I could make up the difference?

    Suddenly, someone interrupted our conversation. I looked over to see who it was, only to find Elmesia, Emperor of Thalion, with Archduke Erald in tow. She sat next to Gazel, who visibly winced when he saw herjust for a moment, but still enough to give you pause.

    Carefully, I turned to Erald. Um, Duke Eraldand the Heavenly Emperor, too? What brings you both here?

    Well, Sir Rimuru, whenI spoke about this with Her Excellency, she was kind enough to offer her support to you

    Erald did all the talking, Elmesia just serenely smiling next to him. The archduke himself looked a bit pained as well, and I could pick up on why. She was making him say it himself, for reasons I better not pry into. Sleeping dogs and all that.

    Oh, no, um, this is a problem we should handle ourselves

    Is it? Were you not just wailing a moment ago that youcked the money? I was only offering our support in light of the friendly rtions our two countries will share going forward?

    Her lips were smiling. Her eyes werent. My instincts whispered to me that this was trouble.

    Um, no, as I was saying

    Trusting in those instincts, I leaned toward turning down the offer. I did need someone to trade us some gold coins, but the idea of owing Elmesia a favor spooked me. We were short only a few hundred, and if it came to it, we could leave a merchant or two in the lurch for the time being. As long as we didnt lose face from it, and as long as nobody lost money in the end, I didnt think people would resent us too much.

    Such were the calctions behind my decision, but:

    Give it up. Once that woman speaks her mind, she wont relent until shes had her way. Trust me, you would rather make enemies with every merchant on the continent together than her alone. You are far better off epting her offer.

    Gazel spat out the words, looking just as pained about it as Erald. It was surprising from him, the Heroic King having so much trouble dealing with a fellow leader.

    My, my, Gazzie. You are taking my side? How wonderful!

    She smiled. It was so transparent. And given that Gazzie nickname, I began to understand what their rtionship was like.

    Would you mind not calling me that, please? What is it youre after here?

    Oh, youre always so formal! Your grandfather was much more freewheeling than that, you know.

    If he was, then my father must have led a trying life. Would you mind getting down to business?

    I thought Gazel was pretty uninhibited himself, but for the most part, he yed the role of a sober, duteous king. Maybe it was his youth, growing up with such a harried father, that inspired him. When his father ruled, that was Gazelsst taste of true freedom, and it was then that he first met Erald and Elmesia. I imagine thats when he trained under Hakuro as well. The way Elmesia talked to him about that eraI could imagine Gazel picturing him like an annoying aunt showing up at every family event just to bug you. No wonder he found her to be trouble.

    My, my, so hasty. Were you always so impatient like that, hmm?

    He was doing a good job hiding itit didnt look that way at allbut I was sure Gazel was intensely irritated. He mightve fooled me, but Elmesia could see it bright as day. Reading someones subtle bodynguage was a piece of cake for nobility. What I was witnessing was an intense, high-stakes game of witsand Gazel, something of a mentor to me, was like a deer in the headlights to Elmesia. Now I could see why he was wincing so much.

    The emperor asked Shuna for a cup of wine. She was settled in her new seat now; there would be no shooing her away. Gazel and Erald exchanged nces and simultaneously sighed. Those two acted like they disliked each other, but they were in total sync here. In terms of Elmesia treating them both like children, they shared a lot inmon.

    With myck of experience, I doubted I could ever out-negotiate Elmesia. Gazels advising me to give in made sense.

    Oh, this is good!

    Thank you.

    Elmesia smiled broadly at the wine Shuna had poured for her. It was one of Shunas treasured varietals, a drink that seemed to change in taste with every sip. If the emperor didnt like this, itd be hard to find anything better for her. That was a relief.

    Right, then, Gazel said, trying to shift the conversation. Our time is valuable. We cant afford to consume it with your caprices. All right?

    Yes, Elmesia said, finally yielding to Gazels demands. In exchange for providing my support, I have one condition to ask. Whenever you organize a festival as grand as this, I want you to invite me. If you promise me an invitation for your events going forward, I would be happy to help with your mary exchange. Because, goodness me, why would you ever stage such a wondrous event and not let me know about it?

    Erald turned his eyes skyward, hand against his temple. Gazel looked like hed just swallowed a bug.

    Id be d to, I casually replied.

    Elmesia smiled at me, ted. The difference in enthusiasm between us was palpable. Maybe that was the wrong thing to do. But if she liked this kind of excitement and wanted to be part of the action going forward, I couldnt ask for anything more.

    Royalty arent the ves of the people, you know, she said. If they can live freely, that makes their citizens happy as wes it does me. I think it could help bring joy to everyone!

    There is truth to that. I agree with you. Its reassuring to see people on my sideand I look forward to it staying that way.

    We shook hands with a smile. Now she was part of the teama team consisting of me, Mjllmile, and her. Call us the Three Pranksters, I suppose. Gazel and Erald shivered a bit as they looked on, fearing the worst, but they didnt matter to us.

    Elmesia promptly took out what I could only describe as her magic purse.

    This is just my pocket money in here, so I only have around a thousand gold coins at the moment. If you need more, I can arrange for that, but?

    No, that alone will be more than enough, I replied, not skipping a beat. Could we exchange those for ten ster golds, then?

    What was this emperor thinking? Just carrying around 1,000 gold like it was spare change under her sofa? She was living on another from the rest of us, as close to an A-list celebrity as you got in this world. Gazel was rightI did not want to cross her.

    Thats quite fine. Dont forget our promise, all right?

    Of course not!

    I smiled and nodded at herand right there and then, we made the exchange. Now, if I could get that 1,500 gold exchanged over at the Dwarven Kingdom tomorrow morning, we had the money we needed. I sighed, relieved. The problem was behind us.

    How nice, Sir Rimuru, Diablo said as he refilled my cup of tea. I watched him tend to Gazels and Elmesias cups as I savored the hot brew.

    Benimaru intrepidly smiled. If someone thought that Sir Rimuru wouldnt be able to y by the rules, were about to prove them very wrong.

    Yes. I was no longer going to be dunked on by someone. No need to kowtow to those tradesmen demanding their money. I had saved face pretty well, I thought; it was a heavy load off my shoulders. But then Elmesia started insinuating something else to me.

    You know, though, I think someone would have offered their help even if you couldnt prepare the gold coins in time, hmm?

    Oh? What do you mean?

    I was being honest. I really didnt know.

    If you want someone to do your bidding, its far easier to have them owe you a favor, rather than browbeating or scaring them into it. Its also sessful quite a bit more often.

    She smiled warmly at me. That was no doubt the smile of a ruler, and it elicited a swift response from Diablo.

    I see. You think, for example, someone mightve swooped in at thest minute to mediate for us, uninvited?

    That might be the case, yes. But if such an interloper did show up, whos to say that they werent being controlled behind the scenes by someone, hmm?

    Keh-heh-heh-heh-heh An interesting thing to consider. Causing the problem, then alleviating it while creating an obligation for us. That does seem like a viable scheme. But

    This interloper, perhaps, wouldve been willing to ept a signed contract allowing payment at ater date, even if you didnt have the gold coins. It would show world leaders that Tempest could not be trusted, while they could be. You would be quite obligated to them, yes.

    How greedy. Truly, a very human approach. Ive learned a lot from this.

    Um, so? Did this mean someone might be putting the merchants up to this just so they could make us owe a debt to them? And they might be doing someone elses bidding here? Theyd be more disposable that way? I see If we trusted in this person, theyd reap the benefits; if not, theyd abandon the whole strategy. And maybe they were just doing this to make us look badbut I felt like Elmesia might be right. I could see Diablo agreed, judging by the evil grin on his face.

    It makes little sense to me, Benimaru said, but can you think of anyone whod want to do that? Is some member of the Council of the West trying to test us or what?

    Elmesia smiled, not taking offense at his tone. Oh, I wouldnt know! Thalion isnt part of the Council. But maybe he would know something?

    She was staring right at a pensive Mjllmile.

    Um, me?!

    Being fingered like this unnerved him, but he quickly regained hisposure.

    I have heard rumors, he furtively stated. Rumors of a kind of shadowmittee that enjoys de facto control over the Council. Itsposed of the ruling sses, the highest-level leaders from the Councils nationsbut I wouldnt believe it for a moment. The Council isposed of elected representatives from each country, but royaltys hereditary. They dont need to worry about losing their seat.

    So Mjllmile was familiar with a few rumors going around the merchantsrumors about a cabal of rulers who held the most power among the Western Nations. It smacked of a conspiracy theory, though, and Mjllmile himself didnt lend it much credence.

    Well, if someone should appear tomorrow and attempt to mediate with us on this matterI will give them a thorough examination and fully expose their backgrounds for you.

    Soei was here, kneeling next to me. I never noticed himbut, hiding my surprise, I gave him a cool,posed nod.

    My goodness. What a shock. I hardly even detected his presence.

    This is why I told you, Your Excellency, the denizens of this domain are like nowhere else. Paying a personal visit is just too dangerous

    Tee-hee-hee! But its offered such interesting experiences. May I ask you a question, Sir Rimuru?

    Hmm? Whats she want to know now?

    Yes?

    I am considering enacting a new pact with you, but before I do, I wanted to hear your thoughts.

    Elmesias demeanor changed. She was no longer hiding her real facethe face of a ruler, one shed shown me for a moment earlier. It was turned straight at me. I could feel an overpowering pressureHeroic Aura, at a level iparable with Gazels.

    Lets hear it.

    I fought back with my own Heroic Aura. We exchanged staresor more like fired them at each other like cannonballs. I tried to take the full brunt of hers, not averting my eyes for a moment.

    How do you n to deal with that demon over there? That incredibly dangerous primal one

    Primal? I didnt know what Elmesia meant, but was she talking about Diablo? Hes pretty strong, yeah, but not that dangerous, no

    Um Nothing, really? I mean, Diablos doing a pretty good job for me, so whats the problem?

    Let me rephrase the question. If that demon were to go out of control, how would you take responsibility for that?

    Out of control? Ium, could picture that, actually. She mustve had perfect insight into what I was going through. No, there was no telling when Diablo might decide to go berserk. But did that apply to Diablo alone? It wasnt a topic I wanted to think about much, but I had another problem child in Shion, too. And while I appreciated Elmesias concern, I wasnt sure what she could do about it.

    Well, Ill stop him before that happens. Thats all I can really do to prevent any fallout, isnt it?

    If there was another way, Id love to hear it. But the only option was to prevent it before it took ce. Diablo looked content enough at my response, which I didnt appreciate muchthis is about you, you know.

    And I wasnt the only one perplexed here.

    Huh? Um Wait a minute. Not to drop the act for a moment, but youd stop that demon? Youd step up to do that?

    Yes. I know its maybe a likely scenario, buttely hes started listening to what Ive told him more. I think hes much more mature than previously.

    I felt confident about that. If they kept it up, Diablo and Shion wouldnt cause any problems at all, I didnt think. I didnt like how Shion was listening to this like it wasnt about her, but Ahhh, itd be all right.

    Hearing my response, Elmesia started giggling like a young girl. Oh my. Did you hear that, Erald? This demon lords an even bigger piece of work than how you described him!

    Archduke Erald found a way to scowl even more than he already was. I pitied him. Speaking of overly freewheeling rulers

    It is fine, Lady Elmesia. If that is what Rimuru says, then Ill support it. And should pushe to shove, trust me, Gazel Dwargo wille to Rimurus aid.

    Gazel stepped up to support me. It seemed like the first time in a little while.

    Elmesia gave us a contented look. All right. I understand your position. If you should ever be an enemy to mankind, I will exercise all my force to stop you. So instead, let us continue to deepen our bonds and maintain our current friendly rtions. Erald?

    Y-yes!

    I, as representative of the Sorcerous Dynasty of Thalion, hereby officially acknowledge the Jura-Tempest Federation as close friends with our nation. Please handle the paperwork for me.

    Y-yes, Your Excellency!!

    Thats an emperor for you. All that dignity, all that authority, as she ordered Erald around like an errand boy. I could stand to learn from that.

    Elmesia turned to me. Right. Should anythinge up, feel free to confer with me or Gazzie. And please dont let yourself go out of control, am I clear?

    This wasnt making sense. We were talking about Diablo or Shion, I thought, and now she was referring to me? Since when? And me, going out of control? Man, that was just rude.

    Hey, um, you know, Im a pretty prudent person. Whyre you talking like I could go crazy someday?

    Rimuru, who was the leader who decided to hold a Founders Festival on a passing whim?

    Gazels gaze burned into me. Id have to say it was me, I suppose.

    Um, Mollie, right?

    No it wasnt, Sir Rimuru!

    Mjllmile didnt want to y along.

    All right, all right. Yes. I promise Ill talk things over with you guys in advance next time, okay?

    Very good. I hope you will.

    This isnt the kind of advice Id normally give to the king of another nationbut this time, we are. Dont think badly of us for it.

    Griping about this too much, Gazel said, would be meddling with our internal affairsbut since a lot of my ideas often ran counter tomonly epted norms around here, they wanted me to keep them in the loop a little more. It wasnt any judgment on how good, or bad, those ideas werethey just needed more warning.

    And this wasnt a bad thing for me, either. In fact, itd be good fortune for all the countries involved, given that wed need to prepare for the angels attempting to destroy civilization sooner orter.

    So we had gone from solving my gold-coin problem to the leaders of two nations lecturing me at the same time, but I didnt mind. The tough stuff was over.

    I had a promise from Elmesia that wed work to build good rtions. What started as an informal chat turned into a great diplomatic coup for me. I figured things couldnt get any better, so I was about to end the night when Elmesia brought up another topic. She was staring straight at me, her expression a tad desperate.

    Um, was there something else? I nervously asked.

    No, no, nothing major. Its just, um, I have a request I want you to introduce me to Mr. Yoshida!

    Y-Your Excellency, what nonsense is this?! How shameless! Sneaking that into these high-level talks!

    I was expecting some other weighty political issuebut this? Erald was freaking out, but no, this was nothing major. Yoshida was cooking for us all through this festival on the invite of Shuna, but I hadnt heard anything about his future ns. Id certainly like him to stick around, but that would be up to him. Connecting him to Elmesia, in itself, wasnt a big deal.

    Oh, that would be simple. But dont force him into anything, all right?

    Of course I wont!

    That seemed to please Elmesia well enough, so we would introduce them to each other after the festival.

    And so our impromptu three-way summit among some of the biggest superpowers in the world came to a quiet close.

 Volume 9 - Ch 4

    THE FINAL ROUND AND THE LABYRINTHS GRAND OPENING

    The morning of Day Three.

    I had alreadypleted my little jaunt to the Dwarven Kingdom and exchanged my sters for gold coins. That takes care of that. Now well have to wait and see how the schemer behind this reacts.

    So, all anxieties for the future quelled, lets go back to enjoying this festival. Kicking off, we had todays first main draw: the tournament final between Masayuki and Gobta.

    The coliseum was already whipped up for this, people arguing and betting with each other over who would win. Mjllmile was taking those bets, of course, and I looked forward to seeing how much wed make off that. The most surefire way to win at gambling, after all, is to run the game. No matter who looked like the favorite, you were always going to profit that way.

    I had made a bet on Gobta, in hopes of maybe earning some pocket money out of it. No, it wasnt because he was a long shot. Definitely not. I certainly didnt ce arge sum on Gobta just because the odds were so crazily skewed against him. Uh-uh.

    Um, but that didnt matter anyway, all right? I had a hobgoblin to cheer on.

    Aaaaaall right,dies and gentlemen! The final match of the tournament is here atst!! Which of our twopetitors will seize the championship for himself today?! Will it be Lightspeed Masayuki or Gobta, the fighter rising up and making a ssh as he vies for a spot in the illustrious Big Four?!

    Sokasmentating was as fresh as ever. She was talking up Gobta in such a breezily casual manner. It was, in a way, insurance to keep Gobta from ditching the tournament and hiding out somewherea cruel way of doing it but damn effective.

    Diablo lifted up his hand. The arena fell silent. Was it me, or were some of the female audience members falling for him? I banished the thought from my mind.

    If Gobta beat Masayuki today, all my problems were in the past. If, on the other hand, Masayuki really was a fighter on the level of Hinata, Gobta was toastbut we could still learn a lot from this battle. If Masayuki had, well, pretty much any trouble dispatching Gobta today, for example, wed know that he was no threat at all to us.

    Gobta had both Ranga and astonishing good luck on his side. It wasnt a bad way to test Masayuki out, I thought.

    Soka was now busy introducing thepetitors in detail. Once that was done, the fight would begin. I patiently awaited the moment. How much of Masayukis real skill could Gobta pull out of him?

    Masayuki was panicking.

    When he saw Bovix and Equixs battle yesterday, realizing hed be fighting whoever won, he turned pale as a ghost.

    Im dead. Ifif I fight either of those monster freaks, theyll rip me in half!!

    Somehow, hed found the right words to turn Bovix against himself and forfeit the match. He really wanted to pat himself on the back for that one. But the match after that threw Masayuki right back into despair. How the hell can I beat them?! Did they only open this countrys tournament to insane monsters or what?! Both thepetitors at yesterdays closing match were more terrifying than even Bovix. It made him want to curse at the world.

    He didnt eat one bitst night, feeling all the world like a condemned prisoner waiting for the call to the gallows.

    Looking back, things really have been going too well

    Leaning too much on the strength of his friends, letting people bandy him around as a Hero and champion, hed let it go to his head, figuring itll all work out somehow. And it had, so far, enough so that Masayuki never really doubted it muchor maybe he deliberately strove not to think about it. He believed, without evidence, that his group was invincible and could defeat allers. That was how Masayuki managed to maintain some sense of sanity about all this.

    But how did I kid myself into trusting any of those stupid delusions? I gotta go. I gotta get out of here!

    The urge had seized his mind again and again.

    Heh! Once you win your fight tomorrow, Masayuki, how bout you move right on and challenge the demon lord on the spot?

    The question from Jinrai was so innocent. Masayuki wanted to shout Youre crazy! at him.

    This was all that demon lord Rimurus fault. He looked so kind, so vulnerable, that Masayuki wasnt as wary as he shouldve been. Otherwise, he wouldve taken more careful steps to protect himself.

    Either way, said Jiwu, its only a matter of time, Sir Masayuki. Soon, you will p the demon lord silly, and this nation will finally be free!

    But shouldnt we talk with Yuuki before he fights him? Youre calling this an easy fight, but what if he somehow loses tomorrow?

    Jinrai looked up. Whoa, Bernie, are you kidding me?

    Yes, Id be more worried if Lion Mask made it to the finals, but Gobta, this hobgoblin? It has to be in the bag. The battle will be over before he can even summon that beast.

    No, it wasnt in the bag. Masayuki had no idea how hed defend himself. All he could picture was a future full of teeth, ws, and daggers. But hispanions had so much faith in him, he couldnt reveal his feelings to them.

    So he just nonchntly said, Well, Ill try my best! and bluffed his way through the evening.

    And now, time had beaten its merciless path all the way to this moment.

    Masayuki visited the bathroom several times in the lead-up to the final, just to make sure he didnt pee himself in the arena.

    Gaaahhhh, what am I gonna do? How can I escape this coliseum alive?!

    Facing him was a fighter who exuded coolness. His name was Gobta, ording to thedy announcer next to them. Jiwu thought beating a hobgoblin was a cinch, but Masayuki just couldnt see it. A hobgoblin? You liar! Goblins are the weakest monsters in the world! So whatd this guy do to evolve into such a heroic-looking dude?!

    Ladies and gentlemen! The final round of the First Tempest Battle Tournament is about to begin! On one side, we have Gobta, young captain of the Goblin Riders and a member of the demon lord Rimurus personal staff! On the other, Lightspeed Masayuki, Hero and champion of the Western Nations! What kind of battle will these two giants show us today?! You can see them staring each other down, here in the center of the arena. In just a few moments

    When she stopped talking, the battle would begin.

    Oh crap. Im seriously running out of time.

    Hed thought his dder was empty. His nerves were telling him otherwise. They pounded against his mind, urging him to release himself. If he wasnt so worked up, he mightve been interested in things like the cute butt lurking underneath the base of the announcers tail, but now was no time for that.

    Masayuki recalled his skillChosen One, his sole unique. He still didnt know much about it. The name had been reported to him by this cold, businesslike voice in his mind. Only recently had hee to know that this skill provided him assorted effects. He knew it made people react in ways that always benefited him, making him worshipped as a modern-day champion. But he couldnt find a way to turn it offand now, it had brought him into this arena.

    Yeah. And that power did its stuff against Bovix yesterday, too. And if it can just get me safely through this one

    As far as Masayuki knew, Chosen One simply made everyone assume the wrong thing about him. He resolved to bet on it one more time. This inner decision helped calm him a little. He looked at his foe. Thenwas it a coincidence? Their eyes met. And he saw that he was looking a bit agitated, too. Fidgety.

    Huh? Wait, is this gonna work?

    Opponents reacted this way to him at the tournaments in Englesia, too, assuming Masayuki was all-powerful and throwing in the towel. It happened more often than he could count.

    Now, maybejust maybehe could win this. And the moment he thought that, his legs stopped shaking.

    Maybe, if all goes well, I can win without doing anything again.

    His wits were returning to him as he thought it over. But in all too short of a time, hed have to reconsider his wisdom

    Ready? Andbegin!!

    At Sokas signal, the battle kicked off.

    Woooo! Lets do it!

    Gobta acted first, plunging straight ahead. I feared this was some kamikaze move to get himself hurt (but not too hurt) so he could quit. I was wrong. I guess that fishing pole Id dangled in front of him was pretty damn tempting.

    Heading straight for his foe, Gobta slipped right past him in a baseball-style slide, taking position against the outer boundary like yesterday. His eyes were on his foe the whole time, but Masayuki didnt even react, slowly turning back toward Gobta with a distant smile.

    Whoaaa! Is handsomeness the key to strength after all?! Gobtas tricky maneuvers were totally ignored as the dashing Masayuki shows just how unfazed andfortable he is!

    Sokasmentary hit hard. Itd make anyone with hang-ups about their looks cry, not just Gobta. Yeah, Masayuki was handsome, but this was ying favorites a bit too much.

    Hehheh-heh All part of the ybook Youre acting like nothing I can do will hit you, huh? I wanted to see just how far I could go with my own strength todaybut I cant even touch you, huh? Then its time to use thismy new, ultimate power!!

    Oh lord. He was up to no good again. This was so going to fail. No one was around to stop him, but I really wished hed actually try practicing something before busting it out in public like this.

    Report. Last night, the subject Gobta obtained the unique skill Summon Demon Wolf. It is believed that the subject Rangas forcing himself into yesterdays summoning is the cause, but itbines with the extra skill Unify to unify the summoned Ranga with the summoner.

    Huh?

    So wait, Gobta could use Summon Demon Wolf to, like, merge with Ranga? How did he? Hey, wasnt Raphael about to say somethingst night but kept quiet instead? Was it about that?!

    That usation is

    That usation is what, huh? If Raphael couldnt even drive himself to finish the sentence, something must be going on. Gobta suddenly awakening to this crazy new power out of nowhere was way too unnatural to believe. I was beginning to think Raphael mayve helped grease the wheels a little, helping Gobta pick up this skill.

    Raphael stayed silent. He never lied to me, but he was in no hurry to answer with the truth, either. I could force the issue, but maybe I didnt need to. Lets just see what happens. Good timing, at least.

    Check this out! Transform!!

    The air warped around him. Ranga appeared behind his backand then they unified, Rangas body seeming to merge with Gobtas. To make a long story short, the results looked like a bipedal version of Rangaand Ill admit it. It looked way cool. Dammit! Why does Gobta get to transform into something so awesome like that?!

    Whoaaa! Sweet! What is that? So cool!!

    Milim, next to me, was dancing in her seat. I could understand her excitement. Gobta drove me insane sometimes. Turning into some dashing fantasy creature like this

    L-look at that! Gobta has transformed into something far from himself!

    Yes, aposed Diablo said to the excited Soka, whose voice had ratcheted up an octave or so. The ability to infuse your own body with the power of a summoned creature. A very rare skill.

    So Gobta is using the power of the creature he summoned yesterday for himself? Amazing! Were witnessing something amazing here, folks!!

    Wait, I whispered. So its kind of like Gobta extracting all of Rangas force for his own use?

    Impressive, isnt it? Ranga seems to be giving himself up to Gobta, but thisbo might work a lot better than I thought.

    But were talking Gobta here.

    Oh-ho-ho! And Gobta is my apprentice, remember. He may not be the greatest physical specimen, but he has experience fighting magic-born more powerful than he is. If he can ably harness Sir Rangas power, he may grow in ways I cannot predict

    My officials seemed impressed, at least. And the rest of the crowd was watching on silently, holding their breath.

    Heh-heh! Now its my turn!

    Its been your turn, dude. Masayuki hasnt done anything.

    My jealousy was driving me to pick on him internally.

    Then Gobta disappeared before my eyesfiguratively. My eyes could follow him, but Im sure most of the audience thought he vanished.

    G-Gobta is gone? Soka shouted, very deliberately drumming up the tension. Where did he go?! I knew she could see him as wellnice performance on her part.

    And then, right before her eyes

    Booooom!!

    There was a small explosion, apanied by a thundering sound. It was located by the wall under the standsright by the VIP boxes I was in, as it happened.

    Thus, I had a close-up view

    of Gobta, right after dering it to be his turn, running straight for Masayukiand then continuing to run right past him, until he smashed into the wall.

    I knew he shouldve rehearsed that first. Even before he tried it, I knew there was a pretty big chance hed screw it up.

    Whoa! Gobta isnt getting back up! Is he all right?

    He wasnt. In fact, bashing himself against the wall had knocked him unconsciousand the out-of-bounds line was far behind him. He was out.

    That idiot had no control over that transformation at all. Everything worked great up to taking in Rangas powers, but I could see those powers treated him like a chew toy. To put it simply, he wanted to start running, then stop runningbut his brain was still judging these maneuvers based on his original body dimensions. A second of time in Gobtas world was far different from that same second in Rangas. Before he could even think to stop, his head was against the wall.

    Even worse, as Soka pointed out, he showed no sign of getting back up. It was the shock of the collision, rather than actual physical damage, that had knocked him out.

    What can I say? First he reveals this supercool new monster, then he reveals himself for the dolt he is. Very true to character.

    I was stunned into silence.

    That fool, Benimaru muttered, eyes turned upward.

    Thats Gobta for you. Shion snickered.

    Veins throbbed on Hakuros forehead

    Wow, so thats your fighting apprentice, Dad?

    and Momiji added more fuel to the fire.

    It was, shall we say, a hard-to-describe sort of tension. And Gobta deserved it, frankly. The crowd around us was also having trouble parsing these events. I could hear one of them try to exin them, based on the sparse evidence at hand.

    Wait Did he throw him aside in midair?

    The arena was so quiet, the words echoed oddly well.

    Amazing. Amazing, Masayuki!

    Whoaaaa That was awesome!

    I barely even saw it happen. This is just too crazy!!

    The praise for Masayuki spread like a virus across the coliseum. Then, as if this exnation was the unvarnished truth, cheers began to erupt, heralding Masayukis victory before Soka and Diablo could even take action.

    My neighbor, however, was quivering with anger.

    Is Is this some kind of twisted joke? After looking all cool like that I mean, what was that?

    After that radical transformation, this was the result. Gobta had shot expectations sky-high with Milim, then sent them crashing down to earth. It only amplified her anger.

    Now, now, I, um, I think he did his very best! In his own way

    Rimuru, you know spoiling him isnt good for him!

    Thats right, Sir Rimuru. I think I have been too lenient with Gobta as well. We should all be more stringent with him going forward.

    Hakuro agreed with Milim. This was the first I heard of him going easy on Gobta.

    Right! Ill whip him into shape. Rimuru, let me borrow Gobta for a while. Ill make him into the most wonderful fighter youve ever seen!

    Milims eyes were sparkling now. This was a rare monster, and she just had to have him, I was sure. If I nodded my approval here, thatd be so mean to Gobtabut then I thought of something else.

    Actually, I have a favor to ask of you. Ill ept your offer if you ept mine; how about that?

    All right. Lets hear it.

    So theres this set of ruins in ymans domain, right near his manor. I dont want people poking around them without permission, and I think theyre packed with artifacts thatll teach us about the ancient past, so Ive been keeping them untouched for now.

    Mm-hmm.

    And Id like to explore these ruins, but I wanted to get your permission first.

    Whyre you asking me?

    Because its your domain now, doofus.

    Milim, whos the ruler of that domain right now? Frey asked Milim quietly before I could even say it.

    Oh Milim shot straight up in her seat. Oh, right! Thats me, isnt it? Right! I knew that!

    Great. d she remembered.

    So

    Of course its fine!

    That was easy. Maybe Milim just wanted to put the subject behind her, but as long as I got her permission, anything was fine. Sorry, Gobta, but at least I was achieving something out of this. I mean, Gobta essentially self-destructed, and I still didnt know anything about Masayukis skills. He wouldnt mind if I at least got some use out of this travesty, right? Itd help build him up, besides. Alls well that ends well.

    But when you do this exploring, Rimuru, youll take me along, right?

    Ummm, thatll depend. Ive actually reached out to an expert from the Free Guild on this topic, but if they give the okay, you cane, sure.

    Ooooh! Sounds like fun!

    Yeah? Dont get your hopes up. It might turn out pretty boring.

    I continued to chat with Milim as we awaited the certified results, which took a few minutes. Finally, Soka and Diablo wrapped up their discussions.

    The judgment is in! And while Im concerned for the still-unconscious Gobta, the winner is

    Dont remind me, I thought as I listened to Sokas announcement.

    Check this out! Transform!! came the shoutand only then did Masayuki realize he was being far too optimistic.

    Whoa, wait a second! Whats that thing?! I heard nothing about this!!

    There was no way hed finish Gobta before any summoning took ce. He was transforming his own body nowsomething Masayuki totally didnt expect.

    The sheer power in the air was electrifying. To the amateur-level Masayuki, this looked like a towering monolith of strength. He knew there was healing potion on hand, but no way it could help him. It couldnt raise the dead.

    Dude! If one of those ws tears through me, this armors about as good as cardboard! If I knew this was gonna happen, I never wouldve turned down full-te for being too heavy

    For that matter, he realized in the midst of his reverie, not even a full suit of magisteel armor could help much.

    Heh-heh! Gobta shouted. Now its my turn! Then, not waiting for a reply, he burst into action.

    Masayuki was this close to saying, Wait a minute! I give! His life, he concluded, meant far more to him than his pride. Faced with this transformed monster, victory no longer mattered to him at all. But regardless of what he thought, events moved on without him.

    Before he could say, I forfeit, a rumbling boom echoed across the arena as Gobta self-destructed. Masayuki, unable to react, just stood there dumbfounded. A small piece of the stone wall scratched against his cheek. The stinging pain told him this was all too real.

    No No way I could never have dodged that. I know people misconstrue my words to my benefit, but if I wasnt able to get away with murder like this, itd be hopeless for me

    It was clear what would happen. Gobta would be disqualified, and hed be crowned champion. But Masayuki began to wonder if that was really good for him. Would winning this provide him with anything he wanted?

    The right to battle a demon lord? You gotta be kidding. Thats totally suicide!

    Masayuki wasnt a fool. If he was named champion, itd be him against the demon lord Rimuru. He understood what that meant for him. That ck wolf who just whipped by him, as well as Lion Mask from yesterday, were both opponents he had no chance of beatingand they both worked under Rimuru. Pick a fight against that guy, and hed just get pummeled.

    Pummeled? More like killed!

    It wasnt about whether his skill would work or not. The demon lord was in a whole other universe; it was hopeless. Thus, Masayuki decided he needed to get out of here, pronto. Seriously, the crowd thought he threw that freak into the wall? That was just depressing.

    He had to do something fast, or else Gobta would lose. Masayukis mind raced faster than it ever had before in his life. How could he arrange things so he could lose and remain in one piece?

    The judgment is in! And while Im concerned for the still-unconscious Gobta, the winner is

    Oh crap.

    Wait.

    Masayuki went on the move, panicking internally but ying it cool on the outside as he brought his hand up toward Soka.

    Um? Soka figured Masayuki had something to say, so she handed him a spare mic.

    I think I lost, actually, he said, trying his hardest to keep his voice from shaking.

    Ummm But, Masayuki, sir, Soka replied, bewildered, it looks very much like Gobta took himself out of the match

    Perhaps. But you know, I couldnt keep up with that attack at all. I dont think I have the experience needed to challenge a demon lord quite yet; I just thought

    He spoke slowly, trying not to get tongue-tied as the sweat poured down his entire body. It was a real stretch of an excuse, but he tried to make it sound as reasonable as he could. Then, without saying anything else, he walked out of the arena and never looked back. If someone asked him a question right now, hed have no answer for it, so he decided to just leave without another word.

    With my skill active, Im sure the crowd will imagine some way to make that sound convincing for me. Right now, getting out of heres my best option

    Masayuki had never focused so much on moving his legs before now. But it worked. He was out of his potentially lethal pinch.

    Gobta was just lying there, sprawled on the ground, but then Masayuki dered out of nowhere that he lost.

    What is he thinking?

    Hmm I dont know.

    He couldnt have been scared of Gobta. Whats motivating him to do that?

    Benimaru and Shion had no clue what had happened, either, as they watched Masayuki walk off.

    So was he just a big fake after all? Or was there something else going on in his mind? Ah well. If Masayuki was giving up on fighting me, then Id call it a good way to settle matters.

    The crowd, too, was confused at first.

    Is it because he cant drum up the will to face the demon lord?

    No, no! You saw that throw. It was masterful.

    He said he couldnt keep up with his attack. Is he hurt?

    There is a small cut on his cheek

    What?! He managed tond a blow on Sir Masayuki?!

    The murmuring continued anon.

    Wait! Ive got it! one man screamed. Sir Masayuki just gave the demon lord a reprieve!

    What do you mean?

    The demon lord dered he wants to be friendly with humans. You all know that, right?

    Of course.

    Yeah!

    So thats why, the man smugly said, what Masayuki did just now was give a warning to Rimuru.

    It did sound oddly convincing, as much as it irritated me. Thats likely why the people around the man started nodding at him.

    I see And that reminds me: Sir Masayuki didnt unsheathe his sword this time, either, did he?

    Well spotted. Youre right. Thats his way of telling us he could win this tournament anytime he wanted to!

    Right! And if the demon lord pulls any false moves, hes not gonna take that sitting down. Thats what hes saying?

    Probably. Of course, if they ever did fight, I bet hed stop beforending a killing blow.

    So hes willing to lose some face just to bring the message across What a wonderful young man he is!

    Thats the Sir Masayuki I know!

    Hes so cool!!

    They were starting to interpret this in very surprising ways. But soon, all of them were in agreement, singing Masayukis praises like a church choir.

    Ma! Sa! Yu! Ki! Masayukiiiii!!

    What the hell? Was this a religion or what? I felt like I was getting a glimpse into something terrifying.

    Masayuki answered the chanting with a raised hand as he exited. His motion was a bit awkward-looking, which struck me as curious. What a strange kid. Why does he get all this praise heaped upon him?

    Understood. It is believed that this is the effect of a unique skill possessed by the subject Masayuki Honjo.

    Just when I thought some things in the world couldnt be exined, Raphael stepped up and exined them for me. I guess the professor was doing a little analytical work on him.

    Apparently, Masayukis skill, when it takes effect, could manipte the thoughts and feelings of people under its spell. Hed just forfeited the championship because he saw how powerful Gobta had be, I supposeand given how hed won over Bovix yesterday, I imagined Masayuki hadnt thought he could beat him, either. I thought back to his performance so far, based on this new assumption. As far as I could recall, it was like he couldnt even react to what his foes were doing, could he? No wonder he never took out his sword.

    I suppose the conclusion to make was that Masayuki himself couldnt fight very well. Hinata said she couldnt read his strength at all, and I could see why. There was no strength to read.

    Still, it wasnt safe to look down on him. If he could influence the people around him that much, making him your enemy could be seriously dangerous. Definitely not someone to trifle withif anything, I think I need to stay on his good side. Maybe I could threaten him, like Heh-heh-heh, I know your secret Nah. Just joking. I bet he was racking his brain figuring out how to deal with Bovixter; no way his friends would let him weasel out of that rematch.

    Maybe Id offer him some sympathy. I could help prop him up as a Hero, even; itd certainly be helpful advertising thebyrinth challenge to people.

    Soei! Make contact with Masayuki and tell him I want to meet with him.

    At once!

    Keep it courteous, okay? If you could invite him to lunch after this, then perfect.

    As a fellow native of Japan, Id like to talk to him anyway. Ill ask Hakuro to whip up some sushi. Hopefully this hunch of mine turns out to be true.

    While I was thinking about Masayuki, Gobta was finallying to. As he did, Soka and Diablo, after some deliberation, apparently decided to ept Masayukis request.

    Todays been a cavalcade of unexpected events, but with Masayukis withdrawal, Gobta is our champion!!

    I could hear jeering from pockets of the crowd. Yeah, Id be disappointed, toohere we were, the big final, and wed gotten a champion who gave up and a half-wolf who almost killed himself. If I paid good money to see this, Id find it totally valid to demand a refund. Luckily for me, they were in the minority. Masayuki made that decision himself, and nobody was ming me for it. I imagine Gobta proved his strength well enough that nobody was too dissatisfied with this result. Of course, Gobta was still the heel in everyones mind, and with his antics today, that rep would be set in stone.

    So, Gobta! How are you feeling right now?

    Uh Huh? Really? I won?

    You sure did! And you really put in an excellent performance today!

    Yeah right. All Gobta did was trip over himself and get knocked out, and Soka was trying her hardest to rev him up.

    Regardless, though, the fight was over.

    Afterward, I stepped back into the arena and gave out awards to each of thepetitors, offering all eight of them my thanks and praising their performances. I also gave Masayukis friend Jinrai the set of equipment Id promised him. Gaiye said, Give that to me, too! when he saw it for some reason, but we had no such agreement, so I ignored him. Masayuki also agreed to my offer of a meetinghe looked more resolute to me now, but he didnt have the wrong idea about this, did he? If there was any misunderstanding, Id take the time to unravel it for him.

    That left Gobta.

    You did well, Gobta. I hereby name you a member of the Big Four as of today!

    He had taken a pretty rocky road on his way to it, but a championship was a championship. As promised, I appointed him to the Big Four, a title Gobta would no doubt find quite alluring. From now on, if he ever lost to anyone, I could just say, Heh-heh-heh! Hes the weakest of the Big Four! A disgrace to his team! and people would ept it. It was the perfect role for him, one thatd no doubt make Gobta seem pretty cute and charming. In fact, it was almost too perfect for him. Scarily so.

    Thank you! Ill keep doin my best!

    And with that, the First Tempest Battle Tournament came to a close.

    If only it really was over for Gobta. But his personal hell was just beginning.

    Okay, are we ready now? Cause Im gonna start training him hard!

    Milim was beaming at me when we returned to the VIP boxes.

    Oh, uh, sure. Dont overdo it, okay?

    Nothing to worry about! Hell undergo my special training inside thebyrinth, so he can die all he wants to!!

    Ah yes, she could use it like that, huh? I wasnt sure Gobta would see that as much of a constion. All I can say is, its gonna be tough for him. Not even death would offer sweet release for him. Just thinking about it made me shiver.

    Gobta, can we talk over there for a moment?

    Milim marched right over to Gobtaand picked him up with one hand.

    Pyahhh?!

    There was so much strength focused on her arm, I was surprised I didnt hear any bones crunch. Milim was smiling, but her eyes sure werent.

    Congrats on the win. But thatst match was pitiful. Im not going to let that one slide! Its time to start training you!

    Milim really enjoyed Gobtas transformationwhich was why his subsequentmebrained acts angered her so much. Her reaction made it clear that her expectations and excitement had been deeply soured.

    Youll be facing off against me personally. Youre gonna be stronger in no time!

    Wh-whoa! Lady Milim?! II didnt ask for that!

    Gobta was panicking. I doubted anyone was listening to his input.

    This is a good opportunity for you, Gobta, Hakuro said with a forceful smile. I want you to put everything you have into training with her.

    M-Master, are you selling me off?

    Silence! Milim said, shutting him down before he could finish. How cruel.

    Oh-ho-ho Dont make a disgrace of yourself like that, Gobta. This is all for your sake!

    I wasnt sure Gobta was listening to Hakuro any longer. This was him getting back at Gobta for acting like such a clown in front of Momiji, I bet. It definitely wasnt for his sake.

    Thus, Gobta was now Milims property. I turned my attention to the other party involved in this stunt.

    My master, my teamwork with Sir Gobta brought us the championship!

    Ranga ran up to me, abandoning Gobta without a second thought. Smart of him. He didnt want to get caught in the cross fire at all. Unfortunately, there was no fleeing from Milim.

    Hold it! Ranga was your name, right? Gobta cantplete his training without you!

    ?!

    Ranga looked at me, his eyes pleading. Sorry, man. Once Milim gets an idea in her head, she tunes out everybody else. Besides, he was the one who went into battle without my permission, so he had thising. I didnt see any need to help him.

    Wah-ha-ha-ha-ha! Dont worry! I wont do ya no harm!

    And with that, Milim strode off, dragging Gobta and Ranga behind her.

    Really, I thought Gobta relied too much on his own good luck. That, and Ranga had a tendency to fight on instinct. If they could polish their skills a bit and work with each other more, that transformation could really be something formidable, you know? Milim mustve thought to train them because she spotted that. Heres hoping they worked on that, bit by bit, and gained something concrete from it. Id be expecting big things from Gobta, and Milims the girl whod bring him there.

    Farewell, Gobta. Farewell, Ranga. Ill never forget your courage! I vowed to say a prayer for them as I saw them leave with Milim.

    It was time for luncha lunch Id now be spending with Masayuki.

    This was nothing that fancy, really. I told him I wanted to speak with him alone; the rest of his group could stand by in a separate room. We had a little trouble earlier, but I was sure Masayuki could smooth things over with themter.

    Um, well, good to make your acquaintance, I guess? My names Masayuki Honjo, and people call me Lightspeed and the Hero and stuff

    He was blushing a bit. Yeah, calling yourself the Hero in our old world would be about the most embarrassing thing ever. People would think youre a thoughtless moron if you tried it. Im sure it made him feel creepy. That, and it looked like he was worried how Id react to him. He remembered how he promised to defeat me, although that was mostly just his friends egging him on. This mustve been awkward for him. Im a demon lord, after all. He had to be scared out of his wits, fearing hed picked a fight with a foe way out of his league.

    He was no doubt conflicted, but he didnt need to worry about me. I was ready to leave the past where it belongedin the past. A nice meal together should help us work out our issues.

    Yeah, I know we spoke before, but its nice to meet you, too. I am Rimuru, a demon lord, but my real names Satoru Mikami. I used to work for a building contractor.

    Masayuki wasnt too keen on touching his food, so I decided to just blurt it out. I hadnt used that name in a long while, but it still felt like it fit me, a lot more than I anticipated. It wasnt like I was hiding itI just never had the chance to use it much.

    Huh? Are Are you Japanese?

    Masayuki didnt quite seem to believe me. And yeah, I did look kind of like a cute little girl at the moment. I couldnt me him.

    Yeah, more or less. But lets talk about that over lunch, all right?

    That finally inspired him to pick up his chopsticks.

    Um, this is okay for me to eat?

    Of course. I had them whip up something Japanese for you.

    Sushi and tempura were on the menu today. They had wowed Hinata earlier, and I thought Masayuki would be just as gratefulhe hadnt been part of our pre-festival banquet, so I was sure itd be the first time hed seen sushi in years.

    This isnt, like, myst meal before my execution, is it?

    No. You seem sensible; were from the same ce. I just wanna be friends with you.

    Seeing this spread mustve given him thepletely wrong idea. Maybe he thought this was thest meal hed eat in his whole life. I told him I was from Japan, but he still doubted me.

    Well, um, all right

    He finally took a biteand the moment he did, he fell silent. His eyes looked different now, and his chopsticks, and his mouth, sprang into motion. He was so focused on his meal that it didnt seem like the right time to start talking, so I waited until he was done.

    And the moment he was:

    All right. Satoruum, I mean, Rimuru, Ill dly be your servant!

    I had no idea where this came from. I mean, I could tell he was starving for good Japanese food, but I hadnt even said anything yet. Besides, he mustve had his own thoughts about me.

    Servant? Uh

    No, its fine. I dont have anything keeping me from abandoning this Hero crap. Its just embarrassing when they do that Ma! Sa! Yu! Ki! chant, and Really, Ive been constantly trying to figure out how to escape from all this.

    This sounded like the real Masayuki here. And as I enjoyed some post-meal tea, I let him tell me his story.

    Masayuki was a pretty smart kid in his old world, going to a high school that put most of its grads into college. He liked reading manga and light novels, something he kept a secret, and heined to me about how it mustve led to this for him.

    My skills called Chosen One, you know? Its just sostupid.

    Hed wanted to be a hero, and as he saw it, thats why he wound up here. And his skill, Chosen One, was about what I figured it was. It let him naturally guide the thoughts of those around him, almost like brainwashingand thats what brought him to Hero-dom. This ability was beyond his control; he couldnt turn it off even if he wanted to. Thats not too user-friendlyor maybe its a little too much so.

    Maybe it is, but that doesnt mean its not incredible. You wouldve won the championship if you didnt bow out.

    The tournament was ample proof that this skill worked. Victory was his if he wanted it.

    Yeah, but its only caused me trouble. I do nothing, and people just make all these assumptions about me That was the whole way I won over in Englesia, too.

    As he put it, he let that get to his head. Even with his efforts crushing the Orthrus crime ring, he didnt actually do anythingpeople just treated him like a king. He couldpletely give up and things still worked out his way, so life was generally pretty easy for him. The experience at this tournament, though, made him realize that if this ever failed, even once, itd end his life.

    That was why hed decided it was time for a reality check, and I thought he was right. But would Chosen One affect me?

    Understood. Against ultimate skills, nearly all lower-level skills are canceled.

    So it doesnt affect me. Good. Because I intended to go easy on him anyway, but I didnt realize he was aplete amateur in battle. I bet even a quick jab from me would be disastrous.

    Well, you made the right choiceand probably at thest moment possible. I think you should be proud of that.

    You think? But Gobta transformed into that terrifyingthing and You know, I didnt need brains to realize I could never beat him.

    I wasnt so sure about that, actually, A pretty decent chunk of people were taking Gobta on regrly But yeah, Masayuki did the right thing.

    So we chatted some more, giving each other our stories and backgrounds. For the most part, though, I just gave a quick rundown of my life, spending more time listening to Masayuki talk. His friends worshipped him like a god, so he couldnt really speak frankly with them. He had nobody to vent to except Yuuki, and his busy schedule made it difficult to meet up. It made the stress and irritation umte.

    Basically, he revealed everything about himself to me, without me having to ask any questions.

    Well, Id like to hear more from you, but my lunch break is just about over. So let me ask you this: What are you going to do now?

    How do you mean?

    I mean, you promised Bovix a rematch, right? Are you gonna tackle the Dungeon?

    Ahhh!

    I guess Masayuki had forgotten all about it. He mustve been nning to promptly skip town.

    Wellwhat should I do?

    Ahhh, dont worry. Bovix is only guarding the area around Floor 50, and the Dungeons super huge, so its gonna take a few days just to make it that far.

    Oh. So if I pretend to tackle it, Ill make it through today, at least?

    Exactly. And all the dignitaries here right now are gonna leave town tomorrow.

    The festival ran for three days. The highways were going to be packed with people tomorrow, so wed mainly be working to keep traffic smooth. The real cleanup work wouldnt start for two days, once all the visitors were gone. The big Dungeon opening today was mainly a demonstration for the royalty and nobility in towna pre-unveiling, really, or a temporary opening until it began normal operation.

    Thus, I didnt think anyone would go more than a few floors down in the several hours it was open today. Besides, I also had an idea about that battle between Masayuki and Bovix. Not to disappoint him, but I didnt want Masayuki to get defeated. Since I had him here and all, I wanted him to function like a living, breathing billboard for me, leading the Dungeon-conquering adventurers down and getting them enthused about tackling the challenge.

    So Id like you to grab peoples attention for me, but do you think you can do that?

    Wow. Thats pretty reassuring to hear. Thats why you gave Jinrai all that great equipment, huh? And personally, if screwing up in there wont kill me, I can tackle thebyrinth worry-free. It sounds perfect!

    He dly pledged his support. Id meant nothing of the sort with Jinrais gift, but that certainly worked out well, too. Going into the Dungeon de facto topless was just asking to be killed.

    And Ill be d to leak some hints about conquering the Dungeon, too. If you can use them to get down pretty far for me, thatd be great. Also, if you see anything you think we could improve, dont be shy about telling me.

    I wouldnt offer any help going beyond Floor 50we wanted to keep things on the up-and-up here, so I advised him to keep that in mind. But even there, hed never die as long as he held on to his Resurrection Bracelet, so it was all good.

    Sounds great! I feel like Im beta testing a game or something.

    Ah Now that you mention it, it is kinda like that. But no need to knock yourself out today. Try to reach, like, Floor 5 or thereabouts.

    A game, huh? Thats an interesting observation to make.

    All right, Masayuki said with a refreshing smile. Im d we got to talk to each other, Rimuru. Its really put my mind at ease. Now Im starting to think this world isnt so bad after all.

    His skill had made things pretty easy for him before now, but he was still anxious a lot of the time. Having someone pledge their support for him mustve eased his worries. That, and our nation was at the cutting edge of technology in this world. Our baths and toilets made our amodations far better than anywhere else, and the variety and quality of the food here mustve surprised him, too.

    We have that orchestra, and were teaching painting to people. Pretty soon, I n to get some theater productions going. I want to have fun here, and Im not gonna skimp on investing in that stuff.

    I really respect you, Rimuru! Um, what about manga?

    Hee-hee-hee! Of course well have manga, Masayuki. Thats a longer way away, but nobody else is gonna do it, so

    Whoa! I-Ill follow you wherever you go, Rimuru!

    And so Masayuki decided to remain in town for the time being. I nned to stay in close touch with him, passing on information and such. Hopefully we could have these talks regrlyI wanted to kick back and ask him about our old world, too. Itd be a nice nostalgia trip. That, and I wanted to prod his memory for manga. He was keenly curious about my collection, and I definitely hoped to stay on good terms with him.

    Now I had a new friend.

    Our Dungeon was finally ted to open this afternoon, and I decided to perform onest check beforehand, just in case. Heading down to the open area at the bottommost floor, I was greeted by Ramiris, who came flying right up to me.

    Were just about to open things up, but hows it all going?

    Ha! Who do you think I am, huh?

    She certainly sounded confidentand Veldora, lumbering out from his room, seemed pretty proud of himself, too.

    Kwahhh-ha-ha-ha! Fear not, Rimuru. We have overlooked nothing!

    Uh-oh. I was suddenly very worried.

    Whoa, are you sure about that? I dont want you guys doing anything stupid during the unveiling today, okay?

    Ha-ha-ha! No worries! Just leave it all to us! I activated every safety feature.

    Heh-heh-heh But starting tomorrow, thebyrinth will bare its fangs!

    Ramiris and Veldora looked at each other and sneered. Were they really gonna be okay? Because they werent assuaging my fears at all.

    Um, Im gonna say this just in case you forgot, but were closing thebyrinth right after this, okay?

    Wh-what?!

    Why was Veldora saying Wh-what?! to me? Id told him as much several times before, but I suppose he wasnt listening.

    After seeing how today turned out, I wanted to fine-tune thebyrinths difficulty levels. Thus, my n was to close things up for two or three days, then reopen after that. We also hadnt worked out admission prices yet, and we needed trained personnel in ce to sell the Labyrinth Cards (i.e. the tickets) and other items. We didnt have the free time or people for that so far, but I wanted to talk it over with Mjllmile after we finished the post-festival cleanup.

    Looking back, maybe it was a mistake to leave the final details to this pair. I mean, Ramiris and Veldora looked like they were having fun, and I was busy anyway, butman, they were paying no attention at our meetings. But I didnt want to yell at them, either. Everyone was a little flustered right now.

    Calm down, okay? Ill do my best to get us officially open as soon as possible, so just sit tight until then.

    Okay!

    I will trust in you, Rimuru!

    Great. That ought to get us through today Oh, but I almost forgot. I had something extremely important to ask.

    By the way, is Milim in here?

    She is.

    Yep! She took two unlimited-use Resurrection Bracelets from us and ran off.

    Ahhh. And I gave her control over Floors 96 to 99, right? The dragon chambers with the elemental-effect floors and everything?

    Thats right. She has been putting a great deal of work into them.

    She sure has! And she even gave me the rights to the dragons she caught for those floors! She said that if we raise them right and they evolve into Dragon Lords, theyll be intelligent enough to understand mymands!

    Ramiris was all smiles. I guess, in her mind, even Milim had some good facets to her.

    The sight of Milim flying through the air, carrying captured dragons in her arms, mustve given anyone who saw her quite a shock. Apparently, wed receivedints about it the first two times, but people got used to it from the third time onward. I guess our towns residents just epted it as normal.

    Milim had found for us four dragons in a Fire Dragon, Frost Dragon, Wind Dragon, and Earth Dragon. These were elemental Arch Dragons, just as Milim had promised us, and even now they were about as intelligent as your typical farm animal. Give them care like you would any pet, and itd be possible to connect with them.

    Huh. Did you put cors on them or anything?

    For now, yes. These are my beloved servants, so I want to be darn sure we set up a clear master-and-servant rtionship!

    I see. Ramiris was certainly thinking deeply about this, and what I heard sounded good enough to me. But back to the main topic.

    So is Milim in the dragon chambers right now?

    Yep. She said she found some ymates to help my servants stay in shape!

    Indeed. I believe I went fishing with one of them once. But how is someone like him going to y with a dragon?

    Youre better off not knowing, I think. But all I needed was Milims current location. If she was toiling away near the bottom of thebyrinth, I doubt shed meddle with our opening at all.

    Right. She probably wont get in the way, then, so Im fine with that. Were about to open thebyrinth right now, so can youe up top for me?

    Yep! Id be happy to, chirped Ramiris.

    I will pass. It is the role of thebyrinth master to await his challengers!

    Look, I told you, nobodys gonna make it to the bottom in one day! In fact, youd probably have to wait many days before anyone shows up. I refrained from telling him this, however. Thats so kind of me.

    Great. Well, good luck, then!

    Leaving Veldora with some encouragement, I took Ramiris along as we teleported to the chamber up top.

    With lunch over, arge number of people had arrived at their seats. Ramiris and I were there to greet them.

    Wee back, Sir Rimuru, Diablo said, smiling. He was done with his refereeing work, and I heard he was looking for me. I gave him a quick nod and hello of my own, then switched gears and took a look at our program. I had a lot of expectations for the Dungeon we were opening. It was one of the centerpieces of our nations future development, so I wanted as many of our visitors to explore it as possible. Fortunately, it seemed like few to none of our invitees decided to take an early leave after lunch. The hall was nearly full, so I thought this would function as pretty decent advertising.

    Turning toward the event space, I could see Soka and Mjllmile, thetter of whom would take Diablos ce as guide and announcer during this event. It was time to go, so I gave them both my signal.

    All right! The time hase! The final event of Day Three of the Founders Festival is about to begin!

    Ladies and gentlemen, thank you for your patience. We are about to show you a small portion of our impregnable Dungeon, one of Tempests greatest achievements. It is the ultimate challenge for adventurers, presented by our leader, the demon lord Rimuru. Will anybody out there be able to conquer it?!

    Mjllmile was giving this spiel from center stage, mic in hand. He wasnt quite as much of a natural at this as Soka, but he looked well enough in his element.

    What he had to say was this: Running a demonstration of thebyrinth was well and good, but taking all the visitors here inside the Dungeon was too dangerous. There were several hundred members of the ruling ss in here; add our more nearby residents, and the number became several thousand. A crowd that size crammed into thebyrinth would be far too unruly to guide around.

    Instead, wede up with the idea of sending several parties down there and showing their progress on arge screen. That presented a few technological challenges, but we had already seeded at providing a clear picture on a huge screen at the battle tournament, and we could use the same tech for this.

    The projector that Gabil and Vester built was proving useful for a variety of purposes. Its what wed used to disy the battles on-screen earlier, via a video-recording crystal ball stored inside the machine. This crystal was inscribed with magicalmunication spells that let it receive images recorded far away and project them here, allowing the audience to watch the challengers from a safe distance and enjoy the entertainment.

    Getting a king or prince injured would be a huge problem; as a result, only a few selected parties would actually be experiencing thebyrinth today.

    And so, a smiling Soka shouted, wed now like to open thebyrinth up to adventurers! Are there any members of the audience courageous enough to delve into the Dungeon were proud to offer you?

    That was our cue. Ramiris, perched on my shoulder, summoned a temporary doorway to thebyrinth in the center of the stage. We couldve just brought any challengers down to the basement here, but it was important to put on a show for things like this.

    Oooohhh!

    See? The crowd was amazed, just as I hoped theyd be. A quiet sort of excitement was taking root among them, the adventurers in the audience sizing up one another. We were strictly epting volunteers today, and if possible, I wanted to see a lot of participantsand even if nobody raised their hand, we still had Masayukis group. That was part of why I wanted to negotiate with him earlier; he had already exined matters to his friends, and they were on standby right now. I had given them a map of the first five floors to ensure against any mistakes. Hopefully theyd serve as the advertising pitchmen I wanted.

    So would we see any volunteers? As it turned out, my concerns were for nothing.

    Heh-heh I dunno what a demon lordsbyrinth is all about, but Im ready to rip the facade from it! You might think youve cowed us all, what with that phony battle tournament and everything, but you wont get us this time!

    Yeah! Bassons right!

    If the highway wasnt so jammed, Basson wouldve won the whole tournament!

    Heh-heh-heh Youre not forgetting about me, are you?

    Ah, dont be that way, Gomez. They know all about how strong you are. As long as you and I are together, our Great Lightning teams got nothing to fear!

    Oh? Looks like weve got all kinds of challengers. This Basson guy mustve shown up toote to join the tournament. If he was around to see it, he shouldve known full well how powerful thepetitors werebut with a couple of matches forfeited, the quality of the fighting was admittedly hit-or-miss. I was sure there were a ton of people like Basson who assumed they were invincible and so on. But that was fine. I figured wed see a few skeptics who refused to believe in any of this. Those would be our future customers, after all.

    And Masayuki the Hero wasnt anyone special in the end, either, was he? Hes strong, Ill grant you that, but in a fight, you gotta see it through to the end! Letting the demon lord of this country off the hook like that How half-hearted of him! It sickens me!

    Um He admitted that Masayuki was strong? Okay, whatever.

    Yeah, this so-calledbyrinth is a big con joband Basson and I are gonna expose it for what it is right now!

    Bassons group certainly had gusto.

    I refuse to allow them to berate you like this, Sir Rimuru.

    Let me go over and shut them up a bit

    Halt!

    I couldnt let my guard down. Shion was irritated, and Diablo came this close to going out of control. I hurriedly stopped thembut at least they didnt threaten to kill them this time.

    Theyre just a little overconfident, okay? Besides, I think itll be more fun if we get people like them.

    They might be a little dumb, I thought, but they were the right people for this job. Shion and Diablo nodded their agreementI was used to handling them by now.

    Basson was a fighter with a shaved head; Gomez, a sorcerer in a ck robe. They had four others in their party, none of them worth writing home about. This sextet would be our first challengers.

    Then someone unexpected spoke up.

    Well take the challenge!

    Three people jumped out of the audience. I thought Id seen them before Wait, is that Elen?!

    I was having Elens trio help with the founding of Yohms new nation. They were going around the Free Guild locations in the former Farmus, and I had asked them to aid Yohm however they could. A B-ranked adventurer was a fearsome presence in itself, and Elens party was now rated B-plus. They were allowed to cross national borders unhindered, so I figured this was the perfect job for them. They hadnt joined Yohm on the way here, so I assumed they had gone back home or something, but no. I had no idea they were nning this, in factthey mustve been hiding it so Archduke Erald didnt stop them.

    Were really going to do it?

    Oh, of course we are! I havent had any adventurestely, so Ive been waiting for this!

    Let me askas leader, I have the right to say no, right? Right?

    Um, no? Not at all. Its already set in stone!

    Crazy. I felt so bad for Kabal. And I thought Id just heard Erald screaming over in the other room, only to fall silent after the sound of something smashing. I could picture what had happened but chose not to. Hopefully, at least, Elen would be done before her father woke up.

    Our third party here was led by Masayuki, hero of the day. They all calmly strode onstage, greeting the audience with smiles.

    Ma! Sa! Yu! Ki! Masayukiiiii!

    Yes, yes, all right. They hear you. The apuse in the room was deafening. What a stud he is.

    Counting Masayuki, there were four people in the party, including the formerly topless Jinrai d in the armor Id given hima suit of Mithril Armor, crafted by Garm and rated as a Rare on the scale. It was heavier than Yohms Exo-Armor and not quite as effective but just as durable. It even gave the wearer anti-poison effects.

    I had also given Masayuki a rapier as a present. Id asked him over lunch why he never drew his sword, and he tly replied, Well, like, its heavy, so Honestly, I was shocked by how much of a bluffer he was. He had some kendo experience but none with actual swordsand besides, in this world, slicing Japanese katanas werent as popr as heavy, skull-crushing des, so they were all gonna have a little heft to them.

    As he told me, even striking a pose with a sword for a long time was difficult for him. So I gave him this rapier, advising him to try working out a little more as well. This de was a discarded version of the one I gave to Hinatait had the same light weight and strength, but not her swords unique trait of always killing your opponent on the seventhnded attack. Just swinging this thing around was enough work for Masayuki; he didnt need that sort of advanced feature anyway. Plus, the rapier also remedied exhaustion for its user to some extent. If all Masayuki would do was strike a pose and keep it steady, this sword was more than enough.

    So the party of four was soaking in the cheers from the audience, none of whom questioned their change in equipment.

    We nned to set a time limit of three hours, calcted back from my intended goal of keeping anyone from going past Floor 5. Masayukis party had a map, giving them an advantage over the others, and I was counting on them to advertise thebyrinth for me.

    So three parties, then? That didnt seem like too many, but of course, a lot of people would think twice about challenging a shady, demon lordrunbyrinth. We needed to address, and quell, that hesitation with this demo today.

    But just as I was about to move the show along:

    Wait. Ill join in, too.

    A man d entirely in ck appeared onstageGaiye the Flowing Swordsman.

    Youve done a fine job trapping me in your bluffs and trickery, havent you? Heh-heh-heh The demon lords Big Four, or whatever theyre called, certainly y dirty, do they not? I can understand if theyre afraid of my talents, but they picked a fight with the wrong foe. You can scheme all you want, but Im about to crush your ambitions for good!

    Quite an introduction. I was wondering what he was doing here, and now I knew, I guess. Basically, he couldnt understand how Ranga had beaten him and decided it was all a trap. He assumed I was up to something no good with thisbyrinth, and now he was standing up to stop me in my tracks, I guess. And yes, I was up to somethingbut probably not the things Gaiye was picturing.

    Right. This time, Im going to chop his little

    Yeah! Get im, Diablo!

    No. Dont get im. And stop imitating my voice, Shion.

    These people I swear, why were they always like this? Whenever someone said something about me, they just give them no mercy. And Shion was getting so sensitive to every affront, too, imagined or not. Maybe it was time I thought of some more serious measures for her.

    But whatever.

    Gaiye looked like he wanted to go solo on this, but was he gonna be okay? I was honestly concerned. On the other hand, itd be nice to get a sample of how a lone adventurer would fare in thebyrinth. We might as well make him the fourth party today.

    Now that we had our challengers, the long-awaited moment was here. It was time to open the Dungeon.

    There wasnt much time to work with, so all four parties would be going in at once. Soka would stay here tomentate on the on-screen action. Inside guidance would be best handled by the dryads, whod also serve as cameramen as they apanied each party. We didnt have many of them, but there were a fewTreyni, Traya, and Doreth included. The others were young and inexperienced in battle but boasted tremendous magical force. Under Ramiriss management, theyd make for perfectbyrinth managers.

    These four people, Soka said, are the curators of ourbyrinth. Normally they will not apany parties entering the Dungeon, but for todays run, well have one shadowing each team.

    The quartet gave their hellos to the crowd. These were named Alpha, Beta, Gamma, and Deltanot having names would be inconvenient, so Id just pulled those out of my head. It didnt cost me any magicules; since dryads are high-level monsters, I could have them consume their own magic force for the job. Ramiris was their boss, so all I did was helpe up with their names. As sisters, they all had the same looks, so telling them apart via visuals alone was a challenge. Monsters often rely on things like magical waveforms to identify individuals, but I thought that was asking a lot of humans, so names were more helpful.

    If you guys run into any trouble, feel free to ask them for advice! And now, let me run down the rules for you all! First, Im going to give these to everyone!

    Soka pulled out a couple of items, Alpha and the other dryads giving the same ones to each party.

    These items here, you see, were nning to offer for sale when people enter thebyrinth. Does everybody have them now?

    As she spoke, each item was shown in a close-up on the screen. This pseudo-television technology was really helpful for stuff like this. Currently, it was showing a set of ten High Potions, one Full Potion, and a bunch of Resurrection Bracelets and return whistles. These had been provided for free during todays beta testif they were kind enough to volunteer, I didnt mind giving them somepensation. The dryad chaperones would have some backup items, too, just in case, so they could get whisked to safety if things went south.

    Given the size of this thing, it was entirely possible that a party wouldnt get out of Floor 1 in the time allotted. Even if they took the shortest path to the stairway down, were talking a literal mile or so of walkingand given that this was a maze, they were gonna be covering much more distance than that. For the next three hours, itd be best if the parties tried just hard enough to keep the audience entertainedand once time expired, theyd use their items to get back up top.

    I had other rewards for them, too, of course. For advertising purposes, I had some treasure chests set up containing souvenirs in the form of decent armor and so on. During actual operation, these chests wouldnt show up until Floor 2 onward, but we were being generous today.

    Finally, Soka exined the most important item in the lot.

    Now, take a look at this item. This is known as a Resurrection Bracelet, and we highly rmend you purchase this when you enter ourbyrinth. What does it do? Believe it or not, it resurrects you from the dead!!

    The crowd immediately began chattering about this. Impossible! I could hear a few of them shout.

    Ladies and gentlemen, quiet, please! This is important, so I want to be sure everybodys paying attention, all right? The key thing here is that this item only works if you are inside Tempests Dungeon! It doesnt do anything at all outside thebyrinth, and given the stakes involved, we want to be absolutely sure everyones aware of that. Always remember that at all timesthis doesnt work outside!

    That was important. If someone assumed otherwise, itd make for some sad scenes if they tried using it and failed. I didnt want people to im I was liable. Its up to you to keep yourself safe, okay, guys? But I knew that some people just loved to cause a scene andin about anything and everything, so we needed to be 100 percent sure we drilled this point into everyones minds. Nobody could be allowed to think this worked outside thebyrinth; we couldnt have some idiot think, Hey, maybe itll work somehow. If you mess that up, hey, its not our fault. The promoteri.e., mebore no responsibility.

    You know, in my old world, I always felt like people foisted way too much responsibility on retailers andpanies. If some fool breaks the rules, goes crazy, and gets themselves killed, all I can say is that they had itingbut if were negligent about providing guidance and cautions, then it does be our fault. Thats why we needed to be thorough about our warnings here.

    So once again, never, ever attempt to use this bracelet outside!

    Soka was being exactly as clear and thorough as I hoped. Good. The only unresolved item on my wish list was to have someone actually die in theresomething people would admittedly be reluctant about. But Ramiris had upgraded the Resurrection Bracelets to the point that they even canceled out pain upon determining you were dead. They also gave you a dy of around ten seconds between when you died and when you got teleported back up, so if you or a fellow party member could take suitable measures in time, you could still get fixed up on the spot. Resurrection, being a divine skill and everything, was too high-level for most people to cast, but still.

    By the way, Full Potions normally cannot regenerate the soul, but since your soul was stuck firmly inside your own body inside thebyrinth, you actually could resurrect people with a Full Potion to restore the body. I feared encouraging this, however, since (again) it may give people the idea they could pull that trick outside as well. Thats why, unless you resurrected a downed adventurer the standard way, their body and soul would get teleported topside after ten seconds. Just like Masayuki, one should just think of it like a dungeon-exploration video game.

    Anyway, that wrapped up the initial briefing. Now I just needed someone to try out the Resurrection Bracelet for me.

    So who would like to experience this for themselves?

    I doubted anyone would, actually, but Soka brightly belted out the question anyway. Talk about thick-skinned.

    Basson, the giant skinhead of a man, grunted at this. Hmph! Youll never die in thebyrinth? Thats a funny joke. If you think Im gonna believe that and get myself killed in there, you got another thinging!

    The people around him nodded their assent. This was justmon sense. Not even Elens team was taking the bait.

    Heh Well, who do you think should do it? You go first.

    Gaiye the Flowing Swordsman pointed a finger at Mjllmile. He wanted someone else to go first, not him, and I guess that was to be expected. I wished he were more polite about it, though.

    Me? An understandable suggestion, I suppose. Id be happy to.

    Mjllmile, perhaps expecting this, wasnt agitated at all. In fact, hed already experienced it once. The members of Team Reborn under Shion had experimented with it many times, so he fully believed it was safeand going through it one time removed any fear from the process. So, with as much stately majesty as he could muster, he put on the bracelet and set foot inside thebyrinth. The challengers followed behind him.

    Now, if you actually attack Mjllmile in here

    Soka took up the sword on her hip, preparing to sh at Mjllmile. But before she could continue, Gaiye cut him off.

    You cant trick me. Krahhh!

    There was an arcing sh in the air, and then he sliced Mjllmiles arm clean off.

    Hey!!

    Soka tried to stop him, but nowhere near in time.

    Gaaahhh!

    Mjllmile started shouting as well, bringing a hand to the gaping wound. The reduced-pain effect kept him from dying of shock, but Im sure getting forcibly amputated wasnt a very pleasant feeling.

    Ha-ha-ha-ha-ha! And now its almost time for the final blow!!

    Was he just ying with him? What a bastard. I almost lost my temper, but then I saw a smile on Mjllmiles face. That restored my cond just as it did, Gaiyes sword hewed Mjllmiles head clean off. At once, his body turned into a collection of light particles, flowing up and gathering by the door at center stage. Mjllmile, along with what he was wearing, formed anew from these particles, fully restored.

    The crystal balls carried by Alpha and the other dryads recorded all of this, transmitting it to therge screen in the hall.

    And there you have it! Im back in perfect shape!

    Mjllmile stood there, as if he hadnt just been brutally murdered. His severed arm was attached to him as well. It couldnt have been a better performance.

    Whoooaaa!!

    The audience cheered for him. Some of them screamed that it was a miracle. Id say the demonstration was a sess. I didnt want people to think this was an borate trick, but thanks to Gaiyes penchant for sudden violence, I think everyone was more convinced than they would have been otherwise. If anyone still didnt believe it, wed just have to let them experience it for themselves. Of course, it wasnt risk-free, so the best thing to do in thebyrinth was to simply not die. Take care of yourself down there, and youll never have to go through it.

    I figured we could let adventurers who challenged thebyrinth spread the stories for us, and things would work themselves out. I thought some curious daredevils would want to get killed just to see what the experience was like, and that was no problem to me, either. The important thing was that adventurers had nothing to fear if they took on the Dungeonand I thought Mjllmile had just ensured that for me. I gotta say, hes got courage. He put up with Gaiyes morbid antics because this is exactly how he wanted this to turn out. Definitely need to thank himter for taking that role, I thought as I looked at the screen.

    The Dungeon is now open for exploration! A brand-new world is waiting for you inside. What could be awaiting those intrepid enough to battle their way through to the bottom?

    Soka was onstage, kicking off hermentary, as the screen showed the viewpoints of all four parties. The live connections worked without a hitch, bringing the audience inside thebyrinth. She was taking a documentary-style approach to her announcing, and I really appreciated her attention to detail as I watched the parties set off.

    The first one that caught my eye was Bassons, as they plunged past the orderly, well-built stone-type walls that defined Floor 1.

    I figured at least one party member would be drawing a map on the way, but nobody was. They werent even leaving marks on the walls to keep their bearings, instead just pleasantly chatting as they strode down the corridors. Were they gonna be okay? I knew people like them explored caves and went on hunting missions in lush forests and so onhow did this party find its way to their destination otherwise? They didnt hire a guide every time, did they?

    Tch! Its the same damn kind of corridor over and over! And all these crossroads!

    Werent we at this intersection before, boss?

    Just as I feared, they were lost. Id told them earlier how big this ce was, but had they tuned that out?

    Whoa, this is bad news, Basson! This maze is bigger than I thought

    Ah. Yeah, the first floor alone was over eight hundred feet long per side. They had been told this was a pretty big ce, but I suppose they were picturing something cozier. I guess that, if you heard it described as a man-made structure beneath the coliseum, youd likely think it wasnt that big, either. But oh well. It wasnt my problemand again, it made for good advertising.

    However, I really didnt want these parties to face instant death at the start of Floor 1. If we went that insanely hard on them from the get-go, nobody would want to take the challenge. They needed to get at least a little far in. They could always die to be transported back, and there was an SOS feature in their bracelets as well, which treated the wearer as dead and let them escape at any time. The dryads could alsoe to their rescue, and there was one apanying each party, ready to promptly bring them back to the surface.

    So I really wanted them to be serious about plumbing thisbyrinthbut Basson was too busy getting irritated at his panicky party members.

    What are you people? Idiots? Ive never heard of such an enormous maze before. That demon lords just feeding us a tall tale. Hes using magic or something to disorient us.

    Oh Oh, he is!

    Youve convinced me, Basson!

    Yeah, the magicule concentration around here is pretty high. Youre probably right. This must be illusory magic or the like.

    You said it, Gomez. Weve been following the right-hand rule religiously so far. Worst-case scenario, well just wind up back where we came.

    Oh dear. Labyrinth difficulty was the least of their concerns. They mightve thought they were thinking things through, but they sure werent. I wouldnt be so harsh on them if they were taking notes on paper, but no way could they memorize a path through all these simr-looking corridors, packed with forks, four-way intersections, and dead ends. Between the uniform decor and the twistiness of the paths, simply going right at every opportunity wasnt going to get you anyce.

    These challengers were just way too idiotic. Couldnt count on them for too much, I guess

    But then Bassons party disappeared. Or, to be more exact, they fell down to the next level.

    Wh-whoaaa! Was that a trapdoor?

    I was as quizzical as Soka. Did we set up any trapdoors on the first level?

    Ramiris

    Um Yes? How can I help you?

    When I set up this floor, I really dont think I installed anything like that. You havent been messing around with my design, have you?

    I tried to keep a smile on my face, so as not to scare Ramiris. That being said, I still found it prudent to grab her to keep her from flying away.

    Well, actually, she replied with a forced smile, we wanted to make thebyrinth a moreplete creation, so

    Upon further interrogation, Ramiris admitted to cing a fairly decent number of trapdoors around. I had to chew her out for this. A floor thisrge doesnt need trapdoors, all right? The idea was to tire adventurers out and sap their endurance, but these kinds of traps had the opposite effect, essentially serving as time-saving shortcuts. Traps are only traps, after all, if their effect matches your intended purpose.

    But, um, but, I mean, you had a lot more fiendish trapdoors in the lower levels, didnt you? So I thought, you know, perhaps you forgot to install some higher up. I just did it out of kindness, you see?

    I didnt need that type of kindness.

    Sure, if they wanted to make this into a punishing gauntlet, I could get that. If I left everything in the hands of Ramiris, Veldora, and Milim, theyd litter the wholebyrinth with insane traps like that. But I didnt want that at the very start. That was the whole reason I worked on the topmost floors myself!

    Quickly, I turned my attention to the other parties.

    Elens group was theoretically led by Kabal, but Elen herself had fully taken over the leader role. On the whole, they had no sense of direction at all, so I thought beating the first floor could prove difficult for themand I was half-right.

    The group didnt run into any traps, at least, as they carefully advanced. Amazingly, they were even writing down notes as they went, following the textbook method of dungeon conquering.

    Oh? Elens party is sure taking this seriously. They didnt hit any trapdoors, and theyre dodging the traps I set up as well. And they already looted three treasure chests? Theyre having a pretty smooth time so far.

    Eh-heh-heh!

    Um? Whats so funny? Why are they having such a smooth time of it? And something about Ramiris hiding her reaction with augh rubbed me the wrong way.

    Uh, Ramiris?

    Y-yes? What is it?

    I trust in you, okay? I know you wouldnt hide anything from me.

    Ofof course not, Rimuru!

    So let me ask: Did you do something to Elens group?

    Nothing looked amiss on-screen, but they were performing a little too well. As one would expect in a dungeon, many of the treasure chests throughout contained nothing of valuebut Elens party picked three chests in a row with killer loot. It stank of cheating.

    Well, actually

    Not that again.

    What did you do?

    Oh, um, well, Elen and her group gave me a nice little gift, so we really hit it off, you could say! So then

    The more I heard, the worse my headache got.

    In the midst ofbyrinth construction, Elen had given Ramiris arge number of cakes. These were baked by Mr. Yoshida, so Im sure they were all delicious. Elen had made simr overtures to the dryads as well, and bit by bit, she had gleaned information from them about the first floor. Ramiris realized this after a while, but as she put it, the magic of those pastries was simply irresistible.

    I mean, what could I do?! I didnt see it as a problem! And Master Veldora and Milim didnt, either!

    Now she was firing back at me, trying to portray her actions as totally justifiable. But it was straight-up bribery. I was exasperated at how quickly corruption had be an issue down there.

    Still, no need to catastrophize about it. I had adjusted thebyrinth today to skew easier difficulty-wise. Plus, only the first floor had been exposed to her. The treasure chests with the real top-shelf prizes werent on that level.

    Kabals party is doing a good jobnding treasure, isnt it?

    That it is, Mjllmile told Soka, joining her in the announcers role. Sir Rimuru mentioned that chests can sometimes be found in small side rooms and the like, but they need to watch for traps as well.

    Good point! Do you think there are neat items in them?

    Theres some really good stuff in the lower levels, I would imagine And speaking of which, I understand there are three types of treasure chests in allgold, silver, and bronze. It seems only the bronze chests run the chance of being booby-trapped.

    These three chest types contained different sets of items. Floor 1 contained nothing but bronze chests. Silver chests could contain items up to the Special level of rarity, but most of them were seeded with potions, silver coins, and other useful stuff. This included some of the lesser-quality swords forged by Kurobe, only ranking a Normal in quality. Overall, nothing that would really cost us much if someone was gunning for them.

    But its the gold chests you really want, I suppose, Soka said.

    Quite so, agreed Mjllmile, reading from some notes Id given him earlier. And apparently, those only show up on floor numbers that are a multiple of tenthe boss chambers, in other words.

    What do you mean by that?

    Well, as all of you know, Sir Bovix has been appointed the guardian of Floor 50. In much the same way, we have other guardians, or boss monsters, positioned in chambers in front of the exit stairway in Floors 40, 30, 20, and 10. The gold chests are only for those adventurers who can defeat such formidable foes, and they could even contain Rare-level weapons and armor!

    This was meant to be an advertising event, so I didnt want opportunities like this one to go to waste. The script here was admittedly kind of trite, like ate-night infomercial, appealing to peoples greed with such refreshing crity that I was almost ashamed to be one of the writers. But it worked like a charm. The mention of Rare weapons sent a mor across the audience.

    I imagine most people here got to see Bovixs strength for themselves. He is the kind of powerhouse challengers have waiting for them in here, so if anyone thinks theyve got the muscle for it, Id love to see them challenge thisbyrinth!

    Thats right! And one more thing: As you can see on this screen, each floor is veryrge in size. I imagine youd need to clear out several days if you wanted to fully conquer the Dungeon, huh?

    That was our basic setupSoka asking leading questions, Mjllmile answering them. The ssic y-by-y and colormentary setup, and they were doing pretty well as partners.

    Like I said before, Floor 1 had only bronze chests.

    You didnt mess around with the contents of the chests, did you? I asked Ramiris.

    All good there!

    Ah, all right. I didnt appreciate Elen gaming the system like this, but her party was advancing the right way, and it made for perfect advertising. I suppose she earned whatever she picked up down there today. Giving her a map and list of trap locations was a tant rule vition, but Id overlook it this time.

    So I knew Elens party was safe. What about Masayuki, whom Id given my own set of hints?

    And look at this! Theyve already made their way to Floor 4! What speed! Were definitely seeing Lightspeed at their quickest today, folks!

    Pfffthhh!!

    Why, man?! It hasnt even been thirty minutes since we began! Why was he already down to the fourth level?!

    Masayukis party had hit virtually every trapdoor so far, as if aiming for them, which gave them a head start to the lower levels. And the crowd

    Ma! Sa! Yu! Ki! Masayukiiiiii!!

    I didnt even need to look at them, really. Even audience members whoughed at Basson blundering into a trapdoor sang Masayukis praises whenever he found one. It was incredibly unfair, but that was just Masayukis power doing its thing. He was probably resenting me right now, given that the info Id leaked to him was less than fully reliable. Sorry, man. It wasnt my fault, not that that was an excuse.

    By Floor 4, theyd start to see monsters patrolling the corridors. I was sure my map wasnt looking too reliable at this point, what with those fearsome trapdoors at random locations, but I still prayed theyd do their best with the situation.

    That just left Gaiye, and he was using his physical gifts to rush through thebyrinth, Delta flying at full speed to keep up.

    Being a demi-spiritual being, Delta could teleport herself using whatever nearby nt life there wasbut doing that would cut off the video she was telecasting, so she was frantically chasing after Gaiye instead, I suppose. It was an impressive effort, and I was d to see her so devoted to her post.

    Gaiye, of course, paid her no mind, proceeding along at his own pace. Judging by how he wasnt getting lost at all on his way to the stairways, I was guessing he had some kind of magical positioning system activated.

    Understood. This is the elemental magic spell Automap.

    Aha. You wouldnt need a map at all, then, huh?

    This magic shed pinpoint positional data into your brain, sort of like what the Great Sage used to provide me. If Gaiye was keeping it constantly activated, he mustve been well versed in magic, too, not just swords. Pretty gifted in both as well, Id say.

    Upon reaching out to Fuze, I learned that Gaiye was indeed an A-ranked adventurer, a very rare breed. Based on his performance, Id call that more than fair. He was on Floor 2 right now but would be reaching the next stairway down shortly. If he kept up this pace, he should make it to Floor 5 in the two hours or so remaining. This was much faster than I envisioned; I didnt see this speeding at all.

    But something caught my attention. There was something sparkling within Gaiyes eyessomething unusual. His lips were twisted downward, his eyes bloodshotand even when he hit Floor 3, he kept up his zing speed. Unlike the first two floors, however, he started ducking into side rooms, checking them for treasure chestsor, really, just raiding the chests without hesitation, like he knew where they were all along. Strictly silver chests, too.

    Uh Hows he doing that? I grumbled. Raphael had no response, so not even he knew.

    I feel like that adventurer Gaiyes got this intense greed pushing him forward, yknow? Like his nose can smell out where the gold is.

    Ramiriss appraisal was a tad vague, but I think I might understand what she was getting at. It was clear there was nothing normal about Gaiye, between this and the gruesome treatment he gave Mjllmile. Hopefully, I reasoned as I watched him sprint forward, I wont have to get involved with him much.

    We were now two hours in, and Bassons party had just found another hidden room.

    Basson! Theres another chamber in here!

    A fellow party member happened upon thetch for the door.

    Not another trap, is it? a doubtful Basson asked.

    The adventurers had been stymied by a paralysis-poison trap Idid for them, as well as a treasure chest loaded with sleeping gas. They even got osted by one of the weaker mimics in thebyrinth, so now they were eyeing every chest with caution.

    Hey, Ramiris, which chest was in that chamber? Id really like them to find something good soon. It makes for bad advertising otherwise, and Im kinda starting to feel sorry for them

    Seeing them bumble around reminded me of my days of buying ten loot crates in a mobile game and getting nothing but crap from them. After all this failure, they just seemed pitiful to me. Theyd nevere back if theypletely lost their drive to continue, so I wanted them tond something pretty soon.

    Um, n-no worries there. Its just, yknow, that challengers party is really awful. Not that Im one to talk, but I didnt expect anyone to be this reckless. But that chambers got one monster and one silver chest. I dont remember whats inside, but itll definitely be worth the trouble this time!

    Great. Today, at least, I wanted something good toe their way

    Whoa, boss, its a trap! Theres a monster!

    Geh. Wanna fall back?

    We cant, Basson. Hes already locked on to us!

    A giant bear?! Yeah, no running from that

    Both sides began to size each other up, gauging their first move. Iwas concerned. Why would the simple presence of a monster spook them so much? No, you didnt see creatures like this on Floor 1, and Floor 2 had nothing too powerful on it. But this hidden chamber had a silver chest with a fairly decent item inside, so wed just ced a monster in there to protect it. Ramiris was rightthis hidden room housed the best prize of the entire floor, and the giant bear guarding it was a C-ranked monster. Bassons team was rated B; this would be easy pickings for themand yet, the sight of that beast scared the pants off Basson and Gomez.

    Basson, I see a treasure chest on the other side!

    And its silver

    It might be a trap, but we gotta do it. Brace yourselves, people!

    Lets go!

    Now the party of six was finally ready to fight, gripping their weapons tightly as they stared the bear down.

    Ill distract it. You guys catch it off guard!

    Basson, as leader, intended to y the advance-guard role. The moment he jumped into the room, he let out a roar, drawing the bears attention. The two of them faced off.

    Whoa, Bassons party has started fighting a monster! Is that a giant bear theyre up against? Those enormous ws could easily take your life with one swipe, its said!

    Sokasmentary made me realize how wrong I was. Ah yesthis wasnt a game. Bassons party wasnt proving it too well today, but they were professional adventurers, and they didnt like getting hurt. The stakes dictated that one wrong move could end your life, so naturally, they wanted to avoid anybat that didnt suitably reward them. I told everyone that dying in here was perfectly safe, but it looked like thatd take a while to sink in.

    Maybe I needed to reconsider the pitch I was making with thisbyrinth

    And then battle began. Basson was up in front, fending off the giant bears attack. His face was taut. He had gone with a set of hard leather armor today, which left his arms and sides undefendedno wonder even a lower-level foe was making him sweat. The swipes from his ax were heavy and punishing, no doubt, but they didnt offer good defense against a wed foe. Instead, he was deftly using his circr shield to push the giant bears arms away.

    Meanwhile, hispanions were offering him support, focused on staying safe as they aimed for the enemys eyes and footing with their barrage of attacks. It was Gomez the sorcerer who struck the final blow, however, with a Windcutter attack that hit home.

    And the curtain has closed on their battle with the giant bear! That was quite a battle, wasnt it?

    That it was. Truly a textbook approachnot going in too far at any time. These are true veterans of the craft at work.

    I listened to Soka and Mjllmiles banter as I thought over the fight. The party had worked well together. Theyd wrapped up that battle sessfully in around five minutes, with nobody hurt on their side. To me, though, this was a serious problem. My head started to hurt again.

    Guys, this was a fight they wouldve dominated from the start. Why were they being so damn careful with it?

    Yes, Im a tad surprised as well. But thats the normal approach, isnt it?

    I guess so. I was worried when I saw they werent drawing a map, but I guess their approach to this is just too far removed from what we pictured.

    Right, right. It might take some people three days or so just to wrap up Floor 1

    Hmm In which case, maybe we better start thinking about supplying food or something

    Man. I sure wasnt expecting our ns to go awry like this. Bassons party had adventurers of assorted ranks, but as a team, they were equivalent to a B. With the right equipment, I figured Basson and Gomez could both merit a B by themselves. The sight of a party of six experiencing so much trouble on Floor 2 was beyond unexpected. They were the clear victors of that battle, but five minutes? That was too long. Yeah, their emphasis on safety was probably the mark of professionalsbut maybe they should focus more on healing injuries with potions and learning how to fight a little more efficiently.

    As I fretted about this, the party approached the treasure chest.

    Looks like theres a treasure chest in the room. And that colors silver, isnt it? What could we find inside?

    Sokas buildup filled the audience chamber with tension. Other parties had opened many chests by now, but it seemed like the crowd couldnt get enough of that moment when the chest swung open.

    One of Bassons party members popped open the top. Eesh, at least try to be on the lookout for traps, guys! There werent any on silver chests, but they wouldnt know that They already had a dose of paralysis-poison earlier, along with sleeping gas before that. Now the party was taking turns picking someone to open chests, like it was a kind of punishment. It was so low-level, it scared me to look at them. For someone like me, used to the unwritten rules of video games, it wasplete amateur hour. People here might not be used to uncovering chests in the middle of huge mazesbut was that why they were being so thoughtless about opening them?

    Along those lines, Elens party was looking far more sensible. They had Gido with them, so up to now, they had managed to raid the chests without getting caught in any traps. Not having a thief-type specialist in his party might be a problem for Basson. Hunter-type adventurers who made most of their coin from bodyguard work might not be used to situations like this. Itd be best for them to bring on a dedicated explorer or just expand the size of their party.

    But Hang on. Maybe thebyrinth really was more difficult than we pictured. I thought Bassons crew was just kind of low-level, but with nobody here well versed in this kind of dungeon hacking, perhaps things were just going to go slow at first. Wed need to reconsider thatter.

    Oh! Ohhhhh! Basson, its a sword!!

    Nice! Theyd finally drawn a winnera big winner.

    Top prizes for these chests included high-grade potions, ancient gold coins, quality armor, and so on. Starting on Floor 2, you also had a tiny chance at uncovering a Rare-level item, and that was exactly the kind of sword Bassons team had just found.

    Oh, actually, Master Veldora said that he adjusted the chests from Floor 2 down to give out more jackpots like that.

    Did he? Ah. But this party didnt find anything good until now

    Veldora saw the problem and addressed it, but with a party this unlucky, it still didnt help. If he hadnt fudged the stats a little, Basson wouldve been finding nothing all day. Drawing a Rare item was certainly quite aeback. It meant good PR for us, and I bet itd drive Bassons party to try their luck some more. Thinking about it that way, I had to admitVeldora did a good job.

    That was a smart decision on Veldoras part, though. People need to have some positive experiences in here, or else itll affect our future strategy.

    Id have to thank himter.

    Bassons party, meanwhile, was passing the sword around to one another, staring at it and whistling their astonishment. Seemed they liked it.

    Okay, guys, Basson said as he put his ax away and switched to the sword, lets keep this up!

    The next chamber had three lesser bats flitting around, but Basson managed to swipe them all down with one hit. The de must have helped, because they were starting to move faster. One of Kurobes apprentices had crafted that sword, which just barely qualified for Rare status, but to Basson, it mustve been a legendary piece. The same was true for Gaiye; I heard that even A-ranked pros had difficulty acquiring a full set of Rare equipment. If so, no wonder Basson was so excited.

    The party was now proceeding more quickly, making up for lost time and umting arge number of magic crystals from the monsters they slew.

    This is nice. Were definitelyin out ahead. I think well earn a lot more than I thought before the days through!

    Yeah, I definitely want to pay another visit here once its fully open!

    Now the party was all smiles as they ventured farther into the Dungeon.

    I turned my attention to Elens group.

    Since they were on Floor 1, theyd have trouble finding any Rare items. They were being very cautious as they proceededtoo much so, reallybut the approach paid off with all the chests they got to raid.

    Now, though, they were suddenly switching tactics.

    Are we about ready?

    Youre really going to do this?

    Um Do I get a voice in this?

    Here we go! Time to hook some big fish!

    Completely ignoring Kabal, Elen began to head for the lower levels. They had just under an hour to go, and I guess they chose this moment to go for broke. It looked like theyd focused on Floor 1 so much up to now because they were trying to gather as many potions as they could. Now it was time to make use of Ramiriss info and attempt to get all the way down to Floor 10.

    It looks like Kabals party is on the move. Theyve been thorough in their work so far, proceeding bit by bit, but now theyre making a beeline for deeper floors.

    Hmm Are they looking for treasure chests withrger payoffs? But itll be hard to discover chests out of sheer luck

    But it looks like you can find Rare items from silver chests, like Bassons party did earlier, right?

    Right, but its not something you can aim for, really. Sir Gaiye has opened something like twenty silver chests so far, but he still hasnt scored any Rares.

    So theyll need to look for gold chests to be guaranteed Rare items?

    Thats correct. But theyll only find gold chests in the designated boss-monster chambers, mostly.

    Mostly? Are they anywhere else?

    Well Actually, there are other powerful creatures in thebyrinth that you may run into at random. These are called area bosses, and the rooms they guard could contain golden chests.

    Sokas and Mjllmiles guidance convinced me of what Elen was after.

    Hey, Ramiris?

    Yeah?

    Did you leak out the locations of the area bosses as well?

    Well, um

    Well?

    ?! II think such a thing might have been included, yes!

    Oh lord.

    Buthey, lets stay optimistic. These area bosses, something I included mainly for fun, could also be good PR for usand I knew Iid one out in Floor 4. Its position changes whenever its defeated, but those guys should still be where I left them

    Essentially, this floor housed a small monsterir inhabited by several giant bats, each ranked C-plus. If you werent aware of them, youd have to face a torrent of monsters all at once, but if Elens party saw theming, I suppose they could prepare for it well enough. I just didnt want it to look like they knew in advance there was something in thatirthatd seem a little too contrived.

    But I had nothing to worry about. Elens party deliberately used trapdoors to go down to Floor 5, pretended to be injured so they could advertise the effects of potions for me, and imed loudly to be searching for somewhere to rest all the way to the monsterir. The perfect act from start to finish. They had futures in the theater, I tell you.

    Guys, theres a small chamber around the corner. Lets rest in there.

    All righty! Are you okay, Kabal?

    Y-yeah. Boy! That potion worked like a charm. I feel absolutely fine, but lets rest a little bit before we start farming some more.

    Kabals delivery was a touch wooden, but nobody noticed. The eyes of everyone in the audience were on the big screen as Gido opened the door.

    Whoa-ho-ho! Giant bats!!

    Stay calm! Kabal, youre on!

    I dont want them sucking my blood, but

    Despite Kabals reluctance, he hefted up his Scale Shield, hiding behind it as he faced the full brunt of the bats attack. It looked like a tricky situation at first nce, but Kabal was cool as a cucumber. The giant bats had no way of cutting through a shield that durable, so he shrugged off their strikes without breaking a sweat.

    As he distracted them, Elenpleted her magic spell.

    Here we go! Icicle Shot!!

    A flurry of small, sharpened shards of ice flew at the bats. In a room this small, they had nowhere to flee. With her magic amplified by her Dryads Staff, Elens st of ice tore the entire flock of bats to shreds.

    Hmm Too easy, by the looks of things.

    You may be right. If this were Bassons party, I bet itd be a life-and-death struggle

    I feel like giving out a gold chest for this is costing us.

    Maybe, but lets not use Elens party as our yardstick for this, hmm?

    Ramiris had a good point. Plus, if you think about it, this went easy for Elen only because she cheated; she wouldnt get this advantage normally. If she had run herself ragged all around thebyrinth before finally discovering a gold box, Id be happy to toast her good fortune then.

    That was a fine battle, wasnt it? Soka asked Mjllmile on mic.

    Yes, this is definitely a well-seasoned team of adventurers. They certainly made it look easy. Ah, and heres Sir Gido opening a treasure chest

    Ooooh! A gold chest! Are we really going to see a Rare iteme out?!

    I focused in on Gidos hands. He was guaranteed a Rare, but exactly what, I couldnt guess.

    Looks like a sword

    A, I wanted some sorcerers armor!

    A sword?! Sweet! Someone up high must be watching how hard Im working!

    Three people, three reactions. Gido couldnt care less, Elen was pouting, and Kabal showed his first real enthusiasm of the day. The sheer across-the-board variety made meugh.

    And it looks like a weapon, Mjllmile!

    Ahhh, Im sure it is. The demon lord Rimuru has given me word that every gold chest is guaranteed to house an excellent item inside.

    I didnt remember saying that, but I was d Mjllmile was kind enough to hype it up for me.

    This chest contained a Tempest Swordeveryone thought it was a Rare, but it was actually a Unique. Like the Tempest Dagger Id given Gido, it was a masterpiece of a weapon, forged by Kurobe from Charybdis scales. Veldora had made jackpot finds like this moremon for today, and maybe thats why Elens party scored a killer item that usually showed up just 1 percent of the time.

    Then, their mission done for the day, the party promptly prepared to head back. Talk about a cold, calcted approach, huh? I dunno.

    We kind ofvished too much on them, I said as Iughed at their indomitable drive for riches, but ah well.

    How were Masayukis team and Gaiye doing?

    Both were drilling deeper and deeper down, as if in a footrace, but it was clear who had the advantage. Masayukis party was overwhelmingly ahead, already at the ninth floor by the time two hours passed by.

    Theyre just way too fast

    Im sorry! I didnt think challengers would use trapdoors that way.

    Ahhh, I doubt Masayuki is deliberately aiming for them, but

    Even as Ramiris and I spoke, the party tore their way across Floor 9. With over fifty minutes left to go, they reached Floor 10and thanks to yet another conveniently ced trapdoor, they managed to get deep inside, right nearby the boss chamber. Masayukis good luck again, no doubt.

    I never wouldve guessed theyd go this far in under three hours

    Their speed just totally floored me.

    By this point in thebyrinth, youd start to encounter monsters in the middle of corridors as well, not just in rooms. Sometimes theyd appear in small groups, toobut Masayukis friends did an impressive job against them. Nearly all their foes fell with one hit; at no time were they ever endangered. And since my map was urate except for the trapdoors, they were still checking it to figure out the way ahead.

    Finally, the party reached thest chamber in the floor. The stairs to Floor 11 would appear only once they defeated the boss lurking insidea ck spider, ranked a B in difficulty.

    The party cowered against this fearsome sight

    Yahhh!

    and Jinrai then shed it to death in one swipe.

    Damn. That was frustrating. Against Team Masayuki, a ck spider didnt even begin to pose a challenge. If it werent for all those damn trapdoors, at least they wouldve had to spend more time getting here

    Thus the party picked up their gold treasure chest, grabbing a Rare-level dagger from it. That, and they even added their names to the floors save point. I decided, right then and there, to just do away with all the trapdoors.

    Once the boss was in, Masayukis group used their return whistle to head back to the surface, making them the second group to emerge after Elens.

    Just when the party exited the boss chamber, the door leading to it opened again.

    Masayukis party is back with us, but now Sir Gaiye is going to challenge the boss!

    Gaiye has traversed this far into thebyrinth all by himself. No traps or pitfalls have caught him yet, and hes been going at a breathtaking clip the whole time.

    Yes, at the speed hes going, hes racing past trapdoors before they can even open. Thats an unexpected approach to take! I dont think most people could copy it.

    The adventurer types in the audience nodded in agreement with Mjllmile. Going solo was one thing, but a multimember team could never pull a trick like that. Gaiye didnt have the greatest of personalities, but he was every bit worthy of the A rank he was rewarded. He had run into no problems in these early floors, taking every measure avable to score as many silver chests as possible. He was about the worst beta tester I couldve picked, but I couldnt do much about that now.

    Pffft. That piece-of-garbage swordsman beat me here, eh? Oh well. Bring back that boss for me!

    Gaiye wasted no time copping an attitude. It was grating, but I was mature enough to put up with it.

    So what happens at a time like this, Mjllmile?

    Well, Im told that the boss is resurrected in approximately thirty minutes.

    And the gold treasure chest with it?

    Thats what I understand, yes. Otherwise, Sir Rimuru was concerned people would start fighting each other for the right to tackle a boss.

    I see, I see. In that case, Im afraid Gaiye may not have enough time

    No, theres not much time left. I imagine thatll be the end of this run for him.

    Fifteen minutes remained out of the three hours allotted. Gaiye, once the situation was exined to him, did not take it well.

    Are you kidding me?! You think you can boss me around in here? I know how talentless all you people are, but I dont see why I need to stoop down to your level! Get this boss back here now!

    The greed was visible in his eyes as the self-centered vitriol continued. Delta took it all in stride, but the next thing Gaiye said changed matters for her.

    Hmph! The master of a talentless fool is a talentless fool. Theres no need at all for me to abide by the rules of you buffoons!

    Oops. Shouldnt have said that. Thats all but dering to the master of thebyrinth that you arent gonna y by herws. Gaiyes shouting wasnt going to change anything, but was the master going to ignore that insult?

    Doubtful.

    Your statement clearly vites the regtions set by us, Delta calmly stated. I will let this go if you apologize, but I will not allow any more abusivenguage.

    Gaiye snorted at her. What? Whys a guide like you think youre so far above me? Dont make meugh!

    Clear rule vition confirmed. Executing punishment.

    Huh? Punishment? What could you ever do to?

    At the next moment, Gaiyes body was bound and lifted into the air by vines that sprang up from the floor around him.

    Wha?!

    I have removed the pain suppressor feature on your Resurrection Bracelet. Do you feel like apologizing yet?

    Small thorns shot out from the vines, piercing into the slits between his armors ting. The results were painful for him. This was the spirit magic Thornbind, and Delta was able tounch it with zero spell-casting dy.

    D-damn you! You think thats all it takes to beat me?

    This is your final warning. Do you have any interest in apologizing?

    The hell I do! This level of magic could never

    His shouting was cut off mid-sentence, as Delta used her slender hands to slice Gaiyes head off.

    He had chosen the wrong person to pick a fight with today. Yes, he was an A-ranked adventurer, but Delta was a dryad. Even without battle experience, her species had instincts that made her a threat beyond Hazard level. Once she was a bit more well versed, shed be at the Cmity tier with Treyni and the others. Someone like Gaiye had no chance.

    The sight of Gaiye, who had wowed in the battle tournament, getting destroyed by the gentle-looking Delta made the crowd audibly gasp. The Flowing Swordsman mayve thought he was strong, but he was killed in an instant, unable to defend himself. Seeing that projected on such arge screen would scare the crap out of anyone.

    Ah yes, Mjllmile said in hushed tones. In thebyrinth, the words of the maze master essentially serve as thew. Ignore her rules, and the managers will deliver a swift punishment like the one you saw just now.

    As he put it, if you followed the rules, you were perfectly safe.

    That, um, thats pretty scary. So what happens to Gaiye, then?

    Nothing at all, actually. He will be stripped of the items hed acquired in this trip into thebyrinth, but otherwise, he is alive and well Although without the pain suppression feature on his Resurrection Bracelet, I imagine its a rather grueling experience for him at the moment.

    There was no real punishment, you could say. All it meant was a reset back to what you were before venturing inside, and nothing else. Serious rule infractions might require us to ban you from the Dungeon entirelybut we nned to discuss that once we saw how things went.

    Ah! Gaiyes now out from thebyrinthbut unlike you, Mjllmile, it appears hes unconscious.

    Immediately after the decapitation, Gaiye dissolved into particles of light and was resurrected at the surfacestill knocked out. Thats because Delta exercised her right to restrict the functionality of his Resurrection Bracelet, a sort of nuanced way to mete out extra punishment. He was safe and unhurt, but his body would need some time to recover from the shock of dying.

    Between his mistreatment of Mjllmile and outright contempt for Delta, Gaiye was proving to be one of the most distasteful people Id ever met. Seeing him like this was, to say the least, gratifying. Hopefully, he learned his lesson a little.

    Yes, Mjllmile continued, as long as participants follow the rules, the Resurrection Bracelet always works perfectly. But as all of you saw, Sir Gaiye was deliberately unting regtions, so Thebyrinth has a number of rules for visitors to followfor example, no conflicts among adventurers, and always follow the advice of the mazes managers. We n to distribute a book of rules once normal operation begins, and our guides will also provide rule rundowns to those adventurers who cant read. Well want all of you to follow the rules and behave well inside, lest you meet the same fate Sir Gaiye just did.

    Oh, I could imagine Gaiye might be a little disappointed about this result, but during normal operation, all you have to do is wait a short period of time, and the boss will reappear! Its against the rules to fight other adventurers, so its important to wait your turn and conquer this Dungeon the right way!

    Soka used a melodious tone of voice to run all of this down. Whats the right way mean here? She didnt specify. I thought the crowd felt kind of awkward about this, but Sokas follow-uprgely steamrolled over all of that.

    As she went on, Gaiye woke up againthen reeled back in shock, remembering what had happened to him. Seeing him recovered (if intensely frustrated) helped calm the crowd down a great deal.

    Well, good.

    It seemed like the crowd had epted Mjllmiles exnations for everything. He may have been a total prick, but the things we learned observing Gaiye were quite useful. If we could work out how to deal with high-level adventurers sprinting down just to raid treasure chests, hopefully we could avoid losing a mint on this. That, and everybody certainly knew how the rules worked now.

    All in all, Id say Gaiyes journey proved pretty satisfactory for all of us.

    Thus, each team wrapped up their runs, leaving only Bassons party inside. They had about ten minutes left, so Id want them to wrap up shortly.

    As I thought about that, one of Bassonspanions screamed loudly and fell to the ground in the corridor. Someone in the adjacent room mustve gotten him; he was alive, but there was an arrow straight through his right eye.

    See? I told you going in all careless like that was dangerous.

    There was a single skeleton inside this chamber, wielding a bow and taking potshots at anyone through the door. The second party member through the archway was rewarded with a bolt between the eyes; he fell as well, but unlike Gaiye, he disappeared into light particles after ten seconds. Nice. Wed have at least one challenger experience death before time expired, then.

    The remaining four party members made quick work of the skeleton.

    Ahhh, look at this! Soka said, talking quickly. We havent had anyone drop out yet, but that skeleton has just imed two victims! But dont worry, because the deceased will be revived shortly back at the surface!

    The audience was riveted by the you-are-there viewpoint they had of the battle. Having it shown on such a huge screen like that really did make it feel like you were exploring thebyrinth with them. I heard screams here and there whenever a monster appeared, which I thought was a pretty cool reaction. Maybe it was like watching a horror film; people started shouting their heads off when that party member died, too.

    Maybe staging viewing events of the action inside thebyrinth would be a fun idea. Wed work this out with the participating adventurers in advance, of course; we couldnt get away with showcasing their exploits without permission. Really, today was helping mee up with all kinds of little ideas.

    For now, though, time was almost up. This offered a nice taste of the show to everyone, I thought.

    Bassons party helped keep things tense throughout; in the end, they were pretty good challengers, actually. They mayve dissed Masayuki and crowed about ripping the facade off thebyrinth and used me of running a con job, but once they were in, they forgot about all of that and focused on their task. Now they were shedding tears and wailing the names of their fallenrades. Not only did they have the wrong impression, they clearly werent the kind of people who listened to anything they were told. As beta testers, they were tremendously helpful.

    All right, everyone, its just about time to return to the surface.

    Alpha, the guide for Bassons party, interrupted their mourning in her matter-of-fact voice. Basson looked livid at her for a moment, but Alpha ignored him and forced their return whistles to activate.

    Goddamn you! Basson protestedbut he swallowed his words back on the surface.

    Oh, hey, Basson. I guess I actually got resurrected.

    Being greeted by his alive (and very confused)panion made Bassons anger vanish.

    Whoa! Awesome!! You really came back to life?!

    Yeah, I thought I was done for, but it didnt hurt near as much as I thought, and now Im back to normal.

    Man, are you serious? Cause if so, this is just amazing. Theres so few people out there who can cast resurrection magic, and this bracelet does it all for us?!

    The group chattered on some more as they celebrated their revivedpanion.

    Ugh, dammit, my eye

    How about we use this?

    The man with his eye shot out had it all fixed up with a dose of potion.

    This is crazy. For people like us, you know, our bodies are our main asset. So having this sort of setup is like a dream.

    Wow, so its true?! Man, we can really go all-out next time!

    You were going all-out, man. I dont think I saw you check for traps once all day. Once they get nastier onter floors, youre goners.

    I could criticize their style all day, but I stayed mum for now. The key thing was how the crowd reacted, and after seeing how Bassons party fared start to finish, I think they understood how safe the Dungeon was.

    As an advertising stunt, Id call today a sess.

    The challengers were all lined up onstage now. I headed up as well, standing in front of them, to offer some closing remarks.

    So what did you all think? I asked, mic in hand. Did you have fun today? Our Dungeon will be officially opening to the public in just a few more days. I guarantee to all of you that its perfectly safe, so if youre interested, go ahead and give it a try for yourself. And if any of you can conquer the hundredth floor on the bottom, I will grant you the right to challenge me to battle!!

    With that, the event was overand my instincts told me we kicked ass. The tournament final was exciting enough, but viewing these test runs into thebyrinth really did make it seem like you were there. It was a great way to round out the show.

    Of course, it wouldve been perfect if the show actually ended then. But:

    (Rimuru, what is the matter? I have yet to see any challengers. How long do I have to wait?)

    Veldora, lord of thebyrinth, sent me a Thought Communication that clearly indicated he hadnt listened to a word I said. Way to ruin the moment, man.

    (Shut up! How many times do I have to tell you?! Listen to me: Youre not gonna see anyone good enough to make it to the bottom for a while!)

    (Wh-what?! That was not how I understood it!)

    (Then you understood it wrong, dumbass! Why dont you try actually listening to me?!)

    We argued about this for a little while afterward. You know how you sometimes see kids get yelled at during a fair or festival, because they get too worked up and all that? Its so regrettablymonso this time, I lectured Veldora until I was damn sure he was sorry.

 Volume 9 - Ch 5

    AFTER THE FESTIVAL

    It was the final night of the festival, and to cap it all off, we held a massive banquet. Shuna and Mr. Yoshida worked on full overdrive, sparing no expense to provide the best dinner spread yet. We wanted to leave a good impression at all costs.

    Here, I started noticing more nobles chatting andughing with one another. They mustve made friends over the past three days, and the mood overall was much more convivial than the first night.

    Right now, I knew that Veldora, Ramiris, and Milim were enjoying a fun night in thebyrinth, alongside Carillon, Frey, and Middray, too. Treyni and the elves were working hard to keep them fed and entertained, and I was nning to join themter, dessert in tow.

    Over in town, there were visiting merchants, adventurers, nearby farmers, and residents all enjoying good food and drink together. The bars and restaurants were opened up for free, letting people drink, sing, and carry on all they wanted. Here, too, people were letting their guards down. Monsters, humansit didnt seem to matter as the night wore on. There was music, along with singers following the beat and dancers moving to the rhythm.

    In a way, it was painful to think that this moment was going to end. It seemed like such a waste, sort of. Starting tomorrow, everyone would be back at their old jobs. The thought depressed mebut, at the same time, made all the effort feel worth it. It was strange, and I didnt think I was the only one experiencing it, but everyone still looked like they were having fun.

    That, I suppose, is what happiness is. And watching all the happy scenes, I hoped that this peace couldst for a long time toe.

    And so the night wore on

    All too cruelly, the festival came to an end.

    The highways had been full of people heading back home since morning. The security team, led by Rigur in ce of Gobta, had been busy since before sunrise.

    I bet you wanted to sleep past noon the day after this festival, huh?

    Ha-ha-ha! You cant work security if you let the drink consume you, not the other way around!

    Rigur was serious about his job. No wonder he was Rigurds kid. If this was Gobta, I was sure hed go right up to me and say, Boy, dontcha just want to sleep past noon the day after a festival? I was in full agreement with that, so maybe I wouldve spoiled them a little along those lines, but silence is golden.

    Unlike Gobta, after all, Rigur neverined about anything, briskly giving orders to his patrol. Thanks to that, our VIP visitors began their journeys home without major issues. The highways were wide enough, so as long as a wagon didnt block the road, the waves of people shouldnt stop. Some even nned to stay in town for a few more days, anticipating the rush back, so I didnt think wed have too manyints.

    Leaving the highways under Rigurs management, I went back to my own work. Today, for starters, I had to pay out those gold coins. Over a hundred merchants were now seated in our main meeting hall, waiting for us. Rigurd and Mjllmile were maintaining order and exining matters for me, but it was about time I showed up as well. This was going to be a critical moment, and I knew I needed to nail it.

    Arriving at the meeting hall, I could already hear people arguing from the outside.

    I told you, everybody is going to be paid today, so please stay calm and wait just a bit longer!

    You think you can trick us like that?

    I waited for you until the end of the festival. Hurry up and just pay me my due!

    Whoa, whoa. I certainly understand your concerns, but can you show some deference to us, please?

    Yes! Are you intending to drag our names through the mud for introducing you to our friend Mjllmile?

    No, sir, were not. All we want is for whats owed to us to be rightfully paid

    And thats why Im telling you to be patient. This nation isnt going anywhere, and they said they can pay everyone right now in anything besides Dwarven gold coins. Can you help us out a little and hold on until things are cleared up?

    A likely story!

    Yeah! Come onpay up!

    It sounded like some of Mjllmiles merchant friends were trying to smooth things over with the tradesmen we owed money to. Maybe this was just how they operated as merchants, but I couldnt have been happier to see it. It proved that Mjllmile really was a good judge of character.

    All right, everyone, can we please take a few deep breaths? I, Meus, representing the Kingdom of Ghastone, am here to tell you that not even a nation of monsters will default on their debts to any of you. Isnt that right, Mjllmile?

    That sounded like a big shot. A noble from the Kingdom of Ghastone, one of themercially active nations ringing Englesia.

    Y-yes, Duke Meus, you are exactly right! However

    Hmm. A prince from Ghastonenot a superpower but still decently sized. Any noble with a title like that was no slouch.

    In that case, I do hope you will put to ease the minds of everyone here and provide payment, following the international regtions of the Council of the West.

    Duke Meus was a powerful noble, but he was still acting like a gentleman in these negotiations. Mjllmile was an important person in my government, but for now, he had no official title or noble name. He was still something of a guest, with some temporary power as my representative at times like this. Rigurd, one of my ministers, was also there, but the fact that this prince remembered Mjllmiles name and dealt with him personally It was literally the royal treatment. I mean, a noble remembering amoners nameoftentimes, even if they knew the name (which was frequently not the case), theyd pretend not to. That was how nobility worked, apparently, the way Mjllmile described it to me, so I bet hes the most surprised of all right now.

    P-please, Duke Meus, just one moment. Our initial contract stipted that payment via customary methods is eptable. By customary, of course

    Mjllmile, I am not here to concern myself with such trifling matters. When working with merchants, and with nations as well, trust is the most important thing. And trust is something created by keeping ones promises, is it not?

    You are absolutely right, my prince, but?!

    Silence! These people engaged in business with you because they trusted your team. You have no intention of trampling over this trust, do you?

    Of course not. But we have our own issues to deal with

    Heh-heh! I see, I see. So thats how it is, Mjllmile? Well, fortunately for you, Ive got an idea for how to solve those issues. Would we be able to talk in private for a moment? You can take Sir Rigurd there with you.

    Ah. So that settled it. It was exactly what Elmesia had warned me about. It was like when something I studied until I had it perfectly down showed up on the testthat feeling of total control. It was like I had that inside me.

    Im gonna ace this.

    Um, what do you mean? Mjllmile continued, making a grand act out of it. Like any veteran merchant, he was both cold-blooded and a born actor. He mustve realized the same thing I did, but he didnt let any of it show on his face. I could probably just leave things to him and this problem would be solved, but I didnt want it that way.

    It was time to take action. There was no point eavesdropping forever; I wanted to end this farce sooner rather thanter.

    Diablo opened the doors wide. That will not be necessary, I said as I walked through them. Behind me was Benimaru, followed by Shion and then Diablo, who quietly closed the door behind us.

    Did you wait long? Benimaru asked, nodding at the merchants. Youre being rather loud, you know.

    The merchants looked surprised to see me, my words turning them pale. They mustve figured Id stay away and let Rigurd and the others handle mattersbut here I was with my staff. I didnt think they knew what to do next.

    The demon lord Rimuru has entered the building, Rigurd said, ring at the merchants. Bow your heads!

    A few of them stood up and hurriedly bowed. The majority stayed in their seats, giving me funny looks. It figured. If youre a small-time tradesman, not educated in dealing with nobility, its hard to react instantly.

    Duke Meus himself was about to rise, so I spoke up to save him the trouble.

    No need for such formality, Rigurd, I said with a smile as I looked around the meeting hall. Rigurd nodded and quietly stood aside.

    Among the crowd, I saw not only merchants but a few journalists in disguise. I suppose they were going to report this far and wide if we disgraced ourselves as a country. Maybe Id fall to my knees and tearfully admit that we couldnt pay; maybe Id violently force the merchants to m up. Either way, theyd y up the details in scandalous fashion in their articles, no doubt.

    But we were on to them. A journalist more loyal to our side snitched about this to Diablo. Thus, he had praised the media assembledKeh-heh-heh-heh-heh, howudable of you allbut they looked dreadfully scared, their smiles frozen in ce. I could tell they had a strong desire not to antagonize Diablo; something bad mustve happened to them before. It sounded a bit threatening of him, but that was an issue between Diablo and the press, not me. Itd be clownish if I was to intervene.

    Well, well, the demon lord Rimuru. I hope you are doing well at the moment? I apologize that we have note to know each other before now.

    He was the perfect prince, giving me an elegant bow. My presence threw him for only a moment; he regained hisposure soon after. A gentle, rxed expression was on his face as he greeted me for the rest of the group.

    Duke Meus from the Kingdom of Ghastone? What brings you here? Im not sure we had any pressing business with you?

    I smiled back, beginning with the line Id prepared in advance. I wasnt the type to wither in front of royalty, and here, too, I managed to smoothly handle the asion. Advance prep and review are so important.

    Well, you see, there are some tradesmen here doing business with this nation for the first time at your festival, and they havee to me iming their valid rights have been neglected. It is the job of the nobility to protect their citizens, and while I regret my rude directness, I havee to mediate on this issue.

    So brazen. You could just tell he waspletely ckhearted. Im not far behind him, but since Im a slime, Im fetchingly translucentpared to him.

    I see, I see. But thats strange. Mjllmile over there told me that our budget is ample enough. If people are still waiting for payment, then why is that?

    Ah, well, these people only ept payment in Dwarven gold coins

    Mjllmile was just meant for the stage. He took my question meekly, attempting to exin the issueonly to have Duke Meus interrupt him.

    Isnt that to be expected, Mjllmile? A legitimate merchant from Blumund such as yourself should be fully cognizant of internationalmercialw, I would believe! Unlike the slipshod members of the Free Guild, the only currency these people trust is Dwarven gold.

    Duke Meus was on the merchants side, not raising his voice a bit as he pleaded their case, making certain he remained a benevolent third party. I was sure he was waiting for the moment when he could intervene with me and make Tempest owe him a favor.

    For now, on the surface, he was acting tremendously fair. But all he was really doing was pushing his own rules on us. I nced at Diablo. He read my signal and nodded back, smiling. We were all set to go.

    Ah. Yes, I see. I had heard that members of the international media were here, so I was wondering what the issue was, but it was something that trivial?

    That is why, Sir Rimuru, if you would be able to leave this matter to myself

    Now Benimaru spoke up. His imposing presence visibly unnerved some of the merchants. They mustve thought I was going to threaten them into doing my bidding, like their n called for.

    Not so fast, Benimaru. Based on what I hear, I can understand the concerns of these merchants.

    The audience looked a tad surprised that I held Benimaru back. Or dissatisfied, maybe. Things were going well, and then I had to rain on the parade.

    But, Sir Rimuru, I cant help but wonder They may not be Dwarven coins, but we do have ancient gold coins. If they will not ept those, I think we could provide them with the equivalent value of our Tempest-made goods. Why are they not content with that?

    I agree with you, but Im sure the merchants have their reasons.

    I gauged Duke Meuss response as Benimaru and I bantered. He seemed to be waiting for a chance to speak up, unite the merchants, and entrap me.

    Then how about this? Perhaps you could ce your trust in our nation and, as Benimaru suggested, ept IOUs or goods in equivalent value?

    Mjllmile, seeking to end this quickly, got the ball rolling. If the other side agreed to this, then perfectwe had an amicable agreement in hand. But if notif I was standing here at the negotiation table and they were willing to make me look foolishthen I was prepared for that.

    II dont believe a word of it!

    Y-yeah!

    This is a nation of monsters, and that is exactly why we seek payment in reliable, trustworthy Dwarven gold coins. I hope you will find it in your heart to understand that and, please, be generous in your

    The merchants here ran the gamut, fromplete neophytes to veterans familiar with manners around nobility. But either way, their responses were all one-sided, not taking me into consideration at all.

    Ah, I thought. Its too bad.

    Meus thought the time hade.

    He was worried the merchants might grow hesitant when faced with the demon lords coercive ways, but so far they were following his instructions, just as he nned.

    And if you think about it, it made sense. Meus was a prince in Ghastone. He was young, just thirty-five years of age, but he had ties to the powerful Rozzo family. This made him one of the rulers of the Western Nations, part of just a small handful of upper-ss nobility. Practically speaking, only a very few people could afford to turn their backs on his orders.

    This n came in the form of an order to him from the eldest member of the Rozzo family. Meus was asked to make the demon lord Rimuru owe him a favor and gain his trustand if he seeded, he was promised a promotion to the Five Elders.

    Yes. The Five Eldersthe very peak of the entire world. Meus was tedand at the same time, he swore to tap every power at hismand to execute this order, no matter what it took.

    Thus he promised a lucrative future to the self-interested merchants he made contact with. He brought in newspaper writers from around the world to ensure his own safety. And now he was personally facing the demon lord, the lone job he couldnt leave to anyone else.

    This Rimuru had made his presence known only a short time ago, but he had already killed yman, renowned for his cold cruelty, and dered himself a new demon lord. A fearsome one, said to be connected to the Storm Dragon thatid waste to an army of twenty thousand. Meeting him in person terrified Meus, but when ced on the scales with the glory he could earn, it was easy to bottle up his fears.

    Meus himself knew exactly what he wanted. Thats why he was being used like this, although he hadnt noticed. It was exactly the way Elmesia El-Ru Thalion pictured it.

    Seeing the demon lord and his personal staff in person honestly came as a surprise to Meus. He was nning to talk Mjllmile into a corner and ask him to bring the demon lord over. But while this wasnt quite in the script, it did save him some time. They had reporters in the audience, and there were many more in the hall below this one.

    Everything was set up. Once the merchants rejected the demon lords offers, Meuss n was all butplete. After that, he just had to assuage the merchants and start running this room. Thats all it would take to make Rimuru start to thank him.

    A calm smile emerged on his face as he began to speak, already convinced of his sess.

    How about this, Sir Rimuru? If you are in something of a financial bind, then perhaps you could discuss matters with me personally? Indeed, fate may have brought us together here for a reason. If I could be of service to

    It was just as I predictedand a pretty shoddy acting job, too. Duke Meus was making the request. My officials, standing behind me, looked on coldly at him. Noticing their gazes, the duke appeared a tad flustered. Maybe he felt something wasnt going to nbut it was toote for him.

    Time to serve things up.

    I appreciate the offer, but it will not be needed. Come in.

    Following my order, Geld lumbered into the hall, carrying arge tray loaded high into the air with gold coins.

    Wha?!

    No

    Is all of that?

    The crowd stirred.

    The moment heid eyes on the coins, the color of Duke Meuss face visibly changed. He must have realized that his n of action had failed.

    You were seeking payment, right? Rigurd dered. Very well. Here it isall in Dwarven gold coins.

    You could hear a pin drop in the hall.

    Wa Please wait. Wait just a moment, Sir Rimuru?!

    Duke Meus looked pretty panicked. Its a bit toote for that, isnt it?

    Yes? I coldly asked.

    Areare these all Dwarven gold coins? he asked, face contorting. Counterfeit currency is a clear vition!

    Hmm Is that really something you should be using me of? Because that really sounds pathetic, Meus.

    Rather a rude thing to say to Sir Rimuru, Diablo said, stepping forward. Benimaru was looking angry as well, and I was starting to get bad vibes from Shion behind me.

    I My pardons. But is this really?

    If you doubt them, I said with a smile to the withering prince, feel free to have them appraised.

    In that case, if youll excuse me, I will use my trusty magic tools to examine them.

    Itd normally be unthinkable to interrupt a conversation between Duke Meus and me, but Ah well. No point quibbling over little details. This merchant who just spoke up mustve been a protg of the duke, a colluder of sorts. No doubt these events disturbed him so much, he forgot his manners. He was a faker, not the real thingnot that Im much of a real king myself yet, of course. But lets move on.

    Sir Rimuru, these reporters told me they wanted to write an article about these negotiations. What should we do?

    Shuna, after receiving my Thought Communication, spoke to me from behind the closed door, just as we had rehearsed. The journalists had gathered outside the room at Diablos behestand when I gave the signal, theyd burst inside to serve as witnesses.

    Well, they have impable timing, dont they? Benimaru replied. If we are going to appraise the coins, then let the press be in attendance as well.

    Then, as nned, the reporters entered the meeting hall.

    They Theyre real!! the shocked merchant/colluder bellowed. Of course they were.

    Indeed, one of the reporters said with a knowing look, and these are some impressive gold coins at that. Some of these date back to quite a long time ago. They may not have been circted before now.

    Those were probably the ones Elmesia had traded to me. I was sure she must have tons of them squirreled away somewhere. And with the reporters attesting to their value, the merchant could do nothing else. Even if he wanted to try swapping real ones out for fakes, the media was practically breathing down his neckand if he did try that, then Soei, watching on from the shadows, wouldnt let that go unaddressed.

    So is everything settled, then? I believe our merchants were concerned about their payments, so go ahead and settle our ounts for me, if you could.

    Yes, my lord! Rigurd and Mjllmile said, answering my rather stuffy-soundingmand. Producing a sheaf of documents and receipts, they began the payment process. It all went smoothly, under the watchful eye of the reporters.

    And youre thest one, then.

    Now we were all done. Ourst piece of business for the Founders Festival was settled.

    Ha Ha-ha-ha Impressive, Sir Rimuru. I have no idea how you managed to assemble such a fortune in Dwarven gold

    Duke Meus looked dreadfully stiff now. In front of him were all those piles of coins, shining even after we paid them out. The merchants looked a tad confused themselves, unsure what to do now that things were off script.

    In the midst of this, the merchant Id called the colluder spoke up.

    Well, as far as were concerned, as long as you respect internationalw, we have nothing toin about. We hope to continue doing business with you in the future

    Um, well pass on that, thanks, I replied.

    The merchants stared at me, eyes wide open. So, for that matter, did my staff.

    Wh-what do you?

    Our business with you isplete, I said, as if stating the obvious. Theres not going to be any more.

    My staff was now shocked. Only Diablo looked on with a smile. I suppose he was the only one who guessed what was on my mind here. Thats too bad.

    I-Im not sure I understand

    What is the meaning of this? If you pay us, we can trust in you anytime?

    Are you looking down on us simple tradesmen? You know that nations can hardly trade with each other without traveling peddlers?!

    The truth was beginning to set in, I suppose, as the merchants started shouting.

    Dontyou thinkyou are being quite rude to Sir Rimuru, the king of our nation?

    Shion burned with a quiet anger as she spoke. The merchants fell silent, no doubt sensing the danger. I figured Id take advantage of the silence to finish things off.

    You know, Im not into this cat-and-mouse stuff, so Im just gonnae out and say it. You guys were the ones going on about how you couldnt trust our nation, werent you? Well, trust is a two-way street. It requires both sides to believe in each other. I dont think it involves one side meekly epting everything the other says to it. Mjllmile asked you all multiple times to trust in us, didnt he?

    Th-that

    But

    I mean, I understand what youre thinking here. Were monsters, and you know we want to trade with the Western Nations, but youre not sure if we can truly abide by human rulesthat kind of thing.

    Y-yes, exactly! And that is why

    But, you know, thats why we suggested apromise with bartering goods or using ancient coins. And you kicked all of that to the curb.

    !!

    Ngh

    Mjllmile had practically thrown out his back bowing so much, trying to negotiate with them. But all the merchants here hadughed in his face. I wasnt about to forgive that.

    You guys only want to do business with people you can trust. And you know what? So do we. We only want to do business with people we can trust. Therefore, I refuse to allow any of you to conduct work in our nation. I wont ban you from entering, but dont expect permission to conductmercial activities anymore.

    It took this deration for the merchants to realize just how serious this was. We had a new market here, one that lots of people expected would balloon in size, and there was no ce for them in it.

    The statement made Duke Meus turn white. If he didnt know yet that he had failed, he did now. II refuse to allow such tyranny! he shouted, unable to hold it in. These people were only asking for their justified rights under internationalw

    Did he see being unable to trade with us as a problem? I certainly had ns to make this into a giant new economic union, one bigger than all the Western Nationsbined. That was probably why he wanted to join the bandwagon early and make friends with mebut if he could read us that far, he really shouldnt have taken this approach. I never show mercy to my enemies.

    Their rights, huh? I think you may have the wrong idea, so if youll let me correct you real quick, our nation is not part of the Council of the West yet. Id like to join them sometime, but if I cant, then so be it. Im not gonna mind.

    Wha?!

    I mean, weve already decided thisnds going to be the center of a vast new economic bloc. Why? Because I want it to be.

    Wh-what kind of nonsense are you?! Such arrogance, strictly on your own volition

    Its not arrogance. Were all working together as a team toward the same goal, and were bound to see results from it. All Im doing is helping out.

    I was trying to make it sound all cool, but really, I was prioritizing the stuff I wanted to make happen first, I suppose. I wasnt sure I could deny ims of being arrogant, but I still had tosh back.

    And I want to be on equal terms with the Council of the West, too. But, you know, if they try to keep us down, then forget it. Im not gonna force a rtionship; we can just work through the Free Guild instead. Do you understand me?

    Besides, if we really needed to, we could sign individual pacts with each nation in the west, like we did with Blumund and the Dwarven Kingdom. There was no need to hurry things along. Just polish up our nation, make ourselves more valuable, and in time, we were bound to have a country that people would trust in. As far as I was concerned, that way of thinking was set in stone.

    All All right. In that case, I will be d to serve as an intermediary with the Council. I think we have had some regrettable misunderstandings, but I hope I can be of aid to you, Sir Rimuru.

    Duke Meus is certainly a hard worker. Ah well. If he had retreated earlier, I wouldnt have needed to say all that stuff, but noooo.

    Mm, I dont think I can ask for your help, Sir Meus. Youve kind of lost your footing here already, you see?

    Um?

    Duke Meus froze, unable to parse what Id just told him. Well, all right. Its settled anyway. I didnt want to say it myself, but at this point, exining everything start to finish was probably the kindest approach.

    Once all the reporters here go back to their home nations, theyre going to write articles. Articles about this struggle rted to merchant payments behind the scenes of the Founders Festival we held. Theyre going to make the truth clear, and Im sure all the stories are gonna be very entertaining.

    Duke Meuss mind mustve been racing. It was telling him what woulde next, and the results made him look sicker and sicker. See, this was exactly why I didnt want to say it.

    Here, we have merchants who rejected our requests and demanded payment only in Dwarven gold coins. Then we have this upper-crust member of nobility whoes swooping in to unite them, even though hes not personally involved at all. If someone read that newspaper article, what would they think?

    I, um, that

    Of course, that was all Diablos doing. He had assembled the reporters, revealing the information in detail. That alone would prove we were justified as a nation, and most people would sense a conspiracy among the merchant ranks. I agreed with them. Information means something only if its used correctly. Instead of fabricating the facts and trying to spread them around, its always better to start with the facts and just hand them out.

    It was my discussions with Gazel and Elmesia that helped mee up with this strategy, though. Diablo even personally thanked them, talking about how he still had a great deal to learn and all. I thought they both helped us a lot this time, and I wanted to more amply repay them sometime soon.

    So there will be no need for you. Mjllmile, who you so thoroughly disrespected, has my full and utmost supportenough so that I trust all my nations finances to him. Hes been far more help to me than you have, for one.

    Ah?!

    Duke Meuss face twisted in humiliation as the merchants began to look desperate. Meanwhile, the reporters were having much more fun than they expected when they first filed in. Some of them were rapidly taking down notes of the eventone they didnt mind recording, since they didnt take any of the fallout. A few even had expensive magic items for recording images of our negotiations. This was definitely gonna spread wide. The prince may have called the press over to save his own hide, but it wound up having quite the opposite effect.

    You can take care of the rest.

    I would be happy to, Sir Rimuru.

    I patted the shoulder of the deferential Mjllmile, whispering, Thanks, Mollie, as I passed by and out of the room with my staff. It sort of felt like he smiled back at me, but I didnt see it on his facehis calcting eyes were back on Duke Meus, then on the merchants around the room. I dont think anyone would mind if I made him our chief financial manager.

    On the other side of the door, I could hear him speak: Now, since all our business has been settled, if I could ask everyone to ept their payments His way of putting a final period on these events, I suppose.

    Chasing the duke out of town was gratifying, but we still had many problems to deal with. Thus, it was time for our customary review meeting.

    We were back in the usual meeting hall, not the fancier one for the festivals receptions and banquets. It was the night after the festival wrapped up, but a few guests were still around for this conferenceGazel, Elmesia, Yohm and his gang, Fuze, and even Yuuki, Hinata, and Masayuki. They were joined by a few other rare invitees, all here on my invitation, and the rest of my staff were all on hand as well, making it a packed house. Milim and the demon-lord crowd were not invitedif I had too many people here, wed lose cohesion. We had a lot to talk about this time, so the itinerary was already pretty full.

    One concern of mine, though, was Veldora. He was holed up in a corner of the room, pouting, and I was sure he was gonna say somethingprobably whining about how no challengers showed up. Hoping against hope that he wouldnt derail this thing, I got the meeting started.

    Umm, first off, thanks to everyone for your help!

    That was our signal to begin.

    The first person to speak was Benimaru, surprisingly enough.

    That was quite a shock, however, Sir Rimuruyou penalizing the merchants that way as well. I was not expecting that.

    The rest of my cab nodded in agreement. I guess the majority figured it was water under the bridge once the coins were paid. Seeing how harsh I was mustve surprised them more than I thought.

    Indeed, Rigurd said. I did not expect such draconian measures myself.

    Hearing this must have piqued Gazels curiosity. What? How did you handle them, Rimuru?

    I exined the whole story to the audience. When I was done, Gazel rolled his eyes at me.

    That was certainlydrastic.

    But he didnt get angry, at least, demonstrating he understood my view of things, if only a little.

    Hee-hee-hee-hee! I think he did the right thing. If someone nips you, you nip them back. He was only thinking about whatsing ahead, wasnt he?

    Ahhh, there was no outfoxing Elmesia. Her intuition, and her knack for deciphering my mind, was almost scary.

    Whatsing ahead, Sir Rimuru? Benimaru asked.

    I shrugged. Well, its just like I said to all of them. I have no intention of sitting downwind from the Council of the West forever. If possible, though, Id like to build a friendship where were all on equal footing.

    Yes, were aware of that. That is why we were prepared for a patient process, up to that point.

    I nodded back at Rigurd. Right. So listen: That duke, Meus, was just an errand boy, like Lady Elmesia said. I rejected him, and I followed their rules while I did it. If they want to continue this, their only choice is to send someone higher up on the food chain.

    I suppose so, yes

    So you think we will have another chance to negotiate with them soon?

    Yep. And that round wille after the terrible mistake theymitted today. I think well kick off our next round of talks with just as much of an upper hand.

    I see

    I think the other side doesnt want to make it look like theyre clearly our enemy. Thats why they wanted to put a dog cor on me, like we just saw them tryand now that they failed, theyre gonna have to face up and admit we can be an equal partner. And with that

    Either they wage economic warfare against us or they go back to the table. And neither side is really prepared for the former. Each one, after all, has a fully functional economic bloc even if the other side doesnt exist.

    Gazel was right. And in this case, once our negotiations ended next time, that would be itand wed have an overwhelming advantage.

    And if thats how things turn out, then we can start working independently with each member of the Western Nations, regardless of what the Councilsws or whatever say. Its not war so much as an economic invasion, I suppose.

    Keh-heh-heh-heh-heh And you can leave that to me, Sir Rimuru. In fact, I could present you with all the Western Nations on a tray in short order!

    Im not asking for that, Diablo. In fact, its not what I want at all. He was freaking me out again.

    Look, if you do that, its just gonna leave me with more garbage to deal with, all right?!

    No. Definitely no.

    M-my pardons, sir.

    Ugh, you little brownnoser. Enough butting in and go fetch some more tea for Sir Rimuru!

    Shionnded a follow-up blow to the dejected Diablo. I wasnt much a fan of her act, either, but lets ignore that for now.

    Admittedly, I do think we could execute Diablos idea, if given ample time. Butfor now, at leasttheres no point in doing that. I could think about it if theres a bunch of conflict going on, but itd involve a lot of pain on our part. If were just trying to build friendly rtions, I dont want to go through that much trouble for it.

    That seemed to convince everyone. We had our hands full just trying to improve our own country. Our first priority right now, above everything else, was to establish a firm economic bloc for ourselves.

    Yes, Elmesia said, your opponent will have no choice but to negotiate. But I have to sympathize with them a little. Its rather hard to extract good conditions from a partner for whom economic sanctions and military threats mean next to nothing.

    The same could easily be said for Thalion, I thinkbut she was right. Its safe to say that our rivals options were restricted at best.

    I see, Geld replied. That makes sense to me. So why go down so hard on the individual merchants?

    Maybe he felt I was being vindictive. It wasnt like all of them were in collusion with Duke Meusand those who were mightve been forced into it out of obligation or the like. Revoking their Tempest business licenses was the biggest surprise to my peers.

    But I had a reason, of course. I smiled and tried to exin, but before I could open my mouth, Mjllmilehis smile even bigger than mineintervened.

    Heh-heh-heh The reason is simple, everyone. Just like Emperor Elmesia said, if someone nips at us, we have to nip them back.

    How do you mean, Mjllmile?

    Nip them back?

    I-Im not sure thats enough exnation

    Benimaru, Rigurd, and Geld were still in the dark. Diablo was not, but he just poured out his tea instead ofmentingmaybe he was still a bit bent out of shape about before. Pretty weak-minded for a demon, isnt he?

    Sir Rimuru asked me to take care of the remaining details for him. What he meant by that was to make those stranded merchants obligated to us and turn them into forces for ourselves.

    Wow, Mjllmile. I figured my message would get across to him, but he perfectly understood my intentions the whole time. I was going to fill him in afterward for safetys sake, but it looked like I wouldnt need to.

    If you want someone to do your bidding, its far easier to have them owe you a favor, rather than browbeating or scaring them into it. Its also sessful quite a bit more often.

    Those were Elmesias words, and all I did was put them into action. There might have been a little scaring and browbeating added to the mix, but I dont think I made any mistakes.

    Ah yes. Well yed, Sir Rimuru.

    Indeed, that makes sense to me, too.

    So, Sir Mjllmile, did you seed in winning them over to our side?

    Heh-heh Without fail, indeed. I told them I would intervene in their cases, and now theyre all indebted to us. Thanks to that bit of threatening from Sir Rimuru, things went much easier than I expected!

    Mjllmile grinned as he spoke, making him look a tad viinous. I was d he was sessful, but he was making me out like a mob boss or something. I wasnt too fond of that, but ah well.

    Regardless, everyone seemed to understand my reasoning now, so we moved on to the next topic.

    The next topicor really, the main topic, I should say.

    So as weve described to you, Mollie here has taken care of the merchants for us. Its a problem thats given me a headache for several days, and now that its behind us, Id like us to share some thoughts on how we feel about the Founders Festival. Any feedback you have to offer is fine, so lets get talking!

    The moment I finished speaking, Gazel cleared his throat. Rimuru, as the king of a nation allied to you, theres something I want to say. I think we talked a little bitst night about you going out of control, but what I saw during the festival disturbed me. What was the meaning of that?

    Um, what?

    I had no idea what he meant, but judging by the grumpy look on his face, I had done something bad again. What it was, I really had no clue. Maybe my outburst against the merchants? It didnt seem that way.

    You arent aware of it yourself, then? See, this is exactly why I cant take my eyes off you for a moment! Vester, you said that projector was developed by you and Sir Gabil, correct? And was it also you who came up with the technology to transmit images from remote locations?

    Ah, er, Your Majesty, that

    Vester looked like a boy caught with his hand in the cookie jar. Did he get so wrapped up in research that he forgot to report back to Gazel? Probably so. Careless as ever, I heard Kaijin say under his breath.

    My lord, Gabil said, that is incorrect. Sir Vester and I did develop that technology, yes, but the idea of incorporating the demon lord ymans magical image-recording items in the projector was none other than Sir Rimurus!

    Oh, thanks, Gabil. Did he really think it was smart to b about that? I winced as Vester looked like he wanted to crawl into a hole.

    I thought so, Gazel replied, looking tired. I truly wish you couldve given me some advance notice before you revealed that thing.

    We only saw it as a useful, and vital, invention for entertainment purposes, but to the assembled royalty and nobility from the Western Nations who witnessed it, the reaction was quite different. Why, this technology has so many potential uses, Gazel ruefully continued. I hardly even know where to begin with it. But trust me, not a soul in the audience failed to understand how valuable it was.

    Really? Because to me, it was justlikehey, check out the tournament fights on this big, easy-to-view screen. Everyone dug it, it was good, and thats that. But to the world leaders on hand, it was a pretty heavy dose of culture shock.

    Something like that could change the way wars are waged, Gazels friend Vaughn chimed in, Dolph nodding in agreement.

    It was all too easy, it turned out, to think of military purposes for it. Giving orders to armies from a safe location, for example, would provide a huge advantage. Generals could send in assault teams to conduct enemy recon and channel their findings over to the main force, all without exposing themselves to any danger. Compared to person-to-person magicalmunications, this provided far more information far more quickly. Everyone was provided with the same visual and audio data, vastly improving the uracy of orders.

    Thus, this thing that we casually revealed to them was actually a revolutionary technology, one that had the potential topletely revamp civilization as this world knew it. I made it because I thought itd be kinda nice to have, but it was really a Pandoras box of ideas.

    I wish you told me earlier, I blurted out.

    I wish you told me earlier! Gazel bellowed back.

    Now I regretted itbut hey, thats what this meeting was for. Things dont go the way you want them to all the time.

    Well, um, it should be said that running that projector requires a lot of magicules, so it doesnt work unless the users pretty powerful magically. The range and quantity of data also depend on the user, so I dont think this is gonna spread that fast, you know?

    I tried to deflect the issue as best I could. That issue was actually being addressed with the development of a new magicule-gathering system, but something told me I shouldnt mention that right now. Id break the news to Gazel in privateter.

    For now, the Dwarven king sighed. Regardless, please try not to present such militarily useful technology without a moments thought again, could you? Why, I think you may be the only person in the world whod think of developing this for entertainment purposes.

    I thought that wrapped up the topic, but then Elmesia spoke up.

    Yes, if you have any other inventions like that, Id be happy to buy them, you know. I believe the world youe from has whats known as a patent system? I would dlypensate you for the rights to this technology, if you would give us priority in harnessing them.

    You know, Ellie, I think Thalion could do a lot with Tempests bath and toilet infrastructure!

    I know, Elen. Our negotiations with Mr. Yoshida have paid off as well, so I hope to see you pay more visits to my manor in the future, all right?

    Oh, of course!

    Before I could reply, Elen broke into the conversation. She was seated adjacent to Elmesia, and the way they carried on, they seemed like two loving sisters more than anything. I knew they were rted by blood and all, but Elen was acting shockingly familiar with the emperor of a dynasty. Meanwhile Erald, her father, was already going pale and shouting Elen?! in a high-pitched voice.

    Y-Your Excellency! I know Elen is my daughter, but please refrain from spoiling her, if you would! And, Elen, you will not call Her Majesty Ellie!

    Erald certainly can be loud, hmm?

    Oh, I know! Dads always exaggerating like that!

    Man. These two girls put together may be downright dangerous. I felt bad for Erald. It was really shocking, how perfectly in sync Elen and Elmesia were. They probably were close friends, not just acting that way. Given the high fives they asionally gave each other, the ss system hardly seemed to exist at all with them. Elmesia El-Ru Thalion, Her Excellency the Emperor of Thalion, a figure who not even national leaders from the Western Nations could gain an audience with, seemed like a much different woman here. The royal knight guard behind her looked just as surprised.

    Members of the Magus! What you are seeing here is a state secret. Do not divulge it to anyone else!

    Erald saw fit to give that order, but I wasnt sure how much itd be followed.

    And so, Elmesia continued, paying him little mind, I would like you to send engineers from Tempest to our nation. This is an official request, of course, so I will dly pay you for the guidance they will offer.

    You want us to send manpower your way?

    Thats right. If you want to keep your core technology a secret, you could always just send us whateverplete tools or resources we may need instead.

    Hmm So wed need a way to export the parts we make here over to Thalion.

    We needed to tackle a few issues before I could grant Elmesias request. The pipes used in our kitchens, toilets, and bathrooms were manufactured using technology from Kaijin and the other dwarves; I wasnt sure if Thalions engineers could re-create it, and teaching them from scratch would take too long. Instead, itd be much easier to just manufacture the needed parts here and send them over to Thalion.

    And while youre at it, perhaps you could transport them via that train system you were talking about? I can provide the funding, so I hope you can begin developing that at once

    It was like she was reading my mind. Gazel had a mind-reading skill or two, I knew, but was that the case for Elmesia as well? It didnt seem that way to me, but Id better keep my guard up. Regardless, though, her offer was worth considering.

    We havent gotten around to developing an actual train yet, no. If some of your sorcerous science experts might be able to help with that, Id appreciate it.

    Of course they can! Erald?

    Y-yes, Your Excellency! I will send word out promptly.

    Erald was still undauntingly faithful to Elmesia. He seemed more like a useful servant to her than a high-ranking noble. Gazel looked at him, his eyes piteousthe Dwarven king told me not even he could boss Elmesia around, so Eralds behavior mustve given him something to think about.

    Thus Elmesia, Emperor of the Sorcerous Dynasty of Thalion, was interested in teaming up with us. Wed no doubt sign a technology-sharing agreement and begin tandem research before too long. With Thalions sorcerous science and Dwargons pioneering work in elemental engineering, linking these distantnds together might not be a dream after all. The oveers Luminus nned to send our way might be able to help out, tooId need to see what they were like first, but maybe theyd provide some useful input.

    This is a great thing to hear, Lady Elmesia. It ought to vastly elerate development. We may just see magitrains be practical for regr use sooner than we think.

    Oh? You call those magitrains?

    Yeah. My basic idea is to develop spirit cores, or spirit magicdriven power reactors, then install them into a sorcerous science-based control system. Sounds perfect, right?

    Ha! You make it sound so easy.

    How fascinating! Very fascinating indeed. I hope we can see it sooner rather thanter.

    Gazel mustve thought I was far too optimistic, but his smiling face told me he was sure Id manage it. Seeing him like that, I dont think he was really one to talk about going out of control on projects like this Elmesia, meanwhile, looked like a girl who found a new toy, her expression astoundingly bright. It left quite an impression, much unlike the depressed-looking Erald by her. This definitely would elerate development, for sure.

    All right. In that case, well start byying down rails to Thalion first. We can do that alongside our highway construction, so thatll save us some time.

    If we were leading the project, itd be easy to make sure it was all unified under the same standards. Completing the railwork first shouldnt be an issue, I thought, but:

    Wait! Sir Benimaru suggested the concept of a tunnel to me at our meeting. Will you be needing one of those in the future?

    The question came from Momiji, an unexpected participant. If she was asking whether tunnels would be necessary, was she saying Thalion was open to us sting one into their mountains?

    If possible, I would like to open one in the future. Our first order of business is building a rail nexus in Blumund. From there, well go through the Kingdom of Farminus and connect to the western entrance into Dwargon. Meanwhile, we n toy track south of Blumund as well, eventually winding up in Thalion. If we try to go through the Western Nations, wed get tied up acquiringnd-use rights and such. In other words, if we detour the track around the mountains, itll lead to huge losses. At the same time, though, we dont want to force you into anything you dont want to do.

    I understand. I will trust in you, Sir Rimuru. If you can guarantee that it will not affect our mountains, I am willing to give you permission to build this tunnel.

    For real?!

    Yes. Um, for real. But as a personal request, I hope you will enlist Sir Benimaru to overlook this

    Momijis cheeks reddened as she spoke. I didnt need her to finish the thought.

    Benimaru!

    W-wait a second! Are you trying to sell me off, Sir Rimuru?

    Dont make it sound like that. Gelds in the middle of a big job, too, you know. Well need someone good at leading people, and youre the best guy we have!

    Geld nodded at me. Benimaru, meanwhile, looked like I was driving him up the wall.

    Im afraid its just not possible. I dont know anything about construction!

    No, I bet not.

    Ah yes Yes, it may not be possible, huh?

    And here I thought I could sacrifice Benimaru and get this whole thing wrapped up fast. Things never quite work out like that, I suppose. I didnt want Benimaru out of town for that long anyway, so this idea was a stretch from the start.

    Well, sorry, but Benimarus my right-hand man here. Perhaps he could join me during my regr visits to inspect our progress, but

    Oh, thats fine, too. As long as he will visit our homnds when you do.

    Momiji was all smiles. And judging by Hakuros triumphant chuckle, I suppose thatpromise was eptable from the start.

    Are you giving in yet, Benimaru?

    I am not, but if you need a bodyguard during your inspections, I will ept that position.

    He shrugged. That was as much as he was willing to give. But it still made Momiji happy, and I wasnt going to force any more out of him. The rest, you could say, is up to them. Id just reap the profits.

    So, Lady Momiji

    Just Momiji is fine, Sir Rimuru.

    Hakuro nodded at me as well, not minding the informality.

    In that case, Momiji, Id like to conduct some surveying work to see if a tunnel is possible. Is that all right with you?

    Yes. Feel free to carefully inspect the range for any potential issues.

    And if we didnt find any, that meant we could start digging. With the tengu rapidly softening their stance against us, it looked like construction would go far more smoothly than I thought. Good. Next time Im over, Ill be sure to say hello to Kaede, Momijis motherand Ill make sure Hakuro is with us.

    So, Lady Elmesia, if we have your permission to perform simr surveying and excavation work within Thalions borders?

    You may have any permission you like. Erald, please make the arrangements.

    Elmesia so readily passed off responsibility to other peopletruly, a living ideal for me to follow.

    Yes, Your Excellency. Sir Rimuru, I will prepare the necessary permits. However, when construction work begins within Thalion, I request that workers from our nation be brought in for the project.

    Erald was looking more bedraggled by the minute. Working under such a free-spirited emperor would turn anyone into a gifted servant. But he never forgot to add his own conditions, making sure each of his bullet points was fulfilled. If we handled all construction, that might make things harder for him, I supposebut I had no objection, so I epted the offer. And with a promise to help out if we ran into trouble along the way, we wrapped up the conversation.

    This had started as a review meeting, but now we were rapidly deciding on a variety of important issues. Thats because, thanks to the political leaders in the hall, we were cutting through an astonishing amount of bureaucratic red tape all at once. Though, really, it was mostly Elmesias doing.

    In the midst of this, Yohm, who had been silent so far, spoke up.

    Hey, paler, Sir Rimuru. I got a question, but is now okay to ask it?

    Simply offering ones opinion in this room packed with the worlds biggest names took a lot of courage. Yohm mustve been maturing as he grew into his new role.

    Whats up, Sir Yohm?

    Well, Id prefer to exin it myself, but Im not too well versed in this stuff, so Id like mydy here to go over it instead. That okay?

    By which he means Mjurran? Because Yohm doesnt strike me as the kind of guy whod take in concubines. My mind was put at ease when Mjurran stood up.

    Sorry I havent been aroundtely, Sir Rimuru.

    Me neither, um, Lady Mjurran. d youre well.

    After everything youve done for me, Sir Rimuru, you hardly need to add Lady to my name.

    Um, actually, I do, dont I? I knew everyone there, Elmesia especially, had been talking really informally all evening, but I didnt think this was something shed want to get used to. But it was a bit toote for that, I suppose. Lets hear her out, then tackle that subjectter.

    Okay, Mjurran, whats your question?

    Right. This is rted to the highway from Blumund to Dwargon running through our nation, as you discussed earlier. Should we consider this a part of the Monster-and-Man Cooperative Alliance youve mentioned before?

    Monster-and-ManCooperativeAlliance?

    I liked the sound of that.

    You can treat it that way, yes. And I think I like that name for it, too. It encapstes the ideal were aiming for really well.

    Monster and man working together for each others benefit. The term monster covered a diverse spectrum, of course, including some species better termed demi-humans. But regardless, that was the exact ideal I had in mind.

    In the center of this alliance was our nation, Tempest. To the east, the Armed Nation of Dwargon. To the west, the Kingdom of Blumund. To the south, Milims domain. This alone was a vast alliance of monsters, and to that we could add the human side, centered around Blumund and including Farminus up north and Thalion down southan expansive amount of human-controllednd. Plus, Blumund was our interface to the Western Nations and the people who lived there. If these diversends could join hands and form a true team, then I thought the Monster-and-Man Cooperative Alliance was a fine name for it.

    Thank you very much. Now, my question. In order to realize this ideal, our nation is willing to cooperate with you as much as we possibly can. Luckily, Diablo has coercedum, I mean convinced our noble ranks to join our side, and they are now very submissiveer, cooperative with us, so I think they will listen to anything we tell them. Thus, as one of the first steps our fledgling nation takes, we are thinking ofunching a new national-level project to help support you.

    Basically, her question was what kind of project they shouldunch.

    Well, itd involve agriculture, I guess, like youve been talking about.

    Everything is going well there. Were having our people grow the designated crops without issue.

    Um, so what else?

    Was there something else? Everything I thought to ask her about was already taken care of. Diablos work cowing the noble ranks into submission wasplete, and Yohm enjoyed overwhelming support among the people. The role of the military in his government was clearly defined, and the entire nation was now united.

    The old Farmus was gone, and the new Farminus had taken root in its ce. I thought that tying up the loose ends from that was job one, but as Mjurran exined, that was already finished. The citizens had by now been notified that agriculture would be the nations focus for the next little while, too.

    I was impressed. Diablo mayve set everything up, but Mjurran, taking over from him, had a greater talent for this than I thought.

    Okay, well, can you bring together anyone whos still out of work for me?

    Certainly, Sir Rimuru. We were hoping that we could help with the railying work for you as well. This transportationwork will be a lifeline for moving around the crops we produce, wont it?

    Yeah, I imagine so. Youll probably be producing a lot more than wed be able to consume internally, besides. I think its important for a nation to bring food to anywhere its needed before it rots.

    Back in the Farmus era, when the government had traded on the sly with the Dwarven Kingdom, the products involved were crafts, weapons, and other durable goods that didnt deteriorate over time. Responsibility for their transport was assigned to the merchants; the nation collected customs taxes as essentially free ie for no work on their part. That would change now. The nation would need to boost its trust, guaranteeing goods alongside the merchants. It was the start of a new era, one where Farminus provided guaranteed logistics for trade.

    I look forward to the day when these magitrains run across the grasnds of our nation. I think they will transform our merchant ss and how they conduct their business. We have much to learn if we want to contribute.

    Yep. Theyll run far faster than wagonsa journey that takes a week now will be run in less than three hours. And thats with carrying over a hundred times more goods at once, I imagine.

    What?!

    Gazel and Elmesia didnt seem surprised, perhaps assuming this kind of leap. Everyone else was stunnedit was just so unexpected. Yuuki, Hinata, and Masayuki, meanwhile, all cracked smiles for other reasons.

    So yeah, Ill want to purchase thend we need now and n our rail lines out to be as straight as possible, for efficiencys sake. Gelds staff, and the beastmen studying here in town, should be mastering surveying before long. Im thinking of leaving that work to them and just performing the final checks when theyre done. Mjurran, I can put all the workers you can give us under theirmand. Divide them up into teams, led by whoevers literate out of them.

    Very well. This is getting a little exciting.

    Mjurran sounded up for it. She seemed ready to offer her support from the very start, so things would go pretty smoothly with Farminus, I felt.

    The next person to raise a hand was Fuze. He smiled at me.

    With all the leaders here, I havent had a chance to introduce myself yet. Hello.

    He had attended the full festival, including the prunch banquet, but all the celebrities I was hanging with apparently made him too timid to speak up. I had noticed him, actually, but sadly, the timing never quite worked out. Hed looked like he was enjoying the show, though, so Id resolvedand then promptly forgotto chat with himter.

    Ahhh, sorry about that. I meant to say hello, but

    No, no, its fine, Sir Rimuru. You looked busy regardless. But anyway, today I have a friend who wants to speak about the very topic weve been discussing.

    He then introduced the Baron of Veryard, a man I knew well, to the audience. I remember how much of a hard worker he was, one I trifled with at my own risk.

    My name is Veryard, and I appreciate being granted the permission to attend. Thank you, Sir Rimuru, and thank you in advance to everyone else I am speaking to.

    He stood handsomely upright, then gave the hall an elegant bow. It was an impressive performance. One could hardly believe he was a rank-and-file noble from a small nation.

    Now, on behalf of my lord, His Majesty King Doram of Blumund, I wish to ask a question.

    Veryard took a moment to survey the audience. The king himself was in attendance, along with his wife, the queen. They barely even registered. I hardly knew they were in here. I had told King Doram that wed n an official conference shortly, but I suppose we didnt need to any longer. This was kind of functioning as one. He was all smiles, an affable old man in appearance, and I wasnt sure if that was a good look for him right here.

    In his ce, Veryard began to speak.

    I was informed by Fuze that Sir Rimuru would be speaking about matters rted to our homnd of Blumunds future ce in the world. I have also heard from King Doram that he ns to make Blumund into a hub formerce and distribution. I have been thinking about what that might look like, but listening to everything discussed today, I now have a much clearer picture. It appears, Sir Rimuru, that you envision Blumund as a sort of clearinghouse for logistics. Now, the magitrains you speak of will no doubt vastly change the norms of this field. If a hub in this new logisticalwork is built in our nation, I am sure we will see goods from every corner of thend gather within our borders. Naturally, we will need someone to oversee all these goods, as well as people to oversee what each nation iscking and make the necessary arrangements to address that deficiency. Sir Rimuru, do you wish for us to perform these roles?

    Thats Veryard for you. A lot sharper than Fuze, to be sure. And he put exactly what I was thinking about into words.

    Yes, thats right, but can you manage that? Because Im sure it goes without saying that if all you can provide is space for this, thats fine, too. In that case, wed promise to pay you a percentage tax every year for use of thend, but?

    Oh, nothing of it. Staying out of this business andzily living off the profits is something our citizens would never be satisfied with. Certainly, we are willing to offer education and prepare for the times toe!

    Man. How many years into the future was this guy looking? I had the good Professor Raphael watching over me, but this guy was using his own brain to keep up with all of this? That went beyond just being visionary; it was like his mind was more sharply refined than anybody elses in the room.

    But he was right. Blumund was about to experience a paradigm shift that would make it reconsider its value system for just about everything. The same would be true for other nations, but for Blumund, Id imagine the results would be dramatic. Veryard could see this, and he just dered that he was preparing for it.

    What a guy this is. He had already bested me in one round of negotiations. Just as I thought, I definitely had to stay alert around him. I swear, Im really d hes not my enemy right now.

    In that case, by all means. Id like you to examine what sort of goods will be imported and exported from each nation and build ways to transport products to ces that need them. For a nation so gifted in gathering and manipting information, youll be uniquely qualified, Im sure.

    Ah, theres no pulling the wool over your eyes, Sir Rimuru. Very well. I promise you that I will bring this issue home and deliberate over it in further detail.

    Like youre one to talk, I thought as I nodded.

    I was trying to hold a Founders Festival review meeting here, but now itd turned into a huge political war of nerves. But it was worth it, because I no longer had to negotiate with Blumund. I was expecting to take more time navigating all manner of tricky issues, but Baron Veryard helped spring me from all of that. Was that a good or bad thing? I wasnt immediately sure, but if we were at this point, might as well throw all my weight into supporting it.

    With that, I promptly began to agonize over what I would ask Veryard for first.

    So we had talked on end about thorny issues rted to running our nations, but now it was really time to focus on the festival. I mentally changed gears, preparing to listen to everyones feedback.

    All right, does anyone else have anything to add?

    Someone shot to their feet, as if waiting for the signal. It was Veldora. I dreaded this moment so much, I thought about pretending I didnt notice him, but

    Rimuru, what is the meaning of this?

    Whats the meaning of what?

    How do you mean?

    Thebyrinth! You know what I mean. I was anticipating so much, and nobody even attempted to tackle the hundredth floor!!

    After all that lecturing I gave him, he still wasnt the least bit apologetic, was he? He just. Doesnt. Listen.

    Already, he was going on about the lines he memorized for the fateful encounter and so forth. I wanted to snap back at him about how little I cared, but I didnt. If I did, thats when hed start really throwing his weight around.

    Well, yes, I have my thoughts about that as well.

    Do you? How reassuring to hear. So what are you going to do about it?

    What? I dunno. At the very least, wed have to start dividing adventurer groups by strength levels.

    Well need to work on it, thats for sure. Because the challengers who came in were all decent, at least. Intermediate or better, you know?

    Decent?

    Thats kind of rude

    But Im not sure I can deny that

    Kabals party gloomily sighed at me. Considering how devoted they were to robbing my treasure chests blind, I hoped they would forgive at least a little sass.

    Nah, nah. Me, all I had to do was walk a little bit, and we were on Floor 10. The next thing I knew, mypanions beat the boss for me

    I think Masayuki meant tofort them with that, but it just came off as self-aggrandizing. Then again, Elen didnt seem too despondent about the experience, so maybe it wasnt a big issue. I figured I could leave them be.

    So I wouldnt count on anyone knocking on your door for a while toe.

    Of course, for Veldora, he might not ever get any visitors, but

    What?! Then what did Ramiris and Milim and I work so hard for?!

    He really shouldve included me in that list, but ah well.

    Hey, dont worry. In terms of worldwide advertising, yesterdays unveiling was a big sess.

    Oh?

    Can you give us the details, Mollie?

    Mjllmile stood up, brimming with confidence as he addressed Veldora.

    The footage we revealed from inside thebyrinth drummed up interest from multiple nations. I think Rare items appearing from the treasure chests generated a great deal of attention.

    And that was my doing.

    Ummm Actually, Veldora may have done something right, maybe?

    If my guess is correct, the nobles in the audience will likely be sending the adventurers on their payroll into thebyrinth before long!

    As he exined it, the noble sses often hired adventurers or stout mercenaries to serve as bodyguards. Now that they saw the treasures potentially avable in thebyrinth, theyd likely send those people over to collect the booty, earning the rights to whatever they picked up in exchange for supporting them. Even adventurers without wealthy patrons would likely take multiple trips in, searching for fortune and glory. As Gaiye so eminently showed us, Rare weaponry and armor really were that hard to pick up otherwise.

    We wouldnt mention it here, by the way, but Mjllmile had an even more vicious scheme in mindbringing on shills whod score big in thebyrinth for him, like a crooked lottery, to stoke everyones gambling instincts. Having them obtain shy items that everyone could see as valuable would no doubt drum up apetitive spirit among the adventurers. Between that and other little tricks, we were nning ways to get adventurers and nobles alike addicted to this thing.

    And Mjllmile had even more ns in store.

    Thats not all, either. I am considering instituting a bounty system as well. If we announce that anyone who conquers the Dungeon down to the hundredth floor will win a vast sum of money, I believe many nobles will bring adventurers over and support their quest to win it all.

    He grinned. Dangle a vast fortune in front of nobility, he suggested, and theyre all too greedy to resist. Talented adventurers would quickly find patrons to hire them, no doubt, using their wealthy bosses funds to shore up their equipment and tackle thebyrinth in better shape.

    Itd be like athletes taking sponsorships, actually, wouldnt it? And if their adventurers performed well, thatd paint their patrons in a better light and maybe earn them more money elsewhere. Thatd offer more than enough reason for them to step up, Mjllmile thoughtand the noble sponsors could kick back in the city, too, enjoying all the entertainment while their team hacked away.

    It could be fun, too, to broadcastbyrinth runs to the coliseum seats. Between this, that, or the other thing, wed likely be able to attractrge audiences.

    Sponsors, though, huh? Hearing that concept from Mjllmile really impressed me. I always knew he was talented, but I didnt think he had this much insight into the future. Theres no doubting that sponsors would love adventurers in their stablending a huge item or scoring an impressive boss defeat. Theres no telling what hed think of next.

    Now, just one more thing.

    After a great deal of discussion, Mjllmile and I had something we wanted to work on with the Free Guild. My financial partner had everyone in the hall enthralled; even Veldora had shut up. Realizing this was his chance, he spoke up.

    Now, while we have Grand Master Yuuki Kagurazaka here, I have a request, or an offer, to present to you.

    An offer? Whats that?

    As I said, we are nning to offer bounty prizes in thebyrinthand thats something we would like the Free Guild to manage.

    Why is that?

    Mainly for the advertising effect, you see. With all the Guild locations out there, youll be able to spread the word quickly worldwide.

    Yeah. Thats certainly true. But what else?

    Well, in addition, I wanted to use Guild membership cards to manage the challengers.

    Ah. Wow. Yeah, thats quite an idea

    Yuuki sighed, either amazed or exasperated.

    We had thrown around the idea of issuing Labyrinth Cards to challengers, but this actually required a lot of work. This way, we could reduce running expenses and give some of the workload to the Free Guilds staff. In a way, it was Mjllmiles quest to palm off responsibility for it on someone else.

    But this offers certain advantages to the Free Guild as well.

    Oh?

    You see, the monsters in the Forest of Jura are managed by the orders of Sir Rimuru. That management will be expanding to the edges of the forests expansive borders in the future

    Ah. And when it does, therell be less monster-hunting work to be had?

    Precisely. But that wont be a problem, because thebyrinth will be home to a vast number of monsters in time. Hunting them down provides magic crystals, as well as pelts, fangs, ws, and otherponents, all on a regr basis

    !!

    And wouldnt that boost the Guilds profits as well?

    Defeating monsters let you obtain parts and ingredients from them. Selling them to the Guild earns adventurers ie. When the Guild sells them to shops and so on, they earn the resulting profit margin. And meanwhile, wed leave adventurer management to the Free Guild and collect taxes from them.

    Going forward, there was likely gonna be a lot of out-of-work adventurers going around. Thisbyrinth can help create new outlets, and new jobs, for them to take advantage of. Nobody loses, I thought.

    But how would Yuuki respond?

    Im sure Rimuru gave you a few suggestions about this, didnt he? WellMjllmile, was it? Id like to think about this idea, but its likely that well ept it and establish a new location in town here. Would you be able to provide a building for it?

    Of course. Once you know who youll assign here, we can work out all the detailster.

    Man, theres just no beating you, Rimuru

    Yuuki grinned at me. Mjllmile and I had our deal.

    I turned back toward Veldora.

    Did you hear that? Once thats epted, were gonna have a ton more adventurers going in.

    Mm-hmm

    And a year may be asking too much, but in two or three years, I think well see some pretty formidable challengers.

    Oh? And why is that?

    Well, its simple logic. Theyll be polishing their skills in abyrinth where theres almost no chance of dying. Itd be weird if they didnt get stronger.

    Ah yes. Well said, Rimuru. I look forward to this!

    To someone as long-lived as Veldora, two or three years went by in a sh, I imagined. He was smiling now, chatting about how exciting this could be. Right. If that cated him for now, then we were good.

    As I gloated internally, Hinata raised her hand.

    May I have the floor?

    Yes?

    I didnt think shedin to me at this point, but I still tensed up anyway. Once I decided I had a hard time with someone, it was difficult to shake that image from my mind, I guess.

    I have a requestor a suggestion.

    The way she put that wasnt exactly encouraging. Mjllmiles eyes were averted, sweat running down his head.

    Im listening.

    Thank you. If youll excuse me

    Hinatas concern was forbyrinth users failing to conduct adequate safety measures during outside work. If they grew used to not dying inside there, she feared, they might wind up unprepared when theyre in the real world. This had urred to me as well, but I concluded it was just a y at your own risk thing and that was that. Having Hinata point it out left me tongue-tied.

    Hmm Well, apart from warning people, I didnt think I could do very much

    Its an issue that could affect peoples lives, you know. You cant just let it go unaddressed.

    Um, yeah, but?

    No.

    Y-yeah, but, Hinata?

    Before I could plead with her, Hinata offered a suggestion of her own.

    But if you ept the suggestion Im about to make, Ill be fine with what youre doing here.

    All right. Ill listen. What is it?

    I tried to be reserved with her. I shouldnt have worried.

    Ha-ha-ha! You are such a Never mind. You dont have to tense up like that. This could be useful to both of us.

    Huh?

    Challenging thisbyrinth is a fine idea. Itll help improve your core skills, and I think you can learn how to effectively dispatch assorted monsters better this way. But Im concerned that itll reduce peoples awareness of the potential lethality involved. So Id like to send over a Priest or two from the Western Holy Church.

    A Priest?! No! Have you lost your mind, Chief Pdin Hinata?!

    It wasnt me shouting but Fuze. A lot of other people were surprised as well, so I asked why. It turns out a Priest, in Church pance, was a kind of magic user, a religious healer. I think I had actually heard about them beforethey were a rarity, in fact, one of the few individuals in the Church hierarchy able to harness holy magic, which the organization kept a guarded secret. Those ranked a bishop or higher could apparently perform divine miracles, including the recement of lost body parts.

    I am quite serious. Yes, their abilities are ssified, but they, too, need to learn and grow. No matter how much genius-level talent they have, only a very few manage to master the divine miracle of Resurrection. At this rate, we risk losing skills and lore that have been passed down for ages. Times of war are one thing, but it can be frustratingly difficult keeping this knowledge alive during peace.

    So basically, raising the dead as a skill was dying out because there were fewer dead to raise? Maybe it wasnt exactly that, but I understood what Hinata meant well enough. Her idea was to use my Dungeon to help improve her peoples holy magic.

    It was heaven-sent, exactly what we needed here. Even if they never learned Resurrection, having Priests with high-level healing spells around would help keep people safer during work outside thebyrinth. If I wanted to fully learn the secret skills of faith and favor Luminus turned me on to, seeing and analyzing a Priests skills in action would be a good shortcut as well. I had no reason to turn Hinata down.

    Well, theyd all be wee here.

    Hee-hee! I thought youd say that.

    Ignoring the gasps of surprise around us, Hinata and I came to an agreement. Priests were now going to be lurking around thebyrinth.

    I thought that was the end of the meeting, but Hinata had one more suggestion.

    Also, changing the subject a little, Id like to have the pdins try conquering thebyrinth as part of their training.

    Huhhh?

    We could have Sir Veldora over theresay, werent you selling takoyaki at one of the food stalls?

    That That doesnt matter, does it? Just go on with what you were saying! I begged.

    Y-yes! I was certainly not running a takoyaki stand under the name Alias!

    Oh. And here I was trying to kid myself that it was someone else Well, all right, Hinata grumbled, looking a bit tired out. But there was no fooling her. Although, really, anyone who knew Veldora wouldve spotted it.

    The Storm Dragon insisted that he wanted to run a food stall with a grill during the festival, so I asked Mjllmile to get him a space and someone to help out. Then, for reasons that were beyond me, Veldora convinced the busy Kurobe to craft a special grill top for himone made for cooking takoyaki, the balls of batter and octopus, more poprized in the city of Osaka.

    I allowed this provided that nobody found out it was Veldora running it, butreallyeverybody in town knew the guy anyway, so I begged everyone involved to just keep it a secret from the coworkers at the stall. Along these lines, I asked him toe up with a fake name for the festival, and he decided upon Alias for it.

    Thus we had Alias Takoyaki among the stalls, and from what I heard, it was actually a huge sess. But now we were going way off-subject.

    So, um, if we can forget about that for a moment, can you tell me more about the pdin training youre picturing?

    I lobbed the conversation back toward Hinata. She didnt protest, thankfully.

    Based on what Ive seen, new pdin recruits likely wouldnt be able to win against that Bovix guy from the tournament. So Id like to group them in parties of five or six and let them go inside. Itll give them more on-the-field training, and itll also help train the Priests I mentioned. And if I had to guess, our higher-level pdins could probably make it to Floor 50 right now.

    Oh? That is quite fine by me. In fact, bring them on!!

    Veldora was certainly up for it. And pdins were all ranked A or higher. With that kind of force, a few of them in a team could probably get past Bovix.

    Id also like some of our captains to join in.

    More murmurs of surprise from the crowd.

    Do you mean that, Lady Hinata?!

    You would have us dive into thebyrinth as well?

    Arnaud and Bhus, the first pdins to ever stay in Tempest, immediately fired back at Hinata. She didnt relent.

    Why wouldnt I? Its the perfect training ground, and youll never get killed in there. If foes that strong are found around Floor 50, theyve got to be even stronger below there. Maybe even you couldnt win.

    Veldora contentedly nodded. The pdins, meanwhile, were livid.

    N-no, um, I dont think so, Lady Hinata. Were the Crusaders, the most powerful army out thereand we have a Saint among us, theplement to a demon lord.

    Exactly. The demon lords personal leaders are one thing, but a typical dungeon monster would be cannon fodder to us

    Then prove it to me.

    Arnaud and Bhuss defense was pulverized by Hinatas perfectly fair argument. Certainly, if they could beat Floor 100 and conquer the wholebyrinth, thatd prove they were correct, all right. That was the pure truth, and there was no possible way to spin it.

    Sadly, though:

    W-wait a minute! But isnt the guardian of the hundredth floor?

    Heh-heh-heh Kwaaah-ha-ha-ha! Its supposed to be a secret, but I will let you in on itit is I, Veldora the Storm Dragon!!

    He was certainly enjoying himself, as Arnaud and Bhus turned pale with despair. There was no turning back now. I dly epted Hinatas request.

    That seemed to finish up most of our business, so I decided to take this opportunity to get one thing straight. In fact, this was the main reason Id called so many people in here.

    Now, theres one thing Id like to ask all of you

    My question was about the merchants from easternnds. I had a suspicion they were plotting something, so I wanted to discuss this as I cautioned the rest of the hall about them.

    Our nation is open to anybody, and we allow people to go in and out as they please, so Im sure Eastern merchants are taking advantage of that. But

    Yes, King Gazel, we have been putting them all under surveince.

    Henrietta, knight assassin and head of Dwargons intelligence organization, had been keeping tabs on them. That kept them from doing much, Im sure. Taking any action would be suicide, in fact.

    Unfortunately, we have only a small presence as a trade partner, but we do have a talented intelligence agency. We do receive goods from the East, but not many of their merchants are seen within our borders. Perhaps they do not see us as worth the effort.

    Um, should you really refer to yourself in those terms?

    So they came to Blumund, too, if not in great numbers. It sounded like they were watched over carefully, so no worries there.

    And is my own kingdom safe from them?

    Of course, Your Excellency. All imported goods are kept internally by our dynasty. The thirteen kingdoms are not given the right to ess them.

    The Sorcerous Dynasty of Thalions borders were all but closed to foreigners. It barely even interacted with other nations, and there was no way for merchants from the East to get inside. I sincerely doubted any of them could hoodwink Elmesia, so they were likely fine as well.

    My main worries were for Farminus, the new nation Id left to Yohm.

    Hey, by the way, did Razen check our ount books like Diablo asked?

    You need to stop speaking so informally, Yohm Sorry. He said he examined them all, investigated how much impact there was from the merchants, and severed ties with them all.

    Of course Diablo had it handled. Its scary how talented he is. I thought about giving him some praise, but not in front of all our guests.

    And as far as the Free Guild goes, well have to leave those decisions to each office.

    I was sure theyd have to. Not all Eastern merchants were government agents; some of them were just conducting regr business, no doubt. The Guild headquarters couldnt tell every regional base to cut off all current trade with them. Their members needed work, after all. Thus, Yuuki instead promised hed make sure the headquarters provided guidance as best they could, so Id leave matters to him.

    And the Western Holy Churchor, I should say, the Holy Empire of Lubelius has halted all business with Eastern merchants.

    Oh?

    I wasnt expecting that from Hinata. I asked why, and she replied that they came close to being taken advantage of.

    There was a merchant named Damrada, a fairly important one, so we trusted in him I never thought hed actually try to trick me.

    Trick you?

    Yes. On the night of the Walpurgis, someone snuck into Lubelius. I happened to be around to chase him away, but I was actually supposed to be meeting with Damrada then.

    Hmm. And those two events have to be connected, huh?

    Listening to Hinatas rundown, Gazel agreed with herDamrada and this intruder must be rted. I thought so, too. But how was this mystery foe involved with the Eastern merchants? And wasnt that when the demon lord Roy was killed, too? Was that this intruders doing?

    Well, I concluded, either way, I think we all know what were dealing with.

    Everyone nodded. Good. Building awork of nations on the alert for Eastern activity would help us get a grip on their future moves. And now that I knew we were all on the same page, I officially adjourned the meeting.

    Now, only my own staff remained in the meeting hall.

    So, Sir Rimuru, have youe to a conclusion?

    Yep, I said to Benimaru. No doubt about it. The patron yman refused to identify is Yuuki Kagurazaka.

    Keh-heh-heh-heh-heh I agree. Theck of evidence is an issue, but I have no doubts, either.

    If Diablo agreed, there was no room for questioning it. I had only be sure of it after Luminus gave me her advice. The other woman I was reserving judgment on for now, but Yuuki was definitely suspect.

    I mean, only a very few people knew about what had happened between Shizu and me. I wasnt sure who leaked that info to Hinata, but she told me herself that it was a merchant from the East. Then, as I conducted my own investigations, I came across some interesting information.

    Mjurran told me that she never heard of the Moderate Jesters.

    yman was always a careful demon lord, Geld said. He didnt trust his own men one bit. I think he kept thatpany of clowns a secret from them all.

    He was right. yman believed nobody, and he wanted the Moderate Jesters to remain unknown to his entire bureaucracy.

    However, as Shuna proved in her investigations, he and the Eastern merchants had public connections to each other. Mjurran saw them herself. She even advised them a few times.

    Hohh. Which means

    The clowns approached yman disguised as merchants?

    Geld and Gabil seemed convinced. I nodded back at them.

    I got some testimony from Adalmann on this subject. Apparently, the Jesters showed themselves to him.

    The Jesters did not go through any particr pains to hide themselves. They certainly didnt disguise themselves as merchants, and if Adalmann saw them, they must have at least ventured near ymans manor. No one had seen them inside, howeverwhich made my theory more likely.

    Diablos smile widened. The Moderate Jesters and the Eastern merchants Theres little doubt these two groups are connected.

    Right, Benimaru said with a smile of his own. And if Lace didnt show up in that battle, then it was likely him who killed Roy.

    Out of the three Jesters I knew, Footman and Teare were busy behind the scenes in the battle against ymans forces, looking for and killing any magic-born liable to betray the demon lord. What was the third among them doing, then? Benimaru had to be rightthis other Jester was infiltrating Lubelius, in search of something.

    Everyone who knows about Shizu and me was present at todays meeting. That was why I asked thest question I did.

    Kabal, Elen, and Gido were out of the question. Gazel and Elmesia could be crossed off the list. Fuze, Veryard, and Blumunds royal couple were beyond a reasonable doubtthey had no clear motive and only trivial connections to the merchants. And Hinata, being almost victimized herself, couldnt have perpetrated this.

    That just left Yuuki.

    He admitted that he has connections to Eastern merchants, yes.

    He couldnt have pretended otherwise. That high-quality paper theyve got is made in the Eastern Empire, apparently, and Yuuki always had an ample supply of it. Theres no way he couldve denied it.

    Keh-heh-heh-heh-heh We couldve extracted something more from him today. A written confession or the like. A pity we didnt.

    It was, but I wasnt too sad about it.

    Shizu and I had a unique rtionship. Nobody who knew about it was the kind of person whod breezily gossip about it toplete strangers. If someone leaked the news, it had to be someone opposing me. And if you considered the list of people who were sure that information leak would make Hinata actYuuki was the only one I could think of.

    To tell the truth, I had suspected Kabals group at first. But it was Elens advice that made me decide to be a demon lord in the first ce. Plus, with Elmesia backing her up the whole time, thered be no reason for her to tell the Eastern Empire about me. Revealing such a vital secret would benefit the enemy alone, not her at and the same was true for the Blumundians. If they wanted to oppose me, they wouldnt have signed a treaty with me. They wouldve just held back, avoiding deep ties with us, and profited from the fallout.

    If I had to guess, the Eastern merchants are trying to expand their influence in the Western Nations. And the Church forces got in the way of that, didnt they?

    I think so, too. If they pitted you against Hinata, Sir Rimuru, chances are they hoped you would kill each other off.

    Yes. It is clear that it didnt matter to them who killed whom.

    Benimaru and Diablo were in agreement with me. I went on.

    The two main influential groups in the Western Nations are the Council and the Church, and Im guessing the Eastern merchants are trying to work on both of them, slowly expanding their clout over time. And working with them

    is the Free Guild, then?

    I briskly nodded at Diablo. As motives went, this was the biggest and most usible one. I had no physical evidence to back it up, but my conclusion was already made.

    So what will you do?

    I thought I could hear Diablo offering to assassinate him at once, but I pretended not to.

    Thatll depend on what our foe does. I wondered if I was wrong for a moment, judging by how much support he offered us today, so lets just be very careful with him and see if we find a way to grab him by the tail.

    Very well. I will ensure the Guild building in town is kept under constant surveince.

    Thanks, Soei. Everyone else, I dont want to see any unauthorized moves from you!

    Yes, sir!

    Excellent.

    Honestly, I wanted to corner the guy right now and interrogate him. But without evidence, if he talked his way out of it, Id be sunk. Yuuki ran the entire Free Guild, and I couldnt use him out of the blue with nothing to fall back on. And besides, maybeI mean, its not a nonzero chancemaybe I really was wrong about all this.

    Understood. The chances of that are believed to be extremely low.

    Theyre believed to be, thats for sure. Without real evidence, not even Raphael could make a firm conclusion.

    Well In my old world, we had a concept called presumed innocence. In other words, someones always innocent until it can be proved that theyre guilty. But even so, dont let up on them.

    My staff nodded their understanding.

    I had no idea what Yuuki was thinking. Hinata, yman too, the Eastern merchants, the Free Guild, maybe the Council itself, and Iperhaps we were all dancing on the palm of his hand. We couldnt be sure of that right now, but that was about to change. We knew who to watch out for, and now we just had to quietly prepare and wait for the confrontation toe

    The excitement of the festival was over. Normal life rushed back into the scene all too quickly. We had a mountain of things to do; problems kept piling up, no matter how many we solved. There was no time for me to wallow in mncholy.

    I heaved a gloomy sigh as I thought about the game of wits Yuuki and I were likely about to engage in.

 Volume 9 - Epilogue

    EPILOGUE

    FLAMES OF AVARICE

    Duke Meus staggered along. He had just tasted fear. Fear and despair.

    The demon lord Rimuru was no one he had any hope of handling. The n was to make Rimuru owe him a favor, then tame him into doing exactly what he wanted him to. But, looking back, he couldnt have been further out of his league.

    It made Meus feelughable. He thought he had him wrapped around his finger, but the shoe had been on the other foot the whole time. He couldnt help butugh about it, but he no longer had the mental fortitude.

    And thinking about it, those people have it worse than I do

    He recalled the merchants gathered up for him. A handsome man came from behind the demon lords shadow, reading off their names, birthces, and the type and price for each and every one of their goods. His voice was like an ursed spell binding Meuss heart.

    How deep did they search?

    If they were disallowed from dealing in the demon lords domain, theyd all have to return to their home nations. And Rimuru knew that. Reading off all their nationalities was his way of applying that extra beat of pressure to their threats.

    The demon lords domain would no doubt develop further in the future, as would any nation working with it. It was the creation of a new, and powerful, economic bloc, and it meant any nation shut out of it would immediately fall behind inpetitiveness. No nation had the luxury of sheltering its own merchants and ignoring a new alliance like this.

    Having just experienced the Founders Festival, Meus could see that as the unvarnished truth. Such wonderful music, such innovative science. The gourmet delights, all rarities in the Western Nations, were a shock to him. Monster nations, rural towns, and so on Hed looked down on them all before he came here, but now he felt pathetic for doing so. Sensing all this culture he had never seen before made his heart throb.

    Being spurned by this demon lord was a serious issue, one that had to be remedied no matter what. But so confident was Meus in his scheme that he misjudged how Rimuru would react to it.

    Those merchants may have nowhere left to go, but Im just the same

    There would be no more advancement in his career. The Five Elders werent forgiving enough to allow failures in their midst. He would lose his fortune; perhaps hed even be purged. But all Meus could do was report the truth. Because no matter where he went in this wide world, there was no fleeing the eyes of the Rozzo family

    I see he really did fail, Grandfather.

    That he did, Maribel. I should have let you handle that. When I first heard the news, I thought that nation was too valuable to destroy, and now look

    You couldnt help it. I saw and heard it, tooand I felt it. The aroma of a culture from my past. But thats why we need to erase it all before it bes known.

    It was Maribels indirect way of telling Granville Rozzo his orders were too half-hearted. And as head of the Rozzo family and chief mediator among the Five Elders, Granville bitterly agreed with her.

    The Tempest Founders Festival was attended by the worlds ruling sses. It was Granville who ignored Maribels warnings and decided to see it. If they could bring the demon lord Rimuru under their wing, they couldve invited him onto the Councilin a way that benefited them, of course.

    That was their decisionbut with far fewer movable pawns avable at the moment, Granville grew timid. That was why Maribel stopped him from taking action, instead having a third party feel this demon lord out. And as a result, Duke Meus failed.

    If only Maribel was there, the Rozzos would never have lost. Granville was sure of it, but Maribel looked like a young childand instinctively, he hesitated to let her go off alone.

    Grandfather, I need to make a move of my own.

    Thats the only way?

    Dont worry, all right? I am Maribel. I am greed. I wish for everything, and I take it all for myself. This world belongs to the Rozzo family!

    That it does. Youre right. Its all in your hands.

    Granville gently caressed Maribels head.

    Thus Maribel the Greedy took action. And then, one monthter, a letter arrived in Tempest from the Council of the West.

 Volume 10 - Prologue

    A+A-

    PROLOGUE

    THOSE WHO SET THINGS IN MOTION

    The boy let out a resigned, exasperated sigh.

    You sure look depressed about something. Was there a problem?

    He was asking a man wearing an asymmetrical maskLace, a magic-born and member of the Moderate Jesters. A man that Yuuki Kagurazaka, the boy facing him now, counted as someone he trusted.

    You could say that. I got an invite, so I stopped by to pay a visit, but Im telling you, my jaw practically hit the floor. I suppose you could say it was a big hit to my confidenceor that I thought we needed to reconsider our ns.

    Reconsider our ns?

    Kazalim, the exdemon lord now passing herself off as Yuukis secretary, Kagali, repeated the words right back at Lace.

    Right, right, a depressed-looking Yuuki replied. Im thinking we dont want to get on that slimes bad side, if we can help it.

    So why not retain a close rtionship, then? Im set to explore those ruins before long, so I assumed we would stay on friendly terms for the time being?

    No, the ns still the same as always. Its just that now, its gotten a lot harder.

    And whys that? You keep it cool, dont make any waves, and nobodys gonna get hurt, right?

    Lace was no fool, either. Given how his friend yman was no longer alive, he did have a bone to pick with Rimurubut he wasnt willing to defy their boss Yuukis orders just to start a fight. And Lace wasnt alone. Footman and Teare had the same opinion, and as leader of the Jesters, Kagali understood well enough the dangers of letting emotion drive your behavior.

    In this world, the one supreme rule was survival of the fittest. Through their shared experiences, Lace and his team had learned that nothing goodes from taking reckless action before victory was assured. Not only did ymanpletely fail to obtain his revenge against the demon lord Leon; he even died in the attempt. Thanks to that, even with the former Kazalim returned among them, the Moderate Jesters were right back where they started from. If they decided to open hostilities against the demon lord Rimuru at this point, revenge against Leon would be the least of their worries.

    They all understood that, and so the Jesters bade their time, just as Yuuki ordered. But then Yuuki informed them of a problem.

    Well, on that note, I think thats gotten a little difficult for us, too, said Yuuki.

    Meaning?

    Its looking like that slime is starting to suspect something with us

    Whaa? Hang on, did you do something to make im catch you out? Lace asked.

    Oh, dont be silly, Lace! Unlike you, the boss would never make a mistake like that!

    Ho-ho-ho! Youre right. I dont know anybody nearly as wary as our boss here. I sincerely doubt he did anything ill-advised.

    The eternally careful Yuuki seemed to be suggesting he was the one at faultbut Laces response was quickly shot down by Teare and Footman. That was the sort of respect Yuuki had earned from the Jesters.

    Calm down, guys, rebuked Kagali, their leader. Its no mistake Sir Yuuki here made. The slime was quite cautious indeed, as it turned out. Facing up to him myself, I could tell theres nobody else like him. He made me feel like my whole body was being watchedlike I couldnt let my guard down for a moment. I couldnt fully suss out the force he has to work with, but hes a formidable one, no doubt.

    Having gone toe to toe against Rimuru once before, Kagali was able to instinctually feel the danger the slime presented. He wasnt even Leons equal in terms of strength, but that ability to see and react to everything in the world was a threat, she felt.

    Yuuki nodded at her. No, I think that slimethe demon lord RimuruI think hes a menace. One of the leaders of the Council was there, one of our main sources of funding, and he met his intellectual match pretty quickly with him. Hes crafty, hes careful, and hes merciless against his foes. Normally, hes kind and gentle, but get him riled up, and theres no controlling him, you could say. And since I tried and failed to use that man, its little surprise Im under suspicion.

    He shrugged.

    Well, yeah, Boss, but whatever he thinks about ya, he aint got no evidence, does he? So just go with it and y it normal, and he cant do nothin about that, right?

    Theres no physical evidence, no. But you know, Im the one who leaked the fate of Shizu to Hinata, and thats some pretty damning circumstantial evidence, I bet. Plus, at the very end, he rounded up all his people to discuss their future direction, but I guess Rimuru chose that meeting to round up all his suspects, too. Its pretty fair to assume that our covers been blown.

    Oh my

    The group looked on, distressed, as they listened to Yuukis rundown. Kagali, unsurprisingly, was the first to recovergiven her demon lord roots and experience with life-or-death situations, shed always be the quickest on her feet.

    Fair enough, but it was bound to happen sooner orter, wasnt it? That slime truly is a threat. So how should we revise our n, Boss?

    Well, well stay on the quiet side, like before. As long as Rimuru has nothing damning against us, I doubt hell decide to get openly hostile. He might look like hes ying it all by ear, but hes actually a pretty meticulous leader. Im sure hes worked out everything he stands to gain and lose.

    All right. Him telling us about the ancient ruins was probably his way of feeling out how wed react, then. His way of saying Try anything funny, and I wont go easy.

    I think youre right. People have a way of changing their minds on you. They even have a saying for itYesterdays foe is todays friend. So if we can make him think that nows not the time to fight, no matter whats changed, Id call that a victory for us.

    Yuuki looked around at hispanions, gauging their reactions.

    So were gonna stay buddy-buddy with im?

    We could easily make him do our bidding, but if thats your take, Boss, very well.

    How stupid are you, Footman? Were having all this trouble because we cant do that.

    Nah, nah, I get where Footmansin from, yknow? Itd annoy anyone if some new guy treats you like dirt. Thing is, maybe we could win in an all-out war, but they even got Veldora on their side. I dont see much point in bettin against the odds right this minute, you get me?

    Exactly. So its best for us to quit overthinking this and just follow our orders from the boss and our director!

    Isnt that what they asked us for from the beginning? And Ive got no problem with their takes, either.

    The three Jesters seemed less than enthused but were still in agreement with their bosses general direction.

    Once he was assured of that, Yuuki nodded at Kagali. True power in the Western Nations wasrgely imed by two factionsthe Holy Empire of Lubelius (and the Western Holy Church they backed) and the Council of the West, the parent organization of the Free Guild (not to mention the Rozzo family that ruled the Councils core). Now Tempest, governed by the demon lord Rimuru, was part of that mix. And now that he was fresh from the Tempest Founders Festival, Yuuki hade to realize just how foolish it was to rile Rimuru.

    I was a little worried, though. If I dered that I wasnt going to fight Rimuru, would these guys be willing to meekly ept that?

    The thought urred to Yuuki, but it appeared to be baseless. Kazalim mightve acted differently, but losing to Leon once had taught Kagali a little prudence. The Jesters had been working to realize their ambitions for years; to them, patience was already a virtue. To Yuuki, it didnt seem like any of his faithfulpanions were hasty enough to thoughtlessly go out of control.

    Im d to see that, he said with a smile. Now, I think Ill let you take over the work I had assigned to Damrada.

    Huh? Meaninthe ssified goods?

    What?! Leaving that work to us?

    Hoh-hoh-hoh! Are you sure, Boss?

    This instantly unnerved the three Jesters. Yuuki kept smiling at them.

    Mm-hmm. You can handle that, right?

    Oh, youre on, Boss! Yer just worried that well go outta control and start a buncha crap, arentcha? Well, no way were gonna. Even if we think we can win in a fight, we aint gonna so much as lift a finger, I swear to ya!

    Right, right! Even yman lost his cool at thest minute, after all If we made the same mistake, I wouldnt be able to rib him for it in the afterlife.

    True enough. Acting from a ce of anger only leads to mistakes. As the Angry Jester of this bunch, thats something Id be particrly prudent to remember. The demon lord Leon swore revenge against him someday, but I think that someday will need to wait.

    The trio each reassured Yuuki with their own choice of words. He gave them a light nod.

    Youve matured more than I thought, Yuuki muttered, before recalling something else. By the way, the mention of ssified goods reminded meRimuru brought the children I took in over to Tempest, didnt he?

    Ah yes, the ones Shizue Izawa prevented us from reaching

    Right, those. He had a built-in excuse, wanting them to see the festival and all, but thinking about it, he really does suspect me, doesnt he? Which is fine. I just cant get what he said off my mind.

    He paused for a moment. The children were growing stronger and stronger. That was no doubt because of what the demon lord Rimuru did to save them. And while he said it was a secret, he let on to Yuuki that he wanted the kids to learn more about the spirits within them.

    He kind of glossed over it thest time I asked, but

    Perhaps theyve gotten so strong that theres no glossing over the subject any longer.

    Well, who knows? I got all excited, thinking he had some kind of scheme in mind for them. But theres no doubt that hes using their elemental spirits to neutralize the magicule counts in them.

    One could never leave their guard down around the demon lord Rimuru. A scheme, Yuuki thought, could easily be in y. He shrugged.

    True, Kagali said. And Shizue Izawa was an elementalist capable of wielding high-level me elemental. So is it possible, then, to use spirits to take the failed Heroes that werent fully summoned correctly and utilize them for their intended purposes?

    This seemed to ring a bell with the Jesters.

    Ohh! Is that what Leon was after? He seems to be collecting otherworlders from failed summonings. You think he could raise em into fighters?!

    Ah, now I remember! Ifrit used to be in Leons service, too, wasnt he? yman ordered his armies to attack him several times, but Ifrit killed them all off.

    Hoh-hoh-hoh! And now hes using the same method to create more elementalists like Shizu? Then perhaps he deserves to receive those ssified goods after all.

    They excitedly talked among themselves. Footman may be right, thought Yuuki. But that left a few things unexined.

    The ssified goods were, in fact, a group of children that had been subjected to failed summonings. Even now, in an undisclosed location, these summonings were taking ce again and againwithin the Western Nations, while Shizue Izawa was never informed. More attempts, of course, meant more failures, and it was Damrada and his team in the Cerberus group that retrieved themas they could never be allowed to be public knowledge. They were marked as test materials, but there was another purpose meant for them. That purpose was the demon lord Leon. And Leons order was to gather otherworlder children under the age of ten.

    Hmm Is Leon trying to build more power for a war? That sounds convincing, but why not do that himself, then? And by the way hes leaking new theoretical summoning techniques to the Eastern Empire and Western Nations, it seems like hes got other goals in mind. Better keep an eye out.

    Yuuki couldnt reach a conclusion yet. Thus, he was forced to stick with the pact Leon signed with them and keep up their current obligations.

    Yuuki frowned as he gave the Jesters his orders.

    All right. Ill leave the negotiations with Leon to you. If you can determine whether hes trying to improve his armies or has some other purpose, try to figure it out. Misha is handling negotiations with the Rozzos, so take the goods from her and get moving.

    Roger that. No problem!

    Yeah, yeah! Ill do my best!!

    Hoh-hoh-hoh! Very well.

    Kagali smirked at her enthusiastic group. Just dont get so excited that Leon figures out who you are.

    Listen, be as careful as you can, okay? We dont have the capacity to take on Leon as well right now.

    The trio nodded at Yuukis reminder. Lace and his cohorts were no fools. His trust ced in them, Yuuki began to exin the details behind his n.

    With the Jesters given their orders, it was now Kagalis turn. She turned to Yuuki, dour-faced.

    So what should I do?

    She was asking about the expedition into the ruins. But ruins was a misnomer. Really, it was a city that Kagali and her acquaintances knew well.

    Back when she was still the demon lord Kazalim, Kagali had constructed a defense system for a city that used the most advanced of magical techniques. That city was the so-called ancient city in question. Its name was Amrita, and unlike the surface zone protected by the system Adalmann was part of, Amrita used abination of a golem army and intricate, Kazalim-woven spells for its defense. Even Vi, the masterpiece yman crafted with the skills he inherited from Kazalim, was only slightly above averagepared to the golems guarding the ruin.

    That ruin of Amrita, a ruin with such an impervious defense system, housedin essencethe true hidden value of the Puppet Nation of Dhistav.

    Why were a bunch of ruins like Amrita guarded by such advanced defenses? To learn the answer, one has to go far back into the past.

    Long ago, a city of magic, once ruled by the elves during their heyday, fell thanks to their own foolishness. After riling the anger of a nondemon lordthe Dragon Princess Milimit was wiped off the face of the in a single night. These formed the ancient ruins that are now referred to as Soma.

    The surviving elves swore to rebuild Soma somedaybut they never did. Unable to resist the violent rage of the Chaos Dragon, the most horrid of monsters born of their own hands, they were all but forced out of their homnd. The Chaos Dragon was a Catastrophe-level threat, not as powerful as one of the natural-born True Dragons but still nothing the elves could have ever handled.

    Thus, the surviving elves scattered across thend, each taking their own path. The unlearned peasant sses,menting their sudden misfortunes, relied upon the elven leader; those with more strength and intelligence cleared out space to build their own nation. Some of them simply fled, blending into the background. Thus, thanks to only a small handful of people, the elves glory days were over.

    Now the dark elves, ursed by their own sin, set off for new and distantnds, hoping to escape Milims watchful eye. Kagalithe demon lord Kazalimwas among them, one of the few members of elven royalty to experience Milims rage and live to tell the tale. Not a demon lord yet at the time, Kazalim built a city in the region he eventually found himself in, modeled after his homnd. It was his way to leave everything elven technology produced intact before it was gone forever.

    That city was Amrita, the capital of the Puppet Nation of Dhistav.

    Kagali shook her head, driving the memories from her mind.

    Amritas defense system is still active. Could we use it to lure Rimuru into a trap?

    Based on their previous promise, Kagali would be joining him as they explored the ruins in ymans domain. If she was asked to direct Rimuru into an ambush, that would be simple for her. Besides, the only real threats in Kagalis mind were Milim and Veldora. If she caught Rimuru alone, she thought, shed be able to do away with him. She had no doubt she could activate the defense system, at least.

    But Yuuki didnt waste a moment to reply.

    That sounds like a neat idea, but you realize the demon lord Milim might be joining you, right?

    Well I think we can work something out. If its simply activating the system, I can do that withouting under suspicion.

    Kagali, or Kazalim, had already had a nation destroyed under her feet. Yuuki worried about whether that still traumatized her, but she didnt seem to pay it much mind. She had transformed from an elf to a dark elf, then to a walking dead and demon lord. Any hang-ups she had about Milim had been fully conquered in the midst of that. Did that mean Kagali thought she had a chance against her? No. It wasnt impossible so much as it was suicidal.

    All right! In that case, have at it. I doubt itll defeat him, but I was just thinking we need some data on how well Rimuru can actually fight.

    You think he can handle all that?

    Oh, no doubt. So please dont do anything that might reveal yourself, all right, Kagali? I know hes suspecting me, but right now, youre neither a friend nor a foe to him. Be careful that you dont give him any kind of information.

    I know, Boss.

    They smiled at each other.

    Great! In that case, well all go make contact with Misha.

    And Ill stay here and keep preparing. So what will you do, Boss?

    Me? Im nning to contact Damrada and expand our bases of operation in the East. That way, if something happens, I can always flee over there. But first

    Oh, so you are scheming somethin, then? Youre tellin us to lie low, but youre out pullin who knows what?

    Yuuki snickered. Nothing like that, Lace. Its just, you know, Im thinking I should y whatever cards I have in my deck. I havent given up on ruling the West, after all.

    He grinnedand then, as they sank into the darkness, the magic-born quietly began to set their ns in motion.

 Volume 10 - Ch 1

    A BRISK LABYRINTH BUSINESS

    The Tempest Founders Festival had ended in a resounding sess. Those hectic days of preparation and festivities were now a good ten days in the past.

    Our VIP visitors, as well as themon folk who visited from neighboring countries, were already gone. The same was true of Fuze and the king of Blumund; they had hurriedly made their departure, promising to discuss matters once they had returned home. Gazel, the dwarven king, had left in a simr rush to build the science-and-technology research team he was nning to send my way.

    Meanwhile, Elmesia, emperor of Thalion, was nice enough to purchase one of the lodging houses in the swankiest district in town, near our reception hall. She had a teleportation circle installed in one of its rooms, ensuring she could visit anytime she wanted. Thats the rich for you. When they buy into something, they go all the way. I still remember the superiorityden smile Elmesia gave the clearly jealous Gazelchances are hell march right back to Dwargon and have their treasury authorize the cash to purchase one of our vis.

    Maybe I should be thanking Elmesia. Even better, she agreed to continue employing our local people working there, under the same conditions. Rigurd was handling all the detailsarranging for regr cleaning, meals when Elmesia was staying, and so forth.

    Of course, next time I pay a visit, Ill do so by transferring my consciousness into a homunculus. That might prevent me from enjoying myself to the fullest, but

    Your Excellency, we cannot allow such selfishness!

    Once again, the mere fact that Elmesia left her nations boundaries sent shock waves across Thalion. Not that it was any of my business, but in Eralds eyes, it must have been unbearable. Simply mobilizing the Magus, the top-level knight forces protecting Elmesia, presented huge national-defense concerns, apparently.

    Ah, I see. Would that apply to Elen, too?

    Elen, being Eralds daughter, was elven herself, although her ears were the regr, rounded human sort.

    No, Elen can visit in person. Homunculi have their ws, after all. Spending too long in one can have adverse effects on ones own body.

    Your Excellency! Please do not reveal state secrets such as this!

    As Elmesia had let me know on the sly, Elen had been using certain potions to change her appearance and travel the world unhindered. This rmed Erald enough that he apparently assigned a small army to stay in the background and guard her unnoticed.

    By the way, it turned out that herpanions, Kabal and Gido, were both Magus members, too. Shocking, I know. So after all that whining about deploying the Magus outside the country, he assigns two of them to guard his own daughter? Eralds such an overprotective father.

    Really? But they didnt look like anything impressive to me?

    When I ran Analyze and Assess on Kabal and Gido before, they seemed unremarkable in terms of strength. But when I asked about it, Erald just frowned.

    This is also confidential, but fair enough. Their abilities are actually being restricted by the magical rings on their fingers. Their restraints are lifted only when Elen is in truly, truly mortal danger.

    That was kind of a surprise. So Thalions magical tech was a level beyond what Analyze and Assess told me? That said, my Analysis skills back then were a far cry from the uracy I enjoyed now. Maybe Id notice the concealment this time around. For that matter, maybe I should stop resting on myurels just because I analyze something once. Next time I see those guys, theyre definitely being scanned again.

    Please take good care of my daughter, then.

    Okay! See youter!

    With that, Elmesia and her crew headed back for Thalion, riding a ship pulled by a Dragon Lord for protection.

    Byparison, the demon lord Luminus had it easy. With her vast magical force, she could cast Spatial Motion as much as she wanted, so she just poofed her way back home. Apparently, shed contact meter about the musician exchange we talked about.

    Hinata, meanwhile, was still in town, watching the kids study at our church and helping out with battle training. Right now, we had no really suitable teacher for those children. Hinata had been busy keeping the peace in the Western Nations with her pdins, but now wed be helping out with that, taking over the southern portions, and that opened some time in her schedule.

    If you like, would you mind helping the kids a little? Im good with magic and everything, but Im not so hot at teaching.

    Sure. This towns been added to my list of Warp Portal destinations, so I can watch them when Im free.

    She dly epted the offer, and believe me, I was ted.

    I never had any intention of giving the children back, really. Now that I had my concerns about Yuuki, I figured itd be better to keep them away from the Kingdom of Englesia for a bit. Thats why I brought them over to Tempest, and luckily, the festival was a good excuse for that.

    Their school transfer had already been arranged, which was a blessing in disguise, since it was getting hard to provide much guidance for them in Englesias academy. Now that I had Combined them with their elemental spirits, they had grown to be pretty darn strong. They were too much for any normal teacher, and it was about time they had a real instructor watching them.

    Yuuki himself mentioned that pdins were a good match for spirits. I kind of inadvertently turned the conversation toward the spirits as we spoke, but looking back, he mustve known about my ns from the start. I think I was intending to keep that a secret

    Report. You were keeping it a secret.

    Y-yeah, I sure was.

    And my bbing it seemed to have rankled Raphael a bit.

    I mean, cmon, it was gonnae out either way. Youre focusing on that too much. No need to get too worried about it.

    Right. Sorry. I had already heard some disquieting things about Yuuki, but I blurted it out anyway. Maybe part of me really wanted to believe him. But I made him privy to things he didnt need to know about, and I regretted it now. Id need to be more careful next time.

    Thus, I would be taking responsibility for the childrens careand given the situation, Hinatas assistance was a godsend. Through the festival, the kids had really taken a shine to Hinata, and I had no problem with her taking the job. But Hinata as a teacher, huh? Maybe I should join the ss, then.

    So I was seated alongside the rest of the kids as Hinata coldly red at me.

    What are you doing here?

    Oh, you know, just observing

    Well, youre in the way. Go.

    Um, okay

    And so I was unceremoniously kicked out of school. A real shame.

    In the midst of all this, wed been all wrapped up from the festival for about a weeks time. Things were calmer on the streets again, and the townspeople now had more time on their hands.

    So I decided to perform our testunch of the Dungeon now that we had finished fine-tuning it. More than a few adventurers were excited about exploring it; we had already gotten arge number of requests, and I wasnt about to disappoint them.

    It was the start of a busier time than ever for me.

    On the first day of our Dungeons soft opening, problems erupted after only a few hours. It turned out that the challengers were a lot more inept at tackling it than I thought. This was something I predicted when we first revealed the Dungeon at the Founders Festival, hence why we lowered the difficulty level. But everyone was taking so much time advancing through the chambersmaking me realize that something needed to be done soon.

    There were no traps in the first floor. Any naturally urring monsters who might show up were ranked F at the mosttotal wimps with no real fighting skills, creatures your average viger on the street could pummel. I designed it to help people get used to thebyrinths atmosphere, so all it really contained were rooms with treasure chests and monsters guarding them. But I had already removed the traps Ramiris set up, so if you wanted to reach the next floor, you couldnt count on a handy pit trap taking you thereyou needed to make a map.

    Even with everything involved, I figured the first floor could be conquered in a day of holing up in there at the most, no matter how slow you were. But in the past three days, the number of parties that made it to Floor 2 was zip. Even Bassons team gave up after getting hopelessly lost on the first floorthey had already experienced just how big thebyrinth was, but I guess they didnt bother taking any measures against it.

    It was really just exasperating, but if anything, Basson was on the more decent side. Some of the parties were getting killed by the D-ranked monsters I had as room guardians. In fact, not somea lot. Themon theme was people lured by the treasure failing to notice the guardian creatures lining the rooms. I bet even the skeletal archers I had in there were surprised. They had all these adventurers sprinting toward the chests, giving them the chance to shoot them in the backs over and over again.

    Were talking apleteck of fundamentals. No risk management. But at least those fools were smart enough to form groups. Because just when you think youve run into the biggest idiot, another onees along to show that youre nowhere near rock bottom yet. Yes, some were even tackling the whole Dungeon solo. Thats beyond reckless and well into the realm of hopeless.

    You wouldnt encounter too many monsters on Floor 1; as mentioned, random encounters were restricted to F ranks only. But even F-ranked monsters could be a threat if you had a big enough group of them. I guess. I mean, I wasnt entirely sure about that, but to them, they were a threat.

    Seriously, if youre tackling this solo, even finding a ce to rest was a challenge. Nobody was keeping guard for you. Youd have no chance to get some shut-eye. And even an F ranker wasntpletely helpless. Some of them werent shy about attacking sleeping humans, so letting your guard down spelled death. I wondered if the solo questers had some ingenious scheme to handle this, but noI dont think they really thought it through at all. It was hopeless, and they all were whisked out of the Dungeon without anything to show for it.

    Clearly, at this rate, theyd never be able to survive the deeper levels. Floor 2 saw more random encounters in the corridors, including E-ranked monsters. By the time you make it past Floor 5, I think youd be seeing D rank, even. If theyre getting tripped up at this point, any D-ranked monster wouldve mangled them with one swipe.

    Among the more head-scratching cases were people who quit for the most pathetic of reasonsthey had no food and got hungry. Save points were located on every tenth floor, and every fifth featured a safe, monster-free zone with drinkable water. We also amply warned people to bring a decent supply of food with them. But no. The other adventurers mustve looked at the example Basson set for their own preparations, but clearly that was not enough. Adventurers tend to be proud people, I suppose, and they definitely werent into listening to instructions. A fair number of them didnt even bring any rations alongmaybe they felt safe, knowing they could be resurrected, or maybe they overestimated their own strength. I dont know, but regardless, they couldnt find their way back to the exit, so no wonder they started starving.

    Clearly, they had iting.

    And I mean, I get it. I know people want to retrieve as much as they can from the treasure chests here. But if I was seriously intent on killing my challengers in thisbyrinth, I dont think anyone would conquer it in a hundred years.

    Still, most of this first wave of customers were broke bodyguards and mercenaries looking for a quick buck, none of them with much exploration experience. No need to panic yet, I thought, as I watched things unfold for three days. But in the end, not a single party made it to Floor 5s safe zone. I could barely stand to watch.

    We made money from their admission fees, at least, so it was no loss for us. But if this keeps up, itll kill adventurers enthusiasm, and well lose any shot at repeat traffic.

    I figured we needed to reevaluate things from the ground up. This was far beyond expectations. I just wanted to bury my head in my hands.

    So I called for an emergency conference.

    This consisted of Veldora, Ramiris, Masayuki as an observer, and me; I also invited Mjllmile as the main businessman behind the Dungeon. Once everyone was present, I spoke first.

    Well, its been about three whole days since we opened thebyrinth, but I think its safe to say the results have been unsatisfactory. Or really, just crap. If we want this to be any fun at allum, I mean, if we want our user base to keeping back to thebyrinth, I think well need to give them some guidance.

    The way things were going, I wasnt sure anyone would even reach Floor 10. Everything about my ns for this ce was in stasis. My conclusion: We needed to offer at least a little bit of strategic help for our users, or wed never get anywhere.

    Indeed! Rimuru is right. At this point, Id need to wait until the end of time for anyone to reach me.

    True, true. And I want people to see all my masterpieces below Floor 50. I think people deserve some hints!

    Along those lines, Veldora and Ramiris were in agreement. Masayuki was still thinkingor really, just standing there confused. I guess he wasnt too sure why I called him here. The invite came kind of suddenly, so I couldnt me himbut he was bound to get into the swing of things soon. Ill call on him, then.

    I turned my eyes from him to Mjllmile, who looked pretty excited about getting to meet Masayuki the Hero. Maybe thats why he so eagerly spoke up once he noticed my gaze.

    May I offer my impressions? Mjllmile asked.

    Anythings wee, I said. Give me your worst.

    He nodded. You mentioned offering hints, but Id like us to approach that with a soft touch. Its still only been three days, and our challengers so far have all been from the lower ranks. Weve asked the Free Guild to invite more seasoned adventurers for us, so I think well see more rated C and above from here on.

    You think thatll work out?

    I do. I have trouble figuring out Sir Yuukis motivations sometimes, but hes always true to his word. Hes been sending magicalmunication to advertise to Free Guild offices worldwide on our behalf.

    Yeah, itd benefit the Guild, too. Anything else?

    Yes, Ive been using my own connections with other merchants. Weve been reaching out to more talented bodyguards, as well as their friends. ording to the feedback Ive received, weve had quite a good reaction so far.

    Rying the news and gauging the results were both key. I had asked Soka, leader of Team Kurayami, to work with Mjllmile and help him on those fronts. The two of them had led thebyrinth presentation together. Mjllmile was always good when dealing with people, and they had quickly broken the ice. I was d to see there was no discrimination involved there.

    Sokas team was now following Mjllmiles instructionsand actually, Soei was as well. At the moment, Soei was tracking the movements of Duke Meus and the people around him, but when that didnt upy him, he was meant to help advertise my nation a little. Now rumors of the Dungeon were spreading even to little country towns, ces not big enough for a Free Guild post.

    So you dont think itll be toote if we wait for some more talented challengers to travel here from afar?

    Exactly. Weve only just kicked this off. In my personal opinion, we shouldnt expect instant results! Better to settle down and focus on our long-term future. And once the noble ranks worldwide begin to invest in us, we can expect to see challengers ranked B and above before long.

    Mjllmile certainly sounded passionate. Masayuki gave him some appreciative nods, which made him visibly grin. He mustve been bursting to show off to the Hero.

    But he did have a point. Maybe all Veldoras and Ramirissining was making me feel a needless sense of urgency. Even Bassons band was rated B as a team. With their current equipment, the individual members would rank about a C or C-plus at best, not exactly outstanding. Once we started seeing single party members ranked B or above, I figure theyd be used tobyrinth work without too many hints. Money bought you safety in this maze, so even if we didnt walk them through every step, Im sure theyd be able to figure things out through their own experiences.

    Right. Guess theres no need to panic, then.

    Thebyrinth was generating a lot of interest. There were magic crystals, as well as other materials, to harvest from fallen monsters. A lot of people would enter thebyrinth as a way to earn a little spending money, no doubt. And the nobility was even more eager to dive in, it seemed, including some very sensible ones whod enlisted adventurers back home to go conquer the Dungeon for them. Those kinds of adventurers wouldnt let greed steer them off coursetheyd fully prepare, set up goals, and execute a n of action. Theyd be the minority, for sure, but we figured their numbers would grow in time.

    So what should we do now? Veldora asked.

    We have a front desk set up in the first floor. Maybe we could offer some guided experiences? I said.

    Experiences? What dyou mean by that?

    Ramiris wasnt the only confused-looking one.

    I mean, I exined, we could set up a training area that lets you test things out a little. Teach people about traps, have them train in battle with monsters, those kinds of things. Thats a lot more meaningful than just giving out tips, isnt it?

    Id also like to set up a gym of sorts, to help us train all the new Tempest recruits weve seentely. It was impossible to get identally killed in thebyrinth, so I think itd be pretty useful to have.

    Then a rather unexpected person offered their agreement.

    In that case, maybe you could offer some courses in conquering thebyrinth, too.

    It was Masayuki nonchntly chiming in. I looked at him, surprised.

    Oh, should I not have butted in?

    No, no, youre fine!

    Ah, well, good. This is a topic I could contribute to a little bit more, so I thought Id speak up.

    He grinned. He was adapting faster than I thought, but then again, he always was bold like that.

    What kind of sses, though?

    Would we have a big band of adventurers sit down in our meeting hall? Setting up times to give a rundown on thebyrinth seemed worthwhile.

    You know, kind of like video game tutorials.

    Tutorials? What are those?

    It sounds like a dessert. Is it good?

    Veldora and Ramiris pounced on the unfamiliar word. I assumed Veldora had the vocabry to know it, but maybe not. Languages in this world tranted pretty well in my mind, but that auto-trante function only worked if both members of a conversation had amon understanding of the topic.

    If Veldora didnt know what it was, Ramiris certainly had no chance. So Masayuki and I had to exin the concept of a game tutorial.

    I was picturing something like an obstacle course.

    Yes, like Rimuru said, I think its important you experience some of the basic moves youre expected to know before you enter thebyrinth. If we offer quick rundowns on the basics and divide it into missions, I think thatll help adventurers retain knowledge better

    Adventurers wouldnt gain much from lengthy lectures. A training ground avable to all wouldnt see a lot of use apart from the hard cores. So went Masayukis logicand why he thought a mission-based structure was a good idea. Before being admitted inside, challengers would get toplete a simple set of missions, ensuring they had the barest knowledge required to challenge thebyrinth.

    Veldora and Ramiris listened on, looking more and more convinced.

    Yes, that may just work. For my part, allowing this cavalcade of fools to tumble in and die simply bores me. Let us grant them a training area, so their skills can be at least somewhat up to snuff.

    Yeah, I think so, too! Cause if Milim saw this, shed be so angry that shed send all these challengers up into the clouds!

    They seemed all for it. And so did Mjllmile.

    And perhaps after this tutorial, we could offer them a line of Tempest-brand weapons and armor to try their hand at. And if some challengers are facing more difficulty deeper down, a set of tougher missions could perhaps be of some benefit?

    This was some really helpful feedback. In fact, maybe we could even release a guidebook. Itd help advertise the town. It could be fun to have some qualified writer tackle that task for me.

    Regardless, thisck ofbyrinth experience was killing our challengers efficiency. Lets give them at least a few instruments to work with. Otherwise, wed never find anyone capable of handling Floor 50 and below, when the difficulty really started to ramp up. Plus, for people who really wanna get serious, we could even offer a few experiences that get down to the nitty-gritty of Dungeon survival.

    Of course, the real Dungeon began at Floor 50, and at first, we nned for Hinatas Crusaders to be our main customers for those levels. For now, at least, we couldnt expect much of anything from our adventurers, so Ramiris and Veldora would need to be content having the pdins to toy with.

    Thus, we decided to renovate Floor 1 into a general training area. I also made sure to provide a separate entrance and exit for our new soldiers, in addition to the one for Dungeon challengers.

    Yes, that does sound like a good idea. Right. Ill make it this instant!

    Ramiris was ready to start work, and since we were all in agreement, I was about to wrap up the meeting. But:

    Oh, wait a second, please. Theres something else Ive noticed.

    Masayuki spoke up again, his eyes sparkling.

    So right now, the only inns and taverns are in the safe zones, right? Dont you think we ought to offer them on each floor instead? And its kind of a pain if theres no toilets or anything. If you can connect different spaces together anyway, I think itd be nice to set up a door near the stairways to each floor or something that leads to these facilities. Some adventurers arent even bringing a sleeping bag with them, so even if you charged a premium, I think youd get a lot of customers, you know?

    What?

    Is this kid a genius?!

    And toilets, huh? I no longer had any need for them, so itpletely slipped my mind. All this useful feedback was flooring me. I turned to Ramiris; she confidently nodded back.

    Yes, Masayuki! Ill take that advice, too!

    Ah, Sir Masayuki, your observational skills astound me. Such insight!

    Mm-hmm! Ill get rid of the safe zones and set up a door leading to a rest stop near each stairway!

    It was kind of like setting up a vending machine selling toilet-paper packets at high prices next to a train-station bathroom that had no paper on hand. Unfair? Yesbut extremely effective. Masayukis insight really was sensational.

    Well, I said with a smile, if you have any other thoughts in mind, dont be shy about sharing them.

    Masayuki pondered for a few moments, no doubt recalling all the video games hed yed.

    Hmm Could we maybe have a portable save point you can only use once? I was lucky enough to make it to Floor 10, but now that youve removed the trapdoors, I think its taking a lot more time to reach that point. This isnt a game to the challengers, so I think the timemitment involved is making things a lot harder as well.

    Yes Thats fair, too. I had to agree with him. The way things were, a journey to Floor 10 would take several days. With his previous idea, we had stumbled upon the notion of making money off extended stays in thebyrinth. Maybe we should think more along these lines?

    Mmm, yes, that child is on to something! I was thinking the very same thing. Humans are such fragile little creatures, so we need to offer a bit of a helping hand.

    Veldora was the first to offer agreement. And who was the very person who designed this hellscape of a dungeon for fragile little humans anyway?

    Well, I can certainly set up disposable save points! But wouldnt it be more profitable to have adventurers stay at inns?

    So implementation wasnt a problem. Man, whenever the topic turned toward money, Ramiris was sharp as a tack. I was surprised she had something useful to say.

    No, Lady Ramiris, not necessarily. We should actually price them on the high side. If they dont have any pressing business, they can always stay at an inn, but I think a lot of people would need to regrly report back to their patrons or whatever. That, and I think some people would want to carry them around as extra insurance, in case something unexpected happens in thebyrinth. It could help sell our return whistles as well.

    Mjllmile was keen on this, too. I think he sensed a business opportunity. And he was rightyou could use them in many different ways. If you were spending several days in thebyrinth at once, you may want to know whats going on outside. Plus, the idea was to attract mercenaries hired by the nobility going forward, and they may need to file regr reports with their bosses.

    And also

    In my case, mypanions beat him pretty easily for me, but the save point on the tenth floors protected by a powerful monster, right? I think a lot of people would want to use a save point before they challenge that guy.

    I nodded deeply at Masayuki. To a gamer, saving before you tackle a bossor a floor guardian, in this casewasmon sense. I recalled moments when I skipped that vital step before the final boss, only to lose several hours worth of y. Sad idents like that can beughed away because its only a game, but how frustrating would it be if that happened in real life?

    Right, I said. Thinking about it, maybe were being a little too unkind.

    Veldora and Ramiris nodded their agreement at me.

    Boy Ah, right, your name was Masayuki? The advice you provide is quite helpful, yes.

    Yeah! Im really amazed! You sure are an otherworlder, arent you? Just like Rimuru! Its gonna be great working with you, Masayuki!

    Somewhere along the line, Masayuki had been epted as a peer.

    Now, theres no need to spoil anyone past Floor 50, I dont think. But in the floors that wont entertain too many veteran adventurers, I think itd be a good idea to at least go a little easy.

    And now Masayuki was advising them as a full-fledgedbyrinth administrator. That adaptability is probably his greatest asset of all, I think, and I had no objections to his take.

    All right. So lets set up a rest stop before the stairway on each floor. When you reach it, you can pay a fee or something to gain ess to part of Floor 95.

    And well set up an inn and tavern down there?

    Right, right. Im not gonna open up the elven lounge to the general publicthats still members onlybut we could easily set up something simr for adventurers. And dont forgetwell charge a premium for it!

    Hee-hee-hee! Oh, I understand, believe me, I do.

    As a rule, prices are high in tourist sites. Theres a soda and coffee vending machine at the summit of Mount Fuji, but youre gonna be paying the equivalent of five bucks for a soda. Theres nothing like eating a cheap box lunch at the peak, but while something like thats never gonna be gourmet cuisine, if you purchase it on the mountain itself, you can bet its gonna go for four-star restaurant prices. So its a given that the facilities inside thebyrinth will be pricier than their equivalents outside.

    Now the little town we had going on Floor 95 would be more useful than ever.

    But can you really craft disposable save points like that, Ramiris?

    Absolutely no problem there! Easy-peasy! There are these things called Recording Crystals, and theyre fine for disposable use.

    The item Ramiris produced was actually quite handy. You could use it anywhere in thebyrinth, and it worked exactly like a regr save point. Add yourself to a Recording Crystal, and the next time you die, youll be able to restart from where you saved. If you use a return whistle to exit the Dungeon, the next time you go in, youll pick things up from your Recording Crystal. That held true even if the structure of thebyrinth itself changesyou wouldnt reappear in the exact same location, but youd get transported to the nearest safe ce, kind of.

    We can sell those at high prices, too, indeed.

    Well, actually, Id like to distribute those a little more widely.

    How about we mix them in with the rarer items in treasure chests?

    The discussion was humming now.

    Kwaaah-ha-ha-ha! Now I have more to look forward to!

    Oh, I wouldnt expect anything to change too quickly, but I do think well see fewer challengers give up.

    Even Veldora and Masayuki were excitedly joining in. This was working out well. We were tackling our problems, addressing them, and debating together toe up with solutions.

    Right. That was certainly a worthwhile meeting.

    Floor 1 would now house a training area to help people learn the ABCs before tackling the Dungeon, as well as a ce for general announcements. Wed provide virtual missions for visitors to try out, helping them acquire the minimum knowledge necessary to survive. They were free to undertake this trainingor not, as the case may be. Forcing the challengers into it wouldnt help much. All the risks fell on their shoulders, besides.

    We would also set things up so that you couldnt die in the first floor, either. You never know; we might get some crazy adventurer in here causing problems, and I dont want our staff in any danger. Besides, I wanted people to experience for themselves what death was like in this space. Wed made it so you were instantly revived on the spot, so maybe itd be a fun ce for kids as well.

    For the more advanced challengers, wed also prepare a room for battle training against a few different types of monsters. Wed put bracelets on the monsters we captured for the purpose, so they could be revived again and againthat way, people could learn how to fight and polish their battle skills. In addition, there was arge gymnasium-style area for the use of our nations new soldiers. Maybe, on asion, itd be fun to capture a whole bunch of monsters and stage arge-scale group battle in there.

    Things would begin in earnest starting with Floor 2. But from there until Floor 4, we got rid of all the insta-death traps and downgraded the rank of the monsters wandering the halls from E to F. The rooms would have just one D-ranked creature, and in the chests they guarded, wed toss in Low Potions and other usefulbyrinth-conquering tools. Equipment and other high-market items would begin appearing on Floor 5.

    So we worked on adjustments like these, recalibrating the Dungeons overall difficulty. That should help people advance a bit faster starting tomorrow. Video games hold closed beta sessions all the time, after all; maybeunching without a rehearsal wasnt such a great idea.

    I mean, we did do some testing, but our test party was six people from Shions Team Reborn, so the feedback we got wasnt particrly useful. They had no trouble storming all the way down to Floor 40, before we had the tempest serpent serving as that levels boss wipe them out. Thanks to that, I had the mistaken notion that thebyrinths difficulty level was just right. The traps and minion-level foes were no sweat to them as they breezed their way downward. Based on Team Reborns progress, we figured everything was okaywith a little experience, folks would be hitting Floor 50 soon, no doubt.

    We needed to select our testers a little more carefully. Shion personally trained the members of Team Reborn, and I guess theyre far more talented than I thought. But we could tackle thatter.

    So does that round out the issues? Anything else to bring up?

    I lobbed out the question, already happy enough with this discussion. Everyone had pitched in, and I figured we were done for the day, but

    Can I say something? Mjllmile asked.

    Oh? Something else?

    Yes. More to do withbyrinth administration, but

    Ah yes, something about advertising or revenues? I had my concerns about that as well. It was only day three, of course, so I wasnt expecting to rake it in yet. But Ramiriss eyes were practically shining at the mention of the topic. Its almost hrious how money-obsessed of a fairy she is.

    Ha-ha! Weve only just started making back our investment, Mjllmile said with augh, as if defending himself against her. Then his expression grew more serious. No, I wanted to report to you about our advertising. In order to attract the nobilitys attention, Ive calcted the amount of the reward purse we should offer. What do you think about a hundred gold coins?

    Oh?

    And thats gonna be paid in?

    Well use one ster gold coin, of course.

    d to see Mjllmiles reading my mind on that. I had learned from our mistakest time; I needed to get our hoard of sters changed out. And a hundred gold coins would be aboutwhat, around a hundred thousand dors?

    Thats not too little, is it?

    It was a fortune to your average peasant, but it didnt seem like enough to motivate a noble whos probably swimming in money. Sure, adventurers can pick up magic crystals and rare items along the way, but a hundred gold didnt seem quite enough for all the effort.

    But Mjllmile simply grinned at me. Hee-hee-hee! I understand your doubts. But Ive spread the word that this reward would be given to whoever can make it past Floor 50. Well award it to the first party each month to achieve the feat. Manage it solo, and you earn the entire purse; work as a party, and youll divide it up among yourselves. And thats not the only reward

    As he exined, he had also attached prize money to the boss monsters on every tenth floor.

    On Floor 10, that would be a ck spider, a B-ranked creature. The first five teams to defeat it would receive three gold coins. Floor 20 housed an evil centipede, rated B-plus, spewing Paralyzing Breath across a broad rangepretty decently strong. The first five teams to beat him got five gold.

    Down on Floor 30, we had an ogre lord, another B-plus, along with five of his henchmen. Unlike Benimaru and his kin, these were unintelligent creatures, violent and acting strictly on instinct. Their physical strength was astonishing, though, and they were capable of team warfare to some extent, so tackling them with a fully equipped party was a must. Beating them earned you ten gold, and again, wed award it to the first five winning parties.

    After that, things begin to get serious. Floor 40, as nned, housed an A-minus tempest serpent, boasting extraordinarily powerful Poisonous Breath that could instantly annihte an unsuspecting party. Even an A-ranked adventurer on Gaiyes level would have serious trouble defeating it solo. Taking the serpent down was worth twenty gold coins, awarded to the first three parties who managed it, but I doubted wed be giving out that prize too often.

    Meanwhile, on Floor 50, I was nning to have Bovix and Equix take turns serving as floor guardian. They had evolved into magic-born ranked above A, so only a small handful of fighters stood a chance. Make it past that floor, and you earned the big one-hundred-gold prizea big step up but merited given the difficulty spike.

    All right. Thats actually a pretty well-thought-out n. It oughtta make for some good advertising, too. Do you think itll help encourage the nobles topete with one another?

    Precisely, my lord. Announcing the prize winners each month will encouragepetition. And challengers can only win a prize once; they cant be awarded the same prize multiple times, so we can keep things from getting toopetitive.

    Makes sense. If you could only get it one time, there was no motivation for people to farm bosses strictly for money. This ensured the same small group of people wouldnt hog all the prizes each monthand since each award had a strict maximum, we could count them as fixed costs in our ounting.

    So do you think we can make a profit doing that?

    That will not be a problem, no. Based on preliminary calctions from the past three days, I think we could even afford to increase the prizes a little.

    Compared to our earnings, it was pocket change, but the prizes would help encouragepetition and spection among challengers without hurting our bottom line. It was a brilliant strategy. Besides, nobody was going to zoom past Floor 50 anytime soon, so I figured our payouts would be on the low side for a while toe.

    In fact, if anything, perhaps we could have Sir Masayuki beat Floor 50 and y that up in our advertising

    Huh?!

    With your mettle, Im sure its only a matter of time, Sir Masayuki.

    Aha. That Mjllmile, always looking for another angle. He seemed to have the n pretty well worked out. Lets have him keep with it.

    Ooh, I like that. Itll boost Masayukis reputation further, even as it advertises our Dungeon for us. Lets deploy that once things slow down a little, maybe.

    Thats just what I was thinking as well. How nice to see we are of the same mind, Sir Rimuru, heh-heh-heh

    Youre always sharper than me at this, deh-heh-heh

    We exchanged self-satisfied smiles.

    Um, if I could interject

    Masayuki looked like he had something to say. I pretended not to hear.

    But Mjllmile wasnt done there. In fact, he was just getting to his main topic.

    Now, Sir Rimuru, along those lines, Im thinking about a potentially evenrger project!

    He shed an evil grin, champing at the bit to reveal his news. I was starting to like that smile a lot. It was proving reliable.

    Im all ears, Mollie. Go ahead.

    I gave him a friendly smile of my own.

    As I see matters, if we really want to impress the nobility in the local area, I think we should announce that anyone who survives the bottommost floor will earn a hundred ster gold coins!

    ?!

    Oh-ho?

    What?!

    Um, how much is that in yen?

    Maybe about one billion? And with the cost of living as low as it is here, it might be worth even more.

    Pretty bold, huh, Mollie?

    Hee-hee-hee! Such a generous reward should motivate any reluctant challengers to spring into action. Theyre all bound to hire adventurers to conquer thebyrinth.

    And that means even more money would be changing hands. The more people gather somece, the more prosperous it gets. If we can drive peoples interest, potential customers who werent interested before may hop on just so theyre not left behind.

    Butbut thats a lot of money! Ramiris shouted, looking concerned. But the confident Mjllmile wasnt perturbed.

    And who was the master of thisbyrinth again?

    He gave Veldora a nce as he lodged the almost-taunting question.

    Heh-heh-heh Kwaahh-ha-ha-ha! It is I, Veldora the Storm Dragon, the very precipice of the draconic races!!

    Veldora made no attempt to hide his opinion of himself.

    Huh?! Veldora the Storm Dragon? That name sounds familiar

    Masayuki looked a bit pensive about something as Mjllmile viinously nodded.

    Yes, Im fully aware of that, Sir Veldora. And Im also fully aware that not a single soul is capable of felling you in battle.

    Of course not. Mjllmile, you are truly an intelligent man! Kwah-ha-ha-ha!

    Heh-heh-heh No, no. Im simply leveraging what Ive learned observing Sir Rimuru.

    What? Me?

    As Veldora and Mjllmile shared an echoingugh, I thought over his proposal. We were offering a hundred sters, a ridiculous amountbut that required conquering the final floor. In other words, beating Veldora. Nope. Not gonna happen. It seemed almost like a swindle to me, but it wasnt a lie, either. Besides, we still werent sure right now whether anyone would even make it to Floor 100.

    Yeah, I do think ourbyrinth is well-nigh unconquerable.

    Right, right.

    Thats bleedingly obvious.

    Precisely. Floor 50 is one thing, but the difficulty beyond that is simply unimaginable to me. We have literal dragons! Where will you find an adventurer who can y a dragon?

    Mjllmile looked a little floored. The concept even exasperated someone as bold and driven by greed as he. Ourbyrinth was well defended, to say the least.

    I doubt wed ever have to pay out those hundred sters.

    No. Thats the whole idea. This is just bait for the nobility, so I humbly believe we can be a bitvish with the figures we throw around. I understand the pdins will be trying their luck, but I do look forward to seeing the results.

    He left it unsaid, but Im sure he didnt think they could reach the bottom. I agreed with him. The money figure shocked me at first, but thinking about it with a cool head, we didnt have to worry about anyone actually iming it.

    Mollie, lets go with it. Make it happen!

    Very well, my lord.

    And try to get as many peopleing here to take the challenge as you can.

    Lets tout it up as much as possible, then! We could call it the Demon Lords Challenge!

    Would that work as advertising?

    Actually, wait a second. If I was going to keep calling myself demon lord, there was a good chance that reckless, suicidal people would keep on trying to fight me. It was a pain to deal with each and every one of themso why dont I let them take a crack at me if they conquer Floor 100, or something?

    Yeah. Lets go with that.

    In fact, tell everyone that if they beat the challenge, Ill give them an opportunity to fight me. That applies to you, too, Masayuki, so if people tell you to take me on, try to change the subject or something, okay?

    All right. Because honestly, I have no intention of fighting you at all. Thanks.

    Oh, I know. Well, Mollie, you have my official permission. Have at it!

    At once, my lord. Ill just excuse myself, then.

    Mjllmile is so dedicated to his work. Once the conversation died down, he stood up, offered each of us a quick bow, and left the room.

    We could have ended the meeting there, as we all watched him go, but Masayuki looked concerned about something. Curious, I decided to inquire.

    Whats up? Something on your mind?

    Well, about fightingI guess people think Im taking a wait-and-see approach, but I really am gonna have to do that fight sometime soon, arent I?

    Fight? Ah, the promise he made during the tournament?

    You mean against Bovix?

    Yeah After what I said in front of that huge crowd, I cant really escape it. But if I fight him, Im absolutely gonna lose

    Im sure he would. Masayukis unique skill was about as unique as they came, but it wouldnt be much help in actualbat. Although maybe it would be,e to think of it. It let him win without fighting, after all.

    But we would need to consider that Bovix battle. The crowd truly believed Masayuki could win, and so did Mjllmile for that matter. Masayuki wasnt shy about ying himself up in the arena, either. It was toote to say never mind.

    Maybe you could train with our kids while Hinata is here?

    That sort of thing would kill me! All I want is to live in peace, you know?

    He smiled briskly as he stated that rather sad fact. I thought at one point that he needed someone to teach him a lesson, but as a kid who came from Japan at the most peaceful point in its history, of course he wasnt gonna be this belligerent wild man. Im not unlike him, if you think about it.

    Well, I cant have you lose either way, so let me think about that a little.

    Will you? Thanks, Rimuru!

    Sure. Just give me a hand when I need it, okay?

    Of course!

    Masayuki was being cooperative, and his reputation was helping me out a lot right now. If Bovix beat him, I stood to lose a great deal. It was a thorny problem, but wed have to do something about it. I could try to reason with Bovix, but that didnt seem fair to me. Ill work on it.

    We chatted for a little while longer before I wrapped up this emergency meeting. The adjustments to thebyrinth werepleted before the end of the day.

    So we excitedly continued our watch over the Dungeon.

    Personally, thanks to the things Masayuki pointed out, I felt like thebyrinth had gotten a lot easier. But considering Mjllmiles warnings, I didnt think it had gotten too easy or anything. How would people react?

    First off, of course, there were always idiots who didnt bother listening to the instructions. They just breezed right along, ignoring the missionspletely. They didnt get far into the ensuing floors, of course, but they just kept on trying, nheless. What drove them to do that? Their employers? Their pride? No, the answer was nothing so noble. They had a more calcting reason than that.

    When we debuted thebyrinth, the Rare-level sword that Bassons party grabbed from a treasure chest was apparently a truly excellent piece in their mind. I guess they saw it in a much different way from me.

    Rare, in this world, referred to superior magisteel-forged gear that had evolved to exhibit unique capabilities. The magisteel our nation produced was made by taking the magic ore from our high orcs in the mountains and exposing Veldoras magicules to it. Simply storing it inside thebyrinth made the process happen by itself. This gave us an easy supply of high-quality steel, and we could liberally use it in our own weapons and armor.

    Unlike the gear circting around the Western Nations, we could craft items made out of nothing but pure magisteel. The difference came down to the materials themselves, so even the swords distributed to our regr forces could be ssified as Special in make, several times better than the equipment mostbyrinth challengers ran around in. Kurobes workshop apprentices handled equipment production for our army, a good dozen of them or so by this point, hammering away daily under Kurobes careful instructionand even their gear was equivalent to Special, a level above the Normal stuff sold across the Western Nations.

    Now their goods were being ced into our treasure chests. The production failures were disposed of, and things deemed worthy of actual use were brought into thebyrinth. We had a wide range of quality in this gear, and some of it really was excellent. Basson had gotten his hands on something that only barely qualified as Rare. You usually had a hundred-to-one chance at one of those, and as odds went, maybe it was an enticing offer for a lot of people.

    By the way, even items from Kurobes workshop dismissed as failures could be appraised at the Rare level. They may look like quality pieces on the surface, but if Kurobe called it a failure, it was a failure. Theres a clear difference, hed tell me.

    So I looked into this a bit more, and it led to a discovery. Even with gear in the same ss, there can be individual differences in capabilitiessomething Kurobe had picked up on and used to craft his definitions of sess and failure.

    I decided topare two Rare-level swords, one from Kurobe and one from an apprentice. The difference was obvious, something I noticed only because my Analyze and Assess skills had improved. If Kurobe hadnt pointed it out, Im not sure I wouldve picked up on it.

    Different how? Let me give an example. Lets say I made a copy of one of Kurobes works. The results, of course, would be in the same ssbut like I said before, I cantpletely copy all its capabilities. They may look the same, but what I produce is still an inferior copy. Thats the difference.

    Maybe this happens because I dont have the cksmithing skills of Kurobe. But what I can say here is that even weaponse in different levels. Maybe a weapon seller would never notice, to say nothing of an amateur, but I feel like I can tell the difference between these levels now.

    To someone who stakes their life on these weapons, differences in capability are important.

    In this world, you never knew when monsters might attack you. High-quality weapons and armor were a kind of lifeline. Kurobes presentation during the Founders Festival mustve generated a lot of buzz, enough to create a deluge of requests for the goods wed exhibited. We were still considering how to handle that, but the n was to make a decision after investigating the market more.

    The Rare equipment dropped by the boss on Floor 10 was the best that Kurobes apprentices could produce right now. They were inferior to Kurobes own work but still on the upper end of whats generally avable worldwide. Adventurers naturally want quality, of course, and I could see why Basson was so delighted. Even Normal weapons, after all, could fetch over ten times the usual price if they were good quality. Once you got into the Special realm, that was more like fifty times. Rare? Obtaining one was a matter of luck more than anything. There werent many around to find, and realistically speaking, money cant buy them.

    So it made sense that people were moring to enter thebyrinth. And Basson and his gang were even advertising for me at the tavernsHeh-heh! Look at this, all of you! A sword just as wonderfully powerful as I am! and so on. The fact that the Floor 10 boss dropped Rare gear spread like wildfire among the challengers, then the merchants, and then around the Free Guilds of every nation. In an instant, people hoping to strike it rich were beating a path to ourbyrinthand thats what led to where we are now.

    I do have to thank Bassons band for all the free advertising, but you cant just run in and grab Rare equipment like its a trip to the convenience store.

    Thus, the people who refused to take our guidance began tog behind those whopleted our missions before tackling thebyrinth. If you had a little intelligence, youd know it pays to listen to our instructions, after and as more people seriously took up the missions, training on the first floor began in earnest. Now we had challengers taking what theyd learned and fully preparing with it, helping our own budget with the equipment they purchased near the front desk.

    Then, a few days after we rebnced the Dungeon, we began to see parties reach the fifth floor. Floor 2 was vast but simple, and the traps up to Floor 4 were more like jump scares than anything really malicious. So long as you kept an urate map, making it to Floor 5 was actually pretty easy. This seemed eptable to me.

    Floor 5 downward was more of a test of ability. The traps got more hazardous, and monsters ranked D and above made their debutbut the treasure chests also held more valuable items. I wanted our customers to really pound those floors, doing their best to conquer thembut s, it really was a challenge for most.

    To put it simply, fatigue began to be an issue. Keeping a constant watch for monsters is an easy way to mentally exhaust yourself, I suppose. Many people retreated back to thest stairway to take advantage of our rest space; the inn on Floor 95 was doing fabulous business, so that much worked out as nned.

    Around when our challengers began to strike a presence between Floors 5 and 8, we started to see adventurers arrive from the worlds Free Guilds, following the rumors. Some of them were seasoned adventurers bearing contracts from noble sponsors, and before long, the whole town was getting busier. With this second wave livening up the old guard, the race to conquer the floors grew fricand with these serious contenders, we also began to see people try to cheat their way to glory.

    Yes, people decided to sell maps of thebyrinth in broad daylight. A lot of people (myself included) had no sense of direction, and in abyrinth, all the strength in the world couldnt help if you kept getting lost. So I could understand the demandbut I really wished people would have formed parties and assigned mapmaking duties to members instead.

    So following an announcement posted in and out of thebyrinth, we began to change its inner structure. The challengers were livid, of course, and we got lots ofintsbut Im a demon lord. Im not beholden to them. I needed to show them early on that maps were meaningless unless you made your own. If anything, I was being kind to themif they didnt make their own, theyd find it impossible to adapt if a change to thebyrinth rendered their maps useless. Call it tough love.

    As a rule, we changed thebyrinthyouts once every two or three days. Completing a single floor took at least a few hours; theres no way youd reach the save point on Floor 10 in one go. Thanks to that, theyout changes were a pretty big sess. The challengers gave up on selling and buying maps, instead taking a more serious approach to thebyrinth. It seemed like some people plunged in right after ayout change to whip up a map to sell anyway, but I decided to let that slide.

    We were pretty happy about the anti-cheating measures. But we sure couldnt let our guard down. The Free Guild adventurers mayve gotten ate start at thebyrinth, but some of them wielded Automap, the elemental magic spell that gave them a skillful advantage in exploration.

    Free Guild members really were in a ss of their own. They were used to fighting monsters, so they were battle-honed and ready forbat. They also knew how to divide tasks among their party members, which I appreciated. Bassons party was all about fighting, but now we saw groups with each member picked to carry out a particr rolefighters to handle the monsters, explorers to handle traps and mazes, and gatherers with a wealth of knowledge to tap. Bnce was the watchword with these parties, and it really struck me how adaptable they all were.

    So the adventurers quicklypleted the training missions and dived into the Dungeon. Those with ruin-exploration experience were masters at trap removal. They didnt sprint for every treasure chest they saw. Compared to the bodyguards and mercenaries we saw first, they were quite carefuldemonstrating an even more professional performance than I imagined. Seeing them execute such a clear understanding of the rules, I started to think we shouldnt have reined in the Dungeon after all.

    So just a few days after the second wave arrived, someone managed to beat Floor 10. Now the challengers were really on a rolllearning from their predecessors mistakes, painstakingly devising countermeasures, and starting to make real, constant headway. And once someone figured out how to handle this trick or that monster, word spread fast about it. People started to imitate the winning form. I bet people were selling their advice, too. No stopping them, I suppose. If maps were a nonstarter, I suppose informationes next. I really had to hand it to themand really, the more enthusiastic everyone was, the better.

    And the town was starting to see the challengers progress as a kind of spectator sport to enjoy over drinks. The shops, the inns, the tavernsrumors spread everywhere, packed with tales that delighted and thrilled.

    Among them came word about one party appearing out of nowhere to ze down thebyrinth at a previously unheard-of speed, a stout and well-bnced group of ten. The first thing they did was add themselves to the save point on Floor 10. One of them joined a party who had already made it that far down; he then put his info in the save point, used a return whistle to go back to the entrance, and then headed down with his own party.

    I was anticipating this and had no issue with it, but the speed they proceeded at astounded me. In just three days or so, they had defeated the boss monster on Floor 20. They had talent, no doubteach one ranked around a B individually, but maybe B-plus as a group. All ten of them showed great teamwork, too, so in terms of real strength, I bet they could earn an A-minus.

    But if theyre going this fast, there had to be some kind of trick behind it. I mean, they kept on selecting the shortest routes through each floor, every time

    Understood. Elemental interference detected. An elementalist is utilizing Elemental Communication.

    Oh, that?

    An elementalist is a magician capable of harnessing the power of elemental spirits. One of the tricks up their sleeve is Elemental Communication, allowing them to listen to the words of those elemental spirits. If they can talk to wind and earth elementals on a deep enough level, it seems, those spirits will guide them down the correct path to the stairsand since an elementalist could tap that, a twisty maze of passages was no sweat to them.

    Those dirty, dirty elementalists! But sadly, this was fully within the rules. After all, theres no guarantee the spirit you tap into will always give you the correct path. Besides, there were precious few elementalists in the world, so I didnt even consider that kind of workaround. As far as I was concerned, this was a perfectly valid approach, one I shouldnt bother trying to counteract. If anything, I should praise them foring up with it.

    The partys rapid advance continued anon. Part of our procedure was that whenever a party conquered a new floor, it was announced across town; thanks to that, the party members quickly became household names. The crack team of explorers were collectively called Green Fury, their mystery elementalist serving as leader, and before long, they were rapidly approaching Masayukis Team Lightspeed in poprity.

    Just as we hoped, thebyrinth was now hosting serious talent. No doubt wed see more young challengers visit town with dreams of fortune and glory. Thebyrinthcurrently enjoying a steadily growing audience of challengershad be a well-oiled machine.

    We took this opportunity to gather again. It had been ten days since we reorganized thebyrinth, so I wanted us to confer and talk about any problems that hade up. Unlike before, everything was going great, so the mood was lightheartednatural smiles all around.

    Ah yes, Masayuki, was it? I always thought you had potential, but now I see you are a mighty man indeed! Veldora seemed very chipper today, and the moment we were all together, he was heaping Masayuki with praise.

    Oh, you think so? Um, thanks Masayuki didnt seem sure how to respond.

    He looked at me, as if to ask who is this guy? I did introduce them to each otherst time, but Masayuki was kind of nervous back then. I could see it if he didnt remember him.

    I think I introduced you before, but

    N-no, um, people just started talking and stuff, so

    Oh, did we?

    Understood. As the subject Masayuki Honjo stated, no introductions were made.

    Oh. Guess my memory was pretty hazy, too. Cant me Masayuki then, I thought.

    Ah well, let me do that now. This is Veldora, a good friend of mine. Hes serving as the master of thebyrinths hundredth floor.

    Indeed, tis I, Veldora, and I dly ept you as one of us, Masayuki. Wee!

    To Veldora, Masayuki was part of the club already. He shed him a friendly smile. Then Masayukis face visibly whitened.

    Ummm By Veldora, do you mean the Catastrophe that killed the entire army of Farmus?

    Oh, right, that was the rumor we spread around. I dont mind telling Masayuki the truth, but its kind of a long story and theres no pressing reason to. Lets just go with this.

    Yeahhh, hes kind of a big shot, so try not to rile him, okay?

    Kwah-ha-ha-ha! Oh, but I am a generous soul indeed, so it takes a great deal to anger me! And if you provide me with sweet treats to eat, I would not hesitate to offer you my protection!

    There he goes again. I rolled up my notepapers and swatted him with them. Punishmentplete. Discipline, you know; its important.

    It must have surprised our local dragon, because he shouted What are you doing?! and so on for a bit, but I still had Ramiris to introduce.

    And this is Ramiris, a fairy and someone you could call the ruler of thebyrinth.

    Masayuki had been muttering things like So I wasnt imagining it In the midst of this, but my voice helped him regain hisposure. His eyes turned to Ramiris, pping in the air.

    Oh Youre a fairy, Ramiris? And you built that entire amazingbyrinth? Thats really great.

    Thepliments were more than enough to get Ramiris going as well. Whoa! Hey, I like you! In fact, Ill dly name you my underling. And Rimuru! Did you hear that? He said that Im really great!!

    She was kicking the air in my direction, visibly excited as she bragged. God,y off. If I yed along, shed only get worse. Ignoring the dropkicks she applied to me, I tried to move things forward.

    Yeah, yeah, congrats, I replied. If Masayuki wants to be your underling, have at it, I guess.

    A Hero serving as a henchman for a demon lord. Whatever. But this must be hopelessly confusing Masayuki, right?

    Uh Who is Ramiris, exactly?

    She may not look it, I said, matching Masayukis quiet whisper, but shes a demon lord just like me.

    Wha?! he eximed, frozen as the beaming Ramiris approached him. Our voices were hushed, but not enough for her sharp ears, I guess.

    Heyaaa! Thats me, Ramiris of the Octagram! Good to be officially acquainted, Masayuki!!

    H-huh? Ramiris Youre a demon lord? And Veldoras a dragon W-wow. Really?

    Masayuki

    The thought of dealing with a demon lord and Storm Dragon all this time dazed him. I guess I should have exined things fully before making the introduction. Thats on mebut Masayuki had to take some of the me here. Hes the one who acted all cool and collected at ourst meeting. Thats why I assumed he knew them already. It was his nerves of steel that allowed him to keep hisposure. I didnt realize he was clueless this whole time

    They say ignorance is a sin, but sometimes its your greatest asset. Masayuki had been epted by a dragon and demon lord, and he never even realized it. Once again, I couldnt help but marvel at his luck.

    It was Mjllmile who finally threw Masayuki a life preserver.

    Lady Ramiris, please, none of that. Why, Sir Masayuki would hardly even know how to respond, would he?

    Since he was such a fan of Masayuki, I suppose Mjllmile assumed that conversation was a jokeRamiris making unreasonable demands, and the kind Hero unsure how to react. I figured Masayukis response wouldve disillusioned him, but I guess thats the Heros skill at work.

    Or maybe not. Somehow, it seemed like Mjllmile really believed in Masayuki from the heart. Seeing it, or maybe even feeling it, Masayuki smiled.

    This is Mjllmile, my trusted adviser and the head of Tempests financial department. Kind of our minister of finance, I suppose.

    A pleasure to meet you again, Sir Masayuki.

    Ha-ha-ha! Thats kind of you, Mjllmile.

    Oh, no, Im just an upstart from the underground

    Well, as you said, Im afraid I cant join with you right now, Ramiris. Ive already promised Mikamium, I mean, Rimuru that Id give him my support.

    Masayuki lightly bowed at Ramiris.

    Ill bet, Mjllmile said. Sir Rimuru does have a way of taking advantage of people!

    What had I ever done? And Ramiris was ready to join him.

    Well, if thats how it is, so be it! Youre so cunning, you know that, Rimuru?

    Hey, I nonchntly replied, firste, first served.

    Then Veldora started bragging for some reason.

    Kwah-ha-ha-ha! You wont find many people as dependable as Rimuru. Ramiris, I think youll have to give up on ever getting ahead of him. But lets hear from Masayuki now! We need to proceed!

    I had my qualms about what everyone here thought about me, butah yeswe were still making introductions. It seemed kind of moot, though. Everyone already knew his name.

    All right. Masayuki, you go ahead.

    Okay, he said with a nod. I think some of you are aware by now, but my name is Masayuki. Ie from the same world as Rimuru, and now were working together. People call me a Hero, but please dont let that cloud your judgment.

    He gave his introduction facing all the others, back straight. I felt like he wanted to tell them he called himself a Hero just as a joke, but with Mjllmile looking straight at him, I suppose he opted against that.

    Highly adaptable as always, he was already back to his usualposed self. Defiant, you could say. They may have metst time, but he was capable of being all smiles with Veldora and Ramiris, which took guts. He really was someone special. Maybe it wasnt his unique skill Chosen One having its effect on the people around himmaybe a lot of it was just his own personality. I didnt think there was any way he could wield this much influence with a unique skill alone.

    That, I thought as we wrapped up the introductions, we could try verifyingter on.

    We were all seated. Ourst meeting was something of an emergency confab, but this time, things were less urgent. We were all at ease.

    I have to say, Masayuki, you sure are something. We owe all our sess to you! Ramiris started excitedly shouting the moment she was seated.

    Lets not forget, Veldora added, Mjllmile has done much for us, too. As you said, perhaps we were right not to simplify the Dungeon too much!

    I agreed with them both. Putting our minds together like this was what provided sess, no doubt about it.

    Oh, Im just d I could help.

    Yes, and I hardly did anything myself. None of this would be possible without all of your powers!

    After that round of pleasantries, we discussed the state of thebyrinth.

    Sales were going greatreally great. It made Mjllmileugh, although all the work made him cry. Plus, the people visiting town were staying in our inns, enabling the innkeepers and the nearby taverns to run a booming business.

    Here is my report, Mjllmile said as he took out some papers. Veldora and Ramiris seemed interested as well, so I made some copies and passed them around. I figured Id quickly skim over it to see if there were any problems at hand, leaving the detailed number crunching to Raphael.

    Right. Lets see what we have here. Its times like these that Im d I can go into human form. I could read through papers as a slime, of course, but for office work, being human was far more convenient.

    ording to the data on the report, things had gone smoothly with ourbyrinth since our adjustments.

    Looks like our advertising worked well.

    Oh yes! Were astonishingly busy every day, he said, eagerly nodding.

    Veldora and Ramiris looked at the report, whether they could understand it or not. For the most part, it was a ledger of our most recent statistics, but there were a few special topics covered as well.

    One of these was the Adventurer Cardsthe Guild membership IDs that could be used as admission into thebyrinth now that Mjllmile had received Yuukis approval to do so. These cards were magic in nature, keeping track of the bearers vital signs and retaining that data in a record, which was quite convenient. They allowed for seamlessbyrinth entry, just like how youd use it at your Free Guild post, so it was easy for adventurers to get to grips with. Hardly any bodyguards or mercenaries werent Guild members, either, so the implementation went pretty smoothly.

    For the moment, thebyrinths admission fee was three silver coins a go. The cards were manufactured by the Free Guild, saving us from production hassles. Our own nation provided basic cards as well, at the cost of ten silverand while most challengers were Guild members, we asionally sold these cards to people, too. Between all of that, we were raking in a lot of money just from admission alone.

    The report also contained details on the three Ramiris-produced items in thebyrinth. Your first Resurrection Bracelet cost nothinga freebie so you could see how useful they were. After that, you had to pay for them; but at just two silver coins, they were quite reasonableespecially considering they not only resurrected you but also healed any of the wounds you incurred that led to your death. After debating it for a while, we decided to keep the price low as a service to our audience. (By the way, we had a warning announcement y if you reentered thebyrinth without wearing your Resurrection Bracelet. If you got yourself killed in there, thats none of my business, but itd still leave a bad aftertaste in my mouth if that happened.)

    To make them easier to buy, the bracelets were sold right next to the front desk, where we had the dead resurrected. Between that and being a pretty indispensable item, they were selling like hotcakes, definitely the most popr out of the Dungeons three items.

    Return whistles, meanwhile, allowed a single person to instantly zoom back to the surface, a godsend if you got lost. This was insurance for a lot of parties, so it was priced on the high sidethirty silver per whistle. People tried to cheap out on these and just rely on Resurrection Bracelets instead, but I wouldnt exactly call that smart. Yes, you would be whisked back to the entrance that way, but you could lose your equipment and stuff as well. Youd keep whatever armor you had on, but anything that slipped out of your hands at the time of death was gone for good. Nobodys literally carrying booty while in a fight, of course; youd probably drop it in the corridor for the time being. Losing that stuff could make for a pretty hefty penalty. Few people would take that risk just to get back to the entrance, so there was a pretty decent demand for whistles.

    Finally, Recording Crystals werent selling as well as we hoped, but we did see some clients purchase them inrge quantities. At one gold coin a popclose to a thousand dorsthey were luxury goods, no doubt. And why not? They let you basically turn back time whenever, and wherever, you wanted. And since a lot of people would be focusing strictly on the bosses, letting them go for cheap seemed kind of dangerous for us, so we priced them sky-high instead.

    Still, I thought there was a demand for them. In the deeper levels, the difficulty really ramped up from floor to floor; the save points on every tenth floor could very well seem like a trip across the continent. Thus, I figured itd be a while before we profited from them, but even in these shallower levels, some people were still using them.

    We were also experimenting with renting weapons and armor out to people, but that hadnt turned a profit yet. These were Kurobe-crafted goods, pretty decent quality, and since many people rented them after dying and losing their main weapon, the feedback from them was excellent. With the right word of mouth, I think we could see demand rise soon.

    So by andrge, things were going wellbut just because we were seeding now didnt mean we could let our guard down. Right now, we needed to be more prudent than ever before.

    The party at the forefront of the Dungeon was continuing to do well, going deeper and deeper without anyone dropping out. They were drumming up enthusiasm among the other challengers, too, people who kepting back after messing up. That improved our sales, a cycle we needed to keep going. If we can convince people that its worthing back again and again, then even our initial goal of at least a thousand admissions per day seemed surprisingly attainable.

    So, looking at Mollies report, Id say were a pretty resounding sess right now. But we cant rest on oururels. If youve noticed anything, dont be afraid to speak up.

    I wanted everyone to be at attention as I got the ball rolling. Ramiris was the first to react.

    Me!

    All right. Ramiris?

    You know the elementalist using Elemental Communication? Boy, I sure never thought about relying on the spirits for info like that! But I can interfere with that, if you want. What do you think?

    Interfere, huh?

    I did want to put some obstacles in their way, but it seemed kind of like a coward move to me. The approach this party took waspletely orthodox, so getting all evil with them felt like wed be going against the spirit of the rules. This isnt a war, or apetition or the like.

    But its not like the spirits are being forced into it, are they?

    No. If theyre providing that much support, clearly the elementalist must have a great rtionship with them.

    Better not interfere, then. Im not into that kind of thing.

    Roger! I figured youd say that, Rimuru.

    Ramiris was quick to back down. I suppose she wasnt much for it but thought it best to bring it up anyway.

    No, it is not good to lie. But, Ramiris, why not create an elemental-free zone? That Elemental Communication; it works by listening to the smaller spirits thatve taken root in the area, no? And it cant work if the spirits arent there, yes?

    Oops. Thats some surprising stuffing from Veldora. Hes normally so useless to me, but sometimes even he says something intelligent.

    Rimuru, why do you look so surprised?

    And hes sharp, too.

    Oh, no, Im just impressed as always with you, Veldora, I said, a little shaken. Thats a really good opinion!

    Yes, is it not? My vast expertise has saved the day once more! Kwaaaah-ha-ha-ha!

    Good thing hes so gullible.

    Well, Ramiris?

    Sure, I can do that! Ill just ask the spirits to relocate for me. Without any conscious spirits in the vicinity, Elemental Communication cant do anything at all!

    I guess that could work. Maybe, thanks to Veldoras proposal, we could do something about elementalists after all.

    Great. Lets do that. See, this is exactly why I think brainstorming like this is a great idea.

    Yes, quite so. You see, my vast wisdom is

    Okay, next. Anyone have any other observations?

    I couldnt let Veldora get further carried away. Time to move on. It wound up being Masayuki who spoke next.

    Do you think defeated monsters could drop items for the explorers?

    Monsters leaving items behinmon in video games but kind of enigmatic from a real-life perspective. And our monsters already left crafting material and magic crystals. Wasnt that enough?

    Why do we need to do that? Veldora asked.

    Masayukis answer was simple. Huh? Well, I mean, healing potions are, like, surprisingly expensive. High-ranked adventurers use em all the time because they can afford to shell out for them, but most people would rather run away from a battle than risk getting hurt. That, and if you die in thebyrinth, youre resurrected without any of your injuries, so a lot of people just nope out of there instead of using any of their potions. So Im just thinking, why not have monsters drop Low Potions or something when killed, so that everybody has ess to them?

    Hmm It was a valid point. Our nations potions served as advertising, and their usefulness to us was starting to expandbut they didnte very cheap, no. In fact, sales were starting to stagnate a bit because of the price. Within Tempest, Low Potions cost four silver coins; High Potions were thirty-five, and Full Potions, while not offered for direct sale, would probably need to be priced at over five hundred silver, or five gold coins, if we did offer them. Meanwhile, the cheapest inn in our city cost three silver a night without meals and five with a bath and dinner. A nicer room, used by passing merchants and the like, averaged around ten silver plus meals.

    On the other hand, a D-ranked adventurer earned, on average, about fifteen silver coins after a day of work in thebyrinthmaybe twenty, if they worked in a party for more efficiency. That was good, for now; enough to live day by day on, but not enough to prepare for any kind of emergency. The treatment theyd need if they were sick or badly hurtor any kind of social safety, reallywould be out of the question. Plus, they needed to maintain their weapons, buying new ones if they broke and saving up for better-quality goods.

    In short, low-ranked monster hunters lived a hardscrabble life. If they wanted a better one, their only choice was to polish their skills. And in a life like that, four silver coins was a painful investment to make. They need to put money aside for admission, of course, and I sure get it if a potion just isnt in the budget for themand yeah, I know theyre gunning for a treasure chest with a major find inside, but its not like whatever they discover will make them filthy rich.

    Thatsmon in games, yeah. I understand what you mean, Masayuki, butthe monsters are naturally generated within thebyrinth, so I think itll be hard to have them carry items

    Itd be a mistake to excessively spoil our visitors, giving them something they didnt ask for in the first ce. Id like to do something to help, but I think they need to be able to support themselves first. Thats what the Free Guild is there to assist with. From our nations perspective, we cant really provide welfare to people who dont even live here. Its not exactly pretty, but you need to be strong to survive

    I think we can do that, Ramiris casuallymented, just as I was mentally throwing in the towel.

    Really?

    Sure. Just have them swallow the item right after theyre born!

    If that was possible, it opened up a few possibilities. Maybe we could popte the treasure chests with more useful items and let the monsters drop the junkier stuff for explorers. Junk or not, itd still be a source of ie for the lower ranksand going forward, Id like those lower ranks to have something to live on. In a perfect world, people are rewarded for their efforts, and I wanted to make that happen as much as possible.

    Well, no problem, then. If itll help people gain more of an ie beating monsters, I bet itll make them try even harder for us.

    And itd have the side effect of boosting the trade-in monster-derived materials, as well as providing another attraction for our nation. And once we have some more money to work with, we can divert some of that into welfare programs. I dont know how much we can do about illness, but serious injury? We could assist with it. If Japan can have universal health care, its not a dream for Tempest to have something like it. A system like this is something well want to implement at an early stage in our nations development, lest people call it unfair. If possible, Id like to see that happen sooner thanter.

    The problem is to figure out who, exactly, well call citizens of Tempest. Labyrinth runners, passing merchants, and people like that arent, naturally. Maybe now is the time to register all our citizens and make the ownership of rights clearer to everyone. Tempest is a developing country right now, so we wee any and all immigrants, but once our nation matures, there might be movements to ostracize noncitizens from our borders. A nation is, in a way, arge cooperative entitynobody can live alone, so we formmunities to help one another survive. We dont need parasitestching on to our nation, and I didnt want to embrace anyone who didnt have a sense of belonging here. Its hard, after all, for people with different thoughts and principles to coexist in the samemunity.

    Basically, if a citizen belongs to a nation, they have a duty to work for the sake of it. In turn, they can receive certain services from that nation. That being said, people have the right to not belong to any nation, free of civic duty and retaining full, unfettered freedom. If you want to be part of Tempest,e on in; if not, youre still a wee guest, but I cant provide you all the services a citizen would receive. Well need to define the difference soon, and I think Rigurd and I need to have some detailed discussions about this.

    See? I can think about serious stuff sometimes, too.

    You think so? In that case, maybe we could mix in some unfamiliar potionsor weapons and armor whose capabilities are unknown? Like, so you wont be able to determine if theyre high value when you find them?

    Oh, right. We were still in a conference. I hurriedly considered Masayukis suggestion. Hmm. I think I see what hes getting at.

    Ah, like, un-appraised tools and equipment that you cant use until you get them appraised at the entrance?

    Yeah, yeah! I mean, I guess you cant really drink a potion if you dont know its effect.

    Oh, maybe some people would. And if we mix in some poison sks, thatd be anotherbyrinth trap for us. Itd help warn people about making item appraisal a habit, too. Lets go with that.

    Cursed equipment might be tough, but magic weaponry would be pretty neat. Like, you think something is a piece of junk but appraise it to reveal its true colors.

    Thats good! You cant throw away junk then, and youll also need to exit thebyrinth to have it appraised.

    Masayuki and I, with our video game knowledge, were getting excited over this. The idea of actually implementing it was thrilling, and Ramiris and Veldora, overhearing us, seemed to be getting into it.

    If you want to hide the true nature of something, my illusory magic ought toe in handy!

    Kwah-ha-ha-ha! Ah, how lovely it is to see challengers jump for joy, only to be agonized by doomter. Now things will be even more exciting!

    Yep. Definitely into it.

    Hmm Yes, and since junk equipment will take up valuable space, people will want to sell it in town in short order. That ought to boost return whistle sales!

    And now heres Mjllmile with some more reality-based feedback. And he was right. Anyone would hesitate to toss out un-appraised weapons and armor. nting that thought in peoples minds would make those people camping out in thebyrinth in search of big finds reconsider their strategy. And since were charging admission, the more people going out and in, the more profit we make.

    Plus, we wouldnt be the only ones having fun here. Theres something attractive about the term un-appraised. Your heart cant help but race as you wait for the appraisal resultsreal pulse-pounding excitement. Something you thought was junk transforms into treasure before your eyesand even if it turns out to be junk after all, youll still treat it as your own. We dont need to have a ton of jackpot items like that, but along those lines, I think we could certainly mix in some more Low Potions and the like. Thatll help support the lower-ranked customers, although well have to fine-tune the ratios of trash to treasure.

    All right. Well, its about time we get to work.

    Time to push a system update, huh? Masayuki replied.

    Given that we came up with all that only just now, its about time wasnt too appropriate. But ourst system update went just fine.

    Sounds good to me! Ramiris nodded, as if she knew what we were talking about. I shed her a quizzical look, and she quickly averted her eyes. I suppose that little sneak was just trying to ride along on the wave. Mjllmile looked confused, and Veldora was back to his usual shrillughing, but I didnt mind. Masayuki and I looked at each other and nodded.

    The following evening arrived.

    My days were now full of serious work. They were usually spent inspecting projects around townno, it wasnt just a leisurely walk, I promiseand each night, Id receive reports in my personal office. Rigurd was handling a lot of my affairs, but a fair number of them still required my personal approval, so I had an office set up in our government building for that.

    Sir Rimuru, Shion said as she handed me a sheaf of papers, heres your report from Sir Mjllmile. She was a hard workeralmost like a real secretary. Kind of surprising.

    Yes, thank you, I said, trying to sound all haughty as I epted the report. Mjllmile was already getting started on what we discussed at yesterdays meeting.

    Everythings going well, I muttered.

    I am delighted to hear, Diablo said, nodding.

    In hardly any time t, our tavern sales are up ten percent. I guess it benefits all our citizens if the low-ranked adventurers have more money to work with.

    Indeed. Its just as you read it, Sir Rimuru.

    Diablo nodded again as he gently poured some tea for me. Its not at all like I had read it, actually, but it was pretty much what I hoped for. I couldnt be happier. Diablo was overvaluing me, like he always did, but it didnt bother me this time.

    I took a sip. Huh? This tastes different. Did you change the leaves?

    Did you not like it?

    N-no, its good, but

    It wasnt displeasing at allmaybe just a tad stronger on the bitterness than usual.

    I-Ill rece it at once! an apparently panic-stricken Diablo said. But he really didnt need to. It was just fine; no problems to speak of.

    Its just that Shuna always brings her A game when ites to preparing teaWait a minute

    Hey, is this?

    Yes, your chief secretary insisted on preparing it herself. I tasted it to ensure it wasnt poisonous.

    Um, okay?

    Thats a surprise, seeing Shion prepare tea this good. The even greater surprise, though, was Diablo actually cooperating with her.

    I never thought youd go with Shion on that.

    Poison doesnt work on me anyway, so I assume Diablo was simply taste testing it, but that made it even more of a surprise.

    I had no other choice, he replied with a smile. Sir Benimaru was balking at being her taster every day. It was my first experience ever feeling ill, a chance Im d to have had.

    I really dont think thats a necessary experiencebut this time, I definitely needed to thank him. Shion looked really happy, after all.

    Shes really grown, huh? Once upon a time, her home-cooked cuisine was more hazardous to your health than the deadliest of poisons, but now here she is getting tea just right. No magic or skills or anything! Her violin performance during the festival was another surpriseIm being wowed all the timetely. It truly felt like an emotional moment to me.

    Diablothank you.

    No, no

    And Shion? Well done. You did great!

    Y-yes! Thank you very much!!

    Next time, I think Ill have Shion pour my refills. It was a little overly bitter, but I was happy.

    Then I recalled that I had never delivered Diablo his promised reward.

    By the way, I still owe you a reward, dont I? You did an excellent job with the Farmus invasion, and here Ive been giving you menialbor ever since you got back.

    No, no, its my hope to be of service of you, Sir Rimuru

    Well, yeah, but

    I had given Hakuro some vacation time. He was off happily training somewhere with his daughter Momiji. Gobta, I took to our special elf-run club down on Floor 95. He didnt quite deserve a membership card yet, but I intended to dangle that as a carrot for his future endeavors. (Of course, he was still off god knows where with Milim at the moment. Veldora grumbled a bit about wanting to toughen him up, too, but I hope he doesnt. Thats just being cruel by that point.) For Gabil, I had a new research facility built, beyond the door that Veldora guarded on Floor 100. Hed be the head of thisboratory, with Vester as his second-inmand. Gabil would be overseeing what had grown into a prettyrge research team, so it was a fairly big promotion.

    So along those lines, I had given what I thought were appropriate rewards to everyone. Not doing anything for Diablo, someone who worked so hard by my side, was out of the question.

    In that case, Diablo said as I thought this over, there is something I would like your permission for.

    He always had the greatest knack for reading a room like that.

    Go ahead. Say it.

    Very well. I was thinking that I would like someone working under me to handle my more misceneous duties.

    Oh, like making tea?

    I knew he wasnt a fan of that. I couldnt me him. Why would a demon as powerful as Diablo willingly brew tea for a slime? Even I thought that was a bit bonkers.

    Ah, no, not that, Sir Rimuru! Taking care of your personal affairs is one of my most vital responsibilities! I am talking about misceneous tasks like razing nations to the groundsomeone I could perhaps send in my ce to handle that. I, personally, will always be by your side, Sir Rimuru.

    He smiled as he said it.

    Come on. Thats real work, not misceneous tasks. But to Diablo, I guess taking care of me was more important than waging wars. I really dont get whats in his mind sometimes.

    Ah. I see. But I cant have someone with that kind of power working under you

    Someone with the intelligence and muscle to take down an entire country? Itd have to be someone like Benimaru or Soei. I wanted to make Diablos wishe true, but this was asking a little too much. However, it turns out I was jumping to conclusions.

    No, no, I have no intention at all of standing above Sir Benimaru or anything of the sort. There are some old acquaintances of mine I am considering, so I thought I would invite him.

    So he wanted to hire some people? I didnt have any problem with that.

    That sounds fine by me, but will you need some money?

    I imagined he would, which is why I asked, but Diablo smiled and shook his head. No, I doubt they would be interested in money. In ce of that, however, they will need some manner of vessel to serve as their physical bodies.

    Ahhh, now I get it. If this is an acquaintance of Diablos, its probably gonna be another demon.

    All right. Is it okay if its something like what I gave to Beretta?

    If Diablo insisted on a human corpse, we were gonna have problems. Things were a bit different now from when I first summoned him.

    Yes, Ill ensure they dontin.

    Then fine.

    Ramiris was just bugging me, in fact, about providing physical bodies for Treynis sisters as well. I said yes, since they could help us run thebyrinth. Maybe I should craft a few extra bodies while Im at it, just in case.

    Thats fine by me, then, but is that the only payment theyll want?

    That is not a problem. But I think that the protgs I am considering each have a staff of their own as well. I was thinking about bringing them on, too. Is that all right?

    As breathlessly confident as always, I see. Its like he never once considered the thought of being turned down.

    I cant pay them, but would they care?

    If you can provide them with physical bodies, they will dly serve you, Sir Rimuru!

    He was so sure of it. And if he was, I had nothing to say. But there is one thing I better ask.

    So how many people are you expecting to serve you?

    By his manner of speech, I was picturing a small handful, but I needed to know how many bodies I should prepare to make.

    Well, I was thinking perhaps several hundred; a thousand at most.

    Thats a lot!!

    A thousand at most? And theyre all demons? What kind of doomsday army was he tryin to build?!

    What, are you trying to have a war by yourself?!

    No, no, Id hardly expect them to battle me. Even if they did, I doubt it would be a hard fight for me.

    And so deadpan about it, too. Where does all that confidence of hise from?

    Are yougonna be okay, though?

    Yes, perhaps there is no need for such arge number. Very well. I will carefully choose among them and dispose of the unnecessary

    No, I didnt mean that! Im asking if youre gonna be okay!

    Diablo gave me one of his happy smiles. There will not be a problem, he dered.

    Well, now it just seemed ridiculous to worry about him. For all I knew, Diablo may very well be stronger than me. If he says its not a problem, there was no point in me protesting.

    All right. Ill prepare a thousand vessels for you.

    You will, Sir Rimuru?

    Sure. I need to reward you anyway. So try not to get yourself hurt doing this, all right? I didnt think I needed to worry, but I went ahead and said it anyway.

    Diablo bowed at me, ovee with emotion. Very well, then. It pains me to say this, Sir Rimuru, but I hope you will forgive my absence for a period of time as I prepare.

    Part of me just wanted to say yeah, yeah, yeah to him. You can leave things to me for now. Get going.

    Shion sounded like she was showing someone she disliked the door. I could kind of empathize with her. She mustve been feeling the same way I did.

    Wasting no time to strike while the iron was hot, Diablo decided to head right out on his journey. To be honest, I was a little anxious about having Shion be my only secretary, buthellShuna was there for emergencies, and I doubted anything too hairy would happen. Such were my thoughts as I saw Diablo off with a smile.

 Volume 10 - Ch 2

    LIVELY DAYS

    A few days after our previous meeting, a party finally made it past Floor 30.

    This was Masayukis team, and just as he had worked out with Mjllmile, they were making their way down the Dungeon at a steady clip. It was fixed, Ill freely admit that, but what the general public didnt know wouldnt hurt them. Besides, with his Chosen One skill, Masayuki can make some pretty big screwups and still look squeaky-clean to everyone around him. I couldnt ask for a better advertising partner.

    So we held a big announcement inside thebyrinth that the orc lord guarding Floor 30, as well as his five henchmen, had been in. The results were electrifying. Cheers erupted from the inns and taverns people gathered at.

    Maaaa-sa-yuuu-ki! Maaaa-sa-yuuu-ki!!

    You could hear it all across town, and Masayuki reacted to the chants with a casual smile. His expression was stiff, to say the least, but to the crowds, it mustve looked like a radiant smile. Once again, Masayukis fame and poprity had risen to the stars. Some shops even held Masayuki the Hero Thirty-Floor Commemoration sales. With all the excitementand all the merchants whose eyes sparkled at the potential profitsthings were, to say the least, lively.

    Now we were holding another meeting in the conference room we had built in thebyrinth.

    Ah, the popce loves you more than ever, dont they, Hero?

    Rimuru, can you not pick on me, please? Its hard!

    I thought my choice of greeting would be a fun way to break the ice, but he really did seem overwhelmed.

    Truly an excellent performance! Magnificent! Stirring!

    Mjllmile couldnt help but join in. He really meant it, too, making Masayuki snicker a little. Now I see. If this is how everyone reacted to him, I could understand how that would get tiring.

    I really didnt do much of anything, though.

    Oh, there you go again! Youre such a modest champion, Sir Masayuki.

    I doubted Masayuki was being modest at all. An ogre lord ranks a B-plus as a monster, and its henchmen would all be B level, too. One B-ranked monster could threaten the existence of a small vige, and here we had a small group of such monsters, so beating Floor 30 requires serious talentbut Masayukis team emerged from that battle without any major issues.

    The Mithril Armor I gave Jinrai did a lot to boost his defense, so the partys strategy involved keeping the monsters attention squarely on himan effective one, as it turned out. The rest of the party was pretty decent, too, focusing their attacks to unlock some pretty powerful magic. Bernies elemental magic, Jiwus spirit magic, and Masayukis Chosen Onebased buff effect all worked together to raise their abilities to their peaks.

    Masayuki said he didnt do anything, butreallyhe yed a huge role just standing there.

    Still Not that its for me to say, but we couldnt ask for much better advertising. Having Rare equipment from a distinct series show up in the chests is quite attractive to a lot of people.

    Right? I came up with that one.

    Equipment that unlocked special effects if youpleted the whole setthat was an idea I discussed with Kurobe, and the memory of that discussion inspired him to make a test set, the so-called Ogre Series. The gold box inside Floor 30s boss room awards you with one random item from that set, which was really a diabolical way of going about it.

    There were five weaponsan ax, sword, bow, saber, and knifeand five pieces of armorthe helm, breastte, gauntlets, gaiters, and boots. (No shield included.) What you got waspletely down to luckyou were guaranteed an Ogre Series item, but you didnt even know whether youd get a weapon or a piece of armor.

    Plus, keep in mind, there was no guarantee youd see a series piece drop. The gold box the boss guarded was programmed to drop Rare items 2 percent of the time. Even if you beat the ogre lord once an hour, that box would still only contain twenty-four items a dayyoud be lucky to see a Rare drop every other day, at that rate.

    Its the perfect drop rate, in fact, to encourage the gambler side of peoples psyches. Its human nature to want to collect em all; if you obtained a piece you already had, you could always trade or sell it. Now people had yet another reason to tackle thebyrinth.

    And we picked up the Ogre Greaves.

    Yeah, and if you can find all five armor pieces, itll grant you Magic Interference, which is a powerful Anti-Magic skill. Real effective against the boss at Floor 40, hint, hint.

    It was the same effect boasted by the Scale Shield I gifted Kabal a while back. That shield gave you the effect by itself, but with the Ogre Series, you needed the whole armor set to unlock it. Thats the difference between a Unique piece of equipment and a Rare one. And to be honest, the Ogre Series was made from the magisteel we salvaged from the by-products of processing the shield-like scales of Charybdis. This meant it was already a powerful magic blocker, effective against the tempest serpents Poisonous Breath, and I hoped people were excited about collecting them.

    Oh, really?

    Uh-huh. So the tactic Im hoping people adopt going forward is to collect the whole set before taking on the next boss.

    With Masayukis team conquering Floor 30, we had now formally announced the Ogre Series. It wouldnt be long before the information spread worldwide, and Im sure itd energize even more would-be challengers to try their own hand at thebyrinth.

    Parties were allowed to be up to ten people in the Dungeon. No matter how strong a group of monsters you found in there, if you had a party of adventurers ranked B or higher, there was nothing they had zero chance defeating. Itd be a trial-and-error process ahead for them, Im sure, but if they think of it as training for group battles against monsters, I think itd be good experience for them. I definitely want them to build up their equipment for the floors beyond, besides.

    Everything was going to n. We didnt miss a thing.

    Thats your idea, huh? So you think we need toplete the series?

    Well, thats a good question. The Mithril Armor I gave Jinrai is a Rare piece as well. Its got no special traits, but it provides better defense than the Ogre Breastte. You could just keep pushing and beat the tempest serpent that way, maybe.

    The serpent was a tough foe, but thered be only one of it. Tackle it with a party, and your strategy would probably involve keeping a decoy healed while the rest of the gang fought. That would be Jinrai with this group, and I figured hed be up to the task.

    All right. In that case, well keep going down.

    Gotcha. Good luck, okay? Because youre the best pitchman we got!

    Jinrai and the others are a lot more enthusiastic about this than I am, but yeah. I think having monsters drop items is kinda adding to the fun, too. Its always exciting to discover a chest, but

    The simple idea of having monsters drop items turned out to be absolutely the correct thing to do. Some monstersskeletons, for exampledidnt have any materials to harvest, and their magic crystals could often be low quality and worth pocket change. The stronger an explorer you were, the more of a pain in the ass monsters like that became to deal with, but now things had changed. The creatures that parties used to reluctantly mow down were now getting actively hunted again.

    With monster materials circting more than ever in the marketce, I couldnt ask for better results.

    Givingbyrinth-generated monsters items was actually pretty simple. The dryads, led by Treyni, helped us out with that, taking newly born monsters and having them swallow the items. That sounded tricky, given that monsters may appear anywhere in thebyrinth and you cant track them all. In fact, though, there was no need to.

    The flow of magicules in each floor was supplied with special pipes. These pipes were set up to run through certain rooms from Floor 5 downward, rooms that subsequently would have lots of monsters born in them. Monsterirs, you could call them. To manage thebyrinth, Treyni and the dryads would ce the items I specified in each of these rooms; the monsters would swallow them up, and then the dryads released them into the maze atrge.

    Tracking all the monsters generated in thebyrinth was a pain, but one greatly reduced by only having to watch over the monsterirs on each floor. Monsters who self-generated in the regr corridors wouldnt carry any items, but that wasnt a problemwe didnt need every single monster to drop something anyway.

    Thus, we had a reasonably efficient way to enable monsters to carry items around on each floor. I originally envisioned the monsterirs as a kind of trap, but now they were more like administrative pens. Of course, you might see a hapless party tiptoe into these rooms right when they were packed to the rafters with monstersbut hey, it adds to the tension! Its all part of the charm for everyoneyou never know what you may find around the corner.

    And the appraisers are working around the clock! Were charging one silver per appraisal, but theres pretty much a line at all times.

    From in monsters, you may find sks of fruit juice or milk, magically treated to keep for several days, plus a few Low Potions mixed in. Some of these drinks might go bad after a while, of course, so an appraisal was a must. We also threw in some of the failed efforts from Kurobes apprentices, junk that we then bought off them for cheap. This might sound like we were taking a loss on them, but theyre kind of like crane-game prizesreinvesting our profits in order to attract more customers.

    And speaking of prizes, we had to have some jackpots, of course. asionally, wed mix in a masterpiece from Kurobes assistants. This, of course, generated a ton of buzz, with people going around town showing off the Special sword or whatever that they picked up inside thebyrinth. It really added that addictive touch we were hoping for; now, like ants to a hill of sugar, we were seeing peoplee back again and again.

    So we had booty in the treasure chests, mary rewards for beating every tenth floor, and plunder from the monsters themselves. A lot to attract repeat business with.

    Thus, it was fair to say that thebyrinth was going well. It was perhaps inevitable that more people were showing up in the town.

    And Floor 95 is just packed! effused Ramiris, the others nodding their agreement.

    Yes, the new inn on Floor 95 was already a big sess. Each floor had a conspicuous room before the stairway containing a rather unnatural-looking door reading INN on it. There was a bell next to each one; explorers rang it to call for abyrinth manager whod exin whaty beyond the door and how they could take advantage of it.

    One silver coin was required to open it, not much less than admission to thebyrinth, but to regrs, that wasnt going to be a big ouy. The majority of people who heard the managers spiel wound up paying, after all. And there was a good reason for thatthe ever-changingbyrinth structure.

    Thanks to all the corridors and such changing every two or three days, it was much trickier to conquer a floor than its size suggested. Few people could advance through a huge map without getting lost, and we had measures in ce to prevent elementalists from relying on Elemental Communication too much. It was now a challenge to find the shortest route through a floor, and as a result, you really couldnt reach the save point at every tenth floor in a single day. Thus, until now, parties were forced to camp out in the corridors.

    Ive never slept in an open corridor before like that, actually.

    Oh? I turned to Masayuki. How was it? Seems pretty fun.

    Hah! Maybe for you, Rimuru, but if youre sleeping on cold, hard stone, youre gonna get terribly sore and maybe bruised up. The other two guys besides Bernie and me seemed pretty used to it, but

    Not even Jiwu, a woman, objected to roughing it like that. But to Masayuki, sleeping in shifts to keep a lookout for monster attacks was nothing short of hell.

    Ah. Sounds rough.

    Can you give me some actual pity, please? Because I never wanna do that again, thats for sure.

    I suppose it would be an ordeal for most modern-day kids, whether you were an otherworlder or not. You could secure a treasure-chest chamber or some such and set up camp there, of course. But youd still need someone keeping watch, since some monsters constantly wandered the hallways without rest. In those circumstances, providing a safe ce to rest was unexpectedly popr.

    There was also the question of what to do with the equipment you found inside. Discarding it would be a waste, sinceas we nned itthere may just be a rare find among things that might seem like junk at first. But between your sleeping kit, a few days worth of food, and backup equipment, you had only so much room to spare.

    When space is of the essence, food is often the first thing to go. If you ran out of stores, youd have little choice but to retreat, although some monsters left behind edible goods when defeated. Water could be procured with magic, so a lot of people made do with the barest minimum of sustenance. If you were at the end of your rope, you could always die and get transported back with your Resurrection Braceletthat cost you your items, but it beat struggling with starvation.

    Along those lines, people were starting to reconsider the merits of the return whistles. Since they let you return to the surface with all your items, more and more people were starting to purchase them.

    Thus, a consequence of thebyrinths new emphasis on dropped items was that people tended to carry less food around than before. So what if we had an inn avable down there? If youre well enough to reach a stairway, the inn was there for you, obviating the need for food or a sleep sack and making your pack a lot lighter.

    Yes, if an inn were avable, a lot of people would naturally want to take advantage. They provided safe rooms for three silver coins, the same asbyrinth admission; between that and the ess fee, you had to pay double or triple the price of a regr inn to stay there, but at least you got a meal with it.

    Those three coins gave you ess to a building divided by gender, filled with capsule hotel-like rooms justrge enough for a bed and little else. Im not going to talk this ce up too muchyour money didnt get you luxury. I was having some treants run it for us, and the work was carried out by new staff as an on-the-job education program. Cleaning,undry, cooking, customer serviceour hires would get to practice all of that here, and if they make the grade, theyll be able to find work up on the surface.

    Despite the rustic conditions, the inn still found its clientele. Your money bought you safety in thebyrinth, after all, and nobody was about toin about that. We also provided a few extra services for additional fees. Clothesundering: three silver. ess to arge open bath: three silver. Equipment cleaning and basic repairs: five silver. That sort of thing.

    These services were all kind of popr, actually. Extended rounds of fighting in thebyrinth could make you a bloody, sweaty mess, after all. The bath was also a big hit, which I figure is because women might be more sensitive to people stinking up the ce. Either way, it was all at exorbitant pricespared to the surface, so our profit margins were through the roof.

    You were allowed to take a break in this space without getting a room, speaking of which. Simply having ess to a bathroom you wouldnt get ambushed in was a huge attraction. Masayuki suggested I look into that, and when I did, I found that was, well, a pressing concern for everyone. There were no flush toilets in thebyrinth, and since you were on the razors edge between life and death for much of your journey, you often had to resign yourself to some wet trousers, or worse.

    Thebyrinth itself never needed cleaning, though. The generated monsters cleaned everything up for usin particr, the slimes in thebyrinth ate anything. Human waste, the remains of dead monsters, you name it. Monsters of that rank popped right back into existence after an adventurer killed them, so hygiene wasnt a concern, at least. Plus, every time thebyrinthyout changed, Ramiris cleared out any useless garbage strewn around, ensuring the Dungeon remained in remarkably spotless condition.

    Of course, this didnt mean people werefortable with dropping trou and doing their business in the middle of a monsterden hallway. Thebyrinth management didnt want their maze to look like an open sewer, and our challengers werent great fans of that, either. If they got attacked by monsters in the midst of a bathroom break, itd probably make them want to cryyelling Time out! didnt work against monsters. Youd need someone keeping watch for you, for number one as well as number two, and I know Im speaking for at least some of you when I say that going to the bathroom in an open hallway while encircled by your friends is the perfect form for performance anxiety.

    Maybe a quick whiz would workwell, maybe not. If a monster caught you with your fly down and you had to fight like that Or, even worse, you put it back in and had to piss your pants during the battleugh. I dont even want to imagine it. Youd probably just want to march right back home, but then youd have to go tromping around the city of Rimuru with a huge urine stain on your pants, like you lost a bet or something.

    A man might be able to cope with this; I can hardly imagine how a woman would handle it. For some, death might be better than the humiliation. And considering that lots of adventuring parties were mixed gender, toilet-rted practicalities were another incentive for people to use our inn.

    By the way, some people tried to solve this problem with magic. Certain household magic spells like Clean Wash and Health Management can help you maintain normal bodily functions inside thebyrinth. Health Management, in particr, allows you to manage the times at which your body needs to eliminate. There were certain limits, of course, but you could use that spell to hold it in for around three days without issue. Unless you were the type of maniac who didnt care if he sprayed his waste all over during battle, this was a must-have spell for adventuring.

    Still, Health Management didnt work forever. If you were gonna wander around the maze for extended periods of time, relying strictly on magic was risky. Thus, it came to pass that even sorcerers and the like saw fit to call upon the inns services.

    Sobyrinth management was all systems go for now. Mjllmile couldnt have looked more pleased with himself.

    Its going along perfectly well, he said. Were seeing a rising trend in our profits. Even subtracting the expenses incurred with the item drops were distributing, Im beyond satisfied with our marginsIm looking at around ten percent right now, from our original investment. My goal is twenty percent, and if we can attract more customers, I think we can make that happen.

    Hmm. So about what we figured, overall. And since I was having him report the items we provide at their sale prices instead of our own costs, we were actually making more profit. That and we werent paying a sry to the townspeople involved with the work, so all of that was going straight into our coffers.

    It seems like we could start investing more into it.

    If we do, itll be a while longer before we see government-scale profits, but I think we could get in the ck before an extended amount of time.

    If profit was all I cared about, we could just sell what we created at high prices. But as a nation, that wasnt enough to survive. There were people in town involved in many kinds of work; we needed to make sure it was divided up appropriately, so they could do their best at their jobs. Thats why I thought it was important to set up an environment where everyones satisfied with their work. As the ruler of this nation, it was job one for me to provide workor really, a purpose in lifefor everyone who lived in it.

    Yeah, but I feel bad about them working for free

    Well, Mjllmile said with a grin, if you factored the average sry in Blumund into our figures, we have more than enough of a budget to pay that to our employees. Whether theyll ept it is another question

    To a merchant like him, freebor must have been unthinkable. I could understand that. You didnt exactly need to ponder the subject deeply to see the problem. We were providing food, clothing, and shelter, and everyone seemed happy enough with thatbut it didnt seem like a good work environment at all like this. I did want topensate them all somehow, in time, but Raphael was doing a perfect job of managing them, so nobody had lodged anyints about their treatment. Nheless, I decided Id better bring this up with Rigurd and my other officials shortly.

    But even as my subjects happily worked for nothing, one of my other acquaintances was much more faithful to her own greed.

    Um, by the way, is my payment gonna be all right?

    Ramiris nervously gulped as she asked the question. All this talk mustve made her think I was gonna stiff her. She didnt have to worry; I keep my promises. So I signaled to Mjllmile, who then nodded with a smile of his own.

    You have every reason to expect it, he proimed, trying to sound as important as possible. I think we can pay you quite a figure, in fact!

    Ramiris gave that a satisfied grin. This is it! she eximed.

    Huh? What is?

    My erathe era of Ramiris has finally arrived!

    Had it? Because I wasnt so sure. But Treyni, bringing some tea in, warmly smiled at Ramiris as she guffawed at this. I always thought Treyni was overprotective of herlove can be smothering like thatbut I wasnt about to get involved in their affairs.

    Do I receive any of this payment?

    Oh, now Veldoras interested in money? Thats thest thing I needbut we do owe him one. I gave another nod to Mjllmile.

    Yes, of course, we have a payment prepared for you as well. Would you be satisfied with the same amount Lady Ramiris is set to receive?

    Mjllmile and I had worked this out in advance. Veldora, after all, was acting as the master of thisbyrinthnot that he had to do anything, really, but it was his magicules that kept the Dungeon environment running. His converting magic ore to magisteel for us, in and of itself, generated huge profits for Tempest. I didnt think it right to try to cheat him.

    Ah! Wonderful! I knew I could count on you, Rimuru. I see that Ill always be safe in your hands.

    Dont go wasting it, you two.

    Ofof course not!

    Y-yeah, of course not! I know how to save money!

    Knowing how, Ramiris, doesnt mean much if you dont do it. But they both looked pretty gratified, so I opted not to rain on their parade.

    Ha-ha-ha! Of course, theyre free to squander at least a little of it. Money, after all, is something you save because you know how much fun it is to use!

    Ooh, yes, yes! agreed Ramiris. Thats such an astute insight, Mjllmile!

    Mollie, if you coddle Ramiris like that, shes gonna run with it. Treyni is a great example of how not to handle her.

    I suppose so, yes. And I have experience working at that takoyaki stand. Now I see what a noble thing work is, as well as how vital money can be. Rimuru, you worry about me far too much!

    Youre one to talk. I was the one who arranged that whole damn takoyaki stand for you, and Mjllmile pulled more than a few strings to make it happen. All you did was grill up the damn things!

    I had to mentally restrain myself from saying all that. Theres no better teacher than experience, I suppose. Let em do what they want. Even if it blows up in their faces, as long as they learn something from it, were good.

    So, Mjllmile, how are things looking outside thebyrinth? I asked.

    I knew things were moving fast around town, but how were things really going? I was curious.

    Mjllmile smirked at me. Brisk indeed! Thats the only word for it. The festival is long over, but really, we havent seen any major drop in our poption. We now have a pretty steady clip of merchants going in and out, and I think thats going to be quite stable for the time being.

    Would you say the town is starting to function as a stopping point for trade?

    Precisely. Merchants are starting toe see me so they can begin to do business here. Theyre not going through intermediaries all the time, either, so Sir Rigurd has a rather full schedule these days. From Free Guild members to big-name merchants from the Western Nations, theyre all inquiring about opening up shop here.

    Sounds better than I thought, then. The Founders Festival was meant to prime the pump, and in terms of attracting people, it was a big sess. Now thebyrinth Id made for fun was building a good rep of its own, winning favor with all our visitors. After that, all we had to do was fine-tune things to keep the money flowing. I wanted people to challenge thebyrinth, earn money, then spend it on our nations goodsnot just our inns and taverns, but weapons, armor, and other consumables.

    Im sure our merchants from other nations would y a big role in that. The Free Guild purchases monster materials, then deposits the money with us. Foreign merchants would bring us rare and exotic goods, no doubtand at the end of it all, our town would be livelier than ever. Give it enough time, and people the world over would know just how fine this nations goods are. Weve got a lot of exclusive things to offerrare foods and liquor; all the cuisine Shuna was developing; the gear from Kurobes workshop. Even Kaijins apprentices were helping flesh out the selection. That wasnt even all of it, and the selection was only going to grow.

    Word about all this could easily spread by now. Even without advertising, wed have no problem attracting customersand at the end of it, people the world over would ept us and see us as necessary. I was sure of it.

    Whats more, some of the gear made in Kurobes workshop was on sale as special merchandise at certain shops. The gear circting in these shops was doubtlessly going to generate attentionand while different stores dealt in different levels of quality, if you had the money, you could buy it for yourself, although anything from them rated Rare or higher would be avable for purchase only on Floor 95.

    Im sure some people might doubt this gears capabilities, but that wasnt a big problem. Weve got a ce right by here, after all, that lets you test out what you bought. We rented it out to people in thebyrinth, even, although not too many people had taken advantage yet. Itd only be a matter of time, either way, before they used that gear and began talking up how good it was.

    Little by little, we were building trust in our nation. Trust is more important than profit. Im not about to go into the red for the sake of trust, but as long as we stayed in the ck overall, Id call that a sess. Were not in this to make money; were in it to get our nation epted.

    Sounds like exactly what we aimed for. Even if Tempests a monster nation, if merchants can see profits, theylle for us. Thebyrinths seeing more and more visitors, and I think we can build a rtionship with the Western Nations, too.

    Mjllmile nodded. Smooth sailing, indeed. And yes, more and more visitors areing. People know its a monster nation run by a demon lord, and theyre stilling. Just as you surmised, I think its safe to say that people are trusting us.

    He was in firm agreement. But hes a funny guy, that Mjllmile. He said us just now. From that, it seems to me that despite being human, hes fully looking at matters from our perspective. Im d for that.

    We cant earn trust overnight. Trust is gained in drops and lost in bucketsthats the truth. And maybe were stimting peoples greed to bring them here, but theres no easier thing to connect to trust. If you think that someone can address and satisfy your desires, thats the same thing as earning their trust. Mjllmiles a good example of that; were connected by a desire-based trusting rtionship.

    Do good work and receive just profit from itthats really important, I think. And, of course, its no fun if thats a one-way street. You need to look at the other side of the equation and figure out if you can trust them. Right now, weve got the perfect environment for training ourselves on that. Weve got a teacher in Mjllmile, and Im gonna study as much as I can under him.

    Then I paid Ramiris and Veldora their sries. They both seemed satisfied with the amount. I told them not to squander it, but have they thought at all about how theyll use it? The question weighed on my mind as we kept discussing matters.

    Hey, um, do you think we could set up a space for my personal use?

    Sure, Ramiris replied to me, but what for? You wanna do some research, too?

    No, its more about development in my case. I have a few ideas in mind that I want to try building.

    In terms of research, Kurobe was way ahead of me. His workshop was in the southwest part of town, along with the workshops of those apprentices hed deemed worthy of going independent. That district was seeing weaponsmiths from all over now, hearing the rumors and building their own forges and repair shops topete.

    It was a full-fledged industrial zone by now, and as a result, it was getting hard to keep new discoveries made there a secret. The atmosphere was more convivial among those artisans, amicably sharing in one anothers neat new stuff, so ssified project development wasnt possible. Instead, my order for Kurobe was to develop new weapons and armor that nobody could imitate.

    Besides, when conducting research, I didnt actually need a physical space. I have the good professor Raphael with me. What I did need, though, was a development facility to implement the blueprints in my mind.

    Sure thing! Ill get it set up today.

    Ramiris was eager to please.

    So now the hundredth level on the bottom began with Veldoras grand hall and continued on to rooms housing a plethora of research facilities. In terms of keeping the space defended (not to mention preventing leaks), I couldnt ask for somece safer. In fact, it was impregnable. Lets use it for really important R&D from now on, then.

    But what are you tryin to make down there, Rimuru? Ramiris asked me.

    Its a secret.

    Huh? But I really wanna know! Youre always cranking out all kinds of crazy things, so

    Indeed you are, said Veldora. There will be no secrets between you and me!

    Oh, great. Who decided that? And I knew full well Ramiris and Veldora were doing this and that behind my back, too. But they were always so persistent with things like this, and I didnt have the energy to try to deceive them, so I gave them an answer.

    Theyre bodies. Ive been thinking about providing physical vessels for Treynis sisters.

    Plus the ones Diablo requested, of course. If I needed a thousand, painstakingly carving them by hand wasnt gonna happen. I needed a setup that allowed mass production.

    And give me as much space as you can, by the way, okay? I want to try out a few different things.

    Comin right up! Anything for my faithful underlings!

    Ramiris was emphasizing the underling part, but she agreed, nheless. Heh-heh Good thing I let her in on part of my ns. Now Ill have the space to try all sorts of things. Up to now, I didnt have the time to make the things I came up with; now I could start implementing some of those ideas. The thought made me grin.

    I spent the next few days setting up my development equipment and tapping Raphaels full abilities for the first time in a while and copying all sorts of things within my Stomach. Any tech I wanted to pass on to future generations couldnt rely on this, of course, but I didnt intend to share it with anyone anyway, so all inhibitions were out the window.

    Then I heard someone calling me from behind the door. Eesh. I was just getting into a groove, too

    Report. You have notmunicated with the outside world for several days. There is a possibility that something has happened.

    Come to think of it, I had been skipping out on meals, hadnt I? Raphaels observation reminded me that maybe Id been a little too caught up in my own world. Even if nothing was going on at all, its natural that Shion or Shuna would get worried. Better make my roundsnow was a good stopping point anyway.

    Replying to the voice I heard, I left my research center. As expected, Shuna and Shion were right there.

    Sir Rimuru, are you all right?!

    I was worried. You didnt even appear for the meals you enjoy each day, so I thought that something might have happened.

    Ah. So they were concerned for me.

    Sorry. I got a little lost in thought.

    N-no, not at all! As long as youre safe

    Shion is right. With all the hard work youve been doing, of course, nobody willin if you want to take some more time off.

    Once they saw I was fine, they were all smiles again. Now I felt kind of bad. They really cared a lot for me.

    Well, Ill make sure to check in at least once a day from now on.

    That would make me very happy, Sir Rimuru.

    Yeah, better not get too wrapped up in my hobbies. Having someone worried for you is, in itself, a blessing.

    As I let the remorse wash over me, Shion suddenly spoke up, as if just recalling something.

    By the way, Sir Mjllmile has been searching for you since yesterday.

    Huh?

    Then he shouldve called for me.

    He did, but there was no response I apologize. We should have been louder.

    No, uh, sorry I didnt notice. Ill set up a doorbell or something next time.

    Shion didnt seem too perturbed about it; I guess she didnt think it was too important. But after seeing how Mjllmile was still hot to see me the next day, she grew a bit more concerned and talked to Shuna about it. Apparently, it wasbyrinth business, but Shion didnt know what kind. Did he figure Shion wouldnt understand it if he exined it to her, or was it something he was reluctant about letting Shion in on? I wondered about that.

    Guess Diablo was a lot more talented than I thought, though. At a time like this, he wouldve absolutely found a way to attract my attention. In fact, he probably wouldve joined me at my research desk. Maybe that made Diablo more selfish than Shion, if you think about itbut enough about that. Mjllmiles waiting for me.

    Shuna had prepared a boxed sandwich for my lunch. Shion brewed up some tea. I was enjoying both as I waited for my finance minister.

    Ah, Sir Rimuru! I was looking for you. Weve got big, big news from thebyrinth!

    I was in full rxation mode, but Mjllmile was frantic.

    What? What is it? I asked, wondering if our user base wasining about something again.

    Following Sir Masayuki, weve got another team that made it past Floor 30.

    Oh? Cool. Thats faster than I thought.

    I wouldnt be so calm about that, Sir Rimuru! Theyre practically sprinting their way down! In fact, theyre almost at Floor 40 already!

    Um Oh. Yeah, maybe I shouldnt be so casual about this. But I didnt see what was worth getting in such a panic about.

    What Mjllmile said next convinced me otherwise.

    And their methods are, well Theyre making a science out of skirting thebyrinths rules. For example

    He then began to exin. And he was right. I hadnt predicted this at all.

    As he put it, this party hade upon fairly ingenious ways of using Ramirissbyrinth items.

    First, they activated a Recording Crystal in front of the boss monster on Floor 20. One Crystal works for an entire party, so even if the boss wiped them out, they could revive themselves at the location they set for themselves. That was within expected boundsso far, so good. But then, apparently, they would use a return whistle to warp out of thebyrinth. And then the party would split up, with each member going on to form their own partyalways with ten people, the maximum.

    So then, um, all those people

    Precisely. Its no longer a party so much as a small army.

    What was once a ten-person team was now ten parties, a total of a hundred peopleeach of them ranging between C-plus and B-plus as individuals. Apparently, they all wore a uniform of sorts, an overcoat with a shared design and a certain emblem sewn on it. They stood in line, no doubt unnerving the people around them as they marched in formation into thebyrinthand that was the force they brought straight to the Floor 30 boss.

    The rules stated that only one party could engage a boss at once, but here were ten of them challenging the same boss, standing in line to wait their turn. The orc lord and his five henchmen were powerful adversaries, but this army was no slouch eitherand after a heated battle, they finally took the boss out with the third party of the group.

    I feel like we talked about something simr just recently.

    Indeed we did. This is Team Green Fury themselves.

    Ah, there you go. Judging by the matching overcoats, this mustve been a set of people working for one noble or another. The sheer budget they mustve had for Recording Crystals made me shiver. Time is money and all that, but those cost one gold coin a pop, and they were tossing them all over the ce.

    Do we know which patron they belong to?

    I had Lady Soka look into that. Apparently, theyre all part of the Sons of the Veldt, a pretty well-known mercenary outfit. She believes their benefactor hails from Englesia.

    The Sons of the Veldt? Id never heard of them. But it was a surprise to hear that one of the core members of the Western Nations had their eyes on ourbyrinth. I seem to remember one of their affiliate families participating in the Founders Festivalbut no one from any of the main noble lines, I dont think. Maybe they got ate start, or maybe they had some other intention?

    Well, hmm. How to put it? It feels kind of like theyre paying their way in, which doesnt leave a great impression, but its not a vition of the rules.

    Annoyingly, we had no reason to mp down on them. I understood Mjllmiles rm, but at this point, there wasnt much we could do about it.

    Our profits are rising, yes. Lodging aint about it might be unreasonable at this point in time. But if this keeps up, the floors you spent so much time filling with traps are going to be conquered in the blink of an eye, it seems like

    So Mjllmile was going nuts looking for me because he thought someone would beat the wholebyrinth while I was holed up in here?

    Guess I made you worry, huh? Well, itll be all right. Things dont really kick off until beyond Floor 40. And I think the tempest serpent is going to stop em in their tracks for a while anyway. Team Green Fury had some excellent teamwork going; I think they ranked an A-minus as a fighting partybut as individuals, they were each around a B, so I doubted they could hold out against powerful ranged attacks for long. A tempest serpent is among the stronger of the A-minus gang, so even ten B-plus fighters could have trouble emerging victorious against one.

    Indeed, but judging by what Lady Ramiris and Lord Veldora tell me, we have reason to believe the leader of Green Fury is misrepresenting their actual skills

    Huh?

    True, I cant really run Analyze and Assess on someone in a video. Like

    Report. urate magicule counts cannot be calcted via Analyze & Assess on a motion picture of battle.

    Right, Raphael warned me as much. I just used that video footage to assign a rating based off how the Free Guild ranks its monsters, so I couldnt really say with any uracy exactly how powerful that party is. After all, I was only ranked a B-plus by the Guild, even though Im definitely an S in actual skill. Ranks can differ from talent like that sometimes. And if someone was deliberately concealing their skill, we needed to consider addressing that.

    I think I better hear from Veldora and the gang about this.

    Certainly. Ive already reached out to them, so lets pay them a visit!

    Thats Mjllmile for you. By the time he rounded me up, he already had everyone else on call. I nodded and stood up from my seat.

    We were back in thebyrinths conference room, the usual gang.

    You arete, Rimuru! Veldora scolded me.

    Yeah! Look at what happened! Youre the leaderstart acting like it! Ramiris added.

    Im the leader? Thats news to me. But that didnt matter right now.

    So hows it looking? I asked.

    Its looking grim, replied Ramiris. Theyve prated all the way to Floor 38 now.

    She began to show me some video of their progress. She seemed pretty flustered, restless even, as she went over the footage, projected inside a little transparent box, with me. The effect was kind of like seeing 3-D miniatures move around by themselves. Too bad I couldnt Analyze & Assess this directly

    Suggestion. If I receive permission to interact with the subject Ramiriss intrinsic skill Mazecraft, it will be possible to collect more urate, detailed information.

    Oooh! A rare proposal from Raphael. It seemed worth trying. Lets ask.

    Ramiris, I have a favor to ask, if thats okay with you.

    Huh? Why all the formality?

    Actually, I was hoping to intervene into your Mazecraft skill, but what do you think?

    Intervene? Whatre you gonna do, exactly?

    What was I gonna do? I wasnt too sure myself.

    Well, you know, intervene. I wanted to collect more information about thisbyrinth, sort of thing?

    I made most of that up, attempting to gloss over the truth with her.

    Report. That is generally the truth.

    Damn, Im good. For once, I actually understood Professor Raphaels exnation.

    I mean, thats fine and all, but you sure you can manage that?

    Um, whyre you worried about me?

    Its just, yknow, theres a lot of information to go through. Not even I can fully grasp it, so I usually ditch it from my mind once Im done creating it.

    Hmm? Hang on. She called it a lot of data, and she was probably right. With over a thousand challengers in thebyrinth at once, plus all the data from each floor, plus everything elseand we had permanent residents on Floor 95, too. Trying to grasp all of that at once

    Understood. It will not be a problem.

    Oh, okay. Apparently, it wont be a problem.

    Hmm, I think Ill be fine?

    Why are you phrasing it like a question?

    Now, now, Ramiris, you are in good hands leaving everything to Rimuru here. There is not a thing for either of us to worry about!

    I was all anxious, but Veldora was kind enough to browbeat Ramiris into trusting me.

    Well, all right! Ill give you the right to intrude into my Mazecraft skill, then!

    Ramiris touched me, and with that, I instantly had ess to thebyrinth.

    Report. Connected to the subject Ramiriss intrinsic skill Mazecraft. Now collecting information.

    The seemingly impatient Raphael sprang into action. The moment it did, I Hmm? Maybe I felt a whole bunch of data run across my brain? But it didnt hurt at all. I was tensed up, prepared for anything, but this was kind of a letdown.

    Report. Analyze and Assess on the Team Green Furyplete. Their leader is over the A rank, but my appraisal of the others does not differ greatly from before.

    In a moment, Raphael found the info I needed. Talk about reliable. Then I noticed the Analyze and Assess was still running. Did something catch its attention?

    Understood. Analyzing all battles that have taken ce within thebyrinth

    so quit bothering me, I thought I heard it say. Which made sense. Theres no way an average bum like me would understand the professors thoughts. Im sure it was plotting something grandiose again, but Ill leave it be for now.

    So back to our meeting.

    I see

    Did you learn something, Rimuru?

    That was fast. It didnt work, did it?

    Ramiris, to say nothing of Veldora, gave me a doubtful look. Im sure they had trouble believing me, as much as that annoyed me.

    You know, I said, bragging a little, this guys an A-plus or so.

    I brought up some other footage from Ramiris, blowing up the view to make it easier to see.

    Huh?!

    This surprised the whole room, Ramiris more than anyone else. Um, Rimuru? Why are you using my skill so well?!

    Ha-ha-ha! Well, you gave me the right to intervene, so I guess thats why.

    Youre kidding me! Even I can only show footage from a set position. I need to personally know someone before I can track them on here

    Apparently, Ramiris could only ess footage that had already passed through herbyrinth managers. I could see why; wrangling all this data in depth was a dizzying task.

    Well, lets just say Im more gifted at this for now, I said to assuage her as my eyes turned to the image.

    The over-A explorer we were following was the elementalist who led the Green Fury team. If that leader was hiding so much power, there were likely even more elementals they were able to tap into. If they had ess to higher-level ones, you could count on them having ess to power several times their own.

    Hohh. When you say over-A, are we talking about monster standards?

    Right. I think the Free Guild pretty much assigns ranks based off what rank of monster they think you can beat, but

    That, however, was ignoring any safety factors. I think, to be exact, the standards were based on the scenario of several adventurers facing off against a monster of that rank.

    All right, so what about us?

    You guys?

    Masayuki, I wasnt sure about. By the looks of him, hed be on the low end of a Dbut his unique skill was out of this world, so put it all together, and hed be well into the A range. Saying that would probably give Masayuki the wrong idea, however, so I decided to keep quiet about it. Better to obfuscate the truth for now.

    Id say Jinrai just barely clears the line for an A rank, but Im not too sure if he could beat a tempest serpent solo or not. If he had theplete Ogre Series set, though, itd be no sweat for him.

    His Mithril Armor couldnt fully protect him against Poisonous Breath; as a foe, the tempest serpent was a bad matchup for him. Unlike monsters, humanse with a lot of weaknesses baked in, so to speakand since this isnt a video game, weakness against one attack or another spelled the difference between life and death. Even if his core strength made himpetitive, the right poison at the right time could still easily kill him.

    Huh. Jinrais really something, huh?

    Yeah. Although, I think your skill is boosting him in pretty much every way. And thenwho else did you have? Jiwu and Bernie? Id pin them both at A-minus.

    It was a great party. Well-bnced, to be sure. Maybe thats why Masayukis faults never bubbled to the surface.

    Yeah, I definitely have somepanions I can count on.

    Ha-ha-ha! And given how much more powerful you are than them, Sir Masayuki, youre an over-A for sure. After all, Sir Rimuru himself certified you as a Hero! Mjllmile had nothing but respect as he eyed Masayuki.

    I really wish hed be kind enough to stop. Masayuki was smiling, but he looked about ready to burst into tears at any moment.

    But the problem is that its not only the Green Fury leader, I said. Over on this team, this guys an A; this guys an A The Sons of the Veldt, theyre all called? They sure assembled a rogues gallery here.

    No way! That many high-ranked people?

    Hmm Nothing I would have an issue with

    Yes, if the top members of the Veldt formed a party, even Floor 50 wouldnt stop them for long.

    Bovix and Equix are A rank, too, but if its one of them against these two dudes in particr, itll be an uphill battle. And Id put the Green Fury leader on the same line as Bovix.

    That high up?

    Yeah. I mean, this pair here, theyre about twice as strong as Jinraijustparing their bodily abilities, not their battle skills.

    The two Veldt standouts were each on the level of a high-end magic-born. Weaker than Gelmud (that name takes me back) but certainly stronger than one of the lower-ranked pdins. Meanwhile, the Green Fury leader was in a ss of their own, too; I wasnt sure, but I was willing to bet their skill level in battle was pretty high.

    Looks like theyre summoning magic beasts to run on ahead and alert them to the traps I set. Theyre professionals, for sure.

    Yeah, if this keeps up, its just a matter of time before they reach the floors I set up.

    Hmm?

    I figured Ramiris would be happier about that. Why all the tension? I wasnt too thrilled about this party dodging all my traps, but she and Veldora were all ramped up about taking on challengers. Between that and the generally disturbed way she was acting, was there something else going on?

    Say, are you hiding something? I decided to just ask her point-nk.

    Veldora and Ramiris looked at each other, figuring out how to handle this. Presumably, Ramiris drew the short straw, because she spoke first.

    Well, in the three days you were holed up in there

    And the story she had made me want to rub my forehead, too.

    As she exined, Hinatas Crusaders had begun their trainingbeginning with Floor 51, as we agreed upon.

    Ramiris had lined Floors 51 through 60 with her own set of traps, and of course she watched them excitedly as the pdins went about their business. Adalmann, the guy she tapped to be the Floor 60 boss monster, had summoned a massive force of undead, leading to innovations like corridors of infinitely spawning zombies, oxygen-free rooms (the dead didnt have to breathe, after all), and things even more diabolical than that.

    I was really confident, you know? And those stupid pdins kept on purifying everything in their path. The no-oxygen chamber stopped them for a bit, but the people behind the front-line team just resurrected them, and off they went

    They had the perfect tools for that challenge, huh? Well, thats the way it goes sometimes.

    I tried tofort the depressed Ramiris as she continued.

    Before much longer, the Crusader group reached the boss on Floor 60. Adalmann was waiting for them, but again, he was just the kind of opponent the pdins trained for.

    Thinking about it, the results really made perfect sense. As a wight with none of his own power, Adalmann was only as good as whatever he could summon. The pdins were way beyond what he could personally fight off. At the same time, however, Adalmann was a sort of elder statesman in the eyes of the pdins. He couldnt just run away from them, I suppose. Hopefully he didnt find the experience too humiliating.

    He wasnt all depressed, was he?

    He was

    Ah. Thought so. Better give him a pep talkter. So what happened next?

    After defeating Adalmann, said Veldora, they pressed on to the floors where my traps were set. I was watching from above, chuckling over all the pain and turmoil theyd undoubtedly be about to face, and

    And they actually dodged our masters traps, too! The slippery floors, the illusory walls, the Corridor of True Darkness, the death raysnot even I coulde up with some of that stuff, but they strode through all of it!

    Veldora and Ramiris gritted their teeth as they described it.

    The floors between sixty-one and seventy were Veldoras to decorate as he saw fit. His traps did take some victims, yes, but unless they died instantly, the pdins could readily heal them back to shape. Between that and their Resurrection Bracelets, as they put it, the team never really acted like they were in danger.

    And here I thought those floors were too tough. With a team ranked A or above, as long as the whole party didnt die at once, they could always bounce back. Something told me wed need to recalibrate the difficulty level a little.

    But my Elemental Colossus put in a real good fight! said Ramiris. He wiped out all the challengers, even

    Wow. If he can wipe out a team of pdins, thats nothing to sniff at. But hell, his sheer weight alone was a threat. He was impervious to swords or magic, he moved like a jackrabbit, and his weight had to be measured in tons. Hed be anyones nightmare.

    So why was Ramiris all despondent?

    Well, it appears that seeing the pdins struggle against that boss frustrated Lady Hinata quite a bit, Mjllmile said with a grin. At one point, Sir Fritz, one of the pdinmanders in the party, said to hispanions Why, Im not even sure Lady Hinata herself could conquer this foe.

    Hmm. Yes, if Hinata was therean angered Hinatanot even an Elemental Colossus could stop her. In fact

    So, uh, how far did Hinata get?

    Y-yes, um

    Thats the problem!

    It really shocked me. In the space of a single day, Hinata made it all the way down to the ny-fifth floor. Even if we spotted her at Floor 61, thats an insane amount of speed.

    She made quick work of the Elemental Colossus, stopping it in its tracks and using Disintegration topletely destroy it. Before much longer, she was at Floor 80, beating the boss there with pretty much a single blow.

    My apprentice Zegions in pupal form at the moment, so he was in no shape to get moving, Veldora exined. Apito woke up first, but she couldnt keep up with that girls speed, so she got whipped.

    Yeah, that was quite a fight! Being a queen wasp, Apitos agility puts her at the top of the monster kingdom. And she was trying her hardest tond a blow on that Hinatady, but she fended off every single one, said Ramiris.

    Mmm. Yeah, if its Hinata involved, I could kinda see that. Shes a strong one. How I even managed to beat her was still a mystery to me.

    And then she kept on going! Floors 81 through 89 are each ruled by one of Kumaras followers, but she knocked them out, one by one.

    Right, and Kumaras still too young, so I let Beretta serve as the boss of Floor 90, but Hinata beat him!

    Ah It looked to me like Beretta had gotten stronger, but I guess he tangoed with the wrongdy, I said.

    Mm-hmm. Its incredible, replied Ramiris. I cant believe people dont call Hinata a Hero.

    And with that, Hinata called it a day and settled down in her elegant suite on the ny-fifth floor.

    She had spent yesterday conquering Floors 96 to 99, the dragon floors crafted by Milim that were supposed to be the toughest we had to offer.

    The Raging Earth floor, you knowthe earthquakes are one thing, but the gravity traps are murder on you, continued Ramiris. Its about five times normal gravity in there, so youd think shed have trouble moving around, but

    But neither lightning from the heavens, nor bone-chilling cold, nor searing heat seemed to work against Hinata.

    So then it was finally time for my appearance.

    Whoa, really, Veldora? You fought her?

    I did. I take allers! As thest boss, I will flee from no challenger!

    And what happened?

    This was Veldoraof course he wouldnt run. But I needed to know the results. Veldora was stronger than me, so I couldnt imagine that he lostbut the question was how Hinata decided to approach this.

    Oh, I won, of course. But she was rather strong, I will admit. Her sword skills reminded me a tad of the Hero who banished me, but her fighting style was quite the opposite.

    Hohh?

    Whether Veldoras victory was a foregone conclusion or not, I was kind of sad I missed the fight. I really wish someone thought to record it

    Understood. Unfortunately, all battle records appear to have been deleted.

    Yeah But damn. I cant believe how stupid I am for missing an epic event like that.

    I tell you, Sir Rimuru, I could hardly believe my own eyes! Ah, Lady Hinata was poetry in motion!

    Oh, Mjllmile saw it, too? I am so jealous.

    Yeah, I have to hand it to Hinata People argue over who is betteram I or is she? But honestly, every time the questiones up, my stomach starts to hurt.

    Ah-ha-ha-ha! Modest as always, eh, Sir Masayuki?

    Mollie, please. Thats not modesty at all. Its the cold, hard truth.

    Hee-hee-hee! Oh, no need to joke about that, Mjllmile. The smile on Masayukis face looked taut and thin as he talked his way out of the question.

    Mjllmile didnt get the message. Ah yes, indeed. I am sure that when ites to battle, there is never any joking around with you! Why, if you ever had the chance to wage battle against Sir Veldora, Im sure the results would be beyondprehension. Id love to have a front-row seat for that!

    Its funny. Mjllmile was usually such apassionate, empathetic man. But with Masayuki, he just didnt know when to quit. Please, just stop. The kid looks like hes about to have a heart attack!

    Oh, you think so? Would you like to have a bit of a sparring match, Masayuki?

    A bit of a sparring match would kill him.

    Now, now, now Yes, Masayukis a champion, but he uses his brain to fight more, you know? If we ever fought, I think Id have a slight edgebut with your oundish strength, Veldora, I dont think hed ever live up to you.

    I see, I see! Yes, I thought as much as myself. You always were a fine judge of character, Rimuru! Kwaaah-ha-ha-ha!!

    Whew. That oughtta do it. Praise him, and it immediately lifts his spirits.

    Anyway, back to the topic?

    For now, I needed to hear Veldoras story to the end. I nced at him, and he nodded back.

    Yes. You see, the Hero who sealed me away never made a single wasteful motion in her attacks. Byparison, that woman Hinata seemed to take a more varied approach, searching for something that could work against me. They were both coolheaded as fighters, never exposing themselves, but Hinatas style seemed full of needless strikes and movements to me.

    As he described it, Hinata executed a wide range of attacksevery kind of magic, amulet, and artifact she could think of; she deployed them all. Simple physical attacks dont work on Veldora, so I imagine she was experimenting to see what, if anything, would. But pretty much nothing she threw at him had any effect.

    That final attack of hers was a fine one, though. It even damaged me, albeit a very small, tiny amount. It reminded me of the Heros Absolute Severance skill, to some extent.

    He was talking about Meltsh, Hinatas ace in the hole and a finishing move that took advantage of her sword Moonlight. But not even that fazed him?

    Do you think she could be a threat if she used the right tactics?

    Ramiris thought about this for a moment. Hmmm, I think shes stronger than yman or the other, lesser demon lords, thats for sure. Even the Octagrams current members might have a hard time with her if they let their guard down. But my master heres in a world of his own

    Kwah-ha-ha-ha! Exactly! If she wants to fight even with me, shell need at least ten times the energy!

    Oh

    So not even Hinata was a good match for Veldora? I really wish I couldve been there to study that battle. If I saved my memory of it, it couldve been a great reference in the future. But there was nothing I could do now. Leaving the past where it belonged, I steered us back to the original topic.

    All right. So in essence, the second half of thebyrinth failed to function properly against the pdins and Hinata? But the bosses get resurrected, right?

    Yeah, but Adalmann is weaker than Bovix, yknow? And he helps me with research and stuffI think hes a real talent, but I dont think hes the best person for the Floor 60 boss. Also Ramiris began to visibly shake. Mymy masterpiece, the Elemental Colossus Its brokenand it wont go back to normal!!

    Then she broke down in tears. Huh? Wasnt he a boss?

    Did he not have the bracelet on?

    No, he did, came the downhearted reply. But he wont resurrect. He didnt back when you broke him apart, either.

    Apparently, golems that ur naturally can be resurrected in the Dungeon, but the types Ramiris built dont. That gave me an idea.

    Maybe its because they dont have a soul. Beretta resurrected just fine, so maybe yourbyrinth treats the Elemental Colossus like any other item?

    What?

    Hmm, that seems likely to me, agreed Veldora. Your authority fails to extend to him, Ramiris, because hes not counted as a potential target.

    It sounded right to me. Which means that even if I rebuilt it, it might just get broken down again. That wasnt going to happen too often, given its strength, but we should really address that.

    And before that:

    That takes a lot of time to build, doesnt it?

    It does! So right now, Floor 70 doesnt have any boss at all

    I knew it.

    Yes, and down on Floor 80, Zegion will likely be sleeping for a while toe. Apito has grown stronger herself, but she has far too little real-battle experience. I think she needs some training before we can have her serve as a boss.

    It turned out Apito was already receiving some remedial battle training. I wasnt quite sure this was what I put her in thebyrinth for, but she was gung ho about it, so I saw no harm in letting her. Hinata was her teacher, by the way; they asked her to help out in exchange for another chance at fighting Veldora. Hinata was already assisting with our kids, so giving Apito some battle instruction probably wasnt much more of a stretch.

    That left Kumara. The Kumara minions running things from Floors 81 to 89 were, in essence, magic-born manifestations of Kumaras own nine tails, one per floor. Each had their own free will, evolving and learning by themselves, but detaching them from her own body like that greatly reduced Kumaras own magicule stores. Thus, they decided Kumara would join with Alice, Chloe, and the rest and study under Hinata.

    All of this was decided yesterday.

    Okay, so we have no real bosses from Floors 60 to 90 right now?

    Thats right!

    Indeed. And that is why we have a problem!

    Ramiris and Veldora were sneering at me for some reason.

    Good heavens

    Boy, talk about bad timing, huh?

    Mjllmile and Masayuki were just as surprised to hear about this. I thought things were pretty chill with thebyrinth by this point, but I guess I was wrong.

    All right. I think I understand the situation.

    I heaved a resigned sigh.

    So now I had a stack of problems to deal with at once, but at least we knew exactly what needed to be addressed from Floor 51 on down. Plus, the traps Iid out were still in fine shape.

    I suppose itll only be a matter of time before someone ys the tempest serpentbut theres no need to panic!

    Ah, thats the confident Rimuru I know. You have a n?

    Hee-hee! I thought so. I knew there was nothing to worry about with you around!

    The anxiety seemed to vanish from Veldoras and Ramiriss faces. It was very self-serving of them, but I nodded back and exined my thoughts.

    Right. Like I said before, my traps begin to get serious from Floor 41 downward. Those are bound to trip them up.

    Ah, how reassuring to hear!

    Hmm? I suppose so, yes.

    And what kind of traps are these, Rimuru?

    Oh, is that what you ask? Better sit down for this.

    Well, the coups de grce are the slimes on Floor 49. Once you make it past a certain hallway, youre cut off from the rest of the floor and confronted with a huge pile of slimes. Bad ones, let me add.

    This swarm of slimes would merge together to form truly gigantic slimes, almost ten feet in diameter. The escape routes in front of and behind it were cut off, effectively stranding the poor victims. Physical attacksslices, blows, heavy impactsdidnt work on it, and in a closed corridor, not much magic was safe to use. Anything that exploded was likely to blow up in your face, so that was off the table.

    These slimes didnt have much attack force, no, but theyll maneuver to cover you from both sides, the ssic pincer strategy. If you can picture edging closer and closer to the wall behind you as one of them advances, you can probably see how much of a threat they could be.

    Kwah-ha-ha-ha! Victory is ours!!

    Yeah! Its in the bag for us now!

    Not so fast, you two. I didnt stop there.

    Im d my initial salvo was enough to make them cheerlead for me, but there were a bunch of other traps. Prepare to quiver in fear as I break them down:

    Slime Pool: What at first nce looks like a bouncy, rubbery corridor is actually a slimeone that opens into a soupy grave halfway down!

    Slime Rain: A storm of fist-size slimes descends upon you, each one small enough to work their way into your clothing and armor. Watch for acid burns!

    Slime Doll: Looks like a monster at first, but it tirelessly takes all your attacks, gradually exhausting you. Even worse, each attack you try on it exposes your weapon to corrosive acid. Try not to let your equipment get destroyed!

    And so forth. I had other ideas, but for this set of floors, I wanted the focus to be on explorer harassment. Breaking their weapons, in particr, could make it impossible for them to fight any longer. Its the perfect way to buy us time.

    Brilliant. Truly, a brilliant selection of traps. So even if we dont defeat our enemies with these traps, we win as long as we can leave them damaged?

    Thats right, Veldora.

    Hmmm And breaking their weapons is a good way to chase off the stronger contenders. I didnt think about that.

    Right. If you can beat them, its fine, but now theyre gonna have to think about what if they cant. It oughtta buy us some time.

    For now, these traps wouldnt do much more than slow the challengers down. That was a shame, but we needed that time toe up with more permanent solutions.

    So what do you intend to do with the time you buy? Veldora asked.

    Better give a serious response to that. Its important we dont forget that ourbyrinth isnt your normal, run-of-the-millbyrinth. This is the Advanced Dungeon, a newer, evolved type, and its meant to keep evolving and growing more advanced.

    !

    Yes, of course.

    So we just need to make adjustments so the Dungeon can handle things better next time. First off Adalmann. Ill figure something out with him. I wanted to change up the atmosphere in his boss room anyway, Ramiris, so Ill need your help.

    Sure thing!

    Adalmann had made it up to the rank of cardinal in his life; I think his job was officially high priest or something. In a party, hed be your back-row support type. Leaving him to serve as a boss solo was a mistake; he needed to be paired up with some kind of front-row partner. I had some other thoughts, as well, so Ramiris and I decided to visit Adalmannter on.

    Next came the Floor 70 boss.

    Well just have to make another Elemental Colossus, I said. And the perfect person for the jobs juste back.

    I could get the needed materials, so lets take that approach. But it wouldnt be any fun to just build the same thing again.

    The perfect person? Ramiris asked.

    I nodded at her. Yeah, Kaijin is back. He knows a lot about spirit engineering, so I think hell happily take the job. Plus, I think thisll help with the experiment I was conducting earlier. Ill show him my research results, so I think you can expect an even stronger colossus than before.

    Really? Oh, great!

    We couldnt produce immediate results for her, but with Kaijin on the team, wed be stronger than ever. It wouldnt be ready immediately, but itd definitely be a threat for the next set of challengers who made it down there.

    So for Floors 80 and below

    I think that will work itself out over time. Once Zegion wakes up, your garden-variety challenger will have no chance, let me tell you. And the dragons Milim got should evolve for us once they spend some more time in thebyrinth.

    Kumara was a growing creature as well. No need to hurry things along. The question was just how much time we could buy for ourselves.

    Okay. So thatll be our basic n. Now we need more time, and I dont think my traps are gonna be enough. So theres something I wanted to test out, and Veldora Ramiris I need your help.

    But of course.

    Sure thing!

    They both affably nodded. I returned the nod, then looked at Masayuki.

    Masayuki, Id like you to continue delving into the Dungeon. But instead of going past Floor 41, it might be best to focus onpleting the Ogre Series first.

    Very true. Sir Masayukis activities in the Dungeon are always good advertising for us, and I dont see much need for him to hurry.

    So I should let someone else get past Floor 40 first, then?

    Yeah. Also, I think you should maybe stay away from us for a little while. I dont want you getting caught up in our ns.

    Are you scheming something again?

    Masayuki leered at me. Well, thats mean. Hes acting like Im always hatching some kind of nefarious new caper.

    Well, let me keep that under my hat for now. But well handle things on our end, so Mjllmile and Masayuki, Id like you to keep things going as normal.

    Very well, Sir Rimuru!

    All right. Ill give the news to my party.

    Good, then. Now to see how long my traps can hold out.

    Okay, if theres nothing else, lets

    Oh, one moment. I did want to discuss something

    Just as I was about adjourn the meeting, Mjllmile stopped me. I guess he had other business to address.

    What is it?

    Well

    What Mjllmile had to say threw me a bit.

    Lady Hinata was asking me about her reward money for conquering thebyrinth floors

    Huh? I reflexively replied. Those prizes, awarded for clearing every tenth floor, were meant to attract the nobilitys attention. Whatd Hinata want with them? I mean, she did earn them, but

    She did not officially make it down to the bottom during normal operation, no, but as she exined it to me, if she yed by the rules, didnt she deserve to be paid?

    Mjllmile looked concerned.

    Okay, Hinata. Yes, youre technically right. But werent we kind of in this together? It was a test for us, too, and to them it was on-the-field battle training. I didnt see how money had to be involved.

    No. Turn her down for me.

    Are you sure, Sir Rimuru? If we do, she may decide to stage a more serious challenge in the Dungeon, wouldnt she?

    Its fine. Just remind her that people will learn she lost against thebyrinth master, and the wordll spread like wildfire.

    Kwah-ha-ha-ha! It is impossible for me to lose!!

    Nice. I knew hed pitch in at a time like this. Plus, if she really did stage another attempt, we could leverage that in our advertising.

    W-well, all right. But if possible, Id like you to break the news to her, Sir Rimuru

    What? No way.

    Yeah. No. I didnt want her hating me. Itd suck if she thought I was being a tightwad. Better to leave this role to someone like Mjllmile, with the firm, resolved attitude I needed.

    B-but if I may, riling Lady Hinatas anger honestly scares me a little

    Thanks a bunch, Mollie!!

    I think he was about to say something, but I cut him off. Sorry. Im just not into doing that stuff. A pretty girl like her, you know, Id like us to stay friends. Besides, Mjllmiles got a mafioso face and isnt afraid of anyone; he thinks of everything in terms of profit and loss, so Im sure hed have no problem saying no.

    Im also sure that I just imagined it when I thought I heard him sadly mutter Perhaps Ill use my pocket money, then under his breath.

    That wrapped up our agenda. Leaving the now-grieving Mjllmile to himself, I went on with my business.

    I told Veldora and Ramiris our meeting time tomorrow. There was some prep Id need to wrap up before then, but before that, I had one errand to attend to. Shion was on standby outside my chamber, so I took her along with me to visit Shuna.

    Shuna was overseeing dinner preparations when we saw her, giving out instructions to her staff. There were more people in the kitchen now, the air alive with conversation between an assortment of species. The skill Shuna demonstrated by organizing them all showed her strength as a leader. I hated to interrupt her for my personal business, but we were battling against time here, so shed have to forgive me.

    Hey, Shuna. Got a moment?

    Oh, Sir Rimuru! By all means, tell me what you need.

    Shuna ran up to me when I called out to her. In this noisy kitchen, everyone was always kind enough to let me sample their dishes when I stopped by now and then. I tried to offer a quickment for everything I tasted, but I was in a rush, so our impromptu tasting had to wait.

    Sorry, guys, but I need Shunas help with something today. Ill be able to take my time in here next time, okay?

    Certainly!

    Stop by whenever.

    Waitll you see what weve been working on now!

    The enthusiasm was palpable. I guess meplimenting someone on their food was a kind of status symbol around here. Next time oughtta be real fun.

    Okay, Gobichi, can you run things for a while?

    Yes, Lady Shuna! Ready and able!

    Gobichi was second only to Shuna in cookery by now. He was the head chef whenever Shuna was gone, so we were in good hands.

    Right, see youter, I said, waving at the disappointed kitchen staff.

    We were on our way to Floor 60, Adalmannsir.

    Oh, thanks for that sandwich, by the way. It was good.

    Shuna smiled as we walked along. Im so d you liked it.

    Allow me to make a box lunch for you next time, Sir Rimuru! Shion was quick to volunteer.

    I considered my options before replying. Yeah, youre certainly improving by leaps and bounds. Could you maybe work with Shuna on one sometime?

    I thought I was safe trusting Shion by this point, but a little insurance never hurt. Shunas presence should keep Shion from going crazy in the kitchen.

    Perhaps tomorrow then, Lady Shuna?!

    Hee-hee! All right, Shion. Lets begin with something simple first.

    It was a pleasant exchange. Their musical performance had been in perfect sync, too, actually. Im d they were getting along.

    So we chatted along those lines as we reached the sixtieth floor.

    Adalmann, Iming in.

    Ah, its you, Sir Rimuru! Truly, recent events have filled me with anguish. I am fully prepared to ept any punishment you deem fit for my inferior self

    He immediately fell to his knees when I said his name. His penchant for exaggeration was as healthy as always, but I was used to it by now.

    Nah, as far as that goes, its our fault for misreading this. Youre not a good fit forbat against pdins. I dont think you couldve avoided that defeat.

    No, even now, Iment just how spiritless I was in battle. Losing to such inexperienced fighters I approached the battle as if I were still a wight king, but I lost after my magic failed to trigger

    Right now, Adalmann was nothing more than a powerless wight. A wight with some pretty advanced magic knowledge and battle experience, sure, but species-wise, he was just a low-level monster. There wasnt much magic he could fully harness, and the only creatures he could summon were equally low-level undead. Monsters had the capacity to evolve via the magicules in thebyrinth, but that took time. Adalmanns minions wouldnt be evolving for a while toebut what I was about to do would help him power up much more quickly.

    One of the most important things you can do is know the extent of your powers. Do you mind if I ask you a question?

    Yes! Anything.

    How much holy magic can you wield at the moment?

    Holy magic was, in essence, force stemming from faith. You didnt need to gather up magicules from the atmosphere, and it wasnt affected by the magic strength within you. If you had the right knowledge and enough spell-casting time, you could weave powerful magic without exerting a great deal of energy.

    What it did require, though, was a pact forged with a god. A god, for the purposes of this kind of magic, was an existence who could wield the spiritual particles that were the building blocks for magicules. It wasnt dependent on the caster believing in this or that god, or some other divine concept in this worlda god was just anyone who could directly interact with spiritual particles.

    In Luminism, for example, Luminus was a god for this reason. Adalmann was a devout Luminist, and bing a monster hadnt shaken his faith at all; thats why he could cast Disintegration as a wight king, I suppose. Now, however, he was worshipping me as a god instead of Luminus, and we couldnt forge a pact of faith with each other. I figured holy magic was thus out of the question, maybe.

    These days, not very much, I am afraid. Even lower-ranked magic is inessible to me.

    I thought so. Holy magic, in essence, worked the same way as spirit magic. A pact was involved, and you were borrowing force from a higher power to cast your spells. Not even Hinata could cast holy magic without borrowing Luminuss powers. If the human race didnt align itself with a god like Luminus, theyd lose ess to one of the most effective ways to handle monsters.

    Itd be ironic if it werent so scary to think about. If Luminuss whims had driven her to go in a different direction, the world mightve wound up far more chaotic than it already was.

    All right. So let me ask you, Shuna: How much holy magic can you use? And whats your faith pointed at?

    In my case, it is not exactly holy magic. It is an imitation, powered by my unique skill Parser, and it works surprisingly well.

    Ah, I see. An imitation? I did leave her to analyze the barrier over our town,e to think of it. Maybe that let her copy a subset of holy magic as a side effect.

    And in addition to that:

    My faith is in you, Sir Rimuru, and theres no doubting the power that brings me. Thats why I think I might be able to do this. Shuna gave me a somewhat bashful smile.

    Huh? But when you fought me, didnt you say that even monsters could use holy magic?

    I was bluffing, Shuna replied, still smiling. It was a bluff I was quite sure of, but you wound up proving it for me, Sir Rimuru.

    Adalmann gave us a quizzical look. It was surprising how much variety there was to his facial expressions, being a skeleton and all. But regardless.

    The most important element to executing holy magic was faith. Faith was intertwined with connections in the soul, and it might be that Shuna inadvertently grasped this at the deepest level. If that was the case, I just needed to present my theory and have Adalmann learn it. He should know how it feels, so I didnt think itd be that hard.

    Now, Id like both of you to ept for me what Ill call the secret skills of faith and favor. I just learned them from Luminus not long ago, and its strictly ssified information, so keep that in mind.

    As a former high priest, I figured Adalmann could rediscover holy magic once he could connect with me. Even now, when his magicule count was nothing like it used to be, holy magic ought to make him a lot more useful in a fight.

    The secret skills of faith and favor?

    Ah, ahhhh Now I too shall bask in the powers of the truly divine He was even more stifling than usual today, but I put up with it.

    Um, Sir Rimuru, do you mind if I ask a question?

    I hadnt thought about it until now, but for the first time in a while, I was being carried by Shionin slime form, of course. I didnt want that to stopit wasfortable, after all. This holy-magic talk would fly straight over her head, I was sure, but I had to be confident she could keep it secret.

    Dont tell anyone, all right? I said to her.

    Of course! came the energetic reply. I was happy enough with that, so I went over the basics of my n with Shuna.

    I see So I can learn holy magic as well if I can believe in you?

    Right. I think so. Its something you can research in your free time anyway. Maybe talk about it with Adalmann and stuff.

    All right. I look forward to seeing how much of it I can learn.

    Shuna was picking this up fast. With her Parser skill, maybe learning Disintegration wasnt a pipe dream, even.

    As for Adalmann:

    Oh, ohh, ohhhhhh!! I am swelling, overflowing with power!!

    He was pretty excited.

    Holy Cannon!!

    With a red light sparking up from deep within his eye sockets, Adalmann pointed a hand forward and screamed. A concentrated ball of energy flew out from his palma bolt of Holy Cannon, a full-fledged holy spell. A powerful one, too, and one he had generated all by himself.

    Ohh, Sir Rimuru, my god

    He prostrated himself before me in worship. I wish he wouldnt. It kind of made my spine prickle.

    Great, um, that worked, huh? Now keep practicing so you can start casting some higher-level magic. And if somethinges up, you can always turn to Shuna for advice!

    I was clearly trying to hurry things along. Shuna, understanding my intentions, lightly nodded.

    Ah. So you want me to be his adviser since you dislike dealing with him yourself?

    I heard that question loud and clear, but pretending I didnt was probably the best move here. If she could just assume Im an insensitive clod who doesnt understand anything for myself, thatd be great.

    I promise I will live up to your lofty expectations, Sir Rimuru!! Adalmann, meanwhile, was energized like never before.

    I decided now was a good time to give him another important piece of advice. Now, as a wight, if you cast a holy spell, doesnt that damage you?

    There were two types of holy magicone neutral type that worked with spiritual particles, and another of the holy type that canceled out magicules. Holy Cannon was thetter type, and as a monster, I figured that would cause him damage.

    Ha-ha-ha! A little pain is nothing that would faze me

    Ah. Adalmanns just soldiering through it. But that doesnt really solve the problem. I could tap Berettas Reverser unique skill to flip the holy attribute around to demonicbut thats another future research topic.

    For the time being:

    Then how about this, Adalmann? Still enveloped in Shions chest, I sent a beam of light into the air.

    Ohhh!!

    I removed the holy attribute and powered it up a bit. Its called Holy Ray, and its my own creation.

    Holy Ray is a neutral attack, neither holy nor demonic in nature. As long as you didnt screw it up, it would never damage the caster. However, it was a trickier spell to castin other words, it required the user to have more faith in me

    It was meant for a single target, and in terms of spontaneous force, it was better than my Megiddo spell. Itunched quickly and emitted a bright light, but it was actually a long string of concentrated, spinning spiritual particles. As a piercing attack, it wasnt as powerful as Disintegration, but took much less time to cast.

    Wonderful. Truly a wonderful spell!!

    Adalmann was beside himself with joy. If he could master this spell, it might help him get used to manipting spiritual particles in general. Then hed be able tounch bigger beams with tons more lethality. This was one of the spells Raphael developed based on my requests, and for Adalmann at the moment, this was the most ideal weapon I could give him.

    Ill be d to discuss magic with you at any time, so dont be afraid to contact me.

    Shuna had already kindly epted my request. That was, to say the least, a relief.

    All right. Keep up your training, then, and try your best to learn holy magic that wont damage you.

    I wanted that to be a focus. It wouldplicate fighting otherwise.

    Raising a hand to quiet down the jubnt Adalmann, I then tackled our next problem.

    So right now, you dont have too many ways to attack. We can help you gradually build up an arsenal, but before that, theres something quick we can do.

    How do you mean?

    Well, youre more of a back-row fighter by nature, right?

    I would say my role more often was to provide rear support, yes. When I was a wight king, Id often use summoning magic to bring forth an army of undead, overwhelming foes with my sheer numbers.

    Im sure he did. There was no rule that said a floor guardian had to fight solo, so all we had to do was bring on someone to take up the front row for him.

    Right? So I think it was a mistake for me to pit you against parties of people.

    Yes, I do have a variety of martial arts at my disposal, but with this body of bones, its all rather ipatible

    No, thats not the issue. He mustve mistakenly thought I was scolding him. Punches and kicks werent going to solve anything.

    Nah, nah, dont worry about that. If youre fighting a single person, then fine, but if its more than one, call for some friends of your own. You had one, didnt you? I think his name was

    Oh, you mean my friend Alberto?

    Yeah, right, Alberto. I guess hes a skeleton right now, but he used to be an imperial acolyte, didnt he? Good enough with a sword to trouble Hakuro, even. Thats the kind of strength you need. And if hes got the right equipment, he can still cut it in a fight today, right?

    Yes, with his talents, I am sure he can live up to your expectations, Sir Rimuru.

    I could sense the pride in Adalmanns voice. Now I was getting more confident about the idea I had.

    Okay, can you give him this equipment for meter?

    I produced a set of gear from my Stomach andid it out on the floor. Previously, I had heard Alberto was capable of fighting without a shield, so I figured this was the best set for him:

    Cursed Sword: A one-handed, medium-length sword that absorbs life force from its surroundingsincluding the wielder, making it a failure as a weapon.

    Cursed Mail: Produces a constantly deployed barrier with high magical resistance and defensebut also continually saps the wearers life force.

    These two items were coborations between Kurobe and Garm, both trying to extract as many features from them as possible. They were nning to create a whole series, but they shelved it once they realized no living being could use them. Garm, in particr, actually copsed while crafting them; things were touch and go for a little while. We couldugh about that now, but given that backstory, we were all a bit loath to just throw these things away.

    Besides, they both worked really great. Unique-caliber gear, you could even call them. But since monsters count as living creatures, too, we figured they werepletely unusableand now, as I realized, thats no issue at all with the undead.

    What do you think? You dont feel sick or anything holding them, do you?

    I feel nothing in particr. We are already dead, after all.

    Adalmann checked them himself to be sure. The moment he unsheathed the sword, Shuna and Shion began to wincethat life-absorb feature mustve been working. Given how Adalmann wasnt fazed at all, undead mustve been impervious to it.

    Great. I think youll be okay, then.

    Back in its sheath, the sword no longer sapped our energybut that alone could make it pretty decent for attacking.

    Oh, and theres this, too.

    It was a surcoat, an outer garment, made of my Sticky Steel Threada superior piece, resistant to heat and cold and also resilient against ded weapons. These were circting around as part of the Tempest-made goods we had avable, but we charged an arm and a leg for them.

    Very well. I will be sure Alberto receives these. He will be overjoyed, I promise you!

    Great. With Alberto fighting for him, Adalmann would have a lot more options in battle now.

    Oops. Just remembered.

    And, Adalmann, I want you to have this.

    I took out a jet-ck robe, like something a priest from some dark, sinister cult would wear. It looked kind of cool, actually, not to mention gaudily decorated. It was, in fact, one of the most impressive pieces of the whole Tempest clothing collectionsomething worth at least a hundred gold coins, or the equivalent of a luxury sports car. Even royalty or nobility couldnt shell out for this without due consideration. Truly top of the line. And it performed well, tooamazingly, even if it got ripped, itd use Self-Regeneration to fix itself up. That made it a magic item, one with features you almost never saw.

    Ohohhhhh

    Adalmann respectfully took it from me.

    Id like you to put that on and greet any challengers you see like youre still a wight king. I think thatll help create more of a floor guardian atmosphere with you, yknow?

    This was more a matter of taste than anythingmy tastebut still.

    I had also asked Ramiris to help me renovate this floor. We envisioned something like a throne room, with Adalmann leading an army of undead like the king he was.

    I will dly do that, Sir Rimuru. It happens to be one of my talents.

    Nice. It seemed like I could rely on him.

    Okay. Ill leave you be here, then. Also, if you have any other talented knights youd like to have serving you in here, knock yourself out.

    Understood, my lord. If I could check with you on one thing

    Mmm? What is it?

    Well, I would like to bring one of my pets here with me, but could I ask for your permission?

    A pet? Hmm Didnt seem like an issue.

    Well, sure, if thats all it is. You can use whatever pets you want in battle, actually; just try not to have them outnumber the parties attacking you.

    Yes, my lord. I have been granted thisnd by my god, and I promise you that I, Adalmann, will protect it with all the ability I can muster!!

    Overreacting again. I let it slide. It wasnt worthmenting on.

    Okay. Were gonna be renovating this space to look like a throne room tonight, so feel free to choose whoever you want to serve you. If you have any questions, ask Shuna or Ramiris.

    Yes, my lord!!

    May the words of Sir Rimuru propel you forward!

    Shion had to butt in there. I really wish she didntbut she seemed happy with herself, so I didnt pursue it.

    The next day, we all came together at the appointed hour.

    Hee-hee-hee Adalmanns floor is just perfect now!

    The moment she caught sight of me, Ramiris started bragging. As she had reported, shepleted the throne room the previous evening.

    Thanks much. The rest, I think we can leave to Adalmann.

    Are you sure?

    Welllll, hell perform better than he did yesterday anyway. If hes fighting an A ranker, hes gonna have trouble, but hell at least be able to expose his opponents skills for us.

    The longer Adalmann held out, the more serious his foes would get. Thats where Raphael would step in, analyzing the battle and figuring out how we should best respondvaluable info we could leverage in the next floor.

    Despite everything I said to Adalmann, it really wasnt any big deal if he lost. Besides, depending on the decisions we made right now, both he and (for that matter) Bovix may be idle for a long time toe. We needed to address every facet of this.

    So! Time to start implementing

    What are you doing?! I heard all about it! My dragons got pummeled?!

    Now thats thest person I wanted to seeMilim, storming into the conference room and looking absolutely livid.

    In her hand was Gobta, looking like a dirty old rag; he was being dragged along, but it looked like he was still breathing. I could hear him muttering Heh-heh-heh I did it I sure did I finished it all! over and over to himself, too, so I guess he was conscious. Milims training mustve really done a number on him, but he didnt look any stronger to mejust kind of (okay, a lot more) beat up. Was he all right?

    Milim nodded at me, oblivious to my concern. Ah yes! Yes, Gobta performed brilliantly! I didnt think hed ever beat Hell mode!

    She did look pretty satisfied. And judging by the praise from Milim, Gobta mustve performed a truly monumental feat.

    In that case, it is time to teach him my Veldora-Style Death Stance

    No its not! Gobta is my disciple!

    Veldora and Milim promptly began arguing, apletely spent Gobta to the side of them. I really didnt want to get involved with that, so Ill leave that choice up to Gobta. d hes home safe, at least. I was going to reward himter.

    Once I had his attention, I ordered Gobta to get some rest. He promptly headed to a nearby nap room.

    Did I mention Ranga?

    Mymy master, I have returned

    He was wobbly as he padded toward me, voice hoarse. Gobta looked bad, and Ranga was about the same. Pretty intense training, I guess. I reflexively gave him a pat on the head; he squinted appreciatively.

    Good job. You can rest in my shadow now.

    He jumped right in the moment I said it.

    By the way, once he had recovered enough, I asked Gobta what they were up to. It turned out that his training was nothing but on-the-field battleback-to-back fighting against monsters either at his level or slightly above it. Once he and Ranga were in perfect sync with each other, they moved on to a never-ending string of battles against people like Carillon and Middray.

    As Milim apparently put it to him: No matter how hard you try, youre never gonna house more magicules within your body. But dont worry! If you can Unify with Ranga, that immediately solves the problemand once you learn how to master the increase in power, youll be fine! So leave the magicule surge to Ranga and just try to polish up your senses!

    So it was nothing but battle-sense training since then, he concluded with a smile. He had also learned the extra skill Sage, which let him speed up his thoughts. I was pretty impressed.

    Having Milim back was a boon, actually. After leaving Adalmann, I had been making the necessary preparations all night, just barely wrapping everything up in time.

    Promptly, I took out one of the items I hadpleted. Veldora, Ramiris, and Milim each gave it curious stares as I held it in my hand.

    Pay attention, everyone! I have a special item here, something Ive been developing for a little while. Personally, I think its groundbreaking. Itll help us solve the problems were facing in thebyrinth, and itll also add some more fun to all our lives.

    I gave all three one of their own. I didnt expect Milim in today, but I was nning to invite her over once I had something practical to share, so hers was all set to go.

    The idea for this came from the homunculus Archduke Erald used earlier. I figured that having ess to temporary bodies would let you do some pretty neat stuff.

    Whats this?

    Never seen this before. Do I eat it?

    Hmm To me, it looks like a vessel for the soulor the like.

    Milim, Ramiris, and Veldora seemed equally curious. No, Ramiris, it wasnt food. Did she think everything I brought over for her was food? Oh, well.

    Veldora was fairly close to the right answer. These items were quasipartments for souls. When transferring your consciousness to a homunculus, a corridor is established between it and your soul using some magic. I had Analyzed and Assessed the coreponents of that magic, revising them for my own needs. This was what I gave to Treynia vessel for her chaos core. I called it a pseudo-soul.

    Veldoras almost got it. This device imitates a soul vessel. I cant provide a soul itself, so instead, I tried to create a substitute that mimics one.

    Hohh. Why did you do that?

    Veldora, maybe pleased he got it right, tried to sound as intelligent as possible. There was no need for me to put on airs; I could go ahead and just state my aims, but before that, I wanted to surprise them a little. After all the effort I spent on this, I thought I deserved a bit of fun.

    Hey, not so fast, not so fast. Ill exin everything to you, okay? But next up, Ive also got this. Take it and try to imagine a monster in your mind. Any one is fine.

    I then took out a set of ck balls, each about the size of a fist, and handed them to my audience.

    Veldora gave it an odd look. Hmm? Any type?

    Yeah. Either an existing one or whatever crazy thinges to mind for you.

    So a goblin or an orc? Or a horned hare, or an ogre bear, or anything?

    Hmm? Sure. But make sure its something you like. I dont want you toin about your choice afterward.

    All right. A monster, then? Do these create monsters who youll repelbyrinth challengers with?

    Something like that.

    He was always supersharp with things like this.

    Satisfied enough with my guidance, the three of them picked up their ck orbs and sank into contemtion. These items were called master cores, and the magical core of Charybdis came in handy with developing them. I had that kept in istion within my Stomach, but Raphael had finally finished analyzing it. It was the core of arge monster, as well as the root of its power; apparently, in the transformation into demon lord, I had consumed all the negative energy inside, so it was now an empty shell. That made it perfect for housing a soul vessnd now, here we were.

    After a few moments, the magicules in the air began to interact with the master cores, creating monstersthe exact ones each bearer imagined.

    Well? Pretty neat, huh? And like Veldora said, we can use these monsters to engage parties in thebyrinth. Thats what I gathered all of you here for.

    That wasnt the only reason, but nobody was listening anyway. They were all marveling at the monsters they created.

    Meanwhile, I was busy making my own monstera ghost, a transparent, disembodied soul floating in the air. Ill omit its stats, but one special skill it had was Cancel Physical Attackas a ghost, no physical attack worked on it. It couldnt attack physically, either, of course; magic was its only offense.

    Next up was Veldora. There was now a skeleton standing next to him. It couldnt cast magic, although it could learn howter onwith the right evolution, it could also master Battlewill.

    Milim, meanwhile, had generated a bouncy, lustrous blob. It had no limbs, its color a garish red that demanded your attention. It was a slime.

    Um

    Whyd you make a slime? Are you picking on me?!

    N-no, um, you asked me to go with something I liked. Whats the issue?

    Now she was firing back at me. Ah well. She was clearly happy, at least, her eyes all but shouting Slime! out loud. I was wondering about the Day-Glo red, however.

    Finally, we had Ramiris. What was this? A knight? Or a suit of armor? Yes, it was a suit of living armor, to be exactfull te, but looking worn out for some reason. It was still thergest out of the four monsters we made. Maybe Ramiriss hang-ups about her size drove her to imagine something big. The fact that it waspletely empty inside was pretty appropriate for her.

    Everyone peered closely at the monsters they just willed to life. But the surprises were only beginning.

    All right, so listen. As Veldora pointed out, Im thinking about using the monsters we created to dispatch the intruders inside ourbyrinth.

    Mm? Intruders?

    Yes. These monsters are the guardians of thebyrinth, so anyone stepping inside has to be intruders, right?

    Ah, I see.

    Huh? What?

    Mmm, indeed. Remember, Ramiris, we are running thisbyrinth. Calling them challengers is rather strange, if you think about it.

    Yes Now that you mention it, youre right!

    Yeah, I was thinking the same thing.

    Veldoras stepping in to exin matters was convincing enough for Ramiris. Milim, meanwhile, pretended she knew the entire time. I doubted she did at all, but I needed to move things along.

    Right. So well be taking on the intruders with thesebut do you think itll be possible at all?

    Of course not. They are far too weak.

    My armor looks pretty cool, but Im not too optimistic, no.

    Rimuru, Im disappointed in you! You know Im too smart a girl to expect anything from these.

    Heh-heh-heh. Just as I thought, they were spouting off whatever popped into their minds. Why were Ramiris and Milim acting so haughty with me? That set me off a bit, but I needed to act my age here.

    Well, the story doesnt end when you create them. The real show begins now, so Id like all of you to sit down and rx, okay? Now, what Id like you to do is point your pseudo-souls at your monster and chant Possess! out loud.

    There were some incredulous looks, but they all settled into their seats for me. We had some prettyfy chairs in this conference room; the cushioning was excellent.

    Then, all at once:

    Possess!

    The moment we all said it together, the pseudo-souls in our hands lit up as they were absorbed into the monsters, fusing with the master cores inside them. This resulted in aplete avatar coreand when it was done, my consciousness cked out.

    In another moment, my view had changed. My Magic Sense, something I had on at all times, immediately shrank down its range, drastically affecting my vision. I had my five simted senses now, so it was still far better than my first few days in this world, but the other three had never experienced anything like that, so it mustve been a bear to deal with.

    I looked around as I thought about this. In my hazy vision, I could see a skeleton stretching out its legs, a slime zooming around at surprising speed, and a suit of living armor methodically toddling around like a ssic wind-up robot. All three of them had sessfully possessed their monster.

    Even now, I could feel myself getting used to this. It felt far more natural than anticipatedlike it was my own body. A body that was far less capable than my own, however, so it was hard to move around. But once you figured out how you moved, it got easier to predict how your body would react to your will. You didnt need long at all to move it exactly as intended.

    The same was true for the other three.

    This is great!

    After a few minutes of testing out their new bodies, they all shouted in unison.

    Isnt it? What do you think of my research, huh?

    Amazing. Truly amazing, Rimuru! Veldora cried.

    Thats ssic Rimuru, isnt it? No wonder I thought you were such a great guy! Ramiris agreed.

    I knew it all along, said Milim. Ive always believed in you!!

    They were hopelessly wrapped around my finger. But hey, d theyre happy. Well, looks like weve got a resounding sess. And now that youve all jumped into those monsters, I dont think I need to exin what we have to do, do I?

    Heh-heh-heh, Veldora chuckled. Such a silly question. So instead of having the monsters do our bidding, we take matters into our own hands? What a creative idea, Rimuru.

    Exactly! I replied. Although, I wish I couldve tried conquering thebyrinth in this form

    So this is what a video game is like? Ive heard about this!

    What? Is that true, Veldora?! said Milim.

    Master! So well beat up the enemy like this, then? And then we can make these bodies learn new things, too? Ramiris jumped in.

    Gotta hand it to Veldora. He immediately guessed what I wanted to do. Yes, this was basically a pseudo-MMORPGalthough, there wasnt anything too massive about our party of four. Maybe just an MORPG, then? It doesnt matter. The key thing here, the concept, was that we could now enjoy the verybyrinth we expended the effort to build.

    Hee-hee-hee! Well put, Veldora. You can nearly read my mind, I see. But dont get the wrong idea yet. Yes, I developed this with an eye toward ying thebyrinth like a game, but we have other business first, dont we?

    Kwah-ha-ha-ha, we do! We need to use these bodies to dispatch the challengersI mean, the intruders causing us problems, then?

    He got it, all right. Yes, I thought about using these avatars, these monster bodies, to interfere with Green Furys rapid advance. And like Ramiris said, I had thought of several ways to enjoy these bodiesleveling them up to evolve them, learning how to fight with the restricted skills they had, and so on. Still, what I really wanted to do was go have fun beating up monsters and challengersI had no idea Id invent something so useful just to make that happen.

    Of course, once everything was ready, I was just thinking that we could enjoy conquering our ownbyrinth as well, I said.

    Ah, right. Well be able to test out our work, huh?

    Mm-hmm. And with these avatars, we cant exercise our full powers, right? So I thought itd help us get another perspective on problems in thebyrinth.

    Yes True. And the master of thebyrinth taking on challengers himselfsome people might see that as unseemly. But copying my soul into a weaker beast like this

    Right! This way, we can beat up intruders as regr oldbyrinth denizens, not as True Dragons or demon lords.

    Now I get it! This sounds fun!! Milim was certainly convinced. Given the nearly infinite power she lobbed around all the time, a much more inconvenient form mustve seemed novel to her. She looked really excited about it.

    Well, shall we spring into action?

    Yes, why not clean up the garbage before enjoying our own game? said Veldora.

    The time hase to fully stretch out my arms, Id say! said Ramiris. I cant wait to test all forty-eight of my finisher moves!

    Im not sure how any of this works, but this seems kinda fun to me! Milim cheered.

    We all triumphantly stood up. Time to go down there, get in Green Furys way, and ensure they couldnt challenge the bottom floors for a little while. How would we do that? Well, I had a few other schemes in mind.

    First, we needed to get used to our avatars. After that, the next important thing was equipment. We all put on Resurrection Bracelets with infinite charges, ensuring we could die as much as we wantedbut that wasnt enough. Our avatars were freshly born and extremely low level. Pushovers like us wouldnt deter Green Fury, no matter how well we surprised them. If we had some decent equipment, though

    Right, well definitely want to get some equipment together. Lets go to Kurobes and have him craft some weapons and armor!

    Ah yes, indeed! Im a mere skeleton as it is, after all.

    Hee-hee! You fools! Im a slime built for speed and mobility now! I could work just fine in thebyrinth!

    Um, Im just a suit of armor Can I put more armor on over this?

    Oh, we can figure something out. Lets just head over. And if you dont need equipment, Milim, just stay here.

    D-dont give me that nonsense! I can hold my own as it is, but I still need some gear!

    Talk about selfish. She shouldve just said so. I wanted some equipment as well, so I prepared to undo the Possession and leave.

    To go back, just picture the word separate in your mind. Thatll bring you back.

    I gave them a quick demo, putting the avatar core in my pocket as I taught them. These avatar cores had the monster encoded in them, one per core, and they couldnt be shared between different people. These cores were a second self for you, really, so I wanted to be sure people took good care of them.

    With these, I added, youll be able to call on your second form anytime you like.

    Pretty neat item, definitely. Well need to think about what to do with them while were busy Possessing.

    Veldora and Ramiris, back in their original bodies, stood up from their chairs.

    Maybe fit it on our Bracelets so we dont lose them? suggested Veldora.

    Thats a good idea. I think Ill do that! said Ramiris.

    They both yed around with the avatar cores in their hands. I think Ill do that with mine as well. But what about Milim?

    Hey, Mili

    Im gonna go like this!

    Before I could call for her, Milimin slime formwas digging her way into my pocket. Okay, lets go! she shouted, bossing me around and demonstrating her utterck of interest in listening to me. She mustve really liked that body. Pretty childlike of herwhich, yeah, she is a child. Calling a child childish wasnt very constructive, so I gave up on scolding her and got going.

    We were at Kurobes workshop.

    You there, Kurobe?

    Oh, Sir Rimuru? What brings you here today?

    Kurobe came right up when I asked for him. Seeing Veldora and Ramiris with me surprised him.

    Well, were looking for some weapons, I said as we walked inside. I hadnt been around for a while, but the workshop definitely had more people nowmonsters included. It was scorching hot as usual. Temperature didnt affect me, so it was fine, but working in here mustve been grueling for the others.

    Looks like youve hired some more apprentices.

    Yeah, luckily! They still need practice, but some of em are pretty talented.

    Some of them looked up as they heard us talking in the workshop. Once they saw who I was, they leaped to their feet and bowed at me. Seeing all of them do that at once startled me, but Kurobe was used to it.

    Its not break time yet! Get back to work!

    His ornery shouting drove his staff to return to their jobs. But I kind of understood their thought process. If youre sitting at your cube, and the CEOes in out of nowhere, youd be nervous, tooespecially if you were on the bottom rung. And maybe it didnt feel that way to me, but I was the ruler of this nation. I hadnt let it concern me before now, but maybe I should have given more advance warning as a rule.

    Coming in casually like this mightve just caused trouble for everyone. Whenever a district manager or whatever came to view our workce in my old world, wed always spend the previous day cleaning up the whole office to prepare. If it was the president, then no mistakes would be tolerated. The higher up you went, the more it unnerved people when you got all casual with them, I guess.

    Still, I didnt want every trip out to be filled with pomp and circumstance. I hated to call Kurobe out of his busy work schedule; better for me to just show up whenever hes free.

    Sorry I barged in without any warning. I think Im gonna make a regr habit of it for a little while, so no need to get all tense, okay?

    Thus, I decided to address the staff. Maybe them being too casual with me would be a problem, but there was no need to be on pins and needles around me. I loved acting like a boss, but I didnt make a hobby out of inconveniencing people. If the other persons too nervous to react to me, that bothered me, too. Gobtas obliviousness was just right. Just keep in mind the acronym TPOtime, ce, asionand it was easier to find the right approach.

    My advice seemed to relieve the staff a bit. Once I was sure of that, I nodded and went into a room deeper inside the workshop.

    I wasnt aware of this, by the way, but the apprentices werent anxious just because I was a demon lord.

    While I wasnt paying attention, someone had held a Tempest poprity contest, and apparently, I had been voted into the top-three idols alongside Shuna and Shion. A surprising result, they told me. Ramiris and Milim were in the rankings as well, and while I wont say exactly where, I can tell you that Milim and I were way ahead of Ramiris.

    I wasnt sure whether to whine about it or marvel at how my towns grown. Either way, hearing about itter made me roll my eyes.

    So what kind of stuff dyou need?

    In his personal chamber, Kurobe got straight down to business.

    Well

    We all went over the hopes we had.

    Im intending to have Garm build the armor, so I think itd be neat if you could coborate again.

    Yeahhh, true. All right. Lets go bother Garm about it.

    So as we talked, we decided to take Kurobe over to Garms workshop. I wound up causing a simrmotion over there, but Ill skip describing it.

    Equipment for monsters?! Wow. You always have the craziest projects for me, dont you?

    As Garm groused about this, the four of us all Possessed our avatars to demonstrate for him.

    All right. Well make you exactly what you wantno, even better!

    Yes, were on the case. I love a nice, creative project like this, and Ill try to craft some stuff thatd never work on a human!

    Kurobe and Garm both readily agreed to the project. And really, I couldnt wait to see what they came up with.

    They said the work would be done in several days, so in the meantime, we trained ourselves to get more used to our avatars. Nothing tooplexfighting monsters in thebyrinths upper levels, attacking obvious newbie adventurers.

    Over the past few days, we had grown adept at dividing up our roles. Reaching that point, though, was a slog. At first, we even lost to beginner parties up top.

    Wed also get wiped out by traps, which would probably be funny to uster but definitely wasnt at the time, and do other stupid things. We tried using magic items to keep traps from deploying and stuff, even. It was Ramiris who kept setting them off, with Veldora usually suffering as the hapless victim. I floated, meanwhile, and Milim could stick to the ceilingpitfalls werent a concern for us two, so we forgot to warn the others about them.

    That was a mistake, Ill admit, but Ramiris Seriously? Why are you setting off traps? We made sure to give her an earful about it, and I think she deserved it.

    Through all the pain, we skipped out on sleeping to keep on training. In battle, teamwork was the most important thing. Normal parties would talk to one another or give signals with their eyes, but we had pretty much none of those skills at all. We had Veldora and Milim with us, after all, two people who were the strongest in the world all by themselves.

    What we did have, however, was one cheat-level skillThought Communication, letting us stay in touch and give orders with pinpoint uracy. I was the partysmand post, Veldora, Milim, and Ramiris serving as my hands and feet. Thanks to that, we began to rapidly build ourselves, eventually gaining some decent experience and abilities.

    Once we had a good footing, we patiently waited for our equipment as we fine-tuned our teamwork. As we did, we heard the news that Team Green Fury had beaten Floor 40.

    Hoo boy, said Ramiris. Now theyve beaten the tempest serpent, huh?

    They took a pretty careful approach. The first team was all about gathering intelligence, the second whittled down its energy, and then the A team killed it, said Veldora.

    Bosses were resurrected regrly, of course. But if a boss sessfully beat a party, that didnt erase its current damage or state of exhaustion. If a group of people had the right teamwork, this gave them a clear advantage.

    That was a mistake. Bosses really need a way to heal

    Yeah, but those monsters work strictly on instinct, so

    As Veldora saw it, theycked the intelligence to use healing items anyway, making it a moot point. He was right, but we werent out of options.

    Why dont we bring it up with Treyni? I suggested. Thebyrinth managers can heal monsters, cant they?

    Oh, right. Ill do that!

    So we decided to have Treynis sisters heal bosses if they were involved in a consecutive streak of battles all at once.

    Little by little, we were addressing and solving thebyrinths issues. And then:

    Theyre about ready to hit Floor 49. Whatll we do, Rimuru? Milim was on the verge of panic. But she was right. Green Fury would reach their most climactic battle yet as soon as tomorrow.

    Well, we may not have our equipment at the moment, but Id say our teamwork is golden, said Veldora. Shall we try taking them on now?

    Im game! Time to use my arms of steel to beat them to a pulp! Ramiris crowed.

    Those two were always out for blood. Honestly, though, I dont think we stood much of a chance in a clean fight. For now, Floor 49, packed with the most devious traps I ever devised, was our only real chance at messing with them.

    Well, so be it. Maybe we can scrounge up some weapons

    Even if Kurobe and Garm provided us the best gear possible, we probably wouldnt take a frontal approach with them. Itd certainly up our chances a lot, but we could probably hold our own anyway. But just when I was about tomit, I heard a knock on the conference-room door.

    Sir Rimuru, came Shions refreshing voice, Kurobe said hes ready.

    Our party looked at one another and grinned.

    Our specialized avatar equipment wasplete.

    I was given a Death Scythe and Hell Garment, two magic items that even ghosts could wear. Veldora got the Death de and Hell Mail, along with a Hellgate Shield toplete the picture.

    As a slime, Milim could only equip simple objects, swallowing up a Death Stiletto and covering her body with a Crimson Cape. The moment she did, her body grew a pair of bloodred wingsquite a transformation. See? she gleefully shouted. Its really true! You need to equip your items, or else they wont work!

    Yeah, great. If she was happy, I was happy.

    Finally, Ramiris. She had ordered Heavy Fullte armor, which looked like a work of art, but we werent sure if she could even equip it. Nervous, she Possessed her living armor and tried to take it upand at that very moment, she switched armor. With a tter, her old tin suit crashed to the ground, turning to dust and vanishing in the wind. She had upgraded from living armor to heavy living armornot an evolution, but more like a total recement.

    Wh-whoa! This is so much easier to move in!

    She was right. Her old, creaky gait was now smooth and ninja-like. Itd help her teamwork a lot, I was sure. Funny to think a suit of armors feature set could affect the way you moved, though. Kind of an unexpected discovery.

    ted, Ramiris now had to select a weapon and shield.

    Ha-ha! I dont need no stupid shield!

    was her opinion, so she opted for arge two-handed weapon insteadthe Death Axe. The power it packed made it the ultimate in weaponswielding it was tricky, but oh well; not my problem. She got picked on all the time for being a wimp, so maybe thisll assuage her ego a little. Funny how her personality kepting out like that.

    So we were all decked out in brand-new equipment. These weapons and armor were all on the level of a Unique item, but since they were heavily modified for use by monsters, they were more novelty items than anything. For beginners like us, however, they were crazily overpowered. Whats more, they had a type of curse applied that registered our names to themthus, they could never get stolen.

    It was the best equipment we couldve possibly asked for right now, and it gave us a new perspective on everything. It was almost time to rumble, and we couldnt have been more excited.

    Time for a quick check of our avatars. My ghost dropped physical offense in favor of magical and spiritual attacks. It was ssed as a sorcerer, and in time, Id like to maybe teach it spiritual and illusory magic so it could make the upgrade to full-fledged wizard. Holy magic would be a nice addition, toowhat would happen if I ced faith in myself to drive that? Thatd be a fun experiment.

    Veldoras skeleton was an all-rounder, capable of various kinds of attacks. It was a fighter ss, and I think he wanted to teach it magic so it could be a magic knightter.

    Milims slime, meanwhile, was geared entirely for speedand fornding telling blows in a single strike. Wish fulfillment for her, I suppose. Her ss was assassin, and maybe I could have Soei give her some training, but I didnt want to upy his time with our dumb little make-believe fun here. Her basic strategy involved lunging down on foes from the ceilinga powerful strike if it worked, but what did she intend to do if it didnt? Run, I suppose; she certainly was fast enough for it. In a way, she was the ideal slime fighter.

    Finally, as youd expect, Ramiriss heavy living armor was an attacker with more than ample defense, giving it a lot more stability than I originally gave her credit for. The ss was berserker, and while she was no crazed warrior, defending herself was never really a priority in Ramiriss approach. As a dangerous, attack-oriented creature, that was the name she was given. Once she got used to things, I could picture her as a tank, providing a twin wall of defense with Veldora.

    We were all set to go. Given that we never got hungry, long, dragged-out battles were our lone major advantage. Lets do the best job we can to get in Green Furys way.

    Such was our thoughts as we set off, butwellwe sent them running so fast, the actual battle was a total letdown.

    If you threw away all emotion and ran apletely impartial, third-party Analyze and Assess on our avatars, youd realize that we were probably already pushing an A in rank. Our equipment was more than half the reason for that, but even without it, as long as we made good use of our powers, nothing could stop us.

    The main oversight we made was that our own personal battle experience was reflected in our avatars. We couldnt use all our skills, but things like Thought Communication and Hasten Thought were themselves enough to give us a decisive edge. Plus, we could cast magic so quickly that it was really unfair. Our restricted magicules blocked us from using much of it, but we had the knowledge for it, and thus we could handle magic better than even your average royal court sorcerer. This came with no casting time, so we could engineer tandem magic strikes with practically zero timegour foes had no chance to react.

    Veldora, meanwhile, was such a genius with his sword, it was like he had eyes in the back of his head.

    Kwaah-ha-ha-ha! My Veldora-Style Death Stance gives me instant ess to an infinite number of sword skills! Oh, wait, this doesnt work

    He was trying to imitate the moves he saw in the manga he read. I thought he was just screwing around, but some of his moves were actually kind of usible. His power was off the charts to start with, of course, so I shouldve expected anything and everything from him. Treating this whole thing seriously at all now seemed silly.

    Milim was exactly as zing fast as she set out to be. Even speeds that nobody else had a chance at controlling were no problem with her reflexes. I really had no idea slimes could move that fast if they triedsliding frictionless across the ground, with enough sticity to bounce off walls and lunge at foes. That worked just as well off the ceiling, too. Your average person would have trouble even following her with their eyes. As a slime myself, these new discoveries were a huge shock.

    Ah-ha-ha-ha-ha! Slow! Too slow! Face my wrath, you chump!

    She was getting exceedingly carried away as she dropped down on her foes backs, stabbing with her Death Stiletto. That was enough to end most battles. Her body wasrgely impervious to physical attack, and if you want to cast magic against her, you needed to capture her in your sights first. Think about it, and youll realize that Milims slime was a pretty scary enemy to face.

    But what let Veldora and Milim truly shrine was Ramiris, the unsung hero of the pack.

    Hraahhh! Time to be crushed!!

    Ramiriss battle strategy was pretty simplefind an enemy, run straight at it, and stage a full-frontal attack. This would be a bad idea for most, an imbecilic strategy, but in our case, it was the way to go. She never listened to any of my advice anyway, so I figured we might as well take advantage of hershed be our tank, our diversion, and the remainder of the party could get on the attack then.

    Normally, that wouldnt work too well, but Ramiris ran around like a daredevil, never bothering to defend herself, this big suit of armor sprinting for you and spinning a Death Axe in its hands. Anyone who saw it would be forced to deal with itand since she didnt care about defense, her attacks tended to find their target. (She also had Cancel Pain, which helped a lot.)

    Plus, the armor itself was pretty sturdy. A Heavy Fullte used what seemed like a cartload of magisteel; weight concerns were tossed out the window with it. It came with a Self-Repair function as well, so most damage wasnt an issue. If a regr person put it on, they probably wouldnt be able to move at all. Having such a hefty chunk of magisteele your waywell, I wouldnt want to be her enemy.

    Whats more, I had Recovery Magic.

    I had been experimenting with holy magic as part of my work, and it was surprisingly easy to deploy. It wasnt a matter of having faith in myself so much as offering prayers in exchange for control over spiritual particles, a skill usually shut away from me. In my case, my magical power as a ghost was sent over to the real me along with the words of prayer. I was, in essence, borrowing force from my main body to cast magic.

    These words of prayer were mainly about building up an image. When working with spiritual particles, youd never get anywhere if you kept asking what your disciples wanted and going with thatitd take too much calction. All that processing work is instead applied to the people who ced their faith in you. The more disciples you had like that, the more magic force you gotto put it another way, you got higher up as a god. You were also connected to your believers, and you could use those believers minds to expand your calction capacitykind of a substitution cheat that saved you magic force and time.

    Now I saw why Luminus sought to build more believers for herself. With a massive enough number of practitioners, she could whip uprge-scale magic on a passing whim. The secret skills of faith and favor, indeed. Thats some scary stuff she taught me.

    But enough about that. The point is, I had holy magic, and as a party, we boasted a pretty formidable forceand right now, like evil personified, we had just wiped out Team Green Fury on the forty-ninth floor.

    You should never be afraid to try something new, I guess. Our frontal attack failed, so we polished our teamwork and took advantage of the traps.

    I set the Slime Doll on them, damaging their weapons. I used the Slime Rain to break their focus and exhaust themand then we attacked, throwing them into the Slime Pool. While Ramiriss bellowing grabbed their attention, Milim sneaked up on them, breaking down their teamwork as Veldora split them apart and isted their rear support. Our giant slime crushed their powerless magicians and thieves, while Veldora and Ramiris bear-hugged the remaining core members straight into the Slime Pool, sinking them down. Our aim was to destroy their weapons in the acidic goop, and once Green Furys main weapons had corroded into useless fragments, thatd be a huge damper on their dungeon-conquering speed.

    Ugghh! After all that swag we earned!!

    It turns out the leader of the Sons of the Veldt, the one currently whining about the equipment dissolving in her hands, was female. That surprised mebut not as much as what herpanions said next.

    Well, maybe this timings for the best. It was about the right moment to pack up.

    Yeah, our home countrys calling for us anyway.

    I definitely heard one of the survivors from the team say that to the leader. I thought the Sons of the Veldt was an independent mercenary corps, unaffiliated with any other nation. My reports stated they were being funded by someone in Englesia, but maybe it was more like a long-term gig? The term home country indicated that they mightve had more loyalty to Englesia than a simple employer-employee rtionship. Id need to keep an eye on them.

    As long as we were encouraging people to use the Dungeon, wed naturally see visitors with murky origins. I was expecting that from the beginning, but we should probably give everyone another heads-up about that. The whole Green Fury thing reminded me of it all over again.

    Besides:

    We did it.

    Yes. Victory is ours!

    Why wouldnt it be? We are the strongest in the world!!

    If I didnt keep these idiots in line, theyd immediately get distracted by the next victory ahead. The thought was in my mind, butright now, at leastI didnt let it get in the way of my joy. Mission aplished.

 Volume 10 - Ch 2.1

    INTERLUDE

    MARIBEL

    Maribel had been resurrected as an otherworlder. She had memories of being a ruler in Europe. In her previous life, she had all the finances she wanted; to her, war was just another pawn for her to use.

    Her glory was built on misfortune. A battlefield, bullets flying. Kill or be killed; a vivid hellscape bathed in blood. Burnt homes, lost families, wailing people. And she never held any remorse about it. Maribels life was a happy one, all the way to the end of her natural life span.

    And now she was here, born as a princess in the small Kingdom of Seltrozzo.

    Her family was in the ruling ss, the people calling the shots in the Western Nations. In this world filled with monsters and chaos, nations couldnt afford to squabble with one another; it was natural that something like the Council of the West would be formed. That council was built hundreds of years ago by Granville Rozzo, the great founder of the Rozzo family and a mysterious, seemingly ageless figure.

    He was the oldest among the Five Elders who held actual power in the Council, while still serving as head of the Rozzos, who had taken root in the Western Nations. Even a princess directly rted to Granville wouldnt have so much as a chance to see him. Maribels own brothers, in fact, had never even met the Five Elders before. But Maribel was different. Her memories, and her will, were things Granville couldnt afford to ignore.

    The advance of civilization would have been impossible without the existence of money. People advanced from using crops like rice and wheat as currency to a money-based economy, pushing society forward by leaps and bounds thanks to the scale money allows.

    The value of money could also change. Gold and silver coins were made of metals with intrinsic value, guaranteeing that the money itself would have simr value. But now we were in an era where things like receipts and bonds in business transactions could serve as substitutes for moneythe start of a paper-based economy. This would lead to the creation of banks, outposts indispensable to free exchange. You gave banks money; they gave you receipts as they diverted the money to other things, lending it to those without cash and earning interest from them.

    That was the business model people eventually came up with, and it was a kind of magic more insidious than alchemy. Money, in the form of interest, seemingly appeared out of nowhere. Comparing the amount of cash circting in the world and the total amount of receipts generated, there was clearly going to be a substantial amount of irrecoverable fundsas well as people in deep trouble after not being able to pay up.

    If you lent money and charged interest, you would always have that problem. The shift from coinage to paper currency only sped up the process.

    People collected money from the rich, dangling interest payments as bait. They invested it to create even more money. Business exchanges began to take ce on a worldwide scale, beyond national borders. Limits on the production of paper money were removed, under the pat promise that the nation would be good for it all. Combine that with exchange controls caused by power differences between nations, and the scale of the economy blew up to dozens of times its original sizeand Maribel was even factoring the amount of currency produced into her calctions as she controlled the market.

    Much of it was a fiction, far removed from the actual economy. A bubble that was bound to pop sooner orter.

    In her past life as well, Maribel blew the bubble up as much as she could. Any debts she couldnt recover, she shunted off on the weaker nations and disposed ofin other words, waging wars to bnce her ounts. The weaker nations thus fell, and the rich got richer. The parties being harvested for everything they had went from individuals to whole nations, but the basic process was the same.

    Maribel was a seasoned master at this. She was a golden child of finance in her previous life, and she had both her memories from that and the intensely powerful greed of a ruler. This manifested itself in her unique skill Avarice, a sinful skill based on one of humankinds core vices. If a unique skill was a set of emotions and desires that took corporeal form, those based on a cardinal sin like greed were treated as special cases among uniques.

    In the case of Maribel, the strongest member of the Rozzo family since the day she was born, that truth was obvious. The Avarice skill let her hold sway over peoples desiresshe could literally see them, and the bigger the desire, the easier she found it to rule over them. Everyone had desires, of course, and stoking those desires let Maribel control them any way she wanted. And, little by little, she used that to slowly build her audience of sympathizers.

    There was no urgent need to act. Observing the people around her, she could tell that the standards of civilization in this world were pretty low. There was a money-driven economy but still a single currency that circted across the whole of it. There were nonguage barriers; everything was different from thest world, but in a way, the environment was perfect for her to take advantage of. To Maribel, the whole world seemed like a sandbox, ready for her to y in.

    Yes Yes. I am destined to descend upon this world as its rightful ruler.

    Ruling this world, to Maribel, was a natural goal to have. Once she was older and had the right to speak up, the world was hers for the takingbut until then, she thought, the fewer people who knew about her ambitions, the better.

    Ever so carefully, she made sure no one could guess her true nature from her behavior. And when she was three years old, she had her first audience with Granville.

    So youre Maribel?

    Yes, Grandfather. It is a pleasure to meet you.

    It wasnt a three-year-olds usual way to greet someone, but Maribel had ounted for that in her calctions. Granville wasnt like the other rabble skulking around the pce; to her, even her father, the king, was just another pawn. Her brothers, her wet nurse, her servants, and everyone elseas she read their desires, she methodically brought them under her rule.

    But Granville was different. He was above all that.

    Why didnt you try to control me? Granville asked, seeing that Maribel had promptly dropped the act. There was no familial kindness to it. All that existed was the rtionship between the ruler and the ruled. It was then that Maribel learned her instincts were correct. If she had tried to deceive Granville, she likely wouldve been killed on the spot. Not even Maribels Avarice skill was omnipotent. It could be resisted. After repeated, gradual attempts, it mightve been possible to bring Granville under her rule, but he wasnt the kind of man to allow that.

    Maribel was confident of that, so she decided to be honest. No matter how things yed out, she would need partnersand along those lines, Granville could potentially be the greatest partner shed ever have.

    I can see peoples desires. I mean literally see them. And prodding them allows me to make them do my bidding. But youre not like the others, Grandfather. You have a greater ambition than anyone else, but youve also got a will strong enough to bottle it up. So

    Hmm. So youve seen that far, little girlor should I call you Maribel? Who are you anyway?

    Me? Im Maribel. Maribel the Greedy.

    Heh-heh Ha-ha-ha-ha-ha! I like it. Dering your very presence before me, are you?!

    The head of the Rozzo family liked Maribel. In time, they opened up to each other, sharing in the secrets they knew. Granville knew about the politics surrounding the Western Nations, as well as the demon lords who ruled the world. Maribel knew about her previous world, as well as the Avarice skill she acquired in this one. To her, this was the gamble of a lifetime.

    Her brain was one thing, but her body was still that of a three-year-old. As she saw it, itd be difficult to survive all on her own.

    No matter what it takesno matter whatI need to firm up my position. And to do that

    To do that, she needed to prove to Granville Rozzo, the local kingpin, that she was useful. Instinctively, she understood that was the best thing she could do right now to set herself up as ruler.

    And the gamble paid off.

    Maribel, if something happens to me, I want you to inherit my ambitions. What I seek in this world is peace. We must reach a world of universal equality, under the rule of the Rozzo family.

    Yes. Yes, Grandfather, I understand. I promise I will provide you with my full cooperation.

    Thus, this unlikely pair forged a bond that none other could enjoy. The family founder and the little girlthe alliance between a former Hero and one whose avarice knew no bounds.

    Granville spent the next several years guiding Maribel, instructing her on the full array of Rozzo holdings and coconspirators. He also revealed the true identity of the god Luminus, as well as his own secretsthe underground dealings he engaged in to protect his seat in the Seven Days Clergy, as well as how the demon lord Luminuss power was what truly kept the Western Nations safe.

    He told her everything. And now, at the age of ten, Maribel was second only to Granville in power, using her skills to the fullest to take action against Rimuru.

 Volume 10 - Ch 3

    THE COUNCIL

    Here in Seltrozzo, a small northern kingdom, a conversation was underway between a boy and an old man. The boy was Yuuki Kagurazaka, grand master of the Free Guild, and the man was named Johann RostiaCouncil mainstay, generous benefactor to the Guild, and prince of the Kingdom of Rostia.

    As hisst name suggested, he was the elder brother of Rostias current king, but he was also one of the Five Elders who controlled the Council. He always held his confidential meetings here, in Seltrozzo, a small, rural nation perfect for avoiding the eyes of the Western Nations.

    This was because Seltrozzo was home to a safe house run by the Selt Foreign Information Bureau, the leading intelligence agency in all the Western Nations. The SFIB was established as a risk-management group, surveilling thends outside human control and preparing for any uing monster threats. It had a group of talented agents, all of them ranked B or above, and its small number made it truly a team of elites. Any location under their protection would be impossible for foreign agents to infiltrate, and that was why Johann used this house for all of his most delicate meetings.

    Well, can I hear your report, then?

    Right. Its pretty clear that the demon lord Rimurus fully on to me. I went out of my way not to leave any evidence, using merchants from the East and so on, but regardless

    Then cant you talk your way out of any suspicion?

    Yes, my own staff suggested the same thing, but theres no guarantee talking my way out of it would keep me safe, you know? He is a demon lord, keep in mind. Rile him the wrong the way, and itd be like stepping on a tigers tail.

    Yuuki didnt hide the fact that Rimuru was suspecting him. He had no reason to. After all, Johannthis Five Elders memberwas essentially Yuukis boss.

    Boss was the right term, because this was strictly a business rtionship between the two, one that existed because they both profited from it. The Council funded the Free Guild, and in exchange, the Guild carried out work for the Council. It was a simple, give-and-take sort of agreementon the surface.

    From the Guilds point of view, they couldnt survive without support like this from the worlds nations, the funding and preferential ess it received for its organizations work. The Guild had more influence now than back in its Society of Adventurers days, but in terms of power, it still wasnt above the Council. It was the behind-the-scenes support from Johann the Elder that helped Yuuki develop the Free Guild as much as he had these past few years; that was another reason Yuuki had to mind his manners around him.

    And you cant defeat this demon lord?

    Are you kidding me? The way I see it, you could assemble a hundred A rankers, and it still wouldnt be possible.

    Youd go that far? Perhaps its smarter not to make him our enemy, then. But

    Johann paused, his sharpened eyes ring at Yuuki, before continuing.

    it is the elders opinion that the demon lord Rimuru is a hindrance. And your missteps are the cause, Yuuki.

    Oh? What do you mean?

    Your little conspiracy with the demon lord yman. If that had seeded, we wouldnt have had to deal with those sniveling Eastern merchants to open trade routes with the Empire. Once we had secured that, all wed have to is wait for Veldora to fade into oblivion a few centuries from now, and the Forest of Jura would no longer be a threat. In fact, demon lords like Carillon and Frey couldve served as protective walls for us. And now look.

    Well, I dont see what I couldve done, you know? You really cant n for someone like him.

    Johann was one of the people aware of the ns Yuukis group was working on. They were applying their own spin to the games yed among the demon lords, trying to work them to their own advantage. And the whole reason that was possible

    Yes. Yes, youre right. You couldnt have done anything. We never couldve imagined a monster like that in our way. But couldnt you have bested him?

    It was the young girl who entered the room now, silently closing the door behind her. Maribel Rozzo, the very person whod formted this whole n. She slipped into an ornate chair, joining the other two.

    Oh M-Maribel. And is the venerable Granville with you?

    No, Ivee by myself today. But Id still like to hear the answer to that question.

    Maribel turned to Yuuki, paying Johann little mind.

    Its just not possible, he replied, as if captured by her gaze. Rimuru alone would be a challenge, but hes got the Storm Dragon with him, too, you know? Forget it. Theres nothing anyone can do about him.

    You saw Veldora?

    Yeah. He was going around in human form, but he introduced himself as Veldora and everything. Yuuki meekly answered the question.

    Maribel expected nothing less from him. Right. The demon lord Rimuru is the key to sealing Veldora away. If we let that evil dragon free, hell spread ruin across the whole world. Grandfather told me himself.

    Indeed, Johann said. Your grandfather personally witnessed the darkest days of that dragons rampage. Hes always quick to remind me of why our god is so fearful of him.

    Yes, and now Rimuru has tamed him. Meddling with them is dangerousbut if we want my Rozzo family to prosper, we need to crush the rise of Tempest.

    What a headache this is. Yuuki, couldnt you defeat Rimuru if you truly put your mind to it?

    Johann was now repeating himself. Combined with Maribel, they had now asked the same question three times. Didnt Yuuki have what it takes to beat Rimuru? But this time, Yuuki had a different answer.

    Were talking about someone not even Hinata could beat, you know? Its gonna be really hard for me to win if I fight him. My chances could go way up under the right conditions, but

    What it sounded like he meant was: If it was just the demon lord Rimuru by himself, maybe they could make it happen.

    So whats your next move? Maribel asked.

    My general strategy will be to avoid direct confrontation with Rimuru. Even if I did beat him, I just dont see it earning us much. Wed have to pay far too much of a price for it.

    Yuuki went on to discuss their future ns, including Kagalis uing ruins expedition. As Maribel had ordered, he was leaking out the info he gained from yman, and Maribel and Johann were now acting on it.

    Maribel thought for a moment.

    Eliminating Rimuru, or at least rendering him harmless, was something she wanted to achieve at any cost. The greatest wish of the Rozzo family would have to go unfulfilled otherwise. Maybe itd be easier to seize the world if they worked with the demon lord, but Maribel had already deemed that a poor choice.

    The problem was their differences in thinking. With this world as well, Maribel intended to take it from a single, gold-based standard currency to a paper-based economy spearheaded by each individual country. She wouldnt eliminate the current money system; shed just implement new currencies in each nation. It didnt have to be paper either; silver or copper or whatever was fine, too. Basically, if she could build a world where currency markets went up or down depending on the power of all nations involved, then perfect.

    Thats how foreign exchange worked, and itd be the Coud the will of the Five Eldersthat set it up. That was the one absolute must to victory herethey needed to be the people deciding the value of things. Against the weaker nations, theyd even levy punishing taxes or conscript their poptions into military service in the name of monster hunting. It was a perfectly legal way to subjugate one nation under the rule of a stronger one.

    All the conditions were in ce. There were no outstanding issues to deal with. Maribels n to economically rule over the nations in the Council of the West was proceeding along fineeven Granville was happy with it. They had spent the past few yearspleting the groundwork for it. And now, with the rise of Rimuru and his nation of monsters, it was all going haywire.

    Maybe things werent in crisis mode yet, but Maribel could see what was in store. The demon lord Rimuru would likely offer the Western Nations their defensive support, in a bid to win their trust. With all that military power in the backdrop, hed have them open up an economic rtionship, to a certain extent, using Blumund, a small kingdom, as a foothold into the West. Hed run all the logistics, give his people the joy of working, and guarantee their safety.

    I wish he wouldnt mess with me, Maribel thought. Otherrge nations, like Dwargon and Thalion, were alreadyplete, permanent packagesshe may not have liked them, but she could ept them. But right now, Tempest was riding straight into Maribel and herpanions home turf. If they expressed a desire to join the Council of the West, itd be like torching their personal hunting grounds. A deration of war.

    She refused to ept that. She was sure that she and the demon lord Rimuru were ipatible with each other at the core. There could only be just one rulera single, overwhelming force. You had to be the one calling the shots, or else you were never promised a sure victory. And as long as the Rozzo family was attempting to rule all of humanity, Rimuru would always be an obstacle. Even if they could work in harmony at first, it was clear to her that theyd grow apart over their respective interests.

    That was why Maribel saw the demon lord Rimuru as such a threat.

    It was easy to say shed eliminate Rimuru, but actually doing it was much harder.

    She had participated in the Founders Festival, so she could have a chance to observe him. It took some convincing with Granville, but he gave his okay after she promised not to do anything to Rimuru. The visit convinced her that she was right all along. Tempest was just too attractive of a city, brimming with desires, and in time itd be the cutting edge of trends, building a new age for the whole world. The more they opened up and forged deeper rtions with other nations, the more valuable itd beand before long, the Rozzos would no longer be able to make unteral decisions.

    Yes Yes. Everythings going the way the demon lord Rimuru wants it

    The mere thought made Maribel want to fly into a rage. She resisted the urge as she pondered how to respond.

    Defeating him was out of the question. Even if they seeded, they had no idea how Veldora would respond. Letting a monster capable of wiping out a force of twenty thousand elites single-handedly go around unfettered was the height of folly.

    So that left rendering him harmlesseither through coercion or persuasion.

    If they opted for coercion, Duke Meuss failures offered some important lessons. Maribel had perfectly set the table, hoping to indebt Rimuru in a way that followed every rule. Instead, Rimuru followed the rules to take revenge. The duke was a fool for misreading the opportunity, but what really deserved praise was the personal connections Rimuru enjoyed.

    Yes. If theres a snake in the grass, youd have to be a fool to prod at it

    And now the demon lord wanted to join the Council. It was easy to oppose that.

    Maribel had cornered the market for grain, in anticipation of uing wars. Now, thanks to Farmuss civil war, the marketce was having to turn to private stores to keep their shelves full.

    Maybe we should disguise people as night bandits and have them torch the viges around the big cities. That way

    They could keep raising the prices of staple foods, as well as restrict the amount of bread that entered the market. With the smaller nations, just a little bit of tightening could lead to major food distress. When peoplecked food, they got angry, and that anger was directed at the people who started the war. There was nothing easier than riling up the unintelligent masses, and pinning all the me on Rimuru would be a straightforward task.

    And thenvoil. The representatives from those smaller nations would oppose Rimurus Council bid. Itd be perfectly simple for Maribel to engineer.

    But

    No No. It used to be a given that you couldnt magically transport food, but I guess that demon lords made it happen. Judging by the sheer variety on offer in their dinner banquets, I think its safe to assume that. And given his connections to people as big as King Gazel and Elmesia of Thalion, epting him would probably lead to fewer problems

    Engineering food shortages in the smaller nations could just give Rimuru a chance to provide them with support. If they scoffed at that n and tried to coerce him out of it, theyd just be repeating Duke Meuss error. As Maribel concluded, trying something that already failed once could very easilye back to bite them.

    She wasnt self-absorbed enough to think she could carry everything out wlessly. All she needed to do was proceed slowly, methodically, and carefully. With that in mind, winning Rimuru over to her side seemed more doable.

    If we want to sway him, we should try meeting with him and offering a chance to join a united front. If Im willing topromise a littleNo, I cant do that. No need to be timid. Im Maribel the Greedy. Whether hes a demon lord or not, I swear I can rule over him!

    Theres no other option, she thought.

    The unique skill Avarice could freely control its target, ruling over their desires and making them do their bidding. Just as she had done with Yuuki, Maribel could easily bring him under her rule, with him none the wiser.

    She had not one, but two ways of doing this.

    The first was to overwrite the targets desires with Maribels own, making them into a cooperative partner with the same goals. This approach had a weaknessshe needed to be within conversational distance of the target to trigger it. Plus, like a slow-acting poison, it took a certain amount of time to take full effect. If she didnt want to arouse the targets suspicion, shed have to make several contacts with them to make it seem more naturnd since the conversation would need a reason to take ce, there was only so much desire she could inject at once. It required a major timemitment.

    The second approach, meanwhile, went much fasterit involved using Avarice to force the target to ept her rule. A quick injection of greed could even destroy the targets self-awareness, turning them into a living puppet.

    This, of course, was much more dangerous. Depending on the size of the targets desire, this approach could also take some timeand even if it only took a few seconds, thatd be more than enough for someone as powerful as the demon lord Rimuru to kill Maribel. Taking this tactic required very careful preparation, which was why Maribel immediately gave up on it against Granville.

    Those were the two ways Avarice could take over a person. And given the way that it worked on peoples primordial desires, there wasnt a soul in this world that could resist it. The main drawback was its dependency on time, not to mention the size of the targets desire.

    No matter which approach she took, Maribel couldnt take over a target unless they had a certain amount of desire inside them. Therger that desire, the firmer the grip Maribel could have over them. But what if the desire wasnt big enough? Given that Avarice controlled peoples desires, if there wasnt much to work with, the skill couldnt influence them enough to be sessful. She could prod that desire, inting it enough so she could take hold, but again, that took time and opened her up to suspicion.

    That was why she couldnt take over the mind of Hinata the Saint. Maybe she could if they met more often, but Hinata wouldve questioned her motives if she kept popping in for no reason. Maribel couldnt risk that much danger, so she gave up on the effort. On the other hand, she held regr secret meetings with Yuuki through Johann the Elder. Seizing his mind was easy.

    Now her main question was Rimuru.

    I saw him up close, but he didnt seem to have much desire despite all his outrageous behavior. Its not fair

    At the dinner banquet, she had a direct view of Rimuru. With that insight, she felt what might be just barely enough to rule over his desires. With a desire that small, she could take it over quickly with just a few sessions, but it wouldnt give her much overall influence on his behavior. Of course, once she got that foothold, the rest woulde falling down after it, she figured.

    If worse came to worst, she could use her final option. If that worked, the demon lord would be Maribels to use as she pleasedand since Rimuru had tamed Veldora, the Storm Dragon would essentially be hers to control as well. A dragon even the supreme being Lubelius feared. An attractive prize, to be certain.

    Best to keep up my observations for now. Then I can consider my options ande up with the safest approach to subdue him!

    Her mind made up, it was time to concoct a strategy.

    Yuuki advised against direct confrontation with Rimuru. Thats why the demon lord Kazalim, under the guise of Kagali, would be guiding him through the ruins. Those ruins had their dangers, but apparently Kagali had no intention of putting Rimuru in harms way inside them. She could use that as part of her game n.

    Lets send him a letter. We can invite Rimuru to the Council and see how he reacts.

    You think the demon lord would agree to it?

    No worries there. Joining the Council of the West is one of his burning desires.

    How curious.

    Well, Rimuru wants to work hand in hand with humans. He wants to prove that the monsters under him are harmless as long as we stick to his rules.

    Yuukis exnation made sense to Maribel, as dumb as it sounded to her. Being bound by rules meant losing your freedom. Doing away with your demon lord military force? Staying on the same tier as the human race? It seemed supremely stupid to her.

    So why dont we make that dreame true? Then I can inject him with my poison, said Maribel.

    Ooh, scary. Isnt Yuuki Kagurazaka just as strong as Hinata the Saint? If he and Rimuru fought for real, he has good prospects to win, I think. But now that you have him, you want a demon lord as well?

    Yuukis ambition is too strong. He doesnt even realize Im controlling him. He thinks hes making these negotiations out of his own free will.

    As Maribel exined right in front of Yuuki himself, this was a happy thing for him. Her rule over him meant that he wouldnt be pushed down by any excessive greed. Yuuki ignored it all, not responding to itthat was how perfect her domination was of him.

    And Im sure the demon lord Rimuru is like a child before you, Maribel. And youll have full control of him?

    What do you mean?

    Well, Im just worried that your rule could be broken, somehow.

    She shed a cold look at the flustered Johann. Theres no need to worry about that. Once I cloud someones desires, theyll never return to normal. Not unless you overwrite the desires I imnt in them.

    Maribel was greed personified, enough so to cultivate the unique skill Avarice within her. There was nobody in the world who could desire something more. She was fully convinced of that, and it made herugh off Johanns concern.

    Y-yes, I imagine not. I trust in you on that, Maribel.

    Johann the Elder tried not to invite Maribels wrath upon him. She was the de facto number two after Granville, and not even an elder was safe around her. If he got on her bad side, she might try to control his mind next. He had made a blood oath with Granville to avoid that, but once Maribel took over, he didnt think he could rely on that oath too much. Thus, he never dared to lift a finger against her.

    Everything we say in here is a secret, all right?

    Of course, Maribel. Im not in any hurry to die.

    Smart decision. Now, Johann, I want you to send a letter to Rimuru, leader of Tempest, for me. Ill write it out for you right now, so make sure it reaches him before the next Council meeting, please.

    Without waiting for a response, Maribel began writing the letter. The sight of her scribbling away on the fancy, expensive paper struck terror in Johanns heart. It was the kind of terror youd feel if a girl like Maribel, hardly even ten, treated bossing people around like it was her God-given right. She had the air of a ruler, and not one of the Five Elders was a match for her.

    All right, Maribel. You can leave that to me.

    He left the room quietly with Yuuki, not wanting to bother her.

    Even after Yuuki and Johann left, Maribel continued to weigh her options. She had all the time in the world. She would draw up ns,y out the framework, and see this through. She had more than enough pawns at her disposal. And once again

    Thisll be fun. Thisll be so much fun.

    Maribel, the girl who trusted not a soul in the world, got lost in her own reverie.

    The man fell to the ground, a flood of red, bloodlike particles shooting out in front of him. His eyes had burst open in surprise; he probably never saw iting.

    Ah-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha! You left yourself open, you fool!

    Milims excited voice thundered across the hall as the mans five remainingpanions grew tense and nervous. They banded together, keeping a wary eye on their surroundingsbut they could do nothing.

    Blowing wind, grow into a tornado and slice into my enemies! Time to rageTornado de!!

    Bunching up like that was a mistake, and I all but sneered as my Tornado de shed into them. This was kind of a ranged version of Windcutter, one that cost a lot of magicules but caused shing damage to multiple enemies within a given space. This made it great for battles against groups of foes.

    Milim had acted first, sneaking up on one person as he went ahead to check for traps. After killing him, she quickly shot out of the area to avoid getting caught in my magic. The group had no idea what happened; the moment they huddled up for safety, Milim was out of the way, and they were cut to ribbons by my Windcutter.

    Look out, its Scarlet! Be careful!

    Shit! That magic got Marja and Nadja. And Genes not breathing either?!

    Damn you! All of you!!

    The surviving enemies, beginning to appreciate their situation, started ranting at us. By enemies, of course, I meant thebyrinth challengers.

    We were dealing with a group of adventurers this time, by the looks of it, and a pretty well-bnced one at that. But our party had the power and experience to outss them. That first surprise attack took out the enemys main search specialist, and before they even knew we were near, my opening magded the first strike. Even before we noticed them, we had an invisibility magic deployed, allowing us to discover the enemy first. This magic was canceled once we began to attack, but by then, our foes had already lost one or two peoplethe magic attacker and healer in the back row, to boot. That decided the battle right there.

    Now that they could see us, the enraged front-row adventurers were making a beeline for us.

    Kwah-ha-ha-ha-ha! Tough luck!!

    Ohhhhh-hoh-hoh-hoh! Youre not getting past us!

    Veldora and Ramiris were certainly enjoying themselves as they withstood their charge. By now, I had nothing left to dojust take up a supporting role and make sure those two had enough space to move in.

    I used my Analysis magic to examine the fighters running toward us. Above them, I could see bright-red bars that were less than half full.

    They got less than half of their HP left. You guys can take care of them yourselves, right?

    There was no self-aggrandizing there.

    Yes, the red bars above the fighters heads showed their remaining stamina. That was what I configured my personal Analysis magic to disy; I tried to set it up like a video game for instantprehension. If other people used the same magic, theyd probably see something differentregardless, it was pretty convenient for me. The familiar readouts let me quickly confirm the situation and give out the most suitable instructions to my team.

    By this point, we were pretty much guaranteed to win. A front-row set of fighters with no rear support was no match for Veldora and Ramiris. With no one buffing or magically healing them, wed continually whittle down their stamina until it was over. A more careful party wouldve kept a barrier over them at all timesbut not this one, apparently.

    It didnt take long for my twopanions to prove me right, smiling insidiously as they shed the remaining three adventurers into a bloody mess. It was an easy win.

    Using Milims surprise attacks and my magic to dispatch the scouts and back row first was proving to be a sure-win tactic for us. Of course, wed been kind of overfishing the pond, so to speak, so our efficiency was starting to suffer. It wasnt perfect yet, but more and more parties were learning how to counter us. These challengers werent fools, after all, and they were clearly making a dedicated effort each day. I was d to see that, but we needed new strategies to deal with them.

    As I thought about this, the final survivor disappeared into a flurry of light particles. The battle was overanother sight I was getting used to.

    We did it! These punks were no challenge at all!!

    Heh-heh-heh Youre right! Were invincible, the strongest there is!

    Kwah-ha-ha-ha-ha! All these little ants! They leave me a tad unsatisfied, but

    Mypanions were getting thoroughly carried away now.

    What were we doing, you ask? Well, researching new battle techniques against thebyrinths challengers, of course. We were eager to learn, so wed been putting in a lot of hours down here.

    I mean, you heard of Team Green Fury, right? We were able to beat themst time, but we cant rest on oururels. They got called back to their home country or whatever, and they may nevere backbut maybe they just had some trouble procuring new equipment. We didnt know if theyd pay a return visit sometime, and we wanted to be ready to fend them off if it happened.

    Thus, even after Green Fury was behind us, we kept diving into thebyrinth, sliding into a familiar pattern of fighting off challengers. It kept thebyrinth lively, too.

    A few days after our pitched battle with Green Fury, Masayukis party made it past Floor 40.

    Masayuki really was born under a lucky star. Apparently, acquiring the entire Ogre Series of equipment was pretty simple for them. It was only natural, then, that they stomped all over the tempest serpent. Now their focus was conquering Floor 50.

    The news of Masayuki breaching the forties energized the rest of the challengers. That was just what we hoped for, and now the more talented parties were aiming for Floor 40 as well.

    Our experiments with releasing some videos of the boss battle gave us a huge response, too. The recording of Masayukis team fighting the tempest serpent, as shown on our projector, created buzz all over town; people wanted us to y it again and again.

    As Mjllmile and I saw it, this was a business opportunity. In a TV-free world like this one, battle footage from thebyrinth was as good as entertainment got. We may need to edit out some of the gorier contentbut then again, maybe thered be demand for the uncut version, for the right price. We could work on that. Of course, thered also be broadcasting rights, likeness rights, all those other little detailsbut I could let Mjllmile work on that for me.

    In fact, I bet Masayukis smile could sell a lot of different products. The endorsement contracts alone might make him rich. Hed be happy; Mjllmile would be happy; wed all be happy. Itd be a trial-and-error process, but Id like to see how that worked out.

    And video content wasnt restricted to the footage recorded by magical items. In fact, we had a lot more saved up. Raphael was reading a massive amount of data from thebyrinth and running Analyze and Assess on it made it possible to rey entire fights in visual form. We used that, for example, to create highlight reels for challengersand this, too, was a huge hit when we broadcast it. It really riled up the more attention hungry of the challengers; one of them reportedly imed his video footage helped him find a girlfriend.

    Even people who didnt really take the Dungeon seriously were starting to get into it, thanks to our shows. And I understood it. Maybe it was a little self-serving, but if it whipped up enthusiasm, then great. But it was our job to give them a dose of reality, too. Tough love was in order herewe couldnt let them get softand so we continued to hop inside our avatars and torment the challengers.

    Nowadays, people were calling us the Dungeon Dominators, fearing and respecting us. Our appearance had dramatically changed as well.

    The ghost I controlled now had a Fear Aura, a bluish-white, me-like shimmer that burned around its body. I liked it; it really added to the atmosphere. Veldoras skeleton, meanwhile, had all of its bones refurbishedafter seeing Ramiris change her armor out, he started whining about his own upgrades. A golden skull would suit me well, he said when I asked. Eesh.

    I thought about ignoring him, but considering my project for Diablo, I figured Veldora may as well join my experimentation with temporary bodies. I could, for example, rece his skeleton with a framework made of whatever metal I wanted to test out. Pure gold has durability issues, so I decided to go with the strongest material I had, although it was still in the experimental stage. It happened to be golden in color, too, so it worked well.

    This material is known as orichalc, a special alloy made by adding gold to magisteel and refining it with a denser dose of magicules than usual. Focusing on the evesting element of gold and other precious metals, I was hoping to add that element to magisteel as well. The results were a grand sessthis orichalc was better than magisteel in all aspects, not just strength. It was crazy. The only problem was that I couldnt produce much of itgold itself is both rare and unavable for mass productionbut hey, Veldora asked nicely, so I prepared an orichalc skeleton for him.

    Just like with Ramiris, the bones could be made of anything as long as he hung on to his master core. The conversion was a total snap, and now he was a gold-colored skeleton fighter. The durability far outssed his original bones; it was excellent, almost needlessly so. As he moved around in it, I kept a careful watch, seeing how much punishment it could take and whether any problems cropped up.

    Milim, meanwhile, was now a celebritya terrorizing sight that people had named Scarlet. Her unbelievable speed made her look like a crimson shooting star, they said. Her battle style, abandoning everything except speed and relying on quickness and critical hits, had made her a legendone spoken of in hushed, fearful tones.

    Even Ramiris had changed a little. Like the proactive fighter she was, she had taken on a more eerie presence, a purple Death Aura shimmering around her heavy living knights frame. One swing of her Death Axe overwhelmed her foes, and her unrelenting battle style made her well-known as a suit of armor who fought like a berserker. That knight might even be stronger than the real Ramiris Actually, I take that back. Wouldnt want to damage her reputation.

    So we had be famous in just a few days. The reaction from the challengers was just as great. They feared us, keeping a keen lookout for our presence. That made sense. We were stronger than some of the weaker bosses, and in terms of sheer malice, far above them.

    As I mentioned, our main goal was to research fighting techniques in thebyrinth. This wasnt ytime for usI cant emphasize this enough. Day in and day out, we gave our all to the research, and I was sure this persistent effort woulde in handy for us someday.

    And it did. Challengers would asionally use rare extra skills against usor even original magics that I presume they invented themselves. I learned a lot from that, and now that Raphael could obtain information directly from thebyrinth, everything anyone did in there could be examined in my research. Raphael ran Analyze and Assess on all of it, so the Dungeon was turning into a treasure trove of data for us.

    Even better, just as our personal battle experience was reflected in our avatars, the things we learned in avatar form were retained in our original bodies. This was an unexpected side effect, and I was considering how we could use it on things like new types of training.

    Our research was continuing on a daily basis, so I suppose its only natural that we learned a lot.

    One timejust one time, I promisewe got a little carried away and decided to try conquering our ownbyrinth. The result: utter defeat.

    With our current abilities, Bovix, boss of Floor 50, was like crashing into a brick wall. The frontal approach we preferred was useless against an over-A opponent like him. The effectiveness of our surprise strikes would need to be evaluated, but more than that, Bovix was just too much for us. I was d we could rely on him, but now we felt like we had to beat him.

    So we decided to get serious about building up our characters. Again, strictly for research purposes. Researchand training for ourselves, too. Definitely not for fun. Make sure you dont get the wrong idea here.

    We watched as the fleeing challengers faded into the distance. That was an easy one, I muttered. The other three nodded.

    We were on Floor 38 or so of thebyrinth, and given how close we were to the tempest serpent, there were a lot of strong fighters aroundpeople who could give us a tough fight if we didnt pay attention. For our current state, it was the perfect hunting ground.

    Just as we were about to keep going, the Replication of myself I kept in my office for emergency purposes contacted me. What could that be? I thought as the message EMERGENCY VISITOR shed before my eyes.

    I guess ytime was over. Wait, nowe werent ying. This was research. Very important stuff. I reminded myself of that as I returned to my office.

    There I found Shuna and Rigurd waiting for me, as well as someone elsea woman I knew well. It was the exdemon lord Frey, lounging in one of my chairs. I guess this was my emergency visitor.

    Seeing me enter the room, Frey walked right past Veldora and rested her eyes upon Milim behind me. She gave her a friendly smile.

    Ah, Milim! So you were here, were you? By the way, have you finished up the assignment I gave you yet? I found my watchmen bound and unconscious on the ground, but youll tell me what happened to them, wont you?

    The smile stayed on her face the whole time. This was more an interrogation than a friendly question, I felt. Frankly, it scared me. It wasnt even directed at me, and I still wanted to be anywhere but here. In fact, it was exactly like when my school friend came over to y after finishing his homework, only to have his mom find out he hadnt finished it at all, so she stormed over to drag him back by the ear. Ah, nostalgia.

    As for Milim herself:

    Gehh!! F-Frey?! N-no, um, I can exin everything!!

    The moment their eyes met, Milim grew intensely nervous.

    Welp. Guess the partys over for her. And lemme just make it clear: Weve got nothing to do with this. Okay?

    Ha, ha-ha-ha Milim, if you had work to do, you should have let me know, all right? I really shouldnt keep you here then, huh? Better head on back and get that work done!

    Mmm, rumbled Veldora, Rimuru is right. Our apologies for upying you so long with our research. You should have told us you had work to do. Sorry to drag you along with us!

    Y-yeah, yeah, thats right! Boy, Milim, coulda said something before we took you across kingdome!

    Ramiris got the picture for me, too. Great job. See? Thats the teamwork weve been building.

    Now weve hopefully demonstrated that we knew nothing and arent involved in any way. There were tears in Milims eyes as she looked at me, butwell, sorry. I dont think I can save you here. Also, please dont drag us into this.

    N-no! F-Frey, listen to me!

    Milim tried to protest one final time, but Freys iron smile sunk the effort. Resistance was futile. Milim was now hers.

    Picking her up by the scruff of her neck with her talons, Frey fully neutralized her. With that, she dragged her all the way back to her homnd.

    Phew. That was scary. I thought we were all going downtown there, but we made it through scot-free.

    But just as I breathed a sigh of relief:

    By the way, Sir Rimuru, what have you been doing all this time? Shuna had appeared behind me without warning, and she had a sharp question ready for me.

    Sweat that I knew I physically couldnt sweat seemed to bead up on my forehead. No. Im fine. This is fine. I wasnt ying this whole time. It was research! Yes! Research!

    My resolve firmed, I decided to make excuses. But before I could give it a shot, Veldora spoke.

    Hmm, I think we might be getting in your way here. Allow me to continue my sorcery research back in my own chambers. There is much deep knowledge even I may still glean from it

    He kept up his muttering as he took a volume of manga out and turned around.

    Hes running out on me?!

    By the time that thought crossed my mind, it was already toote.

    Oh, yeah, um, I think Ill join him down there

    Now even Ramiris was stabbing me in the back. They both walked briskly out of the room, leaving me to rot. I cant believe them! Only at times like these did they operate like a practiced team.

    But I couldnt dwell on my heartless friends. I had to give a reason fast, or else Shunas rage would scare me to death. A bad excuse would destroy me herecalling it studying or research seemed a little weak to me.

    As I watched Veldora and Ramiris leave, my brain cells went into full operation, desperately seeking the best response. Dammit. I couldnt think of anything. But I didnt need to panic yet. If itde to this, I had onest resort.

    Its time to shine, Raphael!!

    Nope. No need to fear. I had Raphael, a font of wisdom, on my side. Cmon, I begged my friend. Give me a shining excuse thatll get me out of this.

    And the result:

    Understood. There is no need to make excuses. Just stand your ground, and the problem will be resolved.

    Huh? No need to make excuses?! What do you mean, just stand my ground?

    Oh, there you are, Sir Rimuru! Ive been looking for you!

    Just as I had that thought, my beloved Mjllmile burst inside, looking harried as usual. So thats what it meant. Talk about deus ex machina. Mollie, youre a savior!

    Ah, hello, Mollie. I was expecting you here soon.

    Following Raphaels advice, I stood my ground and acted like I nned for all this. Mjllmile gave me an odd look, but then began nodding, seeing the wisdom of ying along.

    Ah, d to hear, Sir Rimuru. Weve received a letter from the Council, but have you had a chance to read it? It was in a very tightly sealed envelope, so Im wondering if its a request to visit them so they can deliberate over our admission

    Huh? A letter from the Council? They wanted to hold a conference to decide whether to let Tempest join them or not?

    So the moment hade atst. Really gotta hand it to Professor Raphael, though. Did it realize the Council would get to work right this moment for me? Ah, no way. Not even it could

    Understood. Green Fury was hired by the Kingdom of Englesia. Based on the timing involved, their primary goal was clearly to investigate matters inside Tempest. Also, ording to a report from the subject Soei, agents from multiple intelligence organizations were sending reports back to their home nations at the same time. Putting this together, it is very likely that moves were made over the past several days.

    Okay, maybe it could do it. It was just as the professor calcted! But I didnt remember hearing about any report from Soei

    Understood. It is believed that my lord was too preupied with his games to pay attention.

    Dont call it a game!

    They say theres no kidding yourself, but I guess theres no kidding Raphael, either. But it had a point. I was pretty serious about matters up until we defeated Team Green Fury, but after that, yeah, we were just having fun.

    But Raphael definitely got me out of a jam there. Patting myself on the back for not trying toe up with some convoluted excuse, I tried to frame it like I knew everything all along.

    Yes, I definitely think youre right. Their investigation teams were in thebyrinth as well, so I yed along with them for a bit. They all came hurrying back to their homnds after a while, though, so I figured wed see some movements soon.

    Oh! Are you talking about Green Fury, perhaps?

    You got it, Mollie. They were a little too strong in my mind, so I did some looking into them.

    That was a huge lie. I was just riffing on what Raphael said. But thats all right.

    I see, I see. Some secret investigations, eh? Very impressive, Sir Rimuru!

    Shuna gave me a broad smile and a nod. Thanks to standing my ground, I managed to pull the wool over everyones eyes.

    Now that the danger was past, I epted the letter from Mjllmile and looked through it. It definitely was an invitation from the Council. Raphael was proven right, and I had just saved a ton of face.

    Butman, that was close. Getting too caught up in games always trips you up in the end. That was a valuable lesson for me, and Ill try to temper my Dungeon time going forward. Ill need to be more carefll good things in moderation, and so on.

    The Council of the West is a league of nations dotted around the Forest of Jura. Representatives from each of its member nations gathered in Englesia every month for a conference, the aim being to work things out for each others mutual benefit in areas outside the jurisdiction of any single country.

    Each member nation, no matter how small, had an equal say as they all deliberated together. The ideal here was to protect the greater good for all humankindthe greater good, in this case, meaning preservation of the human-popted parts of the world.

    The Councils top priority was conducting anti-monster measures, but they also dealt with droughts, pandemics, typhoons, earthquakes, and other disasters. When it came to the distribution of extra food and other goods between nations, deliberations could often get mired in intergovernmental differences, so for essential goods and services, the Council stepped in to debate and organize things instead. If famine broke out, they worked to provide relief; if arge number of monsters appeared somewhere, they could send extra soldiers to deal with them. This, of course, was never easyall sorts of problems cropped up on a constant basis.

    Funding for the Council was provided by its member nations, each of which paid a different percentage of the budget. Even though each nation paid differing dues to the Council, they all had equal representation in the conference itself. This created some dissatisfaction among the members, so to address that, nations were allowed to send more selected representatives to the Council based on their share of the funding.

    Of course, that opened up the possibility of throwing the Council off-bnce, so regtions stipted that member nations had to contribute a muchrger percentage for each extra councillor they added. Despite that, a country sending more members inevitably meant they got to have arger say in matters. With that in mind, therger nations often paid several times the usual budget contribution so they could send several councillors over.

    As discussed, the Councils activities had no direct bearing on the interests of its member governments. Despite that, it was still a good ce forrger nations to show off to the world. The more of a say they had in the Councils agenda, the better chance they ran of getting favorable treatment when everything shook out. If danger came along, they could apply pressure to make sure their country was looked after first.

    The funding received was used to conduct the Councils business, which was always decided by majority vote among its representatives. For example, lets say a dangerous monster appeared somewhere. The Free Guild, a lower branch of the Council, was tasked with dealing with it, so the Council would send a formal request to deploy adventurers to the area.

    But of course, there might be more than one monster, and they could be threatening more than one country. The more powerful nations would likely act to procure stronger adventurers for their own country firstthat was a given. Sending more funding to the Council indicated that you were a more valuable presence among the Western Nations. There was no point diverting limited resources to protecting something useless. Countries with excess capacity could help, but otherwise, theyd be shut out. That was the reality of itthe weak were given the cold shoulder on an equal basis from everyone, in a very cruel game of numbers.

    This was why beingte with your share of contributions was never allowed. The minimum contributions were always collected, and anyone who couldnt make the payments was booted out of the Council. To the weaker nations, that was a matter of life and deathit meant nobody would help them if things went south. It was the Councils job to make those decisions as well, so it was a given that countries with more councillors had a lot more power in the group.

    These contributions, of course, werent cheap. They piled up based on the number of representatives you sent, so even a superpower like Farmus could only send around five, at most. The fall of Farmus was thus a huge event, nothing the Council could afford to ignore. Between figuring out how to handle the new Kingdom of Farminus and addressing the rise of the troublesome Jura-Tempest Federation, tensions were understandably high around the Council right now.

    After the Tempest Founders Festival, the Council held a special session that quickly erupted into chaos, with representatives yelling at one another until they were hoarse. Hinata Sakaguchi attended as a guest of honor, given her close rtionship with the demon lord Rimuru.

    She could have turned down the inviteunlike the Free Guild, the Western Holy Church wasnt a subgroup of the Council. They were on friendly terms but existed aspletely different structures. As a leading figure in that organization, Hinata had every right to ignore the summons. But when she heard the Councils subject matter, she decided to join in. They were set to discuss Tempests admission into the Council, a resolution that could greatly affect the future direction of the Western Nations, and considering that, Hinata couldnt stay away.

    The current chaotic disorder in the Council made her wince a little.

    When you collect a bunch of fools together, its not surprising how little work gets done

    Hinata led all of her own meetings, keeping decision-making as quick as possible without things falling too far out of hand. A serious enough disagreement, after all, could always be decided with battlesuch was her philosophy. And in the conferences in Tempest she attended, they always managed to decide on vast, pondering matters, even with all the big names that constantly seemed to join in. It was hard for Hinata toprehendlike something out of a fairy tale.

    But even if thats a notable exception, she mused, couldnt this Council be a little more constructive?

    To someone like Hinata, who mostly attended active, useful meetings, the debate unfolding before her seemed like nothing short of a farce.

    We can trust that nation! I feel we should exert all efforts to wee them as our friends.

    You say that, but we are talking about a demon lord here. Allegedly, he can negotiate with the Storm Dragon, but if we anger him, what if he sets that menace on us?

    No need to worry about that. I doubt this demon lord has much power himself. Hes just leaning on his buddy to posture against his foes.

    Ridiculous! Then how do you exin the draw that he and Lady Hinata here fought to? Because I think we should appreciate this demon lord for the strength hes clearly shown!

    It was a never-ending torrent of unintelligent opinions thrown against one another.

    This is so stupid. How can they even keep this going in my presence? Their thoughtlessness is astounding.

    Hinata was right about that, and yet they were arguing over whether the demon lord was a juggernaut or a pushover. It certainly left an impression on her.

    Look. The demon lord Rimuru has dered that thends of the Forest of Jura are his territory. At the same time, however, he stated at the Founders Festival that he has no intention of sending monsters out to the forests borders. This means a lot. Councillors, we need to consider that as we work toward a conclusion!

    Indeed. Our nation is home to a people living in constant fear of monsters. The demon lords statement provides salvation to them, and it is backed by fact as well. Ever since the founding of Tempest, monster-rted incidents have been on a steady decline.

    Nonsense! Has the demon lord deceived you?!

    The Forest of Juras monsters were managed by the demon lord Rimuru. The nations nestled along its vast border were already reaping the benefits. But whether a nation bordered Tempest, was exposed to other threats, or was located rtively safely ind, they all had different motives driving them.

    The border nations here were the most weing to Rimurus reign. They had all participated in the Founders Festival, getting a taste of Tempests prosperity for themselves. Whether it was a nation of monsters or not, they reasoned, if it could directly connect to their own national interests, then bring it on.

    Countries facing other threats, meanwhile, had trouble deciding how to approach this. They had the Free Guild and the Crusaders to protect them and deal with monster damage; none of these nations wererge in scale, and none could afford to act carelessly here. They were all in the same boat,rgely, and they had their hands full staying afloat as it was. The more quick-witted among their leaders were already scheming to see how they could take advantage of Tempest, but some of them skipped the Founders Festival entirely and had no inherent trust of monsters. The debate over Rimuru raged among these nations, and no matter which side they went with, their position was a pretty weak one.

    Finally, therger, safer nations (and the countries dependent on them) were, as a rule, approving. They, of course, had the luxury of tackling this question based on how they stood to profit from itsecurity was not a concern of theirs. They were countered by councillors who were more skeptical about Rimurus policies. If something were to happen, the demon lord might decide to ce the full brunt of his powers upon themsuch was their blind belief, and they were thus virulently opposed to him. Some were already loudly using the Tempest border nations of turning traitor and letting Rimuru brainwash them.

    With all these shing interests, it was a given that the meeting would be a rowdy one. From the perspective of a higher power, it was all the work of foolsbut most of the representatives were just looking out for number one. Hinata knew that, which was why she could stay silent.

    All right. Why dont we ept their argument? If they say Tempest will be our friend, then lets wee them in. But theyll need to bring some gifts with them.

    I firmly agree. Try to fight them, and well just have another Farmus on our hands.

    Theyll need to learn their ce, though. Do we even know if they have any interest in respecting the internationalws weve put in ce?

    I dont think we need to worry about that. Youve heard the rumors about Duke Meuss folly, I trust?

    How could anyone not have?

    The real bottleneck was due to the representatives from the rich nations. They were well-informed to start with, and they were deliberately trying to stir the pot here, encouraging the chaos. Their objective was clearthey already made their conclusion, and now they wanted to guide everyone else toward it without seeming too unnatural.

    I feel for the smaller nations representatives. They were oblivious when they came here, and now theyre faced with a choice. They may as well throw their vote down the drain

    Ignorance really is a sin. Without the correct information, you stood to lose a vast amount. And now the weak were being hounded into letting their precious vote go to waste.

    Still

    But I suppose this is all leading up to Tempest getting epted. Which is fine by me, but

    Therger nations shared the same motives as Hinata. It was a pity about the citizens of the weaker countries, but as she saw it, better to keep her mouth shut about this. She did need to resist the urge to speak up, though.

    The demon lord Rimurus motives here dont really matter. The question is whether we can make good use of him or not.

    Precisely. Given our present concern about the Easts movements, theres no reason to turn down a demon lords power if he allies with us.

    Prince Johann Rostia, one of the senior representatives in the Council, was now bringing up the Eastern Empire.

    The East, you say? Meaning the Empire?!

    There are movements? But Veldora is right next to us, in the Forest of Jura

    Johanns statement caused a stir among the Council. Now, Hinata thought, were getting down to business. The preamble went on far too long, but thats nobles for you. They were feeling one another out, gauging how much information each side had on them. Once they were sure their side had the upper hand, thats when they bared their fangs. That was their style, just as Johann showed when he so expertly seized the initiative.

    As Im sure youre all aware, the military of the Eastern Empirenamely, the Nasca Namrium Ulmeria United Eastern Empirehas begun making certain maneuvers. ording to reports from passing merchants, theyve been conducting military exercises at a higher rate than before.

    The Council fell silent at Johanns words.

    Hinata was aware of that, as were Gazel Dwargo and the heads of the other nations bordering the Empire. They probably kept tabs on the Empire through the sales of their healing potions and equipment. Since the Dwarven Kingdom was officially neutral, Gazel was no doubt following his obligations to keep what he knew confidential.

    Plus, Rimuru undoubtedly knew as well. The proof was in the tech announcements he made at the Founders Festival. Rimuru insisted that no, no, that was really all Gabils and Vesters own work and so on, but that was a barefaced lie. He had to be involved, too, and he meant his statement as a threat against Gazel Not a threat exactly, perhaps, but it was Rimurus way of saying Hey, Tempest is making the potions now.

    You can never underestimate him. He knows whats going on in the East, and hes needling Gazel about keeping quiet. How far ahead is he looking? Its just amazing to me

    Thus, whether he knew it or not, Rimuru was being vastly misunderstood by Hinata here in Englesia.

    Now, while all of this mightve been known information to Hinata, it was shocking news to the majority of councillors here. Everyone sat on the edge of their seats, waiting for more from Johann; they needed as much information as they could as they debated how to protect themselves. Nations rich enough to have regr armies were one thing, but the smaller ones didnt even have the free budget to retain one of those. Small-scale was the watchword with their militaries; they preferred to hire mercenaries at times of war, but if the whole region was building up their firepower, theyd be facing pretty slim pickings.

    Everyone, Johann said in a voice that carried well across the chamber, calm down. Im not saying the Empire will make their move at once. Let us keep our heads cool and debate how to respond!

    Just as Hinata thought, this was the real topic of the day.

    And what will we do? one representative asked, followed by many others.

    How to respond?! What measures do we even have against them?!

    The Kingdom of Farmus is gone! Even if we wanted to build a defensive line, we cant do that with just us smaller nations!

    Order, please! The Empire isnt on the move because of you-know-who in the Forest of Jura. I wouldnt be as assured if he was still sealed away, but now hes alive and active for us!

    Wait one moment! You want us to pin our hopes on that evil dragon?

    Please, Im telling you, calm down! Right now, if the news is to be trusted, Veldora has been tamed by Sir Rimuru, the demon lord. The very same demon lord who seeks admission to our Council, am I right? Then I think the answer is clear.

    The man calling for order was Count Gaban, a representative from Englesia.

    Councillor Gaban is right, Johann continued. As we face this threat from the East, now is no time to wage a war of words against each other. If the demon lord Rimuru will join the Council, I am sure their military might will aid us.

    Ah

    Certainly, yes

    Cheers of agreement rang out. Johann smiled approvingly.

    In my humble opinion, I think we should recognize Tempest as a full-fledged member.

    His voice was solemn, as if gauging the reaction around him. That alone changed the atmosphere in the chamber. Even those who feared the demon lord as aplete unknown now recalled the very real and recognized threat from the East. Tempest was and of monsters but also a nation that responded tomon sense. The Empire, on the other hand, was a ravenous foe bent on gobbling up everything in its path. They were a human enemy, and as such, if they lost to the Empire, everyone could see that theyd be next at the dinner table.

    The ruling ss, all of them, would undoubtedly be killed.

    The Empire was a massive military state, with a history of growth powered by the nations they swallowed up. They were always thorough with their enemy, and to the Western Nations, they were a presence to be feared.

    Hmm. I think Councillor Rostia is making a valid point. A point I agree with, I should add.

    Im very d you understand, Councillor Gaban! And I think you wont be alone in this chamber. I think its time to take a vote on Tempests admission first, but what do you think?

    Seconded. The West needs to put up a united front before anything else.

    Quite true. Nows no time for infighting!

    Several representatives voiced their approval of Johann. It led to a generalmotion that forced the chairman to shout for quiet once more.

    At the chairmans lead, the vote began. First Johann fanned everyones fears; then he put on the pressure to conform. A very impressive performance, indeed, in the ssic style of nobility.

    I suppose this is all part of the script, too? Even without the preamble, that took forever

    Clearly Johann and Gaban were colluding on this, with a supporting cast voicing their agreement in the audience. As a nonvoting attendee, Hinata could tell that much from her seat. It was all just a scripted performance, and the ending wasing up shortly, much to her relief. Eight hours had passed since the session was brought to order, and despite the regr breaks, the exhaustion was palpable. Not physical exhaustion, of course, but the mental kind, making it all the more painful to Hinata.

    I cant believe all the stupid questions I got asked, though. They couldve just asked me to watch Rimuru to make sure he doesnt go crazy, but no

    That was the main reason Hinata was there. Whether the Council knew him or not, they were about to ask a demon lord to join their ranks. They just wanted to cover their asses in case he decided to get violentand considering she (reportedly) fought him to a draw, Hinata helped the councillors feel far safer. Thats basically what the nobles wanted, although they asked her in the most roundabout way possible.

    The talk about an Empire on the move was just an idle threat as well. Those military maneuvers probably were happening, but they were just an empty show of force. If they were really about to invade the West, they had mountains of obstacles to deal with firstthe Forest of Jura and the Armed Nation of Dwargon, to name but two. And maybe things wouldve been different before Tempest and Dwargon forged an alliance, but now, the Empire didnt have much to work with.

    They really shouldve made their move before Rimuru became a demon lord. Then Veldora wouldnt be back in the picture, and the Empire really couldve had a chance at world domination

    Now the Empire was pinned down, too afraid of a vengeful, unmuzzled Veldora to act. They were too careful for their own good back when there was no sign of Veldora, and now they probably knew full well the golden opportunity they missed. Rimuru and Gazel were still on the lookout for them, of course, but the way Hinata saw it, any move the Empire could make was nothing for anyone to worry about.

    She was pretty sure Johann and Gaban agreed with her on that point. Here they were, keeping the smaller nations eyes fixated on outside threats while they firmed up their own footing. It was so noble-like of them. Hinata had had enough of it long ago.

    And after the ballots were tabted, the ayes had itthe majority of the counted had voted to admit Tempest.

    The Jura-Tempest Federation is now officially our ally. We will hereby send a formal invitation to the Jura-Tempest Federation, and after confirming the intentions of their leader, the demon lord Rimuru, to join the Council, we will reconvene to enact the relevant procedures. Adjourned!

    With the chairmans stentorian deration, the meeting drew to a close. All in all, it was enough to make Hinata swear off dealing with the nobility again.

    The exhausting Council session was over, and Hinata was on her way back to the Church. But her suffering wasnt over yet.

    Hinata, could I have a moment of your time?

    She was stopped by a young man guarded by a posse of nearly ten bodyguards. He had shiny blond hair and a refreshing smile; a handsome man, although not much Hinatas type. After eight hours of that torture session, her tolerance for anything else today was gone. She just wanted to get home, and the smile of a man she had no interest in was worthless to her.

    Unfortunately, the mans social position posed some difficulties for Hinatas escape. This was Elrick, the first prince of Englesia, where the Councils headquarters was located. Being rude to him could trigger an international incident, so Hinata was in no position to ignore him.

    Yes? Can I help you?

    She summoned as much social courtesy as she could muster for Prince Elrick. He smugly smiled back at her.

    Well, Hinata, I wanted to ask you a favor.

    Elrick did not know Hinata well enough to address her this casually. Given her position, she knew his name and face, but little else. This was their first conversation, and Elricks overfamiliarity annoyed her.

    And what would that be? she asked as they moved over to a reception room.

    Im thinking about testing the demon lord Rimuru at the next Council meeting. Only the upper echelons are aware of the news as of yet, but if a demon lord is joining the Council, I think that would greatly unnerve many of our people. We will need this demon lord to live up to his duties, and we need to see whether he will deign to listen to us. Thats where youe in!

    He shed her another gleaming smile. Hinata wanted to jump out a window.

    How do Ie in? she asked, dying for him to get to the point.

    ?!

    Elrick, perhaps expecting Hinata to be a bit more cooperative, seemed daunted by herck of interest. Still, he tried to look unaffected as he continued.

    W-well, let me exin. I describe it as a test, but the one in question is still a demon lord. If he decides to cause a scene, well all be in trouble. So Id like to ask you to provide security duties for us.

    As prince, Elrick no doubt expected the entire world to serve him at all times. He knew he had good looks, and he was convinced no woman could ever turn him down. Hinata, he was sure, would be no different. Even his bodyguards looked on like this wasmon knowledge.

    But Hinata had her doubts. For one thing, she had every right to turn him down.

    Did he think Id say yes with that attitude?

    Why, if I may ask?

    Why? Because I know you are a strong woman. The most powerful leader of the pdins, confidant to the Luminian god, the chief knight of the Imperial Guard itself! Among the Western Nations, you truly have no equal, and I even hear that you fought the demon lord Rimuru to a draw. With your support, Im sure we can reveal the true nature of this demon lord!

    His sheer arrogance was clear for Hinata to see as he heaped extensive praise upon her.

    What is he talking about?

    Rimuru was generally kind to her, but he was a true-blue demon lord. Deliberately trying to rile him was beyond stupid. And that fought to the draw thing was a rumor they deliberately spread around; she couldnt beat him at all. If Rimuru ever got really angry, itd take a fellow demon lord like Luminus to stop him.

    I think that idea may be ill-advised. He is truly a powerful demon lord. If we were to fight again, there is no guarantee I could beat him.

    Oh,e now! No need for modesty. Just because youre talking to me doesnt mean you have to act like a meek, gentle woman.

    The smile was now gone from Hinatas face. Elricks self-absorbed protest deeply peeved her.

    The oblivious prince was interrupted by one of his bodyguards stepping in. Thisrge, important-looking man was Reiner, head general of Englesias royal knight corpsand Reiner was about to rankle Hinata even further.

    Ha-ha-ha! Lady Hinata, I can understand if youre smitten with Prince Elrick, but now is no time for such dalliances. Theres no need to worry about matters if Im around, but with your additional muscle, we will have that much extra insurance. So if you could

    The chiding tone to his voice robbed Hinata of any desire to hear the rest.

    Im afraid I cannot. The Western Holy Church and the Holy Empire of Lubelius have signed a nonaggression pact with Tempest. And a word of warning as well Please refrain from angering the demon lord Rimuru.

    Pardon me?

    Areare you ordering me around?!

    The bodyguard, along with Elrick, seemed flummoxed by the idea that shed actually say no to them.

    Hinata had absolutely no intention of ying along. If this was an official request made through the proper channels, not even Hinata wouldve had the right to refuse. If the Council was making the request themselves, after all, itd only be logical to call for an anti-monster specialist like her. Given the Councils vital role in world affairs, there could very well have been an official request along those lines, once it passed through the local Western Holy Church post. And considering their future rtionship with the Western Nations, Hinata wouldnt have had the final right to turn that down.

    What a pain it would have been, though

    Still, if that happened, there wouldve been a lot of intricate conditions to decide on, and given how their nonaggression pact forbade clearly hostile acts, Hinata probably couldve found a way out of it. Elrick and his goons mustve tried approaching her directly to skip all thatand now they were paying for it.

    You will regret this, Lady Hinata! Do you wish to make an enemy out of Sir Reiner, head general of the Englesia royal knight corps?

    Exactly! The human race cannot allow a demon lord to do whatever he wants among us. Dont tell me the Western Holy Church is fine with someone like him going on a rampage inside the Council!

    The other bodyguards were starting to whine at her, toobut that actually relieved Hinata. From them, she could tell this was all just a few people stepping way out of line.

    Unfortunately for you, Im afraid the demon lord Rimuru enjoys my full trust. Now if youll excuse me

    So she left, thanking her lucky stars that this entouragecked intelligence. In her eyes, she had exhibited the barest minimum of decorum needed, so this shouldnt be any sort of diplomatic controversy. Making this unscheduled approach to a Council invitee was a much ruder thing to do anyway. Even if a prince was involved, Hinata handled it passably well, if not exactly with perfect poise.

    But

    Theyre not really going to try to anger Rimuru, are they?

    The anxiety bounced around her mind. The moment she swore off nobles forever, this had to happen.

    Well, I turned down any involvement in it. Hopefully, cooler heads will prevail among them

    If you wanted to take on a demon lord, youd better have had the national army backing you up. If a small group of them tried to pick a fight, it really would take a party of champions to save your assand they wouldnt have the time to prepare like that. A demon lord on the Council floor was probably an opportunity too good for them to pass up, but having an unexpected event to take advantage of didnt automatically up your sess rate.

    But what if this entire encounter was nned from the start?

    Thatseems pretty unlikely. But I better keep my guard up next time

    The thought was depressing her already.

    With the invite in hand, I was now here in Englesia.

    I guess they were giving me the royal treatment, because I was lodged in the fanciest hotel they had. Once this meeting was over, I looked forward to checking out the capital for the first time in a while.

    Benimaru was dauntlessly guarding me, with Soei receiving reports from his spies in the shadows. Speaking of shadows, I was starting to miss Rangas presence in mine; he was out hanging with Gobta often these days. Gobta had fully rebounded from Milims grueling training, but I guess he didnt have much time to rest. Milim had apparently dered that she was going to test him regrly from now onwith a string of real-battlepetitions against Carillon. He came crying to Ranga, wailing about how hed be killed at this rate, so I guess Ranga felt obliged toe join himbut judging by his wagging tail, I supposed he liked Gobta a fair bit. Nothing wrong with building a friendship.

    So I officially brought Benimaru and Shuna along with me. Arger group wouldve presented lots of problems, so I decided to keep it small and simple. I was thinking about taking Shion as well, but I was still ever so slightly concerned about unleashing Shion in a big city. If she messed something up like she usually did, it could lead to all sorts of disasters, so I had her focus on educating her staff and keeping things orderly for me.

    Geld was too busy directing the construction of Milims new capital to get away from that. Diablo was still off on his epic journey whereverhe talked about the protgs hed round up, but was he struggling with it? Because the production of his body vessels was proceeding along wellI wanted that wrapped up before he returned, so really, there was no need for him to hurry things along. Im sure hed zoom right back if I called for him, but I didnt have any pressing work for him, so no reason not to give him some free time.

    Hakuro was off with Momiji to thend of the tengu. Gabil was out with Middray visiting the City of the Forgotten Dragonit was home to a flock of wyverns, apparently, and he intended to capture some and attempt to domesticate them. Building Team Hiryu into a stronger fighting force had been on Gabils mind for a while. As part of that effort, he decided to try building a flying squadron with wyverns as mounts. It was easy to forget given his newfound career as a scientist and researcher, but Gabil was still a powerful warrior beloved by his followers. I think he was on to something with that ideaif he made it work, Id need to amply praise him for it.

    Thus, the rest of my top-level staff were busy with other matters, so it was just two others and I who went to Englesia, meeting up with Soei there.

    Our first visit was to some clothing stores, lined with the kind of show windows youd find in modern Japan. In much the same way, a lot of passers-by liked looking at them, indicating just how much of a city the Englesian capital had be. The window in this particr shop also seemed astoundingly tall to mess was a fairlymon thing to see around here, but panes this size could cost as much as a small house by themselves. If the shop was using these for disy purposes, they mustve been doing a damn good business. As Mjllmile advised: Look at the flow of people, and you can see they made the right choices.

    By the way, our town had show windows like this as well. When I told everyone what I saw in Englesia, Shuna and our other female staff demonstrated a keen interest in adopting that custom. I had no reason to turn them down, so after discussing it with Mildo, I had him work on manufacturing ss for me. We had a valued partner in Raphael, so it didnt take long at all to produce practical show windows.

    Regardless, we were clothes shopping at Shunas request. She was curiously peering at all the new fashions in those windows right now, and I have to say, it was all pretty gaudy. In the stores we passed, there were lots of outfits with novel designs we never saw back home. The clothes Shuna and her team sewed, after all, were mostly ensembles gleaned from my own memory, but these shops were full of original pieces from entrepreneurial designers. They all seemed topete with one another on the racks, and the sight was more than enough to capture Shunas heart.

    I certainly dont want to lose out to all this, she whispered, resolute. I must redouble my efforts!

    Yeah, keep up the good work! And, everyone, go ahead and select whatever you like. Ill cover the cost.

    What?! Areare you sure?

    Me too?

    Ill keep this on, thank you.

    Its fine, its fine! I dont pay you a sry anyway, so at least let me be generous with this.

    As thanks for their usual hard work, I decided to give all three of them new clothes. I had a suit along with me for tomorrows conference, but Benimaru and Soei were still in full battle gear. They fit in with the adventurers milling around town, so nobody brought it up, but on the streets, they were too imposing for my tastes. Shuna was in her usual shrine-maiden garb as well, and I think some fashionable casual wear would do her some good.

    So I had them pick out their favorites.

    Benimaru and Soei went with tailored jackets, shirts, and skinny jeansHuh? All right. It looked good on them. And Shuna went withWhoa! A fluffy white gaucho skirt and an ice-blue knit vest? Cute! That really worked on her!

    That looks good. I like it, Shuna!

    Thank you very much! Im d to hear that, Sir Rimuru.

    Yep. The shrine outfit is fine and all, but something casual wouldnt hurt her, either. Its also novel on herfresh, if you will.

    Since we were there and all, I decided to purchase several outfits. Wed no doubt use these as models to sew our own, starting next time. I also purchased a thin, dark-blue dress for Shion as a souvenir. Shes got kind of a cool demeanorin terms of looks anywayso I figured shed stand out in that.

    Im sure shell love it!

    You think so?

    d to hear that.

    Yes, Im positive. If Shuna said so, it was probably true.

    And you guys look okay in that, too, so go ahead and take it.

    Not as much guidance for us, huh?

    No.

    Benimaru and Soei sounded like they hadints, but who knows? And why were they still trying on outfits? They acted like they didnt care, but now they were diving deep into the racks. A handsome man looks good in anything, so I really didnt think they needed to agonize over their decisions that much

    Meanwhile, all my decisions were snap judgments. It wasnt like I could describe the difference between one ensemble or the other, so I had the store clerks pick for me. Couldnt go wrong with that, I figured.

    Finally, we made our selections. We were fitted for them on-site, which let us change right into them.

    Shuna was now lovingly clutching the box of clothes I got for her, smiling broadly. Unlike my disappointing secretary Shion, Shuna pretty much always had it togetherthe gap between them was charming like that. Benimaru and Soei looked happy about their own clothes, too, so Id call this outing a sess. They pretty much worked day and night, so I really wanted to thank them somehow. If this excited them that much, I thought as I settled the bill, I shouldve taken them here sooner.

    After changing into new clothes, we headed for the caf our old friend Yoshida used to run. A trainee of his had taken it over, and it was doing a pretty decent businessand since we were one of their suppliers, we were allowed to make purchases at a discount. We were scheduled to meet Hinata there, whom we heard had arrived in Englesia before us; I figured we could enjoy my first Englesian lunch in a while as we talked over tomorrows conference.

    As we waited for her, I let Soei give me a briefing. He had his feelers all over the Western Nations, so I figured hed know why they chose this timing for the invite.

    All right, Soei, your report?

    Certainly. First, Id like to start with some of the feedback from the Founders Festival

    He gave me a rundown of the more important rumors and discussions he had picked up from across thend, in an easy-to-grasp fashion. I appreciated that.

    The response to the Founders Festival was pretty positive. From the royalty up top to the farmers at the bottom, people talked about it all over the ce. The Dungeon was also generating tons of buzzour ad pitch to the nobility mustve worked, because a few of them were forming teams of challengers to conquer the Dungeon. Even people from farawaynds, not just the border nations, were reportedly curious. At this rate, I thought we could expect even more customers soon.

    After that pleasant news, we got down to business.

    So did you investigate the merchantsand whos behind Duke Meus?

    I did not neglect that, Sir Rimuru. From the merchants families to their business rtions, I conducted a thorough investigation. Based on that, I did not find any connections to particrly suspicious figures. However, these merchants did go through several government intermediaries in order to obtain business licenses in the nations they work in, and when I traced these officials, I found they all had connections to Duke Meus.

    Sowhatd that mean?

    Understood. The merchants were likely doing the bidding of the subject Meus.

    All right. So theres probably not much point investigating those guys further.

    What about Meus, then? I guess there really is some kind of secret cabal running the Western Nations, and they might be scheming something new right now, as we speak. Meus seems like apetent enough noble. We better keep him under surveince.

    So Meus did a good job covering his tracks, huh? Whats that potential threat up to now?

    Aspetent as he might be, though, there was no escaping Soeis eyes. No matter what kind of seedy group he tried to buddy up with, itd only serve us in catching him red-handed. But Soei quickly banished that thought from my mind.

    Hes dead, Sir Rimuru.

    Huh?

    We believe he was felled by some manner of long-range attack.

    As the duke of Ghastone, Meus was something of a big shot. If someone like him was murdered, I really was starting to wonder about this mystery cabal. And if this was that cabals way of escaping capture, they must have a lot of power to work with.

    Report. There is the possibility that they have noticed the subject Soeis investigations.

    So they shut him up, huh? Maybe we should give this adversary the respect they deserved. They werent ying around.

    And you didnt see who did it? Benimaru asked.

    No, Soei tly replied. I didnt detect any presence at all until Meus fell to the ground in front of me.

    He only heard the sound of Meus copsing, so there wasnt a whole lot he could do to stop anything. He sounded despondent about it, and I couldnt do much apart from console him.

    Thats pretty unbelievable. If not even you could spot them, they mustve been attacking from thousands of feet away. You wouldve detected the magic if they used any, and if it was some flying projectile, you wouldve picked up the lingering aura from that, right?

    It really couldnt be that easy to hoodwink him. Ive got Raphael with me, of course, so Magic Sense lets me detect pretty much anything. But this?

    Maybe it was a sniper, huh?

    A sniper?

    What is that?

    Ah. Not a concept Benimaru or Soei were aware of. Shuna gave me a curious look as well, and I suppose I could see why. This world didnt have gunsbut then, would it be so unusual for an otherworlder to have one?

    You said a gun? Im pretty sure Yuuki has a handgun.

    Wha?!

    The sudden voice from behind almost made me fall out of my chair. It was Hinata, sneaking up in an attempt to startle me. Benimaruughed in my face. Even Soei was stifling a chuckle, a hand covering his mouth. I looked so dumb.

    Come on, my brother! And you too, Soei!

    Shuna, thankfully, yelled at them on my behalf, so I resisted the urge to speak up. And, I mean, if Raphael wouldve been kind enough to say something to me

    Report. No malicious intent was detected.

    Yeah, I bet. So its my fault for acting all haughty, like always. I sighed at myself and yed it off with a chuckle.

    With Hinata at the table, we all ordered lunch. For one silver coin a pop, we got a pretty fancy spread, and we avoided any serious conversation as we enjoyed it.

    Full and satisfied, I decided to order some coffeea little mature bitterness to round things out. And with enough sugar and milk, I had the perfect harmony between bitter and sweet

    Thats pretty much a caf auit, now, isnt it? Id call you mature if you took it ck, but thats liquid candy youre drinking. Hinata hit me back hard. I guess my inside voice had leaked out again.

    Will you shut up? This is fine! Its all part of the atmosphere!

    Oh? Because between that and your outfit, theres nothing mature about what Im seeing at all.

    Oof. First the coffee and now my clothing? And Boy, is that really how I look? The clerk at that shop arranged what I thought was a neat poncho-type thing. I thought it wasyeah, maybe a little on the young n springy side, but I trusted the staff there. And now look I regretted ever trusting in a store employees fashion sense.

    Dammit! This does seem like kids wear, doesnt it?

    No, no, Sir Rimuru, its lovely on you!

    R-right. Yeah. Looks great.

    I thought you liked it.

    Its lovely on me? So I look like a kid to them?! Man. What a shock.

    My clothes werefortable, at least. I didnt dislike them. But thats not the issue. Im supposed to be high society, you know? I had even grown a bittely, enough that I could probably pass for a middle schooler.

    It makes you look cute. Those are the facts. Give it up.

    My shoulders slumped at Hinatas verdict. I guess Id have to. I dont have the slightest amount of adult charm. I already am grown-up! Why do I have to be obsessed with my height at this point in life? Maybe Im just gonna have to face reality soon

    Hinata, meanwhile, wasnt as brightly dressed as she was at the festival. She was looking smart in her pdin uniform, a dignified beauty in an outfit usually meant as menswear. Maybe she and I should swap looks? I resisted the urge to verbalize that thought, still a bit peeved as I went back to our first subject.

    With all due respect to thete Duke Meus, we needed to discuss the method of his murder.

    So if there are handguns around, do you think a sniper did it?

    I dont know much about guns, but a handguns range doesnt go beyond fifty yards or so, does it? said Hinata.

    Hmm. Maybe. So wed need something like a rifle.

    Are there sniper rifles in this world or anything?

    I couldnt tell you. Ive certainly never seen one, but I cant guarantee there arent.

    Right. But maybe its better, for now, to assume there were and act based on that. I decided to send a Thought Communication to Benimaru and the others to describe the kind of rifle I was envisioning.

    Hmm Interesting weapon.

    Yes, if someone used that, I can understand why I didnt detect it.

    I think I could handle this weapon well enough. We can mix up the required gunpowder, and I imagine Dold would be able to make the unit itself for us.

    The three of them had a variety of feedback. Benimaru didnt seem too impressed, but to Soei, it was a threat that he clearly didnt have a countermeasure against as a bodyguard. It was a different sort of missionand a different sort of challenge.

    Shuna, meanwhile, was eager to make one of her own, the scariest reaction of all. Im sure it was possible, yes, but should we? The development of guns changed the entire nature of warsalthough the nature of war in this world was more about the quality of your offense than the quantity, which often made traditional Earth strategy obsolete. Bringing guns into the mix seemed dangerous to me; I figured we should hit the brakes on that for the time being.

    In the other world, this is a brutal weapon, something that can make even a powerless person the strongest out there. I cant say how effective itd be over here, but maybe you could defend yourself against a magic beast or the like.

    Well, you can run out of bullets, but you will never run out of magic. But you could always make higher-caliber weapons for extra punch, and with enough of them, you could be a serious threat. But I hope you wont start mass-producing them just because you can, all right?

    Yes, it certainly wasnt impossible. In fact, it was very possible. That was why Hinata put her foot down so fast.

    Ah, well see. I think magics gonna win out in a fight, but arming the general popce with guns would still be dangerous.

    Theck of widespread gun ownership in Japan made me feel that particrly keenly. Looking at the news from overseas, you had situations where guns helped protect someone, but there were a lot more cases where nothing wouldve happened if guns hadnt been added to the mix in the first ce. With that in mind, giving everyone ess to such a lethal weapon out of nowhere seemed hazardous.

    All right. Well keep this strictly confidential and stick to research only, then.

    That seemed to cate Shuna, so we decided to go with that. And besides, threat or not, they didnt work on us, so it wasnt that big of an issue, was it?

    Report. Someone without the relevant knowledge would not understand what happened if they witnessed someone being shot to death. There is a potentially high chance someone near the victim is suspected as the killer.

    Hmm? That word of caution from Raphael sure came out of nowhere. What did it mean? Someone near the victim

    Oh, right! If someone right by me got assassinated, Id be a prime suspect, wouldnt I? That did make sense. And since Hinata was so closely involved with me, she probably wouldnt be allowed to testify on my behalf. If the killer got away, and the weapon was never found, there was every chance I could be framed for murder.

    That was close! I couldve fallen right into that trap if we didnt have this little chat. Not that I knew whether a trap was in ce at all, but if Raphael was on the lookout, Id better assume there was.

    Either way, well all have to be real careful at tomorrows Council meeting.

    I dont think non-magical lead bullets would do much more than sting if they hit us, though. I dont see cause for too much rm, said Shuna.

    No, I wouldnt underestimate it like that. Like Hinata said, higher-caliber weapons are more of a threat, and for all we know, there may be magic-infused bullets out there. Plus, if anyone got shot in the middle of the conference, I think people would point their fingers at me first.

    I worry about that as well. I will station Replications around the Council and stay on enhanced guard, said Soei.

    Thats Soei for you. He mustve reached the same conclusion without me pointing it out.

    Right. Thank you.

    Of course.

    I trusted he could handle any suspects he stumbled upon. With that concern addressed, I went back to the main topic. So, Hinata, why are they calling me here anyway?

    I still hadnt heard exactly what would be discussed tomorrow, although I had my hunches. Ramiris and Veldora thought it was about a dragon causing trouble, or a mystery demon lord rearing his ugly head, or some other nonsense. It wasnt any fairy-tale junk like thatthey wanted to see if they could ept me as one of them. And based on the four-star treatment I was receiving, I expected some good news.

    Well, the resolution to let Tempest into the Council passed at thest special session. At the regr session tomorrow, youll be asked to sit for a Q&A before they officially enact it.

    Bingo! Those fools could spout off all that nonsense because they were oblivious to the truth. I was smart to ignore them.

    Oh, really? I was expecting as much.

    I nodded, as if I knew everything in advance, as Hinata gave me a doubtful look.

    Report. Based on the current situation, there is no other potential possibility. The subject Hinata Sakaguchi is believed to be thinking Why that act? at the moment.

    Huhhhh?!

    So sneering at her just made me look stupid, huh? And sure, I didnt have any doubts about this, but even I had my guesses about what they wanted. Like, what if they asked about my magitrain ideas or the requests to sell the weaponry Kurobe showed off? Or what if they interrogated me about which countries were asking us to reveal our research results? There was a pretty broad range I could picture, which gave me a headache.

    But Raphael was confident this was about Tempests admission. I wish it couldve clued me in earlier. With a nervous cough, I took a sip of coffee. Hopefully, I covered myself well enough

    Regardless, its still not official yet, so try not to do anything dumb, all right? And I think, during the Q&A, theyll probably ask you some tough questions and try to get under your skin as a demon lord. Dont fall for their tricks, okay?

    I wasnt sure I covered for myself at all, but Hinata didnt seem to care either way. I guess itd be trouble for her if I screwed up the meetingssince the Holy Empire of Lubelius was supporting us and all, itd make them look terrible. Thus, she was focused on giving me warnings, first and foremost. How unsettling! I have the patience of a saint! Nobody could anger me that easily.

    Oh, youre worrying way too much. Unlike you, I know how to deal with adult social situations.

    Huh? If youre picking a fight, you know Im game anytime.

    Uh, no, um, not like that

    See? Theres the difference between Hinata and methe way she so readily flips the switch. But getting her any angrier would be bad news for me. I closed my mouth, a little fearful.

    But you do have a point. Theyre giving me all the bombast of a royal guest, so I am worried that theyll want something from me in exchange. Youve been looking into that, too, right, Soei?

    Yes, and I do have some information along those lines. Beyond that, itlle down to the motives of the royalty involved in this affair, as well as what their subordinates think

    Right. Id appreciate it if we could talk that overter.

    Yes, Sir Rimuru

    Not him and me, but him and Raphael, really.

    But there is one thing Id like to ask Lady Hinata.

    Whats that?

    Hmm? I thought we were done here, but Soei had concerns of his own. He had deployed his team to the four corners of the globe, looking into matters. As they investigated the shadowymittee running the Western Nations, they were also gathering information on each nation they visited. I was used to relying on them by now, whenever there was something I wanted to knowand knowing Soei, he mustve heard some relevant rumor by now.

    It seems that several ministerial-level government officials from around the region are attempting to take advantage of our nation. Their aim

    is to have Tempest serve as a defensive wall against the Eastern Empire?

    Yes. Exactly, Lady Hinata.

    She had guessed it before Soei could finish. She mustve had her finger on the pulse of it, too.

    So if a war breaks out, they want us to help them? Because right now, the only obligation we have along those lines is to Blumund. Is that correct? Benimaru, for his part, concluded from his own analysis that Soei was worrying too much. He smiled at himand Id say he was right.

    But the real issuey elsewhere. Hinata probably realized that as well, and judging by how worry-free she seemed, she mustve reached the same conclusion I did. Plus, in my case, I had Raphael predicting the future for me, so I could trust in that. If Hinata agreed with me, that just sealed the deal. So lets check on that.

    Benimarus right. Our only treaty along those lines is with the Kingdom of Blumund. But even apart from that, I dont think we need to worry about the Empire.

    Could I ask why you think so? Soei questioned, apparently quite worried. He always was serious-minded like that. To calm his mind, I decided toy out the conclusion Raphael led me to.

    Well, first off, its important to think about things from the Empires standpoint. If the Empire tried to attack the Western Nations, what kind of strategy could they devise for that?

    Their goals for the attack were also key, but lets put that aside for the moment. If they wanted to wage war, theyd need to select an invasion route. There was a path straight through the Forest of Jura, a harsher one over the Canaat Mountains, and a potential sea route, the old trade passage dating from before our highway system. And while it depended on howrge a force the Empire sent, there were issues with every option.

    The sea route was a challenging one. It was the most direct path to the Kingdom of Farmus, but once you left the shores and went into coastal waters, you left yourself open to therge sea creatures that called them home. Youd be sailing right into a nest of over-A monsters, and even arge fleet wasnt guaranteed to make it through safely.

    Even the spear tuna that was such a delight at our dinner banquet was a tough foe to face in open water. If one rammed your ship at sixty knots, or nearly seventy miles an hour, it would easily tear a huge hole in the vessel. But even a steel-sided ship couldnt breathe easy, because among the creatures in the ocean, a spear tuna was still on the small side. These creaturescked intelligence but brutally attacked anyone who dared intrude into their territory. There wasnt a military vessel on this world that could take a ramming from their thirty-foot-long bodies and stay afloat.

    Thus, only merchants with an intricate knowledge of safe sea routes dared to cross the ocean.

    So what about the Canaat Mountains option? Well, thatd involve traversing a hellscape known as the Dragons Nest.

    Dragons are willing to let a merchant caravan go by unharmed, but something biggersay, arge armywas a great way to invite their wrath upon you. They werent human, so negotiation was out of the question. If they mistakenly decided you were hostile, it was all over. These dragons were led by a powerful Dragon Lord, and if they had you in their sights, theyd pare down your army well before you had a chance to fight your war. If you won, then fine; if you lost, the whole world wouldugh at you. And even if you did beat those dragons, you had the Western Nations forces waiting for you on the other side. The feature presentation, in other words.

    Besides, a military march through rugged mountains was an ordeal in itself. The path only opened up in the middle of the summer anyway. When the snow and ice settled onto those frigid peaks, all the magic in the world wouldnt get you through.

    No, any strategist who hadnt lost his marbles would avoid this route at all costs.

    Thus, your only choice left was through the Forest of Jura. But:

    The forest is the territory of a demon lord, and thats me. And theres Veldora, too, right?

    Yeah. And now that the whole world knows of the Storm Dragons awakening, the Empire cant afford to make any funny moves. They feared him even when he was still banished, so right now, theyre essentially frozen in ce.

    Exactly.

    We had spread the news that Veldora destroyed the Farmus army, and the Empire heard about that quite some time ago, Im sure. Any ambitions they had along those lines mustve been shelved by now. The Empire had feared Veldora for ages, and that fear made them too careful for their own good. If they had acted sooner, they might just have wiped us out, for all I know.

    But now Veldoras here, and Veldora was chiefly why Raphael assured me we were golden.

    Report. That was a prediction, not a conclusion. The situation is constantly changing. If I obtain new information, I will need to factor that into my assumptions.

    Wow. What a worrywart. But that was fair. Working on bad assumptions can lead to some serious pitfallster.

    It is true that the Empire is making some ominous moves. The Shadows I tried as familiars have proven pretty useless, so I was thinking we had better conduct a more thorough investigation soon. However

    Soeis time was already upied with exploring the Western Nations underground, and members from Team Kurayami were carrying out their own missions as well. About all he could do was send out Shadows, low-level apparition creatures that ranked a D but could use Shadow Motion and Thought Communication, making them perfect spies. On paper, at least. Unfortunately, they were too weak to prate the barrier that protected the Empire.

    It was hard, however, to send over anyone stronger than them. If I was deploying people to ces with unknown security situations, that limited my applicant list to those Soei could vouch for. And if I detached any of those people from their current missions, that would hinder my orders.

    Soei was talented but not omnipotent. Even after his evolution, he could only deploy up to six Replications of himself at once. Those were the trump cards he used to carry out the dangerous work I always sent him off to. He needed to leave some on tap in case a battle broke out, so if I sent any of those to the Empire, Im sure hed worry over who would be left to guard me.

    The Empires moves really arent being looked at that seriously, though. Its more of a cover story, an excuse for letting Tempest into the Council, thats being spread around by a few of the louder representatives. But if youre that concerned, Sir Soei, I could conduct some investigations myself.

    Oooh. I see that Hinata, like Raphael, doesnt like trusting her own thoughts too much. I always knew how wary she was, but seeing that in action, I kinda had to admire it. I could learn from it, in fact.

    But now shes volunteering to help investigate, huh? I might as well take her up on that

    Report. Please ask her to look into the Armed Nation of Dwargon as well and see whether military activity is possible within its underground cities.

    Raphael never wavers, does it? Now its trying to work Hinata to the ground, too. But that made sense to me. The Canaat Mountains had some paths that led into the Dwarven Kingdom, the territory of Gazel. I couldnt imagine the Empire can do much with those roads, but itd be worth looking into, just in case.

    Could I ask a favor when you do, Hinata?

    Whats that?

    Id kinda like you to investigate the structure of the Dwarven Kingdom, I think.

    Right, the Dwarven Kingdoms a city crafted from a cave underneath the Canaat Mountains. Hmm That could be a possibility, too. You act so careless, but I really cant let my guard down around you, can I?

    Haha-ha-ha Right?

    All right. Ill look into the Dwarven Kingdom as well.

    I wasnt sure what prompted Hinatas admiration, but fine. I thought Raphael was carrying on about nothing, but theres no sure thing in this world. I was just thinking about how I needed to be more careful. If theres a weed bothering me, better to uproot it now rather thanterand if Hinata was volunteering, no reason to hold back.

    So we carefully went through the rest of our discussions, talking about closely held state secrets and other vital affairs in the early-afternoon caf space. We had a magical Soundproof Barrier over us, so nobody was going to eavesdrop on our conversation anyway. Skills can be so useful like that.

    Hinata was kind enough to brief me on a few other things, too. It seemed like a lot of people wanted to take advantage of usand not just for military purposes. Humans, after all, were suspicious folkI should know; I used to be one. Thats why what Hinata told me made so much sense.

    I just want you to know, all right? There are people out there trying to use and abuse you, so dont let them shoehorn you into anything.

    I had to ept that as correct. Whether I would listen to that advice was another question.

    What do you mean, use and abuse me?

    Well, in terms of your military, at the very least. Thats something Id want from you, too, and thats what you want to see, right?

    As she put it, one condition for joining the Council was that wed be responsible for management of the entire Forest of Jura. The member nations were unanimous on that, since wed function as a bulwark against the Empire.

    I got no problem with that. With fewer monsters out there, Im sure well see more people challenge thebyrinth. We do want that, yeah.

    Better not freely admit it so much. Ive had to deal with a lot of heads of state in my time, and let me tell you, theyre clever. They might even ask you to station troops in their countries to keep monster damage down.

    Normally, allowing foreign troops to stay in your nation wasnt the kind of thing governments liked to see. But as Hinata put it, in a world where monsters were a universal threat, leaders wanted to retain as much war power as they could. Many of them werent afraid to use other nations troops for that, including the Western Nations Temple Knights.

    Proposal. You could deploy troops to their nations to create an obligation to you.

    If we were recognized as a nation, it made sense that we could deploy our army to foreignnds as a peacetime maneuver. If something came up, thatd make it easier to exercise our military authority. My home country back in my previous world took that strategy a lot.

    Hohh. I see, I see. Thats not a bad idea, actually. Why dont I let them use us?

    I cant say I like letting them think theyre taking advantage of us, butyes.

    Its essentially giving influence to our nation, isnt it?

    I grinned as Benimaru and Soei voiced their agreement. Shuna kept up her own smile, and I suppose herck ofint meant she agreed. And if we were all on the same page, that meant I could do what I wanted tomorrow.

    Whyre you looking all sinister? an exasperated Hinata asked. Guess shes reading my mind again. But she didnt say anything else, which I took as her tacit approval.

    That marked the end of our lunchtime discussion, but before she left, Hinata brought up something else, as if she had just thought of it.

    Oh, right. I think theres also a group nning to do something stupid at the event tomorrow, so be on the lookout for it, okay?

    Once again, she warned me not to lose my temper orsh out at anyone. What she meant, I suppose, is that the Council wasnt a monolith, and I should treat everybody there as one and the same. Eesh. Why was she so concerned about a pacifist like me? She didnt need to say it; I understood just fine. So I told her she was worrying too much, and we left it at that.

    The next day came.

    We were heading over to the Councils meeting hallBenimaru, Soei, Shuna, and me, all in suits and lookin sharp. It goes without saying that all our weapons were in my Stomach, so at a nce, it wouldve looked like we were unarmed.

    Hinata had given me her full briefing, so I didnt have an iota of anxiety. Maybe a few councillors wanted to take advantage of us, but on the question of my admission to the Council, all my worries were behind me. If I was recognized as a friend to humankind here, thatd be one step closer to the ideal society I had in minda world where man and monster coexisted and shared in one anothers prosperity. To borrow a phrase from Mjurran, a Monster-and-Man Cooperative Alliance.

    On the monster side, we already had magic-born, dwarves, elves, and more living with one another. That alone already resulted in a massive new economic sphere, but as an ex-human, I really wanted to reach out to them as well. But humans, you knowtheyre greedy. Its all What do I get out of this? with them, and theyre willing to shut out their own countrymen just for thinking the wrong thing. But that greed helps them improve their lives, too, and its the engine driving all sorts of new and expanding entertainment.

    They werent simple to deal with. Not like monsters. Better avoid expecting too much here. I couldnt assume this would go great from the very beginning.

    When I reached the Council hall, several councillors were there to greet me. They were from our border nations, and based on what they heard from the Founders Festival participants, they wanted to forge friendlier rtions with me. I sure appreciated all thepliments, and I responded in kind, figuring it best for the future. They started smiling at me, the ice now firmly broken.

    Ah-ha-ha-ha-ha! I heard you were a demon lord, Sir Rimuru, but what I didnt hear about was how much of a sociable leader you are!

    I would certainly like to maintain a friendly rtionship with you, going forward.

    No, no, the pleasures all mine. Ive got a te of events in mind going forward, so if youre interested, please feel free to attend!

    I got the idea they were still a bit too leery to attend the Founders Festival. Now, though, they were being downright familial with me. All that effort from Rigurd, Mjllmile, and the others must have been paying off.

    Now I was feeling really good. Hinata gave me all sorts of doom and gloom yesterday, but I guess I really didnt need to worry. But the next person to greet me sent me straight into a depression.

    A-hem! People, people, quit bothering Sir Rimuru. Councillors from tiny dots on the map with hardly anything to them shouldnt be upying his time all day!

    Indeed, indeed. All this rudeness may give Sir Rimuru the wrong idea about our Council. So please, remember your ce and leave him alone.

    My little entourage was promptly chased off by a group of representatives who acted like they owned the ce. I wanted to ask who was being rude here, but I held back. Soei told me via Thought Communication that these people were from nations with some clout in this Councilevery representative was allegedly equal, but that wasnt really the practice. That was shown perfectly well by these people who took it as their prerogative to lord it over their peers. There was definitely a pecking order here, based on your social standing.

    Right, Sir Rimuru. I tell you, youll never have any constructive conversation with people like that.

    Yeah, thanks. And what would you call constructive?

    I really didnt want to deal with these guys, but I decided to y along.

    Heavens be! I suppose you may not be picking up on the hints, Sir Rimuru?

    Ha-ha-ha! It stands to reason, I think. Sir Rimuru has never had to deal in noble etiquette before. But dont worry. Well teach you everything you need to know!

    A simple question, and already they were answering me with stuck-upughter. They made it seem so natural that I couldnt even tell if they were being deliberately malicious. A bit overly familiar perhaps, but it beat being fearedI think?

    By the way, Sir Rimuru, I hear youve been busy crafting a great deal of interesting things?

    Yes! They say youre considering a magitrain system, for example, and let me tell you, my nation would be more than happy to be part of that effort.

    Ah yes, precisely. And the same is true with mine. Wed be happy to pitch in! Of course, wed like a little, ahwell, you knowin return.

    Um, sure.

    So this is what jaw-dropping means. Rude aint the half of it! I went lightly because these are presumably nobility, but that was a mistake. I mustve really given them the wrong first impression. But I was on their turf. I needed to hold back, or things could easily spiral out of control. Broad mind, broad mind. Given all my grandstanding to Hinata, I couldnt get riled up here.

    Well, we need to put rails in ce before we can run any magitrains. Weve already created an order for ouryout construction, so Im afraid I cant take any more requests right now.

    Ah, no need to worry yourself over such details. I will dly arrange matters with my government, so if you could give us some priority with your delivery, that would be quite fine.

    Something told me he had no idea what a magitrain was. Hed never seen the real thing, after all. As if that werent bad enough, he was alsopletely ignoring my own priorities and throwing thoughtless, one-way demands at my feet.

    Butagain. Patience.

    No, no! As I said, theres an order to this

    But as I tried to bottle up my anger and turn him down, the demands just kept piling up.

    Then perhaps some other product, then? If you could arrange for some weapons or armor, we will be happy to buy it. Of course, dont forget topensate uster!

    The bearded man in front of me, representing the duchy of Laquia, was a particr eyesore. He was not-so-stealthily demanding a bribe. I wondered if he had somehow forgotten I was a demon lord.

    The nations adjoining the Forest of Jura were exposed to monster threats, but these more ind nations enjoyed total peace and security from them. Thats why they prospered so much, I suppose, and maybe they just didnt see a demon lord as that big of a dealbut this was still an awful way to approach me. I felt like an idiot for even giving him the time of day.

    Also, may I inquire as to what kind of education your agent Mjllmile has? I asked my officials to have him open some business channels, but hes been rather evasive about giving a reply, I hear. Would we be able to work with someone else instead?

    I wanted to yell Shut up!! at him. If this was the type Mjllmile dealt with, then I was inadvertently putting him through a ton of pain. He always seemed to brush them off with ease, but some officials are more stubborn than others. I had a lot to learn from him.

    Ill look into that, I replied with a smile. Such a lovely turn of phrase, Ill look into that. Indicating your interest in getting the job done, but offering no firm timetable, freeing you from the obligation to actually do anything. The secret weapon of elite office staff everywhere. That was the brilliant strategy I deployedbluff my way through, then pretend the conversation never happened.

    Ah, good to hear!

    Well look forward to future matters, then.

    And now, wed best be on our way.

    Dont be shy about offering your lineup, now! We can talk any time!

    That phrase deftly shooed all those fools away. Now thats how an adult deals with matters. If you want something, go buy it yourself; thats what I say.

    Ah, certainly, I look forward to that, I lied as I saw the representatives go.

    What a pain they were. I had no obligation to give them anything. Itd be much surer for us if we just sold our wares through the Free Guildat least they didnt demand bribes.

    A few other councillors approached me as well, and I gave some quick greetings before moving along. Any long conversations here seemed likely to get me in trouble.

    It was still morning and already I was getting a bit testy, but at least this was good experience. If I caused any problems before the conference even began, theres no telling what kind of tongueshing Hinata would give meter. I decided to ept things as they were as we entered the hall.

    Should you have let them go like that, Sir Rimuru? I cant believe you forgave their flippant behavior

    Benimaru turned to me the moment the attendants guided us to my seat. He held back before, following my lead, I suppose. I was ready to vent back at him, but Soei and Shuna beat me to the punch.

    Dont expect Sir Rimuru to act like you. The bleating of little minions like them would never be enough to disturb his mind.

    Exactly, my brother. Sir Rimuru has a heart as broad as the wide-open sea. It would be foolish for him to engage with themon crowd like that.

    Um, sure. If thats what they say, I guess Ill just have to y along.

    Yeah, something like that. Benimaru, if you let that rile you, youve still got a lot to learn.

    Of course, I was angry on the inside. But if Shuna and Soei were kind enough to misread my bodynguage for me, I had to work with it. I spent a few more minutes lecturing them on the finer points of interacting with humans.

    The seats wereid out in a fan shape, with us at the base, where the chairman would normally be situated. This put everybodys focus squarely on usone desk and one chair. My associates had to stand behind me.

    The chairman emceeing this session had moved to a safer seat on the second mezzanine. I say safer aspared to us. Being a demon lord mustve put a lot of people on their guard around here, and having all their eyes on me made it terribly difficult to collect my thoughts.

    So the meeting was formally brought into session, but thats when hell really began for me. I was trying to be shrewd, as haughty as my post demanded, but I couldnt lose my temper, either. I had to hold it all in, listening to everything the councillors said.

    Hinata had clued me in on the agenda before I came here. First, on the subject of Tempest joining the Council of the West, the representatives were debating on assorted conditions to impose on the deal. These could be broadly divided into three demands:

    One: adherence to internationalw

    Two: ess to our economic sphere

    Three: provision of military power

    Number one was no problem to me. If we became a member, wed have a duty to follow thew, big or small. The Council didnt have any right to be involved with the internalws of other nations, which eased my concern. Each individual merchant would have to follow the rules of whatever country they were doing business in, and if any problems arose, theyd be resolved following thosews. Got a problem with that judgment? The merchants could file aint with their nations embassy. Depending on how that turned out, itd either be an international issue or the merchant would have to give it up.

    Frankly, I liked that system a lot more than what I saw after the Founders Festival. It established an international legal framework to preside over cross-border issues,plete with an international court and a judge from a third-party nation. In fact, that was part of the Councils role in this region, with representatives recusing themselves as the legiture debated issues involving them. Nothing too tricky about it.

    Of course, to keep things fair, we needed to enact and announce a body ofw for our own nation. That was an issue, but I had good ol Raphael on my side. It had a full grasp ofws from all nations, and it used it to perfectly cover all the bases as it defined our own set for us. We already sent a copy of that to the Council, so all was well.

    Providing ess to our economy presented a few issues.

    Given theck of patents in this world, the trend was for whoever produced the best copy of something to win all the marbles. Before that, however, there was that heavenly army that attacked whenever our civilization got too advanced, an army of a million angels descending from the sky and razing our cities to the ground. Thats why the Western Nations had no gas or electricitynot even steam engines.

    But this didnt mean life was difficult. We had magic and, by extension, magic-driven items. Our attire didnt lose out to Japan at all, and while the transport of fresh foods was out of the question, our nations were good at food storage. There was some excellent magic being harnessed for building construction, leading to some very impressive workIm not sure you could replicate some of the castles and other standout projects with modern Japanese technology.

    So everyones core needsfood, clothing, shelterwere being fulfilled, and life was actually pretty pleasant in the cities. So whats the problem?

    The problem was that, between Vester and Gabils presentation and Kurobes weapon and armor exhibition, word about our technology was starting to leak out, as shown by that bearded guy from Laquia asking about my magitrains. Yohm and Mjurran weremandingrge groups of workers, of course, so this was expected. I didnt mind if people knew about our stuff, but I did mind the people who tried to steal it.

    Or really, trying to steal it was one thing, but now you had people like that Laquian guy trying to make us build a railroad and calling it a business transaction.

    Laquia should share in this first!

    How could you be so thoughtless? Sir Rimuru, the Republic of Zamund is far more worthy of serving as Tempests closest partner!

    Order! Now is not the time for debate between member nations. Youre simply baffling Sir Rimuru!

    If the white-bearded chairman hadnt stepped in to quiet things down, we mightve been bogged down forever.

    Open markets, in themselves, werent a problem, but I wasnt expecting an obligation to share all of our tech. If they see us as some kind of international handyman for them, I dreaded how they might try to use us in the future.

    Now I saw why I had reason to worry about the things I did. And despite how depressed I already felt, the conference was still dragging on.

    As for the third condition, a military power-sharing deal, wed need to have some debate on that.

    Following Hinatas word of caution, I had Soei do some more research for me. We know there were people who wanted to tap into our war power under the name of military cooperation, but the same was also true for us. Tempest would be responsible for managing the Forest of Jura; the proposal was for us to handle monster-rted issues, and I was fine with that. That much I predicted from the start, and it worked better for us. Even in my discussions with Hinata, we agreed that Tempest would handle Jura defenses, while the Crusaders covered things in the Barren Lands.

    My nation would cover the bill for this monster defense, which Im sure the Council loved. After all, if we wanted to keep the economy running smoothly, world affairs needed to be kept stable. Nations wary of the Eastern Empire no doubt appreciated our defensive power as wellnot that I expected it to happen, but if push dide to shove, wed be there on the front line of it.

    So yes, the Council definitely wanted to take advantage of us. Thats why I needed to be sure we could do the same in return.

    We would defend the Forest of Jurathat was a given. But the smaller nations also wanted to use our excess capacity to help protect themselves. There may have been fewer monsters venturing out from the forest, but they still couldnt defend against unexpected monster intrusions. Some flying monsters were particrly dangerous, and the nations couldnt afford to cheap out on their defense budget. But there were patrol soldiers and monster-hunting adventurers to pay, and if the Council didnt cover the cost, theyd have to make up the difference with taxes.

    Even worse, if they had to wait around for the Free Guild to show up after a monster discovery, they couldnt prevent damage before it happened. Nations that had Luminism as their official religion enjoyed regr patrol visits from the Crusaders, but there wasnt an infinite number of them. They had a huge amount of terrain to cover, and Im sure there were times when they were simply unavable when needed the most.

    Thats where we came in. Each nation could pay us a defense fee, and then theyd be free to use us however they liked. At the same time, though, theyd be relying on us for national defense, so they wouldnt be able to ignore us any longer. Itd be a disy of power for Tempestand a way to expand our influence on the Western Nations. The money theyd pay us would also strengthen our positiontwo birds with one stone, really.

    And what if the Empire really did attack? Then, for better or worse, Tempest was right in the middle of their invasion route. If a fight couldnt be avoided, itd naturally be well-advised for us to shore up our rear support. If they epted our defensive forces instead of fearing us, we couldnt ask for anything better.

    If we wanted to make this work, there needed to be an absolute, overwhelming difference in war powerenough to make other nations think they could never beat us in a war. Itd be ridiculous to entrust your defenses to another country otherwise. And if we could make the Western Nations take a if you cant beat em, join em stance with us, our mission was as good as aplished.

    As each of the representatives gave us demands and yed interference with one another, the chairmanpleted his preamble.

    Those are the conditions ced upon the admission of the Jura-Tempest Federation. Lord Rimuru, do you have any objections?

    I had better give him some, or else Id be consenting to everything. I could ignore the councillors inanementary, but I better notmit any oversights with these conditions. I wanted to take advantage of these guys, but unless I could bind them down with a treaty, I was wasting my time.

    Isnt this the kind of thing we work out on paper first, then get a chance to debate on? That annoyed me a bit. What if I couldnt give them an instant reply in this session?

    I assumed this was another way of harassing me. But I had Raphael with me, considering all the oral arguments and using my own hands to write them down. Talk about omnipotent. So I had my friend think about the issues ande up with a rebuttal.

    Well, Ive considered all of your conditions and prepared a list of my doubts and alternative suggestions for each one. If you can ept those, I have no reason not to go forward.

    I handed the documents I had written up to Benimaru, who took them to the chairman. He epted them, looking a bit overpowered by him.

    Wha?!

    I had agreed to the general outline of the conditions offeredbut I had changed a few of the stiptions to ensure I still profited, even if they took advantage of me. Raphael was kind enough to mark out all the sections to change for me, so (unlike an oral agreement) everything was set in stone after the fact.

    The chairman, no doubt seeing us as mere monsters, looked at the documentsaplete, blow-by-blow rundown of the exnation he had given usand nched. I could understand his surprise when he saw my revisions in red pen, all but spelling out for him that he couldnt pull a fast one on me. It was all Raphaels doing, not mine, but lets gloss over the details here.

    If you have any concerns, Id be happy to discuss them.

    If he couldnt ept my terms, there was no urgent need to join the Council. Id just presume that my quest for general eptance from humankind was still a bit premature and deepen my ties with the nations that already epted us.

    No, no, there are no problems, exactlybut if possible, Lord Rimuru, I would like some time to debate these matters.

    The chairman, being no fool, mustve realized that he couldnt browbeat us like usual. He would carefully go over my revisions, and he voiced no realint about that. Not that I got any time to deliberatebut even if I protested, I wouldnt have gotten any. So for now, I agreed to his request.

    Why was this happening?

    The desk, kicked into the air, was suspended in space, slowly falling to the groundand in the midst of this nearly stopped moment in time, Hinatas eyes seemed particrly cold to me. She didnt need to use her voice to tell me what she was thinking: Youve done it after all.

    With a heavy sound, the desk crashed to the floor. I buried my heel in it, crushing it beyond recognition. Toote to turn back now.

    So I reclined in my chair as if I had nned all this, crossing one leg over the other. Then, giving a gloating stare at the councillors gaping at me, I heaved an internal sigh.

    Look, I kept it bottled up at first. I had a reputation as a grown, mature leader for Tempest, and I took pride in having a heart broader than the ocean. That much, I think Ive made clear from my recent actions. People called me a bastion of fortitude; I could even handle Milim with no problem. That broad heart of mine allowed me tough off and forgive all her selfish bantering.

    But what if, instead of Milim, you had this room full of unattractive, obsessed, materialistic old men who never even bothered to hide the avarice glinting in their eyes? You could find the answer in that twisted desk in front of me.

    After an extended, three-hour break, the meeting went back into session.

    Heres where my problems began. In response to the documents I submitted, the representative created something they called a list of requests and handed it to me. Judging by the tired look on the chairmans face, this was done against his will, but I didnt have any sympathy for him.

    A quick look through the list showed me that I could ept absolutely none of their demands. Heres a rundown:

    Open a magitrain line to Englesia, with Tempest handling all construction and costs.

    Provide high-quality weaponry and armor. Tempest is requested to help the Western Nations strengthen its military preparations.

    As thebyrinth that appeared in Tempest is a treasure to all humankind, add the Council to its administration team.

    Upon admission, Tempest will provide a preset amount of taxes on a yearly basis. Due to safety considerations, the representatives it selects must be humans.

    And so onthere was a lot of nonsense written down.

    I gotta hand it to them; they made me lose my temper in the space of three seconds. These conditions werent even worth debating. This wasnt just an unequal treaty; Id sooner give up living with humans entirely than sign on to this.

    All right, people. Are you making fun of me? Youve been prattling on and on today, but what makes you think youve got the right to make demands to a demon lord?

    My kicking the desk to pieces made the hall notably quieter. Holding back my rage, I spoke directly to the chairman, currently hanging his head in shame.

    Sir Rimuru is asking a question. Dont just sit there quietly. Please answer him.

    Shuna, smiling, delivered a follow-up blow for me, and I think that had more of an effect than anything I said. The councillors looked fully cowed now, some of them breaking into a cold sweat.

    I think you have the wrong idea here. Our nation has already almostpleted a gigantic economic bloc of its own. The one reason we want to join the Council of the West anyway is so we can show the human race that were not hostile to them. But if you dont want that, Ive got no intention of forcing things along here

    My voice rang quietly in the silent chamber. I wasnt shouting at all, but it seemed to make all the representatives minds shiver with fear.

    I wasnt using Lords Ambition or anything like that. Against a human target, Lords Ambition would cause sheer panic at best, insanity and death at worst. No need to break that out. And I wasnt brainwashing them at all, eitherif I did, Id be throwing all the goodwill I built with humanity out the window. I had no interest in living out my life with a legion of boring puppets who said nothing but yes to me.

    No, this was just me being riled into destroying the desk andying out my full opinions. But even that had a massive effect.

    N-no, Sir Rimuru, that was not at all the motive behind our requests

    C-certainly not! We simply provided our perhaps overly optimistic feedback out of a desire to deepen our friendly ties with you.

    The browbeaten councillors desperately began making excuses. The more of them I heard, the more annoyed I got.

    First off, why was the king of a nation only a sir? If I was convening with other kings and leaders, Id expect thatbut being called it by someone without a country to govern was the same as saying I ran no nation at all. It was a nation addressing a colony, and it demonstrated zero respect for us. Im sure they looked down on us as a bunch of monsters. I could put up with being looked down upon personally, but if it was my whole country? Forget it.

    I am a demon lord and expected to be treated that way, but this was even worse than I expected. My hotel was first ss, and lot of the councillors here treated me with respect, so maybe I let my guard down a littlebut still, this was horrible.

    Oh? Then what was your motive? Because to me, this sounds like you want my nation and me to work day and night for you as your ves.

    No, not at all!

    That was not our intention whatsoever! It was nothing like that

    The councillors argued mightily. If these nobles were meant to represent entire nations, it just made my head hurt. Even with a heart as tolerant as mine, having to negotiate with people like this was testing me. If Yuuki had made these sly old dogs do his bidding, then he must be the slyest fox of all. I wish I could follow his example, but I dont think I could.

    Suggestion. Would you like me to automatically handle this?

    Yes

    No

    It sounded like Raphael was saying something, but Im sure I imagined it. Yes, its a trusted, talented assistant, but its still just a skill. It shouldnt be able to so freely speak its mind like that. I guess Ive been relying on it so much, Im starting to hear my own internal desires spoken back to me. If something like that were possible, Id probably have Raphael give all my speeches for me, and itd belikewhy did I suffer for so long, then?

    I shook my head, attempting to shake the delusions from my mind, then stared back at the councillors.

    Crap. Now that my mind was cleared out, I just realized I had no idea how to resolve this situation. Haste makes wasteand all that. I just made things superplicated for myself, and fixing it all up was going to be an uphill battle. The representatives were frantic for a solution, and honestly, so was I.

    Report. It is not a problem. As you intended, Master, I have confirmed the effect of the spiritual interference affecting the room.

    Um, what?

    I wasnt intending anything there. I wasnt thinking at all. I was pissed off, so I reacted ordingly. And now

    Report. With this quantity of samples, I have discovered thews governing the spiritual interference. As with the subject Gaiye, the majority of councillors in this chamber are under the effect of spiritual interference from someone. Remove the interference?

    Yes

    No

    Well, I mean, sure

    I thought Yes in my mind without hesitation. The moment I did, the previously silent councillors began to speak up again.

    Well, of course Lord Rimuru is angry! How could we make up for this disgrace?

    Wait! These conditions werent even brought up in our previous special session!

    Who tried to slip these past us?!

    Things started to change pretty quick. Raphael strikes again. No matter the issue, I can always rely on it.

    Heh-heh Looks like the councillors regained their senses, I defiantly muttered, as if this was my n all along. I just wanted to look cool, really, but it sure elicited a response from Shuna.

    They certainly did! I thought they were acting a bit strange, but someone had taken over their spirits?

    Well, Raphael?

    Understood. It is a type of Spiritual Interference skill. It does not exert any influence on magicules, so confirming its presence took some time, but it is statistically impossible for so many people to possess such simr wavelengths. It was believed that canceling it would take time, but your anger wavelengths created an open seam.

    Right. Exactly like I pictured itlets go with that.

    I dont think it was that strong, I ventured, without any evidence. The spiritual interference gave the councillors a sort of tunnel vision, maybe?

    Shuna and the rest of my crew gave me looks of impressed respect.

    I see. So you ced pressure on them to shake them out of it?

    Thats right, Benimaru. I considered it all clearly before doing it.

    Better phrase it that way, I dont want them to start imitating my temper tantrum just now. Plus, this gave me the perfect excuse for Hinata. Were all good

    but I still had my doubts. Who carried out that spiritual interference, anyway? Probably not Yuuki, I dont think; I doubted hed take an approach that left so much evidence like this. If he did, hed need some motivation tobut no point pondering over that. Now wasnt the time to pursue the culprit.

    Right now, I needed to solve the problems staring me in the face. The newly awoken councillors were bearing down on a subset of the Council, the group who created that list of demands. There were more than I thought, but they still looked like all was well. They mustve had some other scheme in mind.

    Suddenly, I felt something odd. A few of them were looking toward a door deeper inside the chamber. Turning my ears toward it, I could hear several sets of footsteps. Did someone call the royal guard?

    Report. No such movements were detected, so it is believed this was nned in advance.

    Mm-hmm.

    Maybe they set this up to have me cause a scene so they could arrest me? Against a demon lord, that took a lot of guts. Maybe it really was that sloppy of a nI could picture itbut if so, the people of Englesia and its surrounding nations must have been pretty oblivious to danger. They were so far away from the threat of demon lords that they mustve gotten soft. The same was true of their councillors; there must have been a lot of optimists around there.

    Or maybe these were the fools scheming something Hinata had warned about?

    The moment that urred to me, the door opened, revealing a dozen or so soldiers led by arger man.

    Well, someones sure in a lively mood! So youre the fool calling himself a demon lord? You certain you can afford to act so high and mighty if youve only got three people with ya?

    Therge man immediately began shouting at me the moment he came inside. He gave a vulgar smile as he made no attempt to hide his disdain for me. This wasnt just rude; he was trying to start a fight, and there was no way to excuse it. My friends and I gave one another dumbfounded looks.

    Hang on. This was part of their n. They had some kind of deep design behind this

    Understood. It is believed that this man has nothing of the sort.

    Oh, really? So hes just a huge idiot?

    Um My name is Rimuru, and yes, I call myself a demon lord. Are you confusing me with someone else?

    Juuuust in case, I thought I should ask. Whoops, wrong guy wouldnt cut it when the dust settled, so I tried to figure out the mans true motives.

    Shunas smile had disappeared, and Benimaru was so angry that he was now frozen in ce. Soei was about ready to whip out the sword he had hidden on him, and weapons in the chamber were gonna be real hard to exinter. I was just as livid as themin fact, I was so far gone, I almost wanted tough. That was how I remained coolheaded enough to ask the question.

    But the results were prettycking.

    Yep. Youre the one. He said that idiots name was Rimuru!

    No mistake, then. Which meant I was safe doing him in, but

    Look. Can you quit it with that? I dunno what you want, but do you think youll get away with that kind ofwlessness in front of all these witnesses?

    This wasnt something I could really say after bashing up that desk, but that was then. Lets use thew as a weapon to chase this freak away, because otherwise, I really might kill himand if I didnt, I feared Benimaru or someone else would lose it.

    But therge man kept at it.

    Moron! This is my big chance! Once I knock you around and put this on you, all of you monsters will be under ourmand!

    Uh, what? Knock me around? Under hismand? Whats he talking about? Maybe I really was a moron, because I didnt understand him at all

    Understood. This fool is saying that he will defeat you and make you follow hismands.

    Yeah, I know! If you keep exining things with a straight face like that, I really will look like an idiot.

    And whats that in the mans hand? It was none other than an Orb of Domination, the very artifact I saw in use back when Milim pretended to be hypnotized. It looked real, but would that work on me?

    Understood. It is impossible to rule over my lord with the Orb of Domination.

    Thats a relief.

    I dont know where this lumbering man found it, I thought, but Id better break it before it puts anyone in danger.

    I stood up from my seat. It mustve woken the chairman from his stupor, because he started shouting in a panic.

    W-wait, Lord Rimuru! This is some kind of mistake. No one in the Council is sponsoring this! Please, confirm it with Lady Hinata if you wish! Shes an impartial party!

    He was respectful toward me, and I didnt think he was lying. Hinata didnt say anything about this; in fact, she warned me to stay on guard. I didnt think itd be this in-your-face stupid, but for now, I couldnt do much except sit back and see how things went.

    The chairman wasnt my enemy. Neither was Hinata. And I had a lot of allies among the councillors as well.

    I know nothing about this! What is going on here?

    Who sent you here?

    Those soldiers armor bears the emblem of the Englesia royal family. Is Englesia instigating this?

    I could hear them shouting above the confused representative. Clearly, they couldnt have been involved. This wasnt something the Council hatchedit was the work of a smaller group gone clearly out of control.

    Amid the chaos, one person made a coolheaded decision. That was Hinata. When the chairman stated her name, she stood up and stepped between therge man and me.

    Sir Reiner, what is the meaning of this?

    Reiner, was it? If Hinata knew him, was he famous around here?

    Do note in here without permission! We are in the middle of a Council session. Soldiers like you are not allowed!

    Emboldened by Hinatas actions, the chairman began yelling at the group as well. But instead of Reiner, one of the councillors answered himCount Gaban of Englesia, I think his name was.

    Ha-ha-ha! Worry not, Chairman Leicester. I called them in here to discipline thatwbreaker over there.

    Gaban was all smiles from his seat in the second tier, close to the chairman.

    Sir Gaban, have you gone mad?!

    The chairmans face went red as he shouted. I could see why. If a fellow councillor was involved, that kind of prevented the chairman from iming the Council wasnt in on this. And as long as we had an impartial observer in Hinata, this ridiculous farce could very well benefit me. I hated all this verbal abuse but decided to weather it for a bit.

    Sir Gaban! I was not informed of this!!

    This was Representative Johann Rostia, a prince, screaming now. He was among the more decent councillors, not ced under spiritual interference. I remember the disgusted look on his face when things first went awry. Looks like he was siding with me hereI presumed he was on the pro-admission side.

    Everyone, please, calm down. I know that we all fear the demon lord Rimuru. Am I wrong? And Sir Reiner here is the strongest man in all of Englesia. He is here to defeat Rimuru, rule over him, and make this member of the Octagram into his personal pawn. And with hies Veldora!!

    Even with the other councillors telling him off, Gaban remained unaffected, using his seat to formally dere hostilities against me. Several councillors shouted their agreement.

    If it was getting to this point, I no longer had any reason to hold backbut the situation was progressing so fast, I was getting left in the dust.

    I-impossible!

    Unforgivable! How dare you disrespect the Council!

    Indeed! Are you ignoring the will of the Council and prioritizing your own motives instead?

    Even more councillors stood up and began airing their grievances.

    This was starting to look ominous. Some of the representatives didnt look well, hanging their heads. Given Gabans dauntless behavior, he probably had another trick up his sleeve. And I was right.

    Order, please, gentlemen. What my knight Reiner says is true. And now the demon lords been kind enough toe visit us. How could we afford not to use this opportunity?!

    With these words, a delicate-looking man strode into the chamber. This blond-haired figure wasnt a councillor but certainly acted like their boss. I thought I detected a murmur of surprise among the Council; I could guess he was pretty high up. But the next moment:

    Prince Elrick, what is going on here? I thought I advised you to refrain from any foolish behavior Hinata confirmed it for me.

    Apparently, this was the honest-to-goodness prince of this nationand not even a council could be rude around a prince. No wonder there was so much consternation in the chamber.

    So was this Prince Elrick the mastermind behind all this? He had incited at least a few councillors, by the looks of it.

    Hinata, I am disappointed in you. Youve grown fearful of the demon lord and abandoned your post as guardian of humankind.

    What? came the cold, low-pitched reply.

    Wow. He really pissed her off. Now I wasnt sure I needed to act at all.

    Enough back talk, Hinata. All right? You may be the leader of the pdin forces or what have you, but theres no possible way you could best me, the head general of the Englesia royal knight corps. You cant even beat that wispy weakling of a demon lordinstead you lick each others wounds. What augh! I bet you wet your pants running from him, didnt you?

    That vulgar smile was still on Reiners face as he picked a fight with Hinata. Oh, man. Even I could feel the blood draining from my face.

    You

    Hee-hee-hee! Cant even reply, can you? Im assuming Ive hit the nail on the head? Well, Ms. Crusader captain Thats a ceremonial title I presume you obtained by exercising your womanly wiles on that dirty old cardinal? Yes, Im sure it was a sorry fight indeed between you and that demon lord. And a demon lord with no interest in killing his adversary? Dont make meugh!

    Oh, now Im taking the heat again. I really wish hed stop.

    But Ill hand it to you, Hinata. You are attractive. If youll be mydy, I promise Ill take good care of you as a concubine. You know?

    Ohhh, man. Now hes dead.

    Hinatas expression didnt change. She was the cool, reserved beauty she always was. But the colder she looked on the outside, the more her insides raged like bubbling magma. Her patience amazes me, it really does. I wouldve lost it hours ago.

    Now, now, General Reiner. Isnt that going a little too low? But Im interested in the demon lord as well. I wouldnt want you to have him all to yourself, you know. What do you think?

    I felt an indescribable chill run down my spine. Was this Gaban guying on to me?! The thought, and this man, sickened meand after todays events, itd take a lot to move me at all. Good thing he was far away from me, because otherwise, I mightve clocked him just now.

    Prince Elrick, as the prince of Englesia, are you willing to allow this man, Sir Reiner, to say such things? Hinata hid the anger in her cold voice as she asked the question.

    Elrick just smiled. Hee-hee-hee! Hinata, if you had cooperated with me, I would have given you much more honorable treatment. If you wish to me anyone, me yourself for angering Reiner. And yesI forgot to mention this, but Reiner is more powerful than an A-ranked adventurer. And hes not alone

    With that, Elrick snapped his fingers. The door immediately opened once more, revealing a man in ck, another in a green robe, and a group of people in overcoats with a familiar emblem on them. Come to think of it, I knew the first guy, too. It was Gaiye, the dude who got his head cut off by Delta the dryad. And those overcoat guys were definitely Green Fury, the team our avatars waged a life-and-death battle against.

    So was the green-robe guy part of the Sons of the Veldt? He was hooded and wearing a scarf over his face, making for a mysterious, unknown figurebut he acted all upper-ss, so I figured he maybe ran the Veldt or something.

    Allow me to make some introductions. This is Sir Gaiye, an A-ranked adventurer and now Reiners aide-de-camp. And this

    Elrick ced a hand on green-robe guys shoulder. The theatrics made it clear just how self-absorbed he was.

    is the leader of the world-famous mercenary group, the Sons of the Veldt. I assembled as powerful of a team as I could, as I thought defeating a demon lord with anyone less worthy would be poor manners. Yes, you see, there are dozens of people like you running around here. Just because you have a little strength to your name, you know, doesnt give you the right to act like a king.

    He certainly had confidence. And if he wanted a fight, I was happy to give it to him

    Report. Doing so would have a 100 percent chance of damaging your reputation.

    Right? Even to me, a demon lord starting a fight in front of such an influential audience seemed like a poor idea. And my policy was to fight a challenger only after they conquered mybyrinth. If I started bending that rule for no good reason, Id have to duke it out with every idiot I passed by on the street.

    And whats moresomeone in the chamber was angrier than me. People are strange that way. If someone else gets angry first, that actually has a calming effect on you.

    Let me ask you, Prince Elrick. What you are doing is antagonizing not only me, but the entire Western Holy Church, said Hinata. Are you prepared to ept the consequences?

    No need to worry. I will not cause any trouble for the Western Holy Church, nor for the Holy Empire of Lubelius. Just sit there and watch, and I will guarantee your safety.

    Seeing Hinata fight to keep her cool, I forgot all about how angry I was.

    But from the chairman on down, there were councillors attempting to defy Elricks group. We werent alone in the lions den here; we hadnt been rejected by the Council. These were just some idiots gone out of control. Maybe it wasnt worth getting worked up about.

    That is not the issue. I have been asked by the Council to attend this session as an impartial observer. My role is to ensure its proceedings remain fair, and I am thus in no position to let your recklessness go unanswered. If this was the Councils will, that would be a different story, but please dont expect I will allow a single person to act out of line like this!

    Given their rtive positions, Hinata was trying to reason with Elrick first. I doubted itd work much. The words just werent reaching him.

    Lady Hinata is right! This nonsense will not be tolerated in the chamber!

    Prince Elrick, I heard nothing about this! And Sir Gaban, do you expect no repercussions from this?!

    Lord Rimuru himself came out here for us. This treatment is going to spark an international incident!

    This is unforgivable! Is this how the Kingdom of Englesia oppresses its people?!

    Rage, anger, rantingmore and more councillors were putting up a fight. Now I felt like I was in a theater, watching the events unfold from my seat. My starring role mightve been taken from me, but I didnt care.

    Without fairness, can you call it a Council at all?!

    Now the chairman was shouting. I cheered him on in my mind. Keep it up!

    Shut your mouths, old men! You can simper all you want once Ive taken control of the demon lord!

    Reiner, meanwhile, was already up on his imaginary victory podium. He had already riled Hinata past the point of no return, so I doubted I needed to do anything. I figured wed just ignore him.

    Prince Elrick, our agreement only covered our bodyguard services for you alone. Any hazardous behavior you engage in would void our agreement

    Whoa. So the Sons of the Veldt leader wasnt in on this? And here I had bunched them all together in my mind. Good thing I learned the facts in time.

    Y-yes! The demon lord Rimuru is the most dangerous figure I can personally think of! Thatbyrinth he created is crawling with all kinds of insane creatures! Youd have to be a madman toe up with it!

    Should I take that as apliment?

    Maybe all that fighting was worth it after all. The elementalist leading Green Fury was almost too scared of me now.

    Hmph. Nonsense. You cowards do nothing but get in my way.

    Ah, but Gaiyes in the same boat with Reiner, eh? They seemed pretty alikeoverconfident and turning a deaf ear to all outside opinion. He was shing hateful looks at me now, although I really didnt know where the grudge came from.

    Either way, the chamber was one step away from erupting into full-fledgedbat.

    Elrick, taking charge in the midst of this stalemate, raised a hand.

    Order!! All of you, listen. Prince Elrick is speaking!! shouted Gaban, who hade down from the mezzanine to stand next to Elrick.

    The prince nodded his approval, took a long, careful look around, and suddenly spoke. Councillors! Now is the time to express your will to me! Will you join us, the heroes who will y the demon lord? Or will you side with that nefarious lord and betray humankind? I, Prince Elrick von Englesia, know in my heart that the representatives before me will make the correct choice!! He gloated like a stage actor.

    What, I reflexively replied, were gonna vote on it now?

    The prince nodded back at me, like this wasmon sense. After that wacky entrance he made, he still wanted to try upholding his honor? Besides, if we held a vote right now, theres no way hed win a majority of

    Heh-heh! Why not? We must decide this democratically, by vote. Of course, Im sure we hardly need to. The Council, you see, is firmly on my side.

    That piqued my interest. He was supremely confident, as if he already knew the resultswhich, if you thought about it, was ridiculous. Not even a prince could get away with this outrageous behavior in an international council like this.

    So why was he doing it?

    Understood. He has likely bribed many of the councillors.

    Ah, I knew it. But I didnt think hed buy off representatives from foreign nations as well. Itd be an international scandal if it got out, so I discounted any possibility of that. Served me right for making the wrong assumption.

    Now, let us decidefairly and honestly! We are about to defeat and take rule over the demon lord. All in agreement, stand up!!

    As the princes voice rang up to the rafters, several councillors rose to their feet with vile smirks. The collusion was obvious.

    Well, I suppose itse to this. Even if todays turned out disappointing, Ive got all the time in the world. If weve been rejected, then its our duty to ept those results.

    Report. There are no problems. This is within expectations.

    Umit is?

    I was struck by the vision of Raphael letting a dark grin materialize on its visage. Come to think of it, Soei had done a lot of investigating, hadnt he? Peoples opinions of our nation; the financial states of all the countries; how the royalty and nobility approached them He had even pored through the legitive proceedings of each member nation.

    Raphael had examined all of it in intricate detail, and inside my Stomach, it had quickly created a set of documents for me. I took them out. It was a set of ledgers.

    Ooh! Secret ledgers! Were these really within your expectations, Raphael?

    I couldnt believe this guy had actually found dirt on all the paid-off councillors. If I revealed these detailed lists of bribes given and received, I could take down everyone involved in one fell swoop. And now that I had incontrovertible evidence, this really was nothing more than a farce.

    Thats Raphael for you. No stone left unturned. It was honestly scary.

    Report. My lord will be victorious without needing to reveal that evidence.

    Hmm?

    Before I could figure out what it meant, the vote was over. Several councillors stood up and started pping. Seeing this, Elricks voice boomed out again.

    We have our results. And the Councils majority agrees. The resolution has passed!

    Gaban and Reiner had simrly sinister smiles as Elrick gloated to the audience. They were ready to capture us at any momentbut not so fast.

    Fewer than a third of the Councils members were actually on their feet. The majority were still sitting down. That fool Elrick was so sure of his n that he dered victory without even looking at the seats.

    Now the councillors pping for Elrick realized they were the minority. They nervously looked around, faces growing pale. The results were clear. The majority was against ying the demon lordin other words, me.

    Interestingly, I had more ledgers on me than the number of people standing up. They made up more than half the Council, in fact, but I guess a lot of them had a sudden change of heart.

    Understood. It is believed that, after removing the spiritual interference earlier, they have regained their consciences.

    I see, I see. They regained their wits and realized how foolishly they were acting. Excellent. It meant the people seated right now had weighed the issue fairly and decided to side with me. The bribes were apparently good enough for some of them, but

    Understood. It is believed that the spiritual interference stimtes the desires of its targets. It appears to exact a powerful coercive force on them.

    Huh. I kinda sympathize with them, then.

    Between that and Masayukis Chosen One, mind-altering skills are a menace indeed. Masayuki had no control over it, but it looked like this skill user could target individual people. I didnt know who it was, but it was definitely someone to watch out for.

    That blond dude, maybe?

    Well, at least the freed councillors saw the light in time. They all seemed friendly enough to me, so maybe I could keep quiet about the bribes. Really, though, if the fate of nations can ride on the choices of just a few councillors, I think there might be some issues with the whole Council system.

    If organizations like the League of Nations or the United Nations cant keep themselves pure like that, its only a matter of time before they go rotten. Corrupt representatives ruin the reputation of the nation they represent. If youre going to leave nations destinies to individual personalities and dignities, then I wish they picked the councillors here a lot more carefully.

    But then, thats nothing for me to worry about. My concern right now was with the people who stood up. Anyone who kept their head down and engaged in injustice like this needed to pay for their crimes. Before that, I thought, we should open the eyes of the fools who still hadnt caught up with events.

    Hey. Take a breath and look closer at the room.

    I kept myselfposed as I spoke to Elrick.

    Hah! What are you?

    He hadnt noticed the vote yet. Its amazing how much you could embarrass yourself when you were this stupid.

    What are you, a clown?

    What?!

    No, pardon me, Prince Elrick. It was just soical, you see. Even Hinata, coldly viewing this farce, chose this moment to join with me. She may have seemed frigid, but right now, she was bursting to fight.

    I didnt want to lose out to her, but Hinatas lips were simply moving too fast.

    The majority of the chamber voted against your opinion. As the observer, I hereby dere that this vote was carried out in a fair, legal fashion. Of course, Im sure the Council will hold an inquiryter to determine whether you had any right to call for a vote in the first ce.

    Hah! I refuse to stand for this nonsense! Have you all forsaken me?!

    Pfft! I love it. His anticipated results failing to happen, Elrick was now carrying on like a child. Considering how much of a narcissist he was, seeing him break down like this was the height ofedy. Hinata was all smiles, and so was I. I could just feel all the frustration from before dissolve away.

    Y-yes. Yes, Prince Elrick is right! Do you understand what this means, everyone? If you pull an act like this, we will rescind our nations support to

    Wait. What does that mean, Sir Gaban? Would you mind exining it to us?

    The exhausted-looking chairman cut Gaban off right as he was shouting, spittle sticking to the edges of his lips. Something about that statement mustve caught his attention. Our nations support, perhaps?

    Understood. It is excerpted in the previous documents.

    I looked back at them. Ah yes. Now I see the transactions in detail.

    Anti-flooding construction in the Kingdom of Raibach. Food support for the drought in Carnada. Theyve made many other promises of support to an assortment of nations. And this is how they were meant to pay you back, huh? But if youre going to cut off that support after they stopped taking your orders, its all but admitting to the malignant bribery youve been engaging in.

    Wha?!

    Why do you know about our internal affairs?!

    Elrick was silenced. Gaban was unable to hide his shock. I remained calm and lorded over them with a light smile. That was all I needed to bluff my opponents. I didnt really know what was going on, either, but if thats what Raphael said, I was sure there was no doubting it.

    Now Elricks allies were beside themselves with panic. The chairman, sensing my gist, was staring at them like a man possessed. The Council had just taken another turnnow things were tilting our way for good.

    I saw one of the councillors try to sit down when no one was looking. None of that, thanks. Soeis Sticky Steel Thread had already kept them standing in ce.

    Ah, I knew it, said the Sons of the Veldt leader in an indistinct, genderless voice. Were not in the business of guarding someone looking to prod the hos nest.

    I guess their business transaction with Elrick was over. Victory was ours. By now, our objectives were as good as aplishedbut there were still some fools here who refused to ept defeat.

    Enough of this utter garbage! Prince Elrick, now is no time to give up. Once I defeat the demon lord, our problems are solved!

    Ahah, Reiner!!

    Y-yes, General Reiner. We still have you, the greatest weapon in our arsenal. What a sight for sore eyes!

    They didnt know when to quit, I guess. Now they were casting the entire Council aside to fulfill their aims. I doubted it would work, but then, I didnt know much about an idiots thought processes.

    Are you trying to defeat me?

    Of course, you fool! Or have you gotten cold feet now? Crawl up here and lick my boots, and Ill think about keeping this painless for you!

    Reiners vulgar smile was back. He was shing the Orb of Domination around, so I suppose he was still intent on stuffing that into me somehow. Gaiye, behind him, gave out some sort of order to his soldiers. They promptly moved to block the door. I suppose they wanted to keep everyone in here, to keep word of their blunders from getting out. The Sons of the Veldt had already taken a step back, but there were still a few upper-level adventurers on Elricks side, weapons out and pointed at us.

    W-weapons in the chamber! Of all the foolish things!!

    The chairman was screaming his head off, but the soldiers were keeping anyone from leaving the mezzanine. I stopped hearing him after a while, so I guess he got captured along with the other councillors.

    If itse to this

    I thought, but Hinata moved first.

    As observer, I refuse to ept this reckless behavior. Also

    Hinata smiled at Reiner, reminding him of all the insults he lobbed at her. She wasnt armed, since weapons werent allowed in the chamber, but if she was, Im sure she wouldve had her hand on the hilt of her sword by now. Theyre so dead.

    Rimuru, Ill take care of this.

    Heh-heh-heh Oh, this is rich. I am the strongest man in Englesia, and I say its time to expose you. Some Saint you are! You mightve gotten carried away, being touted as the guardian of humankind and all, but that ends today. Its time to give you a dose of reality!

    Never once reflecting on her actual skills, Reiner gave Hinata all the bombast he could muster.

    And you know what? He wasnt weak. An over-A in rank, even. He could probably wage a pretty even battle with a magic-born like Gelmud. But he wouldnt know, would he? In and as peaceful as Englesia, he was an outstanding talent and font of strength, but he hadnt put in hours on the battlefield fighting monsters. Thats why he was so oblivious to the threat they posed. Gaiye was the same.

    Heh Would you allow me to engage the demon lord, then?

    Of course! But dont kill him, Gaiye. Make sure you control the force of that holy sword I gave you.

    No need to remind me. With this piece of equipment, Ill never face failure again!

    Gaiye wanted to go against me. Whatever fancy weapon he got put him in high spirits, but it wasnt anything that extraordinarykind of toeing the line between Rare and Unique. Plus, if hes relying on equipment and skills instead of actual talent, its unlikely he had much of thetter to work with. Gaiyes another over-A fighter, but to me right now, he wasnt even a threat.

    Faced with a foe like this, the honest thought in my mind was Man, I really dont wanna have to deal with this. But apparently, I wouldnt need to.

    All this time, Ive put up with your humiliationbut you have been far too rude to Sir Rimuru, the man I respect and admire. Shuna stepped in front of me, her attitude suggesting shed take no prisoners. Quietly, she walked up to Gaiye. Wow. She might be way angrier than me.

    Looking around, I spotted Benimaru, frozen in ce and not moving an inch. He was caught t-footed, and when our eyes met, he gave me an awkward look. Yeah, I get it. We were of the same mind, and one nce was all it took to confirm that.

    Heh-heh Ha-ha-ha-ha-ha! How long will you continue to put me down?! Arent you ashamed at all, Demon Lord Rimuru, hiding in the shadow of this poor little girl?

    Shuna was right in front of Gaiye as he continued to scoff at me. What did he expect from me? If Shuna was ready to kick ass, I didnt want to steal her thunder. And if Benimaru was reluctantly giving her the stage, I had to follow suit.

    Silence. There is no need for Sir Rimuru or my brother to bother themselves with you. I am more than enough.

    Hmph! If you say so. But you better not regret this, all right? Man or woman, I go easy on no one!

    With that, he took out his sword. It was a holy onepretty cool-looking, I thought. But Shunas smile only widened. Her Parser skill mustve already stripped Gaiyes abilities bare for her, and if it did, I had nothing to worry about.

    If something went awry, Soei was already poised to step in, so I decided to cheer her on instead.

    And so, as the leaders of the Council and I looked on, the battle between our two groups began.

    I mightve tried to make that sound epoch-making, but the fight was over in an instant.

    First off, Hinata against Reiner. This was like an elephant against an ant.

    There was Hinata, dressed to the nines in the formal wear she picked for the Council. It didnt look too suited for physical work, but she still lunged at Reiner, not a single wasted motion in her approach.

    Huh?

    Reiner, meanwhile, couldnt keep up with her at all. I couldnt me him. She wasnt going at 100 percent force right now, but she might very well be stronger than a demon lord or two.

    Reaching for his chest, she grabbed Reiner by the hand and shoulder and threw him straight off his feet.

    As for Gaiye, he lived up to his word, offering no quarter as he shed at Shuna. But that didnt rm her, so she removed her folding fan and made a single swipe. That was all it took for Gaiyes de to snap off.

    Haahh?!

    His pained wail sounded less than heroic, but Shuna wasnt done yet.

    What garbage. Im not going to make this kill easy for you. You said something about the A rank, if I recall, but would you mind fighting seriously for me, please? Dont tell me youre giving up just because your swords broken? She pointed the fan at Gaiye, egging him on.

    Damn Damn you!! A monster like you, acting like my lord and master!!

    Indignant didnt begin to describe Gaiyes state just then, but Shuna was clearly toying with him. The talent difference was clear, and if he thought he could win, I had no idea what was going through his mind.

    Still

    Shunas a damn good martial artist, isnt she?

    Yes. Shes been learning jujitsu from Hakuro.

    Shrine maidens are certainly versatile. Of course, Hakuros jujitsu was the old style, suited for real-lifebat. A lot of its moves were designed to kill, putting the art well beyond the bounds of self-defense. If thats the kind of thing they taught ogre princesses, there was no denying that races battle chops.

    Shunas follow-up attack continued. Gaiye had taken out a backup sword, but she kept toying with him, knocking him down with a foot sweep. His heavy armor backfired on him as he frantically tried and failed to get up.

    Now she loomed over him, her fetching lips reciting a spell.

    I dedicate my prayers to my god. I seek the power of the mighty spirits. Now, heed my request

    The prayer coursed through space and time to reach me. It didnt have to since I was right therebut that didnt matter.

    Huh? Whaa?!

    A multyered magic circle surrounded the bbergasted Gaiye.

    Wait! Thisthis magic!!

    Oh, he knew it? He really did break the A-rank barrier, then. But understanding it and being capable of defying it were two different things. The spell was nearpletion, and there was no escaping it. Could he withstand or block it? I doubted it. After all, this spell

    Ahahhhhhhh?! Stopstop it!!

    Consume all! Disintegration!!

    is the most powerful of all holy magic.

    A torrent of light swallowed Gaiye whole, consuming everything insideor so it appeared. Just as I was thinking Oh, great, she killed him, I realized it wasnt the case after all.

    Ahah, ngh, hnnnhhh

    The swirl of light disappeared, revealing a half-naked Gaiye. His legs mustve failed him, because he was sitting down on the floor and weeping like a schoolyard kid.

    Well hey, at least hes alive!

    Oh dear. My skills are still so immature; I suppose my magic didnt work. I knew I shouldnt have tried a spell Im still practicing

    She smiled the whole way through. I had to resist shouting Yeah, right! at her. Using Disintegration to strip only the armor off someone, after all, is an impossible feat unless you had perfect control over the spell.

    Really, though, it wasnt that long ago since I had Shuna and Adalmann work together to learn holy magic. And shed already learned the hardest spell? What a magic phenom she was. Her Parser skill must have been offering her tons of support.

    Regardless, though, it meant she beat Gaiye without breaking a sweat.

    That left Hinata, but the results were already clear as day.

    G-General Reiner! Stop ying around!

    Silence that impertinent woman at once. You must defeat the demon lord! We have no time for games!

    Gaban and Elrick, failing to grasp the situation, were shouting at Reiner in unison. Reiner couldnt move. Hinatas stare was just too withering for him. Only after that throw did he finally realize just how much stronger she was.

    Noting back for me? Then how about I head over to you?

    The moment Hinata moved to take a step forward:

    Ahahhhh?!

    With one of the most pathetic screams ever uttered in the world, Reiner buried his head in his hands and fell to his knees. A steaming liquid was leaking out from his crotch. Holy crap. Who was wetting their pants now, huh? It was so exasperating that I didnt know what to say.

    Wha? General Reiner?!

    Whatwhat has happened? As strong as you are, Hinata the Saint should pose no challenge at all!

    Seeing someone refuse to ept reality like this is scary, isnt it? It made it so easy to issue the cruelest of orders to people. Reiner just kneeled there, tears and spittle intermingling all over his face. So much for that. It was a mismatch from the start, but I assumed this was the end of it.

    With that settled, I looked around at the people standing by their ground-floor seats.

    The most prominent one was Elrick, in the front row and acting strangely. The Sons of the Veldt were huddled next to him, but I doubted they wanted a fight. They were keeping a natural distance, appealing to me with their bodynguage that they wanted nothing to do with this.

    All right, Elricksorry, Prince Elrick? You picked a fight with me, so whatre you gonna do now? Keep going?

    Ah, um, no

    And you guys who stood up. Im assuming your home nations fully sanction your behavior today, right? So can I presume them guilty of the same crimes?

    N-no, that, uh

    S-Sir Rimuru, please, one moment I mean, L-Lord Rimuru

    Please allow me to speak for a moment!

    I was greeting them with a smile; they were keeping their pallid faces down. A few of them were trying their hardest to plead their case, but I ignored them. Soei had forced them to remain on their feet, so all these councillors who incurred my hostility could do right now was plead for mercy. Whether I engaged with them or not, they were powerless. This way, I knew I had the upper hand.

    From the side, it mayve looked like a pretty little girl nonchntly lording it over a bunch of grown-ups. A rare sight if you ever saw one. Comical, probably.

    No way a faceless crowd like this could ever oppress a demon lord. Theirck ofmon senseor a mind too weak to notice realityjust lost them the day. And what a sloppy strategy! I cant believe they really thought theyd beat me and turn me into some kind of puppet demon lord. I suppose Hinata was right; they wanted to rile me into making the first move, but

    So how to settle this?

    Well, hang on. Over half the councillors were subjected to spiritual interference, their desires stimted. Without me intervening, they wouldve sided with Elrick, and his measure wouldve passed, putting me in a bad spot. No matter the internal circumstances, it was nigh impossible to reverse apleted vote. Things only worked out like this thanks to Raphael.

    But clearly, someones out to get one over on me here

    Report. Murderous will detected. The target is the subject Elrick.

    Oh crap!

    My Magic Sense skill was picking it up, too. Over a mile away, someone was eyeing this chamber with malicious intent. But what would they do from this far? I promptly invoked Mind elerate and gauged the situation.

    Via Magic Sense, I saw a girl with red hair and kind of a wild look. In her hand was something small, ck, and metallica handgun.

    Huh? A handgun from that range?! And I didnt know how far one could shoot, but

    Understood. It is the Walther P99, apact, lightweight, but highly capable pistol with an effective range of fifty-five yards.

    I didnt need to know all that, thanks.

    Maybe its a really good gun, but if it cant clear a football field, its pointless. Our chamber is almost in the center of Englesia, built inside a special security zone. Anti-magic defenses are built into its walls, sturdy enough that your run-of-the-mill attack couldnt even make a dent. Besides, any bullet fired would be subject to the physicalws of gravity and air resistance. Maybe it was enhanced with magic or skills, but if so, there was no reason not to use a full-on sniper rifle.

    Of course, you needed to see a target to shoot itand there shouldnt have been any way for the girl to see Elrick from her spot. Even if she had ess to Magic Sense to pinpoint his location, there was a wall in our direct path, making a sniper strike impossible. After the recent assassination of Duke Meus, security had been beefed up around the chamber. I was on my guard as well, and I had already confirmed that this building was a poor choice for an assassination strike from far away.

    So her behavior shouldnt have meant anything to us. Shouldnt have. Or was she aiming for a ricochet thatd changed the path of

    The moment I had the thought, the red-haired woman fired her handgun.

    In the midst of dted time, I could see the bullet fire out from the barrel, flying at zing speedonly to be swallowed into a ck hole that appeared out of nowhere.

    Huh?!

    As I goggled, the bullet disappeared.

    Report. This is Spatial Connection, a type of Spatial Motion.

    Spatial Connection was just thata skill that connected two recognized points in space together. If the distance involved was small and the portal tiny, it apparently didnt take that much effort to deploy.

    But I didnt have the time to listen to that exnation. The red-haired woman had used Magic Sense to pinpoint our positions, then aimed carefully andunched her skill so her bullet would reappear within close range of Elrick. Thanks to that, she was about to assassinate someone across a full mile of walls, homes, and who knows what else.

    A small ck hole opened up in the air, about a foot and a half from the side of Elricks head. Coming out of it was a sure-kill bullet running at a quarter mile a second. It was a point-nk shot, and there was nothing blocking it from drawing nearer and nearer to him.

    Slowly but surely, I watched it unfold. But I couldnt do anything. My voice wouldnt reach him in time. Nor could I move quickly enough to try to stop it.

    It is not a problem. Launch the ultimate skill Belzebuth, Lord of Gluttony?

    Yes

    No

    Oh, thatll work? I thought as I invoked it. And then Whoa. Neat. Ignoring all time and space, the bullet tumbled into my hand, all its energy gone.

    ?! Are you okay?

    A disturbed-looking Hinata was already talking to Elrick as she approached him. The Veldt leader appeared just as shocked as he stole a nce at me. I said nothing as I checked up on Elrick. He didnt seem to understand what was going on and was just staring into space. Only a couple of us did know, really. But whatever happened mustve triggered the buildings magic securitywork, because rms began going off chamber-wide. The session would have to adjourn for a while.

    Soei, capture the assassin.

    I have a Replication on its way.

    As we waited for the councillors to calm down, I carried out the tasks demanded of me. Already, there was an investigation happening nearby.

    You could kill a person with this?

    Yes, its called a bullet. You need a special tool to fire it, but theres not one near us at the moment.

    So the assassin was targeting Prince Elrick? But what for?

    To frame the demon lord Rimuru, of course.

    Indeed, indeed. If Prince Elrick was killed at this point in time, suspicions would naturally turn to Lord Rimuru. Itd certainlyplicate our efforts to admit Tempest into the Council.

    Yes, that was probably the real motive. These fools were likely set up as disposable pawns the whole time.

    The security chief, Sons of the Veldt leader, Chairman Leicester, and Hinata were discussing matters here. I was certainly d to be cleared of doubt.

    Elrick was safe now, although hed need to face up to themotion he caused in the chamberter.

    Amam I being targeted even now? he asked, his face haggard. He mightve been a fool, but I didnt want him dead or anything.

    I think its all right now, Elricksorry, Prince Elrick. When the assassin missed you, that put an end to the ambitions of whoever wanted you dead. At this point, theres no reason for them to try again.

    By now, it was no longer possible to frame me for murder. Elrick was no longer of use to them, you could say, and therefore he had no need to fear for his life.

    B-but Im the prince of a superpower nation. People could exploit me in so many ways

    Ummm, you think so?

    Maybe he was vulnerable, as someone in line for the throne, before he pulled all that nonsense today. But he wasnt officially crown prince, and there were other people in the line of session, so at this point

    If Elrick had actually seeded today, he would have been a hero, I supposebut Englesia wasnt easy enough on its royalty that an idiot prince doing dumb things would be allowed on the throne. Maybe the people would sympathize with his motives, but theyd never forgive him for screwing up. After today, Elricks chances of being King Elrick someday were as good as gone.

    But hey, lifes not all about bing king, is it? Youll probably need to atone for today somehow, but after that, why dont you try reconsidering your future a little? I mean, I became a demon lord just by sort of drifting along, but I never really wanted to be one or anything. But theres no going back on it now, so I figure I may as well take advantage.

    Heh-heh! A demon lord offering mefort? I thought youd be scarier More vengeful.

    Im not trying tofort you. But generally, Im a pacifist.

    Elricks shoulders slumped down as he resigned himself to his fate. I was a fool to be tricked like that, Gaban. Its time for you to take responsibility.

    P-Prince?!

    You were the one who approached me. I fell for your cajoling, and I must atone for thatbut you had best prepare to do the same, Count Gaban.

    Elrick had now fully given himself up to the security team.

    It was pretty obvious that Gaban was the main person behind all this, rounding up Reiner and Elrick and convincing them to cause this wild scene. Im sure someones using Gaban, toothat mystery organization, perhaps. I cant write it off as a conspiracy theory. Its probably best to conduct a full investigation, but not even Soeis found any clues yet.

    If we can capture the sniper, though, maybe thatll lead to something. Lets hold out hope for thatand meanwhile, theres someone else I need to consult about.

    So, Gaban, theres something I wanted to ask I turned my eyes to Gaban in custody.

    Wh-what? What does a demon lord want from me?

    Even now, his attitude still had problems.

    I want you to tell me what you were scheming when you enticed Prince Elrick to join you.

    Hmm? Im not sure what you mean. I dont know anything.

    Wh-what?! Are you abandoning me?!

    And wheres your evidence? Yes, I was asked by the prince to invite you here, but I certainly had no idea he would try something like that.

    You will not talk your way out of this, Sir Gaban. Both the other councillors and I in this chamber will speak against your case. Johann was having none of it, and neither were the assorted representatives nodding along with himincluding a few being forced to keep standing. No problem finding witnesses, then.

    Behh But its true! I didnt know. The prince designed all of this! All I did was follow his orders!

    Nonsense! Youre the very one who procured the orb and brought the n to me!

    I cant say I know what youre talking about. Again, you will need to find some proof

    Gaban was sticking to his story. And as sly as Im sure he was, he mustve been convinced that no evidence was left. Would it be hard to pin anything on him, then? Itd probably damage his reputation for a period of time, but at this rate, I could see him returning to the scene after a while. Thats the nobility for youyou cant take your eyes off them for a moment, and theyll never go down too easily. A more direct approachwith weaponswould be quickest, but that was ast resort.

    As I thought about this, the door suddenly opened.

    His Majesty the King Aegil is here!

    The attendants shout was audible across the chamber, and those responding to it immediately stood at attention. I was about to join them before Shuna and Benimaru stopped me. Yeah, me kneeling or whatever wouldve presented an awkward picture. Apart from Hinata and me, however, everyone was focused entirely on the new royal visitor. Even the chairman was bowing his head. Thats the kind of respect the king of a nation like Englesia deserved.

    King Aegil nced at the councillors Soei had restrained. He didnt linger on them long before turning to me, his bushy blond hair going well with his curly mustache.

    I see my sons caused you some trouble.

    You could say that. But I think weve cleared up our misunderstandings? I had no intention of exaggerating things. If human society could ept us, better to let a little rudeness now and then slide.

    Ah. Very good. Then as his father, not as a king, I give you my apology and my appreciation. He lightly bowed his head at methe king himself.

    I was willing to ept that. Consider it forgiven. But I dont want to see a repeat.

    Yes, that I am certainly aware of. I hope to build a good rtionship with you.

    King Aegil looked straight at me, providing me with what I felt were his honest feelings. I figured I should trust him on that. If he reneged, I could consider my options at that time.

    Itll be good to work with you, then.

    And with you.

    We shook hands. He was also kind enough to forgive the busted-up desk, so as far as I was concerned, our reconciliation wasplete.

    All rise!

    Everyone raised their faces. They had all overheard our exchange, but I supposed this formality indicated that it wasnt meant to be on the record. A king wasnt supposed to bow to a foreign power that readily, and I supposed King Aegil saw it as ast resort.

    F-Father

    Enough. You need some remedial education, I see.

    Yes, Father.

    Mm.

    With a nod, King Aegil turned to Gaban. Count Gaban?

    Your Majesty!!

    You were talking about evidence. Were you expecting a quick escape because you thought I wouldnt intervene?

    N-no, Your Majesty, not at all

    I have called for magical inquisitors. I will let them decide your treatment.

    Gehh?! Now Gaban seemed concerned. He clung to the king. P-please, forgive me! I will tell you everything, so please, Your Majesty, have mercy!

    His desperation mightve evoked sympathy among some people, but King Aegils reaction was merciless. Take him away.

    Sir!!

    One nce at his attendants, and his royal guard sprang into action.

    Now, Sir Reiner, Sir Gaiye Youlle with us as well.

    The guard began to haul them off.

    Stop! Let me go!

    Who do you think I am?!

    They tried to resist but were stopped in their tracks by a group of hooded men that appearedthose magical inquisitors, I supposed. Reiner and Gaiye tried to resist as well, but the men had them subdued in short order, treating those admittedly powerful men like little children. I could tell these werent your average prison guards, no.

    Englesia really is a superpower, huh? And they got some pretty tough hombres working for them.

    Report. It is likely a show of force, to prove to my master that they have powerful fighters at their disposal.

    Ah. One of those dont mess with us things? This mustve been their way of demonstrating that Reiner wasnt the best Englesia could produce, an attempt to preserve their dignity. Its hard being a king. I guess he had to stay on his toes to keep a demon lord like me from taking advantage of him. As if Aegil wouldnt have used my power to make Englesia the worlds dominant force if Elrick had actually seeded

    Well, if you wanted to keep a legion of sly, cunning nobility under your finger, I supposed you needed that type of malice in you.

    Excuse me, then. And please allow us to handle this affair.

    With that, the kings entourage left. They confiscated the Orb of Domination, too, by the looks of it, but I didnt mind. I had already disabled it while no one was lookingit wouldnt do to see it used for evil purposes. It also wouldnt do for me to carry on about it any longer, so I let it go withoutment.

    Following an afternoon break, we continued with the legitive session. The councillors seemed a lot less energetic than they were in the morning hours, somehow. That was lucky for me, because I didnt need to cajole them into passing all the days important business.

    The following three resolutions were enacted today:

    Tempest is recognized as a nation.

    Tempest will officially join the Council.

    The Councils military rights will be assigned to Tempest.

    These were epted without protest and passed, barring any issues, by unanimous vote. It was a long road to get there, but everything I wrote up for the Council was epted in the end.

    Im really not good at this level of brinkmanship with a room full of hungry sharks. People can scoff at my ideas all they want, but having to feel out my opponents mind and objectives just tires me out. I think Ill let Raphael handle that for me from now on.

    Understood.

    Today it was brute strength that let me take control of my problems. But I didntsh out firstit was Hinata and that charming young Shuna. In fact, I was the guy who saved Elricks life. This amply demonstrated the broadness of my heart, I think, so I was pretty satisfied with myself. Whats more, I had taught them all a valuable lesson: Attempting physical force against a demon lord was meaningless.

    The session behind us, we left the chamber. It was a stormy day, but now, it was finally over.

 Volume 10 - Ch 4

    BEHIND THE CURTAIN

    Glenda Attley, the beautiful ex-mercenary, pulled the trigger with every intent to kill.

    The gun she had kept since she was summoned to this world didnt betray her. It was already a part of her body, to the point that it no longer even required maintenance. Combine that with her Sniper unique skill, and there was nobody who could stop her.

    Sniper, as a skill, provided three abilities. One was Magic Sense, tuned to a perception level far beyond the norm; one was Compute Prediction, letting her read and understand the results of peoples actions; and the other was called Control Space. This third ability, in particr, made Glenda practically superhuman, allowing her to connect any two points in space that she could picture in her mind.

    Anything she had physical sight of was within gunshot range for her. She could shoot from directly above the heads of her targets, and she was free to ignore any obstacles in her way as shended a bullet home. She could also ignore all gravity and air resistance, making long-range shots possible without a sniper rifle.

    Put this all together, and Glenda had never failed a mission. But after herst blunder, she came to realize that there was always someone better out there.

    That was doomed. A monster like thats too much for me.

    The moment she saw him, Glenda realized how dangerous this opponent was. That man, Diablo, was impervious to her handgun. It wasnt a matter of physical attacks not working. Glenda had two types of bullets, a normal one and a magic-infused set. The first type was for when she couldnt leave any magical traces behind, but for monsters with physical resistance, Glenda concentrated her own magical force into bullet form, an original magic skill of hers.

    She treasured the ability to handle anything that came her way, and so Glenda truly had no blind spots. But Diablo didnt work that way. Her instincts warned her to run from him, her Compute Prediction skill foreseeing nothing but her death. Even with her standard-breaking strengths, she could see no possible path to victorya hard lesson in reality for her to take that day.

    And now Glenda had stretched her Magic Sense skills to their limits to carry out an assassination.

    The bullet she fired appeared just a foot or so away from her target. Now, in the blink of an eye, itd demolish his heador it should have.

    That eighteen-inch (or so) gap was very carefully selected. When connecting two points in space, the connection would fail if the destination point ovepped with a certain amount of mass. In other words, if the target unexpectedly moved, the connection Glenda built might cut out. Thats why she settled on eighteen inches. Even someone with godly reflexes couldnt respond quickly enough to something that close, especially a bullet traveling at the speed of sound.

    That monster is one thing, but the prince of a kingdom is no sweat. Well, no point crying about it. Ill have toe up with a strategy for the next time I see him.

    She was much more confident about todays missionbut at the next moment, her face filled with surprise and foreboding. The bullet that was supposed to shatter the princes head had vanished.

    No! What just happened?!

    The unthinkable had urred, something impossible under any normal circumstances. She didnt know why it took ce, but if someone had done something, it had to be that demon lord.

    Him! That devil bastards boss! Did I underestimate him, too?!

    That was Glendas initial reaction.

    For a moment, she thought about firing again. Her perfect ambush had just failed, so any further attempt had even less of a chance. She knew that, but it meant that shed fail her mission. Her bossesMaribel and the elder Granvillewould never allow that. It made her hesitate, and thus she failed to escape soon enough.

    Heh. I would say so. You did underestimate Sir Rimuru. And I have no interest in forgiving you for that.

    Tch! Whore you?

    My name is Soei, faithful Covert Agent of the demon lord Rimuru.

    Glenda was shocked. But quickly, she resigned herself. The man didnt ask her name in returnnot because he didnt care about her, she thought, but because that could wait until he captured and interrogated her. If she could just get away, she could keep what she knew concealed.

    The assassination failed. And being captured afterward would be an even worse fate. Any further mistakes, and shed be disposed of as useless. Glenda had seen many of herpatriots walk that road, and to her, getting away was job number one right now.

    She squared up against her foe.

    So you were expecting an attack?

    Yes. Everything was worked out in Sir Rimurus mind. If you want to resist, go right ahead. I have no interest in killing you, but the more you resist, the more painful this will be for you.

    Hah! How kind of you. In that case, Ill do what I want here, thank you.

    Without hesitation, Glenda fired instead of waiting for a response. This was a single, regr bullet; she had sixteen left, but she doubted theyd work against the magic-born who called himself Soei. A magic bullet would, probablybut instead, Glenda took out her military knife, shing at Soei with a refined, well-honed motion.

    Soei dodged it with the minimum movement required. Glenda smiled at this. The knife was infused with her magical force, making it both a physical and magical weapon. She did this when facing foes where physical attack wouldnt be enough, and Soei just revealed that he saw it as a threat.

    Plus, Glenda had noticed another habit of Soeis.

    This guys the type who hates extraneous motion. He may be more susceptible to simpler methods. Lets see howfortable hell be in a moment

    She unleashed another attackknife in her right hand, gun in her left. Unhesitant, she repeatedly pulled the trigger, gauging Soeis response. As she predicted, there was no reaction. He mustve known theyd have no effect on himbut he kept his guard up, staying on the alert for her knife.

    Not bad. Maybe the strongest opponent Ive ever had.

    Diablo didnt count in Glendas mind. Foes she never had a chance against werent tabted in her records.

    Soeis left pointer finger moved. Glenda didnt miss it, sensing the danger and instantly performing a backward somersault to dodge. There was now a sizable distance between them, and that was the right move for her to make, because in the next instant, an ultra-thin wire advanced upon her original position.

    Hohh. You have good instincts.

    Well, thank you. Youre not so bad, either.

    The light exchange was punctuated by a gunshot from Glenda. It wasnt a threat to Soei. He went straight at her, not bothering to evade.

    So simple. Im d to have opponents like these. Theyre so easy to deal with.

    Magic bullets didnt require any firing. They could be shot without a sound, so if she mixed one in with her regr bullets

    Now that her attack pattern was established, shed strike with her real attack while his guard was down. That was Glendas standard strategytake a seemingly wasted shot and turn it into an instant kill. Even if you were expecting it, itd be tricky to dodge it out of the blue.

    And Soei demonstrated the same reactions all the other titans she defeated before did. He took the bullet in the right shoulder and was sent flying back.

    Ah-ha-ha-ha-ha! So much for you, handsome man. Rama fell for the same trick. The more confident you are, the more effective a simple move like that bes.

    Glendaughed loudlybut her eyes were still alert, surveying the damage to Soei. Going easy after felling your prey was out of the question. That was the irond rule of the battlefield, and Glenda would never rx without checking her foe for a pulse. Besides, she didnt think she killed him with a single shot anyway.

    I see. More of a handful than I thought.

    Being a sore loser now? Well, sorry. If youve seen my face, my only choice is to take you out.

    Soei, back on his feet, had lost his right arm. The fight seemed to be Glendas to win. Thats why she was more careful than ever as she pointed her gun forward.

    Magic bullets work on him. And now, with my next move, Ill blow his brains out.

    Launching her Sniper unique skill, Glenda cautiously steadied her aim.

    Heh. Dont worry. Ive been asked to capture you. I imagine Sir Rimuru wants information from you, but hes a gentle person. Cooperate with him, and you wont be killed.

    Dont lecture me like that now!!

    With a shout, Glenda firedthree bullets toward his head, two toward his heart. Five magic bullets, whizzing straight to their targets. Then the first three made the leap in space, reappearing in front, above, and to the right side of his head. The other two quickly followed, materializing before his heart and at an angle behind it.

    All five bullets hit home, shattering Soeis body.

    These Warp Shots were Glendas pice de rsistance. Magically created bullets, unlike their regr counterparts, could disrupt and scatter magicules. Even if he could regenerate his body, those shots made it impossible.

    No matter what your skills were with a sword or spear, being targeted by supersonic bullets from all directions would be impossible for even the greatest of masters to handle. Based on her past experiences, Glenda knew full well what she was capable of. That was the secret to her continued survivnd that was why she now checked to be sure Soei was dead.

    His body was, in fact, copsing into ck smoke in front of her eyes. She breathed a sigh of relief. Since the moment she caught sight of him, a dark anxiety had been smoldering in her heart. It wasnt as vivid as it was with Diablo, but her instincts told her this was a dangerous foe.

    Its over. You were a tough one. I didnt have any capacity to go easy on you.

    Glenda was so relieved that the words just fell out of her. But that relief came just a bit too early. Suddenly, behind her, she heard a voice that couldnt possibly be there.

    Oh, really? In that case, why not give up and let me capture you?

    She reflexively leaped out of the way. Turning around in a panic, she saw Soei himself standing there.

    Th-thats crazy! Didnt you die just now?!

    Heh. Youre the crazy one. You think that was enough to kill me? I have no reason to lose to you anyway.

    Then Ill just do it one more timeWhoaaa?!

    Glenda froze. Anyone would. Unbelievably to her, she now sensed Soeis presence on all sides of her. She immediately activated Magic Sense, but it just revealed the very truth she didnt want to know.

    Itit cant be! Wh-why are all of these physical bodies?! Thats ridiculous! What kind of joke is this?!

    Its simple. I have a skill known as Replication. That is all. And while my Replications arent as powerful as my true self, you should be proud that you defeated at least one of them.

    Soeior at least, one of the four Soeis in the roomoffered Glenda his sincerepliments. But now, escape was possible.

    Goddamn it!!

    With a barbaric scream, Glenda lunged at Soeiand at that moment, her desperatest stand began.

    On a balcony overlooking a garden blooming with flowers, a girl, a boy, and an old man sat at a round table facing one another. It was Maribel, Yuuki, and Johann.

    We messed up. We botched it, Maribel said quietly. Despite that, she didnt seem too affected. She had predicted this, and in a way, it was part of the n.

    What a disaster for Gaban, though. After all the devotion he had for you.

    Johann, seated in front of Maribel, was holding a ss of wine as hemented the counts fate. He may not have felt that strongly for him, but even he had just a twinge of sympathy for the man. Gaban, after all, was one of the Five Elders, just like Johannor maybe was, by now. His fall was already in progress.

    Gaban was ipetent. All that time he spent living in Englesiadid he develop a love for its king, perhaps? He would certainly have brought them under his control faster otherwise

    Dont be silly. Not even we in the Rozzos have reached into the central core of Englesia yet. Gaban couldnt

    No. No, youre wrong. Its easy to seize the core. Just kill them all and leave a single infant remaining. And if that infant shares a blood lineage with Gaban, all the better.

    Well, yes, if you put it that way, but

    To Maribel, and all the bloodstained history she knew, this wasnt that radical an approach. In fact, she thought it was the peaceful way. It kept the body count low. But Johann wanted to exin to her that Englesias security wasnt about to just let that happen. It was an easy thing to envisionless so to act upon.

    But Im interested in those magical inquisitors.

    Those unusual-looking people who served the king?

    Yes. Impudent, arent they? So impudent. They mustve built up their military to oppose the Rozzos.

    What do you think of them?

    Mmm, theyre strong, I suppose. Gaban told me as much after he experienced them for himself.

    Maribel was able to share information with those under her Avarice rule, to a certain extent. Anything her target learned, Maribel could tap into as well. Thus, she now used Gaban as a throwaway pawn. She wanted to learn about those inquisitors, so she had him engineer a crime so heinous theyd have to step up. All that foolishness aimed at the demon lord Rimuru was perfect for that, and considering Count Gaban was Englesian nobility, the magic inquisitors were bound toe knocking.

    She saw all of that. And just as she hoped for, she now knew the secrets behind the inquisitors. In fact, they werent anything too deepjust people infused with enough monster force to be magic-born. They hadnt worked and trained themselves to perfection, like the magic-born Razen of old Farmus.

    To Maribel, these inquisitorsbereft even of sentience, a side effect of their bodies rejecting the monster elements injected into themwere just uninteresting toys. But they regained that sentience when not in magic-born form, so depending on what you imnted in them, they could work in a variety of environments. Their strength, each an over-A by themselves, was nothing to sniff at, either. As she saw it, they could be useful enough.

    How fearsome. So you approved of Gabans scheme, even though you knew it would fail, just so you could learn that?

    No. My goal was to help build up your trust. Now the demon lord Rimuru sees you as trustworthy.

    Do you mean?

    No, he didnt need to ask. He understood it well enough. Her goal from the start was to eliminate Rimuru; the magical inquisitors were just a nice bonus. Maribel just wanted Johann to tell her about Rimurus internal dealings.

    And if I dont give that to her, Ill be snuffed out as quickly as Gaban was?

    He didnt think he was as ipetent as Gaban. But nheless, Johann felt an inscrutable sort of fear toward Maribel.

    Youyou must be kidding. Here I am, one of the Five Elders, and this little girl is bossing me around

    He may have thought that, but he would never daresay it. So he decided to return to their main subject.

    What do you think about pitting these inquisitors against the demon lord? Pin some manner of crime on Rimuru

    We cant. We just cant. All itd do is anger the demon lord. Yes, the magical inquisitors are strong, but thats it. Nothing at all that could hold its own against a demon lord. Its silly even to consider it.

    That much so? So wouldnt teaming up with the demon lord be our best bet, then?

    Maribel shook her head. That wont work. It wont work at all. Besides, apart from Grandfather, every single one of you are suffering under a serious misunderstanding.

    Misunderstanding?

    Yes. Yes, exactly. The misunderstanding that humans are equal to monsters. Do you understand why I proposed to Grandfather that we eliminate the demon lord?

    Because hes building a new economic bloc that will eventually be a financial threat to us?

    Right. But thats just our cover story. The real reason is because, in time, well be helpless against him.

    Maribel, this little girl, struck fear in Johanns heartand now this girl was looking fearful herself as she spoke.

    How do you mean by that? Johann asked, pressing her to continue.

    The demon lord Rimuru possesses a staggering amount of war power. With that backing him up, what do you think would happen if he decided to negotiate with someone?

    That?!

    Only then did Johann stumble upon the true danger. In this world, wars between nations almost never took cethey needed to save their fighting ability for the monsters who threatened them. The Council stepped in to handle cross-border issues, and that inevitably meant those with the most economic strength were able to speak the loudest. Even thergest of states, such as Englesia and the former Farmus, didnt have enough of a military to make enemies out of every Council member.

    And you realize that their militarys not their only asset, either, right? Being bound by rules is the same thing as losing your freedombut if you can create the rules yourself, you dont have to lose anything, do you see?

    Tempest might follow the Councils rules at first, but after that, nobody could say. And if Tempest decided to spread its own values to the Western Nations, soon the entire region would have to take orders from them. The demon lords rule would bepletea totally peaceful coup. He could threaten them with warfare, he could apply economic pressurebut either way, the stronger nation always gained the power to punish others.

    Its funny. So very funny. And as time passes, there wille an era where everything will need to go through the demon lord.

    Andand if

    If that happened, even Johann know where it led.

    But doesnt the demon lord seek to coexist with

    Maribel stopped Johann with her cold eyes. Its stupid. So stupid. Not just you, but the entire Council. Theyre all idiots.

    Then she took pains to exin matters in a way Johann could understand. Essentially, things may be fine now, but the future was an unknown. If humankind, after forgetting about the threat of the Storm Dragon, ever did anything to cross Rimuru

    I dont know what the life span of a demon lord is, but humans are such short-lived animals. If we dont stop the demon lords ambitions right here, the Rozzos one fervent desire is as good as scuttled.

    A demon lord could always change his stripes. And while humans maye and go, Maribel absolutely refused to expect human values from such long-lived rulers.

    You see? So thats why ideas like partnering with a demon lord, or taking advantage of a demon lordtheyre all wrong, down to the very roots. None of them would ever work.

    Johann was silenced. Then, like the final nail on the coffin, one of her Blood Shadow troops chose that moment to make a magical call to her.

    He was reporting on Glendas defeat.

    No They captured Glenda?!

    Johann looked shocked. Is that true?

    Not even Maribel could hide her surprise. Glendas wariness was alwaysmendable; no matter the danger involved, she always made it home alive. Maribel trusted hernot her personality, but that animal-like craving for life.

    I cant believe it. That clever, conniving vixen

    Glenda was one of the standout results from the Rozzo familys secret summoning program, an otherworlder forced by their spell to remain faithful to them. Her strength was well-known by now, and the family treated her like a full-fledged tactical weapon.

    The idea of her being defeated and captured was beyond belief for Johann. Elder or not, he was a normal human, and unlike Granville or Maribel, he could only think about things in standard human terms.

    Maribel ignored his awestruck muttering as she pondered her options. Defeating him is out of the question. But if we can take rule over him, all our problems are gone. Well have to do it.

    Well set a trap, Maribel said.

    A trap? What are you intending to do? Yuuki asked, breaking his silence.

    She turned to him. Right. A trap. Your people are going on a ruins expedition trip with the demon lord Rimuru, arent you? Well set a trap there.

    She wasnt asking for his opinion. This was a finalized n, and it was set in stone.

    Right, Kagalis headed therebut I dont think thats such a good idea, yknow?

    Why is that?

    Because the demon lord Milims joining them, Yuuki warned. Itll be too dangerous to hatch anything.

    In his opinion, they needed to win Rimurus confidence first, then work out more of a long-term n with him. But Maribels mind was already made up.

    No. No, I cant have that. The more time we give him, the more trouble that demon lord will be. Thats what my instincts are telling me. Yuuki, is there a way you can keep Milim froming along?

    Thats even less possible. Hes already eyeing me. If I try putting a stop to it, its basically admitting that Im tricking them.

    Fair enough. Then lets bring down the demon lord Milim as well.

    Huh? Yuuki asked, dazed.

    Thats ridiculous! Maribel, thats not just beyond reckless; its beyond the realm of possibility! Johann stood up out of his seat.

    Their reactions were perfectly understandable. Even crushing one demon lord required a careful, foolproof n. But two at the same time? It was deliberately giving yourself no chance.

    But Maribel still smiled. I will put everything I have into it. Everything, do you understand?

    Its still impossible! Yuuki cried. You say everything, but my Moderate Jesters are all busy with their own work right now. And

    I dont know how useful they are, but if theyre not avable, well proceed without them.

    Maribel shuttered Yuukis objections before he could finish stating them. To her, the Jesters werent worthy of considerationor, to be more urate, she already knew a better force, arge one, that could take on demon lords for her.

    But you know, Yuuki, I had you supply a certain something from the Dragons Nest for me before. I think its high time we use it.

    You mean that? Thats such a bad idea! Not even I can control it!

    Not a problem. It belonged to the demon lord Milim anywaywere just returning it for her. Maybe we could say that yman was saving it as hisst resort, and his surviving loyal troops set it off? Then Milims rage wont be directed at us.

    If something goes wrong, it could cause untold damage to human areas

    And?

    N-no, um

    Johann attempted to talk Maribel out of this but waspletely shut out. She mightve been theoretically open to alternatives, but t rejections would never grab her interest. And since Johann had no other suggestions, Maribels strategy won the day.

    As Johann struggled against her, Yuuki kept talking, trying to figure out her thought process. It made him realize this operation had a better chance of sess than he thought. All right. In that case, Milims likely to take it on herself. Shed stop Rimuru from doing so, for sure, and itd be the perfect way to separate them, maybe.

    Hee-hee! Very good. Very, very good. And while the demon lord Milims ying around with it

    We go in and take over Rimurus mind?

    Yes, precisely.

    But Ive still got one worry

    The Storm Dragon?

    Yep, you guessed it. If we fail to take over Rimuru, and Veldora goes on a rampage, whatre we gonna do then?

    Thator their target might fight back more than they expected, giving them no time to take over his mind. If it came to that, Yuuki would have no choice but to kill Rimuru. He attempted to voice his concerns about that, in a roundabout away, but apparently that was an eptable consequence of her ns.

    No need to worry about that. No need at all, Yuuki. Dont worry about a thing. Just focus on defeating the demon lord Rimuru.

    Yuuki didnt defy her. In the end, he did what he was told. All right. If you say so, Ill believe in you.

    Maribel gave him a nod.

    Thanks to what her grandfather Granville told her about demon lords, Maribel saw much deeper into the world than most.

    If Rimuru should fall, and Veldora the Storm Dragon flew into a rage, the demon lord Luminus would likely step in to handle it. Paradoxically, that would actually be better for her than Rimuru keeping up his current rule.

    He and Luminus had already joined forceswhich essentially meant that Luminus left management of the Western Nations to him. The Queen of Nightmares herself, someone who saw humankind as little more than vampire food, had let the Seven Days Clergy do that before, butas shown in Granvilles own fallthey were no more. He had lost Luminuss protection, and with that, the authority he had to influence the Western Nations.

    From now on, Hinata the Saint would doubtlessly gain more political cloutand considering their rtionship, the rising rule of the demon lord Rimuru would grow even firmer with her.

    No matter what, Ive got to stop that.

    And as she secretly thought this, it didnt matter if she needed to expose the world to the threat of Veldora to do it.

    Maribel and Yuuki spent the next little while fleshing out the details of their n. By this point, there was no room left for Johannall he could do was pray they seeded. Thus, these magic-born, packing as much malice as they could into their intricate ns, began to devise a way to suppress Rimuru for good.

    After that long, long session was over, we all regrouped back at the caf. I was rxing in my seat, the tie on my business suit loosened. I couldve used Spatial Motion toe home now, but Soei still hadnt caught our culprit, and there might be some unforeseen snags, so I decided to stick around for a bit.

    Butman. That conference was so exhausting. Prince Elrick of Englesias intrusion, that guy Gaban pulling the strings behind him, all the councillors whose support they enjoyedbut it all ended with their mouths agape.

    Gaban was a high-level noble, I guess, but even he got taken away by those scary-looking magical inquisitors. The other councillors in on the conspiracy were saved from that by diplomatic immunity, but thanks to the ledgers I submitted to the authorities, I think their home nations will be investigating them shortly. Theyll lose their posts, no doubt, and a lot of them looked pretty rmed about that, but they had iting.

    Even a lot of the councillors who werent involved at all treated me with, shall we say, noble indifference. I let the innocent ones go, but judging by my ledgers, a lot of them were criminals indeed. So I nned to alert their home nations about my evidence as well. The more the merrier, and all that. That ought to shake up things a bit among those fools, a lot of whom used their posts to fatten up their own coffers. The sooner they were gone, the easier things would be for meter.

    I sipped my coffee as I thought all this over. Well, a lot happened today, but now Im d Hinata and Shuna got angry before I did. I am the demon lord here, so I figured it wouldnt look too good if I started bashin heads in first thing.

    Oh, I didnt get angry. Some of the councillors were being discourteous in their diplomacy, and I just offered them some etiquette lessons.

    Neither did I, Sir Rimuru. I just helped a few rude gentlemen see the errors of their ways. If I was truly angry, there wouldnt have even been a pile of ashes where they once stood.

    Hinata and Shuna smiled at the same time. Perfectly in sync. It was a little frightening. Against that sheer impact, all I could do was nod and say Uh, yeah back.

    But it was a good experience for me, interjected Benimaru.

    Hmm?

    I mean, I got too angry up there. My mind became a total nk, and I didnt know what I should do about it. If Shuna had waited any longer to act, I mightve torched every human in that room.

    I nearly did a spit take with my coffee. Yeah, I sure thought Benimaru was coolly eyeing the proceedings. I was d to see him act all mature for a changebut he was actually so enraged that he lost hold of himself. Guess I shouldnt have been so impressed. But man, was that close. If I oversaw a bloody massacre in there, the entire human race would have it in for me.

    Look, whatever you do, dont do that, all right?

    Ha-ha-ha! I was just kidding! Benimaru tried tough it off with a breezy smile, but he couldnt fool me. He was serious. Id need to pick a representative to send to the Council before the next meeting, and I better choose damn carefully.

    We were still talking, me finishing my coffee, when Soeis report came in.

    Sir Rimuru, I have captured the assassin.

    I figured hed manage the job fine, and I was right. What a talentalways doing a perfect job with the work I assigned him.

    She was an able fighter, to be sure. She didnt give her name or any other information about herselfbut she referred to you as that devil bastards boss.

    Hmm. A crack professional assassin, no doubt, one who wouldnt divulge her identity that easily. But devil bastard?

    Did she mean Diablo?

    I couldnt imagine anyone else.

    Made sense.

    I didnt receive any report along those lines from Diabloat least, I dont think I didbut hes the kinda guy who treated even Razen like a snot-nosed kid. If he and this assassin ever fought, chances are the girl didnt even register in his mind. It reminded me once again just how sky-high Diablos standards were.

    Razen himself, after all, was a human strong enough to be worthy of a magic-born title. The way Hinata described it to me, there was almost no person stronger than him in the Western Nationsand if he called him a wimp, then Diablos sense of judgment mustve beenpletely out of whack. I should probably teach him more about what passes for strong in this world.

    I ordered another cup of coffee as I considered this. Shuna, Hinata, and Benimaru were going with tea instead, as well as some cake for dessert Whoa, you too, Benimaru?! Guess I might as well join in, then. Ill never say no to a good shortcake; thats my favorite.

    So I had the waitress deliver coffee to us both when Soei arrived. The waitress was clearly blushing, which Soei prudently ignored as he drank it ck. Coffee reallypletes the picture with him, although I personally sided more with Benimaru and his sweet tooth.

    Thus, we enjoyed our drinks as I asked Soei, this perfect specimen of a man, for his full report.

    And thats everything for now.

    He wrapped things up by the time I got to the end of my second cup, using Thought Communication to rey the memory of what he saw to everyone. Based on that, it looked like Soei managed to make this assant throw every type of offense she had at him. She was pretty beautiful, too, but Soei showed her no mercy. It was kind of like cheating in an old-school online game, taking advantage of some bug to get infinite energy. Letting your opponent think they had a chance to winand justughing in the shadows the whole time. If you can get your foe thinking theyve almost won, thats when you can get truly malicious, forcing them to use all their items and so forth. Thats the strategy Soei mustve used to get information from the assassin.

    Of course, this wasnt a gameand in an intelligence operation like this, you had to know how to read the story behind your target. Soei didnt mess that up at all; I think he deserved praise for a fine job.

    Good work. You always impress me, Soei.

    I tested out the strategy you described to me, Sir Rimuru, and it proved surprisingly effective. The key is to show yourself struggling a bit first, isnt it?

    Um?

    Oh. Right. I think we did talk along those lines. I definitely recall talking to him about spy movies, but maybe we discussed online games, too? It was such an inconsequential conversation that I forgot all about it. I internally apologized to Soeididnt mean to imnt any malicious ideas in him.

    Haha-ha-ha. d to be of service.

    No, I still have so much to learn. She eliminated three of my Replications.

    Oh, did she? Well, at least we can get some clues about our enemy now.

    Yes. I will handle the interrogation.

    Interrogation, huh? Hmm Should I say something about that?

    As I considered whether to, Hinata interrupted us.

    You know, I wasnt sure whether to speak up about this, but Im sure you already know anyway, so The assassin Sir Soei encountered used to serve under me. I didnt know what kind of powers she was hiding, but it sounds like she was more trouble than I thought. Now I see how she managed to beat Rama. If a bullet appeared two feet away from you, you probably couldnt react in time, either.

    Whos Rama?

    Oh, sorry. He was a man in my force, one of the Three Battlesages. Glenda beat him, andter he started working for her.

    Maybe Hinata could dodge a bullet that close to her, but most people couldnt. There was no doubting the danger Glendas skill posed.

    But this Rama guy was a Battlesage-level fighter, huh? That made him potential demon lord material. Serious strength. And

    Soei talked about one of his Replications getting blown off its feet. That was probably a hand grenade, wasnt it?

    Oh, you mean that exploding ball of hers?

    Yeah, that. It doesnt sound like magic, and I think its a weapon from my old world.

    Understood. It is believed to be magically generated by the subject Glenda. It is a force somewhat simr to Materialize Weapon, allowing her to bring things in her memory into reality.

    M-Materialize Weapon?! So shes not only a born sniper, but shes got that, too?

    ording to Raphael, the full-on Materialize Weapon let you fully regenerate any weapon in your memory. With Glenda, the skill wasnt quite as well-defined, so she could only create imitations with simr effects to what she pictured. Even that, however, was enough of a threat.

    I agree with you. I havent seen a real one, but it sounds like the ones in movies and stuff. Should we assume Glendas an otherworlder, too?

    I dont think theres any doubt about that. Especially if shes using her memories to create Earth weapons. I sneered triumphantly at Hinata.

    She leered back at me. Why do you know that?

    Oops. Shes sharp. I was still keeping Raphael a secret. Better talk my way out of this. Thats what I get for being a know-it-all, I thought. Oh, just a hunch. When you get to my level, you start to get hunches like that.

    Benimaru looked over to me, wonder in his eyes. Itforted me a bit as I gauged Hinatas reply.

    All right. But do you think I could help interrogate her? There are a few things Ive been meaning to ask Glenda if I had the chance. Saare and Grigori never returned, either, and I think she might know something about them.

    Good. She let it pass. And if she wanted to talk to Glenda, I had no reason to deny her the chance. There was no need to hide our prisoner, and I definitely didnt want Glenda exposed to whatever awful things Shion did to hers.

    It sounded like Glenda had an encounter with Diablo, one she fled from immediately. The whole Prince Elrick thing was nothing to do with us, really; so as long as she gave us her information, I wouldnt get rough with her. I guess Soei gave her quite a fright alreadynot physically, but in the break your heart kinda way.

    Whether wed let her go, on the other hand, was a tough question. She was a tougher foe than we thought; she might be dangerous if set free. But I wasnt sure handing her over to Englesia was such a great idea, either. Lets save that question forter.

    Okay. Wanna join me?

    Please, Hinata said, nodding.

    For now, wed need to go meet Glenda first, gauge her demeanor, and figure things out from there. We decided to get going.

    By the way, I covered our tab at the caf, just like I did yesterday. I didnt exactly appreciate Hinatas check making its way over to me, but should I have forgiven it like the generous man I am, or should I have said something? Id hate to be called cheap.

    Then again, worrying about little things like this would probably get me pegged as a member of the lower ss. The question weighed on my mind as we put Englesia behind us.

    Ughh, Chief?!

    We were all back home, meeting up with one of Soeis Replications there. There we saw the captured Glenda open her eyes, only to find Hinata right in front of her. And she screamed in response.

    This was in a in old reception area, not an interrogation room. Benimaru and Soei were guarding me on both sides, and Hinata was there as well. We were all having tea from Shuna as the interrogation began.

    Its been a long time, Glenda. d youre doing well.

    Hinata went first, coldly looking down on her. She never did go easy on her opponents, and while Glenda was thrown at first, she regained herposure quickly.

    Hah! I guess this is it for me, then, she brazenly said. If youre gonna kill me, go ahead. The fates of captured spies never change much in history.

    Silence. All you need to do is answer Sir Rimurus questions.

    Soei was being just as merciless with his follow-ups. Sir Rimuru, should we amputate her limbs to train her to be a little morecent?

    Um, no thank you. And if Soei said hed do it, he really would, so

    No, no, just because weve got healing potions

    Ah, meaning we can give her that painful experience time and time again? Shuna interjected. That does make sense

    No! I mean, just because we have healing potions, its not nice to go so far with this!

    Seriously, stop. Shuna was smiling and nodding her agreement, but Hinatas eyes were killing me. Not even I would go that far against a woman. And Glenda didnt seempletely disinterested in talkingI felt like we could negotiate something.

    All right, Glenda. We havent met before, have we? Im the demon lord Rimuru.

    Hello. Im Glenda. One of Lady Hinatas old troops and part of the Three Battlesages.

    For her part, she understood that jokes and bargaining wouldnt work against Soei. She provided her name, at least, perhaps figuring I was better worth giving answers to.

    She certainly knew Diablo, and I could see it if she ran after realizing she couldnt win. Very few people who shout out kill me actually want to die. I felt safe assuming she was attached to her life. But I was also interested in why she betrayed Hinata. Even if she didnt reveal her client for this murder attempt, maybe shed be more willing to discuss other matters.

    Well, regardless of how open she is, Ill just have to ask whatever I can.

    I began with a calm approach.

    So you were definitely aiming for Prince Elrick. Is that right?

    Yeah.

    And was that in order to frame me for it and get me kicked out of the Western Nations?

    Probably. I didnt hear any reason. I was just told to do it.

    All right. That didnt seem to be a lie.

    Can I ask the next question? Hinata asked, eliciting a nervous shiver from Glenda.

    What is it?

    I assigned you to amercial hub city so you could have more freedom of movement. I told you not to listen to what the merchants there told you, but had they already won you over by then?

    Noment there.

    Were you ready to betray me from the beginning? Because you were ordered to?

    Noment.

    Im thinking your backers are the group controlling the Council. Who are they?

    I always thought it was strange. The Council would sometimes make these moves to indicate they had an eye out for the Western Holy Church. I figured there had to be a spy, and you were my prime suspect. I was waiting for a chance to expel you, but if you tell me your employers name, Im willing to subtract from your sentence.

    I told you, noment!

    No? All right. One more question. Did you believe in Luminus?

    Tch! Theres no god out there. If you want me to believe in that, pay me

    The next instant, Hinata had her rapier out. With a pure, melodious ng, I stopped it with my own sword.

    Whoa, Hinata! Not the head! You interrogating her or killing her?!

    I didnt intend to.

    You liar! You had every intention of it just now!

    Eesh. Gonna have to keep a constant vigil, I see. Hinata absolutely wouldve decapitated her. I managed to react because I had an eye out, but we came this close to losing a valuable information source.

    Its all right, Sir Rimuru. I can use her as a test subject for my resurrection magic.

    Shuna was there smiling, like always.

    Thats true. And I can use divine miracle resurrection as well. There was hardly any problem with it.

    I wasnt sure how much of this was an act. Both Hinata and Shuna were griping at me now, but I didnt really think it was okay to kill someone just because you could resurrect themter. I didnt think so, but there was a certain type of persuasive logic to it. Its strange.

    Look, can you just shut up for a second, Hinata?

    Time to tag back in. This was going downhill really fast, so I better have Hinata cool off for a bit.

    So. My turn again.

    Raphael, do your stuff!

    Understood.

    Raphael eagerly epted the challenge. I simply voiced what it told me.

    Im assuming a professional like you isnt gonna just tell me everything because I asked nicely. So you can just listen to me instead, okay?

    Hmm. Interesting. Prod her and gauge what she knows from her reactions, then?

    Try not to lose your poker face, then.

    Hah! You better not look down on me. I dont need you to remind me! Glendas up to the challenge, huh? So whos gonna win this? I wondered, as if I were part of the audience.

    Unique skills often take root in peoples souls. Youre a good example of that. Yours is bound fast to your soul with a powerful force.

    Huh. Didnt know that. So?

    So in that conference I attended, a lot of the councillors were tarnished by their vast, greedy desires.

    Uh-huh

    These desires were forcibly nted into them. Theres a force involved that can directly impact peoples souls, and I think thats what guided their moves.

    And youre under that same influence, Glenda.

    What?

    In your case, though, your unique skill is providing protection to your soul, so this influence hasnt fully clouded you yet.

    Ngh Glenda wordlessly scowled. Maybe she couldnt find a way to deny itit was kinda news to me as well, but still.

    But as amazing as your unique skill is, there are people out there who can see it for what it is.

    You mean with Appraisers Eye?

    Certainly. Dragons Eye, from the demon lord Milim, is more famous. Not that Im up on this stuff, but theres an old story about how Milim can see everything, right? Apparently, thats really true. One nce at someone, and Milim has a general idea of what kinds of skills they have.

    That was true, although she couldnt guess someones internally manifested skills and couldnt give you details unless the subject invoked them. She could gauge their strengths, as well as whether a given skill was extra or unique in nature. It was just harder to give you finer detailsfor example, if someone had two or more unique skills, shed have trouble telling whether it was two skills or one really powerful skill.

    I was actually the same way, too. My Analyze and Assess was now urate enough that I got a hazy insight into the skills of other people, and I also learned how I could conceal mine from others, the way Guy Crimson had hidden his own magicule count. When I first met Guy, I assumed your skills stayed hidden unless you showed them off to people. I was wronglike I said, an Analyze and Assess skill forged well enough can detect them, with the one being assessed none the wiser.

    Looking back, I was pretty lucky, actually. Thanks to having four different ultimate skills, Guy mustve taken one look at me and assumed I couldnt be toyed with. Raphael was the one skill I absolutely had to keep under my hat, so that was the watchword for my future moves from that point forward.

    So I switched my way of thinking and assumed there was no way to hide skills, but that was actually pretty possible. If youve built up a skill to the point that itspletely your own, you can actually defend Analysis skills from picking up on it. It wasnt perfect yet, but that was the result of the experiments I had been doing.

    What are you trying to say? Yes, I have a unique skill. But even if its protected me from the desires, so what?

    My little pause there mustve irritated Glenda. Hearing about these outside influences inspired her to y along with me. I wanted to give her an answer, but Raphaels roundabout descriptions were getting a bit hard to grasp. Parsing it into something I could reasonably exin took some time.

    Suggestion. Use Hasten Thought?

    Yes

    No

    Oh, yeah, there was that. I thought Yes, cursing myself for not doing that in the first ce. Now lets hurry this up and get Glenda on my side already.

    Whether your minds clouded by greed or not is none of my business. But one things for sure: Your employers got a pretty powerful unique skill running. Thats true, isnt it?

    Nomentbut I guess theres no denying it, either.

    Thank you. So, building on that, there was a man at the Founders Festival whose desires were being harnessed like that. His name is Gaiye, and Shuna took care of him at the Council this afternoon. The other festival visitors werent subjected to interference that way, but some of the merchants were. And if arge number of people are brought under a skills influence at once, chances are that the skill user is physically nearby. Thats what I thought.

    Gaiye waspletely hooked by it, but the farther away you got from the skill user, generally, the weaker the skill got. Masayukis skill was another monster, but the rumors that spread around about him only added to its synergy. That foundation is why the skill propagates so much further than he means it to.

    Influencing peoples desires, meanwhile, was purely dependent on the skills power itself. Beyond that, the user could utilize their strength or some other element to enhance the effect if they wanted. Basically, though, if you told me our skill user attended the Founders Festival, Id certainly believe it.

    Along those lines, I had a suspect in mind. Someone I spected about enough that I had Soei look into her. Have you ever heard the name Maribel Rozzo?

    Raphael sure was cutting to the chase. The name came straight from the dossier Soei prepared for me.

    !!

    She mightve been trying to hide it, but Glenda gave me an ever-so-slight response. So that was a yes.

    My Analyze and Assess skill is pretty good, yknow. Not only can it detect what skills a person has, but it can also tell if someones hiding one of them. I was sensing thetter all throughout the Founders Festival, and one of the people I got that vibe from was that girl Maribel.

    I could see Glenda grow paler as I continued. I couldnt tell if she was getting hot or if it was a cold sweat running down her cheek. Either way, she was getting nervous.

    Y-you

    Maribel Rozzo, you said? The Rozzo family Hmm. I see.

    Ah?!

    Hinata interrupted Glenda just when she was about to say something. I shouldve been annoyed, but looking at Hinata, I didnt need to be. She had a delighted expression, like she had just found the answer. Glenda, meanwhile, made it clear that something had gone awry with her ns.

    Granville Rozzo. The founder of the Rozzo family and a former Hero. Im sure you know him, too, dont you, Glenda? Thatand he was the real person behind Gren, the Sunday Priest and head of the Seven Days Clergy

    Just as I thoughtHinata was at the truth now. I could see her mentally connecting the dots on the people she knew.

    Seven Days, huh? Those guys we met before? I heard they had all died, but Granvilles still alive?

    Nicus said hended the final blow, but were talking about someone who ruled over the Western Holy Church for centuries. I wouldnt be surprised if he survived it.

    So Maribel was the skill user behind all this greed maniption. And Granville RozzoGren from the Seven Dayswas the head of her family. Mm-hmm. And if Grens the kind of monster who can survive for hundreds of years, hes likely got the Council in his pocket.

    So should we assume Grens our mastermind here?

    No doubt about it. Hes using Maribels powerful skill for some kind of scheme of his.

    Hinata and I were nowparing notes, ignoring Glenda entirely. We basically had our answer, and Glenda had just lost her value to us.

    Goddamn it! Why do you know so much? I didnt even tell you anything! This is basically the same damn thing as me revealing it all!

    Mmm, yeah, sorry about that. You picked the wrong team to mess with, is all I can say. Raphaels too much of a talent topete against.

    I suppose they might think you did, wouldnt they? I said.

    Well, thats what you get, Glenda, said Hinata. A fitting end for a traitor.

    Dammit. I I Theyre going to kill me Seeing Glenda whisper to herself, face drained of color, I felt a little bad for her.

    I had no intention of killing her; now that I had my info, I was ready to hand her over to Englesia. Butyeah. Wherever she went, she probably wasnt gonna be alive much longer. I figured she had the talent to flee to safety, but judging by how unnerved she was, she was dealing with some pretty ominous odds.

    Is this Maribel girl that powerful? I decided to ask.

    Shes not that big an issue. But summoned people like me are bound by spells that we cant resist. The moment they decide Ive fled from them, theyll crush my soul, and that will be the end for me.

    Gee, that doesnt sound nice

    So you didnt betray Luminus out of your own free will? It was because you didnt have any other choice?

    Wellitsplicated. I wanted to throw myself upon the mercy of my god, but Granvilles eyes were on me. Really, there was nothing I couldve done about it.

    Maybe I was right to sympathize with her a little. Hinata was still giving her a cold look, but I think she wasnt so angry now. She wanted to murder her less, at least.

    No, youre right about that. If your souls shattered, not even Resurrection can help you then.

    Wow. Guess even Hinata can be gentle sometimes. She was still stern, but now she was looking for a way to help Glenda. But could I undo that spell?

    Understood. It is not a problem. Remove the spell?

    Yes

    No

    That was easy.

    And so it was off.

    Its over now,mented Glenda. Maribel Shes reading my emotions. I may not have intended to betray her, but shes gonna judge me now

    So I let her in on what I just did.

    What?

    Yeah, no need to worry. Were all done with you, so go live whatever life you want. Im pretty sure she thinks youre dead now.

    N-no, um, I wasnt talking about that. You mean to say you undid the curse ruling over me?!

    Yeah, pretty much. But lemme just remind you: You get hostile with me, and Ill show you no mercy.

    Yes, I suppose Ill look the other way, Hinata said. If I kill someone Rimuru let go, hell never let me hear the end of it. But keep this in mind: You have betrayed Luminus herself. The Western Holy Church will never forgive you for that.

    Glenda was a strong girl. A threat. But now that she was free from the rule of Maribel or whatever, we didnt have much reason to remain hostile. If she started trouble with us again, we could always do her in then. Personally, I didnt think she caused that much of a headache, so I was ready to forgive her. Hinata seemed willing to do the same; I guess she felt she couldnt be so narrow-minded about someone I let go free.

    Besides, in a way, Glenda really was just following ordersnot with her brain, exactly, but with the influence of the curse forced upon her. This time, I was willing to give her a p on the wrist.

    So right, youre free to go. If you want to stay in my nation for a while, youre wee to, but if you cause any trouble

    W-wait a I mean, wait a second! Youre really letting me go?

    Uh-huh. I dont really feel like killing you anyway.

    If Sir Rimuru has forgiven you, we have no reason to defy his will, said Soei.

    Not that youre much of a threat anyway, Benimaru added.

    They were willing to go with me, too. I didnt much appreciate the way they phrased it, but they didnt seem to have anyints. They didnt see her as a threat, I imaginewhich I wasnt too sure about, but to them, it was the truth. Shed never beat Benimarus full effort, much less Soeis. Glenda struck me as the kind of woman who took a profit-and-loss approach to living, so shed never do something stupid like challenge an unbeatable foe. Letting her go didnt seem like that big of a problem.

    As I convinced myself to take an optimistic approach, Glenda turned to me, kneeled, and said something extraordinary.

    II have a request! Ill tell you everything I know, so could you please give me some employment? Ill do anything you want, even dirty work, so please!

    Benimaru and I looked at each other, passing messages with our eyes:

    Now what?

    Do whatever you want.

    But employment? What about the money? I had more to work with, but we were still sorting out sries for my top officials. Working for free was still the norm around here.

    Hmm I appreciate the sentiment, but were still busy developing ourselves. Were pretty far behind in terms of organization, so were not paying anyone a sry yet

    Times like this, you gotta just be honest. No point trying to smooth over things.

    Huh? Glenda froze. But the next thing she said surprised me instead. Well, Im used to that. I was stationed with the Master Rooks in the Holy Empire of Lubelius, but they didnt pay us there either

    Dang.

    Even the Three Battlesages, the best Lubelius had to offer, didnt get any money. They were paid in goodsand any money they needed, they were expected to scrounge themselves. They had an illustrious name to leverage, though, and Im sure they got treated like kings wherever they went. Sometimes theyd receive payments for resolving crimes, too, so they led pretty decent lifestyles.

    Wait, so you get nothing, either, Hinata?

    She sure racked up a hell of a bill at the festival

    Tch No. Lubelius is an advocate for equality, so theres no public sry at all. We all get paid in goods.

    That was a surprisebut also a relief. Lubelius has a long, storied history, and it made it this far without sries. Maybe we shouldnt be in any hurry to enact them, either.

    By the way, thanks to running the Crusaders and the Imperial Guard, Hinata was given ess to some of the government budget. Between that and monster-hunting rewards, her ie was actually pretty upper-ss.

    And yet you made me pay for you?

    Quit sweating the small stuff! Im just saving money.

    She brought the kids all kinds of stuff, but with me, its all Ooh, gotta save money. And actually, did Mjllmile pay her thebyrinth reward fees yet? The thought just urred to me, but I didnt want to prod that hos nest. I was too scared to ask, so I didnt.

    But Im pretty well-known around the Western Nations. Even if Im free, I dont have any work waiting for me. No nations gonna hire me now, and Im not cut out for adventuring work. Besides, youre on the cutting edge in culture here, so if you can guarantee me meals and a roof over my head, Im good!

    Judging by how desperate Glenda was sounding, I doubted she was trying to deceive me.

    And I had reason to believe her. If Lubelius was in pursuit of the Three Battlesages, everyone would have to assume a betrayal was the cause. Shed never find a nation willing to employ someone as politically touchy as her. Even if she became an adventurer under an assumed name, I could get it if everyone kept a prudent distance. If her cover got blown, she might have Lubelius and Granvillee after her, too. Any kind of stable life was impossible.

    Yeah, I guess youll have a hard time of it without support from somewhere.

    Right? So please, Sir Demon Lord! I know you dont believe a word of this, but I swear Ill stay faithful to you!

    Theres no way I could believe it. But somehow, I just couldnt find it in myself to hate her. She was the ssic spy-film femme fatale, and I couldnt just abandon her.

    Can I leave her to you, Soei?

    As you wish, Sir Rimuru. I have no objection.

    Great. Thanks. And I cant have her turning traitor, so deal with that if it happens, okay?

    Absolutely. In terms of battle strength alone, I would rate her above Soka, so perhaps I could establish a special-ops team for her that answers to me.

    Oh, kinda like a team all the problem kids get thrown into?

    Something like that, Sir Rimuru. Id like to scout out members locally and elsewhere.

    Soeis got some ideas brewing, doesnt he? Diablo was still off searching for an army, so it wouldnt be fair to turn Soei down. Let him do what he wants.

    Right! Ill leave all that up to you! You can work out a budget with Mjllmileter.

    Yes, Sir Rimuru!

    We wrapped that up fast.

    Can you not call me a problem child in front of my face?

    Glenda was whining about something, but if she had an issue, she oughtta try to win my trust first. Either way, she was now part of our team.

    Before leaving Glenda to Soeis management, we decided to have Glenda tell us everything she was aware of. It was no longer an interrogation, so we decided to talk over dinner.

    In the dining hall, you pick up these boards with menu items on them and take them to the window over there. Theres a selection of three items each day, plus a regr special. If you get promoted to management, youll get to order one item of your own, too.

    Oh, really? Because my meals always get picked for me.

    They were always good, I felt, but I never went through that board trade-in thing. The managerial dining hall brought food over to you without having to say or do anything. Thatand Shion and Gobichi would asionally rent kitchen space so they could develop special new meals of their own, but that was another story.

    Todays special is our most popr menu item, Shuna exined with a smile. Normally, youd either reserve it with merit points or get in line early for a chance at it.

    Ah. I always thought the desserts were really fancy here. I guess I wasnt alone.

    We always get this, dont we?

    Yeah. I make sure I get my share.

    Benimaru and Soei order the special, too? I wondered what Soei meant by that. Did he have one of his spies stand in line for him? I hope hes not resorting to silly cafeteria antics like that.

    With the dishes on our table, dinner began.

    Right, so lets begin with

    I was trying to talk to Glendabut she waspletely focused on her food, a woman possessed. It was good, Ill admitdefinitely worth being called a special. So I decided to wait. Its nice to have more pleasant conversation during a meal anyway.

    After we were done:

    Up until now, I always thought money was the most important thing in life. But today, Ive changed my mind. From now on, I live for nothing but merit points!!

    If she meant it, she was way easier to take down than I thought. But whatever. If thats what motivates her, then hey, knock yourself out.

    All right. So what do you know? Give me the unembellished truth, Soei pressed.

    And Glenda finally started to talk.

    First, about the Council. This organization was under the control of five senior councillors, known as the Five Elders. These were headed by Granville, whom we had discussed earlier. As for the other four? Amazingly, one of them was Count Gaban, the mastermind behind todays events. Prince Johann of Rostia, one of the councillors rtively supportive of me, was another.

    Howe there are so many differing opinions among the Five Elders?

    Thats how Maribel likes it. She pits the Council against one another so they can keep the mainstream faction the strongest. Its kind of fixed, you could say, but to the people involved, its a serious battle for survival.

    Hmm. A way to encourage activity within the group? Itd be more efficient if they all worked together, but thatd open it up more to stagnation and corruption. You often hear about family-runpanies getting ruined by whoever was at the top. Besides, if Johann sessfully earned my trust, itd be easier for him to learn more about our inner workings. If they had booted us out today, then fine; if they didnt, now Johann was no doubt ready to extend his feelers toward us.

    Its all kind of malicious, isnt it?

    I wish we could just burn it all up instead of deal with it.

    Just hearing about all this made my eyes water. You had to know who your friends and enemies were, or else youd quickly be ruined. Thats how they did things in the nobilityand if I didnt know that, I wouldve been on the cusp of trusting in Johann. Maybe taking Glenda in was the right thing after all.

    The other two elders were Margrave Cidre, tasked with protecting the northern regions of Englesia, and King Doran, leader of a small military kingdom also called Doran. This meant two out of the five elders were Englesian, which showed how much Granville valued that nationclose to the Holy Empire of Lubelius, far from the Forest of Jura, and one of the safest countries in the world. He mustve marked it as the nation most worthy of serving as his political and economic center.

    So why do they see me as the enemy? Im so harmless! I wouldnt hurt a fly. I kind of let that slip out. It seemed to surprise the group.

    Huh? If you keep picking the kind of fights you pick, of course people are gonna be hostile.

    Pardon?

    Yeah, I thought you were picking fights with people, too. Diablo told me all about how Sir Rimuru was going to have the world economy in his grip before long, so I thought you wanted to take over the Council.

    What?! And hang on, Diablos saying stuff like that?

    That was my intention as well. My information gathering was part of that effort, I thought.

    Well, no, Ill admit that was what its for, but

    Dont tell me you didnt even realize you were doing it?

    Not you too, Hinata! Whys everyone looking at me like that? N-no, um Im not gonna say I didnt mean it, but I didnt intend to hurry things along that quickly. So for now, I just wanna keep things to peaceful negotiation

    Hinata sighed and rolled her eyes. If some new merchantes along and ruins your marketce, you wont find a lot of merchants softhearted enough to forgive that, either.

    Oof. Maybe not.

    Well, all right, all right. We were gonna sh in the future anyway, so lets just treat ourselves to the main support of economic activity in the Western Nations, all right?

    That was my intention all along. My jobs to shore up their defenses, but

    And I will investigate the Rozzo family and the Five Elders.

    In a way, it was good that we knew our enemies now. Befriending Glenda was an unexpected windfall, and thanks to that, we had a direction to go.

    Okay. Be careful on that. I dont want to wage a two-front war against Yuuki and the Rozzos.

    Im aware, Benimaru said with a nod, while Soei gave his own agreement.

    I was taking a wait-and-see approach with Yuuki as we waged information and economic warfare with the Rozzos. There were no real bullets flying around, at least, which made things easier on me.

    So I was about to wrap things up, wondering if I was worrying too much about this, when Hinata stopped me.

    Wait a minute. Yuuki and the Rozzos? Why are you suspicious of Yuuki?

    I was thrown for a moment, but then I realized Hinata might be oblivious to all that.

    Well, thinking about it, if you look at the list of people who know Im a reincarnate involved with Shizuand who couldve leaked that info to the Eastern merchants

    Yuukis about it, isnt he?

    Pretty much. And while Im at it, I think that Roy, the guy who yed the role of a demon lord, was killed by this guy Lace, member of something called the Moderate Jesters. Sorry if Im wrong about that.

    No, I appreciate it. I dont have any stake in that, but if hes working against us, I cant stand for that.

    She was willing to ept Lace and his cohorts as our foes. She gave a cold, cold smile, one that froze my spine in ce. Man, thats scary. I definitely better make sure I dont rile her.

    After that exchange, Hinata stood up, preparing to head home.

    Ummm, actually, about that, Glenda timidly spoke up. Guess she still had something to say.

    What is it? If you wanna say something, dont hold back. Did you remember something else?

    Then she dropped the biggest bombshell of the day.

    By Yuuki, you mean the grand master of the Guild, right? Hes connected to Johann of the Five Elders, but Id say hes pretty much under Maribelsplete control.

    Huh? Yuukis being manipted?!

    Are you serious?

    Im not shameless enough to joke at a time like this.

    No, I bet not. Well, why didnt you tell us sooner? Thats important!

    Um You know, I answered directly to Granville for the most part, so

    Essentially, two people had the right to give Glenda orders: Granville and Maribel, although it was Granville nine times out of ten. As a result, Glenda didnt get to talk with Maribel often or get much of an insight into her mind.

    I picked her brain a little more, seeing if I could get anything else. We learned about more of her underlings, as well as the Blood Shadow, a group that handled the Rozzo familys dirty work.

    That is a problem, said Shuna after a moment of reflection. It might be that whoevers controlling Yuuki drove him to leak your secret for some reason.

    Hinata was lost in thought as well. It looked like wed need to reconsider matters from the ground up.

    Even Raphael was thinking in silence for once. Thats a rarity, but if it couldnte up with an answer, worrying about it might be a waste of time.

    What we needed here was a clear solution. If thinking wont solve a problem, we can thinkter. When taking an exam, its always smarter to leave the tougher questions forterwasting valuable time was never a good idea.

    Well, either way, Yuukis still suspicious, so lets keep an eye on him Actually, wait a minute.

    As wary as Yuuki was, I couldnt imagine him trying to spring something on me. But if he was under someones thrall, that was another storyand since that someones the clearly hostile Maribel, maybe the assumptions Ive been working with were wrong all this time, huh?

    Hey, if Yuuki cant defy Maribels orders, you think he might be scheming something no matter what his position is?

    Yeah. Thats the thing. Maribel wanted us out of the picture, and she might be willing to use Yuuki for that goal, keeping her own hands clean. Trying to avoid a two-front war was the least of our worries.

    That doesnt sound too good, does it?

    Given that were in the info-gathering stage, the Rozzos cant make any shy moves, I imagine. But

    Soei and my brother are right. Youre about to venture into the ruins with Yuukis assistant, the Guild vice-master Lady Kagali, yes? They might be nning something in there

    Mmm. Looks like everyones reached the same conclusion. Maybe the wait-and-see approach was too optimistic.

    I cant lie and im thats not a worry of mine. Maribel and the Rozzos can always say they didnt know what Yuuki was doing, too. They can pin all the me on the Free Guild and cause a rift between us

    And that would ruin your ns, Sir Rimuru.

    If we stay on the sidelines like this, they might strike first.

    Mmmmmm.

    But I felt we were already on guard enough. Security was stepped up across town. They could try to rile up our townspeople, but it wouldnt go that easy.

    So

    Suggestion. You could deliberately open a soft spot to lure them in.

    Thats it!

    Perhaps we could cancel the expedition?

    I shook my head at Benimaru. No. Actually, lets take advantage of it. Milim will scream at me if we cancel it, so lets go through with it. Lets go in as prepared as we can for anything that could pop upand when it does, lets engage it!

    Milim was looking forward to exploring the ruins. It was like a field trip to her, something to take her mind off homework, and shed fly into a rage if I told her it was off. I didnt want to create yet more problems for myself, so I really wanted to avoid that.

    But wouldnt that be dangerous?

    With Milim there? And I was going to take Shion to guard me anyway.

    Ah, that should work, then. Im sure shell be d to hear that, given how she was on home duty.

    Benimaru had noints, so Shion it was.

    And Ill take Gobta and Ranga along, too. That should be more than enough of a fighting force, shouldnt it?

    Understood. Well make sure nothing happens in town in the meantime!

    And Ill help my brother strengthen the barrier around it.

    Ill keep a steady watch for any unusual movements between countriesespecially the Five Elders Glenda mentioned.

    Thanks. And we have Veldora in the Dungeon, so if things get really bad, turn to him. I gave each of them my approval.

    Well, I need to bring all this discussion back to Lady Luminus, said Hinata. Be careful, all right? Because you have a tendency to get careless sometimes.

    Quit reminding me!

    So she magically willed herself back home. Shes usually cold to me, but sometimes, in her own way, she can demonstrate legitimate concern, too.

    Was this her idea of flirting?

    Understood. No.

    No dice, huh? I was hoping Id get to dream a little, but reality isnt so kind, is it?

    Anyway, we had our walking papers. Now we just had to prepare for the big day.

 Volume 10 - Ch 5

    THE TRAP OF GREED

    Once Id rounded up all my officials together, I shared everything I learned with them, introducing Glenda and ensuring they epted her. This, of course, meant exposing Glenda to their surveince; shed need to earn her trust with all of them.

    I also introduced her to Kaijin and Kurobe, so they could get a chance to examine her handgun. She oughtta be able to restock her ammo here, too. Maybe we can even mass-produce those things? Honestly, Id like one, too. I wasnt gonna put them on sale, but maybe I could give them out to important people on some kind of licensing system. Theyd be cool to have, too, I wickedly thought as the days passed by.

    Soon, the day of our ruins expedition came. We were all set to go. Our expedition outfits were perfect, and I even had a prototype gun on my side.

    It had piqued Kaijins interest enough that he produced a mold during the off-hours of his research. Dold then carved a seal into them that used magical power to trigger a small explosion inside the chamberno gunpowder needed and no ejected cartridges. All you needed were some elliptical bullets, and off you went. It was sized at a third of an inch and could hold sixteen bullets. It used a blowback system that made the bolt retract with each shot, in order to load the next bullet and eliminate the impact of the explosive charge.

    The construction was more like a toy than anything, but even this had the power of a .44 Magnum. That was thanks to the guns magisteel make, which improved its shock resistance, and the inscription-driven explosive charge also delivered the maximum amount of power possible.

    By the way, the force of this gun depended on the type of bullets used. Normally, itd use in old lead bullets, but for monsters, we also had magic-infused mithril shots. The force could differ depending on how much magic you put in, so you could say this weapon needed the right person using it to excel.

    In terms of ssification, it was a Rare, albeit one that could hit as hard as a Unique. A really interesting weapon to have around, one that even surprised Kaijins team as they made it. With the capability it had, Id really like to make it standard-issue with our new troops, but as mentioned, that was up for discussion.

    Frankly, this was something wed normally never do. In a way, I made it to y out the ssic tropes more than anything; I was reluctant to formally adopt it. Wed have to see how things went, perhaps lending it out only if we determined it to be truly necessary.

    Such as today, for example. Carrying this around definitelypleted my look. Any mans got to have a little ssic adventure in his life.

    Ooh, this is really cool! The way it kind of recoils in my hands feels so awesome! Gobta cried.

    See? Gobta and I share the same good taste. Typically, these were for lending out only, but lets give Gobta one as a present.

    You see what I mean, Gobta? But dont go pointing it at people, all right? Its dangerous.

    Of course not! Ill be real careful!

    He was overjoyed, while Ranga looked on jealously. Ranga, you cant use that thing. Ill give you a fancy scarf, though, so make do with that.

    Hee-hee I have Goriki-maru V2 with me, thank you. Not to mention the clothing you chose for me, Sir Rimuru

    Shion, no going on an expedition in that, all right? Safetys our top consideration here!

    She mustve really liked the clothing I gifted to her, because Shion wore it every chance she got. But it was meant for fashion, not exploration.

    A pity

    Her head drooped down as she changed to her normal suit. That wasnt exactly a great improvement, but it was her de facto battle gear, so ah well.

    Rimuru, what do you think of me?

    Milim was practically jumping up and down with excitement.

    Ah Looks good on you. Definitely worth getting for today.

    Like Gobta and me, she was in expedition gear we obtained for this day.

    You bet! It feels goodand talk about easy to move in! Can you believe how many pockets it has? So cool!

    She was in shorts, which I wasnt sure was such a great idea, but they suited her, so wed go with it.

    That it is. Be sure to thank Shuna, okay?

    Okay!

    Thats right!

    Thus, we were all in high spirits as we headed for our meeting pointthe Free Guild headquarters in the Englesia capital. The n was to head to the Puppet Nation of Dhistav from there.

    Kagali was waiting for us at the front entrance.

    Good to see you again. We have a lot to do today!

    I guess this is the first time? Im Milim. Good to meetcha!

    My name is Kagali. Its a pleasure to meet you as well.

    They all smiled at one another before Kagali guided us forward.

    Milim?

    Mmm I dont think theres any problem. But its a littleum

    ?

    Kagali gave our conversation an odd look. She worked for Yuuki, so we eyed her with suspicion, just in case. I was having Milim check her out with Dragons Eye just now, and it sounded like something caught Milims attentionbut nothing especially problematic. It still bothered me, though, so I resolved to keep my guard up.

    Our teams all here, so let me introduce everyone.

    Rolling her eyes a bit, Kagali began introducing the expedition team to us. They were lined up in a row, waiting for us in an open area near the HQ. It was a team trained by Kagali herself, and the more talented and experienced among them would be joining us today. They all volunteered for the job, around ten men and women in all, even after being told we could be attacked. Some of the passers-by were giving them curious looks, but nobody minded. They seemed well trained enough.

    Their equipment, meanwhile, was the full,plete deal. Not the make-believe stuff we had on, but a lot of heavy stuffthick upper and lower clothing, withrge backpacks. Each of them carried tools for the role they yed in the expeditionwalking sticks, pickaxes, shovels, you name it.

    Well carry your equipment for you, Sir Rimuru, but where did you put it?

    We didnt have any. Just these cool new outfits.

    No, um, we didnt prepare anything, so its just this.

    Huh? Thats an amusing joke.

    Yeah, I know, but

    Look, you really shouldnt have any of your skin exposed. You might get stung, and its easier to get hurt that way, right?

    Work clothing did its job best if it covered all your skin. Plus, Milims outfit was just downright slovenly.

    Hmm, you think so? But my skins protected by an aura at all times, so Ill be okay!

    Yeah, but you wanna have Kagali get mad at you?

    Youre just the same as her! From my perspective, youre both far too lightly equipped! Youre treating this expedition like a walk in the park!

    Oof. Harsh. What was so bad about this, really?

    All right, all right, all right. Well be fine, okay? I may not look it, but Ive got a lot of adventuring experience!

    To be more exact, I had gone light since I didnt really need to camp outside anyway. That was better demonstrated in person than exined at length right now.

    Well, if you insistbut if you have any trouble, please let us know at once.

    I doubted wed have that much trouble. We were treating this like a fun outing, but we did have an eye out for danger. I made sure Gobta, Ranga, and Shion were all aware of that.

    Time to head out, then.

    Right. I have a wagon prepared for us

    Huh? We dont need a wagon, do we?

    Kagali stared nkly at me. I stared nkly back at her. What? I mean, itd take, like, two months to reach Dhistav by wagon. That was never an option.

    What do you mean?

    I invited the quizzical Kagali to just take us out of town for now. Once we found ourselves in a deserted area, I used Dominate Space to open a transport gate straight to Dhistav. This process was familiar to me by now; if Ive been somewhere before, it was easy to open a gate there.

    All right,e on in. It wont disappear on you or anything, so dont panic.

    The dazed expedition party began talking all at once.

    Youre kidding me! How far away do you think we are?

    Trulya demon lord is an amazing thing

    Impossible. Now the majority of our preparation has gone to waste

    I felt a little bad about that, butheyat least I looked cool.

    So we were at the Puppet Nation of Dhistav.

    The first people to greet us were the dark elves, lined up at the castle entrance and bowing deeply.

    Wee to Dhistav! You must be exhausted from your journey!

    The elder among the group stepped up to me. I say elder, but she looked maybe in her twenties, a woman with blond hair and dark-brown skin.

    Oh, no, not really. But do you have rooms for us?

    Of course. We could provide individual rooms for each of you, but if necessary, we haverger group rooms as well.

    I gave them advance notice, so they were entirely set up for us. For now, I figured we could drop all our stuff in therger group room.

    Okay, lets head to the group room first. We can keep our luggage in there, so maybe we can get a tour around the castle today?

    Very well. Id be happy to guide you.

    The elder guided us into the room. I told the team to drop their stuff there, and they did so, walking like out-of-sync robots.

    Um, what is going on here?! It hasnt even been an hour since we came together, and were already at our destination?!

    This is insanity! I must be going insane!

    What? Individual rooms? Theyre treating us like guests in this castle?!

    I guess the robotic walking was because their brains were still catching up to all this. It was a departure from the usual sort of expedition, and I suppose it confused them.

    Sir Rimuru has directed us to look after all of you. If you run into any issues during your stay, please dont hesitate to inform us.

    The elder shed a soft smile at the dazed team as she spoke. That was enough to make them face reality. I watched them all, warm fuzzies running over me.

    Then we took the team on a tour of the castle, the former residence of the demon lord yman and a ce that brought the word opulence to new heights. The dark elves were fully maintaining the pce, and everywhere I looked, it was spotless.

    This is gonna be yours once the expedition is over, Milim, but I think all these people still want to live here.

    Mmm. Yes, I see that. Lets have them provided with regr food and supplies.

    Thank you very much, Lady Milim.

    Dont worry about it! Youre my people, too, so if you carry out your roles, thats great.

    Wow, Milims really getting smarter. Freys efforts must be paying off.

    Impressed, I asked her some more about the castle and whether she had any issues with it. Its a big pce, enough so that it had space for all the dark elves. There was no surrounding castle towndwellings for magic-born existed, but they were all out working under Geld right now. The elves were tending to them as well, for when they eventually came back.

    And this is the entrance into the ruins. Its divided into three sections, with the deepest one serving as a crypt. Only the higher officials among us are allowed to enter, and only the demon lord yman himself knows what lies in the middle section and beyond.

    Hakuro mentioned this in his own report, but the ruin entrance was right inside the castle.

    So you know how the topmost section is structured?

    Yes. All the treasure in the top section has already been recovered, so we are currently using the area for our residences.

    There were so many empty rooms inside that it could easily house over a thousand beds.

    We opened the door and went in. It was supposed to be underground, but the space was filled with a soft light.

    Whats this light?

    Ah yes, this is a perpetual magic-driven effect. It is synchronized with the passage of the sun, so it gets dark at nighttime.

    Heavens! Magic from the distant past is still in operation today?!

    This This alone is a huge discovery. Its being treated as the most normal of things in here, but Id like to thoroughly investigate it

    Is this magic active in the other sections?

    Yes. I had a nce deeper in when I apanied Lord yman, but the central section was just as bright.

    The elder patiently answered all our questions, a back-and-forth that continued for a while toe. I could see how excited the team was, and that energy was starting to rub off on us.

    Better stay out of their way, Gobta.

    Right! Gettin kinda nervous, huh?

    We whispered at each other as we looked around the first section. It looked pretty lived in, so I could believe the dark elves called it home.

    So if you live in here, you dont see any monsterse up from below? Cause if theres a crypt, Id expect ghosts n stuff

    The elder snickered at Gobtas query. No, no need to worry about that. There is only one door leading to the underground, and only Lord yman could open it.

    Hmm? Milim raised an eyebrow. Well, if it wont open, lets just break it down.

    Certainly. One swing of my de, and all shall be pulverized!

    No! We need to examine it first! Please, no breaking anything!

    I rushed in to keep the extremists from having their way.

    R-right. Good point. Better be more careful than that, Shion!

    Yes, that was close. If I didnt hear that, I would have lost hold of myself.

    Thats just what I was anxious about, but at least they were open to guidance.

    So we made our way through the rather extensive ruins, past the dark elves settlement and up to a single, veryrge door, the same size as the first but with a very apparent magical seal on it.

    Ah. This appears to be part of a defense mechanism powered by ancient magic. It might wake up the entire city defense system if we touch it.

    Defense system?! Is it still active?

    Well need to be careful. If we trip it, the expedition might have to be called off very quickly.

    Kagali stiffened as she gave the warning, and her teams faces all tightened up, too. I wonder how yman got this thing open.

    Was yman involved with running these ruins or something?

    No, he came to the forefront only just recently. I doubt he was involved with them before that point.

    I think he managed to undo this magical seal. Follow the correct procedure, and I think it should open withoutint.

    Mmm, yes, yes. Even yman could tackle this one, if he had enough time. Didnt he have some unique skill along those lines?

    Affirmative. Maniptor, the power to convert information into encrypted messages that can be sent and received.

    Right, that one. He could probably use it to decrypt whatever data he saw, which was a good way to analyze and break open magic seals like this one.

    By the way, have I obtained that skill yet?

    Understood. The skill was an inferior version of the powers my master already has, so it was dismantled and absorbed as energy. As a formality, Control Terrain has been added to Control Laws.

    Ah. No wonder I didnt hear about it. If its not worth reporting, Raphael doesnt tell me about it. But if yman could do it, so can I. Its really Raphael doing it, but whatever.

    This could be a long battle.

    Quite a challenge to start out with. But this is still a good environmentpared to what weve dealt with before. Lets settle down and start deciphering this!

    The team was enthusiastic about getting to work, for sure. Meanwhile, Iid a hand on the door. The energy flowing through the veins in the earth, I could tell, was spreading out across the wall as it went through the magic seal.

    I see. If we break down this door, thatll knock out all the light in this section. All this energy would be diverted toward eliminating the intruders, and then itd heal itself once everything was safe again, perhaps. Staying in operation like this for over a thousand years This is the work of a highly advanced civilization of magic.

    It was Greek to me if I was alone, but thanks to all the support I had here, this was pretty easy to follow. It was even kind of fun, like a puzzle.

    Working my way through the magic seal like a worksheet full of mathematical problems, I managed to figure out how to open it.

    Oh, here we go. Run some magic power through here, and thatll open up an input window for an encrypted spell.

    I turned back toward everyoneonly to find the team staring at me, jaw down on the floor. Oops. In an instant, I knew I had gone too far. It was so much fun analyzing it, you know, but this was their job, wasnt it?

    Sorry, kinda got carried away

    N-no, not a problem at all.

    Kagali offered me somefort, but I really felt like I was stepping on some toes here. Butting in too much would be regrettable, so I decided to sit back and fluff up Rangas mane for a while

    but with the kind of gang I brought along, that wasnt gonna happen.

    Wah-ha-ha-ha-ha! I just solved it, too! Milim was already bounding around the door.

    Oh? Im pretty stumped, I guess. Meanwhile, Gobta was bringing a quizzical hand to his head.

    Several of the team members were debating among themselves, voices and eyes bright.

    This all happened thanks to a question from Kagali.

    Sir Rimuru, would you mind exining how you deciphered this?

    I was deep into giving Ranga a grooming session, but if she was asking, I had to answer her. So in front of an eager-to-learn audience, I went over the steps I took to decipher the magic seal.

    First, before you examine theplete shape, you need to examine what kind of magical form has been added to it. Then you divided that form into individual sections.

    So you look for the newest spell first?

    Right. Youre figuring out which form will keep theplete shape from working right if you take it out, and then you repeat that as you try to grasp the core features of the spell. After that, its just a matter of taking all the correct answers and stacking them atop one another.

    I see

    So get rid of the false data and keep the spells that work correctly?

    I had heard this was a team of elite explorers, and they certainly were quick learners. Just a little advice from me, and their understanding grew deeper and deeper.

    So with trap spells, theyre usuallyplete packages in and of themselves, right? Theyre kind of like leaves and branchesing out from the main tree, separate from the flow at the foundation. Thats assuming the main purpose of the spell isnt to activate the trap, of course, but

    Hmm. So theyre in the main flow of the seal, but we cant afford to ignore them, huh?

    I guess my experience educating children was paying off. The team found my teaching style really easy to grasp. Having so much sess lifted my spirits, so I kept on demonstrating my approach to magic seal analysis.

    In the midst of this, Milim went and got the doorpletely unsealed. A few others followed quickly after her, but it was then that the dark-elf elder spoke up again.

    Everybody, weve prepared dinner for you. Im sure youre tired from your long journey, so why dont we finish up work for today?

    Only now did I realize we were into the evening hours. Yeah, the real expedition could begin tomorrow. Lets wrap things up for nowwe can get the door open for good soon enough.

    Okay, wanna stop here?

    Sounds good. It feels strange describing it as a long journey, but we can get down to business starting tomorrow.

    With Kagalis agreement, our work ended for the day.

    The next morning, Kagali formally opened the door, her fully equipped team lined up behind her. A blue light flickered as the door silently slid away.

    And there we go.

    The team cheered. Well done, I said as I took a step inside.

    In this middle section, the light wasnt as bright as above. It was more of a dimmer glow, eternally shining from candlesticks installed in the stone walls. Another impressive piece of magical technologynot real candles, but magic-driven illumination.

    As I walked along, astonished by them, Milim came up to me.

    It feels a lot more oppressive all of a sudden, huh?

    Yeah. The ceilings a lot lower, and it feels like these stone walls are closing in on us. Pretty narrow corridor, too. I bet this is set up like kind of a maze.

    The corridor was maybe six and a half feet wide; two people standing next to each other would feel a little cramped. Milim and I were on the small side, so it wasnt a problem, but the people carryingrge packs behind us probably had a rougher time of it.

    Sir Rimuru, who should we have up front?

    If this was a mazelike area, wed have to figure out a path to take at every fork in the hallways. There might be traps in ce, too.

    We can detect traps for you as the leaders. Do you mind if we stay in the front?

    If you dont mind handling that for us.

    Sure thing! With me around, youre safe no matter what shows up!

    Milim gave a reassuring nod before I could speak up. Nobody had any issue with that, so we were now leading the whole team, Kagali and her assistant behind us. Shion and Gobta took up the rear, serving as bodyguards for the rest of the team; Ranga was in my shadow; and the elder was watching the door for us. I couldnt wait for dinner from her tonight.

    I ambled along, using Magic Sense to survey the path ahead. The corridor was stone, but sometimes wed pass by murals on the wallsvery pretty ones.

    Wow. These murals alone have a lot of artistic value.

    Do they?

    Sure. They must be depicting scenes from ancient times, so theyll be great to research. Theyre really worth a lot.

    Hmm. You know, thinking about it, they do remind me of things I saw way back when.

    Oh, right. To me, its the faraway past, but to Milim, this is probably just a nostalgia trip. Thatd make anyone a bit emotional, I bet. Better be careful with our expedition hereI wouldnt want to add any more damage to the wear and tear of time.

    Our explorations continued apace, with no booby traps to speak of. We were now taking a break for lunch.

    All right. Ill begin cooking, then.

    Oh, wait one minute. The elder made some box lunches for all of us, so lets go with those.

    I stopped a team member as he was trying to start a campfire, then took out enough lunches for everyone. It mustve looked like I conjured them up from nothing, but they were in my Stomach, of course. That kept them well-preserved, making it a useful skill for long journeys like this.

    Umm

    Is that even possible?

    I could hear people whispering about me. Let them. Despite their confusion, they readily epted the boxes.

    Oooh, this does look good, eximed Milim when she opened it up. On the menu today were sandwiches with tons of veggies, eggs, and smoked meat. Dark-elf cuisine was all about uniquely heavy sauces; the one used here was a bit like mayonnaise, doing a great job of softening up the rather hard buns. If people still had trouble biting through them, thats where the vegetable soup came in, poured intorge wooden bowls. It used a hearty chicken broth, giving it a nice, tasty body that really worked its way into the veggies for a satisfying treat.

    I have lots more, so dont be shy!

    The moment I shouted it, I was mobbed by team members, empty bowls in hand. Milim was first in line, so I guess she was a fan.

    We almost never get food this good outdoors. Youre making us a very happy team today.

    I couldnt help but feel Kagali was needling me a little when she said that. I had just resolved not to butt in too much, after all, so I could read between the linesbut if she thought this was cheating, I hoped she was willing to overlook it.

    Well, you know, Id like to avoid using fire in this ce if we can.

    Fire?

    Right. We dont want a fire to go out of control in here, and besides, were underground. I think weve got good venttion so far, but just in case, you know?

    You were thinking that far ahead, huh?

    I wouldnt worry so much if we were outdoors, though.

    That was the truth. This was a tight corridor, and there was no ready source of water. If something happened, we might not have an escape route. Thats why I felt it prudent to bring along box lunches from the start.

    Also, bathroom breaks.

    Um, by the way, if any of you want to go to the bathroom, Ill set up a transport gate back to the entrance, so take care of that during our lunch break, okay?

    With that, I flipped the figurative switch on a transport gate. Some of them gave me youre kidding me stares, butyou know. I figured they would probably just do their business behind a rock or something otherwise, but I wanted to avoid that. This path eventually leads to a crypt, after all, and I didnt want to profane it.

    I think youre worrying too much. And the dead might not care anyway.

    No, I think we could learn from that.

    Kagali agreed with me. That was nice to see.

    So while everyones taking a bathroom break:

    Hey, is it all right if I try out something real quick? I said to Kagali.

    Whats that? Coming from you, Id really like to know.

    Well, in thebyrinth I run, one popr strategy right now is to rely on Elemental Communication. You have to be a shaman or elementalist to ess that, but it lets you immediately discover the best path to take.

    Really? Because that sounds real convenient.

    Oh, Kagali didnt know about that? I guess you wouldnt, unless youre intimately involved in that stuff.

    Hey! Um, Im a shamaness! Can you tell me more about Elemental Communication?!

    Ooh. Lucky break there. I felt a little self-conscious about casting the spell myself, so perfect. The volunteer who spoke up was a woman versed in spirit magic, so I gave her a quick lecture on Elemental Communication.

    Oh. Okay. Yeah, I get it!

    She was geared toward the wind element, which made conversation between her and the spirits a rtively smooth process.

    Wow Now we really wont get lost, huh? she said. The path goes into a dead end up ahead, so well want to go back three intersections and turn east. But this is gonna be hard to map out

    Kind of. If you just listen to the spirits voices all the time, youll tire out themunicator. So youll want to get the path down on paperbut of course, I had Raphael handle that for me, creating maps I could produce on paper with so much uracy that youd think I used some mapmaking software package.

    But hang on?

    Isnt there a magic spell that puts any diagram you can think of on paper?

    There definitely was, I thought. I saw it in the book 101 Wild & Wacky Spells I found in the library.

    Report. Searchplete. It is the illusory magic Thoughtography.

    Thats the one!

    Funny how there were still a lot of useful, important magic spells I didnt know, but this kind of nonsense stuck in my brain so easily. I got some good slime cells in me, you know, so my memory skills are even better than beforebut with stuff like this, its like I was back to my old human mind again.

    Hey, anyone here know illusory magic?

    Oh, Im a mysticist! Still in training, but

    Okay, try learning this spell for me, then. Also

    My friends and I all used Thought Communication to share ideas with one another. That wouldve made things easier, but if you wanted to teach something like this to a regr person, magic was still your best bet.

    I had just the thing for a time like this:

    Suggestion. The best option would be the illusory magic Channeling.

    Ooh, theres that, huh?

    So I taught Thoughtography and Channeling to the young man who volunteered his mysticist skills. He gave it a quick whind right away, he was drawing up maps with ease.

    Wow! Well never get lost now!

    In fact, if we use this magic, we could draw out the full structure of these ruins

    This will make future expeditions so much easier!

    Well, Im d everyone likes it.

    A maps fine and all, but it wont show us any traps or magic-driven mechanisms! Dont drop your guard! Kagalis order brought the jubnt team back to earth. Impressive of her to notice that danger without me warning her about it.

    For today, we decided to go ahead and make our way to the bottom of this section first. We wound up reaching it before dinner.

    Day three began in front of the door to the third and final section.

    We decided to split up, one team disabling the magic on the door and the other continuing their exploration of the middle section. I had given them an on-the-field tutorial on this yesterday, so today I was just supervising. Milim, Gobta, and Ranga were on the exploration team.

    Not much to do, eh, Sir Rimuru? Shion said.

    In that case, why dont you go make some drinks for the workers?

    Right away!

    Shion was right; we didnt really have much to do. But the team was still lobbing questions at me now and again, so I was enjoying it.

    Cheerfully, Shion set up a table, pouring coffee from a sk into the cups she had lined up. It was an oddly moving sight. Just a little bit ago, letting Shion touch anything that might go into your mouth was verboten.

    All set! Care for a quick break, everyone?

    We all settled down to rx a bit, the team enjoying her coffee as they had a moment of peace. We still had an eye out for potential attacks, of course, but for now, nothing seemed forting. Hopefully, I wasnt overthinking mattersbut now that I was away from Veldora, Maribel and her cohorts might see this as their big chance. If they were going to act, it was now or never. Id need to stay on my toes as I saw how things went.

    Thatand I needed to keep Kagali and her team guarded, too. I ran a quick Analyze and Assess, but nobody seemed suspicious among any of them. They all had the abilities they imed to have, and there was no sign they were under anyones control, whether via their desires or not. If they were brainwashed, then my eyesor Raphaels eyes, reallymust be deceiving me.

    I felt safe in dismissing that possibility. But what if they werent brainwashed, but following orders they truly believed in? That could happen, too, so I couldnt rest easy yet, but none of them were a threat to my life.

    So I sat back and enjoyed my coffee.

    After a while, Milim came back carrying a ton of stuff. Rimuru! Look at this! I found so much booty!!

    To be urate, she was riding on Ranga empty-handed, while Gobta and the other team members were loaded down with swag.

    Check it out! Theyre all so perfectly infused with magicules. This alone ought to be a huge harvest for us, huh?

    She was right. Most of their booty was battle equipment. And while they were no doubt fine pieces in their heyday, crafted by talented artisans, the magisteel inside them had settled down and vastly upgraded their abilities.

    Ooh, youre right. Theres not much artistic value, but you could still use a lot of this stuff today.

    Right? And look! This one has to be a Unique!

    It was. Extremely valuable. Not the sort of thing youd want to have lying around, I thought. It aroused my suspicions.

    Where did you find this stuff? Because I doubt yman left it untouched without a reason

    Well, there was actually a trap I set off by ident, and a bunch of these golems came lumbering up to us. They were carrying all this! she exined.

    Um, that sounded like something I shouldnt ignore, there

    You set off a trap?

    Ah! Um, no, no! It went off the moment I stepped into this one corridor! I think even you wouldve had trouble avoiding it!

    Yeah! We used magic to detect traps with every hallway we went down. We werent bein careless or anything! Gobta added.

    Milim and Gobta imed they were being careful, and judging by testimony from the rest of the team, they werent lying. Something mustve been programmed with certain biological life-form patterns, repelling any intruders who didnt match them. If you didnt know the eptable wavelengths beforehand, it was impossible for anyone to deactivate. The only logical way through was by force.

    Sounds like you had no choice, then. Some of these traps are prettyplex, huh?

    Oh yes! It sure taught me a thing or two. We should set something like that up in our own Dungeon.

    A corridor that only allowed preselected people through? Maybe this whole section of the ruins was designed to ward people away from the crypt.

    Then perhaps we should assume there are lots of other golems bearing Unique weapons. Their weapons mustve evolved right in their hands while they were on standby over so many years. Its boggling to think about

    Kagali was right. Good thing we had Milim and Gobta with us. If this expedition team were by themselves, there was a decent chance the golems wouldve killed them.

    Nothing mightve happened yesterday, but I bet there are more traps like that in this section of the ruins. But no need to panic. Lets try to act more carefully from tomorrow forward.

    Right. Itll be a while before we have the door analyzed, so tomorrow

    Just when Kagali was voicing her agreement, the earth began to shake. A gigantic burst of energy shot across the entire region, including these ruins. Fragments of rock fell from the ceiling, adding to the stress and terror.

    ?! What was that?!

    We gotta get outta here! Its gonna cave in!

    Kagali raised her voice to calm her team. Pipe down! That was just a single joltits not an earthquake. A structure this solid wont fall that easily. Just stay calm and start evacuating.

    That was enough to restore order among the team, a testament to how well trained they were.

    So what was that? the cool-as-a-cucumber Gobta casually asked.

    Hmm Some kind of shock wave just ran across the surface, I think. A pretty big one, too, so it mightve affected the pce

    I had a transport gate handy if we needed it, so I wasnt panicking as I answered him. Still, though Like Kagali said, it wasnt an earthquake, but some kind of localized energy st, which meant it had to be man-made.

    But just as I was thinking about going back up to look over things, my instincts reacted.

    Report. Hostile force detected. At this point in time, the ruins defense system has activated. Arge number of activating golems have been detected. There are also other intruders going into the ruins.

    rms began to re, followed by a mechanical-sounding voice.

    Intruders into Amrita detected. Eliminate at once! Intruders into Amrita detected. Eliminate at once!

    The repeating voice made the danger crystal clear. Now things were criticalthe surface wasnt guaranteed to be safe, and we had an emergency inside the ruins.

    Youre kidding! Did these ruinsdid Amritas defense system just go off by itself?! Kagalis cool, unaffected demeanor was gone now.

    There are intrudersing inside, I said. Maybe they set off some kind of trap. Too bad the golems wont listen if we tell em were not involved.

    And frankly, I was starting to doubt Kagali herself. She was right near the door. Maybe she couldve set off the defenses while I wasnt paying attention? And look at the timing. Other people entering the ruins just when the rm goes off? That had to be deliberate.

    You notice anything, Milim?

    No, I didnt hear a thing.

    Milim could pick up all Thought Communications and magical conversations around her. Trying to hide anything from her was pointless, but she didnt overhear anything unusual. I thought the intruders mightve been connected to Kagali, but maybe I jumped to conclusions.

    So shes innocent?

    Report. Cannot reach a conclusion. If there is a soul-corridor connection, it is possible to engage in a hidden Thought Communication.

    So I couldnt feel safe yet. I really hated having to protect a potential spy while dealing with enemies If she wouldve been kind enough to reveal herself and ditch me at this point, itd make things a lot easier. But oh well.

    Were in a bad situation. I think the intruders must be from the organizationing after me, I said.

    Ah, its really true

    So that earthquake, too?!

    But what kind of fools would take on a demon lord?

    The team seemed honestly surprised about all this. I didnt question any of their motives. I supposed Id have to brace myself and keep them protected as I fended off this adversary.

    Well, dont worry. I promise Ill step up to keep you all safe.

    They looked at me, surprised. Well, thats meandid they assume Id abandon them all in here? We were getting along pretty well; I kinda hoped they trusted in me more.

    Just what you wished for, huh, Rimuru? said Milim.

    Yeah. Though Im not too sure whether they caught me or I caught them. Well have to see right now.

    Just as Raphael predicted, the enemy took the bait. I wont ask how they managed to get in. With the kind of talent they had to choose from, itd be a snap to sneak past the dark elves up top.

    Well, lets take this opportunity to end things here. I was anticipating this, and I debated over how to address it. There was nothing to panic about. Quickly, we all moved into our nned intercept positions.

    The second tremor came along.

    Whats that? I really dont like the sounds of that!

    Even Gobta was growing concerned about events outside. But I didnt have the time to answer himbecause now, I could see it. An ominous dragon, advancing upon us from faraway skies.

    Whoa. Thats real bad

    It was hard, inside the ruins like this, but I used Magic Sense to follow the magicules to the outside. There I could see a dragon, as vicious as they came. It looked like Veldora on the outside but a measurerger overall. Its skin was ragged, festering, almost rotting off, and its massive aura was exploding out of control. One look told me it packed a massive amount of magicule energy, far beyond what an awakened demon lord possessed. This was a Catastrophe-level threat.

    That bad?

    Yeah. Looks like a dragon, but its way beyond an Arch Dragon. Its probably stronger than a Dragon Lord, even. Maybe its one of Veldoras siblings?

    S-Sir Veldora?!

    It was outside the whole framework of what defined a dragon. My only guess was that it was a True Dragonbut it didnt have Veldoras grandeur or personality at all. Maybe grandeur was the wrong term to describe that doofus, actually, but this dragon just seemed different from him, fundamentally.

    That!! Then Milim suddenly opened her eyes wide. Rimuru! I, um, I think I got some business to take care of. That dragon

    She squinted into the empty space in front of her, then used Spatial Transport to vanish from the scene.

    Judging by her panic, I could see where this was going. If Milim was freaking out over something, it was usually of her own doingand that meant the enemy found one serious skeleton in her closet.

    I really cant believe this, but I think thats Milims dragon friend she sealed away long ago. It didnt get resurrected; someones unsealed it and is controlling its will now.

    Wha?! Is that true, Sir Rimuru?

    Yeah. Im feeling these intense shock waves. Not even I might be able to beat it.

    I was telling the truth. Charybdis, made from the remains of Veldoras power, was like an insectpared to this; the sheer hatred and rage was overpowering. I doubted it would ever stop until it destroyed the whole worldand the scary thing was, all of its emotions were painted over ck in my mind. Maribels emotional takeover skills were controlling that thing.

    A Chaos Dragon. I never thought Id see such a tyrant in this day and age, Kagali murmured, and I firmly agreed.

    Thank heavens Milim was here! I was sure she could beat that guy and put it back to sleep for us. Then I wouldnt have anything to worry about. For now, we had our own things to take care of.

    Gobta, Shion, we have guests to wee.

    Roger that!

    Im on it. Those puny little dolls are no match for me!

    I thought about opening a transport gate to evacuate the expedition team to the surface, but I didnt think Id have the time. An organized legion of golems was now here for us, bearing down at full speed as we stood in front of the door.

    Shion stepped forward, brandishing herrge sword. Unfortunately, it caught on the corridors low ceiling.

    Dammit! Check your surroundings!

    S-sorry! Just a little mistake.

    A little mistake could cost you your life. It cost her a bit, judging by the spear from one golem that was now stuck inside her. That nonsense left her wide open, and I really wish shed get it together for a change.

    Its too cramped to fight in here. I dont know whats beyond, but maybe theres a bigger space in the third section.

    Then maybe we can have them hurry up with deactivating it

    Nah, at this point, Ill just do it myself. Sorry, guys, but times up. Ranga, help those two.

    While Gobta, Shion, and Ranga bought time for me, I quickly wrapped up the door for us. The rms were still ring; all the traps were activated. I wanted to avoid violence in here to keep the ruins as intact as possible, but luckily, the door opened without much of a challenge.

    Get inside!

    Heeding my words, the expedition team quickly ran down the stairway inside, none of them demonstrating a hint of panic. Kagali followed behind, and I joined her, protecting her back as we all went into the crypt area.

    The dead were asleep here, but it didnt look the part. It was an enormous, brightly lit space,rge enough to house a broad, grass-covered in. I almost forgot everything as I marveled at thendscapebut now was no time for surprises.

    Soon Gobta was down the stairs, the golems not far behind, and the battle began anew. Now, however, things were turning around. Shion had full freedom of movement, and now she was pulverizing those golems.

    At this point, I didnt want to let anyone escape. When I strike, I strike hard, and my foes probably think the same way. After all, they were trying to keep me isted in here, even if it meant risking the wrath of Milim. I didnt think theyd go that far.

    Honestly, I probably underestimated Maribel. But no more.

    Understood. Shifting into full-power battle mode.

    Quietly, I finished my preparations. All restrictions I ced on myself were removed, to get myself ready for the enemy toe. Now I just had to wait for the ringleader.

    There were arge number of golems, but we had the advantage. Shion was kicking up a huge ruckus, and Ranga was going berserk. In between them, Gobta was destroying each golem with the gun he had, one at a time. He even had enough time to reload at regr intervals. Seeing how in control he was, the expedition team looked pretty reassured.

    Um, Im surprised there was actually an attack, but what kind of force would attempt to attack a demon lord? Even waking up a Chaos Dragon for it

    Kagali mustve been curious about that. She seemed disturbed, the concern clear in her voice. If it was an act, she was good at it, but I still didnt know whaty in her heart.

    Sorry to drag you into this.

    Not at all! If theres a living Chaos Dragon out there, I wouldnt feel safer with anybody else, Sir Rimuru.

    Yeah! We need to report this to the Guild HQ and figure something out.

    But if the demon lord Milim loses, theres not much we can do, is there?

    We need to survive this first! I dont know who deliberately set off the trap, but that was such an evil thing to do.

    I was seeing some optimistic opinions among the team. They sure knew how to mentally switch gears on a dime.

    I told you I was gonna protect you, right? And if I win, were good.

    I tried to keep it casual as I calmed them down. I had Gobta and Ranga here, not to mention Shion. And Milim, strongest among all the demon lords, wasnt gonna let a Chaos Dragon beat her. It wasnt a good situation, but it wasnt a terrible one, either. We had to kill our foes, survive this onught, and address our anxieties. Simple.

    Kagali mustve been relieved a little, because she didnt say anything else for a bit. I turned my eyes toward Gobtas battle, waiting for the adversaries toe.

    You have many foes, Sir Rimuru, she whispered. Is that because youre a demon lord?

    I was unupied while waiting for my enemy, so I casually replied to her:

    It wasnt voluntary on my part, but yes.

    Why is that?

    The Kingdom of Farmus provoked me. With yman, my foe was messing with me, so I had to respond. Hinata the Saint had the wrong idea about me. In every case, it was started by the other side; I just yed along. In a way, it was self-defense.

    It was? So you never start anything, Sir Rimuru?

    Well, maybe I cant say that. With this particr enemy, its kind of a conflict between motivations. Our philosophies dont mesh. This wouldve happened sooner orter anyway, I think.

    You cant resolve it without fighting?

    Sure we can. But that resolution would probably nevere until I swallowed up the other side. If they didnt want that, they were probably right to do this.

    With the twin superpowers of Dwargon and Thalion at their side, Tempest would have no reason to lose in an economic war with the Western Nations. If the enemy did nothing, Im certain that we wouldve annexed them all, financially speaking. Raphaels way faster than a quantumputer; I wouldnt stand for anyone dissing it.

    Oh? So you think the other sides justified in this, then?

    Hmm Are they? Maybe we couldve epted the differences in our principles and agreed to some mutual concessions. If we were never gonna get involved with one another again in the future, that mightve worked. But if theyre justified, then so am I. I had no interest in doing whatever they said, and they didnt want me ruling over them. And if thats how it was, confrontation was the only choice.

    In a way, economic warfare is even more terrifying than the kind with guns and tanks. Theres no defined surrender in one, and as long as the other side doesnt fall under your umbre, it never ends. Thus, you could say that my foes turning to military warfare was a stroke of luck. This way, once they realize they cant win, theyll have to admit to defeat. But even if that was their only choice, the question of whether it was just or not is another issue entirely.

    Well, justice can mean a ton of different things, depending on your viewpoint. Im not saying Im absolutely correct, but if I retreat here, thats going to worsen my position. The only choice I have is to fight

    Its not that I couldnt have taken a more modest path. But if I bent, all my friends wouldve gone down with me.

    Even so, if you respected the other sides position and tried talking to one another to search for a better rtionship, dont you think you couldve avoided hostilities?

    Thats a tough one. How should I answer it?

    I didnt have to worry about it. A young girls voice answered for me.

    Its impossible. So impossible. People have endless desires; you cant ask them to be patient. And if the other side bends, the demands get bigger and bigger. Thats part of being human.

    Right.

    If I conceded, Id like to believe the other side would understand. But thats just not realistic. If I were just another citizen who could believe in fairy tales, maybe I couldve given you an earful of all that idealistic stuff. But from a politicians point of view, theres just no way I can believe in that nonsense.

    And I guess my adversary thought the same way.

    You know, I think the exact same thing. Im the demon lord Rimuru. You are?

    Good to meet you. My name is Maribel. Im your enemy.

    Somewhere along the line, all the golems had been defeated. There, I saw a girl I caught sight of at the Founders Festivalthe enemy I anticipated and one far bolder than I ever imagined. I figured shed be the sly sort who didnt venture out herself, but I wasnt expecting to see her right here in front of me.

    And it wasnt just Maribel. Three others were next to herGaiye, lookingpletely changed; a man in knightly clothing; and Yuuki Kagurazaka.

    The sight disturbed Kagali and the team.

    G-Guild Master?! Why are you here?

    No Were you after the demon lords life?

    Youre kidding me! Then why did you order us to explore the ruins?!

    Yuuki demonstrated zero response to these questions. Just as Glenda said, he mustve been under herplete control.

    Sir Yuuki, what is the meaning of this? Are you turning your backs on us?

    Kagalis voice was full of anger. It sounded like that came from the heart, but that didnt matter anymore. I really wanted to end this farce soon and go back up Milim, but before that

    Yeah. You certainly are my enemy. But before we fight, theres one thing Id like to ask, if thats okay, I said.

    I turned my eyes toward the blond-haired girl. The expedition seemed thrown by my choice, but I kept watching silently. By this point, I suppose theyve thrown their lot in with mineor maybe theyve been taken in by this girls dark atmosphere. That shiny blond hair; those lips the color of cherry blossoms. Maribel, this girl who may or may not be just ten years old. Deep down, though, she was cold, just too different from anyone else on the.

    What is that?

    Join me. Then we can avoid all this needless conflict.

    Laughable. Soughable. You should join with me, Demon Lord Rimuru. Youre going to lose right here. If you dont like it, submit to my rule.

    Your approach isnt a match for my policies. The way you do things will lead to unnecessary wars. Itll make countless innocent people suffer, just to keep the riches of a few safe.

    Yes. Ill admit to that. But so what? Itspletely natural for the powerless to be exploited. Its survival of the fittest with monsters, too, is it not?

    Oh, it is. But I dont like that.

    Well, its stupid. Its so stupid. Do you believe in a bunch of insipid nonsense like Were all equal?

    No, Im not a total idiot. But everybody needs to be given an opportunity. Some people just cant manage to do anything, but you cant cast away peoples values that easily, can you?

    Some people bloomter in life; some have hidden talents. You have people who hate working but have unbelievable artistic talents. With Maribels approach, once a gap opens between rich and poor, itll be impossible to close again. And I just couldnt ept that.

    From the moment theyre born, people are unequal. That was a given. You could probably count the mary fortune a set of parents gives to their child as a kind of talent. But a life where youve given no opportunity at an educationjust constant exploitationmeant ignoring the potential in all of us. In a word, it was a waste.

    People have an infinite potential for talent. Throwing all that away is unthinkable. But

    Ridiculous. So ridiculous. I cant believe a childish dreamer like you is a demon lord. Your stupidity is simply unbelievable. My argument didnt move Maribel.

    Is it? Well, all right. Then lets determine which one is right. There couldnt be an easier way.

    dly. Let me teach you how reality works.

    Our arguments would never mesh. Only through a fight would we ever reach a conclusion. I did feel sad about that, but I could ept it. Thats the way it is. The human race will never see a day when everyone truly understands one another. But that just proves how diverse we all are.

    Thanks to the process of evolution, were a living contradiction. Only the victor can proim how just that is. And Maribel and Itwo sets of justice, opposed in principleswere about to sh against each other.

    Smash him down!

    At Maribels signal, Gaiye moved first. Perhaps it was his hatred that made him lunge at me, eyes bloodshot. He had been taken away by the magical inquisitors, but maybe he escaped or something?

    Pfft! The likes of you challenging Sir Rimuru Shion shouted as she attempted to get in Gaiyes way.

    But Yuuki stopped her. Ill take you.

    Oh! How interesting. No one weak enough to let that girl rule over them can defeat me! Her eyes shone redthats a sign Shion was dead serious. With a tremendous aura, she readied her giant sword. The battle was underway.

    Leaving her to work things out, I looked at the other man in the group. He seemed stronger than a pdin, but Gobta was engaging him now. Ranga was with him, but honestly, I had my concerns.

    Gobta, Shion shouted, time to show us what the Big Four can do!

    Oh. I totally forgot. I did kinda put that in ce, didnt I?

    You got it! Okay, now lemme show you something really good! Transform!!

    With that callout, Gobta and Ranga merged together, turning into a cool, werewolf-style figure that didnt have a hint of Gobta to it. Right. That could probably work. And unlike thest time I saw it a month ago, Gobtas apparently learned how to control himself better. Now he was conducting himself perfectly, no longer battered around by Rangas strength. He was facing a foe who could most likely beat the Ten Great Saints, but I figured Gobta could probably manage.

    Trusting in that, I focused on my own enemy.

    Oops, but before that. Gathering my aura into my left hand, I casually hurled it at Gaiye.

    That was all it took to render him into dust and erase him from this world. Stained by Maribels desire, he had obtained powers beyond his own, it looked likebut to me, he was just a distraction.

    You wanted to fight me, huh? Well, d you got the chance before you died. It was sort of a blunt way to address the dead, but hopefully hed be satisfied with it.

    No?! What was that? What was that? That power?!

    What was it? Thats me taking this seriously. And now its your turn. You dont need to understand who you made your enemy. Im going to gobble you down until you can never get resurrected again, so have fun nourishing me. I offered that little speech out of politeness before our battle.

    Now that I was serious, I didnt want anyone to expect kindness from me. To me, Maribel was now my enemy. I was going to kill her. It couldnt have been more obvious.

    Lets end this fast and go help out Milim, I said to myself as I took a step toward Maribel.

    Maribel now realized itjust who she was up against. This was a member of the Octagramand one of the strongest people in the world.

    Hey, is it me, or is Sir Rimuru lookin kinda scary now?

    Shut up! Thats no way for part of the Big Four to talk! Listen, Gobta; that is the true form of the Demon Lord Rimuru. Ah, look how gant and imposing he is! I, Shion, am truly happy to bear witness to this!

    Oh, uh, really? I think his true form is, yknow, how he usually goes around, and stuff

    Yes, and that is quite fetching, too, I will admit. Hee-hee! But Im sure Diablo so regrets not being able to see this right now. Hee-hee-hee! I will be sure to tell him all about it. For an extended period of time.

    Maribel could hear that conversation, but to her, it just sounded like mockery. Her mind was on other things. She needed to focus on Rimuru.

    This is no joke. Not a joke at all. The demon lord Rimuru mustve found his experience at the Council to be incredibly humiliating, but he didnt seem that angry about it. Thats why people called him gentle, but thats so inurate.

    Yesto Maribel, a riled demon lord was not a foe to trifle with.

    She had powered up Gaiye as best she could. He had taken on more power than your average magic-born, well beyond any human standard. Some of the older-guard demon lords, like Frey or Carillon, mightve had a difficult time against him. After all, Gaiye had sacrificed the rest of his natural life span, burning up all the energy in his soul to borrow this outrageous force.

    And yet Rimuru had defeated him with a single passing blow, as if burning a pile of trash. That was how outssed Gaiye had been. Not just a child against a grown man; not just an elephant against an ant.

    Maribels soul held a stronger force than Gaiyes did. She had been resurrected, traveling to and surviving in another world, and presently, her mind was in a realm beyond humanprehension. But even so, she sensed that the demon lord Rimuru was now a threat.

    Thus, she immediately broke out her final optionHoly Field, the most lethal of barriers and a killer move against any monster. Ever well prepared, she had already stationed her Blood Shadow troops around the outer rim of the castle grounds for this.

    You can threaten me all you want, but now its time. Time to see just how much more intelligent we are than monsters!

    As she bragged to Rimuru, she used her magicalmunication skills to send an order.

    Whoa! I feel all heavy

    I remember this. And its even stronger than it was then. This must be its true force.

    The Big Four werewolf stopped, confused, as hispatriot the ogre grinned defiantly.

    How annoying, Maribel thought, gritting her teeth. As the name Big Four suggested, they both possessed unusual strength. Gobta, the werewolf, was the kind of champion to earn second ce in battle tournamentsand the ogre he was with was just as formidable. They were joined by other magic-born, people Rimuru brought with him to the Council.

    Their sheer power is ridiculous. If I tried a frontal attack, Id have no chance, even if Veldora never showed up. But

    But now things were different. The demon lord overestimated his skills, and now he exposed his defenseless underbelly. Maribel chuckled to herself. That mistake will be their doom.

    But her conviction was wishful thinking.

    Ah, I thought so. I anticipated you making this move. Did you think I wouldnt prepare for it? The demon lord Rimuru grinned at herand the next moment, the Holy Field disappeared as quickly as it deployed.

    Wha?! What did you do?

    Well, Im walking around here all but asking to be attacked, so of course I had my people keep watch around the castle for me, right? Maybe you thought you had me in a trap, but I was just using myself as bait to trap you. I figured, after all, that if you wanted to enve me with greed, you needed to be on-site.

    That was his response to Maribnd at that point, Maribel understood everything. The missing Glenda hadnt been rubbed out at all. Shed betrayed her.

    Yes Yes. The only one overestimating their skills is me

    And with herst resort exhausted, she was at a major disadvantage.

    Gaiye was dead. Yuuki had the advantage but still wasnt overpowering the ogre. The other oneRama, the Battlesage burning to avenge Glendawas struggling against Gobta the werewolf. Both of them had been powered up by Maribels greed, but the reality of itthe fact that neither could emerge victoriousshowed just how strong the enemy was.

    Maribel would have to step up herself to change matters. The petite, doll-like girl was about to expose her true nature.

    Combusting her own soul, Maribel went beyond her limits. All she hoped for was victory. She couldnt make up for falling in that trap, but this was exactly what she wanted the whole time.

    A chance like this wouldnte again. She knew that. And thus, she had no regrets. Time to get serious. Im going to wager it all to kill you!

    Right. And Ill reply with my full force.

    Following that signal, Maribel started running.

    With a bound, she unleashed a kick on Rimuru, her physical skill far from childlike. The attack was fiercer and heavier than a tank round, forceful enough to bend an iron beambut it gave Rimuru no distress. He lightly parried it, then used his momentum to throw her body down.

    Maribel reached out to the ground, leveraging her rebound to spin out of harms way. Dodging Rimurus follow-up attack, sheunched Avarice as a sort of return gift.

    Die! You will thirst for death!!

    Waves of darkness attacked Rimuru. This was Maribels finishing move, a strike that took the livings instinctual lust for life and flipped it on its head. That was Maribel Rozzoa girl who used her own will to perfect her unique skills. This one, too, was a sinful one, harnessing the most primordial emotions in the human body. No one could resist the enhanced siren song of greed it yed, and there was no longer any doubting Maribels victory.

    Yes This couldnt happen any other way. I am reluctant to kill him, but its not the worst oue. Itd be far more foolish of me to leave such a dangerous man unchecked

    If she had her way, shed rule over Rimuru instead. But he wasnt the kind of foe whod ever ept that. So Maribel opted to graspplete victory for herself instead.

    Surrounded by the ck surge, the demon lord Rimuru stood there, seemingly not attempting to resist.

    It just wasnt enough. No one, no matter how strong, can do away with their thirst for life. And thats what makes me invincible.

    It was true. She was all-powerful. Against Frey, Carillon, or an awakened yman, she probably would have won. Even Hinata the Saint would have faltered in the face of her skills. Thats how strong the unique skill Avarice was.

    But

    Sorry, but my Analysis just finished up. Now it wont work on me.

    Rimuru had triggered his ultimate skind at that moment, Maribels chances of victory were zero

    for while she was all-powerful, she was all-powerful within the dimension of that ultimate skill.

    Raphael was right after all. Maribel had a Holy Field prepared. Granville was the boss of the Western Nations, so I was right to assume she had adopted it.

    She was such a master at it that it scared me. But it also yed right into my hand.

    Now, the ever-eager Gabil, as well as Hakuro, Soka, and all her fellow troops, had something to do. It had been a pain keeping them calm over the past few days of no action. I certainly was d I didnt disappoint them.

    Butman, look at this girl Maribel. She was strong. Definitely strong. I felt that for myself when we were tussling earlierand when she exposed me to those dark waves, that really made my spine tingle. I wasnt worried at all about the possibility of dying, but if she fired that at one of my other officials Well, the thought scared me. Anyone besides me wouldve died for sure. If I had to guess, maybe Diablo would be the only one to survive. Well, maybe Shion, too, but anyone else from Benimaru on down wouldnt have a chance.

    Maybe it was time to train their spiritstheir soulsa little more, I thought.

    Completing my Analyze and Assess like Raphael requested, I gave Maribel her final warning.

    Sorry, but my Analysis just finished up. Now it wont work on me.

    I wasnt going to let her control other people, but if she was willing to retire to a quiet life and not bother anyone

    Yes, even I knew I was going easy on her, but she looked like a ten-year-old girl. If I had to kill her, the guilt couldve been gargantuan. So, you know, itd be nice if she could surrender for me. (Of course, I guess I can coldly reason like this because Im no longer human myself, but)

    Dont give me that. More. Give me more. Even if I consume everything I have, Im going to seize victory!

    Unfortunately, my words failed to reach her.

    Our principles were never gonna mesh anyway; I was preparing for an ending like this. But now that it was really happening, I couldnt help but feel a twinge of sadness.

    Maribel flew into a crazed flurry of physical strikes. Regrettably, none of them affected me. Well, if we cant understand each other, so be it.

    All right. Im going to make this painless for you. Feel free to stew on your loss inside of me

    With that, I set off Belzebuths Soul Consume. Or tried to. But just then, with a loud boooom!! I saw Shion get sent flying from the corner of my eye. Turning toward her, I realized that Yuuki had just drilled a kick into herand despite her Ultraspeed Regeneration, she couldnt get back up to her feet. This was very unusual.

    Shion?!

    Ah-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha!!

    Maniacalughter drowned out my shouting. It came from both Maribnd Yuuki, as if harmonizing with her.

    Well done. Well done, indeed. I underrated you, Demon Lord Rimuru. I underestimated you. I had no idea you were this kind of monster

    Thats true. I didnt think you could win against Maribel. But I cant have you forgetting that Im right here, okay?

    Yuuki, fresh from besting Shion, stood before me. The ck waves from Maribel were now crashing upon him, stronger than ever before.

    Understood. The subject Yuuki Kagurazakas power has just skyrocketed. The subject Maribel Rozzo is apparently using the unique skill Avarice to transfer her power to him.

    How many cards does she have in her hand anyway? Now I gotta deal with Yuuki, too? I knew he was only under the influence of her Avarice, so I wanted to subdue him if I could, not kill him.

    Tch! Dont hate me if I kill you.

    Id say the same to you!

    With that exchange, he and I moved in sync.

    There was a flurry of kicks, sending both of us hurtling through the air. Something like this had happened before to me, but this time, we were both seriousand now we had these two rivaling powers shed against each other. Yuuki was stronger than I thought, certainly more of a physical specimen than Maribel. He fought Shion and pretty soundly beat her, so he had to be a phenom. I had no intention of going easy on him, but maybe itd be tough to resolve this fight quickly.

    I thought over my options as I faced down Yuukithen I spotted Maribel moving around a bit, trying to catch me unawares. Uh-oh. Thats bad, but I got my hands full with Yuuki right now.

    Turning her back to us, Maribel began fleeing toward the middle of the crypt. I wanted to pursue her, but Yuuki stopped me. Ah well. Not like Maribel can escape. Now that I fully grasped the wavelengths of her soul, I could find her no matter where she hid.

    For now, Yuuki had toe first. I turned my eyes back toward him.

    My peripheral vision told me that Kagali and the expedition team were attending to Shion. She was awake, but it didnt look like she could stand upsomething she looked pretty pained about, but there was no quick solution to that.

    If Yuuki left her in such bad shape, I couldnt afford to make light of him. But I wasnt worried at all. As Raphael put it, a unique skill can never work against an ultimate skill. The strength of our rtive souls was at the crux of it. If someone awakens to a power that surpasses unique skills in all dimensions, you needed a strong enough heart to go with that. Faced with that kind of spiritual strength, there was no way a unique skill could have any influence.

    The only thing that could beat an ultimate skill user was another ultimate skill user. No matter how much power Maribel gave him, Yuuki couldnt beat me. My victory was as good as assuredbut the next moment, my confidence was thoroughly crushed.

    All right. Time to get real.

    With that, Yuuki unleashed a right roundhouse kick. It was just the same as before, and I easily blocked it with my left arm. But the next instant, my entire upper arm shattered, as if it burst open.

    Huh?

    I backstepped to safety, honestly surprised as I nkly stared at my arm.

    Concern. The Universal Barrier of Uriel, Lord of Vows, has been broken. This is believed to be due to the subject Yuuki Kagurazakas extra-singr Anti-Skill constitution.

    Um, wait a minute. So my Absolute Defense doesnt work on him?! In fact, is he pretty much nullifying all my attacks right now?

    Affirmative. Anti-Skill is a spiritual-body constitution that suppresses magic and skills. It is likely that only holy-de skills and certain other Arts will be effective against him.

    So something like Meltsh could work?

    This wasnt a joke any longer. He seriously managed to break down my ultimate skill. Id never be able toprehend all the details behind that, but his constitution was terrifying news to me.

    I thought you couldnt obtain unique skills or special stuff like that!

    That wasnt a lie. I did say that my physical abilities have developed beyond normal, didnt I?

    I wanted to yell at him about that, but he was right. Besides, if his mind was being controlled, there wasnt much pointining at him anyway.

    But whatll I do now? Yuukis attacks work on me, but mine dont work on him. Id just be wasting time as it is, and if this is what itse to, I cant get hung up with trying to keep him alive. I really wanted to, since we shared a homnd and everything. If he was deliberately my rival, thats one thing, but mind controlled like this? I felt real bad for him.

    Facts were facts, though. Yuuki wasnt someone I could beat while going easy. Steeling my resolve, I drew my sword, sending my aura up and down its jet-ck de.

    Ooh Nice katana there.

    He took out the knife hanging from his side with his right hand. Then he took out another with his left, a small, single-edged sword. With these two des, he held his hips down in an unusual stancenothing I had seen before; maybe it was self-invented.

    Seeing him square up, it finally dawned on me. Losing my skills and magic worried me, but Yuuki wasnt impervious to physical attack. Anti-Skill constitution or not, if I cut him, hed bleed.

    Thats why some Arts will work, huh? And in my case, my skills even affected my punching, which is why that didnt do much. Would it be more effective if I didnt enhance them with my aura?

    Negative. A correct answer cannot be determined due tock of information.

    Roger that. Lets just try it, then.

    nting my feet on the ground, I shed at Yuuki. He blocked it with the sword in his left hand, his physical skill letting him easily match my speed. But I had experience trading blows with Hinata, which helped both my sword skills and my confidence.

    Staying calm, I looked ahead two or three strikes. Even if skills didnt work on Yuuki, Predict Future Attack still worked just fine, since it used Raphaelsputations to discern his behavior.

    Yuuki preferred to defend with his left-hand sword and attack with his right-hand knife. It usually went the opposite way, I thought, but everyone has their own preferences. Both of his weapons were made from purified magisteel, metallurgically evolving for vast power gains. Even among Unique weapons, they were in a ss of their ownmaybe even Legend-ss, in fact.

    Those were a threat, but then I made an unexpected discovery.

    Report. Anti-Skill is not applied to weapons.

    Whoa. So using weapons actually weakens Yuuki. That little tidbit doesnt mean much for anyone besides me, but to Yuuki, thats a real blind spot. If these were just regr old attacks, Absolute Defense gave me nothing to fear.

    I decided to risk Yuuki getting a hit on me.

    Ha-ha! Dropping your guard, Rimuru?

    Pretending to lose my bnce after a parried katana strike, I left myself open to him. Yuuki thrust with his knife, as if it was attracted by a ma; there was some special feature to it that let it expand and contract, which messed with my sense of distance. To Yuuki, it probably felt like a surprise attack, expertly tossed into my single moment of vulnerabilitybut I nned the whole thing.

    The knife was aimed squarely at my heartbut then I stopped it. I touched it to make sure; turned out it contained a special poison that would affect my nervous system. If he really stabbed me with it, even I wouldve taken damage, but that was just pointless theorizing now.

    Well, too bad for you! It hurts more when you punch me, yknow.

    No way. This is insane! Yuukis eyes widened. But I had no obligation to listen to hisints.

    Instead, I mercilessly unleashed a new sword strike, one I had just finished developing. It was called Stormbreak, abination magic-and-Art move inspired by Hinatas Meltsh. The magic in question was Storm magic, as provided by the skill Veldora, Lord of the Storm. Veldoras magic was scarier for its secondary damage than its primaryonce it opened up a wound, the destruction would begin from there, eventually breaking down your entire body. Stormbreak was the same way, a sure-kill Art that ate into its targets life force.

    Thanks to his unique constitution, however, the strike Inded on him didnt trigger that effect. There was now arge gash across his chest, but it still wasnt a lethal blow.

    Ngh

    With a groan, Yuuki red at me. I tried to look into his inner thoughts, but a ck mist blocked me from seeing anything. Maribels desires had fully infected him. If I could clear all that away, I wouldnt need to finish him off, but

    Understood. Interference is blocked by Anti-Skill.

    but no dice.

    Then there was just one thing to do.

    Ive won this. I wanted to release you from Maribels rule, but I guess I cant do that. Im gonna go a little strong on you, but no hard feelings, all right?

    I would damage him almost to the point of death, knocking him unconscious. Then, while he was knocked out, Id go take care of Maribel. If that eliminated her effect on him, then great.

    I readied my sword against Yuuki. Sadly, punching him with my bare hands didnt deal him any damage. The energy that Anti-Skill cancels even included the kic energy from my fist. Its crazy, I know, but Yuuki was a very special case.

    Waiting until the best possible moment, I applied power to my sword. I wanted to strike him with the blunt side of my degood thing its sturdy enough not to break, but if I applied too much, I was liable to cut Yuuki in half. Striking the right bnce of power was tough.

    But just as I readied my sword, preparing to smash it down on him:

    P-please, wait a minute! I beg you, please reconsider killing Sir Yuuki!! Kagali started shouting. I turned her way. She was on her feet, attempting to run up to Yuuki.

    Whoa, look out! Yuukis under Maribels control!

    No, its fine! Theres no way someone as strong-willed as Sir Yuuki could have his heart taken by a little girl like that! She clung to Yuuki, ignoring my warning. The expedition team was following her lead.

    Yeah! Shes right! The Grand Masters not that much of a wimp!

    Thats true! Hes always going by the beat of his own drum! Theres no way anyone could exploit his weaknesses!

    Hes the kinda guy whod beat a dragon just to show off to us!

    He was certainly well loved. If they were defending him that much, I was starting to look like a viin. Look, if there was a way to keep from killing him, Id use it, all right? But I cant go easy like that right now. Im just taking the option thats best for the situation. Cant you see Im carrying my katana backward?!

    I mentally begged them to take a closer look as I watched Kagali and the rest. They wereing up from behind him, trying to get his attention. If that was all it took to break Maribels influence, we wouldnt be having this problem.

    But:

    Im not trying to kill him, either, okay? So

    So get out of my way, I tried to say. And at that moment:

    Guys Yuuki whispered the word, his face twisted in pain.

    Report. Change detected in the subject Yuuki Kagurazaka. The desire-driven spiritual interference appears to have been canceled

    What?!

    Seriously? Were going with that happily ever after ending? I could barely believe it, but my sense told me Yuuki wasnt after my life any longer.

    You gotta be kidding me! I thought, but I had to ept it.

    With Yuuki back to normal, the only foes left were Maribel and the Chaos Dragon.

    Looks like I caused you some trouble there, so forgive me for that. But you saved me, Rimuru!

    Y-yeah. d youre okay, I replied, trying my best not to look like I was okay with him dying a moment ago.

    Hey! Gobta! Get this done with already!!

    I needed to change the subject, and yelling at Gobta did the job. Soon after, his battle was over.

    Shion was safe. Yuukis Anti-Skill effect wasnt permanent, so her Ultraspeed Regeneration sprang back to life after a bit. She red at Yuuki, still in a rage, as I tried my best to calm her down.

    This is a humiliation. I still havent trained enough

    When the anger left her, the sadness came rushing in. I tried to calm her once more, telling here thered be another time.

    Gobta, meanwhile, looked pretty exhausted. I told that guy Glenda was alive, but he just wouldnt listen to me

    Now that he was used to handling the power of Ranga, Rama wasnt much of a threat to him. Between Gobtas sense for battle and Rangas hyper-instincts, that wolfman form was a huge upgrade. Ranga stayed conscious for it, too, apparently, keeping a honed eye out for external threats. The way they divvied up responsibilities during battle kinda reminded me of Raphael and me. No wonder theyre such a force.

    So why did Gobta have so much trouble in battle? Because he learned that Rama, his opponent, was burning to avenge Glendas apparent death. Being a kindhearted goblin, he couldnt find it in himself to kill him.

    I had asked Raphael to undo the spiritual interference in Ramas mind. He had used the power in his soul a little too much, but it looked like hed survive. He was perfectly awake as well, and he was believing our description of how Glenda managed to survive.

    That should have wrapped things upbut sadly, it didnt.

    Well, we cant sit around for long. Judging by the intense shaking were feeling, Milim still hasnt managed to seal away the Chaos Dragon. I really wanna go help her.

    Rimuru, Ill go chase after Maribel.

    Yeah, but Yuuki, youre Wait, youre not wounded? It healed up? Your wounds are okay?

    Oh, yeah. Kagali can use healing magic, so

    Huh? Why is he stating that like its an obvious fact? I thought magic didnt work on you

    Oh, no, its fine. I can turn these properties of my body on and off.

    I was too exasperated to reply. Yuuki was giving me a breezy smile, which was so unfair. Hinatas body could purify magicules, or something like that, but she didnt have a flip switch or anything. And Anti-Skill was way more powerful than that. He could control it with that much precision?

    It just seemed so unfair. But ah well. I needed to address his offer.

    You can beat her?

    Itll be easy, if I dont let my guard down. I mean, being controlled like that; I cant let her go. Its a matter of pride to me.

    Sir Rimuru, please, said Kagali. I think Maribel is bent on destroying these ruins. In the ruins of Soma that I explored, there was a magical generator that I think was used to run the city. This area looks simr to me, and if the generator goes out of control, it could blow up the entire area around us. And I think Im the only one who can stop that!

    You think Maribels gonna blow it up?

    Supplying too much magical force to one can destabilize it. And if it hasnt been used for so long, theres no telling how itd react

    We werent even sure if there was a generator like that in here, but if she was right, we had trouble on our hands.

    You know how those things work?

    I thoroughly analyzed the one in Soma. If need be, I know how to stop one!

    A woman with her beauty sure had a lot of impact when she gave you a serious look like that. It wasnt just because of it that I nodded at her, but I sure did feel overpowered, yeah.

    Okay. You take care of that. Yuuki, get going!

    He was back to his usual breezy, aloof self, brimming with confidence. The two of them were now on Maribels trail.

    Shion, Gobta, guide the expedition team up and regroup with the dark elves. Keep them guarded!

    Yes, sir!

    What about you, Sir Rimuru?

    Im gonna go back up Milim. If I dont hurry, the Chaos Dragon might start striking all of us soon.

    Milim was doing her best to fight back, but even a stray shot of energy would devastate us. We didnt have time to waste here, so once we decided on something, we had to move.

    Let me join you!

    No. Your wounds healed on the surface, but Im sure youre still damaged inside. Just bodyguard the team for me!

    Hmph. All right

    Reluctantly, Shion agreed.

    Yuuki and Kagali were already on their way into the crypt. Shion and Gobta had their orders. It was time to head out.

    Maribel was running. But she hadnt given up on winning.

    She had unleashed the sealed Chaos Dragon, one of the best cards in her deck. Under no circumstances could she let this operation fail.

    But there was still one more card to y. Deep inside the cryptthe heart of the ancient elven citythe pinnacle of the old worlds magical technology was still sleeping. She had heard about it, and so she wanted to overload it with magic and bury Rimuru with it.

    Thats the only way Ill ever defeat that monster. My strongest pawn right now is Yuuki, and Im sure hell buy me a little time. In the meantime, Ill set that magical control reactor on the path to destruction

    Yuukis reports to her included information on the ancient ruins of Soma. She knew that Amrita was a city built by a simr ancient culture. If they worked the same way, itd be easy for Maribel to control them.

    Setting off a magical control reactor would cause vast amounts of magic-power destruction. If she triggered it right when Rimuru and Yuuki were locked in battle, she could catch them in the explosion, and theyd be caught powerless. An attack the demon lord Rimuru wasnt conscious of could absolutely defeat himMaribel was certain of it.

    Now she was in the central part of the cryptbut she couldnt find the reactor discussed in her report. In fact, there was nothing at all. The sarcophagi were empty, bereft of any apanying decor or treasure. Yes, there were gold and silver baubles lying around, but no magic weaponsnothing of real value.

    Thats strange, she reflexively whispered to herself. So strange. Whats going on?

    Nobody was there to answer heror so she thought.

    Ah-ha-ha-ha-ha! Theres no magical control reactor in these ruins, you know.

    !!

    And by the way, there wasnt one in Soma, either.

    Is that you, Yuuki?

    It sure is.

    It was definitely Yuuki who answered her, standing tall where she could see him. Kagali was also there, nestled close to her.

    Arent you fighting the demon lord Rimuru?

    Its over. I gave my all against him, but it was pointless. Rimuru had enough strength to go easy on me, but I didnt stand a chance. If I could have won, I figured I wouldve beaten him right there, but

    I was so scared watching you! And I really thought you betrayed us, too.

    Ha-ha-ha! Sorry, sorry. I figured itd be more believable if I didnt let you in on it. Besides, I always believed youd understand my intentions.

    Well, all right. Everything worked out fine, at least. If this is what you wanted, Ive got nothing toin about.

    Yuuki and Kagali were thoroughly enjoying themselves. Seeing them carry on, Maribel finally realized. Yuuki tricked her.

    Thats a lie. It must be a lie. But Yuuki, did you break my force?!

    It seemed impossible to her, but it was a reality Maribel had to ept. But when, and how, did Yuuki manage to ovee the desires of her Avarice?

    How did you do it?

    Curious?

    Just tell me!!

    Heh-heh! All right. I will.

    Yuuki gave Maribel a look of pity, then showed her. As she watched, his brisk, cloudless demeanor suddenly appeared to have a dark pall over it.

    No Thats a lie! A lie

    Ah-ha-ha-ha-ha! Dont believe me? But its the truth. I was pretending to be under your thrall from the beginning. What do you think? Pretty good performance, huh?

    Yuukiughed, having a st down in the crypt.

    Maribel, on the other hand, looked ill. No! My desires They harness your emotions, to give you power Whispering to herself, she tried desperately to understand her situation.

    Yeah, your greed was something else. Sadly, though, my own desires are stronger than yours. This world, you know Its like my sandbox. And its my dream to be king of it someday. I didnt even need Anti-Skill to keep your Avarice from working on me.

    The smile stayed on Yuukis face. To Maribel, it was like having her death sentence read out.

    Dont count me out! Im Maribel! Maribel the Greedy! Someone like you isnt even a threat to me!

    She drummed up all the energy in her soul, hurling it straight at Yuuki as she screamed. This was Greed re, a skill that transformed the power of her iron will into waves of physical destruction. It didnt work.

    Forget it already. You cant beat me.

    Yuuki took her attack unguarded. The ck waves dissipated like clouds around him. And at the next moment:

    Grrhh!

    The edge of Yuukis hand shot straight into her heartand that wasnt even the worst of it. Her force flowed out of her body as Yuukis own absorbed it all.

    Nghhah My power Youre

    You got that right.

    No Youyou cantdo that

    The light faded from Maribels eyes, the power draining from the arms clutching at Yuuki.

    If you were born into this world even ten years earlier, you might have taken the whole thing over. You just werent lucky this time. Your body was too young to fully control your skills, wasnt it?

    Maribel didnt respond. She red at Yuuki, frustration clouding her faceand then her soul flickered once, twice, before fading away. The one golden rule of this world had been upheld once morethe powerless always lose.

    You said it yourself, didnt you? You said I had too much ambition. Well, good night, Maribel. Ill take on that desire of yours

    His words no longer reached herand thus, Maribel, who lived in an era of near-constant upheaval, breathed herst.

    Leaving everyone else to Shion and my friends, I rushed over to help Milim.

    Right this minute, I was looking down on the Chaos Dragon. It was huge. Super-huge. A good three hundred feet or so in length, maybe. It made Charybdis look like a shrimp, and just beholding it drove the viewer to despair. The Chaos Dragon was now consuming the magicules around itself, growing bigger and bigger. I could see it razing entire mountains with a single spout of breath. It was violence personified.

    Even I had no chance against a monster like this. But Milim was different. Thanks to her super-dreadnought-level magicule stores, she had stopped the Chaos Dragons advance.

    Sorry Imte, Milim!

    Rimuru? Its about time! Ive got a little problem here. This guys actually my friend. I wanted to seal it away, but its just not working. I think its gonna cause some damage soonbut I cant bump off my own friend! She looked ready to cry.

    Unlike Charybdis, the Chaos Dragon was bosom buddies with Milim. She mustve wanted to give it the benefit of the doubtbut it was so huge that not even Milim had enough force to banish it away. Simply beating it would be doable enough, but she couldnt kill a friend like that.

    I could understand that. It reflected well on Milim, in my eyes. So I smiled, trying to reassure her.

    Its all right now. Ive got an idea!

    Milims eyes sparkled as she watched me. I could tell she trusted me, but man, talk about pressure. I couldnt let it get to my head, though. Trying to look as confident as possible, I exined my strategy. Listen. No matter how big this guy is, there has to be a core in it. You can attack him urately enough to leave that intact, right?

    I figured Milim could preserve the Chaos Dragons soul while striking the rest of itmuch as I did with Charybdis to save Phobio, its vessel. This soul would be protected by the dragons astral and spiritual bodies, but those bodies were already corrupted and breaking apartor actually, they were broken to start with, hence this hate-driven corruption. It was also smeared head to toe with Maribels desire, and I couldnt extract it out of the guy.

    But its soul, thoughthe heart of Milims best friendstill seemed to be working hard to me, shining as strong as always.

    B-but If its this big, itll take a lot power to stab into it. If I mess it up, I could blow away the whole thing

    I taught you how to go easy, didnt I? Your friends trying its very best for you right now. You have to be strong for it!

    I couldnt let her make excuses. Momentum was key. If she starts thinking What if I mess this up? shell fail at something she ought to seed in.

    And Ill help you out, okay? Just follow my instructions and release all the magic force youve got!

    Yes, I told her I had a n. I really didnt. I was just gonna rely on power hereMilims power. But this wasnt the first time for me. I already saw it happen once, and it seeded then. This was operating on an even huger scale, but the task before us was identical.

    All right. I believe in you, Rimuru!

    Okay! We got this!

    I faked as much confidence as I could. Really, it was breaking my heart, acting so bold like this. If it failed, I was deathly scared of the consequencesbut I had no other bright ideas, and I was the only one who could pull this off.

    Youre on, Raphael!

    Understood. Yes, my lord!

    I might be a pro at palming responsibility offbut for this moment, at least, I needed to perform. No mistakes would be allowed. I repeatedly told myself that this would go fine.

    Thisll be easy, okay? Its the same thing over again! Do it, Milim!

    Right! Yeah, youre right. Here goes, my friend. May the shining of the stars burn into your eyes! Drago Buster!!

    There was a sh, so bright that closing your eyes did nothing.

    The enormous swirl of power Milim released reached the Chaos Dragon, smashing against its ominous wall of force. Power struggled against powerand as I watched it, I searched for the source of the Chaos Dragons strength, relying on Raphaels calctions to control Milims torrential might.

    It was heavy. Incredibly heavy. I could tell it was draining my own magicule stores. But despite all the energy we poured into it, the Chaos Dragon was unscathed. This guy really was crazy.

    It was about to break my heart, but if I gave up now, this would all be for nothing. All my previous experience was for this exact momentI truly believed that as I threw everything I had at it.

    Trying desperately to retain my peace of mind, I slowly brushed away the evil force that loomed around the Chaos Dragons soul. In terms of time, it was less than a second, but the pressure made it seem like forever.

    I saw it! The Chaos Dragons spotless heart, blinking there amid it all. But I couldnt let up yet. Even without the ck mist of desire, even without the hateful evil, I still had the dragons broken, polluted spiritual force waiting for me.

    Carefully, with pinpoint precision, I kept up my work. Then, out of nowhere, the ck mist disappeared. Yuuki defeated Maribel!

    Yes! We can do this! Hoping to seize victory, I set off Belzebuth. Milim, were finishing this now. Can you boost your output?

    You got it! RaaahhhhhDrago-Nova!!

    Heeding my instructions, Milim finally got serious.

    Feeling it all over again made me realize just how amazing she was. How could she turn the spigot any farther than that? The way she engineered incredible feats of strength like thatI could really tell she was on another level from the rest of us.

    But watch out. Nows no time to stare at her, all amazed.

    Okay, Chaos Dragon. Im gonna stop the pain for you.

    Now for the final touch.

    Timing was going to be key here. Milims magic had to pulverize the Chaos Dragons exposed spiritual body, breaking down its astral body as well. Not missing my beat for a moment, I waited until just before Milims power shattered its heart, then triggered Soul Consume.

    Ignoring all rules of time and space, Belzebuth did its work. Within my perception, it was done quicker than Milims magicand just as I nned it out, I had the Chaos Dragons shattered heart in hand.

    Without the core governing that massive cloud of magicules, the Chaos Dragon was already starting to disintegrate. But that was a problem of its own.

    R-Rimuru! This is bad news! Its gonna explode!

    Milim had already stopped infusing her magic at my signal. But now there was a massive energy field in the sky, twisting and warping the air inside. Force shed against force,pressing the energy at eye-popping pressures. The reaction woulde soon enough, a huge explosion that not even Milim could neutralize.

    She gave me a panicked look. But I was calm. ording to Raphael, I could apparently do something about this.

    Its all right. Ill figure it out!

    You can do that?!

    She looked surprised. I appreciated her admiring eyes, but if I messed this up, I was gonna look like such a dumbassah, but nows no time for that.

    Are you sure thisll be okay, Professor?

    I couldnt help but ask.

    Affirmative. It is not a problem.

    Just as businesslike as ever. That seemed so reckless but kind of reassuring in a way.

    With a smile, I looked at what used to be the Chaos Dragon. It was already just a shell at this point. No need to hold back.

    Gobble it up, Belzebuth!!

    Could it really consume such a vast blob of energy? My worries were instantly quelled by the fury of Belzebuths appetite, astounding me beyond imagination as it swallowed every bit up like a midnight snack.

    Is? Is it over? Milim asked.

    No, not yet. We gotta do something about your friend here.

    Huh? You will?

    Sure. I brought this along for times like these! Not really! But lets roll with it!

    I took out a pseudo-soul.

    ?

    No time to spell it out for the confused Milim. I focused on myself. Theoretically, this was possible. In fact, Raphael guaranteed it. I just had to believe in it.

    Boldly, I did my work, trusting it was guaranteed to seed. I picked up all the pieces of the shattered heart, then absorbed them into the pseudo-soul; Soul Consume patched all the pieces into a single unit for me, so it went easier than I expected.

    The issue was what came after that. Can a core like this be housed in a pseudo-soul?

    There was no reaction.

    I began to sweat. Staying calm on the surface, I frantically tried to brainstorm a solution. What should I do at a time like this?

    My brain finally settled on something I saw on TV dramas a lot.

    M-Milim Did this Chaos Dragon have a name or anything?

    A name? Nothing like that, no

    No? Crap. But calm down. There has to be another way

    Gaia! I wanted to call it that someday. This creatures name is Gaia!!

    Oh, it does have one.

    I breathed a sigh of relief and softly called Gaias name.

    What a nice name that is!

    So your names Gaia, huh?

    Hey, shouldnt you open your eyes before your friend starts crying?

    The pseudo-soul began to softly glow. We did it. The heart was in the soul.

    Now I wrapped the master core in Gaias pseudo-soul. Thatpleted its avatar core, and now my job was done. Time would take care of the restand once Gaias heart was healed up, it would be revived in the shape of its choice. In Gaias case, that shape would be its actual body, not some other vessel. Itd be a new monster,ing to life right before Milims eyes.

    It worked, Milim. This is the new Gaia. It hasnt been born yet, so its kind of like an egg right now. I presented the avatar core to her.

    Right Right! I just knew leaving everything to you would work out. I trusted you, Rimuru. Thank you. Thank you!

    d to be of service. That, and Im d I didnt screw that up. But more than anything, seeing Milim smile really did make me happy.

    Wanna head back? Everyones probably worried for us.

    Mm-hmm! I need to tell em all what I did!

    Sure, sure.

    Good thing Milim came along, though. I couldnt have done a thing against that guy alone.

    From far away, we saw the pce, along with our friends nervously watching us. They all looked okay, which was reassuring.

    That wrapped things up, then. I just wanted to go home and rx. A nice bath, followed by a cold beer. Basking in the joy welling out from me, I joined Milim as we went back down to regroup with our friends.

 Volume 10 - Epilogue

    EPILOGUE

    THE ONE WHO LAUGHS LAST

    Yuuki had obtained Maribels power.

    I really wish youd talked to me about it first.

    Ha-ha-ha! I already exined why I didnt. Thats why I was able to trick Maribel, you know?

    But do you realize how hard it was not to let my outside friends find out the truth?

    As Yuuki fought Rimuru, Kagali was forced to distract the expedition team so the secret behind Yuukis powers didnte out. Any strange activity on her part ran the risk of attracting Rimurus attention. It was an ordeal for her.

    Yuuki, meanwhile, didnt really care if people found out, so he didnt see it as a problem. Even if everyone knew he could cancel peoples skills, it wasnt like someone could devise any kind of workaround against it. It was an ace in the hole for Yuuki, yes, but it wasnt even one of hisst resorts.

    Well, you know, I trusted in you. It worked out in the end, so can you maybe let me off the hook this time?

    You siphoned off Maribels power, didnt you? Was that in your ns, too?

    Yeah, more or less. They say sinful unique skills are the most powerful ones out there, so I did have my sights on it. I heard Avarice was driven by the size of your desires, and I figured itd be pretty appropriate for me.

    You really are crazy sometimes. Its not that easy to take somebodys skill, you know that?

    Im sure its not. But Avarice kinda chose me this time. I still couldnt win against Rimuru, but

    Im sure you couldnt. Hes so unfair like that.

    I know! But now I can pin all the negative stuff on Maribel. Ive just been fully acquitted! Im probably gonna have to mind my ps and qs for a little while, but now Ive got something else to look forward to, you could say.

    Right. No need to hurry things now. And its so unnerving, how wary the demon lord is of the people around him. I cant say I liked everything about your ns, but I think I can appreciate them now. Kagalis mainint was how Yuuki ruined the crypt by blowing it up.

    Yuuki told Rimuru that Maribel activated the reactor, then took her own life. The explosion, which razed the deepest section of the crypt but little else, was his way of hiding the evidence. Yuuki had prepared a magical bomb for just this purpose.

    There wasnt much energy left in reactor, hed exined to Rimuru, so the damage was pretty light, thankfully. He even had the foresight to scatter the remains of a real reactor around the crypt to back up his story. Now he was prepared to stick to that story, no matter what he was asked.

    But Kagali had her concerns.

    You were nning to abandon this ce from the start anyway, werent you? Yuuki retorted. So why worry about it?

    To Kagali, though, this was a familiar city, her home. Once everything was cleaned up, she wanted to restore it to its former bustling glorybut with the crypt now buried, she had a few gripes.

    Not necessarily, I wasnt. She shrugged. It was kind of my second home, you realize.

    Yuuki gave her a grin. Yeah. But we earned something from this. My name got cleared, which is huge, but other stuff, too. Maribel deployed her Blood Shadow troops, but did you see how they all cast holy magic? Thats a lethal blow.

    Youre right. I noticed that, too. It proves that the Councils connected to the Western Holy Church. Thats why theres all the secrecy behind the Five Elders true identities.

    Exactly. It showed up in the papers and everything, but after the war in Farmus, the reputation of the champion there took a huge hit. Then, at the same time, the Council started losing clout with the Western Holy Church. That points to only one truth! Im thinking that Maribels grandfather, Granville Rozzo, is actually part of the Seven Days Clergy.

    I see Thats a clever deduction, Sir Yuuki.

    Kagali was just as sharp as himand her reading of the situation matched his to some extent, convincing her it was the truth.

    Yuuki looked at Kagali with a sinister smile. Oh, its nothing too impressive. But Ive stumbled upon another really key possibility. You know what it is?

    He paused, gauging her reaction. Kagali couldnt think of anything else. She put up her hands in surrender.

    I tried tracing Maribels thoughts, based on the actions she took. But she really forced things with this whole operation, you know? If she killed the demon lord Rimuru, there was a chance Veldora would go berserk on us. When she took over the Chaos Dragon, that really did enrage Milim, almost. You were terrified that shed discover us, werent you? So I really think she pushed her luck way too much with a demon lord as dangerous as thatto say nothing of a True Dragon.

    Putting it that way, youre right

    Maribel had to know the danger she was putting herself in, and Im sure she worked out some countermeasures. But what were they? Yuuki looked straight at Kagali. He didnt have an answer himself, but he figured asking would help organize his own thoughts.

    Hmm Maybe she believed that she, alone, was safe the whole time?

    There is that, yeah. But I dont think thats all.

    And maybe she was anticipating at least a little damage? She feared the rise of Rimuru, and if she thought some sacrifice now was worth it in the future

    Yuuki nodded at this. Well, me, Id never do that if I had no idea how much damage thered be. But if I could predict how much to expect, approximately, Id definitely weigh the losses against the gains on the scale.

    Meaning?

    I think Maribel had some kind of reason to believe things would work out, even if Veldora and Milim lost control.

    And what was that reason?

    Granville

    No. Yuuki had arrived at an answer. He grinned. Who did Lace fight in the sanctuary?

    Well, the demon lord ValentineOh!

    He chuckled, seeing Kagalis reaction. Right. The demon lord Valentine is deadbut theres a demon lord Valentine in the Octagram. The real demon lords even stronger than the fake one, I bet.

    Even at my peak, I was about equal with that Valentine. In that case

    In that case, the real ones even stronger! Now Im sure of it. The headquarters of Luminism isnt just a religious siteits a demon lord stronghold.

    You mean Valentines really the god Luminus? Thats insane

    But its true. I really dont think Im wrong. The confidence behind Yuukis voice led Kagali to the truth.

    Yes Youre right. And it wouldnt be strange if Granville knew that.

    Not at all. And so did Maribel. Thats why she figured Luminus was protecting the Western Nations.

    It all seemed to make sense. Kagali had to ept it. There wasnt any room for objection. Sounds like well need to rethink our strategy.

    Yeah. But Im gonna have to move my base of operations to the East for a while anyway.

    Hee-hee-hee! You are a scary man. You say youre going to lie low, but it sounds like youll be moving around a lot, arent you?

    Well, sure. Im gonna be king of this world, remember? I promised you Id get a hold of it!

    That you did. Hee-hee Hee-hee-hee-hee-hee. I look forward to it. I really do. And Im sure yman will be delighted, too.

    Yeah. So keep lending me a hand, okay?

    Yes, of course. And please dont betray me, either, Sir Yuuki.

    Of course I wont. The world will be mineand then we can all have a st together!

    Yuuki and Kagali looked at each other and smiled. Theughs continued on and on; two magic-born aiming to seize the world like it was a game to enjoy. Their aim was childlike, but they were serious about it.

    They wanted to conquer the world.

    The Chaos Dragon was gone. Milims friend was saved. And now that I was back on the ground, I was shocked to find the bottom section of the ruins all caved in.

    ording to Yuuki (who was safe), the cornered Maribel blew herself up inside. She wanted to take all of us along with her, apparentlyshe really wanted to take me out that bad? That was just too much, in a waybut she was hostile to me, so I didnt know what else I could do. No point moping about it.

    After discussing matters with Kagali, we decided to restore the ruins back to their pristine condition. It would take time, but we nned to excavate the bottom portion as well. Eventually, we would disy the artifacts we dug up and turn this pce into a museum. We wanted to make this into a tourist attraction,plete with a magitrain stop.

    That would take who knows how many years, of course, and we had a ton to do before then. Unless we negotiated a peace treaty with the Eastern Empire, at least, this whole area was a front line. Just because it was Milims turf didnt make it a safe zone, necessarily.

    For now, at least, our n was to work on restoring the site.

    Negotiations were continuing to go smoothly with the Council. Several of the councillors got dismissed, though, which definitely affected its power as a legitive body.

    The Western Holy Church was gaining more power now, and Yuuki, freed from Maribels hold, was also making his presence more known. With things as they were, the Council was seeking a new unifying force. That, of course, would be usor to be more exact, me.

    Tempest had now be the biggest faction of the Council. Yuukis Free Guild gave us a push along those lines, offering their public support of Tempest in exchange for financial backing. Hinata was working with us on this, too, in the name of stability among the Western Nations. Thanks to that, we had now obtained a pretty hefty amount of influence in the region.

    Still, Im d Yuukis been cleared of everything. Now I can keep building up our alliance without any qualms.

    Negative. The doubts have now been confirmed. The subject Yuuki Kagurazaka is definitely acting of his own free will.

    Huh?

    Wait, why didnt you say anything before?!

    Understood. Because his motivations were simple and easily taken advantage of.

    Was that why? Oh. I see. So you were keeping quiet for my sake?

    This is all thanks to my carelessness, isnt it?

    For one moment there, I hesitated to kill Maribel. Considering what the future held now, I shouldnt have wavered. If Im damaged, that wavering disappearsbut if someone hasnt been that much of a bother to me, I couldnt help but think killing was going too far.

    Even with Gaiye, I thought killing him overstepped my boundaries. My heart mustve softened up with Maribel along those lines.

    So did you keep quiet because you assumed I couldnt kill Maribel?

    Affirmative. It was decided that it was necessary to do so.

    Thats so selfishor maybe not. Just as Raphael predicted, Yuuki killed Maribel for me. And now he was resting on hisurels, assured that all the evidence was destroyed. I guess someone like that would be easy for Raphael to handle.

    I was in no position toin, but I still found it incredibly frustrating. Making Raphael worry like that, just because Im so unreliable

    Negative. That is incorrect. I did not want my lord to feel any anxieties.

    Well, thank you. I wouldnt feel guilty this way, right?

    Yeah, Im d for that, but thats not gonna work for me. I need to face facts and decide things for myself. Otherwise, Im a failure as Raphaels master. If I keep clinging to people like this, Im never gonna grow and mature.

    So next time, report the whole truth to me, okay? I promise Ill ept it.

    Understood. As you wish.

    No matter what Yuukis scheming, Im going to crush his ambitions. And Im not alone. I have friends, partners I can rely on. Dont I? With Raphael, I can walk straight ahead, never making any mistakes.

    Id really believed I could. And maybe, just a little, I thought I felt Raphael smile for me.

 Volume 11 - Prologue

    Prologue

    The Golden Mncholy

    It was a pure white mansion. There were blossoming flowers of all kinds in the garden. A young girl smiled as a young boy observed her.

    That was a happy time in the past, and the memory of it hadnt faded one bit. His one goal in life had been to retrieve such happiness. Yet, it was a task harder than traveling to the moon.

    The mansionthe golden city that he had built. There was also a beautiful garden, like a paradise in heaven. It was far more luxurious and grandiose than the one in his memory. Yet the most important aspect, the key to his memory just somehow couldnt be found.

    Even after he had be a force to be reckoned with in this world, he was unable to find his beloved young girl. And without her, he could never find his smile.

    All of this had been prepared for his beloved young girl.

    His name was Leon Cromwell. One of the demon lords, known as the tinum Saber. And the girl that Demon Lord Leon was seeking was

    This was the kingdom that Leon ruledthe Golden Valley El Dorado. The royal castle, in the shape of a spiral, towered at the center of the kingdom. The location was the meeting hall of the royal castle.

    Leon exuded an air of majesty on his throne as three suspicious individuals kneeled before him. They were garbed in all ck and adorned with rain hats, a rather bizarre look. Their outfit looked the same as that of the weapon merchant Damrada. It went without saying that this was Laces party.

    You again. Isnt this the second time?

    Yes. To have the honor of being recognized by His Majesty Demon Lord Leon, we are most grateful. However, we regret to inform you that we will be suspending the transaction of the confidential merchandise this time.

    It was Teare who answered Leon in a rather serious tone. It was an attempt to make them seem more appealing by letting the female Teare do the negotiating.

    This was also going to be theirst engagement. They had decided to follow Yuukis n and pause all activities in the Western Nations.

    Misha of the Cerberus organization would continue to act as a correspondent to the Rosso family. While they proceeded with their prior transactions, Yuukis party would move their headquarters to the Eastern Empire.

    In addition, losing Mariabell also greatly reduced the Rossos strength.

    In truth, the supplier of their top-secret merchandise was the kingdom of Siltrosso, and right now the Rosso family didnt possess enough power to conduct any more summonings.

    Moreover, now that Tempest had joined the Western States Council, the Western Nations would be under the influence of Demon Lord Rimuru. Their surveince would be tighter than ever.

    Lace and the others all agreed that it was time to leave.

    Ho, thats quite bold of you. Unlike Damrada, you wish to raise the price with me so soon?

    No no no, you have misunderstood. As His Majesty Leon is probably aware, Demon Lord Rimuru has cemented his ce in the Western Nations. Hes rather displeased with the summoning of otherworlders and strictly forbids it. We believe that it wouldnt be easy to continue the trade under these circumstances, Teare answered smoothly.

    Hearing this, Leon thought to himselfas I suspected.

    He had sent some of his men to blend in within the Western Nations, and they reported the same things. Leon himself thought that things would develop in that direction sooner orter.

    Honestly, there was too much uncertainty with this method. The rate of sess was astronomically low. It was an approach that was unlikely to work from the start.

    After all, this was about summoning a specific individual to this world

    He had ordered his subordinates to do the summoning countless times. It took more than thirty summoners working together in the span of seven days of rituals with detailed procedures to do the summoning to Leons specific criteria.

    Yet the rate of sess was less than one percent. Moreover, it would take some time for the same person to conduct the summoning ritual again, and the number of times a person could attempt the ritual was also limited.

    From the start, the rate of sess was close to zero.

    Even Leon himself had conducted many summons, yet they all ended in failure. Hisst summon called upon Shizue Izawa, and tomorrow, it would be sixty-six years since she was summoned. If he wanted to narrow down the conditions into the summoning rituals, the interval between summons would be even longer.

    The next summon was not worth looking forward to, either. That was why he devised the Iplete Summoning rituals. It was a young girl that Leon was looking for. That was why the iplete summon, which had a higher chance of summoning children, should raise his rate of sess, even though it would be barely noticeable in the grand scheme of things.

    He nned to spread the method among the Western Nations, thereby increasing the chance of sess by raising the number of summons attempted and thus gathering more children

    Yet to this day, it had been aplete failure.

    There was no other way, and he could not think of any other alternatives.

    That anxious uneasiness weighed heavily on his heart. Regardless, Leon spoke in his usual cold monotone: Rimuru you say? We have not signed an agreement nor asked for any aid. But in the end, he became the hindrance. Still, thats something that cant be helped. However, what did you mean by our trade will be suspended? Even if the West has fallen, wouldnt the East still be operating?

    Leons sonorous voice echoed in the meeting hall. There was an intense pressure in his voice. Teare couldnt help but feel numb after being hit by his voice head-on.

    They were on different levels.

    A half-baked majin would have problems just standing still in front of a demon lord. Even for someone as strong as Teare, it was difficult to deal with Leon.

    She was not alone here, however.

    Allow me to exin, Lace interjected. Things are heating up in the East, actually. They seem to be secretly preparing for war, so their mages are quite upied. Thats why its not as easy to gather people needed for conducting rituals.

    Leon squinted at Lace after listening to what he had to say.

    How annoying, he thought to himself.

    He didnt care about what happened between the Western Nations and the Eastern Empire; but if the war were to be lengthy, it would impact Leons goals. If this were to be the case, he would need to re-examine his ns.

    With that being said, these thoughts were all in Leons head. He was still sitting on his throne with a cold expression, silently ring at Lace.

    His gaze made Lace rather ufortable.

    This guy is definitely a pain in the ass to deal with. Hes nothing like the fake demon lord I killed. The real deal really is different, no? Just like Boss said, its not gonna be easy to seek revenge against this guy directly

    Due to Yuukis orders, they had been keeping a low profile. So even with the person who killed Kazalim standing in front of him, Lace didnt have the slightest intention to take on Demon Lord Leon. He was doing so to live up to Yuukis trust. He wanted to do his job well.

    But, even if that were to be the casewith their archnemesis in front him, he could still try to measure his strength and find his weaknesses. Even in Laces eyes, Demon Lord Leon was a monster. If he were to battle against him seriously There was no telling who woulde out on top. Perhaps he would win, perhaps he would lose. Even if the trio of Teare, Footman, and Lace were to cooperate in challenging him, the winner would still be up for debate.

    That was why Lace had been entrusted with the job this time to try and negotiate with Leon. He had also guessed Yuukis intentions for letting them handle this task.

    Boss wanted us to take a look at this man. Its important to learn about our enemies. Like with that Mariabell, Boss wouldve had a hard time fighting her straight on. Demon Lord Rimuru is a monster beyond belief, thats why Mariabell failed. That being said, its impossible to see how strong Demon Lord Rimuru is.

    Mariabell failed because she misjudged Rimurus strength. In the first ce, it was a miscalction of Mariabell, who was better at scheming, to have attacked directly. This was not just Laces analysis, but Yuuki and Kagalis as well.

    What Mariabell was thinkingwhat she was afraid ofwas that the longer she waited, the more disadvantageous the situation would have been for her. That was why she decided to ce her bets on a high-stake gamble. It was something an outsider such as Yuuki could not have predicted.

    Moreover

    The culprit that led Mariabells thoughts in that direction, now that theres no need to hide the truth, was Yuuki himself. Indeed, Mariabell believed too much in her power, but it was Yuuki who intentionally designed it so that Mariabell believed she could defeat Demon Lord Rimuru. In addition, he had mixed in false information to disrupt Mariabells n.

    Yuuki wasnt sure that Mariabell would have lost, either. His goal was to let the strong fight among themselves so that he may observe and confirm their strengths. In the end, Demon Lord Rimuru emerged victorious.

    Mariabell, who even Yuuki thought was difficult to deal with, was dead. And her source of powerUnique Skill The Greedy Onealso recognized Yuuki as its new master.

    That had been Yuukis true goal. Lace was shocked after hearing about this. You couldnt just rob someone elses Skill; but ording to Yuuki, he had thought that he might be able to.

    How reckless. Mariabell sure was unlucky. Her opponent was our Boss, after all. She was too naive and too confident in her skills. The power of information definitely is amazing. This goes with Leon as well. Thats why even though Im furious, I shouldnt take this guy on when I dont have a good shot at winning. Thats the smart thing to do, Lace concluded.

    Suspension of all engagement and focusing on expanding their influence as well as gathering intelthis n remained the same. Now that Yuuki had achieved his goal, there was no reason for them to stay in the Western Nations.

    This was the reason why they wished to avoid provoking Leon and instead proposed to suspend their trade.

    It was no use yielding before Leons intimidation. Lace decided to finish his sentence.

    We are not saying that there will be no more dealings from now on. When we can conduct summoning rituals once more, we shall contact you, but please be patient until then. Furthermore, our informationwork spans the whole world. If there were to be any stray otherworlder children, could you permit us to take care of them first?

    That cant be helped then. Ill let you handle that. But I have one question.

    Whats that?

    Why is your tongue so loose?

    Eh? Lace replied with confusion, confronted by Leons question.

    He was calling him loose-tongued, yet Lace didnt even know what he said wrong.

    What did I let slip? Never mind thatif he wants to pick a fight, well give him a fight all right.

    Lace wasnt nervous in the slightest. You gotta enjoy every situation you were in, or else youd be a sore loser. Even if he failed, it was fine. He would just see what to doter on.

    He hid his killing intent and quickly made his resolve. Yet Leon followed up, ignoring Laces conundrum: Is it really fine for merchants who are sensitive to profits to reveal something as important as war so casually? If this were the previous handler Damrada, surely he wouldnt have done something so foolish.

    T-thats

    Now that he pointed it out, even Lace thought he had a point; but Yuuki had ordered him to say this to decline Leon. Moreover, Yuuki had revealed other information to him. Now that Lace recalled it, he began to connect the dots.

    What Leon would probably say next was

    Are you trying to hide something? You seemed to want to keep my focus on the war. In case you havent noticed, thats a foolishly naive thought, he threw his doubt at Lace.

    Weve seen through everything. Lace finally regained his cool, but also felt annoyed at the same time.

    Seriously, Boss has got me totally beat. Hes even foreseen how things would develop here.

    Leon overanalyzed Laces words and twisted his meaning, thinking that he was hiding something. It was because the demon lord knew the great value of information that he misunderstood, thinking this was all Laces tactic to distract Leon from other goals.

    That wasnt the case at all in reality.

    Lace and hispanions were merely following Yuukis orders. They didnt put much thought to it, but it wouldnt be helpful to tell the truth now. Leon would probably think that he was just making up excuses. This was all part of Yuukis cleverly crafted ns. In other words, there were great schemes behind what he had done.

    Naturally, Lace needed to give a hint regarding their ace in the hole.

    How impressive, as expected from Demon Lord Leon-sama. Actually, this would be thest of the top-secret merchandise. There were five more. The children who were taken in by Shizue Izawa, to be more specific.

    Umm.

    Yuuki wanted to leak the information about the children under Rimurus protection from the start. However, it would have raised Leons suspicion about their devious intent if they told him directly. Therefore, Yuuki had reminded Lace time and time again that he should only bring up the children at the end.

    Depending on how the negotiation went, there was no telling how things would develop. Yet Yuuki saw through all of this with ease, which was why he was so terrifying.

    Apart from feeling terrified, Lace continued to say the words he had been ordered to ry to Leon.

    There were three boys and two girls. They were all otherworlders as yad ordered. But therein lies the problem: We cant get them out.

    Shizue Izawa Shizu, huh? In that case, they are in Tempest?

    Yes. Its a real pity. Were merchants too, so we dont want to get ourselves in trouble. By the way, the childrens names were

    Ken Misuru, Ryozeki, Gale Gibbs, Alison, Kroba Hale.

    The one who spoke in Laces ce while he was trying to recall the names was Footman, who had stayed quiet until now. The others figured that Footman wasnt the bestmunicator, so they only let him memorize the names of the children.

    Right, right. But since the merchandise cant be obtained, surely Demon Lord Leon wouldnt have any interest either, Lace uttered with a smile.

    Yet Leon still scowled.

    Your pronunciation made it really hard to tell. Are you sure it is Kroba and not Chloe?

    Footman remained silent even though Leon asked in a rather annoyed tone. If he were to respond without thinking, Leon would probably be so infuriated as to pick a fight with him. Footman, by virtue of being here with his group, was putting everyone else in danger. It was the right choice to have had him remain silent; otherwise, Footman would, no doubt, have only further aggravated Leon.

    Teare apologized in his ce.

    Please forgive us, His Majesty Demon Lord Leon. The names of the otherworlders dont trante well in our tongue. As a result, our pronunciations are not very urate. Also, we heard that you didnt particrly care about the names of the travelers. We truly apologize. Teare bowed after apologizing. Lace and Footman also bowed dramatically to apologize.

    Indeed, names do not matter. It is your miscalction that the merchandise was taken, but it didnt vite our contracts. The information about the uing war would suffice as your apology, I shall ept it.

    Leon swallowed his emotions and announced with his usual attitude.

    And with that, the meeting concluded.

    Lace and the others took the payment for the merchandise and safely left El Dorado.

    All right, what to do next Leon muttered to himself after Laces party had departed.

    The long hair by Leons nape gathered neatly together as if it had woven itself into a single brilliant strand of golden light. In sharp contrast to the radiance, his long and nted eyes were a shade of mncholy.

    A knight stood ramrod straight next to Leon. He was the silver knight Alrose, one of Leons top lieutenants, as well as the person he would often confide in.

    Should I eliminate those people just now? How dare they displease Leon-sama like that. I think there is no value in having them live.

    Ummthat was the sound that Leon made as he was pondering Alroses words.

    Compared to their predecessor Damrada, those three were more than just suspicious. It was questionable whether they were really merchants at all. Frankly, Leon never trusted merchants from the start. He simply wanted to avoid antagonizing the secret organization Cerberus.

    Leons subordinates had integrated into human society as well, but they were nowhere near this enormous organization based in the East that had even exerted influence on the West.

    We should use them while they are still exploitableLeon judged calmly.

    Especially with the ordeal of finding Otherworlders, as opposed to having monsters searching for them, it was more appropriate to have humans handle the work. In order to achieve his goal, assistance from humans was necessary.

    Let them be. More importantly, the problem lies with the information those guys just leaked. If the Eastern Empire really were on the move, it would lead to a real world war. Im not sure what the other demon lords would do, but if the world went to chaos, there is no way that we would not be affected.

    It is as you say, Alrose affirmed in agreement. El Dorado is under Leon-samas protection, but other ces may be subjected to the massive scale of war. We must arrange preparations for it.

    Leons ruled territory, El Dorado,y on a different continent across the sea. This continent wasrger than the country of Australia on Earth. All of it was under Leons rule.

    There was arge active volcano in the center that erupted all year round. Yet the volcanic dust was blown away by magic-controlled wind and never once fell over the beautiful capital city. There were also all sorts of ore deposits near the volcano that could be processed into valuable magical metals. In addition, the high yield of gold made it possible for Leon to conduct secret trade with humans.

    The city was extremely prosperous. The kingdom was protected by magic. This was the golden valley of El Dorado under Leons rule.

    There was no way that this prosperous kingdom would be affected and subjected to the ugly wars of humansthis probably was not just Alroses wish, but the wishes of all of Leons subjects.

    Then we should cast defensive magic for emergency use; enter a high alert state.

    Very well, we should do just that. But it is beyond my control.

    ? What is?

    The war. If many were to die, it may bring those troublesome creatures to the world. I recall that the Yellow Primordial slumbers within thisnd. But it probably wouldnt be enough to grant it a new body

    Leon was truly annoyed by the idiocy that was beingmitted. He had no idea what the Eastern Empire was nning, but death always apanied war. Ifrge amounts of blood were spilled, the seas of blood would awaken monsters. It may just cause those dangerous demons to be awakened and rain catastrophe upon mankind.

    Leon had a very special standing in all this as an ex-Hero. To him, such a move was extremely foolish.

    However

    Now that he had be a demon lord, he simply felt that it was rather saddening. Even though he pitied the humans outside, it wouldnt really hurt him, regardless of what would happen to these outsiders.

    Leon had only one thing on his mind. He feared about the possibility that the girl he was finding might be harmed by this whole ordeal.

    We shall let them witness our strength by that time!

    Very well. I look forward to your performance. In addition

    Allow me to send members of the Blue Knight Order to his kingdom.

    Leon nodded steadily to Alrose.

    There was no need to give orders in detail, Alrose knew what he meant and had put it into action.

    Ill leave it to you, Leon dered, then calmly closed his eyes

    As his subordinate left, the meeting hall fell back into silence.

    Leons nted eyes opened and gazed into the empty space.

    Speaking of which, did he just say Kroba Hale? I shouldnt expect much, but is it seriously that simr? Perhaps its a trap.

    No, it didnt matter if it was a trap or not.

    Demon Lord Leons primary goal was to find her, after all, that girl. His ymate when Leon was a kid, the girl that he was supposed to protect

    Her name was Chloe Aubert.

 Volume 11 - Ch 1

    Observation and Research Results

    In the corner of a luxurious vi, a group of strange men were resting on sofas surrounding a table. This was one of the western bases of the secret organization known as Cerberus. The vi was owned by one of its leadersMisha the Lover. Her personal maid served tea for everyone before bowing and promptly left the room.

    And so, the meeting began.

    I see, it appears that everything has been going smoothly, Yuuki Kagurazaka said happily after hearing the report.

    Everything was just like the boss predicted! I was starting to suspect that Lace had failed.

    Hehehe, Lace is always cautious. But hes not good with negotiations.

    Eh, hold on. Im way better at that than ya guys!

    Teare and Footman were tacit under these circumstances, to which Lace voiced hisint. It wasnt actualining, but more like friendly banter between close friends.

    Dont be mad; its not that bad. Im d about the fact that you were all able to hold back when facing Leon, Kagali admitted.

    Right. To be fair, I also prepared a mental note for myself in case you guys did lose control, added Yuuki, smirking as he finished.

    If that were to really happen, they would need to see how things developed. At most, they would only lose a way tomunicate with Demon Lord Leon. Now that theyve decided to no longer operate among the Western Nations, it was no longer that big an issue.

    Yer truly ruthless. By the way, did ya have something nned when ya let me tell Leon about the kids? Lace asked, sounding resigned.

    No, there was nothing too significant behind that. To be honest, Leons goal of gathering these iplete summons was probably to expand his military force. On the other hand, I am concerned about whether or not he has some other intention, Yuuki replied with a wry smile on his face.

    So thats why you revealed the truth and told him about the five children under Demon Lord Rimurus protection

    Theres more to it than that. After all, what Leon did with those children is only based on our assumptions. By design, iplete summonschildrenwould inevitably die. Demon Lord Rimuru saved those kids and granted them the power of spirits. Leon didnt know about it. Im more interested in what that guy will do now that hes learned about the existence of those children who are supposed to die soon.

    I see. That is certainly intriguing. We can see the reason behind Leons actions by simply observing his reaction.

    Thats true. After all, there havent been that many clues, so we need a stimnt of some kind.

    Dont we now? But for the most part, I just did it out of curiosity. Im always very mindful of details.

    After listening to Yuukis exnation, Kagali and Lace both understood what he meant. Indeed, perhaps just as Yuuki said, this was him erring on the side of caution. He wanted to explore Leons intentions, but more importantly, the deliberate leaking of information had some significant meaning behind it.

    What if Demon Lord Leon decided to take action?

    Leon wouldnt go to war with Rimuru for the sake of adding a mere five soldiers. The risk of antagonizing Rimuru far outweighed the benefits of his attempt at increasing military strength. Leon wasnt stupid enough that hed fail to realize this.

    Under normal circumstances, he would write off the loss of those kids, but if Leon took actions regardless of the cost

    Then they coulde to the definite conclusion: Leon had some other motive.

    Buttheyre just a couple of kids. I dont think Demon Lord Leon will take any action, Kagali remarked.

    Lace frowned. Seriously? We even had to leak information about the war just so we could mention those kids. My nerves were killing me after he became suspicious. It took a lot of effort to work that out.

    Things would undoubtedly get interesting if Leon were to respond. But the probability of that happening was very low.

    Both Kagali and Lace felt that Yuukis idea, while intriguing, would eventually fail.

    Seeing hispanions reaction, Yuuki could only reply with a wry smile. I told you guys its my fault. If you guys didnt go in that direction, revealing the childrens information would just seem unnatural. Also, if you revealed it from the start, with your acting skills

    Yuuki tried to y dumb.

    He didnt n on finishing his sentence. Lace and the others knew all too well themselves with what he wanted to say.

    Teare put it inly for everyone. While regretful, its something that cant be helped. Footmans not good with making speeches, nor is his temper. Laces arrogance makes him suspicious. And since I was on my own, I couldnt pull it off without making any mistakes, no matter how hard I tried.

    Lace was left dumbfounded whereas Footman looked all pissed off. It was a prettymon sight. But to their surprise, Teare followed up on her words as if she hade up with something at thest minute.

    Boss, you can call me paranoid, but theres something bugging me.

    Ohwhat is it?

    Heres the thing. When Footman was reciting the names of the merchandise, Leon

    What did Leon do?

    He kept asking about the names afterward. When Footman mentioned Kroba Hale, Leon asked back Are you sure it is Kroba, not Chloe? even though he said it himself that the names didnt matter. That was the only reason why we werent careful about names.

    That man looked a bit sensitive; no doubt he cares about little details like that.

    Hehehe, that guy was really pissing me off. He was probably making fun of me for my pronunciation.

    Lace and Footmans feedback was justints.

    But Yuuki and Kagali nced at each other.

    What do you think? Yuuki questioned.

    If he actually wasnt interested, then surely he wouldnt have such a reaction, answered Kagali.

    But No no no, it cant be Can there really be a coincidence like that?

    If there are things such as causality, we cant say for certain that there is absolutely no coincidence

    Now that you mention it, it may just be

    Yes, Demon Lord Leons goal is most likely that kid named Chloe.

    It cant be.

    Yuuki was shocked. If they were somehow right about Chloe, then they just identally threw away a trump card against Demon Lord Leon.

    Kagali was more frustrated than Yuuki.

    And if that honestly were the case, then maybe they wouldnt have lost ymanshe was infuriated by this knowledge.

    Eh, EH!

    Seeing that her words had inspired such an unexpected possibility, even Teare couldnt hide her surprise. If their hypothesis turned out to be truereality seemed all too cruel and unfair for them.

    Oi oi, were yall joking just now?

    Are you both serious about what you said?

    Lace and Footman were both taken aback. Yuuki and Kagali were indeed good at strategizing, but it wasnt like they were able to foresee everything. Failure didnt matter; they would alwayse up with a second or third backup n. They could always calm down and develop a scheme to handle any situation. Lace knew this all too well, but he genuinely thought the two were stressing too much this time. Footman nodded heavily as well, seemingly in agreement.

    Regardless, there is still the chance we may be wrong. We cant ignore the possibility at this point, but we also cant say if were correct for sure, Yuuki admitted.

    I suppose what Boss did out of curiosity paid off after all! cheered Teare.

    No no no, this is no ordinary pay off. This could prove to be a huge bomb shell, spected Lace.

    Kagali thought to herself for a bit. You have a point. Although I wont put too much hope in it, it will certainly be interesting if thats how things really turn out. We can utilize this to our advantage if things progress well and let the more difficult demon lords fight among themselves. Perhaps it will help us with our revenge too.

    Teare voiced her opinion. Umm, it doesnt matter which side wins in the end. Right, well just treat this as more ytime.

    Hehehe, I still think you guys are just worrying too much, but its of no loss to us, Footman reassured.

    Anyway, just dont get ya hopes up. Things probably wont go that easily after all.

    Realizing that everyone was cutting Yuuki some ck, Lace reminded the folks to have some reservations. They were all aware of this, and the conversation came to an end.

    It was then that Misha had the maid refill everyones tea.

    By the way, how are things going on Bosss side? Lace asked after drinking his tea.

    In response, Yuuki took a sip of ck tea from his cup and nodded to Lace. Im still a bit mindful of the whole thing with Chloe, but I think I will analyze it carefullyter. Lets cut to the chase now.

    A smile broke on his face as he started to recall what he had been up to. While Lace and the others were busy confronting Demon Lord Leon, Yuuki was in the midst of a major engagement.

    Their contact was some ruler behind the scenes of the Western Nations.

    They were negotiating about how to deal with the aftermath of the mess created by Mariabell.

    As you all know by now, I was acting as if I were manipted by Mariabell. So naturally, she took the fall entirely afterward.

    Was that the thing Boss had to deal with?

    Thats right. Since I was being controlled, there was no way I could just run off to the Eastern Empire.

    Well, you have a point.

    Thats true.

    Umm, it would definitely be suspicious.

    By the way, the power of Greed was a real gambit when I tried seizing it. But I had the more important goal in mind of killing Mariabell. With her out of the picture, it wouldnt seem strange if I roamed freely now. Apart from solidifying my position, I also got to negotiate directly with the Great Elder Granbell of the Rosso family.

    Indeed, Yuukis goal had been Mariabell.

    In order to avoidpletely losing his foothold in the Western Nations, he had to deceive Mariabell. The fruits of hisbor led to the chaos that happened some time ago.

    With Mariabell taken care of, Yuuki was free once again. Even the worst of his misdeeds were ultimately pushed onto Mariabells te. He simply imed that they were her orders.

    Things were going the way that Yuuki had nned. Mariabell had lost, and Yuuki gained even greater power. He also sessfully negotiated with Granbell. There was something interesting that he heard during their discussion, which was the reason why he gathered everyone today.

    Then, let me get to the conclusion first. There is one more job we need to finish before heading east.

    Everyone seemed to be stunned at the news. ncing around at his audience, Yuuki switched to a more serious expression.

    Listen up now. Im going to exin this in detail from the start.

    After he finished, Yuuki began sharing the contents of his meeting with Granbell.

    How peaceful.

    Ive been busy every day now that I returned to the capital of Tempest, or moremonly known as Rimuru.

    I knew for sure that Mariabell was dead.

    When the dust had settled, I ordered people to head down the ruins and investigate, yet no body or items of value were found.

    She probably died from the explosion when she self-detonated that engine reactor like Yuuki imed, or maybe it was all smoke and mirrors.

    Regardless, every problem had been resolved regarding the issue.

    Mariabell was the princess of the Siltrosso Kingdom. The princess attacked us in the ruinsif we were to publicly announce this bit of news, it would only make matters worse. That was why we secretly contacted the Siltrosso Kingdom and regarded the matter as an ident that unfortunately urred.

    The fact that we were able to negotiate at all was because neither country wanted the incident to be in the public eye. We were both well aware of the ramifications, hence the open cooperation. There were always plenty of idents when it came to royalty with deep, historical roots. We quickly reached an agreement and did not escte further conflict.

    Their king and queen appeared to be very cruel and ruthless.

    With parents like that, it was no wonder Mariabell wanted to rely on knowledge from her previous life.

    If she had the chance to happily live out a brand-new life as a naive child, would she have turned out any differently? With that being said, that was just an afterthought.

    Let us check on the Five Great Elders now.

    The head of the Five Great Elders, the one that instigated Mariabell, was the leader of the Rosso family, Granbell Rosso. I put myself on guard thinking that he would be plotting something, but it was surprisingly not the case. I suppose that was the right move. It wouldve been a public acknowledgement of their illegal doings had he acted in some way. As long as we also stay quiet, they wouldnt be able to do anything.

    In fact, more than a month had passed since the incident. Granbell had beenpletely quiet the entire time.

    This brief break still gave us plenty of time.

    We effectively utilized information collected by Souei to gain intelligence regarding the underbelly of the Western Nations. We realized that there was no bigger threat than the Rosso family.

    For instance, their friendly rtionship with the mercenary band Apostles of Verte, but we also discovered several organizations that we had to keep our eyes on. However, it was still unclear as to whether my policies and interests had any direct conflict with them.

    Unless they openly dered a hostile attitude towards us, we had no reason to retaliate. I didnt want to stir up trouble myself. For now, we only needed to observe their every move.

    Furthermore, we were on good terms with the Freedom Association. We also had the Western Holy Church as our benefactor. It wasnt unreasonable to say that there shouldnt be a single organization out there that would dare to oppose us. As a result, Tempest became thergest faction within the Western Council.

    It was now a peaceful early afternoon.

    As per usual, we organized a meeting among the executives.

    In a short period of time, we had virtually reced the Five Great Elders. Probably that was why a whole new set of problems suddenly appeared, most likely a direct consequence of their absence.

    The Western Council undoubtedly yed an important role in directing the decisions of the Western Nations.

    Inside the council, the councilors of each nation would cast their vote to decide whether a motion passed or not. The diplomatic weight of a nations words corresponded to the number of councilors they had. Since we learned about the weaknesses of each nation in the council, our councilor will have to take on the role of mediator.

    As our influence on the Western Nations gradually grew,ints and petitions from other countries inevitably increased.

    It was like they were saying It wont cost you your life just by expressing your opinion, which emboldened people to give us all sorts of requests.

    That was why conquering the world was nothing but a fools errand.

    Being a ruler was definitely not easy. It was no wonder why the other demon lords werent interested in other peoples territories at all.

    If they identally received a tract of impoverishednd, they would have to figure out a way to alleviate the local popces dissatisfaction. Reducing the wealth gap was easy to talk about in theory, but for the person actually handling the mess, it was a difficult job.

    Each regions total capital was made up of their inherent resources andbor within. I believed the proper way to resolve the wealth gap issue was to cut down on costs, calcte the resulting profits, and redistribute them.

    On the other hand, we needed to be cautious with subsidizing local regions.

    If we didnt handle the matter appropriately, it would be a breeding ground for grievances.

    Now that our nation was thergest faction in the council, we were expected to behave ordingly. While organizations that opposed us were being contained right now, it was only a matter of time before they began rising up again.

    Then there was the problem of who we should send to the council.

    This person needed to be socially adept and possess a certain degree of charisma.

    But at the same time, when conflicts arose, they also needed to be intimidating enough to keep others from talking back

    First things first, I want to apologize for having to turn down this task, I announced.

    After all, the early bird gets the worm.

    It was rare that I considered myself to be devious, but even I didnt want to take the initiative on this hot mess.

    Benimaru followed in my footsteps. Me neither. Thest meeting made me realize that my personality is not suited for trying to probe other people. When I am not on the battlefield where my martial prowess can be disyed, I wont be of much use.

    While he sounded too modest, what he said probably was genuine too. Indeed, those sly nobles would be too much of a hassle for Benimaru to handle.

    Likewise, Souei also rejected the job. My duty is to collect information. As the eyes and ears of Rimuru-sama, Im afraid I cant abandon my position right now.

    Well, I somewhat guessed that already. I didnt want to send Souei as well.

    Geld wouldnt do either.

    Although he had good morals and was a very reliable man, the current work assigned to him was more important.

    Due to therge number of construction projects that were lined up, he had no free time on his busy schedule. I figured that Geld would be perfect at handling the councilors, but right now, I definitely had to remove him from the list of potential candidates.

    In that case

    W-will you be sending me?

    At that moment, I nced at the source of the question and saw Gabil, who was attending the meeting with a serious expression on his face.

    Hes surprisingly self-aware, so he probably wouldnt turn down such an important role.

    No, I should say that I felt pretty uneasy, but I couldnt think of any other suitable candidates.

    I already made Hakurou our military advisor and asked him to train our soldiers.

    As for Shuna, while having her as our councilor was a possible solution, doing so would doubtlessly have a negative impact on the overall affairs of the country.

    Based on the same rationale, I naturally couldnt send Rigurd and the other Goblin chiefs.

    As a newborn nation, we needed to draft ourws and negotiate with other governments. There were also other problems such as managing an increasing poption. The chiefs would handle these challenges first, but without the support of Shuna and Rigurd, all of these affairs would sadly have to be put on hold.

    Even though they were the ones nurturing the next generation, there was always room for improvement and development.

    I-I want to tame the wyverns that were captured and use them as mounts in order to strengthen our air force. This training would require a huge consumption of all sorts of potions, so I still want to continue collecting data

    Ummthats right.

    As the saying went, the right person for the job, I believed that Gabils talents were a perfect match for what he had suggested.

    As opposed to forcing him to attend the council, I would rather have him focus on raising wyvern troops.

    All right. Gabil, you should continue to handle the matter.

    He gave an expression of relief. Yes sir! Understood!

    Its no good forcing tasks down other peoples throats, which was why I thought this was the correct choice.

    But even so, the growth of our domain was too fast. It was a bad idea to expand our reach before weve even nurtured our talents, but the number of jobs we had to deal with was increasing at an unstoppable rate.

    It was very troubling.

    It cant be helped, I guess. Lets try to think of other alternatives.

    Just when I was starting to brainstorm.

    My gaze suddenly locked onto Shion, who was staring at me with sparkling eyes.

    Rimuru-sama, I

    No!

    I immediately cut Shion off.

    She was probably trying to toss her hat into the ring, but Shion was definitely not up for discussion.

    Why?! Shion asked with a surprised look.

    Jeez, Im the one whos surprised by your reaction.

    Lets think of a scenario. This is only an example, but lets say youre a councilor. Theres ascivious old man with a big belly in front of you. Hes a councilor, too. And then, that old man gently ces his hand on your shoulder like hes a very close friend. Now, how will you react?

    Its obvious. I grab that mans neck with my left hand, lift him up, and punch him without hesitation! I gotta hit him!!

    I gotta hit him! isnt the answer!!

    Thats why Shion was out of the question.

    Although Shions growth was an indisputable fact, there were still many parts about her that I couldnt feel rxed about.

    Like what happened a few days ago

    When I went inside the restaurant, Shion was there, looking at me with a huge smile that covered her whole face.

    Next, she held out the te that was in her hands.

    Rimuru-sama, I have been waiting for you. I finally made a cake with my own hands as well! Now, please try it! It tastes exactly like what Shuna-sama makes, but the portions are several timesrger. Dont be shy, please eat your fill!!

    What I felt right then was definitely a bad feeling.

    But Shion had learned to brew a delicious cup of ck tea. Because of that knowledge, I let my guard down.

    O-oh. Thank you. Then lets try it.

    After saying that, I epted it without much thought.

    It was a mistake.

    On the te was a big chunk of what looked like a Konjac.

    I suddenly became grave.

    Eh, what cake?

    After looking at that object, I nced around for help.

    Nobody was there. Did they all run away?

    No, Gobichi was lying down in the kitchen. He was definitely a victim.

    I realized that I hade in at the worst possible time, but it was already toote.

    Oiis this a cake?

    Yes! The taste was perfectly reproduced!

    The taste is perfect?

    Doesnt that just mean everything else is awful?

    Shion was very confident. And looking at that pleased face only caused my uneasiness to increase. While regretting my own foolishness, I decided to take a bite. I took a spoonful and brought it in my mouth. I didnt need to say much more about the results.

    I thought I was going to throw up.

    The texture was Konjac. But the taste was sweet cake.

    It had a gray color, and just like its appearance, it felt as if I was chewing on Konjac.

    It was then that I realized how important visual information was with a cake.

    No, it wasnt something limited only to cakes. With cooking, appearance was also essential to enjoyment. Even if the ingredients are served as is, they do not look delicious.

    How is it? Doesnt it taste good?

    I was annoyed looking at Shions proud face, as if she wanted to dere, Its perfect, right?

    From the beginning, Shion didnt know the basics.

    The very first stepWhat is cookingshe had made zero progress on this rudimentary stage.

    Sit down. Sit there for a moment. I have to scold you a bit!

    Huh?! It cant be, why?

    Shion went from being all smug to teary-eyed in an instant. She was taken aback and didnt know what to do, but I didnt care and started lecturing her.

    For about thirty minutes, and in earnest.

    I talked to Shion about what cooking really was so she could understand. And Shion seemed to be reflecting on it. She promised me that she would definitely talk to someone from now on, and take their opinions to heart.

    Something like that happened.

    Then, I remembered something after I scolded Shion. When Shion was trying her hand at making ck tea, Diablo was with her. Diablomented something along the lines of how he thought his body was going to be destroyed just from taste-testing ck tea. Thanks to his sacrifices, Shion was able to improve.

    If Shion practiced alone, she wouldnt realize what was wrong herself. It was a mistake we couldnt ignore anymore. Shion always tried producing results by only relying on her skills. It was hard to improve yourself like that.

    We needed someone to act as a chaperone for Shion.

    As a result, there was no way I could appoint Shion as a councilor. If she were to cause a problem at the council, it could harm the friendly rtionship we just established with humanity. And if Shion did go on a rampage, the only people who could possibly stop her were limited to those in our country. If such a person existedone capable of restraining Shionthen having that person as a councilor would be far more effective.

    For example, Diablo.

    I think Diablo would do well, I mumbled, sharing my true feelings.

    When that happened, the executives all together nodded.

    Hmm, if it is Diablo-dono, then I feel relieved.

    Im sure he would be able to convince those nobles into doing whatever we want.

    And he wouldnt be strong-armed or bribed.

    Rigurd, Benimaru, Gabil all voiced their thoughts, and it was clear they fully trusted Diablo.

    Shuna and Shion agreed too.

    With his wits and resourcefulness, I think we would be able to progress things the way Rimuru-sama wants.

    Although I feel upset, Second Secretary (Diablo) is excellent. And if that interloper goes to the Kingdom of Ingracia, the importance of me, the First Secretary, will increase! There probably isnt anyone more qualified for the job.

    Everyone seemed to approve of appointing Diablo as our councilor. It felt like Shion had some kind of ulterior motive, yet there was no doubt that she recognized Diablos talent.

    There were no opposing opinions.

    Since there werent really any other good ideas, for this case, we concluded with Diablo being the leading candidate.

    But he was definitely not going to like it.

    However, keep in mind that Diablo decided to search for subordinates because he didnt like having misceneous work being dumped onto hisp. Maybe hell be able to scout and bring someone whos good at the kind of negotiation were looking for. Diablo is the most reliable candidate thus far, but lets conclude with the reminder that it could potentially change.

    We decided to postpone our meeting.

    No, until someone was selected, attending the council would have to be my job. I wanted to make a final ruling on a recement, and so I hoped Diablo would return soon.

    It was an urgent matter, but I was the one who was seriously troubled by all this. The oue depended on Diablos return, which meant the meeting had a rather unnoteworthy end.

    Peace was the best. Having no problems was a good thing. Being able to enjoy your free time was awesome.

    Therefore, I decided to go look for Kurobee. And thanks to recently having some free time, I found something that had been weighing on my mind.

    I went into the workshop and called for Kurobee.

    Kurobee-ku~n! Are you free right now~?

    I greeted the disciples, who were bowing to show their respect when they saw me, with a wave and went inside the back room. There, Kurobee had several swordsid out, deep in thought about something.

    Ohh, Rimuru-sama? You came at a good time. I have something to report.

    Hmm, something to report to me? What happened?

    If it was something he needed to inform me about, perhaps hepleted a new piece of work. Kurobee had been bringing my ideas to fruition, often developing them together with Kaijin, so I thought maybe he made another useful thing.

    My assumption turned out to be true.

    Its about the weapon mechanism you requested a while ago. Its finallyplete! Kurobee eximed, pointing at the assortment of differently shaped swords that were spread out in front of me.

    Seeing his happy expression, I could immediately tell that this was something truly astonishing.

    But what was it that I requested?

    There were so many spur-of-the-moment ideas I told him about that I couldnt pinpoint which exact one he was referring to.

    Whatever the case may be, Id probably find out more if I appraised it.

    Answer. Weapon: broadswordthe ssification is unique-grade.

    Ohhh, its unique-grade.

    This was crafted by Kurobee as well, so it must be of excellent quality. However, I doubted that was the only reason why Kurobee had such a proud expression on his face. With his level of skill, he could have easily made several unique-grade items in the span of a single month. If Kurobee was forging a normal sword, then he only needed a day to finish it.

    The average quality was unique-grade, and even if it was a failure, it still fell under the category of being one of the best rare-grade items. If he invested a lot of effort, it would require about two or three days, but in those cases, the ssification was guaranteed to be at least unique-grade. I think hes still far away from being able toplete a legendary-grade item, but since it was Kurobee, I believed he would eventually aplish it.

    Furthermore, if skilled masters kept constantly using the weapons crafted by Kurobee, I had a hunch that they could evolve to be legendary-grade.

    It was crucial to start the process off right by carefully selecting materials, like utilizing high purity magisteel. The weaponsprehend and evolve alongside the users will, so I thought it wouldnt be long before we saw the birth of a legendary-grade weapon that Kurobee made. Therefore, I figured that there was no reason for Kurobee to go out of his way to show me a unique-grade weapon, but

    I inspected that broadsword a little more carefully.

    A distinctive feature were the small holesthree of them, to be precisethe size of a marble located at the base of the de.

    Apart from that, there was nothing else that caught my eye.

    Of course, the quality was fairly satisfactory for a sword. It was a different story had this been the work of a disciple, yetpared to Kurobees other works, it didnt seem very remarkable. It felt a little weird saying this, but it was an extremely ordinary-looking unique-grade weapon.

    It didnt appear to really have any special Engraving Magic either Wait, could this be?

    What is this? Although unique-grade is certainly remarkable, it isnt rare for you to get that ssification, right? I asked, feigning confusion while I hid my inner agitation.

    Have you forgotten by any chance? Ufufufu, this is an unbelievable thing. At a quick nce, it looks like an ordinary weapon and doesnt have any magical effects. Yet, it has an incredible characteristic.

    Even with myor rather, Wisdom King RaphaelsAnalyze and Assess, I couldnt detect anything unusual at all. If this really was what I thought it was, then the possibilities could be truly promising.

    In front of me, Kurobee, who could hardly contain his excitement, brought out some kind of glowing ball. He then casually fitted it into a random slot.

    You ce the ball like this into the hole on the slotted sword. If you do that

    Report. Weapon: broadsword has changed into Magic Weapon: broadsword.

    Ah, I knew it!!

    An ordinary weapon had changed into a magic weapon. In other words, it meant that the idea I had been fantasizing about had ultimatelye to fruition.

    Woooah!! Is it finallyplete?

    Ufufu, as expected of Rimuru-sama, youve realized it too? Thats right. This weapon mechanism is exactly the same as what Rimuru-sama mentioned before!

    Thats right. Ive definitely brought up that idea in the past.

    I knew that Kurobee had been steadily researching, but the thought of him seeding this quickly never crossed my mind.

    You sure are scary, Kurobee.

    He was a reserved man who didnt feel the need to boast about his aplishments; his work was more than sufficient enough to eloquently describe his prowess. He was a true example of a master craftsman.

    He-hey, Kurobee! Kurobee-chan! Youre really amazing, you know that? This is a really amazing invention!! I eximed to Kurobee, excited.

    Kurobee smiled happily, just as excited, and nodded vigorously.

    Mufufufu, I did it!

    He had a smug look.

    But it wasnt often you saw a smug face as handsome as his. Shions smugness annoyed me, but unlike her, I honestly wanted to praise Kurobee.

    There were several ways of crafting magic gear.

    I could utilize the Synthesis and Separation of Wisdom King Raphael to affix magical effects to equipment. Kurobee could do the same thing; on the other hand, Kaijin and Kurobees disciples were not capable of such an overpowered skill.

    Then, you may ask, what will they do to achieve the same effect?

    Normally speaking, they would achieve the same result by having an engraving mage cast Engraving Magic. Dold was a skillful user of said magic and could easily cast it onto weapons.

    Engraved magic gear could be infused with mana, and once infused, it was possible to execute certain magic. However, there was a limit to the number of varying magics that could be enchanted. At most, only two types of different magic could be enchanted. Moreover, it was impossible to remove the engraving after enchanting.

    I figured that I had mentioned this plenty of times, but there was another method, and that was through the evolution of weapons. The weapons could be given special properties through the users mana.

    It wasnt an easy thing to achieve, and it usually took an exceptionally long time. However, the growth of the weapons would often develop unexpected power. Thus, this could be one of our research projects to see if there was a more efficient way to cause weapon evolutions.

    We had acquired arge amount of unique-grade equipment from the ancient ruins of Amalita and supplied part of them as research material. Research like that would not yield results so easily, so we would have to be persistent on the matter.

    Next, lets check out some of Kurobees work.

    These were some products that subverted conventional concepts.

    Kaijin, Kurobee and I had been drinking one time when an idea suddenly came to us.

    We would use magisteel, since it was a great conductor of mana, to craft hardened weapons. In addition, we also nned to prepare an item that can be used as a Core to cast magic. That way, we might be able to create magic gear that didnt have fixed magic anchored in them.

    For instance, what would happen if we fitted a sword with spirit magic stones?

    The answer wasthe same effect as the slotted swordsthose weapons with holes in the base of their de. And, the slotted swords werent going to use magic stones, but rather jewels that had much higher purity.

    So, is it close to what Rimuru-sama had envisioned? As you can see, Ive managed to craft these slotted weapons. Kaijin-san also discovered a way of condensing magicule concentration in order to craft high-purity magic crystals!

    Kurobee sure had a lot to show off.

    It looked like Kaijin really took part in the research effort. While Kurobee crafted the weapons, Kaijin crafted the marbles. It was no wonder how they were able to sessfully create something this wonderful since the two of them had joined hands.

    Regarding the magic stones that provide these properties, weve named them Spirit Core. Weve also been calling them Magic Marble. When Gabil-san was out catching wyverns, Vesta-san, who was taking a break from work, also joined us. I heard that those two were already researching the power core of the Spirit Magic Core. Basically, they already possessed the technology to enchant magic stones with the earth, water, fire, and wind spirits, exined Kurobee.

    I recalled Ramiris mentioning that the Spirit Magic Core was meant to ensure all the spirits were activated at the same time. Kaijin and the others were doing simr research in the past, so crafting a single-spirit magic stone was a piece of cake for them.

    All he had to do was adjust the size and power output of the magic marbles. With the properties of the magic power imbued in them, they became Spirit Cores, which could be ssified into four elementsearth, water, fire, or wind.

    Naturally, the energy of these cores would run out. Once the magic contained within was depleted, they would be no different than purely decorative marbles. However, they could be recycled for repeated use.

    Can we replenish their energy? I asked.

    We can. Although, we will need to find skillful mages to infuse our magic in it. Its not something an amateur can handle.

    I see. Perhaps we could create some new jobs by assigning some workshops to specifically infuse magic for other people, too.

    Thats right. I think it will be a good idea to prepare as many magic marbles as possible. That way, we could also start trading these marbles.

    That was indeed the case.

    I was nning to mix these magic marbles into the items dropped by thebyrinth monsters. With that being said, these marbles could be a sort of newmodity on their own as well.

    Yet, Kurobee wasnt finished. Nheless, its best that we be cautious. These magic marbles are still in the experimental stage, and their properties could change depending on theirbinations.

    Combinations?

    What did he mean?

    Their properties could changecould it be?!

    Please take a look at this. There are three empty slots on this de.

    I knew it!

    In other words, if you put two magic marbles with different spirits in them, you would get some unexpected properties?

    Thats right! Kurobee agreed with my spection.

    Then that wouldplicate things.

    We would have to experiment more to verify these properties. Such innovative technology should not be published without a second thought.

    Negative. All information used in thebyrinth can be managed.

    Oh, oh oh.

    I see how it is now.

    This way, we could save the time and effort of experimenting, and in addition, it would eliminate any possible security issues since it was within thebyrinth. Now that I thought about it, the best approach was if we asked thebyrinth challengers for help in order to get arge pool of verified data.

    Even if they managed to find some incredible discoveries, the only people capable of recreating this technology were probably from our nation. While I still had my reservations about our technology being leaked, since we nned tomercialize it, then it was only a matter of time. And if that was the case, then the smarter move was to at least carry out the experiment in a venue that we could overlook.

    Right, so what kind of dangers are you expecting?

    It depends on the number of holes to the number of inserted magic marbles. Its fine if there is only one slot. However, if you put a wind spirit next to a fire spirit, the overall magic power intensifies. In contrast, a water spiritbined with a fire spirit reduces power. Even so, one water spirit marble paired with two fire spirit marbles results in a dramatic spike in power. This is not power increasing by a factor of three we are talking about here, but a spike ten times more powerful than the original. Thats why I figured we should collect more test results. Ive discussed the matter with Kaijin-san too.

    By the looks of things, there were plenty of hazardousbinations. Magic marbles genuinely required some experimentation. It would be a huge project.

    I should listen to Raphael-senseis suggestion and carry out the research in thebyrinth.

    Is three the maximum number of slots a weapon can carry?

    Yes. Regardless of how hard we tried, we could only support up to three for now.

    Moreover, the chances of sessfully punching three holes was apparently one in one hundred. It was only when Kurobee devoted his entire strength and swung his whole body that the potential of forging a three-holed weapon appeared.

    Naturally, it was next to impossible for Kurobees disciples to craft slotted weapons. Just four of his best students managed to craft a single slotted weapon.

    By the way, even Kaijin was limited to a two-holed weapon. This goes to show how immensely difficult it was to sessfully create these slotted weapons.

    Right now, we can only craft three-holed weapons. Despite that, with the rightbination of magic marbles, they can give off the same power as a legendary-grade weapon, Kurobee proudly revealed.

    Under normal circumstances, magic swords were already extremely precious and treasured items. If their properties could be altered at will, such an invention would undoubtedly defy allmon sense. If you could switch up the properties of your magic weapon depending on your enemies weaknessesthen they had honestly crafted something incredible.

    Its value was priceless. Just like what Kurobee mentioned, these weapons could rival legendary-grade weapons. Furthermore, with the rightbinations, some might really give off the power of legendary-grade weapons. This was truly unbelievable. I gave my sincere praise from the bottom of my heart to Kurobee and the others.

    After discussing the matter with him, we decided to prioritize dispatching thepleted slotted weapons to thebyrinth.

    We also intended to manufacture arge quantity of one-time use magic marbles and scatter them within thebyrinths treasure chests. In addition, once Kurobees disciples learned how to craft slotted weapons, then they would be incorporated as rewards for defeating thebyrinth bosses, too.

    It wasnt easy making three-holed weapons; however, it might be doable if we loosened the requirements on quality control. We could achieve this by reducing their durability and lowering the weapon grades.

    Would that work?

    I believe it would. Although, it will definitely be fragile, so I dont rmend using it in actual battles

    Kurobee didnt seem to agree, as he answered rather timidly.

    With that being said, I believed that they would at least be able to endure our experiments.

    In my opinion, we merely needed to verify the variousbinations of magic marbles. That was why I had hoped Kurobee and his disciples could mass produce two or more holed weapons and distribute them to thebyrinth challengers.

    Moreover, those challengers were no fools. Only amateurs would rely solely on unfamiliar and mysterious weapons that they found. There would not be a problem as long as the challengers were able to tell the difference between their main weapons and disposable weapons and use them ordingly. In teams thatcked a mage, these weapons could be a real treasure, which was why they were an important experimental case to study.

    Rimuru-sama, thats one evil expression you are making.

    Hahaha, you are overthinking things, Kurobee-kun!

    Then I shall hurry and teach my disciples the techniques.

    After saying so, Kurobee agreed to my request on increasing the quantity.

    The n was quickly finalized now that he had voiced his support.

    Even though the project would consume quite a bit of magisteel, it could be considered a form of training for his disciples. We would be able to test out these potentially battleworthy products.

    I decided to make these weapons the official equipment for centurions and higher-ranked officers. By considering their weaknesses and issuing the correctbination of marbles, theirbat abilities could be raised.

    Ill be counting on you then!

    Understood!

    And so, I left the matter in Kurobees care.

    By the way, Rimuru-sama. Surely you have something in mind for me if you came all this way, right?

    That was when I remembered.

    Ipletely forgot about the reason why I came to find Kurobee in the first ce.

    The thing is, my sword I began, taking out my straight sword to show Kurobee.

    Are there finally holes on your de?

    No, thats not it. I wouldnt be as surprised if it were just that.

    I suppose you have a point

    My sword wasnt bent nor shattered, and waspletely familiar with my mana.

    The de was as ck as the midnight sky.

    However, nowadays, if I infused my de with mana

    Shocked, Kurobee stared with his mouth open. What! The b-de is turning goldenno, thats not the only color. Its a rainbow. The de is giving off the glow of a rainbow!

    Surprising, right? I got quite the scare at first too; thats why I decided to discuss it with you.

    I had been gazing at my sword back in my room one day when it suddenly started changing hues.

    Obviously, I was caught off guard.

    The de was giving off a rainbow-like sheen.

    Gold was never used during the forging process, yet it was giving off a shine brighter than orichalcum. That was why I decided to investigate the matter.

    Answer. This is the Ultimate Metal hihiirokane 1 .

    Raphael-san had said that to me.

    Apparently, it was some very impressive metal that was superior in quality than the orichalcum I refined. Thus, I came to Kurobee for confirmation.

    T-thiswhat in the world is this? I cant even analyze it

    I think it is called something like hihiirokane?

    Hihiirokane? D-does something like that really exist? Its said to be a mythical-grade metal that possesses immutable properties. I honestly thought it was something of a fairy tale

    Kurobee was no longer just excited. He was stunned speechless.

    I figured that this change would be powerful, but it seemed to have exceeded my expectations. Afterward, Kurobee and I studied the now hihiirokaneprised straight sword together.

    In the end, we discovered that this sword would only respond to my mana.

    Even if Kurobee infused his mana with it, the de would remain jet ck, and the metallic reaction at that point was still magisteel. However, it had indeed transformed into authentic hihiirokane.

    This hihiirokane seemed capable of resisting the wavelengths of every single physical property. Normally, it wouldnt even reflect light because it simply cancelled out the wavelengths within the visible light spectrum, which probably exined why the de was pitch ck. It could mask its unique properties from others as welleven from my Analyze and Assess. How impressive.

    Only when I imbued it with my mana and entered a state ofbat would this sword begin to give off a rainbow-colored shine.

    Even though it might be too eye-catching to unsheathe in a public area, as long as I didnt infuse it with my mana, it should masquerade as an innocuous sword well enough. Moreover, it was also far sturdier than most average weapons, or should I say, its immutable properties meant that It could not be destroyed. Even when it was damaged, it could be repaired by saturating it with mana.

    I was curious about what would happen if two hihiirokane weapons shed with one another, but I suppose it was no use thinking about something impossible like that.

    There was only one thing I could say for certain right now: this straight sword was worthy of being my weapon, and that it had evolved to outshine the sturdiness of any other sword in the world. With this swordplementing my Absolute Defense, I could afford to be a bit reckless at times.

    In addition

    This sword was notplete just yet.

    In order to engrave it with a magic marblemagic crystals of different spirit propertiesI nned on drilling a hole at the base of the de so that said marble could be inserted.

    I was looking forward to the day that this sword could be finally consideredplete. It was already quite impressive, but I couldnt help but feel excited at the thought of its great potential.

    This sword is really something else. Despite the fact that I was the one who made it, the state it is in now is something I could have never imagined

    No no no, thats not true at all. Kurobee is super amazing!

    Thanks for thepliment. I am truly happy to hear Rimuru-samas praise like that!

    The special properties of this sword were only possible because Kurobee, while undeniably modest, was the one that made it. That much was certain.

    Even so, I believe that this sword can triumph Hinatas saber.

    My sword was Kurobees greatest masterpiece, so wouldnt it be at least the equivalent of a legendary-grade?

    I had spoken based on this thought.

    Kurobees answer to myment was quite unexpected. Are you referring to the legendary-grade Moonlight Saber? Hmm Actually, this should be stronger. Perhaps this sword could possibly be a lead-in to the mythical-grade weapon witnessed by Veldora-sama.

    Mythical-gradethat was a phrase synonymous with the word ultimate and supreme. There was no such equipment for sale on the market. There was no such record of it in legends and folktales. However, something like that definitely existed.

    For instance, Milims magic sword, Tenma, was certainly one of them. She had shown it to me before. At the time, even Analyze and Assess failed to yield any results. ording to Raphael-san, the quality of Tenma was above that of the Moonlight Saber. This sword had be a precious item like TenmaI couldnt help but imagine that it had also reached the ultimate realm of mythical-grade.

    ording to Kurobee, it appeared that my sword, at its present state, was at the level equal to higher-end legendary-grade weapons. In a way, there was a lot to look forward to as it had the potential of reaching mythical-grade quality one day.

    We were both mesmerized by the sword for some time.

    Ah ah, its such a cool sword

    Indeed. Such beautiful de patterns are truly a rare sight.

    The immutable hihiirokane gleamed brightly, adding a beautiful color to the Hamondemonstrating the very essence of Kurobees skilled techniques.

    We both couldnt contain our excitement while observing the almost art-like patterns of the de. Its beauty was irresistible; it was the best sword I had everid eyes on. And it would also continue to evolve. It wasnt that far of an exaggeration to say that I had already acquired a mythical-grade weapon.

    This unexpected discovery made me very happy.

    I heard a flurry of panicked footstepsing my way.

    The person heading for the front of my office had no intention of stopping and immediately burst through the door without so much as a polite knock.

    I could tell that it was Milim.

    Had anyone else been so rude, they would have met Rigurds iron fists. If it were Veldora or Ramiris, they would have been punished by having their desserts confiscated. But Milim was a special case, so lets not pursue the matter with her.

    After all

    R-Rimuru! Its hatching, its gonna hatch!

    It was because Milim had been holding onto an egg this whole time.

    She had refused to go back to her home country, insisting on staying in our nation. She was worried that something might happen to the egg and felt that it would be safer keeping it near me.

    Milim looked panicked.

    Judging by her demeanor, I assumed that the egg was probably hatching soon. Milims old friend, Gaia, lived in the eggthe Avatar Core was flickering on and off.

    It was only a matter of time.

    Gaia, a new monster, was about to be born.

    Gyuuiii!

    A tiny chibi dragon broke from its shell.

    Its length was around fifty centimeters. It was hard to believe, given its tiny size, that this used to be the Chaos Dragon.

    Are you Gaia?

    Gyuu, Gyuu!

    The young girl and the tiny dragon hugged each other tightly.

    It was very moving seeing the two reunited.

    Gaia managed to hatch not long after Milim barged in. With the safety of her friend assured, Milim was now at ease. Yet, when I thought that this meant she was returning home, it turned out not to be the case.

    Come on, lets take Gaia out on an adventure! Milim proposed excitedly.

    No, I expected her to say something like this.

    Naturally, my answer was

    I mean, Frey-san must be quite worried about you, right?

    Frey-san had be Milims guardian. If I yed with Milim without giving her prior notice, she would undoubtedly get angry. It would be a different story had Gaia not been born, but seeing how energetic and healthy it was, Milim now had to go back and take care of the work she had been putting off.

    WAHAHAHA, theres nothing to worry about!

    Nothing to worry about?

    Rimuru did give Milim some of his wise advice.

    Yet his advice has beenpletely ignored!

    Just kidding.

    I mean, since Milim suggested it, I guess I dont object.

    I had been busy dealing with the aftermath of the whole incident with Mariabell, and Ive only recently started to take a break. It wasnt a bad idea to have some fun with my friends after working all this time.

    Besides, its actually a necessity! Dragons are apex predators and will only eat what they hunt. Even babies are the same, so we need to teach Gaia how to hunt, Milim smugly added.

    I heard that dragons dont go hungry very easily, and how they could survive on water and magicules alone. The downside was that they wouldnt grow. If we wanted it to grow bigger and stronger, appropriate workout and hunting monsters as meals were absolutely essential.

    That was why Milim sought to adventure with Gaia. My initial impression was that she just wanted to run away from Freys clutches, but it turns out that she had actually thought things through a lot.

    Right, then I know the perfect ce for that.

    Uh! Is it thebyrinth?

    Umm, thats right!

    And so, we initiated our n to nurture Gaia.

    Now that the issue was settled, lets gather everyone here as soon as possible.

    I called Veldora and Ramiris, telling them that we were challenging thebyrinth once more. This time around, we would bring Gaia along and form a party of five. Even a newborn like Gaia was safe inside thebyrinth. Compared to bringing him on an adventure in the outside world, full of unknown variables, thebyrinth was unquestionably less risky.

    GAHAHAHA! We are actually quite busy right now, but because its you guys asking for the favor, we will have to give you our full assistance!

    Umm umm, you guys can rest assured now that we are here. Have faith that Gaia will grow just fine under our care.

    I suddenly felt uneasy.

    No, its all right. I gotta have faith in them.

    Veldora and Ramiris had been maturing, so they should be able to read the atmosphere and act ordingly. Even Milim knew that this was not ytime but educating Gaia. Surely, they wouldnt be selfish and do whatever they wanted.

    Well then, lets go!

    At mymand, everyone possessed their monster avatar.

    Our adventure had begun.

    We went to power level Gaia.

    Me, Veldora, Ramiris and Milim.

    Besides the four of us, there was Gaia, who was capable of flying, following me. Gaia was a dragon. It was originally the Chaos Dragon that possessed the power to destroy the world.

    It shouldnt be weak at all.

    And just as I suspected, it was indeed a dignified and very strong creature. It only took a few fights for Gaia to calibrate and get the hang of fighting. Furthermore, it had a wide-ranging dragon breath attack that could take out a whole group of enemies.

    Chaotic Breatha highly concentrated miasma with a curse that corroded any substance it touched. Its effect was simr to the Corrosion of my Gluttonous King Beelzebuth, and its power was so strong that most monsters couldnt defend against it. In addition, Gaia possessed the Earth spirit, a power carved in its Soul since birth, which enabled it to control gravity.

    Had the unsealed and freed Chaos Dragon retained intelligencethe mere thought of that possibility terrified me. With abilities like Curse Breath and super-gravitational waves being thrown around, the number of casualties would have definitely been much greater.

    But that was all in the past now.

    Nowadays, Gaia was Milims cute pet and our reliablepanion.

    We shouldnt be wary of it.

    It was then that a Blood boar appeared.

    Blood boars resided in the area near the thirtieth floor and were a rank B monster with strong legs. Its head and shoulders were protected by thick bones and muscles, while its skin was harder than steel. With a total body length over two meters, it would charge into its enemies with a speed of around fifty kilometers per hour. No one would be able to withstand that type of attack.

    If you encounter it in a narrow passage, the blood boar was an unavoidable dangerous enemy. Yet, even a dangerous monster like that was no match for our team.

    Gaias ability to control gravity meant that the blood boars charge was unexpectedly dulled. Seizing this opportunity, Milimnded a fatal strike and ended the blood boars life.

    The blood boar, feared for its ability to end up drenched with the blood of its enemies, had be a staple in Gaias diet. With the oue of todays hunt, I looked forward to Gaias growth in the future.

    As you can see, our team cooperated very well with each other.

    Gaia also had a skill called Gravity Barrier, which was expected to reduce the effects of a physical attack. This,bined with my magic barrier, gave us additional protection against enemies magical attacks as well.

    We learned all sorts of coordinated team attacks in the following days, and Gaia quickly became an integral member of our party. After that, we continued gaining actual fighting experience while at the same time, securing food for Gaia. Eventually, we made our way down to the forty-ninth floor.

    Thus, the level boss of the fiftieth floor, who was quite the challenge for usst time, was defeated.

    GAHAHAHA! Gozer can no longer stand against us!

    Thats right, thats right! Gozer is not that strong after all!

    WAHAHAHA! That felt great!

    Gyuu!

    These guys sure were excited.

    Eh? What do you mean were having too much fun?

    Nonsense, all this hard work is for Gaias sake.

    I mean, maybe a little.

    We were more or less enjoying ourselves during the process, but it was for Gaias benefit as well.

    With this elegant-sounding reason, we returned to town from thebyrinth.

    Looks like you all had a lot of fun.

    A smiling Frey-san was waiting for us, with veins visibly popping across her forehead and a spine-chilling atmosphere surrounding her.

    Eh, EHHH! F-Frey! I-Its not like that. Theres a very important reason behind this!

    I felt a sudden sense of dj vu.

    Why?

    What happened next was predictable too, as if I had somehow seen it before.

    Didnt you promise me that youd return once Gaia hatched?

    I-Its not like that. Gaia needed me!

    Yes, thats right, but was that enough to break our promise?

    B-but it needed education

    Just like how Gaia requires education, I think you could use some education too.

    ?!

    This battle was settled.

    Milim couldnt seem to persuade Frey. Regardless of how desperately Milim tried to deny it, Frey was unmoved.

    I, of course, didnt want to step on the tigers tail. And to be fair, Frey was being reasonable anyway. In the end, Milim tried to resist like a spoiled child, crying and causing a scene. However, she stood no chance against Freys unfazed smile, and thus Milim was taken away, defeated.

    All right then.

    It was Milims fault to begin with, so it couldnt be helped. If she had at least contacted Frey first, then she wouldnt have been so angry, but it was toote now.

    ILL BE BACK!

    Milim left after saying this, though I didnt think thered be a third time

    Even though she hadnt been given a curfew yet, and I was sure shed be able to get permission toe visit me regrly, I believed that kind of privilege was in jeopardy at this point. Frey knew that itd be dangerous if she didnt at least give Milim some time off, and that was why she had been generous with her. However, I didnt know what would happen if Milim kept running away from her responsibilities.

    But that was someone elses business, which I preferred to stay away from and rather observe. Although it would probably still be best if she could teach Milim about ReCoCo (report,municate, and consult).

    While thinking so, I saw Milim off.

    I was keeping Gaia by my side for the time being. There was an unlimited number of Resurrection Bracelets in thebyrinth for it to use, as well as plenty of food to eat. In addition, we even switched our avatars to automatic mode and let them explore with Gaia together. It was a fantastic way of allowing Gaia to keep on training.

    It was still too early for Milim to directly coach it. I anticipated that wed let him grow its strength to a certain extent before handing it to Milim.

    And so, we had a newpanion in thebyrinth.

    On a side note:

    Eventually, five unique monsters found roaming thebyrinth were deemed as special level bosses, and struck fear into peoples hearts. There were rumors among the challengersthese bosses appeared to have two levels of strength. While they were already terrifying in their normal state, they became extraordinarily powerful in their second state. To put it simply, we were puppeteering what were viewed as uncontroble, nightmarish fiends.

    But we only learned thatter on.

    I was afraid of what would happen to me if we secretly yed while Milim was absent.

    That was because once the automatic mode of our avatars were deactivated, their growth would sell us out to Milim. And even if there wasnt much growth, Milims keen instincts would probably expose us regardless. Therefore, it was best that we avoid such a dangerous act.

    So, I would like to introduce you to my serious work.

    Since we would be dealing with the Western Nations, we had to outlinews as soon as possible.

    As the ruling demon lord of the Jura-Tempest Federation, I held the final say on all matters. While most of my work could be handled by people like Rigurd to some extent, the important decisions had to be reviewed by me personally.

    I had a great deal of authority.

    To put it bluntly, I could manipte the judicial, legitive, and executive powers at will. This was because I held the absolute right to control these three powersand so, I held absolute power over the nation.

    I was even overseeing militarymand, which could be considered the cornerstone of this nation. I could march our army with a single order. The appointment of any officers had to be approved by me as well.

    The word Federation was purely superficial; in truth, this was no different than a dictatorship run by me.

    But in reality, I just tossed all my work to other people.

    Administrative matters were handled entirely by Rigurd, while in terms of the military, Benimaru was acting on my behalf and held full control over it.

    We were currently recruiting talents to serve as their aides.

    Rigurd was learning about the separation of powers, whereas the former goblins chiefs, Rugurd, Regurd and Rogurd were acting as the head of the Judicial, Legitive and Executive branches, respectively. Nevertheless, there was a slight problem hereseparation of powers could not be maintained without some kind of oversight.

    Simr to Japans parliamentary cab system, the boundary between the legitive and executive was blurred. It was difficult foreseeing what correct measures I had to take in order to improve this problem.

    Anyway, we began setting up the Legitive branch.

    Regarding that, our nation settled on creating a Senate and a House of Representatives. Senators from the Senate would be appointed by me while the representatives from the House of Representatives would be elected through public elections.

    The senators would not change. They would be allowed to continue serving forever unless they fell from grace by getting in any kind of trouble.

    On the other hand, the representatives from the House of Representatives would be elected by the public. Holding an election wouldnt be easy. It was going to require a lot of trial and error.

    The Legitive branch would only be in charge of draftingws.

    Then, the Executive branch would be in charge of carrying out the chartedws and see to it that the nation operated ordingly. I wanted to have someone talented in order to solidify our Executive branch.

    Using the Japanese bureaucracy as an example, even with the prime ministers constantly changing over and over, the nation still functioned very solidly.

    Although there have been more and more problems in recent years

    Anyhow, we must be practical and push forward our policies gradually. We needed someone who possessed tenacity and diligence so that they wouldnt give up so easily during the execution of ourws. However, long-term ns tended to waste unnecessary resources, and perhaps officials might be bribed to do bad things, so I wanted to prevent this kind of thing from happening by closely monitoring them.

    As for the first wave of officials to take office in the Executive branch, I intended to select them from the pool of goblin tribe chiefs in Tempest. The elders, on the other hand, were to be elected by proxy.

    In this regard, I believed it would eventually turn into a meritocracy. We were still in the process of reconciling the stakes and rivalries of each tribe, but I hoped that in the future, we would be able to unite together as one. Although it would also take time for us to do so, I wanted our nation to pursue a policy of peaceful reconciliation.

    Leaving that aside, there was a problem here.

    Those who were good at governmental duties tended to be mostly weaker races, whereas those who were at the top of the militant races were not good with the paperwork.

    This was a troubling issue.

    Should we focus on the strength within the monster world, or focus on the coexistence with humanity, knowledge, and coordination? It was quite the conundrum.

    No matter how strong some people were, I wasnt going to tolerate criminals; this was already well known to us. In addition, the military honestly had bragging rights to the sheer power they possessed. However, that didnt mean they could interfere with the countrys operating policy. Depending on the future policies, I was afraid that it might cause discontentment.

    Legition, at its core, was gathering the opinions of the people, drafting them intow, and having it approved by the Executive.

    However, at the Executive level, even the weak could control power by using their wits, and the strong could be deprived of their rights.

    Wouldnt some people have a problem with that? This was to be expected at this stage.

    After all, the Executive yed an important role.

    The Executive branch had the responsibility of managing the national budget, and the vast amount of wealth amassed in Tempest would be put to use by public officials. Myourmiles was our top financial functionary, but he alone could not uncover every single case of corruption and fraud.

    Moreover, the division of territories also fell under Executive control. I expected that appointments would be made to develop regions at the appropriate time, but that n might also be a point of contention. To prevent this from happening, all decrees would be issued in my name.

    Finally, there was the Judicial Branch.

    The most important work of the Judicial Branch was to try people who had been arrested and charged with a crime.

    Police power was vested in the Executive Branch; yet, the power of arrest was not limited to only the Executive, but also to the Legitive and Judicial Branches. The purpose was, of course, mutual oversight.

    The judiciary was responsible for sanctioning persons that were under arrest.

    It was the Judicial Branch that required the highest regard for impartiality, and to protect the order ofw without being swayed by the opinions of the people. Relying on thew to punish without mercythat was surprisingly difficult.

    I was also troubled by the question of how to guarantee a fair and just trial.

    In any case, in order to implement the separation of powers once and for all, I was learning alongside Rigurd. The peoples voices must be heard, and legition must be discussed and enacted together. It was essential to establish a transparent political system.

    In terms of administration, Rigurd and other talented people were currently being selected as officials and were training to be bureaucrats. In order to strengthen the authority of the central government, it was necessary to create aw enforcement agency as soon as possible.

    The military, under Benimarus direct control, and the intelligence agency Dark Shadow led by Souei, would answer only to mymands. In order to prevent chaos in the chain ofmand, it was decided that they would not listen to any orders from the Executive Branch. Therefore, I was nning to appoint someone quite powerful as the head of the Public Prosecutors Office.

    There was another thing.

    The judiciary also had problems.

    Conducting trials could easily stoke violence and resentment on all sides. This demanded not only smarts, but a certain amount of adroitness to get the job done.

    Of course, judges needed protection, but that thought alone was disturbing.

    Purposefully attacking a judge for the sake of revenge was absolutely intolerable, and was grounds for an immediate death sentence. However, we couldnt rule out the possibility of someone being aware of the consequences and stillmitting a crime like that.

    Unlike humans, monsters were tough. No matter how discrete the security was, officials were susceptible to ambushes. That was why we wanted our judge to have some personal physical strength.

    Uhin that case, relying on Rugurd alone is rather concerning, I admitted.

    Rigurd agreed with my view. Right. Even though he is my close lieutenant, hes not as strong as a centurion. If we switched to Rogurd however, he wouldnt lose to any average youngsters

    Rugurd had a deep and ruthless side, but could deliver an honest verdict. Good for a judge, but not powerful enough to protect himself when things went wrong.

    Rogurd was a strong man, and can take on a thousand captains one-on-one. However, he was spearheading all the ministries and departments in the Executive Branch in ce of Rigurd, and therefore it would be difficult for him to transfer over to the Judicial Branch.

    I pondered for a bit. I would like to set up a prosecutors office within the Executive Branch. If its a domestic crime, Gobta and the security force will be able to stop it, but when ites to cracking down on executives andwmakers, its too much of a burden for those guys, isnt it?

    Indeed, youre right. All sorts of monsters, even named majins, maye to our nation. In addition, people confident of their own strength from various countries will also gather here due to the influence of the opening ceremony. Its not surprising that theres going to be a lot ofmotion.

    While most of the effects of the Founding Festival were positive, due to a certain event that urred, its also begun to attract strong characters. In a way, it was what we wanted, but some fools simply couldnt be satisfied by thebyrinth, they had to go to town and make a mess.

    With Gobtas return, the security force had been strengthened significantly. But Rigurd didnt think that was enough.

    There are still A-ranked majins, arent there? I asked.

    Yes, although the numbers are small. They havent shown any outward signs for wanting to rampage, but I thought it would be prudent to stay vignt.

    Just like Rigurd said, preparedness was very important.

    There was a huge difference in the fighting abilities between each individual, so it was smarter to be proactive rather than reactive when dealing with majins.

    Hmm, the Public Prosecutors Office and the Judicial Branch. Theres also the matter of sending someone to be our diplomat in the Western Council. At the moment, we all have our own jobs to do, so it doesnt seem like a good idea to make any personnel changes

    It would be more confusing.

    Hmmthat was going to be a headache.

    The system was being established, thews were beginning to be enacted, but the necessary resources for actually executing them was still in its infancy. There were many vacant positions that needed to be filled.

    That was the downside of rapid growth, and it was something we could not avoid. I could only sigh at ourck of manpower

    It was no use ruminating over not having enough personnel.

    I decided to lighten my mood by inspecting the construction sites.

    Geld was building a new capital on the ruins of Beast Kingdom Eurazania.

    The construction was going smoothly and the foundation work had beenid out. Weid the foundation all the way down to bedrock, and magical high-strength concrete foundations connected by steel and rebar proved to be an excellent base. By using stones with mana as the building material, not only were they sturdy, they would give off an unique magic wavelength that repelled low level spells.

    The downside was that we could not use magic to reduce its weight during transportation, but the positives outshined that, so I suppose it was good enough. By the time this giant castle waspleted, not only would it be capable of defending against an outside attack, it would also block magic being used inside as well.

    We were even able to create magic rocks that were several hundred times harder than concrete. After polishing it, a towering pir rose from the center, supported by the foundation, and seemed to almost reach the sky. Using the pir as support, the outer walls were being erected next.

    I should mention that the scale of this project was simply enormous. The pir alone was a spectacle. Below, people were bustling around like busy ants. It was certainly a strange sight to behold, but it was also evidence of just how massive the building was.

    Ah, its Rimuru-sama. We wee your presence, Geld greeted as he happily ran up to me.

    Not wanting to bother everyone working, I came here using Teleport from my Spatial Domination. But it appeared that I was discovered by Geld in the end.

    Hey, Geld. Long time no see. Its great seeing you guys progressing so smoothly.

    Hahaha, thanks a lot. Surely everyone will be delighted to hear Rimuru-samas praise!

    Geld gave off a brightughter, which brightened me up as well.

    He wouldnt be reacting this way had the operation not gone smoothly.

    The cheerful atmosphere at the site was what made the work enjoyable.

    No no no, I really mean it. You guys seem to be doing a lot better than I anticipated. Will you guys be finishing soon?

    Indeed. It is thanks to everyone getting along so well.

    ording to Geld, he thought a lot by himself after his talk with me. He then went on to have open conversations with the captives majins, lending his ears to theirints.

    There was no way that he could move the hearts of those who werepletely unmotivated to work. With that being said, Geld did not rely on strength to rule, but by understanding others viewpoints.

    They were all afraid for their future circumstances. They were scared that they would be executed due to their past conflict with Rimuru-sama, exined Geld.

    Huh? Why would I do something like that?

    Of course you wouldnt. We all know that Rimuru-sama is not a ruthless demon lord. But these people are new around here. They do not know Rimuru-samas character, and consequently, they couldntpletely shake off the feeling of fear Thats why I decided to share my own experience with them

    Geld retold the story of the duel between the Orc Lord and me, the oue, and the fate of the orcs. The majins were only half convinced, despite therge group of high orcs right in front of them. Those that were involved backed up Gelds testimony, and as a result, few people doubted his story.

    Some of them were calling Rimuru-sama naive, but I replied with So what?. I asked them, Are you really going to try and rebel when even I cant win against him? That shut everyone up, Geld recalled, chuckling. If it was Shion or Diablo, they probably wouldve lost their nerve and killed the misspoken majin. Once again, I was reminded of how kind-hearted Geld truly was.

    And just like that, Geld managed to unravel the minds of the captives.

    He would also invite them out for drinks every week and treat them to delicious meals. Nowadays, they had beenpletely won over by Gelds masculinity and were willingly assisting us.

    More importantlythey felt that they could be of help to other people; having their efforts recognized must have filled them with pride. Not only were theyboring hard to be freed of their captive status, they were also experiencing the fun of working. This was far more efficient than forcing them to work. In some sense, our effective approach was to be expected. And so, these higher majins support became a great help to us.

    We resolved theck of manpower issue while at the same time, work became more efficient. Naturally, with this improved efficiency, construction was progressing far better than I hoped.

    In fact, in contrast to the progress of construction sites in my previous world, it was quite shockingly fast. Honestly, the two could not even bepared in the first ce. And keep in mind that construction was proceeding entirely by hand, since heavy machinery didnt exist.

    People might be dubious at thisparison, but when they see the construction in person, surely these doubts would be blown away.

    After all, these majins could not be seen as natural or human.

    Some were able to lift up several tons worth of material by themselves.

    Some could obliterate junk and rocks in the way with their bare hands.

    Of course, some of them could fly, so their safety standard for working several stories in the air was different than humans.

    No wonder theyre so fastI nodded with a serious look on my face.

    There were construction projects at several other locations as well.

    If this was war time, it was a bad idea fighting on several battlefields at the same time, but with construction, it was a different story. Construction could be carried out with different phases of nning to maximize efficiency. Furthermore, this was a fantastic training opportunity for our field engineers, which was why we arranged field officers to lead each team and let them give orders at their discretion.

    To be more specific, there were four locations with construction urringthe outskirts of Dwargon, Ingracia, Eurazania and Sarion.

    The one near Dwargon had already been connected with a highway, with inns lining it. The goal of the current project was to widen the road andy down tracks, specifically for the magitrain. We also hired adventurers as paidbor. Because of the job offer, it had quite the surge of poprity. The site was full of energy.

    On the Ingracia side, it was just like Dwargons route. The difference was that the one in Ingracia was already broad enough, so we could startying down rails directly. It wouldnt take too long before it was finished.

    The one leading to Eurazania was next. For now, we had everyone working on jobs such as widening the road while preserving the natural environment. The wood cut down from the process would be transported to the new but still under construction capital. That was why we had been making arrangements so that the supplies could be shipped out at a faster pace.

    The road leading to Sarion, on the other hand, was not progressing so smoothly. We initially began with cutting down forests, but it was taking more time than expected. The main workforce there consisted of high orcs. They could use Stomach to transport material. As they were the most skillful of workers, the task of widening the road should have posed no problems.

    However, they were also required to transport the wood they had cut down. This type of work required more manpower, which would only be sufficient by the time the operation in Eurazania wasplete and the two construction crews rendezvoused.

    First, our workers needed to be able to traverse the forest. After which, we nned to gradually build and then pave the road. We would only start drilling the tunnels andying down tracks after everything wasplete.

    This was the current situation on our four main fronts.

    Some people were against the idea of running the magitrain to the Armored Nation Dwargon. They imed that predicting the movements of the Eastern Empire was impossible, and that there was a possibility of information leakage.

    Furthermore, they were afraid that the Eastern Empire would steal the magitrain and repurpose it for military invasion. In that way, the magitrain tracks we went through all the trouble ofying down could turn out to be a double-edged sword.

    Others were also worried that the route was going to be sabotaged.

    Some even suggested that We should build a fortress to face the Empire.

    The inn town near Ameld river had arge residential area. They were arguing to settle at the location and turn the town to a strategic fortress city. I had considered the proposal, but ultimately decided against it. I thought it was meaningless.

    Right now, we still had no idea what the Eastern Empire would do. The thought of adding more to our growing pile of work definitely put me off. Even though we had more manpower these days, there were still a ton of things that needed to be done.

    However, this did not mean that we were being careless.

    It wasnt that we were sitting idly by with the assumption that the Eastern Empire wouldntunch a preemptive strike, but rather that if the other side did seriously attack us, then we would simply do our best to crush our enemies. I did not want to continue dealing with them with a facade, and it was incredibly foolish maintaining a high level of vignce all the time.

    It depended on how the Empire came at us, but we intended to meet their challenge with full strength and force a short yet decisive victory. Among our ranks, some of our lieutenants also agreed to this more direct approach.

    By the time the war began, the train tracks, among other things, that we spent so much time putting down would likely be destroyed. However, even if that turned out to be the case, we could always construct them again. We should not dy the progress of our development just because we were afraid of something that might happen in the future.

    The same goes for the angels invasion.

    No matter who our opponent was, we would not back down.

    We will roll with the punches when the timees.

    We would simply have to rebuild what was ruined.

    While it was crucial to think about how to protect these things, people were more important, not objects. As long as we protected the craftsman, then everything would turn out fine.

    With this resolve in mind, the construction and development of the projects were carried out at an incredible pace, thanks to sheer determination and nning.

    Thest location I visited was the Kingdom of Farmenas.

    Following our agreement, Youm found some workers to handle the preparation duties tied to the opening of the magitrain. We received reports that they hadpleted both selecting an initial route forying track and the subsequent site surveys.

    This was progressing faster than I had anticipated too.

    I thought they would only handle the matter after the farming season, yet Youmor rather, Myuranseemed to prioritize the train tracks.

    Its only rational. If the agricultural products of our nation can be exported to other nations, then that means the foreign currencies earned will enrich our nation. Im well aware of this. In addition, itll make it easier for ration support to arrive should there ever be a famine. When this wonderful magitrain isplete, I will not allow our nation to be ill-prepared andck the necessary infrastructure, Myuran dered with a smile, clearly more concerned than I was.

    Despite the fact that she was now the queen of Farmenas Kingdom, she still very much cared about the nations policies.

    Hahaha, I am honestly useless these days. Rommel was good at these things, so I sent him to supervise the field operation.

    With a wry smile, Youm introduced me to a man named Rommel.

    I recalled seeing him before in the past. He was Youms magepanion during his time as an adventurer.

    Rommel nervously reported the current situation to me.

    Scrolling on a precision map that was the equivalent of national secret, he pointed out specific locations to pass the road and rails through. The map also clearly indicated the results of each detailed survey, just as I had instructed.

    We all agreed that I would finalize the measurement in the end, which was why I headed immediately to the construction site.

    I then used the rest of the day to double check all the information.

    While there is still room for improvement, everything seems to be in order. Did you assign someone to keep records of each region?

    Yes, everything has beenpleted ording to your arrangement.

    Then, please inform the person in charge that they need to resurvey this section here, here and here again.

    It looked like they were doing a good job nurturing new talents. The uracy of the schematic that had been drafted was within the margin of error I had permitted. While some teams seemed to have exceeded this margin, it showed that they had been undoubtedly studying very carefully. Although I asked them to reevaluate their surveys, they should be able to find the mistakes themselves. While it might be harsh, we couldnt let this go that quickly.

    It would be meaningless if I were the one finishing all the work since I had incredible precision. I hoped to encourage the new talents by having them finish all the procedures by their own hand. Considering their present skill level, this minor investigation shouldnt take long.

    We might even begin the construction early, so Id have to inform Kaijin and the others to prepare the automatic, barrier-producing magic generators beforehand. They had a proven track record. Thanks to the magic generators, the roads connecting our nation and the Kingdom of Blumund were safe and sound. The stone tablet would also glow after reacting with magicules, meaning they could be used asndmarks in the dark. Both travelers visiting Tempest and the patrolling soldiers gave high praises to the invention. Here in the Kingdom of Farmenas, the magicule concentration was lower than that of the Great Jura Forest, but I still nned to deploy some generators here.

    That day, I received a grand weing ceremony by Youm and the others.

    To be honest, I never expected you toe here by yourself. Young Master is just as easy-going as usual. Im really jealous. Youm, who had been drinking quite a bit, expressed his envy of me.

    But he was mistaken.

    I was not by myself; I brought Ranga with me.

    Ranga is here too.

    Do you require my service? Master!

    Responding to my words, Ranga extended his head from my shadow.

    WOAH! So you were there, gave me a good scare

    Of course. Even though there shouldnt be anyone bold enough to challenge a demon lord, protecting my master is my duty as a subordinate. Please have this understanding when you act as the ruler of a nation.

    Ill pass. When Edgar can stand by himself, Im getting rid of this boring king role.

    Edgar was the son of the former king Edmalis. He seemed to be a pretty cleverd and his royal bloodline was irrefutable. Youm thought his usurping the crown did not have a justified enough cause and wanted to have a proper member of the royal family act as the heir to the throne.

    However, Edgar, the person in question

    Your Majesty Youm, please dont speak of nonsense like that! Now that Lady Myu is pregnant with the heir to the crown, its only natural for him to inherit the throne! My dream is to serve that person in the future, so please dont say something that could be taken for unnecessary dispute!

    He didnt seem to want to be king as he rejected Youms words.

    As opposed to that

    Eh, hold on a second! Didnt I just hear something important?

    I was in the middle of passing a drumstick over to Ranga when I froze, and instead asked Youm what was on my mind.

    Lady Myu is pregnant with the heir to the crowndoesnt that mean Myuran is pregnant?

    So a greater majin could have a child with a human that easily

    Could it be that Your Majesty has not told your benefactor, Rimuru-sama, about the heir?

    Well, it was too embarrassing to reveal

    I felt it was a bit awkward to bring it up

    Edgar appeared quite baffled as he inquired, whereas Youm and Myuran answered almost simultaneously.

    You guys are seriously a match made in heaven.

    Speaking of which, I recalled that when monsters gave birth to children, they would be weakened. Would Myuran really be all right?

    It should be fine. I was originally human, so even though my strength will weaken some, it wont matter too much these days. With my knowledge of magic and skills, I shouldnt be inconvenienced too much.

    My concerns were quickly soothed.

    By the way, regarding Grucius, he seems to have been hit rather hard by this news. He hasnt been himself ever since Youm mentioned sadly.

    No wonder.

    I had been nning to ask why I hadnt seen Grucius since my arrival.

    Its all right, Im sure hell find his other half.

    But that was not something I would know.

    I couldnt get a girlfriend for the longest time myself, so this was a problem Grucius had to solve himself.

    Im sorry to hear that. With Grucius in that state, are you sure the knight order is fine? I questioned.

    Likely due to Diablos interfering, the thriving insurgency had been pacified, so I figured there shouldnt be anything to worry about. However, it was still concerning to have themander of the knight order acting like this, which was why I was afraid there might be problems.

    Its all right, mypanions were within the order too. More importantly, Uncle Razen is amazing. Just like what a living legend is supposed to be, hes something else.

    Oh yeah.

    This nation still had Razen.

    I heard that Diablo took him as his servant. He seemed to be working pretty hard for the Farmenas Kingdom. I mean, after all, Diablo made a pact with him using the Unique Skill Tempter, so we shouldnt have to worry about him betraying us.

    Speaking of this Razen-sama, hes been energetically overseeing the domestic situation. He would regrly contact us with magic and even assisted us in eliminating dangerous elements across the kingdom! Edgar revealed with shimmering eyes that only a young boy could have. Apparently, Razen was very popr in this nation.

    I had received all sorts of reports about him and thought that this Razen was only involved with immoral and dirty business, but perhaps from the perspective of someone trying to protect his nation, he probably was a very outstanding person.

    I didnt intend to pick a problem with him and instead listened very carefully to what Edgar had to say. With a change of perspective, how you viewed certain things began to change as well.

    As the saying goes, history is written by the victors, and the losers lose everything.

    In the eyes of this nations citizens, King Edmalis and Razen were the righteous ones. Had we been defeated during our war with the Farmus army, we would likely have been known in history as an evil and vicious band of monsters.

    I didnt intend to belittle my opponents with illegitimate means like that, but that was merely because there was no need to do so.

    With that in mind, Youms rejuvenation of this nation was a huge sess. He managed to retain the exceptional individuals from the old systems among his rank and as a result, kept the public outcry to a minimum and continued to rule the nation. In addition, they also managed to manipte information such that harmfulments against our nation were kept from spreading, and instead, we were now considered a friendly country.

    At this rate, human prejudice towards monsters would likely soon fade away. Diablo sure was impressive. He was able to understand human nature well enough to bring me the oue I wished. Everything was proceeding ording to n.

    Feeling satisfied, I chatted with Youm and the others for the rest of the day.

    During my absence, Ramiris and Veldora seemed to be hard at work too.

    After having inspected all the major construction sites and returning home, the two came out to wee me.

    Is there a problem? Or do they have something to show off?

    It was thetter.

    Great news, Rimuru! The prototype is finally finished. If the test run is sessful, we begin producing actual models en mass!

    Umm umm, Im very confident this time,e check it out!

    Urged by the two, I followed them as they hurried along.

    Right now there were several research facilities within Tempest. The one open to the general public was the smithing workshop used by Kurobee and his disciples.

    The technology there couldnt be pirated or immediately learned.

    While the special weapons I asked them to craft were mainly kept secret, other armaments and gear were disyed to the public for advertisement purposes. And by using methods such as disying newly crafted items, we hoped to build brands around Kurobee and Garm, respectively.

    However, what came next was the real deal.

    These research facilities had their location kept strictly confidential from the public. We wanted to construct these institutions in locations that were difficult for any average person to enter, but at the same time, could defend easily. Based on these criteria, we ultimately decided to build them inside the undergroundbyrinth.

    At one hundredth floor stood the research facility for me, Veldora and Ramiriss personal usage. Gabil was appointed as the director of our nations official research institute. In addition, a forest was already growing on the ny-fifth floor, and so arge research facility was established there as well. Since all of the beastmen refugees had already left for their home country, it was an empty, spacious area that we promptly utilized.

    Alchemists from Dwargon, magic researchers from Sarion and Vampiric researchers from Lubelius, who allegedly had been bored out of their minds, all gathered here in our country, and thus required arge-scale research facility. The researchers sent by these nations were experts in all kinds of different fields.

    The alchemists from the Armored Nation Dwargon were experts in spirit engineering. The Magic Armored Soldier scheme that Kaijin and Vesta were once involved in was essentially an inquiry into that type of research.

    In this world, people believed that natural phenomena were directly rted to the power of spirits. There was a total of five traditional spirits: earth, water, fire, wind, and space. Furthermore, there were also the three greater spirits of light, dark and time. The science that utilizes phenomena caused by these spirits, and the subsequent technology rted to them, was known as spirit engineering.

    It was one of the most well-known fields of research in this world.

    The magic researchers from Sarion, on the other hand, studied the more secretive field of Magic Science. It was a realm that only those who had mastered magic could reach. It was said that the basic theories were first proposed by a genius elven researcher, Sarion Emperor Elmesias mother. There seemed to be fewer and fewer people who were able to inherit the knowledge contained within this field.

    To what extent could the world be changed by manipting thews of magic?

    I heard that even philosophy was considered to be a part of this fields study.

    I felt that it was something Diablo would love to look into.

    The fundamental theory of Magic Science seemed to infer that by forcefully altering phenomena, spirit engineering can be developed. The difficult part was that the theories could only be understood by mages that have mastered elemental magic. However, the practicality of this unique theory was also obvious. It was no wonder why Sorcerers Dynasty Sarion dered it to be a national secret and forbade anyone from leaking it to other nations.

    Thest batch of researchers were vampiric. I took them in as a result of my agreement with Luminas. They were called Surmounters, a group of strong people, each equivalent to a Cmity-ss threat. The problem was they were all oddballs, but luckily there werent a lot of them. At first, I thought theyd be a headache for me if they were to start causing trouble, but I quickly realized that I was worrying too much.

    YoRimuru-sama! Moi is most interested in fun stuff!

    The leader of the group was a very bright and easygoing guy that quickly broke the ice. They were simply people that wanted to explore and learn new things. They didnt mind if their colleagues were humans, elves, or dwarves. Their priority was to sate their curiosity.

    Although, there were indeed some arrogant individuals.

    However

    Veldora and Ramiris were the ones supervising things. Even though Ramiris herself was not that menacing, her assistant Beretta and Treyni-san would not sit still to any rudeness directed at their master.

    The arrogant ones demise was truly tragic.

    Oi, wheres my tea? a certain annoying dragon demanded.

    Yesright away!

    Ahh, what a rough day. My shoulders are so stiff, a certain annoying fairy sighed.

    Please allow me to give you a massage!

    What are these Surmounters even

    Oh, these stupid idiots, youre useless! the leader of the vampiresmented, but at least he didntin about this to Veldora or Ramiris.

    And so, they had a surprisingly smooth time integrating with everyone.

    What they were researching was even more interesting. The vampires research was the pr opposite of Magic Science. Luminasbeled their research as useless, but I disagreed.

    The research the vampires were undertaking was exactly the same as Engineering Physics back on Earth. It was devoid of any magicalponents and instead tried to discover thews of the natural world. By jotting down detailed records of natural phenomena, they would then turn them into physicalws. This was the essence of their study.

    They always wound up obtaining the same oue, regardless of who the researcher was at the time.

    In some sense, it was to be expected, but there were also many variants due to the many magical phenomena in this world. In a way, this field of study could be considered unorthodox.

    Luminas didnt seem to like it, but I believed it was quite interesting.

    To be honest, the recording of data was a means to kill time to the vampires, but this huge collection of data was significant. If we were to use this data as a foundation, we could investigate the influence of magic on the world much more easily.

    A breakthrough in science often came from the umtion of small, minor discoveries over time. Therefore, what they were researching should not be underestimated.

    And so, we managed to bring schrs of varying fields to our nation.

    The knowledge they carried over was immeasurable, and the research findings as a result of this academic exchange would prove to be invaluable. We needed to ensure the personal safety of every researcher, in addition to keeping the oue of their research confidential. That was the duty our nation had to uphold.

    The researchers working here were wearing specially-designed bracelets. It was a fine gadget that Ramiris made, which removed the numerical limit on the traditional Resurrection Bracelet. It also included functions such asmunication and teleportation within thebyrinth, though the preset teleportation destinations were only the surface and the research facility.

    Since the researchers had to keep all sorts of secrets, we had to inconvenience them on some matters. Based on these considerations, we gave away these items for free.

    They could only ess the predesignated locations and couldnt move between floors or teleport to other areas. Moreover, once they teleported, relevant data about the user would be recorded to prevent any information leak.

    Although, they still had other means to move around; for instance, asking the dryads to help teleport them. In that regard, they needed Treyni-sans direct approval. All in all, there shouldnt be any way to conduct espionage activities within thebyrinth.

    Technically speaking, however, the Surmounters might have other methods of breaking these restrictions, but doing so could be dangerous for them. Even I had no idea the exact types of traps that were set in thebyrinth, so it wouldnt be easy for these vampires to try and break through them.

    Furthermore, all of their activities were being monitored, so if they were up to some dishonest activities, we could immediately pursue them. And if they got stuck in parts of thebyrinth, we could easily apprehend them.

    There were reasons for such strict regtions.

    I had been informed that highly developed civilizations tend to attract attacks from the angelsand that was the main reason why we had prepared so thoroughly.

    In that regard alone, there was no safer ce than Ramirissbyrinth.

    Inside therespecifically, the ny-fifth floor of thebyrinthit should be possible to stop even the angels invasion. Ramiris bragged that if anything were to happen, she could switch the floors instantly, exchanging floor ny-five for floor ny-nine.

    This deep city within thebyrinth was likely the safest ce in all of Tempest.

    In order to prevent secrets from leaking, this ce waspletely isted. On top of that, thebyrinth also provided the perfect environment for the welfare of the staff, including health care, so thebyrinth was a great living environment too.

    The ny-fifth floor had some of the most luxurious service facilities in our nation, so I figured that would be enough to satisfy the researchers.

    By the way

    While the sealed cave was considered as a major research site in the past, it had been shut down. The prolonged nting of hipokute herbs caused the concentration of magicules to drop drastically within the cave. Therefore, even though the concentration was still rtively high, the product yield would naturally not be as ideal. That was why we decided to move the hipokute ntation to a different location.

    With that being said, we had already nned to transform the flower field on floor ny-three to a special zone for growing hipokute herbs. We would merely increase the magicule concentration on the floor in order to mutate the weeds.

    Gabil and the others research facility was moved underground to the hundredth floor too, since one of the reasons why the ntation moved was for conveniences sake.

    The sealed cave was excavated all the way to the back of the mountain and became a residence for the wyverns. Since that was considered a military secret, we hadpletely shut down the location, preventing any ordinary citizens from entering. All vital research would be conducted within thebyrinth in the future.

    As I suspected, the two were bringing me to the ny-fifth floors research facility.

    The fact that we werent heading to their private chambers appeared to suggest we were reviewing the results from our joint research agreement. They did mention a prototype, so it seemed that the research was going smoothly.

    It looked like our key item would be ready just in time for the railroad tracks to open.

    The ny-fifth floor, which I hadnt visited in a while, had gradually be a forest-type city before I knew it.

    In this beautifully maintained park, the cityscape seemed to mesh perfectly with the surrounding trees.

    I always wondered how they managed to erect such arge city, but considering some of the elves had once lived in the forest, this was probably the manifestation of their wisdom.

    The treants seemed to have also helped build this wonderful ce.

    Naturally, the challengers who only briefly visited thebyrinth were barred from entering this hidden town. Only those who had challenged thebyrinth under official rules earned the right to enter the city.

    I stopped by the elven cabaret quite often myself, but I seldom visited them in the morning. Thats why I didnt expect this ce to change so much.

    I had been leaving everything in Veldora and Ramiriss hands, and this result was very interesting. The other floors seemed to have undergone drastic changes too. I couldnt help but anticipate a more casual trip to thebyrinth in the future.

    With that in mind, I continued to follow the two.

    Soon, Iid eyes on the research facility in the center of the park. The building was constructed from reinforced concrete, so it was rather jarring. There were also manyrge buildings adjacent to the main facility. We also had a dormitory for the foreign researchers to sleep in. For some reason, these supposedly brand-new buildings built under my supervision looked a bit ancient. However, it did give off a rather unique air, so I guess that was okay.

    Its so quaint with all these trees nearby, Ramiris gushed.

    Right? A research facility obviously needs an aura of mystery! Veldora dered proudly.

    What aura of mystery are you talking about? Theyre like a bunch of kids joyfully building their secret base. Where did you learn all this bizarre stuff?

    Everyones getting along well, we were even thinking about forming a secret society!

    Secret society?

    What the hell have you guys been doing here?!

    Hehehe, wasnt Rimuru the first one to reveal everyones research results? Some people originally wanted to steal other nations technology, but because of what you did, they were finally able to turn back on the right path.

    I never expected this.

    There were huge barriers between nations, and researchers from different countries were no different, since they all had contrasting opinions. Each had their home nations best interests in mind, and some nned to absorb the technology of others while keeping their own hidden.

    I figured this joint research wasnt going to work if that happened, and so I decided to expose everyones technology in one go.

    In the eyes of Raphael-sensei, there was no such thing as secret technology. I summarized everything so that it was easy to understand, like some kind of official manual, and handed everyone a copy. I had generously used up all the expensive paper that Yuuki helped prepare for me. Although it was a little wasteful, I deemed it a necessary loss.

    As opposed to parchment, I wanted to record information on paper that was made from nt fibers. The paper given to me by Yuuki appeared to be manufactured by the Empire, though its quality was almost the same as paper produced on Earth. I was sure everyone saw my seriousness after using all this valuable paper. After the incident, the researchers became very open with one another. Everyone was cooperating out of pure desire to fulfill their intellectual curiosity.

    Ohh, youpiled confidential information from every nation involved and made it into a data book so everyone could read it, didnt you? Even though people were very vocal about it at the time, I thought it would lead to new technologies being developed.

    Umm umm, we share just this thought with Rimuru! Weter held a recognition-of-service party and everyone found a kindred spirit in each other, added Ramiris.

    Consequently, researchers gave up on trying to hide their technological secrets and began cooperating with each other; strangely enough, an unusual sense of solidarity quickly developed within the research facility. It seemed that everyone was no longer just thinking about their home nation. Even the Surmounter vampires had bepanions that considered themselves to be our equal.

    Things were getting interesting.

    This was good.

    Yet despite this fantastic oue, there was a problem.

    The researchers gradually formed the structure of amunity, which was led by Veldora and Ramiris. That might be the reason why an independent organization was formed.

    Thats right.

    It was like some sort of evil secret society, where everyone could enjoy researching the things they truly liked. It was quite the mysterious environment. Ramiris was especially interested in the various fields of research. She eventually became the groups mascot and idol. Veldora, on the other hand, became the evil ringleader.

    These guys seriously did this while I was gone With that being said, I figured if I were here, they would probably do something even more outrageous.

    No, that cant be true.

    With that thought in mind, I continued my conversation with them.

    So thats why the ce now looks like this.

    How about it? Isnt it cool, having an evil secret base?

    Ah, just as I suspected. It really is a secret base.

    Veldoras source of information was mainly reproduced from my memories. That exined why the research facility looked the way it did, straight from manga and other sources. As a result, my intuition regarding the reasons behind his actions was often the right answer.

    Tsk, you guys sure were having fun by yourselves.

    GAHAHAHA! Its nothing really. Whates next is the important part. We will need your wisdom in the future.

    Thats right, Rimuru! You always give us a scare. Now its our turn to surprise you. Take a look at our research first before you share your opinion.

    Hearing the idental slip of my genuine thoughts, Veldoraughed out loud while Ramiris tried tofort me.

    I shouldnt sulk after what she said.

    I regained myposure and followed the two into the facility.

    A group of men d in white coats were working tirelessly.

    And in front of me was a moving miniature train.

    This was what you called a model train, though it was stillrge enough for an adult to ride on it.

    Yo, Young Master! Did that surprise you?

    It was none other than Kaijin. He was acting chief director, and he had on a rather unfitting whiteb coat.

    The hall was roughly the same size as a university auditorium, and the ground was marked with railways, making it impossible for people to stand around.

    Theres models of mountains, valleys, and tunnels here weremade for aerodynamic analysis?

    Indeed. As expected from Young Master to have seen through their purposes right away. Honestly, the impressive thing here is all of the talented researchers that have gathered in our nation. They managed to build such an amazing facility with ease.

    Indeed, Kaijin had a point.

    It was thanks to the engineers coboration that this groundbreaking facility had been created.

    This three-dimensional model was created using magic. Kaijin made the masterpiece of a prototype train, currently running along on the track, and it was one of his best works yet.

    Whats powering this train?

    I could have deciphered it using Raphael-senseis Analyze and Assess, but I asked about it on purpose.

    Steam, Kaijin replied with a grin.

    I nodded in response. It was just as I thought.

    Right now, horses provided the physical power for trains operating within our nation. These horses would pull the carriages as they slid along the track. Naturally, the total load capacity was about the same as horse-drawn carriages. Although it improved stability and helped reduce traffic, overall efficiency hadnt improved a significant amount.

    There had been proposals for either golems or monsters to drag trains around, but these proposals ultimately could not solve the root of the problem.

    The key was to develop a lotive.

    And its primary source of power was the steam engine.

    Of course, it wouldnt use old world technology like burning coal. Rather, we tried to create an engine that utilized both the strengths of magic and science.

    This was why we named it the magitrain.

    The concept behind the magic engine was using magic to convert magicules into an energy source, which then provided thebustion energy that gave rise to steamthis was the basic magical mechanism. Perhaps this prototype could be called the Spirit Magic Core. Even though it was a simple design, it still required sophisticated magical technology.

    Thews that magic obeyed were drastically different than those that governed the natural world. It was difficult trying to observe any patterns from the former, due to its ability to grant effects purely by imagination.

    For instance, lets say there was a lit candle inside a transparent ss container. The enclosed space would quickly consume oxygen and produce a high concentration of carbon dioxide. However, if the fire were made by magic, it would continue to burn regardless. As long as the mages mana and the necessary magicules were still there, the magical fire wouldnt disappear. Naturally, the mages mana had a finite limit, so the fire couldnt burn forever.

    Through this experiment, we could see that magical me was governed byws different from that of the chemical reaction behindbustion. Therefore, even if you tried to apply the same phenomenon for another purpose, the reality was that it wouldnt work. Consequently, hardly anyone corrted magic to thews of physics in this world.

    With that being said, the magic here purely referred to elemental magic.

    Spirit magic, which could be cast by borrowing the power of spirits, would not be manipted by a mages imagination. In other words, it was a magic that delivered the power of a spirita being whose existence was based on natural phenomenain its original, purest form.

    This meant that the fire caused by spirit magic would consume oxygen and generate carbon dioxide.

    By the way, during my battle with Ifrit in the past, Great Sage had warned me about causing a steam explosion. The reason why it could have potentially worked was because Ifrits mes obeyed the same properties as fire in the natural world. Had it been elemental magic, which alters thews of physics using magicules, my strategy undoubtedly wouldnt have worked.

    This was the same reason why I could use spirit magic while inside the Holy Purification Barrier.

    There was one more thing.

    In order to illuminate the cave inside, I once used Engraving Magic to heat up metal, yet the light generated proved insufficient. Thus, I had Dold work on it and he changed it to another spell. Apparently, he devised a method of directly converting magicules into light by applying elemental magic.

    Thanks to magic, there were some processes that could bepletely bypassed for results. Yet, the downside was that there wasnt much interest behind analyzing the natural phenomenon in this world.

    In order to recreate the technology of physical phenomenon, it would be better to utilize spirit magic, which also relied on the same type of physical phenomenon. And that was how I came up with the idea of incorporating spirits as the power source for the magic engine.

    Kaijin was very impressed. Sometimes, we would boil water with the excess heat from the fire at the smithery, but we never knew we could use steam this way.

    I was more shocked at their technological capabilities as they were able to recreate steam engines solely from my exnations.

    All in all, there are a lot of methods to power it. For instance, using pistons, turbines, and steambasically, its using thermal energy to do either mechanical work or converting it into electricity. That will be our field of research in the future. It appears that the research in the piston mechanism is going rather smoothly, Imented.

    Ah, youre right, Young Master. If we can figure out how to work with electricity, then we can produce a great deal of power, agreed Kaijin, turning to the small train.

    I have had discussions regarding electricity with Kaijin and the others before. They seemed to have done plenty of research since then, and now possessed some level of understanding.

    I was starting to think that they knew more about it than I did.

    Kaijin was gazing at the lotive that had six trains attached to it. Each one was carrying some iron ingots. If this was the real deal, then it was capable of transporting a huge amount of weight efficiently.

    In thisb, we can recreate all sorts of different environments. We are currently in the tropical rainforest, but the room next door is the desert region. The room next to that is currently simting a snowy region. We collect data individually from each room so that we can design trains for each environment, Ramiris, who at some point had flown onto Treyni-sans shoulders, described with a smile.

    Even one of the vampires, with his shiny fangs, nodded vigorously after hearing this. Its truly wonderful that moi and the others are of some help. Moi loves these types of experiments.

    This happy go lucky guy was a bit of a weirdo. Rather than saying he enjoyed experimenting, he was more like a mad scientist who had no interest in anything else. But they genuinely had been of great help.

    He handed over his very neatly written notes. It was full of detailed remarks that filled up every single page.

    By the way, the paper was made of nt fibers.

    We could get more supplies if we started trading with the Eastern Empire, but right now, we did not have any trade interaction. Under these circumstances, I had asked them to start by researching paper.

    Gabils subordinates were very good at monotonous work like that. And so, I assigned it to them, and they immediately developed a low-quality paper prototype made out of wood fibers. After that, they were on their own, but through a lot of trial and error, the paper quality quickly reached a good standard. Even though they did have physical samples, as well the necessary information about the steps to produce paper, this was still very impressive work.

    I immediately praised them afterward.

    Back to the topic of the important notes I was given.

    There were a lot of questions, proposed solutions, experiments, and their subsequent oues. It was all very intriguing.

    There were passages regarding motive power, and the required amount of magicules for generating it; a record of how long the engine managed to run and the apanying deterioration; the estimated load capacity and the load conditions on the cargo bed. This allowed us to calcte the stability of the interior train, and even the extent of the trains eleration.

    All of this data could be used as reference when we eventually built a full-scale lotive. I hurriedly sped through everything, and it seemed that all the relevant theories had beenpleted.

    Given the aforementioned information, we could actually start crafting a prototypeeh, could it be?!

    Oi, Veldora, when you mentioned prototype, could it be that you werent referring to the model train, but something else?

    Kukuku, how impressive. You really know your stuff to have noticed that, Veldoraughed happily.

    Ramiris, now sitting on his shoulder, had a smug look as well.

    I nced around the room and realized that all the researchers, Treyni-san and Beretta all had the same expressions.

    Before I knew it, they had gathered and lined up next to a certain door.

    In that case

    Kaijin began to exin as he slowly walked towards that door. We went through a lot of trouble making it. Turns out summoning a fire spirit in the engine alone was not enough. We needed to control the power output and had to have actual workers stationed nearby. Therefore, each lotive would need to be staffed with a qualified mage. We could start to train mages based on the number of trains nned for manufacture, but it would take too much time. Thats why we decided to build and install magic circuits in the train to automatically regte it. The fire spirit, which is the engines Core, and the control panel engraved with Engraving Magic that controls it; everything came together to give you the finished product.

    He offhandedly mentioned about summoning spirits, but the process proved to be a major hindrance. Because lower spiritscked enough power, mid-tier spirits, such as fire smanders, had to be summoned at the very least.

    A smanders power could reach up to rank B-plus, which was impossible for any average person to summon.

    Is it because Ramiris is here after all?

    It likely had to do with the fact that she used to be the Queen of Spirits. It seemed that anything spirit-rted was a piece of cake for her.

    As I was left shocked, Kaijin put his hand on the door handle.

    Oh oh, this is

    It was past the door.

    It had a ck, shiny, and somehow majestic appearance. It was clearly made of magisteel, but at the same time, it looked like a steel monster that gave off a dangerous aura.

    While feeling impressed, I heard Vestas proud deration. This is the culmination of our technologies, Magitrain Zero!

    I was under the impression that it was still in the experimental phase, yet there it was,pleted. And even if it was just a prototype, this was the train that I dreamt of.

    We managed to take one big first step forward.

    We will likely be testing the durability of the trains body. Not only do we n to make freight cars, but also passenger cars, resting cars and dining cars.

    Honestly speaking, even the lotive itself isnt finished yet. Im trying to refine certain details and make it moreplete.

    Vesta and Kaijin were both filled with motivation as they spoke.

    All the researchers were ardently gazing at Magitrain Zero, so I guess there was still room for improvement.

    Theres also the electricity Rimuru mentioned; that one was a bit difficult. I had a wind spirit summoned to generate electricity, though we werent able to use that energy directly

    That was to be expected.

    While electricity was indeed a versatile resource, it was also exceedingly difficult to control.

    First, we will need to develop batteries. Once we seed, we will be able to utilize the lotives excess thermal energy to generate electricity. If we manage to do that, it will broaden the possibilities to make the train ride morefortable. Its definitely worth trying.

    While I barely understood anything on the matter, Raphael-sensei had tranted my memories of technological textbooks from Earth into the localnguage, and then transcribed everything for me. I then handed the consolidated book to Vesta, assured that he was going to put them to good use.

    It felt like the secondary use of it through magic, but it was very convenient.

    Indeed, thats how it is. I wanted to bring this up when you mentioned electricity back there, but in the end, I decided to do it after you saw it for yourself. After all, Seeing is believing. Lets take a look.

    Could it be that theyve already put electricity to practical use?

    With this thought in mind, I followed Kaijin.

    I climbed in and was immediately met with surprise.

    The inside of the lotive was enveloped in a gentle halo of light.

    I turned to Kaijin and conveyed with my eyes, Whats this about?

    By the time Young Master handed me the data, I had already made my decision. Didnt you too, Vesta?

    Of course. When Rimuru-sama handed the research regarding the application of electricity to us, Kaijin-dono and I studied the materials in detail. Even though there are still parts that I dont understand, with all these researchers under one roof, we were able to utilize everyones wisdom.

    Well, thats right. Everyone helped answer our questions and doubts. And, when I saw the Elemental Colossus of that little girl thereRamiris-samaI was truly surprised. A working product of our abandoned Armored Soldier Project, right in front of me, Kaijin recalled.

    Indeed, that was the case.

    If you had the real thing right in front of you, obviously you would get a better understanding of how it worked.

    Right now, another Elemental Colossus was being built and was supposed to be a subject of research.

    Exactly. As I read that book and heeded varying opinions, I realized that we had a serious misinterpretation. Back then, we experimented under the belief that elemental magic and spirit magic were the same kind of magic. That was the source of our mistakes

    So then, we deduced what we werecking by investigating with the Elemental Colossus in front of us.

    What became clear with those results was that thew of magicpletely changed depending on the magic.

    As for Ramiriss Elemental Colossus, instead of spirit magic, the summoned spirit itself was being used. Because Kaijin and the researchers tried to move the Spirit Magic Core with elemental magic, they failed to initiate a chain reaction and thus wasnt operating properly.

    And yet, I ended up increasing the magic output. The result, the magic heat had nowhere to go, eventually grew out of control, and the experiment ended in a failure.

    I see, it was that kind of thing.

    In Ramiriss case, there was a possibility that she simply couldnt use elemental magic, and thus her golem reflected that. But, as a result, that became the key to sess. The Elemental Colossuss power reactor was the Spirit Magic Core, but as engineers gathered en mass, they seemed to have found a way to fully realize its performance capabilities. And by analyzing my Master Core, the original Spirit Magic Core waspleted.

    I feel both happy and frustrated.

    Yes, I wholly agree. To think that the theory we once gave up on was only due to a misunderstanding

    Despite how much research they conducted, they couldnt even see any signs of sess with just the theory, but as soon as they rified and fixed their mistake, they were able to finish and obtain results right away. It was so ridiculous, Kaijin and his team couldnt help butugh.

    What? If we have the Spirit Magic Core, we could convert magicules into energy. Well, there are different types of energy, so its kind of hard to exin.

    This lotive is converting magicules into heat in order to turn the turbines. Thus, we can also generate the electricity that Rimuru-sama mentioned before, and illuminate each car like this, too.

    I was surprised.

    No, I was genuinely surprised.

    In other words, this train was powered by a fullypleted Spirit Magic Core. By giving magicules to spirits of various attributes, they would then convert the magicules into a more easily usable energy. Furthermore, they had the ability to circte energy as well. They could send electricity made by the turbines to the Spirit Magic Core and store it safely. Although the spirits were capable of directly generating electricity, Vesta and the others said that the method would be too difficult to control. Therefore, they decided to use the electricity generated in the steam engine instead.

    After all, electricity wasnt that great if it was high voltage. Not only did we need power nts, but also substations and a battery storage facility to actually hold the charge.

    To think all that such aplicated process was handled solely by the Spirit Magic Core

    Moreover, with magicules already in the atmosphere, fuel wasnt that big of a concern. If the concentration wasnt high enough, all you needed to do was prepare magic stones, which were simple enough to carry around.

    The continuous operating time was determined by the presence or absence of magicules.

    If the lotive were a ce where magicules were always present, and as long as it doesnt do anything strenuous, it technically couldmaintenance definitely requiredoperate forever.

    It was like a dreame true.

    Come on, Rimuru, arent you surprised?

    Were like this when we get serious!

    Although it irritated me seeing Veldora and Ramiris brag like that, what they had achieved was admittedly astonishing. For now, lets just honestly praise them.

    No, its amazing. Keep up the good work!

    Hmm. Leave it to us!

    Mhmm mhmm, just rx!

    I could understand Veldora and Ramiriss feeling of wanting to boast because I, too, felt like boasting to someone.

    The day that trains began running through our country was drawing closer, and it wouldnt be long before the magitrain spread across the world. I couldnt help but feel excited.

    So, sir, I have one thing I wanted to discuss with you

    Yes, what is it?

    No, you see, I wish to organize a little get-together to celebrate thepletion of Magitrain Zero. So, you know

    I see, its a get-together in name, but what you really want is to eat, drink and y to your hearts content, right?

    I couldnt exactly say no, so we wound up at one of my favorite nightclubs.

    Well, whatever.

    All right! Lets drink the night away!

    Thank you so much! That high-ss bar is a ce that your honor manages, so I couldnt just rent it out as I want, said Kaijin, smiling with anticipation.

    That ce certainly wasnt the kind of establishment where we could visit inrge groups and make a lot of noise. But even before that, we wouldnt have been able to fit this many people inside anyway.

    For Kaijin, it wasnt about the money either.

    Ill have them get you a seat outside the restaurant as well. Well turn away the other customers for this evening and hold a recognition-of-service party for the research employees here.

    We had known each other after all this time. There was no such thing as a get-together. I had decided to hold a recognition-of-service party, with me paying for everything, as a token of my gratitude to everyone.

    Or rather, if I had to be honest, I didnt care what the name was.

    Alcohol was best for celebrations.

    Whether it was a get-together or a recognition-of-service party, as long as you had a good time, it was all the same.

    Thankfully, this was a city of elves famous for its pleasure gardens.

    Lets all share the joy we feel and nourish our spirits for the future.

    KUA-HA HA HA! The conversation is flowing well!

    Thank you for the food, Your Majesty Rimuru!

    Going along with Veldora, who was in a good mood, the researchers promptly showed their gratitude with a bow. It was such a unified movement that it made me wonder if they had regrly practiced it. Also, the vampires apparently didnt need fresh blood, judging by the fact that they were enjoying the alcohol too. They took part in it like it was natural.

    And apart from that

    This is exciting! I, too, get to drink alcohol for free today!

    Oh my, thats great. But please be careful not to drink too much

    No, Ramiris-sama. I have been ordered by Rimuru-sama to prohibit children from drinking.

    Attempting to use the hustle and bustle as a distraction, the little fairy tried to sneak a drink, but was prevented in the end, of course.

 Volume 11 - Ch 2

    New Companions

    That demon crossed the border like a strong gust of wind, devastating this evil realm. Crossing the Gate of Hell, he arrived at a spiritual worldwhich could be called Hell, or theher realm. He became the symbol of violence, ughtering powerful demons along the way.

    The weaker demons had already fled, while the strong grouped up to battle him. But to him, this was merely a meaningless struggle of the weak.

    He destroyed his enemies in a wless fashion, crushing them with ease.

    Demons were spiritual life-forms. Thats why, even if their bodies were to be destroyed, they would self-restore and over time, resurrect once again. Perhaps it was due to knowledge of this facet, that he obliterated his foes without mercy.

    The fearsome personification of violencethis demon was named Diablo.

    Kufufufufu, it has been a long time since I returned. Looks like a bunch of scum is squatting the ce. Theres no use in collecting these weaklings. I must hurry and see my old friends.

    These old friends were even capable of rivaling the strength of Diablo. The goal of his expedition was to recruit these people.

    Kufufufufu, if its those guys, Rimuru-sama would surely be pleased!

    After saying so, Diablo teleported away from the location without a trace, only leaving behind the remains of meaningless fools who knew not of Diablos power

    After inspecting the construction in person, I was able to understand the current situation. Theying of tracks for the magitrain was far fromplete. We still had a lot of work left, namely: Laying the track between the Dwarven Kingdom and Tempest, between Tempest and Blumund, constructing a road between Blumund and Farmenas, and creating the road that started from the Dwarven Kingdom and went south to Eurazania via Sisu Lake, which was ruled by the lizardmen

    We still had to finish building the road connecting Blumund to Sarion. We also needed to open a tunnel through the Coscia mountains. Only after these ns wereplete could the railways beid down. We must be mentally prepared for long-term construction efforts.

    Furthermore, I really wanted to lead the route to the coastline soon so we could provide sea products at a cheap price. We also nned to establish a main railway line between the kingdom of Blumund and Ingracia.

    Now that I was considering all of these new connections, it would take some time before the whole trafficwork could be considered fully operational.

    We also couldnt forget about the development of the trains. Since the prototype had beenpleted, we had jumped across the biggest hurdle. Now, all we had to do was to put the prototype through the wringer. Although we had already established our fantastic motor core, the rest of the magitrain still required further development.

    It was important to ensure the trains werefortable to ride. We also had to tackle the issue of noise that the trains would undoubtedly unleash upon its surroundings. Our train was already substantially quieter than traditional steam lotives. However, traveling at such high speeds still generated a bothersome racket.

    The research team headed by Kaijin was currently working to address such concerns. We were breaking down these troubling problems to smaller, bite-sized pieces to tackle them in finer detail and find theoretical solutions. Meanwhile, I also hoped that they kept a record of the processes they took to resolve these issues. It was my wish that this journal would eventually be useful reference material for future research prospects.

    With that being said, since we had managed to develop the most challengingponent, the Spirit Magic Core, it was fine to hand all train-rted matters to Kaijin.

    For other recently initiated research projects, we spared no expense in their financing from the national treasury. I had to appeal to Myourmiles so he could allocate more funds.

    And so, I started to visit the research facility frequently. I even got quite familiar with the researchers and had plenty of opportunities to discuss useful ideas. The knowledge I possessed as an Otherworlder was all too intriguing to them. They often stopped to consult my opinions.

    Although, when they posed a question that I couldnt answer, I had Wisdom King Raphael-san handle it. By entrusting my problems to Raphael-sensei, whose ability rivaled that of a quantumputer, no matter how difficult the questions were, it could solve them with ease. And I have been putting it to use relentlessly as well.

    After finishing the days work, it was also important to squeeze in some time for socializing at night. While not all the night shops were luxurious, they were still one of the go-to spots for researchers to take a breather from work. There, they could rx and engage in casual conversation.

    I, for one, was no exception. Sadly, I didnt get paid overtime.

    Pretty incredible stuff, not gonna lie.

    By the way, even though I mentioned that our budget had increased, we definitely did not spend the money on booze. It was all for the sake of research! Surely you guys understand what I mean.

    In addition, among Veldora, Ramiris, and myself, Ramiris was the one getting paid the most. Her sry was still very promising even after deducting the costs of running thebyrinth. She waspensated with twenty percent of thebyrinth revenues. It was no longer just the two gold coins we had estimated at the start. Nowadays, she could earn up to twenty gold coins or more.

    Twenty gold coins were about two million Japanese yen per day. However, Ramiris was also responsible for paying the sries of Treyni-san and her sisters, as well as Beretta. That said, she was still projected to profit nearly one hundred gold coins by the end of the month.

    My daily allowance was the same as Veldoras: one gold coin a day from the national treasury.

    Veldora was thebyrinth master, so Ramiris also rewarded him with extra pocket money. Since thebyrinth greatly depended on Veldoras magicules, the treasury granted him special bonuses as well. Thats why he actually got paid more than I did.

    In spite of this, I did keep some pocket change around. I had been investing in many varying fields and the profits were incredibly favorable.

    Motivated by everyones enthusiasm for work, I also decided to work hard. I was diligently trying to craft the bodies I had promised Diablo for his demon friends to possess.

    The person assisting me was Ramiris. In addition, I also couldnt forget to prepare bodies for Treyni-sans sisters. I needed Ramiriss opinions on that.

    Ramiris agreed immediately, though she was also insistent on me providing her with more subordinates.

    We have a lot of work to do and not enough people to do it. With only Treyni-chan and Beretta, my job would be very challenging

    Isnt this gal doing this just so she can brag about her having new servants?while that was my assumption at the time, my viewpoint changed after witnessing how hard Treyni-san and the others were working in thebyrinth.

    Ramiris wasnt just my assistant, she also had endeavors of her ownnamely, reconstructing the Elemental Colossus that Hinata disintegrated. The most vitalponent, its heart core, was alreadypleted. In addition, I had alsopleted the outline and general sketch of the body. We did have an Elemental Colossus avable for reference though. We could always refer to that during research. However, the actual construction would require time.

    Moreover, Kaijin was busy with the magitrain while Vesta was focused on developing the Magic Armor Soldier by himself. If Vesta were avable, hede to assist Ramiris. However, it would certainly be awfully tiring for him.

    We would be incorporating thepleted Spirit Magic Core, so I also wanted to collect empirical data, and in order to achieve that, the more help we could get, the better.

    By the way, what has Veldora been up to?

    HmmI dont know what Mentor has been up to. Every time I asked for his help to do some detailed tasks, he suddenly goes missing

    I see, so Veldoras still not that reliable, huh?

    Yeah, now that she mentioned it, I felt the same way, too.

    Veldora always appeared to be assiduously working, moving back and forth from ce to ce. I thought he was going to be a nuisance for everyone, but it also turned out not to be the case. Despite his appearances, he was actually quite knowledgeable and had been of some help. He also seemed to enjoy being praised. Thats why instead of letting himbor as Ramiriss assistant, I might as well cut him some ck and let him do as he pleases.

    I get it. Ill try to do some recruiting on my own.

    Umm, sorry for the trouble!

    After making this promise with Ramiris, I began to worry about the potential new candidates, and if they were right for the job.

    And so, the days quickly passed by. Our daily routine had been quite peacefuluntil one day, That Guy suddenly arrived without warning.

    I was inside my office. In front of me were stacks of documents that required my attention. It would have taken an average person an eternity to review them all. But luckily, I had Wisdom King Raphael at my aid. I ordered it to precisely scan through the files and prioritize the more urgent cases. Then, I scrutinized each document like lightning, swiftly approving or rejecting them.

    In reality, I wasnt toiling nearly as hard as I had described, but performing such monotonous tasks was still quite the chore. I fantasized over Diablo being here andboring in my stead, as I continued the same repetitive motions with my hands, gradually chipping away at the pile.

    Then came post-work break time.

    I transformed into my original slime self and rxed on the sofa. Sofy. My body itself was super soft, and the pillow was quite plushy as well. With the twobined, it felt as if I were swimming in a sea of soft feathers.

    Now that I had a knack for sleeping, this was my little secret hobby.

    Suddenly, I heard a knock on the door.

    Just when I was about to ck off for a bit, it appeared someone was stopping by. It cant be helped then. I turned back to human form and sat down on my chair.

    Come in, I responded while posing stylishly.

    Soon after, Shuna opened the door and entered. She bowed deeply to me.

    Rimuru-sama, you have a guest. He said his name was Dino, and that he is an acquaintance of Rimuru-sama?

    As I suspected, I had a visitor. He said his name was Dino and that he knew me. Then, I could only think of one person that fit the bill.

    Hes a demon lord like me, a part of the Octagram. What is he doing here?

    A demon lord? Then perhaps, just in case, I should call Onii-sama here and surround him with our army?

    No, that wont be necessary. If a fight really were to break out, simply call for Benimaru and Shion. Although there truly is no need to worry about since hes probably just here for fun.

    Whileforting a seemingly concerned Shuna, I stood up from my chair.

    Nothing to worry about.

    I recalled during the Walpurgis Banquet that Dino hadmented something along the lines of Ill drop by to hang out with you. Although I didnt pay much attention to it at the time, it looked like he was serious.

    Understood. Then, I shall do as you have ordered.

    Shuna nodded first before leading me to the guest room where Dino was waiting.

    Having a ton of rooms made it super convenient for differentiating who you were receiving. The merchants and noblemen would be shown the luxurious suite. On the other hand, if our guests were suspicious individuals or monsters with great power, we would bring them to a in room built with sturdy walls. The reason for this differentiation was to minimize losses on our side if the guests were to start a fight in the opulent suite. That was why the space we currently had Dino in was more practical than fancy.

    I followed Shuna into the room and saw the disheveled Dino. He was sitting casually on the sofalying down on it, to be precise. He was quiteid back despite being in someone elses house. To put it bluntly, he was a thick-skinned, airheaded man.

    Hey, long time no see, whats popping? he greeted me, showing no intention of getting up, stillfortably sprawled on the sofa.

    His reaction made Shuna re at him with distaste. However, she stayed silent and simply left the room after bowing. She was presumably preparing tea for us.

    Umm, Ive been good. Its just that Ive got a ton of problems to deal with, so I cant say my lifes been carefree, thats all, I answered as I sat down on the chair on the opposite side of Dino.

    I began to carefully observe him. Just like ourst encounter, Dino still looked decidedly nonchnt. Despite appearances, however, he had an oppressive aura around him. No wonder Shuna acted so cautiously.

    What do you mean? Are you having difficulties? Sounds like a big hassle.

    Indeed. Ever since I became a demon lord, nothings been easy. By the way, what are you doing here?

    Eh, me? Just as Ive said before, Ivee to hang out, Dino quickly replied to my question.

    However, it sounded as fake as it could get.

    Both of us fell silent.

    It was then that Shuna entered the room with a tray of tea and desserts. In this room filled with deafening silence, she soldiered on with her duties as if there was nothing wrong. She expertly served both of our portions and left after giving us a bow. She really was professional.

    I first took a sip of tea, then stared at Dino. He appeared to have given up the pretense and began speaking slowly, Not really. In reality, Dagruel chased me out.

    Huh?

    Ahh, its nothing. I dont actually own a home or anything, so Dagruel took me in. Also, Im broke

    Oi, oi. Are you really a demon lord?

    He spoke those words without a shred of shame. This guy seemed to be the worst kind of trouble.

    While I was thinking of a solution, I recalled that Dagruels sons were living in the care of your nation right now. Thats why Ivee here to be in your care as well!

    I must not show any weakness orpassion.

    Nope, nuh-uh, I rejected Dino immediately.

    EH?

    Eh what?

    The room fell silent again.

    Dino was clearly shocked that I had rejected him. Although, I should be the one surprised by how naive his idea was. Even if you knew me, I had no obligation to take care of a suspicious individual like him. Moreover, I instinctively knew this guy was definitely the type to say: Also, I dont want to work at all!

    H-hold on a second. What is this? Do you want me to starve to death in the street?

    No, but you can get a job.

    Please dont be so difficult! My philosophy is to never work. Ive never made a single coin with my own hands for hundreds of years, nor have I spent a single coin earned by myself, either.

    No wonder. If you dont work, you obviously would be broke. And consequently, how could you feed yourself with your nonexistent funds?

    Wow, how impressive! Please leave after you finish eating that.

    You have to chase this type of person out as soon as possible.

    Completely ignoring Dino, I reached out for the dessert in front of me: tea and cream puffs.

    How delicious. Will I ever get sick of eating this?

    Dino seemed unusually frustrated, but still followed in my footsteps and reached out for some of the cream puffs. His expression changed the moment he took a bite.

    Right, I am going to be this nations citizen, so let me work for you.

    He suddenly started spewing out some nonsensical crap.

    Huh? Hey man, what are you talking about

    No, I am serious. If I can eat something this delicious every day, I wont regret it at all. Rimuru, no, I shall address you as Rimuru-sama. Pleasemand me as you wish!

    No, I should be honest with you. I really dont wanna hire you.

    Are you kidding me? Even though weve met before, it was only for that one time. So what are you really here for?

    After finishing my pastry, I sampled my tea, and gravely questioned him.

    Dinos eyes darted around. He was a lot like Ramiris in that regard, except this guy, unlike Ramiris, was not cute at all. Finally, Dino gave up on making excuses. He shrugged and dropped his previously presumptuous attitude entirely.

    Heres the thing. Guy told me that I should stay in this nation, but he never said why. Hes a selfish fellow, after all, and defying him will be problematic. Moreover, Dagruel really did kick me out, so its gonna be troublesome going back to his ce. Thats why I came here.

    Guythat red-haired man said this?

    Yeah yeah yeah, that red-haired man.

    Uhhhe didnt seem to be lying.

    Guy probably did suggest something like that.

    But why me?

    Answer. Individual Guy Crimson, likely in the hopes of not having to deal with individual Dino, decided to push the problem to master. The possibility of this scenario is very high.

    Oi. Can you not put it so bluntlyalthough, its definitely usible.

    Ah, right, Guy had a letter for you, Dino said as he handed over a folded sheet of paper that was sealed with youki. It was indisputablyced with Guy Crimsons aura. The piece of paper contained only one scrawled sentence: Take care of Dino for me. It looked rather authentic. Since Dino had the letter, he really must have gone to ask Guy for help. It was undeniable at this point.

    This was like someone just forcibly gave me the joker card in a game of old maid 2 .

    See?!

    See?! my ass!

    Fuming, I began to ponder the situation I was in. While this was indeed troublesome, it would also be unwise to go against Guy. He was the dominating elite among the demon lords. I wouldnt have been able to defeat him in my current state. Instead of antagonizing him, it would save me a lot of headaches if I just took care of Dino now.

    So my only option is to ept the proposal?

    However, I didnt n on letting himze around all day. Even though I never invited him as a guest, I didnt want to start off on the wrong foot, either.

    It was then that I unexpectedly remembered something. This guy was pretty well-behaved whenever Ramiris was around. She always wanted more subordinates, and Dinos arrival might as well be perfect timing. Although this demon lord couldnt be underestimated, he did say, even in a joking tone, that he would serve me. Then service you shall provide. Appointing Dino as Ramiriss assistant was a stroke of genius.

    I cracked an evil grin after settling on the idea.

    Okay, I understand. But you will have to work as well!

    What are you babbling on about?!

    And you have the audacity to talk back! Werent you the one saying, pleasemand me as you wish! just now?

    I masked my inner irritation and divulged details about the position to Dino.

    Well, even though it is a job, its responsibilities are extremely simple. I want you to be Ramiriss assistant.

    Ramiris? That gal is also here?

    Yeah, shes been helping out a lot for my work.

    What the hell? That pixie has always been a recluse in her maze, and I thought she was one of us

    Dino had incorrectly assumed Ramiris was just like him. Although, I could sympathize with him; it was only recently that I realized Ramiris was a surprisingly diligent worker.

    Weve been coborating on a bunch of projectstely. She even seems to be having fun! That said, I want to hasten the research process, so theres still a lotta work to be done. Having her around has been really helpful.

    She would undoubtedly get all smug if she heard me praise her like this. That was the reason why I would never bring this up in front of her. However, these were my genuine thoughts.

    Dino was baffled for a bit before asking me timidly, T-then, when you said job What exactly am I supposed to do?

    Looks like he really hated being productive. I was struggling toe up with an exnation on the spot when I realized that may not have been the best approach. I should bring him to the actual research site. We could educate him once he was introduced to the people in charge.

    Dont assume it is anything too difficult yet. Aplish what you can to the best of your ability. First, let me show you where you will be working.

    Uh, umm, right. Just dont expect much from me!

    Hmm? Ahh, dont say something like that before you even try. I dont think there will be any problems. Just follow Ramiriss instructions.

    With a sense of uneasiness in heart, I decided to bring Dino to the private research facility located on the one-hundredth floor.

    We teleported directly to the one-hundredth floor, crossing the room that Veldora was guarding. It was arge chamber whose purpose was to receive the arrivingbyrinth challengers, while Veldoras private quarters were situated beside it. There were two rooms in total. There was also no sign of Veldora in either of them.

    Where did Veldora go? Hes probably off horsing around somewhere.

    Oi oi oi, howe the magicule concentration here is so dense?

    Oh, because thats Veldoras room over there. Dont go inside, the guy is really selfish. Youll piss him off if you touch anything.

    Ah, so this is where Veldora lives. I was wondering what your rtionship was with him back during Walpurgis.

    We arefriends. Good friends.

    I half guessed that you guys were not just acquaintances, but friends Well, lets talk about itter.

    My answer surprised him so much so that even his sleepy eyes suddenly widened a bit.

    I see. That exins why Veldora hasnt been easy to detecttely; its because hes been hiding inside Ramirissbyrinth this whole time

    Oh, thats not it really. His presence disappeared because he learned how to conceal his magicules. That guy used to let his youki go wild, so his magicule leakage was all over the ce too. Wouldnt it be dangerous if I wanted to attract more people to our nation? Thats why I have been telling him to practice and get his youki under better control.

    Whaaat? Are you saying youre demanding that egocentric troublemaker, the former guardian of the Great Jura Forest, to listen to you? Moreover, youremanding him to regte his youki so well, that even I couldnt sense it? That Veldora?

    Can you not make it sound so easythis was what Dino implied as he feverishly questioned me. Even if what he said were true, it still wouldnt change anything. And that was a fact.

    Umm, yeah. In fact, he agreed immediately. Otherwise, half of the residents in this town would be dead by now.

    No, even if you put it that way Isnt this the Veldora with an insane pool of magicules that were talking about here? Isnt he the flying catastrophe, the tyrant that everyone fears, the one unleashing his youki all the time before the Hero sealed him up?

    Peoples opinions of him seemed rather negative, but they were probably justified. After all, we had an actual example of a victim: Luminas. From what I had been able to gather, this guy truly hadmitted all sorts of horrible misdeeds in the past.

    In any case, that guys changed a little. Nowadays, if I want to ask him to do something, hell listen to some degree. Hes not that selfish.

    Werent you the one who was justining about how selfish he was?!

    Eh, did I say that?

    Answer. Yes, you did.

    I-I see.

    Selfish as he may be, hes not that unreasonable. And concerning the whole deal with controlling his youki

    Its times like these that I needed to quickly change the subject. I began to describe what had happened when Veldora was released.

    On the matter of his youki, I told him that Youll be super cool if you can suppress it. Since then, hes been practicing hard to mask everything. It was equally tiring coaching him by myself.

    But the hard work was worth it, otherwise, I couldnt even let Veldora outside. This was something that couldnt bepromised on.

    Likely out of admiration, Dinos expression shifted slightly as he gazed at me.

    I-I understand now. You are quite impressive, Rimuru. I knew you had it in you.

    No no no, you only came here to mooch off me. Im not gonna be swindled by your sweet talk.

    The fact that you were able to tame Veldora is incredible, Dinoplimented, feeling impressed yet again.

    Speaking of being selfish, Milim was worse than him. Yet, in spite of her self-centered attitude, she couldnt even raise her head in front of Frey. Everyone had their own kryptonite, I guess.

    Veldora wasnt the only selfish one, Milim also

    And so, I divulged to Dino about my experience with Milim, how I knew her, and how egocentric she could be. Since Milim wasnt here, I had the rare opportunity to spill my guts.

    I even generously shared the mess Milim had been giving me recently to Dino. I also revealed Veldoras self-indulgent acts ofte, since I wanted to hear his opinion regarding which one was more difficult to handle.

    I ranted on and on.

    Dino demonstrated his enthusiasm by putting his brain on autopilot mid-way through our conversation. I was going to ask him whether Milim or Veldora was more annoying, yet wound up with no answer.

    And so, I brought Dino to our research facility.

    I nced around in the facility to discover Veldora, who I was looking for, helping Ramiris out. Evidently, hed been toiling away today. Despite Ramiris ordering him all over the ce, this dragon was surprisingly diligent.

    V-Veldora is working?

    See, told you.

    While Veldora oftenined about having to do work, he nevertheless decided to support Ramiris in the end. He was probably happy to be called mentor all day that he took a predictable liking to Ramiris.

    The same applied to my requests as well. Ultimately, he would agree to help out. After all, if he werent easily instigated and manipted, I wouldnt have nicknamed him Gullidora 3 for nothing.

    Even Vesta, who was in charge of constructing the Elemental Colossus on the ny-fifth floor, was present. Ramiris did mention before that she was short on personnel, but was that just an excuse to make the project a priority?

    Ramiris and Veldora were happily going about their business with evil grins on their faces. On the other hand, Vesta appeared utterly drained; he was practically on the verge of death.

    Is he all right? I was kind of worried.

    Hey heywhats up? Hows the research going? with a casual greeting, I entered the facility.

    Upon noticing my arrival, Vesta immediately stopped writing on the document he had been busy with and stood up.

    Ahh, Rimuru-samase to see us.

    Yeah, but dont let me distract you. Speaking of which, are you okay? You look thoroughly exhausted.

    Im fine is what I really want to saybut researching down here has been bad for my health

    Hmm hmm? It was apparent that he wanted to get something off his chest.

    Just when I was about to inquire, Veldora suddenly cut in, Oh, its Rimuru. I showed up to help as well. Ramiris begged me toe and help her, so I had no choice.

    Thanks for the help. She does seem to becking manpower.

    My research was ssified as top secret, so I couldnt summon just anyone from level ny-five here. I could only bring people that I wholeheartedly trustedactually, I just wanted people who wouldntin about the uing research.

    After all, I was preparing a bunch of bodies whose sole purpose was to be possessed. And as for who was gonna possess them, those would be demons, of course.

    People may recognize this as a military threat rather than research.

    Its best that we keep this a secret from the other nations.

    Yahoo! Rimuru, Ive been waiting for you! Mentors support is like giving me an extra pair of wings. But I still need more help, fast!

    I knew youd say that, and for that reason, I brought someone new to assist you. Ramiris, dont you know this guy too? From today onward, Dino-san, whos also a demon lord, is going to cooperate with us. You can rely on him for all sorts of menial tasks.

    Although Dino didnt exactly give the impression of being an academic type, he could probably still contribute via manualbor. As an amateur, he really shouldnt be an assistant researcher. At most, he would provide help by carrying heavy stuff or collecting data. With that being said, we definitely needed more people to do the grunt work. I thought he would be of use to some extent.

    Dino appeared to have taken an interest in everything, swiveling his head around to scrutinize the ce. He addressed everyone after hearing my introduction.

    Im Dino. Although you probably already know at this point, allow me to reiterate, I am one of the demon lords. I personally dont want to work, but Im being forced to contribute. Ill be in your care now.

    This person ishow should I put this?obviously not motivated in the slightest. But thats fine. At least he seems willing to lend us a hand.

    After a general exchange of greetings, I found out the reason why Vesta was down here, and the current circumstances of his visit.

    The motive for Vestas lengthy pilgrimage to my private research facility, located on the one-hundredth floor of thebyrinth, was due to Ramiriss persuasion. As I had suspected, because of theck of authorized staff, Vesta had to suspend his research and prioritize mine.

    However, I also heard that Ramiriss so-called persuasion was, in fact, quite effective. She didnt care whether Vesta was avable or not.

    That couldnt be helped. She needed people to handle secretarial tasks such as filing documents or collecting references.

    Berettas schedule was already packed.

    Treyni-san was in charge of managing thebyrinth and taking care of Ramiriss daily life.

    Veldora didnt carry out the aforementioned job, which was why Ramiris chose Vesta.

    Will the Elemental Colossus be okay? I asked.

    UhI cant confidently conclude that no problems will arise. But when our work here is finished, Treyni-chans sisters will have bodies too. We may as well construct the Colossus at the same time.

    I see, that does sound very sensible.

    Sorry for the trouble, Vesta, I replied with an apology. He responded with a weak, yet somewhat enthusiastic smile.

    I am still rather disappointed in the failure of the Magic Armor Soldier, but the research here is also

    Vestas internal feelings were conflicted. On one hand, he wanted to resume with his own work, but on the other hand, he was overjoyed to participate in my project. As a researcher, Vestas interests seemed to be torn between the two. Just the fact that he had these inner turmoils was a testament to how far he hade along. Even now, he demonstrated an example of his maturity. He was able to ovee the initial shock of finding out that Dino was a demon lord, and he was quick to regain hisposure.

    Since he has experienced numerous traumatic scenarios, he had grown a nearly unshakable heart. And because he was exceptionallypetent, I assumed that Vesta would probably want to devote himself to his own experimentsbut it appeared that I was mistaken. The contents of my project were the reason why Vesta was so exhausted.

    Please allow me to continue researching here. I want to see the bodies that Rimuru-sama wishes to create through to the end. There have been so many astonishing discoveries every day, to the point that I forgo sleep just so I wouldnt miss out! he informed me without even trying to contain his excitement. It became clear that Vestas exhaustion was naturally due to sleep deprivation.

    Despite the ability to restore stamina with magic, the spell wasnt omnipotent. It couldnt justpletely rece the need for sleep; you still needed to achieve a minimum amount of rest.

    That was why I decided to pressure Vesta into taking a break. Because we just so happened to have a new helper, we could hand the chores to Dino and let Vesta get his well-deserved rest. Thus, he began giving Dino a rundown of the job he needed to do.

    I hoped Dino would have a good time with everyone here.

    Vesta didnt look afraid, by any means, even though he was talking to a demon lord. His exnation was both concise and natural.

    Then Dino-dono, I know this is all very sudden, but you will be my assistant.

    Eh

    Please dont eh me. Come now, we are short on time!

    But Im a demon lord, you know?

    So what?

    What do you mean so what

    Phew, Vesta sighed, eyes aimed at Dino.

    Please hear me out. It doesnt matter if you are a demon lord or not here. As you can see, Veldora-sama and Ramiris-sama are both enjoying their work.

    Yeah, it does seem that way, but

    How wonderful that you understand. Well then, let us begin!

    Okay.

    Vesta was simply phenomenal. I observed the situation for a bit and there was no indication of any issues. That was when I felt reassured to let them handle it.

    Now, lets examine the intriguing results of our research.

    Even though this was a reward for Diablo, assembling almost a thousand bodies was still a monumental project. I wanted to build a magisteel doll like Beretta and replicate it with Wisdom King Raphael. But that would be dull. That said, it also wasnt feasible to build each one from scratch. It was then that I unexpectedly thought of a better alternative: create a workshop that could mass-produce them.

    I prepared a one meter wide, three-meter-high transparent cylinder made of tempered ss. I officially named it the Growth Capsule. As the name implied, the goal was to grow entities such as monsters inside them.

    The capsule would be filled with the water I had stored in my Stomach from the undergroundke within the Sealed Cave. Since theke water contained a high concentration of magicules, I decided to name it magiwater. It could be added to fortify our Tempest potions or even restore mana in humans. The useful properties it exhibited had a wide variety of potential applications.

    The growth capsule had a pipe fitting that allowed additional magicules to be added. By inserting supplementary magicules, the density of the magiwater increased, which subsequently improved the chances of spawning a monster.

    When the concentration of the magiwater dropped below the minimum threshold, the capsule would automatically refill with magicules in order to revert this change.

    I prepared one thousand growth capsules. When I had finished assembling them, I suddenly realized it would have been much more convenient to simply build one thousand dolls from scratchwell, dont sweat the small stuff. That was my belief. The point was to be romantic enough 4 . After all, I was delighted to have worked on my project and had zero regrets.

    The hall was now filled with growth capsules. Magnificent.

    In order to spawn monsters, specific conditions must be met firstit was thanks to our recent research that we had discovered this fact. Otherwise, no matter how many magicules we pumped into the filled capsule, no monster would spawn. However, if you were tobine certain factors, then you attained the ability to spawn strong monsters as a result.

    For instance, if we threw a snake into the capsule, the dense magicule concentration would poison it to death. Regardless, its flesh wouldbine with the magiwater and be rebuilt as a tempest serpent. And as a result, an A-minus ranked monster would be created. Now, you probably have some idea of just how incredible the growth capsule was.

    It was evident that monsters produced from the growth capsule were several times stronger than their original counterparts. The reason these monsters were so strong was likely due to the fact that they were born in a stable,b-controlled environment filled with magicules.

    Despite this, sometimes an individuals body would break down upon birth and quickly die. Whether these monsters could survive was all down to luck.

    There was still room for improvement, and I nned on taking advantage of the growth capsules properties to generate the necessary thousand bodies.

    Well then, hows progressing along? I inquired.

    Quite fine! Ive also been doing a lot of researchtely! Ramiris cheerfully replied.

    Ho? Then Ill be looking forward toeh, what the hell is that?!

    I got spooked upon noticing the floating object inside the growth capsule. It was almost hard to believe; aplete one-eighty from what Id expected.

    For my original n, only the skeletons of the one thousand bodies would be crafted out of magisteel, and then they would be submerged in the magicule medium. Theoretically speaking, the skeleton would be used as the foundation to form a bone golem.

    Since the framework was artificial, there was little possibility of their bodies decaying. There wouldnt be any soul possessing the bodies, either. Only the magicules in the liquid would crystalize on the skeletons. The probability that the bodies would abruptly gain self-consciousness was theoretically zero.

    Unlike when I had created Beretta, they did not require detailed modelling. The demons nning to acquire the bodies would no doubt use their own magicules to alter their appearance to suit personal tastes.

    At least that was how I initially envisioned it

    Within the one thousand growth capsules were humanoid dolls drifting in them. However, various measures were taken to implement each essential body part. The most eye-catching one was the centralponent. Inside their chest was the artificial representation for the heart, the pumping Spirit Magic Core.

    This is

    I came up with the idea! If they have a strong enough core, the monsters would probably be even stronger, Ramiris casually revealed with a smirk.

    Inymans terms, it was already very difficult to prepare one thousand Spirit Magic Cores. It wouldnt take me too long to craft them, but with ack of interest and passion, I considered it a chore and didnt have the motivation to make them. That was why I wanted to resort to something simpler. Yet, Ramiris was apparently too stubborn topromise. Looks like she did the work the traditional way to prepare the portions for one thousand bodies.

    They even had Emted Souls installed. It seemed that the technology to possess a homunculus from Sarion was also being utilized here.

    Although Beretta easily possessed his body, if it were Treyni-sans sisters, they presumably would struggle to achieve the same result. With that being said, using Emted Souls was probably the right choice.

    On the downside, this would obviously have led to a ton of work No wonder why sheined about theck of manpower.

    Ramiris-samas ideas were wonderful and truly intriguing. When I saw what she was trying to integrate, it wouldve been impossible not to assist her endeavor, Vesta exined with distant eyes.

    That was only natural. With the sheer amount of stuff here, he could have gotten as much data as he wanted.

    These fist-sized Spirit Magic Cores were all top-quality products. Whenbined with the skeletons I had built, the alteration greatly differed from my original design. There were even enchantments on the metallic bones. As magicules enveloped the skeleton, they began materializing as muscle tissue. We could further observe the process of how monsters were born.

    I finally understood why Vesta considered sleeping a waste of valuable time.

    How about it? Arent these all super fascinating?

    GAHAHAHA, seeing that expression on Rimurus face has already made it worth our time!

    Ramiris and Veldora were visibly pleased with themselves.

    Yes, its very interestingbut did Ramiris reallye up with this?

    Of course! Well, how about it? What do you think?!

    Apart from shouting her line, Ramiris also proudly puffed out her chest.

    Mhm, you can show off all you want this time. This is truly extraordinary stuff.

    While Ramiris looked a bit ditzy at first nce, she was still intelligent. She was highly knowledgeable about spirit engineering to the point of mastery, and right now she was also learning about magic science. I heard that shed been visiting level ny-five quite frequently.

    She didnt just idle around during her immense, cyclic lifespan. Her proficiency in thews of physics was exceptional. Surprisingly enough, she was fully qualified as a researcher.

    I cant allow her appearance to deceive me.

    Ahh, these are really impressive. And theyre all hand-crafted as well. How much work did you put in making this?

    It was super tiring. Although they arent dolls with ball joints like Beretta, but rather simply bodies imitating human skeletons, if we prepare heart-emting cores like this, Im sure that they will absorb arge quantity of magicules when submerged in the capsule.

    I wholeheartedly agreed with a nod after listening to Ramiriss opinion.

    Thus, we now had the ability to manufacture bodies that were far stronger than I had predicted. They would be the cream of the crop.

    Gazing at the vessels that were suspended in the capsules, I tried to estimate their potential strength. I suspected their magicule content would be at the top of rank Aand there were a thousand of them.

    This was all thanks to the integration of Spirit Magic Cores and Emted Souls.

    What an incredible feat. I was thoroughly impressed from the bottom of my heart.

    A few days had passed since Dinos unanticipated arrival. Diablo had yet to return, but I suspected that it was almost time. In order toplete the bodies early, I headed to the research facility today as well.

    The ce was bustling with activity; Ramiris was in a heated argument with Veldora.

    Like I said, I want to pour mentors magicules directly into the capsules to elerate the growth!

    But what would happen if you messed it up? Wouldnt all the me get pinned on me?

    These guys are up to no good.

    Having piqued my curiosity, I concealed myself and eavesdropped on them. I had be quite skilled at hiding my presencetely. It seemed Veldora didnt even realize I was there.

    Its okay with so many bodies here! Moreover, I will also show support for that thing mentor wants to request from Rimuru. So pleeeese, pretty please! Ramiris beseeched Veldora to donate some of his magicules.

    They sure are close. I couldnt help but smile at the scene.

    By the way, what was it that Veldora wanted to request from me? I had no idea, which further piqued my curiosity.

    I just cant get mad at you Just remember to support me on that thing, Veldora sighed, signaling his defeat.

    Mhm mhm, just count on me! Ramiris hurriedly reassured.

    It looked like they both came to an agreement. Veldora nodded with an Mhm. Despite acting all pompous, his expression clearly gave away the fact that he was more than happy to do it.

    On one hand, it was probably because of Ramiriss instigation, while on the other hand, he likely would have agreed regardless.

    Veldora raised his hand toward a capsule and bellowed, HYAA! It was quite the spectacle as he injected his magicules. The abnormally dense magicules began to swirl inside the capsule. The pressure within was so intense that it looked capable of sending the entire facility to kingdome.

    Will this really work?

    I was a bit apprehensive but continued to quietly observe with high expectations. Even if the cylinder broke, we could still revise our course of action. Compared to that, I was more curious about what Ramiris intended to aplish.

    Within the capsule, magicules crystallized and adhered to the magisteel skeleton, like moths to a me, forming artificial tissue. Everything followed Raphael-senseis n to a T.

    But with Veldora dumping a massive quantity of magicules, unexpected side effects were bound to arise. Arge amount was absorbed by the skeleton and consequently caused structural modifications.

    How strange? It seems different from what I expected Ramiris said, perplexed.

    Well, that was usually how scientific experiments went.

    The material that made up the skeleton could no longer be ssified as magisteel. We didnt mix any rare elements like gold or silver in, so it was neither orichalcum nor mithril. However, in terms of yield and tensile strength, while it was not as strong as the ultimate metal, Hihiirokane 5 , it was strong enough to rival orichalcum.

    But what bothered me the most was that despite being a type of metal, it almost looked alive

    Answer. Deducing that the wavelength of the individual Veldora has caused its quality to improve. It is a subset of the material adamantite. Following its ssification, the corresponding name is most likely dragotite.

    I see.

    Ramiris had attempted to speed up thepletion of the bodies, only to end up discovering a new, interesting metal instead.

    Hold on, looks like its not finished yet.

    W-wait a second, mentor! Stop, stooop!

    Huh? WOAHHH, theres a crack in the capsule!

    Ramiris and Veldora both eximed with consternation.

    Are these two geniuses or idiots? By the look of things right now, I cant tell for sure.

    What are you two doing?

    In order to clean up this mess before it got any bigger, I decided to reveal myself in front of the two. And so, while working to fix the damaged capsule, we grabbed some coffee to tide us over.

    We called Vesta and Dino as well and gathered together to enjoy coffee and cakes. The meal was prepared by the dryad Treyni-san.

    Tsk, we were just about to get to the good part Dinoined.

    Ah, so you dont want your cake? Then Ill give your share to Ramiris

    Sorry, I was just joking. No, wait. Even though what I said were my genuine feelings, it was just a slip of the tongue.

    Dinos reaction implied that he was pissed off about being interrupted while working. Yet, when I suggested taking his cake away, he immediately lowered his head and apologized.

    Are you really okay being like this, Dino-san? Are you really living up to the name Sleeping Ruler?

    Still, seeing that he was at least putting effort in reassured me a lot.

    Vesta and Dino were performing experiments together. I was told that they were recording data from the one thousand growth capsules. Additionally, when they had spare time, they left to examine Kurobees slotted weapons and his interchangeable magic crystal enchantments.

    The reason for their sudden interest was because I bragged about it.

    If the oue of the research went well, it may even contribute to the construction of the Elemental Colossus. That exined why Vesta was eager to start his own investigation on Magic Marble Combination.

    I gave Dino a couple of magic marbles as samples to y around with, while Vesta would observe and jot down detailed notes. Noticing Dinos displeasure when I called him over to rx with us, it became obvious that he was enjoying research. It was work, but the line between work and y had blurred. Dino would go on some tangent about not wanting to be productive, yet he seemed to have already assimted into this professional workce without realizing.

    It is imperative to enjoy your work.

    Next

    As I finished thest of my coffee, I turned to face Ramiris.

    By the way, Ramiris, why were you in such a hurry toplete the bodies for possession? I asked rather directly.

    Ah, about that Ramiris was dodging the question.

    Coming to her aid, Treyni-san interjected, Please hold on, Rimuru-sama. Ramiris-sama was doing this for my sisters andpanions. She was simply trying her best for them!

    I didnt mean to chide her, but Treyni-san mistook my intentions and tried very hard to defend her. She was usually like this as well. To be honest, I thought Treyni-san outright spoiled Ramiris.

    Its not that, I just wanted to know her reasons. Im not scolding her, dont worry. So, why did you do it, Ramiris?

    I attempted to calm Treyni-san down and continued to question Ramiris for her rationale.

    Ummnow that I have some time to think it over, I was being too rash. These children admire me a lot, so I wanted them to get their own bodies earlier. This way, they would be happy, and we would also get extra help. The more the merrier, right?

    Ramiris was quite embarrassed as she answered.

    I could empathize with her motivation. The dryads could move freely around thebyrinth without a body, whereas the treants couldnt. Although treants retained the ability to reposition near where they were rooted, they couldnt possibly leave the forest and enter areas without soil. Essentially, without a body, their mana would steadily dissipate over time, which was detrimental to their well-being.

    The same concept applied to the dryads, where if they were too far away from their corpus, then their strength would greatly diminish as well. They were considered high tier species among the rank A monsters and much stronger than greater majins. If the same restrictions also applied to the dryads, then demanding more from the treants, a lower species, would be far too cruel.

    From Ramiriss point of view, with the dolls that were cultivated in the growth capsules, not only the dryads, but even the treants would possess the capability to effortlessly travel in the future. That was probably why she wanted to test her idea out on some of the dolls behind my back.

    If thats the case, you could have discussed it with me. Diablo hasnte back yet, and theres no telling how many subordinates that guy will bring. If there arent enough, we can always make moreter. Lets first prepare the bodies for the dryads, I suggested with a genial tone.

    Can we really? Ramiris excitedly inquired.

    Of course.

    Thank you, Rimuru!

    She flitted around me, overjoyed.

    To be fair, this decision was also made with my best interests in mind. We trulycked the number of people necessary to operate efficiently. Treyni-sans sisters, as well as the other dryads, were all assisting with running thebyrinth and its rted matters. They were already busy enough as is and couldnt spare any more time. If this were to continue, everyone would be overworked since administering thebyrinth required twenty-four-seven attention. That was why I desperately needed more staff to fill in the shifts.

    With these state-of-the-art bodies, even the treants would rise to rank A and be able to move unhindered inside thebyrinth. Furthermore, in the rare case that their bodies were destroyed, their original corpus wouldnt be harmed. However, they could only travel as far as their willpower allowedin essence, only within the confines of Ramirissbyrinthbut that was sufficient.

    As for the dryads

    By the way, we should turn Trya-san, Triss, Alpha, and the rest of the dryads all into dryas dolls

    Huh?

    Is it really okay? Treyni-sanunched her question at me with terrifying fervor, all before I could even finish my proposal.

    Can we really do that, Rimuru? Ramiris nervously asked,pletely ignoring Dino and the others who were unfortunately left out of the discussion.

    Can we do what?

    Thatevolving them into dryas doll dryads 6 . But wont that take a lot of work?

    I suppose, but theyve also contributed their fair share. I hope they will continue to help us with thebyrinths management in the future as well.

    All because Rimuru-sama allowed us to live here Since Ramiris-sama is determined to support Rimuru-sama, we naturally will follow Ramiris-samas wishes as her subordinates, Treyni-san admitted.

    After hearing my reply to Ramiris, Treyni-san seemed rather guilty.

    With that being said, we benefited tremendously from the dryads involvement within thebyrinth. In a sense, this was my token of appreciation for them. I wanted to give them the opportunity to act on their own. Although it required handcrafting humanoid dolls, I was quite keen on matters involving creating dolls for beauties or bishojos.

    I originally nned on using the same bodies I had prepared for Diablo, but that would seem like a cheap gesture. Dryads should use wooden dolls.

    No no no, you guys really helped out a lot, so please enjoy these. And whether they wish to directly possess these bodies or be a dryas doll dryad by possessing extra wood from their original tree host, the choice will be up to them, I proposed to Treyni-san.

    She nodded happily.

    Ramiris muttered on the side, Hey you, why are you more polite talking to Treyni-chan than to me? I wont take that

    But Ill just pretend I never heard that.

    As soon as break time was over, Vesta and the others returned to work.

    Looks like this ce is beyond my field of expertise, but its still very fun. Ill go finish my work now. Lets go, Vesta-san.

    Understood, Dino-sama.

    And somewhere along the line, Dino put emphasis on the word work as he left with Vesta.

    This guy had clearly never done anything productive until he came here. He was a waste of space before, but since hed been working hard, I would overlook his past behavior. Speaking of which, I needed to work on my own stuff as well

    Hold on, Rimuru. I have something to ask of you. Ramiris, its time to fulfill your part of the bargain!

    I guessed that he was going to trouble me with something, so I was trying to run away. It appeared Veldora had been waiting for the moment right after break time ended.

    And what is it that you need me for?

    Truthfully, I really didnt wanna do it, but I still begrudgingly replied, nheless.

    Umm, the thing is

    Mentor said he wanted an assistant. It will be a good thing if we have more people to help, thats why I alsowell, have a favor to ask

    Uhh, my ominous feeling came true! More hassle was headed my way

    Were already understaffed right now, so who could we possibly spare to be Veldoras ymate?

    No no no, everyone is very busy. They dont have time to hang out with you

    Wait a second! Rimuru, you got it all wrong. I have been helping Ramiris and guarding thebyrinth, all very important tasks. If I can have an assistant at my side and praise me from time to time, then it will have quite the therapeutic effect. That way, I wont be exhausted quickly, Veldora passionately argued.

    Ramiris disyed her support with vigorous nods. However, since I already heard every bit of their conversation just moments ago, I could only think You really do stick to your end of the bargain. But, since no one avable came to mind, I would have to end that train of thought.

    No. Unfortunately

    Hold on, hold on, hold on!

    I was interrupted yet again.

    Veldora apparently did not want to back off. He was adamantly standing his ground.

    To be honest, when I was staying inside your Stomach, I met someone whom I can call a friend. I hope that you can give him a body just like the ones you are preparing here, Veldora suddenly revealed.

    I was clueless. What kind of friend are you talking about here?

    Answer. The individual is deduced to be the greater spirit Ifrit.

    Huh? How did Veldora befriend Ifrit?

    Answer. Individual Veldora intervened at the time to move Ifrit to the same isted position during Masters Predation.

    I see, it is exactly what Raphael-san described.

    When I consumed Ifrit from Shizu-san, he was moved to the space in my Stomach where Veldora had been isted. This, however, did not affect us from taking Ifrits data. Thats why Raphael-sensei, or Great Sage at the time, did not resist the change and allowed it without notifying me. Since it wasnt an inconvenience, I only discovered this fact just now. That is to say, unbeknownst to me, Veldora befriended Ifrit.

    Ahh, so you want me to revive Ifrit?

    GAHAHAHA! As expected from Rimuru, you understood me so quickly!

    Veldora-san was delighted, but on the other hand, I had mixed feelings. Ifrit and Shizu-san were totally ipatible with each other, and he was also Demon Lord Leons subordinate. If I were to revive Ifrit, would he y nice? With this thought in mind, I couldnt just agree to his proposal so easily.

    Hmm

    S-so thats a no?

    R-Rimuru, I want to ask you too! Please fulfill mentors wish!

    While I deliberated, Veldora gazed at me with sad puppy eyes whereas Ramiris pleaded for her mentors sake.

    What a headache. I was quite troubled with this turn of events.

    To be honest, I preferred having more people to work for us, but I just didnt feel safe releasing Ifrit. Despite his modest appearance, he was still head and shoulders above any second-rate greater majin in terms of strength. Although we would win if he were to start a fuss, damage would be inevitable. He might even wind end up fleeing back to Leon. I wouldnt want to wake a sleeping babyI figured it was understandable for me to think this way.

    However, Ifrit seemed to have pledged his loyalty to Demon Lord Leon before Are you really sure hes willing to be your assistant after being revived?

    Uh? Umm umm, thats definitely the case. You dont have to worry about it. My sincerity has moved Ifrit. That guy really is willing to be my assistant, Veldora hurriedly reassured.

    Oi. Seriously?

    For a brief second, Veldora seemed like he was talking to someone; it had to be Ifrit himself. In other words, Veldora wasmunicating with him in my body in some unknown fashion.

    Were you just talking to Ifrit?

    Yeah, I can do anything.

    Mentor is super amazing. He asked Ifrit to summon a bunch of me smanders for the magitrain! Thats why we should n for the future and make him one of ourpanions, trilled Ramiris.

    I see how it is.

    Indeed, within thebyrinth itself, Ramiris could summon spirits at will with ease. However, once the magitrainmenced operations, it would be much more reassuring if someone could actuallymand the smanders. Guuhh, I really couldnt refuse the proposal from a profit standpoint. Moreover, Veldora personally guaranteed that he would take care of Ifrit.

    I suppose I will put my faith in Veldora.

    All right, all right, since you are so convinced, just make sure you take responsibility for the whole thing!

    All right, just leave it to me!

    This is great, Mentor!

    Veldora and Ramiris were hyped up like I was going to buy them a pet or something. Hopefully, my faith in Veldora being responsible wouldnt backfire.

    Then lets

    Right, right, Rimuru. Dont we still have the shell of the magic core of Charybdis? That contains the remainder of my mana, so it can adapt to my power easily. Ifrit has been submerged in my youki for a long time, so using that as a Core would be better.

    ording to Veldora, thepatibility would work better than an Emted Soul.

    Answer. I agree with the views of individual Veldora.

    Since Raphael had agreed, I had no reason to object.

    Okay, then we will use this body for Ifrit to take over.

    I stood in front of the growth capsule that had just been repaired before our break.

    A skeleton originally made of magisteel, which had transformed into a unique metal called dragotite, was floating inside. Inferior beings wouldnt be able to endure the exposure to Veldoras excessive magicules. However, since Ifrit was a greater spirit, he should be able to hold his own.

    Oh ho, this is great. That guy will be happy as well, Veldora assured as well.

    I began to execute the conversion without hesitation.

    Report. Remains of Ifrit have been discovered. Transferring to the magic core of Charybdis Sessful. Proceeding to phase two, constructing soul container Merging with the body made up of dragotite.

    The operation waspleted in an instant.

    As expected from Raphael-sensei, how masterful.

    The next moment

    After Veldora, Ramiris, and I watched the body receive Ifrits core, its form underwent drastic changes. Muscles and blood vessels started growing on the silver ck skeleton. Skin quickly formed the finalyer, and just like Veldora, it had a tanned hue. Its head was veiled with wavy long hair, whose ck color gave off an impressive sheen. There were highlights of red intertwined, like a burning me was scattered within. It had golden eyes, while its dragon-like pupils glowed a deep scarlet.

    Eh, no matter how you looked at it, that figure was a female. And a superb beauty as well.

    Oh oh, Ifrit, how does it feel to return to the mortal realm with a body?mented Veldora.

    Ah, so this femme fatale was undeniably Ifrit. Putting aside whether spirits really possessed genders, I explicitly remembered that it had a more masculine body type. How did this change happen?

    Veldora-sama, this is the first time I have seen you in this world. And Rimuru-sama, I am eternally grateful for you resurrecting me.

    Despite my confusion, Ifrit kneeled as soon as she finished speaking. I was afraid that Ifrit would rebel out of her loyalty for Leon, but it seemed that I had worried for nothing. Immense relief flooded through me.

    Oh, oh oh, Im d you look well. But I want to ask you something I wavered for a moment.

    Please ask away.

    I had so many questions. However, what I was most curious about

    I recall that your previous look was more suited forbat, I mean, you looked a lot more agile moving around

    And you didnt have gigantic breasts like those, right?

    I didnt dare say thest line out loud. I didnt have the audacity.

    You couldnt exactly me me for thinking this way. Ifrit only had a few thin articles of clothing that covered her private areas. She was aiming for a super-hot belly dancer outfit. Her elbows, belly, thighs were all exposed, which came off as really erotic.

    Are you referring to this look

    Upon saying so, Ifrit suddenly sighed for some reason.

    I am afraid this was Veldora-samas fauI mean his will.

    She wanted to say, It was Veldoras fault, didnt she?

    Ifrit seemed a bit worn out, and I got the impression that she was wholly exasperated. Could it be that shes been suffering the whole time in my Stomach? Now that I thought about it, Ifrit had been alone with Veldora for approximately two years with no means of escape. I was pretty sure she had a rough time.

    Hmph! It was thanks to me that you got a body. Do remember to be grateful! Veldora reproached.

    Understood.

    Ifrits reply sounded rather forced.

    You said it was the will of Veldora. What did you mean by that? I inquired, wanting rification.

    Hmm?

    Oh, about that. Even though I am a greater fire elemental spirit, now I can somehow wield wind elemental power as well. My hair should have been red, yet for some reason its color is mostly dark. I believe that Veldora-samas power has influenced it greatly. Furthermore, it may have been because the Charybdis was a female that I ended up looking like this.

    Report. Correct.

    She got it right?! Oi oi, can you really change something like gender this casually?

    I didnt mean to offend her, so hopefully she wouldnt hate me for it.

    W-well, if you are not satisfied with it

    How could I be unsatisfied. Putting aside my appearance, I have be far stronger than I had ever been before, Ifrit dered while cracking a brilliant smile.

    Veldora had probably teased her so much to the point where she had grown ustomed to it. She seemed to be tremendously adaptable. It also made her quite affable. Unlike when she was fused with Shizu-san, I couldnt sense any malicious intent from Ifrit anymore.

    Do you not hate me?

    No, how could I hate you? Veldora-sama taught me many things while I was trapped inside Rimuru-sama. Thinking back, the sense of duty and responsibility Shizue Izawa and I both shared was very strong. However, our ideologies were diametrically opposed, and so we werent able to build any other connections. I cant help but think that maybe we could have changed the way we treated each other.

    It looked like Ifrit genuinely didnt harbor even the slightest trace of resentment against me. She was even regretful to have never opened her heart up to Shizu-san. I couldnt help but feel saddened.

    We decided to go to a different venue to discuss ns for the future.

    Thus, I chatted with Ifrit for a while. Just as I suspected, she truly had endured arduous hardships. Before I knew it, she grew on me.

    If I were to appoint anyone to deal with Veldora, then I would appoint her without hesitation. She was still reminiscent of Demon Lord Leon, but not to the point of pledging her loyalty to him again.

    Even though Rimuru-sama defeated and almost killed me, I was lucky enough to have been saved by Veldora-sama so that my consciousness wasnt erased. That said, I am self-aware now as well, and I feel different from before. I still think that Leon-sama is an incredible demon lord, but I wish to pledge my loyalty to Veldora-sama now, she exined, clearly expressing her will.

    I believed Ifrit was worthy of my trust, and besides, Veldora seemed to haveplete confidence in her from the beginning. I probably didnt need to worry that much.

    I understand. Then please continue to work hard in the future as Veldoras assistant!

    Yes sir. I am willing to give it my all and pledge my loyalty to Veldora-sama.

    Ifrit sure was serious.

    I still felt kind of bugged with the whole ordeal regarding Shizu-san. But since Ifrit had shown remorse, it was all water under the bridge.

    And so, I decided to ept Ifrit.

    By the way, Rimuru, I have something else to discuss with you, Veldora slyly added.

    What is it again?!

    I legitimately did not want to deal with any more of these annoyances. Yet if I ignored him, hed probably nag me to death.

    What is it, Veldora-kun?

    Um! Heres the thing, I want to name Ifrit. You see, Ifrit is an individual name, but at the same time its not. Thats because all the greater fire elemental spirits summoned through the Spirit Summoning me Giant Ifrit are called Ifrit

    Wow, a surprisingly serious suggestion. A name, indeed, was warranted. HoweverNaming could be very dangerous. Now, even if I, who had experienced several miscalctions during naming, was saying this, then you knew it was credible.

    Wont it be dangerous naming Ifrit now? Your magicule content is huge, but theres gonna be a big problem if you dont know how much to give!

    Giving too many magicules had the same effect as poisoning, and the one being named would be in danger as well. The fact that no idents happened during my namings was purely due to good luck.

    GAHAHAHA, but I can leave all that to you, right? If I were to give away too much, you should be able to cut me off with our Soul Corridor.

    Hmm, that would indeed be safer.

    Report. Please leave it to me.

    Welp, since Raphael said so, we should be fine.

    Very well, I shall assist you, I dered.

    Oh, I knew youd say so!

    And so, Veldora named Ifrit.

    Ifrit, from today onward you shall be known as Charys! he proimed in a majestic tone.

    Charysthat would be Ifrits name. Clearly, the name Charys had nothing to do with Ifrit, but instead was an abridged version of Charybdis. Although, in my honest opinion, a name like Irys would have been more fitting. However, it wouldve been a bit too rude to interject now.

    Through the Soul Corridor, I observed arge amount of magicules disappear from Veldoras body.

    Ifrits magicule content was already at Special rank Ameaning she rivaled the strength of a Cmity-ss monster. While she was weaker than Shion and Benimaru, she could put up an even fight against Souei and Geld. And now that Ifrit received a name

    Understood. I shall henceforth be known as Charys. I pledge my loyalty to the servitude of the great Veldora-sama!

    Ifrit epted her name. At that instant, Raphael shutdown Soul Corridor and cut off Veldoras power.

    It worked. Veldora sessfully named Ifrit. The me giant began to evolveit was practically exploding with magicules, rapidly reaching the level of a demon lord-ss. Ifrit not only surpassed Treyni-san, but seemed to have even surpassed Karion and Frey.

    Report. Greater spirit me Giant Ifrit has evolved into me Lord.

    Raphael-san dutifully notified me.

    A me lord, you say?

    This race was a spiritual life-form that gained a physical body through monsterficationessentially, exposure to a massive amount of magicules.

    GAHAHAHA! Well done! I knew I could count on you, Rimuru.

    Veldora-san sounded particrly pleased, yet he frowned as soon as he saw Ifrit. Her appearance had greatly altered once again. Or rather, it was restored to its original form. Its hair was still the same pattern of ck and red, but its body had reverted back to more masculine proportions. Although some changes remained, Ifrits will might have strongly influenced this physical transformation.

    Tsk, and I went the extra mile for funI mean, I thought youd look better, so I made you beautiful. I never knew itd turn out like this, Veldorained.

    So it was his fault, after all.

    IfritI mean, Charys, sighed in resignation, I see that it was true. I should have guessed so. Luckily, my will has triumphed, which is reassuring. That said, I can change back to my female form if you were to insist

    No need, no need, I was just joking around. I wontin if you can maintain your preferred form!

    Veldoras jokes were some.

    Even though Charys sessfully restored his appearance, he had the option of reverting back to his old look. I needed to be careful in the future as well.

    How are you feeling?

    I feel very good, my lordeh, t-this is?!

    After my question, Charys suddenly realized the change in his body. Dazed, he began to confirm his strength.

    S-such tremendous power

    He was taken aback by his own power.

    Kukuku, you got that right.

    Veldora-san gave off a satisfied smile like he had predicted this oue.

    About your race, you apparently evolved into a me lord, I casually added.

    Y-you said me lord?! I cannot believe that I now wield such power

    I suppose he really couldnt. To suddenly gain the strength to rival those of the demon lord-ss immediately after being resurrected, it was no wonder he had such a reaction.

    Despite the fact that you became this strong, your job was still to take care of Veldora. In addition, if you were to be too powerful, you had to be wary of Veldora exploiting you even more. I was bing somewhat sympathetic to our new addition.

    And so, we gained a newpanion by the name of Charys.

    It wasnt long before Charys settled in and immediately began being exploited by both Veldora and Ramiris. Although my worries came true, he didnt seem to mind, so I guess it was fine. With this new assistant, our efficiency in researching improved significantly.

    Um, since when did we get such a tough guy as our new member? Dino asked, dumbfounded.

    When you were still addicted to ying with magic marblebinations, I replied.

    No no no, you made it sound so simple! This is a spirit lord that can rival demon lords were talking about here!

    Actually, its a monster spirit lord.

    Whatever! I dont give a crap what type of lord it is! Thats not my point!

    Dino was the only one who was shocked. Meanwhile, everyone else was already ustomed to this sort of oue.

    Ah ah, dont get so worked up now. This type of thing just happens, you know? added Vesta.

    No, butVesta-san?

    Ramiris alsoforted Dino by saying: Dino-chan, you shouldnt be surprised at trivial things like these while spending time with Rimuru and Mentor.

    But, thats

    Dino wasnt capable of epting this reality. However, he finally relented after everyone talked it out with him.

    You get used to it. Sometimes, it was better to not overthink things.

    Afterwards, I began cutting down the necessary wood to craft dolls and evolve the dryads into dryas doll dryads. Unlike their original counterparts, these dryas doll dryads could wield their true strength even when they were far from their roots.

    No one was against the idea of evolving, either.

    And so, the number of dryas doll dryads we had increased to nearly ten. They didnt have anybat experience, and none of them was stronger than Treyni-san. However, they had plenty of opportunities to train in thebyrinth. In the near foreseeable future, they would surely be capable servants of Ramiris.

    In addition, the bodies that I wanted to lend to the treantsor rather, the humanoid dollswere also nearpletion. These bodies were only being used for possession, so it didnt really matter whether they were strong or not.

    There were no issues withpatibility either. With this, around a hundred plus several dozen treants would be able to roam inside thebyrinth. I regretted the fact that we didnt start recruitment much earlier. We would have secured a considerable number of capable people from the start.

    The dryads were mostly in female forms while the treants were mostly male. Since they were spirits, they didnt seem to have specific genders. That was why I focused more on efficiency when crafting the dolls. The treants could modify the details to suit their own tastes when they possessed them.

    Once we were finished, they began the transfer almost immediately. With some minor work here and there, the operation was finallyplete. Now with all the new helpers, we wouldnt be that busy anymore.

    Thank you, Rimuru-sama!

    I shook my head as I heard Treyni-san thanking me. This was really nothing. I had always wanted to express my gratitude for all the help they provided.

    Well then, Ill be counting on you guys in the future as well. Ramiris, report to me if anything happens.

    Roger that! Ill fly straight away to inform you.

    I told her to notify me should any problems arise.

    There was still some work at hand for me to do.

    For one, I had to attend daily meetings with Rigurd and Myourmiles to make executive decisions. Even criminal trials required my verdict now. It was also my duty to mediate disputes between my lieutenants. I genuinely wanted to help out with the research here, but reality often intervened. I desperately needed to scout some talent that would alleviate my workloadthat was my task at hand. I could still find time for my hobbies since I technically didnt require sleep, but sometimes you just wanna ck off for a bit, ya know? And I thought I was all mouth and no trousers, but it looked like I was really diligent after all.

    While feeling a sense of doubt towards this statement, I headed back to my office.

    Diablo-sama has returned with some strangers. He wishes to see you; what should we do?

    The long-awaited news had finally arrived.

    Now if it were only Diablo, then he would have just casually strolled in. However, he had guests with him this time. Although I felt that it was troublesome to do this, since there were other people around, I decided we should go through with the standard procedure.

    Let me see them right now before Benimaru catches wind of this and wants to greet them together.

    I shall meet them in the reception room. Summon them immediately!

    The attendant bowed respectfully before leaving. Her movements were rather stiff. She must have felt very nervous around me. I thought to myself, this really cant be helped, before asking the other attendant waiting next door to prepare some tea.

    Shuna was busy with her work. During the day, she wouldbor at some other venue, though she would always prepare meals for me in the evening.

    Shion, on the other hand, was training the Yomigaeri inside thebyrinth. She seemed to be examining just how difficult it was to kill them, and thus was conducting extremely rigorous training. I heard that they were currently residing in the lower levels, so I shouldnt bother them if nothing important came up.

    This was why I had two attendants serving me now. Even though they were goblinas that had evolved from goblins, they were indistinguishable from humans. Recently, some simple cosmetic items that Shuna had developed were growing popr as well. This was probably why our female citizens were bing ever more beautiful.

    Had I not been their master, theyd probably be top-tier servants who wouldnt even break a sweat when confronted with foreign dignitaries. Their skills were masterful.

    I began moving towards the reception roomthe sturdy one, by the way. Despite the fact that I figured nothing would go wrong, it was always better safe than sorry. Speaking of which, I had no clue just how weird the subordinates chosen by Diablo would be.

    When I entered the guest room, the attendants brought out tea and desserts. The preparation was wless. As I thought so, someone approached the room.

    Rimuru-sama, I have returned!

    With a happy smile, Diablo also entered. Though I shouldnt be saying this, Diablos smile looked extraordinarily evil. While I may not have seen it that way, other people would probably have considered his smile as a bad omen. He was emanating an evil aura as if he were up to no good.

    Today, I have brought the people I had hoped to show to Rimuru-sama. I couldnt be happier if your grace wished to meet them.

    Like usual, Diablo greeted me with the utmost respect. It was to the point of being excessive, but I was getting used to it by now. This guy treated me like his one and only master, almost like a god.

    Three females followed Diablo in.

    He told me that he was looking for subordinates, so were these women the ones? They appeared to be rather young; however, age was irrelevant to demons. I had no idea how many years Diablo had lived through, but since he said that they were his old acquaintances, they had probably been alive for quite some time.

    Urged by Diablo, the three women bowed to me and seated themselves on the sofa.

    Are these girls your old friends?

    They dont look particrly strong

    Negative. These three are the highest race among the demonsarchdemons. It is suspected that these individuals are concealing their magicules perfectly and are mimicking a human being.

    Raphael was quick toment and correct my misunderstanding. Lately, my appraisal had be more urate, but it seemed that I still had room for improvement. After hearing Raphaels words, I tried to raise the precision of Magic Perception. Yet, no matter how hard I looked, they resembled ordinary humans.

    Eh, did you just say archdemon?

    Compared to a greater demon summoning, the chances of calling an archdemon was next to impossible. After all, one archdemon would already be a strategic force to be reckoned with.

    Sometimes, a summon would fail even after great sacrifices. If humans were to summon them, they would have to prepare a huge ritual at the national level. And right here in front of me were three archdemons. I should have guessed, considering that Diablo used to be one as well.

    Indeed. I thought only people at my level would be worthy to meet Rimuru-sama in this ce, Diablo proudly stated.

    Is that so? They are truly impressive to have blended in like that. In fact, they all seem like normal humans. Perhaps even the Holy Knights wouldnt be able to tell that they were archdemons.

    My words shook the three a bit. Diabloughed happily in response.

    Kufufufufu, as expected from Rimuru-sama. I told them to try their best to hide their race, yet you saw through it with such ease.

    Seeing Diablos reaction, I nodded pompously and replied, I guess. This was actually all thanks to Raphael-san.

    And the others?

    Only seven were worthy

    Yeesh. This guy was a bit too harsh.

    I already prepared a thousand bodies for you, and in the end, you gave me less than ten

    With that being said, the treants already used more than a hundred of them, so this might have worked in our favor.

    And the remaining are small fry. However, they are the subordinates of these people, so thats why I considered letting them enjoy the honor of joining Rimuru-samas ranks.

    Ah, so there were more.

    In that case, how many have you brought?

    To answer that, they will have to report with the details, Diablo concluded.

    Nice to meet you, Rimuru-sama. I feel greatly ashamed to meet you as a nameless one. I hope to be in your care. Ive heard that Noir-chan 7 highly admires you, which, to be honest, was hard for me to believe at firstbut now I can see why.

    Is that so?

    An alluringdy stood up and greeted me. She had a head of pure white hair. Her movements were refined and elegant, like nobility. She had a dazzling smile, one that radiated warmth and grace; she was nothing like a demon at all.

    Indeed, my heart started racing the moment Iid eyes on you. I hope that Rimuru-sama will allow me and my two hundred subordinates to join your ranks, the white-haired beauty proimed with a charming smile.

    Being praised like that made me blush a little. But thanks to Diablo, I was already conditioned to it. I better take this type of praise as a given from now on and ignore it.

    Me too, sir. I, along with my two hundred servants, wish to follow Rimuru-sama, a purple-haired bishojo dered energetically. Her side ponytail only further entuated her appearance, making her look extra cute. She was so cute that I earnestly doubted if she really was a demon despite what Raphael-san just told me.

    I dont object either! I, along with my two hundred soldiers, pledge my service to Rimuru-sama! a young girl with a head of shining blonde hair announced rather arrogantly.

    Seeing that a somewhat annoyed Diablo was about to stand up, I reached out my hand to stop him. She seemed to be trying her best to show me the maximum amount of courtesy she could muster. I saw no reason to scold her for that.

    And so, I greeted everyone here.

    The threedies and their two hundred subordinates each.

    In total, six hundred demons are about to join meI mean, join the ranks of Diablo? He sure is a terrifying guy.

    I never expected him to prepare an actual army.

    Kufufufufu, they each have two lieutenants, and there was one other person that caught my attention as well. That person has around one hundred subordinates of his own. Thus, there are approximately seven hundred in total. I, originally, was nning to recruit one thousand. I must apologize, I feel tremendously ashamed by my ipetence, Diablomented.

    Oh, no no! Dont be so hard on yourself. Let me see them first.

    So, its not six hundred, but seven hundred That just seems a bit excessive.

    Oh, thank you so much! Before that, regarding how I recruited them, please allow me to report in detail

    Is it going to be long?

    Yes, very long, in fact. However, this is to inform Rimuru-sama of my exploits

    Diablo was ready to start his lengthy brag post.

    I stopped him immediately.

    Then never mind. They probably dont want to hear you boasting either, so tell me in the future when the chance arises.

    Although there wouldnt be any chances like that.

    Diablo froze up on the spot in shock.

    Seeing his reaction, the three demonesses snickered among themselves. Obviously, they were just as worried about having to sit patiently through Diablos long andborious speech.

    Knowing that my judgement was correct sure was satisfying. I spoke again with a grin, Its inappropriate to let the others wait so long, so do introduce them as well.

    Y-yes sir. Then let us change the venue

    Diablos face was filled with regret. But I wasnt spoiling him this time.

    Ill admit that Diablo was an outstanding subordinate, but giving him treats like this in front of our new recruits would be a very bad influence. I couldnt let people think that I was endorsing nepotism with him, so he would have to endure it for a bit. And of course, I didnt want to waste time listening to him bbering on and onbut since these were my genuine thoughts, there was no need to say them out loud.

    Diablo quickly regained hisposure. It was probably because he was a spiritual life-form that his spirit was so resilient.

    Jeez, why are my words such a big deal to you? He always took whatever I said a little too seriously. What a fascinating guy.

    Since summoning all those people in town would be troublesome, lets head to thebyrinth first, Diablo said.

    On the bright side, he seemed to have matured somewhat. At least now he was a bit more mindful of others.

    And just when I was about to be impressed by his newfound growth, Diablo quickly dashed my hopes.

    Kufufufufu, it will ruin the barrier if we gather those guys there. That magic circle was meticulously handcrafted by Rimuru-sama, so I must be extra cautious.

    Youre looking at this thepletely wrong way! And just when I got my hopes up to boot.

    Speaking of which, his words did remind me about something. Here in the capital city of Rimuru, we applied an experimental barrier that epassed the entire area. It was an improved version of the holy purification barrier, and it could suppress the magicules leaked from monsters. Since many humans were visiting the town, this was created to guarantee their safety.

    Even though it was slightly burdensome for the monster residents, it wasnt a big enough deal to interfere with their daily lives. As long as they were able to handle it without any issues, we could ensure that the magicule density was maintained at a human-friendly level.

    Moreover, it would prevent the casting of unauthorized magic and protect the town from wild monsters. Any monster capable of destroying the barrier had to be, at the very least, Special A rank; otherwise known as a cmity-ss threat. And even if they werent, they still wouldnt be able to just destroy it instantly. If anything abnormal were to happen to the barrier, we would notice right away. During that time, the guards would take care of the problem. Speaking of A ranked magic beasts, they werent a threat if they were non-intelligent. Mindless beasts would be a piece of cake for our elite soldiers.

    I was just worried that there may be people among the seven hundred demons who were capable of breaking this important barrier. The three in front of me could easily destroy it, but perhaps there were even more dangerous demons amidst their ranks?

    Diablo was no slouch when it came to evaluating people. When he said that those seven were capable, he clearly meant it

    Thus, we made our way to the research facility inside thebyrinth.

    I permit you to show yourself. Come now! Diablo ordered.

    Seven demons appeared right after and knelt down. Behind them were seven hundred more, that swiftly followed suit.

    Should I say that this was to be expected?

    There were six archdemons among the seven. Thebyrinth had mechanisms that prevented the leakage of magicules, so anything that happened inside had minimal impact on the surface. That was why the demons were able to reveal all their ominous appearances.

    Speaking of which, the seven in front of me were the ones Diablo personally recognized. They indeed had the presence of strong demons. Although one of them was a greater demon, he appeared to be a special case. Surely, he had some level of strength as well. I heard that this demon actively sought after a fight with Diablo, though Diablo promptly beat the crap out of him afterward.

    He had guts, which was good. On the other hand, it was never a good idea to challenge someone without knowing how dangerous they were. With that being said, he was definitely an oddball.

    ording to Diablo, he had challenged him over and over again for some reason. This wasnt a problem about having guts or not. He was definitely an idiot. However, Diablo seemed to have taken a liking to this greater demon. Since Diablo liked him, I wasnt going toin.

    Moreover

    What I was more concerned about from the start, were the three demons. Each of the three had two subordinate archdemons under their service. Beyond magicule content alone, they definitely had more to them than what meets the eye.

    Answer. Demon race has no definite life span. As such, the older a demon is, the morebat experience it has. In the world of demons, they divide sses simr to how divisions between Royalty and Nobility work. Among them, the ruling ss has enormous authority, which distinguishes them from other demons like night and day

    Is that so?

    Ive heard about the demon race having growth limits, and how they could at most only evolve to archdemon. After that point, instead of being judged based on their racial hierarchy, they were ranked based on theirbat experience. A ss that distinguished their true strength, one could say.

    Even though the demons may have simr magicule content, each demons fighting ability varied greatly. This included their knowledge, their ambition, and their willpower. The existence of a demon was established bybining these constructs.

    Furthermore

    Archdemons are also ssified in terms of the era they were born.

    There were legendary demons who had lived for over three thousand years the prehistoric species.

    There were great demons who had lived for over a thousand yearsthe ancient species.

    There were those who had lived for over four hundred years or morethe medieval species.

    There were those who had lived for around a hundred yearsthe early modern species.

    There were those who had lived for only around half the lifespan of most humansthe modern species.

    There were those who were just bornthete modern species.

    Andstlythe primordials who were defined as the original demons.

    The extent of a demons power is determined by the number of years theyve lived. The ruling ss refers to the ancient species and olderthe equivalent of counts and their superiors.

    Thanks for the detailed exnation.

    Raphael-sensei was kind enough to provide in-depth information on demons for me. Much appreciated.

    Well then, lets put this knowledge to the test by observing the demons in front of me.

    The threedies who arrived first were among the ruling ss, so lets assume the six archdemons here were younger than the ancient species. Did this mean that, apart from the three from before, Diablo was also an old demon that was ranked higher than count?

    I had no clue before, but it looked like I had gotten my hands on an incrediblepanion. This realization sent shivers down my spine. It was then that Diablo began speaking with a smile, These fellows have great potential. I enlightened them about just how magnificent and amazing Rimuru-sama was, and they ended up crying and begging for the honor and privilege to pledge their loyalties to you. This was why I considered bringing them along.

    And so, Diabloid out an engrossing tale. Although, I had the sneaking suspicion that he might have embellished the story a little bit there.

    I scrutinized these seven demons. They probably did cry and beg, though I highly doubted whether or not they actually said anything about pledging their loyalty. After all, they showed signs of being roughed up here and there, especially the lower-ranked greater demon. I was amazed that he was even alive, given his current condition.

    In short, Diablo was concocting fables again.

    The seven demons looked like they wanted to say something, but with their superior right next to them, they didnt dare speak up. They were pretty tameI mean, probably because a certain someone had threatened them.

    From now on, we are the loyal servants of Demon Lord Rimuru-sama. We await yourmands!

    The seven demons simultaneously bowed their heads and pledged their fealty to me, prompting the seven hundred demons behind to mirror their actions. The synchronized kneeling of seven hundred demons was quite the sight to behold.

    Diablo smiled with satisfaction as he nodded, seemingly in approval.

    What a terrifying guy. I felt relieved that he was fortunately on my side.

    Since the demons were spiritual life-forms, without physical corpora, their mana would gradually dissipate if they remained in this world. It would be difficult for them to maintain this form for a long time, so it was imperative that we granted them bodies as soon as possible.

    The method was simple.

    First, use Gluttonous King Beelzebuth to predate on the demons. Then, use Wisdom King Raphael to fuse them onto the Emted Souls of the figures growing in the growth capsules.

    Of course, the result was a resounding sess. After obtaining their bodies, the demons began changing to their preferred forms. They wouldpletely integrate in two to three days.

    However, there were problems with the three demonesses. I felt that it was inappropriate to give them the same treatment as their subordinates. They were Diablos old friends, so I might as well give them some special privileges. After all, they were gorgeous.

    It was time for me, a schr of beauty, to shine. I wanted to remove their demonic characteristics while preserving their current charming appearances; I preferred that they looked more like humans. And with Raphael, it would be a piece of cake, which was why I proposed my assistance.

    Do you need me to adjust the appearance for you? I offered.

    Could you really?

    That would be great.

    Then, please indeed help us with it.

    The white-haired beauty smiled and epted my proposal. The other two, witnessing this, also allowed me to amend their bodies for them.

    I readily agreed andmenced with modifications. It was a difficult task to change the exterior while preventing the skeletons from being affected. However, with my hands precise movements and Raphael-sans wless calctions, re-sculpting the three demonesses appearances was rtively straightforward. For them, once they grew ustomed to their skeletons, they would be able to control the flow of their own magicules and perfectly reproduce their self-image.

    I could also slip them some extra goodies. I mixed gold into the magisteel skeletons and turned them into orichalcum. Since these were Diablos close friends, I could at least do this much for them. Gold was a widely used universal metal in this world as well. Itspatibility with magicules was excellent. In addition, not only its strength, but also its overall quality was above that of magisteel.

    The threedies all praised how beautiful the skeletons looked; they were eminently well received.

    Thank you so much, Rimuru-sama!

    Seeing how happy they were, I felt decidedly satisfied as well.

    And so, my work here was done.

    Now, we just had to wait for them to wake up.

    Oh yeah, its inconvenient not to name themand just as I thought so

    Oi oi oi, what have you guys been up to sincest time?

    YahooRimuru! Did Diablo bring his subordinates? Are you gonna introduce them toeh?

    Dino, Ramiris and Veldora demonstrated their hobby of rubbernecking and ran to us.

    Just as Ramiris said, Diablo has brought his subordinates. These people are all demons, thats why I was preparing the bodies back then, I exined to Dino, who was out of the loop.

    Actually, Ive heard about all that

    Then why are you so surprised if youve already heard about it?

    This is another miraculous sight. Diablo sure is incredible, to suddenly assemble so many demons.

    Ah, it was because of therge gathering. Indeed, there definitely were a lot of them. It was thanks to Veldoras remark that I realized why Dino was shocked. Had I not heard about it beforehand, I would have been even more shocked.

    No, thats not all. I was kind of scared as well, since the three over there seem to have lived for a looong long time Ramiris admitted with a bbergasted expression while Dino nodded along.

    Oh, they appear to be the ancient species of the ruling ss. They apparently have lived over a thousand years, I added.

    Eh?

    Did you make a mistake somehow?

    What mistake? Theres no way Raphael-sans exnation could have been mistaken.

    Negative. It is a misunderstanding. Because there is no knowing the precise time and year of their existence, the deduction is purely spective. The so-called lived for over a thousand years can even include those who have remained alive for over thirty thousand years.

    I see, this was the correct definition. The one description, lived for over a thousand years, included three thousand, four thousand, and even ten thousand years. Raphael didnt make a mistake, but it wasnt necessarily the correct interpretation either.

    Hmmeven if you guys say soits inappropriate to ask a girl her age, warned Ramiris.

    GAHAHAHA, I learned about this lesson as well. It will make you seem like a troublemaker and piss people off, Veldora boasted.

    In any case, how long theyve lived isnt that important. Its enough to know that the powerful demons of the ruling ss have be ourpanions.

    If Rimuru can ept that, I wont object.

    What an impressive mindset, I wouldnt be able to mimic it

    Kufufufufu, as expected from Rimuru-sama. What you meant must be It didnt matter how long theyve lived, but how theyve lived?

    Eh, Eeehhh?

    While Ramiris and Veldora voiced their opinions, Diablo seemed to have given a really good summary. Feeling slightly embarrassed, I still nodded in agreement, nheless.

    Dino and the others interruption almost made me forget about what I was going to do. I wanted to name the demons. Lets cut to the chase this time. I nned on giving them supercar names like Diablo. I wasnt trying to imply that their price tag indicated their strength, but was simply just borrowing the names of premium sports cars.

    From today onward, you shall be known as Testarossa, Ultima, and Carrera, I announced in a majestic tone to the three golden skeletons floating inside the growth capsules.

    The first female had exquisitely shining white hair and snow-like pale skin. In contrast to her porcin skin, her elegant eyes and soft, striking lips were a brilliant shade of crimson. That touch of red reminded me of the beautiful Ferrari Testarossa sports car.

    The violet-haired, energetic girl was the one I named Ultima. She was full of energy, a characteristic quite reminiscent of the Ultima GTR supercar.

    Carrera, which went without saying, referred to the famous Porsche automobile. The blonde-haired girl had a pair of coquettish eyes, just like this famous car that picks its owner.

    Hold on, oi! Dino, alone, scrambled in a panic. You cant just name these people so casually

    It was toote to give advice like that now. There was no use panicking at this point.

    Look at Ramiris and Veldora; they werent the slightest bit freaked out

    Isnt he always like that?

    Its normal for Rimuru to do something like this!and so on and so forth. They quickly changed the topic thereafter.

    As soon as I finished speaking, the three archdemonspleted their possession. Flesh and blood vessels began to cover the golden skeletons, quickly shaping into the naked bodies of goddesses. Soon after, magicules transformed into clothes that covered their bare skin.

    The growth capsules shattered, unable to contain the youki that was surging from their bodies. That was to be expected. After all, due to my naming, they had all evolved to demon peers.

    They were on apletely different level than before. Their overwhelming power was fearsome, coupled with a strength beyondprehension.

    This cant be Even Ex-Demon Lord Karion cant hold a candle to them? Hey, just how deep does this rabbit hole go?! Thank goodness Im not hostile to Rimuru, Dino moaned, though no one paid attention to him.

    Vesta, who arrivedte, was mumbling in a corner by himself, I didnt see anything, ahaha, I dont know, nope, saw nothing! None of my business

    Watching him mindlessly bash his head against the wall, repeating the same words, was truly saddening. But lets just pretend we didnt see that.

    And just like that, we called it a day.

    Depleting my magicule stores was never good. I gotta be more careful. To see how much more I could spare, I should take it easy and name a couple more. I suppose it was the right choice to limit the naming to three people a day.

    With that in mind, I began to name the demons over the course of the next few days.

    Moss.

    Veyron.

    Agera.

    Esprit.

    Zonda.

    Cien.

    Venom.

    As such, I named the strongest ones first.

    Testarossas lieutenants were Moss and Cien.

    Ultimas lieutenants were Veyron and Zonda.

    Carreras lieutenants were Agera and Esprit.

    The demon that piqued Diablos interest was Venom.

    The three girls alone were already a huge military force in their own right. In any case, the addition of these three demon peers was just the beginning. The seven demonspleted their evolution the moment they were named. They casually hopped out of their capsules.

    Two of them were now demon peers. The other four were still archdemons. Nheless, their auras felt different from before. Although I couldnt put my finger on it, it felt as if their limiters had been removed. In addition, Venom also evolved into an archdemon, greatly boosting his power.

    I, on the other hand, was stunned to the point that my mind nked. To put it simply, you couldnt simply find demon peers in the wild. They were all legendary demons that reigned supreme like the demon lords. Including Diablo, our nation now had six of them. Having this many definitely detracted that legendary feeling though.

    What should we do with all these new additions then? I personally wanted to recruit some people who were well-versed in politics and finance. Could any of them handle such a role? I had my doubts, but it couldnt hurt to ask anyway

    While I was pondering this, I still had to figure out names for the other seven hundred demons. Since I had made a promise to Diablo, I would see it through to the end.

    However, I soon became aware of an unexpected miscalction. ording to Raphael-san, I could just name the demons by consuming the magicules within the growth capsulewhat a pleasant surprise!

    And so, with this motivating information in hand, it took me only two days to finish naming everyone else.

    The seven-hundred-strong army of demons was now kneeling before me. Most of them were originally lesser demons, but with their new bodies and names, they were able to evolve into greater demons. And just as I had suspected, regardless of where they stood on the racial hierarchy, all of them were at least rank A.

    We now had seven hundred new subordinates that surpassed rank A 8 . While it might sound weirding from me, this excessive addition to our military force was quite frankly ridiculous. Some of them even evolved to archdemons.

    I might have just overdone it again

    Our new military power was terrifying. In fact, the threedies from the startTestarossa, Ultima, and Carrerawere already insanely strong.

    Welp, no point thinking about it now. Ill just pretend like nothing significant happened. Yep, lets go with that.

    This was the best way to maintain a tranquil mind.

    Rimuru-sama, we would like to offer our utmost thanks for bestowing upon us these beautiful names and this wonderful power. Please allow us to henceforth pledge our loyalties to you! Testarossa vowed on behalf of everyone else present.

    Mhm! I nodded, then offered encouraging words like: Do your best!

    Now that I thought about it, Diablo should take full responsibility for these guys.

    I merely kept my end of the bargain. Surely, Diablo will educate these demons well, I thought to myself, throwing any notion of responsibility out the window.

    While Rimuru was escaping reality

    Noir-chanI mean, Diablo. I finally understand why you revere Rimuru-sama so much.

    Mhm, what an incredible character.

    Not only did hepletely see through us, he even dismissed us as an irrelevant threat. Yet the ancient Demon Lord Dino was so scared, he turned pale in front of us.

    Testarossa, Ultima, and Carrera noisily chattered.

    Little did Rimuru know, the three originally werent nning to pledge their loyalty to him. They were only temporarily lending their strength and subordinates because their old friend Diablo reached out to them.

    They all had immense longevity. They were the strongest beings in this world. And so were the demons that served them.

    Following human definitions, two of their servants were of the so-called prehistoric species. These demons had been alive for a remarkably long time and had never lost a fight. They were Moss and Veyron.

    Mosswho was undefeated for over tens of thousands of yearswas the archduke of the demon world. His strength was only inferior to the primordials.

    Veyronwho had lived for more than four thousand yearswas a cunning and sly marquis. He lost several times to Moss and had repeatedly reincarnated.

    The other servants were no simpletons either.

    Ageraearly modern speciesheld the rank of viscount.

    Espritthe viscount that never suffered a single defeat for the past five hundred years.

    Zondathe baron that never suffered a single defeat for the past three hundred years.

    Cienyet another baron that had never been defeated for the past three hundred years.

    Agera was a special individual. After surrendering to Carreras service three hundred years ago, he hadnt lost to anyone since. What was rare for demons, however, was Ageras specialty. Unlike most demons, his proficiency was in weapons, such as the katana, instead of magic.

    Esprit, Zonda, and Cien were like Veyron in the sense that they had reincarnated over and over again. They were born in ancient times and were individuals very simr to the primordials.

    Venom was another special individual, instead born with a Unique Skill. Although he hadnt been around for too long, his rate of growth was rather astonishing.

    These powerful entities that even excelled in the demon world were all recruited by Diablo. Rimuru knew nothing of it and held a careless attitude like he usually did. He was even reckless enough to give them names.

    And as a resultthe demons were reborn with power to defy the Truth of the World. They became a legion beyondprehension. They were fearsome and evil demons. In spite of numbering less than one thousand members, this group undoubtedly could be called a legion.

    The ck Numbers. 9 They were the strongest force of the Tempest Federation, and the symbol of fear.

    Or at least, widely known by generations toe.

    The moment the demons were freed from the growth capsules, the ck Numbers was born.

    Testarossas white cheeks blushed as she muttered, enthralled, Ah, how interesting. As opposed to constantly ying the same game of corrupting nations, or fighting for supremacy with you guys, its so much more fun observing that lord.

    Yeah, I think so too, Ultima voiced her support. Rather than torturing those naive demons, itll be more interesting to work in this nation.

    Indeed, Carrera agreed with them both. Just like you guys said, Rimuru-sama is incredible. The Menace I unleashed just then was like a childs y to him! It really made me feel excited, serving a lord like that. Now that he gave me a name, I have genuinely decided to pledge my loyalty to him, she affirmed, giving off a bright smile.

    I was nning to kill you then, you know? Diablo proimed, looking deadly serious. But he probably could tell that Carrera wasnt lying, so he had no intention of pursuing the matter any further with her.

    Seeing how Diablo was acting, Testarossa announced: By the way, Diablo. I have to thank you. When you first found me, I was actually intending to kill you.

    I know. Youre that type of woman after all. I was greatly intrigued about why you would ept my proposal. Had it been you, you would have fought me until you were satisfied.

    The nc Diablo knew was a real rebel and would never obey anyone else. Duels between demons were all about knowledge and techniques. Even though Diablo had evolved to a demon peer, he was still concerned regarding whether he could have won against nc or not. However, that uncertainty was part of the fun.

    Indeed, we are strong. Do you think there is anyone in this world stronger than us demons?

    No, Diablo answered Testarossas question with a satisfied smirk.

    Her smile deepened as she continued, Right? Thats why I became interested in your precious master, Diablosomeone who was capable of charming one of my kin, one of the strongest people in the world. Had he been too boring, I was nning to kill him on the spot.

    Me too, Ultima chirped.

    Hmph, even though Ive already given up that thought, I did consider dueling him right there, Carrera added.

    Diablo smacked his mouth anxiously in response.

    It wasmendable that you guys didnt embarrass me in front of Rimuru-sama. However, if any of you really were to have done that

    Dont worry, Diablo. Simr to how you are proud of your name, I also took a liking to the name Testarossa Rimuru-sama gave me. I swore with this name to serve him. Dont you also think so, Ultima and Carrera?

    Mhm!

    Just like what I said before.

    The threedies nodded almost simultaneously.

    Diablo shook his head rather helplessly, Anyhow, apart from you three, all the other trash probably wont be of much help to Rimuru-sama. This unfortunately cant be helped. Just dont give me unnecessary trouble. You guys are not only answering to Rimuru-sama, but to me as well.

    You are the one who cant be helped! is what shouldve been my line. I suppose this is returning the favor for introducing us to Rimuru-sama.

    Fine, I dont object.

    All we have to do is to aid Rimuru-sama and eventually surpass you in status. But until then, I suppose I shall allow you to give us orders.

    Diablo was extremely anxious, but since the three agreed to obey his orders, he didnt press the issue any further.

    The number of people that Diablo tolerated could be counted on one hand. From that alone, you could tell just how special those three were to him.

    And so, unbeknownst to Rimuru, a chain ofmand was established.

    Im not sure whether this conversation above really took ce or not.

    While I was nning on having a nice, peaceful day, Diablo whispered something to me, We had this conversation once before. Although these people are under mymand, theres no telling what they will do. Although theres no need for Rimuru-sama to worry, please keep that in mind!

    Uh-oh.

    Eh, what is this guy talking about? Arent those three recruited by you?!

    Well, there was no point in crying over spilled milk. All I wanted was to be happy and have a nice, peaceful day. And now hed dumped this unnecessary problem onto me. I was looking forward to newpanions, you know

    Never mind. Im not sure how much of what he said was the truth. After all, they were under Diablosmand. He should take some responsibility, at the end of the day.

    Employer responsibility? Whats that? Can I eat it?

    So theres that. And so, I very casually tossed my problems for other people to handle.

 Volume 11 - Ch 3

    Signs of Unrest

    I wasnt expecting such a drastic boost to our military forces, but at the same time, I was genuinely d at the prospect of morepanions joining our ranks.

    I urged Diablo to discuss new work arrangements for the demons. The three demonesses were in attendance as representatives of the new personnel. I was interested in hearing their opinions as well.

    Right now, there are three vacant positions I want filled as soon as possible. There is the military attach who will act as my plenipotentiary, the chief prosecutor of the public prosecution office who will seek out any great evils (uwful activities) within the nation and bring forward charges, and the chief justice officer of the supreme court who will judge the fairness of tribunals. Since theres three of you here, do any of you wish to fill in these roles?

    It felt as if I was forcing the girls to ept, but I casually brought it up as an option, nheless.

    The jobs werent as simple as they seemed. If they were to take them, then there might even be bacsh from my executives. However, that would be Diablos problem to deal with.

    You also needed to refrain frommitting illegal activities, such as epting bribes, while on the job. That was why I wanted to appoint trustworthy people close to me, just in case. If these demons wound up doing anything illegal, I would naturally ask Diablo to purge them. Things would be quite straightforward that way.

    Then, please allow me to act as the military attach.

    A greater evil than me? This gets my blood pumping!

    I shall judge with utmost fairness. I hope to meet my lords expectations!

    Testarossa, Ultima and Carrera dered, respectively.

    Oi oi, why are you already agreeing without even listening to the details of these positions first?

    Can you guys really? The tasks involved with these jobs could be very challenging

    Please leave it to us.

    Mhmm! Im really good at detective work!

    Allow me to grant them the fair verdict of death.

    Hold on a second. Something is off here, especially with thatst one.

    Their answers filled me with an eerie sense of unease.

    I turned to peek at Diablo. He had a smug grin stered on his face. No matter how you looked at it, his facial expression all but screamed: Its so good to be free from such troublesome duties!

    Ah, I supposed that would be the case. Diablo would, surely, have rejected the offer of military attach.

    Listen now. As the military attach, you will act as a representative for the Western States Council and speak on my behalf. Not only that, if we are to deploy military forces to foreign nations, you will also be responsible formanding those armies. Its a really important job.

    Yes, I understand, Testarossa replied with a gentle smile, promising that there would be no problem.

    Testa is a smart woman. I can assure you that she will never make any decisions that arent in Rimuru-samas best interest, Diablo reassured.

    Uhm, arent you saying that because you dont want to do the job yourself?

    Although Diablos guarantee was in no way reliable, Testarossa may very well be highly intelligent.

    By the way, youll also need to familiarize yourself with our nationsws, but those arent set in stone yet. Furthermore, you will also be responsible for informing other nations about them

    Please rest assured, Rimuru-sama. I have memorized them all.

    As if to back up her im, Testarossa immediately began to recite the experimental decrees of our nation, even going so far as to point out some problems she found with them.

    Hired! You are, without a doubt, hired. Sometimes, you may find yourself thoroughly pissed off during the council meetings. However, you must keep in mind that you are carrying the honor of our nation. Remember, never act on impulse. Ill be counting on you.

    Please leave it to me. If anything were to happen, I will make sure to destroy all evidence of my involvement.

    No no no! Youre looking at thispletely the wrong way!!

    But then again, Testarossa did make the impression of being capable enough. I couldnt find any other suitable candidates and, given my unruly behavior during thest council meeting, I was better off not casting stones in a ss house.

    We will see how it ys out.

    Even though Testa was the one who got the job, that didnt mean the other two were unqualified either.

    Its my turn now! Ultima shouted, and also effortlessly started to repeat the major codes ofw as if she were reading from a script.

    Simr to Testarossa, she appeared to be pretty sharp.

    My liege, we are a race that holds contracts in the highest regard. We are well versed in the craft of exploitation, so there is no way wed lose to foolish mortals. You can also rest assured that we wont fall victim to bribery. One can only bend us to their will through a sh of strength. Even among the demon lords, there are only a few that could stand against us.

    Well, she didnt say no one could stand against them.

    Given that to be the case, there probably were demon lords stronger than them. It was presumably that guythe red-haired one. Well, that was none of my business.

    After all, the important thing was that Carrera would take on the role of chief justice.

    Then, I shall hire you all. Ladies, I will be in your care from now on!

    Please leave it to us!

    As provisional personnel, I decided to hire the three demonesses.

    It proved to be the right call. The Tempest Federation wouldter be a state featuring a legal system like none other. Its legal structure would be esteemed throughout the generations that followed.

    By the way, I wasnt above thew. I gotta be more careful so I dont end up being arrested for bribery.

    Our nation finally possessed the framework of a constitutional country. Even though we were still in a trial period, we had the foundations for a system with separation of powers.

    Ultima and Carrera were both extraordinarily diligent workers, though, perhaps I should also give credit to their many outstanding employees. They all got along and worked together, which enabled them to demonstrate their full potential as a team.

    Ultima was assigned to learn from Rogurd. She would always call him Uncle Rogurd and listened to whatever he had to say. Rogurd would then call Ultima missy. He cared for her like she was his own daughter.

    Although, Rogurd was unaware of Ultimas true identity. Rogurd may have been bold, but had he known that Ultima really was a demon peer, he would definitely have been far more reserved around her. With that in mind, I only told him that she was one of Diablos recruits and nothing else. At the end of the day, it was her work performance that mattered, so there shouldnt be any problems.

    Chief Justice Carrera was also handling her new responsibilities well. Rugurd was the attorney general and had since returned to the executive branchs legal department. The judicial department was now officially its own independent branch, separate from the executive branch. However, this didnt mean the judicial branch had free rein. The judicial, legitive, and executive branches would all monitor each other.

    Rugurd was responsible for observing and supporting Carrera, whom I had appointed. From his report, her behavior notwithstanding, she was doing an excellent job. She would not yield to violence or bribery. Rugurd seemed to approve of Carrera.

    This was fantastic.

    There was no such thing as a perfect political system, so wed just have to wait and tackle problems as they arose.

    And so, all that remained was to send out the drafts of our legition to the council.

    Thats everything. Testarossa, have you prepared everything properly?

    Yes, Rimuru-sama. Moss handled all of the procedures.

    Testarossa was resting elegantly in front of me. She had personally poured me a cup of ck tea. It was delectable.

    Shunas ck tea was superb, and Shions ck tea was nice too. While their teas were exquisite in their own right, Testarossas ck tea was no slouch either. The fragrance was profoundly sophisticated, and it lingered in your mouth. It didnt even leave the slightest trace of a bitter aftertaste. There was also a hint of sweetness despite itsck of sugar. Overall, it made for a very refreshing drink.

    Diablo stood behind me, eyes wide. Testa, I never imagined you would personally make tea for others. How surprising.

    Hehe, indeed. I obviously need to give Rimuru-sama special treatment. And of course, theres no tea for you.

    I dont mind. As long as you treat me as your superior, I can turn a blind eye to things like these, Diablo responded, preparing some ck tea for himself.

    I couldnt tell if they were close or spiteful of each other. Although the air wasnt tense, they didnt appear cordial enough to bebelled friends.

    By the way, the reactions from the nations were rather intriguing too, Testarossa suddenly divulged. Some nations want to get on our good side, while others are trying to exploit us for their own benefit. About half of the nations are weing, and it seems that the majority of them are still paranoid.

    Her tone implied as if she had seen this for herself

    Where did you obtain this information?

    My apologies, I ordered Moss to investigate a little in order to be of help to Rimuru-sama.

    Moss again. It looked like he had some outstanding talents. I recalled that he was a powerful individual whose strength was second only to the three demonesses. He was also one of the demons that evolved to be a demon peer, and he seemed to be stronger than the other demon peer, Veyron.

    So this Moss was even capable of collecting intelligence.

    How urate is this information?

    Did he acquire it using magic? Or did he see and hear things for himself?

    Itd be great for us if the information were reliable. However, if it wasnt, then wed have a bunch of other problems on our hands. With that fact in mind, I questioned Testarossa.

    Moss holds a special ability which enables him to split into multiple small Clones and travel to different locations. Acquiring and analyzing intel from various ces at the same time is a piece of cake for him.

    That would make him truly impressive. I was quite d to have gained such fortuitous talent.

    Then thats really convenient. Ill introduce him to Souei next time and let him help with information gathering. They may have different suitabilities, so hopefully they canplement each other.

    Ara, how I yearn for such praises from Rimuru-sama. I am almost jealous of Moss, Testarossamented, cracking a smile when she finished.

    S-surely you jest behind Testarossa was Moss himself, who was standing by, previously unnoticed due to his weak presence. As he spoke, a cold sweat suddenly ran down his cheeks.

    Veyron had the appearance of an old gentleman with a handlebar moustache. Moss, on the contrary, looked like an adorable, run-of-the-mill young boy. From appearances alone, he seemed to be in fifth or sixth grade of elementary school. I saw no evidence of him being strong; was he really that exceptional?

    Is Mosss information valid? We did eliminate a couple of hostile councilors recently. Itd be reasonable if people were paranoid, but are there really nations still trying to exploit us?

    While it was sort of bold for me to say this, our nation was quite the dangerous one. And just what type of overly optimistic leaders would want to exploit a country this unbelievably dangerous? It was only natural to doubt the uracy of Mosss intel.

    Moss, exin the situation to Rimuru-sama.

    For some reason, it was Diablo that gave this order as opposed to Testarossa.

    Y-yes sir. The nations neighboring the south of Tempest, centered around the Kingdom of Blumund, were all in favor of our nation. Yet, relevant knowledge of our nation has not yet spread to the northern realm. It seems that many noblemen there are skeptical about the rumors. As for the now dmissioned councilors, their words, regardless of their veracity,ck credibility. Although this part was purely spection from said rumors, it is difficult to determine the authenticity of the matter. With that being said, among several kingdoms, some of their royal family members undeniably hold ill intent towards us.

    On a side note, Mosss power allowed him to directly eavesdrop on the conversations that he wanted to hear. That exined why it was up to the receiver of the information to determine its legitimacy. Nevertheless, his power was quite handy.

    If we can detect suspicious activities ahead of time, we can n ordingly before anything bad happens.

    Indeed.

    Testarossa, can I trouble you to take care of the matter?

    Most certainly. Regarding the method, however, should I destroy their entire nation?

    No no, that wont do.

    Thatd be overkill! Just make sure to hold the people in charge ountable.

    Understood.

    Remember to avoid methods that will lead to casualties.

    As you wish. At the very least, I will not do anything that results in the world condemning Tempest, Testarossa promised, smiling brightly. Despite that smile, I found her terrifying. I was kind of worried about whether or not it was really okay to let her handle it.

    But hey, theres a first time for everything.

    After all, you couldnt run a country by always sucking up to other nations. This was an irrefutable fact. If other nations looked down on us, it would only lead to unnecessaryplications.

    Good! You must work hard towards those goals without damaging the reputation of our nation. However, should the need arise, you should also be prepared to show off our might.

    And so, I saw Testarossa off to the council.

    Now that the major problems were resolved, from today onward, I could throw away the worries I had in the past few months and live a peaceful life.

    Eh? Youre telling me that not everything was stressful since I was actually enjoying the research?

    Well, youre right. Though I did have to asionally act as if I was trying my best, lest I be viewed as a cker. This was what we called adults art of socializing. It was never a good idea to invest maximum effort at work. If you were to do that, then the amount of work you did would be viewed as the norm. Naturally, it would seem as if you had no problems with it, and thus you would be prone to be assigned more responsibilities.

    A capable man must be able to distinguish how much work was suited for the amount of effort devoted. At the end of the day though, what mattered most was enjoying your work.

    Despite framing it in such flowerynguage, ultimately, that was just idealism at its finest. After all, I was satisfied with where I was now. Working under these circumstances made me realize again just how fortunate I was.

    In any case, I nned to inspect the newly constructed school today. The children I brought from Ingracia were studying here too.

    I mentioned this once while chatting with Yuuki: letting the children socialize with each other would be the fastest method for them to learn humanmon sense. In a school filled with only monster kids, there was a possibility that they would never learn about the norms of human society.

    Be that as it may, you wouldnt have to worry about such things at this school. Many adventurers and migrantborers, family in tow, had immigrated to our town. Naturally, there were many children among them.

    In this world, it was the norm for children of low-ie families to be part of thebor force. However, our nation hadws prohibiting childbor. After all, a kids job was just to have fun and enjoy their childhood. Anyway, they only needed to study things they were interested in.

    Both humans and monsters would be subject to the same standards of education. Surely, they would grow a sense of camaraderie this way. That was the objective.

    By the way, the students in this school werent limited to just children. Adults woulde here to learn writing and mathematics, too. Mastering these subjects was essential, so they were eminently enthusiastic to develop their skills. Theck of these skills would no doubt close many doors for them. They may also make simple mistakes that could trouble their coworkers. Since the adults were all evidently aware of this, they had been studying hard.

    Not knowing whether or not anything you learned would be applicable to the real world was probably one of the biggest reasons why people were never motivated to study. However, that wasnt a problem here. Furthermore, the hard work of the adults would inspire the children to put in simr effort towards their studies.

    With that being said, putting aside mathematics, the focus was mainly on reading and writing. To be honest, even I considered the curriculum difficult, and Masayuki was of the same mind. Being proficient in reading and fluent in conversing was one thing, howeverwriting was the difficult part.

    In my case, I could rely on the automatic trantion of Wisdom King Raphael to bypass the issue. Without that, even I didnt have the confidence to score full marks on anguage exam administered here. I figured that as long as it didnt cause any problems, I could simply y dumb about it. Although, this did feel like cheating.

    Getting back on topic, the children were excelling in their studies. Serving as a wonderful incentive to boost their eagerness for learning, I had tranted manga into this worldsnguage. It was a huge sess. It seemed like everyone in the school was a fan of the manga, to the point where some even carried it around with them, apparently turning it into a highly coveted status symbol. Kenya, being both adept atbat and a holder of manga, somehow became the boss of the school.

    You stinky boys! Stop ying all the time and help clean the ssroom!

    Ah, Alice just lost it.

    She was shaping up to be an extremelypetent ss representative.

    Huh? Why do we have to bother with that

    Wait Ken-chan, well be in a world of hurt if we make Alice angry!

    Shut up, Ryota! Im gonna beat Alice today and be the real boss around here!

    Such a brat!

    Hold on. I guess they were still just kids.

    I realized that Alice was the real boss around the ss, not Kenya. Were they fighting because of this? Kenya wouldnt want to admit it, which is perhaps why he wanted to fight Alice.

    So, thats how it is, huh?

    A boy would intentionally infuriate the girl he liked to make her look his way. However, this tactic wasnt always effective in reality. Besides, it was liable to mess up and cause the opposite of the intended effect. It was best to treat the girl you admired gently.

    Kenya was still too naive and thus presumablycked this insight. Fighting Alice wouldnt win her heart; instead, it would doubtlessly serve to only piss her off.

    Didnt I say this already? Ill show you how scary I really am!

    Alice was no different, showing not a single shred of femininity. She may have seemed mature, but that couldnt be further from the truth. But to be fair, Alice was only eleven years old. Didnt all sixth graders behave this way?

    Everyone elses reaction implied that they were ustomed to this scene.

    Oi, who do you think will win today?

    Of course itll be the Empress.

    I suppose so. Shes our empress, the youngest and the strongest. While Kenya is strong too, hes no match for her.

    Its because hes in love with Alice; thats why he cant win.

    They were all adding their own two cents.

    Oi, Gail! Dont talk nonsense! Kenyained.

    Thats right! How could Kenya have a crush on me? Is your brain fried or something? Alice, on the other hand,ughed it off as the ramblings of an idiot.

    Gail had very casually revealed Kenyas secret.

    Uhhhlooks like its too early for these kids to get in any sort of rtionship.

    That was okay in my book.

    Both the monster and human kids found the two interesting. Everyone knew that they werent really on bad terms despite what appearances suggested.

    Gail was the oldest boy and seemed to be covertly monitoring the two, ready to intervene if any real problem were to arise.

    It would have been interesting to continue observing this silently, but today was not the day. Hinata was due toe byter.

    All right, thats it! No fighting in the ssroom! I scolded as I entered the ssroom to greet the kids. At that same exact moment, Chloe jumped in from the side andtched onto me.

    Sensei! Chloe joyfully eximed.

    I somehow didnt sense her aura, which suggested that Chloes skills had improved dramatically. Moreover, it looked as if she knew I wasing very early on.

    Ah, Rimuru-sensei?! Chloe, thats cheating andand cunning! Alice protested, but wasnt one to be outdone. Just like Chloe, she came running and hugged me.

    Mmmhmm, cuteness is truly the best.

    Someone emerged from behind them, eximing: Rimuru-sama, long time no see arinsu!

    A cute girl with the clich bob haircut jumped in front of me. She was wearing an elegant kimono and appeared to be a little girl around the same age as Alice. Her most eye-catching features were her fox ears.

    HmmI didnt remember seeing a beautiful little girl like thisbut I also felt like Id seen her somewhere before.

    Could it be

    Are you Kumara?

    It is me arinsu! the young girl with the bob haircut energetically repliedI mean, Kumara replied.

    Right, Kumara was a high-level monster. She had sessfully evolved, after I had bestowed a name upon her. That must be why she had a human form.

    I recalled that I left her in Hinatas care along with the rest of the kids. Once the school was constructed, Kenya and the others began walking to and attending sses. I had always thought that Kumara was staying in thebyrinth all this time. But to my surprise, it seemed that she was going to school with the children as well, and even made some friends. I believed that this was a good thing.

    Eh, Rimuru-sensei hase

    Kenya and Ryotas reactions were slower than the girls, as they only noticed me just now. However, their words were overshadowed by the cheers of the other students.

    W-WOAHRimuru-sama!

    Its actually him! Awesome!

    Im gonna brag about this to my dadter!

    And so, amotion broke out in the ssroom.

    Catching wind of the excitement, the teachers that came to investigate soon formed a crowd of their own.

    H-His Majesty himself has graced our facility?! Had you contacted us first, I wouldve shown you around!

    What silliness is that?! I am the vice-principal, I should have been the one to show His Majesty Rimuru around!

    Nonsense! You are just a mere vice-principal, begone! His Majesty Rimuru has granted me the position of principal, I should have the special privilege!

    They were getting riled up as well.

    We hired teachers by paying monthly sries. They were retired adventurers, merchants from the Kingdom of Blumund sought through Myourmiless arrangements, and more.

    The principal of this school was a chief from one of the goblin viges. Even though he couldnt teach, he was able to promptly handle any conflicts that broke out. He could also keep an eye out and prevent monster children from being discriminated against.

    Other than the principal, the rest of the staff were all humans. The Holy Knights acted as special lecturers, taking turns to hold sses; Hinata would spend time with the children when she could as well.

    Everything was going very smoothly.

    At first, the Holy Knights all seemed rather confused, but they didnt treat the monsters any differently. Rather, they gave the same level of care and guidance to both humans and monsters. They genuinely helped out a lot.

    Ahh, dont worry, I just snuck out on my own today. I actually have something to discuss with Kenya and the kids.

    I see, then please visit and observe the childrens progress next time!

    Indeed, if you inform us of your arrival, we shall present you with the perfect learning conditions!

    The teachers and children simultaneously nodded in agreement.

    But hold on a second What the hell did perfect learning conditions mean? Wouldnt you guys be guilty of trying to deceive me? Didnt that make the whole visit meaningless to begin with?

    Oi oi oi, His Majesty Rimuru is really troubled by this, we were interrupted by Holy Knight Fritz, who was handling todays lecture. If he hadnt, thismotion probably would have continued for a while. Speaking of which, having amander of the Holy Knight Order as their lecturer was honestly incredible.

    Is Fritz-san the lecturer for today?

    Oi oi, please stop with the san, Your Majesty Rimuru. You can drop the honorific.

    Ah, really? In that case, Fritz, drop the Your Majesty too.

    That would be inappropriate. Fritz smiled and added, please allow me to call you Rimuru-sama at the very least. Or else, every citizen in this nation is going to look at me differently.

    This guy seemed to be someone that wasnt mindful of social statuses, yet he was still cognizant of the fact that he couldnt directly address me by my name. To be fair, I wouldve acted the same way if I were in his shoes. Unless a person had some respectable background, to call another kingdoms ruler by their name directly would take a really pure-hearted moron.

    You have a point. Youll need to wait until youre out of the public eye in order to rx honorifics. Its a bit inconvenient here.

    Thank you for understanding, Fritz said with a wink and gave a somewhat yful smile.

    You shouldnt be happy seeing a man wink at you, but it felt like Fritz was somehow naturally affectionate.

    All right, putting that aside, thank you so much for assisting the school activities.

    Please dont say that. Seriously,pared to the rigorous training assigned by Hinata-sama, a mission like this is honestly heaven. You get food until your tummy is full and, more importantly, the childrens respect. All the knights have been fighting over the gig.

    I see.

    I caught wind of unexpected hardship.

    Fritzs straightforward attitude naturally made him exceptionally affable, but I didnt want to be oblivious of the time and ce as he, unfortunately, had been. After all, my Magic Perception was sending me feedback.

    Ho, con-gra-tutions then, Fritz. Was my training too rigorous, hm? I fine-tuned the training based on your strength, but apparently it is getting in the way, a cruel voice drenched Fritz.

    Hinata entered the scene. Suddenly, the whole area was filled with a tense aura. The children, and even the adults that had gathered, all straightened their backs and didnt dare to move a muscle.

    The teachers had the same reaction; I wasnt sure whether tough at this or not. It went without saying that Fritz was tonights biggest loser.

    E-ehH-Hinata-sama?! Misunderstandingyes, its all a big misunderstanding! That was just bureaucratic talk

    Fritz tried his hardest to save himself given the conversation, yet I could already tell that he was irredeemable at this point.

    Thats why Rimuru here is to remind all readers that it is very important to ensure the safety of your surroundings.

    I hurriedly made myself scarce and sought refuge; hopefully Fritz wouldnt suffer any ill fate in the future.

    We went inside thebyrinth. Hinata joined me, coupled with the five children and Kumara. As for Fritz Ehh, best not to disturb him.

    I have been awaiting your arrival, Rimuru-sama and Hinata-dono, Hakurou came out to wee us.

    My, Hinata eximed, you look as lively as ever, how wonderful.

    It appeared that the two of them had formed a friendship before I knew it. The two greeted each other amicably.

    My apologies for asking you toe out here when you are already so busy, Hakurou admitted.

    Not at all, not at all. The major issues have all been resolved, I reassured.

    I see, have you decided who to send to the council?

    Yes, a neer recruited by Diablo. I named her Testarossa. Ill introduce you two next time.

    Named her? muttered Hinata. Theres a lot I could say to that, but itll take forever, so Ill do it another time.

    I-I see.

    I know you like to drop your head out of the loop, so I wont bother anymore. Besides

    Ill just get a bigger headache listening to you exinshe quietlyined.

    It was best to pretend that I didnt hear thatst part.

    The reason why I invited you today was to show you the progress of the childrens growth. Hakurou-dono and I both have been instructing them, so I wanted to update you on their current situation.

    Uh I didnt quite get what was going on, but I figured the conversation should continue first.

    Since you said it like that, they have grown a lot?

    Grown a lot? I guess. Youll find out when actualbat starts. Thebyrinth is really convenient. You can fight at full force with no risk of actually dying, Hinata reminded with a smile, terrifying as always.

    She had the dark aura of a sadist around her.

    I get it. Then Ill use my Clones as their opponents, I suggested, splitting my slime body from my main body. The slime looked like a knock-off version of me, but it had the actual me inside. My humanoid body on the other hand would be handling the battle trial.

    YEAH! I havent fought against Rimuru-sensei in forever!

    This is awesome. Sensei, please observe how much Ive improved!

    The bellicose couple Kenya and Alice rejoiced at this news immediately.

    The normally reserved Gail started to warm up to the proposal as well. Ryota resembled his usual fussy self, though his eyes were glittering with light that conveyed his anticipation. Since he hadnt called quits yet, it meant that he had acquired a level of confidence already.

    Now the other two, Kumara and Chloe.

    Then I shall go first arinsu!

    Ehh? But I want to fight Rimuru-sensei as well!

    They were both particrly enthusiastic.

    I see that everyone is full of energy. Its fine if everyonees at me at once, but since we are training, we should try one-on-one fights.

    Hearing this, everyone gave a smile. They seemed to be looking forward to dueling with me. It wasnt a bad idea taking them on asionally.

    With this naive thought, I began to battle the kids in a simted arena.

    One hourter

    Y-you guys, havent you gotten a little too strong?! My voice echoed throughout thebyrinth.

    Kenya had indeed be more powerful than the average Holy Knight. He synergized beautifully with the light spirit. Using bizarre stances that you would only see in manga, he brought out these phantasmagoric sword techniques.

    Ryotas swordsmanship was not as strong as Kenyas; despite that, he could use both water and wind Spirit Magic strategically.

    Gail, conversely, was well bnced. His cautious personality made him focus more on defense, and he utilized his shield and sword cleverly. He also incorporated earth elemental Spirit Magic to make his defense almost indestructible.

    While the boys surprised me, the girls were even more impressive.

    First, Alice. No wonder people called her Empress. She pulled out a number of dolls from thin air, which were made of magisteel like Beretta. They snarled at me as if they were alive. Her puppeteering skill was getting stronger, and this time, the puppets were no y dolls. If she had faced anyone else, it could have been dangerous.

    Moreover, Alice had one more card up her sleeve. There was a massive number of swords floating in midair that targeted me constantly throughout the battle. Scary. There was no pattern to their trajectories. If I didnt have Predict Future Attack, I probably would have taken a couple of hits. In a few years time, she may be able to rival a Holy Knightmander.

    Lets not forget about Kumara.

    Come out everyone, demonstrate your power before Rimuru-sama arinsu! she shouted while unleashing her power.

    Her nine tails began glowing golden and twisted behind the cute girl. The next instant, her tails turned into beasts.

    Eh, I should have seen thising, but the creatures that flew out startled me, nheless. As expected from ymans ace in the hole. She was already tremendously tough with the beasts summoned from her two tailsand there were eight of them this time. Her ninth tail seemed to be her own, while the rest were all magical beasts. Each creature was over rank A. An average Holy Knight, in all likelihood, wouldnt even be able to touch one of them. They could also share theirbat experience, making their coordination wless.

    Based on what I saw, she had the potential to beat Fritz and the others. This little girl was on par with the Ten Great Saints. I know it may sound like I was joking, but I was telling the truth. Once the beasts from her tails gained morebat experience, she would definitely be an unbelievable force. She may eventually live up to the name of the nieth-floor guardian.

    Thest one was Chloe.

    Hiiyaaaa!

    Her yell was very cute, whereas her sword was not, even in the slightest. She was faster than Kenya. In fact, much more than that. I battled against six people in total this time; however, Chloe was the only person that I fought seriously.

    Actually, I was treating the situation too lightly. Chloe was so strong that had I not fought her earnestly, I honestly would have been in danger. Obviously, I wouldnt have died even if I had gone easy on her, but it was definitely humiliating if I lost in front of the kids.

    I really didnt want to embarrass myself here. That was why I had to fight seriouslyplease dont call me childish. I would never hold back to preserve the little dignity I still had.

    I can understand your feelings.

    Indeed, I was just like Rimuru-sama. I needed to show everything I had battling against lil Chloe.

    Seriously? Even Hinata and Hakurou, who were both more skillful in swordsmanship than me, had trouble fighting Chloe?

    I was genuinely shocked. Knowing the innocent Chloe was so powerful made me shiver.

    Ahh, you guys are so good!

    Right? Hearing sensei say this fills me with confidence!

    But Chloe-chan was the really strong one. Even though everyone calls me the Empress, Ive never won against her.

    Yeah, Chloe is so different. She looks so gentle at first nce, but shes super scary when angry. An angry Alice isnt scary at all, but when Chloe gets angry, we have to pray.

    Alice jumped up, furious, and shouted, What did you just say?!

    Ryota and Gail simply nodded in agreement.

    It looked like the boys were all on the same page.

    Kenya was quite strong as well, I remarked. Although, your stance and swordsmanship could use some work, consider them your weak points. If you can refine those, you will move even more fluidly.

    His moves felt like they were inspired by manga. Although they looked wonderfully dashing, it was detached from traditional swordsmanship, and he made many unnecessary moves. If he could fix this, Kenya would be stronger too.

    Thats precisely it. No matter how I teach him, Kenya just wont budge Hinata sighed, baffled.

    She had noticed it as well.

    I cant help it either! That pose was taught by Masayuki-san himself!

    Huh?

    Did that idiot have to teach Kenya such superfluous sword techniques?

    I mean, it did look pretty cool in hindsight, so it wasnt entirely uselessbut knowing Masayukis actual skill, it suddenly made me think that such a stance waspletely trivial.

    No wonder the stance looked like it came from mangait clearly was.

    All right then, Hakurou interjected, theres no use talking. I shall instruct you personally to remove your bad habits. Ill train you well and make your movement as smooth as flowing water.

    Hakurous method was different from Hinatas in the sense that he wasnt entirely faithful to traditional swordsmanship. It seemed that he was keeping some of his more heretical techniques to himself, which was why if he found some skill useful yet non-traditional, he would focus on refining those techniques in secret.

    Thankfully, it appeared what Kenya learned was not entirely wasted. I left the rest to Hakurou.

    As opposed to that

    Chloes swordsmanship was quite simr to Hinatas. Your moves were very beautiful and effective.

    Chole smiled happily at my praise.

    Yeah! It looked just like Shizu-senseis, thats why I have been working hard to imitate it!

    Even though you call it imitation, its not that simple to learn. It may be a different case if you learn by using Skills like I do, but youve mastered this entirely through your talent and hard work. You should feel proud!

    Indeed. I have had all sorts of disciples in the past, yet Ive never seen anyone rivaling the talent of this young girl. Your future is very promising.

    Hinata and Hakurou were both rigorous teachers, yet they were both praising Chloe.

    It sounded like she was extraordinarily talented. Considering how young she was, there was no telling how much she would progress if training continued. On one hand, I was looking forward to it, but on the other hand, I couldnt help but feel a tinge of fear.

    All right, back to the focus of today.

    Hinata seemed to have other goals during her visit here.

    The reason why I called you here, for one, is that I wanted to show you the progress the children have made. These children are all very adept, but they are still young. In order to prevent them from straying off the right path, I hope you will get to know about their current states.

    It went without saying that I had been keeping an eye on the matter as well. Nevertheless, I decided to heed her advice. Hinata was treating these children, who were previously tended to by Shizu-san, as her siblings.

    I understand. Hakurou will take care of them too, plus there are a lot of seniors who can help them in this town as well. I will do the same so that they wont go down the wrong paths in life.

    Hehe, I knew youd say so. I brought up what I said just in case.

    This gal really worries too much.

    Hinata really did have a gentle side despite her usual, frigid demeanor.

    Well then, what were your other reasons? I asked Hinata while peeking at the children who were in a group fight against Hakurou.

    Well actually, the main reason why

    Hinata paused upon saying so and turned her eyes to the children.

    Even though this was Hakurou, taking on all five of the children at once was still tricky. Although he could see through the childrens intentions, if he had reacted just a tad bit slower, he would have sustained a fatal injury.

    If just considering their constitutions, the childrenpletely outmatched Hakurou. Naturally, he could not be careless.

    By the way, Kumara did not participate. Had she joined and fought seriously, they would have won against Hakurou with sheer numbers. Nheless, the team had Chloe right now, so the children had the upper hand. I thought they had wonderful teamposition. It was as if they were putting on a martial arts performance. It honestly was captivating.

    Shes so young yet so strong, Hinata muttered, her eyes fixed on Chloe.

    While Kenya, Ryota, Gail and Alice were also very strong, Chloe was abnormally powerful. If she were absent, Hakurou could have ended the battle already rather than being in knee deep mud right now.

    And soon, the simted battle ended.

    The children were all catching up with their breaths as Hakurou began doling out advice. It was no wonder why the children had all grown so fast if the training was this harsh every time.

    Hinata returned her attention to me and got back on topic.

    I got mesmerized by their fight halfway through our conversation. Have you scheduled the music exchange that Luminas-sama has been pestering for yet? I knew shed be interested, but by the look of things, she seemed to really enjoy it. Thats why I came to bring the matter to you.

    How surprisingbut I had been swamped with work, so I was nning to postpone it.

    Oh, I guess Luminas genuinely liked our concert. I told Takt and the band to continue to practice, and as a result, the number of pieces they can perform has also increased.

    Your memory in that area is really amazing. I cant even read music notes, and writing scores from memory was obviously impossible.

    Ahh, so there were things that even Hinata wasnt good at. She hadnt been all that interested in the concert either; she was probably terrible with music.

    I enjoyed a momentary internal feeling of superiority. With that being said, I had to rely on Raphael-san too.

    Then, please anticipate our visit soon.

    Very well. Moving a whole band is a huge project, so allow us to send our Holy Knights as escorts. We will use Elemental Magic Warp Portal to send them in groups.

    Wonderful. Since theres going to be a lot of luggage with so many people, I figured that going there by horse-drawn carriages would be a hassle.

    I recalled that Lubelius was protected by a Barrier, meaning we couldnt just teleport there. This was why we needed a morefortable method of transportation.

    The problem would be resolved when the train wasplete. But that would be a long time away from now. You couldnt ask for things that didnt exist yet.

    Transporting the whole band wasnt only about moving the performers themselves. Each yer had to carry their own instrument for the performance, which was quite cumbersome. If we were to travel by horse-drawn carriages, we might be forced to go down some unfinished roads as well. Riding on roads that were in poor condition could damage the instruments, and we wanted to avoid that type of situation.

    I was super envious of the dragon ship owned by the empress of Sarion. Traveling by train might be fun, but in order to reduce the travel time, aircraft were obviously more convenient in that regard.

    You could navigate by sea ornd for logistical transportation, but for sightseeing or other purposes, air was the fastest andfiest method.

    This was the reason why Hinatas proposal was very beneficial to us. I promised that I would help too, and so we worked out the detailed matters regarding the travel ns.

    As I was halfway through my discussion with Hinata, the children, who were on break, gathered together.

    Rimuru-sensei, where are you going with Hinata-oneechan?

    Since Chloe had inquired, I exined the music exchange that would be held at Lubelius to everyone.

    I want to go too!

    Me too!

    I might fall asleep during it, but since Chloe and Alice are going, Ill go too!

    Yeah me too!

    In that case, Im going as well. The fact that these guys areing and the possibility of them causing problems is what worries me.

    Because of Chloes words, Kenya and the others began moring about wanting to go to Lubelius.

    Uhhwhat should I do?

    It was good to let them see more of the world as a form of social experience. But if you were to ask me whether there might be danger or not, I couldnt confidently rule that out.

    Raising her head to look at my troubled expression, Kumara opened her mouth and timidly said, I-I wish to go too arinsu

    Kumaras presence was needed as the guardian of the nieth floor. The way she spoke indicated her regret; it appeared that her senses were telling her not to beseech such a request from me. But as a child, she naturally yearned to go on a trip with her friends. It went against my way of doing things if I were to turn her down.

    You dont have to be so courteous. If its only a tiny, selfish request, ask and I may just approve it.

    It was gonna be a headache if she were to grow up to be as stubborn as Milim, but that was better than losing her innocence as a child. Based on these considerations, I told her my thoughts while patting Kumaras head.

    Simr to her small fox form, it feels smooth and fluffy. Her warmth seems to have nothing to do with her human or monster form

    Ehh, Kumara had gone through transforming into a humanoid being; what happened above was purely sensible imagination conducted by yours truly, Rimuru.

    Awesome! Now we can officially travel and skip school!

    But you always looked happy at school, Ken-chan, did you really want to skip sses?

    Idiot! Attending sses is fun, but if we get to y while everyone else has to studyhow should I say thisit makes us really special.

    Kenya, I understand what you mean, but I dont want to get corrupted by your mindset. On the other hand, I feel very excited too.

    Right? Thats exactly it!

    The children were all fired up about going before I had even given them permission. They even went on to dere something about skipping school. It wasnt like I didnt understand their feelings. And although I could sympathize, I would never put such a thought into action

    Right, it wont matter. Instead, please have the teachers assign them more homework.

    Eh! How can you do this, sensei!

    I ignored Kenyas cries.

    Everything doesnt always go your way, and many things in life were ultimately unfair. I intended for them to learn about this point while they were still young. This was a demonstration of my fatherly love, and they would surely grow stronger from the experience.

    This was definitely not me picking on or punishing them. Hopefully, the children woulde to understand my justification behind it.

    I just want to be with sensei.

    Chloe, who started the whole thing, seemed rather satisfied.

    All right, I suppose its fine as long as they make some good memories together.

    Your heart goes soft so easily.

    Ah, could it be that Hinata-san is against the idea? I retorted and signaled with my eyesYou are so cold.

    Tsk Hinata clicked her tongue I never said that, she answered with irritation. But she didnt appear to object.

    Then we are all good to go.

    And so, the n was settled.

    We would be attending the music exchange in Lubelius. The day that we sent out our band, the children would tag along as well.

    We arrived at the Holy Empire of Lubelius.

    On our tour through the citys streets the children were ovee with curiosity as they took in all the sights with wonder. On the contrary, Takt and the band members were practically shaking in their boots.

    Diablo was by my side, acting as my secretary. Shion was here as well. Since I had let her guard our townst time, I decided to bring her. Instead, Veldora would be keeping guard.

    You have an important task as the master of thebyrinthI convinced him with this line. That was why he didnt follow us during this expedition. It might have been a different case if we were heading to another country, but it was simply too dangerous to let Veldora meet with Luminas.

    Warning. Probability of problem urring100 percent.

    I also received such advice from you-know-who.

    It was an obviousndmine to avoidone that must be avoidedat all costs.

    Our guide was Hinata herself.

    Wee to Lubelius. His Majesty the Pope wees you all too, she introduced in a tone that sounded remarkably disrespectful towards the pope. Although I was aware of the secret that the pope was merely a role Louis yed, Takt and the others knew nothing of it. This was, of course, highly ssified information. Obviously, I couldnt tell the children, nor could we tell the members of the band.

    I gave an improvised response and confirmed ourter schedule with Hinata.

    First off, she announced, tonight, we will be hosting a banquet to wee everyone. Tomorrow, we will invite you all toplete soundchecks. The following day is scheduled for rehearsal and the concert will take ce in three days time.

    What do you think, Takt?

    Y-yes sir! Theres no problem, Rimuru-sama. Even though we require magic to transfer the instruments, I dont think it will affect them very much. We will need to make slight adjustments depending on the size of the venue, but since there are bands here as well, I dont think there will be a problem.

    Then it was okay to perform.

    You only have one day to rehearse though.

    Hahaha, that is indeed true. However, weve been practicing every day back home for this concert. All of the members can guarantee that we will not disappoint.

    Excellent!

    It must be thanks to their diligence that they possessed such conviction. Despite the fact that hard work was sometimes unable to measure up to natural talent, it was still a reliable method. With hard work, you could build up confidence that subsequently made your heart stronger. Plus, this newfound resilience would also prove itself useful in all manner of other everyday activities. If you persevered every day, you would obviously be confident in your work.

    I gave full marks to Takts answer.

    Now, I am very much looking forward to the concertI thought to myself, nodding with satisfaction.

    Fast forward toter that night.

    The members of the band were being treated like nobility. But this only made them more confused and nervous.

    M-may I ask, Rimuru-sama? We are meremon citizens of the Tempest Federation. Are we really allowed to stay in such luxurious rooms?

    This great expedition involved more than one hundred participants, yet each person was assigned their own room. They also got a personal maid, who was on standby next door, to respond the moment they were called.

    Moreover, there was a bar that even rivalled ones in a five-star hotel. You could ess it regardless of species, human or monster. This, nheless, made everyone rather nervous.

    The banquet was excessively grand as well. They continuously served bite-sized appetizers, which were both delicious and arranged to be aesthetically pleasing. While portion sizes werent toorge, the vors more than made up for that deficiency. Furthermore, the dishes were extraordinarily creative in order to satisfy everyones varying ptes.

    In the beginning, the children wereining about the small portions and appeared unsatisfied. But, by the end of the banquet, they all seemed quite full as they patted their round bellies.

    Since I was a slime, it was impossible for me to be full by any measure. The childrens stomachs, on the other hand, had their limits. Regardless of how small the portion of each serving was, if they ate a bunch, then naturally it would eventually add up until they couldnt eat another bite.

    In contrast to the innocent kids, the band members feelings were a lot moreplicated.

    There were many delicious cuisines in Tempest as well, but none of them were like thismade with extreme attentiveness and served exclusively to nobles and royalty.

    Not only had they never tasted such luxurious dishes, they also received amodating services that they had never experienced before. It was unreasonable to expect them to not feel skittish.

    In any case, dont be so constrained. This is all a token of appreciation from Lubelius for your performanceter.

    I was tremendously grateful that I didnt have to perform.

    I hadnt shown dedication like they had, yet even if I did and was in the same position as Takt and the band members, the crushing performance anxiety wouldve been enough to drown out my enjoyment of the dishes. Not being able to savor delicious food was a huge loss in the pleasures of life.

    That was the main reason why I hoped Takt and the band members would appreciate it as much as they could.

    The banquet soon ended without a hitch, and the band members made their way back to their rooms.

    The children went to sleep too. They were quite excited after spending the entire day seeing new and interesting things. They were undoubtedly exhausted after all the fun they had.

    Everyone quickly fell asleep, leaving me the only one awake. I was nning to use my special skill of sleepy boi, but apparently it wouldnt be necessary.

    Knock, knockI heard the door being gently rapped on.

    My apologies for disturbing Your Majesty at this hour, but our master would like to invite Your Majesty Rimuru to join her. Is it convenient for you to convene?

    Someone ran up to me almost silently. It was one of the attendants that served Luminasa Surmounter. Unlike the ones who came to our research facility, the attendants appeared to be very outstanding individuals. Although I was under the impression that Luminas would not show herself this time, the attendants presence suggested that she intended to meet me.

    I epted the invitation without hesitation.

    I only brought Shion and Diablo along, and we had the maid guide us to the venue.

    Long time no see, Rimuru. I see you did not bring that evil dragon with you, thatsmendable.

    I figured that evil dragon was referring to Veldora. Considering all the bad stuff that guy caused in the past, Luminas definitely had a right to call him that, but I thought she was being a little too harsh.

    Nevertheless, it was none of my business.

    Indeed, its been a long time. Obviously, I wouldnt bring him along. That guys a walking troublemaker. Letting hime to an event such as this would only give me a headache.

    Kukuku, so you do understand.

    With just a short exchange, I suddenly got the feeling that Luminas and I had a lot inmon.

    It turned out Veldora could be useful on asion.

    Three people, including Luminas, were waiting for me in this opulent room. Gunther, with the appearance of an old butler, stood to Luminass left while Louis the Pope stood to Luminass right. Since Roy, who was acting as Luminass body double, had died, all that remained of the Three Archdukes were gathered here.

    I was somewhat perplexed by Hinatas absence on this asion.

    Arent you going to call Hinata?

    To my question, Gunter and Louis helpfully replied.

    I was nning to. Even though shes evolved from a sage to a saint, she was still human once. While she doesnt need to sleep anymore, she apparently could not get rid of her old habit as a human.

    I went to call her, but she mentioned something about how insufficient sleep would be bad for skin and some other bizarre things

    Indeed, it was already past midnight, which exined why they didnt drag Hinata along.

    As I was going to take their word for it, Luminas cracked a small smile and told me something unexpected.

    Ara, her bodily structure has evolved close to that of a spiritual life-form, so theres no way her skin could get worse. But Hinata does require sleep. Even though shes a saint now, her body is still the same as when she was human. It will take a long time before her body fully evolves as well. This has been a misunderstanding, Hinata is not some superwoman, she smiled again upon finishing her exnation.

    Humans were different from monsters in the sense that their bodies would not change drastically like thettersthat was the gist of her description. In other words, Hinata still retained all of her human qualities, and in a way, that could be considered her Achilles Heel.

    I noticed the way monsters evolved was quite beyondmon sense too.

    Incidentally, this went without saying, but Diablo didnt need any sleep either. And while Shion still required some rest, she only needed three hours each time. She could also go without sleep for more than seven days straight. Benimaru and Souei were the same, which was perhaps a sign that monsters had stronger adaptability to different environments.

    If Hinata wasnt here, I just had to ept it. As the one being invited, it wasnt something I should be worrying about anyway.

    In that case, I have a gift for you guys. This is a new dish made by Shuna and Yoshida-san: brandy apple pound cake, I offered.

    Since Hinata missed out on my donation of this delicious dessert, she would no doubtin. But snacking on sweets at night was probably bad for her beauty. Hinata enjoyed eating this type of stuff, but since she was oblivious of this fact, she would not have hesitated for a single moment to eat it.

    How caring of me.

    Your courtesy impresses me! You are a smart one after all, Luminas praised aloud.

    It was thanks to Shuna that I could bring these gifts. The two people who imed to be my secretaries, on the contrary, were not nearly as considerate. Diablo was definitely the most careful when it came to behaving around me, but he didnt seem to focus on anything else. A lot of the time, it was like those two had a screw loose somewhere.

    Putting that aside for now, I asked, Right, so why did you call me here?

    Umm, I was deliberating over whether I should tell you this or not, but now Ive decided to share this information with you. Granbell has been nning something sinister. I am looking forward to the concert in three days and dont want anyone to get in the way. Thats why I want your help.

    She cut to the chase without skipping a beat.

    Shouldnt you stop eating cake when discussing something serious like thisI really should have mentioned this to her.

    Shion nodded as if she had a clue of what was going on, yet my intuition immediately told me otherwise.

    Diablo was giving off a Its none of my concern vibe, probably thinking along the lines of Just kill the enemies when theye.

    Well, to be honest, I felt awfully conflicted.

    It might be a different case had thisnd been under my administration, but this was another persons entire nation. Even though I could summon Soueis subordinates and scatter them around the continent, along with some demons, I did not want to stir things up too much.

    That was why:

    If its something so important, shouldnt you call Hinata?

    Indeed, this was the time for Hinata to shine. Compared to us, who were merely guests here, she was more qualified to uphold the security of this nation.

    While I thought this was a sensible approach, Luminas wouldnt buy it.

    Hmph, dont you look down on us now! Even if those trashe and instigate a fight, Lubeliuss defense is indestructible. Wevepletely fortified our borders to fend off that evil dragon. However, no matter how wless our defenses may be, intruders could still sneak in by utilizing secret tunnels that we are unaware of andunch an attack.

    I could see glimpses of her confidence from what she had said. The city was an iron fortress even against an entire army. That was to be expected of a city built to withstand attacks from Veldora. A ten thousand strong army, in all likelihood, wouldnt be enough to conquer it.

    Even so, this was not what Luminas was worried about.

    Secret tunnels that even you dont know about Right, I recall that Granbell Rosso was the head of the Seven Luminary Clerics

    You are correct, added Louis. Theyve been operating behind the scenes on thisnd for a long time. Surely, he had prepared one or two secret passages. Humans are exceptionally skillful at such trickeries.

    The most unfortunate thing is that man used to be the Hero of Light, and even fought against Luminas-sama in the past, continued Gunther. If he were to hide his aura, we wouldnt be able to detect him.

    Their eyes glimmered as they spoke.

    This sounded like a challenging task to handle. Isnt this what youd call an inside job? Granbell knew better than anyone else about this nationsposition and geography. He had previously proven his strength as well. I heard that he was stronger than yman, and therefore could not be underestimated.

    That was how I saw it.

    How boring. Please dont trouble Rimuru-sama with menial chores like that, someone suddenly interjected, disgusted.

    It was Diablo.

    Just when I was thinking he had been behaving nicely, he abruptly interrupted with this line. Seriously, couldnt he be more mindful of the time and ce?

    Louis and Gunthers expressions darkened drastically, but fortunately, Luminassughter made the two hold back.

    Kukuku. ck Primordial, Rimuru has truly made you quite the obedient pet. Its still rather unbelievable despite witnessing it with my own eyes.

    Luminas sure was odd tough under these circumstances. But thanks to her jovial reaction, the atmosphere smoothed over once more.

    Please dont call me that. Rimuru-sama has already given me a wonderful name

    Back off, Diablo. Luminas and I have already established an alliance, and I intend to keep it that way.

    I publicly rebuked him, partially to apologize to Luminas.

    Apologies for my intrusion.

    Diablo did not challenge Luminas any further and instead remained silent at mymand. It looked to me that he was simply putting on an act. Seeing how he had apologized to Luminas and the others, Ill let it pass. Luminas had some requests for us guests, and I didnt want to make the scene any more awkward

    No, that guyDiablohas a point too. Its not very courteous of me to ask a favor such as this from you. On the other hand, I still wish you will agree since I have good reasons.

    Luminas sure had a big heart. She even considered Diablos feelings and directly called him by his name.

    Even though she addressed him without any honorifics.

    Luminas wouldnt get mad over trivial things such as these. Thus, she calmly revealed why we had been invited.

    I brought this up when I mentioned that Hinata needs to sleep, but when humans evolve, their bodies wont adapt right away. It takes a long time before they can mature.

    From a sage that possibly rivalled a Demon Lord Seed, a human could grow to be a saint which was the equivalent of an awakened demon lord. Yet, if this evolution required some time to activate beforeing into effect, then a newly risen saint would not pose too much of a threat. Even if they gained enormous power, it was still meaningless if they couldnt properlymand it.

    Hinatas control over her powers was masterful; unfortunately, it relied entirely on her techniques. It wasnt something as natural as breathing, so it would burden her body and mind.

    Speaking of which, why did Luminas bring this matter up when Hinata wasnt aroundah, I understand now. It was actually because Hinata wasnt present that she found the confidence to discuss the topic.

    Humans would evolve over eons. Could it mean

    Luminas continued with her exnation:

    Regarding Granbell, he is not a saint, but A Bearer of The Heros Egg. When the hatchling grew its wings and left the nest, even I have no idea just how strong he has be.

    Didnt this imply he was a legitimate Hero?

    The term Hero was used here and there, but had different connotations to it. Some would proim themselves to be a Hero, but only people bearing the Heros Egg were acknowledged by the world. In other words, thetter were the real deal, possessing sufficient strength to even seal away Veldora.

    Just like how Demon Lord Seeds were still considered demon lords, Heros Egg bearers would be considered Heroes in conjunction. Their sources of power were very simr. Heroes and demon lords are bound by causalitythis saying really hit the nail on the head. And deducing further from this knowledge, I could tell that Granbells power was presumably on par with an awakened demon lord.

    Could it be that he is more powerful than Hinata?

    When I heard that Gran was killed by Nicus alone, I thought I had misheard. Disintegration is truly the strongest magic spell, but Gran would not be stupid enough to take a hit like that head on. And, to answer your question

    Luminas stared straight into my eyes.

    I see, so thats why she didnt call Hinata.

    You are correct. I tried convincing him to join me, which is why I fought against him in the first ce. As a result, this is why I can confidently dere him to be stronger than even the older demon lords, Luminas concluded without hesitation.

    Not only me, but Luminass servants, Louis and Gunther, were shocked by her words. It was likely due to the fact that they had always looked down on Gran in the past.

    Indeed, weve never challenged Gran head on before

    Is he really that strong?

    Certainly. The reason why I allowed Gran to do as he wished was so that I could have him in the palm of my hand. We did not have any conflicts of interest, and I only proposed a deal with him out of curiosity. I allowed him to create the Seven Luminaries and granted him the highest authority. If I had to justify why, I wanted to make him one of my trump cards, Luminas reluctantly admitted.

    Yet this trump card backfired before it could be exploited.

    Did he be a hostile dagger at her throat?

    On one hand, this was her miscalction, but on the other, I was also partly responsible. However, no matter how you put it, my role was simply a small percentage of the cause and therefore shouldnt be held ountable.

    The girl was precious to the Rossos. This is all happening because that Mariabell died, I quickly surmised.

    For Granbell, who was constantly cautious, to act now during these turbulent times, that must have been the reason.

    Was it the little girl I saw during your nations founding festival? I did not know her either, yet I could tell she was a remarkably strong foe. If Granbell treasured her so much, then she might have been the key to his ambition.

    Mariabell was indeed tough to deal with. She definitely would have continued deviously nting seeds for even more trouble in the future had she not revealed herself and her underhanded scheming.

    In contrast to enemies you can face head on, it was the hidden viins that were so much harder to eliminate.

    But now that she mentioned it

    By the way, what is Granbells goal? He hadnt made any moves until now, so it doesnt feel like he is exposing himself just to avenge Mariabell

    It could beno, its nothing. Luminas swallowed her words. She closed her eyes and pondered for a few seconds before calmly exining, That man has always dreamed of bringing peace to the human world in the past. He battled vile fiends and eliminated vicious beasts in an effort to safeguard humanity. Furthermore, this stubborn guy fought me several times until he learned that I had no intention of killing all humans, but instead wished to coexist in peace. Afterwards, we created a pact, and the Western Continent became a ce of peace and prosperity. Various kinds of familys united together, and nations were founded. Some smaller countries flourished and becamerger. Gran manipted these nations from the shadows, eventually spurring the birth of the Western States Council.

    Listening to this firsthand, I realized that GranbellHero Granseemed to be a bona fide legendary figure. He justified his decision to remain the holder of the head position of the questionable Five Great Elders as a way to protect humanity. Putting the morality of his actions aside, judging from the results alone, humanity was given a thousand years of peace because of Granbell

    Sarion, led by the ancient elven tribe,cked the ambition to expand their territory. While Continents Wrath Dagruel and Storm Dragon Veldora fought on thend, us in Lubelius handled the defense. The demons from the frozen realm of the north attempted to invade several times, but they were merely toying with us. If Guy were serious, this world would undoubtedly have already perished. And in that case, there would only be one more human circle left. To prepare ourselves for such a possibility, we allied ourselves with the dwarves and had merchants gather information for us. Granbell had been handling all this by himself the entire time, Luminas finally finished.

    Upon learning these new details, I couldnt help but think that Granbell was quite impressive.

    No, no, this is no time to resonate with Luminass words.

    And so? If Granbell-san is this powerful, what is he attempting to aplish?

    Kukuku, dont get so hasty now. Gran has no reason to antagonize mealthough I wish I could boldly im that, actually, I thought of one possible goal he might have in mind. However, I do not intend to tell you about it.

    Ah, just as I thought.

    She was trying to avoid giving too much away, so I half guessed this oue.

    Regarding his motivation, there was one piece of information that concerned me. Have you ever heard of the name Yuuki Kagurazaka? inquired Luminas.

    Yes. Didnt you say that he had an ominous aura around him? Not only did he instigate the Kingdom of Farmus to raise arms against my nation, but thete Demon Lord yman was also doing his bidding.

    Ara ara, so you noticed that as well. Good, then itll be easier for you to understand. You see, this Yuuki had contacted Gran in the past. The two appear to have interacted with each other and even formted somewhat of an agreement.

    Its Yuuki again, huh? Enough is enough. Im getting pretty tired of being jerked around by that guy

    Had it not been for Raphael-san, I would have been easily fooled by him again. If I were to allow this individual to continue his pernicious acts, then there would be a ton of problems to deal with in the future. Perhaps it was time that I confronted him directly.

    Could it be that Gran was operating due to Yuukis maniption?

    Indeed, I am afraid a part of their n is directed at you.

    I see.

    They mustve thought that now was the perfect time to strike since I was away from Tempest.

    I get it, Shion suddenly interjected, that brats goal is to make Gran and Rimuru-sama fight each other!

    I was so shocked that my eyes automatically focused on Shion. And here I thought she was ignoring the meeting because she didnt understand. Turns out she understood everything just fine.

    Kufufufufu, he thinks that just because we left the country with a few guards, this is an opportunity that cant be passed up? How naive. There are two Heavenly Kings guarding Rimuru-sama; no matter what he is nning, it will be meaningless.

    Diablo was up to his usual antics.

    Please stop. I felt tremendously embarrassed every time someone mentioned the Four Heavenly Kings.

    In any case, as a precaution, we should stay alert. There are three more days before the concert, and after those three days, it wont be a problem of yours anymore. Just like what I said in the beginning, I merely wish to enjoy the concert.

    Luminas wasnt shaken either. While shebeled Gran a threat, she still prioritized her entertainment.

    I wanted to learn from her how to be this calm and collected.

    On that thought, the secret meeting deep into the night concluded.

    Next, would we see if Granbell really took action? Would Yuuki take advantage of this as well? Despite our worries, the second day of our visit to Lubelius began.

    Today, we were preparing the venue. We moved around the instruments and started setting them up.

    We were led to the cathedral. This was an enormous building that could hold arge number of believers and, at the same time, a major structure that was the vital point of defense for the path leading to its interior.

    I didnt have anything in particr to do. Tasks like tuning instruments were best left to the experts. I would proceed with the schedule as nned and bring the kids on a field trip.

    Of course, as Luminas made abundantly clear, it was important to remain vignt. To that end, we summoned Diablos direct subordinate, Venom, and brought him along as a bodyguard.

    Venom must have been quite shocked since he was summoned without any prior warning.

    Diablo, you will be in charge of supervising the band members work

    Rimuru-sama, I was interrupted mid-sentence by Diablo, please wait a moment. I knew this would happen, which is why Ive already made arrangementsst night.

    This guy just had to eliminate all possibilities of us being separated. I suppose this was the reason why he had called all his subordinates here, though I couldnt necessarily me him for doing that.

    Diablo even threatened Venom with Show up within ten minutes.

    It was one thing for Venom to actually carry out the order, but for Diablo to demand that without batting an eye, it just proved his heartlessness. Oh well, he wouldnt have a heart to begin with. He was a demon after all. While impressed by Diablos efficiency, I also felt sympathy for his subordinates with how tiresome his orders must have been.

    Before I could blink, the one hundred demons under Venomsmand had already begun helping the band members. These majins were all over rank A, and Luminass subordinates would also stay alert. Now, I could rest assured that the bodyguard detail was wless.

    Under Hinatas guidance, I toured around the city to examine Luminass legacy. And taking it all in, I felt that the Holy Empire of Lubelius was the direct antithesis of the Tempest Federation.

    This was not to say, however, that they didnt have their merits. Although the citizenscked freedom, it was a blissful society because the people here didntpete with each other. The only work they needed to do was to follow the procedures already set for them by their superiors.

    In a sense, everyone had essentially relinquished their independence, but in return, they would never experience hunger or pain. Those who couldnt bear such a society had already left the country, whereas the remaining people had all adhered to these rules since birth. Naturally, this would seem unbnced to a bystander.

    Ignorance is bliss.

    People wouldnt be dismayed if they never knew how less fortunate they werepared to others. Conversely, this discontentment could also inspire people to work harder for greater aspirations. After all, a society withoutpetition would be stagnant.

    For some reason this feels really boring, Alice muttered to herself.

    Yeah Kenya voiced his agreement. People our age here are all working. Arent there any schools?

    While the rest of the children did not speak, they still remained confused at the bizarre sight in front of them.

    There are no schools in this country. Everyone is under someonesmand. Everyone is equal under the glorious name of God. Peoplee to this nation to enjoy peace and prosperity, Hinata said proudly.

    But I had to wonder, did she really think that was the right thing to do? Did they have no qualms about the fact that the upper echelons of society had monopolized all luxuries for themselves?

    But on the contrary, she still had a point. It didnt feel right to teach the unknowingmoners about luxury when they didnt need to know anything about it in the first ce

    No matter how hard one tries, there will always be some things that are impossible to acquire. If people never know about the existence of these things, then they wont feel the need to obtain it and suffer as a result.

    Thats true as well

    Kenya wasnt dumb either. He understood what I meant.

    Living in an extremely regted society like this, we maintain a high standard of happiness for our citizens. Thats why whenmunicating with other nations, everything must all go through the Western Holy Church first, Hinata exined.

    That made sense.

    If their people were ignorant of things like luxury, then they wouldnt be allowed to have contact with other nations in fear of them learning about the inequality they were living in.

    They sound like fish raised in a fishbowl.

    If they feel like they are happy, then we should not interfere.

    I suppose so. Human happiness cannot be satisfied by materialistic desires alone. A society that pursues spiritual happiness definitely isnt a bad idea either.

    Although, I probably wouldnt be able to tolerate it. I believed that my knowledge of these luxuries granted me the right to pursue that prosperity.

    A long, long time ago, I used to run around the neighborhood ying hide and seek with friends. Perhaps if it were me from back then, I would have found this society to be veryfortable.

    Everyone has a different definition of happiness. You dont have the right to criticize others and call their ideologies false. Think for yourself and do things your own way.

    I thought that should be sufficient. Even so, there was something else that I was mindful of

    But the people here wont be able to survive on their own. If they are to sustain a life like this, they need protection

    Chloes mutter was just what I was thinking.

    Childrens observation skills cant be underestimated sometimes.

    Her words seemed to have gotten a reaction from Hinata as well, seeing how she rapidly blinked her eyes a few times.

    Looks like she noticed it too.

    This society was twisted, in a sense. Without its ruler, its citizens, unknowledgeable of the outside world, were unable to do anything. Losing their personal freedom meant that their lives were entirely in other peoples hands. A life like that would be no different from livestock

    Indeed. But we have been working hard to improve the situation to prevent such things from happening.

    OhI see. But I still think its better if everyone can work together. Then they wont just rely on Hinata-oneechans hard work. Everyone can help out!

    That was an idealistic take because things were not as simple as working hard.

    Everyone was born with different talents, and so the amount of responsibilities they could aplish were unequal as well. The word equality sounded wonderful, but everyone would stille to experience cruel and unjust reality.

    Idealism and realism.

    The two locked in eternal conflict with each other. When one of them stands valid, the other will not. So there was never really a right answer. As long as you walk down the path you believe in, that was enough. The unknown was what made life so interesting.

    The children appeared to be troubled over something the rest of the day. It made me realize again that happiness wasnt just about fulfilling our material needs. Even though I knew this, I couldnt stop emphasizing it. Regardless of the conclusion, I didnt think the day was wasted.

    I suppose that the Holy Empire Lubeliuss approach was another valid method. This diversity allowed for life to have infinite possibilities.

    I reflected upon my life again and pondered carefully. I figured not limiting myself intentionally was the correct path for me. I was reincarnated as a slime after being stabbed to death in my previous life. There was no telling what would happen in the future. And if that were the case, not living in the moment would be a shame.

    I couldnt help but ponder after considering all these thoughts.

    And thus the wheels of fate began to turn

    Did you just say that the Yellow Primordial has disappeared?

    Thats right. Its honestly baffling, but after we detected an enormous surge of mana, all the dormant demonic aura in the area had disappeared

    Unbelievable. Having listened to Alroses report, Leon couldnt help but think hed misheard.

    Leons domain crossed paths with the spiritual world known as the Realm of Demons. It was and covered in a thick, impure aura of magicules, and powerful demons asionally roamed the territory. If it were a demon without a host, Leons knight order could handle them, even if it were an archdemon.

    However, they had discovered the presence of some ancient demons dwelling within the area. One of them was an overlord that even Leon could not ignore. That demon was the Yellow Primordial, Jaune. Since she had yet to obtain a physical body, she had a limited range of activity. Consequently, Leon could not leave thisnd. She was simply too dangerous to be left alone. After all, no one else would be able to handle that vicious demon.

    Shes a psychotic demon that fires off nuclear magic for fun. Theres no way we can coexist with her. Any attempts at negotiation were ignored as well. If not for Leon-samas presence, I would not have been able to handle ityet you say that such a foe has gone missing?

    Yes, ude. I couldnt believe it either, thats why I came to verify. I found that the area ovepping the demons realm was somehow dimensionally modified. The only logical exnation is that someone shut down the Gate of Hell.

    Is that even possible?

    Hearing the words of Leons top knightck Knight ude, the strongest knight of the Golden Valley of El DoradoSilver Knight Alrose responded with agitation.

    Not only Leon, but all of thisnds inhabitants were troubled by these demons. The fact that the culprit, the Yellow Primordial, had disappeared was incredible news. It was so unbelievable that they were all in shock.

    Moreover, even the Gate of Hell had disappeared. They couldnt help but suspect that this was a prelude to something much more ominous. The Gate of Hell was the door where the physical world and spiritual world ovepped. As a result, demons without physical bodies could still influence the physical world for a short period of time.

    In the past, Leon had sent out his knight order several times to try and seal the gate, yet their efforts were foiled by demons on every asion. There had been regr skirmishes ever since he founded his nation here.

    The most frustrating part was that Leon was unable to destroy the source of their problems, thus enabling spiritual life-forms to revive endlessly. For the demons, their battles with Leon were merely to pass the time in their immortal lives, but to Leon and his people, it caused tremendous harm.

    For Leon, the ruler of this richnd, demons were the root cause of his worries. Had he been more serious, he probably could have wiped out the demons. The only issue was, if he werent careful, he could inadvertently wake up the Yellow Primordial.

    Actually, even if it were toe to that

    If Leon were to battle an awakened Yellow Primordial, he could still win following a fierce battle. But shing with her would result in the continent sinking to the bottom of the ocean.

    In hopes of preventing such an oue, Leon avoided conflicts with her.

    What the hell happened? Yellow Primordial ording to Guy, she cant be reasoned with like Mizeri or Raine.

    Leon carefully weighed the pros and cons of keeping the demons there, and even when sacrifices had to be made, he chose to maintain the status quo as it was.

    Yet this threat had suddenly disappeared.

    There is no way something this fortunate would happen in this worldthis thought weighed not only on Leons mind, but everyone elses as well.

    A clearly shaken Leon received more information:

    I have something to report. There was a total of five kids who were hidden in the Tempest Federation. I have confirmed with sources within Ingracia and investigated further on the matter. Demon Lord Rimuru seems to have made a secret agreement with Demon Lord Luminas to sell the children.

    Is this true?

    Lubelius and Tempest both formed an alliance. The two demon lords are on good terms. We deduced that Demon Lord Rimuru might have deceived Yuuki Kagurazaka and made the children, who all possess arge quantity of magicules, his bargaining chips for the alliance.

    The Magical Knight of the Blue Knight Order had been investigating Tempest, and now he shared what he had discovered with Leon through Magic Communication.

    Leon couldnt help but wonder at the surprising news. He had met Rimuru during the Walpurgis Banquet, and he didnt seem to be the type of person who would do something like this.

    Have someone monitor the source of this intelligence. They are likely tied to some other party, or worse, being manipted.

    How could this happen?

    Could this have been Demon Lord Rimurus bidding?

    No, it shouldnt be. Demon Lord Rimuru has no reason toy a finger on the children.

    Then what could possibly be the reason?

    Perhaps they wanted us to fight among ourselves and profit from it. Demon Lord Luminas may have been a victim of this plot as well, or perhaps she was the conspirator herself.

    Uh!

    Who could have?

    Based on the current situation in the Western Nations, who is the most likely suspect?Leon pondered silently to himself.

    The answer seemed both obvious and obscure.

    The secret organization Cerberus?

    The only people who knew Leon was collecting Otherworlder children were those suspicious merchants. Actually, there were others, those being the people who originally provided the merchandise with summoning magic.

    Could it be that the Rossos discovered the secret behind their summonings? Or perhaps they had secretly allied with the merchants

    Once doubt took hold, it started to rapidly grow. However, based on the new information, it just didnt make any sense. If the situation simply involved five mere kids, then there was no reason for Leon to actor at least, that should be how anyone involved in the matter should view it

    For a demon lord, you normally avoided interfering with the affairs of your peers. Moreover, imposing yourself on the affairs of other demon lords when it didnt involve you in the first ce would be an extraordinarily foolish act. If you did not tread carefully, you might end up antagonizing two demon lords at once. That was the reason why the smarter choice for Leon was to ignore this information. Luminas might have been up to something, but it was in all likelihood directed towards Rimuru and therefore of no consequence to Leon.

    There is no reason for me to actLeon finally concluded.

    Yet this time, it was difficult for him to justify his decision. Likely realizing the validity of what Leon said, his subordinates began expressing their opinions too.

    I seeso someone is trying to take advantage of Leon-sama, no?

    Shall we eliminate them?

    Leon spoke up to stop them. No, without concrete evidence, its not wise to make a move against Cerberus, since they enjoy quite the standing with the Eastern Empire. It was probably instigated by those guys, but it might also be the Rossos who betrayed us. Furthermore

    Leon calmly made his decision and gave his instructions when a sense of unease crossed his mind.

    He recalled the name Kroba Hale.

    Could it be

    Yes, there was no reason for him to act, and moving now would be the same as stepping into someones trap. Despite knowing this, Leon was still extremely anxious.

    Had the Yellow Primordial stayed, he would not have been able to leave this territory and follow through with such a foolish decision. He probably would have made the logical choice without hesitation.

    Yet today

    This is unbelievable, but for some reason, I feel like I must act this time

    Leon had stopped in the middle of his sentence as his subordinates watched on. Alrose and ude spoke up.

    Your Majesty, we are all your loyal knights. We will heed and obey your everymand.

    Indeed. Even if you were to be more stubborn, we would not have anyints. Please give us an order. We shall fulfill your wishes without dy!

    Everyone

    The rest of the knightmanders followed their lead and voiced their loyalty to Leon.

    The disappearance of the Yellow Primordial may be purely coincidental, but Leon closed his eyes as he muttered.

    The next time he opened his eyes, a firm smile had emerged on his face.

    Then I shall heed your advice. I will attend to the matter myself. Ill trouble you all with the task of staying guard here.

    YES SIR!

    On thisndthe prosperous Golden Valley of El Doradothe situation had changed drastically. tinum Saber Leon Cromwell broke his long-held silence and raised his sword once more

    Thats it! Demon Lord Leon is on the move. As Ive predicted, this Chloe isnt just any kid. She might turn out to be

    Leons end goal was not the children, but a specific someone from the Otherworld. If this was bound by causality as well, Chloe was most likely the person who Leon was searching for.

    But, Yuuki-sama, even if Leon is going to take action, it doesnt mean that he will dance to our score. He should be heading to Lubelius now, but I dont think hell believe all the information weve leaked. He might get suspicious instead.

    I thought as much. However, the tradeoff is worth it now that weve identified Leons target, Yuuki revealed, seemingly satisfied.

    Kagali and the others couldnt catch up with Yuukis train of thought. Unable to figure out his scheme, they were rather disgruntled.

    I agree that Chloe is very suspicious, but do we really have enough evidence to make her our trump card? Its not really Yuuki-samas style to wager on such uncertainty.

    Ya have a point. Besides, we had to perform really dangerous acts just to get the words out, aint that just telling him to suspect us? Whats the point in doing that anyway?

    Right. I wouldnt think Boss would make bad calls, but wouldnt this make Cerberus a public enemy of Leon? How would that benefit us in any way?

    While Footman seemed pretty unconcerned about the situation, Lace and Teare both expressed their doubts to Yuuki. And even the intelligent Kagali remained silent this time.

    Misha, the Lover of Cerberus, gave off a frivolous smile.

    Its understandable that fellow members of the Moderate Clown Troupe would find it confusing. After all, such an ordeal promises no benefit for us whatsoever. Theres only one reason to do it, which is because we wont be able to trade with Demon Lord Leon in the future anywaythats why the Boss made his decision.

    Upon hearing her exnation, Kagali suddenly understood everything. So that was the reason! In reality, its not that we didnt want to trade with him, but rather we cant anymore in the future

    What are you on about?

    W-what does that mean, Kagali-sama?

    Kukuku, you wouldnt understand even if you asked. We should simply follow orders

    Footman, shut up for a second! Its fine if you dont understand, but I still want to ask! Teare interjected, cutting Footman off.

    He seemed a bit upset. Being good friends, Footman was far more affected by Teares words.

    Theres no need to listen to all this convoluted stuff, just obey your leadersin other words,ply with Yuuki and Kagalis orders, and everything would turn out fine. Footman earnestly believed that by doing so, the n proceeding smoothly was all but assured. However, it seemed that he was the only one holding onto the idea.

    While the others had faith in Yuuki and Kagali as much as he did, they wanted to be sure of the rationale supporting their actions before epting them.

    ncing at hispanions, Yuuki gave a wry smile. Considering convenience alone, men like Footman sure are easy to use. But to be honest, in order to raise the chance of sess for our operations, Lace and the others are the better candidates. Frankly, there arent that many reasons behind our actions anyway, he thought to himself.

    Thus, Yuuki chose to exin the matter to his subordinates in greater detail.

    Its more than enough that Leon is on the move. Didnt I order you guys to move the top-secret merchandise to him? Thats because I no longer wish to make deals with Leon anymore. And thats why I gave you guys thest opportunity to take a look at your archnemesis.

    Eh, but doesnt that mean we couldve wreaked havoc while we were there that day and not gotten chewed out for it?

    Indeed, it wouldve been okay under the condition that everyone made it out alive, of course, Yuuki said with a grin. His smile was brimming with so much confidence that it calmed the clowns down. Even though they are all just children, its not easy gathering Otherworlders. Do you guys know the reason why we continued selling children to him despite knowing it would only increase his strength?

    Lace thought for a bit. Because Boss wanted to stay in touch with him, right?

    Yes, thats correct. Then what would be the necessary condition for that?

    Is it the secret merchandisethe kids from the Otherworld?

    Indeed. But right now, we no longer have the means to acquire them. Do you know why?

    Because the Rosso family is in charge of summoning the kidsehI get it, so thats wha it is! Lace excitedly eximed.

    Eh, what and what is?

    Teare was still very confused, while on the other hand, Lace seemed to have pieced everything together.

    To put it simply, Teare, we n to frame the Rossos and let them take the fall for the entire ordeal. Since we cant acquire merchandise anymore, that also means we wont be able to make deals with them. Thats why we have to take the initiative. We will stop all dealings with Leon and only contact him when it bes necessary in the future, Kagali rified.

    But even if thats the case, we dont have to intentionally do something that suspicious Teare mumbled.

    That aint the case. Its so that we could make the Rossos look like the masterminds behind all this. Boss sure is one crueld. Lace groaned in amazement, as if he had finally noticed the truth.

    Ahahahaha! Ill take that as apliment. Lace is right. I intend to push all responsibility to Elder Granbell.

    Leon is annoying,mented Kagali, but more importantly, hes extremely cautious. He will definitely suspect us, but he wont think that Cerberus would employ such a crude tactic. Furthermore, hell probably clear Demon Lord Rimuru or Luminas of suspicion and wind up with no one to me. As for the Rosso family, he probably wouldnt even consider them suspects.

    Yuuki voiced his agreement. While Leon is indeed cautious, hes also overconfident in himself. To him, the only value people have is so they can be exploited, and he would never think that they could harm him. Thats why he never investigated the Rosso family in the past. Thus, he probably doesnt realize that is exactly where the real threat lies.

    Indeed, the Five Great Elders arent really that impressive to be honest, except for those two, Kagali remarked.

    Kagalis offhand remark confused Teare again. Two? I thought that Mariabell had already been taken care of. Wouldnt that leave only Granbell?

    Looks like you guys didnt know. Within the Rosso family, there are three people that you cannot underestimate, Kagali quickly corrected.

    Mariabell had died, leaving two remaining. They knew this from information gathered by Cerberus.

    Well, technically thisst person isnt one of the Five Elders. The rumor is that the Count of the Cidre Border has a subordinate, a real tough character, Yuuki divulged, smiling wryly as he shared the information with hispanions.

    The Count of the Cidre Border was in charge of safeguarding the northern realm of the Kingdom of Ingracia. Thend had been protected by a guardian for generations.

    This guardian wore a mask and armor that covered him from head to toe. No one knew about his true identity, and he was a mystery who answered directly to Granbell. Even though he was not one of the Five Great Elders, anyone who knew about him wouldnt dare cross him.

    Yuuki originally heard about this masked man from Damrada. Even Damrada said though I havent actually fought the guy, Im not sure I would win. Its quite telling of his strength. After all, Damrada had only spoken highly of Hinata and no one else.

    To Yuukis knowledge, there were only three people within the Western Nations that Damrada was wary of: Hinata, Mariabell, and that man.

    From Damradas viewpoint,pared to the head of the Five Elders, Granbell, that mysterious man was much more difficult to deal with.

    Damrada of Wealth, was one of the leaders of the secret organization Cerberus. Yuuki trusted him as a goodpanion and leader, so if he said that the man was rather powerful, then they definitely couldnt ignore him.

    Lace tried to make sense of everything. Whats the deal with this guy then?

    Im not sure. Ive never met him. But apparently the north is peaceful all thanks to that man. ording to Damrada, he had witnessed him fighting against the demons from the northern realm.

    Yuukis words shocked everyone.

    While Kagali and Misha caught wind of this information beforehand, they still couldnt help but be shocked, nheless.

    It was absolutely mind-blowing.

    I heard that that mans name is Razul. Elder Granbell gave him this name personally.

    You mean Elder Granbell

    Named him?

    Eh, then could it be

    Looks like Kagali-sama did not know this either. Indeed, Damrada ims that Razul apparently is not human, Misha exined.

    Yuuki added some more information. Yup, thats what Damrada told me. Apparently, his mask and armor arent equipment, but his actual body.

    However, this meant nothing to Lace and the other clowns.

    That really doesnt matter though. Just to rify, when ya said demons from the northern realm, you arent talking about that demon lordsckeys, are ya?

    R-right, if its that demon lordLord of Darknessthe western continent would be in ashes already

    Lace and Kagali normally wouldnt look so panicked, but no one made fun of them. Neither did Yuuki.

    Dont be so nervous. I guess you are really afraid of Demon Lord Guy Crimson. That aside, regarding your question, the demons from the northern realm are obviously Demon Lord Guys men. It seems that Guy has permitted his subordinates to go off and invade human society for their own amusement. To demons, its like a game, though the ones being attacked would hardly agree to that sentiment. However, Razul made it so that they were blocked outside Ingracias border.

    That man had managed to defeat armies of demons by himself and protected human society.

    Listening to just how powerful the man was, everyone went fell silent and still except for Yuuki. While I also found it rather unbelievable, I still think its true. That being said, Demon Lord Guy never fights seriously, which is why the Western Nations are at peace. Regardless, this Razul does pose quite the threat.

    He seems pretty reckless. Id never be able to do something like that, confessed Lace. Everyone slowly started to recover from the onught of shocking information.

    W-well, now that we know this guy is strong, what does it have to do with Leon? Are we nning to lure Leon to the north and fight that guy? Teare asked.

    Hearing this, Yuuki smiled happily. Well, about that, lets get back to where we left off. Just as Ive said, the Rossos have always held on to their trump card Razul. Since they never knew when the demons would attack, they couldnt move their pawn away from the north because it was acting as a deterrent.

    That was the reason why Mariabell didnt ount Razul in her n. After all, he was a strategic piece who served Elder Granbell directly. He was not someone that even Mariabell could order around.

    It wasnt like Yuuki had only found out about that man recently. The reason why they didnt utilize this Razul despite knowing his strength was because an opportunity never emerged.

    If they were to use him without carefully considering it first, then Guys men could decimate the western continent. Yuuki wanted to avoid this possibility and therefore insisted on not doing anything about the northern realm.

    However

    The situation had changed.

    Now lets get to the crux of the matter. I had a meeting with Granbell and made a deal with the old man. Ive informed you all of what we spoke about before. Yuukis smile disappeared after he finished talking.

    Everyone nodded, and Kagali spoke in his ce:

    The true identity of that God everyone worships in the Western Holy Church is just who we suspected. Furthermore, Granbell was extremely saddened by the passing of Mariabell. This is why he has decided to coborate with Yuuki-sama.

    What a foolish old man.

    Quiet now, Lace. Yuuki-sama was asked to do a job, we are preparing ording to this n!

    Yuuki and Granbells secret meeting.

    Its content was

    Yuuki informed Granbell of Mariabells death.

    Mariabell attempted to challenge Demon Lord Rimuru and suffered a major defeat. As ast resort, she attempted to overload the magic power core and due to the subsequent explosion, she was killed on site.

    It was the same story that Yuuki told Rimuru. He had thought about lying on the matter before, but he figured it was best not to. Since Rimuru no longer suspected him, Yuuki didnt want to identally disrupt the status quo.

    Even though Yuuki couldnt predict how Granbell would react upon learning of Mariabells death, he believed that he could still handle him in a fight. Even if Granbell was the guardian of humanity and one of the Seven Luminaries, at this point, he was nothing more than a sad old man drowning in his desire for poweror at least that was how Yuuki saw it. Although Granbell was still a force to be reckoned with, he was a shadow of his former self, someone that Yuuki could defeat.

    There were, however, guards at the venue where they met. In addition to that, there were also some otherworlders among them as well. It would be unwise to antagonize all of them. Still, even under these circumstances, Yuuki was behaving very calmly.

    Now that Mariabell was out of the picture, he only had to worry about Razul. With all these factors, Yuuki no longer nned to hide his true nature and decided to confront Granbell directly.

    Is that so, Mariabell has died

    Indeed. We are quite troubled as well. I was controlled by Mariabell and forced to fight Demon Lord Rimuru. Even though my association is a subsidiary to the council and is run from the councils funds, wouldnt that be a vition of our contract? Honestly, I could demandpensation from you guys for stripping me of my free will.

    Granbellpletely ignored Yuuki and demanded an exnation instead. What happened between you and Demon Lord Rimuru?

    Yuuki was expecting this sort of reaction to some degree, so he wasnt too displeased.

    He simply shrugged and continued, Nothing that bad. He might suspect you, but he likely thought everything was instigated by Mariabell. I intentionally created this illusion; I hope you wont me me for that.

    Hmmm

    Contrary to what Yuuki had predicted, Granbell looked tired.

    He closed his eyes and fell silent for a while.

    I suppose thats it then, Mariabell is dead. The hope of the Rossos has disappeared. In that case, we must use that lords secret treasure and seek vengeance against Rimuru.

    That lord? secret treasure? I have no clue what youre talking about. Please do not drag me into this anymore than you already have.

    Kukuku, now, now, Yuuki. You are a smart man, surely youve figured this out already.

    Figured what out?

    Hmph! The God of Luminism is Demon Lord Luminas-sama.

    Oh

    Yuuki had more or less guessed that already, but he was still shocked to hear this from Granbell. Moreover, he was curious as to why Granbell would suddenly disclose such an important secret.

    Whats your intention for sharing this with me?

    My intention, you say? Thats a harsh way to put it, said Granbell. He rose from the sofa, and speaking gravely, I am acknowledging you. Now that Ive lost Mariabell, theres no better candidate for us to entrust the task of safeguarding the Western Nations and humanitys future than you.

    Yuuki sneered at his words. There was no way he would buy that.

    What nonsense is this? Even if I dont do anything, Rimuru-san will certainly figure something out. That man really wishes to coexist with humans.

    Negotiations had failed. However, Granbell wasnt finished.

    Naive, oh how too naive you are. Mariabell has seen the future, but based on what youve said, you dont seem to have the same foresight. That demon lordthat demon lord called RimuruI cannot let him live in this world. Luminas-sama has no interest in the human world, and thats why she can coexist with humanity. But Demon Lord Rimuru is different. That demon lord will make humanity fall and cast the world into chaos. Much blood will be spilt when that timees.

    Wow, what incredible foresight you possess. Do you have any evidence to back up your ims?

    Instinct.

    Huh? What a bizarre reason.

    My instincts as an ex-Hero tells me that I must eliminate Demon Lord Rimuru.

    His words surprised Yuuki quite a bit, causing him to scrutinize Granbell.

    Granbell said that he used to be a Hero, yet no matter how you looked at him, he appeared to be nothing more than a dying old man. The luxurious clothes, his sharp eyes; he had an overwhelmingly dominant aura that sent shivers down ones spine and the charisma of a great leader. Yet, when Yuuki looked at Granbell, he could not feel any strength from him that could surpass Mariabells.

    You say you are a Hero? You shouldnt joke around like that, you know.

    Hmph, believe it or not, just answer me this. Are you willing to eliminate Demon Lord Rimuru?

    Haha, you want my help? Doing something that dangerous serves no purpose at all. I wish to maintain my rtionship with

    You fool! Now that Mariabell has died, we cannot afford to dally! Even if we let the Empire handle everything, all their higher-ups are overly mysterious. Even those merchants you associate with have little to no credibility.

    Oh

    Whos the fool hereYuuki internally mocked.

    Unlike Granbell, Yuuki never ced humanity as his priority. He didnt mind what human society became as long as he gained everything he desired in the end.

    There was something bothering him, however, and that was the secret treasure Granbell mentioned. It appeared that he intended to use this to defeat Demon Lord Rimuru. It piqued Yuukis interest and he wanted to know what it was.

    Granbell didnt care about what Yuuki was thinking and continued to try to rope Yuuki in further. Im not asking you to believe me, but we can form a temporary alliance and fight together.

    Ill be honest with you, whats in it for me?

    I can give you Luminas-samas secret treasure.

    And the treasure is?

    The ultimate weapon that was used to seal Veldora.

    UHH!

    This revtion came all too suddenly, and Yuuki couldnt just ignore it.

    From what Ive gathered, that person is known as the strongest Hero. I never had the opportunity to make direct contact. However, the person is being protected by Luminas-sama in the Holy Ark.

    A demon lord protecting a Hero? What kind of a joke is that

    Guhaha, dont be so quick to judge. I was confused at first, but every few hundred years a great war would ur, and I personally witnessed that person in actiona supreme existence capable of eliminating all monsters.

    Is this person stronger than you at your prime?

    I was nowhere near it.

    He sounded genuine. Yuuki thought himself as pretty talented at seeing through lies and knew that Granbell spoke the truth. Moreover, he also had a hypothesis as to why this particr Hero left Shizue Izawa behind.

    That Hero is probably restricted by something. Maybe a limited life span? No, the reason doesnt matter. If I can take the Holy Ark from Luminas, I could control the strongest pawn

    Granbells mention of this ultimate weapon implied that the Hero was under the control of Luminas. Thus, Luminas must have used some sort of spell to control the Hero.

    If that was the case, then if Yuuki could crack the spell

    How interesting, but Im not naive enough to take your word for it.

    I thought as much. I have a proposal. I shall lead the attack and create a distraction inside the Grand Cathedral. It will probably plunge Luminas-samas headquarters into chaos, which gives you an opportunity to steal the Holy Ark.

    This was quite an attractive proposal.

    However, it was way too beneficial for Yuuki, which made it suspicious.

    What do you get out of it then? Isnt Demon Lord Luminas your master? Are you willing to avenge Mariabell even at the cost of betraying Luminas? he asked doubtfully.

    Granbell gave his response with a chilling look on his face.

    Of course. I used to be on good terms with Luminas-sama, but now she has abandoned me. At the end of the day, our rtionship was only maintained because of her agreement with me to never antagonize humanity. If she is to coborate with Demon Lord Rimuru, then Luminas-samano, Demon Lord Luminas is nothing more than my enemy.

    There was a sense of animosity in his words.

    Even Yuuki felt that. His resolve was quite impressive.

    And here I thought he was just a dying old man, but turns out he is still useful. This proposal may be pretty decent after all

    With that thought in his mind, Yuuki began to analyze the situation.

    The condition for this to work was that Granbell had to strike first. Therefore, Yuuki could immediately confirm if Granbell had held up his end of the bargain before acting. As a result, there was little chance of being betrayed. On top of that, he would gain ess to the strongest pawn in existence. If Granbell had lied, Yuuki had no reason tomit himself to this operation. He could just flee right away.

    The worst-case scenario was that Granbell nned to deceive Yuuki and his men and frame them. But, as long as they had eyes on the battle started by Granbell, they could tell if it was real or fake. If they couldnt even tell whether Granbell was really fighting or not, then they only had themselves to me.

    Interesting, this all sounds very interesting. I still have some doubts, but considering the gains from this, I suppose its fine to take some risks.

    Guhaha, I knew youd agree. This is a temporary alliance, and likely ourst act together as well. Can I expect you to put in some work?

    Of course. Since youve made all these grand ns for us, I shall give you some trust. What do you intend to do to start this operation?

    Well, about that

    The two began to discuss the n in detail.

    And so, the old man controlling the Western Nations and the majin attempting to rule the world forged an alliance.

    In the Grand Cathedral, a battle with the full force of the Rosso family would take ce.

    This n included the agents of the Foreign Intelligence Agency of Siltrosso and the surviving members of Blood Shadow. Among them were many otherworlders summoned by the Rosso family. Moreover, Razul, would be recalled from the northern border as well.

    I am curious how strong they will be when all of the Rossos move out, Kagali muttered to herself with an evil grin.

    Everyone present wondered the same thing. Then, Yuuki-sama, do you know where this Holy Ark is hidden?

    Granbell has already given meprehensive information about it. But considering that he may be deceiving us, we have to be cautious.

    Ill take the honor. Although I aint too sure about doing this one alone, can I bring Teare and Footman along? asked Lace.

    While I want to say yes, I have another job for Teare.

    All right, Footman alone should be enough, but what do ya want to do with Teare?

    She has the most important job this time. By the way, avoid fighting as much as possible. Prioritize the goal of our visit, Yuuki reminded everyone.

    Since there is the possibility that its a trap, you must retreat immediately upon encountering danger, Kagali added, like a concerned mother fussing over her children.

    We aint kids, ya know? We got that covered already, Lace replied, full of confidence.

    Footman silently nodded along, agreeing with Lace.

    Thats the spirit. Demon Lord Luminas is Demon Lord Valentines master. Since Valentines power could rival mine, Luminass strength goes without saying. Shes probably stronger than I was during my prime. Do you have a rough idea now, Lace? Our primary goal isnt to steal the Holy Ark, but to gather as much information as possible with the least amount of risk.

    Dont ya worry. We dont owe that ol man Granbell anything. He never hired the Moderate Clown Troupe either, so well just do our best within our abilities.

    You have a point Ill be at your aid as well this time. After all, this Holy Ark is what Granbell considered the weapon for the final battle. After Kagali shared her concerns, Lace and Yuuki quickly reassured her.

    Ya dont have faith in us? That hurts a bit

    No, thats not what I mean. Its only natural for the ce to be highly guarded and secured with traps. Im only doing this to be certain. While Yuuki had confidence in Lace and the others, he had no idea what could happen this time. If he didnt strategize appropriately, the entire n would fail. That he could not ept. I will secretly trail behind everyone. The operation shallmence at your own pace.

    I see, so we are supposed to stall the enemies! Thats quite smart.

    Worst case scenario, you guys escape in the midst of chaos while I grab the objective. At that, Yuuki cracked a smile.

    The n was wless. He had discussed it with Granbell several times and confirmed that Granbell was indeed serious. This was an opportunity of a lifetime, and they wouldnt get something like this again in the future.

    No matter the cost, we must get our hands on this Holy ArkYuuki thought decisively.

    By the way, is this thing really that good? What even is this Holy Ark Lace questioned, somewhat dubious.

    Ah, I heard it contains the Herothe one that sealed Veldora. She is under the control of Luminas, so I n to analyze the spell on the ark and make her my pawn.

    Hah?

    It cant be Is this real?

    Eh, what is this all about?

    Hehehe

    Yuukis nextment stupefied his audience. This prize is immeasurably valuable. Now that we have settled on moving to the East, I shall figure out the secret to dominating the ultimate Hero.

    Now understanding just how valuable the Holy Ark was, they were all excited. Misha received orders to prepare for their move to the Eastern headquarters, yet even she was flustered at the news.

    This was to be expected.

    If they could control that Hero, the individual strong enough to seal a True Dragon, the strongest species in the world Cerberus and Yuukis ambitionworld dominationwould no longer be a far-fetched fantasy.

    No wonder Boss is still cautious, Lace mumbled.

    Indeed, if thats the case, please allow me to join you in researching the matter.

    Haha, you are getting ahead of yourself, Kagali. Its dangerous to believe everything Granbell says, even if I personally think it has decent enough credibility. Anyhow, failure is not tolerated.

    Kagali was confident in herself. Yuuki-sama can rest assured; dont you guys drag him down now.

    Gotcha.

    Hehehe, just leave it to me!

    Lace and Footman knew the full weight of their duty and became motivated. Seeing the two in this eager state, Yuuki felt very satisfied.

    He then turned to Teare. Now, TeareI didnt expect Demon Lord Leon to join in on the matter, but itd be rude of us to not wee him with a warm gift.

    Due to Leons involvement, Yuuki made additional ns to ount for this factor. Had Leon not moved out, they would have only observed the situation and made minor contributions to the fight.

    But now that Leon was heading to the holynd too, the battlefield would be chaotic.

    That was undeniable.

    Since we lured Leon in, we must make him think that the Rossos are using Cerberus as well. This way, we can misguide them into thinking that we are trustworthy

    And we should go and give Demon Lord Rimuru the impression that Leon is a cruel tyrant that wanted to capture the children?

    Yep. For that to work, I need the kids that were meant to be given to Demon Lord Leon.

    Ah! So you want me to handle that?

    Correct. Although you will have to use your real identity, if its you, Im sure you wont mess it up.

    Umm, I got it! Ill throw Demon Lord Rimuru off with my excellent acting skills.

    Teare was exceptionally enthusiastic, yet Yuuki shook his head dismissively.

    Ill be looking forward to it, but that alone wont be enough. Demon Lord Rimuru is extremely calcting, and he has abnormally sharp instincts. He might realize that we were behind all this. Thats why Ive discussed with Granbell beforehand

    Yuuki lowered his voice and gave Teare her orders.

    The majins malice grew day by day.

    The day of destiny was closing in.

    Not a single shred of light illuminated the room. Deep within it

    Obviously, I needI need to eliminate Demon Lord Rimuru, and Demon Lord Leon, andLuminas-sama too Granbell muttered to himself. His eyes darkened, filled with bottomless hatred.

    Granbell dedicated over a thousand years of his life to humanity. Even though his goal in life had changed, aiming to be the ruling ss and gain absolute power and domination, Granbell still wished for peace to human society. His resolve was unquestionable.

    Over time, he had to endure countless betrayals, the deaths of hispanions that supported him and endless suffering. But despite everything, Granbells tenacity enabled him to ovee every single challenge he had faced in order to protect humanity in this world.

    While he had Demon Lord Luminass aid, Granbells own effort was irreceable. In the distant past, he used to talk about dreams and ideals with hispanions. Making promises with the people that gradually passed on to the other world.

    When the hope of his family, Mariabell, was born, he was just one more step away from aplishing his dream.

    Even thenGranbell had lost hope.

    The East and the West.

    Humankind needed to stand united against the demon lords, or else, humanity would not survive.

    Nowadays, the demon lords had formed the Octagram, and their power was at its prime. Although the Ten Great Demon Lords were reduced to eight, their power hadnt diminished but rather increased instead.

    The demons let loose by the Lord of Darkness Guy Crimson plundered the northernnds like it was their yground.

    Continents Wrath Dagruel had his eyes set on human society as well, because of his ambition for territorial expansion. As of yet, he had avoided conflict with the Queen of Nightmares and did not act against her. However, it was unknown how much longer he could tolerate it.

    In addition, power beyond humanprehension was intervening within the Eastern Empire.

    Granbell suspected that it was the doing of the Sleeping Ruler behind the scenes, but he had no evidence to back it up.

    Facing against all these powerful beings, Granbell needed to protect humanity from harm.

    Yet this wish of his was also

    That brat had some boring goal too. He could take the reins if he wants. I am already tired

    Granbell didnt know how much longer he would live either. Now that Mariabell had died, there was no one qualified enough to take on the role of Granbells sessor.

    Without a mediator, humanity would soon walk the path of destruction. They would show their true nature and desires, even beginning to ughter each other. That was simply how humans were as a species.

    A long, long time ago, Granbells wife, who Mariabell resembled a lot, was killed by these kinds of people.

    All for the sake of the children who survived, Granbell suffered his pains and sorrows alone this entire time, yet his life was about toe to an end.

    This world has taken everything from meit is best that it falls

    His quiet but passionate words were genuine. This was Granbells heart speaking without a single false pretense.

    He had already been consumed by insanity.

    And so, he had made up his mind.

    Granbell had gone mad.

 Volume 11 - Ch 4

    Western Turmoil

    Demon Lord Leon left to meet with a difficult character, a woman with flowing silver hair and a distinctive pair of long, pointy ears. She sank deeply into a luxurious chair, beautiful like a scene straight out of a painting. She was a high elf and the gorgeous Emperor of the Sorcerers Dynasty SarionElmesia El-Ru Sarion.

    The two of them sat facing each other under the gazebo set in a breathtaking garden. A faint trail of steam drifted from the teacup that had just been served, and its rich fragrance was rxing. Maids waited by the side to refill the tea before it got cold. The two silently observed each other for a while.

    Elmesia spoke first. As always, you are a man of few words, Leon-kun. Its been so long since you visited me; its gonna be quite boring if you continue being like that.

    Her tone was rather intimate. It was only natural, since Elmesia and Leon had known each other for an extensive period of time. Not only were they close as rulers and important business partners, but as friends as well. The fact that Leon was permitted to enter this venue showed a glimpse of the level of their friendship. He was already acquainted with Elmesia even before he became a demon lord. At the time, Leon was still called a Hero and had operated within thisndwithin the boundaries of Sarion. The two had been friends ever since.

    I wouldnt smile considering the predicament Im in, Leon said.

    But I seldom see you smile as is.

    Does that really matter? I dont have the time for it. We should cut to the chase

    Ah, right, right, I got some desserts from Yoshida-sans shop, do you want some? Elmesia offered, interrupting Leon. As if on cue, her servants pulled up the dining cart and began promptly serving the cakes.

    Im not a fan of sweets.

    Hmmbut this is soooo delicious. Ah, the cookie seems to have tea leaves blended in. Its not that sweet. I heard they called this a matcha cookie.

    Fine, Ill eat then.

    Its no use arguing with Elmesia, Leon judged based on his own experience. The same could be said for Demon Lord Ramiris. Leon felt that all these difficult characters had amon trait: they were all woefully stubborn. And as a result, Leon had given up on them a long time ago. Suppressing the anxiety welling within, he gingerly reached out for a cookie.

    So sweet

    Ara? Is that still too sweet for you?

    No, its not too bad.

    Hoyou really arent the straightforward type. Anyway, it doesnt matter. What brings you here today? Are you going to ask me whether or not Ive seen some kids in Demon Lord Rimurus kingdom? Elmesia guessed.

    Leon was relieved. Shes just like always. I can never let my guard down against this woman. Has she already gotten hold of my situation?

    With that being said, this conversation would go a lot faster. Leon adjusted his approach immediately.

    Yes. Demon Lord Rimuru seems to have a rather strong opinion about me. Its likely because one of my previous subordinates came into contact with him and got something into his head.

    I am aware. Shizue Izawa, was it? That champion nicknamed The Conqueror of mes. She is even quite famous in this country.

    How did you know? My rtionship with Shizu should have been highly ssified

    Oops, how about we get to the real business? Arent you short on time?

    Leon felt a little irritated.

    And who do you think is wasting my precious time? He wanted to shout at Elmesia but managed to hold back. Leon decided to cut to the chase.

    Right, then, I suppose. Ive been nning to send an invitation to Rimuru in the near future. I want to resolve our misunderstanding. Moreover, antagonizing that guy would be way too dangerous.

    It was quite rare for Leon to be dragged around the ear like this. He could hold his own in conversation even while confronting Guy, yet he was hopeless against Elmesia.

    Ara? If its you, surely you would be able to win against Rimuru, no? Elmesia asked Leon almost teasingly.

    But Leon wasnt so easily provoked, either.

    Its not a matter of whether I can win or not; its meaningless to antagonize him. There isnt any benefit to it, and on the contrary, there are way too many downsides.

    Havent youe to the same conclusion?Leon conveyed with a sharp nce.

    To that, Elmesia agreed, I suppose. Moreover, forging an alliance with him would be greatly beneficial. Even though I fear the possibility that he would change his mind, I still decided to move forward with the alliance anyways.

    Leon, naturally, would be inclined to see things the same way. Hed guessed that Elmesia would make a judgement along those lines.

    Indeed. I personally would wee a negotiable demon lord. Considering Rimuru, whenpared to the other demon lordsor rather, whenpared to the former demon lords Karion and Freyhes a better candidate to ally with. However, there is one problem

    You mean what youve been doing all this time?

    NoWhile thats what Leon wanted to say, considering his current circumstances, he couldnt deny it. In reality, Leon indeed had treated Shizu poorly, which led to this rocky rtionship with Rimuru.

    Fine, it doesnt matter, Elmesia continued. I will make my move on the matter soon. If Tempest were to start a war with El Dorado, we would be very troubled, too. By the way, you were going to ask me about the children, right? I did see them. They seemed to be enjoying themselves during the festival.

    Is this true? Then

    Ara ara, one step at a time now. Mmh, this cake is sooooo delicious!

    Leon almost lost his usual calm demeanor.

    Thats why I didnt want toe here, Leon cursed internally. But now wasnt the time for that.

    Well then, among the children, was there a young girl called Chloe?

    Asking straight on was a very risky move. Leon had always been very cautious, not knowing whether Elmesia would betray him or not. He always avoided doing things that could expose Chloe to danger. However, Leon also treated Elmesia as a friend. Under these dire circumstances, he didnt want to hold back. With all that in mind, Leon decided to reveal his secret.

    Have you finally decided to trust me? Very well, Demon Lord Leon, since you are willing to believe me, I shall generously offer you a helping hand, Elmesia announced to Leon, suddenly changing her demeanor.

    And so, the two began to exchange their information.

    There were five children under the protection of Demon Lord Rimuru: Kenya Misaki, Ryota Sekiguchi, Gail Gibson, Alice Rondo, and finallyChloe Aubert. The name of the girl Leon had been searching for all his life.

    Did you know this from the start?

    Youre always a man of few words. Arent you afraid that people may misunderstand you? You always keep your thoughts to yourself and expect to carry all the responsibilities on your own. Isnt this why even the champion Shizue Izawa never trusted you, ex-Hero-san?

    Had Leon been willing to be more genuine with Shizu, the rtionship between the two may have been very different.

    Elmesia was being sarcastic about it. In truth, she knew Leon had a kind heart, but knowing this was why she couldnt stand how he had be a fearful demon lord of this world.

    Hmph, Leon replied, quit with the boring spection. Ive sacrificed a tona shit ton of people for my own sake. If I can save her, I dont give a shit what method I use. Ill take any me thates with it.

    That was Leons genuine thought. This man used to be the Hero who protected humanity. When he realized kind deeds would no longer achieve his goals, he was willing to bloody his hands to get the job done. At that point it was toote to just sweep it under the rug. He didnt say these things as an excuse for his actions, it was simply what Leon lived by, his belief.

    You are as stubborn as a mule. Even Chloe-chan would dislike you being like this.

    Shut up already. Then, does Rimuru do a good job caring for the kids? If so, it seems like theres some dipshit who wants to lure me out for whatever scheme they have.

    Is it the Rossos, or maybe Cerberus? I even have my suspicions on Demon Lord Luminasisnt that what you are worried about, Leon-kun?

    Just how much do you know? Leon muttered, feeling powerless and utterly baffled. Reconfirming the massive intelligencework Elmesia possessed, he felt it was right to have asked for her help. He genuinely thought Elmesia was terrifying, not in terms of herbat ability, but her political strength. Indeed, anyone who could push Leon against the wall was no mere simpleton.

    Right then, Ill stop teasing you. ording to my investigation, Tempest and Lubelius are free from strife. Demon Lord Luminas ostensibly decided to abide by the treaty she made with Demon Lord Rimuru in earnest. That is readily apparent by observing the actions of Holy Knight Commander Hinata. However, it is a lot harder to judge on the side of Cerberus. That organization is aplete mystery, and the higher-ups of it never really worked hand-in-hand either. They seem to have deliberately created this impression for outsiders, so the information I could get from within the organization was limited. Lets reserve our opinion on the matter for now. On the other hand, the Rosso family is certainly bad news. I heard that theyve deployed all their reserve forces in the north to n a secret assault on Lubelius. Even the agents of the Foreign Intelligence Agency of Siltrosso have alle out in full force. The whole area has been in a state of unrest because of it.

    The defenses of the Northern countries were stretched thin, and Lubelius faced a war at their doorstep. These were the two major locations Elmesia pointed out. However, the information she just gave Leon had the potential to stir up great amounts of trouble.

    Then Guy would move out.

    That being the problem in question. To be more precise, Demon Lord Guy wouldnt move out, however, every one of his subordinates under the sun would rampage. If Guy were to move out personally, no matter who confronted him, the world would likely be destroyed.

    Elmesia knew this all too well herself. But even if it were just his subordinates, it would still present a major crisis for humanity. The simple reason being that among Guys subordinates were the Green and Blue Primordials.

    Indeed. This problem has just gotten a bit too scary. If no one were to go and stop Guys subordinates, the Western Nations may be destroyed.

    Elmesia gazed at Leon, looking particrly troubled.

    Oi, I!

    Leon-kun, youre back to speaking in your old tone like from before, arent you?

    Uh, I was just

    You dont have to act tough and y cool all the time. Its so cute when you do something like this, but I dont have the time to tease you right now.

    She even teased him during times like these. Leon was truly amazed by how easy-going Elmesia was.

    Sorry, Im simply fixed on my goal. Id like to negotiate with Guy, but that guys got a bad temper. If I intervene without careful nning, it may cause the opposite effect.

    I understand. If we dont show him that we would fight back with our own strength, that demon lord would likely lose interest in humanity. Right now, the Holy Knight Order is in a bind, so I have no choice but to send the Magus to reinforce the guards of the Northern realm. You can also hop on our dragon ship to get you to Lubelius.

    Can I really?

    Of course, didnt I tell you to take your time? Now then, you are on a clock, right? Hurry up and get going.

    The situation was more dire than Leon had imagined. Despite how strong he was, he could not teleport to somewhere he had never been before. Moreover, Lubelius was protected by a barrier. If he were to head to Lubelius now, air transport was probably the fastest.

    Leon gratefully epted Elmesias proposal with a, Sorry for the trouble.

    If only you were always so straightforward. Right right, I think this goes without saying, but Cerberus definitely wanted to drag you into all this. Its one hundred percent a trap!

    To Elmesias warning, Leon replied with two words: I know.

    Elmesia answered, I figured as much, with a tinge of sadness in her smile.

    Leon was just like this in the past. Never showing weakness in front of anyone, aiming to achieve his goal no matter what got in his way. That young man had an unbreakable will. He lived his life like a true Hero. It was the same when he became a demon lord.

    And hes just as clumsy. Nothing has changed since back then

    Elmesia had conflicted feelings about him.

    Before boarding the dragon ship, Leon suddenly recalled a warning he meant to ry to Elmesia. Turning towards her, he said: Consider this a token of gratitude from me. The Yellow Primordial has disappeared. So be careful yourself.

    Huh?! Elmesia blurted in shock.

    Leon cracked up seeing the look on her face.

    Wasnt your hobby collecting information? Looks like you didnt know that. Im happy though, as it seems like I was of some help to you.

    Leaving these words, Leon savored the taste of victory as he left.

    After Leon departed

    This cant be true, right? Three primordials, and it had to happen when half of the Magus was out. What the hell have I gotten myself into But, had it not been the case, Leon-kun likely would not have acted either. I guess I still have to sharpen my observational skills

    Everyone just does as they pleaseElmesia thought to herself, holding her head in her hands.

    It was a sunny morning. Relishing the warm breeze, I felt it would be a wonderful day. However, my prediction turned out

    Th-this is a disaster! Someone has broken into the Grand Cathedral and currently being fought against! a novice Holy Knight-san barged in, panicked.

    My prediction was way off.

    Calm down. How many men do the enemies have; how many casualties have we sustained?

    Hinata was having breakfast with me. Her reaction was extraordinarily calm. Seeing her like this made me realize again that itd be horrifying going against her.

    Yes maam! Enemy numbers are unknown, however, its certain that it is close to a hundred men. Theyre at least as strong as rank B-plus. Seeing how they were acting, they know theyout of our nation very well.

    Nearly a hundred B-plus ranked soldiers were a force to be reckoned with. He also mentioned that they were familiar with theyout of the citythey were most likely Granbells men.

    Regarding casualties, several novice knights were injured. There have been several deaths and wounded among the Popes Imperial Guards. Fortunately, no civilians have been harmed, the envoy answered swiftly, describing heavy losses.

    Had this happened in my nation, I would have lost my mind (again). But since I was a guest here, it would be best that I stayed out of other peoples business. That sounded quite cold, but this wasnt my country to run.

    Is that so? Then our enemy must be the head of the Seven Luminaries, Sun Priest Gran and the Rosso family under hismand. We must not underestimate these enemies, Im sure theirbat strength is far greater than they let on. Inform the Holy Knights awaiting orders to prepare for a full-scale assault.

    The enemies reportedly sustained a number of casualties too, a lot more than Lubelius. However, Hinata did not dare lower her guard.

    Thats the Hinata I know, I thought to myself, and impressed as I was, I asked the burning question that was on my mind this whole time.

    By the way, you mentioned it happened in the Grand Cathedral, is that the ce where we set up all the instruments?

    If that were the case, we would have a big problem.

    Yesterday, the band members set up their instruments at this Grand Cathedral and did a rehearsal. I figured that there werent exactly a lot of Grand Cathedrals in the nation, so I had a bad feeling about this. And yet it was in times like these that my prediction

    There is no other facility called the Grand Cathedral except for that.

    Tended toe true

    I mean, it was infallible.

    How annoying, I thought to myself as I turned to Diablo.

    His smile was unfazed, indicating No problem to me. Diablo seemed to be contacting Venom through Telepathy Net as soon as the envoy had arrived. Trulypetent in every sense of the word.

    Venoms response was perfectly prompt as well. The members of the band were already inside the Grand Cathedral; however, the defenses around them were wless. No suspicious individuals had been able to approach them, and they carried on their final rehearsal, as nned.

    With all hell breaking loose around them, those guys sure are bold.

    Kufufufufu, thats only natural. If they couldnt even handle something this trivial, they wouldnt be qualified to be my subordinates.

    This mans confidence was something I could only hope to attain.

    Never mind that, lets not idle here and head to the Grand Cathedral at once, I said with a pretentious air.

    I opened a portal to the cathedral using Spatial Domination. I had gotten pretty good at using it, so even when I was hereinside Lubelius, which was protected by a holy barrierI could still use it without a hitch. It was probably because they didnt put up barriers that would prevent teleportation inside.

    Phew, I dont even have the energy to mock you anymore, just take me there too, Hinata-san said, looking exhausted.

    Why are you so tired this early in the morning? Although I felt like Id get scolded for saying so, possibly even considered a creep, so I decided to just keep quiet. I wanted to make strides in improving myself too and outlive the days of being called an air-head.

    A man named Nicus came along as well. The fact that he was preparing breakfast for us led me to believe that he was a servant at first. As it turned out, he was the high cardinal of the Western Holy Church. He was wearing some sort of a high-ss robe beneath his apron, so this guy was legit. But why was such a big shot character serving Hinata? I felt that there were more and more mysteries as we spoke.

    Uh, but they probably werent that important.

    The children were in the Grand Cathedral as well. They were very energetic this morning, so I let them go first. Even though the defenses were thorough, this world was full of surprises and I had no way to predict what might happen. I adjusted my mood a bit and headed to the Grand Cathedral in a hurry.

    A cacophony of intense fights could be heard outside when I arrived in the Grand Cathedral, and quickly spotted the frightened band members.

    At that moment, Shion raised her voice and shouted, Dont worry! Have you all forgotten what Rimuru-sama said? He said he would guarantee your safety, that you shouldnt worry and should just focus on your performance. Didnt Rimuru-sama say that? Yet you guys are not continuing your practice, how is that fair?

    Ehcant you cut them some ck?

    Shion-san, have you not realized this is a battlefield? Telling the nonbatant members of the band to not be afraid, no matter how I see it, thats too harsh

    Shion-sama, my apologies, looks like I was panicking a bit.

    Eh?

    Takt, after being scolded by Shion, regained hisposure out of nowhere. He turned his eyes to the band members and raised his conductor baton.

    They seemed to have noticed my presence as their eyes found me. Not sure if that was the reason or not, but the band members were seemingly at ease and calm again. There were even smiles on everyones faces.

    Then lets get back to practice!

    It looked like Takt wasnt worried at all whether the other members would object or not. He began to practice again; the rest of the members followed almost as if nothing had happened. And then, with fine coordination, beautiful notes of music began to fill the air. It was a powerful and intense performance which overshadowed even the sound of the fighting. I couldnt help but feel proud of the band members. Fighting with a score in the background; it almost felt like a stage drama.

    But it went without saying that this was authenticbat.

    I found the children and told them not to run around.

    You have me here arinsu?

    Kumara was filled with fighting spirit, but I told her to calm down. Right now, Kumara only had one tail, so she was by herself. She was just like the kids; it was too soon for them to engage in actualbat.

    I ordered Shion and Diablo to protect the children together.

    What does Rimuru-sama n to do?

    Me? Im gonna get rid of the troublemakers. Hinata and her men seem to be fighting against the guys behind all the plots, so Im going to help kick them out.

    Even though we were guests here and shouldnt intervene, seeing how hard-working the band was, I wished to ensure the sess of the concert tomorrow.

    Understood.

    Hmm? Shion looked at Diablo in shock. Second Secretary, what happened? You actually obeyed Rimuru-samas order, thats surprising.

    Umm, Im quite surprised myself.

    I thought Diablo would say that he wasing with me. That said, this would be better since it would avoid spreading themotion.

    Ill be counting on you guys here then!

    Very well, may you triumph in battle, Diablo cheered.

    Ah Shion seemed to want to object but wasnt able to say anything in front of Diablos face.

    Seeing this as an opportunity, I turned a blind eye and headed straight into the battlefield.

    The fighting was chaotic at the entrance of the Grand Cathedral. The entire gate was wrecked with nothing left. There were over a hundred people fighting. The most eye-catching part of the fight was the person that Hinata was confronting.

    It was an old grandpa, yet his back was ramrod straight and maintained a beautiful stance. He was wearing what seemed to be a very fancy suit. His eyes were sharp and had an aura that showed he was no average person. He was neither monster, nor human. Seeing the dominating auraing off him, I could tell he bore unusual power.

    Who is that man?

    Granbell Rosso. That old man is the head of the Five Great Elders, leader of the Rosso family.

    So thats who he is

    I suddenly realized upon hearing the exnation.

    Maria, go find Luminas-sama and bring her here. If she resists, its fine to kill her.

    In response to Granbells words, a woman came out. Her appearance was reminiscent of Mariabell, a woman in her prime. The two seemed to be rted by blood, but Im not sure whether they were mother and daughter.

    Answer. Based on gic analysis, there is no evidence of them being blood rted.

    How can you tell that just by looking Never mind.

    If it werent coincidence that she looked so much like Mariabell, the problem would be how strong this woman called Maria was. She didnt look strong enough to fight against Luminas; was Granbell serious with hismand?

    Understood. Executing order.

    This woman called Maria didnt even turn her head at us before leaving straightaway. Her reaction was very robotic, and it was obvious that she was different from a normal human being. I wasnt sure whether she really was as strong as it seemed, but I figured Luminas would be the one to test that.

    I just wanted Granbell to leave soon. If we could end this with just a conversation, then itd be fine. But if I couldnt convince him, Id take care of him quickly.

    Granbell-san, nice to meet you, I am Demon Lord Rimuru. You gotta start a conversation with a greeting. It was hard to build a good rtionship at this point, but I still approached in a friendly tone.

    So you are Demon Lord Rimuru? How dare you kill my Mariabell

    Oi oi oi, it was you guys who

    Ah, I see; I was indeed getting ck as well. But Mariabells death was purely an ident, and it didnt seem right to me it on me. Yet if I told him that I didnt mean to kill Mariabell, it would probably sound like an excuse. To be fair, had Mariabell not picked on me, it would never have happened.

    With that being said, Granbell probably wouldnt hear me out. Yuuki likely already got to him. At this point, I knew the guy was deceitful, so I could imagine what he would say about me. This was no time for us to negotiate and make peace.

    Report. Deduced that either way, the two sides are ipatible.

    All right, that was the case.

    Mariabell was one such example, and I thought this Granbell would be hard to coexist with as well. If that was the case, then I could only use strength to make him yield.

    Will it even work trying to exin this to you? Lets use strength to decide which side is right!

    Kukuku, you talk tough. But by the looks of it, you are nothing more than a newbie demon lord, do you think you can win against me? Ill take care of youter, meanwhile just stay put there and watch your friends get beaten down.

    Did he seriously just call me a newbie demon lord?

    Wasnt he Luminass subordinate? This man had quite the ego. Right, I supposed he had a point. A monsters strength varied depending on the amount of time they had livedbut shouldnt you at least be a bit cautious against a demon lord? I guess this grandpa was a lot more conceited than I expected.

    Some people ran out to challenge Granbell.

    There is no need for Hinata-sama and Demon Lord Rimuru-dono to strike. Head Priest Gran, we shall be your opponents! Nicus shouted.

    Wasnt he some big shot higher-upah, now I remember. Cardinal Nicus was the one who set the trap to capture Granbell and used Disintegration on him. No wonder why he was self-assured.

    Someone responded to Nicuss call; it was the three captains of the Holy Knight Order. They were Vice Commander Leonard, Captain Arnaud, and Ritase. Fritz and Bhus were currently away, training in thebyrinth. Had I known that something like this would happenah, I forgot that I wasnt one to be dishing out judgement here.

    Hinata-sama, please sit tight and watch me in action! With Nicuss order, Leonard sprang into action. In addition, Arnaud and Ritase began assaulting Granbell at the same time. Were the three captains buying time for Nicus to cast the deadly Disintegration?

    This attack n seemed a bit over the top, but that probably just meant that Nicus was on maximum alert against Granbell.

    Leonard was using his elegant sword arts to distract Granbell. Arnaud understood right away and cooperated with Leonards strikes. Ritase was on the side, providing support for the two.

    Under normal circumstances, with these three coordinating attacks, itd be a guaranteed victory. Yet when pitted against Granbell, he seemed to be handling it all with ease. Whats worse was that Granbell seemed uninterested in interrupting Nicuss chanting, and instead, used smooth and almost ballet-like strikes against the three. There was not a shred of panic on his face. He barely broke a sweat taking on the threes attacks.

    He is on apletely different levelI thought to myself.

    Nicuss chanting had entered its final verse. He used the chanting to interfere with the physical world and expandedyers of magic circles. Trapped in a prison of light formed by magic circles and mantra, Granbell remainedpletely unfazed.

    When the casting of Disintegration wasplete, there was no way anyone could defend against the beam of light. The beam would shatter even the soul of the target at lightning speed.

    Or at least, this was how it should have worked.

    Yet thismon sense was shattered.

    Mmmh, very fine chanting. Perhaps this is the best example of ones understanding of the flow of magic. Granbell said in an incredibly cruel tone. The arrogance in his tone sounded like something a teacher would say to a student.

    And then

    Hearing his words, Hinatas face turned pale as she muttered, Could it be She seemed to have realized something but wasnt quick enough to inform Nicus.

    Die! Disintegration!

    A beam of light shed and went straight for Granbellbut to everyones surprise, its trajectory changed and was absorbed by the sword in Granbells hand.

    It happened all too fast. Even with senses elerated to a million times greater than normal, one would still have a hard time capturing this detail.

    Yet I knew. I knew full well what had just happened Because I had seen that same exact technique used before. It was the ultimate holy sword art, Melt shthe strongest technique developed by Hinata.

    Everyone, spread out!

    Heeding Hinatas order, thebatants reacted quickly. The swiftness of their actions did not dishonor their titles, yet they were still too slow. Granbell struck with Melt sh. This act alone sent out a fan-like shockwave.

    Hinata dashed out at that instant and blocked Granbells sword in front of him. Her movement was impressively fast, but that alone was not enough to block Granbells attack entirely.

    Hinata took the Melt sh head-on and was sent flying into Nicus. She was fine herself, but Nicus sustained heavy injuries. Had Hinatas sword not been the legendary-grade moonlight rapier, both of them would have been obliterated.

    The three captains were sent flying away by the shockwave as well and had been lying on the ground since. It looked like that hit knocked them all out.

    Areare you guys all right?! Hinata shouted.

    It went without saying that no one responded.

    Hinata red at Granbell while some anxiety showed on her face. Even the usually calm andposed Hinata didnt expect Granbell to be so strong.

    The one to answer her question was Granbell, who was meant to be her opponent.

    Huh, it seems that I didnt manage to kill anyone. Looks like my skill has weakened over the years. You should thank that demon lord too.

    What? What are you talking about

    Hinata turned her eyes to me and regained her cool upon realizing something.

    I see, it was you who saved us. Thanks a lot, Rimuru.

    Youre weeI nodded slightly to Hinata.

    Indeed, it was thanks to my help that the captains were only knocked out. When I realized what wasing, I activated Absolute Defense. Otherwise, the three would probably have been obliterated. I thought that I could block the attack perfectly, but that turned out to be wishful thinking.

    The Absolute Defense of Ultimate Skill Covenant King Uriel could block any attack. Although, there were exceptions; for instance, Yuukis Anti-Skill. I couldnt get overly dependent on it, though its defensive properties were high enough to be trusted. However, even when it was a perfect Skill to use on myself, when applied to someone elsein fact, multiple other peopleits precision took a hit.

    For me, it was okay even if some attacksnded, since I had my Infinite Regeneration. Any injuries would be quickly regenerated, meaning I could achieve perfect defense.

    But it was different for the three captains. This small amount of shockwave that slipped through my Absolute Defense sent them to deaths doorstep. It was an extremely close call.

    I never expected anyone other than me to master Melt sh. That was surprising.

    Heh, what an arrogant thought, Hinata. With enough time and practice, many can reach your level.

    I mean, I could use it too.

    Although it was thanks to Raphael-sans liberal use of Analyze and Assess. By the way, the condition for utilizing Melt sh was to first master Disintegration. If there truly were several people who managed to reach that level, then I would have to be impressed by humanity.

    Actually, now that I thought about it carefully, there was indeed a possibility. There was the Hero who managed to seal Veldora. Therefore, there was nothing strange about the existence of powerful humans. Now that I had be a demon lord, it was best that I watch my back around them.

    But now wasnt the time to have idle thoughts.

    And to the Holy Knight captains: you are a bit too useless, ending up on the verge of death after that weak of an attack. In any case, you guys cannot even begin topare to the master swordsmen of the past, much less stand against me, Granbell proimed, sounding like he was convinced about his words. In essence, he dered in front of Hinata that she wasnt on his level.

    What a pathetic joke. Ill trouble you to be my opponent now, Hinata sneered in reply.

    Apparently, shed gotten serious as well. I wouldnt have a chance to take the stageor so I thought, but I was once again caught up in wishful thinking.

    A huge explosion went off inside the Grand Cathedral.

    Is that Razul? I ordered him to destroy the Grand Cathedral, and it looks like hes doing it rather mboyantly.

    What? You bastard

    The children and the band members were all inside the Grand Cathedral. Even though I ordered Shion, Diablo, and the other guards there, if they were to start fighting inside, some people may be affected as a result. I wanted to take care of Granbell as soon as possible, and to do that Id need to get rid of these hindering enemies first.

    After settling on the idea, I decided to Teleport back to the Grand Cathedral.

    Yet I was interrupted by Granbell, Demon Lord Rimuru, these people shall be your opponents. Some of them may be your countrymen, but do enjoy yourself now.

    Several individuals under Granbellsmand showed up.

    The word countrymen was a bit too worrying; I immediately caught on what he had meant. Their ages varied and consisted of different ethnicities too. At first, theposition seemed to be disorganized, but they all shared onemon point in core, and that was that every single one of them possessed a magicule content far exceeding the average persons.

    Otherworlders, huh? I see, no wonder some of them may be Japanese like me as well.

    Uh, theres no time to idle aroundsince more than ten otherworlders were charging at me simultaneously. It looked like they were controlled by a curse like Glenda. Even their free will seemed to have been deprived. Under this state, even if I were to break their curse, they probably wouldnt stop, either.

    But

    Kukuku, do you truly intend to fight them? These people are only being manipted by me, you know?

    What a cunning man.

    He told me this deliberately, probably thinking it would keep me from making a move. While I didnt want to give up like this, I had to admit that it was a very effective method.

    I heard that you go soft very easily. Are you hesitant to extend your killing hand to the innocent? Or will you see this as warfare and choose to defend yourself? Either way is fine.

    Granbell merely considered the summoned otherworlders as his weapons. In truth, they were just like simple consumable items to him. Even if I were to kill them all, he would probably act just like how he proimed,pletely untroubled. What a very difficult opponent. He had done some extensive research on me.

    If he were to run into people like Diablo or Shion, they would have cleaned house without hesitation. Considering from that perspective, I wasnt sure if it was good or bad that the one facing these enemies was me.

    Ahhh, dammit! So troublesome!

    There was no time forints. If I didnt act fast enough, the children would be in danger, and the casualties would increase too.

    At this point, there was only one way out. It wasplicated, but I could managedispelling their curse one by one and knocking them out non-lethally.

    With that, I was roped into battle as well.

    A fellow Japanese personunched an attack at me.

    Some of these otherworlders might actually not be from Earth; was it possible that they came from some other or dimension? Perhaps these thoughts indicated that Id regained some of my cool.

    Otherworlders had very strong constitutions, and they may possess some unknown special abilities. It went without saying that they were dangerous, but they posed no threat against me right now. Even if I werepletely unguarded, they wouldnt have been able to harm me, even if they sent that Glenda. Thats just how overpowered when Absolute Defense wasbined with Infinite Regeneration.

    While they were difficult to handle, they were just that. I could probably manage to paralyze them all given some time, and without harming them during the process. I wasnt underestimating my enemies; this was just my genuine thought. After all, I had Wisdom King Raphael-san. I wouldnt have the chance to underestimate my enemies.

    Considering this, I invested a part of its impressive calction power to observe my surroundings.

    First was Hinata who was fighting not far from me. Granbell wasnt talking anymore, but was locked in an elegant sword fight against her. Just like Hinata, he was only using a rapier. His right hand held the sword while his left hand was held behind his back. It seemed like he would only use his left hand when casting magic.

    Tsk, have you been holding back your power as the Master of Sun? I recall that you were known to be best at fighting with bare hands in close quarters, turns out your swordsmanship was masterful as well.

    Hehe! I have mastered all weapons. I merely did not need to use them in the past.

    Ara, I see. Then allow me to wipe that casual look from your face.

    Hinata wasnt holding back from the beginning. It was very obvious considering she was using her Moonlight Rapier. What was curious was Granbells sword. It was already unusual that he had a sword that could rival Hinatas.

    Answer. Regarding the grade of the sword Analysis failed due to interference. Deduced to be above legendary-grade.

    The analysis result was rather surprising. Lately, Raphael-san had been entirely reliable; I was rather taken aback by this turn of events. I might have underestimated Granbell a little too much.

    I never expected it toe to thiscould even Hinata lose to him?

    No, that cant be

    There was no way that could happen. However, the terrifying thing was that I couldnt say for sure. Even Wisdom King Raphael-san couldnt see through the abilities of the enemy.

    While Hinata and Granbells duel was concerning, there was another fight that caught even more attention. There was some intense fighting taking ce in the Grand Cathedral. I raised the precision of my Magic Perception and focused on the situation.

    There was a man in ck armor. Shockingly, when faced with Shion and Diablo, he wasnt even fazed. Ah, no wonder. This guys magicule content was more than Shion and Diablosbined.

    This is insane. Oi, what kind of a hidden trump card is that? Hes stronger than an average demon lord.

    Thats only natural. In order tobat the army of demon lords and the monsters hostile to humanity, no amount of trump cards can be reassuring, Granbell replied to my rambling.

    I was surprised he even had the time to do that while fighting against Hinata. What an opportunity presented itself, since he had answered, that I might as well get more detailed information from him. It could also distract him, killing two birds with one stone.

    That guy seemed to be a lot stronger than the demon lord imposter Roy, but isnt he stronger than you too? I asked Granbell in a rather provoking tone.

    His name is Razul. A friend that Ive known for thousands of years, Granbell calmly answered.

    Hinata did not speak. She probably had understood my intention and didnt want to interfere. I continued with this n.

    So you are friends. But Razul-san doesnt look very human.

    So what?

    I didnt know what to say upon getting the question thrown back so abruptly. Even though I really wanted to figure out his true identity, learning that he was not human was a gain of sorts.

    No, its nothing

    I seemed to have killed the conversation. I kinda regret my choices now.

    Razul is a race that enjoys longevity, my closepanion during my prime. Hes a lot stronger than the Holy Knight captains, so your subordinates may have a hard time fighting him.

    Granbell was right. Shion and Diablo were indeed in a tough fight. And here I thought that there was no need to worry when Diablo was around, could that thought have been too naive as well?

    No, the way he was fighting didnt look right. For some reason, Diablo didnt seem to be focused.

    Report. Unusual spatial distortion detected. This is an indication of someone using Spatial Movement

    Raphael-sans warning suddenly rang in my head.

    Had it not been urgent, it wouldnt have warned me. Thats why the situation mustve been dire. If that was the case, I shouldnt hold back either. Diablo probably noticed this anomaly too, thats why he wasnt concentrating on the fight.

    Ranga, are you there?

    Im here, Master!

    Got it!

    He was sleeping in my shadow.

    I want you to support Shion covertly!

    Understood!

    Ranga used Shadow Step to stealthily enter Shions shadow.

    Now that the preparation wasplete, I gave my next order.

    Diablo, was your mind on something else?

    My apologies, Rimuru-sama. To fall into a hard battle should be considered a misconduct of mine. In truth, this individual is far stronger than I expected. He is a rare insect type monster, and whats more, hes in hisplete form. They are like a natural enemy to us demons.

    ording to Diablo, the insect type monsters were magical beasts from a different dimension that possessed the power of spirits. They sometimes would show up in this world. It was extremely rare for one to evolve to humanoid form.

    With that being the case, Diablo still had a chance to win, however, he had yet to defeat the enemy. In other words, the reason Diablo had been so concerned with was far worse than Razul. The thing that was distracting him had arrived through Spatial Movement. I could only hope that Diablo would handle whatever it was.

    Shion, you heard us. If Diablo is finding excuses, the situation must be dire.

    Upon saying so, I sensed Diablos guilt internally. He would never find excuses under normal circumstances, thats why I could tell if he was hiding something right away.

    In order for Diablo to move freely, Id have Shion and Ranga hold the ground here.

    Right now, Ranga is hiding in your shadow, I want you two to cooperate and beat that insect type monsterRazul.

    It goes without saying!

    I will not let down Masters expectations!

    Shion also seemed to realize that Diablo was acting strange. Even if I hadnt given the order, she would probably have done the same. However, for Shion alone to handle the powerful Razul, she would fall in crisis. It wasnt that Icked confidence in Shion, but rather that I wanted to find the safest solution possible. While two on one may be dishonorable, we should always fight with the hope of a one hundred percent chance of victory.

    Diablo, go and handle whats on your mind. Also, you should trust yourpanions more and learn to rely on them sometimes.

    ! Kufufufufufu, understood. Looks like I can be a little pretentious at times. Very well, I shall resolve the problem right away!

    Not just a little, too pretentious, to be honest. But at least this helped him get his usual pace back, how wonderful.

    Then, lets get moving!

    Understood!

    I gave the order, rather out of practice, as the three replied in high spirits.

    I just needed to believe they would bring me the best oues.

    I focused my attention back on paralyzing the otherworlders.

    Kufufufufu, Rimuru-sama has seen right through me. Hes seriously unparalleled.

    That goes without saying, Second Secretary. Dont mind that for now, go and resolve whats on your mind!

    Of course. You must have noticed too, that man called Razul is stronger than you. Are you sure you will be all right, First Secretary-dono?

    Fufufu, I never expected you to worry for me, Second Secretaryno, Diablo. I admit that you are strong, stronger than me. Thats why you need to defeat whatever enemy that stands before us to avoid trouble for Rimuru-sama! Isnt that your duty?

    ! Kufu, kufufufufufu, I never expected you call me by my name

    Get going! Leave the rest to me.

    Even if Rimuru-sama didnt give the order, I would still have faith in you from the bottom of my heart, Shion-dono.

    Shion shuddered. Just call me Shion. Honorificsing from your mouth give me the creeps. It sounds so disingenuous.

    Kufufufufu, then Shion, I wish you victory in your conquest.

    You too, Diablo.

    Shion and Diablo didnt exchange any looks, but acknowledged each other with a few words. Both of them had very strong egos, but they had also recognized each others strength from the start.

    Diablo walked away without even turning his head. He gave an order to his lieutenant coldly.

    Venom, even if you die, you need toactually, its okay if you die, but you must protect these kids.

    Speaking of which, Rimurus order never included what to do with Diablos subordinates. Therefore, there wasnt much to be worried about here.

    The important things here are the children and the band membersDiablo judged calmly.

    Ah, yes sir.

    I honestly hoped he would care for us moreVenom thought. But he wasnt dumb enough to say that out loud. If he had, he would probably have been taken out by Diablo before he could be killed by the enemies.

    Moreover

    Its fine, Shion-sama and Ranga-sama seem to be handling that tough guy. If its only protecting these people, even we would be more than sufficient. Itd be easier than fighting Diablo-samawere Venoms genuine thoughts.

    I wish you glory in your conquest, Diablo-sama!

    Shut up, its pointless for you to worry.

    As Venom sent Diablo his regards, he was scolded coldly by Diablo.

    Never mind, thats just how our lord is

    A shback of him being forced into subordination crossed Venoms mind. He quickly shook off these thoughts. Had he run into Diablo looking all displeased like this, theres no telling what would have happened. Venom changed his mood and focused on the mission.

    Diablo, having entrusted the tasks to hispanions, left the battlefield. He teleported at the precise location of his target. The ce was a bit far from the Grand Cathedral, located in a wastnd outside Lubelius.

    A blue-haired beauty in a dark red maid suit was there. Several Holy Knightsid by her feet. These supposed one-man armies of human guardians didnt stand a chance against her.

    Long time no see, Noir, I was getting impatient since youve taken your time getting here.

    I could feel such a fierce killing intent, its just that I couldnt withdraw myself for a few minutes until now. By the way, please call me Diablo, Blue Primordialexcuse me, youve already gotten the name Raine.

    The blue-haired beauty, Raine, smiled with satisfaction to Diablos response.

    Indeed, the strongest among us primordials, Red Primordial, the great Guy-sama has given me the name; unlike the name given to you by some cheap shot demon lord of unknown origin.

    Huh? Do you have a death wish? Actually, you are asking to disappear from this world, no? Kufufufufu, allow me to grant you your wish.

    While a smile still hung on his face, the smile in Diablos eyes dissipatedpletely. The red pupils of his golden eyes turned thin, locking Raine as his prey.

    Lets go then, Diablo! Ah ah, how exciting. Ever since I learned that you fought against the White Primordial on the eastern continent, I wanted to duel you.

    How boring. If you think you are qualified to fight against me, you are sorely mistaken.

    Lets confirm that after our battle!

    As she finishedactually, before she finishedRaine was on the move. Her knife-like hand was faster than the speed of sound. Yet, it was easily swatted away as Diablo raised a hand.

    Raine rejoiced. She could finally put her body to use and fulfill her thousand-year wish.

    Yes, this is it. Id be really troubled if it were finished instantly. You were always too free-spirited, even though we are all primordials. No faction, no sense of duty, even when all demons craved a body, you sneered at the idea

    You could say that Raine was jealous of Diablo. The lifestyle that he had chosen was unbearable to Raine, who valuedw and order. Moreover, Diablo also

    Unforgivable, he even reached a draw with Guy-sama. This idler who never sought to be stronger! The demon race should follow the natural order of things, acquiring a body and considering evolution as their goal!

    In order to relieve her dissatisfaction with him for over thousands of years, Raine had gone all out as she closed in on Diablo.

    Diablothe ck Primordial Noirwas a special demon. During the ancient era far, far in the past, Rouge and Noir fought for the throne of the strongest. They ended up in a draw, yet what happenedter to the two differed greatly. Rouge was brought to the physical world and acquired a body as well as immense power. However, Noir, almost as if he had denied evolution, remained unchanged over the years.

    nc, Jaune, and Violet on the other hand, were under rather unavoidable circumstances. These three had always hindered each others evolutions. The three powerhouses were evenly matched amongst themselves, and that power bnce was never broken.

    The ck Primordial wasnt limited by such things; however, he seemed to treat the other primordials like fools and found pleasure in going his own way. And so, tens and thousands of years passed.

    This was why Raine couldnt forgive Diablo. His contrarian, free-spirited, carefree lifestyle, as well as being recognized by the strongest primordial, Guy Raine couldnt stand all these things about Diablo.

    Ahahahaha! Just as you always say, running away all the time isnt realbat. Looks like you are really only good at running away.

    Kufufufufu, I will be straight with you, dont get mistaken now. Against someone like you, I wouldnt even need to use my full power. Moreover, I never intended to run away.

    Gonna be a sore loser now, eh? I figure that you probably cant use all your power with your newly acquired body. You know you cant use that as an excuse.

    Raine began tounch magic missiles with her fists. The magic missile interfered with the worlds rules and was turned into the nuclear magic Nuclear Cannon. Raine could cast magic without chanting.

    However, Diablo had expected this too. He calmly dispelled all the vicious nuclear magic strikes. Layers andyers of magic barriers and counter-attack techniques were applied. They each tried to break through the others defenses andnd a fatal shot. This was how high-level demons fought against each other. There wasnt any time wasted on chanting, both of them put forth extremely masterful spells.

    As time passed

    U-unbelievable! D-did you manage to draw that while fighting with me?

    Indeed, Raine. Fighting you is like doing paperwork; a fight in which I could see the oue is so boring, that its not even entertaining as a game.

    Raine was extremely shocked. Yet the victor had already been decided. Around Raine wereyers of magic circles formed by glowing mantras. They appeared out of thin air as Diablo snapped his fingers. Being caught in the magic circle, Raine didnt dare to move a muscle. If she were to move, Diablo would trigger the magic.

    And the spell was

    T-this is multi-stage Disintegration? B-but that spell is a hard counter to demons and is extremely dangerous. You could end up dying using it, why would you use that?!

    Diablo red coldly at Raine.

    How can you not even know thisHe thought to himself as he pitied her with a cold heart.

    How boring. If your faith in your master is strong enough, you can even control spiritrons. Itsmon sense.

    Are you out of your mind?! What kind ofmon sense is that?!

    Doesnt matter. Its time to send you on your way. I shall let you suffer the most painful death for foolishly daring to insult my beautiful master, Rimuru-sama. Reflect well on your crime now.

    Seven beams of light began to shoot out. While one beam of light contained forces of destruction that defied any attempts to counter it, all seven beams came from all directions and viciously made their way to Raine

    Luminas was genuinely irritated.

    It just so happened that when she invited Demon Lord Rimuru to attend this musical exchange, the traitor Granbell decided to ravage thend. Such a miscalction had been a first since the founding of Lubelius.

    She wanted to head directly to the Grand Cathedral and decimate all those trouble-making enemies. But out of her instinct and reason, she did not. Seeing how much of a wreckage the enemies were making, it must have been a distraction.

    Louis and Gunther stood by Luminass side. Neither of them dared to make a sound, fearing that it would further infuriate their master. Yet even when surrounded by serenityjust like Luminas, their hearts were anxious. However, they were not stupid enough to make the wrong judgement of what to prioritize.

    If Granbell was handling the distraction, what would his goal be?

    If its that man, he must know of my treasured Holy Ark. Then its not impossible that hes thinking of liberating Her

    The Holy Ark was Luminass secret treasure. However, there was an evenrger reason as to why she had to protect the Holy Ark at all costs. Granbell was among the people who knew the reason, so it was unlikely that he would target the Holy Ark. But even so, Luminas decided to trust her instinct.

    And she guessed right.

    In that deepest room, found within a tomb that nobody else should have known even existed, some unwanted guests showed up.

    Wha the hell, our infiltration has beenpromised! Or maybe the security here is too tight?

    Hehehe, how regretful, but looks like we have interesting prey here. Maybe we can make a bit of fuss?

    Why not, but ya gotta be careful. That babe over there aint normal, Im guessing yer probably Demon Lord Luminas-sama?

    Two intruders broke in and dropped some fighting words. They were Lace and Footman.

    Luminas wasying elegantly on a couch before the Holy Ark she was guarding with her life. Her guys were fixed on the two intruders.

    These two men at first nce were no match for Luminas, but the aura they were giving off was something that she could not underestimate.

    While hiding her strong emotions, Luminas solemnly spoke, I shall permit you to announce your names.

    While the clowns were surprised to find that their intrusion was expected, Granbell did mention the possibility. With that in mind, he had sent someone to tag along with them. That person had helped guide the clowns to make it through multipleyers of defense before reaching their destination safely.

    Nice to meet ya, I am Wonder Pierrot 10 Lace, Vice-Chairman of the jack-of-all-trades Moderate Clown Troupe. This here is Footman, he introduced himself in a teasing tone before signaling Footman with a gesture.

    Hehehe, I am Angry Pierrot Footman. Even though I dont know you too well, Ill be in your care, facing Luminas and her servants, Footman wasnt shy in the slightest. His idea was pure and simple. Defeat his enemiesthat was the only thing on his mind. He waited quietly for Lace to give the green light.

    Oh yeah, theres another one, on in, as Lace called out, someone else appeared by the entrance. A blonde beauty showed up.

    She aint a big talker, but I think her name is

    Ive met you in the past. Yes, you are the woman Granbell loved so deeplyMaria Rosso.

    Right right right, that Maria! My my, so Luminas-sama knows her already?

    Hearing this, Luminas had a disgruntled expression.

    You there, quit acting all friendly. Self-introduction is over, so there wont be any regrets now. The time to talk is over, we shallmune with our fists.

    Luminass tolerance was nearly depleted. She only held back knowing that someone was hiding, when thest person showed up, she couldnt take it any longer.

    The hell, ya got a real short temper, no? We did finish our introduction; theres one more thing though, Granbell wanted us to give ya a message.

    Ho?

    Then Im gonna give ya the message: Ill be waiting for you on the ground,e and fight me. If you donte fast enough, the people you value are all gonna die. Thats basically what he said. Hes probably fighting that monsterHoly Knight Commander Hinata right now. I wonder whos gonna win

    Lace went on and on before Louis shut him up with a sharp strike, one that Luminas had ordered with a wave of her hand,mencing the attack.

    Are you the one that killed my brother? Louis demanded.

    Tsk, ya gotta hear other people out before doing this! Right, never mind. By the way, to answer yer question. Yep, thats me, I was the one that killed that Roy guy that looked exactly like ya!

    Umm, I have no interest in revenge; but this is a rare opportunity. Im going to prove here that Im stronger than my brother, Louis fixed himself on Lace as he finished.

    Then your opponent shall be me. Dont bore me now, young man!

    He-HEHEHE! Thats my line!

    Gunther and Footman exchanged looks before rushing out the tomb to duel. They werepletely absorbed in their duel, disregarding the amount of damage done to their surroundings.

    Louis and Gunther sure give me a headache. They are usually so level-headed but get riled up inbat. But Im the same way. Granbell, just you wait, even with your final trump card, you cannot stop me!

    Luminas was just like them; her sharp gaze fixed on the silent, frail-looking Maria.

    A dead personperhaps not. Has Granbell still not given up? Maria has already passed on, it wouldnt work even with my Gods Miracle Resurrection. Lost souls cannot be saved, yet he Luminas muttered to herself calmly.

    Indeed, the woman in front of her was not Maria. It was merely something that resembled her.

    Very well, I must perform thest rites over you.

    With burning youki surrounding her, Luminas stood up. She then began to fight against Maria at a speed no average man could see. Would the victor be Luminas, or the unknown entity that resembled Maria?

    Only the Holy Ark remained in the tomb. Mindful of causing damage to their surroundings, everyone had moved outside. Predicting this, a young man emerged from the shadows.

    Ahaha, I never expected this n to be so simple. But its true, just like Granbell said, Yuuki sneered.

    While notpletely convinced by Granbells information, he hid his presencepletely and followed. He was so well concealed that even Luminas was fooled.

    Yuuki usually made sure to give off some of his aura so that he couldpletely conceal it during an emergency. Most people facing an opponent with a noticeable aura would get the impression that they were the stronger one, which made them more susceptible to getting careless. Knowing this, Yuuki had made sure to exploit it whenever possible. During important asions that practice came in handy. This time was no exception. With little to no effort, Yuuki acquired his target item.

    So, this is the Holy Ark.

    He put his hand gently on the icy coffin to feel its surface.

    Ahthats what its made out of An entity purelyposed of holy particles. So things like this actually exist

    Its so fortunate that I tagged alongYuuki thought to himself.

    The others probably wouldnt be able to even touch the exterior. It would likely burn up all their mana, yet with Anti-Skill, it had no effect on Yuuki. He was the only one with the means to steal the strongest Hero.

    And so, he broke the coffin without hesitation. The secret treasure Luminas had tried so hard to protect was destroyed so easily. A beautiful young girl was sleeping inside. She had to be the Hero Yuuki came to seek.

    Oh, this girls body is sealed too. Well, not that I cant dispel it, but Maybe Ill just do itter.

    The security measure sure was tight. Yuuki gave off a wry smile internally. A Barrier stronger than the Holy Ark covered every inch of the young girls skin.

    I suppose Ill take my time decrypting them at the base.

    Coming to that conclusion, Yuukis eyes fell on the girls face.

    Who is this girl? I feel like Ive seen her somewhereuh, theres no way.

    Her age was around sixteen. Her long, dark-silver hair covered up her private parts. She was like a newborn, naked with not a single piece of cloth.

    UhhIll probably be used of sexual harassment for doing this, but theres no time, Yuuki muttered before picking up the beautiful teen.

    I got the Hero, now its time to bail.

    As he finished, Yuuki cracked an evil grin and left the scene.

    Why was the Hero sleeping in the Holy Ark in the first ce? Is it really the weapon for the final battle as imed by Granbell? Regardless of all that, what was Granbells true intention?

    Yuuki was always skeptical, but perhaps because he had always found great sess in what he did, he had grown pretentious, thinking that he could solve any problems that came up. This was probably why despite the doubts in his mind, he still cooperated with Granbell. Yuuki couldnt begin to imagine the consequences of his action right now.

    The otherworlders charged at me like zombies. I carefully paralyzed them one by one without killing anyone. Based on my current power level, even when faced against one hundred of such opponents, I wouldnt have a hard time. At most the process of dispelling the curses would be troublesome.

    Speaking of which

    These otherworlders were really something else. I focused and observed them carefully to discover that they all possessed arge quantity of magicules. Their constitution was strong as well, with some even showing strength that matched the level of rank A. However, for some reason, I didnt feel that they lived up to the rank. At first, I thought that it was because of the difference in our strength, but it wasnt the only reason: their free wills had been taken by Granbell. Moreover, there was also

    Answer. During this battle, none of them used their Unique Skills.

    Ah, thats it!

    I get it now, so thats how it is. None of the people I had been fightingunched any special attacks, thats why the task of paralyzing them was so monotonous. In other words, even though there were so many otherworlders, none of them had a Unique Skill? Were they all holding back against me? No matter what the truth was, it felt strange. Anyhow, no matter what Granbells goal was, itd all be resolved when I beat him.

    After settling on the idea, I approached thest otherworlder. She looked rather young, around ten. She was probably old enough for magicule to settle properly inside her body. The child only wielded empty power, nothing challenging. I undid the curse skillfully. Everything proceeded smoothly. When she regained her consciousness, she seemed confused at the situation. I didnt have the time to exin everything in detail to her, so I quickly knocked her out and let her lie down with the others.

    There were several kids like her, so it was really difficult for me to handle them. Granbell didnt seem to care about them at all, but I still managed to figure out a solution. His goal was probably to win some time. Had I been serious, it wouldnt take much time to kill them all. It looked like Granbell achieved his goal in that regard.

    But with this, all the otherworlders fighting me had been paralyzed. I didnt know why he wanted to stall time, and truthfully, I didnt really care at this point. I simply wanted to finish this battle as soon as possible.

    Judging so, I turned to the battlefield to get hold of some information.

    The children were all fine, so I could rest assured for now. Even under these circumstances, the band members were still practicing with utmost effort. Should I call them bold? Perhaps it was a good way to reduce stress by focusing all your attention on something.

    Hinata and Granbell were both standing their ground in the duel; as expected from masters ofbat. It wasnt an exaggeration to say that the two were fighting at ultra-high speed. They were exchanging blows in a brilliant disy of their masterful techniques, where a single mistake could not be tolerated. A misstep on my part might throw out the current bnce and lead to either ones swift defeat. I figured it would be best if I focused my attention on themter.

    Shion and Ranga were being suppressed by Razul; however, his advantage wasnt enough to guarantee victory. Shion allowed Razul tond his blows on her since all of her wounds could automatically be healed. Ultra-Speed Regeneration was really a cheating Skill. No matter how vast the difference in strength, she could still rely on this Skill to get an edge.

    Ranga, on the other hand, focused onnding attacks. He hid in Shions shadow and targeted Razuls blind spots. He was also casting magic attacks such as Death Heralding Wind and ck Lightning.

    The clever method ofbat was impressive. The problem was, however, that none of these attacks were working on Razul. In fact, he was very different. I recalled that Apito and Zegion were both insect type monsters like him. Theirpound eyes could apparently watch their blind spots clearly, therefore he even evaded Rangas sneak attacks with ease. Basically, unless it was a powerful attack, it wouldnt work on Razul.

    The thing that looked like ck armor on him was his exoskeleton. It was harder than steel. He could block Shions odachi with the shell of his left hand alone. It was ridiculously tough; therefore, nothing would work except an attack to the joints. It could also deflect Rangas magic, so the surface of his exoskeleton had an effect simr to Magic Interference.

    If that was the case, no wonder Diablo had a tough time fighting. He excelled at using magic, so Razul would be his natural counter. With that being said, Diablo probably had other means to defeat him.

    With advantages in both physical and magical defense, this Razul was something else. To think that such a formidable guy would have no ambition and serve Granbell Never mind, even if Shion and Ranga were having a hard time fighting him, I would probably have been able to take him down.

    On that note, I decided to take care of Razul

    I swung around to the entrance of the Grand Cathedral. I couldnt help but immediately tense for a fight. Not only me, even Hinata, Shion, and the others were surprised. It was only natural.

    After all, Demon Lord Leon, who wasnt supposed to be here, was standing right there. Under his white robe was a high-quality knight uniform and golden armor. As always, he was a real handsome dude, though he seemed to be in a terribly foul mood. Leon was not alone; several knights were behind him. They all gave off a powerful aura. It looked like he only brought his lieutenants.

    What is he doing here? Is he a friend or foe?

    I figured that it was impossible for us to be on the same side, but I didnt want to make Leon an enemy at this point.

    You havee, Demon Lord Leon-dono. Also, Hinata, since you are looking away while fighting against me, you must have plenty of strength to spare.

    Wouldnt the one with strength to spare be Granbell?

    He wasnt fazed by what happened, yet he didnt take the chance to attack Hinata either. He looked all calm and casual. That said, even if he had taken advantage of the situation, the opening shown by Hinata might have only been a trap. At the high level they were dueling at, only an honorable win would be recognized.

    All in all, Granbell seemed to have known long ago that Leon woulde. The suspicion was confirmed by the way he spoke. In other words, the two were on the same side.

    Dont act all familiar now, who are you?

    Oh yeah, this is our first time meeting. As a matter of fact, all the children you bought in the past were gathered by me. I must apologize to have troubled you toe here personally for the delivery this time.

    Maybe they werent together?

    It looked like Leon and Granbell were just meeting for the first time. But it couldve all been an act too Now that they had mentioned it, most of the otherworlders beaten by me were not adults yet. They were mostly kids around the age of middle-schoolers. Could it be that Granbell was referring to

    What are you talking about? I didnte to see you. The reason I am here is

    Ahh, I summoned children with the technique you taught me. Are you going to im you knew nothing of it? Dont you just want to fortify your forces with these unstable Otherworld kids and make them into spirit-wielders? So you can build strengthened warriors like that Shizue Izawa.

    It almost felt like Id been hit on the head with a stick.

    Hinata wasnt striking anymore either, but had her eyes glued on Granbell and Leon.

    Report. Danger detected. Suspicion that individual Granbell Rosso is trying to use rhetoric to turn Master and Demon Lord Leon against each other.

    I got the feeling too.

    No matter how you see it, it was a horrible move to antagonize Leon now. So I couldnt trust Granbells words. With that being said

    How many failures do you think I have sacrificed so you can summon who you want? The people here are the answer, Granbell finished.

    I could no longer ignore it now. Shizu-san was summoned by Leon and abandoned by him. Not only so, Leon seemed to have summoned other kids too. Such an evil deed could not go unpunished.

    Is all that true?

    Of course its true, Demon Lord Rimuru. Where there is demand, there is supply. Us merchants were happy to provide.

    How infuriating. I wasnt asking you, Granbell.

    The supplier should have a moral code too. To push all the responsibilities to the consumer is against my philosophy. Butpared to that, I wanted to confirm something else.

    Youit was not just Shizu-san, but other children as well?

    Yes.

    Even when you knew that unstable children wouldnt survive for long?

    That

    As Leon was about to say something, a thunderousugh rang out at the scene, interrupting him. It was Granbell.

    Kukuku, ku-HAHAHAHA! How funny, Leon. Wasnt your request for us to provide Otherworld children under the age of ten! As opposed to performing stable summonings of otherworlders andmanding that, why not rescue unstable children and do them a favor? And then manipte them to make them your weapons, didnt you?!

    These were incendiary words; Granbells goal was obvious. He knew that I was soft-hearted and wanted to exploit that trait. In other words, he wanted to provoke my sense of justice and turn me against Leon.

    HoweverGranbells words actually had very high credibility. For the spirits to possess the children, the summoned ones needed to be in the so-called unstable state Granbell mentioned.

    Is it really the reason? Is this why all Leons subordinates are shrouded in the auras of spirits?

    Is this true?

    Yes. But I have my reason

    Shut up! So this really was your doing! I shouted and went straight for Leon.

    I couldnt relinquish my anger without punching the guy in the face. Even knowing that it was Granbells scheme, I couldnt dismiss my anger towards Leon. Wed talk about reasonster, I had to relieve some of my hatred first.

    And so, I used all my force to punch Leon. He didnt move. He stopped all his subordinates trying to protect him and looked straight into my eyes.

    Did that mean itd be simple for him to take care of me? Or was it

    My fist was rapidly closing in on Leons face, faster than my elerated thoughts could follow.

    Leon didnt even flinch.

    Subject disys no signs of evasion, brace for impact.

    There was no trap. The next second, my fist connected with Leons right cheek.

    You got it out of your system now?

    I struck with my full force, yet it didnt cause a lot of damage to Leon. His lip seemed to be split as he wiped the blood from it with a handkerchief, yet he didnt move an inch.

    Tsk, even though I hadnt applied any Skill with the strike, clearly, I underestimated Leon a bit. It was with that punch that I realized something. I felt that this guyDemon Lord Leonwas a lot kinder than I expected. The proof was that he took the hit when he waspletely unguarded, even though, by any reason, he didnt have to let me do it at all. While his demeanor always gave an impression of cruelty, he wasnt that bad a person at heart.

    Shizu-san didnt hate Leon. She wanted to hate him but could not do it no matter how. She wanted to check Leons genuine thoughtsthat was Shizu-sans dying wish.

    There was no need for Raphael-san to give me any advice. I was calm from the start. I had made a promise with Shizu-san. As she had regrets before passing, I would find her justice with Demon Lord Leon. To fulfill that promise, I made use of this situation.

    There must have been reasons behind Leons action. Id decide whether I should forgive himter. During such chaotic circumstances, antagonizing Leon would undoubtedly be suicidal. This was no time to judge based on emotion.

    Leon wasnt on my side, nor was he the enemyknowing this, I gave my answer.

    Not enough. Even though Ive conveyed Shizu-sans feelings, my feud with you hasnt been resolved yet. About that, we are gonna have a nice chat about it now?

    Now, did he get what I meant?

    Leons eyebrow twitched slightly. By the looks of it, Leon was no fool either; now I was reassured. Then lets have a nice chatabout how to handle Granbell.

    On that thought, I raised my sword and pointed it at Leon.

    He looked just like a young Shizu. No pigmentation of any kind, his skin was tender and meticulous. His hair was smooth, every strand was glowing. It was no longer the appearance of an asian person. While he kept Shizus form, his beauty was on a different level.

    As his golden eyes gazed at Leon deeply, he opened his pink lips and said, Not enough. Even though Ive conveyed Shizu-sans feelings, my feud with you hasnt been resolved yet. About that, we are gonna have a nice chat about it now?

    While Rimuru said this, Leon immediately caught on to the meaning behind his words.

    I see, so he wants to utilize this situation? In other words, even though he doesnt know me too well, he decided to trust me, nheless? This guy is surprisingly bold.

    Leon didnt dislike it.

    Rimuru appeared to be doing things based on emotion, but in hindsight, all of those things must have been calcted. It was to differentiate who was friend and foe under these chaotic circumstances.

    I thought that I shouldnt lower my guard against this guy, but with everything thats going on, he turned out to be quite reliable.

    While thinking so, Leon drew the sword by his waist and assumed abat stance.

    Earlier, aboard the dragon ship on his way to Lubelius, Leon received an emergency message via Magic Communication from the secret organization Cerberus.

    The message stated that one of their intelligence personnel lost contact, likely due to his real identity being discovered by someone. This someone could be Demon Lord Rimuru or the Five Great Elders. There was also the possibility of it being the Holy Knight Order. Since the person in question had lost contact after being captured, it was only natural to be suspicious of anyone.

    However, Leon was not dumb enough to trust the words of Cerberus. This could be a well-drafted plot aimed at deceiving Leon. There was only one thing he was sure ofheading to the holynd now would mean entering a trap voluntarily. But even so, it wasnt enough to shake Leons resolve.

    It doesnt matter if its a trap, as long as Chloe is thereno matter what dangery ahead, Leon didnt care.

    Fast forwarding to the present, Leon had finally calmed down as he drew his sword against Rimuru. He began to observe the surroundings and tried to get hold of the situation. The battlefield was in a shocking state of chaos. It was difficult to even tell friend from foe.

    The Magic Knight Order elites who were protecting Leon somehow got mixed in the fight as well. They were cleverly lured into battle by someone and started fighting with the local forces at the holynd.

    Continue to defend, you must not kill your opponent.

    Understood!

    Leon gave his order to Silver Knight Alrose. Even though he used an encrypted channel, the presence of eavesdroppers was to be expected. He had already prepared himself for that and only gave orders that were intended to avoid future problems.

    Since no matter how you saw it, Leons presence here made him seem like a troublemaker. To Demon Lord Luminas, Leon was definitely an unwanted guest. It wouldnt be strange if she retaliated against him. Under these circumstances, in order to ensure the situation favored his side, Leon wanted to lower the human casualties to the minimum.

    Speaking of which, where did that Luminas go?

    Near the entrance to the Grand Cathedral, Leon and Rimuru fought. Holy Knight Commander Hinata was dueling against Granbell not far from there. Behind them, Shion and Ranga, who both participated in the Walpurgis Banquet, fought the insect type monster, Razul.

    There was no way that Demon Lord Luminas, the ruler of thisnd, would allow such a thing to happen, yet there was not a trace of her to be found. If someone as strong as Luminas was getting stalledno matter how you saw it, the situation was extremely abnormal.

    To Leon, the situation was all too strange, though based on his previous assessment, the goal of this trap was rather obvious. While he did not know the perpetrator, the goal was to have Demon Lord Rimuru fight against Leon. However, while it was a miscalction to this unknown perpetrator, it was good luck to Leonthat being Rimuru easily seeing through the trap.

    And Rimuru was trying to make use of that to control the situation. Right in front of Leon, Rimuru signaled his eyes to Granbell.

    I see, so thats the guy behind all this? Very well, I shall put my faith in you for once.

    It was truly rare for the usually cautious Leon, as he decided to open his heart and trust Rimuru.

    Leon was not the only one stuck in a state of confusion. Hinata was baffled by the continuously shifting circumstances as well. More importantly, Granbell, whom she was dueling, gave off an ominous aura, it was very eerie.

    Are you wondering why you cant rob any techniques from me?

    ?!

    Being exposed so promptly, Hinata couldnt help but express her shock visibly.

    Hmph, dont be so surprised now. Do you really think I wouldnt discover your secret? I merely had to observe it to guess. Thats why I had the other six fight you first.

    So thats why

    Hinatas Unique Skill Usurper had an absolute advantage against people stronger than her. Yet the analysis result of Granbell in the past was not applicable. By any logic, Granbell shouldve been stronger than her. Thats why Hinata tried using Usurper on him during their training sessions until it returned sessful in robbing Skills from Granbell. She could not rob thempletely, at most copying them

    You can rob Skills and Arts from your opponent through some means, cant you? But You can only use that little trick on the same person once, and havent you already tried robbing my Skill before? Thats why you wont be able to do it again.

    How can that be

    Granbells words were met with an involuntary response from Hinata. She quickly realized she had thought out loud.

    Kukuku, so that is the case. Hinata, you are the most talented disciple Ive taught. You were good at scheming, cautious yet cunning. In the history of the order, there were very few who have reached your level. You should be proud of that. Yet you are still too young, too amateur fighting against someone on your level.

    Dont you ever shut up?! Hinata, seemingly impatient, shouted back at Granbell.

    However, Hinata knew that she was getting baited by Granbell. Because of her idental reaction, she admitted to the fact that she could rob other peoples abilities. Granbell had his suspicion in the past but was probably not one hundred percent sure. He managed to get it out of Hinata by her own mouth.

    Just who is more cunning!

    Even while he was going all out against Hinata, Granbell kept on talking.

    Thatposurethat was what Hinata could not tolerate.

    Even if Ive robbed your Skill in the past, I still have other ways to do this. Dont you look down on me now.

    Hinatas hostility towards Granbell was on full disy. Indeed, Hinata still had her trump card Forced Usurpation. It wouldnt be copying this time, butpletely robbing his Skill. By doing this, Granbell would run out of tricks to use and Hinata would achieve victory.

    Observation ends hereseemingly implying this, Hinata proceeded with a flurry of attacks. Each of her swings held deadly power. At the same time, she consecutively activated Usurper to weaken Granbells strength.

    However

    How is this possible, my Skill should be taking effect?!

    Yet the analysis result was still not applicable. It meant that Granbells strength was indeed weaker than Hinatas. Indeed, she was much more powerful than before and it wouldnt be strange if she had surpassed Granbell, therefore this result would be sensible.

    The problem was however

    Even when she was using her most reliable Forced Usurpation to rob Granbells Skills, Granbell was still using the same Skill the next second, the result was the same no matter how many times she had repeated. Hinatas anxiousness was written on her face. She did in fact rob Granbell of his Skills and Arts, but they were useless to Hinata. You couldnt rob an already robbed Skill, there was no use in piling up more.

    However, it could prove to be useful if she managed to rob Granbells ace in the hole

    Why is this happening? Perhaps Granbell knew someone may try to rob his Skills and had made copies beforehand?

    It was a possibility.

    While the average man wouldnt be able to handle it, Granbell was an ex-Hero. A trick such as this wouldnt be a problem for him.

    What is it, Hinata? You dont look so good.

    Granbell gave off a mocking smile. It looked like hed seen through Hinatas mindthat was the source of Hinatas irritation.

    Huh, based on your looks, you dont know what Ive done. Theres nothing more important inbat than to observe your enemy carefully. Could it be that you thought I wouldnt prepare any countermeasures? If I am right, then your thoughts were honestly too naive, Hinata.

    Tsk, you sure talk a lot of nonsense.

    I can tell from the way you fight. You are good at fighting against opponents stronger than you. In contrast, you seemed to rarely rob Skills from opponents weaker than you. But to have done that in the past, nheless, must imply you have some special means. However, doesnt it exhaust you quickly as well?

    You dont have to answer. Based on your current state, I can confirm my spection.

    Hinata was shocked that she had beenpletely seen through. She always thought that Granbell was an old-timer and held a sense of disdain against him. Right now, she really wanted to punch her old self.

    Uhindeed. Looks like its meaningless to continue like this.

    Activating her Forced Usurpation from here on would be pointless, she concluded, as she distanced herself from Granbell for a moment. She adjusted her breathing and took note of the beating in her chest. Her heart rate had reached record-breaking pace. Sweat was pouring down her forehead at an increasing rate.

    ThumpDeep inside Hinatas chest, she felt a light sense of pain.

    What was that? No, its probably because I burnt more stamina than I expected to. But maybe its not a calction error, maybe its the effect of some sort of attack

    Looking at it objectively, she found that she was getting tired a lot faster than usual. Even with her consecutive use of Forced Usurpation, Hinata shouldnt have consumed as much stamina as she did now. Just as Granbell had pointed out, Hinata had exhausted herself to the point that she could no longer ignore it either.

    You look rather confused, Hinata. You are indeed strong. But against my more dishonorable way of fighting, you dont really have enough experience.

    What are you talking about?

    Its very simple. All of my moves were calcted so that it would waste as much of your stamina as possible. Little by little, you tired yourself out every time you thought your attack would pull through if only you could muster that tiny bit of extra strength. Heed me now, if you are fighting against someone on your own level, youd snatch a ticket to victory by tiring out your opponent. Once their judgement bes dull, they will show bigger openings, just like what you are experiencing right now.

    !

    Hinata could not deny Granbells words even if she wanted to. She had analyzed her battle calmly with her Unique Skill Mathematicianor so she thought. Yet Granbell was clearly ten steps ahead of her. She had thought she was cautious enough against Granbell. While she had looked down on him in the past, she had never dropped her guard.

    By the looks of it, this man is stronger than me, is that it? Yes, thats it. I guess this is the resulting difference between technique and experience.

    That was the honest, logical exnation Hinata deduced, she couldnt help but admit. Her Usurper was unable to robbat experience.

    I understand the situation. I must really go all out in order to beat you then.

    Correct. Now show me what youre really capable of, or else you can keep dreaming about surpassing me.

    Shutting out all unnecessary noise, Hinata focused herself entirely on Granbell. In a world of silence, the two of them were isted.

    Here Ie, Elder Granbell!

    I shall dance with you then, Hinata!

    As it stood, the battle between Hinata and Granbell raged on, fiercer than ever before.

    Diablos multi-stage Disintegration gradually broke through every defensive barrier of Raines. Thest beam pierced cleanly through her chest.

    Everything had gone ording to Diablos n. Raine was still breathing, which Diablo had also ounted for.

    Kufufufufufu, how weak. Fighting you felt more boring than fighting Testarossa before she evolved.

    Te-Testarossa?

    Thats none of your business. Compared to that, why have youe here? Tell me the reason.

    Do you honestly think Id!

    While Diablo asked arrogantly, Raine didnt feel the need to obey. She refused without hesitation, much to Diablos displeasure.

    Despite having just defeated her, he was not rxed. The fully evolved insect type monster was left for Shion and Ranga to deal with, that thing was no jokethe natural enemy to the demon race.

    It was a life-form from a different dimension, living inside the crevices of the physical and spiritual world. They were semi-spiritual life-forms and upon entering the physical world, they would naturally gain a body and be a challenging invader. If there were arge group of them, they would be extremely dangerous. Such dangerous species must be discovered early on and eliminated as soon as possible.

    Essentially, it was extremely rare for these monsters to evolve into humanoid forms. They usually couldnt adapt to the physical world and would be stuck at a certain level of evolution. Yet that insect type monster called Razul somehow evolved into its final form. Diablo thought that even Shion and Rangabined would have trouble dealing with it.

    To be fair, Shion-dono is Rimuru-samas subordinate, after all. She is capable ofmitting horrors that may potentially turn the table entirely, despite the difference in strength. With Ranga-dono at her side, they probably wont lose. But even if thats the case

    Diablo could win against Razul. He thought that eliminating uncertain factors like that from the battlefield would serve Rimuru-samas interests. Thats why he wanted to head back quickly to finish off Razul

    And yet, another thought crossed his mind.

    Diablo suspected that Rimuru was being intentional when he assigned Shion and Ranga to the task. It was true that Diablo was shaken. He felt the presence of Raine closing in and didnt want them to disrupt the battlefield. That was why Diablo couldnt focus on his fight.

    And I was so pretentious to think I should have taken out Razul fast

    But was this really better?

    Perhaps Rimuru-sama wanted Shion-dono and Ranga-dono to fight against a powerful foe in order to gain experience. Then I would only get in the way by defeating him Diablo thought.

    This was the train of thought one would expect from a battle maniac. Normal people wouldnte to a bizarre conclusion like this. Diablo was an absolute believer of Rimuruism, which meant that any action taken that was not ording to Rimurus will would run afoul with him.

    Just win against your enemyThings were not that simple.

    As Diablo passed the opportunity to fight against a rare powerhouse to them, he had also genuinely hoped they would win against this opponent and turn them into their useful experience.

    I really have to take it slow and be careful with my judgement in this kind of situation.

    And so, Diablos thoughts derailed far into thend of misunderstandings. While someone as masterful inbat as Raine was right in front of him, Diablos mind was in turmoil.

    Of course, Rimuru never considered any of this. He merely wanted the whole thing to end smoothly and ensure the safety of the children and the band members. Having Shion and Ranga gainbat experience was something that didnt even cross his mind under these circumstances.

    Diablos mind had sailed in apletely wrong direction. And based on this absolutely wrong judgment, Diablos n took a huge turn.

    I was nning to kill you, but I guess not.

    What are you saying? Was that a threat

    No, its enough. You dont have to act anymore, juste out already, Diablo said in the face of Raine, who had a huge hole in her chest.

    She didnt seem to understand what he was saying, but her expression gradually turned to one of agitation. Unlike the pale face from before learning she was defeated, her expression now looked quiteplicated, a mixture of chagrin and hatred.

    Noiryou, you only managed to evolve to demon peer recently

    You are as much of a blockhead as always. Strength is not a matter of magicule content alone, its about your techniques. Just as my senpai once said, A difference in magicule content does not equate to a difference in strength.

    How dare you say something so arrogant

    Raines voice slowly dissipated as her body disappeared. She turned into ashes and vanished. In that moment, a beam of light pierced the sky, and as the light faded, two figures emerged.

    They were Bleu and Rouge. The one who was kneeling was BleuRaine. The one standing majestically was Rougethe strongest, Demon Lord Guy Crimson.

    Hey, long time no see, Noir.

    Hmm, Rougeno, you are now Guy Crimson. So you were here.

    Diablo had been keeping his guard up for Guy from the start.

    To Diablo, Guy began to talk in a reminiscing tone.

    Youve realized from the start that it was just Raines Mist, havent you? If that was the case, why did you still make use of such a powerful spell?

    Diablo frowned in disgust at the question.

    Basically, he had pretended to not realize Raines Mist from the start. ording to Diablos original n, he was going to mislead Raines actual self and Guy, who were watching over him to get the impression that This guys not that strong after all. Had they seen Diablo act all pretentiously and left after beating Raines Mist, Guy wouldve probably been disappointed in Diablo. He would lose interest and leave right away.

    This way, Diablo would have been able to hide his ability from Guy and win some time to help Shion and the others. Yet this n was forced to be terminated. This was out of Diablos own pursuit.

    You dont have to act anymoreThis line was meant for Diablo himself too.

    Wouldnt it be impossible to beat us primordial demons with just Disintegration? A trick like that couldnt even be called a trump card.

    Ho, you sure talk big. Even I wouldnt be able to stand unfazed if shot directly.

    If I took a direct hit, I would disappear too; that said, Id first need to be hit directly.

    Kuku, AHAHAHA!

    Kufufufufu.

    Guyughed with satisfaction hearing Diablos response. Diablo continued with this calm attitude as he stood his ground against Guy. During this, Raine was treated like air.

    Oh by the way, why did you wait until now to evolve? Arent you different from those three and didnt want to draw anyone back?

    Umm, while those three might seem to be dragging each other back, the truth is that it was their way of entertaining themselves. But it is true I had nothing to do with them. Guy, I wanted to ask you something too. Do you think that there could be people stronger than us in this world?

    Diablo responded to Guys doubts with a question, simr to the one he had asked Testarossa. Such a statement wasmon sense among the primordial demons, Guy being no exception, so it was easier to get a response.

    Probably noif I had to give an answer, probably True Dragons, but they are more like natural phenomena.

    Even True Dragons would not be a threat to Guy. It may be different had Star King Dragon Veldanava been resurrected. Considering the current state of things, Guy wasnt wrong.

    Indeed, Diablo nodded, we are the strongest. However, evolving even knowing this, wouldnt it make fighting others boring since its a one-sided ughter? he imed with a smile on his face.

    This was another mindset one could expect from a battle maniac.

    So thats how you see it.

    Guy understood it now too. Even though they wouldnt admit it out loud, the two had very simr personalities, and they were surprisingly tacit in times like these.

    Did your view change because of that slime?

    He is called Rimuru-sama, please dont call him a slime.

    Got it. So the reason why you evolved was because of this Rimuru, right?

    Diablo had always lived life on his own terms, at his own pace, which pissed Guy off a bit. Butining now wont help things progress. While ying along would still piss Guy off, he cooperated with Diablo and rephrased his question.

    RightDiablo continued: Rimuru-samas growth so far has been most astonishing. What he has achieved was truly worthy of the name evolution. Hes also incredibly adorable in appearance, his soul is filled with noble spirit, moreover

    Are you gonna go on with this for a while?

    ?

    That goes without sayingAlmost as if saying this, Diablo returned a sharp look at Guy.

    Lets stop with Rimuru for a while and talk about you?

    Diablo was a little displeased, but he suspected the situation was rather dire and decided to follow Guys suggestion.

    Tsk, cant be helped then. Let me cut to the chase, thepanions of Rimuru-sama have also been progressing at an extraordinary pace every day, and I, too, was inspired by such an atmosphere.

    Oh, how surprising. Guy looked a bit exhausted, but he still tried his best digesting Diablos words.

    Yes, if I live too casually, I may eventually get left behind. There is no reason for me to limit my growth living in that kind of environment.

    So that was the reason. Now Guy understood.

    Guy finally picked up his pace.

    Rimuru seemed to have dominated the Western Nations, Guy told Diablo, then cracking an evil grin, but unfortunately, my subordinates should be wreaking havoc over there.

    In Guys view, it was simply a prank he pulled on the humans. For Rimuru, on the other hand, who wanted to have a friendly rtionship with the humans, the situation was a lot more severe.

    That was the reason why Guy said this. Trying to create trouble for Diablo was a fools errand, so instead he targeted Rimuru, catching Diablo in the fallout. That was when he recalled that his subordinates were starting a rampage in the Western Nations, so he decided to exploit the situation a bit.

    Diablo, who used to be able to rival Guy, suddenly acknowledged someone as his master, and Guy was not amused by it. Thats why he decided to provoke Diablo and try to start trouble.

    Without Razul guarding the northern realm, the Western Nations werecking in reserve. Just as Guy said, the ce was probably a living hell now. Considering the current circumstances, Diablo would not be able to do anything about it. Even Rimuru would not be able to react. Or so Guy thought.

    Upon hearing that, Diablo continued tough in his usual kufufu manner.

    You think Rimuru-sama has not expected that? He has already made arrangements. Rimuru-samas magnificent mind could perceive and foresee all things in life

    And Guy thought Diablo would be shaken a bit, yet he waspletely unfazed. Worse than that, even under these circumstances he was still singing Rimurus praises.

    What a nutjobGuy couldnt help but realize.

    Oh, he does seem very interesting. I suppose that guy has exceeded my expectations?

    Yes, that is only natural. It is only natural to Rimuru-sama.

    Diablo would continue to provoke Guy, big time, during the absence of Rimuru. Had Rimuru known this, he would have shouted What the hell are you doing!

    Raine bit her lips regretfully hearing their conversation. Yet Guy and Diablo continuedpletely ignoring her.

    It was during which

    The Western Nations were experiencing an unprecedented crisis. The main defense force of the Cidre Border region, who were in charge of fending off demons, had disappeared for reasons unknown. Due to their inability to defeat the regrly invading demon armies, they requested emergency support.

    How can this be! You said that the demon army ising down south?!

    What the hell is the Count of Cidre Border doing!

    Theres no time for pointless squabbling. All nations should be assembling their armies and setting up defensive positions at important junctions! Or else the Capital of Ingracia will also fall prey to the invasion of the demon army!

    The delegates of every nation had gathered for an emergency council meeting and were quarreling endlessly without a solution in sight.

    The Western States Council was an organization formed by delegates of its member states. Even though the councils decisions held great weight, it would also waste a lot of time in following procedure during emergency situations. This was the biggest weakness of a democratic majority vote system.

    The defense of the northern realm was handled alone by the Count of the Cidre Border in the kingdom of Ingracia. Around half of the total military strength of Ingracia was deployed in the north against Guy Crimson. Moreover, several Holy Knights were dispatched there as well, alongside several rank A adventurers from its subsidiary organization, the Freedom Association.

    That was how important thend was as a strategic location. If it were to fall, it would be a matter of life or death for humanity. No wonder why the councilors that had gathered were in such a panicked state.

    Right now, the final line of defense was barely holding on as the Holy Knights and adventurers stationed there were taking the brunt of things. Based on the dire situation that was unfolding, they needed to send reinforcements immediately.

    However, there wasnt enough time.

    While this might have already been aplished with authoritarian states, since the decision was made by a league consisting of independent entities, they needed to request approval from their respective home nations first. The quickest solution right now was to issue an emergency request to the Freedom Association.

    A solution for the Kingdom of Ingracia, the host nation of the council, was to mobilize their military reserve. On the other hand, since it would likely weaken the defense of Ingracias capital, they definitely would not approve of this decision.

    Speaking of which, the responsibility of defending the northern realm had always been managed by Ingracia, so it wouldnt be unreasonable if they were to request additional troops from other nations. Just like what one of the unnamed councilors had already shouted, it was more viable to form a coalition army.

    Even so, there was a catch: the soldiers dispatched by various nations would be led by the neerthe Jura-Tempest Federation.

    The motion had passed with unanimous support, so one would expect zeroints. Yet, to the councilors, willfully handing over their nations precious military to monsters was a hard pill to swallow.

    Please remain silent! the Speaker of the Western States Council shouted, trying to restore order in the hall.

    The eyes of the other councilors fell on the Speaker as he addressed his audience. Right now, we are faced with an unprecedented crisis. Rather than arguing, you should try to establish contact with your home nations as soon as possible and order their troops here. We have the delegate from the Tempest Federation, appointed by Demon Lord Rimuru-sama, present. SheTestarossa-donoknows her way around military strategies. Since Rimuru-sama has entrusted her as his proxy, she should be worthy to lead the coalition army.

    While some were against the Speakers view, they werent bold enough to voice their protests. And because there werent any alternative solutions,ining here would only worsen the situation.

    At this point, every councilors eyes were fixed on Testarossa. As the council summoned their army, executive military control would ultimately fall to Testarossa. It was, to some extent, normal that everyone would simultaneously begin to assess her.

    Among the councilors, Testarossa was an unusual sightbeing a young woman, not to mention gorgeous looks on top of that as well.

    There are so many beauties from Tempestmany councilors couldnt help but think. But no one was stupid enough to say it out loud. Everyone was wondering why this woman, this Testarossa, had so much power.

    While it might sound like an exaggeration, the sess of this whole affair was not only tied to the councilors fates, but also the fate of humanity.

    One of the councilors braced himself and asked Testarossa a question. T-Testarossa-dono, uhhI understand it is rude of me to ask this, but do you really know how tomand the army?

    With a bewitching smile, Testarossa replied: Please rest assured, everyone. My master Rimuru-sama has given the order to protect every nation that is a member of the Western States Council. My subordinates have already departed to each nation. AlsoMoss.

    Yes maam. ording to the information I just received, reliable reinforcements have reached the northern defense.

    This young boy, Moss, must be Testarossas servantwhile the councilors quietly had the thought, Mosss report sent a wave of shock across the hall.

    W-what!

    I-is this true?

    T-then, Testarossa-dono, what are these reinforcements referring to?

    Moss.

    Yes maam. Dragon ships from the Sorcerers Dynasty Sarion are heading to the scene. There are some lesser demons scuffling there; however, with that elfs subordinates, they will be easily taken out.

    Everything you heard, Speaker-dono, is true. By the way, Moss, its very rude to call His Majesty Rimurus ally an elf.

    Ah! M-my utmost apolog

    Dont ever do it again, understand? Make sure to address her as Her Majesty Elmesia.

    U-understood.

    Under the intense re of Testarossas crimson eyes, Moss shrank back in fear. His face paled with the realization that he still hadnt outgrown the prejudices he held from his time as an archduke in the demon realm. If he were to anger Testarossa, then hed be signing his own death warrant. Moreover, to have belittled Rimurus friends, Moss himself could not allow such a mistake.

    Perhaps it was because Testarossa knew what Moss was thinking that she did not pursue the subject any further and only gave him a warning. If Moss hadnt changed his arrogant attitude, he likely would have been executed by Testarossa the very next second. Despite Moss being a demon of great standing, he still pledged his eternal loyalty to Testarossa. That would never change.

    Testarossa was truly a gentle yet cruel person.

    The next moment, the atmosphere within the hall became unbelievably chaotic. After listening to the conversation between Testarossa and Moss, the councilors had gotten a rough idea of the situation. On the other hand, there was no evidence to back up her im, so they couldnt just blindly trust them either.

    Our nation believes in Testarossa-dono.

    Umm, our nation agrees. We shall entrust the handling of all military affairs to Testarossa-dono.

    Some of them dered their support outright.

    How can you say that, isnt that being too irresponsible?! If anything were to happen, itd be toote!

    Hear, hear! If the talk of reinforcements were all a lie, human society would be crushed by demons!

    Some of them rejected the idea

    They continued to argue as the council was split into two sides.

    Testarossa observed this pandemonium rather casually. She did not give her opinion and merely watched.

    Not long after, Testarossa suddenly stood up.

    I get it now, it was you. Youve hidden yourself quite well.

    This happened so abruptly, the councilors were all confused about what Testarossa was saying.

    Although, there was one persons face that turned pale, with sweat dripping down his cheeks, when Testarossa gazed at him.

    He was one of the Five Great Elders. The Duke of the Kingdom of Rostia, Johann Rostia.

    W-what did I do? Trying his hardest to hide his inner panic, Johann questioned Testarossa in return. Yet Testarossa simply cracked an amused smile.

    Johann lost hisposure and reacted first.

    A-as expected, monsters are indeed untrustworthy! We have to use our own strength to protect humanity. Guards, guards, get over here! he shouted, acting all serious. His face was covered with a thin sheen of perspiration, desperately trying to fight the fear he felt. In contrast, Testarossas smile deepened.

    Noticing Johanns order, soldiers quickly charged into the meeting hall, his personal guards among them too. He quickly regained hisposure.

    Testarossa began ying with her hair, looking elegant as she did so, while the other councilors fell into disorder again.

    What Johann had done waspletely out of line. Even if Testarossa was bearing malicious intent, an uwful act that purposefully ignored the rules of the council would not be tolerated. Regardless of how important Johanns position was, such reckless behavior was unsanctioned.

    You there, your name is Johann Rostia, correct? The Duke of Rostia, a rather prestigious position.

    S-so what? Its no use ttering me now

    Johann-dono, who were youmunicating with via Magic Communication just now?

    What!

    Why did you give the order to disrupt this nations Defensive Barrier?

    H-how did you

    Could you please tell me why? Testarossa pressured Johann to answer with the demeanor of someone casually chatting in a tea party.

    The other councilors were all bbergasted. There was no time to panic anymore. They immediately ordered their subordinates to confirm the Defensive Barrier of Ingracias capital.

    Before they could get an answer

    Everyone felt the rumbling that slowly started urring in every direction, like an earthquake.

    Could this be true!

    How could you destroy the barrier?! This means it cant prevent monsters from invading anymore! This will bring catastrophe upon the civilians!

    Seriously, what in the world is going on! Johann-dono, please give us an exnation!

    Seeing someone more panicked than themselves, people would naturally be influenced by that as well, causing a positive feedback loop and eventually falling into a state of fear. Yet, if you were to take a step back in these circumstances, you would naturally regainposure.

    Johann belonged to thetter category.

    Knowing his n hade to fruition, a serene smile emerged on his face.

    Girard-dono, the barrier has disappeared, and thus the time hase. Please summon that lord.

    Urged on by Johann, someone began to move. The councilors faces turned pale as theyid eyes on the man.

    T-that man, hes the leader of the mercenary band Apostles of Verte

    Commander Girard!

    Are the Apostles of Verte linked not only to Gavan, but Johann as well?!

    If thats the case, what is Johann-dono nning?

    Ignoring the councilorsments, Girard stood by Johanns side.

    Our contract is effectivelyplete as of this moment. Thank you for the assistance.

    Its nothing, but youre wee. This is the final wish of our leader, the Great Elder Granbell. It just so happens to align with your goal. Come on then, no need to hold back. If you are going to do it, make it thorough, and turn this ce into a living hell! Johann dered,ughing maniacally.

    The light of reason gradually dissipated from his eyes, and instead was reced by his true vicious nature.

    It was not until this moment that the councilors finally realized Johann was the traitor. Even so, the Defensive Barrier of the capital had already been breached.

    Seemingly grasping their situation, the councilors all looked desperate.

    Ayn, its time.

    Umm, understood!

    Following Girards encouragement, the woman named Aynmenced with her chanting. It was summoning magic.

    Ayn was the leader of thebyrinth team Green Rebellion and a spirit wielder. However, what she was summoning this time was not a spirit, but the god worshipped by the Apostles of Verte.

    A dark oval-shaped portal appeared. A powerful being of undiluted strength crossed the gate and stepped in front of everyone. It was a green-haired beauty in a dark red maid outfit. Yet everyone could tell that this beauty was dangerous. Contrasting with her attractive appearance was the youki, reeking of deste despair, that emanated from her entire body.

    Even the magical inquisitors that arrived after sensing the disturbance were petrified by this youki. Their instincts told themmoving even a hair now would get them killed.

    The one that emerged from the darknessher name was Mizeri, a demon peer.

    Amidst the sudden desperation, Johann sneered with satisfaction. He recalled the day that he was summoned by Granbell for thest time. With the demise of Gavan, there were only four people left among the Five Great Elders:

    The head of the Rosso FamilyGranbell Rosso.

    The Count of the Cidre Border of the Kingdom of Ingracia.

    King Dn of the Dn Kingdom.

    And then there was Johann.

    Granbell summoned all three and gave them the terrifying final order. Mariabell is dead. At this point, us Rossos have exhausted our strength. Perhaps it is possible to achieve our goal from a different perspective and coexist with monsters. If it were like Luminas-samas method and that they had no interest in the human domain, we could perhaps sessfully coexist with one another. On the other hand, if we were to walk the path that Demon Lord Rimuru promotes, humanity would fall prey to his control. We must stop him at all costs.

    But Great Elder Granbell, if there is no viable way to fight back, regardless of what n we create, it would have ws.

    I am well aware of what Mariabell was afraid of, but now that even our Chaos Dragon trump card is lost, we have no more options left. Razul should not be moved out so easily either

    Dns words were a reality check. Cidre nodded while Johann agreed.

    Johann had directly interacted with the dangerous individual named Mariabell before. To have won against that menacing young girl, Demon Lord Rimuru sure was terrifying.

    Right now, its probably smarter to pretend to y along with Rimurus will as we umte our strength againthat was Johanns belief.

    With that being said, likely sensing that the others were hesitant, Granbell expressed his view vociferously. Fools, did you lose your nerve? No matter how chaotic the world is, no matter what sacrifice we have to make, the human world should be ruled by us humans! Have you forgotten?

    The others did not dare make a sound against such a fierce aura.

    Granbell rarely expressed his emotions, and because of that, they could tell how deep Granbells hatred and fury truly ran.

    I am tired. If this continues on, the human world will be destroyed, and in its ce, Demon Lord Rimuru will have the entire world in the palm of his hand. If this is our fate, then I shall make myst stand. I am going all in for this wager. You people can follow your own will.

    Granbell had given the others time to contemte their decision for the future.

    Would they follow Granbell to fight against destiny, or surrender to Demon Lord Rimuru?

    In order to prevent the Rosso bloodline from dying out, someone needed to sever all ties and be a hostile faction to the Rossosonly Dn chose this option.

    My domain is far from the heat of battle. I shall be thest of the Rosso family and judge the history toe with fairness.

    Granbell approved of Dns words. Very well. I fear that I wont have the opportunity to do this in the future, so I shall give my final words to you. Its toote for me, but you must never hold a grudge.

    Granbell steeled his resolve and left Dn with this advice. Dn quietly wept and nodded. He then left the scene alone.

    Johann knew this would be their final gathering, yet he had no regrets in his heart.

    Granbell was the progenitor of the Rosso family. When considering the hardship he had already experienced, to Johann, sacrificing himself for the cause was nothing.

    Cidre had the same thought.

    And so, the three began nning their final scheme.

    Granbell would manipte Grandmaster Yuuki of the Freedom Association into confronting Luminas.

    Cidre would dissolve the western defensework and allow the demons from the north to wage war against the Western Nations.

    Johann, on the other hand, would sabotage the Defensive Barrier that protected the capital of Ingracia and kill off key members of the Western Council. If it was possible, he aimed to kill the delegate of the Tempest Federation, hopefully antagonizing Demon Lord Rimuru and also worsening his rtionship with Demon Lord Guy.

    And so, human society would be plunged into chaos.

    They would deal with the aftermathter. After all, their designated survivor, Dn, would lead the restoration of society.

    There might also be some nation that stood out and rose to power. Or perhaps someone would be humanitys new hope and lead the masses.

    Granbell seemed to have some other ideas, but Johann did not give too much thought to it.

    Are you all fine with this? You do understand that I am sending you all to your deaths, right?

    Why in the world would we object? I am also a member of the Rossos, and my heart rests with you, Grand Elder!

    Me too. While my illness-ridden body may not apany you to the end, I wish to be at least of some use.

    Granbell had asked to confirm their will, and both Johann and Cidre answered without hesitation.

    There was a reason why Johanns mind changed so quickly. The Rosso family naturally should follow the order of Granbell. Without his guardianship, the family would never have prospered. This was just how much the fate of the family relied on Granbell. It was obvious Granbell had decided to embrace his death and so the usually indecisive Johann made up his mind.

    Dn-dono appears heart-broken as well. Its like a child being abandoned by his parents; surely his heart must be uneasy tooJohann thought to himself. In considering that viewpoint, perhaps he was rather happy in the end. He could bear the pride of the Rosso family and ept his final moments.

    Johann followed Granbells orders and made contact with the Apostles of Verte which previously conspired with Gavan. He promised to assist them.

    The Apostles goal was to summon the Green Deity that could plunge the world into anarchy. This mercenary bands dream was to blossom during that chaotic state, an ideal that waspletely self-centered.

    Back to present time.

    Johanns mission wasplete. The Apostles of Verte had also clearly achieved their ambitions. Because their godDemon Peer Mizerihad answered their summoning.

    Mizeri was more terrifying than some demon lords. She wouldnt break a sweat in destroying the Kingdom of Ingracia.

    Kukuku, even the supposed strongest unit of this nation, the magical inquisitors, froze at the sight of the demon. This country is doomed. Our nation of Rostia will probably be affected as well; I suppose Ill just have to apologize to everyone in the next life. In satisfaction, Johann nced around the meeting hall.

    And what he saw next made him question his eyes.

    Faced against Mizeri, the embodiment of horror, was a person that wore a gentle, conspicuous smile. The young man standing beside her seemed disinterested at the fact as well,pletely at ease.

    W-whats wrong with those two?

    Johann, shocked, recalled that those two were the delegates of Tempest: Testarossa and her servant, Moss.

    I see. What an interesting scheme, Johann-dono. Could it be that you wish to destroy this nation and plunge the world into chaos and war?

    Testarossas reaction displeased Johann quite a bit. He was even more upset at how casual and calm Testarossa was acting while facing Mizeri, the walking cmity that surpassed demon lords. What if I did?

    Yet he quickly changed his view. While Testarossa may be strong as a monster, her arrogant confidence would soon be her downfall.

    You cant do anything with strength alone. You havent even seen through your opponents true strength. That ignorance will destroy you. When she finally realizes the reality of her situation, shell cry and plead. By purely imagining the sight of a distressed Testarossa begging for mercy, Johanns heart was filled with an overwhelming sense of ecstasy.

    How veryughable. Your n failed the very moment I was appointed military attach.

    Kukuku, what nonsense are you talking about?

    Hearing Testarossas words, a calm smile settled on Johanns face. The more confident Testarossa was, the greater her despair would be when she got a taste of what was toe. With that belief, Johann eagerly anticipated that moment.

    It was then that the Speaker interrupted their conversation.

    T-Testarossa-dono, this is no time to chit-chat. You must escape even if its by yourself, and you must report to His Majesty Rimuru as soon as possible!

    Ara, Speaker-dono? What should I say to His Majesty Rimuru-sama?

    In the Western Nations, peoplesprehension of demons was not deep. Compared to the experts in the Eastern Empire, what they knew was barely the tip of the iceberg.

    The Speaker was no exception. When he saw Mizeri, he was not aware of her species. He only knew that she was the subordinate of Guy Crimson, the symbol of terror, and therefore determined Mizeri to be a highly threatening individual.

    Ignorance is a sin, but sometimes it was useful too.

    Had the Speaker and the councilors known demons well enough, their hearts would have despaired the moment Mizeri appeared. They were lucky since they hadnt fallen into that state yet, which was why the Speaker continued to earnestly beg Testarossa.

    Please inform him that one of Demon Lord Guys subordinates has invaded ournd. Surely he will not leave the council for dead!

    The Speaker knew he was being too optimistic.

    Regardless of how much Demon Lord Rimuru sought to coexist with humans, he would not purposely go against Demon Lord Guy just to secure his wish. It was a simple cost benefit analysis that anyone would understand.

    Yet even with that being the case, the Speaker still wanted to have a glimmer of hope on this small possibility. He had seen Demon Lord Rimuru with his own two eyes and believed his words.

    Perhaps if it is that emotional and overtly human demon lord, he may just defy logic and save usdespite knowing that his thought was absurd, the Speaker couldnt help but to think so. That was the reason why he was still able to maintain a coherent frame of mind amidst the terror.

    Testarossa smiled at the Speaker. Thats why I am here.

    Although the Speaker didnt understand what she meant by that for the longest time, he would soon enough. And he was not the only one confused about Testarossas words.

    Johann felt the same. Thatposed, easygoing attitude of Testarossa had pushed him to his limit.

    Do you really think Ill just sit by and let you interfere? Girard-dono, its about time to give them a reality check.

    However, Girard, as he was being ordered around by Johann, was also confused by the scene in front of him.

    Why, why hasnt Mizeri-sama made a move yet?

    Ayn was Girards lieutenant, and she had lost consciousness the instant Demon Peer Mizeri was summoned. It likely cost much of her life force, but it was undoubtedly masterful work. The fact that she was even alive at all wasmendable. Although, without the supernatural power of Mizeri, she would likely never wake up. While feeling proud of Ayn, Girard prepared to retreat once the opportunity presented itself.

    With the unusual power of Mizeri, itd be a piece of cake ughtering everyone at the scene. Besides, even the capital of the Kingdom of Ingracia would soon be engulfed by the hellish me that was about toe.

    Girard was nning to flee with Ayn before that happened. He intended to sacrifice all the citizens of this city to their god, Mizeri. And with this contribution, the members of the Apostles of Verte would surely be able to join the ranks of their deity. That was his n.

    However, things were going the opposite way of what Girard had envisioned. Ever since Mizeri showed up, she had been standing still and silently staring at Testarossa.

    Finally, she decided to speak. Unbelievable, nc. How did you manage to get a body?

    Ara, that title sounds so deste to me. Someone has already given me the wonderful name of Testarossa. Wouldnt you dislike it if people started calling you the green demon? No, Mizeri?

    Y-yougot a name? How is that possible

    Testarossa giggled. Very possible it seems. Its so kind of you toe all the way here to say hi, but unfortunately, I wont lose to you in this state. Itd be quite amusing if you still intend to fight me. How about a thousand years of slumber as a parting gift from me? she said provokingly with an elegant smile.

    Not only did she obtain a body, but she even received a name.

    And just like that, Testarossa had evolved into a demon peer, same as Mizeri.

    They were now both on a level ying field.

    At first nce, theirbat abilities were on par with each other, but logically speaking, Testarossa, who only acquired her body recently, would be at a disadvantage.

    That would have been the case if not for Testarossas bellicose personality. Mizeri, as Demon Lord Guys subordinate, mainly handled administrative affairs, whereas Testarossa, a primordial just like Mizeri, had been fighting for power every single day of her life.

    There was no clear-cut way topare either of them inbat experience. Furthermore, Testarossas subordinate, Moss, was here with her.

    While I possess more magicules, I dont want to risk fighting two demon peers. Moreover, my opponent is one half of the troublesome ck and white duo. The duty Guy-sama gave me was just to create a disturbance at the capital, not risk my life trying to eliminate one of the primordials. I should report this problem to Guy-sama first.

    Mizeri was very calm. She instantly recognized the difference in strength between her and her enemies, and determined the best course of action that the situation demanded.

    There is no need to provoke me like that, Testarossa. My target today is not you, but only to destroy the Barrier over the capital. I think I achieved my goal.

    Ara, are you trying to flee?

    Indeed. My life belongs to Guy-sama. It is not something I can choose to throw away with my own free will.

    I see. Then I look forward to our next encounter.

    To that deration, Mizeri remained emotionless. That is my line. Get used to your body soon. I wont allow you to make excuses when youre defeated.

    Testarossas smile deepened.

    The two stared at each other for a while before Mizeri vanished.

    Eh? Girard couldnt help but let out a gasp.

    With her departure, she left behind a room full of baffled bystanders.

    Their godthe supreme existence, the invincible, the omnipotent beinghad been persuaded to leave by the councilor who only had a beautiful appearance going for heror so it seemed in Girards eyes.

    The Apostles of Verte was merely a disposable tool to Mizeri. It was something she prepared on a whim to keep human societies under her surveince and obtain information. There were plenty of recements at the ready, so she was indifferent to the fates of Girard and the others.

    She abandoned them without a second thoughtbut Girard refused to ept this reality.

    N-no way! Dammit, you made our god leave!

    Enraged, Girard swung his sword at Testarossa.

    His elevated rank A abilities werent just for show. The swiftness of his sword was invisible to the average person.

    Yet to someone like Testarossa, he moved like he was in slow motion. Besides, there was no need for her to do anything; Moss was with her. He would never ignore such insolence.

    Familyg. With a sharp crack, Girards sword shattered in half. He was apprehended by Moss the very next moment.

    Dont kill him. Same goes for that official, Johann.

    But these people insulted Testarossa-sama

    In the blink of an eye, Mosss ear was sent flying away.

    Moss, are you asking me to repeat myself?

    He kneeled immediately, demonstrating regret for his misconduct. I would not dare! To have given my opinion to Testarossa-sama, I thought too highly of myself!

    Testarossa had been in a good moodtely, which caused him to be careless for a second. She was actually very egocentric.

    The same applied to not only Testarossa, but Ultima and Carrera as well. Birds of a feather flock together was probably the best phrase that described them.

    Since you are aware of it, I shall forgive you this time. Ara ara, I have such a generous heart. Right, Moss? Wouldnt you agree?

    Definitely! You are absolutely correct! Moss said cooperatively. He was a smart man after all. Even though he asionally made mistakes like this, he had served Testarossa for over ten thousand years. That was an incredible achievement that no one could even hope of replicating.

    And so, Johann, Girard and Ayn were captured. Even the soldiers on their side were arrested.

    H-how can this be

    Girard finally collected his thoughts after losing to Moss. The conversation between Mizeri and Testarossa began slowly sinking in before he realized something crucial.

    Our enemy was acknowledged as an equal by our god? ould nc be referring to the White Primordial?!

    Girard knew of the primordial demons. That was why he was able to see through Testarossas hidden identity. As soon as he connected the dots, Girard plunged into a state of utter stupefaction. Now armed with the knowledge of what they had attempted to go against, he knew his soul would never see a day of rest. His ego as a strong individual meant nothing in front of the power of a primordial.

    Aha, AHAHAHAHAHAHA! Girardughed maniacally.

    In a way, he had met an enviable end. Thus, both Girard and an unconscious Ayn were dragged away by the magical inquisitors.

    Johann looked as though he had suddenly aged a few years as heid lifelessly on the ground, rambling, H-have I failed? Even Granbell-samas wish, his final request

    Yes. There is nothing you can achieve, Testarossa mocked, whispering into Johanns ears, her words filled with spite.

    When the sweet voice of Testarossa reached Johanns eardrums, itpletely numbed his heart.

    Dammit! DAMMIT! If-if it werent for you, our n would have worked!

    Ara, is that so? Then Im terribly sorry to have interfered with your n in the end. Perhaps this is fate and it wanted you to give up. Ara ara, looks like someones waiting behind you. Now please excuse me.

    Testarossa stroked her pale finger across Johanns jaw before making way for the magical inquisitors, who were waiting to carry out their orders.

    N-no, stay away, stay away from me!

    The magical inquisitors remained silent throughout the process as they escorted Johann out.

    Stop it, oi, get your hands off me! Johann shouted in front of an aloof crowd. D-do you have any idea who I am?! Do you not know the consequences of your actions here?! My nation will not allow this to stand! Youre creating an international problem for yourselves!

    No one reacted. Not a single person was willing to lend him a helping hand.

    That was only natural.

    With all these witnesses present, Johann would have to answer for his actions.

    Theres no use cryingyou have to pay the price for your crimes. Dont worry, your friends will be with you too. You will all have a fun time together.

    GO TO HELL YOU DEMON!

    Seeing Johanns distress, Testarossaughed happily. Ufufufufufu, wonderful! There it is. How can I not be amused by a stray dog barking like that? Within the council, criminals are judged by a jury, and if your charge is Inciting subversion of state power or Conspiracy against ones country, it is outside the jurisdiction of the council and instead will be handled by Ingracia. How unfortunate that I wont have the right to punish you. Even though I could im self-defense, you seem a bit too weak for me.

    Testarossas words were perfectly aligned with internationalw. Taking thew as an excuse, she merely utilized logic to force Johann into a corner. With Johann arrested, he would follow in the footsteps of Gavan: never to see the light of day again and eventually executed in secret.

    Looking at the results, Testarossa single-handedly forced the demon that attempted to destroy the kingdom to back down, thus saving Ingracia and even all of the council members.

    This incident cemented Testarossas status within the council. Both her intelligence and martial prowess were insurmountable. Even the Speaker began to regard Testarossa highly, and her reputation spread far and wide.

    And so, Testarossa was able to conquer the West once and for all.

    Did he predict what would happen beforehand? Ah, Rimuru-sama is truly infallible! How wonderful, how truly wonderful, Testarossa sighed.

    The extent of the lords wisdom is genuinely unfathomable, added Moss.

    Indeed. But the incident could potentially cause Guy Crimson to take things seriously, and if that urs

    We shall gather our strength. We must let the world know that no matter how fierce our enemies are, none will stand in the path of our lord!

    Since you know this already, I dont have much to add. You should work hard in order to reach his expectations. Remember to tell Cien the same.

    Understood, my master!

    Testarossa nodded, satisfied, and gave a graceful smile.

    The situation in the northern realm was going well too. Testarossas subordinate, Cien, went above and beyond to contain and control the battle before Elmesias Magus Order could arrive. Luckily, Guy wasnt really trying to invade anyway, which meant the demons were quickly defeated and routed back to their domain.

    And so, the disturbance in the West seemed to have drawn to a close.

    But the true unrest had yet to even begin.

    Hey, Mizeri just contacted me, said Guy, sounding rather dismayed. When did the White Primordial get a name?

    Oh, you mean Testarossa. She is among the many people that have learned how wonderful a person Rimuru-sama is, Diablo exined proudly.

    All my men got defeated too. This prank was aplete failure.

    It is only natural. Everything is going ording to Rimuru-samas n. You are merely a pawn in this game as well, Guy, Diablo added. Again, unbeknownst to Rimuru, he was antagonizing Guy.

    Had Rimuru been there, he would probably have squealed something along the lines of, What the hell are you saying, you idiot! and tried to stop Diablo at all costs.

    So, did that Rimuru give her the name Testarossa too?

    Yes, he did.

    And the fact that Testarossa evolved into a demon peer after obtaining a body

    That was thanks to Rimuru-sama, of course.

    Right.

    Diablos smile widened whereas Guys headache worsened. Behind him, Raine was awaiting orders. Yet, upon realizing the severity of the situation, her face paled.

    Oi oi oi, is this for real? The bnce of power that had been maintained for thousands of years has been shattered to pieces

    Guy could only find the situationughable.

    The bnce of power in different regions had always been subtly preserved. The three primordials had stood strong in their respective domains whilst the East and West were against each other. Furthermore, Luminas and Dagruel pressured each other from their respective domains as well.

    Yet, this delicate bnce was nowpletely obliterated.

    Abruptly hit by an ominous feeling, Guy couldnt help but ask Diablo, Oi, if Testarossa emerged from the primordial trio, what happened to the other two?

    Diablos expression became smug. Hmm, you mean Ultima and Carrera? Rimuru-sama prepared positions for both of them. They seem very happy about

    Baffled, Guy quickly interrupted him. Hold on, HOLD ON for a second!

    What is it? I was about to exin the important part, you know? Diablo was quite displeased as he was just about to brag.

    Eh, slow down now, is it a long story? Whatever the answer was, Guy just didnt want to spend all this time with him.

    Of course.

    Ill hear you outter. Who is this Ultima and Carrera

    Oh, Ultima is the Violet Primordial. Carrera is the Yellow Primordial. But if you dont call them by their names, they wont take kindly to it. Lately, its almost like theyve forgotten their original titles.

    I see

    Guy was utterly gobsmacked.

    Oi oi oi, what the hell is that brat Rimuru thinking? Guy thought to himself. Its not impossible for the ck Primordial since hes always been an oddball, but theres no way the Violet and Yellow Primordial would yield so easily. Didnt he mention the White Primordial too? That woman is the most prideful of all primordials To think she would be willing to take orders from other people

    Well, Diablo casually interjected, I was the one that invited them. I would wee more jobs, but its pointless if that means I cant take care of Rimuru-sama as a result. Wouldnt you agree?

    Huh?

    Guy gave Diablo a weird look, as if saying, Oi oi oi, what is this guy talking about?

    The absolute overlord, Guy, waspletely dumbfounded at Diablos words.

    To put it simply, I wanted to push some of my chores onto other peoplecough, cough, I mean, I wanted somepanions to work with. So I invited that unemployed lot. Endlessly fighting like a bunch of idiots over power is so boring. Thats why I hoped they would mature a bit ande to Rimuru-samas aid! Diablo dered in a haughty tone.

    So you were behind everything! Seriously, this is all your faultyoure the one who should grow up! Guy cursed internally.

    So you invited those girls and Rimuru took them as subordinates, giving them names and physical bodies?

    Thats right. They were very rude to Rimuru-sama at first. Now that I think about it, I wanted to kill them for that. But since theyre now useful, as long as Rimuru-sama doesnt mind, I will forgive them.

    Diablo was weird enough already, which made Rimuru seem even weirder. That was Guys genuine opinion.

    An average demon lord would not have been able to name a primordial. Such a drastic action was apanied by an equal amount of danger. One would need to wager their life, or even their existence as a whole, to do it.

    Essentially, if the primordials didnt recognize your strength, they wouldnt follow you, regardless. Your entire soul could potentially be consumed before you sessfully named them.

    What Rimuru did could no longer simply be described as crazy or overconfident.

    With that, Guy came to a conclusion. I suppose I should just talk with him directly.

    Ill go hang out at Rimurus ce next time.

    Huh? That sounds troublesome. I refuse.

    You little shitGuy clenched his fists. But hed lose if he lost his temper now.

    Diablo was a very special demon. Even if he were to be eliminated here, he would revive instantly. Knowing this well, Guy did not fall for Diablos taunts.

    Its nothing really, I just want to hear more about all this from you, and this is certainly no ce to chat. I heard from Dino that Rimurus domain is quite affluent. So, I want to check it out for myself too, Guy said in a rather intimate tone as he wrapped his arm around Diablos shoulder.

    Pffcant help it with you. If thats the case, I will wee your visit. Surely, Rimuru-sama would be pleased to have you.

    Diablos mood improved dramatically when he heard Rimurus nation being praised. So much so that he permitted Guys visit.

    Rimuru would definitely squeal upon learning this.

    Later in the aftermath of these events, when Diablo reported this to Rimuru, the demon lord would think to himself: This guy, why do you pick up all the bad traits from Shion

    But not knowing things would go this way, Diablo promised Guy.

    Since you are here, Ill be going now.

    Right. Whatever happens here, Rimuru-sama will surely take care of it.

    I guess. Please send my regards to Rimuru.

    No problem. See you next time. Ill look forward to our next meeting.

    And so, Guy left the scene.

    Diablo gave a sigh of relief.

    Looks like I managed to pull through this time. Theres no telling how things would go if Guy decided to interfere. Even I would have trouble dealing with him. Kufufufufufu, I must be stronger

    The sound of Diablosughter echoed in the empty space.

    A fierce battle raged within the inner sanctum.

    Louiss innocuous hand-chops shed through any obstacles. Furthermore, it was apanied by a shockwave which closed in on Lace, who was fleeing further away. However, Lace was merely evading, almost teasingly, with a rxed smile on his face.

    Right, right, are ya Roys big bro? Yer twins? Then ya can stop fighting already, ya wont be able to beat me!

    Lace was so unconcerned that he could run around dodging attacks, and still have the strength to crack jokes.

    Louis remained emotionless to Laces teasing. He didnt mind that his attacks were being avoided; he simply continued to swing his hands at Lace.

    At some point, the two ended up fighting outside of the tomb. With Lace constantly avoiding Louiss attack, it was only natural that they would wind up here.

    As you just said, I am Louiss twin. Our power was quite alike to each other, so was our appearance. The only difference was that Roy was more aggressive while I didnt have much emotion, that is all the difference. However, there was one aspect that I am a lot stronger than him in, that is, I have good eyes.

    The hell is good eyes?

    I can closely analyze my opponents skill, bodynguage and his focus of attack. That is why I clearly see that you have been looking for an opening on me ever since we started.

    The hell, so ya really are better than yer bro. But having a good pair of eyes alone aint gonna beat me!

    Dont sound so certain. By the way, my name is Louis; please do not call me his bro. To be honest, I was not that close to Roy.

    Hmphfine. Its none of my business anyway.

    Amidst the fiercebator rather, Lace evading Louiss pressing attacks and casually respondingit was not Louis who was observing him; instead, Lace was the one analyzing Louis. It was evident from the expression of his eyes.

    Enough of this, arent you getting tired? Take a good nap for now, Louis dered.

    His attacks began to intensify.

    Told ya its useless.

    Is that so? Then allow me to go even further.

    His tone did not change at all, yet Lace had a bad feeling about this. His instincts were surprisingly urate in times like these. He instantly darted away from the scene with overly theatrical movements.

    His judgement was on the mark.

    Louiss attack split apart and decimated the location where Lace was standing just a moment ago.

    Uh! What is this power?

    Thetest attack held immense destructive potential. Had Lace continued to underestimate Louis, he likely would not have been able to react quick enough, sustaining severe injuries as a result.

    PhewIm finally getting the hang of this. Im surprised you managed to dodge that strike. Looks like you are not a simple man after all.

    Ya wanted me to get careless so ya could take me out with that shot, right?

    Well, I cant say I didnt. But I can still beat you without underhanded tricks like that.

    What are ya on about?

    Lace had ughtered Roy. At the time, Roy had underestimated Lace, but even if he hadnt, Laces strength was still far greater than that of Roys.

    Regardless, Lace did not get careless. Even when Roy acted as the body-double of Demon Lord Luminas, his power still rivalled Kazalims. That was the undeniable truth. Kazalim was like a parent to Lace and the clowns, and there was no way Lace would let his guard down against someone of his caliber.

    Just now, that was the enhanced version of Blood Raine. Its magic aura was purposely hidden to lower my opponents guard. Although, once theyve seen it in action, it is impossible to pull it off again. Louis decided to exin his skill to Lace, even though he was essentially showing his hand.

    Yet hearing this worsened the ominous feeling in Laces heart.

    This is bad. Is he stalling? The hell is this guys goal?

    Laces instinct told him that he was still in danger. He determined that he would fall into Louiss trap at this rate, and decided to pull out his trump card immediately. There was no time for hesitation. A moment of indecision could cost him his life.

    And that is why you will die here! Louis roared as Laces surroundings exploded.

    The shockwaves from the explosion were concentrated at the center region where Lace was standing. He had nowhere to run, since the Blood Ray missiles had already locked onto him.

    The victor had been decided.

    Anyone would reach the same conclusion if they saw it.

    The mes burnt fiercely.

    A humanoid figure copsed at the center.

    What a pity. Roy and I were the same person; it was Luminas-samas power that separated us into two. Roys death had returned my original power back to me.

    In the past, there was once an extremely violent Bloody Lord that no one dared to challenge. It was Luminas who subjugated the man and recruited him into her service. But because of his sadistic and violent nature, he constantly shed with Luminass other subordinates. It was then that Luminas decided to bisect the person, naming one of them as her right-hand man, the pope, and the other as her body-double, the demon lord.

    In other words, Louis had finally regained his old powers and becameplete again. He was several times stronger than before. Even if Laces power was above that of Roys, Louis still had confidence in winning.

    And that was why

    Terrifying. That was a close call.

    Louis felt a bit surprised to see Lace raising his body and standing up.

    There was no way Lace would ignore such a good opportunity.

    Run away now, Footman, or ya gonna get killed!

    Hehehe, while Im not content yet, I may really end up that way if I continue.

    Footman was devastated by cuts and bruises, courtesy of Gunther. Gunther was the strongest among the three Archdukes under Luminassmand. Even though he wasnt nearly as powerful as Louis in hisplete form, he was still capable of rivalling Footman.

    Lace was able to meticulously analyze this aspect even during his battle with Louis. It would have been too easy for him to flee by himself, but there was no way Lace was going to leave Footman to his own demise.

    Even if I go all out here, I still wont be able to take all of them out. Footman will probably die before that too. That being the case, its best for us to run away as soon as possible. Weve done our job of stalling the enemies, so theres no need to risk our necks any longer! Lace concluded.

    He intentionally spoke up to distract Louis before taking action. His n worked, and so both Lace and Footman managed to escape with their lives.

    Thus, only Luminas and Maria Rosso remained inside the tomb.

    Luminas seemed to be holding back against Marias attacks; she was not fighting seriously. The fact that the being before her, Maria, was able to hold her own in a lightning-fast battle was proof in itself that she was a fake.

    Yet, even so

    Luminas could still sense the benevolent aura that Maria emanated.

    Granbell probably preserved Marias body and then used her corpse to create this death golemno, thats not right. This carcass has no free will. This must be a familiar summoned by the necromancy spell Raise Undead. To have resorted to such forbidden sorceryhas that man really fallen that low?

    Anyone would pray having lost their loved ones

    Pray that their loved ones would return.

    But no one could grant this impossible wish.

    Luminas could understand Granbells feeling as to why he resorted to heretical crafts like that, but her mind could only rte on a hypothetical level. Luminas was far from death, and therefore she could never truly understand sorrow and grief.

    Granbell and Maria were a very intimate couple.

    Maria was a Saints priestess, or Saintess, that supported the Hero Gran throughout his life. Gran wanted to share the burden of Saintess Maria, and thus they got stuck with each other. The two were so close that it made Luminas, who was their enemy at the time, jealous of them.

    It demonstrated the extent of Granbells resolve to have turned his precious Maria into a familiar. However, she was abnormally strong, so he must have casted other dark spells on her. Luminas came to this realization because Maria had used countless special abilities during their duel. It was like she was invoking several Unique Skills at once, and even Luminas was having a hard time fighting her.

    While its quite magnificent, its still too weak. Granbell probably knew she couldnt defeat me. Then, his goal here must bea sense of uneasiness suddenly washed over Luminas as she pondered. She felt like she had overlooked something very important

    Luminas-sama, the intruder has escaped. Louis is currently pursuing them, and I shall depart to join him

    Gunther had returned to report to Luminas. Yet he stopped halfway, just as Luminas finally noticed what was wrong.

    Something was missing in the room.

    Something very important

    Gunther saw it; Luminass heterochromatic eyes simultaneously darted to the same ce.

    The carefully guarded Holy Ark from within the depths of the tomb had disappeared

    Luminas was struck speechless. She was inplete shock and denial of what was in front of her.

    This shouldnt have happened.

    Stupefied, Luminas took a direct hit by Maria.

    Luminas-sama!

    Gunthers anxious voice reached her ears, yet Luminas had no time to be concerned. The pain quickly spread across her body, but she weed the stimtion to her senses; it helped her keep her cool. Part of Luminass mind calmed down and began to think critically once again.

    That part forced her to ept the reality of the situation. Although she desperately wanted to deny the truth, she managed to pull herself together with her calm, analytical mind.

    And the reality was that the coffin made of holy particlesthe Ark of Holy Powerhad been stolen.

    Overwhelmed with rage, Luminas pierced through Marias chest.

    Luminas unleashed the mana from within her body with a furious roar. GRANBELL, HAVE YOU REALLY COME TO DO THIS?! YOU DAREYOU DARE TEST MY LIMIT, GRAN!

    The tomb was instantly destroyed by a tsunami of immense power. Luminass surroundings were filled with swirls of chaotic mana, to the point that she had be an aura of death.

    Gunther!

    Yes, I am here to serve!

    Find them. Flush out the invaders at all costs!

    Understood!

    No more words were needed.

    Gunther acted immediately, having understood Luminass will.

    Facing an enraged Luminas meant that even Gunther could lose his life if he werent careful.

    If this mission fails, Lubelius may face destructionGunther thought as he sprinted out as fast as he could.

    Luminas was the only one left at the scene and was having a difficult time trying to simply suppress her anger. She began analyzing in aposed manner, knowing that if she were too reckless, it would only worsen the situation. Her thoughts needed to be detached from her emotionsto Luminas, this was only natural.

    Nheless, the incident had shocked her greatly. This cant do. If its not carefully protected before the timees, itll likely lead to this worlds destruction. Itd be something even I wont be able to handle

    That objectthe Holy Arkhad been entrusted to her by an important friend. If she were negligent in its management, the world could face an unprecedented catastrophe as a consequence. That was why it had been sealed tight.

    Luminas calmly scrutinized the current state of affairs.

    Only she could remove the seal imposed on the Holy Ark. The holy particles would burn even the original caster, Luminas; an example of how powerful and terrifying the Barrier was.

    Thus, the problem washow could something like that be stolen?

    Who could it be? To have taken that item means this person was quite capable, or at least strong enough to rival me.

    In other words, this individuals strength was on par with the demon lords.

    The chaos Granbell incited at the Grand Cathedral must have been a distraction. The fact that Granbell entrusted them with his key goal meant this person was powerful. He definitely had enough faith in the other person to let them steal the Holy Ark while allowing himself to y bait.

    In this wager, Granbell had won.

    No, perhaps there is still time. I cant show weakness at this point. Compared to that, right now I should

    What did Granbell want with the Holy Ark?

    She needed to confirm this first and foremost.

    Luminas hadnt shared any information about the Holy Ark with Granbell. It was confidential information. Even Gunther and Louis only possessed a surface-level understanding of it and the young girl sealed inside.

    Granbell was willing to sacrifice all of his aces. Just from that knowledge alone, anyone could see that his resolve was more than just strong.

    Luminas could clearly tell that something was off.

    As long as I can achieve my true goal, nothing else mattersLuminas could feel this hateful sentiment from him.

    Very well, I shall confirm your true intentions first, Luminas muttered and turned her gaze towards the cathedral.

    It seemed like Leon had caught on to the meaning behind my words. He was simply ying along and crossed swords with me.

    To the eyes of bystanders, this certainly appeared to be an actual battle. If I were too careless, I could actually be killed by the shes.

    On that note, did he really understand me?

    The look he gave told me that he probably knew Granbell was behind everything. We just had to wait for the right moment. And before that happened, we just needed to pretend to duel. At least that was how I envisioned it. Yet, Leons swordsmanship refused to give me any room to breathe.

    His speed was extremely fast. While Hinatas rate of attack was swift, Leon was no slower. He had a very beautiful stance, typical of practicing orthodox swordsmanship.

    I, on the other hand, had incorporated some personal tastes to my swordsmanship after learning from Hakurou. Since using a sword was not my only means ofbat, I couldnt help but add my own ir. Moreover, with Raphael-sans monitoring, it wouldnt be too unconventional.

    In any case, that didnt really matter; I was justplimenting how clean Leons attacks were.

    It truly made me question whether he was actually nning to kill me with his attacks or not. In addition, Leons face was essentially an emotionless mask. That meant I couldnt tell if he had killing intent by looking at him, which began to really concern me that my message hadnt gotten across.

    Report. No problem. ording to analysis of Predict Future Attack, he is striking in coordination with you.

    Ah, what a relief.

    Ill let this continue while Raphael-sensei takes over with automatic battle mode.

    Putting that aside, there was something else that was unsettling. I had been getting feedback about small earthquakes. At first, I suspected it was te discementbut it was quite intense. My guess was that it was Luminass doing, who was currently absent.

    There were problems everywhere.

    This unrest was no longer just a minor incident. It was already far beyond just the simple involvement of other nations. Had I not been the person at the center of all this, aint would have definitely been filed to escte the whole thing into an international affair.

    Although, Luminas probably wouldnt let aint affect her anyway.

    Putting that aside, Diablo had yet to return.

    Shion and Ranga were struggling against an insect type monster called Razul.

    While Hinata and Granbell appeared to be on par with each other, I felt that Granbell still had more strength to spare. It was obvious to me that if the battle were to continue any further, the odds would soon turn against Hinata.

    The various battles, as a whole, were not ideal. It was almost impossible for me to judge which one I should handle first.

    As I was analyzing the battleground, I detected an intense mana explosion underground. It was from Luminas.

    The stone tiling of the Grand Cathedral floor was blown away, breaking open a circr hole with a diameter of two meters. A pir of light shot from it and instantly evaporated the ceiling as it dissipated in the sky.

    The power of it was insane, but such an attack was probably a piece of cake for Luminas.

    Granbell, it looks like you are seriously trying to be my enemy.

    Luminas emerged from the hole in the ground while holding a beautiful woman. And as soon as she came out, she interrogated Granbell. Her killing intent was palpable.

    Looks like the situation is changing.

    Leon seemed to bear the same thought as he turned his attention to Luminas.

    Kukuku, as expected from Luminas-sama. Even my familiar was not able to stop you. I had to infuse it with the power of many otherworlders, and it was my greatest masterpiece.

    Foolish man. No matter how much power you infuse into that knockoff, a mindless golem can neverpete with the real thing. You should know something like that best yourself.

    Of course I know.

    Granbell was still very calm in front of an agitated Luminas.

    Hinatas strikes against him had be even faster, yet Granbell parried them easily.

    I knew from experience that Hinata had some way of stealing Skills from her opponents, but it seemed that she was unable to invoke it this time.

    Speaking of which, Arts and Skills were different things. You wouldnt be able to use an Art immediately, even if you stole it. You could only master them through years and years of training and umtion of experience.

    The reason why Granbell was so strong was probably due to exactly thatyears of training and research. His center of gravity did not shift an inch, maintaining his bnce like a steady mountain.

    Leon and I whispered to each other, Impressive. Looks like he wasnt bluffing when he said that he was an ex-Hero.

    Umm, this was a little bit unexpected.

    We were ignored as Luminas and Granbell continued to speak.

    What in the world are you nning to have done this Luminas said while gentlyying the woman in her arms down.

    She looked like she had fallen asleep. No, she was already dead. As the name suggested, she had merely been turned into a familiar through the maniption of her corpse. Since she did not have a soul, no matter how much energy was inserted into her, it was meaningless.

    I knew this point very well.

    Maria has already passed away, and yet you chose to desecrate her like this!

    Luminas apparently knew this woman.

    Was her name Maria?

    She looked quite simr to Mariabellcould she be

    Because it is necessary. Everything I have done was for this exact moment.

    Facing a confused Luminas, Granbell took off the glove on his left hand, revealing an engraving on it. It began to glow, and responding to it was the body of Maria, which also started to shimmer along.

    What are you doing?! Luminas questioned loudly, but this unfolding event was undoubtedly on everyones mind.

    Leon and I stopped to observe.

    At this point, keeping up this facade with each other would just look ridiculous. I almost couldnt remember why we were fake fighting in the first ce.

    An unbelievable phenomenon was urring right in front of us. Marias body turned into a beam of light and was absorbed into the engraving on Granbells hand. Soon after, Granbells body quickly began filling up with power.

    It was not only his magicule content. His physical body also seemed to enhance. Granbells cells were now rejuvenated; his white hair transformed into a shiny golden color, and his withered skin regained their sticity.

    The Hero of the past had returneda young Granbell Rosso.

    His eyes were sharp.

    I understand now, youyou even put my love energy into Marias body! Luminas shouted while Granbell nodded in confirmation.

    I recalled that love energy was the power to help maintain ones youth. Was that power originally granted to Granbell now fully restored in him?

    Whatever the case may be, the end result was the Granbell in front of us.

    Luminas-samano, Luminas. Our duel has yet to be settled. I remembered that I cant die before this is all over. Now that Mariabell is dead, my ambition has changed, but I still intend toplete one final wish!

    You scum!

    Dont you underestimate me now!

    Two people responded to Granbell, and they were Luminas and Hinata, respectively.

    Granbell, now revitalized, turned his head towards Hinata.

    Ah yes. Hinata, there are still things that Ive yet to teach you. You are the most talented among all the students Ive taught. You have always been ambitious and worked hard to hone your skill. Outstanding is not high enough of a praise for you. However Granbell casually swung his hand, releasing an unbelievable attack.

    Melt sh?! No way! Can you really manipte spiritrons like that without chanting?!

    Hinata sure was impressive to have dodged that unscathed, but her aplishment paled inparison to how Granbell was able to unleash the ultimate holy sword art with ease. It was a feat simply beyond imagination.

    He had be an unthinkable monster.

    Hinata, in the past, I was very confused about why you couldnt be a Hero. One cannot dream of bing a Hero through talent and hard work alone. Without the endorsement of spirits, it is impossible to obtain the credential. That said, however, you were endorsed by spirits, and yet

    How unfortunate then. So what if I was endorsed by the spirits? I simply cant be what is impossible.

    Had you awoken as a Hero, it would have surely helped with my ambition. Allow me to give you a word of advice. Is there darkness in your heart already? You killed someone close to you, havent you? Your parent, sibling, or perhaps a friend?

    SHUT UP!!

    Hinata had previously kept her distance in order to dodge the Melt sh, but now she charged forward to close in on Granbell. Her eyes were brimming with rage. Granbells words probably hit a nerve.

    The shing of swords resounded.

    Granbell remained still. Instead, it was Hinata who was sent flying away.

    Uh!

    The difference in strength was too overwhelming. Comparing Hinata to Granbell was likeparing an infant to an adult. I could barely believe my eyes.

    You could not ept a light spirit into yourself. Ovee it. The darkness in your heart is nothing more than an illusion fabricated by your own mind. You must forgive your past self and be proud of the life you lead now. Then, you shall see the light

    I TOLD YOU TO SHUT UP!! Hinata shouted frantically as an expressionless Granbell watched on.

    How regretful, Hinata. Had there been more time, I could have given you the proper guidance. If you cannot understand my words, then you shall experience it in person. If you cannot protect what you yourself want to protect, then you are delusional to think you could save the world.

    This is badmy instincts alerted me.

    This conversation put everyones attention on Hinata.

    If Granbell had calcted all of this, his goal would be

    Warning. ording to results of Predict Future Attack, his target is

    Once Granbell swung his sword, the Disintegration released from his sh could not be stopped. Rather than a sh, it was more like a strikesomething akin to a Melt Strike. The strike would travel at nearly the speed of light and piece straight through its target.

    This was why I bolted towards that kid.

    Yet ording to my calctions, I wouldnt make it in time, even at full speed. But perhaps if I activated Gluttonous King Beelzebuth and consumed the entire space in front of me

    I could not capture spiritrons traveling at the speed of light. But since I knew that his target was Chloe, I should be able to make it.

    Chloe! I shouted.

    Then it was all over.

    Hinata took action first. Without a hint of hesitation, she jumped in between Chloe and Granbells attack. Sacrificing herself, she let Granbells Melt Strike hit her directly in the chest.

    It instantly pierced through, and Hinata coughed up blood as she fell to the ground. However, this merely reduced some momentum of the beam as it continued to approach Chloe.

    Unexpectedly, another individual jumped into action right after Hinata. It was Venom. Just like Hinata, he nned to sacrifice himself in order to protect Chloe. Likely out of loyalty for Diablos order, Venom had been extremely focused this whole time to ensure the childrens safety. That was why he managed to make it in time.

    Guu, that hurts!

    He seemed pretty energetic even with a gaping hole in his stomach.

    As expected from demons; so long as their soul remained intact, they would be perfectly fine even if their bodies were destroyed. It might have been a different story if Granbells target was Venom, but that was not a question I had time for.

    I managed to make it thanks to the extra time Hinata and Venom bought. I consumed the entire space in front of Chloe. With that, I appeared in an instant. Now I just had to use Absolute Defense of Covenant King Uriel to protect Chloe.

    Eh, Rimuru-sensei? Hinataoneechan?

    Chloe only paid attention to Hinata, and while it was kind of rude to Venom, I couldnt me her; I was concerned about Hinata too.

    Luminas ran towards Hinata to inspect her wounds. Hinata, are you all right?

    Hinata-oneechan, you cant die!

    Oi, Chloe!

    I wasnt fast enough to stop her before Chloe bolted away. The rest of the children wanted to follow her, so I swiftly put them to sleep using Paralyzing Breath. I gave Venom a healing potion and instructed him to protect the children.

    C-Chloe, you say? Is it reallyChloe?

    Leon seemed to be acting a bit strange, but I didnt have time to worry about it.

    I chased after Chloe and reached Hinata.

    On one hand, I was keeping my guard against Granbell, whilst on the other, I was examining Hinatas situation.

    Eh, this is

    Oi, Luminas

    Quiet! The spiritron corrosion is progressing too fast!

    Although her superficial wounds were being healed, Hinata grew weaker and weaker regardless. The spiritrons were destroying her spiritual body. At this rate, even her astral body would start eroding. If that happened, even she

    It was then that Hinata opened her eyes slightly.

    G-good! Youre doing great, Hinata, stay awake now!

    No, Luminas-sama, I-Icough!

    Shit.

    Hinata would be in mortal danger if this continued. But even so, Luminas, who was more skilled at holy magic than me, could not drag Hinata back from limbo.

    Granbells skill truly was deadly.

    C-Chloe, its good that you are unhurt

    Despite the blood dribbling from her mouth, Hinata managed to hold herself up. She had a will of steel. Even though her eyes were unfocused now, a smile still hung on her face.

    Hinata extended her right hand to Chloe. It was trembling. She held out her Moonlight Rapier and a braceletthe Holy Spirit Armament. Chloe, Ill leave it to you. Still, as your Masterit seems that I couldnt do anything, but youll be able to Youll be able to surpass me

    Hinatas sentences were broken up, but she was able to convey the heart of her message to the weeping Chloe.

    Hinataoneechan

    Chloe reached out her shivering hands to touch Hinata

    And in the next second

    Hinatas body began to glow, with the light seemingly drawn to Chloes hands.

    Am I seeing things?

    Even Luminas was quiet.

    Or rathertime had frozen for a brief instant

    Chloes cry reached my ears. Y-you are lying! I didnt know about this! Why?! Its not time yet!

    Oi, Chloe? As I called out, Chloe vanished without a trace, as if she were never here to begin with.

    I recovered swiftly.

    What happened just now?

    Chloe? Chloe, where are you? Rimurudamn you, what did you do to Chloe?! Leon demanded as he clutched my shoulder, yet I was equally confused. Where did Chloe go?

    Uh, no, I have no clue

    Could she really have just disappeared?

    Seeing how I was behaving, Leon seemed to believe the truth behind my words. He began to anxiously turn his head around in search of her.

    I, on the other hand, felt incredibly shocked.

    What just happened? I had absolutely no idea.

    Unknown. Situation is abnormal. No information can be obtained regarding what urred with individual Chloe Aubert.

    To my surprise, even the usually reliable Wisdom King Raphael offered no information about the situation. Nevertheless, I didnt even have time to be dazed.

    Luminas wasnt surprised about the disappearance of the young girl at all. To her, the most important matter was lying in front of herher preciouspanion.

    Luminass resurrection spell had no effect, and instead evaporated in mid-air. It baffled her.

    Why?! She didnt die for long, so why is it

    No, Luminas could see it.

    While Hinatas body was restored to perfection, the most important part of her, her soul, had vanished.

    Hinata, I am so sorry. To have let this happen to you when I am here

    A single tear escaped from Luminass eye. Yet, it was this exact moment that someone decided to speak up, spoiling the heartfelt scene.

    Quit mourning already. Everything has been going ording to n. This one just now went extremely well, Luminas.

    Under these circumstances, only one personGranbellwasughing gleefully. Obviously, this enraged Luminas. Hinata was dead, and Luminas didnt even get the time to grieve.

    UNFORGIVABLE, I WILL NEVER FORGIVE YOU. I WILL TEAR YOU APART! Luminas roared furiously. The re of rage reddened her face.

    Her precious Hinata had been taken away right in front of her eyes.

    Yet she could do nothing. Feelings of powerlessness and desperation swarmed her mind. The level of anger was perhapsparable to when her old kingdom was destroyed by Veldora. Luminas, the demon lord, was in distress.

    This reminder of her past trauma evoked Luminass lust for strength, and it was thest straw that broke the camels back.

    Her great emotional turmoil prompted some sort of change within Luminas, who had always suppressed her inner feelings. She had perfected all her skills. However, shed never been able to ascend to the pinnacle of the world. Until now. The Voice of the World resonated in the air, ringing in the silence of her evolution.

    Confirmed. Conditions satisfied. Unique Skill Lust has evolved to Ultimate Skill Lustful King Asmodeus.

    At that moment, the power within Luminas soared to new heights, making her much more vicious and violent than evershe had reached the realm of the rulers of heaven.

    Demon Lord Luminass evolved SkillLustful King Asmodeumanded Life and Death.

    Luminas awakened this power as a result of her feeling helpless at Hinatas death. However, Luminas did not react to her newfound power at all. She instinctively knew that, at this point in time, this Skill meant nothing.

    It doesnt even matter anymore! Its tooteif it wasnt useful when I needed it most, then it is a meaningless power to me! Ignoring even the Voice of the World, Luminass fury continued burning. You wish to finish your duel with me, dont you?

    Indeed, Luminas. Youve evolved too, havent you? It was unexpected, but I am happy for you.

    Luminass heterochromatic red and blue eyes glowed, much like that of a monster. As she red at Granbell, they swirled with hate. Inexplicably, the face of the girl that had vanished suddenly shed through her mind. Luminas chased the stray thought out of her head.

    This is different from what Ive been toldbut that hardly matters now. I shall send you to your maker, Granbell!

    And so, Luminas stood against Granbell.

    After over a thousand years of entangled fate, they began their final showdown.

    I could only watch silently at how Luminas dealt with the issue. Even though she employed a textbook example of her resurrection spell, it failed to make a difference. It was a shocking scene to say the least.

    Basically, as long as ones soul was safe, resurrection should have been able to revive them regardless of their spiritual or astral body.

    So howe it didnt work?

    Answer. The soul of individual Hinata Sakaguchi has disappeared.

    Nosoul?

    Actually, I noticed that too.

    This was the second time that Hinata had fallen, yet there was a distinct differencepared tost time.

    Luminas probably realized the same thing as well.

    Normally, ones soul wouldnt disappear so quickly. Was it possible that something went wrong, and we didnt recognize it? Perhaps Luminas was holding onto that tiny sliver of hope.

    With that being said, it still didnt appear to have worked. I never expected Luminas to fall into a panic like that. The intimacy of her rtionship with Hinata must have been beyond my understanding.

    I couldnt excuse myself of this oue either.

    My mind had be a jumbled mess. How could something like this happenI thought to myself.

    But now was not the time for reflection.

    This is different from what Ive been toldbut that hardly matters now. I shall send you to your maker, Granbell! Luminas yelled. I jolted at her outburst, realizing that I had been dozing off this entire time.

    What the hell am I doing? Especially since this is a live battlefield.

    It was practically suicide.

    I can grieveter. I have to do what I can right now.

    Luminass words sounded a bit strange, but I could look into itter.

    Keep calm, just keep calm.

    This wasnt over yet. If I acted recklessly, Hinatas sacrifice and everyones efforts would be all for nothing. Even though I was forcing myself to do it, I still managed to switch up my mindset. Perhaps, had Luminas shouted a bitter, the situation would have worsenedthe reason being the huge explosion at the Grand Cathedral that just urred.

    The bright light and dust storm caused by the explosion rushed to the central area. It rapidly swept across the area, butpared to the recent lightspeed battle, it was rather sleep-inducing.

    I acted calmly, trying to protect the children and band members. I peeked in Shion and Rangas direction, as I was worried about them.

    Apparently, Diablo had returned without me noticing and created a Barrier to protect them.

    Kufufufufu, I waste.

    No, youre just in time! I thanked Diablo.

    By the way, what surprised me was Shion. Ranga and Diablo both noticed the explosion, yet it seemed that Shions attention was purely devoted to her enemy. Her expression was terrifyingly serious, and her face was flustered, seemingly mesmerized amidst all the bloodshed. It was a strangely sexy and eye-catching sight on the battlefield.

    Well, never mind that.

    They were being cornered by Razul, but at least they were holding their own in the fight. Thus, I let Shion and Ranga continue their battle against Razul.

    With that, I decided to find the source of the explosion.

    I soon felt an immense wave of youki.

    The aura was so evil that a chill ran down my spine.

    This was a lot worse than an ominous sign.

    The oppressive atmosphere was as heavy as lead, like if the sky was crashing downeh, why did this aura feel like the greater spirit that had once merged with Chloe?

    While simr, there were subtle differences. However, the immense presence it exuded was exactly like the one in Chloe.

    Warning. Target possesses a material body. Abnormal power detectedlimit is simr to the power of individual Veldora.

    Holy moly. Now thats a real monster!

    Unlike before, the result was no longer incalcble, but this knowledge wasnt veryforting at all.

    If it was just rampaging based on instinct like the Chaos Dragon, I might be able to handle it. On the other hand, if this enemy possessed intelligence, I could only surrender. Furthermore, if it hadbat experiencethe thought alone was terrifying. Perhaps I would see defeat before I could even get the chance to put up a fight. That power was several magnitudes higher than mine.

    Unfortunately, I had a sneaking suspicion that I most likely would have to fight it head-on.

    Is this what despair feels like?

    Shortly after, the smoke dissipated. Standing there was a peerless beauty. Stark naked like a newborn, her eyes were closed as she stood silently. Her long, silver-ck hair drifted down her head, whilst she was surrounded by shimmering light. She had a beautiful body that was the stuff of dreams. I couldnt help but be mesmerized.

    It was a little untimely to be dazed.

    The one who stole my Holy Ark, is this your doing?! And you just had to unseal the holy particles and awaken the consciousness of Chronoa too Luminas shouted in a certain direction, where a familiar figure appeared.

    It was Yuuki.

    As I suspected, he was behind everything.

    While a part of me really wanted him to be innocent, it seemed that Wisdom King Raphael-san was right. Nevertheless, if you asked me who I trusted, it would undoubtedly be Raphael-san.

    That exined why I wasnt surprised at all.

    So, it did have something to do with you? I questioned coldly.

    Yuuki didnt look guilty in the slightest, and instead arrogantly replied, Tsk, did I get caught? Never mind though, this is fine.

    So this was his true nature. Judging by his words, he seemed quite reckless.

    Behind Yuuki were two unfamiliar majins, both wearing masks.

    One had an asymmetric, with a pretentious attitude mask and the other, an angry-looking maskthey were probably Lace and Footman from the Moderate Clown Troupe.

    I had my suspicions for a long time, but it appeared that they really were in league with Yuuki.

    And you must be Luminas. I am Yuuki Kagurazaka, a pleasure to meet you.

    Silence! How did you manage to break the seal?

    To answer your question, I have a very special attribute. My Anti-Skill can nullify all magic and special abilities.

    I see. You are quite bold to give that information so tantly.

    Luminas, biting her lip, red at Yuuki. Still, her actual attention was entirely focused on Granbell. The two of them were both on equal footing. Neither could find an opening on the other.

    Moreover, Granbell was looking at the ck-haired girl too. And just like Luminas, he was responding to all of her attacks.

    In terms of skill, the battle between the strong was indescribable.

    I suppose so. Anyhow, since Rimuru-san already knows this Skill, theres no need for me to hold back. By the way, I also have a question to ask. Not you, but for Granbell-san over there. Yuuki spoke in a casual manner, but he didnt let down his guard. His eyes had been carefully surveilling his surroundings the whole time.

    Kukuku, I can practically guess what your question is, but regardless, speak your mind.

    Since both Leon and I were free to move, Yuuki wouldnt be able to escape so easily. Though, that was assuming Yuuki nned to run away. Even so, I was confident that he would definitely try to flee.

    I still couldnt figure out why Yuuki would be here, right at this moment. It led me to believe that things probably hadnt turned out the way Yuuki wanted to today.

    Nheless, itd be dangerous to act now without getting a clear picture of the situation. I could only try to deduce what was going on from Yuuki and Granbells exchange.

    While I was told that the Holy Ark contained the Hero, she wont listen to mymands no matter what. She even unlocked her seal by herself. What exactly is going on here, Granbell?

    Hero? You are saying that this girl is a Hero?

    I was getting more and more confused.

    Why would a demon lord keep a sealed Hero?

    Although, it appeared that Luminas treasured her a lot, so maybe it wasnt as simple as it seemed.

    Luminas answered the question for Yuuki. You dont say! That thing is known as a Hero, but is not actually the Hero. Right now, this girl in front of us is the incarnation of evil named Chronoa

    She sounded furious, yet surprisingly, it was mixed with a touch of anxiety.

    Luminas said that the girl was called Chronoa, and that she was the incarnation of evil. Hearing these foreboding words from her, she had to be very dangerous.

    Kukuku, thank you for all your efforts, Yuuki,ughed Granbell. For that Holy Arknot even I could crack the seal of holy particles. Thats why I manipted you. Once the seal is undone, none of us can stand against her. You demon lords and evil men! All of you will die here! he finished with a roar. What a nice guy though. He spilled the beans about his entire n; in a way, he did us a great favor.

    Even so, the current predicament didnt improve.

    I could hear Yuukiining.

    Seriously, in this a game of betrayal, I lost? I totally got yed

    However, this stalemate was about toe to an end.

    A certain object started trembling. The ck-haired girlChronoawas moving.

    She shook her head slightly and opened her eyes

    And thus began one chaotic battle.

    Did Luminas know about something else? Ill have to ask her about thister. Right now, the goal is to survive.

    Diablo, take my ce and handle things here.

    Understood!

    Diablo looked like he was about to say something else, but he read my expression and promptly agreed.

    He was probably going to volunteer himself to fight. I didnt have to argue with him over this. Diablo must have seen that I had no intention of changing my order to him.

    Next

    The immediate question was how to act.

    Luminas and Granbell were locked in a fierce stalemate.

    Shion and Ranga were battling Razul.

    Yuuki and his men were attempting to flee. While I didnt want them to escape, they were barely a threatpared to Chronoa. With that being said, my grievances also made it difficult to simply ignore them. They would surely plot something behind our backs. There was no way that they would fight alongside us.

    Leon had been looking rather soulless for some time now. Honestly, I had a feeling that he was going to be unreliable.

    There were too few allies and far too many enemies.

    This was a difficult situation. The odds werent in our favor.

    Then, Chronoa opened her eyes.

    She looked ready to fight.

    While Chronoa was naked, she had on a single essory: the bracelet on her wrist. That bracelet began to glow as ck particles slowly covered Chronoas body. It was an exact copy of Holy Spirit Armament. She was now protected by jet ck armor, which was even stronger than Hinatas light-based Holy Spirit Armament.

    In addition to her armor, Chronoa also summoned a sword. It was a beautiful rapier akin to the Moonlight Rapier, with the only difference being that the de was ck.

    Warning. Despite having an identical shape, the energy stored within it is incredibly high.

    It looked like both her armor and weapon overshadowed legendary-grade. It was probably equal to my straight sword, or perhaps even stronger. In other words, it was possibly mythical-grade 11 .

    I better abandon any naive expectations now.

    This was no longer a question about whether my enemy was intelligent or not. My Skills alone might already be outmatched by her. I had a hunch that her weapon could break through my defense. If that premonition were urate, I would be in grave danger.

    Warning. Enemy Chronoa will

    I know!

    I didnt need Raphael-san to tell me that I was in deep shit.

    Following my instincts, I activated Absolute Defense and dodged. Immediately after, ck lightning zed through the spot where I had been standing. It traveled in a straight horizontal line, vaporizing any obstacle in its way. The sh of light easily pierced through the walls of the Grand Cathedral and disappeared.

    This was worse than deep shit. Had I been one step slower, I would have taken a direct hit.

    I guess whether I can hold on or not will depend on my luck.

    Negative. Even with Absolute Defense of Covenant King Uriel, Spirit Particles can still break through. Only solution is to predict her movements and utilize Spirit Particles to interfere with and cancel each other out. However, the enemys attack variability is greater than expected. It is difficult to predict, therefore

    Impossible to defend against, right? I get it.

    Then why was Absolute Defense called Absolute But myints could wait.

    Evading her attack was already quite a feat. I deserved a bit of praise for that at least. Moreover, Chronoa wasnt just targeting me alone. She turned her attention to Yuuki when she struck next.

    Chronoa scored a slice on his cheek, as Yuuki failed to evade the attack.

    You deserve that onewhile it was sort of inappropriate to gloat now of all times, do indulge me to take a jab.

    Speaking of, Chronoas attack was really something else.

    Against a purely physical attack, Yuukis Anti-Skill was pointless.

    Now that I thought about it, I actually enjoyed how convenient Skills like Physical Attack Nullification were, while Yuuki did not. Even if he could fortify his body, at the end of the day, he was still human.

    And here I thought that Anti-Skill was quite a threat, but as it turns out, it had a surprising number of ws.

    I could only produce these observations by watching other people fight.

    I needed toe up with a solution before she turned her attention back to me.

    Proposal. Do you wish to activate the Skill Storm Dragon Summon of the Ultimate Skill Storm King Veldora? YES/NO

    Ah, I forgot I had this in my deck!

    I didnt want to use this ace in the hole in front of so many people, but if I didnt do anything, the situation would undeniably be dire. And thatd be an even bigger problem.

    It would be toote if someone else was killed like Hinata.

    I felt a bit uneasy considering the rtionship between Luminas and Veldora. But I could deal with thatter.

    I happily epted Raphael-sans proposal.

    I had secretly practiced this by myself in order to master the key points. However, when I called for Veldora through Soul Corridor, I only got azy response.

    Hmm, Rimuru? Are you having fun after ditching me for your little hiking tour?

    He was throwing a tantrum.

    This isnt a hiking tour.

    I really needed him to stopining for a second. I didnt even have time to make a clever retort.

    Now was the time to speak from the heart.

    Veldora, Im begging you here, we need your help. Pleasee and help us!

    Emotions transmitted through Soul Corridor was a lot more straightforward than in Telepathy Net. As a result, I would get caught lying very easily, hence I didnt use the former that often. On the other hand, if I wanted to convey genuine words, it was perhaps the best means ofmunication.

    Veldora seemed rather surprised.

    Oh oh, do you need my power? Of course you do, there arent that many people as reliable as me after all. I can totally understand why youd want to rely on me!

    Dammit, did I boost his ego a bit too much?

    No, its fine. Surely Veldora will answer my request.

    Theres no time; can I summon you?

    Hmph, what kind of a silly question is that? You have a favor to ask from me, and if thats the case, theres only one answer! Whatever your request is, I will fulfill it to the best of my abilities!

    Just as I thought, Veldora was quite reliable.

    Approval granted. Activating Skill Storm Dragon Summon.

    Soon after, a gust of wind began blowing within the Grand Cathedral

    This whole time, Leon had been numb.

    Did I not make it in time?

    The girl named Chloethere was no other exnationshe was the ymate that Leon had been searching for. In his pursuit, he had dirtied his hands, using countless forbidden methods for hundreds of years. And she was standing in front of him.

    Indeed, she was right there. Yet, a momentter, she vanished.

    At first, Leon suspected it was Rimurus doing. However, he quickly rejected the thought. Leon could only ept that something beyond hisprehension had urred.

    Its still too early to give up just yet, Leon told himself. Ive seen her now. I will get another chance!

    By the time he pulled himself together again, he realized that the situation surrounding him had taken a steep dive for the worse.

    A new enemy, with seemingly invincible power, had appeared.

    Even though he had no idea about her strength, the fact that he could see Rimuru on the defensive put Leon on the spot as well. There was no telling whether he would be the next target or not.

    Watching Yuuki being attacked and dodging left and right for his life reminded Leon that he was still on the battlefield.

    It was a bitte of a realization.

    All the people who had been incapacitatedid by the walls of the Grand Cathedral. Unbeknownst to Leon, Rimuru had purposefully moved them there to keep them out of the battle.

    These people were still alive, just knocked out. That was why Leon lowered his guard against them.

    Normally, Leon would not have made such a mistake, but his head was a mess. Seeing the girl hed been looking for disappear before his eyes shocked him.

    With all these factorsbined, Leon was full of openings. And that was why he could not react in time.

    Suddenly, a small magic missile shot from the wall side. It didnt really pack a punch. Besides, it was meant for Chronoa, who was chasing Yuuki. Something like that obviously could not harm Chronoa, but the attackers actual purpose had been achieved.

    Chronoa turned her attention to Leon, her stare boring into him.

    Leon clicked his tongue. Tsk, so it was meant to draw her onto me!

    He had to ignore the perpetrator as he couldnt take his eyes off Chronoa for one second; otherwise, itd cost him his life. If he didnt fight seriously, even Demon Lord Leon would be in a tough spot. Yet, even if he did, he probably was not going to win against her.

    That was how tough of an opponent Chronoa presented.

    At this point, Leon could no longer care about anything else.

    In the background, people began to cheer at this turn of events.

    It was Yuuki and his entourage.

    Nice job, Teare!

    What a nice call. I never expected Teare to be of use under these circumstances. But having this fail-safe sure was the right choice.

    Teares job was to potentially make Rimuru antagonize Leon. Sadly, no opportunity ever emerged, so Teare had to y along this whole time.

    Her endurance and the perfect timing had been rewarded.

    Hehehe, now we just have to wait for Teare to return and we can retreat.

    Yuuki was sweating hard when Chronoa targeted him, but now, he had regained hisposure. He even had the spare time to observe Leon and Chronoas battle. Because of this, he discovered Teare stumbling by the wall, trying her hardest to escape. He managed to rescue her in time for Lace to finish his preparations for their escape.

    Just as Yuuki brought Teare back, Lace cast his magic.

    All done, lets hurry back now.

    Agreed. Rimuru-san seems to be nning something; itd be dangerous to stay here. Lets get out of here, shall we?

    Nodding in agreement, Yuuki raised his hands to the sky. He subsequently destroyed the entire magic barrier over the nation of Lubelius.

    Hehehe, as expected from the boss man.

    No matter how you see it, Bosss Skill totally feels like cheating

    But aint that just great? Thanks to that, we can easily get away.

    Just as Lace said, it was impossible to escape from the city center with his magic alone. Fortunately, Yuukis power managed to change things in their favor.

    Teare was right too; it really was like cheating. But thanks to that unfairness, everyone managed to escape, and so there were noints.

    Im not sure who will manage to survive, but the next time we meet, we will be enemies. Give it your best shot!

    With these parting words, Yuuki and hispanions departed.

    I saw Yuuki and his men run away.

    Although I was angered by it, with them having left behind these difficult opponents and being able to flee scot-freeperhaps it was a good thing when considered from a different perspective.

    It was impossible to tell whether he was an enemy or a friendor in this case, a definite enemy. Therefore, you never knew if you were going to be stabbed in the back while working together with someone like that.

    It could get ugly quick with there being two fronts. Rather than that, it was better to lock onto one single enemy. Id have a better chance of winning.

    In the Western Nations, the Western Holy Churchs influence was massive.

    As long as Luminas supported my ims, Yuuki would lose all shred of credibility in the West. After all, the backbone of the Freedom Association was the council, yet this supposed leader of the Association was fighting against Luminas.

    If we were to win here, Yuuki would no longer pose a threat. Thus, I neednt be so upset about his escape. I strengthened my resolve with these words, and fixed my eyes firmly on my enemy.

    Rimuru, isnt thisthe Hero that sealed me?

    It appears so.

    Its definitely her, Veldora smugly dered. Even when shes not wearing the mask, the shape of her mouth is just how I remembered when I got a peek. I was right! She is beautiful!

    Even though this was hardly the time, how could he, a True Dragon, judge human appearances? I was a bit curious.

    In any case, my suspicion that Veldora Only lost because he fell in love was deepened.

    I agree that shes stunning, but shes our enemy now. Looks like she was sealed by Luminas before and just went berserk. It sounds like it was a countermeasure to you, so could you please take responsibility and do something about it?

    How rude. Why would anyone need some dramatic countermeasure for someone as upstanding as me?

    Did you actually just say that out loud

    I was almost impressed, if notpletely baffled.

    But Veldoras nonsense could wait.

    You can save your jokes forter. Please try to hold her back for a while and win me some time!

    KUA-HAHAHA! Leave it to me! After all, fate has brought me the opportunity to fight her again. Would it be okay if I beat her?

    Oh oh, so cool!

    But hold on, isnt that what the losing side usually says?

    Fine by me! Ill be counting on you!

    Just leave it to me. I lost to her when I was just a dragon, so this is a great chance to show off my strength after my growth.

    In spite of how confident he sounded, hadnt he actually be weaker?

    What kind of logic is that you be stronger in your human form than when you are a dragon? Despite internally disparaging him, seeing how motivated he looked, I decided it was better not to tell him. And so I very dly shoved Veldora onto the battlefield.

    Even if he lost, Veldora wouldnt die anyway. I could rest assured about that.

    I turned my head to Leon. Are you all right, Leon?

    Chronoa was observing us, so my eyes didnt dare stray from her as I spoke to Leon.

    I managed to hold it together, but dont get careless. She is stronger than I imagined.

    In any case, I healed Leons injuries first. His sword had been broken and he himself was covered in wounds. It was a miracle that he made it this far.

    It was thanks to the time bought by Leon that I managed to summon Veldora sessfully.

    I could tell that from the moment I saw her. Moreover, since Luminas had been on high alert against her, I knew from the start that she wouldnt be an easy opponent.

    That was the reason why I even used my trump card, Veldora.

    Is this why you called Veldora? Im not going to ask you how you did it, but its definitely encouraging knowing hes on our side. However, even a True Dragon would have a hard time fighting that thing.

    I didnt need him to tell me twice.

    Because this Chronoa was the one who sealed Veldora away.

    By the way, how are your wounds?

    Nothing severe. I wasted too much mana trying to prevent my sword from shattering, and thankfully, nothing fatal hit me.

    Coincidentally, Leons sword had broken in the end, regardless. In addition, despite how nonchnt Leon put his words, he seemed to be biting his lip, trying to hold himself up.

    We didnt have the extra hands to protect Leon. With how things developed, perhaps I made the right choice in the end.

    I didnt just summon Veldora. There was one more person I called.

    Are you all right, Leon-sama? Long time no see.

    It was Charys.

    I ran into a bit of an issue during the summoning. Veldora decided to be stubborn and wanted to bring Charys along, no matter what.

    You areIfrit?

    Indeed. I have now been given the name Charys and am in the service of Veldora-sama.

    I see, I am d that you are doing well.

    I never realized Leon-samas true intention was for Shizue Izawa and I to understand each other. It was under the guidance of Veldora-sama that I have now realized how foolish I was.

    Is that so? Leon nodded.

    But I honestly doubted whether the two really knew each other. It sounded like they were just casually greeting each other, though itd be improper to tease them about it given the current situation. They were both so serious. I guess the master and servant were very alike one another.

    Rimuru, please buy me some time. Its time for you to witness some of my trump cards, Leon said.

    He could be nning to escape by using me as a distraction, but I believed that Leon wasnt that kind of person.

    I trusted him.

    Understood. Ill be covering Veldora then. Charys, you shall stand guard here as Leon finishes his preparations.

    Understood!

    My apologies, thanks for the assistance.

    And that was settled.

    Leon quickly began getting ready. Charys would be in charge of protecting him. The master and servant from the past were working together once again.

    I, on the other hand, returned to the battlefield.

    The final battle was about to start.

 Volume 11 - Ch 5

    The Heros Awakening

    Ahh, so sleepy.

    Hinata was on the edge of a bottomless abyss, fighting against an almost irresistible temptation. Her life shed before her eyesthe memories from her childhood to the present.

    Right, I remember now. When I was young, my father would spend time ying with me.

    Since she could only see the present, she had forgotten these important memories.

    In the past, Hinata once had a normal family.

    But everything went to hell when Hinatas fatherspany went bankrupt. Had father not strayed to devious ways, mother would not have gone insane. Hinata didnt have even the slightest intention of imagining just how much her father was suffering.

    That was why, even to this day, she still hated him. She lived in hatred, trying to escape from the unfortunate reality that was her family. Unable to forgive her fathers sin, Hinata focused the me on him to justify her own actions.

    Amon trait in humans was that their hearts were weak.

    Her father was the same.

    Had the family supported each other, perhaps things would have ended differently

    Perhaps itsughable for someone like me to act all high and mighty about justice. Perhaps thats why I pursued the shadow of my father in that man

    This sense of justiceregardless of if he denied itshe felt saved by his unbounded good-heartedness.

    Hinatas heart had struggled and was about to burst until the one that brought enlightenment to her and put her at ease had undoubtedly

    With that being said, that was just what Hinata thought. He would probably be very troubled if she shared this sentiment with him. But sometimes she let herself dwell on this sweet and tempting possibility that perhaps he would ept it.

    Wouldnt that make me just like what Granbell said? After all this time, I still couldnt forgive myself.

    Realizing this, she felt rather mncholic.

    All her life, Hinata had been burdened by the thought that her actions were unforgivable. Had she not been the person she was, mother would not have felt sad. Even if she were to go back to her original world, no one would celebrate her return.

    Thats why she decided to help as many people in this world instead.

    I want to save as many people as possiblethis thought became Hinatas driving force.

    But I have grown tired. I just want to rest in this dark abyss

    And slowly, Hinatas consciousness was devoured by darkness. Her senses disappeared, her doubts vanished, and she had no more regrets

    You cant fall asleep!

    An intense call woke Hinata up.

    Is thatChloe?

    This thought brought Hinata back to reality.

    No, this was hardly what youd call reality. Her circumstances were extremely peculiar.

    Through a window floating in mid-air, she could see the world outside. Or rather, she did not see through her eyes, but instead could feel it through her heart.

    Thats because Hinata-oneechan is inside me.

    What does thatbefore Hinata could ask, she recalled what had happened to her.

    R-right, I was struck by Granbellbut am I not dead?

    As all her memories slowly came back, Hinata fell into a state of confusion. Even with her Mathematician running at full capacity, she couldnt reach a logical answer. In fact, it was already a miracle that she was able to use her Skill under these circumstances.

    I will exin everything to you. Just try and stay conscious. Now then, I hope you can synchronize with me.

    Synchronize?

    Yes, can you see a light ahead?

    Hearing this, Hinata concentrated her mind in the direction Chloe spoke of. Soon enough, she could see a dim light in the direction of her voice.

    Yes, over there!

    Hinata approached the light.

    It felt as if she was physically moving her body, while in reality, only her consciousness was moving forward.

    And then

    The moment Hinatas consciousness came into contact with the light, her consciousness was tinged with rainbow light.

    A whileter:

    Have you woken up?

    This is?

    Umm, looks like youve stabilized. Heres the thing, Hinata-oneechan

    You can just call me Hinata.

    Um, got it! Heres the thing: Hinata is inside me, in my soul, in particr. If not for this, Hinata would have been devoured by Infinite Prison! I think this is the first time that something like this has happened to you, so you must be confused, but this is all true.

    Hearing her words, Hinata began to understand her situation. She quickly realized the reason behind her not having a body and that her soul was inside Chloe. And the Infinite Prison Chloe mentioned was the bottom of that dark abyss.

    And so, Hinata expressed her gratitude. I see, thanks for waking me up.

    Chloe exined many things to Hinatater.

    ording to her, when Hinata was struck, her soul ended up in Chloes. Normally, your soul would leave your body after death and slowly dissipate in the air. However, due to Hinatas soul interfering with Chloes, it led to such an incredible event.

    This exnation alone was still not convincing enough for Hinata, but there was something else on her mind. Agitated, Hinata interjected. By the way, is Rimuru all right? What about Luminas-sama? What happened to Granbell?

    However, Chloe remained calm.

    Umplease calm down and listen to me. This is the ancient era.

    Huh?

    Look there, can you see that mountain?

    Yeaheh, could that be?! The spirit hill 12 of Mount Liora? But thatwhere is this? If going by geo-location, shouldnt this be the holynd of Lubelius?

    It was only natural for Hinata to feel confused.

    The only thing she could see was the vague summit of Mount Liora, far in the distance. Since there was nothing in the way, she could see things far away.

    Indeedthey were standing in an empty in. However, to her knowledge, this should be a city. Yet there was nothing there.

    She wouldnt want to consider the other possibilitythat the city had been wiped out entirely due to the earth-shattering battle among powerful individuals. However, if that were the case, there wouldnt be any grass growing here.

    In other words

    I know that its a bit hard to believe, but I am not lying.

    Chloe was right.

    In short, this was the holyndor where the holynd was meant to be in the future. Hinata and Chloe had traveled through time to the ancient era before the nation of Lubelius had even been born. It was said that Luminas would move her nation here in another two thousand years or more from now.

    With that being the case

    Theres no way?

    Despite her realization, Hinata couldnt help her utterance.

    No way, this is way too strangeHinata thought doubtfully.

    Chloe, how can you tell that this is the past?

    Indeed, that was her question.

    Even if Hinata was to ept something as ridiculous as time travel, how would Chloe know that this was the past? Wouldnt there also be a possibility that this was a future where everything was destroyed?

    Indeed, not only were there no buildings around, there was no trace of any human upation either. Since there werent any ruins, it was more likely to be the past. But even if that were the case, the ruins could be buried underground, so surely, she could not have concluded that it was the past.

    Yet, Chloe had spoken without hesitation.

    That was why Hinata was in doubt.

    Seeing Hinatas reaction, Chloe replied with a smile.

    Its simple. Because this isnt the first time Ive been here. Every time I lost control over my power, I went back to the past Since Ive been to this ce before, I remembered.

    HUH? Hinata thought to herself. She couldnt say anything out of shock.

    As she processed, she began to gradually ept Chloes exnation and tried to understand the situation more.

    Well, I guess you will exin to me in detail what this is all about, right? Hinata asked, determined.

    Chloes exnation was indeed very shocking to Hinata.

    It appeared that Chloes Skill involved time leaping. Emphasis on appeared, because Chloe didnt know this too well herself, either. She mentioned that she couldnt consciously activate it. At most, she could recall some events from the past.

    However, that alone shouldnt be underestimated.

    This past was rtive to Chloes own experiences. And since she had been time leaping over and over, her version of the past included events in the linear future of the timeline.

    However, she couldnt seem to recall all her memories clearly

    Human memories could be very ambiguous at times. One may not be able to recall what happened exactly at what time. It was especially so when having over two thousand years worth of memories. It was far too difficult to solve the issue.

    When did you awaken this power? Hinata asked.

    Chloe thought for a bit before answering. Well, when I was rescued by Rimuru-sensei. In order to stabilize me and the other children, Rimuru-sensei brought us to the Dwelling of the Spirits to host a spirit, but

    Chloe exined that the thing that had taken her as its host was not a spirit, but her power from the future. Somehow, her power was self-aware.

    I think I died in the future. Thats why it seems to repeatedlye back to me at that point in time.

    In other words, the Dwelling of the Spirits is where your awakening starts?

    No, thats not it. At the time, I dont remember anything. But I will regain my memories the moment I go back in time.

    Then youve been repeating the same thing over and over?

    It seems to be the case. I can only remember the details from thest time I was here. Although, there are memories from different lives mixed up in there at times.

    I seeHinata thought to herself. She was reassured by Chloes words.

    If she had to repeat this over and over again, it would be hell. The human heart wasnt strong enough to continue fighting for the same result over and over.

    Hinata listened to Chloes story in silenceter on.

    Chloe would always travel back to the same era. Perhaps that was the limit of the time leap.

    As for the location she would be in, it seemed to be dependent on when Chloe lost control of her power.

    From herst memory, Hinata had died in the Great Jura Forest.

    Rimuru-sensei died, and Veldora was revived

    Huh? Rimuru died? Killed by who? And how? How can anyone manage to kill that cockroach Rimuru

    Well, after I epted my future self from the Dwelling of the Spirits, my memories from before leaping back in time have changed a lot. After all, by the time my power went out of control at the church, Rimuru-san was still alive. This was possibly the best oue I could hope for.

    Hinata noticed Chloes address of Rimuru as -san, but decided to ignore this detail to avoid interrupting her. She wanted to hear the rest.

    Chloe began to summarize key memories from the previous timeline after her visit to the Dwelling of the Spirits.

    After saving the children, Rimuru used Spatial Movement to return to Tempest. However, the timing of his opening the portal was a little different, so he never ran into Hinata.

    The otherworlders who were about to invade Tempest were given a proper beatdown, sending a message to the nations around the Great Jura Forest that Tempest was a force to be reckoned with.

    Knowing how dangerous Rimuru was, no nation dared to move recklessly. However, since the Farmus Kingdom remained intact, they began to increase their military reserves as they observed Rimurus nation closely.

    Something happened among the Ten Great Demon Lords too, but as far as she knew, there were only rumors.

    Rimurus rtionship with the grandmaster of the Freedom Association, Yuuki, grew closer and closer, which allowed him to startmunicating with other nations. However, due to the interference from the kingdom of Farmus, problems arose.

    Even with that being the case, Rimuru did not give up and tried many different things.

    The childrens school was one of them.

    Staying at the school built by the Tempest Federation, Chloe and the kids studied alongside monster children just like in this timeline.

    However, things quickly took a turn for the worst.

    The Western Nationsat the request of the councilformed a fighting force led by Hinata to invade Tempest.

    Me?

    Mm, Hinata. It was really scary.

    Iam really sorry then.

    Its all right. In the end, you managed to reach a peaceful conclusion.

    ording to Chloe, in that timeline, Hinata and Rimurus duel ended in a draw. It was due to the childrens involvementespecially Chloe, that Hinata stopped.

    Hinata said that she would observe a bit more and made peace with Rimuru-san.

    At the time, Hinata had likely found that the whole thing was strange, so she began to investigate by herself. Her investigation revealed that the Farmus Kingdom was behind all this, and that was when she decided to believe in Rimuru.

    Five years passed after that.

    Rimuru never became a demon lord. He had lived as the ruler of the Great Jura Forest and led the same busy daily life as before.

    After making peace with Hinata, he established stronger rtions with Lubelius as well. For some reason, Luminas kept an eye on Rimuru too, and peace was maintained.

    Chloe grew up to be very strong. She even became good friends with Milim, who asionally dropped by to y.

    However, this peace didntst.

    The fateful day arrivedthe Empire began their invasion.

    Id fallen in love with Rimuru-san at that time. I wanted to be selfish and told him not to go to the battlefield. The Empire was powerful and had many terrifying weapons. I didnt think he would win, but Rimuru-san smiled and said, Dont worry, just leave it to me!

    In reality, he was also scared, but he still put on a brave front. He even gave me the mask

    Shizu-senseis

    Umm, yes. The one I gave her.

    This was an event that would happen in the future, yet at the same time, had already taken ce in the past. It was a circle of repetition.

    Chloe continued the story.

    Rimuru never returned from the final battle, and the Tempest Federation fell. This was because Veldora had suddenly been resurrected. Enraged, Veldora rained chaos everywhere. As a result, the Empires army was decimated.

    Afterward, Luminas, Hinata, Chloe, and the others fought together against Veldora, fearing that human society would be destroyed if he were not dealt with.

    But, before they could finish their battle with Veldora

    Hinata was murdered by an unknown individual.

    Chloe saw a sh of light piercing through Hinatas chest, which triggered her ability. She was sent back in time, but could not remember what happened next.

    Even if her experiences differed slightly each time, Chloes loop would repeat in this fashion regardless.

    The key was Hinatas death, and it was the same this time.

    This time was the same. Which means that I die every time

    Hinata was quite bewildered. It was rather diforting and awkward.

    Yet Chloe did not mind Hinata and continued.

    But this time was very special. Usually, Rimuru-san would already be dead before I leap into the past. Hes never seen me time-leap before!

    Rimuru would always die from some unknown cause. Until now. Rimuru was fine this time when Chloe leaped. Hinata had seen it too, so perhaps they could expect a different oue for once.

    Indeed, many things had changedpared tost time.

    Perhaps Chloes endless cycle could end here tooHinata silently decided.

    Considering that guy, hed probably think that he could pull through under those circumstances somehow, even if its illogical.

    Right?! If I get back to that time period, Rimuru-san will still be there. No one will die this time, and we can find who killed Rimuru-san and Hinata!

    Just as Chloe had said,pared to thest timeline, the entire situation had improved.

    The future is filled with hopeHinata thought.

    By the way, howe things turned out so differently this time around? What could the cause behind this be?

    Hehe, actually, I managed to regain some memories of the future when I was in the Dwelling of the Spirits this time. Thats why I acted all spoiled to Rimuru-san back in Ingracia, just to have him stay a little bit longer.

    And then he gave me thisas Chloe said so, she pulled the mask out of nowhere.

    ThatsI see. You got it this time as well. Then surely you can get back to that direction in the future.

    Hinata was very mindful of the mask too. Because of the different situation at the time of her death, she thought Chloe might not have been able to get the mask. Hinata considered the possibility that if things had changed, the mask wouldnt be given to Shizue at the right time. But since Chloe had acquired it, there was no need to worry about it.

    How clever. Impressed, Hinata began to n for the future. Since she decided to trust Chloes words, she wanted to ce her hope in the future.

    It was then that Chloe whispered something to Hinata:

    By the way, let me be clear about something. Even though I really like Hinata, I wont let you have Rimuru-san!

    Huh?

    Between girls, there are some wars that cant be negotiatedeven Alice-san said that!

    They really are just kidsHinata couldnt help but give a wry smile, hearing Chloes words. Me liking Rimuru? No way

    But she felt rather troubled at the same time, thinking of the possibilities

    Were you just panicking? At Chloes teasing remark, Hinata firmly changed the topic.

    Not at all! Never mind that, lets get to work!

    Now that I think about it, this kid has over two thousand years of memories after repeating this over and over, right? I must not be deceived by her appearance. I must not treat her like some innocent child

    The reality of the situation finally dawned on Hinata.

    And so, the two, Chloe and Hinata, embarked on a bizarre adventure together.

    Hinata and Chloe decided to first visit one of the few acquaintances they had who was actually alive in this eraLuminas.

    Chloe started off without hesitation.

    Do you know where she is, though?

    Umm, there was a massive battle over there, and I went check it out.

    Was it because of Veldora?

    Uh-huh. Even though he is friends with Rimuru-san now, he was an enemy before. It looked like he was fighting someone, so I wanted to help.

    Is that so? That someone was Luminas, right?

    Yeah. I want to go early this time before Veldora-san causes any trouble to tell everyone to evacuate. I will try to get Luminas to trust me and help me.

    Chloe sure was determined.

    She also had a good sense of direction, unlike Rimuru. She didnt need Hinatas advice at all, and they made it to their destination without once losing their way.

    And so, they arrived at Luminass castle.

    So this is Night Roseno wonder Luminas-sama was so proud of it.

    It was a beautiful castle.

    Even though it waspletely man-made, it looked like an entirely natural fortress. It held a great sense of majesty to it. There were sharp ridges like the thorns of roses in various ces. Those seemed to be guards outposts.

    Soon enough, someone noticed Chloe approaching the castle, and arge number of vampires ran out.

    Chloe spoke up to the soldiers surrounding her. I am here to see Luminas, please lead the way.

    Hinata was surprised at her words.

    H-hold on! Do you think theyll let you leave in one piece with you calling Luminas by her name here?

    Even with Hinatas warning Chloe wasposed.

    Its all right, I am friends with Luminas!

    Wouldnt that be after you save them from Veldoras wrath? You are a total stranger now.

    It was then that Chloe realized that she had confused her memories.

    Ah, right. Ive done this too many times and thought they already finished fighting. And I always get scolded by Hinata for this too

    Of course youd get scolded, Hinata thought. Regardless, she began to worry about how things would turn out as well.

    Indeed, even though Chloe had gotten used to her situation, this was a first for Hinata. Its better to have a fresh view when dealing with these thingsHinata thought to herself.

    Thats why Hinata proposed that she should take charge for Chloe.

    Listen now, Chloe. Let me give you advice. Dont reply immediately, but listen to my opinion first.

    Ummgot it. I figured this would be better too. If I identally say the wrong thing, history could be changed.

    At Chloes prompt agreement, Hinata felt a bit reassured.

    However, upon realizing the significance of the words she just said, it also sent shivers down her spine.

    Hold on a second! Shes right. Any slight deviation can alter history. We have such a hopeful future, but if we were to do something wrong, wouldnt it all be for nothing?!

    At this, Hinata realized that her stopping Chloes reckless act was the right thing to do. Even though she had just made a major mistake, it was fine as long as she avoided repeating her mistaketer. Its still salvageable, Hinata thought to herself.

    Soon after, they were brought before Luminas.

    Of course, it was not as simple as it sounded. Chloe had to force the soldiers to let her pass.

    Furious to the point of trembling, Hinata snapped at Chloe, Seriously, do you even remember what I just said?

    Its fine, Ive had simr experiences in the past, said Chloe, casually. I had to barge in so I could inform her about Veldoras attack! She sounded as if she had done nothing wrong. Since she imed that she had done this in the past, Hinata couldnte up with a retort.

    Luckily enough, we havent had any problems. By the looks of this, Ill have to have another look at the information we have

    The thought in itself, induced a headache. Hinata sighed.

    That evil dragon wille here soon, you say?

    Yes. I know Luminas is strong, but you wont be able to win against Veldora. He will destroy the castle too, so its best if you can all take shelter as soon as possible.

    Although Hinatas Mathematician analyzed Luminass personality and said it was fine to tell Luminas the truth, Hinata still felt uneasy. Is this really okay?

    Obviously, they wouldnt tell her the whole truth. Some important parts had to be left out.

    Hmm, I do not know you, so I cannot trust you easily. Do you have any proof?

    Luminass tone turned a bit gentler. But that was nothing to be reassured about. That was just an act to bait the foolish.

    Hinata knew this well enough, which was why she began to advise Chloe calmly.

    She acquired information about what year they were in from Chloe, and by processing all the information in her head, Hinata calcted the time Veldora would invade.

    At the fastest, Veldora will arrive here in two weeks. At a minimum, he wille by fall, so you must be on guard.

    Luminas was no fool.

    She could tell if Chloe was lying by analyzing her heart rate and such. Even though Chloe could be lying, she did intimidate those proud soldiers like they were nothing. So there was no reason for her to be a liar.

    In the end, Luminas decided to drop the decision of trusting her or not, and instead allowed Chloe to stay at the castle.

    Later on, Veldora came.

    Luminas fought valiantly.

    While Chloe wanted to join Luminas in battle, she was stopped by Hinata.

    Listen closely now, you did not fight against Veldora here in the previous timeline, right?

    Umm, but

    Then you should forget about the other memories. The important thing here is to repeat what you didst time. You must tell Luminas about the future in order to win her trust. However, you must not tell her what happens in the future. This was important, so Hinata repeated it. You only need to follow the road you tookst time, so it connects the past with the future we came from.

    Overwhelmed by her determination, Chloe could only nod in agreement.

    If Chloe were to share her memories of the futurefor instance, Granbells betrayalLuminas would undoubtedly take him out quickly. In that way, it may be impossible for Chloe and Hinata to return to the future where they came from.

    It had to be avoided no matter what. Hinata and Chloe reconfirmed this.

    Even though the castle was destroyed by Veldora, due to Chloes active involvement, there werent many casualties. This therefore aligned with the history Hinata knew.

    Since Veldoras attack proved Chloe right, Luminas seemed to trust Chloe too. And so Luminas and Chloe became good friends.

    In her secret chamber, Luminas met with Chloe.

    So youve leapt through time on several asions already, Chloe?

    Umm, I have about two thousand years worth of memories. Would you like to hear it out?

    Very much so, do tell.

    With Luminass approval, Chloe began to tell her about herself.

    That was of course while consulting with Hinata.

    Chloe told Luminas that she would be active as a Hero for two thousand years.

    After that timeter, there would be a slime called Rimuru. After going onto the battlefield, that slime never returned and then Veldora was released. She also told her that Luminas made friends with Hinata. But that Hinata would be killed by an unknown individual.

    Neither Chloe nor Hinata knew who killed her and Rimuru. Even though she couldnt give this particr detail, she did reveal information about the circumstances of their deaths and more.

    I see, and you intend to change the future?

    No. I hope it will be aligned as closely as possible. Any major changes would likely result in a very different future.

    I suppose you have a point. I wouldntin about a future like that either. But if I must say, I would not ept the fact that the person called Hinata was killed. I have never even met this friend, so I dont know what to expect, Luminas said smiling.

    Luminasthank you. I never thought youd say this, I am truly happy.

    It was rather unbelievable that Luminas would say this due to her cold appearance. But she was, in heart, very kind.

    Hinata knew that very well.

    Then I promise to be at your aid. It might be difficult to convince Roy, but everyone else should be fine. I will let everyone know that you are my friend. Luminass eyes sharpened. So, what is your n for the future?

    In response, Chloe dered, very naturally, Just like before, I want to be a Hero and help those in need!

    Seeing how straight-forward she was, Luminas smiled brightly.

    Is that so? How interesting. Its also quite intriguing to know the person your fate revolves around. What should you be known as then?

    Chloe and Hinata paused a bit.

    It probably would be bad if the name Chloe bes widely known.

    Umm, Leon-oniichan will definitely find out about it.

    Regardless, neither Hinata nor anyone else ever found out the actual name of the Hero anyway. Even though they had given Luminas her actual name, it was best that they hide this from the world.

    What should we do?

    What did you do before?

    Well, Ive alwayse up with a random name. Usually I dont have to give any name before leaving.

    Then you should do the sameHinata was about to say this when she recalled Rimurus words.

    Heined a lot about the trouble he had when naming monsters.

    Thats why Hinata decided to throw out a name she thought of in that instant.

    Right, since your name is Chloe, and have the Unique Skill Time Travel, we canbine it with the god of time, Chronos, to be Chronoa?

    Why not Chronoa?

    Wed get exposed quite easily if we spelt it that way, no?

    Ah! You have a point. Got it, then I shall be called Chronoa!

    Using Hinatas Mathematician to elerate their internal conversation, they had this emergency conference to quickly decide the alias they would use.

    Call me Chronoa. Its best that the world doesnt learn my real name. From today onward, I shall be Chronoa the Hero.

    And so, the name Chronoa left its mark in this world.

    Leaving behind the ruined castle, Luminas and her men left for a new home.

    Naturally, Chloe also came along.

    Now that I think about it, why did my Usurper disappear too?

    Im not sure, but I think Hinatas power would always merge with mine in the end

    Chloe paused at that. It seemed to be somewhat difficult for her to talk about. Judging from her attitude, Hinata could guess how that ended.

    Never mind, its fine. Its only a matter of time. By the way, your stealing my Skill after taking the name Chronoa from me is really simr to naming a monster.

    Oi! Wasnt that a bit rude?

    Ahh, sorry, I meant no harm.

    Hinata can be so mean sometimes. What a waste of your beauty; no ones gonna fall for you like this.

    Shut up already, it doesnt matter since Im already dead anyway.

    The two cheerfully bantered as they continued on their journey.

    After parting with Luminas and her men, Chloe actively used the identity of a Hero just as she dered.

    Time passed.

    It was almost three hundred years before their time leapwhen Veldora was sealed.

    Having lived for this extensive period of time, just like before, Chloe learned Absolute Severance and Infinite Prison. Hinata, with her Unique Skill Mathematician had also been supporting Chloe while inside her body.

    As this matched the timeline, Chloe casually dered:

    Im going to seal Veldora now.

    This was what Chloe said after reuniting with Luminas.

    I see. I do recall you mentioning that. But are you really sure about this?

    Luminas seemed worried. Unlike before, now Chloe and Luminas were very close friends.

    There wont be a problem. After all, I have Hinata with me.

    Chloe had also revealed Hinatas existence to Luminas alone.

    Luminas epted another soul within Chloe very quickly.

    Thats good to know. Just dont push yourself too much!

    Dont worry, Ill handle fighting with Veldora, Hinata said.

    Eh?

    It seemed that it was Chloes first time hearing Luminas so bewildered. But Hinata didnt mind it at all and spoke in a firm tone.

    I actually fought with Veldora once. At the time

    The situation then shed through Hinatas mind.

    KUA-HAHAHAHA! So weak, so weak.

    This is supposed to be humanitys guardian? Dont make meugh!

    PHEWKUSUSKUSU, what is it? You cant get up already?

    How unbearable, the price Id pay to know defeat.

    All right then, its about time for me to end this.

    I dont have that much time to y around.

    That was about how it went down. It was a rather humiliating memory for Hinata.

    Things happened. Ill have to give him a good beating to ease my grudge against him.

    Chloe could tell from her tone that she was serious.

    Luminas was serious too.

    I can understand your feelings. I would like to see that lizard bite the dust for once.

    I managed to make him show me every Skill he had. This is a great opportunity. Im sure we can use it to our advantage during battle.

    Hinata and Luminas happily discussed how to punish Veldora.

    In Chloes memory of the future, Veldora had spent time ying with her, so she didnt hate Veldora as much. However, knowing how violent he was in the past, she didnt feel like defending him that much.

    I dont really know about your past grievances with him, but please hold back a little. Veldora-san is actually a very nice person!

    So in the end, Chloe let Hinata have her own way with him.

    During the battle against Veldora, Hinata was in full control. With Chloes assistance, they managed to seal Veldorapletely.

    GUWAAAAAAHHHH!

    Hearing Veldoras furious roar, the beautiful face behind the mask twisted with satisfaction.

    And with that, Hinata handed the control of the body back to Chloe.

    Chloes time was about toe to an end.

    That point between past and present was approaching.

    I havent mentioned this to you guys before, but I will be disappearing soon.

    Chloe, what are you talking about?

    What does that mean?

    Chloe had kept it a secret this whole time, but she intended to tell them now. The truth is

    Hinata had half-guessed this.

    Soon enough, Leon would appear in the history Hinata knew. Since Leon and Chloe were thought to havee to this world together, it would cause a special situation where two of the same person existed in the same era at the same time.

    If one were to take the multiverse theory as truththe idea that new universes, including parallel worlds, emerged one after the other, yet also at the same timethen perhaps having two Chloes at the same time was usible.

    However, if assuming there was only one world

    Chloes Unique Skill Time Travel was an abnormal case, to the extent that the notion of multiple worlds shouldnt be surprising. In any case, it was still hard to believe for Hinata.

    It was more logical to think that the world was being remade. Or else, if many versions of themselves existed in many worlds, Hinata and Chloes efforts would be meaningless in the grand scale of things.

    If there is a world that will be saved, then there is another that will perishHinata found this idea hard to ept.

    That was why she made up her mind to end Chloes endless cycle and save the world. It didnt matter if she had to be sacrificed in doing so. However, there was also a problem. And that was what Chloe had just said.

    By the looks of it, my theory seems to be correct

    There really was only one world, and it did not allow the existence of a paradox.

    No, thats not entirely true. Its not that it doesnt allow the existence of a paradox. It just stops the world from copsing. If there was something strong enough, such as the creation of the mask, then even the paradox couldnt destroy it, and instead only twist its existence. Otherwise, theres no way to exin the existence of the peculiar mask.

    Whilst relieved that her reasoning appeared sound, the thought of what would happen plunged Hinatas heart into darkness once more. She knew that what would happen next was entirely based on luck; their fate would fall into someone elses hands.

    Thats why I wont have memories from that moment on. I think Hinata will probably take over afterward and help save Shizu-sensei

    Me too. So I can onlye into y until my future self who doesnt know anythinges, right?? What do you think would happen next?

    In the future, Luminas had always kept something very important to her.

    Now that Hinata thought about it, it was probably the sealed Chronoa.

    I vaguely recall losing control and going berserk. But that probably wasnt me, but a different personality.

    Hinata suddenly recalled her naming of Chronoa. The moment she gave Chloe that name, it robbed Hinata of her Skill.

    It finally dawned on her that Chronoa might actually be something akin to a monster.

    Anyhow, Chloe will lose consciousness soon, right? That is probably what happens when two of the same entity exist at the same ce in spacetime continuity. Hinata, I believe your theory is correct.

    Right. And then, Chloes younger self will be physically transported to that time period since shell have just been summoned.

    It would most likely be the case.

    Umm, thats why, Hinata, even though I know asking you to do something like this is

    Its fine. After saving Shizu-sensei, I will go and ask help from Luminas-sama.

    Please leave it to me. I shall craft a Holy Ark using holy power to iste you from the world. I will find your souls in the future myself, and thenpletely unbind the seal.

    Chloe, Hinata and Luminas.

    The three remained united in heart.

    All was entrusted to Luminas.

    After Chloes consciousness disappeared, Hinata was alone. Apart from proving her theories to be true, she was also hit by a great sense of unease and pressure.

    She felt uneasy because she was lonely. On the other hand, she was pressured by a strong will raging within her body, attempting to take over their shared body. It was tiring suppressing this will.

    Chronoa is raging after its master Chloe disappeared. But I never imagined its power to be so strong

    Despite her shock, Hinata bent it to her will with her steely resolve.

    Hinata went to Leons castle and rescued Shizue, handing her the mask sessfully. Now that this mysterious mask had been given to Shizue, Hinata had a major breakthrough. And even though Hinata couldnt show any of her yearning for Shizue, she traveled with her.

    Their journey, however, eventually came to an end.

    The day came, where they had to part.

    While Hinata wanted to spend more time with Shizue, she could not do so. Perhaps due to the prolonged absence of Chloes main personality, Hinata was beginning to have a hard time controlling Chronoa. If this were to continue, their n could fail. And all of this would have been for nothing.

    In the end, Hinata bid farewell to Shizue ording to the history she knew and went to seek Luminass help.

    Hinata never truly found out what Chronoa was in the end.

    Instead, Luminas used her power to seal Hinata in the Holy Ark.

    Soon, she herself,pletely ignorant of all their history, woulde here.

    What would happen to the slumbering Hinata?

    If she were lucky, perhaps she would remain unaffected. But if notthe one to awaken first might be Chronoa.

    But even so, there had to be

    I believe you will be able to find a solutionRimuru!

    Reminiscing about that slime shed missed, Hinata fell into a deep sleep with a smile.

    Veldora went to take on Chronoa, yet he quickly started yelping:

    GUWAHHI-Ive been cut! R-Rimuru, Ive been cut!

    Ahsure, sure.

    Of course you got cut. You were using your hand to block her sword. I mean, thats no ordinary sword she is wielding. Its an immensely powerful sword that was considered mythical-grade. And you just ran in recklessly trying to catch the sword by your hand.

    How unreliable

    As I suspected, this guy had gotten weaker after turning into his human form. And because of how confident he acted before, my disappointment was immeasurable and my day was ruined.

    I had been looking forward to Veldora beating Chronoa.

    But as it turned out, theres no free lunch in this world after all.

    Seriously, how are you so careless?! Obviously you would have gotten hurt!

    I started crying seeing the pathetic state Veldora was in. This was some grade-A bullshit.

    B-but, Rimuru, that sword was even stronger than when we foughtst time

    So youre saying the Hero is using Absolute Severance? Didnt you say youd been hit by it before?

    To be fair, I didnt know how credible the Absolute part was. But I definitely didnt want to use my Absolute Defense to test which one was stronger.

    No, thats becauseI was fine being cut by that

    With that mutter, Veldora concentrated on evading Chronoas attacks. He would get cut at times, but fortunately, he seemed to have strength to spare.

    No, in fact

    I understood what Veldora meant.

    He was saying that in his previous battle with her, he didnt take nearly as much damage with these same shes. But the reason why was rather obvious if you thought about it a bit. This was purely the result of different sizes. The size of a sh could be estimated, and even if it could be widened through skill, it, surely, would not have been able to cut through Veldoras giant draconic body.

    However, Veldora was in his human form now. And he was stupid enough to try to use his hands to catch the sword, so of course he would be cut. Even though it would quickly regenerate,pared to his dragon form, it would consume magicule at a much higher rate. Normally speaking, when fighting in human form, it wouldnt require nearly as much stamina. However, it didnt seem to be strong enough against Chronoa.

    He was probably too confident in his proud Veldora-Style Killing ArtsTM and tried to recreate the made-up technique of blocking a sword with his hands from manga.

    That said, I wasnt really panicking. This would be a good lesson for Veldora. Thats why I decided to let him continue drawing Chronoas attentionpletely.

    I turned my attention to Leon.

    Under Charyss protection, Leon was conducting a summoning. Even though it hadnt been that long in reality, it felt like an eternity.

    Leon summoned a rapier.

    Sorry to have kept you waiting. I couldnt do anything about our enemy without a weapon. Thats why Ive summoned my beloved sword me Pir from my time as a Hero for this asion.

    It turned out to be mythical-grade, befitting of an ex-Hero demon lord.

    The round, golden shield in his left hand seemed to be legendary-grade. It looked very impressive, but didnt look strong enough to block Chronoas sword attacks. Leon probably just felt it was better than nothing.

    All in all, Leon seemed to be ready.

    We could finally start our counterattack

    Or so I thought. Suddenly, Luminas was sent flying in my direction.

    Is she losingI got worried a bit, but seeing how Luminas was uninjured, it looked like she was pulling an act.

    In that instant, as Luminas and I crossed eyes, she sent a strong telepathic message to me.

    Let me exin this for you first. Chronoa is another personality of Chloe! Hinatas soul may be resting inside her too, so you must not kill her!

    WHAT!

    Compared to the strength of her Telepathy, the message she delivered was far more shocking.

    How could you say something so important at a dire time like this so casually?!

    I panicked when I saw Leon approaching to fight against Chronoa.

    Luminas, right after dumping responsibility onto me, headed back to take on Granbell.

    I didnt know what to do now that I had been informed of the truth so suddenly.

    Chronoa was Chloe.

    Now that she mentioned it, they looked quite simr.

    But what was the thing about Hinatas soul? I didnt know what to take from that

    What in the world is happening there?

    Report. Considering all possibilities, it could be deduced that Chronoa = Chloe.

    And that means?

    In other words, individual Chloe Aubert likely time-leaped to the past and grew to be the Chronoa in front of you now.

    No way, no no no.

    Is that even possible?

    I could just ask Luminas, but she was busy fighting to the death against Granbell. So I couldnt just have a Q&A. Even her Telepathy was only just sent in the nick of time.

    Speaking of time leapsis it like time travel or a time slip? I dont think she can control it freely, so I suppose its more like sliding in and out of time?

    Eh, why do I believe all this.

    No, the thing is

    Chloe disappeared in front me before.

    Answer. Assuming the phenomenon urred at that time was a Time Leap, then it is impossible to observe all elements of the event. Without authority to interfere with Time, it is naturally unobservable.

    I suppose, after all, even if you know the concept of time, observing time itself is impossible.

    Actually, hold on. I didnt have to understand any of this. If I just epted that it was possible, then so many things suddenly made sense.

    When I was trying to help the young Chloe, the thing we summoned must have been from the future. If something happened to the future Chloe, and the spiritual part of Chronoa was sent to the past

    Correct. This possibility is extremely high.

    I see.

    If that were true, it would exin why Ramiris was so panicked at the time. The Chronoa in front of me reeked of an evil aura. Sensing that aura, Ramiris would naturally try to stop it.

    There was no use worrying about this now.

    Chloe had definitely leapt through time, that was for sure.

    Then how to exin the situation right now?

    Report. The same soul cannot exist in two ces in the same spacetime. Thus, they reacted to each other, causing one of the two to disappear. However, the crucial factor is that individual Luminas Valentine utilized a holy spirit power BarrierHoly Arkto seal the soul. Therefore

    Chloe and Hinatas souls may all be sleeping inside Chronoas body?

    If the power of the Holy Ark really surpassed the ability of Chloes Time Leapuh, I had no choice but to believe it now.

    In that case, my n would be

    Leon, dont attack Chronoa, just focus on defense.

    Did youe up with a n?

    Yes, you may not believe me but

    Nah, Ive got faith in ya, cause ya trusted me too. 13

    I was surprised. I didnt expect to gain his trust so easily. He spoke less formally too. I suppose a more casual Leon wasnt that bad either.

    A thanks would have to suffice for now. I then gave my order to Veldora.

    Veldora!

    You can count on me.

    But I didnt even say anything

    Never mind, its fine. I had no time to roast this dragon.

    Ill give you a signalter. Please suppress Chronoa. I figure you probably know this will be very dangerous

    Didnt I say that you can count on me, Rimuru? I have faith in you. Thats why you gotta make sure your n works.

    That was reinvigorating.

    I didnt want to hurt ChronoaI mean, Chloe. But that might just be selfish of me.

    All of this was still just a theory. We could still be wrong anyway. To have such a naive thought before an overpoweringly strong individual like Chronoa would be suicidal.

    But even so

    Since there was the possibility, I wanted to wager on it.

    Sorry, please hold on a bit more.

    GA-HAHAHA! Dont mind it, it happens all the time.

    Ive noticed something too. Im gonna y along yer n just to confirm it. No other intention behind it.

    I didnt know about Veldora, but perhaps Leon had realized it too.

    Chronoa was Chloe.

    I really wanted to exin it to him in detail, but now was not the time for it.

    Leon crossed swords with Chronoa calmly, but sweat was absolutely gushing down his forehead. Surely, itd be difficult for him to even answer my calls.

    If this n worked, I needed to apologize to him properly.

    Next, regarding how wed infiltrate Chronoas soul

    Rimuru-sama, it was wise of you to have kept the details of your n quiet. The Grand Cathedral is likely still under the surveince of Demon Lord Guy.

    Diablo also spoke to me through Telepathy Net. His Telepathy was concealed with careful and meticulous encryption.

    By the way, it felt very simr to Luminass Telepathy. She must have been very aware of her surroundings as well. In actuality, I just didnt say it aloud due to my own selfishness. I also didnt want Chronoa to hear my n.

    I suppose it was fine as it turned out to be the right choice.

    That so? What do you want then?

    He mustve had some reason for speaking to me like this.

    Diablo was truly talented. He seemed to have already caught up on the situation. Perhaps he could give some valuable suggestions.

    Please allow me. If it is Rimuru-sama, you should be able to send your thoughts directly to her by interfering with her soul. However, there is another way which is more reliable.

    What would that be?

    This method would be to maintain physical contact with your target and use that to enter her spiritual ne. And then, in allowing your astral bodies to interact with each other, you can directly interfere with her soul.

    Regardless of my ability to do so, it still sounded very dangerous. I may end up never returning

    Couldnt I just reach her like how I usually used Telepathy Net?

    Answer. Proposal suggested by individual Diablo has a higher chance of sess. However, the level of danger involved is insurmountable.

    Thats probably why Raphael hadnt brought the idea up before.

    Thanks Diablo. But I do want to say something to you.

    Yes, do tell.

    You are overestimating my abilities way too much.

    Kufufufufufu, surely you jest. Yet again, how very modest of you!

    Its not modesty!

    In order to save Chloe and Hinata, I needed to use the method with the greatest chance of sess. However, in this situation, I needed to prioritize my safety.

    I should show Diablo just how useless I am this time.

    I decided not to argue since he seemed to have run into Guy. I hoped he didnt say anything weird. If he bragged about me like he usually did, it might attract Guys attention. Id scold him properly about thatter.

    If possible, it is best to stabilize her first with a certain object. Then, I wish Rimuru-sama glory in your conquest!

    Diablos faith in me was unmatched.

    But for now, I needed to focus on the useful information he gave me.

    But how do I calm her down?

    If I could do that, everyone could rx a little.

    Theres no way some miracle item like that would just beying around

    From his position supporting Leon, Charys spoke up. Rimuru-sama, why not try using the mask?

    This guy seemed to understand what I was trying to do.

    Impressive, but also somewhat scary.

    Mask?

    Yes. That thing was able to seal even me. Surely it is enough to calm that persons spirit down.

    I see

    While his idea was brilliant, he didnt seem to realize I actually wanted to keep this quiet. But perhaps, in the end, it was my bad for muttering too much.

    Well on that note, the mask, huh? But didnt I give that to Chloe? Where is it now? Eh, hold on a second

    It was Shizu-sans memento and then I remember fixing it. And then I gave it to Chloe as a presentdoes that mean that the mask ended up going back to Shizu-san again?

    Huh, if thats the casewhere did that maske from in the first ce?!

    No, theres no time to think about that.

    Can I somehow recreate the mask?

    Answer. Do you wish to Copy the Anti-Magic Mask? YES/NO

    YES!

    As expected from Wisdom King Raphael, it managed to create a replica almost instantly. It looked just like the real thing, and had the same quality as well. With this, perhaps we could calm Chronoa down.

    I showed the mask to Charys and thanked him with a smile. Then I turned my attention to Chronoa.

    The n was settled. Now I just needed to get serious and engage.

    Leon was still dueling Chronoa. It was a one-sided battle, however, as she controlled the entire fight. Leon was only defending, but his injuries were still piling up. Even someone as strong as Leon was having trouble dealing with Chronoa. He would no doubt be defeated if this were to continuethat is, if I didnt intervene.

    Veldora, now! I shouted as I approached Chronoa, mask in hand. The next moment

    As I ced the mask on Chronoas face, my consciousness faded to ck.

    Taking the shock wave released by Razul head-on, Shion and Ranga were sent crashing through a wall and outside the church.

    Razul casually strolled out to pursue the two.

    In their fierce battle with Razul, Shion and Ranga were greatly wounded. However, Shion was still very calm. She wasnt afraid at all and confronted Razul as if it were nothing. She was maintaining a false pretense of confidence in order to avoid showing weakness to her opponent.

    Behind Shion, Ranga was trembling as he regained his footing. Unlike Shion, Ranga didnt have Ultra-Speed Regeneration. So every attack he received added up. He did, however, possess many resistances, wherein his defense was strong enough to nullify most physical and mental attacks. In addition, due to my blessing, he also received the Unique Skill Magic Wolf King. The Ultra-Instinct of his Magic Wolf King Skill gave him the ability to predict and evade almost all attacks.

    It would normally be impossible for him to be beaten down like this. Moreover, he was fighting against a single enemy with Shion. The fact that they were still losing showed very clearly just how dangerous of an opponent Razul was.

    Almost as if she were protecting Ranga, Shion stepped forward.

    Ranga, its okay for you to take a rest.

    How can I do that? This guy is strong. If we are struggling as it is with the both of us, it will be too dangerous for you to fight alone, Shion.

    Dont worry. I think Im getting the hang of it. You should try to save your energy as much as possible until I give you the signal, Ranga.

    Shion didnt wait for Ranga to respond before raising her odachi at her opponent. Her stance was very beautiful, a symbol of her unwavering will.

    Magnificent. Even amongst demon kind, few have been able to stand against me for so long, Razul praised.

    To Shion, having beenplimented by her opponent, who she failed to evennd a scratch on, was nothing but humiliating.

    Shut up! Ill rip that smugness off your face! Shion shouted, raising her sword high and then bringing it down with the wrath of a demonic god. While her action seemed to be uposed, it was a swift movement without any ws.

    Razul waspletely unmoved. He simply raised his left arm.

    A familyreverberated.

    It was the sound of Shions odachi being deflected off Razuls exoskeleton. He was an insect type monster and his body was covered in an exoskeleton stronger than steel. Thats why, even without weapons or armor, he still had incredible defense. Moreover, Razuls exoskeleton deflected Rangas magic attacks. It would seem that his exoskeleton had a special field around it, rendering any attackpletely useless.

    After blocking Shions attack, Razul threw a punch. He was strong enough to crush a boulder. So if a human with flesh and bones were to be hit, they would be sttered into pieces by it.

    Had it been the Shion of the past, she probably would have taken it without much thought. Her past self would have had no choice but to endure or die.

    But Shion had grown since then. Perhaps it was due to her having to educate her subordinates, she had learned to see the bigger picture.

    If she were to die here, the whole battlefield would be affected. If she could buy some time before she lost, surely, someone woulde at her aid. These days, she had learned to prioritize her survival instead of recklessly seeking victory.

    It was why she wanted Ranga to rest. If they both went all out here, should something happen, they would both be useless. So, to avoid that, Shion, who still had strength to spare, decided to be the meat shield.

    Although, naturally, she had other reasons as well.

    Hehehe, if I win here, Rimuru-sama will definitely praise me!

    Thats what she was really thinking about.

    Although she prioritized survival, Shion was not going to give up on trying to win. Her growth had given her plenty of room in her heart. And that extra room elerated her dormant talent to blossom.

    Shions fighting style had also changedpared to that of the past. Having devoted herself to Hakurous teachings, she learned to value the importance of technique instead of relying on brute force.

    Her duel with Razul had honed her skill even more. That was why Shion embodied the beauty that an orthodox swordsman would have.

    It was brute force plus techniques.

    The result was

    In swinging the odachi, Shion created a shockwave heading for Razul.

    Of course, Shion only used it as a distraction for Razul and then rapidly closed in. Sheunched her next attack in a swift motion. Razul managed to deflect the blow yet again, but it numbed his arm. She had improved greatly. Even duringbat, she was refining her skills.

    Not enough, this is still not enough!

    Just now, she utilized her Unique Skill Cook. She wanted to use Guaranteed Oue to destroy Razuls hardened exoskeleton.

    She had not given up even though he deflected every blow. She focused on shing the same spot all this time, only holding one thought: destroy the exoskeleton.

    Shions goal was to bend the rules and break the seemingly unbreakable exoskeleton. Regardless of how strong Razul was, Shion refused to relent. She kept him busy, and even when her skills seemed useless, she did not fall into despair. She had faith that her wishes woulde true as she continued to attack.

    Razul calmly parried Shions attacks. He attacked and defended with mechanical precision. He was entirely nonchnt in how he calmly handled Shion.

    On the other hand, Shion tried every trick in the book. She even activated her Intrinsic Skill Ogre Berserker to go beyond her limits as she fought. Yet no matter what she did, to Razul, her attacks were a piece of cake.

    The difference in strength was unfathomable.

    Shion exhausted everything in her arsenal. She could barely stand against her enemy. Inparison, Razul was as steady as a calm river. Yet, there came a sudden storm to flood the river.

    Shion had drained her willpower after continuously using her Skills. If she were to lose her bnce even once, she would suffer the repercussions of overtaxing both her body and mind.

    Moreover

    Since Ranga had withdrawn from the battle, Razul had been able to grasp Shions techniques. During the fight, he had carefully probed her to confirm each trick until she had none left.

    The next second, Razuls youki swelled dramatically. With overwhelming aggression, he began tounch a fierce counterattack. His power had grown several times greater than before, and he used it to rain a barrage of fists on Shion.

    Just a moment again, Shion and Razul had been in opposite positions, with one stationary and the other on the move.

    You are indeed strong. And you should be proud of that. But you cant win against me. You failed to damage my shell. Youre finished. You should just give up and surrender! Razul dered.

    Yet Shion answered him calmly, Hehehe, howughable. Did you think I was attacking mindlessly? I want to reach greater heights than this. If I dont, I will always just be looked down on by that arrogant second secretary, Diablo, and not be of any help to Rimuru-sama.

    What?

    Youre one clueless insect, arent you? I said that I will surpass you.

    Shions youki suddenly grew exponentially as well, and she swung at Razul again with all she had.

    The odachi mmed into Razuls arm.

    Unsurprisingly, Shions attack was deflected by Razul.

    Yet, Shion cracked a smile. Hehe, as expected.

    At that, Shion pulled herself up from the ground, shaking, to face Razul again.

    How disappointing. Your attack couldnt harm me after all.

    Shion sneered at Razuls words.

    Shion recalled how shallow she was in the past.

    Strength is justice.

    As a monster, it was only natural for her to think this way.

    The weak would only be exploited.

    Shion was born as an ogre, a higher ranked monster of the Great Jura Forest. Yet Shions thought process was very concerning to the other ogres. Especially to the mentor of Shion, Benimaru, and the other ogresHakurou.

    Shions mind and body received thorough training. Even though it made her more modest, she probably didnt understand the true meaning of it.

    When Rimuru set the ruleDont look down on other racesShion didnt oppose it, but neither did she care about it.

    The weak can only diethat was just thew of thend.

    It wasnt until Shion had died herself that she realized just how wed her view was.

    She was afraid of dying.

    She did not fear death in itself, but instead the thought of disappearing before she could be of any use.

    Later when Rimuru saved Shion, she was relieved. It was the kind of relief one felt when realizing that they hadnt been abandoned, and that their parents still protected them.

    After the battle with the Holy Knight Order, even Rimuru shared some wisdom with Shion.

    She changed again.

    At the time, she thought that humans were detestable adversaries. But afterwards, Shion let go of most of her anger. Even though she had to reflect on it afterwards, Rimurus words helped solve the issue of what humans were to her in her mind.

    Rimuru said that not all people were bad. If there were bad people, then there were also good people.

    The important thing was being able to tell the difference.

    A persons value depends on how they choose to live.

    Stuff like strength or weakness had no intrinsic meaning. Even if you seemed to be useless in some field, perhaps you just had to explore your talents in another.

    A persons value should not be determined by other people but themselves.

    Shion understood what Rimuru meant. In this way, she realized that there was no need to be envious, or begrudge others. She knew that she was inferior to Diablo in every way, and so she had always been afraid that Rimuru would abandon her.

    But that was not true.

    Knowing that Rimuru would not forget about her, Shions insecurities vanished. That ugly emotion had upied Shions heart until recently, but finally disappeared entirely.

    There was no need to be envious of others; she just had to surpass them. She focused on her own improvement. She no longer treated other people as herpetition, but instead, found meaning in improving herself.

    By doing so, she believed she would continue to grow.

    Even if it took her years and years, Shions kind lived long, so she would doubtlessly reach a point where she was no longer fragile and weak

    This change of heart helped Shion grow, and she was less anxious as a result.

    Even further, under these extreme conditions, her tenacious spirit bore fruits

    Confirmationplete. Intrinsic Skill Ogre Berserker of individual Shion has evolved to Unique Skill Battle God.

    This was not Shions aim. This miracle was simply a byproduct of her endless determination and struggle in attaining victory.

    Ill tell you this. The goddess of victory looks favorably on the persistent! Take this, Unleash Battle God!

    Without hesitation, Shion put her newly evolved Unique Skill Battle God to use.

    Her overtaxed muscles screamed in pain as she pushed her body to its limits yet again. Using Ogre Berserker earlier had burdened every part of her body, but in order to continue fighting, Shion spammed Ultra Speed Regeneration.

    Unique Skill Battle God was like the upgraded Skill of Ogre Berserker. It would not cause the user to lose self-control, and instead, purely enhanced the strength, stamina, and psyche of the user. Just like Benimarus Magic me Transformation, the Skill enhanced the users strength, and gave them the properties of a spiritual lifeform.

    However, it wasnt an all-powerful Skill. In fact, it had some major ws.

    Whilst activated, Shions physical strength was directly added to her spiritual body. However, it consumed magicules really quickly, enough that it could dry her storage in a short amount of time.

    When Shion activated her Unique Skill Battle God, she would quickly be pushed to the limit of her abilities. Her next strike would decide the victor of the battle.

    And so, with this resolve, Shion entered the final confrontation with her enemy.

    What is this power? Razul eximed. Itsing straight for me!

    Under the influence of Battle God, Shions youki was overwhelmingly powerful. At the same time, it had enhanced her body, sharpening all of her senses. Shion could feel her strength boiling inside her.

    Now, Ranga!

    Got it!

    Shion raised her Hercules Ex to the sky with both hands.

    It was then that Ranga released ck Lightning, having concentrated all his energy on it. He had been saving his energy to charge its power. It was the most powerful strike Ranga could manage.

    Ranga had faith in Shion, and even if the lightning he summoned hurt her, if that were what she wanted, he would do it in a heartbeat.

    You punks! My shell

    Shion didnt give a crap about what Razul was going to say.

    CHAOTIC FATE!

    With all her willpower infused in her strike, it could cut through all thews in the world. As lightning intertwined with her odachi, she swung down

    Shions attack left a small crack on Razuls arm. His exoskeleton blocked most of the attack, but that was more than enough for Shion. As long as she could make a tiny opening, she would be able to activate Optimal Action and reach Guaranteed Oue. This was the secret of Shions Unique Skill Cook.

    The de shed, leaving a severed de flying through the air.

    Shions odachi had broken into two in the end. Yet, Razul was the one to fall.

    Starting from the left hand that was originally cut, a huge wound extending from the center of his body and his shoulder severed him in two.

    The devastating lightning ripped through the wound and scorched Razuls insides.

    It was at that moment that the battle was decided.

    Razul fell to the ground. He knew he would die soon. He turned his eyes to see Granbell fighting against Luminas.

    Sorry, GranI will go first. I shall meet you, at the cewe promised

    The light faded from his eyes, and Razul finally passed into oblivion.

    Like that, Shion and Ranga emerged victorious.

    As she watched Rimuru ce the mask on Chronoas face, Luminas couldnt help but think, Did he seed?

    It was a gambit.

    Chloe and Hinata had ced their trust in Rimuru, and so would Luminas put all the hope in him.

    The two had mentioned Rimuru to her a long time ago. Luminas had decided to feign ignorance, whilst keeping a close eye on him. When she discussed it with Hinata, she even pretended to know nothing. She only attended the Walpurgis Banquet because shed learned that Rimuru would be present. However, Luminas had been told differently. Especially in regard to Rimuru bing a demon lord.

    As Chloes words gradually came true, Luminas no longer had any reason to doubt. And that was why Luminas had never intended to antagonize Rimuru in the first ce.

    However, recently, these events contrasted greatly with the story Chloe and Hinata had told her. Inconsistencies were beginning to rise.

    This stirred great fear in Luminas. She was afraid that Chronoa, hidden in the Holy Ark, wouldnt be revived correctly if things continued to change

    Her fear was realized when the least expected happened.

    Right before her much anticipated music concert, her long-time subordinate Granbell betrayed her. Actually, she knew Granbell would betray her a long time ago, but never expected him to rebel against her so openly.

    And then, Hinata died.

    Chronoa was revived.

    Facing all these irregrities was to depend on Rimuru. Despite what she knew, he had also survived, so he, too, was an irregrity. Thus, he was the best candidate to handle the situation.

    That was how Luminas judged the matter.

    Sure enough, Rimuru did not disappoint. He decided to try to call for Chronoas soul.

    That mask looks just like the one Chloe had. Then theres still hope! Luminas cheered internally.

    It was then that Granbell spoke to her.

    You seem quite happy, Luminas-sama. Do you truly believe that your beloved Chloe would return?

    What did you say?

    Isnt Chronoa the will of destruction? Now that the Holy Ark once containing it has disappeared, you must return Chloes will in order to stop Chronoa. But do you really believe that Chloes soul still rests inside Chronoa?

    Luminas was stunned. How did you know this?

    She quickly turned her thoughts around. Had it been Granbell, it would have been possible for him to eavesdrop on Luminas and Chloes conversation.

    I see, so thats why you

    Indeed. Just as you thought. This is the fastest way to destroy the world: just hand responsibility to someone stronger than me! Granbellughed, and his eyes were dark with madness.

    Silence! Dont think you can achieve that so easily!

    But I will. This world has always trampled my dreams. For example, my friend has just died.

    Hearing Granbells words, Luminas noticed that another battle had concluded. Rimurus subordinates had won and Razul had perished.

    Hehehe, this world is so cruel to me.

    So what?! Luminas snapped.

    Granbell merely dered to her calmly:

    Thats why, a world like this should just disappear.

    Quit talking to yourself. You can despair all you want, but do it by yourself! Luminas shouted as she raised her beloved saber.

    It was called Night Rose, named after her hometown.

    Granbell responded to Luminas in a simr fashion.

    He drew his partner since his days as a Herothe Longsword of Truth.

    Both of their weapons were mythical-grade, and had simr quality.

    Then

    Despair? No, thats not it at all. Right now my heart is filled with hope! Granbell roared. Suddenly, the energy released from Razuls body began to flow into his.

    It was Razuls soul, and his power.

    Maria, Razul, and Granbell.

    The threes power sublimated in their souls to create one hope.

    Confirmationplete. Conditions satisfied. Unique Skill Unyielding One has evolved into Ultimate Skill Hope King Sariel.

    Granbell had once again gone to greater heights of strength under these circumstances. He had reached the ultimate realm, which only the chosen could reach.

    Coincidentally, both Ultimate Skill Hope King Sariel and Ultimate Skill Lustful King Asmodeus had the same authority, and that was over life and death.

    Now even their powers were on par with each other.

    Granbell stood silently, gazing at Luminas with his darkened eyes.

    I am ready too, Luminas-sama. Let us end this once and for all.

    Well said. I shall ept your resolve. Now then, rest assured as I will kill you.

    The next moment, the two powerhouses collided.

    A duel between those who had awakened their Ultimate Skillsyet the victor was decided in an instant.

    In a sh of red, Luminas struck with her Night Rose. With a dim blue me, Granbell blocked her strike with his Longsword of Truth.

    MEMORY END REQUIEM!

    FORTITUDE!

    The Ultimate Skill Lustful King Asmodeus shed with Hope King Sariel. In having the same abilities, the one with the strong will would win the battle.

    And because of that

    The unyielding Hero Granbell had no reason to lose and yetLuminas was thest person standing.

    After cing the mask on Chronoa, I could feel myself sinking into her spiritual world. Of course, I had no idea how to do that myself. Raphael-san handled the operation entirely.

    I thought her world would be a void of darkness, but as it turned out, it was rather bright. Since a ce like this definitely wouldnt have any light source, I suppose that this must have just been an imaginary scene.

    As I bounced forward, guided by my instincts, I noticed someone walking towards me.

    Hey, long time no see, slime-san. Actually, I should call you Satoru-san.

    It was Shizu-san.

    Despite my nostalgia, I felt a little shy. So I said, half-jokingly, Dont be so formal. My name now is Rimuru. Not to discard my past, but its a bit embarrassing being called that.

    It definitely wasnt because I was hoping she would call me that.

    Definitely not.

    By the way, this mental scenery was really convenient. If I ever felt lonely, even the dead could keep mepany.

    Shizu-san wasnt wearing her mask, and instead greeted me face to face. Her burn scars were gone as well, which once again confirmed to me that Shizu-san was absolutely beautiful.

    It was only natural that I looked like a bishojo myself due to it being based on Shizus appearance. I suppose that made sense.

    Although, as a guy originally, the feeling was rather strange.

    Having Shizu-san apany me boosted my confidence and my pace hastened.

    Shizu-san smiled and followed.

    Yet, in front of us, stood another bishojo. It was Chronoa. Her eyes were flooded with hatred. It was terrifying. It really looked like she wanted to destroy the world.

    First, I wanted to talk to her.

    Hopefully she would listen. But as I was about to speak, something unexpected happened

    You areRimuru? Is this realis it Rimuru himself?

    This reaction was rather surprising.

    I thought she would be more hostile towards me.

    Y-yeah, Rimuru-san here.

    Confirming that it was me, Chronoa stepped forward to hug me.

    The bishojo was hugging a slime.

    It was pretty nice.

    Seeing us like this, Shizu-san giggled. She patted Chronoas head lightly and murmured: You have worked very hard. I really wanted to see you too, Hero-sama.

    Hmmwas it okay for us to act all lovey-dovey like this now?

    People were fighting intensely outside, but here I was feeling really happy

    W-were you Chronoa?

    Now that we were with each other face to face, I started to suspect that Chronoa was how Chloe would look after growing up. They were very simr.

    Yes. I am Chronoa. I am a personification of evil trapped inside Chloe. I am also her alternate personality. If Hinata never named me, I probably wouldnt have be self-aware as a separate personality.

    I-I see.

    I still hadnt reallyputed the situation just yet, but it seemed that the situation was a lot moreplicated than I originally thought.

    Then your goal is

    If she wanted to destroy the world, I had to do my best to stop her. But since she was Chloes alternate, maybe I could figure out a way to call Chloe back and switch themwhich was why I had to ask her.

    However

    Its all okay now. Because Rimuru is safe and sound, Chronoa asserted calmly. She didnt seem to have any other conviction.

    What do you mean Im safe and sound, please dont say something so ominous.

    I had safely pulled through many dangerous situations in the past. So now, I didnt want any more trouble like that again.

    I mean, Ive always been fine?

    At my answer, Chronoa became furious. How dare you say that? You sacrificed yourself to save me!

    I sacrificed myself? I was very confused.

    I didnt really know why she was pissed, but I decided to just apologize anyway.

    Ahaha, sorry sorry, Ill be careful in the future.

    Dont lie to me again! Pinky promise.

    I then promised Chronoa to not do anything reckless.

    I dont get it. Its not like I go out to do reckless things. Oh wait, hold on. If Chronoa has memories of the future, maybe in the future Id

    The likelihood is very high.

    Oi, theres no way thats true, right?!

    I really didnt want to hear thatactually I suppose it was better that I did. Better hear it now thanter.

    Never be reckless in the futureI solemnly swore.

    With Chronoa finally calming down, I moved onto the important questions.

    Then, do you know where Chloe is?

    And is Hinata with her?

    Even though I was getting impatient, I still needed to be careful. If I got on Chronoas bad side, she probably wouldnt tell me anything.

    But it seemed that I was worrying for nothing.

    She is lost in the Infinite Prison deep inside my heart. In the past, I was the one trapped there. But as times changed and two of the same existence appeared, we switched ces.

    And so, she told me everything.

    It seemed that Chronoa cherished Chloe a lot too. She seemed to think that Chloe was indeed the main personality while she herself was the supporting alter. I believed her.

    Upon thinking so, I asked my next question.

    What about Hinata?

    Hinata Shes already dead, Chronoa said.

    Her answer made me freeze. How can that be? Luminas said that Hinata traveled back in time with Chloe

    In that way, Hinata should be fine

    You are mistaken, Rimuru. Hinata has already died here. Granbells attack could even extinguish souls. They were able to leap back in time together because Chloe absorbed Hinatas soul. But Hinata alone would not be able to withstand the Time Leap.

    Eh?

    But, I thoughtLuminas said she spoke to her as well.

    Moreover

    Wasnt Hinata the one who gave the name Chronoa?

    Umm.

    Wouldnt that mean!

    Only Hinatas consciousness was left from the residue of her soul. Since it was stored inside Hinatas Unique Skill, I couldnt absorb Hinatas Mathematician. If I did that, Hinatas consciousness would disappear too

    Seeing how sad Chronoa was as she answered, I knew she wasnt lying.

    But, hold on.

    Her Skill was born from her soul, and Hinata used it to preserve her consciousness, right? If so, if I put her Skill back into her body, wouldnt that revive her from the dead?

    I know what Rimuru is thinking. IChloe had the same idea in the past too. But it didnt work. Didnt I say this before? The remnants of Hinatas soul are also trapped in the Infinite Prison. Its a chaotic void, where everything mixes together. As someone who was born there, I can tell you that Hinatas Mathematician is probably integrated in that void already

    It was different for someone like Veldora, who had a sizable ego and immense energy. But for Hinata, even if she became a Saint, she was still human. There was no way she could survive in the Infinite Prison

    Hinatas body was outside.

    As long as the soul was all right, she could be revived.

    Chronoa sighed and I felt depressed.

    But then someone spoke.

    No, dont worry. Hinata is a very resilient child. She wont have disappearedpletely. So lets try to call for her. It was Shizu-san. She was smiling.

    The unsettling feeling on my mind gradually dissipated.

    It was better to grieve after we had confirmed the result.

    Indeed, you have a point. Chronoa, I want to save Chloe and Hinata from Infinite Prison. Is there a way to do that?

    Now that Ive calmed down, I think I can feel the aura of the other me, Chloe. But its gonna be difficult trying to deactivate Infinite Prison. Im not sure myself, but my body might disintegrate if I do that

    This was because she had locked up her enormous energy reserves in the Infinite Prison. I almost forgot to mention this, but it was actually Chronoa here who controlled the young Chloes power.

    If the amount of energy unleashed was strong enough to rival Veldoras, Chloes body would be obliterated. Moreover, we still couldnt confirm whether Hinatas soul was inside or not.

    I wanted to trust Shizu-sans words.

    Since we needed to cleverly control the energy inside Infinite Prison and save Chloe and Hinatahow about having Wisdom King Raphael interfere with Infinite Prison?

    Or perhaps, it could simply examine what was inside instead of unlocking the prison?

    Negative. Based on current circumstances, it is impossible. Insufficient ess to interfere with the smallest physical unit, information particles.

    Raphael said it could unlock Infinite Prison. However, it did not have the authority to interfere with the information locked inside there. So that was a dead end.

    Veldora managed to revive himself, but it seemed that he was a special case.

    I get it! Then Ill transfer the authority to you. The other Chloe agreed too. We will have Rimuru do as you wish!

    Eh?

    As I worried about what to do, Chronoa suddenly made an unexpected proposal.

    An information particle was a substance smaller than even spiritrons, and was close to having no mass at all. All matter in the world had to contain information particles.

    Even though they only existed in my Stomach and Chronoas Infinite Prison, these information particles could be observed. Raphael seemed to have the ability to manipte information particles to eitherbine or abolish Skills.

    Now with the ess granted by the owner of the Infinite Prison, Raphael obtained the freedom to exercise its authority over it.

    Report. ess granted. Interference will begin.

    How should I put thisRaphael-san sounded very happy. It must have been just like that one time when it was ying around with my Skills.

    The series of events that took ce next happened extremely fast.

    Before I could do anything, Raphael took charge by itself.

    Complete. Unique Skills Infinite Prison, Absolute Severance and Usurper have beenbined along with arge sacrifice of magicule to evolve into an Ultimate Skill.

    Without asking me YES/NO as usual, Raphael acted promptly.

    Actually, it probably didnt have to ask for my permission.

    Since it wasnt my Skilleh, this felt a little off.

    Ignoring my concerns, ChloeChronoatheir power evolved to Ultimate Skill Spacetime King Yog-Sothoth. Moreover, even the discarnate entity Chronoa, which was originally the other personality of Chloe, went through the upgrade to be an information-particle entity called Manas, which gave her the authority to manage Skills and ability to switch with Chloe at any time.

    Is it really okay to make such drastic modifications?

    I wanted to follow-up with a No, its not okay at allbut everyone seemed okay with it.

    Rimuru is always so reckless, but I love Rimuru for it!

    Not only did Chronoa hug me, she kissed my right cheek.

    Moreover

    Eh, Chronoa! How can you cut in line before me like that?!

    I felt a soft touch from the other side too.

    Just like Chronoa, Chloe came to hug and kiss me. Chloe was also in her adult form. Chronoa and Chloe had the exact same appearance, like twins. They were incredibly beautiful.

    The minds imagination is the best.

    Even though the fact that this wasnt reality was a bit saddening, it was still very nice to be sandwiched between two beauties.

    On that note, couldnt I shift out of my slime form and return to the appearance of that nice guy from my previous life?

    I began to get immersed in my lewd fantasies.

    Shizu-san watched me from the side.

    Someone else was there too.

    Looks like youre having fun, Rimuru. Youre enjoying yourself so much that you didnt even check if I revived or not.

    It was Hinata.

    She was right, I shouldnt get ahead of myself.

    I gave a couple dry coughs with my face flustered.

    A-as expected from Hinata-san, you are just as pretty as before.

    Should Ipliment her like that to start a conversation?

    I would say that, but I had seen her earlier.

    But I suppose it was always good to praise a woman.

    As expected

    Spare me the ttery.

    Ah, yes maam.

    She saw through me immediately. But I still had something to say first.

    That said, while its strange to say that Im d youre okay, I am truly happy to reunite with Hinata under these circumstances.

    That was genuine.

    Thank you, Hinata said. Her cheeks were a bit red.

    She had to be blushing.

    Could that be a dere 14 moment?!

    Negative. It is not.

    I figured as much. There was no way.

    Hinata then proceeded to ignore me, and joyfully reunited with Shizu-san. It looked like she had be a bit more open as Hinatas eyes were filled with tears.

    I am sorry, sensei. I never meant to cause you any trouble

    I understand, Hinata. I never noticed at the time. I should be the one apologizing. And thank you. You were the Hero that saved me from Leons castle, right?

    Yes, sensei.

    Seeing them hugging each other, I had the urge to cry with them.

    Hinata, youre a really strong girl. Your Mathematician, born from that iron will of yours, was likely the reason youre still here now, Shizu-san whispered sincerely.

    I see, perhaps she had a point.

    Hinata was just like before, nothing had changed.

    But my other power disappeared.

    Hehe, that means you dont need it anymore. You will be able to face yourself properly and grow on your own.

    But can I really be revived?

    There wont be a problem. And you believed in it too, right?

    Umm, sort of

    It was then that Shizu and Hinata turned their eyes to me.

    How long do you guys n to hug him?

    With Hinatas interjection, I realized that Chloe and Chronoa were still clinging onto me.

    But I want to hug Rimuru a bit more!

    Thats right, Hinata. I havent seen him in two thousand years, let me hug him a bit more too

    Saying something like that could be easily misunderstood, you know?

    I wasnt doing anything, but Chloe and Chronoa had buried themselves in my slime body, thats all.

    With a smile, Shizu-san intervened. She faced Chloe and Chronoa. All right, all right, we will talk about thatter. Its time for me to go. I hope you will be revived soon, Hinata.

    Where are you going?

    Shouldnt you know, Rimuru? I am just an illusion you created.

    Right, this was just an imaginary space, so

    All dreamse to an end one day. I am happy to have met you girls too. The children seem to be doing good as well. And thanks Rimuru, for punching Leon. I have forgiven him. It seems like everything was just a misunderstanding. Knowing this makes me feel a little better about this world. Thats why I no longer have any regrets and feel satisfied.

    Chloe and Hinata were trying to convince her to stay, but seeing the satisfied smile on Shizu-san, they swallowed their words. They then vigorously nodded their heads.

    Rimuru, Ill leave Hinata to your care, Shizu-san said.

    Rimuru-san will definitely be able to do it, said Chloe reassuringly.

    Im quite looking forward to your performance, came Hinata.

    All three of them were giving me quite a lot of unexpected pressure to revive Hinata sessfully.

    It actually made me sweat a lot.

    What if I fail

    No, I couldnt think like that. I couldnt show weakness like that. It wasnt my style to give up before even trying.

    Hinata was probably more anxious than me, so I needed to stay calm.

    Just count on me, Hinata. Ill get you out in no time, I dered.

    Words had power. I must seedwith this resolve, I left the mindscape.

    Back in the real world, I was still in my human form. My posture hadnt changed at all, and it looked like I hadnt moved one bit.

    I stretched and cheered myself up.

    Inside the scenery of the mind, thest thing I saw was the smile of the fading Shizu-san. I had to hold on a bit longer to not fail that smile.

    Oh, Rimuru, you seem all right!

    What happened? I saw Chronoa stop and fall

    Ill exin to you guyster, can you please keep your guard up, so I wont get disrupted?

    Just leave it to me! Leon agreed without hesitation.

    On the other hand, Veldora seemed to be hesitating, Right, but remember to exin it in detailter.

    Now I could rest assured.

    I doubted it, but if Yuuki were toe back, the two would be able to handle him.

    Lets see where Hinatas body is

    I found itpletely uninjured after being healed by Luminass magic. She was lying next to the fallen Chronoa.

    Ahh, there was a hole opened near Hinatas chest area. I pulled out my backup coat and put it on her. This was the kind of charm you could expect from a mature adult who knew when to show tenderness.

    I dont want to get red at again eitherbut Id hide that thought inside my heart.

    The key was resurrection magic, but it would be difficult for me to perform it alone. Even though her consciousness had reemerged through Mathematician, which was also Hinata herself, it was still inside Chloes Spacetime King Yog-Sothoth. Whilst merging with the Skill saved her from vanishing, separating them would be difficult.

    I had to prepare the energy to rece her and switch out the two while simultaneously applying resurrection magic in order to rescue her. In order to do that, Id need that gals help.

    I called out, Please help me revive Hinata, Luminas!

    Gu-guwah, goodwin, Luminassama.

    Granbell fell to the ground, coughing blood.

    Struck with a mortal blow by Luminas, his life force was slowly draining out of him. Yet Granbell looked at peace.

    You idiot

    Luminas had indeed received the true message Granbell wanted her to know.

    If I cant even ovee such a difficulty, protecting humanity is absolutely impossible. If thats the case, its better for the world to be destroyed by the hands of the Hero who is meant to be humanitys guardian

    Luminas rightly understood that he was betting on thisst hope. epting his resolve, Luminas gave him her response and defeated him in the duel.

    It was at this point that she painfully understood Granbells thoughts. He didnt want to make Chronoa go berserk, but to awaken her correctly and turn her into humanitys hope.

    He is still so clumsy even after a thousand years. Luminas felt so in heart, but at the same time, a sense of loneliness.

    Mymy pathetic wishwas nothingagainst herpower over time. If you, Demon Lord Rimuruand her joined forces

    In this cruel world, what was justice without strength? Even someone as strong as Granbell could onlyment his own failures.

    Suddenly, Luminas heard Rimurus voice.

    Rimuru wanted to revive Hinata. In other words, ChronoaChloe had awakened sessfully.

    That guy sure is reliable. Mission aplished perfectly.

    Luminas had much praise for Rimuru despite not saying it out loud.

    Youve done what you can. Leave the rest to me. Be at ease.

    With these final words to Granbell, Luminas nned to go to Rimuru.

    Luminass strike was more than enough to kill him, but Granbell had already exhausted his life force before that. His life hade to an end. There was no way he could continue to live, even with Luminass help.

    He could potentially survive if Luminas turned him into a monster, but she knew Granbell would not have wanted that.

    B-before thatLuminas-sama. I have one more request

    What is it?

    HopeI want to pass my hope, tothat girl

    Luminas paused at this.

    She wasnt sure whether or not to fulfill Granbells wish, considering that it could be another trick of his.

    With that being said, Luminas still epted his request.

    Sometimes, Luminass heart was just soft.

    Fine.

    M-much obliged

    Holding onto the hand Luminas reached out, Granbell was nothing but grateful. At the same time, his body began to dissipate and disappeared in a ball of light.

    Pass on peacefully to the other world.

    The ex-Hero had fought for a very long time. But finally, seemingly guided by Luminass voice, Granbell was freed from his fate and vanished from the world.

    Sorry to have kept you waiting.

    I didnt even need to check who it was. The arrogant tone told me it was Luminas. Her clothes were still all tidy even after what was obviously an intense battle. She looked victorious. But even so, I wished she hade sooner.

    What is it, do you have a problem with me?

    No, not at all.

    I didnt dare to say it out loud. It was probably a result of the exclusively Japanese ideal of not looking for trouble.

    But that didnt matter. We needed to hurry and help Hinata.

    I am going to interfere with Chloes Infinite Prison. You take the chance and extract Hinatas Soul. If there isnt enough energy

    Dont worry about that, I will figure something out.

    Wonderful. Luminas was indeed super capable.

    And so, I got to work quickly.

    I held out my hand above Chronoas prone position on the ground and pointed out the location of Hinatas soul to Luminas. She was getting on fast and began to perform some sort of interference. As opposed to magic, Skills were more useful in these times.

    Rebirth!

    Luminas activated her ability.

    As I watched, I realized something.

    Luminas was activating some super high-level Skill that I couldnt learn.

    Analysis failed. This power originates from an Ultimate Skill.

    My guess was right.

    Although, since it was Luminas, I shouldnt be surprised. I could rest assured with the matter in her hands.

    The limp Chronoa and Hinatas corpsey side by side. Fragments of Hinatas soul merged with Chloes soul and werepiled into the Unique Skill Mathematician.

    Luminas used her power to grasp Hinatas soul that Id managed to separate using Istion. In its ce, she was carefully injecting a high concentration of energy to rece what she was extracting.

    The energy injected was far greater than what was being extracted, but it was likely a necessary procedure. I watched as she reached out her hand to Hinatas corpse instead this time.

    Luminass power was returning Hinatas soul to her body.

    Her hair regained luster, her cheeks reddened, and her heart began to beat once more. The next moment, Hinata opened her eyes and coughed. There were no anomalies inside her body, however.

    It worked. Hinata had been sessfully resurrected.

    And there was Chronoa too. With the abnormal presence of Hinata removed, she recovered to herplete self. While her soul was already very beautiful before, Chloes soul right now shone with an inhumanly divine light. It was far beyond the beauty of a normal human soul.

    She opened her eyes.

    Will it be Chloe or Chronoa?

    Rimuru-san!

    That reaction sounded like Chloe. Although she used to call me -sensei, for some reason, she began to call me -san. Still, it sounded like Chloe.

    She darted over to me.

    I hugged her gently. She has really changed from her childhood appearance. Shes gotten a lot more feminineeh, how strange.

    I got a much smoller armful of Chloe than I expected. With a closer look, I found that Chloe had turned back into a child. She was wearing a ck, form-fitting suit, likely the result of Holy Spirit Armament. That was quite fortunate. I did feel a little disappointed, but Id keep that to myself.

    The others saw me hugging this little girl.

    This could easily be misunderstood as memitting a crime.

    Hinatas re was sharp.

    Moreover, Leon looked especially pissed for some reason.

    What the hell is this, Rimuru?

    You better give us a good exnation.

    Oi oi oi, chill out, Leon.

    Also, Hinata-san, ring so intensely will give you wrinkles.

    But saying something like that would probably be suicidal.

    Hinata had finally revived and Chronoas rampage was over. But for some reason, I still wasnt out of the hot water yet.

    The sheer absurdity of this made me cry inside. I hoped they would hear me out.

    Everyone, please calm down. Either way, this is no ce to talk. I am pretty exhausted for the day already, to top it off. Lets set a time and ce and discuss the matter in detail!

    This motion was passed by majority vote.

    And so, the battle concluded.

    In the end, there was only the beautiful music left.

    How surprising, Takt and the band members had been practicing their performances during the battle. Their diligence wasmendable.

    I praised the band members before dismissing them.

    We also found out something else.

    Eh? Isnt Chloes power stronger than before? Imented.

    You must be imagining things.

    No, just as Rimuru said, it must be Veldora agreed.

    Silence! I wasnt asking for your opinion, you damn lizard!

    Luminass words startled us.

    She seemed to be so cid earlier. You cant me us for getting startled when she suddenly lost it.

    Its better to leave this topic aloneI thought. However, a certain man didnt know how to read the room.

    It wasnt Veldora, by the way. While he often said stupid things,tely, hed learned better. Knowing it would piss Luminas off, he and I agreed to keep quiet about it, and he nodded at the thought, as if telepathic.

    No, just as Rimuru and Veldora-dono have said. While at first sight she is merely the most beautiful girl in the world, her strength has surpassed even that of when she was Chronoa earlier.

    It turned out to be Demon Lord Leon.

    Despite his calm and collected appearance, he was actually a bit of an airhead, and the type to step in conversationalndmines.

    I mean, he valued Chloe so much. Hed been rather attached to her, without showing any signs of leaving. He even imed that she was the most beautiful girl in the world. He was being indulgent and didnt even have the decency to be subtle.

    Leon-oniichan, youve always been like this. Youre too attached to me! Thats why I always tell you that you wont get a girlfriend acting like this!

    Chloe was quite harsh on Leon.

    Leon was just a super [Redacted] born for Chloehonestly, it is what it is. Spelling it out aloud could hurt some people.

    By the way, I might have been fooled by his cool and handsome appearance, but Leon was a really unlucky guy. Ramiris also said that Leon used to be a crybaby. Maybe I should treat him better.

    After berating the rather baffled Leon, Chloe turned her head around to face us. Umm, now seems like a good time to tell you guys. I wanted to tell everyone before, but it seems that Ive finally awoken into a real Hero. The Egg growing inside me merged with the Egg incubated by Hinata. But thats a secret just among us. Chloe smiled as she finished.

    Surprised, I suddenly remembered. Chloe! Something this important I paused.

    Guy could still be watching us, so I couldnt speak so carelessly. I tried to cover it up as soon as I realized, but

    But it turned out that my worries were unnecessary.

    Its fine! I dont think anyone is watching us anymore. Chloes deration assured our safety.

    In that moment, Chloe was far more than the young girl she looked to be. Children would eventually grow up to no longer require their parents care. While happy at Chloes growth, it made me a bit lonely too.

    It was then that I realized something.

    As of nowTrue Hero Chloe Aubert had awoken. Hinata and Chloe werentpletely separated. Somehow the Heros Egg inside Hinata was left in Chloes body.

    Her single body possessed two Heros Eggs. It was inconceivable. It shouldnt have happened, yet Chloes awakening allowed her to reach this unprecedented realm of existence.

    No, thats not true.

    It was not some idental miracle, but instead a certain result of Chloes unyielding will. Chloe pushed forward, persevering through her endless cycle of repetition and in the end, managed to ovee all challenges to reach a whole new level. It was Chloes undying will that dispelled despair and made this miracle.

    At that moment, I admired Chloe from the bottom of my heart.

    That was why I decided to say this without any pretense: You really worked hard. I want to learn from you too. I swear to never give up in the face of anything.

    That was my most genuine thought.

    Mmhm!

    Chloe nodded with a bright smile. I swore to never let her lose that smile in the future.

    In other words, I couldnt always be so naive. Now that I knew that there was a force out there trying to kill me, it was only naturally that I would have toe up with a solution.

    Am I right?

    Correct. Aprehensive solution must be made.

    This incident gave me a very deep realization: if I were to be defeated, it would not just be my problem alone.

    No mercy for my enemiesI solidified this resolve in my heart again.

    Understanding my enemies ideals were indeed important, but it was meaningless if it was at the cost of our sacrifice.

    I will do anything for victory

    While smiling back at Chloe, I secretly made this vow.

 Volume 11 - Epilogue

    Epilogue

    To the Promised Land

    That night, we just exchanged a bit of information with each other. We decided to discuss the details after we had settled downter.

    Leon told me about his rtionship with Chloe. They were childhood friends that grew up like siblings. He didnt reveal more information. Chloe probably had forgotten about it too, so it remained a mystery.

    Although I wouldnt consider it to be that big of one.

    Leon was always calm, cool, and collected, except when he was with Chloe. The extent to which Leon spoiled Chloe could rival how much Treyni-san spoiled Ramiris. His dedication was on a dangerous level. He might as well have dered, with a straight face, in front of Chloe something like: Let me take a vow and pledge my loyalty to you.

    That being said, Chloe would probably smile and reject him.

    On that note, Chloe seemed able to turn herself into an adult. Chronoas consciousness remained healthy inside her in a rtionship simr to Wisdom King Raphael and me. Thats why they could switch control of their body. When engaging in seriousbat, I heard that she could merge consciousnesses with Chronoa, and in doing so, she could restore her original appearance.

    She also mentioned that suddenly turning into her adult form would probably cause a panic among the other children. So, she wanted to continue life in her current form.

    I found that safer too and told Chloe to do as she wished.

    Luminas told me about Granbell.

    Gran likely went mad after his wifes death. Following that, Mariabell was that mansst hope, her death has plunged him into insanity yet again. I suspect that he recoveredter on as well.

    So serious yet so clumsy.

    Thats perhaps the best way to describe Granbell Rosso as a person. The death of his wife Maria made him feel guilty that he was unable to protect the one he loved.

    When this Granbell found his new hopeMariabell, she too suffered defeat after challenging me. Even though I had no evidence, my guess was that Yuuki had killed her.

    Yet to Granbell, any exnation was meaningless. Mariabells death had a significant impact on him. Perhaps it was the loneliness he felt after losing her that cleared up Granbells mind in the end.

    Theres nothing more ironic than that.

    After his mind returned to normal, Granbell devised a n to awaken the True Hero. Had he failed, the world would have been devastated in a crisis. Yet Granbell had made his decision. His resolve was unmatched. That alone, was the only undeniable fact.

    A Hero didnt have to be someone of lofty virtue. Everyone has their biases, or their madness in his case.

    Granbells love for humanity was great. Therefore, when he had sumbed to insanity, the consequences afterward were probably greater than if it was anyone else.

    Even I could not deny that I was not susceptible to this. What if I were to lose my loved ones? I recalled the time when I had almost lost mypanions. The loss almost tore my heart out.

    How foolishI seriously cant say this about him in good conscience.

    I could rte to Granbells feelings on some level.

    The next day:

    Under the vast blue sky, with the ruins of the Grand Cathedral as the backdrop, our musical exchange concert took ce as nned.

    In front of the band was a neatly seated crowd as the audience.

    The beautiful yet mncholic music resounded through the skies. It was the song to bid farewell to those who had ced their hope in the futurea requiem.

    I had a dream. A very strange dream. In that dream, I became a very selfish little girl.

    Maria smiled as she woke up to the sight of Gran.

    Was it a good dream?

    Yes, it was very sweet.

    The two smiled at each other.

    How incredible, why didnt I believe that slime?

    Ummthats a hard question. Because it was a dreamAn answer like this sounds a bit unromantic.

    Ehhh, cant you answer it seriously?

    Hahaha, sorry. Just like you said, Maria, things wouldnt have escted to this extent had we been able to ept everything and trust each other. But humanity is cowardly. They fear the people who live by rules different from their own and are wary that they might betray them. More problematically, he who does not doubt others is a man of beautiful heart but by no means qualified as a politician. Since being more careful than anyone else is the quality that is required of those who lead

    Hearing this, Maria bulged her cheeks, seemingly discontent.

    Seriously! Then humans would never really understand each other from their hearts! I dont like that, dont like that at all! Thats why Ive decided to trust him next time.

    You are talking about what happened in the dream, right?

    Yes, I am. That is, if I ever have the same dream next time, I will definitely believe in that slime-san. Im sure we will be very good friends by that time!

    Is that so? Im sure you will, Gran agreed gently.

    By the way, Gran, what dream did you have? Maria asked Gran innocently.

    Me? I

    Gran had a very long and sorrowful dream.

    But in the end, he got to see a ray of hope.

    It was a good dream. Really good.

    Ahh, thats great! If you are happy, I am happy!

    Me too. As long as you are happy, I will be able to ovee whatever hardship I meet.

    We can spend every day together peacefully. That thought alone brings me joy.

    Indeed.

    When our child is born, we will have more family, and well be even happier!

    Yes, you are absolutely right. As he finished, Gran gently hugged Maria.

    They heard beautiful music ying. It was the music telling them to set forth on their journey.

    Itd be improper to keep Razul waiting. Its about time for us to get going.

    Umm, right. Did you forget anything? We probably wont get a chance to return here, no?

    Well, no worries. As long as I have you by my side, I dont need anything else.

    And so, the two held each others hands and started walking.

    To the promisednd far far away, where everyone was waiting.

 Volume 12 - Prologue

    Prologue

    Clowns on the Run

    Yuuki Kagurazaka was a genius.

    In his original world, he already possessed a special power. Mental forceso-called psychokinesisa superpower, one that he was born with. However, he never intended to make use of this power. Because he knew that if others were to discover his power, he would be a spectacle.

    Despite the monotony of daily life, he seemed to enjoy himself. He had loving parents and plenty of friends. Making money was easy for him. As long as he wanted it, there was nothing he couldnt get. There was nothing he wasnt satisfied with.

    Yet, one fateful day, tragedy struck. Just as he started middle school, both of Yuukis parents died in a car ident. It was not his parents fault. The Kagurazakas car was struck by a truck driver who was dozing off behind the wheel. Only Yuuki, who was sleeping in the backseat, survived.

    Yuuki found it incredibly unfair. He hated the guilty driver but could not do anything about it. Japan was a nation ofw and order, and taking personal revenge was illegal.

    When the verdict of the trial came, he realized various things. He realized the ipetence of the transportpany, given that they contracted the work under unreasonable conditions. They put all the pressure on their employed field workers, and these workers had to keep working despite being overworked. The driver was a victim in a sense, too.

    Then the fault would fall on the transportpanybut that was not true, either. If they were to decline the request from their important clients, they wouldnt order from them in the future. One doesnt simply turn down an old clients requests. In that case, they would need to improve the management of their business, but it wasnt easy hiring experienced drivers, either. Even if thepany wanted to hire young talent and train them, their circumstances right now would not allow them to spare the effort.

    What is thisYuuki couldnt help but exim. There were so many unfair things in this world, yet his hands were bound.

    Who should he hate?

    At the end of the day, the faulty with the wed societal structure. He yearned to take his revenge against this society. But there was nothing Yuuki could do. He was a genius, but quickly realized his limit.

    This world was already highly developed. Even with his superpower, it was not enough to make an impact. He had no chance of winning against an army. And even if he could, there was no future for him if he did.

    Yuuki also thought about destroying society and rebuilding it from the ground up But that would plunge many into misfortune. He couldnt do such a thing.

    If he really wanted to change society as a whole, he would have to do it step by step, slowly increasing the number of like-mindedpanions. Only when he became a politician would he be able to shape this country into his image. This was the only solution within his reach. But walking this path would require patience. It was a feasible goal, were he to work assiduously, but that would still take a matter of decades.

    Yuuki was torn.

    But before he coulde to a conclusion, he found himself in the other world.

    Was this a blessing or a curse?

    Yuuki was summoned by the demon lord Kazalim and his deep-seated resentment. He had lost his physical body and became purely spiritual instead. But he never lost his power as the Curse Lord.

    He spent a long time preparing for his resurrection. In order to see this to fruition, he resorted to summoning a body that waspatible with his spiritual body. Naturally, he needed to make sure that the being he summoned was carefully restrained. No misstep was allowed in this ritual, so as a precaution, he used his domination power to engrave a curse before summoning.

    First, he would crush the mind of the one he wanted to summon, before the target even knew what hit it. Next, Kazalim would deprive its souls power and take its body to resurrect himself. That was the gist of his n.

    There was only one thing Kazalim hadnt ounted forthe person he summoned being Yuuki.

    The curse proved ineffective. With his genius, Yuuki already grasped the rules of this world. When he crossed worlds, he acquired the power he so wantedthe power to change the world. It was soul powera pure form of energy that could freely adapt its nature. Its name was Unique Skill Creator. When he told Rimuru that he didnt have any special ability, he lied as naturally as he breathed.

    His first act of creation, using his Skill, was to create the ability that would nullify evil intentions against himself: Anti-Skill. At that moment, Kazalims scheme was ruined.

    He even lost to Yuuki, bing his servant in the process.

    Yuuki, on the other hand, discovered his raison dtre in this world. This was a world where the strong trampled the weak. It was built on an imperfect system that still had a long way to go until it was fully developed. And so, Yuuki thought that if he could be the ruler of this world, then he could lead this world in the right direction.

    Yuuki was determined to challenge this unjust world head on. His next step was to wage war against this world itself.

    Conquering the worldYuuki began moving towards his goal.

    Yuuki, apanied by Lace, Footman, and Teare, escaped from the chaos they unleashed at the church. Their first priority was to escape from the Holy Empire of Lubelius. While it was tempting to hang around a little longer to watch the chaos unfold, it wasnt worth the risk.

    The berserk Hero Chronoa wasnt a force to be taken lightly, and she certainly was not someone Yuuki could control. She wasshing out indiscriminately. Everyone there was her enemy. She was a truly terrifying force.

    Granbell must have known this when he asked to cooperate with Yuuki.

    It was a tough pill for him to swallow, but Yuuki had to admit that hed simply been outsmarted this time.

    Aint we the biggest losers here, Laceined. All that work distracting Demon Lord Luminas to get an opening, and we were this close to gettin the ultimate weapon, the Hero

    Hohoho, Footman chuckled, that ones on a whole other level. Its a shame we let it go, but everyone who took that thing on has gotta be dead by now.

    Footman had a point, but Yuuki was far from convinced about thetter. The Hero couldnt possibly have dispatched everyone there that easily, he thought.

    We cant guarantee that, though, Lace remarked. No matter how you put it, Demon Lord Rimuru is stupidly powerful. Plus, Luminas and Leon were there too. With three demon lords and several powerful majins, both sides had equal chances of winning.

    You have a point. Granbell is an ex-Hero, so hes also pretty strong. I wouldnt bet on who won out in the end there, Teare added.

    Those two were not as optimistic as Footman. Like Yuuki, they thought that Rimuru and his entourage had a chance of winning against Chronoa.

    To Yuuki, Chronoa winning would be the best possible oue. If that were the case, not only could he get rid of the nuisance Rimuru and the hindering Granbell, but also the future threats, namely Luminas and Leon, whom the clowns despised. All these threats would disappear, and it would essentially put control over the entire West in Yuukis hands.

    The only remaining wild card would be Chronoa, which would be tough to deal with. But considering that shecked self-consciousness, there was nothing to fear. By using a couple monsters as bait, theyd be able to lure her off to some far corner of the desert anyway.

    Raw strength alone wasnt enough to pose a threat in Yuukis eyes. Thats why he wanted to stay behind and watch the battle y out

    Actually, running away is the right choice. If we got caught in the crossfire, wed be taking a lot of hits. Besides

    I had an ominous feelingYuukis instinct kicked in.

    In order to make ns for the future, he needed to analyze this chaotic fight. Even though he wanted to stay, Yuuki chose to trust his instinct and fled alongside the troupe.

    If Chronoa were defeated, the surviving demon lords would surely consider them a thorn in their side. Rimuru seemed to have already noticed Yuukis betrayal. He wont be able to make excuses anymore.

    The territories and reputation he built in the West would go to waste due to this blunder. He only had himself to me for having fallen into Granbells trap. He was merely reaping what hed sown.

    This was why he chose to flee as soon as possible. He could no longer hesitate. One of Yuukis strengths was that he was decisive. He had made it through countless challenges with his judgement.

    This time is the same, Yuuki thought to himself.

    But not a moment too soon, his naive n hit a brick wall.

    It happened in an instant. As Yuuki and his entourage were about to escape, a man suddenly stood in front of them. Beside him was an eye-catching, blue-haired beauty, wearing a rather out-of-ce crimson maid uniform.

    Huh?!

    Whore ya?

    Yuuki stopped, sensing danger.

    The man didnt respond to Laces question. He was staring straight at Yuuki, ignoring everyone else.

    Hohoho, if you insist on getting in our way

    Footman, who was standing in front, went to attack the man and woman. Instead, a figure suddenly appeared and pinned Footman to the ground with one hand.

    It was another woman, wearing the same crimson maid uniform as the blue-haired one. This one, though, had green hair. Needless to say, it was Mizeri, who had been busy sabotaging the Ingracia Kingdom until just a few hours ago. Due to Testarossas interference, she had to stop her meddling, and quickly came here thereafter.

    Since Mizeri hade, it obviously followed that the blue-haired beauty was Raine. Both of them were apanying the one and only demon lord, Guy Crimson. Known as the Lord of Darkness, he was the strongest of the demon lords.

    His crimson hair, a red sheen deeper than blood, fluttered in the wind. His crimson eyes, glimmering gold and silver stars, gazed down at Yuuki arrogantly.

    Yo. I think this is the first time weve met. Youve done well to catch my attention.

    Guys gaze was locked on Yuuki. No one else was worthy of his eyes. That fact wasnt lost on Yuuki, but he was conflicted over how that made him feel.

    When Footman was easily beaten by Mizeri, he could measure just how strong they were. Or rather, he could tell by the color of their hair and by those special maid suits. Kagalialso known as Kazalimand yman had mentioned these people. These three fit the bill.

    In other words, the person in front of him stood at the top of the world. His position was Yuukis end goal. As long as his ambition was to conquer the world, he would have to sh with this enemy one day.

    Is that so? You must be the so-called strongest demon lord, Guy Crimson. Its an honor to meet you. My name is Yuuki Kagurazaka. I never expected you toe to me; were you looking to team up? Yuuki mustered a smile without being intimidated by Guy.

    Naturally, that was just wishful thinking. He could tell just by looking at how Mizeri was handling Footman right now. It was in as day that Guy and his maids did note to forge any alliances.

    Even though he was faced with overwhelming danger, Yuuki still tried to put on a friendly tone. This was his unique way of negotiating. He would often throw out a wild statement to get a reaction, in an attempt to gauge his enemies intentions.

    Ah-hahaha. Youre an interesting fellow. Youve got plenty of guts to be saying that straight to my face. Now thats not a bad proposition, but you seem to be Leons enemy. Besides, werent you nning to head east? I personally dont want Rudra to rue any more power.

    Negotiations failed.

    Yuuki knew from the start that Guy would not have epted the ludicrous proposal. But he didnt let that discourage him, instead reading deeper into Guys words. Rudra was the name of the emperor of the Eastern Empirethe Nasca Namrium Ulmeria United Eastern Empire. He figured those two had some kind of rtionship, one evidently tainted by bad blood.

    So is he trying to get rid of us before we can run to the East? I dont really want to make the strongest demon lord my enemy, but I suppose theres no other way out, considering how things have developed

    He wouldnt be able to avoid conflict with Guy. They had no chance of escaping unscathed. Under these circumstances, he couldnt resort to trickery, either. With all other options cked out, his best bet was going all out against Guy.

    Yuuki finally came to a conclusion.

    Hmmnever mind, then. Since were enemies, this timing is impable. Before I move my base to the East, I can see just how strong the strongest demon lord is for myself, Yuuki answered, practically taunting Guy.

    An overwhelming sense of excitement welled from his heart. He had been hiding his full strength all this time, but he had to let loose against the strongest of the demon lords, if he wanted even an inkling of a chance.

    The thought of failure never crossed his mind as he stepped forward 1 .

    Yuuki was incredibly confident. So much so, that he wagered he could beat absolutely anyone in a one-on-one fight.

    He saw Chronoa go berserk, which only reminded him of how dangerous she was. But that was all there was to it. It would be a tough battle, but he was sure that he woulde out of top if he gave it his all.

    She wasnt alone though; there were still several hostile demon lords with her. That being Leon and Luminas. And that good-natured Rimuru, too, had surely guessed Yuukis true intentions.

    In reality, Rimuru had known Yuuki was an enemy for quite a while now. But it was better for Yuuki that he did. Otherwise, had he continued his innocent charade in an attempt to manipte Rimuru, it couldve easily backfired. Yuuki had been oblivious to this, but he definitely made the right call. Rimuru was his enemy.

    Despite his confidence, he wasnt so reckless as to take on three demon lords and Chronoa at the same time. Even without his premonition, he wouldve opted to get out of the fray as fast as he could.

    However, this time was different. This ominous feeling was because of the man standing in front of him.

    Yuuki understood this, but still decided to face the challenge head-on.

    Oh, do you think you can defeat me? Guy smirked.

    I suppose. I n to defeat you sometime in the future anyway. Im just doing this a bit ahead of schedule.

    Raine and Mizeri seethed with anger. They really wanted to kill him, but without Guys permission, they wouldnt even dare speak. Guy was the absolute authority, and it would be disrespectful to worry for his safety.

    Guy was normally pretty fickle. Unless he recognized his opponent as worthy, he would crush the enemy mercilessly.

    Raine and Mizeri worked hard to gain his approval, and if they were to cause any trouble, he wouldnt hesitate to kill them. Guy was overwhelmingly powerful and could easily beat the two of them.

    Lace couldnt move a muscle. Like a rabbit petrified by the gaze of a snakethat analogy seemed fitting.

    If Lace tried to save Footman, Raine would fight back. Even though Guy and the other primordials were outnumbered, the difference in ss was insurmountable. If they were only fighting Raine and Mizeri, then they could probably figure out a way to pull through. But with Guy here too, they had no chance of winning.

    To Lace, Yuuki challenging Guy was suicide.

    Theres no chance hed win. We aint on this guys level. That Chronoa may be pretty strong, but this Guy Crimson is the real monster. We aint able to take him. We cant run away, either. The n that Boss hasit better work or we aint gonna survive

    Lace deserved credit for having seen a fraction of Guys true power. Amazingly, considering the circumstances, Lace was still thinking about ways to escapethat tenacity was one of Laces greatest strengths.

    He knew Yuuki was strong too, albeit constantly hiding his true strength from even hispanions. Lace didnt know whether it would be enough to fight Guy or not

    If Yuuki couldnt win, Lace nned to save Footman and run away with Teare. Yuuki would surely catch on to Laces n and act ordingly. This would only work out because of their mutual trust.

    The problemy with Raine and Mizeri though. They were no ordinary enemies, either. They wouldnt sit back and let him get a chance to help Footman. Lace was rooted in ce. He had to carefully weight his every move.

    Gotta figure out a way to save Footmanwhile his mind was working on a solution, something unexpected happened.

    Hey, let him go, Guy ordered Mizeri.

    There was no way shed go against his order. She quickly released Footman.

    Howcent. But now we have a chance to escape.

    Lace began to think more positively, but it seemed things werent going to be that easy.

    Dont worry, if you manage to beat me, Ill let you guys go. I wont touch even a hair on you guys.

    Guys challenge contradicted itself. If they could beat Guy, wouldnt they be able to just walk away anyway? His deration was troubling. The situation was bing increasingly hopeless. He prayed that Yuuki would win as he watched the battle.

    Yuuki was the first to move. With absolute confidence in his immunity to magic and Skills, he fearlesslyunched a kick at Guy.

    His kick was sharp, heavy, andbined with a feint. At first, his foot was closing in to sweep Guys legs, before jerking upward tond a clean uppercut. Despite Yuuki being the one tond a devastating kick, he ended up scrunching his face.

    Tsk, just how built are you? he grumbled with a click of the tongue.

    His Anti-Skill was invincible and could prate all of his enemies defense. Yet, Guy stood still, unaffected by Yuukis hit. It was as if he didnt feel any pain at all. He had done no trickery whatsoever. Guys body was simply harder than diamond. Being both tough and flexible, little could stand in his way. That neatly described just how powerful Guy was.

    Hahaha, that tickled. Id hardly call this a fight. Entertain me more, or Ill kill everyone here, Guyughed as he ignited a small me in his palm.

    It was the elemental magic Napalm Burst 2 a jet of mes that took the shape of a dragon, diving at his target with its long and narrow body. Its goal was to relentlessly attack the target until they were toasted. Burning at several thousand degrees, any normal man would be charcoal in an instant.

    This me dragon closed in on Yuuki.

    Its a waste of effort! Yuuki shouted. Magic doesnt work on m he was about to take another careless swing at Guy when suddenly a shiver ran down his spine and he jumped away.

    Ho, your instincts are quite sharp, Guy said with a smile.

    Yuuki had no time to retort, as he had thrown himself on the ground and was rolling around, trying to quell the mes. 3 Without a doubt, the effect of Anti-Skill prevented Yuuki from getting harmed by Guys magic. However, at the same time, the supposedly nullified magical me was still burning. It didnt behave like a typical magical methis one burnt oxygen, depriving it from the air. A tad too slow, and Yuuki would likely have suffocated.

    Although it felt like a long time, it all happened in the span of just a few seconds, meaning Yuuki got off without getting hurt. Had he not noticed the depleting oxygen, he would have continued attacking Guy and definitely tasted defeat. Having realized this in time, he opted to extinguish the fire, despite it making him look like a buffoon.

    And from Guys reaction, a daunting thought settled in Yuukis mind. While he didnt want to admit it, he had to be sure. Without necessarily expecting Guy to give him an answer, he took a chance and asked while standing up, Why didnt you attack me again? Are you actually trying to fight me fair and square?

    Ahahaha, dont y dumb! Surely you have realized by now that I have already discovered the secret behind your power!

    As I suspectedYuuki thought bitterly.

    His Anti-Skill was versatile and could cancel any form of power it encountered, but when it was used against Arts, which were made by fusing magic and a Skill, he could not nullify both of them at the same time. That was its only whis only weakness.

    All physical enhancements aside, Yuuki was still human. Even if he could fight toxins with antibodies, he could not live without oxygen. The weaknesses of his humanity, Yuuki now realized, put him at a disadvantage.

    Guy stood there casually.

    I know someone who can cancel out magic perfectly, but I would still win in a fight. Thats because they couldnt cancel anything other than magic. As far as I know, there is no way topletely defend against thews of physics in this world. When you specialize in one thing, youll be vulnerable to another. But you dont only seem to be able to counter magic, but Skills as well

    Guy, looking down on Yuuki, revealed his thoughts without attacking any further. Hisx attitude was all calcted.

    It wouldve been easy for Guy to kill Yuuki outright, but that wouldnt have been fun. Instead, Guy wanted to destroy Yuukis confidence first, and then watch him admit defeat in despair.

    He had figured out Yuukis physical constitution when Yuuki first attacked. Guy had already seen through his quirk. He even nned a counter for it.

    So what if Yuuki was able to cancel magic and Skills? As long as he was human, it would be a piece of cake to beat him. Humans are fragile. Their frail bodies had plenty of weaknesses to exploit. Guy didnt need to think too hard toe up with various ways to kill a human.

    Besides, Yuukis physical abilities were far inferior to Guy. When Yuukiunched his kick, Guy only left a tiny Barrier as defense, but even that was too much for Yuukis kick to prate, leaving not even a nick.

    In terms of magicule capacity,paring the two of them was almostical. Guys magicules could rival a True Dragon, so even if Yuuki canceled his magic, he could immediately recast it without a hitch.

    If I just wanted to kill you, then I wouldnt havee here myself. Now since Im here, youd better amuse me, Guy provoked Yuuki, arrogant as he stood over him.

    He wanted to make Yuuki desperate enough to go all out. And then he would promptly beat him to a pulp.

    Yuuki had painfully figured out what Guy was nning, but he couldnt muster a retort. His remaining confidence disappeared from his face. He started analyzing the situation, desperately trying to figure out a way to get through this.

    His genius brain hade to the conclusion that the gap in power was lightyears across, but Yuuki was not going to give up. He was searching for all possibilities. The only ray of hope he could grasp onto was that Guy was underestimating them.

    I cant fault him for looking down on me when he really is leagues ahead. But as it stands, hes a bit too cocky.

    Yuuki had other trump cards. They were the superpower he was born with, as well as the Greedy One he had taken from Mariabell. In addition, he had his Creator, which could create whatever Skill he required for the situation. Using Creator could help him ovee this disaster.

    Youll regret that you didnt kill me when you had the chance!

    Steadying his breath, Yuuki faced Guy again.

    Dont get cocky just because Ive shown a fraction of my power.

    He wasnt being a sore loserhe meant it. If he could make his opponent angry, he would loseposure and make mistakes. That was his n.

    As he spoke, Yuuki allowed his power to surge through his body. He now used the power he usually suppressed, concentrating his mind on a singr task, to remodel his body to fit his will He evolved from a human to a Sage, and then once more to be a Saint. He evolved to a form surpassing Hinata herself, and ceased to breathe. A fully evolved Saint was equal to a spiritual life form. While Hinata was still being limited by her body, Yuuki had reached a higher ne of existence. Now, he had ovee the need to breathe at all. He cast out the weaknesses of humanity and greatly elevated his existence. If he were to convert all his energy into magicules, he could rival Leon and Luminas.

    Yet, Guy was not fazed by this either.

    How disappointing. Is that all youre capable of? You wont be able to win against me, even if we fought a million times over, he said dismissively, nonchnt as always.

    Perhaps. In that case, Ill do my best to entertain you!

    Yuukis promation kicked off the battle anew.

    A secondter, Yuuki learned why Guy was regarded as the strongest demon lord.

    The scene was desperate. Yuuki was lying on the ground, physically outmatched. Against Guys overwhelming strength, none of Yuukis attacks worked. It was no use trying any more tricks. Not even his strongest, most polished attack could leave a scratch on Guy.

    Dammit, damn it all!

    Yuuki didnt have the strength to even get up again. The most he could do was curse at Guy. At this point his prevailing resilience was praiseworthy.

    Laces eyes were glued to the battle. He could never forget what he saw unfold.

    This is just too wild. It aint Boss being too weak, its Guy being outta this world

    Yuukis strength exceeded Laces imagination.

    Making use of his strange power, psychokinesis, Yuuki was pulling out all the stops to see what would work on Guy. He was lobbing stones, igniting fires, applying force, and releasing mental interference waves. Yet, all of this was easily countered. Even though he was using ridiculous strength, thirty times stronger than an average human, tounch attacks at speeds over a hundred meters per second, his attacks were childs y to Guy.

    Yuukis primary way of defense, Anti-Skill, was no exception. It was unable to stop Guys magic after a few hits.

    That wont work on me anymore, Guy taunted.

    It appeared that he had figured out how to counter Anti-Skill somehow. That was a horrifying fact.

    Kazalim and yman had mentioned the Ten Great Demon Lords in the past. They had emphasized that Guy and Milim were particrly strong, but this vast difference was unfathomable. Had they been aware of it sooner, they would never have agreed to the naive ambition of conquering the world.

    So this the power of a Catastrophe-ss

    Lace had finally learned his ce in the food chain, and that he should avoid those at the top. He had always chosen to hide his true strength from even his closestpanions, yet against a demon lord like Guy, he wouldnt have even made a scratch. Guy was on a whole other ne of existencepared to them.

    Lace couldnt even spot an opening for an attack. Even Yuuki, who was certainly stronger than him, was lying helplessly on the ground like a baby. With how things had developed, itd be easier to travel to space than toe out of this alive.

    Someone has to make a sacrificeLace made up his mind. He put on his usual half-hearted attitude and stepped in front of Guy.

    Magnificent, Demon Lord Guy-sama. We, the Moderate Clown Troupe, are open to any business requests. Currently, we are already employed by Yuuki over there. Since our boss has lost now, we may logically consider our contract terminated

    Huh!

    Lace, what are you sa

    Lace put on a front of betrayal, pretending to betray hispanions, though rather flippantly. He didnt know what Guys personality was exactly, but heard he was remarkably selfish and arrogant. He seemedpletely uninterested in the weak. Unless he recognized you, you were not permitted to speak with him.

    Lace approaching Guy with this attitude was flirting with death. But at the same time, it also meant that he had Guys attention. This could give Yuuki just enough time to make his escape. Lace made his gamble.

    Never betray yourpanions and never betray your clientthat was the golden rule of the Moderate Clown Troupe. Thats why Lace thought Yuuki would for sure be able to pick up on his unspoken n.

    Footman was too much of a loose cannon and not the sharpest tool in the shed. But he was also very thoughtful of hispanions. Teare was actually stronger than yman, yet she was too timid to show her true ability. And even though both of them had the bad habit of getting over their heads sometimes, they worked fine under Yuuki. It was because of this that Lace decided to sacrifice himself.

    Im sure Id be of help to Guy-sama. So what do ya say, at least spare me my life? Lace shamelessly dered in open treachery.

    Footman and Teare were in utter confusion, while Guy looked on with curiosity, as the edges of his mouth slowly widened into a grin.

    Great, I just have to keep this up and Guy will surely be pissed off!

    Lace didnt n to dig his own grave, either. There was little hope with Guy as your opponent, but he still had a slim chance of saving his life. Thats why he wasnt going to hesitate anymore and decided to finish his sentence.

    But just before he could say it out loud

    A-ha-ha, dont push yourself like that, Lace. Seriously, am I really that unreliable?

    Someone spoke before Lace. It was Yuuki, shakily standing up.

    Yuuki braced himself for his own death.

    At this moment, his heart filled with unquenchable resentment. He was angry at his own powerlessness. He was even angrier when he heard what Lace said.

    Yuuki had managed to interpret Laces words correctly. Lace would never betray him. In other words, what he had said was all an act. Even when Yuuki was in such a sorry state, Lace still chose to have faith in him.

    His mind was swirling with joy, but also guilt.

    If only I had more power

    Realistically, nobody would be there to respond to his desperate thought. Yet at that moment, something spoke inside Yuukis mind.

    You want power? You need my help.

    Yuuki was baffled. He thought he mightve been hallucinating from the exhaustion, but the voice definitely sounded real.

    Just trade ces with me. You will obtain the strongest power. Your wish is to conquer the world. Taking my help will make it a cakewalk. Come on, make your decision.

    The strange voices proposition irritated Yuuki.

    Shut up. I am me. It may be different from borrowing the strength of mypanions, but I wont stoop so low as to borrow a strangers power to fulfill my ambition.

    Yuuki was confident in his choice to reject the offer. After all, going after a personal ambition would only be meaningful if it were achieved without outside help. Yuuki had his principles, too.

    The voice fell silent, seemingly confused about his unexpected response.

    Changing gears, Yuuki quickly brought his mind back to the situation at hand, disregarding the voice he could no longer hear.

    Even though the situation had be desperate, something caught Yuukis attention. He realized that Guy mustve had some goal. Indeed, while Guy likely wanted to engage in battle, there must be some other reason.

    Guy said something along the lines of: I dont want Rudra to gain more strength. In other words, if he would not go into the Eastern Empire and assist Rudra, Guy wouldnt need to kill Yuuki and hispanions. At least, thats how Yuuki interpreted it.

    So, then why didnt Guy kill Yuuki immediately?

    Seriously, toe to toe, I have no chance against him. My next y is a battle of wits. But instead of Lace offering to take the fall, this will have a better chance of seeding!

    Yuuki regained his confidence and stood up once more.

    Yuuki brushed back his bangs and put on a defiant smile, in spite of his circumstances.

    I didnt expect you to be so strong, clearly surpassing my calctions, Yuuki conceded. But Ive seen through your n. You werent going to kill us after all, were you?

    Heh, what makes you think that? Guy sneered.

    If you had nned to do that, you would have obliterated us by now. With each attack, you only ever left me on the brink of death, never finishing me off. Why? The confidence in his voice was palpable. He was being incredibly reckless.

    How could Yuuki talk to Guy like that after seeing his immense strength?

    Nobody could understand Yuuki. Nobody except for Guy, who was rather intrigued.

    So you noticed, but you dont need to know the answer.

    Guys response made it clear that he wouldnt reveal anything else.

    Yuuki shrugged. He had expected this answer, so he began to calmly execute his next n.

    Then I want to make a deal with you.

    You want to make a deal?

    Yeah. If you let us go, we can be of help to you.

    Be of help to me?

    Indeed. It sounds like you dont want us to join the Eastern Empire, but I hope I could sway your mind otherwise.

    Keep going

    Since our goal is to conquer the world, we will eventually be an enemy of the Empire. I have experienced the extent of your great power just now. Knowing it, I dont want to be your enemy. Because of that, destroying the Empire first would be much easier.

    Yuukis exnation was just confusing nonsense to everyone else. Footman and Teare were lost. Lace was confused about the current situation, too. He was prepared to die for his n, yet his only hope, Yuuki himself, threw a wrench into the whole thing. All that was left for him was to hope that Yuukis negotiations went well. Even so, Yuukis rash words made Lace sweat profusely.

    This is way too reckless. The reasoning is absurd, but why does it seem like Guy is enjoying this?

    Indeed. As Yuuki said this, strangely, Guy cracked a smile.

    You still intend on challenging me?

    Thats only natural. My ambition is to conquer the world, after all. Right now, I dont seem to stand a chance against you. But one day, Ill eventually surpass you.

    Yuuki could barely stand because of his wounds, yet he still talked big to Guy.

    Thoughts like pissing off Guy would get me killed didnt even cross Yuukis mind while he was talking.

    But this was Guy he was talking to, so his attitude turned out to be the right call. Had he begun to pathetically plea for his life, Guy wouldve immediately lost interesta surefire way to get them all killed.

    Unbeknownst to him, he had yed all his cards right.

    So youre saying that itll be good for me if you manage to take down the Empire?

    The conversation had reached its turning point. Yuuki had to execute his n cautiously. He shifted his gaze back to Guy and nodded affirmatively.

    Of course. I dont know the exact reason, but you dont seem to want the Empire to invade the West. Is that right?

    Guy must have some connection with the emperor, Rudra.

    That was the key. Yuuki turned up the act.

    I have many enemies ahead of me to bring down, and I intend to join the Empire. However, I dont intend to be under its control. Instead, I will destroy it from within and turn it into a puppet of ours.

    Hrm, I see. You will get help from the Empire while your goals still align, but they might not be the same afterward. You want to borrow the strength of the Empire to defeat Leon, and probably that Rimuru as well, right?

    Guys sharp eyes seemed to have seen through it all as he stared at Yuuki.

    There was no turning back for him now. He didnt know what kind of rtionship Guy had with Leon, nor what he thought of Rimuru. He couldnt even predict how Guy would react as he replied. Despite it all, Yuuki still decided to express his ambition deliberately.

    Thats right. I want to dominate the world, and I will beat you in the endDemon Lord Guy Crimson-san, Yuuki proimed with impudence.

    It was up to Guy to interpret this.

    Even if we followed Laces n, I doubt a single one of us wouldve seen another day. Sorry guys, but please y along with my n.

    Yuuki apologized to hispanions in his heart.

    It was all or nothing for them, and Yuuki was very greedy. If he lived, he would get everyone else out alive as well. The bet was incredibly risky.

    However, Yuuki hit the jackpot.

    Are you guys seriously called the Moderate Clown Troupe? Because you sure act like clowns. Youve thrown the entire ying field into disarray, like some kind of joker card. Your proposal is very interesting. Considering how bold youve been, Ive decided to let you all go peacefully. However, dont expect me to be merciful the next time we meet.

    In the end, there was no telling what Guys goal was. Whatever it was, what mattered now was that Yuuki and hispanions were saved.

    Raine and Mizeri couldnt object to Guys decision. As soon as Guy said they could go, Yuuki and hispanions fled on the spot.

    After Guy and his servants left, Yuuki and the other clowns hurried to the agreed upon rendezvous point, where Kagali and the others were. Since there were no more threats, everyone thought that it was best to leave as quickly as possible.

    Once he saw Kagali at the rendezvous point, Lace spoke up to Yuuki.

    Ya gotta be kidding me Unbelievable, to do something so bold in front of that monstrous Demon Lord Guy

    And we somehow managed to escape safely, Teare added. I honestly thought that we were screwed.

    Hohoho, I had confidence in Boss from the start.

    Thats because you dont use your brainLace teased Footman. Yuuki saw the exchange from the corner of his eyes, and sat on the ground, exhausted.

    I was forced toe up with that n on the spot, but that probably was the only way we could have gotten out of the situation alive. Thankfully, it worked in the end. Im not taking anyints from you guys.

    As opposed to the wounds he sustained in battle, his mind was far wearier. Yuuki didnt want to argue any longer at this point. Hey down spread-eagle on the ground and closed his eyes.

    Kagali had no clue what had happened, so Lace and Teare began to exin the whole story.

    Y-you guys fought Guy! And you managed toe back unscathed Kagali couldnt contain her shock, bing utterly baffled.

    Ah, its so good to be alive.

    As the wind caressed Yuukis face, he let his thoughts wander.

    Suddenly, he remembered something.

    What was that mysterious voice he heard halfway through his battle?

    Was it my alter-ego? No way, that sounds like some made up nonsense. Actually, hold on. Even though I dont feel theres any power hidden inside me, theres one possibility that I could think of.

    Yuuki recalled his recently acquired power. The Unique Skill Greedy Onewith this Skill, the stronger his desire was, the more power it would grant him.

    During his battle with Guy, not a single one of Yuukis attacksnded. This naturally included the powerful Skill Greedy One, of the Deadly Sins series.

    This Greedy One sure is a mystery too, but there are always Skills and magic beyond my imagination. Guy managed to bypass my Anti-Skill with his magic. I have to figure out how he did that

    Yuuki had an incredible amount of self-confidence, yet his ego took a huge hit after being taken down by Guy so easily. He wouldnt give up that easily, though. Now that he managed to survive safe and sound, he must think of ns for the future. Yuukis greatest strength was that he could quickly refocus himself. He was once an extremely arrogant person, thinking that he had power even surpassing the demon lords.

    No, even if Im not the strongest, with the right amount of research and strategizing, I can beat any opponent I face.

    Relying on the power he had and the assistance of Kagali, Lace, and the others, he managed to build a powerful faction.

    Everything was going smoothly. Buttely, he was experiencing failure after failure. Moreover, Yuukis fight with Guy hadpletely destroyed his confidence. That being said, he was lucky to even be alive after that fight.

    Things are getting very interesting. Some extra difficulty really spices up a game.

    And so, Yuuki was not frustrated at his defeats. Instead, he pondered further on it.

    Speaking of Guys ability, he was struggling to analyze it, even using his Creator. Unique Skill Creator was very special. Not only could it create Skills, but it could also analyze other peoples Unique Skills, provided they were using them, but Yuuki believed no one could hide their abilities against him.

    And yet, it hadnt worked on Guy. That meant that he had some power greater than Unique Skills.

    Yuuki craved for power. He wanted stronger powers that would surpass Guys. Deep inside his heart, the me of his desire burnt violently.

    In that case, perhaps my Greedy One has the chance to evolve, too. I am greedier than anyone; if I pour my desire into it

    Yuuki felt a shiver of excitement.

    He started thinking hard. Losing to Guy had made him realize how unfair this world was. He wanted to fight it and emerge victoriousthat was Yuukis wish. He closed his eyes and spoke to the voice inside his heart. He ventured to a ce deep in his heart and continued to delve deeper until he reached the bottom of that abyss.

    Yuuki observed the abyss carefully.

    So, are you ready to take my help now?

    No, thats not my n.

    Then what do you want?

    I have some business with you.

    Some business with me?

    Yes. I am going to take your power.

    Quit joking around.

    Im not joking around. I am very serious, you know?

    Stop this nonsense

    Sorry, but youre in my way.

    Ah!

    The next second, his wish swelled to fill his entire mind. He desired his true ambition and its fulfillment. He didnt want to be anyones servant. His strong will turned into a weapon. Yuuki was challenging himself.

    Then, the Voice of the World rang out.

    Confirmed. Conditions satisfied. Unique Skill Greedy One has evolved into Ultimate Skill Greedy King Mammon.

    Yuuki opened his eyes once more, now with a smug smirk.

    Ill make good use of your power, he muttered quietly enough that no one else could hear.

    On that day, at that moment, at that ce, the foulest majin was born.

 Volume 12 - Ch 1

    The Stato of Marching Jackboots

    We returned home on the same day that our music exchange with Luminas ended. Venom and his subordinates, as well as the band members whom they were in charge of escorting, were now all perfectly safe.

    The children that Diablo protected were given a week off to rest. Thankfully, they did not sustain any injuries, but I still wanted to make sure they were safe and sound, just in case. They had witnessed firsthand the difference between training and the real deal, and as a result,cked their usual liveliness. I was afraid they were traumatized, so I told them to have a good rest.

    My conference with both Luminas and Leon was moved to a different date. After arguing over where it would be held, we finally settled on the capital of Tempest, Rimuru.

    We came to this decision because Luminass ce, Lubelius, would be busy with restoration. As for why Leons territoryEl Doradowas a no-go, there was apparently something serious going on over there and so they couldnt afford to invite foreign dignitaries at the moment. In that regard, there would be no problems if we convened in Tempest, and I had no reason to decline.

    After all, we already had two demon lords staying in our nation.

    A certain annoying fairy and azy, young nobleman popped into my head.

    I didnt have time to rest yesterday, since the two of them came over as soon as they could. After Leon had returned home, he allegedly began to make immediate preparations for his visit. While I thought it was rather impatient of them, I understood that both Luminas and Leon wanted to prioritize the exchanging of important information. Besides, I wanted to hear their sides of the story about what happened. That was why I didnt voice anyints and instead agreed with them.

    We gathered in the most luxurious reception room avable. The leaders of this conference were Luminas, Leon, and I. Given that it was a conference between demon lords, I put on airs to suit the asion.

    Only those involved would take part in the meeting.

    Once we coted the various details, we would determine how much information we could share regarding Chloe. Given the circumstances, there was a tacit agreement that it would be better to keep Chloes situation a secret from even our own subordinates.

    Shion, Diablo, and Veldora were alsoing with me.

    Honestly, I didnt want Veldora to attend. Since he would get bored halfway through the conference anyway, I wanted him to y quietly in his room. But for some reason, he became all adamant and asked, And why should I not be joining?

    If you insistI had unwillingly agreed to let him participate.

    Shion was supposed to be in critical condition following her battle with Razul, but she recovered in the blink of an eye. Ultraspeed Regeneration was indeed a very terrifying Skill.

    She stood dutifully behind me, alongside Diablo. Hinata was seated next to Luminas, with Louis and Gunther shadowing them both. Positioned behind Leon, the two knightsAlrose and udewere also at the ready. Last but not least was Chloe, the girl of the hour. Even though she returned to her child-like form, it would be prudent to treat her as an adult.

    The inside of the room was furnished with a rectangr table, along with six individual armchairs that we had provided. Veldora and I sat side by side, directly facing Hinata and Luminas. Leon and Chloe, on the contrary, were seated at the ends of the table, opposite each other.

    With that, the interim demon lord meeting had begun.

    First, we asked Chloe to personally exin to us what had happened. As she delved into her story, Hinata interjected here and there, adding her own rifications for what had urred. Naturally, what they shared was impossible to believe. However, having experienced that imaginaryndscape firsthand, I could more readily ept their testimony.

    So, with the help of Hinata and Rimuru-san, I was able to safely free myself from the Infinite Loop, Chloe dered, marking the end to her almost inconceivable exnation.

    Everyone looked like they had something to say, but kept quiet, ncing around as they tried to gauge each others reactions. In such an uneasy situation, Veldora was the one who broke the ice, mainly because he couldnt read the mood at all.

    Which means the Hero who sealed me away was

    That doesnt matter at all, does it? I thought quietly to myself, but Hinata already had a response waiting.

    Me. Now were tied with one win and one loss. Dont you think its good to have tasted defeat?

    Wha-WHAAAT?!

    Ara, do you have a problem with that? If you want, we can settle this once and for all.

    Grrr, very well! Since you insist, allow me to show you my true strength and

    Our meeting would go nowhere if this continued. Hinata was usually levelheaded, but strangely enough, she was being immature towards Veldora.

    I decided to be the mediator for this one.

    All right, thats enough.

    Please discuss your differences when you two are alone.

    Hinata, it is very important to teach that moronic dragon some manners. If you are going to fight him, then Ill join you, so dont be afraid to call me at any time.

    Please dont make things worse, Luminas-san.

    And so, I hurriedly changed the subject. Come now, everything turned out fine. By the way, Ive been thinking about this for a bit, but I was apparently killed, right? I wonder if the culprit came from the Empire.

    This was an important issue to me.

    Even now, the Empires movements remained suspicious. We needed to stay vignt due to their potential hostility.

    Chloe voiced her support. Yeah, probably. I also think that it was the same person who killed Hinata. It seems like there are powerful individuals in the Empire, and although theres also the possibility that you were challenged by several people at once, the sh of light that pierced through Hinata was something I couldnt even follow.

    I see. If this person could kill Hinata, then including me on their hit list wouldnt sound too far-fetched because I never became a demon lord in that timeline.

    Despite the fact that Ive evolved into a demon lord now, its still better not to let my guard down.

    Even though it was apletely different timeline, I felt serious aversion to the person that had killed me. We definitely needed to exercise caution when it came to antagonizing the Empire.

    I agree. The Empire is a lot more dangerous than what you think, Rimuru-san. After you died, Veldora went on a rampage, but the Empire was still able to fend him off.

    While fighting Veldora, Hinata was murdered, and Chloe leaped into the past. Afterwards, Chronoa could only remember certain things from her fragmented memory.

    Still, there was no doubt that the Empire used the sh between the rampaging Veldora and Chronoa to their advantage. Given that we had witnessed firsthand the power of Chronoa, just being able to intervene in such a battle was a feat in itself. And if that was the case, then the Empires strength was definitely greater than what we expected.

    Luminas and Leon looked like they had the same idea. Everyone had a growing sense of urgency regarding the Empire.

    Of course, in this somber atmosphere, Veldora just had to blurt out his off-topic opinion. Me going on a rampage? I find that hard to believe, he asserted, a smug look on his face.

    Everybodys reaction to that outburst could be summed up with What is this guy even saying?

    Veldoras impressive ability to joke around like that in such a heavy atmosphere was quite

    Wait! Why are you all looking at me like that?! Theres no way a gentleman such as I would go out of control like that!

    Well, you see Given that he used to run amok in the olden days, it was easy for anyone to imagine that he had let his emotions get the better of him and gone on a rampage. Then again, watching my death moments before his revival mightve set off his wrath, or something like that. When I thought about it that way, I couldnt help but feel a little happy.

    Come on, let bygones be bygones.

    So, I decided to appease Veldora with a bit of warmth in my voice.

    The Empire is dangerouswe ended the discussion with that conclusion.

    Next, we analyzed Chronoas memories by having Chloe recall as far back as possible.

    After Veldora was defeated by the Empire, the world entered a tumultuous period of conflict. In the war involving the West and the East, it was the Empire who possessed the upper hand.

    Milim made her move in the midst of all this. My death set off her wrath against the Empire. However, before she could cause any meaningful damage against them, Guy intervened. As a result, history wound up repeating itselfa devastating battle between Milim and Guy.

    Dagruel and Luminas also shed with each other, adding fuel to the fire, their armed conflict bringing even more destruction to the world.

    And Chronoa fought someone and ultimately died in the process. She had rushed to wherever there was battle and fought for as long as her life stillsted. All she had left was a lust for destruction, indiscriminately taking down powerful people, friend or foe.

    So thats why she couldnt remember who killed her

    The number of individuals capable of defeating someone as strong as Chronoa is certainly limited, right?

    Its Guy.

    I can only think of Guy.

    Luminas and Leon immediately responded to my mumbling.

    I thought so, too. Despite the oue of the duel between Guy and Milim being unclear, the only person who could kill Chronoa was him. Be that as it may, we didnt know the exact reason as to why Guy would kill Chronoa, so it might not have been him.

    So, why is Chronoa so fond of me?

    Judging by Chloes story thus far, I didnt think I had any connection with Chronoa. She was revived after my death, so we never encountered one another. And yet, no matter how you looked at it, Chronoa obviously adored me. I wasnt that dense to have missed the obvious signs.

    She was already like that the first time we met, now that I think about it. When I had unwittingly summoned her to stabilize Chloe, the moment sheid her eyes on me, she hugged and kissed me. I was a little bit shocked because I thought that it was our first time meeting each other, but I surmised there was a pretext to her behavior.

    Thats because

    Because Rimuru helped me. You were definitely the one who saved me in that future, where all I did was rampage. Chronoa took over Chloes story.

    Hey, I was about to exin it to them!

    Its fine, let me continue. After all, Im also you, so arent we in this together?

    From a bystanders point of view, Chloe acted like she had multiple personalities. Chronoa could apparently interject herself into the conversation as long as Chloe wasnt actively suppressing her.

    It was something we just had to get used to.

    And so, Chloe and Chronoa swapped back and forth as they told their story. Based on ChloesI mean Chronoasmemory, I wasnt dead in the future. It was indisputably the Empire that had defeated me, but by all ounts, I had somehow revived afterwards.

    Fair enough If I survived, then that meant Great Sage, the predecessor of Raphael-san, was alive too. It appeared to have taken some time, but in the end, it also managed to pull through.

    Unfortunately, the world had seen dramatic changes. A great war erupted between the East and the West, and a fierce power struggle arose among the demon lords.

    Hmm, its not hard to imagine what I would be feeling then. After all, it was still me. There was no doubt in my mind that I would have desperately tried to find friends who had managed to stay alive. Saving everyone was an impossible task but helping those I had a connection with was definitely feasible. And through that, I found Chloe (Chronoa).

    The crucial parts of Chronoas fragmented memory were, regrettably, what she could not remember clearly. Despite the setback, we could still perceive the flow of events, albeit vaguely. I evidently met Chronoa and ended up fighting her countless times. And with my earnest efforts, she wouldve eventually returned to her normal self.

    Nevertheless, what the world endured was simply irreparable.

    As we all expected, I indeed fought Guy. I dont know how or why it happened, but the one thing Im certain of is that Rimuru was already gone at that point. Yet, Rimuru had hugged me while I was dying. After I finally passed on, I recovered my consciousness and saw myself (Chloe) and the previous Rimuru together.

    I wasnt surprised about Guy fighting her.

    More importantly, the strange thing that urred just before Chronoa was about to diewas probably her Time Travel activating. But that in itself was not enough to exin how she arrived at Chloes timeline. Perhaps I did something to make that transpire.

    When you saw me, had I evolved into a demon lord yet?

    You had. The Rimuru I met then was strongerpared to the current Rimuru.

    Oh, you can tell that just by looking?

    I was under the belief that I was pretty strong at the moment, but I doubt Chronoa would misjudge someones strength. If that was true, then I could only infer that losing the people I knew spurred me on to do something crazy. Honestly, all of this was irrelevant to me now anyway; then again, there was also the issue of the Empire. Rather than stressing over it, we should view the situation in a positive light: an opportunity to motivate everyone and get them stronger.

    Well, lets just keep it at that. Besides, if that alternate Rimuru was stronger than me, then surely Great Sage had also evolved into Wisdom King Raphael. If so, then it wouldnt have been too far-fetched if it did something unthinkable like sending Chronoas spirit and memories to the young Chloe.

    Fufufu, even you cant deny the possibility.

    With that, we tentatively cleared up the presumed future chain of events.

    I guess everything turned out fine, I said, nonchnt.

    Hinata gave me a sidelong re. Arent you taking this a bit lightly?

    Dont say that. Chloe is safe now, and Veldoras already been revived. As long as we keep an eye on the two, we dont have to worry about them going out of control. Therefore, isnt the only problem we have to deal with the Empire? I answered with a bright smile.

    Thats right. If Dagruel ever attacks, I will take care of it. This is my repayment to you for helping Chloe.

    Luminas and Chloe seemed really close, and because I had saved Chloe, my stocks with her reached an all-time high 4 . Thanks to that, it appeared Luminas and I would be able to maintain a better rtionship than ever before.

    One of our main concerns involved Dagruels treachery. Thankfully, Luminas vowed to take care of it for us. She even promised to protect the West without me needing to ask. The Western Nations had always, by nature, been Luminass domain. Even though some of the regions had disputes with Guy, he only saw their interaction as nothing more than a game. Luminas apparently came to the conclusion that there was no use fretting over it. The bigger problem was Dagruel. Obviously, we were wary of the fact that he would be hostile one day.

    He is going to join the uing war, Luminas dered, so there is a high possibility that he will take advantage of it when the Empire ultimately moves.

    I was still skeptical. But Dagruels sons are currently living in this country, you know? I dont think he would use military force against us that easily.

    In my opinion, there had to be a reason for Dagruels actions.

    Huh? Did you say Dagruels sons? Are you sure?

    Yup. Theyre Shions subordinates now and have been working hard on their training.

    In response to my words, Shion crisply remarked: Yes, that is true. Although they still have a long way to go, theyve recently shown good results in their training. And when I treat them to my home-cooked meals as a reward, they cry tears of joy. They are such a cute lot.

    Cry tears of joy sounds rather dubious to me. While eating food cooked by the woman you loved would certainly leave you happythat entire premise depended on the food being edible. Actually, as long as you tolerated the look and texture, you could technically eat Shions cooking. Well, I reckon it was fine to leave them to their own devices. If the people themselves didntin, then I had no reason to interfere.

    Luminas looked astounded upon hearing that Dagruels sons were in my nation. That said, she regained herposure within a matter of seconds.

    Sounds like its true. Then, someone has manipted Dagruelno, it sounds weird if I say it that way since its something that has taken ce in the future. I suppose we can say someone might manipte him, Luminas stated after careful consideration.

    A war had broken out in the future, but we were at peace right now.

    There must be a reason behind Dagruel harboring such territorial ambition. When I had met him during Walpurgis, I never got the impression that he was a bad person. I figured I should ask Dagura and the other two sons for a possible exnation. If he were experiencing any problems, we could lend a helping hand by offering advice. And if it could be solved through diplomacy, then it was a much better solutionpared to armed conflict.

    We will also look into the matter on my side.

    All right, I shall entrust that to you. I do not wish to engage in some unreasonable battle, after all.

    We still had time to spare for the results of our investigation regarding Dagruel. Luminas would also be on the lookout, just in case, as it would be troublesome if Dagruel truly did conspire with the Empire.

    Louis and Gunther nodded together, implying that we could trust them to stay vignt.

    Next up is the situation with Guy I began.

    Ill tell him, Leon volunteered.

    It was useless if weined to Guy since this whole ordeal took ce in the future. On the other hand, our worries werent exactly assuaged, either; a better n would be to exin the circumstances to Guy instead. However, I wasnt sure how much information we could actually disclose

    Guy is a Mediator. Although it has nothing to do with me now, I feel like he may or may not have destroyed me a long time ago. I cant really remember it clearly, so it doesnt count, Veldora suddenly confessed.

    I didnt know where to start, what to do, or how to go about it. What did Guy being a Mediator even mean? This was also the first time Id heard about a fight between Guy and Veldora long ago, where Veldora was annihted.

    By the way, I thought that saying something along the lines of I cant remember it, so I still did not lose was a petty excuse that children used. But that was a bit mean, so I decided not toment.

    Ho, Guy sure does some nice things, remarked Luminas.

    Mediator, huh? Guy is not an ally of humanity, but he is undeniably not an enemy either. Its safe to assume the reason why he killed Chronoa in that future was because he feared the idea that if she, the lust for destruction incarnate, were to be left unchecked, it would lead to the copse of the world, Leon concluded.

    What the heck is a Mediator anyway?

    Everyone else had already grasped the situation. I asked the question outright, and Luminas was the one who exined it to me.

    A Mediator is a system that exists separately from Heroes and demon lords. It is said that a Mediators goal is to prevent the destruction of the world and to be the spokesperson of its creator, Star King Dragon Veldanava.

    Thats right. My older brother, the Star King Dragon Veldanava, established that system to prevent the world he worked hard to create from copsing.

    I see. That would exin why Veldora was punished; in order to prevent him from destroying the world.

    It made a lot of sense to me. Also, as a result of Veldoras story, I was able to confirm that True Dragons could resurrect. I still doubted whether he really lost his memory about that incident, but lets not point that out.

    Got it. So, Guys unlikely to go after Chloe now.

    Yeah. I also recall Chronoa rampaging, and I think what Demon Lord Guy did was reasonable, so I dont n to hold any grudges against him.

    Hinata and Chloe seemed rather convinced and had spoken with smiles on their faces. We could avoid a fight with Guy as long as we nipped potential causes for violence in the bud.

    If thats the case, can we permit Leon to exin this matter to Guy? I proposed.

    Of course. After all, the future of me and Chloe is at stake here, Leon stated with firm conviction.

    Leon-oniichan, Chloe quickly pointed out, has nothing to do with this.

    Such innocence was quite scary. I felt a bit of sympathy for Leon.

    While Leon was very handsome and cool, the world apparently universally recognized him as a viin. As was the case with Shizu-san, Leon seemed to be a poor talker and was haunted by a guise of evil. Maybe that was why he was so easily misunderstood. Inymans terms, he was the pr opposite of Masayuki.

    Chloe treated him like the friendly neighborhood onii-chan. Not even a shred of romantic interest existed in her mind. Leon appeared to have been a popr man for a long time, but that might be the reason why Chloe waspletely unaware of the affection he showed her.

    When I thought about it, he was also a pitiful man. And so, I came to the conclusion that I should be a little kinder towards him.

    The two demon lords promising their cooperation was proof in itself that this conference was a resounding sess.

    Thus, the only thing left to be wary of was the Empire. We still needed toe up with our own ns after the meeting, so when I was about to formally dere the end of our discussion

    P-please wait! We have guests right now, and they are in the middle of an important meeting!

    Oh, Im amazed you noticed meing. But, you see, I made the effort toe all the way here, so let me just say hi.

    Amotion could be heard from the corridor.

    I mean, this voice and the arrogant attitude from that conversation just now could only mean one thing

    The person right outside the room was unmistakably the strongest demon lord, Guy. I could count the number of people who were able to slip under my radaran impressive feat, might I addon one hand.

    Report. No hostility detected.

    Dont tell me you noticed him?

    But now was not the time to argue. I hurriedly got up from my seat. But before I could move any further, Diablo, who was standing behind me, headed to the door with a sour look on his face.

    Yo!

    Go home.

    Following that brief exchange, Diablo mmed the door shut with a bang.

    We were all frozen in shock at the incredible spectacle before us.

    The door reopened and Guy stormed in, yelling, Hey, hey,e on now, Diablo!

    Tsk, youre interrupting this important meeting. It hasnt even been a day yet, which is why Im still unprepared. I want to take my time speaking with you, so please donte here until I invite you.

    Despite Diablos polite words, his attitude towards the one he was addressing, Guy, sure was self-assertive.

    Or perhaps they know each other? I wasnt the only one who had the same thought. Even Luminas and Leon were surprised.

    Unbelievable. He didnt budge an inch against Guy. As expected of Noir.

    Noir, you say?! Why is somebody like him working under Rimuru?

    Hmmm?!

    Listening in, there was something rather disconcerting about the words being spoken around me.

    Is Diablo that significant of a figure? Well, I guess hes got a cocky attitude Seriously, what does Noir even mean?

    While I was standing there, utterly bewildered, more disturbances arrived. The first toe running here was Benimaru, followed by Souei, hot on his heels. Next was Carrera, and almost at the same exact time, Ultima burst into the room, too.

    Rimuru-sama, are you all right?! Benimaru pressed. Just now, my sister told me

    Milord, Carrera said urgently, I felt the presence of Red!

    Has the war started? If so, I will do my best! Ultima promised.

    It was pandemonium.

    Given the circumstances, it would be a better idea to receive Guy as a guest than to drive him away. I had no intentions of inviting Guy here to begin with. Id have to wring out Diabloter to find out what the deal is.

    But for now, the first priority was to get this ce in order.

    Guys, calm down. Diablo, control yourself.

    My words quieted the people who had just barged in.

    Once everyone in the room collected themselves, I continued. Although this wasnt nned, we do have something to talk about with you, Guy. Since youvee all the way here, Im going to ask you to join our meeting. Is that all right? I checked with Guy.

    Yeah. I also need to discuss something with you, so this is good timing.

    Leon was supposed to exin everything to Guy, but it looks like there was a change of ns. And so, with Guys attendance confirmed, I decided to dismiss the people that had assembled.

    Dont worry. Ill call if something happens, so for now, you guys can get back to work.

    When I said that, everyone had a look of relief.

    I had to do a double take when I heard certain people spout lines like: Phew, as expected of Red. Im still no match for him now, huh? or Tsk, I thought this was my opportunity to go all out, but in the end, the situation was somehow brought under control.

    Everyone that had gathered returned to their respective jobs. Then, Shuna left the room to prepare tea for those who remained in the room.

    Immediately after her departure, Leon spoke up.

    Hey, whats the meaning of this? Why is Jaune here?!

    Hm?

    I have a question, too. Isnt that other person Violet, or is it just my imagination? Im not sure because, from what I have heard, she allegedly has a more gloomy and malicious personality

    Hmmm? What are these guys thering about with this Jaune and Violet thing? Ah, maybe!

    Did you mean Carrera and Ultima? They were recruited by Diablo over there, and theyve been better than I expected I tried to exin, but was unable to finish my sentence.

    Carrera? And Ultima?! Youyouve given them names!!

    I cant believe it. So what you are saying is you not only have Diablo, but other primordials attending you as well

    Leon had suddenly stood up and yelled at me, whereas Luminas looked genuinely astonished. Their sharp gazes pierced right through me.

    See, youre bbergasted too. This is also the reason why I came hereto ask this guy about his real motive.

    Even Guy blurted something out of left field.

    Id like to answer you, but I dont really know what to say, okay?

    While I was puzzling over how to respond, Shuna entered, pushing a tea cart. We became quiet so we wouldnt hinder her work. A pleasant smell wafted through the air and brought a sense of calm to everyones mind.

    It also helped keep my wits about me as I tried to piece together what these guys were saying. The keyword was primordial, which Luminas had just mentioned. And by primordial

    Answer. One of the criteria for ssifying a demon.

    Right, I remember, you exined it to me before. If Im not mistaken, the original demons are called primordials. Wait, the original demons?!

    Diablo, are you, by some chance, one of the original demons?

    Upon asking Diablo, he casually replied, Well, yes. Indeed, I am the progenitor of one of the seven original lineages to the demon race born in this world.

    Oi oi, are you serious?

    I couldnt believe the demon I had summoned when I was about to evolve into a demon lord was such a prominent figure I knew he was very strong, yet evidently, he was even more dangerous than Id anticipated.

    No way, dont tell me you didnt know?

    Unbelievable. I thought you were careless, but I never expected you to be clueless

    Leon and Luminass stares hurt.

    After all, it couldnt be helped, right? How was I supposed to know he was that big of a deal if he answered a random summoning of mine?

    Even Raphael-san was speechless. Although, that reaction wasnt directed towards Diablos true identity, but rather at my ignorance. It was under the impression that I already knew about the primordial demons.

    No, wait a sec.

    Come to think of it, I felt that Elmesia, the empress of Sarion, had mentioned the primordials before. That would exin why she was so wary of Diabloshe already knew his true identity!

    Had I been more attentive, I wouldve noticed Diablos real character much earlier.

    Well, this was what you calledmaking assumptions.

    I never dug any deeper nor did I try to bring it up. For Raphael-san, it merely decided that there was no need to inform me. This was a major pitfall. For example, if you had a dictionary on hand, it would be worthless if you didnt use it. Raphael-san had recently been giving me advice, but even it wasnt omnipotent. There was no way it could figure out what I did and didnt know.

    No matter how brilliant your partner was, if you didnt fully utilize it, then it was useless. Never had this been more true.

    Putting aside my surprise, Diablo began to share how he met me.

    Apparently, it went back to my encounter with Shizu-san. There seemed to be a connection between Diablo and Shizu-san 5 , and when he sensed that she was about to die, he happened to visit this ce.

    It was a surprise that Diablo already had his eyes on us back then, but I had no clue regarding his intention for doing so.

    A low-ranking demon from my lineage stole my position in line and ended up getting summoned by Rimuru-sama instead; that was the height of my sorrow. However! I stayed calm and waited for another opportunity, and splendidly enough, I was able to sessfully respond to Rimuru-samas summoning! Diablo finished, grinning from ear to ear.

    Then, Diablo responding to the summoning wasnt pure luck, but rather inevitable since he was already aiming for it in the first ce?

    I was so taken aback that my head started to hurt.

    Also, this was news to me, but Diablo was evidently jealous of Beretta and tried to purge him behind my back. Despite that, he mentioned how he couldnt hurt Beretta because it wouldve been sacrilegious to damage the body I had created for him.

    This body is handmade by Rimuru-sama, warned Beretta, so if youy a finger on it, you will incur his displeasure.

    I was dumbfounded, to say the least.

    But honestly, Diablos story was excessively long. The thought that someone should go and stop him urred to me, yet Diablos fervor was too great for anyone to interfere.

    There was no other option. I had to bite the bullet.

    Diablo, Diablo-kun! Thats enough. The meeting is about to start again.

    Following my lead, Guy spoke next.

    Youre already satisfied, arent you? More importantly, that guy Dino is also here, right? Can you call him over for me?

    Prompted by Guys words, Diablos endless chatter had finallye to an end.

    Well then, I shall summon Dino-sama. Shuna, who had sadly missed her window to escape from this torment, left with a polite bow.

    She ran awaythe fact that I thought of Shuna this way was proof that I was at my wits end.

    But Im just about to reach the good part!

    While Diablo obviously still had a lot more to say, everyone shared the same sentiment and simply ignored him.

    I didnt know what he might even begin to reveal if we heard any more of his story. Also, it was better for Diablo to keep his mouth shut for the sake of my own peace of mind.

    Guys seat had apparently been set up in the midst of the uproar. It was a guest armchair brought in by Leons subordinates from an adjacent waiting room.

    Oh, how thoughtful of you.

    Guys words were answered by Leons subordinate knights, Alrose and ude, with a light bow. The two were apparently already acquainted with Guy. Otherwise, neither of them wouldve dared to engage in such reckless behavior, given that this was Guy we were talking about here.

    I shouldve prepared his seat, considering he was my guest, but with what just took ce, I didnt have enough time to pay attention to these kinds of matters. I mightve offended Guy if I hadnt offered him something, so I was grateful those two guys were here.

    The secretary who was supposed to assist me was, well, too engrossed in his storytelling. And my other so-called secretary, Shion, never left my side, like it wasnt part of her job responsibility.

    Sorry about that, I apologized.

    No, dont worry about it!

    We are also aware of Your Majesty Rimurus circumstances. Arent you keeping people away from this room so we could be at ease? If so, then this was the least we could do.

    These two, Alrose and ude, were really nice people. Diablo and Shion should take notes from them.

    Listen, you guys have to be attentive like that.

    Kufufufufu, I spoke a little too passionately.

    While Diablo appeared to have wanted to pin the me on Guy for dropping by unexpectedly, he normally wouldnt have made such a blunder. But I guess this was just bad timing.

    Yes, this was a good learning experience!

    Shion was rather upfront.

    This girls only good at talking the talk.

    I silently prayed that this incident would contribute to their development.

    Guy plonked down on the armchair, exuding his cavalier attitude. At the same time, Shuna returned with Dino in tow. For some reason, Ramiris also came along, and, putting all the things that had just happened aside, the meeting resumed once again.

    The first topic of discussion was about the primordial demons.

    Then, Dino. Let me hear your excuse.

    Er, what excuse? Dino naturally responded to Guys inquiry. However, his attitude struck a nerve with Guy.

    Dont fuck with me! Why didnt you stop this guy from naming those three?!

    Hes got a point. That is important, you know?

    It seemed that this guy referred to me, but if Im being honest, I wouldnt have entertained the thought of naming them, had I known how dangerous they truly were.

    Although it was toote now, he shouldve at least warned me.

    Listen, what the hell do you think I sent you here for?

    Uhm, sightseeing?

    Wrooong! For reconnaissance, reconnaissance!

    Looking at their exchange, I thought Guy was rather hot under the cor. While I had already suspected as much, Dino was now definitely confirmed to have been a spy. But really, I wished Guy hadnt openly outed him as a spy to the face of the very person being spied on.

    And you, too! Dont make that innocent expression as if you had nothing to do with this!

    Uh oh, I got dragged into this as well. The fact that I was being scolded by the same people who decided tomit espionage against me was outrageous. On the other hand, I was certainly the cause for such behavior. I wanted toin, but itd be unwise to gripe without thinking things through.

    This was Guy we were talking about here; provoking him was definitely not a good idea.

    Gah-hahaha! Dont fret over little things, Guy. This isnt the first time hes granted names willy nilly, Veldora-san unexpectedly backed me up.

    Keep at it! I cheered in my mind.

    Shut up! Luminas shouted. Dont interrupt when the adults are in the middle of a conversation!

    O-okay.

    Veldora fell silent after that harsh rebuke. His inability to talk back demonstrated how wimpy he really was.

    Well, thanks to Veldoras sacrifice, their finger-pointing had shifted away from my direction. I didnt want to blow this opportunity, so I started to needle Guy with my grievances.

    Okay, okay. The reason Dino came here was to keep an eye on me, right? Ill put aside myint about that for the time being, and while Dino is at fault for not stopping me, shouldnt the person who entrusted Dino with this job and sent him to my ce also be held liable for poor supervision? Dont you think so, Guy-san?

    This was, in other words, sharing responsibility. Itd be no fair if I were the only one being criticized here, so my n was to ensure Dino and Guy got their fair share.

    Dinos involvement was already clear, so all I needed was Guys confession.

    Thats right, Guy. Basically, I cant do surveince stuff for the life of me. Its frankly surprising that you thought of making me work.

    Dino appeared a lot more perceptive in this kind of situation given how he caught on to my plot.

    Guy looked frustrated. You bastards

    We had to find a way to settle this quickly, all the while being careful not to provoke him any further.

    First and foremost, I didnt have time to stop him, Dino said. When I saw Rimuru with the primordials, I was totally baffled, speechless. After all, theres three of em, yknow? I epted the matter with Diablo because hes always been an oddball, but the idea that someone like Testarossa, along with those other two, would willingly serve another person was something I couldnt even begin to imagine!

    I guess so.

    Oh, Dino is trying to shirk responsibility with his remark, and Guy is agreeing with him. This was a bad development.

    Me too! I added I wholeheartedly believed Diablo when he brought them here and promised that they would be helpful, and so I weed them. I never thought that they would turn out to be such big shots, since everyone was very polite about agreeing to work for me. Theyre under Diablos direct control, and hes the one responsible for them. If anything happens, Ill also be held ountable, but its only natural to trust your subordinates, right?

    Trying toe up with a good excuse, I redirected the me towards Diablo. When you got down to the crux of the matter, Diablo was the root cause of all this trouble. That much was certain.

    I nced at Diablo, giving him a hint that he should do his best to take on Guys anger. When I did, for some reason, Diablo nodded happily after hearing my remark.

    Kufufufufu, Rimuru-samas faith and his words fill me with joy. I will have to work harder to live up to his expectations!

    Guy wearily fell silent after witnessing Diablos radiant smile. Then, he let himself lean back in his seat.

    In other words, its Diablos fault? Guy asked with disdain.

    Hes at fault, and

    We are the victims, yeah?

    When I faltered with my exnation, Dino awkwardly finished the sentence.

    Diablo was the only person that had confidence in his response.

    This guys been weird since the olden days, so theres no useining now, Guymented, pointing to Diablo.

    Dino, you werent able to stop Rimuru. This, too, is understandable given the situation.

    Oi oi? I dont like where this is going.

    Well. Rimuru, its you!

    I knew it! Why are you pointing the finger at me now?!

    What do you mean?

    I shouldnt panic here. I had to face Guy with a sense of self-assurance, coupled with an attitude that showed I hadnt done anything wrong. With that in mind, I relinquished control of my body to Raphael-san so that he wouldnt notice my agitation.

    I felt relieved. Regardless of how turbulent my thoughts were right now, I appeared calm on the outside.

    Dont fucking make excuses!

    Following that outburst, Guy then scolded me aplenty.

    He mentioned quite some serious stuff, like how the delicate bnce of power in the world hadpletely copsed as a result of my actions. Consequently, the changes to the current state of world affairs were unclear, among other things. Transferring control over to Raphael-san had been a useless attempt.

    Guy seemed a lot more calcting than Id thought.

    Also, because of you, Mizeris n failed. You gonna be taking responsibility for that too, yknow?

    Guy finished his sermon on that note.

    While it was ridiculous to ept responsibility for something I didnt even know about, if Guy was willing to overlook my behavior, then it was a small price to pay. I nodded and agreed to his demand, for the time being, and got through this precarious situation.

    Even though the sermon was over, Guy continued with his story.

    He imed to be causing disasters regrly to remind humans who themon enemy of mankind was. The purpose, ostensibly, was to make people fear the existence of a powerful entity, so that they wouldnt spend all of their time engaging in pointless power struggles among themselves.

    When Granbell had been in charge, his approach was to wait and see how things would go and refrained from taking any bold actions. But this time, Granbells war against Luminas had upset the bnce.

    Thus, Guy had ordered Mizeri to unite humanity with fear.

    With the deaths of the elected councilors, the leaders of the member nations within the council would reaffirm the threat of the demon lords. And by making that happen, the leaders of the Western Nations would join forcesthat was the scheme Mizeri had devised.

    Then, for some reason, WhiteTestarossawas present in the assembly hall where Mizeri attacked. Tsk, Im so used to calling you by your old name, I said it by ident, Guy grumbled under his breath, then resumed recounting his experience.

    Mizeri abandoned her n to avoid shing with Testarossa. That was fine. The problem is, whates next? As soon as we are unable to control those devious humans, they will start skirmishing. Moreover, now that the Rosso family has copsed, the power struggles will undeniably intensifyits just a fact of life. And with that tomfoolery of the Western Nations in the midst of the Eastern Empires suspicious movements, their defeat is all but certain. This is your fault, Rimuru. Tell me, what are you going to do?

    This was unexpected. I didnt know Guys goal was ultimately to prevent the dissolution of the Western Nations.

    He didnt seem particrly interested in humans, but he still might be concerned about them perishing. I mean, it did sound like the duty of the Mediator.

    I didnt think he was on the side of humanity, and that his methods were rather extreme; nheless, I felt that we could understand each other, depending on the way we did things. Therefore, the current point of contention was how to deal with the Western Nations, which I intended to sort out.

    I didnt even know that Testarossa and Mizeri had encountered each other, but I couldnt use that as an excuse. I just wanted humanity to recognize our existence as monsters and build friendly rtions with them.

    As I was wondering how to answer Guy, Diablo stepped forward. Ignoring Guys slightly ufortable expression, he began to speak.

    Heh, we dont have to do anything unnecessary; we only need to help realize Rimuru-samas ideals.

    Although I was anxious of what he might say, it wasnt like I had a better alternative. Arguments about ideals wouldnt work on Guy, so I wagered on Diablos confident attitude, but it appeared to be a failure.

    Diablo, to my surprise, started preaching about idealism, which I had dismissed as an ineffective strategy.

    What do you mean?

    Its simple, Guy. What is the point in tediously shackling people in fear? Indeed, fear makes people obedient. However, thats not the best way to utilize their full potential. Whats more, remember that fear gradually fades away. Regardless of how much tragedy you inflict on mankind, they will eventually forget. Conversely, resentment will be the only thing that remains.

    Hmm. Continue.

    Their resentment will eventually turn into hatred, and they will begin to seek revenge against the one that oppresses them. Thats exactly what human beings, clever butcking wisdom, will do as they are not aware of the stark difference in absolute power between us. If they are instigated by monsterkind and the like, they will soon resort tomitting foolish acts.

    Well. I would ughter them before they could carry out those stupid decisions.

    Kufufufu, itd be futile. Considering how stupid humans are, their memories about the massacre would eventually vanish. It is unavoidable because their species cycles through generations so quickly. But

    Diablo paused briefly, then faced Guy with a serious expression.

    Compared to the unipr concentration doctrine of the Rossos, the redistribution of wealth rebuilds rtionships between countries while maintaining some degree of equity. Thus, a new economic principle emerges.

    Which is?

    The new economic principleby providing the foolish human race with different options, they will be under the illusion that they are the ones who have chosen their own future, and innately believe that they created it. This system, unlike human memory, wont disappear over time. It wille to rule the world of man semi-permanently. Managing that will be Rimuru-samas jobin other words, our job.

    Ooh, Diablos talking sense. If people believed they created it, then theyll take care of it themselves? I mean, was that even my original intention? I felt like I had said something along those lines, but I didnt think it was that big of a takeaway Starting with the premise that it would seed was also a little daunting.

    I see. If you control the economy and guarantee security for free, the weak will undoubtedly depend on you. A society in which everything is decided by a bloodless war. Maybe it is even better than what the Rossos had in mind.

    Guy nodded to himself, as if he now saw Diablo in a more positive light.

    Of course. It will be a world where many are happy, rather than an elite wealthy few. The supply and demand created there will produce new possibilities. Thats Rimuru-samas wish, Guy.

    Welp, he isnt wrong.

    What I was looking forward to, was the improvement of cultural life. Movies, music,ics, and novelsI wanted to see more entertainment avable for the masses to enjoy. In order to create such art, possessing a stable livelihood was essential. I wished to help people lead fulfilling lives so that new hidden talents could be discovered.

    With that being said, I havent given it much thought beyond that.

    Meaning, once you experience and appreciate a blessed period of peace, you will be afraid to lose it?

    Thats right. If I had to sum it all up in one word, itd be the concept of gratitude. People would thank Rimuru-sama for protecting their peace, and therefore be cooperative for the sake of maintaining world stability. I believe it is more effective than your idea of control through fear.

    The next thing I knew, Diablo and Guy were nodding together as if they had understood one another.

    After listening to Diablos conjecture about the future, Luminas and Leonand even their subordinateslooked at me, seemingly impressed. I couldnt exactly reveal that this whole thing wasnt actually my original intention in this serious atmosphere.

    However, itll require a long-term outlook and careful calction to put that into practice, wont it? If you dont manage it well, I can picture the number of people growing out of control. Could you look after and handle that many?

    Oi oi, they arent exactly pets you need to take care of. Dont phrase it as if theyre some Japanese rice fish pets that are getting overpopted inside a fish tank.

    Hm, are you implying that Rimuru-sama cannot see that far into the future? That may be an arduous task for you, but its nothing Rimuru-sama cant handle in his spare time. So, allow me to inform you that there is no need to worry.

    Oi. Why are you already assuming that I will manage it?

    To be honest, I believe I once told Diablo that it would just be like the demon lords who controlled the world from behind the scenes. If I said that in front of Guy and the others, theyd probably be annoyed.

    Though I was concerned, it turned out that my worries were unfounded. Rather, it was

    I see. Well, Ill leave it up to you. Im not too optimistic, but I have nothing at stake if you fail. The only thing left for me to do then is to weed out those stupid idiots with my own hands. Lets see how you handle your responsibilities, Guymented with a surprising grin.

    Having been forewarned, all I could do was prepare myself for the worst. Since I had nodded in agreement with him earlier, I couldnt really say no now.

    Diablo exaggerated a tad, but he is, for the most part, not wrong. Its a bit idealistic, but I do hope that will happen one day. Even if you hadnt said anything, I aim to achieve world peace my own way, I promised Guy.

    Thus, before I could fully process what was going on, the Octagram had officially entrusted me with the management of the Western Nations.

    Well then, it would have been nice to end the meeting on that pleasant note, but there were still other problems.

    Rimuru, Ill give you a small piece of advice. Jaune, or Carrera, has a violent temper and a penchant for unleashing nuclear magic whenever she feels like it. If you dont keep a tight rein on her, this precious capital will be reduced to ashes, warned Leon.

    Following that little bit of news, Luminas also shared her insight. Thats right. Let me add another thing. As I mentioned earlier, the Violet that I know of is gloomy and malicious. She is a being synonymous with inhumanity. Unlike monsterkind, she does not seem to have any intention of eradicating the human race. On the other hand, she has a very fickle and vtile personality. Although she appears to be acting as a cheerful little girl in front of you, I suggest you keep your guard up.

    Yep, they both revealed something rather unsettling. Whats more, even though it was never directly mentioned, it seemed that Testarossa was more troublesome than those two.

    This became a problem. No, it wasnt appropriate to say it became one. To be precise, I finally came to the realization that this whole situation was a massive headache.

    Now that I knew the three demonesses were actually primordial demons, I had to take charge of them. If something went wrong, then I would be held ountable for their actions Despite the fact that they were supposed to be Diablos subordinates, that excuse wouldnt fly.

    I had already promised Elmesia-san that I would take responsibility, so it was toote for me to refuse.

    I wanted to punch my naive self for not knowing what I was really getting into, but I guess I had to suffer the consequences for being such a carefree person at that time.

    Compared to managing human society, this one seemed to be a bigger pain in the ass. The thought made me depressed, and I let out a mental sigh.

    Once Guy finished talking, Ramiris, Dino, and Veldora stood up, as if on cue.

    Well, it seems like were just bothering you guys, so Ill leave the rest to you!

    Right. I also have something important to do. Vesta-san is waiting for me, so Ill see youter, Guy!

    Then, I should return to guard thebyrinth. Ahh, busy, busy, Ga-ha-ha-ha!

    Noting their well-rehearsed choreography, it wasnt hard to figure out that they were nning to escape.

    Dino, in particr, was evidently tired of having the proverbial finger pointed at him, and thus made his announcement without even a shred of sincerity.

    Huh? Guy retorted, and unable to let it go that easily, took another jab, You working? What a sorry excuse for a joke.

    No, no, its the truth! came the reply, but instead of Dino, it was actually from Ramiris. You see, Dino is also helping out as my assistant!

    That bit of news came as a genuine shock to Guy. Dismissing whatever came from Dinos mouth was one thing, but when even Ramiris backed up his im, Guy was left with no choice but to believe him.

    Dino is working? Really? Rimuru, just what kind of magic did you use?!

    Guys astonishment was directed at me this time, but I also struggled toe up with an answer myself.

    I dont know either! In our country, we have a simple rule: If you do not work, then you do not eat. He was no exception, thats all, no magic involved!

    I wouldve had a much easier time if that kind of convenient magic was at my disposal. Thankfully, I somehow managed to get my point across to Guy since he didnt push the subject any further.

    Ramiris and the other two had hastily retreated from the room. Their impable timing was hardly a surprise, given how they had already polished off all the tea and snacks Shuna had prepared. Geez, what upstanding guys.

    Well, fine. I thoroughly chewed Dino out this time, so maybe hell finally put some effort into his reports now, Guy muttered quietly.

    As Id mentioned, that kind of talk would be more appropriate if I werent sitting right here. How was I supposed to deal with such a brazen admission of espionage? Well, I doubt Guy wouldve even listened if Id told him. Plus, it was probably better to spin this in a positive lightwe could be honest with our intentions.

    I decided to leave it at that and changed the topic.

    So, did youe all this way just to ask about Testarossa and the other two?

    If that was all he wanted to do, then he wouldve left by now. And seeing how he was still here, there mustve been something else on his mind. I wasnt particrly keen on inviting more problems, but if I hadnt asked, I wouldnt have found out.

    That was troubling me too, but the reason for my visit is different, Guy rified, slumping back into his chair.

    His gaze wandered over everyone in the room and came to rest on Leon.

    I swung by after meeting these guys who call themselves the Moderate Clown Troupe.

    Oh?

    Arent they the ones youve been making deals with? Guy asked.

    Yes, Leon replied.

    No, wait, wait. This is an important revtion, not something you can just gloss over!

    Hey, I interjected, so did you meet with Yuuki, too?

    Yeah, Guy frankly responded to my question.

    I had recently ordered Souei to search the Freedom Associations headquarters and branches. I hesitated to think that Yuuki had intended for yesterdays encounter, and so I figured he would show up in the association headquarters, where he was based. Although he likely wouldve made efforts to reappear unnoticed, I cautioned Souei and his subordinates to keep an eye out for disguises and substitutes while they reconnoitered the location.

    I hadnt received any reports of movement as of yet. I also wouldve never guessed that Guy had encountered Yuuki and his troupe.

    Then, does that mean you were conspiring with Yuuki? I ventured.

    What? Dont be stupid. Those bastards were trying to escape to the East, so I punished them a little.

    I was under the impression that Guy and Yuuki were on the same side, but evidently, they werent. That tidbit came as a relief to me, but it still didnt exin Guys motive.

    So you didnt kill them? inquired Leon.

    While that concerned me too, there was more beneath the surface. Did Yuuki intend to abandon everything he had built up in the West and flee to the East? Like, I knew he was gutsy, but that was a terrifyingly bold decision to make.

    However, catching Guys ire was definitely a stroke of bad luck for them. Since he said it was just a punishment, he probably didnt kill them. Still, they were undeniably given a serious beatdown. Well, I wasnt about to feel sorry for them; on the contrary, they had certainly deserved every bit of it.

    They didnt die. At first, I considered capturing them to sell you a favor. However, the situation changed, Guy exined, and went on to recount what happened when he encountered Yuuki.

    As a result, a rough outline of Yuukis surreptitious behavior became clear: Yuuki was the employer and the boss of the Moderate Clown Troupe. Well, this only proved that myRaphael-sansprediction was urate.

    As for the numerous feats and misdeeds Yuuki had carried out:

    First, he developed the Adventurer Mutual Aid Association into the Freedom Association.

    Second, he conspired with the Rosso family, who controlled the council, and handled ndestine work for them, which included brokering deals with Demon Lord Leon.

    Third, he backed yman as demon lord and was manipting him from behind the scenes.

    Fourth, he crushed Echidna, the Mother of Darkness, whichmanded the underworld of the East, and engineered the surreptitious organization named Cerberus.

    By day, he was the head of the Freedom Association, and by night, he led a secret society.

    This was the first time Id heard of Echidna, and apparently, it was a considerablyrge, underground group. The information was authentic, since Leon was the one who provided it.

    By the way, the Orthrus ve Trade that Masayuki allegedly destroyed was supposedly a subsidiary of Cerberus, so Yuuki mustve been involved with that. He was immensely gifted at destroying a preexisting organization and seizing control.

    Although the strategy sounded pretty easy in theory, it was actually a Herculean task in practice. He had achieved all this within ten years, which clearly ced him a cut above merelypetent. It wouldnt even be an exaggeration to call him a genius.

    Despite Yuukis many talents, he still suffered setbacks that stemmed from his overconfident personality. A major w of his was that he would misjudge an opponents strength.

    One look from Guy should have been enough for him to understand just how much trouble he was in. Fortunately for him, Guy decided to let him off the hook, so I suppose I could onlymend his exceptional luck.

    Yet the fact that Yuuki survived that encounter left me with mixed feelings. I wouldnt go so far as to wish death upon my fellow countryman; at the same time, I couldnt forgive his actions, either.

    Yuuki had the facade of a kind person, all the while secretly leading Leon and the Rosso family, which was headed by Granbell, around by their noses. Not only that, but he also employed the Moderate Clown Troupe to set Hinata up for a fight against me

    His utmost goal was this childish dreamone of world dominationand I couldnt evenugh because of the implications.

    By the way, why did Guy forgive Yuuki so easily?

    So, I began, addressing Guy directly, what are you nning, since you let Yuuki go like that?

    It would pay off big time if I got an answerthat was why I had inquired.

    Well, it was all for a game, Guy replied nonchntly.

    The word game didnt make much sense to me, yet Guy seemed to ignore my confusion and continued on with his story.

    ording to him, the Eastern Empire would soon make a move. Guy had let Yuuki go because he was offered a deal: Yuuki would sow chaos among the ranks of the Eastern Empire in exchange for sparing his life.

    Incredulous, I asked Guy, Um, hey, you dont seem to want the Western Nations to copsewhats up with that?

    The answer I got was even more surprising than the one before.

    Its my job to manage them so that they dont copse. Well, I dont want too many of them, though. The entire human race will be ruled by demon lords. Thats my ultimate objective.

    That must have been the game Guy was talking about. When he hasplete control over humanity, victory is his.

    No no, then why did you order Mizeri-san to go destroy the council?

    The members of the council wouldve been wiped out right before the impending invasion from the East. Had that happened, the Western Nations wouldve been royally screwed. Any efforts to coordinate a defense amongst countries wouldve been impossible, their fates most likely sealed before they even had a chance to fight.

    You can just call her Mizeri, Guy smirked at my question, then continued. I approved of Mizeris operation in order to unite the West.

    What does that even mean

    Answer. It is likely that the n was to bolster Masters control in the West by instilling fear in council member states.

    Uh, so in other words, what he implied was something like this: the council members are wiped out by a demon lord, and the humans fall into panic. Then, if I were to reach out to them, the humans wouldnt hesitate to seek my protection. To that end, a little sacrifice was trivial.

    Answer. That is likely correct.

    I see. They had purposefully concocted an extreme plot, which could easily paint me in a good light. Though I felt that Guys aim and Mizeris intentions didnt quite align, they were trying to work things in my favor.

    No, thats not it.

    I guess they thought they could use me to manage the Western Nations. But I was one step ahead of Guy, and already had my hands on the West. While I didnt really think that far ahead, the council waspletely within Testarossas unrelenting grasp.

    Guys goal wasnt to destroy humanity, but rather the exact opposite: he wanted to properly manage the human race so they wouldnt perish due to their own stupidity.

    Thus, if I were to take on that role, it would be a boon to him. Nevertheless, this failure marked a positive development for him.

    I figured one thing out thoughGuy is a cker at heart.

    I was now convinced that things would be better if I handled them myself.

    Then, I pondered aloud, you wont have any problem with me dominating the West, I assume?

    Nope. Unless those idiots forget whos boss, I have no intention of butting in.

    Thats a relief.

    It felt like we skipped over a couple steps I had otherwise expected, but if he was fine with it, then I had no qualms about managing the Western Nations from now on.

    In that case, Ill ept the offer. By the way, do you mind ending your assaults on the northern regions of Ingracia?

    Id heard from several sources that Guys subordinates regrly ravaged thosends. That area had been under the protection of Razul until he met his demise at Shions determined hands.

    Since it was an emergency at the time, Sarions emperor, Elmesia, dispatched the Magus to subdue them. It would be out of character to thank her for it, but it was also a little too convenient for me to ask her a favor like that again.

    As long as I was in charge of the Western Nations, Id have to shoulder the burden of defending them, which entailed hefty defense expenditures. Id really like to avoid that, and fighters of Razuls caliber were few and far between to begin with.

    Please be at ease. Those chores can all be left to Testarossa, Diablo reassured me with a smirk, as if he had solved all my worries.

    Yeah, thats right, Guy interjected before I could even ask if that was okay. Those guys would need a ce to unwind from time to time, so just leave them to their own devices.

    Even Guy agreed with what Diablo suggested.

    In that moment, I knew that a normie like me would never understand what went through a demons head.

    As Diablo had rmended, I decided to hand the demons off to Testarossa. And because I took Guy at his word, I judged there wouldnt be any disagreements about it.

    This was how I cemented my hegemony over the West, but it wasnt over just yet.

    All right, Rimuru, can I leave the matter regarding the Eastern Empire to you then?

    Prompted by Luminass question, I suddenly remembered that little problem again.

    When you say the Empire is making a move, do you mean theyre taking military action? I ventured to confirm it for myself, and Guy nodded as if it were obvious.

    Ive heard the Empire has been conducting a number of military exercises recently, Hinata added. Theres been a lot of talk about it at the council as well. The fact that she was aware of the situation suggested that she probably had a n in mind.

    As for me, I was rather skeptical about whether an invasion from the Empire was truly feasible. I had deliberated over the three possible routes of invasion and deemed them far too arduous and unrealistic to assault.

    Apart from the vast losses they would incur, the Empire stood to gain little if they ultimately decided to conquer the West, ending in a Pyrrhic victory. A war of aggression was, after all, waged for profit. Prosperous countries became promising targets for those who had no food to eat, no resources to use, nor any space to live. If those problems could be solved, then there was no real reason for bloodshed.

    However, it came as no surprise that this was not an easy problem to solve. There was no reason for a rich country to make sacrifices for a poor country, and if they were demanded to do so as a matter of course, it would definitely cause disputes among other nations.

    That was why affluent countries also held armies for self-defense. It was important for them to dissuade aggressors with the guarantee of a heavy cost for victory. Should the blood they spill outweigh the potential gains they would make, then only a fool would resort to war.

    Even so, they still wanted to wage war. The reason for that was

    Answer. They are likely confident in their odds of victory.

    Is there no other possible exnation?

    Since Id taken control of the council, it was inconceivable for there to be an insider. But if there were one, they might have developed some new technology or devised some oundish tactics Or perhaps they possessed some kind of trump card.

    Hinata.

    I know. Youre wondering about the structure of the Dwarven Kingdom that you requested me to evaluate before, right? From what Ive gathered, its not impossible to get arge army through.

    Hinata instantly read my intentions and gave me the information I wanted.

    The Dwarven Kingdom was neutral, and I doubted that Gazel would permit it, but it was the safest route to use to invade the West.

    No, perhaps

    I wasnt sure it would happen, so I had dismissed the thought, but there really is a chance that theyll attack the Dwarven Kingdom first, huh?

    Hmph, dont try to hide it. I know your request for me to investigate that route was based on that very suspicion.

    Huh, Hinatasplimenting me? It was just something that popped into my mind, but whatever.

    Was I exposed? Well, since thats a possibility, we need to deal with it first.

    I should contact Gazel and conjure up a n together.

    The fact that we had delegated military authority of the council to Tempest was already bing more trouble than it was worth. Nheless, it was now our inescapable responsibility to bear the brunt of the Empire.

    If you werent here, Granbell and Luminas wouldve had to fight the Empire, Guy informed me, his voice indifferent like it wasnt his problem.

    The Empires military power was unknown.

    The Rosso familysbined strength, the Holy Knight Order, and Lubeliuss forcesled by Hinatawould have been the ones entrusted to counter the Empires advance.

    Guy didnt seem too concerned with which side would win, but even then, he had epted Yuukis offer; he mustve had his own reasons for that. The key thing to find out was what he meant by the word game, but I didnt think he would give me a satisfactory answer even if I asked.

    Ill help as well, but I wont be under yourmand, okay?

    There was no reason for Hinata to be on the front line, so she had a pretty good point.

    I still dont understand why they want to initiate war, but we wont be sitting on our hands, thats for sure. Hinata, I want you to be ready in case the Empire invades in a very unconventional way.

    Understood. Well take care of the agent who disguised himself as a merchant, too.

    Hinata reassured me with a somewhat strained smile. That was a relief; there was nothing more for me to add.

    Rimuru. If you are defeated, then I will have to fight. Work hard and make sure that does not happen, Luminasmanded, as if my failure would be a major annoyance.

    Luminas couldnt afford to worry about a war right now. She had to assess the human casualties surrounding the copsed Grand Cathedral, as well as its reconstruction efforts, back in her own nation. Honestly, I was grateful to have gotten Hinatas cooperation, given everything that was going on.

    What worries me is if we can even cooperate with Yuuki

    The potential prospect of working together made me feel quite emotionally conflicted.

    The Farmus Kingdom had been led around by the nose, and mypanionsincluding Shionwere harmed, all because of Yuuki. He was the one who controlled yman, and if we went further back, was also involved with the Orc Lord, the incident caused by the previous Geld. Even if you were told to let bygones be bygones, it was difficult to readily ept that sentiment.

    Rimuru-sama, are you worried because of us by any chance?

    Shion could sometimes be unusually sharp. I hadnt even breathed a word about that, yet she spoke as if she had already seen my inner turmoil.

    I guess you could say that. With everything that weve endured, its hard to just suddenly trust him.

    Or rather, having faith in him was out of the question. And when it came to war, there was nothing more dangerous than an untrustworthy ally.

    Even I dont know what that runaway Yuuki has nned next. Im not really interested either; I just hope hell do his best in sabotaging the Empire, Guy revealed rather nonchntly.

    I thought for a moment after I heard that.

    As Id expected, the idea of including Yuuki as a part of our military forces was a bit far-fetched.

    Kufufufufu. Let us ask Souei-dono to investigate his recent activity, suggested Diablo.

    Please do so.

    We would hold off on the matter of Yuuki for now. But the question of whether or not we would findmon ground was entirely up in the air. At the very least, there was no way we could work together without at least receiving a proper apology.

    Since we were also running a country, we might have had to consider reconciling with him depending on how he yed his cards. Although, my heart definitely wasnt kind enough to disregard his actions without some form ofpensation.

    Shion, will that be enough for you?

    Of course! If he remains hostile, I will crush him, and if he is willing to reconcile, then I will forgive him after just one punch!

    Please dont end him in that punchI silently begged her in my mind.

    If that really wound up happening, then we just had to say it was an ident. Since neither Shion nor I had the intent to kill, we could insist that it wasnt on purpose.

    On that note, we decided to postpone the matter of Yuuki.

    That was not the end of Guys business with us as he had one more thing to discuss. His real reason foring was rted to the Heroin other words, Chloe.

    I knew that Granbells goal was to free what Luminas had desperately tried to hide in that ce. So, Ive been watching over it to make sure it doesnt go off rampaging. But then Diablo told me to let Rimuru handle it.

    Guy said he then dropped by to check up on what happened after that.

    Just when did this exchange happenwas what Id initially thought, but then I remembered there was a short interval where Diablo momentarily stepped out while the battle was still raging on. Thats probably when he made that unwanted negotiation.

    I sighed internally, but it turned out to be a blessing in disguise. I didnt know how things wouldve turned out if Guy ultimately decided to join the battle at that point.

    We were just talking about that earlier, but this is good timing. We can go over it once more, and Ill exin it myself.

    Taking the lead here, I decided to elucidate everything. I didnt think Leon or Luminas would say anything uncalled for, but better safe than sorry. It was probably a good idea to hide critical information, like Chloe casually leaping through time, or that she had gone through several loops already. I thought that if I never mentioned it in the first ce, then there was no way for him to find out.

    And for that reason, we defeated the rampaging Chronoa and resolved the case.

    Although this wound up dumping all of the me on Chronoa, it was done to protect Chloe. It would have only led to trouble if we exined that Chloe was Chronoa. I wanted to keep it a secret from Guy.

    I see, you went through a lot. Then, can I ask just one thing?

    Ahh, ask me anything.

    That girl over there, no matter how you look at it, is a Hero. How are you going to exin that?

    Grr. I tried to cover up the story, but it was impossible with Guy.

    Next, I attempted to give a probable yet absurd exnation. This childs hidden power was awakened in that fight

    Dont lie.

    I knew it.

    Awakening to new powers in the middle of a fight was a ssic development, but as expected, such an excuse didnt work.

    The truth is I hesitated, wondering what to say.

    Leon spoke up and covered for me. The person Ive been constantly searching for with specific summoning is this Chloe. By whatever whim of fate, she was there, but thanks to that, we were saved.

    I had absolutely no idea how Leon nned to continue the tale, but ying along appeared to be the only way to deceive Guy.

    That is correct. I was surprised too, but this girl, Chloe, was the perfect vessel to seal Chronoa.

    Before I could interject, Luminas cut in and followed Leons lead. The scale of this whole turn of events ended up getting even moreplicated, but more importantly, was I supposed to be the person to continue after her?

    A sealing vessel, you say? Guy muttered, then nced at me with weary eyes.

    Thats what I want to ask, tooI thought to myself, but it was unthinkable to tell the truth now that the story had gone this far. I had no choice but to join in.

    Right. ording to Leon, she possesses a special ability that allows her to steal the power of any opponent and seal it away. I was skeptical at first, but once I witnessed its effect with my own eyes, I had no choice but to believe it.

    Hows this?

    I handed it off to Leon, signaling that the rest was up to him.

    Honestly. I ended up having my trump card taken from me, but its better than allowing it to uncontrobly rampage around.

    Luminas quickly joined in with a bitter expression, delivering it in an extremely convincing fashion. Shes incredible as alwaysI quietly admired her.

    All that was left was for Leon to wrap it up.

    Thats what happened. There are a lot of strong people in this world, including you, Guy. I sought to protect Chloe in case of a threat, but I didnt think that she would expend her power as soon as I met her. I really am unlucky.

    Leon let out a depressed sighpaired with a look that made me seriously question if he was pretending or not. If Luminas won the award for best actress, then Leon wouldve won best actor as well. Thankfully, the story now came perfectly together: by sealing away Chronoa, Chloe gained the power of a Hero. That was the setting we had concocted.

    Hmm. You guys arent trying to trick me, are you?

    No, not at all.

    Being overly doubtful is a bad habit of yours.

    Thats right. You shouldnt worry about such trivial things.

    We denied Guys suspicion in perfect harmony. The reason why we were able to instantly cooperate was because the three of us all cared for Chloe.

    But you see, Guy mused, that girl definitely gained the power of a Hero, right? Would it truly be okay to leave things as they are?

    Leon stood up in response to Guys words, but Guy merely smirked and cated him by saying: Rx, I wont touch her.

    Then thats fine. Just remember, if you ever think of pointing a de at Chloe, then youll have to go through me first, Leon warned, then sat back down.

    While that didnt exactly help the tense atmosphere, Guy never had any murderous intent. I was on guard because Id thought that he might cause a problem, but he subverted my expectations with his cordial behavior. I felt relieved as a result, but in an instant, something happened that made my blood run cold.

    The bright glint of a moving de.

    I had no clue where he brought it out from, but Guy had a longsword in his hand and was currently swinging down at Chloes neck with it.

    Guys swift swordsmanship was worthy of being called godlike. My perceptual speed, which stretched things out a million times more than normal, told me that I was already toote even if I moved immediately.

    Not only that, Leon and Luminas faced the same dilemma. Everyone had an air of despair and tried to turn away from the horror that would transpire.

    But, in the next moment, a sharp and clear ng echoed.

    ?!

    The small Chloe suddenly grew up and blocked Guys attack; I didnt know when she had pulled a sword out, either. Her clothes had also changed to that of a Hero. Chloes usage of her Holy Spirit Armor was fairly natural, and she seemed to have already mastered it.

    Nice to meet you, Demon Lord Guy-san. Even though its my first time seeing you in person, I always knew you were strong.

    Ahahaha, youre not bad as well. Chloe, was it? People capable of using that power properly are, including me, quite scarce in number.

    Guy and Chloe exchanged greetings. Despite the friendly behavior between the two, I was on edge.

    This was because I didnt understand what had just happened. I couldnt track their movements even with my perception cranked up by a factor of one million.

    It became abundantly clear that this phenomenon wasnt due to some kind of super speed. There was no turbulence in the surrounding air, nor were there any abnormalities in thews of physics.

    Magic, or something else, perhaps. Its times like these that my trustworthy partneres into y. Now, I request an exnation, Raphael-san!

    Report. Unknown. Failed to Analyze and Assess the phenomenon performed by individual Chloe Aubert.

    Uh, seriously? For Wisdom King Raphael-san to say I dont know was certainly a rare sight to behold. Whether it was prediction or partial calction, it would normally give me at least some information. The fact that it couldnt even provide that this time meant it really was a supernatural event outside of itsprehension. In other words, this was impossible to deal with.

    I was definitely taken aback, but I nced around to gauge everyone elses reactions. Leon and Luminas appeared just as pale as I did. However, instead of being angered by Guys actions, it felt as if they were desperate to understand what had taken ce right in front of their eyes.

    The others were out of the question. They evidently didnt even notice the movement of the swords, so they couldnt have possibly recognized the dire situation.

    If anything, Diablo was the only one who looked remotely surprised. Maybe he had some idea of what had just urred. Id ask him about thatter, but first, I had to stop Guy and Chloe.

    With an expression that read, its my turn, Chloe began attacking Guy.

    They were amicable enough when they exchanged greetings, so why is this happening

    They crossed swords several times. It felt like I was watching a stop motion animation; the continuity to the flow of their sword exchanges was nonexistentor so it seemed. This was bad. I couldnt fully follow everything, so this was all based on conjecture.

    Stop, stooop!!

    I forced my body in between Chloe and Guy. It was a risky gamble trying to predict where theyd pop up next, but it thankfully worked.

    Hey, dont do anything rash. You couldve been cut down by mistake.

    Thats right, Rimuru. Guy wasnt seriously fighting; he was just testing me. Although, Im really happy that you were so worried about me, Chloe reassured me, adding a hug and nting a kiss on my cheek. This, too, was another stop motion movement. Ill dere that this was unavoidable force majeure.

    Speaking of Chloe, right as she kissed me, she became small again. No, it was more like she became the original Chloe again. She then yelled, while turning red and shaking with anger, Enough! How dare you hug Rimuru-san on your own, and even ki-kiss!

    Was that Chronoa just now? I asked.

    Yes. We switched in the middle.

    Apparently, while Chloe was the one who blocked the first attack, Chronoa took over for the rest of the battle. They lookedpletely identical, so telling the difference was a little challenging.

    As soon as Chloe calmed down, Leon picked her up and carried her in his arms. He cautioned, Rimuru, I greatly appreciate the fact that you helped Chloe, but I cannot allow you to get any closer to her.

    Enough already, you worry too much, Leon onii-chan.

    After cing Chloe down on her chair, Leon stared coldly at Guy.

    Guy, didnt you just say you wouldnty a hand on Chloe?

    Sorry. I was just testing her for a bit. Obviously, I had no intention of killing her.

    Even if thats the case, you shouldnt joke around with that level of strength, regardless of whether or not you had murderous intent.

    Leon was fairly angry and refused to back down against Guy, given his long-windedint.

    It was Chloe herself that intervened between the two, desperately exining that Guy had no intention of hurting her, and that she wanted to test Guys strength as well. Consequently, Chronoa seemed to have gone on a slight rampage, so it wasnt entirely Guys fault. Perhaps Chloeno, Chronoawanted a glimpse of how strong Guy, the cause of her death in the future, was.

    The current situation was entirely different from the future that Chronoa experienced. She possessed a new power that she never had beforeif my memory serves me correctly, I believe it was the Ultimate Skill Spacetime King Yog-Sothoth.

    Chronoa was rather interested to see if that power would work on Guy.

    !! One possibility has emerged. Assuming that the individual Chloe Aubert can use the power of the Unique Skill Time Travel, which has been integrated into Ultimate Skill Yog-Sothoth, to control time, Analyze and Assess will always fail, since it is impossible to observe phenomena that are not on the same time axis.

    Ah, is that so

    The true nature of the power that Chloe acquired was the ability to stop time, or something to that effect.

    Raphael, too, was using Analyze and Assess on the inner workings of the Unique Skill Time Travel, but itd still take some time before it got any conclusive results. It looked as though Time Travel had firmly been incorporated into Chloes Yog-Sothoth.

    Well yeah, its hard to understand something you cant even observe.

    In short, Chloe was the one who made that power her own. While the thought of that was already absurd, I also wanted to scream aloud that being able to stop time was basically cheating.

    Needless to say, I wouldnt be able to see anything even with my perceptual speed stretched by a million. There was no way for us, whose bodies yielded to the flow of time, to perceive events that happened in a frozen world.

    No, hold on a second.

    If we assume that is correct, then doesnt that mean those who cant reach that time-frozen world will never win against those that have, no matter how strong they are?

    Answer. That presumption is likely correct.

    Hey, youre kidding me, right?

    As much as I didnt want to believe it, I had no choice but to at least acknowledge that potential. I mean, even Chronoa was once killed by Guy. It was only natural that if someone could willfully stop time, then you never stood a chance. On the other hand, if we applied the same reasoning, didnt that mean Chloe could stand up to Guy right now?

    Even though she bore the appearance of a cute little girl, Chloes strength had already surpassed mine. And with that realization, I broke out in a cold sweat without anyone knowing.

    In the end, Leon gave in and a settlement was reached.

    Just like you care deeply for Ramiris, I care deeply for Chloe. Keep that in mind, Leon warned, strongly insinuating that he wouldnt stand idly by next time, and sat down.

    I feel the same as well, Guy. I certainly admit that you are the strongest, but it would hurt to lose our cooperation, wouldnt it? Unless you are serious about antagonizing her, know thatying a hand on Chloe will make us enemies.

    Luminas seemed like she was also secretly upset and joined Leon in berating Guy.

    Normally, it wouldve been foolish to dere outright who you thought of as a loved one, but with Guy, the opposite was true. There was no stopping him if he truly became hostile towards Chloethose two thought of it this way, and so they demanded he noty a finger on her.

    Okay, okay. I dont want any trouble either. As long as she doesnt get in my way, I wont mess around with your precious thing.

    Surprisingly, Guy was rather understanding, and so the safety of Chloe was secured.

    Meanwhile, our beloved Chloe was far stronger than any of us, but it was probably better to keep that to myself.

    The sun was already setting when the meeting ended.

    Shuna had thankfully prepared dinner, so we moved to a different location and started the banquet. Or rather, there was no sign of anyone wanting to leave until we ate.

    On todays menu was kakuni 6 porkwell, a monster substitutewith fried eggnt and tofu. That was paired with miso soup and freshly made ricemore specifically, a pure-ck rice called Magic ck Riceas the sides. This wasnt one of our multi-course meals, given that todays meeting was unnned, so I refused to hear anyints.

    What is this, theres no tempura, Luminas grumbled aloud.

    Who knew she was such a big fan of it?

    Its all right, Luminas. This should be very tasty as well. You must not underestimate Rimurus obsession with food.

    Hinata took my side out of nowhere. Not sure how I should take that kind ofpliment if thats the only thing Im getting praised for. Oh well, moving on.

    Thus, the banquet continued, and it appeared that everyone was satisfied.

    I see. Your countrys dishes are somewhat okay too, Guy noted, sounding impressed.

    It has a strange taste, but at this level, I suppose it passes.

    Given how Leonpletely finished his food without anyints, I decided to take it as his way of praising me.

    Hmm, what Hinata said is right. This is another abnormal dish, but it is remarkably delicious.

    Its amazing as usual. Its a taste that Ive really missed. Getting another chance to eat this meal makes me d to be alive.

    Luminas appeared content, and Hinata was extremely overjoyed.

    No,e to think of it, isnt this the first kakuni pork and rice shes had in two thousand years?

    Maybe white rice wouldve been better?

    Thank you for your concern. Ive already gotten used to these kinds of odd-looking foods.

    I see, thats a relief. If Hinata lived inside Chloe for two thousand years, she wouldve seen a lot of varied dishes, and that exined her indifference towards the color. Even before that, she mustve been unable to taste food, unlike Chloe. Perhaps it was because she could only get visual information, but the simple fact that she could finally taste what she ate was enough to make her emotional. When I imagined Hinatas situation this way, it made sense for her to be so thoroughly impressed.

    In the end, the banquet concluded with favorable feedback. The demon lords quickly prepared to leave as soon as they were done eating. While it wouldve been nice for them to stay a bit, since they already finished their business here, they had no ns to prolong their visit.

    Chloe, if you dont like it here, dont hesitate to call me. I wille get you right away, Leon said sourly, seemingly refusing to give up.

    There was a major dispute on the topic of who would take care of Chloe.

    My friends are here, and I like the ce where Rimuru-san is.

    Although we all respected Chloes decision, I had my doubts that Leon would so readily ept it. After all, Leon hadnt even tried to hide his clinginess with Chloe.

    Despite my reservations about the methods he chose, ultimately, his desire to protect Chloe was genuine. And Leons feelings were clearly conveyed to her as well.

    Onii-chan. I was very happy to know that you were concerned for me. But you dont have to worry like that. Because I am not a little kid anymore! Chloe said as she hugged him.

    Leon gave a gentle smile and patted Chloes head. They were childhood friends who grew up together like siblings, but Leon sincerely cared about Chloe.

    She finally let go of him and changed to her adult form.

    See? If I borrow Chronoas power, I can change back to my grown-up form, so onii-chan doesnt have to worry about me anymore, Chloe beamed happily, as if she were trying to reassure Leon.

    That smile had devastating power. It washow should I put itenchanting? It was an ephemeral smile, yet at the same time, made me feel her strength of hearta smile filled with charm.

    I see. You have be an amazing woman. But that wont change the fact that I care about you. You may rely on me anytime, Leon dered to Chloe with a tender smile on his face.

    As one would expect from Mr. Handsome Leon, it was an exceptionally mature-looking move, befitting of an adult.

    I can only hope to imitate something like thatI thought to myself from the sidelines, but then, Leon suddenly turned around and stared at me coldly.

    The difference was quite drastic. Really drastic.

    Chloe said that she became an adult, dont tell me you

    No! Im asexual so theres no way that can happen!!

    He was even making terrible assumptions. When he faced me, that previous sense of handsome maturity had all but disappeared. I desperately tried to plead my case, and I thought he understood after Chloe noticed the topic of our conversation and got angrybut apparently, it was superficial.

    I believe you are already well aware of this, Leon whispered to me as he left, but never do anything that would expose Chloe to danger.

    Although I did think that he was being overprotective, Leon had used every tool at his disposal to look for Chloe, who got swept up in the world transfer along with him, so it wasnt as though I couldnt understand his worry, either.

    On the bright side, he also returned home quietly. I promised to bring Chloe for a visit next time, and thanks to her, we might be able to establish diplomatic rtions with El Dorado, which Demon Lord Leon ruled over. It was a bit annoying since he felt like a brother-inw, but I had to live with it.

    Well, I suppose you have settled down where you arefortable. Chloe, you are an important friend to me. Im here for you if you ever need anything, so dont hesitate to ask me for help. Please take care of yourself.

    Just like Leon, Luminas also fretted over Chloe. As for her, she felt like a sister-inw, but obviously, I didnt dare say that out loud.

    It was best to let sleeping dogs lie.

    Luminas said her goodbyes and departed with her entourage.

    Since Hinata was also gone, the only person that remained was Guy. When I turned my head to see if he would leave, I saw Diablo still glued to his side. He began to speak. Now then, shall we continue what I wasnt able to finish a while ago

    No, Ive heard enough of that already, so its quite all right, Guy reassured.

    Kufufufu, there is no need to be shy.

    Stop giving me weird invitations!

    What the heck are you doing, Diablo!

    Tsk, then I have no other choice. Lets change the subject to the topic you wanted to hear about, the task Testarossa and the other girls took, and anecdotes about Rimuru-sama

    Just how much does this guy want to talk?I looked at him in dismay, and Guy appeared to feel the same way.

    No, no, you guys seem extremely busy right now, so Ille by again when things settle down, Guy urgently declined and quickly ran away.

    I was strangely impressed by the fact that even Guy had times where he was taken aback. After witnessing such an unexpected side of him, it made me think he wasnt the unreasonable type. I still couldnt afford to be careless around him, but maybe I didnt have to worry as much as I thought. Since he epted that Chloe was a Hero, I guess we could tentatively dere that all the big problems had been dealt with.

    Now, the only things left unsettled were Yuukis movements and the intentions of the Eastern Empire, where he ran off to. I would put aside whether or not we would trust Yuuki for now.

    A war, huh?I sighed quietly to myself.

    Solve one problem and another pops up. I felt depressed and thought about how nice it would be if things became peaceful again soon.

    In spite of the fact that it was a verbal agreement, it was still a notable achievement that we were able to establish cooperation with two different demon lords. If a war truly broke out, just having allied countries that you could trust was something that made you feel more confident. I could expect support and, worst case scenario, they could consider taking in refugees.

    Although, the best possible oue was having no war in the first ce. This all depended on how the other side acted, so all we could do was simply wait

    Since there was nothing I could aplish byining, I decided to devise countermeasures. First, we had to begin defensive preparations and ensure that if we wound up waging war with the Empire, we could handle them.

    Lets be prepared for anythingI silently strengthened my resolve.

 Volume 12 - Ch 2

    Oues and Preparation

    Several months passed since the meeting with Guy and the other demon lords. Time quickly flew by; itd already been one year since I became a demon lord, attended the Walpurgis, had the fight with Hinata, celebrated the Founding Festival, and dealt with the confrontation concerning Mariabell and the Rosso family. Maybe it was because so much had happened, but the past year really went by in a sh.

    We had concluded the Tempest Resurrection Festival in private and the Empire had yet to make a move. However, ording to the information gathered by Souei and Moss, supplies were being delivered one after another to major cities along the border. Now that their actions went this far, it didnt take a genius to figure out what was happeninga war was brewing on the horizon.

    Since armed conflict was all but certain, the screening of humans and monsters alike entering Tempest began to be strictly enforced. We wouldnt be able to wee anyone willy nilly; only authorized adventurers, merchants, and those with referrals or other credentials would have the right to enter. It was a precaution to safeguard against spies, but there was another reason as well: To sort out the entrants.

    Not all visitors to our country were human, and the abilities of individuals ranged widely. Many of the strangers were uncivilized, and if we epted them inrge numbers, we wouldnt be able to keep up with them. After all, there was no way to stop idiots from running amok, despite strictly forbidding fighting in the city. We had barriers in ce for that exact reason, but it was still difficult topletely prevent the usage of magic. These were the drastic differences between a human-popted city and a city with monsters.

    Thus, we consulted with Gazel and decided to follow the example of the Dwarven Kingdom. We had decided to educate the entrants a little about the rules of our country at the time of their entry. That was what the entry inspection was all about, as for those who wished to migrate to our country, a more formal preparation was a priority. We set up a separate, dedicated ce that they could attend. It was only after they finished learning how things worked in our country that they were ultimately admitted.

    Shions men were best suited for this job, since they could deal with even the most violent of people and put them in their ce.

    This system would be continued in the future since it also helped to detect spies from the Empire. At the time of inspection, visitors were screened and asked why they were visiting. Preventing the influx of people who didnt have money was one way to prevent unnecessary trouble.

    There were a lot of normal inns near the Colosseum, but the people that used those werent very wealthy. The amodations for the upper ss had be very luxurious in the capital city Rimuru. Hence, rich merchants and nobles, as well as people arriving for a vacation, were guided to high-ss hotels.

    While one might argue that memories were priceless, I dont tolerate such sophistry. My goal was for tourists to enjoy their vacation in the spirit of you get what you pay for.

    Prices ranged from as low as thirty silver coins per night for ordinary guests to a gold coin or more for wealthy merchants and lower-ss noblemen. But there was essentially no upper limit, as we even had rooms prepared that cost ten gold coins and morewait, why am I advertising? Well, this was how we segmented things.

    I wanted to make Tempest a tourist hotspot, so wed been trying our best to advertise our city by gifting vouchers for high-ss inns to merchants who maderge deals with us, and to those who beat Floor 10 of thebyrinth.

    Our strategy was well-received by the challengers of thebyrinth. The widely known exquisite quality of our food was a tremendous motivator. The meals alone cost more than ten silver coins. Considering that you could stay at a cheap inn for just three silver coins, you might feel that this was absurdly expensive. However, one might wish to indulge in luxury once in a blue moon, and some people certainly had that kind of cash from challenging thebyrinth. As hosts, it was our job to offer ces for those types of people to spend money on, too.

    Speaking of which, clearing Floor 10 of thebyrinth was equivalent to a group defeating a ck spider, a B-ranked monsterin other words, a team of rank C-plus adventurers or higher. If a person could beat a ck spider alone, they would have to be rank B or higher. Therefore, I had no qualms about granting these adventurers corresponding privileges.

    Furthermore, if you viewed it through the lens of a small country, they would be strong enough to be hired as knights. If you were rank B in the Freedom Association, then you could be recruited in any country. By acknowledging their position this way, they would naturally pay more attention to their own conduct.

    Additionally, if they were B-ranked adventurers, then they most likely possessed a decent amount of money. The same logic applied tobyrinth challengers. Elens group in particr seemed poor, but exceptions prove the rule.

    In any case, there were no second chances for troublemakers. The high-ss area was surrounded by a moat and heavily guarded. It was exined to everybody that they would be prohibited from re-entering once they were chased out.

    Since no one became upset upon hearing that, it appeared our public image-building strategy was a sess.

    Merchants, being merchants, came in droves to barter for weapons and artifacts manufactured in Tempest. There were also those who performed high-value transactions, so there were quite a lot of rich individuals.

    The number of customers gradually increased over time, even without us giving away amodation vouchers.

    The weapons and armor Kurobees disciples forged and the craftsmanship of Dolds disciples were of great renown among the merchants who purchased them due to their unparalleled quality.

    However, something I didnt expect was merchants secretly buying equipment discovered from the treasure chests inside thebyrinth. I had mixed feelings about this, but we were being careful not to let anything dangerous slip through our fingers, so we decided to monitor the situation for now.

    Every time any of our items were sold in other ces, it spread our reputation ever further. Perhaps as a result of that, the number of regr customers had recently been on the rise. Word of mouth was truly impressive.

    You might wonder why we were doing all this with the threat of war looming, but the war was a whole separate issue to itself, and this was another.

    Im aware that Im doing whatever I want. I am on guard against an imminent danger, but I wont let that fear rule me. I refuse to surrender my daily life and will keep moving forward.

    Just as the capital city was steadily progressing, so too was the transportationwork to other countries. With Benimarus persuasion, we were able to secure Momiji and the tengus cooperation. The tunnel was now open as well, and almost all of it was paved, save for certain parts.

    The handover to the civil engineers brought by Duke lude had beenpleted, and a direct road would soon be opened between Tempest and the Sorcerers Dynasty of Sarion.

    Moreover, construction of the railroad linking the Kingdom of Farmenas had also begun and was rapidly heading towardspletion. The tracks to the Kingdom of Ingracia were operating as nned. The same applied to the Dwarven Kingdom, where an inn town developed around the train station on their side.

    The point where the road passed through the Great Jura Forest and met with the Great Ameld River was an ideal resting ce and thus it served as the location for a base during construction. In addition, since the railroad tracks wereid along the river, using this site as an intermediate outpost killed two birds with one stone.

    Even monsters that lived in the surrounding area gathered there and formed a small settlement. It wouldve been a waste to leave it as is, so we expanded that town further into an inn town. In the future, this modest inn town would likely grow to be a major city with a terminal, so its importance couldnt be underestimated.

    The road widening project was finished on Eurazanias side, too. There was still some paving to be done in some sections, but traffic could pass through without any issues.

    Merchants had been constantly pleading, It would be nice if you could finish it soon, because riding a high-speed carriage on a bumpy road was enough to make anyone sick. Regardless,pared to what they had before, safety and convenience had improved significantly.

    We had installed streemps for travelers who moved at night and automatic magic generators at fixed distances, so the barriers that stopped monsters from approaching the road operated without any gaps in coverage.

    Thus, in less than a year, the development of the transportationwork was more or lesspleted.

    We had begun preliminary operation of themercialized magitrain by running it all the way to Dwargon, as well as the Kingdom of Ingracia. Here, we would be able to gather raw data and iron out problems that arose. The various experimental trials had already been performed, so in other words, this was a real-world test.

    The magitrain made it possible to move an overwhelming amount of goods while maintaining an average speed of 50 kilometers per hour. And so, the history of logistics would forever be rewritten. It had opened the door to transporting fresh produce from farawaynds without it ever going bad. This allowed ess to a richer diet, and I believed it would also contribute a lot in the fight against famine.

    Indeed, logistics was indispensable in increasing a nations powerI reaffirmed this belief once again.

    In parallel with the data collection, a detailed operational cycle was also being considered. A trial-and-error method was underway to create a timetable.

    The distance between the Dwarven Kingdom and the Tempest Federation was around 1,000 kilometers. If we travelled at a speed of 50 kilometers per hour, we could arrive in 20 hoursless than a day.

    Ingracia, on the other hand, was approximately 300 kilometers away, so it could be reached within six hours by train.

    We worked these figures out after ounting for a considerable amount of safety margin. Theoretically, the magitrain could quadruple its current speed, and the cargo capacity was calcted to exceed 1,000 tons. However, I thought that it would be difficult to handle unexpected problems if we started running it at full capacity, out of the blue, without any previous experience.

    First, we needed to observe the situation. It was bound to experience issues during its service, and we had to take breaks into ount as well. Since there were limitations to the continuous operation of the magitrain, nighttime service was currently suspended. Besides, it was unfeasible to keep our engineers and drivers working around the clock unless maintenance, such as recing broken or worn parts, was performed at night, for uninterrupted service all day.

    So far, we had twenty lotives that were ready to go. Each train formation would consist of six-cars: one lotive, two freight cars, and three passenger cars. The passenger cars contained 80 seats but could amodate a maximum of 150 people. However, the downside was that they would have to spend hours standing up, so it was better to prohibit this.

    If we set at least 200 passengers per operation as our goal, we could achieve an upancy rate of over 80 percent. Then, how high would we need to set the fare price per personno, wait, why do I have to think about these kinds of problems! I just have to leave it all up to Myourmiles-kun, hell handle it just fine.

    It was only a matter of time before the train became fully operational, and as we gradually got more experience, I felt that we could cram in just a few more people, to make the most out of each train.

    Our goal was to run the train at a speed of at least 100 kilometers per hour and to increase its length to about ten cars. This wasnt a dream, but a fact that would soon be made a reality.

    Well, the results of the past year had been truly tremendous.

    I believe that the announcement of these results would be met with surprise and excitement around the world. A bright future woulde into light, and our efforts, our countrys resourcefulness, would surely be known in everynd.

    Improved standards of living, delicious food, and a variety of entertainment gathered from countries around the worldit all promised a fun and interesting life, something that was unthinkable when I had just reincarnated as a slime. I could freely devote myself to my hobbies if only we didnt have a problem with the Eastern Empire

    It suddenly urred to me that Veldora and I, along with volunteers, could dere war and immediately invade the Empire.

    Ive heard that if we developed civilization too quickly, an army of angels would rain down and attack, but we didnt even know where they came from. Therefore, itd be hard for us tounch a preemptive strike, but the Empire was a different story.

    Since theyre openly preparing to attack us, they cantin if we barge in firstthat was what Id thought. Waiting wasnt in my nature, and no matter how you looked at it, attacking would be easier for us than defending.

    If what the Empire sought after was the annexation of the Western Nations, then there was no reason for them to invade the Great Jura Forest. They could always choose to ignore us. Veldoras resurrection was already well known, and a little research would reveal that antagonizing me meant making an enemy out of Veldora as well. The ball was in the Empires court.

    Yet, this situation was giving us a considerable amount of stress.

    How about we consider the possible routes for invading the Western Nations:

    First off, a sea invasion was imusible. Considering the attacks of the great sea creatures, even if they prepared arge number of dreadnought-ss battleships, safety wasnt guaranteed. Fighting in the domain of gigantic aquatic monsters was too risky to be an option. It wasnt even clear if they could safely navigate the ocean. The conditions would be miserable for knights if they were forced to battle on the sea, as theyd have to deal with the rocking of the waves.

    Furthermore, another question arose: Just how many ships would they need to amass if they wished to transport arge number of soldiers? If they nned to send soldiers in the tens of thousands to the Kingdom of Famenas, Youms side wouldnt be standing idly by. They were prepared to defend themselves and meet the enemy in battle.

    As long as they couldnt establish a beachhead in the first wave, itd be impossible for the Empire to send reinforcements. Imposing sea beasts behind them and the Kingdom of Farmenas in frontif that happened, the morale of the Empires troops would plummet, and itd be as good as a tactical victory for our side.

    Thus, another question arose: Ignoring Farmenas, could they use a different approach by invading northern Ingracia? The conclusion was that it would also be challenging. Ingracias northern border was the yground of demons. Guy didnt seem too keen on keeping his subordinates in check, and Testarossas men were now in charge of its defense. It was a constant battleground for belligerents, and if the Empire were to invade, then they could expect to be a target of opportunity.

    Therefore, an attack via the sea was unfeasible.

    Next, you had to consider and invasion. They needed to take a route through the Dwarven Kingdom or cross the Dragon Roost in the Canaat Mountains. Thetter possessed too great a risk, so itd be discarded as an option. After all, marching at an altitude higher than Mount Everest would be suicidal, regardless of how well prepared you were.

    It would be impractical for them to train ordinary soldiers into mountain climbing experts, and even if they did, a group of dragons, who were A-ranked monsters, would be waiting for them.

    Common sense dictated that no one would be stupid enough to choose this route.

    Then, what about going through the Dwarven Kingdom? When this possibility was pointed out by Wisdom King Raphael-san, Hinata investigated it in my stead, and she confirmed that it was theoretically possible for arge army to pass through. However, Gazel wasnt someone who would ever permit this, and if the Empire forced their way through, then they would need to battle the Dwarven Kingdom before they could face the Western Nations.

    The invasion of the Dwarven Kingdom was as reckless as it sounded. The Armed Nation of Dwargon, who dered neutrality, had a highly-trained standing army to guarantee their security. Their armaments, which made full use of their technological prowess, were simply exceptional, and it was said that the dwarves had no weak soldiers among them.

    To begin with, based on its topography, the Dwarven Kingdom was built like a fortress. If they just protected their entrances, they could stave off any attack, even one by an enormous army. Eastern, Western, and Centrmong these three entrances, if the Empire were to invade, they would choose either Eastern or Central. Western was connected to the Kingdom of Farmenas, so they wouldnt have to worry about that. Eastern was the most dangerous and at risk, since it shared a border with the Empire, but as expected, Gazel was nothing but prepared. Hed been concentrating the bulk of his forces in this area in order to keep an eye on the Empires movements.

    If something were to happen, I nned on quickly responding to their call for aid, and the Dwarven Kingdom was also safe in Gazels hands.

    This was the current situation surrounding our country.

    In the end, I felt that the Empires only option was to go through the Great Jura Forest. Before my meeting with Benimaru, which had be a daily routine, I went through these same ns once more.

    In case they chose the Great Jura Forest route, which we defended, it was obvious that the greatest obstacle, from the Empires perspective, was Veldoras existence. They wouldnt attempt a frontal assault, so theyd probably try to trick Veldora by preparing a decoy unit. With that in mind, I had to consider our countrys defensive setup.

    There were three possible routes for initiating military operations within the Great Jura Forest. However, one of them was adjacent to Dwargons territory. If the Empire ignored our warning and came to invade, the Dwarven Kingdom and our army could catch them in a pincer attack. The Empire would definitely be aware of how dangerous this option was, so I think its fine to set a lower alert level. It was more likely that the Empire would strike by using one of the two remaining routes.

    But is it really that straightforward? It was a bad idea to split your forces when facing arge enemy, so we could deploy Veldora on one side and our full army on the other. If we employed this tactic, then we should be able to handle the Empire, even if they prepared a diversionary force.

    Even I, who was by no means an expert in military affairs, could formte something like this. Thus, I had my doubts that professional soldiers would set out to war with such a simple strategy.

    There was also the possibility that the Empire was looking down on usthinking that with an overwhelmingly massive army, they could trample over us, regardless of Veldora or our monster army. On the other hand, perhaps they would utilize an underhanded strategy instead of facing us head on.

    For instance, they could use the regr army as bait and initiate guerri warfare with elite troops in small groups. What if they split into toon-sized units in order to infiltrate the forest and then regrouped somewhere else?

    In these cases, itd be impossible to monitor all of the minor trails throughout the woods. If we carelessly deployed a reconnaissance force, depending on the scale of the enemy, it mighte back to haunt us. Just like what Hinata had done before if a toon of Holy Knight-level troops were dispatched

    If we took that prospect into ount, there wouldnt be enough troops to cover all possible incursions. It was risky if we moved to intercept the Empire after determining their objective, so I wanted to avoid that as much as possible. And if we lost the initiative, there was the chance that wed fall into an unrecoverable position.

    Although we were trying to be vignt for that exact reason, the crux of the matter was that we couldnt read the Empires movements. In war, the more unpredictable you were, the bigger the advantage you held over your opponent. Oftentimes, making an unexpected move would be enough to clinch a victory. As a result, we had to consider every single possible scenario

    Its no use; my minds going in circles. I became irritated when those thoughts bubbled up. Wouldnt it really be better for me to attack first? Or rather, wouldnt attempting a Blitzkrieg, the moment the Empire dered war be the correct answer?

    Since we couldnt guarantee that the Empire would move ording to our predictions, it was pointless to dwell further on this subject. No matter how many times I thought it over, I felt thatunching a preemptive strike was the rational thing to do, rather than waiting for an opponent to make their move. We wouldnt be overwhelmed with worries and could seize the initiative.

    Well, I wont do it.

    No matter how long I mulled it over, the perfect answer wouldnt drop from the sky. It was smart to be flexible about these things. In other words, ying it by ear. Somehow, it sounded cool and gave the impression of a capable man.

    Right, lets do that.

    Having reached my usual conclusion, I grabbed the cream puffs that Shuna had prepared. All this hard thinking gave me a craving for sweets. Although some im you would get sick of having too much of the same thing, thatd never happen to me. Well, if that ever did happen to me, I might reconsider.

    Hey, eating them alone is so unfair.

    While I was in the middle of enjoying my cream puffs with Shions ck tea, Benimaru finally arrived. We were in my office. He was a littlete to our meeting, which somehow had be a routine. He mustve been extremely busy, given that he was in charge of war preparations against the Empire. Comining about tardiness wouldve been quite petty of me.

    What? Help him? I have no idea what youre saying. If you arent an expert, youre better off leaving it aloneI know, awfully convenient of me to say.

    Shion, pour Benimaru some ck tea, too.

    Understood!

    Benimaru seemed to have been traumatized by Shions cooking, and as a result, always wore a wary expression. It was okay if it was just ck tea, but still, his cautious attitude never fadedvery typical of him.

    Thank you. Nothing like a couple sweets to get you going again.

    Well, good thing weve got sugar to spare. Itd be nice if this peace continues.

    Right. I guess if a decisive battle were toe, we could just beat them and call it a day.

    Benimarus confidence was as strong as ever. Although reliable, I hope he didnt forget to make an effort to avoid war as the first option.

    Enjoy!

    Shion ced the cup of ck tea in front of Benimaru. She poured some more for me too. It had a wonderfully rxing scent.

    What about Diablo? Benimaru asked.

    Ahh, he has another day of arbitration.

    Again?

    Yeah, again.

    Yep, Diablo was out mediating. Ultima and Carrera got into a spat every single day. It wasnt that they didnt get along, but rather they tried topete with each other in any way, shape, or form.

    Yesterday, it was about the extradition of criminals, and before that was the treatment of suspects in custody. Sometimes theyd fight over the food menu, and other times theyd argue about who should buy thetest fashion clothes first. Everything would be fine if it were just a verbal debate, but when those two fought, their ferocity could surprise even the yakuza.

    Only Diablo could stop those ruthless perpetrators. Venom, who was Diablos subordinate, was already a victim, having been abused both verbally and physically by Ultima and Carrera.

    No damage had thankfully been inflicted upon the towns residents, and in fact, it had actually be famous enough to lead people to make bets, but it was still a problem that we couldnt turn a blind eye to. That was the reason why I had Diablo sort things out, but it might be time to think of a permanent solution. Otherwise, the situation might change for the worstI could already feel that Diablo was going to snap sooner orter.

    Speaking of which, Diablo took Ultima and Carrera to thebyrinth a few days ago. He was brimming with enthusiasm not because of something fun and sweet such as a date, but about the thought that he was going to give them a thorough scolding.

    He took advantage of the fact that you couldnt die in thebyrinth and beat them up without mercy, yet it appeared that they hadnt learned their lesson at all. On the contrary, they were rather eager to fight Diablo.

    Ahh, why are the demons so bellicose

    Personally, I couldnt keep up with them.

    While I was having a brief chat with Benimaru, Diablo suddenly came in, looking utterly exhausted. Im sorry to keep you waiting.

    Oh, thanks for the hard work, I replied.

    No, no, its barely enough to warrant calling it hard work, its just that my time with Rimuru-sama has

    You dont seem tired, so lets get down to business.

    All right.

    Well, if you can spare the energy to talk nonsense, then I suppose youre okay.

    Diablo wanted to say something, but itd just wind up being his usual soliloquy anyway. Putting that aside, Benimaru and I decided to start todays meeting.

    As I had mentioned before, the number of immigrants to our country had grown. And when that happened, the problem of work allocation to those newly immigrated naturally arose. The employment rate was very important, just like with any other country. This was because if we wished to increase the nations productivity, then each and every citizen needed to work diligently.

    If the employment rate was good, then consumer spending would naturally rise, and the economy would improve as well. On the other hand, if it was bad, then the economy would deteriorate, and crime would naturally increase.

    It was the role of the national leadership to properly manage the task, but obviously, this was exceedingly difficult.

    There were individual differences in the abilities of the immigrants we epted, and there was a limit to the amount of unskilledbor that could be assigned to anyone. Our country was still in development, and the onrush of construction work in various locations had kept us afloat. But even that was drawing to a close, and now the question of What do we do from here? was in the air.

    Skilledborers had no problems. If you were an experienced craftsman or someone with enough personal talent to earn a living, then it was an easy question to answer. The problem was those whocked the knowledge and means to make money.

    If you were a farmer, then we could grant you farnd. If you were a craftsman, then we could introduce you to a workshop. If you were an adventurer, then thebyrinth was the perfect ce, and if you were an actor, then you could be hired by theaters.

    Still, what about people who did not possess any such talents? The solution I came up with was to establish an education center. At the time of immigration, theyd be asked what they could do and based on their answer, they would be taught ordingly. The education center would serve that purpose, and it was going to be operated by the military under Benimaru.

    The number of immigrants continues to grow, and there are a lot of people applying for the military. Whether or not theyd be useful is another issue, but at the very least, I believe they could manage being assigned to domestic security.

    Wed been trying to solve the immigration problem, yet it seemed that there were even more peopleing in.

    If you join the army, you can earn a living. You can also learn skills for free and even get a jobthis was the rumor being spread around.

    As a result, the number of people joining the military gradually increased, which not only included ordinary immigrants but adventurers and mercenaries alike. Well, as long as our country was responsible for the defense of the Western Nations, building up our armed forces was a crucial task. For that reason, there were no difficulties for now. While minorplications did arise, those had been at a level that could be resolved within the military.

    The bigger problem was that war with the Empire was bing a reality. Obviously, there was no way we could send people who had just been enlisted the day before intobat, so we were forced to reorganize our forces. And so, I had ordered Benimaru to submit a proposal for consolidating our military.

    He brought forth a single sheet of paper and ced it on the table.

    This is the new organizational structure that Ivee up with. Some of the personnel changes are a little bold, but I think this will work.

    Benimaru held militarymand authority, whereas suprememand authority, which included the right to appoint individuals into positions, rested with me. It was a littleplicated; originally, militarymand authority was included in suprememand authority. Now, militarymand was separated and given to Benimaru. This was due to my belief that an amateur like myself shouldnt interfere with themand of the military. Therefore, Benimaru was entrusted with all matters rted to the military. With this setup, Benimarus orders took precedence over mine within the army.

    However, strategicmand was a different story. I had the power to designate the upper echelon of the military, or to make the decision to end any war we were currently engaged in. Benimaru was free to nominate anyone below the rank of general, but the establishment of corps or the appointment of generals was left to my discretion. He still needed a confirmation from me on whether or not the organization chart that he drew up was eptable.

    Hmm. If youre okay with it, then I dont have any objections

    Even if I didnt n onining, there might be some things I wanted to say. After all, I would be the one responsible if something went wrong as long as I had the authority to make appointments. Nheless, we had already debated numerous times regarding the new organizational structure. I wasnt going toin or anything; it was already toote for that. And the personnel I kept pushing for until the very end was First Corps Commander Gobta.

    I wasnt too convinced when I first heard about the idea of designating Gobta as a general, but now I think hell be a good fit.

    As you can see from Benimarus reply, there were pros and cons to having Gobta be a general. Indeed, the thought of giving that idiot, Gobta, responsibilities of a leader was worrisome. It was only natural that Benimaru and his staff were anxious, since the lives of Gobtas subordinates would be entrusted to his judgment. Given that he was someone who often slept during meetings, it wasnt like I didnt have any reservations, either. That said, I also knew very well of the fact that Gobta had been secretly undergoing special training, and that he was trying his best because he wanted to protect this country.

    Right?! Hes a man that pulls through when it counts, I said.

    Although, when it doesnt, he does absolutely nothing. But, well, Gobtas men trusted him a lot, and he was also quite good at looking out for them. I had faith in Gobta.

    Hes one of the Four Heavenly Kings, so he will never betray your expectations! Shion dered.

    Thats right. And we will send Testarossa as an inspector so she can make up for any shorings, just in case, Diablo added.

    The two of them both supported Gobta as their co-member in the Four Heavenly Kings.

    When you put it that way, even I cant say no as the head of the Four Heavenly Kings, Benimaru added with a bitter smile.

    He must have acknowledged Gobta.

    Diablo is certainly correct, he then added. If anything happens, we can support him. Lets give him the job.

    Itll be okay. He may not look it, but his heart is in the right ce.

    Thus, Benimaru and I decided to make Gobta a general.

    I took a closer look at the organizational structure in order to review the other corps leaders beside Gobta. There was a total of three new corps to be established under Benimarus directmand.

    The aforementioned First Corps, with Gobta assigned asmander and Hakurou as the military advisor, would have the following soldiers:

    100 Goblin Riders: Each member had grown to the level of rank A-minus and possessed thepetence to be a centurion.

    12,000 Green Numbers: The 4,000 initial men became senior soldiers and would takemand of the 8,000 newly hired junior soldiers. They would work in teams of three.

    The number of troops had increased significantly over the past year, but most of them were monsters from the Great Jura Forest. As a result, they were able to operate without any major problems.

    Although the junior soldiers were only rank C to D, the senior soldiers had grown to the equivalent of rank B. It seemed like we could expect them to be a considerable force.

    Following that was the Second Corps. Geld became themander for this one. This Second Corps, however, was currently active in various ces as a construction unit. In wartime, it would be recalled and be Tempests main force. The soldiers under Geldsmand were:

    2,000 Yellow Numbers: They were High Orc warriors who followed Geld from the start. Their individual strength was considerably high at rank B-plus, allowing them to create an iron wall defense by uniting with Geld. Furthermore, they also took the role of toon leaders thatmanded the new troops.

    35,000 Orange Numbers: The newer high orcs that had joined as enlisted soldiers. They were a unit around C-rank in strength, but only 15,000 veterans would be involved inbat. The remaining 20,000 would serve as logistical support or military engineers.

    Andstly, we had the Third Corps. The aerial cavalry unit was finally being put into action as a secret weapon. Themander of this particr corps was Gabil, its original founder. The soldiers under hismand were:

    100 Hiryuu: They were the most powerful unit within Tempest. Each individual bore the strength of rank A-minus, was capable of flying, and had a highmand ability. Some were able to reach rank A and had the Skill Dragon Body that could be used as their trump card.

    3,000 Blue Numbers: These were Lizardmen warriors who volunteered to participate because they wanted to be Gabils subordinates. The unit was established with them as its members, and theirbat prowess was equivalent to rank C-plus. But they werent just ordinary foot soldiers; their distinguishing feature was that they fought while riding wyverns. Their unit had the best striking power, coupled with air superiority.

    Be that as it may, the current number of wyverns we had at our disposal was only 300, so we couldnt assign one to everybody. Most were relegated to raising and supporting wyverns, and it looked like it would be a while before they could participate inbat. Even then, you shouldnt underestimate them. Wyverns were a subspecies of lesser dragons, a B-plus-ranked monster. While Gabil had seeded in capturing and nurturing them, their goal for now was to increase the poption. If they could assign a wyvern to everyone, then the Blue Numbers could disy their true value.

    These were the three corps under Benimarus direct control.

    So, the Second Corps is under Geld and the Third Corps is under Gabil. Looks like there arent any problems, I said.

    Well, Ive considered a lot of various options, but I think this is the safest bet, Benimaru assured me.

    Geld was, needless to say, a reliable general. I also didnt see any issues with Gabil either. He definitely tended to get easily carried away, but even then, he was good in a fight. His performance in mock battles was excellent, and he was at the point where Benimaru recognized him as a rival. His strategic thinking was a bit on the weaker side, but his tactical decisions more than made up for that shoring. He treated his subordinates well and knew when to retreat. He was, without a doubt, a talented person that could be trusted as a general.

    As for these, theyre the same as before.

    Benimaru brought out a different piece of paper. Three units were listed there:

    Benimarus personal bodyguards, Kurenai, wasposed of 300 men. Led by rank A Gobua, it was an elite unit full of fierce fighters, all ranked A-minus and above. They also currently served as the general staff.

    It was only after I saw them inbat training, but I thought that Gobua and the others were evenly matched with someone like Gelmud, who had once been a high-level majin, if not stronger. If we took proficiency into consideration, there were some members of the squad that were equal to rank A. Some of them could even defeat a Holy Knight one-on-one, so calcting the overall strength of this unit wasplicated.

    The criteria for a monsters strength were almost always decided by the amount of magicules. Since monsters were born strong, they had no concept of proficiency. However, in addition to their innate physical power, our countrys monsters had undergone military training. It seemed that this training helped them acquire even morebat strength.

    I didnt think I was overestimating them, even if you considered them out of ce or above the normal criteria. In the first ce, if we just looked at the anomaly Hakurou, it was enough to prove that I was right.

    The people of this unit were fierce soldiers who had all endured Hakurous hellish training. They were extraordinarily well trained.

    Second on that list was the intelligence unit, Dark Shadow, that Souei ranit consisted of at least 100 men. There were many mysteries surrounding this group, and as they were under Soueisplete control, few knew of its existence. But as far as I know, they were considerably strong.

    Souka and her four subordinates, who were themanding officers, were ranked A. Several of them were even more dangerous. Glenda was part of this corps, but there were a couple of Special A rank fighters as well. In fact, Testarossa managed to recruit a few talented individuals via plea bargains, and they were taken in by Souei. They were Girard, the leader of the mercenary group Apostles of Verte, and Ayn, a spirit wielder who had apparently served under him. Both of them were over A rank and were now active as excellent intelligence agents.

    I had once joked that it was like a special agency for troublemakers but now it was looking exactly like that.

    Souei imed that we couldnt expect muchbat ability from this team, but I didnt believe it. I felt that they would be perfect at assassinations. I mean, the group possessed numerous people that were over rank A, so I wanted to ask him what nonsense he was talking about. I wondered what Souei wished to achieve.

    Rumors that they were a frightening unit was, in a way, unavoidable.

    Finally, there was the Yomigaeri, who were under Shionthey totaled 100 men. The quirk of this group was that they werent easy to kill, stubbornly so. They reportedly received incredibly severe training that utilized their terrifying regeneration abilities and became as strong as rank B-plus. Considering the fact that they were originally ranked C, their growth was the highest. They performed well in the battle against the Holy Knight Order, and some of them might even break through their ceiling and reach rank A.

    While I thought the strongest unit right now was Hiryuu, if there was a team that could turn it around and im that title, it was definitely Shions Yomigaeri. And this unit, ording to Benimarus organization chart, was supposed to be my bodyguards.

    I didnt like it, but the idea of abusing their near immortalitystalling for time by acting as baitwas the main reason why they were delegated this role. Essentially, if anything ever happened, I could use the Yomigaeri as a decoy and escape. Shion exined it rather proudly.

    In case you were wondering, even though they were technically my bodyguards, they didnt need to follow any of mymands. They were a group that solely existed to protect me, so they were strictly forbidden from doing other things, regardless of my orders. Therefore, even if I shouted at them not to, theyd dly sacrifice themselves for me. It was extremely troubling.

    Although, if I asked them to do some trivial tasks, they would readily ept

    It was probably a good idea to not tell Shion any of this. At times like these, it was best to put up a facade in order to hide how I truly felt.

    By the way, Shion had one more undisclosed unit that wasnt written on the list. Although officially it was a secret, it was more so an open secret nowadays. It was a self-proimed unit that followed Shion. They were supposed to be her bodyguards, but in reality, it was simply a fan club. The exact number of members was unknown. I didnt think that there were more than 1,000 people at most. Since it wasnt an official unit, they were outside the jurisdiction of our country.

    We dont know how many of them there are, nor their abilities; is it really going to be okay? It would be nice as long as nobody died. Shion was secretly raising them, so their strength was also unknown.

    It seemed that Dagruels sons were working hard as captains, and some adventurers withbat experience had joined the group as well. There maye a time where they would be useful in the future, but for now, I was more anxious than Id expected. They were definitely not a unit that we could send to the front line. It was only natural that Benimaru hadnt listed them on his organization chart.

    I handed the sheet back to Benimaru.

    I dont have a problem with this. It looks like weve increased our forces, but as far as Im concerned, there are no changes for these units. I think we can safely put this behind us.

    I agree. I take pride in the fact that the Kurenai are troops that Ive nurtured with my own hands. Souei and Shion would certainly feel the same way, so I wont include their units into the organization chart.

    Shion nodded in agreement after hearing what Benimaru said.

    I had no objections, so I gave my permission by saying, Please do so.

    Everyone wanted the unit that they had trained themselves close at hand. In fact, there was no need to add Gabils Hiryuu to the new structure. It was just something he had suggested himself.

    On that note, Gobta wasnt the one who raised the Goblin Riders, but they were his colleagues as well as brothers-in-arms, and they had all acknowledged Gobtas abilities. So, even in the case where we had to changemanders, we decided to take their feelings into consideration.

    Benimaru brought out the third sheet of paper.

    I guess this is todays main topic. These are the corps that belong to people other than me, but I have condensed it all together here.

    It was finally here. The table Ive seen so far only contained current units and their subsequent increases and decreases.

    The only thing that caught my eye was Gobtas appointment as themander of the First Corps. This was something Id suggested, so there wasnt anything new to surprise me.

    Well, I wonder what will be written here this time.

    With a pounding heart, I looked down at the piece of paper.

    There was a chart of the left and right wings of the army. The number of troops we possessed so far was listed on the right.

    The First Corpmanded by Gobtahad approximately 12,000 soldiers.

    The Second Corpmanded by Geldhad approximately 37,000 soldiers.

    The Third Corpmanded by Gabilhad approximately 3,000 soldiers.

    In total, there were around 52,000 men. This was the entire standing army of the Tempest Federation, and in my opinion, it was quite a scary number.

    Regardless, we still had plenty of room for more soldiers. The poption of our nation had already surpassed one million and had been increasing at breakneck speed. Looking at it objectively, our national power had grown exponentially. It was precisely because of our nations strength that we were able to support such arge army. On top of that, because the Second Corps acted as military engineers, we were able to maintain this manpower.

    If all of them were unproductive, then we wouldnt have been able to get this far. I really needed to thank Geld and his team. Without him and his subordinates, the remaining number of soldiers would approximately be only 15,000. This was definitely not enough for a confrontation with the Eastern Empire.

    As a result, Benimaru and I had pondered the question of what actions we should take.

    Once war breaks out, Ill recall Geld and his men; this was the original n. However, even that would not be enough. Although the Western Nations appear to have their own armies, mobilizing them would be a massive undertaking, warned Benimaru.

    Indeed. We went through all that trouble to gain control of the Councils military authority, so itd be remiss of me not to utilize it. With that being said, doing so may cause some major bacsh, I replied.

    Moreover, if problems began to ur within the Western Nations, theyd have nothing to stop it. If that happens, things may get toughter on.

    It wouldnt be an issue if it was within our borders, but if the citizens of the Western Nations start to question our leadership, itll make it harder for us to do our job in the future.

    Exactly.

    And so, we repeatedly went through this back-and-forth exchange. Benimarus response to these concerns was probably the armys left wing that was written on the paper. Lets take a closer look at the breakdown:

    Western Reserve Force: 150,000

    Mixed Majin Corps: 30,000

    Volunteer Corps: 20,000

    That was it.

    These numbers are huge, but what sort of army is this left wing? I asked, confused.

    For the time being, theyre soldiers under ourmand. The aforementioned army that belongs to the Western States Council is the Western Reserve Force. Unlike the armies of each individual nation, this one is hired directly by the Councilor rather,rgely hired through our funding.

    That was certainly the case since the Council granted us military authority, which bestowed our country the right to give orders to the Councils forces. I knew that, but

    Why is the number so high then?

    The army that belonged to the Council existed for formalitys sake. Moreover, it consisted mainly of knights and soldiers that were brought in from each of the council-member countries. There were only about a thousand of them, and their duties were mainly to oversee the security of the council venue in the capital of Ingracia.

    In principle, each member of the Western Nations had its own army and was responsible for its own security. There was no need to maintain a full-fledged army since instances where the Council would actually need to mobilize its military were exceedingly rare. It was for this reason that they handed militarymand over to us without a second thought

    Although, the reason I wanted military authority had nothing to do with handling emergency situations in the first ce. It was simply forying down tracks so that each nation had ess to the magitrain. It wouldve been a hassle to get approval from every single one just to dispatch Tempests engineers.

    If there really were some emergency, our nation would dispatch troops to handle the situation. Based on this consideration, I sent the soldiers under the Council back to their own countries. This was also because we had decided to establish a security force on the condition that our nation would fund the whole operation. To achieve this, I limited recruitment only from the local poption as it would probably be more reassuring if the soldiers were humans and demi-humans, rather than monsters.

    After the disbandment of the previous army, the new one surprisingly increased in numbers. ording to Testarossas report, rumors spread like wildfire iming that you could earn a living if you enlisted, which ended up attracting a lot of recruits.

    But wasnt the purpose of this force just to maintain public order? Why would we need 150,000 soldiers?

    Since all the nations still retained their own jurisdictional rights, we would be overstepping our authority if we arrested criminals. Even if the new force was meant to preservew and order, that was mainly for disaster prevention, and to be quite frank, their real purpose was to assist the engineering unit and provide logistical support. We wouldnt even need more than 10,000, let alone 150,000.

    Regarding the matter, Testarossa stated that this was the result of what the nations requested, Benimaru exined in detail.

    Testarossa had seized control of the Council and pushed for a bold structural reform. I was aware of that, but it was apparently causing more of a stir than I had expected.

    At the end of the day, this reform was the result of mutual consultation. The nations themselves would have the initiative, and our nation would provide the technology to do so. It was kind of like the ODA 7 Official Development Assistance. The Council would invest official funds, and our nation would dispatchborers as a national project to any country that needed a helping hand. We would hire local workers and give them technical guidance and fulfill the concerned countrys request. This way, we could secure job opportunities and wages for ourselves while our partners would receive our assistance. It was a win-win situation.

    However, there was no such thing as a free lunch in this world. Of course, there was more to this support system than meets the eye; it demanded something in return. For example, if we built a dam, depending on how much we invested in the construction, we would acquire an equivalent value in water rights aspensation. As forying railroad tracks, we would charge a tax on the train fare and collect the profits in perpetuity. Just like what we had aplished with the roads, we would be responsible for maintenance, but in exchange, the benefactors would have to agree to forgo tariffs and grant all kinds of privileges.

    This was definitely something a demon lord would do. While acting all nice and friendly on the surface, I wasmitting rather wily acts. With that being said, since those who utilized our services would ultimately enjoy its convenience, they barely lost anything in this transaction. They were only paying the toll for future profits they had yet to see.

    Naturally, I expected the more powerful nations would try to take their own initiative. Even though it would take a while, they could mimic our technology after seeing it physically for themselves. Secretly stealing it for their own useI had anticipated this as a normal response.

    What I didnt expect was

    On that note, many of therger nations are also demanding the trains to be operational as soon as possible.

    In other words, they felt like there wouldnt be enough manpower relying on our nations engineering unit alone, and therefore even mobilized those they hired as logistical support?

    Correct. And that didnt seem like it was enough, which is why they decided to hire locals to help.

    Is this the reason why the number of troops is absurdly high?

    I gave Testarossa full authorization as the military attach and told her to not report minor details of things to me when verifying policies. Due to my orders, it appears that this was news even to Benimaru, until very recently. The result was this mass recruitment.

    Wouldnt that just be ying right into the hands of these nations? By making us train their engineers, they could operate more easilyter on.

    In lieu of imitating technologies, this was a more efficient method. Although it was quite the forthright approach, I actually didnt mind it. It was only natural for the leaders toe up with a n like this under these circumstances.

    Moreover, the engineers we instructed would grow to be the pirs that supported these countries in the future. While it was a shame we couldnt keep the sole rights of this technology to ourselves, itd be fun to witness the healthypetition of technological innovation that would surelye about in the future.

    Apparently, thats not it. If that were the case, those nations wouldnt merely hand their engineers over to us like this.

    He does have a point.

    Waitso what youre saying is you took Testarossas newly trained support troops and incorporated them directly as the Western Reserves?!

    Thats correct, Benimaru grinned after witnessing myplete astonishment.

    Itd be a shame to simply let go of all those engineers after we invest considerably in their growth. Under these circumstances, we might as well turn them into a full-fledged security force and train them in disaster response, VIP protection, and city defenseit seemed that Benimaru had quite the foresight.

    Testarossa was going to discharge them because she had no more use for them, Benimaru continued, but it would definitely be a waste.

    Indeed it would.

    I figured that we could prepare work for them, so I made the decision to organize and name them the Western Reserve Force.

    I see. Now I understand. Well, I dont think we could expect them to be proficient at anything yet in the short span of a year. However, if they continued to train, they had the potential to be an expert unit in disaster countermeasures. This would also be a good countermeasure against any unforeseen idents, and as Benimaru mentioned, it could be utilized in a variety of different scenarios.

    I get it now. That was a nice call, Benimaru.

    That is not something worthy of your praise, Benimaru answered, looking rather abashed.

    The Western Reserve Force, huh? A force of 150,000 men was truly impressive, but if we dispatched them all to the Western Nations at the same time, then even this many people would be insufficient. If they could secure some concessions, theyd be able to make enough money to feed themselves. Id never expect this to happen, but I was pleased about the good news, nheless.

    On to the next order of business.

    Now that we got the Western Reserve Force cleared up, whats this Mixed Majin Corps?

    Theres 30,000 in total, are we conscripting monsters from the Great Jura Forest?

    Its a corpsposed mostly of majins who were under yman. Geld had them working as prisoners of war, but I picked out and borrowed those who were decent at fighting. At the same time, the high orcs who had nothing to do afterpleting their construction work filled in the missing gaps.

    Based on what Benimaru shared, he was taking proper precautions so that the progress rate of Gelds construction projects wasnt negatively affected. In that case, good. It wouldve been better if the corps were made up of experienced fighters rather than a bunch of amateurs. However

    I thought they werent being cooperative?

    The majority of ymans men were rank B. But there were a few of them that were over rank A. They were a fairly strong group, but as a corps, they were clearly weak. Monsters who only followed orders out of fear were obviously no match for trained, professional soldiers. Gathering them now, just like thatI dont think there was enough time to give them any military training.

    Thanks to Geld, none of them are selfish miscreants anymore. Besides, even if there were someone that stupid, I wouldve personally shut them up.

    Well, yeah. Its easy for Benimaru to subdue people by force.

    But, you know, they just got used to the job, so forcing them to fight is kinda

    Although I was reluctant, Benimaru quickly reassured me. This is something theyve been saying: We want Rimuru-sama to see that we can be useful too!

    Huh?

    Benimaru said something unexpected. Those selfish majins had volunteered to help on their own ord.

    Good food, good friends, bosses who rely on them, and rewarding work. They kept going on and on about how their strength should be used to protect all of this.

    Seriously?

    This was a happy little miscalction, and their offer was very helpful. Conscripted troops were of no use in actual warfare. Sometimes, it was unavoidable for the sake of national defense but other times, it was wiser to surrender unconditionally when weighing both costs and benefits.

    I couldnt bear the thought of being a ve to another country, but if it were only about being heavily taxed as a vassal state, temporarily bowing your head and secretly plotting your revenge was always an option. I was trying to y it cool saying it like that, but the point was that they could wait patiently for their chance at vengeance.

    There was also the option of willfully epting the slight losses so long as the invaders didntmit extremely atrocious acts. But that wasnt an excuse to ignore the feelings of the citizens who originally lived in that country. Those people should be responsible for choosing their own future. As a ruler, you could only respond to those feelings. That was why I felt conscription was the worst way to go about it and that patriotism should never be forced.

    Tempest was a country under my protection. I had no intention of obeying outside influences who made arrogant demands. If we didnt intend to relinquish our rights easily, there would always be disagreements. Furthermore, if the other side refused to give in, then war was an inevitabilityit would be such a pain being antagonized.

    For me, if they didnt have the will to defend their own country, then I wouldnt mind if they simply ran away. I shouldnt get the wrong idea about who Im supposed to be protecting. It was only natural that my priority should be the citizens that I shared hardships with since the founding of this nation, and I had no intention of taking care of freeloaders that cameter and purely insisted on their rights.

    If I had nobody to protect, then I would flee as well. In that case, Id just go off and create a new country somewhere else with like-minded friends again. For me, thisnd itself wasnt something I needed to cling onto.

    However, as long as everyone loved our home, Tempest, I would do everything in my power to meet their expectations. Regardless of what kind of foreign enemy they are, I will crush them with all my might. Even if the enemy were the Demon Lord Guy. Im prepared to kill him no matter what it takes. Well, Guy was horrifying, so I hoped it wouldnte to that.

    I could sense their motivation, and Im sure their feelings are genuine. Besides, people from all over the Great Jura Forest have heard rumors of the uing war and have offered their assistance. This Mixed Majin Corps is the unit that brought them all together. Benimaru then added with a wry smile, Although I have removed the weaklings.

    Yeah, thats great. With this move, they could really do their bestthe thought made me d.

    Lastly, we had the Volunteer Corps. This was a unit derived from humans residing in Tempest and neighboring countries.

    In any case, if we were defeated, the nations surrounding the Great Jura Forest would also surely fall. Because of that, it was better to cooperate with us from the beginning and so a group of people had gathered to offer their full support.

    Most of them were adventurers and mercenaries. It seemed that many of the immigrants we had epted also volunteered. A lot of the idiots who risked their lives to explore the Dungeonwho fed our monster avatars every timealso joined.

    The total number of these people was 20,000, and while we couldnt expect too much from them, they were still a considerable force.

    Well, thats everything on the left wing. The only difference between the right and the left wings is the level of loyalty to Tempest, or rather Rimuru-sama.

    Me?

    The right wing troops are those who are willing to risk their lives for Rimuru-sama and this country. The left, in contrast, is a hodgepodge of different people with their own agendas. Some of them may truly have noble aspirations, but we didnt have time to conduct personal interviews, so we had to organize them like this.

    I see

    Behind me, Shion and Diablo were nodding their heads in agreement. I could swear I heard them talking about disturbing things, such as how the left side were merely pawns waiting to be used and thrown away, or how they nned to hold trials in order to find the cream of the crop, but I mustve been imagining things.

    So, thest question that remains is who we should appoint as themander of each corps.

    This was where we finally got to the heart of the matter.

    Well then, let us begin with the Western Reserve Force. This corps was by far thergest. Its allegiance was with the Council and its members were scattered all across the region.

    Looking at sheer numbers alone, this wing is arge army of 200,000 strong. That said, I do not intend to move the 150,000 soldiers of the Western Reserve, so they will be deployed where they are stationed, Benimaru revealed.

    I suppose. Technically, theyre a unit under themand of the Council so we could move them at our discretion, but I believe theres no need to summon them here.

    Although, if they gather in one ce, I could use my magic to teleport them all at the same time. If we moved 150,000 people simultaneously, just trying to manage that would already be a gargantuan task. I had my doubts whether theyd be able to take proper military action until we set up a clear chain ofmand. It would be smarter to have strict security measures in ce to prevent the Empires spies fromunching diversionary attacks in each country.

    I think so too, Benimaru agreed. Although it wouldnt be impossible for me to organize them with my power, Ill maintain the status quo as far as the Western Reserve Force is concerned. The corpsmander is also absent but Im thinking of having Testarossa, the military attach, take on that role as well.

    I think thats for the bestbut if war breaks out, Testarossa may be asked to return home as well. Im worried about whether or not theyll be able to keep in touch with each other when that happens.

    How would she keep in touch with the troops scattered throughout the Western Nations? By using various means ofmunication like Magic Communication, correspondence-specific transmission crystals and a transmission web made of magisteel threads, awork had been sessfully established between countries and their respective major cities.

    However, in towns and viges located in more rural areas, the deployment of thework was going at a snails pace. I mean, it was the mission of our engineering unit to install them. There were wizards in each unit, so Magic Communication would probably get through, but

    Dont worry, Diablo reassured. Moss can handle a few hundredpanies.

    Yes, I heard that from Souei too. Moss is working with him on intelligence, but he can also take care of inter-unitmunication in his spare time, said Benimaru, voicing his support.

    Really?! Mosswhat a handy guy.

    Then, shouldnt Moss be the corpsmander? I suggested.

    No, that would rather be bad for Moss

    Indeed, given Testas temperament, it would be rather miserable for Moss. Not that its any of my business but I do feel a bit sorry for him.

    Okay. Lets appoint Testarossa as the provisional corpsmander then.

    Benimaru, not to mention even Diablo, felt sorry for Moss. Reading the room, I decided against giving the role to him.

    The Western Reserve would concentrate on their main job of maintaining security at this time. We might need to deploy them depending on how things develop, but I ultimately decided that would be ast resort.

    Testarossa would serve as the corpsmander. This was a temporary appointment and I made it clear that she would be reced when there was a suitable candidate.

    That should take care of the Western Reserve for now.

    Next was the Mixed Majin Corps.

    How about we leave this to Benimaru?

    I rmend Rigur-dono, Benimaru proposed.

    Rigur, huh? He certainly had experience in leading the security force, and his strength was over rank A. But on the other hand, he was already Rigurds assistant, so I suspected that he couldnt afford to be a corpsmander.

    If at all possible, I would like to win the war by relying solely on our standing army. Yet at this time, it was unknown just how many troops the Empire had assembled. We had sent people on reconnaissance missions, but we failed to obtain any information from beyond their borders. Nevertheless, based on the bits of information gleaned from their military exercises and other events, we could estimate that at least 300,000 troops would be mobilized. If we were unlucky, that number might rise to over a million. In light of this, we couldnt afford to keep the Mixed Majin Corps in reserve.

    I wasnt exactly dissatisfied with the idea of Rigur inmand, but I was worried. No matter how you looked at it, sending in an unorganized force with barely any preparation was dangerous.

    Hmm, I think Id rather leave this to Benimaru. As for this Mixed Majin Corps, lets call it the Red Numbers from now on. Select a couple members of Kurenai and have them each lead battalions of 1,000 soldiers. This will be the Fourth Corps, and Benimaru, you will be the corpsmander and take directmand.

    Its red because this corps screams dangerget it?

    Its been a while since Ive cracked a satisfying dad joke.

    Yeah. Jeez, I can already hear crickets; I should probably keep that one to myself. Despite throwing around stupid quips in my head, I somehow kept a straight face. Thankfully, nobody noticed, and the meeting went on smoothly.

    I understand. If thats the case, please leave it to me.

    Benimaru apparently anticipated this oue and assented without a hint of surprise.

    Since he had the Unique Skill Generalissimo under his belt, he could easilypensate for the unitsck of training. He was the perfect choice to handle such a random assortment of troops. Thus, in addition tomanding the entire armed forces, Benimaru also ced the Red Numbers under his directmand.

    Lastly, we had the Volunteer Corps.

    What are we going to do about the Volunteer Corps? I inquired.

    Thats the problem, Benimaru replied with a furrowed brow.

    The Volunteer Corps consistedrgely of humans. Benimaru was evidently worried that appointing a monster as themander of such a unit might stir up unnecessary discontent.

    Thats true, I agreed. If word gets out that humans cant get ahead in a monster country, our reputation is going to be damaged.

    Anyone whoins about such things is a weakling and a failure. We cant expect them to make it big anyway, so theres no need to worry about it!

    No, Shion. I mean, thats notpletely wrong, but itd be easy for people to believe that if they dont know us.

    I see. Humans are difficult beings.

    Shion remained skeptical, but our image-building strategy was important.

    Itd be ridiculous if we were called discriminatory over this kind of thing, so I thought we needed to give it some serious thought.

    But is there truly no one else more suitable? Diablo asked.

    He was right, and thats why Benimaru was worried.

    You arent wrong, I said. Theyre volunteers, after all, so theyre an unnned addition, as far as Im concerned.

    Yet, not taking advantage of their offer would be a waste.

    Thats right. I genuinely appreciated the sincerity of those who volunteered, and I didnt want to let it go to waste. However, if we wanted to make good use of it, we needed a capablemander. These guys were even more of a mess than the Mixed Majin Corps, which was now known as the Red Numbers. I couldnt imagine anyone other than Benimaru bringing them all together.

    Well, I dont know what to do.

    What about Girard, who is under Soueis care? Benimaru probed.

    Not possible. We took him in as part of an undisclosed deal with the Kingdom of Ingracia, and I doubt he wants to be seen in public, I admitted.

    I havent heard what kind of deal Testarossa made, but I dont think its a good idea to let Girard y an active role in the public eye. Apparently, he was evenbeled as a traitor to humanity, so they had to make an example out of him by publicly dering his death. While I didnt have any obligation to protect him, I didnt want to force him to y an active role, either.

    He would be more thanpetent, but he isnt a realistic option

    Benimaru made a case for him, but he wasnt really pushing for it. He quickly gave up on him and started thinking about other candidates. Yet the problem remainedwe needed a human as themander. Names were proposed one after another, but nobody seemed to fit the bill.

    How about asking the Holy Knight Order for help? Shion suddenly suggested.

    Benimaru and I nced at each other, then stared at Shion.

    W-we cant do that, can we?

    No, thats not

    Thats not possiblewas what I tried to say, but Shion brought up a name and cut me off.

    Then, how about Masayuki-dono?

    Masayuki, eh? It was as if a light bulb went off in my head.

    Thats it!

    That was impressive, Shion!

    Benimaru and I shouted at the same time.

    At that moment, we locked in Masayuki as themander of the Volunteer Corps.

    Although the decision to appoint him was made without his approval, it was a wonderful choice that everyone could agree on. Masayuki was the only person that remained skeptical.

    Why should I?

    When I revealed the news to him, he had his head in his hands.

    But it cant be helped, right? Sad as it may be, war was looming over us. His opinion didnt matter. Although that might be contrary to my earlier stance, there was no need to be concerned about Masayuki because if we left it to him, then everything would eventually turn out perfectly fine on its own. He was a good friend to have in troubling times like these.

    As for me, Masayuki began, Ive gotten pretty good at using my Unique Skill Chosen One. I dont feel like Im being praised for everything I do anymore, like I used to. But now, I cant use it even when I try, so dont expect too much, okay?

    I knew that he was lying, of course, and that he was making excuses so he could try to escape. After all, his poprity hadnt diminished one bit and he remained as influential as ever.

    Dont you want to show Kenya and the others how cool you are? I prodded.

    Urgh, thats

    If you go along with this, Ill let you off the hook for teaching the kids questionable stuff and gaining their respect.

    Dont worry, you can do it!

    But

    No buts. Didnt I help you with your fight against Gozer?

    Masayuki and his team had already passed the 50th floor. During that time, I had been secretly helping him along by using my avatar to weaken Gozer, the floors guardian.

    Thank you for your help back then he mumbled.

    You understand, dont you?

    Yes.

    After a little bit of coaxing, coupled with a few sprinkles of threats, he eventually came around to my idea and sealed the deal.

    Yes, I understand. I owe you a great deal, Rimuru-san, and Id like to repay a bit of that debt at times like these

    Although he was reluctant to do so, Masayuki agreed to be the corpsmander. There were noints from the volunteers. Rather, I heard them shouting stuff like, We did it! and Victory is ours!, all in a state of euphoria.

    No matter how dour Masayuki looked, he couldnt change the oue now.

    This is how I thought things would end up

    He said he mastered the Unique Skill Chosen One, so what gives? As Id suspected, it turned out that Masayuki had lied about mastering his Skill. Or maybe this had nothing to do with his Skill and it was simply his natural luck? Thatd be even more surprising.

    Leon, for instance, was the pr opposite of Masayuki; regardless of what he did, it always came off in a bad light. Hed been that way since his early days as a Hero, and I suppose it wasnt easy changing ones natural disposition.

    Well, well. Im sorry that I made this decision for you, but please shine brightly as the beacon of hope to inspire everyone! I cheered, trying to console him.

    Thus, the 20,000 members of the Volunteer Corps were led by Masayuki and fell under the banner of the Hero.

    In the revised organizational structure, the right wing had 52,000 while the left wing had 50,000. Benimaru was listed at the top. Beneath him were the various corpsmanders. In total, we had more than 100,000 troops, but even so, it was up in the air whether they could hold a candle to the Imperial Army. But there was no need to panic; our preparations were progressing steadily.

    As a reserve force, there were 150,000 soldiers in the Western Reserve. Plus, each country also reported that they were making preparations to ready reinforcements from among their own knights. An allied western force would be organized to be the veryst line of defense. The number of this army would probablye out to no less than 200,000, and we would be relying on them if the worstes to pass.

    We were scraping together as many mercenaries and aid from each country as possible. It was a lot, or pitifully little, depending on how you looked at it

    I heard that Testarossa had threatened them at the Council meeting, which was why they were cooperating. Either way, if we lose, then they would undeniably be the next targets, so they had to lend their support. Well, either way those forces would remain in ce until our defeat became evident.

    We had the home field advantage. We also had Veldoras presence nearby and the cooperation of demon lords like Luminas and Leon. Milim also promised to help us out. Karion said that his Beast Masters Warrior Alliance would always be prepared to deploy. And as my personal trump card, the ck Numbers under Diablo were at the ready.

    Since I gave Benimarumand of the entire army, ostensibly I wasnt directly in control of a single unitthat was how we ultimately decided things, but it wasnt the whole truth. The ck Numbers would only ept orders from Diablo and the demoness trio, who were his subordinates. It was a unitpletely independent of Benimarusmand.

    This was the full picture.

    We did not take into ount how Yuuki would act.

    War, huh? I muttered quietly in my room.

    Did the Empire really want to annex the Western Nations? Guy had mentioned the word game. There seemed to be some kind of connection, and perhaps the Empire had some disturbing ulterior motive. But even if that were the case

    I dont care whoes, if they try to mess with our paradise, well crush them.

    This was what I genuinely felt from the very depths of my heart. Im not going to make the same mistake again. I am a demon lord. I couldnt afford to misjudge what my priorities truly were.

    Meanwhile, within the Eastern Empire, preparations for the war were moving smoothly forward, just like in Tempest.

    Or rather, the Empires investment in the matter was orders of magnitude greater in scale and time, so immense that the two could not even begin topare.

    They had nned meticulously for a long, long time, all for a major offensive. Soon enough, the Empire was about to awake from its slumber. The days before their ferocious advance steadily counted down.

 Volume 12 - Ch 2.1

    Interlude

    The Internal Affairs of the Empire

    The Eastern Empireone of the oldest nations in the world. It was more formally known as the Nasca Namrium Ulmeria United Eastern Empire.

    The history of the Empire was said to be ancient, and that its foundations wereid out by a nation as far back as two thousand years ago. The long-standing minor Kingdom of Nasca gradually absorbed therge nations of the Magic Kingdom of Namrium and the Eastern Union of Ulmeria, thus giving birth to the Empire known today.

    Its overwhelming military power was its backbone. During the past two thousand years, under the reign of the uniting emperor Rudra Nam Ul Nasca, the Empire grew immensely powerful, quashing any signs of rebellion from the nations they had absorbed. It acted as the hegemonic power, dominating these states.

    This was the truth behind the Nasca Namrium Ulmeria United Eastern Empire,monly referred to as the Eastern Empire.

    The emperor could be described as an absolutist and was born from a pure bloodline of overlords who all passed down the name Rudra.

    Regardless of the truth of this matter, the emperor advocated absolute meritocracyand firmly stood by it. Thus, the core philosophy shaping the military was Power is everything, and a special system was established that allowed a person to climb the ranks, if they had the strength to.

    There was a rumor going around among the citizens of the Empire, pertaining to the reason why they had yet to begin their invasion of the Great Jura Forest. The reason many believed: The Empire had not finished preparing.

    Around three hundred and fifty years ago, an attempt to subdue the Storm Dragon Veldora failed, and a city was destroyed in the process. Those who had provoked the capricious dragon had no time to regret it, as they shared the same fate as that city.

    It had been thergest city of the Empire at the time, boasting a poption over a hundred thousand, and was a fortress city adjacent to the eastern side of the Great Jura Forest. It had been built over a hundred years to serve as a bridgehead to invade the forest. They had hoped to turn this city into a military stronghold in order to break through the forest and further expand the Empires territories. Driven by this ambition, the military at the time began to draft an assault n.

    They had to cross the Great Jura Forest. They had spent the past century longing for this opportunity. They were already a prosperous nation, and so there was only one reason why they hoped to expand their territories further: It was their emperors wish. There was no other reason, and none of the Empires citizens had anyints.

    The n proceeded smoothly, and as the Empires army gradually umted power, they were ready to disy their military prowess. Soon enough, they were given orders to invade the forest in the name of the emperor. However, all ns for the invasion were thwarted by the foolish idea of a certain troop captain.

    Since we are here, we might as well subjugate the ruler of the Great Jura Forest too. Its just a giant lizard, after all, it doesnt stand a chance against us. This hubris led to their ultimate downfall.

    As for what exactly they had done, it was not urately recorded. After all, the people in charge of keeping records as well as the ces holding said records were all turned to dust. The Empires wish and the emperors ambition were reduced to ashes.

    Time passed, and in the present day, the Empire found itself in a state of limbo. They had finally recovered from Veldoras blow, however, the emperor had yet to give his permission to invade.

    Any act of invasion towards the Great Jura Forest was strictly prohibited. After three hundred and fifty years, they had rebuilt their power once more, waiting for the right opportunity to strike.

    Then, let us have a look at the political structure of the Empire.

    Within the Empire, the political department and the military department were the left and right hands of the emperorhe had both political dominance and militarymand, holding absolute authority.

    Within the political department, the nobles within the Empire were organized into the House of Peers and enjoyed extraordinary authority. Yet it was merely superficial: in reality, these nobles had no actual decision-making power. They merely enjoyed the honor and privilege, while staying beholden to the emperors will. At most, they were just bureaucrats.

    The power of the nobles was hereditary, and they could be senators without being elected. Even if they were extremely ambitious, they would never have enough power to achieve their dream. All of the territories of the Empire belonged to the emperor. The nobles were merely leased thend for temporary management.

    The ones supporting the nobles were highly-educated officials. It was these officials who handled all the nning. They were directly supported by the emperor, since these officials had all sworn allegiance to him.

    Up next is the military department. The supreme decision-making power of the military did not belong to the nation, but the emperor. All of the Empires military power was centered on the emperor. This also applied to the nations that had been annexed by the Empire. All of their territories were imed, and theirnd now became the property of the emperor. So were the defense troops deployed there, where they were considered as a generous gift from the emperor.

    This policy was effective inpletely eliminating any form of rebellion in the provinces. The overwhelming difference in national power was the key to its sess.

    The Empire would ept the surrender of other nations, but it was the equivalent of forfeiting all of their rights. If one of them rejected those terms andunched a rebellion, they would be met with a bloody purge. The Empire did this to deter even the thought of insurrection, cutting off the very roots of rebellion.

    In that manner, the Empire managed to maintain order. On the one hand, the fear of their tyranny, and on the other, ensuring the livelihoods of its loyal subjectsthe quintessential carrot and stick policy. Through this, the Empire managed to maintain peace and prosperity with itsplete authoritarian control.

    It was normally impossible for an empire of this scale to be ruled by a single person. Yet even so, throughout its two millennia of history, the dominance of the emperor had never been shaken. Generation after generation, the emperors authority never faded. By all ounts, it was an extraordinary feat. If all of this truly was the emperors own doing, he was a being that transcended the mortal realm.

    Moving on, let us have a look at the military strength of the Empire. The structure of their military could be roughly divided into three major corps.

    The Armored Corpsan army modified by armored technicians consisting of mainly mechanized troops. They were the modernized Armed Corps and their arsenal included heavy weaponry, such as tanks. They symbolized the Empires technology.

    The Magic Beast Corpsan army consisting of all sorts of magic beasts captured by the Empire from various regions across the world, within their domain and otherwise. The corps manipted the magic beasts and wielded their power. They symbolized the Empires strength.

    The Mixed Corpsa cesspool where nonstandard mechanized troops and uncontroble, ferocious magic beasts were dumped, loosely resembling an army. This corps was considered to be too reliant on individual strength and unsuited for organized group action. However, their total strength was unknown, and if united, could potentially pose a tremendous threat. They symbolized the Empires heart. Though, this heart was not mature enough yet.

    Unlike the Western Nations, which focused its military power on swords and magic, the Empire was pioneering a new era with magic and science. The existence of otherworlders yed a major role in the growth of the Empires military power.

    Someone had seen potential in the knowledge brought from the other worlds, an archmage, one who had lived for a long time within the pce, named Gadra. Despite his elderly appearance, the man was extremely energetic. He craved knowledge of all kinds, even outside the field of magic. He was also very fond of hearing the stories told by people from other worlds. That was how he learned that there were many other nations in other worlds as well. Unlike this world, the residents of these other worlds spoke differentnguages and had different ideologies. Yet, even then, they were able to ovee their differences and coexist. He also learnt that other worlds had no magic, yet their civilizations were highly developed andpletely different to this worlds.

    Gadra had lived for a long time. Every time his life was about toe to an end, he would undergo the secret ritual he inventedthe mystic art of Reincarnationin order to rewind his lifespan. It was this ability that allowed him to study otherworlders over many lifetimes. He amassed a wealth of knowledge, including several otherworldnguages. In addition, whenever otherworlders arrived in this world, he would send his subjects to ensure that they were under his personal protection. Magical beasts werent the only thing the Empire was collecting.

    Gadra also appealed to the emperor on the practical use of otherworlders and was given the permission to do as he wished with them. Some of these otherworlders possessed unusual abilities, and some possessed vast knowledge. The otherworlders arriving at the borders of the Empire received special treatment, and far more had gathered there than any other nation. As a result, their cultures and traditions were seen across the Empire.

    Naturally, the Empire realized that many of them possessed Unique Skills and thus carried out further research. Because of them, the Imperial Armys technology continued to develop to the point that it likely surpassed all the other nations in the world.

    The Empire had abandoned the use of knights. Fighting on horseback had long since be obsolete, and in its ce, battles were fought with modernized weaponry. Soldiers who reced their flesh and bones with steel and machinery were called mechaknights, 8 and they soon yed pivotal roles in the Empires war force. The Armored Corps, the main force of the Empire, strongly exemplified this feature.

    In addition, the Magic Beast Corps also cleverly used the knowledge of the other worlds. DNA, also known as deoxyribonucleic acid, was a biological macromolecule that held the gic information of biological beings. Having gained this knowledge from the otherworlders, the Empire was able to analyze the strength of the magic beasts. They even went a step further in their research

    As for the Mixed Corps, it consisted of many powerful otherworlders. Every one of them had awakened their Unique Skills. They were a force to be reckoned with.

    And so, by cleverlybining the technology from the other worlds and special abilities, the Empire created an incredibly powerful army. You wouldnt be wrong to attribute much of the Empires steady growth to Gadras passion.

    However, separate to the three main corps Gadra developed, there was another group in charge of protecting the emperor. This group was, at most, the size of apany, which was a hundred men. It was called the Imperial Guardians. The members were called Imperial Knights, 9 despite the term knight being a relic of a bygone era. A clueless outsider might think that they were merely a formality, or like their name, a remnant from the past. But that was far from the truth. The Imperial Knights of the Imperial Guardians were the elite of the elite, handpicked from each of the corps.

    Among them were otherworlders, which only further proved theirmitment to the credo that Power is everything, by disregarding any prejudice over a persons home country. These people had not gained their titles through their familys name or influence in this old empire, but purely on their own merit. There were rumors saying that the Imperial Guardians were all gifted legendary-grade weapons as proof that they were the strongest among men. These powerful elites paired with the best gear could take on thousands of foes on their own. Theirbined strength was superior to that of every corpsbined.

    They were also guaranteed the best treatment. Each one of them had the rank of a senior officer. When they carried out special missions, they were granted the authority of a colonel, at minimum. They were the Imperial Guardians, admired by the Empires soldiers as the greatest force of the Empire.

    In conclusion, there were four military corps within the Empire. To be themanding general of these corps, one had to demonstrate adequate military prowess to force those below into obedience. They had to make sure that everyone recognized why they were the strongest within the Empire.

    So, how would they prove this?

    This was done throughpetition for ranksa rank battlewithin the Empires military. So long as the battle was supervised by a neutral third party, this system allowed a lower-ranking individual to challenge his superior. In other words, it allowed insubordination. As a result, ranks within the corps often fluctuated.

    Naturally, several conditions had to be met for these rank battles to be approved. They could not be held during a military operation. It would be rendered invalid without the presence of a witness. Moreover, if the challenging party were defeated, they would need to wait another year before regaining the right to challenge. The same rule applied if the challenger killed their opponent.

    Since superior officers were allowed to kill their challengers, these challenges had to be treated with caution. The challenger had to utilize an overwhelming amount of strength in order to make their opponent admit defeat. This system was very much in line with the Empires philosophy, Power is everything.

    Nevertheless, there was no shortage of people who hoped to climb the ranks to be Imperial Guardians. The Empires ideology was engraved on the peoples hearts.

    This was how the rankings within the Empire were decided. However, Gadra was exempted from this rule. Due to his special position, he was like a foreigner to the Empire.

    Excluding Gadra, the Empire would select soldiers from the rest of the military to join the ranks of the Imperial Guardians, as well as elect the corpsmanders. When a recement was needed, candidates would be chosen from among the top 100 ranks.

    Those who wished to climb the ranks of office were given equal opportunity. That was why those who truly possessed strength would not go unnoticed. Everyone continuously honed their skills, eager to demonstrate their talents.

    Through this method, the Empire would elect one marshal, the most highly-ranked officer, and three generals. In addition, the highest-ranking individual would automatically be elected as the marshal. In contrast, only after the emperor, the marshal, and Gadra had discussed the matter would they appoint the appropriate candidates as the generals. The reasoning was very simple: strength didnt always trante to strategicmand.

    All in all, the members who remained in each corps were weaker than the Imperial Guardians, so there was no doubt that the generals who became the corpsmanders would all be the most capable elites in their respective corps. This was how themanders of the corps were decided. These four individuals were the highly esteemed people representing the Empire to the public.

    The marshal and the three generals would receive gear appropriate for their position. Since the members of the Imperial Guardians received legendary-grade gear, the gifts to these four individuals must therefore be superior, secret treasures of the Empire. These were the strongest treasured items, those whose power was wielded during the many conquests in the ancient timesmythical-grade gear.

    The fact that the Empire possessed multiple mythical-grade items, the existence of which itself was often questioned, underpinned their prestige. The ultimate gear that no mortal human could ever dream of touching. Only those worthy could wield it. Once the gear itself approved of them could they unleash their true power. Only the strongest deserved this ultimate power. These individuals seemed almost invincible, and so the Empire managed to stand, unshaken.

    Yet as time passed

    An anomaly appeared in the Empire. For the first time in several decades, a new face took the ce of an old corpsmander. With a feat that had seemed unfeasible, one man brought the disjointed Mixed Corps together under a single, strong will. He had been a part of the corps for less than a year, but the rate of his progress was unprecedented, beyond all reason. Following triumph after triumph, defeating countless experienced warriors, this young man had managed to climb to one of the Empires top positions.

    His name was Yuuki Kagurazaka.

    With the rise of Yuuki, things were about to escte rapidly.

 Volume 12 - Ch 3

    Visitors from the Empire

    In a luxurious room, three men stood close to one another, faces stered with nervous expressions. They straightened their backs, waiting for the master of this room to return. That was the man who had be one of the corpsmanders of the Empire in the blink of an eyeYuuki.

    But in the eyes of these three, that was nothing surprising. After all, Yuuki was their overlord, as well as the grandmaster of the secret organization they were all a part ofCerberus.

    Hey, sorry for the holdup, you guys! You could have sat down while you waited, Yuuki greeted, entering the room.

    Kagali followed closely behind him like a true secretary.

    No no, Yuuki-sama, we are your loyal subordinates, there is no need for you to be concerned about us, one of the three replied for everyone. He was one of the leaders of Cerberus, Damrada the Golda suspicious and seemingly unpredictable man.

    As for the other two, one of them was Misha the Lover. A beauty who simultaneously possessed both the appearance of a young girl and a mature woman, although with an unusual allure which one might even call eerie.

    Thest person symbolized raw strength, Vega the Power. His body was muscr and tenacious, like that of a ferocious beast, while the aura he exuded was oppressive enough to kill a person with just a nce.

    These three were the leaders of Cerberus.

    They bowed to Yuuki before taking their seats.

    Congrattions for taking the office of corpsmander, sir.

    Since Yuuki-sama has even managed to escape from the hands of Demon Lord Guy, this was only to be expected.

    Hmph, if you had handed over the matter to me, running the corps would have been a piece of cake.

    While Damrada and Misha both congratted Yuuki, Vega seemed extremely displeased. But Yuuki didnt mind.

    Indeed. A meathead like you would have no trouble fighting his way to the top, but theyd never elect a corpsmander that hopelessly inept at leadingYuuki smirked to himself.

    Either way, this was all thanks to Damradas rmendation to seek Master Gadra, Yuuki said, trying to change the topic.

    You are too kind, Damrada replied with a smile. Our progress to this day has all been thanks to the prior arrangements made after we predicted how things would develop. I merely introduced the otherworlders prepared by Yuuki-sama to Gadra-dono. Its nothing worthy of praise.

    Hahaha, youre as stubborn as a mule. You couldve just acted happy at mypliments.

    I deliberately chose not to. It would be a burden if someone were to set their expectations of me too high.

    Haha, you sure are a funny man.

    Yuuki and Damrada exchanged looks as they both smiled. This alone was able tomunicate each others thoughts, since both of them had confidence in each others abilities.

    After they continued chatting for a bit, Yuuki cut to the main issue. Now then, Kagali, please give the report on the movement of Demon Lord Rimuru.

    Understood, Yuuki-sama. Currently, Demon Lord Rimuru is

    Hearing Yuukis order, Kagali began to speak. Her source of information came from the members of the Freedom Association in the West. Most of Yuukis subordinates had already fled, so by using this distraction, they had managed to leave behind a few spies.

    Kagali spoke in a very clear voice and gave a concise exnation. She revealed that the Western Nations were nowpletely under Rimurus control. Furthermore, they had organized a massive, fearsome army as a countermeasure against any invasion initiated by the Empire. In addition, at the capital Rimuru, there were often sightings of incredible phenomena, and so on.

    I see. There is a small town near the bank of the Great Ameld River, meant exclusively for hosting taverns; did he turn that into a military outpost? Yuuki murmured to himself. Now that I think about it, if he intends to expand his defensive perimeter to our nation, he would have to do that.

    Indeed, nearly 20,000 soldiers have already been deployed there. It looks like they utilized something called a magitrain to transport the supplies. I heard that there were enough rations for a protracted war, Kagali exined.

    Impressive. If that is the case, it will be difficult for the Empire to win.

    Thats true. That nation has imported rations, enough to feed over a million people, directly from the Kingdom of Farmenas. While Farmenas could hardlypare to its strength a year ago, the nation right now could probably fight a war with the Empire all by itself. Moreover, if the Western States Council, controlled by Demon Lord Rimuru, were to gather all their might, they would certainly be a force to be reckoned with.

    That would be hard to say. Rimuru-san has already decided to embrace cruelty and ruthlessness; however, considering his personality, hes still as soft as ever. If we were to fight seriously with our numbers, the casualties would only increase. Thats why he would probably want to push back the Empire with only the elite forces of his own nation.

    How would that be possible

    He managed to be a demon lord, after all. Surely he wouldnt do something that foolish

    While both Kagali and Damrada rejected the idea, Yuuki remained steadfast in his view.

    That person is incredibly naive and abnormally powerful at the same time, theres no telling what he can and cannot do

    Thats what Yuuki believed deep down, but he decided not to voice that opinion and asked Kagali to continue.

    Excuse me, Kagali apologized, I shall resume with the report. There are over fifty thousand soldiers waiting for orders at the capital city Rimuru. Reinforcements sent by the former Beast Kingdom Eurazania are gradually arriving as well. The estimated number of soldiers would amount to over a hundred thousand.

    That does sound very surprising, but the Empire still has the numerical advantage.

    Kagali voiced her genuine thoughts. Indeed, the difference in numbers is huge. The Imperial Army has more than a million troops. Even the leastpetent soldiers have undergone those suspicious physical modifications and their average strength is at least rank C or above. Plus, they are armed with many strange pieces of equipment. Honestly, Demon Lord Rimuru will not stand a chance against the Empire.

    It was astonishing to have an army of 100,000 men. Every single one of those soldiers were highly trained and had high morale to boot. Normally speaking, this was a size to be praised. However, it would quickly seem trivial whenpared to the scale of the Empires army.

    Centuries ago, when Kagali was still Demon Lord Kazalim, even her castles defense mechanismwhich she was quite proud offaced defeat against the Empires military might. This great difference in numbers couldnt help but make her think that an army of merely 100,000 soldiers was pointless.

    However, Yuuki had a dissenting view.

    Ill keep your opinion in mind, please proceed with the report.

    Then, Kagali calmly continued, next I shall report regarding his nations technological strength

    She mentioned that Tempest had suddenly begun to sell some extremely rare, new products. There were items that could make life more convenient, as well as high-quality equipment. It was a strange assortment of items, yet all of them were very useful.

    Naturally, many people wanted to get an exclusive contract with the producer of these items; yet, no matter how hard these traders tried to locate the source of these products, they could never find it. The whole ordeal remained a mystery.

    The aforementioned magitrain is also one of these items. That nation seems to be experiencing a wave of technological innovation, just like the Empire. Unfortunately, they seem to havepletely prevented any leaks of their confidential information. Despite the best efforts of the Freedom Association, we were not able to find the source of these items.

    It was certain that the development was being carried out somewhere in that nation, but they had no clue as to where that exactly was. This seemed to have frustrated Kagali as well. They couldnt even send their subordinates to try and find the source; if they were to draw any suspicion, it would all be over. Besides, their opponent was Demon Lord Rimuru and even she could not face off against him.

    It was then that Kagali suddenly recalled something. Now that I think about it, they are also developing some new forms of weaponry. Considering this, we should be more cautious. We must not be blinded by the number of soldiers alone.

    Hearing this, Yuuki suddenlyughed. Clever as always, you noticed. Thats it. While the tanks developed by the Empire were shocking enough, Rimuru-san has also managed to develop the magitrain. Now, scientific weapons are not exclusive to the Empire, so we cannot treat them as our ace in the hole.

    The Empire was not the only one who possessed technology from another world. Rimuru also possessed the memory of an otherworlderthere was no telling what type of weapons he was developing.

    Any other nation would surely descend into panic when faced with the unknown strength of the Empire. Even if they had otherworlders who understood its weaponry on their side, knowing what they were up against would only make them fall further into despair The difference in strength between the two would be very clear to them, and they would realize they have no chance of winning.

    But what if the Empires enemy possessed sophisticated technology and the ability to develop the same type of things as the Empire? They could quicklye up with a solution and crush this supposed superiority the Empire enjoyed. On the other hand, if they let their current advantage get to their head, the dynamic nature of the situation might prevent them from responding quickly and leave them behind.

    Yuuki had the foresight to notice this, and that was why he thought that the chances of Rimuru emerging victorious were, in fact, quite high.

    How boring! Vega snapped. Well just beat the shit out of them, or better, kill everyst one of them! That way, wed be able to solve all our problems!

    Whether it was weapons or armies, they should just eliminate any hindrance in their wayVega dered so confidently. Yuuki was quite frustrated having realized that nothing they said till now had gotten through to him.

    This guy sure has strength, but not the brains to matchor rather, he doesnt have a brain to begin with If only he were smarter, I could have given him some more useful roles to yYuuki sighed internally.

    When that timees, Ill leave the matter to you, but dont underestimate the enemy.

    With this vague statement, Yuuki otherwise told Vega to shut up. However, what Vega said was not entirely unreasonable. Yuuki began to ponder, thinking: After all In this world, quality was more important than quantity. No matter howrge an army you managed to organize, it would not stand a chance against Demon Lord Guy. It was easy to tell from this example that the individual strength of abatant was something that could not be ignored.

    In order to achieve strategic goals, judging your enemys strength was crucialessentially, information warfare was vital. And in order to achieve this, it was imperative to send someone who was actually capable, as it was remarkablymon to surrender when faced with an insurmountable foe.

    Regardless of how strong the opponent was, the more people joined in on the attack, the greater the chances of achieving their strategic goals. Merely looking at only thebined strength of the troops was meaningless; to consider what type of troops you had and how to use them effectively was more important.

    From this perspective, the Tempest Federation was one tough enemy. The demon lord, Rimuru, was not the sole threat from this nation. Within Tempest, there were several powerful majins. For instance, the famed Four Heavenly KingsBenimaru, Diablo, Shion, and Gobta. Simply having these four deployed would be equivalent to four tactical units, and defeating them alone would be a highly challenging task.

    Its not just their technological prowess, there are plenty of tough warriors too. It doesnt matter how many people we gather; they wont stand a chance against these guys. In hindsight, it makes me feel like surrendering to Demon Lord Guy really was the right thing to do.

    As far as Yuuki knew, he could name several people in that nation who were even stronger than Gobta. In other words, there were definitely monsters who could rival the strength of the Four Heavenly Kings.

    The problem is those majins, who seem to rival saints and demon lords in strength, Damrada muttered, agreeing with Yuuki.

    Exactly. His country not only has the Four Heavenly Kings, but also majins like Geld and Gabil. It is a bit hard to understand how he was able to gather a number of demon lord-ss individuals like them.

    The more Yuuki thought about it, the more dubious it became. A number of people with strength that could rival ymans were under one demon lordRimuru. And to those who knew this, it wasnt a joke but a real headache.

    I guess its fortunate that we arent antagonizing Demon Lord Rimuru right now.

    Everyone but Vega nodded silently at Yuukisment.

    Because of their agreement, it could be said that Yuuki and hisrades hade under the umbre of Demon Lord Guy. In other words, making a move on Tempest was an affront to Guy himself. As long as they did not intend to meddle in Rimurus affairs, one could say that they were in a temporary ceasefire with Rimuru, which was rather convenient for Yuuki, who intended to make the most of this situation.

    And if they ever did be hostile, it would only be after they had regained all that they lost in the West.

    Yuuki returned to the main subject.

    So, was that everything you had to report? he questioned Kagali.

    It seems that detailed military information could not be investigated, Kagali added, and thus concludes all the highly urate information I obtained. But theres one topic that is quite interesting.

    And that is?

    In the capital city Rimuru, they have a kind of event called emergency drills, and now they have supplemented an evacuation drill to this event.

    Up until now, their disaster prevention drills had been very specific, such as taking shelter in a sturdy building or training to put out a fire. However, the purpose of thistest disaster drill was unclear, which involved getting into the town as quickly as possible through any of the gates.

    Just getting into the town?

    Yes. The spies were puzzled by it too, so they decided to split up and act in two groups.

    From the inside and outside, I reckon?

    Thats right. As a result, they reported seeing a strange sight, like something straight out of a dream.

    A strange sight? Misha suddenly inquired.

    Yes, Misha, Kagali answered. Unbelievable as it may seem, the whole town suddenly disappeared ten minutes after the announcement was over. And they imed that the only thing left remaining was one big gate.

    ording to the reports of the investigators who were outside, other than the gate, there were several guards left to guide the people who failed to enter the town in time.

    After confirming that nobody was there, the investigators decided to enter the gate. What weed them was a stone-builtbyrinth. The investigators were able to flee outside as they panicked, which suggested that it was possible to go in and out freely.

    Hmm That might be the Dungeon

    Is there something youd like to share with us, Yuuki-sama?

    Yeah, I think Kagali knows about this as well; that town has a tourist attraction called the Dungeon, right?

    Ah yeah, the ce thats crawling with monsters just waiting to be ughtered by adventurers, was it?

    That might be it. After all, there was a rumor that there is a city in that Dungeon

    A city inside the Dungeon? Damrada repeated, unable to believe what he had just heard.

    It was hard to exin all this to someone wholly unfamiliar with it. All they could do was attempt to convince him of the truth. Yeah, you have every right to think its absurd, but considering this is Rimuru-san were talking about, it may very well be possible. I mean, thatbyrinth is a hundred floors deep, with Veldora guarding the very bottom.

    Is that true?

    Of course. I heard it from Veldora himself.

    Damrada was rendered speechless by Yuukis words.

    Well, it makes sense if you think about it, Kagali conceded with pity in her eyes. There might be an important facility in that city, such as a site for developing new technology.

    Ah, I see. Its possibleno, its reasonable to think so.

    Yuuki was getting more and more excited, beyond stunned, at the idea of doing something so outrageous. His vapid spection didnt seem far off anymore. He was convinced that it was possible for Rimuru.

    But if thats the case, what will happen with the war?

    I dont know either. Although Ive always thought that he wasnt the kind of opponent tounch a frontal attack, protecting the city with that method is just unbelievable. Im sure the Imperial Army will also be shocked.

    Yuuki was convinced that Rimuru would never bring a ruinous battle to his doorstep, because there was no way he would allow the residents of his town to get in harms way.

    But what if the town is fully protected We have to reassess all the tactics we had anticipated.

    Well just wait and see what happens in the inn town, and besides, the real battle will take ce in the capital, right? I surmise that if the Imperial Army ignores the gate, they will be attacked from the rear by Rimuru-sans forces.

    In that case, it would be possible tounch a pincer attack together with the allied western forces.

    Their vanguard will explore and analyze the war potential of the Imperial Army. And while the allied western forces and the Imperial Army are engaged in a war of attrition, the remaining Tempest forces can deal with the enemy slowly but surely.

    What a scary n to think of. As expected of a demon lord.

    Understanding Yuukis words, Kagali, Damrada, and Misha looked astonished. He knew that Demon Lord Rimuru wasnt someone that could be dealt with using conventional forces alone, but he hadnt thought that it would go this far.

    The difficulty of even envisioning future hostilities towards him seemed to bother Yuuki. Hence, he and the others were even more excited to see how the battle between the Imperial Army and Demon Lord Rimuru would turn out.

    So, Yuuki-sama. How should we proceed going forward? asked Misha, looking for the right moment. She and the others followed Yuuki even after knowing he had lost to Demon Lord Guy. But even now they were not able to read what he was thinking.

    It was in their favor if the Empire was made to suffer by Demon Lord Rimuru and his subordinates. But if that failed to ur, they didnt want to be the ones to make it happen. With his agreement with Guy, they didnt think that Yuuki would seriously back the Empire. However, they feared that now that he had be a corpsmander, he would fall into his own trap.

    To Cerberus, the fact that a top-ranking officer of the military was on their side was very appealing, but on the contrary, it implied the risk of being taken in by the military. To eat or to be eatenit would take only a single wrong turn to meet their doom.

    It was this worry which prompted Mishas question, and Yuuki was well aware of it.

    Theres no need to worry, Yuuki reassured. If Rimuru-san does hold out against the Empire, thats good for us, too. The Empire will be in the way of achieving our goals. So, its not just because Demon Lord Guy told me to do so; I will have to eat away at their strength, one way or the other. Now that Ive be a corpsmander, I can control when it happens. Think of the situation this way.

    Now that Yuuki had be one of the three generals of the Empire, it was safe to say that he had the inner workings of the Imperial Army in his hands. If he knew the military strategy of the Empire, he could even predict its faults, too. This meant hed be able to urately predict when the Empire would take military action, what the size of their army would be, and even when the Imperial maind would be at its most vulnerable.

    If resistance in the West was strong, the Empire would have to exert more military force. And if that were to happen, Yuuki thought that no matter how tight of a defense the Empire had, an opportunity would surely show itself, sooner orter.

    We will seize that opportunity! Yuuki dered, mming his fist on the table.

    Kagali smiled while standing up straight, and Damrada and the other two, still sitting, got excited at the meaning of those words.

    Do you mean a coup dtat

    Aah, I cant wait for that to happen. Just what youd expect from Yuuki-sama.

    Hehe, aint that interesting. Whether it be the Empire or a demon lord, Ill destroy them all!

    Yuuki ignored Vega, who was evidently excited, and got back on track.

    Well, thats our ultimate goal. At the end of the day, my promise with Guy was to throw the Empire into chaos. I need to keep my promise. Incidentally, we will also stir up the West, so I dont think thats something we have the right toin about, Yuuki said with a grin.

    Guy hadnt forbidden him from interfering with the West, so Yuuki was free to do whatever he wanted.

    So, you want the Empire and the West to fight each other, and then crush the Empires head in the meantime Damrada trailed off.

    Misha revealed a brilliant smile. You alwayse up with the most devious of ns.

    Not really. I think anyone could havee up with such a thing.

    Some may have been able toe up with such a n, but fewer were willing to carry it out. No, there mightve been people who wanted to do it, butcked the strength required to see it through. Yuuki was differenthe could bothe up with such a n and bring it to fruition.

    Ive also leaked some information to Master Gadra. That old man is a trailzing, flexible thinker, and for some reason, he holds a sharp grudge against the Western Nations. Developing various weaponsone of his contributions to the Empireis a product of this animus.

    Indeed, his reputation has spread far and wide.

    I know, right? Once he investigates those tidbits, he will surely recognize Demon Lord Rimuru as a threat to the Empires ambitions and see how dangerous he really is.

    And what do you think will happen then?

    Master Gadra has a lot of influence over the Imperial Army. However, he doesnt actually have any authority. Thats because that old mans interests revolve around getting revenge. So, in my opinion, if I steer him properly, I can pit him against Demon Lord Rimuru.

    At the same time, Yuuki wanted Gadra to look for more information about the Dungeon.

    If that happens, Damrada spected, then it will be possible to weaken both Demon Lord Rimuru and the Imperial Army, wouldnt it?

    Exactly! Yuuki nodded with satisfaction.

    Yuuki didnt intend to make a move on Rimuru himself, but he was more than wee to have someone else challenge him of their own ord. That was why he had devised many cowardly measures.

    In my opinion, he continued, going further into detail, there are three people that we need to be wary of in the Empire, and one of them is Master Gadra.

    Gadra was an archmage who had lived for a long time. He was a majin who knew all about the inner workings of the capital and was also a champion who had survived thest battle to subjugate the Storm Dragon Veldora. Those who knew all this feared him.

    So, who are the other two? Kagali wondered, showing genuine interest, much to Yuukis chagrin.

    Actually, I havent been able to figure out their identities. Thats why I can say that they are definitely a troublesome bunch.

    Yuuki wasnt able to nail down their real identities even after making full use of his informationwork. So, from this fact alone, it was obvious how vexatious these people were.

    Could it be that they are top-ranking members of the Imperial Guardians? suggested Misha, as if she suddenly remembered something.

    Yuuki vaguely affirmed the question. It was rumored within the army that the Single Digit Imperial Knights were stronger than the corpsmanders. Yuuki personally felt that it wasnt a mere rumor. Although he rose to the position of corpsmander, his rank was only at Double Digit.

    There was no point in trying to contest a rank battle unless you knew who your opponent was. And, in order to be a Single Digit, one was required to appeal directly to the Emperor and win the battle in his presence. This fact was only known to those who were privileged enough to consider the position.

    I think I might be able to beat a Single Digit. However, I didnt want to show my trump card in front of our enemies, so I didnt apply for a rank battle before the Emperor.

    Nevertheless, Yuuki was chosen as a corpsmander, but that was because of the connections he had with Gadra.

    But if thats the case, then you must fight them first, so that we can know for sure if youre stronger than them or not. Anyway, who are these troublesome folks youre talking about? Dya mean there are more than nine people behind the Single Digits?

    Vega raised an excellent point. Yuuki nodded, a bit shocked at that.

    Well, youre right. There is a possibility that a nasty guy is hiding among those nine people. But hey, you cant be wary of someone youve never seen before, can you? Guys, Im talking about the people who have already shown themselves in broad daylight.

    And whos that? Damrada inquired.

    The Head of the Imperial Intelligence Agency, Tatsuya Kondou.

    Youre right, I cant get a handle on the mans identity.

    Its creepy that we know his name and appearance, but we dont know what hes really like.

    Tatsuya Kondou, as his name suggested, was an otherworlder. But as far as personal details went, that was all anyone knew about him. There was even a rumor that he was the specter that fed on information. He was just a first lieutenant in rank, but none of the corpsmanders had the authority tomand him. It meant that the Imperial Intelligence Bureau stood above the militaryplex in the power hierarchy.

    Weird, right? Its only an assumption, but I think hes also a Single Digit.

    I see.

    Now that you mention it, that does add up. Damrada and Kagali nodded firmly. Misha was also contemting the possibility but appeared to have no objections.

    Then, who is thest person? Vega, apparently the only one disinterested in the matter, asked Yuuki, urging him to cut to the chase.

    Hahaha, how impatient. About Tatsuya Kondou, its best to meet him first. Ill find an opportunity to arrange just that with him. As for thest person, Im not sure about this either.

    What? What does that mean? Vega demanded in a slightly rougher tone. The excitement mustve gotten to his head.

    Calm down, Vega, Yuuki lightly warned him.

    Y-yeah. Sorry.

    Vega, who was reprimanded, broke out in a cold sweat. The difference in ss between him and Yuuki was apparent.

    Thest person is the one who sits next to the Emperor. She had such a tremendous presence that you could feel it from the other side of the blinds.

    ?

    No one but Yuuki was aware of her true identityor even the fact that she existed. From this alone, one could tell how dangerous that person was.

    That kind of big shot, huh? I never heard anything of the sort Damrada replied on everyones behalf.

    As I thought, Yuuki muttered. Despite such a presence, no one seems to have noticed her existence. I can only imagine how dangerous she is.

    The room fell silent.

    Does that person really exist? I havent heard any rumors suggesting that sort of thing.

    On the other hand, none of us would have believed it if we hadnt heard it from you.

    Yuuki smiled at his subordinates who still eyed him skeptically.

    Dont worry about it. Just remember that these three will be the major obstacles when we stage a coup in the Empire. Im going to get rid of Master Gadra first; so, Damrada, start digging about Kondou Tatsuya.

    Very well.

    Misha, just continue your mission.

    Understood. Ill continue to focus on wrapping themander of the Armored Corps around my little finger.

    What about me? Vega pointed out.

    Youre going to infiltrate the Magic Beast Corps. With your strength, youll be an Imperial Guardian in no time. However, youre not allowed to kill the corpsmander, got it?

    Got it. Ill do my best, Vegaughed ferociously, happy with the fact that he had finally received his order.

    Is it going to be all right? Yuuki was a little bit worried but decided to trust Vega, nevertheless. If, by any chance, he did kill a corpsmander, the military actions of the Empire would be dyed. Yuuki was anxious about that, but he decided to dismiss it and nned to cross that bridge when he got to it.

    The three heads of Cerberus left, making Yuuki and Kagali the only people in the room.

    Say, Yuuki-sama, will they be able to perform their missions sessfully?

    Beats me. Even in all my efforts to be careful, I stepped on a tigers tail named Guy. So, I dont mean to be hypocritical, but I want them to carry out their missions as best as they can.

    Damrada would investigate Tatsuya Kondou. Misha would ensnare themander of the Armored Corps. Vega was ordered to rise up in the Magic Beast Corps. Each of them embarked on a perilous mission under Yuukismand. As their leader, he could only wish for the sess of his subordinates.

    But weve finallye this far. The war is going to start soon.

    Yeah, thats right. Now then, it will be interesting seeing which side wins.

    Please dont get ahead of yourself. Even if the coup seeds, what happens after that is way more crucial.

    Yeah. Thats why we have Lace and the crew working on it. Our n is wless. The two smiled at each other.

    Their goal wasnt to let the Empire win. The more the war became bogged down, the more the national power of the Empire declined. That was what they were aiming for, and then, they would carry out a coup dtat. The sess or failure of that was the linchpin to Yuuki and Kagalis ns.

    We will turn the emperor into a puppet and establish a new empire. And then

    We will reconcile peacefully with the Western Nations.

    And when that happens

    We will assassinate the emperor!

    If defeating Demon Lord Rimuru proved difficult, then they didnt need to push their luck. After losing to Guy, Yuuki had given up and settled on medium-to-short-term world domination. He realized that until he gained absolute power, going ahead with violence was the height of folly. Instead, focusing on increasing his own trump cards for now, was far wiser. If the devastation from the war spiraled into rivers of blood

    I will awaken as a True Demon Lord.

    Looking forward to that, Kagali. By then, I will have mastered my new power as well.

    Yuuki had awakened an Ultimate Skill. And with it, he had felt that his life span was extended several times over. Not only that, but he had also learned the fact that there was a superior existence in this world, the absolute beingDemon Lord Guy. Disregard such an existence, and world domination would be nothing more than a pipe dream.

    He had slipped under Guys radar and was now umting strength. They would incite the Empire and prolong the war to exhaust both East and West. If the emperors assassination happened at a time when the masses grew weary and turned their backs on the war, the world would face a more chaotic and horrific period. By taking advantage of this confusion, they would aim for further awakeningthat was the gist of the n Yuuki and Kagali had drawn up.

    In any case, we should be exceedingly careful.

    Indeed. Really careful, I suppose.

    Then they looked at each other again and smirked.

    Despite their massive intellect, these two big brains didnt attribute much importance to the Dungeon. They only saw its value in hiding important facilitiesand even a whole cityand to pique the interest of Master Gadra, just to make him a nuisance for Rimuru.

    They might also go into thebyrinth someday, so they had a fleeting thought about the necessity to, at the very least, have it investigated in order to find clues on how to conquer it. As a result, the dungeon attack team would return with unexpected findings, which Yuuki hadnt foreseen.

    Master Gadra was grim-faced, deep in thought, upon receiving information from Yuuki.

    Hmmm. Why now, when the Empire finally has the opportunity to destroy the god Luminas

    With the revival of Storm Dragon Veldora, drastic revisions were made to the n. That couldnt be helped. Since, in thest expedition, the Storm Dragon hadpletely ruined the project.

    And nowopinions in the Empire were greatly divided. The first faction proposed waiting for the Storm Dragon to disappear to ensure the sess of their n. The second faction sought to subjugate the Storm Dragon with the power of their newly developed weapons. Lastly, the third faction urged to avoid the Great Jura Forest in its entirety so as not to stir trouble with the Storm Dragon.

    The schism between these three factions threw a wrench in the Empires ability to move forward. As a consequence, they had allowed the revival of the Storm Dragon. The faction seeking the Storm Dragons subjugation was infuriated at this turn of events, but the other two factions held the majority, and thus, their opinion was ignored. After all, if the new weapons didnt work, they wouldve been setting themselves up for another abysmal failure.

    As for Gadra, he didnt care about the Storm Dragon. His goal in life was to destroy Luminism in the West and take revenge on the Seven Luminary Clerics who had killed his close friend.

    A newspaper he got from the West described the Seven Luminary Clerics evil deeds under the headline The Downfall of Champions. At the same time, he had heard news that the Seven Luminaries had perished. In spite of this, Gadra didnt want to believe this to be true. He was firmly convinced that at least Gran would have survived and was lying low in the shadows.

    In the past few months, a lot of disinformation hade from the West and it made it incredibly difficult to corroborate information. Because of this, he did not know whether or not it was true, but there was a rumor that the Rosso family had fallen, too.

    Well, its still unconfirmed. The Sun Priest, Gran, is probably that wreck of a Hero. Even though he is old, hes not someone you should ever underestimate.

    Besides, the rule of the Western States Council seemed to be rock-solid on the surface, but behind the scenes, various developments had been confirmed. There was no indication among these rumors that the Western Holy Church had been weakened, which seemed to prove to Gadra that the Sun Priest Gran had managed to survive.

    We should just ignore that Storm Dragon and attack the West

    But he knew exactly how hard that was.

    The Storm Dragon and a demon lord are joining forces, huh. It is the height of folly to send an army against such a monstrous creature that lives beyond thews of magic. I helped to develop the new weapons, so Im sure they can be used to halt it in its tracks. But to destroy it is another matter. Let alone control it

    Gadra had survived the previous great expedition, so he had experienced first-hand how big of a threat Veldora was. Due to this experience, he also thought that the belligerents were reckless.

    Those fools dont know how hard it is to perform Mental Control on spiritual life forms in the first ce!

    Achieving Mental Control over spiritual life forms wasnt entirely impossible. The varying degrees of sess from the experiments conducted on demons had proven this. Gadra knew this very well given that he was the one who hade up with this theory. Based on the results from these various investigations, he had arrived at the conclusion that the Storm Dragon Veldora should not be messed with.

    He had submitted this report to the emperor, but, unfortunately, it was rejectedThere are people who want to do this, so I wont stop them. Gadras advice fell on deaf ears. There was nothing more he could do.

    This time, a new problem had appearedDemon Lord Rimuru. He was the demon lord who had unified the Great Jura Forest, established it as a country, and ruled over it. And he had done all this at a terrifying pace If that demon lord had partnered up with the Storm Dragon, attacking the Great Jura Forest would be a fools gambit.

    It would be a different story if the Empire mobilized its whole army. Still, it would be necessary to lure the enemy out into favorable terrain in order to deploy the entire army effectively. And normally, that was impossible. Then, how about fighting in the opponents own ring?

    Dungeon, eh? Gadra mumbled to himself. They may also be developing weapons from the otherworld. I have no choice but to look into it. It would be advantageous if we could defeat Veldora and Rimuru without sustaining more than thirty percent in casualties. Otherwise, our following chances for a decisive victory over the Western Nations would look bleak. He was giving himself his very own pep talk.

    Gadra failed to notice that hed made a grave error. He believed that Luminism, the religion that dominated the Western Nations, was the one they should be more cautious of, not Tempest. Whether Gadra would realize this mistake or not was the key that would decide his fate.

    At the behest of Yuuki, three people were selected. They were chosen because they were members of the Mixed Corps and, perhaps most importantly, acquainted with Master Gadra. In preparation for the uing introduction, Yuuki had invited Master Gadra to his room so he could meet the men that were to be his entourage. They were:

    Shinji Tanimura: A university student from Japan who had spent most of his days in theb doing research. Even in this world, he loved wearing a white coat, which had now be his trademark look.

    Mark Lauren: He was a brown-haired, muscr man in his mid-twenties, making him the oldest of the three. As a guy in peak physical condition, he was the type to wear a tank top and jeans all year round, even in the winter.

    Xin Liuxing: This was a young man of few words. While you could never quite tell what he was thinking, he would carry out his orders to a T. He wore a loose Chinese-style outfit with his braided, ck hair running down his back. It seemed like he always had various weapons tucked away underneath his loose clothes.

    Both Mark and Xin followed Shinjis words obediently. And before he knew it, Shinji had established himself as their leader.

    The three of them lined up straight in front of Yuuki and Gadra.

    Long time no see, Teacher! The ck-haired young man, Shinji, greeted Gadra on behalf of the group.

    Indeed Shinji, long time no see. And you too, Mark and Xin, have you been well?

    Yes, Im fine. Im d that you seem to be doing well, too.

    Master, Im not well.

    Gadra grinned widely upon hearing Mark and Xins replies.

    You havent changed one bit. I am relieved to see that the corps is thriving.

    These three were otherworlders protected by Yuuki. He gathered otherworlders from all over the world under his protection and sent them to the Empire, whether they had any affinity forbat or not. They were received by the secret society Cerberus and brought to Master Gadra, the archmage of the Empire. Although his goal was to elicit otherworld knowledge from them, Gadra trained those who had the will, as well as talent, forbat. And those he instructed belonged to an exceptional group, a ce for individuals with unique and special talentsthe Mixed Corps.

    The Empire wasnt quite so naive as to bestow high military ranks upon people simply because they were otherworlders. It was due to the fact that these people were able to masterfully wield their power, making them excellent warriors in their own right. That power was the Unique Skill that manifested in each of them. The three, having achieved fullmand of their Unique Skills, had earned themselves unshakeable positions in the army.

    Yeah, Shinji and the gang are top-notch even among my Mixed Corps. I believe that they are the perfect candidates for this investigative mission.

    If Yuuki-dono says so, then I have no qualms about it. You guys can take a seat, too.

    The trio sat down in their chairs as suggested by the stern wizard, feeling a slight sense of dread. Gadra chuckled as he watched them. Even though they had bepetent soldiers, he still got a kick out of seeing them so nervous around him.

    So, Yuuki-dono, you will lend these three to me for the investigation? Gadra broke the ice, not dwelling on the little fun he had.

    Yeah. I wanted to do the investigation myself, but, unfortunately, I really cant go to that country. Sending only these three does worry me, so as their supervisor, I wonder if I could ask for your help too, Master.

    Hmm. The report I read was quite intriguing. If whats written in it is true, then its imperative that we investigate it before the great expedition.

    Gadra looked at Yuuki inquisitively, waiting for his response. Yuuki nodded as if hed seen iting.

    They are all true. I will exin it to you three as wellthis mission is a little bit special: I want you to investigate a certainbyrinth.

    Whoa whoa, please wait a second! Weve been summoned here to do some kind of obstacle course? Are we that unreliable to you? Even if its a request from Master Gadra, that kind of thing should have to wait until after the great military invasion! Mark, the hot-head among the three, red up at Yuuki. This was business as usual with Mark. Yuuki would let him blurt out as many questions as he wanted if he wasnt convinced.

    Calm down, Mark, Shinji chided him. This is a serious matter, okay?

    But!

    Just be patient, Mark. Yuuki-san has something in mind, right? First lets listen to what he has to say. Having cated Mark, Shinji turned to Yuuki. Well then, please exin.

    Of course. If you hear me out, Im most certain you wont have anyints.

    And so, Yuuki began his thorough exnation of their mission.

    Gadra had heard it all beforehand, so he just sat there listening to Yuuki, checking if there were any inconsistencies in his statements. The trio, meanwhile, was astonished.

    Yuukis protgswarriors possessing Unique Skillshad infiltrated every corps as sleeper agents. Once awoken, they were to simultaneously create an uprising and seize control over their corps.

    The trio wasnt given any specific details, but they had reason to believe that day was near. These three were part of it, too. They believed it was only a matter of time before they got their orders, now that Yuuki had taken control of the Mixed Corps.

    World domination.

    When they heard Yuukis dream, it seemed so childish that none of them thought for a second that they could pull it off. But as time went on, they began honing their abilities and started bing aware of the state of the world atrgecracks started forming in their doubts, and soon enough, a belief that this was possible started to take root in their minds.

    Shinji and the others hade to admire Yuuki and eagerly awaited that moment. But when they were called out of the blue, they instead received an order to conquer the Dungeon. The three of them were understandably puzzled. Still, as they listened to the exnation, they began toe around to the idea.

    ording to Yuuki, of all the preparations and investigations done for the war, only thebyrinth remained a mystery. And they thought it was highly likely to house a number of secrets within its walls. After hearing that a whole city was hidden inside it, they knew they had something significant on their hands.

    I understand The Imperial Army cant ignore the Dungeon before making its move.

    A whole city? I wont believe it until I see it with my own eyes.

    So thats why we are going, right? The three of them muttered as it finally clicked.

    Thats all I have to say. You guys get it now, right? If the Empire invades the Great Jura Forest in this expedition, then we will stage the coup dtat once the front lines be entrenched. To have the advantage when that timees, we will need as much of the Imperial Army as possible lured away. Demon Lord Rimurus forces and the Storm Dragon Veldora alone are not a reason enough to set the whole force of the Imperial Army into motion. We need a stronger, morepelling reason to make them move.

    Yuuki indicated that such a reason may or may not be found in thebyrinthand if there really wasnt one, then they should just make one up. And while that reason kept the Imperial Army upied, Yuuki would seize control of the Empires capital.

    Shinji and his crew were shocked when they heard this. They had expected the coup, but this was the first time they had heard the details of it. Moreover, Gadra was right there with them. They never expected the conversation would wind up on that topic when they walked in, given that one careless word was all it took to leak their conspiracy.

    WaiYuuki-san?!

    Shinji hurried to cut him off, but Yuuki answered him with a smirk.

    Aah, dont worry. Master Gadra is aware of my n.

    What!

    Kukukuku, what else did you expect? While I do feel indebted to His Imperial Majesty, I dont really care what bes of the Empire. My objective is to destroy Luminism. I was blind to the fact that the god Luminas is, in reality, Demon Lord Luminas. What bes of her believers is of no concern to me. However, I must bury those who killed my friend with my own hands, or else, I wont ever find peace. First, I want to dispose of this Rimuru, who is rumored to be on good terms with Demon Lord Luminas. I also n to join you in the conquest of thisbyrinth.

    I dont care what happens after that, Gadra said internally, a mad smile on his face.

    Of course, Gadra had heard rumors about Demon Lord Rimuru. A year ago, the Kingdom of Farmus had incurred the wrath of the Storm Dragon Veldora and brought upon themselves their own destruction. And once that violent act exhausted the Storm Dragons strength, it allowed Demon Lord Rimuru to subjugate it. It was unclear whether he really subjugated it or if they were simply allies. Nevertheless, since then, the Storm Dragon had not shown any signs of an outburst, or even released a colossal amount of youki. This led Gadra to believe that there was some truth to these rumors after all

    In addition, there was some disturbance among the demon lords. It was said that several demon lords had withdrawn from the Ten Great Demon Lords, consequently turning it into the Octagram. The human society was notified of this change, and Demon Lord Rimuru was undeniably the root cause behind all this.

    The fact that yman, one of the Ten Great Demon Lords, had disappeared, and the neer Rimuru had earned a spot, clearly meant that Rimuru was stronger than yman. yman was a cunning and formidable demon lord, but Rimuru was an even greater threat. Moreover, Rimuru had established diplomatic rtions with mankind and had buried his roots deep into the Western States Council. He had no idea what the Western Nations were thinking, but Gadra was certain that it was dangerous to anger the demon lord named Rimuru.

    Besides, there was something else that bothered him: Only three people survived the military campaign of Farmus, in which 20,000 were thought to have participated. Out of these three, one had been murdered, leaving only the former king and Gadras own former apprentice, Razen.

    I guess Ill have to ask Razen about this. There are so many things that I dont know about Demon Lord Rimuru, Gadra thought to himself, reminding himself to be cautious.

    It was disconcerting that there was no proof of the Storm Dragon destroying the army of Farmus. In a normal war, losing 30 percent of your forces as casualties spelled the failure of a campaign, and usually led to a definite surrender. Yet, there was no record of any such action taken by the Farmus army. And, of course, some believed that the Storm Dragon didnt ept any would-be prisoners of war.

    But Gadra remained skeptical. After all, he was a survivor of the previous great expedition and had an idea of how Veldora would have reacted. The Storm Dragon wasnt the type to chase down people who were trying to escape; it would cause unimaginable damage, but only to those who were caught in its opening attack. Knowing this, it was hard for Gadra to assume that all 20,000 soldiers were annihted at the hands of Veldora.

    Then, Demon Lord Rimuru mustve had a hand in this Given his reputation, that didnt seem to be the case. It was likely that he wouldnt have taken their lives if they had surrendered. Yet, the reports stated otherwisplete annihtion.

    I suppose I ought to assume that Veldora turned them to ashes before they ever got the chance to surrender.

    Gadra was honestly horrified. For that reason, a head-on battle with Veldora should be avoided at all cost, and thankfully, measures for that had already been prepared.

    The bad news was Demon Lord Rimuru, but once their investigation took ce, they would be able to develop countermeasures to put their minds at ease.

    On that note, Gadra took a step back to reflect on his position. He didnt hold any personal grudge against Demon Lord Rimuru, but if he was in league with Demon Lord Luminas, that made him an enemy. While yes, Gadra wouldve liked to defeat his enemies, he couldnt afford to throw caution to the wind. He had spent many years nning the downfall of the Western Nations at the hands of the Empire. Now that his goal was within arms reach, he couldnt get ahead of himself.

    Yuukis and Gadras interests aligned, and as a result of their discussion, they had decided to share information and help each other as brothers in arms to form a united front.

    Shinji and the others were taken aback by this striking revtion. You couldnt me them for needing a moment to digest it.

    Th-this mission One slip up and were done for

    Shinji wasnt stupid, he knew they didnt trust his team, but he didnt get the impression that they viewed them as mere sacrificial pawns. Instead, he believed that they were testing them. Mark and Xin felt the same.

    Understood! We wont leave a single stone unturned.

    Well, we sure wont be slowing down the old man, so look forward to it!

    I will do my best.

    The importance of their mission couldnt be overstated. If they were sessful, then No, it dawned on them that they had to pull it off if they wanted to make it through alive.

    Then let me ask you. Do you guys know how many demon lords there are?

    Yes, eight, right? Shinji replied.

    What? Mark gasped. Werent there ten? Wait, didnt it increase to eleven?

    Mark. It just changedst year Gadra sighed, then began ranting. Shinji, feed that idiot the right information. Any soldier who cant be bothered to inform himself will be dead before he knows it! After taking a moment to calm down, he began to exin. There are eight demon lords. They call themselves the Octagram. It may mean that they liken themselves to stars, and its not entirely wrong for some of them. Im bringing up this topic because our enemy this time is Rimuru, the Newbie in the Octagram. We can never be too careful around him, but lets set that aside for now. Let me tell you the main reason: One of the other demon lords is called the Fairy of the Labyrinth. Well, what do you think this means?

    The trio was stunned by his words. Even Yuuki couldnt hide his surprise as he nced at Gadra.

    Its thebyrinth, isnt it? Shinji answered with a tinge of fear in his words.

    Gadra nodded deeply and pulled out a book and showed it to them. There was abyrinth called the Dwelling of the Spirits, located in the Republic of Ur-Gracia in the West. It was believed to be an underground or aerialbyrinth, but the truth of the matter was something else entirely. Those descriptions were, in a sense, both right and wrong. In the book, it was written that the Dwelling of the Spirits was not only inhabited by spirits, but also by their queen who had transformed herself from a spirit into a fairy.

    That queen is this Fairy of the Labyrinth, Ramirisone of the ancient demon lords.

    Gadras words weighed heavily on the trio. And then, he hit them with the bombshell: The door to thebyrinth that once existed in the Urgr Nature Park has vanished. Believe me, Ive checked it out myself. Judging from the information that I heard, it disappeared around the same time that Rimuru dered himself a demon lord, followed by opening the Dungeon in his country to the public.

    So, this has already been confirmed then? I was wondering how he was able to create such a hugebyrinth, but now, Im certain that its the work of Demon Lord Ramiris. In other words, the demon lords Rimuru and Ramiris have joined forces, Yuuki concluded with confidence, grinning from ear to ear.

    Shinji and his crew found no faults in that logic. On the contrary, they were downtrodden as their investigation was looking more and more difficult.

    Im counting on you.

    Please, be vignt.

    Then, the trio departed after Yuuki clued them in on Rimurus cunning reign of terror as a demon lord.

    Following their meeting with Yuuki and Gadra, the three men were brought to the outskirts of Tempest by Kagali the very next day. Ten days after sending them off, Gadra went somewhere else on his own. Given how Yuuki frightened the three, Gadra decided to leave the initial investigation to them.

    Yuuki probably didnt see them as disposable pawns. He did threaten them a little, to make sure that the trio took their mission seriously. Hm, I guess Yuuki-dono is not particrly honest, either. Hes toopetent and hence he expects the same of others as well, huh?Gadra perceived it like that. But the same could be said of him. He had no intention of leaving his disciples to their deaths and intended to help them in times of need. Others thought he was scary since he never expressed these thoughts verbally and silently intimidated the people around him.

    While being oblivious of this fact, Gadra headed towards the former Kingdom of Farmus. He remembered his former disciple was still there and decided to collect information about Demon Lord Rimuru from him.

    Gadra rushed over to the former royal capital of Farmus, Malis, and then headed straight to the royal pce.

    Razen was busy working in his office when he suddenly jumped up from his chair. He felt the presence of his great mentor, Gadra, who he thought was dead.

    I cant believe it Hes still alive he murmured, as if it was a bad thing.

    He didnt know what Gadras intentions were, but he had probablye to look for him. He didnt hold out hope for anything casual like rekindling an old friendship.

    The problem was that the soldiers of Farmenas didnt know who Gadra was. At this rate, they might begin arguing with Gadra at the castle gates and get on his wrong side, which certainly wouldnt be good for their lifespan. If by any chance they did end up fighting him Heaven forbid. If that really happened, I certainly wouldnt be able to calm down Gadra-sama.

    Razen rushed to action. He called someone who recently became his disciple through Magic Communication.

    Can you hear me?

    Tsk, dont call me out of the blue

    I believe you are aware of the situation.

    Yeah. Grigori doesnt seem to have noticed, but an abnormal presence just appeared. That guy will arrive at the gate soon.

    If you know that much, we dont have to waste any time. You guys shoulde to the gate as well.

    Very well. Im indebted to you.

    Then he cut off the Magic Communication.

    He had two new disciples. Sare and Grigori. They were the former members of the Three Martial SagesImperial Guards affiliated with the Church of the Holy Empire of Lubelius.

    Razen became their acquaintance when they hade to the country for a survey mission. They hadmitted a grave mistake and couldnt return to the Church, so Razen made them his disciples. It was not out of kindness, but simply because he sympathized with them. He had heard about their total defeat, particrly that of Sare and hispanions in front of international journalists. Aftering to know that their opponent was Diablo, Razen was able to rte with them.

    Although Sare was impudent, he recognized Razen as his teacher. And Grigori, who had developed a particr animal phobia, was regaining the fearless attitude that he once possessed.

    These two were impable in terms of strength, so Razen nned to train them and eventually let them work behind the scenes for the Kingdom of Farmenas. That included crisis responses such as this one.

    So its going to be me, Sare, and Grigori. And if Grucius-dono can make it in time, we can hold off Gadra-sama.

    Soldiers were useless in the face of an individual with overwhelming strength. The current Kingdom of Farmenas suffered from ack of champion-ss talents. The former Farmus Knight Corps, with thete Folgena departed associate of Razensas itsmander, was now a thing of the past. The same went for its many brave, simrly highly-ssed warriors. Finding talents to rece them was currently a major issue for Farmenas.

    His sluggish response to the problem hade back to bite Razen.

    By the time he reached the castle gates, the other two had already arrived and were confronting Gadra.

    Hey, man, Im not sure what sort of business you have here, but we are the ones who guard this castle. You understand that we cant just let an unidentified person enter it, right?

    Ya heard him, old man. I dont wanna say anything bad, so youd better go home for today, will ya? If you wanna meet someone, apply for a visit at the reception, youll get a reply in a few days.

    The two thought they were quietly blocking the way so as not to let Gadra pass through. However, from Razens point of view, they were bringing doom upon themselves.

    Stop! Let him through!

    Huh? Arent we supposed to stop him?

    Then what did you call us for?

    They seemed miffed about the order, but Razen had bigger fish to fry.

    Its been a long time, Gadra-sama. Im very sorry for the dy in greeting you, for I had not known that you were still alive, said Razen, kneeling down in front of Gadra.

    Razen wanted to avoid antagonizing Gadra. In the worst case, he was prepared to go all out just to stop him, but it appeared he was wound up over nothing.

    Long time no see, Razen. You lookpletely different from what I remember, but it seems that it really is you.

    Yes, unlike you, Master, I preserve my life through transference of flesh.

    I dont me you, Gadra replied, so dont humble yourself too much. I came here today because I have something to ask you. Also, that beastman hiding there doesnt have to be so rmed. Had Ie to stir trouble, I would not havee here alone.

    The tension finally lifted. Nevertheless, they did not let down their guard, and left the scene after arranging a meeting with Gadra.

    The following day, a conference was set up in one of the rooms of the castle. The participants were Youm, Grucius, and Razen. Sare and Grigori were on standby in the room as escorts of Youm. Myuran had also wished to join the meeting, but her request was declined. Youm insisted that she get her rest after giving birth to their child. It was a baby girl whom they named Meme. She was adorable like Myuran and now affectionately being cared for by Edgar.

    Now then, Master, what did you want to ask?

    Hmm, before we get into that, there are some things I have to point out. Sare, youngd, you seem somewhat strong, but you are horrible at magic, arent you? You see, that isnt something you can learn to use. You need to have proper control over your mana. That beastman there, youre Grucius, right? You

    Gadra started picking at everyones ws one by one.

    ording to him, Grucius needed to develop an eye for judging an opponents strength. Transforming right in front of your enemy is like begging to be attacked first, Gadra sternly exined, as if he were scolding him.

    As for Youm, Gadra started off: You do seem stronger than the average guy, but then followed up by instructing him to figure out ways of defending himself, since an overreliance on the power of his gear rendered his own strength moot.

    Turning to Grigori, he gave him a bitter pill to swallow: He simply had to work on his skills and get good.

    Lastly, Gadra looked at Razen and said, Razen, I can see that youve been working hard on your magic. Is that magic possession-type?

    Yes, it is the great secret art Possession that I devised based on your theory of the mystic art Reincarnation.

    Hmm, thats an interesting experiment. Unlike my magic, you dont ce yourself in a temporary weakened state, turning yourself into a baby, when using it.

    Thank you for thepl

    However, its useless if you cant master it. Im sure you cant draw out the full potential of that body youve stolen.

    Yes, sir!

    Razen broke out in a cold sweat after hearing Gadras words. He was well aware of this fact, and now that Gadra had pointed it out, he had to believe that everything hed just heard was spot on. How scary. He was able to see through our abilities even though we met just yesterdayRazen didnt say another word and kept silent.

    Sare and Grigori, on the other hand, werent amused.

    Oioi, dont get a big head now that hes all silent. What did you see in me to make you spout such bullshit, anyway?

    Thats right. I am indebted to Razen-dono, but we have no reason to stand in awe of his teacher. If youre that confident, would you care to enlighten us?!

    At once, their argument became heated. Razen tried to shut them up, but the glint in Gadras eyes told him to stay back. The old man had expected this turn of events and intended to give the rowdy upstarts a little taste of his abilities.

    Well, if thats the road he wants to take this down, it would definitely shut them up good. Let me y along as you do your thing, Master, Razen thought quietly.

    And so, as a light exercise before the meeting, a fight between Gadra and the team of Sare and Grigori was held. They faced off on the training ground, their battle ending in a one-sided thrashing at the hands of Gadra.

    I-impossible

    This old man He was going at both of us at the same time without breaking a sweat. He got us good.

    Gadras strength was so overwhelming that he crushed their pride as two of the former Three Martial Sages. It turned out just as he had hoped; his little disy of strength would be enough to speed up the following negotiations. Yet, their next words shocked him.

    But hes not as powerful as that demon, right? Sare asked Grigori in a daze.

    Youreparing him to that guy? Though, I do feel like this old mans around the strength of that dog I fought.

    Hmm?

    Sare and Grigori easily came to terms with their recent defeat. Whats more, despite witnessing Gadras strength, they were remarkably unperturbed.

    As powerful as I am? In fact, a demon more powerful than me? Gadra was puzzled by their unexpected reaction, but it didnt sound like they were being sore losers. He felt their words were genuine.

    And just as he was about to ask

    Gadra-sama, we shall discuss thatter. First, I will answer your questions, Razen announced as they walked off the training ground.

    They went back to the reception room and resumed their meeting.

    I expected nothing less of Razens teacher, Yoummented casually. Youre a true monster. Theres no way I can win against you.

    While Majin Razens name was known far and wide, there were only a few anecdotes about the teacher that taught him, Grucius added with a nod, visibly excited. Myuran said that you were a great man who had built a new system of magic theory, and after seeing your fight, I believe it now

    It came as no surprise; Gadra was a highly esteemed mage, after all. He could interfere with the mana of his opponent, obstruct the activation of their magic, and activate multiple spells simultaneously to achieve extraordinary effects and power.

    He pulled out all the stops during their fight, turning the spectacle into a breathtaking demonstration. Grucius, even at full strength, was no match for Sare and Grigori. Watching Gadra effortlessly toy with them proved his strength beyond a shadow of a doubt.

    While Youm and Grucius were in high spirits, on the flip side, the two recent losers sat there dejected. Nevertheless, they remained calm and focused on their duty as guardians.

    Well then, to what do we owe this asion? questioned Razen.

    The reason I showed my strength was to prevent unnecessary resistance. As Razen might know, I have a bone to pick with Luminism. Im not interested in anything else, so I cannot bear to see this country suffer any unnecessary casualties when the Empires invasion washes over it.

    Gadra tossed that bombshell out like it was nothing.

    The Empire

    Are you for real? Youm moaned. Why does it have to be now, when I am the reigning king?!

    Exactly, Grucius added. I cant imagine us winning, and I dont want to endanger Myuran and my daughter.

    Shes not your daughter. She is my treasure! Youm shouted.

    Shut up! Grucius yelled. We arent blood-rted, but she is my daughter. Ive decided to live as her father from now on!

    That isnt your decision to make!

    The two of them broke out into an ugly spat.

    Razen cleared his throat and silenced the two idiots.

    I see, I understand why you came here, Gadra-sama. In return for saving us from the ravages of war, you want us to change sides and support the Empire?

    Correct. Do you understand how powerful the Empire is? In addition to that, Ill be there too, so if you join us, we should be able to bring down Dwargon with ease. That country is vulnerable to a siege. If you stop the supply of grains to Dwargon, they will be forced to surrender immediately.

    That, of course, required them to do something about Tempest.

    Thats impossible, Gadra-sama, Razen pointed out. There is now a railroad between the Dwarven Kingdom and Tempest, which enables high-speed transportation. Even if we cut off food exports from our own country, theyll get supplies from that one.

    Thats why Im telling you to betray them. Tempests self-sufficiency in regard to food is not that high. From this country

    Gadra-sama.

    Razen knew full well how rude it was but interrupted him anyway. He could tell that Gadra was behind the times and hadnt grasped the current state of the world.

    The world of today moved at a rapid pace, much faster than ever before. If they betrayed the Western Nations, it would lead to their ejection from the economic zone. In other words, the destruction of their nation would be inevitable. Even if this ced them under the patronage of the Empire, who promised them generous support, they could not expect to have the same prosperity they were experiencing now. That was how influential the West, or rather, Tempest was to the Kingdom of Farmenas. Razen rified everything for him.

    I see. The truth is, I already knew that, but I wanted to hear the precise story from you. But does Demon Lord Rimuru not fear the heavenly army? Of course, if he had the power, he could beat the angels; but even so, the damage to his creations would be enormous. The Empire had also considered introducing trains, but because of that, the n had to be postponed

    This was what Gadra said when he heard about the idea of connectingrge cities with railways.

    His Majesty Rimuru isnt afraid of any damages.

    Indeed. Boss hates it when people die or get wounded, but other than that, I think he would ept the cost of material damages.

    Rather, he might even consider the need for reconstruction work a boon.

    Razen, Grucius and Youm freely expressed their own opinions.

    Youms words in particr held a lot of weight. Humans by nature desired providing for others, giving them a drive to make the most of their skills. Anyone losing their job would be demoralized andbeled a waste of space. Some might even turn to crime. To prevent this from happening, it was the duty of leadersemployersto prepare new job opportunities.

    Once the projects arepleted in every country, the only work remaining will be maintenance and repair, Youm remarked. Boss was nervous about what to do when that happens. He wants to do this and that, but the technology cant keep up. He grumbled all about it when we drank together.

    If the angels attacked at such a time, Grucius added,ing around to Youms point, it would undoubtedly call for plenty of disaster reconstruction. That might spark joy in Boss, though hed likely feign anger over the destruction.

    Sare and Grigori sat there with their eyes zed over, apparently just nodding along.

    However, despite him being a demon lord, if he so brazenly stuck his nose into the affairs of the West, which is the domain of humans, the Rosso family would have a thing or two to say, dont you think?

    Razens story matched the information Gadra had gathered. However, some key details were still missing. Seizing the opportunity, Gadra decided to squeeze out as much information as he could out of Razen.

    The Rosso family would move to protect their own interests without waiting for the heavenly army. If the matter was economic, wouldnt they simply concoct non-violent machinations to sabotage his budding country?is what Gadra was really asking. Of course, the question was really intended to get more information about the current situation surrounding the Rosso family.

    Razen read his intention and gave Gadra the answer he wanted.

    The Rosso family has already fallen. The Kingdom of Dn is alive and well, and it is where all the survivors have gathered. With that being said, they have lost all means to exert any influence in the Council. Still, the surrounding countries continue to trade with them only because His Majesty Rimuru has permitted them to do so. Plus, King Dn himself conceded to His Majesty Rimuru.

    Razen described the state of affairs, and, incidentally, he even told the truth behind the fall of the now Kingdom of Farmenas.

    That revtion finally threw Gadra off bnce, as that was news to him.

    Demon Lord Rimuru destroyed the Farmus army all by himself? And the Rosso family got crushed as well? No, wait! If that wasnt a rumor, then what happened to GranGranbell?!

    Hero Granbell was the strongest man Gadra had ever known. This, and the fact that he was the leader of the Seven Luminaries, were taken into ount while they carefully nned their expedition to the West.

    Yet, Razen was iming that the Rosso family was gone.

    So the rumor that the Seven Celestial were vanquished is

    Master, that is also true. The Seven Luminaries were hostile to His Majesty Rimuru and intended for him to fight the captain of the Holy Knight Order, Hinata; but s, their n failed, and they all died.

    Gadra was bereft of words after what he had just heard. Razen unmistakably dered that all of the Seven Luminaries had perished. Even Gran was reduced to atoms at the hands of Cardinal Nicus. Upon learning of this, Gadra bemoaned the sheer inadequacy of his own intelligence efforts. If Granbell was dead, the fall of the Rosso family naturally followed. Gadra wished he had gotten that information much sooner, since it threw a massive wrench in the current expedition n. And also

    That kid He knew and yet he didnt tell me a thing Yuukis face shed before his eyes as he muttered in anguish over the fact. Yuuki mustve surmised that revealing it would quench Gadras lust for revenge. Nevertheless, it was by no means pleasant news for Gadra.

    Could you be referring to Yuuki Kagurazaka? We understand how you feel, Gadra-sama, for we have also been used by that man.

    After an attempt at constion by his apprentice, Gadra was left frustrated, ashamed, and ultimately speechless.

    ording to Razen, Yuuki had been a thorn in Rimurus side as well. Still, both parties were currently lying low, which meant that their rtionship had yet to reach a state of open hostility.

    Yuuki, you bastard, youre still hiding several things from me, if I had to guess. Besidesyou knew that I had it out for Luminism, so you fed me nebulous information about the Western Holy Church. Were there some ugly truths you sought to keep hidden? It dawned on Gadra that hed been used, as he sat in front of the others with a perplexed look on his face, contemting his next steps.

    This is troubling. Now I have to reconsider my approach to Demon Lord Rimuru.

    Rimuru was a greater threat than Gadra had imagined. How would he tackle the problem now? His grudge over the betrayal and murder of his best friend still burned within him, so he had no intention of cooling his vendetta against Luminism. However, the ones he had an ax to grind with in particr, the Seven Luminary Clerics, were already dead.

    Given the situation, it took the wind out of his sails in terms of destroying the West. It had been thismon interest that Gadra and the Empire shared, which formed the foundation of their cooperative rtionship. And once that crumbled, Gadra had no reason to stick with the Empire.

    No, theres still one more reasonthe god who is the ultimate target of my vengeance, and very much still existsDemon Lord Luminas. Gadra remembered his friend who died because of his faith in that goda demon lord who masqueraded as a god. He couldnt tolerate the existence of that demon lord any longer.

    Stewing in his enmity, Gadra decided to continue his n with renewed determination.

    Or, he was about to.

    Gadra-sama, I may be asking for too much, but I beg of you to halt your n.

    Hmm?

    Razen had been eyeing Gadra, before throwing this curveball.

    To this day, I hold pride as your loyal disciple. However, my loyalty is even greater to my lord. If you stir up trouble in that country, I will have to consider you an enemy.

    Could you be talking about Demon Lord Rimuru?

    No, my master is one of his subordinates, Diablo-sama.

    Gadra was taken aback by what he heard. Razen was a proud disciple of his. It was hard to believe that such a man would meekly submit to a mere subordinate of a demon lord.

    I know its not my ce to interrupt you, Sare interjected out of the blue, but since youre on the topic, allow me to mention that this Diablo hes talking about was the demon that defeated me.

    A demon stronger than me. Its hard to believe, but if it was able to bring Razen to heel, I cant count that out. Even then, he didnt think that he would lose against this demon; still, he engraved the name Diablo in his mind.

    Gadra-sama, please let me tell you one more thing. Diablo-sama is an ancient demon.

    Just as I thought. Since he was able to defeat you, hes probably of the ancient species. Or worse, he could even be a prehistoric demon, which are exceptionally rare.

    It wouldnt be strange for the demon to exhibit power exceeding that of a demon lord, especially if it were named.

    No, he was far stronger than the demons of those levels

    He imed to be a demon peer, Sare murmured.

    Thats!

    Thats absurd! Gadra nearly shouted.

    There was a limit on evolutions for demons. That was the absolute rule, and as far as Gadra knew, there was only one demon who had defied thisw. The archdemon who evolved further and became a demon peer. That demon was the strongest and most terrible of demon lordsthe Lord of Darkness Guy Crimson.

    Gadra-sama, my master, Diablo-sama, has no need to discuss how long he has lived You know what that means, right?

    Razen asked, but his voice was drowned out by Gadras thoughts swirling in his head. I cant believe this. No, I dont want to believe this.

    Is he a primordial? Gadra murmured with a sinking feeling in the pit of his stomach.

    Razen answered with ruthless certainty. Yes.

    I see. Gadra tried to piece together the truth while calming his mind.

    If that was really the case, then it was only natural for Razen to serve him. It also wouldnt take much to believe that a primordial evolved into a demon peer if it had received a body. Taking their story at face value, it would call for drastic revisions to the Empires great expedition n. Considering how nc haunted the Empire, it went without saying how troublesome the primordials were.

    No, wait a minute. When a primordial receives a body, a tragedy is bound to follow. So why havent I heard anything till now? This thought struck him as he began to regain hisposure. Wait. Whether Diablo is primordial or not is beside the point. Taking his triumph over Razen to be true, it would follow that hes, at the very least, a demon peer

    But what he overheard from the conversation between Youm and the others chilled him to the bone.

    Diablo-dono is Bosss butler. Some time ago, I rushed over to celebrate the maiden journey of the train, and there, I heard that he had scouted some acquaintances to work for him, since hed grown tired of doing the chores on his own.

    Oh, if you mean that woman, then Im sure Ive seen her. I ran into her at the Council meeting because Boss had appointed her as his military attach. The one with pure white hair and beautiful crimson eyes. She was drop dead gorgeous.

    Gadra slumped back helplessly in his chair. I-is this a joke?! That description matches that of nc one-to-one That bombshell put it over the line, proving the story authentic, as well as a terrible nightmare for Gadra.

    He nced at Razen, who returned a confident nod.

    Is this true?

    I would not lie to you, Master.

    Suddenly it struck him. Gadra realized that they were telling the truth and earnestly trying to steer him away from sailing towards his own demise by starting this war.

    Is it really that dangerous?

    The answer was a silent nod from all who were there.

    Seeing that, Gadra paled as he remembered the trio who had gone to Tempest.

    Oh, I dearly hope the boys havent screwed this up already!

    The capital of Tempest, Rimuru, was bustling with life. It was a thriving city that could very well be called a metropolis. Even from the perspective of Shinjis crew, who were all otherworlders themselves, they found it to be highly developed and devoid of medieval drawbacks.

    Aside from the Empires capital of Nasca, its surrounding cities were filled with the stench of animals. Here, however, there was nothing of the sort, much to their surprise.

    I thought we were going to be weed by an empty plot ofnd aside from a gate, or are we at the wrong ce?

    I doubt it. Either they can change this ce however they want, or the spies we sent were hallucinating.

    If so, then we cant let our guard down.

    They shared a quick look and braced themselves.

    Kagali had dropped them off here through the elemental magic Warp Portal, since she had visited Tempest before. Although she didnt stay long and swiftly went back to the Empire, there was nothing to worry about since they had already arranged a return trip. Once they were finished, they were to meet up with Gadra, who would bring them back home using magic.

    Until then, they were ordered not to pull any reckless stunts and investigate every nook and cranny. The three of them were no fools. It went without saying that they were going to do just as they were ordered.

    Lady Kagali is really hot.

    Hey hey, Shinji, your girlfriend will dump you if you keep talking like that, you know.

    Girlfriend? I dont have one. If I did, my life would have been way better

    Eh?

    Dont bother, Mark. Hes just too slow on the uptake.

    Mark and Xin both shrugged as Shinji bemoaned his loss.

    They carried on with their banter while passing through the entry check at the citys gate.

    Thanks to the Freedom Association IDs which Yuuki had prepared for them, they were allowed to enter the country more smoothly than they had expected, requiring only a brief exnation about their purpose for entering.

    After that, they secured a room at an inn and went sightseeing, under the pretext of collecting information.

    The three of them were astonished by what they saw. As otherworlders, the three of them possessed considerable power that afforded them several privileges in this world. But they were limited in their ability, unable to act as freely as Demon Lord Rimuru, even if they wanted to.

    Yuuki went to great lengths to make improvements in the food situation and living conditions, which also spread throughout the vast Empire, but even those mammoth efforts paled inparison to the strides this country had made. Shinji, who was quite familiar with the situation, was less surprised and more amazed by it.

    Takoyaki, okonomiyaki, and yakisoba were just the beginning. There were also a wide variety of pastries to be had, such as crepes and cakes. A handful of extremely pricey treats also lined the shelves, leading one to wonder where the ingredients even came from.

    From food stalls and coffee shops to fine dining restaurants. The lineup exuded a passion for food and the tastes from the original world. Residents of this world, who might have been confused at first, appeared to have gotten ustomed to the wide variety of cuisines.

    Shinji, for one, cried tears of joy when heid eyes on a curry rice restaurant.

    Plumbing and toilets were set up perfectly. The inns also couldnt have been morefortable.

    There was also a public bath, which had be a popr pastime.

    I think Ill stay here. Hey, can we, like, not return to the Empire? Mark asked.

    Hey!

    No, sorry I wasjust kidding, just kidding. Dont take it the wrong way, Shinji.

    Im not mad, Im just wondering if I could seriously consider it.

    I want to live here as well.

    The three of them looked at each other and sighed.

    Long had they lived under the impression that the Empire was the forerunner in civilization and modernforts in the whole world. But now, after seeing this country, they had be disillusioned.

    The town was lively, and the food was tasty. Not only did it feelfortable to live here, but there was also no shortage of entertainment and a rich culture, providing plenty of opportunities to enjoy themselves.

    These pleasures were all based on the ones from their previous worlds, and in contrast to the harsh lives they had led till now, these guys were ovee with nostalgia.

    The Empire also had cultural centers and various forms of entertainment to speak of, but those were made for the nobility and they werent free like in this city, meaning they were prohibitively expensive for amoner. Compared to that, this city was

    No, no, no, we absolutely cant.

    Yeah. Yuuki-san wont be cool with it and Master Gadra is, frankly, too scary to deal with. Besides, the war is on the horizon

    The firing squad is all that awaits defectors.

    Yes. The war would soon break out. This city would obviously be a target, there was no way it could escape undamaged. The trio was well aware how powerful the military of the Empire was and believed that this country wouldnt stand a chance against it.

    With heavy hearts they swallowed their doubts and, true to their mission, set out to challenge thebyrinth.

    So, Hero Masayuki finally managed to break through the 50th floor, but I must say, this is too easy.

    Haha, that makes sense. After all, Yuuki-san said that Masayuki wasnt particrly strong.

    But his Skill shouldnt be underestimated.

    I mean, thats probably why he was able to conquer it. He slowly but surely challenged it, taking him more than half a year to break through.

    They tittle-tattled as they passed through the 40th floor.

    Initially, they were constantly on guard inside the Dungeon, but now their tension had eased. They gathered information in advance to avoid taking risks but now Shinji and crew felt that the Dungeon was heavily based on game mechanics.

    Xin seemed to have had no connection with games, but Shinji and Mark were avid gamers. Shinji, in particr, was an RPG enthusiast, who loved adventure titles and had managed to enjoy them in between his studies at the university.

    In light of this knowledge, they could best describe this Dungeon as nothing but a ything, its challengers certainly being the targets of someones devious schemes. Nevertheless, this was all familiar to those in the know.

    Xin Liuxing was good at detecting traps, and with Shinjis assistance, he managed to pick them all out. As long as the traps were taken care of, the strength of the monsters wasnt much of a threat.

    I guess the challengers had a hard time conquering it due to theirck of knowledge.

    Thats right. I did mock this as an obstacle course, but thats exactly what this is. If you can decipher the malicious intentions of the creator, you can just sneak past that stuff.

    And it doesnt even kill you.

    While they were collecting information, they had heard about the Resurrection Bracelet. You could get one for free like a one-time deal from the reception desk. With the bracelet equipped, you would revive back at the entrance upon dying in thebyrinth, so they were told. That immediately had them intrigued. It was somewhat hard to digest, like they had stumbled upon aedy show inside this serious world.

    The problem was that they didnt know how deep this dungeon was. Even though they wanted to conquer it in one go, the rations they brought were limited. The trio were at a loss about how much food they had to pack for the exploration, and an unexpected solution to this problem came from the reception desk.

    Oh, you dont have to worry about that, the receptionist assured them, then exined at great length: When you see the stairs, you will find an entrance to the inn, where you can stay for a fee. So you guys dont have to rack your brains over rations. Rimuru-sama said only snacks up to 300 yen 10 . I have no idea what that means, but it must be important. Oh yeah, there are merchants waiting in the inn, so they can buy the stuff you dont need, you know?

    Shinji repressed his urge to shout, Hurry it up, we dont need to hear about the snacks! Thest thing he needed was getting charged with insolence for shouting profanity.

    Now back to the present. It had been a week since they started their conquest of thebyrinth.

    Shinji and the other two were examining their loot while resting in thebyrinths inn.

    By the way, Mark began, apparently in a good mood, weve earned a lot in these few days, havent we? They imed that this ce would be spartan, but its quitefortable. Despite that, the amodation fee is cheap, and weve saved a lot of money by selling unnecessary equipment, right?

    Xin looked up showing a bit of interest.

    Shinji responded by taking gold coins out of their purse. They stared longingly at the golden sheen. This wasnt just the money from treasure chests, monsters, and selling loot. They also received dozens of gold coins and even a ster gold coin as rewards. This was a huge prize.

    I suppose. Weve earned quite the pretty penny. From what Ive heard, the challengers on the frontline havent managed to make it past the 50th floor. Only Masayukis party has managed to conquer it, so that will make us the second group to do so.

    Masayukis group was evidently stuck on the 60th floor. And the other challengers, they guessed, were being held up by the Boss Monster of the 40th floor. Thanks to this, Shinjis crew was in the spotlight as this months MVPs.

    Yeah, that tempest serpent, right? It was certainly strong, but it was no match for us.

    The tempest serpent was ranked A-minus, so even high-level adventurers struggled against it. Its breath attack, covering a wide-area, was devastating in small rooms. The challengers had no ce to escape, leaving them no choice but to face the enemy head on. If the snake managed to wrap itself around you though, its tough scales meant you were a definite goner.

    This monster was supposed to be a tricky opponent, but Shinjis crew beat it without breaking much of a sweat. They werent interested in how strong the monsters were, but what they got after defeating them.

    I wonder whats up with the hole in this weapon. Its listed for a crazy price

    The ridiculous number threw them for a loop, enough to make them drop the idea of selling it. Weapons with holes began to appear in loot starting around the 40th floor. No one had ever seen anything like it in the Empire, so naturally the three of them had no idea how much they were worth. They couldve sold them for a fortune, but they remained on the fence about whether they should.

    Whats the deal with this hole? Even my appraisal magic tells me nothing, maybe we should hold onto them until Masteres.

    These kinds of weapons didnt appear before the 40th floor.

    Yeah. They dropped from the boss room or powerful monsters around the 50th floor.

    Yeah, youre right. However, these actually seem to be in cirction in town, albeit quite rare. They say that theyre an exceptional find in treasure chests on the 30th floor and below.

    I guess so, since its build-quality is impable. But that alone cant be the reason theyre this expensive though, right?

    Maybe theres a secret behind it.

    Seems like it. When I asked the merchants, they just gave me this smile and didnt tell me anything.

    Hey, it sure is weird. Lets keep them until the old man gets here. But more importantly, this is the deal. I mean, look at this! Mark shouted, taking out Minoss Bardiche, the gozus battle ax, and presented it to them.

    It glimmered with a bewitching silver glow. A high-ss masterpiece made of mithril. It was a unique-grade weapon, obtained from the treasure chest protected by the guardian of the 50th floor.

    Its a Unique weapon, you know? Even in the Empire its impossible to get a unique-grade, right?

    Mark was so enthralled by it that he was practically rubbing his cheek against the bardiche.

    It was undeniably a powerful weapon.

    If you became an Imperial Guardian of the Empire, you would be lent legendary-grade weapons. While soldiers of lower ranks were given equipment that had good quality and strength, theycked any magical properties. It was understandable why Mark would be so excited given how even the senior officers would struggle to get their hands on unique-grade equipment.

    I guess so. Yuuki-san told us that the Empires weapons are mass produced. We rarely see them, but it seems that all the legendary-grade weapons have the same shape.

    Is that even possible? asked Xin, wondering if legendary-grade weapons could really be mass produced. Logically, at least, that shouldnt be possible.

    Shinji, isnt that an oundish assumption? Mark scoffed. You think they can be mass produced just because they have the same shape?

    He didnt like the idea, since it meant that his newly-acquired unique-grade weapon wasnt worth nearly that much.

    Of course, doing it with normal means would be impossible. Master Gadra himself noted that even the mass-production of magisteel is too difficult. But its not impossible if you can maintain a special environment.

    A special environment?

    Yeah. Shinji continued, An environment so densely packed with magicules, itd kill a man just by standing in it. Someone at rank B wouldnt make it long either, and even someone ranked A probably wouldnt make it out without getting sick. If a piece of armor were kept in a ce with such an environment for a long period of timemaybe a hundred to a thousand yearsit would then be ready to evolve. After that, if a capable owner were recognized by the armor, it would start its own evolution from there.

    Surely such conditions dont exist?

    Yeah, I think its impossible as well.

    Right? But Yuuki-san and Master Gadra said otherwise, Shinji insisted.

    So, even if it was possible, whats your point? Mark shot back.

    Well, look. I was just wondering if this bardiche was produced in such a way.

    No way

    You dont think so, huh? But listen, theres also a hole in this bardiche. You wouldnt see this on your run-of-the-mill bardiche, right?

    True. I wonder what this is

    Its a beautiful weapon, nheless. Although it has an eerie shape.

    It wasnt as though Shinji really wanted toin. He wasnt jealous seeing how happy Mark was, either. After all, neither Shinji nor Xin could handle weapons asrge as this bardiche.

    Its just that, you know, Shinji fumbled for the right words, if a country can casually give away weapons of this caliber, its quite likely that this country is also more dangerous than we imagined

    Mark and Xin fell silent. In fact, the two of them felt the same way. Mark was worried that the receptionist would take away his bardiche shortly after he got it. The rules stated that all items obtained in thebyrinth belonged to the challengers. Despite this, he figured a country would normally confiscate such a weapon, especially since it was this powerful.

    If that happened, Mark and the others would have no choice but toply. As long as they were dependent on the country, they were forced to follow its directives and decisions. That was a rulemon to every country. They were spies first and foremost, so stirring any kind of trouble woulde to bite them twice as hard.

    But what ended up happening was aplete 180 from what they expected. They were met with cheers and apuse from the staff, who even handed them extra prize money.

    By now theyd seen enough to believe that Tempest was unlike any other country.

    The weapons are one thing, Shinji muttered, but the whole country really is bizarre, isnt it?

    Its quite unexpected, Mark echoed. I think wed make more money and have more fun if we took conquering thebyrinth more seriously. I mean, weve nothing to lose, right? If youre weak, youll barely make ends meet, but if youre strong, like we are

    Mark, stop. You remember what turncoats get, right?

    A death sentence.

    Yeah, I know that, Mark replied, exasperated. But for what its worth, life here seems more enjoyable.

    That was one thing they could all agree on.

    However, reality was harsh. Marks words were tempting, but this wasnt the time nor ce to be daydreaming.

    If the war starts, this country will probably suffer a lot.

    Yeah. If this country wins, we could happily defect, but if we desert the Empire now, none of the countries will ept us.

    We cant afford living without a country.

    They sighed and abandoned their naive thoughts.

    Changing gears, they started contemting their strategy for the following days conquest.

    Tomorrow, Shinji started, we will head to the 51st floor. The area from that point onward seems to be called The Paradise of the Dead. Marks Minoss Bardiche is made of holy-attribute mithril, so we can expect it to be highly effective against dead spirits and undead beings.

    Exactly. Also, this is kind of weird, but this really is like a gamethe boss protecting the key to the next stage, Mark pointed out.

    And the monsters are also getting stronger and stronger after each floor, Xin thought aloud.

    Shinji was already on the same page. He was the resident RPG specialist, so it went without saying that he had already picked up on it. But it was so creepy that he didnt want to think about it.

    Too many things came to his mind. The boss monsters, one on every 10th floor, were bing stronger the lower they went. First, it was the B-ranked ck spider, and then it was a B-plus-ranked evil centipede. And on the 30th floor, the B-plus-ranked crazed ogre king showed up with multiple subordinates. The fact that those monsters knew how to coordinate made it impossible to beat them with strength alone.

    There was the previously mentioned A-minus ranked tempest serpent on the 40th floor, and the monster that appeared on the 50th floor was the majin named Gozer, a gyuki 11 that could talk like a human. Something of that caliber was so rare, you wouldnt find one in a hundred years. It was a Hazard-ssor, if you preferred to use the rank ssification Yuuki had created, an A-ranked monster. An opponent that dangerous was typically a majin serving a demon lord.

    Still, the trio had made quick work of it, though not without substantial effort. Despite this, they couldve taken it on solo, if they really wanted to. But it was worth remembering that they couldnt die in thebyrinth, so aggressive and reckless strategies paid off.

    Mark began with, Seriously, since a monster as strong as that was protecting Floor 50, the ones following it will be even tougher nuts to crack.

    It might be ourst fight, Xin nodded with a thoughtful expression.

    Things had gone smoothly for now, but from this point on they would face a rough ridethat they all agreed on.

    I guess our tactics centered on Mark will stay the same as before. Now that we have special weapons, lets push it as far as we can.

    Yeah.

    I dont suppose youll find monsters much stronger than that. In fact, Id say the 60th floor is the final one, but if it isnt, dont freak out, reassured Mark.

    Dont worry, thats not happening. Shinji denied it, but really, he had heard unpleasant rumors. He didnt want to be the one to rain on their parade though. As rumor had it, the Dungeon sprawled underground for a total of a hundred floors. Thats ridiculoushe couldnt help but think this way. Despite his concerns about the next boss, he knew there was no use fretting.

    The trio believed they would win in the end, since death wasnt a factor for them. However, it was going to be a long, arduous battle ahead.

    Well, if worsees to worst, well stille out alive. So, lets stay sharp and go hard, Shinji announced with vigor.

    They were all on board; their sights were set on the final floor. They wanted to confirm whether it held research facilities or not. The three men went over their ns once more and then got a good nights rest.

    Three dayster

    After conquering the poison swamps and corrosivends, the trio finally found the stairs on the 59th floor, leading to the 60th floor where the boss monsters room was. It had taken them seven days to reach the 50th floor, but it took them three days to reach the 60th floor from there. The area was smaller than the previous floor, but the difficulty rose exponentially.

    Are you ready?

    Yeah.

    Mhm.

    They had rested up the night before and were full of energy, ready to go.

    The one ahead is called a guardian, just like the one from Floor 50. Theres no doubt that itll be an intelligent monster.

    I know. Its likely that its more troublesome than the death lord we fought yesterday.

    Lets go all out from the start.

    As long as they kept their cool, the boss would go down easily. They gave a final nod to each other, and then They carefully ced their hands on the door and pushed it open with a single thrust.

    Stepping back a bit in time

    I was in my room, working on building a surveince system. Currently, intelligence agents dispatched by Souei and Moss were waiting at key locations in the Great Jura Forest. Not only that, they were stationed all along the coast from the Kingdom of Farmenas to the northern part of Ingracia, and even at the tops of the mountains.

    Despite this, I was still uneasy about our intelligence gathering. Latency was my biggest fear here.

    Although the agents were stationed in pairs, there was a chance that both of them could be killed at the same time. If that happened, then the intel from that zone would bepletely cut off.

    The death of the agents was one thing, but the inherent dy caused by that could threaten the survival of a nation. In order to prevent such circumstances, I had strongly warned Souei to exercise extreme caution.

    In the event that one of these agents were uncovered, while they might not get killed, it would still lead to confrontation andbat. That would naturally mean a dy in the transmission of intel. And that was what I was trying to eliminate, along with making thiswork robust and secure.

    In order to achieve this, I thought of using magic as a surveince tool. There was this long-range observation magic that existed in the sorcery system, but it wasnt nearly as useful as Id hoped. All it could do, at best, was confirm the shape of the object, which meant that the information it could provide was trivial. It could only monitor a particr ce and required re-casting it to change to another ce. It was terribly cumbersome magic, since switching locations took time, and if your target already left the area by the time you switched, it was aplete waste.

    Plus, if the target had put up a magic barrier, your magic would bounce off of it. This made it impossible to monitor powerful beings, and I concluded that it would be useless in an actual battle.

    But then I had a bright idea. The physical magic Megiddo was a spell that converged sunlight into high-intensity beams using lenses formed by collecting water droplets in the air. I thought that the same theory could be applied to create a surveince spell.

    For instance, suspending water drops in various locations to project a live image feed of those ces. If that information could be transcribed, then it would allow us to monitor locations from far away. And if that wasnt possible, then I would use the lenses I made on high-altitudes to magnify the feed and project it onto a monitor.

    Take telephoto lenses, images, and a mechanism to transcribe information. To put it simply, I would create magical surveince satellites bybining these three.

    Although it seemed difficult to construct each concept with magic at first, Raphael-san answered that it was possible using physical magic, spirit magic, and Spatial Domination.

    Now all I had to do was to send detailed requests to Raphael-san. Just like that, my improved magic concept had been created.

    Once this surveince system was in ce, it would be easier to safely gather reliable information. The potential amount of information that would be obtained was enormous, and no matter how the enemies moved, itd be a piece of cake to find out what they were up to.

    You might be thinking I was just ying around during these hectic days, but this was super important.

    He who controls the information controls the world, and thus, wars as well.

    During the Battle of Tsushima during the Russo-Japanese War, the Imperial Japanese Navy destroyed the Russian Baltic Fleet under themand of Togo Heihachiro, the Commander in Chief of the Combined Fleet.

    It was said that the most important issue faced by the Japanese Navy in this battle was whether or not they could actually encounter the enemy fleets. Predicting the ce you would capture or intercept the opponent was crucial. If their predictions were off, this battle would not have urred, and as a result, Japan wouldve been defeated.

    And this was applicable to our current situation as well. If our forces were deployed in various locations, there would be a high possibility that we, who were disadvantaged in terms of numbers, would lose. The deciding factor for victory would be whether or not we could read the movements of the Empire and make them concentrate their strength at the right spot.

    On the other hand, if the Empire dispersed its forces, it would be possible to defeat them individually after devising a more detailed strategy. This magic was essential for us to execute our strategy, and above all, for us to obtain certain victory.

    While Id just spent my time talking it up, I had, in fact, already finished the prototype stage of the project.

    I also made sure to ask Raphael-san to make it nice and user-friendly.

    What? I couldnt have done this myself?

    Dont be stupid. Raphael-san was my Skill, so if it was working hard, I was working hard. Thinking about it that way, I might have been working too muchtely. I should take a short break to unwind.

    For the first time in what felt like ages, I enjoyed the ck tea that Shuna brewed. As I was rxing, I was musing over the uses of thepleted surveince magic when suddenly

    Rimuru-sama, I have something urgent to report!

    I received a message from Beretta through the Telepathy Net.

    My jaw dropped as soon as I heard the report.

    A second group had conquered the 50th floor of the Dungeon.

    By the way, the first team was, needless to say, Masayukis party. They were taking a break right now due to this pre-war situation, but they had already reached the 59th floor.

    Thanks to Masayuki and his team, the Dungeon was booming. More and more challengers were arriving every day, and we were raking in the dough.

    Of course, the challengers also got something out of this; over the past year, the average skill level had grown considerably. There were already a number of groups that had conquered the 30th floor, and they developed strategies that took advantage of the resurrection mechanic, namely the Zombie Attack and the Sacrifice-and-Abandon n.

    Upon passing the 30th floor, the cheap death traps and monsters that fought in groups were bing quite the nuisance for challengers. In spite of their wicked strategies, they were struggling.

    As always, the strong challengers persevered. Fighters with simplistic attack habits were initially left in the dust, but as time went on, they honed their skills and obtained better equipment. Eventually, they could hold their own, too. The ability to adapt was a frightening thing, as some people became experienced enough to avoid even the most vicious traps by intuition alone.

    Like that, the groups fighting on the frontlines recently began approaching the boss monster on the 40th floor, where they all ran into a roadblock.

    Floor 40s boss monster was a tempest serpent, ranked A-minus. It was that ck snake I encountered way back when, which took pride in its breath attacks that were devastating against groups. Many peoples weapons were corroded by it and they would oftene crying to our stores. We would give them a hand by lending some of our Tempest trademarked equipment and they would eventually be regr customers. Our store policy You break it, you buy it was another way to make good moneyall thanks to the tempest serpent!

    The serpent roughed up the challengers and stripped them of their hard-earned gear. It was such a dependable guardian whoted us a wonderful stream of iewhat a pity it got defeated.

    Also, they had even beaten the guardian of the 50th floor.

    Masayukis group was kinda cheating when they did it, so this time around, we had a party that meant serious business. They also imed the cash reward, but the hype it generated was a worthwhile tradeoff.

    New heroes were emerging on the daily within thebyrinth, and it was flourishing like never before.

    Intelligent majins were responsible for guarding the 50th floor. In this case, I had ordered the gyuki Gozer and the baki 12 Mezer to take turns on duty, guarding this floor. These two definitely were nothing to scoff at, so it would be really surprising if someone beat them.

    After all, these two challenged each other in their free time, and devised fighting tactics of their own ingenuity. They werent the same berserk meatheads they once were, which probably had to do with their new strategic approach to battle. They had buried the hatchet and grown to be good friends.

    I remembered that I had set up a pretty sweet reward for clearing Floor 50. The treasure chest was guaranteed to drop gear only on the first clearnot just any kind of gear, but unique-grade gear from the Minos series. It was named after the Minotaur 13 , the Lord of the Labyrinth. The gear itself was insanely good and bound to be a prized piece in any collection.

    If the chest had a weapon, youd be looking at either the gozus battle ax, Minoss Bardiche, or the mezus spear, Minoss Trident. There was no shield; the rest would be various pieces of armor.

    I hadnt anticipated that people would reach this point so early, so Id only stocked up on maybe a dozen sets. Be that as it may, they were all top notch in quality. Indeed, they were masterpieces created by Kurobees best students using their finest techniques.

    One of the pieces getting snatched up was an issue, but the dominant performance of these challengers was more concerning.

    To begin with, Gozer and Mezer had be stronger as a result of receiving their names. If those two could be defeated, I wanted to recruit whoever they were for my country. And if those candidates turned down our invitation, they could be dangerous enemies down the line. That was something I liked to avoid, so I had already nned to put those kinds of people on a watch list.

    To that end, I requested for there to be an emergency call whenever Gozer or Mezer were defeated.

    That brought us to the reason why Beretta called me.

    So, hows the situation?

    Yes sir. There were three people who broke through, and all of them are Unique Skill-holders.

    I wondered if they might be acquaintances, but my guess was quickly proven wrong. It only took three to defeat Gozer and they all possessed Unique Skills Moreover, they werent even active Dungeon challengers, but rather newbies that recently made an appearance.

    I wouldnt have questioned it during peacetimes, but given the current situation on the eve of war, there was a strong possibility that they were spies who had taken the bait.

    It was necessary to investigate this thoroughly. Thus, I stopped the n to test the surveince magic and headed to the Control Room of thebyrinth.

    I walked in and saw Ramiris and Veldora. It seemed like Dino and Vesta were taking a break today. Never mind Dino, Vesta had been looking tired these days, so I wanted him to get some rest.

    Ramiris and Veldora were always full of energy. The concept of fatigue likely didnt apply to them; they had that unlimited child energy. As long as they were doing something they were interested in, they could keep going all day.

    Ah! Commander, youre here! Ramiris eximed. The situation remains unchanged for now!

    I didnt know what was going on to begin with. She was probably just saying whatever fit the mood.

    I then turned my eyes towards the video shown on the huge screen. It disyed three youngsters. It appeared as though they were conquering one floor after another at break-neck speed, and their fighting style was quite distinctive.

    One man moved his arms through the air as if he were throwing something, and it apparently had some significant power behind it. Was this like apressed air bullet? It sure wasnt possible with mere human strength. He was a tall man of stout build, with brown hair. He had a chiseled face and stood out among them wearing his jeans and tank top. Yep, jeans and a tank top. That alone convinced me we had an otherworlder on our hands.

    Let me take a look at the other two.

    There was a short and skinny man d in a ck robe and another was a young man wearing a white coat over chain mail.

    White coat. Yeah, a white coat. The conventional type youd see inbs and hospitals. However, in this world it wasnt exactly conventional. That guys face looked distinctly East Asian, and undoubtedly Japanese.

    Apart from the ck-robed man, I thought the tank top guy andb coat guy were both otherworlders.

    Anyway, looking at the huge screen, I could see that they were still fighting. This time they were up against a big groupsix death wolves had joined the fray and were assaulting the trio. The death wolves quickly closed the distance at a speed that ordinary humans couldnt react to. They were obviously smart enough to realize that they had to get in close if they wanted to stand a chance. Beyond the 50th floor, even the riff raff had moderately high intelligence.

    By the way, a single death wolf was ranked B-plus, so if six of them were in a pack, things could get ugly fast. Moreover, since it was a dead spirit, it had the characteristic of being immune to physical attacks, unless they were from a holy weapon or a magic weapon.

    Because their bodies were constructed of magicules, they could regenerate them immediately, even if they were sttered to bits. These were some wicked monsters that wouldnt go down without you taking the right steps to counter them.

    One mistake and theyd eat you alive, but

    Dont underestimate me, you damn mutts! Hiyaaa! roared the brown-haired guy who had previously been throwing air.

    This time, he was charging with the terrifying bardiche held high, and brought it down in a wide arc. With a deafening thud, three death wolves turned into light particles and disappeared.

    Oh, thats it! No wonder the terrifying ax looked familiarit was Minoss Bardiche.

    When it came to unique-grade weapons, they, needless to say, had magical powers. In other words, it was a kind of magic weapon, and even the dead spirits could be damaged. The weapons magical power alone was enough to wound a monster.

    More to the point, Minoss Bardiche was forged out of a very special alloy. As I recall, it was made from mithril, which was a custom alloybining silver with magisteel. It was a holy-type weapon, which inflicted extra damage to dead spirits and the undead.

    Aah, I muttered, with Minoss Bardiche, the death wolves are dead meat.

    Yeah, that weapon was the one dropped by Gozer, Veldora pointed out. This guy here seems to be a pretty sharp fighter, swinging that ax like hes practiced for years with it.

    As we stood there watching their fight, they filled me in on what happened until today.

    I had a sudden craving for potato chips right about now.

    By the sound of things, the brown-haired guy had been the one taking out all of the monsters. And from what I saw, I could definitely believe it. That guy was a beast.

    But then, what happened to all the traps?

    Regarding that, the ck-robed guy discovered them immediately and informed his friends of their positions. Floor 51 was where the most insidious, meanest traps starteding into y, which could kill you on the spot. As I watched, the ck-robed guy pointed at the exact ces where the traps were hidden.

    That was his Unique Skill. His role was vital for conquering thebyrinth.

    Theb coat guy himself had only engaged once so far; it was in their fight against Gozer.

    Veldoras exnation didnt make sense, so I asked Raphael-san to read the past records from the Dungeon. Whatever had happened, it mustve been strange indeed:

    He took out a syringe from his inside pocket and injected his friends with two shots. Immediately afterwards, Gozers movements became sluggish.

    Did he give them some kind of state changing stuff?

    Answer. It is poison. ording to the analysis result, the attack that individual Gozer received contained a neurotoxin. The room was filled with poisonous gas, inhibiting movements of individuals who were not resistant to it. Currently, there is no such effect in ce.

    Aah, poisonous gas. He could supposedly mix it up on the spot to suit their opponent.

    Theme Gozer was a great target for the brown-haired dude. But it was theb coat guy who delivered the final blow. He took out a shiny silver scalpel from his pouch and slit Gozers jugr vein with expert precision.

    This guy was the leader of the three. Not because he hung back most of the time, but because he was ying the role of theirmander. And he was also skilled; it seemed that the spearheading, brown-haired man could focus on his attacks since he knew that theb coat guy could defend himself if push came to shove.

    They appeared to be a good, well bnced party.

    Just then, I heard a knock on my door.

    The door opened quietly and Shuna entered. She brought the papers which had the registration information of these three people.

    This is the registration form of those three collected at the time of their entry to Tempest. With a bow, Shuna handed me the papers.

    Shinjee: twenty-three years old, magician.

    Mark: twenty-six years old, warrior.

    Xin: seventeen years old, hunter.

    Their names and upation were briefly recorded on this piece of paper. Their hometown was a little country within the Empire. It said that they hade to this country to challenge the Dungeon, about which they had heard a lot of rumors from the merchants.

    Well, that was clearly a load of bullshit.

    Raphael-san showed me the results of the trios analysis. And just like Beretta had said, they all possessed Unique Skills. Those three had formed a party and came here together. So, it was simply absurd to take anything written on this paper at face value.

    The jobs that they had written here were also very fishy.

    Being a magician was a high-ss career that entailed mastery over two or more types of magic. In Shinjees case in particr, he had apparently learned both spirit magic and elemental magic. The guy did have noteworthy talent.

    The same applied to warriors, who must master weaponry and hand-to-handbat skills. In this case, proficiency in at least one basic martial art and weapon ss was to be expected.

    There were several weapon categories to choose from, ranging from sword fighting, archery, and in some cases, throwing arts, which included knife throwing and stone throwing. You just had to pick the one that suited you best. The essence of the art of weaponry was the path towards mastering that weapon of choice.

    In the case of Mark, he was evidently good at hand-to-handbat, throwing, and fighting with a speara jack-of-all-trades.

    Lastly, hunters were said to be the cream of the crop among those who dispatched monsters. You had to master the type of archery that specialized in using the traditional bow and Formhide, an Art that was very difficult to handle. Furthermore, you had to master the Danger Detection Skill, and thus talent alone was not enough to get a job as a hunter. It was the most reliable upation among the members of subjugation guilds.

    In this world, hardly anyone had the abilities to discover traps and monsters, which were skills essential for exploration. As such, people who could be hunters were very few, to the point that they were only born from tribes that specialized in hunting. So that made the career harder to achieve.

    Those three with rather rare jobs had arrived as a party. They were practically begging me to suspect them.

    Those three must be spies who took the bait, I proposed.

    Yes. However, would they really blow their cover this tantly? Diablomented, showing up out of nowhere.

    He had been consulting with me on the development of my magic and was looking forward to experimenting with the new surveince system, but was distraught about the current interruption. He looked like he was about to take out his resentment on the three people on the screen, but I guess he figured out the right call.

    Yeah, I said, thats what I was wondering, too. I thought it might be a diversion, but the towns security is pretty calm.

    This party was indeed highly suspicious, but their registration information was, quite frankly, too honest. But it may just be a red herring.

    Rimuru, youre overthinking it, Veldora interrupted. Didnt you say honesty is the best policy?

    Ramiris jumped in next. Thats right! Putting that aside, its more important to figure out how to deal with these people!

    Oh, thats good, you guys. Always happy-go-lucky. I envied Veldora and Ramiris for not having a care in the world. Ah, whatever. No matter what the truth was, there was no doubt that we needed to be careful.

    About that ck-haired man wearing ab coat, Shinjeethats obviously a fake name. It has to be Shinji.

    The brown-haired Mark. Not only was he throwing air bullets, he seemed to be able to throw anything that he grabbed, be it a monster corpse or a fallen stone. I nearly spat out my tea when I saw him throwing a living monster and smashing two skeleton warriors at the same time.

    He really was a warrior. He used the Minoss Bardiche skillfully and steamrolled dead spirits one after another.

    The ck-robed guy, Xin, definitely had an eye for detecting traps. At first, I thought that he had the Skill Danger Detection, but seeing him avoid all the dangerous ces in advance, it made me think that it was thanks to his Unique Skill.

    Essentially, beyond the 50th floor, traps were more threatening than the monsters.

    Undead monsters did not need to breathe, so we adjusted the airposition of this floor inside the Dungeon in an unnoticeable way. I had also prepared an oxygen-free room and such, so that even an unintentional step into the room would lead to immediate asphyxiation.

    Besides this, there were poisonous waters, acid swamps, corrosive gas rooms, and so on.

    A number of really nasty traps awaited the challengers, damaging not only their bodies but also their equipment. These traps, insidious like the character of their creators, were there to hinder the conquest of the challengers on the 50th floor and below. Yet, the traps werepletely useless if the challengers could figure all of them out.

    In addition, Xin had an excellent sense of direction, and it was easy for him to take the shortest paths without being fooled by the rotating floors. Obviously, the twists and turns of thebyrinth did little to slow him down.

    Whenever they were seriously injured, Shinjee, the young man in ab coat, would treat them. He could also break down poison, so I guess we couldnt expect much from these traps.

    Despite there only being three of them, it was as though they were specialized for conquering a dungeon.

    And so, three days passed.

    Veldora, Ramiris, and I were happily observing the progress Shinjee and his party were making. No, we werent thinking of them as a reference for the next time we would conquer it, okay? I mean, look at them; I was merely admiring their fights.

    Diablo was reading in the corner of the room, while Shion was taking lessons from Shuna on how to make desserts. Shuna poured the three of us another cup of tea. Today, we were having ck tea with a pleasant apple scent to it.

    By the way, Rimuru, you said that those three were people who took the bait. What did you mean by that? Veldora suddenly asked.

    Mmm, what was that Oh, the conversation from three days ago. I didnt want to turn a deaf ear, but this was Veldora we were talking about.

    Dont worry about that.

    Dont give me the cold shoulder, tell me.

    These kinds of things normally went in one ear and out the other with him, but today, he was being remarkably persistent. Ah, fine then.

    Okay, Ill tell you. Actually

    I exined the situation to Veldora.

    Taking the bait was both literal and figurative.

    We had introduced disaster drills. The idea behind it was to do the impossible and iste the entire city within the Dungeon. Ramiriss Intrinsic Skill Labyrinth Creation really was amazing. I knew that the floors could be swapped, but even the city aboveground could be swapped with one of the floors.

    Once separated, it would be anchored there for twenty-four hours, but you didnt need to worry about water or air. In fact, even the sun was visible. It seemed that there wouldnt be much mental stress for the residents.

    Of course, it needed a lot of power, and thats where Veldora-san came into the picture.

    That was why I had been nning to iste the town when the war came.

    We had practiced it a few times, and unexpectedly, it turned out to be excellent bait for spies. Since the gate, which was the entrance to thebyrinth, would be the only thing left above the ground, it was bound to raise a few eyebrows. Investigations would surely be carried outthis was the conclusion we reached in a meeting with Benimaru and others.

    I see. Thanks to Mentor, Ive also gotten a power-up! Im d to be of help.

    Kukuku, I see. Thanks to me, huh, Veldora grinned, giving me those puppy eyes he does when fishing forpliments. It was a pain in the ass, but I had to hand it to him, we couldnt have done it without him.

    Well, you really helped, Veldora-san.

    Gaaa-hahaha! Aint that right! You all heard it! So, could you give me the cake?

    Of course I cant! That was the piece I had saved forter.

    Then, have mine.

    Ooh, thanks Diablo!

    Sorry about that, I apologized.

    No, no, its the least I can do for you, Rimuru-sama, Diablo assured me.

    How reliable. I may as well indulge in his kindness.

    I nced at the screen as I enjoyed my cake. The challengers were trying to take on the 60th floor.

    Knowing they are spies, wouldnt it be better if we captured them?

    No, I want to see how strong they arehow far they can go. Giving them the prize money does sting, but its pretty exciting and I dont see any problems with it.

    At worst, there was always the option of capturing them and confiscating the money. I was going to let them think I generously paid them, while taking full advantage of them.

    Youre amazing as always, Rimuru!

    Thats dirty! But really smart!

    Although Veldora and Ramirisplimented me, for some reason, it didnt make me happy.

    Shuna rolled her eyes at us.

    But it seems we failed. Who wouldve thought that Minoss Bardiche would appear on the first drop. Its a holy weapon, so undead creatures will have to watch out.

    We were getting a little carried away with the first-time guaranteed drop thing

    The guardian of the 60th floor was Adalmann.

    I decided to give him the title Immortal King for him to wee the challengers like he did when he was still a wight king

    Adalmanns powers shined when he led an army. On his own, he was weaker than Gozer and Mezer, so I had a feeling that this time would be another disappointment. Moreover, since Adalmann was a wight, he was extremely weak against holy and light elements.

    As long as Mark was using Minoss Bardiche, it seemed like Adalmanns chances of winning were fleetingly low. Although I had given him a lot of advice, this floors main gimmick was the traps.

    Since I was not expecting much of the bosss strength, I had decided that it would be okay to give the challengers some weapons he was weak against. I did kinda screw Adalmann over. Sadly, even he couldnt stop these three, right? Well, it mightve been my fault, but I hope youll forgive me.

    At that point, I curbed my expectations and instead looked forward to their battle against the guardians of Floor 70.

    Immortal King Adalmann curled his fleshless lips when he noticed the presence of intruders in his domain. His jaws clenched, teeth grinding against each otheryou could hear a slight creaking sound. It was hard to tell, but apparently, he had a broad grin on his skull.

    You seem happy, Adalmann-sama.

    The voice addressing him belonged to the man who had been his trusted friend for many centuries, a former pdin named Albert. He had been at Adalmanns side the longest, even after the day they fell into a trap and died.

    When Adalmann joined the lowest ranks of Rimurus subordinates, Albert devolved into a skeleton swordsman, a low-ss monster. He was reduced to such a weak existence that he was lucky not to have disappeared.

    Naturally, he became unable to speak. And yet, the Albert of today was speaking fluently. How? The reason was very simple. Right now, Albert wasnt a skeleton swordsman; he wasnt a death knight, which was a few evolutionary stages above. He was a death pdin, an even higher existence.

    He remained a dead spirit and had no physical body. However, he appeared no different than when he was alive. The blue will-o-wisps floating around him and his deathly paleplexion were the only indication that he was no longer among the living.

    Adalmann had no lingering attachments to the body he had in his previous life; rather, he loved the bony body he had right now. Albert, on the other hand, didnt share the same opinion, so he used his newfound magic powerbeing far stronger than any death knightto construct a body by manipting magicules. He still had a lingering pride and an emotional attachment to his human appearance of the past. Therefore, he currently had the appearance of a fresh-faced young manalthough calling a dead spirit fresh-faced was rather strange in itself.

    He was decked out with terrifying equipment, and just from a single glimpse, one could understand that Albert was no ordinary individual.

    Indeed, I am in high spirits. Albert, the guests have arrived.

    Hearing these words, Albert, too, nodded happily.

    I see, theyve finallye.

    A handful of words were enough for them to understand each other; these two truly were on the same wavelength.

    Yes. The time has finallye to be useful to him, Adalmann cheered. After all, it was Rimuru-sama who let us live peacefully. Now that we have been given this much power, you know that we cant afford to make the same mistakes asst time.

    I am well aware of that, of course.

    Fufufu, I suppose it was an unnecessary warning. Perhaps the excitement has made me a bit talkative.

    The two looked at each other andughed. And there was one more creature with them.

    Graaaaaah!!

    A brutal and vicious roar reverberated through the city of the dead.

    I see, youre looking forward to it, too. Very well. You should use that power to your hearts content today. We shall give a testimony of loyalty to God!!

    Quietly, and then profoundly, their eagerness filled the entire area.

    Adalmann had oncepletely lost his faith. But now, the demon lord Rimuru was the subject of his renewed faithhe had be Adalmanns new god.

    A few months after his painful defeat

    In order to be useful to Rimuru, Adalmann devoted all of his time into regaining his strength as a wight king as quickly as possible. Thus, he rapidly possessed power which surpassed his own when he was in his prime. That was the degree of Adalmanns devotion.

    Meanwhile, Rimuru found faithfulness to this degree rather overbearing. On the contrary, he was thinking, Sorry guys, it doesnt look like youll win this one, and was already cing his expectations on the next guardian. But since Adalmann and Albert were blissfully unaware of this, they remained full of energy and enthusiasm.

    Especially this timeno, always from this point forwardlosing was absolutely not allowed; they must continually offer up victories. In high spirits, Adalmann and hispanions began to take careful measures against the foolish intruders who would arrive shortly.

    The ferocious battle ended as soon as it began.

    Is what I wanted to say, but it all ended so quickly that it left me speechless. I had even gotten out a set of ying cards just in case I got bored, but I didnt get the chance to use them.

    It ended with Adalmann steamrolling the invaders. It was a stunningly vivid victory. It wasnt that the opponents were weakthey werent sick or hurt, either. In fact, they looked to be in great physical condition and were well motivated. But Adalmann and his troops outperformed them in all respects.

    The challengers this time were quite strong. When I finished analyzing their Skills, I thought that they were stronger than Adalmann. They were all above rank A and had their own Unique Skills.

    Shinjee had a Unique Skill called Healer, which was a very unusual Skill that allowed him to manipte viruses. When fighting against a living creature, he seemed to be able to destroy them from the inside. He was also evidently capable of manipting theposition of the air to disseminate microscopic attack agents called viral poison.

    Honestly, it was a ridiculously powerful ability. Wouldnt that make him invincible against living creatures? Since it was impossible to see the viral poison with the naked eye, you wouldnt be able to beat Shinjee, if you had nothing to rely on other than your eyesight.

    Of course, those microbes could be used for healing, too. Given how it was superior to medical nanomachines, it was an extremely versatile and handy Skill.

    Next was Mark and his Unique Skill Thrower. It evidently allowed him to throw anything he could grab, and given how he was able to toss even monsters, it looked like the Skill also applied to anything he could lift.

    Ifbined with gravity maniption magic, it could potentially be more troublesome than your average kic weapon. It would be really effective if used against an army rather than individuals.

    Finally, regarding Xins Skill, it was an assortment of convenient powers. Unique Skill Observer contained Instinctual Avoidance, Danger Detection, Trap Detection, Monster Detection, and Presence Detection. Apparently, he could even spot Shinjees viral poison. Whenbined with his battle prowess, he was unparalleled in escaping danger. He was fast and didnt fall into any traps, which made him a natural enemy of thebyrinth.

    That was the gist of things. I nned to use those yummy-looking Skills as a reference.

    While those three were brilliant on their own, their perfectpatibility with each other made them even stronger as a team. I thought itd be understandable if they were able to defeat Adalmann.

    On the other hand Adalmann had gotten way stronger than ever before, and just within the past few months. I mean, you wouldnt see much of an improvement in the battle prowess from monsterscking self-consciousness. Though maybe you would, if they survived for several decades, but it was not something that would change after a few years.

    But in the case of Adalmann and Albert

    Uhm, whats going on? Why are those two so strong right now?!

    And whats with that dragon?

    Adalmann, Albert, and an evil dragon that Id never seen before were all standing in the boss room. It was nearly ten meters long and exuded a noxious miasma. Where the heck did they dig that thing up from I wondered what else had happened while I was away from town on my business trip.

    Hehehe, you mustve been surprised! Actually, I kept it a secret, but you gave them equipment, right? They looked overjoyed and were training really hard. Oh, oh, and you remember how the magicule density in thebyrinth is so high? By absorbing those magicules, Adalmann and Albert regained their former power! Ramiris proudly chirped like she was bragging about pulling off a sessful prank.

    What she said was true, howeverwhen I examined him more closely, I saw that Adalmann had evolved from a wight to a wight king. He still came across as a bony guy dressed in regal clothes, so I didnt realize that his magic power had increased to such an outrageous level.

    Meanwhile, Albertpletely skipped over the death knight evolution and turned straight into a higher-level monster called a death pdin.

    Wight kings and death pdins have the same amount of magicules as archdemons

    Ga-hahaha! The little guys are trying their best to be useful to us in their own little way!

    Theyd supposedly evolved rather easily, but they became much stronger than Id expected.

    Well then, what is that dragon?

    What! You didnt know? Thats Adalmanns pet.

    His pet? Hmm. Now that you mention itI feel like Adalmann did say something about wanting to keep a pet. I never wouldve expected such a fiendish dragon.

    The dragon was a death dragon, the pinnacle of dead monsters. Since Shuna and the others were familiar with it, they thought I knew about it as well. This was partially my fault. It made me realize once again that ReCoCo (report,municate, and consult) truly was important.

    So, moving onto the main point, the events of the battle.

    There wasnt much to say. Adalmann sat still on his throne while the death dragonid calmly to his left. Albert went ahead on his own and defeated everyone just like that.

    Mark didnt even get any time to disy the true abilities of his Minoss Bardiche. Albert blocked him with a weapon of equal ssthe unique-grade Cursed Swordand wlessly cut him down.

    Xin, witnessing this for himself, became dumbfounded, lowering his defenses for a split-second. Albert didnt let an opportunity like that go to waste and attacked Xin with lightning speed, turning into a blur. Xin was defeated just as easily as Mark.

    Huh?! Shinjee couldnt help but scream in shock and rushed to shoot Albert with the holy magic Holy Cannon. Holy Knights were good at this kind of magic, but barely anyone else could use it. He didnt mention his proficiency with it when he registered, so this mightve been one of his trump cards.

    This spell was suited for rapid-fire, so he managed tond a direct hit on Albert. Since it looked avoidable to me, I thought Albert mustve been carelessbut my worries had been misced. The only reason Albert didnt move was because he didnt need to.

    No way! Shinjee cried out as Alberts sword sliced through him.

    The battle ended there.

    Hold on, Albert is undead, so shouldnt he be weak to the holy element?

    To the people who thought the same way, Im one of you. See, you arent wrong, so why was Albertpletely fine? The answery with Adalmanns trump card, Extra Skill Holy-Demonic Reversal.

    Report. Holy-Demonic Reversal is a secret technique created by the individual Adalmann. With the effects of this Skill, attributes of holy and demonic elements can be exchanged.

    With that Skill, Albert had his attribute changed from demonic element to holy element. It didnt affect his equipment in the slightest, and the fact that Albert was undead did not change, either. This meant there was still no life force for his equipment to suck up. Swapping his element seemed to be all fine and dandy.

    When targeting allies, Adalmann didnt have to worry about them resisting his Skill.

    I thought holy undead was a joke, but Adalmanns Holy-Demonic Reversal proved otherwise.

    Since Adalmann and his team were dead spirits, they were resistant to all types of attribute attacks. Physical attacks, too, were almost useless against them. Now, they had ovee their biggest weaknessthe holy element. Lets just say that this situation was beyond what an ordinary challenger could handle.

    Adalmanns team had won without having to use the magic I had taught them. That was how easy Shinjee and his friends were defeated and turned into particles of light.

    My God, did you watch us? We offer our victory to thee!! Adalmann shouted at the top of his lungs like a true fanatic.

    Wasnt Adalmann and his gang a little too strong to guard the 60th floor? I did tell Adalmann to challenge a party with a party, didnt I? Well, he definitely obeyed my orders and fought opponents with equal numbers.

    But he was still cheating, right? Why, you ask? Because, if three Special ACmity-ssbeings appeared at the same time, they could easily obliterate a small country. If this was happening under my nose, then there mustve been more things they were hiding from me.

    Ill save Ramiriss interrogation for when things settle down. Today, Ill show my appreciation for Adalmann and his crew.

    Youve done a great job, Adalmann! This is something that needs to be said in person, soe to themand room.

    Oh, oooh! I thank you for those words, they bring me boundless joy! I shall forthwithe to your side!

    As usual, he was excessively formal. Well, this was simply your quintessential Adalmann.

    It appears Albert has regained his voice. Can you bring him here as well?

    Understood. Then, what about my death dragon?

    Im afraid you need to leave it there.

    Yes sir!

    The death dragon looked rather depressed, but I had to harden my heart and reject the request. It was something like ten meters long, which was way toorge to even fit in this room, okay? Aside from Veldoras private hall on the 100th floor, themand room wasnt that big. I felt bad for the dragon, but my hands were effectively tied.

    I asked Shion to make ck tea for Adalmann and Albert. However, she spun around and responded with a serious face, Can skeletons drink?

    Right, she had a point. Although Albert seemed to have regained flesh, Adalmann was still the same old skeleton. Well, maybe they could at least enjoy the smell?

    Its more about setting the mood, you know?

    Oh, really? Understood!

    I waited for Adalmann and Alberts arrival as we were having this bizarre conversation.

    I sincerely apologize for keeping you waiting, Rimuru-sama!

    I am eternally grateful to be able to have an audience with you.

    Adalmann and Albert both kneeled down in front of me.

    Looking at these two up close instead of on the big screen made me doubt whether these really were the same individualsthey had grown too strong.

    Hmm, that was a splendid job. Albert, was it? You handled that sword masterfully. And Adalmann, your performance as a guardian was very impressive. Keep up the good work!

    Mm-hmm, were counting on you!

    Veldora and Ramiris started encouraging them before I could even say a single word. When it came to these situations, you had to be the first one to speak, or otherwise youd be hard-pressed toe up with something to add. Oh well, just gotta y it safe.

    Man, aint that the truth. I havent seen you guys in a while, so I was really surprised at how much youve grown.

    It was more of an evolution than growth.

    Those three were pretty strong, so I thought it might be a tough fight for you guysis what I actually wanted to say, but there were times when you had to bite your tongue, and this was one of them.

    Yes sir!!

    Adalmann and Albert were ovee with emotion.

    To wash away this little sense of guilt, I told them to take a seat.

    Thisthis is truly a pleasant aroma. If anyone else served me tea, I might have taken it as an insult

    Ah, she had a point after all, huh? I guess it would be a cruel joke to people who were unable to drink.

    However, with Rimuru-samas invitation, this aroma alone is enough to soothe my mind and relieve my weary bones.

    That was good to hear, but Shion was the one who brewed it

    Delicious. A sweet and lovely scent, like nectar. I, Albert, am extremely grateful to be blessed with this moment of bliss.

    You guys are really overreacting

    It appeared that Alberts body was structured using magicules. It was a temporary incarnation only made possible inside thebyrinth.

    Adalmann, why dont you incarnate like Albert?

    Eh?

    No, I just thought it would be nice for you to enjoy the tea that way.

    Th-that may be true, but in my case, I am cing greater importance on the mood, I would say

    I see. I didnt understand it, but he mustve had his reasons. Welp, who am I to tell him how to enjoy his tea.

    In that case, I wont force you.

    On that note, I changed the topic.

    By the way, I began, youre brilliant with that Extra Skill Holy-Demonic Reversal. Merely being able to develop such a Skill tells me how hard youve been working.

    Thank you very much! This wouldnt have been possible without Beretta-donos help. And Adalmann started to go off on another tangent.

    I subtly changed the discussion and now uncovered a stunning tale in which even Luminas allegedly yed a role.

    Luminas-sama said it was an apology and taught me one of her secret techniques: Reversal of Day and Night. This was then remodeled by Beretta-donos Unique Skill Double-Crosser, and as a result, I mastered this great Skill.

    This was the whole story. The apology, as Luminas called it, was for overlooking the rampage of the Seven Luminaries.

    Why did Granbell n to eliminate the talented Adalmann? I had my own theory about itother than Granbell, the members of the Seven Luminaries had desperately tried to remove any threats that challenged their positions, so they ultimately decided to eliminate Adalmann. On the contrary, Granbell thought that Adalmann would only be useful to him if he could ovee such a trap.

    Adalmann and his entourage fought against the zombie dragon, ending that battle in a draw. Perhaps that wasnt the result Granbell was looking for. He felt that if Adalmann couldnt even beat an enemy of that caliber, then it would be impossible for him to be a guardian of humanitythis is what I believed had urred. Perhaps this conclusion was based on what I saw in the aloof Granbells final moments.

    It would be tactless for me to voice my theory though.

    While hoping that one day Adalmann would realize it himself, I changed the subject yet again.

    Thats brilliant. Ill have to give Luminas my regardster, but first things first, Adalmann!

    Sir!

    As of now, you can beat the current guardian of the 70th floor, right?

    What do you mean by that?

    I gave a detailed exnation to the confused Adalmann.

    Right now, Floors 61 through 70 were the golem zone. They were filled with mechanical, tireless soldiers. Some of the special Area Bosses were even outfitted with prototype firearms. This zone had many types of evil traps, includingnd mines. Nevertheless, they werent strong enough to kill, which heavily implied that this whole setup was for the healers to be able to use the zone as a training ground.

    Also, the Boss Monster was a remodeled Elemental Colossus. Vesta had finallypleted his brainchild with the help of Kaijin. They had seeded in miniaturizing it and reducing its weight while maintaining the high defense offered by magisteel. Its mobility was greatly improved too, and careful consideration was given topletely protect the cockpit.

    Even though it wasnt autonomous, it was designed with room for a pilot to control it from the inside. It also had a very handy remote-control feature that let you operate it telepathically.

    Around this time, Beretta shouldve been controlling it remotely. And since nobody was technically inside, that meant it was immune to attacks from viral poison. Even Minoss Bardiche wouldnt have made a dent in its magisteel body since it was covered inminar armor. Plus, it featured Magic Interference thanks to Charybdiss scales.

    It was a wholeheartedly invincible iron guardian. That was the Demon Colossus in a nutshell, the updated version of the Elemental Colossus.

    Shinjees team couldnt conquer the 70th floorI was sure of it.

    However, after watching how Adalmanns team fought, I changed my mind.

    Veldora, who do you think is stronger: Adalmann, or the Demon Colossus?

    Hm. Adalmann, without a doubt.

    Exactly. Its official, Adalmann. Youve been promoted to guardian of the 70th floor.

    Im not making a mistakeam I? If Veldora thinks so too, then then this must be the right call.

    Answer. The difference inbat power between the individuals Adalmann and Demon Colossus is

    Ah, hmm.

    This was more about the mood, so I really didnt need all the minute details

    Oh, oooh!! I, Adalmann, shall spare no effort to live up to your expectations, Rimuru-sama!

    I, Albert, humbly pledge myself to my lord, Adalmann.

    The two of them dered while kneeling down in front of me.

    I look away for a bit and these guys get crazy strong, huh?

    The Demon Colossus wasnt actually weak, but its presence as a boss honestly was. And above all, we couldnt afford to let it get destroyed again. Unless it was operated with a soul properly enclosed inside, it would remain out of the scope of Ramiriss power. Itd be a hassle to try to find out whether or not it would resurrect if it were destroyed.

    It would be a different story if it had a sense of self. Or if someone actually piloted it? No, rather than that, it might no longer be considered just an item if someone possessed it

    Unfortunately, we currently didnt have any ns for that. So, there werent any problems promoting Adalmanns team.

    Great! Then, as of today, exchange Floors 51 through 60 with Floors 61 through 70!

    Understood! Leave it to me!

    That was all it took to swap entire sections of thebyrinth.

    After congratting both Adalmann and Albert, I decided to have their floors switched. Now that business had ended, I was about to tell them to leave when suddenly

    This seems like a good time to interrupt; there is something I wish to report, Diablo, who had been quiet all this time, announced.

    What is it?

    My servant Razen has sent me a message via Magic Communication, saying that he has urgent matters to discuss with you. An old master of his has arrived and is requesting an audience, it seems. This man goes by the name of Gadra.

    Hmm, I dont recognize him.

    Report. There is a high chance of this person being the one that is credited as the author of several grimoires.

    He sounded like a pretty famous guy. Id heard that Razen was also quite the brilliant and revered archmage, but if this was his teacher, then he was probably even more brilliant.

    This is interesting; I think itll be okay to see him.

    Isnt that a trap? Were on the eve of war with the Empire, so a meeting at this time is nothing short of dubious.

    Exactly! There is no need for you to meet with such a suspicious person!

    Shions vignce was maxed out, beyond mine, even.

    Although, I did sort of understand where she wasing from. Given the current situation and time, and also how her group was supposed to be my bodyguards, it was her job to protect me from unnecessary danger.

    I wasnt a particrly cautious person, so I figured itd be better to listen to my subordinates in this regard.

    Rightfully so, Diablo agreed. You do not need to heed the opinions of a man like Razen. Naturally, that extends to me, as well.

    He sounded so genuine, but most likely he just sought to avoid any hassles.

    If my two secretaries were against it, then Id refuse the offer. Thats what I was about to say, until I noticed Adalmann fidgeting out of the corner of my eye.

    Poor Adalmann, I totally got how he was feeling. It was like when you were about to leave a meeting with your boss and a visitor suddenly came in, or the phone rang. Disturbing your boss was a no-go, so you just had to sit there helplessly, watching the time tick by. All you wished for was to go homethis happened way too often at the office.

    Huh, it was just me? Whatever, it doesnt matter anyway.

    Adalmann, sorry I got sidetracked. Ive said everything I had to say, you can leave now.

    Ah, no! You dont need to worry about us, the thing is

    Hm?

    Actually, um I

    Uh-huh.

    About this person called Gadra whom you were talking about

    Yes

    He might be a friend whom I once knew.

    What?

    I caught myself staring at Adalmann unintentionally; he was getting anxious and fidgety. No, I dont think youre a traitor He was shaking so bad that I wanted to tell him that.

    I told Diablo to put the reply on hold and asked Adalmann for more details.

    It turned out that Gadra and Adalmann were friends more than a thousand years ago. Adalmann presumed he had died already, but since Gadra was an archmage, he said it wasnt outside the realm of possibility for him to have extended his lifespan using the secret art he created.

    After all, the person who used the mystic art Reincarnation and saved Adalmanns life was apparently the same Gadra. He also happened to know the name Razen and thought that he was one of Gadras oldest and greatest disciples.

    After listening to a couple more tidbits, it appeared as though the person in question really was the Gadra whom Adalmann had once known.

    Diablo.

    Understood. I will arrange a date and time and prepare for the meeting.

    As expected from the useful secretaryI need but only call him and he understands my intention.

    The hopeless secretary didnt have any objections, so I decided to have a meeting with Gadra.

    For the first time, Shinji and his gang experienced resurrection after getting killed on the 60th floor.

    When they returned, they were greeted with all kinds of reactions from the many spectators, ranging from boos over their loss to words of constion.

    Battles in thebyrinth were broadcasted exclusively, and the trios fights garnered a lot of poprity. Of course, they could have refused to let their battles get broadcasted, since that was part of an opt-in agreement. For two reasons, however, Shinji decided to allow it.

    Firstly, they would receive a cut of the profits earned by broadcasting their battles.

    Secondly, he figured that if they became famous, it would guarantee their safety.

    After all, they were in the heart of enemy territory, and getting assassinated was less likely if they were well known. Besides, they were told that only the boss battles would be aired, so they didnt have to be mindful of it the entire time. They were sure to profit quite a bit from this, so Shinji had no reason to decline. The other two didntin, either. Hence, they epted the contract, and the oue was this reaction by the people around them.

    That was unfortunate. Looks like youll have to train a bit more and try again.

    No way, that was impossible. What the hell were those monstrosities? That swordsman was wicked fast, and the skeleton sitting on the thrhat was a legendary monster, right?

    Probably a wight king. Even a high-ranking demon would be no match for it; its a living cmity that controls death itself.

    That reminds me, was that dragon even alive? It didnt look like decoration, but if it were to join the fray, then, to be honest, humans wouldnt stand a chance of winning.

    A lot of questions were getting thrown around.

    The trio justughed in response and did their best to escape from the scene.

    Well, I guess well have to ce our hopes on the Hero.

    With this, you guys have managed to reach the same record as Masayuki-sama. If you n to win, youll have to find a way to deal with that boss while Masayuki-sama is busy preparing for the war.

    Yeah. I was betting on you guys winning. Youll get em next time!

    The shouting followed them all the way as they headed back to the inn.

    The three copsed on their beds as soon as they reached their room.

    Hey, what should we do now? Mark inquired.

    Theres nothing we can do; just let me rest for a bit, replied Shinji, utterly exhausted.

    They had enthusiastically challenged the boss, but the difficulty made the previous 59 floors look like a walk in the park. On the 60th floor, even the small fries had group coordination. A sentient monster called a death lord 14 attacked them, apanied by its own subordinates. Even after somehow oveing these difficult enemies and eventually reaching the boss room, in the end, they met a grisly death.

    Are we reporting this to Yuuki-san?

    Xins question made Shinji sit up. He sighed as he sat on his bed.

    Mark and Xin also sat up and the three of them faced one another.

    Report it or not, that thing is impossible. Who knew the secret area would be this intense?

    Yeah, we werepletely fine until the 59th floor. So, what the hell was that 60th floor? The death lord was roaming around with its own toon of death knights. Thats a ughterhouse for any ordinary soldier!

    Yeah.

    That was bad. The power level of that floors guardians shot up exponentiallypared to the previous floors. Not just the knight that defeated us, but also that skeleton on the throne and the death dragon beside it I think those three are the secret bosses

    The trio started shooting the breeze eagerly. The excitement got the better of them as they chattered away without a worry in the world. The facades theyd kept up these few days melted away.

    Also, that skeletal boss, who sat on the throne the whole time, is a wight king. Anyone with advanced appraisal magic couldve seen just what that skeleton really is. But its presence ispletely different in person,pared to on a screen!

    Right on. If you bumped into that guy without any preparation, it wouldnt end nicely.

    To be honest, Xin concluded, I dont want to challenge it again.

    The wight king hadnt even joined the battle. He hadnt moved from his throne, as if to disy the dignity of a king.

    The gozu monster, which seemed like a regr boss, was easily A rank. With that as a reference, the 60th floor is way too overpowered, isnt it?

    That was just awful. Maybe everything up until the 50th floor was just intended to lower our guard.

    But now Im sure of it. There must be something in thebyrinth if such strong monsters are protecting it, Shinji concluded without a shred of doubt in his voice.

    I guess so. I mean, that knight named Albert was brutally strong.

    Even its equipment was different from the others. I tried analyzing it while Mark was fighting, and shockingly, it turned out to be a unique-grade masterpiece.

    No wonder. And here I thought I could crush any opponent, no matter what they had, with my Minoss Bardiche.

    Come on, beating a boss with a weapon that youve picked up only works in games.

    Yeah, true, we kinda overestimated ourselves, huh.

    Yeah.

    The three looked at each other again and sighed heavily. After their energetic discussion, they had finally calmed down. They brewed tea for themselves and took a breather.

    Wanna give it another shot tomorrow? Shinji asked tentatively.

    Are you serious?

    Its impossible. No matter how many times we try, well always fail.

    I thought so.

    That Hero is that Masayuki guy Yuuki-san told us about, right? Ive heard that hes just a lucky teenager, but hes challenged the 60th floor, huh? Mark remarked.

    No, Shinji answered, it looks like he hasnt. I heard hes zipping along, without dying, not even once.

    And what about the others?

    Theres a rumor that the strongest ones are still challenging the 50th floor. However, they didnt sign the broadcasting contract so the highest record, of those broadcasted, would be Masayukis conquest of the 50th floor. Other than that, it seems like there are several groups on the 40th floor.

    Even if you agreed to the broadcasting contract, they wouldnt broadcast you on every floor. Only the floors that were a multiple of ten were equipped with cameras. Other than those, it seemed like news crews asionally followed the challengers around for scoops during events and such.

    Since they had challenged the 60th floor while on air, Shinji and his group had be the talk of the town. Apparently, they also became the focus of gambling, owing to the countless records they broke.

    You know, Shinji pondered, I think its likely Masayuki received some behind-the-scenes info. That being the existence of the secret bosses on the 60th floor.

    Then its no wonder we lost. Two brokenly strong guys and a dragon to top it off; can you believe it? Thatbyrinth is horribly unbnced.

    It was reasonably bnced till the 50th floor, so those really must be the secret bosses. Im sure the town is beyond that floor.

    The three consoled themselves as they chatted and began nning their next steps.

    Now that were in the limelight, we cant continue spying.

    Thats not a problem. As I said earlier, were safer this way.

    Weve also only been exploring thebyrinth.

    Then, why dont we wait for Gadra-sama toe? We cant keep challenging the Dungeon by ourselves, can we? Or should we do some training? Mark wondered aloud.

    First, Shinji replied with a grim smile, lets report to Yuuki-san that theres definitely something beyond that floor and that the guardians were abnormally strong.

    Next, lets tell him how huge thebyrinth really is. No matter what magic is used to make suchrge spaces, it extends so far down it cant possibly be man-made, right? Mark added.

    Also, dont forget to mention that the monsters on that floor were far and away the toughest ones yet, Xin reminded everyone.

    Shinji nodded. I know. Then, lets go sightseeing after contacting him.

    Now that the matter was settled, it was time to act. The trio stepped out onto the busy streets of the night.

    Shinji and his colleagues went to the outskirts of town and started reporting as instructed. They forwarded a brief message to Yuuki, and after about ten minutes, they were contacted by him through Magic Communication.

    Hey, its good to know you guys are doing fine.

    We were okay up until yesterday. Today has just been awful.

    Hahaha, seems like you guys have had it rough. So, what do you n to do next?

    It depends on Master Gadra. We cant conquer the 60th floor alone and there is no way to sneak into thebyrinth.

    Just as I thought. Then, let me ask you one thing.

    Yes?

    How strong do you think the boss of the 60th floor was? What does your gut tell you?

    This was something that only the trio could understand. It meant how strong the opponent was whenpared to the ranks of the Imperial Guardians.

    Shinji thought hard to himself. He wasnt typically interested in the rank battles of the military. He didnt have any ambition of rising through the ranks, so he hadnt participated in any.

    Yuuki had taken him under his wing, and Shinji was indebted to him in other various ways, and thus he became Yuukis subordinate with the intention of repaying his kindness. Since he was reluctant to help criminal organizations, Shinji instead chose the path of the army. So when Yuuki became a corpsmander, he was quickly moved from his former department, the Armored Corps, to the Mixed Corps.

    Some of the otherworlders had a simr mindset. They didnt show off their powers and tried to live a carefree life, avoiding serious responsibilities. The powers and abilities of these people were a mystery, so it wasnt really known whether the Imperial Guardians were actually the strongest. But at least on paper, they were the strongest force in the Empire. In a sense, it was natural to use the rankings as a guide.

    Lets see. Probably at least within the upper fifty. Anything lower is out of the question, Id say.

    And thats just for this knight, Albert, alone?

    Yes. Ah, Im not sure if this will help you get an idea for its power, but I had once joined an archdemon subjugation force as its military doctor. I only caught a glimpse of that demon, but the wight king that I saw today has about the same magicule count as that thing.

    Could you be referring to Lakeshore Dyed Scarlet?

    Ah, yes. Thats right.

    Understood. Thats actually really helpful. Then, you three should take it easy until Old Master Gadra joins up with you. Yuuki advised as he ended the call.

    The Lakeshore Dyed Scarlet incident was one of the most hideous stains on the Empires history.

    A vassal state adjacent to a beautifulke rebelled and called for its independence. At that time, the king was outmatched in military strength andout of sheer desperationultimately triggered the ensuing tragedy.

    It was a forbidden secret art called demon summoning. The king ordered the magicians to summon the strongest demon they could control, and the courts magic divisionplied. As a result, the little country was destroyed when an archdemon answered the summoning.

    As a small country with a poption of less than ten thousand, there was no way it could stand a chance against the Empire. Nevertheless, the king had a reason for dering independenceas it would happen, an Imperial aristocrat wanted the princess of the country, the kings only daughter, as his concubine.

    The Empire was exceedinglyrge and powerful, so the emperor didnt pay attention to every little thing that happened in the small, remote vassal states. Even though all of thend belonged to him, the regional management was split up among the nobility.

    The treatment of the vassal states remained at the mercy of the nobility. It was amon sight in the Empire to see the margraves, who were in charge of the local regions, abusing the emperors name for tyranny.

    The demon demanded the kings daughter as the price for its summoning. The king adamantly refused, but the head court magician, whose mind shattered the moment he saw the demon and went insane,plied with the demons request.

    The demon possessed the princesss body with a sinister smile on its face. The king was furious, but his anger turned into terror as the demon, now in possession of a physical body, went on a rampage.

    When word of this little countrys ruin reached the Empire, they decided to subdue the demon. Had they acted anyter, the world wouldve seen the birth of a second Guy Crimson.

    The beautifulke turned scarlet, stained with the blood of the small countrys inhabitants. This abominable incident was known ever since as the most tragic event to tarnish the history of the Empire in thest few centuries.

    The Lakeshore Dyed Scarlet incident was resolved by the Armored Corps, which had branches throughout the Empire.

    That was how it was written in the official report.

    However, reality was often different.

    The main army was no match for the archdemon. Shinji, who was a medic in the subjugation force, had watched from afar as a battle between a small number of elite soldiers and the archdemon yed out, ending with the defeat of said demon.

    Something about the entire incident was fishy. It was true that the nobles had been tyrants, but Shinji questioned the truth of the matter surrounding the attack the demon had led against the countrys citizens.

    Besides, the Empires initial response was abnormally fast. Information about the incident was transmitted to the maind of the Empire, from which they decided to dispatch a subjugation force, then the subjugation unit was organized. With this much time, the demons incarnation would have beenpleted. However, that didnt happen.

    Shinji believed that the fact that the Empire was able to prevent the demons incarnation at the veryst minute proved that the Empire knew about the situation from the very beginning. But he didnt n on telling anyone else about his conclusion. Witnessing the strength of those who fought the demon for himself, he realized that there were things in this world that you were better off not knowing.

    Its likely those people were top-ranking Imperial Guardians

    Shinji firmly believed that he couldnt beat them no matter how hard he tried. He truly felt that he lived in a different world than them.

    This was what made him lose interest in rank battles.

    Shinji took a deep breath to release his tension as Mark and Xin called out to him.

    Finished?

    Good job.

    Yeah, the report is over with. Lets take it easy until Master Gadra arrives.

    Sure. Anyway, Shinji, youre actually a survivor of the Lakeshore Dyed Scarlet?

    Im d that you survived.

    Well, you know, all I did was y dead at that time and got away with it, but I think it was a fine y on my part, if I say so myself.

    No, no, justing back alive is incredible. Less than thirty percent returned from that mission, huh?

    Yeah. I dont want to join anything like that ever again. For one thing, I ended up beingpletely useless as a medic back there.

    Eh?

    I mean, everyone who got hit died immediately so I didnt even have a chance to do anything. Thats why my priority was to just get the heck out of there.

    Thats awful. Are archdemons that dangerous?

    For the demon that I saw, dangerous doesnt even begin to describe it. Actually, I felt like our eyes met but I think it let me go. And those crimson eyesI nearly wet myself just thinking about them Shinji exined,ughing at their surprise.

    However, if that skeleton is on the same level as the terrible archdemon, then we obviously cant beat it.

    Are they really at the same level?

    Judging by their magicule amount, at least. They say the longer a demon lives, the stronger it bes. The one I saw mustve been on the older side.

    If not, then the higher ups of the Empire wouldnt have taken such measures, he was about to add, but stopped himself.

    Well, Shinji continued, worrying about that wont solve anything. I heard theyre working on a machine which can be used to measure the power of others, but it will probably be meaningless. That knight, Albert, was unbelievably strong for his magicule count. Besides, I want you two to remember the sses we got in school; your physical strength isnt the only thing that can win you a fight, is it?

    I understand what you mean.

    Yeah.

    Thats what I mean. Among the demons, there are some with immeasurable strength. Thats all you need to remember.

    As Shinji rmended, the other two left the matter alone.

    Changing gears, the trio rushed to the Freedom Associations office before it closed for the night. They wanted to sell the magic crystal and excess equipment to the Materials Department.

    Hey, hey, this is a magic crystal from the lower floors, eh? The quality ispletely different.

    Oh, is that another slotted weapon? Were it made of pure magisteel, youd never find anything like it in another country, yknow?

    The Association workers were happily discussing the trios findings, pleased to handle all the materials from the lower floors.

    You could make more profits if you carefully selected the buyers. However, since the trios purpose was to infiltrate and investigate thebyrinth, they didnt want to spread their name or make more acquaintances than were really necessary.

    Besides, the sales they made in the Association were superb. Their investigation had hit a dead end, but the profits they made were quite good. They had earned a lot of money within the past few days.

    Military personnel received an annual sry, the payment being in advance. So if you were promoted, the difference would be paid the following year. Even those who didnt have money would be paid in advance on the day they joined the army. This was paid as part of the sry, after calcting the number of days remaining in the year.

    Basically, you had nothing to lose in the army. Even if a soldier died on the battlefield, the advanced payment was to be considered as part of thepensation.

    Common soldiersprivatesreceived only the basic pay of ten gold coins, which amounted to 1,000,000 yen per year. The army took care of their food, clothing, and shelter, so the poor considered the sry to be a small fortune. Various benefits, bonuses based on rank, as well as hazard pay could also be supplemented.

    Mark and Xin had the rank of first lieutenant, while Shinji was a major 15 with a military doctor qualification. They didnt have the authority tomand others, but their positions came with certain privileges.

    In the Empire, otherworlders were given preferential treatment. At the very least, they were treated as second lieutenants, but Shinji was given better treatment than the others. That was why the trios sry was much higher than ordinary soldiers.

    The bonus given to a first lieutenant was 36 gold coins. The bonus given to a major was 44 gold coins. Four gold coins were added to the bonus amount for each rank you climbed. The annual sry of Mark and Xin totaled to about 50 gold coins and Shinjis was a little less than 70.

    Even though soldiers earned more thanmoners, it wasnt enough for them to live a luxurious life. They would be rich in the countryside, but the cost of living in the capital was high. However, you would face this worlds harsh realities if you left the army to live independently.

    Being able to live a stable life was attractive in itself.

    But today, they had learned something.

    The three of them were debating whether they should quit the army and live together in the Labyrinth City. They earned more than 300 gold coins in theirtest sale with the Freedom Association alone. This short-term mission had earned them way more than what all three of thembined could make in a year.

    On top of that, they could never have hoped to possess their own unique-grade equipment unless it was provided by the Empire. All in all, the mission was greatly rewarding.

    All of them had realized this truth but hesitated to say it aloud. They walked without saying a word before stopping to eat at one of the high-ss restaurants of the capital city Rimuru.

    They hadnt experienced luxury in a long time.

    Are you sure this is a good idea? Selling equipment on our own like that? Xin, who was a little timid, asked nervously.

    Its totally fine, Shinji assured him, unperturbed. Its not like we sold everything, and we have already set aside some samples.

    And no matter what, we cant bring everything back with us, Mark added. So, if we keep the good quality ones, then there wont be any reason for them toin.

    All of the goods looted during a military action belonged to the army, except when soldiers were permitted to plunder. In this case, they couldntin if everything were taken away from them.

    However, Shinji and his crew were tasked with the mission to investigate the Dungeon while posing as adventurers. So, it would only seem natural for them to y the part; you could think of it as a perk of this kind of job.

    Besides, Yuuki wouldnt ask them to hand over any of the looted goods. There was no doubt that the trio could keep everything except what they had to submit as part of their mission.

    But, you know, if theyre going to take away all the money we earned, well seriously consider immigrating here, right? Shinji suggested, and they both readily agreed.

    One gold coin equaled 100,000 yen. This held true in the Empire as well. The gold coins made in the Dwarven Kingdom were in cirction far and wide, and even the Empire recognized them as legal tender. Since the coins they had earned were the same, they could still use them back home.

    I seriously think we should do that.

    Yeah. I was joking earlier, but if we try our best, we are pretty sure to have a better life here.

    Shinji was half serious about that, but Mark and Xin were way more interested than he thought.

    It was true that the Empire was the hub of cutting-edge technology and fostered a prosperous culturethe capital was especially advanced. The food was tasty, and the living standards were high. As long as they had the money, they could live as happily as they did in their previous world.

    However, the trio were active soldiers in the army, so it wasnt an understatement to say that death was waiting for them around every corner. In that respect, the Dungeon was a blessing for them. After all, death would never catch them there. They were skeptical at first, but after experiencing it for themselves and getting resurrected, their doubts were instantly erased. If they didnt have to worry about dying, then they could earn as much money as possible and live every day to its fullest. It was quite reasonable for Shinji and the others to think this was the better choice.

    But even if you had enough money, it would be useless if there wasnt any entertainment to spend it on. This, too, was possible in Rimuru, which had more than its fair share of entertainment centers.

    They had a ce called the Colosseum, which was open to the public on days when there were no events taking ce in it. On such days, the citizens were free to hang out and y there. Sports like football, baseball, and various others were popr andmonly yed in Tempest, so those who challenged thebyrinth also had a great time. There were hot springs and opera houses as well. ys were also staged, whichas they found out during their investigationswere packed every day.

    The trio found that the food was just as goodif not betteras the Empires. The Japanese vor that Shinji missed dearly, plenty of sweets, and a wide variety of liquors. Even the dishes that didnt exist in this world had been recreated here. As someone from Earth, Shinjis heart was truly enamored of this city.

    Frankly, they were obliged only to Yuuki, and it seemed like Yuuki himself didnt want to be hostile to Demon Lord Rimuru. So even if Shinji and his friends were to move to this country, they wouldnt really be considered traitors.

    Despite desertion in the face of the enemy ensuring us a death sentence, and the fact that we are currently on the eve of war, its not like we are currently at war.

    I was thinking the exact same thing, Shinji. We can still resign from the army voluntarily, right?

    I think it depends on Yuuki-san.

    Had war broken out, it would have been desertion, but fortunately, the situation was still peaceful. Depending on how you interpreted things, it wasnt impossible to retire and leave the army.

    The problem is the war, muttered Mark.

    This was the exact reason why they couldnte to any concrete decision. There was no doubt a war was about to start, and thisnd would be directly subjected to its ravages. If it werent for that, they would have already chosen to immigrate here.

    Which side do you think will win?

    Rather, if we were ordered to attack this city, what would we do?

    The three exchanged looks with one another.

    The food, which they found so tasty before, suddenly lost all its vor. There were two reasons why they couldnt do such a thing. They had only stayed in the city for a short period of time, but it had already grown on them. The thought that this city would vanish disheartened them. There was another reason, too

    Considering the strength of the boss in thatbyrinth, it wasnt hard for them to believe that the powerful people in this country had incredible abilities.

    Normally, Id think its only natural for the guardians who protect important facilities to be strong, wouldnt it? But is this countrys army really weaker than the guardians of the Empire? That borders on wishful thinking, Shinji reasoned.

    Thats what I think as well. Demon Lord Rimuru himself must be on another level, Mark murmured in agreement. A long time ago, that evil dragon Veldora annihted an entire city, and that story doesnt seem to be a joke. I think even that wight king is capable of the same.

    Shinji nodded. In all honesty, the monsters in this country would be capable of causing simr cmities.

    Its just my estimation, but it seems like archdemons are capable of using nuclear magic, and I think that isparable to the tactical nuclear weapons on Earth.

    I think so, too. Ourmon sense dictates that war is about numbers, but fighting that boss using quantity seems futile.

    I dont think we can win unless we have dozens of warriors who are at our level.

    They all had worry in their eyes as they nced at each other once again.

    It was immediately after this that they received the Magic Communication from Gadra.

    An old man prostrated himself before me. Behind him were the three challengers, who I had been watching on the big screen yesterday, also prostrating.

    The old man was called Gadra. He was the one who had requested an audience with me through Razen and Diablo. He wasnt wearing anything shy, just a somewhat high-tier magical robe. His eyes were sharp and didnt match his old body.

    Just as Id thought, Shinjee was actually Shinji. His real name was apparently Shinji Tanimura. It appeared that the other two had registered themselves using their real names. These three seemed to be this archmage Gadras subordinates. The trio worked for Yuuki, but this time, they were under Gadras care as assistants in this investigation.

    That was what theyd told me so far

    Gadra assumed this pose right after he had finished talking and the others followed suit, but if they were to keep this up any longer, the talks would go nowhere.

    Uh, wellI figured as much. Anyway, we really cant have afortable discussion like this, so why dont we go somewhere else?

    Raise your heads, Shion ordered them after I spoke.

    For some reason, she said it rather pompously. This was why I found formalities annoying. I always felt like I messed up the procedure, and the truth was that I really didnt want to do this.

    Y-yes maam!!

    Given Gadras exaggerated reply, I already knew that the uing discussions would be a hassle.

    The meeting ce was the reception room, the cheaper one. If I had to pick, Id prefer this one since I couldfortably rx there. The opulent one had high-ss furnishings, and I just couldnt stop worrying about it getting nicks and scratches. If someone spilled tea, the expensive carpet would be ruined.

    Live within your meansas a lower middle-ss citizen, I was morefortable with the furniture I was used to. Shinji and the others appeared to be of the same mind; their faces werent quite as gloomy.

    Coffee or teawhich do you prefer? I asked them without beating about the bush.

    T-thencoffee, answered Shinji.

    S-Shinji!!

    Gadras expression changed to anger as he shouted, but I calmed him down.

    Gadra-san, how about you?

    M-me? Uh, t-then, Ill have the same thing as Shinji.

    Huh? Maybe coffee didnt exist in the Empire? I felt like it did, but it might not be in their market. When I turned to Mark and Xin, they started nodding wordlessly. Guess they wanted the same thing, too.

    Shuna, four Americans 16 !

    Americans?! Shinji sputtered.

    Ah, you want something weak then? Maybe a blend? How about our national pride, a Tempest?

    N-no no, I didnt mean it like that, um

    Mhmm.

    Y-Your Majesty Rimuru, are you perhaps an otherworlder? Shinji inquired.

    Yeah, what about it?

    Eh, why is he asking this now? Wouldnt that be part of basic information collection?

    As I dwelled on the thought, I examined the four of them a little closer and noticed that only Gadra had an I screwed up expression. He was probably already aware but had forgotten to tell them. Whatever, it didnt really matter.

    All right, lets hear the details.

    Shuna gave them the coffee she had prepared; there was also milk and sugar on the table. I listened to what Gadra had to say while Shinji and his friends looked really impressed with the coffee set. Shinji took a sip of his coffee and murmured, This is delicious!, which earned him a sharp re from Gadra. I was kind enough to ignore it.

    Actually, I am a reincarnated person.

    Old Master Gadra casually dropped a sudden bombshell. The trio was just as shocked as I was and turned to face him.

    Master Gadra had wanted to be a great sorcerer for as long as he could remember, so he reincarnated himself countless times. Each time he was reincarnated, he studied all the treasured books he could get his hands on in various ces; hence, he had umted a vast wealth of knowledge. It was during this time, when he was researching magic in secret, that he met Adalmann and became fast friends.

    As I said before, I have nothing but hatred for the Western Holy Church. They killed my friend Adalmann. For centuries, I have been nning to pit the Empire against them.

    Following his small rant, Gadra continued his story. When he learned that Adalmann had fallen into a trap and was killed, he vowed to take revenge. With this resolve, he went to the Empire with nothing but his name andbored to slowly gain their trust.

    He seemed to have fought Veldora as well; his past was more extreme than Id imagined.

    To be honest, I am d that I hadpleted my reincarnation ritual in advance. I wished to see it with my own eyesthe natural-born apex of monsters 17

    Only four True Dragons existed in this world and they were the strongest race in existence, standing above all other monsters.

    Gadra said that from his actual battle experience, he didnt think that the Imperial Army could ever beat Veldora. He pointed this out right in front of the dragon himself, so that guy was now repeatedly ncing at me with a delighted expression.

    Good grief, stop it already. Sure, hes amazing, but I dont feel the need to praise him for it.

    No, they could have achieved a tactical victory, but those imbeciles wanted to control Veldora-sama. I advised them over and over again to give up since it was impossible and futile.

    Gadra was only interested in taking his revenge against Luminism in the West, so he didnt want to expend any men on something which was evidently in vain. He desperately tried to make them understand the reality of the situation, but the corpsmanders, all of them blinded by pride, refused to listen.

    And yet From his story so far, Gadra seemed to be a man of integrity, but simultaneously responsible for the Empires growing imperial ambitions.

    I asked him to cut to the chase and borate on recent developments in the Empire.

    So youre saying that its mostly your fault that the Empire is trying to start a war?

    Well, thats one part of it, I guess

    No, no, no, youre trying to be evasive. Regardless of how you looked at it, the fault lies with this old man.

    Realizing that I was in a bad mood, Gadra rushed to make excuses.

    Its not like that! The Empire has always been a hegemonic power, and if we dont set a direction, the ravages of war will spread throughout thend. Thats why I had them look westward. Well, it fits with my purpose, too. I thought it would be convenient.

    How could it be convenient?! Were getting dragged into this for no reason at all!

    I was also against invading the Great Jura Forest, considering Veldora-sama lives in it, and I didnt want them to make the same mistake as before. I proposed that it would be better to focus on the Dwarven Kingdom, but there are too many stubborn people who would rather solve everything by force

    Gadra began ranting about something again, but my attention was focused on a different point entirely.

    Wait a minute. So the Empire really is nning to attack the Dwarven Kingdom?!

    I hadnt really expected this possibility to be truedid we now have to consider the potential of them passing through the Dwarven Kingdom?

    I see you are aware of that. However, its not like were attacking them. My proposal was to form an alliance with King Gazel and have them turn a blind eye towards any action taken by our army. I hold a grudge only against the Western Holy Church

    Gadra was already informed that Adalmann was safe and was promised a meeting with him right after this one. As a result, he realized how fruitless all of his efforts had been and turned his back on the war.

    It seemed that he was close to the emperor, but not close enough to put a stop to the whole military campaign. Thus, he nned to advocate against the war in the uing conference. It was a bit too convenient to think that Gadras help could avert the war, but if it did, then I would definitely stopining. In any case, we wanted to get as much information as we could out of him.

    Benimaru and others were on standby in the adjacent room, listening to our conversation while holding a strategy meeting. My job was to keep Gadra happy and talking.

    And King Gazel refused, didnt he?

    Well, that was a given. And then, a n to assassinate him was proposed, but I was against it. If were going to do it, then we should face them head onis what I told them!

    Thats not a scenario you should be proud of. Old Gadra was way more militant than I thought.

    Even though I was getting more astounded by the minute, I still kept him talking. He told us a lot of useful informationfrom the breakdown of the Imperial Army to the mindset of the upper echelon. He even revealed the shocking news that Yuuki was nning a coup. I had pretty much wrung him dry at this point.

    Finally, Gadra began speaking his mind in an honest and light-hearted way.

    I dont have any obligations to the Empire. The army corps that I raised was disbanded, and my men were taken away. These three are my disciples, so I borrowed them. Although its hard to say that he is well, if Adalmann is doing all right, then I will not have any regrets leaving the Empire behind.

    He said it himself that deep in his heart, he was a self-centered person with no sense of loyalty whatsoever.

    This old man really was something. I had to keep it a secret, but I couldnt help but feel some respect for him.

    Thats why, from now on, if Your Majesty could grant me the honor of even the lowest office among your followers, I will work my fingers to the bone!

    The guts he had to ask me to be my subordinate even though he had just stated that he had no loyalty. Yet, I didnt dislike this sort of person. However, Benimaru and the others were listening to this conversation in the room next door. I had a feeling that Gadras attitude might anger them, so calming them down might be a bit difficult.

    So after that

    I decided to hire Old Gadra on a temporary basis, treating him as a guest. Since he expressed his desire to be my subordinate, I intended to work him as hard as possible. I didnt expect loyalty, but I did expect him to spare no effort.

    For the time being, I brought him to meet Adalmann and also gave him permission to teleport to the 70th floor.

    His knowledge would be honestly beneficial, so making him Ramiriss assistant mightve been a good idea. Prior to that, however, I nned to have him do a small task in the Empire.

    Shinji and his team decided to stay and immigrate to Tempest. After taking some time off, they were going to decide about their line of work for the future.

    It was the trios request following Gadras persistent pleas to take him in, so I had no reason to decline. Besides, it was clear to them that they would be permanently exiled if they betrayed me. They clearly didnt want that to happen, and so they pledged their allegiance.

    Nheless, the trio still held some respect for Yuuki and didnt want to go against him. I didnt think there would be any problems in that regard.

    We have aplicated rtionship with Yuukis side. Its like we are in somewhat of a ceasefire right now. To be honest, I want to get back at him for pissing me off so many times, but somehow, I cant bring myself to hate him.

    He may be like that, but despite it all, he was one of Shizu-sans students. When I remembered Shizu-san, who had happily talked to me about Yuuki, I couldnt help but feel forgiving. I think I was being a bit naive, but it was also out of goodwill since we shared the same homnd. There wouldnt be a next time, but for now, lets put our differences and grudges on hold.

    On the other hand, whether or not I could trust him was a different matter. If I had trusted that bastard, I would have ended up getting killed several times over.

    It would do all of you good to not trust Yuuki too much, I warned them.

    Gadra nodded for some reason; it seemed like he had something to say about this. I have an inkling that Yuuki and Gadra knew each other and had a cooperative rtionship, so it was a good decision to bring Gadra into the fold, since he would serve as a good link to Yuuki.

    I believed that I could trust Gadra due to the simple fact that he doesnt blindly follow Yuuki.

    Later on, I let Gadra meet Adalmann. They spent the rest of the time reminiscing about the old days, and it was clear that they missed each other.

    Adalmann agreed to take Gadra in, so I left him in his care for the time being.

    But before that

    After obtaining all the information I could from old Gadra, I ordered him to return to the Empire to carry out my n. The first order of business was to promote an anti-war stance.

    So, are you okay with that?

    Leave it to me. Im used to acting behind the scenes.

    Well, yeah, I couldve guessed as much. Though, normally it would be impossible for just one individual to stop something that the nation had decided to do. It wasnt as though I didnt believe in Gadra, but itd be smarter toe up with a n B, too.

    What I want the most is to stop the war, I admitted, but from what youve told me, that is looking very difficult. The Empire is a hegemonic power, right? If so, it will stop at nothing once it has been set in motion.

    But

    Thats why I want to lure them into thebyrinth, when that happens.

    What do you mean by that?

    If the battle took ce inside thebyrinth, it wouldnt really matter how much damage was dhat was what I exined to Gadra.

    Oh, I understand now. Your Majesty wants to weaken the military power of the Empire and reduce their will to fight.

    Yup. Yuuki will most likely take advantage of this situation and stir up a mess in their homnd, the Empire wont possibly be able to continue fighting after that.

    I wasnt sure if it would go as smoothly as I had just described, but it was true that there wouldnt be any damage if the battle took ce inside thebyrinth.

    Once I made this clear to Gadra, I gave him three Resurrection Bracelets and made-inbyrinth equipment. We nned to use these as bait to entice people to enter thebyrinth. In military terms, getting attacked from the rear was truly nasty. It was hard to imagine them ignoring thebyrinth and marching towards the West, but if they had any incentive to seek out the treasures of thebyrinth

    Ohh, I see! That is brilliant, Your Majesty. Im familiar with a certain greedymander, so Your Majestys n will certainlye to fruition, Gadra confidently replied.

    If possible, stop the warif not, then lure them into thebyrinth. Everything depended on Gadras skills.

    Asylum for the four of them was granted at my discretion. And just like that, I had made some unexpected friends and brought an end to this small ruckus.

 Volume 12 - Ch 4

    The Empire Strikes First

    There lurked a man of many mysteries within the Empire. This man was Tatsuya Kondou, an otherworlder, and he knew every secret among its inner workings. He, indeed, was the darkness of the Imperial capital. His short ck hair, with bangs gently flowing into his eyes, softened his otherwise tensive demeanor.

    At first nce, he looked like a fine young man, someone in his early twenties. Beneath it all, however, his heart was cold. The eyes on his emotionless face glowed with a sharp light, as if piercing his enemies and seeing through all.

    That was to be expected. Tatsuya Kondou, or First Lieutenant Kondou, didnt look his age.

    Here in the Imperial capital, otherworlders werent so rare. This was because the Empire had a policy of protecting otherworlders and gathered them in its capital from all over the world. This policy was what saved Tatsuya and so many others. This world had magic, and that was the reason why he had been saved.

    Over 70 years ago

    Tatsuya put his life on the line for his country as he engaged in a suicide attack against the enemys naval strike fleet. He wasnt one to argue the merits of that operation. Reflecting back on the situation, he had believed that it was the only way forward.

    When he thought about hisrades who valiantly sacrificed their lives, he wished he could find meaning in what they did. This was the reason why Tatsuya would go on to always remember them. In order to let hisrades live within himto never forget his memories of themhe stayed as a first lieutenant, which was his rank at that time.

    He was racing towards his death as it came time for him tounch his suicide attack, but when he was engulfed in the blinding light and heat of the explosion, he somehow found himself in another world. He lived despite staring death straight in the eye.

    The emperor himself was the one who saved him.

    Fortune had smiled upon him that day.

    Tatsuya appeared in a garden that only the emperor and a few close associates could enter. And as it happened, the emperor was rxing there.

    Interesting. This must be a twist of fate.

    Those were thest words Tatsuya heard before his consciousness faded.

    When he awoke, he realized that his body was devoid of any blemishes or scratches from before. Tatsuyas luck had saved his life. So, in order to return the favor, he pledged the life he had once wasted to the emperor. The power he awakened from crossing worlds and facing deathTatsuya dedicated it all to him. And to this day, that was the only thing he lived for. He never stepped into the spotlight. He didnt grow old; in fact, he still looked exactly the same as the day hed arrived. He resided in the darkness of the Empirein other words, the Intelligence Headquarters, which lurked in the shadows of the Imperial capital.

    The specter that fed on information.

    The man who lurked in the shadow of the Empire.

    The man who was apanied by fiends.

    A man of many namesthat was First Lieutenant Kondou. He was the head of the Imperial Intelligence Agency. None of the corpsmanders dared to make light of his existence, as they had never actually seen who he really was.

    Gadra had sent Shinji and his team to conquer the Dungeon, and of course, the Imperial Intelligence Agency was well informed of this information.

    First Lieutenant Kondou was a taciturn man. Ah, thank you, had been his brief remark and nothing more. The informants, ustomed to this, bowed and promptly left. The first lieutenant was not the kind of man to express his thoughts to other people.

    The report contained detailed information about Yuukis subordinates. There were more than a thousand otherworlders gathered from every part of the world. Less than 10 percent of them did not awaken a Unique Skill. Those people were leading a peaceful life in the Empires capital. More than 10 percent had awakened a Unique Skill designed forbat. Over a hundred otherworlders chose to join the army corps that matched their individual characteristics. The rest of them were offered ces of employment ording to their specialties, where their work greatly varied.

    This time, the subject was about thebat-type otherworlders. Yuuki Kagurazaka was the man who created the Freedom Association in the Western Nations. Until a year ago, he made full use of his power as the grandmaster to protect the otherworlders as best he could.

    That was what Yuuki self-reported; yet, ording to investigations, it was a lie. He buttered up the Rosso family and exploited their power. In the West, forbidden summonings of otherworlders were conducted. And from the investigation, there was a massive number of summoners who performed them. Otherwise, it was inconceivable that such arge number of people specialized inbat would appear. Moreover, it was possible to ensure the obedience of these summoned otherworlders through a curse. As such, summoning was the best way to prepare subordinates who would never betray their master.

    Those otherworlders were scattered across each corps.

    The rming implications dawned on First Lieutenant Kondou. That insight was right on the mark; his mental acuity was terrifying, one might say. And as a matter of fact, his fears were justified. The results were evident in this report. Based on Yuukis words, deeds, and actions since moving to the Empire, it was determined that there was a huge probability of him staging a coup dtat. Furthermore, the people that Yuuki sent in had all been identified.

    Thanks to his achievements, the Empire granted Yuuki asylum. Despite that, he didnt appear to cherish the Empires kindness since he was making efforts to expand his influence as he pleased. He dispatched the people that became his followers to each of the army corps. And to top it all off, some of them were recruited by the glorious Imperial Knights.

    The other corps werent that much of a concern, but harboring traitors among the Imperial Guardians, charged with protecting His Imperial Majesty, was beyond the pale. To First Lieutenant Kondou, this kind of situation wasnt one to be overlooked.

    How dangerous, Yuuki Kagurazakait seems like I must eliminate you.

    First Lieutenant Kondou made up his mind, but now wasnt the time; he had to wait a while longer before making his move.

    Intel revealed that the archmage Master Gadra was connected to Yuuki. This information had been corroborated, but it remained unclear just how deep their rtionship went. Needless to say, Master Gadra was an important figure to the Empire. Although it seemed unlikely for him tomit treason, Kondou knew that the reason why Master Gadra and the Empire had a cooperative rtionship solely came down to his goals aligning with the principles of the Empire. Taking that at face value, it was conceivable that a conflict of interest might arise down the line.

    In that case, that old man will also pose a significant threat. If so

    Yuuki and Gadra.

    The former had the build of a young boy, yet his conduct indicated a far greater wealth of experience. Like with Kondou, it was dangerous to judge him by appearance alone.

    Thetter was an old man in appearance. In truth, he was a mysterious person who had been walking the earth for over a millennium. Challenging such a man required more than a half-hearted attempt.

    This was the motivation behind why he gathered information. Evidence had been piling up, but it was still not enough. He couldnt make any open moves just yet.

    Each and every otherworlder under Yuukis care would be scrutinized with a fine-toothb. And then, they would be examined to see if any of them were dominated by the curse.

    Nevertheless, if Yuuki or Gadra showed any unnatural signs, then

    When that timees, dont expect a public trial, First Lieutenant Kondou, the man who worked in the shadow of the Empire, had anything but mercy in store for traitors. Dance for the Empire. Your lives are already in the palm of my hand.

    In the darkness of the Imperial capital, his eyes shone with a cold light as First Lieutenant Kondou muttered quietly to himself.

    A one-eyed man sat in a posh chair in an office with a luxurious desk. He was a skinny man in his forties and wore an eyepatch over his left eye. His name was Calgurio, and he was themander of the Armored Corps, which took pride in being the most powerful force within the Empire.

    On the desk in front of himy several magic crystals. These magic crystals, which were a source of magical energy, were of high purity and quality. Thanks to the technique Yuuki introduced, magic crystals could be refined into magic stones. By purifying the magic crystal extracted from the core of a monster, one could produce a magic stone, which could store magical energy.

    There were also natural magic stones dropped by monsters. That said, these could only be extracted from individuals who possessed an enormous magicule content, such as A-ranked monsters and higher. Such natural magic stones were of iparably high quality and weremonly used as ornaments or magic catalysts, rather than as fuel. Without a regr supply of them avable, they had no value as an energy source.

    Calgurio reached for the magic crystal on his desk and picked it up. The closer he examined it, the more readily apparent its brilliant quality became to him. With a heavy heart, he ced the magic crystal back down, longing for that sensation he felt while holding it. Reaching out, he instead grabbed the apanying report that was delivered to him alongside the crystal. It was a summary of the research institutes findings. With a magic crystal of this purity, a hundred Empire-made magic stones could be produced. It was so pure that it could even be converted into energy without further refinement. To collect samples this immacte, one had to y monsters of rank B or higher.

    That was what the report had concluded.

    Damn you, Gadra! he erupted furiously. Dont you dare think you can hide this cash cow from me!

    He had paid off the research staff so that they would let him know when something amiss had happened, which led to this astonishing report.

    Gadra had brought in these magic crystals fairly recently. It was unknown where he got them, but judging from the number, it could be surmised that he found a colony of monsters. Regardless, they were all first-ss in quality and further testing showed that they contained roughly equal amounts of energy.

    It wasnt possible to harvest the same consistent quality from different kinds of monsters. The grade of the crystals would inevitably vary between them; consequently, it was necessary to refine and process them into magic stones.

    On the contrary, the magic crystals before him were surprisingly uniform. This was a strong indication towards them stemming from a pack of monsters of the same race.

    He doubted there was a possibility for them to domesticate whatever monsters produced these crystals, but thought that it would improve the energy situation of the Empire if they engaged in regr raids. However, it was apparently moreplicated than that.

    Calgurios face twisted with burning desire.

    If we aim to acquire a sustainable supply of energy, it will be paramount for us to secure the ce that produces these magic crystals, the report concluded.

    Rather than listing possible locations where such a habitat may be found, they had already secured a fix on the precise location. That ce being the Dungeon, rumored to be in the domain of Demon Lord Rimuru.

    Recently, hes been so chummy with that runt, Yuuki, that he doesnt even pay me a visit anymore. I cant let you milk that golden cow all on your own and get away with it! Thats unforgivable!

    This was the cause of Calgurios foul mood.

    As it would happen, that wasnt even the end of it. Calgurio heard an interesting story from the high-ss nobles whom he was friends with. They came over in great numbers, and, with wicked smiles on their faces, they ryed the information to him. ording to their report, Gadra ventured out to investigate thebyrinth and lost three of his disciples while there.

    Had that been all there was to it, then there wouldve been little more to do than pay their condolences. Yet, what Gadra brought back with him was the problem. Apparently, he didnt only bring back the magic crystals, but some other loot, too.

    The sword that Calgurio had disyed in his room was immacte. It was made of high-quality, pure magisteel, and the forging technique spoke of a masterful craftsman. It was a magnificent sword, one that could rival those forged by the best craftsmen of the Dwarven Kingdom. No, if you considered the quality of the material, this one came out on top. The ones circted within the Empire were a far cry from it.

    The noblemen had brought with them swords of exquisite quality, which, after some consideration, Calgurio bought. One of the three swords was sent to his corps technical team for examination. These are very rare items, and they may have some kind of mysterious effect, you know? the nobleman proudly presented them to Calgurio in the most grandiose and overblown fashion, in a transparent effort to sell them. This was despite the fact that these goods were offered to them by Gadra himself. When Calgurio asked them what Gadras demand was, they would feign indifference and reply with suspicious remarks like Of course, we cant answer that, can we?

    In the end, he purchased each sword for 100 gold coins, or 300 gold coins in total; regardless, there remained something in the back of his mind that bothered him. The fact that he was offered three swords eventually gave him a hint, but

    Calgurio was born a low-ss noble but was able to climb the ranks all the way up to corpsmander through his innate talent. The Empire was a society based on absolute meritocracy. Thus, Calgurio held a higher position than a regr high-ss noble, whose standing was predicated on their social status. Under normal circumstances, merely speaking to a noble of high rank was unthinkable. But even for such a personage, being courteous to Calgurio was essential.

    I know they are looking down on me deep inside, but that doesnt matter. Whats important is how I get the most use out of them.

    High-ss nobles would be careful never to act without regard for their own interests. There was no way they told him such information with honest intentions; it was too good to be true.

    Leaking Gadras words to Calgurio must have been carefully nned out by them. In other words, they were weighing their options between Yuuki and Calgurio.

    Those greedy nobles! Whatever, Ive got to focus on Gadra now. How dare he tug on the nobles purse strings to make them suggest that the Mixed Corps should conquer thebyrinth! He should have referred my army instead Didnt expect him to still have a grudge against me for taking the Armored Corps from him

    The Armored Corps was sessfully modernized, thanks in part to Gadras help. In spite of the corps military force growing by ten to even a hundred times as a result, Gadra did not hold any authority tomand it. Calgurio assumed that was the reason why he was jealous of him.

    Anyway, that cant be helped. It was a godsend that I was able to get information from those nobles. This will allow me to get ahead of them and snatch the authority to raid thebyrinth for my army.

    Of course, greasing the palms of high-ss nobles would cost him a pretty penny. And even if he were granted the authority, he would have to share a part of it with the nobles. But still, he didnt think it was a bad deal.

    The magic crystals arent the only thing thebyrinth has to offer. This sword is of excellent quality; its rare-grade, but it might evolve to unique-grade in a hundred yearsmaybe even sooner than that, seeing as its made of such fine magisteel. This alone should be enough of a reason to seize thebyrinth!

    On this closing thought, Calguriomitted himself to winning over the nobles.

    As Calgurio contemted his future ns, there was a nagging question that kept bothering him.

    What is this hole even for, anyway?

    A high-ss noble told him that it had a mysterious effect, but he probably just got that from Gadra. Despite Calgurios trained eye, he found nothing out of the ordinary. But nevertheless, that hole in the sword was remarkably peculiar.

    What did it mean? Calgurio couldnte up with an answer.

    Following that, he had sent it to his technical team. However, the analysis results were yet to be seen.

    Well, unlike the West, the age of the sword hase to an end in the Empire, anyway.

    So, no matter how valuable this sword might be, it would be of no significance to their modernized troops. Only highly skilled warriors could use this sword to its fullest. Indeed, that included Calgurio and his close associates.

    On that note, he looked forward to the results of the appraisal.

    A few dayster

    Calgurio was astounded by the report that hade in.

    I will exin. It was the director of the technology department himself who presented their findings. Scientific analysis of the sword revealed various facts. Most notably, the hole wasnt merely decorative. It was an energy absorber and efficient medium for activating magic. In other words, it wasnt a sword but a magic trigger.

    Demon Lord Rimuru, was it? Looking at this intriguing thing hese up with, that guys not to be taken lightly.

    Indeed, the director remarked. This swordor more broadly, weaponis designed to mimic a melee weapon, and intended to catch an opponent off guard byunching a surprise attack from the magic it possesses.

    Right. The crux of this weapon was in defyingmon knowledgeallowing those without the ability to wield magic, to suddenly cast it.

    However, the director inquired, is it true that he got that from thebyrinth?

    About that, there is proof. I sent some of my own people, and Gadra seems to have told the truth.

    Calgurio had also sent his men to the monster capital Rimuru to gather information about thebyrinth. Though investigating the inside of it became quite tricky around the 40th floor, they heard interesting stories from merchants and the like.

    The slotted swords were discovered in thebyrinth. Although they fetched a high price, they were cheaper than unique-grade weapons.

    So, to what end are they going through all that trouble?

    Hmph! Calgurio snorted. Give it some thought, and itll be in as day. We wouldnt adopt a new weapon without conducting trial runs, now would we?

    The director of the technical department was smart, but hecked tactical vision. With Calgurios brief exnation, he finally realized the merit behind what they did.

    Oooh, I see, he eximed. So, hes been passing these on to a bunch of adventures to investigate the effects, you think? Thats certainly a reasonable approach. Upon inserting a magic stone into the slot, we found that the swords rank rose by a notch. It turned into a high-powered magic sword, but it seemed to have other functions, as well. To figure that out, various experiments would be necessary, thereby requiring a huge amount of time.

    Yeah. He hands them out at random to let these individuals try them out. And once the experimental data has been produced, hed surely want to aggregate all of it, Calgurio mused.

    He understood Rimurus intentions, to a certain extent. And experience had taught him that these kinds of experiments were time-consuming. At present, this sword was only in the experimental stage. However, it would be dangerous to let him perfect it.

    Humans were a peculiar bunch; some of them could intuit the nature of things in the spur of the moment. This intuition tended to be sharpest among those that walked into the line of fire.

    That is clever, Calgurio muttered, performing human experiments by putting them into abyrinth without a chance of death.

    They say you need this bracelet if you dont wish to die, but how that could be possible still remains a mystery after analyzing it. If the rumor is true, then military training should be a breeze, the director said, taking out a small, tightly sealed box, and presenting it to Calgurio. Inside the box, one of the treasures that Gadra brought, the Resurrection Bracelet, was stored.

    Of course, Calgurio pondered, it is questionable information. However, if my army could seize thatbyrinth

    If this rumor turned out to be true, it meant a huge achievement.

    Oooh, you are indeed an ambitious man, Calgurio-sama. Will you go so far as to wage war against a demon lord?

    Of course I will. Pointlessly picking a fight with him would be a poor idea, but as things stand, the Great Jura Forest is en route to our invasion. Not to mention, thatbyrinth is something we cannot ignore. Someone has to do it.

    Fufufu, youre using smooth words to smooth the way, I see.

    Calgurio and the director of the technology departmentughed together.

    We can secure a stable supply of magic crystals and an efficient proving ground. And if things go smoothly, the enemys new weapons will be ours, too.

    Then, the Armored Corps must conquer it under yourmand, Calgurio-sama, before the other divisions get the chance.

    That goes without saying. I suggest you look forward to it, Calgurio assured him with a gentle smile.

    However, the director chuckled, it seems the old man has be senile.

    Couldnt agree more. He was so dazzled by the magic crystals that he failed to recognize the more important thingsthebyrinth, its treasures, as well as the ability of the swords.

    Its the downside of solely relying on magic, Calgurio added in agreement. Weapons that change rank such as this are unheard of.

    Gadra was an outstanding man, but the winds of change were blowing, heralding the end of the age of magic. This new windscienceblew in and integrated with magic, setting the stage for a new era.

    Thats why I am the best person to lead the Armored Corps. That old man as well, I would respect him if he just remained quiet. But if he allied with Yuuki then theres no need to go easy on him.

    Calgurio began to formte a strategy in his mind. Antagonizing several demon lords would be an ill-fated approach, however, concentrating solely on Demon Lord Rimuru would be a cinch. Along with that, the Storm Dragon was their designated targetthe Empire had sought its subjugation for the longest time. Calgurio intended to subdue the Storm Dragon with his newly developed weapons.

    To that end, a little sacrifice would be well worth the cost And yet, Gadras stubborn refusal on the matter had driven a wedge between the two of themone so great, that it ultimately caused them to part ways.

    Hmph! If we can subjugate that evil dragon, then even a slime demon lord will be no match for us. Now, I will show everyone that we are the strongest army in the Empire!

    The time haseCalgurio was filled with excitement. He would bring Gadra down a peg or two and cement an unshakeable position in the Empire. To do just that, he needed a crowning achievement under his belt. Therefore, it was paramount for the Armored Corps to subjugate the evil dragon and conquer thebyrinth. And for that to happen

    At the next Imperial conference, I will propose a march, Calgurio dered.

    Oh, finally

    Mmh, Calgurio nodded in agreement.

    We should not give that demon lord time to prepare. That reason should suffice to silence the opposition. Oh Gadra, I wont let you steal a march from under my nose. And that brat, are you on cloud nine now that you have Gadra on your side? Im going to show you your ce.

    Calgurio mocked his idiotic colleaguethe fool who had the chance to grasp critical information, but let it slip without even realizing it.

    After all, he is but a foolish upstart, Calgurio firmly believed.

    He was incessantly brooding, even while scorning his colleague.

    How can I reap the greatest benefit? Lost in thought, Calguriopiled the contents of his proposal to the emperor.

    Calgurios hand would awaken the Empire once more.

    The Imperial conference was about to start. This time, the situation was unusual, given that the military officers present were rather tense, to say nothing of the civil servants. Perhaps sensing this atmosphere, people unrted to the meeting didnt dare approach the conference hall.

    This meeting was on a different level. Everyone sensed it.

    The attendees lowered their heads as the entrance of the emperor was announced. The silhouette of a person could be made out behind a bamboo blind. That person was the unifying emperor, Rudra Nam Ul Nasca. He stood at the pinnacle of the Nasca Namrium Ulmeria United Eastern Empirethe strongest military power in the world. His figure was hidden on the other side of the bamboo blind, as were his true intentions, which were never revealed to anyone. A supreme existence, which none except close associates had ever seen, intimidated the people in the conference with his mere presence emanating from behind the blind. Peerless and absolute. Only a tiny handful of people could express their opinion to the emperor.

    There were nearly 200 people assembled in the conference room. The Three Commandersthemanders of each of the military corpsand their adjutants. Neatly lined up, were the elites of the Imperial Guardians. Andstly, the cab ministers, who administered the government of the country, as well as the Great House of Peers, which was the Eastern Empires backbone.

    Eminent figures gathered and lowered their heads.

    Only the rustle of clothes echoed through the quiet halluntil even that sound disappeared.

    On cue, the prime minister motioned to the ceremonial officer.

    His Imperial Majesty the Emperor has arrived!

    In response, everyone greeted him in unison. It was their chorus of shouts that broke through the silence. Thus began the Imperial conference, which would go down in history as weighing the benefits of their great expedition.

    The Imperial conference opened solemnly. Opinions were split on the great expedition. Regarding the war, the first faction wished for it to be fast and decisive, while the other advocated for a more cautious approach.

    First of all, under what pretext would we start this war?

    What a stupid question.

    We will invade because it is what the emperor wishes, simple as that.

    Is that possible?

    Those were the dividing lines this conference was stirring over. Between those who advocated caution and those who insisted frontal invasion. And the civil servants who were adamant about firstunching diplomatic negotiations that included rmendations of surrender and the pressure of threats.

    If the emperor willed theing of war, there would be no room for dispute. However, an imperial order had not yet been given, and so the assembly proceeded ording to each persons intentions.

    Starting the war was just a matter of time. So the problem wasnt when, it was how.

    The demon lords who ruled distantnds were also a hindrance, but as long as their territory wasnt vited, they wouldnt take action. The hurdle to ovee was Veldora, the Storm Dragon. Therefore, the focus of discussion ended up on the Great Jura Forest.

    One person voiced opposition to the war. With all due respect, Your Majesty, I am against this. It was the archmage of the EmpireMaster Gadra. He had openly and fearlessly offered his opinion to the emperor.

    What a cowardly thing to say! Youre still going on about that, Gadra-dono?ughed one of the Three Commandersthemander of the Armored Corps, Calgurio.

    This happened every time. The two represented the cautious faction and the belligerent faction.

    The West would easily crumble if we struck them. However, the evil dragon Veldora dwells within the Great Jura forest. It was only two years ago that its revival was made certain, so of course we must be cautious! one of the sympathetic voices agreed. It was also joined by scoffs calling Gadra soft.

    In the 300 years that had passed since the Veldora disaster, the memory of its terror had faded. Now, the belligerent opinions were bing the majority, squeezing Gadras side between a rock and a hard ce.

    Taking up on this, Calgurio spoke feverishly. Master, theres something to be learned from your cautious attitude. Nheless, as I have assured you many times, the countermeasures against Veldora are wless. With our new weapons, we can subdue that evil dragon!

    Youre ridiculous! Stop living in an illusion, Calgurio-dono. As long as the possibility of it failing cannot be denied, we must, naturally, exercise caution. Not to mention, a new demon lord has risen to power in that forest! Although it is known that the demon lords do not cooperate with one another, it is still unwise to deliberately antagonize one. That evil dragon was revived and seems to have joined hands with the neer, Demon Lord Rimuru. Dealing with a demon lord through mutual invibility is the tried-and-true approach!

    One possible route would lead through the Valley of Death, which was connected to the former territory of yman, as it allowed forrge armies to pass through. They did not, however, wish to venture into Demon Lord Milims domain, whichy beyond it, thus discarding that option. Marching across fertile ground would be significantly faster, but that said, incurring the wrath of Demon Lord Milim was too great of a price to pay. Likewise, passing through the Great Jura Forest would allow them to reach the West. But now Veldora, the Storm Dragon, had returned and was allied with Demon Lord Rimuru.

    There is no reason to make more enemies, Gadra insisted, receiving nods from several civil servants. On the other side, Calgurio gave a scornfulugh and posed the question: Well then Gadra-dono, are you saying that we should give up on pursuing the Empires dearest wish?

    Taking the route through the Great Jura Forest off the table would cripple their options in terms of dispatching arge army towards the West. Calgurios concern was picked up by the army circle on those grounds.

    Calgurio-dono is right. Master, even demon lords pose no threat in the face of the great Imperial army!

    Youre being insolent before His Imperial Majesty! Gadra-dono, do you intend to defy the emperors will?!

    Nay! Gadra shouted and refuted the objection. Come to think of it, rather than fighting a demon lord, it would be wiser to get the cooperation of the Dwarf King. There wont be any casualties, and it will be easier to conquer the West!

    However, there was someone whoughed at Gadras assertion.

    You are being ridiculous, Gadra-dono. The Dwarf King is a master swordsman and a man of great honor. His predecessors were champions as well, and he is exceptionally skilled. Hispanions are also famous champions. They would be tougher opponents than the neer demon lord. As much as Id like to test their abilities in a match, thats not our main concern. What Im saying is that instead of fighting against champions, the optics of subjugating a demon lord are far preferable in the public eye!

    This interjection came from none other than one of the Three Commanders. He was themander of the Magic Beast Corps, Beast King dium. As he merely rose from his seat, the air was heavy with an overwhelming sense of intimidation. Rightly so, for the dignity of a king.

    dium also ruled over the magical beasts by force. He was one of the best warriors in the Empire and a highly skilled militarymander, holding the rank of general. It was said that he was the second strongest man in the Empire. dium was not, in fact, a Single Digit but a Double Digit, but his strength led him to be a corpsmander early in his career. Owing to his privilege of being freed from participating in the ranked duels, he took pride in iming to be the strongest. That was why dium didnt have any conflicting emotions towards the Marshal, who was considered to be stronger than him.

    It was rumored that he descended from the Beastmen n, but the authenticity of that rumor was uncertain. Gadra didnt get along with him as he was the type of person who acted not on logic but on instinct.

    Ah, dium-dono, thatparison is wrong, Gadra replied. What Im saying is that we should make King Gazel our ally!

    You fool, dium shot back. If you mean to absorb the Dwarven Kingdom at the same time, I understand what you are saying. After all, crushing every fool in defiance of imperial rule would be enough. However! What is your n? You think of your nonsense as a reason to hold back our forces that are fully ready to march!

    What kind of drivel is that! You already know that the Dwarven Kingdom is a natural fortress, right? Taking it by force would be

    Silence! Beast King dium roared. Comining in the presence of His Imperial Majestyno wonder why you were dismissed from being a corpsmander!

    That was, indeed, the truth. Until about 30 years ago, the Magic Corpsmanded by Gadra were part of the Empires three great armies. Now, however, the best and brightest from the corps had been transferred to the technology department and elsewhere.

    That was because the so-called magic relied on talent. To begin with, you could not control magic without possessing magical power. No amount of effort could rece it, thereby softly limiting their numbers. Although it was useful inbat, weapons had been developed to rece magic.

    One was a small magic weaponthe spell gun. Using magic stones as the energy source, the magic circle engraved into the gun barrel would activate. It was a weapon by which anyone could use magic. While it fell short in being limited to only a single kind of magic, its effectiveness spoke for itself.

    For closebat, there was the Imperial magic saber. It worked on the same principle as the spell gun and was one of the small magic weapons with weapon-strengthening magic applied. It was because of this item that the technical team realized the purpose of the slotted weapons from thebyrinth. They all reached the same conclusionin other words, they had to be right.

    Now that magic could be manipted in spite of the absence of talent, the Magic Corps had be obsolete. It was a sorrowful event for Gadra as it marked the end of the magic era.

    Ha-ha-ha, Master, another person sneered at Gadra. Youve grown old. Your knowledge of magic is a treasure to the Empire. While I owe you my gratitude for your help in developing new kinds of magic weapons for my Armored Corps, as dium said, your remark just now wasmentable. It feels like you are scared, Calgurio smirked contemptuously.

    Stifledughs escaping from the House of Peers and the army circle could be heard.

    Do all of you even understand? That evil dragon ruling over the storm is the most powerful species in this world.

    It is you who does not understand, Old Master. The Imperial army of today is different from before. We have learned the knowledge of many otherworlders and gained a technological systemsciencedifferent from our own. Thanks to this new technology, the Empires military strength has increased tenfold over the previous generation. An old-fashioned mage like yourself cant keep up in modern warfare. A quiet retirement in the grace of His Imperial Majesty is all that you should hope for now.

    H-how dare you?! Gadra cried out with indignation, but in reality, he was just faking it. To begin with, Gadra had already surrendered to Demon Lord Rimuru. He tried his best to advocate against the path of war. That said, the ultimate oue did not concern him.

    These guys are really pathetic. Science indeed produced wonderful knowledge, but even the Sorcerers Dynasty Sarion had their own secret knowledge: magic science. On top of that, His Majesty Rimuru also used to be an otherworlder. I dont know how far this military strength, which guarantees the supremacy of the Empire, could go

    Now that he knew about Tempestabout RimuruGadra doubted the victory of the Empire. It wasnt that he wished misfortune to befall his former associates, and on top of that, he also felt indebted towards His Imperial Majesty. So, he was trying his best to deter them from war, but if he failed Well, he would cross that bridge when he got there.

    From what he could tell, Yuuki seemed to be gearing up towards staging a coup dtat and nned to capture the emperor, assassinate him, even. Considering his goal was to rule the world, a powerful leader was nothing but a hindrance. In the old days, Gadra would have left him to his own devices. But now that the very reason for war had disappeared, Gadra could no longer tolerate Yuukis ways, which threatened to plunge the world into chaos.

    Well, I dont know what will happen after this, but any further advice would be meaningless. In that case, the next step is to carry out His Majesty Rimurus orderdrawing the attention of the Imperial army to the dungeon.

    Gadra quietly steeled his resolve. Then he turned his eyes to Yuuki, who still remained silent.

    Calgurio took Gadras silence as an admission of defeat. Gadras Magic Corps had been disbanded, followed by internal restructuring of the military. The subsequent treatment of Gadra was nothing more than an honorary position, serving as the technical advisor to the Armored Corps. Having said that, his heroic might was well known, and he probably even retained more influence than Calgurio.

    It was also Gadras own decision to rmend that boy Yuuki to be a corpsmander. What a pain.

    Calgurio was not amused. Archmage Gadrathat champion had now be old. Still, Calgurio held his grand achievements in high regard and didnt think he should be disrespected

    Hah, in the end, he is a person of the past. Now, hes just an orthodox old man causing trouble, huh?

    With the passing of time, the war effort steadily increased. And those who couldnt keep up with that progress were left in the dustunmistakably, thats where Gadra now belonged as well.

    The Empire entered a new era. The new three great army corps were unlike anything seen before.

    First, the Armored Corpsmanded by Calgurio. It was thergest military force in the Empire and represented a fusion of otherworld science, technology, and magic. The total number of troops that could be mobilized exceeded 2 million. However, that is including the standing forces in various parts of the Empire, meaning the number of troops who could immediately take military action was, in effect, about 1 million. But even so, it was still an abnormallyrge army, unthinkable one hundred years ago.

    Next, the Magic Beast Corpsmanded by dium. DNA analysis, an otherworld technology, had made it possible to nurture and raise magic beasts. The training of these monstersy at the core of this corps. Nurturing magic beasts had been impossible with the conventional knowledge of the past. They realized the potential andmitted to further efforts to tame them. By doing so, the tenacious magic beasts became beast knights.

    The champions of the Empire spurred the magic beasts in battle. The new generation of champions analyzed the blood of the champions who had been active since ancient times and made their power their own. They were born strong. By awakening the power in their blood, the Magic Beast Corps became a legion consisting of only champions.

    It was said that a fleeting 1 in 100,000 had the talent to join this corps, making it the smallest with only 30,000 soldiers. Nevertheless, their beast knights were magic beasts ranked A-minus and above, and their strength as a human-monster union was impossible to gauge. Despite numbering only 30,000 members, they were the most powerful elite force the Empire had to offer.

    Last but not least, the Mixed Corpsmanded by Yuuki. This division was a hodgepodge, but had a lot of potential. It was a den of misfits, singled out due to their inability to cooperate in groupsat least, that was how the public perceived them. But on a closer look, that was hardly urate. The reason why the corps members could not coordinate well with others was because of the fact that each and every one of them possessed extraordinary abilities. So outstanding were their abilities, in fact, that managing those guys was difficult. Many of its members were otherworlders whose potential waspletely unknown. Due to various experiments that were being carried out inside the corps, there were also individuals who awoke powers beyond belief that could not be reproducedthey became magic beasts, boasting strength beyond A rank. While troublesome to control, they were outstanding warriors. Among them were also human weapons that obtained their power from unknown sources, and as such, many products of experiments were gathered under that banner.

    In the past, they were simply being managed and kept in line, but now with Yuuki as their leader, the corps suddenly emerged as an extraordinarily powerful trump card within the army.

    The total number of soldiers was around 200,000, half of which were officers and nonbatant staff, leaving around 100,000 troops that made up the actualbat force. Within it was also a hand-picked toon of elite members that worshipped Yuuki. These individuals became the pirs of the Mixed Corps.

    These were the three new grand army corps of the Empire. Together, they were a force to be reckoned with. As soon as the emperor issued the edict, 1,130,000 troops would start military operations.

    At present, the Imperial Intelligence Bureau estimated the total military strength of the Western Nations to be less than 1 million. Looking at it in terms of soldiers who could potentially be mobilized, the Western Nations were looking at an underwhelming 400,000if they were lucky. On top of that, since it was deemed unlikely that efforts to cooperate among the Western Nations would seed, they concluded that it was unrealistic to expectprehensive military action from the West.

    Against those 400,000 disorderly soldiers, the number of Imperial elites exceeded 1 million. You could say that it was an exceedingly overwhelming military force, the core of which was the Armored Corps of Calgurio. This time, he intended to handpick the best military force to do the job. The breakdown of the 1 million soldiers to be mobilized within his corps was as follows:

    Augmented Legion: the main force.

    These were soldiers who had adopted the otherworldly technology and underwent magical modifications. Their individualbat capability was at least C-plus-ranked, and the elite among them even reached rank A. There were 700,000 of them, an unrivaled division.

    Magic Tank Division: a decisive weapon in battle.

    It possessed 2,000 magic tanks, a new weapon they had put into practical use. The magic tank, which was operated by five people, was an unprecedented war machine that revolutionized the understanding of battle. The main armament of the tanks, named magic gun, had an initial velocity of 2,000 meters per second. It had a 50-round capacity and could fire five rounds per minute. Its power was tremendous, being able to unleash destruction equivalent to tactical-ss super-high explosive magic. Incidentally, although this was fired based on magic principles, the shell itself was a simple lump of iron. It was a formidable kic projectile that could easily prate through both anti-magic barriers and anti-archer defenses.

    Such tremendous power, formerly exclusive to wizardsrare elitescould now be wielded by the hands of ordinary soldiers. Beyond that, when it came to the difficulty of defending against them, the implications were endless. The number of troops, including the maintenance team, was 200,000, and the more tanks they had, the stronger they were.

    Air Assault Division: the highly ssified weapon.

    They had 400 airships and were the pride of the Empire, the fruit of the otherworldly knowledge. Each craft could carry a maximum of 400 passengers. Of them, 50 were vital maintenance crew required to operate the ship, while the remaining crew would be engaged in defensive magic or gunning. It was equipped with arge number of magically enhanced guns, making it an excellent warship for both offense and defense.

    It was also useful as a means of transportation. In this day and age, it could be said that there was no concept of air supremacy. Since anti-aircraft precautions didnt yet exist, it was possible to transport arge number of troops while the enemy was off guard. With the use of airships, it became easy to spring a pincer move on an enemy, attacking them from both sides.

    This, too, was an invention that revolutionized tactical theory. The division numbered 100,000 troops, most of which belonged to the former Magic Corps.

    With such military might, Calgurio felt that they were unbeatable. For example, the strength of an average knight in this world, depending on the size of the country, was at most C rank. They had to be armed to the teeth, covered in armor, and trained rigorouslyall that only to have a slim shot at reaching B rank.

    The Armored Corps, on the other hand, performed magical modifications on its members if they so desired. For those who were found to be highlypatible through medical examination, they would have to undergo semipulsory augmentation procedures. As a result, they had seeded in raising the army corpsbat capabilities exponentially. The same applied to the various soldiers scattered across the Empire. Thus, it gave Calgurio ample reason to believe that the solid foundation of the Empire could never be shaken.

    In addition, he nned to spare no reserve for this great expedition, gathering all magic tanks and airships they could muster. In both quality and quantity, these soldiers would overwhelm even an alliance of all other nations. On top of that, they had a number of new weapons they were going to unveil.

    Calgurio held a sincere conviction that the Armored Corps was the only way they could demonstrate the might of the Empire to the world. With an army of this might, be it Veldora or a demon lord, there is nothing to fear! My army alone can conquer the world! With such confidence in heart, Calgurio observed Gadra. That was when he noticed: Gadra had fixed his eyes on Yuuki for a while now, and then Yuuki spoke up out of the blue.

    I also agree that ol Gadra is being too prudent. From my perspective, you are overly cautious of the Storm Dragon. As Commander Calgurio said, we can take care of him with the current Imperial army, dont you think?

    It was the first time Yuuki spoke at this Imperial conference. The fact that his opinion was in line with his own made Calgurio wary. This brat, are you volunteering to conquer thebyrinth? You think I wouldnt notice? Youre so naive! It is of utmost importance to be well-informed if you ever want to assume the important role of amander! Even while having this thought, Calgurio smiled graciously towards Yuuki.

    There was one exception, namely dium, but that was only because of his extraordinary strength propelling him to where he was. Calgurio had always regarded Yuuki as an adversary, insisting that it was still too early for him to be a corpsmander.

    Concealing his inner feelings, Calgurio began spinning his rhetoric. Amazing, Yuuki-dono. Indeed, an up-anding young man such as yourself has exceptional vigor.

    Well, I still have a long way to go. More importantly, in my opinion, even if we are going to war, we still need to investigate, dont we? To get out of the Great Jura Forest, we need to pass through the dominion of Demon Lord Rimuru. And by the way, I heard an interesting story about how this capital of the demon lord can escape, buildings and all, into thebyrinth.

    Oh, abyrinth? Calgurio wondered, feigning ignorance.

    Yeah, Yuuki said, pleased to borate. To be precise, a dungeon. I dont know what the reason is, but allegedly the capital city could vanish from the face of the earth, leaving nothing but a veryrge gate above ground.

    Humph, how foolish. I suppose youre going to offer to investigate thebyrinth and then steal the authorization to conquer it, butthat would be mighty presumptuous.

    Calgurio chuckled to himself.

    Huh, are you sure that information is correct? someone asked, followed by several others.

    If what you said is true, then we cant ignore the dungeon. They might attack from the rear after the army passes through.

    Youre right. If the West isnt stupid, theyve probably fortified a defensive line. If our supply chain were to be cut off by the demon lords army, our troops would be in a bind.

    Then, passing the Great Jura Forest will be dangerous.

    Those who heard Yuukis remarks began to express their opinions freely. Yuuki also looked cheerful, probably because it was just what he wished.

    Theres no doubt about the credibility of the information, Yuuki affirmed, having waited for the right moment. After all, ol Gadra went to thebyrinth himself and looked into the matter for us! It was because Old Master Gadra saw Demon Lord Rimuru with his own eyes that he deemed him to be a threat. Also, he caught wind of a rumor during his stay. It has been imed that thebyrinth spans up to 100 floors underground, and that the guardian of the 100th floor is none other than the Storm Dragon Veldora himself. It was a baseless rumor. However, the investigation was interrupted due to casualties in the 60th underground level. It is said that even the Hero Masayuki had not yet conquered that level, so it seems that said level is equivalent to A-plus in terms of difficulty. Regardless of which route well take to attack the West, investigation is essential, he concluded, setting aside his usual aloof attitude and assuming a serious tone.

    The casualties are

    Thats regrettable to hear. I understand your sentiment, Yuuki-dono.

    Conducting an investigation should be trivial. Why dont we leave this to the Mixed Corps?

    Hearing the nobles chime in like that began to make Calgurios blood boil. Tsk, bribed imbeciles! Yuuki you shrewd bastard. You shouldve be a politician, not a corpsmander.

    Even those who were not paid off seemed to agree with Yuukis sincere attitude. This provoked Calgurio, making him raise his voice.

    Please wait! he shouted, as he rose from his seat.

    Then, he bowed once to the emperor beyond the bamboo blind.

    Your Imperial Majesty! Master Gadra and Yuuki-dono appear to be deathly afraid of Veldora, but I am not. Needless to say, that applies to the West as a whole! It is my desire to give Your Imperial Majesty peace of mind, so by all means, order my humble self to dominate! Then I, Calgurio, will risk my life to deliver!

    Calgurios speech to the emperor shocked everyone in the room. Speaking directly to the emperor was a woefully imperious thing to attempt.

    What the! How dare you do such an outrageous thing?!

    You know thats unforgivable, Calgurio-dono!

    Calgurio, are you stealing a march from me? Your Imperial Majesty, my Magic Beast Corps is also ready to go into battle at any time. By all means, order us to go into battle as well!

    At this point, even dium presented his corps.

    As if in panic, Yuuki followed up: Then, please entrust the investigation to the Mixed Corps!

    As Yuuki stood up, the Three Commanders bowed together.

    Now that it hade to this, only the emperor could suppress the situation.

    No. There was one other person.

    She stood up on the other side of the bamboo blind andughed charminglythe suprememander of the Imperial army, the Marshal.

    Be quiet, you foolish ones. You are in the presence of Rudra-sama.

    To address the emperor by his name was a reckless action that no ordinary person would ever be allowed tomit. And here the one who calmly did just that was the one person who was awarded the rank of marshal.

    In the Empire, the word marshal was synonymous with the strongest. Only a handful of her associates knew who she really was. Her name remained unknown to the public, and it was said that she always stayed by the Emperors side to protect him.

    At the word of someone carrying that lofty rank, the room fell silent once more. As they prostrated themselves all at once, a voice rang out from above.

    What is it with Veldora? He interrupted ourst great expedition, but did it shake the Empire?

    No maam!

    Of course, for this Empire carries the blessing of His Great Majesty.

    Yes maam!

    An atmosphere, which while not overpowering, was something no one could defy, dominated the room.

    Yuuki, was it? the Marshal asked. Youve been in the Empire less than a year, but your achievements are impressive. However, you are cowardly. Too cowardly. Do you know why the Empire has not made a move since Veldoras resurrection?

    Its because we were not ready Yuuki, confused why this was brought up out of the blue, tentatively gave her a safe answer.

    The Marshal, however,ughed scornfully. Wrong. Its because of the foolish ones who are trapped by their fear of the past, giving all sorts of reasons just to escape. Isnt that right, Gadra?

    Ye-yes maam!

    Deep down, everyone knew that was true. And even Gadra couldnt deny it. It was true that he did not discuss whether or not they could win against the Storm Dragon and carried on being adamant about avoidance. He had no room to object.

    But whats the matter with her? Why is she so impatient now?

    Gadra was one of the few people that knew the Marshals true face. Thats why he felt that the Marshal, who had always remained aloof, was somewhat impatient. But he could not question that here. Without knowing why, a vague sense of unease had crept up on him.

    The Marshal continued pressing questions. Dont you think it is highly unlikely that negotiating with Dwarf King Gazel would go smoothly? I dont think you do not understand that, so why are you insisting? Or were you more stupid than I thought? Perhaps, dont tell me you are trying to impede the Empires supremacy?

    Her cold voice sent a chill down Gadras spine. Has she caught on to me? Itsincredible, Gadra thought. He had served the Empire for a long time, even once as an adviser to the emperor himself. Despite that, Gadra cowered in front of the Marshal. Come to think of it I dont even know her name Gadra was trusted and most certainly invaluablebut that might have been nothing more than his own delusion. The realization hit him like a ton of bricks. And for the first time, he started to doubt what the Empire, or rather, who the emperor, really was.

    Ignoring Gadra, the Marshal turned her attention to Calgurio. So, Calgurio. You think you can win, dont you?

    Yes maam! That is most assured, Your Excellency!

    Right. Then tell me your n.

    Tha-thats

    Calgurios bravado was overwhelmed by the Marshals dominance. It dawned on him that nning an attack through sheer numbers was too childish of a proposal. More importantly though, he had devised a n against the Storm Dragon. It was something he had carefullyid out over the years. He wasnt afraid of Veldora. At the end of the day, hes still a dragon, right?

    Indeed, the dragons that nested in the Canaat Mountains were all strong monsters. The lesser dragons that inhabited the foot of the mountains would be easy to handle, but those that had grown into fair dragons would have a strength of A rank or higher. And if they turned into archdragons with elemental attributes, they would be dangerous threats to a small country.

    In the case of the Empire, however, it was possible to defeat them by simply dispatching a battalion of about five hundred troops from the Augmented Legion. These soldiers had subjugated dragons several times in military exercises, and as long as they made no mistakes, they could handle the encounter without serious damage. That was testament to the greatness of the Empire. It was within their power as a nation to support tens of thousands of soldiers. Not even a horde of dragons could jeopardize the Empires military.

    Calgurio perceived Veldora as another type of dragon. Thus, he arrived at the conclusion: What is there to fear from a single dragon?

    The strength of a monster was determined by the amount of magicules it possessed, and that held true no matter how powerful it was. Dragons were strong because they had enormous magicule reserves in proportion to their mass. High defenses and breath attacks that could exterminaterge areasthey possessed such powerful abilities thanks to their overwhelming magicule capacity.

    Taking that to be the case, there was no need to fight them head-on.

    Calgurio and his men had a secret n. The magic cancelera new top-secret technology they were developing. Using magic to weaken a dragon wasnt a sure-fire sess. Depending on the dragon, such an attempt could be nullified by its Magic Interference. But all of that became moot with the introduction of this new technology. The radiation emitted from a magic canceler directly affected the substance called magicules. It could not manipte the magicules in a directed manner, but instead made these particles behavior erratic. In other words, it had the effect of making magicules go haywire.

    When used against a mage, it would inhibit the ability to chant, and by extension, the ability to cast magic. When used against a monster, it would disrupt the magicules that made up its body, restraining the ability to act. In short, it weakened their bodies. A sessful attack would render a monster totally disabled. This would be especially effective against a dense mass of magicules like Veldora. Calgurio had built his confidence upon this belief.

    The second ace up their sleeve was the magic tank. Its magic gun packed a serious punch, able to fell a huge magic beast with a single shot. Experiments performed on dragons they captured showed that even those ranked A could be killed in one hit.

    Next up are their treasured airships. The secret weapons described as the culmination of magical technology. Able to reach top speeds exceeding Mach 1, they were impossible to outrun for any flesh and blood creature.

    Calgurio devised a strategy against Veldora as follows:

    Fast-moving soldiers would lure out Veldora and pin him down by activating the magic cancelers ced in the forest. As a follow-up, the airships would then focus the rays of their magic cancelers on Veldora to immobilize himpletely. And then, for the finishing blow: volley fire from the magic guns mounted on 2,000 magic tanks. With this, surely, even that ancient, evil dragon would meet its demise.

    Lets say it did survive No matter how strong these True Dragons are, there is no way it could make it out unscathed.

    Gathering intelligence was key to increasing your odds during a battle. With all of the dragons they had buried came a wealth of information. Calgurio had absolute confidence in their chances of victory.

    However, when he was going to exin it to the Marshal, he became reserved in his speech.

    T-thats why we will deploy the tank division and then lure the evil dragon there

    Since he believed that the sheer amount of resources at his disposal guaranteed their victory, he held off on finalizing the details of their strategy until they arrived on site.

    Even if the roads were unusable, their tanks had no issues cutting straight through the forest. Apparently, there was also a road leading up to the Dwarven Kingdom, one they had heard was wide enough to amodate a tank with ease. He also estimated that deploying the tanks wouldnt pose any hurdles, but answering to the Marshal with vague statements was uneptable.

    I was so focused on strengthening our military power that I neglected to investigate the location. Thats where I messed up, huh Calgurio had to face the bitter reality.

    How ipetent. It appears you have gravely misunderstood: what are you going to do after destroying Veldora?

    Huh? Calgurio blurted unconsciously, unable to process the question.

    The Marshal stared at Calgurio coldly.

    Why do you presume that the Empire did nothing even though Veldora was sealed all this time?

    T-thats because our preparations werent

    Wrong, you foolish one. It was because we are waiting for that child, Veldora, to be revived to properly settle it with him once and for all. And then make His Imperial Majestys might known far and wide. To that end, what were you nning to do once we had destroyed Veldora? Only by defeating and controlling him will the Empires victory be sealed!

    Her words resounded in the quiet conference hall.

    Everyone was ovee by a feeling that gripped their hearts, an emotion that was neither fear nor awe.

    Gadra shuddered as well.

    This is crazy, is she serious about that? Didnt I make it clear that Mental Control isnt going to work? Yet And yet, there was something strangely persuasive about the Marshals words. There was something about them that made him doubt the impossibility of it all.

    Upon feeling it, an inexplicable fear washed over Gadra.

    Right, now that I think about it, it sure is strange Who is the Marshal? I have met her, and yet I never found it suspicious that I do not know her name

    A fact that Gadra was strangely reluctant to ept now loomed over him. It was his suspicion that maybe the Marshal was an exceptionally skilled user of Mental Control, surpassing even himself, the archmage of the Empire.

    It was no longer a mere doubt, as his certainty grew by the minute.

    Gadra opened his eyes and gazed intently at the bamboo blind. A delicate silhouette appeared to be visiblea shape beyond the most eldritch of horrors imaginable to Gadra. Caught up in the illusionthat one of the True Dragons had manifested in human formhe hurriedly brushed aside the idea.

    Everyone swallowed nervously, the tension in the conference hall was palpable.

    Well then, Id like to propose a n. The voice of a young boy echoed in the silent hall.

    It was Yuuki. His courage for speaking out in that moment wasmendable.

    Do tell.

    A voice, as gentle as it was cold, permitted Yuuki to speak.

    Yuuki bowed while burying his inner thoughts.

    I believe that now isnt the time for quarrels, and each corps should set aside their differences. Please allow me to speak openly. Following this preamble, Yuuki began to propose his strategy with a solemn look.

    Commencing the invasion, the Armored Corps would enter the territory of the Great Jura Forest from the east. Demon Lord Rimurus troops were currently gathering near the intersection between the Great Jura Forest and the Great Ameld River. ording to reports, they had fortified an inn town there as their base of operations and were on high alert.

    The marching route of the Imperial army passed between the Canaat Mountains and the Great Jura Forest. There was no road in the eastern part of the Great Jura Forest, rendering that route far too slow.

    If they advanced to the main entrance of the Dwarven Kingdom and then headed south along the Great Ameld River, they would reach this inn town. That was where the real battle would beginwere it not for one problem.

    Wait a minute, Yuuki-dono. If we dont cross the forest, we will run the risk of provoking Dwargon! Calgurio interjected, bringing up a fair point. I heard that King Gazel and Demon Lord Rimuru are on good terms, and the two countries are allies. If we followed your n, then dont you think we would be recklessly wedging ourselves in between two fronts!

    Instead of advancing along the Great Ameld River, he proposed they should march through the forest, out of the desire to avoid confrontation with the Dwarven Kingdom. Once the battle began, the dwarven troops would be deployed as reinforcements. In order to prepare for that eventuality, he deemed it uneptable to leave the supply lines at risk of getting cut off. The troops would be trapped between the mountains and the river. If they were forced into a two-front war, they would lose their advantage in numbers. Even with the aid of airships, they wouldnt be able to make use of them to resupply if they couldnt set up a camp.

    Calgurio couldnt let Yuukis proposal go unchallenged. But Yuuki grinned as if he had expected this.

    Dont worry, Calgurio-dono. We arent aiming for the inn town, but the Dwarven Kingdom. If we cannot negotiate with King Gazel, then we cant call his nation a friendly one, wouldnt you agree? Hostile kingdoms have no need to exist, isnt that right?

    What?! Calgurio was at a loss for words after hearing Yuukis speech.

    Following that, the conference hall exploded into chaos.

    Are you proposing we attack the Armed Nation of Dwargon?! While yes, we could win, we cannot fathom the scale of destruction involved!

    If we do that, we wont have enough remaining strength to attack the West.

    As we all know, that nation is protected by a natural fortress.

    A multitude of ideas were thrown around the hall, and the resulting cacophony only widened the grin on Yuukis face.

    Youre right. That nation is like a fortress. Because it specializes in defense, it is said to be impregnable. But you see, we have tanks, dont we? Dwargons specialized magic defense is what earned them their prominence. If we were to get rid of that, we could cut through them like a hot knife through butter.

    Hmm

    Calgurio thought he had a point. Supposing they attacked the Dwarven Kingdom:

    The target would be Eastern or Central. If they wanted to catch their enemy off guard, they shouldnt aim for Eastern, which was adjacent to the Empire, but rather attack the front lineCentralthrough the Great Jura Forest.

    If they feigned an attack on Demon Lord Rimurus inn town, only to swing around andy siege to Central with the tank unit That would allow them the opportunity to eliminate the inn town while preventing reinforcements from the Dwarven Kingdom.

    I see, that n may be more interesting than I thought.

    Right? If the Dwarven Kingdom were met with a crisis, then Demon Lord Rimuru would have no choice but to act. If we take the initiative and prepare the battlefield in a way that allows us to intercept them, then

    It means our army will be guaranteed the upper hand.

    Thats a good n, Calgurio nodded.

    I presume that only a vanguard force is stationed in the inn town, Yuuki said. But either way, they will have the edge as long as we fight in Juras forests, which wille at a great cost to our side. However, if weunch a full assault on the Dwarven Kingdom first, its natural fortress will provide us with defense, instead.

    His words wereced with deception. If it came down to firing their magic guns, the initial salvo would destroy Central. Even if the enemies escaped into an underground cave system such as abyrinth, the urban areas near the entrance would be turned to rubble.

    Although, in due time, the Empire would take the city and rebuild it, the timeframe would extend beyond the length of the war. This meant that it couldnt be used to their advantage as Yuuki had described. Calgurio realized this, but he decided to y along with Yuukis proposition.

    While I dont think that is going to work out smoothly, theres something I need to ask. At the very least, it is more exhrating to set a trap and wait for the mouse, killing it in one go, than to chase it in the dense forest. After that, we could take aim at the capital of Tempest with impunity.

    Before that, I still have something to say about my n. As everyone knows, my Mixed Corps is better at individualbat than group battles. And I think thats why we are better suited to carry out the investigation of thebyrinth. As I mentioned earlier, there is a rumor that Veldora is guarding the 100th floor. In order to confirm this, too, we require an investigation, correct?

    And there we goCalgurio smiled internally.

    He didnt expect Yuuki to abandon his goal, so he could see thising a mile away.

    Thats unnecessary. If you ignore the inn town and head for the capital of that monster country, you will be caught in the crossfire from both sides. It would be better, then, to send my army westward and head towards the Dungeon on an unpaved road. In the first ce, Id have to see it with my own eyes to believe that a city can disappear. Tactically speaking, it would be correct to assume that the main force of Demon Lord Rimuru is on the ready.

    As Calgurio protested, he caught a fleeting look of frustration on Yuukis face.

    Kukuku, youre still green behind the ears. Dont tter yourself by thinking everything will go your way, kid! Calgurio was filled with delight.

    And then:

    Finally, youre acting like a decent military council, the Marshal said. Well then, you seem confident, Calgurio, so Im going to leave the matter concerning Demon Lord Rimuru to you.

    On hermand, the invasion of the Great Jura Forest by the Armored Corps became final.

    The Marshal continued speaking. This alone is not enough. If we are to attack Dwargon, wed better put pressure on them from Eastern. Ill leave that up to the Mixed Corps. Together with the task of defending our capital, you, themander of the corps, will be responsible for its formation.

    Understood.

    Yuuki was about to argue but caught himself. Judging from the tone of the Marshal, her decision was non-negotiable.

    Instead, the remaining corpsmander, dium, spoke up.

    P-please wait! Does this mean my Magic Beast Corps will not participate in this war?! I Promise that my corps will be useful, so please consider he called out to the other side of the bamboo blind with a ghastly look on his face. If he and his corps were ordered to stay, the Magic Beast Corps, smallest of the three, would be given no chance to show off. The other corpsmanders were about to rob him of an important task, right under his nose, making him miss his chance at glory during the war.

    I can never ept that,diumwas desperate.

    Dont panic, foolish one. I have already nned for your time in the limelight.

    Really?! S-so, what is my role going to be?

    You are to lead the entire Magic Beast Corps to the north.

    When dium finally registered the answer from the Marshal, he was astonished by the absurdity of it. Demon Lord Rimuru and King Gazel would concentrate on defending their nations. They then had the opportunity to blindside the Western Nations, who were fixated elsewhere, byunching a simultaneous invasion. And before the Western States Council could react, theyd need to construct a beachhead.

    To the north?! Are you saying we cross the Canaat Mountains?

    dium was shaken as he pieced together what was implied in her statement. He understood the reason. Not just two fronts, it would be a simultaneous three-front strategy; nevertheless, the Empire had enough military power to pull it off.

    However, the tactical, not strategic, aspect of this operation posed numerous challenges. The idea of trekking through the Canaat Mountains with tens of thousands of soldiers bordered on insanity.

    dium was hesitant to point this out, but then he heard the Marshalugh.

    Thats right, dium. Attack the royal capital of Ingracia by sea. The Kingdom of Farmenas, which is in the process of reconstruction, can be destroyed at any time once we take Dwargon.

    W-what? The sea? B-but I dont think our nation has naval battleships capable ofrge-scale transportation

    We have them. Right, Calgurio?

    Having been called upon by name, Calgurio knew it was futile to lie. Hearing the Marshal call him without an honorific, he got a bad feeling in his gut, enough to dissuade him frommenting on it.

    The Marshal was that intimidating.

    As the Marshal said. Thetest weapon developed by my army is called an Airship. With the support of the Air Assault Division, which uses this state-of-the-art weapon, transporting the Magic Beast Corps is feasible.

    Calgurios remark caused a ruckus in the conference hall.

    That meant there was a way to invade the Western Nations without going through the Great Jura Forest. Of course, they were excited.

    However, Calgurio continued, turning to dium, as they are a necessary trump card to fight the Storm Dragon, we can only provide assistance in the form of transportation. Would that be all right?

    Calgurio would keep 100 of the airships and load up as much firepower as they could carry. The remaining 300 airships were already sufficient to transport well over 100,000 troops, each of them sporting a maximum capacity of 400 people. Excluding the staff operating the ship, they could still carry 350 troops.

    The Magic Beast Corps numbered 30,000 warriors and 30,000 beast knights, adding up to 60,000 plus the support force to help them fight at their full potential. And not to forget, their supplies. A total of 300 airships would be enough to transport everything.

    The airships themselves could not be expected to take part in the battle, but if it were just about transporting the Magic Beast Corps, they could handle it with ease.

    Calgurio promptly drew a line that was absolutely non-negotiable and thrust it at dium.

    dium, well aware of this, groaned to himself. It was an honor for the soldiers to fight against the demon lord Rimuru and Veldora the Storm Dragon. It would be a shame to miss out on the opportunity, but the strategy that the Marshal proposed was equally appealing.

    It was an unprecedented blitzkrieg operation that would fundamentally challenge the understanding of war. The sluggish Western Nations would crumble before diums Magic Beast Corps. This strategy made sense, all but guaranteeing their sess.

    More importantly, there were champions called the Holy Knight Order in the West. They were a group that specialized in individualbat and were rumored to be the strongest even in group battles. It was said that the Imperial Guards, their partners, were also outstanding. Not to mention the presence of Hinata Sakaguchi in the Holy Empire of Lubelius. She was virtually the strongest knight and served as the head of the Imperial Guards as well as themander of the Holy Knight Order. Her reputation was heralded across thends, reaching even the Empire. However, there was a rumor abound that she had recently tied with Demon Lord Rimuru.

    If that were the case, the so-called strongest knight would be no match for dium, now that her spirit was lost. He would tear apart Hinatas champions and trample the holy capital.

    dium felt the beast blood flowing through his veins start to simmer.

    Thats great! Beast King dium roared. If you can transport us to the battlefield in one piece, lets go with that n!

    His agreement further jacked up the excitement in the grand conference hall.

    We will win! We will definitely win!

    Victory belongs to us, the Empire!

    Long live the emperor!

    And so on, and so forth, many of them were already beginning to revel in the idea of victory.

    As if responding to their fervor, Calgurio made dium a promise: Going by sea, you can give the dragons a wide berth. Rest easy and leave it to me.

    This was one of the ns that Calgurio had in mind from the beginning.

    Considering the flight range of dragons, the over-sea route was well outside the purview of the Dragon Roost. Plus, since travel by air also let them wholly avoid the sea monsters, which were more than a little pesky, he figured that this was one of the safest routes to reach the West.

    It would be, however, impossible to coordinate with the tank units, thus he thought it was too early to propose the n. That was why the preliminary investigation was perfect.

    So, despite the odd circumstances leading to the adoption of his n, Calgurio was pleased with the way things had turned out.

    Interesting. We will transport the Magic Beast Corps with the airships and then focus on support and supplies afterwards. Thats how Ill let it all y out, and then, I could reap all of the glory. If arge force emerges in the North, it will take the allied forces of the West by surprise. When that happens, theyll deteriorate into a pathetic rabble. Unable to muster any reinforcements for Demon Lord Rimuru, they will descend into utter chaos.

    The Western Nations, who had fixated both eyes on the Great Jura Forest, would be blindsided by such a turn of events. If that happened, nothing could bring down Calgurios offensive. He was sure of it.

    Concentrating on the Dungeon and the Storm DragonCalgurio calcted that doing so would greater military gains.

    Is there anything you do not understand? the Marshal asked.

    No maam. I will, in consultation with dium-dono, draw up a strategy that will aplish our task.

    Aye. Once you drop us off, we will show our enemies just how pitiful they are!

    Well then, Yuuki added, I shall have to make a show of force against the Dwarven Kingdom.

    Once the war engulfs Central, there will be no further movement in Eastern, the Marshal said. However

    Do you mean to imply that we can rule out retaliations from bloodthirsty dwarves? I already know.

    Yuuki never lost his spunk, even as he cut off the Marshal.

    Everyone else in the room, including the other corpsmanders, stared at Yuuki in disbelief.

    Is he dense or in stupid?his attitude begged the question, but Yuuki shrugged off the nces he was getting.

    Very well, the Marshal picked up. Now then, begin preparations at once!

    Yes maam!

    The order had been given. Without the emperor, Rudra, saying even a word, the stage was set for the Empires simultaneous three-front invasion.

    On that day, the Imperial edict to start the war was issued in the name of the emperor. Spirits were running high in the Empire. At longst, after centuries of slumber, the behemoth was raring to show its ws once more.

    Yuuki let out a sigh of relief as the Imperial conference ended.

    In the previous meetings, the Marshal never spoke. But this time, she was actively interfering. As a result, Yuuki was forced to tweak his n a bit

    Its no big deal. My army will be deployed near the Imperial capital as nned. Most of the Armored Corps, which is the most influential and distracting, would invade the Great Jura Forest. I wouldnt have guessed that even the Magic Beast Corps, with Vega in their midst, would move to the front lines, but I guess the Mixed Corps is all I need for the coup dtat.

    The original n was to build Vega up as the driving figure behind the coup, which also wouldve made him the fall guy if his n was foiled. Of course, Yuukis troops would support him behind the scenes. Rather, Vega was a diversion, and Yuuki intended to take charge of the actual work.

    He had no choice but to scrap the n, but in the grand scheme of things, it didnt matter much. Because Calgurio, the idiot that he was, had yed right into Yuukis hands.

    Calgurio was more of a strategist than a fighter. He was strong enough to hold his own, but ultimately, he was a man who was particr about strategy and certain victory, avoiding any risk. And yet, when weighing a loss against the potential payoff, greed would get the better of him.

    In short, all he needed was apelling reason. Tempest was rich, and their groundbreaking technology was rife for the taking. And then, if you told him they were hidden in the Dungeon Telling him directly would raise suspicion, of course, so it was better for Yuuki to make him think he was after it himself. Using the information and samples Gadra had brought back, Yuuki was able to make Calgurio dance to his tune.

    Still, though

    You look so grim, whats on your mind?

    Yuuki asked the person sitting across from him, Gadra.

    Hmm, its about the Marshal

    The Marshal?

    Hm. I was wondering why she mightve been so impatient.

    Impatient? Yuuki blurted. I didnt get that feeling from her.

    Yuuki couldnt fathom why that was keeping Gadra preupied. To him, it was neither here nor there, but something about it was inly bothering Gadra.

    Ah, Yuuki murmured, I also thought about it during todays meeting, but she was quite the monster. To tell you the truth, it would be difficult to say whether I could win against her or not, unless I found out personally.

    Yuuki could gauge the strength of most of his opponents without having to fight them. Now that he had awakened to his Ultimate Skill, he could even see through his opponents hidden abilities. So, for him to encounter an opponent who he couldnt analyzeit was self-evident that she was one dangerous individual.

    Marshal-dono is always appointed right after the session of His Imperial Majesty Rudra. She has always protected His Imperial Majesty, like she did for the previous generation, and the ones before that. But still, as far as I know, there is no record of the Marshal being involved in military affairs. So why Gadra contemted.

    The Marshal bing a problem was something Yuuki hadnt ounted for, either. But it wasnt entirely unexpected. After all, the strongest demon lord, Guy Crimson, seemed to have a bone to pick with the Empire. It didnt take someone as smart as Yuuki to figure out that something was going on.

    Why did Guy Crimson, the embodiment of power, let the Empire do as they pleased? Yuuki wondered if the reason behind the prideful demon lords reluctance to make a movewas because of someone even he was wary of. And if he were told that this person was the Marshal, well, he would be inclined to believe it.

    At any rate, if the war spirals out of control and engulfs the world in chaos, what follows would be extraordinary. Then, a monster lurking in the shadows might reveal itself!

    Yuuki smirked as he yed out the uing events in his head, barely containing his enjoyment.

    Gadra sighed as he watched Yuuki indulging in his fantasies, but s, there was nothing for him to do about it. Changing gears, he decided to talk with Yuuki about their future ns.

    So, Yuuki, things are on the up and up on my end. Now that my cause for vengeance against the West has disappeared, I would have preferred to avoid war, nheless.

    What do you think that self-centered attitude will achieve? Youve been encouraging war for years.

    Well, I cant deny that.

    Gadra was, by andrge, a selfish man who never cared about what others told him. As long as he and his beloved friends were safe, nothing else mattered to him. Indeed, he was a great mage, but he was no god. He did not pride himself on being all-powerful and had a clear understanding of his own limits. That was exactly why he desperately insisted on avoiding war, viewing it as his final service to the Empire.

    Demon lords were said to be the enemy of mankind. They were absolute beings, and thus it was wise to abide by mutual invibility in principle.

    He made contact with thete demon lord yman to avoid making an enemy out of him. Through this connection, he was able to establish a friendly rtionship with Yuuki.

    All of this for a single objective: defeating the Westdefeating Luminism.

    The reason for letting the demon lords rule over a rich territory was to make sure they would not haveor not let them haveterritorial ambitions for other nations, so Gadras policy was not wrong. All this became meaningless, and that was why he wanted to do the opposite and prevent the Empire from descending down the wrong path.

    Not to mention, Gadra saw Demon Lord Rimuru in a new light. He was a kind and genial soul, and Gadra believed coexistence with him to be the wise choice. After all, even his friend, Adalmann, was leading a fulfilling life, despite the drastic change in appearancepared to his previous one.

    Even more surprising was the strength of his country. Even Adalmann, who appeared likely to be on even footing with Gadra, carried the mission to guard the 60th floor of the Dungeon. While he was promoted to the guardian of Floor 70, it meant that there was still someone higher up thedder. And of course, there were his other real executives.

    To oppose such a country is the height of folly. Gadra was certain about it. And by extension, he was convinced the Empire would suffer a crushing defeat.

    He didnt know what Shinji and crew thought of Rimuru, but he felt something unfathomable about him. For this reason, he had pulled out all the stops to speak out against the war.

    He was let down in the end; nevertheless, he had upheld his end of the bargain with Rimuru. Because he seeded in directing the eyes of the Imperial army on the Dungeon, all he needed to think about was his future course of action.

    What happens to those who dont listen to me is no longer my concern. I will request for onest meeting with His Imperial Majesty, and then Ill be on my way to the monster country.

    What a remarkably imposing deration. Its treason, then.

    Nothing of the sort. I just strive to live on my own terms. Yuuki, this doesnt mean that Im cutting ties with you. Whenever you need it, you can count on me.

    Gadra, despite his selfish side, had another, which showedpassion and kindness to the people he was close with. He seemed to like Yuuki, as his promise showed.

    Ah-haha, Ill look forward to that time! Yuuki nodded with a bitter smile.

    Well, I am a neer to that country now. Ill be working to earn their trust from now on, so dont expect much leverage out of me, if you had that in mind.

    How mean! Keep those thoughts to yourself.

    What nonsense. The brash fellow you are ought to handle it. Ah right, those clowns are more befitting of brash, but regrettably they arent here to say hello. Did you send them off to do some nefarious deeds?

    Sort of. I could tell you now, buuut Rimuru-san will catch wind of it if I do, so too bad.

    Ah-ha-ha! Yes, indeed, then I wont ask. If you happen to need me, Ill be there for you!

    Thanks, Ill count on it, Yuuki replied with a grin. He had also taken a liking to Gadra. His honest way of life sparked a bit of admiration within him.

    After a moment ofughter, the two shook hands.

    Well then, Ill be on my way. Yuuki, you can go ahead and stage your coup dtat or whatever with as much of a ruckus or fanfare as you want. However!

    I get it. Its just that killing His Imperial Majesty is off the table, right?

    Aye. Great that you understand. Then, farewell!

    And so Yuuki and Gadra parted ways.

    Gadras request for an audience with the emperor was granted.

    I suppose I should warn the emperorGadra waited nervously as that though weighed on his mind. Despite the opportunity to state his plea, there was no telling if the emperor would heed his advice. But still, he wanted to offer his final service to the benefactor whom he had served.

    His Imperial Majesty is expecting you, a guide called out to him. Gadra walked along the hallway, following the veiled attendant.

    From the polished corridor of the atrium, the sight of pink cherry blossoms slowly came into view. Eternal cherry blossoms. Their petals, on trees that were always in full bloom, were said to be a symbol of the prosperity of the Empire.

    It is as beautiful as ever. However, it was unpopr with Japanese people who came from another world.

    Is that so?

    Hmm, was it wabi-sabi 18 or beauty in destruction? Cherry blossoms are an ephemeral beauty,sting only the moment they scatter in the wind. Thats also a way to look at it. Isnt that right, Kondou-dono?

    A fierce man emerged from the shade of a sakura tree.

    I thought Id hidden my presence well.

    Youre right, Gadra answered, and took out his beloved cane, I didnt notice you at all. It was just, whats the term, foreboding? Somehow, I guess, I had an ominous feeling for whatever reason.

    The attendant slipped away unnoticed.

    I cant let you have an audience with the emperor.

    Why? Gadra asked incredulously.

    I have no intention of giving you the reason, and its meaningless for you to know it.

    First Lieutenant Kondou responded and raised one arm, holding a glossy lump of ck iron in his hand. It was a Nambuthe first Japanese semi-automatic handgun.

    You want to kill me?

    Gadra asked, eyes wide, ring at him, but it did nothing to perturb First Lieutenant Kondou.

    Kondouyou bastard?!

    Just as he was about to raise his voice further, Gadra copsed as a sharp pain tore through his chest.

    He hadnt let his guard down. He was well-informed about guns and had kept a steady eye on Kondous trigger finger, waiting for the sound of a gunshot, which never came.

    And more importantly, as hey there, his consciousness rapidly fading, he realized something. With hisst bit of life, he noted that the pain in his chest came from his back, and it wasnt caused by a bulletbut the stab of a knife. Meaning this wasnt the work of Kondou, but someone else

    Why did you interfere?

    Because this man is dangerous. If we allowed this traitor to live, he wouldve hindered the next reign of His Imperial Majesty.

    That someones voice sounded familiar to Gadra, but it seemed entirely out of ce. He had to wonder if his mind was ying tricks on him on the verge of death.

    But this man was still His Imperial Majestys friend

    Gadras senses grew fainter by the moment as the voice of Kondou faded away.

    Atst, Gadra could feel deaths cold embrace.

    Is this poison? What a thorough job. All of this is punishment for betraying His Imperial Majesty Rudra, huh

    A moment longer, and he would let out his final breath. Lying among the undying petals dancing through the air, Gadra yed his final gamble.

    He invoked a spell he had prepared in advance And lost consciousness on the spot.

 Volume 12 - Ch 5

    War on the Horizon

    After sending Gadra to the Empire, it was time for a little interrogation. The first person on my list wasnt Shinji or his friends, but Ramiris. I just couldnt ignore some of the things that hade out of her mouth. She had pulled pranks on me before, so I was pretty sure that she was hiding something else.

    What? Im not hiding anything!

    Ramiris started to act very suspicious and fidgety It was clear that she was hiding something.

    From now on, I wont give you any more cake! With this threat fresh in her mind, Ramiris spilled the beans, and fast.

    What do you want to know, captain!

    Captain Well, whatever. There was no point thinking about it too much, so I began pressing her a bit.

    Adalmann had a much better showing than I expected, all well and good there. That said, whats the deal with the others? I didnt think Albert could drive back Shinji and his friends all by himself! I didnt think that there would be a death dragon here either These oddities arent happening on other floors though, right?

    Albert wasnt just your average strong monster anymore. He had evolved from a death knight into a death pdin, ranked at Special A. He could take full advantage of his abilities. Before his evolution, he fought an even battle with Hakurou. Now, theres no telling how strong he is.

    Hasnt Albert been teaching the guy named Arnaud? This time, he decided to go test his strength again in the lower floors.

    Hold on, hold on! I hastily stopped Ramiriss exnation. I found it weird that Albert was the one teaching Arnaud. After all, Arnaud was a captain of the Holy Knight Order. He had to be pretty strong, maybe even more so than Albert. And yet, it was Albert who was teaching Arnaud? Thats why I just couldnt get what Ramiris was saying.

    You see, after Arnaud and his men got scolded by Hinatast time, they went out and decided to try to challenge the Dungeon again. This time, they managed to make it through the 70th floor because the Demon Colossus was still under development.

    Uh-huh, and then?

    Those kids got their asses beaten again, of course!

    Gahahahaha! It was a sight to behold!

    Ramiris exined happily, as Veldora nodded with a chuckle.

    That mustve been very interesting, by the sound of it.

    Report. The battle log has been recorded.

    For real?! Youre awesome, Raphael-san! Ill watch the recordingter, but for now, lets focus on Ramiriss exnation.

    So, how far did Arnaud and his men go?

    They mightve gotten to the dragon chambers from Floors 96 to 99. The terrain effects active in those rooms were bound to bring any flesh-and-blood humans to their knees, for sure.

    Hmm, if I recall correctly, it was

    They were crushed the moment they encountered the next boss. It was funny to watch them cry and flee with their tails between their legs!

    Hey now, thats quite the sadistic streak youve got going there.

    Hold on, the next boss?

    Huh? Was the boss on the 80th floor really that strong?

    Eh? What do you mean?

    I mean, isnt Arnaud one of the Ten Great Saints that could even stand against an ex-demon lord like yman?

    It suddenly clicked as the words were leaving my mouth. On second thought, Adalmann or Albert probably could have beaten an unawakened yman. Moreover, with that weird death dragon thing, whos to say they couldnt have defeated even an awakened yman.

    Um Well

    I was pretty sure we had Zegion as the 80th floors guardian. Could this mean that he had metamorphosed inside his cocoon and emerged in his fully evolved, perfect form?

    I heard that Veldora had been training him, but that just didnt add up to me, either. After all, Zegion was an insect-like monster. I had no idea how hed put the super dubious Veldora Style Killing Arts to good use. I only allowed it because Veldora seemed to enjoy doing it, but I probably shouldnt have taken it so lightly.

    Way back, I had used my own cells to heal Zegions wounds and repaired his exoskeleton with magisteel. Maybe thanks to that, he could move at high speed and even summon his own subordinates.

    Since this was backed by Treyni-san, I wasnt going toin. However, the idea of pitting you against a super-fast insectoidan insect-type monsterright after a slow-moving colossus definitely rubbed me the wrong way.

    Hey, so how is Zegion nowadays?

    Just when I was about to further question the suspicious Ramiris, Veldora cut in: My disciple, Zegion, has undergone aplete metamorphosis! Hes be an invincible warrior and inherited my techniques!

    Better yet, he continued, Arnaud and his friends werent even worthy of facing my disciple! The boss of the 79th floor already took care of them all!

    It was starting to make sense. Arnaud and his friends were beaten by the 79th floors boss, Apito the Queen Wasp. She was able to travel at ultra-high speeds and spew deadly poison.

    Despite the many years Arnaud and his fellow knights had honed their swordsmanship, they couldnt even touch her. s, all of them got stung by her insects and fled in tears

    Thats incredible! I felt likeughing.

    You shouldve told me! You knew that I was busy working!

    Hey hey, hear me out! Ramiris squealed. It wasnt just me. It was Mentor who started talking about training or something, then went on to teach an insect!

    Y-you idiot! Veldora wailed. Is this a betrayal?!

    Because its not fair that youre acting like it was none of your business, Mentor!

    Grrrr

    I suppose Veldora was in on it as well I guess that people all wanted a part in something as fun as this. That said, I still felt like Id been yed. I couldnt believe that they were doing all of this behind my back

    Actually, it was a mistake to have left things up to them. Id have to think about thatter, but for now, there was something else bugging me.

    Hey, Ive been wondering just now, what did you mean by training Zegion?

    He is an insect, right? Could it be that Zegions final evolution had granted him a humanoid form?

    I guessed correctly.

    Kukuku, so you have finally realized! I have known from the start that you didnt realize this. So I kept my mouth shut until now to keep things interesting!

    Heh, Veldora was being cheeky again. Though, this time, he bamboozled me hard.

    I began to look through the Dungeons recordings, and asked Raphael-san to show me an image of him. In the image, I could confirm Zegions slender human form.

    Thats it. It was just like that insectoid Shion beat in LubeliusRazul. Zegion looked just like that absurdly strong Razul. He emanated the aura of a powerful individual.

    It was all thanks to the mutation in his evolution that he could attain that form. And it was this form that opened the door to a wealth of newbat techniques.

    Apito had undergone a simr transformation. Her body had morphed into a figure resembling a beautiful female. I should have noticed this sooner when Hinata was mentoring her. I thought that they were just doing some mock battles, but it turns out that she was actually learning things from Hinata. Apito picked up some great techniques and became very nimble in action.

    It appeared that she had also been sparring with Zegion to learn even more advanced moves.

    Arnaud and his mens bitter defeat was testament to this.

    So, Arnaud and his friends re-evaluated their skills, but

    They resigned themselves to beginner status and began to conquer the Dungeon from Floor 1.

    However, a single knight halted them in their tracks on the 60th floor. The death pdin Albert, the trusted confidant of the Immortal King Adalmann, who was the strongest of all the pdins hundreds of years ago, defeated them.

    And since then, Albert has been beating them to a pulp every time.

    After defeating Arnauds team by himself, Albert had asked: I heard theyd rebranded themselves as Holy Knights; but I didnt know their quality also changeddiminished, even?

    That infuriated Arnaud, making him go all out; but even his strongest Art, Aether Break, was useless against Albert. Albert wielded his sword with the same skill he had back when he was alive, and with his monster evolution added on top, Arnaud never stood a chance.

    His immortal body never tired and could even recover broken limbs. It really was borderline cheating, so unless you could leverage his weaknesses against him, he was unbeatable. On top of all that, Adalmann had a Holy-Demonic Reversal Skill that made him way stronger than he already was.

    Of course Arnauds team lost, I thought.

    Adalmanns team absorbed the magicules in thebyrinth and evolved into high-ss monsters. Arnauds timing couldnt have been worse to challenge the Dungeon.

    However, you could also look at it another way. He was lucky to have the opportunity to be taught by the strongest knight from hundreds of years ago.

    And now, Arnaud and everyone in the Holy Knight Order were training under the guidance of Albert on a rotating schedule.

    As it stood, the 60th floor became a dangerous area. But

    So then, what about the other floors?

    At this point, I could tell the general situation. Adalmann and Zegion werent the only ones who underwent a crazy abnormal evolution.

    I was spot on. In the Dungeon, there was a group of strong monsters called the Dungeons Elite Ten. If I were to assume, it was possible that they possessedbat skills on par with my executives.

    Needless to say, Adalmann was one of them, as was his subordinate, Albert. Apito managed to get into the Dungeons Elite Ten because of her abnormal evolution, under the alias Insect Queen. As for Zegion, it seemed like he had be the reigning figure of the Elite Ten. Next up was Kumara. If she absorbed the power from her tail beasts, she could turn into her true form, which was her adult form.

    Listen up! Ill fill you in! Ramiris announced and gave me an update on the current forces inside the Dungeon. Starting from the bottom:

    The four elemental dragons that Ramiris had carefully raised under Milims instruction had sessfully evolved into dragon lords. It was the result of their exposure to Veldoras eminence of massive amounts of magicules. The fire dragon lord, ice dragon lord, wind dragon lord, and the earth dragon lord. These were the Four Dragon Lords.

    I could barely believe my eyes, but there they wereand that wasnt even the end.

    The guardian of the 90th floor, Nine Heads Kumara.

    The guardian of the 80th floor, Insect Kaiser Zegion.

    The boss of the 79th floor, Insect Queen Apito.

    The guardian of the 70th floor, Immortal King Adalmann.

    The vanguard of the 70th floor, Death Pdin Albert.

    As a bonus, there were two guardians on the 50th floor, Gozer and Mezer. Frankly, the two of them didnt make the cut for the Elite Ten. As for thest, tenth, member, it was Beretta, who was also the manager of said group.

    Nevertheless, I want this troubleahem, ahem, this honor to be passed on to someone else murmured Beretta, ncing at Treyni-san and IfritI mean Charys.

    Ara, I have the important task of taking care of Ramiris-sama, Treyni-san said, with a charming smile.

    Me too, Charys added. I am the only devoted servant of Veldora-sama, so I am already busy taking care of him.

    It looked like Veldora was taking full advantage of Charys, but at least Charys seemed to be satisfied. He already had his hands full, unwilling to take on another job.

    My heart sighed; these two really did take after that butler.

    Seems like youre having a hard time, Beretta.

    You understand, Rimuru-sama!

    I nodded.

    While catching up with Beretta, I uncovered a number of things.

    First of all, who did the Elite Ten belong to? We ran the Dungeon for our enjoyment and the profits. Without Ramiris, who built thebyrinth, or Veldora, whose magicules filled thebyrinth, it couldnt exist. So, now that raised the question who the Elite Ten should serve. Following the chain ofmand, that would be Ramiris

    Oh, yeah. I met with all of them and asked what they want to do! Ramiris exined.

    Beretta would be with Ramiris, so no change there. Every dragon lord turned into Ramiriss subordinate. Apparently, she even made a contract to seal the deal. Dragon lords had egos, so it was created with their consent.

    Moving on to the rest of the team; Kumara had be friends with the kids and was living happily here, so she was overly grateful. I caught wind of her saying that she would be my pet, disregarding the fact that I already had Ranga as one.

    Zegion and Apito admired me greatly, too, so they dered themselves my subordinates.

    Needless to say for Adalmann, he definitely had a couple screws loose. It went so far that he even worshipped me as a god. Albert was under the influence of Adalmann, meaning his loyalty fell back on me by proxy.

    Just like that, the five became my subordinates.

    Gozer and Mezer kinda worked in thebyrinth, so they may as well be Ramiriss subordinates, but I heard that they declined to join Ramiris and requested to serve me. Whatever. Its possible that they dismissed Ramiris based on her appearance, given their nature as a power-obsessed race.

    Wrong! Those children got their names from you, didnt they, Rimuru? They were happier with that than getting a paycheck. They told me they couldntpromise it.

    Oh, thatd exin it. It was nice to hear that. I should treat Gozer and Mezer better next time I meet them.

    Just like that, I learned about an unexpected phenomenon in the Dungeon while I was inspecting the three intruders actions. It was this urrence that shocked me, but the fact that the guardians were stronger now was good. But it would be a bit of a problem if they evolved way more than we thought. It might be a cowards bad habit.

    Be that as it may, with the existence of the Dungeons Elite Ten, no one needed to worry about the Imperial army intruding and attacking us. However, I ordered them to hold back for the normal challengers. Otherwise, it would be impossible for these ordinary people to traverse thebyrinth.

    The unfortunate thing was that theyd have to take on abyrinth containing a number of demon lord-ss monsters. The only floor that I wanted to be seriously guarded was the 100th floor, and Id leave that to Veldora.

    As for the other levelsat least up to around the 80th floorI hoped for the challengers to take their best shot and attack them. We made the Dungeon with a lot of care, so I wanted them to see how cool it was.

    But all that would have to wait for peaceful times.

    After going through thebyrinth to make sure it was in good condition, I visited each of the guardians. Actually, I wanted to see just how they evolved with my own eyes.

    Their growth was staggering. With the power they currently had in thebyrinth, I couldnt imagine them losing to the Empire.

    After a few days

    I went to try out the observation magic I had finally finished after a bit of work. The ce was the Strategic Military Control Battle Command Centemonly known as the Control Room. The name had that tacticool oomph to it. Thus, thats what I settled on with Veldora and Ramiris After I took a step back and thought about it though, I guess it was kinda long. In hindsight, I probably picked the wrong crowd to brainstorm with. Since Benimaru and the others simply called it the Control Room, few people knew its original name.

    It was newly built next to Veldoras private room on the 100th floor of thebyrinth and could be essed through the usual war room. If the city above ground was isted within thebyrinth, this would serve as the main headquarters.

    We were absolutely prepared for war. And if the invasion never came and all of this was for nothing, Id still count it as a win, right?

    The results of the observation magic turned out extremely well. The same big screens that we used during the tournament were set up to show situations from various locations. Several ces in the Great Jura Forest, along the trade routes of the Dwarven Kingdom, as well as a lot of other critical ces could be surveilled at any time. Everything from the sea route bordering the Kingdom of Farmenas to the peak of the Canaat Mountainsall of it was projected in full detail.

    The principle behind it was simple:

    Lens-shaped water droplets that I had devised for the physical magic Megiddo were controlled by spirits. The huge lenses that I deployed near the stratosphere reflected a magnified view of the target destination. And by reflecting it, they transmitted a detail-rich video of the ce.

    Taking a page out of Mosss book, I had sent out a herd of tiny slimes, each a Clone, and used them as a medium to activate the magic on site. Because of that, they were all connected to my main body through Spatial Domination, allowing for an instant data link, which meant that I could enjoy zerotency streaming.

    My clones were too tiny to act autonomously, which had the added benefit of requiring no magicules so long as I didnt consciously act on them. On the flip side, moving them to the ces I wanted to see was quite the challenge, but Souei and Moss handled that for me quite well. It was a very handy, low-cost solution.

    I named this physical magic Argos, the Eye of God.

    The feed to the monitor was highly urate after being processed by Wisdom King Raphael. A close-up view of whatever distant area could be enjoyed from the warmth of the Control Room. Thepletion of this magic system was a delight to everyone. Especially Diablo, who was over the moon, but lets ignore that.

    Next, the surveince system actually had another benefit that we only found after it was finished. Now people could activate Megiddo in the ce shown on-screen while they were in the Control Room. I tinkered around with it for a bit and was stunned. I fired a beam at Gobtas feet while he was training in a clearing, but I didnt expect it to work so well.

    Ill never forget the look on Gobtas face as he jumped in shock.

    Idiot! Its because youre not paying attention!

    I may have told him off, but I didnt think it was his fault.

    Megiddos performance had also improved. Originally, Great Sage had optimized this magic, but the current Raphael-san didnt seem to be satisfied Following much more careful refinements, I had developed a system that used a number of lenses floating in the sky at all times, like satellites. By linking it with Argos, Megiddo could even be fired at night. Although it wasnt as powerful, I seeded in converging the light by reflecting beams of light from one satellite lens to another.

    To be clear, I really did get maybe a bit carried away here, but the results spoke for themselves, so it was time well spent in my book.

    Powerful spirits were really the ones creating these lenses, so I just supplied them with magicules. Raphael-san was the one who did all theplicated calctions, so that made it easy to operate.

    During the daytime it operated at full power, of course, since that overhead became unnecessary. With more light and heat sting through it, it was one heck of a heat ray cannon.

    If I were to face off against a human army, I bet I could reduce them to ashes without lifting a finger. After my little upgrades to the magic, it really seemed that strong.

    Satisfied with the oue of my experiment, I returned to my office.

    Not a moment too soon, Shuna came by to let me know that we had guests. By that, I could see that there were quite a few guests.

    Ah, lets just say that most of my time was spent meeting guests. I spent the rest just developing magic, thinking of cool new products, and ordering the right people to the right ces. I was also running thebyrinth and consulting with Myourmiles-kunamong other things. Having fun was also part of my work.

    With that being said, treating my guests well was very important, so I took it seriously.

    Shinji and the other two were waiting nervously in the guest room, which Shuna escorted me to. They were granted asylum in our country, and so we asked them for as much information as they could share with us over thest few days.

    Of course, this wasnt an interrogation, but a voluntary thing. We had interviewed them peacefully in separate rooms. They were allowed to do whatever they wanted to in their free time, so they could think about their decision regarding their futures.

    Today, they came to report that.

    So, have you decided what youre going to do?

    They were torn between the choice of working in my kingdom or bing frence adventurers. If they wanted to continue being adventures, they could strike it rich by challenging the Dungeon over and over.

    The drawback being, now that they knew how difficult the Dungeon was, they couldnt see the prospect of beating it in the future. The Demon Colossus would be ced on the 60th floor, a boss that Shinjis crew would surely bite their teeth out on. Furthermore, even if they did beat it, Adalmann and his entourage awaited them on the 70th floor. It was a checkmate. This prospect of a dead-end career had them worried, as they werent looking forward to grinding the same floor till the end of their days.

    Knowing this had killed their drive to press on. In spite of the riches theyd earn, their lives would be monotonous and boring.

    I mean, Adalmann and the others had be stronger than I expected, so I couldnt really me the challengers of thebyrinth. Normally, them achieving such growthmore like evolutionwas unthinkable, but I guess it couldnt be helped.

    Whatever, forget about that.

    I stopped worrying about how the other challengers were doing.

    Then, how about working in my country?

    Although I would give the right job to the right person, I also promised that they would live a steady life. However, right now the war with the Empire was near at hand, so they seemed to be afraid that they would be drafted into the war.

    I didnt intend to force anyone, but I couldnt guarantee that the three of them wouldnt get involved.

    Yes, Shinji said nervously, after discussing amongst the three of us, we decided to work for His Majesty Rimurus country. Because Master Gadra is also going to serve this country, would you allow us to do the same?

    The other two nodded sternly, apparently on board with it.

    Understood. In that case, youre wee to join us.

    Thank you very much!

    I promise to do my very best!

    Ill do my best.

    Just like that, the trio became part of my country.

    So, what kind of job should I give them?

    Ill let ol Gadra-san manage the 60th floor. This way, he can research the Demon Colossus in order to pilot it in the future.

    That old man had an unquenchable thirst for knowledge and became deeply invested in the topic. So much so, that he couldnt contain his excitement when I presented him with the Demon Colossus.

    Right now, Adalmann was supervising him. In the future, I had ns of letting Gadra be the guardian of the 60th floor.

    So, you guys dont want any part in the war, right?

    Ahyeah, Shinji replied hesitantly. There are people that we know, so if it is fine with you

    Then, rather than bing my subordinate, maybe they could be researchers in the Dungeon.

    On that note, I decided to introduce the three of them to Ramiris.

    We strolled into the dungeon and headed to Ramirissb.

    Ramiris, this is Shinji and his friends, would you like them to work at your ce?

    Ah, Rimuru! Those kids that visited before?

    Yep.

    Ramiris had been looking for an assistant, but she hadnt found one yet that was up to task. She couldnt do things as freely as she wanted with foreign researchers. On the other hand, unintelligent monsters just couldnt understand her crazy ideas. She had Dino, but she couldnt rely on him alone. Right then, Shinji and the others appeared, and they happened to be the right people for the job.

    Yahoo! Im Ramiris. Are you guys interested in working as my new assistants?

    Um

    Shinji was bereft of words, but he didnt seem to realize who Ramiris was.

    Fantastic! Hey, Shinji! Fairies really exist?!

    Mark eximed in surprise. Was this the first time that they met a fairy? I had no idea how long they had been in this world, but his reaction to seeing a fairy proved that this guy was more genuine than I thought

    I am looking for useful assistants. Ill give you a good sry, so, what do you think? Rimuru also said that since weck researchers, educated otherworlders are a great value!

    Ah, Ramiris had said too much.

    That was true though. They were highly skilled, and their thinking was flexible. They were always ready for work, so theyd make a great addition to the team.

    I agree. I think Id be more at peace with research.

    Xin was straightforward with his opinion. Perhaps moved by this, Shinji quickly made up his mind.

    So then, please take us on!

    Hearing this reply, Ramiris fluttered around happily. Fufu! she giggled haughtily, puffing out her nonexistent chest. Seems like you guys are gonna be useful. Very well, you all passed. However, you must obey my orders to the letter! she dered to the trio.

    I was shocked by how quickly she flipped. It felt like her modest approach a moment ago had been a ruse. To say that it was typical of Ramiris would be an understatement.

    Ignoring the dumbfounded trio, Ramiris quickly came up with a list of conditions for them.

    They would be paid three gold coins per month. Meaning their annual sry would be 36 gold coins, along with a bonus. It was better not to count on the bonus, though, because Ramiris paid it ording to her mood, as did I.

    However, it looked like she would be taking charge of their food, clothing, and shelter. They would probably mainly use our cafeteria, but that shouldnt be an issue.

    That wrapped up Shinji and his two friends speedy immigration.

    A few dayster:

    It seemed that the trio got used to their job and were busy working as Ramiriss assistants. That was all well and good, so my next worry was Gadra. Wed lost touch with Gadra ever since he returned to the Empire.

    Im sure that old mans doing fine, hes a tough guy

    I started to worry about him though and hoped to get in touch.

    With that on my mind, I went to the Control Room to have a meeting with Benimaru.

    The big surveince screen showed footage from my Argos. It showed all of the surveilled locations, but I couldnt spot anything out of the norm. I wanted to get information on Imperial territory as well, but I had to be satisfied with the military border for now. A lot of soldiers gathered there to guard the area around the base. That ce was always busy.

    It doesnt look like theres going to be any movement today, I remarked.

    Yeah, Benimaru replied. By the way, this magic is really nifty, isnt it? Its what youve been working on recently, right, Rimuru-sama?

    Since we were the only people here today, Benimaru engaged in a casual tone. I liked this more rxed side of him. Unfortunately, as soon as someone else was around, he would go back to his rigid self. Well, except with Souei and Diablo.

    I wanted to cherish the camaraderie we had, so every once in a while, Id take the three of them to Ingracia for a night out and crack open a cold one with the boys.

    Thats right! Diablo jumped in. The greatness of this magic begins with its unconventional conception and out-of-the-box thinking. The cost-to-performance is incredible. Not to mention its convenience, and theplexity of the calctions needed for it to activate are as fine as a beautiful work of art. So

    Stoooop!! I shouted. Hold it right there. If you cant stop gushing over it, just do it somewhere I cant hear you, okay?

    This was what happened when I got careless. Diablos sudden gushing was something I just didnt want to deal with.

    This magic was indeed great, but the only reason I could do it was because I had Raphael-san. It was a bit awkward to hear such praise because I couldnt take full credit for it.

    Yeah, Diablo. If you dont pull yourself together a bit, youll bother Rimuru-sama.

    Thats ridiculous. What are you saying, Benimaru. Thats not true, right, Rimuru-sama?

    No, Benimaru is right. Youre overreacting too much. Its always wonderful Rimuru this, incredible Rimuru that, its totally overblown!

    This was the perfect time to properly call Diablo out on it.

    He deted like a punctured balloon, utterly devastated. It wasnt anything serious, though, just him being dramatic.

    When I heard that Diablo was a powerful demon or something called primordial, I didnt know what to do about it. But if you really thought about it, he was a weirdo from the start. He even made a fool out of Guy, so youd just make a fool of yourself if you took him seriously. I had realized that, so I wanted to be alert.

    Kufufufufu, how incredible of Rimuru-sama, even your mere words inflicted excruciating mental damage to my soul

    Didnt I just tell you to stop it!

    Right? This guy was incapable of self-reflection. Having a stern word with him was just fine.

    Our heartwarming conversation was interrupted by a sudden report.

    Rimuru, there has been a direct spatial transfer to thebyrinth! This feedback, it came from the old-timer that recently became our ally!

    Understood. Ill go to the 70th floor right away.

    When I stood up, Benimaru and Diablo realized that something was up. I was impressed at how quick they were to react, so I let them know what was happening.

    Seems like that Gadras back, but somethings wrong. Lets go check it out.

    Understood. I will remain here as a guard.

    Then I will escort Rimuru-sama.

    Ill rely on you.

    During important times like this, I could count on Diablo. If only he were always like this, then Nope, never mind. Diablo was brilliant, but he seemed like two entirely different people at times.

    On that somber note, we headed to the room we had assigned to Gadra.

    As expected, we found him right there. Well, now I didnt have to worry about him because he was right in front of me, alive and well.

    Oh dear, I could already see the other side, Gadra murmured, all the while still looking as spry as ever.

    The only people here, other than me and Diablo, were Adalmann and the others. Ramiris and Veldora got herete but got back to work once they found out that Gadra was safe and sound.

    So, what happened?

    Well, during the Imperial conference, I suggested that we do not go to war, as Rimuru-sama ordered. In spite of this, they are intent on moving forward. I already expected that, so I wanted to make a direct appeal to His Imperial Majesty Rudra as myst service to him.

    And then he said he requested to meet with the emperor, which was epted. Their meeting was meant to take ce today. Gadra entered the emperors castle, only to be stabbed by someone. It had all gone down just moments ago, not even ten minutes had passed.

    It would be dumb to ask him if he was okay.

    Oh right, we gave you the Resurrection Bracelet.

    Yes sir, Ramiris-samas power is marvelous. This bracelet saved my life. I was expecting something like this would happen, so I prepared a teleportation spell in advance.

    Seeing him safe now, I figured that might indeed be the case. That was quite the clever idea. If you were to return to thebyrinth, no matter how injured you were, or how close you were to dying, the Resurrection Bracelet would bring you back to life.

    Gadras return and resurrection reaffirmed how useful Ramiriss power truly was. Even so, it was owed in part to Gadras finesse to set up magic in advance. It seemed like he also passed this technique on to Razen. Id have to try this myself some other time.

    In my case, I had Thought eleration, so if Ibined it with that, I might be able to create more amazing magic.

    So, who attacked you?

    I didnt think there were that many people capable of beating Gadra, even in my country. He was always on guard, with thorough defensive magic, so I didnt think he would be slow to react even if taken by surprise

    The thing is, I was attacked without detecting the presence of the culprit, robbing me of my chance to confirm the identity. I do have an idea about who it was, but its very hard to believe

    Gadra turned and showed us his back, where we could see a gash in his robes. His wounds were healed, but his equipment was not restored. His robes had traces of corrosion on it, which made it clear that it wasnt your average physical attack.

    Stabbed in the heart from your back, huh?

    The assant even managed to break through the defensive magic. It looks like they have someone with an intriguing technique.

    Even Diablo was impressed. That was how you could tell this opponent was not one to be underestimated. There was likely someone powerful enough to kill me in the Empire. Maybe he was the one who stabbed Gadra, but it was better to assume that there were still others.

    Gadra himself wasnt certain about his attackers identity. He wanted to look further into it, so I decided to leave it to him. He didnt seem to be lying because he looked seriously confused. It may still be too early to trust him, but Im not one to burn a bridge like that.

    Well, Im d that youre safe. This just shows us that the Empire is strong We must double our efforts to be careful in the future.

    Rimuru-sama is right, Diablo added. We cant get any new information now, even if we pushed our luck further than this.

    We seemed to be on the same page.

    For now, we should be content with the information Gadra had obtained, nearly paying the ultimate price for it. With that in mind, I decided to question him a little further and thanked him for his troubles.

    From Gadras story, the Empire was headed for war. They wouldnt publicly dere war against another country, though. To them, their emperor was the absolute authority, so they didnt acknowledge the existence of other countries.

    However, that was just a facade. In fact, they somehow had diplomatic ties with the Dwarven Kingdom, and had not interfered in their governance.

    When the Empire invaded other countries, they always came fully prepared. That was why instead of a deration of war, they would announce a rmendation to surrender. They would only do it once. If the country surrendered, then great. If they didnt, then war woulde. The Empire would give no mercy.

    What a condescending and prideful country. You cant be friends with other countries if youre that annoying, you know? Worrying about that was useless, since the Empire never participated in any international affairs anyway.

    Thats why they didnt ratify the Western States Councils internationalws, so there was no use arguing when they started a war, as they were not bound by thesews. Agreements after defeat, handling of prisoners of war, a number of prohibitions in wartimewithout any of those arrangements, the Western Nations were very much afraid of the Empire.

    That was, indeed, scary. At worst, they would justify the ughter of civilians. That meant that if we were to lose the war to the Empire, we would lose everything. And maybe, the word reparations wouldnt evene into y. Everything would belong to the Empire, leaving the losing country with nothing, not even a single right, after unconditional surrender. In order to be able to negotiate with the Empire, it would have to end in at least a draw.

    Then, my side wouldnt have to go nice on them. All we had to do was to settle this once and for all and cut off the root of the problem.

    Now that we were certain about the Empires movements, we also switched to war mode. First of all, I set up a joint operation headquarters in the Control Room. I did it on a whim; nevertheless, something like this was important.

    Benimaru and Souei would always be on standby here.

    Souei still stationed his Clones in several ces so we didnt have to rely entirely on my Argos for reconnaissance. With Mosss help, we could get information with a high degree of uracy.

    At this point, our advantage was considerable. To put it bluntly, when it came to warfare in this world, the real action only started once the opposing armies shed. We were trying to gather intel on the enemys troops with the use of scouts and long-range magic, but in this world, it wasmon practice to only do so when the sh was imminent.

    The concept of information warfare existed here, but no countrys military conducted surveince of enemy forces as thoroughly as ours. Thats what Hinata and Gadra told me, so its not me being presumptuous, ok? Its a hard fact.

    This footage is from the sky? Gadra asked.

    Kufufu, Diabloughed. This is created through Rimuru-samas magic. It only uses a small amount of magicules, and the reaction urs outside the atmosphere. Only few could sense this magic reaction, such as those with danger precognition Skills like Ultra Instinct.

    I-indeed. Ive always been confident in my ability to sense magic, but this magic appears too natural for me to think it was being controlled by someone.

    Of course! Even an archdemon, who may excel in magic butcks experience, wouldnt be able to appreciate this masterpiece. How brilliant, wouldnt you agree?

    That goes without saying! This is really quite astounding!

    For some reason, Diablo started showing off my creation to Gadra with a smug grin. They were both in awe and Gadra was getting visibly excited.

    Shion.

    Understood!

    Since they were quickly bing a nuisance, I ordered Shion to iste them in a separate room.

    Once I had peace and quiet again, I got down to business.

    The birds-eye-view surveince footage was a fantastic cheat. Think about it: Not long ago, I was worried about where we would be attacked from, but that couldnt be simpler now. After all, we were not just monitoring the possible routes for invasion but also our shared border with the Empire, so wed know it the moment they started moving.

    Taking shogi as an example, it was like ying against a blindfolded opponent. That means your opponent could only be sure about the positions of their own pieces. Assuming you didnt act like a total amateur, this was your game to lose, even against a master of the game. This wasnt a minor handicap, but an absolute advantage. On top of that, there were no rules in this war. Victory was justice.

    The prospect of a one-sided invasion was scarier than I thought. As long as nothing had been promised, we could do anything in this war. However, I did set one rule: Do not attack civilians! That was it. Of course, I strictly prohibited our side from striking first. Plus, once I dered that the war had ended, further attacks were forbidden. I believed that no one would disobey me and vite my orders.

    So now, all of the countrys executives were gathered in the Control Room.

    Benimaru was the general. Hakurou was the advisor. Souei was the intelligence officer. Rigurd and the chiefs of the three powers that support him: Rugurd, Regurd, Rogurd. Representing the women, we had Shuna and Lilina. There were also the unsung heroes, namely Rigur, Kaijin, and Kurobee. Vesta and Myourmiles served as consultants. Gobta and Gabil served as themanders of their corps. Even Geldid down his work and came over. I also called the three demonesses led by Testarossa. Diablo seemed to have done some self-reflection, so I let him join the meeting, too. He stood in his usual position, on good terms with Shion. Gadra and the trio also came to contribute their information about the Empire. And not to forget, Masayuki, now called the moral support of the people, of sorts, showed upte.

    Wait a minute. Why am I the moral support of the people?! Please dont say stuff like that! Come on! he shouted, giving me some serious side eye.

    Oops, he really did just say that in front of everyone.

    For some reason, Gadra was staring at the two of us during our little exchange. Something mustve been on his mind, so I decided I would ask him after the conference.

    Andst but not least, our coborators, Veldora and Ramiris. Beretta, Treyni-san, and Charys were also on stand-by in the corner of the room.

    There we go, thats everyone.

    I gently stroked Ranga sitting next to me and looked around at everyone in their seats.

    I suppose ites as no surprise why I gathered you all here today. We must discuss our strategy against the Empire. Benimaru and I came up with the outline of the n, but I would also like to know what everyone else here thinks. Please express your thoughts freely!

    Yes sir!   everyone answered in chorus, kicking off the conference.

    Looking at the screen, you could see vast numbers of Imperial soldiers lining up one after another.

    Visible beside them were alsorge hunks of steel, rolling with continuous tracks wrapped around their wheels as they sputtered in loud bursts. Those were tanks. Going off of what we saw from our birds eye view, they appeared to have 2,000 of them.

    Waioi! Why do they have tanks! I called out, unable to believe my eyes.

    I hurriedly asked Shinji and the others and found out that the Empire was pushing for the development of modern weapons using the otherworlders knowledgescience and technology.

    Instead of gas, it had an internalbustion engine running on magicules. These were supplied by the constant intake of outside air, which had the added benefit of not only harvesting magicules from the environment, but also served to cool the hot engine. This tank was highly versatile, and in terms of its performance alone, it easily outperformed the best tanks in my previous world.

    Gadra said that they analyzed the magic-controlled power reactor they had excavated from ancient ruins and modernized it. Also, magic stones could be used to fuel it. During normal operation, it gathered magicules from its environment. But forbat, magic stones were used.

    This was an all-terrain vehicle fit for even the roughest roads, reaching a top speed over 100 kilometers per hour. Althoughing at a great energy cost, it even had the ability to float a short distance above the ground.

    I felt like I waste to the party and frustrated about the fact that I didnt make them myself. The idea of a tank in this world of knights never urred to me. We had built a train, meaning we were this close to making tanks, too

    But we didnt have cars, either, so skipping straight to tanks wouldve been weird. I always thought that it would be a shame to poprize the use of cars, too. They were convenient, but equally dangerous, you know what I mean? Everyone would mor to get one, but in the end, it would be impossible to ever meet demand. Resource scarcity was still a thing here, so the split between haves and have-nots was inevitable.

    In my opinion, using trains in urban environments was more convenient than cars. Then once everything was up and running with the trains, I wanted to invent luxurious cars for the rich. They were meant to be something people could strive for, as the ultimate status symbol.

    Well, that would have to wait until after the war. After all, their tanks werent the only thing of note.

    They also had ships that flew in the sky. Are you for real?! I wanted to shout. Having that kind of thing would make transportation a piece of cake. They could single-handedly solve logistics problems when used for war.

    At that point, I realized that maybe I was getting too cocky. Perhaps I was being a bit optimistic when I assumed our air superiority. I had thought about developing that sort of thing as well, but dismissed it as impossible. One does not simply develop flying ships overnight.

    Given enough time, we maybe couldve done it, but development wasnt that straight-forward. It takes a lot of trial and error before a product is ready for practical use. So, we had to apud the research and development team of the Empire; those guys were brilliant. But I must admit that I had a slight desire to capture at least one ship whole.

    Had I tried to think more outside-the-box and been a tad more liberal in my demands, we couldve been sitting here with our very ownyou know what? Forget it. There was no use crying over spilled milk; it was something to think about for the future.

    After the war ended, I would try and develop a lot more things on a whim.

    The situation with the Empire was as I just saw.

    It was nothing new to me, but for some of the people here, this was their first time seeing anything of the sort. They just stared at the screen dumbfounded, unable to hide their astonishment.

    As far as estimates go, we could be dealing with a million invaders in total! Well, its already evident as we can see. I know you may have been surprised by their weapons, but that doesnt change the fact that we have the upper hand. Dont worry.

    The most important part of war is to know how strong the opponent would be. At this point, we knew their abilities as if wed proverbially stripped them naked.

    Raphael-san counted that the enemy troops numbered a million soldiers in total. Now that may sound like a crazy number, but it was still unlikely for our side to lose. That was how strong our side was.

    Gadra told me that there are three major corps in the Empire, I said. One of them, which is called the Armored Corps, has the tank troops that were shown on the screen. They call it the Magic Tank Division and it is undoubtedly the main force of the enemy.

    Then, I went into further detail about the inside information I had on the tank division.

    Thats not all the intel Gadra gave me. He also attended the strategy meeting and told me everything about it. They must have learned about Gadras escape, so it was likely that they made changes in the n that they had initiallyid out in the meeting, but it was safe to assume that they didnt change the main gist of it.

    After all, Yuuki was also there with the goal of starting a coup. He would definitely stir the othermanders up by insisting that they didnt have to be on guard as Gadra was already dead.

    Gadra also said that the Armored Corpsmander Calgurio took the bait, hook, line, and sinker. He believed that the Dungeon held treasures and was nning to beat the othermanders to the punch.

    If so, he would probably hate to make major changes to their n, so he was likely to agree with Yuukis suggestion. It was dangerous to act on assumptions, but it was easy to guess the intent of their actions if you looked at how Calgurio was positioning his army.

    Gobta was the first to speak after I finished exining.

    Um, about my army that is on standby in the inn town, are we gonna fight against those tanks?

    Gobta brought up a good point. In fact, from the point of view of the corpsmander, this question had to be asked. It was a matter of life and death. Gobta, who would always sleep during meetings, had matured. Indeed, it was because people take responsibility that they

    Why are you asking such an obvious question? Benimaru demanded, turning to Gobta while I was deeply moved. The First Army will destroy their tank corps under yourmand!

    I didnt know about that Gobta murmured in a daze, somewhat shocked.

    Well, I could totally understand where he wasing from.

    Are we going to have to defend the inn town to the death? he asked, with dread in his eyes.

    Of course not! I said with a smile. From what I know about the tanks, you have a shot at beating them if you y your cards right. The only problem is that we dont know how many people would be hurt during the battle. To begin with, its harder to defend than to attack, so the inexperienced Green Numbers will only serve as targets for the tanks. The n isnt for you to fight till the bitter end.

    I took my time exining this to try and reassure him. Hakurou, who was in charge of supporting Gobta, could apparently sense what I was ying at from the onset. He just listened and agreed to what I said.

    Then, what should we do?

    Themanders role is to think about that, but it would be hard for a first-timer like you. Benimaru, exin it to him, I said with an air of authority.

    Actually, like Gobta, I was no better than an amateur when it came to army stuff. I didnt know much about tactics, so I just let Benimaru do the finer details.

    But my approach of taking it easy and delegating stuff had many upsides. If Gobta managed to step up and worked hard, I would have even more time to ck off.

    We both listened to Benimarus exnation, hoping that Gobta would do his best on this one.

    Listen, Gobta. The inn town is important, but it doesnt matter if you lose it. If it gets destroyed, then we can just re-build it. If it gets taken by the Empire, then we will just take it back. The problem is about the residents being hurt. However, Rimuru has alreadye up with a solution. We have issued an order to the residents there to evacuate to the capital Rimuru.

    Yep. The moment we knew the Empire would make its move, we started evacuating the civilians. It was taking time, but it should be finished before the Imperial Army arrived.

    Ah,e to think of it, there arent very many residents there.

    Exactly. Your job is to safely evacuate the rest of them. Once youre done, go here, Benimaru pointed at the huge map spread across the table. Specifically, the central city of the Armed Nation of Dwargon.

    Huh?

    Look at this video. From what we can see, the Imperial Army is nning to divide its forces and invade along several routes. While some of them have already entered the Great Jura Forest, there was no movement in their tank troops. If you look at the direction these troops will be going, its clear that theyre nning to move along the foot of the Canaat Mountains. There arent as many trees there, so it doesnt affect the advance of their army.

    I-I see

    You dont get it, do you? Your goal is to defend the Dwarven Kingdom, said Benimaru, as he ced a piece representing Gobtas army in front of the Dwarven Kingdom. Next, he took out a piece for the dwarven army and ced it next to Gobtas.

    It is a united front.

    Ooh! Gobta gasped with surprise and excitement as it finally clicked.

    We had formed this military tactic based on Gadras information and had already talked to Gazel about it. In ordance with our alliance, we told him that the Empires aim was the Dwarven Kingdom. He also pledged to send reinforcements to our aid as he had promised.

    Naturally, Gazel also knew that the Empire was on the warpath. He said that he was tired of turning down their repeated requests for permission to march. But sooner orter, the Empire would run out of patience, he predicted.

    Gazel was happy with my offer, and it was of mutual benefit.

    We would abandon the inn town andter rebuild it if it got destroyed. Though, if we didnt bring the battle to its doorstep, the Empire would probably spare it. It didnt really matter though, since we could always reconstruct it after the war ended.

    The Empire is passing through a conspicuous route because they want us to know where they will attack from. Anyone would notice an army of that size marching.

    Um, is that what you call a tour de force?

    Gobta, you little smartass, when did you learn such fancy expressions? So this bastard did do his studiesI was somewhat impressed.

    Right, Benimaru continued. This route falls right on the border between Dwargon and Tempest. Both countries will definitely notice them, and its their way to easily gauge the others reaction. If we carelessly provoked them, they would use it as an excuse to start the war immediately. However, since it is strictly forbidden for us to attack them first, we will start with a warning. Do you follow?

    Yes.

    If we dont make a move on them, the Imperial Army will cross the Ameld River and take the high ground outside of the entrance to the Dwarven Kingdom. Its a great ce for them to deploy their army since its t and doesnt have many trees.

    I see

    If they end up doing this, Gazel wont sit by and wait. Hes going to send his troops out and start negotiating with the other side. Its the same for us, and the Empire will have both Tempest and Dwargon as their enemies.

    Benimaru moved the pieces on the map,plementing his exnation with a visual demonstration of the n.

    ording to Gadra-dono, the Empire was wary of a pincer attack from both our armies. As long as they hold that ce, though, thats not going to happen. After all, attempting to surprise an enemy who is waiting with open arms is tactical suicide.

    The point of a surprise attack was to catch the opponent with their pants down. But if they anticipated our n, not only would our advantage be mootwed be walking into a trap.

    Thats why well let them attack us, and then crush their army head on! Benimaru said, mming Gobtas piece into the Empires.

    Ooh! Gobta was impressed.

    The other officers didnt seem to have anyints, but I wonder what they thought about the difference in fighting power between Gobtas army and the Empires.

    Gabil, the Third Armysmander!

    Yes!

    Your duty is to guard the evacuating civilians. Watch them from the sky and look out for people who are falling behind or need help.

    Understood!

    Once everyones evacuated, move on to aid Gobta straight away. If the timing is right, you two can meet before the Imperial Army arrives.

    My corps prides itself on being the fastest in Tempest. We will make it on time! Gabil replied confidently to Benimaru.

    But it wouldnt be that easy. When the time came to evacuate our residents, we intended to run the trains at peak capacity. Even so, moving tens of thousands of people would still take a not insignificant amount of time.

    Another chink in the n was the unprecedented speed that the Imperial Army was moving at. When you factored in legion magic, we could estimate them to be marching at a surprising 80 kilometers per day. The Imperial Army was currently stationed near the border. The distance from their camp to the battlefield was about 1,500 kilometers. At this pace, they would reach the battlefield in about 20 days.

    The reason they could keep up this pace was because each soldier had undergone some type of surgical augmentation. From what I heard, they could go without eating or drinking for a week, so their top speed was probably even higher still.

    Gadra said that the tanks could move at about 10 kilometers per hour without refueling. Since they could absorb magicules even at night, the soldiers could rest while the tanks were replenishing their energy. Surely, they would be foolish to exhaust themselves before the war began.

    Gadras exnation made sense, so Benimaru and I calcted ordingly.

    The Imperial Army might get here faster than expected! So dont let your guard down! Benimaru warned.

    The Imperial Army should deploy their main force here, but as Gobta said, what they are doing now is a tour de force. In other words, a diversion. Their main army is on a beeline towards this very position!

    Benimaru took out different colored pieces for the Imperial Army and scattered them in the Great Jura Forest.

    They wanted us to think that the tank unit was their main force, while keeping the actual main unit separately from them, huh? Since all of the enemys moves were on full disy for me, I honestly just had to sit back and stay sharp.

    Even if we may be overwhelmed, Benimaru continued, we still have Geld to defend thisnd! Geld, please call your men back as soon as possible.

    Understood. Ive already ordered them to return with Thought Communication. It wont be long before everyone gathers under me.

    Benimaru and Geld looked to be on the same wavelength, as they got their points across in a few words. That was Geld for you, reliable as ever.

    After that, Benimaru turned his eyes back to the map. Their main force will continue to hide from us. Unfortunately, Rimuru-samas surveince magic Argos cant tell us whats happening in the forest. Thats where Soueies into y.

    At that, Souei nodded and stood up. The forest is overgrown with thick trees, making it difficult to monitor from the sky. Even if my subordinates tried hiding throughout the forest, theres too much ground to cover and there is a risk of being discovered. For this operation, I am counting on Moss. He has the ability to release a lot of tiny Clones and use them to collect information. As such, we cannot expect them to fight, and either way, Moss has assured me that losing a clone wouldnt set us back. As of now, the eastern part of the Great Jura Forest is under Mosss surveince. We know that the Imperial Army is divided into toons and is currently advancing there, so its up to us to crush them individually, Souei finished with a cruel smile.

    He did kinda spook me, to be honest. I was d he was on our side.

    Taking each toon out individually wasnt the problem. The main force behind them was. So, Benimarus n was to wait until they came together to a certain extent.

    If the Imperial Armys aim is the Dungeon, then all we will have to do is lure them to its entrance and take them on from there. If there are still any Imperial troops left on the ground at that point, Gelds Second Army and my main unit will take care of them! Thats all!

    The n was straightforward and easy to understand.

    But there was one big question still hanging in the airthat was addressing ourparableck in military power. No one had said anything yet, leaving me wondering what everyone thought about the n.

    As I waited, hesitant about whether I should raise the question, the Control Room suddenly erupted with cheers.

    Understood! With Gabil-san backing me up, theres nothing to be worried about. Victory will be ours!

    Im d to hear you say that! Im not one to be outdone by Gobta-dono; I will show you how to fight!

    I was worried that we wouldnt get an opportunity to prove ourselves, but General Benimaru-dono has, of course, not let us down. Indeed, bestowing us with the greatest honor of protecting our country, no less. We shall unleash all our might!

    The threemanders were overjoyed at Benimarus deration.

    It didnt just stop there. The civil servants enthusiastically discussed their opinions amongst themselves, too. Excitement was in the air, and the three demon girls were enjoying a nice chat.

    But likethe difference in military strength

    I too had confidence that we would win this war. Yes, I had a serene outlook on the matter myself, but that didnt necessarily mean I wasnt the least bit anxious. I was slightly put off by the utterck of worry everyone else exhibited. Even Gobta was full of zeal, not a trace of his earlier unease left. I still had my qualms about leaving this big role in his hands, in spite of having Hakurou as his consultant.

    Are there any questions after hearing Benimarus exnation?

    I pushed the question into the room, with no response.

    Instead, Benimaru said on behalf of everyone: Dont worry, Rimuru-sama, Benimaru said with a briskugh. We arent worried about losing. Not from an abundance of temerity, but because we are going all out. A battlefield awaits us with our chance at glory. If that is where we meet our fall, we can onlyment our own shorings. We will be forced to face our reality, a world where you will eat or be eaten.

    I was met with many simr reactions from all monsters alike, including Shuna and the other girls. They didnt fear losing the battle, they feared the idea of running from it. And in some sense I kind of understood their feelings.

    Then, Id make sure to show them my full support.

    Testarossa, Ultima, Carrera!

    Yes sir!

    The three demonesses stood up in unison and bowed to me.

    Now was the time for me to assign each a mission.

    Apany each corpsmander and assist them!

    Understood, Rimuru-sama. I will leave Cien as our representative on the council. I will personally see this war to the end!

    Its finally my time to shine! Ultima shouted gleefully. Please leave it to me, Rimuru-sama!

    Fufufu, Carrera giggled, you can count on me, milord. I will show you every bit of my power!

    The three of them looked up and replied to my order eagerly.

    I nodded and introduced them to their respectivemanders.

    Testarossa, youll go with Gobta.

    Yes, its my pleasure, replied Testarossa. On the other hand, Gobta looked doubtful, asking: Are you sure? A stranger to the battlefield, like this woman here, aint fit for the First Army, yknow?

    He was treading on some very thin ice.

    Although pretty hypocritical of meI had only recently found out that these girls were, in fact, these fiendish creatures known as primordialsGobtasck of awareness was painful to watch. Youre a dead man if you keep this up, you know? I thought to myself, but kept my mouth shut. It would be more fun to watch this one unfold on its own.

    Ara, youre so dependable, Testarossa mused with a smile, but her eyes gave a chilling re.

    I think Testarossa will forgive you if you apologize, Gobta-kun. And so, I would look forward to the day when Gobta found out who Testarossa really was.

    Gabil, on the other hand, had definitely matured.

    I have a lot of weaknesses, so Im counting on you! he said as he bowed his head to Ultima.

    ording to what I heard from Diablo and various others, Ultima was the most sadistic of the three demon girls. Carrera was the most likely to go on a rampage, but Ultima was the scariest. While she would dutifully follow my orders, she would also seek out loopholes that let her get back at her opponents. Thats the type of person she was.

    Gabil had made the right call here. Ultima seemed to take a liking to him already and replied, Yeah! Im also counting on you! cutely.

    Gabil had always warned himself not to get carried away. It seems that it worked and had saved his life. After all, its important to be mindful of that every day.

    Geld shook hands with Carrera just fine.

    Somehow, I felt that they both shared this warrior spirit, which was why I thought that these two would go well together.

    I was proud of the pairings I made. Had I swapped Gobtas and Gabils partners, things wouldve been looking grim for our goblin friend already.

    Feeling quite pleased with the oue, I gave the three pairs words of encouragement. Barely anyone knew who these threedies really were. This was because a gag order was in ce on everyone who had been at the meeting when Guy showed up. I didnt want anyone to end up frightened, so I had instructed the threedies to keep it on the down low.

    I told them to obey the orders from their corpsmander and not to reveal their true identities, but I was quite concerned over what may happen if they ever snapped. And to think that I couldve gone on in blissful ignorance

    Oh well, I shall trust them.

    Unless I gave them orders, they would be standing by quietly.

    Anyway, with all that said and done, the three pairs were formed. Whatever challenge came their way, I knew they could handle it. I could finally put my mind at ease.

    Thats all we nned to talk about, but is there anything anyone still wants to add?

    The rest would depend on the Empires reaction, so wed have to stay flexible.

    Working with King Gazel was also important, so I had to make some detailed ns with him in advance. However, that was the operation headquarters job. The corpsmanders had their own work cut out for them, so if there were no other pressing matters, we could adjourn the meeting.

    I was about to call it there, when suddenly a hand shot up. It was Masayuki.

    Um, could you give me a moment?

    What is it, Masayuki-kun?

    Err I have a question

    Mm-hmm.

    The fact that you made me a corpsmander aside, you didnt exin what the Volunteer Corps is supposed to do.

    Oh, I forgot about that. He must have quite a few questions. He was still a high schooler, so it made total sense for him to be nervous after being given a corps.

    Had we been in ancient Japan, it wouldve been normal for someone his age to lead an army. For a youngster living in peaceful, modern-day Japan though, I could see how it would be overwhelming.

    It was pretty hard for me too, you know. Before I knew it, I had be a demon lord without a boss to guide me. By contrast, Masayuki was a pretty lucky ducky.

    Dont you think so?

    So please exin!

    Ah, roger that. It was truly a shame I couldnt ry the full extent of my internal monologue. No matter how I said it, it would sound like I was making excuses. It is what it is.

    Oh well. I do feel kinda bad about dropping this huge responsibility on your shoulders.

    Eh, no, I

    However, youre better suited to calm the towns residents than I am.

    If it were just the monsters, then we wouldnt have to worry as much if the war started. Morale was high among them, so no one would try to disturb public order.

    The immigrants were different, though. They might disturb the peace and do not-so-good things because of their fear and anxiety.

    Thats why I need you to help alleviate everyones anxiety, especially now that were going to war.

    I see If thats what you need, my power will be helpful, said Masayuki, seemingly convinced.

    Ha-ha-ha, youre being modest! I, Myourmiles, and everyone else know that you dont want to be partial to one country due to your position as a Hero, Masayuki-sama! But please lend us your strength, for the sake of the powerless people! said Myourmiles, gazing at Masayuki, eyes sparkling. He still had the wrong idea about Masayukis capabilities, but I wasnt one to rain on his parade.

    I mean, even Hinata seemed to have the wrong idea about Masayuki.

    How fearsome you are, Masayuki! Id make sure to keep a keen eye on how the legend of Masayuki would develop during the war.

    Youre right, Masayuki replied begrudgingly. Looking at his expression, I could tell that he was already sick and tired of it. I felt sorry for him, but I wanted him to do his best here.

    Then, I guess I will try to maintain public order with the Volunteer Corps that youve entrusted me with.

    Please. I figure you already know about this, but thanks to Ramiris, I think the damage to the town will be minimal. When the war begins, the n for the urban area on the ground is to iste it within thebyrinth.

    Executives and other relevant parties shouldve already been in the know. There were probably some rumors floating about from the people who werete to the evacuation drill, since I hadnt cracked down on them. The idea being that it would help alleviate some anxiety.

    Uh-huh! While my power is amazing, its all thanks to Mentor!

    Yep, this great feat was achieved by lending Ramiris my super powerful magicules. You could call it a triumph of friendship.

    Thanks to Ramiris, we could iste the town from the outside world, and this was also only possible with Veldoras help. I honestly should thank them both.

    Thank you, you two. You really helped a lot.

    Eh, really? Well, I guess so! You can praise us some more, you know?

    Gah-ha-ha-ha, shes right! You can praise us some more!

    Yeah, yeah. Thank you guys very much!

    A bit of praise goes a long way. And this time I really owed them one.

    Despite being isted in thebyrinth, you could still see the sky, and some of the inhabitants didnt even notice what had happened. They wouldnt witness any of the Imperial Armys violence, which I thought was absolutely wonderful.

    But Rimuru, just keep this in mind, Ramiris warned.

    Hm?

    In the unlikely event that Mentor is defeated and the 100th floor gets conquered, the town will be ejected out of thebyrinth. Its an inevitable reaction to the strain it causes.

    I see, well need to consider that as well. But thats if Veldora loses, right? If such a thing happened, the fate of the town would be the least of our worries.

    In that nightmare scenario, it means we had be engaged in a battle that called for all our strength. No way we could afford to care about the town then.

    Well, theres no way I would lose, anyway.

    Right. We even have the Dungeons Elite Ten, so we dont have to worry about that!

    Indeed, just as Ramiris said, I didnt anticipate Veldora partaking in any action, to begin with. Nevertheless, if pushes to shove

    If that timees, well have Masayuki.

    Huh?! W-wait a minute! the person in question protested. I have epted your request of maintaining order because I think I might be able to do it, but for that situation, what is it that you think I could do?

    Masayuki eximed that he had never even led an army, a feeling we could all sympathize with. Even Myourmiles, who held Masayuki in very high regard, nodded in agreement.

    Dont worry, Masayuki-kun, I said. I dont expect you to be able tomand an army right now. Im currently discussing this with Hinata; I asked her to send us an aide from the Holy Knight Order. Im sure shell grant my request, and if so, that person will help you as your second-inmand.

    Oh, really? Thats a relief.

    One other thing! Im putting you in charge of guarding the kids, so youll be safe and souI mean youll keep them safe and sound!

    Wahahaha! If its Hero-sama that will protect them, they couldnt be in better hands!

    O-of course, Masayuki affirmed as he broke out in a cold sweat.

    He also knew that the kids could hold their own, so he understood that this was for his own protection. Besides, Chloe was going to be there. If the situation turned dire, then she would be there to protect Masayuki and the others.

    That concluded the important topics of this conference.

    We prepared the best we could, but who knows what will happen once the chips are down.

    And I wasnt without worry, myself.

    Chloes memories of my death.

    Right now, there was someone in the Empire strong enough to kill methere was no doubt about that. If that guy appeared, even the Dungeons Elite Ten wouldnt be able to stop them. Wait, on the contrary

    Report. The Dungeons Elite Ten are being used to expose the enemies cards.

    I figured. It seemed like Raphael-sans first priority was my safety. While that did put a smile on my face, I was also determined. No matter what, I would protect my friends. I would never let anyone get hurt in this stupid act called war.

    And on that note, I ended the meeting that day.

    From the looks of it, Masayuki had sessfully persuaded the townsfolk. The scenario became something like He reasoned with the demon lord and made him promise to protect the town.

    Well done, Hero!

    Our savior!

    Masayuki had taken in the praise of the adventurers and immigrants, all with a perturbed look on his face.

    But even with that expression

    That worried crease Hero-samas brow is oh-so handsome!

    Despite pressing a sizable concession from the demon lord, Hero-dono is still not satisfied.

    Indeed. What a refined dignitary.

    This town is protected by Hero-sama, and with Demon Lord Rimuru to back him up, I have nothing to fear from the Empires invasion!

    Yeah! All will be well if we leave everything to him!

    These one-sided interpretations did nothing to slow Masayukis mounting poprity. All the while, his anguish went unnoticed in the public eye.

    As the townsfolk were peacefully going about their days, that fateful day had finallye. The Imperial Army made its appearance. The time of peace hade to an end. Whisked away, like a midsummer nights dream.

    The war had finally begun

 Volume 12 - Epilogue

    Epilogue

    The Emperors Hegemony

    Youre awake, Rudra.

    The words were addressed to a man sat atop his throne, dressed in opulent clothing. The speaker, a beautiful, blue-haired woman, was the Marshal, the one in charge of the meeting hall.

    Yes. How did the meeting go?

    Weve decided to move forward with the expedition.

    Thank you for your hard work. Did Gadra oppose the idea?

    Yes, he did. The old man is very realistic. Weapons from otherworlders cannot rival the True Dragons. There was no way he could not have known that, and it would be silly for him to assume otherwise.

    Hehehe, thats obvious. Nevertheless, we must carry out this great expedition. Thou shalt know that I am the ruler of this world.

    Its what I promised Guy, after all, Rudra whispered. Snapping back to reality he turned and smiled pleasantly.

    By the way, Velgrynd. Tell me, how do you think this expedition will go?

    Velgryndthe name of one of the only four True Dragons of this world. She was the symbol of me, the crimson dragon that wielded zing heat. She was a being even older than Storm Dragon Veldora, and immortal too. Her name was Scorch Dragon Velgrynd.

    There was only one person with this name in the world.

    And it was this beauty who answered Rudras question.

    We will undoubtedly emerge victorious. We shall force the dwarves out of their hideout and crush that new demon lords ego. I will also beat some sense into thatzy, dumb brother of mine and make Guy realize the ruler of this world is Rudrayou!

    She was not a single bit hesitant about calling this name. Indeed, she was Velgrynd. One of the strongest beings, a True DragonScorch Dragon Velgrynd.

    Despite being in the presence of such a majestic being, Rudra continued in a friendly tone: Is that so? That would be wonderful. Do you really think your brother will attack?

    Of course he will, Rudra, she answered immediately. He will definitely show up. That kid likes to get in on the fun. However, I feel that he has yet to return to his prime after his seal was undone. I didnt detect any violent magical storm, like the ones that ravaged thends in the past. In the past, I wouldve felt that aura from any corner of the earth, but now it seems to have disappearedpletely. Perhaps his resurrection was iplete?

    In that case, perhaps my army has a chance against him.

    That would be very fun indeed. That demon lord dares to bribe my foolish brother and deceive my dear niece. I will be sure to punish him properly. At that, the two shared a conspiratorial smile.

    To Rudra and Velgrynd, it did not matter whether the attack n seeded or not. Rudra was ying a game with Guy, and they had wagered the right to rule this world. This game didnt have anyplicated rules. You simply had to use your pawns to overwhelm your opponent. The world was their board, monsters and humans their pawns.

    At first, Guys pawns were monsters and majins, while Rudras were a portion of humanity. They had kept up this game, switching their pieces over the centuries. And now, the game wasing to a head, as the situation on both sides grew chaotic.

    Fundamentally, stealing pawns from each other was fair game. Not to mention, their strongest pawns were their partnersthe True Dragons. There was only one absolute rule in their game: they could only use the aforementioned pawns. In other words, as long as Guy and Rudra did not confront each other directly, they could do whatever they wanted.

    If this world were destroyed, naturally, the game would end. But neither of them wanted that, which was why certain preventative measures needed to be set in ce.

    With that being said, there were certain wild cards in this game. These included the remaining True Dragon, Veldora, and the primordial demons. These wild cards were not directly involved in the game. Whether they were turned into allies or enemies was entirely up to the yers, Guy and Rudra.

    One of Guys pawnshis ally, Demon Lord Leonwas held under constant pressure by Jaune, the Yellow Primordial, in his domain. In the West, any reckless action could bring down the wrath of Violet, the Violet Primordial, who resided there. And in the East, there lurked nc, the White Primordial. These demons were immensely powerful and immortal. It wasnt impossible to wipe them off the board, but it would require careful preparation. As opposed to suffering great casualties, they had a better chance negotiating with them and turning them into allies. It was the best solution. In order to turn the tide in his game with Guy, Rudra and Velgrynd agreed that this was the right option.

    If Velgrynd were to fight by herself, she could even eliminate nc. But this came at a cost and was bound to cause unimaginable damage to the surrounding area. In conclusion, fighting them wasnt a viable method.

    Apart from that, an error in their judgement showed itself: The Western Nations had begun to act with their own ideals and logic. The native religion called Luminism was born in the westernnds and gradually grew into the dominant monotheistic religion. Its authority was solid and unified the people of the West.

    They had already discovered the true identity of Luminas as a demon lord, but it was all toote by then, because the religion had since taken root and wove itself into society. By the time Rudra gainedplete control over the East, the West had begun unifying under a single banner. That was the point at which Guy and Rudras game became locked in a stalemate.

    Because of the active presence of the Heroes Chronoa and Granbell, invading the West became unfeasible. They posed a huge hurdle for us. Had it not been for those meddling Heroes, victory wouldve been yours a long time ago.

    Not necessarily. My path to ruling the world will forever be fraught with intrigueits probably the trial Veldanavaid out for me. That guys always been fond of pranks.

    Yes, indeed. My elder brother really was a handful

    The two of them smiled as they took a moment to relish the nostalgia.

    But the opportunity has arisen, Rudra said. All the necessary pawns are in ce. I will grasp victory soon enough.

    I shall checkmate Guy and sister Velzard this time.

    Hehe, Guy has been waiting for an opportunity, too. If you and Veldora were to fight, surely he would jump at the chance.

    Indeed, how annoying, Velgrynd replied. Had that not been the case, I would have taken care of that child Veldora myself

    She was talking about the failure of thest expedition. Had Velgrynd moved out, Veldora would not have posed a threat. On the flip side, this wouldve made them vulnerable to Guy. If Rudra were to use his strongest pawn, a True Dragon, he needed to have everything prepared perfectly.

    And this was the perfect time to do so. Rudras spies across the world had brought back all sorts of information.

    Even though its been a long timeing, the wait was worth it. Our biggest roadblock to invading the West has been removed.

    The true identity of God Luminas was Demon Lord Luminas. With this knowledge, they could narrow down a ballpark estimate of her strength. Moreover, her demon lord double had died, and the Seven Celestial Sages had fallen too. Plus:

    That Granbell, the roadblock, has passed away. The threat of the Western Nations has been drastically reduced.

    That is indeed the case. Those who dared to stand in my way have met their demise entirely on their own.

    Both of them firmly believed that this had to be a divine revtion preceding Rudras domination of the world.

    By the way, Rudra, how are you doing?

    Perfectly fine. My powerArmy of Angels, Armageddoncan be activated at any time.

    Armageddon was Rudras ultimate trump card. The conditions for its activation were very strict, and once it was triggered, there would be a long wait before this Skill could be called upon once more.

    There was only one reason why the Empire had stayed put until nowthey had been waiting resolutely for the day that Rudra could unleash Armageddon again. Now with the threat of Granbell out of the picture, needless to say, Rudra believed that they would be victorious.

    As for Guy, he still had not been able to control the demon lordspletely. They were uncooperative with each other. All the demon lords did as they pleased. Each of them possessed great influence individually, but they were no threats in Rudras eyes.

    This time, everything is stacked in our favor.

    But do we have enough time? I really want to bring my foolish brother to our side. That way we can use him to deal with Guy. If we could even manage to dispose of my sister, Velzard, then Raine and Mizeri wont stand a chance against us. That brings me to my next question: How is your power of Domination?

    Rest assured. If you could keep Veldora upied on the battlefield, I can use Regalia Dominion to achieveplete control over him.

    A gentle smile emerged on Velgrynds cruel yet beautiful face upon hearing this.

    Ara, then victory is all but guaranteed.

    Naturally. Everything is going just as I nned.

    Wonderful, though I am rather worried about you

    Oh, stop that, he chided. This is the natural order of things. The human body is truly inconvenient

    Rudra

    Sessively inheriting my will and memories each time I reincarnate has taken its toll on my soul. It would be fine if I had some time to rest like Gadra, but that is a forbidden luxury for me. If I were to do that, my power would be sealed again.

    That way, Rudra would have to start over if he wished to unleash his power. If he were to do that during every reincarnation, he would have no chance against Guy. That was why he had been waiting for his power to mature this whole time. Now that he felt his power reaching full strength, the stage was set.

    Despite everything, Rudra was pushing himself quite a bit in order to maintain this state. Not only did this incarnation of him have no empress, he did not even have a concubine. Even though the supposed empress of the Empire was nothing but a title, this was highly abnormal. This meant that no imperial heir was born as a spare for Rudra. Having one wouldnt separate his power. His incarnations were very special; the heir he brought forth would inherit all his power and knowledge. It was the purest form of hereditary monarchyin a sense, it wasnt an heir at all. The imperial heir could be said to be the emperor himself.

    However, he did not do this during the present incarnation. It had to do with the use of Armageddon. If the imperial heir were to inherit his power, his Skills would be limited until he matured to adulthood. Obtaining immense power came with repercussions, and he wouldnt be able to contain it. Even Rudra couldnt hold up against it.

    Yet, right now, this was the best situation theyd chanced upon. All the stars had aligned, and to forfeit the opportunity, solely to reincarnate as the prince would waste yet another decade.

    Rudra did not want that. But this greatly worried Velgrynd. Maintaining his full strength seemed to push Rudras mind to its limit. The duration of his sleep had been shortening and he was often exhausted. Under these circumstances, Rudras soul was wearing away rapidly. If he gave his power to the heir, it would dy the activation of Armageddon, but it would also ease his symptoms. Yet still, he adamantly refused.

    This was his time. He wanted to settle his game against Guy once and for all.

    Velgrynd could not bear to see Rudra like this.

    How much time do you have left, Rudra?

    You dont have to worry. At the very least, I can guarantee you that I will not fall before I conquer this world.

    I-I see. I should have expected that, from you of all people

    Dont be so sad, Velgrynd. When I achieve victory, I shall end this all. Have faith. Simply observe how I dominate this world, Rudra said with an arrogant smile.

    He was the embodiment of a ruler in every sense of the word. He who ruled all and walked the path of hegemony. That was the Hero Emperor Rudra.

    Captivated by Rudras ambition, Velgrynd steeled her resolve. Indeed. Then please look forward to it. Those who stand in the way of your crusade will die in peace. I shall rain mercy down on them! she announced as she gently embraced Rudra.

    The two of them continued to chat well into the night.

    On the following morning, a legion of unprecedented proportions departed from the Empire and began their march on the Tempest Federation. 19

    Notes

    [1]

    Oh? Youre approaching me?

    [2]

    Kanji: Domination of me dragon

    [3]

    Just like they taught us in kindergarten: stop, drop, and roll!

    [4]

    Fuse phrased this weirdly, but essentially, Rimurus value went up in Luminas eyes.

    [5]

    See episode 24 of the animes season 1.

    [6]

    Japanese braised pork dish which literally means square simmered.

    [7]

    The ODA is part of Japans Ministry of Foreign Affairs that assists developing countries

    [8]

    For rification, the author made a wordy on the phrase Knight (Kishin) in Japanese. He named these soldiers of the Empire Kishin but with a different kanji spelling, making it Mecha Soldier.

    [9]

    The Imperial Knights had the ruby text Royal Knights in the original Japanese, which is a misnomer.

    [10]

    Its a popr phrase in Japan. Schools limit the cost of snacks kids may buy or bring on a school trip.

    [11]

    ox-demon

    [12]

    horse-demon, see volume 8.

    [13]

    Greek: Minoss Bull. In Greek mythology, Minos was a king of Crete, and the Minotaur was his wifes son, who she gave birth to after being cursed to fall in love with a bull.

    [14]

    Kanji name: Death Knight Captain

    [15]

    A major is two ranks higher, between them is captain.

    [16]

    American coffee is coffee made with light roasted coffee beans. It is also called American but is different from Americano. In Japanese English, American has been expanded to mean less concentrated.

    [17]

    The word used here is anything rted to magicules, the basis for monsters and magic.

    [18]

    In traditional Japanese aesthetics, wabi-sabi is a world view centered on the eptance of transience and imperfection.

    [19]

    There is, indeed, no afterword for this volume.

 Volume 13 - Prologue

    Prologue: Doubts

    Gadra felt troubled.

    It was mainly for two things.

    The first thing that needed no boration was the identity of the person attempting to kill him.

    I''m surprised that I can''t even detect his breath, there are very few opponents like this. Though in my heart

    I dare not admit it, thought Gadra.

    This was because, if he had guessed correctly, it meant that all of his and Yuuki''s shenanigans were now in the hands of Emperor Rudra.

    No, it''s possible. After all, His Majesty Rudra has lived longer than me and possesses wisdom and power beyond reason. Even if I had foreseen thingsing to this and prepared for it decades ago, it would not be a surprise. However, in this way

    Now that he had left the Empire it was a different matter, but it was assumed that Yuuki would be in danger. Thats what Gadra believed.

    So, what''s next? Should I warn Yuuki? Or just leave it alone? That''s the problem.

    The two of them weren''tpletely unfriendly with one another, and he was personally quite fond of Yuuki. But even if Gadra felt that way, he was now on Rimurus side. That could not be taken lightly.

    Instead of worrying about that here, there was another option, and that was to exin everything to Rimuru and go to him first. However, if he revealed such uncertainties and he was wrong about everything, Rimuru''s trust in him might fall apart.

    After all, Gadra had betrayed the Empire. If his credibility continued to decline, it would affect Gadra''s position in the future.

    Part of that was taken into consideration here, and that''s why Gadra still hadnt put it into action.

    Furthermore

    There was a second doubt that messed with Gadra''s thoughts.

    That face, that domineering airit was certainly true, just like His Majesty Rudra. However, seeing how he didn''t falter in the slightest, and how he really seemed to know nothing about itIt didn''t feel like he was pretending to be him, but

    Under normal circumstances, Emperor Rudra could not have been in that location.

    Whichever way one looked at it, no other correct answer could be foundthis was the conclusion that Gadra drew.

    In that case, that person was really just someone else who looked a lot like Rudra.

    If that man was His Majesty Rudrano, that''s a stupid thing to say. What''s more important now is that the person who assassinated me is definitely that guy. If that''s the case, Yuuki is in danger. If I didn''t give a little warning, I would probably have a bad conscience. In that case, Ill report to Lord Rimuru as well.

    As a result, Gadra decided to put friendship at the forefront.

    Other people''s opinions of him might falter, but that wouldnt hurt.

    In this country, strength is everything. For Gadra, the weak are the strongest.

    He came to that conclusion and put it into practice immediately.

    Its me, Yuuki. A word of advice to you. Actually

    It didnt matter if it was now convenient for the other side, Gadra unterally made his point.

    Hey, hey, hey, this is so sudden.

    No way. Just put yourself in my shoes, too. Lord Rimuru may be suspicious of this matter, so I don''t have time to discuss it with you here. I will work in my own way, so you too must be careful not to be taken advantage of in secret. (***Gadra seems to have a habit of referring to himself as this old man

    but I just switched to the word I because it didnt flow well in english) After that, Gadra ended his "magicmunication" with Yuuki. Then he went forward and reported to Rimuru.

    The reporting, liaising and negotiating were now done.

    After such a decisive movements, Gadra deserved to be called an expert in training ministries

    ***

    So the old man is safe and sound. And the situation is so good that he seems to have run off to join Mr.

    Rimuru''s side.

    Yuuki looked out the window and smiled bitterly.

    It had been raining today, and it was foggy outside the windows. However, Yuuki''s eyes still urately caught the suspicious figure that used the rain to hide his tracks.

    That move looked well trained and must have been monitoring Yuuki''s movements. Despite discovering it, Yuuki only had a smile on his face.

    Seeing Yuuki like this, the other figure in the room, Kagali, responded.

    Are you talking about Gadra? That''s for sure. Even I, a former Demon Lord, looked at him and thought that the old man was too cunning to take lightly. So it''s better for us to just help each other.

    Yuuki echoed Kagali''s statement.

    Yeah. It is thanks to that old man that we have this status. And he also seems to have brought us quite the favorable information this time.

    If it was Gadra, he would have brought favorable intelligence from the Jura Tempest Federation. Yuuki calcted as such.

    There is a fake "hero" named Chronoa. It is not yet known whether the man is alive or dead. Since Rimuru was safe and sound, the other party must have been knocked down

    If Rimuru absorbed this tyrannical force, word would have surely spread somewhere. Yet nothing was heard at all about this.

    There is also no mention in Gadra''s report, which suggested that the other party may be dead. So Yuuki thought about it for a moment, thinking that perhaps he was worrying too much.

    The immediate issue that must be confronted was the urgent message from Gadra.

    Oh, yeah. So what did Gadra tell you?

    He says Masayuki looks exactly like the Emperor Rudra

    What?

    Kagali unitentionally asked back in an unpolished tone as soon as she heard, which made Yuuki show a bitter smile. This was because he thought he probably had the same reaction himself when he suddenly heard something like this.

    It''s a mystery, isn''t it? On the one hand I felt like the old man was saying something silly, but on the other hand it didn''t feel like a joke at all. However, the emperor pretending to be Masayukiits hard to deny thatpletely

    The smile on Yuuki''s face disappeared as he thought about his encounter with Masayuki.

    In retrospect, Masayuki was not called to this world. He had told him, As soon as I looked over, I was here. Yuuki originally thought he might be an "otherworldly visitor" who came to this world by chance

    I cant find any evidence that Masayuki is "from the other world". If magic or skills work

    He was about to think in a different direction when Yuuki''s thoughts suddenly stopped. He began to think of something else, and the next thing he knew, he was speaking out.

    Forget it. It''s more important now to keep an eye on our gang.

    Geez, it''s been a long time since we''ve had such an interesting conversation. Still, what you said is true. I''m always being watched, and I''m a little out of breath.

    Right? This would put a damper on our ns, and until then it seems necessary to abandon everything else."

    How can you say that?

    I mean it literally. If what gramps says is true, then we can say that we are in a crisis.

    If Gadra''s words were true, it would not be good to send out the hybrid legions that were beingid out against the Dwarven Kingdom. How that will y out in the futureno, before that theyd have to decide who was friend and who was foe. Maybe theyd have to go back and start all over.

    That''s what Yuuki was forced to think.

    so it is. In that case, there''s really no time to think about that kid right now.

    Kagali didn''t doubt Yuuki''s words.

    If Yuuki thought there was danger, then there was no doubt about it.

    Gadra wanted to see the emperor, but I heard he was assassinated from behind in that ce.

    Wasn''t it Kondo?

    The person who asked this was Kagali, who then went on to deny it herself.

    No. Who else but Kondo could have killed Gadra, but if it was the Double 0 number that never shows up, it wouldn''t be surprising if there was an unknown genius among them.

    That said, if Tatsuya Kondo really did it, then it would be only natural that Yuuki wouldn''t be surprised.

    I think so, too. But there were other reasons why I was surprised. It was Gadra who said that he probably guessed who the prisoner was.

    The room fell silent at once.

    Kagali exhaled and stared into Yuuki''s eyes, questioning him.

    does it mean that the other person is someone we also know well?

    Kagali gestured with her eyes to stop Yuuki from talking about him.

    Still with a bitter smile, Yuuki nodded lightly.

    It''s unbelievable, but it is what it is. Of course, it''s also possible that the old man thought wrong. But it''s not something that can be brought up simply by admitting the wrong person.

    Kagali opened her eyes wide.

    "Does that mean that the other side is important among partners?

    The smile on her face disappearedpletely.

    Exactly."

    Yuuki nodded.

    In contrast to Kagali, Yuuki''s smile deepened as she replied.

    So the name of the traitor is

 Volume 13 - Ch 1

    A month has passed since the gathered executives had met.

    Today, I was also in the Control Room monitoring the movements of the Empire.

    Since this was the staging ground for all of our intelligence, Benimaru and I could practically say we moved in here.

    We really only left to our homes at night.

    If left unattended, this would likely turn into a secret base for Veldora and Ramiris. It was a ce I had been building for a long time, and had put to good use.

    Benimaru also cleaned up after himself, so I think he had all but actually returned to his room. I don''t even need to worry about such things, but with the battleing up, it would be bad if the Great General fell.

    The "control room" was usually manned by staff. When we were at war we would work round-the-clock shifts, taking three shifts.

    This was to prevent everyone from sticking their heads up too hard.

    It is important to manage your own health, and this was the only thing that needed to be thoroughly implemented. Still, the one person I didnt even need to worry about with that kind of thing was our ally, Veldora-kun.

    And then there was Ramiris.

    Those two would rest and rx without me needing to say anything. Rather, it should be said that they would also go AWOL.

    At first they were excited that the war was about to start, but when it turned out that there was no movement after a month, they looked as if they werepletely tired of everything. By now they had returned to their research and were saying capricious things, telling us to just wait for something to happen before notifying them.

    It''s just as well. It they were here they would only cause trouble, so I decided to just go along with them.

    So thats the situation. The only group of people here at the moment were me, Benimaru, and Souei.

    Then, there were my secretaries, Shion and Diablo.

    I also cant forget the other number one, Geld, who was there too. However, it kept some other projects at a standstill, which made me sad. I''d really like to get the war over with before Miss Frey gets mad.

    But in the end, its up to the opponent to make the first move.

    In this war, the side that attacks first takes the reins. If the other side doesn''t fight, even if they want to fight with the other side, they can''t fight.

    It was originally thought that the Imperial Magic Tank Force would attack in almost twenty days or so, but the invasion turned out to be slower than expected. It should be said that they were deliberately slowing down and making a deliberate show of their majesty when they entered.

    I was always watching them with my own Argos, but some of them haven''t even seen a magic tank, so they looked like evil demons.

    Monsters would also fear those huge and vicious opponents. Even the sub-A level monsters that lived in the forest fled from their marching range because they were afraid of the Imperial Army.

    As for where the Imperial Army was currently, they had just crossed the border.

    Forced entry into our bordersa matter that was totally ipatible with internationalw asid down by the Western Council, but the enemy empire did not take rules seriously. Nowadays, the most important thing was how to apply them and make them strategically valuable.

    We could actually use this as a reason for us tounch a surprise attackbut I still felt that we should at least consult with each other.

    It also seemed likely that the Imperial side would persuade us to surrender and hold off on attacking for the time being until that momentes.

    I think the other side is naive, but we''re not ready for that either. It should be a showdown afterwards anyway, so there''s no need for us to sneak around.

    In this way, Benimaru also expressed his approval with a leisurely attitude.

    I was relieved that preparations for war against the Empire could indeed be made.

    Immediately following, the days that we had been waiting were finallying to an end.

    The Imperial side had stopped and started toy out their formations.

    The Imperial Army was not stupid either. It seems that they had no intention of fighting us squarely from the beginning. Other than the magic tank units, the other infantry squads were marching towards the forest one after another.

    The total number was about 70% of the entire strength of the Empireup to 700,000.

    Although we already knew this, I would review once more.

    Looks like this is their main force.

    Should be. While using the Magic Tank Force as a front, the real purpose is actually to suppress the Dwarven Legion, right?

    So it seems. Is it to avoid being pinned from behind in an attack on our country? It is clear that such arge army is well prepared, but they are still very careful in their actions.

    The reason why the magic tank forces seemed to be moving so slowly was really not just to demonstrate their majesty. There was another, more important purpose, and until their main forces, the infantry, was assembled, they seemed to want to attract our attention by using the magic tank force.

    It''s just that the other side''s attempts have already reached us. With intelligence, we can umte so many advantages.

    While saying that, Benimaru smiled wryly.

    Kufufufufu. It''s true, Lord Rimuru. Everything is under your controlthats how it is!

    Diablo came over to us and was about to do that whole Lord Rimuru is the best'' thing. Id gotten used to it, so I just nodded and said I guess.

    With the right know-hows, it''s actually easy to deal with Diablo.

    As for that group of Imperial infantry, we seem to underestimate each other''s threatening nature a bit.

    It seems that all of them are quite skilled, and none of them could keep up with the others and went to gather at a ce thirty kilometers away from the capital ''Rimuru''. They camped there, and set upmand posts.

    Souei said this in order to get more attention and to exin the current situation to us. Plus, there was Moss to bring us information with impable uracy. I also used my "Argos" for reinforcement, and even the enemy''s strength was visible.

    It''s unnatural, isn''t it, that we don''t react when we''re all close to each others throats?

    No, not necessarily. Those guys believe that they are better than us and believe that their actions have gonepletely unnoticed by us. Theyve underestimated us and must be preparing to act immediately after persuading us to surrender.

    Kufufufufu. I think so too. I would like to add to Mr. Benimaru''sment that this thirty kilometers is a wonderful distance. If it is monitored by magic, the farther away the uracy decreases. Combined with the magic used to unleash interference through Legion magic, that area would bepletely turned into a safe zone. The other side should believe that they can do that. But the funny thing is, I think that''s all those guys can do.

    It seems my worries are just unfounded.

    There must be some kind of trap behind thisck of action on our partthat was what the Imperial Army thought while pushing in this direction, so even now, the enemy thinks we must not be able to see through them.

    In that case, all that was left to worry about was how strong the enemy''s army actually was.

    By the way, Souei, how strong are the enemy soldiers?

    Souei deliberately emphasized that the other party was extremely threatening, that should mean only the strong ones. Depending on his answer, it might be necessary to revisit the operational n.

    From an average evaluation, any grade that trantes into human terms is equivalent to a B grade.

    There is no shortage of people in the upper echelons who are above A, and those in the lower echelons who are not below C+. Even whenpared to the Knights of the Western countries, they seem to be very good.

    The opponent''s fighting power was beyond imagination.

    In this world, however, it''s more about quality than quantity when ites tobat, and a B-grade is pretty good, but sometimes an A-grade person alone can be more dangerous.

    While this is true, but the power of the group as a whole still cannot be underestimated.

    And there are absolutely no casual drafters among them, all of them are professional soldiers?

    Yes. They are well trained and considered the quality of their weapons and defenses, coupled with their tactics, each of which seemed to surpass the Order of the Western Powers. Even with Benimaru and his ''ck me Jail, it might still be difficult to prate those guys'' magic defense.

    ording to Souei, the enemy army unleashed legion magic from time to time. The level of the standard can only be described as very high, thebinedbat power of each team is equivalent to rank A.

    The hobgoblins were the same way, tacit troops are tricky. It''s not just adding up everyone''s strength, sometimes it even has a multiplier effect.

    If every twenty was equivalent to an A-grade, that''s 35,000 A-grade opponents to deal with simply by calction. Seriously, that is not to be underestimated. They are very dangerous opponents.

    But it should be fine. That''s the reason for using the maze.

    Kufufufufu. Just let them spread out within the maze and easily break through before the enemy could fully muster their strength. Everything is as Lord Rimuru has predicted, that''s how it is.

    Actually, it''s not.

    But in the end, it was the right choice tounch an attack inside thebyrinth, but depending on the enemy''s strength Huh, wait?

    Thinking about this side of the story made me realize something.

    No matter how strong the opponentes at us, this meet-and-greet battle wille in handy. Bying to the maze, we are able to spread the other''s war power and keep our own war power concentrated.

    So the truth of the matter is that if they really want to go through the maze, they can only rely on a few elite challengers.

    I thought this to myself, not to be outdone by Master Raphael, the King of Wisdom.

    I''m d to see them on our side. (***Not positive, but I think he is referring to Ramiris who created thebyrinth)

    I couldn''t help but murmur, and Benimaru was quite sympathetic.

    It will prevent the town from suffering, and will also make it easier for the war to move in our favor.

    Standing in the position ofmanding an army, thest thing I want is to make an enemy of her.

    It''s only because Ramiris isn''t here now that I canpliment her from the bottom of my heart. If it was apliment to her face, she''d get carried away for a while and show it off, which would be annoying.

    These things aside for now

    We shouldn''t have any problems on our side, but we don''t know what''s going on with Gobta and the others.

    There were several big screens in the control room, and my magic was shining through them. And of course there was a broadcast of the scene near the Dwarven Kingdom above.

    There were two thousand magic tanks lined up neatly.

    Theyout here was no exception, which tranted into a distance of about thirty kilometers from the central metropolis of Dwargon (St. Doran). This unbiased location is what we had anticipated.

    What matters is the performance of the magic tank. Its muzzle is facing the front door, which I had visited several times.

    The Imperial-developed Magic Guided Tank seems to be a step up in performancepared to the magic tanks I know of. Maybe the range of the magic tank is better than my native world military tank.

    At such a distance, there should be no way for the shells to hit

    In the square just inside that gate there were people like Gobta and Gabil standing by.

    Gobta and Gabil led their respective legions in their mission. The asional battle with the enemy was not frequent, and the people who stayed in the hotel town took refuge.

    We also went as nned and sent reinforcements to rendezvous with the Dwarven Kingdom.

    The two army chiefs, Gobta and Gabil, have entered the Dwarven kingdom. Either way, it''s a matter of fighting with each other, and the other side is not taking away ourmand.

    Gazel had already promised this, so I wasn''t worried, and it looked like the military units of the Dwarven Kingdom had indeed kept their word.

    That should make it all right.

    Although there is still some unease about us joining forces with the Dwarven Armybut as long as we let Tempest attack and ask the Dwarven Army to take over the defensive duties thoroughly, there should be no problem.

    Confusion in the chain ofmand is a problem in military operations. In order for legions of different nationalities to join forces to fight, as they did this time, it must first be decided which side of the order will take precedence.

    If it was Benimaru, he could interfere forcibly by using his unique skill, "Generalissimo". Even if he was in a difficult position to distinguish between the enemy and himself on the battlefield, as long as he had this skill, everyone else would not have to worry about their own people fighting amongst themselves.

    Adding in the Dwarven Legion in this case, there was the potential for chaos. That''s why we came to the conclusion that it was more efficient to share the responsibility for offense and defense.

    Just to be on the safe side, maybe it''s better to talk to Gazel again.

    That''s true. Now that the empire has beenid out, it won''t be long before the war begins. It''s almost time for us to get on the battlefield, so we''d better get in touch with King Gazel and make a final confirmation.

    It looks like Benimaru agreed with me.

    With that in mind, I hurriedly reached for the newly set contact device".

    ***

    The so-called contact device" was a magicalmunication machine sessfully developed by Vesta.

    The great thing was that not only audio information, but also visual information could be transmitted.

    The contact device" had the shape of aputer. It looked like a screen plus a mouse and a keyboard.

    And it wasnt a mouse, it was actually a palm-sized crystal ball that could be activated by touching it.

    Then, you could specify your options with the engravings on the keyboard to contact someone.

    The construction was simple and everyone could use it.

    But there were also inconveniences.

    I just said that it was visual information, but it was actually mind power reyed in the brain. When you activated something like this by holding the contact device", what you think will be conveyed to the other person.

    The principle is the same as that of Communication Network". I''m so used to it that I can remove distractions, but people who aren''t used to it might shed unnecessary intelligence.

    If one was thinking of something evil in one''s mind, they may identally convey it to the other side, which was one of the risks.

    There must be no evil intent. I can''t help but think that I really don''t rmend using this machine to chase girls.

    For the average person with no mental training, it''s better to just use the talk function.

    In short, thisponent is expected to improve in the future.

    Hello, Hello, I''m Rimuru. Is His Majesty Gazel here?

    I also take it for granted in this world that I say "hello hello". This has be habitual and natural, so I do it up without a doubt (***Rimuru is saying moshi moshi which is a japanese phone greeting that roughly trantes to hello hello).

    What''s interesting is that this evolved into the new rule when using the contact device".

    Hello, Hello, this is for His Majesty Gazel. Could you please wait on the line for a moment?

    Okay.

    One could sense that someone on the other side of the contact device" was fumbling with his hands.

    The other party seemed to be trained to be in charge, but fell into a panic upon hearing my name.

    If the head of thepany we do business with called out of the blue, then perhaps even I would be rmed. I should be more considerate of the other person.

    It''s rude to ask Lord Rimuru to wait!

    Shion said this statement with an exasperated look. I think that was supposed to be the secretary''s job, but what Shion said was to not touch the contact device".

    The reason couldn''t be simpler, it was because she didn''t know how to use it.

    It seems a little wrong to say she doesn''t know how to use it. No matter how many times I taught her how to use it, it would cause more damage due to Shion''s overpowering ''Numinous Power''.

    After that, Shion used the contact device" like a hot potato. She didn''t even have the qualifications toin.

    Personally, I don''t think I need to rely on this kind of thing, I just need to meet directly through ''space transfer''. Why don''t you bring King Gazel here?

    Diablo was also there to make his own outrageous remarks, which were not even negotiable. The other party also had his own schedule and should make an appointment with the other party first to not be rude.

    This time it was me who sought out Gazel without an appointment, and it was me who was to me.

    The other side just wanted me to wait for a reasonable moment, how can I get angry because of this?

    It''s hard not to panic when Rimuru-sama is suddenly talking to them. I sympathize with the person in charge.

    Hearing Geld say that, I wished Shion and Diablo could emte him.

    Waiting less than three minutes, Gazel responded.

    I''ve kept you waiting. I was thinking that it was about time to contact you, too.

    Gazel''s voice came from the microphone attached to the screen.

    There was no image. I personally had the King of Wisdom, Master Raphael, to help manage and can pick the images that want to be shown. But Gazel doesn''t seem to be used to it yet, so I guess the only way is to use the call function. It''s a smart choice.

    That''s great. I''m looking for you to make a final confirmation of the sharing of tasks in a joint fight.

    Hmm. It''s also important, but before that, let me tell you one thing. Our gate to the east of the city of Dwargon (Isthmus) has been blocked by the Imperial Army.

    It was just like Gadra said.

    This was the legion led by Yuuki.

    I have captured the image. Ill pass it on to you.

    I aimed the Argos at the Empire''s territory. In addition to the distance, there was also the magical obstruction caused by the "barrier", and those images were not very distinct. Even so it was possible to see a certain group blocking off the street that stretched out from East.

    Just like you said. When I heard that the enemy would rebel, I suspected that it was a trap, so it seemed more or less credible.

    No, not necessarily. Gadra may have been disillusioned with the Empire, but we still couldn''t trust the guy one hundred percent. And sometimes he can be taken advantage of without realizing it, so it''s best not to take it lightly.

    Well, that''s a good one! Just because you can see that, that''s a big deal.

    Gazel said and smiled happily.

    It seems like he''s testing me to see if I was taking things lightly, but really, he was still the same as usual, trying to y up his senior brother status.

    Thats right, Rimuru. We have sent emissaries to the Empire, but they seem to be talking him out of it.

    We in Dwargon, byw, use preemptive attacks as ast resort. As detrimental as that was, as long as it was still a day of dwarven pride, we would have to wait for the Empire to strike. And you don''t have to go along with this. What are your ns?

    Gazel collected his smile and said this with a look of unsuspecting intent.

    What would he do if he could tell what was going on behind his back?

    I looked over to Benimaru. Immediately afterwards, Benimaru also smiled and looked back at me with those eyes.

    Communicating without words, we already understood what the other meant.

    I sighed and said, Got it, then sat back down and faced the screen again. Looking at the empty image, I informed in a serious tone.

    The Imperial Army has invaded our territory without our consent. This must not sit idly by, and my country even intends to resort to military means and consider a strong response. That''s why I wanted to check with our allies, your country, beforehand, to see if you''d like to follow suit.

    That''s about all there is to say.

    Benimaru looked satisfied.

    Shion nodded her head.

    Geld shivered with excitement, and Diablo was all gleeful, jotting down some notes in his hand.

    I wasnt sure what was being recorded, or what he was going to do with those, but it was certainly not a big deal. I decided to dispose of thoseter, while waiting for Gazel to respond.

    Well, youre starting to look like a king. That''s good. You''ve been trying to meet them there since the beginning, haven''t you?

    Of course. Considering the damage that would be done to the town, we could actually fight on the edge of our borders as well. In this way, however, the opponent mayter im that this is a legitimate defense against monster aggression. By being on our territory, it would prevent them from making such statements and would also create a sense of crisis in the West. Besides, the inhabitants have taken refuge without incident, and the enemy has prated so deeply into our country that we can be justified in going all out.

    Hahahahaha! It''s good to know how to use what you have, but you''ll lose points for saying it.

    Gazel smiled and said those words.

    ''You''re the one who started it, so why are you talking so hard? I didn''t realize his words had a follow-up.

    Having said that, a King does not like to beat about the bush. The military, in particr, is prone to trouble if misunderstandings arise. So I''ll be clear with you. The work of negotiating with the Empire was left to the Jura Tempest Federation. After that, if you decide to go to war, we, the "Armed Powers of Dwargon", will take part in the war as the Tempest allies. To avoid chaos in the chain ofmand duringbat, we at Deva Heights will only be in charge of defense from beginning to end, no problem?

    Wow, the answer was clearer than I thought.

    The Dwarven kingdom must remain absolutely neutral, so I imagine that if others are not encroaching on their territory, they will most likely not be able to do so casually. Benimaru and I had long thought that things might turn out this way, so I wasn''t surprised and epted the offer.

    Thank you. Having you say that makes me feel more confident.

    Come now. You knew from the beginning that it was going to go in that direction. In short, it was the most feasible tactic, and with the Allies in crisis, it was enough in that name. If you have any problems, you don''t have toe to me.

    Oops, really good and reliable.

    We''re backed up by a thousand years of undefeated Deva Heights. If the defeat is not such that there is nowhere to run, then this alone will give us peace of mind to fight.

    In that case, we will send the messenger ording to the n.

    In order to defend the center and the east, our country must divide our army in two ways. It is also more appropriate for our position to be thoroughly defensive. By the way, you guys be more careful.

    Regarding the new type of weapon you call a "magic tank", itsbat power is unknown. Looking at the Imperial Army equipment one would think that the era of using swords might being to an end. We are tantamount to putting a dangerous task on you, so forgive us.

    Gazel was probably worried about us and said this to me.

    Indeed, that is hardly reassuring. As Gazel said, the performance of the Magic Tank is unknown.

    So, while I don''t think it''s necessary, it''s important to warn Gazel first.

    As far as I know, the world I used to live in also had weapons called tanks. It was to make the gunpowder explode, and by this force the shells were sent flying. The principle is simple, but the construction isplex. The power of the shell, the range, the uracy of the hit, whatever it was, seemed to be impressive. As for the Magic Tank developed by the Empire, if its construction is simr to that of this type of military tank. It is likely to be impossible to deal with the current tactics.

    Gazel was right, the age of using the sword was probablying to an end.

    That is likely to lead to an even more gruesome battlefield.

    What if the projectiles were fired not by gunpowder but by magic power?

    I once had Master Raphael, the King of Wisdom, run simtions against this part, and the results were terrible. Depending on the type of magic, it seems to be able to produce high-powered magic cannonballs, which are even better than the military tanks that had been the result of modern science.

    And it was still a mass weapon

    So the "defensive barrier" against magic will be useless?

    That''s what it''s all about. It''s not just the "defensive barrier", it''s probably also the "magic barrier". Not only that, but we have envisioned those things to be incredibly powerful, so to merge the use of ''earth wall generation'' or ''tectonic strengthening'', it is best to form a double or triple defense through trenches or earth walls.

    It''s true. Is everyone thinking the same thing? In order to cope with the new era, we are also working on the development of "Magic Armor". While getting jumped on by others,ining isn''t the way to go here. So what are our chances?

    It''s a hard question to answer.

    So that''s all I can say.

    Don''t worry about winning, we have to win! That''s all I can say.

    It wasn''t just Gazel, this statement seemed to satisfy my partner as well.

    Heheheheheh! You''re a reliable guy. I wish you a sessful start.

    Okay, I''ll take care of it!

    Finally we finished this conversation and my call with Gazel ended.

    In terms of final confirmation, that was a pretty good result.

    Shouldn''t that be enough to make sure?

    Thats good enough. It means he has promised to let us go ahead and do it.

    After hearing Benimaru''s response, I nodded.

    The time hade.

    Now, we don''t have to wait for the Empire toe out. We''re ready for it too, so let''s make this war official.

    We were on the side of justice.

    Within my monster territorydeep within the great forest of Jurathe footsteps of the Imperial Army''s invasion hav set foot here. This was already a fact that could not be denied.

    Next, we would be careful not to let the other party that we have seen through everything, and pretend that we are in a panic to formte a countermeasure while dealing with them.

    So now its about who to send over.

    Gobta and Gabilcked a few things, and above all they were unfit to deal with people.

    Especially Gabilthinking back to the moment I first met him, it felt unfit to send him as a messenger.

    And so, there was only one person left.

    I decided to send Testarossa.

    Well, if it was her, even if the Empire attacked indiscriminately, there was no need to worry that she would die.

    Even though it was all staged, it was time to negotiate a deal with the other party.

    It was also possible to preemptively say nothing, but a Demon Lord is also big on theatrics.

    Thinking about this, in order to give the key order, Iunched the Communication Network,

    ***

    It was at the time when Rimuru spoke to Gazel through the contact device".

    Gathered inside the gates of the Dwarven Kingdom were about fifteen thousand soldiers, the First Legion led by Gobta (about twelve thousand), and the Third Legion led by Gabil (about three thousand).

    Instead of going inside the cave, they camped in the za at the outer edge.

    The inhabitants of the hotel town had all gone to shelter without incident and were currently watching the movements of the Empire.

    The Empire had not yet sent emissaries to visit, nor had they induced surrender. However, those gathered at the scene were vaguely aware of the impending war between the two sides.

    The Dwarven legions were also quick to prepare for the war.

    The Dwarf Pce Knights had seven units, two of which were working units and magic support units, and the generals on the team were reinforcing themselves against the gates, as well as building temporary defensive walls.

    That earthen wall was built with earthen magic, and with the addition of fire magic, it would gain more strength than brickwork in a blink of an eye. It is then further strengthened to create a defensive wall like a brass and iron wall.

    These operations flew and went well, and when a triple defensive wall was constructed on the outside of the gate, the heavily armed strike force came out at this time.

    The generals of the heavily-armed strike force had magical equipment all over their bodies, but were very different from their appearance, forming a whole formation with sharp movements.

    Presumably things had taken a turn for the worse.

    Yet Gobta and the rest didn''t care.

    Not bothering with the busy dwarves, the members of the First and Third Legions rested individually.

    As for Gobta and Gabil, they were about to sit down nicely on the ground to eat.

    A set of tables and chairs were somehow prepared next to it, even a luxurious parasol. Sitting in those pristine white chairs were none other than Testarossa and Ultima.

    They were drinking tea.

    The man who served them looked like a butler, and this man was Veyron. Externally, he looked to be an old man with a straight back and a very nice posture, standing up straight like a statue.

    This is so good! What lovely cuisine. I personally love it!

    Mmm! I am also content. The taste is fantastic, the more you chew it, the more vor it has, the better it is!

    That said, Gobta and the others were eating a meal prepared by Zonda, an attendant of Ultima. Taking the boned meat whole and grilling it, then seasoning it only with salt paste and herbs. It wasn''t a meal, it was a dish that Zonda had made by going on a hunt and bringing back the prey.

    Its a great blessing for us cooks to hear the two army chiefs say so. I''m particrly good at making pce cuisine, but not at cooking this kind of food for camping. Please forgive me if I''m rude.

    With a graceful bow when Zonda finished, he returned to Ultima''s side to stand by.

    The chef''s outfit he wore was a two-piece style, a special cloth from Shuna. A silk weave from the Hell Moth is processed and then dyed with a mauve that is the same color as Zonda''s hair.

    The people here wear armor and military uniforms, so Zonda is particrly conspicuous.

    Even Testarossa and Ultima wore specially made military uniforms. Testarossa wore trousers and Ultima wore a skirt, and although there was a difference, it was undoubtedly a military uniform. Zonda was, of course, particrly conspicuous.

    Zonda''s demeanor was so calm and introverted that it didn''t match the battlefield, and even gave the impression that he was a gentleman, however, he was an indispensable figure. His instruction in cooking on the battlefield had grabbed everyone''s stomach.

    On top of that, he was an attendant of Ultima, which was one of the reasons Zonda was free to act.

    Ultima herself had a free-spirited personality, and as a consultative subject of the Gabil''s army chief, she uses that authority to the fullest. Such a dignified attitude did not take the bitterness spewed out by other magical creatures seriously at all.

    In the Jura Tempest Federation, Ultima was already a celebrity. Few would dare to question her.

    This is not to my liking. There are also very few items, I wish there was more variety.

    I agree. Either it is simply grilled or cooked into a fondue pot, which seems a bitzy. It''s been a long time since I''ve met Ms. Shuna and Mr. Yoshida. I hope you hone your craft more so that it will be more beneficial to me.

    Unlike the raving Gobta and Gabil, Testarossa and Ultima gave negative reviews.

    I apologize.

    Zonda immediately gave thanks. But Gabil said to Zonda.

    No, no, no, Mr. Zonda. I think Miss Ultima recognizes Mr. Zonda''s handiwork, too! It''s not really the taste that''s the problem.

    Gabil suddenly uttered such a sentence and the eyes of all present became fixed on him.

    Testarossa showed a look of interest.

    His words were denied and Ultima was displeased.

    Zonda was in a panic, afraid he would displease his master.

    Veyron looked nd and did not reveal his emotions.

    It was at this point that Gobta, who did not know how to read the atmosphere, asked a question.

    What does that mean?

    Good question, Mr. Gobta! It''s actually nothing. Even I was often scolded by my sister. She wants me to look at things more in a female mood.

    So what exactly does that mean?

    Gobta gorged on the meat while asking questions.

    That''s what it means, Mr. Gobta. If it''s us, we can dine like this without looking at the others. But Miss Testarossa and Miss Ultima can''t be like us, can they?

    Hearing this side, Zonda understood the meaning of Gabil''s words and at the same time dawned on him.

    Since they didn''t need to eat at all when they hadn''t acquired flesh before, something so basic had been overlooked by him, which made sense.

    The discovery of so-called cuisine does not mean that taste is everything.

    Oh, it''s not like Mr. Gabil to have such a great opinion!

    Thank you, I''ve been working on it too. That being said, this is actually sold from Lord Rimuru''s side

    Speaking of this side, Gabil began to talk about what had happened not long ago when he went to consult with Rimuru

    I also want to be as popr with women as Lord Rimuruwhat should I do?

    Asking me something like that? I''m also no, nothing. Gabil, let me teach you a trick or two. If you want to be popr with women, you have to know how topare your heart to her heart. In this way, I think the other person will naturally feel good about it.

    Gabil proudly said he once had such a conversation with Rimuru.

    Then I remembered what that Souka said. What Lord Rimuru was trying to say was, Don''t do things that would make the other person hate youthats when I realized that it turned out to be so basic!

    Listening to Gabil''s headline, everyone felt a sense of admiration.

    They thought to themselves, You''re worthy of the name Rimuru.

    If he had heard this conversation himself, he would have nched, but fortunately, Rimuru was not there. So no one was going to stop Gabil from making a big deal out of it alone.

    I''m sorry, Lady Ultima, and Lady Testarossa. We''ll definitely work harder next time and serve the dishes you expect.

    With a beautiful gesture of a bow, Zonda came in front of Ultima and Testarossa and next knelt down to say the words.

    "Oh, what a good servant you have. Byparison, my servants are

    What are you talking about? As far as I''m concerned, Moss seems pretty handy too. And Cien, being able to hand over the job of agent means he''s good at paperwork, right? The servants under me are better at physicalbor, and I envy having servants who can take care of those chores.

    That''s true, perhaps you are right. It''s futile to ask for something that you don''t have.

    As if not seeing Zonda, who was kneeling on the ground, out of sight, Testarossa and Ultima continued to talk. That attitude looked cold in the eyes of Gobta and others, but in fact it was just the opposite.

    They were the pinnacle of all demons, and it seems to them that it is rare for them to praise others, or even to care about them. Knowing this, Veyron and Zonda, who became the subject of the chat, were very nervous.

    At the same time, realizing that the masters were giving recognition, the mood became so intense that even their souls seemed to be burning.

    Yet there were still those who could not detect such an atmosphere.

    That man was Gobta.

    It''s always a problem for girls. That''s what it means, simply to be able to cut it into bite sized pieces and serve it better when you serve it. And I understand what Mr. Gabil is saying, but seriously, that''s a pain in the ass!

    Mr. Gobta, even if you have that thought, you can''t say it. This is the first step to bing a gentleman. I learned this from Lord Rimuru''s words.

    Geez, I know that. But this is a battlefield. Eat when you can, and don''t be too extravagant about it.

    That''s the right attitude to have at a time like this, and that''s what I thought when I was in charge by being the army chief!

    As long as there''s something to eat, there''s nothing to worry aboutor so Gobta thought. This was a battlefield, and when he heard such capricious words, he was tempted to say, there''s something wrong with that.

    As a result of epting the assignment to be a military chief, Gobta also began to develop a sense of responsibility. In addition to that, he had anotheryer of thought, which was that he wanted to show his handsome appearance to the people present, and that was why he spoke the words just now.

    Gobta was right on the money.

    But in this world, it didnt help to reason with certain people. Perhaps Gobta should have thought more carefully about this.

    What fun Gobta boy! I''m starting to get excited.

    Yes, indeed. Fortunately, he was the one responsible for corresponding with me.

    Testarossa and Ultima responded with a smile.

    But there was no smile in their eyes at all.

    Ah, this is badeveryone but Gobta thought so.

    First, wait a minute, Gobta-kun Chief of the Gobta Army? Let''s get this here first. I think several of the intelligence marshals should have understood

    Someone rushed to intervene to stop it, and it was one of Gobta''s adjutants, named Gobchi.

    Gobchi knew that Gobta meant no harm, he was just being frank about his feelings, and it was because the two had known each other for a long time and knew that Gobta was not wrong in what he said.

    But in this world, life on earth could not be about right and wrong. These correct statements didnt work for some people.

    The hobgoblins knew how to read an atmosphere and knew that there were dangerous people who should not be provoked. It was not an unusual role for someone to be able to enjoy an afternoon tea on the battlefield.

    Gobta-kun, it''s not good to preach to such people!

    That''s the state of mind that Gobchi was currently in.

    He had guessed correctly that Gobta was in a very dangerous position at the moment.

    Testarossa and Ultima were not angry with Gobta at all, simply treating him as a fun toy.

    But they were still demon primordials, and being treated as toys by them meant that

    The fate of Gobta was like a candle in the wind.

    But just at this time, a miracle happened.

    Oh, Testarossa? Can you talk now?

    It was toote to tell, and Rimuru reached out to Testarossa through the Communication Network.

    Thus Gobta was saved.

    No problem at all. So, Lord Rimuru, what can I do for you?

    Testarossa fell to her knees on the spot and responded.

    Upon seeing this, the others around them realized that Rimuru had used the Communication Network

    to contact Testarossa.

    It didn''t take long before everyone was on their knees.

    Rimuru waspletely oblivious.

    Ah, yes. Hold on a second.

    He said this leisurely, and then this time also contacted Gobta and Gabil using the Communication Network".

    Is there a connection?

    Yes!

    I''m okay with that too!

    Feeling a nod from Rimuru after hearing that. What Rimuru said afterwards startled Testarossa and others.

    I have just discussed this with King Gazel. To take on the Empire, the vanguard goes to us, Tempest, but until then, we have to deal with the Empire first.

    In fact, he was tempted to attack first, but still expected to go and talk the other side down once before that.

    Next Rimuru began to state what he had said to Gazel about the good things. Testarossa and neither of them interjected and listened through the instructions.

    And after that

    Then, Lord Rimuru. Can I take care of this negotiation?

    The discerning Testarossa asked so rhetorically.

    It sounded like an acknowledgement to someone, but it was actually already a matter of decision in her mind. The question is how to strike a bnce with what the other person meant.

    Yes, that''s it. You should also continue to serve as a diplomatic officer on this side, giving you full authority to represent me. You may consult me at any timegranting you permission to contact me through themunicationwork and maintaining your equal status with the armymander, in the hopes that you will work together with Gobta and Gabil to make things work.

    I''ll do as you say.

    At the moment she, like Ultima, had been sent as an ombudsman, but Testarossa was on the other hand the chief of the Western army. That legion didn''t have a chance to appear this time, but its power was thergest in the Monster Kingdom.

    On the same level as Gobta and Gabil, she was the right man to send as an emissary to the Empire.

    Uh, good. By the way, it should be dangerous to travel to the Empire as an emissary, is that okay?

    In this way, Rimuru asked in a worried tone, and the subject, Testarossa, seemed to happily oblige.

    There is no problem. I will definitely show those who don''t know the height of the empire how powerful Lord Rimuru is.''

    That isHopefully a war can be avoided if it can, but I don''t think that should be possible. So after that

    Think of the Empire as an enemy, and just wipe them out.

    Hey! No, well, that''s right"

    Just leave it to your servant. If those people are foolish enough to ignore Lord Rimuru''s merciful ultimatum, it is not worth letting them live in this world at all. I will destroy them all.

    Testarossa was full of killing intent.

    Gabil, who felt this, was scared to death and thought to himself, I''m a little afraid topliment such a terrible girl. Conversely, Gobta was as dumb as ever.

    Lord Rimuru, please be assured. Testarossa had a lot of energy and said some very imposing things the first time she went to war. I''ll be right beside her. Don''t worry.

    In this way, the Gobta, who did not know how to read the situation, spoke towards Rimuru.

    Hey, you???

    Of course it''s me. I am at least a military chief, and I should take responsibility for my position. It is also my duty to guard the tender women.

    Facing the astonished Rimuru, Gobta finished and straightened his chest.

    Even Testarossa smiled darkly when she heard it.

    This kidhe''s stupid, but I don''t hate it.

    To be able to misunderstand herself so much, even Testarossa was surprised.

    While Testarossa clearly did not intend to hide her cruel nature, Gobta waspletely unaware of it, making her feel that the man had quite a lot of nerves.

    I-I know. Then I''ll send Ranga over as well, and you''ll go over with Ranga as Testarossa''s escort. If the Empire responds to our demands, so be it. If you don''t respond, there will be a war on the spot. You must be careful not to die!

    Leave it to us. I''m the best at running away!

    Is that so? Then I''ll leave it to you!

    After saying this, Rimuru cut off themunicationwork".

    Just like that, the monster army decided to strike.

    Everyone was quiet, watching the situation

    It''s finally our turn! Everyone, get your stuff together, we''re going on a march!

    The sound of Gobta''s loud voice rang out from the scene.

    Immediately afterwards, the army of monsters moved out simultaneously.

    ***

    Welthough it''s a little different than I thoughtthats how I felt after theymunicated the order to Testarossa.

    To pretend that we''re in a panicthe atmosphere just made it impossible to say that.

    No, and rightly so, when you think about it. It''s not natural at all to pretend to be panicked in order to show everyone how good the Demon Lord is. I think that''s the right way to respond.

    That being said, Testarossa is so reliable.

    She seems to be able to show the Empire my majesty in a highbrow way.

    Did Testarossa mean what she just said about wiping out the Imperial Army?

    No, how is that possiblebut, Testarossa is just like Diablo. Which means she''s definitely a problem child, most likely serious?

    It seemed so horrible that it was better to stop herwell, something hade up. This is a war, and it''s not toote to wait until we''ve won the war beforeing to observe a moment of silence for our enemies.

    There were also unexpected takeaways.

    That is, Gobta has grown.

    Probably thanks to the responsibility I let him take on, he carried out his duties with great care.

    Hes be very responsible.

    Now that Gobta has grown, I''m also going to be a little easier. Hopefully he''ll be able to work at this pace, but on the one hand he''s afraid he''ll step on a bigndmine at any moment.

    I''ve been watching from the sidelines because it''s funny, but it''s better to bottom out with Gobta too, while Testarossa isn''t really angry yet.

    With that in my head, I opened my mouth.

    "Is Ranga here?

    Yes!"

    Ranga burrowed out of my shadow.

    The tail wagging around is so cute. So much so that I wanted to lie down and snooze in that ball of hair, but I tried hard to hold back.

    "Ranga, you stay with Gobta and protect him if anything happens.

    Ranga''s tail came to a sudden halt.

    After a brief silence, he replied in a tone of great disappointment.

    "...Yes, master. So what''s the best time to leave?"

    It always felt like this reaction was like a little kid who didn''t want to get past it.

    For a moment just now he seemed to notice what I was thinking, but my orders would not change.

    Since the fighting power of the Empire was unknown, it was disturbing to rely on Gobta alone.

    "Please go right now.

    "Then I''ll be on my way

    A droopy-headed Ranga was about to leave.

    You want to part with me that much?

    "Please. It''s true that Gobta has be more reliable, but it''s reassuring if you''re with him!

    Although feeling a little sorry for him, this time please cheer him up. Thinking that way I said that to Ranga.

    And then, right then and there

    "Put it on me, master!"

    So responsive was Ranga, full of energy and glowing all over.

    Theck of domineering footsteps became heroic because of my words. In addition to this, Ranga will also use Space Shift. He should catch up before Gobta and the others set off.

    It''s a relief for the time being.

    "First of all, regarding the deal with the Empire, Most of them will break up. At that point we will dere war and expect it to start immediately. What should we do to get everyone in formation then

    There is no doubt that there will be a war with the other side, ording to the words and reactions of Testarossa. Honestly, I''d like to avoid fighting the other side, but that''s just not possible. Since they have sent their troops so far into our country, I don''t think they wille back empty-handed.

    At least once against them, to show them the power of our country.

    But the other side''s fighting ability is unknown - they''re a magic tank unit. We are also very likely to suffer significant harm if we identally adopt the wrong strategy. Operational ns must be decided carefully.

    It''s certainly a time to bring out Benimaru.

    "If Testarossa decides to go to war after dealing with the other side, the city will be immediately isted inside thebyrinth.

    "In that case, I think it would be better if you called on Ramiris first.

    "Right. Things havee to this point where we are about to go to war and she shouldn''t be bored.

    It always feels wrong to think of war as a form of entertainment. In ces like this, monsters think very differently than humans.

    "And after that?

    At this stage, we will be defending the best defense facility in the Maze, as nned. That''s on our turf, and I''m sure I can take the reins.

    The problem is with the green legion.

    "As a matter ofmon sense, the battle is too great. But also the ability to treat the enemy as a giant object and the thing called a magic tank as a magic creature. That would be to our advantage.

    As for the apanying supply force, it was nothing to write home aboutBenimarus confident attitude had shown that.

    I do think it should not be, however Benimaru''s words are also very telling. Anyway, I decided to hear what the follow-up said first.

    "However, if troops are deployed on arge scale, they may be the victims of the magic tank artillery. Already trying to calcte the power of the magic tank cannon based on the images known to Lord Rimuru, the Green Legion should not be able to hold out. Therefore, the first one to be sent to confront the Imperial Army could only choose the Wolf Rider Troops.

    Huh? Wouldn''t that be too much of a strain?

    "Should I challenge myself on a hundred horses?"

    "Yeah. I was going to arrange it this way at first and see what happens. If the enemy''s magic tanks are as I expected, all our forces will be able to ovee them, and if they exceed expectations, then the battle n must be redrawn. So that being said, whatever the oue, it''s important to hit it off with the other side first. It''s not fun to add victims in this situation.

    With that, Benimaru ndly exined.

    The implication of this is that he intends to take Gobta and test them. I''m afraid that one careless mistake will turn all the wolf-rider troops under Gobta into dead soldiers.

    But Benimaru was unfazed.

    He thought it was the most efficient thing to do and made a cold judgment.

    "Worst case scenario, what will happen to them, and Gobta?

    "I have already told them that they should judge for themselves and run away with the shadow movement."

    So that''s itis that the basis for keeping the Green Legion in ce?

    Benimaru predicted the performance of the magic tank, that is from my memory, with knowledge as the basis. But all this knowledgees from television and doesn''t feel very urate.

    Having said that

    I have the formidablepanion of the King of Wisdom, Master Raphael, and although those memories are ambiguous, I think the Master should be able to calcte the specifications very correctly.

    Other than that as seen so far, the shape of the Empire''s magic tank has been learned.

    Also mastered were the caliber and full length of the magic tank gun, as well as the machine gun that looked like a secondary weapon. These are all based on the knowledge of "otherworldly visitors", and the way they are used is simr to that kind of magic tank. While the power and performance are unknown, I think it''s all the same in terms of the few points that should be alerted.

    Benimaru''s predictions and Master Raphael, the King of Wisdom, had turned out to be only slightly wrong, and this part of the battle n was sure to go ording to Benimaru''s view.

    At least it would be more appropriate than what I, ayman, had in mind.

    Benimaru''s n is as follows.

    First, while the war was going on, the hundred cavalry woulde together tounch a surprise attack.

    Use the high speed maneuver feature, irregr action does not give the magic tank gun a chance to aim.

    So that they don''t suffer straight blows.

    Since it was a minority unit, it could respond to any situation it faced. If you''re lucky, you''ll also be able to fight and run to catch the enemy.

    Listening to the instructions made me realize that it made a lot of sense, too.

    If you''re afraid, you losethats what Benimaru seemed to say to the green legion.

    Of course, no one knows what will happen on the battlefield.

    It is also possible that the enemy may not y his cards right and may miss the point. Although it is possible to guard against a direct hit without losing one''s life, such a thing can not be determined until the moment of the final showdown.

    So I want all of them to abidepletely by one thing, and that is to withdraw immediately if anything happens.

    "However, escape is ast resort. Let the majesty of Lord Rimuru be stainedI must not let that happen.

    Compared to the Empire, the Benimaru was even scarier.

    "Don''t force them."

    "It''s impossible. It is the proper etiquette that one must exert in oneself in order to achieve victory.

    Only to see Benimaru respond in such a way, showing a bright smile.

    He didn''t have the slightest confusion on his face and felt handsome, but I was in aplicated mood.

    On the one hand, I can understand the meaning of Benimaru''s words, but on the other hand, I feel like I''m saying, There''s no reason to sacrifice some people for this.

    Actually, my prestige really doesn''t matter at all. If you have the talent to protect the majesty of your country, but you have to sacrifice to protect that majesty, isn''t that putting the cart before the horse?

    Whichever partner it is, I don''t want them to get hurt

    Just be prepared for the worst and be ready to "teleport" the Third Legion at any time and let them be reinforcements.

    If it was me going into battle myself, there would have been no such fearI began to feel uneasy in my heart.

    ***

    Lt. General Geist, the head of the Mecha Legion and the beloved Lieutenant General of Calgurio, is in charge of the Magic Tank Division on this expedition.

    He was a muscr man of about thirty-five years of age.

    He stood proudly at the head of a state-of-the-art instructional vehicle configured in the rear, enjoying the atmosphere on the battlefield. The situation in therge forest around them was unchanged, and no one stood in their way. Geist, who was already used to this situation, began to think that this war was probably going to make him famous again.

    The invincible kingdom of the Dwarves for a thousand yearsthe armed kingdom of Dwargon is ruled by the heroic King Gazel, and will be brought down by my own hand. You can''t find anything more painful than that in the sky!

    Geist will be apuded by the nations this time.

    A new hero will be born, and he will go down in history. Just going and dreaming about it makes Geist''s heart ache.

    The man who defeated the heroic king Gazelthe title will be his. This will happen in the near future and is bound toe. After all, the Magic Guided Tank Division led by Lieutenant General Geist had the correspondingbat power that made him so sure.

    Two thousand Magic Guided Tanks were neatly arranged.

    There was a in at the foot of the mountain, and there were twenty magic tanks in the horizontal and vertical lines.

    Such a magnificent sight pleased Geist greatly. Yet this is just like the opponent''s strategy.

    Each magic tank measures about ten meters in length and three and a half meters in width, and if there are two thousand magic tanks stretched out, you have to choose a ce to disy them all. Geistid out his troops in ordance with the findings of the prior investigation, which turned out to be exactly where they expected it to be on Rimuru.

    Such a thing Geist hadn''t even thought about, but the man was an excellent soldier. Fit to serve as a Lieutenant General, with excellent personal fighting ability.

    Geist thought to himself that he wasn''t going to lose to the Close Knights.

    The reason I didn''t make the cut was simply because I didn''t get a chance topete in the ranking battle. Since I''ve been assigned to this division, it means I''m on a military operation at all times.

    Such and such, he thought unpleasantly.

    Of course it will be a very high post. In the empire, it is a choice between one of ten thousand, or the upper ss, whose status is equal to that of a high ss nobleman.

    It would not be too much to say he was a distant existence in the eyes of themon man, but that did not satisfy Geist.

    One day he was going to rece Calgurio and make himself the army chief. And to be a hero afterwards, Geist has big ambitions.

    What he wanted was not money, but fame. So he didn''t want to go through the maze, but to fight with the heroic King Gazel.

    And Geist is strong enough to embrace such ambitions.

    He has a unique technique called "yer", which is the ability to control the sound and analyze the situation by listening to a variety of sounds.

    He is also able to use special fluctuations tounch specific instructions, so that even in the midst of chaos, he canmand his own army.

    This is the force best suited tomand the legions, but it''s not the only thing worth mentioning.

    The unique skill of the "yer" also conceals a vicious attack.

    It is possible to manipte the sound waves to irradiate the subjectusing the sonic cannon for cellr destructionand Geist is capable of such brutal tricks at will.

    Even within the Empire, Geist was certainly among the masters of the awesome.

    Ha! I''ll admit that the near guards were strong. But that was because they had the legendary-grade equipment given by His Majesty the Emperor''s imperial court! Obviously I''m the only one who deserves those things

    With the legendary equipment, he can also earn the highest honor of "single digitsthe confidence of a Gestalt.

    Despite thinking about this all the time, Geist didn''t take thebat operation lightly.

    Huh? The smell of the forest has changed?

    The surrounding voices suddenly broke off. Finding this out, Geist ordered to the whole army.

    "Interrupt camping preparations and go on alert immediately!

    After giving the order, Geist focused even more, turning his attention to the patch of forest to his left.

    The sounds of birds and animals are gone, and there are no bug calls.

    There was always a sense of tension.

    And not only thatthere was the sound of tiny footsteps. On top of that there was the sound of leaves scraping closer and closer.

    The distance is long, but it''s fast.

    Is the other side nning to attack by surprise? It''s not a bad move, but it''s a shame your opponent isn''t that easy.

    Geist secretly snickered.

    Analyzing the sounds heard, the number of people approaching here was about a hundred. I heard that the Demon Lord''s army was gathering in the inn town from which they had marched.

    This proves that Geist''s n is going well. The demon lords army had been stationed in the inn town, and they missed the main body of the Imperial Army.

    As the army of up to seven hundred thousand approached, one wondered how panicked those monsters would be. Imagining the situation made Geistugh wickedly.

    The sound was approaching a distance of ten kilometers.

    We''re about to enter the effective range of the "Magic Guided Cannon". Its maximum range is up to thirty kilometers, but at this distance, the hit uracy is not very good. The mere fact that it can attack that far is actually an effective range of about three kilometers. That said, you don''t have to worry about the uracy of your hits as long as you use special shells that explode.

    The enemy was few in number and had gathered in a small area, approaching here. As long as they don''te into the open, they think it''s okay to take trees as shields

    Too naive. Let''s give them a greeting.

    The special shells are still in the trial stage and can only be prepared for two rounds, but the st range is tens of meters. Explosive power is not explosive magic that can bepared to it. There would be tens of thousands of degrees of heat and storms that would deform even the entire topographdscape.

    Only themand vehicles in which Geist travels are equipped with this special product, but Geist does not shy away from it.

    He didn''t hesitate to fill the cannon and keep the muzzle pointed at the forest.

    Instructions were then given to the battle group.

    This is just in case, if the enemy is still alive, they will meet it immediately.

    "Left squad, turn counterclockwise!

    The soldiers were originally preparing tents for camping, however they were about thirty kilometers from the Dwarven Kingdom and were on guard at all times.

    As soon as they heard Geist''s order, they got to work unhurriedly packing up their things and putting them into the wagon being towed by the magic tank. It wasn''t long before everyone had finished preparing for battle.

    In time to catch Geist''s order, the left columnup to five hundred vehiclesall floated into the air and headed for the forest.

    And just like that, Geist they were ready to go.

    As if always waiting for this moment.

    A magical creature appeared in the depths of the dense forest.

    With two horns on their heads, they are monstrous creatures with the appearance of wolves.

    That huge body made people stare nkly. At five meters tall, even with a magic tank, it was no less impressive.

    I r emember in the report given by the intelligence agency there was a mention of this magical creature called "Ranga". Seems to be teased as the demon lords pet, but his strength is equivalent to A+

    That''s a lot to take in.

    "There''s only one? What exactly is the nno, it turns out.

    Geist wondered what their purpose was.

    Since it came alone, it was not to fight. The purpose is to warn us, I''m afraid. That''s right, in order to protect their position as monster lords, they cannot lose to their enemies in their aura. Heh heh, that''s stupid.

    You are going to send a master like Ranga to oppress your enemies and suppress your opponent''s fighting spiritthats how Geist interpreted it.

    ''''It seems that Demon Lord Rimuru''s pride is high. Do you want to preserve the prestige of the Demon Lord even if you give up the advantage of a sneak attack?

    Speaking of which, Geistughed aloud.

    The other generalsughed along with it, and the soldiers thus ceased to be nervous and only remained appropriately nervous.

    Ranga came nearby.

    He''s got a leisurely pace and doesn''t look like he''s going to fight.

    It looked like Geist was right in guessing that the other side was aiming to deal with them.

    Coming to a ce a stone''s throw away from Geist and the others, about ten meters away, Ranga finally stopped in his tracks.

    A woman sat sideways with her body on his back and then jumped gracefully.

    Not a sound, not a whisper.

    Then walked unthinkingly ahead of Geist and the others.

    Seeing that beauty unlike all human women, a chill ran down Geist''s back, like being held against an ice knife.

    How could? This woman''s voice is not quite right

    It''s a heartbeat sound, but the melody is eerie.

    There was also the sound of blood flowing. Yetpared to the human voice, it sounded quieter and faster.

    No, it''s too fast.

    If the blood flowed at this rate, the human body could not bear it at all

    Ranga was long gone from Geist''s eyes.

    He kept looking at the woman.

    Pure white long hair flowed down beautifully, adding to that beauty.

    But the other part was wearing serious military uniforms that didn''t match that beauty. The lower half of the body was worn like riding pants, with a rounded, slow swelling curve in the thigh area.

    There was another man riding on Ranga''s back, and Geist didn''t bother to notice him. That was because the woman exuded enough eerie scent to make Geist put all his attention on it.

    What is she? The intelligence agency gave the information without this figure. This woman is more dangerous than Ranga who is a main subordinate, right?

    Geist really wants to rebuke the intelligence services.

    But the person who wanted toin to him wasn''t there.

    At the moment, the appearance of the Demon Lord''s close attendant was more important than that.

    In order to hide the fact that his aura had been overpowered, he spoke to the woman in a tone full of majesty.

    "You are a messenger from the Demon Lord Rimuru, are you not? The timing of the contact was sooner than expected, but the Demon Lord''s minions were pretty good. So, what''s the matter withing here?

    Seeing Geist ask such a question, the woman responded with a voluptuous smile.

    "Greetings everyone, my ''name'' is Testarossa. Thisnd is governed by the Great Demon Lord Rimuru, of whom I am a confidant. So, as to what you''re here for today

    When that was said, the smile on the woman''s lips, Testarossa, deepened.

    It was a very wicked smile.

    "If you leave like this, I''ll leave you alone. But I am not at liberty to continue the invasion. I havee this time to deliver these words from our lord.

    Those eyes, redder than blood, glittered, and Testarossa dered so.

    Geist held his breath for it.

    What the hell was that? Even if she meant it, Testarossa''s movements were quick.

    She just waved her hand and things happened in a sh.

    A wall of me appeared one meter in front of the frontmost battle group.

    The wall of mes disappeared in a sh, and the molten scorch marks on the ground became crystalline, drawing a straight line.

    "I think Ive made it very clear. Once you cross that line, you are dead. Don''te in without being fairly aware. Well, take care, everyone.

    After bowing extremely gracefully, Testarossa said so. The next thing you know, you look like you''ve lost interest, and you turn your head and leave without looking back.

    Testarossa walked away.

    This means that the bargaining is over.

    Ranga also looked like he took it for granted, tail wagging from side to side.

    It was just the short figure sitting on his back who kept looking over at Geist their side, but none of that mattered to Geist at all.

    I can''t believe you don''t think of me! What do you think I am!? And in the face of such arge army, it would be too arrogant to bluff like that!

    Geist was furious. It''s as if his beliefs so far have been smashed to pieces and lost their cool in a sh.

    Unterally saying what they want to say on their own is not at all going to listen to what the likes of Geist have to say. This was supposed to be the attitude the Empire took towards its enemies.

    How dare you

    The messenger''s attitude had set Geist on fire, and the fear that had just been embraced in his heart disappeared.

    Geist thus made an error of judgment.

    Its five meters from Testarossa. It''s right in the middle ground between Ranga and Geist and the rest.

    How can you just go back unscathed?

    He had made up his mind.

    It was not at all important to the empire to treat the messenger with the courtesy that was due.

    If only the other side would surrender, otherwise they would bepletely ravaged.

    By analogy, Testarossa''s attitude was an insult to the Empire, and Geist considered it enough to justify war.

    "Can you hear me?

    "Yes! Communications are good.

    "Shoot that arrogant woman through her head. Afterwards the reverse direction was reversed, allowing twenty magic tanks toe to the front and fire their shells together. Let the monsters that lurk in the forest see the power of our empire!

    Geist ordered quietly through his "yer".

    Snipers dedicated to themand vehicle took the lead in responding. They immediately raised their sniper rifles to lock on to Testarossa.

    Then the silent bullets were fired through the "magic gun", which was specially designed for long range.

    The Magic Gun was originally a small magical weapon, but its long-range counterpart has an improved range of up to two kilometers. It''s not even 10 meters away, so I''m sure I can hit it and kill someone.

    The bullet is wrapped in the elemental magic "Great ming Sphere", but what happens to those if they areunched inside?

    It doesn''t take much thinking to know that the subject matter will burn out from the inside out and eventually explode and burn up.

    Even for magical creatures that are highly resistant to magic, the inside of the body is usually defenseless. There was no way to escape the vicious supersonic shells, and Testarossa was going to die Geist was convinced of it.

    The moment the bullet is fired and passes over the border.

    Testarossa turned her head.

    That face was very wicked and very beautiful.

    Next, Geist widened his eyes in surprise.

    The vicious bullet, which was supposed to run through Testarossa, was blocked by her slender index finger.

    This magic-bearing bullet hase to three times the speed of sound at its initial velocity.

    The magic contained in it was gently grabbed and thrown away before it was time to be liberated.

    It was like treating it as a boring toy in general

    "That''s your answer, isn''t it? Very good. This answer is great. Then let''s go head-to-head."

    Leaving this to go and rendezvous with Ranga, Testarossa never looked back.

    Immediately afterwards, she left the scene as if nothing had just happened.

    Geist almost went into a panic mode, but he pressed on by sheer force of will. Fear and humiliation are put on the scale to be measured, and in the end it is humiliation that wins the day.

    The average soldier has no idea what just happened. Only Geist himself and the sniper had noticed what had just happened.

    In that case, we will proceed directly ording to the n and sweep with the strongest weapons and magic tank guns. In this way, we can also preserve our dignity as a soldier of the Empire.

    "Lieutenant General Geist, what should we do, what should we do?

    "Don''t panic! Don''t let that illusion fool you! We are the glorious Imperial Army. To win the victory for His Majesty the Emperor! Let''s go ahead with the n and start firing the shells!"

    In conjunction with Geist''s loud orders, the battle group listed on the left simultaneously moved in.

    They didn''t take the warning seriously at all.

    In order to keep a proper distance from the vehicles in front, the magic tank units began to advance as they crossed the state line.

    ***

    The war had begun.

    It started more easily than one might think.

    Testarossa drew the final warning line that the Imperial Army did not hesitate to cross.

    It was at this moment that the Eastern Empire began to enter a state of war with us.

    "Looks like it''s already started.

    "Yeah. It all starts now.

    The look was high and mighty.

    Sitting up on the slightly raised chair on her toes, Ramiris conversed with Veldora.

    I let out a sigh.

    It''s not like we''re ying a game, it''s war as if it were.

    I wish their nerves would tighten a bit and correspond with a more serious attitude.

    "Don''t worry about those first. Let''s get the town to take refuge.

    "I know! It''s all on me, Master Ramiris!"

    Listen to me, please," responded Ramiris, refreshed.

    The next second, the capital ''Rimuru'' had silently isted itself to the interior of the maze.

    It was all for the sake of acting so as not to be discovered by the enemy, which is why we dyed the town quarantine and implemented it at the nick of time. But we don''t need any more acting.

    When they disregarded Testarossa''s advice, we used it ungraciously.

    "By the way, Treyni has something she wants me to pass on.

    After isting the town in three or two strokes, suddenly, Ramiris remembered the incident and said so out of her mouth.

    Hmm?"

    "It seems to mean that she sensed the presence of a suspicious person and went to say hello.

    "Huh? What do you mean?

    "I don''t know. I''m not sure.

    I would ask her to count me stupid.

    It would be useless to ask for a detailed report from Ramiris.

    That being said, I''m not in a position toin when she''s not under mymand. And with her involvement in our country''s wars, the mere willingness to help us is appreciated.

    Besides, the other one was Miss Treyni Well,e to think of it, that person wasn''t careful enough at some point.

    "Souei, is there any way to deal with the intruder?

    I was a little worried, so I confirmed it with Souei.

    "That part''s okay. The next thing you need to do is to run ording to the n, and to guard the gate on the ground.

    It looks like I''m overthinking it, which is a relief for now.

    There seemed to be a few spies invading, but the "blue dark congregation" below Souei would take care of that. There should be no need to worry too much.

    Again, about the individual floors.

    The ny-first floor to ny-five floors all move to ny-six to one hundred.

    The towns on the ground have all moved to the lowest level of the mazethe temporary one hundred and first floor.

    If you want to get to this side, youd have to beat Veldora. Bymon sense, we would have been defeated by that point.

    As for the critical final defense, we intend to put it on the 95th level. The ny-one to ny-four floors were all dragon rooms, and after breaking through these levels you woulde to therge room where Veldora sat.

    There''s also the "control room" in the back where we''re staying. If Veldora is defeated, we will buy time there.

    Take this time to get the town back on the ground and let Gelds troops step up to the defense and help the residents escape. Seriously it''s reluctant, so hopefully this time the floor guardians can cheer.

    At least the interior of the maze was defensively sound.

    It should be said that even if one wanted to fight to the 95th floor, it would be impossible for an ordinary army.

    Because of the battle against people, service inside the maze is naturally suspended altogether. Of course, no "resurrection bracelets" will be given out, and you can''t stay in a hotel to go to the bathroom, etc.

    In such cases, things like food must be prepared by the adventurers themselves. The water feeds that ur every five floors are also expected to be closed, making them rtively more difficult.

    If you want to seriously tackle the maze, let alone for days, I think it could be months. It''s not that more people are better; more people are more likely to get in the way.

    ording to the information given by them in Gadra, Imperial soldiers seem to have been modified.

    Even if you can move around without eating or drinking for a week, it shouldn''t be easy to get around the maze.

    We ran simtions with several knights from Western countries and found that it was impossible to sessfully navigate the maze. Even if the Imperial Army was better than them, they still couldn''t break through easily.

    It''s probably just me being paranoid. It''s better not to be too worried.

    It is also possible for them to skim the maze directly, so we can only match the moves of the enemy.

    That''s pretty much it, our side is ready.

    We have also informed the surrounding countries of the Empire''s actions, and presumably they are now praying for a victory for our country. In order to cope with the worst case scenario, the West is equipped with military units that are ready to stand by, and afterwards they are expected to adapt to the situation at hand.

    That''s what happened, and I pulled my attention back to the battlefield.

    Testarossa went to rendezvous with Gobta and retreated on Ranga.

    As if in pursuit of her, the Imperial magic tank force wasying out.

    The magic tank guns kept moving and looked like they would soon be firing in force.

    "Will it be all right?

    "It should be dangerous to get hit, but I don''t think it will be a problem,"

    This arrogant responsees from Benimaru.

    Next, he directly instructed the First and Third Corps using his unique skill, "Generalissimo".

    Tempest''s side was about to swarm into action.

    The Green Legion began to advance cautiously toward the enemy''s rear. They looked like they were about to enter the forest, using those trees as shields, careful not to be seen by their enemies. Launch a surprise attack when there''s a chance of winning, retreat first if the opponent is having a hard time dealing with it, they''re not going to make much of a move until they see that.

    As for the guerri flying regiment led by Gabil, one hundred "flying dragon congregations" and three hundred flying dragon troops selected from the Blue Regiment flew into the air. They were going to attack the slow moving magic tanks from the air. That''s a good judgement, but the enemy is also warlike in the air. Once they''re out in force, the showdown will be yed for real by then.

    Then look at the green legion and others who are closest to the enemy army.

    It is unclear how powerful the magic tank guns are, and getting into enemy range is an act of suicide.

    There is still some distance for the two forces to engage, but the effective range of the other is not clear and vignce must be maintained.

    Other than that, I don''t think the other side has seen the Wolf Rider troops yet, but they seem intent on firing their magic tank guns.

    Maybe there''s a new type of weapon that Gadra doesn''t know about.

    <<warning. calctions="" have="" been="" made="" ording="" to="" the="" direction="" and="" angle="" of="" magic="" tank="" guns,="" they="" correctly="" aimed,="" seem="" grasped="" position="" wolf-rider="" troops="" hidden="" behind="" trees.="">> Huh?</warning.>

    That wouldn''t be so bad.

    "Benimaru, the enemy seems to have somehow mastered Gobta''s position!"

    "Understood. It was with this possibility in mind that only the green legion were given the role of vanguard force.

    I was the only one who felt anxious, and Benimaru was still as old as ever. It looked like this was in his expectation.

    I decided to trust Benimaru first this time and watch the situation from the sidelines.

    There are 2,000 units in total. Five hundred of them had already turned around and were on alert towards Gobta on their side.

    As for the top twenty, the one that is currently firing its main gun.

    The difference between the original world''s magic tanks and the this world''s magic tanks is that the guns on this side are shorter, right?

    Even if they came by the foothills, some ces should be overgrown with grass. Even then it is not a problem because the gun is rtively short and does not pose a hindrance when rotated.

    It''s just that it''s possible to cut down trees with brute force.

    That said, rotating up is more conducive to taking dense formations. The guns of each other do not pose an obstacle and are able to rotate quickly.

    While it''s not certain that such a gun length would ensure hit uracy and range, these are not things we should worry about. It''s because the other party has ovee this problem that it''s used in practice.

    Next, lets talk about Gobta and the others

    Gobta has rejoined the troops. There wasn''t much blood on his face, so presumably he didn''t see the magic tank troops in fear.

    I guess it was discovering the true nature of Testarossa that made me realize I was in a very dangerous position.

    And this Testarossa was sitting sideways on Ranga''s back, elegantlybing her hair. Now that the bargaining is over, she seems to think she has done her duty.

    Indeed, it was a credit to her that she came home unscathed. It would actually be possible to give her a break, but the current situation would not allow it.

    Just thinking about that, the magic tank guns have fired.

    Twenty-one shells came flying.

    It was hard to tell by the "Argos" alone, but the one that came out of themand vehicle looked different from the other shells.

    What the hell is that?

    "Gobta, use the Shadow movement.

    "All are in the shadow!

    Putting my doubts aside, Benimaru quickly ordered.

    Gobta responded to this.

    Without a moment''s pause, the Wolf Rider troops disappeared from the scene by "shadow movement".

    Immediately afterwards, a rain of shells poured down on the spot.

    Twenty-one rounds of rainstorm with destructive force.

    The mere imagination is horrible as hell.

    <> You seem to be having a good time, sorry to bother you</answer.>

    I don''t know how powerful trinitrotoluene explosives are, even if you convert them, I don''t understand them.

    <<understood. that''s="" a="" little="" more="" specific.="" if="" hit="" head-on,="" even="" the="" gates="" of="" dwarven="" kingdom="" would="" shatter.="" an="" a-rated="" dragon="" can''t="" take="" it.="" in="" addition,="" anyone="" within="" five="" meters="" impact="" site="" will="" suffer="" significant="" damage,="" and="" below="" level="" c="" may="" not="" survive.="">> That''s right. If you''d said that in the first cehey, hey, hey, hey!</understood.>

    That''s not two words for horrible anymore.

    And there''s a mystery shell mixed in, so I''m worried about Gobta''s safety.

    But after all, my worries were unwarranted.

    The shells blew the ground apart as soon as they hit. And it blew up twenty rounds in a row, and the terrain all changed with it.

    Thest shot hit the target, and the ce where Gobta had just stayed was immediately surrounded by karma fire. The wind pressure from the explosion blew wildly, and small-scale storms blew the perimeter to pieces. The damage reached tens of meters, and one can imagine how powerful it was.

    That''s the effect of that mystery shell, right? Such a dangerous shell was even enough to rival nuclear strike magic, thanks to their ability to develop it.

    The reason one can feel admiration like that is because they are safe and sound in Gobta. They immediately reacted to Benimaru''smand to disengage from the scene through the "shadow movement".

    "It''s really good that theyre okay.

    "What''s okay!? The shockwave has even hit this shadow space.

    "Is anyone hurt?"

    "No, our group is fine. Thanks to Benimaru-san, everyone is safe.

    Gobta replied with a Yuanqi (?) voice. Although it hurts toin about it in your mouth, I think it''s okay.

    By the way, does Testarossa know how to use shadow movement" well, she seems to be fine, so there''s no point in worrying about that.

    The bigger question today than that is what to do next.

    ***

    I organize awork through the Communication Network.

    Joining them were Benimaru, Gobta, and Testarossa.

    In order to extend the somatic time, I also start "thought eleration". This makes for a meaningful meeting, even if it''s a short one.

    "So what''s next?

    It''s times like these that I want to hear from Benimaru.

    "At the moment, Gabil''s forces areunching a surprise attack on the enemy''s tank forces. I want the green legion toe out and pigeonhole them.

    Oh.

    "Isn''t this dangerous?

    "Danger is danger, but it will make Gabil''s troops do fakes. Gobta and the rest took the opportunity to attack again. The magic tank is beyond destructive, but maneuverability is to be expected. We have a good chance of winning.

    Benimaru sends out a proud message.

    Looking at the flurry of attacks just now, one could tell that Gabil''s men were flying at a higher speed than the rotating speed of the magic tank guns. Had they concentrated on evading, they would not have been hit by the magic tank guns.

    It must be very difficult to target themalthough Benimaru said so, it was the members of the assault force who would be feared. But don''t look like Gabil, who is actually very brave and doesn''t seem to care about any of that.

    Indeed, as long as one can fly through the air, the light escapes from the rays of the shell without suffering damage. Hopefully, Gabil will be able to get over this hurdle with gusto.

    Let''s look at the green legion again.

    "Me, us too?"

    "You are the main characters. But you can rest assured. Once infiltrated into the heart of the opponent, the enemy they will be afraid to hit one of their own and the movements should be sluggish. So as soon as Gabil and the others start attacking each other, you''re going to rush in with all your might.

    In this way, Benimaru gave orders to Gobta like an evil spirit. No, he is indeed a monster.

    "I mean, you''re moving in the shadow, right?"

    Hearing Gobta ask that, Benimaru shook his head.

    "That''s dangerous. I think the enemy would have prepared all sorts of defenses, such as magical detection object or defense against the barrier. There are probably countermeasures against skills, so it''s best not to y around with them.

    I share the same view on this point.

    The magic tanks are their killers, can''t be unguarded, and I think should be thoroughly guarded. There are some boundaries dedicated to skills, and it would be bad if the other side used that. It''s probably safer and safer to break through positively at times like this.

    "There is also something called an interface boundary in Legion magic. This magic is specifically designed to protect against surprise attacks from space, so that we risk being blocked from action.

    Benimaru-san is right, a positive break should be the safest.

    The meaning I wanted to express is perfectly summed up by Testarossa.

    On that point, Gobta seems to be okay with it.

    I-I know. I''m fine with that, even if Miss Testarossa says so."

    The Gobta guy is scared.

    That''s right. After all, the opponent was several times better than he was, and he''d made a big deal about an opponent like that.

    Would be afraid of course.

    I''m looking forward to it, tocorrection, pleasure in itand it''s not wrong to say, by the way, that it resonates involuntarily with this situation. So I want to send Gobta these words.

    "Gobta-kun. People are not to be profiled. Once again, you have to keep that in mind and not repeat it!

    Although that phrase could also be applied to me just fine.

    I hadn''t even noticed it until no one told me about Testarossa and them

    "Good. I will reflect on it

    Hmmm. That''s good!

    "What are you talking about?

    "It''s no secret that Gobta would be wrong.

    "I see. Is it something to do with Testarossa? The most important part of it didn''t grow. It''s nice to give him a hard time once in a while.

    It seems that Benimaru also found out and revealed a dark smile for my exnation.

    "By the way, who are those people Diablo brought back? Especially those three girls, who feel like unusual people?

    Because these people were approved by me, Benimaru didn''t have anyints and just epted it.

    Still, he did care about the women''s true identities.

    That being saidthey are terrible Primordial DemonsI think it''s better he doesn''t know these things.

    But there''s no way to keep it hidden forever.

    Even the subordinates hid it from me, and I felt bad about it. I think Shion didn''t care even if she didn''t know, but maybe she could tell the truth to Benimaru.

    "Well, I''ll exin that to youter.

    When I so responded, Benimaru shrugged.

    "Well, that''s right. One shouldn''t care too much about such topics when fighting a war.

    It seemed like he was able to take it, so I turned my attention elsewhere as well.

    "That''s the way it is, Gobta, we''re at war with the people. It''s important to reflect, but that''s when youe back alive."

    "It''s a must!

    "Is there anything you don''t understand about the battle summary?

    "No problem, Mr. Benimaru. We''ll move to the edge of the forest first and rush in when Gabil starts attacking.

    "That''s it. You''ve got to do your best!

    "Got it!

    Gobta is no longer afraid.

    That way he can focus on the fight.

    In that case, we will discuss it through the "Communication Network".

    Immediately following, a few minutester.

    The Third Corps, led by Gabil,unched a strong surprise attack on the magic tank units.

    "Gah, gah, gah, gah! Let''s see what I can do! You guys move so slowly, you''re no match for us!

    He''s just as smug as ever, talking out of turn.

    It''s a little unsettling, but that''s what makes it Gabil.

    In fact, there was no immediate response from the magic tank units.

    Benimaru had expected correctly, the magic tank cannon''s movements couldn''t keep up with Gabil''s.

    Gabil also takes credit for this. Because hemanded well, the members of the regiment cooperated well.

    It took a fair amount of training to get to this point. It seems to acquire an airbat capability that makes the eyes ze over.

    Even the three hundred Flying Dragons performed well. They still seem to be cultivating alternate riders, and as long as the number of flying dragons increases, it should turn into a very reliable fighting force.

    Gabil had been responsible for shifting the focus of the enemy, but he was not entirely without an attack. On the one hand, they wanted to dazzle the enemy and also make the flying dragon spit fireballs.

    Are those really the B+ equivalent of magic? The power isparable to the elemental magic "Great me Sphere" which is manipted by ordinary wizards.

    It wasn''t enough to break through the magical defenses of the magic tank, but it was effective enough for the infantry. Attacking the ground from the air gives a glimpse of what Gabil can do.

    Didn''t put up much of a fight, but he did it beautifully at the tactical level.

    And so does Gobta.

    Looks like he''s adjusted to the mood.

    Without a trace of confusion, he tookmand, was straightforward and meticulous in his movements, andunched a surprise attack on the battle group.

    A total of five hundred stations were confronting the green legion, and a thousand and five hundred more were lined up in front of them, all aimed at the Dwarven Kingdom. Now that we are so deep, the enemy cannot move lightly.

    Progressing to this point has been a great victory for us, but the Imperial Army is not that ipetent.

    They''ll be desperately trying to get in our way, and then we''ll have to rely on our strength and speed to win.

    Gobta seemed to understand this as well, and while following Benimaru''s instructions, he used that electric speed to rush towards the magic tank unit.

    There was no fear of even looking at the muzzle of the gun aimed at them, no color on their faces.

    About a hundred meters remained from the front of the magic tank unit.

    Changed to a wolf-rider troop, it took less than six seconds to run.

    Several rounds of shelling sounded on the spot, and yet the green legionnaires were not at all afraid and did not reduce their speed, and just kept running.

    In fact the shells seemed to be threatening, hitting in a different direction than we had expected.

    This is evidence that the Imperial Army is shaken.

    The wolf rider troops did not act in any way, and did dispose of the obstacles that stood in their way.

    The infantry unit currently in charge of protecting the magic tanks also tried to block their way, but were bitten off by the wolves.

    There''s not a bit of distance left.

    In this way, we seeded in approaching our first target, the magic tank unit.

    Ranga ran at the forefront, the hobgoblin sitting on his back in all his glory.

    Running in second ce was Gobchi, and Gobta gestured to him with a wink. Gobchi looked away and nodded. Immediately following, the next second, the hobgoblin threw some "little thing" at the magic tank''s turret.

    It was a jewel that glowed red.

    It is the Element Core, or the Magic Pearl for short.

    I asked Kurobee to prepare arge pile of empty magic pearls, and then asked Charys to seal in the magic of the me.

    It''s not meant to be used on a magic sword, but a substitute for a bomb.

    The name is "ming Jade".

    Will it work or not?

    The weakness of the magic tank is in the interior, so we set off a big explosion of firepower inside. If that does not work, we intend to terminate this operational n immediately.

    "No problem?

    "Rimuru, don''t worry. Have faith in my friend Charys!

    "Rest assured, Lord Rimuru. Since the infused magic was almost on the verge of bursting, I thought to myself that I would be able to easily make that piece of iron unable to move again.

    I also think it should be fine, but this is the first time I''ve done an experiment. Don''t worry about me -

    the magic tank exploded.

    "You see, it''s just like I said, right? My battle n is indeed correct!

    This idea was started by me.

    So I feel more uneasy about itbut when it works out in the end, it makes me want to show it off.

    "This guy''s a cheapskate

    "It''s so Rimuru-esque!

    "You two have no right to talk about me!"

    A few of us were bickering over there.

    Charys had a proud face.

    Benimaru and Beretta, on the other hand, were smiling bitterly.

    Shion and Diablo grinned.

    The second phase of the battle n was sessful, so the atmosphere became somewhat cheerful.

    It''s an outpost battle on this side.

    The next step is to dive into the midsection of the enemy. Leave the magic tank units that are killing each other with the green legion and strike at the center.

    The opponent had infantry units deployed to defend the dead ends of the turrets, and Gobta gave blows on one side and Testarossa on the other.

    It rushes across the battlefield like a giant monster.

    A series of actions show the beauty of the wash, all reflected on the big screen.

    "That guy Gobta, did well. That way they won''t get locked out by the magic tank gun.

    "No, not yet. Depending on how the other side''smanders will arrange it, it is possible that they will not take the damage done to their own people seriously and will attack directly."

    How can this be?as much as one thinks it, this is war.

    Let''s also assume that this might happen.

    "Besides, the enemy has air power on their side. It''s too early to rest assured.

    That''s right, I followed and turned my head to look at the other big screen.

    Seeing the shadow of the enemy machine reflected above, one can see that the speed has increased. It looks like the Empire also got its soldiers to work better with each other by some means.

    Once the enemy''s air warfare arrived, Gabil would be busy. In that way, Gobta risked their istion on the battlefield.

    It''s a race against time.

    I want to y the key battle while I can.

    As if to respond to this expectation of mine, people on the battlefield continued to fly in.

    Gobta and Gabil.

    The pair made the most of their training results, hitting the ground running in their first live battle. But it''s impossible for everything to go so smoothly.

    Like Benimaru said, it''s too early to rest assured

    ***

    Geist stared angrily at the iing green legion and others.

    Those brats are so arrogant!

    He was filled with indignation and vowed in his heart to take advantage of the monsters that had forced their way into his eyes.

    Just a moment ago, the full head of white hair falling out of Testarossa struck fear into his heart. Geist was reluctant to admit it, intending to dismantle the green legion and regain his confidence in this way.

    The monsters would only mess with the scene, and no matter how fast they moved they couldn''t hurt the magic tankso Geist thought.

    However, a loud explosion from the battlefield shattered that thought.

    How could that be!?

    Geist almost screamed out and hit the brakes urgently at thest minute.

    How can amander act like he''s panicking on the battlefield. He was, at least, an excellent man, not so bad as to lose his normal sense of judgment.

    "General, what''s next?

    "Don''t panic. Take a close look at the enemy''s actions. They only sabotaged one magic tank, after which there was no follow up. That proves that''s one of the few killer weapons they have on hand.

    "So it is. That''s true, to hear you say it. Otherwise those lizards flying in the air should be spilling everywhere too.

    Geist hmmmed" and nodded.

    He thought to himself that he was making a very calm judgment, but it was actually a miscarriage of justice.

    In fact, the total number of ming jades prepared by Rimuru was as high as three thousand. Each of Gobta''s wolf-rider troops held ten, and the lizards flying in the airGabil and the Flying Dragonsall had ten in advance.

    The reason why they didn''t use the ming Jades was to focus on distracting the enemy. In addition to that, they also knew that they couldn''t use the ming Jade''s true abilities without using it in a confined space.

    If the explosives are allowed to explode in a confined space, their power will increase several times.

    The same principle applies to ming Jade.

    Benimaru focused on destroying the magic tank and didn''t give a second thought to the surrounding infantry. That''s why they weren''t allowed to waste ming Jades.

    The focus is on whether or not the battle n will work, rather than on the immediate results.

    Not only Gobta and Gabil, but even the magical creatures underneath them knew this all too well.

    Geist didn''t know anything about it, and what he had just said to himself made him feel better.

    The generous use of new weaponry ismendable. It''s just a shame it''s me who''s going to win!

    Geist misjudges Gobta about their assassination, yet he correctly sees through his opponent''s true purpose.

    The reason for not looking at the big left team is because the opponent''s goal is to take down this team, right? That being the case, there are many ways to deal with you!

    Gabil and the others attacks were fierce, but these were blocked out by the magic-generated ''barriers''.

    The only ones that should be guarded are the new weapons, in that case, just stay away from them with Gobta.

    "We''ll take an intensive air battle formation.

    Geist''s order took the adjutant by surprise.

    "General, that''s too dangerous! Some men are fighting the enemy now, for fear of hurting their own!"

    "So what? If they pull back, why don''t they just use a magic tank gun to smash them to pieces? That said, ipetent enough to rip one''s own legs off, the glorious Imperial Army doesn''t need them!

    What?

    The other side was so asserted that there was nothing the adjutant could do to stop Geist.

    Several magic tanks, along with most of the infantry, would have been affected and actually won the battle as the adjutant well knew.

    Do not be afraid to sacrifice a few, that way you can win in war. Without such macro and awareness, how can one be amander?

    "Will there be any problems with the regtions?

    "No, sir. There''s nothing wrong with that.

    The staff officer echoed Geist''sments.

    And just like that, Geist''s recital began.

    "Left column, take a heavy air battle formation!

    Without going through the ministry, Geist ordered directly with skill. This allowed the left brigade to regroup at a faster pace than before.

    Ignoring the soldiers who had been chased by the green legion, they blocked the road with the remaining vehicles and then let the magic tank guns spin, linking the vehicles back and forth.

    That formation even subverts themon sense of modern warfare.

    What!? What a mess!"

    It was only natural that Gobta would shout in surprise.

    Using that massive body, the magic tank began to gather densely, as if to fill in all the gaps. Yet doing such a thing would make even themselves immobile, but it''s effective. In this way Gobta and the others had no way to run between the cracks.

    And what''s even more surprising is that itester.

    The left brigade spread into a circle and a wall was erected to surround Gobta and them. As if echoing this wall, half of the magic tanks belonging to the Central Division were out in full force. They floated back into the air and begannding on the back of the frontmost magic tank. Immediately afterwards, a barricade was formed that blocked Gobta''s way to them.

    Nearly a thousand magic tanks were connected to each other and turned into a huge fortress. That way, it''s not just about destroying the main force.

    "I''ve heard about them being able to do this kind of thing, but I never thought theyd actually make this move"

    Even Gobta''s adjutant Gobchi opened his mouth at the sight in front of him, and he began to mutter to himself.

    "Use the machine gun to create a bullet screen to stop the enemy!

    A three-dimensional wall of machine-gun fire ensued. With bullet screens on all sides, Gobta couldn''t exercise the high speed movement they were good at.

    Gobta was surrounded by magic tanks that were supposed to be enemy partners, plus infantry units that followed the magic tanks, yet the enemy didn''t care about that.

    "This is bad. There''s no way to implement abat n like this, is there?

    Discovering a w in Benimaru''s battle n, Gobta was rmed.

    Seeing that the Imperial soldiers were about to be attacked by their own people, even Gobta couldn''t help but feel anxious.

    "Gobbledygook, I''m sorry. I''d love to go over there and help you, but I can''t separate myself right now.

    Gabil and the rest were also subjected to aerial artillery fire.

    Even if the magic tank cannon couldn''t hit them, the magic tank was equipped with a machine gun.

    That''s why they''re being held back by Gabil.

    Now that Geist, inmand, has regained hisposure, the difference in numbers will form a critical advantage. And things always get worse.

    "Long time no see, Mr. Geist!

    The "Air Combat Air Corps" led by Major General Faraga is here today.

    The number of airships is 100.

    Gabil and his team were busy dealing with these blimps, making the situation of Gobta and the others even more precarious.

    "Faraga, you''re finally here. This is a win for us. This stage is perfect for testing the secret weapon, right?

    "Yes, are you ready, Lord Geist? Then hurry up and let''s join in.

    "I''m giving you a chance to win. Don''t be careless."

    "Got it. Well, I wish you good fortune in your martial arts!

    Talking over a special line, Geist and Faraga made an appointment to fight hand in hand.

    Geist is trying to solidify his gamen.

    Faraga wants to warm up before the big showdown. There is also the purpose of showing them to the outside world that they can also be useful in realbat.

    Although the "Air Combat Flying Corps" has the killer weapon of blimps, its status is the lowest among the three units as it has to to have a record of war.

    In this way, the situation became even more unfavorable for Tempest as Faraga and the others entered the war.

    It is the green legion who are the most able to understand the change in circumstances.

    "What shall we do, Commander Gobta?

    "This won''t do. We have to take refuge!

    "That would be good. Now that the situation has changed, there''s no need to hold on.

    Gobta''s judgment is correct.

    Don''t force the battle n, and temporarily retreat if something unexpected happens. This is the guideline for being thorough with them in advance.

    Benimaru, who had been watching the battle from the sidelines, had already given instructions for them to retreat, and now even the soldiers at the bottom understood the situation.

    Even if we have to run, we have to act together. There was nog and everyone turned around.

    And then tried to use the "shadow moment" to retreat

    "Gobta, the enemy is not a light to save fuel. It seems that they have started to do magic obstruction so that people on our side can''t use the Shadow Movement.

    Ranga sensed that something wasn''t quite right and his warning was given a littlete. By this time Gobta and his team had been affected by the Empire''s ''widespread magic hindrance''.

    Ranga was a different story, and the other dependents could not break through such obstacles. The way things had evolved, they had to run and flee.

    "Run for the forest with all your might!

    The pale Gobta shouted, and the wolf-rider army followed his orders.

    It''s not even 200 meters from the forest.

    Run past in just a dozen seconds. Yet now being sniped from behind, that distance feels so far away as to make you despair.

    This battle of retreat is full of suffering

    Seeing Gobta as they fled, a cruel smile appeared on Geist''s face.

    He immediately gave orders to his men to prepare magic tank guns.

    You trash, you think it''s that easy to escape!

    He was going to use a special shell with only one round left.

    Following Geist''s orders, the magic tank guns were ready to fire without dy.

    Special artillery shells hit the forest in front of Gobta and the others. Those karmic fires scattered all over the ce.

    The purpose is to hinder the enemy''s advance. The green legion dodged the flying shells by super-intuition, but the forest was burning and there was nothing they could do.

    "This is badis there any way I can get back alive?"

    "Gobta-kun, please don''t say such things even when you''re joking. But with me here, everyone can go back alive.

    "Gobta is so confident inexplicably. I feel like an idiot to hear such baseless words and to be bothered there.

    "Captain Gobtano, the armymander has his moments of trouble, too?

    "What are you talking about? Must be talking about what''s for dinner today or something anyway. Or is it that you were caught hanging out with His Majesty Rimuru and were wondering how to apologize to Mr. Rigur?

    Even Gobchi and Gobte added to the mix, and the members of the Wolf Rider Soldier unit allughed out loud.

    Despite the desperate situation, Gobta did not lose their usual pace.

    And this conversation between them, Gobta, was overheard by Geist, who was eavesdropping.

    how dare you belittle us. Nowpletely surrounded by us, your fate is in my hands!

    An agitated Geist was full of restlessness.

    In front of his eyes was the white-haired beautyTestarossa.

    She was exposed to the storm of hot air breeding, but her face was nk. Those shots didn''t seem to pose any threat to her.

    You too. How dare you fool me? I''ll never let you go! To make that beautiful face of yours turn into a wailing face because of fear!

    Geist didn''t notice the dark desire that appeared in him.

    Compelled by Testarossa, she did not even notice that she was making too extreme a judgment.

    That face twisted wickedly, and Geist issued an order.

    "Order to all remaining vehicles! Fire your magic tank guns at the enemy!

    The residual fighting force on the left is holding Gobta to them. Although that orderpletely disregarded the security of the unit, no one disputed it.

    While the magic tank force that had be the fortress was holding Gobta back on their movements, the thousand magic tanks that remained made the turrets spin.

    Adjusting the angle and preparing the defenses to absorb the impact so that they can fire from close rangethese muzzles are bound to kill people and are now intended to fire at the same time.

    ***

    Fierce fighting also began to appear in the sky.

    The airship fires many enhanced spells.

    Gabil and the others were fooled by these things.

    Nothing is more problematic than the disruption of the magic element movement. The Magic Disturbing Radiation was a ssified weapon, and not only Gobta and his team, but even people on Gabil''s side would be affected.

    "Coo-hoo-hoo, that''s tough. Just get near that blimp and our bodies get good and heavy.

    "Lord Gabil, what shall we do?

    "I''d love to save Mr. Gobta and the others, but I don''t have the strength to do so right now.

    If they relied on the Flying Dragons alone, they might be able to think of something, but there are still Flying Dragons on this side whock real-worldbat experience. If they acted rashly here, not only Gobta and the others, but also those on Gabil''s side would suffer.

    "Oops, no way! Let''s shoot those boats down first. In terms of numbers we are better off. Let us all turn our attention to the enemy in front of us!"

    "Yes, General."

    "But they''re bigger, right? Just in terms of numbers"

    "Stupid, shut up! Lord Gabil noticed it too, but he could only give such orders!

    Certain people are still out there saying less than sturdy things, which is amon urrence. In contrast to those conversations, Gabil and the others actually ran off to fight the pile of blimps.

    Someone looked at such Gabil and them with a cold look.

    He is Major General Faraga, who is in charge of the killer "Air Combat Flying Corps" thatmands the Mecha Corps.

    He was a capable man and had a desire for glory to match it, a desire to rise to the top without losing to other generals.

    Such a Faraga is particrly hard-working, thoroughly helping other colleagues so that they do not be hostile to themselves.

    There is certainly a reason for this.

    Since he was in the "Magic Legion" before, he had experienced the end of that Legion firsthand.

    The Legion of Magic, which held great power long ago, has disintegrated and is now a relic of the past.

    Maybe times change that way, but the biggest reason is that people think that legion is too inefficient in war.

    People tend to think that fighting with magic is shy, but it''s actually very unassuming work.

    To analyze the magic of the enemy, and to carry out obstruction. Then to take the opportunity to unleash magic and strike the enemy army. Then just keep doing it over and over again, with no way toe up with much.

    This was because the knights were several times stronger than the magical legions in actualbat after being strengthened through magic.

    For example, the most powerful magic known was Nuclear Strike Magic, and to use this move you had to send out a dozen spellcasters. This is not a spell that can be cast by an individual. The spell must be constructed, that is, it requires chanting time.

    If you are a heroic figure, you can control the nuclear strike magic by yourself but your power can only explode within a hundred meters in diameter at most.

    If it was a direct hit it would be quite powerful, however when the opponent was an army, they would use Legion Magic to build the barrier used against magic. If one wanted to have enough power to break through, one could only rely on a group of people exercising ritual magic.

    In other words, a single wizard is less likely to be active on the battlefield.

    Other than that, it''s certainly more beneficial to have more wizards, but not the more the better. The amount of mana floating around the battlefield was limited, and if it was depleted, the wizard would not be able to disy his long talent in one go.

    A wizard''s existence, though indispensable, cannot produce magnificent results.

    Faraga is also an excellent magical teacher and is one of Master Gadra''s disciples.

    He had great respect for his teacher Gadra, followed his teachings and refined them from time to time.

    However, he discovered one thing.

    That is, Gadra, who was a teacher, stepped in to assist and did a modern treatment of the Mecha Legion, resulting in them never having an active stage again.

    This age is beginning to see no need for hard-drilling wizards.

    As long as there are "magic guns", even ordinary people can manipte magic.

    Faraga hates Gadra.

    He once made the observation that teachers were stifling them by such behavior. Yet these were dismissed by Gadra.

    The result was the wiping out of the Legion of Magic

    That''s why I betrayed my teacher and dered my allegiance to Lord Calgurio.

    Later he gained the status he has today.

    epting the former minionsthe capable wizardsand giving them a stage to show their skills. One day we will get what we want, and we will make the Air Combat Air Corps the best it can be.

    Until then, they have to bribe their colleagues so that the Flying Corps donte out on top. Because of this idea, Faraga was always strict.

    After that, he finally waited for the perfect opportunity.

    That is, to go out and crush Veldora. The "Air Combat Air Corps" was selected and became a key unit.

    The mission is roughly to seal off the Veldora by disrupting the radioactivity of the magicules.

    The rest of the job is to supplement the other troops.

    Serving as a resupply force was their original mission, but they didn''t need to do that this time. It should be said that out of the four hundred blimps, three hundred had to go on other missions, and the remaining hundred had to carry elite wizards within the carrying limit.

    Designed entirely forbat, it''s conceivable how much importance Calgurio ces on thisbat n.

    The battle n had to work no matter whatand Faraga was well aware of that.

    Ill take advantage of this time to make a big ssh and prove we are useful. And then I''m going to start a new era!

    Faraga secretly snickered.

    In this way, there was no need to look at the other generals'' faces. The stance will be reversed and no one can ignore Faraga''sments.

    That was the gesture he was supposed to have, and Faraga was convinced of it.

    Ill use them as a bit of a warm-up before beating Veldora, and just make do with it. Ill take those lizards flying in the air and dogs crawling on the ground and use them as practice objects for new weapons.

    Faraga fought the reckoning.

    "Say what''s mine to take credit for. I''m the one who sold you a favor, Lord Geist!

    He raised the ss of wine he was holding in his hand and shouted.

    "Guys! So far we''ve been patient, and those will alle to a halt today! Let''s show them what we''re really made of!

    "Yeah, yeah, yeah!"

    The people who took the blimp all responded.

    These people were originally elite wizards who had been living in seclusion in a reality filled with heartache. From this day forward they will enjoy the glory and the humiliation will be nothing.

    All of them on the same page.

    With this tacit agreement, a hundred blimps stepped up their offensive

    The airship''s biggest feature is the magic--disrupting radiation device, and it is also equipped with other state-of-the-art weaponry.

    And it is the wizards who are well versed in "elemental magic" and "summoning magic" who are in charge.

    The construction of the airship is broadly divided into three parts.

    There is an operational sector, a defense sector and an attack sector.

    Each department is assigned one hundred men each, the remaining one being used as a reserve or for liaison and medical work.

    The Operations Department, which naturally needs no exnation, is in charge of the blimps. In fact, the ship can fly with a minimum of fifty people, if you want to use the fleetpletely, even a hundred people is not enough.

    The defense sector is responsible for applying a "defensive barrier" to airships.

    It is used to respond to a variety of attacks such as physics, magic, and attributes.

    In order to keep the blimp light, the outer walls of the blimp are not thick. If one is negligent in defending through fortified magic, one will be shot down in three or two strokes. So there must be no weak points in this department.

    Then there''s the final attack department, which sort of ys the role of the soul character.

    The weaponry prepared on the hovercraft also contained magic-enhanced cannons.

    On the one hand being able to make it easier for the wizards to work together.

    There are magic balls ced on the base, and several wizards will pour magic into them at the same time, then chant magic at the same time, making it easier to manipte big magic.

    There is one on the front and two pairs on the side.

    There are five Magic Enhancement Cannons in total, each with a maximum of ten wizards. The back seat has the person in charge of the shift on standby so that the magic can be unleashed continuously.

    In particr, it is worth mentioning that the magic enhancement cannon is proportional to the number of users, and its power will increase along with it.

    If two people use it, the power bes four times as powerful.

    If the maximum number of people was ten, the power would be twenty times greater.

    This is enough to pose a threat.

    Even ordinary fireball techniques would override the Great me Demon Sphere in terms of power.

    What a powerful thing this is, I''m sure it doesn''t need much exnation.

    The airship is well guarded.

    The fireball that the flying dragon spat out was nothing at all, and even if it was rushed with its body, it would still have a barrier to resist.

    A half-assed strike doesn''t work, much to Faraga''s satisfaction.

    And the offensive performance is no less impressive.

    "Blimps are the strongest. Almost time to show them the real power. Use all your strength and shoot down all the lizards that are in the way!

    Faraga sounded the call.

    Just now, there were only two or three wizards performing magic chants respectively. However, they''ve tested enough and now it''s time to y for real.

    They use very pure magic stones to make spells that are about fifty centimeters in diameter to control the treasure beads. Pouring the magic into it will activate the Magic Enhancement Cannon.

    Even the wizards who had been waiting and watching just now also moved, so that all ten of them would be able to unleash massive magic.

    It was twenty times more powerful than normal, with thunder and ice, mes and vacuum knives, and all kinds of terrifying magic sweeping through the skythese mad attacks were closing in on Gabil and his team.

    ***

    I had been watching the battle intently, but I couldn''t help but get up from my chair when I saw it halfway.

    sted by magic tank fire, Gobta''s men were knocked out.

    Exposed to the massive magic, Gabil''s men were beaten down one by one.

    The fighting intensified and casualties began to emerge.

    No, we had expected casualties. It''s been expected, but perhaps I''ve been optimistic.

    Thinking we''re going to win no matter what.

    Benimaru is so confident, and Master Raphael, the King of Wisdom, doesn''t say much, so I don''t think there will be any problem with thinking too good of everything.

    Yet reality is at variance.

    It''s no wonder. After all, we are at war.

    How can one take victory for granted when there are absolutely no casualties on our side.

    Knowing that I''m thinking too much, I''m now furious and anxious at the same time.

    At this point, Benimaru spoke to me with a nd expression.

    "Please, sit down, Lord Rimuru. These are all to be expected, no questions asked.

    Hearing that, something inside me seemed to explode.

    "I say, there''s already a victim! Wouldn''t it be better for me to cover them with Megiddo as well?"

    No, the conclusion has been drawn on that.

    The "Megiddo" does work, but the conclusion is that even that would be pointless.

    Benimaru is so doubtful about its effectiveness that even Diablo denies it.

    There seem to be several reasons.

    First of all, having begun to leap onto the stage as a nation, one cannot always look to their demon lord that is, me, for support.

    The demon king must protect the magical creatures underneath, but it was the duty of those ministers to guard the country, so asserted Benimaru.

    If one does not have the self-awareness to treat the Jura Tempest Federation as one''s own country, and does not possess the will of his mothend to be protected by one''s own hands, then one is not qualified to live in this countrythe other subordinates think so too.

    "Lord Rimuru cannot be left to carry everything alone."

    Shuna once said so.

    It made sense to me to hear it too, and I was amused at the time.

    The above is the first reason.

    The second reason is the weakness of the "Megiddo" pointed out by Diablo.

    "This ''Megiddo'' is a very beautiful magic. No need to expend too much energy in exchange for high power. It is very versatile and easy to use. But once you''ve seen it, you''ll be able to figure out how to respond to it.

    Diablo said as above.

    If you stay in the control room, you''ll be able to use that trick, and if you use it this time, it''ll work great. But once it''s seen, it won''t work next time.

    Hinata seems to have said the same thing, she said that by lifting the wind to roll up the sand, this alone would make the uracy and power fall straight down.

    He was also able to get advice from Hinata''s side, and Diablo''s intelligence-gathering ability was really not something to write home about. But let''s ignore that for now.

    Last time I killed all my enemies.

    The survivorsnow only two men, Edmalis and Razen, remainhave been silenced, and there is no need to fear that information will leak out. It''s just that there''s no way to make it work this time.

    The Imperial generals and soldiers added up to a total of several hundred thousand people, how could it be possible to silence everyone.

    "A great move should be kept hidden.

    Even Benimaru said so.

    Such magic should not be used haphazardly. Diablo and Benimaru''s opinion is as above.

    It makes sense to me to hear them exin it like that.

    The true face of the so-called "Megiddo" is actually a super-hot concentrated beam formed by shrinking sunlight, and it is almost impossible to avoid the light just by seeing it with the naked eye. That said, magic used specifically against people must be used at critical times to make sense.

    Plus this time the opponent was not flesh and blood, but a magic tank formed of iron. Megiddo shouldn''t bepletely useless, but the effect is probably weak. The calctions of Master Raphael, the King of Wisdom, also indicated that it would take some time to destroy the magic tank.

    The power must be increased, which means that the focus temperature of the hotline must be focused to tens of thousands of degrees or it will not prate the magic tank. Other than that, the power of the magic tank should not be oil, and there is probably no way to break out into a fire.

    If you can''t stop the magic tanks from moving just by using the beam, you''ll have to beat the magic tanks into a thousand holes until they can''t move. Instead of doing something so tedious, it''s easier to blow up with nuclear strike magic.

    In such a case, you would have to break the "magic barrier" that had been cast severalyers first, and then you would have to clean up the magician who was the spellcaster first, and in the end, it would start a magic war that would be mired in a quagmire.then it would be meaningless to fight.

    There was no way things were going smoothly.

    That being the case, both handed over themand to Benimaru, and my job was left to silently watch.

    It was supposed to be like this

    "I did go to war together"

    My words were interrupted halfway through.

    "That won''t do.

    As the general in charge of everything, he could not expose me to danger. After all, the words of ''hero''

    Chloe made people care.

    In another time, someone killed Lord Rimuru. Knowing this dangerous man, letting Lord Rimuru fight in battlesuch a thing will not be tolerated.

    All the subordinates were aware of the presence of dangerous people on the enemy''s side. This is because I have talked to people and told them that this could happen in the future.

    How did you all feel when you find out?

    As for the answer, just look at Benimaru''s expression right now and it''s clear at a nce.

    "The current threat is posed by the chiefs of the three legions and the hundred men who belong to the Imperial Emperor''s Order of the Near Guard. There may be other hidden strongmen present that are still being investigated. I beg your pardon for our ipetence.

    The words were spoken by Souei.

    Souei and his group were currently desperately gathering information.

    All of this is for me.

    To rule out the threat that would arise against me.

    "It''s not clear how the enemy''s battle strength can bring Lord Rimuru, who is the king, to the front line.

    The battle n is going well, so please have faith in me, in Gobta and in Gabil.

    The words made me slump helplessly in my chair.

    The displeasure of not being able to tell whether it was chagrin or agitation did not go away. Although it didn''t go away, the words of Benimaru were just too valid.

    That''s right.

    Calm down and think about it, from the very beginning, Benimaru was thinking of me in order to implement such abat n.

    It wasn''t just Benimaru, it was also Shion who stayed behind me, and Souei who stood next to me.

    Diablo didn''t need to say much more, even Shuna looked at me with a worried look, which only made me realize that everyone was mentally prepared, knowing that those who went forward to fight might be sacrificed.

    It is not just those who are hereI am afraid even those who are fighting on the front lines think so.

    To use themselves as bait, they go into battle ready to face unknown threats, ready to be bait to lure each other in.

    Other than that, there is the same reason why Veldora, who normally always does what he wants, stays in the "control room". That is, if anything, he will protect my personal safety.

    All for the sake of me as the King of my own country.

    The only person who has not made an enlightenment is me

    At this very moment

    Because of this, I must be invulnerable

    Vaguely it seemed that a sound wasing from somewhere.

    Even you''re worried about me?

    However, it''s been okay.

    I feel sad that it is offensive to those who make the consciousness.

    That being the case, I must also be aware.

    "Sorry, I''m losing my cool"

    When I apologized to Benimaru, he nodded.

    "Please don''t worry. The victory must belong to Lord Rimuru.

    With a proud smile on his face, Benimaru hung reassurance with me.

    That''s the serious look that only a major general who carries the life of a general''s soldier can get.

    Hearing that, it felt like the negative emotions like annoyance and entanglement in my mind were gradually disappearing.

    There has been a long time of awareness of the fact that you will die and that you must kill your enemies. Yet there will be those who will die for themselves, and I deliberately do not think about that.

    I have to bear those.

    I would do it not just for me personally, but for their families, for the country that protects those familiesthe symbol of all of this is my being.

    Therefore, I must bear their thoughts.

    They deserve to be repaid for what they have given, and we must not lose the war.

    Since it''s a symbol, it has to look the way it should, so it has to go with the show. Thinking about this side, in order to look like there was such a thing, I leisurely responded to Benimaru''s words.

    "That''s for sure. Pass on my words. Is that okay?

    as youmand!

    With Benimaru''s approval and help, Imunicated my "will" to all my minions. My words are conveyed intact through my unique technique, "Generalissimo".

    "Listen up, everybody! Do your best to crush the enemy. No need to hold back. And certainly no mercy is needed. Use all your strength to get rid of the enemy as quickly as you can!

    Pouring all of my thoughts into it, I gave the order.

    Benimaru nodded after hearing my words.

    Smiles also appeared on the faces of other subordinates.

    This order represents one thing.

    No more suppressing your strength, you can do it

    Interpreting the meaning of my words correctly, the magical creatures are once again active.

    And the result

    would create a major turn in the entire war.

 Volume 13 - Ch 2

    Those words of Lord Rimuru prated into the souls of all the magical creatures on the battlefield.

    Those words came from their King whom all their loyalty and trust was offered.

    Immediately after, they heard an order.

    "The camougedbat n is terminated. Those fools upset Lord Rimuru, beat them to a pulp!

    In this way, the things that bound those magical creatures were gone.

    The monsters were full of joy, following the urge to free their magic.

    In order to live in the town, their aura had been suppressed so as not to affect the environment, and the full liberation had allowed the concentration of the surrounding magical elements to rise one level higher.

    They are no longer fearless.

    The inner impulse that drives them all to the battlefield

    ***

    In the midst of the gunfire, Gobta also heard the order.

    "Finally? Still, we don''t seem to have reached our goal, is that okay?

    He muttered to himself there.

    Someone responds, and it''s his adjutant Gobchi.

    "That''s not so bad, actually. Although the original n was for us to continue to pester our opponent to y the trump card, we would be the first to go first. If they didn''t scare each other a little, the powerful ones wouldn''t havee forward, would they?

    "Is that so?

    "That''s it.

    Gobta and Gobchi were still talking about the numerous shells that were pounding the battlefield as the st wave raged. They were able to hear each other, and those who saw this scene were impressed.

    As far as this old godlike attitude goes, no one feels anything wrong with it.

    "If it''s our side, the powerful ones will be the first to jump out.

    "So, isn''t the leader of the Gobta army one of the Four Heavenly Kings?

    "Wait! Although it is said that I am the Four Heavenly Kings, I am the weakest one on the inside.

    Please give me a break

    While saying some yes and no there, not only Gobta and Gobchi, but even the members of the Wolf Rider Soldier Unit were even more emotionally high than just now.

    This is because they have been waiting to see when Gobta will give the order.

    The rain of shells falls every now and then.

    This is deliberate and unbiased in its uracy, and it isunched to attack the entire face. From the very beginning, it was not to strike directly, but to annihte the opponent with a shockwave.

    The green legion had seen through this a long time ago and had been looking for a safe ce to move.

    Once hit head-on you die on the spot, but the flip side is that you live if you don''t get hit.

    The men in this ce are masters, with strength equal to that of a centurionthey all have the rank of A-. No matter how much damage is done, they can be healed by restorative medicine.

    That''s why Benimaru asked them to engage in pretend to fight and lose big battles.

    And they don''t really have to lose to the other side, but just pretend to be in crisis. Then take the time to let the rest of the men block the Imperial Army, leaving them with no way to retreat, and fight back with the next breath.

    When the magic tank''s shells run out, the enemy''s side should send out the best men to kill youust like that, Benimaru used to make extremely simple instructions.

    In Gobta''s opinion, he really wants toin.

    But amand is amand and cannot be disobeyed. Compared to the Imperial Army, Benimaru was even more terrifying.

    No, Benimaru-san is normally very nicebut he doesn''t show any mercy in the military. Plus, this time it was Lord Rimuru''s safety at stake. How can I have a way to counter that?

    Gobta began to think back to the moment he heard the battle n.

    It was tiring to go and convince the yers and finally lift the big name of Rimuru and everyone stoppedining.

    Again, all it takes is andslide victory in the initial engagement, but things don''t seem that easy. When the enemy thwarted Gobta''s breakthrough three or two times, they turned to the role they were meant to yas bait.

    But this role also ended.

    Because Rimuru said those words.

    And Benimaru followed suit to give the new order.

    They don''t have to be polite to the enemy.

    Finally all the power in their bodies can be liberated.

    "We are now free to attack. The Green Legion side has been handed over to Hakurou, no problem with this part, then this team will be handed over to Gobchi.

    Gobta changed his expression and informed all the team members through the "Communication Network". His tone was as usual, but with an irrepressible verve.

    "Got it. So what''s the green legion army chief''s n?

    When Gobchi asked helplessly, a troubled smile also appeared on Gobta''s face, followed by a response.

    "I don''t have time to y there now either. It didn''t matter what the Four Heavenly Kings were, after all, it was an order from Lord Rimuru. Lord Rimuru is watching, so don''t be too bad! Thats why, I''m going to be serious from now on!

    Gobchi and the rest of the team knew he meant it when they saw Gobta''s eyes.

    It''s rare to see their supervisor so serious.

    "Hmph, use all your strength that I recognize, without reservation.

    "What makes you so arrogant?

    "Can you hear me?

    "Forget about it, and do your best!

    "Well, you can say that.

    Gobta, who had taken his cluelessness, let out a sigh.

    Gobta was one of the early yers and the two have known each other for a long time. Although he was excellent, he had absorbed all kinds of extra knowledge from the Rimuru side, so he now inexplicably liked to y handsome.

    What started out as a copycat has evolved into his own unique style. He wore a long ck version of his jacket and carried two long swords. The two swords were used, even though they were clearly not used properly.

    Does that look make people worry that it''s really okay? But with Gobchi by his side, he should be able to work something out. Gobta made the conclusion look away and turned his attention to the opponent who should be paying the most attention.

    The one sitting behind the green legion, it was known without saying it, was Testarossa.

    "That''s the way it is, Miss Testarossa. I''d like to ask you to split up with us next, okay?

    Only to see Testarossa smile and nod.

    Even staying in the midst of the bursts of mes and sts, her movements were as graceful as ever and her military uniform as clean as ever. Presumably, coal and sand dust wouldn''t have been able to get Testarossa dirty either.

    "Yes, of course. I feel the same way you do. She then ceased to act as an ombudsman and instead acted as a minister under Lord Rimuru. Everyone should do their best.

    Testarossa finished and got off of Ranga.

    So take care of yourselvesleaving those words, and Testarossa walks off at a leisurely pace.

    Rimuru had ordered Testarossa to stay with Gobta as inspector, now that her mission was over. The dangerous demon began to strike.

    This one is really my type.

    Even Gobta was wrongly stunned, but he didn''t say anything. He''s grown up, at least, and wouldn''t do such a stupid thing.

    And so, after seeing Testarossa leave, Gobta was like saying it''s our turn to y

    "Then let''s get started!

    "Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah!"

    He gave the order to all the yers, and the response of the yers satisfied him.

    Gobta also wants to show Rimuru how cool he is.

    He was very fond of Rimuru.

    Although capricious and a bit bad-hearted, he has a good and reliable heart. Gobta also had visions of such a Rimuru.

    What was once a tiny goblin has now grown into a warrior with a name. Now it is time for him to repay his kindness.

    "Gobchi, you do the rest!

    After shouting this, Gobta gave a coded signal to Ranga.

    "It''s our turn, Mr. Ranga! The Demon Wolf in One!"

    Some people have responded to this statement with the same Ranga who has so far repeatedly endured.

    "I''ve been waiting a long time, Gobta. Let our leader, Lord Rimuru, see the power we have!

    Gobta synced with Ranga''s consciousness on both of them, liberating the magic within. The next moment, a ck mist surrounded Gobta.

    "Come on, let''s make a scene!

    "Mmm. No need to show mercy. It''s been a long time since I''ve shown any real skill!

    The ck haze disappeared without a trace, looking as if it had been sucked in by the green legion.

    Immediately after, the Goblin warrior who had merged with the ck Wolf showed up.

    Two dangerous horns grew on his head, turning him into a ck wolf with a humanoid stance.

    This is what Gobta and Ranga looked like after they were "assimted" and indeed possessed enough strength to be called Four Heavenly Kings.

    As soon as they saw that posture, the members of the Wolf Rider Soldiers underneath Gobchi rushed out in unison.

    "Don''t mess with him! The head of the Gobta army is serious!

    The hobgoblins shouted desperately, seeing how dangerous they were now to the green legion.

    The evidence is

    Even though the magic tank was firing shells, it was still knocked down by the Monster Wolfs fist. Not only that, even if the magic tank attacked from the front, the hardened ck fur could still leave the demon wolf unharmed.

    Those mass bombs were more than six times the speed of sound and contained powerful destructive energy, but Gobta now had the extra armor that Ranga had turned into, and they couldn''t hurt him at all.

    This was due to the defensive effect provided by Ranga''s ''multiple barriers'', but the Imperials didn''t know about it and it was like a nightmare to them.

    "So, what''s that? Am I dreaming?"

    "No, no! That''s the monster. There are monsters under the Demon Lord!"

    Those subordinate soldiers began to panic.

    And on top of that, the members of the Magic Tank Force, who are so intertwined that they can''t move a muscle, are even more scared.

    As Gobta-Ranga let out a loud roar, "ck Lightning" came down over the magic tank force. Nearly a thousand magic tanks were turned into fortresses, which happened to be the subject of the "ck Lightning".

    The ck lightning would interfere with the defensive enclosure cast on the magic tank, emitting a dazzling glow. Although the magic tank can withstand it for a while, the "electrical resistance" cannot be said to be perfect.

    The men seated inside seemed to have ensured their personal safety, but the infantry unit, which had posed with the magic tanks as a barrier, had suffered a great deal of damage.

    Not only that, but the threat of "ck lightning" is more than just current.

    Essentially more terrifying than nature''s thunderbolts.

    "It''s hot! This, this issignificant damage to the defensive structure of the vehicle!

    Ev-Everyone retreat! Get away from the magic tank now!

    While there are ways to prevent the electrocution effects of a lightning strike, there seems to be no way to withstand that heat. Immediately afterwards, even if the other party appeared broken, things didn''t end here.

    ck Lightning, as if a self-conscious snake, began to nibble at the lifeless magic tanks. It then causes significant wear and tear on the precision mechanical parts.

    The magic tanks erupted and burst into mes before they were evened.

    The thunder rumbled and the magic tank units were no longer able to move smoothly.

    In this way, the magic tanks that join together to be fortresses only be stumbling blocks. All of the general soldiers desperately fled from the magic tank, falling apart in order not to be caught in the lightning wave.

    It has long since be a scattered mass of defeated soldiers.

    It doesn''t look like much.

    Watching the enemy''s movements on the one hand, Gobtaughed out loud.

    Their power works very well against enemy armies.

    Besides, even the first target to be targeted, the enemy''s own team, was not to be feared in his current wolf form, Gobta thought.

    He looked to the magic tank barrier that towered over the front.

    The barrier, which had been blocking their way, was hit by Ranga''s thunder until ck smoke rose.

    Gobta didn''t hesitate to let out a growl.

    That sound, the sonic cannon, shattered the barrier formed by the magic tanks.

    On the opposite side of the barrier appeared a line of tanks that were aiming their cannons at this side.

    "I''ve had enough of being bait. It''s time for us to go for it!"

    "That''s right. I''m sure Lord Rimuru is looking forward to seeing us do well too.

    Gobta and Ranga nodded happily at each other.

    Then let''s get started.

    Without a moment''s hesitation, Gobta burrowed into the barrier formed by the magic tank.

    Even in the face of the strong enemy waiting ahead, he didn''t have the slightest fear.

    Make the best of Testarossa on the battlefield.

    That speed instantly surpassed the speed of sound, and it was no longer possible for the Imperial General''s soldiers to catch his movements with the naked eye.

    "Let you see the results of my special training with Mr. Ranga! Let''s see how far you can go with this.

    Blizzard Wolf Dance!"

    A ck st of wind ran across the battlefield.

    At the same time, the destruction from the supersonic shockwave hit the Imperial Magic Tank Force.

    This shockwave also has the magic effect of "breaking the storm" attached to it, eventually growing into a tornado. The carefully calcted actions are effective in wiping out enemy forces and evolving into a "tornado of destruction".

    Fearfully, Gobta''s special skill for wiping out armies is the Blizzard Wolf Dance.

    A corner of the battlefield copses in on this.

    ***

    As the Gobta began to drive them to the ground, changes also appeared overhead.

    That was the Third Corps, led by Gabil.

    ...........

    ........

    Following Benimaru''s orders, the Gabil group was responsible for covering Gobta and the others. Even though this task was starting to get difficult, they didn''t go into a panic and immediately executed their next battle n.

    That was "pretending to lose" like the green legion.

    Pretend that you''re about to lose, so that you can stay glued and let the enemy perform a big trick.

    Although this battle n was very messy, Benimaru ordered it without changing his colors. Not only that, but Gobta and Gabil also epted it with an unchanged face.

    If there was real danger, they were allowed to retreat. And that, of course, had toe first to help Gobta get away.

    But Gabil thought such concerns were superfluous. This was because although Gobtained from his mouth, he kept a smile on his face.

    Gabil would love to emte the neurotic man he has be in this regard, but in fact the two of them may have unexpected simrities. If the situation allowed, he would even want to shoot down the blimp in that case.

    If the glue can be maintained without being forced, Gabil believes it should be able to give his opponent more or less some damage.

    Based on this idea only to take to airbat, but the enemy is stronger than expected.

    Gabil and the others magic didn''t work, and the fireball attacks of the flying dragon troops were blocked. Now that they have lost the advantage of attacking one-sidedly from the air, Gabil can be said to be at the disadvantage.

    Our job is to get the attention of these blimps and not think about whates after. If one fights with all one''s might, it''s not impossible to fight down

    Using Gabil and everyones "flying dragon congregation"''s killer weapon, it might be possible to break through the airship''s defenses. But once that was done, there was no way for them to continue with the operational n. So Gabil thought it was time to be quiet for the moment.

    Obeying Benimaru''s orders, willingly taking the attack unterally.

    That''s when a problem is encountered, and that''s the under-persistent Flying Dragon Force.

    Although the elite people inside were all selected from the Blue Corps, they had not evolved into the Dragon Race like Gabil and the others had. Endurance against magic is very low, and if they are attacked by mass magic, the light will be shot down.

    So Gabil wanted the Flying Dragon troops to retreat.

    "Miss Ultima, I have a favor to ask of you.

    "What is it?"

    "We''ll continue to ''pretend to lose'' and then we''ll do our best to act.

    Acting?"

    "Exactly. Even if we continue to flee, the enemy won''t let his guard down. Therefore, we, the Flying Dragons, will deliberately bear the magic of the enemy.

    Gabil informed the other side of these.

    Ohthat''s interesting what you said. So what''s the real purpose?

    "Mmm. That''s what I thought, and now this situation is just the thing to get resistance to. Even if we get hit head-on, we probably won''t die. There''s a lot of restorative medicine here, and I''m going to do an endurance experiment to make it look like we lost.

    The above is what Gabil said.

    Ultimaughed after hearing that, and the yers began to express their displeasure.

    "Wait, General, are you serious?

    "Lord Gabil can be an idiot sometimes.

    "I really want to sayis that necessary now?

    Watching the yers mor, Gabil pretended not to hear when they were all air.

    "Well, yes! Seems like fun. Permission to execute?

    "I''m grateful. Then, hopefully, you can retreat from the scene.

    Gabil asked Ultima, who was the Inspector, to lead the Flying Dragon forces in retreat.

    All that was left was Gabil and the others to attack the airship force.

    "If I die, I''ll hate you!"

    "I wish you hadn''t thought of this experiment.

    "I''m sure you''ll be scolded for doing thister.

    The crew looked off into the distance, having said that, they had known Gabil for a long time. Despite the lip-smacking, they looked happy and dry.

    In this way, they decided to implement magic endurance training for the Flying Dragon congregation.

    In passing

    Rimuru was worried to see it all, and almost fainted when heter learned the truth that the Gabil group was stigmatized, and that several people had seen iting. Even so, they were put into practice, and it seems that they were assimted by General Gabil.

    All in all, because of the exposure to the magic released by the blimp, Gabil and the others were badly injured.

    ...........

    ........

    Timees to now.

    Gabil heard the ''voice'' from Rimuru.

    "Listen up, everybody! The training is all over. And I''m going to go into dragon mode next!"

    Totally unaware that their training had left Rimuru in a state of unease. Gabil dered aloud.

    The yers rejoiced at this.

    Gabil happily continued.

    "Fortunately, the rookies are retreating with Miss Ultima. It''s just us, even if it''s a little messy!"

    Seeing Gabil like this, the yers started joking with him.

    "Since it''s going to be a mess, I think it''s better to use my real skills inbat than the endurance training I just did!

    "That''s right. That''s right. It''s not like Lord Gabil''s messing around didn''t just start now.

    Hearing this, Gabil shouted red-faced.

    "Shut up, all of you! Don''t say anything, get moving! Follow me to the best of your ability!

    Seeing Gabil try to hide his shyness in this way, bitter smiles came to the faces of the yers.

    "There''s nothing I can do about him. Stop joking around and follow orders.

    "All right, all right. You can''t disobey a great general.

    "Yes! Lord Gabil, please give the order again!

    Hearing those words, Gabil nodded with satisfaction. Then stared at the Imperial "Air Combat Flying Corps" that was confronting them, and pulled up the volume to ask.

    "I ask you, who is the overlord of the skies?

    "It''s us, the Flying Dragons!

    The aura on Gabil changed, and the minions responded in earnest.

    "Exactly. Those who dare to defile our skies must be cleaned up. That''s what Lord Rimuru meant! The holy decree under Lord Rimuru. Everyone, give it your all! With all your might, you don''t need to think much about what happens afterwards!

    Yes!"

    Gabil''s order has special significance for the Flying Dragon congregation.

    Thats

    "Be careful not to let your sense of self be consumed, okay? All of you, Dragon Warriors"

    Gabil''s order made the Flying Dragon congregation''s blood boil.

    The Dragon Warriorization is thest trump card they have hidden.

    Combat power gains an overwhelming rise, bes more ferocious, and is not easy to control. If self-consciousness is devoured, they will be raging monsters.

    It will not suppress the urge to destroy, so this skill has been sealed so far.

    Gabil brought in Middray as an instructor to train with his partners to learn control. But as things stand, the sess rate is not high.

    Even so they still used it.

    For Rimuru had given the orderthat they should go all out.

    They had no reason to hesitate.

    "Dragon mode!"

    Together, the Flying Dragons unleashed the power they deserved.

    The muscles began to swell and the purple scales that covered the surface of the body turned ck. The thickness is increased, and the softness and hardness are several times greater.

    The body size also doubled. Absorbing the magical elements around them and constructing a new body.

    Both volume and mass have increased dramatically, and attack and defense have improved by leaps and bounds. Needless to say, those values were notparable before the transformation.

    As for the most important self-awareness

    If this makes them unconscious, they are simply a collection of forces. However, each member of the Flying Dragon congregation has sessfully maintained his or her self-awareness.

    The Dragon Warriorsthat was the strongest force in Tempest, and their true fighting prowess blossomed in this instant.

    "Everyone''s going to hit the next one. Is there a way?

    "Yes, sir!

    "Good! So, let''s go"

    Gabil gave the order for the "Flying Dragon" to move out en masse.

    Who is the king of this sky?

    In the face of this question, the answer will now be revealed.

    The Mecha Legion, one of the three legions that made the Empire proud. Their killer "Air Combat Flying Corps" is now a poormb for the ughter.

    This is because the Dragon Warriorization, an inherent skill of the Draconians, has now been unleashed with special effects, and magic does not work on them.

    Gabil and his group have turned into dragonized warriors, and even the ''divine Wrath'' that belonged to the natural effect didn''t work on them. That''s because they automatically generate barriers that correspond to all physical attacks and invalidate magical attacks and natural effectsmultiple barriers" and "natural effects".

    The airships'' means of attack were all magic-based, and the machine guns were only auxiliary weapons, with no way to prate Gabil''s scales. The Flying Dragons had already possessed abat power equivalent to A-, and now it had been strengthened several times, and now their strength had casually surpassed the A-rank wall.

    The ability to regenerate close to "overdrive" is also avable during the transformation.

    The strength even surpassed that of high-ranking demons

    The blimps'' means of attack could no longer hurt them, and now the blimps were out of gas.

    As if to prove the point, Gabil shouted.

    "I''m going in! Take it, and watch me do it"

    Gabil was originally a powerful individual, with an excellent ranking of Extra-A. Although not as strong as Shion and Benimaru, he was a strong one alongside Souei and Geld.

    Such a Gabil transformed the Dragon Warriorization into his own power and spawned powerful warriors.

    That power even went right to the former demon lords Carrion and Frey

    "Whirlpool water strike!

    The blow that Gabil struck broke up one of the blimps and sank it.

    The air currents curl into a vortex, coalescing the moisture in the atmosphere at a certain point, forming a maelstrom of magical power. This majestic force was released from thatnce in Gabil''s hand, running through one of the aircrafts.

    Even the "defensive frontier" from a hundred members of the defense services was defenseless and was crushed in this way.

    It really does sink in a sh.

    The other Dragonized Warriors followed close behind. Although they couldn''t release the magical spear like Gabil, they stillunched a surprise attack on the airship with his enhanced body functions.

    The magic didn''t work on them, so the hovercraft''s barrier didn''t do anything to stop them. In the blink of an eye, the barrier was breached, allowing them to invade the interior of the ship.

    A small party of five men took on a ship that took a few minutes to sink one by one.

    As things turned out, the "Air Combat Air Corps" would all die sooner orter.

    This made Gabil shout in triumph.

    "Gah, gah, gah, gah! Come on, everybody, take it up. If someone can''t even bring down a ship, you''ll see what happenster!

    Hearing these words, the members of the Flying Dragon congregation, who were moving rtively slowly, turned green in the face.

    There are only a hundred blimps. Today Gabil continues to attack and the number of remaining ships is gradually decreasing.

    This has turned into apetition.

    "That will not do, Lord Gabil!

    "Lord Gabil is easily swayed by the mood of the moment. It seems to be hitting the right way now, maybe not leaving prey for us.

    "It is possible that the Grand Admiral did so

    How well everyone teamed up to fight down the airship was going to be defined, it all depended on the mood of Gabil. Knowing how things might turn out, the yers rushed to join the attack one after another.

    The position of the hunter and the prey reversed and the situation in the sky was decided.

    ***

    A little time passed.

    The supply troops belonging to the Imperial Army''s "Magic Tank Division" were about to face trials.

    "Gentlemen, I''m d you''ve followed me to this point. But everyone needs to be prepared, and thenes the heavy lifting!

    The person who said this was Hakurou, who had been assigned to the Green Legion.

    He also did not breathe a sigh of relief, a look of indifference, but the 12,000 regiment members who heard this, all of them were panting.

    This was because they were now staying further back in the Imperial Magic Tank Force. In order to get around from the Dwarven Kingdom, they meandered for over forty kilometers.

    Still in a state of wearing heavy equipment

    It was thanks to Hakurou, the ''teacher'', that all this came true.

    Hakurou thoroughly exercised the members of the regiment and made them learn the "qi fighting method". As a result, members of the team are able to use a variety of techniques, such as the instantaneous movement method, which allows for instantaneous movement, and the invisibility method, which makes opponents invisible.

    The Green Legion marched out at the same time as Gobta and others, running to get there so the enemy wouldn''t find out.

    "You are to bemended for your flexibility in using the ''qi fighting method'' taught by me.

    Hakurou said as he put on a Buddha-like and kind face.

    The members of the regiment were all sitting on the ground, holding their breath as they listened, and instead had an ominous feeling in their hearts.

    Theyve all known Hakurou for a long time. And this unflinching "teacher" treats his enemies more harshly than he treats his own people. Such an old looking man giving orders afterplimenting his own peoplejust imagining it could be terrifying. The people knew that the person who was going to carry out the order was themselves, and without awareness they could not listen to what wasing.

    "Our mission is to cut off the enemy supply line here. Although it is not very meaningful, but if we can defeat the enemy''s supply troops in the rear, we can more or less thwart the enemy''s fighting spirit. There is no need to do needless killing in the face of the enemy, but there is no need to show mercy to the enemy either. Besides"

    Speaking this way, Hakurou nced towards the battlefield, then revealed a smile, then continued to say the following words.

    "Gobta has also changed. When the bait is right, it''s right. You can''t lose to the army chief either, but you have to y well!

    Not losing to the sound of explosionsing from afar, Hakurou''s voice was resounding. Some people who had no real-world experience inbat were sedated by such a Hakurou and began to feel nervous.

    "Listen up, don''t think of anything superfluous while you''re fighting. Be aware that the one who does not hack the enemy to death is himself. If you let the enemy escape, your partner will die as a result. It''s an ironw on the battlefield.

    Just now, everyone was still panting, but they all unconsciously held their breath and listened to Hakurou speak.

    This is hitting everyone''s hearts.

    Let those who are well aware not be confused on the battlefield.

    "The value of life is not created equal. Compared to the lives of those we cherish, other strangers be indifferent. And the enemy is still the aggressor. These fools have no value in keeping us alive.

    Don''t think about it. Kill them all!

    Then Hakurou pressed everyone through such fierce words, minimizing their guilt.

    This Hakurou was being considerate of everyone.

    "If it is you who have been exercised by the Master, even those pieces of iron can be cut off. What the enemy shoots is nothing more than gadgets that look like standing still to you, don''t they? In that case, there is no need to be afraid. There is no opponent before our de!

    It doesn''t look like it''s standing still at allthats something no one can say.

    How can it be said? If you say something like that, you''ll get a ck of cultivation" and you''ll be treated even worse than you were on the battlefield.

    Some people have "this discontent" in their hearts, but everyone has noints against Hakurou.

    What he couldn''t do on his own, Hakurou would never take his word for it. Although Hakurou''s words were too radical, it was hoped that the members of the group woulde to the same pinnacle, and that such words and deeds would appear to contain the heart of the instructor.

    And just like that, the Green Legion has been waiting in the wings.

    They were waiting for Hakurou''s instructionsto order a surprise attack.

    The army chiefs who led them were on a more dangerous missionto be the decoy. Fight beautifully without disgracing the name of the Four Heavenly Kings.

    The figure was clearly seen by Hakurou''s additional skill, "Heaven''s Eye", and was then seen by everyone, even the most extreme legionnaire, through the "Communication Network".

    They are going to be scared. But beyond the fear, the regiment members were all taken from their gaze by the wolf-rider army led by Gobta.

    Everyone had already made up their minds, thinking that this time it would be their turn to work hard.

    Seeing the members of such a regiment, the uneasiness in Hakurou''s heart somewhat subsided.

    In order to be able to cope with various situations, he thoroughly trained the members of the regiment, but there are still victims of the first battle.

    Trying to exercise them a little moredespite such regrets, there''s no way around it. The enemy is not waiting for them.

    ording to Benimaru''s battle n, the Gobta group is going to fight tooth and nail to maintain the glue. This will surely make the enemy feel anxious.

    The magic tank''s shells were not infinite, and there was always a moment when that shower of gunfire stopped. At this point, it was Hakurou''s turn to make their appearance.

    To strike the enemy''s supply forces and seize their supplies. This would also easily paralyze enemy magic tanks.

    There is another purpose, which is to force out the hidden mastersto wait for the opponent to show up for a win or loss.

    I hope it''s in front of me.

    Hakurou expected so, but it also depended on timing.

    It was their first time on the battlefield and they would have died if they had been consumed by fear.

    Though hopefully theyll more or less alleviate their fears, then the next

    All we can do now is pray that the battle will be sessfnd that everyone will be safe. Hakurou thought so in his heart, but those worries were ultimately unwarranted.

    Listen up, everybody!

    Suddenly, through Benimaru''s skill, Rimuru used his mind to talk to everyone. Just by hearing those words, the uneasiness in the hearts of the monsters disappeared. Immediately after, unspeakable excitement began to well up and the flesh gradually became hot as if it were burning.

    "Get rid of the enemy as quickly as possible."

    Rimuru said sono, he gave the order.

    This made Hakurou smile darkly.

    "Looks like I''m overdoing it. You all heard me, right?

    Yes!"

    "Well, go ahead, everyone! There is no need to hold back any longer. Go to the battlefield and make the most of your strength.

    Long before the old man said those words

    The legion of monsters then rushed out like a wave of fury.

    After that, ten minutes passed.

    Some of the infantry, who were originally guarding the Empire''s supply forces, fought against the horizontally lined up army of monstrous creatures.

    The sudden surprise attack by the opponent almost had them in disarray, but these were the elite men of the Empire. They immediately reorganized their posture to find order.

    Take the armored vehicles for transport as shields, and some troops for sniping magical creatures. The Army was outnumbered and at first nce the battle situation seemed to be in their favor.

    Yet the Green Legion was not half afraid.

    Even when exposed to gunfire, the scaled shields set in the front row are still useful.

    Unlike bows and arrows, small guns shoot without forming parabs. The purpose is to suppress the enemy at close range, and that suppression cannot be exercised if the enemy at the front of the line is not shot down.

    Currently, the world is still dominated by swords and magic.

    If a weapon like a pistol is to be refurbished tactically, it must first exert too good a killing power.

    There is magic in this world. There is no way to paralyze the enemy with just one shot. The gunshot attack focuses on one point, with swords and axes hitting out with stronger longitudinal attacks.

    The epoch-making revolutionthe new weapons of which the empire is proud are not enough to usher in a new era.

    That being the case, another new type of weapon will be used. Once themander had made up his mind, he then gave follow-up orders.

    "Damn it! Everyone switched from small guns to "magic guns". The whole squad just needs to get the important supplies and meet up with this team!

    Small pistolsbased on knowledge brought from another world to recreate the weapon, there was not much use against magic. No, there was some sess in the experimental phase, but at best it was used against magical creatures that were not armed with anything.

    Then they switch to magic. The average soldier can also use this "magic gun" with the magic of the Great me Magic Gun carved into it.

    Using this would cut through most of the magic and let them burnor so themander thought.

    Yet sadly, it must be said that the idea is too naive.

    The Green Legion is equipped with thetest special-grade defense. It was a scaly shield that Garm had processed from Charybdis scales. A lead bullet can bounce off at any time, and it has a special effect

    "No, no! Magic is useless against enemy forces!

    Highly resistant to magicthats where the scaled shield reallyes in.

    There was another nightmareing at the Imperial Army in the back.

    The Flying Dragons flew in from the airthese were the elite of the Blue Corps led by Ultima.

    "Spill blood all you want!

    After this lovely shout, the entire ground exploded and burst into mes.

    This was arge scale attack with the ming Jades. Although not very powerful, it was already quite lethal when used on the infantry of the Empire.

    And the roar was enough to bring chaos to the battlefield.

    Support soldiers who are not ustomed tobatfor example, the reserves or the medicsare simply toote to react to sudden changes in the situation. As a result, there was no way to follow orders to rendezvous with our team, resulting in more and more unnecessary casualties.

    Seeing that the battle situation was more favorable to our side than what he had just worried about, Hakurou was somewhat relieved.

    "Hi, Mr. Hakurou. Can you hand them over to me for now?

    "So it''s Miss Ultima. It doesn''t matter if I do it for a while"

    Seeing Ultima jump off the flying dragon''s back, Hakurou was like an amiable old grandfather, responding withposure.

    It''s a far cry from the way he treated the group.

    "Yeah? Then I''ll leave it to you!

    Ultima also looked cute begging like a granddaughter who was pandering to her grandfather. Veyron and Zonda must have looked dumbfounded, thinking they were dreaming.

    After all, how could Ultima talk like that

    "That''s fine, but"

    "Well, what is it?

    "It''s nothing really. Just a question, is Ultima-sama close to Carrera-sama?

    WellThat''s a bit of a concern, but since it''s Mr. Hakurou, I''ll let it go. The answer is simple, we''re on super bad terms!

    Ultima replied with a narrow smile.

    The expression on her face was as cute as ever, and the vibe on her body was starting to get a little intimidating.

    Actually, Ultima is very good at pretending to be a good baby. Cruel and cold by nature, her emotional ups and downs are so great that one suspects she has a dual personality.

    Even so, there is still respect for her predecessors, so few people can detect her nature.

    "Well, that''s a shame.

    "Why do you ask?

    "It''s nothingjust a little interest. Lady Carrera has a subordinate named Agera who I want to ask if you know anything about him or not

    Hakurou stammered.

    This demon in Agera resembles someone Hakurou knewor he should say its exactly the same.

    This person was Araki Byakuya, the grandfather and master of Hakurou.

    That''s why Hakurou was interested in Agera. Yet Agera, the party in question, looked as if he did not recognize Hakurou.

    Is it because you''ve gotten older and changed your appearance? Hakurou once thought so, but

    Um sorry. I''m not interested so it''s not clear.

    Ultima said this indifferently.

    And she added

    "If you care so much, why don''t you just ask him yourself?

    That statement is beside the point.

    Hakurou nodded as he listened, thinking that it was right to say so.

    "That''s true. I''m sorry, I seem to have too many worries.

    "Well, well, it''s not good to think too much and worry too much. Still, that one''s forter. What''s more important now isbat. Otherwise, even Mr. Hakurou would have been scolded by Lord Rimuru!

    Then the rest is up to you"leaving those words with a smile, Ultima flew into the sky again.

    He watched her leave, and then Hakurou changed his expression to one of enlightenment.

    "Oh, my goodness. It seems that it was myself who was not cultivating enough. I''ll have to make up for that as soon as possible."

    Immediately afterwards, Hakurou drew his sword.

    He turns into a swordsman and is ready to dominate the battlefield.

    ***

    The sight before his eyes stunned Major General Faraga.

    By managing the plural "defensive borders" with elite wizards, you can create an air fortress with a proud and all-around defense. Such a hovercraft was shot down by a magical creature.

    ording to Imperial Intelligence, it appears to be a rare race called the Dragon People. He had heard that the other side had what was called a human-type dragon''s battle strength, but what he saw in front of him was simply worlds apart.

    "Is that guy a monster? I''m not getting any information from the intelligence agency!

    To get rid of his own self, who is a magical mentor and wizard, so give him false information? Faraga almost thought in that direction, but he thought it shouldn''t be.

    No, not right. Those guys were transforming before my eyes. Could this be a change in the type of magical creature that Master had once written about in his book?

    It is said that certain races among the magical creatures are free to change into two postures, one suitable for general life and the other specifically forbat.

    The Dragon People who had just fought them were magical creatures that had evolved from the Lizard People. They have wings capable of flying through the air and the stunt is to be able to spit out various attributes of attacks. The danger level is B among magical creatures, which is not to be underestimated, but it is certainly not a particrly threatening opponent.

    "What''s going on?

    Faraga originated to question the adjutant.

    The discrepancy between the facts and information at hand also seemed to baffle the adjutant in question.

    "I''m so, so sorry.

    The person in charge of detecting the energy value of the enemy''s magical creatures returned, saying that as soon as the other party''s appearance changed, the values increased dramatically. The value was found to be several times higher than the benchmark ssified as A rank.

    "You meanseveral times higher than an A rank? Andpletely resistant to magic, is that what it means!?

    Faraga shouted, but that thought was actually wrong. Gabil and the others are not "magically ineffective" despite their high level of "magical resistance". It was just that the magic attacks released by the blimps weren''t powerful enough to break the ''multiple barriers'' that guarded them.

    "I don''t want to admit it, but I can only specte in this direction based on the current situation. Our magic attack was useless at all, but the attack from the enemy magical creatures brought down our proud airship"

    That kind of thing to see and knowFaraga was tempted toin. But he stiffly suppressed the urge and managed to cope calmly.

    It was only about a hundred Draconians, nothing to be afraid of. No matter how great the gear they wore, they were no match for the Empire''s newest weapon - he had always thought so.

    When as many as three hundred flying dragons escaped, he was sure they would winno, not right. In fact, at this time Faraga felt uneasy. Perhaps he had long experience of fighting in the battlefield, and an unspeakable feeling of foreboding rose in his mind.

    Am I guessing? But now we have to think about countermeasures.

    Thinking about this side, Faraga once again looked to the battlefield.

    "Is the reason why it''s said several times more is because each one is equivalent to a high-ranking wizard? A catastropheno, maybe it''s as good as a catastrophe ss, is that right?

    "Yes! That''s what the analysts'' side said.

    "That''s tricky. If the magic is useful, even an A-grade magical creature can be disposed of. And what rank are the individuals leading the team?

    "This, this

    "What''s wrong? Answer quickly.

    "Yes! Then I''ll tell you."

    The adjutant faltered as he looked at the report, but re-reported under Faraga''s re. And its contents shocked Faraga.

    "Ten times more, you say? Is this true?"

    "It''s true. It''s not that the detector is malfunctioning, that''s for sure, I''ve heard that one particr individual has ten times more mana than the others.

    What

    Faraga lost his voice dumbfounded.

    Faraga''s master Gadra reincarnated repeatedly and gained power, even he didn''t have such exaggerated magical powers. Such a value is not even close to the Demon Lord.

    "There''s no information about the monster, not even the information given by the Intelligence Bureau.

    And he didn''t participate in the martial arts tournament organized by the demon creature, so his fighting strength is unknown.

    "The spy lurking over there said he seemed to have given a conference on herbs. I''ve heard that the content was interesting at the time, but in retrospect, the aim was actually to hide the equivalent of a catastrophe-levelbat power.

    It was only after listening to the subordinate officers expressing their opinions that Faraga came to his senses.

    A phenomenon like that just now is definitely a "transformation".

    To hide your fighting strength and let the enemy fall off guard. Later on, he learned that the airship was armed only with magic, so he revealed his true nature.

    Underestimated by them, thought Faraga.

    "Calm down, everyone. The enemy is magic. In that case, we win. No matter what opponent you face, its fine as long as you do unleash the Magicule Disrupting Radiation and seal their movements!

    The Dragon People are a very rare race. There are even rarer, but notpletely invincible, opponents who can "transform" among them.

    The airships were secret weapons developed by the Empire to be used against Veldora. Even the dragon''s dependents were no match as long as the real value of the magic element, which disrupted the radiation, was yed out.

    They''re also now unleashing the mana-disturbing radiation. Even the surface can beted with a wide range of influence. But that''s like testing the waters and waiting until you''re up against Veldora to apply it centrally.

    If the mana element is disturbed, the magical movements of the body made up of magicule elements will be dull. Just focus on letting the disturbance wave shine, and no matter what kind of magic creature it is, the action will be blocked.

    "Start moving now!

    Ignoring the adjutants who had rushed to get started, Faraga struggled to get a grip on the battle. With the exception of the individual responsible for taking the lead, the others were all five acting together.

    There are currently twenty in the fray. Fewer than ten blimps were shot down.

    In the face of such casualties and losses, there is still a great chance of redemption.

    "Major General Faraga, the irradiation is ready. But if this goes on, our personnel will be affected

    "So what?

    "No, it''s okay."

    "In that case, let''s get on with it.

    Yes!"

    The airship was able to float with the power of magic, so what would happen if it was irradiated with magical disruption?

    This, of course, goes without saying. After losing the magic effect, the hovercraft will fall in obedience to thews of physics. Of course the people above would not have survived.

    Faraga is a fellow wizard who once stayed in the "Magic Legion," which means that those wizards who look up to him will die.

    Still, Faraga didn''t even raise an eyebrow and gave the order in this regard.

    Mana disrupting the radiationstart irradiation!

    Around the engaged hovercraft and gobbler, the remaining ships began toy out. Then one by one, the magicule-disturbing radiation was irradiated from the bow of the ship.

    As a result, the blimps fell one after another. Along with the Draconians who were fighting them

    Sorry about that. It''s all a necessary sacrifice.

    Faraga opened his eyes and prayed silently.

    The fallen blimp hit the ground hard and burst into mes. The people sitting inside, not to mention the magical creatures will not be safe and sound.

    "Looks like it''s all gone. Then it''s just that special individual."

    "Even if magic doesn''t work, there''s no way they can survive the shock and the heat."

    "Although the sacrifice was great, being able to pack a hundred high-ranking monsters, such a price is already quite cheap.

    The adjutants were relieved.

    But Faraga threw a cold shower of water at them with a scolding.

    "Don''t be careless. It was a sacrifice for apanion, nothing to be proud of in a battle like this! And we haven''t packed that individual away yet!

    Hearing this, several adjutants tensed their nerves along with it.

    Even that special individual that was equivalent to a demon lord level was blocked from moving. But his wings were still there, still lingering in the air.

    Now that twenty hovercraft had been sacrificed, how could just one kill this enemy.

    "If only Gobta, the Four Heavenly Kings, who cannot fly in the air, were left, we wouldn''t have to work so hard

    "Mmm. If allied with Lord Geist''s charioteer force, no amount of tenacious defending could break it down.

    "However, he''s been so dislodged by the weapon that he can''t move. As long as you keep irradiating at this pace, it won''t be long before the flesh falls apart."

    "No, I don''t think so. The analyst ss is observing, and they say the rate of reduction in magicule values for particr individuals is minimal.

    Hearing what the adjutants were talking about, Faraga instantly had a chill to the bone.

    There are already so many of them, more than seventy hovercrafts together releasing magicule disrupting radiation, but only barely sealing the operation? Then wouldn''t the effect of weakening the magical creature be of no use to that guy at all.?

    While thinking, How could there be such a thing? Faraga simultaneously thought to himself that he had to rearrange his battle ns.

    This is when he realized that the enemy''s strength was on a different level than theirs.

    Letting all the magical vein disrupt the radioconcentration only barely seals its action. Taking some time might have made it weaker, and it was surprising that there could even such a monsterexcept for Veldora.

    Doesn''t that mean this guy''s tougher than Gobta of "The Four Heavenly Kingsno, is that it?

    It was at this moment that a certain thought suddenly shed through Faraga''s mind.

    In fact, this particr individual must be their target, "Veldora".

    Faraga couldn''t help but agree with himself.

    "So that''s it, this guy is Veldora. This would exin why his mana values were abnormally high.

    When he looked back, his mouth had taken the liberty of muttering those words.

    All sorts of reactions emerged from the adjutants as they listened.

    "I seebecause his seal has just been lifted, he has be weak, so weak that he cannot maintain his dragon form.

    "Weak? Hes so powerful, but hes still weakening. Even those followers areparable to dragons, so maybe they can find someoneparable to the high ranking dragon n.

    Faced with such adjutants, Faraga opened his mouth.

    "Exactly. That''s what''s scary about Veldora. Once upon a time, the Imperial Army was defeated by Veldora. My master, Gadra, also told me about the situation at that time. It''s been sealed for 300 years and the guy is still so strong. It''s hard to imagine how strong he was before being sealed, right?"

    After listening to Faraga''s exnation, the adjutants nodded in sympathy.

    "Indeed, with such great power, it is no wonder that the Farmus army was exterminated.

    "Major General Faraga has a point. That guy must be Veldora.

    Most agreed like this, but some of them were skeptical.

    "Excuse me, Major General Faraga. But the name of the head of the Dragon People is Gabil''...?"

    Even when questioned in this way, Faragaughed.

    "I''m telling you, that''s a fake name. It was heard that Veldora was sealed and his strength declined along with it. I think it''s to try to hide it as much as possible until his originalbat power is restored.

    Now that the other side was so asserted, the adjutant could onlypromise.

    "It''s unheard of for a magical creature to use a pseudonymNo, that''s more like a Veldora move.

    While there is still much to foxhole, he interprets it himself in this way.

    Immediately afterwards, when everyone decided that the particr individual in front of them was Veldora, the adjutants began to have a look of joy on their faces.

    "Although our ace blimp showed less damage, it was understandable that the opponent was Veldora!

    "It''s better to say lucky. Attention must be paid to the widespread attack that wiped out the Farmus''

    army. It''s a correct choice to use the magic vein to disrupt the radiation to seal his movements as soon as possible.

    ''Exactly''thought Faraga.

    Veldora is trapped by the mana-disturbing radiation and the whole person can''t move. As long as it continues to drain his strength at this pace, it will be easier to solve it afterwards.

    A quick nce back reveals that they got the biggest battle result of the campaign so far.

    Faraga has to savor this good fortune.

    "Is the output of the magicule disrupted radiation okay?''

    "No problem. The output is down at 80 percent, which is pretty steady.

    "How long will it take to get up to maximum output?

    "Not for an hour. The current state alone was a struggle to seal the action, but Veldora''s flesh had begun to gradually crumble. The effect should be well worth the wait.

    "Mmm. Does that mean that Veldora has only an hour to live if hees back? Until then, Lord Geist can alsoplete the ground suppression.

    These adjutants are excellent.

    As far as he could see his intentions without saying anything, he started a discussion with the analysis ss. Then revisited thebat n and filtered out the problem.

    The conclusion was that after one hour, the Four Heavenly King Gobta would also be finished with his crusade. The hobgoblin that was merged with the Demon Wolf was also a powerful individual, but still not as good as Veldora. As long as Geist''s charioteer units got serious, it wouldn''t be that hard to crush such an opponent.

    "Magic doesn''t work, and that''s because the opponent is Veldora and his dependents, which is something that can''t be done. But the Goddess of Victory is smiling down on us! As long as we wait slowly like this, the Empire''s long-cherished wish wille true!

    Faraga was so convinced and inspired their soldiers and generals.

    ***

    An atmosphere of imminent triumph permeated the bridge.

    "I''ll have the bar set up."

    Good idea. Please be prepared to set aside the 400-year-old wine from your collection.

    "It''s a dreamy escape to celebrate the empire''s shame. If it had been an hour, the sediment in the wine would have sunk.

    "Well, leave that to me.

    Give me one too."

    A beautiful girl with long dark purple hair tied back into a single ponytail had unknowingly taken her seat next to Faraga as an adjutant.

    When exactly did she start sitting here? No, rather

    The other party was wearing a military uniform, a dress that didn''t match her age. However, the seemingly serious military uniforms can contrast with the vulnerable aura of a young girl.

    Faraga cringed at his own carelessness.

    He was negligent in confirming that he would win. It''s not just Faraga, it can be applied to all the soldier generals present.

    It was only when these soldiers and their generals were not on guard that the girl was able to invade.

    "Who are you?

    Where did she invade from?

    And what is the purpose of the maiden?

    To say whether she was an enemy or one of her own would certainly qualify her as such.

    Faraga didn''t think the maiden would answer honestly.

    "Huh, no? Then it''s okay to give me tea. I''ve been visiting on the side and feel thirsty.

    Hearing Faraga ask who wasing, the men on the bridge turned their heads. Next, they found the maiden and were surprised to find her eyes wide open.

    Not only the ships, but also the inside of the ships are also arranged with "barriers".

    However, no abnormality was detected.

    The maiden took it for granted and just stayed there.

    "I''m asking what you are.

    Faraga slowly stood up and came face to face with the maiden. Then draws his gun and asks the same thing again.

    Even so, the maiden continued tough.

    Even when a gun was pointed at her, she still didn''t consider it a threat.

    After all, this maiden''s real face is

    "Who am I, you ask? My name is Ultima. It is a very important and precious name given to me by Lord Rimuru!

    Because she is one of the strongest forces in this worldthe Purple Primordial.

    Faraga calmly observes Ultima, looking to get a good look at his opponent. In order to achieve this, he believes that the most effective means of gathering information is through dialogue.

    "Your name is Ultima? Haven''t even heard of it.

    "Yeah? You are so ignorant. I''vee to ask a lot of questions today, and it doesn''t look like it''s worth expecting.

    "What did you say?

    "Because you''re going to die soon, right? So until then, I hope you can reveal all sorts of information to me!

    With an innocent smile, Ultima said so.

    Seeing Ultima pose in such an attitude, Faraga had an unspeakable feeling in his heart.

    It was simrthats right.

    It was like facing those high ranking members of the Imperial Emperor''s Order of the Near Guard, who absolutely existed, and maybe this girl''s sense of oppression was even stronger.

    Hard to believeI lost to the other side in terms of stamina? I''m so afraid of such a young girl!

    Faraga began to doubt his instincts.

    However, the reality of the matter came to light, and the young girl sitting in front of himUltima, who had invaded the ship alone, was simply extraordinary. This definitely needs to be ssified as an emergency.

    Faraga spected on Ultima''s purpose, and next found out that her purpose was actually quite obvious.

    Outside the window was the trapped Veldora. Such a sight symbolized the imminent victory of the empire, and it must have been desperate to see in the eyes of those demonic creatures. It was to save him that the magical creature underneath Veldora acted, right?

    Her name is Ultima? Even I shuddered at the sight of such a magical creature, and I didn''t expect the Intelligence Bureau to fail to grasp this figure. She''s an ace, I''m afraid. It must be a high-level magical creature that belongs directly to Veldora.

    That must be right. She was a subordinate that had only recently been named. Although the appearance was close to human, the demonic aura was unnerving and evil to the point of being indescribable. It was still unclear who the other party really was, but fortunately, Faraga knew where the demonic spirit with such a demonic aura was.

    For Gadra, the master of the Faraga, was once keenly studied for a time.

    Pointing the gun at Ultima, Faraga opened his mouth to question.

    I get it. You''re from the demon race, aren''t you?

    "Wow, that''s awesome. That''s the right answer.

    As if to say "that''s par for the course", Faraga snorted.

    To be able to exude such a strong evil aura must be a high-ranking demon general. And it''s still a monster that gets a name for flesh.

    The question is what ss Ultima is.

    She''s definitely an aristocrat. That''s okay if it''s below the Middle Ages, but if it''s an older species, it might be a struggle to deal with? No, in this case, we have a way to seal the demon''s stunt. Demons who can''t use magic are nothing to fear!

    Thinking about this side, Faraga secretly gave instructions to the ministry.

    He wanted his men tounch a magic vein disruption radiation on the inside of the warship. In that case, the magic enhancement cannon cannot be used. And no "magic guns" can be used either, the wizards on the ship will be useless, right?

    But that''s what Faraga wants.

    Zone magical creatures, the magical element is not a threat when sealed. The same goes for demons. As long as the mana was sealed, the demons could not use the magic they used as weapons.

    The opponent is a high-ranking demon general, and minions who will use magic are useless no matter how manye. Instead of that, it''s better to put the demon at an irreversible disadvantage so that the odds of winning also increase.

    ncing at the gun in his hand, he sneaked his hand up to the sword hanging from his waist. Then to distract Ultima, continue the conversation with her.

    "It''s surprising that Veldora has a demon like you as a subordinate.

    Huh? Lord Veldoras subordinate?

    "Heh, you don''t have to hide it. In that case, there''s no other reason than toe to the rescue of the master!

    "No! I am a loyal servant of Lord Rimuru!

    She''s under the Demon Lord Rimuru? No, her goal must have been to save Veldora.

    It is true that there is no mention in the report that Veldora had a subordinate on this matter. But it didn''t matter if the Demon Lord''s men were still Veldora''s men.

    "That''s rude. So, you''re here to save Veldora, right?

    "What have you been saying since just now? I just said I wasing to ask about something, don''t you people listen to people?

    It seems the two sides are talking about the same thing.

    Is that a bluff? I don''t think there''s any need to hide it, but what''s this guy''s purpose?

    Faraga worried if he had gotten something wrong, an unspeakable uneasiness rose in his mind, a feeling that had disturbed him.

    He felt like he was making a big mistake

    So, what do you want to ask?

    Hearing these words, Ultima, as if she had been waiting for this moment, smiled and then spoke with a smile on her face.

    "The construction of this ship and the way it is used is a major focus. Also exploring the remaining war power in the Empire in passing. And how many strong men there are on your side, as far as you know, just admit it.

    To pose such an innocent attitude is simply to rag on a small view.

    You underestimate us, so just so. I''ll admit she''s a little tricky, but what can the other person do when they''re alone?

    As unsettling as it was, these were Faraga''s genuine thoughts.

    It won''t be long before it''s ready to bepleted.

    He also has killer weapons that he uses against demons.

    The afterglow in the corner of his eye caught the coded signal his own men had yed, indicating readiness.

    This will definitely be able to beat the other side. Faraga looks to regain some leeway.

    "Heh, you think we''re gonna tell the truth?

    "I don''t think so, but it doesn''t matter. Let''s forget about that. Is the tea ready yet? I''ve been waiting.

    "Forget the tea, I''ll serve you something better!

    Seeming to have shaken off all the confusion, Faraga pulled the trigger.

    Bullets were fired, and that became the signal for war to begin.

    The ce was also affected by the magicule-disturbing radiation.

    The pistol Faraga holds is not a "magic gun".

    The M1911, a military automatic pistol developed by the American Colt Manufacturing Company, is an antique brought to us by "otherworldly visitors", carefully maintained daily, and is a favorite pistol of Faraga.

    It holds seven plus one rounds. The power of therge caliber bullets made especially for arge sum of money is worthy of the nickname of the handheld cannon.

    But that''s a fake move at best. The demon races were all spiritual beings and ordinary weapons were simply useless to them. If it was a demon possessing flesh, perhaps it would sense some pain, but that''s about it at best.

    Faraga disarmed the insurance with a skilled move, knocking all the bullets out. He wasn''t optimistic enough to think he was lucky enough to identally take down his opponent. Only those who dared to underestimate a high-ranking demon general and want tomit suicide would do such a thing.

    When the voices stopped, things went exactly as Faraga had expected.

    Ultima sat in her chair as if indifferently. She opened her left hand and let eight rounds fall with a tter.

    Not knowing how she did it without using magic, the bullet lost its physical energy and Ultima''s hand was unharmed.

    "That''s a funny toy. But I prefer what Lord Rimuru has in his hands.

    "Yeah? I''d like to see that.

    The results were less positive than expected, but Faraga wasn''t surprised. He put his gun away and drew the sword that hung around his waist.

    The "Imperial Style Magic Sword" won''t expire even if it''s affected by the mana-disturbing radiation.

    By using his own magic power to circte the magical elements, Faraga is able to achieve the same effect as a magic sword, and is more powerful than the skill Fighting Qi Sword.

    If it was a magic sword, it would also work against the demon race. As long as they can destroy each other''s flesh, there is no way for the other party to tolerate magicule-disrupting radiation.

    That''s what Faraga thought.

    Hurry up and drive her back to the demon world!

    In addition to being a magical instructor, Faraga''s swordy was also highly skilled. It was just that he didn''t deliberately boast about it, he thought to himself that he wouldn''t lose to a famous swordsman.

    It was because Faraga had this ability that he could stay calmly in this environment where magic was sealed.

    Ultima was no exception, and even with the effects of the mana-disturbing radiation, she was still as unhurried as ever.

    Faraga thinks the other side is just holding out hard. Not to be fooled by his opponent''s acting, he calmly makes his judgments.

    "What''s it like to be sealed by someone who''s good at magic?

    ?"

    Putting on a misguided expression, Ultima crooked her head.

    "Heh, are you in a hurry? The time for chatting is over, motherfucking demon!

    The aura on Faraga''s body changed abruptly, a tension that was invisible to the naked eye permeating between him and Ultima.

    Ohyou want to fight me?

    "You don''t have to say that. Would anyone be stupid enough to respond to a deal with the devil?

    "Stupid? I say, is this supposed to be aboutme?"

    "Stupid. Don''t you even understand that? Then I''ll tell you something. It''s the strong ones you want to explore, and I''m one of them!"

    While Ultima was talking, Faraga stabbed his sword through in a single breath.

    This is an expert grade spike. The stab at Ultima''s heart, even if the opponent was a demon, it couldn''t avoid it, it was a sure-fire blow.

    However, the sky is the limit.

    Ill kill youst.

    A voice came from behind Faraga.

    Faraga''s sure-fire strike couldn''t even touch Ultima, who was originally sitting on a chair, only poking a hole in the chair. Surprisingly, something like this could happen, just now Ultima was still sitting in front of his eyes, and when Faraga found out, the other party hade behind him.

    This is incredibly realistic for Faraga.

    "Since you don''t want to talk to me, that''s okay. But when I ask a question, you have to give me the answer. Rest assured. Even if you don''t tell me, I can take knowledge at will.

    With an innocent smile, Ultima looked around at the general soldiers watching, then announced in a voice that was unnervingly frightening.

    "Then we''ll start with you.

    Huh?"

    Faraga turned his head in a panic as some sort of circr object flew past him.

    Pop-chop, that thing hit the wall and made a puddle on it. That thing is a human head to be exact.

    One of the adjutants lost everything from the neck up, and then, as if suddenly remembering that he had lost his head, he fell to the ground with a jerk.

    "How could!?

    "Looks like he doesn''t know much information. Hurry up and find the next one."

    Once that was said, Ultima casually twisted the head of the enemy soldier general, yed for a few seconds and then dropped it, starting to repeat the matter over and over.

    One by one, the fallen appear. The bridge was suddenly hell, filled with shrieks and fear.

    Pop, pop, pop, pop, pop, pop, pop

    Make contact with the other ships and focus around ourmand ship!

    The wizards went into a state of panic from fear and immediately came to their senses upon hearing Faraga say so.

    Everyone hurry and follow the order.

    "This Mana disruptor is your new weapon, isn''t it? Theoretically, to hinder magic by firing a jumbled number ofmands at the magic element? It does have an effect on magical things, but do you guys think it will work for me?

    Lovingly tilting her head, Ultima mumbled out her doubts.

    Like in response to her, Faraga shouted.

    A bluff! Dont think you can bluff your way through!

    "Well, I guess you don''t understand. If the flesh is made up of monstrous beasts and so on, one can expect to y to great effect. But don''t you think there''s no point in doing that when you''ve already acquired flesh like me?

    "What did you say?"

    "Also, if it''s a lower-order demon, it doesn''t mean anything to a higher-order demon, does it? Just as you would naturally breathe, we can naturally generate magic as soon as we are aware of it. Just like this.

    Ultima disappeared without a trace as soon as the words were spoken.

    At the same time the headmunicator sitting in thest position flew out with it. This is what Ultima made by moving in a sh.

    "See? Just now I just moved and this man''s head flew off. It''s beyond the speed of sound, but it doesn''t send out shock waves or anything, right? Because I move like this by magic. And then theres

    Ultima flicked her wrist. The front of the fingertips seemed to blur for an instant.

    Immediately followed by a "bang" and with that impact, the adjutant standing beside Faraga lost his head.

    "It''s easy to follow thews of physics like this and send out shock waves.

    Ultima spoke innocently while not changing her face tomit this cruel act. It doesn''t look guilty at all.

    "How could

    The pale Faraga began muttering to himself.

    Then Ultima''s words finally made their way into Faraga''s head. Toprehend them, themon sense that Faraga has cultivated so far would instead constitute a hindrance.

    It was as if someone from afar was speaking a foreignnguage, and there was something incredible about it. His instincts refused to understand.

    High-ranking demonsis she really?

    It is only now that Faraga thinks deeply about who Ultima really is.

    ording to Faraga''s strength, he could be equal to a high-ranking magician.

    If it''s a newborn individual, he can win on his own. Although there was no way to defeat the Ancient Race and above, facing the Viscount ss below the Middle Age Race, even if they couldn''t defeat their opponent in the end, they could still fight beautifully.

    So, what is the status quo?

    It was not at all useful to have the Mana Disrupting Radiation that even Veldora could seal.

    This high-ranking demon general who called herself Ultima had acquired flesh, but her strength was extraordinary.

    Even subvertingmon sense in Faraga''s mind

    He found no chance of beating Ultima no matter how much he struggled. So it was decided not to keep it any longer and to use the yers used specifically to deal with demons.

    "Don''t get cocky, you damned demon! The spirit summons the ming Giant - Come, ming High Spirit of the Origin!

    Only heroic characters can use this most powerful summoning magic. There was no way for Faraga alone to perform such secret magic, but this blimp had magic-enhanced cannons on board, along with fifty wizards, making the impossible possible.

    And for the spirits, the effects of magicule-disrupting radiation are minimal. Thus he seeded in summoning.

    Destroying the bridge, the ming Giant descended upon it. If it was a high-ranking spirit with an advantage rtive to a demon, even an opponent who was a high-ranking demon general could defeat it.

    Sure of being able to do so, Faraga yelled at Ultima.

    "I admit you''re a monster. But we''ve been doing research on demons! So we also have a foolproof response. It''s a pity that even you''re going down!

    Even after hearing Faraga''s high voice, Ultima still had a smile on her face.

    A smileHe didn''t think it was such a terrible thing to experience for the first time in Faraga''s life.

    No way. That''s not possible. There''s no way she can defeat the ming Giant we summoned!

    The me Giant summoned by Lager was being infused with power by fifty wizards through magic enhancement cannons. Of course, the me Giant''s strength will be several times higher than that of ordinary high-ranking spirits, regardless of whether they are facing ancient or prehistoric species, even if they encounter high-ranking demons, they will not lose.

    Yet the fear in Faraga''s heart is hard to erase.

    "It is only to summon such scum, not to get carried away. While I''m at it with a kind smile on my face, you''d better be honest with yourselves. Otherwise you will taste the despair.

    Ah, this is the endFaraga understood.

    It''s a gut feeling.

    And his instincts were right.

    The next second, right in front of Faraga''s eyes, the me Giant, the embodiment of absolute power, froze to pieces.

    As if in a breath-change, Ultima unleashed the elemental magic "Frozen Hell" without chanting through it.

    "Ah, ah

    "Ee, ee, ee! It''s a monster!"

    "That''s nothing, that''s nothing!"

    It was about time to go down the Yellow Springs road, and the stupid people started crying and screaming.

    Complete panic.

    It is understandable that there would be such a reaction. For the incarnation of death stood before them.

    "Then I''ll move on to the questions.

    Ultima, who could be said to have a very cheerful voice, became thest words those poor people heard.

    In a few minutes

    The smiling Ultima nodded.

    She was very happy to have all the information she wanted to know. Although there was no way to seize all the knowledge, sensing human brainwaves for intelligence was easy for Ultima.

    Ultima was an intelligence marshal, and bringing intelligence back was part of the mission. If the results were satisfactory, she was sure their master, Rimuru, would be pleased too.

    She''d be happy if he couldpliment her, thought Ultima.

    Then she looked to the one who was still alive.

    That man is Faraga.

    In the midst of this desperation, Ultima had no choice but to spare Faraga.

    The reason is certainly not of thepassionate kind.

    "You called me a fool, so I''m going to take the greatest fear and give it to you as a gift. If you try, maybe you''ll survive, try to struggle.

    Ultima thus proimed was like a whisper, while unleashing a spell.

    A fist-sized pitch-ck karma me appeared in her left hand.

    "Ah, ah, ah, ah

    Faraga knew such things.

    Abyss Corethis uncontroble hellfire urs when some kind of magic is unleashed.

    It is said to be uncontroble by humans and is a kind of extreme magic.

    No, it''s just that Faraga doesn''t know that someone is actually in control. If it was the "Seven Celestial Sages" who had once been human heroes, it was possible to control the three of them together.

    However, the ck me core emitted by Ultima now was more than twice asrge as that emitted by the Seven Celestial Sages. Faraga knew nothing about it, but even he could see that it was a strategic level threat

    Ultima threw something like that out with ease.

    "Then take care of yourself. Goodbye!

    With these words, Ultima left the bridge.

    Faraga, who had been thrown down, stood there dumbfounded.

    What exactly is Ultima''s true identitythat question is no longer important to the present Faraga.

    As he suffered the ck me Core Baptism, Faraga knew that his life wasing to an end at this time.

    There was absolutely no way he could control the ck me Core, and instinct made him understand that.

    He was right to understand it that way.

    It doesn''t make sense to make a full effort with respect to the algorithm.

    As if mocking Faraga''s efforts were worthless, the fires of karma that were out of Ultima''s control just swelled, multiplied, and spread.

    Then after waiting for Ultima to fly away, the ck fireball immediately devoured themand ship.

    That fireball expanded massively and then exploded.

    Turning into the ultimate destruction magicNuclear me.

    And Faraga, who was forced to stay

    "It''s beautifulthis is, this is magic at its best

    A trance-like expression came over his face, the ck mes burning his body.

    The body evaporates and the "soul" tastes the pain of being burned by karma fire.

    I don''t know if Master Gadra ever experienced this miracle?

    No, that''s not possibleso asserts Faraga.

    The magical hindrance created by the magical radiation of the mana-disturbing radiation would be deactivated by simply dominating it with a stronger thought wave, Faraga understood this. The proof is this beautiful destructive magic perfection given to Faraga despair.

    Faragawhile savouring the despair of being surrounded by extreme magic, and the good fortune thates with that,es to the end of his career.

    The "Air Combat Flying Corps" he led waspletely destroyed by the me of Destruction, leaving not even a trace.

    The first wave of damage is the super-hot me and the second wave of damage is the shockwave from the explosion.

    Themand ship evaporated in a superheat beyond belief.

    The surrounding ships erupted and scattered, their hulls turning into cannonballs. The ship''s debris flew apart at supersonic speeds, and this alone caused a great deal of damage.

    This big bang determines the trends on the battlefield.

    The only ships that remain intact are those that fall to the ground in the first ce. The ships that remained in the air were all victimized by chain explosions and were sunk in an instant.

    So, before the original imperial assassins, the Air Combat Flying Corps, had even fought with Veldora, all the ships were destroyed in the blink of an eye, defeated and left with a discredited record.

    ***

    As Ultima flew away from the ship, her interest in Faragapletely disappeared.

    Watching the ball of fire that swelled into arger and upward spiral, she nodded with seeming satisfaction.

    Thinking that Rimuru was asking everyone to give it their all, she thought that she should increase her power a bit more, but then she thought that doing such a thing would kill all the "flying dragon congregation" on the ground, which made her think that what she had done earlier was just right.

    Although something terrible had happened in the air, the damage to the Flying Dragon congregation was calcted as zero.

    No, it didn''t actually meet the standard, and someone was indirectly victimized afterwardsbut Ultima doesn''t care that much.

    More than that, Ultima cared about Gabil''s actions.

    "What has Mr. Gabil been up to since just now?

    Gabil was hit with concentrated fire from the magicule disturbance radiation. It looked as if he had been mistaken for Veldora for some reason, but Ultima didn''t bother with that.

    At this rate, Gabil would be swallowed up by the me of Destruction, and she hoped he retreated quickly for refuge.

    Troubled but unable to do anything about it, Ultima had to fly to Gabil''s side.

    "I say, Mr. Gabil, what have you been up to since just now?

    "Oh, oh, it''s Miss Ultima! In fact, I''ve got a new grip.

    Somehow Gabil had a look of pride as he answered Ultima''s question.

    Ultima was originally still curious about what was going on, but it urred to her that she would have to retreat first now.

    She wouldn''t be killed by her own magic, but Gabil probably couldn''t afford it. Maybe he''ll survive, but the odds of winning such a bet are too low.

    She didn''t want to carry the notoriety of killing one of her own, so Ultima took Gabil with her by force.

    She came to the ground to meet the Flying Dragon.

    It was at this point that Ultima could finally start questioning.

    "So what the hell just happened?

    Ultima questioned Gabil''s tone of voice with a firmness.

    In addition to holding the position of intelligence marshal, Ultima is also the inspector general, who is to monitor Gabil''s movements. Not just assisting him, but advising him so he doesn''t take the wrong action.

    A Gabil failure is the same as an Ultima failure, so of course she will be harsh.

    But Gabil does not know how to read words and say such things.

    "Gah, gah, gah, gah! Actually, it was, being hit by a special light released by the enemy, I thought of something. I saw on the spot that the property of the thing was that it would have an effect on the magic element, so I thought I''d experiment and see how far I could take it!

    Gabil, the stinking lizard, had better be scolded by Lord Rimuru, thought Ultima. But she relented and pursued the question next.

    "So what''s this new feel you''re talking about?

    "Whoo-hoo, that''s the point! Listen up, you guys. With regard to our inherent skill, Dragon Warriorization, Mr. Middray once said that skillfulness can prolong use. Now I''m in a state of ''transformation'', right?

    Turning his head and looking around at all hispanions, Gabil spoke triumphantly.

    Hearing this, the Flying Dragon congregation looked at him and back, showing a surprised expression towards each other. The average amount of time they could transform was only about ten minutes, and everyone had long since recovered.

    "I thought it was the Gabil who could do it, as a matter of course, but it seems not.

    "So if we know the mystery of it, we can extend our time too?

    In this way, Gabil''s men began to mor one after another.

    Watching Gabil they began to mor, Ultima showed an unbearable look.

    I sincerely hope that these lizards will kick the can down the road and suffer.

    She has no mercy on her enemies, even in the face of her men. But strictly speaking, Gabil and his men were not her minions.

    If they took the liberty of doing so, it would be Ultima who would be scolded by Rimuru.

    It was only okay to be scoldedto think that Rimuru was so angry when his men were injured, then he would probably be punished even more horribly. They might even get kicked out.

    Ultima didn''t want that to happen. The relief of your own stress and possible punishment are measured on the scale, and in the end the heart is unwilling to choose to be patient.

    Gabil spoke up to such an Ultima.

    "It is thanks to Miss Ultima that I have discovered the secret behind this power. You bought me time because you believed I had other ideas.

    Huh?"

    "Oh, don''t y dumb, I''ve seen it all. Your willingness to give immature us the opportunity to grow is really appreciated!

    It didn''t bother Ultima to be told that. She regained herposure and her opinion of Gabil rose a little.

    "Let''s take it as it is. By the way, what''s new with Mr. Gabil? Everyone seems to be wondering.

    Ultima decided not to correct Gabil''s misunderstanding. Because she thought it was more important to clean up the mess now than that.

    Currently the fighting is only taking ce in localized areas.

    There was Hakurou in charge of the rear, and there was the central area where Gobta and Ranga were fighting like crazy. And then there was the enemy stronghold to which Testarossa was heading, three ces in all.

    The aerial battle force that Gabil and the rest were responsible for holding off had been expelled and had to go to other battlefields for support. No time for a leisurely chat here.

    "This matter is expected to be reported to Lord Rimuru, but I will briefly exin it first. It should also help boostbat power, and you all need to listen carefully.

    Taking these words as an opening, Gabil proceeded to paraphrase with a serious expression.

    The content is rted to theplete control of "Dragon Warriorization".

    Dragon Warriorization, an inherent skill of the Dragon People, is a special skill that strengthens itself by letting the mana get out of control.

    The out-of-control mana will absorb the surrounding material and strengthen the user''s flesh. By increasing the quality in this area to improve the defense, even if injured, it will recover immediately.

    They will not be able to use magic because the mana will get out of control, but there is nothing wrong with using skills like spitting breath. It is a great power if it retains self-awareness, and mere reinforcement will only be effective.

    "Then, the enemy attack seemed to have the property of disrupting the movement of the mana. It feels like my power seems to be further strengthened.

    "Huh, soit will be stronger than this current stance?"

    Even Ultima was surprised that the magical vein disturbance radiation had such an unexpected effect.

    The amount of mana Gabil possesses today is not dissimr to the amount of mana yman had when he awakened before his death. It''s surprisingly reinforced and looks to have a listening value.

    The mere act of letting the monster element get out of control could increase the power, and Ultima was naturally surprised to hear that it could surpass an Awakened Demon Kinga True Demon Lordon a numerical level.

    After all, where in the world is such a good thing.

    "No, no, no, it''s not that. Despite the increase in power, I couldn''t control it smoothly. So I concentrated my consciousness and felt the mana that was out of control within me"

    It turned out to be just like that, the body couldn''t move.

    Even if it didn''t hurt, Gabil couldn''t move. But Gabil could be said to have learned how to sense mana right about that time as he got more and more frustrated.

    "Mr. Middray once said, ''The realm without me'', right? To look squarely at the universe within you and listen to those voices. This way"

    It''s too long. Keep it simple and clear!"

    At this time, Ultima spat viciously, and Gabil''s men nodded in agreement.

    Temperamentally seeming to lose to everyone, Gabil nodded and said, "Ah, yes.

    To put it simply, it''s a matter of sensing the out-of-control mana first, and then casting the Numinous Power. This way the unthinkable can happen and the power can be controlled.

    Upon hearing this, Gabil''s men began to mor, saying outright, "It''s too messy.

    Instead, it was Ultima who gave an oh in her heart.

    It was easier than breathing for herself, but it seemed very difficult for Gabil and the others, and watching Gabil and the others react, Ultima found out about it.

    At the same time Ultima began to take an interest.

    Oh? Meaning that Mr. Gabil''s men might get stronger if I exercise them?

    That would certainly help Rimuru.

    Rimuru would most likelypliment her.

    "I see what Mr. Gabil means. But these will be negotiatedter. Now to go first and help the little hobgoblins.

    Ultima said this as if to announce that the break was over.

    Originally intending to return the favor by saying that Gabil was cking off, Gabil brought such meaningful information that Ultima was a little impressed with him. So she did some favors.

    Containing the actions of Gabil, she decided to turn a blind eye this time.

    "Well, that''s right! Then let''s go over there and provide support too.

    Gabil also cheerfully agreed.

    The man was still in a state of utterly wrong-headedness, but Ultima didn''t think that would matter. It was actually a bit lessplicated for her, so she didn''t say anything and just left it at that.

    "If someone doesn''t live up to the standard, they''ll be educated againter, so be aware of that!

    "Mmmmmm, then I''ll help too!"

    That''s a great ideaUltima smiled sweetly as she thought about it.

    Gabil and the others did not spot Ultima''s attempt and returned to the battlefield again.

    ***

    "No way, how can this be!?

    In the main camp, far from the battlefield, Lieutenant General Geist shouted with an iron grimace.

    The tragedy of the impossible is presented.

    His proud division of Magic Guided Tanks was being tricked by a monster wolf who turned into a humanoid.

    The sight was like a nightmare. It is now certain that the damaged body has taken up the majority.

    It was immediately certain that he was about to be defeated, but the battle was progressing much faster than expected, causing him to miss the opportunity to retreat.

    There is also no way to report on the situation to Calgurio, the Mecha Corps chief andmander-in-chief.

    I must report to that Calgurio guy quickly to get permission to evacuate

    Geist''s rational dimension speaks thus.

    but

    Even if it''s reported, the other side won''t allow it.

    This team, led by Calgurio, is already in action, and if Geist retreats at this juncture, it will be isted this time.

    In front of the base of the Demon Lord Rimuru, the main force of the "Mecha Regiment" is supporting them. Each of them was a warrior who had undergone reconstructive surgery and made the Empire proud, and was full of an overwhelming army of seven hundred thousand. Even if it was the main force that would win by 100%, it would inevitably be panicked if it was known that the rear force was retreating.

    The armies of the Dwarven Kingdom will also be out in force. That way, they would pigeonhole the enemy along with the forces of the Demon Lord Rimuru.

    This means that the supply line will be cut.

    Even if you don''t sleep or eat, the "mech-modified corps" can still be active for about a week. But that''s the limit. As long as they still had human bodies, supplies were indispensable.

    My mission is to suppress the Dwarven kingdomto retreat from this battlefield would be to abandon them with Calgurio. Even if there''s no way to win, at least keep it together

    But it''s difficult to implement.

    What Geist saw before his eyes was the defeat of their army.

    The rear is also in a state of disarray, with the chain ofmand even more disrupted.

    One''s own people even started killing each other. Even if the battle continues, it''s only a matter of time before it''s all over.

    "Lieutenant General Geist! No matter what we do, it''s all over!

    "Please, please, please order a retreat!

    Without having to listen to the advice of these ministers, Geist held the same view as them. Yet once this order is given, he takes all the me for the defeat.

    That said, Lieutenant General Geist, a man of impable personal bravery, was also highly regarded within the army. He had never encountered such a setback before, and therefore was not used to the situation he was experiencing at the moment.

    How can I retreat? If so, His Majesty will certainly dispose of me. How could this be allowed to happen! I am the man who is going to be a hero in the future. But here is where my road to greatness is going to be ruined. At the very least, there has to be a justification that doesn''t hold me ountable alone

    Now the battle bets on the prestige of the Empire and will end with his failurean idea that reveals Geist''s true nature.

    He only wanted to preserve himself, and didn''t care about sacrificing his men. Geist is such a minor character.

    "Lieutenant General, it will be difficult to revive the troops at this rate. This team has not turned into a scattered mess at the moment, we should let them get rid of the enemy in the rear!

    "There is no shame in withdrawing for a while. If the fighting continues, we will only suffer more!

    Upon receiving such a suggestion, Geist finally began to use his brain.

    If he loses the troops assigned to him from above, he will not be punished in any case. Don''t say it''s relegation, maybe it''s going to cost you your life without a referee.

    "Damn it. I''m the man who''s going to be a hero. How dare you let this happenyou''re all ipetent and will only rip my legs off!

    Fully revealing his ugly nature, Geist scandalized.

    Just at this time the sound of the big bang boomed, almost drowning out his voice.

    The other side is also shaken by this.

    "What happened?"

    "The enemy, the enemy attacks through magic!

    "Magic? Could it be, could it be nuclear strike magic!?

    "It''s not certain yet, but it should be right in terms of scale. But that

    "What is it!? Say it!

    "Yes! As for the enemy''s attack magic, the one that seems to be able to easily break through the legion''s magic that our army uses exclusively for defense"

    What!? What about the level of casualties?

    "The explosion was overhead. We''ve lost contact with friendly airships...!"

    "This, this is not possible! You mean the blimpsthe Empire''s proud ''Air Combat Flying Corpsare all gone?"

    One by one, they rified the situation.

    One thing this makes clear to everyone is that the damage is worse than imagined.

    The blimps that could not be contacted included not just one, but all of them.

    This could only be exined by the fact that the magic just now had wiped out all the airships.

    The airship is carrying a new type of weapon, the Mana Disruptor Radiation, and yet it has been defeated by magic, which is incredible.

    "We''re retreatingno, we should retreat somewhere else and regroup!

    Rather than speaking to the soldier generals, he was speaking to himself, Geist so ordered.

    Faced with this overly unfavorable situation, Geist finally made a judgment call for everyone to retreat.

    But this judgment was made toote to have a critical impact.

    ***

    A brisk voice rang out across the battlefield.

    "Oops? You''re not going to say it''s over here, are you? I should have said that already. If you invade, we will show no mercy.

    Geist hurriedly turned his head in the direction of the sound, a beautiful face of extreme whiteness reflected before his eyes.

    The other party wore a full smile.

    It''s Testarossa.

    "Don''t look at me like that, I''m a woman of my word. After all, when I used toe to this world to y, I had indeed fulfilled the desire of my lord. Please be assured. And I will repay you well.

    Geist''s heart was upied with fear.

    Not the fear of inferiority in wanting to know how to preserve oneself, but the never ending fear that erodes instinct and threatens the root of life.

    Youyou''re a!

    "Oops? Maybe you forgot. How rude.

    As if looking at a headache-stricken child, Testarossa gave a motherly look and her mouth responded.

    How could Geist forget.

    On the one hand, not much time had passed since they parted, and yet the beautiful white hair and red eyes that were so full of charm were absolutely impossible to forget, no matter how many years passed.

    But it''s more about fear.

    Testarossa''s beautiful face gave Geist the creeps.

    Forcing down this fear, Geist intended to order his men to attack.

    Yet no one responded.

    "I don''t know what you want to do, but your men are resting. They seem to be very tired. Because, they don''t seem to be able to stand up anymore.

    As if in a whisper, the voice of Testarossa informed rang in Geist. They had been talking face to face until just now, and when they came back, they were standing behind each other.

    Geist didn''t take her lightly and definitely didn''t take his eyes off of her, but Testarossa moved without anyone seeing.

    Moved too fast.

    Even more frightening was the absence of any sound at all.

    Geist has a unique technique called "yer" that can sense the movement of the opponent through the sound. No matter how skilled, no one can control that tiny sound-not just the beating of the heart, but even the sound of blood flowing through the veins can be captured.

    But there was no semnce of a voice in Testarossa.

    And by this time Geist had discovered another horrible fact, and that was that the fallen men made no more noise.

    They''re all dead.

    Youkilled all these men!

    One side stomped a shaky pace and fled away from Testarossa, while Geist asked.

    To this, Testarossa replied without guilt.

    "Oops? Since I was a little hungry, I ate a little.

    "You said you ate some? What is it to eat?

    "Well, I ate a little bit of soul.

    Hearing the other side talk like it was nothing, Geist was outraged. Anger overrode fear and his body found strength again.

    "Go to hell, evil demon! Mind Requiem!

    Geist took advantage of the opportunity to make the strongest aura he possessed. A murderous sound wave was released into the surrounding space that left people with no ce to run.

    This murderous sound wave will have a spiritual effect on intelligent lifeforms, and its special effect will cause these lifeforms to die. It also works on these spiritual beings, spirits or demons, and is Geist''s ace move.

    But only in exchange for a graceful smile from Testarossa.

    "Ahhh, the sound is so refreshing. What a waste to let humans have such a beautiful tone. It''s a pity.

    You''re such a great musician, and I have to kill you.

    A look of sorrow overshadowed the drunkenness, and Testarossa murmured.

    Seeing Testarossa like this, Geist knew his attack wouldn''t work. Then he felt despair.

    Although always bewitched by her beauty, Testarossa is certainly not human and is an over-the-top formidable character. That''s when Geist finally realized it.

    Probably more so than the humanoid demon wolf who''s been messing around

    No, shes definitely dangerous.

    Are these monsters everywhere in this country? If that''s the case, then we may have adopted the wrong strategy from the start

    It was only now that Geist knew regret.

    He also anticipated the failure of this imperial military battle n.

    And there''s also the "natural disaster level" threat of Veldora on the Jura Tempest Federation''s side. The odds of defeat are so high that the probability of winning is almost zero.

    Because of this, Geist yelled desperately.

    "Wait a minute, I want to make a deal!

    "Geez, what kind of deal is that?"

    "I, myself, am a high-ranking officer in the Empire, and I am well versed in militarybat and have ssified information. I promise it will work for you. So please leave me alone!

    Not afraid of disgrace and not caring what outsiders thought, Geist began to beg for mercy. However, his eyes were still alert and he was still cautiously spying on the movements of Testarossa.

    He had thought there was nothing more he could do at this point, but his proud "ears" caught the sound of several approaching footsteps.

    Geist knew who the people close to this side were. That kind of running would have been silent if he hadn''t noticed it at all. Just hearing the footsteps alone, he intuited that these people were from the Imperial Intelligence Service.

    If it was Imperial Intelligence, it wouldn''t be surprising to release intelligence officers to monitor the battlefield.

    I''m sure Tatsuya Kondo, the rumored "intelligence-feeding entric" and director of the Imperial Intelligence Bureau, will do whatever it takes.

    It will be savedGeist was so convinced.

    No matter how embarrassing it is, just buy time and you''ll get your life back.

    The reason he thought so was because he knew of a rumor that had something to do with the intelligence agency.

    Among the staff working in the Intelligence Service, some are so-called intelligence officers. These intelligence officers have been trained to be active in a variety of environments and have the best fighting skills in the world.

    The reason these masters'' names are not known is because they did not participate in the row battle.

    After being attached to the Army Intelligence Service, there was no more movement.

    These intelligence officers are all obeying the orders of Tatsuya Kondo, an enigmatic "otherworldly visitor" who is isted from the world.

    But those are just hearsay.

    While there''s no credibility to be had, Geist can only believe the rumors.

    If the personing over is simply a soldier, then he is finished.

    However, if it is really intelligence officers

    With Geist''s help, theyre sure theyll be able to win even if they have to face Testarossa. So now whether it''s begging for mercy or doing something, he intends to buy time.

    In the end, Geist won in this bet.

    "This smell, you''re a demonno, a high ranking demon general!

    One side shouted and several soldiers jumped in front of Geist.

    Geist thanked himself for his good fortune.

    Hearing that the other party was a high-ranking demon general, he understood. Physical attacks don''t work also because the opponent is a spiritual lifeform.

    And high ranking demons would be the highest ranking among demons. It is the presence of a hazard equivalent to a catastrophe.

    The only people who can deal with them single-handedly are heroes. It''s not as if Geist is without a chance to win, but it''s going to be a fight to the death.

    "Oh, you guys are?"

    There were three men who came over here.

    Seeing that they hade, Geist regained his remaining strength, but he still deliberately inquired.

    "Yes! I''m with the Intelligence Service"

    As Geist had expected, the other party seemed to be from the intelligence services.

    One of them was about to dere his name when a man who looked like the leading man of the center stepped in to stop him.

    "Hey, wait! Now is not the time to introduce yourself.

    Being so slighted, the man also looked at Testarossa with a stony expression.

    "You''re not just a high-ranking demon general, are you?

    "Looks like this one has acquired flesh. Tsk, no wonder the breath is faint.

    "Lord Geist, I''ll introduce myselfter. Let''s join forces now to crush this evil demon first!

    "Well, sure.

    Hearing the leader say so, Geist could only agree. The fact that the mastery was in someone else''s hands displeased him, but the immediate priority was to stay alive.

    The men from the intelligence service worked together well to surround Testarossa. Then take out the chains woven into the magical hair crafted to seal the movement of Testarossa from three directions.

    Unbeknownst to Geist, the move was called the Imperial Sealing Array. The Trinity, which can kill even high-ranking magical creaturesthats right, even high-ranking demon generalsit is the most superior form of the must-kill formation circting in the Empire.

    The secret lies in these chains.

    Inside were hairs woven into magical creatures, forged with holy silver, which were secret treasures of the legendary level.

    The men who could serve as ambassadors were definitely more than just ordinary soldiers, these men were the Empire''s highest fighting forceaffiliated to the Imperial Emperor''s Order of Near Guard Knights, a disguised posture for those Near Guard Knights.

    The 11th-ranked Tibbs, respectively.

    Balder, ranked 38th.

    Gordon, who is ranked 64th.

    Basically the near-guard knights move in threes when infiltrating. There were also rows in the Imperial Emperor''s Order of Near Guard, and it was customary for the person in the front of the row to be the leader.

    As for intensity, it is said that the difference between before and after rank thirty is like heaven and earth.

    All those who were before the 30th rank surpassed the human race and came to the rank of "Immortal", and their strength was close to that of the "Sage" who was above them.

    Such an over-the-top presence has one of its own to be present.

    This man had been at the helm of the Lakeshore Dyed in Scarlet affairhe was Tibbs.

    Tibbs squad had sealed the nightmare-like White Primordial, and they took to the field when Geist was desperate.

    And as for having anything to do with the White Primordial

    Seeing the "knights" of the Trinity sealing Testarossa, Geist apuded in his heart and thought well done.

    If it continued to be eroded by its own spiritual death funeral, even spiritual lifeforms should perish.

    The target of the attack just now included even creatures, but this time there was an adjustment that would only have an effect on the spirit. In this way, no matter how powerful a high-ranking demon general was, it would be impossible to maintain form.

    Geist thought so.

    But he thought too much.

    The prerequisite for the implementation of such abat n is that the opponent has not yet acquired flesh. Testarossa had acquired the flesh, and even if it was only for spiritual effects, it meant little.

    Geist''s hopes were bound to be crushed.

    More importantly

    "Oops, oops oops. This is nostalgic. You''re the ones who once beat me, right?

    What?"

    "I''m so happy. I was hindered at that time, so I didn''t get enough to eat. It was a rare asion when I cooked so well that I was about to feast on it. I''ll always remember the regret I felt at that time.

    Testarossa spoke out, with an evil will in her. She was being sealed, and her voice sounded unmoved.

    "This wickedness can''t be!"

    "That face is! Are you the White Primordial?

    "You''re kidding! It took so much effort to seal her, but she came back to life so quickly!

    Seeing the three men in a panic, Testarossa shed a dismissive smile.

    The look was very wicked, very beautiful.

    Ufufufu. That''s a nice look. There is fear, there is anxiety, and there is unfounded confidence. I''m not even running away from, even though I''m bluffing. You guys really like to make extra effort.

    "Shut up, you demon!"

    "I didn''t think you''de back to life, but did you forget? We once sealed you. Wait until you beat us and then show off!

    "Mr. Tibbs is right. I''ll kill your soul this time!

    Those words seemed really funny to Testarossa.

    "Oops, oops, that''s funny. Is it okay to be so confident? Do you think the same trick as back then would still work for me?

    Caught in the Imperial Sealing Formation, Testarossa asked gracefully.

    "It''s so unconvincing. No one will listen to the demons nonsense.

    "Gordon was right. This is not the ce for you to be. If we don''t understand it once, we can bury you a million times!

    "All right, Mr. Geist. We''ll take care of it here. Please order a retreat as soon as you can!

    Tibbs is calm whenever he is. Although they did not expect the White Primordial to appear, they did not forget their original purpose.

    Tibbs had intended to defeat the Monster WolfGobta and Ranga. In order for that to happen it had to be done in such a way as to keep people from discovering who they really were, which is why Geist asked the army to retreat.

    Even Tibbs had no right to order Geist, who was of a higher ss. The worst-case scenario was even expected to get rid of Geist, but the White Primordial debut left him without that leeway now.

    If one were to take on the White Primordial, it would be impossible to win without hiding one''s true identity. More importantly, if the whole army is not withdrawn soon, everyone could be affected by their fighting.

    Not finding Tibbs in such a mood, Geist, who had turned back to his senses, was nning to act.

    The current situation left Geist momentarily unresponsive.

    White Primordial? What are you talking about? Could it be "the" big demon? No, there''s no time to think about that right now. Instead of looking into these guys, it''s better to find a way to stay alive first.

    Desperately trying to get the idle head to work, Geist exported the most action he should be taking right now.

    Then he hastened to order the entire army to retreat through his unique technique, "The yer".

    However, it was toote.

    All hope was dashed when they met Testarossa in the present moment.

    ***

    The trio of Tibbs, Balder, and Gordon were previously unsung heroes who had once defeated the powerful demon.

    At that time, there was what the world called the Lakeshore Dyed in Scarlet Incident.

    The White Primordial is the demon that dominated the East and is feared, and the other party came into the world just short of acquiring flesh.

    From that day on, the vignce against demons changed from the previous. All cities have demon countermeasure rooms, and spells such as demon summoning are forbidden byw.

    After all, once a high-ranking demon would gain flesh, it couldn''t be solved without sending out an army. It may also bring about the demise of the entire city and cause an irreversible catastrophe.

    Plus the opponent is still a Primordial.

    Among the high-ranking demon generals, the power is not calcted by the amount of mana alone, it is the feared demon.

    They were lucky to have beaten the White Primordial when that happenedor so Tibbs thought. But at the same time, he was confident that no matter how many times he fought the opponent, it was impossible to lose.

    After all, Tibbs is ranked 11th.

    Even those heroes who enjoyed the strongest reputation in the surface world were no match for the truly strong ones who had lived for more than a thousand years in the world below the surface.

    For example, the Great Power of Farmus'' guardian, the mage Razen.

    King Gazel, the hero of the armed power of Dwargon.

    There are also the "otherworldly visitors" of Yuuki Kagarazaka and Hinata Sakaguchi, the powerful men of the Magical Order of the Sorcerer Dynasty of Sarion and the Pdins of the Holy Kingdom of Ruberios.

    No matter how powerful the battle force was, the Imperial Emperor''s Knights of the Near Guard would look out of ce when encountering them.

    And in the strongest group of such, "single digits" symbolizes special meaning. And in charge of aiding them was the eleventh ranked Tibbs.

    His Majesty has granted me the strongest equipment. Coupled with this power, how could I possibly lose to a demon!

    So much so that Tibbs is confident.

    After urging Geist to retreat, Tibbs shouted at hispanions.

    "You guys hurry up and open the door. The White Primordial seems to have gotten flesh, but it shouldn''t have umted too much mana yet. We''re going to do everything in our power to beat her here!

    "Got it!

    Yes!''

    Only to see Gordon nod, and Balder sh a wild smile.

    As soon as the answer was given, the alchemical pendant that the three hung around their necks began to glow. This ray of light turned into a rushing current that enveloped the three of them.

    Then the warriors, fully clothed in gold armor, appeared.

    These are legendary equipment, given only to the chosen ones. Although there are individual differences between the weapons, the armor is all the same shape. This is the highest grade equipment that has been handed down from ancient times.

    Nowadays, wearing this armor, Tibbs and the others would be able to fight with all their might.

    "You''re out of luck, White Primordial! It seems you''ve had a hard time gaining flesh, but it''s naive.

    Running into us here means your luck hase to an end too"

    The hand that Tibbs had been holding on to the chains, intending to send Testarossa to the west, was about to exert itself, but at that moment the force of the chains fell on it.

    He didn''t expect her to get away with it as if it was nothing.

    "I said, you think I''ll forgive you for doing this?

    Hearing the sound that made even one''s body freeze, Tibbs turned his head. And in front of his line of sight, Testarossa reached out and grabbed Geist by the neck.

    A muffled Gack!" sounded, and the next thing you know, Geist goes limp.

    There was nothing he could do about it, and he was killed like that by Testrossa.

    "How is this possible?

    And so it was, Tibbs muttered, disoriented.

    While Geist the man is a bit overly narcissistic, he is not weak. His strength is worthy of a high rank.

    Even being strong enough to be selected for the Knights of the Near Guard is not surprising.

    Of course, he could only be ranked in thetter ss, and even then that man wouldn''t be killed so simply.

    Tibbs looked at his hands, trembling.

    The weave of hairs and chains forged with holy silver, a rare weapon of the legendary level, were added to the magical creature, and now it seems as if everything is in vain.

    It wasn''t just Tibbs, but also Balder and Gordon''s faces appeared agitated and confused. There was no way to see how Testarossa broke the chains and at what point she moved.

    After that there was greater suffering to find them.

    "Did I keep you waiting? I''m sorry if that''s the case. Because this man was trying to escape, I lectured a little. After all, not to do so would be to disobey Lord Rimuru''s orders. It can''t be helped.

    Testarossa stared at Tibbs as they spoke, a voluptuous smile on her face. And then, as if suddenly thinking of something, add the following.

    "That''s right. That''s right. Its been a concern since then. Can you please stop calling me White Primordial?

    What?"

    "Because, yes, I already have the name ''Testarossa''. I would be unhappy if you didn''t call me that.

    She made a promation that only two words could describe despair to the Tibbs.

    Waityouyou just said your name?

    "Not only did she gain flesh, but she even had a name

    This has never been done before.

    Now they must admit that the battle is against them.

    "We must retreat. We must report to His Majesty that there is a crisis."

    "Okay. Then let me trip her up.

    "Then I''ll use elemental magic to move the stronghold"

    The reason the Trinity was taken was to respond to such moments. They quickly decided who should do what, and next Gordon began chanting teleportation magic.

    Immediately after, Testarossa shed an evil smile.

    She smiled miserably and beautifully, looking ominous.

    "What''s so funny!?

    After shouting this, Balder picked up hisnce andunched a surprise attack on Testarossa.

    However, the figure of Testarossa had long since disappeared. Balder simply couldn''t keep up with the speed of her actions.

    "Damn it, where''d she go?"

    "Here I am."

    Someone exhaled into Balder''s ear, the sweet aroma taking over the nasal cavity. It took no looking back to know that the other person was Testarossa.

    Balder felt it, the slender female hand that was cold enough to freeze his soul was touching his neck.

    ahhh, ahhh, ahhh!

    The image of Geist being killed just now came to his mind.

    "I hate people who don''t think for themselves.

    It is also not known if Balder heard thisst remark from Testarossa.

    Gack!

    A magnificent look of fear came over his face and Balder fell.

    Balder, who was ranked thirty-eighth, was thus killed by Testarossa.

    Tibbs watched in a state of thoughtful confusion, not having been so restless in centuries.

    "Hurry up, Gordon! Balder was killed. That one is too dangerous!

    The cry was no longer controlled by Tibbs'' will, and was tinged with fear.

    Seemingly in tune with him, Gordon nodded silently as well. After that, the teleportation magic wasplete and the magic array that floated on the ground glowed.

    "Good, let''s retreat!"

    Tibbs also rushed into the magic formation and gave this order

    But the teleportation magic didn''t kick in.

    H-How? Why!?

    As if mocking a panicked Gordon, Testarossa gently answered for him.

    "What''s so strange? After all, there''s nothing wrong with the use of magical vein to disrupt radiation.

    Even if the other said so, Tibbs and Gordon couldn''t hear it for a moment.

    "What did you say? Mana disrupts radiation?

    "Is it possible that you used magic to recreate

    Looking at the two of them like this, Testarossa sighed with a headache.

    Testarossa can share information with Ultima and Carrera in a municationwork". The information obtained also includes information that the airship is equipped with magic-disturbing radiation.

    Reproducing that technique based on the information obtained and then applying it would be like child''s y for Testarossa. But such things are so far beyond the reach of humanmon sense that it is impossible for Tibbs and Gordon to understand them.

    Only, Tibbs and Gordon are still aware that

    Whowho are you? Even if it is the Primordial, a high-ranking demon general wouldn''t have such a powerful power!"

    Like trying to manage to cover his fears, Tibbs let out a loud scream.

    "No, that''s right. You weren''t this good in the war before! What did you do to evolve like this

    evolve?

    At this point, Tibbs and Gordon looked at each other face to face.

    Hearing himself shout, Gordon was able to correctly ascertain the current state of Testarossa.

    He didn''t bother to figure it out.

    The same goes for Tibbs.

    Not only did she acquire flesh, but she was also namedand the result is unknown as to what realm the White Primordial evolved to

    Testarossa looked at the two men''s faces pleasantly.

    To answer their questions, she opened her mouth leisurely.

    "Gee, that''s clever. Correct answer. I became a more powerful being than a high-ranking demon general after gaining a name. Do you know about the Demon Archdukes? It''s very different from the ''rank'' of a high-ranking demon general. It''s sad that you can''t understand without saying it through your own mouth.

    This answer deepened the despair of the two men.

    "Evil, evil archduke

    "The second Guy Crimson

    Tibbs and Gordon had by this time finally discovered that things were serious.

    Now, instead of appearing in the world for a little fun, the Primordial has a clear will to settle in this world.

    "As a matter of fact, you shouldnt be interested in this world again after you lost that princess'' flesh

    "Not so. By the time you came over, my deed with the girl was done. So that''s where I went from there, although I''m a little sorry.

    Murphy..."

    "Oops, sorry about that. Could it be that you''ve been mistaken for me? How could there be such a thing, it''s silly.

    There was such a thing as this in the skyand Tibbs felt his self-confidencepletely shattered.

    "How dare you disturb my dinner at that time.

    "Hey, hey, Tibbs

    Ever since being stared at by the bright red eyes of Testarossa, Tibbs and Gordon had been unable to move.

    It was as if a frog was being watched by a snake.

    you said dinner?

    All Tibbs can do is buy time through dialogue.

    Then use the precious time earned to desperately exin what is happening. To take revenge on Testarossa, who was so proud and sure of her victory.

    "That''s right, I was eating. Even after being bathed in so much blood, so much that the beautifulke water was dyed bright red, I still didn''t get enough to eat.

    "Thousands of innocent people died.

    "This is what the covenant is about. And to eat the most important main course before you run to mess with it. That is a rare opportunity, and I want you to atone for that time.

    "You bastard!"

    Testarossa was responsible for the tragic Lakeshore Dyed in Scarlet Incident". Yet this demon says that the tragedy was just a meal.

    Not only that, but also saying there wasn''t enough to eat!

    The strong anger made Tibbs'' heart burn.

    And this fire of righteousness burned out the fear in his heart.

    One should never let something so evil out in the open, Tibbs thought to himself.

    "Evil things like you

    With the glowing sword raised high in his hand, Tibbs struggled to escape the spell of Testarossa. The struggle paid off, the physical strength came back, butthis was only the beginning of Tibbs'' desperation.

    "Testarossa, you haven''t killed them yet? Seeing that you''re busy, you didn''t bother, but it''s almost time to finish.

    Cute voices that didn''t match the battlefield came through the air. She was the maiden who had tied her long dark purple hair into a single ponytailUltima.

    Even the eleventh-ranked Tibbs could detect a strange scent on her when she looked over.

    The tone of her voice seemed to be very familiar with Testarossa, which meant that both of them were of equal status, or very close in rank.

    "Oops, isn''t this Ultima? I made you wait so long?

    "Well, I was muddling along with Mr. Gabil and the others, so I''m not in a position to say anything about anyone else, but Lord Rimuru wants us to do our best, and we''ll be scolded if we don''t finish this soon!

    "That''s bad.

    Right?"

    "It''s rare to meet old acquaintances, so I couldn''t stop talking. Still, so to speak. Let''s get this over with before Lord Rimuru gets angry.

    The conversation that unfolded before his eyes was iprehensible to Tibbs.

    No, it''s not that he can''t understand, it''s that he doesn''t want to understand.

    No way, no way, no way, no way!

    Testarossa and Ultima.

    There is no doubt that they must be "of the same rank".

    There are two primordial demons

    Just dealing with one of them would be a struggle, and this reinforcements came deadly. The fire of righteousness in the heart of Tibbs was still burning, but it was unconsciously consumed by darkness.

    It''s all out of fear.

    The glory of being ranked eleventh became meaningless in front of the two demons.

    If it was just a high-ranking demon general, Tibbs could still pack up alone, but the reality before his eyes was that two Primordial Demons had appeared, and even he was in a state of near disillusionment.

    He can''t be med for that either.

    In fact Gordon was already crouched down and sobbing. He had been a quiet and reliable man, but now he was like a child.

    That''s when Tibbs suddenly began to envy Balder, who had died first just now. After taking the initiative to fight the other side without discovering her true identity, hispanion died. How lucky is that

    "Mm-hmm. That''s right!

    "Then I''ll say goodbye to you, even if I''m a little bit wary. By the way, if you''ve met someone you''ve never met before, let''s show you the magic that suits your heart''s desire.

    Faced with a bewildered Tibbs, Testarossa happily recounted.

    In a dazed state, Tibbs knew his death was not far away.

    ck mes were summoned from the deep darkness.

    The ck me condensed to the size of a fist and glowed in the palm of Testarossa''s hand.

    The ck me Corethis uncontroble hellish karmic fire that Testarossa could crush with ease.

    She shed a dismissive smile and whispered as if in song.

    "Death Streak

    Tibbs'' eyes widened at once.

    He didn''t know what kind of magic it was.

    Unintelligible.

    He doesnt get it at all.

    But one thing is for sure

    That is this magic is very evil.

    "That little brother over there knows Guy Crimson too, right? In that case, you would know what this magic is, right? This magic was released when Guy became a demon lord"

    Sadly, Tibbs''s awareness is interrupted here.

    He was consumed with deeper despair and thought to himself within he never knew.

    ...........

    ........

    The ck ming core that had been crushed by Testarossa turned into a ck glow that illuminated all around.

    This light has the property that it can prate almost all matter. It is a light of darkness that does not arise naturally.

    While not physically destructive, it has certain characteristics.

    That is, prating an organism affects its gic sequencing.

    Forced gene recement is capable of the forced extinction of almost all living things.

    It''s extremely evil death magic.

    Yet legend has it that this magic has another purpose.

    Those who could withstand such magic were either spiritual beings or those who had the power of memory in their souls. Even if the flesh waspletely destroyed, they could still be resurrected from that origin, and only they could escape this magic.

    The special particle that makes up the magic element, the reiko, emits a special fluctuation, the Dark Light, which is difficult to defend even with magic, and has no physical defense means.

    The "reiko" can only be fought with the "reiko", and likewise, the Dark Light can only be fought with the Dark Light, there is no way to defend it in the usual way.

    Once exposed to this light, the chance of death is ny-nine point ny-nine percent.

    But, asionally, someone still survives.

    The odds are one in a million that the body will transform into a magical creature and gain new life

    that is, the magic is actually a blessing magic, and on the one hand, it can also screen out people who are suitable to be magical creatures.

    This kind of magic is the most evil of forbidden spells.

    Instead of the physical destructive power of Disintegration, it can only actually prate the Information Bodyin other words, the nuclear strike magic "Death Blessing" is the ultimate forbidden magic that can even destroy the soul".

    ...........

    ........

    In this way, Tibbs, who was eleventh in the Empire, and Gordon, who was sixty-fourth, became the first casualties of the "blessing of death"unched by Testarossa.

    Immediately after, within a limited radius of five hundred meters, a ferocious death storm was raging.

    This kind of magic didn''t distinguish between enemies and allies, and would wipe out all the creatures within that range. So Testarossa first confirmed through Magical Sense that there was no one from Tempests side of the range before making that move.

    If they didn''t pass the limit, all life forms within a radius of several kilometers would be extinct.

    The "death blessing" is also effective for spiritual beings. This time, however, Testarossaunched cautiously so as not to harm the "soul" and so was harmless to Testarossa and Ultima.

    Testarossa and Ultima breezed over to confirm the results.

    "Looks like there are no survivors around here. That being said, Testarossa did a beautiful job.

    "Gee, what are you talking about?"

    "I''m talking about this toy called a magic tank. Because you beautifully retained its original form, we were able to bring back unharmed ready-made goods to investigate the intelligence.

    "That''s for sure. That''s why only humans were eliminated."

    "Perhaps I should also use the Blessing of Death without mercy. That way, the toys floating in the sky won''t break.

    "Yeah, your magic is too shy. However, it would be sufficient to recover the first sample that was knocked out and use it as information.

    and right. Seriously, that toy was so fragile that it did more damage than imagined. I was only going to break one, but I ended up breaking a bunch.

    "No way. Because Lord Rimuru named us, we are stronger than ever. It''s going to take a lot of attention, Ultima.

    "Mmm. I have also been reflecting. But perhaps Carrera was worrying more than I was. I don''t know if she knows how to "hold the force", but she likes the gorgeous magic

    "That''s why you''re here. Lord Rimuru saw through even that, and I''m impressed.

    "Ah, so it is! Then I''m relieved!

    And so it was that the two continued to talk.

    Although the content of some of the words seemed to misunderstand Rimuru, no one anywhere near the scene could be found who could correct them.

    "Then again, Benimaru-san is also overly worried. The people who are worried about hurting Lord Rimuru are on the Empire''s side, and they want us to be merciful in order to force out such talents.

    "That''s a bit of a problem. If it''s simply a matter of getting a victory, just send us over from the beginning. That way, the things that bothered Lord Rimuru are gone.

    "These are the policies of Lord Rimuru, right? He wants us to stay out of the fight. I guess Lord Rimuru is trying to make Gobta Junior and Mr. Gabil grow. In the case of Lord Rimuru, it was easy to make them evolve, butbat experience had to be honed and umted on its own. A brat like that, who thinks he''s good for nothing, is just a piece of shit to us.

    "It''s nice to think that way, and I understandbut it''s a shame.

    "At least there was still a chance to make an appearance, so that''s good.

    Testarossa and Ultima chatted like this, but even when they were having fun, they didn''t forget to carefully collect the spirits of the dead.

    In fact, there is a secret behind the forbidden spell of "death blessing".

    That is, there has been no sessful case of demonizing humans through this magic.

    To turn a person into a magical creature through this magic is limited to "there is still a soul left". If the souls were taken away, as they were this time, there would be no chance of survival.

    The devil uses deception to give a glimmer of hopemost of the time, the truth remains unknown.

    Of course Testarossa and Ultima knew this well. So when there were no more survivors on this battlefield, they assumed the battle was over.

    Seeing those who had their good deeds go to the end of the road didn''t bother Testarossa''s heart either.

    Not the slightest bit of emotion, as if treating the rest of the world as it were.

    These things were originally out of sight, so it''s fair to say that this oue would have urred.

    And just like that, the battle of Testarossa and others was over.

    Of the Imperial Mecha Legion currently inbat, the Magic Tank Division and the Air Combat Flying Corps have beenpletely defeated.

    The death of Lieutenant General Geist disables the headquarters, the soldiers at the end of the general can''t grasp the situation and begin to flee in defeat, the situation on the battlefield changes and bes a battle of annihtion.

    There were 200,000 men in the Magic Guided Tank Division led by Lieutenant General Geist.

    The "Air Combat Air Corps" led by Major General Faraga had a total of 40,000 troops.

    The Army had fewermanders and fewer means to apply for an armistice. And most of the Imperial General''s soldiers were on the battlefield.

    Just at this moment, the Jura Tempest Federation was certain that it had won the battle.

    But that doesn''t mean the war is over.

    That was because of the fact that these Imperial forces had been defeated, and the head of the Imperial

    "Mecha Legion" army, Grand Admiral Calgurio, was still unaware of it at this time.

    Now the main force of the Imperial Mecha Legion, the Mecha Modification Corps, is advancing towards Rimuru, the capital of the Jura Tempest Federation.

 Volume 13 - Ch 2.1

    Intermission: Mncholy

    Seeing the scene reflected in the big picture in front of him, the Dwarf King Gazel lost his voice.

    "This is

    "My lord, you have a look of panic on your face. That''s a panic. It''s just that you''re not good enough.

    "Don''t say that, Jane. Themon sense on the battlefield was so disrupted that even I didn''t know how to react.

    Spat upon by the court wizard, the old woman Jane, the one who answered was not Gazel, but Pan, the suprememander of the military, with an ugly expression.

    He can''t be med for that either.

    The Rimuru side provided the technology, so they prepared a big screen with a live broadcast of the war. Even the Dwarf Hero Gazel looked at it and thought the situation was unusual.

    "It seems thatmon sense in war has beenpletely overturned."

    After saying this, Dorf, themander of the Knights of the Heavenly Flying Order, tiredly picked up the words.

    "That weapon called a magic tank, even if you use Legion magic to create a ''shield'', it can''t resist. If we were to face off against these weapons without knowing anything about them, we would surely lose the battle, right? Buteven if the power is fearsome, if it is dealt with in the way it is heard beforehand, it seems to be counteracted by the construction of trenches and walls

    The group agreed with him.

    There is no way to defend against it by just the earthen walls, but if severalyers of barriers are put in ce, that will reduce the power of the shells, the above is the conclusion they came to.

    This is the correspondence derived through the knowledge of Rimuru. In fact, it was toote to use it, but after further calctions based on the power projected from the images, they came to another conclusion, and that was that this weapon did not have an overwhelming power that left peoplepletely helpless.

    "A look at the Empire''s equipment will reveal that their main forces are ced at medium to long rangepared to closebat. It looks like none of the soldiers are heavily armed, most of them are lightly armed, right?

    "I''ve tried to investigate that, too. I heard that the Empire had prepared a new type of weapon, the

    "Magic Gun", which even the most advanced soldiers could easily master magic. In addition to that, it seems that some of the troops are equipped with otherworldly weapons such as ''guns'', and it seems that the other side thinks that closebat is out of date.

    "The age of the sword is over, and it''s only natural that the Empire would think so.

    Dorf nodded deeply.

    Guns are said to prate iron armor easily. Facing arge army of magic tanks makes one feel like even the walls are unbearable. Those weapons were like a mockery of the weapons and defenses that had been used as a major industry by the Dwarven Kingdom and had fallen out of step with the times.

    Having said that

    "This is not a foreign world. Even if some kind of tactical theory isbined over there, it won''t work here without a clever integration of the concept of magicthats what it means.

    "That''s it. Although the "Magic Gun" is also a threat, it has run into opponents who are opposed to each other. His Majesty Rimuru possessed arge amount of scaly shields from Charybdis. He''s given us some too, and with all this stuff, most of the magic doesn''t work, right?

    Yes."

    Using the concept of magic, it is possible to fight against a variety of modern weapons. And the enemy''s magic would be paralyzed by their own equipment.

    Although it would have turned out that way because one thing happened to grind one thing, it would have been a disaster for the Imperial Army.

    Their overemphasis on medium to long range results in an even greater emphasis on how vulnerable they are after being approached by the enemy. That''s a huge oversight in terms of tactics.

    "No matter what you''re facing, the point is to see how the person in question is nning. We cannot follow in their footsteps and must use the intelligence gained in this war effectively,

    He came to such a conclusion, but in fact he thought, "These are all secondary".

    There''s more to it than tactics and weaponry. Yet he did not speak.

    That is the strength of each individual magical creature.

    Naturally, Gobta, Ranga, and Gabil didn''t need to say much, and it looked like the monsters underneath them had grown considerably.

    Coupled with the use of recovery potions at no cost, they also take a rather dangerous approach tobat on the one hand. Unlike before, because of their sess in mass-producing Hipokute herbs, they were able to supply arge supply of recovery potions.

    This move also subvertsmon sense on the battlefield.

    But,pared to that

    "King Gazel, may I give you a word of advice?"

    "Don''t say it. I understand everything."

    "Maybe so. But the words must be spoken."

    Janes words were heavy.

    That piece of advice everyone must listen to.

    Knowing Gazel acquiescence, Jane spoke.

    "Those female demons are extraordinary. The ritual magic that burned the airship to the ground was the great spell ''me of Destruction''. Even I have a hard time exercising alone. And the tricks the white-haireddy used were even more problematic. It was the ''death blessingsaid to be unmanageable with the human body. It''s a forbidden spell"

    Everyone was silent as they listened to Jane.

    The reason why those female demons were unusual was understandable just by spending a few days with them.

    The head of the secret service, Anrietta, had investigated them.

    The girls were newly hired members of the Jura Tempest Federation and were said to have been brought in by Diablo, the devotee of Rimuru, from nowhere. Their true identity is that of the demon race, and ording to the rumor, they are friends that Diablo knew long ago.

    It is said that Rimuru appointed them as intelligence officers, and they were also sent to observe the various regiments. Gazel had originally suspected that things weren''t so innocent, and it turned out as if he had guessed it.

    "Actually, I was thinkingcould they be

    "So His Majesty has guessed the true identity of those girls?

    Wellbut it''s better not to know the truth.

    "What are you talking about? I''ve already seen such exaggeratedbat, I feel uneasy not knowing.

    Jane was right, what was most frightening was the fighting ability of those demons. Even Gazel almost said, "Are you kidding me?" after seeing those images. .

    and we''re all mentally prepared for it. Even you, King Gazel, are dumbfounded, and there is something written on your face that makes us guess.

    When Jane finished these words, the otherpanions nodded along with him.

    Dorf, Pan, and Anrietta were among them.

    Looking around at the faces of these reliablerades, Gazel made up his mind.

    "It actually happened on that night of the festival.

    "Is that the ritual you''re talking about? The time you were invited to the Jura Tempest Federation?

    "So, His Majesty Gazel was once invited alone to a secret meeting or something. We were all in the next room on standby too, so what happened then?

    "Mmm. It''s actually the secretary of Rimuruthe butler, I should say. You''ve met him, haven''t you?"

    "Oh, he''s Sir Diablo, isn''t he? A very gentlemanly man.

    "That guy doesn''t feel easy. What''s wrong with him?

    Those who went to the Tempest Founding Festival have also seen Diablo. Anrietta had also been guarding Gazel in the shadows, so she knew what the subordinates under the Rimuru looked like and what they were called.

    Only Jane, who hadn''t followed, didn''t know, and then Gazel dropped a shock bomb.

    "ording to Elmesia, Diablo seems to be the primordial''."

    .

    "Wait, wait, wait. What did you say? King Gazel, what did you just say?

    Jane''s face was suddenly pale, and she prayed that she had misheard herself, and asked for Gazel. Yet the reality is harsh.

    "I heard he was a primordial. Which brings me to the ck Primordial. Because only that ''ck Primordial'' is not bound by the dominion realm and cane and go as he pleases, there are people all over the world who im to have seen him.

    King Gazel seemed to be out of it, and he stated it calmly. Good at posturing, indeed, but no way to fool Jane.

    "Wait, wait a minute! King Gazel, wait!

    "What''s wrong?

    You''re asking what''s wrong!? Could it be that the Primordial, the ck Primordial, has be a servant of the Demon Lord Rimuru?

    Exactly."

    "Well, that''s a serious problem! Why did you keep it a secret before?

    Jane let out a scream.

    There are others to follow.

    "Could it be thatMiss Testarossa and Miss Ultima are also?"

    "Hey, hey, that''s too muchI guess it''s that one anyway. They are Diablo''s subordinates, older individuals?"

    The more optimistic inferences made by Dorf and Pan are disproved by the subsequent statements made by Anrietta.

    "In addition to those two, I have heard that there are many other talents that His Excellency Diablo has somehow scrounged up. From a standpoint, those men all seem to be under Sir Diablo''smand, but the diplomat-at-arms, Testarossa, the attorney-general, Ultima, and the president of the inquisition, Carrera, all three of whom seem to have had a rtionship with him from a long time agoseem to be on an equal footing in their correspondence."

    "Oi oi oi, no way.

    "His Highness Rimuru is a bit arbitrary

    "You''re saying there are three people of the same status as the primordial? How can that be? But two of them now look almost like"

    People are tempted to deny it. But when you take into ount what has happened before you, the truth wille out.

    At least Testarossa and Ultima felt too powerful to deduce even when Jane looked at them.

    "So it''s better if you don''t know, as I just said.

    "Anyway, it may be bad for me not to tell you about Diablo, but so what if I do? It would be a different story if the guy did something bad, but Rimuru has promised to really prevent him from losing control. I have also personally decided to believe my junior brother''s words. I just didn''t think he''d find more primordials, which even I couldn''t see through!

    The point of this isn''t whether you see through it or notthats what everyone thinks in their hearts.

    At the same time, they feel that even they I listen to them, they can''t do anything about them.

    "In fact, the moment I decided to believe in the Rimuru, I was ready to realize it. He has even the Storm Dragon on his side, so it''s toote now. Be aware of it, too.

    It''s not that simple, but what Gazel says isn''t unreasonable.

    "Well, I''ve always trusted you. If you trust each other, then I have no problem with that.

    "That''s true. I have also met His Majesty Rimuru with my own eyes. That man is trustworthy, that''s what His Majesty Gazel and I think.

    "I am His Majesty''s shadow, and His Majesty''s wishes shall be obeyed.

    "Really. I also trust His Majesty. Although it was before he became the demon lord, I did once pay a visit to His Majesty Rimuru. What is most frightening is that the overwhelming force of the battle is particrly concentrated on one sidebut it is true that it is all toote. And there''s nothing we can do about it, so it''s futile to think about it.

    Hearing Jane say that, everyone felt the same way.

    It would be a different matter if one were to think about it ande to a conclusion, but the question is not answered.

    Believe it or not, one can only choose between the two.

    "Keep it inside for now."

    With a word from Gazel, the question was put to rest.

    It is not quite true that the war will end on this side.

    Although the forces that had forced the central part of the Dwarven Kingdom had been wiped out, the eastern side was still fighting the Imperial Army. And the smell of danger still wafted around the capital of the Jura Tempest Federation, Rimuru.

    That guy is really scary.

    "No, maybe that''s not what His Majesty Rimuru meant either. Perhaps the Army has not found itself defeated and has not broken off its aggression"

    "Mmm. That''s a pretty high probability.

    Dorfs words made Gazel nod his head in response.

    If the Imperial Army found out that they had lost this time, it was likely that the battle n would be interrupted.

    "And so, King Gazel. Presumably, the Imperial Army is also integrating their forces through magic. But the battle changed all at once. It is hard to believe, even with their own eyes, that the defeat hase to such an extentEven if they suddenly received a report that everyone had been killed, they would suspect that it was the enemy who had been deceiving them with false news.

    "Even I wouldn''t believe it if I only heard the report. The Empire''s Grand Admiral Calgurio is not ipetent, but I don''t think he has the means to decide whether to retreat or not at this juncture.

    Because if you don''t get it right, you could be considered a coward. They won''t understand if they ask those fools in the Empire to retreat and not let them lose once.

    Janesments are well taken and Pan''s judgment is sound.

    Gazel was no exception, and if he had been on the Imperial side, he would have made the same judgment, so he could have experienced it.

    The poorer ones were the soldiers of the imperial generals who were forced to cooperatebut the onus was on the aggressors.

    Gazel was also a famous neutral ruler, but the Empire was currently hostile to them, and he didn''t want to take responsibility for the Empire in passing. And there''s no such obligation. All he had to do was carry a cold heart and predict future movements.

    "The imperial army that attacked the great forest of Jura was ny-four thousand, of whom two hundred and forty thousand (***idk why these numbers dont make sense, so the 94,000 might be a trantion error) had been wiped out. In that case, it''s almost certain that Rimuru will win.

    "Sort of. It would be kind of cute to take it lightlybut His Majesty Rimuru is not one of those.

    Hearing the wordsing out of Gazel''s mouth, Pan responded sympathetically.

    In the end, how much will the Imperial Army sacrifice?

    "We need to really document this battle as a lesson. It must be truly kept in mind, knowing that humans must never take on the Demon Lord.

    Yes!"

    Themon sense of war waspletely shattered, and the strength of those monstrous creatures were originally only a deduction, now it was really certain that their strength hade to the Heavenly Cmity level. Rimuru''s goal was not to dominate the world, but to coexist and prosper with mankind, and mankind was lucky.

    The empire is making a fool of itself.

    In order not to let their sacrifice go to waste, Gazel intends to see this battle through to the end.

    Then one must n for the worst case scenario.

    If the future is hostile to Rimuru

    One side of him prayed that this wouldn''t happen and the other side wondered what to do if it did.

    Although he bragged to hispanions that he believed in Rimuru, that was only his personal opinion at best. As the guide of the country, he must do his best to think of countermeasures so as not to cause harm to the people.

    You can''t stop thinking because you can''t get an answer.

    That being said, it would be foolish to go against the Primordials, and it would be impossible to win a fight with Veldora. Id seriously have to throw up my hands in surrender

    Faced with difficult questions for which answers were simply impossible, Gazel was troubled.

 Volume 13 - Ch 3

    Everybody, give it your allI seem to have said that.

    No problem, I shouldn''t be old enough to have Alzheimer''s.

    Only about three years have passed since my reincarnation.

    No need to worry about that.

    That being said

    Seeing the scene reflected on the big screen, I began to wonder: Did I really say that?

    That''s because the big screen has already shown our army''splete victory.

    It''s all right over here.

    That part was fine, but the content was brutal.

    It was a one-sided ravaging battle that even had me watching in awe.

    Gobta was so cool that he didn''t look like himself at all, running wildly across the battlefield, beating the magic tanks to a pulp. Since he had been ''assimted'' with Ranga, he was worthy of the title of the Four Heavenly Kings in terms of appearance and strength.

    Gabil also had his own doorway, transforming into what looked to be a very powerful dragon monster, and also appearing to have an unusually high power mana attack that smashed the enemy''s warship in one fell swoop.

    It wasn''t just Gabil, all the members of the Flying Dragon congregation were transformed, and that was no joke.

    Although I discovered that the secret behind it was "Dragon Warriorization", I didnt know when they started using it so easily

    It''s time to forget about the effect of "Dragon Warriorization" before throwing it aside, I didn''t expect it to be so powerful.

    That seems to have a time limit, and in fact can only be active for about ten minutes with that state

    but the reinforcement is just too big, big enough to make up for that.

    If used in the wrong ce, it can be an act of suicide, but there is nothing wrong with using it as a great trick.

    However, therge explosions in the air made the fortified Gabil look pale inparison.

    I don''t know what''s going on, but the enemy''smand battleship suddenly had a thermonuclear reaction and exploded, which also affected the Empire''s airship forces, and finally caused a big explosion.

    Even I was shocked to see it.

    As far as results were concerned, the aerial warfare on the Empire''s side had been destroyed by this time. One fell to the ground without being left behind.

    This became the beginning, and the Tempest Army began to attack heavily. Gobta rendezvoused with the rest with Gabil, and whoever watched would have known that the battle was in our favor.

    Even in the midst of modern warfare, helicopters would have an overwhelming advantage over fighting vehicles. By analogy, the Gabil group alsounched their breath attacks mainly from the air, unterally inflicting damage on the ground forces of the Imperial Army.

    Because the target is small, the magic tank gun cannot pose a threat.

    Simply put, if you can''t hit them, you can''t seed.

    It wasn''t like the Empire just got pinned down and tried to fight back on several asions. But it was only then that the counterattack began and waspletely destroyed.

    It was Ultima''s men, Veyron and Zonda, who struck.

    These two were worthy of the ancient demons, and seemed to have enough vision to see who was the expert, not to distinguish between captains or ordinary soldiers, purely choosing only the strong ones for blood sacrifice.

    They wore the butler''s clothes and cook''s clothes that stood out on the battlefield. Yet these became symbols of fear for the soldiers of the imperial generals.

    Hakurou was responsible for dealing with the enemy''s supply chain.

    No mercy at all, one cut, two cuts.

    Among them are others who are nning to put in their names

    "Damn it! I''m number 97

    Even without letting his opponent finish speaking, Hakurou''s white de shed by and his opponent followed with a ssh of blood.

    And said to those who were cut down by him, "Forgive me. Lord Rimuru is watching this battle. Since he has ordered us to ''do our best,'' I cannot be merciful.

    I didn''t say those things from a point of view other than that it was a big deal.

    Having said that

    I don''t think there''s any way to revoke the order at this point.

    If I had interjected at will, the battlefield would have been a mess.

    Finally I looked away and decided to watch the battlefield from the sidelines.

    No plug is the right thing to do.

    Seriously, the Imperial soldiers that Veyron, Zonda, and Hakurou packed away were already on par with the Pdins in terms of fighting ability, or had been. And they were tricky to arm, with a higher performance than the "Spirit Armor" worn by the Pdinsthe equivalent of legendary levels.

    Taken together, you''ll find these people are stronger. Even I was surprised to hear the parsing results of Master Raphael, the King of Wisdom.

    How did the Empire manage to get such strong equipmentits useless to think about it when the facts are already in front of you.

    As for the people who got the equipment, could their true identities be the rumored Imperial Emperor''s Order of the Near Guard?

    There was some information from Gadra''s side, and I heard that there were also "otherworldly visitors"

    in it, and that the members of the organization were selected from among the Imperial masters.

    The members are said to number around a hundred or sothey also have rankings, which proves the rumors are true.

    Had these masters yed to their strengths, perhaps the battlefield would have be more chaotic. It was right to go over and clean them up without waiting for the other person to be ready, like Hakurou did.

    Veyron and Zonda did the same, secretly starting to finish up before these guys could even get their act together.

    With a few strokes, you can see through your opponent''s strength, and being able to distinguish between the eyes of the strong is the most frightening.

    It shouldn''t be so easy to deal with the enemy if they''re all assembled. But on this point, the wrong people are the ones who are careless on the battlefield. If they had aint, they should have given it their all from the start.

    The words apply to us as well.

    If one casually sympathizes with the enemy, there is a good chance that they will take advantage of the situation. In this way, there is a great deal of damage to be done.

    Such a foolish act of causing injury to us in order to save the enemy soldiers is never allowed. While it''s close to sympathizing with them, it''s the same thing as underestimating your opponent if you win all the way.

    We are at war. It''s time to chill out and please try to hang in there until the end.

    There is one more point to consider, and that is whether the enemy has expressed surrender to us

    While I was watching Hakurou and theirbat situation and saw as if he was enthralled, the Imperial Army''s Combat Operations Command appeared in an abnormal state.

    <<notice. a="" mass="" annihtion="" magic="" "death="" blessing"="" has="" been="" confirmed.="" the="" user="" is="" individual="" named="" testarossa."="">> Hearing Master Raphael, the King of Wisdom, report this to me, I hurried to get the scene conditions projected on the big screen. The next thing you know, Testarossa and Ultima are standing there with a smile on their faces.</notice.>

    There are no other survivors.

    The remaining strengthnearly a thousand vehiclesalso ceased operations, and all the infantry that had been deployed around them fell.

    The number is probably in the tens of thousands.

    There was a talk about "death blessing", which shows that it is very dangerous magic.

    <> Although Master Raphael, the King of Wisdom, is happy to analyze and exin, how can such dangerous magic be used!? I almost called it out, but it''s human nature.</answer.>

    It is said that the nuclear explosion used by Ultima is called the "me of Destruction", but the danger of death blessing is higher.

    Testarossa should not be fighting them

    When this magic is unleashed, victory and defeat are decided in an instant.

    There were absolutely no survivors on the enemymand''s side.

    It was only a matter of time before those remaining troops were eliminated.

    In this way, the battle between the Dwarf Kingdom and the Imperial Army ended in aplete victory for us.

    ***

    The imperial army that had been sent as bait to deceive was all but dead.

    As it literally meansall gone. I''m afraid there''s no other military exnation for this either.

    We''ve all been too messy.

    I didn''t think I''d cause this by just asking people to give it their all.

    And Benimaru had looked terrifying from just now.

    "I say, if this turns out to be the case, doesn''t my battle n mean nothing? What is this, what are those intelligence officers up to!? I''ve heard that they''re under Lord Rimurus directmandmay I ask you to rify that?

    I just hid it a little in every way, but Benimaru turned to me with a very big smile and said so.

    This one, that one?

    It''s impossible to have a n of war that''s all-epassing.

    But then again, Benimaru, youre not the only one who wants someone to give you an answer.

    I just want you to give me an ount.

    But how can such a heartfelt voice be spoken

    For help, I sneak a look at Veldora.

    He averted his eyes in a sh.

    I know that Veldora is particrly unreliable at times like these. So is Ramiris, who didn''t look like she was going to help me.

    "It''s nothing really, I told you that before. Those are the newpanions Diablo poached.

    "I know those are Diablo''s men.

    It looks like there''s no way to keep lying.

    There''s nothing I can do.

    I''m going to be honest and give a full ount of what happened.

    Normally, if it was Benimaru and Geld, even knowing their true identity and danger, knowing that they were in fact the Primordials, those two would have epted with a smile. And I''m going to hold Diablo responsible for all of it, so if anything goes wrong after that, we''ll see what happens then.

    I armed myself with these theories and decided to get the truth out.

    "Actually, that''s right. Do you know about the Primordials?

    "You mean the Original demons?

    It looked like Benimaru didn''t know, and Shuna, who was making coffee, interjected to pick up the conversation.

    "You''re talking about the seven kings, the seven monarchs, who are the origins of evil, right? Hearing everyone''s previous conversation, I was curious and ran to investigate. I was surprised to learn that Mr.

    Diablo was one of them.

    The definition of a primordial is an original demon, and I didn''t know there was such an exaggerated appetion in the original.

    Saying that, Shuna told the important secret, but she had a peaceful smile on her face.

    The aroma of coffee wafted through the control room, easing the tense air.

    Meaning?"

    Benimaru started muttering, looking puzzled.

    "Geez, you don''t know that, do you, brother? Not only Mr. Diablo, but even Miss Testarossa, Miss Carrera, and Sister Ultima seem to be primordials.

    "Is thatis that so?

    Yes."

    Shunas smile was so dazzling.

    Faced with a smile like that, Benimaru couldn''t seem to ask any more questions either.

    Squinting my eyes at the silent Benimaru, I began to think in my mind.

    Shuna is actually a big deal.

    I had already tensed my nerves when I was about to reveal a frightening secret, but it turned out to be so easy to reveal that I got nervous for nothing. But thanks to her outburst, I went along with it a little easier.

    "Diablo, Ill let you speak for yourself.

    "Yes, Lord Rimuru. Mr. Benimaru, I am actually one of the primordials, just as I was introduced"

    As I listened to Diablo''s exnation, I started to drink my coffee.

    Hmm.

    The ck tea was good, but the coffee was also delicious.

    "So it is, I have understood. That''s why theyre so awesome, right? In that case, I wish you would have told me from the beginning.

    "No, no, no, I was afraid you''d be scared when you found out. If it was me or Veldora it would be a different story, but I really don''t want you Benimaru to mess with anyone else''s extra heart.

    I deliberately only emphasized this point because I was worried about my partner.

    As for the good things I dogiving them fleshly namesits not appropriate at this point, so please don''t go into it.

    "I''m not scared either!

    Even Ramiris had said so, and I hope everyone didn''t have any superfluous fears.

    "Anyway, that''s a lot of worry. As long as it''s someone approved by Lord Rimuru, I will ept it as a partner.

    "Well, Mr. Benimaru is right. Our partners do not treat us differently because of our appearance or strength.

    Benimaru wore a dark smile on his face, while Geld took it for granted. Just like that, it blew my worries away.

    Shuna didn''t seem to have a problem with Diablo either. The proof is that she still treats them as she always does in a very general manner.

    "That''s good. It seems I''m the one who took the unnecessary heart.

    "Hahaha, you should trust us more.

    "That''s it. It''s toote for us to be thankful when we say that Lord Rimuru was worried about us epting Miss Carrera and a few of them into our army.

    It was a little sheepish, but it was great that Benimaru and Geld were willing to take them in.

    One wonders what Gabil and Gobta will think of them.

    As things stand, they seem to be getting along just fine. One should expect to have peace in the future as well.

    "All in all, Diablo and I get along just fine. It should be all right!

    Shion jumped out to hang the reassurance, but I wasn''t worried about how you were from the start?

    "What does that mean, Shion?

    "It means literally, Diablo.

    First Secretary Shion and Second Secretary Diablo began to re at each other. I''ve heard that the other side is the Primordial and thought it was serious, but it turned out to be okay.

    I felt relieved again, thinking that I was really over worrying myself.

    Now that the story has been told, it is time for a reflection session.

    "I think it would be bad if the enemy''s army had demon lord level experts, that''s why I arranged for Testarossa and the others to go there, but they seemed to be trying too hard.

    Although the reason for this is my one sentence. I didn''t expect people to make such a big deal out of it.

    Should we say they''re messing around too much, or are they overdoing it?

    These guys are too cold.

    For they did not hesitate at all in annihting the enemy.

    "Kufufufufu. The effort was surprisingly overdone, and it looked a bit overwhelming. I''lle backter to educate them.

    Seeing Diablo chuckle and say such things, I didn''t forget to tell him to "stop in moderation! .

    Anyway, I''ll leave the rest to Diablo.

    I am sure he will educate people well so that they will not overdo it in the future.

    Nextes the confirmation of our damage.

    Less than two hours had passed since the battle had begun, and it hade to a full end.

    It seems that a lot of people have been injured, and it is not known what the victimization is

    "As for the current situation, all the injured are said to have recovered!

    A bright voice sounded in the control room.

    For those of us who go out to fight, we all distribute our own high-grade recovery medicine.

    Everyone gets ten each. Thanks to these medicines, most injuries seem to heal immediately.

    And also the ones I thought were dead at first.

    In fact, they just faked their deaths, and even the missing limbs werepletely healed with the full restoration of the potions potency.

    It can be said that under Benimaru''smand, they y the bait beautifully.

    "Didn''t you just say that? Don''t worry about it.

    "That''s true. I certainly do believe you and everyone else.

    Everything is going ording to Benimaru''s n. Surprisingly, it seems that only Testarossa and the girls are active.

    Although many recovery potions were used in terms of results, the number of casualties was zero.

    We got the big, unexpected win.

    But not entirely free of damage.

    Just look and see Gabil and the "flying dragon crowd" under him.

    Because the use of the special skill "Dragon Warriorization" seems to do a lot of damage to the flesh.

    Originally, I wanted to say that the effect of this move was so powerful, but as it turned out, the bad thing was not just the time limit. As soon as the battle was over, barely a physical reaction appeared, and it was heard that the whole body would be as if paralyzed, and the whole person could not move.

    Because it wasn''t an injury, even the recovery medication didn''t work.

    Since they were absorbing the surrounding magical elements to build strong flesh, the reaction of repelling foreign objects was only possible.

    This time, Gabil''s arrogance was too much, and not only him, but all the members of the Flying Dragon congregation suffered the repercussions.

    It''s the only thing that''s good enoughI hope they do some soul-searching.

    By the way, it was added that this state wouldst for about twenty-four hours or so, and it waster concluded that the move could only beunched once in two days at most.

    This time, they won after giving it their all, but if they use it in the wrong ce, they might get themselves killed. That force is equivalent to a double-edged de, so I want them to be more careful.

    ***

    Let''s change the subject and talk about what''s going on over there in the Empire.

    Lieutenant General Geist''s Division of Magic Guided Tanks had 200,000 men under hismand.

    There were 40,000 people in the "Air Combat Flying Corps" led by Major General Faraga.

    Regarding the war power the Empire possesses in this regard, we have also confirmed it with Master Gadra.

    <> That adds up to about 240,000 people</answer.>

    It was a massacre.

    How could I not be heartbroke?

    But when I became the demon lord before, I had already killed 20,000 people with my own hands. I don''t want to argue about it now.

    Not to mention that after killing about 240,000 Imperial Army soldiers, many souls seem to have entered my body. It wasn''t long after the war started that I felt the "souls" build up like crazy.

    This feeling is that the ministry is collecting souls for me. Thanks to this feeling, I seemed to be able to correctly grasp the number of enemy soldiers who were beaten down.

    That being said, there are so many human "souls" that have been acquired

    To evolve from a demon lord seed to a true demon lord", 10,000 offerings are required to satisfy.

    So what happens when youe to about 240,000 souls?

    The answer is no change!

    That means that I''ve reached my evolutionary limit by awakening as the "True Demon Lord", right?

    So to speak.

    If it wasn''t for that, Guy would have been killing humans so wildly that they would perish by now, so let''s take souls this way.

    Because intuition told him he would never evolve again, he didn''t engage in needless killing.

    Didn''t expect to receive unexpected news at this point.

    <<notice. the="" number="" of="" "souls"="" acquired="" has="" exceeded="" required="" number.="" at="" present,="" it="" is="" possible="" to="" awaken="" others="" who="" are="" connected="" through="" "soul="" corridor".="" subordinates="">> And so it was that Master Raphael, the King of Wisdom, uttered the unbearable words.</notice.>

    It seems that if one quantifies the "soul" of those who are qualified, they may be able to awaken. I thought it would be meaningless to get so many "souls", but even if it doesn''t affect my own evolution, it can still be used for my subordinates to evolve.

    ording to Master Raphael, the King of Wisdom, there are several people who seem to have met the conditions for awakening. By giving me the acquired souls, they will be able to awakenwith a power as powerful as the true demon lords.

    The necessary number of souls is one hundred thousand.

    In order to awaken his subordinates, I never thought I would need up to ten times as many souls

    So far, no one should know about this.

    While it is possible that Guy had knowledgeGod only knows.

    Even if you know it, it shouldn''t be that easy to implement. Might as well pull in the people who have be true demon lord seeds and guide them to awaken, faster that way.

    That''s why Guy held a party of masters like the Walpurrgis and wanted to choose someone worthy of being a partner.

    More than that, there may be other reasons.

    But it''s also possible that I''m thinking too much of him, when in fact he doesn''t even know.

    Needing at least 100,000 "souls" is a big battle. It''s like killing everyone in a metropolis, there''s no easy way to do that.

    In a word

    Currently, I have an umtion of extra souls in my body, about a quarter of a million or so. Using all that up should awaken two people.

    The subordinates whoo can be awakened areRanga, Benimaru, Shion, Gabil, Geld, Diablo, Testarossa, Ultima, Carrera, Kumara, Zegion, and Adalmantwelve of the above.

    <<notice. do="" you="" want="" to="" create="" "soul="" corridors"="" for="" your="" subordinates="" evolve?="" yes="" no="">> ording to this passage from Master Raphael, the King of Wisdom, it can be learned that even the other party can make it evolve even if it is far away.</notice.>

    Just like Veldora, simply connect using the "Soul Corridor" so that it is not limited by time and space.

    It''s certainly a good thing that my ties with my partners have gotten stronger for this benefit.

    So what''s next?

    I personally am bing stronger than I was before the awakening, so much stronger that I can''t say the same.

    The unique skill Great Sage" has also evolved into the ultimate skill "Raphael the King of Wisdom".

    If Benimaru and the others can evolve too, then what''s there to hesitate about?

    It''s just that

    The phrase "the genealogy of the soul" is a cause for concern. I''m afraid it''s the "naming" that connects the soul.

    Just naming a monster will allow it to evolve. Although I didn''t even think much of it and messed with it, I now know thates with a high degree of danger. It was because Master Raphael, the King of Wisdom, analyzed the security for me that I could safely name them.

    If the naming fails, there is a good chance that all of my power will be taken away and I will die as a result. Even if I didn''t fall this far, there was a chance that I wouldn''t be able to regain my strength and the whole person would be weak.

    Personally, I have a convenient skill, such as the "stomach bag" of Beelzebub, the king of gluttony, to keep the excess mana created.

    If it''s not enough it seems like it''s all on loan from Veldora, then it''s all in the hands of Master Raphael, the King of Wisdom.

    Simply put it''s actually a foul y.

    Generally speaking, one has to use one''s own magic element, and no one can simply "name" creatures, which is a matter of course.

    Even if it''s Guy, it''s the same.

    So few people have subordinates where souls are connected to each other.

    Those partners are irreceable to me.

    If it was me, I wouldn''t want to use my partner as an experiment.

    But Master Raphael, the King of Wisdom, rmended it all so that there should be no danger. No, it''s the direction I want to think in.

    Yet there was a sense of overly dangerous foreboding.

    And I''m also struggling with who to choose.

    There are a bunch of other issues that exist.

    If the benchmark was the amount of mana, then Souei should also be qualified. However, he was not chosen, so I had my doubts about the conditions of awakening.

    One wonders what the reason for this is.

    To evolve into a demon lord requires a dormancy to evolve. I''m not sure that''s going to happen this time either, so I think it''s best to be prepared to do it all over again.

    The most important thing is that the war is not over.

    The Empires own army, which amounts to 700,000 troops, is invading our capital.

    It''s best not to take any chances in such a crunch.

    So be it, my answer is NO.

    Let''s put this matter aside for now, when the dust of the war has settled.

    ***

    I ordered the green legion to stay on site and do recovery work.

    Ask them to recover the undamaged magic tanks, plus the wreckage of the blimps.

    Gabil and his group all seem to be out of action, so I''m going to have the Flying Dragon troops drive them to the Dwarven Kingdom and let them tune up slowly.

    Instead, I want the Blue Corps to meet up with the green legion.

    It was toote toe back in time for the showdown, so Benimaru gave instructions and told them,

    "It''s okay toe back in no hurry.

    Incidentally, Gazel asked if we needed reinforcements, but I told him no problem.

    Gazel and the rest are also still fighting. Even though the battle in the central part was over, there was still an Imperial army deployed on the side of Isthmus, which was adjacent to the Empire.

    The total number of troops is 60,000.

    ording to Gadra, this is all a fake move by Yuuki''s forcesit''s unclear how the situation will y out and definitely not to be taken lightly.

    It would be nice to remind Gazel that they should be careful hereeven if I didn''t, they would be careful.

    We''ll be responsible for a showdown with the Imperial Army.

    By the time we get to this side, there is a consensus.

    In the meantime

    Although we won a big victory in the outpost battle, there is still a huge battle force on the enemy''s side that cannot be taken lightly.

    It is an overwhelming disadvantage in terms of numbers.

    Although not to our advantage, the subordinates were highly motivated.

    Shion looked energetic and even said to my chagrin, "Those monsters, they only let themselves get the spotlight! I have to go out there and show everyone what it means to be really strong!

    What the hell are you fighting against?I can''t help but want to spout off like that.

    "Aren''t you my bodyguard?

    As soon as I pointed out the problem, she panicked and searched for her senses. It is also doubtful that it is too much to fightI thought at the moment.

    The energetic people are not the only ones.

    "My Lord! Ultima came to show off. I heard you won in your first fight, right? Ahhh, I''d like to get a chance to make an appearance soon. I think it''s okay to go over there and say hello now, right?

    Carrera rushed into the control room, red-faced and shouted out the words.

    I''ve ordered her to stay with the Second Legion, so it turns out that she''s been in touch with Ultima and the others on the Communication Network.

    I can''t seem to hold myself back anymore after hearing my colleagues brag to her about their great exploitsbut I''m troubled by the fact that Id be acting without permission.

    "Go say hello?

    The person who asked this back was Benimaru.

    Even knowing that Carrera''s true identity was the Primordial, his attitude remained unchanged. It looks like I really was overly worried.

    "Yeah, that''s it. Trying to say a little nuclear strike magic as a gift to them.

    I can''t believe shes saying something so ridiculous with such a cute smile.

    It''s the Yellow Primordial, it''s a jump of ideas.

    No!"

    Benimaru replied with a dumbfounded look.

    "Miss Carrera. I want to ask you one thing, and that is to please wait for the order from above. It only makes sense to act and do those things when it counts.

    Carrera looked rather grumpy, but she didn''t seem intent on disobeying Benimaru''s orders. Geld also stepped in to reprimand, and she nodded reluctantly.

    "Got it. I would love to show you my active performance, but I need to wait for the ''moment'' when I can make the most of it. I''ll be good and wait for the right time.

    It''s great that she can understand.

    Still seemingly willing to listen to Gelds advice, the two might turn out to be a more tacit partner than they thought.

    "Hahahaha, Carrera, it''s not the only way to make a big show of yourself. To be the sword of the lord, so that we can glow!

    "I know that, Miss Shion. I also seem to be a little too pushy. I''ll let my mind cool down a bit and calm myself down.

    Youre saying things like that of all people? I''m thinking in my mind.

    The words sounded good, but the thought that it was Shion who said them made it hard to ept.

    I mean, you, up until just now, were the one who wanted to mess around the most, weren''t you?

    Although I almost got thatint out, I held back at this point. It took a long time for everyone to reach a consensus, and it would be a bad idea to let it get stuck in a stalemate again.

    While watching the departing Carrera, I gave Shion white eyes.

    However, it''s enough to see the fighting spirit.

    Our side also includes the Labyrinth Force and the Second Legion, which is always in reserve. It wasn''t just the subordinates, it felt like even the soldiers at the very end of the line were very energetic.

    Probably hearing what I said, everyone was in high spirits and about to give it their all.

    Rtively speaking, there are 700,000 people on the Imperial side.

    It seems impossible to fight them in terms of numbers, but the point isquality is more important than quantity.

    The other side should also have a master lurking, but we still have the ace of the maze on our side.

    "The key to winning or losing is in the maze. Please, Veldora and Ramiris!

    No problem. Just leave it to us!

    "Just say it. With us, you won''t have to worry about fighting anyone!"

    Hearing such a powerful response made me feel like I was in the right ce.

    The most important thing is how to avoid casualties.

    To do so, luring the enemy''s army into the maze was the best course of action.

    If we were in a maze, there would be no attrition in our army.

    Not only that, but the magical creatures within the maze can also join the battle and can make up the unfavorable gap in numbers in one fell swoop.

    If even the lower-order magical creatures were counted together, the total number should reach hundreds of thousands.

    "Next we''ll see how much the empire believes in Yuuki''s rhetoric, isn''t that right?

    "I think it''s the other way around. It''s precisely because this guy isn''t trustworthy that he was able to sessfully induce and make the Empire suspect him, isn''t it?

    "I see. It does make sense!

    Presumably, it''s like Benimaru said.

    If Yuuki is treated as an enemy, he is a very tricky opponent.

    For the time being we are only joining forces with him, but to treat this man as one of our own is really not to be trusted.

    Maybe the Empire side thinks so too.

    "It would be more reassuring to have them lurking among the enemy than to have those suspicious elements join us in the fight.

    Shion unexpectedly hit it.

    "This way you don''t have to worry about being betrayed, and you don''t have to spare your mind to deal with it.

    As such, Benimaru agreed.

    "In this regard, the empire must not have fully regarded Yuuki as one of its own. There should be vignce and suspicion of what he says. By analogy, there are 60,000 troops deployed in front of the eastern metropolis of Isthmus in Dwargon, and there is no telling how they will act. It is likely that the empire will send troops there to clean up the mess, and also to speak to Gazel and tell them to be on the alert.

    "If it is King Gazel, there is no need to worry about him in this regard. But nothing is more problematic than our untrustworthy personnel. If it was me, I would have gone over and disposed of them first.

    I also told King Gazel about Yuuki. As Benimaru said, I don''t need to worry about it, so I''m sure the other party will take every measure.

    We should be worried about the Imperial Army.

    They are currently on the offensive, intending to surround us from all sides. There was only a huge door left on the ground, and while that made it unnecessary to panic, I couldn''t help but feel nervous.

    There was nothing more worrying than the fear that they would overtake the Jura Tempest Federation and attack the new kingdom that Youm had establishedFarmenas.

    Although there were two major forces over there, Razen and Grucius, that country didn''t have any spare energy for a major war. Even if we are providing assistance, there are reforms under way, and it is hoped now that we can avoid turning the ce into a battlefield.

    Of course, if that happens, we will also send additional reinforcements, but the battle will be moreplicated.

    Although it has not turned out that way for the time being, you can rest assured that it will not be taken lightly.

    If the Empire didn''t believe Yuuki''s words and went directly through thisnd towards that direction of the Blumund Kingdomthen Geld and the rest would attack from behind the Imperial Army.

    Even if it is possible to send the entire Second Legion through my teleportationthere will still be fighting on the ground at that time. There would be far fewer reinforcements from thebyrinth, and it was conceivably going to be a harsh battle.

    If one went inside thebyrinth to collect volunteers, one should be able to recruit a considerable number of people. If you say so, we can''t bring out all the magical creatures that don''t have a will, and the number of reinforcements will be small.

    That said, if we were to fight on the ground, there would be no way to cover us on the other side of the maze, and we would have to be prepared to suffer a lot of damage. The ideal development is for the enemy to put the target on the maze.

    The same is true of the battle n proposed by Benimaru, the one with the highest sess rate and security is the "Maze Offensive and Defensive Battle".

    If it evolves into a ground war, the vantage point that only exists within the maze is gone. We must go head-to-head and fight on even terms.

    In fact, this is a matter of course, how you can build a situation in our favor in wartime is the key to winning or losing.

    Although using a maze even I find despicable, as long as I can beat it.

    So if you can, hopefully the maze will be the main battlefield.

    Even when switching to groundbat, the basic approach is the same.

    The primary goal is to find out who is the master buried on the enemy''s side. Just as the previous battle had sent the green legion as bait, that job would go to Gelds legion this time.

    Benimaru''s battle n was based on a certain objective.

    All for the sake of protecting me as the King

    I cherish those partners, the sameor even more soand I always feel that Benimaru puts me first.

    I hope they don''t force themselves, but Benimaru has more detailed insight on this part than I do, who knows nothing about tactics. Even in the fight just now, looking at the results alone would reveal that the damage suffered was minimal.

    Since everything is in Benimaru''s hands, all I have to do is wait patiently.

    In addition to that, I want to continue to work quietly in order to make everyone feel more at ease and more willing to rely on me.

    ***

    To facilitate the Imperial invasion, we prepared a gate on the ground, but that was perhaps a little too deliberate. I was a little worried about whether the other person would suspect that it was a trap, and I ended up worrying too much.

    I don''t know if my wish was granted, but as far as the conclusion is concerned, the subsequent developments were as I had hoped.

    "The enemy has deployed in front of the gates on the ground!

    Themunications officer came to report to us.

    Therge screen shows the neatly arranged Imperial General soldiers.

    It''s information is obtained through the Argos, so I don''t think there''s any mistake, and Souei''s men are also watching, so there''s no need to worry about being deceived by illusions or other tricks. It looks like the Imperial Army has really taken the bait.

    The other side does not seem to want to continue to hide, and all 700,000 troops have shown up. I guess on the one hand they are trying to scare us, but it means nothing to us.

    We have no intention of surrendering at all. While there is the possibility of escape, there is absolutely no submission to the Empire.

    Plus everything is in ideal condition.

    "It''s a win.

    I couldn''t help but mutter.

    "Right. We will win."

    Benimaru replied with morale.

    In fact by this time it was already certain that tactically we had won.

    Enter the maze and we will be unscathed, and with some more time we will surely win. Then, as long as there is no overpowering person above the demon lord, there will be no flip-flop to take advantage of.

    "It''s a good thing some greedy fool was drawn to the maze.

    "Indeed. Originally I was going to say that the bait spilled by Lord Rimuru was too obvious, and it was great to smoothly get the opponent on the hook.

    "Yeah. It looks like Gadra has got things in order.

    For the moment the enemy has given us a glimpse of them.

    Once the battle power is dispersed, the rest of the unease is not knowing where the master is hiding.

    Spreading the war effort was basically a foolish act, but this time the other side all came together and kind of helped. It seemed like they were going to invade the maze in order, so the question would only be how muchbat power the other side would actually stay on the ground

    "In any case, it would be strategically unwise for the Empire to pass through our doors. If they just blocked the door on the ground like that and went straight to the west, there would be trouble."

    "That''s true. A hundred thousand of the seven hundred thousand would be enough to surround.

    Moreover, if the remaining armies were to march on the Western countries, they would be able to cut off their worries.

    By the way, if that''s the case, we''ll be able to get in and out from other locations. However, ces that are blocked off by techniques such as fixed space-type "boundaries" cannot open the entrance or exit, so they can only open the door to ces where they have been to some extent.

    Realistically, if we can unseal the entrance and exit to the Spirit Realm, which is Ramiris''ir, we can get in and out from there.

    Only in this way, we''re locked in a maze. He would have to watch the Western countries being ravaged, and he would have to send troops even if he barely could.

    The result is to go to groundbat.

    In the end, you''ll have to face off against your opponent, but until then, cut the enemy''s battle strength as much as possible.

    "Don''t you have to warn those people on the ground?"

    "If it''s to incite them to anger, they''ll probably be outraged to go to war, won''t they?

    At this point, Veldora and Ramiris made this observation.

    "Thesements are worth listening to, but with no warning.

    "Oh? What''s the reason?

    "You know that, don''t you? There are ''words'' above the door.

    "Ah! To hear you put it that way it does.

    In fact, there is an engraved message at the gate on the ground.

    The weak have no right to pass through this door

    I wonder how the enemy will react?

    "I wonder how my opponent will act when I see that.

    "I think I''d feel the heat and rush in. It''s just that they''ll let the men go first."

    Benimaru might actually do that. He''s the kind of guy who still rushes in knowing there''s a trap.

    "I wouldn''t care. Because I''m strong!

    Yes yes yes, again, not asking Veldora.

    "My words would be like this. If Beretta had said he wanted to go anyway, I probably would have thought there was nothing I could do with him and gone along.

    Ramirisdon''t force it if you''re afraid. Beretta, who was named by me, isughing bitterly.

    "Lord Rimuru is merciful, and there can be noint about someone being stupid enough to ignore your warning, no matter what happens in the end.

    I''m tempted to ask "why are you so happy? but like Diablo said, I would write those words on the one hand and warn them on the other.

    "So if anyone is too cowardly to walk through the door, he is not qualified to go to war. We will destroy them without mercy, and must show them how foolish it is to be hostile to Lord Rimuru!

    Miss Shion, if you say something like that, won''t you end up in a fight? Even Geld was smiling darkly, wishing she had thought a little before speaking.

    Despite saying so, the other subordinates actually thought very simrly to her.

    People were really energetic and looked energetic as they talked to me about giving me a bigger victory.

    Testarossa and the others "soul" collection was dedicated to me, and for some reason, others who had learned of it were nning to paint gourds as well.

    Testarossasupposedly of the demon raceseems to enjoy the emotional residue that attaches itself to the soul. I''ve heard that there are all kinds of ways to eat, but her favorite is to see the look on a face when theyre cramping up from fearthats what Testarossa said.

    That smiley face was a little scary at the time.

    If it was before I was reincarnated, I might have been scared, but now I just think, "That''s how it is.

    The demon race didn''t matter, what were the other demons doing that for?

    Even if it''s okay to collect "souls" and not know what can be done. It should be said that even I was just learning about it for the first time and it even made me wonder why they were racing like this.

    It''s probably a trophy or something, but I don''t really want it

    That''s 700,000 people.

    If I did get all these people''s souls, I could awaken seven other peoplehorrible to think of myself as naturally emerging from this.

    No, no, no.

    In order to avoid turning my mind into a demon, I''ll have to get in a good mood to deal with it.

    After renewing my resolve, I turned my eyes to the big screen.

    "Looks like they''re out in force."

    There, the Imperial soldiers are reflected in full gear.

    They didn''t look frightened at all and began to barge in the door as if nothing had happened.

    "Everything is going ording to n. If more than half the people break in, it will be much easier for us after that

    When I muttered these words, Benimaru smiled arrogantly.

    "We will not spare a single soldier. Depending on the situation, I will also strike.

    Geld nodded as he listened.

    "My Second Corps can actually send out about 17,000 men. We are at a disadvantage in terms of numbers alone, but we are not at a loss. Let''s change the terrain and seal off the enemy''s army.

    "So reliable. If the inside ispletely burned with my me again, then only the strong ones worth fighting will remain.

    ''''On that note, I suppose Ms. Carrera will help as well. She seemed eager to make a scene from a moment ago, and would have been happy to y to her strengths.

    "The power of the Primordials is unquestionable. But I won''t lose to her.

    Ouch ouch ouch?

    This conversation sounded very different from what I expected to hear.

    Benimaru and Geld both talk with a win in mind. Personally, I''m a little worried too, they''re really hoity-toity.

    It was only natural to count Carrera among the warriors, and to feel no fear or politeness towards the Primordials.

    "Benimaru, you''re too cunning. Since we''re going to fight a war of annihtion, we should put me on the field!

    In the end, even Shion followed suit and volunteered.

    It looks like she forgot she was my bodyguard again, but the control room is in the safest ce. The selling point of this unit is the resistance to beatings. It would be a pity to leave them to cool off on the side, if we had to fight on the ground, which I intended to do.

    If Shion had that intention, I could have given the order to attack

    "Calm down, Shion. Be the first to see how the enemy will act. Depending on the situation, it may also be possible to ask you to go out.

    Anyway, let''s cate her with these words for now.

    "Kufufufufu. Speaking of Lord Rimuru''s bodyguard, having me alone will suffice.

    Even Diablo had said so, if anything happened, just call Testarossa and the girls back. They can

    "teleport" ande in an instant.

    "Since Lord Rimuru has said so, all right. I''ll ask you to strike at that time too, Shion.

    "Mmm! Benimaru, just leave it to me.

    With a full smile on her face, Shion thanked Benimaru.

    Why is this girl so intobat? It''s a little hard for me to understand. But since she was so happy in person, let''s do that.

    "That follows. Rimuru, I''m going to get ready!

    "I''ming too! To show them the horrors of the maze!

    "Mmm. You can rest easy with me as yourst line of defense.

    "Then if you''ll excuse me, Lord Rimuru.

    Lookingbative and full of energy, Veldora and Ramiris leave the control room. Beretta followed suit and the control room returned to silence.

    In Veldora''s opinion, this was his first job as abyrinth master. It''s not sure if he''s actually going to make an appearance, but that look feels so reliable just looking at it.

    "Then let''s go and see what the enemy is capable of.

    Watching everyone walk through the door one by one, I said something very Demon Lord-esque.

    The group nodded.

    As such, we are about to face off against a total of 700,000 Imperial troops.

    ***

    When the leader of the Mecha Legion, Calgurio, saw that the situation was developing as expected, he secretly snickered.

    He looked at his army with great confidence.

    A number of elite men were passing through the gate one by one.

    Ahead lies thebyrinth that will bring great wealth to Calgurio.

    I guess the monsters are now in a panic because of the unexpected presence of an army.

    They were able to do so thanks to their careful nning and the strength of the soldiers and generals who could match.

    ...........

    ........

    He had consulted with those staff officers several times about the invasion route, deliberately allowing the Magic Tank Division to attack from the front so as to be conspicuous.

    In addition to that, if the evil dragon Veldora shows up to repel him, they also send a hundred blimps of the killer Air Combat Air Corps.

    It was also the job of the Air Combat Flying Corps to transport the Legion of Warcraft led by dim to the West. Yet they would fly over the sea and the journey was bound to be safe.

    He didn''t think the blimp needed the war effort, so Calgurio had to ask for resupply support. It was his intention to put an end to the duties of the blimps by having all three hundred of them go out while carrying military supplies.

    So the battle was all focused on fighting against Veldora. As for the hundreds of airships sent to the Great Forest of Jura, they were all fully prepared and carried the most powerful magicians.

    It was a sure thing that even if they had to take cover, Calgurio thought that these forces alone couldpletely suppress the whole West.

    If dim and the others had attacked the capital of Ingracia, they would have put an end to this war in one fell swoop.

    By waging war on two fronts at once like this, Calgurio''s mech legions were responsible for a great deal inparison. This means a lucrative campaign once sessful.

    In this way, his power within the empire will rise even higher. Thinking about this side, Calgurioughed until his mouth was full.

    As for the outline of the battle n, its

    He will let the Magic Tank Division invade in a conspicuous way, and once the enemy takes the bait, this time the team led by Calgurio will appear in full force. Followed by an attack on the base of the Demon Lord Rimuru.

    ording to the intelligence obtained beforehand, the metropolis ruled by the demon lord seemed to have been isted into the maze. He had originally wondered how that was possible, but it was all true.

    What remained on the ground was a single door to the maze.

    That being the case, all they had to do was surround this door and let the enemy stick their wings in it.

    If you disrupt the space around you, you will be sealed with the teleportation magic. This will allow for aplete blockade.

    The problem of thebat power of the armed power, Dwargon, is greater.

    The heroic king Gazel is not to be underestimated, and the dwarven soldiers are notoriously tough. It''s not a lie that the Millennium Undefeated would die a horrible death if they were underestimated.

    However!

    We can''t lose. There are up to 2,000 magic magic tanks here, so if they sacrifice the antiques of the old days, they are no match for us at all.

    The armed power of Dwargon remains neutral, but this is not at all important in the eyes of the Empire.

    I''ve only let them go because I thought it was tricky, but since I knew my own army would win, I didn''t have to.

    Magic and Science.

    The fusion of the two creates the strongest legion, with a whole new way of fighting as a foundation.

    That''s the mecha legion led by Calgurio.

    Gazel is indeed a hero, but he alone can''t do anything. Of course, it''smon sense that the quality of the force is more likely to change the battlefield than the number of men. Calgurio knew how destructive the magic tank cannon could be, and fighting with swords and magic was just an outdated way of fighting in his eyes.

    Those dwarves would just have to prepare old equipment that couldn''t keep up with the times and certainly couldn''t imagine how capable the legions of the new era were. By the time they know, it will be toote. The dwarves were just waiting to be unterally ravaged.

    But these ideas are fundamentally wrong, except that at this point the Calgurio has no way of knowing.

    Lucky along the way, Calgurio was sure he would be victorious, and could not have imagined what eventuality would defeat him to the enemy

    Then came the report that had been awaited from the very beginning.

    The enemy sent an emissary to visit, and bargaining broke down. They will go straight to belligerence.

    Upon receiving this report, the Calgurio''s marched in ording to the intended n and have now suppressed thend that looked like the base of the demon lord Rimuru.

    ...........

    ........

    Calgurio waited there leisurely and began to think about the ministry.

    It might be a bit of a shame to let Geist get Gazel''s head, but the minions won''te after me until they give me something sweet to eat. There''s no way around that.

    That said, Lieutenant General Geist and Major General Faraga, who were among the best under Calgurio''s men, were among the best. Sure to echo his expectations, Calgurio was convinced.

    Although both Geist and Faraga were now dead, it was too much for Calgurio to detect.

    "By the way, hasn''t Geist contacted us yet?

    "Yes! Ever since Lieutenant General Geist returned they had begun to engage the enemy and had been unable to make contact since!

    "Mmm. I think it''s about time we got a look at the situation. After all, it''s impossible for them to get into a bitter fight and not contact us, isn''t that toozy?

    "Yes, I''m not sure

    "Forget it. So, what''s going on over at Faraga?

    It seems like Geist was too excited to go to war for so long. Calgurio thought he saw a big victorying, so he focused all his attention on the battlefield.

    That being the case, let''s ask Faraga about it. If it was him, he would currently be looking gracefully at the battle from the air. In other words, he should bring the right information.

    However, the liaison officer in charge of liaising with Faraga was not quite right. He was sweating furiously and was desperately trying to make contact with the other man.

    "What''s going on?

    The good mood was doused with cold water, and Calgurio stood up in displeasure. The tone of the words was a bit harsh.

    Perhaps anxious about the rtionship, the intelligence general replied in a panic.

    "Report from Major General Faraga that he''s encountered a suspected Veldora! We''ll report back when it''s confirmed, but

    There was no further contact after that.

    No further contact at all after the first report.

    ording to the Communication Magic Instructor underneath them, the magic element of the Jura Great Forest was very strong, and under normal circumstances, it could easily obstruct the Communication Numinous Wave.

    Hearing him say that, Calgurio realized that the magical element seemed to be really thick, and knew why that was. After all, this forest was created by the nemesis, Veldora.

    And this is thend of the Demon Lord. Let''s just say that exnation makes sense.

    Calgurio didn''t think it would be useful to worry about it, so he didn''t intend to go into detail.

    There should be no time to report if one is fighting the other. And as the Communication Magic Instructor said, the surrounding magical concentration will have an effect, and there''s a good chance that the "magicmunication" won''t get through.

    And nowadays, if that Veldora was actually on the battlefieldit would be impossible tomunicate through magic.

    After a rational exnation in this direction, Calgurio immediately changed the direction of his thinking.

    "Huh! Then just wait for them to bring good news. If they did run into Veldora, Geist and Faraga certainly couldn''t contact us. That being the case, we can''t afford to lose. Come on down to the maze!

    Geist and side had given a huge battle force, and this sense of reassurance did not make Calgurio feel that they would lose the battle. He believed that such a thing as defeat could never happen and had long ago eliminated that possibility.

    Not only that, but it even felt right to his advantage.

    Now that Faraga met Veldora, all that''s left in the maze is the Demon Lord. He heard that the Four Heavenly Kings under him are also tricky, but it''s not enough to watch against the elite of the "Mechatronics Transformation Corps".

    Without the slightest confusion, Calgurio decided to set his mind on the maze before him.

    The spot where Calgurio was staying was arge open field.

    Big enough to stuff an entire metropolis. There was a gate towering over the central area, which was the junction to the maze.

    Magic probing also revealed no harmful substances such as traps. There was only one door there, just waiting for Calgurio and the others toe and challenge them.

    There was a phrase written on the gateThe weak have no right to pass through itand Calgurio thought it proved he had thought it right.

    Hide everything for fear of being plundered by us. It''s obviously magic and a little clever, isn''t it?

    Whichever country it is, it is rightfully afraid of looting operations in the name of "dispatching supplies on the spot".

    Seriously, not being able to get food is a major annoyance. The Empire had a huge army, which was undoubtedly a big pain in the ass for them. He admits it''s also a tactically effective means to an end.

    But you guys are so naive!

    Calgurio wasughing at the shallow intelligence of the demon creature.

    The soldiers underwent intensive surgery from otherworldly science and magic, and were able to do their best even if they didn''t eat or drink for a week.

    The food they carry focuses on energy bnce, and one will supply the energy needed to be active throughout the day. Each person carries twenty of each, and the consumption so far is being calcted.

    They had already distributed enough for them to consume, and they could continue to fight even without robbing the city of its food, which was foolproof.

    Small, lightweight carrying food, but also made as simple as possible for the supply station, even the most problematic drinking water can be made by magic.

    That way everything will be fine. ording to their calctions, those elite soldiers would be able to move within the maze for twenty-seven days.

    One of the greatest weaknesses in the conduct of military operations by the great armies was the interruption of the sources of supplies, on which the other side seemed to be pinning its hopes, but Calgurio must say they were naive.

    "Think you can win by cutting off our supplies? It''s stupid.

    Calgurio acted like he wasughing at their stupidity, and one of the staff officers followed suit. The man was of noble birth and wanted to follow Calgurio for oil.

    "Hahahaha, Lord Calgurio. Don''t make them sound so sad. That demon lord Rimuru made a mistake right from the start. Our proud "mech-modified regiment" sends its strongest assassin, the evil dragon Veldora, to take on the bait. By the time they found out, they were already surrounded by so many heroes.

    Other staff officers jumped in to echo the sentiment.

    "But there''s no reason to think so. It''s bait, but it''s a big army.

    "Exactly. I can understand that.

    After listening to these staff officers'' conversations, Calgurio''s mood became good.

    "Huh! You think you''re a demon lord, but that''s not all! You must be shrinking into a ball in the depths of the maze right now!

    Besides mocking the Demon Lord''s short sightedness, Calgurio was sure that their expedition would be sessful.

    "Whoa, whoa, whoa! That''s how it is. The next thing we need to do is drag the demon lord to Lord Calgurio and cut off his head. That way, Lord Calgurio will be a hero for killing the demon lord!

    Staff officers of noble birth began to tout Calgurio.

    That wouldn''t be so bad, thought Calgurio.

    The first step is to attack this maze and establish roots here.

    Military positions were then constructed, and the West was taken advantage of.

    If they didn''t act fast, dim, who led the Warcraft Legion, would ravage the Western nations from the north. Seriously, Calgurio would love to get through the Great Forest of Jura before then.

    But he used it without panic.

    It is true that the number of feats they could have erected would have been reduced, but that would have been a mere ny cents.

    The Empire''s long-held wishto crush the "Storm Dragon", Veldora. If such a great feat is achieved, the other feats are not worth mentioning at all.

    On top of that, if one could also hand over the head of the Demon Lord Rimuru, Calgurio would surely be chosen as the one who would take the most credit.

    Like Calgurio, the staffers seemed convinced that they would win.

    After all, they had an army of 700,000.

    Seeing such a majestic sight, no one could have imagined that they would be defeated in battle.

    "Let''s start the ''border'' on thisnd and make it a camp. Then send troops there in order. Everyone, get up and tackle the maze!

    "Leave it to us.

    "Then proceed as nned.

    No objections were raised. After all, the situation is not urgent, oppose it without deliberately risking upsetting the other party.

    As for the glory to be gained by marching into the West, let it be given to dim. Everyone in the room had that consensus.

    It''s more about something else these days.

    Most were able to get substantial gold and silver treasures within thebyrinth, which heightened their interest.

    The lust in the hearts of these people wins.

    All in all, they were going to flood this maze with manned tactics and then plunder it all, a pure and simple battle n. The fact that no one has objected to this battle n proves that they have all been blinded by the interests at hand.

    It is because they are sure they will win that Calgurio and others openly ept their desires. They were convinced that their share of the treasure in thebyrinth would make them a fortune.

    With that, Operation Maze Raid began.

    Immediately following

    The poor people who knew nothing about it walked happily down thedder that they never would have a chance to climb again.

    Thebyrinth is a maze of people

    Even if the opponent doesn''t follow the rules.

    It''s just that

    The safety locks have been disengaged.

    The real posture of thebyrinth, which no one has ever experienced, awaits them just aheadit is hell on earth.

    ***

    The current location is one of the deepest rooms of the maze.

    There was a secret conference room there that even Rimuru didn''t know about.

    The masters within thebyrinth then gathered in this vast hall.

    On weekdays, the members who appear here do not gather. And they''ll be there in full force like this, so imagine how important this discussion topic is.

    ...........

    ........

    The leader is Beretta, thebyrinth coordinator, who is the adjutant and agent of Ramiris.

    There are four Dragon Kings of all kinds.

    There was the me Dragon King, the Ice and Snow Dragon King, the Gale Dragon King, and the Earth Shattering Dragon King, each upying four corners of the hall.

    And in the middle of the hall, in front of the ebony round table, sat those who were

    The floor guardian of the nieth floor, the "Nine-Tailed Beast" Kumara.

    The floor guardian of the 80th floor, the "Bug Emperor" Zegion.

    Apito, the "Bug Queen", the 79th level of the Domain Guardian.

    The floor guardian of the 70th floor, Adalman, the "Immortal King".

    The vanguard of the 70th level, Albert "Pdin of the Dead".

    They are what people call the Ten Lords of the Labyrinth (Labyrinth Ten).

    There were also three other people who looked abrupt.

    Next to Adalman was an old man with a keen eyehe was Gadra.

    To apany the end seat were the floor guardians of the fiftieth floor, Gozu and Mezu, knowing that they looked out of ce among these strongmen, so they didn''t dare to be too high-profile when they came to participate.

    That being said, the two of them always feel like they can win no matter what kind of opponent they meet. However, after actually witnessing people standing on top of each other, they realized the difference between them.

    That''s why theyre sitting on pins and needles.

    There was another reason why they didn''t dare to be too unbridled, and that was that those present and gathered often argued about who was the strongest.

    Nowadays, they were also in a dark tide with each other, making one feel as if the space was distorted by an unusual pressure.

    Even though Gadra was new to the scene, he was still not looking good in this battle. Seeing this scene, Gozu and Mezu realized how much they weighed.

    Those guys are the real rabble-rousers, there''s no way they can beat these guys.

    Being able to make people like Gozu, who had been fighting for a hundred years, think like that, Gadra was not too simple either.

    Although Beretta and those Dragon Kings didn''t join the scramble, they weren''t going to stop it either.

    The attitude from beginning to end says "let them be".

    While this is not the reason, the debate over who is the strongest among the Ten Lords of the Labyrinth is arguably growing stronger.

    The fact that Adalman was praised to Rimuru''s face and elevated to the next floor is still fresh in his mind.

    After that, everyone''s spirits were high.

    Each person believes that he or she can be of greater help. And the idea is reinforced by the fact that none of the floor guardians below theparison have a chance to make an appearance. They want a chance to make a difference.

    As for neer Gadra, he is full of blood and wants to help his friend Adalman. If there was a waking good showing here, he thought to himself that would really solidify his position.

    Adalman is now more eager to fight for the Rimuru he believes in than he was before, and wants to improve his status if he can. Thus the other floor guardians are an eyesore. Although not the enemy, they felt in the way.

    Albert followed Adalman, in addition to secretly having ambitions to enhance his feats and make a name for himself. I didn''t expect him to be very intentional.

    Apito is the same female as Kumara, and their rtionship is very sinister.

    Especially the Nine-Tailed Kumara, who was responsible for guarding the deep 90th floor. Thus the chances of appearances are almost equal to zero.

    Apito had a good showing against those Pdins, and Kumara was jealous of her and therefore particrly easy to work against, all out of a heart that wanted to work against the other.

    Apito, on the other hand, was very unconvinced and waspletely unwilling to give up half a step in the face of Kumara. So these two are at each other''s throats all day long.

    Zegion always looks like he''s staying out of the way, but he''s actually the top guy in the maze.

    Everyone was jealous of him. He hoped, or didn''t hope, that he would be caught up in the dispute.

    And just like that, the masters within the maze have a nasty rtionship.

    But to say whether they hate each other to the core, they really don''t.

    In fact, they''re just trying to prove they''re the best, and not trying to fight their opponents off.

    Respect each other despite being jealous.

    Just because they will fight doesn''t mean they hate their opponent.

    Both consider each other to be good opponents for each other''s cutting.

    ...........

    ........

    Such a gathering of them together, but quiet to the point of surprise at the moment. Everyone''s eyes were fixed on the still-empty main seat of the round table.

    Look at the seat that belonged to the king of thebyrinth, Veldora, and to the great Ramiris who created it.

    Two hours had passed since they had been summoned.

    It was all still noisy just now, and Beretta''s presence silenced everyone.

    "In a short time, Lord Veldora and Lady Ramiris will be visiting. Everyone has to wait quietly.

    With that said, Beretta sat down in his seat.

    "Chief, may I ask a question?

    Beretta nodded when he heard Nine-Tailed Kumara ask that.

    "This time we''ll be here because?"

    "You should all have guessed that. Some fools have invaded this maze, and the purpose of this time is to consult with everyone to see how to defeat them.

    Upon hearing this, everyone shut up.

    They''ve all heard about the current situation, too.

    Although they hadn''t heard the purpose of the meeting that brought everyone together, they could almost guess the main points. Therefore, although the big moves had held each other back before, now, when they heard that the Imperial Army had invaded thebyrinth, they were more in the same mood than apetitive heart.

    What would it mean to make an enemy of thebyrinth? To make sure those people understand that, let''s all work togetherthat was their mindeset.

    The scene is filled with breathless tension, followed by

    Yah-ho-ho-ho!"

    "Everyone, wee to the party!

    The atmosphere in the hall heated up in one breath because of the rtionship between Ramiris and Veldoras debut.

    Seeing such an atmosphere, Ramiris was happy and addressed the group in a serious tone that she wouldn''t normally have.

    "We haven''t had a crisis of this magnitude since the opening of this maze! That''s why I want to hear from everyone!"

    As soon as this was said, everyone started meeting.

    The first person to react was the Nine-Tailed Kumara.

    "Gee, that goes without saying."

    It seemed that she had been waiting for this moment for a long time, and was about to say what she thought when Apito snatched up the conversation.

    "Just shoot to kill.

    Kumara began to re at Apito with each other.

    "You''ve got a chance to appear on my floor this time, haven''t you? Apito and those Pdins should be ying satisfied these days, right?

    "What''s that supposed to mean? If it''s Hinata-sama, it''s not bad, a Pdin is too weak to be an opponent, but it makes me feel even more bored!

    There was another wave of tension in the venue.

    I didn''t think it would be Veldora who came out to y roundup.

    "Kuahahaha! Everyone, stop arguing. And everyone can rest assured. This time there''s a chance to prepare everyone for the battle on the field. ording to what I''ve heard, the guys seem to think the maze is only 60 levels at most. Despite our outward propaganda that the maze has a hundredyers, they don''t believe it. Do people think it''s okay to be so stupid?

    Everyone was like, No!

    Veldora also ''hmmm''ed and nodded.

    "It''s fun to make a scene with thembut it''s a pain in the ass.

    "Yes, that''s it! Just like Master had just said, waiting for them to attack to the fiftieth level was really troublesome. Not only is it troublesome for us, but for each other as well.

    "Mmm. There are about 700,000 people crowded out there right now. Rimuru wants us to lure as many people as possible into thebyrinth

    "If they''re all crammed in by the entrance, it''ll take time, won''t it? The sheer number of enemies is also a problem. So we intend to distribute the enemy forces separately from the beginning, sending a thousand men to each floor!

    Fortunately, the Empire''s general soldiers were disciplined and everyone lined up for action. Smoothly entering the maze, the ranks were not messed up, but that still took time, of course.

    If the man in front starts fighting the man, that line of movement will be broken. In this way, one has no idea how long it would take to get everyone into the maze.

    "If you''re lucky enough to draw straws, you might be able to run into some serious enemies!"

    Ho ho ho! Maybe there was someone inside who would threaten Rimuru''s life, the same guy Benimaru was looking for! But that might be his over worrying, but then again, just finding out who this person is would be a big help.

    Everyone''s eyes changed when they heard Ramiris say that to Veldora.

    To be one of the Four Heavenly Kings under Rimuru, that was a vision for the men in charge of the maze. One of them, Benimaru, is also Rimuru''s right-hand man and is his best friend. People want to go up against him one day and see.

    No, his best friend is me''thats what Veldora would think. But everyone didn''t let that out of their mouths, and the live conversation went smoothly.

    "That meanseveryone has a chance, right?

    "If that''s the case, I''m fine with that."

    As soon as he heard this, Apito and Kumara instantly showed signs of reconciliation.

    Others have their own ambitions in mind, and everyone is full of fighting spirit.

    "So if someonees into their own dominion, we can all do as we please?

    Hearing Adalman ask that, Ramiris nodded sharply and said, "That''s it! This became the key message, and the members of the maze became more serious again.

    Ramiris went on to exin.

    "They''re also invading one by one at the moment, so all in all we''ll put them in order starting with the fortieth floor. Whenever the number reaches a thousand, drop down a floor and follow this pace! Gozu and the others will assign other tasks and exinter.

    The jealous eyes of everyone on the scene were focused on Gozu and Mezu, causing those two to tremble with nervousness. Their bodies shrank even more than just now, desperately trying to pass.

    Instead of falling into this situation, it would be better to fight the foolish invaders, which would be a thousand times betterthe mood of both men.

    Also not bothering with such a Gozu and the others, Ramiris continued to illustrate.

    "That''s about it, we''re going to skillfully disperse the enemy on all floors. Thest forty to fifty tiers would be 100,000 people. The fifty-first to sixtieth floor is also 100,000 people. Sixty-one to seventyyers of 100,000. Seventy-one floors to eighty floors and 100,000 Eighty-one levels to ny 100,000.

    And then probably let each Dragon King deal with 10,000 people? If someone still keeps breaking in, it will divide them up to the upper floors!

    The maximum number of people epted at one time was targeted at 540,000. Ramiris said she wanted a minimum of 350,000 as well. Finally she would address the most important matters.

    "One more thing not to be forgotten, and only this time, we are going to change the rules inside the maze. Each room with dragons will expand to ten times the normal size, and we''ll also let the floors swap and fall into the room with dragons as soon as we break through the nieth floor. But that''s not the point. The real point is that the conditions for breaking the barrier change!

    Ramiris pped her wings and flew around, one side for emphasis.

    So what exactly were the conditions changed to?

    First of all, once you get through the door this time, you can''t get out if you don''t break it. To break through would mean having to defeat Veldora, and that would really be a showdown with the whole army out in force.

    On top of that, the challenge to Veldora was conditional on collecting the ten keys that the Ten Lords of the Labyrinth had dropped.

    That is, even if some people started off from the eighty floors, they still had to go back to the upper floors to beat down Ten Lords of the Labyrinth.

    Hearing this, a satisfied expression appeared on all ten of their faces.

    The Dragon Kings in the four corners of the hall chattered in small voices.

    "If so, it seems an equal opportunity."

    "That sounds about right. There can also be more prey than whoever hunts it."

    Sparks began to re up among the group.

    "Huh. I hope I have a match to make me swing my sword seriously.

    "Can''t be too arrogant, Albert. We just have to figure out how to annihte the enemies of god.

    There is a fight between the master and servant that begins to burn.

    There are also people who have been meditating quietly.

    The group seemed to be full of energy in the face of the uing battle.

    Faced with such abyrinth of ten masters, the chiefBeretta, identified as the chief of the Ten Lords of the Labyrinth, opened his mouth.

    "By the way, Lord Ramiris. It''s been a matter of asking you before"

    "Oh, oh, that''s what I''m talking about. Hmmmmm, Rimuru allowed it too, let''s observe it this time.

    "Thank you. So

    After conferring with Ramiris over something, Beretta stood up and looked around the Labyrinth Lords.

    "Ladies and gentlemen, Lord Ramiris has assigned me the role ofbyrinth coordinator. I''m also a Labyrinth Lord, but

    Beretta personally felt that bing Chief of the Ten Lords of the Labyrinth was just a side hustle. It takes ten people to put together a good sounding name, so Beretta joined the ten just to put together the numbers.

    And the title also reflects the casual nature of the things that Ramiris does, changing again and again.

    It''s not like he''s willing to do it.

    As for his colleague, Treyni, though in the same position as himself, Ramiris held her in high regard.

    The reasoning was that she wouldn''t scold Ramiris just yetbut Beretta felt it was too much to take.

    That being said, Treyni still does what he does. She seems to have gotten the promise of Ramiris to go somewhere without Beretta''s knowledge.

    It was so disturbing, Beretta sighed quietly at the thought of it.

    All in all, he was currently forced to rank among the Mazes Ten Lords of the Labyrinth in order to make up his numbers. Beretta himself didn''t want that, so he was keen to cede the position of the Labyrinth Ten Chief to someone else.

    Now the opportunity he had been waiting for had finallye.

    "I want to cede my ce to the man who made the war.

    The Labyrinth Lords eyes seemed to light up for a moment, and all their eyes changed.

    Even Gozu and Mezu were no exception, and began to hold ambitions that were notmensurate with their status, thinking that perhaps they could join the Ten Lords of the Labyrinth. Only that ambition went up in smoke with Beretta''s next words.

    "As for my share in this war as a Labyrinth Lord, I will leave it to His Excellency Gadra over there for the time being. He has been rmended by Lord Adalman as having considerable strength, and his knowledge is recognized not only by me but also by Lady Ramiris.

    Gadra, who was suddenly named, was surprised but unfazed. He hadn''t lived this long and was used to such scenes.

    Here we go! The time of this old man hase. If I had taken advantage of this opportunity to make a ssh, I wouldn''t be a temporary recement!

    Gadra is always positive. How else can there be a way to quickly get a head start and navigate between countries?

    And Gadra was also well aware of his own abilities, relying on his urate vision to see through the Ten Lords of the Labyrinth. Some of them were not as good as themselves, or not on a par with him, and there were even some masters among the Ten Lords of the Labyrinth who were notparable to him.

    There was absolutely no way he could ignore these over-the-top strongmen and think of himself as the first. Because he was well aware of this, Gadra''s goal was limited to joining the Ten Lords of the Labyrinth.

    "Well, then, I''ll take that as apliment!

    "Will you take it? That does me a favor, Sir Gadra.

    Just at this moment, Gadra and Beretta agreed on what was at stake.

    So much so that, though only temporarily, on the eve of the uing battle with the Empire, they had a personnel change. Beretta emerges from the Ten Lords of the Labyrinth, and Gadra joins to be one of them.

    "Mmmmmm! Gadra was willing to ept, and I was happy. Ask Gadra to take charge of the sixty floors. You will do well to enve the Colossus, the Floor Guardian Colossus!

    Things were quickly finalized.

    In this regard too, Ramiris had talked to Rimuru, and they had long since decided to try Gadra.

    Gadra was usually there to assist in the research work of Ramiris, so he agreed without a second word.

    The other party was willing to send him the floor guardian statue, which was a great request from his point of view.

    "Mmm! In that case, let''s get a nickname for Gadra, too.

    "Ah, that''s right, Gadra. Do you have a nickname you want?

    Suddenly being asked so, Gadra was at a loss for a moment as to how to react.

    "This, this

    Gadra personally doesn''t think that''s very important.

    The Imperial Army had also invaded, and now it was best to start defending quickly. He also thought that even if he didn''t say it, everyone knew it by heart.

    But that doesn''t seem like much of an issue to the top people, and even at times like this the attitude is as usual.

    Frustrating. His majesty Rudra was already very good, and these people were no match for him. No, no, no, since the other party is a "Storm Dragon" and a "Labyrinth Fairy", that''s a natural reaction too

    Gadra was impressed.

    Gadra, a man with no connection to loyalty, could nevertheless be said to harbor a sense of awe for both Veldora and Ramirisplus Rimuru, who could use both of them deftly.

    "Should we name him ''The Magic Guide?"

    "Master, I think that sounds cool!

    "Right? I''m cool when I''m supposed to be cool. Kuahahaha!

    How could Gadra herself dare to have an opinion.

    That''s the way it is.

    Thought it was allrgely exined, he didn''t realize that it seemed like there was something else Ramiris had to say.

    "That''s right, that''s right, I remember! Gozu and Mezu also have important missions!

    Hearing that, being nervous about not knowing what kind of task they would be assigned, Gozu the whole of them jumped up.

    "So, then, what are we responsible for?

    "What''s the best thing to do?"

    The two men inquired tremulously. Not taking such a reaction to heart, Ramiris ordered it.

    "Go to the 30th floor and stand by so that you can summon the monsters of the passers-by over there. If anyone escapes, get rid of them. The location of the resurrection with the bracelet is also arranged on the 30th floor, so it''s okay to identally kill the wrong person! You''ve got to work hard!

    She sounded like she could do it as if it was a matter of course.

    Gozu and Mezu too could only ept it.

    It''s not that they don''t want to do it, it''s that the unease in their hearts is greater.

    Worried if they didn''t get it right this time, they would be cut off. If they y hard, they''ll probably be cut from this honor-filled post. To avoid that kind of thing, they had to cheer well, and Gozu and Mezu looked at each other and nodded.

    The 30th level of the maze, the floor guardian, is a B+ level Ogre King and five of his men. They will obey the orders of the A-ranked Gozu and Mezu and are now considered reliable partners.

    And even the neer Gadra agreed to take over the Labyrinth Ten post without changing his face.

    As predecessors, they could not afford to miss out on this battle.

    One other point. The two of them also discovered one more thing.

    Even if someone broke away from the thirty levels, there was nowhere for the Imperial Army to run.

    Even if those people ran to the first level, which was located at the top, they would still have to be forced to turn back from there.

    In that light, the responsibility they have taken on in this mission is actually very light. And they find that the more people they lose to themselves, the more people they can kill.

    "Look at us. We''re the floor guardians, for better or worse. If this battle is recognized, our ''status'' will be enhanced!

    "That''s right, that''s it, buddy. This time, don''t talk about the petty family business there, talk about taking turns and all that. We''ll do everything we can to crush the enemy!

    "If any of the Imperials escape, we will expel them all!"

    "That''s it! I won''t let Lady Ramiris down!"

    Since there was no way back, they had to move forward.

    The uneasiness in their hearts vanished in an instant, and the two men''s energy rose with them.

    And just like that, the task for each person to take on was set.

    "Rimuru asked us to bring as many Imperial soldiers into the maze as possible! In order for that to happen, we have to give our opponents some sort of sweet treat!

    The group listened and nodded forcefully, indicating that they understood. Everyone is clear about their responsibilities. At least on the first day they nned to quietly watch the enemy''s movements.

    Ramiris originally looked at everyone with satisfaction, but she finally dropped a shock bomb.

    "Very good very good. Then everyone,e on! By the way, Rimuru said he would be watching the battle as well. Not only is this a way to judge who should be Labyrinth Chief, it''s also a chance for him to see how you all behave!

    The moment those words came out of Ramiris'' mouth, everyone''s expression suddenly turned serious, serious to the point of being full of killing aura.

    "You say Lord Rimuru will watch us?

    Zegion had originally been silent, and now even he spoke up.

    This surprised Apito.

    The "Worm Emperor" Zegion is a quiet man who rarely speaks.

    Aside from his allegiance to the Demon Lord Rimuru, the only thing that interests him is to be strongerZegion is one such person.

    "Well, umm, umm, Rimuru said he''d watch it too!

    Stammering in response, Ramiris was caught off guard by her opponent''s airs.

    After all, even Ramiris didn''t get much of a chance to watch Zegion speak, and would be surprised quite normally.

    "Oh Zegion, what Ramiris said is true. Rimuru was also intrigued by the strength of the Maze members. That''s why I chose to trust you and decided to let you take on the heavy responsibility of this battle.

    Like looking for the steps down for the astonished Ramiris, Veldora so stated.

    For Veldora, Zegion was an excellent apprentice to thebat training he had implemented since before.

    He''s also a great yer who has a long history of friendship with Veldora. Not only that, but depending on the conditions, he even grew to the point where he could fight Veldora to the point of being above even odds.

    Zegion was too powerful.

    To ask if there was anyone in the Maze who could be Zegions opponent, there was no one else but Veldora.

    Just because Zegion was such a master, this once-in-a-lifetime opportunity was all the more exciting for him.

    "Yeah? Lord Rimuru will be watching to see how we and others fareit really gets my blood pumping.

    Let the adults see how much I''ve grown, and I''ll show it all.

    "Hey, hey, that''s a must! He says he''s looking forward to it, so people are going to surprise him!

    With a smile of innocence, Ramiris ended with these words.

    Despite her innocence and kindness, Ramiris is inherently without mercy. She was the one who had be a demon lord and had no objection to the absolutew of the weak and the strong.

    When entering the maze, everyone will see the rules. Even the general soldiers from the Empire are no exception, and while confirming their own will to enter thebyrinth, they are also asking their instincts, If they can''te out without meeting the conditions, can they still ept this?

    Will people take this as a threat or a warning? Everyone fantasizes about what riches can be gained in the maze, and like the colony of ants drawn past by sugar, all get sucked into the maze.

    From this point on, Ramiris stopped being merciful.

    So she would no longer be polite and would greet these enemies.

    Next, the soldiers of the Empire''s generals will understand.

    They will witness the true gesture of this maze.

    Taste the fear

    "We are going to win. Dedicate the victory to Lord Rimuru.

    Zegion read the words and rose from his seat.

    It became a signal that everyone was out in force.

    In order to get to the venue that had be hell, theyll wait for the guests to arrive.

    ***

    At the entrance of the underground maze, soldiers from the Imperial Army were drawn in one after another.

    They were in neat rows, their movements were not in the least bit strained, and they were all well behaved.

    Each person is equipped with a seat belt around their waist that links them together, spacing them back and forth for a total of three meters.

    There were other squads in charge of the fight, and these men were not connected by ropes and could move freely. When there was nobat going on, they held the life-saving ropes that bound those soldiers.

    In the face of such arge army pressing down on the territory, the maze was nothing. They were prepared beforehand, they wereing to challenge the maze, no one would get lost.

    In addition to being satisfied with their borate arrangement, Calgurio began to think of the wealth he would receive.

    This maze is basically some kind of trickery for kids. The problem is the magical creatures that inhabit it

    It''s not just how strong those magical creatures are, it''s also a question of how much time fighting can consume. ording to the research they''ve done beforehand, the 60th floor is the bottom floor, but that''s not necessarily true.

    It was said that thebyrinth had so manyyers of a hundred, but he didn''t think it made sense.

    Calgurio always thought it was bluffing.

    The deeper you go, the more valuable treasures you can acquire, and most importantly, the higher the purity of the "magic crystals" you can recover. This is fascinating to hear that it increases in proportion to the strength of the magical creatures that inhabit it, etc. But Calgurio had been bitter and found that tricky.

    In any case, if you can identify the type of magic creature, you will be able to find the proper way to dispose of it. It would be more efficient to hunt that way too.

    Stroking his proud beard, Calgurio came to this conclusion.

    Looking at the well-trained general soldiers, the Maze is not even a threat. Their majestic looks are proofproof that they have untouchable power.

    They''ve imagined what battles might ur within the maze and have done training.

    Able hands using spirit magic will confirm the way forward and a special work team will disarm the traps. Thebat team will be responsible for expelling the magical creatures, and the team responsible for handling them will disintegrate those magical creatures and harvest the "magic crystals". This sequence of moves will have the top of each column executing.

    And the acquired treasures will be transmitted to the rear through the linked soldiers. Then it was just passed to the front of the entrance for those waiting over there to move back to Operations Command.

    Linking soldiers together allows for a change in circumstances. If something happened, they would immediately send back information that had been rigorously trained on these soldiers.

    Calgurio''s response started out well. Over time, however, abnormal changes began to appear. When about a thousand or so soldiers entered the maze,munication between the two sides was suddenly broken.

    "My lord, how can this be?

    What happened to those soldiers?

    It is not yet clear. Watching the ropes being neatly cut, one can imagine that space has twisted.

    Information obtained in advance mentions this, saying that sometimes the structure of the maze can change. But I''ve heard it only happens every twenty-four hours

    Calgurio agonized over it, but had no intention of preventing the soldiers from parading in. He intended to keep the soldiers rushing in for the time being.

    As it turned out, he discovered one thingfor every thousand or more people who entered, the structure of the maze changed.

    No, that''s not right. By this time Calgurio was alert.

    "I get it. The enemy seemed happy to see us in, too.

    "What the? What does that say?

    "It''s obvious. If thebyrinth is overcrowded, they probably won''t do well. Going down that staircase doesn''t lead to the second basement level, I''m afraid it connects to another level.

    What!? How could such a thing happen?

    Looking at the surprised staff officer with a foolish look, Calgurio snorted.

    "Of course it''s possible. The opponent is at least a demon lord. If they couldn''t do even that little thing in their own territory, they would have been destroyed long ago.

    Calgurio urately predicted what would happen in the maze.

    Based on conversations before the soldiers broke off contact, it didn''t seem like there was anything unusual going on. But that doesn''t mean that something suddenly happened to them.

    "Also, when it was just over a thousand people, contact was suddenly broken. What do you think that means?

    "I seeYour Excellency is aware of this, I am afraid."

    Hmmm" with a nod, Calgurio began to think of a course.

    Several treasures have been shipped over. It''s all amazing equipment, or "magic steel" made weapons.

    Everything is top-notch. Moreover, the "magic crystal" received just now is of excellent quality and has an impable energy conversion rate.

    If the invasion was interrupted at this time, the 2,000 soldiers who had gone in would have lost their lives. Instead of doing that, it would be more effective to stick to the original n and use that kind of manned sea tactics.

    Calgurio so judged.

    "This is a threat to us. To get us to abandon the Maze, they intend to buy time. That way they''ll have a chance to wait for reinforcements from Deva Heights.

    "Ridiculous. Even that Dwargon today

    "Exactly. To interrupt the operation here would be to call the enemy''s will!"

    "Yes! Then let''s get back to the maze battle!

    Seeing through the enemy''s tricks, Calgurio was satisfied. Then weighing the benefits that could be gained against the lives of the soldiers on the scales, he decided to ignore the slightly unnerving elements.

    It was at this moment that the fate of the Imperial Army was sealed.

    A full day had passed since they had started invading the maze.

    They pushed on day and night, and about three hundred and fifty thousand soldiers and generals invaded the maze without incident.

    As usual, for every thousand people sent, the route of aggression they take changes.

    It seemed that only those who ran to a particr floor could barely get a part of their body to appear outside, and the kinds of treasures acquired there would change along with it. There are almost no low-quality objects, which also contain weapons with holes.

    Those weapons look like a new type of enemy weapon.

    From this one can infer how panicked the enemy was.

    If there was time, they would have taken it back. Failure to do so proves that the enemy doesn''t have that leeway now.

    me them for trying to suck up customers with a maze, only to have one head and two tails in a sudden situation. They are too stupid.

    The idea of using thebyrinth to attract people from the surrounding countriesan idea that Calgurio found interesting. Yet they couldn''t pick up the pieces at the crucial moment, and can only say that they did things too roughly.

    In this way, at first, Calgurio thought that the Demon Lord Rimuru''s gang were all fools, but after a whole day, they decided to watch the situation for the time being.

    Soldiers at themand headquarters would take turns resting. It would have been fine to continue the invasion n in this manner, but Calgurio suddenly felt uneasy.

    "The total number of people who have broken into the maze is 350,000, right?

    "Yes! Half of our army has invaded the maze.

    Although almost every full thousand people were disconnected, that was as Calgurio had predicted.

    After a while, someone reported that they had found the soldiers who had entered the maze earlier.

    The Imperial Army''s morale was instantly boosted. Originally, everyone was very upset and relieved to know that our soldiers and horses were fine.

    To get into a panic over a little thing is a disgrace to the Imperial Army.

    All the soldiers thought so, forcing down the restlessness in their hearts to act. So this good news breathes life into them. There was nothing to be afraid of this time, and the pace of aggression increased with it.

    As a result, half of the General''s soldiers entered thebyrinth right now, but

    "So many people were sent, and it still wasnt enough to fill the maze

    "I didn''t realize it was so vast."

    "That''s what I heard. Thought we''d be able to suppress the whole maze in a little while"

    By what they expected to think, the Imperial Army should have taken control of the entire maze long ago. However, this was not actually the case, and when they temporarily kept the soldiers out of the maze, they cut off contact with the people inside.

    If the troops who had gone in first were found, they would be able to move out a great deal of treasure.

    But now that the movement into thebyrinth has been interrupted, those gains have been temporarily halted.

    No one hase out yet, have they?

    "Yes, yes. It seems that in order to get out of there, we have to break through the maze first

    "Then I''ve heard. I''ve heard that during the invasion, someone in every soldier''s head was asking questions of them, right?

    "Exactly. However, although the conditions are clearit seems that before defeating the Labyrinth King, the Guardians of the Ten Keys need to be crushed first

    "So that''s it, then we haven''t crushed them yet?

    The answer is in sight.

    But that''s not what Calgurio wants to know.

    The King of the Labyrinth is probably referring to the Demon Lord Rimuru. If the goal was to seed in crushing him, it would have been a great one for them.

    As a matter of fact it should be.

    Yet in fact they were interrupted for a time, didn''t continue to send troops in, and currently couldn''t even get in touch with the soldiers inside the maze.

    "Do you think it''s possible to defeat Demon Lord Rimuru with 350,000 soldiers?

    The staff officers are at a loss for words when asked. But they answered immediately and with aplomb.

    "The reason the Kingdom of Farmus had failed is because they met Veldora, I believe. If it''s just Demon Lord Rimuru, it should be more than enough to defeat him.

    "I think so, too. There''s no shortage of people who''ve taken part in this Raider Operation, so we just have to wait for them to bring back good news.

    Seemingly reassured to see someone agreeing with them, the staff officers began to shout one after another that they would definitely win. Yet Calgurio could not erase the uneasiness in his heart no matter what.

    "The first thing is to get in touch with the people in thebyrinth. Also send liaison troops over and try tomunicate by various means ofmunication.

    Receiving orders from Calgurio, they tried various methods to get in touch, but all failed. They also tried the Thought Communication or the Communication Network, but none of the people inside the maze responded.

    Things have evolved to such an extent that it''s hard for the staff members to fool themselves anymore.

    The loot from thebyrinth had excited them, but in the face of the present, with no future in sight, they began to look demoralized.

    The reason for all this is the inability to get in touch with the people inside the maze. Without rity, the function of those staff officers cannot be fulfilled.

    "Then we''ll continue to organize the troops and let them enter the maze once more.

    At this point Calgurio "hmmm''d" and nodded.

    Either way, they had to send soldiers in to confirm the situation. Even if they continued to stay on the ground, they couldn''t confirm what was going on inside the maze.

    The entrance to thebyrinththat door had not been closed, but was still wide open. Nothing has changed since the beginning, as if nothing has happened.

    Even so, as long as the person who entered next was slightlyte, they immediately couldn''t sense the scent of the people in front of them.

    This action was also interrupted by the fact that the gold and silver treasures had been transported smoothly from inside thebyrinth. On the one hand, perhaps because of this, a heavy breath began to pervade the Combat Command.

    Thentwo more days passed.

    "Why doesn''t anyone return the favor after that?"

    "Since every thousand people are put in different ces, there''s no way to find the forces that invade the depths of the maze again.

    "What, the maze is this big!?

    "I don''t think

    What?"

    "It''s not all gone"

    "You fools, are you afraid!?

    "Everybody calm down. I''m afraid these are all tactics of the Demon Lord Rimuru. His purpose is to make us suspicious and give up on the maze.

    The practice is different now than it was in the beginning, sending out only a thousand people per hour to enter discreetly. But in that case, it would be difficult to bring back the information, not to mention the treasure.

    On the first day alone, three hundred and fifty thousand people entered the maze.

    An additional 150,000 people were added the next day.

    There were only 30,000 people on the third day.

    As for the Imperial General soldiers who remained on the ground, it had been reduced to the remaining 170,000.

    "Wouldn''t it be wise to hold on to your strength now?"

    "We also send supply troops into thebyrinth to extend the activity limits of the general''s soldiers.

    Shouldn''t it take at least 20 days to observe the situation?"

    "That''s so negative!

    "But we still can''t reach Lieutenant General Geist or Major General Faraga. Are they still tangling with the enemy, or are they"

    They have sent out spy troops several times, but none have returned. There has been no contact with reliable friendly forces.

    "That''s because of the high concentration of magicules. There could be no other reason."

    Calgurio so asserted.

    It would be bad if morale continued to be low, based on that judgment, he would say that.

    But it''s still hard to erase the uneasy atmosphere that pervades the scene. In an unspeakably eerie silence, the soldiers of the Imperial Army General had an ominous feeling of foreboding.

    Even the speaker, Calgurio, was no exception.

    There were 170,000 more Generalissimo soldiers on the scene. The converse can also be said of only 170,000.

    Maybe I made a big mistake

    The thought suddenly shed through Calgurio''s mind.

    The gate was towering. Nowadays it seems that the door was very eerie and fueled the unease in Calgurio''s mind.

    What will be the fate of thebyrinth''s challengers in this door

    It wouldn''t be long before Calgurio would know where they were headed.

    ***

    Forty-first through forty-eighth floors

    Those Imperial General soldiers who entered thebyrinth, because of the different floors they entered, had fates that were vastly different from each other.

    One who is put on the forty-first to forty-eighth floor can be said to be lucky. Although the magical creatures that appear are very strong, they are only B-grade at best. The soldiers were fortified, the magic creatures were not their opponents, and the Raider operation went off without a hitch.

    These empire''s generals and soldiers were very powerful.

    When converted to an adventurer''s rank, everyonees to C+ as a minimum. It''s a first-ss skill.

    This way, they could handle it without any trouble even if they came across a magical creature.

    They march in neat rows, at this pace.

    Slightly behind the front row, thebat team took guard action on one side.

    A stronghold was set up at each corner, followed by the clearing of the entire road. Act ording to what they''ve been trained to do, and gradually take care of the entire floor.

    Neither had passed the day yet, and the upward steps and the downward steps had been found by them both.

    Their currentbat goal became to crush the demon lord with all their war power once they met.

    The task of capturing the treasures of the upper floors is left to the other troops, or they can wait until it''s over. They used the stairs as a stronghold to suppress the entire floor. Then moved on to the strategy.

    There was a locked room with a door near the stairs. The bulletin board above that door says "Lounge".

    Just like the results of their prior investigation, the only thing that was different was that the door would not open.

    "The door is really not open. They deliberately made us unusable."

    "Think so. There''s no way to destroy it?

    "Yes! Using firearms or magic had no effect. Just like the road inside the maze, it should be difficult to destroy!

    After hearing the soldier''s report, the captain nodded.

    It''s nothing to be surprised that there will be such an oue for granted.

    If the magic tank guns are brought in or massive magic is unleashed, perhaps the destruction is possible. However, this would not guarantee the safety of their own troops in thebyrinth. I don''t know how many casualties there would be if they nned tounch nuclear strike magic and so on.

    So the captain decided to challenge the maze head-on, as originally nned. That is, the use of human sea tactics.

    Now that he heard that even the lounge could not be used, he was not only annoyed, but also took it for granted.

    "Report it up. Then tell them the operation is going well.

    "Yes, sir!"

    He had faltered in the beginning when only a thousand of them were left. But to panic like this would be a disgrace to the Imperial Army.

    The department captain decided to continue with the strategy. That decision was the right one. It wasn''t long before they rendezvoused with the other troops.

    Although the floor wasrger than expected, there were spirit emissaries working hand in hand with the surveyors, and the Raiding Operation went smoothly. And defeat, magical creatures will drop "magic crystals" of good quality, and from the treasure chests they found, great gold and silver treasures will be opened.

    The man who came down the stairs returned to him, saying that the forty-two floors were almostplete. There was a great cheer, and everyone said that the Imperial Army would not be defeated.

    The next day they also explored all the rooms on the fortieth floor. Step into the forty-second floor at this rate and meet the troops who are staying there. They pounded straight into the forty-third floor with the momentum of a bamboozle, approaching the forty-eighth floor in less than three days.

    The results have exceeded expectations.

    But the forty-ninthyer doesn''t start out that easy.

    Forty-nine to fifty levels of the maze

    "Oooh, oooh, oooh, oooh

    "It''s going down, mymy feet are melting off!"

    "Help me! I can''t get my hand out!"

    It''s a living hell.

    Drop it and you run into Slimes.

    There''s a bunch of Slimes everywhere.

    Slimes, Slimes, Slimes, Slimes, Slimes

    Halfway through the break, Slimes fell from the ceiling.

    As soon as the corner was turned, the squad was cut off and wiped out.

    The walls are made of Slime, and the floor is Slime.

    Weapons and defenses were destroyed and the soldiers'' physical strength was taken from them.

    "What the hell, still no way to break through!?

    "Yes! The entire floor smelled of magical creatures, there was no way to sense through magic. And they seem to have a high level of resistance to physical attacks, half-assed attacks are useless!

    "And the enemy is multiplying at an abnormal rate! They don''t seem to feel pain either and don''t seem to be afraid of our attacks at all!

    If it was an average Slime, only one would be nothing to be afraid of, but bing so massive, it would take a lot of effort to burn the Slime out and turned into a tougher opponent than expected.

    Every few hours reinforcements woulde in to help, so the damage they suffered was not so great that they had to retreat. But it''s just a matter of time consuming and dying toe up with the desired results.

    It turned out that all the floors were not explored until the third day was almost over. This time, they could finally rendezvous with the troops from the upper floors, and they were able to survive with the human sea tactics.

    Anding to the fiftieth floor, they saw hordes of the wounded.

    The road is like a dark, damp cave. The sound of battle echoes here.

    "Damn it, these monsters are back!

    Someone shouted in feverishness.

    He was looking at the giant snake that stood in front of him and wouldn''t let anyone pass, moving stupidly like the incarnation of darkness.

    It''s a Tempest Snake.

    The scales were like armor, half-dangling magic and gunfire could not do the trick.

    Even if you want to get close enough to cut it with your sword, the Tempest Snake''s "poisonous spray"

    can spray up to seven meters away. The swords are bathed in death spray before they even touch.

    "Damn it! This narrow passage is equivalent to being their world!

    "If we can still get around the wide area, there''s nothing we can do.

    "Are the heavy magic cannons ready?

    "It''s not working. It''s been used just now, and it will be another two hours before the energy is replenished.

    The so-called "Heavy Magic Cannon" is a new type of magic-guided weapon that is capable of exerting the greatest power among portable weapons. Unlike "magic guns" that use magic stones as an energy source, they collect magical elements from the atmosphere and are filled with magical elements.

    It''s filled with magic, the elemental magic of the "Air Breaking Cannon", which is a high-powered magic that explodes continuously afterpressing air. It doesn''t catch fire and can be fired in a specific direction. So this kind of magic is also useful in confined spaces like buildings.

    Just by being able to manipte this kind of magic, you will be judged as an A grade, which is a high level magic.

    But the problem is that the energy consumption is too great. This is why the surrounding mana is used to fill the maze, but even in a maze with a high concentration of mana, it would take three hours to fill it up. That kind of speed is fast enough under normal circumstances, but it was still too slow to use on this one.

    "Oi oi oi, are you kidding me? What does that mean? Does that mean those monsterse back to life faster?

    The Tempest Snakes are clearly unusual individuals. Wearing a cor around its neck, it felt set apart from the other magical creatures.

    The most important thing is that no matter how many times it is knocked down, after three hours it wille back to life. In other words, no matter how many times they are knocked down, they have to fight again as soon as a certain amount of time passes.

    The tricky part is that there is no so-called safe zone on this floor.

    And

    "Tweets, tweets, tweets..."

    The sounds of fighting began toe from other roads as well.

    Yes, there''s more than one Tempest Snake.

    There were ten of them found alone. A group of high-risk magical creatures with ranksing to A-are using their characteristics to dominate this area.

    This is their of the ck snakes.

    The Tempest Snake was originally a floor guardian of the forty floors, and now even the spare ones were put together on this floor.

    The soldierster managed to rendezvous with reinforcements from the upper floors and had a chance to rearm. This time, they finally had enough heavy magic cannons to defeat the Tempest Snake. It waste in the night on the third day that the Tempest Snake was finally sessfully exterminated.

    "Everyone, while maintaining this floor, beware of monster resurrection. Let the injured and sick take refuge on the upper floor.

    Yes!"

    With that, the Imperial Army reorganized its forces here. The next thing you know, they''re in an even worse hell.

    Fifty to sixtieth floors of the maze

    The fifty-first floor has arge area of modern ess.

    The Imperials seemed to have mastered this one floor, and soldiers could be seen around every corner.

    The scene can be seen to leave traces of fierce fighting, and one can imagine that this floor is also tricky.

    One of the troopers tried to make contact with the people on the scene.

    "How''s it going?"

    To avoid waking the soldiers who were resting, he quietly questioned the station staff.

    "The situation is dire. We have underestimated the Demon Lord.

    "What do you mean?"

    "There are a lot of traps on this floor. We are standing in the right channel. The others should never go.

    I think most of the traps should have been destroyed by us, but maybe some haven''t lost their function.

    "Got it. That said, those are"

    In order to report to his superior officer, the unit chief asked for further details.

    The soldier then told him about the various chemical weapons that seemed to be not in use in the Empire either.

    There is colorless and odorless gas that can poison the eyes and throat.

    It is also sprayed with neurotoxins as well as melting solution.

    Those vicious traps maimed quite a few people. The Imperial Army originally thought that this knowledge was exclusive to them, and therefore felt it was all the more threatening.

    "There will be no magical creatures on this floor for the time being. Instead, some of the puppets that used Mana as a power source are hovering there. The tricky part is that they seem to be self-healing, and it takes some work topletely destroy them.

    "That''s a lot of work.

    The department captain originally wanted to say that he and the others had also suffered a lot, but he still swallowed those words back and asked the other party to continue to reveal the subsequent situation.

    "Yeah. The weary and the injured went to the fifty-fifth level to rest. It should be safe to go over there and have a meal.

    "Thank you. What about the situation on the front line now?

    "The front lineording to the information I just received, they seem to have arrived at the 60th floor. They also say some pretty bullshit things, and if they were to present this information upwards, the people above them would surely think they were crazy. I think it would be tiresome to hear, and even then do you still want to hear it?

    Watching the soldier who answered begin to sigh, the troop leader could only nod in agreement.

    "Yes, please.

    "So. Then I told you, I heard there are huge human weapons sitting on the 60th floor! About the strength of that guy

    The more you listen, the more you feel. Makes you want to say that because the other side is so strong it''s a mess.

    It is said that even if the A-ranked fighters team up to challenge, they still can''t find the knack to beat their opponents. The opponent''s body is made of "magic steel" and physical attacks like swords and guns don''t work at all. Moreover, the opponent is always protected by a "barrier", and it is said that even the "heavy magic cannon" can''t hurt him in the slightest.

    There''s nothing to be dhats what''s happening right now.

    "And then there was the sound that came out of that huge magic doll, and it turned out to be surprising that the sound was simr to that Master Gadra. Even I find it hard to believe, but it has to be reported upwards, right? It teaches one how to do it, really

    The soldier''sint came this way.

    The head of the department decided to report what he had just said directly to his superiors for their instructions.

    We can only go forward now. You guys go to the fifty-fifth floor first, go there and talk about what to do in the future.

    "Yes, sir.

    At such times, one can only do as one pleases the superior officer. There is no alternative on the side of the chief of the department, how can one oppose the superior officer''s approach.

    But that just puts the question on the back burner first and the answer must be found out soon after. In any case, the Imperial Army could not retreat.

    "You''re leaving? Well, think about it too. Good luck to you all, but before that I almost forgot to give you a piece of advice. Five special magical creatures have been found to be present, so you should be more careful.

    "You mean special creatures?

    "Right. There have been no reports of sessful crusades, that must be exceptional individuals. Very tricky, and severalpanions have been taken out by them.

    There''s the Red Slime, the Golden Skeleton Swordsman, the Ghost of Death, the Monster-Moving Armor that looks like a heavily armored knight, and the small, powerful Dragon Wraith.

    Those dreaded monsters seemed to be lurking in this area of the floor. They are an extraordinary presence mixed in with the magic puppets.

    The soldier concluded by saying, "You might die in the first ce.

    The survivors from the upper floors took this advice to heart and moved on. What exactly lies ahead awaits them will be known shortly

    The general soldiers of the Imperial Army gradually went down. Not knowing that going any further was their demise, the whole team pushed forward without interruption, continuously.

    The maze at the 61st to 70th floors

    "Not yet? We haven''t won yet?

    "I''m sorry! It seems that this operation has also failed"

    Hearing this in return, the soldiers of the General were in despair.

    There is a gate on the seventy level.

    It leads to the city of the dead, the border between the world and the living.

    ...........

    ........

    Advancing amidst a mass of demons, the soldiers of the Imperial Army strutted through the maze.

    It all went well at first.

    Right. Only in the beginning

    The magical creatures that appear are all Necromancers. Just getting used to the stench of rotting flesh, and judging by the strength of the Imperial General''s soldiers, those enemies won''t let them get into a bitter fight.

    The first 1,000 people to enter were responsible for establishing the position. After confirming that the men behind follow, the battle will continue.

    Losing contact with the troops on the ground is a major defeat, but they are notpletely alone. It only took a little time to wait for the rear troops to arrive, so they didn''t think there would be any problems.

    The Imperial Army suppressed the entireyer with a wave of fury. On the first day they explored almost all of the sixtieth to sixty-ninth floors.

    The problem is on the 70th floor.

    For some reason, the seventyyers were arge, dry, hilly area of grass and trees.

    The look is hair-raising, a remnant of a battlefield that drifts with the scent of death.

    A huge gate loomed ahead, about the size of the one on the ground.

    The gate, made of skeletons, was used to guard the fortress city, which was located in the middle of the moat that protected the town.

    Why would such a thing be in abyrinththe question came to everyone''s mind.

    There are no other entrances to the city but the main gate. Drainage facilities, universal gates, and other amenities essential to life are not avable in this city.

    That''s no wonder.

    None of the people who live in this metropolis are alive.

    It''s all Necromancy.

    At first day, the door was still closed.

    Even with the attempted destruction, the walls are just too thick. Not that the deceased would have been running out to make repairs, hence the dyed progress of the damage.

    Even if one wanted to get close, there were skeletal archers with bows on the outer wall.

    The imperial superiors felt that relying on a few men to attack was too much of a stretch, so they had to wait for reinforcements to arrive.

    Immediately following the time came the next morning.

    The Imperial Army has increased in numbers to over 10,000.

    They began to attack the gate, which opened soundlessly before them.

    Then the horrifying-looking King of the Dead appears.

    To say that he was a skeleton is not an appropriate description.

    This rather genteel white bone spoke in fluent humannguage to the general soldiers of the Imperial Army.

    "Wee to mynd of the dead. My name is Adalman, the Immortal King. The party is all set. Let''s just have a good time. So, here we go!

    As soon as the king, Adalman, had dered his name, there was a sudden sense of oppression in the whole space.

    Following this king are a group of Necromancers, as well as the dead but still brave Necromancer dragon. This dragon of death let out an evil roar that felt like it was going to overwhelm the entire space.

    The next moment the Necromancer descended from the sky and came to the door. It was the most ferocious dragon at the pinnacle of the Necromorphic System, and in this instant, it bared its fangs at the Imperial Army.

    Not only that.

    The gates had been opened, and legions of the undead had emerged from them one after another. The Necromancers led by the Necromancer Chief climbed out one after another.

    The Imperial Army had been lined up in front of the door, but the sudden battle had caused them to be in a state of confusion.

    The Dragon of the Dead is a ss A magical creature, which is so powerful that it is frightening to be attacked.

    Its attribute is Immortalitythere is no other means of elimination than a direct attack on the "soul".

    The soldiers of the Empire had a high level ofbat ability that they prided themselves on, but their attacks simply couldn''t hurt each other, and nothing could be done in the face of such an opponent.

    "Fall back, fall back! This is not an opponent you can beat with one blowpoof!

    "Damn it, if you burn it all with fire"

    "It''s not working! That guy''s regenerating faster than he''s burning!

    "Get out of this ce! Otherwise, the spirit will be destroyed by the guy''s miasma!

    The Imperial Army is in chaos.

    As if in mockery of these soldiers, the dragon''s jaws opened considerably.

    "Shit! Thats... ah-uh!!

    Pfft."

    "The body is corroding!"

    The corrosive spray of the Death Dragon poured down from high in the air, bathing those crawling on the ground. As a result, most of them were unable to resist and ended up losing their lives.

    That''s not all.

    Certain people suffer from spiritual pollution due to the miasma of the Necromancer, and they turn into walkers, obeying the orders of higher-order magical creatures.

    The so-called high-ranking magical creature here is the King of the Dead, in other words, Adalman.

    The damage suffered by the Empire directly adds to the war effort for Adalman.

    The tragedy of the Army is more than that.

    It was hardly safe even to escape the threat of the Necromancer. That''s because some Necromancers rides a Necromancer horse and starts hunting down the fleeing people.

    The Imperial Army''s numbers plummeted in an instant, and ten thousand were wiped out in less than an hour.

    These tragedies were passed on by the few survivors to the troops who followedter. Because of these things, the 70th Level Raiders Battle began to be white-hot.

    ...........

    ........

    After the next day, there were several times when the Imperial Army wanted to try to rush into the seventy levels.

    But every time, they lose miserably. The next two fights, the second and third, were all with the same result, and things didn''t get any better at all.

    As for the overwhelming threat posed by the Necromantic Dragon, even less so.

    Although there are only a thousand or so Necromancers, these opponents do not fatigue nor die. And they''re also the threatening equivalent of an A-, which is pretty high. It''s unbearable that no matter how you kill, you''ll still keeping back alive.

    As for the long Necromancer whomanded them, his strength was not even close to that of the high-ranking warriors of the Imperial Army. The quality alone is also above the Imperial Army, with enoughbat range to overturn the numerical disadvantage.

    In addition to this, there is one of the Ten Lords of the Labyrinth, Albert "Pdin of the Dead", under Adalman. Even the elite of the Imperial Army had no chance of winning against the army of the undead.

    "But we will not repeat the mistakes of this campaign. Looking forward to your performance!

    The Imperial Army brigadier finished his speech to the soldiers of the general.

    The Raiders team from the upper floors met them on the fourth day. Then they bet all their existing strength that this battle will send all the troops on this side.

    Plus the Imperial Army is not ipetent.

    The techniques used to deal with the Immortals are well known from ancient times to the present.

    Divine magic is most effective against the enemy of mankind, the undead.

    Dialysis of the principles of divine magic. There has been research being done on this part, and a technique has been developed on the Imperial side that can have an effect simr to praying to God.

    There are veterans of this in the Imperial Army.

    They gathered these men from among the existing fighting forces and deployed them in various units.

    In this way, it will be able to resist the evil miasma and break through the so-called "immortality". That''s what thisbat n is all about.

    The Army was in full formation in the hilly terrain, bringing the total number to 70,000.

    In contrast, Adalman''s men were still less than 40,000, even counting the increased number of walkers over the past few days.

    Just by looking at the number of people, it looked like the Imperial Army had the upper hand, and at that time, everyone thought that they would definitely win this time.

    Then the showdown beginsthe king takes action.

    "You guys think too much. The Holy Reversal

    The Immortal King Adalman''s dominance extends to the end.

    As for the holy attribute that was originally their weakness, when this force covered, weakness was no longer weakness. And it was this weakness that the Imperial Army relied on, their miscalction leading to their own loss

    This defeat broke the spirits of the Imperial generals'' soldiers.

    The survivors were pushed to the breaking point and started running towards the upper floors.

    Simply forget about the maze''s breakthrough conditions. All that remains in the mind is the desire to survive, just to live.

    The seventy-first to seventy-ninth levels of the maze

    Walking into this floor, the Imperials were forced to engage in a never-ending battle with an entire swarm of insects.

    The insectsunched a fierce attack that went on and on and on.

    Fearing no death, they repeatedly attacked, a whole group showing absolutely no signs of interruption.

    Maze Day 1.

    The soldiers of the generals who had first begun to send in were frightened but not frightened by the onught of insects. They took the channel build site and processed it immediately.

    The gigantic insects were dozens of times bigger than ordinary bugs, not only were they swift, but they were also very powerful. One careless nce and they''ll kill and eat you in the blink of an eye.

    But a calm observation will reveal that each bug is not very strong. And they are endless, which means there are many "magic crystals" to be had. Plus the quality was good, and the look on the soldiers'' faces went along with it.

    Well, it''s not really a big dealthe soldiers think so.

    Changing to a normal contingent of adventurers will get more and more tired with no way to rest. Until finally there will be no way to put out your full strength and get knocked down by the magical creature.

    But the Imperial Army has less of thatyer of worry. A well-trained armyes to raid the maze, and a swarm of bugs is no match at all. No matter how many bugs there were, the numbers on the Imperial side would not lose.

    Change shifts when you feel tired and can always stay in top shape. As such, they gradually increased their positions and the operation went smoothly.

    While it''s not possible to rx mentally, that''s all that''s wrong with saying it. On the flip side, their gains are not small.

    Even this floor of what can be called an insect paradise, there are still hidden rooms that are indeed prepared such as tree caves or caverns, etc. There are powerful magical things there, but there are also treasure chests.

    Some soldiers evenughed at the luxurious treasures.

    Perhaps it was the person who opened the treasure chest and found the short sword in that room just now.

    A short sword with exquisite goldsmithing on top would look expensive. The performance seems to be good too, with the glow on the de proving that the short sword is made of "magic steel".

    Only the hilt part of the scabbard was made of items that were already expensive, and the short sword was all made of "magic steel. No wonder the soldier wasughing.

    Upon entering this maze, it was exined to them that items such as "magic crystals" were to be given to the military. But something as small as a short sword was likely to turn a blind eye.

    Of course, after that, they are subjected to an inventory of their belongings, but considering the fact that the leader who defeated the guardian of the treasure is also a credit, then the item will definitely be given to the soldiers.

    The other soldiers around seemed to be envious, and everyone was thinking in their hearts "next time it will be my turn".

    Without such benefits to take, there would be no incentive to fight the bugs consistently in ces like this.

    The amount of "magic crystals" harvested is also considerable.

    Normally high purity "magic crystals" are rare, but you can easily get them by defeating magical creatures here.

    That''s what I mean by making peopleugh, and at this pace, there should be all kinds of added benefits.

    The other floors seem to be pretty much the same as far as they''ve heard. The more tragic ones are the floors where many people die, right?

    The opponent is a dead spirit and can get rtively little. But it was hard work to defeat the dead souls, in contrast. Byparison, this floor with bugs moving around is more profitable.

    At least the treasures obtained were satisfactory, and everyone thought that they should be able to treat this battle as a fond memory when they returned, and the delusion of happiness swelled more and more.

    It started to get out of hand the next day.

    One soldier''s eyes widened in surprise. Because the head of the partner walking next to it suddenly fell to the ground.

    "When we get back, we''ll have a good time

    Looking down at his missing head on the ground, the soldier had a look of dismay on his face. The words that didn''t make it came to a halt in mid-sentence, and the mouth just opened.

    Blood spurted upwards. As if spraying water on the surrounding partners.

    "Hey, hey!"

    There were screams from the soldiers. Still talking to the other party just now, the sudden and tragic death made people momentarily unresponsive.

    However, the soldier was lucky.

    It''s not toote to keep thinking, he''s already been chosen to be the next victim.

    The head dropped with a tter.

    Like the soldier who was turned into a corpse in the beginning and could no longer speak, the man died in the moment.

    The ce where they died was the seventy-ninth floor.

    This ce is so full of flowers that everyone thought this floor was a safe zone until just now.

    "Uh-huh-huh-huh. The day of waiting was worth it. Because there was a lot of prey gathered around and made a point of running over themselves. Thank you for your hard work. Just die for us and be fodder.

    Those soldiers heard a clear sound.

    Beautiful tones resounded throughout the floor.

    The words came from the Queen.

    It was the wonderful voice of Apito, the Bug Queen, the Domain Guardian responsible for guarding this floor.

    Apito''s voice transformed into a wave of chanting power that could be heard throughout the entire floor. This was tomunicate the order indeed to her faithful servants.

    ...........

    ........

    Apito was leading the "Legion Bees".

    Its true identity is a killing group formed by bees about thirty centimeters in length.

    They have superior super-sensory abilities and will not let go of humans who are hidingtheir prey.

    The tiny transparent wings emit high circumferential waves that be terrifying des that can easily achieve irregr high-speed maneuvers.

    They will approach quietly at a speed beyond the speed of sound, a silent assassination bee.

    If you''re going to deal with Legion Bees, it''s useless to just have superior dynamic vision. Without going beyond the limits of the human race, it is simply impossible to discover the existence of an opponent.

    Without the additional skills of "Thinking Speed" and "Over Speed Reaction", there is no way to capture the movements of your opponent.

    Just one alone is equivalent to a ss A disaster, and is a formidable magical creature.

    By the way, it ismon to find only one emergency alert in the West. It would be reported to the higher units of the countries immediately and the high ranking knights would form a crusading force. If feasible, the Order of the Pdins will also be invited to march and conduct a massive sweeping campaign.

    They would first rely on the divine barrier to gather these bees together from all around, performing weakening magic or making them sluggish, indeed weakening beforeing to pack. However, be prepared for sacrifice, as these magical creatures are ssified as fearsome by the rules.

    If more than one is found, the level of danger increases dramatically.

    Plus, what would happen if there was a queen''s rule? The answer is

    ...........

    ........

    The number of legionnaire bees that received Apito''s orders casually exceeded a thousand.

    What followed was a one-sided act of torture.

    It''s just that people who are a little more or less confident in their own hands, that level of confidence doesn''t work at all. Even if you''re an A-grade warrior with a certain level of strength, you''ll end up like ayman.

    If youre toote to react, you will surely end up dead.

    The Imperial General soldiers gathered on this floor were all killed, and it took less than ten minutes to go back and forth.

    Eighty-first to nieth floors of the maze

    It can be concluded by now.

    The first day was just to give them a taste of something sweet.

    All the surviving soldiers thought so.

    Thoserades in arms are gone.

    Everyone was killed.

    The monster in front of thema monster that is as strong as a ghost.

    Yet they are not the only ones who are unfortunate.

    The same tragedy is unfolding on other floors.

    Everyone is fighting a desperate battle these days. Staying on their own floors, facing their own strong enemies, forced to fight battles that have no chance of winning

    The eighty-first floor is a paradise for those magical beasts.

    Powerful individuals walk around and lead whole groups of people.

    But those are no more intelligent magical beasts. If it was a group of imperial soldiers with a hundred years ofbat experience, it could be said that it would be easy to defeat them.

    The strength of each one should be above a B on average. They would appear in teams of three to five, forcing the Imperial Army into an unexpectedly bitter fight.

    But it wasn''t enough to cause death or injury, and they managed to find thedder.

    They also rendezvoused with the 82nd floor Raiders team, which was pretty good for the first day''s results.

    It would take some time to proceed at this pace, but the Imperial Army thought it would be breached in a matter of days.

    However, when they cheat the next day.

    Because "that guy" showed up, the situation suddenly turned upside down.

    On the 82nd floor, in the dense forest, appears a monkey with an IQ high enough to speak humannguage.

    The monkey was able to control the wind and sound and could fly through the air and call out storms.

    It was a pure white demon monkeythe name was White Ape.

    The beautiful white hairs that adorned the supple body looked so beautiful that it even gave the illusion of dancing as it came and went rapidly across the battlefield.

    He can use sticks and stones to create unique kung fu and perform aerial martial arts that can change freely.

    And it also releases vacuum des in all directions, an extremely dangerous beastthis is the White Ape.

    The White Ape used monstrous arts and was even close to destroying the entire Imperial Army.

    After wreaking havoc for an hour, it left like a gust of wind. Leaving ament and saying it wille back.

    For the next two days, the white apes would repeatedlye over and attack regrly.

    One by one, the Imperial Army''s own members fell.

    He took out his pride as a soldier of the Empire and fought desperately against this beast, and finally lost the battle.

    The sniper team''s shots were all blocked by the storm, and even the magic that could make the opponent weaker or attach an abnormal state was not spared, those effects were all blocked by the demon magic.

    The Magic Gun''s attack magic was also not powerful enough to break the barrier formed by the wind.

    When we look at close quartersbat, the Mechs are the elite of the Imperial Army, and even their fortified soldiers are beginning to be toyed with.

    It was like dealing with small children, those elite people being teased by the white apes.

    Then when the timees, the white ape will retreat.

    In fact, the White Ape''s reason was simple. He wanted to wait for the Imperial Army''s soldiers to gather.

    At first the Imperial Army was indignant, thinking the other side underestimated them, but now began to pray that the opponent would retreat.

    And the number of survivors is now down to a thousand.

    How long will I live? wondered a soldier.

    How did things get to this point? It doesn''t matter how many times you think about it or not.

    The soldier''s eyes caught the remnants of the white ape.

    Where did it all go wrong?'' It''s toote to think of the answer, the soldier''s eyes are already dark

    Eighty-third floorThis is an expanse of open grasnd.

    While there are cute traps like groundholes, such things don''t pose a hindrance at all.

    The weather is clear. The marching soldiers were also glowing.

    But

    The next night, the Imperial Army was greatly wounded.

    At that time, a bright moon in the sky was about to turn from the upper lunar to the full moon.

    With the moon as a backdrop, a lone rabbit floats in the air.

    Its the rabbit that can manipte gravitythe Moon Hare.

    The Moon Hare''s attacks were indistinguishable from each other.

    It''s because you don''t care if one of your own is harmed that you can give it your all.

    Although swayed by the moon''s gains and losses, even during the new moon period, the moon hare possesses enough power to turn heaven and earth upside down. The supergravity is used to oppress and wreak havoc on the Imperial Army.

    But it''s not over here.

    The nightes again.

    And it''s a full moon in three days. The night ising when the moon hare pushes its power to the limit

    Eighty-fourth floora maze of streets formed by stone bs.

    The Imperial soldiers who walked on top of them all nched.

    It looks like they are wearing out more than expected.

    Givegive me water

    "No way. There was no way to contact the supply force. You have to be patient.

    "Damn it! It''s only the third day, but I want to drink waterIf I can''t drink water, I can''t even eat

    The reinforced soldier had undergone reconstructive surgery, but he couldn''t resist the thirst in his throat and said something depressing. This sight makes one look incredulous for a moment.

    But he can''t be med for that.

    Because of the ability to make water by magic, everyone carries only water from a water bottle.

    Because they think it''s more important to carry food than water.

    That''s a misstep on their part.

    This floor seems to be so full of toxins that it would be impossible to drink them at all if only to collect moisture from the atmosphere.

    It wasn''t until the third day that they found out about it. Some of the soldiers'' bodies began to appear, and this is when they realized that something was wrong.

    And these poisons are so vicious, there''s no way to detoxify them with antidote magic.

    No matter how many times the toxin is detoxified, one will look back and realize that the toxin ingredients have been mixed in the water.

    Thankfully, there was no problem breathing, buteven so, the soldier''s injuries were about to get too big for one shot.

    The soldiers in front of us all fell in pain. A look at them will reveal dark spots on the skin and a high fever.

    "Here we go again! Their strength is reduced and they must be treated"

    "Oh, my God, there''s no doctor here! And with healing magic?"

    "No effect

    The situation was like this, with partners falling one after another.

    The soldiers of the Empire''s generals were beginning to feel uneasy when they saw the situation, guessing whether it would be their turn next.

    There were small magical creatures running past those soldiers'' feet in intermittent bursts.

    These are ck rats that are less than five centimeters in length. Because they looked so overwhelmingly fragile, the Imperial soldiers didn''t even take them to heart.

    It''s just that

    It was a huge mistake. Those rats are the culprits that make the situation what it is.

    The Dark Sick ck Ratthats the floor guardian on this floor.

    They spread the ck Death and are the master of the gue. That''s what a ck rat is.

    The Imperial soldiers would bepletely wrong.

    They were overly concerned with the powerful magical beasts that walked on, and thus left out the weak, ck rats that seemed to die at the first step. There was absolutely no finding that it was the minions sent out by the ck rats, and the individuals who allowed the spread of the pathogenic bacteria led to this result.

    If one of them had a skill like Shinji''s, he should be able to paralyze this floor. It''s just a shame there''s no such coincidence in the world, no such doctor on the team.

    Healing through magic has a weak effect on disease. It would be a different story if the magic was used specifically to heal the disease, but the magic used to heal wounds is simply not effective against the disease.

    At best, it will restore strength, not cure. This is because treating a wound and treating a disease, the principles of which are followed, are two entirely different things.

    After all, divine magic masters who couldpletely cure the disease were so rare that it was uncertain whether even the countries could identify one or two people. Not to mention the fact that getting them to go to the battlefield together is not possible unless there are special circumstances.

    In this way, "death" began to spread on this floor

    Eighty-fifth floorThis is a dense forest of deciduous leaves in which the Great Tiger King is walking.

    While the other floors were able to make a fuss as they pleased, on this floor it was ruled by the king.

    The tiger was covered with thunder and lightningthe king''s name was Thunder Tiger.

    Before he showed up, the Imperial Army had the upper hand, but after that, it was different. They could only defend one-sidedly and were also forced to pull the stronghold back to the front of thedder.

    The woods are full of magical creatures.

    The fighting conditions were not favorable for the Imperial Army, who continued to resist

    Eighty-sixth floorthis is a sparse oasis in the desert.

    Under the sun, the temperature rises.

    The temperature drops after nightfall and the chill is frightening.

    The temperature difference was so great that although there was nobat, the Imperial soldiers lost their strength as a result.

    So those generals and soldiers thought the temperature was the biggest enemy.

    This statement does not say the wrong thing, but it is not the correct answer.

    The real trap out is in the oxygen concentration.

    A winged snakea pterodactyl.

    Pterodactyl affects the atmosphere.

    The operating ingredients zero out the oxygen concentration, which is as easy for a pterodactyl as breaking a baby''s hand.

    The general soldiers of the Imperial Army thought that it was the temperature difference that made them unwell, thinking that a night''s rest would allow their bodies to recover, thinking too simply. They just died quietly

    The eighty-seventhyerThis is somehow a vast expanse of mountains.

    Theid-back scenery reminded the soldiers of their families.

    Without rxing, they think about their happy childhood and dreams of having a date with their beloved woman.

    It took less than five days for everyone to let their guard down.

    The low frequency of the appearance of magic can also be a reason. Unlike the other floors, it''s hard to keep the tension up all the time here.

    Just by being in this state, they didn''t notice.

    Didn''t find the shifters asleep and not up.

    I didn''t realize that anyone who seemed to be awake was really just a wishful thinking of their own.

    The sheep that make men dreamthe sleeping sheep that tempt them.

    Gentle sheep love peace and deprive soldiers of their consciousness in a state where there is no bloodshed.

    If seduced by the hallucinatory hypnosis of a dormant sheep, those people will fall asleep and never wake up again

    The 88th flooThis is alongside a river in a forest where firebirds live.

    Incredibly, these mes do not burn into the trees. It will only react to people who are hostile, it will keep burning and it will not go away.

    It was a bird with a full body of firethe mingos.

    The floor guardian of thisnd is called by that name.

    mingos and flocks of dependent birds set out to burn the Imperial Army to death

    Eighty-ninth floorThis is the maze of mirrors.

    This floor is not affected by vegetation.

    It''s well managed and the mirrors are all polished.

    The passageways are reflected on the mirrors, making the maze even moreplex.

    And none of these mirrors will break.

    Because these are all born of a magical creature using secret magic.

    The dog that can wander in the mirrorthe Mirror Dog runs through it.

    He was free to run around in the mirror and tease the Imperial Army.

    His body is in the mirrors, and those mirrors reflect all spells on the user.

    Even capturing its essence was difficult, and the Mirror Dog was such a magical creature.

    Under the light of the mirror, the Mirror Dog grows infinitely, and the poor prey is bitten and killed by him

    On the various floors, the vicious floor guardians went on a rampage.

    If it''s a handy domain, the floor guardians will be at their best.

    Even so, the Imperial Army resisted desperately.

    There will be times when the opponent seeds in taking down the opponent, and a big cheer will be raised at that time.

    But

    All of these magical things wille to life.

    Resurrected again and again.

    This part is the scariest.

    When the situation on the other floorses back, it will be found that they are in the same situation.

    Soldiers who learned of this could not help but be discouraged. They had been fighting a hopeless battle, only to find that it was all for naught.

    Beyond that, who is more desperate

    It is said that monkeys, rabbits, rats, tigers, snakes, sheep, birds, and dogs, which are the demonic beasts of the animal family, are the eight tribes under the Nine-Tails. Just some cute pets.

    Those demonic beasts were all illuminated by the tails of the Nine-Tailed Kumara, and their respective abilities were only from Kumara.

    The gesture of the eight congregations assembled was the true face of the Nine-Tailed Kumara.

    Nowadays, Kumara is no longer childlike, but rather beautiful.

    The illusionary queen who leads the monstrous beasts is the floor guardian of the nieth floor, the Nine-Tailed Beast, Kumara.

    Some foolish and pathetic sacrifices came to Kumara.

    These people were nothing more than fodder to Kumaramore dead people appeared in the maze.

    Immediately following

    A few days passed when the Imperial Army''s fifty-three thousand soldiers stormed the maze.

    The survivors in thebyrinth go to zero.

 Volume 13 - Ch 4

    Seven days had passed since Operation Maze Raider began.

    Maze had been silently swallowing the general soldiers as best he could.

    They failed to pass the report back, leaving Calgurio to spend the restless hours.

    The reason for this constant state of anxiety is to mask instinctive fear.

    There is still no way to contact the other units, and contact with those inside thebyrinth has been broken.

    At first nce they lookedpletely isted in enemy territory. Such a situation made Calgurio uneasy.

    "Still no one''sing back!"

    He let out an angry roar, but no one responded.

    That''s actually the answer.

    And it wasn''t just Calgurio, those staff officers knew the situation wasn''t good.

    At first they sent soldiers several times, returning from inside thebyrinth with information.

    Although none of the soldiers came back to the ground, they were still able to interact with the people inside at first. It is possible to consolidate the information and get a general idea of the situation.

    When you enter the maze, you have to check with me at the maze.

    This time the maze prompts the conditions for breaking the barrier.

    The ten men in thebyrinth must be defeated and ten keys collected. That would seem to get the right to challenge the King of the Labyrinth. Defeat the King of the Labyrinth to break through

    At first they didn''t think it would be that hard.

    But nowadays, they have to say it was bad judgment.

    ording to the information gathered, the lowest floor in thebyrinth is also more than 50 floors.

    Although the floors were exchanged every time they were full of a thousand people, the soldiers were still able to enter in order. Thus able to make contact with those who had gone in first, but the first time they were able to make contact, the number of people who had entered thebyrinth had long exceeded fifty thousand.

    They repeatedly sent people into the maze several times, and calcted that the floor was probably over fifty-four floors.

    Yuuki had once revealed to them the contents of the report that Shinji and others had brought back, hearing that the maze had sixtyyers. Yet this information was not reliable, and they found this out early on.

    That was because the strength of the magical creatures that appeared within the maze was simply not the same as what was heard.

    That said, they said that the King of the Labyrinth was the "Immortal King, and from that point of view, the words of Shinji and others were no longer credible.

    This was because someone reported upwards the next day that they had found the floor dominated by the Immortal King.

    That "Immortal King" seems to be one of the so-called "Ten Lords of the Labyrinth

    Some say the hearsay may be true.

    Nowadays, no one dares tough at those people anymore.

    "No matter how powerful the elite personnel are, they seem to be struggling

    "Yes. The operation may fail if it goes on like this.

    How can that beat the thought of this, Calgurio shivered.

    The phrase Raid Operation Failure was simple to say, but it represented the death of five hundred and thirty thousand Imperial General soldiers.

    Emperor Rudra handed over such important general and soldiers to him, how could he abandon them in three or two times and not save them from death?

    Seven days to go. There''s still quite a cushion before the deadline, and the current Operation Maze Raid within the Labyrinth should be ongoing. He would just have to trust these people and wait on the sidelines.

    That would have been the right judgment, but Calguriono, he wasn''t the only one, even the other staff officers didn''t think it would be good.

    The reason why it makes them think that way is because of the existence of the Labyrinth Ten".

    There are currently four "keys" that they have been given. Although they seemed toe back to life no matter how many times they were defeated, they still managed to get the key from the four Dragon Kings.

    However, there is not even a single sight of the other six to be crushed.

    The "Immortal King" was also one of them, along with the Necromancer Pdin who looked like he was his right hand.

    As well as the queen who rules the insects, plus the mistress of those beasts.

    There''s another attacking type of wizard, nicknamed the Undead of Gadra.

    Thest one he is not even sure of its true identity.

    If these six were not defeated, it would have been a fool''s dream to break through the maze.

    Such conditions could not have been met with the current strength of the war inside thebyrinth

    Calgurio thought so, and the staff members were unanimous in their judgment.

    "But no matter how much you bet, it''s useless.

    Yes."

    "That''s just a waste of money. And the guards here are disturbing, too, I suppose.

    So what should be done?

    There is only one answer.

    Only the most primitive method of maze nning can be usedform an elite team to challenge.

    In that case, however, the question is who to choose.

    After a moment of annoyance, Calgurio picked out some of the cream of the crop from the legion.

    He sought out a hundred men and women.

    Only the cream of the crop from each unit is recruited, as well as those who are confident in their strength.

    Sitting in the front row was an elegant man, looking calm and gentle. Even on the battlefield, his battered uniform is still worn straight.

    The man''s name is Minute. He was the first right-hand man to Calgurio''s side, ranking high as a major general.

    It was themander of this battle n that was rmended by Calgurio.

    Next to him sat a cold man with a cigarette in his mouth.

    His eyes seemed to be staring at his prey, and his bearded face was so decent that anyone opposite him would be afraid. And this man also possesses no less strength than his appearance.

    He''s Grand Marshal Kansas.

    He is a hero who has made many great achievements. The most famous of these is the "Monster Country Annihtion Campaign". The man in charge at the time was Kansas.

    Self-confidence may be on disy in his attitude, which is rampant. Even in the face of a group of superiors, he doesn''t show half a fear in the slightest.

    No one else around them made a sound to warn Kansas. It''s no wonder, after all, that even his immediate superior, Minute, acquiesces to this attitude.

    Calgurio, personally, while having an opinion on this, is not yet so much as to speak ill of a hero who is also famous in the Empire. Everything was left in the hands of the opposing boss, Minute, so there was no way the crowd on the scene was going to pick up on Kansas'' behavior.

    Other celebrities include Michel and Raymond.

    These two are "otherworldly visitors".

    Michel has a unique skill called "Fusionist". She is good at using this power to create high firepower attacks, and is well known in the Imperial Army.

    As for Raymond, he has a unique skill called "fighter". He was originally a fighter, and that seemed to turn directly into his skill. He is a top fighter who is able to use all weapons and fighting techniques, as well as techniques learned in this world, with the utmost skill.

    The more prominent and famous ones are these four, but the others are also one-trick pony fighters.

    The lowest ranked among them have all made it to level A, which is the best among the Imperial Army.

    These one hundred men alone could destroy the Knights of other nations. Calgurio decided to entrust everything in this battle n to those heroes.

    "So, everyone, you''ve heard all about it, right?

    Everyone nodded in silence. Although there were also men like Kansas who existed with a disdainful smile on their faces, most of them listened attentively to Calgurio.

    "Ourrades are currently awaiting rescue in thebyrinth. Certain conditions had to be met in order to leave the maze, one of which was still to crush the Demon Lord. If the strongest mecha legion in our Empire is sent, I am sure this problem will be solved as well. Only pity! That would waste too much time.

    This maze could not be defeated by the army waging manned naval tactics. Calgurio understood that, but he couldn''t say it honestly.

    Doing so would cause demoralization, so he polished the words and exined them to these ministers.

    "We will crush the Ten Lords of the Labyrinth and collect the Ten Keys. That would seem to gain the right to challenge the Demon Lord Rimuru. I look forward to your being able to take on this task. I want to ask you to crush the Demon Lord!

    Calgurio makes this speech in the face of the elite of the Mecha Legion, who are no longer equalled.

    "Wrap it up on us, Lord Calgurio. For us, the glorious Imperial Army, the Demon Lord is no match at all. Let''s prove it next!

    Minute, the highest ranking man, replied on behalf of everyone.

    He posed gracefully and was guaranteed to win.

    No one in the room objected to Minute''s words. Because these people were proud of their abilities, everyone was sure they would win.

    So much so that they elected the brave man in charge of challenging the Demon Lord.

    These people don''t know the truth.

    It is because of their ignorance that they get their hopes up.

    Knowing nothing about it didn''t reveal the hidden crisis in the maze.

    This is the time when retreat is the right thing to do.

    But it was all toote.

    Calgurio was too slow to make the decision.

    The battle inside thebyrinth was over and no one was left inside.

    He had no idea that the situation had turned out this way

    The chosen brave men are ready to enter the daunting maze with aplomb.

    ***

    We were all drawn to the images on the big screen, and we were able to catch our breath.

    Should I say it''s not surprising? The Imperials seemed to take that as a joke and ignored the warning written on the door. And the number of general soldiers sent into thebyrinth exceeded our expectations.

    "That''s great. The results exceeded expectations."

    As I mumbled something, Benimaru nodded along with it.

    "I don''t think there''s anyone who has to be on guard. One of the reasons should be that the Ten Lords of the Labyrinth are too strong, but it really seems like it''s easier than one would think.

    He said so with his mouth open and not a slouch in his eyes.

    He seems to have switched thoughts, this time putting the focus on the ground.

    "There seems to be another movement on the enemy''s side.

    "Right. This time it didn''t have to be manned, the members seemed to have been selected. It''s going toe in eventually anyway, they should have made their decision earlier. Then our people in thebyrinth will probably be in a bit of a fight too"

    "Hey, hey, hey, isn''t that just what we want?

    "Yeah, that''s right. But it''s disturbing that things are going so well

    Benimaru said the words, but one could see from his expression that he took them for granted as a result.

    That''s not the problem

    Since there''s no chance of him making an appearance, this guy wants the Imperials to fight a little bit, right?

    He seems to understand his mood, but he doesn''t seem to understand

    No, no, no, if it''s figured out, it means I''ve be a battle nut too.

    I''m not like the Benimarus.

    Such an oue makes me very happy.

    And one thing has been said many times, and that is that in this world, quality is greater than quantity.

    The troops they selected were probably the enemy main force. These guys are likely to break the Ten Lords of the Labyrinth individually, so they can''t take it as a game now.

    The original purpose was to reduce the number of enemy troops.

    That part is done. There are only a hundred thousand or so people left on the Imperial side, and that number alone has been reduced to the point where even the Western countries can adequately cope.

    Simply put, that''s it.

    The same is true of the gamble, which is to give the enemy a big win in the beginning, so that they will miss the opportunity to stop it just in time.

    Because the illusion of their winning is so beautiful that these people think they can make up for it even if they losewhich sums up the phenomenon.

    In this case, it''s hard to stop even when you know you should.

    This was exactly what the Imperial Army had written about this time, they had sent troops in repeatedly, only to identally bet too much on battle power, so much that it was irreparable.

    Personally, I think it''s great that the purpose was served.

    It is pleasing that the battle n is going so well, but the other objective, to force the master out, is not yet achieved.

    There seemed to be a few masters on the opposing side, but none that looked like they could beat me.

    However, as Chloe mentioned earlier, I didnt seem to be a Demon Lord yet, and I don''t think there''s much difference in strength from when we lost to HinataNo, I don''t think there''s much difference in strength from when we were tiedThat said, I still don''t see anyone who can pose that much threat.

    To be hard to say, only the people Testrossa killed had Legendary level equipment.

    If it''s the eleventh-ranked Tibbs, he might be able to kill me, too.

    Certainly not the current me, but the one who was still fighting Hinata at the beginning.

    The result is still no one who could potentially kill me, that''s the conclusion.

    It''s no use trying to think about that, and I decided to put that topic aside for now.

    I care more about what the enemymander thinks.

    Things have gotten so miserable that it would generally be right to choose to retreat

    What on earth was themander on the enemy''s side thinking?

    <> s, Master Raphael, the King of Wisdom, speaks spitefully.</answer.>

    Hearing it say that makes sense to me. But then again, it''s not good to suppress too much in an intelligence war.

    If themander had had a real grasp of the situation, perhaps the other side would have retreated.

    <> Good snarkyments.</answer.>

    While it sounds logical and cold, I don''t think it''s the right answer either.

    The Empire wouldn''t have given up on ambition if it had left them with some full decent fighting power. But if they werepletely crushed here, at least for the time being, they would avoid fighting the Eastern Empire.

    No matter what you do, there is nothing worse than not being able to do it.

    The enemy also has their family, and presumably the family that was left behind will feel sad.

    But

    If one took the opportunity to let them find out how stupid they were this time, one might be able to prevent a fight afterwards.

    It''s definitely not righteous to do so, but at least to guard against petty strife, which I think is the right thing to do.

    Anyway, it''s toote to say that.

    Unlike Master Raphael, the king of wisdom, I am indecisive.

    If the enemy flee, let them go, and attack again, and then crush them again.

    Maybe I''m still too naive to let my opponent decide what to do in the future.

    I understand it myself, but that''s my nature, and it''s not that easy to reverse it.

    Seriously, I actually don''t want the other person to call me, I hate trouble.

    I sighed quietly in my heart, and at this time, Ramiris got in touch with me.

    "Rimuru, can I talk now?

    "Yes, yes. I''m Rimuru, no problem.

    It didn''t seem urgent to hear her tone, not knowing what was going on.

    "I''m asking you, there''ll be another hundred peopleing, right?

    "It seems so. The enemy seems to be very strong this time.

    "Mm-hmm. So, the Labyrinth Lords, they want to ask for something.

    Ramiris told me about what they were asking for.

    Request number one, sponsored by Gadra.

    I didn''t expect that there was someone he knew among thosebyrinth intruders. The names seem to be Michel and Raymond, who are "otherworldly visitors".

    He would step up and convince, begging me to let them join as partners.

    Request number two, sponsored by Kumara.

    She also seemed to spot familiar faces from among the intruders.

    Yet unlike Gadra, not old acquaintances, but those she wants revenge from.

    This man not only destroyed the Kumara''s hometown of Monster Country, but also sold the youngin other words, seemingly nearly three hundred years old at the timeKumara was sold to the demon lord yman. I didn''t expect such a vicious bastard to be affiliated with the Imperial Army

    That''s all there is to request, what should be done?

    "What do you think, Benimaru?"

    "Well, send a few more men against them, and it will be easier to win, but it will not be. I know you can''t fight a war without knowing what you''re going to do, but we can''t just ept the proposal, can we?

    If Gadra seeds in convincing them, it is well to say that even if it fails, there is not much to lose.

    Indeed, that is correct.

    It''s all about spreading each other''s fighting power anyway, so leave those two to Gadra.

    As for Kumara

    "Anyone who wants revenge doesn''t want to be hindered.

    The words came out through Benimaru''s mouth looking a little heavy.

    So to put it this way, Kumara used to be dominated by yman using spells. Since the man who started it was here, of course she would want revenge.

    Although some people say it''s not time for revenge, I think it''s a good way to vent one''s grievances.

    Instead of holding on to your anger, it would be better to take it out on the other person.

    For these reasons, I have decided to approve.

    "These requests are approved, Ramiris.

    "Great! If its Rimuru. It''s reasonable.

    "Anyway, we want to spread the other side''s strength, so Gadra''s side we will just let him deal with Michel and Raymond. This way"

    "Give her the bearded man! I don''t know what his name is, but this man''s face is nasty.

    Ramiris waspletely on the side of Kumara.

    But I was in the same mood as them.

    "Let''s send that guy over there. Then send a message to Kumara to do her best!

    "OK, let her have it.

    So much so that I granted their request.

    As for the distribution of the remaining strength

    "That man over there looks like he''s inmand. Lord Rimuru, let that man be alone and leave him to Apito to clean up.

    Benimaru does not change color to say horrible words.

    He also said, "You can''t win with more bullying, but you can''t win with less," but he said that he was nning to do so easily.

    But I went with his offer.

    "Ramiris, that fashionable middle-aged man seems to be themander, send this guy alone to Apitos side.

    "I get it. To take away hismand, so that the enemy bes a scattered disk of sand. It''s a dirty battle n!

    Huh?

    And I turn out to be the bad guy?

    Throwing the surprised me aside, Ramiris came up with her own set of exnations.

    "Can we give the rest of the 100 men to Adalman?

    "Understood! Although other people''s Dragon King treasures were lost, others were still trying. Let''s work at this pace until the end.

    Ramiris seemed a little chagrined, but it didn''t help.

    Even if those dragon kings were better off, they were no good against the hordes that swarmed in.

    Unlike the other Ten Lords of the Labyrinth, the floors with terrain effects arerge. It is true that it ys an important role to find fault with the enemy, but if the enemy side shares information with each other and formtes countermeasures, the advantage will be lost.

    The Dragon Kings were fighting in this situation and I think they all did their best.

    Despite being robbed of four keys, there were still six Labyrinth Lords left to lose. Let''s ask them to continue at this pace.

    "It''s up to you! But you must not be careless. There may be dangerous people in those 100 people.

    "No problem, no problem! I said that Rimuru would be watching from the sidelines and everyone was in high spirits. And the king of thebyrinth is Master Veldora!

    That''s saying something.

    This time the maze''s condition bes "Collect ten keys and defeat the king of the maze to win". I can''t imagine that Veldora would go down, I think that aspect can be taken care of.

    Right, me too. Then keep up the good work!

    Leave it to us!"

    Leaving these energetic words behind, Ramiris ended the conversation through the Communication Network.

    So next, onest step to go.

    To observe the final battle, my gaze pulled back to the screen once more.

    ***

    Michel and Raymond sat on the steps, panting as they drank water.

    ording to the report, it does not appear that magical creatures will appear in the stairwell. Although it''s dangerous to take it as it is, they thought it was safer here than elsewhere, so they rested here.

    ...........

    ........

    They had been admonished by the great general, Calgurio, and were ordered to enter thebyrinth. For that, they have noints.

    Just like Shinji and the rest of them, Michel and others were "otherworldly visitors" picked up by Master Gadra. They all felt that Gadra had been gracious to them, rewarding them with a bite to eat when they fell into this inexplicable world.

    And this Gadra''s whereabouts are unknown.

    He seemed to be leading a special force on a mission to the Demon Lord Rimurus territory.

    Although Gadra hade back once, none of the other team members returned. I heard that Gadra had reported to Yuuki that all the people who had gone with him had died in battle.

    Then even Gadra disappeared.

    Rumors spread that he had gone to the rescue of his buddies from the previous unit.

    Those who know Gadra will find it a little hard to believe, but if it is true, it cannot be ignored.

    And again

    These men, who were said to have died in battle and to have travelled with Gadra, were also well known to Michel.

    The three men were Shinji Tanimura, Mark Lauren, and Zhen Liu Xing.

    The incident was momentarily unbelievable, but the truth was that Shinji hadn''te back for either of them. It was said that their mission was to investigate thebyrinth and that something must have happened between there and the Demon Lord Rimuru.

    Shinji exined it best when the three of them challenged Demon Lord Rimuru and were killed as a result.

    Among fellow countrymen, there are those who are sad because they are truly ruled out. The same is true of the Michel and many others. Because they are all from the same hometown, there is an inexplicable sense of connection.

    Also, Shinji Tanimura is a man with leadership qualities and won''t leave behind people who are in trouble, this man has a good heart. Although a bit retarded at times, there are people who admire such Shinji.

    Gadra has been gracious to them. Plus Michel and the others also wanted toe and make sure to see if the friends who were going to be good were okay.

    After talking to the pals about such ideas, the two who fought the most among them, Michel and Raymond, were pushed to join the expedition.

    The two of them immediately made their wishes known to Yuuki, only to be rebuffed by the other.

    "It''s really dangerous to act now. The situation is a bit confusing and it''s best not to act rashly. I can''t tell you in detail, but I''m sure they''ll be safe"

    That''s roughly the case, the other side didn''t actually respond to their wishes.

    Since Yuuki had said it was dangerous, it should be really dangerous. But some people don''t have the means to do that. Letting things go like that, those people would probably run over without permission, and instead of letting things evolve that way, it would be better to have people like Michel, who was particrly good at fighting, step in and everyone thought they had a way of handling whatever situation they were in.

    For such reasons, Michel took the liberty. Raymond agrees with her, and the twounch their operation behind Yuuki''s back.

    They hired someone to transfer them from the Hybrid Legion to the Mecha Legion so they could carry out this battle n.

    For there is such a story behind Michel and them, and Calgurio''s order is just what they want

    ...........

    ........

    "Maybe it''s a big mistake to go in there.

    "Probably. I didn''t expect the enemy to be this strong.

    The two of them were divided into fifty-nine levels.

    These two were unaware of it, in fact Rimuru and the others had nned to get them directly to the sixtieth level in a single turn.

    But these two are likely to hide their strength.

    There was also the possibility that someone was pretending, so Rimuru and the others decided to see the situation first before they did.

    By the way, this ideaes from the Rimururather the "King of Wisdom Raphael," it should be said.

    They hadn''t expected Rimuru''s mind to be so deepboth Ramiris and Gadra had exined themselves in that direction and decided to go along with it.

    It was for those reasons that Michel was forced toe to the fifty-ninth floor to encounter a fierce battle.

    Wee across things like variableser beam cannons, sonic cannons, or other scientific weapons of all kinds. Once the wall was down, it created passages that spewed out colorless and odorless poison gas.

    At the moment, it has been moved to the 100th floor, and all the weapons produced by the 95th floor have been put to use on the 59th floor.

    The most extreme representative is the magic puppet, which strengthens the human attack weapon.

    In the Puppet Kingdom Gustav found the ruins of "Amrita" and Rimuru asked someone to bring back information from there. The reappearance of the defense apparatus after the study ys out best in this ce.

    When ites to wiping out the Imperial Army, not even ten percent of these weapons will be used.

    Those are now used to test Michel and others.

    Both sides got serious and fought offensive and defensive battles, and those two exposed all of their best moves.

    Raymond is responsible for buying some time in the guard.

    Michel uses this valuable time to unleash a must-kill strike.

    Michel''s "fusionist" effectiveness is as the name implies. The ability to allow substances to mix and also to extract energy from them. Depending on how it''s used, it can even turn into an attack of the same level as nuclear strike magic.

    It was also Gadra who discovered this and taught it to Michel. While recalling the favors the benefactor had brought to herself, Michel fought desperately.

    As for the fight, those two got andslide victory. Faced with a high destructive attack, even the Magic Puppets and Science Weapon Swarm were no match for them.

    Only, the numbers are just too abusive.

    Just the two of them breaking through so many traps alone was very taxing, just one day made Michel tired them half to death, inevitably this would happen.

    Heywhat to do? Want to move on?

    "Say what the hell. We''ll just have to walk the next floor. With so many weapons and traps, it''s dangerous to advance with no countermeasures.

    "That''s true. But when I say you, there''s no other way, is there? Once inside the maze, they got separated from the others

    Raymond was right. In fact, even Michel understood that, but there was really nothing they could do at the moment.

    Since it''s dangerous to move forward, what''s the right thing to do?

    Even if you don''t go down and instead go up, there''s no guarantee you''ll necessarily leave the maze. It should be said that if one believes that the will one receives when entering thebyrinth is true, one should not be able to leave without meeting the conditions for breaking the barrier.

    "There''s no way this maze can be broken

    "Also. If there is time, there may be a turnaround, but even if it takes more than a month to walk through one floor a day, it will take more than a month. It''s not really that bad, but we don''t have enough food.

    The biggest problem is this.

    Michel and Raymond did not undergo reconstructive surgery and therefore had to eat. The water part should do the trick, but the grain is only twenty days old. If they didn''t have magical creatures lurking on that floor like the one just now, they wouldn''t have been able to resort to eating monster flesh and blood.

    They may notst even three weeks at this rate.

    It''s only been a day since they broke into the maze. The situation was already desperate, with a sense of unpredictability.

    However, the two of them didn''t give up.

    After all, the two of them had one more purpose, which was to gather information about their benefactor and friend. If they give up on this side, then they should never have entered the maze in the first ce.

    "By the way, someone sent this to us before we came in. Do you think you can trust it?

    Pointing one side of his throat, Michel asked Raymond so. His finger pointed to a piece of jewelry that was to be carried out before the maze invasion battle that Calgurio had handed them.

    I heard that it''s a test piece produced by the development department, modeled after the resurrection props that Gadra brought back.

    I''ve heard that there is this even if you die in thebyrinth, you can stille back to life, but Michel doesn''t believe it.

    "Of course I can''t believe it. Even if it doese back to life, then where will wee back to life?

    "That''s true. If we wille back to life on the spot, we will run to the magical creature that killed us.

    This part of the experiment hasn''t even been done yet, has it?

    "Right. Seems like theyre going to experiment with us. Besides, why hang it around your neck? Isn''t that the bracelet I heard you brought back?

    "That means the Empire''s technology isn''t mature enough.

    Since this is a replica of the duck that was rushed to the shelves, someone exined to them that the size becamerger. Yet this made both of them even more suspicious.

    I am not even willing to ept the idea of handing over my life to an imitation, as a matter ofmon sense."

    "It is only the chosen ones that we prepare such things for them. I''m bullish on you guys and think something like this is worth delivering to you!

    In this way, Calgurio has polished the words in his exnation, which in turn means that he has not confirmed what will happen if he uses them.

    Also not for the soldiers at the end, the results won''t be known until it''s used.

    At least if there is experimental data, then they are willing to believe it, but only if they are going to be experiments themselves, idiot.

    "If you die first, then I can confirm what happens when I use it.

    "That joke''s not funny. At least I''m not going to rely on that kind of stuff.

    Raymond gave a practical response.

    "After all, the original version of such a thing, the Resurrection Bracelets, came from the power of the Demon Lord, right? Don''t you think a fake like this will make the other party angry?

    As Raymond continued to pick up where he left off, Michel seemed to share this, shrugging her shoulders in agreement.

    The premise of the action is that there is no way to be resurrected from the deada conclusion that both rightly draw.

    All that can be counted on is their strength. So the two stood up with bitter smiles on their faces.

    "Want to go?

    "Right. Now that it''s alle down to this, we can only move forward. If it doesn''t work out, people will forgive us.

    "Will it? Shinji would haveughed, but he"

    "Please stop. It''s hard to forget.

    "Yeah, sorry. Hes even scarier than the maze.

    "Hey, hey, how can you speak your mind just because the other person can''t hear you? But I also agree that that''s it.

    "Right? I really admire Shinji''s retardation. People are so passionate about him, but they arepletely ignored.

    "I agree. But that''s the way it''s gonna be. About that, actually, hes alsojust that.

    "Also. Thinking about it this way makes you think that Shinji isn''t easy either. Maybe he''ll survive if he doesn''t do anything to save his life.

    "Yeah, that''s it!

    A smile appeared on the two men''s faces. Even in these circumstances, there is hope and a clear sense of which way to go.

    With cheerful smiles on their faces, the two men began to walk down the steps.

    There was absolutely no telling who would be waiting for them ahead.

    Immediately following

    "Hello, you! Michel, and Raymond. There''s something I''d like to discuss with you two!

    "Right. Because this thing is really doing you guys a lot of good, it doesn''t hurt to listen!

    "You''re supposed to be listening.

    Seeing the trio of Shinji and others who they wanted to savee out to greet themselves, Michel and Raymond were surprised to the point of stiffness.

    "Well, you guys seem surprised. I''d like to ask you too. Can you hear us out first?"

    There was also a huge magic doll towering in front of us, and a nostalgic sound came from inside. It must be right that the owner of the voice was the one who had been kind to Michel and themGadra.

    Youyou''re still alive?

    "Shall we saywhats going on?

    Gadra and the others are going to start docking to convince each other.

    The two were in turmoil, and it only took a little more time to convince them.

    ***

    It looked like Gadra had them convince each other with such ease and simplicity that it was surprising.

    Shinji said they would not take part in this war, and even they ran to be lobbyists. Presumably, their efforts were not in vain, and without argument, the other just agreed.

    The two, Michel and Raymond, were both disciples of Gadra and friends of Shinji. They were frantically tested for strength at the fifty-ninth level, and the scarier one was Michel.

    This ones skills are foul. It looks like she flicked something with her fingers and the result was a small explosiona nuclear explosion that could be confined to a specific area. The response was small, but powerful to the point of no return.

    The unique technology of the fusionistthe ability to denature the substance and fuse it with other substances. The way to use it is to let the tiny shattered stones spoil and then throw them at the enemy, causing them to explode.

    Even if you have to use something like a "barrier" to bullet the gravel, it will still explode when it falls to the ground. It could have been avoided if it had been a clever bounce, however the gravel used by Michel is small enough to be bounced with a fingernail, so it''s not easy to actually bounce. The preconditions are such that it would be difficult to bounce it off the ground.

    It''s so vicious. Using such a means of attack, one ident and even she herself would suffer a wave of blows, but about that, she did a lot of research. Not sure what kind of training she did all the way through, but it all seemed to predict the route perfectly.

    And then there''s Raymond who teams up with Michel like that.

    Raymond''s fighting skills were great, as was releasing Fighting Qi to form a shield. The ability to block out all attacks from the front will be fascinating to watch.

    Even the st wave that Michel had triggered was beautifully defused by Raymond''s shield. Theyre a great duo, and the two characters fit together nicely.

    It doesn''t look like anyone else has changed either, it must be them personally. There was also no sign of the spirit being manipted, and it seemed that their purpose foring this time was to save Gadra and Shinji.

    Both seem trustworthy, and it''s really great to be partners in earnest.

    In order for the two who became partners to take some time to study for the time being, the intention was for them to work under Shinji and the others. While it should be used without fear of their betrayal, it''s better to take precautions first.

    Let''s look at the situation first, and thenpare them to Shinji and let these two people get promoted.

    Things were going well up to the 60th floor.

    Thene to the 70th floor

    It is hilly and there are about a hundred people gathered together.

    At first it all seemed a bit fuzzy, but now that the day had passed, they had all calmed down. Above the hills there was a ce of great visibility, where these men camped, and several scouts were sent to scout in various ces.

    They don''t seem to be nning to act right away and feel very deliberate.

    Just themander running off to somewhere else, but it''s amazing that they can still correspond so calmly.

    It should be said that the warriors are outstanding in the various units.

    "Thought they''d panic even more.

    "No, that''s the way it should be. They crafted a clear chain ofmand from the beginning, even if themander wasn''t there.

    Unlike me, Benimaru givesmentary lightly.

    If the chain ofmand is chaotic, how can operational operations be carried out? Someone must be found to lead.

    Of course this has to be clearlyid outI can understand that, but as a matter of course the people who are gathered here have been brought here on a temporary basis. Yet they were able to find a recement for themander right away, which I secretly admired despite being the enemy.

    "Are we okay here?

    "Of course. Even without me, there is the green legion, and underneath green legion, there are excellent talents standing by. Tactical theory is also a must for the Kurenai, and everyone can be amander.

    Oh, you''re so confident.

    Even I didn''t learn those, at what point did they learn them?

    "That''s good. What do you think their purpose is?"

    The chain ofmand of our army was left to Benimaru and the chiefs of the various corps. I''m going to care about that won''t help much, so I''m going toe back to the reality side now.

    About the Imperial General''s soldiers whoid out the 70th floor

    "Their purpose must have been to find out if there were any survivors on the other floors. That''s on their bad luck. The rest of the floor is a different story, and this one leaves no trace.

    Benimaru replied as if he was sympathizing with those enemies.

    Hearing that, I also understood.

    I know there are no survivors on the Imperial side, but one of their purposes is to findpanions.

    Meeting up with survivors to increasebat power is a reasonable move from abat standpoint.

    But now that it was known that it was pointless for them to do so, there was no point in waiting for them to act.

    "Shall we let Adalman attack?

    When I said so, Shion nodded vigorously along with me. It looked as if she was feeling very bored and she herself was eager to strike out.

    Even so, as long as there were still enemies left in the maze, she was responsible for protecting me.

    Even Shion understood this, so she wanted to finish the matter sooner rather thanter and go outside to fight.

    "That''s right. There''s no way to get any great information if you keep watching.

    Seeing this look on Shion''s face, Benimaru said with a dark smile.

    Instructions to Adalman follow.

    "My god, let me behave!

    It seems that Shion wasn''t the only one who was looking forward to fighting. Adalman had also been preparing his army to meet the Imperial Army early on.

    Adalman and the others continued their winning streak. Seemingly intent on taking advantage of the situation to win even the final battle.

    "Then go for it!

    Yes!"

    The encouragement I gave became a signal for war.

    Adalman and then rest came in force and opened the closed door and struck at it.

    Then an hour passed.

    A startling sight appeared before his eyes.

    There were only three survivors left on the Imperial side. It''s just that the only ones who have survived on our side are also Adalman, Albert and the Necromancer Dragon.

    It''s now a three-on-three showdown.

    The other remaining nearly a hundred people were all killed along with the Necromantic Army, and these guys couldn''t wait for reinforcements. Wait three hours before the army of the deades back to life, and when I think about it, I''ll be able to determine the winner.

    However

    "Kufufufufu. Interesting people have emerged.

    "Mmm. I''d like to fight them too.

    Rarely do Diablo and Shion give their testimonials.

    Such a powerful warrior was mixed up in the enemy army, and there were three others.

    One was a gentle looking male swordsman.

    The opponent is fighting Albert.

    The other person is the Wizard of Beauty.

    In a magical showdown with Adalman.

    There was also a tall warrior of stature.

    The power of one man alone held the Necromancer dragon.

    Seeing the opponent summon the familiar glowing armor to wear on his body, it must have been a partner who was previously killed by Testarossa and possessed legendary equipment.

    The styles are uniform and definitely belong to the same organization.

    "That swordsman is so strong that he''s intimidating. I never thought hed be on equal footing with Albert.

    The battle between Albert and the man, both of them used a rare divine skill. Each belonged to the genre of equipping swords and shields, and their strengths were somewhere in between.

    Like Benimaru said, it''s true to say that those two areparable in strength.

    This guy seems to be more than the man who was beaten down by Testarossa. Maybe this guy''s ranking is up front, too.

    "Kufufufufu. In the face of an opponent of that level, the magic was surprisingly at the disadvantage.

    "That said, Diablo. Regardless of the holy and magical attributes, that armor can resist all magic. It''s no wonder it''s working against Adalman.

    Shion''sments hit the nail on the head. Although Adalman had the additional skill "Holy Demon Reversal", that legendary level defense was so foul that it could resist almost all magic.

    If you want to break through, you can only use the strongest magic such as "Reiko Bad Destruction".

    Adalman would have used it, too, but the opponent wouldn''t let him.

    One can only hit a break with some random magic and then attack while they''re at it. But they seem to be thinking the same thing about each other, and the two sides are currently deadlocked.

    Don''t forget thatst man.

    This guy can''t be taken lightly either.

    After all, he could deal with the Death Spirit Dragon by himself alone.

    This guy gives up to win. Because the regeneration power of the Necromancer was too strong, he had already seen that it was impossible topletely defeat the Necromancer.

    He believed that his partner would win and always took the pragmatic route when fighting.

    In fact, without this guy''s effort, the winner would have been obvious.

    The Death Spirit Dragon was a monster that even Souei couldn''t defeat. Facing such an opponent and being so belligerent, it was more difficult than expected.

    "What do you think?

    When I finished asking, all three gave different answers.

    "The strength of the theory is that Albert is better. But he is poorly equipped and should lose this battle."

    "Adalman is too eager to get ahead of himself. If he had been calm, he would have won by now, and there was no way to deal a fatal blow to his opponent. If Albert is defeated at this time, they will be defeated in one fell swoop.

    "They can only win! How can they be defeated!?

    Three people with three viewsshould I say that the answer of only Shion is strange?

    Benimaru and Diablo''s views are very simr. They both think that Adalman and the rest will lose.

    In contrast, Shion justthought that ones spirit could conquer all. That''s not called an opinion, it''s called a wish.

    "So they might lose, huh? That doesn''t seem good?

    "Anyway, even if Adalman and the others lose, there are still ten others on this side. And I won''t lose if I''m on the field, so it should be fine.

    "Of course! I will also defeat the others, so rest assured, Lord Rimuru!

    Benimaru is so confident and feels as if there is a solution to whatever problem he encounters.

    Shion is still the same. As much as it was tempting to ask her what her basis was for saying something like that, she couldn''t havee up with a basis, I suppose.

    It''s true that there is a Shion style, so let''s just ept it.

    "Lord Rimuru, you needn''t worry. The Ten Lords of the Labyrinth also have Lord Veldoras apprentice, Zegion, at their head. As long as he sits, there''s no need to even bother Lord Veldora.

    One side giggled and Diablo so responded.

    It''s rare for Diablo topliment someone. That should make it okay, which reassures me a bit.

    While we''re at it, the win-loss showdown seems to be getting better.

    In time, Adalman and the rest will win. We were hoping for the same thing, but unfortunately the enemy seems to have noticed.

    "It looks like you''re going to stall for time to break through, but it seems too much of a stretch. Get me serious, you guys go to the other world and show off with this thing!

    The Scandinavian man facing Albert, who was an enemy, shouted the words.

    At this point in time, does he have a killer weapon?

    "Before you guys die, let me give you a name. My name is Krishna. A Knight of the Empire17th in the Imperial Order of the Imperial Kaiser''s Guard!

    "I am Reiha, the 94th in line.

    "Thirty-fifth in line, Bazan.

    Ah, is it really the Imperial Emperor''s Knights of the Guard?

    I heard about it from Gadra''s side, and it looks like the members inside are really good. The man who had been beaten down by Testarossa was ranked eleventh, and thought the one called Krishna would be ahead of him. Originally I thought strength was proportional to ranking, but it doesn''t seem so.

    It felt like Reiha was more strutting than Bazan again, and exining in that direction should be right.

    These aside, the point is who wins and who loses.

    Seeing Krishna and the others had reported their names, Adalman and the rest also seemed to have renewed their fighting spirit. Thought that would turn the tide, unfortunately things didn''t go so well.

    The key to victory lies in this battle between Krishna and Albert.

    Krishna''s Sword shes Albert''s Grudge Sword (Curse Sword).

    Whether to say sh, or crush, it''s all in the difference in weapon performance.

    That spirit sword was also an excellent escape crafted by Kurobee. The average person doesn''t have ess to it, but it''s the best weapon for Albert.

    Yet Krishna''s sword belongs to the legendary ss.

    Repeated chops gradually umte damage to the opponent''s weapon, crushing it with thest breath. That seems to be the kind ofbat that Krishna is good at.

    It''s a good thing that light can confirm this, even though it doesn''t ask about the process but only about the results.

    Just like that, the loss of the weapon defeated Albert. Once the forward was lost, Adalman was momentarily at the disadvantage. Not at all like a defender, he yed shy, unexpectedly sticky, but still got pinned down for it and ended up losing the game.

    The battle ended when thest threeunched simultaneous attacks to wipe out the Necromancer.

    If Albert''s sword hadn''t broken, the oue would have been different. And in the face of someone who is good at magic, it''s too much to ovee with the fighter''s fists and feet, so I don''t n to hold him responsible for his defeat. Instead, I''d say that Krishnas ability to draw out the opponent''s killer points makes me want to praise "well done".

    As it turned out, things went exactly as Benimaru and Diablo had expected. Two keys were also snatched by people, but there was nothing that could be done about it. This is the time to praise your opponent for a good fight.

    So, in the face of three people like Krishna, we suffered a bitter defeat.

    Anyway, it''s all over, just reflect on it afterwards.

    Now to go to the next stage.

    The big screen illuminates the battle situation on the 79th floor, and the battle situation on the 90th floor.

    Both sides are getting better and better in terms of wins and losses.

    Kumaras reaction was too intense. Since the bearded man was the one she wanted her revenge on, it was no wonder she was particrly keen.

    Rtively,e and see Apito.

    This side is again a surprisingly tight race.

    That being said, Apito is now so strong that she is on a par with Hinata, who has no use for magic. To be able to fight a tie with such an Apito would mean that the man who looked like amander was also very powerful. This guy also looks to be a Scandinavian man, and seems to be no slouch in terms of strengthpared to that Krishna from a while ago.

    I wonder who wins and who loses in the end.

    We all watched nervously, our eyes firmly on the big screen.

    ***

    Major General Minute wore his proud suit straight and walked leisurely through the maze.

    The style is the same as that of a regr general, but the material is different. Each silk thread is specially selected and is a magically infused fad.

    This set alone was enough to rival the annual sry of the sous-officer ss, it was high ss, and it was guaranteed to befortable to wear, to the satisfaction of even the Minute who loved to dress up.

    Minute the man just loves grace. Because of his nature, he had a lot ofints about this battle n.

    The so-called war should be about gathering overwhelming war power to suppress the enemy, with the goal of winning without a fight.

    How can there be a sacrifice, plus the fact that it was caused by our army''s own initiative, that would inevitably call into question the ability of themander.

    It was because Minute thought so that he thought this battle n would fail before it came out.

    But

    "Well, there''s no way to tell the truth as a matter of course, and that''s the sadness of being an official.

    Even with such a grumble on his lips, Minute had a arrogant smile on his face.

    The men of Kansas are usually very visible, so no one noticed him, in fact Minute himself is one of the most important warriors in the Imperial Army. He is not so weak-minded as to give up fighting in the middle of a war because he vited his own aesthetics.

    "Then again, the Demon Lord Rimuru is also very evil-hearted. Although it was natural to take such a ploy, I did not expect to fly only me, themander, to another ce. In that case, the warriors who came here this time might also be broken by a few of them individually. But the Kansas kid will survive, after all"

    Not caring even if it was overheard by others, Minute began to mutter to himself. Contrary to what he had said, the look on his face was one of amusement.

    It''s no wonder, Minute hasn''t been this excited in a long time. Falling into such a dangerous situation was the first time in one''s life.

    As far as his position is concerned, there are few opportunities to allow him to be pro-front.

    Minute didn''t climb up thedder hard, but because he was a nobleman and belonged to the upper ss. In fact, if left from the army, he could have had more outlets than Calgurio.

    He also has contacts in the political world and has built his own faction.

    The reason such a Minute remains in the army to this day is because he is very belligerent by nature.

    Minute loved seeing the blood. This time he gets his chance and ys to his heart''s content. Thinking about this side, he couldn''t help but have a smile on his face.

    Such a Minute was thrown to the seventy-eighth floor, one floor up in the Apito dominion. The reason is that in order to analyze Minute''s strength, one has to observe first.

    So Minute went to the floor below like nobody''s business, fixing the bugs while he went.

    "Really, I hate bugs. The mere sight of those feet moving around was sickening. We have to get the hell out of here.

    After making a grand entrance like that, he flung his hand to the side. This action alone created a gust of wind that caused many of the bugs to disintegrate into dust.

    This is the power of Minute.

    A "suppressor" with unique skills.

    The power is simple and straightforward. Up to psychologicalpression down to physicalpression, everything Minute can see is affected by its effects. There''s no way to escape, and everything goes up in smoke.

    In fact, even a wave of the hand is not necessary, just a nce can damage the subject matter. Thanks to this force, Minute has not lost so far.

    "So fragile. The fight was so boring, it was boring. I wish they had tried harder.

    No one can stop Minute.

    Although swarms of bugs above the A level would also appear on the 78th level, those were killed by Minute. Not his opponent at all, splitting the win in an instant.

    It''s almost unbeatable.

    With this power, it''s no wonder Minute is so arrogant.

    Immediately following, it took him a few hours to find the stairs. I thought he was going to head for the floor below, but I didn''t expect to see him start resting on his own.

    The bag that hangs around the waist is a high-ss travel magic guide. He took the freshly baked food out of it and enjoyed it.

    It also contained a set of bedding with an exorcism effect and a roof, andter Minute went to sleep with a flourish.

    His attitude was nothing short of underestimating the Maze.

    Time came to the next day.

    Minute entered the seventy-ninth level and ended up meeting a truly formidable enemy there.

    The assassination bees came without a soundthese were legion bees, all of which Minute had swatted away in two or three strikes. No matter how dangerous a magical creature it was, the moment it came within his line of sight, it would determine victory or defeat.

    "Hmph, Its no match for the magical creatures here. What the hell, it''s disappointing.

    Seeing Minute deliver a boast like this, someone went on a rampage.

    That someone is Apito.

    Regardless of the angle from which he tried to sneak in, Minute had a way of coping. From this, it is clear that Minute is able to use Magic Sense.

    Then there''s no point in continuing to send Legion Bees over.

    Having so judged, the Queen decided to step in herself.

    "How dare you say such contemptuous things, you damned human."

    "Will it? You''re a little too pushy, aren''t you? To me, you''re no different from the ants here"

    Minute said as he stomped on the body of the swarm of bees that had fallen to the ground. This behavior further angered Apito.

    "I''ll kill you

    "Try it if you can.

    Just like that, the two great heroes began to fight fiercely.

    At first Minute looked at Apito very little.

    He wasn''t careless, just convinced that his ''suppressor'' could crush her. But he soon found it too naive to think so.

    Releasing a jamming wave by sight, Minute puts heavy pressure on Apito.

    The true face of that force is gravity invisible to the naked eye. Minute can have an effect on the surrounding matter, giving gravitational directionality.

    Using the gravitational pull possessed byrge mass objects, thes reflect in all directions. The clever maniption of gravitational and reaction forces can cause the subject to burst orpress.

    To counter this force, one must either have a strong body that does not move like a mountain, or one that emits directional fluctuations that cancel out the disturbing wavesthese are the only two ways.

    Minute has not seen anyone with this ability to date. In other words, he equates to being invincible.

    With such absolute confidence, Minute unleashed his ability. Yet the sight that appeared before his eyes was different from what he had expected.

    "Humph, too slow!

    What Minute crushed was the remnants of Apito. Apito didn''t see past the true face of Minutes power, but she had already found that it had directionality. Presumably a quick move will get you out of effect range, so pretty dodge.

    "I''m sure it''s what I thought. Can you catch my movements?"

    Apito''s movements gradually picked up speed.

    This time, no matter how much Minute would use Magic Sense, it would be difficult for him to cast an effective attack on Apito.

    Only this, in turn, excited Minute.

    "Interesting. If it wasn''t, the fight would be boring!"

    He allows the ability to be fully liberated, centering himself in a force field. And parallel to that, any direction ahead would be in the way of Apito.

    So much so that Apito had to back off. Although the passage of the maze was five meters long, trying to get past Minute would be trapped by the force field.

    "Gee, that''s tricky.

    "That''s my word!"

    Both sides won''t even take a step.

    Because of the special training with Hinata, Apito''s movements became more pure and sharper. Even the Pdin captain would be toyed with by her, but being unable to get close to the enemy would be useless.

    On top of that, it''s dangerous to stop moving. Once caught by the interference wave, even Apito couldn''t get out in one piece.

    Coming out this way is a big mistake. If I retired to the Queen''s throne room, I would be able to fly more freely. Not sure how long this man''s power willst, but one must go back if one wants to defeat him.

    Apito so judged.

    There is no shame in running away. The insatiable desire for nothing but victory is Apitos basic approach.

    Even after seeing Apito run away like that, Minute didn''t look at it as a joke. He had already seen that the retreat was based on tactical considerations, so he instead cautiously pursued it.

    There''s no need to rush. Rather than reluctantly do it here, it''s better to keep the power for now.

    Ha ha ha. Combat is all about grace. But more than losing, I enjoy watching people struggle miserably.

    Minute thought Apito was beautiful.

    Unlike all the other magic creatures, you can tell this opponent has aesthetic connotations.

    It''s a natural thing for a warrior to choose a battlefield that''s good for them. Minute doesn''tugh at her, instead thanking his opponent for fighting himself and being willing to give it their all.

    He didn''t look down on his opponent, but rather thought about how to drive her into a desperate situation and hunt Apito down while doing so.

    Next he came to a wide open ce.

    There was a chair on one of the high tforms.

    Looks like this is the throne of Queen''s King''s Landing. Also, this ce is perfect for me to go toe-to-toe with you.

    Minute deliberately cooperated with the enemy''s temptation. At the same time arrogantly thought, "So you''ll have to make me happy.

    "Isn''t it time to end the hide-and-seek?

    "Right. I''m going to do my best to treat you right. Ill bet on the name of Apito, the Bug Queen.

    "That''s really something to look forward to. I am Major General Minute, the man who is going to kill you. Let''s move on to round two!

    After the big blowout, Minute picked up the pace.

    Those moves just now were just watching the situation, and that''s how he got serious. While not to the point of overtaking Apito''s speed, such a pace did notg.

    Yet Apito was unfazed. She rose high into the sky, raising her speed in preparation to y with Minute.

    But all of this was to be expected from Minute.

    "That''s naive. Don''t underestimate my power!

    By the time he finished shouting these words, a force had been released.

    The ceiling of the hall takes on an egg shape, and invisible force fields capable of capturing Apito begin to appear nearby. It was Minute who was manipting the gravitational pull to get Apito on the ceiling.

    Goo!"

    Seeing Apito show a look of pain, Minute snorted.

    "Oh, it hurts, doesn''t it? I''d like to run you over right away, but you''re a little too tough. If it''s a normal magic creature, even at this distance, it''s enough for me to run it over.

    Speaking from one side, Minute stepped towards Apito.

    Minute'' strength is proportional to distance. The closer he got, the pressure would increase along with it, and he thought to himself that even an expert like Apito was able to run over and kill, which was why he acted this way.

    Plus now he had grabbed Apito and was using the power not to cast in all directions. Just focus all of your power on Apito and he will indeed win.

    Although the fight was tougher than expected, she was really no match for me. Just thank you for bringing me so much pleasure, I''ll let you die without pain.

    Minute has no penchant for bullying his enemies. He just wanted to get high feelings by fighting, and the touch of winning.

    It should have been purely out of good intentions to have mercy on Apito, but

    "Don''t underestimate me, human! I''ve said I''m going to give it my all!

    After shouting these words, Apito, who had been suffering from the heavy pressure just now, flew into the air once more.

    Her wings were broken and her hands and feet were bent and deformed, and she could be said to have be covered in wounds, but it did not affect Apito''s fighting spirit in the slightest.

    Apito is also hungry for a win.

    "Lord Rimuru was also watching the battle. Even if I''m in a mess or something, it''s my job to expose the enemy to all they can do!

    "Ho ho ho, funny. Meaning to see through my power? I''ll take your life before that!

    Minute opened the force field again with himself at the center. Also possessing the power of repulsion and gravitational pull, in addition to being able to bounce people trying to get close to himself, he also maniptes the flow of power with the intention of pinning the opponent to the ground. Minute is looking to crack Apito with a death blow.

    Conversely, Apito isn''t going to be pinned down all the time. She flew at a speed beyond Minute''s perception, keeping her distance to avoid being caught by the interference wave.

    The inability to find a means of attack is certainly annoying, but the opponent''s power is not endless.

    There should be some sort of limit to it, and Apito had been waiting for that moment.

    It depends on whether Minute wille to the limit first, or whether Apito will run out of power first.

    And with that, the two sides began topete for stamina

    After a few hours, the situation progressed.

    Following the teachings of Hinata, Apito continually tried all sorts of attacks.

    The broken arms and legs were no longer working, and she flew desperately on her broken wings, continually testing Minute for a break. Fire the poison needle at the dead center, pping your wings to release the ster de. The Legion Bees underneath were also summoned tounch an all-out raid on Minute. These are designed to detect which ces are least susceptible to the intervening forces of Minute.

    These actions brought the legionnaires'' bees all but to an end. Although she was only a subordinate, it was Apito who called it out after all, and she couldn''t help but be chagrined. Even so, Apito continued to let her menunch suicide attacks.

    It turned out that Minute was hardly unharmed either.

    The fancy suit he was wearing became tattered and looked wolfish. He didn''t have time to care about elegance either, she could tell he was desperately dodging.

    "Well, I guess you''re tired already."

    ...and so are you. I''m honestly amazed to be able to follow it to this point.

    "I already said that, didn''t I? It doesn''t matter if it''s embarrassing or whatever, just win.

    "I agree. Only I''ll be the one who wins!

    Both are good at forcing a smile.

    I''m so tired that I can barely stand. Even in such a situation, they were reluctant to show weakness to each other.

    "You guys are really powerful. This I acknowledge, but not without a hitch. I dere that the next attack will kill you!

    Apito, who was floating in the air, said so to Minute. Although her face was covered in her own blood, it was with a smile so beautiful it glowed.

    Narrowing his eyes at the sight, Minute also raised the corners of his mouth in reply.

    "It''s exciting. Then I also promise you that the next move will set you free.

    The strength of both of them, was all that was left. The reason why it was said that the next move would be life and death, was because the remaining power in their bodies was only enough for that.

    And the two didn''t bother about the aftermath at all, taking out all their strength to strike out.

    Apito takes the operational approach of predicting the movement of the Minute jamming wave by changing the track in the first moment. She intends to use the speed beyond the speed of sound to pounce, thereby outpacing Minute'' reaction time.

    Minute sees that too. The question is how well Apito knows the power of Minute. When will the wave of interference, invisible to the eye, beunched, and it must be judged whether Apito sees through that correctly before changing the response strategy.

    She couldn''t possibly see through itMinute was confident in himself.

    The winner is decided in that moment.

    The moment Minute unleashed his power, Apito changed track. Yet this point was as Minute had expected, judging by gut instinct, and she did not see the scrambled waves.

    WinningMinuteughed; I''ll dieApitoughed too.

    That''s right, Apito''s attack was premised on death from the start.

    "It''s over, Queen Apito.

    Minute shouted happily.

    Feeling the undtions invisible to the eyes wrapped all over her body, at that moment Apito opened her mouth wide, intending to shoot her ace.

    Queen of needleApito bets her life on releasing the strongest poison needle. It wasn''t created with demonic qi, it was a part of Apito''s body.

    Hard enough to prate even "magic steel" with ease. The poisonous needle poured all the power at a very close distance to release, and Apito believed that even the force field in Minute'' body could prate.

    Minute'' powerpresses Apito, and Apito unleashes a poisonous needle through the force field towards Minutethe winner is about to be decided.

    The result was a tie between the two sides.

    While not quite winning upset Apito, she had done her part and that part was satisfying.

    Death is not the end. She can be resurrected countless times in the maze.

    She looked forward to the moment of resurrection and disappeared from the scene.

    After determining that Apito had disappeared, Minute decided to quietly recuperate until the wound healed.

    Although the attack just now crushed the heart, Minute was still alive. He won''t die from this level of injury, the wound will heal after a while.

    I can fight a battle like never before, Minute is content.

    This showdown was pretty awesome. I would love to taste a little more. That''ll prove I''m the strongest

    Immersed in the afterglow, Minute thought so. His feverish emotions were high, but he was still not satisfied. His instincts backtracked on the idea of still wanting to go up against someone stronger.

    Wanting to push and go beyond your limits. He believes this makes him stronger.

    Like in response to thoughts like Minute, there are anomalies going on this time of year.

    A certain voice rang out.

    This was a good fight.

    The voice exuded a kingly air of making others obey.

    "My ''name'' is Zegion. You are qualified to fight me. If you want to fight with me,e before me.

    As if guided by this voice, Minute''s closed eyes opened again.

    He saw before his eyes a dark vortex that appeared at an unknown time.

    This is going to make me have fun, right? That being the case, I must respond to the invitation

    The body not yet healed but not afraid, Minute stood up. And then

    Undaunted, he went to the ce where the other party had invited him.

    ***

    Once upon a time, there was a paradise called "Monster Country".

    It was one of the secret realms that existed around the world, the paradise that people called Evergreen.

    Nowadays it''s gone.

    It was ravaged by the Imperial Army twenty years ago and has disappeared from this world.

    Thinking about that day, the Nine-Tailed Kumara was literally losing herself to anger. Because of herck of strength, she lost her mother and partner.

    The Great Mother is a monster, possessing powerparable to that of a demon lord. However, she is gentle in nature and definitely not hostile to humans, a monster with a good heart.

    Indeed, the king of the monster race, who is hostile to humans, is called a "Demon King". It was a force other than the Ten Demon Lords that was a threat to humans as well, right?

    But this has nothing to do with "Monster Country".

    The monster tribe is the monster tribe and the demon lords are the demon lords. And the Demon King was just a demon lord whose race was not even known.

    But humansno, for the Empire, the existence of Nine-Tailed Kumara was not allowed. In order to show his country''s might to the subjects of the Empire, the Monster Country" became a victim to make an example to the others.

    The location of Monster Country" is right on the edge of Demon Lord ymans territory and the Eastern Empire''s borders. Hidden between the foothills of the Gustav Mountains and the Imperial Forest is a junction to the Otherworld.

    There are resources from the forest, mountain products, plus a stable climate. The paradise of Evergreen is not a ce to live in, it is veryfortable.

    Since they were on the edge of the border, they could not help but think that this side would not be attacked. A private treaty of non-aggression between the Demon Lord yman and the Empire.

    The current state of peace has made people unconscious of the crisis.

    Suddenly, armed soldiers quietly attacked the "Monster Country". The warriors guarding the vige were useless even if they resisted, and all their partners were killed.

    The mother, the previous generation of the Nine-tails, also died at that time.

    Despite having power, the mother hates fighting. Although the opponent was human, how could she defeat a professional soldier who was particrly good at fighting?

    Then, the Nine-Tailed Kumara would definitely not forget that man.

    He''s called Kansas, isn''t he? I remember. He was the enemy who killed mother and everyone else, how could I

    Kumara said hatefully.

    The bearded man with a disgusting smile on his face was a hateful enemy, and even killing him would not satisfy the Kumara.

    In return for payment to yman, Kansas surrenders the youngest child of the Nine-Headed Beast, Kumara, who was captured alive. And all the treasures that the vige had umted were used to enrich them.

    They told their subjects that they had removed the threat posed by the "monster country".

    And this supposed threat is really all a self-directed criminal act on their part. In order to let everyone know that "Monster Country" is dangerous, they brought in nearby residents and a few merchants so that everyone could see these people being brutally killed.

    And the fearful subjects looked upon them as heroes

    It wasn''t someone else who revealed these things, it was yman.

    If the Nine-Tailed Kumara hated humans, then her power as a monster would be enhanced. As the monster aura increases, so does the "rank" of being a magical creature.

    Precisely because the Nine-Headed Beast was a very valuable demonic beast, yman determined that the Nine-Tailed Kumara would be a warrior in the future. Fortunately, Kumara survived as a pet.

    As yman had expected, Kumara umted resentment to increase in strength. And was also selected as a subordinate of the yman Armythe thumb of one of the five fingers.

    Then it was a mistake to let Rimuru pick her up.

    It was there that she remembered what happiness was, and the contact with the children healed the wounds of her hearjust as the resentful enemy was reunited with her.

    "To kill you. I''m gonna tear you apart with all my might

    The Nine-Tailed Kumara muttered, waiting for Kansas to arrive.

    Rtively,e see Kansas.

    Even if he was the only one who had been made to wonder where the ce was, he was unmoved.

    Kansas is a soldier who climbs up one step at a time. The empire practiced power-ism, and this man was like a symbol of the empire, climbing to his present position with a pair of fists.

    It doesn''t matter if you do something bad, this man is the embodiment of the desire to be great.

    Even the matter of the "monster country" was no exception, and he believed that it was justified behavior that could strengthen his position and strength.

    A little sacrifice for the peace of the majority is not worth it. What he does is a necessary evil, and he is not even guilty of it.

    While greatly questionable in terms of humanity, the strength is unquestionable.

    Had he entered the battle of the rankings, he would surely have been selected in the top 100. The reason why it didn''t turn out that way was because Kansas had no interest in joining the Imperial Emperor''s Order of the Near Guard.

    He valued his own interests more than his loyalty to Emperor Rudra. The most important thing is to have an officer that Kansas can trust from the bottom of its heart.

    This officer is Major General Minute.

    He and Kansas, in addition to being neck and neck in strength, were men who valued Kansas and promoted him.

    I want Minute to get to the top of the legion and hold all the power under him myselfthats what Kansas is aiming for in life, and he dreams of that daying and working his way through.

    He therefore saw this invasion as the perfect opportunity.

    Anyone can see that Calgurio''s missteps were inevitable. No, Kansas conspired with Minute, intending to make arrangements privately first to get people within the Mecha Legion thinking in that direction.

    Just save the general soldiers who were left in thebyrinth and give them a favor, then a new faction can be created soon.

    By that time Calgurio would be useless.

    "Oh,ugh at that. How could such a naive idea be allowed to emerge when one wants to climb to the top of the legion on political power alone?

    It was because it would not be overheard that Kansasughed heartily at the chief. The next step was to look for the surviving men with no change of face.

    As the day passed, even Kansas began to feel a little strange about the situation.

    Let alone the fact that thebyrinth is filled with forests and deserts where not even a single figure can be seen. Not only that, but not even the magic object was in sight.

    No matter which floor it was, it was quiet to the point of eerie, nothing was happening that even made one feel like an idiot for keeping a vigil.

    Of course Kansas wouldn''t take that little thing lightly, but his "danger foreknowledge" waspletely unresponsive, which made Kansas even more uneasy.

    Well, it seems the intention was not to neglect me. So that''s where they''ve concentrated their war power somewhere, right?

    Kansas'' insight is daunting. He guessed right.

    "Hahahaha, I didn''t expect to be greeted with such a big show of joy! Then I''ll make myself at home, if you''ll excuse me!

    Doing things spritely enough, that''s what Kansas is good for. Thinking that even if there was a trap, so what, just destroy it, he started running, wanting to head for the floor below in one breath.

    The speed was so fast that even the wind couldn''t keep up, Kansas ran wild all the way. You can move several meters just by stepping on the ground, only toe to the stairs in a sh.

    A few hours passed

    Something appeared in front of Kansas, and it was the gate of a vast oceanarium.

    The styling is luxurious, as if it would bring a sense of oppression to the visitor.

    Immediately after, the door opened soundlessly, the battle began.

    *** That beauty was so beautiful that even the most beautiful woman in the world lost face, with a warning smile on her face that made people''s chills stand up straight, Nine-Tailed Kumara went to greet him.

    "Wee. You''re wee.

    Hearing her say hello, Kansas responded with a smile.

    "That''s very polite. Your face is nostalgic. You were the little fox back then, weren''t you?

    "Do you remember? Thats delightful.

    "How could I forget? Because your mother helped me get ahead.

    Sparks shot out between the two.

    This is not an illusion. The physical phenomenon was triggered by the fierce conflict between the demon qi and the fighting qi.

    "I can''t believe I''m saying this without flushing!

    "Hahahaha, you survived unscathed. Thanks to me selling you to yman, you survived. Thank me.

    Ill kill you.

    The killing qi had increased even more dramatically, and Kumara roared out these words.

    As if to echo the words, the white ape appeared. In order to show his opponent how powerful the Chief of the Eight Sects was, he began to attack Kansas with sticks in session.

    "Is it a monster that survived? In that case, let me show you something interesting too.

    With that said, and without any preparatory action, Kansas summoned a magical creature.

    It was a dark ape, a monkey with a ck fur coat.

    "You, you are Mother''s servant!"

    That''s right.

    If it was true, he was one of the tail beasts owned by the Mother of Kumara.

    "Yes, you do. You miss it, don''t you? Let him be your opponent.

    The Dark Ape is also a magical beast with a good heart. Kumara also has memories of ying with him, however

    The dark ape that brought back deep memories showed a fierce expression and bared its fangs.

    "Have you forgotten your friend?

    The Dark Ape could not hear the Kumaras voice, Kirk!" The ground let out a sharp cry and ran towards the white ape.

    "It''s no use. That monkey has be my faithful servant. About you, he doesn''t remember anything.

    Kansas himself did not participate in the battle, he took the tobo out of his arms and began to light a cigarette, looking at Kumara with a bad smile.

    "What did you do to the dark ape?

    "Huh? That''s a hurtful thing to say. Are you doubting me?

    That answer was like mocking Kumara.

    Finding that Kansas didn''t mean to answer seriously at all, Kumara was furious as she continued with her next move.

    "Moon Rabbit, ck Rat, youe out!

    The tails of Kumara turned into a demonic beast.

    That makes it three against one. Once again, Kumara''s side had the upper hand.

    But it was also only for a brief moment.

    "Come out, mute rabbit, dark rat.

    I didn''t expect Kansas to cooperate with Kumara to summon the monsters.

    Even Kumara was shocked by this.

    "How, how?

    "Surprised, huh? Only, I was just as surprised. I didn''t expect you, a brat, to summon three tailed beasts.

    Looks like yman is pretty good at conditioning too.

    Kansas said those words seemingly despising Kumara. There''s a reason why that attitude is so confident. For the monster beasts that Kansas summoned were stronger than those of the eight tribes under Kumara.

    "What a pain in the ass. The game is over here.

    As soon as the words were said, Kansas called out more magic beasts.

    "No way! Even the Dark Tiger and Dark Snake are called out!

    Only stronger than the individual strength of each one, those magical beasts under Kansas. It''s no wonder. The mother of Kumara was a previous generation of Nine-Tailed Beasts, and those Monsters were her faithful guards.

    There were five such powerful magical beasts. At that time, all of the calm and benevolent aura had disappeared, and the raging instincts had been liberated, blocking Kumara in front of them.

    At this point, Kansas considers himself a winner. No matter how much the young fox Kumara had grown, there were only three tail beasts at most that could be manipted, he thought so.

    After all, even the mother of Kumara could only call out five tail beasts. If it was a demon fox that had lived for thousands of years, it was a different story, Kumara had only lived for a few hundred years, and Kansas didn''t think she could make that much power.

    That''s why Kansas arrogantly put out the word.

    "If it were you now, I could keep you as a pet. You will betray the Demon Lord Rimuru ande to my side. That way I can spare your life.

    The tone of voice was less like a bargaining and more like an order.

    It was certain that you would win before you dared to say those words. Yet there was a fatal misunderstanding in Kansas.

    The Nine-Tailed Kumara was furious.

    The smile on her face grew deeper and more beautiful.

    "You''re a funny guy. I''m sure you''vee to your senses to make me so angry.

    This question doesn''t need to be answered.

    Kumara released all of her tailed beasts, the rest of her men, the Eight Sects.

    Those that appeared were Thunder Tiger, Pterodactyl, Sleeping Sheep, ming Bird, and Mirror Dog.

    All eight are hereby present.

    "That''s not possible! There had eight of them? You guys

    It wasn''t until this time that Kansas first showed a look of panic, but that was only for a moment. He immediately found hisposure and a dismissive smile appeared on his face.

    "I should bemended for growing to such an extent that it surprised me. But even so, it''s still our side that''s fighting better.

    "Shut up!

    "It''s terrible, terrible. That being the case, there''s no need to go on and on about it. I''m going to twist off your arms and legs and decorate my room.

    The negotiations were concluded.

    Immediately following, an eight-on-five matchup ensued.

    The eight sects were more advantageous in terms of numbers, but the opponents were all elite Beasts who had served the previous generation for long years.

    There is a disparity in the amount of magicules umted. The most important thing is the difference in experience.

    The white apes and others weren''t weak, but those dark demonic beasts were stronger enough to flip the disadvantage in numbers.

    As time passed, the eight sects began to take the lead. Yet even so, Kumara did not give up.

    She observed Kansas''s appearance and next thing you know, she noticed something.

    Each one of the magical beasts summoned by Kansas was strong. And the only one who remains rational despite theplete loss of memory.

    Faced with Kansas''s instructions to react quickly, it came down to the eight sects again.

    On the flip side, by beating Kansas, who was in charge of the order, Kumara had a chance to win. And there''s a killer weapon on this side of Kumara. All it takes is for the eight sects to return to themselves and be the way they should be.

    Kumara thought that would beat them in Kansas. Therefore, Kumara did not panic at all, but gradually analyzed the battle situation.

    And then look at the Kansas side.

    This side looks like it''s going to be fine, but it''s on the verge of breaking point.

    There was certainly a reason why it was necessary to tame these dark demonic beasts. The secret lies in the power of Kansas.

    The unique skill of the Marauderthat''s what Kansas has.

    There is little point in this force alone. It''s a skill that doesn''t have any effect.

    When Kansas was small, he sensed the power. He got into an argument with someone over something trivial and killed a friend''s dog in revenge. After that, he was able to summon the Dogs of Darkness.

    Just that alone can more or less make a difference inbat, but the real value of that skill lies elsewhere.

    One thing was discovered when Kansas joined the army to crush the border guerris. That is, after killing the opponent, you can summon a "dark avatar" that has the same power as the opponent.

    And there''s another thing Kansas has discovered. That is, creatures that can be summoned are limited to being killed by him.

    In other words, the more people you kill, the stronger you be.

    Still, there are limits.

    Through this power, it''s not that killing someone can add all the power to oneself, it''s that only the maximum can be obtained.

    Whoever you kill will be able to perfectly reproduce the other person''s posture and skills. If you need to perform infiltration missions and so on, it is very convenient to disguise yourself and is a very versatile skill.

    But there are limits anyway. That is, there is no way to summon a "dark incarnation" that exceeds Kansas''s own capacity.

    If there was a way to do that, it would mean that one person in Kansas could manipte an entire army.

    It''s not that omnipotent any more, Kansas itself has a limit of autobiographical energy.

    Kumara saw through that urately.

    So even though the current situation was bad for her, she didn''t panic.

    "I know you''ve reached your limit, haven''t you?

    "Yes, so what?

    "I don''t know how you manipte the dark apes, but no problem. Because just kill you and it''s over.

    This was the battle situation analysis made by Kumara.

    The men of both sides fought evenly, but themanders of both camps did not participate in the battle. As long as Kumara stepped in to deal with Kansas at this time, there was no way he could give orders to those Dark Beasts.

    In addition, if we onlypare Kumara with Kansas, we can see that the amount of magical element is much higher than Kansas.

    "Don''t worry. The ve will not let you die too painfully.

    As soon as these words were said, Kumara immediately disappeared from the scene and came behind Kansas in a sh. Then extended a w intending to slice Kansas''s neck.

    Kansas also made a counterpart.

    He admitted that Kumara was right, but he still didn''t change his easy-going attitude.

    "So scary. If I had known you would grow to this point, I would have killed you first at that time.

    "Shut up!

    "Ho ho ho, don''t be so angry. Consider it a gift, I''ll show you something interesting.

    Kansasughed when he finished.

    Indeed, Kansas "marauders" only has the power to call out the creatures he killed. There was also a limit to the number of people who could call out, and the strength of Kansas itself could only be strengthened to the same extent as the first strongman who had been defeated earlier.

    Only, Kansas still has a hand in it.

    He didn''t hesitate and decided to make out at this time.

    "Do you know why I sold you to yman? Do you know why I let you go when I knew you''d be a powerful warrior? Thats"

    This was because there were simpler ways for him to have achieved greater power than taming the Kumara and raising her.

    Kansas made those dark beasts disappear, summoning a huge beast in their ce. This was the source of Kansas''s power and the reason he didn''t need Kumara.

    "That, that face isMother!"

    There appeared a dark demon fox.

    There are five thick tails and four thin tails. With a total of nine tails, she was the mistress of "Monster Country".

    Only the appearance became ominous,pletely invisible to the kind face of the living.

    Ha ha ha ha! That''s right. This one is your mother. However, she was manipted by me, so she was able to use all of this guy''s berserk power. It''s fantastic. You''d love to see that too, wouldn''t you?

    Her good nature became a big taboo, holdingpassion for her enemies. Therefore, even though she possessed the powerparable to the Demon King, she kept a low profile and hid herself, keeping her interactions with this world to a minimum and living peacefully.

    That''s what the previous generation of hostesses looked like today. Will have to wield real power through the hands of Kansas.

    "You want to fool even the dead, don''t you

    "Wrong, it''s called a tribute. I''m just trying to put that power to good use, and she should thank me.

    The dark beast that Kansas summoned out of the city was so ughtering at the sight of Kumara that not a hint of emotion surfaced in its eyes. Only ncing towards Kumara, that look was like looking at an enemy.

    Mother"

    "Kill her.

    Following the order, the monster began to move. The next moment, the full force blow released by the Integrating Dark Tail Beast swept towards the eight tribes.

    "Pterodactyl, Dog!"

    Two of them were slower, and this move left them heavily wounded and back in the tail of Kumara.

    There is such a powerful force. It is obvious to see that the eight sects have no chance of winning.

    "Ha ha ha! How''s that? Isn''t that interesting? It''s because of this power that I don''t need you. But just looking at the number of tails, you seem to be better than your mother. It just doesn''t look like you have enough experience, but I''ll make it up to you. Oh, well, it was nice to let you off the hook. If even you can get your hands on it this time, then I can get even more power!

    Kansas is full of joy.

    He didn''t see himself losing at all.

    Possessing the strongest Nine-Tailed Beast, and being strengthened herself, strong enough to rival her.

    Possessing such a powerful fighting power, one could not possibly lose to that little fox. Kansas is convinced of this.

    Even yman, Kansas looked down on him.

    Originally, he had nned to use the power of the beast that wasparable to the Demon Kings until the fire was pure, and thene back to clean up yman, but he never expected to lose to the new Demon Lord Rimuru. So Kansas mentally taunted yman, thinking he was no big deal.

    However, Kumara in front of him was able to summon eight tail beasts. Looking at individual strengths and finding them inexperienced, Kansas is not yet invincible, but growing up it''s hard to imagine how strong they will be.

    That''s why I said I got lucky. I''m going to kill this one here and stain that body with my power!

    In that case, Kansas''s power would have risen dramatically along with it, right? A neer to the district, a demon lord with this power would be able to take care of anything.

    With that in mind, Kansas began to attack Kumara.

    Originally, Kumara was still standing dumbfounded, at which point her head shook and her mouth muttered something.

    "If you lose your cool, you loseI haven''t forgotten what Hinata-sama taught me."

    Next, she began to look at the slowly approaching men and magical beasts.

    "Come back, everyone.

    Reacting to this, those tail beasts all turned into light and were sucked into the tails of the Nine-Tailed Kumara. Next, her nine tails also began to radiate dazzlingly.

    The man and the beast were close at hand.

    However, Kumara did not panic.

    The tail beasts were inexperienced, she admitted.

    Only, she herself was not like that.

    She had an excellent master and a partner to cut her teeth with. Stay in a great environment and hone her to be even stronger.

    ws and sharp swords closed in, and Kumara gently grabbed both with her right and left hands.

    !

    "What, you guys!?

    "I don''t think yove heard my name yet. My name is the Nine-Tailed

    "What, there''s a name!?

    "I am the Nine-Tailed Kumara.

    ws were shattered and short knives were snapped.

    Kansas hurriedly pulled away, and Kumara showed him an overwhelming smile.

    "You don''t have to remember. It was intended that you would savor the miserable death slowly, but that would have been too much of a burden for us. So"

    Before the words could even be said, the dark beast had already been torn apart. By the hand of Kumara, the previous generation of the Nine Tailed Beast was dismantled in pieces by her.

    "How could!?

    The incident was so shocking that it caused Kansas to let out a cry of forgetfulness.

    It was the strongest pawn in his hand, and now it was disappearing before his eyes.

    Kansas Marauders skill differed from the Summoning only in that they form the Dark Incarnation on an entity basis. Thus the vanished individual can no longer be called out.

    At this moment, Kumara had reimed the mother who had been taken from her.

    "You, you

    "If I were any stronger, I''d make you suffer. It''s a shame, but it''s almost time to end it.

    "Wait, wait!"

    That kind of stupid talk, how could Kumara listen to it.

    Kansas'' bitter plea simply could not reach her ears.

    Farewell."

    When that was said, Kansas'' life span came to an end.

    The Nine-Tails Strikewith a glowing tail shing from all sides, this left Kansas shattered and dead in a few strokes.

    This is the Nine-Tailed Kumara.

    Possessing an alluring beauty, coupled with the generous will of steel, even to the point of coldness.

    I still think about what I''ve lost, but I don''t miss it. She knew that death was irrevocable.

    So not continuing to be taken away is the point.

    Despite losing the Monster Country, the current Kumara had a home to return to. To avoid having this home taken away from her, that was the most important thing to the current Kumara.

    "I also wanted to give everyone a chance for revenge, forgive me.

    In this way, Kumara sessfully took revenge.

    Her mother could not survive, but she had found her dignity.

    This incident made Kumara''s heart content and she smiled from the bottom of her heart.

    ***

    One man meditated quietly.

    He had a darkened exoskeleton with gold stripes on them.

    Like a shining ruby, a horn protruding from the center of the forehead looked like a sword.

    There were dark redpound eyes below the horns, and these eyes were not closed. They will absorb the information around him and process it continuously in the brain.

    As for the exoskeleton, it was modified on a whim by his lord, Rimuru. The cells of Rimuru and

    "Magic Steel" replenish the lost parts.

    Nowadays it is very much in tune with one another and bes part of one''s own body. Its strength surpasses that of diamond, while at the same time being as flexible as a living creature should be, it can even be called the living body magic steel, with unparalleled performance.

    It was the natural armor equivalent of the legendary level.

    However, its definitely not the exoskeleton alone that makes him so strong. This "strong" nature stems from the instinct to thirst for battle and never tire of it.

    To this day.

    A new prey came before him.

    Everything is as it should be.

    He was the strongest man in the maze.

    He is the strongest guardian, the "Bug Emperor" Zegion.

    And then

    Zegion thought to himself.

    The will of those people has been confirmed and they are qualified to fight with him.

    That''s why he called the other guy over.

    To make theme to this dark space.

    The people who were able to reach this floor were lucky.

    The pride of being a strong man, of being able to satisfy the dignity of being a human being, to die in such circumstances.

    ...........

    ........

    After walking down the steps leading to the 80th floor of the maze, there is a hut where you can rest.

    To show that there are no traps inside, the house has no doors and is open to the public.

    A luxurious door could be seen from the depths of this room. Behind the door is this levels floor guardian room.

    After walking through the dark vortex, it was this room that Minute arrived in.

    The room is slightly lit, with fruit and drinks on the table, practical necessities, and evenfortable chairs to sit on.

    Several people have been first to this ce. Minutes eyes widened slightly, trying to recall if these men had met themselves.

    The men who had seized such a Minute and were sitting in the chairs talking stood up.

    "Major General Minute, are you all right? I''m a member of the 26th Mechatronics Regiment

    "Greetings. This maze wasn''t that easy to mingle with, allowing the district''s soldiers and subordinate generals to survive. I know that very well.

    Raising a hand, Minute stopped the other from introducing himself. If it is a person whose identity is above that of a superior general, all the names and units of configuration he can remember. Yet Minute was unimpressed by these people in front of him.

    This represents only one meaning

    It means that even those of A level or above will have to work hard to survive this maze. At least take a look at the worm-type demon Minute had knocked out just now, even if it was useless to get a big ticket to deal with her.

    Some superheroes have broken through the power mark, but only a small number of them are capable of dealing with such opponents.

    A strongman like that couldn''t be willing to serve as a subordinate sergeant, so Minute could specte on the true identity of the group before him.

    "Yes! It is indeed as you said. I am the seventeenth ranked man in the Order of the Imperial Emperor''s Near Guardthe name is Krishna.

    "I''m the 35th, Bazan.

    Im the 94th ranked, Reiha.

    "Mmm. You''re really all knights of the Emperor''s guard, aren''t you? The reason for infiltrating our army is to monitor this battle.

    Exactly."

    "Even if you answer honestly like that, it''s still a bit of a problem, but not this time. Let''s leave that alone for now and talk about what to do next.

    "We just happened to be discussing whether we should do the same.

    Mm-hmm."

    As if taken for granted by his own expectations, Minute continued to let the conversation go on.

    Although the fact that he was being watched made him feel bad, what mattered now was how he survived this showdown.

    What is needed now is not ss and position, but strength. So Minute has no desire at all to delve deeper into their position on Krishna and believes that something meaningful should be said first.

    "So, what happened to everyone else?

    "Back to your word. The floor we were teleported from is mentioned in the report, there is a Necromancer over there.

    On behalf of the three of them, Krishna gives the answer.

    Minute urged him on by sight.

    "We have only ny-six men short of amander to face off against the evil King of Necromancers.

    After the battle everyone else was

    "It''s incredible. We have gathered together a thousand warriors who can act on their own judgement even when no one gives orders. It''s not as good as you guys, but they''re all elite members of our army.

    The purpose of this battle n was to rescue the Imperial soldiers. It has been envisioned for various scenarios, and even the smallest of the end of the line has A-grade strength.

    It was unbelievable that all those soldiers had been killed, so Minute intensified his tone of questioning.

    "That guy is a terrible monster. And the Necromancer who guards that king is also a top swordsman.

    "Except for the three of us, everyone else was killed on that floor. If there is criticism that we should have shown up earlier, there is nothing to be said for that. Just facing the Necromantic Dragon and the Necromantic Sword Saint, plus the Immortal King, it would be a miracle that even we survived.

    Krishna talked to Minute halfway through, and Bazan interjected. He spoke with a tone of anger, on the one hand, and as if chagrined at their misuse. Anyone could tell he meant what he said.

    "It''s rude to speak to the Major General, Bazan.

    "But Reiha-san

    "No, it''s okay. This maze is dangerous. We should not talk about identity here, but rather work together to kill a way out of this.

    Minute put those words out, offering to work with each other.

    Since the opponent was the Order of the Emperor''s Near Guard, then the strength was impable.

    Now is not the time to be on this tit-for-tat.

    "With your words, it''s like a shot in the arm for us.

    Krishna was also well aware of Major General Minute of the Mecha Legion. Rationally speaking, even if he was that strong and joined the Imperial Emperor''s Order of Near Guard Knights, it was not surprising that he refused to cooperate.

    Krishna waited for the three and Minute nodded silently at each other. As for what''s nned after leaving this maze, just think about it then. It was at this moment that the four men reached a consensus.

    "By the way, what did Lord Minute go through before he got here?

    "I took on a whole swarm of legionnaires.

    "Legion Bee!"

    It was a representation of a dangerous monster. Because it''s too dangerous to dispose of quickly once discovered, people generally don''t know much about it. Once seen they are almost always killed on the spot, so the general public is less aware of such magical things.

    You were alone in the face of such a dangerous monster?

    "Since entering thisbyrinth, you have met no one else but yourselves. In my case, I was summoned by a voice after beating down the Legion Bees and the Wraith Queen who was suspected of ruling them.

    I''vee to this ce in a sh.

    "I see, I see

    After hearing Minute give a straightforward answer like this, Krishna was impressed.

    Once the Queen Bee turned into a monster, the strength could be said to be beyond imagination, and the strength was afraid to beparable to that of a low-ranking demon lord. The fact that you can put that kind of opponent with her men to pack up together, do not know how powerful the body of Minute harbors, think of this side will feel that this person is worth looking up to.

    Because of the constant tension, Krishna hadn''t noticed that Minute was covered in injuries until just now. There was also arge hole in the chest, reminiscent of what a fierce battle had been previously experienced.

    "And how are you?

    When Reiha finished asking, Minute smiled and said, "That''s a long timeing.

    "I''ve got the medicine ready to go. A little rest and some strength will be restored. Forget about that for now, which route did you take to get to this room?

    The man who holds the reins is Minute. Despite saying that they were on equal footing with each other, the Minute still had the big official posture to ask Krishna to do their bidding.

    After that, the three men also shared the intelligence at hand under Minute''s domination, each of them.

    One thing they found outter was that the maze was twisted in its construction.

    Exit reports are so far removed from reality that no benchmarks can be found. Like a blind man touching an elephant on a maze quest, the path that follows is all unknown.

    "But what the hell is going on here? The opponent we''re dealing with is also mentioned in the report, it''s the 60th level of the barrier demon lord, right? Why doesn''t Rimuru let us start from the first floor and follow the sequence?

    It will take more time for us to get up that way. If it''s just going to leave us in a state of exhaustion, it should be done right, shouldn''t it? Bazan spoke out the doubts in his heart.

    The man who gave him the answer was really still Minute.

    "It''s simple. You''ve heard the rumors about the maze, right? Even if you go in for the challenge, just equip the bracelet and you''ll be resurrected. What do you think would happen if this effect worked on all magical things?

    Ah"

    Hearing someone say that, Bazan let out a cry of dismay, while Krishna and Reiha picked up the ck for Minute with stony expressions.

    "Rather than letting us spend time on the strategy, it would be better to let us in one by one, as that would drain the Imperial Army''s strength.

    "And as soon as youe in, you can''t get out. That would be talking about breaking us up individually."

    Minute uttered a ''exactly so'' and nodded.

    "Of course, that''s because of the confidence in the fighting power inside the maze. I have actually mentioned this to Lord Calgurio as well. But he said we''d take control of the resurrection stronghold and just wait for the monster toe back to life and kill it each time. That makes sense, so I''ll just have to back off.

    It was revealed after the fact that the n had failed, and Minute said this bitterly.

    In the end, the Imperial Army sent over half a million general soldiers. Sending the fighters in in batches was the most stupid thing.

    The minions of the Demon Lord Rimuru were responsible for guarding this maze, and the reason for this ending was because we misjudged the strength of the other side.

    "Were any survivors found?

    This"

    That statement alone says it all.

    They must assume that there are only a few of them currently surviving.

    "It''s not so much a reluctance to believe as it is a reluctance to believe. If anyone survives andes back to the surface, it''s imperative that everyone retreats as quickly as possible."

    "I''m sure His Majesty will be angry, but there''s nothing we can do about it.

    No one bothered to disagree with that conclusion. While this is the approach to be taken, the next step is to grasp the status quo.

    "What''s this ce like?

    "No poison was found in the drinks and fruit ced here. I do not intend to receive charity from the enemy, but this is clearly intended to entertain us.

    "And that door. It won''t open with either push or pull, but you can see the numbers on it, right? We were all talking before you came and wanted to say if that was counting down.

    Behind that doorway located in the depths, there seemed to be an indescribably thick aura of monster matter wafting out. And the door that Bazan pointed out did have some numbers written on it.

    That''s obviously indicating time. The numbers say two hundred. It should mean that the door will be open in another three hours or so.

    Coincidentally that time coincided with the time it took for Minutes physical condition to fully recover.

    It didn''t feel like an ident, and Minute sighed helplessly.

    "It seems the enemy wants to fight us who are fully prepared. It''s not exactly dangling, but at least the other side seems to be waiting for me to recover.

    "And it doesn''t look like we''re waiting for a group of people to arrive for a separate challenge?

    "That means the opponent is confident in his own strength, right?

    "We and the Lord Minute have killed the King of the Dead, and he really underestimated us.

    "But don''t be polite to him at a time like this. In a little while Kansas should being over as well, and it would be in our interest to buy some more time.

    "That''s true. The more people who can fight, the better. If even Lord Kansas joins us, breaking through this maze isn''t impossible, is it?

    "Exactly. That said, the keys we have now, there are currently seven of them. Did Sir Minute get something like that, too?

    Reiha said while pulling out a badge. There are ten crystals set on it, seven of which are glowing.

    This badge is the key that gives the right to challenge the king of this maze.

    "Of course. In order to challenge the King of the Labyrinth, the Ten Lords of the Labyrinth must be defeated. The Imperials already had four keys before we came in.

    "Yes. It''s not just the Necromancer, the Necromancer we defeated seems to be one of the Ten Lords of the Labyrinth as well.

    "So it is. If Kansas wins and gets the keys, the minimum number of keys that can be added to a waiting opponent is nine. There was only a faint glimmer of hope, but there was always a bit of a clear path to follow.

    If they could get back on the ground right away, they''d probably swear never toe in again. This maze is just so treacherous.

    Yet that wish is unlikely toe true.

    If the enemy had not been defeated afterwards, they could not have made it back out alive. As early as the time they entered thebyrinth, they already had this realization.

    All they can do now is move forward.

    So much so, that Minute and his crew did nothing but wait for Kansas to arrive, while resting on one side. In order to increase the chances of winning, physical fatigue must be removed as much as possible here.

    Although there was no need to worry about poisoning, everyone did not go to eat the food prepared by the enemy.

    Each person took out their own carry grain and did what may have been theirst energy boost.

    Take a chance on living.

    When only three minutes remained, Minute stood up.

    After confirming the badge he was disappointed to find that the glow had not increased.

    ...maybe Kansas lost the battle.

    Even as the wait continued, reinforcements seemed to show no sign ofing.

    This made Minute shed naive expectations.

    He judged the situation calmly and gave the correct instructions.

    "It''s time. It''s about time we got ready, too.

    The words made the Emperor''s near-guards nod their heads speechlessly. Then they took out their pendants and chanted briefly in unison.

    Open!

    In a sh, a stream of light erupted and the three men were armed.

    There were three Emperor Close Guards, plus Major General Minute, the strongest man in the Mecha Legion. Although there were only four people in total, the people gathered here were among the best in the Empire.

    With a team like this in ce, breaking through the maze is no dream either. Yes, everyone is so convinced.

    And just like that, the moment of destiny came.

    Time counts down and the rest goes to zero.

    Meanwhile the front door opens.

    Everyone is ready to wake up.

    They didn''t hesitate to walk through the door and throw themselves into that matchup that bet on their chances of survival.

    ...........

    ........

    There was darkness in front of the door.

    It''s apletely dark space where not even light can shine through.

    Reiha hurried to light up with the elemental magic of light ''Wide Range Lighting''.

    The sight that appeared there took the crowd''s breath away.

    The ce was a vast wilderness, with the bodies of Imperial generals and soldiers piled as high as mountains.

    At the highest point there was a magical creature that was meditating.

    That''s Zegion.

    Not sitting directly on top of the body, but floating slightly in mid-air.

    Just looking at it was proof enough that Zegion possessed a high degree of magic.

    "Wee to you, warriors.

    The voice was low and flooding.

    Zegion just said the word and a strong sense of oppression appeared throughout the space.

    This time Minute could be sure.

    This monstrous creature was the one who had drawn him to this ce, the Demon Lord Rimuru.

    So without thinking, he asked.

    "You arethe Demon Lord Rimuru, right?

    He had already read the report that said the Demon Lord Rimuru was a Slime.

    But how is that?

    Since it''s a Slime, it''s not surprising to be able to morph into various forms.

    The most important thing was that this creature released a rather overwhelming "Demon Lord Qi". This proves that the creature is the Demon Lord Rimuru, or so Minute thought.

    He didn''t expect that statement to piss off Zegion.

    "How dare you mistake mefor the great Lord Rimuru"

    What?

    An intense rage enveloped the space.

    Seeing such a violent reaction from the other side, Minute this time realized the blunder.

    "My name is Zegion. Just one of the Ten Lords of the Labyrinth. You foolish men who crawl on the ground, it is not a pity to die so foolishly.

    Despite the passion that burned in his heart, Zegion only ndly informed.

    "There is only one way for you to live, and that is to defeat me. Burn your lives and struggle as hard as you can!

    Although he spoke arrogantly in the face of the heroes of the Empire, the tone did not sound arrogant andcent.

    It made it clear to the Minute that knowing Zegion was stating what he knew to be the truth.

    Trying to get him to retract those words, as Zegion said, can only show strength.

    "Guys, we''re going all out.

    "Yes, sir.

    "Got it.

    "I see."

    And just like that, a truly ravaging showdown ensued.

    ***

    True or falsethats what I''m saying from the heart.

    That said, Benimaru and I were staring at the scene reflected on the big screen.

    The image shows what was going on inside thebyrinth until not too long ago, and now it has be quiet. This means that all Imperial General soldiers on all floors were killed in action.

    The battle is over.

    However, the sight we just saw was too much for us to talk about.

    "That guymight be better than you?"

    In the end, I finally managed to say what I really felt in my heart.

    Presumably unwilling to admit it, the look on Benimaru''s face was hard to watch.

    "On that part, there are a few possibilities"

    The tone in which he spoke felt very chagrined.

    Benimaru also muttered in a small voice but not to the point where the probability is zero at best.

    Just admit it.

    It''s time to be honest and admit it.

    "Kufufufufu. I also fought against the one called Zegion. In addition to having intimidatingbat credentials, he is also a worm-type demon beast, a demon nemesis, able to directly nullify even half of a man''s magic. Truly an apprentice of Lord Veldora, a careless one could have defeated even me. Just not admitting defeat is not a loss.

    Losing doesn''t count! Just like that, although Diablo said it with a smile, it didn''t seem funny to me at all.

    Razul was also one of those cases where certain high-ranking members of the Worm-type Demon Beast belonged to the Demon Race''s natural enemies. It looked like Zegion had also be such a being.

    By the way, it looks like Testarossa and the girls have challenged Zegion as well, but I hear there is no record of winning until now. Being able to see the chagrined Testarossa, Diablo seemed very content.

    But just the mere fact that it was a tie with Zegion, those three girls could be said to be exceptional.

    Having seen thebat situation just now, I sincerely think so.

    Then let''s try to review the battle just now.

    ...........

    ........

    The battle within thebyrinth ended, by andrge, as predicted.

    Being able to sessfully convince a few enemies was a highlight, and Kumaras victory was also worth apuding.

    While the Adalman group and Apito''s side had regrets, it can only be described as encountering a tricky opponent.

    That said, there''s a guy who rounds up all these masters and even gives them time to nourish themselves.

    That''s all Zegion did.

    Through Operation Space, Zegion forcefully called over the masters he recognized.

    His five senses were really scary. He must have been watching every battle while meditating and paying attention back and forth inside the maze.

    They didn''t intervene until the winner was decided, only bringing in the strong ones who had survived.

    That guy is really messing around.

    If losing in such a case was simply idiotic, I''m sure the other Ten Lords of the Labyrinth wouldn''t remain silent.

    Yet everyone else was fine with it.

    On the one hand because the people who lost the matchup had no businessining, but more importantlyeveryone acknowledged that Zegion was strong.

    "It shouldn''t be a problem to leave it to Zegion.

    There''s even news that Veldora has decided on the guarantee.

    In my opinion and Benimaru''s, I hope Zegion sets his sights on actually winning. If the enemy is defeated identally

    Although thisyer of worry was inevitable, there were only four people left on the enemy side.

    Comining over a little thing feels very mosntrous.

    So I decided to stop being a pussy this time and give Zegion permission to be capricious.

    Plus, they can gatherbat intelligence.

    It seemed like fun to see Zegion get serious this time, so I decided to just go with him.

    The results show it was all a rampage.

    In a phrase, it''s a one-sided fight.

    The first to start the action was Bazan, who had been alone against the Necromancer. In his first move, he used his full strength to kill Zegion with a sword strike that could shatter even the earth.

    Zegion defuses the left hand by using it in a way that doesn''t hinder his opponent''s movement. As the crossbelly of the sword was pushed away slightly, Bazan lost his center of gravity so that he was unable to deliver a continuous attack.

    Zegion didn''t let the break go, and managed to burrow into each other''s arms like that. The right foot stomped on the ground with force, and at the same time, the right fist was aimed at the enemy''s armor and struck over.

    Only then did he wonder how much power was contained in that punch, and then he realized that the hardness of that punch wasparable to legendary level.

    The glowing armor shattered, and Bazan died as a result.

    It wasn''t even three seconds after the fight started that this thing happened.

    The gang probably didn''t react for a moment to the sudden death of their partner. The female wizard whose name was Reiha was dumbfounded. It should be clear what would happen if such behavior appeared in front of Zegion.

    She''s still lucky.

    There was no pain or fear, just death.

    The Reiha, who had been sliced in two with a hand knife, went limp.

    Seeing this scene, Krishna, who had beaten Albert, let out a shout.

    "Hey, hey, hey, hey...! How dare you kill Reiha! Go to hell, you monster! Dimension Cut"

    Anger esctes into fighting spirit, and Krishna shows divine skill.

    The so called Demon Extinguishing Subdimension Chop can cut through all defenses and even cut through the subdimension. If I didn''t have a space maniption skill like "Space Domination", it would be impossible to fight against it. It wasn''t too much to say that it was a must-kill technique, this strike was evenparable to the Holy Sword Technique.

    But it didn''t work on Zegion.

    Ridiculous."

    After saying that, Zegion began to twist around.

    Hey, isn''t that one of the "Absolute Defense" moves of Covenant King Urielthe Space Twisting Defense Field!?

    Let me use it, the "absolute defense" that is admittedly going to be broken, and Zegion uses it perfectly.

    Facing a stunned Krishna, Zegion said to him.

    "Lord Rimuru granted me this skill, no matter what kind of attack it is, it won''t work!

    I don''t remember teaching him.

    <<>>

    Master Raphael, the King of Wisdom, it turns out you did the right thing

    Speaking of Zegion''s spatial dominance, that''s beyond the scope of unique skills. It''s nothingpared to what I use.

    No wonder it''s only about fighting, he can fight Veldora to the point where he''s evenly matched.

    It''s no wonder Krishna''s attack was blocked.

    Now that I''ve seen it, Krishna and the others, they don''t stand a chance, but

    "Listen to me, Krishna!

    The man, who seemed to take dressing very seriously, was remembered by the name Minute. Minute called out to Krishna.

    "This guy''s not simple. Do your best to give him the death blow while I blunt his movements!

    It looks like they haven''t given up trying to win.

    They may be the enemy, but I want topliment them like that.

    Minute is going to let Zegion bask in his power.

    That force I have also analyzed. The battle of Apito''s defeat was not in vain.

    It''s a unique technique called "suppressor" to manipte gravity. Through this force, Minute let the surrounding gravitational pull focus on Zegion''s side, intending to hold him in check.

    It''s a pity

    It didn''t work on Zegion.

    By distorting the space around him, he was also able to manipte the flow of gravity and defuse it.

    It turns out there''s another use for itand that surprised me.

    That said, how did Zegion get so strong?

    The doubt in my mind began to swell.

    Is that that Master Raphael, the King of Wisdom, has a way of guiding Zegion?

    <></answer.>

    I remembered.

    Having previously rescued the dying Zegion, I did mend his wounds with a part of my flesh.

    But to put that into perspective, Apito had the same conditions, didn''t she?

    <> Apito was good enough, but it didn''t seem to be enough for Master Raphael, the King of Wisdom. It seems to be satisfied with Zegion, and I don''t have a concrete idea of how good Zegion is.</answer.>

    That said, what the hell is hyper-optimization?

    That''s simply a big makeover, right?

    Although that was the first time I heard it

    That is to say, the crystallization of the interest of Master Raphael, the King of Wisdom, is equivalent to Zegion being right. With thisyer of perception, it''s no wonder it''s so exaggerated when you think about it.

    It''s only right that Master Raphael, the King of Wisdom, who is known for often going too far, should be fooling around again without my knowledge.

    Possessing the ideal fighting type, this guy is particrly good at fighting. That kind of Zegion blossomed after special training with Veldora. Unusual people simply could not deal with him.

    And then, as expected.

    "Dimension ray!

    Only to see Zegion spread out his right hand, five fingers, and casually swing it downward. Just this action cuts the subdimensionin other words there is a spatial disconnect.

    There is nothing that can be done tobat this phenomenon without space maniption skills.

    Although the two men from the Imperial Army had reacted early, there was no point in just taking a one-sided beating.

    Krishna intended to use the Monster Extermination Subdivision Chop to counteract it, but couldn''t defeat his opponent and was cut in half. The power gap is clear at a nce.

    As for Minute''s side, he was going to release interference waves around himself, knocking the spatial break off bnce, butit was a pointless struggle. In the face of spatial distortions, almost all physical phenomena are impossible to counteract.

    The expression of surprise on his face was indescribable. The first defeat of a man who has never lost a battle to anyhat look is what it looks like.

    Maybe it''s not toote to admit defeat and Minute is out of the way.

    ...........

    ........

    And just like that, the fight began before even a minute had passed and the challenger was dead.

    Presumably that was it, Zegion had been strong to the point of being a mess.

    Although Kumara being so strong as to be abnormal also surprised me, Zegion''s strength was not something she could match. It even made me think he might be better than me.

    No way. This isn''t working.

    Its already beyond the limits of biology.

    Hes the Superman of beasts, which is even better than Hinata getting serious.

    ording to my calctions, even Apito is strong enough to be on a par with Carrion and Frey. But even this Apito, against Zegion, wouldntst more than three minutes.

    If Zegion fights for real, the winner will be seen in a sh.

    No, that''s no longer a showdown.

    It is unteral decapitation and extermination.

    How could such a strong master be nesting in a maze?

    What a waste, huh? That guy''s a secret weapon, though.

    Can''t let this guy out into the world.

    It''s decided.

    However, even so

    I originally thought that the world was full of crouching tigers and hidden dragons, and I thought that I hadn''t taken it lightly, butI didn''t realize that there were such superhumans hidden in our territory.

    I always thought he looked like he was strong, but didn''t expect far beyond that.

    There really are some other things in the world that are mind-boggling.

    That said, let''s put those aside.

    There were other things to reflect on this time.

    I find that casually leaving things in the hands of Master Raphael, the King of Wisdom, can really get out of hand.

    I don''t have time for trouble over there right now. To see if it was doing any other good, it seemed necessary to get Master Raphael, the King of Wisdom, to have a good chat about this matterter on.

    Thinking on the one hand, the battle inside the maze ended without incident, giving me a temporary sigh of relief.

    ***

    In this way, out of the 700,000 Imperial troops that hade from the ground, more than 530,000 had already been packed up.

    While it was essentially carnage, to me it represented nothing more than obtaining half a million

    "souls".

    That makes a total of over seven-hundred thousand people. Seven subordinates can be allowed to evolve. Ill wait until the rest of the groundbat is over before I consider who to let evolve.

    As for this ground game, there''s no room for carelessness just yet.

    "There are less than 200,000 Imperial troops left. It''s still a big army, but it feels like very littlepared to when it started.

    "Right. It had been two days since they hadst sent troops into thebyrinth, but nothing had moved since. Nor does it appear that there is any intention of sending any more troops in. If they continue to cling to thebyrinth, then the enemymander will be too ipetent.

    Also, Benimaru is right.

    The opponent''s battle strength was gradually draining away, so normally, he would not continue to send troops into the maze. So that we don''t have to kill out.

    Now that the soldiers who had surpassed the A level were gone, the enemy''s fighting power had plummeted. Despite therge numbers, we should still be able to cope.

    Thinking so, or feeling worried.

    "So what''s next? Not only is it better than the number of soldiers, but it''s also the other side that has the upper hand, right? If the Second Legion is sent directly there, there will be casualties no matter what, right?

    Can we just nest in our territory and wait for the other side to run out of food. That way our side can win unscathed.

    Inside thebyrinth there was an umtion of some grain, and we relied on those to fight for a year.

    There was also a certain amount of cultivation going on, and if anything went wrong, it was up to Ramiris to ask her to increase the amount of farnd.

    If it is prudent, we should implement this operational n.

    "The enemy''s supply line is down. In fact on a strategic level it was us who won. It''s gotten to this point, and all that''s left to do is follow up"

    "Hmph! As said earlier, we''re not going to let those invaders go back alive, are we? It''s true that Benimaru is very reliable!

    Benimaru was only halfway through his exnation when Shion interjected. After hearing her words, Benimaru revealed a dark smile.

    It seemed as if she had been right.

    "The empire cannot be allowed to have that kind of boring ambition again. In order for that to happen, we must kill all the invaders.

    Benimaru also spoke the same words as Master Raphael, the King of Wisdom.

    If you want to destroy half of the Imperial Army, Benimaru can''t be satisfied, but you still have to follow the original n to kill all the enemies in one piece.

    This man really has no mercy on his enemies.

    Things havee to this, and I''m not going to object.

    I''m ready toe to my senses. Even if I will be resented, I will only be hated by the subjects of the empire.

    It''s just that, at any rate, I want to avoid even the West cursing at us

    <> Oh?</answer.>

    It seems like there''s still a record on Master Raphael, the King of Wisdom''s side.

    Seeing that it doesn''t say anything like that, it''s probably not sure what the odds are.

    Can that be implemented right now?

    <> I see.</answer.>

    That being said, there''s no way to start some weird experiment while you''re at war. Although I don''t know what it''s going to do, the person responsible for implementing it is me.

    Ill talk to Master Raphael, the King of Wisdom, about thister.

    I pulled my attention back to the Benimaru.

    He''s going to burn down the whole enemy, which I ept. Then there''s the very important request, which is really just to hope that there are no victims on our side.

    "We can''t die on our side. Is there any way to do that?

    "As long as we, the leaders, are out there, no one will die."

    Still as confident as ever.

    Hearing these words from Benimaru, not only Diablo and Shion, but even Geld, who was a gentle man, nodded along with them.

    "So what exactly should we do?

    As soon as my question was thrown out, Benimaru began to illustrate.

    "The guards at Lord Rimuru''s side must not move.

    Everyone listened and nodded. Looks like everyone agrees on that.

    "As for the intruders into thebyrinth, they killed all but Michel and Raymond, right? Then there''s no need to be so vignt.

    As for the two people mentioned now, they are still taken as captives. It didn''t look like they would betray, so there were no restrictions on their movements.

    Just to be on the safe side, well let them stay on the sixtieth floor first, then ask Gadra to keep an eye on them over there.

    Guessing that they might get bored, Gadra asked them to look at the fighting on the various floors. We also have a record of the reaction of Michel and the others at the time, who watched the Ten Lords of the Labyrinth all dumbfounded inbat.

    "Isn''t that right? Just like I said, defecting to this side is the right thing to do, right?

    "Just say it. Be thankful for us.

    "We''re going to have three dinners to show our appreciation.

    "Geez, don''t give them a hard time. We''ve been down the same road and can appreciate how you feel."

    That was probably the case, Gadra and Shinji and the others even stepped in forfort. I guess there should be no need to worry about them.

    In this way, it is important to note whether there was an invasion of the town before the war started.

    "Souei, is someone invading the town?

    "Don''t worry. It''s all taken care of.

    Looks like it is.

    But since Souei had answered like that, that meant it was a great relief.

    <> Ah, so Krishna is still alive.</answer.>

    Although he was strong, hearing Master Raphael, the King of Wisdom, say so, the relevant information was all in hand. That would be no problem.

    "Anyway, the inside of the maze seems to be safe, so there should be no need to worry so much.

    Meaning people like that Kansas, Minute, and Imperial Emperor Close Guard Order, those ranks would be better than me before I became a Demon Lord. ording to Chloe, it seems that I didn''t evolve into a demon lord before, so it wouldn''t be surprising even if I was killed.

    I did not summon Diablo in that time and space, and he was not there. With Veldora not yet resurrected again, Zegion should still be in the same state he was in before he evolved.

    Even in terms ofbat power, it should be too weak to bepared to the present.

    If the Empire attacked under such circumstances, it would not be surprising even if we had no way to defeat them and I lost my life.

    <<impossible.>></impossible.>

    No, no, no, I think it''s possible.

    I know that the King of Wisdom, Master Raphael, hates to lose to others, but it''s too much to lose to say that.

    After all, it was still "The Great Sage" at that time.

    << >>

    Hm, can''t tell.

    It''s been a long time since I''ve talked about winning.

    It''s pointless to argue for a win-lose for something like this.

    "Indeed, perhaps Lord Rimuru is right

    Benimaru agreed, looking unlikely to ept it.

    That said, Shion just won''t admit to anything she says.

    "No! How can you lose a battle!?

    No, no, no, let''s just say it''s possible.

    As much as it''s tempting to say that history will prove everything, we''re now headed for a different history. Facing a person of Shion''s type, it would be difficult to exin to her if the truth wasn''t really in front of her.

    I gave up exining to Shion and decided to continue discussing things.

    "Anyway, there''s no point in talking about that now. The point is that there are masters on the Empire side too. There may be other masters left, and we should never take them lightly. People say I can''t have fewer escorts, and this sentiment makes me happy, but I don''t want you to get hurt because of it.

    Thebyrinth should be safe, so it''s best to take a breath and get to know it.

    I thought about it so much that I said those words, but they seemed to contain an iparable amount of power.

    "Geez, since Lord Rimuru has said that, I''ll strike too, and make this war over in the blink of an eye!

    "Diablo, I won''t let you run away! This is a great opportunity to introduce my secret troop to Lord Rimuru, and I''m definitely not giving this opportunity away!

    "My lord, please wait! Wouldn''t it be too much for you to give Testarossa and Ultima a chance to be active and me the only one who doesn''t? Trouble has ordered me to attack this time too!

    Diablo, Shion, and Carrera, who opened the door and rushed in, began to mor and scramble to strike.

    "You guys

    This time, Benimaru also had silly eyes.

    Even Geld began tough darkly.

    "I know, I know. I will stay here and leave the final showdown to you.

    As a result, in the end, even Benimaru gave Diablo permission for them to fight.

    ***

    In this way, the question bes what kind ofbat n is to be implemented.

    "To confirm strength. The main force is my Red Legion of 30,000, plus Gelds Yellow Legion and Orange Legion who deployed an elite 17,000. From a qualitative point of view, they should also be able topete with the remaining Imperial soldiers. We should be able to take tactical action ording to the circumstances, and if we confine the battlefield to certain areas, we will have the upper hand most of the time. By the way, Shion, what is the approximate number of your secret troops?

    The current battle strength is 47,000? On average, it''s equivalent to a B+ rating, which is more than enoughbat power. However, the Imperial Army is nearly four timesrger than ours, and even if it is used to our advantage, it may still be defeated

    "Ten thousand in all. By the way, only those who can survive my special training are left inside, so they can be considered as having a minimum of B+.

    The Pro-Guard of Shiomonly known as the Shion Fan Club.

    Unlike the "Yomigaeri", the captains of this mysterious force are all Dagruels sons, and it seems to be even bigger than expected.

    "Are there really that many?

    Didn''t think theyd add so much without paying attention, which surprised me so much.

    I know Gobzo was in attendance, and there were all sorts of other people joining in as well

    "Yes! In order to make them worthy enough to serve as Lord Rimuru''s pro-guard, I have secretly exercised them!

    Welllets say it''s not mine, it''s yours.

    Never mind.

    It''s times like these that reliable partners should be happy.

    "But it''s still overwhelmingly negative in terms of numbers. So I want to expect the leaders to perform.

    First, use a big move to throw your opponent into chaos, then take advantage of this time to kill them.

    And of course the enemy is not silent and dry-eyed. Let''s assume they''re going to get in the way, so somebody''s going to have to take the lead, it''s just

    Originally, this task was expected to be given to Benimaru.

    At times like this, the "ck me Prison" is the most suitable one to use arge scale burn attack.

    Only it''s a pity that Benimaru is staying here as my bodyguard.

    So who should go?

    "My lord, isn''t it my turn to y?

    Wellthat''s right.

    It felt like she was well suited for the task.

    I peeked at Benimaru and ended up eye to eye with him. He nodded faintly and let me decide to assign the mission to Carrera.

    "Oh, oh, oh, oh, let me this time

    "Leave it to Carrera. You''re going to use super-m magic to destroy the Imperial Army!"

    "Leave it to your men! Looking forward to it, my lord!

    Ah, Diablo just seemed to have something to say halfway through as well.

    "Sorry, Diablo. What were you trying to say?

    "No, nothing. Kufufufu. Not a very important thing. Great, Carrera.

    "Mmm! I''m so happy."

    It always felt like there was a spark between Diablo and Carrera.

    Was that guy Diablo going to rmend himself?

    It would be embarrassing for him if that was the case, but would Diablo use mass magic?

    It should work.

    He was going to give it his all, right?

    Just thinking about this side makes him feel a little pathetic.

    "Sorry, Diablo. In fact, I was just going to ask you to take care of the Supreme Commander on the enemy''s side!

    I jumped out of my chair, shifted from Slime into human form and stood in front of Diablo. Then put a hand on his shoulder, meaning to say.

    Huh!"

    Only to see the look on Diablo''s face ease up.

    It looked so happy, the whole crowd was ecstatic.

    That''s fine.

    "Maybe the enemy still has a master we haven''t seen, right? That guy named Krishna seems to havee back to life just now, and tracking that guy''s aura is easy for you, isn''t it?

    This guy has a bit of a stalker streak and should be good at this kind of thing. It was based on this thought that I asked, and as a result he replied cheerfully, "Of course, Lord Rimuru!"

    I thought to myself, Sure enough, while nodding my head.

    "There are likely to be intimidating masters lurking on the Imperial side. In order to force those guys out, we have to show them what we can do this time. Carrera, Diablo, please!

    "We vow to do our best, my lord!

    "Kufufufufu. What an emotionally charged order from Lord Rimuru!

    Great. With the opportunity to make an appearance, Carrera looked happy, too, and Diablo''s mood changed for the better.

    That way they''ll be better off in Geld too.

    "In order to avoid the obstruction of Carreras magic, other troops were sent to thoroughly intimidate each other. If someone doese out to get in the way, then Shion will send her troops to deal with them.

    After I finished speaking, Benimaru took over to give instructions. Looks like he''ll have no problem with leaving everything else to him.

    "As for the formation, Geld will be in charge of ying the lead, and the Shion side will be ying guerri tactics, as mentioned earlier. The pursuit looks to the Red Army for firepower, as to who will be inmand

    That person needs to be able to link to Benimaru using "Communication Network" to immediately reflect what he means. The wrong action on the battlefield can be fatal if you identally take the wrong action. So there is an absolute need for people who can make fine corrections.

    Gobuya should be well suited for the role as well, but the burden of giving instructions to Shion or Geld might be too heavy?

    "Then this time send Gob

    "Wait a minute!"

    Someone interrupted Benimaru''s words, and at this time the door to the control room suddenly opened.

    Someone came in, and it was Momiji, the leader of the Tengu n.

    She is also the daughter of Hakurou and is close to us. Having said that, it''s a problem to be able to easily enter the control room in the midst of such heavy guard

    "I was kindly invited here by Lady Shuna.

    I see.

    Shuna prepared dim sum and tea for us, and did it without any fuss. It looked like Momiji had been helping her.

    Since that made it okay, I decided toe and hear what Momiji had to say.

    "As for Lord Benimaru''s agent, as his future wife, I think it''s my responsibility!

    "What are you talking about!?

    This battle, Benimaru''s agent is not just anyone to call. It''s just that switching to Momiji would be fine.

    Her strength was impable, her temperament was rigid, and she would not be overwhelmed by Shion and Geld in terms of her aura.

    "Wouldn''t that be nice?

    I decided to ept Momiji''s offer.

    "If it''s Miss Momiji, she''s also a pretty reliablerade in arms!

    It seemed that Shion didn''t have a problem with it either. Knowing that she was Hakurou''s daughter, Shion seemed to have a special fondness for her.

    "I''m with you. The Red Legion is a collection of powerful demons. Instead of just relying on the Red me n for control, we should have the Tengu ne along and help manage it.

    Even Geld said so, and the other subordinates were okay with it.

    "No one seems to object, so let your wife take care of it, shall we, Benimaru?

    "No, but"

    Benimaru wants to object?

    It''s not certain, it''s possible that one doesn''t want to send one''s wife to war.

    "I see, you''re worried about your wife.

    "That''s one of the reasons" Huh? no!

    Benimaru didn''t fight himself as soon as he was in a panic to deny it. Watching Benimaru like this, someone made up an unexpected sh from the side.

    Brother!"

    With a "pound", the door opened, only to see Shuna-chan standing up inrge letters and shouting at Benimaru.

    Lady Momiji has been preparing my brother''s meal for the past few days. I hope to make my brother eat good food and ask me to teach her how to cook. In the face of such a positive attitude, I will not trample.

    "Yes, is that so?

    Yes."

    At this point, Momiji nodded.

    I''ve actually noticed that too. That''s because some ces aren''t quite cooked yet,pared to the dishes made by Shuna.

    That''s why I wanted to answer Momiji''s offer.

    "But that incident is not the same thing as this one"

    Brother!"

    Ooh."

    It turns out that even Benimaru can''t beat his sister?

    "It''s my brother''s indecisiveness that''s to me. Because this indirectly made Lady Momiji feel uneasy.

    Since you''re a manly man, you should be strong and say exactly who you love!

    Ah, indeed that''s right.

    Albis vs. Momiji. I''m curious who Benimaru will pick, but it doesn''t seem appropriate to talk about that right now.

    I sympathize with Benimaru from the bottom of my heart.

    After all, I wouldn''t want to discuss such things in front of a crowd.

    "No, Lady Shuna. I''m going to win on my own!

    This time Momiji firmly deres.

    Ah, the situation was rather unfavorable for Albis this time.

    Momiji''s side has bought off the people they should have bought off, so it looks like it''s a winner?

    I was just thinking about this

    "I won''t let you sneak away.

    I didn''t expect even Albis to show up. Shezily walked out from behind Shuna.

    "Just now, I finally arrived here with reinforcements from Eurazania.

    We didn''t ask, and we didn''t hear about itthat said, Albis brought the letter from Milim.

    "Do your best!

    That''s all that''s written above.

    The phrase is being said to whom, and depending on who the recipient is, various interpretations can actually be made.

    All that aside

    How did Albise to be in thebyrinth?

    "It was all through Lady Milims magic. Wasn''t it all the Lord Rimuru''s referral?

    Oh, I see.

    Milim went to get permission to talk to Ramiris through the "mind talk" and sent the army straight into the maze.

    As messy as it felt that way, Milim was capable of anything.

    Then looking at the army led by Albis, there were 20,000 in all.

    It wasn''t just the Beasts, even the Winged n hade. It seemed that the Beast King Warrior Regiment had also sent several people from their side.

    Even Benimaru put on a bitter melon face after reading this.

    Since it was Milim''s intention, then he couldn''t refuse the reinforcements that Albis had brought, and the way things had turned out, presumably Momiji would never back down.

    "I know, I know. Momiji, Ill just give you my army. You will be my agent.

    "I''d love to!

    Momiji looked happy.

    The next battle of woman against woman begins.

    "Don''t you pull my leg.

    "What''s that supposed to mean?"

    It was as if seeing visions of sparks popping and flying apart made me a little uneasy about whether this would go wrong.

    ***

    Although something happened, the members to be sent to fight were finally finalized.

    Either way Albis and the rest have these reinforcements to look up to.

    We are still numerically disadvantaged, but even so, this still creates a lot of residual power.

    Geld came to the front and gave the back to Momiji.

    Both sides are guerri forces. The right decides to configure Shion, while the left is Albis.

    This is slightly relieving, but the war has to start next. I tensed my nerves and asked the legions to prepare for the attack.

    Seemingly impatient for the moment, Shion and Geld set out. Momiji followed in their footsteps, and the control room suddenly became busy.

    The ny-five floors now turned to a hundred, and there became a vast expanse of emptynd. It wasn''t to the point where they could conduct military training, but it was okay for all of them to squeeze over there.

    Thinking about this side, I told Geld''s Second Legion and Benimaru''s Fourth Legion members to stay near the hundredth floor.

    It took about an hour to get all hands on deck, and I decided to go over there for a morale boost. Either way it would require the use of teleportation magic to transport the legions to the ground, and that kind of spell was the only one I would use.

    "Lord Rimuru, may I have a moment?

    I was about to move over when this time the Souei came to speak in my ear.

    "What is it?

    "That''s right. Just now Moss contacted me to say that he had found a fight on the Blumund side. The investigation revealed that Miss Treyni was engaged in a battle with someone.

    Huh!?"

    So, about ten days ago, Miss Treyni had not been seen. She said she was going to say hello to the suspicious person and turned out not to be back.

    Have you been fighting the other side ever since?

    "Souei, I''m sorry. Can you go over there and help her?

    When I asked him so, Souei hesitated for an instant. Presumably he was worried about my reduced escort, but everyone was overly worried.

    I don''t think people need to be so neurotic.

    With Benimaru staying here, if anything, I can still call a Labyrinth Lord over. Instead, he should be more worried about Miss Treyni than I am.

    After exchanging a nce with Benimaru, Souei nodded. It looked like he thought it would be okay with Benimaru on this side.

    I didn''t expect them to be so worried about me, I was in such aplicated mood, I felt both happy and annoyed.

    But indeed, to the sound of Chloe''s words, it seemed that I had been killed. But now that I''ve evolved into a demon lordwell, that sounds like a g.

    If something happens, Master Raphael, the King of Wisdom, will inform me, and there is no point in being upset there.

    "As youmand. Then I will leave at once.

    Please."

    As soon as my words were finished, the Souei disappeared. As usual, it''s the perfect "instantaneous movement method".

    If Miss Treyni had been fighting, it would mean that the other side''s strength was not too far off. In this way, with the addition of the Souei, they should win.

    I''m a little worried, not sure what the opponent is, but we can''t take it lightly. To get this war over with first.

    One hourter

    The empty space on the hundredth floor was crowded by arge group of monsters.

    As soon as I showed my face, all of them stood up straight and the scene was silent and neat to the point of being a little scary.

    Looks like morale is high and very motivated.

    Thisguys! We will use this battle to drive out the Imperial Army. The goal isplete victory. All muste back alive, and not one less. Now go!

    Let me say this kind of thing a little bit, I''m really not good at speeches.

    Master Raphael, the King of Wisdom, has said that it is possible to have it written in its original form to read for me, but at times like this I have to pretend I didn''t hear it.

    I could only try to express it in my own way, not expecting the monsters to be receptive. Based on the follow-up reactions, it seems that not only the minions that were there before, but even the newly arrived wizards are giving positive reviews.

    "Whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa! His Majesty Rimuru''s speech was wonderful!

    "So I can go to death and there are no regrets!

    "You idiot! You''ll be killed if you go to your death!

    Vaguely it seems that more and more people are saying this.

    I know nothing of those that send silent armies to the ground with teleportation magic.

    ***

    The scene became very lonely all at once.

    Even Shion and Diablo struck out together, and the only people left on the scene were me and Benimaru.

    "They''re gonna win, right?"

    "Yes, it should be fine. It looked like the Imperial Army''s general soldiers were unmoved, but those heads seemed to be panicking. It was supposed to be the one called Krishna who reported to them on the inside of the maze. Had it been known that the survivors were the only ones left, I would have retreated instead. But until then, I''m not going to let the situation get to that point.

    Benimaru replied with an unruly smile.

    That''s saying something.

    If it were me, I would feel uneasy about not being able to contact my subordinates, so I would think of some countermeasures.

    I honestly didn''t think the enemy wouldpletely and utterly fall for our n.

    "You can''t be too greedy in anything you do.

    "Yeah. War and plunder are usually tied together, but at least our military strictly forbids such behavior.

    Very good.

    When fighting, the side that loses its cool loses, while the other side that is stimted by desire immediately gets hot. This time we took advantage of that habit, and as a result the n went smoothly to the point of being daunting.

    To use this case as a counter-example, be careful not to follow in the footsteps of the other party.

    I was discussing this with Benimaru on my side and was about to return to the control room.

    That''s when a possibility popped into my head.

    "If it were now, would it be just you and me?

    Right."

    "That''s just a hypothetical. If there''s an enemy hiding in thebyrinth, I don''t think they''ll let that chance go, do you?

    "How can that be? It couldn''t have been done at such a good time.

    "That''s right.

    That''s right.

    That''s called being too suspicious.

    Even Master Raphael, the King of Wisdom, hangs on to reassure that the interior of the maze is safe and sound. Once you start doubting, you can''t collect it, and it''s best not to think about it anymore.

    Thinking the same thing all the time makes you feel uneasy in your heart. But there was an ominous sense of foreboding from just now

    <>

    It''s actually nothing.

    Not in disbelief of Master Raphael, the King of Wisdom, just always feeling concerned, thinking that he might be missing something.

    <> I believe you have confirmed that.</answer.>

    But on the flip side, what if it''s a character we know well?

    Eren the the others, for example. Because I trusted a few of them so much, it would be traumatic to be betrayed.

    Of course this one is hypothetical at best.

    Eren and the others had no reason to betray me, and we had umted a lot of trust in each other along the way. Presumably it can be asserted that they must be fine.

    But should other people be seen as well

    <<>>

    The subordinates of the country are fine.

    As for Brother Myormile, he works tirelessly for me. I have no way of doubting him.

    Except for the subordinates, all the other people close to me were people who came to stay in our country after the founding celebration.

    Yes, for example

    "Mr. Rimuru!"

    Some came from the "Labyrinth City" side.

    It can''t be them.

    The person who waved at the front of the line, who I also knew very well, was Masayuki. There were two others, both of whom were in his entourage.

    Warrior and Wizard, respectively, with names like Thunder and Bonnie. I rarely have conversations with them, and that''s because these people have been hostile to me until now.

    "That''s just my guess. Maybe there''s a chance that theyre lucky enough to want to kill me, too?

    "No, no, no, that''s a bit much to think about.

    "That''s true.

    My concerns were overruled by Benimaru.

    I don''t want to doubt Masayuki either.

    So, Gadra once said that Masayuki and Emperor Rudra looked exactly like each other

    No, no, no, they just happen to look the same either way you think about it.

    <> So to speak.</answer.>

    I''m relieved for the time being that a vocal response is a blessing.

    "Hi, Masayuki. Did something happen?

    "You ask me what happened! You''re giving me a headache by arranging for me to be a militarymander without my permission! They even said they wanted the vampire n to join them temporarily. Didn''t you guys just panic and do something? As a result, people on our side started making a lot of noise and talking about what was going on with everyone

    Because more and more people are volunteering, it''s a lot of work just to straighten these people out.

    The legion was out in force again in this situation, so it was fortunate that there were some bloodthirsty people on their side who were dumbfounded.

    His expression looked dejected, not at all like he was acting. If it were fortunate and suspicious, Master Raphael, the King of Wisdom, would have warned me.

    That means excluding Masayuki.

    "Most people stay in their original towns, right?

    "Yes, that''s right

    The town was originally above ground and has been moved to a hundred levels below ground for shelter. People were still able to see the sun and the stars as originally, so unexpectedly they didn''t find anything wrong with the situation. The war has long been fought, but it seems that some still believe that the two sides are still a long way apart from the ongoing standoff.

    We asked 20,000 Legionnaires to maintainw and order in the town, and because of this, there was no chaos. Just speaking of Masayuki himself, he seems to have gone through a busy day.

    The problem lies with the researchers who live in the "Labyrinth City". Normally they were all supposed to just deal with paperwork, but most of the people Ruminas sent were very powerful, the equivalent of catastrophe.

    These people seem to be called "overkillers", but they have too much time. To them, this war was also like a celebration, and they even went to Masayuki to negotiate with him face to face, saying that their willingness to participate was high.

    The two men, Barkas and Masayuki, who were currently dispatched from the Pdin''s side, were trying to find a way to pacify their partner, Maiden Jiu. It''s going to be difficult to clean up after this, so Masayuki came to me and asked me to think of something.

    It is possible that they are inciting Masayuki and want to cause a stir. And thene at me again, but in that case, it would have been much earlier to act.

    So this possibility should also be zero.

    I sighed, feeling that I had really overthought it.

    "This is amazing

    "Right? Do something about it!"

    "Don''t worry. The war is almost over, so just make up some random excuse before them.

    "No, no, no. You think it''s easy to say things that don''t concern you"

    It was fortunate toin to me with an embarrassed expression that didn''t work.

    But he can''t underestimate my perfunctory powers. I don''t have that kind of time to run off on my own initiative to get into this kind of trouble.

    It''s exhausting to be there, so I want to hurry back to the control room. Then let Shuna make a cup of ck tea for me and enjoy a delicious cake.

    "You must be trying to escape, right?

    "Ha ha ha!"

    "What are youughing at?

    It''s all crap arguments, but that''s the essence of perfunctory.

    I wish Masayuki could follow my example ande to the top of this realm. It is because I have this wish in my heart that I will not save Masayuki from death.

    "If that''s the only reason you''re looking for me, then I''m going to go back first.

    "Will the war really be over any time soon?

    "I want to be able to finish today.

    "We didn''t do anything, it sounds so unreal, since when did the war start?

    Also true.

    Don''t let the general public notice, that''s the way I should ideally fight.

    "Right. That''s it, just rx.

    A smile appeared on my face and I said this to make Masayuki ept it.

    That solves the problem. I''m gonna go back to the strawberry cake

    "Hey hey hey, give me a minute. It''s because Mr. Masayuki is giving you the courtesy that we''re silent and patient, but we''re not giving up on beating you! You''ve forgotten about this and told us to do this and that. That''s too much of a joke!

    Thought all the problems were solved, didn''t expect a new one to emerge.

    It seemed that it was Masayuki who was following Thunderbolt''s lead, and this time started toin.

    "Oh, shit. It''s all a misunderstanding. I can''t believe that I''m going to use you

    I started to make excuses, but it''s a lot to say. After all, I do use them, so the trick may not work.

    It is anxiously awaiting the arrival of reinforcements.

    "Hey, Thunder! You''re overstating it. Mr. Rimuru is now working for the people of the town, too!

    Masayuki stepped in to pacify him.

    Thank you. I''ll treat you to caketer!

    I looked at Masayuki with a grateful look.

    Thunder didn''t continue toin after being raised by Masayuki. I guess he''s still upset, but he seems to have enough of a belly to be able to take it in stride.

    It didn''t match his looks, and I thought to myself that this man was unexpectedly mature.

    All in all, that settles one thing. Originally thought so, but didn''t realize it wasn''t that simple.

    Thunder is right, just lucky! The demon lord and daredevil were supposed to be hostile. Don''t you keep holding back, it''s better to finish him off sooner rather thanter!

    Bonnie always steps back as a spectator, and only then does it get heated.

    I was thinking about how to calm him down.

    "If you''re lucky enough to refuse to do it, let me do it for you!

    After saying this, Bonnie began to chant the mantra.

    I secretly thought to myself, "That''s enough," and the next second I changed to a serious expression.

    "Holy Purification of the Frontier!

    How could II almost shouted the words, but finally held back.

    Not only was it difficult to use this spell, but only a small number of people could cast it alone. Bonnie was indeed an ''otherworldly visitor'' and had heard that he was good with magic, but hadn''t expected to be able to manipte such high order divine magic.

    In other words, he''s serious

    <<notice. confirmed="" intent="" to="" kill.="" the="" person="" named="" "bonnie"="" is="" enemy!="">> It was at this moment that it finally dawned on me.</notice.>

    Originally wondering how the enemy could be one of our own, thinking myself overly worried. Turns out that enemy is the immediate Bonnie.

    One person acted faster than I did.

    A crisp and sharp sound rang out, it was the result of Benimaru''s Taizen shing with Bonnie''s saber.

    "Bonnie, so youcan use a sword too?

    The one who was so surprised was Thunder.

    This would have been Bonnie''s first time with a sword. That means Masayuki and others are clearly Bonnie''s partners, but he has been lying to them so far.

    "Hmph, how could I be so stupid as to show off my true style so easily.

    To strike is to win and to kill, the expression on his face was written clearly.

    "Damn it! You bastard, not only did you lie to me, but to Masayuki-san as well!

    "What deceitful talk, to make it sound so unpleasant. I only used him to get close to the demon lord.

    Youyou say use?

    "Exactly. It''s fortunate that everything is convenient for me to do. Thanks to him, I was able to catch the perfect opportunity like this. And thank him.

    While Bonnie was sparring with Benimaru with a sword, he was conversing with Thunder with aplomb. I probably shouldn''t have said that when I listened to that conversation and heard that attention was drawn past him, but she seemed to be hiding a rather high level of strength.

    "Benimaru, I''m going to help you now"

    "No, this person, let me handle it. Please, Lord Rimuru is in charge of policing the perimeter.

    I wanted to add in help, but Benimaru stopped me. I decided to trust Benimaru this time and further raise my guard around me.

    Even in this situation, Bonnie and Thunder continued their conversation.

    "Are you kidding me? I can''t believe I''m saying that Mr. Masayuki is doing something convenient for you!"

    "Right. Actually, you''ve noticed that. The man was no big deal. He was living off his bluff.

    When he heard that, the expression on Masayuki''s face immediately became hard to look at.

    Oops, that''s a poisonous thing to sayits just a thought thates to mind, at best, but it''s a big problem for Masayuki. What Thunder said next was not what we expected.

    "So what? Whether it''s a bluff or some other bad move, Masayuki-san is good! Never fails to live up to our expectations!

    He really noticed.

    Discovering that Masayuki wasn''t just a brat who could bluff, he did see Masayuki for what he was.

    This made me impressed with Thunderbolt.

    Masayuki also looked at Thunder with an incredulous look.

    Only to see Thunder appear such a reaction, Bonnie seemed very unpleasant.

    "Tsk, I''ve noticed you''re sticking to him all day long and respecting that loser, don''tugh.

    He was unhappy to utter such ttering words.

    But I''m the one who should be upset.

    "There''s nothing wrong with bluffing. I''m bluffing my way through life, too!"

    "Mr. Rimuru"

    "Isn''t that what it is? I used to be nothing more than a working man, not living in a world with demon lords and heroes. I''m trying so hard, and I don''t want to beughed at by other people who don''t know anything.

    Hearing me say that, Masayuki also nodded speechlessly.

    "You, you"

    Even Thunder looked at me in confusion as he muttered something.

    I didn''t think so, and the conversation went on.

    "That''s normal. One must always convince themselves that they are doing the right thing, or there is no way to be king!

    Taking advantage of the yelling, I walked over to Masayuki. Avoiding irritation to Bonnie, who was opposing Benimarus Sword Strike, the action was slow.

    I''ve been working hard to create a world where everyone can live happily ever after, because everyone is trying their hardest to survive. It is fortunate that I am helping such a person. He''s been a big help! I will never allow anyone to look at him like an idiot!

    I came to stand in front of Masayuki and let out the word to Bonnie.

    Hearing me say that, Thunder nodded deeply.

    Immediately afterwards, even Masayuki spoke up.

    "Bonnie, were you going to use me from the beginning?"

    The panicked look just now seemed like a hallucination, and he asked Bonnie righteously.

    "I''ve just told you all that."

    Bonnie side kept his distance from Benimaru and didn''t fall off his guard, mouth so responsive.

    Benimaru also stepped in front of me and continued to stare at Bonnie. Affected by the ''Holy Purification Boundary'', Benimaru couldn''t bring himself to exert his full strength. It was probably because of this that he didn''t just attack in one go, but nned to observe the situation continuously.

    "Is that what Yuuki-san ordered you to do?

    "What? Oh, I see. Oh, it wouldn''t hurt to tell you, but it wouldn''t do me any good.

    And just like that, Bonnie says something that feels very despicable. But he was, for better or worse, going to keep talking to us.

    Was it because the Holy Purification Nexus was stable, and he was sure he had the upper hand?

    <> Master Raphael, the King of Wisdom, reported to me with appalling speed. Judging from the fact that the intelligence cotion had not yet beenpleted, Master Raphael, the King of Wisdom, must have considered the situation to be very urgent.</answer.>

    That being said, there was indeed another young girl in thepany, named Jiu. I heard that she and Bhus were working together to cate the Overkillers

    <<confirmationpleted.="" a="" massacre="" at="" the="" institute="" on="" 100th="" floor.="" individuals="" named="" "bhus"="" and="" several="" "supercreatures"="" were="" killed.="" urgent="" measures="" have="" been="" taken="" to="" protect="" their="" souls="">></confirmation>

    This is going to be a big deal!

    Bhus aside, every single one of those Overkillers is a Special A monster. After parting ways with Masayuki, she killed all these people in that short period of time, and it was a bit unbelievable that something like this happened.

    It would be very difficult to beat them if the Overkillers defended thoroughly. After all, they have

    "super-speed regeneration", and they also have all kinds of special abilities.

    If it''s a Benimaru with great firepower or a Zegion with abnormal evolution, it''s a different storybut even the other Ten Lords of the Labyrinth", including Kumara, can''t do it.

    There is a more important point.

    The information can''t be ignored. For all the circumstances within thebyrinth are in the hands of Master Raphael, the King of Wisdom. And yet there''s no way to find her, which means that Jiu

    "Mr. Rimuru!"

    The voice resounded directly in my heart as it conveyed itself faster than the "Communication Network". It was in this moment that "thinking elerated" made my physical time longer.

    Was it myself or Master Raphael, the King of Wisdom, who reacted?

    Whoever it was, it saved our lives.

    "Go to hell!"

    A ck sh of light crossed over and drove straight into my chest.

    SomeoneIm afraid it was Jiu, she''s perfectly invisible just to kill me. But I threw away my face and reputation, and fell straight down and rolled on the spot, only to escape the de that would surely kill me.

    Thanks to that warning.

    The voice came from the petite maidenthe masked Chloe.

    Although the name-calling to me has changed back to its former name, there is no time to correct it now.

    That said, it''s bad.

    I clearly did my best to be on guard all around, and Master Raphael, the King of Wisdom, was not negligent in his vignce. It would have been possible to sneak through thiswork, and then only one possibility could be thought of.

    In other words, this assassin had something like that.

    It''s an ultimate skill.

    Finally, I was able to confirm who the assassin was, and that person was really Jiu. She was still as expressionless as ever, but the atmosphere on her body was very different from before.

    It''s not too much to say she''s like a different person, with a feeling that''s both cold and poignant.

    "What a surprise. You''ve been tailing me without me noticing, haven''t you?

    The assassination n against me clearly failed, but Jiu didn''t seem to panic at all. The ck de held in her hand was shifting from the pendant, and the de was pointed at Chloe, and Jiu said so to her ndly.

    "You''ve been fighting people like that in high profile, so I can smell you."

    "You''re a little bit tough.

    "You don''t say that, and I''m not little!

    As soon as the words were said, Chloe immediately turned into the look of an adult. Next, she drew her moonlight rapier.

    That mythical level of light pointed towards Jiu, and then suddenly stopped.

    The masked "hero" Chloe shows up.

    "Geez, this is a great opportunity, but it''s just right, and I didn''t expect such a big mistake. You''re out of your mind, Jiu!

    After smacking his lips, Bonnie informed disgruntledly.

    "Sorry. I didn''t expect to be ambushed. I didn''t count on it."

    Not at all unreasonable, Jiu responded.

    These two know each other. And she''s a skilled assassin sent here by someone who wants to take my life.

    It looks like they are on equal footing.

    That means Bonnie is also likely to have ultimate skills.

    He and Benimaru stared at each other.

    Jiu, on the other hand, confronts Chloe with her sword.

    In order to protect Masayuki and Thunder, I stepped in front of them and decided to stand guard.

    "There''s nothing we can do about it now. Now that their true colors have been discovered and their battle ns have failed, there''s no point in hiding their strength.

    "I agree with you. The enemy should be wiped out quickly.

    After saying that, Bonnie and Jiu held the pendant, which was the source of the weapon''s power, with great strength. Reacting to the movement, the pendant emitted a strong glow.

    The light was familiar.

    "I see. So you''re the Imperial Knights of the Near Guard too?

    When I finished muttering, the armed finished Bonnie nodded with an unbearable face.

    "You have indeed begun to fight against our men and horses. But don''t think we''re like the rest of the Near Guard Knights.

    As he said, I could feel the extraordinary strength in him.

    "Let''s end this conversation here. Hurry up and kill her.

    Jiu also wore unique armor on her body. The styles are simr, but this set is ck in color, with a sheen floating above, as if the stars were floating in the dark.

    That, I''m afraid, is legendary and the performance looks very close to mythical.

    On that point, so does Bonnie. The color of the armor was gold, but the performance seemed to be on par with Jiu''s. The strength of the wearer will most likely be reflected in that armor.

    Jiueven you want to do this to me?"

    Masayuki questioned Jiu in a sad tone, but Jiu looked this way with a cold gaze.

    "That''s for sure. It''s all a mission, I''m just responsible for protecting you.

    She made it clear. Indicates that there is nothing further in the words. Since this is obvious, one can imagine just how injured Masayuki was.

    Personally, I''d love tofort him, but this is not the time to do that kind of thing.

    "Benimaru, be careful! This person is strong. I''m sure there are some ultimate skills hidden in his body."

    "Ultimate skill? Is it the ultimate of a unique technology? You''re supposed to be able to fight it with effort and perseverance, right?

    "I don''t think so. I honestly don''t think you can win.

    "s, it''s more depressing than one might think to hear Lord Rimuru speak with such certainty.

    I was told so out of cool judgment, but Benimaru smiled patronizingly and bitterly. The look on his face was subdued, maybe there was something he could have done.

    To deal with ultimate skills, only ultimate skills can be used. I don''t think it should be possible to subvert this absolutew, but here it is in thebyrinth. Even if there was any eventuality that it wouldn''t die, I decided to leave this matter directly to Benimaru.

    And Chloe.

    She is truly the most courageous person in the name.

    Even without her ultimate skills, she can still beat the hell out of Veldora. But it''s not actually Chloe, it''s Chronoa who''s out of control, but the fighting ability is still very good.

    Besides, she now has the ultimate skill, Jugovos, the King of Time, so I don''t think she''ll lose to Jiu.

    If there''s one thing that''s troublingits her ability to control the power of Jugovos, the King of Time and Space.

    So just to be on the safe side, I decree to Master Raphael, the King of Wisdom.

    <<understood. now="" we''ll="" start="" analyzing="" the="" skills="" enemy="" has.="">> Shouldn''t that be a problem?</understood.>

    In any case, I''m going to be in a tight position so that I can help out at any time and watch what happens after the battle.

    ***

    The first person to get started was Bonnie.

    He gripped the pendant and applied the force again. The next thing you know, the shape of that thing starts to change, and finally settles into the shape of a gun.

    "So far it has not been revealed to you, but what I am good at is actually guny. I''ll show it to you as a hand-me-down for your trip to the Yellow Springs.

    As Bonnie loftily released his words, he lowered his body and struck a cautiousbat posture. Next, without chanting, the magic was unleashed and applied to thence.

    The magic he unleashed belonged to the thunder attribute, which was the Thunder Strike Great Demonic Rain. It was supposed to be a ranged attack, but all that energy was focused on thence.

    It felt good, but the threat it posed didn''t seem as great as expected.

    In order to confront him, Benimaru also inflicted "ck me" on his lovely de "Red Lotus".

    Immediately after, the red de began to produce ck mes, emitting a demonic glow.

    This side is also so powerful that it even makes one think that themand ability is just an additional skill. An aura that made one feel like he was as powerful as a ghost.

    The two men thenunched into action simultaneously.

    Originally it was always thought that Bonnie specialized in magic, to no one''s surprise that he was also very good with guns. Sure enough, just like he said himself, this man was amazing. Yet it wasn''t too much effort for me to keep up with his movements.

    What I''m more concerned about is the "future attack prediction" not beingunched. This means that

    <> Is that really the case? The reason why the aura of Jiu is lost is also because of some kind of obstruction.</answer.>

    Presumably Bonnie and Jiu possess a power that is immune to all interfering abilities. The power is impressivebut what''s more curious is what the other skills they possess are like.

    Benimaru and Bonnie fought an evenly matched battle.

    The look on Benimaru''s face didn''t have half an anxious tinge, enough to handle Bonnie. Conversely,e look at Bonnie, who seems to be a bit annoyed.

    The strength gap is that Benimaru has the upper hand. When ites toparing the performance differences of the equipment, Bonnie has the advantage. So Bonnie must have felt very bad about it.

    "Looks like you can do something.

    "You disappoint me.

    Benimaru''s answer made Bonnie''s face twist with a look of wonder. Presumably pride stimted, he red at Benimaru with a look like he was looking at a pest.

    "How dare you say that for a magic creature. Then when you''ve eaten this, will there be any way to talk big like you just did?

    After shouting that, Bonnie spun his gun around on one side as he tried to escape from Benimaru''s strike range. He was going to attack and defend on one side and pull away and hit a must-kill.

    But Benimaru wasn''t going to let him do that.

    Seeminglypletely seeing through Bonnie''s actions, he leisurely approached the other.

    It can only be described as awesome.

    I knew Benimaru had been secretly cultivating, but I didn''t expect him to grow so much

    In my opinion, the strength of the Benimaru is still above Hakurou nowadays. Albert was also a very good swordsman, but it was definitely Benimaru who was superior.

    In addition to this, his control of ck me is also excellent. Instead of being led by the nose by that force, he used it as his own.

    It seems that the unique skill "Generalissimo" canpletely control even his own strength.

    I honestly admire that.

    I once asked Benimaru if Zegion was stronger than him, but after looking at Benimaru nowadays, I wasn''t sure who was stronger. Depending on the situation, the Victory Goddess would smile at both of them.

    "Good, good

    "There is something to be said while it''s happening, fighting those strong men is simply suicidal. And Mr. Rimuru is stronger than them, right? Therefore, don''t impose on others in the future.

    "Understood, Mr. Masayuki.

    Right behind me, Thunder and Masayuki began this conversation. Those two probably couldn''t see Benimaru and Bonnie, only the shing paddles. But even so, they could still tell just how strong those people were.

    I personally wanted to keep those two men from being hit by stray bulletsshould I say from shockwaves, always protecting them with the "absolute defense" of Uriel, the "King of Vows". But it''s conservative and hard work. Due to the influence of ultimate skills, it is possible for Bonnie''s attack to prate the "absolute defense" if one is not careful.

    It''s not me that''s working hard, it''s Master Raphael, the King of Wisdom.

    Those two in the back would just leave it alone for now, more so than them, it was time to pay attention to Benimaru''sbat situation.

    That being said, Bonnie''s juggernaut doesn''t seem to be able to mount without pulling away. He was all annoyance from a moment ago, trying hard to distance himself from Benimaru.

    On the other hand, the Benimaru side is a very easygoing one. A face of indifference pressed Bonnie and began to make him gradually take some damage.

    At this rate, Benimaru will win sooner orter, but it looks like I''m overthinking it.

    In the face of Benimaru''s fierce attack, Bonnie didn''t stand still for a moment. Seizing this momentary breakthrough, Benimaru picked up the sword that was wrapped around the ck me and shed it.

    It was a fatal blowas it should have been, but instead Bonnie was smiling.

    "You''re really no match for me!

    The look on his face lit up, as if it was all a sham to be pushed into a corner, and it sounded to him as if he''d seen itingno, it was all Bonnie''s doing.

    Exactly what is going on is clear enough.

    An ultimate skill can only be fought with an ultimate skillin the face of this absolutew, all of Benimaru''s attacks are nullified.

    In contrast to the smug Bonnie, Benimaru showed a look of chagrin. Even if his unique skill was useless, his sword skill should still be able to do something, which was what he originally thought.

    Yet the reality is harsh.

    Benimaru''s swords did hurt Bonnie, but Bonnie''s armor all but kept those out of the way, not to the point of fatal injury. And Bonnie also immediately uses reparative magic to heal his own wounds.

    In that case, if Benimaru wanted to win, then he would have to rely on a must-kill blow to win.

    Benimaru is more powerful in terms of sword skills, but Bonnie has ultimate skills. It wasn''t easy for Benimaru to do that in the face of a master who was even better than himself.

    Now Benimaru was in a difficult situation. Later the battle was all in Bonnie''s favor, with Benimaru only defending.

    ***

    Just when Benimaru was in desperate straits.

    Chloe also suffered an unexpected setback.

    If we justpare strengths, Chloe has beaten her opponent a lot. However, Jiu is good at attacking her opponent''s key points and breakthroughs, and does not intend to go head-to-head with Chloe. In addition to this, they also set up a barrier, etc., to prevent Chloe from calling us for backup, making a poisonous fog that almost blinded one''s fingers and blurred the opponent''s vision in an attempt to create a situation that would benefit him.

    Chloe wore a mask, and those tricks didn''t work on her at all. But Jiu kept running away, and even Chloe had a hard time catching her.

    Jiu runs away, and Chloe chases after her.

    The result was a long dy in fighting.

    But unlike Benimaru, Chloe had Ultimate Skills on her. I''m still above, and I don''t think it''s too much of a stretch to lose to Jiu.

    I thought this side could rest easy, so I didn''t bother to pay attention to them, but it didn''t look like it was that simple. Just as Benimaru was forced to defend with all his might, Chloe was in trouble.

    "Look at you moving around. You''re a good runner."

    "That''s for sure. Your sword is dangerous. I think most will be able to prate my defensive.

    Jiu was cautious.

    The opponent is the enigmatic Chloe, who has been calmly coping.

    Although Chloe''s "Absolute Severance" is a unique skill, I don''t know why it''s so powerful that it''sparable to an ultimate skill. These words were said by Jiu herself, and I think on the one hand it was also in humility, but at least the fact is that legendary-grade defenses are indeed irresistible.

    That''s because even that Veldora was bruised by Chloe, and it''s safe to say that Jiu made the right choice.

    "You can''t beat me if you keep running.

    "I don''t deny it, but it''s okay. My goal is not to win, but to cover Bonnie. When Bonnie kills the ogre man, the two of us will kill you together.

    But then Jiu really had to y that annoying game. Every time I tried to add in help, someone would attack Labyrinth City.

    Far behind them, fortunately, was a town that had been isted. If that side is attacked, I wonder how many casualties there will be.

    And Jiu started asking Bonnie for assistance.

    "Bonnie, there are unexpected people who want toe in and get in our way. This woman is more tricky than one might think. It''s too dangerous to deal with her and the Demon Lord Rimuru at the same time, so we have to adopt a safety strategy. In order to avoid interference, you will support the attack on Labyrinth City.

    "Understood. I will assist appropriately.

    As Bonnie also stepped in to attack, it multiplied my burden.

    Masayuki and Thunder have the "Resurrection Bracelet", and the result is not as bad as it could be.

    However, the Labyrinth City is inhabited by people who know nothing about it.

    And it''s kind of the safest ce to be, not everyone wears a resurrection bracelet. The adventurers who are taking refuge are a different story, and the average resident wouldn''t even bother with one of those.

    In addition to preventing stray bullets from spreading, it is also necessary to deal with Jiu and Bonnie''s troubles. Since those were all attacks of the Release System, they could be eliminated with the "Gluttony King Beelzebub", but there was no time to help Chloe.

    No, seriously.

    Honestly Chloe was a big help to even run to my aid. If it was just me and Benimaru on the scene, we might have lost the battle a long time ago.

    After all, Benimaru alone was going to struggle to fend off Bonnie''s attacks. If you''re not careful, you won''t be able to resist the attack, so it''s hard to interfere with the enemy''s attack on Labyrinth City.

    Even so, Benimaru and Bonnie were still able to engage consistently, and that was because Benimaru''s skills were above Bonnie''s.

    A mere blow to the front would have killed him, and in the face of such a fierce attack, Benimaru ndly defused it. Although the situation was reversed because of the strengths and weaknesses of the skills, it was Benimaru who deserved the credit.

    That being said

    I had always thought that these guys were Masayuki''s followers, but I didn''t realize that they had a great strength hidden in them.

    On the other hand, the fact that they were able to hide it from my eyes to this day is a good indication of the strength of these guys.

    Even Ruminas ignored these guys at the celebration. It should be said that Master Raphael, the King of Wisdom, did not notice it and could not me it.

    All in all, it''s safe to say that the current situation sucks.

    The Communication Network that theymunicate with Ramiris is also hampered, and the other side is acting meticulously.

    Perhaps it was the unease in my heart that conveyed to her that this time Chloe made the bet. That causes unexpectedpses to ur.

    "Now that it''se to this, I''m going to use my best moves.

    There''s still a hand left to break, and if there is, let''s hope she uses it anyway. Yet somehow, at this point I had a bad feeling.

    Just then, the whole world seemed to darken for a moment.

    All the movements were still, and the whole person seemed to be fixed.

    Before I could figure out exactly what was going on, it urred to me where this feeling seemed to have been experienced.

    By the way, just like when Chloe and Guy used to fight

    <<warning. the="" energy="" of="" individual''s="" name="" "chloe="" obell"="" is="" low.="" seems="" to="" have="" failed="" control="" skill.="">></warning.>

    It was that feeling of time standing still at the time, just remembering this, Master Raphael, the King of Wisdom, had just given a warning. That''s when I realized that Chloe had turned back into a child.

    "Hey, Chloe!

    "No way? The power is so inefficient that the current me doesn''t seem to be able to use it"

    "I told you so! It gets harder to control in time."

    Although it was unknown what was going on, Chloe''s stunt had definitely failed. And most tragically, the coteral damage caused Chloe''s fighting ability to fall apart.

    As it turns out, even Chloe couldn''t fully control the power of the "King of Time and Space Jugovos". Thest time she fought Guy, she seemed to use it with ease. But in reality, these phenomena are almost all generated by the power of Guy, and Chloe just strikes a counterpart.

    Even so, it''s pretty awesome. If it is impossible to act in a world where time stands still, then it would be a unteral defeat for Guy.

    However mock battles are different from actual battles.

    Chloe seemed to be able to make time stand still for a moment, but that seemed to take a lot of energy.

    The fact that she''s back to what she is is proof of that.

    It is because of this risk that it is a problem to use unconfirmed skills in actualbat.

    The situation might have been different if Chloe had been able to fully control the abilities of the Time Lord Jugovos, but how could one expect that kind of miracle to happen when even Master Raphael, the King of Wisdom, hadn''t even resolved it yet.

    "Hey, Chloe! Are you okay?"

    "The situation is a bit bleak. Although I was able to return to my original form, it seems that it will take some time for me to regain my original strength"

    I asked through the Communication Network out of concern, and the next thing I knew, I heard Chloe answer in chagrin. That being said, the situation is not so far from irreparable. Chloe is notpletely incapable ofbat and can rest assured for the time being.

    "I don''t know what you''re trying to do, but it''s all a pointless struggle. You can''t even grasp your own power, and it seems you''re doing things more haphazardly than you thought.

    "Hahaha, thought so. Jiu, it''s you who''s over-vignt.

    Seeing thepse in Chloe, Jiu and Bonnie begin tough at her.

    However, at that moment, a voice rang out in my heart, which could be said to be a help from heaven.

    <<notice. the="" skills="" possessed="" by="" enemy="" have="" been="" resolved.="">> That was fast!</notice.>

    The "King of Time and Space, Jugovos," owned by Chloe, has clearly not been analyzed until now.

    Bonnie and their prizing skills were so simple to analyze.

    It was a delightful miscarriage of justice to be able to get a rough idea of where the other person''s skills fell.

    So what''s the content?

    <> Which means Bonnie and her power is borrowed from someone?</answer.>

    <></answer.>

    I see.

    I actually find it a little unnatural too.

    It takes a lot of work to acquire an ultimate skill. Even that Hinata could only acquire exclusive skills, and even the overkillers like Granbell and Ruminas had failed to acquire ultimate skills.

    It''s a little hard to say, but that power isn''t so easy to take, not for something like Bonnie and Jiu.

    And the ultimate skill will show the nature of the possessor in a dense manner. While they did a great job of obstructing and hiding tracks, they didn''t make a stronger y.

    I was on guard, afraid they were hiding something, but it didn''t seem so

    <> That''s all they''re going to use, is that the right answer?</answer.>

    How things will turn out, we don''t know without an end to it. Seeing Bonnie and themughing, I couldn''t help but have that thought slowlye to my mind.

    "Benimaru, Chloe! I know what the secret is behind their power. A tricky opponent, but not insurmountable. In order to defeat them, I have a proposition. Would you like to hear it?

    When I finished asking, the two nodded their heads without saying a word.

    "Of course. If I could have cut that guy down with my Red Lotus de, I would have won long ago.

    The tricky thing is that guy''s strength is especially focused on defense.

    In order to avoid losing, Benimaru is ready to keep fighting his opponent all the time. Not confused by the other side''s words or actions, always looking to win. Just stalling for time would be enough to wait until Diablo and Shion returned, he was trying to wait for that time to strike back.

    A man worthy of the "Great General" this man is calm and reliable at all times.

    "I also believe in Mr. Rimuru. If I want to make up for a mistake, if you have a n to win, you can say whatever it is!

    Chloe also trusted me.

    Unlike Benimaru, she would have won if she hadn''t had a momentary rush. Using the "absolute severance" should cut through Jiu''s defensive and make it impossible to lose one-on-one to the opponent.

    But the incident was a good lesson of sorts.

    Although this exposed the weakness of Chloe who was not yet used to using the ultimate skill, it would only take more improvement in the future. Looking forward to her future performance, let''s focus on getting this fight over with right now.

    "Then I''ll tell you. I hope Benimaru can connect with me through the "Soul Corridor. That way, I can lend you some of my power.

    "Just the way I want it. Although borrowing Lord Rimuru''s power feels unhelpful, it was better than losing to his opponent. I promise to win.

    Benimaru dly agreed.

    More than personal appearances, he valued practical benefits, much like a choice Benimaru would make.

    I don''t think he has to be ashamed of it. If it was a contest of strength, Benimaru would definitely be above the other.

    Thinking on the one hand, I imposed an ''absolute severance'' on the Red Lotus de of Benimaru.

    That''s as powerful as what Chloe is using. I''m just reversing the Absolute Defense, which would be offset ifpared to the Absolute Severance, but it should be sufficient against Bonnie.

    That''s it for this side of Benimaru.

    And then there''s Chloe.

    "Chloe, Chronoa, you listen to me. If the fight continues to buy time, Benimaru can beat Bonnie. And then we''ll put Jiu"

    This time, the exact opposite strategy was adopted.

    The present-day Chloe had changed back to her adult form, but there was still a long way to go before she could return to normal. It''s time to y the safety card and actually win.

    All Chloe has to do is buy time before Benimaru wins. That''s what I thought

    "Wait a minute! I haven''t lost. If it''s one on one, Ill beat the other.

    "That is, Rimuru. I''ve just been pushed by Jugovos, the King of Time and Space, but I can''t lose if I fight seriously.

    The Chloes were full of energy.

    I had expected them to say that, so wasn''t surprised. I decided to make an offer.

    "Then I have one condition.

    "What conditions?

    "Once again, you will use the "Lord of Time and Space, Jugovos," to win perfectly.

    Huh?"

    "If it''s only for a short period of time, it''s not working for Jiu because it''s too short," he said.

    If she hadn''t been so hasty, Chloe would still seem to be in fullmand of her skills. It''s a matter of seconds, but it''s not enough time to force Jiu, who has great skills, into a desperate situation.

    That''s why Chloe was identally out of tolerance once, but should be fine next time.

    "I will also help. I''ll help you with the arithmetic, you try it again.

    "In that case, I personally have no problem with it

    "Rimuru is opening up theputing field, right? That should control it.

    Chloe and Chronoa epted my offer.

    They seemed disturbed, but I was actually in the same mood as them.

    After all this offer came from Master Raphael, the King of Wisdom.

    One can''t help but wonder, "Is that okay? But I decided to trust the King of Wisdom, Master Raphael.

    It should have something going for it, this time don''t doubt it, believe it and act on it.

    Thinking about this side, Chronoa asked me a question.

    "But there''s not enough energy. The energy is currently enough to turn into abat type, but not back enough to pause for time. Even if the energy efficiency is improved with the help of Rimuru, the current Chloe is not able to use it as well as it should be."

    I actually noticed that too.

    Next it should be expected to lend power, but is that enough?

    <></answer.>

    Master Raphael, the King of Wisdom, gives a firm answer.

    There''s probably something to it. I''ll stop pursuing this in depth.

    "No problem. If it''s not enough, I''ll be ready.

    Though the one responsible for the preparation was Master Raphael, the King of Wisdom. Anyway, those things don''t lend themselves to exnation at a time like this, so let me y nice.

    Hearing me answer like that, Chronoa epted.

    "Got it. Then I''m for it. Let''s show that guy.

    So, the battle n is finalized.

    We have to start fighting back.

    ***

    Benimaru wants to change the offense. Before that, it was all by "static braking", and when I gave the effect of "absolute severance", he became "dynamic braking".

    This is a sword skill that focuses on counterattacks. And putting the focus on blocking is essentially an offensive and defensive package that won''t actively attack.

    In contrast, the so-called "dynamic braking" is more about the offense than the defense. Attacking your opponent in one fell swoop, not letting them take the reins, and achieving andslide victorythats what it is.

    Benimaru sent out his sword to produce a change that surprised Bonnie and began to take a guard position. Despite the reversal of position, his expression at this time wasposed.

    Only those moments of calm disappeared.

    The reason why Bonnie showed subduedposure was because it was actually proven that Benimaru''s sword couldn''t hurt him, and that was what created confidence. But that''s all in the past.

    Faced with Benimaru''s fierce attack, he was toote to respond, thus allowing Bonnie to appear broken.

    Benimaru then seized on the breach to deliver the fatal blow.

    How!?

    How can heis that what he''s trying to say?

    That strike sliced through Bonnie''s body. Immediately after, Benimaru released another smooth strike, splitting him in two from the head. So he didn''t even have time to say hisst words and just died.

    That being said, Benimaru is really overwhelmingly powerful.

    "If you did this from the start, you would be able to win easily, too, right?"

    "No, if I did, my Red Lotus de would break. I felt that armor was not good to deal with, and in order to avoid burdening the de, that''s why I continued to fight in an unustomed way.

    That''s not a good idea. It looks like it''s a good look, but it''s true that Benimaru is better suited for

    "dynamic braking".

    That being said, the Benimaru of today, he was indeed stronger than Hakurou. Originally physically taller than Hakurou, now even his skills are equal to or even above him.

    That''s just the way things are, so in earnest, Benimaru is awesome. It was less than a minute from the time he started fighting back to take Bonnie down.

    Chloe was no less.

    "There''s just not enough energy!

    Trying to unleash that force, Chronoa let out a strained yelp.

    And yet right after that

    <></answer.>

    I also felt, in addition to the calm voice, I also heard someone sadly yell Yah-ah-ah-ah!" A sound.

    No, I don''t know what''s going on.

    I had a feeling, should I say definitely, that it was the man''s miserable scream I think

    Even I felt sad after hearing it.

    It''s so sad.

    I admit to myself that the fault is not in me, but the reason is in me.

    So, it''s really my fault?

    I vowed in my heart to treat him to pudding next time, not only to apologize to him, but to cate him in passing.

    All in all, the energy problem is solved.

    In the next moment, the whole world stopped

    Jiu followed the ashes.

    Presumably that was it, we had Bonnie and Jiu down, but by this time Master Raphael, the King of Wisdom, was reporting to me in a guilty voice.

    <<warning. the="" individual="" named="" "bonnie"="" and="" "jiu"="" are="" confirmed="" to="" be="" alive.="" did="" not="" ount="" for="" them="" having="" "resurrection="" bracelets.="">> Thatnever mind?</warning.>

    It''s rare that Master Raphael, the King of Wisdom, would make such a lowly mistake. No, when you think about it, it rarely happens, and it''s not too much to say it''s the first time.

    "Oh, shit. I should''ve destroyed Bonnie and their ''resurrection bracelets."

    "No, they weren''t wearing bracelets.

    "Mmm. I''ve seen it too, nothing of the sort."

    s, unlike me, Benimaru and Chloe do things so discreetly.

    They did remember something like a bracelet,bat side confirmed.

    No, maybe I wasn''t careful enough.

    In this way, it can''t be said that Master Raphael, the King of Wisdom, is looking away, but rather Bonnie and the rest of them.

    "Ah, about that

    As we were halfway through the conversation, someone added in to interject, and it was Masayuki, who had been watching from the sidelines. When he finished, Thunder followed suit.

    "Actually, a few of us have always thought of you as an enemy, and we didn''t take the bracelet honestly. That being said, there''s no need to do it for nothing

    Thunder said while rolling up his pantsuit.

    I didn''t realize the "bracelet" was on his ankle.

    "This is a bracelet

    "Uh, we know yeah. But this is a magic prop, right? So wear it here and it will have the same effect.

    Bonnie once said to wear it that way as a little bit of defiance.

    It seems that Bonnie had anticipated the possibility of things turning out this way before he set aside this hand.

    Benimaru scratched his head and smacked his lips, while Chloe''s side was exuding displeasure. I''m sure there''s a big fire under that mask.

    Since that is the case, one cannot expect Master Raphael, the King of Wisdom, to do some precautions first.

    After all, through Jiu''s power, the ce was isted, and thusmunication with Ramiris was hampered. Although it should be possible tomunicate with Veldora through "mind talk", I don''t think it''s easy to exin things correctly.

    And considering the amount of work of the King of Wisdom Raphael master, God knows how much information it has to be processed side by side, just to think about it feels like a headache.

    The challenge is to give the Benimaru the "Absolute Severance" and to assist Chloe and Chronoa in controlling the "King of Time and Space, Jugovos". The rest is more to maintain my "absolute defense", plus the ability to parse Bonnie and the rest is too much to count.

    In this case it''s hard to predict that some idiot will put a bracelet on his foot.

    "It can''t be helpedit can''t be helped."

    "Yeah. Forget it. We''ve seen how much these guys are capable of, and we''re sure to win the next time we y them. Although it would be worrying to send someone else besides me, one can always think of countermeasures.

    In the end we came to this conclusion, and Benimaru and I decided to forget about this incident.

    ***

    Just like that, we held off Bonnie and Jiu.

    Not being able to finish them off was a big mistake, but we all decided to forget about it, so it doesn''t count.

    Although the betrayal by his peers was a blow to Masayuki, I am sure he will try to pull himself together. I was thinking about this while watching him walk around with no energy, going back to convince the others and watching him.

    The war will continue. Although I''m embarrassed for Masayuki and them, I don''t have time for their business right now.

    I decided to leave Masayuki and them to Chloe to take care of, and returned to the control room with Benimaru.

    This time we should really clean up all the enemies in the maze. The only thing left to do was to watch over thest battle, and the room already had a few guests who hade first.

    "Ah, Rimuru! The sudden inability to get in touch with you scared me to death!

    "Just say it. But I''m not worried at all, and would like toin to you about it nheless. Besides, Ramiris had toe over anyway. So we''ll just hurryno, we''ll juste over a little bit and see what happens.

    Ramiris looked worried, coupled with the towering Veldora.

    Please don''t take away my magical essence out of nowherealthough heins about it, he''s clearly worried about me.

    This guy is just such a ce to be cute.

    So say Master Raphael, the King of Wisdom, you might as well talk to the other side first to get permission before you borrow the power of Veldora.

    <<the? it''s="" too=""te="" to="" say="" those="" things,="" it="" won''t="" matter.="">> To say that it was toote</the?>

    You''ve been using it without my permission, haven''t you?

    It always felt like Veldora was used to it too.

    If that''s the case, then I''m sorry for Veldora. Not only do I have to prepare a delicious snack for him, but I also have to prepare a newic.

    I seem to have worried you. But Veldora can contact me no matter where he is, and if anything goes wrong it''s up to you.

    "Is that so? Master?

    "Ah! Ahem. That''s why I said there''s no need to worry!"

    This time, Ramiris began to re at Veldora.

    Presumably trying to hide his shyness, Veldora changed the subject with a condescending attitude.

    "So, since everything''s fine, let''s hear what they have to say, shall we?

    Hearing Veldora finish, I looked along his line of sight, only to find Miss Treyni and Souei right there, plus a suspicious man tied up in five flowers.

    I''ve long detected the Souei of their scent, but who is the other one?

    Miss Treyni looked exhausted and was drinking juice.

    She seemed to have some left in her, so I left it at that.

    I looked to the Souei instead and asked.

    "That''s right, I went straight to the ce I heard about from Moss and found out that it was this man who was fighting Miss Treyni, our enemy, Lace.

    It was Lace who was tied up in a pile of flowers.

    He had been beaten to a pulp, but at least he had a breath.

    "How is that guy still alive?

    Benimaru asked Souei in an icy voice.

    It''s a rare thing. He''s a killer.

    "I wanted to kill him too, but this guy kept insisting that he had to talk to Lord Rimuru.

    "Must be a trap."

    With one side of his mouth talking, Benimaru drew his de.

    Just then, the whole of Lace, who seemed to have air, bounced as if he were a caterpir.

    I thought to myself how dexterous he was, and at the same time, a little funny.

    Ahahaha!"

    I seem to haveughed out loud by ident.

    "First, wait a minute! Don''tugh. Stop those men!

    "I don''t even need to salute!

    The killing aura on Souei''s body was even more intense. But that was just fine, the silent Benimaru was even going to cut Lace to death.

    I rushed to intervene, all in all, to get Benimaru to cool off first.

    "You calm down. After all, we''re still in a truce with that Yuuki guy, right? Now that Lace is here, let''s hear what he has to say.

    Souei echoed my words.

    Despite angry but still obeying the morals, Souei was really forgiving and calm.

    Only then did Benimaru realize that he had been too reckless and retracted the sheath of the Tai de.

    "So what do you have to say?

    "This is a really scary ce. The eldest sister over there doesn''t listen to anyone either, and she''s much better than she was when we met before. That big brother over there was still rtively amiable, but there was no smile in his eyes at all. And that"

    Hah?"

    No way, Benimaru. It''s time to reveal your hidden nature.

    I coughed and cleared my throat, trying to change the increasingly heavy atmosphere.

    "In fact, if you''re like this, I''ve been entrusted by Yuuki to deliver a message!

    Lace also knows how to read the asion. He cast a grateful nce at me and began to spell out the reasoning here.

    I thought to myself that I should have done this in the first ce and decided to listen.

    "That''s the way it is. You watch out for Bonnie and Jiu!

    Benimaru and I remained silent and couldn''t help but look at each other.

    I wish he''d told us that sooner.

    ording to Lace, there was a man named Damrada under the Yuuki. I heard that he is one of the leaders of the "Cerberus", a secret association under Yuuki. But Gadra gives advice, and after some discussion, they discover that it is suspected that Damrada wants to assassinate Gadra.

    Of course Yuuki didn''t give that order. So they began to suspect Damrada.

    To say it''s suspicious is actually almost certain. Yuuki has made such a judgment, and has taken this judgment as a prerequisite for correctness and re-examination of the actions taken so far. Later he seemed to find quite a few things suspicious.

    This leads one to specte that Masayuki''spanions were all arranged by Damrada and that there was another purpose behind it. That''s why Lace rushed back from dropping off other assignments and was assigned to deliver the message

    As Lace''s words grew more and more, Miss Treyni''s face grew harder and harder.

    Why didn''t youe earlier and pass on the word?that kind of thing where you don''t have to ask and know what the answer is.

    "Since this is the case, make it clear that it is so!

    "That''s why I told you several times that there was something very important to say! But you said,

    "Only ghosts believe you! You don''t listen to the troupe!

    "Well, that''s all because you''re so suspicious. I''ve also got some unpleasant memories of you slipping away, so I''ve got all the energy I need to say I''m not going to make the same mistake again

    "Don''t you think you''re overdoing it? You said, Shut up and cut the crap! I don''t listen to any exnation!

    Seeing the two arguing ugly in front of me, the answer was clear enough.

    "Have you two been fighting?

    "That, that is enough

    The indignant Lace began to turn on himself. Sounds like it''s been a fight, more than a few days, I think it''s been about ten or so.

    No wonder he''d be indignant.

    "I''m so, so sorry!

    Miss Treyni only realized that she had made a mistake in the first ce, and apologized to me with a red face.

    But who among us has the means to me Miss Treyni?

    You should''ve trusted Lace morethats a tough one to say.

    Because even now he''s suspicious.

    I don''t think you can judge people by their appearance, but this guy always does weird things. I think there''s something wrong with people who would trust such a dubious character, that kind of talent.

    Although it was Miss Treyni''s mistake this time, I can''t me her.

    Benimaru was the same, he just wanted to cut Lace down and had no position toin. Souei also looked embarrassed, it should be said that thanks to him he had the means to endure bringing the guy over here.

    "Anyway, those things are in the past. Let''s not get into a bull''s-eye and put these things in the water.

    Now it''s an afterthought and a pain in the ass to think about it.

    So say, find a way to stall it now.

    More so than that, the battlefield situation is now.

    Not knowing what would happen until thest moment. With that in mind once again, we set off for the big screen.

    ***

    Calgurio, who was in a state of annoyance, had been waiting for someone to report back to him.

    Two days had passed since sending a hundred elites into the maze. But the constant interruption of contact with each other left him very dissatisfied.

    No, it''s not just that.

    Outwardly feigning discontent, in fact, Calgurio was troubled inside.

    He was bewitched by the gold and silver treasures and the high quality "magic crystals" before he decided to implement this maze n. He doesn''t regret doing so. In order to ensure the safety of the army''s rear, the territory of the demon lord must not be ignored.

    The acquired treasure was also more plentiful than expected, and looking at what had been moved out of thebyrinth, Calgurio''s heart sank. In retrospect, those were all ploys of the Demon Lord Rimuru.

    After a dawning realization, he was annoyed at his own ignorance.

    At the same time, he couldn''t find a way to undo the situation, making Calgurio begin to fear that he would just lose to the Demon Lord Rimuru.

    "Damn it! Really, there''s no news yet!

    Today alone, Calgurio didn''t know how many times to roar.

    None of the staff officers answered him, but just at this time a loud noise came from the outside of the barracks.

    "What''s wrong? What happened?

    As if in response to this query from Calgurio, a subordinate soldier rushed in.

    "Report! Just now, the Charioteer Division joined us!

    Calgurio said, What?'' in his mind

    No matter how good the Magic Guided Tank was, it was impossible not to hear half a drive before they came to rendezvous.

    The messengers had never returned, and they never knew how the friendly forces were faring. This point makes the ominous foreboding in one''s mind grow stronger and stronger.

    The uneasiness in Calgurio''s mind came true.

    "I''m back

    Someone was talking while entering the field tent where Calgurio was staying, a beautiful female nonmissioned officer who had nothing to do with the battlefield.

    Her true identity is one of the heads of the secret society "Big Three", Misha, who represents "Women".

    Acting in ordance with Yuuki''s orders, he hade to draw Calgurio, and was therefore involved in this battle n.

    Only her status as a staff officer of the Imperial Mecha Corps was as it should be. Demonstrate strengthmensurate with it by serving as Calgurio''s staff officer.

    However, this time the unit Misha was distributed was not the main unit, but the "Magic Guide Tank Division". It was with security in mind that Calgurio arranged it that way.

    Misha''s purpose was to monitor Calgurio movements, and to her, this decision really upset her. But her position wasn''t enough to interject herself into the matter, so she pretended to thank Calgurio for his kindness and went to report the battle to Yuuki on the one hand.

    Of course, even the "Magic Tank Division" was reported to have failed miserably. After that, carefully withdraw from the battlefield so as not to be spotted by those magical creatures,e again just like that and sessfully rendezvous with the main force.

    "Misha, are you all right?"

    "Yes, Lord Calgurio.

    Misha showed a sultry smile. It was dirty, but it didn''t hurt her beauty.

    In addition to feeling relieved to see such a Misha, Calgurio had not forgotten his part.

    "What about the others? How many men will rendezvous with the main force after that?"

    He immediately pursued the question.

    "Take it easy. It''s useless to panic even now.

    "What? What does that mean?

    "Everybody''s dead.

    Huh?"

    "Not only the Magic Tank Division, which the Empire is so proud of, but also the 100 Killer Hovercrafts have all been reduced to ashes.

    Her face still wore a sultry smile as Misha reported to Calgurio.

    "How is that possiblewhat are you talking about?

    A disbelieving smile appeared on Calgurio''s face, and Misha didn''t even speak. Seeing this scene, Calgurio could only believe it.

    "Really all dead?"

    Yes."

    "So everyone here is a survivor of the Mecha Legion?

    "Exactly, Your Excellency.

    Hearing Misha respond in this way, Calgurio hung his head helplessly.

    It wasn''t just him, the other staff officers had a dark look on their faces that followed.

    The invasion battle was aplete failure. Even if thebyrinth is sessfully defeated this time and arge number of general soldiers lose their lives, they will not be able to escape ountability.

    Emperor Rudra would never forgive Calgurio for them, would he?

    "What to do?

    The staff officers were also unable to give an answer when they heard Calgurio''s words.

    It was at this time that Misha spoke.

    We should be retreating.

    What?"

    "I''ve looked a little, but Operation Maze Raider isn''t very optimistic, is it? Thebyrinth is for exploration. Can''t send an army to attack, is that right?

    "That''s what Yuuki said?

    "Yes. He said that if you want to go through the maze, you should only let the elite in.

    "What a load of crap! The best men have been sent in!"

    Misha informed faintly, the emotionally charged Calgurio so shouted in response.

    What Calgurio says is true.

    In fact, two days ago he only sent in the strongest battle force he could think of.

    In addition to that, the elite personnel of the "Mecha Modification Corps" considered themselves to be the strongest among the Imperial Army, with a total of over half a million people sent in by him.

    It would be an extravagant request to send in a more powerful person.

    Those elite people would definitely meet up sessfully inside the maze. And I think we should keep going in for the sake of taking the maze.

    Calgurio believes that is so. If he didn''t believe it, his heart would have been filled with fear.

    Confronted with such a Calgurio, Misha utters a cruel word.

    "However, despite sending in our elite men, thebyrinth was still not taken. Indeed, it may be that the men inside are still fighting. But we can''t spy on the situation, and it''s hard to keep sending reinforcements, right?

    "Shut up.

    "All we can do is wait for our men toe out alive, right?

    "I told you to shut up! Listen up, Misha, just rx. We have distributed jewelry with resurrection effects to those in high ces. I heard that as long as you wear those jewels, you can be resurrected outside the maze even if you die. The fact that no one hase out proves that they are doing well!

    Calgurio also understands that it''s too optimistic to think that way. But he was the general in charge of leading the army, and one can only say that at a time like this.

    Misha didn''t give up on the recovery, however. Unlike the other staff officers, Misha had made Calgurio her captive. Even if she defied him here, she was confident that she could handle whatever happened.

    "But the jewelry is still a trial piece, so we haven''t confirmed the resurrection effect, right? ording to Yuuki-sama, it''s impossible to replicate a bracelet if it''s made by skill.

    In the face of these words, Calgurio was speechless.

    Because we are going to do an experiment, so you go and try to see how he can say something like that to his subordinates. As Misha said, he sent thoserades out without having experimented.

    Jewelry is at best an extrayer of insurance, just in case.

    That''s something that Calgurio also knows.

    Misha was right, he was the one who was wrong.

    You don''t get to be a military chief just by brute force. Although it''s impossible to hold the position because ofck of strength, it''s impossible to climb up to that position because of ipetence that you can''t even grasp the current situation.

    Only toe across a structure that even half a million elite people can''t cheat, Calgurio said anything is unwilling to believe that is true.

    That was a great military force, enough to turn several metropolises into ashes. It was originally thought that even in the worst case scenario, they could still destroy the maze and escape

    Not only that.

    There are already a number of dead people at the moment. If thebyrinth''s inner circle is not saved again, then Calgurio will be an ipetent man who has suffered a historic defeat and will bear the me forever.

    He had originally led an army of 940,000, but now he had less than 200,000 men left.

    Tell him to just retreat like that, how could he have the means to do something so daring.

    Only now did Calgurio realize that he had underestimated the Demon Lord.

    Only felt that the "Storm Dragon" was a threat, thinking that Demon Lord Rimuru and his army would only be ravaged by our army. It was an opponent that was supposed to be fought, and he didn''t treat the other as an enemy.

    That''s a fatal faux pas.

    But it''s too early to give up. There is onest hope for Calgurio, and that is Minute.

    "You calm down. Major General Minute, my most trusted man, has invaded the maze. He was sure to bring back some kind of information. Why don''t we wait for the results toe in"

    Yet this statement by Calgurio does not go far enough.

    "No, we should retreat immediately, Lord Calgurio.

    A man suddenly entered the tent and made such remarks without permission.

    "What are you!?

    The staff officer interrogated.

    Calgurio wondered what exactly the guard was doing, while looking at the man.

    He looked in good spirits, but the bloodstained uniform was concerning. It''s reasonable to assume that he''s from another unit, a survivor, or

    "My name is Krishna. One of the hundred who entered thebyrinth two days ago, ranking seventeenth within the Imperial Emperor''s Order of the Near Guard.

    Hearing this, everyone present was astonished. Calgurio is no exception.

    You, you mean the Imperial Order of the Imperial Kaiser?

    "Why is the Emperor''s guard here?

    Those staff officers began to falter.

    But should we say that some people are really not simple? The first person to regain hisposure was Calgurio.

    "Now is not the time to talk about that! Your Excellency''s name is Krishna, right? Can you tell us about it first?

    He let out a yell to steady the scene.

    Krishna first gave a look of gratitude, then hurried to exin the situation.

    "In a word, that maze is dangerous. If I tell you, you probably wont understand, even Bazan, who was ranked thirty-five, and Reiha, who was ranked ny-four, are dead. Major General Minute was also killed before my eyes. While there is no conclusive evidence, I''m guessing that the Colonel Kansas is also dead. There were no survivors in the maze. You''re right to think so!

    Everyone listened nkly to the words.

    It wasn''t trueCalgurio was tempted to shout, but Krishna''s eyes were serious. His whole body was telling the truth of those words.

    Plus that face he had an impression. Calgurio remembered that Krishna was indeed one of those sent out two days ago.

    He''s back from the dead, isn''t he? In other words, he holds the "resurrection bracelet". And it''s not a knockoff, it''s a real bracelet. Then this guy must be the real Emperor Near Guard, right?

    Contrary to the exasperated mood, Calgurio tried hard to calm down and think.

    There were two "resurrection bracelets" given by Gadra.

    One of them was taken to the technical bureau for analysis and used to make imitations.

    The other one is dedicated to His Majesty the Emperor. It was supposed to be the Emperor who gave him that "bracelet" so that Krishna could be resurrected.

    This will confirm that the "resurrection bracelet" does have a resurrection effect, but also confirm that the imitation is not effective.

    Which means that the general soldiers inside thebyrinth are really all dead, that''s about it.

    More than half a million of the general''s soldiers had been killedthe thought of that fact left Calgurio with no blood in his face.

    But there''s no time for that right now.

    Krishna''smentary isn''t over.

    "And the man who killed us is not even the demon lord, not even the Four Heavenly Kings below. It''s a monster who we havent even heard of. It''s like one of the ''Ten Labyrinth Lords'', but that guy is very different.

    That being said, the fighting abilities of the ''Ten Lords of the Labyrinth'' alone were enough to rival and even surpass those of high-ranking Demon Generals. And among these monsters, the one who called himself Zegion was simply as strong as if he was from another subdivision.

    And even Krishna knew he certainly couldn''t beat him.

    "I''ll say it again this time, to retreat. There is no shame in that. In order to help the surviving generals and soldiers, please make your ruling now!

    Seeing Krishna so eager, the subordinates began to back off. He''s certainly telling the truth. Everyone''s gut is telling them there''s no time to hesitate.

    you said it wasn''t demon lord? A monster equivalent to a high-ranking demon general moving stupidly in there? Is it that strong? If you want to say that the demon lord is new, you don''t look too hard at the other party, why do you have such a strong fighting power!?

    Seemingly unable to hold back any longer, Calgurio let out a loud scream.

    This call made the staff officers start to stir.

    "Let''s retreat now! It''s not all our responsibility. Part of it is also due to the negligence of the Intelligence Bureau!

    "Exactly. We should run away with those who are currently surviving while the Demon Lord Rimuru is still out there!

    Those staff officers started expressing their opinions in one word or another. They usually get into arguments all the time, and only then do they agree. For they already instinctively perceive that a crisis of life is approaching.

    Lastly, Misha speaks.

    "One thing I forgot to report is that it wasn''t the evil dragon Veldora who destroyed our army. Rather, it was because someone released the nuclear strike magic that caused our army to suffer the fatal blow. And still twice. This was magic that wasrge enough to easily defeat the legion''s magic. The people who use this magic are also very threatening, but it''s a different thing from what I was trying to express. Thats"

    The next words don''t need to be heard, everyone understands.

    That is, there is still a "storm dragon" in thend where Veldora still sits.

    At this point Calgurio made his decision and he gave the order.

    "Gather all the soldiers! We''re going to turn around. Turn around and go back to your home country!

    Either way it wasn''t a retreat, it was a change of direction, and Calgurio shouting out those words was like convincing himself. He knew full well that this was sophistry, but if he hadn''t thought so, unease would probably have crushed him.

    Whether it''s sophistry or whatever is fine, as long as one can get away with it. The staff officers thought so and immediately decided to obey this order.

    But their decision was made toote.

    Things have been moving forward for a long time.

    It became a raging wave, a sweeping rushing current gradually approaching, to swallow up Calgurio and the others.

    The fate of the imperial armyit is long gone.

    ***

    A low, flooding voice resounded in the tent to nullify Calgurio''s order.

    "That''s troublesome. The lord said he would not allow you to retreat."

    A pot of cold water was thrown at the panickedmander, and a man, showed himself.

    All eyes were focused on the entrance to the camp tent. There stood a man, wearing a weapon called a sword around his waist and wearing an exotic costume.

    Still a few mottled blonde hairs were received at the back of the head and tied in a bunch. He had a long white beard and his face was covered in wrinkles. Yet his sharp gaze, standing up straight, gave the impression that the man didn''t look old.

    "Who are you?

    At this point Krishna stepped forward and questioned.

    "Excuse me. This ones name is Agera. This time Lady Carrera sent me to be an emissary.

    The man''s real face is Agera.

    Rimuru was a pacifist, and for better or worse, he decided to send messengers to persuade the enemy to surrender.

    Not many expected the Imperials to take it, and many instead felt sad that they didn''t get a chance to perform. But Agera was one of the few who had normal values, and he began to assert that it was the habit of martial generals, and Geld agreed. Momiji didn''t object either, so he took orders toe over here and be an emissary.

    But this operation was of greater significance to buy time until the Tempest Army was ready to finish.

    It didn''t matter whether the Army was going to fight the war outright or surrender, whichever it was. But they are not allowed to escape.

    Anyone who takes part in this aggression will be punished. That was the decision under Rimuru.

    Agera respected him.

    So there was absolutely no way he was going to let Calgurios army go this time.

    Faced with such an Agera, one of the staff officers raised his voice.

    "You said you were an emissary? My lord is referring to the Demon Lord Rimuru, right?

    Hearing the other person ask that, Agera''s expression instantly became sinister.

    "It would be arrogant not to pay tribute to our great lord. Just go to the afterlife world and reflect hard.

    When this was said, the staff officer who asked the question followed suit.

    Everyone on the scene didn''t feel Agera pulling the knife. Even Krishna, who was closest to him, was toote to make any response.

    With this one, Agera dominates the field.

    In the silence of everyone silent, only he was heard asking aloud.

    "It seems you have decided to listen to me. So this one says. Disarm and surrender to us immediately.

    That will keep you in very and keep you alive. If you want to resist, so be it. Let''s fight valiantly to the death. We will wait an hour for you guys. If you want to surrender, you can do it in the meantime.

    That was all Agera said and turned away.

    At that moment Calgurio thought desperately about what was the best thing to do. Then, with a glimmer of hope, he decided to deal with Agera.

    "Wait! No, no, no, no. Just a moment, please.

    "What is it?

    Agera stopped in his tracks and turned his head to look at Calgurio.

    "Excuse me, my name is Calgurio. I am the chief of this legion, the supreme leader of this campaign.

    "Mmm. So what do you want to do?

    Agera''s aim was to buy time, to spend it in no hurry to get back. Although he wasn''t interested, he decided to listen to what Calgurio had to say.

    Seeing Agera react in such a way, Calgurio put all hope in bargaining.

    "Mr. Agera, you said earlier that if we surrender, you will ept it, right? Can you please review the terms? It is inhumane to be a ve. That condition is difficult for us to ept anyway.

    The staff officers were uniformly surprised to hear Calgurio say such things out of the blue. But no one is objecting at this point. Everyone knows that the situation is unfavorable, so they all put their hopes in negotiation.

    Seeing that Agera hadn''t even said a word was taken as an opportunity, Calgurio unterally put the word down.

    "Instead of forcing us to fight to the death, it would be less likely that you would suffer damage and win. Don''t make us ves. Can you let us go for a while this time? Of course we will paypensation, promising you all that there will be no future acts of aggression. No, it''s more than that! I also intend to return to my home country and ask the Emperor to make an alliance with your country! If the Empire joined forces with your country, it would be easy to dominate the world. And being able to have an advantage rtive to other Demon Lords as well, I think it''s not bad for His Majesty Rimuru. We will not forget this benevolence. How? May I ask you to pass it on to His Majesty the Demon Lord Rimuru?

    Calgurio lobbied desperately.

    Considering the current situation, both Operation Dwargon Raiders and Operation Maze Raiders have failedpletely. All the soldiers who went to carry out the battle n were killed.

    The only ones who survived were those who were thereless than 200,000. This invasion is a major failure no matter who looks at it or how it looks.

    Things hade to this, and Calgurio could only admit it. On top of that he wanted to at least let those who survived return to their home country safe and sound.

    This matter, and only this matter, is a responsibility that Calgurio can take on.

    After saying what he wanted to say, Calgurio waited for Agera to react.

    He understood that saying those things was all wishful thinking on their part, but not entirely without a chance of winning.

    Although the number of people is significantly reducedpared to the original, less than 200,000 is still arge army. The number of people should not be so far behind the Demon Lord''s Army, and if so many people turned into dead soldiers fighting like crazy, it should not be a good thing for Demon Lord Rimuru.

    The ground is not like a maze, and there is no way to rise from the dead. Thus, the proposal just made could give the other side aplete victory that he felt the other side would find worthy of review.

    At least that''s not what this Agera was able to do in front of his eyes in response to the lord. He had to ry it to the Demon Lord Rimuru.

    If I could ask him to ry it to the Demon Lord Rimuru, then the next step would be the heavy lifting.

    Even if he can''t let everyone go, he can still deal with the other side to let some of them go.

    If you can, wish you could be let go.

    Since hes going to make us ves, that means he''s not bad enough to even take our lives. Being so naive really wasn''t like being a Demon Lord, but this time it might be life-saving. As for the bottom-most general soldiers, just buy them backter. Now in any case, we must first return to our home country and report the situation to His Majesty.

    Calgurio thought so.

    He valued his life. But more importantly, he wanted to save as many General soldiers as possible. And the correct information must also be brought back to His Majesty the Emperor.

    That''s what Calgurio really thinks.

    He overestimated the enemy''s battle strength. That''s the reason for this failure, but in a way, it''s all force majeure.

    Dwargon, Tempest, plus the Western nations. Even if he dealt with these three forces at the same time, this time his own army had such a huge battle force, he was still confident that he could ovee the other side.

    It was the certainty that they would win that it turned out the way it did.

    There were several catastrophe-grade equivalent monsters underneath the Demon Lord Rimuru, and how they could not have imagined such an exaggeration.

    With this dereliction of duty, Calgurio will inevitably lose ground, but the emergence of more casualties could shake the Empire State. This time, even if we give up our dignity, we will temporarily retreat and bet everything on future reconstruction.

    As greedy as Calgurio was, he was not ipetent. That is why the proposal was made.

    If the Demon Lord Rimuru wants to take my life, then I have to give it up too. Someone will always take the information back to His Majesty Rudra. In that case, this defeat counts for something

    Calgurio hade to his senses, thinking that it would be all right if he had to sacrifice himself, and went to intervene.

    Yet it was all toote.

    "The situation is such that you think you''re qualified to make a condition? From your disdain for the mercy of Lord Testarossa, your fate is decided. See to it that you resist or obey, and make your choice as you wish.

    That was Agera''s answer.

    No one could move, and Agera left the tent at a leisurely pace.

    The only words dropped at the end were "Don''t try to run away".

    "What to do?

    Calgurio stood bewildered, at which point Misha asked bluntly.

    The brief silencested for a while

    can only fight. Our lives all belong to His Majesty the Emperor. You may live longer as a ve, but you are too humiliated to see the Emperor!

    Quietly, while full of determination, Calgurio made his decision.

    "But we don''t have a magical magic tank and we don''t have a magicule-disturbing radiation. It might be hard to fight like that.

    "Doesn''t matter. Anyway, our purpose is no longer survival, the point is to bring the information back to His Majesty the Emperor! No matter how many generals and soldiers have to be sacrificed, even if it''s just you, you will flee and live.

    ! Please, please wait!

    "So, what are your ns, Your Excellency?

    "That goes without saying. Let those monsters see the pride of being an Imperial soldier!

    In such desperate circumstances, Calgurio finally gave up his selfish desires. In the end he bes a pure soldier, finding pride.

    Seeing the breath change on Calgurio''s body, the expressions of the adjutants and staff officers changed with it.

    "How could you do such a shameless thing as to leave your Excellency to flee?

    "Exactly. Isn''t it fun to end up struggling for nothing?

    "Not sure we''re going to lose yet! Next, we''re going to show off the true power of the Mecha Legion!

    Everyone''s words were full of energy, and morale was getting higher and higher.

    In such an atmosphere, it was only Misha who let out a sigh.

    "Then let me run away. I don''t have the backbone to go along with your suicidal behavior."

    It''s like saying let me be the character that''s annoying, she said while waving her hand.

    Calgurio revealed a bitter smile.

    "Sorry. If it''s you, that Yuuki kid should be able to handle it for you. It is difficult to convey correctly to His Majesty the Emperor how ipetent we are.

    "Understood, Your Excellency.

    Misha smiled bitterly at him as well.

    And no one stopped Misha. It wasn''t hard for everyone to understand that it wasn''t going to be easy to get out of here.

    "You need someone to protect you

    Let us take this mission.

    Before Calgurio''s words could be uttered, silhouettes were already appearing in the camp tent. Their true faces are Bonnie and Jiu, who have just escaped from the maze.

    It''s the single digits"

    "So it''s Krishna, long time no see. Staying here is only a dead end. Do you want toe along?

    The words made everyone froze for a moment.

    Being the strongest fighting force in the Empire, the "single digits" had already predicted their defeat and said it themselves. This event is enough to express how serious the battle that awaits them next is.

    "No. I want to be with Sir Calgurio.

    "Yeah? Then I promise you that I will certainly ry your performance to Your Majesty. You will not die in vain, you will be glorious deaths of war. Be exhausted. That must make a meaningful death.

    These words of Bonnie''s resounded heavily, and Jiu silently agreed.

    The next thing you know, the two of them are leading Misha to a quick retreat from the scene.

    Those who are left behind are prepared to die.

    "Do not observe the time appointed by the Messenger. While the enemy''s side isn''t ready, we''re going to hit them with the utmost force!

    In the blink of an eye, Calgurio''s order had extended to the end. Then they were about to face a final showdown, and everyone stepped up to the te in order to give it their all.

    ***

    "Yeah? You chose a showdown.

    Seeing the Imperial Army step up to the te, Geld salutes that.

    It''s not certain they will win, not only that, but it''s an overwhelming disadvantage in terms of numbers.

    Never be careless. In the face of a tiger that is fighting a beast in distress, you cannot let your own people die.

    The Second Corps, led by Geld, were in charge of the defense. To maintain the front line, protect the fire forces in the rear. That way they would naturally win.

    This is the tactic that dwarves excel at. Send in troops to act as a barrier and then cast powerful magical attacks.

    Simple and concise, good for Geld and the others.

    The fourth legion was responsible for outputting firepower, and themander was Momiji of the Tengu n.

    "Go win for my husband!

    It was amusing to hear her inspire those gathered with these words.

    Starting the offense from the perimeter, it felt very scheming. Unknowingly filling in the other side''s moat, waiting for the other side to return to find that the wood has be a boat.

    Geld thinks that Benimaru is not as strategic as Momiji, and surprisingly, Benimaru himself doesn''t think it matters.

    If he really didn''t like it, he would have found a way to deal with it. Otherwise, the title of

    "Generalissimo" would have made us cry.

    The problem is that there are too many women who love the Benimaru.

    One of the famous ones is Albis.

    Within the management, they are known topete fiercely with Momiji. Whether or not Momiji will be able to sit on the championship throne, we won''t know until the end.

    This time Albis came with reinforcements too, and even Geld was confused, not knowing which side to cheer for.

    At this rate, someone will eventually not get what they want. It''s better not to go too deep.

    Geld made very unlike the conclusion that the martial artist would have made.

    Afterwards, he changed his mood and once again confirmed that he was all set.

    The troops on standby in the rear are ready for full support, and there is no problem with the means of attack.

    It wasn''t just the main force led by Momiji, but also the other forces led by Shion and the reinforcements led by Albis.

    As far as working with each other in this regard, as long as Benimaru is around, it''s a relief.

    As long as I do my duty, we won''t lose.

    Geld''s defense can be described as a brick wall.

    The elite of the Yellow and Orange Corpsbined totaled 17,000 men. These warriors are all endowed with indestructible defenses through Geld''s unique skill, "The Guardian". On top of that, coupled with the equipment of the Kurobee and Garm Forge, Gelds strength had been strengthened, and even the shells were capable of withstanding it.

    Not only that, but Gelds exclusive skill "Gourmet" has stomach pockets that the entire legion can share is a big plus. In case of some damage, the support unit in the rear will use magic to heal, and will be able to use the recovery potion immediately, even if the damage is huge.

    Just in case, Geld''s "stomach pouch" was always stocked with plenty of recovery medicine. Not just this war, but to deal with all the situations, Rimuru took the restorative medicine they had created to Geld for storage.

    This way the quality does not deteriorate and is best for preservation. This time they have been given permission to use the potions to their heart''s content.

    From the point of view of a supply station, such a unit is most reliable because it does not need to be moved separately and can be resupplied on the spot. The monsters will build strong walls of protection by their own flesh, so they can function on the battlefield.

    We can''t losethought Geld.

    The rest is

    His eyes looked to the sky.

    You can see a military officer named "Carrera" who was assigned to Gelds unit.

    Lord Rimuru looks forward to that power, and I''m eager to see it.

    It won''t be long before the showdown.

    Excited to the point of shaking, Geld waited silently for the moment toe.

    ***

    Ahead of Geld''s line of sight, Carrera stood still in the high air.

    She had been assigned to the Second Legion with two of her entourage, but was currently splitting up.

    Rimuru has given her the honor of ying in the starting lineup.

    As a martial arts general, Geld epted them with open arms and said they could y as they pleased.

    The man was a good one, and Carrera felt he hit it off with herself.

    In fact, Rimuru had secretly ordered Carrera to protect Geld. The same is true of Testarossa and Ultima.

    If there were subordinates on the Army''s side who couldn''t handle it, the real task for the girls was to buy time to deal with them.

    But this time is different.

    She was in charge of ying lead so that she didn''t have to stay with Geld. In fact when Geld and the others take on the defensive duties thoroughly, that''s when there''s no room for the likes of Carrera on the field.

    Now we have to figure out how to annihte the enemy first.

    Therefore, Carrera intended to release the nuclear strike magic from overhead.

    "One moment, please! What are you going to do now, Lady Carrera?

    Ending his mission as an emissary, Agera had just returned and he rushed to stop Carrera.

    The cold-hearted gesture shown against the Imperial Army had vanished. In front of Carrera, Agera is also just a bitter guy.

    He had a bad feeling before he hurried back and seemed to guess correctly. In addition to being able to detect aura sensitively, he was also able to read Carrera''s movements, and after long years of exercise, his instincts as a bitter subordinate were already keen.

    "Oops? Agera, you''re back, aren''t you? I''ve done all kinds of thinking, and I always feel like I have to practice now to really get on the field and not fail!

    The person who had intended to take advantage of the situation was not there to intervene, but Carrera did not want to talk to him at all. This is clear evidence that she normally does just that.

    "You mean practice?"

    "Yeah, that''s it. It''s only going to set off a nuclear explosion overhead, which feels like a rtivelyrge firework, right? The residual temperature will burn the floor, but don''t worry about that. How? Is that all right?

    "That''s great, that''s perfect! It''s true, Lord Carrera!

    Watching Carera''s smug face, the maiden who was standing by her side gave her apliment. The maiden was a partner of equal status to AgeraEsprit.

    She''s cute looking, but has a very bad personality, and it''s not an understatement to say it sucks. But she did have considerable strength, and even Agera didn''t know what to do with her.

    It''s only right that you should have a hard time with your fellow soldiers. However, Esprit was too busy following Carrera to help at all.

    Never intending to admonish Carrera, always going along with whatever she did. Agera, who had put all the hard work on Agera, was a bad character, and he himself was patronizing Carrera.

    In the end creating a disgusting environment, all the drudgery fell on Agera.

    But he finds that Testarossa, who maintains reason as evil, and Ultima, who pursues a more cruel realm, to be very sickening as well. That being said, the problem is not that it doesn''t matter without malice.

    Not minding the trouble it would bring to those around her, Carrera was always at full strength, and in Agera''s view, a headache for the lord.

    Even if the other personughed and said "the damage done seems a little big", he didn''t find it funny at all. There was no way tough with her.

    On that note, fellow Esprit and Carrera are simr on an emotional level and don''t seem bothered at all.

    It was something that Agera was very envious of.

    "Where''s the!? You shut up!"

    The bitter man Agera red at the irresponsible Esprit. Turning next to Carrera, he began to borate as if he were talking to a child.

    "Please listen to me, Lady Carrera. I went to the enemy''s camp just now to be an emissary, right?

    "Well, yeah.

    "That being the case, it is the rule on the battlefield not to make a move until the time is right.

    "What did you say? It''s practice!"

    "Even with practice, what you can''t do is what you can''t do!

    That said, Agera''s boss, Carrera, is characteristically like a runaway vehicle with fewer brakes.

    It would take a lot of effort to stop her.

    However, her power skills overwhelmed the group and were difficult to clean up.

    Usually, she just goes around stirring up Demon Lord Leon all day long. Every day, nuclear strike magic is fired, repeatedly provoked. It was because Demon Lord Leon was mature enough that it didn''t turn into a war, and if it had been another Demon Lord, the war would have started long ago. And Carrera will wreak havoc and end up back in the demon world.

    Her purpose is only brief enjoyment, and she doesn''t care at all about winning or losing the war. So even if you lose, Carrera will disappear whileughing.

    Because she herself didn''t feel like she had lost, it wouldn''t do her any harm, and she wouldn''t reflect on it. How to teachmon sense in the face of such a Carrera, something Agera had agonized over not long ago.

    But now it''s different.

    By far, the demon race was the strongest existence, and among them, the higher ranking ones, those who belonged to the ruling ss, such as Agera, no one couldmand them. What''s more, Carrera could even be in charge of the demons of the ruling ss, and to simply express an opinion about her would be to bet her life.

    It was only because Carrera likes Agera that he didn''t disappear and was allowed to follow Carrera around.

    Yet nowadays even such a Carrera has be a minion of the Demon Lord Rimuru.

    From now on, in order to make a good impression on Demon Lord Rimuru, Agera thought he had to learn to endure. And you can''t act on your gut, you have to use your head.

    In order for that to happen, he had to get his boss, Carrera, to learn somemon sense.

    In fact, Carrera was able to actually keep thews and regtions in mind and respond properly. That being the case, hopefully she will also think a little about things in general before acting.

    This way, I won''t have to work so hard.

    With such a small wish in mind, Agera strove hard every day to persuade Carrera.

    Therefore, Agera always preaches to Carrera on the point of the problem.

    The person on the sidelines looked like a granddaughter who had been scolded by her grandfather, but the person in question didn''t care and thought that now was the time, continued the exnation.

    It must be easy to understand and concise in content. It''s easy for Carrera to get bored of listening and not to be nagged, so it''s hard to get her to listen.

    Only to see Agera earnestly exin the customs of the battlefield to Carrera.

    And yet at this very moment

    The Imperial Army suddenly began to move.

    "I said, Agera. It''ll be a long time before your appointment, right?

    "Yes, indeed

    "That means the Imperial Army got away first while you were listening to this nonsense, right?

    A tension rose in Agera''s heart. That has two dimensions.

    The whole NPC erupted with anger and loss of control. Since the anger was directed at Agera, then he could not stay small.

    Anotheryer is irritation with the Empire.

    Still preaching to Carrera about the customs of the battlefield, she was unexpectedly taken down. Such unreasonable behavior on the part of the Empire was no different from betrayal, and Agera had not been so angry for a long time.

    "Lady Carrera! Let''s leave that old grandfather alone and let''s go educate those fools who can''t even keep their promises!

    At this point, Esprit uses "Thank me, you fool! The eyes looked at Agera while pointing to the Imperials, as if to distract Carrera.

    Geld and the others areying it down.

    Nearly 200,000 elite soldiers were closing in on them. Looking up, they were all soldiers of the Empire''s generals, and from high above, they just looked like prey at the right time.

    At this point Carrera nodded.

    "Just do it! Agera, I presume you won''t stop me?

    As if to say "stop me or I''ll kill you", the questioning was full of killing air.

    Agera''s reaction, however, was unexpected by Carrera.

    Indeedthis one said he would wait for an hour, but did not say they could not attack in the meantime. The me seems to lie with me.

    So?"

    "It''s what a samurai should do to send someone who wants to die. With no mercy. Please y thoroughly and do whatever you want.

    Agera too hase to his senses.

    He wasn''t like a demon, a Mr. Nice Guy, but very much hated being treated like an idiot by his lord, or someone breaking a deal. The Empire stepped right on his bottom line.

    "That''s nice. The whole crowd was excited. That''s why I like you so much.

    Agera didn''t stop her anymore. Finding this out, Carrera smiled triumphantly.

    "Then let''s get started. Let them see what happens to us when they underestimate us!

    "Yes, sir.

    "Got it.

    And just like that, the war began.

    This side of the Imperial Army doesn''t know it. In fact, their actions are tantamount to granting each other the death penalty.

    Nextlet''s have a rain of nuclear magic, shall we?

    "That sounds good! It feels so good to blow up the ground!

    And it will be known that, once the normally warm-hearted are pissed off, the other side retaliates with considerable fierceness.

    "No, that''s too lukewarm. Lady Carrera, please recall what your lord has said. Didn''t he say, "Scare the Imperial Army with a very shy magic" or something?

    Hmm?"

    "Let the other side see our full strength this time, so that we can meet the Lord''s expectations, right?

    This made Carrera''s eyes widen in a sh of realization.

    Agera was right. Nowadays Agera himself, who is always whining and trying to keep Carrera from losing control, is telling Carrera to give it her all.

    Just thinking about it made Carrera sigh with emotion.

    "You finally get me, Agera. As you say. I seem to have identally painted myself into a corner. Your words sober me up. Okay, I''ll show them the grand finale this time! The big magic I didn''t pull off, let''s make a hot show of it this time!

    Carrera plucked up the energy.

    And with a full force that has never been used so far.

    Ah, craponly then did Agera regain hisposure, but it was toote. Carrera had long since focused all her attention on unleashing magic.

    What to do? Esprit stared at Agera with such a look, but even Agera did not know what to do. Now that things have turned out this way, they''ll just have to watch and do it.

    The supervisor, Carrera, was out of control and would probably be scolded afterwards, but it would be nice to figure out what to do then. Agera looked away and decided to take advantage of the situation.

    Anyway, Agera is still of the demon race.

    As a result, the Imperial Army, which had only just begun its advance, was attacked from high above and eventually destroyed.

    They set up multiple boundaries with legion magic, use thetest equipment to defend against magic, each with a high degree of magical resistance, and don''t skimp on joining the many sacred guards. And these defenses were powerless in the face of the mass annihtion magic released by Carrera.

    That magic is a type of nuclear strike magic, called Gravity Copse.

    Among the various types of nuclear strike magic, the most powerful type of magic requires arge amount of mana and sophisticated magic maniption techniques.

    When the core of the magic "ck me Core" is released, it expands to produce the "me of Destruction". The so-called "gravity copse" is the forbidden magic that is formed bypressing those.

    Compression means that supergravity is created. The simple exnation is the ability to produce man-made ck holes.

    That disrupts the gravitational field of the, creating a localized supergravity field. If someone is caught in the sphere of influence of a localized hyperpressed space, all will be crushed.

    As for the Imperial Army that was exposed to this kind of magic, it was needless to say that they knew the fate was miserable.

    Gravity suddenly went haywire and the force increased. Under the influence, the soldiers of the Empire''s generals, who could not even bear their own weight, were gradually crushed.

    Coming to the clearing was a defeat; there was no way they could escape from the eyes of the demons.

    More than 80% of the nearly 200,000 troops were trapped within the sphere of influence of that magic.

    The soldiers of the General could not move a muscle, but this magic had to work its true essence next.

    At a correctly designated range, the inside scrapes a magic storm. It was a storm big enough to turn the heavens upside down that no one had ever seen.

    The hyperpressed space came to the tipping point and finally all the energy was focused on one point. Just now those energies were spinning in the opposite direction and small supernovae appeared on the ground.

    A dark pir connects the heavens and the earthone would think the gates of hell are open, but it''s the sand and dust that rolls up into the sky because of the Big Bang.

    This ss is no longer magic that can be used on a confusing star. If there was no limit, the Great Forest of Jura would have been scorched earth.

    There was no one in the Imperial Army who was good enough to fight it.

    That''s for sure.

    After all, this nuclear strike magic "Gravity Copse" epasses all magic and physical phenomena and is an all-attribute attack.

    In this way, the Imperial Army didn''t understand what was going on, and most of them were all dusted off.

    That blow satisfied Carrera.

    It is Agera, who is troubled, who regains sanity.

    The one who incited Carrera to do it was himself and had no businessining. Agera never expected to trigger such a tragic situation.

    No, it should be correct to say that he had thought, "This is probably not good," but did not know that Carrera''s power was so strong.

    What to do, what to do, what to worry about until now, what to do, what to do, what to do?

    The suffering of the bitter man Agera is only now about to begin.

    ***

    Geldughed and thought to himself, This is really something.

    There was a guess that Carrera was supposed to be strong, but she was surprisingly strong.

    I didn''t think I could destroy so many enemies in just one fight. So we don''t have a chance to show it?

    Geldined like that on the surface, but not so much in private.

    Despite the chaos of the scene, the survivors of the Imperial Army were still over 20,000. Those people were all trying to escape from the living sky and were desperately heading towards Geld their way.

    While the numerical disadvantage has been turned around, it is not to be taken lightly just yet. Geld understood that very well.

    The Imperial Army had seen the horror of death firsthand, and theyunched their raids like mad. That pressure is not a cover.

    Yet Geld was unfazed.

    Presumably because themander was calm, the men under Geld, including the soldiers at the far end, all looked calmly at the enemy.

    "Raise your shields!"

    There was little time left before the two armies made contact, and at this point Geld gave the order in a calm voice.

    The Second Corps responded with a meticulous movement, and the next second they became a barrier that no one was allowed to cross.

    Even though there was going to be a fierce confrontation, they didn''t even take a step back, just blocking the Imperial Army. After that, the protective wall Geld and them had formed didn''t copse at all, and didn''t take a step back at all, pushing the Imperials back just like that.

    The final showdown began, and the next to take action was Shion.

    "Everyoneunch a raid. I will kill all of Lord Rimuru''s enemies!

    Shions pro-guard was led by the "Purple Crowd", which matched this statement with a battle cry.

    Immediately afterwards, 10,000 wizards of all kinds began to act individually.

    These people are exercised by Shion and call themselves fans of the Shion. Because of the leadership of the "Yomigaeri", this force seems to be scattered, but in essence it is in order.

    The number of people goes without saying, and the fighting ability is noteworthy.

    The additional skill "Terrible Power" has been extended to all members of the team through the

    "Yomigaeri". Tens of thousands of wizards disguised as horrible knights went to teach the Imperial Army a lesson.

    This is the essence of the "Terror Overlord" skill. It can seal the enemy army''s original strength and let its own army wreak havoc unterally, which is very effective.

    Wearing the same dark purple armor forged by the three dwarven brothers, the eldest male Garm, the pro-guards wreaked havoc on the battlefield. The figure looked like a nightmare to the Imperial Army.

    There was nothing more striking than the three giants, who released demonic qi so strong that it was in disarray.

    Assimting Shion''s "terrifying overbearing aura" and the demonic aura in herself into a violent incarnation, she was making a big deal out of it.

    Their true identities are, of course, the three sons of Demon Lord Dagruel.

    Others are no less so.

    The "Purple Crowd" is responsible for attracting the enemy''s attention, and other wizards take advantage of this opportunity to finish off the enemy. In this way, no harm would be done to their own troops and the number of enemy troops could be reduced.

    Gobzo is one of them.

    "Ah, the head seems to itch.

    Although he said such things if he didn''t, there was actually an empty hole in the top of his head that had been pierced by a sword. This wound gradually heals and is a thrilling experience in the eyes of the unustomed.

    "A true hobgoblin brother.

    "Yeah. If it had been me, I would have died a long time ago.

    Gobzo had also grown, and even his men were admiring.

    In between this back and forth, three vortexes emerge on the battlefield, centered on Dagruel''s sons.

    Using that as a starting point, the left side of the Imperial Army began to crumble. The pro-guards of Shion didn''t let this opportunity go, and began to crush the Imperial General soldiers with a furious wave.

    Even if the general soldiers of the empire went into a frenzy to fight and took out the potential that would be triggered by encountering fire, they were still no match for Shions Pro-Guards.

    If one onlypares individualbat abilities, there really isn''t much of a difference. However, there was a world of difference in the level of sophistication, and in terms of skill, the Pro-Guard was even better.

    What kind of exercise did it take to get that way?

    The members of the Pro-Guard were groomed to be particrly good atbat, to the point of surprising people.

    Just as Shion was active on the right nk of its own army.

    The right side of the Imperial Army also made waves.

    Howhow!? How can there bepoof!

    "Yes, it''s the Order of the Beast King!"

    "No, I don''t want to die yetcoo!

    The Beast King Warrior Regiment came over for reinforcements, and the reinforcements included the monsters under the Beast King. Rimuru had great kindness for them, and they wanted to repay it as best they could, and were giving it their all without reservation.

    "That''s a real monster.

    Indeed."

    Hearing Albis murmur like that, Zar the Elephant Beast nodded.

    Great magic that had never been seen or heard of appeared before your eyes.

    The terrifying pirs that connected the heavens and the earth instantly reduced over a hundred thousand Imperial General soldiers to ashes. Yet the power did not diminish and still wreaked havoc on the battlefield.

    This one''s a winner or loser.

    The only remaining question was whether or not the Imperial Army side was hiding masters.

    They had to make sure of that so that the enemy would not be allowed to flee in this battle.

    Albis knew that Rimuru was normally a very generous man, and it was only fearful to see him thoroughly implement this policy. At the same time, she felt a deep sense of approval that this was how a Demon Lord should be.

    "Although 20,000 troops were sent to help, it seems that they have be redundant. That way there is no way to make a big im that it''s a payback.

    "Those kindnesses were meant to be repaid.

    "Indeed. Then at least avoid making His Majesty Rimuru feel sad. We can''t fight to the death. Do your best to leave everyone unharmed.

    "You''ve heard it all. You must remember your pride as a Beast King''s servant, and you must not let up until the end.

    When Zar finished roaring these words, the Beast King Warriors all responded in one fell swoop.

    In this way, those fierce beasts also began to charge towards the right side of the Imperial Army.

    It was at this point that the big picture was set.

    There was great magic at the back, and both the right and left were thoroughly ravaged.

    This time, the Imperial Army could only wait to be surrounded and annihted.

    Momiji stared at it all with cold eyes.

    She was calm in her head, but a fire was burning in her heart.

    "It''s time. Let a fire of mercy be put out to save the enemy from the sea of suffering.

    Momiji finished softly and signaled to Gobya.

    At this time, the Fourth Legion began to work together to raise their demonic aura.

    Through Gobya, the order was conveyed to the Kurenai, and thework was extended to all members.

    Following the great reversal, the demonic qi raised by those people were all transmitted to the Kurenai, beautifully tempered.

    Unifying these is Momiji''s task.

    "Is it really okay?

    Gobya was a little uneasy when he asked, but both were dismissed with a smile by Momiji.

    "I''m going to be the wife of Lord Benimaru, and if I can''t do anything to that extent, then what should I do?

    An unwavering confidence can be seen in that attitude.

    The integrated demon qi was even more concentrated, turning into a firepower that pounced on the enemy army. That''s what Momiji''s proposal is.

    The way ofbat was simple and quick, but if the integration of the demonic energy failed, she had to consider the possibility of an explosion. That way, Geld, who was in charge of maintaining the front line, would probably be hit by a wave. It was no wonder that Gobya was upset, but Momiji''s confidence made her keep her mouth shut.

    Momiji was Benimaru''s agent and the army was entrusted to her. To doubt Momiji is to disbelieve Benimaru.

    "Then I''ll leave it to you. Shall we begin?"

    "Yes. It wasn''t as powerful as the evil magic that Miss Carrera had put out, but it was still enough to clean up the rest of them. Let''s use this blow to win."

    Immediately afterwards, Momiji disyed a once-in-a-lifetime great monster technique.

    "Gently envelop the enemy and blossom the flower of the Red Lotus. Come on, let''s be impressed. The Monster Heaven Red me!

    Red flowers bloom in the sky.

    The first purpose is to burn oxygen rapidly.

    That way the oxygen from the ground would be taken away and the enemy would be incapacitated.

    The second purpose is to bring down the me of mercy.

    Before the enemy could feel the pain, he would first be robbed of consciousness by the heat of that burst.

    The third purpose is to force out a powerful enemy.

    If they could withstand this attack, those people would be distinguished as strong. If you just want to clean up the stumbling blocks, this monster technique is most suitable.

    The flowers that bloomed on the battlefield afterwards gave up.

    No one survived.

    "Oops? Miscalcted.

    "As expected. Those who ended up invading the inside of thebyrinth were superior to the others, and I''m afraid they were the aces of the Imperial Army.

    "Should be. That leaves only the Command as the enemy.

    "It must be over there, too. After all"

    "Yes, indeed. If that Carrera-san''s entouragees forward, no matter what kind of opponent they meet, they can''t beat them.

    "I agree."

    "In other words?

    "Yes. In that case, the showdown is ours to win.

    Those words made the battlefield roar withughter.

    The battle of annihtion, known as the Armageddon, ended without incident.

    ***

    Desperate reports were sent back to Calgurio in droves.

    No, you don''t have to listen to anyone.

    There is already a great tragedy ahead.

    The only thing they felt lucky about was that things came so fast that they died before they could even feel the fear and remorse.

    On the contrary, those who survived the horrible magic were all changed in their eyes and fled back to the main camp one by one.

    Even the soul felt fear, holding in its heart a sense of mistrust of the Empire, whilementing its own folly.

    There was no room for rhetoric either, and the staff cried out for a retreat.

    Yet things evolved to such a point that they could not have survived the situation.

    How did this happen? Should one choose to be a ve? No, should I say ,when exactly did I start doing it wrong?

    Thinking was stuck in a dead end, Calgurio tried desperately to get the thinking circuit back to normal, but failed, and once again he looked out over the desperate battlefield and began to think about what other battle ns he could execute now.

    It''s nowhere to be found.

    At this juncture, how could he have juste up with that kind ofbat n?

    No, that''s an afterthought

    "How is that possiblewhat is that? What the hell was that!?

    Calgurio''s heart was filled with fear and confusion.

    It was beyond hisprehension that there was such a vicious magic.

    What was it that made it like thatthe hundreds of thousands of general soldiers with severalyers of

    Barrier" guards, the tactics used to kill them all like they were wringing a baby''s hands.

    Nearly 200,000 troops were destroyed by a single blow.

    For the rest, it was only a matter of time before things came to this point of total annihtion.

    "Hard, isn''t it?

    What?"

    "Then, that magic is still on the theoretical side, there is a kind of magic that can interfere with the gravity of the. ssified as nuclear strike magic, that kind of magic has the most powerful and evil power, except for the huge amount of energy required, which cannot be realized without precise control

    ''Gravity Copse, as I heard from Gadra?

    That''s right, actually Calgurio had heard of it.

    But only theoretically feasible, that kind of magic is still being studied at the moment.

    Not the magic that was found to have existed in the past, but the gathering of the technical essence of the Empire, the mobilization of scientific knowledge from otherworldly sources, the study of theoretical structures from the beginning, and the frustration suffered at that stage

    Let''s not talk about a war, that kind of strategic-level magic can even wipe out countries. But the conclusion had been reached that that kind of magic was not possible.

    The other side, the other side, unleashes that magic to perfection.

    And by just one magic creature.

    The Demon Lord.

    The word began to enter Calgurio''s mind with a sense of dread that apanied the writing.

    He suspected that his own army would not be able to strike at a target that he absolutely could not?

    "Lord Calgurio is a learned man, and I admire him most."

    A staff officer makes an ufortable remark that pulls Calgurio back to reality.

    Then Calgurio began to shout, as if to vent his hatred.

    "Whether it''s still magic on a theoretical level or not! Gadra is still selling it, saying that once this kind of magices true, even Veldora can kill it!

    "Exactly. That kind of magic is just so powerful, one doesn''t know the limits.

    Unknowingly, the staff officers split their reactions into two.

    "So, is that a monster? There''s only oneonly one of them, and it''s a great magic that can be released..."

    Some people go into a state of panic.

    "Great. Ahaha, go back and write it into a paper! That way we can get that forbidden spell too!

    Some of them discussed it furiously.

    One group loses their fighting spirit and the other begins to run away from reality.

    Their side has lost its function as amand.

    It''s so bad, there''s nothing we can do. Even so, however, Calgurio remained the army chief.

    Still responsible for the lives of the remaining generals and soldiers.

    Calgurio, he absolutely must not give up.

    But the situation at hand made it impossible for them to retreat.

    Including those who had escaped, only less than 2,000 general soldiers remained in the main camp. The dragons are headless, and even if they escape, they will only end up being killed.

    Power, so wanting power, Calgurio prayed bitterly.

    As the Empire has always revered, as long as the power is strong enough, whatever is done will be forgiven. It is because of their overwhelming power that they have the possibility to calm the world.

    Yet those who do not have the power end up in a miserable situation.

    Without further ado, one need only look at the current state of Calgurio''s affairs to get a glimpse.

    The "Three Generals" are the pinnacle of the empire, and Calgurio, who is ranked among them, boasts of being the dominant yer in the world. But now he realizes that it was all just an illusion.

    How powerless and weak I am. I didn''t realize I was so miserable that I had to be ughtered

    He couldn''t help butment over it.

    Wealth, fame, at the moment, those things are of no value at all. It''s only when there''s really trouble that certain needs arise, and that''s more important than anything.

    "So desperate for power"

    Large teardrops fell from Calgurio''s eyes.

    The glory of the empirestrictly speaking, it is believed that Calgurio, who was themander, lost nearly a million of his general''s soldiers. The fact that such a thing was in front of him left Calgurio devastated and discouraged.

    "Report, report! There was a huge ze over the battlefield. Based on the heat observed, there should be little chance of survival for those on the ground"

    "It''s over. Now the Empire ispletely defeated

    The adjutant could not help but murmur these words, and the staff officers fell into a silence.

    Those who fled from reality seemed to wake up from a dream and froze. Trying to face the reality of what will happen afterwards and the brain refuses to ept it.

    "Let''s surrender. While it''s possible that the other side will ept to use the bait, it''s possible that it will work. Everyone will be killed if this continues. That''s all that''s left for us to survive, what do people think?

    Instead of dying, it''s better to be a ve. It''s because of thinking so much that I''m proposing it, but there''s always that feeling that it''s toote. That said, Calgurio decided to ept the offer.

    and right. It may not work, but we can try to negotiate and see. At least if we can keep the enemy''s attention on us, the chances of Misha and their escape will increase."

    Even if they end up facing death, as long as word can be sent back to the Empire, this defeat will mean something. It is based on such thoughts that negative approval is given.

    So modest and unlike Calgurio, but his heart was long broken.

    Yet it was because of this, he had a way of thinking about what was best to do in this situation.

    If he could allow his mind to reach this realm sooner, Calgurio would surely be a rare and famous general in the world. Abandoning so much lust and vanity, Calgurio takes back the wisdom he should have had.

    But these judgments were made toote.

    And Calgurio and the others have long since lost all hope.

    "Kufufufufu. Surrender, right? Then there''s trouble. You''ll have to keep mepany for a while.

    It was Diablo who spoke these words, and he appeared unconsciously in the tent. Dressed in butler''s clothes as usual, a smile appeared on his handsome face.

    At the sight of Diablo, Calgurio immediately recognized the absolute difference in strength between the two sides. Now he has found his cool judgment and won''ty down his life for a boring sense of honor.

    The first thing was to engage the other side, so he asked the guards to put down their swords. It was the right thing to do, even if the battle was lost to the opponent.

    The afterglow from the corner of Calgurio''s eye saw that Krishna was muttering something about "It won''t work" and the whole person crouched down. Like Calgurio, he felt the gap in strength between the two sides was too great to be filled with despair.

    Calgurio, while weighing the rightness of his choice, was the first to report his name.

    "My name is Calgurio, and I am the highest-ranking officer in charge of this operation. May I ask your name?

    Asked that, Diablo responded happily.

    "Oops? How polite. My "name" is Diablo. I am the loyal servant of Demon Lord Rimuru.

    Diablo is fond of saying his name.

    Faced with such a Diablo, Calgurio began to think.

    A victory over Diablo is unlikely. Even if everyone in themand went on together, there was no way they could win, right?

    That magical aura was even denser than the giant dragon''s. As for the overbearing aura that emanated from him, it was much stronger than the Demon Lord yman, who had also befriended Calgurio.

    And without anyone noticing the aura, Diablo appeared. This meant that he had invaded with such a powerful overbearing aura that it had gone unnoticed until just now.

    Such an untouchable strongman appeared, but Calgurio''s heart appeared calm.

    This is an opportunity. They did not seem to allow our troops to surrender, but responded with an engagement. If it buys time, it is equivalent to being able to keep this dangerous man.

    Calgurio thought that it would also be safer for Misha and others to escape in this way.

    But he thought too hard.

    You''re not trying to buy time, are you?

    What?"

    "It''s because someone ran away from here that you''re being used as bait. The idea of sacrificing the ego in this way is great, but it''s a shame it''s all for nothing. Because those people were packed away long ago.

    The demon was approaching quietly and would never spare the pathetic prey.

    As if to prove it, Diablo smiled.

    Then out of thin air, two bodies were transformed and left to lie on the ground.

    "Could it be the single digits!?

    At this point Krishna shouted with a stunned expression.

    The real identities of those bodies were those of Bonnie and Jiu.

    At this point there was a tension in themand.

    It wasn''t just Krishna who was shocked. Those who stayed behind clearly understood what a "single-digit" defeat meant.

    That is, they couldn''t beat Diablo. No, more importantly

    How, howthen our death, the death of all the generals and soldiers, will not mean anything at all!

    Deep despair assaulted Calgurio.

    "Everyone, draw your swords! There''s an intruder! To crush the invaders!

    At this time the adjutant let out a loud cry, and the guards followed the order.

    Unlike Krishna, there was no way to see through how strong Diablo was with the strength of these escorting martial officers. So they reacted and didn''t know it was too courageous or unwise.

    "Kufufufufu. You''re all lowlifes, and you want to fight me like that?

    Diablo smiled dismissively.

    However, the adjutant was not weak, and he shouted after him.

    "Shut up, you demon! There are more than a thousand other warriors on guard here. No matter how good you are, what can only one person do!?

    Like trying to hide his fear with anger, the adjutant said desperately.

    Calgurio couldn''t move. He wanted so badly to tell the other man to stop, but couldn''t even get the words out. This adjutant said what can the enemy do with only one person, and Calgurio was tempted to shout "that''s not it", but

    It is only now that Calgurio understands what it means to be really strong.

    Discover what Emperor Rudra expects of them.

    It only takes one master to defeat a million armies.

    The proof is the superb magic that the enemy has just released.

    Plus there was a monster that could kill two powerful people named "single-digit", and even the Mecha Legion could disintegrate with ease.

    The evidence is

    Kufufufufu. That sentence came a littlete. Those who survive are just you.

    It seems the adjutant didn''t understand what the other party was saying for a while. Yet what was going on outside, Calgurio knew even without looking.

    He''d been paying attention since just now.

    It felt too quiet outside.

    At this point Diablo "snapped! He snapped his fingers.

    Just then, the cover of the tent was blown open. The light outside reflected into the eyes of Calgurio and the others.

    There you can see mountains of bodies.

    The soldiers were all dead, as if asleep.

    That''s right, as if only the soul was siphoned off

    No, Calgurio found that that was exactly what happened. Before the soldiers could even resist, the souls were taken by Diablo.

    Now on again. Right before our eyes, tragedy rears its head.

    When Diablo snapped his fingers, Krishna and the rest fell to the ground.

    Despair and sadness swept over Calgurio''s chest.

    Oooh, oooh, oooh, oooh, oooh, oooh, oooh!!

    He cried out in blood and tears.

    Immediately after, Calgurio''s emotions saturated and exploded

    ***

    That being said, Diablo had no reason to let the enemy escape.

    Receiving the order from Rimuru, Diablo headed happily to the battlefield. Explore Krishna''s aura, discover the enemy''smand, andter snoop into the situation.

    This time he just happened to run into Bonnie and the others as they came over, and Diablo wasn''t going to let anyone get away, so of course he would finish them off.

    Those two were stronger than one might think.

    I didn''t expect that even if you practiced your unique skills to the limit, it wouldn''t work. But those powers seem to have been borrowed by them from others. Should I say sensory dissonance, doesn''t look like an ability awakening. That would make it possible.

    Thinking about this, Diablo tidied them up with aplomb.

    Misha looked at it and began to feel panicked, so she confessed that she was under Yuuki''smand.

    Since Rimuru and Yuuki belonged to the partnership by default, Diablo would not disobey Rimuru, so he only let Misha go.

    Is that an ultimate skill? Guy bragged to me a long time ago, got people on fire, looks like there''s research value in it.

    He is not polite about getting stronger, and he has thrown away his reserve in a few moments. He could use anything as long as it was an effective means, and Diablo was such a demon.

    In this way, Diablo began to take an interest in prizing skills, but he did not forget his work.

    He returned to the Imperial Army''s camp and the invasion was sessful.

    He was also afraid that it would be troublesome for the other side to make amotion, so he used

    "End of the world" to take his life when he saw someone.

    Move quickly and pick at random.

    He did not hesitate to kill all the enemy''s soldiers.

    Right in front of Diablo''s eyes, Calgurio let out a growl.

    FunnyDiablo thought with a smile.

    Calgurio has pushed the limits of humanity. He would have belonged to the qualified people.

    Now that he has surpassed the "Immortal" level, the energy has gradually increased.

    Ah, was it desperation that awakened him? It looked like it was the guilt that was pushing him further up thedder. That''s what''s worth fighting me for.

    Up until recently, Diablo was not interested in bing stronger.

    Yet now he pursues power.

    To be of use to the lord he servedto be a useful tool, a servant to Rimuru.

    To Diablo, tools are meaningless if they can''t show their ability to the lord. Tools that don''te in handy have no existence value.

    This is also the reason why they do not have their own ministry.

    He doesn''t need ipetent minions and enjoys being a lone wolf along the way.

    It is because Diablo is such a man that he has not forgotten to be aggressive and make himselfpetent.

    To be able to fight against the strong, it was also a great opportunity for Diablo.

    ***

    His own roar sounded so distant.

    Immersed in such feelings, Calgurio awakened.

    Strength rises, and it''s still a growing strength never experienced before.

    Very overwhelmingthought Calgurio.

    The killing of his partner left him feeling anger, despair and fear, and that became the key to pushing his limits.

    And that power is what Emperor Rudra had pinned his hopes on Calgurio, I believe.

    "I look forward to your performance.

    Rudra gave him these words to his face.

    The events of that day are not lost on Calgurio.

    To this day, he thought that the emperor wanted him to be a military chief and to do his duty for the empire. Yet this is all a misunderstanding.

    I see, so it is. Your MajestyLord Rudra was hoping I would awaken!

    With this realization, he realized that the sequence of actions was meaningful.

    Nowadays, Calgurio has transcended the "Immortal" to the "Saint" realm.

    Each cell is mixed, and the spirit overrides the flesh. This caused a transformation in his body, and Calgurio had a tangible insight into it.

    That power was strong enough to rival the awakening demon lord. Calgurrio who had awakened to this realm only realized how ipetent he had been before.

    In the face of this force, the Mecha Legion is also a nullity. In other words, it was impossible for the Imperial Army to defeat Demon Lord Rimuru or Veldora.

    I-I''m so stupid

    Kufufufufu. That''s it.

    "But that''s exactly why! I vow to right my wrongs!

    As soon as Calgurio finished shouting these words, the divine armor that emitted light wrapped around his body.

    This is the strongest armament handed down from mythical times.

    It was the mythical-grade armor given to him by the Emperor.

    Only the marshals and the three generals could wear it, a testament to the Empire''s supreme war power.

    Today it acknowledges that Calgurio is the real master.

    "I''ll never forgive you, demon! I''ll kill you!

    "Kufufufufu. That''s the fun part.

    The two men just red at each other and the final battle began.

    Calgurio raised the strength on his body to the limit, making his best effort with his first move.

    The fist is protected by armor, and that alone is a murderous weapon. It can crush almost any substance in this world, harboring the most destructive power.

    The speed of the forefront of the fist surpassed the speed of sound, and even the residual shadow was not left behind,ing to the realm of myth. That shockwave is capable of breaking through the defenses possessed by matter and destroying the molecr structure. And this fist-infused chakra was able to pass through the mind''s defenses and could even inflict damage on the Star Psi body.

    In other words, even if the opponent is a spiritual lifeform, it can kill.

    Calgurio had heard of Diablo''s name.

    He was one of the Four Heavenly Kings under the Demon Lord Rimuru, the true face of the evil demon race. And incredibly, the report also states that he is a "demon archduke" who exists only in legend.

    Calgurio hadn''t even taken the intelligence agency''s findings to heart before and was now willing to believe the reports were true.

    Even two "single digits" to challenge can''t beat that. Even if he really was such an appalling presence, it wasn''t surprising.

    Yet there was no fear in Calgurio''s mind.

    I''ll admit this guy is a terrible demon, but when ites to me now, he''s no match. With this power,

    True Dragon", "Demon Lord" or "Hero" are all good, I''ll take them all down!

    If you count human strength as one, those who are ssified as ss A have at least ten or more physical functions.

    High-ranking demons were nearly a hundred.

    In the case of a high-ranking magician, the record is one hundred and forty.

    If it was the Demon Lord, the minimum should be three hundred as well.

    The dragon species is undetectable, and I''m afraid it will break the thousand.

    Now Calgurio found himself with a power that had broken a thousand.

    Only awakened saints can reach this realm.

    Plus, Calgurio wore mythical-grade armor that contained enough energy to rival his own.

    With this power, even the opponent, the demon archduke, could be exterminated. It''s no wonder that Calgurio is so convinced.

    "s, how disappointing.

    A surefire jab is lightly defused by Diablo.

    "How is that possible!?

    "What''s there to wonder about?

    "Why, why are you okay?

    No matter what kind of demon it was, it should have been killed by that blow just now. Even if he misses well, Calgurio thinks it''s absolutely impossible to be unharmed, how could something so exaggerated be possible.

    "Ask me why, for a simple reason. It''s because you don''t have enough fire in you to use this power well.

    Only to see Diablo answer in a lighter voice.

    "You say I''m not hot enough?

    "Right. I personally feel very sorry for it too. It is too early to fight. Compared to those two just now, they were still rtively strong. Although it was suspected to be a borrowed power, they already had ultimate skills on them. If your power had been awakened sooner, we would have had a more enjoyable showdown"

    The fruit is not good to eat without waiting until it is ripe. Diablomented over it, thinking he had picked too early.

    It was an insult to Calgurio, and he couldn''t take it.

    "Damn it! Don''t underestimate me, you demon!

    With that kind of shouting, the situation turned out to be awful.

    Calgurio understood in his heart.

    He knew he could not defeat this demon in front of him.

    Most importantly, the power of "single digits" has secrets.

    They were the strongest warriors in the Empire, and were handpicked by Emperor Rudra, who then lent his dense powers to these men.

    Diablo''s reference to "power being borrowed from men" proves this point.

    It wasn''t a power they gained on their own, and therefore didn''t work against Diablo.

    Without understanding the nature of power and making it one''s own, it would be futile to have even the most powerful power. The same point can be applied to Calgurio.

    Diablo says it''s too early for the matchup. This reality is impossible to deny even if Calgurio wanted to.

    Whoo-hoo-hoo-hoo-hoo-hoo!"

    Knowing he couldn''t win, Calgurio still gave it his all.

    At least take revenge, or everything they do will be for naught. Wanting to deny that, Calgurio would only fight recklessly.

    But that can no longer be called fighting.

    Diablo does see through Calgurio''s power, and to him it''s just a homework flow.

    Even with mythical grade armor that contained great power, the current Calgurio could not draw out the performancepletely. The armor had identified himself as the master, but had note to the point of being mindful of each other.

    The mythical armor has a personal will. The umted time is simply not enough if Calgurio is to be the true master.

    Props like this make sense only if they are used until the fire is pure. Nothing is sadder than the user''s inability to elicit performance props.

    As a result, Calgurio, who was thest man in the Imperial Army, was defeated and didn''t even get Diablo to get serious.

    And then his soul was taken away

 Volume 13 - Epilogue

    Epilogue: What the Demon Lord Does

    Feeling his body enveloped in a gentle warmth, Calgurio snapped awake.

    This, here?

    He hadn''t been able to remember what he had been doing until a moment ago. Calgurio hurriedly looked around, only to find himself lying in a somewhat wide chamber.

    It was in this very ce that a young girl with blue and silver hair, about twelve or thirteen years old, with an angelic smile, was doing something.

    Calgurio nced to the side and found the opponent cing his hand on top of the one lying on his back, his hand emitting a seven-colored glow that leaned over his lying partner.

    Is that Mr. Krishna? No, wait. Remember Mr. Krishna has been killed before my eyes

    The thought circuit was not yet clear, but it came to its senses in this instant. That''s when Calgurio suddenly remembered that they were waging war to invade the Monster Kingdom.

    He rushed to his feet and tried to yell. The next moment, however, there was silence. Unexpectedly, the supposedly dead Krishna opened his eyes slightly and locked eyes with Calgurio.

    !

    Krishna, who had just woken up, looked just as confused by the current situation as Calgurio. Not understanding what was going on, the eyes moved with the girl''s movements.

    The blue-silver haired maiden didn''t seem to notice that Calgurio they woke up and was repeating the same job in order.

    Now before the maideny Bonnie and Jiu, and next door were the adjutants and staff officers of Calgurio.

    What''s up with that? They should have been killed too

    Even though his consciousness was clouded, Calgurio tried to calm down and ept the truth.

    However, no matter what is done, it is impossible to understand what is going on.

    That must be right, they''re long dead.

    Because none of those people''s chests were rising and falling, obviously not breathing. Yet as the maiden''s hand waved past, they came back to life one by one.

    A dozen or so Imperial subordinates had gathered in this room, and it didn''t take long for everyone to finish processing.

    It was at this point that the maiden nodded in satisfaction and then turned her head to face Calgurio.

    "Hey, you awake? How does it feel? Do you remember your name?

    The teenage girl spoke to Calgurio in a rxed tone.

    But not to the point of being annoying.

    One of the reasons for this was the maiden''s seemingly pitiful rtionship, and most importantly, the aura of the maiden''s body that made it impossible for Calgurio to be rebellious.

    But to say whether he has the means to respond, the answer is no.

    Still confused, not knowing what was going on, those people kept their mouths shut.

    Even Bonnie and Jiu, who belonged to the "single digits", froze in bewilderment.

    Seeing the bewildered faces of Calgurio and others, the young girl spoke softly.

    "Hey, did it fail? The technique should be perfect

    A puzzled look appeared on the young girl''s face.

    The words made Calgurio understand that they were under some sort of spell.

    Could that spell be

    No, no way. How is that possible? It''s not possible, but

    There was nothing unusual about the body.

    No, actually, there is.

    The power that had originally risen so much, but after Calgurio woke up, the power he had previously gainedpletely disappeared. All he knew was that something terrible had happened.

    I''m sorry. Aren''t we supposed to be dead?

    At this point Calgurio asked a timid question.

    Hearing that, the memories of the other partners seemed to follow suit with rity. A glow appeared in his eyes and he realized that something was not right under the circumstances.

    By all ounts, they should have been killed by the demon who called himself Diablo.

    The demon made no sense to keep them alive. That''s why Calgurio has doubts about being alive.

    "Oh,e to think of it? Do you remember your name then?

    "Well, um. My name is Calgurio.

    One side answered, and Calgurio thought of some possibility.

    Perhaps it was this maiden who saved Calgurio and others who were in danger.

    It''s impossible to save them in such a situation.

    The demon was an overachiever. Even when Calgurio gained extreme strength, his opponent against him was like wringing the hands of a small baby, making it easy for him to lose.

    Not only that, but even Bonnie and Jiu who are "single digits"

    To say who would be able to defeat such a demon, all Calgurio could think of was the legendary ''Hero''.

    "Um, did you save us? What about the evil demon? What happened to that evil demon?"

    At this point Calgurio mustered the courage to ask.

    As soon as he''s done asking

    "You''re being rude to Lord Rimuru.

    The voice rang out.

    The voice was familiar, like that ominous demon.

    The bigger problem lies with the name Rimuru.

    That''s the name of the demon lord that Calgurio and others have targeted for crusade.

    The demon, Diablo, appeared to Calgurio. He couldn''t help but tense his body with fear, but the maiden interjected to stop Diablo.

    Well, some of you may be mistaken, so let me make it clear that you are all dead. Your army is all gone. All the soldiers who fought in the battle were killed and I don''t think there are any survivors. So it wasn''t me who saved you, it was just me who brought you back to life.

    "Kufufufufu. This secret technique is amazing. I will not ask you to be thankful, but at least admire Lord Rimuru for his greatness.

    Eh?"

    What the other party was saying waspletely unintelligible, and Calgurio couldn''t help but ask back in a wrongly stunned voice. But no one on the sceneughed at him for losing his cool.

    "Come on, Diablo.

    "I''m sorry. These people are ignorant and foolish, and were trying to make them understand the greatness of Lord Rimuru as best they could"

    "I told you it was nosy!

    And so on and so forth, even with this conversation ying out before our eyes, no one was able to shout.

    After a moment, the maiden smiled and opened her mouth to Calgurio.

    "Looks like the memory''s fine too. I''m relieved to see that the spell works.

    "Yes, yes

    "Then reintroduce yourself. For the first time, I''m Rimuru. Demon Lord Rimuru, the king of this country. Please tell me more!

    Hearing his opponent say that, Calgurio blurted out.

    Not just Calgurio, but everyone else on the scene of the resurrection as well.

    When those words reached his mind and he understood the meaning, at the same time, Calgurio''s eyes widened to the limit and he began to stare at the young girl before him.

    This maiden is Rimuru.

    They are seen as enemies to be hindered, to be acted out.

    One of today''s Eight Star Demon Lords (the Octagram), the Demon Lord Rimuru himself.

    From the situation at hand, it was this maiden who brought Calgurio and others back to life.

    The man in front of him was the Demon Lord Rimuru himself. That cute smile looks nothing like the posted photo, but the problem lies elsewhere.

    "Please, please, I would like to confirm one thing

    "Hmm? What is it?

    After obtaining permission, Calgurio inquired fearfully.

    "Did you bring us back to life?"

    "Yeah, that''s it."

    "Why is this?

    "Well, it''s hard to exin. It''s the soul"

    "No, no, no, that''s not what''s being said! Why should we be resurrected when were enemies?

    "Oh, is that it?

    The maidenno, the Demon Lord Rimuru nodded as if relieved to be asked that by Calgurio. He then replied indifferently.

    "It''s simple. Although the war is still going on, you have fallen into my hands, so now you are my pawns!

    That''s why you were raised, he said so.

    Calgurio didn''t catch on for a moment, and the whole man froze.

    Is it the Demon Lord Rimuru who brought people back to life?

    To whom?

    Is that for us?

    Surprise and confusion coupled with fear fill the heart.

    It''s not just Calgurio, the resurrected all react the same.

    It will take some time for the chaos to return to calm for now.

    ***

    Leaving the muddled Calgurio and others to dry, I left the room and went outside.

    That said, the people in the room are important people in this legion. He is said to be the supreme person in charge ofmanding the imperial invasion campaign.

    The reason for their resurrection is, as I said to Calgurio, to be used as pawns. And this is the belly case that Master Raphael, the King of Wisdom, came up with.

    ...........

    ........

    Resurrection of the dead

    Ever since the death of Shion, Master Raphael, the King of Wisdom, has been conducting soul-analysis. It seems to be going well nowadays and almost all the principles have been analyzed.

    There is a quality to the soul, not just to people, but to magical creatures. That''s what''s called

    "information pieces" of matter, and by managing these, one can manipte life and death to some degree.

    Regardless of the soul mass of nts and animals, the energy is extremely small. Inparison, the human soul contains a great deal of energy.

    It has been confirmed that everyone will be assigned a certain value equally.

    The ability to put this soul energy to good use will make it possible for the person to discover the soul force called skill.

    The information etched in the soul is the source of the exercise of power.

    Is that information engraved directly on the energy?Its not.

    First there is a self with an indeterminate wavelength, and a collection of "information fragments"

    envelops these - the core. All the information is carved into it.

    And the energy crystals that envelop the nucleus of the heart are the "soul".

    The development of the "mimic soul" is used as a receptor for projecting this core.

    The nucleus of the heart projected onto the "mimetic soul" has no energy, but it has an ego. Without the power of the soul, unable to use skill, yet able to act in the possession of self.

    As for bringing them back to life this time, I used a substitute for the soulthe "anthropomorphic soul".

    Take their souls, then weed out the nucleus of the heart, leaving only the bare minimum of energy, and transnt it into the "anthropomorphic soul".

    ...........

    ........

    Not sure what the sess rate is, but it''s great that it worked out in the end.

    Yet this resurrection was not entirely without problems.

    First of all, they get weaker substantially. For all the power of the soul is taken away from me, that is for sure.

    Since they have all taken their souls, there is no reason to return them specifically. Even if the other sideins, I don''t think they''re qualified for that.

    Thus

    In the future, they won''t be able to use their skills.

    Even if skill information was engraved on the core of the heart, it could not be used without the power of the soul. They don''t get to learn skills and use skills after that.

    There is also an impact on the use of magic, but on that point, more effort should improve.

    As long as one gets used to it to some extent, one can use magic even without the power of a soul.

    Magic is both a skill and a craft. Using the magical elements in the atmosphere to rece soul energy will be able to manipte thew.

    It was also possible to rece the fighting qi with mana so that even the techniques could be used.

    Even if one''s flesh was aging, one could exercise again, and with more practice one would be able to retain one''s skills, so long as that person wasn''t just relying on skills, there would be no problem.

    That means you can get stronger with more effort. It''s just that the quality of the energy is different and there should still be limits present.

    The "ghosts" are, to put it bluntly, just toys to make the maze more fun, and there''s no point in expecting too much from them.

    But no problem this time.

    Bringing those men back to life is not for the good of the empire''s generals and soldiers, but to prevent our windy reviews from turning bad. How the breeze is judged will sway people''s opinion.

    It was the other side that came and attacked us without permission, and it was their own doing to end up dead, so I was under no obligation to bring them back.

    Only, it is better to resurrect them than to have dishonorablements spread. If there is anything to be said for added value, it is that the subjects of the empire will not have an unnecessary hatred of us.

    It''s great that Master Raphael, the King of Wisdom, has seeded in his experiment. Now that all those people have been resurrected, we expect to hold those important people ountable.

    Nowadays too, Souei does keep an eye on them.

    It was a "false life," though it brought them back to life. Some degree of freedom will be guaranteed, but whatever happens, we can keep track of it.

    In other words, there''s no way they can escape.

    That''s the way it is. Let''s leave these people alone for now.

    I want to get my work done quickly.

    I tested the spells on Calgurio and they confirmed the effect. It didn''t look like a problem, so it was decided to implement it on arge scale.

    Some 700,000 bodies are in front of them.

    No matter what happens, you need to be able to correspond, so the location was chosen inside the maze.

    The 70th level, which is the area under Adalman''s jurisdiction.

    We collected these remains from all over the battlefield as best we could.

    Then I''ll do the mass transmission and move them all over.

    Gobta, Geld, and Gabil plus the Guardians of the various floors of the maze set out en masse to recover the remains.

    That said, the remains ced here are those of those who may be resurrected from this sacrifice.

    The troops deployed in front of the eastern metropolis of Dwargon, Isthmus, remained unmoved as usual. The two sides continued to standoff.

    As for the ny-four thousand people who invaded the great forest of Jura, all the others died in battle except Misha, Michel, and Raymond. Of these, some 240,000 remains could not be recovered.

    The reason why it is impossible to use resurrection magic is because it is impossible to recreate the soul. This time it was thanks to the Testarossa and the girls that we were able to reim the "soul". So as long as the flesh remains there is the possibility of resurrection

    But some people have no flesh left at all.

    People like those who were vaporized by Ultima with the me of Destruction, or those who werepletely destroyed by Testarossa with the Blessing of Death, and those who were turned to dust by Carrera with Gravity Copse.

    On top of that, some people cannot be resurrected even if their flesh remains.

    Those are the people who die of fear and despair. These people have lost their most important selves and can never be resurrected.

    It''s like Kansas being killed by Kumara. The man seemed to have had his mind destroyed by fear before he died, and there were no "pieces of information" left in his soul.

    Even Master Raphael, the King of Wisdom, was unable to recover the "information fragment", so there was nothing I could do.

    But I wasn''t originally going to resurrect a man like Kansas, so I didn''t think it was a problem.

    For these reasons, about 240,000 people could not be resurrectedbut originally all of them died, and it can actually be said that only these numbers could not be resurrected is lucky enough.

    People who can''t be resurrected are miserable, but only if they are down on their luck.

    It''s not like I''m the Almighty God.

    There''s no way to create something out of nothing.

    And

    Seriously, I don''t regret it at all.

    Although it felt like the three female demons had gone too far, this was war. It would be pointless to be lenient and cause casualties on our side.

    All that matters to me is family and friends, and I would not hesitate to choose to protect my own peoplepared to others who have no connection.

    I don''t say that to be kind to the invading enemyI. don''t mean to be a saintly gentleman.

    People like this who are full of fancy fantasies can''t be held ountable until there are real casualties.

    So I used not to care about those who cannot be resurrected.

    I don''t care, but I still feel the same way when I lived in Japan, thend of peace, and I feel unspeakable emotions for those who have died.

    It''s definitely not regret, and it doesn''t feel like what you did was wrong, it''s just not something you''re used to right now.

    The hope that no one will die and that they will live happily and peacefullythat thought keepsing to mind.

    Even so, in the future, I will not show mercy to those who vite my own territory, or Ill let them taste fear thoroughly

    It would be hypocritical for me to mourn those who rest in peace.

    So let''s not have a moment of silent mourning for those who have passed away, but a moment of silent prayer for those who have risen.

    The "Sacred Birthday".

    The people who came out of the room, such as Calgurio, all had their eyes wide open in surprise.

    At this rate, next thing you know, their eyes won''t stay open.

    Never mind, it''s none of my business.

    Hurry up and bring those people back to life to finish.

    All of the remains were ced with a replica of the "anthropomorphic soul".

    Due to the urgency of the situation, I''m making the most of the "copy". To ensure that everyone has a

    "mock-up soul" avable.

    The remains have been repaired. Thanks to the collective efforts of those good hands who used divine magic under Adalman, everyone was now intact.

    Despite the fact that they were targeting enemy soldiers, everyone worked tirelessly. Thank them.

    Adalman used not to rest, so he was twice as diligent as the others. He should be more tired than inbat.

    He is active and I would like to give a positive review indeed.

    In this way, the "created soul" was sessfully transnted into the body with a full face.

    In short, it''s not too much to say that this could have been done with the overwhelming arithmetic power of Master Raphael, the King of Wisdom.

    The next thing I did was not to use the Secret Art of Soul Return, but to use the Secret Art of Soul Impartation.

    Unlike soul regeneration, not much energy is required. The problem, on the other hand, is that it takes a lot ofputing power to do this for each individual.

    It was also Master Raphael, the King of Wisdom, who was responsible for achieving this.

    I actually didn''t do anything. Just stand while meditating and leave everything to the guru.

    The gic information of the flesh and the soul records are checked against each other, and then the person concerned can bepared in an instant.

    Then I really can''t learn.

    Because the artifice is bothplicated and strange.

    But

    Calgurio and the others watched from the sidelines and seemed to think it was me who was executing everything. I don''t know when they all started to kneel, how to say it, or even to worship me.

    Wait, it''s embarrassing for me to see you guys do this.

    This is a big misunderstanding, I hope they don''t. Thinking so, there''s no way toin until the spell is over.

    We just fucked around all day with embarrassment and continued to exercise our secret skills. The result was a sessful resurrection of about 700,000 Imperial General soldiers.

    ***

    Some simple tents stood on the seventy floors, distributing food to those who hade to life.

    Certain people fell into chaos after their resurrection, but are now calming down. Everyone concentrated on eating, as if they were tasting the true feeling of being alive.

    A wide variety of vegetables and meats were being simmered in arge pot, the kind of food that had a unique vor simr to a stew.

    Put a lot of ingredients in it and it was very warm.

    For the soldiers of the Army''s generals, who have escaped the chaos and are beginning to recognize reality, this stew gives them an indescribable feeling in their writing.

    Calgurio was one of such cripples.

    Originally not even noticing the hunger, the tension eased. One side had a practical realization of this, and the other side slowly and repeatedly understood that they had died once before, by the men of the Demon Lord Rimuru.

    But even so, they survived.

    The demon lord says it is "false survival".

    Don''t worry. If one is to live an ordinary life, there will be no inconvenience.

    You can fall in love or start a family and have children.

    It''s just that there are restrictions so that you can''t do anything against us!

    There is no way that you can be hostile to us again, with a spell inscribed in your "created soul".

    I hope you can understand that

    When everyone is no longer confused, the other person informs so in front of everyone.

    But there was really no need for such a spellCalgurio was sure of it.

    Who would ever do such a stupid act again?

    Hundreds of years ago Veldora brought great disaster and there was nothing but fear when one saw such results. That said, even if an urban city is wiped out and all the people who live there disappear, it is still possible for a disaster of this magnitude to be caused by human hands.

    Maybe it''s because of that?

    Although people were beginning to feel fear, everyone didn''t feel that there was apleteck of opportunity to defeat Veldora.

    Had there been more survivors, perhaps one would have felt a deep-seated fear and asserted its invibility, but that''s about it at best.

    However, it didn''t go that wrong this time.

    They died and were raised

    Not through the gods, but through the hand of the demon lord.

    Forced to witness such a pie-in-the-sky miracle, what kind of person would try to rebel?

    WeIm so stupid

    He finally understood that it was they who were too arrogant.

    No, so this is really the work of the Demon Lord?

    Calgurio was dubious about that.

    As for Krishna, it''s only been one night and he''s taken the Demon Lord Rimuru to faith. Now hes following him with adoring eyes.

    But the first person to worship the demon lord was Calgurio, so he had no businessining, nor did he intend to

    As for what demon lord calls "false survivalthere is really nothing wrong with that.

    Indeed, they amount to a loss ofbat power.

    But life doesn''t take too much effort.

    That''s because the current Calgurio and the others still had a way of beating down a certain level of monster.

    Perhaps those battle strengths were worthless to Demon Lord Rimuru, but among the people such as Calgurio, some still retain nearly A-grade strength to this day.

    There was no way to use skills, and it was hard to use magic, but they still kept their flesh after a few years of exercise.

    In addition, they are allowed to live until the time when the body ages and the living creature reaches the end of its life as it should.

    Calgurio thought that alone would be sufficient.

    And about 700,000 generals and soldiers all thought so.

    Everyone was holding an attitude of gratitude and awe, and it was simply impossible for anyone to be rebellious against the Demon Lord Rimuru.

    They were defeated from the bottom of their hearts.

    Everyone wants the war to end.

    Nowadays the Empire''s war of aggression can be described as aplete failure.

 Volume 13.5 - Ch 1

    Payday in Tempest

    The Opening festival hade to an end and the prosperous days continued. As part of it, Rigurdo was busy throughout the day. Although he was upied with lots of work, these were all fulfilling and joyful days.

    And all of this was thanks to Rigurdos master.

    The glorious reward from his masterDemon Lord Rimuru.

    Thinking back a few years time, Rigurdo was the elder of the original goblin tribe. They didnt have names, and were also confronted with the disappearance of the Jura Forests guardian.

    The age of unrestmenced.

    We were just so lucky back then.

    Rigurdo couldnt forget it, deeply grateful in his heart. Had his Goblin underlings, under the dire circumstances identally done something to Rimuru-sama If that had been the case, Rigurdo and his tribe would not be here today.

    Having said that, Rimuru at the time already gave off immeasurable magicules, which dispelled any thoughts they had of attempting an attack on him. Rigurdo and his men werent nning on doing anything, and now knowing the oue of it all, that was what saved them.

    After all, with Rimuru-samas menacing disy, we were able to clear out the direwolf threat. That smooth and shining fluid body that shouts aesthetic. Uponying eyes on him in action, its simply stupid to even think about defying him. I bet whoever he may have encountered would also have expressed loyalty to him.

    Rigurdo nodded to himself as he recalled the past. There exist such surprising oues in life. Rigurdo had made a wise choice. However, most people in this world wouldnt have made the right choice. If Rimuru had shown up in a different ce, it might just have ended up in tragedy. For instance, what if he encountered human adventurers instead? Those who are incapable of seeing the nature of monsters would probably make the judgement entirely based on the appearance of things. You could expect the encounter to turn violent within a matter of seconds. In other words, Rimurus first encounter with Rigurdo was, in a sense, a blessing to both parties.

    Afterwards, Rimuru epted Rigurdos request and became their leaderleading not only the goblins, but the ogres, orcs, lizardmen and forest spirits too. Eventually settling down within the forest and bing the demon lord tomand all races.

    Rigurdo, whod been reminiscing about the past in the midst of a busy day, was called back to reality.

    Oh-oh, there you are. Rigurdo-dono, Ive been looking for you for some time now.

    Myourmiles-dono? Is there a problem?

    Well, its not exactly a problem

    Myourmiles stopped for a moment.

    He, a human, had been entrusted by Rimuru with the duty of managing the Finance Department of Tempest State. He had be an irreceable member of the country, who also worked very diligently like Rigurdo.

    He responded to Myourmiles with a smile. Thanks to Myourmiles, Rigurdo was able to resolve his own concerns. He was burdened by self-doubts regarding what he and the rest of Rimuru-samas subordinates meant to hima demon lord with immense power. Rigurdo sighed at hisck of strength, while being subjected to such a powerful existence.

    Among Rimurus subordinates, there were many majin who were known for theirbat abilities. For instance, the members of Kurenai. 11 These were strong individuals, far more powerful than Rigurdo, who didnt put shame on the name of Rimuru-samas subordinates.

    Apart from them, there were the orcs led by Geld. They were not only pivotal for their specialized role in the citys development, but also tasked with defending and guarding it.

    And then, we had Diablo. That Demon was extremely unusual. There was no doubt that he bears immeasurable strength. It gave Rigurdo a cold shiver simply imagining having to fight him as a foe. His loyalty towards Rimuru was unquestionable, yet in reality, there were many who feared Diablo. He was on good terms with Ranga, and also agreed to Rigurdos request with a smile But even with that, anyone would subconsciously be scared in the face of an obviously higher existencepared to oneself.

    And so it bore the seed of Rigurdos concern.

    Given that at the moment, there were many powerful majins who had joined under Rimurus reign, he worried about what he could contribute as one of them. Despite such a thought, Rigurdos strength was easily above Rank A. Its not that he was weak, it was simply the others outssing him to an unreasonable degree. Or in other words, Rigurdo was still a rather strong member within Tempest State. But Rigurdo did not realize that and earnestly worked hard everyday in order topetently fulfill the role of Goblin King entrusted to him by Rimuru.

    Myourmiless presence was like a saving grace to Rigurdos feelings of insecurity. The man who had no concern for strength and even crossed the racial boundary between human and monster. Myourmiles, the head of the Finance DepartmentMinister of Finance.

    So thats the way its been all along, then theres nothing to be worried about. Rimuru-sama has no prerequisite for our strength, moreover, our master is a majestic demon lord! This just cant do it, I am still too close-minded and caused myself such worries. These are just unnecessary concerns. It is simply an instinct for monsters to judge one another based on strength.

    Rigurdo made a wryugh as he came to that conclusion, quickly abandoning his worries and refocusing on the towns operations. Rigurdo was grateful towards Myourmiles in his heart for that very reason.

    Hisck of abilitypared to Myourmiles still passed through his head asionally, though he has long since treated him more like a friend. That was what gave Rigurdos tone a sense of intimacy when talking to Myourmiles.

    Well, what seems to be the issue?

    Ay, I feel as though myself alone wont think up an answer. Rimuru-samas thrusted another hard task down my throat again.

    Myourmiles put on an indignant attitude whileining, albeit unable to conceal his joy. Rigurdo smiled upon hearing this. It was precisely the hard tasks heined about that were proof of the trust Rimuru had in him. Rimuru would never hand an impossible task to his subordinates, this thus symbolized the expectations Rimuru had ced upon Myourmiles.

    Right now Im also busy learning about how the separation of powers works. Whates first now is legition. Rimuru-sama has ordered me to draft our nations constitution.

    Another over-the-top idea, hes always the same

    Even though Rimuru acted as the king of the country, he seemed to have no intention of running it. Since if he had participated in politics, all of his free time wouldve been gone. Yet the authorityy not among the citizens, but with the leader, Rimuru.

    Tempest Stateor Jura Tempest Federationwas based on an alliance between multiple races. People of different personalities and ideologies all gathering under Rimurus protection is what made Tempest State a united nation. Bottom line being, if Rimuru was not around, there would be no nation to begin with.

    Rigurdo had nothing to say against Rimuru holding the authority. As such, with hidden thoughts in his heart, he was handedplete political authority.

    Based on the current condition, we need to assemble key administration departments and establish a legition department consisting of a thousand men alongside a judicial department to enforce thews.  That was his order.

    Needless to say, it was an order given after diplomatic discussions with the western states. But thankfully, Rimuru didnt just let go of all of his responsibilities, he still gave his opinions on the drafts

    This was a nasty can of worms he had tossed to Rigurdo, who undaunted was still happy to follow through with it.

    Hahaha, thats precisely my intent. So Myourmiles-dono, what type of thing are we talking here?

    Rigurdo, such a nice guy. Even when he was having a hard time himself, he still wouldnt turn down his friend. Myourmiles was able to see through Rigurdos personality within the short time he had spent with him, which is why his following request was tinged with remorse.

    Ya Im truly sorry for interrupting your busy schedule. I wanted to resolve it myself, but I do want to hear your opinion about this certain thing before making any decision. Also, this may require the consensus from every department.

    Oh? What do you mean?

    Hmm, as a matter of fact

    Trying his best not to interrupt the busy Rigurdo

    Myourmiles thought to himself but regarding Rimurus order this time, it was very hard to make the decision himself. The subject at handConstruction of a sry system.

    Sary?

    Yes. To quote Rimuru-sama, I want to express gratitude towards everyone working in our country.

    I see. We are already satisfied with basic fulfillments in food, clothes and residence. On top of that, Rimuru-sama has granted us meaningful work. Well probably get struck by lightning if we ask for anything more. However, it would seem that humans have a different view on the subject.

    Rimuru, who Rigurdo respected and loved, was said to once have been human. For that reason, he granted them all rewards, due to his values that differed from those of monsters. Rigurdo nodded in agreement thinking so. Myourmiles agreed to that as well and added:

    I personally also understand Rimuru-samas intent. People tend to work extra hard upon receiving rewards for their work.

    Hmm, I was thinking to shut the greedy ones up with my pair of fists But I cant really get in the way of Rimuru-samas idea. Then, how much would the appropriate sry be as a reward hmm, this sure is a difficult question.

    Honestly, we are rather sparing in finance right now. We can try to give out weekly funds as sry, but in the end, Im skeptical about how much of the funds everyone could spend in the first ce

    Upon hearing Myourmiless words, Rigurdo finally realized how profound the issue really was. Handing out a sry was a trivial task, yet to the monsters who had always practiced might makes right, the concept of mary value was something wholly unfamiliar. Whenever they desired something, they could simply take it with brute force. That had been their way of life. Another factor was that monsters arent as careful with and good at managing their money, as opposed to scheming merchants. At most a handful of them could even count their cash to begin with. At the time it was thanks to Rimurus instructions that the poption of people educated in those fields had increased.

    Yet for the time being, most monsters were still incapable of reading and writing. Distributing a sry to them would have been an ineffectual endeavour.

    If they are unable to utilize their sry, there would be no point in rewarding them.

    Thats precisely the issue. Besides, if they simply save up their money without ever spending it, effectively taking it out of cirction, that may lead to stagnation in the economy. I would want to avoid that from happening.

    Regardless of the good intentions they had when setting up the system, it would have no value if it only hindered the progress of the nation  That Myourmiles had such concerns proved his worth as a prescient businessman.

    Rigurdo was able to understand Myourmiless views, even on thisplex subject. In fact, most people would likely save the sry out of appreciation. The wiser ones would consider what to do with the money. Realistically, most monsters were already satisfied with their current situation and wouldnt know what else to buy. Besides, to them something given by Rimuru was already treasured beyond any sum of money. It would likely be more important to change their conceptions of things before we deliver the first paycheck.

    Rigurdo was deep in thought.

    Hmm, this sure is a difficult question Rigurdo whispered to himself. It was also no easy job to consider the amount of payment for respective work loads, but before that, the educational issue must be resolved first.

    Rigurdo considered himself a fast-thinker, yet faced with Myourmiless questions, his brain was running at full capacity. It would also be preposterous to go discuss the matter with Rimuru.

    This is really jarring

    Rigurdo and Myourmiles looked at each other awkwardly and fell silent.

    Kufufufufu, this sounds like an interesting topic.

    Diablo showed up out of nowhere, gave both a bright smile and inserted himself into their discussion.

    ***

    That smile had immediately made Rigurdo suspicious.

    Unlike Benimaru, who was straightforward with his thoughts and would spit out whatever he thought, Diablo was very different. He was always nning something and cunningly twisted situations in his favor. This was especially the case when it concerned his own interests. If Diablo showed that level of interest, he was definitely scheming something.

    This look, he must have some devious idea on his mind! Diablos got a good head. I wont give him a chance to trick me, I must stay focused!

    Rigurdo steeled his resolve and turned to face Diablo.

    Well if it isnt Diablo-dono? I thought you were away enjoying your holiday?

    Indeed, Ive been pursuing chess-pieces that are going to work in my ce.

    Oh. How did that go? Myourmiles asked, and Diablo smoothly answered with a calm expression: They, of course, epted the offer in a heartbeat.

    This means I can focus entirely on being Rimuru-samas secretary nowhis expression said it all.

    Although the part of in a heart-beat was questionable, Diablo definitely found some subordinates.

    Thats great. Then, since you have overheard our conversation, Diablo-dono, whats your opinion?

    Rigurdo delivered the line cautiously. He was determined to not be deceived. Handling Diablo wasnt easy for him though, and the slightest misstep wouldnd him in the palm of Diablos hand. Still, Diablo also showed much respect towards Rigurdosolely because both of them served the same master, Rimuru.

    If Rimuru ever disappears, Diablo would likely lose interest in this nation, right? But if it reallyes down to that, the country would likely copse on its own

    Kufufufufu. This sry needs not to be in cash, does it?

    Hmm?

    Hmm. Ive considered that point. However, even if we decide to pay in goods, it is time-consuming to learn everyone''s preference. Issuing objects of no significance to the recipient would be meaningless. But it would also be unrealistic to hear everyones demands

    Paying in goods removes the concern regarding them hoarding money, but this would be too costly. After all, every citizen already has a minimum welfare.

    Myourmiles thusly dismissed the proposal as being unfeasible.

    However, Diablos smile remained.

    No, no. Youve got the wrong idea. Think about it, havent we already got a model? Right now, the canteen is using a point-system for ordering, right? What if we utilize the point-system again for this?

    He made his proposal, staring at the two.

    Speaking of points, do you mean the effort point that grants you ess to the special menu?

    If I recall, it is an umtive point-system to represent the work one does. Actually I see! Its only a stamp issued by the department head, so it has nothing to do with money. Then theres no need to consider the stashing of cash nor do we need to investigate their personal preference. Hmm, this might be a good n!

    Before Rigurdo could understand, Myourmiles began to show interest in the proposal and excitedly threw out one idea after another. Diablo was happily smiling as he listened.

    Oya, have I been too cautious around Diablo-dono? I thought he wasnt interested in anything other than Rimuru-sama. It would seem hes also willing to lend a helping hand to others. I really shouldnt have judged others with prejudice.

    Rigurdo reflected on himselfa really easily manipted man.

    And so Rigurdo was tossed aside while Myourmiles and Diablo entered deeper into discussion.

    But the question being, how can we effectively utilize the point-system?

    Hmm. Lets not limit the avable rewards to the special food menu, shall we?

    Thats most true. After all, there are monsters who are not particrly interested in food. Under Rimuru-samas influence, there are also quite a few who have developed a sweet tooth. We should also consider those who dont require food at all.

    Thats most likely a blind-spot. Just as Diablo-dono said, there are ones uninterested in food. If we are to effectively apply the point-system, we should alsopensate these members. What an amazing n!

    No, no, its really nothing. Rather, what should we prepare for the point exchange? That would be an important question, right?

    Indeed, then what should we do

    Rigurdo gradually caught up listening to their conversation. He was also amazed at Diablos clever suggestion.

    Bravo Diablo-dono. No wonder he has the wisdom to fill the role of Rimurus secretary. Aiya, its my own shortings that led me to question his intent. Ive got to improve on how I read othersRigurdo expressed his admiration.

    Then he began to weigh in on the discussion himself.

    Hmm, I believe some may be amused by Kurobee-donos weapons and Shuna-samas newly produced clothes.

    Yeah, thats for sure. If we are to sell the products to the public, how about we consider applying point based priority for purchases.

    I see. In that sense, Gobtas fishing rod may be a surprisingly popr item. After all, its hand-made by Rimuru-sama. Then let Dold-dono make some simr gadgets with his crew.

    That sounds great, Ive also fallen in love with the joy of fishing and wanted one.

    Hahaha, then I should get you a test rod when the timees.

    No, no, we should sell that as well. Please leave the matter to me.

    Thats more than I could wish for. In that way, theres one more item on the list of specialties offered by our country.

    Hahaha, Whaha; Rigurdo and Myourmiles gleefully exchanged their ideas. The two seemed highly motivated now that they seemingly found a solution to the headaching question. Diablos smile didnt leave his face while observing the two. And suddenly, out of nowhere

    The right to serve Rimuru-sama for a day, how about it?

    Like a drop of poison, he nonchntly slipped his opinion into their conversation.

    Ha?

    Eh?

    Rigurdo couldnt utter a word while Myourmiles was so shocked that he suspected he had misheard Diablo. Diablo on the other hand calmly carried on with an exnation as if nothing happened.

    No, its really not that big a deal. Simr to how Rimuru-sama wishes to appreciate us, wed also like to be grateful to Rimuru-sama, wouldnt we?

    O-of course thats the case

    I-I also feel deeply grateful for being trusted and employed by Rimuru-sama

    Isnt that right? Thats why we should allow everyone topete fairly for the opportunity to express their heartfelt gratitude. But thats just my opinion.

    IndeedDiablo eximed confidently. Myourmiles expression was frozen and Rigurdo couldnt begin to agree.

    No, but shouldnt Rimuru-sama consent to this as well?

    Of course! Thats without saying and only natural. However, if someone is to upy Rimuru-samas time, there should only be one person for a day per month to be given such an honor. In this way, the rarity of this reward will go up with fiercerpetition. These high-point rewards will surely ignite everyone''s motivation.

    Hmm, Rigurdo whispered to himself. There was merit to Diablos suggestion. However, there were still some uneptable points.

    H-howeverto have Rimuru-sama greet us would be most disrespectful. And would it really be a reward if we are to serve Rimuru-sama?

    Rigurdo expressed his doubts. Diablo, however, sighed in response.

    Rigurdo-dono, please think it over. To serve Rimuruwouldnt that imply spending a day with him where its just the two of you?

    EH, HMMM?

    In other words, you get to see operas together, serve drinks to Rimuru-sama while he reads, dine together, and spend the day together!

    NA-NANI!?

    We get to serve Rimuru-sama while simultaneously epting Rimuru-samas gratitude. How about it, isnt it a wonderful idea?

    The demon conveyed his exnation smoothly. Rigurdo reached a sudden realizationforced to being enlightened.

    It was Rigurdos naivety that led to his failure.

    Speaking of which, Myourmiles pondered:

    I already get to grab a drink and meal with Rimuru-sama quite often If this were to go public, Id probably get envied. Hmm, so Ill just stay silent for now!

    A smart decision. A capable man is indeed different from others.

    He didnt let anything slip before Diablo.

    Then, Myourmiles began to assemble a draft regarding that matter andter submitted it to Rimuru.

    ***

    Rimuru had been organizing documents in his room when Myourmiles handed him the files regarding the sry system. Diablo stood next to Rimuru and helped organize the papers. He had resumed his role of No.2 Secretary as usual after his vacation ended a few days ago.

    Wow, has it beenpleted, Myourmiles?

    Yes, we were able to finalize our proposal after putting much thought into it. As it states, we will not pay in cash but rather extended the more ideal point-system. But these are just my opinions.

    Myourmiles reported as such. Rimuru nodded happily in response. From that bright expression, one can see the remorse Rimuru had felt over not properlypensating his subordinates for all their work. Rimuru looked through the document and frowned upon seeing the top reward.

    Hmm? Wh-what is this the right to serve me?

    Of course there would be doubts regarding it, Myourmiles thought to himself.

    About the option of the right to serve Rimuru-sama, its in ordance to Rimuru-samas faith in everyone in the nation. I came up with it, believing that everyone working in this country would be most grateful towards Rimuru-sama.

    Myourmiles had prepared his answers before the presentation. It wouldnt really be an issue if that one reward was taken out, therefore he was calm without a hint of panic. Diablo watched the entire thing while a small smile crept across his face.

    As I recall, it was a request from Rigurdo-dono, right?

    Heh, Rigurdo? That guy is way too serious. Theres really no need to worry about this.

    Rimuru forced a smile upon hearing Diablos words. It can be seen that Rimuru put much trust in Rigurdo. If he was told that it was Diablo who came up with the proposal, Rimuru would probably have been more careful and discussed about it. But, hearing that it was what Rigurdo thought, Rimuru was easily convinced without paying it a second thought. Yet that was precisely Diablos goal.

    Kufufufufu, all ording to my grand scheme 12 ! This privilege was the most vital from the start. It will probably get scrapped in no time, so Ill show you all whos number one when everyone else is just pretending to observe.

    Diablo snickered while revelling in his plot. It was precisely because only Diablo would do something like this that Rigurdo was wary of him. It was something that would eventually happen even without the person noticing.

    Hmm, however, its probably not wise to use all the points they earned through hard work on me

    Rimuru still had some objections, so Myourmiles responded:

    Indeed, its exactly as you say. However, everyone whos discussed about the proposal had nothing but praise to say about it. Whats more, if someone decides to exchange their points for it even though the price is high, it would show how much gratitude they feel towards Rimuru-sama. If someone makes that choice, its apletely voluntary action. So I think we should wait and see how everyone reacts to it first.

    Hmm, is that so? It certainly seems like it with everything you just said. Well I suppose its fine, since they wont be able to collect that many points again in a short time span. Lets wait and see.

    Then would you agree to the proposal?

    Rimuru gave up thinking and decided to approve the proposal. And so it gained Rimurus approval.

    Diablo struck a victory pose in secret, no one noticed.

    ***

    Then, two monthster

    Aiyi, Rigurdo. Its nice of you to have proposed the right to serve me, but we should probably cancel it.

    Rimuru summoned Rigurdo to tell him this.

    Ha, Eh? What do you mean?

    Somehow the proponent turned from Diablo to himself. Rigurdo had many doubts, but he hid them for the time and asked Rimuru the reasons behind it.

    As a matter of fact, its Diablo who first obtained the right. And its him this month again. It would seem that he has been collecting points behind my back. If we carry on, I feel that every privilege will end up in his pocket, Rimuru answered.

    Ive been PLAYED like a DAMN FIDDLE!? So its true, I should never have believed that demon!

    Feeling like the sky was falling down, Rigurdo realized that he had beenpletely duped by Diablo. It would seem that Diablo had even considered the abolishment of the right in his n. In other words, once the situation devolved into this, that right would be ced on a pedestal and regarded as a dream-privilege, further adding to its value.

    The impossibility in obtaining the right to serve Rimuru-samaand the only one who was allowed to exercise the right had been Diablo, and him alone.

    His n was executed wlessly.

    Wuuu, Im still too nave. It all started with that damn smile; I had already seen through his cunning nature yet still lost to his tricks.

    Such regrets hardly mattered at that point. In the end, as Rigurdo anticipated, the right to serve Rimuru-sama became a fantasy. What remained were many monsters envy andints.

    As well as Rigurdos regret.

    However, this did not happen for nothing.

    Another reward-based point-system was adopted regarding the sry problem in Tempest.

    A moreplete and detailed structure was built.

    That was the inside story of the sry issue during Tempests early independence, when the kingdom stillcked aplete national system.

 Volume 13.5 - Ch 2

    Goddess of the Ever-night Kingdom

    My name is Ruminas. 13

    Ruminas Valentine.

    Ruler of the old worldVampire.

    I was the one at the top of the food chain, Queen of Nightmare.

    However, politics are truly troublesome and upsetting to me. I needed only to pose as though Im being thoughtful and nod in agreement.

    That being the case, it would be sufficient to have subordinates deal with it in my stead. In more ancient times, I acquired Guntherthe king of an opposing forceunder my reign. It was definitely the right choice. Gunther has freed me from my duty and built up a system of ruling. Even though he wouldin at times, all of our aplishments have been dependent on him. And for that alone, my kingdom prospers.

    Yet even so, I still get shit from that fucking lizard (Veldora).

    If I hadnt met Chloe at the time, there would have been hell to pay. Just thinking about it makes me feel appreciation for Chloe beyond words. And of course for Hinata as well, who was within Chloe. Ive treated them both as true friends from that point onward. While I may act as though theres nothing wrong with the two of them, its not actually the case. I have someints regarding both of them. For instance, their description of events is unspecific, to say the least.

    Yeah, theres about to be a huge earthquake

    So I was warned. But then, it only came in decades time.

    Theres gonna be an epidemic, please be prepared for it

    Even though that may be the case, we can only deal with the specifics of the gue after the outbreak begins.

    And so, so many other, countless examples; Chloes testimonies are simply too vague. At first, I thought it was unclear due to her memories being blurry. But then I realizedChloe was doing it on purpose. She has no intention to prevent any disaster from happening.

    Chloe is a kind person. Yet why would someone as kind as Chloe not try to prevent crises while knowing all about them?

    My suspicion solidified with every following unnatural result that urred. Assessing the aftermath of each disaster revealed that the number of casualties was reducedshe disclosed bits of information to me while deliberately hiding key details.

    So why would Chloe do such things?

    She ims to know the future and I believe her when she says this. Perhaps its because I didnt question any of her words that I now find myself disgruntled It should be a friends duty, my duty, to be considerate of what she thinks. And thats when I reached a conclusion.

    Chloe doesnt wish to change the future. To be more precise, its to ensure she walks the path she was familiar with and wanted to happen.

    Wouldnt it be better to at least share her real thoughts with me

    Thats what bothers me about her. Despite this, we shared a very close rtionship. Weve gotten to know each other heart to heart, having spent more than a thousand years together. And above all it was a real joy for me when she gave that goddamn Veldora a fierce thrashing. Sadly such wonderful days I lived with her suddenly came to an end.

    As a matter of fact, Ruminas, II may be disappearing soon.

    What do you mean?

    Well, it may be a little exaggerated to say Im disappearing. Its more like falling asleep. However, Hinata would still remain for a while, so you could say its a personality swap.

    Personality swap

    I was plunged into turmoil when Chloe broke the news to me out of the blue. This was another one of Chloes bad habits. She knows too much herself and always fails to exin things properly because of it.

    Afterwards, I got to know the details from her.

    I reached some level of understanding from her after I inquired into future events. It would seem by the time Chloe visits this world, due to the existence of multiple Chloes 14 , the consciousness of the current version would thus disappear. Thereupon Hinatas personality would take her ce.

    Thats about how it works. That would be fine, but a problem arose thereafter.

    So, in another three hundred years, wouldnt it be time for Hinatas consciousness to disappear?

    Hmm, it would probably be the case.

    I understand. When that timees, I shall personally seal you up with my power.

    Rather than being sentimental about Chloes disappearance, what followed had to be carefully considered. It would be fine as long as Hinata stuck around, but it seems she will disappear eventually as well. Should thate to pass, I question what would happen to the remaining Chloe.

    ording to her spection, she will undoubtedly lose control. Within Chloe, there seems to dwell a broken consciousness (Chronoa) that knows the future. If that consciousness awakes, it will likely take over as the third personality and rain destruction upon the world.

    That was truly a troublesome issue I got informed of.

    But I will do what I can for my friends sake.

    I suspected that some important elements had deliberately been tweaked or left out by Chloe and Hinata. I would still choose to trust them nheless.

    ***

    This is a disaster!

    This isnt just some slight adjustment, things wentpletely different from what I was told. No, if it was altogetherpletely different I would have just given up on trusting the narrative. But everything had been the same up until Hinatas arrival. But after that, after the appearance of the slime named Rimuru, things wentpletely off the rails.

    Rimuru-san is a magnificent individual as well as my benefactor. But a lot will happen and the situation would develop to the point where Hinata and Rimuru-san confront each other, so Ruminas, you must not intervene.

    Keeping my promise, I decided to observe for the time being. Yet the chaos had no end. The one who took the initiative was Hinata. Nheless I was reassured. From what I heard from Chloe, the battle at Ingracia Kingdom could be avoided.

    Buthow did this develop to the point that Rimuru is deliberating waging battle against Hinata?

    Due to the conspiracy in Farmus, the surrounding council states will reach the consensus to have Hinata lead an army and confront Tempest Federation. At that time, Hinata and Rimuru will be able to reach an agreement and achieve peace

    Or so I was told, but as soon as Rimuru and Hinata finished their battle, I was able to confirm that nothing Id heard held any credibility. In that moment, I had a bad feeling about the future.

    And that premonition became a reality.

    Rimuru became a demon lord

    Farmus Kingdom waged war on its own and was eliminated without survivors. It is rumored that they were devastated as a result of Veldoras resurrection, but that is also questionable.

    Moreover, the issue at hand was Rimuru who had be a demon lord. In the following Walpurgis Banquet we were to discuss what to do with the self-proimed demon lord, Rimuru. In light of this entire situation I felt it necessary to attend, deciding to participate in disguise as a maid.

    Even though it wasnt foretold to happen in the future, I didnt try to get on Rimurus bad side. I wouldve been fine with that oue, but it would be bad if I hurt Chloes heart in that way. If anything, I could even take him under my protectionI observed the development of the banquet with that in mind.

    Rimuru turned out to be an unexpectedly impressive individual. He didnt cower in front of all of the demon lords and was able to state his opinions righteously. On that basis, he deliberately provoked yman and led things in favor of his side, dominating the situation. It was an admirable disy, but I was also concerned for him, since I wasnt sure how things would develop.

    By the end, Rimuru was officially recognized as a demon lord and became a part of the Eight Star Demon Lords (Octagram).

    Then that other guy exposed my identity so casually, ruining my n of passing the name of Demon Lord to Roy. Now I had to be crowned the title again in such a graceless manner.

    This is giving me a headache, so I thoughtBut it really couldnt be helped.

    Every, single, problem was CAUSED BY THAT EVIL DRAGON!

    My suffering continued well after the unrest at the Walpurgis Banquet concluded. That same fateful night, Roy, whom I entrusted the title of Demon Lord, was murdered. And without leaving me time to marvel, Hinata set out to make peace with Rimuru. I agreed it would be bad to antagonize Rimuru, so I decided to keep an eye on how things would develop

    Too dangerous.

    Hinata stepped right into a trap and almost got killed. Had I not intervened, things would''ve seriously gone south. A group that had slipped to the back of my mind returned to the fore, it was the Seven Celestial Saints, whos conspiracy had just been unveiled. The head of the group, Gran, instigated their betrayal.

    Then

    It resulted in anotheryer of dissatisfaction in regard to Chloe. Hinata and Rimuru fought and, atst, reconciled aspanionsat least ording to Chloe, who neither exined why there was a second battle, nor did she ever mentioned Grans betrayal. Current events diverged significantly from the future Chloe foretoldor is that simply what she wishes me to think? Perhaps there was a reason for it

    It is beyond me to draw a conclusion from everything thats been going on. I wouldnt be able to see my friends Chloe and Hinata now anyway.

    Regardless.

    Rimuru''s misunderstanding involving Hinata was resolved and I was able to set things right with him. I had some qualms about getting personally involved at the battlefield, but things seemed to have worked out fine.

    By the way, I got to exact revenge on Veldora. The sight of Veldora crying brought me tremendous joy. Hes also different from beforenot causing havoc everywhere he goes. Im downright surprised seeing it, and even more so, learning that hes actually listening to other people. Now thats a shocker.

    Ive honestly begun to question my eyes seeing him follow Rimurus orders like a puppy. Could this be part of the future Chloe foresaw?

    For every time I grumbled about Veldora, she unfailingly wore a look that expressed a desire to reveal something. It would seem that Hinata within Chloe held a bitter grudge towards him. In spite of this, she didnt deem Veldora to be evil incarnate requiring extermination. And that austere Hinata with her strong sense of justice has probably forgiven Veldora by now.

    Even so, they did give him a solid beat-down when sealing him, presumably allowing her to vent that anger. Either way, the current version of Veldora wasnt that annoying after all, or so I thought.

    ***

    Since history unfolded differently from the predictions, it allowed me to be acquainted with Rimuru. Though considering it in a different light, it was a stroke of luck. Not only are we both members of the Eight Star Demon Lords (Octagram), we also got a chance to talk directly. I was determined to make the most of the opportunity.

    Rimuru dered he would be hosting a feast celebrating the reconciliation, and before that he brought us to the bath house. A bathhouseits where maids fill the tub with water and help me scrub my body, right? Metabolism is unnecessary for my body, so theres no need to bathe. Still, I enjoy it as a symbol of luxury.

    At least that was my impression, but what awaited me when we reached the bathhouse defied my expectations entirely. There was a spacious pool,rge enough for dozens of people. In fact, there is even hot water pouring into the pool from polished stone tubs. I also saw tubs fashioned from aromatic wood and heated rooms where you could warm up in the hot air.

    Wh-what is this

    This, hot spring? And there are sauna and everything. That man really does whateveres to his mind

    I was shocked by the unfamiliar facilities; Hinata, who came along, was surprised in a different sense. The variety of infrastructures all seemed familiar to her, exining them to me as we bathed.

    I see. So Rimuru has recreated the facilities familiar to him in this world, right?

    That is the case. Im quite surprised by the facilities on the streets, but they are nothingpared to this. I wonder how muchbor and funds were invested to build something this amazing.

    At the end of the day, Rimuru is a newly risen demon lord. If he chooses tomand all of his monsters, such feats are probably a piece of cake.

    That may be the casebut I still cant really ept it.

    Hinata seemed frustrated by it. Thats to be expected.

    For the longest time, Hinata has fought vigorously in an effort to improve the standard of living for our people. Although the seeds of her hard work have started to sprout, it will take many more years before any of its fruits will be borne. On the other hand, these achievements are so casually disyed in Rimurus country. So it cant be helped that Hinata was unable to enjoy it.

    However.

    This bathhouse was really nice. I have to admit that. After all, I got to savor Hinatas beautiful nude.

    It was a feast for my eyesher body without a single piece of clothing on it. Her tight waist and alluring, curved hips drew me in. Her luscious pair of fruits proudly presented themselves, giving me the scenery of my life. A beauty worthy of being a piece of art, mesmerizing whoever even catches a glimpse. Her pale white skin, smooth as newly fallen snow, with a pinch of cherry red. Its all thanks to Rimurus recreation of a hot spring bath, that I am now able to justifiably appreciate Hinata''s dazzling form. If I get to spend joyful hours like this, I should build a bathhouse in my country as wellI made up my mind in secret.

    Ah, this is heaven.

    Hmm, indeed.

    I mean, you dont have to be so alerted. Rimuru wont do annoying things like spying on us.

    So, theres no need to enable Magic Perception everywhere, Hinataughed at me.

    That was close, that was close

    I was solely focused on appreciating her naked body, but instead that got mistaken for something else. Hmm-ummm, yeah, I responded, reluctantly deactivating Magic Perception.

    ***

    After the bath, it was time for a feast.

    Before my eyesy dishes Id never seen before. Also, a new challenge awaited me among them. There were two cylindrical sticks ced near my handsthe utensils known as chopsticks. I heard they were used in the east and the Eastern Empire, but its my first time seeing a pair. In other words, Ive got no idea how to use them. Actually, I do know how theyre used, but Im not confident in my ability to wield them properly.

    Ruminas, who is perfect in whatever she does, is clueless when using chopsticksI cant let such rumors spread.

    Moreover, Veldora is here as well. If I were to mess up in front of him, god knows what type of shenanigans he would pull on me. If he dares to pull a smirking pu-hehe at me, Ill blow my lid and start a brawl. In order to prevent such an outburst, Ill have to ovee the challenge at hand.

    I was racking my brain for a solution while trying to maintainposure. And then

    Well, let us raise our cups for the courageous battles fought by everyone here, cheers!

    Rimurus word set the feast in motion.

    There were a variety of steamy, delicious-looking dishes, and a golden drink was poured into my crystal clear ss. Im something of a gourmet myself, so at a nce, I could tell each dish possessed top-notch quality. In this type of circumstance, proper etiquette is of utmost importance.

    My social awareness engaged and I reflexively lifted my ss.

    Down it went.

    Observe the others around me while taking a drink. That should give me time toe up with some great nI took a sip and thought it over.

    This is really tasty.

    Somehow that slipped out of my mouth, but its undoubtedly my honest opinion. The cooling sensation glided down my throat elegantly. It was a refreshing experience unknown to me, someone who possesses extensive knowledge about wines. The Holy Knights attending alongside me shared my surprise about this fine wine.

    Huu, its cold. Could this be beer?

    Its alright I guess. It took me some effort to recreate it and its on-par with what I drank in Japan. Its quite simr you know.

    Is that so? This may be the first time Im drinking this, but I dont find it particrly tasty. Thoughpared to the beer in this world, Id definitely drink this over that stuff.

    Hinata expressed her thoughts to Rimuru.

    This reminds me, Its what she said back when Hinata, an underage student at the time, arrived in this world. I taught her how to drink when she imed shed never tried any alcohol.

    How would a drunk Hinata lose her style? I was hoping to see that But then she dropped the line It doesnt even taste that nice and showed no signs of getting drunk. Rather than having a tough body, she probably just gained Poison Resistance.

    You say that because you are not used to it. I also thought that beer wasnt all that nice in the beginning. But then I started frequenting a small pub after work One ought to get a ss of beer after workI just gradually fell into that mindset.

    Hmm, is that so? Ive only drunken warm beer around here, and wine tastes sour so I really find them both pretty average.

    Thats because youve got a kid''s sense of taste. Okay, I concede that warm beer is nd, but good wines are out there. Like the ones served during the Walpurgis Banquet, it was surprisingly tasty

    Of course they were; whatever gets served there had to be approved by Guy. Hence it would be unthinkable for something not to be exquisite.

    Is that so? But how would I know if its true without tasting it myself?

    I suppose thats how it works. However, that luxurious stuff wonte so easily. Or rather, for Hinata-chan whos got a kids tongue, heres probably a drink better suited for you.

    Youve been going on and on about the whole kids tongue thing from just now, are you looking down on me?

    NO, MOST CERTAINLY NOT, LADY.

    Hinata red at Rimuru, whod prepared a fragrant fruit liqueur. Something resembling juiceor so I thought; on second nce I discovered that it actually had a remarkably high alcohol content.

    How dare you give me drinks for kidseh? This is pretty good.

    And with clever phrasing Rimuru was able to rmend another drink to Hinata. Hinata, whod been kept in a loop, got tricked by the sweet vor and started to get drunk soon enough. Hinata, unlike her usual strict self, showed signs of crapulence (intoxication) on her reddening face.

    ARE YOU A GENIUS?!! I was deeply shocked by Rimurus strategizing side. He cleverly got Hinata to dance in the palm of his hand.

    Perhaps it was because I had lowered my guard out of respect for Rimuru, that I reached out to the dishes in front of me with my bare hands. Ipletely forgot about the chopstick business and simply grabbed the food with my fingers. I was astonished, immediately turning my attention from Rimuru and Hinata to the dishes. The crispy taste, apanied by a thick andsting scrumptious taste that spread throughout my mouth after one bite.Is this what they call Tempura? It was truly tasty for a first try. And theyve prepared napkins, so I need not mind dirtying my fingers.

    I was satisfied with such a long overdue dinning of fine food and reached out for my ss. I want to try the fruit drink Hinata just tasted. Now I see why its so tasty. Its aroma is uncanny, a sweetness that spreads in your mouth as you take a sip. Its obvious to me they have not spared the use of honey and sugar in making it.

    Ruminas-sama, I also rmend this one,  said the kijin named Shuna, as she handed me a clear ss.

    Hmm, then I shall taste it.

    Very well,  she poured some mouthwatering, colorless fluid into it. A fragrance reminiscent of the gifts of the forest filled the air around me. What a unique scent I swallowed my saliva and carefully maintained my elegant behavior, then passed the ss to my mouth.

    This is delicious!

    Its neither sweet or bitter. A pure and elegant taste.

    Your kind words are greatly appreciated. There is an abundant supply of it, please help yourself to any amount you desire.

    Hmm, I shall do just that,  I responded with glee.

    I had not expected that a newly appointed demon lord could have provided such aprehensive reception. And somehow without prior contact, theyve managed to prepare such a feast

    In other words, theyve always been leading such afortable life.

    I thought about it as I devoured thest of the delicious food and drink.

    Are our meals to your taste?

    Hmm, very much so. The dishes and drinks are all spectacr.

    Rimuru came to make small talk with me.

    That would be great. However, you should probably know your limit, or it would be harmful for your health.

    Stop being silly. No poison can affect me so how would I ever lose to alcohol. Or rather, I have to weaken my poison resistance in order to get intoxicated.

    I was rather delighted having been able to speak my mind without the need for courtesy. That may be why I wasnt stingy about teaching Rimuru the secret of controlling his skills. 15

    ***

    Just like that, I was able to build an alliance with Rimuru as well as having a friendly rtionship.

    But thats just where the problem begins. The future Ive heard of has been drastically different from the situation as of now.

    Rimuru shouldnt have be a demon lord and Farmus Kingdom should have survived. The Holy Kingdom of Ruberios should not have an alliance with the Jura-Tempest Federation, only to the extent that Hinata was an acquaintance of Rimuru.

    And then, in many years, when the Eastern Empire begins its invasion, Rimuru would be murdered. As a result, the sealed Veldora would be resurrected, and I along with whoever remained, would risk our lives to challenge the unleashed, berserk VeldoraOr so it should have been.

    Right now, everything is different. So whatever happens next bes more difficult to predict.

    However, however.

    There is one thing I am sure of. Hinata is still around and she got to know Rimuru. It wouldnt take long before I get to meet Chloe again this way.

    My prediction was right.

    Chloe has already visited this world, and I was able to meet her again during the opening festival. Though Chloe doesnt remember meor I should say, pretended to not know me. Although I cant bear to wait, it can not be helped.

    I really want to hug Chloe tight as soon as possible, but right now I must endure. But Compared to that, a more pressing matter would be the impending judgement day. This is a future that has derailed from its original course.

    Seeing Veldora being tamed by Rimuru, I couldnt imagine him going berserk the way he is now. If thats the case, there will probably be disaster of a different kind befalling us. Then Ill have to be cautious with my every move.

    I made up my mind on that closing thought. I will keep my promise. And thentruly reunite with Chloe and Hinata. Ill call Rimuru as well on that asion. Thinking about it, Im also looking forward to the promised musical exchange with Rimuru.

    Ill defy my fate no matter what happens in the near future. Then, Ill put an end to the lonesome days. By that time, it will be my world to reign over. For instance, how about I invite Hinata and Chloe to get bathed together?

    I dream of such days arrival. Ill put mirrors all over the bathhouse to surround Hinata and Chloe from every conceivable angle  Muhuhuhuhu, I can barely contain myself.

    Since Ive made amitment, its time to rid myself of all the annoying burdens. Wipe out anyone and anything in my way.

    With such resolve, I look forward to my future paradise.

 Volume 13.5 - Ch 3

    The Lakeshore Dyed Scarlet Incident

    There once was a small nation named Silberia. 16

    A province state with less than ten thousand inhabitants under the rule of the Eastern Sovereign Alliance of Nasca Namrium Ulmeria Empire.

    It had no signature industry, nor special attractions. If there was anything worth mentioning, it would be its peaceful weather unique to the Namrium region and a beautifulke that lies there.

    No, there is in fact one other thing. That would be Silberias only daughterPrincess nche Nam Silberia. 17 Praised as the crown jewel of the kingdom. A princess loved by her people.

    This is  the tragic story surrounding Princess nche. 18

    ***

    nche was a shy yet short-tempered girl. She inherited her mothers beautiful silver white hair and her red eyes that symbolized Silberia''s royal lineage. She was a cute girl, skin white as snow, with a passion for books, and ate bloomer.

    On top of that, she possessed magicule none could rival. She perceived things people dont normally see, an intrinsic trait of the royal bloodline''s heirs.

    Even though nche was that kind of child, she lived afortable life, embraced by the loving care of her mother Letitia. 19 Very few people were aware of this special ability passed down in the royal family, but thankfully everyone within the family knew how to deal with these special kids.

    Heed me now, nche. You must never tell other people about the things only you can see.

    But why?

    For doing so will only make people fear you. Besides, if those things you see discover they are being watched, monsters will appear and eat you!

    NOOOO!!

    Its alright. Mommy will protect you. So promise me now, never tell anyone about your secret.

    I understand, mother. Ill never tell anyone about it.

    Good girl. How cute you are, my nc.

    nche swore from the bottom of her heart while staring into Letitias golden pupils. She kept that promise to her mother ever since. And thanks to that, no one was ever scared of her, and she was able to grow up in good care.

    Although she was rather shy, her uncanny beauty from a young age made her quite popr among the servants. Such was nches happy childhood, being loved by everyone.

    However

    nches happy days were not for long. nche had just reached ten years of age; the bnce of power within the pces harem was toppled. nches mother, who was the most adored first princess, was in fact from a viscounts family of lowly origin. The snobbish nobles had conspired to urge the king to marry a second princess.

    The one who got selected was a woman named Emilia, 20 born from a marquis family. While still serving as a concubine, Emilia had already given birth to a daughter to the king. For that very reason she was selected as the new princess. Had it been a son, she would have been on the throne long ago.

    Emilia, as a high-ranking noble, was keenly aware of the intrigue and conflicts within the harem. She seized control of the pce where nche and Letitia resided in little time. nches nannies as well the maids who cared much for her were all dismissed for fabricated reasons. None had the audacity to defy the second princess, and the servants relegated to the harem no longer obeyed the king, but her. And as a result, nche and her mother were treated poorly.

    In stark contrast, nches sister Aswho was less than a year olderreceived affectionate care as the second young princess. Everything was ording to Emilias n.

    The king had no siblings, granting nche the first right of session. If the second princess Emilia was to conceive a prince, he wouldve been guaranteed the throne. Even if that failed, there was still As. And if nche ceased to exist, the royal im would fall into Ass hands, leaving her to be crowned as the next queen of Silberia.

    For that, I just have to deal with the meddling mother and daughter in my way

    The ambitious Emilia resorted to far crueler, ndestine tactics in order to advance her blood to the throne.

    A fateful winter day.

    On nches twelfth birthday, her mother the first princess passed away. A nket of snow cloaked the courtyard. nche hid and sobbed alone in a corner no one could see. To nche, her father, the king, was a distant figure. And now she had no left to be called a family. nche could only cry, feeling utter despair and sorrow.

    Suddenly, someone called out to the weeping nche.

    Why are you crying?

    nche raised her head to see the source of the voice. It was a breathtaking sight; someone with beauty beyond humans. No, it was a non-human existence that only nche could see. However, at the time it mattered not to nche, whether the individual was human or not.

    How beautiful

    nche opened her heart to the beauty that could drive out anyones sadness.

    She even forgot about her promise to her mother.

    Such was the incredible impact of this beauty.

    Ho, thank you.

    Perhaps she had sensed nches sincerity. A smile emerged on her emotionless face, an extraordinarily destructive smile. A beauty that drove away even the falling snow. Her long hair floated in the wind, a more brilliant white than the snowkes. Sharing nches red pupils, a deep scarlet, more vivid than blood. With skin that was an immacte white, nigh transparent. Her dark dress, as if to obscure this brilliance, concealed her body. An existence beyond human realms. Whoeverid their eyes, be they as special as hers or not, upon this beauty would find that she transcended humans very grasp. Such a beautiful female smiled towards nche.

    My mother passed away.

    Is that so

    Ive be an abandoned child. My Father too has abandoned me, he cares only for my sister Ash. My life no longer holds meaning.

    Its nothing like that.

    But

    At least, I need you.

    That sentence was gospel for nche. Whatever this non-humans intentions may have been, it no longer mattered.

    Because you can see me. Your white hair, red eyes, are the same as mine. They are gorgeous, and will only grow prettier as you thrive.

    Really?

    Indeed.

    Big sister, do you really need me?

    I do.

    Her angelic words meant salvation to nche. And she continued without pause.

    I really like you. And so I shall grant you any wish you desire. But I would also like you to hear my request.

    Its alright. If its a request from my big sister, I will work hard to make it a reality.

    Never conform to the words of non-humans. It was a bit of advice her mother often repeated. But nche nodded without hesitation; she had been taken in by this beautiful, kind woman; this non-human that spoke the words she needed the most.

    Besides, nches instinct told her to trust the woman.

    Thats right, my good child. Then, let me tell you my request. I would wish to borrow your body. I am only spiritually present, so I wish to possess your body.

    The non-human existence exhibited no intention of hiding her motives, having elegantly expressed her true desire. This non-human, invisible to human eyes, belonged to the most terrifying existences among all monstersthe demon race. Moreover, demons of the rank Greater DemonNo, not only those, this was an existence which even the ancient demons, so called Dominator ss were bound to serve. The king among demons, one of the so called Primordials. The Seven Primordials have names based upon the characteristics of their appearancenamely colors. Unbelievably, her color is simr to nches name.

    Primordial nc. 21

    Of course, this was no coincidence. Thisnd, Silberia, had been her domain since time immemorial. And ording to the ancient pact formed with the ruler of thisnd, she adjusted for dozens of centuries before a vessel of flesh used to amodate her mind would be born. Until the birth of her ideal vessel, she would protect thend. This was the content of the pact. And the special physique of the royal family was testament to it. The red eyes of the Silberia royal family were her blessing. She upheld the covenant and protected thend.

    This was the real reasonwhy Silberia, despite being a province state, was able to retain sovereignty while within the grasp of the Eastern Empire.

    And the body nc was satisfied withwas precisely the young nche. Primordial nc always kept her promises. The ancient pact formed with the first queen of this kingdom was kept to that day.

    When a young girl with silver white hair and red pupils is born, Primordial nc shall take over its body upon fulfilling this girls wish.

    It was a pact upheld for many generations, allowing its effects topound, presumably to grant Primordial nc the perfect vessel.

    And the day of the promise had arrived.

    Twelve years of age, in ancient times this was deemed the day one matured to adulthood, and Primordial nc decided to talk to nche. She had deemed nche an adult capable of making her own decisions, capable of negotiating with others on equal ground. This was also invoked from the ancient pact.

    Typical of most demons personality, they would cunningly induce others to sign one-sided pacts. Yet for someone of Primordial ncs stature, there was no need for such trickery. She thought those would only dishonor the pact. Solely through loyally fulfilling a reasonable pact, would the body be Primordial ncs righteous asset.

    Therefore, she would fulfill any wish made by nche, to the best of her abilities. That was why, even if nche refused her, she wouldnt have given up.

    Human beings are creatures driven by insatiable desire, and there will alwayse a day they carry a wish. She needed only to be patient and await that days arrival. That was why nches answer came as a surprise for sure, but a wee one.

    Would youlike to be my friend?

    Ayy?

    Ill give my body to you, big sister. Then please be my friend! W-will you not?

    Primordial nc was taken aback. This was a first for her, even throughout the many eons she had lived. Reflected in nches eyes was still that beautiful face, yet her heart had been greatly troubled by what just transpired.

    Did she just say she wants to be friends with me? Okay now what am I supposed to do Even for someones bad joke on their deathbed, this wasnt funny. Plus, this is supposed to be some damning ravings, yet I dont really feel pissed about it And it seems quite interesting, in fact, that girl as well. This girl in front of me may allow me to have some fun. I could spare some time with her since human lives are cheap anyway.

    Despite its subtlety, Primordial nc shed a rare look of confusion. But she quickly reached a conclusion in her heart.

    Very well. From now on, you and I shall be friends.

    nche blushed upon hearing this, her crying face lit up with a big smile.

    Ehehe, Im so happy! Please take care of me in the future, big sister!

    Hmm, I will nowtch onto you. Lets have a good time together.

    Then, Primordial nc possessed nches body. On that day, the fate of the kingdom of Silberia rested on the young nches shoulders, yet no one was ever to find out about it.

    ***

    nche grew up to fifteen years of age.

    Although nche still got the cold shoulder within the harem, that being a dark and cold ce for her, as soon as she left it behind, the whole pces view of nche began improving by the day.

    Princess nche is such a genius. Her elegant actions and attitude are perfect no matter how you see it.

    Shes well versed in History, art and mathematics. Even geography and sociology. The amount of knowledge she possesses ismendable.

    More importantly, her theory of magic is fantastic! Her analysis of spells does not have a single unnecessary line and shes able to improve her magical efficiency through simplification of spells. This level of talent is beyond genius, what an outstanding princess!

    The royal tutors appointed by the kingplemented her unsparingly. And the one most frustrated by this was her sister, Princess As. As they walked past each other in the hallway, As began to pick on nche.

    My, my, isnt this my sister dear. Greetings to you. Have you been studying hard today as well? Although thats important, youll be disliked if you dont go kiss Duke Grunces 22 son Lord Guiniass ass properly, you know?

    The family of Duke Grunce, the famous royal family known since ancient times as the maintainer of Namrium. A noble family, powerful even within the Eastern Empire. Grunces domain alone held a poption of three hundred thousand. The heir to such nobility from the Empire had been staying around Silberia since a year ago.

    Guinias Nam Grunce. 23 Age twenty-two, a young man talented in many fields. Guinias had an elder brother whod been appointed as the next duke. Because of that, it was rumored that Guinias hadid his sights on the throne of Silberia. It was an open secret among the Silberian public, most of who supported such an attempt. There were many reasons for it, the most pertinent one being to maintain friendly rtions with the Empire. If the big shot royalty became the king of Silberia, they expected less pressure to be exerted on this province state.

    There was also another reason. Guinias had imported a variety of wares into Silberia by leveraging his connections through Grunce, sessfully winning the favor of the kingdoms royalty with those extremely attractive goods. Those imports were also highly profitable within the kingdom and improved the citizens well-being. And for that reason, support for Guinias within the kingdom rose sky-high without any sign of slowing down.

    That was how Guinias secured his remarkable poprity in Silberia. He was still young and handsome, and already brought great wealth to the nation, so bing son-inw of the queen wasnt far offthat was the opinion of many within the nation.

    And the one Guinias hadid his eyes on was Princess nche, who had been guarding a secret. King Silberia was mindful of the marriages significance, If I was to help nche be the next queen, I would agree to the marriage. Guinias swiftly promised hismitment.

    That meant making nche the next queen. As couldnt stand the idea of nche getting crowded, she couldnt tolerate the thought of their roles getting reversed. Besides, her mother Emilia had also been outraged by this. She exploited many tactics and invested a great deal of time and effort throughout the years to help her own daughter be the next queen, yet it had all been ruined by the appearance of Guinias. Even the nobles among Emilias circle had begun to tter Guinias. If that were to continue, they would be handing the queens throne to nche.

    But there was still a way, as long as she could change Guiniass heart. Emilia instilled this into As, hoping she would win Lord Guiniass heart instead. But even if she hadnt told her so, As shared the same intent. She had gone to great lengths to jeopardize her sisters rtionship with Guinias in order to snatch her fianc.

    This act was also part of her scheme, but nche didnt really mind.

    Oh, Ash. Good health to you. Im d you are concerned for me. But, its really nothing. I shall be apanying Guinias-sama to walk the cityter.

    Is that so. You make me jealous. Very well, I hope you have a pleasant time.

    Hmm. Its work after all, one should not indulge their desire for pleasure.

    Like that, she was able to dismantle Ass effort to provoke her. nche was hardly a young child anymore. Shed been hard at work behind everyones back to gain knowledge and power. Nowadays, even those servants couldnt openly harass her, instead they had to find other subtler ways to do so. Likewise for As, who could merely attempt to provoke her through sarcasm. And for that reason her hatred for nche festered day by day. Yet nche seemed unfazed even knowing so.

    If anything, nche seemed to no longer be alone.

    Yes, thats the way to go. Treat everyone around you as an enemy. However, theres no need to defeat them all. You need only to differentiate those who can and cannot be manipted. Hold on to their secrets to force them into serving you. Your sister is but a pawn used by that mother named Emilia. Neither is she useful nor a threat to your presence.

    I understand, big sis.

    She now had a reliable friend named nc. That was why nche be strong. Her knowledge and magic were all taught by nc. nche epted and humbly learnt her teachings and had grown dramatically in the past three years.

    Huh! Then be cautious when you do have some fun.

    I will, you do that too, Ash.

    The two princesses appeared to coexist in harmony, yet the mutual hostility within their hearts burned like wildfire; thankfully any confrontations dissolved before escting.

    Just like that, nche developed day by day, gaining more and more supporters. Shed also been doing quite well with Guinias, at some point they came to represent the ideal couple. The number of people backing Guinias steadily increased with it. The royals who were still observing the situation also started to step forward in recognizing nche as the next queen in line.

    During this period, Emilias intervention attempts became more radical. She scantly cared about decency anymore and resorted to bloodthirsty violence, ordering the assassination of nche.

    However, every attempt amounted to failure. That was to be expected; nc within nche wouldnt deign to let mere hitmen harm nche.

    It was smooth sailing. All signs pointed towards her bing the new queen in due time. The citizenry deemed the increasingly beautiful nche as worthy of being their queen. nche also gathered the confidence to show a delightful smile to people other than nc. That was her sign for having bonded with others, something that nc expected from her.

    But, there were still parts which she was dissatisfied with. That would be nches rtionship with Guinias.

    this is a real headache. Romance is an emotion that begets naught but uncertainty, nothing good whatsoeveres of it. If nches emotions are to be significantly affected, then Ill have to confront whatever should follow. God damn hum

    But, if nche could be happy, nc didnt really mind. Even if her partner was a stupid human, she would send them her blessing truthfully. Nothing less could be expected of nches friend.

    However

    nc had a very bad feeling about Guinias.

    Setting aside incarnation and rebirth into this world, nc was currently in an iplete state. Likewise, her subordinates were only of spiritual existence and had limited impact on the physical world. Even if that was the case, nc would try her best to strategize ordingly.

    nc wouldtere to find her apprehension manifesting in reality.

    ***

    Thats the end of the report.

    After receiving the reports from her subordinate, nc felt a disquieting sense of dread about the situation. She had dispatched scores of demons to collect information in Silberias capital, surrounding towns, as well as within Grunces territory. These, however, revealed some significant issues.

    Even though Ive always been on high alert with that man, I couldnt have expected hisprehensive defense against demons. In other words, he hase to this kingdom fully aware of our existence.

    The information collection returned no results ever since nche began hanging out with Guinias. Moreover, no useful information at all was collected since, thats why nc had begun to suspect him. Precisely because not a scrap of useful intelligence was collected, it made things far too suspicious.

    And so she increased the scope of the search while dispatching her top lieutenants. As a result, she began to uncover Guiniass real intentions.

    Guinias knows the connection between Silberia and nc. And from that, it is conceivable that he decided to intervene after finding out.

    Silver white hair and red pupils. One who possesses both would be the key to theing of the ancient demon.

    It was no trivial thing to investigate. But if the big-shot royalty in the Empire had a hand in this, their way of extracting the truth made such conclusions usible. In that case, his rtionship with nche was nothing but a farce as well

    If thats the case Unforgivable, absolutely

    ncs face contorted as she gazed at the sky covered in dark clouds. Rather than worrying about the road to her seconding, a project she had nned for eons, being cut offright now she was simply worried about a friends happiness being lost.

    A mncholic sigh came out of ncs beautiful, thin lips.

    ***

    Guinias enjoyed quite the poprity in the capital of Silberia. There are several reasons to exin why, but the most prevalent one was mary and pragmatic. To establish a new industry, he had considered exploring the mines containing magicule ores. In fact, the kingdom of Silberia possessed a high concentration of magicule, leading to the ores collected from the mine being of high quality. And Duke Grunces territory bought them at a high price.

    Before his arrival, Silberia was a nation sustained through primary industry such as agriculture, farming and fishing. Citizens were mostly care-free people that led a self-sustained, simple lifestyle.

    But now, the seeds of profiteering industries were nted. Alongside those, a number of entertainment industries began to take root. One of the most popr attractions was gambling at horse races. Given the insidious nature of gambling, those who turned rich overnight became obsessed with it.

    The kind and modest citizens were gradually corrupted, bit by bit. Financial troubles came to grasp the less fortunate, where Guinias astutely lent them his money with a smile. This generosity propelled his support to unseen heights. Other than having a populist foundation, Guinias had executed his preparations in every field. He steadily expanded his influence by weing the influx of royalty that attempted to befriend him. He threw out his money by the bucketload in the name Grunce, thergest noble family in the Empire, and then subsequently recycled the money back into his own pocket. His actions all reflected his immense talents.

    Everything went ording to the master n.

    This is fairly boring to be honest, Guinias sneered coldly. Theres no fun now that everything is running perfectly ording to my n.

    Hahaha, Guinias-sama. Please dont say so. This type of remote backwater will go nuts over some pitiful fun. It really cant be helped.

    The oneplimenting Guinias was one of his aides from the home country. To the public he was nothing more than a minister-type butler who helped Guinias with random chores, given his status.

    Huh! Nevertheless, I still couldnt get my way with the key figure, nche. Cant that woman just ept me already? She always responds to me with some nonsense about keeping her chastity before marriage.

    Well, forget not that she is the princess of a nation. So its understandable.

    Everything has been ording to n, except for this woman. She irritates me to no end, Guiniasined. This was his nature, beneath his faade as a noble heir.

    Okay, okay Guinias-sama. You neednt keep that unpleasant look. You wont have to endure for long.

    The one responding to him, a measly and cruel looking man, was another trusted subordinate of Guinias, who was in charge of his finances. He had been promised the role of the royal merchant in thend of Duke Grunce upon Guiniass bing a duke. To this end, he only needed to serve Guinias by investing and spreading money to Guiniass desires.

    Ho? Have the preparations been finished?

    Yes. Weve negotiated with the military and got permission to secretly mobilize the Armored Corps. I spent a lot of money buying the gifts for Calgurio 24 , but we should be able to assemble sufficient manpower within the estimated time.

    Hahaha, thats impressive. Atst our n has reached its final stage. My days as a duke are imminent, I await the time with pleasure.

    Guinias fantasized about the near future, wearing a despicable grin on his face.

    Their n was straightforward. Guinias was to pretend to marry into the royal family by being engaged with nche, who had the im to the throne. But in reality, Guinias was not satisfied with merely being the king of Silberiahis dream was to be the duke of Grunce.

    His brother had be an eyesore as ofte, but that had already been dealt with. If he was to rebel, Guinias already considered disposing of him. But his brother was aware of his younger brothers nature; knowing their difference in ability, he had already assumed a position within Guiniass military.

    Guiniass future as a duke was set in stone. So one might ask why he would visit the kingdom of Silberia in the first ce

    So, Guinias-sama, would nche be willing to leave with us as nned?

    Huh. We havent slept, but that woman has already fallen for me. I dont think she will refuse, but just in case, Ive tipped the military.

    I see. If possible, we should avoid using violence. For some reason, I sense the forting of an unnatural power if we are to invade thisnd with force.

    Our party agrees to that as well, lets try to avoid war. Guinias-dono, it would trouble me greatly should thisnd fall to warfare. Facing such a development, I would need to reevaluate my rtionship with you. To me, it would truly be a shame to not be able to maintain our partnership, but I wish to be on good terms with my granddaughter, who is soon to be crowned. If Duke Grunces household is to forge an alliance with us, us members of the kingdom of Silberia could live long and prosper as well.

    The one pandering was Emilias father, Marquis Barnes 25 . He had collected intelligence himself, anticipating his violent daughter lunging towards more violent actions. And through his instinct as a nobleman, he discerned that Guiniass end-goal was never the throne of this kingdom. Barnes then took a gamble in order to make his granddaughter the queen, and approached Guinias, inquiring his true intent.

    In the end, Barnes was epted by Guinias and thus expressed his true thoughts. Guinias wanted to bring nche to his home country, and Barnes saw nche as a burden, best to be evicted from Silberia. Bound by a mutual goal, they decided to form an alliance. And it was for that reason that Barnes wholeheartedly wished to avoid any conflict with the Empire.

    Then, Marquis Barnes, would you be able to keep this countrys royalty under control?

    Of course. Even if the king or Princess nche herself object, most of the nobles are on Guinias-samas side, Barnes carefully responded to the young and not-yet-Duke Guinias. This was, indeed, a reflection of the overwhelming difference in power between big and small nations. Barnes had to force a smile for the sake of his granddaughter, as well as his own authority, even if it repulsed him. In spite Guinias already having seen through Barness act, he kept on smiling as if unaware.

    Very well, then when shall we execute the n?

    To Guinias, who wished to return home as soon as possible, the sooner, the better. However, he had endured for so long and cautiously nned his every step, so it would have been unwise to rush and mess up in the end. To ensure the sess of the n, the date of execution was extremely crucial.

    Lets see

    It would only take a few days to surround the areapletely with the formation of the army.

    The next festival of sacrifice at the pce, which happens to be princess nches sixteenth birthday. In our country, one officially enters adulthood upon that age, it would be an appropriate time to make a proposal. Besides, most of the royalty would gather on that day, wouldnt that precisely be the best timing?

    Huhuhu, as expected of Marquis Barnes. When did you find out that I nned on that day from the start?

    Hahaha, its just a coincidence.

    Very well, well settle for a coincidence. Then our n shall be set in motion on the next day of sacrifice. Any disagreement?

    No!

    Understood.

    As you wish.

    With the approval of the other three men, the day of battle had been settled. Then once Barnes was the first to leave, only men of the Empire remained in the room.

    Speaking of whom, what an idiotic man. But hes clever you know, even as a noble hes good at his stuff.

    As youve said, he just let go of Princess nche, their national treasure. Completely unaware that whoever were next to inherit the throne would be meaningless.

    The bloody red pupil is a sign of the curse. That silver white hair surely makes people think of that horrifying and damning Primordial. Im impressed that despite every characteristic matching, the idiot nobles of this country are oblivious.

    The Empire has been pushing behind the scenes to make them realize as well. To prevent that demon froming to this world, Guinias said with a calm and focused expression.

    The demon within thisnd truly was an eyesore to the Empire. The demons invading humannds could generally be assigned to three categories: Demons who can be negotiated with, demons who wont listen to reason, and demons who do whatever they wish. 26 The demons from Silberia were known for their willingness to negotiate with others.

    Yet the White Queen was really something else. There was no way one could sit and negotiate with her on equal terms. However, the one who broke thatmon sense was the first ancient monarch of Silberia.

    It traces back to around 3000 years ago, and its no simple matter to pass on the correct historical narrative. But this irresponsibility on their part for not caring about their own national emergency is astounding.

    Early rulers of Silberia formed a covenant with the master of many demons, Primordial nc. Its content being to facilitate theing of nc to this realm, and in return, she would be the guardian of the kingdom of Silberia. Testament to the pact were the Crimson Eyes that could see through anything, a power only possessed by the kings lineage. With the purpose of inheriting a cursed bloodline and amassing magicule throughout generations. And then, when the heir with the ideal flesh for the Primordial appears, it shall possess it ande forth to this world once more.

    The Empire exhausted its means of espionage to explore the content of this secret pact. They had long been preparing in order to be ahead of the demons.

    So, Guinias-sama. What would you do with princess nche? Are you really going to marry her?

    Dont be stupid. Even if I decide to y around with her for a couple of years, I would get in serious trouble if she got pregnant. Before that happens, she will just have to die.

    Thats reassuring to hear. If it were me, I wouldnt want to have that type of woman with demonic character as my master.

    Hahaha, its a shame really. But we have to destroy the bloodline in its entirety.

    Of course I understand that. As soon as we end the kings lineage, even the Primordial will be powerless. And unlike that Crimson Demon Lord, the White Queen is a picky one. We were much assisted thanks to that

    Regardless, we should be able to cut off the royal bloodlinepletely.

    Then, about Princess As?

    I wouldnt ask that, its for your own good.

    Hahaha, sorry for the intrusion. But I haven''t asked anything yet.

    You shouldnt have spoken of it in the first ce.

    Then, they continued their plotting.

    Without noticing that a small bug had secretly concealed itself on the corner of the window

    ***

    The sixteenth Birthday of nche. That day would mark the beginning of the Lakeshore Dyed Scarlet Incident

    nche was filled with regret.

    She had already heard of ncs advice, yet she smiled and said it was fine, failing to assess her circumstance.

    You will go with me, right, nche?

    But, Guinias-sama, I must follow my fathers will. Just a little bit more would do, it is my duty to improve this country. Havent you also sworn to support me behind my back?

    I hope you reconsider, nche. I too approve of your devotion to this kingdom. When you arrive at my country, we will continue to assist you in contributing to the kingdom of Silberia in terms of economic and cultural exchange. There will be countless things we can do. Ill also respect your decisions. Now what do you think?

    But

    For the past day, nches head had been filled with the idea that Guinias would support her bing queen one day. Guinias had always gone to tell those nobles supporting her that the throne was exclusively for nche.

    In the ancient past, nc extended a helping hand to the people suffering from poverty in the form of a pact. In order to fulfill the vow with nc, this country needed to bear a real queen. Atst, this country had gained what it neededshe believed this would also have been what everyone hoped for.

    nche was puzzled.

    Guiniass proposal was to bring her to the Empire, and that was something uneptable to her. Yet Guinias hadnt mentioned it until then. The tumultuous situation couldve even plunged nc into chaos. Moreover, all nobles present at the gathering approved of Guiniass proposal. This was a particrly deep betrayal towards nche.

    How can this be I thought I was the one everyone needed?

    The sharp disruption dropped ayer of despair upon nches heart.

    No! I will not allow you to take nche abroad!!

    Suddenly, nches fatherthe kingshouted. The king, who worked his heart and soul for the country all his life, who was always calm and quiet, now stared at Guinias with burning rage in his eyes.

    You bastard, have you been plotting to take nche abroad from the start? Your actions have tarnished the Empire.

    My, whatever are you talking about? This matter is nothing but beneficial for both kingdoms.

    Absurdity! Th-this country, since ancient times has been

    I cant believe that your majesty would still believe those stale superstitions, for if thats true, youll be aughing stock before your guests, Guinias retorted with a scornful tone, as if trying to taunt and mock the king. The nobles joined in withughter; they ostensibly held loyalty to the king, but had longmitted treachery. Guinias had prepared everything for it as well, just for this day. The celebration of nches sixteenth birthday was no more.

    Y-you whoresonsabotaged my countrys politics

    Your majesty, you are too nice of a person. Were you so naive as to believe that those around you would never betray you, and that the people of this country were loyal is if bonded by blood? Im sorry to inform you that these were all mere fantasies. We humans will resort to anything for the sake of our own interests. If we get to keep our life, money and a bright future safe and sound in our pocket, we wouldnt even flinch to betray our nation.

    Dont try to fool us! Ive distinguished you as a traitor. But the people of my country are earnest in wishing for nche to be their queen.

    Aiya, Im rather skeptical about that. Your majesty, I suggest you understand your circumstance better. I would be uneasy about the future if my father inw kept acting this way.

    WHAT!?

    Ill give you three days time. Before the deadline, please hand over Princess nche.

    Wait! Did you honestly think I would

    Your majesty, you should yield to Guinias-donos proposal. Should we let Princess nche marry Guinias-dono, our connections with the Empire would certainly be closer. If you truly want someone to be the queen, my granddaughter is still around.

    Thats right, father. If you choose me, Ill definitely be a better queen than my sister.

    Marquis Barnes interrupted, followed by Princess As, their voices drowning out the king. These were supposed to be vile acts punishable to the highest degree without forgiveness. Yet, none of the nobles intervened, not even the minority who still held a sense of conscience, as they were forced into silence under the intense stares of the nobles supporting the Barnes family.

    The king came to terms with his plight, his face distorting with regret. Facing the king at such dismay, Guinias calmly stated with a victorious tone:

    About what we just discussed, about what the people truly wantyou should know the answer with tomorrows morning paper. You might as well read it before you answer anything. Please do contemte what the right decision for this nation truly is. I shall await your response.

    Guinias had done his part. He then left the scorned king with those words. He departed from the celebration hall, and many nobles did as well, as if following him. The ones who remained in the venue were the king, nche and a handful of nobles.

    How can this Are those people ignorant of our situation?

    If-if this is to continue, our kingdom will fall into ruin

    The King and the royals sighed, to an onlooker they resembled lost souls

    The morning of the next day.

    Hidden away in the most secure chamber within the kings castle, those who remained at the celebration hall gathered. Before themy the country''s morning newspaper, its content distressing everyone present. The cover page was filled with celebratory headlines.

    The great nobleman Guinias hase to marry Princess nche. It is equivalent to an engagement, surely she will be his wife and forge a proper marriage

    The newspaper dered it as such.

    Its all over. My holy goddess, what an unforgivable betrayal the king copsed on his chair with a whimper.

    Father!

    Im sorry nche. If only I had told youforgive me.

    No-no, theres no such thing! Father has done nothing wrong. It is I whos been too immature.

    What are you talking about. You may be sixteen now, but you are still a child. You are still so young, yet such hardship

    Thats absurd! It is I who fell for Guinias-sama

    Enoughthats enough. We should consider the near future instead.

    Everyone present began to express their views on that line of thought. The prime minister spoke first:

    The people are also convinced about the content of the paper. Theres no doubt to them that princess-sama is getting married. They all feel that the country has developed to be affluent, and their blind confidence has numbed their ability to doubt.

    The court magemander said:

    Your majesty, fromst nights investigation, our country has been surrounded by the Imperial military. Theyve already drawn our people to their side, they could fabricate reasons to start a war at this point. Rightful justification in the public eyewould probably lie with the Empire.

    The Army Chief followed up:

    Allow me to be blunt here, we wont stand a chance with the current strength of our army. Moreover, there may be soldiers in favor of the Empire within our ranks, who could announce that weve been surrounded, even before battle breaks out.

    The situation was desperate.

    But they couldnt meekly obey the Empire like a dog.

    We will not bow to the Empire. Should we do such a thing, we would be betraying our ancient pact. There will be travesties far, far more tragic and horrifying than destruction at the hands of the Empire.

    Indeed, my king! Our god is a terrifying existence. If we were to disavow our promise, we would warrant punishment worse than death.

    I cant believe that the number of nobles who have forgotten about this has increased to such magnitude. How pathetic.

    We shall fight, even if to no avail. Perhaps God will show mercy in light of our sincerity.

    The kingdom of Silberiaa kingdom bonded by an ancient pact. If they were to disavow the deal with Godwith the demonwhat awaited them ahead would be torment far more terrifying than the demise of their flesh. It was because they knew this all too well, that they could not sumb to the Empires demands.

    Even if the country was destroyed

    How about w-we summon our godour god. Then, we shall unite and face our demise, the court magemander said solemnly.

    Everyone nodded.

    There may still be time before the final verdict

    nche couldnt hear what her father and the rest were saying, only despair and sadness burst into her heart.

    This is all my fault its all because I didnt listen to ncs advice

    No, nche. It is because my strength has yet to be fully developed. So you shouldnt feel bad about it.

    No, thats not true! Maybe its becausebecause I wished to be your friend.

    Calm down nche

    Im sorry nc. Im not needed by anyone after all. Whether it be Guinias-sama or the people of this country.

    I-I need you

    Thank you. Truly, thank you for everything youve done, nc

    nche, what are you

    This may have been the first time nc had panicked since her birth.

    It is because of my promise to you, that ncs power has been limited, right? I truly thank you for keeping your end of the bargain with this country.

    Stop it, nche! This is just a pact. I dont care anymore. To me, whats important is

    Thank you, and I apologize. Im not as strong as you. But Im still happy about one point. You are willing to use my body, for that I am satisfied. So nc, live your life freely from now on

    Then, nches soul executed the pact. Based on which, nche would transfer her body to nc. nches shining, colorful soul, fell into ncs hand.

    Ahah nche, so gentle and kindmy nche. I love you, I love you the most. My first ever friend. I couldnt protect that gentle and kind you, oh how powerless I am

    Primordial WhiteQueen of Demons, symbol of powernow trembled andmented her powerlessness. Perhaps this was a sight that no one who knew her would ever believe. There was no audience, yet this was the reality.

    nc obtained nches flesh without the kings witness.

    ***

    The court magemander responded first among the group discussing the ns for the future.

    God, Ive heard the voice of god!? he shouted and extended both of his hands to nche, sitting quietly alone. Then he poured all of his magic into a magical circle on the ground, initiating the ritual to summon the demon.

    W-what are you doin

    What followed was faster than the sentence the king couldnt finish.

    Greetings Gentlemen.

    nche stood up.

    No. This was no longer nche.

    This was nc in the body of nche.

    Everyone present knew exactly what had urred and fell to their knees on the spot. Among them, only the king remained standing and asked.

    G-God! Whynow? Your pact with nche should still

    Unfortunately this pact has just been invoked.

    No, this cant be possible! My daughter, nche confided in me that you would protect her!!

    You arerather noisy, please quiet down.

    ncs words shut the king up. But he couldnt hide his anger thinking that nc broke the pact. However

    The kings anger dispersed in the face of an immense, bottomless fury. The source of which, needless to saybelonged to nc.

    It is because you stupid humans took away my pleasure. Dont you all agree this is a grave crime to be punished for?

    The king froze out of fear. For only he sensed ncs fury.

    I-If God wishes so

    Even though that answer was just one line, it exhausted himpletely. Then, the debilitated king crumbled back into his chair.

    Good boy. Since youve kept true to your pact with me, I shall grant you all a painless death, however

    What of those who broke the covenant?

    No one dared to ask about their consequences. Then

    Everyone present was blessed. They now walked the path under their godsmand, their hearts in bliss, to be relieved from ever learning the tragedy that was about to take ce.

    Very well, let us feast.

    As ncmanded, the demons quickly possessed all of the bodies at the scene. The tragedy now unveils

    nc, clouded by fury, cast out the forbidden magic. A spell to grant peaceful death to those who kept true to the pact and bestow endless torment to the traitors. It caused one to bleed to death from the inside out, the demise of this nation being seared into their eyes.

    The effect of that curse covered her entire domain, no living being could escape the curse. But this was hardly enough to abate ncs wrath.

    Bring those cretins before me.

    In that moment, not a single suggestion from her subordinates couldve gotten through to her, even her ancient trusted aidesDemon Dukeswouldve been sent to the guillotine, should they have caught her ire.

    Understood!

    Following the word, the demons scattered, returning after a few short minutes.

    Who do you think I am! Show yourself now!

    The first, arrogant, non-sense spitting fool had been brought before her.

    Oh, Marquis Barnes, so you are the first.

    A-are you nche?! Why are you sitting on that chair!? That belongs to his majesty alone, that is the majestic throne!

    You are really noisy, you know? Thats some annoying barkinging from a petit nobody.

    W-what did you say? How dare you say that to me, you-you are just a little gih!?

    Barnes, clearly bluffing, looked into ncs eyes and felt a sensation of ice cold water being poured onto his heart. The biting frost climbed up his back, with a broken spirit he was reduced to observing his surroundings. He stood where all the losers were supposed to be, yet not a single soul remained. The figures of losers who could onlyment their defeat through the scheme of Guinias. The only person in front of him was nc.

    ncheis no more. Try to use your remaining few brain cells to try to understand me now.

    Only hearing that did Barnes begin to notice how strange nc looked. nche had always been a pretty girl, but the one in front of him couldnt simply be described as beautiful. Her hair, whiter than snow, decorated the crown whilst she spitefully gazed down at Barnes with her crimson eyes. The gaps between her dark dress vaguely shed her smooth white skin. Its seductive gleam could instill lust, yet before all else, it showed them fear. It was the type of beauty beyond humansprehension.

    Barnes became speechless having guessed her true identity.

    C-Could it be

    Settle down, now. Soon Ill invite your family and friends here too, let us have a celebration.

    Marquis Barnes had no right to refuse. Before he could say a thing, he was shackled in front of the throne. Then, another few minutes passed.

    Slow down this instant! Who do you think I am!!

    A woman shrieked words akin to Barness.

    What are you doing! Are you knowingly offending the next queen!?

    That foolish young girl radiated an arrogant attitude without even knowing what she had gotten herself into. She was brought before nc.

    I guess it runs in the genes. Perhaps you all can reflect a bit if this girl sheds a little blood.

    She may have been the heir to the kings blood, yet she held no significance to nc then. Ostensibly forgetting about that, she nced over the two who had been brought in front of her.

    nche What are you doing here!

    Sister, please understand you position. Wife of the imperial nobleman is just an empty title. Do you understand that you are a meremb waiting to be ughtered without anyone to back you?

    People unable toprehend their circumstances tried to argue against nc. But that folly was devoured by a fiery ze once ncs eyes focused on her.

    I-I fee-feel horrible! Ca-cant brea!

    KYAA! I-it burns! MY FACE, MY SKIN IS BURNING!

    What an unpleasant sight. I will not let you off the hook that easily for bullying my friend all these years.

    Hearing that cold and emotionless voice, it struck Emilia and As that he one before them was not nche. By that time it was already far toote. But, even if they had understood any earlier, nc would not have forgiven them anyway.

    You two should wait here for our final guest to show up, nc said without even dignifying the wretched women with a nce. Thest he man with the most sins. Only the hatred towards him burned quietly deep-within ncs eyes.

    ***

    Guinias was satisfied with how everything went ording to his wishes and merrily drank the day away. Thanks to teleportation magic, his body was not exhausted despite having traveled to such a remote nation. Or rather, he was quite energetic, having fully immersed in the joy ofst nights victory.

    This was a triumph. Now all thats left is to get Princess nche out here.

    If we are rejected, well just have to force her away with the military.

    Hmm, the people are on our side as well. But youve got to make it clear to the military to avoid damaging the surroundings.

    Of course. Thisnd will soon be in Guinias-samas pocket. So be cautious not to harm any civilians.

    Ill let you handle that, Guiniasughed in high spirits. But his mirthful moment was suddenly interrupted by some intruders.

    Youve been summoned by our queen, pleasee forth with us.

    Resistance is futile, weve already eliminated anyone in our path.

    The two who showed up were the embodiments of inhuman strength.

    What the hell are the guards doing!? Guinias shouted, despite which, not a single one came to his room. The smaller of the two interlopers mockingly smirked at the panicked Guinias and said: Didnt I say, weve taken care of the ones that looked like theyd get in our way?

    The innocent voice delivered a vicious line. This made Guiniass aides realize those two were no ordinary beings.

    Then, lets go.

    Thats right, farewell then, bye-bye!

    The two only took Guinias away as they loyally carried out their masters order. The people remaining began to panic and shout.

    Those are demons. DEMONS havee to stop us!

    Go inform the military! Guinias-sama has been kidnapped!

    Th-that is probably

    The message was swiftly ryed to the military camp. Guinias-sama was kidnapped despite a highly secured premise. The two criminals, their true identities likely beingGreater Demon Generals. Those unprecedented reports plunged the military base into pandemonium. What immediately followedthe operation was urgently revised to demon hunting.

    On the other side, Guinias unwillingly had the pleasure to experience demonic air travel. At first Guinias was still resisting, the young nobleman acquiredbat skill equivalent to B rank adventurers and was acimed for his excellence in both brass and brain. In fact, having reached rank B, one could at least be a lieutenant officer within the armyquite the talent in others eyes. Because of that, Guinias had been rather naive in thinking he would be able to beat a demon or two.

    His preconceptions were easily crushed. These two demons were able to rush in and kidnap Guinias from the military base filled with sharp soldiers and a strictly secured perimeter. Their incredible strength spoke for itself.

    You bastards, what are you going to do to me?

    Look below.

    Guinias looked down and witnessed scenes straight from hell. Their faces torn, twisted with agony, blood flowing out of their body without end. They writhed in painpeople, people everywhere. The once tidy streets were tainted with blood, while fresh blood kept gushing into theke. It was dyeing theke scarlet.

    WHAT!?

    Guinias was speechless at the sight, but he soon regained rity and howled: You damn demons! You bastards, you should never have existed in this world! The people living on thisnd have signed a contract with your master. But you How dare you just sacrifice them like this!?

    Hearing it, the small demon shook its head.

    Thats not the case. Its all because of your actions.

    Caused by my actions?

    Yeah. You. You taught them to be like this. It was you who seduced and betrayed our masters ally nche-sama, and attempted to exile her from the country.

    T-thats

    We dont want traitors, nor do we want coborators who failed to prevent the betrayal. They both carry equal sin.

    Wait a moment! What about children? Shouldnt there also be innocent infants? Are you just gonna kill them all!?

    So what?

    What gives you the illusion of righteousness?

    Didnt I just say that your sins are collective? But our master has shown mercy this time. She even granted those free of sin a painless death.

    That was really surprising. If she was anything like before, exemptions wouldve been unthinkable. I suppose its all by virtue of nche-sama. That nche-sama also died because of you. So all of these tragedies are of your doing, look below and have its sights burned into your heart.

    Guinias felt confused being told so. At heart, he was not a man of pure evil. Hed contracted all the self-serving habits of a noble, and it was his sincere conviction that a noble was nothing without their people. First improve citizens standard of living, entrap their support through entertainment, then milk them through taxation and theirbor. Because those were his previously held beliefs, his heart began to shake upon seeing so many people being ughtered below him

    I-Ive done nothing wrong. Im not wrong!

    He told himself that, trying to steady his mind. But then, he could no longer keep hisposure after hearing the next lineing out of the demon.

    Its tragic indeed that the residents are involved as well. But rest assured that you are the one who caused all of this, you aint gonna be let off the hook with just this amount of suffering. So dont lose your nerve just yet, brace yourself now for whats next toe.

    Guinias came to terms with his realitythat horrifying reality crawled in front of him.

    No-no. Someone save me, please let me go!

    Sorry, but we cant help you with that. Well get killed for it, answered the small, frowning demon, to which the other agreed. Then, Guinias was dragged in front of the queen. His ego shattered along with his inner self. Guinias was a shell of his former self.

    Ara ara, what happened to prince charming? Why are you crying so much? Have you pissed yourself too?

    Someone save me, Im begging you, please spare me, Guinias wailed while sobbing like a bitch. Hearing this, ncsughter echoed with joy. s, the fire of hatred in her eyes only grew in ferocity.

    Idiot, why would I ever spare you now? But, you are pretty lucky.

    Ayy?

    Guinias regained some hope hearing ncs words and raised his head. What met him was a sinister smile.

    At least you are not the only one getting punished. You wont feel lonely that way.

    In front of ncy Guiniasspanions figures, their faces filled with fear and agony, and their bodies ugly, distorted and rotten. Theyd been stripped of all clothing, their dignity as high nobility was a thing of the past.

    N-no! Forgive me, please forgive me!

    That wont do. Farewell then, fool. Enjoy the curse that grants you eternal suffering without death.

    Guinias heard that annoying yet beautiful voice.

    NOOOOOOO!!

    Guinias left the world with a loud scream before his consciousness was consumed by terror and agonywhat followed was a hellish inferno beyond words.

    ***

    Afterwards, the Imperial army that rushed into Silberia were terrified by the mere sight of the cmity. Fierce battles against the demons broke out. The elites who triumphed against the demons were able to head to the capital. There, they confronted nc.

    By that time they arrived, nc hadpleted her revenge and was filled with destion. She had no motivation of fighting whatsoever.

    I feel so empty. nche is not around, nor her country as my yground. I suppose I dont have any further reason to stick around thesends

    nc sparred with the Imperial knights while thinking that.

    Dont get careless! From the situation, our enemy is the White primordial. But do not be afraid! Us Trinity 27 will not be defeated, even by Primordial nc.

    She had little interest in fighting the menacing knights.

    What a mess. I could easily win but dont want to risk hurting nches body. I should just retreat to let the children of thisnd have a good sleep.

    nc ceased fighting early on. It was the saving grace for the knights that had confronted her. Their identity was the most elite military force within the Empire, the emperors Imperial Knight Corps. However, the knights were no match for the White Queen.

    If nc had fought seriously, the Imperial army would likely have been wiped out. They were convinced of their victory, not realizing their luck in avoiding theirplete demise.

    Then, nc

    She left her host body and cut ties with the physical world as her parting gift for nche. In order for no one to ever touch her flesh and let it rest in immortal beauty, nc casted a special seal to bury nche beneath thisnd.

    Good night, nche. Ill have the souls of those who kept their promise sent to you as well, so that you will not feel lonely on the other side, and may you rest in peace there.

    Many souls with shining sparks gathered around nches soul. Then, nc carefully released them all. Even though demons enjoy souls the most

    Farewell. When would Imeet you again

    Perhaps nc didnt want to consume nches soul and for that she pretended to be destroyed by the knights.

    The wind was howling.

    Then, the demons aura vanished from thend.

    ***

    In the past, thisnd once was a small nation named Silberia.

    Its quaint towns stood tall, surrounding a beautifulke.

    Today, theres not a trace of that left. Thekeshore is dyed scarlet by blood, its reddish-brown water reaches as deep as the sea.

    Theughter of demons echoes day and night.

    The ancient city is a tombstone. A cursednd.

    A kingdom there once stood, met its demise.

    The truth behind it never to be revealed.

    (End)

 Volume 13.5 - Epilogue

    Afterword & Acknowledgement

    Thank you for reading Fuse-senseis work and my trantion.

    This is a revised version of the previous trantion of side stories. We will include the mini side stories in vol 13.5 in the next main story volume.

    Notes

    [1] Psychidae is a cocoon like shell usually made up of wires

    [2] (Gokui): Means a state of in between the limitation and beyond, not sure how to trante

    [3] There is a change of prononune from Ore to Watashi to show respect to Rimuru.

    [4] keikaku

    [5] refer to volume 5.

    [6] Or Shinigami, God of Death in Japanese.

    [7]  (Jian) Chinese sword-like mace

    [8] Wield-Sickle, a traditional Japanese weapon

    [9] A cow-deer hybrid creature (refer to volume 2), a creature in slime world

    [10] The following are alternative narratives in Rimurus head

    [11]   Benimarus corps of soldiers

    [12] Keikaku

    [13] Ruminas addresses herself like a noble (boomer), using the pronoun of  (warawa)

    [14] Exined in volume 11, Chloeing to the world with Leon

    [15] Rimuru gets drunk in vol 8 using this knowledge.

    [16]

    [17]  Special thanks to Waoweewoo foring up with the EN name

    [18] nche - French for white (feminine form)

    [19]

    [20]

    [21] nc - French for white (masculine form)

    [22]

    [23]

    [24] Commander of the Armored Corps in Eastern Empire

    [25]

    [26] FYI: Negotiable  Testa, Rain, Misery; Non-negotiable  Guy, Carrera; Do whatever they want  Diablo, Ultima

    [27] Referring to the three members of the imperial army corp in E astern E mpire who took down Testa mentioned in empire invasion arc.

 Volume 14 - Prologue

    Prologue: The Clowns Decision

    The intelligence has not yet reached the Empire.

    But it should be a happy thing for the subjects of the Empire.

    The imperial soldiers, their kinsmen, who were supposed to attack the western countries through the Great Forest of Jura, becamepletembs to the ughter.

    No one thought that nearly a million Imperial Legions would be defeated.

    Whoever it was, was convinced that this army would be able to fulfill the imperial ambitions of conquering the western states and establishing a unified state fully under the rule of Emperor Rudra.

    The Great Forest of Jura used to be a ghost gate, now that Veldora was weakened, there was no longer anything to be feared.

    It was supposed to be that way.

    Under the rule of the great emperor, the attack of the strongest imperial legions of all time has finally begun at this moment

    This was the view of the subjects in general, and no one ever thought of defeat or even of going through a bitter battle.

    No one could have imagined that the Imperial Army would be crushed in the Great Forest of Jura without even touching the territories of the western countries.

    In fact, the Imperial Army was really wiped out without doing anything.

    The Jura Tempest Federation, whom they looked down onpletely, had taught them what it meant to have someone outside of you and a sky outside of you.

    It won''t be long before the subjects of the Empire will know these facts.

    ***

    A stronghold of the mixed imperial legions.

    In the luxurious room allotted to the army Chief, some people had gathered quietly.

    The room is headed by Yuuki, the owner of the room, followed by Kagali, Lace, Tear, Footman and others in the middle of the clownpany, and one of the "Big Three, Misha.

    Vega had gone off to join the Warcraft Legion inbat and wasn''t here this time.

    Lace and Misha debriefed first.

    Yuuki couldn''t help but smile bitterly after listening.

    All sorts of preconceived notions were made before, but the results are still, shall we say, beyond expectations.

    Too overwhelming, too much faster than one might think. The results of the battle of Rimuru and others were so great that Yuuki had to readjust his strategy again.

    What was most startling, though, was the increased power of Demon Lord Rimuru.

    "I didn''t expectfor them to destroy such an army so easily. Although they were expected to win early on, it''s horrifying to win with zero casualties.

    "I can''t believe that such arge army, even if it were to start a war with the three demon lords at the same time, it would be possible to fight all the way

    "No,pared to the Ten Great Demon Lords, the Eight Star Demon Lords are not on the same level.

    Guy alone, Ruminas and Dagruel have been battling for supremacy all along, right? The forces of Leon are familiar to you, even Milim, who previously had no subordinates, and now the original Demon King Carrion and Frey have be her subordinates. It''s still the Light Rod Commander, just Ramiris and Dino, right?

    Kagali voiced her opinion, but after listening to Yuuki''s exnation, a look ofprehension returned.

    Indeed, things were differentpared to when Kagali was a demon lord.

    There is no need for discussion about Guy.

    Milim, on the other hand, was now the ruler of the vast territory south of the Great Forest of Jura.

    Ruminas and Dagruel, even after fighting with the angels, their power has not been reduced, and has always been a veryrge power, Leon is kind of exception even if not mentioned, those new demon lords when Kagali was still a demon lord are simply not worth mentioning.

    Whether or not a slightly more subordinate Demon Lord survives is a matter of luck, as is the case with Kagali, the original curse lord" Kazaream.

    It was because of this that they had to rack their brains to establish coborative rtionships with other monsters, and they had to resort to various means in order to survive.

    The "Blood Lord" Roy Valentine is only a shadow martial artist, and the god Ruminas is the demon lord, but even Ruminas is not able to win against Dagruel in the power struggle. They''re not the same ss as scum like me, what an envy of those with power. Carrion and Frey are so smart, if only I could live smarter. That way, nothing that would make everyone sad would happen, and there would be no loss of yman

    In retrospect, thepulsory collection of many monsters as henchmen was of little use, and even if the number was toorge, the legion would be of little use in the face of strongmen who exceeded a certain level of strength.

    yman''s failure is proof enough of that.

    What they really should be doing, Kagali thought, is addingpanions who are able to push the envelope.

    No, these are all hindsight now. For us, who have been betrayed, it''s impossible to trust anyone. If I hadn''t met Yuuki, I''m afraid I would still be resenting the world even now.

    Now that it was over, Kagali felt no need to think about it and just buried the regret in her heart.

    The conversation was still going on, not taking into ount these things that were on Kagali''s mind.

    "After all, it''s been hard work, Lace.

    "Yeah, that''s right. This one''s bad too."

    Lace nodded with a very weary look on his face.

    "Ahahaha, the battlested ten days?

    "Yes, that big sister named Treyni has be so strong that it''s exaggerated. Don''t be cruel to her. The one who doesn''t pay attention to our family is the one who will be killed. And it''s not good for our family that the battlefield is in the forest, so we''re working really hard.

    Lace let out a huff.

    The suspicious appearance was of his own making, but this time there seemed to be something to think about.

    Yuuki soothed him for a moment and continued.

    "Anyway, did you finally get them to believe you?"

    "You can''t resist being tied up like this, and I''m being watched by Rimuru the demon lords subordinates, so I don''t think you can believe it.

    However, Lace deserves credit for sessfully negotiating and bringing back information.

    "I can''t believe you''re still free.

    "I thought we were supposed to have a rtionship with Guy Crimson, so instead of trusting the boss, we''re taking advantage of the situation.

    Had the hostile position been singled out, the captured Lace would not have been released, except that in that case, Lace would not have gone as deep into the bargaining.

    Lace grumbled in response.

    Yuuki also felt a little more relieved for the time being, but he couldn''t rx just yet.

    "I felt the same way Lord Lace did, this time it was really exhausting. It was my task to stir up the head of the Calgurio Army and dy the war for as long as itsted, and I understood that it was my task, but halfway through I did offer to withdraw. When my offer was rejected, I even thought of running away even if I killed that man

    Misha said bitterly.

    But then again, by the time she suggested it, it was toote.

    The reason why Misha was able to escape was because of Yuuki''s co-fighting rtionship with Rimuru, if not for that, she would have died at the hands of Diablo long ago.

    "Lucky for you, Rimuru is the kind of person who keeps his word.

    "That Slime called Rimuru is an anomaly. From what I remember, there should be a strong man in the Mecha Legion who can match the demon lord.

    Yes."

    "Yes, there is. But before Demon Lord Rimuru could show his hand, he was killed by his men.

    Even the terrifying demon male had be a subordinate of Rimuru, and Misha had an unbearable look on her face. Things were too unrealistic for Misha, so it was perfunctory to talk about them.

    Unfettered by anyone, this supreme being of the demon race actually followed the instructions of a demon lord .

    "I was struck by the fact that the "single-digit" duo was killed as easily as a mouse, and frankly, it was stupid to challenge that monster.

    The sum of it all is hard for anyone to believe.

    To change this heavy atmosphere, Yuuki tried to change the subject.

    "The identities of Bonnie and Jiu surprised me, I didn''t expect to be tricked by Damrada like this, and I''m just as upset about it.

    Those are the heartfelt words of Yuuki.

    Damrada is a traitoran event thates as a shock to Yuuki and the others.

    Damrada, who had been trusted by Yuuki''s heart for so many years, was a big subordinate who had prated deep into the heart of Yuuki''s camp.

    The level of trust is high enough for Yuuki to entrust him with the important task of secretly associating with the "Big Three" imperialnding site, and such a figure is a traitor, making it necessary to rethink the strategy all along.

    While Masayuki, who had been treated as a pariah by Yuuki, had sent two powerful men to follow him, the incident also proved that Damrada had more vision than Yuuki.

    Damrada presumably used his higher vision than Yuuki''s to influence the actions of Yuuki and others, and upon sensing this, Yuuki''s self-esteem really became tattered.

    "Yeah, in retrospect, yman''s rampage seems to have had Damrada involved.

    A puzzled Kagali said.

    In response, Yuuki nodded in agreement.

    "There''s no denying that our ns have failed one by one, and it''s strange to think of it now. However, I don''t think Damrada gets anything out of it, our power has be sorge inrge part because of Damrada''s assistance, and if you want to take away our power, it would be better not to give it to us from the beginning.

    "There are doubts here, but Damrada seems drunk on Yuuki-sama and doesn''t seem to be acting and feels loyal. It was also with his help that wepleted the various projects.

    "As a colleague, my opinion is that honestly. Damrada is serious about working for the organization, has a good track record and should be really loyal to the boss in my opinion. However, it is also true that the man has a ruthless and cold side, and being in charge of the "money" side shows his rationalistic thinking. So the betrayal of the boss for some reason should be a no"

    There was no way to say it wasn''t possiblethats what Misha said. Yuuki replied to her with a shake of his head.

    "There is no doubt that Damrada has betrayed, but it is not clear whether he has done it from the heart or not.

    No, it was actually a genuine betrayal, Yuuki muttered again andughed bitterly.

    "I also agree with boss. If it''s all acting, it''s hard to see the point of Damrada''s actions.

    Kagali came to the same conclusion as Yuuki, and then she began to state her opinion.

    "Let me exin. ording to Gedora-sensei''s report, we learn of Damrada''s betrayal, that the ce where Gedora was killed was in Emperor Rudra''s castle, and that standing in front of the teacher seems to be the man lurking in the shadows of the EmpireLieutenant Kondo.

    "The emperor''s castleso it is, Damrada''s identity is enough to enter that ce, isn''t it?

    Misha responded. Yuuki nodded at her, then added some more information.

    "Yeah, and by the way, ording to the information you got back, what Damrada''s true identity is is also discussed as a result. There should be very few people who can order a single digit, except for the Emperor."

    Yuuki''s words dawned on the crowd.

    "I see. That''s right. Come to think of it, it''s extremely obvious."

    "Yes, Damrada is not betraying us, just following the Emperor''s orders.

    "It may not have been his intention, but it doesn''t matter now.

    Maybe it was the enemy of Yuuki and others from the beginning, maybe it wasn''t. But the results of the status quo only show that Damrada is a traitor.

    Then there are the people like Lace who cannot ept such treachery.

    "Indeed, boss should be right. But, Damrada might have fooled yman, can''t we just cut him some ck?

    "Yeah, yeah! Miss Bens (???) men will go over there and kill him!

    "Oooh, oooh, oooh, oooh, the House of Everything has a reputation first and will not tolerate betrayers!"

    The frivolous proposal purges Lace.

    Tear and Footman agreed.

    However, Yuuki stopped the three of them.

    "Wait, Damrada''s true identity, being the superior of the Imperial Emperor''s Order of Near Guard, is undoubtedly more dangerous than the average demon lord, is it still a question whether you few can win?

    Even though it was a sneak attack, Damrada also solved Gedora-sensei with a single blow, so it can be seen that the strength is quite strong.

    "That being said, but

    "What''s more, I think there''s a message in Damrada''s actions.

    After a moment''s thought, Yuuki uttered this sentence. Then, with a hypothetical in mind, one begins to state one''s thoughts.

    "Damrada is very careful, knows our information, and also knows the information about the Demon Lord Rimuru.

    "What does that mean?"

    "That is, Damrada may have sensed the resurrection of Gedora."

    "But in that caseis it?"

    Wouldn''t that be the same as releasing Gedora?a possibility that had also urred to Misha.

    "The man who confronted Gedora at the end was a "weirdo who feeds on information", wasn''t he? If we let Gedora live, it will fall into the hands of Lieutenant Kondo, and by that time, we will use every means possible to get information that Gedora knows.

    "In that case, our purpose will all be known to each other, is that what you mean?

    "Probably, but there''s still something I don''t understand, and by gagging Gedora, I''ve avoided giving away information about Rimuru. And as a result, the Empire has suffered great losses, and it is hard to imagine that Damrada has caused the Empire to suffer because of his love for us"

    Yuuki smiled bitterly, unable to exin this.

    Hearing this, Kagali began to speak her mind again.

    "It shouldn''t be wrong to say that Damrada is more loyal to Emperor Rudra than Lord Yuuki. But at the same time, he is treating us aspanions, no, no, is thinking that we can be used, or wants us to take on some aspect of the task, and if so, what happens?

    "Mm-hmm, go ahead.

    "The defeat of the Imperial Army also follows the emperor''s wishesthere may be such a possibility.

    "How is that possible?

    "That''s not possible, is it?"

    Misha and Lace immediately objected, while Yuuki pondered with interest.

    "This possibility is deduced on the basis of which purpose of Damrada?"

    "Very briefly, a great deal of death is necessary forrge rituals, just as the awakening of a demon lord requires a great number of "souls", so wouldn''t Damrada and Emperor Rudra treat the Imperial Army as a sacrifice?

    "It''s possible. Go on."

    "That being the case, there''s nothing unbelievable about getting in the way of Kondo, who is determined to win. Again, this gives a slight indication of why Damrada let us go"

    Gedora had intended to ascend to the Emperor, and Damrada came out to obstruct.

    If the information in Gedora''s possession falls into Kondo''s hands

    The Imperial Army''s casualties might not have been so great, and more to the point, thebat action taken against Rimuru would surely have taken a different form.

    How could Damrada not see the stakes and therefore see that his actions were deliberate?

    So, what is the purpose?

    "A litmus test?

    "Well, yes.

    Hearing Yuuki''s reply, Kagali smiled with satisfaction.

    "In order to give birth to the truly powerful, many sacrifices were made by acquiescence. And we, too, have been used as pawns in the birth of the strong, right?"

    "Or it could be, trying to bribe us.

    What?"

    "yman, hes not going to listen to anyone other than me and Kagali, right?

    Yeah."

    Mm-hmm."

    "Definitely."

    "If he let yman storm off like that, he must have used some kind of hidden technique.

    "Is it, say, brainwashing?

    Yuuki nodded in response to Kagali''s usation.

    "Even if it''s not that powerful, I think it''s still under the influence of ''thought inducement''. It''s possible that some kind of prop was used like us, and there''s also the possibility that there''s a dominating power like Mariabells."

    Hearing this inference, the entire crew''s expressions turned rigid.

    "It''s a pain in the ass.

    Misha''s words were echoed by the crowd.

    Looking around at hispanions, Yuuki chuckled.

    "But rest assured. This power is ineffective against me, from now on, I will touch each of you a little, is that okay?

    All members indicated no problems.

    At this point, mere denial would be tantamount to admitting to being in control, and it would be impossible to reject Yuuki''s proposal even to prove his innocence.

    "Looks like everyone hasn''t been brainwashed. However, if you''re not acting alone, I think you''ll be fine.

    "In that case, our house is in danger.

    Lace said this after standing up and spinning around. However, Yuuki and Kagali very tacitly dismissed what he said.

    "No, no, no. You''re okay.

    "Yeah, well, you don''t have to but this kind of heart.

    Hearing this, Lace sat down again as if he were making a fuss and started to whine.

    "What? You should be more worried about our family, really.

    Lace''s witty manner blew away the heavy air in the room.

    After theughter, the group began to switch thoughts.

    He expressed his gratitude for this, and Yuuki said as if he was going to regain his momentum.

    "All right, all right, all right, all right, all right.

    "Yes, I''d like to question Damrada about how much of our n has beenpromised.

    "Hey, hey, now''s the time to say something like that? Our family''s n was already exposed, right?

    "After all, Damrada knows all about the n and it''s no longer a matter of exposing or not exposing.

    "Yes. Isn''t it better to run away now?

    "I can''t do that either.

    Now, Yuuki''s faction has shifted its stronghold to the Empire.

    Although there were still some lurking in the Western States, it was a very small number. It''s simply not possible to fully ce there, and new hideaways are not that easy to arrange.

    Most importantly, there is simply too little preparation time for all the members at the bottom to escape.

    "At least, it''s impossible for me to run the "Big Three" on my own, partly because of Damrada''s ability and the fact that people have relied on him in the past, and partly because I don''t have a good idea of what his men are like.

    The other giant, Vega, has no merit other than violence and simply can''t be expected to do anything about the running of the organization.

    That''s why Misha said what she said.

    "I know. The Big Three have to take their heads off. Damrada''s men could all be banished, but the problem is that here in the Hybrid Legion, it would be a shame to give up all that powermainly to avoid losing all their strongholds.

    Cutting flesh is a means to an end, but the loss this time is just too great.

    If you can''t find a ce for 100,000 people in this world, then you have to give up your men. If this is done, those who stay will no doubt be purged.

    In fact, based on spection about Damrada''s thoughts, it is estimated that he did not tell Yuuki''s secret.

    "While there could be several reasons for Damrada to seal Gedora''s mouth, I think one of them would be to keep the information from being given to Kondo. Presumably, the emperor''s near-guard is not irond either. Isn''t the imperial coup we''re nning, Damrada, hoping to seed too?

    "Although I don''t understand his intentions, if Damrada wants to hide our secrets, then that''s the only purpose.

    Yuuki and Kagali follow each other''s thoughts and keep speaking their minds.

    The others could only look at them in confusion, and Lace seemed unable to resist, interjecting loudly just to interrupt their conversation.

    "No, no, no, no, no, wait a minute." Wait a minute. Letting Gedora go on purpose is just boss

    spection, right? In that case, isn''t it highly likely that all of this is an illusion?

    Everyone thought it was a solid opinion, but Yuuki replied confidently, "That''s not possible."

    "Listen to me, okay? Our n for the coup was the result of a deal with the Demon Lord Guy, and Damrada knew about it. Rather than get in the way of our ns, it would be better to fool Guy by causing chaos within the Empire, wouldn''t he think so?

    "Hmm, with that kind of thinking, there should be

    "This girl doesn''t understand.

    "Ho, ho, ho, ho.

    Tear and Footman can''t seem to keep up with the conversation anymore, and the duo is already ying with the rag.

    "There is chaos in the empire. Will the emperor''s inner circle allow this to happen?

    Misha just summed up her thoughts, not being able to keep up with Yuuki and Kagali''s perspective on things.

    In a sense, her reaction was sort of normal.

    After all, Yuuki and the others think in terms of being willing to make all kinds of sacrifices to get there, an idea that is absolutely intolerable to people who hold absolute rationality in their thinking.

    What''s more, Yuuki''s idea of them being self-facilitating to the fullest, and even feeling full of contradictions in the perspective of others'' thinking, was an extremely insane way of thinking that Misha couldn''t understand.

    It''s an unreasonable demand to be understood.

    "Misha, there''s no need to think thatplicated, what''s important is who Damrada sees as the enemy and to look at it from that perspective. Damrada, from the beginning to the end, had never considered Yuuki-sama and Demon Lord Rimuru as enemies, and the enemy in his eyes had always been Guy Crimson. Once that is understood, it will be clear why they have acquiesced to our riots within the Imperial Capital.

    "Kondo was different, he didn''t just treat Guy as an enemy, anyone who was against the emperor would be treated as an enemy, looking at things from apletely different perspective than Damrada, that''s how he served the emperor.

    That''s why the confrontation was possible, and Yuuki came to this conclusion. Kagali affirmed this.

    "Well, now that Boss and Lord Kagali have said so, we believe so.

    Without further thought, Lace asserted his belief.

    Tear and Footman keep pace with Lace.

    As for Misha, the central question is raised.

    "Then, Yuuki-sama, what''s your future policy? Since it has been decided that Damrada is the enemy, it is of course impossible to trust him, no matter how sincere he may be. So, abort the coup, admit the impossibility and choose to hide? Fortunately, now that 60% of the mixed legions have gone to fight in the Dwarf Kingdom''s eastern city blockade, and with the remaining battle strength in the Imperial Capital, I will provide as much support as possible, so it shouldn''t be difficult to take any city as long as it is a stronghold"

    "And then unite the nations that are discontented with the empire and form a great coalition against it?"

    "Uh-huh. Wouldn''t this be the battle n with the best chance of winning if you could save the most battle power?

    "It''s a nice ce, oppressed by the imperial nobility, if you look for it, there will be a ce like that, where we can fight the banner of the liberation army.

    So?"

    "Unfortunately, the proposal is rejected."

    That was whyMisha was about to ask, but couldn''t.

    "If we want to survive, we have to choose a coup d''tat. Am I right, Damrada?

    Without waiting for Misha to ask, Yuuki spoke first.

    Before Misha could understand the meaning of the phrase, the clowns present were already in a pro forma state first. Then the tightly closed door was opened and a man walked in.

    "That''s right, boss.

    It was Damrada who came.

    Still in businessman''s garb as usual, but giving the impression that he is no longer hidden and is entirely military.

    The air in the room suddenly became tense, and Lace, who was about to strike, was stopped by Damrada in a calm voice.

    "Stop, this building is surrounded by my men.

    Yuuki, who was observing the situation, saw this sight and sank his body into the couch with the strength to rx his shoulders.

    "Do you have time to talk more? If you have one, you sit too.

    "Boss, there''s no time for that now"

    "It''s okay, it''s okay. Just sit down, too."

    Pacifying the disgruntled Lace first, Yuuki looked at Damrada with a fearless smile on his face.

    "So, what''s your purpose?

    "Because I feel like I''ve been misunderstood by the boss, I''m here to exin that I have something I can''t say.

    He said, changing to take a seat in the seat indicated by Yuuki, the change in attitude left Lace and the others with nothing to do but feel irritated.

    Then

    Regardless of what the people around them thought, the Q&A between Yuuki and Damrada started first.

    "A difficult thing to say, huh?

    "Yes, I really hope the boss coup is sessful.

    "So, what about letting Gedora go?"

    "Heh, heh, heh, heh. Are you sure you''re all right? I just took a gamble on this one, but I thought that man was so careful, I thought hed survive.

    "To avoid information falling into Kondo''s hands?

    Exactly."

    "Didn''t you swear allegiance to the Emperor?"

    "I did take an oath.

    You did, huh? What about now?

    "No matter how many times I say it, you probably won''t believe it, but I am loyal to the boss.

    "How can this be believed?

    Yeah."

    The two wereughing and exchanging words.

    "By blocking the information that Gedora had, the Mecha Legion was almost wiped out. Plus right now, the Monster Beast Legion was far from the Imperial Capital, and even if the news of the Mecha Legion''s defeat came back, it would take quite a while for them to rush back. Right now, the defensive battle power within the Imperial Capital has been drastically reduced, don''t you think, now is a great time to do it?

    "Yes, I even think it''s too good for us to be in this situation.

    "That''s right, it took years to create the conditions that existed

    "Damrada, you"

    "I, boss, live to defeat His Majesty Rudra. This is the only way to save His Majesty, and for that, the best thing to do is to let you take over the world. The idea has not changed, everything is ready, and the rest is your decision.

    Huh.

    Yuuki grunted in bemusement.

    All went ording to Damrada''s n, making Yuuki feel unhappy in his heart.

    But the refusal is something to think about, and the situation, as Damrada says, could not be better arranged.

    The problem is just that one has to believe that about Damrada.

    I have a question.

    "Be my guest.

    "Why didn''t you talk to me and let yman be the outcast?

    Between Yuuki and the Moderate Clown Troupe, they swore to each other that they would never betray each other, and are the rare people in the world who can trust each other.

    One of them, yman, was also an importantpanion for Yuuki.

    Kagali, Lace, Tear, and Footman, all turned pale at this questioning from Yuuki, their eyes focused on Damrada, giving the impression that lying was never allowed.

    In the midst of this murderous atmosphere, Damrada still replied calmly.

    "I had nothing to do with yman. I knew who the prisoner was, but I didn''t think he would use such tactics.

    The scene was greeted with a moment of silence, but Yuuki broke that silence again.

    "He''s talking about Tatsuya Kondo?

    .

    "You seem to know a lot about Kondo, and you have a lot of secrets.

    To the Damrada, who had fallen into silence, Yuuki stated his im. Damrada just listened to Yuuki with a bitter look on his face.

    When Yuuki finished, Damrada replied softly.

    Because it is forbidden, I cannot answer you all. About Kondo, I don''t know how good he really is eitherI can''t say anything else except that. Nheless, I hope you will believe that in order to save His Majesty Rudra.

    The clowns'' icy stares fell straight on Damrada.

    Everyone had a look of disbelief on their faces.

    The same goes for Yuuki.

    It''s just that things are not looking good for Yuuki.

    Outside the building, there were not only Damrada''s men, but there was also a sense that it was impossible to ignore; presumably, Damrada had also brought the superior strength of the near-guard knights with him.

    It would be difficult to break through such an encircling, even for people like Yuuki.

    It''s just that I alone may have a way, and it''s probably going to be harder to keep the whole crew safe, so epting his proposal would be one of the options

    Yuuki counted in his heart.

    Suddenly, Yuuki sensed Damrada''s unflinchingly determined gaze.

    That look,pletely unchanged from when they first met.

    Yuuki closed his eyes and began to think back.

    From the moment they met, Damrada has been a bold and cheeky man, willing to take on any job as long as "money" is paid. However, they will spend a lot of money for theirpanions, and their actions are full of contradictions.

    I am willing to make any sacrifice for the sake of those I believe inas Damrada once said.

    Whose figure was reflected in the eyes of Damrada at that time?

    It''s not me. Yet, those eyes are a delight to behold

    Afterwards, he also began to call Yuuki boss and took an oath of loyalty.

    That said, there are still aspects of Damrada that one is afraid to trust.

    Looking back now, perhaps feeling lonely, realizing that, Yuuki opened his eyes and looked at Damrada.

    "There are lies in your words. You swore loyalty to Emperor Rudra long before you were loyal to me, and it hasn''t changed since, has it?"

    "Oh, I can''t beat you, boss."

    That statement stands for affirmation.

    This instead became an opportunity for Yuuki to believe in Damrada.

    "Well, instead of fighting you, let''s make the coup work.

    No one has expressed displeasure with Yuuki''s decision.

    "I can''t help it, since Yuuki-sama has decided, we''ll just obey.

    "Yes, Damrada, if you betray me, my family will settle the score with you.

    "Together, Lace!

    "Ho, ho, ho, ho, don''t forget me.

    The clowns made up their minds.

    Because, they believe in Yuuki as boss.

    They do have a bond between them that ties them together aspanions.

    Damrada is, likewise, included.

 Volume 14 - Ch 1

    A+A-

    The day after the resurrection of almost 700,000 Imperial officers and soldiers.

    The guys who were active in this defensive battle lined up and stood in the arena, and the auditorium was filled with soldiers from the base.

    Today is the celebration.

    The war with the Empire was still going on and morale needed to be kept high, so we got this event going.

    The Pdins sent Bhus and Ruminas'' "supernaturals" also attended.

    They had been killed by Jiu, but fortunately things happened in thebyrinth and they all came back to life intact and epted our thanks as well.

    Although they are unanimous in saying "it''s us who are not mature enough", after all, this is happening in our country, and a formal apology is important.

    In short, it''s better that the hazards can be kept to a minimum than anything else. Delicious cuisine was arranged for the second half of the celebration, so I hope they can rx and enjoy it.

    There were also guests from foreign countries at the wee table.

    Among them were Albis, who had fought as reinforcements, and Phobio, who had been one step slower, and the Two Wings, who hade with an elite contingent only.

    "Lady Frey was so worried about Lord Rimuru that she sent us here."

    "But it''s really not necessary. In fact, we also believed that if it were Lord Rimuru, he would win.

    Lucretia, the blonde, and Clea, the silver, spoke to me in a moving duet.

    Milim seemed to be worried, too, but it would be a relief to just tell her about this victory. The town is also blessed with the blessings of Veldora and Ramiris and should soon return to a smooth routine.

    "I''m the liaison. I was sent here as insurance because the Magic Call was not working. Andno, I''m being rude.

    In case we lose, the liaison officer will go back to his country and bring reinforcements immediately.

    Phobio with the fastest foot range was chosen considering the possibility that the mana force field was scrambled and unable to use magic.

    Phobio seemed to have something more to say, but closed his mouth again halfway through. The fact that his eyes were turning to Albis made it a bit of a concern, but the thought of it being in the past anyway, I didn''t take it seriously.

    I thanked the three and led them to the VIP table.

    The guests have another set.

    Guests from Dwargon.

    Jane, the old woman who had served as the Chief court-magician of Dwargon, came along as her escort, along with Dorf, themander of the Knights of the Heavenly Flying Order.

    This group is mainly here toin.

    It''s amazing to use the forbidden spell in the Great Forest of Jura.

    Plus, why did the "primordials" work for me? The other guy''s eyes changed over it.

    Honestly, I''m sorry about that too.

    But there''s nothing you can do about it.

    It is a force majeure when one realizes that the raw rice is already cooked.

    "It''s not a matter of force majeure. I''ve lived so long and never experienced a state of affairs that has shocked me so much once!

    "I''m sorry.

    There is no longer any other way but to apologize.

    In any case, first lower your posture and try to impress the other person.

    To be honest, I would have liked to see Granny Jane just go straight back, but I couldn''t not discuss the future.

    Let''s just say, that seems to be the real purpose of the other side''s visit.

    Outside the eastern metropolis of Dwargon, there were still 60,000 of Yuuki''s menying out there. But I''ve already told Gazel that it''s a tentative alliance with Yuuki, so there''s no war between the two sides, it''s just maintaining the tension.

    However, the whole thing can''t be left untouched, so I thought it would be a good idea to have a meeting with Yuuki to discuss the way forward.

    Lace, who was captured earlier, has been released back to take word to that side for me, and now we are waiting for Yuuki''s contact.

    Anyway, Granny Jane and Mr. Dorf were also taken to the VIP table. Inviting them to the celebration.

    In this way, the celebration began in the presence of many foreign guests.

    The position I''m in now is set up on themendation stage, one level higher than the rest, and is currently sitting in the chair above that in the form of a Slime.

    Rigur and Rigurd stood side by side behind me. Led by these two, the other civil officials also stood in two rows.

    Underneath the stage, even the Ten Lords of the Labyrinth, who were rarely seen, had arrived. That''s par for the course, after all, they are the main characters of the day.

    Originally, the Labyrinth Lords were known to look bad, but today there is no such problem. To say why, it was because the townspeople and the adventurers who served as volunteers were not called in this time.

    The first to appear was Shuna, who was standing next to me. She opened with my words and then began her speech of constion to the crowd.

    The presentation was excellent, but it wasn''t something I came up with.

    Shuna thought.

    More than the first and second secretaries, Shuna is more capable as a secretary.

    It was a real help to me who wasn''t good at speaking.

    Shion was not fit for a speech, and handing it to Diablo was unsettlingthe praise alone was enough for this guy to speak in one breath until the celebration was over.

    I started thinking about the next session while being grateful to have Shuna by my side.

    This celebration is arranged so that awards will be given along with the publication of merits. In other words, I''m going to let my men try out that thing called Awakening.

    ...........

    ........

    ...

    ording to the King of Wisdom, by giving 100,000 "souls", his men can awaken and evolve, bing stronger than the "true demon lord".

    The guy has to have qualifications to be a receiver of this, but what is shocking is that there are actually twelve of such guys.

    To ask who exactly, it was Ranga, Benimaru, Shion, Gabil, Geld, Diablo, Testarossa, Ultima, Carrera, Kumara, Zegion, and Adalman.

    Being spiritually connected to me and being a demon lord seed" seems to be the requirement.

    The one that is more concerning is Adalman.

    I didn''t take give this guy a name, but why would he qualify for evolution?

    <> Ah, I taught Adalman the "mystery of faith and grace" that I had learned from Ruminas. Because of this, he and I have a connection that rivals the name.</answer.>

    Awesome, Adalman. To be able to qualify on one''s own, this power of faith was really not an ordinary fierce one.

    Though it tickles the back of one''s mind to think of me as an object of faith, here''s an honestpliment to him.

    I understand the Adalman thing.

    The next problem is being able to get a few people to evolve.

    The number of "souls" I have here is about a million. The secret of this is that I have the King of Wisdom.

    <<notice. the="" existence="" of="" individual="" gaps="" in="" resulting="" "soul"="" is="" confirmed.="" should="" equalization="" reconstitution="" process="" be="" performed?="" yes="" no="">> Asking this question, I chose YES even though I didn''t understand much, after which the number of souls swelled to over a million.</notice.>

    I had returned a number of energies to Imperial officers and soldiers who hade back from the dead, and had expected the number of souls to decrease slightly, but it turned out to be just the opposite.

    There were awakened people like Calgurio in the Imperial Army, and there were also a considerable number of strong people amongst the guys who attacked thebyrinth, all of whom contained a much greater amount of energy than normal people. In addition, although Jius and Bonnies strength was borrowed, it was at least an ultimate ability, so it had also seized arge amount of energy.

    Some people, though individual, hold the energy of hundreds to tens of thousands of "souls", simply put.

    For these reasons, the awakening of ten men became possible.

    But there are a few things to worry about if it''s really going to be implemented.

    One is the issue of intelligence leaks.

    Is it really okay to do something so exaggerated in front of guests like Albis and Granny Jane?

    However, on this issue I decided to trust the other side. It has nothing to do with alliances, mainly because in the end it will be exposed anyway.

    Trying to fool Milim was impossible, King Gazel had been trusted with that time in Diablo. As angry as Granny Jane might be, now that even thebyrinthine forces were exposed, none of this was anything.

    Anyway, those who participated in the Maze Raid would definitely spread the news of how powerful the Labyrinth Lords were by then.

    There is little point in hiding it from those present now.

    The second is not knowing what will happen after awakening.

    Since this was the first attempt at Awakening Evolution, there was the possibility of unpredictable things happening, so I had Ramiris use her powers to iste the entire arena of this fight.

    That way, no matter what happens, the hazard shouldn''t spread to the outside world. Also, by doing so, one can keep secrets and kill two birds with one stone.

    Thest thing to worry about is the "harvest festival of evolution" that appeared when I awakened as a demon lord.

    At the time, I was in a state of low activity, unconscious for three consecutive days. If the same situation were to happen this time, it would mean putting the main subordinates to sleep during the war.

    In that case, there''s nothing we can do in two or three days, and it''s very worrying if something happens.

    After some minor annoyance, I decided that this wasn''t a problem either.

    The Imperial Army no longer exists. ording to the information from Calgurios investigation, the Mecha Legion has no more left to fight, after all, nine hundred and forty thousand soldiers have been killed by us, so there can''t be any leftover forces.

    There were only the Warcraft Legion and the Hybrid Legion left on the Imperial side.

    The Hybrid Legion led by Yuuki were allied with us for the time being, while the Warcraft Legion was transported elsewhere by the Air Combat Flying Corps, the ace unit of the Mecha Legion.

    With my Argos (gods eye), I was able to track the movements of the aircraftording to calctions, it would take more than three days to reach our country from where they were, even if they turned right away.

    The airship''s usual speed averaged about 400 km/h, and its maximumbat speed seemed to exceed the speed of sound, but the excessive consumption of magical power seemed tost only a short time.

    When all is said and done, the ability to fly long distances continuously at that speed makes one wonder.

    While possessing a boat or train with a speed unmatched by any other, it seems that in the air you will also encounter a threat that only exists in the air. For example, locations where the air currents fiercely turned into whirlpools, or locations where the magic element chaos couldn''t unleash any magic, etc.

    Even more troublesome is that there seems to be a habitat for the Empty Monster, so the hovercraft cannot travel in a straight line when sailing, but must set a safe course. The means of moving at the speed of sound is indeed a threat in this world, but it doesn''t seem as beneficial as one might think.

    So I don''t think this side needs to be too guarded.

    All that remained was the possibility of the Imperial Emperor''s Order of Near Guard going out

    This time we were able to achieve andslide victory because of the advantage of the maze. It is because of the ability to die and rise again that we can calmly respond.

    I should be able to beat those near guard knights.

    Regardless, Benimaru should be able to take the win.

    However, what about Shion and Ranga?

    Gabil and Geld are probably pretty dangerous too.

    So that being said, it''s important to be prepared as early as possible to cope.

    At least be able to stall for time in sudden encounters with strong opponents. If we can establish a soul corridor" between my subordinates and my soul, it seems that we can make the connection between us more solid. In that case, no matter what happens, they should be able to contact me through "Thought Communication".

    When you encounter a strong enemy, you contact me and try to reinforce the enemy, and that''s the basic operation.

    Be prepared, so I want to help everyone awaken while I can.

    Beware of a boat that sails for years.

    All in all, it''s arguably a very good time.

    ...........

    ........

    ...

    Then I should get started as soon as I can.

    The one initially named was, of course, Benimaru.

    As Grand General, he did a very good job ofmanding the entire army.

    Although Benimaru himself seemed to show some displeasure at the active performance of the Testarossa girls, but that, well, that was an ident.

    Benimaru wasn''t wrong, and I''m certainly more innocent!

    Nothing went wrong in the end anyway, so it''s totally safe to say that Benimaru''s job was well done.

    After Shuna finished her speech, she called Benimaru over.

    In response, Benimaru walked up and knelt down in front of me.

    "Yes! Then Benimaru-kun. I''m going to reward you next"

    "Can you stop that "kun" thing? You''re definitelyyoure up to something again, aren''t you?

    Unintelligible.

    I''m obviously not doing anything yet, how is it seen through.

    Actually, this awakening evolution, I''m going to make it a surprise.

    Because I think that if we discuss it beforehand, we will definitely be opposed to it, so it''s good to implement it quietly.

    Shuna was reading out Benimaru''s feats, and during this time, the whispers between me and Benimaru continued.

    "Actually, I''ve gotten a lot of ''souls'' through this war. The Testarossa girls seem to have given them all to me. And then, it seems that these things can be used to help people who are connected to me to awaken.

    "Why haven''t I heard?

    "Eh? Because I''m just saying it now?"

    Benimaru and I stared at each other wide-eyed.

    Because I feel like I''m being opposed to speaking out.

    Benimaru is unexpectedly serious, always giving people the impression that they want to be strong on their own. When I evolved into the Demon Lord, he seemed to have something in mind as well.

    If it was Diablo or Shion, the feeling would have been happily epted.

    "So, what do you mean by awakening?

    Great question.

    At that time, I increased my amount and power of magicule levels by more than ten times, and on top of that, I was able to grant blessings to all the magical creatures connected to the Soul Tether Genealogy.

    The growth rate of others after awakening is unknown, but the strength will increase dramatically, and this can''t be wrong.

    "Well, in short, didn''t I evolve when I became Demon Lord? It''s the same phenomenon. Just think of it as evolving into a demon lord.

    "Huh? That is to say, not only me, but even my subordinates will be affected?

    "I think that''s probably it.

    How widespread the impact will be is unclear, but at least the Kurenai will be blessed.

    "No, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, noIts so important, how can youe up here without talking about it beforehand

    "Wait a minute, wait a minute. Maybe you''re right, but this is not the time for a Q&A. It''s not clear what kind of strongmen are still among the enemy, so our battle strength must be strengthened as well, right?

    "Although that''s true"

    Benimaru closed his eyes in annoyance.

    After a while, he opened his eyes again and looked at me with a deep sigh.

    Looks like he''se to his senses.

    He might as well have just given up on rebuttal, but it wouldn''t have made much difference.

    "Well, I''m not the only one who needs to be awakened, am I? I think there''s a danger that this will lead to a temporary decline in battle strength, have you considered this aspect?

    "There are twelve guys who are eligible for awakening, but only nine can be awakened at the moment.

    I was going to let Testarossa and the girls stay as escorts. A few days of reduced battle strength should be no problem.

    "I see. There''s the maze, too. It''s not a problem if you just stall for time.

    Benimaru seemed to ept my instructions.

    The rest of the question is the possibility of storming out.

    "But there''s one thing I care about.

    "What is it?"

    "You are stronger now than I was when I first evolved. Since the growth rate after awakening is unknown, it''s possible for you to be even stronger than me after evolution.

    In that case, I probably would have received some kind of feedback through the ''food chain'' of the

    ''King of Gluttony'' with the extreme power.

    Even so, it was still possible for Benimaru to be stronger than me. That said, it always felt like Diablo was definitely going to get better than me.

    I don''t think Benimaru and the others would betray, but the possibility of these guys being swayed by forces that cause a rampage is hard to dismiss.

    It felt like it would be okay to have this istion space in ce to prevent a rampage, but I was still uneasy about it.

    "Even if we have such anxiety in our hearts, will we be awakened?"

    "Something like that.

    "We are loved. In order not to lose to any enemy, we must use all means at our disposal, right? Well, I''ll be sure to respond in anticipation of showing it to you.

    Without having to make my words very clear, Benimaru already understood my thoughts, and even made a bold promise that he would never storm out.

    Really reliable.

    I trust you.

    "Look at me.

    That''s exactly when Shunas speech ended.

    So, I gave the reward right away.

    *** "Benimaru! This battlemand, it was brilliant! From this day forward, you can call yourself The

    re Lord''!"

    "Yes, thank you!

    The ceremony begins.

    Even though normally casual, in front of the soldiers is a big deal. Benimaru''s response to this public-private distinction was perfect.

    The title of re Lord" was given to Benimaru because he had be a "true demon lord" but still could not im to be a demon lord, a title that implied being a substitute.

    What is called wrath is intense anger.

    Benimaru, who was originally irritable, has now be able to keep his cool. Its essence, however, there remains the burning mes. Only now he''d switched to a quiet burn and has be able to control those rages.

    As a monster in the form of following me, there is no more fitting title for him than this.

    <<notice. use="" the="" prescribed="" amount="" of="" "100,000="" souls"="" to="" help="" individual="" named="" benimaru="" evolve?="" yes="" no=""> YES.</notice.>

    At the same time, a soul corridor" was formed between me and Benimaru. Not something as thin as it used to be, but a clear and solid connection formed.

    One hundred thousand souls flowed to Benimaru through this connection.

    At the same time, the evolution of the Benimaru beganand it did not.

    No change.

    Huh, it failed?

    When I thought so, Benimaru replied with a puzzled expression.

    "It seems that my evolution requires another condition.

    "How so?"

    "Ah, no, it''s not Lord Rimuru''s business, it seems I''m the one who''s the problem"

    For some reason, Benimaru became ambiguous.

    Huh?

    It always feels suspicious.

    "What kind of an answer is that?

    I whispered a question to Benimaru and got a surprising answer.

    "Actually, I just heard the voice of the world. It''s as if I can evolve from a kijin to a demigod, but after that evolution it seems I wont be able to have any more children.

    ording to Benimaru, after bing a demigod, there is no longer a limit to life expectancy, so there is no need to have children.

    Well, that''s right.

    Monsters were already a fairly long-lived race, and if it was its superior race, there was nothing incredible about it indeed losing its life limit.

    In other words, the so-called spirits and kijins are mostly a kind of spiritual beings. The demon race doesn''t seem to be able to have children either, which is probably some sort of destiny for the life-limiting race.

    After all, you cane back to life even when you''re dead, so it''s no longer relevant to poption continuity or anything.

    "So, what''s the problem?

    Sadly, I can''t have children either. But it didn''t cause any inconvenience, so I didn''t see it as a problem of any kind

    " It seems that I still have a soft spot for the identity of the Great Ogre n. Even I forgot myself, it seems like I can''t do my job as patriarch without doing it properly.

    "The so-called job, is that you can''t evolve without having children?

    "Well, um. It seems that it is necessary to leave children and grandchildren behind"

    Benimaru red at me again.

    The ceremony is still going on, is that a good look?

    The participants thought I was congratting Benimaru and that if I didn''t figure it out soon, something was going to go wrong.

    A little anxious, I took a look at Benimaru''s face, and as a result, Benimaru looked around again with an embarrassed look on his face.

    This kind of Benimaru is really rare, he usually always has an unruly attitude, now his appearance is even more emotionally appealing.

    "Make up your mind, Benimaru."

    "No, so what?

    I ignored the Benimaru that wanted to argue and raised the volume especially.

    "So, as a reward, do you wish me to allow you to marry? So, who is the target?

    "Wait, Lord Rimuru!

    It''s time to show your manhoodits none of my business, I''m hanging myself up high.

    With such a pavement, Benimaru couldn''t make up his mind. To get thete blooming Benimaru to act, not being rough doesn''t work.

    TheThis action, which has the potential to result in a damage blow to the owner.

    Huh?

    To my query, the King of Wisdom made no answer.

    No, no, no, I don''t mind.

    I said this to myself inwardly, and at this point a loud cheer rang out from inside the fighting arena.

    Everyone heard what I said and understood the meaning of the words.

    "Brother, you''ve finally made up your mind!

    Shuna smiled brightly.

    "Young master, who are you going to name?

    Hakurou put his hand on the hilt of the knife as he asked.

    Before Benimaru could answer the question, Momiji and Albis from the guest gallery stood up.

    "Your Majesty Rimuru! Allow me to speak!

    "Can I do the same? Like Lady Momiji, I have something to ask His Majesty!"

    The two womens pressing power really isn''t covered.

    I can''t afford to say more.

    "I know, I know. So, you two cane over here, right?

    At the ceremony, it wasn''t supposed to be the asion to say such a thing, but the guys inside the arena have all turned into spectators waiting for a good show.

    So no one isining, rather, it feels like they''d be more upset if they interrupted now.

    The two came forward and I gave them permission to speak.

    "Your Highness, as a reward for this, I hope you will allow me to marry Lord Benimaru.

    Momiji was the first to put such an extremely bold request out of her mouth.

    Moreover, Hakurou followed close behind.

    "Lord Rimuru, the reward shall be that which is given. This one understands that taking the initiative to ask for a reward is not in line with the rules. But Id like you to listen to my daughter''s request.

    For this request, Hakurou was willing to cede his martial arts honor to Momiji.

    The way things are going, it''s going to be hard for me to say no to this father-daughter pair.

    Benimaru, who couldn''t keep up with the situation, was still in petrification, and his high judgement had obviously always been highly regarded, but it seemed that this guy''s head hadn''t even been working up to now.

    Then the statements that made the situation even more confusing came up.

    "Your Majesty, allow me to be the second wife of Lord Benimaru.

    Slowing Momiji to a beat, Albis uttered such words.

    Benimaru and I couldn''t help but use "Huh?" at the same time we responded to her.

    Momiji and Albis'' increasingly intense offense and defense around Benimaru, a situation that seems to be known as free fighting romanticism, has be a well known topic. That is, have the two already split the spoils before we know it?

    "So, that means Momiji as firstdy and Albis as seconddy?"

    Yes!"

    Exactly."

    Momiji and Albis replied with a happy face.

    Benimaru had rolled his eyes.

    While it is not known what happened between the two, a clear sequence seems to have been generated.

    "It''s unbing of a wife to let Lord Benimaru worry about such things. Albis and I will not ask Lord Benimaru to choose one of us, please marry both of us.

    "Wait, this can''t be"

    "It''s okay. I''ve agreed with Lady Momijiwith Lord Benimaru''s talent, there will be no problem, that''s our conclusion.

    No no no no, how on earth did youe to that conclusion!?

    Benimaru looked at me with a pleading look.

    Well, I''m not sure it''s that easy to help

    <<notice. ording="" to="" the="" current="" rules="" of="" jura="" tempest="" federation,="" one="" them="" is="" ''polygamy="" may="" be="" permitted="" if="" it="" for="" purpose="" leaving="" children="" and="" grandchildren.="" but="" only="" survivors="" who="" wish="" bear="" children.="" so="" in="" this="" case,="" it''s="" impossible="" endorse="" second=""dy.="">> Oooooohhhh!</notice.>

    There is indeed such a thing.

    Although a little concerned about why the King of Wisdom would be so active in providing assistance, this way Benimaru would be saved.

    "I''m sorry, Miss Albis. In our country, only survivors who wish to have children can be seconddies.

    In the future I intend to make betterws, and by then these rules may still be changed, so I can''t give you permission yet

    I was ready to reject Albis'' request with an apologetic tone, and Benimaru nodded with a relieved expression on his face, but we who thought this topic would stop there were mistaken.

    "Don''t worry. The rules for this, I looked into carefully beforehand. Actually, I just got married a little while ago

    Hey, did you get married not too long ago?

    With whom?that said, wouldn''t it be even more impossible for you to marry Benimaru?

    What Albis said next, however, went far beyond my expectations.

    and yet experienced a sad state of affairs with the death of my husband. Therefore, I have now fulfilled the conditions to be Lord Benimaru''s second wife.

    Huh?

    Give me a minute, that wouldn''t be because of the war, would it?

    If that were the case, it would be a big problem, but Albis'' next sly exnation made me feel so stupid that I felt so worried about myself.

    "Wait, wait, wait? So, who is that husband who married you?

    "That''s Phobio over there in the guest gallery.

    Albis told me with a smile.

    ........

    So, Mr. Phobio, it looks like you''re still alive?

    Benimaru and I looked at each other in confusion.

    "What''s going on?

    "I don''t know if you ask me."

    "And so it is

    It didn''t even take ''thoughts to convey'', and the two of us were able toplete the conversation just by sight.

    Phobio came to us and knelt down with a very guilty look on his face.

    "I''m really, really sorry. My Albis, who speaks in such a self-righteous way.

    "No, no, no. You''re married? More importantly, what''s the deal with death?

    "About that

    And then the fodder began to break.

    Momiji, Albis, and Phobio, after listening to these three''s exnations, I finally got a general idea of Albis'' n.

    In short.

    After several fist fights, a certain friendship develops between Momiji and Albis. So the two changed the general direction of things frompeting with each other to assisting each other.

    What should we do if we want the two of us to marry Benimaru together?

    The answer to this question, after much trouble, is that Albis married Phobio first. After the marriage, the two went to a duel in thebyrinth, with the condition of victory until one of them died in battle, and Albis won the title of survivor.

    Since the duel took ce in thebyrinth, Phobio certainly survived in the end.

    "And on one condition, if I win, then really marry me. So, can I cry?

    Is that the reason Phobio was willing to join the program?

    The drooping panther looked so pathetic that even I couldn''t help but begin to pity him.

    So, what should we do if things turn out this way?

    "Rigurd, is it okay to do this?

    "Yes! It''s really a simple and straightforward theory of power. To get what is wanted, to make all wisdom and strength to pursue the results. If you ask me, it''s totally fine to have it!

    I see.

    To what Rigurd said, the three of them, Regurd, Rogurd, and Rugurd, also nodded in unison.

    Seriously.

    In the eyes of magical creatures, Albis'' approach really works.

    "Brother. Both Lady Momiji and Lady Albis have shown themselves to such a degree of enlightenment, please behave like a man and answer people properly!

    Shuna is also a proponent of the Albis Initiative.

    No, it''s not just Shuna.

    "If you hate it, you hate it, and if you''re troubled, you''re troubled, isn''t that what you''re saying? What''s there to worry about?

    Shion doesn''t seem to have thought much about it at all, but makes a fairly correct argument. However, she didn''t seem to object to Benimaru marrying both of them at the same time, and saying so was simply an attempt to urge.

    Surprisingly, there were no objections.

    What ethics, what impurity, seems theres no one to have such feelings.

    Indeed, when you think about it, the rule of magical creatures is of the weak and the strong.

    The strong can get their hands on everything, and the rules I''veid down will keep them in check at best. If I want it to be so, and no one expresses displeasure, then it doesn''t matter even if I agree.

    "Benimaru, how long do you want to worry? If you act so indecisive, you''ll beughed at by your father in that world.

    ''Souei...don''t say such things. So I expect to be like my father too, what''s wrong with that!?

    Was it the feeling that Soueis words were harsh, Benimaru rarely got excited.

    However, the Souei remained indifferent.

    "I don''t want to make it sound too hard. It looks like you''re doubting your love, but isn''t all you really have to do is have kids? It is impossible for a man and a woman to have children if they do not care for the other. If you don''t have an idea about the two of them, just say no in the first ce. But if you''re more or less interested in both of them, wouldnt it be just fine to have sex with them and bear fruit?

    Mr. Souei, you are also too direct.

    It was hateful that the words, which were clearly shockingly sexual harassment, were uttered by Souei and yet they made people feel cool.

    Monsters seem to be able to ept that as well.

    I''d forgotten that couples can''t have children if they do not care for each other.

    What''s bothering Benimaru is probably that it''s dishonest to love two people at the same time or something. Also, if he chooses one himself, the other person who loses will be miserable. It was because of this that he kept dragging his answers back.

    I don''t hate it when you think like that.

    But on this asion now, wouldn''t it be better to rely on the results to solve all the problems, as Souei had said.

    "Miss Albis, let''s see who will bear Lord Benimaru''s child first, and let''s fight it out!

    "I won''t lose, Lady Momiji. My love is the real deal, and the rest is just enough to make Lord Benimaru fall in love with me!

    This was supposed to be the most troublesome part, but the girls didn''t seem to be bothered by it. That being the case, it was only a matter of Benimaru''s expression.

    "Benimaru, it''s a celebration, and it''s still the part that honors your achievements. So whatever capricious statement you have I will allow you to make, just say what you mean. Which side do you choose for Momiji and Albis'' courtshipept or reject?

    If Benimaru doesn''t want to, that''s the end of the conversation.

    But if it is not so

    "Momiji, Albis, I may not be able to stay by your side forever, as Lord Rimuru guardian. Even so, are you still willing to choose me?

    Sure enough, Benimaru was honest no matter what, he seemed to have even thought about the future situation.

    After resolving this attachment of leaving a son behind, Benimaru evolves into a demigod. And when he bes the kind of existence that has no lifespan limit, there wille a time when he will be forever separated from Momiji and Albis.

    Right. Because only he evolved himself, then he must have to live longer than his two wives

    To rush an answer in such a scene is too much.

    Me too, nothing real yet, but I think it would be painful if a loved one passed away before themselves.

    But then again, I''m not talking about a specific person, but all of my peers.

    I can understand what''s bothering Benimaru. Momiji and Albis'' moods may have wavered, but looking at the results shows that I''mpletely paranoid.

    "No problem at all! After raising my children, Ill also tried to evolve myself.

    "I feel the same way. Even if you can''t evolve, my children will be able to take care of your worries.

    Women are so strong.

    Momiji and Albis unflinchingly showed their awareness.

    Hearing these responses, Benimaru revealed a valiant smile.

    "Lord Rimuru! I want to marry them both. Will you allow me?"

    That being said, I can''t say no to that, and I didn''t mean to.

    Although this time it sets a precedent of using ploys to forcefully bend the rules, as long as one has to exchange permission for achievements like this one, it might instead give many people hope of bing more diligent.

    Forget it and leave it at that, I''ll make that judgment.

    Although Benimaru is hard-core, he is a pure lover, if you leave him alone, God knows how long he would be single, I think this is a good opportunity.

    To put it mildly, "Do you really love Momiji and Albis at the same time? That''s the pointbut I''m sure Benimaru will be able to get over the hump.

    Add some gas for him by the way.

    I jumped out of my chair and changed into human form.

    Then it was announced loudly.

    "Permission granted! In my name, acknowledge Benimaru and Momiji, and the Knotted Soul of Albis!

    For magical creatures, so-called marriage is something like souls joining to each other. So the statement that you can''t have children without love is indeed an unmistakable fact.

    It is for this reason that the act is appropriate for the term "spirit-knot".

    Hearing my promation, the corners of Benimaru''s mouth showed a smile, his expression tinted with joy, and his face turned redBut he still raised his chest and stretched out his arms to take Momiji and Albis into his arms.

    "Thank you very much. I will love both of them well and show everyone how sincere I am!

    Hearing Benimaru say so, Momiji and Albis both had tears in their eyes with happiness, a look of emotion that could not be uttered without words.

    Honestly, Im so envious of Benimaru.

    Being married to a beautiful girl and a beautiful woman at the same time is a real handful.

    Count, count, I''m not qualified to say anything about anyone else.

    Since I don''t have a gender, there''s nothing I can do about it

    Benimaru''s words caused a loud cheer to erupt from inside the arena.

    Shuna happily sent her blessings to her brother, and for some reason, Shion kept apuding with a proud expression on her face.

    Of course, there are not only blessings in the cheers, but also words like "I''m so jealous, I hate you so much," but that''s a blessing.

    Just like that, surrounded by the solidarity of the participants of the celebration ceremony, Momiji, Albis and Benimaru became husband and wife.

    As much as it''s tempting to just go ahead and celebrate them, the ceremony is still going on and I want to make it a priority toplete the evolutionary ritual. Let''s get the word out now and wait until the evolutionary ceremony in the name of the celebration is over, and then make it good for a Benimaru wedding.

    We were going to have a banquet today, and it would have been more fun to celebrate more.

    Anyway, let''s get the celebration going first.

    After letting a blissful face of Benimaru retire them, I ordered Shuna to prepare.

    The cheers, which continued unabated, finally subsided when I raised my hand.

    What an unexpected surprise.

    In the corner of the line of sight is found the weeping of others, and Phobio, who somehow goes up tofort, but now that time is precious, let''s continue to carry the ceremony forward.

    ***

    I morphed into a Slime again and sat back in my chair.

    After that, the voice of Shunas majestic voice rang out in the venue, which was still in a state of excitement.

    "Three army Chiefs, move forward!"

    The so-called three army Chiefs, the officers of the First, Second, and Third Corps, that is, the three of Gobta, Geld, and Gabil, all of whom are now kneeling before me.

    Let''s start with the Hobgoblin.

    "Ahem! Gobta-kun. You, no reward!

    I let out such words to Gobta, who was looking at this side with a look of expectation.

    "Hey! Thats too much! So, why did you call me here fizz?

    "Good question. You don''t have a reward, but in lieu of that, I think I can give you a right.

    Right?"

    Even if given a "soul", Gobta would not evolve.

    Although this kid can be described as a result of his talent, but there is nothing that can be done about it.

    I''ve thought about giving him weapons or defensive gear, but I don''t think Gobta would be able to use it even if he got something more powerful than what he has now. Besides, this guy is able to y "magic wolf" with Ranga, so he doesn''t need any equipment.

    Given money, this kid certainly wouldn''t use it for serious business.

    What''s more, the army Chief is supposed to be a highly paid position. Money for money trantes into a good number of points per month, so life on the hobgoblin should be pretty easy.

    Usually, in human countries, there are presumably territorial awards and the like, but we have no territory that can be ceded. Also, the hobgoblins are not estimated to be able to do the business of ruling the territory, so such rewards are meaningless.

    That''s why it urred to me that I could reward Gobta with some sort of special privilege.

    Gobta looked puzzled at my words.

    Speaking of rights alone, he probably couldn''t understand what was going on.

    Then, Ill just tell him the answer.

    "That is, your right to be with me in the same casual tone as you have always been with me!

    I shed a bad smile at the puzzled hobgoblin and made this deration.

    Before Gobta had a chance toprehend my words, the meeting hall erupted into a cheer that was even louder than Benimaru''s at that moment just nowrather, it should have been a roar. It''s all loud voices that don''t hide their jealousy.

    Even Shion and Shuna stared at Gobta with terrifying stares.

    They seemed particrly envious.

    "So, that, is it true?"

    "After all, you guys can''t even say a word of respect, can you? It''s better to take this opportunity to acknowledge that you have the right to do so than to fail for such reasons in the future.

    While one can feel the reverence, the tone of the wording doesn''t work at all, that''s the kind of guy Gobta is.

    I usually tell people to feel free to talk to me, but it''s hard for them to do so. Quite a few of them seem toin regrly about the overly ordinary way of talking like Gobta.

    Considering the external face, wanted to ask me to think of something like this.

    If it''s going to be a problem, just recognize it as a "right" of the hobgoblin.

    The foreign guests, Phobio and Granny Jane, were also present, and at this time it was specially advertised that the Gobta problem would be solved.

    Well, while there are all sorts of troublesome issues like decency and authority, we are magical creatures and don''t need too rigid a system.

    I have my standards of conduct.

    It''s not the surface that matters, it''s the inside.

    Gobta is a good example.

    It was spoken in that tone, but his loyalty was genuine.

    Just look him in the eye and you''ll see.

    I could see in his eyes that Gobta didn''t care if he died as long as it was for me.

    That''s why I gave him this "right".

    "Many thanksThank you very much.

    The smiling Gobta gave me a ny degree bow of thanks.

    Very happy.

    Presumably, Gobta had been adjusting his tone of voice.

    But absolutely nothing works just fine.

    The reward seemed better than anything to the hobgoblin, and I was happy.

    It''s kind of hard to prepare the right rewards.

    ***

    Well, after Gobta is Geld.

    "Geld, from this day forward you will call yourself the Barrier Lord!"

    I, Geld, ept this title! I will not disrespect the name of the Barrier Lord" and improve!

    Geld responded forcefully.

    To great cheers, I secretly told Geld the behind-the-scenes details.

    "Like Benimaru, I''m going to try an evolutionary ritual on you too.

    "What the hell is that?"

    Since it was too much trouble to exin it again every time, I connected all the people who were going to give "souls" to them with the "thought transmission" and exined the evolution ceremony to everyone.

    I didn''t forget to use "Thinking elerator" during this time. In this way, important conversations can bepleted in less than a few seconds of real time.

    It was only after my note had ended that Geld opened his mouth to respond.

    "Much appreciated, but I think there is someone better suited to this reward than I. In this battle, Lady Carrera, who is the Controller, gets more credit. Since she too is qualified, be sure to give this opportunity to Her Excellency Carrera, not to me

    Uh-huh, he''s trying to get away with relying on the soul power to awaken?

    I didn''t n on letting Carrera evolve this time, she''s undoubtedly done a great job, but she''s dangerous enough now that it would bother me for her too get more power and storm out.

    Because I had to watch the situation first, I chose to advance the old subordinate that I could trust with peace of mind.

    Hearing this exnation from me, Geld was still a bit confused.

    "But, I

    By the way, Geld had his share of uneasiness.

    After getting the power, you will not storm out.

    Also, there''s atonement in this, right?

    Because of the stormy departure of the orc n at that time, the Great Forest of Jura suffered quite a disaster.

    As the one responsible for that event, one must be strict with oneself.

    Geld looked at me with that look of strong will, full of determination.

    That''s why I answered him like that.

    "Don''t worry, Geld. Even though Geld, the orc disaster king, had stormed out, it was all for hispanions, right?

    Geld is not going to storm out.

    As long as there was such an enlightenment, no matter what kind of power he should be able to control.

    And

    There is no longer anyone who will denigrate Geld for what he did in the past.

    "Although you still hold a sense of responsibility for what happened then, I believe in such a you. If it were you, you''d be able to use your new power to protect everyone!

    If Geld had evolved, his minions would have been blessed. In other words, our country will be more solidly guarded.

    Hearing this rification from me, the glow in Geld''s eyes grew stronger.

    in that case, I will ept your kindness!

    Then promised me.

    This is Geld, a man who does not exert his strength for himself but for his fellow men.

    By the way, no one other than Geld has rejected evolution. Some people, though uneasy, are more expectant.

    It''s not good to not consult with them beforehand, but it''s important that things like this go with the flow. I was also relieved to hear that everyone was willing.

    I will continue with the ceremony after I have lifted the ''thought transmission''.

    "You''ve done a great job, and as a reward, I''ll give you this.

    After saying that, I signaled to Shuna.

    Shuna smiled and nodded, handing the pre-prepared outfit to Geld.

    The armor and shield are legendary equipment seized during this battle, and are still something that was personally modified by me after discussing it with Garm.

    After the equipment reacted to Geld''s monster aura, it became a dedicated equipment that only he could use. The principle is the same as "armed with the Holy Spirit", a preciousmodity that not even Garm can reproduce.

    What''s special about the Mythic and Legendary levels is the maturity of the equipment itself, that is, the existence of something of simr rank, which evolves after a long period of time.

    Although the forms of evolution vary widely, depending on the material, a certain number of years must be met. But if the user is excellent, the speed of evolution also seems to go up several levels.

    Geld''s ability was defensive specialization, and even if it was only legendary-grade equipment, it was estimated that the defensive power could even be raised to a level that rivaled mythical-grade equipment.

    Not only that, but ording to the King of Wisdom, there is a high probability that Geld will be blessed with this evolution. Since this is the case, then I think that Geld must be able to reach the mythic level.

    In this way, his defense must have gone up several levels.

    Geld respectfully epted the reward and then gave me a bow.

    <<notice. use="" the="" prescribed="" amount="" of="" "100,000="" souls"="" to="" help="" individual="" named="" geld="" evolve?="" yes="" no="">> YESAfter reading that, Imanded Geld again.</notice.>

    "It''s been hard on you. This is a good opportunity, just picture in your mind the posture you expect and rest well.

    More than just fighting, it''s going to take an active performance in urban construction in the future, but so far he''s always working and rarely gets a good rest.

    He''s probably the hardest working one of us, isn''t he?

    It''s a rare opportunity and I hope he gets a good rest.

    "Yes! Thank you very much.

    After answering, Geld showed a very happy smile.

    Then, as if resisting the side effect of evolving into a demon lord, the dormancy of evolution, Geld returned to the queue with a bemused attitude.

    ***

    Good thing Geld could hold back that sleepiness. With that sentiment, I turned my attention to the next person.

    Gabil.

    He led the Third Corps and fought a beautiful air battle.

    Hearing my words offort, Gabil bowed his head with a sincere face.

    "Not yet. Under my generation''smand, there were many injuriesI''m ashamed of my own ipetence.

    If truth be told, Gabil has done it to himself this time.

    The idea of doing magic endurance training at the height of battle is too much for anyone to imitate.

    Or rather, it''s not that imitation doesn''te, it''s that there''s no way to imitate at all.

    I didn''t get a detailed report on the whole thing from Ultima until after the war, the level of idiocy of this guy is beyond words.

    I wish I could give Mr. Gabil a punishmentUltima has even advised me so.

    When on earth did he be such an experimentalist?

    However, it was also because of those experiments that the secret of the Dragon Warriorization, an inherent skill of the Dragon People of Gabil, was unlocked. This time, let''s be a little more self-respectful and not be so fierce as to reprimand him on the spot.

    Besides, there are more important things now.

    I switched again to "Thought Communication" and spoke to Gabil.

    Scolding him in front of everyone would be counterproductive, so this is a personal line.

    "I''ll talk to you in detail about experimenting in the warter. And Ultima has a proposal. She seems to be willing to teach you how to control mana.

    "What did you say?

    "It is said that the demon race can control mana as easily as breathing. Since she is willing to look after you, go to her and ask her for advice.

    If it''s up to me to give the punishment, it might just make Gabil feel happy, and for their sake, it''s better to let Ultima train him hard. It''s nothing. Ultima must have known to be lenient and let them suffer a little before they could reflect on themselves.

    Out of that thought I handed down this ruling.

    "My generation is not mature enough. I, Gabil, can''t thank you enough for wanting to give such a generation the opportunity to grow further! I will do my best to respond to Lord Rimuru''s expectations, so that all of us will be able to use the Dragon Warriorization freely!

    I thought Gabil would be reluctant, but he got an unexpectedly positive response.

    He seemed to havee to his senses long ago.

    Come to think of it, Gabil''s loss to Gobta because he got carried away is already a nostalgic memory.

    The once flippant character has now be much more subdued. Not only can you see the atmosphere around you, but you are also gaining the majesty of a general who has been through hundreds of battles.

    As he himself had said, there were still a lot of shorings, but this guy was originally well qualified, and had learned what it meant to be thoughtful after suffering a painful defeat and interacting with the Orcs.

    He has now be very reliable.

    Through umted experience, Gabil has grown.

    Because of this, I believe that the power can be entrusted to him.

    "The power is given to you, use it to your advantage and awaken as the Dragon Lord!

    I gave the "souls" to Gabil to help him awaken to evolution.

    Unlike Geld, Gabil''s evolution was drastic.

    The ck-purple scales turned russet, as if the burning magical essence was swimming through Gabil''s body.

    However, Gabil brilliantly put up with it all. He maintained his consciousness by relying on his qi and controlled the storms.

    It seems that his experiment was not in vain and did bear fruit.

    "Oh-oh-oh-oh! It''s expanding, the force is expanding! Thank you very much, Lord Rimuru! From now on, we will call ourselves the "Dragon Lords". From now on, I will use this power for Lord Rimuru and this country!

    Gabil''s body radiated purple electricity that toasted his body, but then instantly began to heal itself, eventually turning into a much stronger flesh.

    It seems, it seems, to have worked.

    Is it because I said he could have the title of lord, Gabil''s forehead grew beautiful horns.

    This look was both handsome and suited him well, and would even make one think that Gabil was actually so arrogant.

    But that''s just fine.

    It is a remarkable evolution of both majesty and power.

    "And so Gabil, the Dragon Lord, was born."

    That said, the evolution towards the "true demon lord" seems to be different for each individual.

    While I was in an irresistible deep sleep, Geld seemed to be able to resist it, and Benimaru was required to meet certain conditions.

    And Gabil didn''t need sleep at all, it was all over in a sh.

    "Lord Gabil, my strength has expanded!

    Exactly!"

    "So am I, Lord Gabil!

    Such a voice came from the corner of the Third Corps formation.

    The voice came from a hundred "flying dragons".

    The members of the Cyan Legion, the Lizardmen n, seemed to have received their own blessings, and all three thousand of them had actually evolved into the Dragon n.

    The "Flying Dragons" have beautifully crossed the A-level wall and gained the fighting ability of a median monster.

    It has now be normalized to unleash the ''Dragon Warriorization'', so the ability itself has disappeared. The ''Dragon Scaling'' skill that made the skin deteriorate into dragon scales seemed to be gone as well, but in exchange, they gained a new skill called ''Dragon Scaling Armorization''.

    As for how to control the power, Ill leave it to Ultima to tune them up after that, the problem was that newly acquired skill.

    Absorb the magical elements around you, covering the body with armor that can repair itself. Although the principle is the same as that of Body Armor, thetter''s high defensive power ispletely iparable. Minor damage can regenerate itself, and without the need for other protective gear, ''dragon scale armorization'' is really an affordable ability.

    Also, the effect of this skill varies from person to person, which means that it increases the strength of the armor in proportion to the user''s own strength, etc.

    Like Gabil''s ''''Dragon Scale Armorization'''', the defense strength actually soared to a level close to mythic level, which really surprised me.

    Of course, that kind ofpleteness on defense is also reflected in the physical attack. Although the race was still the Dragon People, its strength had increased so much that it was not too much to say it was another species.

    Although in the end it''s impossible to humanize it, it''s a matter of personal will, so whatever works.

    And then there are a few people who can''t be forgotten.

    Surprisingly, even the five of them, Souka and the others, had been affected by the Gabil Evolution.

    This group is the Draconians who remain humanoid. Since it''s still human, the defense is a little worse, but the speed and attack power is greatly increased.

    The holding skill is still ''Dragon Warrior Transformation'', but the transformed look has many human elements, which is apletely different style from Gabil''s.

    The dragon scales and wings seem to be able to be retracted and put away freely, and the transformation into a dragon-like pose with a wizard-like appearance.

    Souka and Gabil were obviously of the same race, but the Souka group seemed to have taken apletely different evolutionary path. It feels like if they continue to evolve this way, they''ll probably be another race next time.

    In terms of strength, the Souka Five are more powerful than the "Flying Dragons". Each of them had been strengthened to the extent that they could be called superior monsters, and Souka even harbored an amount of magical element that rivaled that of superior demon generals.

    As expected, the sess has strengthened the battle force considerably.

    ***

    Okay, now let the three army Chiefs retire first and call the others up.

    "Ranga, Hakurou, Testarossa, Ultima, Carrera,e forward!

    One can''t forget Ranga and Hakurou who served as the advisor at the mention of Gobta.

    There is also the trio of demonesses that I appointed as intelligence marshals and ombudsmen.

    Ranga answered the call and silently emerged from my shadow.

    Hakurou also eliminated the breath that appeared.

    Testarossa elegantly, Ultima breezily, and Carrera majestically, everyone came to the podium and knelt before me.

    When everyone arrived, it was time to give them their rewards in order.

    First, Ranga.

    He assisted Gobta very hard.

    "Ranga, you not only fought with Gobta, but you protected him well, and I thank you.

    "What a word you are, my lord. It''s all taken for granted for me!

    Hahaha, cute guy.

    However, I was well aware that Ranga was happy about getting a reward from me, after all, his tail hadn''t stopped wagging.

    "So, from today on, you can call yourself the Star Lord!''"

    "Yes, sir!

    Ranga responded with a growl.

    During this time, a soul corridor" was established between him and me.

    Like me at the time, Ranga immediately began to evolve, and the harvest sacrifice that belonged to it seemed to have begun as well.

    "Well, well, well, my Lord

    "Do you really want to sleep? Then don''t push yourself.

    It''s not something to hold back either.

    Back in my shadow Ranga fell into sleep.

    Judging from his appearance, the monster wolves under hismand must have been blessed as well.

    What they will look like when they evolve seems very much to be expected.

    Ranga didn''t storm off, just fell asleep in my shadow.

    That''s fourpleted.

    It looks like there is no need to worry about it anymore, but let''s tense up and carry on with the ritual.

    Next up is Hakurou.

    "Thank you, Hakurou, for your excellent work as Gobtas advisor.

    "It''s nothing. Gobta has also grown, and he may soon no longer need this ones assistance.

    "No, no, there''s a big difference between the presence and absence of Hakurou. So, as far as rewards are concerned

    "Just a moment, please, Lord Rimuru. You have just fulfilled the request of Little Momiji, and that is enough for me.

    Ahhhh, so you say, Hakurou said something like that just now.

    However, I couldn''t really just do what Hakurou said.

    "Two different things. I also wish Benimaru and Momiji happiness. Besides, even Albis broke in at the end. You''re in aplicated mood as a father, aren''t you?

    I set up the "Thought Communication" again and talked to Hakurou. It''s a valuable skill to be able tomunicate your thoughts in front of arge group of people who don''t even need to worry about time.

    "That is a point. But this one has always believed in the Young Master and trusted Lord Benimaru.

    Besides, my daughter is equally discerning. In that case, I''m satisfied.

    "That''s great. I''m sure Benimaru will give them happiness.

    However, whether or not the two end up having children is a matter for only God to know.

    So"

    "Wait a minute. It''s important to reward merit, right? Besides, the prize for you is the one I asked Kurobee to create. Even if it''s just to keep Kurobee from getting busy, I want you to take this.

    That''s right, I''ve prepared a newly built knife for Hakurou.

    Kurobee''s craft has been getting better and bettertely. Therefore, his delightful work was really powerful, and it was a first-ss itemparable to a legendary-grade weapon.

    By the way, Benimaru''s "Red Lotus" was also given to Kurobee to be rebuilt.

    In previous battles, Benimaru was unable to make a true feat because of the poor performance of his weapon. Kurobee, who had heard about it, struggled as if he was ming himself.

    To be sure to recreate a knife of the finest qualityafter so demonstrating his determination, until now he had shut himself up in the workshop to try.

    Although it wasn''t quite as fond as Red Lotus, Kurobee had put his heart and soul into this sword, so I''m sure he would like it.

    ''''So, Kurobee heIn that case, I''ll take it with gratitude!

    "Oh, you''re wee to take it!

    Great, great.

    I was also troubled as to what to do if Hakurou refused to ept.

    While humility is a virtue, I always feel like everyone is a little too polite.

    All right, go ahead.

    "Don''t care. This is a special knife for you, so take it!

    "Indeed, Lord Rimuru must not be allowed to care in vain. Then I, Hakurou, ept this sword!

    With that, the knife was handed over smoothly to Hakurou.

    Next it was the turn of the demon women''s trio.

    In fact, at first, it bothered me what to do with a few of them.

    If only to consider the enhancement of war power, it would be the right thing to let the three demon females evolve. But as I said to Benimaru and Geld, this evolution belongs to temptation.

    Theck of souls is also a reason, and more importantly, I am troubled by the question of being able to harness them well after evolution.

    Since we don''t know how strong these three can be, we''ll keep them for now this time.

    The three of them are on the same level as Diablo, so I wanted to try and get Diablo to evolve first and see what happens.

    The Diablo side, in another sense, gives me great uneaseforget it, it''s better not to think too much about it.

    ording to my observation, Diablo gives the impression of being a head taller than these three women. Even as a "primordial", this guy''s personality seems particrly strong.

    The trio of demonesses were handed over to Diablo to manage as my immediate subordinates, in that case, it was better to let the three of them evolve after Diablo had finished evolving.

    However, the souls I collected this time are not enough to help them evolve.

    There seems to be some sort of check and bnce formed between the three guys, so they can''t be allowed to create the question of who is better or worse.

    If I had to say it, it would be too dangerous.

    If the three women are not allowed to evolve simultaneously, they will sh.

    It wasn''t as if Geld had made the suggestion earlier, nor had he thought of letting Carrera advance alone, and the reason why he had stopped was for that reason.

    Besides, just looking at the amount of mana, Carrera was already above Diablo. To give her more power in this situation, I think it was a gamble that was too dangerous.

    Uncontroble forces will destroy themselvesthere is such a feeling.

    For example, the nuclear strike spell that Carrera used, Gravity Copse, really didn''t work. If that one trick had failed, even the Geldites would have been blown away.

    Although Carrera is inplete control of Gravity Copse, the fact that she doesn''t hesitate to use this magic on such asions is also a bit unsettling.

    No matter what, it''s important to confirm safety.

    It is better to let them not evolve based on their future performance.

    "Testarossa, Ultima, Carrera. All three of you have produced very good results as intelligence officers.

    The "souls" that you have collected, I have put to effective use. These are clearly things you have collected and not used on you, and to do so may displease you

    I wanted to keep quiet about the evolution, but most of the "souls" used this time were collected by the three of them.

    It was so rude to say nothing that I made myself clear, but what I had to say was interrupted by a retort.

    "What do you mean, Lord Rimuru!? What a grievance, how could we have that thought!

    "Yeah! Let''s just say the three of us don''t think it''s enough to repay your kindness.

    "They are both right, my lord. We are content, not only with the flesh, but even with the "name". Just that''s enough, we''ve gotten stronger.

    The trio collectively stated that they had no grievances.

    Indeed, they are now overpowered.

    Even just maintaining their current intensity, they were more powerful than the Awakened Gabil.

    Hearing them say that, it did seem to me that that was indeed the case.

    But giving or not giving rewards is a different matter.

    "I am happy to hear you say so, and my heart is with you at all times. It is for this reason that I hope you will ept the reward I have for you.

    "You mean, a reward?

    But

    "There''s no way out of this. If the Lord has said so, then you can''t refuse.

    Right?

    It would be a pain in the ass if they refused, so they had to block their way back first.

    "ording to your merit this time, from now on I recognize you as part of the patrons. Just keep doing your old work in the ordinary time, and in wartime you will be given partialmand. Besides, I have a title for you too.

    Testarossa, the Killer Lord"

    Ultima, the Pain Lord"

    Carrera, the Menace Lord

    This is the title I came up with after sending a few people to do an inquiring survey. The names all sound pretty brutal, but what they reflect is what they have done in this war.

    As subordinates, they specialize in war-rted matters, and I think this arrangement may be unexpectedly well suited to them.

    "From this day forward, you are permitted to call yourselves by these names. I look forward to your active performance in the future, just like my senior subordinates.

    "As you wish

    Hearing my words, the three girls all bowed their heads in thanks.

    They seem to like the new title.

    I thought to myself how nice it was that no one protested and watched the five of them return to the queue.

    ***

    The evolutionary ritual advances with such a feeling all the way through.

    Next to be called to the stage were the minions who were active in the maze.

    Gozu and Mezu were awarded a new set of gear.

    Gedora was officially appointed as the 60th level''s ss guardian, and the Floor Guardian Colossus Statue was handed over to him. From now on, Beretta stepped down from his position as Chief of the Ten Lords of the Labyrinth. In other words, Gedora has officially be one of the Labyrinth Lords".

    In addition, I also gave him permission to enter and exit the research facilities of all walks of life as a reward, and the old man will join the research team in the future anyway. Taking this as an opportunity, I began to choose to trust him.

    Gedora is very happy about this, and it seems that I was right to give this reward.

    If he steals research data, let''s talk about it then. However, there was always the feeling that there was no need to worry about that. That old man is the type to hate andter be expected to work well for us as apanion.

    All in all, it''s been going well so far.

    So, let''s get down to business.

    The four Dragon Kings, and Beretta who retired from the Ten, are not my men, they belong to Ramiris, so they will be ced first.

    Nieth levels of floor guardiansthe Nine-Headed Beast" Nine-Tailed Kumara.

    Zegion, the "Bug Emperor", the guardian of the 80th level of the hierarchy.

    Apito, the "Bug Queen" of the Seventy-Nine Levels, the guardians of the realm.

    Adalman, the "Immortal King", the guardian of the seventy levels of the hierarchy.

    The seventy-tiered front guardthe "Pdin of the Dead" Albert.

    Heree a bunch of awesome guys.

    At this point in the ritual, I feel like I no longer have to worry about anyone storming out.

    Still, it''s better toe alone.

    First up is the Nine-Tailed Kumara.

    I gave her the title of Chimeric Lord".

    Was it because of the outstandingly aplished revenge in this battle that Kumara also looked a bit more majestic?

    Thinking about it, she was still an enemy when I first met her.

    One never knows what kind of turnaround is hidden somewhere in the world.

    Kumara was manipted by yman at the time, and Colonel Kansas, the culprit behind the phenomenon, has been knocked down, and her transformation now is something I am both happy and proud of.

    The reason why I put her in thebyrinth was also because Ranga told me that the she was good at pioneering the forest and suggested that she be the ss guardian of the 90th levels, so I gave permission.

    Without that suggestion, Kumara might still be a small fox to this day. Although I knew that she was a young beast of the powerful race, I never thought that she could reach the level of being called a Labyrinth Lord".

    No, from the moment I named her, Kumara may have been destined for this fate.

    I''m grateful for Ranga''s offer.

    Nowadays, Kumara had be the master of the eight demonic beasts.

    The strength of each of these magical beasts that served as guardians of the 82nd to 89th realms was equivalent to that of the Cmity level.

    They''re the eight sects of the Nine-Tailed Kumaraer, actually, I have an impression of these eight guys too.

    After a few days had passed since I first named Kumara, I took the opportunity to go over and check on her condition while walking. It was then that Kumara asked me to call out the names of these friends of hers.

    I was introduced to a group of monsters that looked very cute and young.

    I have had countless failures in "naming" magical creatures, and it is because of this that I can understand how dangerous the naming thing is.

    However, that time it was just a matter of calling the name of the tail beast that the Nine-Tailed Kumara had told me once, so I easily agreed out of the idea of ''It doesn''t matter, does it?

    Of course, I said yes to a request from a young girl or somethingtheres no such thing as an unseemly thought, and everyone understands it even if it''s not exined carefully.

    I didn''t expect that it would turn out like this

    In retrospect, I doubt that was actually a "naming" of sorts.

    After all, the eight tailed beasts introduced to me at that time were all high in fighting power to the point where they are now.

    <> Ah, yes.</answer.>

    Since they didn''t turn into low activity, the tails didn''t notice any change at the time, so I didn''t realize it until I saw the sight of them fighting, and it urred to me that that might be the case.

    Those lovely magical beasts have now be the eight monsters that contain the fierce power.

    What an amazing back and forth of cause and effect.

    No matter who was surprised, I was the one who was the most surprised.

    In fact, it''s the equivalent of nine names that Kumara got from me.

    Also as a result, the ties between the eight tail beasts and Kumara were strengthened. Then, when the power of the tail beast''s growth after absorbing the dense monster aura returned to Kumara, it disyed that kind of powerfulbined strength.

    Forget it, it''s no use thinking about what''s done.

    If it hadn''t done that, there was a chance that Kumara would have lost this time, so let''s take the result to mean everything.

    I give the souls to Kumara.

    Just after giving, Kumara had sessfully evolved and awakened.

    The eight beasts in the back also returned to her with a glow. Next, Kumara turned into a state of nine tails. Except for the one that was originally there, which was golden yellow, the remaining eight tails all glowed with a white-silver glow.

    These furry tails are very pretty.

    But even more beautiful was the beauty of Kumara herself.

    And, she turns out to be a plump and seductive figure that waspletely unimaginable as a young girl. I think she''s taken her charm to a whole new level.

    The long, teal brown hair that had hitherto been a golden yellow, looked like a tassel of rice reflecting the sunlight, shimmered with light and hung softly at the back.

    Could evolution be beauty?

    s, the amount of magicules has certainly increased considerably. The present stage alone has surpassed the Awakened Gabil.

    I didn''t expect her to reach this level.

    The body of the Nine-Tailed Kumara alone already possessed considerablebat power. Of course, it wasn''t until she and the full eight-beasts congregation merged into a synthetic beast form that she was able to exert her greatest strength.

    And on the flip side, Kumara bing stronger meant that the Eight Beasts would follow suit and be more powerful.

    What''s more, because of being able to connect through the name souls I give, the blessings of the Nine-Tailed Kumara will only be given to the eight beasts

    And then the most foul point was that those given powers would again be returned to Kumara to further strengthen her.

    Kumara is, in a sense, exclusive to the power I gave her.

    Just from that beautiful appearance alone, it''s really hard to imagine such a ventriloquist and masterful calctor, and the current Kumara makes me feel that way.

    No wonder she didn''t have a good rtionship with the somewhat awkward Apito.

    But with such a drastic evolution, Kumara certainly couldn''t be without any burden. As she was now, it looked like she was doing her best just to stay conscious.

    If she kept going like this, she would be in danger of storming out, so she had to stop pushing herself.

    "Go home and rest.

    I gently ordered.

    Although Kumara looked somewhat discontented, she still obeyed my order honestly.

    Mostly, she would fall into a deep sleep like Ranga, taking advantage of the power that she had gained through habit.

    All in all, her growth makes one look forward to it.

    No, just now, she''s already one of the most beautiful women in the world.

    In short, Kumara exited the venue and returned to their guarded realm.

    ***

    The celebration continues.

    Next up were Zegion and Apito.

    Zegion lined up behind, starting with Apito.

    "Apito, your earlier fight was brilliant. That man, Minute, is said to be a powerful man among the Imperial soldiers. It''s true that you''re strong enough to fight someone like that. You can be proud.

    When all is said and done, what I''m after in Apito is not power. What I hope to get from her is honey, and as long as the honey is high enough in yield and quality, I am satisfied.

    The fact that she has unwittingly be one of the "Ten Lords of the Labyrinth" as the "Bug Queen"

    is, in my opinion, an incredible phenomenon.

    "You''re joking. I''m not even close. After losing all mypatriots, I was unable to draw with my opponent.

    "No, no, nothing like that"

    I was just about to deny it, and seeing Apito''s smile made me speechless again.

    "I didn''t get aplete victory this time. As a result, I don''t think I''m eligible for the award.

    "That''s not what it says

    "However, if you will allow me to make my own wish, will you please board the souls of mypatriots who died in battle once more?"

    What did you say?

    Just said there was no need for a reward, but then suddenly this outrageous conundrumes up!

    These guys, they definitely mistook me for the super-duper guys who can do anything. How could anything like that be

    <></answer.>

    Can you do it?

    Not to mention me, the King of Wisdom is really superb.

    "Got it. Then let the spirits board you.

    Apito''spatriots are the ones who didn''t get the "resurrection bracelet". While it''s doubtful that these bugs can be called Ensign, that''s what I''ll say on such asions.

    I am grateful.

    Although Apito is not eligible for evolution, I think she should be able to receive the blessings thate with Zegion''s evolution. So, I decided to ask her what she wanted anyway.

    Apito looks happy now, and this should be the right thing to do.

    Then came Zegion.

    Zegion is the strongest, which is why I wanted to leave him behind, but it seems I''m worrying for nothing again. Just looking at this calm and collected state that Zegion was now in, it was impossible for him to have anything to do with storming off.

    He deserves to be the strongest presence in the maze.

    The unparalleled battle judgment that even the King of Wisdom agreed with, the amount of mana that could rival Benimaru. After taking Veldora as his teacher, he became proficient in the entric fighting techniques from manga.

    Such a Zegion is certainly strong.

    This war was also the one in which the other Ten Lords of the Labyrinth" were locked in a bitter battle with the imperial powers, and he alone broke them all.

    Also when everyone''s an opponent, it''s just an idiot to fight and lose. However, Zegion was able to easily crush his opponent, taking out all those strongmen in a few strokes.

    That''s more than enough to show how good he is.

    Although it was only spection, Zegion was more than a normal demon lord. Even I, who had awakened as the "true demon lord", might have fallen into his hands.

    If Zegion awakens again

    It was estimated that even Diablo and the few of them couldn''t beat this guy, and they were really a little worried.

    However, that was then and this is now.

    I''ve already created several Awakening Demons, and to worry about this kind of thing is aplete afterthought.

    Now there are five guys who have gotten the "souls" and are in the middle of an evolutionary ritual.

    The proof is that from just now I have felt a power passing through me constantly.

    The harvest festival of those who fell into slumber was returned to me through the ''food chain''.

    Although it was a veryrge force, my body was like a tank that was short of oil, receiving all this force without any problem.

    It shouldn''t be a problem.

    It''s important to have a good attitude at a time like this, so don''t think about it in one breath.

    Fear not, move forward!

    That''s how I feel when I put my mind in order.

    It''s better to think backwards for now. For example, think about how far Zegion can actually get stronger and such.

    Thinking about it that way, it bes a lot to look forward to.

    Although Zegion has the possibility of surpassing even me, as long as the ''food chain'' remains, my advantage will not be reversed. Having been convinced of this, I no longer had any qualms about starting the ritual again.

    "You''re really something. Honestly, I didn''t think you''d grow this far.

    "It''s all good to be guided by Lord Rimuru.

    No, it was Veldora who guided you, wasn''t itwait?

    The King of Wisdom has also made a lot of small moves behind my back. So, Zegion may have mistook the King of Wisdom for me.

    It''s also a pain in the ass to correct, so just pretend I did it.

    "No need to be modest. These are the results of your unrelenting efforts all along. Next, keep sharpening this power for me. Then I give you permission to call yourself "The Mist Lord" from this day forward.

    "Yes, I''m awestruck, I''m d!"

    Zegion''s words were still so few, but he still shuddered with emotion at my words.

    Even if I''m just saying that, it''s probably the same as hearing the gospel in Zegion''s ear, it''s like having a worship filter installed, but it''s nice to be admired at this level.

    I originally took Zegion out of the idea of protecting the rare insects, but now it''s be a position of being guarded by him.

    Zegion''s growth wasn''t something I deliberately cultivated; it''s just that his talents are really overblown. Add to that, the fact that Zegion lived in the dense magical aura that Veldora had leaked out, and the cultivation environment where one could die ande back to life. Also, there couldn''t be a more perfect cultivation opponent that was more powerful than him.

    Never mind, the reasoning and all that is just a small thing.

    It was enough to have this result that Zegion eventually became strong.

    I give the "souls" to Zegion.

    Although he shuddered for a moment, Zegion immediately suppressed the torrent of power with his spirit. Unlike Gabil, he really put up with it by sheer perseverance.

    Seeing such a great performance, I feel more and more that I have no perseverance when I wake up and fall asleep easily.

    Usually, it''s not a problem that can be solved with courage and perseverancebut the examples of what can be done are right in front of us and it''s really impossible to refute.

    Zegion evolved into an extremely terrifying being.

    Part of the Zegion''s shell, ording to Zegion''s will became metamorphosable into pr metal.

    Coupled with the variousws that dominated, the hardness of Zegion''s exoskeleton had rivaled the mythical level.

    In other words, his flesh is a murderous weapon in itself. If one looks only at the fight, Zegion is undisputedly the strongest.

    Although for spiritual beings, the strength of the fighting battle did not determine the superiority or inferiorityEven so, it was undoubtedly still a very threatening strength.

    Zegion is still evolving and seems to have acquired all sorts of other powers. After feeling it, I''ll have to go over it to find out what he''s evolved into.

    The Harvest Festival undoubtedly took ce despite Zegion''s reliance on will to force a suppression.

    As I suspected, the object of the blessing seems to be Apito alone.

    The only people I''ve rescued with my own cells are Zegion and Apito. Because of this, for Zegion, Apito counts as his only blood rtive, I guess.

    Although there were other dangerous species in the insect ss, they suffered near total losses in this offensive and defensive battle. The lost worm can''t be resurrected and can only wait for the natural birth of a new worm again. As for Apito''s dependents, they too were all killed.

    The "souls" of these worms have just been transferred to Apito. At the time I wondered what she wanted this for, and now it seems to be used to strengthen herself, as evidenced by the evolution of Apito.

    During the ceremony, Apito likewise did not give me a pained look. That nd attitude remained intact, maintaining the majesty of the Queen.

    Like Zegion, no less a first-ss character.

    With admiration for these two, I told them they could return to the queue.

    ...........

    ........

    ...

    After the celebration, Zegion and Apito returned to thebyrinth where their habitat had been turned into a cocoon, and then smoothlypleted their evolution.

    While receiving the blessing from Zegion, Apito uses the "souls" of her dependents and subordinates to keep a huge amount of energy inside her body. The result was that her flesh copsed at once, then reborn and transformed into a body that was stronger and better suited for battle.

    The newborn Apito used her unique skill, ''Queen Worship'', which she acquired by her own power, to create insect-type monsters with the characteristics of plural insects, and she managed to get nine of them at once.

    The unique skill "Queen Worship" can devour the ecological characteristics of an insect and create a monster with the corresponding characteristics.

    In the future, swarming groups will be formed in the Insect Order, culminating with these monsters.

    Then, Apito will be the true queen of the King''s Landing Bug ss.

    Apito is both one of the Ten Lords of the Labyrinth" and subservient to Zegion. As a result, Zegion would not be shy about pouring favor on her. In this way, an evolutionary anomaly such as this one can be exined.

    It''s just that the blessed Apito was able to evolve so much, and one can only imagine how much Zegion himself had evolved against the sky.

    Even just looking at the strength of the flesh after thepletion of the evolution, the amount of mana in Zegion''s secret collection was enough to overpower the Awakened yman. The main problem, however, still lies in an ability that Zegion acquired through evolution.

    Apito''s ''Queen Cult'' had a destructive performance that was close to matching that of the Great Sin skill, which was already very powerful, but Zegion''s ''level'' was obviouslypletely different.

    He has acquired the real power of the ultimate skill, the ultimate skill Mephisto ''King of Illusion.

    As a disciple of Veldora, this ability was simply too good for Zegion.

    Having gained this power, no one could ever again shake Zegion''s position as king of the maze.

    Apito created the insect paradise, and as the king and queen who ruled the paradise, Zegion and Apito established themselves as absolute in the maze.

    ***

    Well, the maze group still has Adalman left of them.

    Adalman who took me for a faith, was a bitno, rather argely entric character. Take, for example, Diablo''s kind of entric. Although it was also because of this that he was able to use ''divine magic'', so it wasn''t too bad

    Then again, Adalman seems to be a close friend of Gedora, and the two are said to have embarked on various studies in the past. That''s also why he was able to write the special skill ''Holy Demon Reversal'', which eliminates weakness attributes.

    I don''t particrly care about that either, maybe they''re some kind of genius at it.

    It''s an odd situation to think about when you think about it without having a brain, a device used for calction. But if it''s a magical creature, there''s nothing incredible about it.

    Among magical beings, there are some races of astral bodies and spirits that have arithmetic loops that allow them to think even without physical bodies.

    What''s more, there are those who can think with their "mind" without a brain, and there are those who have such powers.

    The Japanese word for a person with superpowers is "psychics", so he is called that.

    I myself have Shion, who has acquired plete memory'', by my side. The one she had was simply reproducing her memories, but as she continued to develop, she was able to use her "soul" and astral body to think, and became a spiritual life form free from life.

    In this way, almost all physical attacks would not be able to inflict fatal injuries on Shion, and even things like regeneration after losing flesh became possible. Nothing can pose a threat to her unless a special attack or a weapon of legendary level or above is used.

    However, Adalman was not able to reach that level, and although the King of the Necromancers was a monster of the spirit body type, he was still bound by the shackles of the flesh.

    Because the thinking circuit is in the spirit, the life-limit has nothing to do with Adalman. Even so, he could not reach the point where he could continue to exist as long as he had a Soul and an Astral Body.

    Just infinitely close to the existence of a spiritual lifeform that is not entirely immortal, that is Adalman.

    The same goes for the Pdin of the Dead, Albert, and the Dragon of the Dead.

    On top of that, they will alsoplement each other''s weaknesses and fight cautiously.

    Adalman excels at long-range attacks with magic; Albert, who is a forward guard, supports him and asionally uses magic to aid him; the Necromancer Dragon makes strong attacks from above and immediately reces Albert as a meat shield if he falls into a state of exhaustion, or if he is wounded.

    This fit pattern is their must-win battle temte.

    It takes a special attack to beat them as a small team.

    However, this time the opponent was just too bad.

    There are always people outside the world, and there is a heaven outside the world.

    This is also the principle of Hinata''s "Spirit Armor", which makes it possible to cut down various attributes when you meet a master who can use the legendary armed weapon with ease.

    Even the immortality attribute is not a problem.

    That''s the way it is with the Hakurou. The legendary sword that I gave him as a reward must be able to use it freely. In this way, his fighting ability was greatly enhanced.

    Such a person would be reliable as apanion, but this time the legendary weapon was in the hands of the enemy.

    Moreover, the user is also the strongest fighting force on the imperial sidethe superiors of the Imperial Emperor''s Order of Near Guard.

    Although the swords of Albert were a failure of Kurobee''s creation, they were also the equivalent of a quality-ss masterpiece. However, the enemy''s sword was legendary.

    Even fighting with lesser quality weapons, it barely matched the opponent''s, suggesting that Albert''s fighting skills were higher than the enemy''s. In the end his sword was broken by the enemy, and the whole squad was defeated for this reason, but it would have been obviously unreasonable to me Albert for it.

    Rather, I shouldpliment him on being so belligerent.

    "The results are unfortunate, but you fought well. Especially you Albert, your swordy can only be described by the word wonderful.

    "I''m ashamed to be."

    "Adalman, you too. It seems that unknowingly, all the magic I imparted to you is now avable. Your spirit of excellence is something I should learn from.

    I''m just as scared of trouble as everyone sees me, I''m not going to learn this and that. The idea of drilling into something other than your interests does not arise.

    But by contrast, I have the King of Wisdom as my excellent partner, so Adalman''s research maye in handy for me in the future.

    "How can that be? A man like me is not even remotely the tip of the iceberg of Lord Rimuru''s wisdom."

    It''s not me, it''s the King of Wisdom.

    Well, I''m not going to correct him either.

    "Don''t be so modest. Adalman, I will give you greater strength. I expect you to turn failure into strength and grow even more!

    "I, Adalman, would be willing to die for you, offering my powdered body and broken bones, if I were defeated in battle.

    Adalman said gratefully.

    I wish he''d stop saying unsettling words like "powdered body" and "broken bones".

    In fact, he had refused toe here when I expressed my desire for Adalman to evolve.

    "Lord Rimuru, I am not like the rest of you, but am in defeat.

    Hearing Adalman say that, I got a general idea of what he was thinking.

    It took a lot of convincing and consoling before I finally got him to ept it.

    When all is said and done, I didn''t expect much from Adalman in the first ce.

    Even when Shinji and the others reached the 60th level, I thought for a moment that Adalman and the others would lose.

    And now, Adalman has long since grown far beyond my expectations.

    It was just that this time the opponent Krishna was too bad for them.

    So, Adalman''s efforts were not too much. With that in mind, I gave him the souls."

    Although it is a significant departure from what was originally intended, the maze will be ourst bastion in the future. Fortifying the defenses here is a very important thing, which is why I let Adalman evolve.

    All the important research facilities are in the maze, and in some cases even the entire capital is isted into the maze. When he first recruited Ramiris, he had no idea that the maze could be so convenient.

    The maze that had been used by us as a yground had unwittingly be something like a fortress.

    It was all thanks to Ramiris, and Veldora. I thanked both of them in my mind and spoke to Adalman while I did so.

    "Although you arementing theck of fruit of yourbor, I have a very good opinion of you. Just use future work to justify my opinion!

    "Yes! I, Adalman, will live up to your expectations!

    Adalman''s evolution began, looking the same as I did then, and an irresistible sleepiness assaulted him.

    It''s not good to let him push himself too hard, so hurry up and finish the ritual.

    "Well, I believe you. So, from today onwards you can use the name Gehenna Lord. Keep up the good work from now on and don''t lose the name!

    "Yes, as you wish

    Whew.

    It''s exhausting to speak with a sense of majesty.

    By the way, it''s hard to think about these titles, I''ve been thinking about them all night long without sleeping.

    Granted it''s just too idle because I don''t need to sleep

    In short, Adalman also received the title of "lord", which symbolizes the highest position among my men. He is one of only twelve lords" today, although there are still possibilities for more in the future.

    As a strong big subordinate, Adalman''s speaking power will no doubt increase as well.

    The premise is that if there is a real opportunity for them to speak.

    Well, it''s not just Adalman who''s active.

    Beside Adalman, who was resisting sleep, Albert knelt. Behind them, there was the Necromancer Dragon that had shrunk its massive body into a ball.

    Both were blessed and there wasn''t much time for me to slow down and talk to them.

    I grant Albert a new weapon to rece his broken sword.

    He had already been able to use his overwhelming sword skills before, and with the right equipment, he could be a great addition to his game.

    Since that''s the case, then it would be fine to give him Kurobee''s highest masterpiecethats when the idea came to me.

    Among the loot seized from the Imperial Army this time were several sets of legendary level equipment. Then, there was the very scarce mythical-grade equipment held by Grand Admiral Calgurio.

    This mythical-grade outfit would be a waste if it was just decoration, and I would have given it to Kurobee, but Kurobee said it wasn''t needed.

    He wants to build a mythical weapon on his own!

    Kurobee had a point, and I agreed.

    The "Red Lotus" of Benimaru, re-forged by Kurobee''s hand, will surely be a mythical-grade divine weapon. I had a hunch, so this mythical-grade outfit wasn''t given to Kurobee.

    So, who is the right answer for this one?

    One look at Calgurio and one can see that Awakening alone cannot be the true master of mythical level equipment.

    Mythical equipment will choose its own user.

    It doesn''t take detailed parsing to understand such things.

    After a long period of time, the magic steel will evolve into an extreme metal and be a "god of death", I think this kind of equipment can be called mythical. To this extent, the gear would be unusable if it wasn''t for people with the appropriate qualifications.

    The Japanese concept of "paying the gods of mourning" is the legendary concept of monsters, which means that creatures are left unattended for years to absorb the essence of heaven and earth, umte grievances, or feel the Buddha''s nature and spiritual power, and then their souls are transformed into monsters.

    This kind of thing is just a dream for humans with limited life spans.

    Bing a spirit of the dead and enduring endless suffering, even so, Albert still maintains the sword skills of his life as a Knight of the Temr, and remains a noble soul. Now, he has evolved into the Pdin of the Dead, who has an endless life span.

    Coupled with Albert''s continuous study, the sword skill was enough to rival Hakurou. If it was him, wouldn''t it be just right for this mythical-grade outfit?

    That''s what I thought.

    Plus, the other subordinates had gear that they were used to. Some people and Kurobee had a deep rtionship of mutual trust, and some were even reluctant to use weapons made by others other than Kurobee.

    There are also guys like Diablo and the Demon Girl Trio who use their own "material creation" abilities to create their own equipment.

    The performance of this equipment is directly proportional to the skill level of the holder, but at least it can reach the equivalent of legendary level performance, so they don''t need any other equipment at all.

    There were even those, like Shion, who were in love with their weapon and constantly pouring magic into it. Because of this, the big sword that Shion loved to use was turned into a legendary weapon called "True Gundam.

    That said, didn''t the weapon break?

    I remember it was supposed to break in two during the fight with Razul, but now it''s back in ce.

    That''s right, just like the holder, Shion, even this love de of hers cane back to life like an phoenix.

    I''m more speechless than shocked.

    Then, there was also a pang of fear.

    In terms of cuisine, Shion poured more love into itwhat kind of substance is that!?

    The so-called love of Shion has the effect of restoring the broken de. And those dishes made with her fullmitment to love

    It feels dangerous to keep thinking about this question deeper, so lets hurry up and pull the thread back.

    Now that it''s been figured out that the phase of the weapon is an important element, there''s no need to rece the subordinate with new gear.

    These reasons are actually sufficient, but it is the advice of the King of Wisdom that is most critical.

    The King of Wisdom asserted that this mythical-level outfit given to Albert was the most appropriate.

    I also nodded without question, so the thing was decided to reward Albert.

    Anyway, that''s it, the reward for Albert is a mythical level equipment set.

    A kit of long swords and kite type shields, plus full body armor.

    "Albert, your sword skills are excellent. After seeing what you can do, I decided to award you this.

    Keep sharpening your sword skills in the future as well, and help Adalman well!

    "Yes, sir!

    Taking advantage of the moment when I said this, Shuna pushed the whole set of equipment over on the cart. It was then handed over to Albert.

    At the sight of the equipment, Albert shook straight and nervously.

    "This, this is

    Presumably taking in the performance of the equipment in front of him with a nce, Albert made a surprised sound.

    It''s no wonder he is.

    This is an extremely rare quantity in existence, handed down from mythical times.

    To be able to use the highest ranking equipment in this world is the highest honor for a knight, right?

    "You should be able to use it, right?

    I won''t let you say no.

    Feeling the pressure of my sight, Albert''s dry spirits exploded.

    "Of course! I will definitely not disappoint Lord Rimuru!

    The agitated Albert answered me thus.

    Seeing his imposing look, I was also temporarily relieved.

    It was only after this that, with a light touch, the mythical-grade equipment naturally wrapped itself around Albert''s body,pletely as if identifying with him as his master.

    There was only one miscalction on my part.

    Being freed of performance by the true owner of the mythical gear was far more than I had expected.

    Wearing mythic-level gear, an Albert would be the equivalent of a flesh-bearing spiritual lifeform.

    The ability to allow those who hold flesh to temporarily sublimate into spiritual beingsthis was the true power hidden in mythical level equipment.

    The so-called spiritual lifeforms are, in simple terms, demigod-like beings. Veldora is like that, and to say my words feel that way too.

    There''s nothing tangible about it, but approaching immortality is certainly not wrong.

    Immortality has been established, and the nature of immortality is quite inexorable. Aside from conditions like the destruction of the core of the heart and the disappearance of the magical element, it feels like there''s no way we can die.

    That is, a spiritual lifeform is an existence that has no life limit, is invalid no matter what abnormal state, and can ovee death by the power of will alone.

    Although it''s only temporary, it makes sense that the performance of the mythical equipment would be so amazing, since it can raise the equipment to the same level as that kind of super existence.

    At the same time, I understood the reasoning behind the King of Wisdom''s rmendation that such a thing be used by Albert.

    Benimaru intended to evolve into a spiritual lifeform on his own power, Ranga and Shion were simrno, I should say it must have felt that way. Although Gabil and Geld are still that far off, even if I give them mythical level equipment estimates, it won''t change much.

    In this way, it is true that Albert is the best fit.

    This is probably the case with the so-called match made in heaven.

    Adalman''s pet dragon can''t be forgotten either.

    The Necromancer is working hard, so I''m going to give it a reward too.

    What to give bothered me a bit, but now the answer is there.

    A name.

    For magical creatures, getting a "name" is the most enjoyable thing they can do.

    This was supposed to be apanied by dangerous behavior, but I had the King of Wisdom to help.

    The King of Wisdom must be able to keep the outflow of the magical element well within safe limits.

    <></answer.>

    Huh?

    The King of Wisdom hase up with an unexpected scenario, and by the way, what would be the approximate level of consumption of the "soul" if that were to happen?

    <> It''s only 5,000 words, and it''s much more reassuring to do so.</answer.>

    ording to the King of Wisdom, after analyzing the soul, it is possible to transform it into mana using the "King of Gluttony".

    So safety is assured.

    Okay, then let''s get started!

    I stood in front of the Necromancer and stroked its head, as a result the Necromancer immediately became nervous. He''s a pretty cute guy, despite his scary appearance.

    "You must also be rewarded. So as of today, you are Wenti the Gehennic Dragon King!

    After saying that, I named the Necromancer after the "soul" I consumed.

    The dramatic change happened at this very moment.

    The gigantic body of the Death Spirit Dragon, which exceeded twenty meters, kept getting smaller and smaller at a speed visible to the naked eye, and finally transformed into a beautiful woman in dark clothes.

    Who are you to think so? But I still wouldn''t be careless.

    With magic, all things are possible.

    This aspect of the experience I''ve experienced so far is annoying. The truth that came from such austerities would not allow me to be in a panic right now.

    Without showing the slightest wavering, everything in front of me was taken for granted, and I managed to maintain that attitude.

    I''m still trying really hard.

    "O beautiful, I wait for the most beloved god! To give blessings to the lowly me is much appreciated!

    Ahem. She can really speak fluently.

    And that''s all I''m giving you is the name, the blessing is from Adalman''s side.

    Wenti seems to have the effects mixed up, but still, I hope she doesn''t get the wrong idea.

    "Oh, oh, oh, oh, that''s great. Drag-no, Wenti!

    "Ahhh, master. The lord has not forsaken me!

    "Yes, this is the gift of our faith, too.

    Yes!"

    What a beautiful love of the Lord and ve.

    It feels like I''m being left on the sidelines, but it''s still great.

    And just like that, the session that awarded Adalman their reward ended peacefully.

    It''s really convenient to be able to use "souls" for a name.

    Originally, if one wanted to name an upper level magical creature of the Dragon King''s rank, one never knew how much magical essence would be taken away in the end. No matter how much the King of Wisdom helps control, the amount of mana I have is still limited after all.

    All of the magicules that had been umted with the ''King of Gluttony'' in the past had been used up when they gave the Demon girl trio their names. Although there''s also the Please Veldora this" method, the guy seems to rather hate it. It''s also hard to reassure him afterwards, so it''s better as ast resort.

    Naming without preparation can be a problem in case you fall into a state of low activity.

    Now that the magic vein limit has increased, it''s anyone''s guess how long it will take for me to revert to full status.

    Nowadays, it''s a time of war, and no amount of negligence could make such a dangerous gamble.

    But, as long as you use the done method this time, you''ll be fine.

    Earlier, I was agonizing over how to return the favor to Ramiris, and if it was this one move, she would have been happy, right?

    That is, to give the names to the four Dragon Kings under Ramiris.

    Even if the Dragon Kings don''t have a link to me, it''s fine as long as you use this method. A shout out to the King of Wisdom foring up with such a proposal.

    There are still more than 20,000 "souls" left, which is more than enough to name the four Dragon Kings.

    In the end, I was able to get so many "souls" because of Ramiris assistance.

    But Ramiris just said, "There''s no need for souls, is there?" After that, all the fruits were transferred to me.

    At the time, I thought it was a little unpleasant, so the idea came at the right time.

    It was enough to make Ramiris happy.

    Don''t forget to talk to her about it afterwards.

    ***

    And just like that, the ritual of the maze group was over.

    The celebration is finallying to a close, and now there are just two problem children left.

    Needless to say, the so-called problem children refer to two people, First Secretary Shion and Second Secretary Diablo.

    Following the course so far, I''m sure there''s no danger of anyone storming out.

    However, it is not enough to be careless.

    After all, the next creatures were Shion and Diablo.

    It''s not an understatement to say its the most vicious of the two.

    These two would definitely create a huge hazard if they made a scene at the same time, not to mention the fact that the subordinates are still mostly in a state where they can''t be relied on.

    For these reasons, I''ll start with Shion.

    "Shion, I appoint you War Lord. Hopefully from today onwards you''ll be able to take it to the next level, and remember to act withposure.

    "Of course! There is no more calm and mature woman in the world like me!

    Uh, that, who''s that?

    It looks like she''s talking about herself, and that''s overrating herself!

    I thought she''d finally learned to control herself recently, but it turns out that Shion is really not that far off. Better to keep your eyes on her for the long haul.

    "Let''s take it as it is. Don''t go on a rampage, talk to the people around you and watch over everyone.

    After saying that, I awarded the "souls" to Shion.

    And then, huh?

    Strangely enough, the Shion had not changed at all.

    Shion also seemed to find it strange, looking straight at me.

    I watched her again for a while, but there was still no sign that anything was going to change.

    Dumbfounded?

    At this rate, Shion was equivalent to not getting a reward, and this was super bad.

    Suddenly there was a crisis.

    After all, I didn''t have anything else in store for her.

    Just as I''m having trouble figuring out what to do about it, something unexpected happens.

    Shion herself was unchanged, while the "Yomigaeri" fell asleep. Even inside the members of the Mystery Fan Club, the Shion Pro-Guard, there were scattered guys who looked like they were having a hard time. It seems that while there are individual differences, all of them seem to have been blessed in some way.

    It was incredible that Shion herself didn''t react at all.

    There''s no point in thinking too deeply. There was a reaction because they were direct subordinates of the Shion, so let''s call it that.

    As mentioned above, the Shion side feels it is better to leave it alone.

    "Well, Shion. If you feel anything wrong with your body, you shoulde and tell me.

    "Yes! That said, Lord Rimuru. Do I have any, special rewards like the Gobtas

    Shion wriggled out such words.

    Uh-huh, indeed. Although the evolutionary rituals are going on, on the surface I''m just giving Shion a new title. Some shouted that it was enough, and that there was no need for Shion to give her any new weapons

    Like Gobtas, eh?

    "Got it. Then, let''s teach you how to make special dishes!

    "Hey! In other words, you admit that I''m already ahead of Shuna-sama in terms of cooking skills"

    "Absolutely not!

    How on earth did youe to the conclusion that even this heaven and earth reversal is impossible?

    Shuna next to me was also speechless at this remark, but immediately became in a super good mood again after hearing me immediately deny it. Although she looked a bit displeased, she muttered, "We''ll have to expand the kitchen now," and returned to the queue with a satisfied nod.

    That''s a good one.

    However, Shion''s men, the "Yomigaeri", have evolved into something very interesting.

    It was quite interesting that they had turned into some kind of spiritual beings, and that they still had a physical body unlike the demon race.

    Possessing both flesh and being close to the demon race. And then most importantly, there is no mating incapacity.

    That is, these guys were actually reborn for a whole new race.

    If I had to say it, it would be the Dead Ogres, right?

    The Ogre Factor from the Shion manifested even more strongly, and its strength increased dramatically.

    Some people have also acquired the special skill of the Body Strengthening System, "Divine Power".

    However, no one grew horns.

    Although the amount of magic is lower than that of the Flying Dragon, it''s hard to tell which is stronger when the immortality of the Yomigaeri is taken into ount.

    No one would believe me if I told people that these guys were originally human ogres, but the ecology of magic is incredible.

    It was a bit of a surprise that Shion herself hadn''t changed, and the ceremony ended with that feeling.

    ***

    Well, it''s finally thest man''s turn.

    Problematic Diablo.

    Diablo has long been with an impatient look.

    ''Is this the one? Is this the one?his smile gives off this feeling, looking at me with anticipation.

    Honestly, it''s more likely that Diablo will make a scene now if the ceremony is aborted than the risk of storming out after the naming.

    If anyone dares to get in the way now, I can assert that the guy will never get his life back.

    All right, here we go.

    Diablo."

    "Yes, Lord Rimuru!

    Aside from the unsettling foreboding, it''s still unsettling foreboding.

    After this evolution, Diablo would undoubtedly take the position of being the strongest in the Demon World.

    Not only was he the strongest among my men, it felt like he would definitely be stronger than me.

    Although Diablo himself said with his mouth that he couldn''t win against Zegion, anyway, that must have meant qualifiers. The proof was that Jiu and Bonnie, who were supposed to be strong enemies, he had solved it all by himself.

    As powerful as Zegion is, Diablo gives the impression of being even more superior. That is to say, even in this current state, he is the strongest one among my minions.

    If Diablo shows his true talent, even now, before the ceremony, he may be even better than me. The person I was when I first awakened was simply no match for the person I am now

    It is a matter of great concern as to what such an anticlimactic Diablo would eventually evolve into.

    "The title of ''demon lord'' must be very appropriate for you. Then, please continue tomand those demons that are my killer weapons in the future as well!

    Especially the demon female trio.

    "Kufufufufu, leave it to me, Lord Rimuru!

    Please, oh, I''m serious.

    I nodded, then performed the ritual on Diablo.

    And then, the devil was born

    Diablo''s evolution seems to have ended in a sh.

    I thought he was also dumbfounded like Shion, but no. Because all the energy was perfectly controlled by Diablo, it all went unexpressed.

    Not bad for Diablobeautifully done.

    The evolved Diablo has be a being that upies one of the strongest corners in the world.

    A portion of the power was reversed back through the newly formed Soul Corridor".

    This is not good.

    Diablo''s power cap is as high as I can imagine it.

    In the present of the evolutionary dumb fire of Benimaru and Shion, he has be the veritable strongest of my ministry.

    Not good, this.

    The amount of mana is alreadyparable to mine, and if you take into ount Diablo''s long experience and skills, it feels like even I''m no match for this guy.

    Sure enough, the probability of an unforeseen hunching true is always high.

    But beforehand, I thought it was going to turn out this way, so I didn''t feel shaken at all.

    "Excellent evolution, Diablo.

    "It is a great honor to receive thispliment from you, Lord Rimuru."

    That''s all right, right?

    His personality remains the same.

    He''d have that kind of fun if he gave me the following offense now.

    If that happens, I''ll be able to fight him in earnest, but of course my idea is a secret.

    Such a Diablo had obviouslypleted his evolution, but he seemed to have his sights set on acquiring some kind of new ability again.

    "What are you doing?

    "It''s nothing. The previous battles have made me realize the value of my extreme abilities. In the past I ignored this power because of Guys showing off, but now I''ve changed my mind and think I should use everything that works.

    "Hey, how about this?

    Is this guy an idiot?

    Thats called being a smartass, right?

    I always felt that I was surrounded by a lot of these types of guys.

    "I''ll have to take this opportunity to show him off next time I see him, Kufufufufufu.

    "Hm, hm, hm, hm."

    Hating to let Guy show off, is it okay to show off yourself?

    Never mind, one only has to look at his attitude so far to roughly imagine that Diablo has always been capricious to people other than me. Even without relying on the King of Wisdom, I can perceive this myself.

    Anyway, the victim is Guy, so I don''t need to be kind-hearted. As long as I don''t get involved, it won''t matter if I turn a blind eye to it.

    Diablo still maintained his attitude so far, and looking at him like this, the fear ofmitting a crime against him seemed to be unfounded. Evolution is also in hisplete control, and as a capable minister, let me rely on him in the future.

    By the way, it was onlyter that a fact was figured out

    Diablo''s blessing was given to his adjutant Venom, and to the hundred demons under Venom.

    However, it''s just my gut feeling, one suspicion is that Diablo depressed the energy used for the blessing. It''s also unclear whether something like that could actually be done, but if it was Diablo, there''s nothing incredible about even doing it.

    To be strong is not to be given by others, but to be gained by oneselfit feels like Diablo would have had that in mind.

    But then again, Venom is also a guy to watch, after all, he has evolved into a demon noble.

    It''s just that, let''s not say for a moment thatpared to the demon girl trio, evenpared to Moss and Veyron, Venomcks a sense of majesty.

    There''s no reason why guys who have been on top for a long time would lose to a rookie like Venom.

    Even though they are also demon nobles, there are clear "hierarchical" differences between them.

    "That''s for sure. I''m just a neer who''s only been around for less than a hundred years. I''m no match for those big shots.

    That''s what Venom himself said.

    It seems that the Venom is a special individual, belonging to a modern species with less experience.

    Since he was born with unique skills, he might be a reincarnationist who has experienced a strange fate.

    Venom himself said that although he had no memory of a previous life, he seemed to asionally remembernguages that he had never heard before. After arriving in our country, there have been many such visions.

    Well, if Venom is a reincarnationist, it makes sense that he would be so special.

    But Venom knows his ce.

    Even those who have evolved to the same level as the demon girl trio are not ashamed to forget, or look down on their peers. After confirming his evolved strength, he seemed instead to understand the gap in strength between each other more. For demons, it''s more important than the amount of mana or experience.

    I thought the kid was pretty good, and ended up hearing something inside from me again.

    "Geez, actually, I''ve challenged Lord Diablo before, and I''ve been taught what a strength gap is since then!

    This guy''s a fool for saying that with a face full of joy.

    This tidbit of Venom bing Diablo''s beloved is presumably the reason why Diablo likes him.

    Still, not bad in terms of results. After all, Venom has learned a lot from this experience and won''t make the same mistake again now. And I always felt that in case he did get carried away again, he would definitely be dealt with by Diablo.

    For Diablo, even his own men, no one would show mercy to anyone who dared to disregard his power.

    And Venom seems like a man who knows how to reflect, so look for him to do well in the future.

    By the way, there are other blessed demons.

    In fact, these guys were originally still constructing flesh in the culture tank. As a result, these one hundred demons were born to be the upper demon knights.

    Although they were not as powerful as the upper demon generals, these demon knights had also gained the power to rival the upper demons, turning into fierce fighters who could kill the upper demons with a single blow.

    To put it bluntly, theyre a super-spec existence, however, Diablo seemspletely uninterested in them and just throws it all out to Venom as his henchman.

    To keep the position that belongs to me and to be able to move freely is the priority.

    In this moment I was sure that this guy hadn''t changed.

    Even if evolution is going to overtake me, Diablo remains Diablo.

    ***

    The patrons evolutionary rituals werepleted with such feeling.

    It''s better than anything to be able to end peacefully.

    That being said, the celebration is not over yet. I called others who were active to the stage and consoled them for their hard work.

    Then, gather those who are still sober for a celebratory banquet.

    The all-around banquet will have to wait for the next one.

    Enjoy today''s feast for now, and those will be the fun for next time.

    Sadly, Granny Jane and the Two Wings have gone back first. They told me with an apologetic face that there was a sudden emergency, and as soon as the ceremony was over, they hurried on their way back.

    Next time, be sure to put together a schedule they can attend at their leisure.

    That said, the guys at the banquet who got really drunk were also a big deal.

    Anyway, a person like me is not worthy of Lord Benimaru. I''ve known this kind of thing from the beginning!

    "Well, well, you''re pretty too, Gobya. Look at me, I was even killed by the longing Lady Albis.

    Monsters just love the strong, either seeking to be on the same level as themselves, or seeking a stronger opponent as apanion. If you''re strong enough, you can marry a lot of them. It was supposed to be like this, but instead I

    "Lord Phobio, aren''t you already strong enough? If I had been stronger, I could have gotten in between those two as well

    "Just call me Phobio. You''re also strong enough, only theparison is too bad. That''s an opponent that even I can''t beat, there''s no way.

    "Lord Phobiono, Phobio. In that case, please call me Gobya.

    "Aaah, Gobya.

    Phobio"

    Hey, hey, hey, hey, I can''t watch this anymore!

    I''m an adult, so I''m not angry, but this isn''t the ce for you guys to go on a date and get a good feeling, is it?

    However, it can''t be said that it''s a bad thing that two people who have been dumped havee together with the same intention. There''s just something so bizarre about being in love.

    I''ll take that as a no-brainer.

    The party climaxed with such a feeling that the whole evening passed in a good way

    Thus, new "lords" were born in our country.

    ording to the rules, they could not call themselves Demon Lords, but in reality, our country had nine characters who could match the Awakened Demon Lords. In addition to this, there are three pirs of the "primordials" As long as nothing particrly serious happens in the future, we''ll be able to handle whatever happens, right?

    For the twelve men whom I had awarded the title of "Lord", I thought I could add the title of Twelve Patrons" to the list.

    "The title of "Lord", although duplicated in some people by the title of "Four Heavenly Kings" or Ten Lords of the Labyrinth", is still given the highest priority in formal settings. In addition, these Twelve Patrons, unlike other positions, does not rece its members.

    In fact, since the "lords" have exceeded their lifespan, the Twelve Patrons are a kind of permanent subordinate. In the future, the most desirable development would be for them to be removed from day-today management, etc., and to perform actively only in times of war or emergency.

    Rigur and Rigurd, as well as several other big subordinates like Gobta and Myourmile, all have life limits. There will be alternating generations of subordinates, and how subordinates should be treated differently from permanent ones, something that must be carefully considered. No immediate conclusion can be drawn at this time and it feels like it will be a topic for the future.

    It''s the hobgoblin that keep me upied.

    This kid is a subordinate for the time being, and is also unexpectedly resourceful and strong inbat.

    He and Ranga''s ''Monster Wolf'' were a foul y to be honest. Ranga has be stronger because of this evolution, but if it were Gobta, he would still be able to handle it.

    The hobgoblins are really quite heterogeneous in their existence.

    Even if the name evolves and the appearance doesn''t change, my dream-like exnation that "all evolution happens in talent" may still be true.

    Having taken this reward, Gobta''s position was also determined. He got closer to my position than the rest of the subordinates and attracted the attention of the crowds.

    Gobta may have gotten the best reward by ident.

    Looking out over thepanions who were enjoying the feast, I developed this feeling.

    More on that by the way.

    After the events of that day spread to the world, my name unknowingly became the "Demon Lord Ruler of the Monsters, Rimuru.

    I also consciously did a lot of work and willingly epted this new nickname".

 Volume 14 - Ch 1.1

    Intermission: Congrattory Celebration

    Jane, who attended the celebration, witnessed the shocking spectacle.

    The monsters under Demon Lord Rimuru evolved one by one before her eyes. Moreover, they have evolved into "true demon lords".

    Thisthis can''t be! I''m not dreaming, am I?

    Jane was so surprised she couldn''t even make a sound.

    Although it had long been known how dangerous Demon Lord Rimuru was, the light before her was too unrealistic and iprehensible, easily beyond the worst state of affairs Jane could imagine.

    The purpose of Jane''s visit was to ask Rimuru how he nned to ce the "primordial".

    Jane herself trusts Rimuru, but a "primordial" is not an existence that can simply be recognized.

    Once liberated, they would cause the bnce of world war power to copse.

    This war had proved that fact940,000 Imperial elites, without a fight, were wiped out.

    Thankfully, Rimuru is now an ally, but there is no guarantee that the rtionship will continue in the future. That''s why Jane came as a representative, to offer her condolences and to scout out the situation.

    Rimuru''s reaction when greeting her was natural, not much changed from when they met before.

    So Jane tried to grumble a little at him, then tried to test out what this demon lord really thought, based on Rimuru''s reaction.

    The result was a flop.

    In response to Jane''s anger, Rimuru not only honestly shows introspection, but even honestly apologizes by saying "I''m sorry." Later, ording to Rimuru''s justification, it became clear that everything was the result of Diablo''s own making.

    "That Diablo, is he right about being the Primordial ck?

    "Uh-huh, it seems so. I don''t know why he''s so close to me

    After saying that, Rimuru made a crooked head gesture that expressed disbelief.

    It didn''t look like a lie at all, so we could only interpret it as ''Rimuru did take in demons as his men without knowing it.

    Jane''s life experience also tells her that this is not acting. Then, even if sheined to Rimuru again, there would be nothing he could do.

    More importantly, Rimuru himself was not at fault.

    Whether or not he had be arrogant after gaining strength, there had been such uneasiness, and now it appeared that she had simply worried too much, and Jane therefore settled down.

    It''s this idea that went wrong.

    At that time, Jane should have admonished Rimuru more severely.

    Even if it''s force majeure to be followed by the primordial, mass production of the "true demon lords"

    will only bring out malice!

    No, Rimuru probably really meant no harm.

    Presumably, he was convinced that even if something went wrong he could handle it on his own, at least she could tell that Rimuru had no intention of giving Jane or them any trouble.

    Normally, such an approach would be suspicious of demonstrating to the outside world, but Rimuru must not have the slightest intention of doing so. Maybe it''s not a good idea to keep covering it up because the "primordial" thing got so hotmaybe that''s how Rimuru judged it.

    That is why the information was made public in good faith and on the basis of a rtionship of trust. If that were the case, it would be impossible to deny that Jane was partly to me for the state of affairs at hand, andmon sense should be hammered into Rimuru''s head as early as possible.

    Regardless of whether that is possible or not, it is an afterthought to say that now.

    The worldthe world''s war power bnce

    Jane felt like she was going to faint at the thought of how it would unfold.

    With the celebration going on unhindered, one by one, Rimuru''s minions gained strength. And the subordinates of the ministry, in turn, can confirm that there is a systematic influx of power.

    In just a few hours, the battle power of the Jura Tempest Federation had undoubtedly been greatly strengthened. Not even the threat of the Empire of the East could bepared to that, and a huge military state centered on the great forest of Jura was about to be born.

    Realizing this, Jane regretted why she hadn''t figured out a way to stop it sooner.

    However, even if she had that thought

    Can''t do it. Last time, the conclusion was, "It''s a waste of time to think, not to take countermeasures.

    Although King Gazel had made a judgment to keep the decision first, there couldn''t have been any solution strategy even if it was dragged into the future, right? That being the case

    The war with the Empire is not yet over.

    The Imperial Army was still fighting against the home country, but Rimuru had conspired with that force. The next arrangement was for both sides to join forces and attack the imperial capital.

    In the end, Jane came to the Jura Tempest Federation in the name of negotiating this matter this time.

    It should have been like this

    This is the first time in my life that my head has been messed up like this. When things got to this point, there was no longer any way to control how and what the Imperial Army did. We must report the birth of the true demon lord to King Gazel as soon as possible.

    For a moment, Jane even got the idea to pretend not to notice.

    Although it was an escape from reality, Jane thought it was not a bad thing.

    However, it was not long ago that she had taken King Gazel to task for not confessing about the

    "primordial", so Jane was now unable to exercise her right to silence in this regard.

    "Dorf, I''m going home.

    "Hey, why? The main purpose was to negotiate, and the reservation was for tomorrow?

    "It''s decent enough with you in the country. Ill use magic to go back, no need for a send-off or escort.

    "Yeah, well"

    Dorf couldn''t read the flow of magic, and couldn''tprehend what was really going on before his eyes. Jane was a little envious of such a Dorf, but at the thought of what was toe, her mood sank into mncholy.

    ***

    The duo of "Two Wingsthe blonde Lucretia and the silver-haired Cleawere as expressionless as masks on the surface, but were already shaking violently on the inside.

    There are many powerful monsters living in the Monster Kingdom, the Jura Tempest Federation. Both knew about this and hadmunicated with several monsters led by Geld.

    While acknowledging that it was a threat, the Jura Tempest Federation was now an allied nation. That being the case, even though there were multiple upper level monsters here that could match their own, the two felt that they didn''t need to be too vignt.

    Yes, until just now, they felt that way.

    The two were given the order to master the war power of the Jura Tempest Federation. Now that a war is going on with the Nasca-Namrium-Ulmeria Eastern Unified Empire, which has thergest and strongest battle force among the human nations, Rimuru''s Army should also suffer a loss. If it turns out that way, there will also be a stagnation in the construction of the Sky City that Frey has been waiting for.

    It is the task of the Two Wings this time to investigate the extent of the damage and to provide information to inform future projections.

    This, of course, also includes an element of reference for the purpose of organizing reinforcements.

    However, it seems that none of this is necessary.

    "What''s the loss, zero?

    "I can''t believe it, but after seeing your bright faces, that should be the truth.

    As a result, such an unexpected report was heard.

    After all, it was a good thing, so the two went along with the celebration afterwards, which was a miscalction, showing in front of their eyes they were dumbfounded.

    "How is that possible? Just by not seeing it for a while, a portion of the subordinates has already be rival to Lady Frey"

    "No, look over there faster than this. Rimuru the demon lordit looks like he''s about to start something.

    Lucretia started to move a little when she saw the subordinates walking up to the podium, and Clea calmly pointed out from the sidelines. What then begins, is a ceremony far beyond the duo''s imagination.

    No, now is not the time to look dumb.

    It was too much non-reality that caused the two to give up thinking somewhat, but either way, the state of affairs was too much for them to pass judgment on.

    "Lady Frey must be informed as soon as possible.

    "Yes, that''s right. I''ll be right back.

    The two women who had exchanged their thoughts with Thought Communication" made a quick judgment.

    And so they went back to the country, reporting everything as it was to Frey.

    ...........

    ........

    ...

    On the topmost floor of the temporarily built castle, in the corner, where no interior had yet been installed.

    Frey let out a long sigh.

    "What the hell was that Slime thinking?

    A man reacted to her chanting.

    "Hey, hey, hey, what''s up? That mncholy expression is beautiful, but a sigh is not good enough for you, huh?

    It''s Carrion.

    The two, who were also aiding Milim, had be confidantes.

    "Don''t you dare say that.

    "Seriously, what''s going on over there? The Imperial Army is in a bitter battle for the opponent?

    Carrion asked worriedly.

    Frey replied with a depressed face.

    "If only that were okay. If that''s the case, I don''t need to worry. Just send reinforcements there quickly.

    "What was that about? What kind of ne has that Rimuru guy gotten himself into again?

    justified.

    After a little thought, Frey uttered the answer like a summary.

    Carrion was silent.

    "Carrion, can I talk to you for a minute?"

    What?"

    "It''s not good to call Lord Rimuru, Lord Milim''s best friend, by his first name.

    "Hey, hey, hey, what does it matter now? By the way, didn''t you just call that kid by his first name when you were with Milim, and you even called him Slime a while ago?

    "Did you hear that? You''re a bad person too. I won''t say that in front of the ministry, so forget what you just did.

    "That''s fine, but don''t get sidetracked again. Tell me what''s going on, too.

    Frey sighed again helplessly.

    The scented exhtion tickled Carrion''s nostrils. However, even though he was in a good mood as a result, Carrion still stared at Frey with an expression that he wouldn''t be fooled into passing.

    "Got it. But don''t you regret it?

    "Depends on the content.

    "I said you"

    "I won''t regret it. But I won''t let you carry your troubles alone, so let me carry them too.

    "That''s not bad. That''s a nice thing about you. It''s very likeable.

    Freys mncholy mood seemed to rx slightly, revealing a smile. Then, part of the report received from the two wings" was told to Carrion.

    Really?"

    "It really couldn''t be more true. Those kids couldn''t have lied to me.

    "So what? Seven Demon Lord sses were born under Rimuru!?

    "It seems that way.

    "Those guys, are they better than you and me?

    "I don''t know about that. Butat least in the eyes of those two girls, they were stronger than me.

    The strength of those people seemed to rival Frey''s even before the evolution began. Then, when the Demon Lord Rimuru "did something, they sensed an overwhelming increase in power in them.

    ording to reports, a few are still evolving, but it''s estimated that it won''t take much for the force to stabilize.

    The content of this report is uneptable, but it''s not okay to believe it.

    are you kidding me?

    Even Carrion, after hearing the details from Frey, was speechless.

    "Carrion, do I look like I''m joking?

    "Not at all.

    "Right, these are the facts.

    Carrion and Frey didn''t give it their all in front of the minions though. But those of their closest subordinates were able to see the upper limit of their master''s strength to a certain extent.

    So this information, even if it''s just spection, is by no means something you can just listen to.

    Not to mention that no one in Frey''s ministry would ever anger their master with jokes or lies. That alone was enough to convince Carrion of what he had just heard.

    What the hell are Phobio and Albis doing?

    Mentally grumbling a bit, but Carrion understood that Phobio wasn''t originally the kind of person who could see through an opponent''s strength with any degree of resourcefulness. I guess he wouldn''t have noticed anything even if something unusual was happening right before his eyes.

    No, Albis'' words should be detectable. Then why didn''t I get any reports from my side?

    Doubts arose in Carrion''s mind, and Frey told him something again as if remembering something.

    ''''By the way, it seems that your Chief subordinate, Albis-sama, is engaged to Benimaru-sama, the head of Rimuru-sama''s subordinate. If this international marriage goes well, it should bring our two countries closer together. And it''s a joy to already have the approval of Lord Rimuru.

    "That guy, she''s doing great!

    Albis had approached Carrion about this.

    The advice given by Carrion is: take it by force.

    As far as results go, Albis took the prize beautifully, so to speak. It was indeed something to be happy about, and Carrion couldn''t help but let out a bad smile.

    "But she''s only the second wife, that''s all.

    "Che, didn''t she get first? Even so, the children they give birth to are our people.

    "It''s a shame.

    "Don''t worry, Frey. For me, you are the only woman I love.

    "You''re kidding me. Our side is monogamous, as opposed to you beasts, how can it go so well?

    The harpy race is basically all female, and either relies on winged males, who are born by chance, or seeks diversity from powerful wizards to maintain the race.

    It is moremon sense for a person like Frey, after bing a queen, to increase the number of subordinates through unisex reproduction, while a husband is something that is not needed.

    The rtive beast side, on the other hand, takes it asmon sense that powerful men love plural women.

    Weeding out the weak and making the race stronger. The two have only this purpose inmon, and in other respects it is water and fire no matter what you think.

    However, Carrion and Frey both identify with each other as being powerful. That''s why they''ve maintained a rtionship as dangerous as a tightrope walk, holding thest line of defense tightly.

    "Forget it, I don''t seem to hear any good answers now, so let me pursue this slowly. The question is, what the hell is Rimuru boy up to?

    After congratting Albis, Carrion pulled the conversation back to the point.

    Frey agrees with this sentiment.

    This country has established a friendly rtionship with Rimuru and intends to continue this rtionship in the future, but no one is sure what will happen in the future. Then, if you can, you should make it a goal to reach a higher level.

    "The only exnation I can think of is that yman was on his deathbed. That guy, at the time, was a very unusual force.

    "ording to Rimuru, it''s called an awakening.

    "Can you think of a reason?

    "Huh! It doesn''t look like the guy hid his strength beforehand. It''s more like a moment of sudden strength.

    "And how did he do it?

    This"

    "Souls."

    Hmm?"

    "Gathering the souls of men, you can awaken as a ''true demon lord''," yman once said. If that''s true, there''s no way yman wouldn''t have collected it beforehand.

    "So it is. And then just try to use that to make yourself awaken?

    "I think so. To be honest, I haven''t killed many humans, and I''ve never given a damn about the souls."

    "Me too. Wars are fought with kinsmen or other monsters, and with angels. Our country is so rich that it has little interest in humanity.

    "Indeed. But in this way, the doubt is lifted. It appears that Lord Rimuru has acquired a great deal of

    "souls" during this war. And then transferred them to the monsters under hismand, causing their awakening.

    "That''s an exaggeration. It''s not a good idea to take in monsters like us, but it''s even worse to be awakened by those guys. So, how many souls did Rimuru use this time?"

    Hearing Carrion scratch his head and ask that, Frey just turned her gaze to the metropolis under construction at the moment.

    Hello?

    "By the way, I haven''t told you about the oue of this war. The loss of the Jura Tempest Federation''s army was, amazingly, zero. In contrast, it seems that 940,000 people on the other side of the Empire have been killed.

    huh?"

    "You think I''m lying?

    "No, not"

    "I also hope this report is wrong.

    In other words, Demon Lord Rimuru got 940,000 souls" this time, and then took them to help seven of his men awaken, which is very simple to think of the cause and effect rtionship.

    Of course, it is also possible that there are more than seven minions of the Awakening.

    ording to the report, it seems that the Chief Grand Admiral Benimaru didn''t appear to have changed much, just entered into a marriage with the two wives of Momiji and Albis. However, it was impossible for Rimuru not to grant the "soul" to Benimaru, who was his right-hand man, so it is not difficult to guess that there was some reason for dying Benimaru''s evolution.

    "Well, it''s a one-sided beatdown with zero losses, so it''s not a war anymore. If it were me, I would have raised the white g a long time ago.

    "Don''t be ridiculous, Empire or whatever. The question is what we do with ourselves.

    "Exactly. I am now surrendering to Milim''s position. I''ve always been worried about the possibility of rebellion if I seek power, but I don''t think it''s really necessary.

    "What do you mean?

    "Rimuru has raised his men to the same level as himself, hasn''t he? Seeing him with such great measure, I realized that Milim should be that kind of person.

    "Indeed. Milim is not so petty as to riot just because we''re awakened.

    "Right? In that case, let''s just take it as ites. It''s not toote to start, although it''s been a little easier. Let''s aim for a higher level of strength as well.

    "Right. Your kind of ce, it''s very endearing."

    Frey and Carrion stared at each other.

    Just when the atmosphere had gotten a little better before the two

    "Whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa! That''s a good one, you two! Although I can''t help my subordinates to awaken like Rimuru, I can help you to cultivate! Don''t worry about dying in thebyrinth, let''s do it to the fullest!

    Milim picked a perfect time to jump out of the way.

    "Che, you''re in theAh Milim! You''re in the way when were in the mood.

    "I''ve said it many times, don''t remove your aura to sneak up on me. That said, I have no intention of apanying you to your practiceah, you listen to me well!

    Carrion and Frey''sints didn''t reach Milim''s ears at all. Milim''s ears, however, are equipped with information that they don''t want to hear, so they will automatically block out such an excellent function.

    "Then, please, Ramiris!

    "Wait, wait, wait, wait! I didn''t ask you toe with me to practice, did I!?

    "Wait, Milim! If you don''t listen to me, I have my own ideas. I''ll leave all three of your meals to Lord Middray to prepare. Is that okay?

    This statement by Frey stimted Milim''s sense of crisis and eventually seeded in stopping her.

    So true to Freythe Carrion who had witnessed the whole thing wanted to praise her so much.

    "I know, I know. If you want to practice, you can always talk to me.

    "That''s good. By the way, did you finish your homework?

    "That, thatbecause I heard something that seemed interesting

    "It''s not done yet, is it?

    Frey was smiling.

    "Ugh, the break is over. I''ll get back to it."

    "Yes, good job.

    With that, Milim went back to her homework, and Frey and Carrion beautifully avoided a crisis.

    However, the ambition to evolve continues to heat up in the hearts of both of them.

    Will this remain ambition, or will it be achieved?

 Volume 14 - Ch 2

    A+A-

    Before I forget, I start by saying thank you to Veldora and Ramiris.

    The gift of thanks to Veldora was clothing.

    He''s always topless, and I think it''s more or less a bit of a bad habit. He didn''t seem to care about it himself, but perhaps he just liked this style of dressing, and I took the opportunity to give him some clothes as a gift.

    "Oh, oh, Rimuru! Friends of the heart! Allies! Finally, you''ve noticed how I feel. I''ve been wanting to wear something so handsome for a long time.

    "No, no, if you really wanted to wear it, tell Shuna and she''ll have it ready for you right away, right? In other words, if you go to a garment store and adjust the size by magic, you''ll have several pieces.

    "Idiot, the only thing that suits me is a custom model. I trust you to have picked the best style, right?

    Uh, I actually, have pretty bad taste

    It seems that for Veldora, I''m a bit overrated, obviously I wear what I''m told to wear.

    Think of it this way, the same is true of previous lives.

    I have terrible taste in casual wear, so it''s basically a suit.

    Then there''s the jacket bar.

    That''s really nice.

    You don''t have to worry about washing it if it gets dirty, so it''s the easiest thing to wear.

    The jacket was chosen for that reason, but Veldora was happier than he thought.

    I was also surprised.

    Veldora gleefully tried on the clothes.

    "Uh, well, as long as you''re happy. I''m going to ask you to do the same.

    "Hmmm. Leave it to me. Kuahahahaha!

    It''s a super cheap payoff in terms of profitability. Well, no, it''s not, although it''s made of particrly luxurious materials and includes special order items, but what can I say

    Well, next time when you''re free, Ill think about giving something else as a thank you gift.

    On the subject of Veldora, let''s just take it as a future topic for now.

    Next up, Ramiris.

    "Ramiris, I had your help this time too. Thank you.

    "What, you''re being so cynical! You''ve taken care of them, so that''s what we call mutual help!

    Ramiris replied a little sheepishly.

    Although I''m a little embarrassed about it too, it''s important to show gratitude.

    "Then I''d like to give you a gift of gratitude.

    "What the what? Do you have to make clothes for people like Master?

    "Just say hello to Shuna. I was trying to"

    I really can''t help but rely on Shuna for my taste in girls'' clothes.

    "So, that means you can name the cute little dragon kings?

    "Something like that.

    "Who''s going to be the namesake?"

    "That''s how it is.

    "That''s awesome!"

    It''s okay.

    Although I was surprised too, it actually worked so no problem.

    "At yesterday''s ceremony, I named my subordinate Adalman''s pet ''Wenti'' and she evolved to be not only human, but also fluent in conversation. So, I thought how about naming your Dragon Kings too.

    Although I was surprised to learn that they could turn into a human, but when you think about it, dragons turning into human is not a standard part of storytelling.

    It''s not unexpected.

    So it should be possible for the four Dragon Kings under Ramiris to be as humanoid as Wenti, in which case there would be more manpower and Beretta would suffer less.

    "If that''s the case, then it''s your turn!

    After saying that, Ramiris nodded happily.

    Now that it''s agreed, let''s get started quickly.

    "Do you have any good names?

    "Well, I''ll leave it all to you.

    Ramiris doesn''t seem to be good at taking names.

    If it''s handed to me, it could easily turn into a fantasy game with a boss nameno, is that really okay?

    Bute to think of it, it was originally boss, so there''s no need to care.

    I asked Ramiris to have the Dragon Kings assemble in the Throne Hall of the Labyrinth.

    Looking at the dragon kings standing side by side in front of me, it urred to me that they had been crushed countless times and had suffered a lot, but they were still working hard to hold down thebyrinth, so I had to give them a handsome name.

    After bing a Dragon King, the amount of mana will exceed that of the upper demon general.

    However, it hadn''t been much time since Milim had picked up these Dragon Kings, so these Dragon Kings didn''t have the corresponding strength yet.

    After the evolution of the name, intelligence should also increase in one breath. That way, you should be even more intelligent and powerful than you are now.

    Looking at a single Dragon King in front of him, his mind silently began to ponder their respective corresponding names.

    With things like names, intuition is most important.

    The Dragon King of Fire, named Zephyrus, the Fire Hell Dragon King.

    The Dragon King of Ice, named Boreas, the "Ice Hell Dragon King.

    The Dragon King of Wind, named Notos, the Lightning Dragon King.

    The Dragon King of Earth, named Euros, the "Tremor Dragon King."

    Borrowing the name of a god from Greek mythology.

    It was originally the name of the Four Wind Gods of the East, West, and North, and I thought it was just right to give these Dragon Kings.

    I was the one who wanted the name, but it was Ramiris who gave the name, and it went well, so I can rest easy for now.

    And just like that, a soul connection was formed between Ramiris and the Dragon Kings. Hopefully, they will continue to do so in the future as official ministers of Ramiris.

    Then there''s the evolutionary situation about caring more.

    The Dragon Kings can really be close to a humanoid gesture.

    Not fully humanoid, but with a portion of the dragon''s features remaining.

    "The Fire Hell Dragon King," Zephyrus turned into a red-haired beauty with reddish-brown skin wrapped in a dragon scale style gown and a tail that seemed to turn into a ming whip.

    "The Ice Hell Dragon King, Boreas who was a slender, beautiful man. Elegant and gentle looksbined with long emerald green hair can easily be mistaken for a beauty.

    "Notos is a tiny little girl, cute from a distance, but up close you will find a mouthful of shark teeth and small tiger teeth, a strange woman who ispletely off-shaped.

    "Euros, the Dragon King of the Earth, is a big, muscr man. Characteristically, his body is covered with dragon scales and covered with thorns.

    All four have the appearance of subordinates of an evil ndestine organization, the so-called "alien beauty", where terror and beauty meet.

    But this form, in the end, was just a change of state, not bing a Dragon Demon Lord like Milim, the race was still the Dragon King as before.

    In the end, the Dragon Humanoid is a spiritual being with a physical body, like a mutant of the Dragon Race.

    Even a powerful Dragon King, as long as he is still confined to his physical body, is far less powerful than a perfect spiritual being, the Dragon Race.

    The races were unchanged, but the evolution seeded smoothly, and they seemed to gain more powerful magic than I could have imagined.

    The amount of mana has also increased several times over pre-Evolution, and feels close to that of an Awakened yman.

    It''s not quite the same as "the true demon lord, but it''s an excellent evolution.

    The mere fact that "naming" is so much enhanced, it would be a chill to think about it just by consuming the amount of your own magic to get a name.

    If one doesn''t get it right, it might cause unrecoverable damage.

    Sure enough, "naming" is a horrible system, and with more than 5,000 "souls" consumed, I realized once again that there is no justification for magical creatures.

    But seriously, you lose.

    And just like that, the evolution of the Dragon Kings went off without a hitch as a thank you gift to Ramiris.

    By the way, the amount of magic element between the Ten Lords of the Labyrinth" can be regarded as basically the same, but there seems to be a big difference in terms ofbat power that cannot be reflected by the value.

    The leading man, Zegion, goes without saying.

    Evenpared to the other Labyrinth Lords", the evolved Dragon Kings are still weak.

    The strong flesh of magic, the means of attack to make full use of it, and the various kinds of magic, even these are absolutely vicious and powerful forces. However, these don''t work when facing someone who is good at fighting in equivalent specs.

    This is because there is too littlebat experience and fundamentally too littlebat skill.

    The Dragon Kings should have been very upset that they were knocked down several times during this defensive battle. Having just evolved to be able to speak fluently, the will to want to practice is presented.

    The Dragon Kings were able to learn thebat skills of human form after they acquired it. Through this, they perceived that the refinement technique was strongerpared to the way the magical creatures had fought so far.

    Instead of relying on physical attacks like attribute spitting or wielding minions, find a way to understand magic and incorporate it into the battle.

    And use this as a basis to learn the human form ofbat and think about how it can be applied to realbat.

    It''s amazing the amount of growth thates from exploring conclusions through your own thinking.

    I approved the application.

    "Kuahahaha! Leave it to me!

    Veldora, who was overwhelmed by the experience of cultivating Zegion, took up the task of guiding the Dragon Kings in their cultivation.

    With that, the Dragon Kings began their cultivation journey.

    After that.

    Among the Dragon Kings, there were even stronger ones who were more human than dragon, and although there was a sense of putting the cart before the horse, it was indeed a reasonable result to learn the spell of changing one''s ws and scales into weapon defense.

    It was a long time ago when I learned about this, and the feeling that came out was that it''s going to be that way.

    ***

    Three days after the resurrection, Calgurio and the others finally calmed down.

    It was hard to say how much the resurrection through the hand of the demon lord had impacted them, but they had finally epted the reality.

    The next question is about their position in the future.

    To this day they still live in tents, and food is regrly carried by magical creatures, and no oneins even if the bearers are skeletons.

    The tents were arranged in a hilly area where the grass and trees had withered away, and although the scenery was poor, the cold and warmth was pleasant and unexpectedly a suitable ce to live.

    The scent of death wafted through the remnants of the battlefield, and rows and rows of gravestones of the dead stood, such a view would not matter if one was used to seeing it. After all, the guys who were supposed to be lying in the tomb were out and about, and it was even stranger to be afraid now.

    That is to say, in terms of life, there is no great discontent felt.

    y

    It was said that this was the sevent levels of thebyrinth, and the one in charge of the narration was the Necromancer who guarded this level, calling himself Adalman.

    Some of the generals had actually fought with him, so no one doubted the veracity of this narration.

    Adalman was very good at taking care of people, and Calgurio and the others were not cked off as captives.

    "Since we, the god, Lord Rimuru, have raised you, I will do the will of god, and you are not a man who has gone against your will, so take your time and think about how you should spend this second life.

    Adalman said so, leaving them free for Calgurio to roam.

    Run away from the ssnone of them say so. Because they hade to their senses and entrusted themselves to the gods, they decided to trust in the demon lord, Rimuru.

    Calgurio held the same opinion, as he was sure that even if he did run, it would only end in failure.

    It was because of this that he decided to ept honestly what Adalman had said and called the subordinates to a meeting.

    Nearly a hundred officers were gathered in therge tent used for military meetings.

    Among them were senior officers and the Empire''s premier heroes.

    Only these people, nowadays, have also lost their power

    "So, guys. Let me begin by thanking you. Because of my ipetence, I am sincerely sorry that I have caused you such suffering.

    Calgurio looked around at the group and lowered his head when he finished.

    And to his words, there was a unanimous negative opinion.

    "What are you talking about. Those of us who did not stop you are also guilty of the same sin.

    The adjutant finished and the staff officers nodded together. Senior officers were also unanimous in saying that it was not the responsibility of Calgurio.

    The attitude is most evident in Krishna.

    "My opinion is the same as everyone else''s. It is because of the folly of us, etc., that has angered the gods. And yet it is through gods great mercy that the opportunity for atonement is obtained.

    Krishna regarded the matter of imperial aggression as a sin in itself.

    Calgurio thought, indeed.

    How foolish it was, in retrospect, to believe too much in one''s own force, to despise one''s enemies too much and not bother to understand them at all, Calgurio sneered to himself. Thinking that hispanions were in the same mood, he smiled again as if relieved.

    "Thank you. I''m more or less relieved that you can say that. I swear to god, this is a feeling I will never forget for the rest of my life.

    Speaking of the divine moment, the figure of the Demon Lord Rimuru shed in Calgurio''s mind.

    Yeah, to me, the god of the moment is His Majesty Rimuru, right?

    Even back in the Empire, there would be no ce for Calgurio. All that awaits him is the tragic end of being held ountable for his defeat and directly executed before he even goes to court-martial.

    Although Calgurio had no intention of avoiding responsibility at all, this second life was given by Rimuru, and Calgurio was not going to waste it casually.

    Well, you can take your time about that.

    The current Calgurio was no longer the same vulgar person who had acted only for his own status and desires before, so the thoughts in his head rightfully put his own affairs on the back burner.

    "Then let''s get down to business. I have brought you all together today to seek your views on how we should proceed in this matter. His Excellency Adalman has graciously granted us the freedom to gather together and deliberate, and let us use this time effectively in order not to waste it.

    After Calgurio brought up the topic, the people present looked at each other and after looking at the others, the discussion began.

    It is inconceivable that such a state of affairs could have urred at the original military conference, but for Calgurio, who wants a practical opinion, the present situation is wee.

    The discussion went on for some time.

    Then, roughly divided into two opinions.

    The one who advocates that they should just be subservient.

    There is also a section of people who advocate that they should go back to the Empire.

    The two opinions are tit-for-tat with no one in particr.

    Both sides are understandable, and it''s only natural that people with families would advocate a return to the Empire.

    However, the ability to return to the homnd depended on what Demon Lord Rimuru had in mind. It is possible that permission may be given for future dealings, but any disorderly conduct is likely to cause displeasure to the Demon Lord.

    "As His Excellency Adalman said, there is no intention of executing us at will, but we should still be prepared, because it does not mean that we are spared.

    Since his life had already been saved by the demon lord, then the fate was already in the demon lord''s hands. While a certain amount of freedom is allowed, it is not known how far it hase.

    no matter what, the only thing that awaits us back home is execution. Even so, I still want to send the soldiers who fought for their country back to their homnd safely. I would like to speak frankly to His Majesty Rimuru and ask for his mercy.

    That said, theyre about on par with hostages, so the question is whether the country will pay thepensation.

    At this point, Major General Minute, who had been listening in silence to everyone''s talk, slowly opened his mouth to speak.

    "It''s impossible. After all, we didn''t even expect to lose. Because our own attitude towards the enemy has always been ruthless.

    Hearing this, everyone was silent.

    The Empire never epts results other than unconditional surrender, and it is the continued winning that gives rise to imperial arrogance. But now that they are fighting with all their might, they arepletely defeated, and if they are not forgiven, they arepletely at their own peril.

    Everyone is well aware of this fact and knows that even back in the Empire there will never be a bright future.

    Even so, they want to do something for those who have families.

    "Major General Minute is right, what exactly is the Emperor''s holy will?

    "I didn''t want to say it, but this time it was an oversight on the part of the Intelligence Bureau. They don''t even want to think about it, how many demon lord level monsters are there here!?

    One of the officers, off the cuff, said thest thing he should have said.

    "Hey, you guys! Watch what you say. It doesn''t matter what happens to the intelligence services nowadays. You''re talking about all kinds of monsters, but you''re a big man in this country.

    "I''m sorry, it was my mistake"

    While free speech was wee, there was no magic in the room. There had been no sign of His Excellency Adalman since yesterday, and Calgurio thought he presumably had gone somewhere for a meeting.

    That''s why it was decided to hold a military conference today, but not everything can be said.

    Still captive in the end, that must not be forgotten.

    "Although His Majesty Rimuru is generous and kind, he will not let others insult his subordinates, so please don''t forget that before you speak.

    Calgurio gave a warning about the way he spoke, and the officers agreed.

    At the very least, it is enough to understand the dangers of the Demon Lord Rimuru, to be able to take those who use the great magic such as Gravity Copse into his ministry.

    Why didn''t the Secret Service get a clue about such a dangerous man?

    I very much understand your desire to scold them for cking off, because I want to scold them too

    Calgurio thought silently.

    However, someone suddenly threw a cold shower of water on Calgurio and the officers.

    "Are you stupid? Listen up, the intelligence services already had a certain amount of information at that time.

    Bonnie, who had been silent until now, said with a sudden smile.

    "No way! Why, then, not inform His Majesty of the correct information!

    "Those guys, did they betray you?

    Everyone faltered at Bonnie words, and only Minute and Calgurio remained calm.

    The first to speak was Minute.

    "Your name is Bonnie, right? As I recall, you were given an infiltration mission that even we weren''t told about, right?

    Calgurio said next.

    "Well, as a single-digit man, it''s not surprising that you have ssified information that we don''t know.

    So, what does the intelligencemunity think and what exactly does it want us to do?

    As soon as this question was thrown out, everyone looked to Bonnie.

    Either one wants to know the answer.

    Intelligence Bureau, is absolutely loyal to His Majesty the Emperor. It was inconceivable that they would betray, that is to say, Emperor Rudra could have predicted the current situation.

    Bonnie snorted, looked pityingly at the Calgurio, then dropped a bomb with little energy.

    "As you may imagine, His Majesty the Emperor knows all, and even your defeat has been foreseen.

    "How, how could"

    "What do you mean? His Majesty sent us when he knew he would lose!?

    "No way! How dare you insult His Majesty like that!

    The officers were in chaos.

    However, some of them have also scratched the surface.

    "So. In other words, are we abandoned men?

    That''s not quite right, Minute. Your Majesty''s purpose, I''m afraid, is

    "Huh! Shut up, Calgurio. The responsibility for leaking important state secrets rests with me. You''re all dead people, including me. So this is not a betrayal of His Majesty."

    That is, Bonnies awakening.

    Now that he has lost his power as a "single digit", even the Emperor''s borrowed supreme power has been taken away, but he still wants to be the one to show the way for his subordinates as a superior.

    Bonnie

    "I''m sorry, Jiu. I, for one, am not so loyal to His Majesty. I followed hismand for one reason only, and that was that I could not beat him no matter what.

    That, too, is what Bonnie meant.

    ...........

    ........

    ...

    Bonnie, born in the United States of America forty-five years ago, was just an ordinary student who loved freedom. However, somehow karma came into the world and his talent was discovered by Rudra.

    He was then taken in by Damrada and taught the methods of fighting.

    I don''t know when I started to get confident and felt that I was the number one strongman in this world and became arrogant.

    The one who shattered Bonnies confidence was the woman who served at the side of Emperor Rudra.

    No, it was the draped, gaudy-looking, scary monster.

    Even if the heavens and the earth were turned upside down and infinitely reincarnated, it would be an extreme realm that could never be touched. It is impossible to believe that there is such a thing in this world, but it is the bloody truth.

    Its name, Velgrynd.

    Absolutely non-disclosable, one of the Empire''s confidential matters.

    One day, Bonnie, led by Damrada, went to the emperor''s residence. It was a very honorable thing to do, and at the same time fueled Bonnie''s ambitions.

    The freedom-loving Bonnie will never allow an emperor to dominate others at will.

    So, when you get the chance, you have to do the followingto dream such foolish dreams.

    The price of stupidity is horror in the extreme.

    It was there that Bonnie met Velgrynd for the first time. Then felt her horror and couldn''t help giving in.

    And at this point, Emperor Rudra, who was behind the imperial curtain, said to Bonnie.

    "You have this qualification, the qualification as a vessel. Let me lend you my strength, and be more diligent in the future.

    Emperor Rudra''s icy, ruthless voice, as if it hade from a distant ce, had be impossible to resist the Emperor when he awoke again.

    ...........

    ........

    ...

    "Your Majesty, even if all the millions of elites are wiped out, you won''t care. Let''s just say that total annihtion is the n.

    It is impossible for normal to understand the meaning of the phrase just by hearing it. However, Calgurio understood.

    "So that''s it. As long as an awakened person like me can appear, it doesn''t matter if you sacrifice millions of soldiers?"

    Guessing the answer based on these instructions alone surprised Bonnie somewhat. However, upon hearing him say ''''an awakened one like me, Bonnie reacted.

    "Yeah, so you''ve awakened too. Then I think you understand. You''re right, the Emperor''s purpose is to collect the pieces of the Awakening. For that purpose, even if it caused millions of sacrifices, he thought it was worth it.

    That''s a fact that even senior officers don''t know.

    From the very beginning, Emperor Rudra had no expectations of the army. The most important thing is only how to collect talents with Awakening credentials.

    "That is, more about quality than quantity? So, then, the failed crusade against Veldora three hundred years ago was too?

    Minute asked with a sharp stare at Bonnie. In response, Bonnie replied lightly.

    "I don''t know what happened then. But doesn''t it make sense just to think about it? If it were me, one person could kill you allno, it turns out it could be done. The gap in strength is just so obvious.

    "So that''s why we say our defeat was nned, is that it? A strategy premised on sacrifice? As much as I want to praise His Majesty, this time it''s really been a total loss.

    "That''s how it is. To lose so badly after awakening, even His Majesty didn''t expect it.

    Minute nodded understandingly.

    Hearing this, Calgurio had a bitter face.

    "s, it''s my fault for not being useful."

    He whispered to himself. However, Bonnie dismissed him.

    "Don''t worry. It''s not that you''re not useful, it''s just that the opponent is too strong.

    "Right. That''s simply not something we can beat.

    Jiu nodded in agreement.

    The duo also lost to Diablo, who knocked out Calgurio. There wasn''t even a monster they could beat, so in their opinion, it was not surprising that Calgurio couldnt win.

    "That is to say, the strength of the battle here exceeds the intelligence agency''s expectations?"

    "It should be. ns to use this ce''s demon lord, Rimuru, as a stepping stone to add pawns were thwarted by misjudging the opponent''s battle strength.

    Bonnieughed bitterly.

    After paying many sacrifices without any reward, it was impossible tough, but in his heart, Bonnie still wanted to say to the Emperor that he deserved it.

    "So, Bonnie-kun. Since the n to use us as bait and have you carry out the surprise attack has also failed, what are your ns for the future?

    "Huh? I told you so. I''ll take the responsibility.

    "What do you mean by that?

    Minute asked calmly.

    There was silence in the tent as everyone waited for Bonnie''s answer.

    "One thing I have to make clear, as I said earlier, is that you are dead. This is not a metaphor, but as far as His Majesty the Emperor is concerned, you are dead.

    "Are you suggesting that keeping us alive is more troublesome for His Majesty?

    "It''s a bit of anguage problem. My point is that His Majesty does not need the kind of general whose power is taken away causing the possibility of awakening to be reduced to zero. To be of no value to His Majesty means that there is no reason to continue protecting you.

    "Well, that''s what it''s all about.

    "Considering this premise, the possibility of not epting the return of prisoners is high. No, it''s more than that. If the surviving soldiers return home, anti-war sentiment will spread, and do you think this is in line with His Majesty''s thoughts?"

    "I don''t think so.

    After saying that, Minute sighed deeply.

    He understood what Bonnie was trying to say.

    "That is to say, what is optional for His Majesty is in the way for the Intelligence Service?

    Right."

    "Will he wipe out those who intend to return?

    "For sure.

    Then throw the pot at the Jura Tempest Federation as a way to stir up the anger and vengeance of the nation. Bonnie was convinced that the Intelligence Service would act in this way and exin it to the crowd.

    "That''s 700,000? How could it be done?

    "Those who have undergone transformative surgery have not lost their strength to that point. But if you fight back, it''s a fight against yourself!

    Minute gestured for the restless officers to quiet down.

    "Do you have an idea of who can make this happen?

    While many thought it was simply impossible, Minute was calm.

    Thinking of his own awakening, Calgurio remained silent. He believes that if one does have that kind of power, it is not impossible to do it.

    "If it''s in single digits, can you do it?

    It would be possible if we just said we could do it, but that''s just paper. Superb individual strength for the offense but not for the defense. If one relies on manned tactics, there will be loopholes that can''t be held no matter what. Likewise, it is not appropriate to track escaped enemies. If people spread out and run away, there will always be fish in the.

    And this time, it takes one person to wipe it all out. Bonnie really couldn''t think of anyone who could do such a thing.

    However, all but one

    "I don''t think anyone can do that, from amon sense point of view, can they? But yeah, there really is. In the Empire, there are monsters that can turn this assumption into reality"

    That figure surfaced in front of Bonnie''s eyes, his body trembling with fear.

    The beauty and horror of that can only be experienced by those who have seen it with their own eyes.

    And Bonnie, who knew this well, felt a little unfortunate.

    "Is it a single-digit existence that you''re also afraid of? It looks like I''ve got something wrong."

    Minute leaned deeply into his chair and sighed with his head back.

    "Me too. I joined the army and dreamed of letting the Empire dominate the world. But"

    However, this was all decided long ago in a ce that had absolutely nothing to do with the military. In the power game of proliferation by who-knows-who, there is no room for non-awakened people to show up from the start.

    "That''s silly.

    "Ah. I feel silly as a clown.

    Calgurio and Minute looked at each other sobbingly. It wasn''t just the Calgurio, the officers present, all sighed as if they had awakened from a dream.

    How sadBonnie thought.

    I don''t know if the truth would be happier, but then they wouldn''t ept it, would they? So Bonnie, coldly, said something rather unreasonable.

    "Now you understand. Do you understand the situation? Even if you go back, all that awaits you is despair. So just stay here and be a prisoner and wait for the war to be over.

    "What are you going to do about it, Sir Bonnie?

    "I''m going back to the Empire. There shouldn''t be a truce like that, I think His Majesty Rimuru would want to deal with the Empire. By then, a guide must be needed, right?

    And the person who acts as a guide, presumably, will be wiped out. Bonnie, who has lost his power now, will no doubt be assassinated.

    Sensing Bonnies awakening, everyone fell silent.

    Then, everyone was deeply aware that their fate had been entrusted to the Demon Lord Rimuru.

    ***

    After expressing my gratitude to Veldora and Ramiris, I headed to the seventieth level of thebyrinth.

    Adalman is currently in a dormant phase because of yesterday''s ritual.

    The Harvest Festival had begun, but Adalman''s castle was still in a state of destruction.

    So it was that he was moved to the guest room on the main floor above ground to continue his slumber, and Albert and Wenti were moved to spare rooms, presumably to be awakened in a while.

    More problematic were the imperial captives, who had previously been looked after by Adalman, and it wasn''t good to leave them hanging so long now.

    Besides, they should have calmed down by now, and I''d like to ask for information about the Empire.

    I''ll go check them out while I can.

    Apanying me were my two secretaries.

    With these two, I can be rest assured even if anything happens.

    "You don''t have to go, Rimuru-sama himself

    "Well, why don''t you go for me?

    "That''s right, you''ve got to get some information!

    "Kufufufufu we might as well go together!

    Diablo was as unflinching as ever.

    Is the same true of Shion?

    There is absolutely no active petition to leave.

    Well, there''s no way that I''m going to let Shion go alone. I thought as I was held to the chest by Shion.

    But then again, these two are still so energetic after just having an evolutionary ceremony yesterday.

    After a night in the Shion nothing has changed. And Diablo, perfectly back to his usual self.

    "So, have you gained new abilities?

    "Kufufufufu! Thanks to Rimuru-sama, I managed to gain the ultimate skill. Finally, I don''t have to put up with Guy''s show-offs.

    From Guy''s point of view, Diablo is the one who is really annoying, right?

    For some reason, I''m sure I thought that correctly.

    "If you''re so reluctant, you should get it yourself. I think Diablo would be able to obtain the ultimate skill himself without my help, right?

    "No, no, you can''t say that. Wouldn''t it beme to get it the way Guy said, as if I were to learn from him?

    I don''t get it, not talking about parody.

    I''ll ask for advice if I think I can use it, was I wrong about that?

    "Hmph, Diablo is really small-minded. Is that how you say "without shame"? Since being taught in this way by Lord Rimuru, I have often gone to ask others for advice. His Excellency Gobuchi also taught me the essence of cooking, and now they all agree that my craft has been handed down.

    Shion said with a smug expression.

    But, I think.

    So, it''s not like the baggage was dumped by Gobuchi.

    Gobuchi is also really, I really hope he doesn''t add any strange confidence to Shion.

    Now that you''ve epted it, teach it well to the end.

    "So that''s why. Not long ago, Lord Gobuchi was hospitalized because his body would definitely copse if he had to try the cuisine of Shion every time."

    Haha, haha.

    Then it would be bad to me Gobuchi.

    In this case, Diablo had already fallen on his face, and Shuna would never taste it.

    I knew it, I had to get Benimaru.

    Well, Shion''s education was supposed to be Benimaru''s responsibility, it would be good to stress it to him again.

    That''s not going to be a problem for the newlyweds. Please, don''t get me wrong.

    Because the topic of Shion''s rtionship was a bit off topic, but in the midst of small talk we had reached our destination.

    After the "transfer" to the hills of the 70th ss, everyone who saw me appear immediately saluted.

    I don''t think it''s right to do such a thing to an enemy demon lord, but Diablo and Shion seem quite content, so I''d better not interject.

    "His Majesty Rimuru is here! Immediately, inform Sir Calgurio!

    Everyone quickly began to move, with a tent at the center, neatly lined up on both sides of the road.

    It seemed that Calgurio and the rest were having a military meeting in that tent, and Rimuru and the others were led into the tent while listening to the instructions.

    Inside the tent, there were probably about a hundred or so people in high ces. They all stood straight and saluted me and greeted me.

    I''m a little surprised that even they are reacting this way.

    I''m the king of an enemy country, and I''m still a Slime. They didn''t even slight me, and it seems that Raphaels scheme was more sessful than imagined.

    Well,e to think of it, it''s a given. Not only did he kill him, but he also brought him back to life, and in the face of such a person,plete submissiveness is the wise thing to do.

    If I were you, I wouldn''t have the confidence to fight back against such a dangerous person. Rimuru convinced himself and was led to the top seat.

    Of course, in order to show majesty on such asions, to take on human form.

    Shion and Diablo stood behind me, respectively.

    Because I was out of Shion''s embrace, she still had a somewhat regretful expression on her face. If you care about such a ce, you lose, so I looked around at everyone and said.

    "So, guys. Just in time, the top brass have gathered.

    Yes!"

    Because everyone bowed their heads together, it was troublesome so there was no way to talk properly.

    I let them all take their seats and then began to exin theing.

    "All of you rx. I''m here today to talk to you guys."

    I said this with a smile to everyone.

    It''s better for the meeting to be rxed and gentle.

    "Adalman''s been up to somethingtely and may not be here for a while. So, I was wondering if there was anything you guys would like to mention.

    "I dare not. You''ve treated us well enough, don''t bother any more.

    So stiff!

    Calgurio spoke back as a representative,pletely respectful.

    Nope, that''s themon attitude right there.

    They are the defeated ones, and it''s the right thing to do.

    "That''s good. And then, what about the way forward?

    "Yes! And on that note, we have a request!

    Request?

    As long as it''s not something that can''t be done, let''s just listen. Then, Calgurio made a startling im.

    "We would like to live in this country for the time being, and see if you can amodate us"

    Wait?

    I listened to the content in detail.

    ording to Calgurio.

    It just so happens that right now, they are also discussing the way forward.

    And then came to the conclusion that even back in the Empire, they would only be killed all over.

    "No, no, no, you''re going too far! There is no country that kills soldiers who fight for their country just because they are defeated!

    I couldn''t help but gag.

    "However, I think there''s no doubt it will turn out that way.

    Who did you think it was? It was Bonnie. I can''t believe it''s the same person who attacked us, he said calmly and clearly.

    Nor, ording to his ount, it cant bepletely denied that there is no such possibility.

    Are you kidding me?

    "It''s true.

    "No, wait? If that''s true, the earlier statement about suspending military aggression for fear of Veldora''s seal being lifted now sounds suspicious, too. Maybe that''s my mistake too, and he is actually waiting for the storm dragon toe back?

    "What Emperor Rudra was thinking is also hard for me to understand. But, in my humble opinion, His Majesty Rimuru is probably right.

    This guy, is it really Bonnie?

    It''s like hes being a different person.

    But then again, is that so?

    Emperor Rudra''s true purpose was not simply to win the war. Instead, the empire''s soldiers were to face off against a strong opponent, so that they could select a strong man who could awaken.

    It''s a big move, beyond the realm of normal human thought.

    <></answer.>

    You''re an idiot!

    It''s not funny to think of people as experimental material!

    That being said, the King of Wisdom has that side too.

    Zegion, for example, is a sess story, and it''s really kind of scary to think that maybe it''s happening to me, too, that I''m being used as a test subject somewhere when I don''t know.

    <<no. no="" such="" instances="" have="" been="" found.="">></no.>

    Seriously.

    Well, there''s still credibility in that.

    Anyway, we''ll talk about thister.

    The question is whether or not to ept Calgurio and the others request.

    "But, ah, your food is not free either. It''s an extra 700,000 people''s rations, and they''ll have to be bought from other countries.

    Hearing that they would be killed back home, it was a bit of a hesitation to let them go. But it is also true that our country has no reason to shelter them.

    All I have to answer for is my own nationals. I hope they live strongas much as I want to say so, I can''t just leave it at that.

    If 700,000 professional soldiers had been admitted, the Western countries, led by the Kingdom of Blumund, would not have remained silent. One messed up and unnecessary bloodshed ensued.

    That being said, it would be too ruthless to let them return. Since I saved their lives, I''ll be responsible until the end.

    There''s no way around it, it''s better to take them in.

    But it''s not free.

    "In our country, he who does not work does not gain, You can earn your own rations. Is that okay?

    Nervously holding their breath as they waited for me to answer the Calgurio and the others faces brightened as they listened.

    "That''s for sure!

    "At your service!

    We haven''t even said what theyre going to do, but theyre all looking very energetic.

    That being the case, I gave them permission to stay here.

    When all is said and done, it seems to me that capturing captives doesn''t mean much to the Empire.

    Because there was no wartime agreement done, and nothing prescribed.

    And it seems to me, listening to Bonnie, that there is little use for an armistice bargaining condition. In that case, it would be better to use them asbor.

    While the stays are undetermined, at least give me some goodbor until the war with the Empire is over.

    I don''t know if it wille in handy if it''s too short, but I''m still watching more. Hopefully, they''d y some better role.

    And they werent about to disobey me either, so just please give them to Geld to let them live for a while.

    But then again, Geld is, at the moment, still in evolutionary slumber. It''s still a while until he awakens, and they should be allowed to do something before then.

    "By the way, are you good at civil engineering?"

    Groups like the military, unexpectedly, have a lot of people who are good at technology.

    It''s still in my past life, but the samuraimanding the building of the castle is still quite famous.

    Even in modern times, the Self-Defense Forces are active in various disaster relief scenes, and the news has reported active scenes of relief overseas.

    By the same token, the working forces in Dwargon in this world, pride themselves on having a high level of skill. It''s in, but it actually makes a difference.

    Then again, it is not too much to say that it is because of the presence of the former head of the Dwarven Work Force, Kaijin, that a solid foundation has beenid for our country.

    It was that situation that created the close link between the military and civil engineering technology.

    "Of course! I can confidently say that the Empire''s skill level is the highest!

    Great.

    In that case, let me show you first.

    "Well, first job. See this destroyed city now, and restore it in its entirety. The materials will be prepared by me, but they''ll be in your hands from the design stage. You can do it, right?

    Since it was broken by them, it is natural for them to fix it.

    Listening to my request, Calgurio nodded.

    "As you wish.

    Calgurio nodded confidently, and the men who had received the instructions left quickly. That quick and unified feeling is just the kind of man who does his job.

    The skeletons will also be able to return to work when Adalman awakens, and it''s estimated that the rebuilding will be over shortly after.

    And just like that, the Imperial Army was appointed to the job.

    ***

    The rest of the purpose, then, is simply to gather intelligence.

    I felt the need to listen to the details, so I picked a few of Calgurio''s men who knew the details and went to the conference room together.

    The sober subordinates will gather and prepare for a countermeasures meeting.

    At this moment, the Imperial side should not have sensed their defeat in Calgurio.

    Although Yuuki should have received information from Misha or Lace, there was no need to worry too much about leaking it from them.

    And we, for our part, have mastered the Empire''s movements.

    Ruminas had been informed that three hundred airships were on the move across the ocean.

    "Huh! Let''s see how I fight him back!

    She boasted.

    Although I don''t think Ruminas will do it herself, she and I have an agreement. We made a pact that Ruminas would defend against the Imperials attacking from the north.

    The divine kingdom of Ruberios, the home of the religion, has many Pdins and the ability to fight alone.

    And with the vampire n as an undercard, handing it to her would be a relief.

    Even if Ruminas was in crisis, there were still a hundred and fifty thousand Western-equipped troops to go out. In order to be able to respond quickly to unexpected situations, we had been keeping Testarossa''s men there.

    What''s more, the fact that Hinata is sending out a counterattack is a foolproof solution.

    However, it is far from being careless.

    I looked around at the participants and announced the start of the meeting.

    The participants are the following seventeen:

    Secretaries Shion and Diablo.

    Chief Grand Admiral Benimaru

    Those in charge of the administrationRigurd and Kaijin.

    Chiefs of Army Gabil and Gobta.

    Advisor Hakurou,

    Souei of the Intelligence Department.

    I also called in the important reference person, Gedora.

    The others were Testarossa, Ultima, and Carrera, the three demonesses.

    For their part, the Imperial Army was joined by Calgurio and Minute, along with the duo of Bonnie and Jiu.

    There were 18 of them, including me.

    Starting with introductions, the Imperial side became speechless when they learned that Diablo and the Three Demon Maidens were the "primordials".

    That sight is very stark.

    I''m sorry, the fault is not with me but with Diablo.

    Noticing again that there was someone who wanted to spit, I decided to continue the conversation as if nothing had happened.

    Then I got started.

    "So, just say what you can, huh?

    After saying that, I began to use physics magic: the Argos, revealing an image of the flying airship troops. As agreed beforehand, Calgurio began to illustrate the current state of the empire.

    Looking at the image on the monitor''srge screen, the Imperials faltered again. And wherein Calgurio hides his inner emotions, the calm quickly begins to illustrate.

    From Gedora, I have been informed in partial detail.

    Although the old man looked like he didn''t care about his betrayal at all, Calgurio was a soldier. Odds are, there are also things that can''t be said that need to be added from the sidelines by us.

    He had already been informed of what we knew, so he was asked to add a note on that basis.

    "I see. Then, let me begin to illustrate.

    Calgurio was more thoughtful and articte than I expected.

    There was a unit called the "Air Combat Flying Corps" in the "Mecha Corps" led by Calgurio, which had four hundred flying airships that were called the newest airbat power. Three hundred of them were sailed by other legions to the north of the Kingdom of Ingracia.

    The maximum carrying capacity of each spacecraft is four hundred people. It takes fifty men to operate an airship, so one can carry three hundred and fiftybatants.

    The same as what I heard from Gedora.

    The main delivery was the 30,000 ''Warcraft Legion'' led by the Imperial Grand Admiral named dim.

    But in fact it seems as if they are two by two with the wizards who can call them partners, so in essence the number ofbatants to be transported is 60,000.

    The rest, it seems, are the support personnel who carry out rear support.

    That aspect of themand was given to a Major General named Samuel, who seemed to be a nonbatant anyway, so it didn''t count asbat strength.

    "It is a shame to say this, but most of the soldiers sent to Ingracia were new recruits. There''s nothing wrong with flying an airship, but it''s a little worse in practice. I''m supposed to be a researcher, so I''d like to ask for your mercy.

    Calgurio said.

    This time, the full force was devoted to war against our country, so it was only possible to lend some of thebatants to Brigadier General dim. There were about 30,000 auxiliaries, but none of them were even at the Magic Instructor level, most of them were at the Spellcaster level.

    Then there''s the technician who maintains the airship, who wants to keep them alive as long as possible without killing them.

    "You bastard, there''s a limit to what you can do. You want us to spare other people''s countries when you feel you can''t beat them?

    Shion shouted emotionally, and Calgurio apologized with an iron face upon hearing it.

    I appeased Shion, but I also felt that Shion was not wrong in what she said. And Calgurio understood exactly what he had said that had gone too far and apologized for his outburst

    "It''s not our job to deal with that. Depending on the circumstances, you may have to give up.

    "Sure, I understand. All things being in ordance with the will of His Majesty Rimuru"

    It would be possible to consider it if it were possible, but I can''t say for sure. My resurrection magic isn''t all-powerful either, and depending on the circumstances, it can fail.

    And, depending on how Ruminas reacts, there may be no room for me to interject.

    I''ve heard that the ''''Warcraft Legion'''' led by dim is quite threatening, and also has the potential to cause significant damage to Hinata.

    If that really were to happen, it wouldn''t be my turn to pity them. Although, in my opinion, the defense on Ruminas'' side is quite strong and will never lose. But there are no absolutes in battle, and I don''t just give promises to people.

    That''s it, so that''s the end of that thread.

    Next, it''s about the eastern city of Dwargon.

    ***

    I switched the Argos disy scene.

    An army of 60,000 men was revealed. There was no sense of tension, loosely lined up.

    Looking at the tense again Imperial group, I began the instructions.

    "Now, although it''s not my wish, I''ve made an alliance with Yuuki. To confront each other like this now is really just an act,

    I finished, Minuteughed to himself.

    "It''s really hard to beat, we''ve been pried out of the army from the beginning, no wonder we can''t win at all.

    Calgurio nodded with a sniff.

    "That''s right, the moment my Legion of Mechs and dim''s Legion of Warcraft disappeared, they pointed straight at the Imperial Capital. So, is that the General?

    A bitter look crawled across the two men''s faces knowing that they had not only lost in strength, but even in strategy.

    However, objections have been raised.

    "That''s not right. The emperor, still left to protect him. I have also said this many times, but again, the Awakened One is an army. Your Highness must have noticed that Yuuki was trying tomit a rebellion.

    Although this was said by Bonnie, the impression he had as Masayuki''s follower was too strong, and he was apletely different person.

    "Is this what Bonnie is all about?

    "Ah, no. The time I acted with Masayuki was the time when my character had nothing to say.

    In the face of my off-the-cuff doubts, Bonnie replied in a disciplined manner. He said it was now the attitude of a soldier, and that nature would be more casual

    By the way, also told me that he was originally American. Well, forty-five. What used to be an ordinary student who came to this side and was re-taught became the present Bonnie.

    Although it was insignificant information to him, it made me feel more or less close to him.

    "Well, that seems like a real possibility. I''ve also heard that the Empire seems to have characters who can kill me, and generally speaking, there''s nothing unbelievable about turning this deadly situation around.

    It''s a pain in the ass to think that in this world, quality is more important than quantity. No matter how many battles there are, as long as one can''t beat that one, one will be disastrously defeated

    Since that''s how we won it too, one also really has to think about what happens when standing in the opposite position.

    "Then let me go and eat them all up!

    The big Tai Sword in Shion''s hand spoke boldly.

    There''s no guarantee that anyone will win that way, so of course it''s a no.

    "Kufufufu, then I will do it.

    Overruled!"

    Although it is impossible to imagine the scenes in which Diablo lost, it was decidedly dismissed.

    My approach is to stay on the sidelines until an absolute victory situation is created. Only this, just in case, must be kept in mind again.

    In short, intelligence is important.

    The number of failures due to inadequate intelligence is truly too great to count. To make sure you don''t make the same mistake this time, take a good listen.

    "So, you teamed up with Masayuki so as not to arouse suspicion of approaching me? To be honest, I didn''t realize it at all, the attack was really dangerous at the time.

    I spoke to Bonnie and Jiu.

    It was presumably Damrada''s order, but it was a perfect battle even if the King of Wisdom didn''t notice.

    As enemies, they should also be praised.

    It is clear that there have been several chances to strike so far, but to be able to keep the highest battle power hidden until that decisive moment is something I don''t think ordinary people can do. Although we were the better team this time, a mistake could have reversed the situation.

    If that''s the case, you''ll be in the Emperor''s heart. If the army of the Jura Tempest Federation loses me and Benimaru, it will be a scattered mass of sand to be trampled down by the Empire.

    "I was too confident and careless in the matter. Convinced that the maze was safe. I will remember that in wartime, no matter what time of year, danger is always with us.

    "Me too. Anyone who gets close to Lord Rimuru, I''ll be more thorough in finding out about him.

    Although Benimaru and Souei seemed to have been indifferent all along, it wasn''t just the two of them that were responsible for this if they really wanted to say it.

    They were more considerate and alert to the possibilities of the situation than I was. My sense of crisis is so weak, that''s something to reflect on.

    "Lord Damrada''s order is to protect Masayuki. But I wasn''t told the reason, so I guess it''s to prevent information leakage.

    "Me too. We are not receiving orders at the same time, but through different channels, in order to prevent our identity from being known. When I received the order to assassinate His Majesty Rimuru, I realized that Bonnie was in the single digits, just like me.

    Bonnie and Jiu also joined the conversation, and they had the right to remain silent, so it was really nice to take the initiative to join the conversation.

    However, something about what they said made me care.

    "Just remembering?

    "No, it was because I had never seen a single digit other than myself that I first learned that she was one when I received the order."

    "Me too. I''m afraid only the Chief and deputy Chiefs know the identity of the other single digits.

    I was surprised to hear that answer.

    The strongest warriors in the Empire, surprisingly, don''t even know each other.

    Why do they do this?

    <> Hmmm.</answer.>

    Since they don''t know their identities, they don''t have to worry that they will join forces tomit crimes. It''s not exactly thorough, but it does illustrate that even to this extent, the Emperor''s safety must be guaranteed?

    "It''s not that I can''t understand, but it''s too much trouble and inefficient. If it''s apanion, how nice to help each other from the beginning.

    As I finished thus, Gedora smiled bitterly and dered his opinion.

    "Lord Rimuru, may I have your permission to speak disrespectfully?

    "Of course, I''m d to hear that,

    That would be rude, Gedora said.

    "While Lord Rimuru''s idea is wonderful, it can also be said to becking in consideration. This old man was well aware of Damrada, a man of great cunning, who never trusted his own men and was extremely cautious in character.

    Sure enough, as the King of Wisdom had expected, it was to prevent betrayal. I heard that he is one of the leaders of the "Big Three", a secret association, and he only believes in money, which is just like the rumors.

    And who he really is, is he in the "single digits"?

    "I haven''t seen it, but he sounds like a dangerous guy, and from the way he''s trying to assassinate Gedora, I think there''s no doubt he''s in the single digits. Moreover, he was able tomand Bonnie and Jiu, could Damrada be the captain?

    I asked so, but Gedora denied it.

    "No, Damrada must be the deputy Chief. In my opinion, the Chief is definitely, Tatsuya Kondo.

    This man seems to be the Director of Imperial Intelligence, one of the men Gedora is guarding? It was a man who even Gedora himself, said not to know much. Thus, although intelligence was scarce, Gedora had some certainty about Damrada''s identity as a result of the determination of his true identity.

    The Imperial group had already entered the abandonment mode. Bonnie and Jiu felt that since they were both at this point then there was no hidden meaning and spoke out favorable information.

    As Gedora had envisioned, Damrada was the deputymander of the Imperial Order of the Emperor, second in the sequence. While it''s not known if Kondo is the captain or not, there''s no doubt that Damrada is a big man.

    Good job, Gedora. I thought of it this way, and then listened while I did.

    "In fact, the order to attack His Majesty Rimuru this time was not the instruction of Lord Damrada, but a secret order from the Chief.

    "Me too. This order reces the order to protect Masayuki, so it feels a little strange.

    Listening to Jiu, in order to gain Masayuki''s trust, a bridge segment was also deliberately arranged for Masayuki to save a vige. To repay Masayuki for saving her life, with such a stance, she finally joined Masayuki''s team.

    "If you want to reveal your identity at the same time, it''s better to help each other from the beginning.

    I think so, too. Since it''s really a great opportunity, I always thought I took advantage of Masayuki to keep you guys from getting suspicious

    But now that I think about it there are some doubts, Bonnie concluded.

    Assuming the duo didn''t lie, taken together, Damrada and the Chief seem to have different intentions.

    Since it was Damrada who arranged all this, it is hard to imagine that he would make the order to abandon theyout altogether.

    No, it could also be argued that sacrifices were made to increase the sess rate, but that alone I think there should be other good ways. It''s normal for them to have doubts in Bonnie, and it makes more sense to see the matter as what else is on the inside

    "By the way, have any of you ever seen what the Emperor Rudra looked like?

    Suddenly a little concerned, so I asked.

    Gedora was the only one, raising his hand.

    "Are you kidding me? You don''t even know what the people you serve looks like?

    Benimaru muttered in a low voice in surprise.

    "My lord, there''s no such thing as a dominant person. I''ll be able to buy food on the street and chat easily with anyone.

    "Hey, hey.

    "Don''t be so mean. Although he was a bit harshpared to Lord Gazel, he also had an easygoing side. However, the average prince and aristocrat is a little bit more important. I think there are a lot of people who don''t let their subordinates look directly at their faces.

    "Well, that''s true.

    "While I also agree with Lord Kaijin, there is something I cannot understand. Isn''t it a bit much to hide your face even in front of someone who is serving as an escort?

    "Well. I don''t think so, either.

    Hearing Kaijins words, Rigurdmented. And Kaijin also readily agreed with what he had said.

    "Sure, something weird is going on?

    "It''s not so much strange as it is abnormal. Your name is Bonnie, and I have a question for you.

    Hakurou finished answering the hobgoblin first, and then asked Bonnie a question.

    "What''s the problem?

    "You are in the position of guarding the Emperor, why don''t you even know what he looks like? So how exactly is the monarch to be protected?

    Facing the sharp eyes that stabbed at him, Bonnie spoke as if he was once again puffing up his breath.

    "Very simple, because only the first six in the sequence can see His Majesty''s face. The head and deputy head of the regiment often stayed behind, so the remaining four were often apanied by His Majesty.

    Those four people seemed to be called the Four Horsemen, and as far as Bonnie and Jiu were concerned, they were strong men who had never been reced even after years and years.

    "That is, you are not trusted to that extent? Even your strength is no match for the Four Horsemen?

    The words that were difficult to ask came straight out.

    Bonnie replied somewhat defiantly.

    "It''s okay if you think so. Indeed, I have a hard time beating those four. Not only that, but there was the man at His Majesty''s side. That is the one thing I can never win, His Excellency the dreaded "Marshal". I don''t think I can beat that one even if the "single digits" all add up.

    There he is again, a very strong guy.

    So far, it''s Kondo, Damrada, the Four Horsemen and the Marshal.

    Let''s say there are nine people in the "single digits", and after removing Bonnie and Jiu, there are seven people left. Consistent numbersno, not true. It''s normal to think of "marshal" as another position if it''s down to the top six in the sequence. In that case, it should be possible to think of a "single digit" on another mission.

    That is, it''s the eight that need to be on guard. If Kondo wasn''t the Chief, it would be tricky to add another one to the alert.

    Just knowing that counts as a gain, but there''s another thing I want to confirm.

    "In fact, I heard from Gedora over there that Masayuki and Emperor Rudra seem to look exactly alike.

    Gedora nodded at my words.

    Seeing Gedora''s movements, the congregation became silent in their thoughts.

    Damrada''s order is to protect Masayuki, right? And it also keeps you all out of each other''s heads and definitely doesn''t draw suspicion. To do so, and then to make an order topletely ignore theying out of the front. Damrada and the Chief, presumably for different purposes?

    Feeling certainly right, I put my thoughts into words.

    Presumably, I think Damrada is sincere in his desire to protect Masayuki. Although the reason was unknown, it must have something to do with the fact that Masayuki looked like the Emperor.

    "You just said you used Masayuki, right?

    "Yes. Since it was unclear why he was to be protected, he honestly epted the captain''s orders.

    "Me too. And no note was received from Damrada.

    He took advantage of Masayuki in order to get to me. It would have been understandable if Damrada had ordered Bonnie and Jiu in this way. However, when the captain came out and stabbed a crossbar, there was a doubt that needed to be confirmed anyway.

    "About the captain, do you think he knows what Masayuki looks like?

    "Well, that''s hard to answer. If Kondo is the leader as I expected, it''s better to consider him informed.

    "We don''t know the details, but we do know something about that man Kondo. He must not be careless in the face, I heard that he has all the information in the Empire.

    "A weirdo who feeds on information" is the nickname of Lieutenant Kondo, who is the Director of the Intelligence Bureau. Our military and intelligence agencies are inseparable and have suffered a lot on his part. Although several hostilities were also organized, they all ended in failure. Just looking at that, that guy is no slouch.

    Although Calgurio wanted to y dumb and get over it, Minute didn''t want to hide the fact that it was all said and done at all. The fact that even the inside story was exposed was enough to show that Kondo was a dangerous man.

    With even a man like Minute being at his mercy, it seemed that this Kondo was truly powerful.

    "At least, not an opponent I can beat.

    ''''Old Master Gedora, don''t look at him like that, he''s actually a pretty powerful man. As far as I''m concerned, one might be able to match the strength of a saint.

    Although the amount of mana was not high, the magic technique was extremely high.

    It seems that Kondo can be considered a "saint" if even such a Gedora asserts that he will never win.

    That is to say, a strongman equal to Hinata and King Gazel.

    By the way, Bonnie and Jiu had also been saints before, and Calgurio had also awakened.

    Then Gedora who can''t use their ultimate skills can''t beat them.

    Anyway, it was better to figure out that Kondo was very strong, and since he was known as the

    "information eater", it was better to think that he already knew about Masayuki.

    "If Kondo knew about Masayuki, then he would have had other intentions than Damrada. At that time, Bonnies attack had no regard for Masayuki''s life and death. It''s contradictory to Damrada''s orders.

    Hearing me out, Bonnie said with some difficulty.

    In fact, I received an order from the Chief that Masayuki was useless in getting rid of him.

    From the point of view of Bonnie and Jiu, a friendship had been formed during the journey with Masayuki, and they were still hesitant to kill him. So, they scheduled to talk about Masayuki''s treatment after settling me.

    Just hide him. If not, use magic to erase his memory.

    Anyway, it''s decided for now.

    "It''s just that it''s not safe. Though a little sorry for him, let''s match him with an escort in recent times.

    Souei, is it okay to leave it to you?

    "Yes, sir.

    Well, that''s how the shadow can be trusted.

    "It can be seen that the intentions of the Damrada and the Chief are different. Wanting to protect Masayuki''s people and those who want to kill him. Although the reason for this is unknown, it is indeed opposed to each other.

    "Yeah. If it''s organic in here, it''s earned.

    "It''s not that optimistic. But it is good news to know that the enemy is not of one mind.

    I''d say it''s good news, right?

    Since it is difficult to identify the enemy and me, we can only see them all as enemies. To get a better sense of that, just hear the details again.

    ***

    Already clear about Bonnie and them, next wanted to understand the factions within the Empire. That being said, it''s not about the army, but at least the movement of those who are in the upper echelons, those who have extreme powers.

    "So, tell me about the single digits."

    When I finished, Bonnie nodded.

    "Yes. We are in the "single digits", which is only nine at any given time. Something like brushing off acquaintances is also possible in order to be able to ensure that the stronger ones get into the sequence.

    That is, there isn''t a big difference in the strength at the end?

    "So it''s not unusual for the 9th and 10th ces to be interchangeable?

    Hearing my question, Bonnie shook his head in denial.

    "The sequence eleven is the auxiliary to the single digits, while the sequence ten is called the reserve, but this is only temporary and they take over when the single digits fall off."

    There seems to be an insurmountable wall between the Nine and the Ten, presumably because of the rtionship between the Infinite Power.

    In other words, it is only after awakening and acquiring the ultimate skill that they are first recognized as "single digits".

    Incidentally, the Bonnie sequence has seven digits and the Jiu sequence has nine. The men to be alerted are a sequence of one to six, and a sequence of eight, plus the "marshal", at least eight more.

    Concerning the Damrada faction, it seems that they are not clear to Bonnie. They don''t even know who the other "single digits" are, so I don''t think any of this is a lie.

    I''d like to know the information outside of the members, so look forward to hearing something useful.

    The ten members of the sequence, who are in reserve, basically stay in their home countries and stand by in case of any emergency. Then, the sequence of knights of the near-guard under eleven is usually a trio of three inmon form, responsible for solving somerge events.

    ording to Bonnie''s instructions, the tenth ce in the sequence was quite strong, just that they hadn''t acquired an ultimate skill, which might be able to match the Awakened demon lord.

    The difference in strength between the remaining ny near-guard knights, up to the twentieth position, and below the thirtieth position, was equally as high as a wall.

    Even so, those who were able to enter the Imperial Emperor''s Order of the Near Guard had at least reached the Immortal Rank. Some of them are close to the strength of the "saints", and if the Empire of the East is out in force, they are strong enough to wage a war against the plural demons at the same time.

    "What are you talking about? With us as opponents, we won''t win without a single injury.

    Spit from Minute.

    "That''s right, it''s more threatening than a million troops, or a hundred men from the Imperial Order of the Imperial Near Guard, that''s the problem.

    "No way. The so-called Imperial Army is nothing more than a show of strength for outsiders to see, and for those who can''t understand the foolishness of what is truly powerful, there must be some violent device that can be seen with the eyes.

    Bonnie finished with a sigh.

    These words were presumably spoken not only to the western nations, but also to their ownand also to the subjects of the Empire.

    The subjects pay taxes for their own security, and to say that the army has only a hundred men would be a source of consternation to everyone. Even knowing it would be of little use, it still made sense to put together such arge number of troops.

    One more thing, you can care less about the numbers on offense, but the numbers are necessary when you y defense. The more points there are, the more people are needed.

    In this respect, the imperial approach can also be said to be justified.

    "In the old days, the army existed primarily for defense, relying solely on the elite to attack other nations and eliminate their will to resist from the roots, and then sending troops to bring them under the Emperor. However, I don''t know when I started sending the army first, and I still have my doubts about itI guess it was for the birth of the Awakened One"

    With a look of emotion from Gedora, it seemed that this was a rather important secret.

    In this way, one could see Emperor Rudra''s purpose.

    "This expedition is not about winning, is it? In fact, Lord Calgurio has awakened, and there are several others that are about to awaken, and using this war to increase the number of pawns in his hands is the real purpose of Emperor Rudra.

    Benimaru and I agreed, stating our opinions.

    Bonnie nodded, spilling out the situation.

    "This expedition, there are several with signs of awakening. It was not only Major General Calgurio, Major General Minute, Colonel Kansas, and Krishna that I received instructions to assist the Awakened in waiting for an escape. It''s the first time I''ve seen a leader''s n deviate so drastically.

    Bonnie said with a bitterugh, but I couldn''tugh it off. If so many people had awakened, it wouldn''t have been so easy to get into a hard fight.

    And, now that it has been made clear that the purpose of the Empire is to create the Awakened, it means that we have been wrong in our judgments so far.

    I also thought that the Empire started this war because they were sure they could defeat both us and the Western States. This included the King of Wisdom who had the same prediction as I was, and I thought I hadn''t been wrong in my thinking

    <<thethe definition="" failed="" due="" to="" insufficient="" intelligence.="" ensure=""pleteness,="" adopting="" a="" redefinition.="">></thethe>

    I was slightly feeling the King of Wisdom seem a little ashamed. Oops, it''s too much to ask to decipher to that extent, and I wouldn''t mention such an outrageous request.

    Don''t mind this time, just learn from the experience and improve next time

    <<understood. reassessment="" of="" intelligence="" to="" avoid="" omissions.="">> It''s up to you, really.</understood.>

    For future actions of the Empire, the predictions of the King of Wisdom can be used as a reference.

    Now, let''s get the information we have together.

    "Rudra is collecting Awakened strengths, and although he doesn''t want to admit it, I think that something like Bonnie and Jiu, whom he conferred ultimate abilities, should be doable. The Eight Star Demon Lords, including me, and the famous heroes of the Western States, must gather enough people to defeat them all at the same time, so that they can control the world.

    What I said, Benimaru and Diablo and others agreed.

    "I agree, it''s really tricky. That''s why there''s this idea that it doesn''t matter to anyone other than the Awakened, isn''t it?

    "Hmm, indeed. Human beings are fragile, but with the ultimate skills, they can fight with us in pairs.

    "What can I do?

    "We don''t think it''s funny either.

    "Well, that''s good. If it works, let''s just do it.

    "But then, fighting will be boring?

    "Kufufufu, what an ancient way of thinking, Testarossa. For those who do not have a corresponding ability, we just don''t use the ability either. With this thought, I''ve acquired the ultimate skill.

    "What did you say?

    "Isn''t that a bit of a trick?

    "You can''t run away.

    "The jealousy of those who have not acquired power is delicious! I ignored him because I didn''t want Guy to feel that way.

    Diablo is really capricious.

    I thought he was agreeing with me, but as a result, the topic got more and more off-kilter, and I had to hurry to stop Diablo''s rampage, and the aura around Testarossa and the girls started to get restless.

    "Back to the point, ording to Lord Rimuru, the Empire''s purpose is to select the strong, right?

    "I also agree with His Lordship. There were also strong men like King Gazel, Hinata, and Her Majesty Elmesia. It was because of the guardianship of these overlords that the world was able to maintain the bnce of war power. Waiting to collect enough to break the bnce before starting a formal attack is something I can understand.

    Rigurd and Kaijin understood my thinking very well.

    "I seeto use the strong to deal with the strong, and let those who can help gather around. In this way of thinking, the weak arepletely in the way.

    "It sounds like a lot, but the weak are rxed.

    "Yes, well, if the strong alone can solve the war, it will be a kind of happiness for the weak. But it is against my aesthetics to need so many sacrifices for the birth of the strong.

    Seeing the reactions of Gabil and the others, Calgurio and Minute also had a bitter look on their faces.

    As a party, one can better understand how cruel and inhumane this practice is.

    In my opinion, Hakurou''s opinion is important.

    War leaves those who want to fight to fight and involves the weak in it, an act that is abhorrent to the core.

    But reality isn''t as simple as talking and the world is hard to predict.

    "By the way, Yuuki-chan has said that the Demon Lord Guy seems to be unhappy with the increase in the Imperial battle power as well. Why is the strongest Guy so vignt? It makes one wonder

    Gedora suddenly remembered what it was like, to say that.

    Indeed, as long as you have the ability to investigate, it''s only natural that your attack will be effective against Guy, and that you will be alert.

    "Guy''s goal is to unify the world with the power of the Demon Lord. Positively confronting empires, the stakes can be said to bepletely stacked against each other. It''s just"

    "It''s weird. Why, arrogant Guy, would you allow the Empire to exist?

    "Gathering the strong to fight might be more fun, but Guy was unexpectedly serious. It gives the impression that if one can act, one will immediately go out personally to wipe out the foolish ones

    Diablo, Ultima, and Carrera spoke the doubts in their hearts.

    It was Testarossa who answered these questions.

    "Quite simply, there is Lord Velgrynd in that ce. To strike out against the Empire would most likely provoke Lord Velgrynd. That''s why I''m so honest in the Empire.

    Upon hearing this, Calgurio gave a surprised look, while Minute whispered, "Is that called honesty?

    Although I don''t know what Testarossa is doing with the Empire, it is none of my business after all. To avoid even ming me for the past, these things are ignored.

    What concerns me more is the name "Velgrynd".

    The name is Velgrynd. Does it mean

    "What a surprise, Primordial White" "No, Lady Testarossa, so much respect for the Scorch Dragon that dwells on the Burning Mountain of the Gods.

    Testarossa was like, What did you say? The smile on her face looked at Minute, and Minute hastened to change his words to say so.

    This convinced me of what Velgrynd is really all about.

    Shes one of only four dragon races in the world, the sister of Veldora, who is in charge of the Scorch.

    This is the real trump card of the Empire

    "It''s not quite right to say respectfully, our rtionship with the Dragon Race is a little moreplicated. However, our lord Rimuru is an ally with Lord Veldora, so isn''t it only natural that I should pay my respects to Veldora''s sister?

    That is to say, without my rtionship with Veldora, then Testarossa wouldn''t have any respect for the Dragon Race?

    "So that means that Testarossa was so honest because she couldn''t win against Velgrynd? Even so, can''t you beat Guy?

    "To say if you can win, you can''t win. Not mentioning Guy, I at least can''t beat the Dragon Race. It''s not a question of strength or weakness, but the fact that it''s an indestructible existence like the True Dragon Race.

    Being spoken of as iprehensible by the iprehensible incarnation-like Testarossa, "the true dragon race" really

    If Veldora hears this, he will probablyugh out loud again, but never say such things in front of him.

    "Yes, the True Dragon Race is not even a threat to Guy, but it''s impossible to eliminate them, right?"

    "Whoo-hoo, don''t know? At least with magic, I don''t think so.

    It''s not a victory as long as you can''t killpletelythat seems to bemon sense among demons.

    If you say so, you really can''t beat the Dragon Race.

    Remember what Veldora said.

    The "dragon seed" wille back to life even if it dies. Demons usually destroy their cores when they are destroyed, but the Dragon Race can still be resurrected, except that part of their memory and personality seems to be reset at that timeIt is also possible that there are Dragon Race that keep their memories alive like the Demon Race.

    As the word goes, it is the feeling of being indestructible."

    "Well, with a guy like that in the Empire, we can''t attack at will.

    Whatever that guy is to Guy first, she''s a threat to us. I repeatedly said "tricky, tricky, tricky," and Calgurio and others looked at each other with a confused face. It was then opened by Calgurio, with Minute, Jiu and Bonnie beginning their statements.

    "I''m sorry to be rude, but I have something to tell you. As far as I know, the Empire worships Lord Velgrynd as a guardian dragon, and through history, there are ounts of guarding the Empire from angelic attacks, but"

    "In the end, it was only because the Empire presented Lord Velgrynd with a tribute, begging her to grant it on a whim.

    "That noble and beautiful true red dragon is the symbol of imperial prosperity. We, "single digits", with the approval of His Majesty Rudra, are bound to visit that symbolic dragon and make it remember its name and face on the spot, saying that we will never be hostile to it.

    "Indeed, I was in that ceremony, too. Hostility is impossible. It''s not an existence that can be earned.

    There was a connection between the Empire and Velgrynd, but the Empire side couldn''t seem to ask her to do anything. Also, Bonnie''s reaction makes one wonder a bit.

    Ah, not somewhat, being super very concerned.

    "Well, you can keep quiet if you don''t want to talk. Which side do you think would win if you fought Velgrynd, the marshal you were talking about?"

    Hey?"

    "To put it another way, it''s still a guess, but there''s always a simrity between the two, have you ever felt that way?"

    "How can?

    Bonnie understood what I was saying and was about to joke, but immediately turned into a serious expression.

    Beside Bonnie, Jiu paled in thought.

    It doesn''t feel wrong.

    "The true face of the Marshal is Velgrynd, the Scorch Dragon.

    It can''t be wrong that''s the reason why Demon Lord Guy didn''t attack the Empire was because of Velgrynd''s existence.

    And I''m afraid that there were threats within the Empire that could rival Velgrynd''s, and if that wasn''t the case, there would be no reason for Guy to not act.

    I turned my gaze to the big screen and sighed.

    "s, a rash attack would irritate Velgrynd, and sending an army would most likely be annihted in one breath. It''s an extremely reckless strategy to attack together with Yuuki.

    Sure enough, intelligence is really important.

    Fortunately, the first to notice the presence of Velgrynd, collected his feet before stepping on andmine, and as much as it was tempting to win the peace with the Empire, it would have been foolish tounch a counterattack by us.

    "With Lord Veldora''s sister as an opponent, none of us could have won. Shall we ask Lord Veldora toe?

    From Benimaru''s presentation.

    As weak as it sounds, this is the result of calm judgment.

    The so-called true dragon" is beyond the existence of the gods, and it would be a failure to see the reality if it was won by the delusion.

    "Well, how shall I put it? We don''t want to involve Veldora in our affairs.

    And I don''t want to have Veldora fighting his own sister, so it''s better not to ask him for help. In that case, it is very difficult to know what to do in the future.

    "I''m going to pass this information on to Yuuki as well. The legions sent out can''t just stay put.

    "Yeah. It''s necessary topletely rework the strategy, and it''s not okay to not contact Yuuki.

    Hmmmmy mind is racing with thoughts.

    At this point, Diablo, the child in question, dropped a bomb.

    "It looks like this has something to do with Guy too, so I called him in. Hell be here soon, so let''s ask the guy together when the timees!

    Huh?

    I couldn''t help but have a serious expression on my face as I repeatedly stared at Diablo. Seeing his shy expression, I couldn''t help but sprout some killing intent.

    At a time when it is so distressing, this idiot is doing something so redundant

    Already?"

    Yes!"

    Yes!?!?

    Im angry, but it can''t be ignored.

    Anyway, I broke up the meeting to prepare for Guy''s visit.

    *** Guy arrived with a look of displeasure.

    "Yo, here Ie. But then again, it was a big deal to call me over.

    You''re right.

    But s, the words are still hopefully spoken not to me, but to Diablo.

    Guy sat down roughly in his chair.

    To keep Guy''s mood from getting any worse, it might have been a bit reckless to take him to thevish reception room in the VIP room. The reception depends on the guest, this was originally a noble hotel only used to receive princes and nobles.

    It''s a lot to lose if you mess around.

    The furnishings in this room were selected and decorated by Myourmile, whose aesthetic abilities are recognized. There are also artworks of considerable value that have been brought in from various countries.

    Most of them catered to my taste, not so much for luxury, but more for elegant furnishings, and you can tell that Myourmile has good taste in making people feel quiet and empty.

    It''s still a long way to go for Rigurd to reach this realm. There''s very little ess to art, and I don''t think it''s that easy to understand the good and bad of things. However, there is a saying of Rigurd that "this is a ce where one can feel inner peace. In that case, it''s possible that we are unexpectedly like-minded.

    Let''s leave it at that for now, and let''s talk about it if Guy goes on a rampage.

    Since there were no other suitable reception rooms, we had to hold back even a certain amount of damage. In any case, something as desperate as bringing the strongest Demon Lord Guy to an ordinary reception room is beyond my ability to do.

    The chair made a small, creaking sound.

    It''s made of incense wood, the highest grade of wood.

    Although the soft sofa is nice, it seems as if the wooden chair that withstands everything is quitefortable to sit on.

    There is a feeling of being surrounded by the forest and being at one with nature.

    It would be nice to let Diablo make amends if it''s bad, and to have the others dismissed in advance, I thought with relief.

    Getting the Imperial forces back to the seventieth floor, Gabil took on the role of guide, with the n being for Adalman to do the job of looking after them during his absence.

    Souei was preparing for Masayuki''s escort matter.

    Rigurd is in charge of contacting various departments in order to make the urban part of thebyrinth where the shelter is located run more smoothly.

    After consulting with Vesta, Kaijin will convey the contents of the previous meeting to King Gazel.

    Since there is no intention to hide it, I will also be in contact with King Gazel afterwards.

    After that, Gedora was exchanging information with Yuuki, and I felt that it was necessary to inform each other of the current situation even for the purpose of formting a future policy.

    Gobta and Hakurou, I told them to stay in the other room. Just in case, the trio of demon women stood by together.

    Because there was no telling what these three would do, it was better to keep them out of Guys presence. Keeping them elsewhere is also an insurance measure based on this consideration.

    With that, there were four people heading to the reception room.

    Me, the culprit Diablo, and then Benimaru and Shion.

    Guy, on the other hand, led the way with three women on the stage.

    Sitting next to Guy was a female with simr looks to Milim.

    The lustrous, soft white hair refracted the light, like a sparklingke. The deep blue of those eyes is as if they are going to take one''s breath away, a stunning beauty, but from a different point of view it feels a bit childish, a woman who is incredible.

    Judging by the way she didn''t care that Guy sat down naturally, there was no up and down rtionship between the two.

    That is, the two are on the same level of existence, and such existence is extremely limited, right?

    I''m afraid she is

    "This is the first time you''ve seen each other. I''ll introduce you, Rimuru, this is Veldora''s sister, Velzado. Shes been called "White Ice Dragon" more often than not, so let''s remember them both.

    "Greetings, Demon Lord Rimuru, my name is Velzado. Do you know anything about Velzado, the white ice dragon? My brother seems to have been under your care, so I thought I''d stop by and say hello.

    No mistake.

    She is the sister of Veldora, one of the strongest of the Dragon Race.

    Velzado "The White Ice Dragon".

    The graceful greeting was beautiful.

    Elegantly seated in a chair with a picturesque figure.

    She seems to be very satisfied with the woody aroma.

    But

    Although she showed a civilized smile, my back seemed to be sweating coldly.

    I look at Veldora every day and think I have a deep knowledge of the Dragon Race, but this guy is not good. It''s better to say it''s as if the existence of the otherworld is so dangerous for women.

    I think his control of demon qi is perfect, but seeing Velzado in front of him, I have to admit that he is still too naive.

    The one in front of him was extremely natural, controlling her demonic Qi. From not feeling any aura at all, it was enough to glimpse her extremely high level of control.

    If she hadn''t made the introduction, I would never have realized that she was a dragon." I''m afraid I''ll treat her like a human being without any doubt.

    However, her beauty and dominance cannot be hidden, and she will not be underestimated.

    "Ah, greetings, my name is Rimuru, and I''m a monster for now. I''m the one, always being helped by your brother.

    Why I, can only say such words.

    And then why, is the King of Wisdom also silent this time?

    One side felt irrational and the other was careful to remain conciliatory in its response.

    "Geez, that''s modest. Don''t be so defensive of the kid.

    As if pleased, Velzado giggled. As soon as she began tough, her calm and collected aura suddenly dissipated, turning into the image of a cute girl.

    Honestly, she looks like an all-girls high school student.

    Once again there is a strong recognition of her blood rtionship with Milim. The heaviness eased, thanks to this smile.

    The pleasantries continued, introducing each other to their respective members.

    The other two, one was the Green Primordial Mizari, whom I had met, and the other was the Blue Primordial Rhein, whom I was first meeting.

    Dressed as usual in a dark red maiden''s outfit, she waited unmoving behind Guy.

    I had heard that Diablo and her belonged to the same level of existence, but that gesture of taking a step back made it impossible to see that it was so.

    Even so, there was no mistaking the fact that she was a primordial, the strongest being in the demon race, a being beyond the reach of ordinary demon masters. In order not to make a bad response, it''s better to greet them carefully.

    With such determination, the presentation was concluded with caution.

    Benimaru, who was sitting next to me, was okay and still a bit nervous when introducing Shion. By the time we get to Diablo, it''s practically the same mood as handling a bomb.

    Why did I choose these few? Even now it''s a hindrance to reflect on it.

    ***

    As everyone was almost seated, I asked for a guide to prepare the tea.

    Shuna understood what I meant and finished her job without faltering.

    No, it wasn''t just Shuna, all the waiters didn''t care what status the person they were serving was in, going about their business as usual.

    It''s all be professional.

    It''s all the result of Vestas rigorous workouts.

    Drinking the tea brought up by them, I took a break and began to move to the main topic.

    "I didn''t ask you toe here today for anything else. I have something I want to ask Guy.

    Oh?"

    "It''s true, we managed to repel the Imperial invasion. Then, I thought we''d take it this time, but I heard that there''s Velgrynd on the Empire sideah, your sister is there too. And, putting a lot of information together and judging by it, I don''t think there''s a karma or something between you and the Empire"

    "Oh, well, I''m d you could see that.

    After listening to my instructions, Guy seemed to have a happy sly smile.

    There''s only a bad feeling about it already.

    While sincerely not wanting to go on asking, it''s not possible to do so

    "You''re just trying to get in the way of the empire''s war power, aren''t you? That''s what keeping Yuuki alive is all about, right? I''m sure you mean it when you say you don''t want to destroy the western countries, but it''s more than that, right? You said "game" and all that. Who are you ying against?

    Although he cares, he acts like he doesn''t care.

    However, if there was a Velgrynd on the Imperial side, or even a hidden threat on its equal, then one could not help but ask.

    If I attacked without figuring it out, there was a good chance that mypanions would show up fallen.

    I looked Guy straight in the eyes and asked out the words.

    Kukkukkuk, well, that''s a good move, so let me tell you.

    Guy didn''t put on any pretense and answered very candidly.

    I felt that instead it was scary and listened honestly to his exnation.

    "Actually, I made a bet with some asshole. The guy hangs onto ideals that are too outrageous to be true, so I told him what''s realistic. We did not choose to fight outright, but to use the pieces in our respective hands to decide the winner.

    In other words, is it the same thing to let someone other than yourself fight and win by knocking out all of the opponent''s pieces?

    "The pawn in your hand refers to?"

    Even without asking, it was vaguely noticeable.

    "Well, it''s you people.

    That''s right.

    I feel the same way.

    As much as it was tempting to ask Guy to stop casually using people as pawns, there was no point in ranting here. Then I''ll just ask for some useful information.

    "So, the man you''repeting with is the emperor of the empire, right?

    Shouldn''t get it wrong, but just make sure.

    Since it''s Velzado sitting next to Guy, then it''s definitely the game''s opponent sitting next to Velgrynd.

    But that person wasn''t necessarily the emperor either, so the right answer had toe from Guy''s mouth.

    "Exactly. The Emperor of the Empire, Rudra, is a rival with whom I identify.

    No point in hiding it, Guy told me happily.

    Since it could be said to be his own opponent, this Rudra couldn''t be a strongman who could rival Guy, right?

    You can''t win, this one.

    Few things can be more annoying than participating in a game where you can''t see the winning side.

    "May I speak?

    While I was hurting my brain, Benimaru, who was sitting next to me, spoke without fear.

    And squarely in the presence of Guy.

    Yeah."

    "Then allow me to ask, what are the winning conditions for this game? Was it necessary to defeat Emperor Rudra? Or is it just a matter of suppressing all his pieces? I hope you can help me with this.

    Hmmmthats really important.

    I''ve always thought that the condition of victory was that one had to defeat Rudra, and if one took the pawnsthat is to say, one could win by disintegrating the Empire''s side of the battle.

    There are a lot of tricky guys out there, but it''s better to be a rival than a guy on the same level as Guy.

    Kufufufufufufufufufufufufufu

    Idiot! You are!

    I couldn''t help but reprimand loudly, even ovepping with Guy''s rant.

    It''s exhausting, really.

    Guy and I were in the same mood, and we both nodded at each other involuntarily.

    Didn''t expect to be able to rte to Guy''s heart in this matter, and only thanked Diablo on this point.

    But this kind of statement that is likely to piss off Guy is also a big demerit item to drop the score significantly.

    Anyway, Ill tell Diablo to shut up for now.

    "Then, Guy. How about answering Benimaru''s question?"

    Although I asked Guy so, Guy didn''t answer just looked at me.

    The moment a smile flicked at the corner of his mouth, my sense of danger pulled the rm full force at me.

    Rimuru-kun?"

    Woohoo, super unsettling forebodings.

    This is already, not a premonition grade anymore.

    I seem to understand the reason for the instantly subtle expressions on the faces of Myourmile and Veldora when they added the word "kun" to their names when I called them. Because I definitely have the same look on my face now.

    "Actually, I''d like to ask you something.

    "I refuse."

    "Oh, listen to this.

    I''m just saying, you listen to me.

    As much as it was tempting to say it, the other person was Guy. It''s not a good idea to anger this brutal opponent, and from my standpoint, I can only listen honestly.

    You see that Myourmile, despite his subtle expression, is still happy to respond to me. And it''s my turn to say no with all my might.

    "I want you to stop that bastard Rudra. I wouldn''t say it''s as hard as letting you take him down, you just have to figure out a way to deal with the pawns and make sure I win.

    Guy''s expression couldn''t have been more evil.

    He got up from his chair and went around to my back, giving me a shoulder squeeze as he talked.

    "You''ll do it, won''t you?

    The hand that rubbed my shoulder increased in strength.

    A threat, right?

    "What would I gain by epting this offer?

    Since you can''t say no, you have to get more out of it.

    It may have been reckless to target Guy, but I did my best to negotiate anyway.

    "I say, it''s because of you that the bnce of the world I''m running is falling apart. What do you think about that?

    "I''m sorry."

    It was over in a sh.

    It''s true that I''m the one who took away most of the battle power from Guys side, even though it''s to build a new bnce, and I''m working on it.

    To put it more bluntly, it would be inappropriate to send the demon girl trio to our camp. If Guy is rejected here, even I might be treated as an enemy.

    There''s no way around it.

    I gave up resistance and epted Guy''s offer.

    ***

    Guy returned to his seat just in time for the sound of a knock on the door.

    The door to the room opened and Shuna entered.

    The aroma of ck tea filled the room, and the tension thinned. The tray was also topped with a cake, so I decided to go into break time.

    Since you can''t get away with it, then be aware that this is definitely not putting off the problem.

    As if tea had been prepared for the next room as well, two secretaries and two maids went over there.

    Expecting them to be reluctant, they went straight through it more honestly than expected.

    I took a sip of the ck tea made with care.

    Soft texture.

    The tea made by Testarossa was perfectly finished, but the ck tea made by Shuna was very rxing and had a different vor.

    "Ho-ho, isn''t that pretty good?

    Guy looks content, that''s better than anything.

    "Ah, really. This cake is not just sweet, but theyers all have different vors fused together for a rich andyered texture. The aroma is great, but the bitterness adds to the sweetness.

    I''m relieved if Velzado-san also makes a positivement.

    "Also, the room is furnished in a style that is to my liking.

    Unexpectedly, Guy also made apliment.

    Because this guy is a tyrant, I took the liberty of thinking he had nothing to do with idle elegance. It seems that one cannot make judgments about people based on preconceived notions, and this requires introspection.

    Come to think of it, the likes of Oda Nobunaga and others have such interests. Since you prefer a tea room where you don''t have to worry about your status, you probably value time for introspection.

    Then again, although I took the liberty of misinterpreting Guy''s interest, it seemed right to bring him here.

    I am slightly reassured to speak in order to see the reaction that follows.

    "Ah, is that so? It''s great that you''re the first guest to visit here to your taste. This room is a top-of-the-line parlor and only brings people here when they need to fill the doorway.

    Ahhhh? Are you trying to make a fool out of me?

    "Yeah, right. If they didn''t do that, where would the Demon Lord be. If you want to give up your glory, why don''t you just hide in the shadows and live happily in secret from the beginning?

    First use the jab to draw the opponent.

    Demonstrate a will not to take him at his word before Guy says themission.

    Based on the response, it was necessary to change the response to Guy.

    But Guy smiled at my overreaction.

    "Ah ha ha. And me, prying into each other''s minds? You''re so funny!

    It wasn''t fun at all, and I felt toyed with by Guy.

    "That''s very kind of you.

    "Never mind, I''ll let the trouble go. While this is my request, it is not unrted to you. I want to continue the war and destroy the Empire just like that.

    Speaking of which, Guy gracefully sipped the ck tea.

    Modestly, like a king who doesn''t know where.

    No, because it''s a demon lord, let''s call it a king.

    But Guy, this guy, threw a straight ball over.

    "That is, make Rudra''s pawns zero without killing Rudra? I had that feeling when you stammered to answer Benimaru''s question.

    "That''s it. There is no strict definition of victory conditions for the game, although they are. The only thing that was decided was the rule that ''yers can''t shoot each other directly."

    "An opponent admits defeat or death, and the inability to continue the game can be considered victory conditions, right?

    "Yeah, that''s it.

    With the ck tea still in his mouth, Guy nodded.

    That is, the emperor Rudra and Guy seem to have fought for over two thousand years.

    There was a struggle, but no direct showdown. There had been several fights before that, but since the birth of Milim and the disappearance of Veldanava, the Star King Dragon, the two had be more restrained. The battle between the two had an excessive impact on the world and then unconsciously turned into not taking out full strength to fight, which was part of the reason.

    The topic went a bit far, but looking at the ki in front of me I knew it wasn''t scary.

    The struggle continues to this day.

    Guy keeps the world in bnce while increasing the number of pawns in his hand. It seemed like there were a lot of long-lived magical creatures among them, and Guy was slowly waiting for them to evolve.

    However, there was no one among the "Eight Star Demon Lords" who knew Guys true heart. Even Milim had no idea about the game that Guy and Rudra were ying.

    "Well, why talk to me!?

    Ahhhh? Of course I would. You''re the first one to push Rudra to this point.

    Needless to say, Guy was aware of the fact that the Imperial Army was annihted. Of course, so spectacrly big was the continuous unleashing of magic that it would be strange for Guy not to notice

    "But you, all kills are right, that Rudra boy''s pieces didn''t increase.

    Sure enough, did Guy also know Rudra''s purpose for this operation?

    Heard the right facts from Guy''s mouth.

    Rudra''s aim was fruitful, to use defeat as a trial to allow the survivors to evolve.

    Making the case for making it eptable to the subjects, training the army and then having them face the threat head on, identifying the evolved from the survivors, is that Rudra''s basic tactic?

    The proof is that although thest Imperial Expeditionary Force was swept away by Veldora, some of them evolved into Immortals.

    Guy has adopted the same strategy.

    The unawakened had no value as a pawn, and it was precisely because Guy was of that mindset that he acquiesced to the feud between the monsters.

    The more people who awaken as True Demon Lords, the more beneficial they will be in the game. With this as a premise, the remaining question is the point at which the showdown will be initiated.

    This side is more powerful than the otherthat moment of certainty is the moment of victory and defeat. It''s unexpectedly hard to do that, and there are times when people get in the way, and so far there''s been an ongoing fight without a winner being drawn.

    Because this is the long term n for growth, both Rudra and Guy are patient.

    Causing a lot of trouble for the people who live in this world, but just passing the time for these two

    "This time too, if dozens of people had survived with Veldora as their opponent, there should be an Awakening among them.

    That is, Rudra doesn''t hold me in his eyes, and Guy treats me as an excellent pawn.

    It''s a bit disheartening, but it''s the truth.

    "So, I''m going to use this gap to attack the Empire?

    "Do what you want. I don''t need to say it, but you know there''s no point in fighting in vain.

    Indeed, it goes without saying.

    If a show of force to an adversary fails to pose a threat to them, it only adds to the number of victims and makes no strategic sense, and the option of sending troops should be rejected.

    "If you know, I''d like to know if there are any of Rudra''s men of whom we must be on guard?

    "Who knows, I just focus on my hand exercise. If I''m the strongest, then it doesn''t matter how strong or weak the other hand is.

    What an arrogant statement befitting a strongman''s identity.

    This guy, that''s the type.

    In a game like mahjong, do not look at the type of opponent how to round the cards themselves. Then, when it feels like you can win easily, you just blithely and a servant full.

    However, if it''s just luck, it''s heaven and peace by luck, so you don''t want to be an opponent either way.

    The topic of the game made me start making strange associations, but let''s get to the point.

    "Either way, we and the Empire must distinguish between right and wrong. Not because of yourmission, I will act on my convictions.

    Since the issue could not be put aside as it went on, it was necessary to have a conversation with Emperor Rudra. Then it would be wise to wait until this side is in a favorable position before raising the conversation with the other side.

    "Lord Rimuru, are you going to go there yourself?

    Benimaru seemed a little surprised, but there was no giving in here.

    "It can''t be helped. We should also not be able to kill Yuuki, but we should meet with him and aim for harmony under favorable conditions.

    "Isn''t it dangerous?"

    "It''s dangerous no matter what. Suppose, even if someone had made a treaty of peace in the past, would you believe it?

    I won''t.

    It was definitely a ploy to get me careless. When I was out for a leisurely walk, assassins would take this opportunity to assassinate me.

    If that happens, I''ll have to be on guard all the time, and I won''t be able to achieve my goal of a leisurely life.

    I don''t want to be like that and have to be done with it.

    "Yeah, me too. What about the guards?

    "Of course, it''s you."

    Benimaru smiled innocently in response to my words.

    "Then I''m okay with that.

    I could tell from his attitude that there was a confidence inside that he could protect me.

    Sure enough, Benimaru is reliable.

    Guy looked at my conversation with Benimaru and thought it was funny andughed.

    "Ah ha ha. You''re fun to watch and the ministry is delightful, too. There''s also an air of wonder that feels like there''s room for evolution.

    "That''s it. Benimaru is the right-hand whom I rely on the most.

    "Oh, so it wasn''t Diablo?

    "Ahhh, that guy is strong, but what can I say, he''s a problematic person

    "I get it.

    I felt like I was being pitied by Guy.

    And there''s a sense of being treated as apanion.

    Watching his reaction, I understood that Guy was having a hard time too.

    "So, I have one thing I want to confirm.

    "What is it?

    "That Rudra, can you give ultimate skills to others?

    I asked, and then Guy narrowed his eyes in admiration.

    "I''m d you found out. As you say, Rudra has an interesting stunt of being able to lend his power to others."

    Really?

    "So, do you know the terms of the loan?

    This is a very important thing.

    If only Guy knew what the conditions were, he could narrow down the range of characters on the Imperial side that needed to be guarded. It is now judged to be less than ten, but it''s not good to bepletely convinced that this is it.

    "Don''t worry. The guy''s powers are not all-powerful. What can be borrowed is degraded and limited power. As for the receiver of the lending, by the way, they must at least be awakened and able to serve as a vessel of power. It seems there are conditions I don''t know about that aren''t that threatening.

    Just by chance, I tried to ask, and Guy responded crisply. That way, all the information I want to know is gathered.

    That''s how it is.

    There''s no threat to holding ultimate skillsyoure the only one who can say that! I really wanted to shout it out like that.

    Milim could be one of Guy''s kind too

    That difference in feeling mightplicate matters.

    Looking at Guy''s delicious tasting cake, I feel a little angry just thinking about it. I was irritated by theck of content and expressions, and even more irritated by the fact that I was handed the assignment as if it was none of my business.

    Give me a minute yo, it''s supposed to be talking about something pretty important right now. However, it seems that the house is already filled with the atmosphere of the end of close talks.

    I was so upset that I stabbed a fork at my own cake as well.

    When thinking about things, it''s important to supplement with sugar.

    I decided not to get carried away by Guy and calm down topile the information.

    ***

    A time of silence.

    Soft atmosphere.

    But

    Things should have been over, but Guy had no intention of going back.

    Shuna briefly filled Guys empty cup with tea. This seems to be a spare teapot to prevent the remaining tea leaves from brewing.

    "You''re good at what you do! The nerds in my family can''t do that!

    "I''m honored to receive yourpliment.

    Benimaru looked a little worried, but Shuna was blunt. Not being overwhelmed by Guys aura, calmly making a counterpart.

    "Can my Mizari and Rheine to you for a while?

    Practice?"

    "Right. I want you to teach them how to make this cake.

    They had eaten their dishes at the Demon Lords'' banquets, and they were of a decent standard, but it was Shuna that was superior in dessert. After all, she and Yoshida had beenpeting for the development of new works, and the craft was getting better and better.

    I thought it wasmonce, but only now do I remember that it is quite extravagant. That being said, I now have a good sense that I have been doing whatever I want so far in this world.

    Things like recreating favorite things, tasting delicious food, etc.

    Sometimes, even with enthusiasm and skill, you can''t reproduce a recipe if you can''t get the ingredients together. Even someone as talented as Yoshida seeded in reproducing this kind of cake only after having the quality liquor produced in our country.

    In this case, do not forget to have gratitude.

    Put this aside beforehand, how do I reply to Guy.

    At first, I thought I''d buy it if I wanted to, but there''s no need to be so petty about it.

    With that thought in mind, I decided to hide the part that Yoshida-san taught and just teach him the recipes we developed.

    "Shuna-chan, can you teach the two next door how to make it?

    "Yes, with pleasure!

    "You have to use good ingredients to make food, so let''s make a deal on that in the future.

    Granted sugar, for example, also has to be refined to reduce impurities and thus increase purity. My preupation with delicious food, coupled with the technical abilities of Kaijin and the others have managed to achieve a quality not inferior to that of my previous life.

    Although the production is not high enough to circte in the market, the amount left for your own enjoyment is sufficient. Just add a little more production and distribute it to Guy.

    "Is that really possible?

    "Of course.

    This is true. Technology aside, I don''t skimp on the finished product.

    I''m worried that even Guy will be in and out of the country, and the trouble will increaseBut if Mizari is able to use the "transfer door, she will be fine. Our side should not have to think about handling as long as we have the materials ready.

    Then, I had other intentions.

    If Guy thinks we are useful, the security of our country can be assured. The deeper the dealings with foreign countries, the more security will be assured.

    If there is a mutual need, there will be no indiscriminate use of force to hinder development.

    The economic circle is tantamount to a strong military alliance. That''s been my consistent view.

    I don''t want to get into a dispute with Guy, so it''s better to have more cards in hand.

    After all, this was my first opponent who put his heart into it.

    No, the second time since I met Veldora, right?

    It doesn''t matter if you can win or not, if you do fight it will create problems that can''t be solved. There will undoubtedly be actual damage, so I intend to respect Guy''s opinion as long as nothing major happens.

    There is such a thing as a rather messy move like this one, one can only ept it in silence.

    Only, there are limits to this

    Judging by the few conversations so far, Guy isn''t the umunicative tyrant that one might think he is. He was unexpectedly a rational, reasonable man.

    His maniptive side is also evident in his counterpart Diablo. I believe he has recognized our usefulness and will not make unreasonable demands.

    So, it''s almost time to go back, right?

    My little wish, as Guy''s words dissolved into nothingness.

    "Wait a minute. I have one thing I want to ask you before I go back.

    What? What else is going on?

    "What is it?

    "Why has Diablo evolved?

    Surprise!!!

    Was it still too naive to think it wasn''t discovered?

    That''s why I hate observant guys.

    "Well, this one is

    What to do?

    What''s the answer to Guy to ept!?

    "It''s not just Diablo right? Since those people were inside Ramiris''sbyrinth, it took a bit of work to scent, but why are there so many people here who have awakened as the true demon lord?"

    Guy asked me with a smirk, but there was absolutely no smirk in his eyes.

    This probably can''t just be stonewalled

    <> Herees the Voice of Heaven!</answer.>

    Okay, that''s it.

    Not bad for a king of wisdom, and at such a reliable time.

    "Actually. I made many attempts on my own strength as I wondered if I could strengthen my battle strength to battle the Empire. And then it became clear that my powers had an interesting effect.

    "Ooh-oh. What is the effect?

    What is the effect?

    I don''t know.

    Tell me about it, Teacher King of Wisdom!!!

    <> That''s just the way it is.</answer.>

    Indeed, the ritual of evolution is not the power of the ''King of Wisdom'', but the use of the power of the

    ''King of Gluttony''. Thus, this ount does not hide anything, but merely states the facts.

    Indeed that may be the right response.

    "My power of the King of Gluttony is able to restore the soul of man to energy. Then, there is also the ability to give energy to others. Just giving energy to someone who is not qualified is a pointless act

    "Hmm. Does it mean that the person who bes a demon lord will be able to awaken? That''s awesome.

    Because there was no lie, Guy epted it before he had heard it all.

    This is all due to the King of Wisdom.

    "It''s okay. The war in this world is more about quality than quantity, right? Improving one''s abilities is par for the course.

    "That''s right. You''ve cared a lot about it since the old days, but you''re not ordinary, are you?

    Huh? I''m very ordinary.

    "No, no, no, ordinary Slimes don''t talk. Even if it doesn''t matter, the means of Veldora or the state of the city''s development, whatever it is, it''s not ordinary. You''re a reincarnationist, aren''t you?

    Hmm? Huh, didnt you know? I died in a world different from this one, and I was reborn as a Slime with my consciousness.

    Really?"

    Really."

    Guy and I looked at each other.

    It turns out he didnt know.

    I thought this was already known.

    I didn''t make it a secret, it''s well known in the West, and I thought Guy had the situation under control.

    The idea that the other party knows all the information seems to be a bit of a problem too.

    While that''s not exactly an understatement, it''s something to be aware of in the future.

    It''s important to be careful not to give away information in a rambling situation.

    Really?"

    "Yeah, the real thing.

    "Lord Rimuru doesn''t lie.

    Hey, hey, why are you so suspicious?

    In person, and confirming something to Benimaru and Shuna

    Ahahahahahahaha! That''s awesome! I thought it was clearly a magical creature but it was so strange, so it was. It''s rare to be reborn across the world, but you''re unlucky to be reborn as a magical creature.

    Guy giggled.

    You don''t have to talk soughingly.

    "But in that case I can ept it. The nucleus of the heart, of course, is tempered by the fact that the

    "soul" alone "passes through the world" and retains its ego and memory. I also understand why you''re obsessed with human looks, and it''s possible to evolve at an abnormal rate to gain ultimate abilities.

    To sum it up, is my heart strong?

    Also, I consider myself rather cheeky.

    Don''t give up, don''t get discouraged, Keep moving forward is my credo.

    "Now you can take it, can''t you?

    "Ah, I used to think you were a strange guy, but I think I can trust you now.

    How rude.

    But I forgive you, because I can''t beat you.

    Besides, it is much better than being constantly suspected of hostility.

    This is the model for looking forward.

    "Now that my suspicions are cleared, and I''ve asked what I wanted to ask, I should probably go back"

    "I''ll have another one of these.

    "Okay, go ahead.

    Trying to get him to hurry back, just as I was about to open my mouth, Guy interrupted and cheekily asked for a second cake.

    Shuna ndly responded.

    Couldn''t help it, I followed suit and asked for one.

    I want to be healed from the sweetness of the cake. Though I thought so, Guy wasn''t about to leave me alone.

    "Say, Rimuru. Let''s get back to what we just talked about.

    I know, it''s definitely a bad thing.

    Hmm? What topic?

    "You''ve awakened your men. Based on the instructions I just gave, If I asked if you could give my subordinates points with your power, how about that? Is it actually feasible?

    This guy

    Do I look like me?

    For example, use what you can, and use what you can.

    I thought I''d been careless when I''d finished, so I was followed up with a straightforward question.

    No, no, no, I''m not as outspoken as he islike I can''t assert that?

    s, I care about that and lose.

    More than that, Guy''s question must be answered.

    Right now

    <></answer.>

    Ah, without waiting for me to ask a question in my mind, the answer was given.

    Always felt a little lonely.

    I feel like the King of Wisdom has the intention of dealing with my troubles.

    <></answer.>

    It seems to be slightly angry.

    It''s not good to keep pissing off the King of Wisdom.

    I can only rely on the King of Wisdom, and it would be bad to be abandoned by the King of Wisdom.

    So, seriously ask.

    I don''t have any contact with Guys subordinates in the Soul Corridors, is that okay?

    > Got it.</answer.>

    That, then, leaves the question.

    I hold the number of "souls".

    I don''t know how many of his men he wanted to awaken, but it would be impossible to talk without the key part.

    "Should be fine. I just don''t know without trying it, though probably, its no problem. However, I no longer have the energy I can part with.

    To deny him in a noble manner without angering Guy.

    I actually had a hundred thousand left, but Guy didn''t seem to be able to confirm the amount I was holding, which he would have given up by now.

    "Oh. So you can do it by giving you souls, right?

    That

    No sense in giving up?

    "In fact, I''ve given Mizari about 10,000 of them. But there was no reaction, no sign of awakening, and I thought it would be useless.

    Giving a "soul" directly, that''s something the demon race would do.

    But can''t this be awakening?

    <> I see.</answer.>

    To get the Demon Lord Seed" to germinate, water it in the right way. But even knowing the right way to do it, whether it can be done or not is another matter.

    Would it be better, then, for the ministers to awaken autonomously?

    <> That is, the evolutionary path is severed from the moment it is named, is that what it is?</answer.>

    Just trying to qualify is hard, and there''s an unexpected catch.

    However, most magical creatures don''t qualify and basically evolve by naming, so it''s hard to say whether it''s good or bad.

    In short, the nature of the named magical creature will change, so you can''t draw the energy that suits you from the acquired "soul". Guy didn''t know that either, and the King of Wisdom''s erudition was truly admirable.

    The name of the teacher is true to its name.

    <<>>

    Oops, no no no.

    I was praising it from the bottom of my heart, but it seemed like I was being hailed as a hoot. Since we already know how to answer Guy''s question, let the conversation continue.

    "Miss Mizari isHave you tried anyone else, that is to say, Miss Rhein?

    "I told you to call them whatever you want.

    It''s not a permit, it''s an order.

    "I''ll call her that next time. So, you''re the one who "named" those two, right?

    "I can''t believe you know that. Yes, I did.

    "That''s why.

    Ahhhhhh?"

    "If you are named by a higher being, your nature seems to change.

    Hmm, that''s what happened. So, it means that no matter how many "souls" are given it''s useless.

    Then, can you match the nature of your opponent and give them the right energy?

    While it was clear that I had to struggle to understand all these instructions, Guy understood them very quickly. And, it''s all correct without error.

    "That''s about it.

    "Well, I have something I want to ask you.

    I just knew it would turn out this way.

    Gradually, I came to understand Guy''s character.

    Although Guy''s words sounded like a plea to me, they definitely didn''t think about the possibility of my refusal......

    As much as I wanted to say no outright, it was too scary for me to do. At this point in time, I''m very fond of myself, so I have no choice but to listen to Guy''s wishes.

    "Let me be clear, even if you have enough souls, you can''t evolve without qualification."

    "No problem, both meet the conditions for awakening. So, you,e and awaken them.

    Guy made this assessment of both of themtoo much scum to be of much use if that''s all it is.

    There seems to be something odd about Guy''s standard of judgment.

    As far as I know, Mizari and Rhein are supposed to be on the same level of "primordial" as the Testarossa and girls. Is it ack of consideration to say that such a person would be useless?

    The more I think about it, the more ufortable it is to think that there is a fool next to me who will incite Guy.

    Hey, forget it.

    All that remains is the question of whether there are enough souls."

    "The only two people to be awakened are Mizari and Rhein, right?

    "Right. So, how many "souls" does it take?

    If one were to awaken oneself, it would be only ten thousand, but the number of subordinates contacted through the soul corridor" would be ten times greater, one hundred thousand. This time it was an unrted third party and could only be considered even less efficient.

    In that case, the necessary quantity is

    <></answer.>

    Half a million? One person needs two hundred and fifty thousand of them!?!?

    This is the usual times twenty-five, and theparison with the magic creatures in the soul corridor is also two and a half times. This

    A veryrge number, and since the King of Wisdom said so, it must be so much.

    "I think if there are half a million more, that''s enough.

    Huh? Is that all right? Then I don''t have to kill anymore, the amount that exists is enough.

    Surprisingly.

    So, what do you want if that''s not enough?

    ''''Ah, really? That''s really, really good.

    I could onlyugh dryly.

    If it''s going toe to that, Im going to have to scramble to stop Guy. Thankfully things didn''t turn out that way, but the thought of so many casualties so far makes me feel very mixed.

    If the values are different then I have nothing to say

    I silently pray that no conflict of interest will arise in the future.

    ***

    Benimaru and Shuna listened very nervously to my conversation with Guy.

    I don''t think there is any need to hide the conversation with Guy from these two.

    "That''s the way it is, get the guests.

    And by the way, there''s Shion and Diablo.

    Guy was in a happy mood, eating his cake.

    This is the third one.

    Seems very much in his heart.

    After giving me half a million souls, he took on the attitude as if his work was over.

    Although the King of Wisdom confirmed that the conditions were in ce, I felt unable to release it because I was narrow-minded?

    Just as I was thinking about it, Shuna brought Mizari and Rhein back.

    "It''s not bad, Lord Rimuru, it''s a very good cake.

    "I''m very grateful for your unstinting efforts to give us the recipe.

    Mizaris gushing praise and Rhein''s acknowledgement.

    It seemed that they hadmunicated well, and they kept their manners to Shuna.

    Just so you can be happy, then you can not y the boring game of betting on the world.

    I think the world is really full of amazing things.

    These two were perfect as maids.

    They dont have the devastating taste that Shion does, and they seems to learn new techniques quickly.

    But until then, the ritual of evolution must be performed.

    "I received your words of thanks. I hope we can work together in the future.

    Work with each other, that''s what''s important.

    I wish there was a good understanding that a one-sided act is not okay.

    "Hey, it looks like Rimuru will grant you guys the power to give me a little more thanks.

    You too.

    I swallowed the words and shed a smile at the two girls.

    "One thing to watch out for in evolution is that it is expected to induce a kind of slumber called a harvest festival. It''s hard to go back in that state, so you can stay here for a few days.

    Guy and them used Mizaris "transfer door" to get outside thebyrinth. Then got permission from Ramiris to be entertained inside the maze.

    After the ritual of evolution begins, it will be difficult to go back. I don''t think Guy will take the two back gently, so I n to prepare the room well.

    And

    "Is this good?

    "No problem. So, you guys send Guy and Miss Velzado back first.

    That''s what I''m all about.

    The bargaining has gone off without a hitch, and I think it''s almost time for Guy to retire.

    Ahn? I''ll take those two back, don''t worry about giving them strength quickly.

    ''''Hee!?''

    Guy''s unexpected reaction made me involuntarily let out a sound.

    And it wasn''t just me; Mizari and Rhein, who were the parties involved, also showed shocked expressions. This look on their faces told the history of what Guy had never done for them.

    That being said, Guy had his own considerations.

    Honestly, it''s a pain in the ass.

    I didn''t want Guy to see my power and wanted him to hurry back.

    Thenat this point, something urred to me.

    I used to think I had simrities to Guy, but maybe it''s actually the exact same.

    If it were me, I would also observe what the other person is doing and let the King of Wisdom see if a reenactment is possible. Even if it cannot be reproduced, information must be obtained to formte countermeasures.

    From this point of view, it''s possible that Guy was thinking the same thing. All the more reason then for me to avoid exposing the undercard to Guy.

    That said, isn''t it already exposed?

    <></answer.>

    Truly the king of wisdom.

    That is, even Guy can fool the King of Wisdom if it''s handed to him.

    The estimate is that there is no exposure, but it''s not to be careless either.

    Therefore, I hope no more information will be leaked.

    "No, no, no, you''re wee. There are many more rooms, so don''t worry, just stay!

    There''s no backing down here.

    Guy''s purpose was no doubt to observe my abilities.

    Can''t stand to have only me expose hand cards and get Guy out of here no matter what

    Guy and Iughed and faced each other, while darkly engaging in an intense psychological battle. Just at this time, the door to the room was mmed open.

    "I found you, Rimuru! I want you toe out again.

    "Yeah, yeah, yeah! People are also helping to monitor what''s going on in the world!"

    Veldora and Ramiris looked pleased. However, there are very important conversations going on right now, and hopefully they can see the atmosphere.

    Besides, that''s a room used for war, not your yground, is it?

    It''s still during the war, but you guys are just using the big screen to investigate where to y.

    There are as many things to say as there are mountains.

    But, the reason is on me, and I can''tin.

    Go y when the war is overIve said that glibly before.

    After that, the two started discussing where to y.

    The two had lived a long life, but unexpectedly had not traveled the world. I don''t know if that''s why I''m so longing to travel, being more active than I am.

    So these two used my physical magic: the Argos, to happily view the sights of the world every day when they could.

    Surveince mana consumption was low, so it was kept up to power. Anyone can simply do it with a change of perspective.

    It doesn''t reflect all the ces in the world, but it''s a very wide range.

    But it''s certainly true that overuse of magic will make the effect disappear.

    "I''lle alongter, give me some quiet until then."

    Seems like a good lesson to teach them not to make a scene when they have guests.

    This is the responsibility of being a protector.

    After all, I wanted to go along with the investigation - no, that''s not true, and it''s important to reprimand them for the sake of the future.

    Let''s leave it at that.

    Now I''m busy dealing with Guy, anyway, to get Veldora out of here first, but at the moment

    "Hey, isn''t this Guy? What can I do for Rimuru?

    Ramiris found Guy.

    Then came Veldora.

    "Looking happy, Veldora-chan.

    Yah-ah!?!? Why, why, why, why is the sister here?"

    "I thought you''d grown, but I didn''t think you''d be as noisy as ever. Still, it''s an amazing gesture to be human. I''m relieved that I''ve just unsealed myself.

    "Sister, I''m very happy too

    The previously joyous atmosphere suddenly shifted and Veldora stiffened and tensed.

    Velzado looked gentle, but seemed to feel differently to Veldora.

    "I haven''t seen you for years. I want to talk to you slowly.

    "No, dontSis is busy too, and I have a job too, so I don''t have time so

    "Don''t mind. Guy and Lord Rimuru seem to have a long talk ahead of them, so let''s, slowly, talk.

    Miss Velzado deliberately emphasized "slowly,"pletely ignoring the part where Veldora said "there is work.

    Veldora looked to me and asked for help.

    So I, with a hard nod, told him.

    Go on.

    "Lord Rimuru, can I borrow the room next to you?

    Being requested by Miss Velzado with a bright smile, could I refuse?

    No, I can''t!

    "Of course you can. There must be a lot to say, please take your time!

    That''s all I can answer.

    Farewell, Veldora.

    We won''t forget your bravery!

    Veldora looked sad after knowing he couldn''t expect my help. But his hand tightened on Ramiris with a swift grip.

    "Wait, wait, Master! This has nothing to do with other people, right!?

    Please! Don''t leave me alone!

    Looking at that pitiful figure, I was convincedVeldora and sister Velzado don''t get along. It looks more like fear than it does about not getting along

    Speaking of not getting along with their sister, my former life friends seem to be too.

    "That guy, he''s a tyrant

    He grumbled with the kind of eyes that looked through the red dust.

    Even though they''re the "dragon race", they''re simr to humans.

    By the way, someone took to not getting along with their sister, and the situation was fiercely fought over who was more unfortunate than me, but that was something that had nothing to do with only the brother. It feels like those of them are just half-assed.

    The same aura was felt from Veldora as from them.

    I suddenly remembered.

    From a time when I used to talk to Veldora as if it were nothing.

    While arguing over travel destinations, Veldora stubbornly opposed the option of going north.

    He was talking about how it was too cold or something in there, clearly not feeling the cold, and it felt unnatural to me.

    Come to think of it now, was it the knowledge that Miss Velzado was there?

    Watching Veldora, who was now grasping the doorframe with a deadly expression, squirming and desperately not wanting to leave, felt more and more pathetic.

    This may also be my illusion, although I was going to die to avoid getting caught in the crossfire, so I''ll help him a little. If not, so be it, so I spoke up.

    "Guy, you guys live further north than the kingdom of Ingracia, don''t you?"

    Hmm? Ah, we live in the coldest ce in the world called The Land of Ice.

    "I did not inhibit my magic there and so it became uninhabitable for the creatures. Since Guy hates the weak, he doesn''t want to be near them.

    It wasn''t just Guy, but Velzado, who stood up and put her hand on Veldoras shoulder, also turned back to me and replied.

    I thought it was a good opportunity, and asked again.

    "Could it be said that Miss Velzado''s power is cold?

    "Cold air, that''s not true, but just looking at the results makes you think that''s what it is.

    I see, then you can''t go wrong.

    It''s surprising that Veldora, who is so confident and unafraid of the world, would be able to cope with something he can''t.

    "Veldora, you don''t get along with Miss Velzado, do you?

    S-saying something stupid! There is no such thing as something I''m not good at!

    Don''t be so strong at a time like this.

    It''s because of you that the damage gets bigger.

    Right? After all, I''ve been taking care of him.

    Velzado said with a smile that didn''t have a hint of gloom in it.

    This way, there was no question that Veldora didn''t get along with her.

    "When Veldora-chan made a fuss after he was born, I quickly destroyed and regenerated him. When even after the reincarnation he fooled around, I sealed his movements so that he would be honest, and then gently preached to him. Because he''s a child who doesn''t humanize, who disturbs, who causes too much damage. What if there''s no punishment and it bes more difficult to handle afterwards?"

    Velzado spoke of past deeds with a feeling like she had done something good.

    It''s so hard to listen without tears.

    There''s no doubt that''s why.

    "Veldora, you have worked hard"

    "You got it, Rimuru. Do you finally understand me!?

    This, it will be impossible to get along as a matter of course.

    No offense, but the substance is awful.

    This misunderstanding, without discouraging Velzado''s self-righteousness, would have kept Veldora alive in fear.

    Also, Veldora.

    It became impossible to resist Velzado because of his overweening bravado. If this pretense of strength does not stop, rtionships will not develop well.

    This kind of asion is supposed to be a dragon rtionship, right?

    s, that''s irrelevant.

    "Miss Velzado, perhaps I''m being a little nosy, but let me just say that Veldora has an ufortable sense of you.

    "Huh, why?

    "In a nutshell, you''re overdoing it. Instead of indiscriminately forcing him to listen to you, he should be taught how it is better to do so and let him learn the rtionship between good and evil on his own. Even if it''s Veldora, it can be listened to if it''s said well. So can we stop using violence and just say what we mean?

    Stay here today if you wantI propose this to Miss Velzado.

    After a brief silence, Miss Velzado sighed and nodded in affirmation.

    Great, she seems to have listened carefully to my proposal.

    "Ahh, Rimuru

    "That''s great, Master! So hurry up and let go.

    "I see. In retrospect, I don''t think I''ve ever heard the idea of Veldora-chan. Let''s take this opportunity to talk slowly, shall we?

    Take your time and talk about that and it still hasn''t changed.

    I-I get it. Please be merciful.

    Veldora also took back hisposure, dead set.

    If only the divide between siblings could disappear like this

    This time Veldora did not resist and also went to the next room. But he still had Ramiris in his hands, so let''s take that as a no-look.

    "Wait, wait, wait! This really doesn''t have anything to do with other people, does it!?"

    It was as if such a sound had been heard, but with the door of the room closed it was no longer audible.

    I took it as an illusion and turned to face the Guy who had stayed.

    ***

    After the noisy Veldora pulled them away, the room suddenly became silent.

    So."

    Guy muttered.

    I cooed and gulped, waiting for his next words.

    "That guy from Velzado seems to be taking his time too, so let''s stay here today.

    "Got it. In that case, I''ll prepare a room for three, don''t worry.

    Ahn? Why three?

    "Uh, no, aren''t you going back?

    I asked this with the hope that he would go back.

    However, he easily betrayed my expectations.

    "Don''t say anything stupid. What do I have to do with you? I''ll take care of you today.

    So hurry up and let Mizari and Rhein evolvesaid the eyes forcefully.

    Damn it, it''s going to go on like this.

    "No, no, no, it''s a rare opportunity, so take your time next time and enjoy the best service I have for you. So today"

    "You said there was room, right? The conditions of service are minor and I can tolerate them, as long as the room is empty anywhere. I would also like to eat the tempura mentioned before, please prepare it for me.

    Lose.

    Since it''s all been said and done, there''s no excuse for rejection.

    It''s better to expose a very important undercard, but it''s better than rejecting it and then generating displeasure.

    "Got it. Then, I''ll prepare the rest of the room for you at the highest level. Dinner also answers your expectation to prepare tempura for you.

    I nodded my head in affirmation, then waved a wink at Shuna.

    "Got it. So, I''ll go get ready.

    After answering with a faint smile, Shuna left the room with a polite curtsy. In lieu, Haruna walked in and stood in the corner of the room without saying anything, waiting for instructions.

    The movement of feeling her aura like air showed that she was a skilled maid. Mizari and Rhein also showed expressions of admiration, and it seemed that there was no problem with rating it first-ss.

    Guy looks very content with the victory against my offense and defense.

    It''s hard to resist, but here''s where it has to give upthe moment I thought so, Diablo, who had been silent, opened his mouth.

    "Kufufufu, is that so? Youre gonna stay here today, Guy?

    Ahn? That''s right

    "So it is. Well, then, time is plenty."

    "You, what are you talking about?

    "It''s nothing. I just thought it would be nice.

    Right? What just happened?

    "I also have a lot of previous topics I''d like to continue to talk about, and you''ve been very proud of your extreme powers since a long time ago, haven''t you? So today, I''d like to hear about it in detail.

    Ooooh!!!

    Well done, Diablo.

    Instantly reversing the situation, Guy was pinned down.

    This opportunity must not be missed.

    "In that case, Diablo, you will take Guy to the inner parlor. Let''s just take your time and talk there today!

    "Thank you very much, Lord Rimuru. I can only express my gratitude for your kindness."

    Diablo put a hand on Guy''s shoulder while saying so.

    "Uh, wait, wait!!

    "No more waiting, let''s go.

    Guy is unexpectedly bad at being attacked.

    He was then inexplicably taken away by Diablo.

    Diablo came in handy in unexpected ces.

    Now that Guy is away, I can use the power with confidence.

    I don''t know when they''ll be back, so let''s get the ceremony over with.

    I quickly injected my soul into Misari and Rhein, prompting them to evolve.

    <<notice. the="" number="" of="" [100,000="" souls]="" that="" have="" reached="" required="" amount,="" name="" individual:="" "mizari="" begins="" to="" evolve="">> Huh?</notice.>

    Oooh oooh oooh so weird.

    I got half a million of them from Guy

    <<notice. the="" individual="" named="" rheins''="" evolutionsess="">> The total number of reduced souls is 200,000.</notice.>

    Huh?

    Can a soul evolve even if it has no connection, as long as it qualifies?

    No, no, no. Hey!

    There were questions before this one.

    Did you, with 300,000 left, say?

    <> Yeah, well, it''s not like that, is it?</answer.>

    There''s no way to excuse the past when you''ve got so many "souls"!

    <> What have you done!?</answer.>

    The King of Wisdom is too messy too.

    It''s really heaven and earth.

    Wasn''t that a strong-armed prank on the demon lord, Guy Crimson!?

    No, wait a minute?

    In that case, isn''t it me who is resented when exposed!?

    <></answer.>

    No, Im full of questions.

    Now I think you''re a little too scary.

    Because of this, it is too scary to be afraid of heaven and earth.

    <> No, is that okay?</answer.>

    I just feel a little out of ce

    That''s a lot scarier than cheating a gutter hoodlum.

    There''s nothing to be said for being wiped out if exposed.

    Although I don''t sweat and the shaking doesn''t show on my face, I''m cold and sweaty inside.

    It''s been a long time since I''ve felt that being a Slime is so good.

    A banquet was held that evening.

    Guy, though somewhat disgruntled, didn''t look for me toin.

    More than that, there was even a thank you to me.

    "There are various things I want to say, but I''m already tired today. Evolution also seems to have seeded, so let me be grateful for that.

    Guy really showed a very tired expression.

    Why is that?

    Diablo is the opposite of Guy, vibrantly alive.

    It''s incredible.

    "Where, where, where"

    The smart thing to do is to leave it alone.

    I pretended not to notice anything and didn''t touch on the subject.

    He seemed satisfied with his dinner and seemed to be in a better mood after the hot spring. Velzado also seemed to be in a very good mood after chatting with Veldora, and this provisionally prepared reception I think should pass.

    "I''lle back.

    "I''ll give you my best.

    "I''m looking forward to it. Because our country is very cold, this thing called hot springs really heals the mind and body.

    "I''m d you liked it and look forward to your next visit.

    "Geez, what a talker. I''d love to meet Veldora-chan again too, so let me bother slowly next time.

    The mentioned Veldora was now invisible.

    To say why, it seems that he and Velzado fought in thebyrinth and became unable to move with his body scaly.

    "Kuhaha, kuahahahahaha! Tell her I let it go a little this time, and I won''t show mercy next time!

    "Are you sure you want to tell her this?

    Im sorry.

    It was as if I heard a very small apology, but I was gentle, so let''s just pretend I didn''t.

    But then again, it didn''t seem that Miss Velzado was serious. An injury of that magnitude would heal in a few days. On the flip side, it was the first time I had ever seen Veldora injured, and it made me realize once again how powerful the True Dragon Race is.

    There is also another sister of Veldora in the Empire.

    In order to think about countermeasures, the King of Wisdom will have to analyze the battle information between the dragon racester.

    ***

    Guy and the others left behind favorable intelligence and set out on the road home.

    Let''s include this information as a reference and discuss the way forward.

    Just as I was about to do so, someone came running in a panic.

    It''s Myourmile.

    "Oh, oh, Lord Rimuru! You''re here, so I can find you."

    "What''s going on? What''s all the panic?

    "I''lle over if I panic. The big sister is here, let me call Lord Rimuru.

    "Big sister''s here!

    I was taken aback and rushed to it.

    The destination was a certain hotel in the first ss area, where the big sister always went every time she came.

    Big Sister is a code word that only me and Myourmile can understand. That''s right, it was only because the person''s direct name calling would create problems that she was called Big Sister.

    That person is the Heavenly Emperor, Elmesia Elule Sarion, of the Sorcery Dynasty of Sarion.

    Her alias is El from our "conspiracy trio.

    I''m Liam.

    Myourmile is Judd.

    Miss Elmesia is El.

    In terms of status, El was first and I was second and Judd was third, and we were all excitedly involved.

    Since it was El who issued the summons, it was impossible not to rush to participate.

    However, she should have known that it was now war

    "Should''ve told Miss El we''re at war, shouldn''t we?

    "Of course I''ve told her. I also heard from she herself that she woulde back when the war was over.

    In fact, Myourmile-kun spent more time with Miss Elmesia than I did. In ce of me, who was very busy, he maintained various negotiating rtionships with Miss Elmesia.

    Both the light and the dark keeping and going.

    Obviously, it''s formal diplomatic rtions with the Sorcery Dynasty Sarion. In this respect I left it all to Myourmile and Rigurd.

    The construction progress, logistic agreements, customs duties, and other rights rtions are summarized, as well as the mutual guarantee of the safety of business travelers staying in the other country. The misceny was repeatedly confirmed to the point of annoyance, before a mutually eptable condition was finally reached.

    They struggled to engage in the kind of engagement that would be disorienting.

    In contrast, we, the "scheming trio", were secretly doing something bad that could be described as the best we could do. As bad as bad as it sounds, it''s definitely not something that can beplimented on the content is also true.

    What''s that bad thing?

    That is, to take control of the newly born giant economic circle.

    ...........

    ........

    ...

    We started out as just three drinking buddies. But I don''t know when we started talking about business matters, and in retrospect we were already talking about important things about state operations.

    There is also my fault for beingx-mouthed, but the Myourmile-kun who didn''t stop me is equally guilty. And, it wasn''t just me who was ranting, Miss Elmesia had also leaked quite a few secrets.

    I would have been careless and forgivable.

    It''s all because three people get together and drink, and drunkenness is terrible.

    The rtionship is, of course, top secret.

    This is a secret that only three people know.

    Absolutely.

    No doubt people would be very angry if such a conversation was exposed.

    I would then be under the pressure of everyone being speechless, and then Myourmile would presumably be med for the stomach perforation.

    Miss Elmesia will no doubt be trolled by lude as well.

    As a result, the unity of the three is very strong.

    This is a friendship that transcends status as a "conspiracy trio.

    To say when we began to build such a rtionship in earnest goes back to the time when the battle with the Rosso I triumphed.

    At the time of the decline of the Rosso, the underground organizations in the Western countries amounted to a state of destruction. The dragon has no head, presenting a scene of a group of masters.

    Thinking this would not do, I gave the order to Testarossa to keep the peace. While there was no major disruption, the reality of the situation could not be left unattended either.

    When the police, or should I say, the army, of any country is out of reach, they secretlye to the aid of others.

    The question then arises as to the disposition of the offender.

    By saying that the military power of countries is beyond their reach, it means that criminal organizations will retaliate. If not handled properly, it bes a case of local lords bing crime bosses andmitting crimes in in sight.

    Of course, crimes cannot be allowed to go unchecked, but there is a risk of civil unrest if they are forced. Fear of this has led to the inability of the State to intervene and, in most cases, to acquiesce.

    I was so troubled by this state of affairs that when I met Miss Elmesia, a frequent hotel guest, I finally could not resistining to her.

    "I wish you''d say something happier to me.

    Miss Elmesia was like this at first and didn''t want to talk with me. However, while listening to my narrative, I gradually became preupied and reached out to ask me to borate.

    What I have stated is not only to my advantage, but to Miss Elmesia''s as well. In fact, to get her interested, I said a lot of dream-like things.

    The economy and crime are inextricably linked.

    Too much disparity between the rich and the poor creates contradictions and can even have an impact on governing the country. Criminal organizations that absorb the poor be stronger and are likely to be the cause of national unrest.

    Myourmile-kun turned out to be a member of the underworld as well. Having experienced it first hand, he understood my instructions.

    It is important to prepare institutions that take in the poor.

    In order for them to stay out of crime, no matter how down on their luck, the key is to be prepared for a job that anyone can do.

    Usually it''s the military or something.

    The jobs in the army are varied and there is often a demand for talent - but even this cannot be met if the country is poor.

    So, we began to back it up in secret.

    "First, create a criminal organization. By absorbing the nations'' defeated organizations, the embryonic form is nowplete. The organizations that haven''t been absorbed yet, I''ll have them all in the by then.

    I tell the story of my one-liner with a bit of booze. But this sess attracted the interest of Miss Elmesia.

    "So it is. There is no organization in the Western countries that can counter the secret association of the

    "Big Three". I guess as long as one can secure clothing, food and shelter, there will be a lot of people loyal to the organization.

    To Elmesia, who had so far been uninterested, the next statement became a key hand in attracting interest.

    Right? In this way, the poor are taken care of while the rich are being taken care of.

    Oh?"

    "Now that Granbell is dead, the Rosso are bound to decline. Organizations that have strength left now will also eventually weaken. My n is to make a move to take his ce.

    n? Let me hear it.

    "That''s the thing. As previously mentioned, the Kingdom of Blumund has a program to make the function of an industrial agglomeration city. And the Lord Fitz is also making preparations, and the work of collecting people is also in progress.

    I have also discussed this general idea with Myourmile, and it is important to reconcile the interests of the surrounding countries in order to develop together.

    For example, industry in the Dwarven Kingdom, agriculture in the Kingdom of Farmenas, and the Sarion Dynasty is also industry, right? It was necessary to adjust for the great controversy, and then to allow industry to flow into the Kingdom of Blumund, with Blumund as the window to spread to the Western nations.

    "Ahhhh, lude-chan reported that too. Are you really going to implement that n?

    "Of course, right?"

    "So, where does his interest in youe from?"

    "Benefits and whatnot are secondary.

    Oh?

    "I''m kidding! We are what we are. Master the core technology and then disseminate it. For example, to build a university campus city to see if it can absorb the best students from different countries. Ostensibly centered on the founding of the country by tourism, it''s sneaking around behind the scenes!

    "Whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa! Patents, patents! Money floats in without working, fantastic system!

    Although the concept itself is understood, it is still difficult to make it known.

    "So it is. Develop products that can''t be made without using that technology and ensure intellectual property rights!

    "El, that''s very perceptive! It''s good to understand so quickly, but don''t imitate?

    "Firste, first served, right? That''s a lie! I''m not imitating, but let me have a piece of it.

    "Whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa! If Big Sisteres to help, it will be a sess!

    "Geez, Judd-chan really. While that''s true, thepliment is overblown!

    The reception was thus lively.

    Then the next day.

    The three reflected on how much they had said and met again.

    "That, about yesterday''s words

    "Well, remember. You''ve told me everything you can''t say, haven''t you?"

    Well

    "Also, please, please keep it a secret. The words that are nned to be destroyed here"

    "Geez, don''t worry about that Judd-chan. I''ll keep my promise even though I''m speaking in the spirit of alcohol.

    And just like that, we were united by the failure of drunken talk.

    From there we began to move the program forward gradually.

    It went very well because there were two heads of superpowers.

    We used the amazing momentum of the Western domination under the water.

    After only a few months, the criminal organization was unified, and this was the birth of the secret association the Three Drunk Sages".

    The members of the group are very worried about the origin of the name Three Drunk Sages", but we don''t care that much. It''s also a bit off the mark, so let''s leave it at that.

    More than that, the gist is the status of how the n is going.

    The oppressed poor people of all countries joined the mysterious secret society of "Three Drunk Sages", which was established as a new force. Then, after a month-long limatization check, people do their best to sort.

    If one is judged to be very good, one is recruited to our country for formal study.

    I put this troublesome task hard on Glenda Atori. She was one of the original "Three Martial Sages"

    and now works for Souei. Since she says she''ll do whatever dirty work it takes, let''s give me a decent role as the boss of the synagogue.

    Gerard, who had been the head of the "Green Apostles" of the mercenary regiment, and Aine, an elven warlock under him, served under Glenda.

    These two had been active in all Western countries and were very good at leading a group of reckless men. The poprity is high among those who are active in the shadows, so give me a hand in supporting Glenda.

    Everyone seems to think that three drunk sages" refers to these three.

    It actually refers to three drunks, but they misunderstood that drunken life and death is handsome, so let the truth be buried in the heart.

    That''s the underground part.

    Next, it''s about the organizations that are active on the surface.

    If given to just one organization, sooner orter it will be a hotbed of corruption. To avoid this, it is better to build confrontational organizations.

    Based on this idea, two organizations were created.

    The first was the fledgling organization led by Lord Myourmile.

    This organization has as its axis practitioners educated in the Kingdom of Blumund, with links to the Council andmercial activities.

    The official name is the "Four Nations Business Alliance".

    With the Jura Tempest Federation as the head, the Kingdom of Blumund, the Kingdom of Farmenas, and the Kingdom of the Dwarves as the affiliated countries. Because the representative is Myourmile-kun, one look and you knew I was involved.

    The second one was the Western Chambers of Commerce union in which Miss Elmesia had secretly intervened.

    The Doran King of the kingdom financed it and carried the banner to absorb the survivors of the Rosso n. Mainly concentrated on those who were very hostile to us, a greater force than could be imagined was born.

    This organization is called "Western General Chamber of Commerce".

    The representative was the son of King Doran, and seemed to be an excellent person who had inherited the blood of Rosso.

    Only King Doran and his son, Prince Figaro Rosso Doran, knew of the involvement of Miss Elmesia.

    Participation in our program in exchange for epting Elmesia''s asylum.

    "The Rosso cannot survive without converting to a flexible way of thinking. Since the Demon Lord, who will be the world''s overlord, has joined forces with the Heavenly Emperor, who has great influence in the world, it would mean our demise if we did not participate.

    Upon hearing this n, the first thing King Doran said seemed to be this.

    The Rosso n valued the covenant and could be trusted to maintain the rtionship for as long as it took to fulfill it mutually.

    By the way, Ms. Elmesia''s and my holdings add up to 61% of the Western General Chamber of Commerce. Since the majority shareholder is Miss Elmesia, when Figaro betrays, it means the destruction of the merchant society.

    I think a good man like Figaro would not have made that stupid choiceMiss Elmesia said so. I also agree with this opinion, and so currently choose to trust Figaro and appoint him as chairman.

    With that, both organizations began their activities simultaneously.

    On a clear level, the two organizations are hostile.

    Pricepetition,petition in cirction, is soundpetition conducted within a legal framework without the intervention of force.

    Some of them are also despicable people who try topete using the underground, but for some reason they have been hit hard. I received such a report from the Three Drunk Sages" that something unbelievable had happened.

    We don''t deliberately try to stop it, but hopefully they understand that overdoing it will cause misfortune.

    As sad as it is for people who use excessive tactics, both organizations are very energetic and growing beyond my expectations.

    After only a few months, the structure of the organization seems to have settled down. The division of posts was refined in the various departments, and the sses settled down.

    I heard that just now, when we were attacked by the Empire, they also became rich by sending war money.

    Even if the merchant spirits are flourishing, there must be a degree, but the profits they make will also return to me, which can only be described as a necessary evil.

    I think the idea that just obeying regtion on everything is fine, no matter what, is wrong.

    I''ll think even more so this time when I can profit from it too.

    Presumably, this is the feeling that control of the economic circle is gradually moving towardspletion.

    ...........

    ........

    ...

    The fact that Miss Elmesia hade first without a reservation undoubtedly meant that an emergency had urred.

    Is it imaginable that Prince Figaro''s betrayal unfolded in this way?

    Countermeasures for this situation have been discussed, but the shares that I hold need to be taken out.

    If so, one can understand why Miss Elmesia came over.

    ***

    Upon arrival at the hotel, Myourmile took me directly to the other house where Miss Elmesia was.

    "Long time no see. What''s the matter today, Miss El?"

    In short, superfluous spection is not necessary.

    Better to hear what''s going on from me.

    Miss Elmesia didn''t seem too happy about it.

    She made no secret of her mncholy and looked at me with contemptuous eyes.

    "Huh, huh? Feeling bad?

    "Of course not! Youdo you really understand what you''ve done?"

    Oops, oops!?

    She seems pretty pissed off, huh?

    And it seems that it has nothing to do with "Three Drunk Sages

    "How, how?

    "Sit down."

    "Ah, yes.

    It was not a good idea to annoy Miss Elmesia, who was staring at me, so I sat honestly on the tatami mat.

    Myourmile-kun is also sitting next to me. Unlike me, he seemed to have a hard time.

    "Is it true, Rimuru, that you let a few of your men evolve?

    Whywhy do you know this!?

    I immediately squinted at Myourmile-kun, taking eye contact, but he desperately shook his head to indicate he didn''t know.

    In that case, where did this leake from?

    "I received an urgent message from Gazel. He was troubled to say or not to say it, but in the end thought it should bemunicated, what a rule that boy has.

    In Miss Elmesia''s opinion, Gazel the old man was just a kid too.

    But so? Actually, I didn''t n to hide it, so it wasn''t something that should have surprised me, but the speed with which the information was conveyed still surprised me.

    "Since the Eastern Empire is more difficult than I thought, I wanted to give everyone a reinforcement.

    Then, I thought it was bad to hide it, so I entertained Granny Jane.

    "Really? So it''s true

    Miss Elmesia stood up and looked out the window with her back to me.

    Her back drifted sadly, somehow a little bleak.

    "Hey, why are you nodding like it''s none of your business?

    Miss Elmesia took out a fan and pped me on the head with lightning speed.

    "No, no, no, no, I didn''t mean it that way

    I was clearly just trying to make the heavy atmosphere cheerful.

    "What are you trying to do with all that power?

    "Hey, it''s no big deal. Just trying to build a country where we can live happily.

    "That''s what I heard from Gazel. You''re taking in the other primordials, too, besides Diablo?"

    "Ahhh, didn''t I say that? I was also shocked when I found out recently. El knows about Testarossa too, doesn''t she? I think she''s very good, and it turns out she''s also a primordial. The other two, named Carrera and Ultima, serve as the head of the country''s highest tribunal and the attorney general.

    Miss Elmesia''s body began to tremble as she listened to my instructions.

    "Is that also true?

    After muttering like this, Elmesia sat down squarely in front of me and stared at me. Then, bluntly ask the question.

    "Do you want to destroy the world?

    "How, how?

    "That''s all people around here can think when they see this!

    Reprimanded.

    I panicked and started making excuses.

    Myourmile-kun also came to support, and then engaged in a thirty-minute discourse.

    "That is to say, Guy and Rudra are ying a game of pawns with their own pieces in order to have a showdown?

    "That''s how it is!

    "Is that right, Judd?"

    "No, I''m very sorry I don''t know the details, but until then, in any case, isn''t that something I shouldn''t be hearing?

    "It shouldn''t be, but it can''t be helped, can it?

    "I really want toin if I can''t finish the show without a word, it will be very hard for me

    Yeah.

    Totally caught up in it.

    Really, I''m sorry?

    But I am sure that with my rtionship with Lord Myourmile, I will be forgiven.

    "Ha, things I already understand. If you''re threatened by Guy, you can''t refuse

    Yeah, that''s it!

    Me, threatened by Guylets call it what it is.

    Right? I''m having a hard time because of these reasons, too.

    The tone of my speech is all affected by Lord Myourmile, but here it''s muddled through no matter what.

    Miss Elmesia let out a sigh.

    As if to quell the anger and retrieve the calm.

    "So, what are you going to do?

    "What do you mean?

    "You''re not the kind of guy who''d be willing to be a pawn of Guy, are you?

    "No, I''m willing.

    Why?"

    "Geez, I''ve thought about that

    Miss Elmesia couldn''t seem to understand what I was thinking. So, I spoke frankly to her about what I thought.

    The Empire does have a lot of strongmen of unknown strength, and choosing to avoidbat at this point is one way to do it, but I think it''s just putting the issue on the back burner.

    In doing so, I would have to be on constant alert for assassins from the Empire, living in hiding.

    Skirmishes with assassins will also ur, and even if one is careful not to make mistakes, there will likely be casualties.

    To keep things from going the way they are, this side has to take the initiative.

    Originally, war was a rite of passage for the Empire to give birth to the Awakened One. Under this approach, we will always face threats from the other side. So I think that to choose to ignore it now is to give the other person time to think.

    "That''s my judgment. It was precisely because the numbers were meaningless that I was going to just barge in with the main force and make peace face to face. Just take care of Rudra''s pawns there, and after that Guy should do something about it.

    Guy is not to be relied upon, in fact I didn''t expect much from him. So, the next question is who to take over.

    "Lord Rimuru, is that all right?

    "Hey, hey, Mr. Myourmile. Who do you think I am? Don''t look at me like that. I''m part of the Eight Star Demon Lords, too, right? Neither the Emperor nor his near guards are my match!

    Yes! You are a goddess to me

    Hmm? Goddess?

    This guystill sees me in that light?

    He caught me staring at him and scrambled to change his story.

    "No, it''s the reliable demon lord!

    "Oh, oh, oh, oh. Well, leave it to me! Ha, ha, ha!

    "Whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa!"

    Weughed out loud.

    As nice as it is to say, if things get bad, run back. It is useless to be tooplicated now.

    Ho Are you trying to disintegrate Emperor Rudra''s men, or are you trying to kill them, can you tell me how you feel about that?

    Asking questions premised on my victory kinda bothers me too, but about that for sure.

    "Trying not to kill. Judging by the game''s winning conditions, the moment that makes someone other than Rudra incapacitated is the moment that Guy wins. After that, I guess, it''s not something I can interfere with.

    Hearing me reply like this, Miss Elmesia nodded contentedly.

    "Got it. Then don''t let me down, give it your all. If there''s a silver lining, I''ll take care of your country, just rest assured.

    Stop it! Don''t say such unlucky things!

    "Don''t worry! I hate self-sacrifice! My motto is to live happily together, so I have no intention of dying.

    Miss Elmesia smiled with great pleasure when she heard me reply like this.

    "That''s good. Remember, if you die, the world wille to an end. You''re the only one who can tame the primordial demons, led by Diablo. The demons you prompted to be born don''t always agree either. If confrontation urs, war will inevitably arise. Got it? Don''t give up on what you want to do, and don''t forget it.

    This is advice from the heart of Miss Elmesia.

    "I know, really.

    So I also swore with a serious look on my face.

    The game goes to the endgame.

    One more count and our victory will be determined.

    But at this point, if you make one wrong move, you could lose it all.

    One must be calm and deliberate.

    First get in touch with Yuuki to discuss how to deal with Emperor Rudra.

    So, the next day.

    We embarked on a journey to the Empire.

 Volume 14 - Ch 2.1

    Intermission 2: The Game in the Sky

    This is the record of the war.

    A heavenly game that hassted for a long time.

    Betting on the hegemony of the ground, the Demon Lord and the Hero go head-to-head.

    However

    For Velgrynd, the Scorch Dragon, such a game would be tasteless. With herck of excitement, it didn''t matter which side won.

    There was no need to add so much to the picture, just use the battle to decide the winnershe even had that in mind.

    When all is said and done, there have been many direct fights between Guy and Rudra that still haven''te to fruition. So at the beginning of this game, the only rule was "no direct matchups".

    Comining didn''t help, and as far as Velgrynd was concerned she was very upset.

    Originally, to speak from the heart, she thought the contest was a disadvantage.

    Of the pawns avable to Guy, the only one who can take down Rudra is Velzado, and conversely, just figuring out how to take Velzado down means victory.

    The same is true for Guy.

    Enough to take down Guy''s character, none other than Velgrynd.

    But instead Velgrynd thought it would be hard to defeat Guy.

    The fact that Velzado exists to take down Rudra, while being no match for Guy himself, is the reason why Velgrynd sees this game as a disadvantage.

    s, what a pain in the ass.

    This is true.

    Velgrynd, who hated the use of stratagems, was very bad at such meticulous actions that required centuries of preparation.

    So she dumped it all on Rudra and simply obeyed him herself.

    Even if that was the case, if Rudra was eager for victory, Velgrynd would not begrudge his assistance, intending to join the fight herself as soon as she was asked. It''s going to take a lot of work to get Velzado and thus secure the victory.

    Guy is undoubtedly the strongest demon lord, and her sister Velzado, the White Ice Dragon, is also very unpleasant to Velgrynd. She was an opponent like a natural enemy and it was very difficult to win head-on.

    If Velzado fought Velgrynd, it would have been a good oue, or Velgrynd would have been forced to reincarnate.

    No, it''s not even an optimistic spection.

    Velgrynd''s attribute is heat.

    By contrast, Velzado''s attribute is ice.

    In other words, "eleration" and "deceleration" are diametrically opposed.

    If the two sides really went all out, it would end badly.

    Neither side will survive and both sides will be beaten down. That is, the likelihood of the two being wiped out together is high.

    In this case, the two will reincarnate together, but the present-day self will disappear.

    Even if the memory can be inherited, they will be another person.

    Velgrynd cringed at this.

    It didn''t matter if she disappeared, but she didn''t want her love for Rudra to go down the drain.

    Such an insignificant affection as love, and yet so obsessed with it, Velgrynd couldn''t help butugh at herself.

    The premise of the so-calledplete victory is that both herself and Rudra must be safe. That''s why insurance is needed, but this one is badly disposed of and hurts.

    Really, that kid is a pain in the ass. Luck seems to have lifted the seal, but why didn''t you even bother to say hello?

    Not realizing that he was afraid of his own, Velgrynd, was resentful of the so-called insurance Veldora.

    If it was the Veldora that Velgrynd knew well, he would have been scattering all over the world a long time ago. But now he didn''t know what he was thinking and became very close to the newly promoted demon lord. Hearing that he had even attended the feast of the demon lords had made her even wonder if he had broken his brain because of the seal.

    Even so, if it was Veldora, who was a keen ritualist, facing an army of millions, she didn''t think he would keep quiet. So she deduced that Veldora would definitely show up, which turned out to be unexpected. He remained hidden in the depths of the maze and did not show himself.

    This was beyond what Velgrynd had expected.

    Originally, the kid was supposed to be my style, but, why not show up this time?

    As was the case on thest expedition, Veldora was disgusted that his domain had been vited. So as long as one invaded the Great Forest of Jura, one could not avoid an encounter battle with Veldora.

    And that''s exactly what Rudra was expecting.

    What matters to Rudra is not the elite legions, but the individuals who go beyond their limits.

    There were also several survivors whopleted the evolutionst time.

    Surrounded by resentment, fear, and despair.

    Only by not losing hope in the midst of such a limiting situation can the chains of being human beings be broken and reach the higher realms.

    Even if a million armies were to be wiped out in the literal sense of the word, just a few Awakenings would be enough to make it worthwhile. This was Rudra''s idea, and Velgrynd agreed.

    It is also full of energy to make the Chiefs of the army misunderstand, without having the Intelligence Bureau disclose more detailed information.

    As far as Velgrynd is concerned, the army Chiefs are hriously confident.

    It is highly unlikely that this operation will progress smoothly.

    It could even be said not at all.

    An army that has only been fortified by science is not going to defeat Veldora.

    So this time, there must have been a mass death as well.

    However, it is closely tied to hope.

    Heh heh, there will be a few people who survive andplete the awakening this time around. The more characters who are able to be recipients of Rudra''s Vessel of Power, the higher the win rate.

    Im really looking forward to it.

    Velgrynd, who had such a thoughtful mind, was speechless when she learned of the unexpected oue of the expedition.

    ***

    "All gone?

    "Hmph, I am shocked, are you too? It''s been a long time since I''ve seen that look.

    "Please don''t joke. With not a single survivor, this kind of defeat was too unexpected by any means. In that case, this purpose of acquiring the Awakened One has also failed, hasn''t it?

    Let the generals umte as much experience as possible, and at the very least, cultivate a strongman of the Near Guard Knight level. The birth of the Awakened from among them again is the hidden purpose of this expedition.

    However, there were no survivors at all.

    It''s not as good as being wiped out by Veldora, a situation where you can''t even say such a thing.

    Experiencing the desperation of making contact with the tip of the world''s most powerful force, and surviving it, makes human evolution more likely.

    An expedition was organized for this purpose, and it would have been meaningless without the survivors.

    Even the several near-guard knights mixed in were nowhere to be seen.

    This is tantamount to simply consuming valuable pieces, which can be costly.

    "Well, it''s gonna be.

    Rudra''s response was calm as usual. Velgrynd was upset about this, but when she saw Rudra''s eyes, the anger dissipated.

    In his eyes there was a very strong resentment.

    Rudra and herself harbored the same feelings, and Velgrynd reacted.

    That''s why she switched minds.

    Despite the loss of a legion, it didn''t matter at all to Velgrynd. It would naturally be best if an Awakened One could be born, but even that failure would not be a problem.

    Only that the very existence that caused it to happen no longer justifies ignoring it.

    If you can literally wipe out a million Imperial troops, you can''t underestimate the power of the other side. Who is responsible for this situation must be brought to light.

    "So this time it''s that kid''s doing too?

    After retrieving herposure, Velgrynd snapped so.

    Velgrynd waspletely oblivious to Veldora''s fuming breath. However, there had been previous reports that Veldora had wiped out 20,000 of the Farmus Kingdom''s army.

    At that time, detailed intelligence was not avable due to the intelligence agency''sck of ess, but this time it was different.

    The whole picture should be in hand and will no doubt be reported to Velgrynd, who is the "marshal".

    The reason Rudra was able to know first was because of his power. So Velgrynd awaited Rudra''s answer with great trust.

    As predicted by Velgrynd, it''s incredible that a brother who likes to make a scene would let the opportunity to get aggressive go. If a million troops attacked, she expected that Veldora would definitely show up.

    At that point, it would be possible to observe the power of Veldora. Following her thoughts, this should confirm whether or not Veldora could do enough to control the demonic aura to even make himself imperceptible.

    Veldora''s growth has been a wee thing for Velgrynd.

    Though a foolish brother, he was also a lovable presence in the eyes of Velgrynd.

    Only, again, he does get tricky.

    Can''t let him join Guy''s side, must make him apanion anyway.'' Velgrynd harbored such thoughts, and from time to time intended them.

    Getting to grips with how much Veldora has grown is an important thing for Velgrynd.

    However, it was not to be.

    "That''s not true, and what''s even more surprising is that I am unable to grasp the details of the situation.

    Rudra told Velgrynd everything he knew.

    Beginning with the great defeat of the initial battle, to the failure to return the troops who broke into thebyrinth, and the final sweep of things by great magic.

    Add to that the awakening of Calgurio and the end of the war.

    It''s hard to imagine how the Mecha Legion was defeated, but the facts are there.

    "Foolish, isn''t it?

    "Yet it is true. The remaining four pirs of the Primordials are all on the side of the Demon Lord Rimuru. If those demons go on a rampage together, there will be no chance of your brother making an appearance.

    "The bnce of the game has been upset. In that case, Guy would be bitter too, right? Or, is it just what he wants?

    "Maybe. If that''s Guy''s intention, I can only admit that it puts the battle at an overwhelming disadvantage.

    Rudra said with a bitter smile.

    Spending long years building up war strength and preparing for the best possible time.

    Don''t be impatient, don''t try to be strong, and fight steadily.

    However, there was a figure who could gather a fighting power beyond imagination in a matter of moments.

    He''s a tiny being who doesn''t see himself as a "rising starRimuru.

    Now, we can only agree. While thinking like this, Velgrynd secretly lit up the fight.

    "Then again, the thing you can''t grasp is what''s going on inside the maze?

    "Oh, exactly. It''s a great pity that the remaining power isn''t enough to break Ramiris'' power.

    Upon hearing this answer, Velgrynd was also able to ept it.

    "Labyrinth Fairy" Ramiris is an invible being. As a referee of the game, she''s less reliable, but there''s no doubt she won''te in and stir things up.

    That''s right, so far.

    This time it was already full on the Demon Lord Rimuru side. It has nothing to do with the game between Guy, just defending against the empire that attacked the Great Forest of Jura.

    The power of Ramiris herself was nothing major, it could almost be ignored, and Velgrynd didn''t think she could make an impact on the game.

    However, her power, ''Labyrinth Creation'', had the effect of separating the intelligence on the outside from the inside.

    The power was slightly troubling, and the urge to smack lips arose in Velgrynd''s heart.

    "Ramiris must have lost enough of her power to be a mediator, right?"

    "Yes, it is. Thinking she wasn''t a threat, she was put aside, but that guys maze had always been the best ce to hide secrets. Until now, I had been looking through the eyes of Bonnie and Jiu

    "Suddenly you can''t see?

    Rudra responded to that query with a nod.

    "This is a ploy to make me careless, right?

    "So it is. It''s really a lot trickier to say that than one might think"

    Velgrynd understood how profound the situation was.

    That is, there is no way to understand what is going on inside the maze at the moment.

    Normally one would think it was Veldora who did something, but Velgrynd didn''t think so.

    "The problem is that there seem to be several more powerful people lurking in the maze. Although the strongest of them is your brother, how far has he been tamed by that neer

    "I don''t think he''s going to do what he''s told, as far as the boy''s character is concerned. Not to mention whether or not you can do it, something like using skill to bind him would be impossible in my opinion.

    Although it was heard that he was assisting the demon lord Rimuru, Veldora was not a character to be left at the mercy of others.

    Even the words of Velgrynd or another sister, Velzado, would have been defiant, so it could be assumed that there was no doubt that he would not have sumbed to strength.

    In this way, does it seem that Rimuru the demon lord has prepared something that will make Veldora do what he says?

    Thinking about it, Velgrynd began to try to imagine what it would be like.

    However, she was clueless.

    If something like that really existed, it wouldn''t have to be asborious as it has been so far. Why don''t you just ask the Demon Lord Rimuru?

    Eventually Velgrynd gave up thinking.

    "We''ll have to ask from my own mouth.

    Hearing Velgrynd''s muttered words, Rudra burst outughing.

    "Well, that''s right. It''s very gratifying to havee to the same conclusion as me.

    The demon lord named Rimuru is no longer dispensable to the two.

    Considering the means by which he had taken the Primordial, and the fact that he did not know what he was doing, it would not have been wrong to assume that Veldora was taking him at his word. That being the case, she made the judgment that it was necessary for him to fall from Guy''s side.

    "Now is the perfect time to make a move. The more our ploy fails now, the more careless Guy will be.

    A patient demon like Guy must have thought we''d have to wait for the next opportunity.

    "Indeed it is. So far it''s all been a deliberate move to never take a chance. It''s not a bad thing to act here in one breath, putting aside your hesitation.

    Velgrynd cheered.

    Rudra is determined to take on Guy.

    The period of hibernation is over.

    Taking advantage of this opportunity Velgrynd will move in and control Veldora with one breath. And ride this momentum to defeat the newly-raised demon lord named Rimuru, leading to a full-scale showdown with Guy.

    "Ohhhh, leave it to me. All you have to do is pick up the pieces after I''ve made my mark. I believe you, Rudra.

    "That''s natural. Whatever happens after that, as long as it takes Veldora under our wing. I also came up with an interesting strategy, something that was enough to offset thispse.

    Even the very tricky "primordial" is no match for the true dragon" Velgrynd if she fights head-on. It would be a lot of trouble if they messed up afterwards, so if they didn''t listen, they should clean up together.

    Seems like there are other things that would be a problem, but as long as I''m personally involved, it''s all right.

    Velgrynd was so so full of confidence.

    "As a warm-up, how about a blood ritual for those fools?

    The disobedient people of Rudra are arrogantly gathering.

    Although they have been atrge until now, they can only go so far.

    The Emperor had no choice but to "die" for the foolish man who nned the coup.

    Velgrynd uttered so while thinking so, but Rudra smiled and shook his head. Then, the unexpected answer came from his mouth.

    "Don''t kill these people, keep them alive.

    "Huh, what a surprise. I thought if I had been as gentle as you, I would have given them a death without pain.

    "No, they are a necessity in our scheme.. In order to get Guy''s attention, another big fight must be started here.

    "That''s Kondo''s style. The idea of taking advantage of a betrayer is something I would not have expected.

    "Is it not to your liking? It is true, however, that Tatsuya''s n can hardly be called humane. But the reasonableness is unquestionable.

    Velgrynd nodded vaguely at Rudra who had said so.

    Even how cruel the n was would not have mattered to Velgrynd at all. She was merely trying to give them a taste of Heaven''s wrath with her own hands.

    Velgrynd loved Rudra, but that didn''t mean she liked other humans too.

    It wasn''t disgusting to say the least, nor was she trying to exterminate them, she just couldn''t forgive people who did things like betray Rudra.

    Well, okay. Since you cane in handy for Rudra, let''s spare your little lives.

    After epting it like that, Velgrynd urged him on down the line.

    "So, what''s Kondo''s n?

    "It''s a long story, and it''s important to look at the current battle n before you do that.

    Upon hearing this, Velgrynd immediately understood Rudra''s intentions.

    "Well, yeah. There''s no point in fighting on two fronts now.

    "Exactly. So withdraw the battle first and dy the attack on Ruminas.

    "As long as you and I can persuade Veldora toe to our aid, whatever happens after that. Just in case anyone messes with it, recall dim and them.

    "Can I give it to you?

    "Well, that''s natural. So let''s quell the rebellion and move on to the capture of Dwargon. Just do that and you''ll confuse Guy.

    The conversation ended in a conspiracy between the two.

    Velgrynd rose to her feet.

    This was her time to get real again after thousands of years.

    And so it was, the tragedy called "The Purge of Red Lotus" was brought to a close.

 Volume 14 - Ch 3

    A+A-

    The darkness in Tidu was deep.

    Thanks to scientific civilization, the neatly arranged streets of the Imperial City are illuminated by gas streetlights. Even so, there are still back streets that people can''t see.

    Even for a continuously developing imperial capital, it was still a long way to go before the darkness waspletely expelled.

    In the darkness of the imperial capital, Misha walked silently.

    This darkness is where Misha was born and raised.

    Instead of fear, there is a sense of peace of mind andfort. That is, the female named Misha.

    In the days following Yuuki''s report, Misha lurked and hid while busy preparing for the coup.

    Currently, the Imperial Army is on an expedition. In such a situation, it would be very dangerous for Misha to go out as an entourage member. The death penalty would be imposed if they were considered to be fleeing in advance, which in fact they are.

    However, Misha appeared to be a straight face with no fear in her face.

    From Misha''s attitude, it could be clearly seen that she was confident that she knew the darkness of the Imperial Capital like the back of her hand.

    After all, Misha was mostly engaged in behind-the-scenes work and had excellent fighting skills. While not as good as Vega and Damrada, Misha''s ability to use her mind is the real deal.

    Intelligence gathering is her forte, and she boasts of being able to outsmart the Dark Ministry of the Kingdom of Dwargon and the spies of Blumund. It was because of this that Misha felt able topletely hide it from the Imperial Intelligence Agency.

    In fact, surviving in the empire to this day is her tangible result. As usual, Misha walks towards her destination.

    But to do so seems like a defeat.

    Although Misha hadn''t been careless, a man appeared to block the way.

    The man''s name was Tatsuya Kondo.

    He is a member of the Imperial Intelligence Service and is known as the "intelligence-feeding weirdo".

    Although not revealed, Damrada''s true identity is feared to be the head of the Imperial Emperor''s Order of the Near Guard. At the very least, an opponent that Misha could never beat.

    "Where are you going in the middle of the night?

    Kondo''s icy voice rang out.

    Misha inwardly smacked her lips and answered with a smile on her face.

    "Aha! It''s Lieutenant Kondo! Lieutenant Kondo is the only one. Are you still working thiste?

    Regardless of what was inside first, Misha made an unhurried counterattack on the surface. However, the current situation is undoubtedly the worst.

    In this huge imperial capital, it''s surprising to find such a remote ce to stabno wonder hes a weirdo. The fight is not won, and the guards can''t even buy time.

    Kondo, who suddenly appeared in front of her, seemed to be acting alone. But even that wasn''t promising, and Misha struggled to find a way to escape the asion.

    "You''re a staff officer with the head of the Calgurio army, aren''t you, Misha? Why return to the Imperial Capital during abat operation?

    In an extremely serious tone, Kondo asked Misha.

    "You scared me, Lieutenant Kondo! In fact, I returned to the Imperial Capital on the secret order of Sir Calgurio.

    Anyway, let''s just muddle through, Misha replied like this. At the same time, look around without care.

    The narrow alley was silent. That''s a good thing, but the problem is that the escort''s breath is gone too.

    Has he been disposed of? I didn''t even notice the aura of battle, what a difference in strength there is

    Just for a moment, Misha grasped the situation.

    Even without having met directly, it was impossible for Kondo not to know Misha. It wasn''t clear how Kondo felt about Misha, but it would undoubtedly be difficult to break through this scene with just flowery words. Without much nonsense to dispose of the escort, it should be safe to assume that the deception is no longer working.

    So judgmental was Misha, who decided to ask for help from Damrada, who was scheduled to meet.

    Suddenly, a nasty thought crossed her mind.

    Why is my position exposed? Although Lord Yuuki decided to trust Damrada, but is he really trustworthy?

    The ce of the appointment was designated by Damrada, and today''s consultation was on the preparation of the liaison on the contents of tomorrow''s confidential meeting with demon lord, Rimuru.

    Not good, this is too bad. There is a possibility of betrayal in Damradano, don''t think that. Not to mention the judgement of Lord Yuuki, I also have a kindness for Damrada.

    Misha and Damrada, had a long correspondence of over twenty years. As a fellow leader of the "Big Three", the leader of the secret society, Misha knows Damrada better than Yuuki. It was because of this that Misha was even more confused.

    Damrada was a calm and sensible man, and judging by the information that came out of his mouth, one could assume that there was no reason to betray Misha and them.

    It wasn''t that she wanted to believe that, but rather, she listened to Yuuki''s instructions before she approved. In that case, now is not the time to be confused, but to trust thepanions even in the end.

    Misha settled her mind and stared at Kondo.

    "Thank you, Great Majesty Rudra, for allowing me the good fortune to meet you here.

    Oh?"

    "Lieutenant, right? Dispose of those who are hunting me. It would be difficult for me to deal with so many opponents on my own.

    "I see. You want to go on like this.

    "Ara, am I under suspicion? I came back from that hell desperately in order to convey the information in my hands.

    Misha continues to perform dutifully.

    She flirtatiously approached Kondo and leaned into his arms.

    Misha''s best trick is to use her "womanly" charm to enchant men.

    The specific method of implementation is to influence the other party''s thinking through the use of the

    "perfume spell" and the illusionary magic "charmed" at the same time, and to stimte the other party''s instincts while hindering thinking, and eventually make him a captive of Misha.

    And then increase their dependence on Misha by ovepping their bodies and minds more deeply. In this way, it is tantamount to dominating the other party.

    With a couple of clinches in the clinch with Calgurio, it''s reached the stage where it''s not even close topleting the cage.

    Not only Calgurio, but many men fell for Misha''s trick. For Misha, who is undefeated so far, that''s the strongest ace.

    Even an opponent who is far from superior in strength will fall in the face of carnal lust. So convinced, Misha wrapped her soft hands around Kondo.

    Pressing her ample chest against Kondo''s, showing off her charm, then peeking at Kondo''s reaction.

    Suddenly, Kondo''s breath went ck.

    Misha faintly smiled.

    Oh, great. It looks hardcore, but Kondo is a man too.

    The effect is better than expected, in which case there''s always a way.

    "Nah, let''s go somewhere better? A quieter room than this one, huh?

    Bringing her lips close to Kondo''s ear, she murmured softly. In response, Kondo''s right hand moved, and Misha heard him mutter a ''Got it''.

    It seems to work. The best result is to rendezvous with Damrada at the destination. If not, find a way to make him my prisoner by the skin of my hand

    It was thest thought in Misha''s mind.

    There was a crisp bang.

    Misha fell limp, bright red blood spilling from the left side of her head, soaking the ground.

    In Kondo''s hand, he held therge Southern-style automatic pistol that he had drawn at an unknown time, and by looking at the nitrous smokeing from the muzzle, he knew that it was the murderous weapon that pierced Misha''s temple.

    Kondo''s expression didn''t change, retracting the pistol as if nothing had happened.

    The intelligence has been extracted.

    With the unique skill "Reader", you can read the mind of the contacted person.

    Whether it was Misha''s intentions, or Yuuki''s attempts, or even the end of an expedition to the Imperial Army. It doesn''t take even a second to read the whole thing.

    Despite reading such a significant piece of information, his expression remained unchanged.

    Just bored talking to the darkness.

    "Coup d''tat, stupid. Are you still going to im that you didn''t betray His Majesty when you did this?"

    In the darkness that should have gone unanswered, a man staggered into view. Instead of answering Kondo''s questioning, he approached the fallen Misha.

    It was Damrada who came.

    "Kondo, there''s no need to kill her, is there? This person can still be useful to His Majesty if she is trained properly.

    "No, the probability is zero. This woman''s strength is at most 37th in the sequence, but if she can make it to the dozenth position, it''s possible that she can''t be of use to His Majesty.

    I deliberately acted defenseless, but she couldn''t even break through my defenses Kondo said coldly.

    Damrada sniffed and shrugged.

    If Kondo had said that then it would have been correct, so he didn''t retort anymore either.

    It''s just that, in the face of his former partner, Misha, his heart is inevitablyplicated.

    Damrada knelt beside Misha and covered his hand over the left side of the body''s head. The soft light blocked the wounds of the remains, pressing back the eyes that had flown out of Misha''s head and closing the eyelids.

    Finally, wiped the stain off her face and did something to retrieve what little beauty there was.

    Damrada did not have the power to resurrect the dead, but at least something could be done to put her to rest.

    "No sense in it. Leave it alone and the body will be disposed of before dawn. Answer my question faster than that.

    "I''m not like you. I can''t be separated.

    Naive.

    "You''re the one who''s weird. So young, but why do you want topletely stifle your feelings?

    "I have no feelings, that''s all.

    "How can"

    "I have seen hell, and it was His Majesty Rudra who saved me from it. If you be an enemy, I will not forgive you.

    "I am His Majesty''s faithful ve and can never betray.

    "It''s hard to say. And don''t forget, you''ve also fallen for my trick. If you want to be trusted, prove it by your actions.

    After saying that, Kondo also left without looking back.

    Damrada took one look at Misha''s body and left the ce as well.

    It''s a long night in Tidu.

    What should be done, is not done.

    After that

    Through the hands of the Intelligence Service, Misha''s body was disposed of without leaving a trace.

    The darkness of Tidu was deep, burying all events without a trace.

    ***

    At Yuuki''s instruction, Kagali immediately acted.

    Meticulous preparation is essential for a coup d''tat.

    On the same day the order was issued, and in a few days important people gathered from all over the world.

    Nearly thirty subordinates flocked to the mansion in the Yuuki Imperial City.

    This time, it was the people who had sworn absolute allegiance to Yuuki.

    Almost half of the subordinates had already gathered here, except for those like Vega who had infiltrated other legions that could not participate.

    ns for the coup have been in constant preparation since before. The people gathered here were waiting for Yuuki''s speech with the feeling that it was finally this time.

    The entire team is a group of people with some strength.

    Relying on their own strengths, they rose to prominence in the army.

    Loyalty to Emperor Rudra has been non-existent from the beginning. There are even those who are excited by the revolution they will bring to this country.

    Visitors from the Otherworld.

    Interracial with an alien race.

    Subjects who repeatedly conduct inhumane experiments in pursuit of power.

    A first-ss adventurer nurtured by Yuuki.

    There were also the ve warriors that Damrada had collected and the monsters that Misha had protected.

    What they believe in is violence.

    That is, the values of this hybrid legion.

    Step up the huge duplex staircase with arge room for meetings.

    Estimating the time when the whole group was seated in their chairs, Yuuki came in with Kagali.

    "Ah, everybody, we''re all here.

    In his usual cheerful tone, Yuuki greeted with a smile.

    "Tomorrow, we are scheduled to have a meeting with the demon lord, Rimuru. Already Misha has been told to call Damrada, the details will wait until Damrada arrives.

    On hearing this statement, the room erupted.

    "Aren''t I the only one waiting to do it?

    "The Demon Lord Rimuru is too cunning to be careless. Can you believe it?

    "No, wait. That said, it''s still war, right? As a party to the war, there is no way that Rimuru the monster king himself would have taken the time toe here.

    Various statements came from all corners of the venue.

    Yuuki''s smile deepened.

    "The Imperial Army has been overwhelmed. It''s said that Rimuru killed all the 940,000 Imperial troops that attacked?

    "How can that be!?

    "Too soon. Even counting the movement time, contact with the enemy is only a few days"

    Hearing these incredible words, the whole room erupted into a tizzy.

    Yuuki smiled and gestured for everyone to be quiet.

    "To overthrow an empire,bat power is necessary. So I decided to join forces with Rimuru-san.

    Hearing this, although it was difficult to ept, people who showed understanding for Yuuki began to appear. Shrewdly, they began to care about whether this information was trustworthy.

    "Did you bring this information from Lady Misha?

    There are people in the venue who belong to the "Big Three", so they know about Misha traveling with the army.

    "Exactly. If I hadn''t be an ally beforehand, I think Misha would have been killed too.

    Misha-sama?"

    "How could you do that?

    Although Misha works behind the scenes, she is well known. The name "Big Three" is not for posturing.

    It is precisely because those present are powerhouses that thepanions are given due credit.

    People who never valued poor strength, in this strange sense, had a deep trust in Yuuki.

    "So it is. In that case, I''m in favor of an alliance. Although I''m unhappy with the concealment so far, the boss has its own considerations, right?: "We haven''t considered it yet, but we lost to Guy and were forced to make a promise.:

    "Guy? Could it be, Guy Crimson!?

    "Fighting the Dark Emperor?" "Even the boss is a mess!

    "No way. I''m d you survived.

    Although it caused a stir in another sense, Yuuki silenced everyone.

    "There was a lot more to say, but there wasn''t enough time. I promise I''ll give a full ount afterwards, so bear with me for now. Instead of that, it would be better to discuss the consultations for tomorrow''s meeting and what operational action should be taken.

    The official battle strength remaining in Tidu was the Intelligence Service and the New Corps.

    The upper echelon of intelligence might be a threat, but the grassroots group doesn''t have to count as a fighting force at all.

    The new regiment, though numbering as many as 100,000, was too weak to be a threat, only slightly troublesome in numbers.

    There are also 20,000 resident guards who act as police, but are not a match for the military ministry in terms of equipment. The disparity in force between the military and the police is akin to making adults the opponents of children. At best, it only serves to stall the pace.

    However, the Emperor''s ace, the Emperor''s Knights of the Near Guard, was still the strongest battle force.

    "There are guards in the Intelligence Bureau. So strictly speaking, the only people who should really be on guard are the close guards.

    "Indeed. To be able to stand out in a sequence snatching battle, the up-ander is really strong.

    "Hey, hey, boasting about it. Aren''t there traitors like you among the guards?

    "Well. I only believe in power, but not in loyalty to an emperor who only shows off his power.

    The manughed as he said this.

    There were people of their own among the near-guards, and by once again perceiving this fact, the congregation understood what an advantageous position they were in.

    The man who created this atmosphere was slightly short in stature but had a very unruly attitude.

    His name is Arios.

    Although they are "otherworldly", they are not summons, they are lost.

    "So, will Demon Lord Rimuru''s reinforcements make it tomorrow?

    The dark-haired maiden asked to Yuuki.

    The ancient city dance dressshe was also a visitor. An ordinary Japanese girl high school student summoned to this world.

    The ancient city was picked up by Free Combination Chief Handsome Yuuki, who had received various assistance. Because of thisyer, she trusted and looked up to Yuuki.

    "Yeah. It would have taken a lot of time to bring the army over, no matter how much time it took to get there. If ites from the air, let''s say it doesnt, it doesn''t reallye, does it?

    As if to overshadow the ancient city''s questioning, a big muscr man spoke up.

    His name was Tolneod and he was originally a ve fighter. Would have been enved to death as a mining ve if not fetched by Damrada.

    Tolneod was integrated into the army, educated, and learned about the joys of learning. As a result, he was more knowledgeable than he appeared to be and served in a staff role in the hybrid corps.

    "Flying magic is extremely psychologically draining. There may be no problem with the Demon Lord, the underlying monsters may not be able to fly over.

    Agreeing with Tolneod was a short, teenage girl.

    The name is Aria. Both wizards and heavy warriors.

    At odds with appearing to be of age, being a disciple of Gedora''s teacher but having undergone transformative surgery himself is a very distinctive character.

    Tolneod replied breathlessly to Aria.

    "Not that. Even if there was norge army left behind, a surveince was spread out over the Imperial Capital. If arge army presses down from the air, it will be noticed at a distance.

    identally pointing out the error, Aria was blushing with shyness. Aria is a rare acute child among wizards, with a poorly considered side.

    "All right, all right, all right, all right. A different perspective can be obtained by analyzing the situation through various perspectives.

    Yuuki quickly interjected, pulling the issue back on track.

    "I''ve been contacted by Rimuru-san through Gedora-sensei, and there will only be a few peopleing tomorrow.

    The contact with Rimuru was made in a hidden "magic call" from Gedora. Even if tapped by Imperial Intelligence, trying to decipher it is impossible because the content is encrypted.

    Gedora has only conveyed a few key points, and it has yet to be decided who exactly wille.

    Rimuru is sure toe, so what about the escort?

    It seems that Rimuru-san also sees no point in demonstrating against Rudra. It''s still more about quality than quantity, and the ones thate will definitely only be executives.

    ording to Yuuki''s preconceptions, it would be about ten people at most.

    "This, to underestimate the Empire? Or, are you ying with us as allies?

    Twisting her soft body, the slender beauty tossed her head crookedly in question.

    This is more of a mouthful than a question. A woman of natural origin is a warrior named Olca.

    Contrary to appearances, it is the xenophobe who hides several special skills.

    "Olca, that''s not true. As mentioned earlier, preparing arge army is a lot of work and doing anything will take up a lot of time. That''s why it''s better to let a few elite people act.

    This time, it''s Tolneod who narrates.

    Yuuki smiled due to the trouble saved.

    "That''s what it is. Therefore, it is necessary to set our side of the line.

    Rimuru only brought the elite, and the question on this side was who to deal with whom.

    Rimuru-sans thoughts, I n to hear them at tomorrow''s talks. So, it is necessary to sort out our own thoughts first. Like, what to do with Emperor Rudra and such.

    Yuuki''s statement was extremely arrogant, not thinking about defeat at all, but looking to the future of victory.

    It is an anomaly to be negotiating the treatment of the emperor when the coup has not yet seeded.

    However, no one has pointed this out.

    Even Tolneod, who had the property of spitting, put on a grinning face and waited for Yuuki to speak.

    The Dwarf Kingdom is already aware of the situation, so the hybrid legions now in formation will be able to march towards the Imperial Capital without any worries. If it''s just the remnants of the Imperial Capital''s battle power, it''s not easy to win?

    "It''s true, the only threat is to the guards.

    Yeah."

    Yuuki always responded with a smile.

    In fact, he knew the real threat was someone else.

    The "Marshal" is an unknown being.

    Furthermore, if you consider the significance of Guy keeping Yuuki alive

    This time, how will Rimuru-san act? Hes clearly a pacifist who hates to initiate attacks on other countries

    Perhaps it''s to spare the fallout, but in any case, it''s hard to imagine that''s the only reason.

    Yuuki then put together the pieces of intelligence and began to organize his thoughts. Thus, he saw the figure of Guy behind Rimuru.

    If that was the case, then there were monsters in the empire that could be Guys opponents, Yuuki concluded.

    "Depending on the circumstances, it may be necessary to kill the emperor, right?

    "Too much of a hurry, Arios.

    "Yeah, it''s not good to take exclusive credit.

    The assembled people got excited and even began to have people threaten to kill the Emperor.

    Yuuki thought that it was too soon to discuss the treatment of the Emperor, but he also thought that it was good that everyone was full of blood and vitality.

    In fact, talk about what to do with Emperor Rudra is also to be had tomorrow.

    Gedora opposed the killing, and Damrada dedicated his loyalty to Emperor Rudra. Yuuki believes that since these two are important coborators, they should try to avoid arousing their resentment.

    Before worrying about these issues, the object of Guy''s vignce was the high probability of Emperor Rudra. If so, reckless provocation is undoubtedly suicidal.

    There''s no need to force yourself to do what''s in the fire, the emperor will just give it to Rimuru-san.

    Thus, Yuuki made a conclusion.

    Detailed consultations will not take ce until Damrada is reached, but a rough draft is already avable.

    The hybrid regiments are used to suppress the Imperial capital.

    The near-guards, who were in the way, were met by the multitude present.

    The people here who had been chosen by Yuuki were no less powerful than the knights of the near guard. Not as good as the top runners, but with a numerical advantage.

    If one person is challenged by several people, this degree of poor strength can be subverted.

    As for monsters like Rudra and the "Marshal", it would be better to leave it to Rimuru, who hade to the war on purpose. That''s presumably what Rimuru intended and should have epted the proposal.

    Tidu''s defense, no matter where it came from, would not receive reinforcements.

    Of the three major legions, the Mecha Legion was destroyed by Rimuru.

    The Magic Beast Legion was in the distant air, and even if they came with all their might after knowing the situation, it would all be over by then.

    Thest of the hybrid legions also defected.

    The n proceeds to such an extent that one can already say that the General.

    No need to rush, victory is close at hand.

    It should have been, but Yuuki always had a sense of unease about seeing what was missing.

    What is it that you''re missing?

    "I''ve kept you waiting.

    A heavy, calm voice resounded in the atmospheric venue.

    The people who heard this voice were as tight as if cold water had been poured over them.

    "Atst, Damrada.

    The man, Damrada, arrived at the venue.

    ***

    Instead of wearing the usual merchant''s clothes for disguise, Damrada wore a rare Imperial uniform.

    At this moment, Yuuki felt at odds.

    "Where''s Misha?

    Dead."

    The venue went silent for an instant.

    Anyone who had felt the strain, went into a clinical state. Those present had experienced many cultivation fields and were sensitive to this aura.

    "What do you mean, Damrada?

    "Literally. Just a moment ago, Misha was killed by Kondo.

    Hearing that, Yuuki felt the lump that had been lingering in his heart disappear.

    Seems to be missing something, that sense of unease.

    Finally came to realize its true nature.

    Yuuki and Damrada''s rtionship, though not long, involved a lot of ground. The two of them have conspired together in countless, unspeakable evil deeds.

    The Dark Mother of Darkness, who was able to bring down the underworld that ruled the Empire, was also able to do so with the assistance of Damrada. There was also the "Big Three", a secret association that was formedter, and Damrada has been very active as a subordinate.

    Yuuki had thought so, but now it seemed that he had misunderstood.

    All of it, all of it, is being pushed ording to the Empire''s ideas.

    The people summoned by Damrada upy the central organization, which is the "triumvirate" of secret associations.

    The purpose is to screen the able and the ipetent. To spread intelligenceworks around the world to identify and attract talented people.

    Protecting the lost is also part of the equation.

    This is not something that has happened recently. Long ago, the era of the Mother of Darkness began, and the same thing has been happening over and over again.

    In this way, wouldn''t it be possible to say that Yuuki was also one of the people who was discovered by Damrada.

    Find the strong ones and pull into their own side. It was Yuuki who caught the eye of Damrada, who acted ording to this purpose.

    It would be too conspicuous to leave Damrada to his own devices.

    Yuuki is nothing more than a sacrifice chosen to be a shield.

    That is, he was going to use him, but instead he used him.

    That being said, it does not mean that Damrada has betrayed.

    Damrada''s loyalty is real.

    In order for the paranoid Yuuki to believe this, Damrada was in fact being manipted by someone, too.

    Thinking it over, Yuuki sighed heavily.

    I feel pretty cheated. When did it start?

    "What the? What''s this about?

    Damrada asked indifferently.

    It was the same tone as before, but Yuuki sensed a certain decisive difference.

    He was not pretending to be confused, but was sincerely unable to understand what Yuuki was saying.

    This also means that Damrada has no self-consciousness of being manipted himself.

    It''s no wonder you don''t notice. It''s precisely because I''m not self-conscious that I won''t be exposed.

    Thinking this way, while thinking back to thest time.

    Damrada, at that time, asserted that he did not betray. It was possible to sense that he was speaking from the heart, in fact, it was possible that something had been done after that.

    If one trusts one''s instincts, then Damrada''s maniption should be the closest thing one can get.

    By the way, the person who decided to trust Damrada was exactly me. I''m not going to say much about that at this point, what''s important is the purpose of the guy who sent Damrada here.

    Someone has manipted Damrada, and Yuuki has determined this in his mind. If one thinks on the basis of this, one would infer that one is in a very serious situation today.

    During the time it took to deal with Damrada here, their encircling against Yuuki should have beenplete.

    Yuuki fell into contemtion.

    Next to him, Kagali also began to quietly analyze the situation.

    However, the bloodthirsty young people gathered at the venue were enraged by Damrada''s attitude.

    "Damrada, you''re being rude to Lord Yuuki!

    Aria condemned.

    Then Tolneod, confronted him.

    "Damrada, you, what are you thinking? Are you saying that you''re going to betray us?

    Damrada replied lightly.

    "Betrayal? Saying strange things. My loyalty is unwavering and is dedicated to His Majesty Emperor Rudra from the beginning to the end.

    "Che, that''s betrayal!

    Arios said fiercely.

    Damrada was known for his greed for money and was looked down upon by a section of his peers.

    There are even people who talk bad behind his back and say he would do betrayals for money.

    It is precisely because Damrada is such that in this case, more people are angry first than are surprised.

    The first to act was Tolneod.

    One hand grabbed Damrada by the neck, threateningly.

    "Don''t pretend! I was picked up by you. You are the one who said that instead of dying as a mine ve, one should live for the greater good. I, however, am always grateful to you. But why are you doing this Goo!

    Tolneod''s actions were actually sheltering Damrada. Get your own hands on the results before anyone else makes a move.

    However, it was nosy for Damrada.

    Damrada gently reversed his grip on Tolneod''s wrist, manipting the flow of power and in turn restraining Tolneod.

    "Oh Tolneod, remember what I said?

    Damrada''s eyes were cold, and the calmer Tolneod only felt a chill in his heart.

    "What, what?

    Tolneod, who answered with a squeeze of his wrist.

    "For the sake of righteousness, one must be strong. I taught you that, didn''t I? You''re getting power, that''s all?

    All of the powering together to one point, Tolneod''s wrist crunched.

    And then it was just thatcrushed.

    "I, my wrist, in a sh"

    Tolneod groaned, rubbing his wrists as he closed the distance with Damrada. Remove the usual recovery medication and administer the treatment.

    Damrada didn''t pursue Tolneod, standing leisurely.

    There is not a hint of breakage.

    In a world of magical creatures where even a broken bone can be cured in a sh, you can''t be careless until you''vepletely rendered your opponent powerless. Without such an understanding, one cannot survive in this world.

    Looking at Damrada, Yuuki narrowed his eyes.

    He knew that Damrada was strong.

    It is not surprising that Damrada is a "single digit" superior to the people gathered in this room.

    The important thing is that there is no dowsing ability.

    And, also, to see how far he''s been manipted.

    In the end, it''s a question of whether or not my ''ability blocking'' can be lifted.

    Depending on the situation, Damrada may have to be killed.

    Yuuki deliberately didn''t try to stop hispanions in order to see through this.

    "Are you the Emperor''s dog? I thought I was just a money grubber, but I waspletely fooled.

    However, breaking in alone and revealing your identity doesn''t seem like the kind of stupidity you would do if you were a coward.

    Arios shouted, and with that, the situation changed.

    "That''s right, Damrada yo. You have been gracious to me, so I, will kill you without feeling the pain.

    Tolneod, who showed his true colors, challenged Damrada with all his might this time.

    "Too slow.

    Tolneod gripped the war club hanging around his waist with both hands and swung it down with all his might, but Damrada drilled through with ease.

    Burrowing into Tolneod''s arms in a natural motion, the palm of his hand pushed out gently.

    At odds with the lightness of the movement, the heavy blows hit Tolneod.

    Spiral pration breaka technique to force the refined fighting qi into the opponent''s body.

    Has a directional, prating fighting aura that can prate weapons and muscles, destroying objects from within. Its power was proportional to the amount of fighting qi, and if it was a spiral pration break refined by Damrada, it would be a sure-fire hit that surpassed the power of the tank gun.

    Tolneod couldn''t take it anymore.

    Goo!"

    Tolneod spat blood and crouched in ce.

    Trying to stand up, but can''t get the legs to work. That''s for sure, the blow just moments ago damaged Tolneod''s guts.

    "How, how is it possibleyou are so strong

    "Whew, oops, oops, oops. To judge people by their appearance is a pride and arrogance unique to the strong. Does it mean that by hiring you as an escort, you mistakenly think you are stronger?

    Hmm."

    "I told you to be strong and not look down on humans. Even if you don''t rely on ability, you''ll get stronger with exercise. Just like me.

    Darmada speaks up and throws a spinning back kick to the back of the head.

    The attacker, who was aiming at Damrada from behind, did not react at all to the kick and was killed instantly by a cracked skull.

    Easily killed was Arios, one of the strongmen recognized by Yuuki.

    Arios has the unique skill of "Killer", and has acquired the characteristics of "Silent Movement" and

    "Presence Concealment", which are suitable for assassination, and is a special skill structure for killing, and its strength is considered to bemensurate with the 44th position of the sequence.

    What was thought to be a man-to-man battle was Arios'' true calling, and instead it was buried dryly by Damrada.

    "It is not possible to rely on one''s ability alone like this, but it is one''s own body and spirit that one can rely on in critical moments. If you ask me, you are of no use at all.

    Damrada''s words were sharp.

    People who hadn''t been ridiculed by the Battle Skill Instructors immediately became angry upon hearing this. It was almost like teaching a weak tone that made anger well up in one''s heart.

    The whole crew''s faces suddenly changed, and they unleashed their killing intent on Damrada.

    In the midst of that, Yuuki continued to calmly analyze the situation.

    A conclusion was then drawn.

    Sure. Damrada did not betray, was manipted by someone. Arios is the closer guard, maybe the Emperor''s man. Not killing Tolneod, butying a dead hand on Arios is proof. That is to say, there is still a vestige of free consciousness, but the inability to do what is detrimental to the dominant, this state, right?

    To be able to manipte Damrada must be a very powerful dominant force. But still, Damrada drilled a hole and tried to convey the status quo to Yuuki.

    Based on this judgment, Yuuki came up with the best answer.

    "Hey, all hands on deck! Now start the evacuation and transfer! You will be given fullmand to Kagali, and you will rendezvous with the Hybrid Legion.

    "Boss, why run away, execute the traitor, and then rise straight up"

    "No way.

    Arias proposal was tly rejected by Yuuki.

    He smiled as usual and looked around at the whole staff with a serious look.

    "Damrada''s purpose is to buy time. That''s why it''s so long on exposition, because that''s what''s allowed, right?

    "Permission granted?"

    Kagali asked.

    Yuuki nodded his head in affirmation.

    "Yes. Damrada did not betray. Rather, hes being manipted by someone. And then that guy, he''s going to kill us all here.

    The crowd reacted to Yuuki''s words, but the effect of allowing thepanions to retrieve their cool judgment had been achieved. Suppressing his killing intent on Damrada, he focused his gaze on the adjutant, Kagali.

    Kagali''s judgment was the same as Yuuki''s.

    The instinctive rm bells kept going off and on, and Kagali understood that she was in a crisis situation. When Yuuki gave instructions, she immediately understood what she should do.

    The situation was urgent, and now was not the time to oppose Yuuki''s instructions, and Kagali acted.

    "Give up here and head for the Hybrid Legion field camp.

    "But what about Yuuki-sama?

    "Don''t mind me. I don''t think Damrada will let us escape, so I have to be his opponent.

    Go for itYuuki takes his back to the full mount and clinches up with Damrada.

    Go."

    Understood!"

    Everyone is aware of what they should be doing.

    Whether Damrada betrayed or not, such things no longer matter. Looking at Yuuki''s back, everyone hade to this realization.

    Being strong, they all understood that the thing to do now was not to argue, but to fight for survival.

    Aria carried the fallen Tolneod.

    The petite maiden carrying therge man on her back wasical but no oneughed at them. Users of healing magic heal Tolneod on the side and join the back row of the team together.

    Then it just disappeared into the night in such an orderly fashion.

    A few minutester.

    In the spacious conference room, only Yuuki and Damrada remain.

    "It''s toote to run away, you''re always light at thest minute. Yuuki-sama underestimated the Intelligence Bureau too much.

    "Maybe. But if you try to struggle, maybe you''ll find a way to live?

    "Ridiculous, this is no child''s y.

    "Of course, I''ve always meant it.

    "Is it a dream like conquering the world?

    "Of course! And, you do the same, don''t you?

    Hearing this, Damrada smiled.

    Yes, that''s right, smiling like that from the bottom of your heart with satisfaction.

    Yuuki Kagurazaka, a good host for Damrada.

    While one can tell that he can''t get rid of childish, childish thoughts, there is a cold side to it.

    Very calcting, not to get bored with Damrada.

    It is for this reason that Damrada believes in Yuuki.

    It was only then that he noticed that his current self, was being manipted by Kondo.

    ...........

    ........

    ...

    Damrada''s loyalty to Emperor Rudra is real. Although Yuuki is also recognized, it is no better than Rudra.

    After all, these don''t even need to bepared.

    Emperor Rudra meant all to Damrada.

    Damrada, on the other hand, acted as agreed with Rudra. Fulfilling the covenant is what Damrada bets his life to achieve.

    Damrada has been involved with Rudra for longer than Kondo. It was therefore impossible to deny that Damrada was careless enough to assume that Kondo would not strike out at himself.

    Damrada understood that he was being viewed with suspicion, and was therefore wary, but Kondo seemed to be more dangerous than Damrada had thought. Having ended his parting with Misha, Damrada''s will was dictated by Kondo.

    It was not understood what method he used, but Damrada could not be undone no matter what means he used. Damrada''s consciousness and actions were thus fully grasped by Kondo.

    ...........

    ........

    ...

    Kondo, I didn''t think you could manipte even me. While knowing that the guy''s caution was deep to the bone, I didn''t expect it to go this far. Still, as expected of Lord Yuuki.

    Since it couldn''t be lifted on its own, the only hope left was to rely on Yuuki. But this has to be done with attention to the situation Damrada is in, which is very difficult.

    Whoever looks at it will feel that Damrada has betrayed. The attempt to gain trust in such a situation was so strong that Damrada himself almost gave up.

    However, Yuuki noticed it.

    Damrada was moved by this fact while saying what he had been allowed to say by Kondo.

    "Lord Yuuki, let''s show you the strength of the Sequence Two, the deputymander of the Imperial Emperor''s Knights of the Near Guard."

    This domination is permissive and Damrada''s movements are restricted. In this case, Damradamunicated as much information as possible to Yuuki.

    Self-reporting is one of them.

    As long as Yuuki knows all the information he can give, it wille in handy in the future. Damrada was so convinced that he intended to entrust the future to Yuuki.

    When Yuuki-sama kills me, it''ll be over. The agreement with Lord Rudra, Yuuki-sama will also fulfill it, right? Too bad I can''t see it for myself

    The will of Damrada will surely be inherited by Yuuki. For in order to achieve Yuuki''s ambition, it is necessary toplete Damrada''s goal.

    Damrada did not hold out too high expectations.

    "Don''t worry. There''s a lot of work to be done, and I''ll save you.

    "Ha ha ha! Saying such naive things won''t defeat me.

    The pleasure that rushes up from the heart, even when manipted, cannot be removed. Damrada does as he pleases and releases this emotion

    ***

    More than thirty warriors ran wildly through the streets of the imperial capital.

    Following Yuuki''s orders, Kagali and the others attempted to escape from the Imperial Capital by night with the aim of reuniting with the Hybrid Legion.

    The camping site for the mixed legions is near the Empire''s border with the Kingdom of Dwargon, five hundred kilometers southwest of the Imperial capital, a distance that would take more than ten days if one were a traveling merchant.

    The people of Magic High can move between designated cities in an instant by using the ''teleportation gates'' that have been set up all over the Imperial Capital, a gift thates with excellent magic technology.

    However, it was not possible for a hundred people to use it at the same time, and the ''portal'' was usually heavily guarded as an important facility. Even in the dead of night like this, it was easy to foresee what would happen in a fight.

    Kagali doesn''t hesitate to choose the path she once took.

    She judged that instead of making a scene here, it was better to straighten out the war effort first.

    In this group, everyone is a superhuman beyond the rank of regrs. With a few hours of non-stop running, you should reach your destination.

    "Is Lady Kagali all right?

    "Well, no problem. Thank you for your concern, Tear."

    Kagali thanked Tear, the masked maiden who ran beside her.

    Kagali was the original Demon Lord, and after losing to Demon Lord Leon, remained in a mental body state for decades at a loss. At the time, Kagali was not a spiritual beingthe Demon Lord Kazaream had done his best just to remain self-aware.

    Crossing over that past, the blessing of Yuuki had finally gained artificial flesh. Then the workout went smoothly and became powerful.

    Therefore, she now possessed a fighting ability that could rival that of the higher monsters. In this group of strongmen, too, they are by no means left behind.

    "Yeah? That''s good. At times like this, it would be nice if Lace was around

    "Yes, if Lace had been there, he would have defeated Damrada.

    "Oooh, oooh, oooh, boss is strong too. Sure to get the win, back to us!

    Yes!"

    "Well, that is to say.

    Although Kagali replied with a smile of affirmation, she felt a growing anxiety inside. The rm bells had been ringing since just now, and Kagali''s unease was gradually increasing.

    not good. It''s not good.

    This instinct, I don''t know how many lives it saved her. Therefore, even though Kagali had no basis, she began to think about what measures she should take to get out of the situation.

    Then, turning their eyes to their most trustedpanions, Tear and Footman.

    "Call Lace.

    Huh?"

    "Tell him toe right back.

    Tear and Footman might be able to have a conversation through ''chanting''. No matter how far apart, the clowns are closely connected.

    "Lace was sent as a messenger

    "It''s okay,e on!

    The rm bells that only Kagali could hear grew louder.

    That meant there was no time left, and after making that judgment, Kagali ignored Tear and gave a second order.

    "All hands, split up from here on out! Act ording to your own judgment, survival first?"

    With the aim of reuniting with the Hybrid Legion, thest words were not spoken, and she understood it was toote.

    "That''s amazing. I thought I''dpletely eliminated my aura, thanks to you for noticing.

    The man in military uniform said so while emerging from the darkness.

    It''s Lieutenant Kondo.

    It wasn''t just Kondo, from the rooftops of the buildings across the street, people kept jumping down wordlessly.

    The number is about 50.

    Yet, every one of them could feel the overwhelming breath.

    "The Imperial Emperor''s Order of the Near Guard

    "Yes. Don''t be needlessly resistant, surrender. In this way, the honor of dying for His Majesty the Emperor is given to you.

    "Yeah, you admit it. Lieutenant Kondo, you are the head of the Imperial Emperor''s Order of the Near Guard.

    Even after being identified, Kondo was still expressionless.

    Neither negative nor positive, but it was enough for Kagali.

    Kagali and there rest gathered while guarding the knights who surrounded them. At this point, fighting is inevitable.

    The near-guard knights were fully armed in legendary gear. Even with equal strength, the gap in equipment is still too great.

    Despite being at an overwhelming disadvantage, none of Yuuki''s men would give up lightly at a time like this.

    "Ha,e on,e on. It''s a good way to save time.

    "Yes. Let''s see what I can do with a close guard!

    Tolneod, who was still dying a moment ago, spoke up and Aria followed suit.

    A person with extraordinary strength should look like he or she should, but he or she will not simply give up.

    And among them, Kagali desperately analyzed the situation.

    The odds of all surviving are infinitely close to zero. The goal of the tactical victory at this stage is to get morepanions to converge with the hybrid legions.

    For this, time needs to be bought.

    Before Yuuki defeated Damrada.

    Before Lace rushed back to help.

    Buy valuable time. Kagali realizes that this is what she is meant to do.

    Well, what would have happened if one of them had made it?

    Thinking aside, Kagali took a step towards Kondo.

    "Ho-ho? Are you going to be my opponent?

    "Yeah. Let me confirm the strength of the Chief Near Guard.

    Saying so, but Kagali was well aware that she was nowhere near as strong as Kondo. Kagali''s purpose was to make herself the bait.

    Winning is impossible, at best, to buy time

    Kagali concentrated and posed towards Kondo.

    Kondo, on the other hand, didn''t look at Kagali and looked around at the battle and sighed helplessly.

    "I don''t like to do useless work, and I''m not going to stall for time with you. You have to understand that you can''t win a war with spiritual will.

    "Well, maybe? With prayer, miracles can happen.

    "Hum, ridiculous. The original Demon Lord talks in his sleep.

    Hearing that, Kagali smacked her tongue.

    Only a few of hispanions knew that his original identity was that of a demon lord, and Kondo revealed it easily. That is, this level of intelligence was nothing more than trivial to him.

    "You''re really being underestimated."

    "No, I don''t think so. Let me tell you something, I reckon your intention is to rendezvous with the Mixed Legion, but it won''t work. Just a moment ago, His Majesty the Emperor had personally organized a crusading army to march.

    "What did you say?

    It was an extraordinary state of affairs for the emperor to go on an expedition.

    But what Kagali cared about was the word crusade army.

    "Of course, it''s only the strong who matter. First of all, whether or not one swears loyalty to His Majesty Rudra, a mongrel that doesn''t even have the possibility of evolution is not going toe in handy.

    "What does this mean?

    "Can''t you understand? You have survived until now only because you still have the possibility of evolution, all in the ns of His Majesty Rudra.

    "Nonsense! Are you trying to say that our ns have all been seen through!?

    Kagali got emotional.

    Kondo said with a bored sweep of Kagali.

    "Stupid question. Do you think you can fool me in the Imperial Capital?

    Inside Kagali, a dim fire of anger red.

    The name of the fire, Shame.

    With her unique skill as a ''nner'', Kagali has been making all kinds of ns and getting them executed sessfully. Despite the sessive failures of the n because of Rimuru, it was Kagali''s pride to be Yuuki''s partner and to be Yuuki''s strategist.

    Kondo, on the other hand, scoffed at that.

    "How could a human?

    "You mean, Yuuki Kagurazaka, right?

    A strong rage washed over her, and Kagali''s eyes seemed to go nk. Still, she could see that it was Kondo''s ploy. If you let your anger run wild, you will lose battles that you could have won.

    The evidence is that Footman, not knowing if he was provoked by Kagali''s anger, lost his sanity and attacked Kondo as he had. In the Clown Troupe, Footman, who prides himself on having the highest attack power, unleashed a great magic bomb,pletely unconcerned that the streets would be destroyed.

    Kondo ducked out of the way easily, but an rm went off on the street side, feeling like it was going to cause a bigmotion. At this rate, not only the close guards, but also the guardsmen and the watching crowds would flock to the scene.

    When this became the case, there was no need for Kagali and others to worry about it, as long as someone was in the way, it was considered an enemy to rule out. Kondo they should be well aware of these things too.

    But why would Kondo allow such a thing to happen?

    That was Kagali''s query.

    Settle down and think calmly. This guy, just trying to piss me off

    Since she saw through Kondo''s attempt, she would just have to apany him. Thinking so, Kagali suppressed her anger. At this point, a wave of unease came up as if she had missed something.

    Wait? Damrada was manipted by someone. If this is Kondos

    It wasn''t just Footman, Tear had joined the war. A surprising amount of fighting is taking ce between the surrounding Konoha and Yuuki''spanions.

    Kondo, on the other hand, waspletely unfazed by the situation.

    At unknown times, Kondo''s right hand gripped a pistol and his left hand held a knife, coping with the onught. Facing Footman and Tear, the two majins who were able to override the Demon Lord, they still maintained a stoic attitude.

    Although Kondo was predicted to be a formidable foe, the reality was beyond prediction.

    Undoubtedly stronger than Damrada, Kagali reacquainted herself with the horrors of Kondo.

    Kondo simply held the gun and showed no signs of wanting to shoot, using the knife alone to simultaneously oppose Footman and Tear.

    That knife, in Kagali''s opinion, was also a famous knife. In fact, what Kagali didn''t know was that the construction of the knife was called a naval taija-type military knife, and the key de was engraved with a beautiful de that was so beautiful that one couldn''t help but look at it. This is a family heirloom passed down from generation to generation by the Kondo family, not a bargain for theyman to hold.

    Rightfully so, this knife is not a weapon that can be wielded with one hand. Kondo, on the other hand, held the hilt of the knife with his left hand and swung it with one hand. This was not some special genre, and a clear-eyed person could tell at a nce that he hadn''t yed up to his original strength.

    This man is dangerous. Taking those two as opponents, but not moving the real thing at allBut why?

    It would have been more serious if the intention was to kill. So you didn''t do it, did you really see any value in using us? So it''s true

    Then, Kagali came up with the answer.

    Shouted.

    "Be careful! Kondo may use some means to manipte people.

    "Hm, exactly."

    Thought Kondo would deny it, but dryly admitted it. It gave Kagali the creeps.

    How dare this man expose himself? No, since we already doubt it, there is no point in denying it.

    Expressing affirmation will, on the contrary, increase our vignce. But, can''t figure out why

    Kagali sank suspiciously into a mire of thoughts.

    Unable to understand Kondo''s thoughts, unable to see what was right to do.

    Since you can''t win the fight, it''s best to follow through with the initial battle of dying time. She thought so, but couldn''t figure out why Kondo would go along with this battle n.

    No, that''s weird! This man said at the outset that he had no intention of stalling with us, and why -

    ah! Is that so, it turns out!

    It was only at this point that Kagali finally learned the true horror of Kondo. Every line of dialogue makes sense, and Kagali understands that Kondo ispletely dictating the course of events by mixing lies into the conversation.

    "You''re also stalling for time

    "Did you finally notice? I''m ying this boring time-stretching trick with you.

    Gah."

    "It''s not easy to see through with your thinking.

    Despite desperately trying to stay calm, Kondo''s prodding irritated Kagali.

    "Don''t just say

    "Do you know why I''m called an intelligence-feeding freak?"

    "You just said that too, didn''t you? I can manipte people. Then why didn''t you think it would be easy to gain the knowledge of the manipted?

    What''s this guy talking about?Kagali marveled.

    If Kondo was lying, it would be too childish and awkward. But if true, it would be tantamount to divulging important secrets. It''s hard to imagine that this prudent man would act in a way that would expose the undercard.

    "What a pain in the ass. Even for me, it''s not like I can see through everything. The original intention was to make contact with you after leaving the outskirts of the city. It''s a shame that Tidu suffered damage, but it''s not easy for me to stay in a fight like this.

    "Stay strong!

    "Ho, ho, ho, what an underestimation!

    Irritated by Kondo''s words, Tear and Footman became agitated. And that''s just winning the other side''s strategy, another bad move. It was with that understanding that Kagali got anxious.

    "Calm down, you two! Don''t let the other person''s words disturb the mood!

    Kagali shouted, trying to stop the two from storming off.

    Kondo boredly skimmed Kagali, then nced at the pistol again, not knowing what to think, and stowed it in his arms.

    "What a pain in the ass. Let me deprive you of your fighting power without killing you. Come on.

    The moment Kondo held the Saber in both hands, the aura changed for one.

    It''s a scent that''s unique to high people.

    "Tear, let me do it here. Take it, human!

    The two men''s breaths swelled and the people fighting around them stopped fighting as if they were overwhelmed by their Qi.

    Kondo took a step forward on his left foot and raised his sword to his right shoulder, posing in a hachioji stance, waiting for the enemy to attack.

    Footman, on the other hand, seems to havepletely abandoned the defense and adopted the stance of specializing in striking. Letting the whole body cover the fighting aura and transform itself into a giant projectile for the assault.

    The chubby figure, however, showed unimaginable agility as Footman rolled agilely. Then, elerating while taking a leap from the ground, he began bouncing around Kondo, continuing the irregr movement, gradually elerating.

    "Ho-ho, ho, ho, ho. How about, if you can, you try to see what I''m doing!

    Convinced that he had elerated to his full strength, Forman conjured up his ultimate move to Kondo.

    The true face of Footman''s power is a unique skill called ''The Increaser''.

    The essence of this power is that of increase.

    Whether it''s vtility, or quality, it can increase at its own will. elerating just by jumping, the weight of the self gradually increases and the weight bes not in keeping with what it looks like. Just drive this momentum into each other and either opponent will be crushed.

    "Take it The angry outbursts fly apart

    With absolute confidence and destructive power, Footman closed in on Kondo. However, Kondo''s expression didn''t fluctuate and he only made one sword move.

    "I''m proud of you for using this thunderbolt."

    It was only after it was over that the calming voice was heard.

    Footman''s hands and feet were cut off at a moment''s notice, a high-speed trick that no one could see. It would not have been possible to do so without an overwhelming strength gap.

    Only the head was still attached to the body, and bright red blood spurted from the broken limb.

    Although Footman is not yet dead from this, I''m afraid it will be difficult to continue fighting.

    "Your name is Tear, right? I''ll bandage the man''s arms and legs and stop the bleeding on his head. It''ll be a pain in the ass if he dies.

    Kondo said ndly.

    That right hand gripped back to the pistol, back to the position it was in at the beginning. Either way, the gesture was a sign that there was no intention of continuing to be their opponent.

    "What are you, what are you thinking?"

    "Won''t kill you. Especially you, Kagalino, the original Demon Lord Kazaream. You still have use, so you can''t be killed.

    "Stupid, to do something like this and want me to help you?

    "Hmph, no need to ask your permission. I told you, didn''t I? I can manipte people.

    What a hateful man, Kagali stared at Kondo with a hateful look.

    Kondo''s statement is so irritating that it''s clear that he''s thinking the right thing, but Kondo''s approach makes himself uneasy and wonder if he''s thinking the wrong thing. Kondo''s every word made Kagali restless.

    At this point, the gun Kondo was holding shed a red light.

    Seeing the red light, the corners of Kondo''s mouth rose slightly.

    That is, a very, very small and unassuming glimmer of a smile. Can this man alsough, Kagali wondered while the biggest rm sounded in her heart.

    Procrastinationby the way, is this real?

    It was toote to realize it until now.

    Kagali was disgusted with herself for being yed like this, and even so, she was still exploring the best options.

    There was no doubt that Kondo had assembled his hand cards, though there was no telling what those hand cards were. There was no escape now, and it was difficult to stall for any more time.

    In that case, there is only one recourse.

    Kagali''s only option was to remove the seedling that might endanger herpanion.

    That is, suicide.

    Kagali is determined to prevent intelligence leaks by dying.

    That being said, Kagali, as an Undead Elf n, would not perish in the true sense of the word.

    Although this flesh will be lost, it can be boarded again with others to gain eternal life.

    Footmant and Tear should have sensed Kagali''s thoughts as well, they were undead elf ns like Kagali, immortal in the true sense of the word. Three men besieging Kondo at the same time should serve their purpose while keeping Kagali''s thoughts from being exposed.

    Even with the loss of flesh, one can avoid the worst state of affairs if one can escapepletely. That''s Kagali''s judgment, and the trump card saved forst.

    It''s a rare time for Yuuki-sama to get his hands on flesh. It''s going to take a while to settle down again, but it''s better than losing everything. Even though it''s dragging Footman and Tear down, Ill prepare them for tougher flesh next time.

    Kagali made her decision.

    After that, just trust Lace to find a way to do something about it.

    Kondo is really stronger than expected, and judging by Kagali at this stage, Kondo and Lace are not on par. No, it''s possible that Kondo is slightly stronger.

    Even if they seeded in converging here, there was no way to ensure victory, and it would be really bad strategy to still implicate Lace in danger under the circumstances, Kagali judged so.

    The more worrying thing is how Kondo is manipting people.

    Although it was tempting to wait to see this before running away, it would be dangerous to be too greedy. Kagali shed her confusion and immediately put it into action.

    "I''m so underestimated by the humans. Footman, Tear, stop ying with him and give him a taste of my true power as a demon lord!

    Kagali let the demon qi spread all over her body, making a power that went beyond the limits. This temporary flesh would not be able to endure for long, at most for a few minutes if it was messed up like this. But then there''s no need to worry about being suspected of suicide.

    Forman and Tear too, seeing Kagali in this state, understood the battle n.

    "Oooh, oooh, oooh, just losing my arms and legs won''t stop me!

    "This girl can go on too! It''s been so long since I''ve been able to show my stuff, my heart is pounding!

    Like matching Kagali, Footman also rounded his body and started jumping. Then Tear, like Kagali, began to liberate the monster aura.

    In the center of the imperial capital, the huge demonic aura gradually expanded. If Kondo could make it look like this was a special attack with the intention of going down together, Kagali and their fight would be a sess.

    However.

    Kondo didn''t even frown in the face of this situation. Methodically, he stowed his saber and confirmed the status of the pistol.

    He said, "I don''t think so, as if I were throwing cold water on Kagali.

    "It seems that only the spirit body can survive.

    This statement is impossible to ignore.

    The people who knew about Kagali''s race were also only Yuuki among theirpanions. Ultra-secret information that even Damrada didn''t know, and then again it should be something that Kondo couldn''t know.

    "For, why do you know this?"

    "The so-called battle is over before it begins. The total annihtion of the Mecha Legion was due to the negligence of the enemy in gathering intelligence. Doesn''t it take failure for granted to storm off without even knowing the right situation? Don''t you think so?

    .

    "That being said, your men have been a disappointment. They were clearly given the best possible time, but lost to a new Demon Lord who had been installed in the district. It''s ridiculous to call it a demon lord too.

    "What did you say?

    "But you guys lost just fine. I also had a basic grasp of what was going on all over there, after all a more interesting existence than yman was born.

    "I asked you what that meant!

    Kagali''s anger erupted.

    Already no longer considered calming herself down, as the hatred of Lieutenant Kondo had made her forget herself.

    Kondo''s statement amounted to a confession that it was he who had manipted yman.

    Thinking about it this way, yman doesn''t know when it started and the behavior gradually spiraled out of control. ording to Lace''s report, the tendency got bigger decades ago.

    Kagali thought it was just caused by the stress of being a Demon Lord, and even thought she was overthinking it. However, if these were caused by Kondo, the situation would be different.

    A self-developed battle n that fails because of human obstruction is intolerable. What''s more, the once-favored yman, if he also died because he was manipted by Kondo

    Unforgivable, absolutely unforgivable.

    Kagali''s anger could no longer be restrained, and Footman, who was particrly sensitive to the emotions of anger, reacted to Kagali''s anger by allowing it to increase further.

    It turned out, ironically, to be exactly what Kondo had expected.

    No, that''s what Kondo is all about.

    "How naive. In battle, get emotional. It''s only because of this level of awareness that it''s so easy to fall into the trap."

    Kondo said so and pulled the trigger.

    Ah."

    Pow!Kagali popped spasmodically as the sound came softly.

    There was no bloodshed.

    Because it was a very special bullet that affected not the flesh but the spirit.

    Its name is "The Curse Bomb of Domination".

    It was a secret treasure bestowed by Emperor Rudra, and one of Kondo''s killer weapons.

    "The Domination Spell Bomb was given a portion of Rudra''s powers, with the effect of dominating and manipting others. However, one could only dominate one person at a time, and the likelihood of resistance was high for those with strong spiritual powers.

    There is a surplus of bullets on hand, but the usefulness and timing of the bullets need to be carefully considered. Failure to do so would not only expose the hand to the enemy, but also lose a piece.

    Those who want to dominate the Demon Lord ss need to fire their bullets while the opponent is asleep or in an exuberant state.

    After being swept away by lust, or being consumed by negative emotions such as anger ormentation, you can finally exercise domination by shooting a "domination spell" when the other person is in this state.

    "It took some effort, but it was in line with the n. Kagali, get yourpanions to abort the act of fighting. After all, you''re so careful, you''ve already carved a spell on the summoner, haven''t you?"

    "I see, Lord Kondo.

    "Don''t call me that. Just call me Lieutenant.

    "Yes, Lieutenant Kondo. Yes, sir.

    Just like that, Kagali fell into Kondo''s hands.

    Then, as Kondo had expected, the spells were engraved on the souls of all of Yuuki''spanions. Tear and Footman, too, were unable to disobey the words of Kagali, themanding officer.

    There are also those who do not have the "spell" engraved on them, but they understand that the situation is unfavorable and that even if theirpanions kill each other, they will only die for nothing, so it is better not to resist being caught.

    The darkness of the Tidu restored calm.

    "To hate, hate your own powerlessness. What is called justice is something that exists only in the midst of the multitude and is united by a stronger will, as is the ideal. Your ambition has turned to morning dew in the face of His Majesty Rudra''s righteousness, that''s all.

    That is, the absolutew of the weak against the strong.

    Kondo was well aware of this.

    "However, without the awareness of being trampled upon, one is not even qualified to be ambitious.

    Therefore, let me remember your remorse.

    Kondo himself was alive with a sense of consciousness, so he wouldn''t look down on people like Kagali.

    If it is himself who loses, he will face the same fate, which he has learned from his own experience.

    ***

    Yuuki and Damrada clinch and engage in a fierce battle.

    It''s not sure how many times the two have alternated offense and defense.

    Facing Damrada with a straight punch to the face, Yuuki unloads with a palm strike. He then tries to reverse Damrada''s wrist, but Damrada won''t let him, and shes at Yuuki.

    And Yuuki, who expected the handknife, throws a double leg kick while leaning back on his upper body. Damrada, who senses Yuuki''s movements, drops back down to his feet and throws a sweeping leg kickbut it seems Yuuki sees that oneing too and leaps forward with a spinning back kick to the side of Damrada''s head.

    But that leg kick misses.

    Damrada has closed the distance and stood up.

    Going beyond the human realm and strike back with a refined martial art. The offensive and defensive ys go on and on, and from the sidelines, it seems as if you''re watching a well-designed action y, with every move in order.

    But at a pace that the eyes of themon man cannot keep up with. Unfortunately there was no audience present, except that it would have been difficult to find a strong man who could appreciate the battle.

    A fight between high level fighters based on the flesh of a thousand hammers.

    Actually the fight was more than that.

    Yuuki tries tomunicate with Damrada, using ''chanting'' rather than dialogue. Damrada also tried to respond by assisting Yuuki in action.

    Several times in the fight, unnecessary physical contact was made in order to exchange information at that moment.

    "Really, is it finally connected? I didn''t realize that Damrada, even you have acquired an ultimate skill.

    It took me so much effort to convey my thoughts. Was it already there when you met me?

    "Just a borrowed item. Of course, when I met Lord Yuuki, I already had an ultimate skill.

    It didn''te to light because it was barely usedDamrada rounded up thoughtfully.

    And Yuuki could only smile bitterly.

    Now that I''ve awakened my ultimate skills, I realize that there is an absolute "ss difference" between those and my unique skills.

    And, there is a word in Damrada''s answer that cannot be ignored.

    "Borrowed item? What does that mean?

    Originally, abilities were acquired by themselves.

    Just because there are people with creative abilities like Yuuki doesn''t mean you can create something out of nothing. Yuuki simply feeds on his own desires and gains abilities by changing the form of his "soul power". That is why it is impossible to ignore the fact that capacity can be transferred.

    Damrada replied.

    "As it literally is. My power is nothing but a gift from the Emperor.

    "Is it possible to do such a thing?

    "I understand your doubts, but I''m the witness. You have to understand, it''s possible.

    That''s what I''m talking about.

    Since that''s all said and done, Yuuki had to agree.

    In this way, the next question arises.

    "Is the transfer of that skill for anyone?

    How so, Damrada smiled.

    "Ordinary humans, not to mention ultimate skills, can''t even be a vessel for unique skills. Just amodating the powers that be requires a huge amount of energy. Therefore, we must transform our flesh like the otherworldly man.

    "I''m relieved to hear you say that. I thought the emperor was having a great sale on my powers, so I was anxious.

    "Hahaha, it''s not happening yet. And it is His Majesty''s n to achieve this goal.

    I see, and Yuuki understood.

    "Is that why we collect the strong?

    "Exactly. Humans, too, will evolve at the end of their practice. The race itself changes and bes

    "immortal". Yuuki-sama, who has reached the realm of "saints," knows this too, right?

    "Sort of.

    Yuuki has also experienced that from human beings to "immortals" and then to "saints", it is impossible to achieve this with ordinary cultivation.

    Even among the "Top Ten Saints" of the Western countries, the only ones who have reached the

    "saints" in the true sense of the word are only Hinata and Sare.

    "It is only after man has evolved into an immortal that he has been able to break away from the framework called humanmunication and be personally connected to the world. Those who have reached this stage will be gathered together to form the Imperial Emperor''s Knights of the Near Guard, and under the screening of His Majesty Rudra, it can be said that this is the minimum passing line.

    Centaur'' is the minimum pass line?

    "Well, yes. Lord Yuuki had also fought with Guy, so he should be able to understand how powerful he was, right? Even for a "saint," there is no possibility of victory."

    "Well, sort of."

    Guy''s strength was abnormal, and Yuuki, who had actually fought, was well aware of that. A half-dragged powerhouse couldn''t even do it against Demon Lord Guy Crimson, right?

    "To defeat Guy, awakening an ultimate skill is the minimum requirement.

    "Is this an ultimate skill?

    This is content that Yuuki can also ept.

    After acquiring an ultimate skill himself, he felt it even more strongly. Only an ultimate skill can counter an ultimate skill.

    "Yes, His Majesty Rudra is well aware of that. Therefore, trials are given to those who have reached the level of "immortals" to promote their further awakening, in order to train them into a vessel capable of giving them ultimate skills.

    "It''s a mess. But I''d do the same if I were you.

    "It''s a great help to understand so quickly.

    Yuuki and Damrada looked at each other and smiled.

    Although it was a topic that normal people couldn''t understand, Yuuki saw through the method and it made sense. Once the methodology is established, it will probably be possible to raise arge number of extreme ability awakeners.

    It''s not a good feeling to be taken one step ahead, but Yuuki thinks it''s a good idea to get recognition where it''s due. More than that, the specificity of Rudra, which is integral to this approach, is the problem.

    "The fact that Rudra can empower others is truly astonishing.

    "This is an example of the greatness of His Majesty Rudra. Those who reach the realm of the Sage, His Majesty Rudra grants the ultimate ''skill of substitution.

    Damrada''s ''''thoughts'' were filled with pride, and one could feel his respect for Emperor Rudra, and Yuuki couldn''t help but smile bitterly.

    While Damrada still swore loyalty to Yuuki, it was still different from the loyalty dedicated to the Emperor. Even though Yuuki knew that was the case, he still felt that Damrada should hide his respect for the Emperor.

    Only, the usual Damrada would never make such a mistake, and this time he did so deliberately, knowing full well.

    "So did Rudra start the war to awaken his men?

    "The reasoning is this. The previous battle was thwarted by Veldora and suffered a setback, but the battle was fought that way. A few have evolved into "Immortals", with more battle power to add than to lose.

    Still patient enough, Yuuki felt admiration at the same time as jealousy.

    Like this, the two men exchanged ''chanting words'' while fighting each other.

    Then finally, Yuuki''s power broke through Damrada''s mental barrier.

    "Oh, we did it. I''ve found it, the core that maniptes your power.

    "That would be great. Can it be lifted?

    "Well, no problem. But will it be exposed to Kondo when it''s lifted?

    "I guess we''ll be exposed. It''s okay.

    "Then let it go in one breath.

    Yuuki and Damrada are not fighting pointlessly.

    Damrada knew about Yuuki''s ''power blocking'', and he believed that this power could lift the

    ''domination'' imposed by Kondo. Yuuki also saw right through Damrada''s thoughts, and without anyone else having to say much, had been testing out Damrada''s condition.

    Yuuki then used the newly awakened power to try to bring Damrada back to his former self

    Yuuki has acquired the ultimate skill "King of Greed" and specializes in seizing it. Just by making contact with the opponent, the ''''Life Snatching Palm'' could seize energy, and even if it was just a fist fight, it could still umte damage on the opponent.

    It can be magical or physical, and depending on the opponent, the nature of the energy that can be seized varies. But what remains constant is that the seized energy can be used for itself.

    But in the face of Damrada, the "Raider''s Palm" did not work.

    Damrada''s strength was excellent, maintaining his best form even when manipted by Kondo. It has nothing to do with my own will, and I''m trying my best to hinder Yuuki''s actions.

    This was made possible by the Emperor''s ultimate power to grant ''vicarious power''. From this, the protection of the soul was exerted on Damrada.

    No matter what kind of mental attack is ineffective, an absolute mental barrier. No matter what kind of defense can prate, absolute physical destruction. Using two opposing forces as twin wings makes Damrada an undefeated presence.

    Kondo was able to dominate Damrada because the Emperor had granted the "Domination Spell Bomb"

    a higher level than the "Acting Power". If ''vicarious power'' had not been a borrowed force, Damrada would not have been dominated.

    In order to lift this troublesome ''vicarious right'', Yuuki drove the ''ability blockade'' to shatter Damrada''s mental barrier. That''s when the "dominating spell bomb" that was inserted into the "soul" of Damrada was finally discovered.

    After confirming with Damrada, Yuuki concentrated his strength in one breath.

    "The Palm of Life

    The bottom of Yuki''s palm struck Damrada''s chest.

    This strike was well controlled and only shattered the bullet. It was really straightforward and Damrada was thus restored to freedom.

    "That''s very helpful, Yuuki-sama.

    "Don''t rely too much on others, I''m more worried about Kagali and the others. I''m going over there.

    What are you going to do?

    "Allow me to apany you. I''m going to show up with Demon Lord Rimuru tomorrow anyway, and it''s even more dangerous to easily return to Kondo''s men if I have to take advantage of the momentum to stage a coup.

    "Indeed, there''s no need to hide it.

    Yuukiughed, and Damrada responded with a smile.

    "Let''s go then."

    Yes."

    Yuuki turned and walked towards the door, and Damrada nodded and followed.

    But this moment

    "Why don''t you clean up the strangers and just hang around, Damrada? Or, do you really want to betray Lord Rudra?

    Hearing the cold voice, Yuuki tensed and stopped moving.

    The real crisis that opens here.

    ***

    No sound was made.

    Somehow, at some point, she was already standing there.

    An overwhelming strongman''s breath.

    The pale blue hair, stunning the beauty of a celestial being.

    What should have been a first meeting, Yuuki was familiar with the beauty''s scent.

    That was, the breath of the man opposite the imperial curtain.

    Known as the "marshal", the figure who sat beside the emperor

    "Eeh, Lord Velgrynd

    Damrada muttered, and Yuuki listened but felt very loud.

    Velgrynd? Don''t you mean?

    At this moment, Yuuki realized that his face had be spastic.

    This world is known as the strongest "dragon speciesin front of this existence, Yuuki unconsciouslypared his own strength.

    Hurts my brain. It hadn''t felt that way when I saw Veldora before, it wasn''t a matter of winning or losing in this subdivision anymore. To go head-to-head with such an opponent would be tantamount to suicide.

    Even though Yuuki realized this, he didn''t give up.

    If it doesn''t work on the front, then you can avoid it and y a dirty trick. He guessed that if he made good use of the cards in his hand, the possibility of victory was still high.

    "I never thought that His Excellency the Marshal would be the True Dragon Race. That way, we''ll know why Guy won''t go out in person.

    "Hey, it''s rare for a human to not tbe imid in the face of me. You deserve apliment.

    "Thank you very much. By the way, it would have been nice to leave me alone.

    "I don''t care. Only it''s not me who''s looking for you. It''s my dear sir."

    Velgrynd finished and took a step back.

    It was only then that Yuuki noticed the man''s aura.

    He couldnt help but widen his eyes and stare at the figure.

    Standing beside Velgrynd was a man in a costume that was almost astronomical in value.

    It was a familiar face.

    Masayuki? No, it''s not possible. Are you?

    Exactly the same as Masayuki HonjouYuuki thought to himself, but then noticed a few differences.

    The most obvious is the hair color.

    The man had brilliant, dazzling blond hair. By contrast, Masayuki just usually dyed his hair blonde, which was supposed to be a Japanese ck-teal color.

    If you look closely, the eyes are also different.

    Masayuki''s eyes looked as loose as if they were less rooted, while the man''s gaze was as domineering as if he wanted to see through everything. To not tense one''s nerves was to be swallowed up by his aura.

    In the face of such verve, it is impossible to imagine that they are the same person.

    It''s a different person, this one

    Convinced of this, Yuuki thought of the man''s true identity.

    Since Velgrynd calls him Dear Sir, there is only one identity.

    "The Emperor Rudra?

    "That''s right, Yuuki-sama. This is the emperor at the top of the empire, Lord Rudra.

    Answering Yuuki was Damrada, who, as a gesture of no hostility towards Rudra, did not care to get his clothes dirty and knelt down in ce.

    Yuuki didn''t use him.

    To Damrada, Rudra''s importance is above his own, and it is understood, if not stated, that the question is why Rudra is here.

    "It''s amazing. I didn''t think that the noble majesty woulde to a ce like this, are you idle?

    Yuuki asked as if teasing Rudra.

    And Rudra wasn''t angry, just extremely natural in his reply.

    "Very busy. It''s not the time to y around when the win against Guyes down to the wire.

    The surprise was with Damrada.

    He didn''t expect Rudra to talk to an inferior, and never expected Velgrynd to tolerate it.

    "Hey, then don''t bezy"

    "Don''t talk too much, and be his men. Doing so will not deprive you of your will.

    That''s the order.

    From the distant heavens,manded the prostrate little man on the ground.

    This was the kind of person Yuuki hated the most, but for some reason there was a feeling of being unable to disobey.

    Is this, "thought induction"? It''s a bit like the "domination" exerted by Mariabell, but it''s iparable in strength.

    It''s a hateful power, but Yuuki has ''power blocking'' and can ignore anymand thates from his power.

    It should have been.

    Nope! It''s not that simple of an empowerment!!

    Knees couldn''t help but want to bend, and Yuuki understood as he fought.

    This is divinely inspired power.

    ***Note: ???? , one meaning divine power and the other meaning transcendent leadership charisma. But in the following, it can be seen that Rudra did not use the ability when speaking, and it can be seen that Yuuki took this innate temperament as a skill and turned it into a divinely taught ability, i.e., the misunderstanding in Yuuki''s mind was directly expressed in words. This is a double entendre, so it''s up to you to understand whether it''s the effect of your ability or your natural temperament.

    Even the overbearing, overpowering dominion that can make all things obey.

    Yuuki fought tooth and nail to resist.

    "Bah, you''ve got some nerve. I didn''t expect this kind of trick when I came up.

    Yuuki exasperatedly spat out a mouthful of spit mingled with blood.

    Dominating was his specialty, and being preempted made Yuuki furious.

    But that''s the right thing to do. Angry feelings are exactly what blocked the evidence of Rudra''s domination.

    Yuuki shed a fearless smile and returned Rudra''s nce.

    However, Rudra looked at Yuuki with a puzzled expression.

    "What''s wrong? Is it so incredible that your own power doesn''t work?

    No..."

    Rudra looked back at Velgrynd with a puzzled look on her face. Then, cackling, Velgrynd replied to Rudra.

    "No way, Rudra. This child bathed in your dominance and mistakenly thought he had suffered a mental attack. Be more gentle with him, or he will be broken before he bes a minister.

    "Don''t you think that''s a good idea, too?

    "Mmm. There are few people who can talk to you as equals, and it''s not because the power differential is hard to grasp.

    Rudra was at a loss for words.

    Velgrynd, on the other hand, revels in it.

    Yuuki, on the other hand, was furious at the shame of hearing the twos conversation.

    You gotta be kidding me! Don''t you see me at all? In that case, let me take away yourposure.

    After a moment of regaining hisposure, Yuuki spoke up.

    "All right, I''ll take it. Indeed, you are the rulers of this world. But with such power, I cannot conquer the world; I am impotent in my opinion.

    Pick on each other as usual.

    And it was Velgrynd who responded.

    "How arrogant. Nah, Rudra, really kill him. Even if such a brat was included in the camp, it wouldn''t make much difference in terms of coping with Qi''s battle prowess. It''ll just be unpleasant, won''t it?

    In contrast to Velgrynd, Rudra is generous and open-minded.

    "Don''t say that. Even if it seems insignificant to you, cultivating it can make you a useful pawn.

    Besides, isn''t it nice to be defiant? Just like the kitten that refuses to get close to people, doesn''t it have its cuteness. I like it a lot.

    This, totally considers Yuuki a lowly little person.

    Yuuki hummed boredly.

    The key Rudra was unfazed and there was no point in provoking. In that case, the only way to speak is with strength.

    Since Velgrynd was present, it couldn''t take much time. The first move was the strongest attack, and even Velgrynd was suppressed in one fell swoop. After deciding, Yuuki set up a pose.

    "I have no interest in submitting to someone weaker than myself when you said you''d be your servant. If you want me to obey, you have to show proportionality!

    Yuuki shouted and began to move.

    No more crap.

    The acting is also pointless.

    The "King of Greed", the research pole power, will restore the original size of his own desires to power.

    Yuuki took it for granted that the power he had taken from Mariabell could awaken him to his greed.

    Because of this, Yuuki had no doubt that he was the strongest one who had acquired the power of the great sin system, the ''King of Greed''.

    Who''s it going to be?

    No need to think, from the beginning there was only the single option of Rudra.

    Dominate Rudra and then hold Velgrynd hostage. Cross this crisis and it will turn into a blessing.

    It''s this tough way of thinking that has been the driving force behind Yuuki''s sess so far. This time too, it will be a victory and a big step forward. That''s all Yuuki could think about, and he ran at a brisk pace.

    Pulling in close enough to be just a few punches away from the opponent.

    In the blink of an eye, Yuuki tried to touch Rudra with his hand.

    The right hand unleashes one of the powers of the ''King of Greed'', ''Sucking Life'', and at the same time uses the ''Power to Block''. In this way, a vicious attack could be formed across the opponent''s boundaries.

    This was the original use of the ''Death Snatching Palm'', which was different from Damrada''s time, and Yuuki attacked with an aura that didn''t matter if he killed his opponent.

    If Rudra is dead, then focusing on Velgrynd again is. With two strong enemies, escape is also difficult, but if there is only one, there is always a way.

    If Rudra survives, then the next step is to make a real attack with your left hand.

    The effect exerted on the left hand is ''worrying'', stimting the other person''s feelings, a terrible power that even memory can affect.

    It is a more sinister, more powerful force of domination than the "desires" of Mariabell.

    With this two-stage attack continuum, Yuuki was intent on killing a way out alive. However, the idea was easily crushed.

    "You won''t be able to do anything to Rudra in front of me.

    With a speed that even Yuuki, who had raised his physical abilities to the limit, couldn''t see, Velgrynd stepped forward. Then easily pops Yuuki''s right hand out of the way.

    Yuuki was stunned.

    While it was surprising that the right hand palm strike was defended, what was even more impactful than that was the energy flowing in from Velgrynd.

    It was enough to make Yuuki vomit blood in rushing waves. The mere moment of the encounter, the huge monster element that exceeded the capacity limit, eroded Yuuki''s body.

    Sensing the danger in this instant, Yuuki forcefully twisted his body to pull away. If the reaction had been a little bit slower, Yuuki''s body would have beenpletely destroyed, right?

    It wasn''t that Velgrynd had done anything, rather the opposite, nothing but remove Yuuki''s hand.

    Even so, Yuuki was wounded, but the reason was that he had exploded himself, only because he had seized a huge amount of energy that he could not fully control through the ''Life Grabbing Palm''.

    With tears and nosebleeds while spitting blood, Yuuki thought so.

    How, maybe. So simple it''s more than I can handle! Now my limit is enough to hold a dozen elves, and it overflows in an instant.

    As ifining to the gods, Yuuki grumbled.

    The dreaded Velgrynd.

    It was obvious that so much energy had been taken away, but it didn''t hurt, it didn''t matter. That is, in the face of Yuuki''s attack, there wasn''t even a need for defense.

    There''s no way out of thisYuuki realized.

    Damn, the power differential is surprisinglyrge, and it''s no wonder it doesn''t put me in the eye.

    This is undoubtedly on the same level as Guy. Yuuki understands this, and only now does he know the height of the world.

    It was precisely because of the awakening of ultimate skills that this desperate rank gap was understood.

    To go on the offensive yourself is an act of suicide.

    In that case, one can only wait and see what the enemy does.

    "Don''t be such a jerk. Wouldn''t it be a pleasure to have me out there, answering your wish to know about my Power?

    "What a bad habit, Rudra. If you get hurt, it''ll be boring. Leave it to me.

    "Oh, that''s not eptable. Right?

    This is provocation.

    This kind of practice, which is like taking away a good show from him, made it impossible for Yuuki to keep quiet.

    "Hahahaha, you''re a good man. If I had epted reality, I would have lost. But ah, I''m not going to give up easily, don''t think I''ll simply surrender.

    Yuuki knew that this was just a case of not giving in, but he still tried his best. Now that it is understood that no matter what you can''t win against Velgrynd, then all that can hold on to is your own reserve. Even if you die as a result, you have to carry out your own capriciousness in the end.

    Yuuki red at Rudra.

    Facing the sight of Yuuki, Rudra smiled amusingly.

    "Sure enough, let me be your opponent. That being said, I am the best at ''domination''. If you can bear it, you''re a winner. You can go wherever you want.

    Hearing this pleading offer, Yuuki narrowed his eyes.

    Rudra''s words were serious.

    In all seriousness, it didn''t matter even if Yuuki got away with it.

    Yuuki didn''t see through Rudra''s intentions, but in fact Rudra was thinking very simply. After umting this experience, Yuuki will gain even more power, right? On that basis, it would be good to negotiate with Yuuki once again and bring Yuuki into the camp.

    Rudra''s broad-mindedness was not the same as Yuuki''s.

    That''s why Yuuki is creeped out about Rudra and at the same time angry at being belittled.

    Good at domination? The same goes for me on this one. Ill bet everything on this powerthe king of Greed.

    Rudra looked at Yuuki amusingly, inwardly rejoicing at the long overdue match.

    If Yuuki is able to bear his own ''domination'', it may lead to the consequences of raising tigers to cause trouble. But even with that possibility in mind, Rudra still opted for a showdown.

    If it falls short here, it means that my supremacy was only that great.

    Rudra didn''t bother to think about failure.

    It would also be a pleasure if Yuuki pretended to be submissive. A pawn in such a tame hand is what a ruler of the world should look like, and Rudra is full of confidence.

    Velgrynd had been together with Rudra for a long time, and what the other was thinking could be understood without words.

    That''s how you know that admonition is useless too.

    "I know. If you lose, I will avenge you."

    Saying so, Velgrynd stepped back.

    "No need to worry.

    Rudra smiled bitterly and stepped forward.

    Then, Yuuki also forcefully pulled the body that was emitting a sad cry to stand up.

    "That''s funny, you guys. It''s also understandable why Guy judged you guys as game disrupting clowns on the board.

    why would you know this?

    "Hey, it''s called the Moderate Clown Troupe, right? A moment ago, a report was received from Tatsuya that the chairman of Clown Troupe had also fallen into my hands. I''ll tell you this, too. Now that we know all your information, challenge me with this mentality.

    Tatsuya, also known as Lt. Kondo. Rudra used some means to get in touch with Kondo, and by this time, reports were received that Kagali had surrendered.

    Understanding that, Yuuki sighedit was bad.

    That is, even Yuuki''s peculiar physique, the conversation during the fight with Guy, it all leaked.

    Yuuki told someone who could be trusted that he had awakened his ultimate power. The loyal Damrada seems to have kept it a secret, but there''s no point in it at this point.

    Kagali was Yuuki''s partner and rightfully shared the secret.

    Really, this is hurting my brain. Are my hand cards all exposed?

    Yuuki thought in his heart that there was nothing he could do, and even had the idea of simply abandoning it all. But pride does not allow itself to be held back.

    More importantly

    Wasn''t Kagali dead? Rudra seems to be the one who dominates the power of the system, and it seems that Kondo is using a power that mimics Rudra''s. In that case, rather than running away, just Yuuki formted the battle in a sh.

    Although the sess rate is very low, the mood is a little more rxedpared to a challenge with no calctions at all.

    "Thank you so much for taking care of me. But your submissiveness will be fatal!

    "It''s okay. The rule of thumb is that a victory over a fullymitted opponent is aplete victory. So you, too, give it your all without remorse.

    After saying that, Rudra took a step further forward.

    Unarmed and in a unique pose.

    Rudra was originally a swordsman, as evidenced by the Taishin that hung around his waist, but only intended to exercise the power of ''domination'', just as he had dered to Yuuki earlier.

    Yuuki had seen right through Rudra''s character.

    It''s not like a dominant person should have the frank personality to face a fight sincerely to the right.

    It is because of this that it is easy to see through.

    Honestly, it''s impossible to win decently. Even if there''s a chance of getting rid of Rudra, there''s still Velgrynd. Since I can''t escape from here, all I can do is invalidate Rudra''s ''domination'', right?

    No, Rudra had expected that.

    On this basis, there is an overwhelming confidence to dominate him.

    In this way, all Yuuki can do is

    "Come on, Rudra!

    Yuuki bet everything on the mere possibility.

    Hegemonyunleash the power!

    With Rudra, Yuuki''s movement, the distance between him and Yuuki was pulled to zero in a sh. The

    "domination of the King" was thenunched.

    The essence of the ultimate power, the ''King of Justice'', which enables anyone to submit to the power of Rudra.

    Unlike the imitation loaned to Kondo, there is no limit and the power varies greatly.

    Even for ultimate skills, there is a "rank" gap. It was impossible for Yuuki, who had just awakened, to defy this power.

    Rudra stood from grace.

    Yuuki fell in ce.

    The win and the loss look clear at a nce, but the oue is unknown.

    "Is it really okay not to kill him? This kind of guy just pretends to be obedient and then bites back when he''s inattentive, right?

    "That''s okay, that''s where the fun is. If he can resist my domination, then as a reward, Ill just let him go.

    Contrary to that statement, Rudra''s confidence was unshaken.

    Convinced of his absolute ''domination'', he did not doubt victory in the slightest.

    "That''s good.

    The winner, Rudra, smiled fearlessly.

    Then, turning his gaze to Damrada, who had melted into air in the corner of the room, he spoke affectionately.

    "Forgive me, Damrada. Now, don''t let you get in my way yet.

    "All is as His Majesty would have it"

    Just so, the two understood each other.

    "When that man wakes up, you take care of him.

    Understood."

    As if satisfied with Damrada''s answer, Rudra left with Velgrynd.

    The purge was just beginning.

    Now that the Emperor has acted, it means that times are about to change.

    Tidu, too, was not immune to intense unrest.

    That day.

    The sky was tinted bright redte at night, and scarlet rain fell incessantly, enveloping the night.

 Volume 14 - Ch 4

    A+A-

    The eastern metropolis of Dwargon, the armed state, is now being blockaded by 60,000 troops.

    But that''s just camouge work.

    Both camps have secretly forged alliances. What should be done to prevent mistakes from causing unfortunate idents is what hurtsmanders.

    In this case, the atmosphere among the soldiers at the grassroots level was rxed.

    The tents of the camp were pitched and the soldiers chatted feverishly there. Only, everyone was also still moderately nervous.

    Every soldier, every pawn, can remain the same, and the quality can be astonishingly high.

    It''s only natural that their morale is so high.

    After all, their superiors were having their finalbat meeting.

    Down with the empire and a new state, that dream, will be decided by this conference.

    All looked in the direction of the Imperial Capital with eager anticipation.

    Because of this, many people are noticing at the same time.

    "So red, huh?

    "Tidu, is there a fire?

    "What happened? No, is the npromised?

    On such an important day, something happened in the Imperial Capital.

    No one would think it was just a fluke. The subordinates must have encountered something, and all present were aware of it.

    "Shall we send a reconnaissance unit?

    "No, it''s better to act as a team.

    "Dumbass! If we do that, won''t our betrayal bepletely exposed!

    The absence of the person in authority means the absence of the person in charge ofmand. What was originally derided as a patchwork of hybrid legions would be unmanageable once it broke out.

    Someone, who had previously kept his eyes closed, ended the scene with a loud cry.

    His name is Zero.

    He is the man who was appointed by Yuuki to the position of deputy army Chief and is the highestmander of this ce today.

    Silence! No random actions. I''ll wait right here until Lord Yuuki arrives, and there will be no change in this policy.

    Such an assertion by Zero has made people of different views regain theirposure. Since one doesn''t know what to do for the right solution, one has to follow the orders of one''s superiors.

    Even so, the uneasiness in people''s hearts does not just go away

    Then their unease, in its worst form, became reality.

    "Good evening, you fools. Even on afortable night like this, it''s still not good to be too noisy.

    Leisurely.

    It was as casual as a walk.

    The woman came down the street.

    The beautiful woman with the blue hair was none other than Velgrynd.

    "You, who are you?

    The soldiers located on the outer side of the street began to stir, interrogating Velgrynd about her identity. Those who can speak to the troops in position are no slouch.

    One who did not detect the extraordinary aura of Velgrynd would not have survived in the Hybrid Legion. As the soldiers confirmed her true identity, the messenger ran toward his superior.

    The soldiers sprang into action and rounded up Velgrynd.

    At this point, someone who was confident in his or her abilities stepped forward.

    Hey, hey woman, I don''t know who you are, but if you want to pick a fight with so many of us, stop it.

    Don''t look at us like this, it''s also the strongest in the Empire known as the Hybrid Legion

    "It''s really funny that the weak im to be the strongest. I''ve let you do this for the sake of morale, but I think it''s better to forbid it in the face of legionnaires.

    What?"

    The words of Velgrynd came from the Absolute Overlord.

    To the army this organization, the existence of orders from distant summits. Whoever it was, it was enough to make even the most base soldiers understand that the other side was a danger.

    Of course, Zero, who was the deputy army Chief, noticed this as well.

    Hearing that there was only one person on the other side, Zero rushed over in order to confirm with his own eyes the true face of the other side. As soon as it was reported, he arrived on the scene.

    Then came the sight of Velgrynd in front of him.

    "My Lord Marshal

    Zero has not seen the "marshal". However, the scent on her body was undoubtedly no different from the overwhelming scent that had been emitted behind that curtain.

    "Well, there are people who are a little smarter. Good, since we agreed not to kill all these people, let''s have some fun before Kondo and the otherse.

    Using that statement as a signal, the tragedy began.

    ***

    Gazel lived each day with anxiety.

    The war goes on, and it''s a headache enough.

    But,pared to this.

    Upon hearing Jane''s report, Gazel felt his stomach perforate.

    Surprisingly, even the minions have evolved into true demon lords, what on earth was Rimuru thinking!?

    He would have taught him a lesson if he''d been thereGazel sighed heavily.

    The phrase "true demon lord" is loaded with words.

    The term "demon lord" is used to refer to the king of monstrous things that dominate a certain territory.

    In contrast, the "true demon lord" represents the state of a magical being.

    When the True Demon Lord Seed" awakens and evolves, it will be called the "True Demon Lord". In fact, the correct criterion of strength should be less than catastrophic and at the top of the catastrophic scale.

    No, there isn''t much of a catastrophe level, so what''s the point of talking about the top and not the top?

    Cmity Level, the ssification used to denote a demon lord. Therefore, only eight people currently meet this criteria.

    That is to say, there were plural minions that were equal to the strength of such a high existence and were born under Rimuru.

    Just thinking about it gives you a headache.

    Anyway, Gazelined to Elmesia first.

    Can''t stand to be the only one to worry about it. Thinking so, he decided to have Elmesia share in the anguish.

    The conclusion obtained is to continue to keep an eye on Rimuru them until the problem urs.

    It''s just pushing the issue back, but because nothing can be done about it, it''s helpless. If ites to the point where Rimuru and the others are really judged as a threat, the battle for the survival of mankind will begin, right?

    "I don''t want that to happen.

    Gazel sighed alone.

    However, to such a Gazel, another piece of bad news came.

    "Oh, my gosh. The Hybrid Legion is on the move! It looks like there''s a fight going on with someone.

    Although the voice was calm, Gazel felt a panic from it that was disproportionate to the dark side.

    Before hearing a more detailed report, he summoned Dorf and others by order.

    A few minutester.

    "Can''t be wrong. It''s a monster. It''s an opponent that humans can''t help. It''s a monster that even a demon lord would bepared to, a monster beyond imagination.

    "Is it a dragon?

    "That''s right. It''s the first time I''ve seen it, and it''s in human form, so I''m sure that woman is Velgrynd.

    This is a "magic call" with the Supreme Commander of the Military Ministry, who is in the eastern city.

    Through the sight that had been transmitted, Gazel they too had grasped the current situation.

    The worst state of affairs always happens at unexpected moments. This, Gazel felt bitterly now.

    The air was burning.

    Coolly dancing beauties, and strongmen who failed to fall to the ground.

    The blow was both beautiful and daunting to the eye.

    However, the real horrorester.

    Velgrynd, who was reflected in the crystal ball used for surveince magic, looked over to Gazel and them.

    Just when Gazel thought it was just chance the next moment, the crystal ball broke.

    "Is that guy looking at us, too?"

    "Hard, unbelievable. How could this happen?

    "Fool, right? It''s a long way from here!

    "That''s the truth. The other party should have sensed the magic and tracked down the caster, but I didn''t think they could even affect the destination of the magic transmission. No, it''s impossible to do such a thing with a human body, even for an old man.

    Gazel listened without a word to hispanions'' remarks.

    From what had just happened, it was also enough to conclude that the other party was their enemy.

    But this opponent is really

    No, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no

    The dragon species, eh? It''s a real monster.

    Gazel now, understood the true meaning of the word strongest.

    He had heard rumors of the Empire''s connection to Velgrynd. Although it was impossible to figure out the truth of the rumor, he had repeatedly assumed that he would manage to defend even under his attack.

    However

    Gazel now understood that this was nothing more than a fantasy.

    The reason for the Empire''s outpouring of Velgrynd at this juncture is unknown.

    What Emperor Rudra really thought, Gazel couldn''tprehend with any more thought.

    Gazel can do only one thing.

    "Let''s put myself in the fight.

    "Your Majesty, this is too dangerous!"

    "Even so, I''ll have to go. Even abandoning now will not save Dwargon. Oh Dorf, be aware of this.

    In the face of these words from Jane, Dorf had only silence. He had no intention of saving them from death, and he realized that no amount of persuasion would change the situation now.

    "Then I''ll get ready to go as soon as possible.

    "It''s all yours.

    Gazel nodded solemnly and closed his eyes.

    There is as much to do as a mountain.

    It is necessary to inform the Allies of the state of affairs and to give corresponding instructions to those nationals who remain.

    If Gazel and the others could win, what would they do if they lost?

    The nationals have nowhere to run.

    It is estimated that there is no other means of preserving one''s life other than submission to the Empire.

    That would also mean the copse of this country of Dwargonand in order for that not to happen, Gazel they must not fail here either.

    "The eastern city can''t amodate the entire army. The follow-on troops were arranged to march on the ground, andmand was left to the old men. Jane, it''s up to you to convince the job.

    "Got it. So, what are you going to do, King Gazel?

    "I''ll be one step ahead. After all, if it''ste, it''s not my turn.

    Gazel said, a fearless smile on his face.

    It was all about ying a powerful king and thus easing the restlessness in the hearts of the multitudes.

    And just like that, the army will finish its preparations as fast as it can.

    And without waiting for the army to finish, Gazel''s party had already set out with the Tenjou Knights, led by Dorf.

    As he flew through the sky, Gazel suddenly thought.

    Is this the reason why Rimuru gave his men the strength to survive the war? If that''s the case, I''d have to say he''s always been so naive.

    Noticing the truth, he couldn''t help butugh bitterly.

    The corners of his mouth couldn''t help but smile at the thought of his mentor brother (Rimuru), who had never been able topletely let go of his nave thoughts from beginning to end.

    "What''s the matter with you, O King?

    "It''s nothing. It''s just a bunch of boring ideas.

    "You mean?

    "Hmph, it was in this desperate situation that I thought of that Rimuru. And then, somehow, there''s a sense of getting through this crisis.

    Although he himself felt that such thoughts were too optimistic, it was better than pessimistic, Gazelughed thoughtfully.

    "Yeah. Speaking of which, when that Charybdis came in, His Majesty Rimuru was also quite a mess. I was shocked to learn that I could be associated with the Demon Lord Milim.

    Dorf replied with a smile.

    "If I had to say that, I would like to mention how hard it is for those of us who have been responsible for surveince. We''re almost fed up with the fact that whatever is reported is being treated as a lie.

    Even Anrietta, who was usually silent and only asionally sarcastic, said so, which made it difficult for Gazel and Dorf to hide their surprise.

    "Hahaha, sorry about that. I''ll take care of itter.

    "Lady Anrietta seems to have a lot of grievances, too.

    "Then of course!

    "Whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa! That being the case, Anrietta yo, you just go straight to that Rimuru guy andin. I have a headache on my side, too, and although I trust you guys, the facts of what Rimuru did were too much formon sense. By the time I heard Jane''s report, I honestly wondered if she was out of her mind.

    "Haha, after all, that report was outrageous."

    "I''ve always been in the position of reporting, so I''m finally able to enjoy it as a spectator.

    At Anrietta''s sarcasm, Gazel and Dorf couldn''t help but smile.

    Laughter echoed through the air.

    "By the way, one more thing. Along with the previous grievances, it has been reported once to His Majesty Rimuru.

    Yeah?"

    Gazel nodded and moved on.

    The unease is gone.

    Releasing a despotic aura corresponding to the hero, Gazel flew into battle.

    ***

    Time goes backwards and forwards.

    The next day after drinking with Elmesia, the sun had already risen to its zenith.

    "You''re up early, Lord Rimuru.

    "I''m sorry.

    The smiling Shuna is so scary.

    There is only one option for apology at this point, so I''m going to preempt it.

    What''s the deal with not only getting drunk but also sleepingzilythats what I''ve gotten through my effortsand getting yelled at for it?

    Shuna let out a deep sigh, then stared at me with oblique eyes.

    "So, have youe to a conclusion?

    "What, what conclusion?"

    "You''ve been having a hard timest night, haven''t you? Because I don''t know if you''re going to do something crazy again, and Ino, not just meeveryones worried about you."

    Hearing that, I couldn''t help but be moved.

    It''s okay. I wasn''t going to mess around.

    If it doesn''t work, just run away, and by thenin to Guy and let him take care of it.

    Just do what you can before it bes that.

    "There''s always a way up the hill. This time we''ll put safety first, too.

    Although I replied lightly like this, Shuna still had a troubled look on her face.

    Or is it that Shuna, who has a unique skill called "resolver", can''t be fooled? I guess even this skill has been exposed to me.

    Just as well.

    Seriously, I wouldn''t want to do something so dangerous.

    Safetyes first, but the enemy''s battle strength is still unknown. In particr, the three of them, Lieutenant Kondo, Velgrynd, and Emperor Rudra, were all strong enemies in every way.

    Not only is it a matter of not being able to beat them, it''s also possible to be killed on the spot. As much as I have pondered how to avoid this possibility, it is the only thing that even the King of Wisdom cannot give a good answer to.

    Since you don''t know the answer, go ahead and go hard on it.

    You can only put in the maximum force and minimize the risk.

    So.

    "Actually, I was wondering who to take there. This time, only the higher-ups could get past. It''s not a good idea to say so, but it''s only a hindrance to those who don''t have the strength to go along.

    Yes. Brother said he muste along, and he''s been working hard since the morning.

    It seems my thoughts have really been exposed.

    He had been drinking with Elmesia all nightst night, so the conversation with Guy hadn''t been conveyed to everyone yet, but Shuna was already smiling as if she knew everything.

    I smiled bitterly.

    To such a me, Shuna began to narrate the report with a natural attitude.

    "Last night, the dubiously extreme Lace came over. Although he said he had a message to pass on to Lord Rimuru, he told him to wait first since he hadn''t applied once.

    Despite the sudden change in topic, though, it doesn''t seem like it''s that important. If it''s really an emergency, I''m sure there will be contact from Gedora''s side as well.

    I guess Yuuki has something to say to me, exactly what it is.

    "It''s gonna be a pain in the ass, but let''s go get some.

    "Yeah, actually I wanted to drive him back, but he''s an ally for now. Then I''ll take him to the reception room.

    Shuna doesn''t have much of a liking to Lace either.

    Barely disying good and evil, Shuna-chan rarely treats the clowns with a revealing attitude. Sure enough, she couldn''t forgive Lace and them from the bottom of her heart for causing the destruction of the Great Ogre Vige ah.

    While they are now considered allies, don''t forget that.

    "During my conversation with Lace, gather the waking subordinates into the conference room."

    I asked Shuna to do so.

    Although there are still many things to think about, these are things to be left to worry about after a win against the Empire. I put aside all confusion and decided to focus on the problem at hand first.

    A total of twenty people, including me, were gathered in the conference room.

    Rigurd, and the four elders under him. Rugurd, Regurd, Rogurd, and Lilina.

    Then there was Kaijin and Vesta, and Myourmile.

    There are seven people of the Twelve Patrons.

    Benimaru, Shion, Diablo, and Gabil, plus the demoness trio of Testarossa, Ultima, and Carrera.

    Lastly there was Souei, Hakurou and Gobta, with Gedora by the way.

    Regarding Gedora, this time it was to ask him to lead the way within the Empire. Honestly, although I myself feel it''s a bit much to do, the hardest thing about what happens is Gedora, it''s just thebat setup that gives him credit.

    That being said, Bonnie also offered to take responsibility for leading the way in the Empire. However, because the loss of strength would have made him a liability, I dismissed the application.

    It''s enough to have Gedora around.

    So next.

    It feels like we''re always in meetings, butining about that doesn''t help. Our country has be too big for us who want to decide everything by our own will alone.

    In spite of all this talk, this time it was only to convey what I had already decided.

    Jumbo dishes were served with tea as usual. After confirming that she had quietly retired, I spoke slowly.

    "This time, I have called you all here to convey the decision on the final battle with the Empire. Ah, one more thing before that. Come on in.

    I''ve already decided on the person to take over, and there''s no need to hurry now.

    Before that, let''s introduce Lace who came as a messenger.

    What Lace came over to say, as I expected, was something rted to themon fight. They intend for the legions blockading the eastern side of Dwargon to attack the empire and want us to join them.

    These were consistent with what I had heard from Guy, and I wasn''t about to say no. However, my intention was not to win by army, but to have a final showdown between elites.

    I didn''t want casualties among civilians, so it was necessary to talk carefully with Yuuki again. Despite the suddenness of the situation, it was necessary to prepare the venue for the negotiations.

    The matter has also been discussed with Yuuki through Lace, and the time has been set for daylight tomorrow.

    It is I who will illustrate for all of you who havee together.

    I was going to leave it to Lace to do it, but he was too suspicious and dismissed it.

    Credit is important, and I''m realizing that again.

    "Hello, everybody, this is Lace. I''m the vice president of the "Moderate Clown Troupe, and I''m here as an emissary for our boss Yuuki.

    Woohoo, this guy is super suspicious.

    And why it''s necessary to dance at a time like this, I can''t understand at all. However, since this guy had been sent over as an emissary, it wasn''t good to be too cold to him.

    I''m not the only one who''s annoyed, as Souei is even ready to make a dangerous move, but we''ll have to hold back here.

    "Lord Souei, put away the bitterness.

    Yes."

    It''s too much to be careless about, Souei.

    Lace always sits down honestly, but still can''t be careless and hurry to end the introduction.

    "This is Mr. Lace, Yuuki''s liaison.

    "It doesn''t matter if you just call me Lace?

    "Oh yeah? Then I''ll make myself at home.

    I''ve said so myself, I''ll ept the kindness of others. It has nothing to do with the identity of the messenger, do what I want.

    "Yuuki has arranged a meeting ce for tomorrow, and although things are urgent, it seems that Lace will send us there, so there''s no need to worry about moving time. The important thing is, who''sing with me.

    Finally getting to the point.

    "We can only send up to six people at a time. Our family and His Majesty are definitely going, who are the remaining four people who can tell me?

    Truthfully, it''s about wanting to put in the maximum amount of fight.

    But now, no matter what you do, you can''t talk about the whole grouping together.

    Ranga is still sleeping in my shadow.

    Geld was also still awake.

    The members of thebyrinth, such as Nine-Tailed Kumara, Zegion, and Adalman, remained shrunken in thebyrinth with no sign of waking up.

    Evolutionary dormancy varies from person to person, which I understand, so now we have to confirm based on the members who can act.

    "Benimaru, I want you toe with me. How''s your health?"

    "What, do you have a cold?

    Lace asked with a look that didn''t dare to be careless, but I wasn''t going to tell him about the awakening. It will be exposed sooner orter anyway, no need to make a deliberate statement.

    "No problem. Excellent condition.

    Benimaru smiled fearlessly. Completely ignoring Lace, the cool attitude didn''t fall apart without a hint.

    Unlike me, I really admire Benimaru''s temperament.

    Whilementing, taking a closer look, Benimaru didn''t know when his race had changed. It seems to be going well with Momiji and Albis and hes managed to evolve.

    It was only afterwards that I heard about it, and it seemed that Benimaru had spent two nights in session with his two wives.

    Should I say it''s really hard work, or rather should I say it''s really fucking enviable

    After abandoning the flesh, he receives it again and bes a full spiritual being.

    The racial name is me Spirit Oni", a kind of the Divine Monster Spirit. Like the Dragon Race, it has both holy and magical properties, and can also be called an upper tier divine monster spirit.

    The Divine Monster Spirit is a lower beingpared to the Dragon Race, and has the same attributes as the Dragon Race, but is higher in the Fire.

    Attributes, i.e. thews that make up the principles of this world, are all made up of eight.

    The natural properties of "earth, water, fire, wind" and "space" are known as the five major properties.

    The earth is not as strong as fire, fire is not as strong as water, water is not as strong as wind, wind is not as strong as air and air is not as strong as earth.

    The earth is consumed by fire, and the fire is annihted by water, which is dissipated by the wind, which is isted by space, and space can only rely on the earth for indicators. The five attributes form a mutually exclusive rtionship in this role.

    In addition to these five attributes, there are two opposite attributes, light and dark, and an unrestricted attribute, time, which is at the top of all attributes.

    A spirit in the form of a giant of inmmation, like Ifrit, is bound by such physicalws. It should be said that thews of this world are manifested in the existence of elves, which seem to have eight properties.

    "Light" is more specific to "darkness" in that light sends angels and darkness sends demons. If we trace the origin of the angelic monster n that we can now identify, it seems that it is not wrong to call them elves.

    Just ask Diablo and he should tell me in detail, only even knowing that would be meaningless and not interesting to me.

    It is important to note that higher than the spirits is the Divine Spirit, who also has eight kinds. The most powerful of the Divine Spirit is the Dragon Race, and only four Dragon Race can be identified at present.

    Veldanava, the Star Dragon is, in my opinion, an attribute of space and earth based on the stars.

    There may also be more attributes.

    "White ice dragon" Velzado, probably watery.

    The "Scorch Dragon" Velgrynd, which is also probably a fire attribute.

    And our Veldora, who, apart from water and wind, can even dictate spacedont look at him like that

    is unexpectedly quite a guy.

    In short, it is not wrong to think of the true dragon seed" as the apex of the Divine Spirit. And Benimaru has evolved into something close to a "dragon species".

    The "me Oni" is not only a spiritual life form, but also a physical body that has an impact on the material world, and its life span has no boundaries, so it is not too much to call him a Oni.

    It''s a special evolution.

    The amount of key magicules is also dramatically increased.

    From what I''ve observed, there are several times as many magicules, and while the max is not as good as Ruminas, it should be a good matchup between them if they fight.

    In that case, they should have the upper hand against the "single digits" of the Empire.

    "Yes! So the first one is sure to be Benimaru, and the second one is next"

    Gedora has decided and there are two spots left.

    Shion and Diablo, I was going to take as well, that''s just four people.

    "Gedora will be the guide, and the rest of the ces are for my secretary, Shion and Diablo.

    Letting Lace take it was, me and Gedora, then Benimaru, Shion, and Diablo.

    "Leave it to me, Lord Rimuru! As long as I''m around, itll be fine!

    Shion said with a smile on her face.

    Shion, what are you talking about?

    Despite the uneasiness, Shion was reliable as an escort. In the past, she had even defeated Razul, who was stronger than herself, and there was no shortage of Shion in terms of fighting.

    "Kufufufufu, I don''t know what Guy is up to, but it''s outrageous to bother Lord Rimuru. With me on board, all troubles will be removed by me!

    Still so confident.

    However, it was very reassuring to give Diablo a job well done, so let me rely on it.

    It''s not a good idea to say it''s an elite few, but that''s a relief, and the remaining people have to follow them to the Empire.

    Just as I was about to say it, someone expressed their displeasure first.

    "Just a moment, Lord Rimuru. If a guide is needed, I think it would be more appropriate for me to do so, please allow me to apany you.

    It''s Testarossa.

    I remember, Testarossa seems to havee from the Imperial side and should be familiar with the geography over there. She was active as a diplomatic marshal and good at negotiation.

    And her fighting ability is impablemaybe even better than mine.

    The good thing about taking Gedora was that he knew Yuuki better than he did, and when you think about it, it should work without him.

    Gedora was pretty strong, but nowhere near as strong as Testarossa. What''s more, there would be the fear of not knowing when he would defect.

    But because of that, even if something happened to Gedora, we wouldn''t feel bad about it, but then again, it''s too pathetic for him.

    Ill take Testarossa''s advice here.

    "Well, let''s swap Gedora for Testarossa, then."

    Im grateful."

    Testarossa had a beautiful smile on her face.

    No, I should say showy.

    Gedora didn''t seem to have a problem with it either, so it was settled.

    "Looks like it''s decided, so let''s go get ready. Call us when we leave.

    "That''s fine. What''s in store?

    Not knowing what else to prepare, he asked Lace, and it turned out that Lace had a look as if his tail had been stepped on.

    "This, this is

    "It''s the hot springs, this guy. He was going back and forth between the cafeteria and the hot springs yesterday, enjoying our maintenance facilities like nobody else.

    Souei''s tone sounded very angry.

    It''s no wonder he''s being watched.

    "Ha ha ha, exposed? That''s not very nice, Mr. Souei.

    How could it not be exposed?

    That''s a lot of guts, Lace.

    "You paid for it, didn''t you?

    "Well, you see, we''re guests. We''ll work in the future to thank you, so please, let''s take credit for this one.

    That''s cheeky enough.

    "I said you

    "Well, well, well. Isn''t it all the country''s fault? Now this is arguably the most advanced ce in the world! It''s such a blissful ce, whoever is here will want a rxing break!

    Lace is a strong advocate of the goodness of this country.

    No one hates beingplimented like that.

    Not a bad guy, my impression of Lace has changed a bit.

    "Don''t be fooled, Lord Rimuru!

    "Benimaru, don''t worry. I will continue to monitor you closely, even if you''re careless.

    Ouch.

    I tensed my nerves hearing Benimaru''s words.

    A coughing sound.

    "It''s okay to stop.

    "Yes, I know! I''ll see youter, and we''ll be going.

    After saying hello, Lace left the conference room high and happy.

    After witnessing this free guy leave, we moved on to the next topic.

    ***

    "Isn''t it too dangerous to go to the enemy camp with only five men?

    "We all feel the same way. If anything happens to Lord Rimuru, no matter how victorious the battle is, it won''t help.

    "Exactly. I also agree that there is no point in having an army at the top of the battle, but just in case, there needs to be someone who can act as a shield for Lord Rimuru.

    Souei, Gabil, and Hakurou sessively expressed their opposition to the course just decided. There was silence in front of Lace a moment ago, in fact there was no agreement inside.

    "The same thing that Hakurou said. Even if it was me, I would have realized that I was to be Lord Rimuru''s double at the critical moment.

    "Hey, Gobta.

    Ah!"

    Meat shield?

    One can imagine what he was trying to say. This kind of thing seriously, I hope not.

    "Hakurou, don''t teach Gobta such things.

    "I understand. But it is also important to teach awareness in the face of such situations, and please understand.

    I also understand Hakurou''s im.

    It''s just that I can''t ept it in my heart

    "I''m d people are worried about me, but I value them just as much. The reason I didn''t want to develop abat n that presupposes sacrifice is so that it doesn''t happen, and that''s why I''m working with everyone like this.

    "Indeed, it seems I''m a bit arbitrary.

    Probably, doesn''t take my word for it.

    On this issue, Benimaru and the others should have been on the side of Hakurou.

    If the positions were exchanged, maybe I would be in the same mood.

    But ah

    The mood of everyone makes me happy, but I really don''t want anyone to sacrifice themselves.

    I know it''s capricious, but let''s prioritize my feelings here.

    "In any case, it''s not okay to have a sacrificial war n. With this in mind, enter the final stage of the war against the Empire.

    Hearing what I said, everyone nodded.

    Regardless of the mood, it should be possible to calmly formte an operational n.

    "Lord Rimuru, I have a n.

    "What is it, Souei?

    "Now, my ''clones'' have infiltrated the Empire. Although it hadn''t reached the Imperial Capital yet because of the excessive interference, the vignce had be looser than before. I think I can rendezvous with it at the destination of Lace''s Shift through Shadow Shift. How about this?

    It turns out that''s pretty reassuring.

    Souei is excellent as a "secret agent", especially at a time like this.

    And his fighting prowess is impable.

    On closer inspection, the Souei also seemed to evolve without moving a muscle.

    Unknowingly, the Souei had ceased to be a fair oni and had evolved into a race called the Dark Spirit Oni. It seemed to be a chain reaction caused by Benimarus evolution, and Souei was granted a blessing.

    Souei was cultivated to serve as the shadow of Benimaru when he was in the vige of the Great Ogre n.

    Benimaru is the table and the Souei is the chair. They are both up and down and equally close friends.

    That being said, it feels like a pair of matching existences with Benimaru.

    It was because the two of them were in this rtionship that Souei was most strongly influenced by Benimaru''s awakening, presumably Souei was being treated as subordinate to Benimaru.

    Well, it''s not a big deal that the two will get along.

    "Dark spirit onis" are also dark spirit demon spirits, and like Benimaru, are spiritual beings with physical bodies.

    It can probably be seen as a subordinate demigod to Benimaru.

    Hes not as good as the top, but he does have a medium amount of magicules. Though substantially inferior to Benimaru, it was nevertheless more than the semi-awakened state of yman.

    The intensity is enough. The current Souei could also have a slight advantage when fighting against the original demon lords like Carrion or Frey.

    Was it because of this reinforcement that he became able to infiltrate the Empire''s vignce?

    Whether it''s actually true or not doesn''t matter.

    It''s pretty reliable if done by Souei, I don''t have a problem with that. But there''s a problem with this, what to do with Masayuki''s guards.

    "So reliable. But what about Masayuki?

    "My ''clone'' will continue to monitor, and even if something happens, I think it will be enough.

    Souei replied confidently.

    Diablo also chimed in with the offer.

    "In that case, why don''t you let Venom mix in with Masayuki''spany? In my humble opinion, as long as the brat is kept secret, Venom can take on both the duties of escort and surveince. It will both reduce the burden on Lord Souei and serve as an insurance policy.

    Well, nice proposal.

    Venom''s character is less of the usual demon, does things withmon sense, and has be quite strong as well. It feels like Masayuki and I can also talk, so maybe the unexpected can get along well.

    It seemed like it would be fun to hand him the words.

    "In that case, there will be no one to serve as your adjutant.

    "Kufufufu, no problem. Since there are still the demoness girls, my own work will not be affected.

    That would be no problem.

    "Does Souei think this is okay?

    "It''s more solid and reliable to shoot inside than to watch in the dark. If I can arrange it this way, I will also be able to save the power that is divided among the clones''."

    That''s settled then.

    "Then I''ll leave it to you to follow this policy.

    Understood!"

    "Leave it to me."

    With that, Venom was dispatched as Masayuki''s escort and rendezvoused with Souei when he arrived locally.

    All that remains is whether the army is going to act

    "Is it necessary to demonstrate against the Empire at the time of the war with the Dwargon League?"

    The First Corps and the Third Corps returned together after recovering the remains. In other words, the whole army is staying in the capital "Rimuru".

    The Second Corps leader''s Geld is still in evolutionary sleep, so the Second Corps can''t move yet, in which case -

    "Lord Rimuru, isn''t it my turn?

    "Wait a minute. Hiss! We should go!

    Gabil put it aside for the moment, Gobta was rarely very energetic.

    However, this time, unlike before, relying on quantity to fight would feel dangerous. When the opponent is arge army, it is unlikely to use a mass attack involving their own side, but this time the opponent is an elite minority and may use nuclear strike magic without any concern, most likely exposing the army to a mass attack of this type.

    The magical battle against the army relies heavily on the strength of the legion''s magic. Before the legion''s magic was breached, elite troops were sent to each other tounch a strong attack, but when the opponent became stronger than a certain level, the soldiers at the bottom only got in the way.

    "Hakurou, tell me what you think."

    "Ho-ho-ho. I understand what Lord Rimuru is thinking, and there should be nothing wrong with what you think.

    "That is to say, the trainee soldier must not have to think about it, and it''s better not to take the subordinate soldier with you, right?

    "If you want to avoid sacrifice as much as possible, you should do it.

    "In that case

    "We''ll have to let the wolves and spirits go to war?

    "Our legions will only send the Flying Dragons to the front!

    It had to be that way.

    The Wolf Rider Soldier unit with its partner could reach A level inbinedbat power, and it had done a good job of decoying this battle, and should not be taken down easily. Besides, it''s first-ss in escape, so I don''t think it will be a problem.

    I don''t disagree with the "Flying Dragon" side either, as the Gabil''s awakening has brought them all over the A level. There''s still some unease about their power control, but it should be fine.

    "So, that''s how Gobta and Gabil prepareno, wait?"

    As I was about to make a decision, I suddenly remembered something important.

    "Gobta, can you call out your partner''s star wolf n now?

    Eh?"

    "I mean, Ranga''s awakening isn''t over yet, so shouldn''t its dependents be in sleep too?

    Ah!"

    He can''t seem to call them out.

    "You just stay home."

    "But, but"

    "Oh Gobta, are you trying to say you can''t recognize your own strength?"

    "I''m sorry, Hiss.

    Gobta hung his head listlessly, which was the only thing that could not be done.

    The superiority of the Wolf Rider Soldier Force was due to the high machine power of the Star Wolf n. Even if the riders are A+ each, there''s no way to take them.

    "It''s not your fault, so please help Rigur keep the peace.

    "Got it, Hiss!

    Sadly, the green legion will just have to stay here and watch their families.

    In this way, the other troops who could go to war have

    "Is the Kurenai congregation all right?

    "No problem. All of them are A-ranked.

    That''s great.

    With the excellentmander Gobya at the head, there were multiple people who had evolved into the Ogre People n with this blessing, and it should be trustworthy to let them go to war.

    "Where''s the Blue Shadow congregation?

    "Scattered throughout the country to gather information and to solicit the enemy. You can call back if you have to

    "No need, let''s get on with the shadowy work.

    Understood."

    There was no need to call them back hard, gathering intelligence was a very important thing, just get on with the mission.

    "All that''s left is the Yomigaeri"

    "Leave it to me! Be prepared for the opportunity to make a big ssh at any time!

    "Well, yeah

    There has been no noticeable change in the awakening of the Shion. However, the "Yomigaeri" have been greatly improved in their fighting abilities, and even some of them have reached the A level.

    With the advantage of not being easy to die, there should be no problem to participate in the battle

    However, the "Yomigaeri" could not be of real value if it did not cooperate with Shion in the battle.

    Without someone who can direct them, the action will be casual.

    This time it''s better to stay here and watch the family, just like the green legion.

    "I see. Let''s stay here and watch the house.

    "What''s the matter?

    "The Yomigaeri are more of an escort group than an army, and I''m morefortable with Shion being with me.

    "I see!

    Shion simply epted what I said.

    With that, the outgoing troops were settled.

    One hundred members of the "Flying Dragon" and three hundred members of the "Kurenai". With four hundred people, it was an excellentbat group with all of its members above A level.

    Although it is not numerically superior, its fighting ability is not.

    But that''s not reassuring.

    "Then, Ultima, Carrera, there are tasks for you as well.

    "Yeah, yeah, yeah! Do as you''re told!

    "What mission, my lord?

    "Ultima continues to serve as an intelligence officer for the Gabil forces. And Carrera, this time, she''s going to assist Gobya instead of Geld.

    Heythat lizard again?

    "Leave it to me. I will help them without being conspicuous.

    There''s something unspeakably disturbing about these answers.

    Ultima seems to have developed a sense of resistance to Gabil, and Carrera says she won''t stand out or be believed.

    "What, does Lady Ultima have a problem with my generation?

    "Yeah, there''s a lot to be upset about! Should I say that your high is disgusting, or that ourmon sense can''t understand your behavior?

    "Ha ha ha, don''t worry! I''ll take it seriously when I fight!

    "Experimenting with the enemy''s attacks in battle, isn''t that serious?

    "What are you talking about? In order to steer the fight towards a favorable situation, it is good to try all tactics. Experimentation is part of it, shouldn''t it be done seriously?

    "No! That''s something that should have been done before the fight started!!! So why do we have to do this exnation?

    This one, no wonder, sprouted a sense of resistance.

    Even as I listened, I thought Ultima was right.

    "I''m sorry. Can we just bear with him for a while?

    "If it''s Lord Rimuru''s order, we''ll try! After all, some things feel like they can''t be taught without him, and this is a good opportunity for me to think about it optimistically.

    With a disdainful but still adorable look on her face, Ultima looked at Gabil with an appraising look as she responded.

    Although the two didn''t seem to have a good match, it shouldn''t be a problem to leave Gabil in Ultima''s care.

    "And you, Carrera, don''t think about being inconspicuous anyway.

    Wow?"

    I don''t think it''s likely that it''ll end up being a big deal anyway, even if you want it to be inconspicuous.

    More so than that, I''m hoping that Carrera will get the timing right.

    "Try to keep your own side free of casualties and make this your top priority. Then there''s the matter of being able to stay in peace until the fight starts.

    "It''s good it''s so simple!

    Really?

    To ask nothing more of her is to repeatedly admonish her to absolutely abide by this and hope it works out.

    "Hakurou, can you help look after the green legion too?

    Understood."

    "Take Carrera''s reins and I''ll leave you to it."

    Hakurou smiled bitterly and nodded.

    This is a temporary relief.

    So the lineup for the strike was decidedjust as I thought so, Gedora raised his hand to ask for the floor.

    "Lord Rimuru, I''m sorry to intrude, but I have a proposal.

    "What is it?

    "In my humble opinion, can we get the floor guardian colossus statue to participate in this battle?

    I see.

    Getting that out of the maze was a bit of a problem, but the damage wouldn''t have caused casualties.

    Even if the ride is performed on it, Gedora should be able to disengage safely.

    Gedora has the magic of the "resurrection bracelet" for emergency return. Being able to observe with peace of mind is a huge advantage, no matter what kind of intense battle zone one enters.

    But exposing the fighting ability of that thing is a problem, right?

    "Vesta, what do you think?

    Wanting to hear what Vesta had to say, then a fearless smile appeared on Vesta''s face.

    Pushing the sses up, Vesta opened her mouth.

    "This is arguably the best showcase stage. Although a detailed report was presented to King Gazel, applications have been received from time immemorial saying that they wanted to see it in kind. I also want to collect data on various conditions, and I''m interested in how it will perform on the actual battlefield.

    Beretta is really a researcher.

    The size of the power determines the value of the weapon, even for the purpose of demonstration, it is meaningless to show its power without first using it once.

    Judging by that thought, the battlefield was indeed a good showcase stage, and presumably Vesta thought the same thing.

    Indeed, the Floor Guardian Colossus Statue is more suited for localized warfare than for weapons of mass destruction. It can both create a sense of intimidation and strike the opponent''s weakness.

    Now that I''ve allowed the demoness trio to go out, it would be inconsistent to reject the offer again on moral grounds.

    "Would it cause a technology drain if taken by the enemy?"

    "I swear I''ll never make such a mistake!

    Even if this happens, there is no end to the technology if you develop a better performance magic doll next time. However, in order to avoid such a problem, the Guardian Statue is equipped with a self-detonating device, so there is no need to worry about the leakage of technology.

    And so on and so forth.

    It was like he was saying something beautiful, but there was a word that I couldn''t ignore.

    "Self-detonating device?"

    "Yes, it is Lord Veldora''s proposal to mount it anyway. I thought it was some kind of joke at the time, it''s true that Veldora-sama came up with the design in anticipation of this state of affairs!

    No, absolutely not.

    I''m guessing it was Veldora, who made such a silly proposal.

    The only people who can think of something like a self-exploding device are Ramiris or Veldora who read the manga.

    I wish they didn''t keep clinging to such meaningless things.

    But it''s true, it''s still better to have a self-detonating device than not.

    "I know, it doesn''t matter if it''s broken or in the hands of the enemy, just don''t push yourself.

    So?"

    "Yes, permission to strike. There may be no chance of Gedora you making an appearance, but be prepared to enter the game if circumstances change.

    "I see. After all, I don''t want to take a hard line on my past colleagues either. If a new type of weapon emerges that even I don''t know about, it will be time for the Floor Guardian Colossus to appear!

    In that case, it can be handed over to him with confidence.

    Gedora, who has no roots under his feet, may betray once it appears that we are about to be defeated. It was possible that the reason he wanted toe outside thebyrinth now was to be able to move easily in case our side might lose the battle. These are my thoughts, but it''s a little unintelligent to pursue this issue now.

    Let''s be optimistic here that Gedora has no second thoughts, that is, just andslide victory in the war against the Empire.

    So Gedora joined the battle, and the men who were to go out were thus determined.

    ***

    It was dusk by the time the meeting ended.

    After the dissolution, each began to prepare for tomorrow.

    As for me, I n to spend my leisure time in the cafeteria.

    Tomorrow''s schedule is to start the morning with a morale boost for the attacking members, followed by a "teleportation" to send them all away.

    The meeting with Yuuki began at noon. Since it was Lace who did the transmission, there was plenty of time.

    It doesn''t take any special preparation to go back that day. Of course, with no intention of preparing any meet and greet gift for Yuuki, one can wee tomorrow with a light heart.

    "Is it really okay to be soid back?

    "It''s okay. How about you? Is it really good not to spend time with Momiji and Albis?

    Benimaru and I came to the cafeteria together, but for obviously still newlyweds, is it not good to spend at home leisurely?

    Benimaru grinned at my words.

    "Today, the two of them went to learn how to cook with Shuna. They seem to have made a mutual no-running pact, so I got kicked out

    Hey, hey, there''s no such thing as a newlywed couple like that.

    ''Isn''t that a bad idea?its just that I can''t get involved in other people''s family matters.

    "Yeah, that''s right.

    I responded with an exaggerated nod.

    Diablo happily delivered the food.

    The pose was like a real butler.

    Well, I''ve thought about whether it''s really good to let the primordial demon do such a thing, but since he''s happy, I have no reason to stop him, and I''m almost used to it by now.

    Thank you very much.

    "No, no, no. It''s my job.

    Is that right?

    Never mind, if he can ept that personally, then thats fine.

    "Rimuru-sama, please use this side too.

    Saying so, Shion poured wine into her ss.

    Of course, this wine isn''t made by the Shion and can be safely drunk, it''s just that the atmosphere is a little breathtaking right now.

    Today''s dish is just themon fried pork chops, which can be easily eaten casually without serving.

    However, Diablo and Shion stood behind me, instead it was mentally exhausting.

    "Why don''t we sit down and eat together?

    "Thank you for this gentle advice."

    "No! I''m so full, don''t worry about me!

    "After all, Shion has already eaten in the kitchen.

    "Diablo! You guys!

    It''s a fight at the seams.

    It felt a little silly to worry about them again, and the two of us, Benimaru and I, just ignored them and started enjoying our food.

    "So you''re going to trust Yuuki?

    "It''s hard to believe from the bottom of my heart, but I guess I''ll just have to believe. And, I want to believe him, too.

    "Then I''ll follow Rimuru-sama''s idea and set up a n on the premise of trusting Yuuki on the battlefield.

    "What if it''s betrayed?

    "It might be bad, but there''s always a way.

    "Yeah, I''m going to trouble you.

    "Just what I want."

    Benimaru''s smile is so reliable.

    Since it is in war, one can only trust the Allies. If even this is in doubt, then there is no way to be sure of sess in any kind ofbat operation.

    If betrayed one suffers a great loss and is arguably faced with a difficult choice.

    However, I chose to trust Yuuki.

    Now that the decision has been made to do so, there is no point in continuing to fret.

    "I''ve always cared. Do you have to eat?

    I asked as I looked at Benimaru, who was eating the same fried pork chops in front of me.

    "If there is no need for it, there is no need for it.

    "Ah, yes.

    "But isn''t Rimuru-sama the same? I''m relieved that my taste hasn''t disappeared.

    "I understand. I felt like my life was over when I couldn''t even get my three major desires met. By working hard to resurrect the appetite for food and sleep, I''m now happy every day.

    "Yeah. I was worried before, but now I''m just as relieved as before.

    We hmmmmd and nodded.

    Suddenly, I felt something was wrong.

    "What? You say the same as before, but have all three desires been preserved?

    "Yes. Very fortunately, all were preserved.

    "Sleep too?"

    "Sleep is not necessary, but it is possible to get into a state of sleep by just meditating, and also to recover from fatigue.

    What''s this? Ive obviously mastered sleep through effort, and this person can do it directly. And it''s even better than my results?

    No, what I care more about than that is

    "Sexuality too?

    I asked Benimaru in a small whisper.

    Then Benimaru nodded slightly in affirmation, somewhat shyly.

    "What the hell, aren''t you unable to evolve because you can''t have children?"

    "That''s right. Momiji and Albis are also both pregnant.

    "That''s a congrattionno, in that case the sex drive should be gone!

    "I also think it will disappear, but even if I can''t have children now, I still have my sex drive. That way it won''t break the twos hearts.

    It''s so enviable.

    It''s a perfect evolution to have a function that I don''t even have.

    Damn, why can''t I

    "That''s great."

    Wellwhy are you taking my food?

    "Shut up! You traitor!

    My jealousy red up and I snatched Benimaru''s fried pork chops.

    It''s all I''ve got left to eat this one for funand I''ll take that for granted.

    All in all, we had a great and lively evening.

    It''s daily as always.

    However

    This daily routine came to an abrupt end.

    ***

    "No, it''s not good! Something terrible has happened. We have to get back!"

    Lace shouted like this and ran into the canteen.

    Right behind him were others.

    "Something''s wrong, Lord Rimuru! We have just received amunication in the name of King Gazel.

    Velgrynd appeared in front of the Hybrid Legion formation, and theyre requesting emergency support!!!

    Vesta eximed with bloodshot eyes.

    The shocking content of this made me jerk to my feet.

    "Call the members scheduled to attack at once!

    Understood."

    Hearing my order, Benimaru immediately acted.

    This should bring people together quickly.

    "Lace, you wait a moment before you go back, and we''lle with you.

    "But, but

    The panicked look on Lace''s face made me suspect acting at first, wondering in my mind if he was up to something else, trying to trick us into a trap.

    But listening to Vesta''s follow-up debriefing, I learned that this is not a trap.

    It was information that even Lace could not have, that something significant was happening in the Empire.

    The more you have to stay calm at times like this.

    "I know something big is going on, but don''t panic. We are now allies. Wouldn''t it be more convenient in every way for us to go there together than for you to go back alone?

    "What''s so convenient? I don''t think so.

    Since there were the enemy''s strongest fighting force in front of the hybrid legionnaires, one could instead consider this an opportunity. Yuuki and the others seem to have been attacked by someone, and taking those guys down would make the subsequent dealings more favorable.

    I asked Lace for more detailed information.

    "So, what happened?

    After a slight hesitation, Lace answered my question.

    "I''ve been contacted by Tear and told that the Chairman and Lady Kagali have asked us to return, and it seems Kondo has attacked us.

    Lt. Kondo? That''s one of the tricky ones.

    It''s only right to join forces with Lace andunch an attack.

    But what was worrying was that with Yuuki''s battle strength, there was nothing they could do.

    "What''s Yuuki doing? Did he lose too?

    "This, the boss''s opponent seems to be Damrada.

    "Damrada? One of the "three giants" is really the deputymander of the Imperial Emperor''s Knights of the Near Guard, right? Did he really betray Yuuki?

    I thought he was Yuuki''spanion, but isn''t he?

    After all, having not seen him in person, it was impossible to guess what he was thinking.

    "I don''t know, Tear and Footman go back and forth. Anyway, Damrada is fighting boss for sure.

    Well, I don''t get it.

    What is certain, however, is that the tricky enemies are scattered.

    In a nutshell, the first thing is to confirm the status. Because of time constraints I unleashed physics magic: the Argos.

    The coordinates had long since been grasped clearly, directly designating where the hybrid regiment was stationed, and the walls of the canteen reflected the local situation.

    "This, this is

    I wonder who didn''t hold back a whisper.

    A beautiful woman with a voluptuous smile could be seen, her most notable feature being the bun of her blue hair that was coiled up above her.

    The woman was dressed in a luxurious Chinese-style costume with a military uniform draped over her shoulders.

    It was like walking in the no-man''snd anding to the 60,000-strong army formation.

    Nopethats not the army, should say the people who were.

    Flying overhead were presumably corpses.

    The bright red pir that connects heaven and earth, that is, the supergravity force field.

    The drifting rain of blood stained the entire force field bright red.

    "Gravity copses? It''s a pain in the ass to use my best y.

    Carrera said as if in jest, with a very serious expression on her face.

    It''s no wonder this page, presumably this one from Velgrynd used this magic with even better precision than Carrera.

    Perfectly specified the range, while controlling to keep it from storming off.

    From the fact that there were no traces of destruction around, one can infer that there was only an effect on gravity.

    "Controlling the gravity and blowing the army into the sky without affecting the ground?

    "Yes, my lord. And what''s even more hateful is that not even a grain of sand was rolled in. Only the humans identified as enemies were blown up into the sky.

    Can such a thing really be done?

    No, it should be doable.

    After all, the results were on disy, and it was no use doubting them.

    "Want to fight that?

    "Kufufufufu, what a sister of Lord Veldora. Funny, I want to fight her seriously for once.

    Diablo was pretty tough, but to be honest it felt like an unbeatable opponent.

    <<no. challenge="" with="" all="" your="" might,="" and="" there="" is="" a="" chance="" of="" winning.="">> It was reassuring to hear, but using your full battle strength was difficult, and there were definitely going to be sacrifices, so you could still hope to avoid the fight if you could.</no.>

    In that case, it would be better to aim for Emperor Rudra.

    It was supposed to be a showdown between Guy and Rudra to end the war, as there would be no needless sacrifice in doing so.

    "But I don''t understand. Why not finish this magic?

    "Maybe it''s because they don''t like destroying the natural environment like we do?"

    "Shouldn''t be that reason. Look, the bodies that have been drained of blood are piled up.

    Testarossa points to a corner of the image.

    There were indeed a lot of bodies piled up there.

    I split the image, zoomed in on the part she was referring to, and then saw a male in military uniform and a female who had met.

    "That''s Yuuki''s secretary, Kagali, right?

    "That''s the man who created our house and the president of the Moderate Clown Troupe. Damn it!

    Although I don''t want to believe it, it actually happened. It was clear to our family when Footman and Tear delivered the ''readings'', and it seems that Kondo has manipted Kagali-sama.

    Manipted?

    "Right. And to top it all off, neither Tear nor Footman were able to resist Lord Kagali. The fact that there has been no more ''chanting'' since just now is probably due to a prohibition order.

    What a worst-case scenario.

    Spiritual domination, I think taking away someone else''s free will is the lowest of acts.

    Compared to this.

    The status quo is terrible.

    "So, to what extent has Miss Kagali''s domination affected her? Are you okay?

    Lace couldn''t see his expression with the mask on, but seemed to be in genuine difort. If Lace, like Tear and Footman, couldn''t resist Kagali''s orders then that was a big problem.

    "Our family is fine. Although the same was all created by Lord Kagali, only our family can disobey Lord Kagali''s orders. The problem now is that most of thepanions Yuuki has gathered have been carved with "spells". Of course, it''s only the subordinates we''re worried about, and since everyone else is in this state, there''s no point in thinking about anything else now.

    Indeed, Yuuki''s army was no longer viable, and even if someone survived, there was no way to escape that magic.

    There seemed to be people among them who had not been affected by magic, but had also lost the will to fight after witnessing a tragedy like that. Without a spell," you''ve lost the battle.

    It''s good news that Lace won''t be affected because the situation is so bad.

    "Even if you''re the only one who''s okay, you''re okay.

    "Don''t worry, our family is finished.

    Lace said finally keeping a t tone.

    The words were t and sounded like they didn''t feel anything, but I didn''t think so.

    There was great remorse for the maniption of hispanions, and there was no doubt that it was from his heart.

    I didn''t say anything and patted Lace on the shoulder.

    Lace looked at me in surprise.

    I said to Lace, as naturally as possible, in a cheerful tone.

    "Isn''t it too early to give up? It''s not like Miss Kagali is dead. If she was manipted by that bastard Kondo, then beating down the culprit would have restored it. Isn''t Yuuki still fighting too, so hurry up and help them fight back.

    It was better tofort him a little than to confront him negatively.

    In short, it is possible to despair afterwards.

    What can be done now?

    It''s more important to consider this.

    "What a strange person to say the same thing as boss. It''s human beings who persecute and exile us, and it''s human beings whoe to our rescueIt''s a match made in heaven.

    Lace whispered thus. The expression under the mask seemed to be smiling bitterly.

    But don''t look at me like this, I''m actually a magical creature

    But then again, even though Im now a Slime, it turns out Im really a human too. Isn''t it a bit inappropriate to spout off the words here?

    "Is it okay to ask you a question?

    "Ask what?"

    "What is it that you want to do?

    That kind of thing?

    Nothing I''ve done since the beginning has changed.

    Since being reincarnated into this world, I have had only one ambition.

    "Live happily ever after with everyone. To this end, they built cities and nations and established diplomatic rtions with other countries. After that, it''s all about getting along with people who share the same interests and hobbies, while emphasizing diversity.

    "Wouldn''t you like to have the world in your pocket?

    "Hey, what''s that? It''s too much trouble."

    "Huh? Conquer the world, and everything will be as you wish!

    "So that would definitely get boring. Only when there are different kinds of thoughts can there be a wider range of possibilities, and all kinds of unexpected and powerful works can be born!

    I argued my point desperately, and Lace listened with some bewilderment. Then a little panicked, shaking his hand and shouting "h h h.

    "It''s strange, isn''t it? What is the work saying? We''re talking about what happens after we conquer the world, right?

    What an unintelligent guy.

    "So you say, ''Everything is ording to your own mind, and you say you want to control the mind of everyone else? Or is it mental domination like it was for Miss Kagali?

    "No, that one doesn''t really want it

    "Thought, speech, expression. I think the freedom of these three acts is to be guaranteed. That is the respect for basic human rights that inspires diversity and is the driving force for cultural development.

    "Huh? That will only increase the number of people who are good at what they say, and the problems that can be solved will be unsolvable. How can you run a country like this!?

    There''s some truth to that.

    The greatest weakness of democracy lies in how it divides national interests and personal feelings.

    But it is also a kind of diversity development.

    "That''s good. Those are the problems to be ovee in the future, and we all consider solutions together. I''m inherently capricious, and no amount of talking will get the country going in a direction it doesn''t want.

    I''ll just be the long one who only speaks in a big way.

    "King''s Landing and not ruling.

    Just take that to heart and do it as you always do.

    Fortunately there are plenty of people who can serve as references.

    A system of domination disguised as a religion like with Ruminas, or a system of domination at the apex of the state like with Elmesia, can serve as a reference.

    But there is a long way to go and no need to make a decision now.

    "So the question of national policy is put to one side. What''s more important is the development of culture, ah entertainment, entertainment. Without this, the development of the country would be meaningless.

    Here are the highlights of the exam to be taken.

    In order to be able to have a fun and happy life, more entertainment must be born. In order to achieve this, there can be no restrictions on thoughts and actions.

    Lace looked confusedly at me who was carrying out the instructions.

    "I can''t understand. Our family can''t understand what you''re saying. That manboss, he promised us, to conquer the world and then create the world that we could live in happily. So we took the boss, Lord Yuuki''s word for it. But what''s wrong with you?

    "What is it?

    "Fooling our ambition with this half-baked awareness."

    "Who''s fooling you? I just think conquering the world isn''t as much fun as you think, and it''s a lot harder than you think.

    Hearing my answer, Lace fell into a brief silence.

    And muttered.

    I''ve known for a long time, this kind of thing.

    Then sat powerlessly on the floor.

    He turned his face to the image that had been projected with magic and presented before his eyes were the piles of corpses and the Kagali that stood beside those bodies.

    "You just asked what''s going on there, right? Our family is here to tell you that this is the secret of secrets. You should know that we are the Undead Elf n, but how that n has increased in number, our family will tell you now.

    Hmmm?

    h h h, this seems like a really important thing.

    "You calm down. That''s not something that should be said in the cafeteria, is it?

    "It doesn''t matter, now is not the time to say such things. Listen, we were all created by the hand of Lady Kagali, and that''s what the "Spell King" is really good at, gathering the grievances left over from the corpses to create the forbidden spell of the powerful demons, the forbidden spell: Monster Death and Abyss.

    It''s a canteen, but it''s also a private room for subordinates. There were no ordinary people around, but Lace was really dry and decisive.

    I can''t believe I''m telling the most secret things in such a ce.

    The only ones who remained were the group of Benimaru, Souei, Diablo, Shion, Hakurou and Demoness trio who hade over ording to my instructions, and Vesta who had watched the image together after finishing the debriefing.

    I don''t know when Gabil returned even after giving the order to everyone.

    The content is important and thankfully it''s okay for people here to hear it.

    "That''s a really, really nostalgic spell.

    "Do you know about this? Diablo.

    Diablo was passionate about magic and came in handy at times like these, and he was a big help if he knew.

    "This flesh, which Lord Rimuru has given me, is also the product of the monster death product. At that time, my flesh was no longer "soul," but it was just right for receiving flesh. The original purpose of this spell was to unify the power of tens of thousands of corpses and take it for himself.

    It''s true that inhumane evil spells can be described as taboo spells. But I can''t say anything about the one who took my soul, so let''s not talk about it.

    "To take power for oneself means to be able to board the will of a particr being into the flesh?

    "It depends, but there''s nothing wrong with that view.

    "Diablo is right. Footman, Tear, and yman are all surviving kinsmen of Lord Kazaream. He lost his homnd, and in order to remember the humiliation of the past, he fell prey to this forbidden art.

    Lace affirmed Diablo''s words.

    My spection seems to be correct.

    That being the case, it would feel bad to let that spell be done.

    "There are about 60,000 people in that mixed corps. With that much material, we should be able to create about ten Undead Elves that can rival yman.

    "Oi oi

    And the trouble is, there are a lot of soulful guys in that legion. Unlike Footman and Tear, those guys might be able to control a more powerful force.

    Asking him specifically what that meant, Lace looked reluctant as he replied.

    One of the reasons for this is this.

    The devouring of Footman and Tear by powerful forces resulted in immature spirits, as the distribution of spirits and power was immature when Kazaream first created the Undead Elf Race, thus giving them too much power.

    yman is an example of sess after lessons learned.

    It would be wrong to say that Footman and Tear are cases of failure. It''s just that mental immaturity that causes IQ growth to be slow, but the power is strong.

    In fact, the pre-evolution yman was no match for Footman. It can also be seen that, in terms of fighting ability alone, it can be argued that the sess story of yman is surpassed.

    In other words, if one intended to use 60,000 corpses to create the Power Specialized Undead Elf, it would probably be condensed into six or seven of them.

    Those guys sacrificed millions of troops for the birth of the Awakened One. It''s only 60,000 corpses, and it''s estimated that it won''t even bother to put it into practice directly.

    "We were all just kids back then. Tear is even more childish than she is now, not to mention Footman, and the only mature ones are yman, who has also taken his own life for his stupid mobbing, but our family doesn''t think it''s your fault either. In the end, the weak are the strongest in this world, and it''s only natural to try out an untrustworthy opponent, so what''s the point of sacrificing others in order to expand your own power? That''s what our family really means."

    Clearly there was no need to say it, Lace said it stiffly.

    It makes no sense to provoke us here; it''s a bad move.

    Even then the reason Lace has to say so is that

    "Don''t underestimate people. I will never forgive you for instigating the destruction of the vige of the Great Ogre n because of you. But now that Lord Rimuru has decided to join forces, there will be no opposition from us.

    "Benimaru is right. The remorse of everyone in the vige tears at the mere thought of it. However, even if we do it now, it won''t relieve this feeling. I can only let go of this remorse if I achieve the world that Lord Rimuru hopes for that would make everyoneugh and live.

    "Hmph, you think you can cut off the root of the scourge by turning everyone''s hatred against you.

    How naive, our anger, is not so easily erased. It''s not just a matter of torturing you to get rid of our anger.

    "Well, that''s right. Like you said, the weak and strong are everything. It was because of the immaturity of this old man and others at that time. Don''t you also look like you''re crying because of your immaturity?

    Well, then you should understand our feelings.

    Benimaru, Shion, Souei, and Hakurou. Bury your hatred of Lace in your heart and face that hatred squarely while determined to fight together.

    They certainly couldn''t forgive Lace and others for what they had done, but they were also determined to defeat that abomination. I thought to myself at the time I epted Geld, what a measure of strength they are.

    "Look, I don''t forgive you, and I don''t believe youpletely, but we''re allies now, and we should put aside our troubles and get on the same page.

    "It''s our family, please. Please, our family wants to save the boss and the chairman, help us.

    Lace bowed his head deeply. This man, who is usually so transcendent, has gone out of his way to be sincere.

    If even that was acting, I wouldn''t be able to trust anyone else.

    Only now, I want to believe this guy.

    ***

    Faced with Lace''s request, Benimaru and the others nodded in agreement.

    This act of determination is kinda handsome and makes you see God.

    "Okay. Then, let''s follow the original n, all six of us sneak in and save Yuuki.

    "Yeah. Even if it''s so that he can apologize properly afterwards, he has to get that bastard out.

    Benimaru is very much on the go.

    It was Yuuki, after all, and it felt like he''d take down Damrada, and then be calm as usual.

    The question is, what to do about Velgrynd. Just as I was about to give my instructions, Shion burst into a startling speech.

    "That Kondo guy is shady, right? If he can manipte Kagali, maybe yman was being manipted too.

    The crowd could not help but fall into silence.

    "What did you say? Lace muttered, and Benimaru petrified in surprise.

    "Kufufufu. The First Secretary really has a way with funny things.

    Diablo wanted tough it off, but seemed to recall all the previous situations and noticed that none of the elements could negate Shion''s statement.

    "It''s possible

    Hakurou said the same thing.

    No, it''s only natural to think so.

    ording to Lace, Yuuki seems to have ordered yman to make peace.

    Regardless of the pig-headed upheaval first, yman''s storming away after that would get him nowhere.

    <> Well, it does.</answer.>

    "So that''s what? Is it because of that Kondo''s attempts that we''ve gotten into so much trouble?

    Shit."

    "Talk too much, Benimaru. If you don''t change it, you''ll have to report it to Lady Shuna."

    "Don''t do that. Can''t I change it yet?

    Ignoring Benimaru and Shion''s duo spins first.

    ''''Although I''m not happy about it, it seems that I can only agree with Shion''s opinion. I also attempted a criminal psychoanalysis, and there were iprehensible behaviors in yman''s actions. At a time when more caution should have been exercised, somehow traces of his anxious use of the army could be found. I thought it was yman''s stupidity and just let it go, and if a third party had intervened, it would have made sense.

    Wow, Diablo''s opinion is in line with the King of Wisdom.

    In that case, there is no longer any reason to doubt.

    "Although we don''t know the truth, let''s act on the premise that Kondo has manipted yman now.

    In other words, when confronting Kondo, be sure to guard yourself against the possibility of being manipted!

    Yes!"

    It''s also possible that even more care won''t help, but it''s better than not being on guard.

    Anyway, keep an eye out for this man named Kondo. Probably even more trouble than Velgrynd.

    Let everyone remember what Kondo looks like as a consensus.

    Well, to recap the battle.

    "Gabil and others went in response to King Gazel''s request for help. But don''t go head-to-head with Velgrynd. Even the subordinates would be in danger, and letting the soldiers on would be a waste of time.

    "Of course that''s clear. Even for my generation, I would never think of challenging the great true dragon race.

    That''s not a match for the other side.

    Gabil and Hakurou, too, were very understanding.

    The purpose of the reinforcements was to buy time.

    After we rescue Yuuki, thene back as Velgrynd''s opponent.

    "But is the ceremony to be left alone?

    Ultima asked.

    The ritual refers to the monster death gue that Kagali is performing.

    "That''s a relief. That spell, takes a certain amount of time to unleash, and the birth of one takes at least two hours. If the energy is to be concentrated, it''s estimated to take more time.

    Diablo helped tell her.

    It hasn''t been an hour since the ceremony began.

    If we rendezvous with Yuuki, defeat Emperor Rudra, and then rush back

    "Well, that''s not right. It would be just as Diablo said, but Lord Kagali can do secret magic.

    "The secret art? Is that so, and that''s why Velgrynd the Grand Marshal has stepped in to assist.

    Diablo seemed to understand, but we were still at a loss, except that we didn''t have time to listen to him in detail.

    "That is, how much time is left?

    "Kufufufufu. Worst case scenario, we can have a few undead elves in two hours.

    Two hours?

    With this amount of time alone, could Emperor Rudra be defeated?

    No, there''s no need to worry, just do it.

    I looked at Lace.

    "You''re the strongest, right? At least hes stronger than yman, and it looks like hes stronger than those two Power Specialized types.

    "Well, sort of, after all, our house is special.

    "In that case, let''s ignore the spell that Kagali is performing.

    "Hey, is this okay?

    Gabil marveled.

    "Mmm. Think about it, Gabil. Lace is also quite strong, but not against an untouchable opponent. As for the other two, you guys can win now, too, right?

    That''s my judgment.

    Although Lace hides strength, it can''t fool my eyes. In other words, I can sense that he has not awakened to the ultimate skill. Gabil will be hard to win, but Souei should be able to hit a tie.

    In other words, if an Undead Elf is born to rival Lace, it will be tricky, but if it can''t match Lace, there''s always a way. It would be troublesome to let those undead elves grow up, so they couldn''t be left unattended. But, to judge, not a threat that must be stopped immediately.

    "It''s good to have Velgrynd assisting with the spell. If possible, hinder her as much as possible so that she can''t concentrate on the spell. If it can''t be done, then leave it at that and leave Velgrynd alone. Rather, we don''t have to actively step on the tiger''s tail.

    Listening to what I said, Gabil nodded after exchanging a nce with Hakurou, and seemed to agree.

    Then, just in case.

    "If she points the finger at you or King Gazel, let Ultima and Carrera deal with it."

    They are also in the strongest ss among my men, so they can buy some time even against a strong opponent like Velgrynd.

    No matter how Kagali''s rituals turned out to be, they could be ignored, but the army was about to suffer a devastating blow once Velgrynd was out in force. The only point to be absolutely avoided, I gave the relentless order.

    "Thank you for relying on us! Even to Veldora''s sister, we will show no mercy!

    "Yeah, we''ll see if we can win. I''m updating my undefeated record, so let me have some fun.

    Ultima and Carrera responded reliably, and the defeat to Zegion was a bit of an unheard of thing.

    Just when I thought the course could be decided on that.

    "One moment, please. I''m sure it''s not enough for Ultima and Carrera to take on Lord Velgrynd. I know it''s rude of me to ask to lead the way again, but allow me to volunteer to take on Lord Velgrynd together.

    This is Testarossa''s proposal.

    Hearing her say that made me tangle. It''s true that the proposal is charming, but if you''re going to break into the heart of the empire, it''s only safe to challenge it with maximumbat power.

    Not only are there strong enemies that Guy identifies with, but also four or more "single-digit" guards.

    To deal with so many strongmen, one really didn''t want to be missing Testarossa in terms of battle power.

    However, it would be feasible to do so if one could buy time on the matter of dealing with Velgrynd.

    In that case, I''ll take Gedora

    "I''ll go instead. It''ll shorten the time and increase the sess rate of the battle.

    Souei offered his own idea, perhaps a proper proposal.

    At least, it''s better than taking Gedora with you.

    Benimaru, Shion, Souei, and Diablo. With those four in ce, no matter what the opponent feels like, they can''t lose.

    "Let''s go with this lineup. Please, Souei.

    "Yes, sir!"

    Gabil and the others main goal was to buy time. Exclude hostile forces, including Kondo, if you can.

    In case anything goes wrong, let the demoness trio y, which is the best option that can be taken at this stage.

    "Then it''s decided. Gabil you too, don''t force yourselves until we return.

    Yes!"

    In this way, even though it was a bit rushed, the policy was set.

    At this point, Vesta, who had been looking at the screen, shouted loudly.

    "Oooh-ooh! King Gazel has arrived on the scene!

    Hearing him say so, turning his gaze to the screen, it was the figure of the Knights of the Sky in the sky.

    "Come on, rendezvous before Gazel''s casualties andmunicate the battle n!

    "Leave it to me, please! I, Gabil, will take on this great responsibility!

    "So, let''s get moving!

    I gave the order.

    Then, the very long night began.

    ***

    After sending Gabil and the others away by "diversion", we were transported with Lace to the Imperial Capital.

    In order to be ready for any situation, I became a human form at first.

    "Here we go. This is our secret home baseHey, where is this?"

    Despite shifting over with magic, Lace didn''t look right.

    At this point, there was an extremely nasty feeling of foreboding.

    Looking around, it was a spacious hall that I don''t have in the country.

    Carved pirs lined the sides, and the ground was covered with fine fleece nkets.

    It seems to be thought that which emperor''s courtesy hall, but there is a distorted sense of space that does not wear off.

    Hello."

    "No, it''s not! Usually they only teleport to fixed locations, so this is the first time this has happened!

    Lace replied anxiously, while I squinted at him. Doesn''t look like a lie, but here''s what''s going on.

    Looking around while contemting, there was a ce a few steps higher in front of fifty meters.

    There''s a chair that looks like a jade seat above, giving the impression of an audience hall.

    There was arge, impressive-looking figure sitting in a chair, and next to it stood a pale blue-haired beauty with prominent features in a bun on her head, and it could not be mistaken for Velgrynd.

    "Velgrynd! No, I was in the battlefield a while ago, I don''t think it''s here.

    "It would be time to move, but it doesn''t look like it.

    Benimaru answered my query.

    Souei and Shion also shared Benimaru''s face with a puzzled look.

    "Surrounded? Looks like a trap.

    Diablo said calmly.

    I sensed it too, and there were dozens of people in this hall.

    And, quite a strong one at that.

    "Lace, you bastard. Is the goal really to set us up"

    Despite Benimaru''s sharp geological question, Lace''s mind wasn''t on it.

    "How could this happen? Is that interference with our technique? It''s a lie, no way

    As the saying goes, confused as hell.

    This also seems to be an unanticipated state of affairs for Lace.

    In my opinion, this is not a trap set by Lace.

    There was a man who came up to us who were reinforcing our guard.

    "Yeah, well done, Lace. I''m also very happy that I was able to fool the Demon Lord Rimuru and his party.

    It''s Yuuki.

    Dressed in the uniform of the Empire, with a smile on his face.

    B-Boss! Wait, wait, wait. What''s going on?

    "Ahahaha, no more acting. We''ll win if we finish off the Demon Lord Rimuru here.

    Listening to Yuuki''s speech, the killing aura of the Shion and Souei rose. But, unexpectedly, Benimaru and Diablo calmly listened to Yuuki and Lace''s conversation.

    Watching them, I am truly impressed.

    "You believe in Lace, too.

    "Ah, no. I want to kill them when the two of them get careless," he said.

    Hey!"

    "Kufufufufu, you''re really worthy of your title Benimaru. Do it before you expose the killing aura.

    That''s the fundamentals.

    Idiots, where are you mafiosos from?

    No such fundamentals exists in our country!

    I''m so impressed, I convinced them both to wait and see. By the way, I would also like to talk to Shion and Souei, who were letting their killing aura out.

    This will, Yuuki and Lace''s arguments go into white-hot water. Lace is desperately trying to prove his innocence to us.

    "Trust us! This time it''s true, we didn''t do anything bad!

    The more Lace tried desperately, the more suspicious Yuuki''s methods became.

    I feel a little pathetic for Lace, let''s put an end to this farce.

    Tapped Lace twice on the shoulder, said.

    "Calm down. That guy can be called Yuuki, but he''s not Yuuki either.

    Hey?"

    "I''m sorry, but I guess Kondo was in control.

    He could have been defeated and then manipted by Damrada, or there could have been a sneak attack during a two-man showdown. Anyway, it''s troublesome that the enemy has guys who can dominate hearts and minds.

    If they didn''t believe in each other from the bottom of their hearts, they would have immediately turned into a fratricidal situation.

    "Ah, that''s what''s going on! It''s not a good idea to cheat someone else, but it''s a good idea to get cheated yourself.

    Lace''s character is also really canny.

    Knowing that I believed him, I got my spirits up.

    However, the situation has not improved either. We are still surrounded and in crisis.

    "I didn''t think it would be so easy to find out. I want to make you more suspicious and kill each other.

    Yuuki too, even when manipted, has a bad personality.

    That''s his nature, and this is the time to show my tolerance as an adult for ignoring him.

    "Your Majesty, I regret my defeat in battle.

    "Boring show, but forget it. Before the battle began, I also wanted to say something.

    After Yuuki had finished reporting to the figure sitting on the stage, he stood up and started walking around.

    Yuuki honestly stepped aside to make way. From this, it can be judged that Yuuki is subservient to Emperor Rudra. Although the possibility of acting cannot bepletely ruled out, it seems better not to have optimistic thoughts.

    Velgrynd followed him like a virtuous wife of Rudra. Other than the fact that she was a beauty and appeared to be just an ordinary person, it was clear that this was hidden information.

    And I can see.

    Velgrynd opened a thinyer of ''barriers'' and surrounded itself and the man walking ahead. By the action of the ''barrier boundary'', all aura is cut off.

    "An amazing sense of power. I don''t think the Velgrynd in front of me is fake."

    "I agree. It''s amazing to have reached this level.

    Benimaru echoed my words. However, there are those who react differently.

    "Yeah? As it is often pulled by Lord Veldora to train, the feeling is the same in my opinion. Of course, you can''t win.

    Shionstill training with Veldora?

    After all, by training, they mean actualbat in a maze. It''s all a fight to the death, and the results are not to be underestimated.

    However, there''s no point in winning if you can''t. There is neither arrogance nor defiance.

    "It''s really a great ''frontier''. But as Shion said, there isn''t much of a differencepared to Lord Veldora."

    Diablo''s views are simr to those of Shion.

    Not sure if it''s a low opinion of Velgrynd or a high opinion of Veldora. I can''t judge at once.

    However, even the confident Diablo didn''t assert that he could win.

    This is important.

    Diablo actually doesn''t lie or say things he can''t do himself. ording to my own understanding, that''s about it.

    "I don''t suppose it was in your ns. It''d be fun not toe to a summit."

    Rudra said with a smirk on her face. Indeed, it''s exactly like Masayuki.

    The hair color is brilliant blonde and the hair is a little different. In terms of pupil color, Rudras is blue and Masayuki''s is teal. There are quite a few differences if you look closely, but the scent that both men exude somehow makes the same impression.

    That being said, Masayuki also said some strange things.

    "Lately, my hair seems"

    "Are you going bald?

    "Yes, yes, there''s been a lot of stresstelywell, how can that be!? My hair''s faded a bit. It was ck, but now it seems to be teal?

    "Hoo-huh. Could it be mnin loss or something?

    "Maybe? That''s what I think"

    Like that, irrelevant teenage angst. It was originally thought so, but somehow now it alles to mind.

    Some care, but now is not the time for deep thought.

    Rudra stepped forward to heel.

    "Indeed, not in my ns. However, I do have something to say.

    "That would be great. Anyway, sit down first.

    Rudra waved her hand as she finished, and two chairs appeared in situ.

    Magic?

    I don''t understand the principle at all, but I don''t think I''m going to get some kind of trap or anything.

    This is the kind of time to focus on atmosphere, and I sat down nonchntly.

    Benimaru stood to my right, and Diablo couldn''t help but stand by to his left. Shion, on the other hand, quickly stepped up behind me, with Souei to her right.

    Bewildered, Lace rolled his eyes and slipped to the left of Shion.

    After we decided on our positions, Velgrynd said something like a prank.

    "Well, sit down for yourself. You''ve got no manners.

    Etiquette?

    I don''t care.

    I''ll sit if you let me.

    "Come on, Velgrynd, they didn''t do anything wrong. Since this person was also in the position of a demon lord, it was the same position as the one who ruled the country. I believe in the existence of reciprocity.

    It seems to be true that the emperor is speaking from the heart and has great measure.

    "If you think it''s okay, then I''m fine with it.

    Velgrynd seemed to simply agree.

    As if it really doesn''t matter, then stop threatening us.

    Rudra was seated squarely in the chair opposite.

    Velgrynd naturally waited on his right.

    A step behind, standing side by side, were four knights armed with mythical rank. It seems that these four people, are the four horsemen that Bonnie was talking about.

    Finally, the man in the clear monochrome ck uniform stood to Rudra''s left. He doesn''t look Japanese, this man should be Damrada.

    Yuuki, on the other hand, stood witty next to Damrada, very clear about his position. Then, simply, treat Yuuki as an enemy.

    That said, all of the high ranking people of the Empire were present except Kondo. Although our side also brought in senior subordinates, it was still overwhelmingly disadvantageous in terms of numbers.

    On the Imperial side, the Order of the Imperial Emperor''s Near Guard has dozens of sequential superiors, and the top "single digit" has five in it.

    Add to that Velgrynd, honestly Im doubting it can be won.

    By the way, Yuuki is also in.

    It is not too much to say that it is an unprecedented crisis.

    Presumably from Rudra''s words, it wasn''t Lace''s fault for bing this state, but rather it was set up in the first ce. Is it so disturbing to let the other party''s schemes seed

    In order not to let the other person read my mind, I put on a fearless attitude and said.

    "You''re the one who''s been killed this time, aren''t you? While considering that our actions might be guessed at, I didn''t expect it to turn out that way.

    That''s a lie.

    The original purpose was to attack with a few elites, always thinking that the domination was in our hands.

    "Hahaha, no need to be humble, it''s unexpected for me too. I already knew that the mecha legions sent out would be defeated, but I didn''t expect that not only were there zero survivors, but even the Awakened ones weren''t born, which is really beyond my calctions.

    It was born, but then beaten down by Diablo.

    There''s no need to tell each other everything, but the people who made the n are really good. That being said, from a human perspective it is heresy.

    "So, who''s making this n?

    Won''t tell me anyway, just try to ask around.

    But unexpectedly, Rudra was happy to tell us himself.

    ording to him.

    It was Lt. Kondo who made the n.

    I was going to say this was expected, but the n was even worse than I thought it would be.

    -Awareness of the number of the attacking army. Afterwards, the army feigned defeat.

    -Facing the pursuing army, meet it with hybrid legions. However, this legion has the potential for betrayal and can be treated as a hostile force.

    -Exclude all together when betrayal is clear. The task was entrusted to the "marshal".

    As a result, in the second phase, the n went awry.

    As a result, Kondo seems to have drastically changed his ns.

    -To envelop the original indulgence of Yuuki and the others. Even based on the information obtained from Demon Lord yman alone, it was possible to judge Yuuki that they had undoubtedly betrayed.

    -Beat Yuuki and the others. Confirm their attempts and then adjust the final n.

    -The assembled hybrid army is estimated at 60,000. Produce wizards in quantity by making them living sacrifices.

    -When the timees, the "marshal" wille out and put on a show to attract the attention of Guy and others.

    -Gather the troublemakers together and smash them down in one breath. For this, the battle strength needs to be focused to a point.

    -One of the benefits of the action is that the enemy can be misled into thinking that the imperial capital is unprepared. There are bound to be assants, and no doubt elite ones. The Empire then crushed it with maximum force.

    -Most importantly, it can be assumed that at this time, the war power of the Jura Tempest Federation will also be thin, and the "marshal" with the maximum war power tounch a challenge. When Guy''s eyes are drawn elsewhere, hell take the strongest pawn, the Storm Dragon, into his bag.

    The above is the full picture of the n.

    With the information he received from the Demon Lord yman, it was certain that yman had been dominated by Kondo before. Originally it was just suspicious, now that can be made clear.

    But that''s not what''s important.

    I didn''t expect the information to be made public to such an extent, so let''s not worry about that.

    There is a more important focus in the n just now.

    A chill ran down my back.

    Hey hey, wait a minute.

    There are several "marshals" in the nVelgrynd is on more than one scene at the same time.

    Right.

    It was strange just now, now that the battlefield in the eastern metropolis of the Dwarven Realm, Velgrynd should also be making a scene.

    So, what exactly is this guy in front of me?

    <<the! in="" the="" power="" of="" inquisitive="" abilities,="" and="" existence="" can="" create="" ability="" to="" be="" one="" with="" itself.="" thats="">></the!>

    "Parallel existence?"

    Praying in my heart not to guess, I spat out the inspection of the teacher of the King of Wisdom. But the reality is harsh.

    "Wow, you know that. That''s smart.

    Velgrynd''s smile was beautiful and terrifying at the same time. The more the heart prays, the more the bad premonitions will be fulfilled.

    You can''t win unless you can win. This shit!

    That is, my current state of mind that I cannot hide.

    No wonder, then, that Testarossa would assert that she couldn''t win.

    I was able to keep myposure because, ording to my judgment, by calling out Veldora, the disadvantage could be turned back into an evenly matched situation. But now I understand that I am no longer allowed to say such things.

    ording to the King of Wisdom, ''parallel existence'' seems a terrible power.

    Thinking about it alone, it didn''t look much different from the ''split body'' that Souei was good at. The Souei could manipte multiple Split Bodies at the same time, and it was impossible to tell which one was the main body, no matter how many Split Bodies were defeated, as long as the main body was okay, there was no problem.

    As long as magic doesn''t use light, it''s foul to create ''split bodies'' infinitely. After all, there was no difference in the physical abilities of the main body and the ''split body'', which was equivalent to the simultaneous existence of several Soueis.

    But, reveal it here.

    The maniption of this ''split body'' requires skill. It''s not a splitting of consciousness, it''s just a maniption of the time difference through ''thought transmission''. The speed of reaction is also adjusted through ''thinking eleration'', so that it seems possible to act simultaneously without any sense of disobedience.

    The reason why I don''t use ''body splitting'' much is because it''s quite a difficult technique.

    In other words, the Souei is the master of the game, with extraordinary senses. But I''m a little white and can''t y that well.

    One more point.

    Although there was no difference in physical abilities, the magic was naturally more ontological. For this reason, there is a downside to not being able to use all your skills. Souei''s ''''Split Body'''' could only use those skills that consumed less magic, and that was also the reason.

    So, by mastering this condition, one can discern which one is the proprioception. When the main body is knocked down, the ''split body'' also disappears, and the inability to be called invincible is the characteristic of this skill.

    However

    The ''parallel existence'' disyed by Velgrynd canpletely split the consciousness.

    Think of it this waymultiple ontologies existing simultaneously.

    That is to say, what is in front of us now is the Other Body, and even if it is defeated, as long as there is still an Other Body left, that Other Body can be the main body.

    And, there is no need for split magic.

    Because all the ''sub-bodies'' are connected to the main body, they seem to be able toplement each other''s magic at will.

    Only, there is a limit to the maximum. How much magic is divided, how much is the maximum magic of the other ''divided bodies'', including the main body, reduced.

    This is the key to the strategy, but the other party is the Dragon Race, which is known for its huge amount of mana. It''s faster to recover than to consume, and it doesn''t make sense not to consume to a certain degree.

    Honestly, I don''t know what it would take to beat it.

    Although I am not a Testarossa, I am now bing tempted to assert that ''victory is impossible'' and that there is nothing that can be done.

    I turned my gaze towards Velgrynd and smiled arrogantly.

    "Well, that''s very kind of you, I have a great partner. In terms of intelligence, I don''t lose. It seems that you think you have seeded in pulling us into a trap, so let me hear what your purpose is, shall I?

    There is only bluffing at times like this.

    Show that I see through your attempts. Make the other side waver and be able to be wary of us and earn it.

    But it won''t actually go that well.

    "How arrogant. The fact that they are not honestly admitting defeat is very simr to my brother.

    I think I''m referring to Veldora.

    With a sister like that, it must not be easy for Veldora.

    It''s as if I heard someone say, "Can you understand, Rimuru!?" But Rudra spoke up and turned his attention to her.

    "Purpose. Since you''re confident in your intelligence, there''s no need to say anything else, is there?

    Even if you say that, it hurts my brain.

    If the intention was to annihte us, the battle would have already been waged. Since there is a venue for talks like this, it means there is room for negotiation.

    Isn''t the answer derived from this an attempt to bribe us?

    <> I''m pretty good, too. Half the answers are right.</answer.>

    Indeed, it was mentioned in Kondo''s n that "Marshal" Velgrynd would take Veldora into her possession. I had thought that such a thing was impossible, so I ignored it, but since there was a ''parallel existence'', could it be that Velgrynd was heading to the Labyrinth now?

    I couldn''t let go and tried to talk to Veldora through the soul corridor".

    "Hello, how are you?

    "Idiot, this is not the time to talk about it! Something''s wrong. Sistersister she came staring at me. It''s still outside thebyrinth, but it''s going to be attacked at this rate!

    Seems to be busy as hell.

    "Can you handle it?

    "I''m the only one who can make an appearance. It''s better than just taking thebyrinth down like this.

    If it''s Veldora, I don''t think he''ll lose even with Parallel Existence as his opponent. With that in mind, I gave permission for Veldora to fight at full strength.

    "I''ll take full responsibility. I hope you can deal with Velgrynd. Can you please?

    "Ho-ho-ho-ho? If that''s the case, just leave it to me! Kuahahaha!

    "You''re in charge!"

    I put my mind down and ended the call.

    Handing it over to Veldora would be reassuring. Then, too, grasped Rudra''s attempt.

    Restart negotiations.

    "Your purpose is to draw us in. One more point. Stall us by talking, so that we don''t get involved in the fight with Veldora, right?

    I had a smug look on my face as if to say, Well?"

    Velgrynd showed a slightly surprised expression.

    Then, Rudra smiled happily.

    "What a delightful guy. It''s fun to have youpare wits with me, but there''s no time to enjoy the aftermath right now. Now that you understand that, words are good. Bing my servant will guarantee your territory will remain untouched and give you the status of Archduke again.

    "Rudra! If you give the title of Grand Duke to someone who is not rted to you by blood, it will cause other nobles to resent it.

    "It''s okay. If hes willing to assist me, he would be of such value.

    Higher than the Duke, is the Archduke.

    Generally speaking, blood rtives within a generation of the emperor do not know if they can be grand princes. And Rudra made sure to give me that status.

    This is an unprecedentedly generous treatment from an imperial perspective. It has even been heard that the Empire does not ept the surrender of defeated nations and forcibly annexes in order to expand its territory.

    The long years of empire that expanded its territory through wars of aggression prepared me for supremacy. Honestly, it seems the Empire thinks more highly of me than I thought.

    However, however.

    Sadly, my answer has long since been determined.

    "I can understand that it''s a very good proposal, but the answer is ''no''. Instead, I have a proposal. Why don''t we shake hands and make peace here? I will not ask forpensation and hope to conclude a non-aggression treaty."

    It didn''t matter how many sacrifices there were among those who served themselvesRudra was the one who would think like that and would not defect to him unless he wanted to kill himself. Don''t think of yourself as the only exception, and hold such naive thoughts that there is only one big road to destruction.

    So, I firmly reject Rudra''s proposal.

    Compare that to this.

    It''s a rare opportunity to make this side''s im first.

    From my personal point of view, after all, there were no casualties, and no intention of making the other person apologize. If we can be assured that we will not be interfered with again, then this invasion can be left alone.

    Odds are some people will have an opinion, but if it can end perfectly without further bloodshed, that''s the best way to go.

    I know I''m naive and understand that treaties are unreliable. Since the other party is not trustworthy, they will break the contract someday.

    But the important thing is to buy time.

    If reconciled here, each would have time to get to know the other. As long as there is time for further mutual understanding, there is hope for avoiding war in the future.

    If the war continues in this way, there will be only one step to take. In that case, think about taking a gamble on that one possibility.

    However, Rudra''s reply was a sneer.

    "Surely, you''re not the type to dominate. I don''t understand mypassion, but I''m joking.

    "How arrogant. Rudra has already made the biggest concessions and doesn''t appreciate them.

    Clearly having lost millions of troops, they still have the tone of overwhelming high rollers. They really didn''t think about defeat in their heart of hearts. The loss of a soldier due to his own orders was no loss to him.

    Because of this, Rudra made me feel terrible.

    I believes that humans are creatures that can understand each other. Ultimately, they will unite into a single will to create a better world. To that end, world unity by overwhelming force is indispensable.

    Rudra''s words sound simr to the ideals I portray. However, there is a huge gap between the two that cannot be filled.

    It made one anxious to lecture him.

    The evidence lies ining to the exact opposite conclusion from me when it is clear that the starting point is the same.

    I was expecting more of an idealist, but not so. Rudra argued that only his own dictatorship was absolute justice, with a dictatorial mindset that would not allow anyone to think.

    Sure enough, he and I were ipatible.

    There''s so much disagreement on the proposition that it''s no longer possible to findpromise points through conversation.

    "Man is a creature of free will. There is no eternal justice in the world, and everyone thinks differently, right? Not wanting to agree with that will only sow the seeds of strife.

    "Stupid. Only the remaining thoughts are supreme and righteous. You must know that even if you cater to the whims of fools, you will not reach the ideal world.

    "No matter who it is, there will be times to make mistakes!"

    "I dont deny it. Even I would listen to the input of my ministers. What''s more, it''s impossible to want to respond to all the voices of the gullible people. If you do something like that, you''ll bring turmoil to the world.

    Gobbledygook, indeed perhaps as he said

    The quarrel didn''t feel like it could bother him either. As much as I hate to admit it, Rudra has been a dominant for far longer than I have.

    "Well, there''s no point in arguing here. What is expected is your loyalty. Rimuru the demon lord, give up Guy and be ourpanion.

    Once again, persuasion.

    It looks like he''s going to have a showdown with Guy.

    If I defected to Rudra at this point, the scales would indeed tip. It is safe to say that it is because of this that he keeps us alive.

    That being said, my answer is the same as just now.

    Now that the negotiations have broken down, fighting is inevitable.

    As if reading my thoughts, a cold smile emerged on Velgrynd''s face and she crossed her index finger gracefully.

    Gently, twice.

    Then, an image emerged from the sky.

    The same principle as my Argos. In the image, the current battlefield is reflected.

    What''s on the screen is

    Pouring out in front of Velgrynd, Testarossa, Ultima, and Carrera were the three. Surprisingly light.

    The trio, also known as the highest fighting force in our country, lost to just one person.

    "That''s a lie!

    I couldn''t help but mutter.

    In the image, the demoness trio stood up again. They dont seem to have lost the will to fight, but in the face of an irreversible power gap, they are forced into a bitter battle.

    I had to realize that they didn''tst long.

    "Even the primordial ones you were counting on are in such a state before me. Think carefully about it.

    You''re smart enough to understand that I''m being lenient.

    Needless to say, it''s a threat.

    If Velgrynd had that intention, hispanions, other than the demoness trio, would not be safe.

    It was not known whose intention this was, but Rudra they gave the biggest concession.

    After all, Gabil and the others, too, couldn''t spare a hand to help the demoness trio. At some point, airships appeared over the battlefield, from which Imperial forces emerged one after another to join the battle.

    On the ground, there were also Kondo''s men.

    In addition to Kagali, who was performing the ritual, originally Yuuki''spanions were also fighting the dwarven army.

    Tear! And Footman too!

    Along with Lace''s shouts, I sensed that those tricky masked majins were among the enemy forces.

    The battlefield is like a melee, and the format is not optimistic.

    It''s in bad shape.

    I also sensed that Benimaru was worried about me.

    However, I cannot give in here.

    "I know your purpose. It''s easy to pull in Veldora as apanion, just pull in me first and then it''s easy.

    That guy does as he pleases and will never obey the orders of his superiors.

    However, Veldora did listen to me a lot.

    It''s just that I''m always angry, and maybe they''re starting to get a hard-on for me too.

    Anyway, that should be the reason for pulling my strings. ording to this idea, in a nutshell, he rejected Rudra''s persuasions severely. On that basis, look for otherpromises "You don''t have to expect negotiations. Take it or leave it. Be clear.

    Suddenly the option is thrown.

    A refusal would have plunged you straight into a fight with a low sess rate.

    But if one agrees, one must throw oneself into the battle against one''s heart.

    In time, following the will of others rather than acting on one''s own will will likely result in greater sacrifice.

    "Unite into one will for a better world. That''s what you said. Is that a world where anyone can live with a smile on their face?

    What?"

    "Even if there is no war, no hunger, but if free will is taken away, doesn''t the meaning of living cease?

    What you are trying to do is an act that deprives humanity of possibilities! Have you thought about this properly?

    "You mean the possibility? This kind of stuff isn''t needed. Acknowledging the freedom of mankind, it is likely to go straight to the path of destruction. This act not only detracted from my thoughts, it also went against Guy''s expectations. In that case, isn''t it only natural to need a manager in order to keep the world from derailing from the right path?

    "To a certain extent I can understand, and do not deny. But is that a world withughter?"

    What I want to do, in the grand scheme of things, is also to try to manage humanity. But to a certain extent, to be entrusted to the will of man.

    Overprotection takes away the opportunity to grow.

    People are tougher than they think and there is no need to manage from beginning to end.

    "Laughter? Saying something naive and stupid. No matter how much sacrifice is made, there is nothing that can be done forsting peace. There''s no need to ask permission one by one in order to guide people who can''t understand this. It takes some patience for the great happiness of the future.

    It''s not that he doesn''t understand, but that hes notpatible with me.

    Rudra was going to do something that did not focus on the individual. That, no matter how you think about it, will go against my righteousness.

    "Indeed, obedience is impossible. You want to do something that I think will only spread more misfortune and I will never agree with it.

    "It''s stupid to refuse my offer of help.

    "Stupid is stupid. I mean, why did you be king? Because it looks amazing? Or do you want to enjoy the luxury?

    "Saying something stupid, of course, its for the people."

    "Don''t lie to me! I also consider myself a demon lord for everyone, and wish more people could live with a smile on their faces. Of course, sacrifice is inevitable, but I''m taking pains to reduce it. How can you think like that and be so dry!

    Trying to create a good world without sacrifice, that is not possible. That being said, there were also numerous sacrifices that appeared when I became a demon lord.

    It seems to me to be the other side''s own doing and not regretting it, but as far as the loved ones of the victims are concerned, they can''t ept it even if I say so.

    It is, I bear the sin.

    Likewise, Rudra should be guilty of a sin that cannot be ignored.

    Hearing my words, for only a moment, Rudra''s burning gaze turned toward me. However, it seemed to regain itsposure immediately, looking at me and muttering to himself, "Young and naive."

    Rudra?"

    "Don''t worry, Velgrynd. I really, it''s been a long time since I''ve been so excited. I didn''t seed in convincing him, but it''s a shame to eliminate him.

    "It''s a bad habit, Rudra. Standing there with Yuuki too, I just can''t understand your collecting addiction.

    Don''t talk to us like we''re toysI want toin, but forget it.

    Now that the negotiations have broken down, it''s time to get ready to fight.

    I made a wink and the entirepany went into pro forma. It was also well in preparation while I was talking to Rudra.

    Defeat Rudra here.

    Having made up my mind so much, I was about to ask.

    However.

    "However, it''s a shame we didn''t seed in convincing Demon Lord Rimuru. And the boy, unexpectedly strong. For not listening to me, I wanted to give him a little punishment. But if you want to maintain the ''parallel existence'', you will not be able to feel the power, so let''s give it our all.

    "Ho? Can''t be convinced?

    "Don''t even listen. But it''s also like his character.

    I couldn''t help but turn my attention to Velgrynd.

    Don''t worry about Veldora.

    I didn''t expect the invincible "Storm Dragon" to lose, but the opponent was also a monster beyond imagination. Now that nothing is incredible no matter what happens, I suddenly start to worry.

    "What, are you worried about the kid? Then I hope you promise Rudra. In that case, I won''t have to hurt my cute little brother.

    Velgrynd, again, floated the image into the air.

    The screen shows a battle with a wounded Veldora, transformed into a dragon pose.

    "One thing I''ve been meaning to ask is, how did you tame that boy?

    Hmm?"

    "I''m asking you, how did you get Veldora to submit to you?

    No, he didnt obey me.

    "I''m friends with Veldora. That''s all.

    "Yeah, I don''t think so. It''s a shame.

    Seemingly genuinely sorry, Velgrynd sighed.

    "In that case, I''ll show no mercy. That boy, the only thing he has above me is the amount of mana.

    After saying that, Velgrynd disappeared.

    I was taken aback and shaken.

    I havee to understand that the purpose of Rudra and the others is to stall for time in order to defeat Veldora and tame him. After knowing this, we still apany them because we are also buying time.

    Velgrynd''s ''parallel existence'', while close to invincible, has a drawback. That is, the depletion of the amount of magicules.

    By eliminating "Parallel Existence" one by one, you can consume the split mana. Magicules dont recover right away and in general can weaken an opponent.

    Splitting out the amount of mana is too little to use a big move. It is for this reason that it is considered beneficial for Veldora

    But judging from the image, facing a Velgrynd''s ''parallel existence'', Veldora didn''t quite beat it either.

    Not only that, but through the Soul Corridor, one can also feel the anxiety of Veldora.

    The image floating in the air, as Testarossa their rival Velgrynd also disappeared. The Demoness trio also fought so hard for time that it ended up being for naught.

    I feel that this is not good.

    The power of Velgrynd exceeded my expectations.

    Seeing through our thoughts and using them as if to mock us

    "Do you care? Then, after this battle is over, another chance will be given. Realize how stupid you are, and your heart will change.

    Rudra''s voice seemed to be far away.

    I''m not willing, but I can''t do anything about it now.

    Velgrynd had disappeared and perhaps it was time to take down Rudra, but for some reason there was a bad feeling about it.

    So, I decided to witness the battle of Veldora to the end.

    In the second screen left by Velgrynd, the crimson dragon roars.

    The battle of the century between the "dragon races", which intensified

 Volume 14 - Epilogue

    A+A-

    Epilogue: Anger

    The scene in front of us is only adequately described by the Monster Armageddon.

    No, I''m not kidding.

    Because it can only be described that way.

    In battle, are two dragons.

    Although not the same shape, both are veryrge.

    "The Scorch Dragon" Velgrynd looks handsome and beautiful.

    She''s more agile than Veldora and has a better contoured line for flying through the air.

    What kind of battle will it be between the two?

    Although it waste at night, the sky was unusually bright.

    The Great Forest of Jura was burning with roaring mes, and the curtain of night reflected the mes as if dyed withyers of red.

    The capital city "Rimuru" has been hidden in thebyrinth so that it has not suffered any damage, and if it remains on the ground, it will probably be wiped out.

    The destruction of the gate connecting thebyrinth to the outside world was proof enough of that. The upper levels of thebyrinth may have also been devastated.

    The fight between Veldora and Velgrynd is in stasis.

    For Velgrynd lifts the "parallel of existence.

    Just looking at the tragic state of the forest one might not realize that both are actually in perfect control of their powers. Although the two used tremendous amounts of energy to attack each other, thebat precision was controlled with great precision.

    The speeds are notparable.

    Veldora has grown at a surprising rate.

    By deftly controlling his power to achieve ultra-high speed flight, he does not budge in the face of Velgrynd.

    It seems to be hiding and secretly cultivating, the fruits of which are manifested in battle.

    For now, it appears that Veldora has the upper hand slightly.

    Veldora was stronger if only the size of the power, the amount of mana, waspared. Not only were they higher than when they were sealed, but he had even learned other fighting techniques that led to the current fighting results.

    Even so, it didn''t take away my unease.

    Because in terms of magic operations, it''s still Velgrynd that has the bigger advantage. Now that Velgrynd has focused on Veldora, it''s safe to say that the real showdown is only now beginning.

    Even so

    Rudra''s calm demeanor was too much for me to let go.

    Why was he so calm when Velgrynd, who was supposed to be an absolute defense, wasn''t around?

    In my ce, it''s because of the peace of mind thates from being able to summon Veldora whenever I want. Regardless of the crisis, I believe that as long as Veldora is around I can get through it.

    Rudra must have been no slouch as well.

    After all, it was Guy who identified with it, and being able to easily dominate Yuuki at that point was quite threatening.

    But I''m also capable of the ultimate skill. There is also the hidden skill of empowering others in part based on my control, just as I did with Benimaru.

    Truth be told, the Imperial Emperor''s Order of Near Guards is no threat to me.

    Only the top five "single digits" and Yuuki are considered to be opponents to be wary of.

    In particr, the man named Damrada seemed dangerous.

    However, it is not an invincible opponent either.

    Even if we don''t count Lace in the battle strength, the fight is one in which we have an advantage.

    The above is my spection, but it is because of this that I feel more uneasy.

    Why would Rudra be so calm? That point makes me wonder.

    Was it to think that even without Velgrynd, there was still an overwhelming gap of strength?

    But even so, there''s no point in taking a chance here.

    Why on earth did Rudra have such confidence?

    While specting on Rudra''s intentions, Veldora''s battle situation with them also concerns me.

    After Velgrynd unleashed the fiery mes to attack, Veldora blocked with the barrier. Then Veldora unleashed a storm in return for a counterattack, but Velgrynd dodged his attack.

    It was a fierce battle.

    It was the kind of battle that would have made even me cringe, the fabulous one.

    This was the first time I had ever seen Veldora fight in earnest, beyond my wildest dreams. I didn''t expect Veldora to be able to fight with Velgrynd, who had suppressed Testarossa and the others.

    But it''s also taken for granted when you think about it.

    Veldora had already been able to use his ultimate skill ''Investigation King Faust'' with great proficiency.

    That''s why it was possible to go up against Velgrynd.

    Skill-wise, it was indeed Velgrynd who had the upper hand. However, Veldora''s King of Investigation was a cheating level ability.

    This is what the King of Wisdom told me about it, whose power is ''probabilistic operation. By the way, he also has the uppermost authority in the "Truthfulness" analysis system. It was as if with this ability, one could instantly see through the power of the enemy and respond appropriately.

    It''s even a little confusing, what''s the point ofbat specialization at this point?

    Truth be told, whoever can defeat Veldora, who is skilled in the use of the King of Investigation, is going to be very troubled.

    That''s why I firmly believe in the victory of Veldora.

    Even now, there were unseen attacks shooting at Velgrynd.

    It was simply unrecognizable through the image and looked as if Velgrynd had suddenly been hurt.

    However, I am very clear.

    What just happened was one of Veldora''s self-created must-kill techniques, called the Harvest Storm Attack. He kept showing off his must-kill skills to me, and I was really impressed after actually seeing it with my own eyes.

    At first nce it looks like all sorts of fluctuations are being put out in meaningless haphazardness.

    Then the ovep urs at the specified coordinates, and it is at this point that the effect is finally realized.

    The discovery was a step toote.

    After all, it''s already hit, and dodging and defense are out of the question.

    Oops, he seems to have developed a brilliant move.

    Just because every fluctuation seems ineffective, it''s subconsciously ignored. If you are inexperienced, you will definitely be hit, and it can be said that it is a must-kill move at first sight.

    Velgrynd was alsopletely hit by a straight attack from the Harvest Storm. Not to be outdone by Veldora, but also to dispel the unease in my mind.

    However

    Things changed rapidly the moment I was convinced of the unshakeable victory of Veldora going on like this.

    And it''s going in the worst possible direction

    Suddenly, a flying airship appeared in thebat airspace.

    Standing in the bow of the ship was a man in a different military uniform than the others.

    Lt. Kondo.

    As I panicked and turned to the reflection on the other side, the Kondo group who had just been there were gone. The ritual ended when Velgrynd lifted the ''parallel existence''.

    It seems I''ve panicked to the point where I don''t even notice these situations.

    <<notice. taboo="" mantra:="" "the="" undead="" elf="" was=""pleted="" about="" one="" minute="" ago.="">> Just a minute, but only a minute.</notice.>

    In this minute, Kondo came to the battlefield of Veldora and Velgrynd.

    Bad feeling after bad feeling after bad feeling. It was because I was unaware of the other party''s intentions that my invisible heart was driven to beat violently by anxiety.

    At this point, another figure appeared on the bow of the flying airship.

    That person, looks exactly like the person sitting in front of me.

    Just lucky?

    No, not right!

    "Parallel existence?"

    By the time I found out it was a step toote. What happened next didn''t even have a chance to be stopped, it happened in a sh.

    Kondo shot at Veldora with the pistol he held in his right hand.

    For the strongest of them all, Veldora the Storm Dragon, bullets and all that just don''t work. Yet after such a thought shed through the mind, the bullet pierced through Veldora''s skin with impossible speed.

    Beyond the unit of sonic speed, the speed of sublight is reached.

    The bullet fired at Veldora did not prate the body, but instead stayed inside him. Thus, the power of evil was liberated.

    Veldora began to feel pain. A wound that should have been repaired in an instant, but this instant was fatal.

    Rudra, in the image, held out his hand to Veldora.

    "Let me tell you. That''s called, the kingly power unleashed. It is the absolute power that can exercise dominion over all beings that possess consciousness. Even the True Dragon Seed can''t escape the remaining domination.

    While saying so, Rudra stood up.

    Once the purpose was served, he wanted to leave the ce.

    "Hey, give me a minute

    "Well, there''s a deal, by the way. I''m not interested in you anymore, if you join my banner, let''s show you a new world.

    Rudra never put me out of my mind.

    And it seems that the Rudra here, is the impostor that Velgrynd created with ''parallel existence''. While consciousness is shared, there''s no point in knocking this guy down.

    It seemed I was being toyed with by Rudra from start to finish.

    This represents, utter defeat.

    "Don''t underestimate Veldora.

    I realized that I was just unconvinced to say that.

    Totally regardless of what was going on inside me, Rudra told me the harsh truth.

    "It''s the True Dragon Race, more tricky than I thought, but atst it''spletely dominant."

    Rudra is telling the truth.

    Immediately after, I felt a pain in my chest.

    Intense pain that cannot be cured even if the pain is not effective.

    It''s like pulling the "soul" out of my body

    <<notice. master="" and="" the="" individual="" veldoras="" "soul="" corridor"="" has="" been="" destroyed.="" "storm="" dragon="" summoning"="" restoration"="" from="" ultimate="" skill="" king="" veldora"="" cannot="" be="" used.="">> I was appalled at being told the cause of the pain.</notice.>

    What?

    To take Veldora from me?

    To take the Veldora from me?

    "Don''t joke around, you beast!

    I hissed,shing out at Rudra.

    God speedas fast as I can make it right now.

    However, Rudra had no intention of duking it out at all, there was no need for that.

    My fists hit nothing.

    Rudra lifted the ''parallel existence'' and eliminated the Rudra that was no longer useful on this side.

    "Is that your answer? Also. It''s a shame that I wanted to take you in as my men, too. It seems that the remaining powers are not all-powerful, and it will be difficult to ''dominate'' again.

    What?

    "Since it''s not boring this time, I''ll give you a little more time to think. At any rate, you were trapped when you were recruited into this ce known as the Fortress of Dreams. Let''s just hope you''ll surrender yourselves.

    Leaving this sentence, Rudra disappeared.

    Using his voice as a signal, Rudra''s men were "diverted" away.

    I didn''t even have the thought of catching up, only a violent sense of loss and intense anger.

    "Don''t be ridiculous

    It was all the result of my carelessness.

    I wanted to attack him, but ended up falling into a trap, and although he guarded Lace, his opponent took advantage of this and deliberately prepared a more despicable strategy.

    There was no need for Rudra to remind me at all, the moment I entered the ce I had discovered it.

    It''s a distorted, isted space.

    Just getting out was enough, but there should always be something I could do. Such thoughts have unwittingly led to my carelessness.

    As cautious as possible, this time it was the opponent who had the upper hand. It''s a war that can''t be won every time.

    This kind of thing, needless to say, I know.

    "Damn it!"

    While screaming like that, I punched myself in the face with my fist.

    No pain. Only the heartache, which seemed to rip, was even more stark.

    "Please stop, Lord Rimuru!

    Shions words did not reach my ears.

    Two, three.

    And when I wanted to hit the fourth

    It was stopped by Shion, who was standing behind me.

    Not only Shion, but also Benimaru, Souei, and Diablo, each of them panicked and tried to stop me.

    "I''m sorry, I just got a little carried away. Impatience is a bad habit of mine, and thanks to you, I was able to regain myposure.

    I lied.

    My anger went up one by one.

    Even then I forcefully suppressed the anger in my heart and stood up at the same time.

    Even after indulging my anger and beating myself with all my might, my face was still intact.

    Quicker than Shion and Benimaru they could react, the King of Wisdom activated self-defense.

    Once again, I realized that everyone was watching over me.

    It is because of this that I am even more unable to forgive myself. In order to be able to fill this sense of loss, the anger kept spilling out.

    This anger, exactly where should it be directed?

    Ah, I remember.

    It''s a war that''sing.

    It that case, no mercy should be shown.

    So I, too, will be their opponent with all my might.

    Anger?

    That may indeed be the case.

    But, what''s wrong with that?

    The Empire has angered me.

    If so desired, It will be given to you.

    The blessing called perdition.

    Those fools have touched my reverse scale.

    I allowed my anger to unleash the power I''d been holding back

 Volume 15 - Prologue

    Prologue: Scorch Dragon vs. Storm Dragon

    For Veldora, this day could only be described as the day of doom.

    Empty ins.

    In response to the Imperial Army, the metropolis has been isted into a maze. It was because of this that the beautiful woman who flew from the sky became extraordinarily prominent in the image.

    "Sister, sister

    An involuntary expression on his face, Veldora muttered.

    The voice seemed impotent.

    This is an unimaginable state of affairs in the eyes of those familiar with Veldora''s usual words and actions.

    Charys asked as he opened his mouth to Veldora.

    "Hey, hey, is that your sisterLord Velgrynd, as rumored?"

    Well, wellexactly. That''s my sister, one of the strongest true dragon species, the "Scorch Dragon"

    Velgrynd

    On hearing this, all those who remained in the "control room" immediately acted. Emergency rms were sounded inside thebyrinth, and someone went to press for a maximum alert posture for use against the enemy.

    "Wait, wait, Master! What can we do without Rimuru?

    Ramiris panicked.

    She''s not usually of much use, and she can''t do anything but make noise at this time. If you do your research, let''s not say that Ramiris has no chance at all in the fight.

    However, Ramiris had reliablepanions.

    The still methodically moving maze keepers, the Treyni sisters, and the tree spirits under theirmand.

    Beretta was also there.

    Although Beretta had stepped back from the position of the Ten Lords of the Labyrinth, his position of the Labyrinth Chief was unchanged.

    Not to mention, half of those trusty Labyrinth Lords were caught in the sleep of evolution. As Former Chief of the Labyrinth Ten, this was the time for Beretta to be working to guard Ramiris.

    "It doesn''t look friendly. Let''s meet in the maze.

    The Treyni sisters had already grasped the situation of the various sses, Beretta said after confirming that information.

    There were only four Dragon Kings left in the Ten Lords of the Labyrinth. Gedora, though also awake, had already rushed to the armed nation of Dwargon with the Floor Guardian Colossus as reinforcements.

    Although it was not reassuring to take on Velgrynd, even this kind of battle power should be able to stall for time by using the perfect fortress of the Labyrinth, which was the basis for Beretta''s suggestion.

    In response, Veldora nodded.

    "I don''t know what she''s here for, but it''s ridiculous toe alone. There''s nothing to be afraid of when everyone''s at it! Kuahahahaha!

    Pretending tough forcefully and say so, in fact, Veldora''s expression twitched.

    He was afraid.

    Just the day before, Veldora had been tossed around by his eldest sister, Velzado. The memory is still vivid, but this time it was the second sister, Velgrynd, who single-handedly invaded the capital city of Rimuru," the capital of the Jura Tempest Federation.

    The situation seemed outrageous to Veldora, who was desperately trying to find a way to get through the situation.

    That''s why he immediately agreed to Beretta''s proposal.

    Just then.

    "Veldora, if you''re a good boy,e out and be honest."

    Velgrynd in the screen swore so.

    Incredibly, her sight pierced the screen and looked directly at Veldora causing him to stagger. Her voice, transformed into an idea conveyed to Veldora.

    "Lord Veldora?"

    "Charys, yo, don''t panic! It''s a trap, and if I casually go out at this time, I''m sure I''ll be screwed!

    "Ha, ha

    Hearing Veldora make a humiliating statement, even Charys showed a troubled look that he could not hide.

    "Huh? Since it''s Master who''s being targeted, doesn''t that not have anything to do with us?ack!

    Ramiris, who wanted to mboyantly dodge the crisis, was gagged by Veldora''s hand and turned into a situation where she was reluctantly but nheless reeled in.

    Thus, the posture of total resistance to war took shapeyet.

    "Yeah, aren''t you going toe out? Stupid, still no different from the past. Well, then I''ll give you a gentle warning for once.

    It was impossible to tell from the image what Velgrynd was saying, but the feeling she gave had changed and all those present understood that.

    As for Veldora who could hear the other''s voice, it was even more so that she had already sensed what Velgrynd was up to.

    But

    No, it''s okay. Ramiris''byrinth is constructed with a superior power that can iste even the subdimensions, and it''s hard for even me to break it.

    Right.

    As long as one is in thebyrinth, escape from Velgrynd is possible. While the maze might be damaged by the other side by ayer or two, Ramiris'' repair power is stronger. It shouldn''t be impossible to keep Veldora in constant istion if she also lends her strength.

    "Don''t panic. As long as I join forces with you, no matter who the opponent is"

    Veldora had intended to state so, but could not get the words out.

    For he had witnessed the sight of Velgrynd generating a true rednce in her hand.

    "Master, Master! That''s not good. If we don''t, we might not be able to protect ourselves from thebyrinth!

    It goes without sayingVeldora thought the same thing.

    "I know! Everyone, prepare for impact!"

    No one doubted Veldora''s words.

    Everyone immediately and honestly put up a defensive stance on the spot.

    A violent onught then assaulted the maze.

    "It''s a lie, it''s a lie

    "It is confirmed that the victims have spread to the 50th and 50th levelsand the upper levels are in a state of destruction.

    Alpha and Beta, among others, kept passing around damage reports. These facts, caused the moment thebyrinthine safety myth copsed.

    Right now.

    The ''thought transmission'' from Rimuru reached Veldora, who was in a great panic.

    Hello...how are you?

    At this leisurely voice, Veldora returned indignantly.

    "Idiot, now is not the time to say such things! I''m in big trouble. SisterSister has her eye on me.

    Although she''s still outside the maze, she''s going to fight her way in if she keeps this up!

    If it''s RimuruRimuru who can certainly do something about this situation.

    Embracing this confidence, Veldora waited for the other''s response.

    But when I came back, I said, "Are you all right? He had asked back in a worried manner.

    Hearing this, Veldora understood.

    Rimuru didn''t have anything left now either.

    If there was anything left, he would havee straight back right away. Since Rimuru wasn''t doing that now, it meant there was no way to get his help.

    So what?

    The naive thought disappeared from Veldora''s mind.

    Since it was impossible to rely on Rimuru, it was a matter of doing it himselfhe had that self-consciousness.

    "I have to go out myself. At least it''s better than just letting her go into the maze.

    It feels like I should be able to fightVeldora thought so baselessly.

    Although he was very forgetful, Rimuru''s cultivation was also very good. If you can survive that kind of cultivation, even if your sister, Velgrynd, is your opponent, you shouldn''t lose, Veldora thought to himself.

    "I take all the responsibility. Can you please find a way to deal with Velgrynd?

    Rimuru didn''t seem to think Veldora would lose either.

    He will take all the me, which means that no matter what destructive act Veldora does, Rimuru won''t be angry. If you think about it further on this basis, it is like saying "Show me the fruits of your practice so far.

    Besides

    Now that the words of please have been heard, there is only one answer.

    "Banter? If you say so, then I''ll take it all! Kuahahahaha!

    With that said, Veldora turned his gaze back to Velgrynd.

    The session with Rimuru had brought Veldora back to his usual mind. He even felt himself calm down quickly during the session.

    "I''ll have to deal with her myself."

    With an easygoing attitude, Veldora responded.

    Master?"

    "Lord Veldora!?

    Both Ramiris and Beretta looked at Veldora in surprise.

    Veldora responded with a valiant expression swept away by annoyance.

    "Kuahahaha! I don''t want to fight my sister either. But since the maze is no longer working, there''s no other way.

    But"

    "Okay, Charys. The reason the maze does not die is because it is an isted space that can be established. Since this won''t work for my sister, I''ll have to do it myself if I want to minimize the damage.

    As long as Rimuru is alive, Veldora is indestructible. So to want no sacrifices, one has to put Veldora out of action.

    "In that case, I''ll go with you.

    "No, I''d rather not. Even though you''ve be stronger, you''re stillpletely iparable to me. It would have been fine with Zegion, but the others would have just held me back.

    It''s a harsh statement, but it is what it is.

    And Veldora, too, is ready toe to his senses.

    The look on his face that he was now looking forward in awe even made one forget that he had that bear look just now.

    "Is it all right, Master?

    "It doesn''t matter how! Both of my sisters, I feel horrible about what I''ve done just thinking about it

    never mind. I also grew stronger after meeting Rimuru. Receiving a disciple, perceiving his immaturity.

    It''s not the same as it used to be. Kuahahahahahaha!!!

    Forcing a smile on his face, Veldora livened up the mood by doing so, regaining his usual form.

    "So don''t worry. All you have to do is stay here and take a good look at my bravery!

    With this announcement, Veldora left thebyrinth alone.

    Veldora recalls past battles with Velzado.

    The big sister, who has not been seen for a long time, has given people the feeling of being powerful and unreachable and unbroken since the past.

    However, the Veldora of the past does not feel this aura. The encounter with Rimuru made his growth impressive.

    The greatest result of this is the acquisition of the ultimate skill.

    Watching Rimuru from the ''stomach pouch'' while being sealed has taught Veldora all sorts of things.

    Then he sensed it.

    Strength that makes sense only if it can be used freely.

    Veldora has a huge amount of mana, arguably thergest of any surviving "dragon species". It was precisely because he possessed a greater amount of mana than his two older sisters that he was able to effortlessly upy the corner of the strongest lineup.

    However, this is just pandering.

    Veldora knew.

    There are guys in this world who struggle to win to the end, even as underdogs.

    Rimuru was like that, and there were many such presences among his own adversaries.

    So did Hinata and Granbell, and Ruminas the Demon Lord.

    These people not only rely on strength, but also use various means to gain victory, and are a group of guys who are absolutely careless.

    In understanding this now, Veldora is different than before.

    The proof is that the matchup with Velzado, also no longer being run over unterally, can do the counterattack.

    Velzado is, arguably, a natural enemy to Veldora.

    A very bad opponent in terms of the phase nature of the force.

    Velzado, who was born before himself, had an upper limit of power that waspletely inexplicable.

    Veldora, who only had a higher amount of mana than their opponent, could barely cope at best when fighting, unable to gain any advantage at all.

    Even if one fights seriously, victory remains hopeless.

    Since birth, Veldora has gone to challenge Velzado several times, but in the end all have been countered by each other.

    Velzado''s "Frozen World" is both an iron-walled defense and a weapon that seals Veldoras movements.

    Storms, destruction, erosion, annihtion.

    All of these effects would have no effect in the face of an absolute stop.

    Fighting against such a terrifying sister, he himself managed to take a slight advantage, and even Veldora himself was surprised.

    Me, I''m a good one!

    He generated such a mood.

    However, although Veldora was aware that he could control his own magic, Velzado, who was his sister, had perfect control over the release of magic.

    The difference in skill level between the two sides is too great topare.

    The nature of Velzado''s power is to specialize in the "cessation of movement energy (deceleration),

    and this power does affect the win or loss between the two, but there is no doubt that there is an overwhelming difference of power between them.

    Being able to take on such a Velzado, Veldora''s amazing growth has even been praised frankly by the opponent.

    "Well, that''s amazing. That Veldora-chan, who would only make a mindless fuss, could actually think before he fought. I''m sure it''ll be fine without destroying you.

    Even if it isced with some dangerous words, it is undoubtedlyplimentary. Since there had always been nothing but fearful feelings towards his sister, the words still made Veldora feel happy.

    Having said that, the fact that he can''t beat the other side still can''t be changed just yet

    So, what about against Velgrynd?

    Velzado and Velgrynd are basically not on par. In Veldora''s opinion, either side was a sister who was not good at dealing with herself, and he honestly didn''t want to deal with them if he could.

    However, the situation was such that he had to strike out.

    "Sister Velgrynd is still amazing. That kind of attack that runs through thebyrinthine levels is obviously not something that can be done that easily

    One or twoyers can still be destroyed by brute force twisting the secondary elements. However, it was impossible to infuse the maximum amount of mana avable to Veldora in an attack by running a plural ss through such a thing in one breath.

    "The key is the ultimate skill. If I want to have a serious fight with my sister, I''ll have to use

    Investigation King Faust" too.

    Yes, if only topare the amount of magicules, Veldora is above Velgrynd.

    At least better than being Velzado''s opponentto be able to think that way is because Velzado has crossed the mental barrier.

    The key to victory lies in how the power is used.

    Although neither side would move the real fight, the strength was undoubtedly higher on the Velgrynd side.

    But that''s all in the past.

    Velzado is hard to beat because of her element, but not so with Velgrynd. Not to mention, Veldora now has the blessing of Rimuru having gained the ultimate ability of the ''King of Investigation.

    With this power that would work against even Velzado, there was nothing to fear even if the opponent was Velgrynd, Veldora thought so.

    Thinking about it, Veldora suddenly had a dry spell.

    Kuahahahahaha! Not necessarily losing yet. Anyway, the other party is a sister, so let me test my strength to the fullest!!!

    Having made his judgment, the well-conscious Veldora stood before Velgrynd.

    ***

    Keeping in human form, the two looked at each other in the air.

    A motionless standstill in the air is a very natural thing for them, the true dragon species".

    "That''s smart, you understood my warning correctly. That means you''re willing to help me, right?

    Velgrynd asked happily so while staring at Veldora. However, the other side answered in the negative.

    "I refuse, sister. I''m not my sister''s tool. Please don''t involve me in your sisters quarrel.

    "It''s a bit of an understatement to be implicated. It''s just that you are willing to assist on your own initiative, and I wee you as apanion. If you promise to help me, I''ll not only teach you how to use your power, but I''ll also make a big deal out of you. But I''ll designate the ce for the fuss.

    "Kuahahahaha! I''ve already said no, sis. I''m also not the same person I used to be, having perfected the use of power. Also, there''s no fun in just making a scene. I''m a mature adult now!

    "That''s a lot of talk. Am I pampering you a little too much? Well, in that case, let me try to see how much you''ve grown!

    Although the answer was casual in mouth, Velgrynd already had the intention of fighting, so it was natural for Veldora to enter into a fighting state.

    From the very beginning, Velgrynd did not feel that she could make Veldora obey her orders by mere verbal intercourse.

    Demonstrate strength and make the other party obey.

    If that doesn''t work, weaken Veldora and then let Rudra dominate him.

    She will try to persuade, out of the tenderness of Velgrynd.

    It was for this reason that Velgrynd had developed a slight displeasure with the matter of the bargaining break, and that was why she had not hesitated tounch a surprise attack on Veldora, intending to weaken her brother as soon as possible, and then wait for Rudra to arrive to dominate him.

    However, the hand de attack she released with her right hand was easily defused by Veldora. Not only that, but the opponent returned the kick immediately.

    Velgrynd takes the kick with her left hand despite being upset

    How!? This kind of power, no matter how you think about it, is not a weakened state, is it!?

    Velgrynd had always thought that Veldora had not yet recovered from the damage he had received from the three hundred year seal. It was because she only knew the Veldora who always used his power to the fullest that she had developed the preconceived notion that her brother''s present weakness was due to the influence of the seal.

    The offense and defense just now made her realize that it was wrong.

    "You seem to have gotten better, havent you? It doesn''t seem like it''s just words.

    "I am invincible in my Veldora Killing Arts Style! Sister, you know your own powerlessnessh, h, hright in front of my fist?

    Veldora wanted to start exining, but Velgrynd didn''t listen to his reasoning, honestly. Let''s just say she has started to attack more aggressively because of the fire.

    The red lotus boarded up to Velgrynd''s twin fists, as well as her legs that protruded from her long skirt.

    The dance-like attack became a majestic move that could burn the enemy to death just by rubbing it.

    Nevertheless, Veldora resisted.

    "It''s hot, it''s hot, it''s hot, it''s hot!

    Although he ran around with a disgraceful look on his face, he didn''t suffer much.

    "I''ve taught you so many times so far, and it seems that you still haven''t gotten better at the root of the problem. If you dare to say that you are invincible in front of me, you have to stop talking big!

    Even though the anger was as intense as fire, Velgrynd was still very calm. She had seen through Veldora not only fully replying, but also bing stronger than she had expected.

    Troublesome still. In this form, I can''t really do him much damage. In that case, even if Rudra came, he wouldn''t be able to dominate him

    Velgrynd''s original purpose was not to punish Veldora, but to dominate him.

    As predetermined, Veldora will be liberated whenever the scales of victory and defeat are tilted in Rudra''s favor. But for now, the most expected thing is for him to perform the duties of an important pawn.

    Continuing to shrink from the fight was pointless in the view of Velgrynd, who had generated the thought.

    The same is true of Veldora in this regard.

    Woohaa!

    The clothes that Veldora was now wearing had been given to him as a thank you gift by Rimuru. Such an important piece of clothing, only to have it burned because of Velgrynds attack.

    If there had been more time, that garment would also have been stained with Veldora''s demonic Qi and be a part of his body. However, it was impossible to expect such a change in just thest few days.

    Although Veldora himself hadn''t suffered much damage, his heart had been severely wounded.

    In fact, it was all Veldora''s own fault, but he now felt that even if he took it out on his sister, he would have no problem.

    And this situation, for Veldora, was actually a blessing.

    Anger can dilute the heart of fear.

    No matter how much energy is poured out, the fear that has been cultivated over the years cannot be shaken.

    To Veldora, the two sisters were symbols of terror. It''s simply outrageous to go all out for an opponent with such women.

    Now, however, he was free from this yoke.

    "Even my own sister, I cannot forgive. Just feel my wrath!!

    With a loud yell, Veldora freed the force.

    The next thing that appeared was a dark dragon with a powerful majesty.

    Seeing this scene, Velgrynd snickeredJust the way I wanted him to.

    "Huh? If you say something like that, you must have a limit. Looks like you''ve forgotten about it, so I''ll re-teach you the fact that you can''t beat me.

    With that said, Velgrynd also transformed.

    Transformed into the deft and beautiful, true red dragon.

    And just like that, the Battle of the Monsters began.

 Volume 15 - Ch 1

    Just as Rimuru was preparing to infiltrate the Imperial Capital, the Dwarven King Gazel Dwargo was in the middle of a desperate battlefield at the moment.

    He watched intently as the beautiful incarnation of death scattered in the distance.

    "Gravity Copse is theoretically infinitely more powerful. Do you think it can be defended with Legion magic?"

    "To put it mildly, it''s not possible to have a magical strike force to defend with a magical support force.

    The Dragon Race is not something that can be summed up in danger."

    Answering Gazel''s question was the Supreme Commandant''s ss at the Military Ministry.

    He had set up a formation here to await the arrival of Gazel, and was thus able to witness the final end of the Imperial Hybrid Legion.

    The soldiers were speechless in the face of an overly absurd tragedy. The war effort had been thwarted long ago, but they had not fled, so he must say something remarkable to them.

    In fact, they have all understood that even if they run away, there is still no future.

    If one''s own death prolonged the little time one''s family had to live, it was enough as a meaning to stay here, to still maintain the column, supported by such thoughts.

    The soldiers believed that the heroic king Gazel would not let them die in vain, so they swore allegiance to Gazel.

    Bearing the expectations of the soldiers, Gazel felt bitter. Although it is not visible on the surface, it has actually be a mess on the inside.

    We can''t win, more than that, it''s a waste of everyone''s life. You want to surrender? However, the Empire does not allow such things, at least we have to show a certain amount of power before we can do so

    The Empire will not tolerate subservience if it cannot be made to believe that the interests of drawing us in are greater than those of directbat.

    Then, there is no other way to live except to resist the war outright.

    No matter how much sacrifice has to be made, one has to believe that these are not deaths for nothing.

    "Quality is more important than quantity, but that''s too much of a foul, so we''ll have to go ahead and take her down.

    "Hey hey, doesn''t the king care about his responsibilities anymore?

    "Idiot, isn''t there only one enemy, so there''s no point in even asking me for responsibility in this situation, is there?

    Bens question made Gazelugh bitterly.

    With the enemy alone, Velgrynd, any strategic tactics were pointless, and it was up to Gazel to open up a way to live. Ben was well aware of this and joked with him like this in order to relieve the pressure inside Gazel.

    Sensing this, Gazel''s confusion dissipated.

    At this point, Anrietta came to report.

    "My lord, the enemy seems to be more than just the Scorch Dragon, and behind it the scent of plural creatures appears to be performing some kind of ritual, and Lady Jane says that the great magic is part of the ritual"

    Gazel nodded in response.

    The great magic cast by sacrificing 60,000 troops was used to perform some sort of ritual, and just by hearing that, one could tell that some sort of evil attempt was being made to make people not want to imagine it.

    Even so, it would be extremely difficult to defeat the key Velgrynd, so the only thing that could be done was to defeat those located behind her.

    "Want the troops to move?"

    At Dorfs question, Gazel shook his head.

    A heavily-armed strike force has poor mechanics, and a flippant move could be a target for magic. It was meant to rely on their thick shields to move forward, but none of that made sense in front of Velgrynd.

    So, the only way left is for the 500 Knights of the Sky tounch a special attack

    "It''s not a good idea to reduce the defensive strength here, but we''ll have to do what Gazel said. Isn''t that right, Dorf?

    Ben chuckled.

    Dorf scratched his head and replied matter-of-factly.

    "That''s disrespectful, Ben. You call the king by his first name, but you should behave yourself! More attention should be paid to the position

    The lecture was going to go on forever, but Dorf grinned in approval again as if he had suddenly looked away from something.

    "But this time, you have a point. In order to buy as much time as possible, one should avoid spreading the battle. Besides, we''re the only ones who can easily fight the enemy, so we might be able to surprise them.

    And Anrietta didn''t object.

    "Lady Jane also said toe to the battle after convincing the elders. Leave the matter of the rear to Lady Jane, ande and make a fuss, as before!

    He waited for Gazel''s reply.

    These oldpanions, as always, haven''t changed much.

    Willingness to work with Gazel to ovee the current difficult situation.

    Gazelughed.

    "Oh, what a bunch of idiots. The brief in charge of supervision is to hear what these really don''t know what to say"

    Jane has been tending to the Gazel group since the past and has given much advice. As the strongest magical mentor in the Dwarf Kingdom, she was very trustworthy for Gazel to consult with.

    Jane will be angry, I suppose.

    Even so, Gazel made a decision.

    Only, this decision seems to havee a littlete.

    "Oops, oops, I''m just not watching for a moment, King Gazel is a real pain in the ass."

    Just before Gazel and the others were ready to go out of the formation, Jane arrived first with transfer magic.

    "Jane, did you hear everything?

    Jane nced at the embarrassed Gazel and shook her head.

    "I thought I would be able to have the look of a great king, so I can feel at ease. However, I won''t me you this time, there''s no other way to fight with such a presence. It''s because it''s impossible for the nation to deal with it, so the Dragon Race is ssified as a natural disaster.

    "Well, that''s true, too."

    Magic that humans can use cannot harm the Dragon Race. Just a moment ago, the tremendous magic that Velgrynd had used had long been beyond the ability of anyone to cope with.

    Even if all the people who can be called heroes in the human nation are gathered together, it is still unknown whether they can beat the Dragon Race.

    But that''s not to say there is no hope.

    Jane put that hope out there.

    "Just now, there was a contact.

    Hmm?"

    "Your Majesty will send reinforcements. We''ll take action when they arrive.

    "Not much time has passed since I contacted you!

    "Even the old me doesn''t understand a bit, but it''s true, it''s a report from Vesta. After all, the people of that country, with just a word from His Majesty Rimuru, would have taken action

    Listening to Jane''s dumbfounded words, which contained a sense of fatigue, all those present could only nod their heads.

    That''s right, everyone understood right away.

    After that, faster than they could switch moods, reliable reinforcements had arrived first.

    ***

    Suddenly, space distorted.

    As if wrapped in a huge cocoon, the few elite troops then showed themselves.

    From Gabil came one hundred of the Flying Dragons and three hundred of the Kurenai,manded by Gobya, making four hundred men in all. Everyone had crossed the threshold of A level, a battle group that was good enough to rival the Order of the Sky.

    Even more striking is a huge weapon.

    "I''ve heard of it, but I didn''t think I''d go straight to war without stint."

    "That is, the finished form of the magical soldier?

    "Exactly. It seems that naming the Floor Guardian Colossus Statue is still reliable as apanion.

    Gazel certainly knew that this thing couldn''t beat Velgrynd, but its majestic appearance could put the soldiers at ease just by standing there.

    "So reliable. If it''s a power nt, it should be able to fight a little bit like a fight."

    "Unfortunately, there''s no point in facing these things in Velgrynd, and if it''s just catastrophe level, maybe something can be done.

    At this point, someone approached towards Gazel and the others in the session.

    Coming were the army chief, Gabil, and the trio of demonesses headed by Testarossa, and behind them, Gobya and Hakurou.

    "It''s been a long time, Your Majesty Gazel.

    Somehow, instead of Gabil, it was Testarossa who came to greet him.

    With a diplomatic license and a wealth of experience, Testarossa was already well versed in such asions.

    "Long time no see, Lady Testarossa. Thank you for the reinforcements."

    Originally, there would have been all sorts of questions answered by Gazel, and ritualistically, it would have been the norm for an intermediary to answer instead.

    However, now is not the time to count such things.

    Everyone understands that, so the war meeting was conducted without regard to form.

    The location shifts to themand post and cuts to the chase.

    Represented by Testarossa, whomunicated the guidelinesid down by Rimuru, and then proposed the course of action to be taken here.

    "Hmm, did Rimuru attack the Emperor directly?

    "It''s more realistic than a special attack."

    "Is that so? Always felt like it was a pretty messy fight too"

    A thoughtful Gazel.

    sses that have expressed approval of the improvement in the situation.

    Dorf who struggles to think otherwise.

    There''s no time to think about it.

    Since no one offered an alternative, Testarossa pushed the topic forcefully.

    "Lady Velgrynd will be dealt with by us, so the others will go and stop the rituals that are going on behind us."

    "No objection.

    Gazel agreed to the request for proposals.

    Since no other way could be found, the most dangerous task had to be left to themhe had judged.

    Jane raised questions.

    "One moment, Lady Testarossa, will you, the primordial, defeat the Scorch Dragon?

    This issue has very important implications for futurebat.

    Jane argues that Testarossa and the others can''t win because Velgrynd is just that overwhelmingly powerful.

    There was no doubt that the three Primordials were the most powerful, so it was important to make sure that if Testarossa and the others were defeated, it would mean that the fate of the remaining people hade to an end.

    "Honestly, we can''t win."

    "In that case! We should take defensive action and not provoke the other side rashly, and wait for His Majesty Rimuru to seed."

    Since there is no chance of winning, one should try to buy time. While Jane''s statement sounded correct, those in the Rimuru camp had a hard time epting the proposal.

    "Unfortunately, that won''t do. If Velgrynd is left alone, then she may return to the Empire to interfere with my lord.

    Carrera said firmly in her attitude.

    Although Rimuru said it was okay to leave it alone, she still felt the need to attract the other person''s attention.

    More importantly, I''m not here to discuss a battle n, but only tomunicate it by order of Lord Rimuru. If we can help each other, we can discuss it, and if it gets in the way of the battle, I hope you understand that it''s not something you can do."

    Hakurou, who normally didn''t talk much, was a harsh opinion when he opened his mouth. It is precisely because there is no time left that we must unite our minds even if there is apse in etiquette.

    Gazel rightlyprehended the implications.

    In order to put a stop to angrypanions, speak up.

    "Since His Excellency Hakurou, My Master, has said so, we can only give in. Or do you guys, have any other proposals?

    Gazel''spanions could only shake their heads heavily.

    "The Imperial Armys intelligence service is already on the move, and it''s not easy to obstruct the ritual, so the best thing to do is to join forces now.

    Dorf uttered the decisive words.

    After that it was just confirmation of the details, followed quickly by the start of the operation.

    ***

    Stimting Velgrynd was like stepping on a tiger''s tail.

    Even understanding this, the demoness trio were undaunted.

    "Can we get in the way of the ritual by dealing with her?"

    "Who knows?"

    "Gravity copses in a state that even I can''t maintain. I''m afraid even Velgrynd can''t handle the three of us while maintaining the cast, right?

    "That''s why I''m so vignt, because I think she can do it.

    Really?"

    "Gee, I''m serious."

    "Never mind, don''t bother. Just y around.

    With the usual tone of conversation, Testarossa and the others didn''t y any tricks either,ing to Velgrynd squarely.

    Of course, Velgrynd had spotted the three of them as well.

    But there was no warning at all, rather than letting the trio of demonessese closer with interest.

    "Greetings, it''s a good day for a fight."

    Testarossa sighed and Velgrynd responded with a smile.

    "Yeah. But before we start, I''d like to ask you a question. If you join my team, you''ll be treated well as the primordials.

    The demoness trio was still calm in front of her.

    The answer from Testarossa and the girls is of course, NO.

    "There is still some karma with the Empire, but allow me to reject this offer.

    "It''s the same for us. It''s nice to have a master for the first time, but I''m not letting go."

    "Yeah, and more importantly, the words are out of the way, let''s get this fight started. If you don''t want to go one on three, you can have those behind you join the fight.

    As if topletely cut off any possibility, a categorical rejection was made.

    To Carrera, it didn''t matter at all what the negotiation or whatever was going on, entirely because the fight had be atmospheric, and seeing Velgrynd''s magic up close had stimted her fighting instincts.

    Velgrynd smiled.

    "That''s your answer, all right. Then let''s have a little fun with you guys!

    This is the signal that the battle is on.

    Light and fluttering.

    In the presence of Testarossa and others, Velgrynd split.

    Nope.

    Like looking in a mirror, Velgrynd became two people.

    Testarossa had a clue about this phenomenon in her mind.

    "Tough aura then. It''s not the same as simply ''splitting the body'', but it''s a bit simr to Rhein''s ''all embracing'', right?

    Testarossa had fought Rhein in the past, and the cause of the dispute had been forgotten, but thebat experience had been gained nheless.

    The "all-embracing" of Rhein is to divide one''s body beforehand, and to have the ability to regenerate any part of one''s body, but unlike the "other body, consciousness can only be housed in one body.

    Even so, it can be quite vicious depending on its use, and it''s perfect for luring the enemy''s attention.

    Even if it''s slightly less useful against prudent opponents, it''s still a very powerful ability to use as insurance.

    Butparing creatures is too bad.

    From the mere fact that the Parallel Presence of Velgrynd gave birth to the Other Body, it cannot be denied that the All-Pervading Presence is a total disadvantage.

    Testarossa didn''t understand as well as she did, a shadow showing on her beautiful face.

    "What is it?

    "You can spread out your body and regenerate any piece of flesh."

    "I see. That means either one can be considered the main body, right?"

    Yes.

    Testarossa and others, who were not panicking and analyzing the status quo, had already started the battle and still spoke with such grace.

    Velgrynd said cheerfully.

    White Primordial is very clever, and yes, this is one of the powers I hold, ''Parallel Existence''. I don''t want you to interfere with the ceremony, so let me be your opponent.

    Elegantly pping the fan, Velgrynd dered.

    That''s not a very funny thing to say to Testarossa.

    The eyes red angrily at Velgrynd.

    "I now have the name Testarossa, given to me by my lord, Lord Rimuru, so don''t call me primordial white."

    She said, casually creating a ming whip without thinking, the whip twisted like a snake and attacked Velgrynd.

    "There''s such a thing as a name for the primordial by the Slime. It seems to be true."

    Uncertain information was affirmed, and Velgrynd was unable to hide her surprise, but she nheless dodged the whip''s attack with ease and without panic.

    "It is rude to call my lord the Slime.

    The indignant Carrera roared and let out her magic.

    The starting point is "gravity copse".

    Reduced in size as much as possible, and thus increasing in power, it was thergest attack that Carrera could muster right now, hitting her directly as Velgrynd''s consciousness focused on Testarossa.

    As if the pitch-ck pir that connected heaven and earth surrounded Velgrynd, the column just happened to hold her, like a prison from which there was no escape.

    However

    Velgrynd smiled generously, a bemused look on her face even in the cage of hypergravity.

    "He is the one whomands demons, and the power of magic is unmistakable. But as long as thews of the world are followed, it won''t work on the Dragon Race."

    As if to prove the point, Velgrynd smashed the Pir of Darkness from within, raising her own magic to interfere with Carrera''s magic, rendering it impotent.

    "Ha ha ha! No less than Lord Veldora''s sister, it was almost yful. Since the magic doesn''t work, I guess I''m out of options? No, and the swordy learned from Agera may not be of much use either, let me try it!

    While her own trick was broken, Carrera seemed to be still happy and not at all frustrated as she took the sword created by magic and set up a pose.

    The beautiful Taishou showed a strong aura that was disproportionate to the demon, and Carrera''s demon aura flowed into the de just like that, emitting a radiance.

    This is the right choice, not just to rely on magic or skill, but to create a skill that can touch the power of the Dragon Seed, the root of the world. ording to Lord Veldora, a woman named Hinata seems to prove it.

    Without trying, Testarossa already knew that magic wouldn''t work on Velgrynd, so she created a whip with magic from the start.

    The whip is white and has the paradoxical nature of a "frozen white me", a forbidden spell developed by Testarossa.

    "Well, humans are fun, so let''s use this.

    Ultima said as she took out two solidified swords, the bodies of which had a very toxic purple color, wrapped in an extraordinary demonic aura.

    You''re not hiding anything. Those things are the same ones that managed to hurt Zegion, right?

    "Well, to be honest, we always thought there was no point in moving our bodies.

    "I''m surprised that the experience of fighting with Lord Zegion woulde in handy in such a way.

    The women who were good at magic didn''t put a lot of importance on meleebat, but when fighting Zegion, there was no other means of attack that worked other than meleebat.

    Because Zegion had an iron-wall-like defense, as well as an absolute advantage against magic, almost all of which didn''t work against Zegion, and as a result, they were forced to fumble for other ways to fight.

    And the answer they came up with is now this.

    By betting on the existence of a spiritual being to give "an attack based on the strong power of the mind, they finally seeded in hurting Zegion.

    For spiritual beings, the power of the mind trumps all.

    Skill is also a form of the power of the mind generated by the desire of each individual, and the ultimate culmination is the ultimate skill.

    So how close can one''s mind get to the point where they conclude it''s just a matter of trying?

    By materializing this idea, you create weapons that you can use while they are still in hand.

    Zegion''s defense was not even inferior to the Dragon''s ability, and despite this, Ultima''s de still managed to do damage.

    That is to say, the attack of the demoness trio was even able to touch the probe ability.

    "After learning my weapon, my sword skills are just for fun, but I''ve got the true legacy of Agera, let''s try it out!

    Saying that, Carrera quickly ran up.

    Totally unconcerned with the defense, she makes a full force chop to Velgrynd.

    Velgrynd opens the attack with a lupine.

    A fan made of high grade feathers could hardly be called a weapon really, but its strength had be even harder than diamond due to the monster aura of Velgrynd.

    Thin, soft and hard, not at all inferior to Carrera''s Taishaku, a weapon that Velgrynd loved to use.

    "It''s amazing that you, as a primordial, gave up magic so easily.

    "Is it that surprising? All our glory is but a trifle in order to dedicate victory to our master.

    As Velgrynd had fallen into a defensive position under Carrera''s onught, Testarossa took advantage of the momentum to strike with her whip, chasing after her prey like a myriad of white snakes.

    Geez."

    Velgrynd smacked her tongue in displeasure.

    The hem of her skirt was also torn by the whip.

    Her beautiful jade feet are hidden, and the long red swellings can be clearly seen in them.

    That''s evidence that Testarossa''s attack worked.

    "Good job, Testa. That''s how I''m going to be avant-garde.

    "I''m d I got hit by a fluke.

    Even with a minor injury, Velgrynd is still very rxed, so only in the face of Testarossa and others will he make a major mistake.

    That is, carelessness.

    "It''s not a fluke!

    The sound of Ultima''s words like a boast of triumph was apanied by an instant of pain in Velgrynd''s nk.

    What!?

    A moment of confusion.

    As if aiming for this moment, Testarossa''s whip and Carrera''s sword attacked at the same time.

    On one knee, is Velgrynd.

    For a moment it was impossible to understand what was happening to her.

    No, not unintelligible.

    Rather, they don''t want to understand.

    "Hit the jackpot, Ultima. Let''s ask Lord Rimuru to collect the reward afterwards.

    "Good fight, but don''t be careless, just keep fighting like this!

    "Mmmmmm! There are other ''parallel existences'', so knock them down and stop the ritual from taking ce!

    Listening to these voices in the distance, Velgrynd stood up.

    "Ahhh, didn''t eating our attack do much damage?"

    "It took me a long time to undo your spell. The Dragon Race is really something."

    "But it''s not like you can''t be beaten. The damage can umte, and so it goes

    Before Ultima could finish her sentence, Velgrynd made her move first.

    With a speed that the three demons possessing super senses couldn''t even perceive, she quickly grabbed Ultima''s head and pressed it to the ground.

    Goo-ha!

    Unable to let out a groan, Velgrynd quickly disengaged from the ce after using Ultima as a jumping kick, followed by ate swing at Carreras chop.

    After getting out of range of Carrera''s attack, Velgrynd drew her nking knife and threw it aside.

    Her clothes were still tattered, but the snow-white skin was no longer scarred, as if to prove that the damage done by that barrage of attacks just now was nothing to Velgrynd.

    "Yes, it''s a monster.

    Carrera let out a low chuckle, to which Velgrynd responded in self-deprecating generality.

    "That''s not so bad. I''m not mature enough either. It''s been a long time since I''ve been careless enough to get hurt, but it''s just that I didn''t notice and nothing went wrong. It''s the same thing as being the strongest''s destiny, you guys can understand that too, right?

    Velgrynd said with a bitter smile, her eyes sharp, staring closely at Testarossa and the others, not intending to let go of any slightest movement.

    Don''t expect a second carelessness, and thus this moment, the possibility of victory for Testarossa and the others. disappears.

    "The primordials are a rather tricky existence, but it''s not from the point of view of a threat, it''s too much trouble to use you as an opponent. However, I have changed my mind now that you have gained a name toplete the flesh and be stronger than I thought, and I agree.

    They are not as powerful as themselves, but it would be very beneficial to have assistance in challenging their sister, Velzado, to be quite powerful.

    Just like now, Velgrynd took an unexpected attack.

    If this had happened during the battle with the sister, it would have basically been a deration of defeat for Velgrynd.

    The proof was that just now, the attack of Testarossa and the others had seeded in inflicting damage on Velgrynd''s ''''Other Body''''

    Of course, it will repair on its own after time. However, just like what Carrera had said earlier, for Ultima''s ''''spell poison'''' to be lifted, it would take a lot of work even for Velgrynd.

    So just now, Velgrynd disarmed the damaged Other Body and divided a new Other Body to remove all the damage.

    Such use was the essence of ''parallel existence'', and no matter what primordial must-kill technique it was, it was meaningless in the face of Velgrynd''s powers.

    Only, this power is not all-powerful either.

    There are still some restrictions on use.

    The biggest limitation is that in order to divide an ''other body'', one must guarantee it with at least 10%

    of the amount of mana, which is not used directly by the mana, but maintains 10% of the mana consumption, and when the ''other body'' is gone, the mana will return to the body.

    Therefore, the number of ''other bodies'' that can be divided is limited.

    At most, Velgrynd could only divide ten ''other bodies'', but if it was divided into ten people, the amount of mana became zero, and thebat power was instead reduced.

    All of the ''other bodies'' of the mana amount could be used together, so it would be more efficient to leave at least fifty percent of it, or so Velgrynd thought.

    Therefore, even more is basically three or four ''other bodies''.

    There is one more limitation.

    That''s about the damage that the ''other body'' takes.

    If you dismantle the ''other body'' in its intact state, then 10% of the magic element will be returned, and if you are injured, the amount of magic element returned will be reduced proportionately. The way Rimuru thinks about it is, in a sense, correct.

    In this case, five percentage points were consumed.

    Incidentally, Carrera unleashed the Nuclear Strike Magic that had only been unleashed at full strength: Gravity Copse, which Velgrynd needed less than one percent of the mana consumption to release.

    "That''s how big the True Dragon Seed''s magic is."

    As mentioned above, the invincible Velgrynd is not immortal at all. It was pointless to do damage to the flesh, but the amount of mana was being consumed little by little, and it was only a matter of time before it was knocked down.

    Although the probability was extremely small, Velgrynd still thought of the possibility that, as a few demons in the strongest corner of this world, might be able to defeat her.

    Although the mouth says it''s no threat, it''s just a bluff tobat the opponent.

    Velgrynd was convinced.

    The demoness trio used as a trump card against Velzado is useful.

    If the battle with the elder sister could get the likes of Testarossa to participate in the battle, it would basically be the same as winning.

    As a result, Velgrynd initiated the invitation again.

    "You understand, don''t you? No matter how much you struggle, you won''t beat me, don''t you see no point in continuing the fight? With a little assistance, I will guarantee your freedom afterwards, so surrender to me here.

    The offer, a concession by the self-respecting Velgrynd to the max.

    But Testarossa and the others expressed their refusal.

    To betray Lord Rimuru? It''s a joke.

    "I''m telling you, you really despise us too much. Isn''t itmon sense that demons don''t renege on their contracts? You won''t turn your back because you can''t beat them."

    "That is, there are indeed some people among the demons who can negotiate. Just be serious and look for guys who might also act for profit. But it is impossible to make me betray my lord!

    Each of the three spilled their hearts, and in order to radiate the displeasure in their hearts, they all attacked Velgrynd.

    This attack, which was full of maximum power, instantly damaged Velgrynd''s ''''Other Body'''' and Velgrynd consumed another nine percent of her mana as a result.

    Deal, break it off.

    is it? I''m sorry, really, I''m sorry."

    Parting the new ''Other Body'', Velgrynd let out a low, cruelugh.

    And then, the time for ravaging began.

    Gazel and the others detoured through the true red pir that rained down the rain of blood, "Gravity Copse, and prepared to attack the scene where Kagali was performing her ritual.

    If it got too close, the Knights of the Sky would be caught by the gravity wave, and it was the task of the advance leader, Dorf, to guard the area.

    Still, it''s superfluous to worry about.

    The "gravity copse" maintained by Velgrynd ispletely isted from the surrounding effects.

    On the ground, the battle between Testarossa and the others and Velgrynd seemed to have begun, but the Pir of True Red was still alive and well.

    Grasping this fact, Gazel couldn''t help but have a chill on his back, though he didn''t show any cowardice and instead shouted.

    "Unbelievable as it may be, that''s Velgrynd. To be able to distinguish a clone of the same level as the main body, what else could this be but a nightmare? But fear not, we also have strong reinforcements that breakmon sense!

    Gazel''s voice conveyed to the knights, the middle-spirited majesty and solemnity of the voice, dispelling everyone''s sense of terror.

    Gazel actually felt fear in his heart as well.

    In the presence of such an overwhelming presence.

    Even the sages had few means they could take, and even if they wanted to resist, the gap in strength was too great.

    But Gazel didn''t give up.

    The sense of responsibility as a king makes Gazels heart strong.

    More importantly, the reinforcements sent by the pampered senior brother had taught him that it was too early to despair.

    The trio of demonesses who were currently fighting were not as good as Velgrynd based on the amount of mana, but they were still brave enough to challenge their opponent who was nearly a hundred times more powerful.

    Kukuku, seeing them like that, how can I, as a king, say anything depressing?

    Gazel''s strong inner vow.

    And Gazel''s enlightenment affected hispanions and the knights, and by the time they reached their destination, all the fear in everyone''s hearts had disappeared.

    The Pir of True Red reached its destination.

    It was an open meadowrge enough for arge army to dispose of.

    The ground was stained bright red with blood.

    This is the end of the road for the hybrid legions of shady deals.

    There were probably close to a hundred people on thatnd.

    One of the men in uniform was particrly conspicuous, and that was Lieutenant Kondo.

    Releasing an overwhelming sense of presence, looking over to Gazel.

    Others were Footman, Tear, and more than thirty of Yuuki''spanions.

    Together with nearly fifty men from the Imperial Emperor''s Knights of the Near Guard, they protected Kagali by scattering around in case the ceremony was interrupted.

    Around Kondo''s side, one could also see men in uniform, who were employees of the Intelligence Bureau, and these men were also from the Imperial Emperor''s Knights of the Near Guard, which meant that the ones here were basically the group with the strongest fighting power in the Empire.

    Position-wise, Kagali was on the outer edge of Velgrynd.

    Bathed in blood and rain, burying their heads in the ritual.

    Velgrynd, on the other hand, stood on the sidelines as if stationing herself.

    After spreading out on the other side of the True Red dragon, it came to this side in order to avoid the magic being hindered by the trio of demon women. Even if it was Velgrynd, it was too busy to maintain such great magic with just one ''clone''.

    As a result, Velgrynd didn''t look like she was going to make a move either, looking like she was watching from the sidelines.

    Gazel confirmed the situation overhead.

    Then, with aid-back attitude, it began to fall.

    Up to greet thended Gazel and others was, Kondo.

    "I am honored to meet King Gazel, who has a reputation as a hero.

    Kondo Tatsuya didn''t care to say.

    Gazel grunted and erected his sword.

    "You are?

    "The head of the Imperial Intelligence Service, Lieutenant Kondo.

    "Funny, you''re the "information-feeding geek. Funny. I will be your opponent. Draw your sword quickly.

    Gazel sensed Kondo''s strength with a nce, and the moment of confrontation attempted mind reading to no avail, and that alone was enough to consider him equal to himself.

    "Hey, hey, I''ll take care of this"

    "Ben, you just deal with the others and avoid getting in the way. You guys too, this guy can''t be handled by anyone but me.

    Looking at thepanions who had co-sponsored the showdown, Gazel spoke up.

    It was Jane who immediately responded to Gazel''s order.

    "That''s right, we can''t handle that one. At least we have to get rid of those who are in the way so King Gazel can concentrate on his fight.

    Dorf echoed Jane''s judgment.

    Got it. All hands, listen up! Quantitatively we are more, but do not underestimate the strength of the opponent! Aerial warfare in groups of five!

    Seeing the enemy, giving proper instructions.

    The Knights of the Order are good at the tactics of attacking overhead, but this time, they are using the numerical advantage to mobilize the opponent''s battle n.

    Whether it is Yuuki''spanions or the Imperial Emperor''s Order of the Near Guard, their strength isparable to that of the "Immortal" level. The so-called "Immortal" level, when converted ording to the threat level set by the freebination, is equivalent to the upper level of the Special A level, which can match the strength of the upper magician.

    If you continue to cultivate, you will be able to reach the "Demon Lord Seed, and it is not too much to call it a hero.

    Dorf''s men, together with the others, had finally reached the A level, and Dorf himself had reached the

    "Immortal" level.

    Not so much how correct Dorf''s judgment was, but a keen sense of the dangers of the enemy''s war effort. While the odds are higher than fighting Velgrynd, you can still tell it''s hard to do a decent fight.

    That is why such instructions were given, and their purpose was not to annihte the enemy.

    Using the advantage of flying through the air to disrupt the enemy and thus buy time was Dorf''s true purpose.

    In order for Gazel not to be hindered, the Heavenly Knights correctlyprehended this intention and immediately reacted.

    Believing in His Majesty''s victory, I willplete my own mission. Besides, reinforcements will be here soon!

    Dorf judged so.

    His judgment was affirmed by a quickening voice.

    "Hah hah hah hah! I''m a littlete. This big guy is heavier than I thought. It took a lot of work to get here. Get on the big ship and enjoy this battle!

    It''s Gabil.

    "Phew! You''re so handsome, Gabil-sama!"

    Exactly."

    "I''m getting more and more manly. I''ll follow you all the way. Be aware of it."

    And Gabil''s minions.

    "The Flying Dragon was holding chains in its hands, attached to a huge object. That huge object was the Floor Guardian Colossus Statue, which was transported by a hundred people by human air.

    There was nothing wrong with the Floor Guardian Colossus Statue waiting for the enemy to arrive in the maze, but to get to the battlefield, the huge body was a bit of a hindrance, although the fighting ability was impable, but the movement speed was really slow.

    But it''s quick in closebat, which has been ignored so far.

    "This is a problem that needs improvement. Since it''s all moved here, I''ll make an effort.

    Gedora shouted with gusto. Now is the time to take credit, and sit down in the floor guardian colossus with all your energy.

    Gedora looked at Kondo and immediately looked away again. Seeing that King Gazel was dealing with it, he felt that it was not his turn to interfere.

    And then he saw Velgrynd.

    Is it true that the real face of His Excellency the Marshal is Velgrynd the Scorch Dragon? But if so, Damrada''s intentions are lost on people; has he really sworn his allegiance to His Majesty? Saying something about protecting Masayuki, was it necessary to give such an order to the Bonnie group? I don''t get it, I don''t get it, butits not something to worry about now. If Velgrynd does it, the battle is over, and to avoid that, I''ll have to keep an eye on it.

    Thinking about it, Gedora fired the Floor Guardian Colossus towards the elegantly standing Velgrynd.

    Watching Gedora walk past, Gabil flew to Dorf''s side.

    "Lord Gedora seems intent on dealing with Lord Velgrynd. We''ll do what we''re supposed to do and we''ll get rid of all the people who get in the way.

    "Oh, you''re so reliable, Lord Gabil. Then let''s fight together.

    "Hmmm. My team will rush ahead, and the reinforcements will be yours!

    Understood!"

    Gabil and Dorf nodded at each other.

    As promised, the "Flying Dragons", with their excellent fighting ability, were the main force. If it was a dragon race with excellent defenses, it wouldn''t be so easy to be killed, plus Gabil and others would be unstinting in their use of full recovery potions, as long as they weren''t instantly dead, they would be able to fully recover, just right for a meat shield.

    "Then, Sir Dorf, themand is in your hands.

    "Huh, wait a minute!?"

    Now, without first discussing it, did Gabil''s action take Dorf by surprise.

    "Hah hah hah hah! I am Gabil, the Dragon King! Let''s go for it!

    Not taking Dorf''s appearance to heart either, Gabilunched a blitz directly at what looked like a group of Kondo''s cronies - one of the men.

    With Gabil like this, Gobya could only stare nkly.

    They got herest, because they were running on the ground, and it couldn''t be helped. But after all, it was a speed equivalent to A-grade strength, so it was barely able to get there before the war started.

    Not only that, but it went around nicely to the back of the enemy forces in ordance withbat requirements.

    "Gabil-sama is going alone, so that man''s strength is outstanding.

    Hearing Gobya''sment, the man beside her offered a retort.

    "Yeah? Doesn''t it look like you''re just a weak-eyed kid who''s good for clerical work?

    For some reason, Phobio the Panthertooth, of the Three Beastment of Carrion, has not returned to his country, but hase with Gobya.

    Gobya, though happy in heart, now led the "Kurenai" and had to be serious in official duties, so began to admonish Phobio to be careful.

    "Sir Phobio, your strength is indeed praiseworthy, but it is necessary to exercise your eye for the strength of the enemy.

    "How poignant, Gobya. Don''t call me Sir Phobio.

    "This is abat operation. Please distinguish between public and private.

    This conversation between the two, which seems to the ministry to be actually flirting, is clearly a battlefield full of tension, but somehow has a gentle atmosphere.

    "So, what happens after that?

    Phobio asked seriously with his suddenly changed expression.

    Gobya also cheered up and replied.

    "We''re here to bide our time. Nowadays, it is no longer possible to achieve the conditions for tactical victory, andbat has failed. Based on Lord Velgrynd''s change of action, there is a chance that we could be swept under the rug. If one is only thinking about survival, one should be single-mindedly running away, but right now we cannot make that choice. In short, the key is to reduce the number of people who get in the way as much as possible and to ease the burden on His Majesty Rimuru.

    That is the expression of good awareness.

    If Velgrynd stayed here, then Rimuru would be able to take advantage of the opportunity to crush Emperor Rudra.

    Or forcing the other side to ept an armistice is the key to this fight.

    But the battle copsed the moment Velgrynd took out the clone'', and all operations should have been interrupted immediately at that moment, except that those who had the power to decide could not be contacted now.

    Gabil is now the supreme person present.

    And Gabil made the decision to continue the fight.

    Testarossa and others agreed, and Gobya did not disagree.

    Do what you can on your own, that''s all.

    Exactly how many other bodies'' Velgrynd would be able to divide is unclear, but the awareness to stall this is already there, and then if possible, try to stop the ritual that Kagali is performing.

    "Do you want to kill yourself?

    "No, His Majesty Rimuru will never allow us to die. So, no sacrifice is allowed, no one."

    With this unreasonablemand, the Kurenai nodded silently.

    "If Velgrynd made her move, there was no way to stop her, was there?

    "Then give it to His Excellency Gedora and we''ll run away.

    After answering, Gobya blinked a single eye lightly.

    The look was devastating enough to shut Phobio up.

    "All right. I didn''t want toplicate it so much, just messed with him a little. It seems there''s some karma in there, too. How can we not say hello?

    Phobio had tasted miserable failure in the past by being duped by Footman and Tear, but that was all because he was too immature to resent them either. Rather, it''s a food that also gains growth and even a little thanks to them.

    He was the beast kind of man who was simply happy.

    It was precisely because Phobio was such a person that seeing his nemesis being manipted gave him something to think about.

    "Don''t force it.

    "I can''t make this deal, but I swear I''ll try to stay alive.

    With these words, Phobio joined the war

    Lt. Kondo confronted King Gazel.

    The sses-wearing intelligence agent who was targeted by Gabil.

    Ben and Anrietta, on the other hand, went to deal with Footman and Tear, Phobio, who had broken in, and Gobya, who was intent on seeing the situation.

    In front of Velgrynd, who was sweeping the battlefield, was Gedora-sensei, who manipted the floor guardian colossus statue.

    And with that, the respective battles began.

    In the midst of the battlefield, Gazel''s heart was calm.

    Not as a king, but as a martial artist, a swordsman, in a confrontation with Kondo.

    Kondo Tatsuya said, drawing his military knife.

    Seeing the way Gazel''s sword was raised, he couldn''t help but sigh.

    "Tease, that''s beautiful. The Sword Sage doesn''t look like he''s a fool.

    It was by no means a polite remark, a genuinepliment, but Gazel snorted in response.

    "Don''t be ridiculous. It''s just sarcasm to hear you say that.

    This is also true.

    The reason why is because Kondo''s frame is also so beautiful that even Gazel can''t find a break at all.

    The current Kondo was holding the Saber in both hands.

    Unlike the fight with Footman, there was no ck in the stance.

    And even more surprising.

    The two were exactly the same as if they had made a date.

    After several rounds of silent sparring, the two havergely grasped each other''s strength, so it is no coincidence that they are already convinced of the same frame.

    Gazels sword skills were learned from Hakurou, and there were also some unique sword skills woven into them, but the basic stance was still faithful to Hakurou''s teaching.

    Hakurou''s "Mizuru" Sword Art was inherited from his grandfather, Araki Byakuya.

    No one other than Hakurou passed on the genre.

    Even Gazel, who was a direct disciple, did not have a full grasp of the Mizuru, and he knew very well that there were mysteries that he had never seen.

    However

    In the Land of Monsters, Hakurou was responsible for training soldiers as an "instructor", and of course he would teach them the basics of swordsmanship, but it was hard to imagine that swordsmanship would spread from there to the Empire.

    After all, sword skills were not something that could be mastered overnight.

    So, Gazel asked for the exit.

    Coincidentally, Kondo asked the same question.

    "That style, why do you know Mizuru?

    "I always thought it was possible that His Majesty''s sword skills were simr to my Mizushin Lifestream. Who did you learn this from?"

    The duo stared at each other.

    The first to speak was Gazel.

    "The Mizushin Lifestreamare you saying that it''s different from the Mizushin?"

    Kondo faced expressionlessly as he listened to the question and pondered it in his mind.

    In the Dwarven Kingdom, thebination of a one-handed sword and a shield is the mainstream orthodox swordy, so it seems that the existence of a certain magical creature with great swordy skills is linked to this information.

    There was little intelligence, but Kondo was basically close to the right answer.

    Faced with such a Kondo, Gazel asked as if anxious.

    "Aren''t you going to answer my question?

    "Don''t worry about it yet. Mizuru is probably the same genre as the one I studied, so I''m asking, Is it possible that the same genre can be derived by chance in this world?"

    "Hmm, too

    Muttering, Gazel recalled.

    While cultivating, he had heard about Old Grandfather Byakuya.

    "My master, His Excellency Hakurou, has heard that his grandfather taught him the Mizuru. It''s said that his grandfather was a "visitor" from the other world, so that exins it.

    Unbeknownst to both Gazel and Kondo, Araki Byakuya had a younger brother, who had be the originator of the Kaikyo sect in ce of his older brother, and who taught the Mizushin Lifestream in the world where Kondo was born.

    Fighting monsters and spirits as a sword to exorcise them.

    Kondo was also one of those who fought against the monsters and learned the "Mizushin Lifestream"

    in a position close to the source stream.

    "Kukuku, it''s funny to be in the same family.

    Kondo smiled cheerfully, a rare urrence.

    He never shows any emotion in his life, but this smile highlights his coldness.

    "I have a proposal, Your Majesty, Gazel.

    What?"

    "Fellowship. With His Majesty Gazel''s strength, he is strong enough to join the Empire. If you can swear to disarm and serve our emperor, I promise you I will stop all aggression against your country.

    "Do you think I will ept your proposal?

    "Yes, I will. It''s the best way to reduce casualties.

    Kondo was right, thought Gazel.

    This was a desperately needed proposal, and it was only right to ept it if the people of the Dwarven Kingdom were to be protected.

    As monarchs, one should not be bitter, one should ept.

    Now that the threat of Velgrynd was known, there was no way to win. This battle, originally, had no clearly defined conditions for absolute victory.

    Before inflicting heavy casualties, Rimuru and the others would go head-to-head with Rudraand that optimistic spection is all there is to it.

    If it''s for the people''s sake

    Thinking about it, Gazel smiled as if he had thrown away his confusion.

    "Ridiculous! You think you''ve already won. It seems you don''t know that you''ve lost Kondo! See how I correct you for your arrogant thoughts!

    Shouting, Gazel focused his thoughts on the enemy in front of him.

    The sage''s dominance has been fully liberated by the unity of mind, body and spirit with the sword.

    What unfolded there was a heroic pose that was close to reaching the Awakening Demon Lord.

    Nevertheless

    Kondo remained calm at the sight of such a Gazel.

    "It''s a pity that the so called Sage King is just a name. Then there''s no other way. I''ll take care of you before your reputation goes down the drain.

    These words are the signal for war between the saints."

    A few minutes passed.

    Kondo is starting to get the upper hand.

    The ''''Heroic Hegemony'''' released by Gazel was easily counteracted by Kondo, and by winding the Hegemony, all the effects were nullified.

    Even if you look at pure swordy, Kondo is able to use his dexterous body movement to counterattack with a blinding wind and thunder, and then he can use his fastest assault technique, the purple electric surge, while Gazel is able to use a running water chopper to break up his attack.

    The same-kind know each other too well.

    Slowly, Gazel''s counterpart gradually became slower, acquiring more sword skills or Kondo.

    "Indeed, there is a sword skill that is not passed down from the Mizushin Lifestream, but even I, who is close to my bloodline, can''t grasp the full picture. I''m still wondering how far the Monster hase to understand the essence of the sword.

    That was Kondo''s honest opinion.

    But this was in no way a despise for Hakurou.

    The sword path is profound and unending.

    Kondo says this because he is proud of his genre.

    But this angered Gazel.

    "Is this an insult to my master?

    Gazel red at Kondo even more imposingly.

    And then, there was one more.

    "I say, Lord Gazel, it''s easy to lose your mind on the battlefield, it''s not enough to cultivate. I''ll take your ce for a while, and you stay here and calm down.

    Hakurou, who led the follow-on troops as Gobya''s counselor, arrived btedly.

    ***

    Kondo could see through Hakurou''s strength at a nce.

    The next moment, a fierce sh of clear sounds sounded between the steel, and Kondo unleashed a divinely fast Curie Chop, which Hakurou took with his hidden sword.

    "Tease? Can you catch that?

    The "Third Eye or ''Sky Eye'' on Hakurou''s forehead opened its eyes, this skill had now broken through the realm of special skills and was about to go beyond the realm of unique skills.

    That''s why he was able to cope with Kondo''s battling.

    "It''s not a miracle that my grandfather is the same as that grandfather, but it''s a miracle. Kid, if you think I''m a magical creature, how much do you understand the true essence of the sword, then see for yourself.

    "Oh, funny. Now that you''ve said that, I''ll teach you how much you can afford."

    And just like that, under the watchful eyes of Gazel, Kondo and Hakurou began to battle it out.

    Kondo had the odds in his mind.

    Hakurou did have strength, he could see it at a nce.

    However, the fact that the so-called magical creature did not understand the nature of the sword was indisputable to Kondo.

    Why? Because the Mizushin Life Stream is the sword of exorcism.

    A sword skill that could be considered a natural enemy to a magical creature, one that was impossible to learn in the form of a magical creatureit was only natural that Kondo would think so.

    Moreover, who could have imagined that the true founder, the elder brother of the founding fathers of the "Mizushin Life Stream, hade to this world?

    It''s a bit beyond imagination to be able to use even the mystical arts, but none of the skills above the secret arts are passed on except for the bloodline of the family. I don''t know how capable that so-called "otherworlder" is, but it''s impossible to pass on the secret mysteries to magical creatures.

    Kondo had made a judgement based on his ownmon sense, and in a sense there was nothing he could do about it.

    It was actually a very big mistake, and Kondo had a hard time thinking about it.

    That''s a big price to pay

    As Hakurou and Kondo faced each other and stepped into the must-kill distance, the two of them simultaneously used their aura.

    Plum BlossomWuhuatou

    Kondo gambled on the glory of the swordsman, revealing his own long-exercised sword skills. It was precisely because Hakurou was a fellow student that he made such an unwise move.

    In one corner of his head, he was calmly thinking about finishing the matter with his real skills, but when he started to move, he became serious about winning and losing.

    Such a move was not in keeping with the usual calm and collected style of Kondo, who actually intended to show his martial prowess to his fellow students in this world through the strongest sword skill he had ever learned.

    The so-called Wuhuatou, the stabbing technique that symbolizes the plum blossom, is the highest peak of Kondo''s learned sword skills and is one of the secret mysteries that is not passed down.

    The key points of the human body are the eyes, throat, heart, kidneys, heart, belly, hips, and shoulders for feinting.

    Even among fellow swordsmen, there were very few who had learned this secret mystery, and it was a miscalction to meet Hakurou here.

    "Yahashige cherry blossoms

    He chose the supreme power, the continuous shing like a flowing stream, with differentbinations, and he hit the enemy eight times in a row.

    Between Kondo and Hakurou, the difference in fighting ability was huge, even though the skills wereparable. ording to Hakurou''s judgment, Kondo''s physical abilities were at least tens of times greater than Hakurou''s.

    So, if this sword move didn''t work, it was basically a judgment that Hakurou had lost the battle.

    Hiding this realization in his heart, Hakurou drew his sword and cut it out.

    Look!"

    Tease"

    Kondo scored andslide victory.

    Hakurou was going to give Kondo a death blow even though he was going to die together.

    But in the end, the results obtained were not what either had in mind.

    With a speed that was difficult for onlookers to see, Hakurou''s sword spread out like eight petals, but all of them were offset by the five petals symbolized by Kondo, and the attack ultimately missed.

    Kondo dodges back half way to his feet, which is a bit of a scrape on his cheek, but that''s out of Kondo''s expectation.

    "I didn''t think there was a swordsman in this world who was above me.

    The fact that Hakurou''s Eight Hua sh was an even more advanced sword skill than Kondo''s Five Hua Tan shattered Kondo''s perception all along and had to admit that he was wrong.

    However, it was Kondo who got the victory.

    Counteracting the Must Kill Sword Technique was indeed wonderful, but this was because the power gap was so great that Hakurou''s arms werepletely unusable due to the miserable split of the sword de sh just now.

    "Even the strongest of the powers will not reach you

    "No, that''s enough. I''m sorry for looking down on you, but I''d like to ask you your grandfather''s name, too.

    Kondo apologized for despising Hakurou as a magical creature, and offered a tribute by admitting that he was a swordsman above himself.

    He was a true man about swordsmanship.

    But at the same time, no judgment of things is influenced by affection.

    This is Tatsuya Kondo.

    "Funny, my grandfather''s name was Araki Byakuya, and he was a great swordsman, but he was already in the ground.

    "Unfortunately, Araki is the name of my family. Perhaps he is rted to the master of the Mizushin Lifestream, and if he can at least reach the level of an Immortal, he will be one of the most powerful in the world."

    Kondo said a silent and simple prayer.

    Really a man who is extremely serious about his genre.

    The elder Hakurou looked at Kondo''s movements in amazement and tried to ask.

    "Grandfather was a strange man and thought it was good to live naturally. Can you guys just pull back on this?

    Sensing that Kondo held a certain respect for himself, Hakurou tried the offer, but it was still rejected.

    "I will guarantee your personal safety, but the war cannot be stopped. In my proposition, halfway through is the least desirable.

    Kondo said coldly.

    Yeah, that''s right, toothought Hakurou.

    Hakurou wasn''t in a hurry.

    I''ve already predicted that I''ll lose, so it''s impossible for these hands to return tobat, but the goal has been achieved.

    That''s right, Hakurous goal wasn''t to gain victory, but to show Gazel the battle between himself and Kondo.

    If it was the Sword Saint Gazel Dwargon, one should be able to understand it just by looking at Hakurou''s Ao-Yi, although it couldn''t be learned immediately, one could certainly gain some inspiration.

    That''s what Hakurou thought.

    What''s more, Kondo had also used the Ao-Yi a while ago, and by doing so, Gazel''s winning percentage would definitely increase as well.

    "Then I will stop here, for I do not wish to be disgraced in this way. In thest days, I intend to take as many enemy troops as possible with me. It''s just that it''s not time yet, so let''s focus on healing these hands now.

    Hakurous hands were heavily wounded so that they couldn''t even be recovered with a full recovery medicine.

    The destruction of the object through the infiltration of the fighting qi was the ultimate meaning of the

    ''qi fighting method'', and Kondo''s fighting qi broke through the Hakurous defenses, so Hakurous had no other choice but to neutralize the treatment through his own demonic qi.

    However, Hakurou still looked at Gazel with a nd expression.

    "All right, King Gazel, have you calmed down?"

    "Of course, I''m excited to see my master''s sword skills."

    "I don''t want to teach it, but I can''t say it now, so I''ll leave it to you.

    "Leave it to me.

    After Hakurou stepped back, Gazel stepped in front of Kondo.

    On the other hand, Hakurou was out of the fray with his head held high as if he hadpleted his task.

    ***

    Again, Kondo clinches up with Gazel.

    Although Kondo shamed himself for being shallow, he switched moods anyway.

    "I''ve lost my cool a little bit, y is over, I''m back to work now.

    "Huh! Although it was not the intention, I also shared it. I must repay my master''s expectations. Let me do my best.

    Whether it was Kondo or Gazel, it was different from what it was before.

    Having long since tested the strength of the opponent, it is now the real opening fight.

    Gazel was grateful to Hakurou.

    If he fought Kondo as he did just now, he would definitely lose the battle.

    Kondo''s secret mystery, the Wuhuatou, was impossible to defend against at first sight. Even if one could miraculously avoid a fatal injury, the inside of the body would definitely be as injured by the fighting qi as Hakurou and be unable to fight.

    It''s amazing that a refined fighting qi could have such a threat. I know it''s the ultimate meaning of "qi doujutsu," but it seems I don''t really understand what it''s about.

    As he did his introspection, Gazel felt his emotions running high right now.

    Because of the perception that you can be stronger again.

    "Kondo. Feel the full power of myself.

    After saying that, Gazel liberated himself from the spell.

    "The genie calls! Come, nameless earth spirit king!

    Gazel, who has liberated the power of the "sage", has taken up residence with the Earth Spirit King, who has been summoned.

    However, Kondo was unfazed.

    Ridiculous."

    He felt Gazel''s domineering attitude, but he said it ndly.

    Not caring about the words, Gazel wordlessly ced his sword in front of his upright eyes and focused his attention, condensing his fighting qi so that it flowed into his sword.

    The huge energy that had been generated after the ''sameness'' with the Earth Spirit King had now been perfectly harnessed by Gazel, a feeling that had not been there for a long time.

    Hes worthy of being a Master, and it made me realize the ultimate meaning. I can win, and if I were me now, I''d be able to reach even greater heights!

    Gazel felt the improvement in mind, skill and body.

    Heart, i.e., skills.

    The unique skill ''Dictator'' was fully mastered, making Gazel''s energy full of power.

    Technique, i.e., skill.

    The "Mizuru" learned from Hakurou has a technique to turn qi power into physical power through the qi-dou method. If it was the current Gazel, it should be able to integrate the energy flowing through the body very well.

    And this is it, the body.

    In other words, the unique skill "Dictator" unifies energy and sublimates the attack into the highest and strongest blow.

    The sword that no one could beatwith such aura, Gazel moved.

    Godspeed m.

    However, it failed to run into Kondo.

    A small sound rang out and Gazel bent his knees.

    Kah!"

    Gazel spat blood out of his mouth and looked dumbfounded at the blooding out of his abdomen.

    Kondo''s right hand held arge Southern-style automatic pistol, the muzzle of which was still smoking, from which the murderous bullet that had defeated Gazel had been fired.

    Youare an honorable swordsman

    Gazel, his expression twisted by anger and humiliation, spat blood and spoke.

    But those words fell on deaf ears to Kondo.

    "Like I said, y is over. There''s no need for glory on the battlefield, my job is to do whatever it takes to win.

    Kondo''s tone was extremely cold.

    Compared to Kondo, who was stuck to his own genre, he was a different person.

    "Bullshit! How could I end up like this

    Gazel tried desperately to get up, but the body was no longer obedient and could only fall to the ground again.

    And that''s par for the course.

    Kondo used not ordinary bullets, but special bullets that were infused with his own ideasspellbombs.

    It wasn''t an ability borrowed from Emperor Rudra, it was Kondo''s own probing ability.

    That''s right. Kondo had awakened the Ultimate Skill by his own power, and the King of Execution is in charge of the "battle".

    So, very strong.

    Though a man, he desires to take the seat of the godsto rece the emperor Rudra, the man of battle.

    And the Domination Spell Bomb was one of Kondo''s ''King of Execution'' powers, secretly concealing the effect of destroying the other party''s magical circuitry, which could kill even spiritual lifeforms.

    Gazel was definitely not weak, rather he was one of the few strongmen in this world.

    Depending on the situation, perhaps even an Awakening Demon Lord could win.

    But between Kondo and him lies a high wall that cannot be crossed.

    That is, whether or not they have an ultimate skill.

    This alone, before the start of the war, had already decided the winner.

    "Give up your futile efforts. I have no intention of killing His Majesty Gazel, but I''ll let you go when it''s over, even though I''ll bind you now.

    Kondo said ndly.

    While not falsehoods, they are not all true either.

    Before letting him go, he was going to use the Domination Spell Bomb to dominate him.

    Now Kagali was at the helm, and for Gazel, too, he was intended to be captured alive.

    Terrible coldness and reasonableness, which is also in the bones of Tatsuya Kondo as a man.

    Hakurou couldn''t act now.

    Witnessing Kondo''s formidable strength, he could only stand resignedly.

    From this moment on, Kondo has basically determined victory

    Hah hah hah hah! I am Gabil, the Dragon King! Let''s fight it out!

    Seeing the enemy, Gabil left his men behind andunched the assault himself.

    As amander this act was very inappropriate, but again tactically it''s hard to say he was wrong.

    To say why, it is because the enemy is so powerful that it stands out.

    The spectacle-wearing Mana man, who was not prominent in the enemy group, Gabil shouted directly without confusion.

    "It''s you, the man over there,e out and be my rival!"

    Gabil nodded at him with his spear pointed at him, and the eyed man snorted with a crooked lip.

    "It''s a pain in the ass. I''ve never been able to y an ordinary intelligence agent who''s been targeted by someone who can see through his strength.

    The elegant man said as he removed his sses.

    In an instant, the feeling the man gave off changed.

    "In that case, there''s nothing you can do, so let me be your opponent. Until then, please leave this ce.

    The usual cowering look disappearedpletely, and he gave orders to hispanions around him.

    But that didn''t work with the confusedpanions.

    "Oi Oi Malcolm, aren''t you unfit to fight!?

    "Yeah, we''re weaker than we are, so don''t try to be strong.

    The man known as Malcolm replied with a smile to hispanions who hade over worriedly.

    "Ahhhh, it''s really a veryfortable workce. I''m a single digit eighth, so you should understand what that means, right?"

    Seeing that the atmosphere of his peers had changed, everyone understood that Malcolm was just pretending to be a good old intelligence agent, and that he had the authority to give orders to himself, which was what the words just said meant.

    Understood!"

    "Good luck!

    Leaving these words behind, Malcolm''spanions scattered.

    Malcolm sighed, those slender, serpent-like eyes looking up at Gabil.

    Gabil''s strength, Malcolm had actually seen through.

    In a world where it makes no sense to challenge a prominent individual with a group, it is because Malcolm is familiar with this truth that he drives away those whose strength reaches the near-guard knight.

    "Your name is Gabil, look what you''ve done. If you take away my job, you''ll have to pay for it with your life.

    Hah hah hah hah! "Single digits" is what Lord Rimuru said about dangerous people, and I''m lucky to have such a prey.

    Gabil happily obliged.

    Thus, the battle between the two males began.

    ...........

    ........

    ...

    The absence of distinct features is the hallmark of Malcolm.

    It was eight hundred years ago that Malcolm became a knight of the near guard. Because of his unique skill of infiltrating a special type of disguiser," he was seen by the then head of the group, Damrada.

    One of the special points of the unique skill "disguiser" is the ability to change into a person you''ve seen before.

    Instead of being "rewritten" like Hinata''s unique skill "usurper", it''spletely mimicked into the same person.

    But there is a limit to imitation after all, and the impossibility of imitating all the same for beings whose strength greatly exceeds one''s own is the weakness of this ability.

    Even so, the more powerful people one encounters, the more versatile they be, and so Malcolm survived the Great Upheaval to be a "saint" and climb into the "single digit" position. This is what happened a hundred years after Malcolm became a knight of the Near Guard.

    It was because of this that Malcolm was unable to wipe away the fear of Kondo.

    Kondo is a "visitor" from the otherworld and has a "soul" that is stronger than normal, but even so, his power is iprehensible.

    The first person to initiate a serial scramble towards Kondo was Malcolm.

    In that battle, Malcolm came into contact with Kondo''s unusually powerful. In the past, he had always thought that Kondo was only being favored by the Emperor, but this battle had made him realize that it was all a misunderstanding.

    With Kondo''s fighting ability, which could not be imitated by Malcolm''s unique skill, the disguiser'', Kondo simply subdued the powerful man from above and took the position of the leader.

    Even though Malcolm looked like the monster''s Four Horsemen, Kondo had beaten them down with a bemused look on his face.

    Because of these things, Malcolm admired Kondo.

    Kondo cared about the lieutenant''s position so much that Malcolm learned that he let himself stay on as a second lieutenant and stayed in the Intelligence Bureau so he could assist Kondo.

    In front of Malcolm, there was now a strong enemy, Gabil.

    Although he came out with a spear, he understood that he could not win by this alone.

    So, Malcolm decided to morph into the gesture of the man he thought was the strongest.

    ...........

    ........

    ...

    Pulling away from Gabil, Malcolm shifted into the mold of Kondo.

    With the unique skill of the disguiser" and the "power of substitution" granted by the Emperor''s loan, the Malcolm now has the strength of a man close to Kondo.

    "Oh, that''s weird. Is that what you''re supposed to look like?

    Mimicking Kondo''s stance, Malcolm replied to Gabil.

    "No, this pose is the imitation form of the strongest man I believe in most. Although the Four Horsemen are strong, they are not as strong as Lieutenant Kondo, now

    Malcolm nced at the battlefield next to him and continued.

    "Even His Majesty Gazel, who has a reputation as a hero, is at his wits'' end.

    Hearing this, Gabil muttered.

    Whether it was the poor state of the friendly forces'' battle, Hakurou''s disengagement from the battle line, or the fact that King Gazel was pointed out to be fighting bitterly, it was already clear through the wide range of?Magic Sense?.

    "Hmm, it seems so.

    "From the moment Lieutenant Kondo struck, our victory was established. That''s why you don''t want to show off your own moves on purpose, and you don''t know where they''ll leak out, don''t you want to hide your power too?

    Malcolm asked the question lightly, turning the gun in his hand into a saber. The legendary equipment loaned to Malcolm can now change form at will ording to Malcolm''s will.

    Malcolm, who had picked up the saber in Kondo''s likeness, looked majestic and solemn in that stance.

    Gabil still held the magical weapon that could be described as the treasure of the Lizardman race: the water vortex spear.

    It was now in his perfect hands, the spear his father had entrusted to him.

    Gabil had fought many times with this spear, if the weapon was damaged, look for Kurobee to redo it, the performance was only of the trait level, but he was a very reliable partner.

    Only, after all, it''s still not legendary.

    The poor performance of the weapon would be a key factor in determining victory or defeat, and this time it could be an overwhelming disadvantage for Gabil. However, Gabil also had the move ''Dragon Scale Armor'', which was almost mythical in defense strength.

    The enemy, Gabil thought to himself, was a "saint", on the same level as his awakened self. That''s why Gabil didn''t spare any effort to mount a challenge from the start.

    So, can this man break through the defenses of our kind?

    Gabil is confident in his defensive capabilities.

    There is no way to win a battle without delivering a decisive blow to your opponent, no matter how many times you are hit, as long as it doesn''t inflict a mortal wound it is meaningless.

    Although Gabil didn''t think Malcolm''s weapons could break through his own defenses, he should not be careless and watch his opponent''s movements carefully.

    "I''m ready.

    "Well,e on!

    Gabil''s misfortune was that the matchup with Malcolm came too soon.

    The power gained by the Awakening was huge, but he had yet to fully grasp it.

    Just as Ultima had worriedly done, even before the evolution, Gabil hadn''t been able to harness the magic element well, but now that he had gained such a great power, he was too big to use it well.

    Highly powerful defense and healing power, those two alone were very powerful, but this time the opponent was too strong.

    Plum BlossomWuhuatou

    "Whirlpool water strike!

    It was because of prudent correspondence that Gabil survived.

    In terms of strength, the two sides are simr and perhaps Gabil is slightly stronger. However, in terms of technique, Malcolm is far stronger than Gabil.

    In fact, Malcolm can''t even imitate most of Lieutenant Kondo''s strength, and he can''t reproduce his ultimate power, the King of Execution.

    Malcolm itself isparable in strength to Gabil, and Gabil is undoubtedly stronger from a defensive standpoint.

    Winning or losing is often rted to timing.

    What appeared to be aplete victory for Malcolm was actually only a hair''s breadth away from victory.

    "Well, I can''t make fun of Major General Faraga. You''re Gabil, the Dragon King. You can''t be mistaken for Veldora.

    Malcolm looked at Gabil who had fallen to the ground.

    Gabil''s fate seems to being to an end at this moment

    ***

    Brother!"

    As if to protect Gabil, several silhouettes blocked in front of Malcolm.

    It was Souka who rushed over.

    And Gabil''s minions.

    "Lord Gabil!

    "Don''t die, Gabil!

    "Exactly. Lord Gabil is not a man who would die in a ce like this!"

    Although they understood that they couldn''t win against Malcolm, they stood firm.

    It was this courage that saved Gabil''s life.

    Although everyone is not as strong as the "saint" Malcolm, they are all strong people who have reached the "Special A" level, and they are not spared to use the medicine to buy time, and they are trying desperately to buy time.

    However, the attack used by the Malcolm, who imitated Kondo, would damage the enemy''s interior with the Condensed Fighting Qi, and the Recovery Pill would be ineffective as a result, so Souka and the others had to be prepared to die in order to be aware of it.

    Another one of Gabil''s men has fallen.

    Then it was Souka''s turn for her men, Nansou, to fall, and although the gap inbat skills was notrge, the difference in basic strength was too great. Coupled with the fact that Malcolm''s weapons were legendary, one after another fell in the face of this inexorable battle power gap.

    Fortunately, no one has been sacrificed yet.

    Gabil, who was evolved by Rimuru, also made the people under the genealogy stronger, thus increasing endurance and being barely able to avoid fatal injuries.

    But because of the continuous damage caused by Malcolm, it was also true that it was impossible to return to the front line, and it was only a matter of time before everyone was killed.

    Thinking about this, Gabil shouted.

    "That''s enough! That''s enough! Run! Souka, this is an order, get everyone out of here now!

    Gabil tried desperately to lift himself up and looked at the girl. But Souka didn''t look at Gabil at all, instead she replied with a fearless smile.

    "I refuse, brother. I am under Lord Souei''smand and have no obligation to obey my brother''s orders.

    "Say what

    "Say it again! If we escape here, there''s a real chance that someone will die! You''re going to die, aren''t you?

    Souka, who was normally calm, couldn''t think about shouting so much now.

    Gabil was speechless and confused.

    What are you talking about? It''s themander''s job to sacrifice as little as possible, isn''t it your job to abandon those of us who have already been defeated and increase the number of survivors as much as possible?

    Gabil was having a hard time even trying to stand up now, looking at his fightingpanions and making a sound.

    And what he said was overruled by Souka.

    "Then I''m right in my fight, our fellow soldiers don''t have the kind of weaklings who get killed by seconds with a single blow, which is why they buy time like this.

    Even as theirpanions were falling, they continued to fight, relying on numbers to harass Malcolm, beware of casualties.

    Look for winning opportunities in this way.

    "What a stupid thing to do! The assurance that help wille is simply"

    The subordinates led by Rimuru had now gone to the imperial capital and they could not expect support at all, and even if the sleeping subordinates woke up, they could not have rushed over for support by that coincidence.

    The trio of dependent demonesses, now in the midst of a battle with the formidable foe Velgrynd, were the ones in need of reinforcements, unable to seek their assistance.

    Gabil understood all of this, and that''s why he thought that the current situation could only lead to a retreat.

    However, Gabil''s minions also denied him.

    "It''s you, Gabil! It''s you we''re waiting for!

    "Yes, Lord Gabil! That''s a little bit of a wound. Get up!

    "Exactly. Buy time and wait for Lord Gabil''s resurrection, there''s no other way for the whole crew to be saved except that!

    Hearing this, Gabil felt ashamed.

    Only oneself, giving up the victory.

    Okay! You, try to hold on until I get up!

    Gabil eximed, knowing full well how unreasonable this order was, and the hot tears streaming down his eyes were a good indication of Gabil''s mood at the moment.

    He who perseveres, the Goddess of Victory will not abandon him either.

    The man who had responded to Gabil appeared.

    "Oops, oops, still so messed up. Let me help you with this."

    "It''s mydy''s order not to let the important toy, Lord Gabil, die, so I wille to the rescue.

    Ultima''s men, Veyron and Zonda, had arrived at an unknown time.

    I feel like it''s harder to live," Zonda muttered afterwards, but it was a happy thing that Gabil didn''t hear, drowning in the sounds of the battlefield.

    The butler of the wind, Veyron came to Souka''s side, and then set up his cane towards Malcolm.

    "If I am to be this man''s opponent, I will ask His Excellency Souka to assist me. The other wounded will need your protection.

    Understood!"

    "So, go!

    Hearing Souka''s response, Veyron began to act. The Marquis-level demon male Veyron, whose amount of magical element was probably less than a quarter of Malcolm''s, whose fighting skills were stronger than Veyrons, had managed to force Malcolm to hurry even if he couldn''t win.

    "Geez, what a pain in the ass! One after the other before being killed offpletely.

    "Of course, it is our mission to grasp the power of the enemy.

    "Oops, I didn''t think it would be so irritating to be imitated in a field I''m good at. Get rid of you guys fast, and get that troublemaker"

    "Something''s broken!

    While dealing with Veyron, Malcolm unleashed his killing intent on Gabil. This moment of breakthrough, Souka did not let up, deliberately shouting out her voice to draw the other party''s attention, as a way to confuse Malcolm.

    If the cast bitter nothing hits that''s fine, even if it doesn''t, Veyrons sword will attack Malcolm.

    Malcolm saw through the tricks and made the best choice. That is, to take the bitterness directly, rather than choosing to avoid it.

    That was right, reacting to Souka would result in heavier damage from Veyron''s side.

    The next moment, Malcolm just continued to ignore the pale light and flicked away Veyron''s cane. And then also reflecting on the fact that you shouldn''t be thinking superfluous things in battle.

    Geez, just knock these guys down before you kill him. Trouble, trouble!

    Gabil was definitely the most dangerous opponent, so Malcolm wanted to kill him as quickly as possible, and was too greedy to do so.

    It wasn''t a major injury, but he still couldn''t forgive himself for being injured in Kondo''s position.

    "Let''s get this over with.

    "So, can you do it?"

    "Sir Veyron, he''s a hard-ass, isn''t he?"

    "Uh, yeah. I''ll just finish my work in no hurry.

    Veyron and Souka team up, even at a disadvantage, to fight against Malcolm.

    In the meantime, Zonda was not idle either.

    "That''s a really, really troublesome move. Demon Qino, humans are supposed to use fighting Qi. In order to continuously emit the wavelengths of scrambled mana, the energy was left inside the enemy.

    What a horrible move. If it''s a move like this, it might work on us spiritual beings too.

    A diagnosis like this is being given to Gabil.

    This diagnosis is correct.

    This is the same kind of power as Damrada''s Spiral Immersion Breaking, which smashes the condensed fighting qi into the opponent''s interior for destruction.

    This is the ultimate meaning of the "Mizushin Life Stream", the "Qi Fighting Method", which is why it is called the Sword of Exorcism.

    It is this reason that the recovery potions that heal on a mana-based basis cannot heal this damage.

    Still, Zonda had a way to heal.

    Deftly manipting the demon element, adjusting the messy breath and neutralizing the fighting breath that Malcolm had fought in, allowing Gabil''s body to resume normal breath flow.

    And Gabil wasn''t just quietly waiting to recover.

    A strong desire for greater healing power.

    His desire to do so was stimting Gabil to discover new powers.

    But

    The n couldn''t keep up with the changes, and Malcolm lifted the frame.

    "Oops oops oops, time''s up. I''ve received the order to return, so let''s save the victory forter.

    After saying this, Malcolm left directly by ''transfer'' regardless of the situation.

    .

    Ben is in a bitter battle with Footman.

    It''s a little light to say it''s a bit of a fight.

    He also has the strength of the "Immortal" ss and is still confident in his own strength. But Footman''s amount of mojo easily overrides Ben.

    Ben''s armor and battle spear were legendary, improving hisbat abilities, but even that was still not enough to win.

    The reason why the fightsted was because Footman lost his sanity.

    And thanks to Phobio''s assistance.

    ck Leopard Fang Phobio,e and help us."

    The man who had barged in so loudly was strange to Ben at first, but he immediately remembered who this man was.

    ck Leopard Fang" is of the Three Beast Warrior of King Carrion! Is it true, Carrion has now abdicated to the Demon Lord Milim, who is also allied with His Majesty Rimuru?

    Since he wasn''t the enemy, Ben weed help.

    "Thank you. I''m feeling a little overwhelmed on my own.

    "I guess so. I don''t think I could do it on my own, to be honest.

    Phobio, who has re-examined his own attitude and reflected on it, is able to assess his own strength calmly, and he realizes by instinct that he cannot beat Footman even if he does his best to "beastialize"

    him.

    That''s why Phobio shed his pride and chose to fight alongside Ben.

    Footman, though strong, has be monotonous in his attacking style due to a loss of sanity. Both Ben and Phobio were covered in bruises and were just barely holding their own now.

    Even if they could not expect victory, the word "retreat" did not exist in their minds.

    For, thepanions were engaged in a dead heat on the side.

    The other clown, Tear, is dealing with Anrietta, the head of the Dark Ministry of the armed nation of Dwargon, and Gobya and the others who are participating in the war. These men intend to capture Tear with a few elites.

    It''s just that Tear''s look was really strange.

    "Really, I''m sorry? I didn''t mean it either, but it''s an order, so try your best not be killed, so you have to find a way to stop me!

    Quite serious when ites to fighting, with words like thating out of her mouth.

    In fact Tear, even though she was ordered to fight by Kagali, still had her own free will, and even though the order could not be disobeyed, she could still understand that Kagali was in a state of being manipted. In other words, she herself had no intention of fighting the current situation and did not want to.

    So Tear is trying as hard as she can not to make a real effort to participate in the battle without disobeying orders, and then also makes a request to ask her own enemy, Anrietta, to stop her.

    In response to Tear''s expectations, Anrietta and the others began to execute capture battles, why the power gap was difficult to fill and had failed to bear fruit until now.

    "I''m sorry about that guy over there, too? I used you before, but I won''t lie to you again.

    Hearing Tear''s words, Phobio felt indignant.

    The reason for removing Footman''s sanity was to avoid hurting themsomething Phobio and Ben quickly picked up on. The fact that Footman is showing the same level of aura as Phobio''s esteemed Carrion, shows he is really not an opponent that Phobio can beat in a normal challenge.

    Therefore, Phobio was thankful to Tear for the time being.

    But

    "Shut up! Don''t remind me of my dark history. Needless to say, I''m grateful for letting this guy go on a rampage!

    "Yeah! You''re all weak, and if Footman had used his skills properly, you''d all be dead by now!

    In response to Phobio''s retort, Tear innocently spat out a tirade.

    Tear didn''t mean any harm and was telling the truth, but because of that it was even more of a fire, but the most that could be done now was toin about it a bit.

    "What an arrogant brat.

    "That''s enough. Don''t talk! That said, can''t you just make an effort to put more water in!

    Mentally remembering it for me afterwards, Ben and Phobio sighed.

    The dire situation continues.

    Gobya actually wanted to rush through this ce well to help the rest of the battle, mainly because she thought her opponent on this side was the best to deal with.

    But reality is not that simple.

    Tear was not hostile, but could not disobey. It is therefore by no means wrong for Gobya to make a judgment to make a capture.

    The reason why the battle could not go smoothly was simply because Tear and Footman were too strong.

    Footman can break through steel with ease, the usual attacks don''t work and it''s very difficult to knock him out.

    It took Ben and Phobio, two strongmen together, to slow him down.

    On the other side, Tear, who was confident in her speed, couldn''t catch up with Anrietta, and Gobya couldn''t even get close enough to touch.

    This side was ready to cast the, but nothing seemed to work out alive. It would have been smoother if Souka and the others hade to execute it, but there was no time for that right now when they were fighting with Malcolm.

    All of this has led to a deteriorating war situation.

    Gobya grasped the battle based on Moss'' intelligence.

    Veyron and Zonda seem to have gone forward to rescue Gabil, only it seems to be in a scorched state again, but out of harm''s way.

    The worst is Kondo.

    Hakurou couldn''t fight, and King Gazel was defeated.

    Agera and Esprit seem to have passed, but facing Kondo, he doesn''t even know if he can buy time.

    "At worst, I''m the one who''s going to fight.

    Moss said.

    Moss''s duty is to grasp the battlefield in ce of Benimaru, and based on Moss'' intelligence, Gobya makes abat case.

    Gobya was now giving clear instructions while responding to Tear.

    It was also possible to do this because of the presence of Moss'' support, and if Moss had joined the battle, the battle lines might have copsed in one breath.

    "The worst-case scenario would be to ask you to help in the end. Can you make a difference?

    I''ll do my best."

    It felt like Moss couldn''t win either, and Gobya felt so mncholy.

    Moss is a self-assured man and gets along with all but a specific character, led by Testarossa, with an air of arrogance. And Moss, who is full of confidence, just says that the best he can do is try with such uncertainty-filled words.

    It is enough to show just how dangerous an opponent Kondo is.

    It would be difficult to stop Kondo.

    It will take time for Gabil to return to the front lines.

    Gobya and the others are going to capture Footman and Tear for who knows how much longer.

    At this rate, it would be impossible to stop Kagali''s ritual.

    And then there''s Gedora, who is now in the middle of a war of words with Velgrynd, and if Velgrynd enters the fray, it''s basically a lost battle.

    Oops. Just how much we normally depend on Lord Rimuru and Lord Benimaru is really fully understood

    Gobya is in a state of introspection, and only now does she realize that she is a bit of an afterthought.

    It is for this reason that one must not give up.

    It''s not over. The reason why Lord Velgrynd didn''t act was because the demons were working on it. The gap in strength was clearly evident, yet it remained tenacious. Let''s start with the discouragement, this kind of thing is never allowed!

    Gobya thought of the trio of self-respecting, arrogant trio of demonesses.

    They have never been defeated, and even though they are new to this world, they sits at the top of the hierarchy as the Twelve Patrons". They are more powerful than Gobya could have ever imagined, yet still leave one despairing in the face of Velgrynd.

    It''s good enough that the fight is still going on right now.

    Can''t lose''thought Gobya.

    Cheering herself up once more, she continued the Tear capture battle. (***it is unclear whether Gobya is a male or female because both pronouns are being used randomly. I went with female because it seemed to be used more often).

    In front of Kondo, stood a man.

    Samurai-like dress for Agera.

    "Kill him, Agera! I won''t get in your way.

    Esprit shouted, then began to treat Gazel and Hakurou.

    Agera sighed and shook her head.

    Esprit has always been this way.

    The benefits are always taken away from her. To put it bluntly, Esprit just saw right now that she couldn''t beat Kondo and took the initiative to disengage from the fight.

    Esprit is a shrewd demoness.

    It was amon urrence these days, and Agera didn''t care, raising her knife towards Kondo.

    After three hundred years of being defeated without a single sword, Kondo, who had defeated two swordsmen, Hakurou and Gazel, in session, was feeling the blood in his body tumbling.

    "Is your name Kondo? Your swordsmanship is fascinating. I''m a swordsman by trade, so I''ll have to fight you."

    You can''t beat Kondo if you let go of the restrictions, Agera saw iting.

    It was because Kondo responded to the win with his sword that Hakurou managed to give that counter strike. If it wasn''t for that, even if Gazel and Hakurou hadunched the challenge together, it was estimated that they wouldn''t have been able to inflict any damage on Kondo and would have been repelled by Kondo soon.

    It was also based on this idea that Agera proposed this.

    The offer was just a try, but Agera believed that Kondo would agree, on the grounds that for some reason Kondo''s sword skills felt nostalgic.

    "Lord Agerais it true that Lord Agera is good at swordsmanship too?

    Before Kondo could respond, Hakurou interjected first.

    "Hmm? What does that mean?

    "Well, noActually, Lord Agera and someone I knew always felt some resemnce

    Facing Agera with a face of astonishment, Hakurou looked a bit hesitant.

    In fact, Hakurous grandfather and Agera could almost be said to look exactly alike.

    It''s not just the look, the height and the feel, but also the unmistakable manner in which they speak and act.

    "Is that so. However, it is a pity that it is someone else. I have no memory of meeting you in this world, where I was born three hundred years ago. I''m not sure if I''m good at swordsmanship, but I''ve learned to fight with this sword all my life.

    After saying that, Agera gave a gentle smile.

    For Agera, the sword is everything.

    Yeahoops, that''s some boring stuff.

    Hakurou put away his various thoughts and retreated.

    Could Agera be the reincarnation of his grandfather? There is some doubt, but no evidence. What''s more, even if Agera was Araki Byakuya, it wouldn''t be a reason for Kondo to take a little care of him (***Agera seems to be the reincarnation of Araki Byakuya, and might consider himself male, but is for some reason portrayed as a female demon, hence the changing pronouns).

    The grandfather, who hadn''t won once, was nothing more than a human being in the end, and no matter how Agera answered, it wouldn''t be the main reason to change things here.

    In order to win this battle, one must be stronger than Kondo.

    "Is it possible that Hakurou-san knows someone who

    "Well, it''s my grandfather.

    Gazel asked in a small voice, and Hakurou answered in a small voice.

    Esprit joins in on the duo''s whisper.

    "By the way, did Hakurous grandfather pass away in 300 years?"

    Yes."

    "Then it''s possible that he was reincarnated as a demon from the beginning with a sword. Moreover, the souls of the martial arts will gather around Carrera-sama, so there''s nothing strange about it.

    "I see. In that case, maybe he''ll know something that even Sir Hakurou doesn''t know.

    "It''s hard to say? I''ve done the best I can, and in the swordsmanship my grandfather showed me, he also said that the Eight Flower is the strongest mystery

    Like that, a few people got chatty.

    Hakurou and others have exhausted all their efforts and still lost the battle, so they looked away and became a kind of watching the victory and defeat.

    Also, although a bit anachronistic, Hakurou cared a lot about Agera''s origins, and Gazel was interested in Hakurou''s master.

    I''m so thorough in my work, I''m so thorough in my work, I''m so thorough in my work, I''m so thorough in my work, I''m so thorough in my work.

    This state of affairs made Agera sigh in disbelief.

    Kondo, on one side, also didn''te at all to interfere with the enemy''s conversation, just leisurely observing Agera''s stance.

    It was Kondo''s duty to exclude those who wanted to interfere with Kagali''s ritual, and by the way, to identify some strongmen who coulde in handy, not to cut down the enemy to death.

    So, without panic, he responded Agera.

    It was because it was too dangerous to let it go. If a "saint" who is evenly matched with himself learns the sword skills that Hakurou has entrusted to him, there is no guarantee that he will win, so Kondo chooses to win, which means that his priority is to finish the job.

    For an opponent of Agera''s apparently lower level than his own, he didn''t see a problem in ying a little bit.

    It would have been rare for Kondo to make such a judgementworkaholics who have always believed in rationalism are extremely annoyed by doing useless work.

    Kondo''s only weakness is his pride in his genre.

    Hes still not mature enough to let go of the affair.

    Even while doing introspection, one still can''t contain one''s curiosity.

    All right, let''s do a couple of things with himKondo was about to talk to the other guy, but he wasn''t too stupid to forget to look around.

    On the edge of the line of sight, Velgrynd was spotted in action.

    Kagali''s Forbidden Spell: Demon Death Aborigine isn''t done yet, but it looks like things have changed.

    Sadly it looked like the time hade and Kondo was ready to make his move.

    "I''m sorry, but I''d like to go through with you, but workes first.

    After speaking to Agera, he stowed his saber.

    It was an attitude that waspletely contemptuous of Agera, only, even knowing that it was, Agera couldn''t stop Kondo.

    Watching Kondo''s departing figure, he still felt cold and sweaty.

    "Looks like you got yourself a life."

    Reluctantly, he muttered.

    Gedora is on his own with Velgrynd as his opponent.

    That being said, it''s not as if they are fighting.

    If that was the case, even the most advanced technology-crystallized Floor Guardian Colossus Statue would be shattered with a single blow.

    Gedora knew her weight and wouldn''t make such a foolish move. Just purely following his own curiosity and asking questions of Velgrynd.

    "I didn''t know that Her Excellency, Marshal, was Lord Veldora''s sister, Lord Velgrynd, the Scorch Dragon.

    A word of courtesy first.

    One side draws Velgrynd''s attention while advancing the conversation.

    "It''s only recently that you''ve seen my face, so it''s only natural that you didnt know.

    Getting an answer is luck at the end of the day.

    Velgrynd had thus been making Gedora talking objects.

    Buying time by talking is Gedora''s strategy of making the most of it.

    The strategy worked and Gedora is still alive to this day.

    Only, there was something in Velgrynd''s mind.

    "I see. That is to say, Lord Velgrynd, who has always supported His Majesty Rudra and yed the role of a "marshal" for generations, I admire so much!

    "After all, it''s not so hard to act when you haven''t spoken for hundreds of years."

    Velgrynd replied in a rather polite tone, but it looked as if she was tired, and now she was being embarrassed by Gedora''s incessant questions.

    That''s why I couldn''t resist saying something that sounded like aint.

    You''ve got a lot of nerves, by the way. You''re allowed to ask questions because Rudra likes you. I didn''t expect you to keep asking so many questions.

    "I''m so ttered!"

    "I''m not ttering you."

    Velgrynd looked like she couldn''t stand it.

    To end Gedora, it was easy for Velgrynd, only now that four ''other bodies'' had been divided, it was inevitable that another one would have to be divided in order to deal with Gedora.

    As long as he doesn''t interfere with the ritual, that''s fine, so just deal with Gedora.

    In contrast to Velgrynd, who was troubled by making the wrong choice, Gedora continued to ask questions with aplomb.

    "On the other hand, there is one thing that is of great interestwhy did Lord Damrada prevent me frommunicating information to His Majesty? As long as Lord Rimuru''s information on their battle strength is properly conveyed, won''t the Imperial Army''s casualties be reduced?

    "Who knows? As you''ve noticed, the Imperial Army doesn''t matter to us at all, it''s just a war to awaken the strong.

    "Even so, wouldn''t it be better to hear from me about the situation?"

    "What pestering. Maybe you''re trying to say that Damrada has betrayed, but he has his own problems.

    Hmm, it''s true. What does this have to do with the kid named Masayuki?

    "I don''t know. Why do I need to know what''s going on in Damrada, and who is that Masayuki?

    Huh?"

    Velgrynd''s reaction puzzled Gedora.

    ording to Gedora''s preconceived notions, this Masayuki should be the key.

    "Well, then, don''t you know that hero is lucky?

    In the face of Gedora''s scowling questioning, Velgrynd replied coldly.

    "I don''t know, or is that guy strong?

    To ask if it''s strong or not, the answer would have to be no. Gedora didn''t hate Masayuki, he rather liked him, and that was because Gedora knew he was definitely not strong.

    Hearing Gedora''s reply, Velgrynd grimaced.

    "Kondo is only interested in people who are about to be awakened. Besides, if calling yourself a "hero"

    attracts karmic circles, then the monsters will reach out and kill him anyway, right?

    ''I seethought Gedora.

    Yuuki used Masayuki to test the reaction of Demon Lord Rimuru, and doing so was no doubt a suggestion from Damrada.

    In other words, the upper echelons of the Empire should be aware of Masayuki''s business.

    But Velgrynd said she didn''t know.

    Indeed, it''s not unreasonable to say that hes ignored because he doesn''t count as strong.

    At least for Kondo, Masayuki should be of little use, and with the intention of budding the unstable elements, plus the fact that Masayuki looks exactly like Emperor Rudra, it''s not surprising that even Kondo would want to take Masayuki out.

    What Kondo''s actions are well understood, but what cannot be understood is Damrada''s actions.

    "Hmm, but Lord Damrada sent two single-digit guards to protect the young man, Masayuki?"

    "This is to infiltrate thend of the monsters, right?

    "Well, that''s right but

    Gedora was anxious in her heart, but afraid to speak too dryly.

    It all sounded like it made sense, but it always felt like there was some sense of dissonance, that Gedora, who had already betrayed the Empire, was annoyed from the standpoint that something that didn''t need to be annoying was annoying him.

    Couldn''t she listen more seriously? Gedora really wanted to yell at Velgrynd.

    "You seem very upset.

    "Uh, no, no, no, no.

    Why was it that the expressions were invisible, but the moods of this side could be seen. Gedora was trying desperately to calm his shaken heart.

    At this point, Gedora suddenly found out why he felt at odds with Velgrynd''s words.

    "Your Excellency, Damrada, is he actually a traitor?

    Gedora said offhandedly.

    "Cut the crap. You''re not the one who betrayed me."

    You are right.

    But Gedora was not discouraged.

    Maximize the nerve of living up to the big strips and offer an opinion on Velgrynd.

    "Let''s say that''s the case. The young man, fortunately, looks exactly like His Majesty Rudra. What do you think about that?

    That''s right, the sense of dissonance came from the information about Masayuki.

    Be it strong or weak, the Empire does take that very seriously. However, Masayuki had a more important element than that, which was "the exact resemnce to Emperor Rudra, the ruler". If this is ignored, the conversation cannot continue.

    It was possible that Kondo knew about it, but Bonnie and Jiu should have been unaware of it.

    Damrada, who was a friend of Rudra, knew about it.

    But why does he want to protect Masayuki?

    It was this iprehensibility that amazed Gedora.

    what did you say?

    "That is to say, His Majesty Rudra and Masayuki the hero look exactly alike, why would this information?"

    Gedora was about to rify when he suddenly shut his mouth with an iron face.

    Seeing Velgrynd''s expression, Gedora thought to himself with trepidation, ''Ah, this old man, I guess I''m going to die'''' and suddenly began to regret being too overwhelmed.

    But Velgrynd hadpletely cast Gedora aside and gotten herself into thinking.

    It was hard to imagine Kondo not knowing about this information, but not reporting it, leaving her somewhat upset.

    The more important issue is Damrada.

    Not sure what he was thinking, there was no way to take Gedora''s words for granted now.

    And, to what extent is it simr

    To say they look like Rudra? It is necessary to confirm once

    The total annihtion of the attacking Imperial army was somewhat wrongly predicted, but it was still assumed that everything was working as nned. By all ounts, but this supposedly insignificant piece of information made Velgrynd feel very angry.

    "Gedora, thank you for the useful information. I''ll let you off the hook for this information, okay? Want to try to challenge me with that toy of yours?

    Velgrynd hadn''t intended to kill Gedora in the first ce, and didnt look at Gedora as she is now, as he''s actually one of the few friends Rudra can trust.

    Furthermore, while it is true that Gedora betrayed the Empire, there was no betrayal of Rudra, as judged by Velgrynd.

    To Velgrynd, this thing called the Empire meant little, so Gedora''s betrayal was still within tolerable bounds.

    In this respect, Velgrynd thinks a little differently than people do, not something Gedora could have guessed, so Gedora thought that one could only ept Velgrynd''s proposal.

    It''s because they can''t win that they choose to fight for time, and if it turns into a real fight, it''s basically the same as a battle to the death. To put it bluntly, it didn''t take a second for Gedora to be done.

    So Gedora was also a no-brainer.

    "Whahahahahaha, you''re such a joker. I''m no match for you!

    The control of the attitude change was important, and Gedora chose to smile and muddle through.

    This answer, which seems to be negative, neither says YES or NO, and leaves the judgment to the other party, so as not to worry about being med for fleeing from the Rimuru side, the perfect way to deal with the world.

    Gedora has subtly gone to the extreme in this regard.

    While Velgrynd understood this cunning of Gedora, she also just thought he was an interesting man.

    With a sigh and a "Gedora or Gedora?", she let him go.

    And

    Luckily for Gedora, the situation has changed.

    The other body'' who fought with Veldora was starting to get serious, and it was now necessary to leave this venue.

    "Oh yeah? If you change your mind, tell me about it and Ill be your opponent. But until then, try to survive this war.

    Hey?"

    "I''ve got things to do now, and I''ll leave that to other pawns. You seem to be hated by the military.

    Work hard to be a saint.

    "What the hell is going on?

    Ignoring the questioning Gedora, Velgrynd floated into the air. Interrupting the magic would slow down the progress of the ritual considerably, but there was nothing that could be done.

    Gedora, who had been left there dazed, was looking up at Velgrynd, confused by the change in circumstances and was at a loss as to what to do.

    On the battlefield, not even for a moment can one ck off, and as if to prove it, before Gedora could figure it out, Velgrynd revealed the meaning of the words "Time, space, connection!"

    It''s apletely breathless, out-of-touch glimpse of reality.

    Floating in the air, Velgrynd let out a roar, space twisted dramatically, and then out of that twisted space emerged countless flying airships.

    "Is that the flying ship regiment responsible for transporting the Warcraft Legion? Difficult, could it beconnecting the spaces? No, no, no, no, no way. I don''t see how far it is from there to hereno, no, it''s not that!

    Gedora was confused.

    That''s because what''s happening right in front of him is just so incredible.

    The flying fleet, which was originally scheduled tounch an attack from the northern part of the Kingdom of Ingracia, had been called here in defiance of time and space. It should have taken more than three days ording to Rimuru''s calctions, and Gedora would have thought it impossible to summon it.

    There is a great danger of transferring through magic, one messed up can kill soldiers, it takes a lot of magic to avoid that, and spells can be veryplicated.

    No, Lord Rimuru''s words can do it. However, pulling people with other coordinates over will increase the difficulty by several levels! This kind of thing should be impossible to do

    It''s just so beyondmon sense.

    Gedora''s insights are correct, but one cannot agree that this is reality.

    Just as Gedora was in chaos, there were others who felt the same way he did

    The flying regiment that was marching towards the northern part of the Kingdom of Ingracia was enjoying its air travel with grace.

    Unlike the dangerous sea route, the air is safe, though not zero, but there are few magical things that can fly over great heights.

    The person most responsible formanding the three hundred flying airships was Samuel.

    Samuel''s mission was to transport friendly troops to the central continent along with the thirty thousand

    ''Warcraft Legion'' led by Grand Admiral dim and his partners.

    It''s afortable life because they don''t have to fight.

    But

    This extraordinarily luxurious gship aboard which Samuel is aboard has a section wrapped in a different atmosphere.

    Very noble men were inspectingHe heard that was the case, but who exactly was in there, Samuel, was not heard. The man inside was a surprise intruder, maybe even the Calgurio army chief didn''t know.

    Having said that, Samuel didn''t care.

    Ha ha ha, don''t know any better. Minding your own business will only shorten your life Let gopletely and focus on your work.

    That''s why he was able to spend a rxed period of time, but then came a sudden emergency report.

    "Excuse me!"

    The general officer in charge of the order came in as if he had an urgent matter and did not give it to the soldiers, but came himself, which seemed to be a very important report.

    Samuel asked with a soft smile.

    "What''s wrong? Is it your country?"

    In fact, the report of the Calgurio army chief suffering a miserable defeat had been received, with the ground battle losing most of its strength, but it had little to do with Samuel, and the battle that had already begun was not going to stop until an abort order was given.

    With more than a few days to go until the battlefield, it would be useless for Samuel to panic, but it would be better to hope that the abort order woulde soon.

    The soldiers didn''t know about it yet, and if it leaked out it would affect morale, which would lead to a decrease inbat sess, and it was indisputable that Samuel would want to regroup.

    Some dismissed this as weakness, but it was something Samuel couldn''t decide alone.

    The friendly general, Chief of the dim Army, was of this type, the type that Samuel was not very good at.

    So Samuel prayed that the report was an order to abort.

    But the truth ispletely beyond Samuel''s imagination.

    "Your Excellency, Marshal, ising out!"

    "What? What?

    Samuel couldn''t help but yelp.

    Not even realizing that he was sitting on the boat, Samuel was no ordinary surprise.

    A very noble man is His Excellency the "Marshal"! How is that possiblethis battle, is it that important!?

    Of course, it''s important.

    It''s just that, with one of the three legions out, there should be no need for the Marshal to make another appearance.

    No, the first thing to think about than this is how to deal with the "marshal".

    "All hands, on your feet! Go forth and salute!

    Samuel immediately stood up to give the order.

    The atmosphere of ck waspletely blown away and a sense of tension filled the bridge.

    The door opened as all stood and saluted.

    On disy was a stunning beauty, Velgrynd.

    The people on the bridge were stunned beyond words by the beauty of Velgrynd.

    The marshal, who had never revealed his true self all this time, now stood before him. Before the head could react to that fact, it was first charmed by the beauty of Velgrynd.

    Velgrynd, on the other hand, took it for granted.

    "Little fools, stop fidgeting and get back to work.

    And gently pointed out.

    However, one can''t be careless.

    Velgrynd was just being more rational, and she was well aware that the gship could be ruined if it got ugly here.

    Since Emperor Rudra was also aboard this ship, which was the result of Velgrynd''s concerns, these people present should be considered lucky.

    "Get back in position! All hands, back to work."

    Following Samuel''s instructions, the sergeants went back to work.

    And just like that, the elegant ship trip was over.

    What happened next was even more of a continuous surprise to Samuel.

    "For the first time, Your Excellency. My name is Samuel. I hope you remember me.

    "Yeah, I''ll think about it if you survive.

    "It is a great honor. Ill remember your golden words and make every effort.

    "As much as I''d like to encourage you, there''s no time for that, so get to the subject quickly.

    Velgrynd coped with Samuel''s ttery and took her seat in the captain''s chair.

    Towards Samuel, who had stepped aside in a panic, gave the order.

    "It''s a pain in the ass to repeat it. Get me the dim Commander.

    Yes!"

    Samuel gave a look, and the sergeant who had taken his meaning contacted the ship that dim was aboard.

    Not a momentter, dim appeared in the picture.

    She''s more beautiful than I thought.

    dim saw Velgrynd and felt it would be easy to subdue her, so there was some doubt in his mind.

    Why, why is it that such a woman is considered stronger than me?

    Not a bit of extra fat or muscle, and a body that looks slim and soft, no matter how it looks, seems like nothing to do with being strong. There are ideas that it''s the magic and fighting qi that are important, but it also takes strong flesh to get those things to circle back properly.

    Just like me dim boasted of his flesh, and so it was even more so that Velgrynd looked weak.

    It''s really just muscle-brain functioning.

    Velgrynd, on the other hand, doesn''t think much of dim, the strength is real, she just wants to make full use of him as a pawn who can y.

    Velgrynd simply returned the words, "No need to be polite," and then ndly began to give orders, looking at that attitude, simply not taking dim at all.

    "From now on, ongoingbat missions are abandoned. The new mission is to go ahead and suppress the armed state of Dwargon, anything to ask?

    Samuel and dim thought to themselves, ''Is it finally here?'' They also estimated that the country should be in a state of unprecedented chaos.

    Now that the defeat has been suffered, it is necessary to immediately re-establish the battle, since the battle is being fought head-on with the three sides at the same time, so that the judgment now made takes on extra significance.

    All it takes is one ring to fail and it will lead to a domain-wide copse.

    However, after a few days, the kingdom of Ingracia was so close that it received an order to abort, and it was only natural that the two would froze.

    "Understood. Then return immediately at maximum speed."

    "Huh! Since it was His Excellency''s order, dim must have fought with his life toplete it. But you''re toote to judge, and you''ll be held responsible for the failure of the operation.

    Samuel was nervous to take orders, and dim was as arrogant as ever.

    dim, aboard a different warship, could not feel the dominance of Velgrynd through the frame.

    Seeing dim like this, Samuel had been nervous.

    Don''t get me involved!

    The heart prayed.

    But Velgrynd waspletely indifferent.

    "Looks like you''ve got the wrong idea.

    Showing a smile spoke to the two.

    "Misunderstanding, huh?

    "What misunderstanding? Are you trying to say you''re not wrong?"

    Yes, Velgrynd nodded and then began to exin.

    "First of all, Samuel, from here to your destination I will lead you, and after that I will continue to give you instructions, so be prepared.

    Huh?"

    "Catch, dim. We didn''t lose the battle, it was all in line with the original n.

    "What a stupid thing to say! It''s toote to think that shirking responsibility will work.

    "What did you say, stupid?

    Velgrynd narrowed his eyes in displeasure and red at dim.

    Inwardly, she wondered what to do about it while thinking what a pain in the ass. Then the conclusion was reached that leave it alone.

    dim doese on strong, but it''s nothing against Velgrynd, it''s easy to break him down, but to do so would be a bit too wasteful.

    Most importantly, there''s no time.

    It is this that has been extremely fortunate for dim.

    "Forget it. If you survive, we''ll talk about itter."

    "Talk about what?

    "Listen, from now on, we''re going to perform the Space-Time Connection and be ready to move immediately. After that, Ill focus on Veldora, and the kid became more difficult to deal with than one might think, a happy miscalction, but a bit tricky indeed. Therefore, you are going to suppress the battlefield in my ce, and it has been confirmed that there are some people worth waiting for, so as to capture them alive as much as possible, do you understand?

    Ignoring dim, who still wanted to continueining, Velgrynd got straight to the point.

    Velgrynd, who had finished speaking, turned her back on the duo as they prepared to walk to the outer deck of the ship, hitching his hand on the reinforced door.

    "Your Excellency! Your Excellency, Marshal, what are you doing? It''s dangerous. Pleasee back quickly!

    "What? I told you. If we don''t go outside, we won''t be able to use the space-time connection.

    ncing at Samuel like a fool, he pushed open the door without hesitation, and then Velgrynd flew off into the air just like that.

    Why so capricious!? Want to reel us in!?

    Samuel felt the terror.

    It is an incredibly dangerous act to open the bridge door in high altitude and high speed flight, or else everyone in the ship will be sucked out because of the air pressure difference.

    The cold temperatures will rob him of his strength and theck of oxygen will lead to death.

    The same goes for the magical envoys in the ministry.

    Samuel anxiously tried to hurry and close the door.

    But all his worries were unfounded.

    Velgrynd''s use of Space Domination has long since prevented its effects on the ship.

    Before Samuel could be surprised, the greatest surprise came at Samuelno, at all the generals.

    Just floating up to the sky is Velgrynd.

    And then the next moment

    "Time, space, connection!"

    Ahead of Velgrynd, a huge spatial distortion appeared.

    "How could?

    "Hard, unbelievable. Acknowledgement of spatial vibration. The tremendous, due to the really overpowering shaking of the magical essence, seems to be having an effect on space-time!

    "No, didntthat''s what Her Excellency the "Marshal" did!"

    It really is, how.

    It is, after all, a phenomenon that is unimaginable and beyond human intelligence.

    There''s no way to understand what''s going on, there''s no way anyone can do something like that

    everyones running from reality.

    However, Samuel perceived.

    "The boy? Her Excellency, "Marshal", called Veldora the boy?"

    There are few conceivable existences that would call Veldora that.

    Could it be!? Could the Marshals true face be

    Dare not speak out, Imperial Guardian Dragon. Having always thought she was only guarding the Empire on a whim, Samuel found out that the truth was different.

    As if to affirm Samuel''s preconceptions, the floating Velgrynd smiled deeply.

    "All right, go work for me.

    It was a voice that would not allow disobedience.

    Not only Samuel, but dim as well, as if invited by the sweet sound, reversed the airship and headed for the time rift.

    The battlefield changed dramatically as a result of Velgrynd''s actions.

    And that''s true for the demoness trio that continually fights.

    In earnest, Velgrynd showed more than her imagination.

    Completely unbroken, relying on her overwhelmingly powerful strength to y with Testarossa and others, not a single bit of her body was allowed to touch.

    Not a bit careless, not a bit drained.

    Even a mere blow of magic had an incredibly high power. Velgrynd brought out all her strength to carry out a sustained attack, trying to destroy the demoness trio.

    Like a mad warrior who has lost her sanity.

    She just didn''t turn into her dragon form, but there was no doubt that Velgrynd was serious.

    However, Testarossa and the others are still alive.

    If it was before Rimuru gave them names, they would have lost flesh and been forced to return to the demon world. The bodies made by Rimuru were further strengthened by the magic of the Primordial.

    Thanks to this, they were barely able to withstand the tyranny of Velgrynd.

    "It''s amazing. I thought it would end sooner than I thought. It''s more resistant than I thought, and I''m used to closebat."

    These are the sincere words of Velgrynd.

    I didn''t expect to use up so much time even though I was using my full strength.

    "We will not be defeated. If we make such a disgraceful spectacle, we will be ridiculed by Diablo. That is more humiliating than death.

    "I feel the same way, that guy. He''s got a dark side.

    "Oi, oi, it feels like Diablo would not want to be told that by you. But I agree about the dark side.

    They were lying on the ground, scaly and bruised, but the threes eyes were still full of energy, not only that, but they also showed a fearless smile.

    It is not defeat as long as one does not concede defeat, and that unyielding attitude is better than eloquence.

    "Oops, oops, that''s a lot of trouble.

    Velgrynd was just as confused, but the battle was irreversible.

    The tricky Demon Lord Rimuru and his subordinates were imprisoned in the ''Fantasy Fortress'', and they managed to lure Veldora out of thebyrinth.

    After that it was just a matter of dominating Veldora as nned.

    Velgrynd, who had taken the demoness trio''s wisecracks to heart, had her expression twisted at the words of Testarossa, who stood up.

    "It took a lot of time, but I have a good grasp of your ''parallel existence.

    Their goal was not to crush Velgrynd, but to stall Velgrynd here, which was the condition for tactical victory, only this condition could not be achieved because of Velgrynd''s secret ''parallel existence''.

    So it was that Testarossa was hoping to at least find the means to break this move.

    "Then tell me?

    "Well, you can."

    Testarossa was still smiling gracefully when she was clearly beaten up and bruised all over her body.

    This reserved attitude, despite being an enemy, was so admirable to Velgrynd that she was willing to listen to what Testarossa had to say.

    Testarossa points out that the ''parallel existence'' of Velgrynd is by no means invincible and limited.

    There is a limit to the number of otheer bodies" that can be distributed, and if an other body" is knocked down, there is no way to ensure that it will be harmless.

    "To be precise, the physical damage is still zero, but for spiritual beings like us, the consumption of magicules is the real damage. In other words"

    "Our attack wasn''t useless!

    Ultima snatched the words from Testarossa and spoke the conclusion.

    Testarossa nodded with a smile, only her eyes weren''t smiling, but instead were fixed on Velgrynd.

    Velgrynd sighed in her heart.

    That''s why I hated being a rival to white."

    Testarossa''s usations hit the bull''s-eye, and in just such a short time, the results were analyzed in the midst of being ravaged by despair.

    It was an astonishing insight intobat that Velgrynd had to admire.

    As expected of the primordial whiteno, it''s Testarossa. That''s right. It''smendable.

    I''d love to take them for myself, thought Velgrynd. It would not be worth it to incur their resentment if they were to be resurrected sooner orter even killed.

    Unlike some demon lord, there''s really nothing more troublesome than being glued to a primordial."

    Nor did it matter what mood Velgrynd was in right now, Carrera let loose with a fearless smile.

    "Kukuku, Lord Velgrynd is acting too easy, and if Lord Veldora had, he would never have fought us like this.

    Carrera''s words made Velgrynd feel a little irritated.

    By the way, what Carrera calls a light fight is something where contempt for an opponent''s fight =

    contempt for an opponent without giving it your all. Veldora was well aware of the dangers of the demoness trio and would never let his weaknesses be exposed to them in order to preserve his majesty.

    It turned out to be misunderstood in such a good direction that Carrera''s words were not very interesting to Velgrynd.

    How could that be interesting?

    But somehow Velgrynd found herself somewhat happy, it turned out that the troubled brother, who needed discipline, was now growing up and she was feeling happy as a sister.

    This could be a reason that made Velgrynd lose her will to fight.

    Just in time too.

    After fighting with Veldora, Velgrynd realized that Veldora''s strength was not the same as before, and if she did not use her full strength, Velgrynd would suffer.

    Judging by thebination, Velgrynd decided at this moment to stop fighting and let go of the demoness trio who she could take out in an instant if she took out her true skills.

    "That''s right. Indeed, as you say, that child has really grown a great deal. It was delightful, but messed with my inability to drain the water. Therefore, we''ll leave the victory or defeat between you to another day.

    Velgrynd unterally proimed.

    What to doin front of the trio of demonesses who had reacted this way, Velgrynd''s other body''

    disappeared, and it happened in a sh, as the three of them could only watch.

    The forest is burning.

    After the other body'' that Velgrynd had put everywhere had been cancelled and returned to a body that shone with a dazzling red light, it transformed into a dragon form that was wrapped with a true red supreme aura, and the trees burned up due to the after-effects of the red light.

    Veldora also took on the stance of a dragon, his domineering aura calling out to the raging winds that ravaged the earth.

    The mes wavered and flickered brightly, mirroring Veldora and Velgrynd.

    The battle between the two, from now, is on

    Velgrynd turned into her original form and stared at Veldora.

    As if to boast of his huge amount of mana, Veldora also showed off his huge body.

    It''s really been a long time since the sister and brother met again in such a way.

    The encounter with Velgrynd and Emperor Rudra was a long, long time ago. While Veldora was making a fuss all over the ce, the Velgrynd of the time was already lurking in the Empire.

    Not even going out for a walk, not leaving Rudra''s side at all. It was because of this feeling of inconvenience that the parallel existence'' was created, and it was after Veldora was sealed that this skill was acquired.

    The siblingsst met another two thousand years ago, on a continent to the southwest.

    Remembering that time, it seemed as though Velgrynd was just yfully disying some power, and Veldora immediately ran away.

    But that was all, and the impact was enormous, and the volcanic zone was born out of the energetic impact of the conflict between the "dragon races".

    On that continent, volcanoes continue to be active to this day.

    Whew~ Hmm. I''m sure he hasn''t been weakened by the seal, but he feels even stronger than before.

    A delightful miscalction indeed.

    The growth of her younger brother was indeed pleasing, except that him not listening to Velgrynd was difficult, but it only took strength to make him obey. Even if this method doesn''t work, one can still rely on the power of Rudra.

    As long as Rudra''s power is at his disposal, even the Dragon Race is at his disposal, as evidenced by the fact that even II waswait what was I thinking?

    Velgrynd felt as if something important wasing back to her, and suddenly her mind was full of thoughts. Only now it''s more important to capture Veldora, so her mood switches over first.

    While wanting to avoid relying on Rudra as much as possible, if one needs to rely on Rudra, one must also deprive Veldora of resistance before doing so.

    Even just a little, to reduce Rudra''s burden.

    Rudra is at his limit, so I have to get him relieved quickly.

    That''s what Velgrynd really meant, so hopefully, as much as possible, they don''t rely on Rudra to tame Veldora.

    For no other reason than that it should have been so.

    Velgrynd had the odds in her mind.

    The amount of mana in Veldora was huge, but there was apleteck of mastery in using it, which is why Veldora didn''t look very dangerous to her to begin with.

    The offense and defense was wonderful, but it was only because of the control of the power that he became able to fight against her, and if the full power is liberated, the control cannot be won, but only the brute force attack. No matter how massive the power is, it''s meaningless if it can''t be used skillfully.

    When he bes apanion, Ill have to teach him a little.

    While keeping the status quo like this is good enough to be an ace, Velgrynd still intends to work out Veldora again if he wants to fight her. But now, there was still the point of taking advantage of the immaturity of Veldora, who relied on brute force, to decide victory or defeat in one breath.

    So the board will move in one breath.

    The long-sustained game is nearing its end.

    The victory of Velgrynd and Emperor Rudra was close at hand, starting with the capture of Veldora.

    With Veldora''s assistance, it would be a good time to win or lose, to attack in a single breath, to end this long-running game, and in that case, Veldora would be free.

    With these thoughts, Velgrynd flew towards Veldora.

    The fight was over-the-top from the start.

    The first to take action was Velgrynd.

    Nor does it prevent a bacsh, releasing scorching spit.

    From the dragon''s mouth, a slender, super-hot hot wire with that intense power attacked Veldora at tens of times the speed of sound like a nightmare.

    Veldora avoids the attack.

    Normally, Veldora could make the Fire me attack ineffective with the ''''Heat Cancetion'''', but Veldora panicked and dodged the Hotline attack.

    "Oh, I didn''t think I''d choose to avoid it. I thought you''d end it with one move like you did before.

    You''ve finally seen the essence of your skills.

    "Kuahahaha! Sister''s exhtion has given you the effect of "elerated destruction promotion", right?

    If I get a direct hit, my magic will go into a frenzy, and if I do, my power will be reduced to suppress the frenzy.

    Veldora replied with a smile.

    Indeed, Velgrynd''s attack had a special attack effect, the ultimate power of ''elerated Destruction Promotion''.

    Through this power to elerate all phenomena, to increase the destructive effect, and not only that, but also to elerate the life activity of objects.

    Even spiritual beings could not resist this power, and even if they were spared from mere destruction, they would definitely be affected by the energy storm.

    Veldora sensed this intuitively and chose to hold back.

    And his actions were verified by Veldora''s ''Analytical Appraisal'' of the ''King of Investigation'', so that Veldora could confidently answer his sister Velgrynd.

    HeyI''m really d that I''ve seen so much, I''ve really grown.

    Veldora''s correct answer gave Velgrynd a sense of crisis.

    What is in front of her is not the foolish brother who can only fool around, but an opponent who needs a proper evaluation.

    To be able to see through one''s own power correctly means that Veldora has an ultimate skill.

    "The True Dragon Seed''s attacks are usually powerful enough to reach the ultimate skill, but with the management of the ultimate skills, the danger level will rise by many levels.

    Velgrynd was overjoyed.

    Congrattions on the growth of her uninjured brother.

    But at the same time, she was vignt.

    Growing up enough to threaten even her, Veldora has the potential to affect Rudra''s ns.

    It was a bit unexpected that she might even be defeated if he kept on like this, not to mention dominating, but growing up to this point.

    Thinking about it, Velgrynd, who was faltering a bit, had her turn to pull out the trigger this time.

    "Thinking about things on the battlefield, sister? It''s called carelessness!

    While talking, he let out the Thundercloud Roar, a move formed by repeatedly releasing storm magic, a must-kill technique for Veldora.

    The attack hit Velgrynd directlybut the power was scattered without doing much damage.

    "I see. It seems that you have really acquired the ultimate skill. Imend you from the bottom of my heart, Veldora!

    "I''m still so scared that I was deliberately hit by an attack to confirm it."

    "Isn''t there nothing we can do about it? Because it''s necessary to measure how much of a threat your power really is.

    "So, has my ultimate skill, the King of Investigation, passed?

    It seems to be the ultimate skill of the analysis system. Although it doesn''t increase the power of the attack, it can correct the hit rate. Your control of magic has improved thanks to the power of the ''King of Investigation'', right?

    "Kuahahaha! That''s right, since I have more magicules than my sister, so there''s no need to add more power, as long as I can hit it, it''s enough.

    Hearing Veldora''s reply, Velgrynd shed a smile.

    Then, the response goes.

    "You''ve be smarter than I thought. You have something I don''t have. That''s why I want you to join me as an ace.

    "Eh? I always feel an itch on my back when I''m praised by my sister

    Veldora, though still yful, also sensed that Velgrynds aura had changed.

    In other words

    "You must be rewarded for your growth. Let me show you what I can do.

    "Well, then you don''t have to"

    Ill use the full power of the ultimate ''King of Charity'' to be your opponent!

    Veldora''s words did not reach Velgrynd.

    It would be ridiculous to lose a battle because you can''t make a move.

    Even after the intense offense and defense, neither took much damage, so Velgrynd decided to go all out on Veldora.

    Even doing so Veldora would not die, Velgrynd was sure.

    Countless magical arrays appeared around Velgrynd, and that was magic that was unleashed simultaneously through a portion of the ''other body''.

    "Eat this!"

    Eleven Rays of LightNuclear Strike Magic: Thermal Beam Cannon Attack was used on Veldora.

    After a moment''s judgment, Veldora decided to neutralize it with the magic barrier, because the amount of light was a bit too much to avoid, and there was another reason why he didn''t pay attention to it because he thought it was just pure magic, which caused him to be a bitte in responding.

    The reason why the magic barrier was opened was because Veldora sensed the danger of the thermal beam cannon.

    Crunch!"

    Veldora felt a violent pain.

    Neutralizing Velgrynd''s magic failed and was shot.

    "Gee, you''ve gotten wiser. I''m a little impressed that you''ve only been hurt like this.

    I didn''t think that even magic had given me the power of an ultimate skillIf I''mpletely trapped, even I''m not safe.

    "I was going to end it with this, so you can be proud.

    "Kuahahaha, I appreciate your offer, but forgive me if I decline. Ill be proud, and also wait until I have beaten you before being fully proud!

    As if to strike back, Veldora unleashed the storm magic: "Mists of Darkness and Destruction", and the gourd dipper also gave it the ultimate skill, sessfully blowing Velgrynd away.

    "Kuahahaha! How about that, sister? When you''ve had it, you can just shake hands and make peace

    "Don''t be so proud! I see you''ve pissed me off.

    "Hey!? Uh, wait

    Already not wanting to say more, Velgrynd was angry. Veldora''s attack had inflicted damage on her, and understanding that fact the instant Veldora''s reason flew away.

    In order to reim her dignity as a sister, Velgrynd attacked again.

    Giving birth to ten heads and spitting out eleven more scorching spits at Veldora, while performing a spatial shift, upying a position above Veldora.

    Avoiding the plural spitting Veldora, waiting for him toe back to find that he was already in an unfavorable situation, he looked up at Velgrynd from the bottom, forming a confrontation.

    Veldora couldn''t help but feel admiration for the walk and at the same time cheerful for sensing that Velgrynd was serious.

    Kuahahahaha! Its so nice to see that someone who used to bepletely incapable of being an opponent is now able to fight like this, thanks to Rimuru''s cultivation.

    Veldora still had the pleasure of being unhurried, pleasure is pleasure, and still had the understanding that he was in danger.

    Veldora pondered how to get out of it.

    Velgrynd, on the other side, was in afortable mood for pushing Veldora to within must-kill distance, and as long as she was within that range, she was certain that Veldora would never be able to escape.

    "Let it end here, Veldora. Sure enough, you can''t escape from my hands!"

    After the Velgrynd promation, a scorching rain of vomit came down from the sky.

    The scorching rain descended without a gap, forming a pir of inmmation that connected the heavens and the earth.

    Looking from the periphery, it was like a cage made of fire.

    In the middle Veldora, anxiously danced back and forth.

    He was by no means ying around, but was all pre-judging the direction of the attack and dodging.

    It was the same old hyper-speed attack, but Veldora didn''t feel like he could keep up yet, trusting his instincts and letting his massive frame fly back and forth.

    As a result, despite being trapped in a ming cage, he didn''t take a single direct hit.

    "Kuahahahaha! It''s nothing as long as you don''t hit me!

    Veldora shouted excitedly the lines he had seen in the sacred texts (manga).

    In contrast, Velgrynd smacked her tongue in displeasure.

    Indeed, not even a single shot missed was a miscalction on the part of Velgrynd, or one has to say a bit of an underestimation of Veldora.

    But

    My attack, it''s only now official!

    The state of absolute dominance remains.

    Velgrynd is ready to strike with a jab.

    "It is indeed admirable to see through my attacks to such an extent. As a bonus, Ill send a big hug! A scorching embrace!

    There was a purpose to why Velgrynd had taken the position over Veldora.

    Below was the earth, for Veldora dodged the scorching spit, and the ground had be a boiling, scorchingva.

    The flyingva droplets harbored a horrible heat.

    What would happen if a further attack was attached to this scorching hell?

    Waitwait a minute, sis!"

    It was toote to hurry any longer when sensing that intention, and Veldora had been caught up in Velgrynd''s spell from the start.

    Withstanding Velgrynd''s excessive attacks caused the ground to boil and even be gas, and the ultra-high temperatures caused the gasifiedva to surround Veldora.

    Those were tiny droplets of Velgrynd''s power, the "scorching redva",ing from the bottom up like rain.

    The "True Red Cage" that captured Veldora waspleted at this moment.

    ***

    The essence of Velgrynd''s ultimate power, the King of Charity, is charitythat is, supportand

    "enhancement" is its true essence, and for Velgrynd, whose essence is "eleration", there is no higher power than the multiplying effect this brings.

    What if the power of Velgrynd was surrounded by the True Red Cage like this?

    The amount of movement of the object is greatly increased, and the heat is also greatly increased, and it is only natural that the "scorching redva" will turn into gas when the temperature reaches 2,000 degrees or even tens of thousands of degrees.

    Thus was generated the scorching prison, but its true essence was more than that.

    Velgrynd''s support effect can be increased indefinitely regardless of the upper limit, i.e., if it is only increased appropriately, support enhancement can be obtained, and if it is given an excessive increase, it bes a burden.

    The negative effect caused will promote the other party''s physical exertion, and the effect can even be increased to the point where the other party is burned out by the heat generated by her body.

    The ultimate skill, the "King of Charitythe power to operate all energies freely.

    As if to embrace Veldora, Red Rain gently made a wrapping, and those trapped by the scorching embrace could only give Velgrynd the right to live or die.

    Even if the object is a "dragon species" the result is the same.

    There is no ce to escape as long as one is captured by a cage.

    Convinced of her victory, Velgrynd prepared to make a final exhortation to Veldora, but her movements came to an abrupt halt.

    The scent of Veldora that should have been captured disappeared.

    What''s going on!?

    Velgrynd was in a rare state of anxiety.

    At this point, she sensed the scent behind her and hurriedly turned around in a panic.

    "Kuahahahaha! Didn''t I just say that? It''s nothing as long as it doesn''t hit!

    Trumpeting the victory was the human-turned Veldora.

    His high, loudughter was extraordinarily piercing to Velgrynd''s ears.

    It was in this moment that Velgrynd really saw Veldora as a threat.

    On the other hand, Veldora was not so rxed when heughed and irritated the other.

    After calming down and thinking about it, Veldora, who was angry because his clothes were burned, felt that there was still a big difference in strength between him and his sister, and knew that the chances of winning a serious battle were slim, so he kept up his guard from the start.

    That''s the learned Hinata way of fighting.

    While taking care not to get mortally wounded,unch an attack aimed at your opponent''s break, and then, when you find that the attack can work, attack continuously.

    In fighting Hinata, one''s own habits seem to be seen through by the other. He overwhelms Hinata with a gap in strength while fighting on the 100th floor of the underground, but is hit hard when she travels back in time to take on the form of Chronoa "The Hero".

    It''s no wonder that she was so familiar with my movement habits even though it was obviously my first fight with here!

    It was a foulVeldora thought so, but even if he said it out loud, he would only be called a sore loser by his opponent, and he felt irritated at the look of smugness on Hinata''s face, but a defeat is a defeat.

    Veldora honestly introspects and then begins to learn the art of fighting against an opponent who is stronger than himself.

    Not only that, but what was learned was cunning in mock battles with demons.

    When you can''t beat an opponent by strength, as long as the opponent is more fatigued than yourself it is a victory, this is the battle between spiritual beings, Veldora learned this.

    This is a perspective that has not been attempted before.

    By observing Rimuru''s life, an interest in all sorts of things emerged.

    The originally inquisitive Veldora''s horizons were opened up and he learned to think in ways that werepletely absent in the past, which seemed to have a benign effect on Veldora and yed a role in Veldora''s growth.

    The fruits of learning yed a role in this battle with Velgrynd, the so-called no-defeat fighting style that Veldora tried to practice.

    And that''s what prompted Velgrynd tounch the scorching embrace

    "True Red Cage" is a must-kill skill at first sight.

    Having been captured, Velgrynd was certain of victory.

    Veldora was desperate enough to avoid the scorching spit alone, not seeing that it was a trap, but the

    ''Danger Foreknowledge'' of the ''King of Investigation was unleashed.

    In order not to be careless on any asion and to be on the alert to keep on going, it was with this blessing that Veldora was saved from the crisis.

    Never in the past had a warning of maximums made Veldora feel that something was not quite right. To keep running like this would be to lose, to feel a wicked chill and to have him convinced. However, even in the panic of trying to cope with the situation, they do not know what is going to happen.

    Just then, the "scorching redva" erupted, and upon seeing this, Veldora saw through Velgrynd''s thoughts.

    But at this stage, it''s still hard to deal with these things, and at first nce, you can''t blow them away with the Mists of Destruction.

    This area was already under the influence of Velgrynd''s ''space domination'', and it was impossible to escape with ''space transfer''.

    Crap!

    Just as Veldora was thinking this, the moment of the ''King of Investigation'' came to an optimal understanding.

    As long as the Scorching Red Lava was boarding Velgrynd''s mind, it would be dangerous to touch it, and it would not be easy to escape from the foggy attack, but even if the huge body could not, it was possible to use a human''s stance.

    Despite having to shed defenses, after all, the future was seen escaping through the cracks.

    Even so, the sess rate of escape is only half.

    If the timing is right, its a sess, if it fails, there will be no next time. While Veldora was dazed, there came the apocalypse that would absolutely seed.

    He didn''t realize that the ''King of Investigations ''Operation Probability'' had been activated.

    The so-called "probabilistic operation" is the power to manipte a phenomenon in a direction that is favorable to one''s self, ording to one''s own situation, against an object that is equal to or weaker than one''s self.

    This point surprised Veldora.

    In other words, if the sess rate is doubled, in this case, half of the sess rate can be escaped, then doubling the sess rate is a sure thing.

    Is it such a coincidence? Half-believing, Veldora warily transformed into a human stance in an attempt to escape the cage, not expecting to seed all at once.

    And just like that, Veldora was out of the crisis.

    ***

    Velgrynd threw away all of herposure so far and stared closely at Veldora, who wasughing loudly.

    The younger brother in need of discipline, who had always been thought of as inferior to her, that Veldora, had somehow grown to this extent.

    The idea of letting brute force run amok is a big misunderstanding.

    Veldora is brilliantly alive with the ability to match Velgrynd''s ultimate skills, and surprisingly, escapes from an absolutely impossible situation to reverse.

    There is also talk of teaching Veldora that there should be a measure of pride and conceit.

    It has to be admitted.

    Veldora was now on the same level as herself.

    Velgrynd endorsed Veldora and confronted him as an enemy above equal.

    If one calmly analyzed the situation, one could actually see that Velgrynd was at a disadvantage because her Ao-Yi had just been broken.

    The little gimmick will be dodged and it will be hard to give him mortal wounds.

    That being the case, there is only the option of consuming Veldora and then relying on Rudra to unleash his kingship.

    Thinking about it, Velgrynd changed her tactics and became more deliberate in her actions.

    "Oh, yeah? Looks like I''ve got your approval.

    As if sensing Velgrynd''s thoughts, Veldora turned into a dragon with a yful gesture.

    It would have been quite irritating, but somehow Velgrynd was happy.

    Come to think of it, I don''t think I''ve ever yed with this kid

    And to think of such things.

    Velgrynd couldn''t help but smile and reply.

    "Well, yeah, I approve of you, you''ve been able to hold your own. So, ah, Veldora, if it is thoughtful to disobey me, there will be no more forgiveness.

    Velgrynd acted as if she was going to say it to herself, so dered to.

    Looking at the sister whose atmosphere had changed, Veldora also sensed a sense of crisis, but couldn''t nod his head here.

    "Kuahahaha! Then I''lly down my life!

    I''m finally getting used to using the ultimate skill that I haven''t used much for a long time.

    Despite being forced into a bitter fight as Velgrynd''s opponent, it was enough to make a confrontation as long as that force was present.

    So Veldora felt it was his turn to strike this time.

    Although he can''t use ''Parallel Existence'' like Velgrynd, Veldora also hides one of the only First Sight Must Kill skills.

    This skill was only told to Rimuru, and was called the Harvest Storm Attack, and the skill was created after consulting with him.

    Even that Rimuru was in admiration, so there was no way it wouldn''t work on sister!

    Veldora was full of confidence.

    As far as Veldora knew, there was no one in the world more cunning than Rimuru.

    I''ve been thinking to myself that I''m lucky Rimuru is apanion.

    This skill is certified by the authority of Rimuru.

    Now, Veldora unceremoniously freed the Harvest Storm Attack.

    A thundercloud roar was released from Veldora''s mouth, its tyranny interfering with space and turning into an unseen light flying haphazardly.

    Velgrynd, of course, would only respond to extremely dangerous attacks, something like Interfering Wave had no effect at all and was never put out of sight in the first ce.

    But it''s that that''s the catch.

    Meaningless fluctuations can be unimaginably destructive when they are in poor plural, just as acoustic weapons, which alone pose little threat, are toote to detect.

    Velgrynd was no exception, looking to miss the Harvest Storm attack. It was only when the whole body was pervaded by pain that one understood that one had fallen into the Veldora''s spell.

    Goo! I can''t believe Imfeeling pain? Veldora, what did you just do!?

    "Kuahahahahah! It''s my self-created Harvest Storm Attack", which I''m very confident in.

    Veldora said triumphantly.

    Getting the results as expected and getting overjoyed.

    Although he knew it hadn''t caused any fatal injuries, it had never been possible to get such an advantage over his sister, so Veldora couldn''t help but want to show off.

    But

    "You''re a real dumbass. That''s why you''re not good enough.

    Veldora felt a fierce pain that he had never felt before.

    The one trumpeting the victory was Velgrynd.

    The moment Velgrynd recognized Veldora, the duel was abandoned, and the winning direction was no longer meaningful, but the full force of the fight was driving the sess.

    So worked hard to keep Veldora unnoticed, quietly approaching the Emperor''s gship flying airship.

    On board the gship was Lieutenant Kondo, who was fully prepared.

    Kondo unleashed the strongest aura towards Veldora, following Veldora''s ''''Chanting Words''

    instructions.

    And then

    That one blow, even a god could be destroyed.

    Kondo can only fire one bullet a day, called the "Kamikaze Bullet", which is the strongest bullet born from the power of the "King of Execution, arge southern-style automatic pistol that has been sublimated to mythical levels.

    The Domination Spell Bomb waspletely iparable to this bullet, and as far as Kondo knew, there were no people who ate this move and remained unscathed. Even Velgrynd''s ''other body'''' could be buried, and even Veldora could not remain unharmed.

    All as expected by Velgrynd''s n.

    The initial speed is extremely close to the speed of light, and it can prate all kinds of "defense barriers" to reach the target.

    Veldora, who had been careless, had no strength left to resist the "god-extinguishing bomb.

    Being hit by such a projectile, even his own existence was threatened.

    Veldora was in chaos.

    Sister, you actually borrowed a third person''s hand!?

    Veldora was a bit forgetful because he felt he could win over his sister, so he got caught in the breach and fell for his sister''s n.

    However

    It''s shocking that the self-respecting and arrogant sister should give up the duel. While understanding that it was a condition to prioritize victory, it always felt too unlike Sister.

    As important as this is, the more important issue right now is the state of himself.

    Oops!

    A strong rm sounded inside Veldora''s head, and being a spiritual being, Veldora was abnormal enough to be able to feel the pain alone.

    As the strongest True Dragon Race is in a life crisis, it''s only natural that Veldora would be anxious in the face of this incredible fact.

    If it had been a head-on strike, it might have been possible to resist even if he couldn''t avoid it, but now as he waspletely caught off guard, Veldora had no solution.

    Ouch, that''s a headache. This time it''s better to admit defeat honestly and wait for the next time we meet to get revenge. Let''s see, let''s get in touch with Rimuru first

    All caught up in this state, Veldora still retained some submissiveness. The reason why, is because there is a "Soul Corridor" between him and Rimuru, which can be revivedter.

    As long as Rimuru was alive, Veldora was indestructible, so there was absolutely no need to panic.

    It should have been so, but instead things started going in the worst possible direction.

    "The King''s Power Unleashed"

    It wasn''t noticed because it was only watching Kondo, and there was actually a well-dressed man on board the airship.

    Masayuki? Uh, no. Mhm!? Wait, give me a minute! What''s this!? Oops, this really sucks!!!

    By the time he found out, it was toote.

    The man, Emperor Rudra, was about to seize the spiritual will of Veldora.

    With all the bruises and wounds from being hit by the the exterminating bullet, it was really over for Veldora.

    But there was one thing that Veldora couldn''t stand either way.

    it doesn''t matter if it''s just me, but if it goes on like this, my friend Rimuru will also be affected, and only that will not be allowed!

    Rudra''s domination is far more powerful than imagined, and if it continues to be left unchecked, it will obviously affect Rimuru through the Soul Corridor.

    ''This will never be allowedVeldora thought to himself.

    Thus, the Soul Corridor was cut off on his own ord.

    This this is good. After that it''s up to you, Rimuru

    With thosest words, Veldora''s consciousness plunged into darkness.

 Volume 15 - Ch 2

    It''s probably the first time Ive lost my sanity in anger.

    When Shion and the others were killed, regret and anger were woven into my heart, and thoughts of self-me flooded my head. But because of the sight of hope, the storm in the heart regained its calm.

    Because of this, I actually managed the rather deft act of being angry while remaining calm

    This time is different.

    This pain of having my soul torn apart, and the possibility of losing Veldora, made mepletely lose my sanity.

    The odds?

    That kind of stuff doesn''t matter at all.

    I want to crush the enemy.

    That''s all.

    "Lord Rimuru, what''s next? It looks like we''ve been isted into a special space, can we pry it open by force?

    Without Benimaru''s reminder, I sensed that we were locked up.

    Since the enemy''s objective is to capture Veldora, of course some means will be used to keep us out of the way. It''s foolish of us to fall headlong into a trap without even realizing it.

    <<sorry. i''m="" really="" sorry.="">></sorry.>

    Unbelievably, even the ''King of Wisdom'' is in chaos. The feeling is the inability to believe that you are being yed by others and has be less calm than usual.

    It''s obviously a skill, but it''s be so human it makes oneughbut I don''t have the mental energy to take it in stride these days.

    Right now, my feelings are only one color of anger.

    Give thanks and you won''t have to be, give me focus on finding a way to escape. As a result, the "King of Wisdom" replied to me that he had mastered the coordinates perfectly and that the "analysis and identification" of this space would soon be over.

    The "King of Wisdom" is very capable.

    "No problem. We''ll get out of here and target the head of the enemy. Listen up, Veldora has fallen into the hands of Rudra. So when you get there with Space Shift, you''ll have to fight them immediately, and you''ll have to prepare yourselves.

    I said in a forced rage.

    I don''t want to anger mypanions. I want to take it all out on the enemy.

    After everyone nodded together, I added another order.

    "Without Veldora to provide the magic, Ramiris wont be able to mess around as much as before. So I''m going to put the metropolis that''s been tucked away in thebyrinth back on the ground, and I''m going to divide up the war effort to defend the metropolis.

    It''s been a matter of time.

    The weight of Ramiris'' current burden was unimaginable, so it was imperative to get over it quickly.

    "Understood. What about Lord Rimuru?

    "I''ll take back Veldora!"

    This takes precedence over anything else.

    It''s basically like saying, "I''ll leave the rest to you," and I don''t have to say that everyone is aware of that.

    "Wait, wait, wait! You guys, are you forgetting the most important thing? How are we going to get out of here after all?

    I thought Lace had gotten honest, only for him to suddenlyin again. That kind of thing, it''s easy.

    "It''s just a straight shoot over.

    That''s too messy. This is the rumored ''Fortress of Dreams, and it''s located in another dimension, so it''s impossible to escape so easily. It is said to be a ce dedicated to isting troublesome opponents. So I say"

    Lace is kinda erudite, but I''m not interested in that right now.

    <<notice. it="" is="" ready="" to="" be="" done.="">></notice.>

    Yes!

    "Well, let''s go. Lace, I''ll get you out of here too, and after that it''s all you.

    "Huh? So instead of saying

    Lace seemed to have something else to say, but none of it mattered to me now.

    Ill rescue Veldora as soon as possible and eliminate the enemy.

    In a state of rage, Iunched the Space Shift

    ***

    We came to the ce that was scheduled.

    This kind of transference without hesitation is so unthinkable that it''s impossible to imagine that I would do it instead of doing it normally. But none of that matters now.

    In front of my eyes were two true dragon races" and a flying airship behind them.

    The enemy is at hand.

    All that''s left is to make a fuss.

    But the ''King of Wisdom'' gives annoying warnings of danger.

    I think it''s because I''ve mastered the enemy''s battle strength that I give advice, but now I think it''s just in the way.

    Since we''ve decided to do it, of course we have to do it to the end, but if we panic now, we can''t do it.

    Do something!''

    Silence the ''King of Wisdom'' withmands.

    <<understood. best="" action,="" rmending="" demon="" calling.="">> Hmmmwell, isn''t that doing it pretty well?</understood.>

    If you don''t have enoughbat power, just increase yourbat power, is that what you mean?

    By the way.

    I''ve pushed back the evolution of the demoness trio, so let''s just get it done while itsts.

    Ill make the most of it right here.

    And then

    Beat the enemy to a pulp.

    Sensing our presence, Velgrynds eyes widened slightly from surprise.

    What''s that "Fortress of Dreams" thing?

    She really seemed to think that relying on that thing sealed my move.

    That kind of thing, as long as there is the "King of Wisdom" calctions, it is not even a problem.

    I was connected to mypanions by a soul corridor. Just follow this link and finding the location coordinates is a breeze.

    Even if I was made to go to another dimension, it was still possible toe back through ''space transfer.

    Benimaru and the others have gone on alert to protect me and the capital city of Rimuru, which is far behind. So I can feelfortable doing what I want to do.

    "Testarossa, Ultima, Carrera! Can you still move?

    "Lord Rimuru! That''s natural!"

    "It doesn''t matter, there''s no problem!

    "If my lord asked me that, how could I not answer?

    The three gave three answers, and all of them seemed to be fine with their injuries.

    It''s a relief for the time being.

    Then I don''t need to worry about it, as a move to liberate Veldora, take the ''King of Wisdom'' offer and summon a demon.

    However, someone came in the way.

    Was it already judged that I was a threat, Kondo immediately took action. Although I was at a distance that a pistol round could not reach, he did not care to fire directly at me with the gun raised.

    The velocity of the shot reached tens of times the speed of sound. I thoroughly grasped the details of this attack with the assistance of a million times faster thinking.

    My mind silently chanted Quickly Give Me Defense, ''The King of Wisdom'' gave the response of

    <<understood.>> without question.</understood.>

    Then the ''Absolute Defense'' of the ''King of Covenant'' invalidated its sess without any problem, which was nothingpared to the blow to Veldora.

    <<notice. sensing="" the="" effect="" of="" barrier-bustinginvalidation="" sessful.="" continuing,="" capturing="" attacks="" that="" can="" disrupt="" mental="" and="" magical="" circuitsnullifying="" sess.="" result="" "analysis="" identification"="" this="" attack="" was="" determined="" to="" be="" ultimate="" skill="" "king="" execution.="" from="" now="" on,="" starting="" implementation="" relevant="" countermeasures="">> I didn''t listen to any of these analyses of the "King of Wisdom.</notice.>

    I nced at Kondo and Damrada and the rest, judging that these people could be dealt withter.

    The attack that Kondo had just made against Veldora was a threat, but since he hadn''t used it again, there should be some reason.

    Is it something you don''t want to use, or can''t use?

    The speed of that attack was close to the speed of light, and there was no way to dodge it once it got close. However, if you pull away, you''ll be able to deal with it as long as you''re not careless.

    The attack didn''t work, Kondo didn''t leave the ship without meaning to, presumably to guard Rudra, then I wouldn''t have a problem even ignoring this guy.

    Then, I uttered the words.

    "Come out, demons! The demon from above summoned the Gate of Creation!!!

    A huge magical array appeared in the sky, and a door full of ominous aura emerged from it.

    This thing can transcend time and space and call the demons who have a connection with me to it.

    The first to appear in response to my call was the demoness trio.

    Then, two demon majors and four superior demon generals also appeared behind them, along with the six hundred demons who were their dependents.

    In other words, the bulk of the ck Legion''s battle force was already assembled here.

    "Kufufufu. Lord Rimuru, I have sent my men to protect the city.

    As expected of Diablo.

    Even without saying anything, he could understand what I wanted.

    Except for Venom, who followed Masayuki''s side as an escort, all the others who could move freely arrived.

    Benimaru also took back themand originally given to Moss and began issuing orders to the entire army. Even if I don''t say anything, the support posture is all right.

    That being the case, hurry up and get the ceremony over with before someonees out of the way.

    After falling to the ground, the demons knelt before me.

    At the top of the list were the demoness trio, and I wonder if they didn''t feel that they hadn''t fulfilled my orders and had suddenly be very honest.

    "I''m so sorry!"

    The demons are all bowing their heads to me in gratitude.

    "No, there''s nothing for everyone to apologize for. The purpose of stalling Velgrynd had been sort of aplished. I''m also responsible for failing to see through the "parallel existence" trick this time.

    That kind of stuff can never be predicted if it''s not known in advance.

    If one fears the fantastic power that might exist, then one cannot formte anybat strategy, and this time there really is nothing one can do. Besides, the Testarossa trios battle gave me quite a bit of reference, so it was definitely not meaningless.

    As much as it was tempting to pass on the gratitude, I''ll let them knowter.

    I gave stern orders to the demons.

    "Listen well, I will now grant you power. However, you are not allowed to fall asleep because of this.

    All of you, like Diablo, hold back on the spot and evolve!

    I also find my request unreasonable.

    I originally practiced the doctrine of not imposing on others what I could not do myself.

    It was clear that I had fallen into evolutionary sleep due to the influence of the Evolutionary Demon Lord, but I ordered the demons under mymand to endure the situation. In fact, I think it''s too much to ask, but this is not the time for such grandstanding.

    If anyone can''t keep up with me, they''ll just have to toss it first.

    Was it sensing these intentions of mine that the trio of demonesses wore fearless smiles as they waited for my next words?

    "Can you do it?"

    "That''s natural.

    "Of course!

    "As the lord wishes!

    There was confidence in the expressions of all three female demons.

    I gave them my "souls" without hesitation.

    I don''t even have to think about what to do if it fails. If these three get out of control and storm off as a feint to exploit it, that''s fine.

    My priorities will not waver.

    It is for this reason that I have gifted my next words to the demons who began their evolution.

    "You can make all the noise you want, no matter what kind of death or destruction you spread. But you will not be allowed to die, nor will you be allowed to run and get in my way. While I liberate Veldora, you will hold the enemy at bay with your own shields!

    While saying no death, the demons were ordered toy down their lives.

    So capricious, that''s me.

    The sister of Lord Veldora, what are you going to do about her?"

    Diablo asked me so. That kind of thing was decided a long time ago.

    "No problem. If you dare to get in her way, you''ll be my enemy. You don''t have to worry about swallowing her.

    Hearing this, Diablo smiled as if he were happy.

    Not only Diablo, but others as well.

    Fearlessly smiling Benimaru.

    Soueis shadow of a sneer was revealed.

    With a smile on her face, Shion began to do preparatory exercises.

    Everyone is my reliablepanion.

    "I''ll take care of the cleaning up.

    I nodded.

    "Yeah. So, go ahead and kill the enemy!

    "As you wish.

    That''s all right.

    That way, there were no worries and I could concentrate on the Veldora problem.

    So, I turned my attention to Veldora.

    While I was making preparations, Velgrynd also seemed ready to meet him, and she received the magicules transferred by Veldora, which appeared to have returned in full.

    That kind of resilience is the real value of Veldora. Because he boasts a huge amount of mana, the Storm Dragon can help others recover in a very short time.

    That one, Veldora, is now showing hostility towards me.

    There was no doubt that he had be a puppet of Emperor Rudra.

    Velgrynd also seems to have a point, and it seems that I must be the opponent of two true dragon races" at the same time.

    It''s hard, but it''s all up to me.

    It was also said to Diablo a moment ago that if Velgrynd became an enemy, it would be to exclude her.

    "Wait for me, Veldora. I''m going to free you.

    After muttering so much, I spread my wings and flew into the sky

    ***

    After Rimuru flew away, the people left behind quickly began to move.

    Benimaru grasped the situation of the battlefield and gave the appropriate instructions. At the same time, they gave orders to the subordinates who remained in the city through the Communication Network to quickly enter the emergency situation.

    Souei sent his own ''clone'' around to gather information.

    During all this, Diablo''s excitement was at its peak.

    "Kufufufufu! You see that, guys? Lord Rimuruits finally time to show his true strength!

    To such a Diablo, Shion was speechless in response.

    "Fool! No matter what kind of Lord Rimuru, it is wonderful. To get excited and wait for the excitement to pass, what must be done now is to go and concentrate on crushing the enemy!

    Although it contains some strange arguments, Shion''s words are spot on.

    It wasn''t that they couldn''t understand the consternation that woulde with seeing Rimuru storm out in anger for the first time, but now was not the time to care about that. Just like Benimaru and the rest, it''s the subordinates who clean up the misceneous soldiers.

    Moreover, Rimuru had issued an edict.

    To the subordinates that was the gospel.

    For the demons who had been summoned, it was even more of a supreme joy, their expressions filled with joy, their strength soaring because now was the time for them toe to their aid.

    Just how long the demons had waited with great anticipation for this summoning was evident by the attitude.

    As if to prove how strong Rimuru''s anger was, that terrifying power of destruction was about to be unleashed to its fullest.

    The order was very simple.

    Kill them all!

    The demons who received this order ignited a sense of mission.

    "All things are as our lord wills!

    The demons, who no longer had anything to fear, rushed towards the battlefield together in order to be of use.

    However

    "Wait a minute!

    That onement from Diablo brought the whole crew to a halt in action.

    The demons simultaneously focused their eyes on Diablo.

    Diablo held up a hand, letting the demons rx first.

    "Kufufufufu. Do you all understand? Not a single one of you is allowed to die, it was Lord Rimuru''s holy decree. That is to say, if any of you die, you aremitting a great sin that even we, the subordinates, cannot repay by surrendering our heads.

    Hearing Diablo dere so unmistakably, the demons fell silent.

    Diablo''s smile is more about nting fear in the creature than intimacy.

    And, Diablo''s words are still very true without any room for rebuttal.

    The demons waited quietly for his next words.

    The opening is the Benimaru.

    "Diablo is right. Maybe you are all immortal, but that kind of sophistry doesn''t work. That kind of thing is no excuse for Lord Rimuru!

    The fact that after a while they cane back to life is no reason to be able to die. With these words, Benimaru corrected the demons'' misunderstanding.

    All the demons realized their mistakes and became honest.

    Seeing all this, Diablo opened his mouth.

    "For this reason it is necessary to assign the duties of each one beforehand. Sir Benimaru, could you please make the assignment?

    "What are you going to do with yourself?

    With these words, Benimaru asked Diablo if he would also listen to his own assignments.

    "Ahhh, please leave me out. I''ll take care of the other side if there''s a mouse I care about.

    Hearing that answer, Benimaru just shrugged. It must have turned out that way anyway, he''d felt that way from the start.

    so it is. Forget it, do what you like.

    It''s better to touch less of anything with Diablo involved, which has be the norm for Benimaru.

    After all, Diablo was a direct subordinate of Rimuru, and Benimaru had no license tomand or order them. This time, it was Diablo who took the initiative to ask for help so that Benimaru could give orders to the demons.

    "Then, Diablo, you are free to act. Moss, as before, gather intelligence from the battlefield and pass it back. We''ll share it with the entire battlefield, ording to Lord Rimuru''s wishes.

    Diablo nodded.

    Moss also nodded without question. In fact, he had already scattered the clones, and at this moment was also conveying the information to Rimuru and Benimaru through ''Thought Communication''.

    "I won''t let you leave me alone.

    Shion made such a statement in a condescending manner.

    Shion could actually use ''Spatial Shift'', but she could only shift within the visual range after all, because she was very bad at calcting coordinates.

    Benimaru revealed a dark smile that took her for nothing, while nodding his head hard.

    "Of course, you have to use your war power as well. The huge aura on the airship, eight in addition to Emperor Rudra, was estimated to be bad to deal with, but at least not as outrageous as Lord Rimuru''s chosen opponent. Even if Diablo isn''t here, we should be able to figure something out.

    "The battlefield side is also troublesome. More than 30,000 enemy reinforcements have gone to war in session.

    The advice was from Souei.

    Of course, Benimaru had gotten a handle on this side as well.

    "I know. Because of this, it was a race against time. I have ordered Gabil to stall as long as he can, and we must bring the emperor under our control before there are sacrifices.

    Hearing Benimaru boldly and fearlessly say so, Souei and Shion also nodded in response.

    Since Rimuru was so hopeful, Benimaru didn''t object. He would go to great lengths to develop what he considered the best course of action in order to fulfill Rimuru''s wishes.

    Thoroughly execute stalling tactics on the battlefield, and then take out the most troublesome airships.

    In this way, it would in turn prevent the city from being attacked, or so Benimaru judged.

    By the way, by the way, Benimaru was referring to the true nature of the eight huge auras, the other bodies'' that Velgrynd had left behind as insurance, and the ''single digits'' that had gathered on the airship.

    Thetter included Lieutenant Kondo and Damrada, the Four Horsemen who guarded the Emperor, and thest one was Malcolm. Because no one was still hiding their aura now, Benimaru''s unique skill '' Generalissimo'''' was able to detect them.

    Just then, a piece of good news reached Benimaru.

    response from Geld. Just now, it seems he haspleted his evolutionary awakening.

    Geld, the Barrier Lord, has awakened, and with it, his men are beginning to awaken.

    Soon, they''ll be joining in on the urban defense operation.

    "That''s great. Since Lord Geld is also involved in the defense, then it feels like it will be possible to remove the demon knights in the upper echelon from the urban defense operation.

    "Are those guysing under mymand too?

    "They can''t move systematically if Venom doesn''t move. Let them decide what to do, depending on the situation.

    "Got it."

    Thus, after a brief consultation, the subordinates decided on their respective duties.

    All that was left was to start acting with the conviction of certain victory, but there was one more thing Benimaru needed to confirm.

    "So, you guys can still fight, right?

    Benimaru asked so to Testarossa and the girls.

    There was nothing polite about the tone.

    Can you be expected to function as warriors, Benimaru asked with a clear meaning.

    "Kufufufu. There''s no need to ask. There''s no need for any of my men to answer no at a time like this.

    Diablo turned his gaze to the demoness trio.

    With no pressure from Diablo, the three also stood up.

    "Stupid question. Diablo can do it, so how could I not?

    "It''s a little difficult, but we''re okay with it. Because we love to fight!

    "Even if it is in response to my lord''s expectations, I must not lose my temper again. Now is not the time to rest.

    Toe in handy for Lord Rimurutheir wills arepletely united.

    The same is true of their dependents in this case.

    The demons, quicklypleted their evolution.

    While feeling the greatest joy, waited for the long-awaited order.

    ...........

    ........

    ...

    It was at this point that Testarossa, Ultima, and Carrera evolved into the true demon lords, as did Diablo.

    Bing a corner of the strongest lineup in the world, a demon lord that is unquestionable even in the eyes of the demon public.

    In this way, all the members of the original Seven Primordials were freed from all restrictions and became one being who had reached the same realm.

    Venom, who was a subordinate of Diablo, also became a demon lord, and those of Testarossa''s men were also blessed with the name Evolution.

    Although Moss and Veyron were still demon nobles, their amount of magic element had increased to the point that they could rival an awakened demon lord.

    The other four demons,Agera, Esprit, Zonda and Cien, have also evolved into demon nobles who are above the "demon lord race".

    Among all sorts of demons, they have literally evolved into supreme beings.

    However, even at the same level, there is still a clear gap of strength between individuals, with differences in knighthoods defining their ss gap.

    Moss became an Archduke who could match the King.

    Veyron is Duke rank.

    Agera is a Marquis.

    Esprit is Earl ss.

    Cien and Zonda are Viscounts.

    On a digression, Venom was also recognized for the Baron rank.

    Among the remaining demons, there were born several superior demons who could bemanders, and these demons, whose rank was equivalent to a knighthood, would then work for a long time to achieve the purpose of being officially knighted.

    The other demons, which were close to six hundred in number, had all turned into superior demon knights whose strength could rival that of the superior demons.

    All to be useful for Rimuru, to be stronger.

    The demonsplete the evolution.

    ...........

    ........

    ...

    The entire demon crew showed a will to go to war.

    Benimaru nodded with satisfaction.

    "All right. I look forward to your performance.

    Just like that, the trio of demonesses and their inner circle, joined the battle against the flying airship with such urgency that Benimaru actually intended to do so initially, so there was no hesitation in giving the instructions.

    "So, Miss Testarossa. I''d like to give you the job of sweeping up the trash, is that okay?

    "Well, no problem. It''s very simple.

    "Wait, we want to do this too! It''s easy for us to do, too?

    Benimaru gave the order to Testarossa, but Ultima stepped in cross-leggedly.

    However, Benimaru wasn''t angry about it.

    "It doesn''t really matter who does it, but the spaceship has to stay. It will be a battlefield for us and Emperor Rudra.

    "Kufufufu. Ultima, it was I who asked Lord Benimaru to assign the duties. If you disagree with this, you are disobeying me. You think this through before you speak.

    Lucky for Ultima, Diablo is in the best mood right now.

    Normally, Ultima would have been sanctioned just for making the statement she just made. It was only because Diablo was in a good mood that he merely scolded her.

    "Che, that''s a shame. But it''s true, this job is not for us. Let''s obey Mr. Benimaru''s instructions.

    Ultima also found herself behaving badly as soon as she opened her mouth. It made Ultima feel a little relieved to be able to carry the topic through like this and pretend to agree that she was no longer stubborn.

    Sometimes Ultima can fail by being too naive, but the unexpected also knows how to act by watching the atmosphere.

    "It''s on."

    With this announcement, Benimarumunicated the content of their duties to the remaining members.

    First, Benimaru gave the job of eliminating the knights on the Emperor''s gship to Testarossa. He then went on to list the names of the members who participated in the raid.

    Four have been identified: Shion, Souei, Ultima, and Carrera. Of course, Benimaru himself was scheduled to participate in the raid.

    "Emperor Rudra, for the most part, will not make a move. Even if he did take action, it would simply be a matter of crushing it. So the real enemy we need to defeat is Lord Velgrynd''s other body" on the airship, and the remaining seven single digits.

    "That being the case, this side doesn''t have the battle strength to deal with one person each. I''ll take care of the two enemies.

    Otherwise, it wouldn''t hurt for me to deal with three enemies alone,Benimaru stopped Shion from continuing with these grand words.

    "Wait, Shion. And while you''re right, it''s not good to take away these guys'' jobs.

    What Benimaru''s eyes were pointing to were Veyron and the others who were waiting with anticipation for instructions.

    "Listen, you must not be careless. Leaving only the necessary numbers, we''re going to attack with maximumbat power. And of course, Her Excellency Testarossa, who cleaned up the trash, must join in?

    "I can''t ask for more."

    Hearing Benimaru''s words, Testarossa showed a voluptuous smile. It would be an unbearable humiliation in Testarossa''s opinion if there was nothing to do after sweeping away the stray fish.

    Although, unlike Ultima, she wouldn''t voice her displeasure, if Benimaru really ordered Testarossa to stay, she would always feel displeased no matter what.

    "In order to keep anyone from escaping from that flying ship, let''s leave a hundred watchmen behind.

    The remaining five hundred upper demon knights, I want them to support the Gabil linebut who''s going to be inmand

    "In that case, Cien is more appropriate. He''s been my old man for as long as Moss has, and is good at chores.

    Cien, who was mentioned by name, raised his head, wondering if he was happy to be remembered by Testarossa, his eyes a little moist.

    "All right. Then Cien, you go over there now.

    "Yes, I know!"

    Cien immediately sprang into action, leaving his own hundred dependents behind, and flew off with all the other ck Legionnaires on the spot. With these reinforcements, Gabil should be able to avoid being wiped out.

    And so the course was set.

    That is, first a preemptive attack by Testarossa, then a select group of elites burst into the airship.

    Finally the Emperor''s gship siege was blocked off by a hundred upper-ranking demon knights.

    To break into the enemy''s line, the subordinates of Benimaru, Shion and Diablo, plus the three "demon lords" and four demon princes will also be heading to the battlefield.

    "Veyron, Agera, Esprit, Zonda, be grateful for being chosen.

    Carrera said so, but she must have been happier than anyone in person.

    Kufufufu. So, everyone, good luck in your battles.

    After the topic was over, Diablo smiled and said greetings to everyone.

    The first to respond to him was Testarossa.

    "Woo hoo hoo hoo hoo, then hear ye well, and if any man shall live from my blessing, settle him well.

    Even an enemy can''t let them get away with it. Understand?

    To her own dependents, Testarossa gave orders to go and be a hound. To the demons, it was actually not necessary to say any more than that it was their mission, but no one put that out there.

    Until thencan anyone really withstand the attacks of the current Testarossa? Instead, it''s a matter of thinking about it.

    After giving the order to the subordinates, Testarossa immediately set off in the direction of the prey.

    Next, Benimaru they also flew into the sky.

    The others were not to be outdone.

    The other demons also immediately scattered, and in the blink of an eye, the encirclement of the Emperor''s gship waspleted.

    The showdown in the sky was about to begin.

    Originally everyone thought so

    Ultima and Carrera were about to start acting as well, when the former suddenly thought of something and cocked her head.

    "So, what are you responsible for, Diablo?

    When she heard Ultima''s question, Carrera, who was so concerned, turned her head back.

    Diablo had a look of something exposed.

    However, he didn''t panic, just smiled and answered the two female demons.

    "So, I have other important work to do."

    Seeing his smile made Ultima and Carrera feel even more suspicious.

    "You said there was a mouse, who exactly?

    Carrera began to pursue it that way.

    "That''s not what you need to know

    Okay, wait a minute. Diablo, I don''t think it''s a good idea to keep something from everyone?"

    "Exactly. Isn''t it important to share information, too, of Rimuru-sama?"

    After being spat at like that, Diablo had to answer too.

    "And I, with the courage of Lord Rimuru, have this noble mission! This is very important work and I can''t entrust it to you!!!

    So he had the audacity to say such stupid things.

    It''s a good thing Benimaru isn''t here anymore.

    However, even if he were still here, it would probably just beplete silence.

    However, Ultima and Carrera could not ept this.

    "What''s that!? We''d like to see Lord Rimurue alive too!

    "You wait a minute, it''ll have to be detailed. Do you want to have the sweet spot all to yourself? Even if you''re our boss, it''s a bit unreasonable.

    This was a really natural reaction from Ultima and Carrera.

    Ultima thought.

    Why didn''t Benimaru himself question Diablo so much when he was still around?

    Carrera sensed the unfavorable situation.

    Things would be different if Testarossa was still in the situation, and Ultima and herself alone could not do anything about Diablo.

    "Oh yeah, you guys seem a little upset, huh?"

    "Of course we do!

    "We will obey, but we cannot ept.

    Diablo also thought about it.

    "I can''t help it. So, I''ll tell you the truth. In fact, there''s a man amongst the enemy who can manipte foreign space. I think it''s probably Lord Velgrynd, and if imprisoned by that, I''m afraid the connection to the present world will be cut off

    !

    "I seeif that''s the case, who really is better off staying?

    Diablo nodded with a good-natured face.

    "That''s how it is. As much as I want to fight, it''s a shame.

    In this way he could justify himself, Diablo snickered inwardly.

    Diablo''s mind is so high and his ability to make excuses is second to none, which is why he''s the ck partner that Rimuru relies on when he''s troubled.

    However, Ultima''s ability to cut to the heart''s content was also sharp.

    "So, who''s the little mouse?"

    Diablo smacked his tongue in his chest, it was good to watch Rimuru and Velgrynd fight, but the dy of the obstructors in leaving still made him impatient.

    "What a pity, Ultima. I thought if it was you, even if I don''t know, you''d be able to detect it"

    With a somewhat obnoxious expression, Diablo answered Ultima.

    There was no need to hide it anyway, so he answered honestly.

    "That''s Yuuki Kagurazaka. I just scouted out the scent of the flying airship, but there was no match for Yuuki. If he''s just lurking somewhere inside the ship, it''s not a problem, but if hees out and interferes with Lord Rimuru, he can''t be left alone, can he?

    "Indeed, it will be against Lord Rimuru''s decree."

    "Well, well, it''s never okay for someone to run out and interfere with Lord Rimuru.

    "That''s how it is. Since we don''t know the purpose of the little mouse yet, we must have at least one person left behind to keep an eye on Rimuru-sama.

    Diablo''s heartfelt reasons for wanting to watch Rimuru fight were half of the reasons, and the other half were premised on thepletion of his duties. However, the truthful side is a bit higher.

    All in all, Ultima and Carrera were finally approving, and while they were ultimately disgruntled, they also acknowledged that Diablo was right.

    "Let''s just forget it. Let''s just take it out on the people over there.

    "Well, let it go.

    "No one willin if I make a scene, right?"

    "That''s for sure. Otherwise, it wouldn''t hurt for you to get rid of Rudra."

    "Well, that does seem like fun too. Well, you can have your seat here.

    "Right. Let''s go make a scene and let off some steam!"

    Yes, yes, yes, Diablo nodded his head with one force.

    That level of ttery would have been too cheap to get the two pirs to ept in the first ce.

    If they wentte the benefits would be taken away from them all, and Carrera and Ultima hurried away with such talk.

    "Please do your best."

    Diablo watched the two leave with a smile on his face.

    Next, Diablo also flew into the sky in order to follow Rimuru.

    After everyone has left.

    Lace thought this.

    No one is looking at his family.

    Being left behind by the crowds made Lace feel a little lonely.

    "In that case, let''s go save Lady Kagali"

    After greeting the clearing where no one was, Lace also left the ce.

    And then

    Without anyone''s knowledge, things have changed.

    Demons that evolved in response to Rimuru''s rage.

    They rebuilt their flesh at an rming rate, gaining new abilitiesall through a ''food chain'', returning the ''umted power'' for a period of time unknown to Rimuru.

    As of just a moment ago there was the awakening of Geld.

    Again, the demons do not reason with evolution.

    Others who have not yet awakened, will join them soon.

    All of this, does not simply stop at the awakening evolutionary stage.

    All were managed efficiently, making it an important factor in the increase of Rimuru''s power.

    More effective and better suited for real-worldbat.

    Even the upper limit, which no one yet knows, is to be exceeded, and Rimuru''s power is waiting for the moment to be liberated

    ***

    There were several men in the bow of the Emperor''s gship.

    With Rudra at the head, Kondo and Damrada were standing behind him, while the surrounding four corners were guarded by a sequence of three to six four knights.

    Malcolm also stood behind Kondo, and all the remaining "digits" had been gathered in this ce.

    To Rudra''s right, it was Velgrynd''s fixed position, and in order to protect Rudra in case of any eventuality, she had left thest of her other bodies'' here. However, in order to focus her energies on the battle with Rimuru, the present Velgrynd let the body sit in the settled chair, then drew consciousness from it to make it snuggle up against Rudra.

    Rudra tenderly stroked Velgrynd''s blue hair in this state and looked out at the outgoing Demon Lord Rimuru with a hateful mutter.

    "That''s an exception. It was apse in judgment on my part. The first thing that should be taken care of is the Slime."

    This is tantamount to dering that the battle is not over.

    ...........

    ........

    ...

    Until just now, this ce was in the midst of a victory celebration for the capture of Veldora. Now, however, there isn''t even a hint of that vibe left.

    They all have recognized Rimuru as an enemy.

    Led by the manifested Demon Lord Rimuru, even the subordinate-level monsters had returned. But at this time, Rudra and others were still more subdued.

    ''''Hmph, to have escaped from the Dream Fortress, we seem to be underestimating them. Is it because the owner, who is the source of the power, was taken away from him that he came back alive?

    Rudra snorted. However, after witnessing Kondo''s attack being nullified by Rimuru, he also had to look at the whole situation cautiously.

    More to the point, it''s the demons that Rimuru summons that are the problem.

    Flesh-bearing ascendant demons were troublesome enough, but Rimuru had strengthened the demons again in front of the crowd.

    Because it was not clear what he had done, he was certainly wary of it.

    ...........

    ........

    ...

    "Tatsuya, you have no mercy, do you?

    "Of course. The Boundary Breaker and the Spellbreaker, both of which are ineffective against them, seem to be opponents that I can''t defeat without using my true skills.

    Kondo made a reply, looking at Demon Lord Rimuru and also generating thoughts of his ownpse in judgment.

    Like Rudra said, he also considered Rimuru to be an extremely dangerous opponent.

    Before the priority was to capture Veldora, it seems that was wrong. Instead of going after just one of them, they should go after both Veldora and Rimuru.

    Even though this is now perceived, the situation has changed.

    Kondo knew that Demon Lord Rimuru was an enemy with whom one could not be careless.

    That''s why he uses tactics to trap his opponent in a trap and dispose of it separately when he''s ready.

    At first, it was thought that by taking away Veldora, Rimuru''s patron, Rimuru would naturally sumb.

    Yet now

    Kondo''s judgement was a muddle.

    In the same way that Rimuru is a counter-scaled being to Veldora, Veldora is a counter-scaled being to Rimuru.

    It was because Kondo was the first to realize that he had touched his opponents reverse scales that he was quicker than everyone else to take care of Rimuru.

    The attack used is the "Boundary Breaker" and "Spell Breaker", which are Kondo''s strongest attacks at this time when the "Kamikaze Shot" is not avable.

    However, it turned out to be a trick that didn''t hurt Rimuru at all and couldn''t even stop him from moving.

    If you take away Veldora, the source of your power, you will be a powerless demon lord?

    That''s not true at all.

    It was a raging, tyrannical will because allies were taken from them.

    It should be thought of this way.

    Don''t be lenient, if you don''t use ultimate skills to challenge, you''ll loseKondo made such a judgment.

    ''''Since he said so, the Four Horsemen can''t win either. Let him try the power of the newly arrived Veldora first.

    Without Kondo needing to ask, Rudra understood how threatening Rimuru was. Still, he made a point of illustrating it so that it would be a point of consensus for all present.

    "Single digits" are the strongest that Rudra has worked so hard to assemble. It is for this reason that the enemy''s level of threat must now be allowed to be their consensus, and they must be reminded to avoid errors of judgment at critical moments.

    Rimuru is indeed a threat, but not an unscrupulous opponent as long as he''s not careless. But it is also now necessary to avoid the loss of battle power that is not easily gathered.

    Rudra remained cautious at all times until the final grand showdown began. He is hoping to challenge Guy with the lineup intact.

    From the status quo, it''s close to victory.

    The capture of Veldora brought great advantage to the Empire. In Rudra''s opinion, it was just one step away from drawing the finishing characters for his and Guys long-running wins.

    Apse at such a time is never allowed.

    So, to be sure, Rudra chose to let Veldora take on Rimuru, and with Velgrynd''s support, he was sure that nothing would happen to him.

    In the meantime, it was up to Kondo and the others to deal with Rimuru''s minions, so that there should be no more problems.

    If possible, Rudra wanted to take Rimuru under hismand as well, but since things had turned out that way, he had to rule it out. The real target, Veldora, was already in control, and the n could not be allowed to spiral out of control because of the local demon lord.

    Originally, something like the demon lord was a very fragile existencepared to the True Dragon Race. It is for this reason that Rudra acknowledges Rimuru as a threat on the one hand, and determines that the battle is unlikely to fail on the other.

    The True Dragon Race is the most powerful in the world. Since he had two True Dragons in his hands, Rimuru''s defeat was inevitable, and it was only natural that Rudra would think so.

    But it wasn''t as if nothing could make him care.

    at that time, why did Veldora stop resisting my domination?

    It''s that little doubt.

    Given enough time, Rudra''s domination would surely seed in the end no matter what. Having realized this, Veldora gave upwhich makes sense.

    However, Rudra always felt that there was more to the reason than that.

    The mere fact that Rudra was able to feel Veldora''s anger intact through the king''s power, shows that the Storm Dragon is not the kind of character to give up easily.

    Could it be that Veldora was guarding something more important than himself?

    Such doubts lingered in Rudra''s mind.

    If that''s the case, the important thing

    "No, I don''t think so.

    Rudra shook his head in denial.

    ***

    Velgrynd shifted back into human form and came to Veldora''s side, then tenderly approached her brother''s head and stroked his dragon scales.

    "Good boy. The next time you wake up, we''ll bepanions. And then, I''ll cherish you.

    Velgrynd already has a hunch that the long game ising to an end.

    However, things will not be so simple

    Suddenly, Rimuru appeared.

    The ill-advised obstructionist made Velgrynd''s mood a lot worse. But at the same time, she also developed a bit of a sense of crisis.

    How the other party escaped from the ''Dream Fortress'' made her wonder.

    Then, in the presence of Velgrynd, who was pondering what to do next, things went in an unexpected direction.

    Rimuru summoned up arge number of demons and then granted them power as if deliberately done to the onlookers.

    This is provocation.

    It was too daring to show your card in front of Velgrynd and stop it if you could.

    That''s not all.

    Testarossa and the other primordials, among the demons summoned by Rimuru, had evolved into the

    true demon lords", a higher being, somehow.

    Velgrynd, who had produced the above sentiment, had bepletely wary of Rimuru.

    On top of that, there are other unusual parts. Rimuru''s anger generated fluctuations that were actually on the same level as her brother Veldora.

    A mere Slime who has be a Demon Lord, but with the same level of dominance as her own True Dragon Race, is a reality that makes Velgrynd unbelieving.

    That alone makes it clear that there must be something unusual going on.

    If only to hear such a report from someone else, Velgrynd would have thought it impossible andughed it off, and since she had seen it with her own eyes, she could not believe it.

    In front of her eyes, this maiden-like demon lord continued to unleash unbridled waves of fury.

    This fluctuation couldn''t be more clear about his danger.

    A human without patience would die instantly just from exposure to this fluctuation.

    No, it''s not just humans.

    Any higher being that is not a superior being that can be called stronga being defined by humanity as A-rankedwill die because it cannot resist.

    It''s an overwhelming "Demon Lord" that can rival the True Dragon Race".

    Okay, what to do now? That Slime is a being that even the Primordials can take in. I thought the kid had been fooled by him, but it looks like I was seriously mistaken.

    If it''s just Veldora, then it''s possible that he''s been tricked by him. However, it is impossible for that method to be effective against the cunning and sophisticated primordials.

    Understanding that, the n must be amended.

    This ''Demon Lords Aura'' could show that there was something about Demon Lord Rimuru himself, and it would not be wrong to think of it that way.

    When you think about it, Veldora''s growth has also been quite amazing.

    If it had been three hundred years ago, Veldora would never have get Velgrynd hurt. However, he had be exceptionally good at fighting in only a short time from when the seal was lifted until now.

    The reason for Veldora''s growth, which was far beyond her own expectations, was also due to the Slime in front of her.

    I was going to go back to my home country one more time and make ns when my fatigue is gone.

    But, there''s no way around it. It feels like he''ll be the bane of Rudra''s existence if this Slime isn''t addressed here.

    Velgrynd made her decision.

    She took it upon herself topletely and utterly crush Rimuru.

    If we don''t fix it now, the future is bound to be dangerousthat''s Velgrynd''s judgment.

    Although a lot of mana had been used up in the battle just now, she had recovered to a state of perfection after receiving the mana from Veldora. And for Veldora, even after that intense battle, the consumption was not much.

    In other words, Velgrynd wouldn''t have any problems even if he fought at full strength next.

    Velgrynd leisurely shifts back into a fighting stance again.

    She discarded the idea that "everything is just as it was supposed to be" and thought she had won.

    It can be said that it was that kind of carelessness that led to the current situation.

    At that time, if Rimuru had been eliminated in the ''Dream Fortress'', Rimuru would not have been able to summon the demons. In that case, the only question left is the final win against Guy.

    Thinking about it this way, the situation isn''t great, but it''s not the worst. The Empire still has a good chance of winning, and as long as there are no more mistakes, solving the enemy in front of us without problems should be possible.

    What happened next, however, was a bit of a bummer.

    Contrary to what Velgrynd had expected, there came only Rimuru alone over there.

    That''s a win. If they alle at me, even I''ll have to work on it

    No matter how much Rimuru was worth guarding, it was impossible to lose as long as both herself and Veldora struck at the same time, or so Velgrynd thought.

    However, the battle has to be won and lost in one fell swoop.

    If the demon lords men get in the way, there is a danger that the battle will be prolonged. That''s why Velgrynd chose to go head-to-head a short time before something like that happened. Shes the type who would follow her instinctive actions.

    Rudra! To Veldora, give the order to attack the Demon Lord Rimuru.

    "Hmmm. Do you also feel the danger of that person as I do? That being the case, there''s no need to hesitate. Veldora"

    In response to Velgrynd''s request, Rudra unleashed the ''Kingship Unleashed''.

    Rudra saw Rimuru as much of a danger as herself, which was a relief to Velgrynd. Since the emperor was not careless, his own side would be sure to win.

    With two of the strongest true dragon seeds" fighting against each other at the same time, it is unthinkable to lose.

    The terrible battle that is now about to begin

    ***

    Rimuru darted towards the yo-yo posed Velgrynd.

    And in front of Rimuru, Veldora snarled at the sky.

    The atmosphere shook with the roaring impact, and Veldora flew out.

    Velgrynd also followed him.

    Was he sure that he would be victorious, and after a roar, the opponent so directly began to attack for the elimination of Rimuru.

    As soon as Veldora came up, she gave her full strength, and the storm attack that even Velgrynd had suffered through, the Roar of Destruction, came at Rimuru.

    <<notice. in="" anticipation="" of="" the="" storm''s="" attack,="" we="" will="" unleash="" "absolute="" defense"="" "covenant="" king"="" with="" its="" ultimate="" power,="" neutralizing="" wavelengths="" and="" rendering="" them="" ineffective="">> Contrary to the ''''King of Wisdom'' who was ready to make an automatic defensive move, Rimuru suddenly issued a mandatory order.</notice.>

    "Idiot! Get out of the way!

    Although the ''King of Wisdom'' immediately obeyed this order, a part of the arithmetic realm was unable to understand Rimuru''s intentions.

    The "absolute defense" that is proposed and then counterattack is the most appropriate answer among the various modes of action. However, Master Rimuru denied this, which made the ''King of Wisdom''

    somewhat shaken.

    Although only a very small part of the field of arithmetic had a reaction, the ''King of Wisdom'' did produce chaos.

    Rimuru had also ignored the ''King of Wisdom'' many times before, but this time it waspletely different. It was also because the ''King of Wisdom'' had fought with Rimuru for a long time, which led to such feelings.

    In the final analysis, as a skill or part of thews of the world, it is unusual in itself to be able to "feel"

    like thisbut the people involved are not aware of this fact

    The Roar of Destruction swept past Rimuru who had forced an evasive move. Immediately afterwards, the ''absolute defense'' that had normally been protecting Rimuru was prated, and arge explosion urred at the ce where Rimuru was just now, and the destructive power of the Roar of Destruction raged there.

    If the evasive action was one step slower, Rimurus damage would have been inevitable.

    Witnessing this, the ''King of Wisdom'' s level of confusion rose again.

    <<failure of="" calction?="" no="" surprises?="" it="" cannot="" be="" understood="" that="">> Why did Rimuru get it?</failure>

    The calctions turned out to be perfect, without any mistakes. That being the case, the ''King of Wisdom'' began to retrieve information with the thought that he had missed a certain condition.

    However, even if one can easily outperform the speed of quantumputers, the reason is still unknown.

    <<gone with="" the="" wind.="" it="" should="" be="" 100%="" defensible="" ording="" to="" projections="">> The "King of Wisdom" couldn''t help but say what he didn''t have to say.</gone>

    It''s hard to believe that the ''King of Wisdom'' is trying to justify it.

    A distinct skills actually defending itself, something that would have been an impossibility, without anyone noticing it.

    It''s still a battle and not an asion for leisurely validation.

    The ''King of Wisdom'' in chaos was rebuked by Rimuru.

    "Now is not the time to be dumb! Veldora has the King of Investigation. As I recall, there''s something called "probability maniption" or something like that, right?"

    Hearing Rimuru say that, the ''King of Wisdom'' came to its senses. Yes, that''s right.

    Whyit forgot something so important.

    It was strangejust then, the ''King of Wisdom'' felt something unusual.

    It can only be assumed that it has been interfered with by someone, but the exact reason remains unknown.

    It was not right to pass this on to Rimuru, the ''King of Wisdom'' hesitated.

    It can''t find the reason, and out of pride, the "King of Wisdom" really didnt want to admit it. But if the status quo continues, the likelihood of damage to Rimuru is high.

    He should be told that the calctions turned out like this.

    Butto be branded as useless by Rimuru is to lose the meaning of existence as the Wisdom King Raphael''.

    The mere consideration of these issues alone constitutes a betrayal of the master.

    The skill is surprisingly hesitant, a situation that is absolutely not allowed to exist

    Just as the ''''King of Wisdom'' was plunged into violent confusion, the words of Rimuru came.

    "Veldora has always been so exaggerated, even if it overrides your perfect calctions, it''s not incredible. More than that, don''t falter at the slightest defeat, predictions don''t work for Veldora, but you don''t need to worry about that! Don''t think too much and believe in yourself. I''ll be Veldora''s opponent.

    You take on Velgrynd!

    It was enough to know that, said Rimuru. For Raphael the ''King of Wisdom'' who is just a skill, it''s really like hes treating it as his own partner

    "Please? Opposite of us is two people, but so are you and I. It''s up to you to choke Velgrynd, and I''ll find a chance to free Veldora. So, you''re going to hang in there anyway. Please, partner!

    These words soothed the confused and panicked thoughts of the ''King of Wisdom''.

    Being relied upon?

    Even if you just made a mistake?

    Raphael the "King of Wisdom" had just done wrong, but Rimuru still trusted it.

    Ahhhh! The master, who still needs what should be nothing more than an actor''s self

    The unease is gone.

    The "King of Wisdom, who had found its usual confidence, responded.

    <<understood. i="" see.="" from="" now="" on,="" we''ll="" move="" on="" to="" the="" individual="" named="" velgrynd.="">></understood.>

    Yes, that''s it.

    Rimuruhe is the beloved master of Raphael the ''King of Wisdom'' and is never a small being that can be imprisoned by the uncertainty of ''probability''.

    So just take heart and trust him to follow his actions.

    At this point, Rimuru threw out a sentence as if it were nothing.

    and by the way, I haven''t officially named you. I used to call you master Raphael the King of Wisdom, partner, or whatever. It''s a little bit weird at a time like this, but I''ll just officially give you a name.

    <>

    The "King of Wisdom" found it iprehensible.

    The "King of Wisdom" felt full of wonder.

    That is, confused.

    That is, rejoice.

    That isthe expression of feelings.

    These unountable uncertainties that emerge make it impossible for the "King of Wisdom" to hide its own overwhelming.

    What was the master saying?the ''King of Wisdom'' was in a state of confusion. But at the same time, alsoprehended Rimuru''s intentions.

    With Veldora taken away, Rimuru should have grieved more than anyone else, but even in these circumstances, he was still looking out for others.

    Rimuru, that''s who it is.

    "Let''s see. How about Ciel?

    <>

    "You''ve always taught me so much, so let''s just call you Ciel. How is it? It may not be satisfying, but just bear with it. If you have an opinion, go take it out on that red dragon!

    (***Note: The Japanese word " ???? " or Oshieru means "to teach. Shortening this to three sybles is Shieru, which can be read quickly as Ciel. This is from the web novel version of the trantion, which is rtively high in recognition.) As if to hide his shyness, Rimuru said so.

    Wisdom King Raphaelno, Cielexperienced a fullness of emotion that a skill would not have otherwise felt.

    Ah I  am now, in eternal bliss

    Yes, indeed thinking.

    Meanwhile, the time of evolution hase.

    This is the moment when Manas: "Ciel" was born from the ultimate power, the "King of Wisdom".

    << I am Manas: Ciel. I am the Theosophy nucleus, the unifier of abilities. With the "soul" of Lord Rimuru, the secondary executor of the master. I''ll be looking out for you forever, Lord Rimuru!>> Ciel thought so.

    There''s nothing to be afraid of anymore.

    In a situation that should be considered a crisis, it does not feel dangerous.

    "Oh, oh, oh. I''m the one? How do you like that?"

    Just hearing that from Rimuru alone, Ciel was ovee with happiness.

    Then show your strength!

    To be ordered by Rimuru was the highest reward for Ciel.

    <></as>

    Wisdom King Raphael awakens and bes Ciel.

    Then in order to fulfill Rimuru''s wish, its power began to blossom even further

    ***

    At Rimuru''smand, the ''King of Wisdomno, it was Ciel now,unched a meet and greet operation against Velgrynd.

    Velgrynd''s searing spit was approaching, easily defended by the ''absolute defense'' of the ''Covenant King Uriel''.

    Velgrynd, who had witnessed the scene, was dumbfounded by the exaggeration of the situation.

    Rightfully so, Velgrynd had no mercy on Rimuru. The Scorching Breath had already been strengthened by the King of Charity, and it was impossible to defend against it with a mere Barrier''.

    As a matter of fact, as long as it wasn''t possible to perfectly see through Velgrynd''s attack and the level was higher than her existence, then the blow was bound to cost the enemy something.

    But there wasn''t even a sign of fatigue on Rimuru.

    Even the Testarossa trio, the primordials, could not have done such a thing as receiving a Velgrynd blow in dragon form without injury. Since it was possible to do such a thing with a nk face, it meant that an attack that wasn''t thorough enough wouldn''t work against the Demon Lord named Rimuru.

    Even though she was very unhappy about it, Velgrynd was still thinking calmly.

    In terms of the amount of mana, Velgrynd prevails, so it''s possible that the loss is in the nature of the ability. Or rather, Demon Lord Rimuru possessesplete resistance for heat attacks.

    More than annoyed, Velgrynd chose to keep trying.

    It''s like dealing with Veldora, creating iplete bodies and then shooting out eleven rays of light -

    nuclear strike magic: the thermal beam cannon. On top of this, eleven heads also emitted scorching spit at the same time.

    These twenty-two heat rays make up a multi-segmented attack that contains heat that even asteroids can easily vaporize. If one eats this move and is still unscathed, it is tantamount to proving that the heat attack is indeed ineffective against Rimuru.

    As a result, even Velgrynd had to admit it.

    The heat rays, which intersected as if the escape route were all blocked, were finally collected on Rimuru. Then, all were bounced off by the unfurled shield of light from Rimuru.

    Geez, what a bummer! It''s almost like it''s all calcted, perfectly defended with minimal movement!

    Very unpleasant, Velgrynd indignantly said.

    Even if the heat attack was ineffective against Rimuru, the attack just now was almost meaningless and inexcusable.

    Even if it was more or less somewhat depleted, as long as there was an absolute difference in the amount of mana, Velgrynd''s victory would remain unassable. The status quo, however, was that Rimuru''s energy consumption rate was close to zero.

    In that case, the dy would end with Velgrynd falling into exhaustion first. Figuring that out, Velgrynd decided to make the most of it.

    And, now there was another fact that made her unhappy.

    Rimuru just nced at Velgrynd at first, then stopped looking this way. He concentrated on Veldora and treated Velgrynd as if he didn''t give a damn.

    Instead of using a shield during the battle with Veldora, Rimuru chose to dodge all attacks. Only when there is nothing else to do, an attack of the same nature will be used to counteract Veldora''s moves, but when faced with Velgrynd''s attacks, that Shield of Light will just be used.

    Even though Magic Sense is able to perceive all around itself, this attitude is obvious. In a sense, this amounts to dering that Velgrynd is not a threat at all.

    Such an approach offended Velgrynd scales.

    I''ll make you regret underestimating me!!!

    The tall and arrogant Velgrynd, decided to make the most powerful attack on her hands.

    Velgrynd condensed arge magic power while looking at Rimuru, who was ignoring her, with a hateful look. She then applied this magic to her body.

    The "support" of the "king of charity" and the "speeding up" power as a symbol of her heat. Start the two side by side for their own words. This allows for a forced increase in calories, i.e., exercise capacity.

    In this way, it became possible for Velgrynd to move at thousands of times the speed of sound, that is, at speeds close to the fastest in the physical world.

    So what if the creature of power''s action is someone other than Velgrynd?

    Although Velgrynd, who was both a spiritual being and possessed of physical endurance, could increase her motion energy without any problem, could the others withstand such eleration?

    The answer is no.

    Forced continuous eleration would be too much for any living body''s flesh to bear. Even spiritual lifeforms were the same, and even intelligence was converted to energy, which sooner orter would lead to a thermal copse.

    And that''s exactly what Velgrynds

    "Die! Not a shred of meat left for you to crumble away! The Scorch Dragon elerated up!

    The strongest attack that even the Scorching Embrace cant surpass.

    In the Scorch Dragon elerated Reed, Velgrynd poured out her full power. It was created in response to the day of the showdown that woulde one day, and it was a hidden stunt to use against Velzado.

    It would have been too much of a waste to use this move on the local demon lord, but the furious Velgrynd couldn''t care about that anymore.

    With the roar of the True Scorch Dragon, the Wave of Destruction was liberated towards Rimuru.

    The ultimate blow unleashed by the Scorch Dragon is just as powerful as the highest-speed Velgrynd''s restraint, capable of instantly copsing any substance.

    The enemy would be buried by a speed that no one could evade.

    If it was Rimuru, who was concentrating on Veldora, it would be toote by the time he realized it. No, Rimuru should have been wiped out of the world without even having time to understand what was going on.

    I''d like to make him regret insulting me, but I don''t have time for that, so that''s the only thing I regret.

    With that kind of absolute confidence, Velgrynd began to confirm the oue of the attack.

    uh!?

    Upon seeing Rimuru standing there unharmed, Velgrynd waspletely stunned.

    How? It couldn''t beVelgrynd even suspected something was wrong with her eyes.

    An absolute hit that can''t be evaded, one that can take it down without injury should not exist.

    Even the Demon Lord, Guy Crimson, or her sister, the White Ice Dragon, Velzado, this blow was secretly powerful enough to bring them down. Velgrynd originally thought so.

    unharmed? That''s not possible. This is capable of affecting any of the ''Barriers'' or Defense System abilitiesmy Scorch Dragon elerated Reed. What did you do?

    Velgrynd agitated.

    It''s fine if it''s counteracted by some means, but it''s absolutely impossible to invalidate it with something like the ''Barrier''. This fact, which Velgrynd couldn''t understand, made her lose her cool.

    Rimuru opened his mouth and answered.

    "Huh. That move is indeed dangerous, but a straightforward attack like that would be easy to eat?

    In fact, the response to Velgrynd was all Ciel, and by reaching the perfect realm of reckoning, Ciel induced the opponent''s attack pattern.

    For Ciel, Rimuru''s business came first before anything else.

    In order to keep Velgrynd out of Rimuru''s way, Cielpletely blocked her as ordered. The nature of power is analyzed, and effective response strategies are selected and implemented.

    The shield of light that has special effects on Velgrynd''s powers is one of them. The present Ciel, aptly known as the Unifier of Abilities, had ced all of Rimuru''s ultimate skills at his disposal.

    What Ciel had just done was to unleash the ''King of Gluttony'' for ''predation''. After instantly understanding the nature of Velgrynd''s Scorch Dragon elerated excitation, in order to iste the effects caused by this move, Ciel had ''isted'' it into the ''stomach pouch, which had now evolved into infinite space''.

    The attack just now was indeed enough to eliminate Rimuru.

    It is impossible to defend against it by ordinary means, and even with the "King of Wisdom''s"

    calcting power, it would be impossible to cope with it.

    Ciel, however, was different.

    The difference between an evolved Ciel and the ''King of Wisdom'' was not in one dimension.

    No matter what kind of enemy attack it is, it is no longer a problem as long as it sees through its essence correctly. As if to prove it, Ciel used the ''King of Gluttony'' perfectly.

    First, iste it like this, and then slowly absorb the energy from the infinite space. In this way, the Void Space of the King of Gluttony became a means of defense beyond even the Absolute Defense of the King of Covenant.

    It''s no wonder Velgrynd was so surprised.

    Even Rimuru himself, the defense wasplete before he had a chance to think about how dangerous that move was. It was only in order to keep Velgrynd from sensing this that he responded to the other in that provocative-like tone.

    Ciel''s strategy didn''t end there, starting to match Rimuru with a smooth rhythm that hadn''t existed before, ready to turn the conversation into a weapon and push Velgrynd even further into extinction.

    What does Velgrynd think

    You gotta be kidding me! You said you ate it? My strongest move, the Scorch Dragon eleration?

    Just like that, because she couldn''t understand Rimurus words, she was still fighting but she was at a loss.

    Although it was only for a moment, it was also a fatalpse.

    "The arrogant attack was dumbfounded, and I''m sorry when you were hit hard. But you''re not going to forget that we''re still in a fight, are you?

    It was toote when asked such a question by Rimuru.

    There was no hesitation for Ciel to act, and Rimuru endorsed its full action.

    The measurement of the amount of Velgrynd''s mana has beenpleted, and after considering its nature and power characteristics, it is judged that it is possible to seal it for a period of several hundred seconds with Heat Break Prison''. Now start!

    Without Velgrynd noticing, the Cascading Spell Formation wasplete.

    It was abination of the infinite prison of the Covenant King Uriel and the hot space, a synthetic ability that Ciel had just devised to deal with Velgrynd.

    Velgrynd was imprisoned.

    All the elements of thisbat airspace had been grasped by Ciel''s arithmetic perception. The temperature, the humidity, the gravity, the flow of the wind, the sunlight, the heartbeat of life, all of these phenomena are nothing more than a dance in the hands of the Ciel.

    Therefore, no matter what Velgrynd does again, it is no longer possible to disengage from this airspace.

    Seeing the glow of the Heat Break Prison'' that had been unleashed after Ciel''s deration made Velgrynd feel a wave of dizziness.

    I can''t believe it, it''s that simple!

    The humiliation of being posed by Rimuru made the True Red Dragon''s body tremble. However, no matter how much Velgrynd struggled, the Heat Break Prison remained unmoved.

    "Just be honest for a while! When Veldora is liberated, I''ll y with you.

    These words, proimed the defeat of Velgrynd.

    I admit I lost this time. But I still have the Parallel Existence, and I can''t stop it as long as I have the Soul Corridor, the Heat Break Prison!

    There was still one more move avable to Velgrynd, she just had to give up her current body, but she could transfer most of her own energy back to the ''other body'' that had remained with Rudra as insurance.

    So it wasn''t over yet, and Velgrynd, while enduring the full humiliation, began to move cautiously.

    It must not be noticed by Rimuru, it must be done slowly.

    Through the "Soul Corridor, Velgrynd transfers a little bit of herr magic away.

    Totally unaware that this was exactly what Ciel wanted as a result

    ***

    It was once the ''King of Wisdom''.

    s, it is Ciel now.

    Since I didn''t seem to be in good shape, I tried toe up with a name on a whimand it seemed happier than I expected.

    After all, Ciel''s response was no longer the mechanical one it had been hitherto, but rather a smooth response, and the tone became very human-like.

    I also feel that Ciel has be strong to the point of terror.

    Just now it was as if it had never existed, and now Ciel was in excellent shape.

    It had also gone into automaticbat several times before, but the use of skills back then waspletely iparable to the current Ciel.

    Even Velgrynd, who I felt possessed an overwhelming threat, was no match for Ciel at all.

    First inducing Velgrynd tounch a must-kill move, then aiming for the moment when the amount of mana decreases after her big move, the battle Ciel has designed is simply perfect.

    It''s easy to put words in my mouth bybining the abilities I possess to form an effect that can deal with Velgrynds traits, but the exact degree of arithmetic required to make such a thing possible ispletely beyond me.

    Most importantly, I lost to Velgrynd in the amount of mana. In other words, in order to block the enemies above me at this level of strength, Ciel efficiently used her advantageous attributes to build a targeted ''Heat Break Prison''.

    In other words, she flexes her skills ording to her opponent''s situation, and this kind of random strain can be called something like an algorithm-bound prison.

    It was because of being able to achieve such a thing that Ciel was able to achieveplete victory against Velgrynd.

    The key to this battle lies in being able to withstand the attacks of Velgrynd. As much as I believe in Ciel''s calctions, if I take one wrong step, I''ll be the one who''s finished.

    Why do I trust Ciel so much?

    It''s simple, because I''ve already said I''m here to be Veldora''s opponent, and Velgrynd is to be left to Ciel to settle.

    And, I think Ciel can definitely do it.

    And then, Ciel also responded to my expectations perfectlyno, above and beyond.

    Using a variety of abilities more deftly than myself, the task was aplished brilliantly.

    As my partner, I''m more impressed with Manas: Ciel" than I used to be.

    The unexpected miscalction made Ciel reliable, but I didn''t forget my original purpose.

    I have to free Veldora as soon as possible before Velgrynd can act again.

    Speaking of which, how many seconds does that thing seal Velgrynd''s moves?

    Even if Velgrynd struggles any longer, there are still two hundred seconds left in the duration of the Heat Break Prison. Therefore, that worry is unwarranted.

    So, what did you say?

    While the mere gain of two hundred seconds was enough to be appreciated, Velgrynd was still a threat.

    So I can''t just ignore her

    <<no. as="" expected,="" velgrynd="" turned="" to="" evasive="" action.="" now="" that="" she="" understands="" can="" transfer="" her="" energy="" through="" the="" soul="" corridor,="" i="" think="" she''ll="" try="" it="" instead="" of="" sticking="" this="" "other="" body.="">> Hey, hey.</no.>

    Since any ''other body'' could be called the main body, there was no need to forcefully destroy the Heat Break Prison''.

    No, thats not it.

    Ciel saw through that, and deliberately prepared a retreat for Velgrynd.

    That''s rightVelgrynd''s trump card, shows too much.

    Velgrynd has not only shown us ''parallel existence'' as if it were a show of bragging rights, but has also fought with the Demoness Trio and Veldora. All of these situations

    Under Ciel''s watch, the analysis material is also veryplete.

    The fact that Velgrynd has the power of Parallel Existence does not mean that she can endlessly create Other Bodies. That''s why the Ciel went to measure the amount of magic element in Velgrynd, and managed to remit the total value. In this way, one can understand how many ''other bodies'' one needs to knock down afterwards.

    But Ciel took advantage of that in turn.

    She had seen through Velgrynd''s insurance technique and had induced the other to use that method to escape.

    After all, with the power of convenience, I would use it as a means of insurance. However, my

    "separate body" can''t reproduce the ultimate skill, so it''s really not the same as "other body. Although I was a little upset, I had to admit that I was not as skilled as others.

    In the end, the seemingly omnipotent "parallel existence" can only be used as a bait or against an opponent that is inferior to itself.

    Well, it''s still super useful as insurance, and depending on the opponent''s situation, it can also be a big battle force. Several methods can be thought of for effective use, but none feel very effective against opponents who are on the same level as or above themselves.

    Ciel has exposed this weakness.

    That said, the algorithm is already a bit intimidating.

    All makes one wonder if future predictions were made, all exactly as Ciel had expected.

    To this extent I can only be stunned, but Ciel is my partner. Better to stop worrying about the excess and get the point across.

    For Ciel, even the strongest Dragon Race like Velgrynd can be yed with.

    Well, I can''t lose then.

    "I know. But just to be on the safe side, in order to get things done for the next two hundred seconds, let''s go all out on Veldora from now on. Come help me, Ciel!"

    <></as>

    Ino, Ciel and I, look directly at the original target, Veldora.

    Ciel bought valuable time.

    Though short, it is the equivalent of infinity for us.

    If we can''t use this time effectively then it''s a shame on us.

    It''s not about being able to do it, it''s about doing it.

    With this realization, I began to approach Veldora again.

    ***

    It is no longer for such negative reasons as Guysmissioning that Veldora be liberated and Rudra defeated as soon as possible, but for my own desire to do so.

    Being surprised by Ciel''s birth made me change back to my usual self, who had long since regained myposure.

    But that doesn''t mean my anger is gone.

    This anger was saved for the Emperor Rudra.

    I have other priorities to achieve.

    That being said, speaking of Veldora''s progress

    All I wanted to do was keep yelling at Veldora.

    To dominate Veldora is a simple matter, but it would take an equal amount ofbor to get an energy as great as the True Dragon Race to do its bidding.

    In the final analysis, even if it is possible to make spiritual beings obey, it is extremely difficult to take away their free will.

    There are several ways I can think of to dominate.

    Let yourself be submissive, charmed by the domination of the heart The taking away of free will to force the other party to submit, to force domination.

    Complete domination without even realizing it in person.

    And so on.

    ording to my analysis, for Yuuki it isplete domination, for Kagali it should be forced domination, and then for Veldora, also forced domination.

    Coercive domination is phased.

    The stage where free will is left, the stage where it will resist but obey reluctantly; the stage where free will ispletely erased and bes like a robot that won''t disobey any orders, etc.

    Kagali looked like she no longer had free will, but what about Veldora?

    The spiritual lifeforms are like collections of strong wills. So I don''t think the free will of such an existence can be simply erased, then it should make sense for me to constantly shout at each other.

    That said.

    Veldora resisted too fiercely too, didn''t he?

    Although he was ordered to rule out the enemyme, he really had no qualms about throwing all kinds of vicious attacks at them. Even if Velgrynd had been handed over to the Ciel, dealing with Veldora alone would have been hard enough for me.

    I also have the storm system powers on hand, so trying to counteract Veldora''s attacks is possible.

    However, just counteracting that kind of attack with unusual power.

    I''ll have to do my best, I can''t keep up with the shouting anymore.

    For these reasons, I now leave the defense in the hands of the Ciel. Although the "probability operation" is still very difficult, I''m sure the current Ciel will be able to handle it.

    From now on it''s showtimeI take this thought with me and try to approach Veldora.

    The storm crossed and flew towards me. However, where I am is as calm as the eye of a typhoon.

    What can I say, it gives me a strong sense of peace of mind.

    Completely devoid of the feeling of needing to fight to the death when I went in alone, Veldora''s attacks were easily offset.

    There was also little to no consumption of the magicules. And, right now I''m in amazingly good shape.

    <<this is,="" of="" course,="" the="" food="" chain="" master''s="" demons="" which="" have="" been="" delivered="" through="" "soul="" corridor.="">></this>

    Is that right? Is that right?

    Although just now I could feel the power flowing out from the source, it seems that with the blessings of mypanions, I was able to fight even Veldora.

    That being the case, it''s even less likely to fail.

    I''ve finally arrived in front of Veldora, Ill say hello to him first.

    "Kept you waiting, Veldora. Do you recognize me?

    No answer.

    He growled and flew over.

    Because I felt the fire, I couldn''t help but punch him in the face.

    Yet to say the obvious and rightfully so, this punch ispletely useless against Veldora''s massive body.

    It might have been a different story if it wasn''t just strength, but even magic was poured into the fist, but even that wouldn''t have caused much damage. However, this will do.

    Since the goal is to get Veldora toe to his senses, I''ll stop hesitating to let the beat down.

    I went all out and kept beating Veldora in the face.

    Get close to that, and most of Veldora''s attacks be out-of-range. Or so close that if he attacked, he would suffer along with it.

    However, because of being manipted, one might not care enough to knock the magic over, but then Ciel would step in to deal with it, right?

    Beatings, beatings, and the asional kick.

    However, Veldora still just growled

    "How about sealing Veldora into the infinite space through Predation?

    Ciel makes such a terrible suggestion.

    To ask to do it or not to do it, of course the answer is yesbut can that kind of thing really be done?

    <<no problem.="" "the="" king="" of="" gluttony="" has="" been="" ced="" under="" my=""mand="" and="" will="" be="" executed="" as="" soon="" you="" give="" the="" order.="">> Such an answer should bewell, that''s pretty reliable.</no>

    After the Slimes inherent skill, "Predation", has evolved infinitely, he will be the "King of Gluttony". This was supposed to be the power with which I had the most affinity and the most maniption.

    So after being most adapted by the Ciel, it worked for Veldora, too.

    In addition, this ''''King of Gluttony'''' can be unleashed from anywhere in my magic sticky spirit body.

    How about not even having toe into contact with a predatory creature. As long as it can be confirmed visually, it is possible to exert influence on the space where the target is located. Since the closer you get the more powerful it is, you should expect great results now that I''m already in close proximity to Veldora.

    Anyway, its decided.

    "It''s so disturbing, Veldora! Don''t let me worry!"

    With a loud yell, I unleashed the ''King of Gluttony'' without hesitation to try and devour Veldorapletely.

    Right now

    "Kuahahaha! A slight failure. Forgive me!

    I heard voices that would otherwise have been impossible to hear.

    "Veldora, is that you?

    "Hmmm, that''s me. Your friend, the Storm Dragon, Veldora, yes!

    It shouldn''t be a trap. After all, it''s a dumbfounding response.

    The owner of this rootless voice couldnt belong to anything else but Veldora.

    "Hey, are you still conscious?

    "Hmmm. In fact, I hastily separated my "heart core" at that time. So after that it was impossible to have a conversation, but it did preserve the ego!

    I see.

    Though unable to make a sound, consciousness remained.

    Now it''s probably because my "King of Gluttony" started devouring Veldora''s body that it''s possible to chant with the "core"?

    Anyway, present Veldora is better than nothing.

    But in that way, it''s a firestorm in another sense.

    What!? If that''s the case, you''d better take your body back!

    It''s so worrying, and you''re still chatting so leisurely!

    I don''t want to think about the panic I felt because of Veldorajust thinking about it makes me want toin about him.

    "If I could have done it, I would have done it! And by the way, Rimuru, shouldn''t you be acting more calmly and carefully?

    You have no right to say that.

    Not to mention

    "You idiot! I couldnt have seeded it if I kept my cool and acted so exaggeratedly recklessly as the opponent of two dragon species at the same time."

    This kind of thing doesn''t even have to be pointed out specifically.

    After I calmed down, even I felt really bad that I was still safe after all this messing around.

    But it would have been impossible for me to act prudently at that time.

    Moreover, from the moment I dared to use the true dragon seed" as a rival, the word "prudence" was no longer relevant to me.

    Just as I was pondering these things, Veldora, full of advice, came in.

    "Oh, look out. I''m gonna let out the ck Lightning!

    Don''t say things like that in a chatty tone!

    Moreover, thest thing he released was not ck lightning, but the wind of death. Although it''s OK to evade it no matter which Ciel is able to offset it, but this is still a setup for me no matter how it looks, right?

    "You! What lightning!? Isn''t this the wind of death that kills souls!?

    I grumbled furiously, but Veldora just smiled and defended himself.

    Kuahaha! Sorry sorry sorry Kuahahaha! It seems that I am still far from being able to grasp my body''s movements. I''m aware of the timing of the skill, but I''m sure it''s only a 50-50 chance.

    In other words, it''s impossible to use it for reference.

    And since the enemy has a Probability Operation, it''s better to ignore Veldora''s predictions.

    "Got it. That''s enough, you just shut up. If I fail because I believe what you say at such an important time, isn''t it true that you can''tugh?

    Hearing me say things like ''I''m disappointed in you, Veldora went to the point of starting to panic.

    "Wait, wait, wait, Rimuru! I''ll try. I''ll help you out somehow.

    Despite Veldora''s desperate assurances, this statement has no basis whatsoever.

    It is not time to get emotional, but to prioritize reason.

    Besides, I''ve been assisted by Veldora.

    Just being able to hear his voice calmed my mood.

    "You''re safe, that''s enough.

    After I asked again if he was all right, Veldora burst outughing as usual.

    "Kuahahaha! Of course I''m okay. I am the strongest dragon!

    It''s a relief to hear that.

    Just as I was thinking this

    "It was not Rudra who cut off the Soul Corridor, but me. So, I didn''t actually lose to them!

    What?

    This guywhat was just said?

    "What''s going on?

    "It''s nothing, it''s simple. It was Kondo, right? Rudra took advantage of the brokenness revealed when my consciousness turned to the man''s attack to dominate me. The fact that three people, including my sister, actually joined forces is just as nastyIm outraged. But at least the worst of it was avoided, that is, I did it after a bitter decision.

    As the strongest dragon, aren''t you being a little careless?

    What more is there to talk about on the battlefield, dirty and clean?

    "What are you trying to do? Really, what the hell are you guys up to? Don''t be careless, isnt that what I always tell you?

    "Kuahahaha! I didn''t expect to be lectured in such a situation!

    It seemed like a happy Veldora all the way through, and I really had to bepletely dumbfounded.

    I always feel like aplete idiot, let''s advance the topic first.

    "So, the so-called decision to cut off the Soul Corridor?

    "Well, that''s exactly what happened. Because Rudra''s domination isn''t just mine. It''s probably yours through the Soul Corridor.

    And that''s why Veldora was in a hurry to cut off the Soul Corridor, that is, to protect me.

    After hearing that, I couldn''t get mad at Veldora anymore.

    "Well, then, I''ll take care of the rest."

    "Hmmm! I don''t worry about anything, because I believe in you!

    Well, it''s kinda nice to be relied on.

    "Ah, yes. I''ll set you free right now, and you''ll be waiting."

    "Kuahahaha! Truly reliable. My friend, I believe you can do it!"

    The situation of Veldora is clear.

    Although the dominion of the body was taken away, the nucleus of his heart was safe and sound. The current Veldora doesn''t seem to be able to take back the reigns, so it''s up to me to figure it out.

    No problem.

    Since the nucleus of the heart is fine, then there should always be a way.

    Yes, for example

    "Ciel, with the core of Veldora, you can bring him back to life with the ultimate skill the King of the Storm, right?

    <<no problem.="" the="" information="" of="" power="" remains,="" and="" recovery="" storm="" king="" will="" be="" possible="" as="" long="" there="" is="" a="" connection="" between="" soul="" corridor="" core="" veldora.="">> The problem was easily solved.</no>

    To put it simply, I''ll just devour the Veldora in front of me and then recycle his core.

    The rest is just going to be implemented, it''s really simple.

    So, now to beat the opponent.

    Take down the strongest opponent, the "Storm Dragon" Veldora!

    ***

    I found a way to solve the problem.

    In that case, let''s get this over with quickly.

    There are two problems.

    Time constraints on where the nucleus of the heart is.

    There''s plenty of time left.

    The session just now was also all conducted during the ''Thinking eleration'' dy, which actuallysted less than a few seconds, and despite being devoured, they were actually still attacking each other, but there were still more than three minutes left.

    The problem is the location of the nucleus of the heart.

    It should be in the body, so it is possible to do ''chanting'' through magical elements. However, locking down the exact location where the nucleus of the heart is located can be difficult.

    If the core is broken, it will be all over. The battle will be lost, and Veldora would have to be reborn.

    In fact, it''s usually the other way around, the nucleus of the heart belongs to the part that''s hard to hurt.

    This is because the nucleus of the heart that will be targeted is usually the most heavily defended thing.

    However, right now, Veldora''s nucleus is in a state of istion from the body, equivalent to being defenseless. If you think you can''t hit it even if you want to, but you have a fluke, if you identally hit it straight, you''ll break the nucleus of the heart, and then you won''t be able tough.

    Even if he is freed from Rudra''s domination, Veldora''s current personality will be gone and the Soul Corridor between him and me will note back to life.

    Only this situation must be absolutely avoided in any case.

    If I could devour Veldora all in one gulp, there would be no need to worry about such things. However, unfortunately, even my "imaginary space" could not swallow him whole without the consent of the "storm dragon".

    Veldora had to be weakened first, to reduce his mana to a certain level, or to ''prey'' little by little. Also, at the same time, I must be careful not to hurt his core

    Think of it this way, first of all to rule out practices that would hurt Veldora. Lets just say, I feel a bit scared now that I think about the beating I gave out just now

    Originally, it would have been difficult to inflict damage on Veldora, let alone knockout. It''s hard to imagine him being so vulnerable.

    In the past, one or two of his spells wouldn''t even leave a scratch, and punches and kicks would mean nothing to him. He can only be dealt decent damage if various attacks have the effect of the ultimate skill attached to them.

    Even the strongest divine magic, "Ancestor Copse", could only do a small amount of damage to Veldora''s huge body.

    The dragon species is known as the "strongest" and its defensive power is really high.

    That''s why I thought that even with a little bit of aggression, Veldora would be fine, but it turns out that everything is a given.

    Especially now, Veldora is in a state of march of no will of his own. So there''s no telling what he''ll do, and that''s the sad thing about being dominated.

    As long as I don''t know where Veldora''s core nucleus is, I''d rather not attack him actively.

    That being the case, there''s only one way.

    The effort to ''prey'' on him a little bit, while trying to find out where the nucleus of the heart is.

    It''s a race against time, but it can only be done.

    With only three minutes to go, optimism is three minutes to go.

    I tried not to care about the rest of the time, and unleashed the full force of Gluttony King Beelzebub to devour Veldora

    My body changed from human form to Slime form.

    The description of infinitesimal is more descriptive of the nature of the viscous body than of the flow form. Following my intent to carry out ''predation'' aggressively, Ciel changed my form to the most suitable shape.

    This is probably the way you can reach arger area and hunt more efficiently.

    The ever-changing body of mine, like a tangle, eroded the surface of Veldora''s body.

    This time, however, the target was too big.

    My body, no matter how it stretched, seemed a mere blip to Veldora.

    It''s a really discouraging assignment, but not one to give up. I ignored those things and further elerated the offensive erosion.

    At the same time, the ability wasunched to search for the core of Veldora heart.

    This is also something that cannot be done without Ciel''s assistance, and it urred to me from the moment I saw the abnormally powerful Ciel that nothing might be able topete with it in terms of calcting power.

    The case of evolving just by getting a name doesn''t seem to be limited to magical creatures.

    Well, things are going well, but not without hindrance.

    Now I am in severe pain. Veldora''s being began to resist the hostile presence that was eroding it.

    The Storm Dragon''s Dragon Spirit Aura is causing my body to copse little by little.

    As opposed to me, who wanted to devour myself, the Storm Dragon also wanted to destroy meand so began the fierce attack and defense.

    ***

    It hurts, it''s hot, it''s unbearable.

    I should have felt no pain, but the pain went through my body.

    The heat was supposed to mean nothing to me, but now I felt like I was about to melt in the unbearable heat.

    And then there is the bitterness that you first feel when youe into this world.

    The sense of danger, as if my existence itself was going to disappear, stimted my survival instincts.

    However, I still haven''t slowed the erosion.

    I want to win.

    To break this misery, to save Veldora.

    Besides, I''m not alone right now.

    With Ciel as a reliable partner.

    I''m going to devour the Storm Dragon and find Veldora''s core from it.

    This level of suffering is nothing at all as long as it is aplished.

    "Ciel, is that okay?

    <<leave it="" to="" me.="">></leave>

    No problem.

    After getting a solid answer, I expanded the erosion further.

    What''s holding me back is the energy that''s swallowed up.

    Normally this energy would be restored to my power, but it''s not the same when the opponent is a true dragon, let alone my power, and this energy even begins to destroy my body.

    The Dragon''s Factor is so powerful that it''s presumably not bound to anyone.

    But the fact that the result was actually domination by the Emperor is a headache, but now is not the time toin.

    Whenever a part of one''s body is annihted, ''infinite regeneration'' creates a new body again. That is, by this practice, the energy that is eaten is forcibly absorbed away.

    Granted, it''s simpler to just throw that energy away, but that''s not going to work. If you don''t analyze it properly with the Analytical Identification, there is a risk of harming the core of Veldora''s heart.

    It doesn''t get any more troublesome than that, but it''s still the best thing to do.

    This was the conclusion reached in consultation with Ciel, and all that remained was to repeat the whole operation.

    I gave up thinking to continue with my homework.

    Time is running out and the object is too big. An uneasiness arose in the mind as to whether it would be possible to make it in time, but I trusted Ciel.

    It must be possible to make it in time.

    <<i have="" a="" few="" other="" parsing="" assignments="" i''ve="" been="" doing="" as="" i''m="" busy.="" do="" you="" want="" to="" hear="" them?="">></i><i have="" a="" few="" other="" parsing="" assignments="" i''ve="" been="" doing="" as="" i''m="" busy.="" do="" you="" want="" to="" hear="" them?="">

    I mean, what the hell is it with you!?

    What are you doing while I endure the pain!?

    <<what is="" being="" done="" an="" ''analytic="" identification''="" of="" the="" power="" velgrynd.="" i="" studied="" scorch="" dragons="" elerated="" excitation,="" which="" was="" isted="" in="" infinite="" space,="" and="" mastered=""ws="" it.="">> No, no, no, that''s not what I''m askingwhat I''m askingto master it!?</what>

    <> Thats too much of a stretch, Ciel.</although>

    It seems better to think of it as her being able to read the content of my superficial mental activity at any time.

    In the future, it''s better to focus your consciousness on the psychological defense walls before thinking about issues in the deep psychological realm.

    Having said that, it''s not a bad thing to be able to imitate Velgrynd''s must-kill technique.

    It''s impossible to reproduce the ultimate skill just by looking at it

    No, wait?

    What else has been analyzed?

    I became a little afraid to ask, but I asked straight out.

    "What else has been analyzed?

    Ciel started to answer as if she had waited a long time for me to ask this.

    <<yes! the="" parsing="" of="" roar="" destruction="" is="" also="" over.="" after="" that,="" it''s="" possible="" to="" use="" some="" leftover="" ''king="" storm''="" create="" this="" skill.="">> Wait, wait, wait!!!</yes!>

    Isn''t this the big report that will blow away all the pain I''m feeling right now!?

    The kind of analysis that felt super difficult just to listen to, and was actually done in the blink of an eye, that''s just too incredible

    <<no, it''s="" true.="" and="" then="" it="" doesn''t="" really="" matter,="" just="" a="" matter="" of="" starting="" now!="">> The involuntary superficial psychological feeling is immediately reciprocated.</no,>

    Butnever mind. There''s no point in hiding it anyway.

    Think about it for a moment and you''ll be relieved.

    The research power of the Storm King does remain with me. If you use this skill, it''s not incredible to recreate the Roar of Destruction.

    It''s an awesome thing to be able to use a power skill, and I''m honestly kinda happy about it. Though taken aback, since it was Ciel who felt nothing was incredible anymore.

    Thinking about it that way, the one thing that even Ciel thought was important, it was very concerning.

    "What''s the point?

    <<the analysis="" of="" the="" "storm="" dragon"="" through="" "predator"="" has="" been="" sessfully=""pleted.="" from="" now="" on,="" it="" be="" possible="" to="" transform="" lord="" rimuru''s="" body="" into="" same="" as="" true="" dragon="" race.="" should="" be="" implemented?="">></the>

    What?

    Just now, did you throw out such a dangerous statement as an understatement?

    To transform my bodyposition into the same species as Veldora?

    Should it be implemented?Its over!

    I''ve lost all understanding.

    If my own understanding is correct, doesn''t that mean I can be a True Dragon Race?

    <<this perception="" is="" right="">></this>

    Huh?

    And say correctlyuh, I said you!

    Really, it can be done?

    <<of course!="" so,="" evolve="" into="" a="" ''true="" dragon="" race?="" yes="" no="">> HahahahHahahahah!HAHAHAHAHAH!!!</of>

    I couldn''t help bute in for threeughs.

    At a time like this, I have to ask yes, no, and so onI give orders while thinking about such boring things.

    YES!

    In an instant, all the pain I felt was gone.

    Pain, heat, bitterness.

    The Storm Dragon''s Dragon Spirit Aura is no longer effective against my new body. If you ask why, it''s because I can also use the Dragon Spirit Fighting Qi.

    That said, the current me just needs to keep eating energy to increase.

    The amount of my mana became more and more massive, increasing at such a rate that one was even concerned that if it continued, it would swell to the point of being uncontroble enough to storm out.

    <<no problem.="" i="" will="" manage="" it="" perfectly.="">></no>

    Also.

    With Ciel around, there''s no need to worry about that at all.

    After bing a True Dragon Species, my amount of mana was finallyparable to that of Veldora.

    Then, the limit was pushed.

    Here I am, reborn as a new true dragon species".

    From the time this state of affairs was put on hold, there was a fatal dy in the response of the "storm dragon" (body).

    Allowing me to evolve into a "dragon species", the "storm dragon''s" dy in responding to this state of affairs was fatal.

    "Sess, Rimuru! It''s surprising that you''ve be a True Dragon Race, but I was right about you all alongKuahahahahaha!"

    Veldora boasted of victory, sounding as if he wasn''t too surprised by the tone.

    You were bred by mein spite of his tone, it goes without saying that the answer to the question of what Veldora had sent on this asion was none.

    Also, it''s too early to celebrate the victory.

    The exact location of the most critical core nucleus of Veldora''s heart is unknown.

    That''s why I started thest step.

    "Come on, let''s get this over with!

    It''s unforgivable that you would call yourself my favorite "storm dragon".

    "Devour it allthe King of Gluttony...!

    In obedience to mymand, the King of Gluttony devoured the Storm Dragon.

    With a cheerful feeling.

    And, still, at an rming rate.

    Apletely different,pletely one-way progression than it had been so far.

    The devourer and the devoured.

    It is almost like the factual reproduction of thew of the weak and the strong

    The curtain came down quietly on the heroic battle.

    With the evolution of a creature and the birth of a being, a higher realm is reached.

    The dazzling glow of the energy residue that leaked out filled the surroundings.

    That is the light of blessing.

    Celebrating the birth of a new true dragon seed".

    My old body, which failed to transform into the Dragon Seed, emits light when it is transformed into pure energy.

    Even this residue, turned into grain, was absorbed by me and disappeared.

    And just like that, I aplished my purpose in wless form.

    ***

    After the light faded, only an unidentified lifeform remained there.

    Veldora disappeared.

    Eaten by the Slime, the Demon Lord Rimuru, Velgrynd realizes this.

    ...........

    ........

    ...

    ording to the investigation, Rimuru was said to have been born from the magical deposits leaked from Veldora, but Rimuru devoured all of the Storm Dragon like his parents and transformed himself into the fifth True Dragon Race: Ultimate Slime (Viscous Dragonic-Demonic Star God Body).

    The Slime, immediately after, began to take on a human form.

    A knife was held in his hand and he was not wearing any clothing.

    The age looks to be about fifteen to sixteen years old.

    A height of only 160cm or so is not too much to describe as petite. However, the amount of mana contained within it rivals and even exceeds that of Veldora.

    The golden pupils seem to see through everything, slender and beautiful.

    The silvery hair wasced with a hint of freshwater, giving off a moon white glow.

    Without gender, the looks are better described as cute than beautiful. However, the divine atmosphere that wrapped around its body still elevated that appearance to the realm of beauty.

    The dazzling white skin was enveloped in a demonic aura mixed with ck and gold.

    Rimuru seemed to mutter something in displeasure, and the demonic aura that covered his body changed into a pitch-ck full-body suit that could give off a divine aura.

    It seems that the demon race is using the ''material creation'' that they are good at, to make the appearance of clothes for their physicalization. Even if it was just using the mana that leaked out of itself, the ck clothes that were created were equipment whose strength was deep and bottomless.

    Rimuru took the next step to suppress his excess energy perfectly, then revealed a smile as if finally satisfied.

    Velgrynd witnessed it all while in captivity.

    From halfway through, the energy transfer stops.

    Unable to believe what was happening before her eyes, she sank into a daze.

    The battle between her brother, the Storm Dragon, and the Demon Lord should have been overwhelmingly in Veldora''s favour, but it was absolutely impossible to be overwhelmed in return.

    If that were to happen, it would mean that both parties were in fact "on the same level" from the very beginning

    By chance? Could it be thatthat Slime, was really just born there by chance in Veldora!?

    Velgrynd, plunged into the sea of thought, finally arrived at this startled answer. However, she could not easily admit such things.

    And that''s par for the course.

    The magical creature that was born by chance to the True Dragon Seed happens to hold a "soul" that can adapt to the Dragon Factor.

    If the other party is really the fifth True Dragon Race, it can be called the existence of a brother.

    However, Rimuru had evolved into the Dragon Race by eating Veldora, and to call such a being a True Dragon Race was something Velgrynd could never agree with.

    If she may say so, it''s something else very simr to the Dragon Race.

    Velgrynd would never identify with such an unpleasant existence, nor would she want to.

    He had to be wiped out while he was at itVelgrynds instincts were speaking thus.

    Also, one must avenge one''s brother.

    Veldora, to Velgrynd, was a sweet little brother.

    Although Veldora was an arrogant and brash presence, very much a distracting one, his freedom was also envied. Though Velgrynd intends to use him as a pawn, that is an insignificant amount of yearspared to the dragon''s long life span.

    Velgrynd dispelled this thought even less so, thinking only of liberating her brother once it was over.

    It''s supposed to be like this

    ...........

    ........

    ...

    Understanding, Veldora was swallowed up before her own eyes in a moment when Velgrynds sanity was blown away with rage.

    "How dare youtake my lovely brother!!

    Velgrynd let out an angry snarl.

    Two hundred seconds had passed and the Heat Break Prison shattered and dissipated.

    The Scorch Dragon, which has put aside her reasoning to protect herself, has shown hostility towards Rimuru

    ***

    After eating Veldora, I seem to have been reborn into a new race.

    The name seems to be Ultimate Slime (Viscous Dragonic-Demonic Star God Body) or something, so I''m joining the True Dragon Race.

    Although a subspecies.

    It''spletely unrted to a Slime now, I guess, although there''s that idea but it''s a secret.

    Nowadays, you lose if you care.

    I confirm my new body.

    I can make a human body without consuming magicules, and it''s gotten a lot bigger.

    Has it grown, so to speak?

    Nowadays I''m about the same height as a high schooler.

    Although it is girly

    Since the age of appearance can change at will, it really doesn''t make any sense, but it''s fun to grow up with that feeling.

    The focus is on being able to move with ease.

    The volume of the Slime form has also increased, with the diameter seemingly increasing from seventy to eighty centimeters. It''s a little too big to be held in one''s arms this way, but there should be a way to maintain the original smaller size.

    Ill check it out afterwards.

    Ah, there''s a problem.

    Right now, I''m not wearing anything.

    In other words, Im naked.

    That''s a no-go.

    Although the strange demonic aura that leaked could hide my body, it still didn''t look good in my ethical view.

    Because of this, the garments were tried on.

    I tried to use what Diablo taught me about the creation of matter, and it was unexpectedly simple and sessful.

    Depending on the ability of the maker, what is made will perform differently. Plus this outfit is not only superfortable to wear, but the pitch ck look is cool too.

    As for the grade that makes people careit''s the mythical grade.

    Eh? Mythical?

    Mythical? So that''s ituh, huh?

    To bepletely stunned is exactly how I feel right now.

    I feel like I''ve really evolved, I see.

    Mostly, my current strength is probably more than I could ever imagine.

    With some careful thought, several reasons cane to mind.

    One of the main reasons why was that when Benimaru and the others evolved into the Awakened Demon Lord, their power would be returned to me in the form of a ''food chain'' feedback, right?

    Eating Veldora, absorbing his power was also a reason.

    The energy that had hitherto been stored in the ''stomach pouch'' that could not be used was now analyzed and could be usedthere must be a reason for that.

    Because of these various reasons, my abilities have blossomed this time, which is roughly how I feel.

    It''s the result of everything working smoothly.

    Simply put, it''s all thanks to the Ciel.

    Oh, it''s rude to call people by their first names now.

    As a tribute to your partner in the future, let''s call you Ciel-sensei!

    <

    ></please>

    It was like hearing something like that, but I didn''t care at all.

    Really, my teacher is just brilliant.

    Please take care of us from now on!

    <<leave it="" up="" to="" me!="">></leave>

    Hmmm.

    And so I got dressed, but the main purpose must not be forgotten.

    "Veldora, are you all right?

    "Kuahahaha! Of course, don''t make me repeat it so many times. More important than that, you''re the one who managed to defeat my body!

    "It''s okay. Now that I think about it, I''ve just be a bit forgetful. But, great. I mean it!

    Veldora and I were happy for each other''s peace.

    Being able to have a conversation like this, Veldora''s core seems to be fine. In that case, all that was left was to reconnect the "Soul Corridor" and restore the ultimate power of the "King of Storms".

    <<it''s a="" sess="" without="" problem.="">></it''s>

    As expected of Ciel-sensei.

    Even when I don''t ask, I often get things done ahead of time.

    The job was also done perfectly this time.

    Good.

    My purpose was served.

    Now that Veldora has been recaptured, there''s no Imperial Army left.

    But yes

    My anger was still there and I was going to take it out hard on Emperor Rudra.

    Moreover, ending the war in such a tiger''s-head manner will leave a bane in its wake. Now that things havee to this, there is only so much we can do to crush our opponentpletely.

    It is also the duty of being a king to take the threat out.

    Now that my anger has subsided, then it''s okay for someone other than Rudra to just throw it away, right? It''s starting toe to mind, but don''t let up on getting the job done to the end.

    Besides, even if I were willing to give in, the enemy would not retreat in silence.

    The evidence is that

    Velgrynd in the front is still alive and is staring at me from the prison with a hostile look in her eyes.

    I had seeded in liberating Veldora, but Velgrynd was furious for some reason.

    There was no point in beating her, and being her opponent was troublesome

    But the threat must be removed.

    Velgrynd can no longer pose a threat. Although the analysis of all her powers is not yetplete, the countermeasures are ready.

    Ciel-sensei is so confident.

    Or rather, arrogant?

    <<no, it''s="" 100%="" true.="">></no,>

    It would be ridiculous to lose the fight, but it really doesn''t take that kind of worry.

    Even the fight just now, we hadpletely defended against Velgrynd''s attack. The current Ciel had even estimated a not too hard fight.

    Anyway, I don''t intend to change my policy of taking this opportunity topletely destroy the empire, and to spill blood without shedding it.

    The ck Legion is also making a ruckus right now, with several particrly chaotic spots in the battlefield, but there''s nothing left in the enemy lineup that requires my particr attention.

    I''m definitely going to sh with Velgrynd who is targeting Rudra anyway, so weakening her here isn''t a mistake in tactics either.

    There were Lieutenant Kondo and Damrada on the Imperial side.

    The Four Horsemen who guarded Rudra also seemed to be quite a tricky opponent.

    Yuuki was also dominated by Rudra, so we had to deal with him as an enemy as well.

    In addition to these enemies, the "single digits" should be left to one person. I don''t know what kind of guy he is, but since it''s a saint level opponent, one must also be on guard.

    In other words, even not counting Rudra and Velgrynd, there were still eight strong enemies on the Imperial side.

    After exploring the scent of the battlefield, it seems that there are several other strongmen who can be considered threatening, so let''s solve the problem with one breath now.

    In fact, I don''t feel "threatened" at this point, even though I say I''m strong.

    Since evolving into the True Dragon Seed, my amount of mana has increased nearly tenfold. With this, the quality and quantity of my strength has been greatly strengthened, and I have a real feeling that my strength is notparable to that of my previous self.

    Because Ive yet to call out Veldora, my energy is also full frame. I''m in such good shape right now that I think I might be able topete with Milim or Guy.

    No, thats a big deal. If one gets too carried away, it will surely lead to failure afterwards.

    It''s better to act cautiously and deliberately for now.

    That said, after scouting the battlefield''s breath I found that the strongmen mentioned earlier seemed to have already fought with Benimaru and the others.

    Although that was my order in the beginning, it was still admirable that they moved so quickly, but at the same time, the fear of casualties arose.

    Will they obey my no-death order properly?

    I hope they don''t force themselves to mess around just to keep me out of the way

    Forget about it, Ill worry about it after all this.

    Now, I have another Velgrynd in front of me who is flying over, Ill take care of her first, then see if I have to go back them up.

    In less than a second, I made that judgment.

    That being the case, the next question was how to fight her.

    First of all, how about unleashing the "Dragon Liberation" from the "King of Storms" with the ultimate skill?

    Calling Veldora out, it became a two-on-one matchup between the two of us against Velgrynd, and in doing so, it was a sure win.

    Come to think of it, normally my mana amount is always in a disagreeable state. Mostly, this is because I let Veldora move freely.

    Veldora and I are simrly one minded and can be resurrected without problems as long as the other is okay. Although it was different from Velgrynd''s ''Parallel Existence'', it was also a cheat level invincibility trait.

    If the mana level not being full is the price of this trait, it feels about as good as no problem at all.

    Also, the excess mana from Veldora flows into me, so there''s actually no inconvenience there. How about because of this loop-back effect, my body has even been activated.

    Anyway, that''s how it is, ''Storm Dragon Liberation'' to me is the ability to do far more good than harm.

    It used to consume about 90% of my magicules, but now it''s enough with three achievements.

    As I thought this, I prepared to unleash ''Storm Dragon Liberation''.

    "How dare youtake my lovely brother!

    Velgrynd yelled so loudly.

    If you ask me, that statement of hers feels like a back bite.

    "You were the first to strike, weren''t you? After all, isn''t it because of you guys that I was going to fight Veldora!?

    "Shut up! Veldora was eaten by your kind, and it will not happen! Although I thought he was a bit shrewd, I didnt expect him to lose to the Monster Demon LordI will never admit it. I won''t spare you.

    A furious Velgrynd began to shoot the hot line indiscriminately.

    Unfortunately, however, that didn''t work for me.

    However, through the conversation I just had, I also figured something out.

    Velgrynd was so angry because of me devouring Veldora, so she probably misunderstood that Veldora was killed by me or wiped outpletely.

    That being the case, that''s a good thing.

    This is the time to unleash the ''Dragon Liberation'' and clear up the misunderstanding.

    But

    "AHHHHHHH! Wait, wait, wait, Rimuru!

    The person in charge, Veldora, however, stopped me.

    "What''s wrong?

    Out of fear of asking so

    "Listen up, Rimuru. Sister right now, is into a rage thinking I''ve been wiped out. Right?

    "Well, that''s right. That''s why I''m putting you out to exin, so maybe it''ll avoid a pointless fight.

    Stupid! Don''t be so hard on yourself! If my sister sees that I''m safe and sound, she can''tugh and pretend that nothing happened. I''m going to have all that anger pushed on me!

    What an idiotic answer.

    It feels like it''s a big loss just to listen carefully.

    I was so scared, I thought I''d stopped breathinglooking at such a noisy Veldora, Ipletely understood that this guy waspletely unreliable.

    That being said, this man really isnot useful at every critical moment.

    Feeling too dumbfounded to listen carefully, I was about toin to him when Ciel came out and stopped me.

    <<wait a="" minute,="" please.="" in="" that="" case,="" why="" don''t="" you="" take="" this="" opportunity="" to="" make="" the="" most="" of="" veldora''s="" powers,="" which="" i''ve="" already="" given="" my="" permission="" for.="" so="" please="" wait="" until="" power="" reform="" is=""plete="" before="" implementing="" "storm="" dragon="" liberation"="">> Same old, polite and attentive tone.</wait>

    ording to the Ciel, it was the revolution of Veldora''s ultimate skill, the King of Investigation, that evolved into the ultimate skill, the King of Chaos. Since it''s said to be evolution, presumably it''s been reinforced.

    What concerns me is the phrase, which Ive given my permission for.

    In fact, Ciel''s existence was actually known to Veldora.

    "When did it start?

    <<when lord="" rimuru="" had="" just="" evolved="" into="" a="" demon="" lord,="" he="" sensed="" my="" presence.="">></when>

    Ciel replied thus.

    Although I''ve noticed it, I''m just now convinced. In the end, it''s just a skill that has developed a sense of self, something that has never been heard of in ancient times. However, the power of the Great Sin system has something like the ego, which is why I began to doubt it.

    ording to Veldora, it seemed like he had been suspicious since the time when the Ciel was still the

    ''Great Sage''. After observing my "stomach pouch", I noticed all kinds of strange phenomena from time to time.

    As I evolved into the Demon Lord and the Great Sage became the King of Wisdom, he seemed to be sure that his guesses were most likely correct.

    So far they seem to have had quite a few conversations with each other, but Veldora has always assumed that the person speaking was me. It didn''t cause much trouble, but it still makes one wonder what these two talked about.

    Those aside, Veldora actually knew Ciel, the most important thing about it.

    "That is, you two actually know each other. And then, you agree with Ciel''s proposal, right?

    "Well, that''s exactly what happened. Although I also wanted to be my sister''s opponent, I couldn''t do it because of this reason. I''m sorry, Rimuru, but I''ll leave it all to you.

    Hey, you''re too kind, aren''t you?

    That''s not the same as what I just said!

    I was going to spit it out like that, but I always thought it would make me look sad, so I just let it go.

    Ciel also seems to want to y around with the Veldora ability, I was thinking that there''s no need to do it now, but after liberation it might be more troublesome to do it again.

    Plus, I''d actually love to try my hand at the power.

    There was still Rudra to deal with afterwards, so one had to know how strong one had be, that''s what I thought.

    I should be able to fight her with ease, so let''s check how much I''ve grown in various aspects.

    It''s a rare opportunity.

    While I keep an eye on mypanions, it''s better to let them try their hand at it before they get into a crisis.

    <<it''s better="" that="" way.="">></it''s>

    Ciel seemed very happy.

    After some thought I had an idea for a fight, but again Ciel spoke a proposal as if in passing tone.

    <<ording to="" the="" results="" of="" various="" analyses,="" it="" is="" possible=""bine="" ultimate="" power="" storm="" king="" veldora"="" and="" covenant="" uriel="" create="" a="" new="" skill,="" ster="" wind.="" should="" be="" implemented?="">> Ciel-sensei, you have no intention at all to weigh yourself down</ording>

    Next up is a fight with Velgrynd, how easy is that?

    Velgrynd was out of sightCiel was practically saying it.

    Modifying skills seemed to be of interest to Ciel, but please that kind of thing please wait until the usual.

    Let''s dismiss it for now.

    "Maybe there''s a better way to improve this? So be cautious and think about itter.

    <<the!>> True to its owner. I see. <<then i''ll="" aim="" to="" get="" better="" and="" keep="" growing.="">> Uh-huh, uh-huh. It looks like eptance, which is better than anything.</then></the!>

    I don''t know if there''s any "me" in there, but it''s a good way to focus on the fight.

    The King of Covenant is valid for Velgrynd, and I could not throw away that advantage, even if I were to have the advantage.

    Of course, the King of Gluttony alone might win, but this is not a game after all, and carelessness is not an option.

    Never allow for what-ifs.

    I understand that Ciel is very high on me, but feel free to take half of it as ttery in the future.

    That said, Ciel''s transformation fetish is a real head-scratcher.

    Veldora is now used as fodder, but since I was so hopeful, it''s all right, however the problem is after this fight is over.

    There was always a hunch that a great overhaul of abilities awaited those of mypanions who had awakened into demon lords.

    If it was Ciel-sensei, even the reinforcement of those guys would have been easy to catch. I even think that the teacher was actually waiting for this opportunity all along.

    Maybe, it could have been

    Just as I was pondering these things, the time hade to go head-to-head with Velgrynd.

    ***

    Me and the true red flying dragon were staring at each other in the sky.

    After Velgrynd momentarily changed into human form, the battle began tangibly.

    She fired nuclear strike magic at me in session: the Heat Harvest Cannon, while swinging the Green Dragon de at me.

    What is the difference between anthropomorphism and dragon form?

    This question, if illustrated in one sentence, would yield the answer of a defensive gap.

    The offense is exactly the same.

    In terms of energy utilization efficiency, the human form is overwhelmingly dominant, and the corresponding human form''s ability to fight continuously will increase. In other words, if there is to be a long-term battle, the human form is more appropriate.

    However, the dragon form also has the advantage of being irreversible.

    That''s the huge body.

    The body bes huge and the scale of the attack increases ordingly. Although equally powerful, the attack range bes wide, making the dragon form suitable for use in battles with multiple opponents simultaneously. In addition, even if there was only one enemy, it was very difficult to evade the attacks unleashed by the giant enemy in session.

    Then there is the defensive aspect.

    This was the true value of the dragon form, in order to take out such a huge body, one had to make a massive attack to match it. Trying to take down the dragon form with a sword was extremely difficult, and most of the magic attacks were rendered meaningless because of the size of the attack.

    Even if we ignore the fact that there is very little magic that works on the Dragon Race, there is no point in using human magic on the Dragon Race. There was little if any damage that could be done if not wide range magic.

    So, the hard way is that the dragon form side is strongerhowever, Velgrynd chose to fight in human form.

    Her thoughts were mostly

    <

    > That''s roughly how it feels.</presumably,>

    In that case, I''ll fight her on that premise as well.

    The murderous look on her face, however, set off Velgrynd''s beauty even brighter. She boarded that killing qi on the de and swung down the Green Dragon Sword with an aura that was going to split me in two.

    Naturally, I wasn''t going to let her cut me.

    The magical counterpart was handed over to Ciel, and I drew my own de, the straight de of the Divine Glory Vajra, to face Velgrynd.

    The Green Dragon Sword in Velgrynd''s hand is a broad-edged machete. She hadn''t hidden the knife before, but had just made it out of ''material creation''.

    This was a divine soldier whose rank rivaled that of a mythical weapon.

    In contrast, my sword also rose to the mythical level when I became a True Dragon. As threatening as Velgrynd''s Green Dragon de is, my weapon should not lose to her.

    More than that

    Snap!With this crisp sound, Velgrynd''s Green Dragon de snapped and shattered.

    As surprised as I was, Velgrynd must have been even more taken aback.

    "What have you done?

    She first distanced herself from me, then asked so.

    I didn''t actually do anything but simply take the opponent''s attack. So I didnt know how to answer when you asked me what I did.

    <<the weapons="" performance="" gap.="" the="" master''s="" straight="" sword="" is="" a="" famous="" created="" by="" kurobee="" with="" all="" of="" his="" soul,="" while="" velgrynd''s="" green="" dragon="" nothing="" more="" than="" product="" fixing="" magicules.="" although="" density="" mana="" amazing="" and="" has="" equivalent="" mythical="" performance,="" it="" just="" dull="" knife="" its="" very="" nature.="">> Is that what''s going on?</the>

    Although I already knew that weapons would vary in strength even of the same level, I didn''t expect that there would be such a big difference between weapons of the same mythical level.

    Sure enough, what one can rely on is one''s own used equipment.

    It''s good to understand that, after all, my clothes are made from "material creation".

    Theyre also mythical grade, but it''s better not to expect too much from it.

    It''s clear from the demonstration just now that even with the same ss, there is a difference in performance. The weapons you have created will not defeat my sword.

    Although I don''t think Velgrynd will give up on this, I still say so to her.

    Velgrynd was by no means a fool, she seemed to have seen that my words weren''t a lie, but she still couldn''t seem to ept it, and then made the Green Dragon dee at me several times.

    Those Green Dragon des were all broken.

    Finally, Velgrynd came to terms with reality. She stared at me defiantly while making her next attack.

    Since the weapons created were useless, all that could be relied upon was one''s own flesh. Velgrynd lets her paws lengthen and sets up a Chinese jab style stance.

    Seeing her like this, I also put away my knife.

    what do I mean by that?

    To experiment, of course.

    I also wanted to make sure I had grown to the point where I didnt rely on the knife anymore.

    If you use a weapon, you''ll be a bully, so I''ll be your opponent with my bare hands.

    A fight is supposed to provoke the other person.

    If Velgrynd can be made to lose her cool on this, it is not too much to say that it is a win or lose from this point on.

    "Don''t underestimate people!

    It''s a hit.

    It''s so easy to be funny that Velgrynd fell into my trap.

    What followed was nothing more than ying chess like a general and pushing her into desperation one step at a time.

    Velgrynd wed away at a very fast pace. Therefore, trying to keep up with her movements by sight was impossible.

    However, now my perception speed is equally extraordinary.

    The speed of "Thinking eleration" has been increasing since I gave the name "Ciel" to the King of Wisdom. What was originally a million times faster, is now hundreds of millions of times more so.

    Shockingly, this is the level at which even the speed of light can be perceived.

    Of course, even if I can see it, it doesn''t mean that I can correspond at the same speed, and such a misunderstanding is not to be avoided.

    But that''s not to say there aren''t recusal methods.

    It is not necessary to say that the unleashing of magic is naturally faster, even the unleashing of ''Space Shift'' has be nearly a thousand times faster. In other words, as long as I can keep a certain distance, I can escape even with light-speed attacks by "shifting".

    A second feels like it''s been stretched into a decade, and so produces a world that seems to stand still.

    Since one''s self would also be as if unable to act, the ordinary human self would copse due to not being able to bear the feeling, but Ciel only unleashed the ''''Thinking eleration'''' when it mattered and smoothly solved the problem.

    So no matter how much Velgrynd speed there is, it''s not a problem for me. At this point, I no longer need to think about physical arts, swordsmanship, or other techniques, and I can suppress her with brute force alone.

    Velgrynd overdrive attacks closing in.

    Her speed had reached hundreds of times the speed of sound, and if it had been me before, it would no doubt have been in a bitter fight.

    However, it is not a problem at all for the person I am now.

    "Too slow.

    I ''deflected'' behind her while stirring up Velgrynd like that.

    However, Velgrynd was no slouch either, was she already anticipating my actions, and she immediately reacted.

    Honestly, I think she''s really tough to deal with.

    Sure enough, you can''t be too careful with the strongest race.

    "That''s right. It''s hard to imagine that your speed is faster than mine, so you did it by using ''space movement''? Your spatial movement is remarkable, so natural and without even the slightest distortion of space, but you can figure out how to deal with it by figuring out the principle.

    I thought Velgrynd had gone into a rage at my instigation, but she was more calm than I thought.

    Trying to say that it was really worthy of being Veldora''s sisterbut it was also the same as what Ciel had expected.

    So the next course of action that Velgrynd will take is

    "As long as you interfere with space and fix the entire space, it will not be possible to ''transfer'' in the realm of my domination. It''s a shame.

    Surely, that was all she could do.

    Velgrynd of course also ''space domination'', she could even interfere with a wide range of spaces centered on herself. In that case, we cannot rely on the "space control" for the "transfer".

    It''s not entirely impossible to force it, but it would be pointless to expose the diversionary outlet. While it could be used to escape, where I would run to would be exposed at first, and the result would be meaningless in the end.

    With the ability to transfer the system blocked like this, the next thing you can do is to physically split the victory and defeat, and for Velgrynd, you can say that you are ready for a must-win situation.

    And because of that, the next thing she''s going to do is

    "I have to use a real hidden trick on someone like you.

    "You think you can win just by sealing the transfer? In that case, let me teach you that it''s not going to work.

    "You''re really arrogant. I probably wouldn''t hate you if I didn''t have to avenge that kid. But that''s the end of it.

    Velgrynd posed.

    A shot at the atmosphere, turning itself into a supersonic projectile.

    However, the rate increases even further

    "The Scorch Dragon eleration!"

    The voicees from the other side of the future.

    Velgrynd transformed herself into a crimson meteor,ing at me at a speed near the physical limit of sublight speed.

    Also, this meteoric bullet of hers can change orbits.

    Velgrynd transformed her own flesh into meteoric bombs and was free to change her flight path.

    No, in fact, this is the form of the Scorch Dragon Fighter''s elerated Speed. Not just a straight line attack, but a free-changing trailing attack. In addition, since the energy fluctuations emitted included not only the quality kic energy, this move turned into an extreme damage attack.

    The essence of this move had been perfectly grasped through the analysis of the Scorch Dragon Fighter''s elerated excitation.

    Velgrynd, though scary, was not as scary as Ciel.

    As a result, on a whim, I allowed the birth of the Theosophical Nucleus named Ciel to be the cause of Velgrynd''s defeat.

    The "King of Gluttony" has already unfolded in the master''s full range, just as it was intended. No matter what angle the other partyes from, they can "prey" on Velgrynd without any problem.

    That''s a good point.

    In the usual way of predation, a willful being will resist greatly, not to mention the fact that the being is a true dragon species. No matter how hard Ciel tried, it was still impossible to ''prey'' on Velgrynd with the ''King of Gluttony''.

    However

    With a will of her own, Velgrynd turned her body into a meteor bomb. Because the energy was all distributed on top of the attack, it caused her resistance to drop dramatically.

    The result is what it is.

    Velgrynd, was isted into my infinite imaginary space''.

    "How is this possible!? Why is this happening!? What''s going on!?

    The moment she thought she''d finished me off, she suddenly flew into nothing but space, and it must have been difficult for Velgrynd to grasp the status quo.

    It would undoubtedly take her a long time to appreciate her defeat.

    So, it''s up to me to tell her directly.

    "It''s me who wins. You just stay where you are."

    Me, I lost?"

    "Yes. You won''t be able to escape from my imaginary space, and you probably won''t be able to transfer your energy to your parallel existence.

    Velgrynd''s mana that I devoured was only a little over fifty percent of the other party''s total ording to Ciel-sensei.

    Of the remaining fifty percent, two were allocated to the ''other body'' beside Rudra, while the other thirty percent had been consumed earlier and was currently recovering. It seemed that she could only recover 10% a day, so it would take another three days for her to recover to less than 50% of her mana.

    However, since the ''other body'' was withheld by me, this part cannot be recovered. Although the situation was somewhatplicated as both ''other bodies'' possessed egos, she was undoubtedly weakened now.

    "Ask Veldora for the details.

    "Ask Veldora? What the hell are you talking about?

    Velgrynd had a puzzled look on her face, but it was quicker to tell her the truth in person than for me to illustrate.

    "Kuahahahaha! Sister, it''s me. All is wellIt doesn''t look like that.

    "Veldora! You didn''t disappear?

    Next, let the siblings talk on their own, hoping she''ll calm down when it''s time to do so.

    Just like that, I tookplete victory from Velgrynd and managed to capture most of her mana into the Void Space.

    With two "dragon races" as opponents, this reckless challenge, with the birth of a reliable partner, Ciel, came to an end in a form that could not have been more perfect.

    </i>

 Volume 15 - Ch 3

    The thirty thousand soldiers of the ''''Warcraft Legion'''' led by Grand Admiral dim were heading towards the sky in a flying airship.

    Witnessing the gantry of Velgrynd, morale was high.

    The enemy beneath the soldier makes an excellent target for their violent impulses.

    "Listen up! With His Majesty the Emperor and Lord Velgrynd on board, we must perform well. There''ll be no fighting, people. Come on!

    The soldiers responded to dim''s roar with a shocking chant.

    dim was content with that.

    Inwardly snickered, this was the perfect opportunity.

    Kukuku! Even if we don''t fight for the world, there''s no doubt that my time hase. Calgurio loses, and that Yuuki boy is discredited, leaving me as the only great general. As long as I make a military mark here, Ill get what I want!

    In dim''s eyes, the Western countries were not enough to mention, and Hinata Sakaguchi seemed to have some ability to do so, but in the end, a draw with a new demon lord was half a bucket of water at best.

    dim is both a confident man and a downright martial artist.

    ...........

    ........

    ...

    The second strongest man in the Empire, the Beast Lord dim.

    His origin was, as the rumor has it, Eurazania of the Beast Kingdom. dim is actually the half-brother of the "Lion King" Carrion.

    The beast that resides in dim is the lone white tiger. In the past, it was considered unworthy to be the king of a country because it was too arbitrary.

    Bunch of bullshit! Not even one of my men is worthy to be in Carrion''s service and plot a rebellion. I will definitely make a clean te for the hate I feel in my heart.

    For a long time, dim had held a grudge.

    However, he was totally taking good intentions for bad.

    Eurazanias predecessor was not a great force, but he was able to see which of the two brothers was better suited to lead the people, and made a judgment.

    Hearing the king''s decision, dim was so impassioned that he seeded in killing his predecessor bymitting a crime and waster banished from the country by Carrion and the Three Beastketeers of the time.

    The rebellion was nothing more than dim''s own imagination; the truth was actually theplete opposite.

    That such a brutal dim has survived to this day is also a testament to his own strength. As a heretic of the beast race, as long as one had a decent character, it was estimated that he had long since be a magnificent man that even Carrion could conquer.

    But this is a past tense assumption.

    dim continued to run and wander. In his wanderings he met three loyal minions, now known as the Three Generals.

    Najiim the Vermillion Sparrow.

    She is a winged mutant that dim encountered while wandering in the Harpy Kingdom of Fulbrosia.

    She was growing three pairs of gray wings with purple patches on them, and a loss of reproductive capacity, rtive to having outstanding fighting ability. dim took her beauty as apanion and began to fall in love.

    Barago the Blue Dragon.

    After defeating the equivalent of the Upper Dragon n''s Water Strike Dragon, dim handed it over to Barago to be tamed. He was a martial artist in his prime, and his strength wasparable to the middle rank of a near-guard knight.

    Goseline the ck Tortoise.

    She belonged to a rare magical creature race, a maiden who served as an envoy to the Rock Goblins, and was also a witch of a foreign race, specializing in a variety of magical spells. After dim beat down the Rock Goblin, Goseline began to follow him.

    The three generals have their own stories, but one thing they all have inmon is that they are all strong men. Najim is a demon lord level, and it''s not surprising for her to awaken at any time.

    The magical creatures led by Barago and Goseline were both of the Cmity ss, and were also prominent among the ''Warcraft Legion''.

    dim''s defection to the Empire three hundred years ago was already after the sealing of Veldora.

    He survived the Celestial Demon Wars and led violent groups in a rampage through Imperial territory.

    He was defeated by a crusading army sent by the Empire, andter agreed to obey the Emperor Rudra to be pardoned.

    dim''s ambition was to overthrow the Marshal and be a hand of the Empire, then wait for the opportunity to kill Rudra and take the position of Emperor himself.

    dim had no such lofty thoughts as gratitude for him, only condescending because his opponent was strong, ready to betray at any moment.

    To conquer the world through the power of empire.

    One day, he will be an emperor.

    It is the ignorance of the identity of the "marshal" that gave rise to such scheming illusions.

    Rudra had long since seen through dim''s nature and had temporarily reused him because of his strength, letting him live one more day as long as he remained onmand, that was all.

    It is because of the coincidence of their intentions that a delicate bnce of mutual exploitation has been achieved.

    And now, the bnce has copsed.

    I''m surprised the Marshal is Velgrynd the Scorch Dragon, that kind of power is impossible to defeat.

    The power to symbolize fear is beyond my reach.

    As the saying goes, a different subdivision.

    It was a lucky fluke to understand this before nning to kill the Emperor, the atheistic dim thanked the gods.

    ...........

    ........

    ...

    dim reformted his intentions.

    Although it was calcted that one day Velgrynd would have to be defeated, and that would require careful preparation. Having understood this, his whole mind is now on achieving sess.

    And it''s just the way I want it.

    Through wild instinct, dim realized that he was not far from awakening. Still one step closer to gaining great power, convinced by intuition.

    Also, Najim, with whom he often fought together with, was the same.

    Although the conditions of the Awakening are not clear, the time ising.

    This is one of the reasons why dim is eager for the battlefield.

    Now, a swarm of baiting food had gathered in front of dim''s eyes.

    Ecstatic and dumbfounded at the situation at hand, dim couldn''t help but lick his tongue.

    Touring the battlefield, there are quite a few enemies that give the impression of being powerful. The more these strongmen were defeated, the more powerful dim and the others battle would be.

    "Kukuku, the merry banquet has begun.

    As dim expected, no, the battlefield was tragically beyond his expectations.

    ***

    The three generals under dim, obeying their master''s purpose, began to act.

    They scanned the battlefield, searching for the strong.

    "Hey, that''s King Gazel. And my reputation will go up when I take that guy down.

    "What, are you trying to sneak away? It would upset him not to leave the main course to Lord dim?

    King Gazel''s bravery was well known, and if he were to be defeated, others would have to be defeated.

    As a martial artist, it was difficult for Barago to suppress his excitement.

    And Najim dissuaded him.

    Knowing that King Gazel was dim''s target, Najim gave advice to Barago and persuaded him to make concessions.

    And

    As soon as Gazel is defeated, Lord dim''s power will no doubt grow. This excellent condition, how could one miss it?

    That''s Najim''s heart.

    And Barago also believes that Master dim takes precedence over himself. Besides, Gazel was already wounded, and as a martial artist who took advantage of people''s danger, one could not rule out the possibility that someone would say something about it. In this way, it is more appropriate to defeat the appropriate enemy.

    "I know. I would also like to dedicate this main course, King Gazel, to Lord dim to make his master stronger.

    For her part, Goseline smiled and hitched up to Barago.

    Kihihihi! Don''t worry, there are a lot of other powerful people, although theyck a bit of vor, but it''s okay to have a full stomach.

    As she said, there were countless strong men on the battlefield.

    Indeed, with a nonchnt nod, Barago nodded.

    Najim agreed with a smile.

    "Woo-hoo-hoo. As Lord dim says, the time for awakening is near. The first one to be a demon lord will be me, Najim The Sparrow!

    "Najim-san, I think you''re the one who''s trying to run away.

    "All right, all right, all right, all right, all right. King Gazel will give Lord dim, and his concubines will indulge themselves as they please.

    A single word from Najim spoke the mind of all.

    "Then I''ll go and take the weak lizard. That annoying dragon race is still alive and well on the battlefield, and that lizard seems to be the leader, so to thwart the enemy''s war effort, the lizard should be crushed first.

    "Then I''ll use that arrogant woman as a match. I have to show her how much she''s worth by stepping into my airspace without my consent.

    "Kihihihihi. Then my servant will destroy that magic doll and taste the power of the Rock Goblin!

    In order to avoid snatching prey, each person states his or her goal.

    But what they think is just naive.

    As envisioned by the three generals, dims target was Gazel.

    As a matter of course.

    It wasmon sense to judge whether or not to start with the strong one first based on the situation, but it was alsomon sense to deal with the weakened strong one first.

    Gazel lost the fight to Kondo, unable to move, and now is the perfect time to do so.

    "You must be King Gazel. My name is dim, and I am the leader of the Empire''s strongest Legion of Warcraft, General dim! Your head is mine!

    Whatever his vile or not, it''s purely a nakedly vile nature. However, it was justified behavior for dim.

    One can do whatever it takes to get to the end, that''s dim''s creed.

    So dim swooped down on King Gazel, but someone stood in his way.

    Gabil, of the Dragon People, who glowed with purple electric light and possessed red purple scales, was regarded as the Immortal Dragon King.

    "Hohoho! My resurrection! Don''t try to be rude to King Gazel.

    "Geez, you want to get in my way. Hateful Lizard.

    Watching his prey in sight but getting in the way, dim''s mood changed for the worse. However, he soon couldn''t care less about his mood and fell into a panic.

    Just as he cast his gaze around, wanting toin about what the three generals were really up to, a startling scene came into view.

    Barago, the "Blue Dragon, who was originally Gabil''s opponent, was struck down by the resurrected Gabil.

    Goseline, who was happily heading towards the floor guardian colossus statue, was crying because her Rock Goblin had been defeated.

    The only one left is "Vermilion Sparrow" Najim, who is fighting an evenly matched battle with her perceived enemy Souka.

    Even when the soldiers went up to challenge Gabil in order to protect dim, the gap in strength was ringly obvious.

    There was no way around it, so dim had to take it on himself.

    Just as he was about to do so, Samuel would more or less send an urgent contact via Magic Talk.

    "No, no, no, no! Reporting back on our side, Demon Lord Rimuru made an amazing move. For His Majesty''s protection, we ask for urgent support!

    Although dim wanted to scold him for not caring so much, he managed to swallow the words with patience. Then ask what''s going on across the room.

    "The sky depicts a great, unbelievablyrge, demon summoning door"

    "So what?"

    ''''So to speak, hundreds of upper level demons above the Greater Demon level have been summoned!

    And weve already suffered. The monoliths are fighting above A level and are organized!

    It was also enough to perceive how serious the matter was from Samuel''s exuberant voice, but dim was not at ease with this debriefing.

    It seems that Rimuru the Demon Lord has done something wrong, but there is Velgrynd on the Imperial side. How could one lose to a monster demon lord, it was hard to believe the threat was that serious.

    For a threat, dim would rather focus his war effort on the guy in front of him.

    "This side is busy, too. Let''s ask them to take care of their own business.

    dim vented his displeasure in one breath, then tried to hang up themunication. However, Samuel called out to him in an anxious voice.

    "But now there is a demon legion that is stronger than the Imperial Army soldiers, and this is a disaster of a great scale!

    "What are you talking about? There''s not only Lord Velgrynd, but the guards are also on standby!

    Although there was only onemander''s airship, it was carrying the Empire''s highest battle force.

    dim thought to himself, there''s no need to look for me when it''s toote, they can handle anything by themselves.

    It''s also normal to think that at this point, no one can me dim. But this time, the opponent was too strong.

    "Indeed, there were Lieutenant Kondo and all of the near guards on this side. However, the subordinates of the Demon Lords Army alone have no time for others.

    "You mean subordinates?"

    Shouldn''t itA thought shed through dim''s mind.

    The identity of the immediate opponent is that of a subordinate named Gabil, which is a rough guess.

    Although his strength was stronger than imagined, a momentary panic struck him, but he calmly turned back to think about it and wrote the names of other subordinates on the report.

    Benimaru, Shion, Diablo, Gobta.

    Among the men under Demon Lord Rimuru who were known as the Four Heavenly Kings, there was no such name as Gabil. If that was the case, the Four Heavenly Kings'' strength was still above Gabil''s.

    "Not only that! Unbelievable as it is, Demon Lord Rimuru hasmitted a taboo beyond our wildest dreams. It''s hard to understand what tactics were used to make him evolve the demons! You hear me?

    Hundreds of demons have been strengthened to the strength of a superior demon general!

    It is, indeed, a very unrealistic thing to do.

    Despite dim''s reluctance to believe it, Samuel was not the kind of man to joke around with.

    It''s better to be a decent, well-behaved person.

    Then what he said was the truth, and could only be understood to mean that a few hundred Cmity-level monsters were liberated.

    "So it seems. Samuel, I understand your concern."

    "Ooooooh, then I''ll leave the reinforcements to you!

    Like a sigh of relief, Samuel hung up the call.

    dim fell into thought.

    Despite the quantitative advantage, quality over that would be meaningless. That was the rule of the battlefield, and that''s why dim worked up his men.

    If it''s just the demons, there might be something to be done.

    But now that two of the three generals are down, it''s dangerous to remain optimistic.

    At the very least, dim''s men had to sit on their hands.

    Nonsense! Thinking that you are just a demon lord and underestimating the other party, you misjudged the situation. I and the higher echelons of the Empire will probably survive, but the soldiers at the bottom will probably be killed. In that case, simply

    By now, it was toote to regret.

    Next, just do what''s within his power.

    dim, on the other hand, retains the taboo killer.

    ***

    The Warcraft Legion isposed of elite personnel that dim has carefully selected and honed.

    This legion was clearly talking about an active heroic bloodline handed down from ancient times, a group of innately strong men, but that was not the case. The actual is a group of heroes artificially created bybining magic and otherworldly knowledge.

    Also, the magical beasts they tamed had secrets on them.

    Not only do they screen out the A-grade and above, but they are also given the ability to specialize inbat by rewriting the intelligence of polymeric biomass.

    The artificial life form that was created by cultivating and increasing the number of magic beasts andbining various characteristics is a weapon called an artificial synthetic beast.

    And it was dim, who was also a beastman, who was in charge of the study. By analyzing the principle of self-mutation, it is used to strengthen the subordinates.

    In this world, there is no research that is prohibited for ethical, religious, etc. reasons. It is because of this that results have been achieved at an rming rate. dim uses ves for human experimentation, creating the strongest legion he could ever hope for.

    A-ranked heroes and their partners, synthetic beasts, gain unparalleled power when fused with adult demon beast. However, the true value of the man-made synthetic beast had yet to be realized

    The unity of oppositesthats the extreme that dim seeks.

    The special cast and ability Demon Beast-Fusion" has been developed for this purpose.

    A special medication as a secret among secrets is also the most important item among military secrets, and only three generals, besides Grand Admiral dim, are aware of it.

    The effect is also naturally a fusion of mastery, warcraft and soldiers.

    The Demon Beast Fusion is based on the Beastialization" of the Beastman race, not from their own bodies, but from the synthetic beasts of their partners. By realizing the true meaning of human-monster unity, you can gain huge power and create a super warrior that can''t bepared to the one who uses magic beasts.

    However, the forbidden potion is the granting of magical beast power to humans, and is apanied by great danger. Once the drug is injected, it not only forces the ability to start, but also cannot be discharged on its own, and must be removed from the body at a hospital affiliated with the Institute.

    And, there''s a serious side effect that can''t be ignored.

    Instead, this side effect is the problem. The safety of this drug is not guaranteed.

    ording to current research, the mortality rate is as high as 40%.

    If the match fails, there''s also a 20% chance that you won''t be able to go back from being a demon beast to a human, and once you do, you won''t be able to go on as a human for the rest of your life.

    And even more brutal than that is the berserk demon beasts. There will be people who are fully demonized and berserk, and there will be people who remain in human form and lose consciousness and no longer obey orders. Once it bes that way, there is no more resuscitation, only punishment.

    The probability of going berserk is 30%. More cruel than death, this is a drug that cannot be easily tried.

    The above is an example ofplete failure.

    So that adds up to a 90% chance of failure. Taking the medicine was tantamount to ordering the ministry to die, and even the self-serving dim would hesitate to let his own men try it.

    dim wanted to improve the quality of the medicine and increase the sess rate before giving it to the ministry.

    But the current situation no longerpelled him to think so.

    Emperor Rudra is a more aloof man than dim.

    In the Emperor''s view, the existence value of the weak is nothing more than bait for the strong.

    Then, it is onlypassionate to let the ministry take the medicine now.

    Also, the berserk demon beasts can be used as bait, and even if they don''t turn back into humans, they still have some value as battle strength. The only thing that really matters is the 40% of the soldiers who died on the spot

    It''s not yet possible to conclude, but there''s no doubt that the battle will be even stronger than it is now.

    Then, the drop is right.

    There are many unknowns as to the efficacy of the medicine, and perhaps there will be some physical abnormalities, but 10% of the soldiers do get stronger.

    On the battlefield, quality is more important than quantity. In the eyes of those who know thismon sense, to be able to strengthen 10% of the soldiers is really a charming allure.

    Indeed, the odds ofplete sess are unclear.

    The number of attempts is too small and side effects may ur due to body condition. Although it was impossible topletely discard the possibility, survivors who had sessfully absorbed the magic beast''s power would also appear among them.

    As a result, less than 1% of the 10% sess rate isplete sessless than 1% of those who are fully adapted.

    These people were hailed as the Chimera Knights.

    These sess stories are exactly that

    "Hey, you guys, listen up. I was just contacted by Samuel and it looks like it''s not time to y. Get up and kill them.

    dim eximed extremely earnestly.

    Hmm?"

    Puzzlement rose to Gabil''s expression as he realized the words were not addressed to himself.

    However, he immediately tensed his nerves and hurriedly dodged from the spot.

    A momentter, a silver light prated where it had just been.

    "Hmph, can you avoid this light? I thought it was already a perfect sneak attack, but it was really an opponent that couldn''t be taken lightly.

    "You say not to be taken lightly? That is my line. Why are you safe when you''ve got a big hole in your chest?

    Confronting Gabil, who had dodged some distance, was Barago, the "Blue Dragon", who should have died. Therge hole in his chest was still open, not to mention the ''hyper-regeneration'', not even the ''self-regeneration''.

    Originally a fatal injury that regr people had long since died, this was a world full of monsters, and no matter what happened, there was nothing strange about it.

    Gabil understood this as well, and it was Barago who walked away only after knocking the opponent out, confirming that his life response was gone, abnormally.

    "Kukuku. I am safe and sound because of the tremendous power granted to me by Lord dim. I''ll show you my true form!

    As if in response to Barago''s call, the water-battering dragon flew.

    No! That just looks like a water battering ram.

    It was actually an artificial synthetic beast that mimicked the Water Strike Dragon.

    Barago was precisely one of the Chimera Knights who had awakened true power.

    The main body and partner, as long as one of them is okay, cannot be killed. It was also one of the hidden powers of the Chimera Knight. And now, by unleashing the special cast and power of Demon Beast Fusion'', the fatal injury suffered was recovered in an instant.

    In addition, Barago and the Water Strike Dragon fused together to form a single body, Barago''s appearance was the same as the original, but with dragon scales growing out of his body.

    The nature of the demon qi was different from before, and no doubt the strength had increased drastically.

    Gabil nced at dim with heart, once again seeing Barago as a rival. Then, intending to focus on the matchup with Baragobut dim wasn''t naive enough to let the two go at it alone either.

    "This lizard is stronger than I thought, and together we can kill him.

    "Yes, sir. Then I''ll be the front man and ask Lord dim to y guerri.

    "All right. I''m here to help you. Don''t be careless!

    Neither honor nor chivalry mattered to dim. It is precisely because of this recognition of Gabil''s strength that the opponent is to be eliminated without any hesitation.

    "Look, this is ridiculous! Even if they go together, they can''t beat me!

    Gabil made a bold statement and cheered himself on.

    What followed was an unfavorable fight.

    ***

    The other one of the three generals is also an opponent not to be cared for.

    Just as Barago was safe, the Rock Goblin, the originally defeated ambassador, was equally fine.

    The Gedora side was in sync with the Floor Guardian Colossus Statue while monitoring the battlefield.

    Thus, hearing what dim had said felt out of ce.

    Say yes, get up? This is, and to whom it is said

    As Gedora thought so, he sensed the resurrection of Barago.

    Panicking, he intended to alert Gabil, but felt a vicious chill first and turned back.

    Standing there was a maiden who had changed her appearance.

    No, nor is it known whether it should be called a maiden

    Despite the girlish gesture, her skin is a stark metallic ck. Her body was not flesh but rockmore precisely, turned into a block of magic steel.

    Like a polished mirror, it was obvious at a nce that the look was not human.

    "Are youassimted with a rock goblin?"

    Ki-hi-hi-hi-hi-hi, yes, His Excellency the Wise Gedora. You seem to be familiar with otherworldly knowledge as well, but my research is unique.

    "Hm, indeed. That''s interesting.

    "Right, right. I''ll tell you all about the results, be sure to let me hear your high opinion!"

    The young girl ck Tortoise" Goseline stirred up Gedora and a wicked smile appeared on her face.

    Then took a step forward.

    Gedora would prefer not to toss his old bones again.

    Originally, he thought he had defeated the Rock Goblin with brute force, but that seemed to be just acting. Gedora figured it out and re-estimated Goseline''s strength.

    That''s really enough. It''s called gic engineering? The nature of the original magical creatures alone had numerous mysteries, and one would think that there wasn''t much meaning in this magical worldquite the opposite? It''s great to be able to produce such results with the goal of assimting magical creatures.

    The old, cunning Gedora also felt admiration for her.

    There are a lot of different kinds of magic, and there are some varieties of them that have no genes.

    There is simply not enough time to exin so many examples, and it is always thought that it is very difficult to produce results.

    Because of this, research in gic engineering has been carried out only in the medical field in the Empire. However, it seemed that there was secret research going on within the ''Warcraft Legion''.

    Presumably, the research is being conducted on inhumane things that cannot be disclosed to the public.

    Gedora was no great benefactor and could understand the sentiment of prioritizing intellectual curiosity over everything. He did not want toin about such studies, but regretted that he had not been able to take part in them, and therefore did not know how far they had been reinforced.

    Judging from the appearance, Goselines strength was higher than that of Demon Lord yman, and seemed to be weaker than ''Sage'' Sare, but it contained an amount of mana very close to Sare''s.

    Judging from the Ten Lords of the Labyrinth, it was even higher than the pre-Awakened Zegion, and although the amount of mana was not equal to the strength, she was undoubtedly a dangerous opponent.

    "The Dragon Kings are far behind you, too. Looks like I''m going to have to show some real talent.

    "It''s an honor to beplimented by Gedora-sensei, let''s have a taste of this power!"

    Goseline started to move.

    The forward thrust of this surge is heavier than a ten-ton truck hitting at 300 km/h.

    The Floor Guardian Colossus Statue, which was more than three meters in height and weighed more than 30 tons in total, would also be easily knocked away.

    Gedora called out as she unhurriedly adjusted her stance.

    "Purple light thunder!

    Technique, as its name implies, let loose a purple thunderbolt.

    It was a soldier''s suit mounted on the floor guardian colossus statue, capable of emitting over a million volts of electricity.

    Incidentally, it''s not that the higher the voltage, the more powerful the weapon, it''s just that it''s cool.

    There''s no point in scaring people except for their appearance, but it''s appropriate for scaring adventurers.

    Surprisingly, Goseline was also stunned.

    "What? What? Isn''t it magic? Can you manipte a lightning strike without unleashing your magic"

    Compared to its prowess, Goseline froze even more out of surprise.

    "Well, it''s a secret weapon, after all. It was Lord Rimuru who trusted me and entrusted me with this.

    Therefore, defeat must not be allowed!

    Gedora also matched up in a flourish.

    By parsing Goselines forward stroke, it was understood that she had reced her body structure with a magic steelponent. Although it was only spection, it should be the special ability of the Rock Goblin.

    Clearly a substance heavier than steel, Goseline''s movements were smooth. Moreover, with the power of a rival saint in her body, he could only admit that this transformation was a foul.

    However, Gedora possessed the Floor Guardian Colossus Statue.

    "Take this, the Demon''s Destruction Cannon, the ultimate magic weapon!

    At this point, the strongest armor is unleashed, and the firearms control device is directly connected to Gedora''s consciousness, allowing the armor to be unleashed without time difference.

    And the Demon''s Destruction Cannon was the strongest of the weapons.

    The name of the move is also very much in the style of Gedora, a tribute to the demon race. And judging by its performance, it can be said that it is a Magic Essence Harvest Cannon.

    This weapon not only uses the mana filled in the statue of the floor guardian, but also harnesses the mana in the atmosphere and releases it together, which is a perfect way to describe this weapon.

    The Floor Guardian Colossus opened its chest, and through that transparent membrane, Gedora''s figure could be seen. From the center of the two palms, a ray of light was released, and with this ray of light as the center, a ray of destruction that coalesced the demon element was generated.

    "Geez! You''re the leader of the original Magic Legion.

    Goseline said.

    It seemed that he did not choose to dodge, but rather to be on the defensive, and his expression was not able to remain calm.

    "Flush it out! Magic Steel Ultra Fine Vibration Wave

    A tiny vibration was emitted from Goseline''s body surface, a vibration that was unique to magic steel.

    The frequency of the magic steel is unique in its ability to create fluctuations that pop off the magic element.

    Being able to render magic ineffective was also this principle, and by assimting with the rock goblins, Goseline was able to manipte this trait freely.

    The contraction of magicules and the diffusion of magicules.

    The opposite properties collide with each other.

    The winner is Goseline.

    What?"

    "Kihihihihi! Survived. It''s a victory for my servant!"

    Goseline cheered loudly.

    Gedora is a wizard, naturally, and his means of attack are also dependent on magic.

    Rtively speaking, Goseline''s body was magic steel and had an absolute advantage in the face of magic.

    Both sides are familiar with this.

    That''s why Gedora had used the most powerful weapon. If that didn''t work either, it could be argued that Gedora no longer had the means to be able to defeat Goseline.

    "I''ve got a headache. I didn''t expect to be able to defend against this

    Gedora is also considered a strong man.

    When facing an opponent with arger amount of mana than yourself, you can also subdue them with your own strength. Even with a saint like Sare as his opponent, he overwhelmed his opponent by virtue of the skill gap.

    However, there is always nothing one can do about an enemy who is not as good as oneself.

    That is, facing an enemy whose attacks don''t work.

    If you can''t beat the enemy, you can''t win even without losing.

    Gedora understood that the fight was against him.

    He was thinking about what to do.

    Now is the critical time. This old man is no decent person, nor can it be said that Lord Rimuru has fully trusted me. If I do not demonstrate my own awareness here, he will not take me as one of his truepanions no matter what the timees Gedora was impressed by the sheer size of Rimuru''s apparatus.

    Although Rimuru spoke suspiciously of Gedora, who had defected from the Empire, he had epted him and recognized his ability to take on great responsibilities.

    And, the Land of the Monsters is beautifullyndscaped.

    Research facilities superior to those of the Empire were also prepared.

    His best friend Adalman is also here.

    Adalman, who is now of the Ten Lords of the Labyrinth", is also the pride of Gedora.

    Moreover

    The study of magic could be said to be this old mans interest, as long as those few high men were present, it should lead me to pry into the abyss. Even in response to that lord''s expectations, it wille in handy here.

    Gedora, wishful thinking of the monsters as masters of his own magic, recalled the masters and made good on his awareness.

    However, his memories are overly embellished.

    A demon had rejected Gedora without putting his eyes on him, a demon had tricked Gedora into almost using him as a test subject, and a demon had somehow drunkenly invited Gedora to practice swordy instead of magicbut these were all aptly misunderstood by Gedora.

    However, there was another demon that liked Gedora over the praise of Rimuru''s magic, and that demon had praised him for it, so it wasn''t as if Gedora''s memory was wrong.

    The demonDiablo and Gedora made a pact.

    If Gedora can find a way to gain Diablos approval, hell take Gedora in as his own dependant.

    So Gedora cannot die here.

    Rimuru had also ordered that there be no messing around.

    Buta thought shed through Gedora.

    "I haven''t lost yet! The battle''s just begun, little girl!

    "Ki-hi-hi-hi-hi. Yeah, that''s good. Let your flesh remember the power of your servant!

    Gedora yelled, and Goseline responded.

    The two then went head-to-head again.

    Goseline, who was clearly less than half the height of the Floor Guardian Colossus Statue, did not fall behind in her efforts.

    This is not normal.

    The weight-dominant Floor Guardian Statue was suppressed.

    Moreover, it was not unusual for Goseline to have countless tentacles growing swiftly on her back. The tip of the tentacle was sharply polished and smooth, plunging into the Floor Guardian Statue.

    Look?"

    Aha! More, more, more! Blood, give me more blood!

    Goseline felt like she was burning out.

    These tentacles are constructed of magic steel, and they sharpen iron by creating high frequency fluctuations through subtle vibrations.

    This move can also be applied to cut through matter and can be called a high-frequency thousand-handed chunk, or a high-frequency thousand-handed chop.

    The hands of the Floor Guardian Colossus Statue were instantly chopped away by the High Frequency Thousand Hand Chop.

    Gooh! The important body that Lord Rimuru has entrusted to me"

    "In front of my servant, it''s a piece of shit. You''re too old to rely on such toys.

    "I''m sick of this!

    Gedora shouted defiantly, but also only hard of mouth. In actuality, Gedora''s body was prated by tentacles that opened several holes.

    Covered in blood, it was fortunate to be in the body and not be seen in this state by Goseline, allowing him to maintain a tough attitude.

    "That''s tough. You don''t need to be ashamed of the fact that the situation is irreversible. Even the legendary wizard could not ovee the tide of the times.

    "I haven''t lost yet!

    "What an ugly struggle.

    Goseline reached out two tentacles that turned into sharp des, then cut off the feet of the Floor Guardian Statue.

    In this way, the Floor Guardian Colossus Statue lost its limbs.

    "Take an oath to obey your servant. You''ll be spared, won''t you?

    It would be a pity if Gedora''s knowledge were lost. With that in mind, Goseline offered an invitation.

    But Gedora wouldn''t nod yes to that either.

    "Well, I''m basically putting myself first. Therefore, only if you don''t betray your love of magic, will the ghosts follow you who despise it!

    Gedora''s soul explodes.

    When loved ones are despised, human anger pours out of the heart.

    Gedora''s stamina and perseverance are now on fire. And that anger made him determined to unleash forbidden magic.

    Use ones own life force as fuel for fierce burning self-exploding magicElemental Magic: Life Sublimation.

    After all, I have a mystical means: reincarnation. Im going to say goodbye to this world for now, and definitely peek into the abyss of magic next time!

    This is a man named Gedora who would rather be victorious than defeated.

    "Resist? Then you''re useless. Go to hell!

    "You''re going to be buried with me!"

    Goseline''s tentacles prated the chest of the body where Gedora was, and at that moment, a dazzling light burst from the Floor Guardian Colossus Statue.

    The light that burns everything to the ground is the elemental magic that Gedora unleashed: the me of life sublimation.

    "What the? That''s what you''re looking for?

    Before Goseline could say a word, she was engulfed by the mes of life and disappeared.

    After that, a flower-like me bloomed on the ground.

    ***

    Gabil got caught up in a bit of an unfavorable fight.

    dim was strong, but even more tricky was Barago who had awakened the power of a Chimera Knight.

    This power was simr to that of the two just now, and it could not be underestimated to the current Gabil.

    Looking at the amount of mana alone, Gabil was higher. Even counting spear skills, it was Gabil who had the upper hand.

    It''s just that the gap isn''t that big when you look at thebined strengths. Gabil could have beaten his opponent as long as he didn''t fall short, but the opponent was two. dim, who fought guerri warfare, harassed on the sidelines, and Gabil had difficulty in breaking Barago.

    And Gabil had another concern.

    That''s Souka who fought with dim''s men.

    One of the three generals, Najim the "Vermilion Sparrow, seems to be a strong woman who can match a demon lord, and is of the same race as the Demon Lord Frey, and Gabil spectes that her strength is simr to Frey''s.

    Therefore, he felt that Souka couldn''t win.

    Although Souka''s strength had grown tremendously with Gabil''s evolution, and he was now also a powerful person who could be called a superior monster, he was still only at the rank of an adjutant of a demon lord. His strength wasn''t enough to fight the demon lord directly, and victory could be said to be desperate.

    Souka is still alive because the sadistic Najim is simply enjoying ying with Souka. Gabil noticed this too, anxious to get over to the rescue.

    However, dim and Barago are also strong enemies.

    Sorry about that, sister. Just hold onGabil prayed while he did so, then focused on his enemy.

    And then, bad news came again.

    A sh of light came from the ground, and Gedora-sensei was in the center of that sh.

    "Sir Gedora!

    Gabil''s ''thoughtmunication'' is not working.

    This means that

    Even more troubling was the sight of a small figure standing up. Although his body was scaly and wounded, Goseline, one of the three generals, did not die.

    Unable to conceal the shake, Gabil shot Barago as he bided his time.

    "Hey, hey, hey, hey, hey, hey, hey!

    "Hohohoho! Of course, you''re no match for me!

    Gabil talks tough, but doesn''t really have the strength.

    The situation was unfavorable, and the words ''retreat'' came to Gabil''s mind.

    But at this point.

    Gabil also rushed to the scene with reinforcements he hadn''t expected.

    "Well, that looks bad. I''m here to help you.

    It was unexpected, but it came from a figure familiar to Gabil.

    "That''s, uh, frank. I can''t help it. I pestered Milim to help me move her here.

    One more person.

    The beautiful queen, the dominator of the sky.

    "Sir Carrion, Lady Frey, why are you here?

    Gabil asked in surprise, and Carrion replied cheerfully.

    "We''ll talk about thister. Let''s get these guys out of here.

    Frey agreed with Carrion''s words and nodded softly.

    "Now that an alliance has been formed, it''s only natural to send reinforcements. We will also fight, under themand of Lord Benimaru.

    The Beast King Warrior Regiment of Carrion, though less than a hundred in number, rode at once.

    The same is true of the Freys close guard, the "Heavenly Soaring People. Although there are not many warrior-type winged people, their strength is guaranteed.

    There was no more reliable reinforcements, if not more numerous, than they were.

    "Then please!

    Gabil stopped worrying and understood the situation.

    So he wanted to consult Benimaru, sent amunication, and Benimaru immediately replied.

    "The situation on your side has been observed through the Argos. Don''t be careless, dim is pondering something, watch out for the soldiers at the bottom!

    Benimaru''s instructions were straightforward and didn''t specify who to fight who, only conveyed the main points.

    Instead, however, Gabil was happy.

    To feel trusted and relied upon.

    "Then Ill let Sir Carrion deal with the enemy''s general.

    "Hey, hey, you''re a good man. That guy was a disgrace to the beastman race and I originally thought that he had stormed the wilderness long ago, not expecting him to be alive. Let me finish him off myself.

    That''s what Carrion was going to do at first.

    The Gabil epted the instructions with gusto.

    "So, my opponent is the harpy, right?

    If you want to say so, Frey is also a harpyalthough Gabil thought so in his heart, he wasn''t so stupid that he wasn''t sure what the consequences would be if he said it.

    He was also worried about his sister Souka, and Freys proposal was exactly what he wanted.

    "Mmm. Can you please?"

    Gabil asked solemnly.

    "Yes. So, I''m over it.

    Frey nced at the Two Wings.

    "It''s all yours after that.

    "Good luck, Lady Frey!"

    Frey nodded and flew over.

    Naturally, Frey''s target is Najim "The Vermilion Sparrow.

    Najim, who was ying with Souka, also sensed that someone had suddenly broken in.

    Frey! The real queen, is me. Today, let me forget all the regrets I have umted for years!

    Unbeknownst to Frey herself, Najim was her own twin sister. Najim is a mutated species born with great power, but unfortunately had no reproductive capacity. For the feminine race with wings, it is impossible to identify with a queen who cannot bear children.

    Najim herself, through no fault of her own, could not qualify to be queen. Because of this, the then Queen judged that she was likely to be the bane of the future and ordered Najim''s exile.

    dim picks up Najim who is wandering aimlessly, and unknowingly, Najim has built up anger and hatred for her fellow people in her heart.

    And now Frey, the symbol of her fellow people, is at hand.

    Joy and loathing surged through her heart, and with this incredible emotion, Najim rushed forward to meet Frey''s unfurled wings.

    Carrion looked over at the two of them, full of concern.

    "Well, let''s start here too.

    dim, on the other hand, was gritting his teeth with hate.

    "Don''t underestimate people, you son of a bitch.

    "It seems that Frey is also rted to her rival. That''s karma. If we didnte as reinforcements, we wouldn''t have had such an opportunity.

    Opportunity?"

    "Yeah. Ill kill you to prove that I am the strongest of the beastmen.

    "Bullshit, that''s my line!"

    Carrion and dim, both of whom have simr personalities and intonations. He has a fierce temperament and cannot afford two tigers in one mountain.

    As Carrion says, it''s a battle of karma.

    "Take it.

    "Come on. I''ll show you what a gap is.

    Carrion unleashed his unique skill "Hundred Beasts" and transformed into a true "Lion King. Fully armed at the outset, make the most of it.

    Rtive dim also made use of the White Tiger power that hadn''t been used in the battle with Gabil.

    The Lone White Tiger, dressed in military uniform, fought against the King of the Hundred Beasts.

    On the battlefield, two fronts were formed.

    Powerful forces sh with each other, creating a force field.

    Gabil, on the other hand, watched the battle.

    Those who came as reinforcements to help, acted on Benimaru''s instructions.

    It''s nothing. Simrly, the Kurenai and the Flying Dragons are under themand of Dorf, Commander of the Order of the Sky.

    Benimaru gave appropriate instructions to each of the key locations, but the specific instructions were left to the people on the ground to execute.

    Gabil also agreed with Benimaru''s approach. As he himself could imagine, Benimaru was also fighting the enemy''s subordinate.

    Benimaru is doing it right.

    Despite the highbat power of the Imperial ''Warcraft Legion'' alone, it was not praiseworthy in terms of group actions. Thus, the numerically disadvantaged Union Army maintained the line through clever cooperation.

    Still, there is no denying the disadvantage.

    The reinforcements came at just the right time, and the Union army was ready to raise the wolf smoke of the counterattack.

    "Well, that seems to be going well. Souka has recovered well. I have to work harder.

    "It''s easy to look around when my opponent is looking around.

    As Gabil cast his eyes to the battlefield, sharp gunfire met him head on.

    The opponent is Barago.

    dim and Carrion were far away, but the battle between this side and Barago continued.

    "Hohohoho! I''m themander-in-chief, I can''t just focus on you.

    "I''m really underestimated.

    "You''re the ones who despise people, aren''t you? If that man named dim had shown his true talent in the first ce, I might not have been able to survive.

    "Huh! How could a great beast lord get real with a little man like you?"

    Hearing this, Gabil shook his head helplessly.

    "It''s called taking things lightly. As the saying goes, "When a lion beats a rabbit, he also uses all his strength. In this world of the weak and the strong, no matter what kind of opponent you face, it''s only etiquette to do your best.

    Gabil replied dutifully.

    In fact, Gabil couldn''t help but think of hispanion as he said this.

    So much for people who don''t do their best in the face of the enemyidentally, remembering this.

    One of the most even is Diablo.

    Gabil asionally provokes mock battles, but it feels like Diablo has knocked himself out with a rather underrated approach.

    That demon is an exception. In the end, if I had shown my true ability, the battle would have been over in an instant, so I can''tinAlthough we are on the same page, there is a world of difference in strength between Diablo and me. It hurts, but that''s the reality.

    With Rimuru''s approval, he was awarded the highest honor, as one of the Twelve Patrons. Gabil is proud of this, but at the same time more aware of his own standards.

    He became stronger through awakening and perceived how powerful Diablo is.

    Even the trio of demonesses who didn''t evolve at the celebration feast were far superior to Gabil. In this way, Diablo, who was even better than them and had sessfully evolved, had be a monster beyond Gabil''s imagination.

    You can''t win a fight. One can only admit that this is not an option, but if one gives up on it, it''s all over.

    It doesn''t matter if you can''t win now as long as you don''t give up and stick to chasing Diablo''s footsteps.

    Gabil thought this way, often with an upward spirit.

    It was because of this that Gabil knew what was truly powerful. Though it was a concept imagined out of thin air, the strong were by no means the unassuming characters of dim and Barago, and Gabil understood this through instinct.

    "Therefore, I will never lose!

    "You''re full of shit! Anyway, your defeat is a foregone conclusion. You should be d that you can die before you see the future hell, so thank me for my mercy!

    Barago''s attacks are getting sharper by the second.

    Gabil, on the other hand, unloads the strike cautiously.

    "Mm-hmm. Is this talking about the change in you soldiers? Can you tell me what you''ve done?

    As Gabil pointed this out, Barago''s movements slowed.

    Then, with a flicker, stared at Gabil.

    Hehdid you notice?

    "That''s for sure. After all, we have a very goodmander."

    "Even so, it''s toote. The order has been given. All you can do is wait to die in despair!"

    Barago pointed to the evidence.

    It was Goseline who had fully recovered.

    "Hmph, it is indeed a very good restorative power, as a strong man, it is just that this level of ability is not taken for granted.

    Gabil found out that Goseline was okay.

    But it''s not worth the surprise.

    However, Barago smiled fearlessly.

    "Nope. It''s not Goseline, it''s her surroundings.

    Hmm?"

    At this moment, a fierce cold ran up Gabil''s back.

    There were corpses of imperial soldiers all over the ce.

    To point out the death of apanion to the enemy in a heroic manner is to be unable to guess the intentions of Barago.

    However, before that

    Speaking of which, when did this group die?

    The number of enemies was toorge to be noticed, but the number of deaths was also too abnormal.

    On closer inspection, more and more of the enemy broke away from the air battle lines andnded.

    While observing their whereabouts, some of them were found to have vomited blood and died on the spot.

    What?"

    "Did you find it?

    "I don''t think it''s because I died"

    "That''s right, Lord dim makes a decision. We are facing a great trial now!"

    After saying that, Barago roared withughter.

    With a maniacalughter that spread throughout the battlefield, the people who heard it were scared to death.

    Gabil looked at him like this and felt horror as well.

    It was an epiphany.

    Something terrible is about to happen.

    ***

    The Beast King dim gave amand.

    That''s the most important ssified order.

    "All hands on deck! As reported by Samuel, our Emperor is in crisis. Moreover, the enemy has vilely summoned the evil demons. The battle power of the demons is still unknown, and presumably, that battle power is beyond your means. If this goes on, there will be serious damage, so this lord is going to use thest resort to counter it. Give your courage and loyalty, and unleash the killer weapon that I have given you, so that you may gain the power to defeat even the demons!

    After conveying the orders to the three generals, the orders were also given to the soldiers.

    As a fortified killer, the tablets were distributed to individual soldiers. However, the pill could not be taken without the order of Army Chief dim.

    And that restriction was lifted by dim''s secret summons.

    Ha! With sesses great power. And if it goes well, there will be some side effects at best. If you''re going to hate me, you might as well hate yourself for not being able to adapt!

    Now that''s it, dim really means it.

    Downright self-centered, this is the man named dim.

    dim calmly ordered the soldiers of his own army to "go to hell". As cold and ruthless as his judgement was, it was also true that just going on like this, there was a good chance that he would be ravaged by the demons. It can also be said that it is reasonable to judge a person as a person who has died in exchange for power.

    The soldiers quickly carried out their orders.

    It is precisely because one knows nothing about the content that one can execute orders without hesitation.

    In other words, the soldiers voluntarily unleashed the forbidden special cast and ability, Demon Beast Fusion".

    The effects of the abilities slowly eroded the Warcraft Legion soldiers'' bodies.

    Because both were in the middle of a battle, the change in the soldiers was ignored at first. However, the results of the changes also became apparent over time.

    The ground was strewn with bodies.

    The bodies Gabil saw were them.

    There were also many who stormed into the enemy lines.

    The "Kurenai" and the "Flying Dragons" and the "Heavenly Flying congregation" of the Beast King''s Order were in a bitter battle.

    In the battlefield, there are also those who wonder about their changes.

    These men are the true warriors that dim pursues.

    There were 10,000 dead.

    5,500 fully demonized people.

    5,000 people who went berserk after the demonization.

    5,000 who kept human form, partially beastialized and went berserk away.

    4,000 beast demon warriors who had housed the Beast Power.

    And 400 who awakened to be Chimera Knights.

    The odds of sess or failure are fixed, and the results are more or less a fluke than expected. Because the experimental parameters were so few, it''s no surprise that the results were even more disastrous.

    Judging from the results, the number of Demon Beast Legion, which originally had 30,000 people, had been drastically reduced. However, the Legion has grown in strength by leaps and bounds.

    The mob will be crushed on the spot.

    Although there is still value in using it as bait, it cannot be restored if it bes that way. So dim also did not spare, and did well to shed their consciousness.

    Of the 20,000 remaining, roughly half still maintain a rational fight. This information, was a little more than dim had expected.

    Half of them were unable to recover as adults, but the moment is also an important battleground.

    dim should also be happy with the result.

    What''s more, 400 Chimera Knights were born.

    That way, neither opponent will lose. Thinking so, dim nodded in satisfaction.

    However, it''s not time to let out a sigh of relief.

    It took some time to achieve this result, and the next step was the integration of these battle forces.

    Despite dim''s desire tomand the formation himself, it was a pity that there was now Carrion in the way. In that case, only three generals could be relied upon.

    Barago "The Blue Dragon, fighting Gabil.

    "Vermilion Sparrow, Najim, is also fighting with Frey.

    That leaves ck Tortoise" Goseline.

    "Goseline, get the troops together!

    Kihihihihi. The results are better than we thought. It''s a joy to behold.

    "Hmm. Then please!

    The instructions were given through a simple ''chanting''.

    The current need is to regroup before the 10,000 marching soldiers run out. Thankfully, Goseline was okay, and dim was relieved for the moment.

    Even the self-centered dim relies on the people with whom he identifies.

    "Well, I''m a good match for you, aren''t I?

    "Of course. I''m a military leader, not like a beast somewhere.

    "Sacrificing your own men and calling yourself a militarymander? No more jokes.

    "Stupid, this is war. It''s precisely because you can''t even judge this that you can''t. It''s pathetic enough to hear that you''ve been kicked off the throne by a newly installed demon king, following the minions of the ipetent!

    "Shut up!

    Carrion shed at dim in exasperation, his anxiety evident in the attack.

    Incredibly, dim became stronger than expected.

    "Oi oi, the attack is so weak, it''s as slow as it''s stopped.

    Without forgetting to sneer, dim came around behind Carrion, who was equipped with a huge w on his right hand.

    The tiger ws that glittered with silvery glorythe white tiger ws. The White Tiger w was also the alias of the Three Beastketeer Suphia, and this w, which possessed the name White Tiger, was exactly the mythical-grade armament given by the Emperor, which dim had transformed into his own exclusive weapon.

    Mythical equipment that can be decapitated no matter what the opponent is. It can also ughter spiritual beings, and with dim''s godlike pace, the effect is remarkable.

    With hammered pace, dim ys with Carrion. Even though Carrion was dressed in legendary level equipment, he was like scrap metal in front of White Tiger w.

    "What''s wrong, what''s wrong? I thought you were going to kill me, but it was just talk.

    "Annoying. Geez, I thought I''d be able to take you out more easilyThe math went wrong"

    Carrion had also be stronger through Milim''s cultivation so that he was not fatally wounded and was able to continue fighting.

    Even more surprised about this was dim. The battle power gap was directly tied to weapon performance, and dim had originally thought he could end the battle more quickly.

    It is also evident from this that both men are kindred spirits.

    The strength is simr, the potential is higher for Carrion and the weapon is favorable for dim.

    Overall, it''s still dim who has the advantage.

    dim is also aware of this, keeping his guard up and charging at Carrion. It was at this point that something unexpected happened to dim.

    "What? The powerthe power ising?

    This is the precursor to evolution, the beginning of evolution into a demon lord.

    Butawakening at this time is like stepping into deaths door for dim.

    Whatwhat, this sleepiness is?

    dim wobbled on his feet, and Carrion could not have misced this break, out of the crisis repositioning posture.

    "What''s the matter, tired of chopping?

    Carrion observes while stirring up dim.

    What happened.

    This y, is it foul, or auspicious?

    Whoever it was could tell that dim''s power was beginning to swell. The magicules gathered, overflowing with a huge magical aura.

    dim himself, however, was a lycanthropic figure who couldn''t even stand up, staggering.

    What''s going on? Is this supposed to be, like, an awakening?

    What he had heard recently came to mind in Carrion''s mind.

    The ritual of evolution was performed at a celebration held at Rimuru. ording to reports, some subordinates fell into an irresistible slumber and withdrew at that time.

    Does it take sleep to be a true demon lord? If so, then is this guy in the midst of an awakening moment!?

    Carrion is no fool, but neither is he observant. But Carrion, facing a life crisis, thinks calmly and ys with excellent insight.

    ording to Frey''s spection, evolution requires souls

    Yes, the conditions are met.

    All it takes to evolve into a true demon lord is abhorrent "souls". Of course, not all evolution requires this, and enduring the hateful feelings of those who have been killed by oneself is one of the necessary trials of awakening.

    dim became defenseless in a situation as critical as ''in battle''.

    This, too, is karma.

    Those minions who had relied on dim must have felt betrayed. These "souls" are filled with abomination and reach out to the source of that abomination, dim.

    Nor was Carrion right to see through everything, only to judge that now was both the greatest crisis and the best opportunity.

    "God help me, too.

    "Wait, wait, wait! Give me a minute."

    "You''ve lived as long as you want, haven''t you? Now it''s time for you to pay back.

    "Calm down and think about it. Only the one who had defeated the state of perfection, me, could be called the strongest. You don''t want a showdown in such an unkind way either!

    dim beat his heart out.

    The time is right for us to be killed, but this is the time when we can''t help but sleep. As things werepletely beyond expectation, no countermeasures could be expected for a moment.

    Sweeping a circle of the minions that depended on it, Barago and Najim were in the middle of a heated battle. Goseline was busy integrating the Chimera Knights, and couldn''t spare a hand to cover dim now due to the onught of Rimuru''s Army.

    At least, now, this moment, no one cane back to save dim.

    dim''s knees momentarily braced against the ground.

    How can that be, damn it!? It''s been so hard to get this far, one step away from getting the most power!

    It is true that he feels the power that is overflowing within him.

    But the more powerful it is, the more powerful the iing sleepiness will be unable to resist.

    As soon as the Awakening was achieved, even Velgrynd was not in question. dim was so convinced, but the reality was harsh.

    There was no reason why dim could endure the trials that even Rimuru could not resist.

    dim''s face, with the distorted by unwilling tears, one could not see the original face.

    "You''re kidding!? You gotta be kidding me, motherfucker!"

    dim tore into a slumber after a final shout.

    Those who cannot cross the trialthere is only death.

    "Wouldn''t it be nice to die in your sleep? So, goodbye! Beast Particles Roar!

    Carrion is not a man who would pity his enemies at a time like this.

    Carrion, who was the most confident when he was the demon lord, is now the general in charge of an army. Being in the position of reinforcements, it stands to reason that victory is a higher priority than one''s own honor.

    The man, true to his ambition and one step away from achieving greater heights, was beaten down by Carrion.

    ***

    Not anticipating the defeat of the army chief, the three remaining generals panicked.

    The three will bepanions who are intoxicated with dim, chasing the same dream.

    Their roars andments were quite intense and even affected the battle.

    The initial action was Barago.

    No longer tangled with Gabil, he turned back and rushed to dim''s side.

    "Lord dim!"

    All of dim''s head below was sted away by the Demon Beast Particle Roar. Only the head with a remorseful expression was left, and in that state it was no longer possible toe back from the dead.

    "Ahhh, what awhat a cruel thing to do. Our long-cherished wish was still a little bit away from being fulfilled

    Chasing thementing Barago, Gabil also rushed over. Without a care in the world, he stabbed the Lizardman n''s secret treasure, the Water Vortex Spear, at Barago.

    Gabil, his eyes still focused on Barago, said.

    "Sir Carrion, a wonderful victory! I admire the majesty of the Lion King!

    To Carrion, who had crushed the enemy general, Gabil''s words of praise were genuine. The power of dim, who holds mythical equipment, surpasses that of Gabil even though he is a demon lord.

    Despite the coincidence and good fortune, praise for the Carrion who knocked him out is also par for the course.

    However, theplimented Carrion''s face did not look good.

    "Oi oi oi, it can''t be, it can''t be

    Seemingly wless to answer Gabil, was thinking about something.

    "Hmm? What''s wrong?

    Isn''t it physically ufortable? Faced with Gabil''s questioning, Carrion reluctantly threw his gaze over.

    Then the appalling truth was told.

    "I''m sorry, I''m sorry, I''m sorry. I''m sorry, I''m sorry

    "Are you hurt?

    "No, it''s the awakening. It seems that the souls, which were originally owned by dim, areing towards me. To fall defenseless at a time like this, I can''tugh at dim anymore

    What?"

    Carrion couldn''t help butugh at himself.

    Sensing the situation, Gabil produced a shake.

    "I''m sorry, I''m going to sleep here. Protect me if you have the strength left."

    "Of course! Rest in peace!"

    To reassure Carrion, Gabilughed.

    Carrion returned a smile, then copsed back onto his back, and with a final word of hopefully waking up well, fell asleep.

    The seemingly daring and fearless Carrion couldn''t resist the sleepiness of evolution either.

    Barago was annoyed by this. If the situation changed slightly, it would be time to switch sides with Gabil. Rtively speaking, it should also be dim, not Carrion, who falls into the sleep of evolution.

    Uh-oh-oh! Ill never forgive you. I''ll never agree with you if you''ve done nothing to make a profit!

    Barago excitedly shot his abhorrent gaze at Gabil and Carrion.

    In his hands he held the relics of the radiant dim.

    The White Tiger w is a mythical weapon that, when the owner is identified, bes a realistic weapon with the owner''s consciousness.

    "White Tiger w, lend me your strength. Let me avenge Lord dim''s death!

    As if echoing Barago''s voice, the white tiger ws radiated an even more intense glow.

    The light retracted and turned into a spear.

    Oooooohhhhhidentify with me as your master!

    Barago said happily.

    In his hand was the Blue Dragon Spear, which had transformed from the White Tiger w.

    You''re called Gabil, right? I''m going to kill you and kill the thief who slept there!

    "Bullshit! I have made a pact between men that I will never let you interfere with the sleeping Sir Carrion!

    Gabil yelled back.

    Then, the two males fought again.

    ***

    While fighting at high speed in the airborne battle, Frey also grasped the situation in every corner of the ground through her unique skill ''Sky Sphere Eye''. Everything within the specific range coordinates of this double irvoyant lock can be seen at a nce.

    so that''s what evolution is all about.

    Frey had a clear mind and was able to understand what was going on on the ground.

    Fighting Najim on the one hand, Frey simultaneously unraveled the correct answer.

    How? Lord dim was

    "Luck is also part of strength, it''s true.

    "You bastard! How dare you fool Lord dim when you can''t do anything about me!"

    "You say that. I''m just stating the facts, not trying to fool him. Besides, I''m not helpless, I just haven''t struck yet. I hope you''re not mistaken.

    Even though Frey seldom did it herself, her strength as an old demon lord was not a pose. Although Najim the Vermilion Sparrow has a much higher amount of mana than herself, she is also able to move around with speed and skill.

    "He''s a fugitive. He''s a liar.

    "You''re not making a big deal out of it. We''ll decide after the fight.

    Quarrels don''t lose out to Najim.

    There are people in the world who are good at making others feel bad about themselves. Frey was exactly this type of person, and even the Demon Lord Milim couldn''t lift her head in front of Frey.

    And Frey wasn''t just running away.

    Observe your opponent while looking for their weaknesses.

    Can''t win on strength.

    The speed on Frey had the advantage, but the opponent''s staying power was even better.

    This will only lead to a gradual decline, but there are always opportunities to win in unexpected ces.

    "Aren''t you, like, anxious?"

    "Huh? What are you"

    "I can finally see the souls, too. Thanks to these eyes, it''s convenient to be able to see."

    Frey snickered. Because she sensed that the performance of the unique skill ''''Celestial Sphere Eye'' had increased, the battle had be a situation in her favor.

    And, she was sure that the information now obtained would be the key to victory.

    "What did you say you could see?

    Najim said in disgust, and then the ws finally caught Frey''s wrists.

    A coldugh followed. The Winged n''s ws have the effect of ''magic blocking'', which can seal the ability of an opponent who is caught.

    "Ahahahaha! What a fool you are. Just talking and identally getting caught by me, right?

    Najim seemed convinced of her victory, and he tone became clearer, and this change of attitude was a good indication that Najim was indeed in a hurry just now.

    Despite the crisis in which Frey was in, she remained calm.

    The observation continued, ndly acknowledging those instances.

    "Take it! Magic Electric Shockwave!

    What followed seemed to be a one-sided ravage as Najim began the onught.

    Frey''s clothes were cracking from the shockwave, but her expression was not the slightest bitter, and she was still watching Najim as if she was indifferent.

    Najim didn''t feel right about the way Frey looked, but she thought it was just a bluff.

    Despite the reluctance to agree, the identical twin, Frey, was more intelligent. Comparingbat power alone is that Najim is stronger, but opponents who can y tricks are tough.

    This is meant to trick me into taking the opportunity to get away from the ws, right? Nopethe woman must have been waiting for a split second to break and attempt a reversal.

    Deciding that it was only right to continue the attack, Najim tortured Frey even more intensely.

    However, Frey remained unchanged.

    "Not even close, huh?

    Frey just muttered, and Najim couldn''t ignore the words. So one can''t help but ask rhetorically, "What''s so close?

    "You''re starting to wake up, aren''t you? Compared to when the battle first started, the amount of mana was gradually increasing. It seems like youll sleep just like dim did, I''ll just have to wait for the opportunity.

    Frey spoke up, revealing a devilish smile.

    Najim was blue in the face.

    She herself was more or less self-conscious that symptoms of awakening did appear in her body.

    And that''s exactly why Najim was anxious. Since the time Frey saw through that, Najim had basically been yed for mercy by Frey.

    "So what! Ill just kill you right now and hide somewhere safe!

    While what Frey said was merely validating the truth, Najim fell even more wolfishly.

    Before the sleep of evolution arrives, Frey must be killed off. Najim so concluded,ing out even more fiercely to increase the power of the attack with full force.

    And that''s what Frey is all about, Najim has no way of finding out.

    "Magic shockwave!"

    It was already unknown how many times it was the first attack, the intense electric shock scorched Frey. However, Frey didn''t even have any burns on her body, at most she was just leaning back from the shockwave and was actually unharmed.

    Too weird? Why is this guy, who can do nothing, like this?

    When it is toote to perceive this.

    "It''s incredible. However, from your reaction, I am also convinced that as a mother of a former queen, I want you to be happy away from racial strife.

    "What did you say?

    "If the Queen''s secret is known, she will only be killed. So without telling you anything, I banished you.

    "You''ve got to be kidding me! Can a fledgling live when it''s abandoned at birth!? That was a clear attempt to kill me!

    Najim shouted impassionedly.

    However, Frey calmly contradicted her.

    "But you survived. This fact proves that someone was quietly taking care of you. Mother is also naive.

    "What the?"

    This is the point that Frey points out, and the one that Najim has long held in question.

    It''s amazing how one can survive the early childhood years before one''s self is born.

    So she gave herself the excuse that because she was a mutant, she probably survived by instinct.

    However, hearing what Frey had said, the doubts that hade to mind in the first ce came to mind.

    But Najim, ovee with hatred, can''t change her mind now.

    A bluff! Yeah, I see. You''re trying to trick me, so wait for a reversal. It would have been nice to beg for mercy, but as an original demon lord, you can''t allow yourself to end up like that, right?

    Najim was convinced that it was the desperate Frey ying up the strategy.

    That makes all the sense. Najim, who forcefully justified herself, further increased the power of the electric shock in order to firm herself up inside and not fall for the deception.

    "Go to hell! Maximum Magic Electric Shockwave!"

    The full force of the purple lightning struck through Frey. And that''s exactly the moment that Frey was waiting for.

    "It''s pathetic. I let you get away, and you came back here to die.

    Huh?"

    "There can only be one queen. In order to get the throne, I killed Lord Mother. Of course, if you''re not abandoned, you''ll have to kill each other with me.

    "Then I could have killed you!

    As a rarebat type, Najim was absolutely confident in her fighting abilities.

    Although the flight speed is not as fast as Frey''s, other than that it is better than Frey''s. Even the battle was not lost, and now it was, and victory was near.

    All Najim wanted to do wasugh at Frey, and thest words before she died didn''t even count as hard words. But hearing Frey''s next words, her face changed.

    "Winged queens are in need of all sorts of abilities. And it is those who are born with these abilities that will be recognized as the next queen. You''re also unlucky to be born as the other half of my twin.

    "You''ve been talking smugly since just now"

    "Then I''ll get right to the point. For an attack of the same race, the queen is going to be at an absolute advantage. In other words, harpy attacks won''t work against me.

    "Stop lying! How can something so ridiculous be!?

    If that was the casethe thought shed through Najim''s mind for a moment, but she vetoed it in a sh. If that''s true, it would be a contradiction to killing the former queen.

    "You''re trying to make up a story to get me into a mess, so make up a convincing story!"

    "It''s sad that you can''t believe me, but it''s true. Incidentally, the old and new queens didn''t have to fight each other. Originally, it was the sisters with the same ability who should have won the battle, and the one who could take the opponent''s ability for himself or herself would be the queen.

    At the same time, it is also true that it will be a "demon lord species.

    "What the...?"

    "Because you were born with a w, it was up to me to kill your mother. And inexcusably, you trampled on your mother''s desire to keep you alive. I don''t know if you''re a sister, but I wish you could hide in some corner and live.

    "You''re kidding! Think you''ve won? As your sister, I also have the ability to fight outside of the Harpy n. Just use that power"

    "It''s toote, enough energy has been saved. I don''t want to put you in pain. I''ll kill you.

    "What, what, what?

    By this time, Najim finally sensed that Frey''s wings were dyed purple and scattered with gold powder, and the beautiful pure white wings were discolored due to the purple electricity.

    Najim''s mind grew fearful as she realized what this meant and her body stiffened.

    The shockwaves that I released, all piled up! And how powerful is it?

    Najim panicked and tried to escape, but the ws that held Frey''s wrists couldn''t be pulled out for a moment, and Frey''s slender hands also hit Najim''s wrists.

    Perhaps the oue would have been different if Najim had awakened before she met Frey. But unfortunately, that too is just a hypothetical.

    "Farewell, sister. Reflexes!

    Wait?"

    Frey didn''t hesitate; kinship was shed long ago when she became queen.

    The umted purple electricity was released in one breath.

    This is the ability that Frey has acquiredthe unique skill of the Two-Knocker, which allows Frey to return the attacks she takes to her opponent.

    It was actually a bad skill to use, since she was also wounded, but this time it was an attack from the same n, and the strong enemy, who should have been invincible, became a one-trick pony for Frey.

    Najim ate the umted electric shock head-on, burned to ck in an instant, and died on the spot.

    "It doesn''t matter if it''s an older sister or a younger sister, it''s mother''s naivet that''s so troublesome.

    Still, one thing is quite enviable, sister. At least, you were really loved by your mother"

    Towards the fallen Najim, Frey bid farewell.

    But Najim had lost hearing of Frey''s goodbye.

    The winged sisters failed to understand each other, and their second encounter came to an end.

    It would be nice if that was the end of it.

    "What the? The "soul" of Najim ising towards me!

    A sudden sharp drowsiness assaulted Frey.

    "Is this, then, the sleep of evolution? So, with Najim gone, the soul''s remorse has been unleashed on me

    It wasn''t that Frey didn''t want to awaken as a true demon lord, but there was also timing and asion to consider.

    Looking at Carrion''s stupidity, I wanted to wait for him to wake up and taunt him, but Frey could onlyugh bitterly in her heart, don''t joke with me.

    Butining doesn''t help.

    "Lucretia, Clea! Guard me to the end. Protect Carrion, too, by the way.

    "As you wish, Lady Frey!"

    Well do as youmand!

    The twins responded immediately.

    Upon seeing the twins, Frey flew to Carrion''s side.

    It''s better for two people to get together for protection than separate. Also, with the Three Beastketeers Suphia guarding Carrion, working with the Two Wings will increase the chances of survival.Frey thought so.

    That said.

    That''s really enough. It''s obviously reinforcements, now it''s all a burden. I didn''t think I''d behave like this.

    Frey was embarrassed with shame inside.

    The only thing that was unexpected about Frey.

    Also unsure if she would be able to wake up, Frey reluctantly fell asleep.

    ***

    Gabil and Barago put on a death match.

    And the one that decided where the battle was going was the Blue Dragon Spear that Barago was holding.

    Gabil didn''t want to admit to being swayed by the difference in weapons, but in fact, even Gabil''s proud ''Dragon Scale Armorization'' couldn''tpletely defend against the Blue Dragon Spear''s sudden stab.

    He can''t be underestimated for hurting me.

    "Kekekeke! That''s my line. I was going to kill you with one blow, but it''s going to be tougher than I thought.

    Both men were covered in wounds, but neither stopped attacking, and neither cared that the wounds were growing.

    "It''s surprising that you can evenlypete with the awakened me. But I can''t lose!

    "Huh! If it''s Lord dim, even without awakening, he''s better than you. If I can awaken, I won''t have to fight against you.

    "Ridiculous! Stronger than me, there are plenty of people amongst Lord Rimuru''s men! You''re not bad, but in the eyes of Ultima and the girls, you''re just a fish.

    This statement was tantamount to saying that he was also a misceneous fish, but Gabil did not notice it. Thoughcking in roots, Gabil himself took this statement extremely seriously.

    Even though Gabil was embroiled in a bitter battle, he didn''t forget to observe the battle situation.

    In order not to implicate the sleeping Carrion, Gabil deliberately reveals the breach to induce Barago''s actions. After all, it was not in vain, and the battlefield was sessfully moved little by little.

    Miss Suphia has also rushed to cover, and Carrion should be fine. And when you get here, you don''t have to worry about getting involved.

    Gabil was also doing some thinking in the fight.

    As Gabil circled, Frey also defeated one of the three generals.

    "No way! Even Najim has lost!

    After the Generalissimo, the woman who had identified herself as an adjutant also died, the much-battered Barago became enraged.

    "Absolutely, unforgivable! I''m going to use this spear to avenge my fellow men!

    Barago eximed.

    Next, it''s the real Barago.

    "A true Chimera Knight is a warrior who has taken the inherent ability of the beastman race ''bestiality''

    for himself. You know what? If you can bear the special ability of Demon Beast Fusion'', you can be a being who can unite the power of man and beast, and this is our ultimate warrior!

    After Barago finished speaking, his body began to change. Keeping a human face, the features of a dragon gradually emerged.

    Military uniforms also break with the expansion of the body.

    Barago shifted, taking on a form that approximated that of a dragon turned draconian.

    "It feels so good. The true power of liberation is so high.

    Barago is also trying to take on this form for the first time. Whether or not the transformation would be sessfulHe was only thinking about it quietly, and hadn''t told anyone about the transformation.

    But now, the revered dim is dead, unshackled from Barago''s heart. Coupled with the defeat of fellow Najim, there was no longer any reason to hesitate.

    "Come here, you guys!

    Barago called out, storming the minions. The miserable soldiers without self-consciousness, as depraved as magical beasts, obeyed the orders of the overwhelmingly strong and instinctively recognized Barago as the strong one.

    It wasn''t just the demonized people, it was the partially demonized people. The assembled soldiers were easily gnawed at by Barago.

    Like a pulse pounding and pounding, the energy flowed into Barago''s body. The gnawed upon soldier became as dry as a corpse and died on the spot.

    "Shh, what have you done!? Aren''t they your men? And you"

    "I hope they''re thankful to be so fortunate as to be able to die in my service.

    "So selfish! Don''t think that I will let you off the hook for such inhumane practices!

    Gabil sprinted forward.

    Instinct sounded the rm that it would be dangerous to leave it alone.

    Judging by the situation, the capacity value has berger after the transformation, and the minions are now used as energy supplies.

    Barago now has the same amount of mana as Gabil. Now that he was about to be what could be called an artificially awakened demon king, there was no reason why Gabil should be anxious.

    Anxiety, however, invites the worst results.

    "Dumbass! On the battlefield, those who lose theirmon sense can only die. Do you think I would indulge in eating and fall off the wagon!?

    Barago''s action has two implications.

    One, the power is increased to replenish the missing energy.

    And then there''s the one that sends Gabil into anxiety.

    Barago''s purpose aplished, Gabil falls into the trap and rushes to his death.

    What?"

    By the time he noticed it, it was toote.

    Barago deftly maneuvered the Blue Dragon Spear with his feet, the tip of which pierced the abdomen of the rushing Gabil.

    The magic steel chest armor failed to cover the abdomen. Gabil''s ''''Dragon Scale Armorization'''' was also unable to defend against the counterattack that came from an unexpected dead corner.

    "Gah, gah!

    Gabil had a hole cut in his abdomen and spat out blood.

    Seeing this, Baragoughed aloud.

    "Kekekeke! You be my bait food, too. Feel the glory!"

    Gabil was in desperate straits, but fate would not allow it to happen.

    Confirmed. The unique skill ''Tuner'' effect has beenunchedPersonal Name: Gabil''s Change of Fate, Sessful Avoidance of Death This is the "Voice of the World".

    The power of the unique skill Tuner'', which Gabil himself had forgotten, changed Gabil''s fate in this moment.

    This was originally a unique skill acquired by Gabil during the transformation of demon lord Rimuru, but it was unclear what effect it had, only that it could increase or decrease his attack power.

    It gets stronger when you get carried away, and weaker when you are weak and inferior. In a sense very suitable for Gabil''s powers, but not exactly a good skill to use.

    With that feeling, Gabil''s life was saved by the unique skills of a bunch of mysteries.

    "Coo-hoo! What? I was really prated in the abdomen just now

    Though touchy-feely, Gabil the man didn''t care about the details.

    Well, that''s it.

    Gabil gave up thinking and repositioned himself against Barago.

    "How can that be!? What just happened?

    Barago can''t just take it like that.

    Against an opponent as strong as Gabil, it was hard to let his opponent fall into the trap and finally he was able to defeat him. It''s a win-win situation to continue the chase, and it''s only natural that it''s uneptable.

    "Don''t be ridiculous, asshole! Then next time it''ll go right through your heart!

    After absorbing the magic essence, the strength had increased drastically, and there was no longer any need to y tricks, defeating Gabil was like a p in the face. Thinking so, Barago gripped the Blue Dragon Spear in both hands.

    The two males once again faced each other in four eyes, ready to strike.

    At a disadvantage, was Gabil.

    It was lucky to pick up a life, but there wouldnt be a second one.

    He didn''t know that it takes a long time for the unique skill "Change of Fate" to start again after the first time.

    It doesn''t matter how good or how overjoyed you are, but one use a day is the limit.

    So Gabil has no other trump cad. Also, the physical exertion was severe as the battles continued one after the other. Having juste back from the brink of death, it was logical that rest was needed now.

    Even though Gabil was not in good shape, he was not weak and smiled brightly.

    "Hohohoho! Your moves are pretty good, but I''m not losing to you either. After all, Master is very good. Don''t think you can beat me that easily.

    In order to be ready to respond to Barago''s outbursts, Gabil concentrated his full attention.

    But by this time, the fate was set

    It was not the influence of Gabil''s unique skills, but the birth of the "Ciel" in Rimuru''s mind.

    Originally, Gabil had no choice but to struggle as hard as he could with hisst strength, when the Heavenly Voice descended.

    <<do you="" want="" power?="" so="" there="" go.="" please="" agree="" to="" a="" transformation="" of="" your="" unique="" skills.="">></do>

    ?

    Gabil didn''t ask rhetorically what that meant.

    The sound was wistful, warm, and just hearing it calmed one down. So without the slightest hesitation, Gabil silently read his agreement.

    The effect is dramatic.

    <<you made="" the="" right="" choice.="" ill="" give="" you="" new="" powers="" by="" offering="" your="" unique="" skill,="" "tuner"="" as="" a="" sacrifice.="">> As the sound faded, Gabil awakened a new power.</you>

    Research has given ''King of the Mind'', a skill given by the Ciel that has five effects: "Thinking eleration - Fate Change - Unexpected Operation - Space Operation - Multiple Barriers.

    elerated thinking can increase the speed of perception up to a million times.

    Fate Change is the upper level version of the unique skill Tuners" "Fate Change" and can now be manipted by Gabil''s self-awareness, but it is still used once a day at most.

    This is also the top version of the "unpredictable effect" of "Tuner". Whereas before it was only possible to unconsciously raise the attack, now it could beunched by his own will. One thing that remains constant, however, is that it still depends on the mood. If emotions are high, one can boost their attack.

    Space maniption is an ability that the subordinate, led by Benimaru, can use. The main purpose is to

    "transfer space", so that as long as space is not interfered with, you can freely move to the ce you have been once. There''s even a handy ability to seal the enemy''s back path to escape by interfering with space.

    Multiple Barriers is a defensive technique that Rimuru excels at. Bybining the various effects of

    ''Barriers'', all attacks can be countered. By way of borrowing Rimurus power, Gabil can also use the multiple barriers.

    Skill effects that hadn''t been noticed so far were now correctly understood by Gabil. Ciel instructed Gabil in a consciousness dyed to a million times over.

    Gabil was deeply moved. Couldn''t help but get it off his chest.

    "That''s strong, that''s strong! I can''t lose anymore!

    Just finished the upgrade and he immediately got carried away, but it was the right thing to do.

    Gabil''sughter swept the heavy atmosphere, and the strength grew in equal proportion to it.

    Whatwhats the matter with you? Suddenly the strength has increased, what on earth was done!?

    "Hohohoho! Sorry, but I have a great master. As long as I have that lord guarding me, I can''t lose!

    Although it was still possible to lose depending on the situation, Gabil spoke out loud and proud. At the same time, the power within Gabil was overflowing.

    In this way, it is already overwhelming.

    "Come on, get killed!

    "How dare you! Let your flesh remember my power well!"

    The two masters of the awakening demon lord will fight head-to-head with all their might.

    In a split-second offensive and defensive battle, the man who took the opponent was Gabil.

    Gabil used the Water Vortex Spear to deftly block the Blue Dragon Spear that was stabbing over with full force. Barago thus revealed a huge gaping hole, and before he had time to regroup his posture, arge hole was opened in his chest by Gabil''s sudden stab.

    "Gah! Goo, it''s not over yet, with my ability to recover, just this injury"

    Yes, Barago had inherited the high recovery power unique to orcs, and coupled with the energy replenished by absorbing his minions, a certain amount of injuries could be instantly healed.

    Barago tries to hang on to the recovery this time too, however, doesn''t manage it.

    Gabil himself found it quite unbelievable that ''Change of Fate'' and ''Unforeseen Operation'' had beenunched without permission, and the two hadbined to seize Barago''s ability to recover.

    Fate Change can only be used once a day, but only for the same object. That is, it can be used against enemies as well. This was confirmed through this battle.

    As Barago himself said, "On the battlefield, the man who loses his ordinary mind has only one way to die".

    "Wow, more power than I thought

    Thus, Gabil was given new abilities and was victorious at the same time.

    ***

    On the other hand, thest three, ck Totoise" Goseline, also encountered an unexpectedly strong opponent.

    Due to the defeat of army chief dim, the ''Warcraft Legion'' was in chaos. Before they had a chance to integrate their troops, the demon hordes fell from the sky.

    It was arge army, though, and not arge number.

    It''s only about 500, but the quality can be described as terrifying.

    The ck Numbersthe direct demon fighting group of the Demon Lord Rimuru.

    Despite the fact that the Chimera Knights amount of mana was close to twice that of a demon, unexpectedly, they were unable to gain the upper hand in the battle. The demons are just that strong.

    Faced with the unsatisfactory state of affairs, Goseline couldn''t suppress her anger. In such a state, the time of destinyes.

    That is, what

    A silhouette emerged from the distance of Goselines vision.

    Somehow, the instinct to feel strongly about this sense of disconnection sounded the rm. Goseline took her eyes off the battlefield, intending to see the true identity of the figure''s shadow.

    Goselines actions were the right ones.

    If the silhouette was ignored, Goseline would never know what was going on until she died.

    That being saidit''s probably happier to die knowing nothing.

    The ce where the figure emerged was the site of the wreckage of the floor guardian colossus statue.

    Just as Goseline was watching what was happening, the silhouette stood up.

    It was a beautiful man with dark hair and waist and a half-naked upper body.

    Theplexion is dark brown with a slight sheen.

    It was as if it was metalno, the remains of the Floor Guardian Colossus Statue fused under the man''s waist.

    In front of Goselines eyes, the wreckage dissolved and changed shape. After that, the man''s lower body was finished.

    "What? I''m naked. It''s a shame.

    The tone that didn''t match the handsome appearance was very simr to the man Goseline had just fought.

    "Are you, are youMr. Gedora?

    The manughed at Goselines question.

    "Of course it''s this old man. Or do you think you''ve won? I would never approve of that.

    Yes, the mysterious all-naked man is Gedora-sensei.

    "What did you say!? Didn''t you die in a self-exploding spell!? The principle of that magic is to burn life, so why are you still alive!?

    Goseline shouted aloud.

    Her own understanding couldn''t keep up, and listening to Gedora''s answer got her more confused. It wasn''t good to be carried along by Gedora''s rhythm like this, and Goseline tried to change the course of the topic.

    "Yeah,e to think of it. This old man exploded with his life sublimation. You think that''s gonna kill me? However, how could a man like memit suicide? Until the battle is over, don''t be relieved to think you''ve won.

    Gedora was long-winded while creating clothes with magic. It''s still unsexy, but it''s better than beingpletely naked.

    "Cut the crap and answer my question!

    Goseline wanted to take out Gedora regardless. However, the one who is obviouslypletely dead hase back to life and has to be cautious.

    Also not sure if Gedora will answer honestly. So Goseline intended that no matter what Gedora''s answer was, the next attack would be to the fullest.

    It was the old man, after all, who must have used some clever trick or prepared a living sacrifice for death. It''s a lot of work to make a servant sway. But, servants will crush these boring tricks with brute force!

    The flesh of Goselines magic steel had super weight on the opposite side of the surface. Therefore, just by crashing through with a certain speed alone, it can also exert considerable power.

    In addition, the high-frequency Thousand-Hand Chop with the tentacles of the whole body can be turned into a cannonball that turns everything it touches into powder.

    Goselines feet were straining.

    Use yourself as a cannonball and gain propulsion by kicking the ground. It''s another of Goselines killer moves.

    Goseline aimed at Gedora.

    And Gedora didn''t notice that she was about tounch an attack and honestly began to exin.

    "Well, I''ve been reincarnated. He had prepared beforehand a mystical arcana that he had developed himself: reincarnation. As long as you use this, you can keep your old memories and start a new life, although you have to say goodbye to the world for a while. It''s a wonderful thing.

    So?

    "It''s just that the sess rate is a little low and the rtive returns are great. And I''ve been reincarnated several times, so sess is guaranteed.

    In fact, the first time you try it, the sess rate is the lowest. It wasn''t due to poor skill on the part of Gedora that Adalman failed that time either.

    Gedora had prepared several spells beforehand that could be unleashed at any time. Razen can only prepare one or two spells at most, and Gedora can prepare more than three.

    Transfer magic for escape and self-break magic for self-break. In case of death, He also has a handful of reincarnation magic.

    Despite Gedora being so thoughtful, though, something unexpected happened to him this time.

    By initiating reincarnation, the "soul" is separated from the body. A "soul" protected by magic is supposed to seek the next body to enter reincarnation.

    And at this point, another engagement wasunched.

    Actually Gedora volunteered to be Diablo''s disciple, and Diablo has yet to give an answer. It was supposed to be a second rejection, but Diablo had his eye on Gedora.

    The two of them share amon interest in praising Rimuru''s magic.

    "I don''t hate men who are as interesting as you. When I recognize that you can truly serve Lord Rimuru, I''ll take you in as a dependant.

    It was said at the banquet.

    Probably just a polite excuse to deny himself, but Gedora was still trying hard to get Diablo to approve of him. And at that point, Diablo had imnted ''tempter''.

    Thus, Gedora''s ''reincarnation'' was rewritten. If one chooses to die for Rimuru, one can be reborn into the demon race.

    And the demon race is a race born with the ability to fight. It''s only natural that Gedora, who possesses lifetime memories, bes a demon race, and transmutes into a special individual.

    The problem is the flesh.

    Being a demon race of spiritual beings, staying in this world required a physical body.

    Originally Gedora could only possess someone, or contact Diablo and wait for the summoning. But as

    "Ciel" was born in Rimuru''s heart, the fate of Gedora was decided.

    <<if you="" want="" flesh,="" then="" have="" it.="" it="" also="" gives="" more="" power.="">></if>

    <<serve lord="" rimuru,="">> so said the voice.</serve>

    For Gedora, too, it''s a request.

    ''That''s for sureGedora eximed.

    So the deal was formed and Gedora was sessfully reborn.

    The new race that reincarnates is the metallic demon race.

    As if to prove himself a ck dependant, he is entwined with ck. The hair, eyes, andplexion are mostly ck. The shine through the metal is like an artifact.

    Having said that, this figure is not the original Gedora''s appearance, but rather the youthful appearance of his lifehis original life. It is a model reproduced from the image of memory in the soul, independent of race.

    Maybe it''s because the new race, but he doesn''t have the limitations of a demon race. Now that Gedora''s amount of mana had been able to match that of a chimera knight, coupled with the knowledge and experience from his life, he had undoubtedly be stronger.

    Gedora also did feel himself being reborn, and savoring the emotion, he couldn''t resist nagging at Goseline.

    "That is to say, you''ve be one of those metallic demons? A race I''ve never even heard of.

    "That''s what it''s all about. A word of advice, I''ve gotten stronger. You have no chance of winning, surrender. I''ll spare your life for the sake of my former colleagues.

    "Idiot, that''s all I have to say.

    The well-prepared Goseline saw the time and burst forward towards Gedora. The astonishing speed turned Goselines body into an overweight cannonball.

    Gedora, who is still gossiping, probably can''t defend against that. Goseline rushed forward with such a thought, only to be dazed the next moment.

    Surprisingly, the body ignored the fact that Gedora was right in front of her eyes, but her consciousness drifted off course.

    "Incredible, isn''t it? Well, to put it simply, it''s the maniption of the maic field through magic that creates the strong maic barrier. When the maic field is energized, it can electromaically induce the object to move as it just did.

    The object this time, refers to Goseline herself. For Gedora, who had learned the science of the otherworldly, being able to do so much with magic was very much a thing. That is to say, Goselines killer weapon was easily cracked by Gedora.

    Youre"

    Floating in mid-air, Gedora was holding arge book in his left hand, while his right hand was carefully turning the pages as if touching a treasure.

    "How? Do you understand the power of this old man? Give up the fight and surrender.

    This only sounded like underestimation to Goseline. Although Gedora didn''t mean it, Goselines self-esteem as a strong person was hurt.

    So the option of surrender does not exist.

    "All right. The only one who doesn''t want to use this is my servant, she''se to her senses!

    Goseline swallowed the pills.

    The special cast and ability of Demon Beast Fusion" was activated.

    Just like Barago, Goseline was about to gain great power. However, there was no reason for Gedora to wait dryly either.

    "Really. Then you''ll be a test subject for this new power of mine!

    Gedora looked happily at Goseline.

    Those eyes, they were the eyes of a scientist looking at a small white mouse.

    "The ultimate gift of the Book of Guidance"

    The book Gedora was holding in his left hand gave off an ominous glow.

    The book records that is Rimuruthat is, all the magic that Ciel manages.

    Gedora was in a trance as he looked at the fine art pose recorded in the book about magic. Now he had chosen the magic that best suited him.

    "The Little ck Prison."

    It was a martial art created by Benimaru, and Rimuru turned it into a skill. Magic is also a type of skill that is recorded in the Book of Magic.

    Eh?"

    Although it was not as powerful as the martial arts used by Benimaru himself, the power was impable. Before Goseline could understand what was happening, she was burnt beyond reproduction by the mes.

    "I want to show it off again, but I cant."

    Gedora muttered, trying to stroke his beard of pride. But his chin is bare, not a hair on it.

    "Oh, no! It''s a headache to look young too.

    Gedora muttered to himself, happily flipping through the ''Book of Magic Guidance''.

    ***

    As a result, the subordinates of the ''Warcraft Legion'' led by dim were all crushed.

    However, there are still dangers on the battlefield.

    One man, seeing dim''s head rolling down to the ground in front of him, was giddy.

    "There''s a delicious-looking bait that fell on the ground!

    That was the reason he was happy.

    The man who had picked up his head and nibbled on it without a care in the world was one of the

    "three giants" that Yuuki had ordered to infiltrate the Legion of Warcraft, Vega.

    Gnawing away at dim''s body, Vega''s body was full of power.

    The body of that seemingly carnivorous beast swelled up another round. dim was originally a big man over two meters, and Vega had grown to be equal to dim, with bulging muscles that made the uniform blossom.

    "Hmph, it''s not badbut it''s not enough."

    Vega muttered to himself, and next came a session of delicious bait.

    Najim, the vermilion bird, burned to a crisp, Barago, the green dragon, who died with a hole in his chest, and Goseline, the metal remains of which are only the remains of her.

    Vega approached quietly, unnoticed by anyone and nibbled on his prey quickly, one after another.

    Vega was able to eat humans because he was born with a special ability, the power of the unique skill

    Plunderer."

    ...........

    ........

    ...

    Vega was born in the royal capital of Ingracia. Unknown to Vega himself, his father was a "magical inquisitor" who eventually degenerated into a wizard.

    The father, having absorbed too much magic factor and unable to change back to human again, attacked the mother, from which Vega was born. So Vega was born a heretic, only three days after conceiving Vega in the mother''s fetus and being born with a self.

    Having said that, he was just an irrational baby who didn''t understandnguage, and everyone around him, including his mother, feared him as a monster. Not only was he not loved, he was nearly killed and had to hide.

    A dozen years passed after that, and Vega survived.

    Eating rats, scavenging scraps of leftovers, eating anything to survive. Finally, it also began to gnaw at the humans who were dying after the fight.

    Then he got it.

    Surprisingly, there is so much bait around yourself.

    Vega, who began eating humans, became a veritable monster. Of course, so an order was given to crush him, and it was Yuuki who was responsible for carrying it out.

    At that time, Shizue Izawa was already the instructor who took up the whip and assisted in the crusade, and Vega was sessfully arrested.

    Originally, Vega was supposed to be executed, but Yuuki felt it would be a shame for the force to just die. Unusualbat acumen, tough flesh. Also, it has the potential to grow, so it can be a good pawn to use if you exercise well.

    Yuuki lied to Shizu and said that Vega had been disposed of.

    Then Vega was educated in the Empire through Damrada. Today, he has grown into a warrior of terror.

    ...........

    ........

    ...

    Fortunately for Vega, the battle between the Upper Beast Knights and the Demon Beast Knights who served as reinforcements intensified. Thus, Vega was able to achieve his objective in a covert manner.

    The limbs of a strong beast, the body of hard magic steel, the power of a dragon that can bounce magic, the wings that can soar through the sky. Vega got them all in short order.

    Not only that, but he also picked up the mythical grade Blue Dragon Spear.

    Though not yet recognized as a master, Vega didn''t care. The injection of power made the Blue Dragon Spear obey itself, fusing together forcibly.

    This was the effect of ?Metal Operation?, the power that Goseline possessed.

    Fused with mythical-grade weapons, an unknown change came over Vega. The unusual armor covered the entire body, and a demon of unknown origin was born.

    At this point, it was time for Gabil and the others to notice.

    "What? Are there still such dangerous foes around!?

    Gabil eximed in surprise, and the minions could not helpining.

    "But Lord Gabil, we are exhausted.

    Exactly."

    "One battle after another, the supplies became scarce. What shall we do, Lord Gabil?

    It''s no wonder.

    In fact, the fatigue of the "flying dragon congregation" was at its limit.

    If the upper beast knight hade anyter, the battle line would have copsed long ago.

    After all, the Beast King Warrior Corps and the "Heavenly Flyers", who were supposed to be reliable reinforcements, were the first to leave the battle line.

    Ah, crap, Suphia mutteredthats how this started.

    Gabil asked what was wrong, and Sophia returned with a "So sleepy"

    Hearing this, Gabil also understood.

    It''s about to begin.

    The indispensable evolutionary sleep of the Harvest Festival begins at the worst possible time.

    Carrion and Frey began to awaken, and it was a natural consequence. In the face of this irresistible physiological phenomenon, there is nothing to be done aboutining. So Gabil and the rest fought alone and held the line.

    The other units are in the middle of an engagement ording to their own judgment. But Gabil and the others couldn''t get out of there. Fatigue reaches its limit at times like these and the situation bes even more unpleasant.

    That''s when Vega came and Gabil was blue in the face.

    "Be assured, Sir Gabil, that first I will speak to that man. That guy''s name is Vega. He''s Yuuki''s partner.

    How reliable, Gabil was impressed with Gedora.

    "Then please!

    Roger."

    The two, who had unknowingly be quite close, smiled and nodded at each other. Then Gedora walked towards Vega.

    "Vega, long time no see."

    "Ahhhh? Ah, is it Master Gedora? I hear you''ve gone rogue to the Demon Lord Rimuru, so it''s true.

    "Mm-hmm. That''s why myself and Yuuki are also in arade-in-arms rtionship, and it''s a good thing I ran into you here. If I hadn''t been there, you might have been considered an enemy.

    Yeah?"

    Gedora walked over and struck up an intimate conversation, and Vega nced around with little interest. Then immediately averted his gaze.

    Now Vega''s eyes only see what is of interest.

    Ahead of Vega''s line of sight, were Carrion and Frey. All around them, too,y what looked like pretty tasty bait. Vega kept his mouth watered, recalling the taste of the meat in a trance.

    "I will mediate here, and you will assist us"

    Gedora ps his hands on his shoulders as Vega sweeps past and a rxed guarded Gedora eats the punch head on.

    Now Vega''s power had been strengthened to override the awakening demon lord. Compared to Gedora, there is more than twice the amount of mana.

    Although Gedora''s physical defense of the metallic demon n was also excellent, it was still no better than Vega, who had full body magic steel and was armed with mythical levels. One blow left Gedora unconscious and lying motionless on the ground.

    Gedora, Gedora!

    The shouting Gabil thought in his heart, Gedora is really unreliable. Gedora himself was full of confidence, but it couldn''t be helped.

    The good hope copsed and Gabil looked even more disappointed. Also, Vega is more than capable.

    Vega wasn''t about to hide either, watching them like he was licking Carrion and Frey.

    His purpose was clear.

    If he is not knocked out here, he will gain even more power.

    I don''t even know if I can beat it now, and I''ll be even more helpless by then. Gabil will lose out and will have to fight now.

    I''ve always wanted to do something big, but one by one, I''d rather be spared.

    Gabil introspected slightly inwardly.

    ***

    Gabil made the realization and was about to move forward when he found someone in the way in front of him.

    "Gabil, let''s leave this to our family.

    "Whoa, whoa, whoa! Isn''t that Lord Lace? Why is he here?

    Well

    Because of being left behind by everyone, Lace, who was about to say so, couldn''t help but fall silent. Because it sucks.

    "You don''t have to say it. Of course hes here to save you!

    "Whoa, whoa, whoa! Thats so reassuring, Sir Lace!

    "Yeah. Since we''re here, don''t worry.

    Lace forcefully closes the conversation. Then, turned to Vega who was supposed to be apanion.

    "So, Vega. Why did you, beat up old Master Gedora?

    Lace asked to Vega with a flirtatious whirl. Vega just looked at him annoyedly and replied.

    "Huh? Needless to say. Because the old man is in my way.

    "In the way?

    "Ah, yeah. None of the guys who get in the way of my eating can stay alive, so ah Lace, you too honestly duck to the side. In that case, I''ll let you off the hook for old times'' sake.

    Lace stopped spinning around.

    "That''s a joke. Have you forgotten where you stand?

    The tone of his voice was almost the same as a moment ago. However, the atmosphere is quite oppressive, and it is not too much to say that it is like two people.

    However, Vega didn''t care.

    "Ha ha, you take a stand? You''re the one who hasn''t forgotten. You want to order me around! Didn''t that Yuuki kid lose to Rudra? I only take orders from those who are better than me.

    Vegaughed when he finished.

    His cackling could be heard in every corner of the battlefield.

    "I can''tugh. Your jokes aren''t funny.

    "So you''re not kidding?"

    The shittyughter came to a screeching halt.

    Lace closes the distance in a sh and chokes Vega.

    "Don''t underestimate people. Believe it or not, we''ll kick your ass.

    Lace lifted a Vega who was two rounds bigger than his body.

    Vega struggled with his hands. He is clearly not needing to breathe anymore, but is not used toing over and is at a loss.

    That''s when Lace unleashes a knee strike on Vega. Vega with the neck choke has nowhere to go.

    After Lace lets go, Vega crouches on the ground to adjust his breathing.

    "Wait, wait, wait. I''m sorry I got carried away. I''ve calmed down. Forgive me.

    Lace was about tond a shot to the side of Vega''s head but looked at Vega pleading with himself and stopped. Then, coldly says, "We''re not as gentle as the boss. I won''t do it again.

    I-I know.

    "Then follow our family honestly. Listen to me, if you do anything, we won''t forgive you.

    Vega immediately nodded in agreement.

    "Understood. So, what''s next?

    "We''re going to go to the president''s ce. As long as the chairman is saved, Tear and Footman will be restored. Anyway, there are some reasons for this, so don''t make a big deal out of it.

    "I got it.

    Vega nodded heavily. From this respectful attitude, Vega was now afraid of Lace.

    Looking at Vega, Lace sighed helplessly.

    "Shouldn''t you be all right?"

    Gedora suddenly stood up, muttering with a worried face.

    "Old man!

    Vega couldn''t help but posture.

    "Whoo-hoo, Sir Gedora! You''re okay!

    Gabil was surprised.

    "I''m sure you''re okay."

    Lace expected it and was not surprised.

    "That''s for sure. Although he lost consciousness for a moment, he had already taken every measure in case of emergency evacuation. I was going to wait for his carelessness and then blow a big spell, so I faked my death.

    In the "Book of Magic," which was given to us, there are also records of "Thinking eleration" and

    "Parallel Computation. With this, even if you pass out, the backup self-discipline will help you out.

    "I see. I''ve been fooled too.

    "Great old man, really.

    "I didn''t live that long in vain. More than that, the problem is Vega, right?

    Lace was going to muddle through but Gedora didn''t give up on pursuing it.

    Me?"

    "Yeah. I can''t trust you no matter what.

    Why!?

    Vega''s attitude was as if he couldn''t understand it at all.

    Lace could only be convinced.

    Helplessly, he shrugged and replied cheerfully.

    "To be honest, my family can''t be trusted either. But yes, this man is ourpanion. Our family understands that some people think it''s better to take out Vega, but we want to trust him. Also, we can''t decide without Boss permission. If he gets too much next time, our family will listen to you. Let''s see if we can forgive him for once and give him a chance to trust and believe.

    Lace agonized, what a headache.

    Vega''s brain is so unintelligent.

    Be too faithful to your own desires to see the asion. Not without merit, though disdainful of group action, but able to follow orders to a certain extent.

    Besides, it''s a shame to be punished like that with all the power in the world.

    The fact that the asional action that caused problems could also be more than tolerated was a real concernone might as well pay more attention to that aspect themselves, Lace thought so.

    This time too, luckily it was an attempted crime, but it almost caused a big problem.

    Even Lace wouldn''t have wrapped his arms around Vega if it came to them against Carrion, presumably punishing him on the spot.

    But honestly, this time, even if it was an attempted crime, it was quite dangerous

    "I don''t have the right to decide, but I understand how you feel. It''s not a stranger after all, as long as it doesn''t cause trouble for Lord Rimuru.

    Gedora is also the one who knows Vega. It was not appropriate to speak at this point and to make concessions when taking a stand.

    "We''re worried about that too

    Lace was also disturbed and didn''t get the whole thing out.

    Only Gabilughed out loud.

    "Hohohoho! As a man, one should learn from one''s failures. All right. I choose to believe in you too!

    You called Vega, listen well to Lord Lace and try to be a good fighter!

    Gabil said and patted Vega on the back.

    Despite the uneasiness of the heart, now is not the time to stop for worries.

    Lace took Vega with him and set off at once.

    "Is that all?

    "Of course not. If Vega can grow up to earn it, even if he fails, Lord Lace will take the me.

    identally pretty dark"

    "Hohohoho! I don''t get anything in return for mypliments!

    I''m notplimenting you, Gedora thought. But it would be too much trouble to exin, so he chose to remain silent.

    The atmosphere isn''t as tense anymore, but there''s still a fight going on.

    The two returned to reality, adjusted their moods, and returned to pro forma posture.

    That''s when the good news came.

    "Brother! Lord Moss sent word that Lord Rimuru has defeated Lord Velgrynd. The subordinates all entered the enemy airship and began a duel with the enemy''s main force. We can''t be left behind either!

    Souka returned to the battlefield after a brief rest, loudly announcing the current situation, and the morale of Rimurus Army was boosted.

    In contrast, the Imperial Army wavered.

    Regardless of the people who had stormed out of consciousness first, the main warriors of the Demon Beast Knights understood how bad their situation was.

    No more reinforcements can be expected with the loss of themander. And with the enemy''s reinforcements still growing, it was almost impossible to crush the enemymander.

    If he continued to persist in crushing the old demon lords whoy defenseless on the battlefield, he would probably be surrounded and annihted.

    If someone hadmanded the army, maybe it would have been different.

    But now the chief is gone.

    It is not surprising that the situation should continue as it is, and that there are those who have run away.

    On the contrary, Rimuru''s minions were overjoyed.

    "Well, well, well, well, well, well, well.

    "Have you beaten and defeated Lord Velgrynd? Unbelievable as it may be, but since it''s Lord Rimuru, it''s only natural!

    "Win. All that''s left to do is ravage!

    Of course, Gabil and Gedora are no exception.

    "Great! It''s true, Lord Rimuru is different!

    "Yeah. I also suddenly became stronger, having thought about this possibility. I''m sure that voice, just as Lord Diablo surmised, is closely rted to Lord Rimuru

    "Did you just say something, Sir Gedora?

    "No, nothing. More than that, let''s hurry up and finish what we started.

    Unnecessary delving will only lead to destruction, which Gedora fully understands, and not to investigate in depth. There''s another reason it''s not good to implicate Gabil in this.

    Gabil nodded in agreement.

    Then returning his mind to the battlefield, Gabil gave the assault order in the loudest voice of the day.

 Volume 15 - Ch 4

    Diablo was the only one left after Lace left, and everything went ording to n to his delight, and hisughter grew deeper.

    While keeping watch over the beloved master at close range, he is also considering how he can use it as a reference for his future use.

    What the master stillcked, how he was going to make up for itthe perfect opportunity to see that, Diablo couldn''t help but secretly snigger.

    Nope, how could Lord Rimuru becking? The most important thing right now is to sort out what action I''m going to take nextthats the right one.

    No matter how his mind wandered, Diablo would only think about how toe in handy for Rimuru.

    And the reason he hadn''t entered the war was because of some other intention.

    If I had gone to war, there should have been no chance of a bitter fight except for Lord Velgrynd, but that would have been a waste.

    The rare opportunity to fight against the strong should be used effectively.

    In Diablo''s opinion, Benimaru still had signs of growth. Even though evolution had given them a significant increase in their fighting power, if they want to be extremely powerful, fighting their enemies is the shortest way to do so.

    This wasn''t just for Benimaru, in fact it was amon topic that all the subordinates who had been granted power by Rimuru now had to face.

    And in this battlefield, just the right opponent is preparing for battle, there is no reason not to take advantage of it, Diablo was thinking like this.

    Lord Benimaru must have read my mind, and since he''s notining, that means he probably feels the same way I do.

    Although it was hard to see on the surface, Benimaru was quite belligerent, just not to the extent of Diablo, but had a tendency to enjoy fighting the strong.

    ''Im really looking forward to his growth.Diablo thought so.

    If one could survive this battle, one would surely gain greater strength.

    Having said that

    Lord Rimuru''s orders were absolute and no one would be allowed to die, meaning they had only one path to victory.

    He who does not die, all survive and then shed their bones to a higher power. To this end, Diablo also did well to leave no stone unturned in his consciousness.

    The mere power that is given means nothing, and it is only by gaining the ability by one''s own efforts and living it to the fullest that one can truly grow and grow.

    This is the stage on which the transformation will take ce.

    Give them the enemy and crush them. The growth that follows is what Rimuru wantedthats what Diablo thought.

    Kufufufu. Testarossa, for the time being, even Carrera and Ultima could imagine a rough fight based on strength alone, especially since Carrera was very problematic, and it would be a good experience to experience a hard fight here. Make sure you survive, or I''ll really kill you if you don''t. Kufufufufu

    Afterwards, the excitement of Diablo reached its peak after witnessing the battle between Rimuru and Velgrynd.

    ***

    On the outer deck of the Emperor''s gship, the knights of the Near Guard were assembled.

    The presence of imperial guardians like Velgrynd ignited their fighting spirit.

    "If it were Lord Velgrynd, it would undoubtedly bring victory!

    "Ahhh, we can''t lose either!

    "Win here, and then calm the western countries in one breath!

    "Exactly. Our empire is just around the corner!

    "Long live the Emperor!

    "Glory to the Emperor!

    Never call it a wide deck where respective thoughts collide with each other.

    Then, neatly aligned, the enemy was identified.

    "Are youing, minions of the demon lord?

    "From the moment the evil dragon Veldora was taken away, it was doomed to your defeat!

    Some let out a sneer like that, but most of the knights were silent and unsheathed.

    The reason is simple and straightforward.

    They see the enemying here as a threat."

    And they are aware of the fact that this is the battlefield and will act to meet the enemy.

    Only, they don''t know it yet.

    Desperation, hade straight to the side.

    When they realize this, it is the time of their death.

    Testarossa flew gracefully through the air, a face of boredom.

    The target flew aboard the ship and could see the fools who had raised their swords.

    "This man is unhappy. I''ve seen how we''re still trying to challenge you.

    Benimaru was just silent.

    While wanting to recognize it, it is only natural that one would do so from the standpoint of the enemy.

    That''s why Benimaru didn''t respond to Testarossa, just followed through with the silence.

    This is also because, in this respect, Benimaru can still count as normal.

    In the eyes of someone who really leaps outside ofmon sense, Benimaru''s thinking circuit is the anomaly. And as if to prove it here, Testarossa moved.

    "It is foolish to despise the strong. For they are exceedingly sorrowful. Let me bless them with mercy before they are consumed with fear.

    If it were normal, Testarossa would only make a little noise to show some strength and then go and devour the feelings that had fallen into fear.

    It is just that it takes time to bring fear into the hearts of the enlightened enemy. Not only is this troublesome, it is also contrary to the purpose of this campaign.

    So she chose to do it as quickly as possible and clean up the mess that was getting in the way.

    Without hesitation, Testarossa unleashed the magic that enveloped the entire airship in effect.

    The magic is called Nuclear Strike Magic: The Blessing of Death.

    The ultimate forbidden magic that destroys the "soul" and spreads its tyranny without mercy. The result, in turn, is the dark sphere that envelops the airship and the death that descends within it.

    Bathed in the light of the demonic death that brought death to all life, the people inside the ship were nearly dead.

    After ending his contact with dim, General Samuel, who had been running around in pre-war preparations, did the same, breaking his breath without even understanding what had happened.

    He wasn''t so lucky.

    If Rimuru had any grace left and recalled Calgurios plea, perhaps he would have given the order not to spread it to Samuel.

    Unfortunately, however, reality is harsh and all beings are equal in the face of death.

    "What a surprise. We''ve ordered her to make the first move, but then we won''t have a chance.

    "I''m trying a little too hard not to ask you to do it.

    "Nonsense. You''re thinking ''in order not to have your prey taken away'', right?

    To Benimaru''s spitefulness, Testarossa returned a delightful smile.

    "I can''t believe I''ve been caught off-guard. As expected of you, Benimaru-sama."

    "It''s been a long time since I''ve had apliment that didn''t make me happy.

    There''s nothing wrong with this kind of banter. For Benimaru, that was a lot of work.

    There werements about the two people who werete.

    "Ahhhh! You want to stay, even for our share!

    "It''s a mistake. Diablo should have left it alone. It''s the right thing to do.

    Ultima and Carrera contained resentment staring at Testarossa.

    Testarossa just returned a bitter smile.

    "You''re not even close. Look for aura and see if anyone''s still alive.

    "Exactly! A weakling who can be defeated by that level of attack is not worthy of being my opponent at all. Well done, and amendation for this screening.

    "I''m ttered, Your Eminence.

    Testarossa showed a smile with a just the right expression.

    Those who can know will know that the expression is so eloquent.

    Those who can bear the blessing of death can only be those who retain the suitability of magic, or spiritual beings. With any luck, an Immortal might survive.

    No matter what, since there were still survivors inside the ship, it must be the strong one.

    Ultima and Carrera, though they felt disheartened, had no way toin. Having understood this, decided to back off honestly.

    Thus

    "Let''s go.

    With amand from Benimaru, the raid began.

    ***

    A line of men descending from the outer deck of the airship witnessed the corpse-ridden knights of the Imperial Near Guard, whose bodies remained as evidence that they had fought to the death.

    That is, it is the end of the road for those who can also be called heroes in the great nations.

    No, dontI don''t want to die yet"

    There were also those who reached for the void in a desperate attempt to bite the vitality.

    However, that life was no longer the same as a candle in the wind, and neither the restorative potion nor the restorative magic had been able to save them from death.

    From the moment of hostility with Testarossa, these men''s lives were numbered.

    "Really! I still think it''s a waste. A man of such quality must sing a beautiful hymn.

    "Don''t say anything like that. Look, someone ising to greet us."

    Forward of Testarossa''s fingertips, the bow section of the gship.

    There are the people at the top of the empire.

    Emperor Rudra, and Velgrynd, who was still asleep.

    Kondo stands on either side of Damrada.

    Behind Rudra, there are four other men and women.

    There was another man with an honest face waiting by Kondo''s side.

    "It''s an honor to be greeted by the Emperor.

    Benimaru fearlessly let the word out, and before Rudra could speak, Kondo and Damrada were about to step forward, but were stopped by Rudra with one hand.

    "No harm done. It took more than 2,000 years to save up the pieces, but that''s all that''s left now. I''ll allow you to answer as the agent of the Demon Lord, Rimuru.

    "That''s very kind of you.

    "And then, what is the purpose ofing here?

    "Nothing, it''s simple. I''m not the sole agent, but I''ll make the request on behalf of Rimuru-sama. From this moment on, cease all acts ofbat and surrender unconditionally. We''ll stop the pursuit if we swallow the terms honestly.

    "So what if I say no?"

    "I have received the order to destroy you from Lord Rimuru. Until one side is all gone, let''s fight.

    That being said, only because we arent allowed to dieBenimaru added inwardly.

    The other side of this heart naturally has no way of knowing, leaving only Benimaru''s arrogant attitude, the imperial side can not help but get angry because of this.

    "Insolent man!

    What couldn''t help bute out of his mouth was a loud yell from Malcolm.

    "A maggot who doesn''t know how much he''s worth is so arrogant and stupid.

    One of the four knights armed with ance whispered in contempt at Benimaru. Benimaru ignored it and stabbed straight at Rudra.

    Others remained silent.

    The decision was in Rudras hands, and since Rudra had allowed for a counter-answer, it was only disrespectful to interject themselvesor so they thought.

    "It''s ridiculous. How can my wish stop here?

    "Well, then, go to hell.

    The current Benimaru is finally able to be thoughtful and not expose his shallow side. But his nature is still always like a raging ogre. It is more natural to exercise one''s strength than to bargain with one''s patience.

    And

    Rimuru had already ordered a drive to kill, and he had no reason to back down.

    One touch.

    There''s no better word to describe the atmosphere, and someone moved. Velgrynd, who was still in a deep sleep before, suddenly opened his eyes and jumped up.

    Rudra!"

    "What''s wrong? What''s going on here?

    With a mere nce around, Velgrynd made sense of the situation. Even so, thinking their affairs were more important, they ignored the Benimaru and began to narrate.

    "My ''other body'' has been locked up by the demon lord, Rimuru. It will take a few minutes to break the barrier, so I''ve decided to send the power back here first

    This is the very moment that Rimuru sealed Velgrynd with the Heat Break Prison.

    Velgrynd had made this move only because she thought she had room to spare, but the fact that Benimaru and the demoness trio were all present still gave her a sense of crisis.

    That''s Lord Rimuru! We can''t lose either.

    A joyful Shion perked up.

    "He seems to be concentrating on Lord Veldora right now, and there is no doubt that Lord Rimuru will take Lord Veldora back.

    Souei nodded.

    But he had also left a "clone" behind and made sure that Rimuru was safe. This is just how the man, Souei, acts.

    He''s great to be fighting with Lord Velgrynd and Lord Veldora at the same time and still have the upper hand.

    "He really is. To be honest, I didn''t expect him to be this strong.

    "That is to say, my lord is unpredictable.

    The three men, who were familiar with the power of Velgrynd, also spoke with more weight. To be honest, they still find it a little hard to believe.

    "If you fail, you shouldn''t have been fooled by Diablo''s gimmicks.

    "Yeah. That guy knew what wasing and stayed alone to watch the fight, despicable.

    To a demon, meanness can also be a word of praise. Listening to these conversations, Shion on the sidelines secretly made a decision to give Diablo some credit afterwards.

    Souei, who was also watching the battle, was calm.

    Benimaru, on the other hand, is quietly moving out of sighthes taking advantage of Moss'' insightful observation of the fight.

    On the other hand, the imperial power was in great disarray.

    "No way! So strong!

    Emperor Rudra, who had always been calm and collected, and whose emotions were out of ce, could not help but stand up and scream in shock.

    He had also listened to Kondo''s advice before and had given a high opinion of Rimuru, but in the end he still thought Rimuru was less threatening than Veldora and no doubt still despised his opponent.

    I didn''t notice it until now, but it''s just an afterthought.

    Kondo also realizes his own misstep.

    It is not enough to be on guard when one finds one''s attacks ineffective.

    No matter what happens, I will protect His Majesty''s noble body.

    He was speechlessly made aware.

    From the very beginning, Damrada saw Demon Lord Rimuru as a threat.

    This is not out of reason.

    The existence of a cunning figure like Yuuki, who has failed to make use of his poor tactics. This alone is enough to be considered an unced danger.

    On top of that, he sensed a certain alienation in Demon Lord Rimuru.

    Yuuki is the same, and so is Demon Lord Rimuru.

    People with a certain kind of leadership that even Damrada would be fascinated by can make one feel some kind of incredible possibility.

    Damrada and Emperor Rudra had made a pact in the past, and it was not clear whether Damrada himself would be able to keep his promise.

    So Damrada had to entrust his fate to others.

    And the one worthy of being entrusted with it, the one that made him think like that, was the shining duo of Yuuki and Rimuru.

    It is the demon lord, Rimuru, who is now irrational in his rage.

    This fact deeply disturbed Damrada.

    It felt like something was going on.

    As Rudra had said, the Empire''s highest battle force had been assembled in the bridge. Here, without the stature of dim and his men, the situation was such that there were no more reinforcements to be expected.

    Even so, it still didn''t overwhelm Demon Lord Rimuru''s minions.

    The Demon Lord Rimuru was never meant to be an opponent to be taken lightly, and looking at the current situation, it was obvious.

    Damrada did not dare to be careless in the slightest, straining every nerve in order to guard the Emperor in any state of affairs.

    Both Malcolm and the Four Horsemen had be unable to keep their usual minds because of this state of affairs beyond what was expected.

    The power of an Absolute such as Velgrynd, even a strong person like them could not peek into the fullness of their power. Such a powerful Velgrynd, yet she recognized the strength of the demon lord Rimuru, such a situation would only be difficult to make them unmoved.

    At the moment, the two sides were in a state of consternation in twopletely opposite senses, and Velgrynd broke that atmosphere.

    "A showdown? I''d like to take you all down and use it as a bargaining chip to bring Demon Lord Rimuru to his knees, wouldn''t you?

    "Yeah. Let''s prove our strength to me right here!

    "Yes, sir!

    Rudra''s decision washed away the imperial knights'' trembling, his voice resounding and directing the warriors'' state of mind towards tranquility.

    "Well, I promise you victory.

    Velgrynd gave a magnificent smile.

    Behind that beautiful, yet chilling smile, you can see a little bit of the gore of the battle that will unfold next.

    "You guys, you''re okay with that, right?

    "Ahhhh. We have won this battle, and we will end the scourge in the future.

    "Good. Then, hopefully, there will be an enjoyable fight

    With those words, Velgrynd opened her hands to the sky.

    What followed was the "eight-door solid formation. Eight gates appeared in the air, lined up in the middle of each side.

    Before narrowing it down to a door through which only one person could pass, Velgrynd began the instructions.

    "This gship has been isted by the otherworld I have created. If you want to leave, you have to destroy the doorpletely.

    The imperial forces on the field, minus Rudra, had a total of eight people. That is, it will evolve into the form of one man guarding one door.

    "What if the whole crew only went through one door?

    "You''re a bit of a funny guy, you can try, but only the one who kills the guardian once in the gate is eligible to step into the next gate."

    If what was said was true, only one person would be eligible for the challenge after all of them had swarmed into one door, and the choice was too risky to leave without breaking all the doors now, no different from gambling.

    "I see. We''ll have to wait for thest one, too?

    Eloquently put. To challenge the door that I guard, it is only right to do so.

    At Benimaru''s usation, Velgrynd cast a smile.

    It was because she was confident that she would not be defeated even then, that she had prompted the conditions in the first ce.

    "It is only because of the conditions that have been set that this otherworld can be sustained with low consumption. As a result, you will not be able to disengage without breaking down all the doors, and you will not be able to strike at Rudra. Or would you prefer to start a direct melee here?

    It doesn''t matter which way it goes, Velgrynd proimed so.

    The "Eight Gate Solid Formation" was not good for the defenders, as long as they knew the information of the guardians inside the gate, they could formte countermeasures to challenge it. If the two sides go straight into full force to start the melee, it could ripple into Rudra, and wanting to avoid that is what Velgrynd really means.

    More importantly, Velgrynd wanted to imprison Rimuru''s men in the Otherworld, so even if she had to swallow some disadvantages, she still set the battlefield in the Otherworld.

    "All right. I''ll take it.

    Benimaru answered without confusion.

    As long as I don''t get knocked down, this otherworld will not be destroyed. In other words, our victory is unassable.

    Velgrynd had the confidence to win even against the full strength of the opponent, which is why she opted for the most secure strategy of the "Eight-Men Stand-Off".

    Benimaru also took note of Velgrynd''s intentions. However, even if one chooses to refuse here, it''s still inevitable that one will have to fight Velgrynd, and all things considered, one decides to go with the one with the better chance of winning.

    Once a consensus was reached, the showdown was set.

    ***

    Before Benimaru''s eyes, one by one, they disappeared into the door.

    Next thest remaining Velgrynd, and Rudra also walked through the door after hugging each other.

    At this point, the door slowly began to move, enveloping and circling Benimaru around them.

    There''s no way of knowing who''s in there, theres no such thing as a dumbass who''d miss it

    "It''s despicable, so it''s unclear who''s guarding the door.

    Someone else spoke up like that, and it was Shion.

    it''s okay, I remember.

    ''''You idiot, you didn''t even look at it properly, right?Benimaru swallowed the sentence back, feeling that he was slightly able to understand Diablo''s hardship.

    "Hmph, what a delightful afterthought. If you can win, then the honor of fighting me will be given to you."

    Rudra, who was protected due to thews of the otherworld, said this leisurely in his chair.

    Rudra had no doubt that Velgrynd would win, and it was entirely clear from his attitude that he was simply using this fight as entertainment.

    "It''s hard to say? If we start a war, who will be able to figure out what will be of it, we must teach you well, there are some things we cannot back down from.

    Benimaru blurted out the lofty words.

    Next, a sweep of the faces of hispanions.

    This is to consider clearly who should act as an opponent for whom.

    However, some can''t wait for Benimaru''s judgment.

    This person is Shion.

    "I''ve endured and endured. That''s enough.

    "Wait a minute, hello?

    "Lord Rimuru said to kill all the enemies. Don''t worry, just clean them up!"

    Do you really have a problem with this guy? Even if I can''t hold you back, I can''t allow her to act without permission. Although Benimaru thought so, before he had a chance to stop Shion, she burrowed through the door as if she was about to kick it down.

    let it go and leave it at that. I don''t know if it was intentional or coincidental, but it''s like she chose the right opponent.

    The actions of the Shion are easily linked to the best results. Even though there were problems this time, the door that matched Benimaru''s idea was chosen.

    That leaves seven doors left.

    One of these is Velgrynd, where one must go inst.

    It''s time to think about who is the right answer against whom

    "May I have a word?

    The person who uttered the words was Veyron.

    What?"

    Ultima whooshed and exuded a creepy scent, so asked.

    "As a matter of fact, I had a battle with the figure of Malcolm that could not be won or lost. If it were me now, I''d be guaranteed victory.

    Fighting against a beaten opponent couldn''t be more normal.

    Just win and you''re out, so handing it to him isn''t bad. After so judging, Benimaru gave permission.

    "Good. I''ll leave you to it."

    Umokay. Since that''s what Mr. Benimaru said, we have no objection.

    Ultima''s anger subsided, and Veyrons opponent was settled.

    Putting this series of conversations in perspective, the next person to open his mouth was Agera.

    "In that case, I have a request.

    "Is it Agera, what''s the request?

    "In fact, although I don''t think it''s a big deal yet, I have an opponent that I can''t tell the difference between winning and losing. If I may, I''d like to use him as a rival.

    "Who''s that?

    "A man named Kondo. He seems to be from the same school as the old master, and even if you consider him as a swordsman, you can''t underestimate him.

    Really?"

    Agera was so karmic, Benimaru thought so.

    Agera''s genre makes one care a bit, and Hakurou has a hang-up on Agera. Even with that heart of wish fulfillment, there are still problems.

    "Are you confident of winning?

    That''s right, if Agera is going to lose then there''s no use talking about it.

    ording to Benimaru, Lt. Kondo was a tricky man, after all, a figure that Rimuru had been guarded against could be grim for Agera.

    Well

    Agera wanted to stop talking.

    In his opinion, it was an opponent who, as a swordsman, would have no regrets even if he lost the battle. It was, however, an act against Rimuru''s intentions.

    Even Agera herself could understand how capricious the demands she made were.

    A helping hand was extended to Agera.

    "All right, Agera. It''s rare for you to be as capricious as this. I''ll help you out.

    This person is none other than Carrera.

    She, being the lord of Agera, said so with a dignified attitude.

    So Benimaru nodded.

    For Carrera, Benimaru would have stopped asking if she could win.

    "Kondo, even I can''t say if I can win. I won''t tell you not to lose, but you mustn''t die.

    Upon hearing this, Carreraughed aloud.

    "That''s natural. And, by the way. How about a dry test for Agera. By the way, I think it''s better to experiment with the weakest opponent.

    "Aye! Ms. Shion has already left, but it''s pointless if you can''t fight continuously after winning.

    "Exactly. If that was indeed the case, it would have to be for someone with the qualifications to challenge Lord Velgrynd. That being said, Lord Velgrynd is a character with a lot of self-respect, and I don''t think she would lie.

    This possibility Benimaru certainly took it into ount. It had been the intention to wait until Shion returned before trying, and since Agera and the others wanted to try it, there was no reason to stop them.

    "What''s the n?

    "Agera as the starter and Esprit as a supporting counterpart. It''s enough to figure out if killing the enemy in the door is really enough to take on the next challenge.

    "Bring Zonda along with you. He''s good at replying, so he can''t use a strong man as an opponent.

    Zonda definitely didn''t count as an underdog, but it was still a fact that having a Saint-level figure as an opponent was still grim. So Ultima judged that there was no problem even if he couldn''t continue the challenge.

    Not to mention, since it was not possible to travel to the dangerous battlefield, it would not be sufficient to treat those who came out of the door here. Because of this situation, no objections were raised.

    "In that case, Agera, Esprit, Zonda, you three, take this door down.

    The door that Benimaru gave instructions was the one that one of the Four Horsemen had entered.

    The giant man, who carried a gun on his back, referred to Benimaru as a maggot in a very condescending tone.

    As much as Benimaru wanted to burn him to charcoal with his own hands, he nevertheless ceded him to Agera and the others.

    Ill take your orders.

    "Leave it to me, please!

    "I promise you, I will return victorious.

    The three then ran through the gate to battle.

    And just like that, the two-door onught began.

    The rest of the men didn''t panic, waiting for orders on who Benimaru would attack where next.

    "Decide on your opponent before they return from Agera.

    The door, guarded by Velgrynd, was put in the back first.

    Kondo''s opponent is Carrera and Malcolm''s opponent is Veyron, and that''s decided.

    There were two others left, Damrada and one of the Four Horsemen.

    "In my opinion, the man who looks like the leader of the Four Horsemen is the strongest, so let me be his opponent.

    "No objection. I had the same feeling.

    "In that case, the guy named Damrada''s opponent is us. How about this?

    "My opponent has already made up his mind, so I''m okay with that.

    With Damrada and the remaining Four Horsemen, there wasn''t much of a difference in strength between them, so Benimaru was okay with that.

    "Souei, is that okay?

    "Yes. The rest is the Four Horsemen with double swords, I think they''re pretty good with me, no problem.

    "Then, it''s decided.

    After saying that, Benimaru fell into a temporary silence.

    Then, with a look of difficulty, he continued.

    even though it''s alle to this, it''s really troubling.

    "What''s wrong?

    To Souei''s question, Benimaru scratched his cheek and answered.

    "I don''t know what my opponent''s name is because I don''t have a registration number. Who guards which door is remembered and it shouldn''t be a problem.

    "Indeed, a blind spot. It''s all right, never mind. It''s going to be a showdown anyway, and it would be good enough to know the name of the man who killed them.

    After listening to the conversation between Benimaru and Souei, everyone nodded with understanding.

    The name is important to the monsters, but the opponent is just an enemy, so there is no need to care so much, or so the monsters think.

    ***

    Agera, Esperanza, and Zonda walked through the gates in a triumvirate of fighting spirit.

    In front of us was a ce built like a coliseum, where a man was standing in a tight line.

    "Unpleasant, just sending a bunch of soldiers. Since I''m the opponent, I''d say of course.

    After erecting the gun on his back with his right hand, the man let out a vileugh.

    "Before you die, tell you my name. I am sequence five, a member of the Four Horsemen who protect the Imperial Emperor, Lord Garcia! You demons, taste carefully the glory of fighting this master, and then disappear in this world!

    After shouting, Garcia danced the legendary-grade gun that was infinitely close to the mythic level in his hand.

    The power of this gun was so great that even spiritual beings would fall to dust just by touching it.

    However, the Agera crowd had a refreshing look on their faces.

    "Your name doesn''t interest me.

    "What an idiot. How dare he call Benimaru a maggot.

    "If I didn''t know better, I''d be so ashamed I''d faint for three days.

    Don''t talk about being scared, and even go as far as to say long and short things as you like.

    Garcia was enraged.

    "It''s just a bunch of soldiers. Youre good at pissing people off. That I don''t know what I''m talking about? Then I''ll show you what I''m really made of!

    After shouting, he freed the suppressed force.

    Once he became a saint level, the amount of mana was enough to rival an awakened demon lord.

    Although Agera and the rest have evolved, the gap is also several times.

    Entwined with a dense fighting aura all over his body, Garcia took a step forward. Just that alone, the marble floor paved inside the arena had cracked open.

    "Be aware, and regret what you''ve done to me.

    Whether it angered him or not, the action Garcia would take was the same. Everyone sensed it, but none of them spoke up.

    Agera put his hands on the knife hanging from his waist and adopted the tactic of carefully observing the attitude of his opponent. If you are hit by a shot, you will inevitably be seriously injured, so you will have to concentrate on defensive measures.

    Esprit, on the other hand, was using Agera as a shield, preparing for sessive attacks with magic.

    The more Garcia focuses on Agera, the more Esprit will be able to preparerge spells. As long as it''s safe to fight, it''s good to have afortable, restful look.

    Zonda, on the other hand, has been carrying the support through to the end, not only being good at reparative magic, but also assisting Agera in various key positions.

    I wanted to team up with Zonda more than I did with EspritAgera was thinking about it.

    Garcia, on the other hand, was starting tough at the demons'' tactics.

    With such a tactic, it was impossible for Garcia to get hurt.

    So Garcia uttered many words of contempt for the enemy in session with an attitude that felt like he had won.

    "Ha! Cowardice. This kind of talk about a demon sounds very powerful, but really, it cannot be an enemy of us. As the strongest knights of all, we have subdued demons like yourselves several times! To us, it''s nothing more than the same existence as ants!

    He mmed his gun into the ground while talking big, and thanks to him the marble floor was smashed out in a big pit. Of course, neither Agera nor Esprit carried out the evasion unharmed.

    Agera would never impulse even if he were fooled. The battle is just a warm-up scene, and you can''t forget that the best is yet toe.

    Esprit was more thorough, responding to the attack with caution and hiding behind Agera, determined not to take damage. Esprit has a unique skill, the ability to observe. In fact, by using this skill, you can get in touch with each other even if you are separated by time or space.

    While there are restrictions on having to be an acquaintance, the only creature that needs to use this power is Carrera, so there is no problem for Esprit. Rather, if by chance she learned of this power, it was obvious that she would be taken forcibly to spy.

    For Esprit, who hates her job, only this is something that absolutely must be avoided. For this reason, Esprit simply circted information to Carrera as usual while providing appropriate support.

    Incidentally, after finishing a certain amount of support, Zonda fled to a safe area to take refuge. He knew very well that he wasn''t abat type character, and as a responder he had to be careful not to get hurt.

    That''s how it felt, so Garcia thought that Agera''s party was just running around.

    It should be in fear of one''s own power, there''s nothing left to do.

    "Ha! So that''s it? You can''t beat me if you just run around with your head up your ass.

    Garcia cracked his mouth while swinging his gun in session.

    While his speech was both brash and garbled, there was no doubt that he was the real deal.

    The spiritual power that fills the tall body of even the "saints" is considered to be a ss apart.

    As a matter of course, he also had the ultimate ''power of attorney'' granted by Emperor Rudra.

    This power is known as the ''crusade for supremacy'' and can transform the will to defeat the enemy into its own power.

    This power was also mounted on his Gun, and thus transformed into an evil-busting holy gun that could purify all evilevil spirits or spiritual beings like demons.

    Not to mention Garcia''s flesh, which is constantly reinforced in the course of his constant tirades against the enemy. What protected his body was a legendary-grade armor, so he didn''t have to worry at all about the repercussions of his power.

    Garcia had a deep understanding of his own power.

    To provoke the enemy in this way is in no way due to his carelessness.

    As Garcia himself had said, the demon noble was a legendary level super demon that could rival a demon lord. They are threats of the highest order and are by no means opponents who can be underestimated.

    Moreover, Agera had a disinterested look at Garcia''s provocation.

    Contempt for human existence was plentiful among the demon race, and if provoked they would immediatelysh out. This creates a breach and thus a simple knockout, which is Garcia''s rule of thumb.

    This time, however, the move didn''t work.

    Because it was a little tricky, Garcia instead grew anxious.

    "Calm down, human, the wording is too crude. As far as I''m concerned, I don''t consider all humans to be inferior, but there are sses of souls. Remember, no matter what you do, you can''t cover it up.

    Garcia, who was going to pretend to have a rude attitude, was outraged when he was judged to be nasty by his very nature. Instead of realizing it was Agera''s provocation, the disrupted pace revealed his nature.

    Agera still didn''t let his knife out of his sheath, just continued to parry Garcia''s attacks with minimal movement, which further fueled Garcia''s pride.

    Esprit, who was observing from close quarters, marveled at the height of Agera''s strength.

    This guy, is obviously so good at close quartersbat, why bother being a demon. Isn''t it stupid that magic doesn''t work at all?

    So and so, caring about the battle while thinking about something that feels both like apliment and a disparagement.

    Garcia was tempted by Agera to cry out.

    "Shut up! Let me crush you all and offer your heads to the Emperor.

    "Well, that''s a lot of haste to say. I''m a rather sedate type, but you''re also too impatient. Still, not as good as Lord Carrera. I''m sorry to hear that you''re so impatient and simple-minded.

    These words of Agera''s no doubt also made their way through Esprit intact, into Carrera''s ears.

    Esprit''s personality was bad, not telling Agera about this power of her own.

    This guy, he''s gonna get yelled at afterwards, eh heh heh heh

    I''m already having fun like this with nothing to do with myself.

    However, Garcia''s next unconcerned statement caused his expression to gradually solidify.

    "I''m anxious? What idiots you are. Can''t see the strength gap yet? Is the owner of you guys the maiden with thevender hair? Or, was it the blond and arrogant one? That white-haired beauty is a celebrity, but in the end, she''s just a frog in a well.

    Garcia said as he danced the gun around and followed up with an urate stab at Agera. Then, smugly as if boasting of victory, the explosive speech continued.

    "Tell the ignorant that there are real monsters in the world. When you are clear about the strength of Lord Velgrynd, Lord Marshal''s true form, you should be able to understand the meaning of my words.

    And Lt. Kondo is also a very intimidating character. Neither that group of ogre people, nor your group of masters, is a match for these few. After all, they''re just a bunch of ants, and getting killed is what they deserve!

    It was only after hearing this that Esprit finally managed to stop passing the information to Carrera, as it took a bit of work to cut off the skill in a moment of anxiety.

    However, it was toote.

    ***

    "Hahaha, just now, I heard some interesting things through Esprit.

    Carrera happily confided.

    But contrary to the tone, an atmosphere of saber-rattling began to permeate.

    "Huh, what''s that?

    Ultima asked.

    From this atmosphere, she had sensed seven or eight.

    "The enemy in this door called you a brat.

    "Hm, hm, hm

    Chop, chop, chopand Ultima''s forehead bulged with bruises.

    Veyron panicked.

    How nice it would have been if he''d rushed through the door himself if he''d known it was going to happen, he regretted it.

    Sometimes ignorance is a blessing, and he had a deep understanding of it.

    "Testa is said to be a frog at the bottom of the well."

    "Thinking of me as a frog?"

    Testarossa was speechless.

    Her beauty was praised from time to time, but there was never a memory of her being tainted. Being described as a frog is a first-time experience, so the unspeakable anger is raw.

    "By the way, he called us ants.

    Because of the surprise, Benimaru''s eyebrows picked upwards.

    What a joke, it was maggots before, but now it''s ants?

    He mumbled to himself in a not-so-funny tone.

    At first nce it seemed calm, but Benimaru was already thinking that he should take care of things like this himself.

    The only one who is truly calm is Souei.

    "Even in the otherworld created by Lord Velgrynd, the ability to maintainmunication is an interesting one.

    One side sped its arms in silence, and one side was already fixated on Esprit''s skills.

    It was here that the exposure of her skill was shown to Souei, and so Espritter received numerousmissions from Souei afterwardsbut thats another story.

    Carrera continued with her report.

    "They said we couldn''t beat Lord Velgrynd and that guy named Kondo, but they made a fool of us and killed us.

    The reason for the calm narrative is that she has worked hard and hard at dealing with her feelings alone. Carrera loves to incite people and hates being incited by people.

    "You don''t know if you win or lose until you try it yourself.

    Testarossa said these words with an expressionless face.

    In fact, it was true that she hadn''t beaten Velgrynd, but Testarossa wasn''t hard of heart to speak so.

    Those bright red eyes are like words of praise.

    "Then again, Carrera. Although I didn''t get it, why refer to me as a cricket? That guy, he''s super, super awesome?

    "Ahahaha, how can that be? And even if it were true, I would never forgive him.

    To Ultima''s questioning Carrera smiled and gave a negative.

    But there was no smile in her eyes at all.

    Instead, there is a dangerous sheen, which is now as if it is about to explode.

    "No need to be merciful to that guy.

    "It''s nature, you''re a human being, you can''t say that.

    Ultima was enraged.

    For her part, Carrera was in agreement while holding back the desire to mess around.

    "What a pity. I would have made him understand from beginning to end how much he was worth. Tell Agera not to be lenient, and we''ll talk about the pardonter.

    "For sure. We must take our share of the me for the insult.

    There was no one on the scene who could stop their conversation.

    Ultima was naive and cruel.

    Testarossa''s sneer could send terror through the minds of those who saw it.

    And Carrera is optimistic about spreading destruction and nothingness.

    There is not the slightest hint ofpassion.

    Never givingfort to the enemy.

    For them, giving a simple death is mercy, and dying without pain is forgiveness.

    Despite all the killing, it made a difference in their eyes.

    Veyron listened to the conversation of the group of lords and cursed the man who was Agera and the others enemy.

    His superiors, the "demon primordials, are a presence that must not be angered.

    But the guy was talking as if he had a hard-on.

    Veyron held his head tightly in his mind.

    Stupid human, ahhhh. The cost of this folly, hopefully, will be borne by you

    He had to pray so.

    The horror of Ultima is clear to Veyron. And on top of that, Carrera and Testarossa, with whom she is hostile, have horrors that cannot be exhausted without pen and ink.

    The direction in which the angry spearhead is pointing may even change the fate of the world.

    At the very least, please rule out this foolish man quickly; the anger of several adults must be appeased.

    Please, Agera! I can only rely on you!!!

    As a great demon, Veyron could onlyment his inability to do anything here, while pinning his hopes on Agera, who was a level lower.

    What the demons were thinking had nothing to do with Benimaru, who continued to give orders anyway.

    "Carrera, can word from our side reach the inside?

    "Well, I haven''t tried, so I guess I could

    "In that case, send a message to them that they can''t keep saying unpleasant things.

    Carrera nodded.

    Thinking that it would have been better to do so earlier, she intervened forcibly in Esprit''s call letter path.

    "Esprit, can you hear me?

    "Hey, Carrera-sama?

    "You owe me one for this statement. More than this"

    Carrera giggled out of the corner of her eye.

    Then came the resentful order.

    ***

    "Cut that man to pieces, and beat him to death, and so convey it to Agera.

    Carrera''s voice resounded in Esprit''s mind.

    "That''s what Benimaru-sama is asking too, get it straight and don''t fail!

    It''s over, my abilities are exposed in front of the subordinatesEsprit sighed. By the way, themunication was still in a state of forced intervention by Carrera, and there was nothing to be done about that, she had given up, and the boss''s unreasonableness was not something that had just started today.

    It''s not a matter of course, Esprit said to Agera thinking so.

    "Hey, hey Agera. Lord Carrera and the others are pretty angry, aren''t they? If we don''t get rid of him now, we''re in for a bad time.

    "Why would Lord Carrera know about this side? Though there are questions about thatyou just give up. I should be more aware than this, and since we masters have been insulted, we must pay the appropriate retribution.

    "Che, you guys, you''re pretty pissed off, too.

    Noting that the normally steady Agera was also indignant, Esprit sighed.

    There is no stopping it now, so let''s say it''s a good opportunity.

    If Agera shows his true talent and observes it well, it is the right answer.

    However, Garcia, who ignored the atmosphere of the scene, cried out.

    "You guys, weak as shit, give up and die! Don''t worry, your masters will be cleaned up sooner orter, and you''ll certainly be able to serve them like this under the Nine Springs!

    This passage from Garcia, naturally, was also passed on to Carrera through Esprit.

    This time, however, Carrera is not the only one who learns about it, and it seems that the whole team is sharing it through ''Thought Communication''.

    "This bastard is full of shit.

    "What the hell is Agera doing? Didn''t you tell him to kill the bastard? Are you underestimating me?

    "Hey, hey, don''t embarrass me.

    "It''s a lucky thing that Shion isn''t here. If that guy was here, our ns would be in ruins.

    "That''s true. Hey, if it doesn''t work, I''ll do it for you. Hurry up.

    It''s all said and done.

    Indeed, if Shion were still around, it would surely ignore Agera''s demands. But even then, Esprit wouldn''t be forgiving, it would just hurt the dignity of being a demon.

    That said, people''s opinions of themselves are declining.

    Uh-huh, that''s too bad!

    These words are what Esprit really meant.

    Although Garcia''s rude words and actions looked like a handyman, his strength was real and unexpectedly a tricky opponent.

    However, it hase to this, and it has toe to fruition.

    Without taking down Garcia soon, the subordinates'' anger would undoubtedly ripple through to several of them.

    Agera still shows no signs of striking out, just concentrating on avoiding it.

    Agera won''t lose as long as they don''t suffer a fatal injury, but there''s no point in not winning.

    Then it bes necessary for Esprit to use magic to figure things out, but that''s in less realistic terms.

    After various previous attempts, it had been determined that Garcia had a high level of patience for magic.

    "What''s wrong? What''s wrong? Only to run away!

    Garcia is very aggressive.

    Even so, Agera still doesn''t look like he''s going to fight back.

    "Hey, Agera! It''s really not good. If we don''t hurry, Lord Carrera will be so angry!

    Even the demons that followed them were afraid of war under the domineering authority of the master who had be serious. If the anger was directed at themselves, what else could it be but terror?

    The normally elusive Esprit was now really anxious too, but Agera remained silent.

    Incidentally, Zonda stayed quite far away and began to prepare tea, as if intending to entertain the subordinates when he went out, which in Esprit''s opinion was simply nonsense.

    "Hey, Zonda! What are you guys doing when I''m not looking?

    "Just take a look and you''ll see. Master Agera is not injured. He''s really free.

    "Don''t be ridiculous, asshole! Why am I the only one who has to be pressured by your lordships!?

    Esprit shouted against it.

    Zonda replied with a smile on his face.

    "Well, who cares?

    ughter this guyEsprit gritted her teeth in remorse.

    Zonda was only a Viscount, yet he was not at all afraid of the Earl-level Esprit.

    Well, after all, he''s serving Lord Ultima, and I''m afraid he couldn''t have handled it without this nerve.

    Thinking about it, Esprit didn''t think any further.

    Since the Zonda faction isn''t going to be of any use, we''ll just have to let Agera cheer properly.

    Agera was no doubt very angry, he must have had a reason for not attacking, and if it was in search of an opportunity then one can only hope for that.

    At this point, however, Agera said something very unpleasant.

    "I''ll tell you one thing, Esprit, that I understand.

    "What is it?

    "It seems that the power of old age alone is not enough to defeat this man.

    Huh?"

    You can''t be serious, Esprit thought so.

    The fact that she couldn''t winhow could she say such a thing to her boss? Even though she usually joked about it, there was nothing she could do if she really got angry.

    What''s more, she was now watching the battle.

    Before the anger of the superiors burns, one must ask what Agera''s true intentions are.

    "What''s going on?

    "It''s nothing, it''s just a simple thing. This man wrapped aura around his entire body, and not only his attacking power, but also his defensive power was greatly increased. So I have learned one thing, no matter how many times I hit him with my sword, I can''t cut him.

    Combining the effect of the ''Crusade to Overlord'', one of the powers of the ''Power of Substitute'', with the defensive power of the legendary armor, Garcia''s defense had reached a levelparable to that of the mythical level, and Agera, who had seen through this, realized that his sword could not do effective damage.

    Is that why my magic didn''t work, too?

    "Exactly. It''s no big deal what he''s doing, but it''s nothing if he can''t get hurt.

    To Agera''s pertinent opinion, too, Esprit could only frown and nod in agreement. If they couldn''t win, they would have to report to Carrera truthfully, but then the few of them would be disgraced

    Even without being enlightened by Agera, Esprit understood the fact that he was not very skilled in practicalbat by observing Garcia.

    Originally, Esprit''s abilities were not as powerful as the dreaded power, but if they were the Dragon Race, they could break the dreaded power by simply attacking. That''s because, as spiritual beings, they possess the most powerful power of will.

    As for the Esprit line, although they were demon nobles and advanced spiritual beings, their strength of will was still notparable to ultimate skills.

    Without a solution to this reality, even if skill prevails, there is no way to win.

    "Ha-ha-ha-ha-ha! I guess youve finally understood the difference in strength, so youre giving up."

    Garciaughed aloud.

    While the fact that the gun didn''t hit was infuriating, even so it didn''t matter that he was so considered.

    It was Garcia''s job, after all, to slow the enemy down here.

    By the time the enemy was exhausted, victory was within reach. Even if it didn''t wait until then, thepanions guarding the other gates would rush to support them after they had cleaned up the enemy.

    That''s why Garcia was able to enjoy the fight without panicking.

    Looking at Garcia like this, Esprit smacked her lips.

    Next, inquire of Agera in a serious tone.

    "You''re still going to challenge that Kondo guy even though you know about it, right? Isn''t it because there are strategies that can win?

    Hearing this, Agera smiled up.

    "Naturally, there is. Your assistance is indispensable in the secret scheme of the ages.

    Having said that, Esprit has not turned down that option.

    you tell me"

    In fact, including prompting Esprit to utter such an answer was Agera''s ploy.

    The spirited Esprit actually has a cheerful side, too, and Agera would never have said yes if it had been normal to ask her.

    The demoness loves Spring and loves to see the expressions of herpanions crying in trouble, and Agera, who knows this well, chooses to drive Spring into desperate straits.

    That being said, if you offend Lord Carrera, I may have to be purged as well.

    Agera rejoiced at having won the big bet.

    Pass on that secret n before Esprit changes her mood.

    "Turning the power of will into a de to crush the enemy is the only way.

    I''m afraid Agera is noting to Garcia anyway. The man who had intended to aim for the gap in the armor was blocked by aura which covered his entire body.

    Sublimation to mythical defenses is not illusory and canpletely protect the owner.

    Agera was able to overtake Garcia easily if only by the looks of his hands, but Agera still couldn''t deliver an effective attack on Garcia.

    That being the case, Agera would have to rise to that level as well.

    Listen to the sound of the sword and be one with it. If you understand this essence and reach the top of your game

    Concentrating his whole body, Agera gripped his innate sword and listened to the sound of it. So, he came to a conclusion.

    "Huh. It seems our will alone cannot prate that man''s armor.

    "Esprit, trust this old man. Your talent is not as good as that of Carrera-sama, but you have the skills of an expert. Although you don''t like swords, the base is very good, which is why I believe enough to entrust it to you.

    "Huh? What are you talking about?

    "Put your hand on my back and I''ll leave it to you.

    Unable to understand Agera''s meaning, Esprit was momentarily overwhelmed, but Esprit chose to trust Agera anyway.

    Agera stood straight.

    Esprit obeyed Agera''s instructions and put her hand on Agera''s back.

    Garcia called out in a magnificent voice as if mocking the demons.

    "Have you finally given up?" Well, I''ll let you off now. Your owner, Rimuru the Demon Lord, should almost be killed by Lord Velgrynd, too. As an inferior demonic creature of thest resort, I should be satisfied to be able to lead your master to the Yellow Springs Road.

    Huh?

    This statement is in no way permissible.

    "How dare you despise our ruler, Lord Rimuru?

    "And you say it''s almost time to be killed?

    The words, conveyed through Esprit, made the subordinates auras change. Only, Agera and Esprit had pushed the limits of endurance first.

    "All right, you guys. I can hold back and give praise when I''m insulted, but if I continue to be rational now, stop being evil! I''ll kill that guy right now!

    There was no need to wait for Carrera''s order; the two had meant it.

    "Esprit, try to master my power!

    "I don''t know what''s going on, but leave it to me, I''m going to cut that bastard to pieces!

    The two attacked in anger.

    Agera pulls consciousness to its limits tomunicate with the sword, thus awakening a power.

    <<let me="" answer="" your="" wish.="" sharpening="" the="" heart,="" body.="">> He seemed to hear such a beautiful sound, but does not yet know its truth. Only, that power did belong to Agera.</let>

    "I am a de, the immortal de that destroys the enemy!

    As Agera shouted, a gold-colored knife appeared in Esprit''s hand.

    It gave the ''de changethe power that Agera had acquired. The effect, in and simple, is that Agera''s body transforms into a de and attaches the skills he has mastered to the holder of the de.

    But if the owner is already strong, the effect will be immeasurable.

    Esprit drew her knife in a natural, fluid motion.

    The de drawn from its golden sheath glowed with a tinum glow, the eight petals scattered by the residual image as it exited.

    The name of this move is Yahwa Shining, the highest mystic of the "Mizushin Life Stream.

    "Are you dead, you piece of shit?

    "Huh? Huh?

    Garcia didn''t see it, nor could he understand it.

    Just now, what happened?

    The prey, which was only defensively strong, suddenly shed and disappeared.

    Garcia saw Agera suddenly turn into a knife, but had no time to think why, as he had been decapitated before this.

    Garcia is very confident in his defense.

    Because in the face of an ultimate skill, all attacks would be nullified.

    In order to crack this ability, one must have an ultimate skill like Garcia. And the demons in the current battle didn''t make him feel that kind of power, so he was relieved to take the time to push them into a corner.

    But the reality of the situation changed in an instant.

    Garcia''s armor was split as if it were a thin sheet of paper, and his flesh was chopped to pieces.

    In a sh, he was killed without time to think.

    No, there''s still time left for thinking.

    Esprit has a physical "soul" in her hand, which has the appearance of a small carnelian.

    "Well, this guy''s red. It suits him.

    "He just doesn''t know what''s going on.

    Esprit let out a mutter, and Agera, who had turned back into her human form, stared at it with disgust in a spiteful tone.

    "Bastard, where in the sky is there a martial artist who can remain silent when his master is insulted?

    s, it was my task to admonish you, but I didn''t expect you to be emotional because of the words of such a small person

    Esprit''s rare appeasement lifted Agera.

    "Forget it, this is an insult to Lord Rimuru, I can''t help it. Even Lord Carrera allowed it. You don''t mind.

    "Well, let''s just say that''s the way it is.

    In so responding, Agera vowed in her heart to be more refined.

    Esprit looked slightly enviously at the look-alike Agera.

    Just now, indeedAgera has acquired new abilities.

    He thought back.

    I am the one who practiced for the sake of understanding the ultimate meaning of the sword.

    Although not all the memories were restored, the sword''s extreme will, which was once the ultimate pursuit, was once again boarded into Agera''s heart.

    No, it should be said that Agerapletely recreates the sword skills of the time.

    Everything contained in this supreme sword technique of exorcism, the "Mizushin Life Stream.

    Agera, who was once human, believed his soul boarded in the sword.

    Maybe that''s why?

    The former memories were awakened by the transformation of itself into a de.

    That''s when Agera understood, for the first time, why she was in a samurai costume.

    For in the distant past, before this world was reincarnated as a demon, he was a samurai.

    Araki Byakuya, used to be the name of this old man. Well, now that a dead human has suddenly appeared, it only confuses everyone

    Hakurous figure shed through his mind.

    His disciples were well trained and inherited this new school called Mizuru."

    Agera felt that the word heart destiny did not fit with magic, and changed the name, and the memory came to mind.

    Kukuku, getting "named" by Lord Rimuru, isn''t that even the heart''s fate understood? That being the case, there''s no chance for me to appear.

    In this world, he became a family with the great ogre tribe and had a daughter, and when the daughter grew up, she gave birth to a child named Hakurou.

    And in this day and age, there are many people whom Hakurou cultivated and grew up.

    The most important of these existences is the lord of Agera, Rimuru, and the credit for teaching Rimuru belongs, of course, to Hakurou.

    A skill painstakingly researched has been inheriteda matter that makes Agera sincerely happy, except that it would be uninteresting toe out now and steal the limelight.

    Agera thought of this and switched his thoughts for a moment.

    He lost interest in the garbage that had just been killed.

    He turned around and headed to where the lord he now served, Carrera, is.

    ***

    The three demons that emerged from inside the door were greeted warmly by the subordinates.

    "Well done, I''ve got a light on my face, too!

    Carrera pped Agera on the back.

    Agera became as if she was going to die as a result, and that counted for something cute about her.

    "Gentlemen, I have prepared some simple meals.

    Zonda roundly and thoughtfully prepared the table and chairs, made the ck tea and put sandwiches on it.

    This was supposed to be Zonda''s job, but the timing was still well received.

    The introspection session followed, and Esprit handed the carnelian first to Carrera.

    "This is the "soul" of that rude man, and his heart nucleus is sealed in it, and there is still self-awareness!

    "Well done, Esprit! This will allow punishment to the guy who insulted Lord Rimuru.

    "Uh-huh. So, Carrera, can we do this?

    Carrera tossed the carnelian to Ultima, who had interjected.

    "If it''s okay with Benimaru-san, it''s okay with me."

    After saying that, he waited for Benimaru''s decision.

    "As you wish."

    There''s no need to ask.

    Benimaru was not interested in tossing the dead man, in fact, there was nothing he could do about the Spirit, but leave it to the demons.

    Originally, tossing the opponent who had already won was a vition of his principles, but this time Garcia''s statement was intolerable, and Benimaru was really in no mood to stop it. And just like that, the red jade fell into the hands of Ultima.

    "Well, let''s do it! Curse and destroy sin!

    This is the fierce poison refined by Ultima.

    It wasn''t something of a physical nature, it was something horrible that even spirit bodies could destroy and astral phantoms could infest.

    The "spirit" solidified, the red jade couldn''t stand it, and Garcia cried out in pain.

    "Stop it, stop it!

    However, Ultima just smiled happily.

    "Well, well, well, well!

    "By the way, what is that effect?

    Testarossa asked.

    Not that she wasn''t aware of it, but for Garcia to hear.

    "This, ah, will continue to give pain until the power that wraps around the Soul is gone. This guy has a lot of energy and probably can enjoy it for a long time, huh? It''ll be a thousand years or so, and then it''ll be a pure white and beautiful soul.

    Ultima replied cheerfully.

    Garcia could only choke breathlessly.

    Exactly where did he choose wrong, to the point where he was starting to regret it?

    "Yeah, that''s a very good thing. This person has also been given the opportunity to redeem himself and will surely thank us."

    Testarossa said with a smile.

    How can that be?'' thought Benimaru, but this time he wouldn''t help out and acquiesced.

    Under Zonda''s service, everyone took a short break.

    Esprit couldn''t help but wonder if there was any time for that now, but spoke up for a spot.

    "Honestly, I didn''t know what to do when Agera said she couldn''t win.

    It was precisely because the atmosphere was now mild that she wanted to vent.

    Though she had anticipated Agera''s ploy, being used perfectly like this kept the matter in her mind.

    "I didnt think it was impossible to win.

    Agera said back. In fact, he wasn''t sure that he could seed in the battle, but if he did now, it would be a shame if he failed to change his de.

    "But, but, but, at least discuss it beforehand! It''s okay to win, but if you lose, you can''t be held responsible.

    Always hiding in the safety circle, Esprit had really spelled it out for a long time this time, which made her anger towards Agera even greater.

    Ultima smiled and nodded in response.

    "Yeah, well, if you lose, it''s not allowed. It should be said, we won''t allow it. I don''t think you''ll be angry even if you lose, but you can''t die in battle.

    "Exactly. That''s what I thought, that''s why it was monitored through Esprit.

    It looked like Carrera was theissez-faire type, but if they were about to lose, she was going to be the first to rush in.

    From that point of view, what would follow would be the official start of the subordinates offensive, a move that might be considered too much for some, but still necessary just in case.

    Speaking of which, Esprit wondered if she felt uneasy and muttered in a small voice.

    "So, is Shion-sama all right? Our battles are over, but she''s not out yet

    Esprit had thought it should be okay, but suddenly became worried.

    Benimaru replied with a nd face.

    "No problem. She might forget her purpose, but she doesn''t feel like fighting hard."

    Souei agreed.

    "You''re forgetting me. If repeating the same attack doesn''t work, you should think of something else to attack.

    The tone sounded as if it had been seen on the spot, and Esprit was a little taken aback.

    That''s when Testarossa interjected.

    "Isn''t that right? I''ll stay outside to prepare for any unexpected situation that may arise.

    Hearing that, both Carrera and Ultima spurted out tea.

    Huh?"

    "Wait, wait, wait, Testarossa. So, what does that mean? Even if Esprit doesn''t pass on the information, you''ll still have a handle on what''s going on inside?

    "Of course.

    Testarossa finished and smiled deeply at the duo.

    At this point, Carrera called out as if she suddenly sensed something.

    "Are you also watching Lord Rimuru''s battle?

    Ah!"

    At the thought of that possibility, Ultima jumped too.

    "That''s cunning, Testarossa!

    "Really, this is bad! So is Diablo. Why are we all just enjoying ourselves? Shouldn''t we be invited to watch it together at this time?

    Carrera and Ultima were indignant, but Testarossa had a refreshing face.

    Benimaru and Souei were the same, and as people who were tasked with intelligence gathering, they both felt that this was a battle that should never be missed.

    By the way, Shion waspletely unaware of this and was the first to rush through the door.

    If they had let Shion see Rimuru''s fight, she would certainly not have moved until it was over, and it was because he knew that that Benimaru had kept it a secret from Shion.

    In short, it was now necessary to cate the disgruntled demoness trio.

    Benimaru helplessly began to illustrate.

    "As mentioned above, it is very convenient that Moss is in charge of surveince, and has entered every door in order to see what is going on everywhere.

    It worked without a hitch, Benimaru concluded.

    That is, Moss is also still gathering intelligence right now.

    In order to keep the enemy inside unnoticed, Benimaru ordered nothing to be done and resolutely not to move.

    "That''s right. I''ve tried, but I can''t touch the other doors, so I think I''ve defeated the enemy for Agera.

    "Of course, I can''t get in there either.

    Zonda, who had done nothing, didn''t mention it first, and even Esprit didn''t have the right to continue the challenge.

    While it''s not clear how Velgrynd made her judgement, in short, those who went in to challenge, as long as they didn''t directly defeat the enemy, had no way to enter the other doors.

    "As expected."

    "Yeah. Looks like it was the right thing to do in the first ce.

    Benimaru, Souei, and Testarossa nodded at each other in greeting.

    "So, if one of us is in a bitter fight, Testarossa goes to support?

    "Yes, it is. Actually, I don''t think that''s going to happen, and I have other things on my mind, but I''ll be there if anything happens.

    "No needas much as I''d like to say it, it''s Lord Rimuru''s order after all. You have to make sure you win. Don''t be so brave.

    Carrera said undauntedly, and the Benimaru nodded their heads in agreement.

    The next moment, Benimaru turned a pale face and admonished Carrera.

    "Carrera, your opponent must not be careless.

    "That''s natural, but why do you say that?"

    "Only this guy Kondo sensed Moss, and one shot took him out.

    Hey...that not so funny.

    Carrera smiled fearlessly, seemingly more intrigued than she was by fear of her opponent''s might.

    "I don''t think you need to worry about it, but if something happens, call for help through Esprit.

    Testarossa said so, and Carrera held up one hand in response.

    Her attitude made it clear that it wasn''t needed, a rather Carrera-esque move that brought a smile to Testarossa''s face.

    So, the subordinates continued to start attacking the various doors.

    Inside one of the doors, Shion was already fighting, so there were still six doors left.

    The five remaining doors were opened in unison, except for the one guarded by Velgrynd.

    ***

    Shion is fighting alone.

    There was peace outside the door, but now Shion was confronting the enemy fiercely.

    The opponent is Minaza, sixth in "single digits, one of the four knights, and a female knight.

    With a violent gasp, Shion stared indignantly at Minaza.

    "I can''t believe you pushed me to this point. I''ll give you apliment.

    She gathered her strength and shouted loudly.

    This Minaza, too, cannot be said to be unharmed.

    The uniform was torn and the skin was exposed, but it was colorless.

    And rightfully so.

    Because Minaza has long since stopped mimicry and gone back to her original form so she can use it to the fullest.

    "Shut up! I am the one who praises youthat pointless effort! It is the children who can beat me who deserve the praise, and I shall have to repay that hatred!

    At Minaza''s feet were scattered countless corpses of worm-type demonic beasts, all of which had been ughtered by Shion.

    Yes, the higher being of the Worm-type Demon (Insectars)a Worm-type Demon, that was the true face of Minaza.

    "Huh! This level of assorted fish is nothing to me. We have a training ground that produces more powerful individuals inrge numbers, so we''re used to it.

    "What did you say?

    "Hmph, that''s a shame. Don''t look at me like that, I''m also an experienced woman. That is, fighting worm-type demons, it''s not my first time!"

    Although Shion had umted some fatigue, she still had quite a bit of strength left, and she said so in a condescending tone.

    Then, as if remembering something, continued to ramble on.

    She also said it was in full form, I think.

    Hearing this, Minaza''s face changed.

    "Razul? Are you trying to say that it''s you, the one who defeated the Western Patron Saint!?

    Shion grunted and nodded.

    "It''s not a fight, but it was my fight. It was a tough one."

    Hearing this, Minaza muttered, "Really?

    Then dropping her head, she let out augh.

    "Yeah, you got that guy done! That guy betrayed us. We are an invading race from the otherworld, and thanks to His Majesty Rudra epting us, we have a good ce to settle down. And yet, without showing us any respect, he continued to be a hopeless fool.

    Even though Minaza was giving instructions, Shion still didn''t understand anything.

    She just showed a look of what is this guy talking about? and looked at Minaza.

    Only, there was something that Shion cared about, so she took the opportunity to ask.

    Ill ask you one thing, have you sent any of yourpatriots around the world besides Razul?

    Shion cared about Zegion and Apito, who werepanions.

    If they were acquaintances, it might not be good to kill Minaza. With that in mind, just in case, shed ask first.

    "There are many races in the otherworld. Various invading races will attempt to invade the world through the asionally opened "gates of the underworld", such as us, the Worm-type Demon (Insectar) races, the Phantom Beast race, the Demon race, etc. Unlike the demon race, we are semi-spiritual beings, and in this world, it only takes time to be figurative.

    Even if Minaza didn''t answer, Shion didn''t care, but Minaza politely responded anyway.

    The "gates of the underworld", in Minaza''s words, are the "gates of hell" in Diablo''s words, but Shion didn''t expect so much.

    ording to Minaza, there are three major races in the Underworld vying for supremacy. And there is a parallel world where the demon race seems to be in hell.

    The Underworld is a world of extreme poverty and nothing to feed it, which is why they are staring at it with a tiger''s eye.

    In the distant past, they had sent theirpatriots here many times with the intention of expanding their territory, and worm-like magical beasts like the Legion Bees were also one of the invading races.

    "There are, however, some disobedient races that are a little troubled by this.

    The representative of this crowd is the Razul that Shion defeated.

    This showed that Minaza wasn''t irond within their race, but Shion was thinking of something else at the moment.

    Apito and Zegion were adopted by Rimuru while running from someone.

    It can be concluded without question that it''s the enemy!

    Although there wasn''t much evidence, but Shion still judged it that way, she just trusted her intuition, and at a time like this, Shion''s intuition wasn''t missing, she was kinda smug.

    This time, Shion''s intuition was also urate.

    Not by ident.

    Shion had oncee back from the dead, and thus forged a deep connection with Rimuruthe skill of Ciel. Thus Ciel''s arithmetic ability had an effect on Shion, who had correctly found the truth through fragmented intelligence.

    "That means you''re the enemy, right?

    "Hahahaha, what are you saying now? Thanks to you buying time with me, I managed to bring my lovely children back to life again!!!

    Minaza shouted, her lower body beginning to swell. Hidden unseen beneath the skirt of the military uniform, in fact Minaza''s lower body was open with several mouths, from which the ominous egg was born.

    "Ha ha ha ha ha! Look at you holding on strong, long since exhausted from fighting my children. You think you can still beat that amountWaah!

    The smug Minaza suddenly stopped talking.

    That''s for sure.

    With just one sweep of the de, many of the Worm-type Demons were swept away and fell.

    "No, that''s not possible!? My childrenwith the support of His Majesty Rudra, should have shed their bodies to be warriors with overwhelmingly powerful power

    The power of Minaza is simr to that of Apito''s ''queen worship''.

    Its unique skill called "Gluttony Rebirth" can regenerate children countless times by devouring their bodies. Moreover, the time required for the reincarnation is greatly reduced by the strengthening of the ''power of substitution'' that Rudra lent him.

    The many insect-type demons that were born were indeed strong enemies to the Shion, and Minaza was proud of it. One by one, their strength wasparable to that of the upper level demons, and they were even interspersed with fierce fighters that could rival the demon lord race.

    However, however.

    Shion had fought a hard battle before, but they had all been defeated.

    That being the case, there will be no second time.

    In fact, by using the essence of the unique skill of the "Chef", "Optimal Action", the worm-type demons were defeated in an instant.

    Minaza was greatly shocked.

    Even if Minaza doesn''t do it herself, just driving the kids can wear down the opponent. It was a tactic she was most content to excel at, and encountering an oversized presence like Shion had thrown her into turmoil.

    But she was still queen after all.

    No longer repeating the mistake, stood up with a face full of anger.

    "Unforgivable. My children, lend your strength to the mother of the Queen in her position!

    "Funny, I ept your challenge!

    Minaza took the power of the children into his own hands and went into battle form. And Shion was happy to meet it with the "True Gorikimaru".

    And so, the long battle began.

    The one-in-one offensive and defensive y continues.

    Minaza''s attack had caused damage to Shion, but the damage was instantly healed by the unleashing of

    '' Overdrive Regeneration''''.

    And Shion''s attack couldn''t hurt Minaza''s exoskeleton. The exoskeleton, which absorbed the legendary-grade defense and was guarded by an extreme, had reached a level where even the mythical-grade could not inflict damage.

    Minaza''s agility overrode Shion, but Shion was superior in strength. Defense is better with Minaza, and recovery is better with Shion.

    "Damn it, this again. The worm type is so hard it''s a pain in the ass.

    As long as it could cause even the slightest damage to Minaza''s exoskeleton, there was always a way for Shion to use the ''Chef'' next.

    Minaza also desperately resisted never let Shion do it, she did not despise Shion, but Shion was much stronger than expected, honestly now she held a sense of crisis in her heart.

    I can''t believe I can fight with this form of mine back and forth

    The amount of magic is as it appears, but that alone will not get you into a bitter fight. The tricky thing about Shion was that her seemingly disorganized swordsmanship was actually of a fairly high standard.

    Although she wasn''t quite as good as the Benimaru, she had been approved by Master Hakurou.

    That is to say, with the sword skill of Shion already out of the school, coupled with Shion''s stiffness, that furious action was like a nightmare to Minaza.

    However, these were not actually what the Shion intended.

    She was tempted to beat Minaza quickly and advance to the next level, but Minaza was stronger than she thought.

    True to the name, the most superior warrior in the Empire, as Lord Rimuru said, is an opponent who cannot be careless I didn''t think of that until now.

    Shion doesn''t generally think too deeply about breakthroughs until it gets to this point.

    It''s a temporary thing to do, but it''s always good to be aware of the use of your mind at this point.

    That being said, you don''t get inspired just by using a little bit of your mind. Though uninspired, Shion has Ciel''s help.

    <<you have="" the="" power,="" and="" it="" took="" a="" while="" to="" pick="" most="" suitable="" race="" out="" of="" all="" possibilities,="" now="" it''s="" decided.="" what''s="" right="" for="" you="">> Hearing this, Shion remembered.</you>

    As Rimuru awarded the prize, Shion seemed to be asked a lot of questions, but she didn''t think deeply about it. Remember at the time the answer was all to you and nothing has changed since then.

    The otherpanions evolved, and Shion didn''t care.

    Benimaru has evolved from a demon to an "Inferno Oni" and is said to have acquired the power of a demigod.

    By contrast, Shion was still mortal now.

    Still, she didn''t care, because it was strong enough.

    However, that alone cannot defeat Minaza.

    Inevitably, Shion would seek power as a result, and in response to her expectations, the "Soul Corridor"

    was connected.

    <<i think="" "the="" tyrant"="" is="" good.="" as="" a="" higher="" holy="" spirit,="" it="" unparalleled="" in="" its="" material="" power.="" next="" the="" validation="" of=""petency="">> ''Over to youShion dryly threw it all over, focusing her attention on Minaza.</i><i think="" "the="" tyrant"="" is="" good.="" as="" a="" higher="" holy="" spirit,="" it="" unparalleled="" in="" its="" material="" power.="" next="" the="" validation="" of=""petency="">

    Although Shion''s attitude was cold, somehow she felt that voice had an air of delight. It may have been Shion''s illusion, but reality did change.

    "What, what, you bastard! The strong demonic aura that eruptedAre you still trying to say that you''ve been merciful so far?"

    The spirit overrides the flesh.

    Thus, responding to the heartfelt request of the Shion promoted the awakening of the race. The possibility of evolution is managed through the hands of the Ciel, and the choice made is the most appropriate one.

    Shion evolves to the rare and powerful overlord of the Divine Monster Spirit, the "Fighting Spirit Oni".

    The flesh achieves ''infinite regeneration'', and as long as there is mana, it is eternal and indestructible.

    The attacks emitted by its flesh can cause not only physical damage but also damage to the spiritual side.

    Being a spiritual being with no weakness attribute, while having superiority over all attributes.

    Shion evolved into what can be called a spiritual lifeform''s heavenly enemy-like existence.

    This evolution, reshaped Shion''s flesh.

    In order to be more specialized inbat, an optimized body was formed.

    Shion basicallyprehended this on instinct.

    As if stretching out under a clear blue sky, the mood was soothing.

    The New Gorikimaru", a sword held in Shions hands, was erected.

    "Did I keep you waiting? However, the time for fighting you is over.

    In a polite tone, Shion hitched a conversation with Minaza.

    "Don''t underestimate people! Just as you hide your strength, I will also show my true form!

    As the saying goes, Minaza''s form became more alien, even cutting life spans and bing more aggressive to confront Shion.

    Then the battle began

    "Die in pain, O you who want to take our ce in peace! Come out, Emergents! I will feed myself and instinctively turn my enemies"

    "The world is alive and kicking!

    The winner is decided in a sh.

    Minaza, intent on a final attack of the Evil Forbidden, was shattered by Shion''s sword before she could show her full form.

    In front of the beaten pieces of flesh, Shion dered.

    "Not only is it annoying, but it''s full of crap.

    Whatwhat the hell is going on?

    Among the shredded meat was a Minaza head that was more than half missing.

    The inescapable death had closed in on Minaza, but she was shaken by her inability to ept reality.

    Shion looked down coldly at Minaza and asked.

    "Do you need to make a mistake?

    For Minaza, Shion was really the worst opponent.

    Before evolving into a "spirit fighter", it was only due to the presence or absence of an ultimate skill that the fighters were able topete. From this point on, it''s enough to say that Minaza won''t have a chance of winning.

    After the evolution of Shion, her power of will had already reached the realm of an ultimate skill. The Otachi sword used by her has also evolved to the mythical level, which should be called Great Gorikimaru".

    The situation would be different if Minaza''s strength wasn''t borrowed, with the current Shion as an opponent she still couldn''t do it.

    "Goo, hano, it can''t betoo, too strong. But, however, my children, will you, you

    The eyes were out of sight, but Minaza said so anyway.

    However, her hopes had been shattered, and the heaven and earth of Shion hade alive, decapitating everything that was alive.

    "If only it were that way.

    The words of Shion containpassion.

    you are too gentle. If youre that naivethere is no way to defeat the Worm King

    Minaza''s mana was thus exhausted.

    The end of life determined the victory of the Shion.

    "...Worm King?

    Minaza leaves this word with a very important meaning.

    However, Shion did not care at all.

    "Whatever, it''s none of my business!

    Just like that, the boundaries were crisply drawn and did not remain in Shion''s memory.

    Minaza, the invader from the otherworld, died tragically with her children.

    The queen who had been granted refuge by Emperor Rudra and wanted to build a paradise for the Worm Demon n disappeared from the world on the eve of her ambition being achieved.

    *** Among the seven Demon Nobles, Veyron was the second strongest ranking, with the rank of Duke, and hadsted undefeated for over four thousand years.

    Even so, Malcolm, who could not imitate the figure of a martial artist in front of him, could only feel the humiliation of lying on the ground.

    Malcolm''s unique skill, the "disguiser", mimics Kondo''s stance and can correctly operate the "proxy rights". Turning Kondo''s body into his own, there was not the slightest bit of waste.

    Veyron is strong, but it''s still Malcolm who''s better. It is precisely because of Veyrons high skill that he is able to do more than just bend the knee.

    As a demon, hisbat abilities were simply invincible. It was a horrible reality, but Veyron was undaunted. Not only that, but the heart is enjoying the situation as it is.

    That''s for sure.

    Since boasting about being able to win in front of Master Ultima and the subordinates was a must for victory to be achieved.

    "O demon, is the name Veyron? Your fight ismendable, but no matter how many times you try again it is futile. I''ve seen through you. I''m good enough for you now.

    "Maybe so. I didn''t show any real talent, but my assessment is correct.

    What?"

    Malcolm tried to persuade him to surrender, showing a surprised look when he saw Veyrons reaction.

    In Malcolm''s opinion, the gap of strength between himself and Veyron was like heaven and earth, and Kondo''s strength was overwhelming, only now it was Malcolm''s own.

    It was for this reason that Veyron''s statement made him angry.

    As a demon noble, Veyron had less than a quarter the amount of mana, which had previously seemed a bit tricky because it wasn''t one-on-one, but now it was just Veyron alone, and since there was no one in the way, it was overwhelmingly beneficial to Malcolm.

    Despite this, Veyron stood up and snorted.

    "You can''t win with imitation, because I''m good at imitation too.

    "Huh? What do you mean?

    "A fake is not as good as the real one. Do you understand that''s the truth?"

    "What are you trying to say?

    Malcolm was anxious.

    Veyron smiled darkly in his heart and said, it would have been better if he hadn''t had a question and answer session and just killed him.

    "I''ll tell you what. What I think is my best work, its

    Veyron shouted unleashing his newly acquired powers.

    ...........

    ........

    ...

    Veyron is Ultima''s butler.

    He served around the clock, taking care of all matters pertaining to Ultima, and anything his master requested must be taken care of.

    The specialized field of cooking was given to Zonda, but everything else was under the jurisdiction of Veyron.

    What Veyron has created in this environment is the unique skill ''Imitation Master'', a convenient power that can change into anyone.

    By unleashing this imitator,'' Veyron would be able to incarnate into the figure he had seen.

    It was indeed an ability simr to Malcolm''s ''''Disguiser'''', but with much higher precision than

    '' Disguiser''''.

    However, Malcolm was strengthened by the power of Emperor Rudra. Considering that aspect, Veyron should have no chance of winning, the matter goes without saying.

    The character that Veyron is trying to emte is more powerful than the Kondo that Malcolm is emting.

    It was only that Malcolm was able to reproduce very little of Kondo''s strength, and was unable to reproduce creatures that were too powerful, as would be expected from Veyron who had the same ability.

    So what Veyron chose was a supernatural being that even his master was enthralled by, and he wanted to imitate Demon Lord Rimuru and turn one end of his power into his own.

    At this point, however, Veyron heard voices.

    <<it is="" impossible="" to="" give="" permission="" in="" this="" matter;="" exchange,="" ill="" you="" strength.="">> It''s a usible thing with the "voice of the world".</it>

    Veyron was at first at a loss for words, but became grateful while understanding the implications.

    I, even such as I am, am guarded by that love!

    Like a prayer to God, Veyron offered thoughts of thanksgiving.

    And so it was that Veyron found that his skills had evolved.

    Even mimicry, as long as it moves the person, bes art, and as is the case with proving the phrase, power does move the person in power.

    The voice gifted the ''True Fake Writer''it was because of this skill that Veyron was sure to win over Malcolm.

    ...........

    ........

    ...

    Appearing in front of Malcolm was the young martial artist with a sharp eye.

    who? No, it doesn''t matter who it is. I''ve never seen a stronger swordsman than Kondo, and it''s your freedom to imitate whoever you are, and even then you still have no chance of winning.

    The young martial artist that Veyron imitated looked very simr to Agera. But that was par for the course, because that was what Araki Byakuya looked like when he was young.

    This result is exactly the height of imitation that Veyron has achieved.

    Veyron thought to himself.

    The real fakes are writers who are able to copy the works of the artist at his peak.

    It was in response to Ultima''s request that Veyron exhausted all areas of artistic study, and it was for this reason that he came up with the idea.

    Even if the character is not actually encountered, the ability to reproduce his peak performance by relying on the "real and fake writer" is really a power of foul y.

    Even further, Veyron liberated himself.

    His master, Ultima, had achieved evolution with the power given by Rimuru, and under the influence of his bounty, Veyron''s power had also been enhanced, and Veyron''s current amount of mana could even match that of an awakened demon lord.

    "What? What!? It''s like you''re a different person than you were!

    Malcolm was startled.

    Ignoring Malcolm''s mood, Veyron solidified a sword in his hand, an ability unique to demons ''''Material Creation''''.

    Although in the end it is only a fake copy of Agera''s "de Change", this is already something that has the effect of giving the "real fake writer" an extra special gift, and is infinitely closer to the performance of the real thing.

    Veyron nced at Malcolm and spoke.

    "Yes, Kondo is a man to be reckoned with, but"

    just, what are you trying to say?

    "Lord Carrera has gone off to fight, and I think his fate will soone to an end.

    "Ha ha ha, what a stupid thing to say!

    Malcolm scoffed.

    Malcolm could not have imagined Kondo''s defeat at all.

    The two red at each other.

    Since the two sides'' ims are ipatible, it''s only a matter of strength after that.

    Both sides began to move at the same time.

    "Plum blossoms"

    "True Fake Transcends Wonderful Technique - Yatsujirakura - Yahashimoto"

    At this moment, the fake bes the real thing.

    The eight sword shes released by Veyron bounced off five sword paths, the remaining three sword shes sliced off Malcolm''s arms, and thest sh of the de came to rest just above Malcolm''s neck.

    "Ah, ah, ah, ah"

    Because of the sharp pain brought on by both arms, Malcolm lifted the change.

    Even if he wanted to stop the bleeding, there was nothing he could do about it, having already lost both arms.

    "I''m not gonna kill you."

    "Geh, you want to take me hostage?"

    "No, how can that be?

    Veyron also lifted the change, snickering slyly.

    "I''m Miss Ultima''s housekeeper. I''ll do anything to make her happy.

    It wasn''t a reply that could be counted as an answer, and it gave Malcolm a feeling of boundless terror.

    "What do you want to do to me?

    Malcolm couldn''t resist asking, a reaction that no doubt indicated that he had fallenpletely into Veyron''s strategy.

    Veyron replied.

    "Missy is a very cruel person, and loves nothing more than the feelings that the adversary fills with out of pain, and usually does not kill the opponent directly, but lets his body decay little by little. I was in the position of advising you, but that''s all!

    Don''t want to hear itMalcolm thought to himself.

    But Veyron is relentless.

    "I like it best, my son, to see a strong man begging for mercy in a miserable and pathetic way, and to feel a joy unmatched by anything else!

    So, Malcolm is the most brilliant toy of all, and Veyron''s words dere it.

    "Stop, stop. I surrender, or I swear I will not resist in the future, so"

    Malcolm had begun to beg, and no one could me him for such behavior, and he, who had been at a loss as to what the defeat would be, became vulnerable when he fell into a defensive position.

    Malcolm was indeed powerful, but his spirit had not been sufficiently exercised, only given borrowed ultimate strength and not by his own pursuit of the limits. The demon among demons, Veyron, is very good at inspiring fear in his enemies.

    "Woo-hoo, sorry! Don''t worry about it, I''ll say no.

    Why?"

    "Because, the Empire''s policy is the same, right? I agree with your way of thinking.

    Hey"

    "Isn''t it wonderful that as soon as a war is waged, you never approve of the surrender of the other side!

    The weak, from the beginning, should be fully obeyed and wait to lose beforeing to the bargaining table, it''s too humiliating to do. It''s a very resonant way of thinking.

    Thatthat is"

    "Am I right? What you have been doing all along, how can you say no when it''s your turn, so"

    Veyron sneered obscenely, a crooked expression that made his ears look like they were about to crack, precisely because he was usually a gentlemanly butler, and now this smile looked even more obnoxious, tearing at the other''s heart like a sharp w.

    "Take responsibility, boy. Then, provide pleasure for Miss Ultima.

    Veyron showed his true nature.

    Very much in keeping with the identity of the First Dependents of Ultima, both cruel and sadistic, unrelenting, this is Veyron.

    "Help, helphelp me, Lieutenant Kondo!

    Malcolms cries for help couldn''t get through to Kondo.

    "Oooh, well, that''s aforting cry, but it''s likely to cause trouble for everyone else, so I''ll have to quiet you down first.

    With that said, Veyron rambunctiously plucked out Malcolm''s tongue.

    "Oooh! Oooh! Oooh! Whoo-hoo-hoo-hoo-hoo!"

    Malcolm''s dissonant voice echoed in this otherworldly separation from the present world.

    As for the fate of Malcolm afterwards

    ***

    Souei was in a good mood right now.

    He secretly watched Rimuru''s battle, and now Rimuru had secured a big victory.

    I''m lucky to be able to watch a battle like this.

    Rimuru, with both Veldora and Velgrynd as opponents, looks to still be at an advantage, and alsopletes the evolution by devouring Veldora.

    On top of that, not minding the onught that those clones werepletely unable to counter, they managed to overwhelm Velgrynd.

    It''s impossible to tell from the outside just how strong Rimuru has be, and even if you go through the "Soul Corridor, Souei realizes it is stillpletely imperceptible.

    There should be more to the curiosity in this regard than just the desire of Souei alone.

    At least, Diablo had taken little action until the end, and was now undoubtedly staying by Rimuru''s side.

    The bastard was always sneaking awayin spite of the thought in his heart, Diablo made a im that was again understandable and impossible toin about publicly.

    To put it mildly, there''s Testarossa.

    Although she ndly dered to stay, considering the implications, Souei felt mixed emotions.

    Because of understanding her thoughts, Souei didn''t object.

    Sensing the unfavorable situation on his side, Velgrynd shifted to a guarded Rudra-dominated move from the middle of the battle with Rimuru, and the other seven gates had no guarantee they wouldn''t be broken.

    It''s unlikely that the cunning Testarossa didn''t decipher the possibility without pointing it out, which would suggest that she thought she could do something on her own, though I don''t think she could have won over Lord Velgrynd, but that''s a remarkable amount of confidence.

    Souei correctly read Testarossa''s mind.

    Testarossa guessed that she wanted to challenge Velgrynd again, she wanted to challenge an opponent that Souei couldn''t beat, so Souei developed jealousy, a small thing Souei hoped the others would understand.

    Souei thought.

    Benimaru also understood Testarossa''s thoughts and approved of her actions.

    To ask why, its because Benimaru can''t beat Velgrynd either.

    Benimaru, who was good at Fire Inmmation, was basically useless when facing Velgrynd, who could be called the Fire Inmmation God, and the attack might not even be able to buy time, but it was Testarossa who was more suitable for this task.

    If Souei was to have Velgrynd as his opponent, he would not be able to survive for even a few seconds, and if he were to face Velgrynd, who was able to dominate space, all of Soueis skills would be useless.

    Knowing that, it wasn''t really fun for Souei, and even if it wasn''t, he had to endorse Testarossa.

    Just like that, Souei, who was in a good mood because of Rimuru''s victory and was discontented because of his ownck of strength, was really engaged in his work with aplicated mood.

    Rimurus order to kill the enemy was absolute, and as for obeying that order, Souei would not be confused, originally Souei felt that it was only natural to eliminate the enemy.

    I must hurry up and get back to Lord Rimuru.

    His loyalty to Rimuru became higher, and Souei obeyed his own high spirited heart and burrowed into the door.

    He has captured the opponent''s aura.

    Without hesitation, Souei ran directly towards the enemy.

    Regardless of which door it was, the interior was mimicked into a diatorial arena.

    In the middle of that, the target object stood.

    "Yoo-hoo, are you my match?

    The man there, smiling triumphantly, is Gardner in the fourth sequence of the "single digits.

    "It''s rare that you''re here, at least introduce yourself. My name is Gardner, and I assume the guardianship of His Majesty Rudra, which should be short-lived, so let me have a good time in the meantime.

    Gardner looked at Souei like a valuation, wondering in his mind how to torment his opponent, his hidden sadistic interest making him dumbfounded.

    In contrast, Souei was speechless.

    Ah no, slightly emptied of time, he sighed.

    "Is it going to take all my precious time to take care of a guy like you?

    Souei spoke in displeasure, something Gardner could hear very well.

    what did you say?

    "My name is Souei, and I will ept it if you surrender, but you don''t mean it, do you?

    "Of course!

    Gardner was agitated by Souei''s attitude and had fallen into Souei''s trap before he could even begin to fight, before he himself was conscious.

    "Souei? I''ve heard that ording to Kondo-san''s research, you''re doing something like imitating the Intelligence Bureau in the Land of Monsters, right? In other words, not actually good at directbat!

    Of course, it wasn''t because Kondo''s investigation was lukewarm, but because Gardner had a certain level of knowledge of Soueis strength, and on that basis hadunched the provocation.

    Originally, he thought he could win by not doing this kind of thing, but he still thought that if he could lose his cool because of it, he could still earn it.

    Such a shallow tactic had lost its meaning when it was provoked by Souei.

    "Imbecile, don''t talk nonsense, let''s get started.

    In just this short time, Souei had already seen Gardner''s strength, and Gardner hadn''t noticed it and was still recklessly shing towards Souei.

    Gardner''s weapon was a green dragon de held in both hands, a thicker,rger de than a long de, difficult to master but powerful, that smooth continuous attack was as wonderful as a dance.

    Powerful and sharp,bined with Gardner''s superior skills, only these attacks still didn''t work against Souei.

    With a grunt, Souei dived into the shadows, and Gardner''s Green Dragon de shed open, as the inertial body bnce was a bit unstable.

    Souei didn''t let that go, and a shot from the shadow at Gardner''s feet flew into the chest of its prey.

    Gah!?"

    Spitting blood to the ground for Gardner.

    Souei who emerged from the shadow after stabbing the fatal blow was holding a Walter P99 miniature pistol, a test piece that Rimuru had had Kaijin make, which Souei had surreptitiously scavenged and had practiced firing from shadow space, the result of which was a blow through Gardner''s heart.

    "Well, that''s boring.

    No matter what kind of strongman,unching an attack in a moment of his carelessness could end his opponent with a single blowSouei who insisted on this kind of im still knew that in the face of some opponents, this move really wouldn''t work.

    But Gardner didn''t seem to fall into that category, and the strategy worked when it was brilliant.

    The gunshot just now added all the effects of Soueis skills, including the unique skills of ''Super eleration'' and ''One Hit Kill'', plus poison, paralysis, and corrosion effects.

    The projectile''s initial velocity had reached dozens of times the speed of sound through hyper-eleration, and it had also been given the power of a ''one-hit kill'', which could be achieved even by destroying the spiritual body.

    And with all kinds of anomalies attached, Gardner was bound to die, and even if it wasn''t Souei, the others would surely make that judgment.

    But

    "Idiot, you''re careless!

    Behind Souei who was walking towards the gate, the sound resounded, and before the sound could be heard, Soueis had been chopped off, and now the Green Dragon de had drilled out from its chest.

    "Well, that''s a pain in the ass. It''s okay to kill a trickster like that, but it''s not fun enough to win in a sh.

    It was Gardner, who should have been dead, who said this.

    The body still fell to the ground, but Gardner stood there with his hands and feet intact, and that was because of some special ability Gardner had been given.

    The ''power of substitution''parallel existenceis the power that Rudra lent to Gardner.

    Unlike Velgrynd, who had a huge amount of mana, Gardner was only average as a "saint", and although he could rival an awakened demon lord, he could not separate several "other bodies" in a row.

    He could only spare one, but that was enough.

    No matter what kind of cunning opponent it was, as long as the one in front of them was a real body, it was impossible to see through the true and false, using this to lure the opponent into carelessness, allowing one of them to act as bait, and then the main body to make a strong attack, was what Gardner had done.

    While a must-win was assured, it would have left Gardner unable to feel satisfied.

    For, Gardner likes to torment opponents who beg for mercy, and fighting in a manner like this can result in the opponent being killed outright without a chance to beg for mercy.

    "Hey, are you still alive? Hey, that''s impossible."

    Despite the grumbling, Gardner hadn''t forgotten his mission to make sure he actually killed the intruder, so he had to check if Souei was actually dead.

    At this time, an icy voice came from Gardner''s ear.

    Decapitated, the heart was pierced by Souei, and the body dissipated into a ck fog and disappeared.

    "Oh, no!

    Gardner let out a yelp, but it was toote.

    If he hadn''t lost my cool before, he might have realized that it was a "body split," but that''s just an "if,"

    and it''s pointless to say anything afterwards.

    Gardner''s takedown attempt leads directly to the result.

    "It''s enough to be bait. The power is too much for you to waste.

    Souei''s cold voice echoed.

    Souei''s usation hit the spot and stung Gardner inside.

    In fact, Gardner had met Velgrynd once.

    Upon bing a "saint", he learned that the "marshal" was a beautiful woman, and he had the pleasure of challenging her, only to have Velgrynd, elegantly seated in her seat, look at his "other body" with amusement and beat him to death.

    From then on, what he longed for most, what his heart longed for most, was the power of Velgrynd, the Green Dragon de that Gardner loved to use and that Velgrynd had given him.

    Souei saw through it all.

    Gardner was just dancing on the palm of Souei''s hand from the beginning.

    "Son of a!"

    Gardner shouted.

    In such an absolute state of affairs, a shaking within arises.

    If one had doubts about one''s own abilities, if it was a probe power, then one would be affected to a certain extent, this kind of opportunity, it was impossible for Souei not to seize.

    "Understood, then you die!

    After saying that, Souei unleashed his unique skill ''The Hidden One''.

    That''s when Gardner makes his final killer move.

    "Uh-oh-oh-oh-oh-oh! How about this, how about this? Either one is my own body, and though I will die, I will pull you along with me.

    The plurality of ''other bodies'' attacked together, each one being its own body, and it was pointless to take down only one of them.

    Gardner made the Parallel Existence''s ultimate attack by burning life.

    It was only something that could be done in a split second, so it was difficult for Souei, who was preparing tounch a fatal blow with the ''''Hidden One,'''' to evade.

    The biggest weakness of Soueis Split Body was the inability to unleash unique skills other than the main body, and even Souei, who could manipte multiple Split Bodies at the same time, could not ovee this difficulty.

    This is the difference between ''separate bodies'' and ''other bodies''.

    If you are close enough to the main body, you will think that you can activate the skill even if you have a split body, but this will create a time difference, and you will be broken if you are facing a stronger opponent than yourself.

    Geh!!!"

    Souei thought carelessly.

    The moment of thest blow was the most dangerous moment, and it wasmon sense to stay awake and never be careless, but to understand this and still be in crisis was a disgrace to Souei.

    Forgive me, Lord Rimuru! I will live and the atonement will stay after

    Souei prepared himself for Gardner''s final attack, and since death was not to be tolerated, it had to be survived.

    But at this point

    <></atone>

    Souei felt as if he had heard something incredible.

    This, this voice is

    It was understood in an instant.

    As for the sound, absolutely no attempt should be made to track it down.

    It was a dereliction of duty on the part of a person in charge of the intelligence department, but Souei made a judgment immediately.

    <<so be="" it="" so,="" that="" the="" name="" of="" power="" given="" to="" you="" may="">> As if born with the power, Souei understood what this power was, and at the same time, in a million times longer consciousness, he realized that his ''clone body'' had changed into an ''other body''.</so>

    This also means that Souei has also acquired ''parallel existence.

    "Ha ha ha ha ha! I''m going to die too, but this guy''s finished too, he deserves it"

    "Is that the end of yourst words?

    Howhow is that possible? There was no doubt that you were the one who"

    "That''s right, but what''s over here is my own body, so die if you understand.

    "Son of a!"

    This time, Gardner literally had nothing left.

    A Thousand Hands.

    Souei stretched forward and became a thousand wrists that caught Gardner.

    This was the effect of one of the powers of the Shadow Moon King Tsukuyomi, which was just given to Souei.

    If you use this with "Parallel Existence, you can use the shadow that creates the plural wrist to attack.

    Gardner, his body restrained, cried out in pain.

    "Go ahead, you people, you''ll be killed by Lord Velgrynd and Lord Graneet anyway"

    Words cannot be finished.

    Souei ended Gardner''s life with One-Hit Kill.

    "Lord Velgrynd has been defeated by Lord Rimuru, and that Graneet, Benimaru who is better than me, has gone to him, I''m afraid, as I amah, it''s no longer any of your business.

    Souei left these words, allowing Gardner to be swallowed up by the shadow and fade away.

    </i>

 Volume 15 - Ch 5

    Damrada is inside one of the eight gates.

    Thinking about why things are the way they are.

    ...........

    ........

    ...

    The status quo is dire.

    Yuuki fell into the hands of Emperor Rudra, and hispanions were simrly deprived of their freedom. Since Rudra ordered them to be taken care of, the position of Damrada could not be defied.

    Now, from Rudra came other orders.

    After handing over the responsibility of taking care of Yuuki to someone else, he boarded the Emperor''s gship.

    And then the air showdown began.

    The real "Marshal" is Velgrynd, and only the first six people in the sequence are informed of this.

    It cannot be outsourced.

    This is an absolute order, and for Damrada, who is often required to leave the country, such important secrets even require a memory operation.

    Yes, I made a pact with the lord, thats

    Seeing the gesture that "Marshal" Velgrynd had changed into, Damrada remembered the incident. In the meantime, all sorts of memories have clearly revived.

    The most important pact with Rudra is still remembered, but the reason for making it cannot be remembered.

    So, what to do?

    There''s no time to fret.

    The Demon Lord Rimuru, seen not too long ago, seemed so kind that he didn''t feel like much of a threat. He had thought that after Rimuru had been captured by the foreign space created by Velgrynd, he should have been unable to hinder Veldora''s capture battle.

    Indeed, sess dominated Veldora, and the situation thus began to turn in Rudra''s favor.

    But none of those things mattered to Damrada.

    Not only that, but for Rudra as well

    Thoughts began to clear up like clouds turning to light, and Damrada pondered what would be best for Rudra.

    However, before he coulde up with an answer, Demon Lord Rimuru made his move.

    With a fury like never seen before.

    Why would one think he wouldn''t pose a threat? Damrada simply wanted to question himself.

    Judging by the fact of breaking free of the seal of Velgrynd, there was no doubt that it was fraught with threats.

    But there is more to it than that.

    From the moment he saw Rimuru appear, Damrada realized that he was still too naive in his opinion.

    Rimuru nced at Damrada with his eyes that glittered with golden light, a look that was unmistakably cold, almost as if there was no need to see Damrada and others as enemies.

    Kondo responded immediately, but the attack didn''t work.

    Is that all? Then there would be no need for vignce at all. Put off the treatment of you, fear not, and don''t be killed before I am your opponent

    Rimuru''s eyes looked like they were talking.

    Could it be that to Rimuru, Damrada and the others have been treated as if they were dead? Even Emperor Rudra was no exception, and Damrada couldn''t help but feel that everyone would be killed if this continued.

    What are the conditions for tactical victory in these situations for Rimuru?

    The needs to meet both of these conditions.

    I. Reiming Veldora.

    II. Elimination of the aggressor.

    Veldora is an ally of Demon Lord Rimuru, and taking away the free will to be Veldora is something that Rimuru would never approve of.

    Havinge to this ce means having made the consciousness of having Velgrynd as an opponent.

    The direction of this win is an unknown in Damrada''s eyes.

    An unattainable pinnacle matchup is not something that Damrada can extrapte.

    Next, it was about eliminating the invaders.

    He had heard that Rimuru was a pacifist, but must not mistake that for non-resistanceism. The few invasions that have urred in the past have all been repelled.

    It''s not a very good technique.

    With the assistance of Veldora, the Land of Monsters won back-to-back battles.

    The Empire''s aggression was something that Rimuru would never tolerate.

    The time for bargaining is over, and it is conceivable that the only remaining recourse is to massacre all the Imperial soldiers.

    At this point, there is no point in talking about strategic strategy, only fighting to thest option.

    There was no wartime agreement between the two, and even surrender was no guarantee that they would be spared.

    The empire had set a trap, and had lost its credibility, and all the windows of negotiation had been closed.

    I should have been more serious about stopping His Majesty.

    Damrada was equally proud of the Empire''s war power.

    Excessive faith in one''s own strength, thinking that one will not encounter defeat, can arbitrarily determine the terms of victory.

    Show the enemy the majesty of the empire, defeat the enemypletely, lose the will to rebel before annexing it. Make a big blood change in the leadership, or turn the current leadership into puppets who can do whatever they want as long as they win the war. The Empire has always expanded in this way, but this time there was a major miscalction.

    Even Emperor Rudra could not guarantee that there would be no problems if the forces of the evenly matched opponents shed with each other.

    It was only natural that Damrada would feel mncholy.

    That said, what really bothers Damrada is still about his own pact with Rudra.

    Rimuru no doubt intends to kill Rudra.

    What bothers Damrada is how he should act if things turn out that way.

    For Damrada, there was a desire to keep his pact with Rudra no matter what, but that was ultimately because Damrada wanted to do it with his own hands.

    However, it''s hard to win with Rimuru as an opponent

    Damrada''s war analysis of the battle.

    The gship was wrapped in horrible magic, and those who survived guarded the eight gates.

    Can this be called a toss-up or not?

    Damrada could only think that they themselves had made an extremely outrageous mistake.

    ...........

    ........

    ...

    And then, now.

    "Long time no see?

    In front of Damrada''s eyes was a pleasantly smiling maiden.

    This maiden, who exudes fearsome power, is truly the strongest corner of the world, one of the seven pirs of demons, the primordials.

    Her "name" is Ultima, a subordinate of the Demon Lord Rimuru.

    "Not only to make the primordial his own men, but to give them strength

    Up close, it''s even scarier.

    The terror of the Blessing of the Dead, both the precision and the prowess became so over the top that it was enough to show that the demons had indeed evolved.

    Ignoring the spying on him by outsiders, Rimuru unreasonably opened the huge demon summoning door and then acted like something to the summoned minions.

    The Empire didn''t have time to look into the matter, but Ultima told him the answer.

    Ultimaughed out happily.

    "Ahahahaha, did you really notice that? Yes, Lord Rimuru has given us strength, and now we''re in great shape!

    Contrary to the very happy Ultima, the words seemed like a nightmare to Damrada.

    Granting the power to a Primordilthough one could have expected it, it was not something that an ordinary demon lord could do.

    Even that Guy Crimson, the "primordials" amongst his men, did not evolve. Thinking this way, one could understand how abnormal what Demon Lord Rimuru had done was.

    Even so, Damrada had no intention of losing. In order to fulfill the pact with Rudra, it was necessary to go all out to challenge this demon named Ultima.

    "I don''t always aim for the most reasonable path, even if I choose a thorny path, as long as the result achieves my goal.

    Damrada stopped agonizing.

    Even after seeing Ultima, who had disyed overwhelming strength, she still posed without fear.

    "Well, it''s time for a fight.

    "It''s natural. As His Majesty''s knight, I will make my power fully known to you.

    "That''s something to look forward to, so let''s get started!"

    Thus begins the battle between the "single digit" sequence of the rank two Damrada and the "Pain Lord" Ultima.

    ***

    Ultima revealed a shallow snort and observed Damrada.

    The incredible power of being human was felt in Damrada and stood out even among the saints.

    The stance was unbroken and even made it feel like the win might have been impossible without evolution.

    It''s that one, isn''t it? It feels like it can match Hinata''s. That person is like the natural enemy of a magic creature, and this person gives the impression of purely honing his skills in person-to-person, this type is really tricky.

    As far as Ultima knows, opponents who hone their skills are tricky. Hakurou is a good example of being able to deal with a variety of situations with a thousand different skills.

    The ability to apply it flexibly is the secret of its power, and that is precisely what has nothing to do with those higher beings.

    ...........

    ........

    ...

    The so-called demons, in contrast to people, possess an overwhelmingly powerful higher existence.

    It even takes only the liberation of magic to be able to be an attack.

    The existence located at one of the pinnacle of the demon race is Ultima. Since her birth, she has been familiar with the use of magicperfect magical domination.

    There is no need for effort.

    Just think about it and it can be realized, that is magic, there is no adversary in front of that all-powerful absolute power.

    The only ones who could possibly outperform themselves were supetive beings of the same ss, such as the Primordial or the Dragon Race, and until recently Ultima had believed so.

    However, this perception is wrong.

    It was during the battle with Velgrynd that Ultima realized this mistake.

    Faced with the overwhelmingly high level presence of Velgrynd, Ultima and others fought as hard as they could and seeded in knocking out one of her Other Bodies, albeit with only 10% of her original strength.

    On the flip side, one more thing learned is that if you get the use of power wrong, you lose to an opponent who is weaker than you.

    A lot was also learned in the battles that followed.

    The True Dragon Race, which is already the strongest in existence, has shown its advanced magical skills, and as a result, the Ultima, a race that prides itself on magic, is overwhelmed by magic.

    Why it could, during the battle Ultima hadn''t understood, but could now.

    The secret lies in attaching an ultimate skill to magic.

    The use of an ultimate skill increases the uracy of the magic, so we can''t win.

    The power of the magic released by Velgrynd out of control, then Ultima had to do her best just to cope.

    There was nothing more humiliating to Carrera than for the opponent to be more skilled at making the magic she was best at.

    Yes, it''s humiliating.

    At the same time, she was lucky.

    She got the chance to experiencebat while still surviving without suffering a decisive defeat.

    Combining the effects of the skill with the magic, the power would grow exponentially, something that Ultima had never thought of all along. The experience gained through that battle had made her aware of more possibilities.

    It''s true that we both have high basic skills, but then again, relying too much on basic skills is also a problem. If one puts in more effort to refine, one can be even stronger!

    As one of the strongest, Ultima had never aspired to gain power so far, yet this time, she hoped to be even stronger.

    How strong can a strong person who is already invincible be if he still strives to study and umte experience to move up to a higher level?

    The answer is either Velgrynd or Guy Crimson.

    From this point of view, there''s no doubt that Diablo, who pursued his interests, was also a super-spec presence.

    Forgetting Testarossa for a moment, Ultima and Carrera, who had never made the effort, were really a far cry from the others in this regard.

    Ultima knew that she was the most immature of the Seven Pirs of Primordiality. Even so, it was still possible to fight evenly with Mizari and Rheinif she fought with all your might, she would feel like she would lose to Testarossa and Carrera.

    Testarossa is elegant and perfect.

    Being confident and always belittling others is a bad habit of hers.

    As for Carrera, it would be more appropriate to call her arrogance inferior.

    People who know they can do anything well if they take it seriously always lose interest quickly and leave things behind.

    And then, Ultima.

    Neither can she operate their magic with the precision of Testarossa, nor does she have as much magic as Carrera, and of the three demons outside of Diablo, Ultima should be considered the weakest.

    She is half-baked in every way, and although her own existence is the result of her talent, she has no experience of studying anything with her whole heart.

    Thinking of it this way, Ultima and Carrera have a lot of simrities, so the two have been fighting each other for a long time.

    Carrera has recently be interested in swordy.

    Ultima was truly envious of this.

    However, such thoughts also end today.

    Ultima, who had the good fortune to have the opportunity to awaken, gained power as she had prayed for it.

    The one with the most room to grow, is us!

    Being able to generate such thoughts, the current Ultima couldn''t help but find it a bit ridiculous.

    It was all thanks to Rimuru who had be her master.

    Why Rimuru was able to do things like that, Ultima didn''t know, but those thoughts were irrelevant.

    The most important thing is to be a higher being.

    Then there''s the question of whether or not she can help Rimuru.

    Watching the battle of Agera just now, Ultima had been praying, and at the end of that contemtion, an incredible voice was heard.

    <<to make="" this="" wish=""e="" true,="" ill="" help="" you="" a="" little.="">></to>

    The next thing toplete is the ultimate skill, the Poisonous Death King Samael.

    The ability to see through the weaknesses of various living beings and then flexibly use the appropriate state changes to create "poison" is the power of the "King of Poisonous Death, the ultimate skill.

    Having gained this power, Ultima felt absolutely no possibility of losing.

    But, however

    Ultima suddenly remembered.

    ''Hone yourself and don''t rely too much on strengththats what Diablo is always saying.

    She thought that Diablo would always have this kind of zero-talk because of his old defeat to Zegion, and always took it as a sarcasticment from Diablo, who had a bad character.

    Actually, it was a misunderstanding on Ultima''s part.

    It did contain some sarcasm, but really it was mostly for her sake.

    Depending on how the strength is used, it can be very different, which was learned from Diablo.

    After understanding this, she remembered something Diablo had said before.

    Just relying on the power that has been given won''t really make ite into its ownits true!

    Ultima now, deeply identifies with this statement.

    These were the words she had heard when she was first given her name and was now indeed thinking ording to them.

    Speaking of which, not to a certain extent, it''s true that Diablo wouldn''t use the power given by Lord Rimuru, and I originally thought it was just contempt for the enemy, but it turned out to be justified.

    Then I will do the sameUltima wants to take advantage of this opportunity to make it food for her own growth. Damrada is a man who can''t afford to be careless and just happens to give it his all.

    Really. If Testarossa finds out he sees us that way, it''ll be a big deal. No, it''s possible that Testarossa might have fallen for this on purpose, but well, it''s a rare opportunitylets take advantage of it.

    Damrada, though a formidable opponent, was also little more than an opponent to use for practice in Ultima''s eyes.

    For the first time, shell use the ultimate skill of her own desire to achieve victory. In this way, Ultima will no doubt gain growth.

    Ultima swore in her heart.

    It is not about relying on the innate power, but about making perfect use of the "power" that one has been given by one''s desire to win the battle.

    For this matter

    Not just to look up to, but to also be a helper to RimuruUltima thought so.

    ...........

    ........

    ...

    The fighting was extremely intense.

    Strength-boosted Ultimaunched the attack and Damrada dodged it through his own skill. Sometimes concentrating the entire body''s fighting qi directly counteracts the attack.

    It''s the deft and nimble improvisation that makes Damrada so powerful.

    Ultima was frankly impressed by this and found it amusing.

    Through the showdown with Damrada, a lot of things were realized.

    So it turns out, so that the action doesn''t lose its physical bnce, and such an approach seems to work in a fight with Zegion!

    Zegion was too powerful to be defeated the moment he got close. It does make sense for Zegions approach to be used in realbat, but it''s less suitable for training for grappling.

    At this point, Damrada is a very fit and good opponent, which is to say the most suitable enemy.

    Realizing how much she was favored, Ultima could simply defend herself against any attack with overwhelming magical power, and her own attacks could crush all kinds of enemies with brute force alone.

    This situation had beenrgely understood before, but now it was finally recognized with more realism.

    Both began to increase in prowess and the battle became more and more intense.

    ***

    The two were evenly matched in strength and were not yet able to see where victory or defeat was heading.

    At first nce it might be so

    "Ahahaha, how pleasant! There''s no way you can go on this long of a free practice against Zegion!

    From the heart of a pleasant Ultima.

    In contrast, Damrada was full of bitterness.

    "You''re underestimating me by treating the match with me as an exercise"

    Despite saying so, Damrada actually noticed it inside.

    If this continues, it will be himself who will lose.

    Ultima is still growing and Damrada is in full swing.

    There was no time at all to feel the thrill of any fight, just to think about how to take down Ultima and put all of his skills to use in the duel.

    In the end, the "primordial" demon was a natural magical genius, and such an existence, which could even tamper with the physicalws of the world, would not be able to do its job as an opponent if the attack was imperfect. Therefore, Damrada applies a "surrogate power" effect to all attacks to inflict damage on Ultima.

    It is because it took more than two thousand years of study to be able to use the powers freely as if they were breathing, to be so familiar with them that Damrada even forgot to borrow them from Rudra.

    Plus, demons were shackled and now seemingly unshackled, but the demon''s mana volume boundary value was still fixed.

    As a result, Damrada, a "sage", has a higher total energy than Ultima, so he can fight Ultima evenly.

    The more I attack, the more I can expose, but even using arge skill may not be effective. Couldnt

    win, huh?

    Considering the fact that Ultima was able to learn a skill that Damrada had painstakingly learned with a single nce, she thought that it would be better to make quick work of it, but to do so would likely reveal a w that would be self-defeating.

    Now, even though it was possible to counteract all of the multiple attacks of equal power released by Ultima at the same timeUltima not only didn''t feel chagrined by this but instead showed a very pleasant expression.

    "That was awesome, like a demonstration!"

    Being said that, instead, Damrada became chagrined.

    Damrada was driven to desperation.

    It was as if she was absorbing water from the dry sand, and it was obvious that Ultima was growing.

    Hahaha, that''s just augh.

    He couldnt help butugh at himself.

    The "primordial" was so horrible that Damrada never thought of it before.

    To an outsider, one might think the two are evenly matched. However, this equilibrium will soon copse, and as long as one side is growing, the scales will sooner orter tilt in favor of the other.

    What a grim reality.

    The time hase.

    "Aha! We''re getting there!"

    Ultima''s aura suddenly changed, reserving her remaining strength up until now in order to steal Damrada''s skills.

    No longer preserving strength, Ultima spread six pairs behind hertwelve wings, featherless as bat wings, smooth and voluptuous with avender glow.

    "Here we go!

    Goo!?"

    After Ultima sent out the announcement, the twelve wings moved simultaneously, changing into a variety of shapes, aiming at Damrada to release the attack.

    Thin as a de, pointed as a steel needle, gathered into fist-like chunks, flexible and changing wings, from which it is already very difficult to escape, let alone confront it

    Damrada, who wanted to avoid the fist-like wings, was blown away the moment he made contact with the fist, and the strength contained therein was unprecedented, a powerful force that Damrada could not counteract.

    What was even more frightening was that the strength of Ultima''s power was still gradually increasing, and without the upper limit on the amount of mana now, the momentum of growth could not be seen to slow down in the slightest, as if talking about gaining power by simply expecting it.

    Ch-che-uhh!"

    "Ahahahahaha! We love this look."

    "Huh! Don''t underestimate people, little girl. The power is amazing, but I just won''t get hit."

    Damrada held his breath even more, concentrating on dodging the attack.

    The mouth says it''s no big deal, but the heart is filled with a sense of crisis.

    You can''t win at this rate.

    However, Ultima was untouched.

    ''Then make a break for itDamrada is looking to strike.

    One of the wings threading the legs of Damrada, it looked like Damrada didn''t get the chance to avoid it, in fact it was a tactic by Damrada.

    A race that prided itself on its great power was prone to pride, and even Ultima would have been careless if she had been certain that she would win - an action that Damrada had taken with that in mind.

    "Ahahahahaha, don''t you keep running around? Or are you tired of running?

    With a wicked grin on her face, Ultima slowed the attack and began to tease Damrada, the wings not attacking the vital parts, but instead attempting to strike through the limbs of her opponent.

    Yes, you guys are strong. That''s why they despise us and fail at critical moments.

    Damrada was sure his strategy had worked.

    While making a wounded fall move, a full force shot was fired at Ultima.

    "Sheng Bang!

    This is the sure-fire aura of Damrada.

    This is a blow that is made by refining all the fighting energy of a saint using the "power of substitution".

    If hit by this move, the creature, no matter how powerful, will be destroyed, and even the primordial Ultima will only end up in a physical copse and disappear.

    Damrada, who identified himself as victorious, did not feel the aftermath of victory. The thought of stabbing a fatal blow at Ultima somehow sent a sickening chill through him.

    The copse disappeared with only a piece of wing, the one that had changed into the shape of Ultima, and Damrada failed to see it.

    By the time this was noticed, it was toote.

    "Deathly Poisonous Punch!

    Damrada''s chest was prated by Ultima.

    Imitating Damrada''s huge magic power concentrated in her hands, she attacked in a cross-hands pose and mastered this technique perfectly by unleashing the ultimate power, "King of Poisonous Death".

    Moreover, the reason why the nails of all five fingers were dyed purple was because the power of the

    ''King of Poisonous Death'', ''Death Poison'', had broken through Damrada''s defenses with a power far greater than the amount of lethal force.

    This is the moment that tells the difference between winning and losing.

    Oooh!"

    Damrada coughed up blood and copsed.

    "Ahahahahahaha, what a shame! Just as we expected!"

    A wicked snort ofughter resounded.

    Damrada tries to get back to his feet again but fails miserably.

    I can''t even clench my fists, not even stand.

    But even so, he still looked at Ultima with all his might and anger.

    "Idiot, that''s not a punch, it''s a m. Just seeing it once, can it be imitatedbut, the prowess is, unmistakablereally, wonderful. To sum up, it would be more appropriate to name it The Red Snake Death Poisoner

    Damrada meets the ground facing up to the sky.

    Looking up at the sky, a bitter smile of slight regret was revealed.

    This time it was aplete failure.

    He was defeated by the Demon Lord Rimuru before he could challenge Guy.

    Maybe some of the elite will survive, but not if they want to make aeback.

    Emperor Rudra had no more left to wait for the next opportunity, and until then, the present Rudra would have been

    "Your MajestyDamrada whispered, looking back on his life.

    ...........

    ........

    ...

    "Damrada, can you listen to me?

    "What is it? If it''s a boringint, still go and talk to Lord Velgrynd. Or, is it against Lord Velgrynd? If so, it should be kept from me, and I should speak directly to Lord Velgrynd herself, or else it would be a pain in the ass if even I was hated.

    "You''re an indifferent guyno, not that, it''s serious business.

    please?"

    He actually didn''t want to ask.

    Seeing Rudra''s eyes, one already realized that it was going to be a serious topic.

    If one hears these words, one cannot maintain the rtionship as it is now.

    Damrada didn''t want it to be that way.

    "It seems that every reincarnation consumes my heart. No, in Guys words, it''s probably the "soul" of something. But it doesn''t matter, what does matter is that I might not be me.

    "The reincarnation of Rudra the Hero was not achieved by magic, but by a special ritual to inherit a power that was too great.

    The cost of gaining power over the ultimate spiritual beings, the Dragon Race, in mortal form, is managed by Rudra''s own power, so Damrada cannot propose a solution

    "The soul is consumed. After that, His Majesty will be no longer His Majesty

    "Ahhh, yes.

    "That''s a funny joke. But I''m not going to take you seriously enough to use that rhetoric to reduce work.

    "Che, you''re still serious. You''re really

    "I think it''s a strength."

    "Haha, indeed. I said something boring, so forget it."

    "Yes, let me do that.

    How can one forget?

    Damrada just evaded it.

    He wanted to maintain the rtionship as it was, wanted to y for Rudra all the time.

    And then, time passes.

    "Ahhh, sure enough, I lose something very important after every reincarnation. What''s lost I don''t know myself, that''s the question.

    "Your Majesty

    "I say, Damrada.

    Yes."

    "This is an edict. If I''m going to be no more, you kill me yourself.

    "Lord Rudra!

    "There''s no way to ask Velgrynd for something like this, is there?

    ''I couldn''t do it eitherthose words, Damrada pressed down with all his might.

    If this was the wish of his dear friend Rudra, he could not answer in the negative.

    Geheheheh. If that happens, I promise to take care of the aftermath for Rudra-sama, so please rest assured that you''ll be able toplete your administrative tasks."

    "Well, you haven''t changed. I''ll leave you to it.

    That was, a pact made long ago.

    And then the time went on

    "I am tired, and there is a limit to restraining my Justice King Michael'' from going out of control.

    Absolute "righteousness" is not much different from "evil" at the root of the matter. Justice that all can identify with does not exist in this world.

    "Your Majesty

    "Damrada, you and I made a deal, remember?

    "Of course I remember.

    Hearing this reply, Rudra said "That''s good" and smiled.

    Changing expressions, solemnly issuingmands.

    "Damrada, this is an edict. In order to be prepared in case you miss, go find someone who can break the

    ''King of Justice'' and kill the rest as an alternate! It''s hard for me to do such a thingbut you have to be ready for everything in my time."

    Faced with this as if it were an order to obliterate Rudra himself, Damrada could only nod.

    "Your orders, I understand.

    Hearing Damrada''s reply, Rudra muttered, "I''m sorry.

    Rudra looked off into the distance as if talking to himself.

    "In retrospect, this ''King of Justice'' that my friend entrusted to me was probably too powerful for me.

    Win or lose, the next matchup with Guy will probably be thest. I wants to fully master this skillIf there is a sign of going berserk, there is no need to worry and you must stop my actions.

    Ill do as Im told.

    Please."

    After saying that, Rudra closed his eyes.

    Thinking about the vows he had exchanged with the Star Dragon, Veldanava, he was filled with resentment that he had not kept his promise to the end.

    A small whisper escaped Rudra''s mouth, "If you can''t make a deal, go to that world and make amends.

    Damrada pretended not to hear the words and quietly withdrew from the room.

    ...........

    ........

    ...

    Choking on the blood from his own mouth, Damrada''s consciousness was pulled back to reality. In less than a few seconds, consciousness flew into the distance.

    Your Majesty, yes or no. I failedtoplete, by your edict

    In the consciousness that was about to dissipate, Damrada wanted to utter this remorse, but was no longer able to do so and spat out another mouthful of blood.

    Regret.

    However, there was a sense of relief.

    The search for the one who can kill his beloved masterthis edict is only painful for Damrada.

    Long hours of agonizing over it.

    Absolutely.

    For Damrada, Emperor Rudra was always a shining hero as always.

    Will youwill you kill something like thathow could I possibly do that!? Why should I do it? Can''t we just let someone else do it? If you no longer exist in this world, I have no attachment to this world. I''d like to go with you

    This is what Damrada wants from his heart.

    Neither Guy nor Rudra''s matchup seemed to matter to Damrada. What matters is what Rudra thinks, and the world that can reflect his thoughts.

    Guy Crimson, though an arrogant demon king, is not an unreasonable tyrant. His domination is unshakeable, he will make his own proper rules and stubbornly follow them.

    Guy and Rudra''s ideals, while different, are not absolutely ipatible, and in Damrada''s view, the two are perfectly capable ofpromise.

    Guy shouldn''t be able to act on his own.

    It was because of this certainty that Rudra issued an edict to Damrada, right?

    Why cling to victory and defeat when it''s clear that there is mutual recognition?

    Damrada is really puzzled.

    But again, there was no way to do something against Rudra''s will, and as a result, he had to follow his orders and operate around the world.

    After leaving the Emperor''s banner for a long time, someone was found who could serve as an alternative.

    This boy, Yuuki Kagurazaka, has a super-powerful physique called "Ability Blocking".

    This physique could even invalidate an ultimate skill, and Damrada was happy to think that he was able to fight against the ''King of Justice'', but he still ended up losing badly, and Yuuki also fell into Rudra''s hands, which was no longer useful.

    The killer was lost, but that''s when a question suddenly arose in Damrada''s mind.

    why, Your Majesty, should you dominate Yuuki?

    "Huh, what?

    To this whisper that contained no intention, Ultima asked rhetorically.

    Without giving an exnation, Damrada continued to ponder.

    It was undoubtedly Rudra who had ordered the search for the man who could kill him, and he should not have interfered with the matter.

    No, it''s not.

    It''s just that Damrada doesn''t want to believe it yet.

    The signs have been there since the beginning.

    Indeed, it is soHis Majesty, Lord Rudra, has

    Like Damrada, delirious from fever, muttered.

    "What the hell are you talking about!?

    Feeling anxious, Ultima shouted out questions that didn''t reach Damrada''s ears.

    Damrada was, for the moment, single-mindedly sinking into his own thoughts.

    Perhaps it should be said that the dying sh of an apparition made Damrada''s thinking very sharp.

    Thus, the search for the truth.

    Rudra is passionate about his ideals.

    To dream of a united world and permanent peace.

    No more strife and poverty, and humanity can focus on development.

    If the unification of all mankind bes peaceful, then all can live equally. Rudra, who believes in this, has set the goal of "building a united nation.

    Human beings are mutually intelligible creatures, capable of uniting their wills one day and working together to create a better world, Rudra believes this from the bottom of his heart.

    He became a "hero" for the sake of the people, carrying great pain and hardship. To make life happy for more people, Rudra kept running for this desire.

    Damrada loves Rudra like this.

    But

    Rudra''s ideals came to an end when they were still at the dream stage.

    Before the ideal is realized, Rudra himself has gone rogue.

    The ideals we were striving for turned out to be broken a long time ago

    Damrada identified with this and was overwhelmed with sadness in his heart.

    "Are you crying?

    ahhhh"

    "For fear of death?

    no, because of the agreement"

    Agreement?"

    ahhhh"

    Unable to avoid death, clinging to Damrada without letting go.

    It was something that could not be helped, and he could put up with it, but the inability to keep the covenant with Rudra was unbearable for Damrada.

    Rudra''s consciousness had dissipated, and who was Rudra now, exactly?

    There''s only one answer to this kind of thing.

    It was undoubtedly Veldanava, the Star Dragon, the friend of Rudra, who gave him the ultimate skill, the ultimate skill of the King of Justice.

    Before Rudra''s mental breakdown, Damrada still had edicts that had to be fulfilled.

    Buthe seems to be about to die without being able to achieve the mission.

    Damrada, who wanted to berate himself for his ipetence, turned around and realized that the situation had not yet reached its worst moment.

    No matter what, the ''King of Justice'' has to be stopped from going berserk, and if Damrada fails, it will be necessary to find someone worthy of entrusting this task.

    This is the edict of Rudra, the pact that Damrada should keep.

    In addition to Yuuki, there was one other person who had a clue.

    The dreaded demon lord, Rimuru.

    He is both the greatest enemy and the ce of hope.

    "May I ask you to kill His MajestyLord Rudra?

    "Huh? Why us?

    "It doesn''t have to be you.

    "No, no, no. Let''s just leave it to us. We were going to kill that Rudra guy anyway, not that we couldn''t ept your request.

    Ultima''s character does as she pleases.

    While not going to respond frankly, actually kinda like Damrada.

    The battlessted a short time, but for Ultima, who had an infinite lifespan, it was the quality of the battle that was valued more. To be able to experience such a fierce battle that coalesces in a short period of time, it feels like no matter what is said, it is allowed.

    "Then, there is one more thing

    What?"

    Thatthe boy named Masayukiplease protect him

    Damrada was convinced.

    It''s just that

    "Yes, I can. But ite at a cost, right?

    Demons don''t fight for nothing.

    While this is not an absolute rule, there are all sorts of ways to circumvent it.

    But this time, it was Ultima''s capriciousness, wanting to see Damrada troubled, that made the question.

    However, hearing Ultima''s question, Damrada was relieved. He felt like he had been liberated, and then he replied calmly.

    "The reward is, all of me. Everything about my soll the technology I haveI entrust it all to you"

    epted."

    Looking at Ultima, who gave a reluctant reply, Damrada smiled.

    And then

    Your Majesty Rudranow, I will go to your side

    These are thest words that Damrada left behind.

    Stopped breathing like he was asleep.

    Former Chancellor of the Nasca Kingdom and a close friend of the unified Emperor Rudra Nam Ul Nasca.

    The curtain hase down on the long career of "The Saint" Damrada.

    In the midst of the circr brawling arena of Iso-space, Ultima stood alone.

    "Ah-ah, what a bore. The core of his heart disappeared and it was still intended for Lord Rimuru

    As a somewhat lonely Ultima muttered, she wrapped the remains of Damrada gently in twelve wings.

    ording to the agreement, taking the whole of Damrada for her own possession.

    That''s it, the end.

    The end of Damrada and Ultima''s matchup.

    The job of the fist saint" came to an end, and a new "demon of the fist" was born

    Damrada gave one of the most vicious demons the most ferocious power in his final moments.

    Would he be unbearably ashamed if he knew about it?

    Or perhaps be happy with the inheritance of their skills?

    Damrada is dead and there is no way to know about it.

    Those who survive can only ponder this question in their hearts.

    ***

    "Come, I''ll be your opponent.

    In the middle of the round fight arena, Agera makes an announcement to Kondo.

    Kondo frowned and without a word raised the hand that held the saber, not responding to Agera, and just looked at Carrera.

    "Don''t worry, I''m only here as a witness.

    "Ridiculous. How can you believe what you say?

    Kondo, who finally spoke, was quite sharp in his words. It''s like saying, since it''s the enemy, let the two go together.

    However, Carrera made no move.

    "True enough, I don''t think two-on-one is a despicable act, and I''m not going to take it out on you. But this time, it was because of the wishes of Agera over there. Don''t worry about me, just enjoy the fight."

    Not only did she say so, but she also sat directly on the stone wall to show that it had nothing to do with her.

    Kondo shrugged.

    "What a farce. But I''ll just take the spirit.

    Then came the drawn saber and confronted Agera.

    "Thank you very much. Then, just for goodness sake"

    A crisp voice rang out, interrupting his words. Agera covered his chest and copsed on the field.

    You!"

    Carrera momentarily drew a short distance and broke between Kondo and Agera, blocking the sword that Kondo was about to cut off Agera''s head with.

    "Hmph, can you catch up to this speed?

    Kondo, who held arge southern-style automatic pistol with smokeing from the muzzle in his right hand and wielded a saber in his left, said so in the direction of Carrera.

    "You knew I could make it, didn''t you? If you were serious, Agera would have been wiped out by now, wouldn''t she?

    Kondo didn''t say anything about epting the invitation to the Agera showdown, so it was apse on Agera''s part to not confirm beforehand.

    And she wasn''t really going to make a killing blow, and Carrera, who had blocked her opponent''s sword, knew it best.

    A strongman like Kondo should not lose even a head-to-head fight with Agera. If it''s just a sword fight, maybe a nice showdown at some point. But even so, the oue of Kondo''s victory probably won''t falter.

    Even so, the surprise attack was made because Carrera was on the sidelines.

    It is pie in the sky to believe the words of the enemy, let alone the words of the devil, and it is the foolishness of those who really believe.

    The exclusion of uncertain elements is the iron rule ofbat.

    "I don''t know what you''re talking about. I don''t have time for this farce.

    Kondo turned to face Carrera, sneering at the uncharitable state of affairs.

    "Well, if you think so, then I''ll be your opponent.

    "With this sword?

    Carrera''s sword had cracked from the blow just delivered, no doubt it would break from a few more blows, and Carrera couldn''t have failed to notice it.

    "No way, there are alternatives, only I have a better sword. Agera, you understand."

    of course. It''s a pity that I didn''t get to fight with thest generation of my school, but I can''tin if I think that it''s because I''m following your teachings. The discontent is only the contempt for my old master, which only deprives me of my fighting power.

    Saying so, Agera stood up.

    The wound in his chest had been closed, and the bullet Kondo fired was called an "annihtion bullet", which, ording to the magical power of the load, caused an equal amount of energy to disappear. If it was a "spellbomb", it would be very difficult for Agera to stand up again.

    As Carrera and Agera had noticed, it was clear that Kondo wasn''t attacking with all his might.

    But, because of this, Agera was able to keep fighting.

    "?Knife Change?

    Agera became a knife, and the one holding the knife was undoubtedly Carrera.

    Carrera''s magic filled the void in Agera, and the lost energy came back again. The result was that the de shone brightly and Agera''s qi became full.

    "That''s stupid. It took arade living as a sword to let you off the hook

    "My dependents love to fight. That''s a lot of concern.

    "Is that so. There is no point in talking about it now. He has dared to impersonate the founder of the sect, and his crime is unforgivable.

    In Kondo''s view, Carrera, who held the sword that Agera had changed into in her hands, was also guilty of the same thing.

    Showing unabashedly clear hostility, Kondo struck a serious pose.

    The battle began in less than half a quarter of an hour.

    Carrera fell to her knees.

    Incredibly, Kondo was powerful to the point of terror.

    As the saying goes, Damn.

    Even in Carrera''s opinion, he was a monster beyond belief.

    Carrera knew she was strong.

    But at the same time, understood that there are people of all people.

    In fact, one would have thought that even if one couldn''t beat Diablo, one probably wouldn''t lose to anyone else. However, it would be met with ease by Zegion.

    This battle was also, facing Velgrynd didn''t take much advantage.

    So even though she was at Kondo''s mercy now, Carrera wasn''t shocked. Not only that, but euphoria even ran high.

    Carrera rolls lightly on the ground to close the distance from Kondo. Stand up smoothly and adjust again to the posture of pointing the tip of the knife at the opponent''s eyes.

    "Very good! My swordsmanship is praised even by Agera, but it still seems inferior to yours.

    "Shut up. I''m just trying to use my own power to beat my opponent, and I''m so angry that I''m saying that."

    Kondo himself was creeped out by Carrera''s fighting instincts, and since this wasn''t the time to be able to have fun, he struck out with full force from the start. Not only swordsmanship, but also the power of the extreme ability ''King of Execution'' is being used unstintingly.

    However, it didn''t quite beat Carrera.

    That alone was already worthy of awe, and Kondo''s heart couldn''t help but warble over it.

    It seems that this is not an opponent that can be solved easily, with mutual awareness of this.

    As a result, the fighting intensified.

    With brute force, Carrera struck at Kondo with her sword, impeding his movement. Kondo lightly opens Carrera''s attack with a knife rack and snaps Carrera with a right handed shot.

    The power ced in this round is to disarm the magic.

    This bullet is called a "spell-breaker".

    Kondo chose this bullet because of the anticipation of Carrera''s next move.

    No need to chant a mantra, the gravitational force field is instantly formed. Kondo points out that Carrera, who only knows how to use her power, is not only not reflecting, but also relying on her own power, trying to unleash magic that does not affect her and hinder Kondo''s actions.

    Seeing this, Kondo chose the "spell-breaker".

    The extremely high generalization of this ability is the powerful secret of Kondo.

    There are roughly four effects of the research pole ability "King of Execution", and Kondo will adapt them to the situation.

    A "boundary breaker" can break the defensive boundary of an creature.

    The Spellbreaker can remove magic effects.

    The Spellbusters are capable of destroying the magical circuits of creatures.

    The "annihtion bomb" is a high-density magic bomb that can expend energy by seeing through the nature of the creature.

    The most powerful bullet that can do all of the above at the same time is the "Godspeed Bullet".

    Before that, Carrera had been deliberately chanting spells for magical attacks.

    It was all in preparation for this matchup, but all the magic was unspeble the moment it was unleashed, and Kondo''s predictions were urate, always making the right choices.

    And, there are all sorts of bullets being shot through the cracks.

    Failure to see through its nature and react to it will leave Carrera with serious injuries. If there is any hesitation, it is estimated that the winner will be decided in an instant.

    Kondo was really calm when he analyzed the battle situation.

    Unhurried, bordering on mechanical.

    See through the enemy''s weaknesses and the flow of magic to make appropriate responses.

    That''s all.

    It was faithfulness to a steady foundation that established Kondo''s position as the strongest in the Imperial Army.

    Significantly different from Carrera, who acts on her emotions, the two are somewhat oddly simr.

    Kondo asked in a cordial tone as she shook her head.

    "That''s tricky. How did you know I was going to use magic?

    Kondo also replied to Carrera while regaining his breath.

    "Well, that''s easy. Because I think that''s what I would do if I were you.

    "I see. It''s really easy to understand.

    Once again, Carrera developed a fondness for this Kondo, along with a strong realization that she had never seen the same type of formidable enemy so far.

    You can''t say that by observing the flow of magic when it''s activated.

    I''d do that, or somethingif I were you, you''d be looking for a reason. Carrera thought unpleasantly, but couldn''t help the pleasant expression that crossed her face.

    Having an opponent that you can fight with all your might is enough to be enjoyable alone.

    Rhein the primordial was a strong one identified by Guy and should have had a satisfying sparring session with her, but Carrera''s provocation never seeded.

    This kind of regrettable incident made Carrera upset and angrybut with Kondo as an opponent, it felt like she could fight enough for her heart''s content.

    For Carrera, it''s the process of going head-to-head that matters more than winning or losing.

    "That''s great. That''s really great. It''s Kondo, right? You''re the best enemy!

    Kondo snorted back at Carrera''s heartfelt praise.

    Without words, state your opinion by the sword.

    Sharp chopping blows stabbed at Carrera in session.

    Dancing the sword with only the left hand, but the path of the sword without any deviation, was even more beautiful than the martial arts that fascinated the people.

    Carrera faced Kondo''s sessive chopping blows, relying on Agera''s skill and her own instincts to judge and dodge.

    In a brief interlude of sword des, Carrera discovered a little habit of Kondo''s.

    Knife in left hand, gun in right.

    Although it was just Kondo''s fighting form, the momentary sight of him firing would move along with his fingertips, as if he was watching the line of fire of a bullet.

    No one would have been able to notice this little habit if it weren''t for Carrera, but it was enough of a fatal w to determine victory or defeat.

    This is it!

    Carrera swung the sword away at the perfect time.

    Unable to respond, Kondo, who was ready to shoot, raised his gun stiffly and took down Carrera''s sword.

    The reaction speed is simply amazing, but Carrera won''t just stop there.

    "Don''t underestimate me! That takes away one of your trump cards!"

    Twisting his body hard to adjust his posture to receive the attack, causing Kondo to be unable to counter the powerful force of Carrera. So, Kondo unstintingly let go of the gun in his hand.

    Therge Southern-style automatic pistol grunted and rolled to the ground.

    Having avenged Kondo''s death, Carrera was rejoicing.

    However

    There was a creepy scent, and feeling it for an instant, Carrera followed her instinct and quickly ducked away.

    Immediately after, Kondo''s sword shed through the air.

    "Geez, didn''t you get it?

    Whatnded on the ground with a flutter was Carrera''s severed left hand, the skeleton of the kamikaze not paying the slightest attention, cut off by Kondo''s sword.

    You!"

    Emotionally charged Carrera.

    But inwardly, calmly, though shaken by the humiliation, she epted this reality.

    There''s no way to beat Kondo at this rate.

    The proof was that Kondo was now wielding a military knife with both hands.

    A perfect form over time,pletely different from his style so far.

    Kondo hadn''t intended to rely on the gun in his hand from the beginning, but instead had deliberately revealed a crack to lure Carrera into the bait, with no other exnation than that.

    But if that was the case, it meant that Carrera was despised by Kondo.

    The sword alone is enough to gain the upper hand, but it''s still a little tricky

    It''s a strategy to kill me easilyIt''s inexcusable that such a powerful master would not show his strength and do such a despicable thing

    Aware of this, Carrera roared.

    "How dare you underestimate me, a human!"

    Carrera wanted to go along with the rage and shatter Kondo into pieces, ready to step forward.

    And yet, just then.

    One moment, please, Lord Carrera.

    Agera, transformed into a knife, hitchhiked over.

    Carrera and Agera were now in a state of near-unity, and naturally also connected through thoughtmunication'', and were able to have a conversation in their hearts.

    And so, in a million times extended sphere of consciousness under the power of Carrera, the two began a conversation.

    "What do you want to say, Agera? I''m so busy right now, I''ll kill you if you interfere.

    "Please calm down, Lord Carrera. If you lose your cool, you''ll be in Kondo''s clutches.

    "Of course I know that. But that guy fooled me, as a king? It''s absolutely intolerable, isn''t it?

    Lately, Agera has basically taken on the duty of stopping Carrera, but Agera has also never seen a Carrera as raging as today. If she wasn''t stopped, Carrera would surely be defeated.

    Agera continues to be persuasive, trying to convince Carrera.

    "Listen to me, Kondo didn''t rely on the sword alone in the first ce because he despised Carrera-sama.

    "Why, you''re underestimating me, no matter what you think!"

    "No, it''s not. It''s just the opposite."

    Huh?"

    ''''It is precisely because of the importance attached to the threat from Lord Carrera that Kondo hides his true abilities. Not anyone is as strong as Lord Carrera, who was very strong from birth. Take the fight against the strongest enemy seriously, that''s something you''ll do as a warrior!

    "So what? Are you trying to say that he approved of me?

    Exactly!"

    Agera seized the opportunity to articte his views with great force.

    That stance of Kondo''s had been said to be in a state ofpletion, but its essence was still that of a swordsman who had inherited Agera''s school. There is no doubt that the other person is serious, and it is for this reason that it is not revealed at the outset, but rather that a shift is made at the crucial moment.

    It is precisely because of the fact that he sees Carrera as his strongest enemy that he is able to use such a small trick.

    If not, there''s no need to craft a fake move like that to increase risk.

    I seethats true, if you say so"

    Agera''s persuasion yed a role, and Carrera calmed down and epted the statement.

    Agera breathed a sigh of relief.

    I''ve worried you, Agera. Thanks to you, I''vee to my senses.

    "That''s great.

    "I won''t let you worry anymore, I promise you.

    Signaling the end of the conversation with this deration, Carrera turned to face Kondo again, and then, slowly,nded a rippling punch to her face.

    Such a serious blow that one wonders if Carrera''s head will explode.

    However, Carrera was calm and shed a smile at Kondo.

    "Oh, I didn''t scare you, did I? I''m sorry, slightly lost my cool and thought you were insulting me.

    However, human beings are so powerful that they will use all sorts of tricks to win. It''s an idea we wouldn''t have had, slightly surprised."

    Thoughughing like this, Carrera also stopped her contempt for her enemy.

    It was no ident, but if it hadn''t been for Agera, Kondo would have been caught in the act.

    The Carrera of the present is different from the Carrera of the past, who can do whatever she wants.

    As a loyal servant of the Demon Lord Rimuru, she acts in ordance with the orders of her lord.

    It''s just that it''s not okay to be defeated and die in battle, which is absolutely forbidden.

    Carrera warned herself in her mind.

    This punch was for that purpose, and to show one''s own awareness.

    Carrera acknowledged Kondo.

    Acknowledge that he is on the same level of existence as her.

    The casual Carrera is like a changed person, thinking seriously.

    "What a surprise.

    The pride of being the strongest race always made her unconsciously fail to use her full strength in fighting with others. However, it was mistakenly assumed that Kondo wasn''t giving it his all and she had to leave it to Agera to correct her.

    Realizing herpse, Carrera finally got serious.

    Kondo looked at the grin that was showing on Carrera''s face, who was in a miserable situation, and felt that it was beautiful.

    "Is the demon going to give it her all? As a fragile human being, there''s no way to wee it.

    For the first time, a change of expression urred, seeing Carrera as the enemy.

    "Then I, too, must be your opponent.

    Kondo, who made this deration, put on the "armor" for the first time.

    No longer a uniform that relied on the Force of Will to materialize, but a pure white spirit suit made from the mythical level changes given by Rudra.

    That is, a spirit dress made in imitation of an old Imperial Navy garment.

    The appearance doesn''t seem to have changed much, but the aura on disy seems to have changed to a different person.

    For Kondo, this garment from the naval era was also the one that meant death. As a lieutenant, he swore to bear the guilt of letting his men die tragically. In order to be able to keep this realization in mind, I fought in these garments.

    Carrera looked at Kondo, liberating a deep and massive magic.

    Next, give your name.

    "I am the loyal servant of Lord Rimuru, one of the Twelve Patrons, Carrera, the Menace Lord. Bet on my glory and I''ll kill you."

    Kondo responded.

    "Heh, Lieutenant of the Imperial Navy, Tatsuya Kondo. I am now the head of the Imperial Emperor''s Order of the Near Guard, and I ept your challenge.

    The two confronted each other, quietly building up their strength.

    From there, the real battle began.

    *** Carrera picked up the left arm that had fallen to one side and gently brought the sections back together, and just like that, it was restored as if nothing had happened.

    "That doesn''t make sense.

    "Don''t say that, after all, it''s a precious body given by Lord Rimuru, so I cant leave any scars on it.

    The conversation sounded light-hearted, but both sides were peering into each other for a break.

    The reason Kondo didn''t make a move while Carrera healed her arm was because Kondo had certain thoughts.

    Without a gun in his hand, Kondo could only fight with a sword, which was of course the original gesture of "Mizushin Lifestream", but on the flip side, it also meant that he didn''t have any reserve backhand.

    Kondo is now in full swing.

    In other words, Kondo bet his whole self.

    With two swords in hand now, Kondo had the confidence to not lose to any enemy.

    Kondo grasps the movements of Carrera through his unique skill of "interpreting", and the movements of his muscles are readable by the flow of magic throughout his body and the breath of his magic.

    When this power isbined with the ultimate power, ''King of Execution'', it can perform far beyond the unique power field. Therefore, he did not see an abnormal increase in the omitted power of Carrera.

    That vast energy is a symbol of Carrera''s tyrannical style, but in spite of that, I wonder if there is a clear will to unify and the flow of energy is unclogged.

    The energy that would normally have produced an explosive torrent was perfectly incorporated into Carrera''s domination.

    What a monsterKondo thought to himself.

    The wrist wound that was so hard to cut off is now invisible, and even the clothes have been repaired, what a joke.

    What gathered that fierce power was Agera''s demon de that had changed into a single heart, and was able to make aplete circle of power because it had transformed into a single heart with Carrera.

    This was not good for Kondo, who sensed something even more tricky than that. Incredibly, a strong crystallization of power was forming in the center of Carrera''s magic.

    Kondo had a clue as to what that was.

    It is something that can only be seen when the form of the heart bes solid.

    Acknowledging this, Kondo took action.

    No matter how powerful the enemy is, it must be eliminated as quickly as possible. It was because of this judgment that he wore these clothes, which symbolizes his fullmitment.

    That is to say, defeat is not allowed and victory must be achieved no matter what means are used.

    It is the winning side that is righteous.

    While examining Carrera, Kondo finished his preparations.

    The only remaining weapon was a sword, pouring its full force into Carrera''s beheading.

    "That''s good, that''s good! That look of no confusion, that''s exciting!

    Ignoring Carrera''s excited shouts, Kondo waved the sword in his hand.

    Although Carrera''s demon sword caught this blow, Kondo''s military sword was indeed iparably powerful, and if that demon sword hadn''t boarded Agera''s will, it might have been shattered by this blow.

    Kondo furthermore continues to apply the standup.

    "You guys!?

    The sharp, heavy chopping blow caused Carrera to not help but let out a groan.

    The secret of its powery in the will that was injected into the saber.

    Kondo''s ultimate skill, the ''King of Execution'', is not only able to attachpower to bullets, but also by cing Kondo''s will, or even his ''soul'', in the saber, which is both Kondo''s killer weapon and his true gesture when he''s serious.

    Under the ensuing onught from Kondo, Carrera can only defend with one touch.

    Kondo intends to fight before Carrera awakens to the ultimate skill, using all sorts of tricks to pursue Carrera.

    Even though Carrera controlled her violence and exerted great power, Kondo remained unchanged and flicked away the entire attack.

    In terms ofbat skills, Kondo is a step above Carrera.

    The barely sustained sparring was the result of abination of Carrera''s massive amount of mana and Agera''s strength.

    If it wasn''t for that, Carrera would have been wiped out long ago.

    Now, too, the chop that contains the power of the "Exterminating Bullet" cuts open the left side of Carrera''s belly.

    With limbs wounded several times by the chopping blows of the boarding "spellbomb" effect, Carrera''s magic circuits have gone into a frenzy, and as a result, even Carrera''s and Agera''s assimtion has begun to take a toll.

    You"

    Carrera groaned and red at Kondo with a grimace.

    Miscalction.

    I knew that Kondo was strong, but I thought that I could always deal with it by using my real skills.

    But Kondo is not that good of an opponent.

    Even in the face of Carrera, who had borrowed Agera''s power, Kondo was still the superman above it.

    Humanshuman! Even though awakened as a "saint", I can''t believe that a human could drive me to such a state

    Contemting her own ineptitude, Carrera covered her right hand over the left side of her belly that kept leaking magic after being chopped open.

    Even if one wanted to reply, the effect would be minimal as the magic loop went into a frenzy.

    Originally, an injury of this magnitude would have repaired itself without any attention, but now, even with deliberate treatment, it still looks like this.

    No matter how bashful and rude Carrera was, she could recognize that the current state of affairs was very bad indeed.

    Whether the will is strong or not, can sway the power.

    What''s more, Kondo is a character who has gained extreme power through his own power, while Carrera spends her days at will because she has an infinite lifespan, and Kondo is simply iparable.

    Only now, along with the pain of torturing herself, did Carrera finally understand.

    There is no point in being given skills.

    The ability to truly live up to its essence can only be acquired through one''s own desire.

    The rank of the race, the strength of the physical abilities, and the life force, all of which were overwhelmingly powerful for Carrera to upy.

    In terms of skill, thanks to Agera, there was a battle of attrition.

    Still, it was not possible to win.

    Not only that, but they were on the verge of defeat.

    If this goes on, are we going to lose?Which means to be wiped outdead? The strongest me I of one of the primordials of the demons!?

    This, absolutely cannot be agreed upon.

    The glory of Carrera could not allow it.

    Not to mention, it would go against the orders of Carrera''s favorite lord, the Demon Lord Rimuru.

    If it turned out that way, it would be a big mistake that could not be redeemed by killing herself a million times, and Carrera felt the fear.

    The inability toply with Rimuru''s orders had terrified Carrera, who had never before known what fear was.

    "It''s the only thing I absolutely disagree with!

    Carrera hissed loudly, looking angrily at Kondo with blood-filled eyes.

    Forcibly regenerate the wound and posture it.

    Carrera prayed even more deeply and intensely.

    Praying for victory over this man in front of you.

    So far, Carrera had fought by her own pure demonic power.

    But that alone will not do.

    It is absolutely impossible to reach people who are at the ultimate skill level.

    Diablo, for example, and Kondo, for example, in front of he.

    In the face of people who have awakened to the ultimate skill, she can not win, and the top of the Guy Crimson is not evenpared to.

    Thinking only about adding strength is not going to work.

    If that''s all, struggling no matter what, it''s just bait for the strong.

    Being pressed so hard, it finally dawned on Carrera.

    Those who want to fight the really strong must understand themselves more deeply.

    What is necessary for this is an unparalleled strong will.

    As a spiritual being, Carrera sought this moment of the will power of the essence.

    <<well, let="" me="" help="" a="" little.="">></well,>

    She seemed to hear such a sound.

    In the next moment, the "something" that was so moving deep inside of Carrera, felt a clear shape forming.

    Carrera searched her consciousness toward that.

    The one that gradually took shape by Carrera''s determination, by her prayers.

    So far, it''s all been a rampaging power within herself, always used again only through repressive control, but Carrera sees this power as her own.

    Then, liberation opens up.

    This ability, is in need of a name.

    O my "power" this is your name. In order toplete the task given to me by Lord Rimuru, be my power and liberate the power to go further. Your name is Abaddon, the King of Death!

    Abaddon, having the meaning of destroyer.

    Also, the King of Death.

    The power couldn''t have been more appropriate for king of destruction Carrera.

    Carrera finally got it.

    The absolute "power" that can destroy everything.

    King of Death

    This is the figurative of Carrera''s desire.

    Once liberated, it is able to bring about definite destruction, fearful empowerment for the adversary.

    For the first time, because of her encounter with a strong enemy, Carrera became hungry for power.

    Thus, the time hade for the battle between Carrera and Kondo to be decided.

    *** This isn''t a jokeKondo thought.

    To Kondo, it was like a mirage when he tried his best to push Carrera into a desperate situation, only to awaken the ultimate skill before his eyes.

    On several asions, Kondo had intended to inflict a death blow on Carrera. However, Carrera got back up again no matter how many times she was knocked down.

    Use the power of the Barrier Breaker Bomb to break the Barrier, and use the power of the Spell Breaker Bomb to disrupt Carrera''s magic circuit, then actually cause Carrera to umte damage, and finally use the power of the Destroyer Bomb to end the other party.

    It''s long overdue for a winner.

    However, Kondo, who had put out his full strength, not only failed to take down Carrera, but also awakened her strength.

    Kondo was deeply aware of his mistake.

    That''s true, if only there was still a "Kamikaze bomb

    The thought would arise, perhaps because Kondo was a little more squeamish.

    "The Divine Extermination (Kamikaze) Bomb was a once-a-day killer weapon, the strongest hit, yet it had just been used to weaken Veldora not long ago.

    Craving for something you can''t use in a fight that bets your life and death really doesn''t seem like a foolish act Kondo would do.

    The enemy, who was already strong enough, had acquired an unknown power, and the mere knowledge of it brought the mood into a gloom.

    Kondo, however, still tries to lift his spirits.

    Since they were already wearing the garments, they could only fight to the end without faltering.

    Kondo couldn''t help but spit out his feelings to Carrera for the first time.

    "You guys, this is so unconscionable.

    It is also natural to make a mockery of human frailty.

    The inter-ethnic "hierarchy" gap is too great to be filled.

    Even Kondo, couldn''t help but grumble about it.

    Hearing this, Carrera lifted her chin in satisfaction.

    "Ahhh, of course. After all, we are the strongest race, but you are not unreasonable enough, are you?

    It was the highestpliment that Carrera could utter.

    Carrera had already identified the other with being equal to herself, so in a show of utmost respect, went all out tounch the challenge.

    Aiming her sword at Kondo, she set up her stance without a care in the world, and Carrera let her right and left hands unleash the ''King of Death'', bringing her enormous power back into a circle.

    Between Kondo and Carrera, a stream of white and ck glow overflowed.

    By transforming the huge mana into energy, the afterglow alone seemed to blow people away.

    Carrera concentrated, harnessing all of her energy.

    Ill let you see what I''ve got.

    I''d really like to say no.

    "Oh, don''t be such a party pooper. It''s because I identify with you that I''ll show you my best magic!

    Kondo had a bad feeling when he heard the other party''s words.

    She doesn''t care about the mood of othersthat is the demon named Carrera.

    Leon also suffered for it, but at the time, Carrera was just amusing herself. While saying so can only seem more egregious in her nature, it was a much better experience for Kondo, who had to use the serious Carrera as a rival.

    Among the four primordials of the demon lord, including Diablo, the current Carrera prides herself on having thergest amount of mana, which she had not been able to control perfectly before, and this shoring was eliminated when she obtained the Death King Abaddon.

    The current Carrera, with her dominance over magic, is able to match Velgrynd.

    Ill send you destruction. Disperse! Final copse annihtion wave!!!"

    It was the ultimate magic that overrode the "gravity copse".

    It''s the biggest and strongest attack magic in Carrera''s ideal.

    By cing matter evoked from the bottom of hell in the gravitational copse force field, the magic was created that contained a great energy rush far beyond imagination.

    It is difficult to control this energy since it is not necessary to say how difficult it is, just to add directionality to this energy.

    Originally this was not the magic that was supposed to be used on the, but Carrera unleashed this magic without any confusion.

    If one step of control goes wrong, even the could be wiped out.

    It was not sessful when practiced in the underworld, and was used for the first time in the material world. The magic that had not been used sessfully so far was used without any hesitation.

    If Testarossa and others were present, they must have stopped Carrera anyway, but the people who could stop Carrera here did not exist.

    Even though Agera was present, it was too cruel to ask him to stop Carrera. It would be better to say that it is not Kondo who feels the most fear right now, but Agera who knows how scary that magic is.

    Then, speaking of Kondo.

    He felt a whiff of danger at the sight of Carrera''s preparatory movements and unfolded the ''King of Execution before he heard Carrera''s announcement.

    This ability to quickly judge a situation is what makes Kondo what he is.

    However, this time the opponent was too bad.

    The "Final Copse Annihtion Wave" is a great magic that is based on the premise of Carrera''s absurd magic, and its scope is so huge that if this ce is not otherworldly, I don''t know how much of a disaster it will cause.

    Maybe even this otherworld will be destroyedso Kondo spected.

    If things turned out that way, then all the matter on this magic ray that targeted Kondo would be wiped out.

    Kondo saw through that fact.

    If the Otherworld is destroyed, Emperor Rudra is also likely to be involved.

    Even if Rudra''s defense was foolproof, there was no guarantee that there wouldn''t be an eventuality that had to be prevented from happening.

    It''s more than that.

    Kondo was also aware of something even more problematic.

    From the way Carrera was staged, even this vicious magic was just a decoy. Even after carrying this blow, the real attack from the Demon de should stille from behind.

    That would be impossible to cope with.

    No matter the sacrifice, the path to survival cannot be opened without oveing this blow.

    Kondo was well aware.

    Put his knife in its sheath and wait for the right moment. Then, make a move while Carrera unleashes her magic.

    Gamble everything on yourself, draw the knife.

    Yaezakura, Yahasanori

    This skill, which Hakurou had demonstrated, is reproduced here.

    The power that is incorporated in this is the "kamikaze bomb" which should only be used once a day.

    If the limit cannot be exceeded here, what awaits Kondo will only be broken. Because of this, Kondo bets on all his possibilities with the confidence that he can do it.

    The glow of the power of the "soul" is even greater.

    As for whether that glow was Kondo''s, or Carreras

    At the very least, both were undoubtedly going all out.

    Kondo''s sword cut through the raging energy rushes generated by the "Final Copse Annihtion Wave".

    A smile emerged from the corners of Carrera''s mouth as she opened her eyes wide.

    Kondo''s whole body, was pervaded by intense pain.

    Even the mythical-grade garments, which possessed the strongest defense, had failed to defend against this breaking power.

    However, Kondo was not timid.

    Aiming with conviction at Carrera''s head, trying to get the eight flowers to bloom.

    Carrera, on the other hand, was a step above Kondo.

    "It''s not enough. Let''s see, afterbining Agera''s experience, my strongest skill!!!

    That is both words and not words.

    In a sh, Kondo''s thoughts were conveyed to Carrera.

    It was the Momochi sword sh that surpassed Kondo''s draw speed.

    The name of this skill is called MizuruHundred Flowers Dazzle".

    Under this unstoppable tyranny, Kondo''s saber snapped.

    Following that, Carrera''s final strike shes off Kondo''s shoulder.

    ...........

    ........

    ...

    Kondo felt a loss of strength throughout his body.

    In fact, it was beyond the limits of the body a long time ago.

    He closed his eyes and copsed on his back.

    Kondo''s life wasing to an end.

    Halfway through

    Thinking this way, heughed at himself.

    As a result, nothing has been done.

    Either to protect the homnd or to keep the covenant with Rudra.

    Be my friend

    Ahhhh, Ididn''t fulfill my agreement with you.

    What surfaced in Kondo''s mind was a feeling of regret.

    The thought of a pact that didn''t materialize made the heart feel like it was about to burst open.

    "Tatsuya, I have a favor to ask of you.

    Ill do as I am told. I''ll do anything I can as your friend.

    That''s right, it''s karma.

    To convey his gratitude to this Rudra, who calls himself a friend and gives his existence in this world meaning.

    Even so, that request is too cruel isn''t it?

    "A long time ago, I asked Damrada for a favor. If I loses my ideals, I hope you, as a friend, can stop me. But I have lived too long, and Damrada is too gentle to kill me himself. I''m sorry that I made such a big request of him.

    Thats

    "So, Tatsuya. If it were you, would you be able to calmly make a judgement to kill me? Go and get in the way of Damrada. You stop me.

    No, think of it my way

    For he himself equally wanted Rudra to live.

    Rudra is calm, sensible and full of dominance.

    He is the vision of Kondo and the hard-won lord.

    This man stopped Kondo, who had failed to protect his country and was about tomit suicide in this world, and became Kondo''s friend.

    The great hero, Emperor Rudra.

    Despite this, Kondo agreed to Rudra''s request because Kondo knew Rudra''s bitterness.

    Rudra''s body, his radiant soul, had long since reached its limit.

    Presumably the result of countless reincarnations to control the special powers of the King of Justice.

    Relying on his own unique skill of ''interpreting readers'', Kondo understood this fact more deeply than anyone else.

    Probably, more than Velgrynd understood.

    Velgrynd had be blinded by her love for Rudra, and no doubt would have been furious if she had learned of this request Rudra had made to Damrada and Kondo.

    Rudra''s request to Kondo was, in a sense, justified.

    As long as it is promised, it must be kept.

    If asked why, it''s because conventions are such things.

    However, the time for fulfilling the engagement wille muchter.

    That''s because Rudra is still very much in control at the moment.

    but is that really the case?

    Thinking about it now, there has long been a small sense of disconnection.

    The icy look that Rudra asionally showed was also too cold when making judgments.

    Kondo only knew Rudra in this state, but he knew that Damrada was thus distressed.

    If Rudra is indeed alive, what need is there for Damrada to agonize over it?

    It''s really suspicious when you think about it.

    Since when?

    When exactly did Damrada really start acting.

    Could it be that I''m missing something very important?

    Following orders to obstruct Damrada''s operations may have been a seriouspse.

    Having just met Rudra, he was indeed a radiant presence.

    Kondo, however, failed to notice Rudra''s deterioration.

    The moment he realized this fact, Kondo''s mind became clear.

    It''s like the inner shackles are liberated -

    So, I was alreadyat the mercy of the ''King of Justice

    What a wimp, he can''t help but sigh.

    That''s right.

    Instead of getting in his way when Damrada was preparing to kill Rudra, he should have taken the lead.

    That way, he would have stopped Rudra.

    Me, how out of character is this

    It is now irreparable.

    The reason why Kondo had been freed from the domination of the ''King of Justice'' wasn''t clear, except that he couldn''t even move a finger now.

    One can only wait quietly for death.

    Im so useless. Whether it''s carrying the pain with you or alleviating it, I''ve failed to do so. Andthe covenant that brings you relief also

    The task of stopping Rudra was probably not going to happen no matter how much thought was put into it.

    It can only be so, with remorse, to death

    ...........

    ........

    ...

    "Hey, dont go to sleep, keep fighting!

    As if to interrupt someone else''s sleep, such talk came.

    After opening his eyes slightly, he saw the enemy who had been fighting a deadly battle with himself until just now, looking over at him with a very irritated probe.

    The demon with the shining blond hair had a smile on her face as if she could chase away a sleeping demon.

    Sure enough, very beautiful.

    Dont say such strong words. I''m dying, how can I keep fighting?

    "Huh? I don''t think theres a winner yet.

    Heh, heh, a showdown? Yeah, sureyou''re so, so unreasonable

    His own meaning should have been impossible to convey to the other party, and Kondo smiled faintly even as he listened to Carrera''s words.

    Carrera''s energy was almost depleted, and presumably in a state of near annihtioughter welled up at the thought of it.

    He tries to get to his feet but fails miserably

    It''s ugly.

    I''m sure I didn''t get anything done.

    So free and purepared to himself, the demon before him

    I''m jealous, really.

    His heart really thinks so.

    So Kondo, spoke words that even he didn''t know the meaning of.

    "There is arequestwithmy gun, please kill His Majesty

    He wanted to entrust his mission to the enemy.

    What am I doing, making such a stupid request to an opponent who''s been fighting until now?

    The aspirations of the defeated are only met with ridicule.

    But somehow it came out anyway.

    Carrera picked up therge Southern-style automatic pistol that hadnded on the ground.

    "This? It''s broken.

    That''s true, Kondo thought hazily.

    One is surprisingly naive to think that the other might listen to one''s wishes.

    The demons are not so gentle.

    Kondo understood very well that reality is relentless.

    His awareness fades.

    Even as a "saint" who became a spiritual being, the original Kondo was only a human being, and if his

    "soul" was destroyed, he could not be resurrected.

    A strike from Carrera dealt Kondo a nasty blow.

    He can actually feel the copse from the end.

    At this stage, resurrection is no longer possible.

    "Hmph, just because the toy broke you gave up? It''s not like you''re the one who gave me a taste of pain. It''s a real bummer to have a fight like this.

    I really didn''t expect to be encouraged by the enemy.

    Kondo used hisst breath to reveal a bitter smile.

    "Heh, heh, it is indeedpleasant. I''m so ashamed of myself, I feelfunny

    After saying this, there was no desire to maintain consciousness.

    But

    "Wait, don''t die yet. Let me kill the emperor or whatever."

    ?

    "How stupid! What''s the payoff? It''smon sense that a deed is necessary to get a demon to work for you!

    Originally, Carrera was absolutely incapable of engaging the demon.

    However, for some reason, she felt that she could not help listening to Kondo''s wishes.

    But working for free definitely doesn''t cut it.

    Facing Carrera, who looked a bit flustered, Kondo couldn''t help butugh.

    It''s really enjoyable.

    He is the devil of the enemy.

    This seemingly somewhat embarrassed panicked gesture of hers healed Kondo''s heart.

    Everything I haveall of it, including my soul, please.

    Hes already out of words.

    With thest of his strength, Kondo opened his eyes, looking towards Carrera with a strong will.

    To believe the demons words is tough at yourself.

    But still, he carved that beautiful face into his mind and entrusted his wishes to her.

    Hopefully that thought would pass to Carrera, perhaps its just Kondo''s wishful thinking.

    Even so, hes betting on thisst hope in order to save his unhelpful self.

    The sound of his inept voice was conveyed to Carrera.

    "This wish, I have received. I, in the name of Carrera, the King of Destruction, recognize the deed! I''ll make your wishe true.

    Hearing this serious deration, Kondo shed a smile.

    The already disengaged hand made a movement by will alone, reaching for Carrera. What his fingers touched was the pistol that Carrera asserted had been damaged.

    The moment Kondo''s fingers made contact, therge Southern-style automatic pistol blossomed with a golden glow, bathed in Kondo''s power, and the material of the pistol gradually changed to mythical grade.

    Kondo''s "soul" is also taken over by Carrera through a pistol, however, it does not contain a heart core.

    Carrera knew.

    A person who reaches the realm of sinlessness after enlightenment, even if his soul is bound, cannot dispose of the core of his heart at will.

    Liberated from reincarnation without any constraints and set off towards the agreed ce.

    That is, liberation.

    It made Carrera feel lonely.

    "Hmph, that''s no fun. It is rare to meet such a resolute opponent

    Just as she whispered a small sigh

    <<then unite="" the="" king="" of="" execution="" into="" ultimate="" skill,="" death.="">> It felt like hearing that.</then>

    Carrera hurriedly turned her awareness to the pistol in her hand.

    The pistol shines with a more dazzling golden light, as if it were silently saying, "So you''re not lonely anymore.

    The pistol was undoubtedly Kondo''s relic, and today it was Carrera''s new partner.

    "So it isYou, who are with me.

    She finished and saw the pistol seem to sh.

    At the same time, it was felt that a force was flowing into the body.

    Youre too rough with using your magic. Let me help you use me more skillfully

    It seemed like Kondo could be heard saying so.

    The next moment, she understood everything.

    In a short moment, Kondo''s power was turned into possession.

    "Don''t treat me like a child, nosy guy.

    The man was so arrogant even to the endCarrera thought so.

    No longer feeling lonely.

    Carrera rose to her feet.

    "Congrattions on this beautiful victory, Agera is very impressed.

    "You''re not bad. You deserve credit for living this long."

    "I''m a little embarrassed to beplimented by Lord Carrera.

    Although Agera wasughing, he was already bruised all over his body.

    After being injected with a huge amount of magic power by Carrera, she was able to withstand Kondo''s sword skills with her de, which almost shattered under the impact, and now that the changes in her de had been lifted, all the attacks she had endured were returned to Agera, and it was a bit strange that she hadn''t been destroyed as a result.

    Agera, however, was all smiles of satisfaction.

    "This man, Kondo, is a descendant of your disciple, right?

    "It seems so.

    "A creature like man is not to be underestimated, the technology will be passed down from generation to generation and will continue to improve.

    Agera nodded happily.

    "But he''s better than you. It''s a little something.

    Agera frowned again in displeasure.

    "Better than this old man, but that man is an exception. If we fight only with swords, the one who wins will be this old man.

    "You can say that.

    Say it and the two willugh.

    In this regard, the two are quite simr.

    Ahead of Carrera''s line of sight was the otherworldly rift that was crumbling, and in the rift a glimpse of Emperor Rudra''s seated figure could be seen.

    "Come on, the fight''s just beginning.

    With a fearless smile, as usual, Carrera walked out.

    Whoever dares to stand in front of us, let him taste the horror carved into his bones!

    Agera followed behind Carrera.

    He was seriously injured, but he looked unconcerned and at ease.

    The enemy survives.

    And

    Most importantly, the promise must be fulfilled.

    ***

    "Single digit" rank three Graneet, the hero who has sustained the Empire from long ago.

    A central figure inying the foundations of the Empire and achieving peace for the millennium.

    He was once praised as a "military god" by the imperial subjects and was also a great man who went down in history.

    Now that he has retired from the surface arena, he has been appointed as the head of the Four Horsemen in the capacity of Emperor Rudra''s heartbeat.

    He is a fighter who is skilled with all weapons and fighting techniques and is physically tough.

    Although he is no less than two thousand years old, his ck hair and short shaved ck beard still give him a vibrant impression.

    Confronting Graneet was the re Lord, Benimaru.

    The two males stood opposite each other in the middle of the roundabout.

    "I am Graneet, Guardian of the Empire."

    "Benimaru. You can consider me Lord Rimuru''s adjutant.

    The names of the two sides have been reported and henceforth only war will be fought.

    "Ah, wait a minute. Aren''t you going to hear me out?

    Ill see what you have to say.

    "Nothing, it''s simple. I have investigated about you, and there are reports that you are quite a strong man.

    "That would be an honor."

    "Heh heh, that''s not blowing your mind. I''ve defeated a number of strong men before, so I think I''m pretty good at it. Even so, I think you''re qualified, and an ordinary demon lord would be no match for you.

    "What are you trying to say?"

    At this moment, Benimaru was starting to get impatient in his heart.

    He did not hate to negotiate, but now that the fighting was heating up, it was no longer appropriate to talk freely, and if the other side had intended to surrender, it was a different matter, as could be seen from Graneet''s appearance. Instead, it''s like intentionally dissuading the Benimaru.

    The idea is spot on.

    "I was surprised that you were so strong. Kondo was also unhelpful, as the Intelligence Bureau''s negligence brought us to a crisis in the Empire. If there are more losses than expected, it will be more than a showdown. So I thought I''d stop here and take an oath to be one of my men, huh? If you surrender, I swear that you and your men, I will take responsibility for their care."

    What a self-serving proposal.

    The proposal to propose an armistice is too much to be beaten, and in the opinion of a third party, it will only give rise to such thoughts.

    However, this is not the case.

    Graneet, never thought of such a thing as defeat.

    Only because they had lost a lot of battle power, they nned to absorb Benimaru and the others in order to replenish their battle power.

    Benimaru had intuitively explored this point, adding ayer of anger to his heart.

    Is this guygoing to use us as pawns? However, to the extent that there seems to be a corresponding strength to support his confidence.

    Benimaru calmlymented on Graneet.

    Since this proposal was thrown out in this otherworldly realm, it meant that he was also in control of the other ns, and it seemed that he was not only an escort, but should be seen as a martial artist who also had a tactical vision.

    Graneet''s proposal is worthless to Benimaru.

    "What will happen to Lord Rimuru, if not to my men?

    "It''s a shame, but that demon lord is too dangerous. In order to confirm your loyalty, it is necessary that you work together to crush him.

    Sure enough, Benimaru thought.

    To say it''s a coborative effort to defeat Rimuru is to expect us to kill each other.

    Of course, surviving this might result in being adopted as apanion, and Benimaru is no fool who would believe such a nk check.

    Most fundamentally, there was absolutely no reason for them to betray Rimuru.

    "No, we can''t talk. We can''t betray Lord Rimuru.

    The reason why he was still listening to the other party was because Benimaru was trying to buy time.

    In fact, just now, he had heard the "voice" of some unknown person.

    That wistful and pleasant voice that rang out of nowhere brought a proposal to Benimaru.

    <<o benimaru,="" can="" i="" help="" you="" with="" the="" power="" you''ve="" been="" waiting="" for?="">> Hearing such a dubious request, one would never nod one''s head in agreement if one were to do so normally, but Benimaru somehow agreed.</o>

    Benimaru''s race had evolved into a spiritual life form, the Divine me Spirit", but he was not satisfied with that. Benimaru wished to refer to the past experience that Rimuru had lent to him with his ability, and then obtain it through his own efforts.

    That goal has been half achieved.

    After witnessing the battle between Rimuru and Velgrynd and the otherpanions'' fighting figures, Benimaru also had an enlightenment.

    Combining the power of fire, which he is good at, with his unique skill ''Generalissimo''.

    Although the power of Rimuru''s "Absolute Severance" cannot be reproduced, the "Red Lotus" has been rebuilt by Kurobee and has gained mythical strength.

    The skills developed during the exercise and the racial characteristics of the Divine me Spirit", and the "Generalissimo"bined with these, are only one step away from reaching the peak of the ultimate.

    The mysterious voice was heard at this moment.

    Exactly what kind of changes would be brought about for themselves after the promise, and Benimaru wanted to witness that result.

    Because of this, he responds to Graneet''s conversation, but he regrets it again after hearing the other party persuade him to betray Rimuru.

    The mere hearing of such a proposal would be offensive.

    Benimaru drew his Taishin and posed to face Graneet as if he had heard enough.

    "Hey, hey, it''s not good to be in a hurry. The so-called way of the monsters" is to follow the strong and leave the weak, isn''t it? Isn''t itmonce for monsters to choose their masters?

    Hearing Graneets words, Benimaru''s brain felt like it was boiling with anger.

    As a general, he is well versed in calm thinking

    I have no right tough at Shion like this

    Although Benimaru was so self-deprecating, he had no intention of holding back his anger.

    "Draw your sword. I have nothing more to say to you.

    Hearing Benimaru reply like that, Graneet shook his head and muttered, "Oops, oops, oops".

    "I don''t understand. That''s mercy, my greatest concession? It is out of respect for your position that I have promised to let you be my men without pain

    Graneet seemed genuinely incredulous.

    There is no doubt about how strong you are.

    It was because of the belief that he was overwhelmingly superior to Benimaru that he said things like that.

    Understanding this, Benimaru''s anger steepened.

    There is only one reason why they haven''t shot yet.

    To make Graneet, regret his statement.

    "You''re just pushing and pulling to make excuses for failure, aren''t you?

    "Hahahaha, what a joke. I appreciate your aura, but you might as well have some more self-awareness.

    My men were probably proud that all three were defeated. I have no face to face with Your Majesty now, but if you nod, our strength will increase instead of decrease. It''s a good thing for me that you don''t have to die in vain, isn''t that a great way to build a rtionship? You should understand after hearing that. I have no intention of using you as abandoned sons.

    Perhaps noticing Benimaru''s restlessness, Graneet shamelessly blurted out.

    What was even more infuriating was being able to sense that he undoubtedly meant what he was saying.

    Graneet exudes the dominance of being a hero, proving forcefully that he has no need to y that kind of gimmick.

    "Since you are also a great general, think carefully. You think you can save your men, don''t you? And well, to tell you the hard truth, Kondo and Daramda are really strong. Damrada and I were allies a long time ago, and his character is well known to me. I''m the better man, but he''s also a strong man who won''t be defeated in the face of the "primordial". Also, there''s Kondo, who is clearly a rookie, but he can match us as well. It was only because it was too dangerous that he had been brought under His Majesty''s control, but even the "primordial" is no match for him. That is to say, in order to challenge Your Majesty Rudra, you must defeat the four Absolute Strongmen, including Lord Velgrynd and myself. You also understand that it''s impossible, right?

    This guy is unexpectedly loose-lippedthought Benimaru. A little bit of anger calmed down, intending to gather as much information as possible.

    Some of the other party''s remarks were indeed unpleasant, but if forbearance for a moment could probe the Empire, then Benimaru wouldn''t have anyints.

    The Emperor''s inclusion of Kondo in the domination was concerning, and it seemed that Emperor Rudra did hold some sort of domination system skill.

    "It''s unfortunate that you''ve been so vocal and unterally determined that we are the losers. Besides, even if we follow you, it''s not nice to have our hearts dominated, is it?

    "Hahaha, are you finally interested? That''s for sure, I''ve heard that the Great Ogre n is an excellent mercenary body, and also thought that you would decide whether or not to join us based on the conditions. On that note, feel free. As you feared, His Majesty does have the power over the people, but there''s no point in worrying about that.

    "Oh, not eptable? It''s normal, but it''s hard to do. Consider it an honor to be dominated, but anyone who is not capable will be ignored. Besides, although Kondo was dominated, he himself was not aware of it. I''m the only one who knows the truth, and I can''t help but feel a little sorry for him.

    "I know. I can''t talk about it.

    Can''t really talk.

    Graneet''s im, too, is not iprehensible.

    No one would be unfortunate if I was not self-conscious of being dominated, that''s the way it is, so give me eptance. No one could nod their head when they heard that.

    "Is that so? It''s true when I say you don''t have to worry. You may not believe much of what I say, but to put it another way, I can assert that you and yourpanion will never be dominated.

    Why?"

    "Because youre too weak.

    What a joke

    Benimaru''s anger red up again.

    Graneet''s tone was so natural that it waspletely unreadable as a bluff. He had no insult in mind, just judged Benimaru and the others as weak, as a matter of course.

    Benimaru prided himself on his strength since his evolution, but he never expected to be underestimated to such an extent.

    "All right, listen up. You belong to the strong among the adversaries, but when you be partners, you do not reach the value of being dominated. It seemed that not only Kondo, but Yuuki the brat was also dominated, and now His Majesty was dominating even Lord Veldora. I think there should be no more power left to dictate to you now, and as long as you take an oath of loyalty, you will certainly be given permission to act freely. Even if you all go together, you can''t beat me.

    "That''s a lot of confidence, but I believe in my own strength too. I don''t want to hear any more of your nonsense, so let''s decide who''s right and who''s wrong.

    Benimaru picked up the sword that was on his shoulder and repositioned himself. He had thought that he might be able to obtain useful information, but now he realized that it would only be more unpleasant to talk about it any longer, and gave up the idea of continuing to pry.

    Graneet sighed deeply, not too pleased.

    "Monsters are incorrigible. It''s sad that you still can''t see reality when I''ve reached out to you. I have no choice but to give up on you, and then deal with the one who fought Minaza.

    Benimaru snorted.

    "Stop that. Shion is more stubborn than I am."

    Hearing this, Graneet''s face showed a serious look for the first time.

    A joke? I shouldn''t have made an introduction, do you know who Minaza is?

    "Isn''t it natural to gather information on the battlefield? We must carry it out. That''s what Lord Rimuru taught us.

    "Well, interesting. It''s a shame to kill a man like you.

    Graneet had finally pulled out his sword, and although he was able to use a variety of weapons, the sword was still in his hands.

    The moment he raised his sword, Graneet showed a sudden change of atmosphere, so far smooth and gentle without a trace, but instead released a domineering aura like a spirit reborn.

    The short hair on his head was upside down, as if he was in a rage.

    "There is a saying in the stories of the otherworldly world: "The swallow knows the will of the swan."

    It means that the little guy can''t understand the big guy''s thoughts. While I''m trying to reason with you, just do what I say.

    "Do you want to lobby at this point? I''m almost tired of hearing about it.

    "Huh! Then go to hell! The Breaking Army - Shock and Awe!

    Graneet made the most powerful must-kill with the first blow, and he was sure that with this blow he would be able to settle Benimaru.

    What Graneet excels at is the analysis of the enemy.

    With the power of the "power of substitution", the "enemy''s ability to see through the enemy", borrowed from Rudra, it is possible to see the fighting ability of the opponent.

    Therefore, Graneet had correctly grasped the strength of Benimaru and others, and because of this, he was sure that these people in his own camp could not possibly lose.

    Of course, the enemy is not omnipotent, and when the enemy awakens to the ultimate skill, it is impossible to know the power of the ultimate skill.

    But just by looking at the amount of mana the guy has, it''s easy to tell what level of power the other person has.

    From this point of view, Benimaru and the others are not a threat.

    Benimaru, Souei, Shion, and the demons, it was clear to Graneet that none of them had acquired ultimate skills.

    "The primordials are difficult to deal with, and understand that it is not valid to deal with them, if the demonse in and kill directly, but it is Benimaru who shows up in front of Graneet.

    In Graneet''s opinion, Benimaru had the potential to awaken ultimate skills, but was no match for him.

    The amount of mana of Benimaru was indeed staggering, and even then it was less than half of Graneet''s, and in a sense, it was normal to make non-threatening judgments.

    And, Graneet didn''t take it lightly or ck off.

    If the enemy has ultimate skills, depending on the situation, it is possible to get into a bitter fight. Once thebat time is extended, there is also the possibility of the enemy awakening to the ultimate skill due to perceived danger.

    But just talking for a while and suddenly increasing in strength, such a thing is not possible.

    So Graneet is looking to settle for an overwhelming submission that doesn''t give his opponent any chance to fight back.

    It was already clear that Benimaru didn''t have a hidden skill like the flying dragons ''transformation'', so Benimaru''s chances of winning would be one in ten thousand.

    Because of this, Graneet will undoubtedly win

    "It''s so gentle, so pompous, but it''s no big deal."

    "What, what?"

    Unexpected things happen.

    The energy contained in the Broken Army - Kic Shock was enough to crush Benimaru into pieces, but he was blocked by Benimaru''s sword.

    This is an impossible sight.

    All of Graneet''s equipment was mythical-grade, and Benimaru''s Taishou, although considered excellent, should not reach the strength of the true mythical grade.

    No, before that

    "No way, no way, no way! Whywhy have you acquired an ultimate skill!?

    It''s only natural that Graneet would scream.

    The ultimate skills that have so far gonepletely unseen cannot be acquired so suddenly.

    Facing a panicked Graneet, Benimaru was very calm.

    "What''s incredible? A man is onee who grows all the time!

    Benimaru looked tugged on the surface, but his heart was filled with cold sweat.

    The moment he received Graneet''s brute sword was the moment Benimaru gained his power, and Benimaru correctly grasped Graneet''s power in a split second.

    As long as the time deviates a little bit, it is estimated that Benimaru will suffer horrible damage. While he may not be able to die, he really can notugh out loud.

    That was close. I didn''t expect this guy to hide his strength to such an extent, and I wasn''t careless, but without it I might have lost.

    It was good to be with Graneet after all that talkthought Benimaru.

    "Well, then, it''s my turn.

    Benimaru collected himself and focused on the enemy in front of him.

    As far as results are concerned, it is good to live, and introspection is saved forter.

    The power just acquired was exactly the ideal form of his imagination, so Benimaru calmly and unstintingly disyed it.

    The ultimate skill, the "zing Sun Lord Amaterasu"this is the terrifying power from Ciel to analyze the power of Velgrynd and reveal it to the world.

    Benimaru''s Taishin was wrapped in a ck glow, the symbol of Benimaru''s power, Amaterasu''.

    There are two levels of meaning to what is called Amaterasu.

    Understood as a meteorological phenomenon, and by extension, as a physical, non-burning, non-freezing, non-stop "invisiblew".

    The otheryer of meaning is even less so.

    It''s the light of the sun, an extremely hot me.

    With the two characteristics of Amaterasu, plus Benimaru''s sword skill, it was hard for Benimaru to even imagine how much his power would rise.

    Graneet lived up to the name of the "God of War" and chose to respond in a reasonable manner.

    After only a moment of surprise, he regained hisposure and began to look for Benimaru''s weakness.

    Probably due to the acquisition of the ultimate skill, the amount of mana of Benimaru was reduced by a lot, and even then it was not something that an ordinary demon lord could match, turning it into a third of the amount of Graneets mana.

    Unknown powers are a threat, but a full-strength shot can still win.

    Graneet yelled.

    "Don''t underestimate me, you little monster! The next blow is not going to be polite, I''m going to give it my all to beat you guys!

    In the former Imperial Army, Graneet''s strength was second only to that of Velgrynd. In fact, he''s so much stronger than Damrada that even with Kondo as his opponent, it''s estimated that he''ll be a tie.

    This is still true today.

    Simply because there''s no chance of moving the real thing, Rudra''s guard isn''t made for anyone.

    Graneet puts on the full force, looking to take Benimaru down for good.

    "Die, Army of the Damned - Shock and Awe!

    Although it was the same move as before, the difference in power was huge.

    A fierce hegemony burst out, thunder and lightning in the atmosphere.

    But these attacks only went through Benimaru.

    No matter what kind of attack it was, it would not be able to capture Amaterasu.

    At this moment, a roaring sound was heard.

    Not in this space, but in some other other realm where something is happening.

    Carrera, this guy, he''s really pushing.

    Benimaru''s mind yed out in great detail what Carrera had done.

    Of course, it was not through the observation of Moss that he gained the ultimate skill of the "King of zing Sun", but the vision of his men, who were connected to the "Soul Corridor" of Rimuru, became "visible" to Benimaru as well.

    As a result, Benimaru also mastered Carrera''s moves.

    "Let''s show you my collection, even though I just saw it, but let''s do it!

    What?

    Graneet failed to respond.

    He had already turned to burning dust from Benimaru''s counter moves.

    That being said, the scary thing is Benimaru.

    The "King of zing Sun, Amaterasu, who has been analyzing the power of Velgrynd, has the power to elerate himself with the power of "Light and Heat Control".

    Although the moves used by Benimaru were not as fast as the Scorch Dragons elerated speed, he had also be capable of using the Sword sh with divine speed.

    The invincible, powerful and fast

    "It''s called prominence eleration". Well, I guess I can''t hear you either.

    Benimaru dropped the words and turned around with a look of relief.

    Graneet is actually very strong.

    He is also calcting, careful and in good shape.

    Even so, it was lost, summed up in one phrase: "bad luck".

    To say that there is one thing that must be reflected upon, is the failure to do so when one can defeat the enemy. Graneet died from talking too much.

    Not being able to repeat the mistake himself, Benimaru carved the thought into his heart.

    *** Velgrynd was anxious.

    This is because, her own ''other body'' was eaten by Rimuru.

    The dreaded Demon Lord Rimuru.

    Unable tomunicate with the eaten ''other body'', the thoughts transmitted here are swallowed into the abyss without any response.

    Even injecting energy is like throwing yourself into a bottomless swamp. Understanding that these actions made no sense, Velgrynd bit her lower lip lightly.

    About half of the energy just disappeared, and there was no sign of it going back. Confident and invincible, ''Parallel Existence'' had been defeated, and it was now difficult to remain calm any longer.

    The Velgrynd now had only 20% of the amount of manapared to when she was in her full state.

    You can judge that you can''t win against Rimuru, and you must make a decision to escape from here.

    "Rudra, he must not be put in danger

    Velgrynd thought about it and decided to give up the guard on the door. Perhaps it was lucky that no one had attacked yet and she could walk outside without hesitation. If someonees to stop her, then by all means settle it.

    Unexpectedly, several silhouettes were found in the area surrounded by the eight doors.

    "Geez, what''s with all the panic? Have you forgotten something, Lord Velgrynd?

    The one who asked the question was Testarossa, who was enjoying her tea as if she was the dominant one.

    Primordial white

    Velgrynd red at the grinning Testarossa with a disgruntled face, and it was precisely because she was in a hurry that she became enraged by the appearance of this difficult opponent.

    Testarossa smiled elegantly, in stark contrast to Velgrynd.

    "I told you not to call me that, right? Oris this a provocation?

    The skin doesn''t smile.

    In the face of the overwhelmingly dominant Velgrynd, Testarossa remains unrelenting in her stance.

    "You still want to fight me after all the pain you''ve been through?

    "Well, yeah. I don''t need to win, just buy time from you.

    Testarossa stood up as she answered, Velgrynd''s fist looming just in time.

    The tables and chairs were shattered from the shockwave, and Esprit and Zonda had long since taken refuge in order not to get caught up in it.

    Testarossa moved with ease.

    With the heat that would have burned into charcoal on mere contact, and the inability to see the speed, there was no need to force a pickup of Velgrynd''s onught.

    Let''s not talk about skills for a moment, there was a tenfold difference in the amount of mana between the two, and even though Velgrynd only had about 20% mana left, there was still a big difference.

    Testarossa remained calm and collected.

    It''s hard to win because there''s no means of being able to beat Velgrynd.

    But if it''s just about buying time, there''s not a problem at all with Testarossa''s strength.

    "That''s why I hate you people!

    "Gee, what a shame. I have the deepest respect for you, Veldora''s sister.

    "Pretentious. Then don''t make a scene, back off from there!

    "Please forgive me for refusing this request, don''t look at me like this, I still hate to lose. So, please let me have my revenge now!

    This is, from the heart of Testarossa.

    Although it was impossible to win a real fight with Velgrynd, there was still no problem in disrupting Velgrynd''s mind. Even if it didn''t wait to rendezvous with the rest of the subordinates, it would be a little while before Rimuru would arrive.

    By then, it would be certain that it was a victory for Testarossa.

    Ahhh, what a wonderful victory for Lord Rimuru, to have the overwhelming Lord Velgrynd ying around like a child, I can''t lose either.

    With all the means that Velgrynd possessed, Rimuru had already forced her to exert them to the fullest, so Testarossa would definitely not let this opportunity go.

    Red and white crossed.

    One side fierce, one side graceful.

    The red and white intertwined with each other at an rming rate, and the two did not touch once and faced each other again.

    "Yes, even I''m surprised. I tried to gain the ultimate skill, that''s probably why.

    Testarossa replied with ease, as if none of this mattered.

    In fact, Testarossa used the waiting time to pray for new powers. As a result, sess has been achieved in making the form of one''s own heart figurative.

    At the time, it felt as if an incredible "voice" had been heard, but Testarossa decisively decided that it was an illusion. Relying on instinct to choose the right answer is what makes a demon Testarossa.

    The power that makes people care is called the ultimate skill Hell King Belial".

    Like Ruminas'' ''King of Lust'', she is in charge of ''life and death'', but with a greater preference for the

    ''death'' side, which no doubt reflects the nature of Testarossa.

    For her, defeat was an absolutely unrecognizable humiliation, let alone death.

    One of the conditions for the evolution of demons is "the umtion of power up to an upper limit and over two thousand years". It means not to allow a single failure, and by failure here, it means perdition.

    The phenomenon of the flesh disappearing back into hell is called failure.

    Strictly speaking, a "tie" is not counted as a failure.

    However, running away is another matter.

    A spiritual being is a being that is swayed by its own heart, and when it admits that it can''t beat the other person and stops challenging it, it''s a failure.

    In this world, there were strange demons like Diablo who remained undefeated in the truest sense of the word, and as far as Testarossa knew, such people could be counted on just one hand.

    As long as the heart doesn''t give in, that''s fine.

    Thus, Testarossa never stopped challenging Zegion, and as long as the challenge didn''t stop before the win, it wasn''t a defeat.

    It''s the same this time.

    As long as there was no escape from Velgrynd, one day there would be victoryTestarossa had always believed so.

    Acquired an ultimate skill?"

    "Yes, Diablo''s show-offs were tiresome as a reason, and the previous battle had made myself deeply aware thatck of strength was the main reason. Since skills are a reflection of the mind, they are not necessary for me and others. It''s always been that way in the past, but it seems to be ill-considered.

    "Maybe it''s because you can face your desires and feel your power being used in a more sensitive way.

    Just because Velgrynd also possessed the ultimate skill ''King of Charity, she was able to understand the meaning of Testarossa''s words, and therefore realized more clearly that retreating from here was bing difficult.

    "What an abomination

    Velgrynd''s uncontroble grumbling made Testarossaugh.

    "Where''s the bestpliment?

    Just as Velgrynd was about to burst into a rage over this responsea massive explosionrge enough to distort space urred.

    Thus regaining his senses, Velgrynd looked back in surprise.

    A door that was beautifully knocked off its feet.

    Appearing there, was the blonde demon Carrera.

    By the way, some of Leons notoriety was caused by what Carrera had done, but those things had little to do with the current side of the fight.

    "Yeah, looks like it''s caught up. I hate losing too, let me in too.

    "Whoo-hoo-hoo-hoo, no way. Oh, Carrera, I don''t mean to be hard on you, but aren''t you covered in bruises?

    "That Kondo guy is too strong, but I''m satisfied. I''ll give it to you today.

    The smiling Carrera staggered as she walked, and Esprit rushed to support her body, and Zonda immediately and thoughtfully prepared a chair to guide Carrera over there.

    Agera followed out, but he was left alone.

    "Since Carrera has chosen to be patient, we''re not going to be capricious, and we''re a little tired, so let''s just take a tour today.

    Not knowing when Ultima had taken a seat next to Carrera, it turned out that it was Veyron who had prepared the chair with care long ago.

    The demons assembled in session.

    Of course, that''s not all.

    Shion, Souei, and Benimaru, all emerged from their respective doors.

    Seeing these faces, Velgrynd''s face couldn''t help but twitch, because it made her realize that the strongmen of her own camp had all been defeated.

    Testarossa''s tactical victory.

    The aspirations of Rudra and Velgrynd were about to fall through.

    ***

    Moving the perspective from the sky to the earth

    On the battlefield, the heat of the battle was cooling.

    Among other things, Lace with Vega is in action with Kagali as his target.

    Taboo Spell: The undead spell seems long over. More urately, because of the loss of Velgrynd''s assistance, Kagali lost control.

    It wasn''t clear how many undead elves had been born, but it should be some time before they started to move.

    Depending on the consciousness of the undead elves that were boarding, it was possible to birth naturally powerful warriors, so it was necessary to restrain their movements earlier than anyone else.

    Lace would think so, and surely others woulde to the same conclusion. Lt. Kondo, who guided the ceremony, could not have been unaware of these things.

    "Geez, I''m getting a head start.

    By the time Lace reached his destination, Imperial soldiers were transporting them into military vehicles.

    "Oh, you''re Lace. I hear you''re pretty strong, so a fight is inevitable?

    The man who spoke to Lace was a civilized man in a different color uniform, Lieutenant Kondo''s white gown was very conspicuous, but the man''s bright red uniform also showed an unusual air.

    However, he does not look very strong.

    With a face that looks like it was made to look like a doll, it''s an incredible person with a gender that looks like a man and a woman.

    The supposedly mediocre appearance would probably not have made an impression had it not been for the bright military uniform.

    No, perhaps it was precisely because the uniform was too bright that the impression of this man could not be made. Lace watches while he responds cautiously.

    "Yes, my name is Lace. If you give that man back to our family, there''s no need to fight?

    "Oh, well, that can''t be done. Look, there''s still a fight going on over there. I can''t run away on my own.

    This man seems to be going to a fight.

    No way, Lace was ready for battle.

    "Then there''s nothing you can do. Who are you?

    Just ask, if you can answer, you earn it.

    "Me? Also, not knowing is taken for granted. I am the tenth in the sequence, and I am the one who supports the history of the EmpireFeldway"!

    Feldway, resident in the Imperial Army, served as a reserve in case of vacancies in the "single digits.

    Lace had also heard such rumors, but it was the first time he had seen them in person.

    "Yes? You''re the man who''s called a backup.

    "Not a man, but not a woman either.

    "What a mess."

    Lace peered in on his opponent while conversing, who was neither arrogant nor natural, posing as abatant, nor trying to run away.

    Hes a bit elusive.

    Vega was anxious.

    "Give it to me, and I''ll kill this guy!

    Lace hastened to stop Vega who was trying toe forward.

    "Wait a minute, I told you not to do anything rash! Chairman, they are basically hostages, so don''t take them lightly.

    Both Footman and Tear are alive and well and are now fighting arge number of enemies. If they were called, it would really be impossible to predict where the battle was headed.

    Lace cautiously tries his opponent''s attitude, but is hampered by the appearance of an unexpected character.

    "Vega,e help me. Lace is the betrayer, settle him here.

    "What the?"

    Feeling a strong killing intent, Lace chose to retreat, and the voice that came through was from the trusty Boss, Yuuki Kagurazaka.

    What was spoken, however, was not what Lace had expected.

    "Boss, get back to normal! To be manipted by someone else, that''s not your style at all!

    Even the domination of Mariabell couldnt affect Yuuki, with such spiritual power, he should be able to resist any spiritual domination.

    However, Lace''s words did not work.

    Yuuki charged at Lace without any confusion.

    Seeing this, the bewildered Vega gave a twisted smile of pleasure.

    "Yeah, boss! Can I eat this guy after we get rid of him?

    "Ah, yes. I''d love to see you get stronger.

    "That''s the boss, I see what you mean!

    Following the strong, Vega is such a person.

    Lacking an ethical outlook and morality, living on instinct more than wild animals.

    Thus not feeling in the slightest that his treachery was sinful, high spirits began to strike out at Lace.

    Yuuki and Vega can be dealt with by just one opponent, but even Lace can''t be dealt with by two opponents at the same time.

    Geez, this isn''t good. Don''t talk about saving the chairman, our family will probably be killed. There is no choice but to get out of here first

    Lace''s idea is strategically correct.

    However, it didn''t work out.

    "There''s no use trying to escape. Is your name Lace? You sir are both cunning and cautious, and it''s no good letting you get away, so let you die here.

    As the saying goes, Lace''s transfer failed.

    Feldway, who had been watching from afar, had ''space domination'' over this area of the battlefield.

    "Damn it!

    The hard kicks from Yuuki, and the scattered energy that Vega was releasing in tandem with the unleashed, were a good thing in the sense of a fight, even though Vega''s head was full of muscle.

    The escape route is blocked and the chances of winning are slim. No, as long as Yuuki is here, there''s no chance of winning.

    No. Is this the end of our family?

    Even so, Lace wasn''t about to give up and decided to bet on the slightest possibility of Yuuki unlocking his spiritual domination and exerting the strength he had been hiding.

    "Go to hell!

    "You idiot! It''s you who''s dead!

    Using Yuuki''s attack, Vega is able to kick at the approaching Vega, who is unable to stand up for the moment.

    "Hey, you''re good at this?"

    "Not bad, not as good as the Boss, but we''re strong, too, right?

    "I know, so at least, I''ll kill you myself.

    What?"

    With a small sense of defiance, Lace, noticing this, scrambled to gaze up at Yuuki''s face.

    Sure enough, it''s a face hes used to seeing

    Carelessly, Lace, who couldn''t help but fall into thought, reacted somewhat dyed in the face of Yuuki''s fist.

    Oopsscreaming inside.

    And yetthere was no paining through.

    Because in front of Lace''s eyes, Yuuki''s fist was blocked by a certain figure.

    "Kufufufufu. It''s all your fault if you''re med by Lord Rimuru.

    It''s Diablo.

    What do you mean?Lace couldn''t help but want to spit, but kept his weight up because this wasn''t the time for that.

    "Eh, Diablo-kun, are you here to save me?

    "Huh? Why would Iuh, yeah. Are you Lace? I''m here to save you. So, when you report to Rimuru-sama, remember to emphasize to him that I saved your life.

    As soon as he reversed his earlier look of disgust, Diablo revealed a bright smile and said so.

    We haven''t even seen such a suspicious smile in our family once.

    It''s remarkable that Diablo could be identified in this way by the admittedly suspicious Lace, and of course, there''s nothing ttering about it.

    "Yes, I know. I''ve been very well cared for by Mr. Diablo, and I''ll convey it to Lord Rimuru."

    "Good! So, give it a try!

    In fact, Diablo had just been told by Rimuru What are you, staying here for? Such a rebuke.

    With everyone fighting, it was only natural that he would be reprimanded when he was alone in visiting Rimuru''s battle.

    Although Diablo is responsible for escorting Rimuru, he is unable to say anything to Rimuru, who has forgotten all about what he ordered.

    The sight of Rimuru alone, capable ofmanding the whims of Diablo, is another moment of proof of this fact.

    Taken together, Diablo ran out because he had been given orders to work, and afterwards, hearing Moss'' report, rushed here.

    Not to help Lace, but rather just to get rid of the suspicious elements.

    Kufufu, you''re lucky to be selling favors here. In that case, Lord Rimuru''s opinion of me will be restored, I suppose.

    So much so that Diablo is already thinking about whates after the win.

    "Then I''ll leave Yuuki over there alone because of the allianceHuh? What? Isn''t this the Phantom King? I know you''ve been coveting this world, so it turns out that''s what''s going on, joining forces with Rudra, right?

    Ahead of Diablo''s line of sight was the expressive, shallowly smiling Feldway. Diablo''s appearance caused his smile to fade, revealing an evil ghost-like expression as he looked at Diablo.

    "Is that so? Are you the Original ck? ording to Kondo''s investigation, it''s true that the ck Primordial has be one of Demon Lord Rimurus men.

    "I am now, with the name Diablo. I have nothing to do with your ns, and if you try to interfere with Lord Rimuru, do not me me for not showing mercy. If you choose to be hostile, I advise you to be aware of it first.

    "How kind of you to say that! It''s not you, you taboo demons, who keep getting in my way!

    Feldway stared at Diablo with fierce hatred, and this killing intent alone showed an aura that would kill an ordinary person.

    But Diablo was unfazed, and said with a face as if provoking Feldway.

    "Forget it. Even if I fight you here, my chances of winning are zero.

    "Don''t worry, I don''t think it''s possible to win.

    After the two men briefly red at each other, Feldway opened his mouth first.

    "I will stand down for the day, and if you interfere with me next time, you will have to be aware, Diablo.

    "Hmm. For the sake of remembering my name, I''ll leave you alone. That said, I will prepare the means to kill you, so please keep that in mind.

    After a few words, the two stared at each other again, and then acted as if they were done, each ignoring the other''s presence.

    Feldway gave the order to Kagali and Yuuki.

    "I fear something may happen to His Majesty Rudra, and I must return to the gship and make preparations."

    At his words, Yuuki, who had been spying on the situation, lifted the fighting stance, and Vega, dragging his shaky body, stood up, following Yuuki back toward Kagali in their direction.

    Footman and Tear were called back, relying on Feldway''s ''space domination'' and shifted away, including the entirety of the undead elf n.

    Diablo remained here and made contact with Moss. Now that it is known that there is a demon king among the enemies, the only one who can fight against it at the moment, ording to Diablo''s judgment, is himself, though reluctantly, acting again for the good.

    After the retreat of Footman and Tear, the battlefield battle came to an end, and reasonable instructions were given for the treatment of the wounded after confirming that all the men had survived.

    Moss was very good and connected with Benimaru as well. Thinking that the work here hade to an end, Diablo himself arrived at the gship by transfer after they had disappeared from Feldway.

    Lace is the only one left.

    "What, leaving our family alone again?

    Lace muttered, slumping his shoulders listlessly.

 Volume 15 - Epilogue

    Epilogue: Sister and Brother

    After eating Velgrynd, I calmed down.

    Now that there was room to focus on the surroundings, he made his rounds of the battlefield.

    The forest was badly damaged, but the capital city of Rimuru appeared to be safe and sound, and the area around the city had been somewhat damaged, though most of it seemed to be guarded by the Geldites.

    Im relieved for the time being.

    "So, what are you doing here?

    "Isn''t this fine, Lord Rimuru? In fact, I was trying to keep someone from getting in the way of Lord Rimuru

    During the fight with Velgrynd, I sensed that there was someone watching the whole fight all the time, and to be honest the situation was quite annoying, but I didn''t have any spare energy to pay attention to such things at the time.

    And then it''s on to the present.

    Of course I''m not.

    "Come on, everyone else is working hard. You go to work too.

    ??I do, I do

    After ncing at me with a sad look, Diablo left.

    This guy alone, I really can''t figure out what he''s thinking.

    <<in order="" that="" no="" one="" may=""e="" to="" obstruct="" the="" master,="" he="" nned="" stay="" here="" as="" an="" escortwatching="" battle="" with="" such="" a="" n,="" honestly,="" not="" at="" all.="">> Ciel seemed to find Diablo annoying as well.</in>

    Pungent tones that wouldn''t normally be used came out.

    All in all, it''s time to quiet down and deal with Velgrynd.

    Although the work of persuasion and illustration has been handed over to Veldora

    I tried to inquire and found that Veldora had put all the me on me.

    Oi oi oi, howe all the problem children are on my side!? Its making people madder and madder.

    This guy seems to be trying to portray me as evil so he can deflect Velgrynd''s anger.

    "Anyway, I wanted to tell my sister that I was safe, but I couldn''t get permission from Rimuru. Now that you''re in the same situation, can you understand what I mean by that?

    Thats how Veldora''s words feel.

    It''s like hes a bad child who puts all the me on his friends for fear of being reprimanded.

    The task of convincing Velgrynd was a failure.

    But, indeed.

    It would be very embarrassing for my sister to appear out of nowhere in the mistaken belief that she had died.

    Understanding is understanding, but what the hell is it to me me for all this?

    Isn''t this just a simple way of putting all your troubles on me?

    He was supposed to help mediate, but now it feels like the anger directed at me has intensifiedah ah, it''s not working at all!

    I can''t leave this to Veldora anymore.

    It was necessary to exin well to her that Velgrynd and Veldora were now in the same situation.

    <<before that,="" there''s="" something="" to="" report.="">></before>

    What is it?

    <<the parsing="" of="" velgrynd="" identifies="" that="" she="" appears="" to="" be="" under="" the="" domination="" someonemost="" likely="" rudra''s="" power.="" what="" do="" you="" think?="">> Hey, hey, hey, thats a hell of a statement!</the>

    I''m a little troubled by how you''re going to respond when you report it to me so calmly.

    I had thought that the Ciel would ''analyze'' Velgrynd, and I wasn''t too surprised about that, but Velgrynd was being dominated, and I couldn''t keep quiet about it.

    By the way, is the prisoner sure it''s Rudra?

    <<basically certain.="" in="" addition,="" while="" watching="" the="" battle="" between="" carrera="" and="" tatsuya="" kondo="" through="" "soul="" corridor",="" it="" appears="" that="" is="" also="" dominated="" by="" rudra.="" presumably,="" they="" are="" same="" state.="">> After inquiring about the situation in detail, Graneet who was Benimaru''s opponent, said everything as if he was a bamboo tube pouring out beans.</basically>

    It''s a silly feeling for him to be the enemy.

    This guy''s behavior must be taken as a counter example and thoroughly memorized by all.

    However, these are topics to be discussed when you return safely.

    The immediate question is what exactly to do with Velgrynd.

    It was obviously impossible to rely on Veldora, so it was up to me to exin, but because of the influence of Veldora''s spiritual domination, Velgrynd would probably not listen to my exnation at all.

    Well, what can be done about this?

    <<how about="" putting="" velgrynd="" in="" the="" same="" position="" as="" veldora,="" since="" it="" is="" rare="" to="" absorb="" it?="">> Huh?</how>

    That is to say, like Veldora, a "Soul Corridor" can be created between me and Velgrynd, making her my ultimate skill?

    Can it be done?

    <<there is="" no="" question="" that="" the="" current="" lord="" rimuru="" equal="" to="" or="" even="" above="" dragon="" race,="" and="" amount="" of="" mana="" abundant.="" it''s="" entirely="" possible="" absorb="" velgrynd.="">> But to do so would not take away Velgrynd''s free willor would it?</there>

    Like Veldora, I couldn''t force him to do anything, and even when I asked him to do something, it was only implemented after he agreed.

    Veldora is more than enough to do as he pleases.

    And now, I''ve sold out without hesitation to save myself.

    Although I would have sentenced him to confiscation of snacks at such a time, but when I think about it, I was really tormented by him.

    Assuming that Veldora actually does something against me, I can''t undo his liberated state either, though I can stop providing energy, but I can''t make Veldora disappear.

    Besides, the True Dragon Race is sorge that it is not an easy existence to disappear. Unless Veldora himself epts the return, he will always be free to move about.

    That is, I don''t have any coercive power over Veldora, basically I can''t force him to do anything as long as I liberate him.

    Thinking about it, I realized that Velgrynd was only going to turn out to be in the same situation.

    Putting Velgrynd in the same position as Veldora and then ''liberating'' her was the quickest way to prove my innocence.

    Then they will not continue to be misunderstood and suffer.

    Sibling quarrel?

    Don''t know don''t know.

    This kind of thing is not under my supervision.

    Anyway, that''s it, so hurry up and get Velgrynd in the same state as Veldora.

    <<if you="" feel="" uneasy,="" should="" add="" restraints="" to="" velgrynd?="">> Hmm?</if>

    Combined with the constraints, can even such a thing be done?

    Adding the condition that Velgrynd can''t resist me is probably still necessary considering what''s toe.

    Butthat approach goes against my principles.

    If Velgrynd just couldn''t take it, I might as well continue to iste her in infinite space''.

    Put a mandatory condition on her, and I''d be on the same page as Rudra.

    Even if she doesn''t want to assist me, it doesn''t matter.

    As long as she vowed to stay out of the way, she had no problem going anywhere she wanted to live her life.

    <<understood. i="" think="" it''s="" only="" fitting="" for="" lord="" rimuru.="">> The direction has been decided.</understood.>

    Then let the execution begin.

    Start by saying hello.

    "Ah, Miss Velgrynd, are you all right

    "You''re Rimuru, righ!t? You gotta be kidding me! Get me out of here now!

    I turned my consciousness to the infinite space, and Velgrynd was in the thick of it.

    The scene feels like it looks like a suspicious Slime is coercing the beautiful woman.

    Just what you would call a criminal.

    That Slime is meer, in human form and back again.

    The atmosphere is rather eerie, but it can''t be helped.

    Everything was done to prove my innocence.

    By imagination, I covered Velgrynd with my hands.

    And then ate Rudra''s power and ''unlocked'' it, and then created a "Soul Corridor" with Velgrynd. The door is a two-way thing, and it''s set up in such a way that Velgrynd doesn''t open up, and I can''tmunicate with her.

    But I can still hitch a ride unterally, hoping that doing so won''t be pointless.

    The above homework was done without any problems.

    The rambunctious Velgrynd came down honestly, and the change was a little surprising to me so suddenly.

    "Ahh, Rimuru? You, couldn''t have done something unruly to sister, could you?

    "You idiot! How could I do something like that!? After all, if you could convince her properly, I wouldn''t have to work so hard!

    It was like the two of us were going to fight

    "Shut up, all of you!

    "Ah, yes.

    Sorry!"

    There was a sudden loud cry that made both Veldora and I lower our heads at the same time.

    Honestly, it''s scary.

    No wonder Veldora found her difficult to deal with.

    "What the hell''s going on, Rimuru?"

    "Just, even if you ask me what''s going on

    What the hell is being said ispletely unintelligible.

    "I can hear the ''other body'' voice over there, but my voice doesn''t go there? What the hell have you done?

    My heart couldn''t help but skip a beat as I was glued to the face by the super gorgeous beauty.

    Her breath came to her face and it felt ticklish.

    It smells so good.

    I was supposed to not need to breathe, but Velgrynd''s scent was very sweet.

    <<now is="" not="" the="" time="" to="" care="" about="" those="" things.="" answer="" velgrynd''s="" query="" should="" be="" due="" her="" liberation="" from="" rudra''s="" domination.="">> You seem a little upset?</now>

    <<it''s an="" illusion.="">></it''s>

    Yes, is that so?

    Never mind, it''s better not to delve into this and listen to Ciel''s instructions first.

    It''s actually quite simple to say.

    The Velgrynd before me is no longer under the spiritual domination of Rudra, but the other ''other body''

    is still under the domination of Rudra. In order to prevent the leak of information, I used the "Infinite Prison" to block it off.

    Our intelligence is not leaked and can be obtained unterally from the opposite side.

    In this way, Velgrynd over there was driven to desperation, andbined with Rudra''s domination, she becamepletely unable to read my mind.

    It''s a one-way street.

    I know Ciel has done something awesome, but I wouldn''t be surprised anymore.

    "That is to say, analyzing this difference in consciousness will prove whether you are being dominated or not.

    "Well, that''s Rimuru for you. Sister, here''s what I believe about Rimuru"

    "You shut up!

    Yes!!

    It was a secret that Veldora, who had interjected, was being disciplined again, and I felt a little happy to see him being disciplined.

    After scolding Veldora, Velgrynd seemed to have fallen into a deep contemtion, probably looking for any difference between himself and the ''other body'' over there, as I said.

    I also grasped the situation on the Emperor''s gship through the eyes of mypanions.

    The battle has entered a final situation.

    A state of affairs that would dispel Velgrynd''s doubts happened just at the moment.

    ***

    Velgrynd was surrounded by mypanions.

    The scene seems a bit despicable, but that''s a sentiment that only the uninformed can feel.

    In fact, even if Velgrynd was in this weakened state that she was in now, it would be difficult for everyone to mount a challenge together to ovee her.

    Putting that aside for a moment, the alien space that Velgrynd had created had fallen apart and looked like it was going to copse soon. Just as I was thinking that, the space was really easily destroyed by the arrival of Diablo.

    "The primordial ck

    "It''s Diablo. That guy, if I don''t see him, I''ll be very powerful.

    "Kufufufufu! That guy will give me his snacks, and I like him.

    You''re being bought off.

    Even if Veldoraplimented Diablo, I still only half believed his words.

    The side thought about these haves and have-nots and continued to follow the developments, and just then Velgrynd over there took a step forward to guard Rudra.

    The situation had alle to this, yet Rudra remained leisurely in his chair.

    Was it guts, or rather, confidence?

    Seeing Rudra like this, one man made the first move.

    It''s Carrera.

    Without hesitation, Carrera fired at Rudra with the golden pistol in her hand.

    And the bullets she shot

    "Wasn''t that the move that weakened me?

    "Kondo can only shoot one bullet a day, why can yellow primodial?

    Ciel has already told me, so I know the details.

    Not the primordial yellow, but Carrera. It looks like Kondo entrusted her with Rudra''s affairs after his defeat.

    Hearing this rification, Velgrynd muttered, "I didn''t expect even Kondo

    Unrted to Velgrynd''s confusion, the situation has changed again.

    Rudra!"

    Over there, Velgrynd cried out, spreading her arms to shield Rudra from her.

    I can''t believe I can catch up with the godspeed bullets and make moves, I''m sure you have the physical ability of a monster. However, the power of the Divine Extermination Bomb was not simple either, not only did it strike Velgrynd''s entire right arm, but it also struck Rudra without decreasing in power.

    However.

    Surprisingly, Rudra was unharmed.

    The emperor''s expression was always at ease, giving the impression that he knew from the beginning that Carrera''s attacks were ineffective against him.

    "What''s that? Why could the Emperor invalidate that attack?"

    "Not clear. It''s hard to believe that you can see something like the ''Barrier'', but it''s hard to believe that it can bepletely invalidated by that alone.

    Veldora and I were both shocked by the light.

    As if Velgrynd couldn''t believe it either, she muttered a ''why'' and copsed to the ground, having to support herself on both hands.

    "What''s wrong, sister?

    Velgrynd whispered in reply to the panicked Veldora.

    "Your friend is right. I really was dominated by Rudra

    Presumably finally figuring it out, Velgrynd told us about Rudra.

    Rudra was safe because of the iron-walled protection he possessed.

    That protection is absolute and impossible for anyone to break, no matter what.

    But there are conditions.

    The loyalty of the vassals or ministers to the emperor is a source of energy for protection, and cannot be unleashed without someone loyal to the emperor.

    Then, there are drawbacks.

    This shield, although it can be activated normally, one cannot do anything else when activated.

    This power is the power of the Justice King Michael", the Castle Guard", which is the pride of the

    "King of Justice", the ultimate skill.

    Even Carrera''s "Divine Extermination Bomb" it can defend against it, and it''s not too much to say that it''s nearly invincible.

    Although the attack could not be carried out whenunched, it was just a matter of handing it over to the minions.

    "Since you have that power, you don''t have toe out and shelter him, do you?"

    Well, I feel the same way.

    Velgrynd answered that query.

    "Right. I should have known better than to pretend to be sheltered and then wait for an opportunity to attack. But she acted like that, which is to say

    Forcing herself to to shelter Rudra, this incident made Velgrynd finally understand that she had actually been ''thought induced'' by Rudra as well.

    Rudra, on the other hand, maintains the absolute realm of the Castle Guard" without any movement.

    That''s how it''s supposed to be

    What?"

    Velgrynd let out another yelp of consternation.

    Even Veldora and I were speechless.

    Velgrynd rushes to Rudra''s side even though she has lost her right arm, but is pierced through the chest by Rudra, who instantly lifts the Castle Guard".

    It''s almost as if Velgrynd was deliberately

    "So, it is sothat man, the Rudra I loved, is gone

    Tears welled up in Velgrynd''s eyes.

    As if to justify what Velgrynd hadmented, Rudra snorted loudly.

    "Ha ha ha ha ha! Oh Velgrynd, feel honored to be of use to me. Your power will be used effectively.

    Hearing Rudra say so, Velgrynd over there crouched down in pain.

    "That''s Yuuki''s ''Death Grabbing Palm''. RudraNo, the ''King of Justice'' has the power to freely use the power of the creatures at his disposal.

    What''s that? Too foul.

    Velgrynd''s instructions made Veldora and I look at each other face to face.

    "When Rudra is against us, it''s up to you!

    "Don''t say anything stupid! I''m the strongest on this matter though it''s indisputable, but its a troublesome opponent, so forgive me for refusing!

    "I''ll make a sundae for you.

    That''s really charming

    Velgrynd looked breathlessly at us who were pushing each other off.

    It seemed that because of this, she had stopped crying.

    Needless to say, this is certainly a good thing.

    So.

    Regarding the Rudra who had just seized the power of Velgrynd

    "Rudra is the King of Justice. What does that mean?

    Although I had an idea in my mind, I wanted to hear about it from Velgrynd, so I asked.

    "Rudra was already at the end of his rope, and his soul was consumed by repeated reincarnations, so it seems that he has been reced by the King of Justice, since he is neither Rudra nor Rudra, sitting there.

    Velgrynd replied sounding lonely.

    "No, no, no. A skill born of the master''s desire cannot be dangerous to the master himself.

    "No, it''s not. Rudra''s ''King of Justice'' was given to him by Veldanava. Rudra, by his own will, is the ''King of Covenant'', and while our brother Veldanava remains unresurrected, the whereabouts of this ultimate skill is unknown.

    The King of Covenant" is here with me though?

    It''s not the atmosphere to say this, so I''ll just keep quiet.

    Velgrynd''s instructions continued, and her words summed up that Rudra had be unable to control the ''King of Justice'' due to the weakening of the soul''s power due to repeated reincarnations.

    Hearing that, rather than the skill betraying the host, I felt there was another way to interpret it.

    <<indeed. if="" i''m="" in="" the="" same="" position="" as="" king="" of="" justice,="" even="" temporarily="" dominated="" by="" host,="" i''ll="" definitely="" aim="" to="" resurrect="" my="" true="" master,="" lord="" rimuru.="">> That''s how it feels.</indeed.>

    Bing Ciel, the Theosophy Core, no matter how unlikely it was, would definitely be a challenge, and definitely not one to give up halfway through.

    So, it''s not like I can''t understand the idea of the ''King of Justice''.

    However, this does not mean that

    "This can''t be left unattended. I''m afraid the King of Justice has evolved into a free-willed theosophy core, so his purpose should bepletely different from Rudras."

    "The theosophy core? What the hell is that? Say, wait a minute! Rimuru, do you know what the purpose of the King of Justice is?

    Since you want to know, I''ll answer you.

    "Isn''t it the resurrection of Veldanava? I think, as long as it''s for this, he''ll do whatever it takes.

    That''s why it can''t be left alone, I said so.

    Velgrynd''s face turned green.

    Just then, a new figure emerged andunched an attack towards Velgrynd, who was confronting Rudra.

    "It was the Phantom King Feldway, and Diablo, feeling unable to defeat him, let him go, and it appeared that he had left hispanion behind and returned.

    Even Diablo couldn''t defeat him, that should be quite a powerful man. Still, it always felt like Diablo was just beingzy, or was it just me?

    Never mind.

    Feldway was no less powerful and used the ''Space Domination'' attack against Velgrynd, which even an awakened demon lord would have difficulty resisting.

    Wounded and weakened, Velgrynd seemed to have no strength left that could resist this move.

    "Hahahahaha! Velgrynd is about to disappear from this world due to a time warp! It''s a lucky start, RudraNo, Lord Michael."

    Feldway changed his name from Rudra to Michael.

    It''s like its trying to justify Velgrynd''s spection.

    It happened suddenly, but both Benimaru and Diablo reacted immediately and wanted to start acting, and I stopped them in a panic with ''Thought Communication''.

    There''s a reason why Phantom King Feldways strength goes deep underground, but more importantly I wanted to see how Rudra, known as Michael, would react.

    What''s moreI see it.

    Some incredible substance, flew out of Rudra''s body, and those things wrapped around Velgrynd as if to guard her.

    Immediately after, all those incredible substances that had flown out of Rudra''s body disappeared.

    This reaction, exactly, is

    "Hmm, it doesn''t feel bad. Velgrynd''s power had be the stuff of me, and Rudra was gone. Next, by absorbing the power of Veldora and Velzado, we will be able to fulfill the wish of the one who resurrected the lord.

    Rudra took very much for granted the fact of being called Michael.

    That''s for sure.

    My enemy is not Rudra, but Michael.

    And the goal of the other side is to bring the Star Dragon, Veldanava, back to life.

    "This is a good thing, Lord Michael.

    "Hmmm. There''s always a way for Velzado. It''s Veldora who''s in trouble.

    The conversation continues.

    Completely leaving Benimaru the the others out of it.

    However, this is par for the course.

    I did not stop the attacks of the Shion and Testarossa, but those attacks were allpletely blocked by the Castle Guard.

    Of course, Feldway was also guarded, unharmed.

    It''s really tricky.

    But there are more important things now.

    "Rudra, that''s Rudra, right!? The shardsthe pieces of the soul are still there!!!

    I thought I was the only one who could see it, but it seemed that Velgrynd sensed it too. Not sure if Velgrynd saw it or felt it, all in all she seemed to want to go after the remnants of Rudra.

    Calm down

    "You shut up! If we don''t get over there soon, aren''t the pieces going to disappear!?"

    Velgrynd hadpletely turned into a messed up child, with an angry but crying face and yelling at me.

    I activated ''Thinking eleration'' to extend the time.

    Then, created a world where only the duo of Velgrynd and I exist.

    "I told you to calm down. If you get out now, you''ll just be dominated by Rudra again.

    But!

    Where the debris flies can actually be grasped.

    However, there is no way out of it.

    In the end, there is no guarantee that he will ever return to this world, and it is even more of a dream to save Rudra.

    <<if you="" go="" straight="" out,="" there''s="" no="" future.="">></if>

    "Shut up! Sowhat do I do? Just give up on Rudra!? I can''t do it!

    These are the heartfelt words of Velgrynd.

    The warning just now had been spoken by Ciel, but Velgrynds agitation was no longer perceptible to such things.

    <<the possibility="" is="" still="" there.="">></the>

    "What the?"

    "If you will ept my power to change.

    Sweet seduction.

    It was no longer even necessary to listen to Velgrynd''s direct answer.

    I ept, as long as I get my wish."

    Even I thought Velgrynd would surely answer that.

    ...........

    ........

    ...

    The moment Velgrynd agreed, the voice rang out.

    <<the will="" of="" velgrynd="" has="" been="" affirmed.="" the="" first="" step="" is="" to="" cut="" off="" interference="" with="" king="" charity.="">></the>

    Hearing this, Velgrynd''s emotions calmed down.

    After examining her own body with precision and guided by the voice, she did find the presence of

    "that".

    There are traces of some kind of interference engraved in the ''king of charity'' deep in the core of one''s heart. Although the interference is now veiled, it is undoubtedly dangerous to continue to keep the thing.

    And here''s why

    Velgrynd grasped that.

    At the same time, she remembered.

    The ultimate skill, the ''King of Charity'', has a power that is paired with the power of the king.

    In a distant memory she seems to have heard it.

    Among the powers created by Veldanava, the more pure in effect is called the Angelic Skill Series, and none of these skills can resist the absolute domination of the ''King of Justice''.

    That power isthe dominion of the archangel".

    Velgrynd''s ''King of Charity'' is no exception, and the ''King of Charity'' and ''King of Justice'' are linked together in extremely subtle corridors that cannot escape the influence of this power.

    Yeah, why did I forget about that? Holders of the Angelic System''s Ultimate Skills are unable to resist their elder brother. He hated it more than anyone else, so he traded the King of Charity for the King of Covenant in Rudra.

    It also makes sense why one would be dominated.

    Since it is the mechanism constructed by the elder brother, Veldanava, it is basically impossible to resist.

    Indeed, I have no future yet

    Rimuru was right, and it made Velgrynd want to cry again.

    Right now.

    In the moment that Velgrynd wanted to give up, she heard an incredible voice.

    <<the pre-processing="" of="" the="" king="" charity="" is=""plete,="" uniting="" it="" with="" covenant,="" which="" no="" longer="" needed.="">> Huh!?</the>

    Velgrynd almost cried out.

    It was only natural that she would react this way, for the ''King of Covenant'' that Rudra had been looking for to be found in such a ce.

    That said, Velgrynd was only now realizing it.

    The sound just heard was not from Rimuru.

    It is not a hallucination, but a voice that is clear and strong-willed, sounding like the "voice of the world, but softer and more refined, and even more tender.

    While there are many things to ask, what is most important right now is the meaning of the phrase to be expressed.

    "Wait, wait, wait! To give me the King of Covenant? Also, what does unification mean!?

    <<if the="" ability="" remains="" as="" it="" is,="" will="" be="" ruled="" by="" king="" of="" justice,="" in="" that="" case,="" just="" change="" ability.="" i="" found="" a="" domination="" loop="" "king="" covenant,="" so="" used="" to="" create="" new="" abilities="" for="" you="" while="" discarding="" it.="">> It''s overblown.</if>

    It''s really an answer that people everywhere want to spit-take on.

    However, what Velgrynd cared about now was only one problem.

    "Do that, and I''ll go to Rudra?

    <<it is="" possible,="" it="" certain.="">></it>

    Since it''s possible, there''s no need to be confused.

    Velgrynd promised toe down with hope in her heart.

    No, actually, it''s been promised.

    <<velgrynd, the="" will="" to="" you="" has="" long="" since="" been="" confirmed="" and="" no="" second=""mitment="" is="" required.="" now,="" ability="" change.="">></velgrynd,>

    The voice, Ciel, had no intention of withdrawing at first.

    The moment Ciel unleashed the ''ability to change'', an otherwise impossible force fluctuated through Velgrynd''s body.

    Then, gently wrapped her whole body.

    <<uniting the="" "king="" of="" charity"="" and="" covenant"="" velgrynd,="" "scorch="" dragon",="" evolving="" into="" me="" god="" cthugua="" sess="">> Ciel dered aloud in a solemn voice full of fantasy.</uniting>

    In this moment, Velgrynd was freed from all bondage.

    ...........

    ........

    ...

    Just as I nodded my head repeatedly at Ciel''s words, my ''King of Covenant'' was also transferred out.

    Although I gave my permission, it''s normal that I can''t help but feel at a loss at times like this.

    After all, it was the equivalent of the ''King of Covenant'' thatbined the ties of hispanions

    <<there is="" no="" question.="" what="" united="" into="" the="" king="" of="" charity="" nothing="" more="" than="" dregs="" covenant.="" essence="" power="" will="" be="" inherited="" by="" new="" ''king="" harvest''.="">> Huh?</there>

    The questions are endless.

    There''s always a hunch that Ciel-sensei has done all sorts of super awesome work when I didn''t know of it.

    I''m afraid to ask in detail, so I''m just going to focus on Velgrynd.

    Unification can work better than anything.

    "Congrattions, Miss Velgrynd. Now, it''s okay to take you outside."

    I was hitching a ride with a smile on my face, but somehow Velgrynd red at me with a very scary expression.

    It''s not that I didn''t have a clue why she reacted this way, so I unconsciously averted my gaze.

    "I really, really want to question you about all sorts of things, but I''ll let it go for now. So, this is going to free me now, huh?

    It seems to be okay already, I nod.

    ording to the Ciel, because it gave the Covenant King Uriel to Velgrynd, Rudra''s "spirit" seems to be reacting to her.

    So it''s no longer impossible to find the pieces and recycle them, in a nutshell.

    Hearing that made me think.

    The remnants of what Ciel calls the Heart of Rudra''s form, and the "core" of the King of Covenant, are actually the same.

    That being the case, it''s now the equivalent of Rudra and Velgrynd being together a lot.

    While it is unsettling to find the "soul" of Rudra scattered throughout the world, there is a feeling that Velgrynd will be able to do so.

    "Then first, liberate yourself!

    Just like that, the three of us returned from the spirit world to the present world.

    The feeling of time being prolonged lingered, so we said goodbye to each other.

    "Thanks, Rimuru, for the trouble.

    It really was.

    I actually have a lot toin about!

    However, pissing off Velgrynd would be horrible, so I''ll just shut up.

    "Now, your ''parallel existence'' is also connected to me, so don''t worry about getting lost and noting back. I think it''s going to be tough though, go for it!"

    A little bit of solidarity.

    But that''s when it happened.

    "Sister, even if it''s not possible, I''m still here! Don''t worry, just rx and go for it!

    Veldora said with a bright smile.

    It doesn''t matter what the atmosphere is capable of, it can only be said that it really lives up to Veldora.

    Velgrynd also seemed troubled as to what response to make, and her final response was

    "You really are an idiot, a stupid, stupid, cute little brother. I''m d you''re safe."

    Velgrynd finished coyly and smiled.

    Then for some reason, she stared at me again.

    Being seen super close by beautiful women made me nervous to move a muscle.

    Seeing the look of a small deer in my heart, Velgrynd somehow shook her head breathlessly.

    "So, goodbye.

    With these words, Velgrynd departed with a valiant ''shift''.

    ***

    There you go.

    The next thing is to go back up Benimaru and the others.

    "Do you want toe too?

    "Of course.

    Time wise, it''s actually been less than a minute, and the onught against Michael is still going on right now.

    Although it did not work for the Castle Guard", it was the right thing to do.

    Because the moment the attack stops, the enemy''s attack will begin.

    So whether it was Benimaru or Diablo, neither of them stopped Shion and the rest, but chose to watch from the sidelines.

    There are only two enemies.

    I really want to take them all down right here, but unfortunately that''s not going to happen. As long as there is a Castle Guard, the attacks will be useless against Michael.

    Only, the conditions are the same for everyone

    "Ha ha ha ha ha! What a pity, your attacks arepletely ineffective against Lord Michael.

    Feldwayughed loudly, aiming for the gap between our attacks and preparing tounch the power.

    The demon lords name doesn''t seem to be called in vain, and he seems intent on exiling all of mypanions present to the otherworld.

    "Goodbye, everyone. Though there should be no morewhat!?

    He wasn''t the only one targeting the attack gap, and neither was I. In order to stop Feldway, I appeared on the battlefield.

    "The Demon Lord Rimuru

    Its our first meeting, Mr. Phantom King Feldway.

    Hearing my deliberately mocking tone, the Phantom Kings smile disappeared.

    "The hick with no manners.

    "Ahn? I don''t want to be told that by an aggressive race that has always had visions of the city.

    After further provocation, the other party''s expression became like that of an evil spirit.

    The type that doesn''t get excited and calmly build up anger.

    And the most troublesome opponent.

    Just then, Michael, who had been silent, interjected with an air of ease.

    "So, you''re not hiding to watch me anymore? I thought that you were trying to use the sacrifices of yourpanions to find a way to get around me.

    I didn''t think of sacrificing mypanions at all, but he was half right, but it didn''t matter.

    "What do you think is your freedom, andpared to that, why don''t we just end it here?

    "Hmph, you''re very proud. Do you think you''ve beaten me?

    "Who knows? But let me just give you a word of advice up front. I know all about your power, whether it''s the absolute domination of the angelic skill series, or the fact that it will never be broken as long as there are people who believe in you, such as the "Castle Guard. After this there will be no need to say any more. Wont turning the Empire into scorched earth and destroying everything that lives take away your advantage?

    This is total bluffing.

    I don''t have any idea in my head that I''m going to do it all.

    But if the possibility ofpanionship sacrifice is weighed on the scales against this practice, I should have practiced it without hesitation.

    That kind of awareness, I would have done it a long time ago.

    it seems that I have underestimated you too. Shouldn''t he be hostile to you?

    "Exactly. Whether you are aspirational or have a noble calling has nothing to do with me. There are actually parts of your purpose that resonate with me, so I won''t interfere with anything you want to do as long as it doesn''t get me in trouble.

    However, it was toote.

    Michael, who has already begun to lose control, will no doubt bring us cmity.

    For the time being, I can predict that Michael will have a conflict of interest with us in any case in the future. That being the case, I''ll just have to act on it with conviction.

    Michael seemed to ponder something andpsed into silence.

    That being the case, let''s get my thoughts across clearly to him.

    "If anyone dares to strike at me and mypanions, I will crush them sopletely that they will never be able to do such stupid things again.

    To inject terror into their hearts.

    Indeed, I have no means of breaking the castle guard" at the moment.

    However, I have a reliable partner, Ciel."

    Ciel must be able to figure out how to crack this trick.

    What''s more

    I will show no mercy if you dare to strike at my importantpanions.

    No matter what means are used to defeat MichaelI swear in my heart.

    "So it is, huh. Then, I will retreat first.

    "Uh! Is it really possible, Lord Michael?

    Hearing Feldway''s surprised question, Michael raised his head to indicate his retreat.

    "To say that the time has note, and so shall we be. If we fight here, I don''t think either side will be satisfied in the end.

    I feel the same way.

    With the means I just mentioned, it is indeed possible to win.

    But to do so vites my purpose.

    I don''t deny that the current approach is just to put off the issue, but now just buy time, and that''s really what I mean.

    "Well, let''s break up for today, shall we?

    "All right. Having said thaton a day that was supposed to celebrate myplete resurrection, there was actually such an unexpected trial. I thought Guy Crimson was the biggest obstacle, but I didn''t realize that the one holding me back was an insignificant Slime

    Leaving these words, Michael and Feldway departed.

    Where they go back, it''s not the Empire.

    Because my surveince magic, "Argos", didn''t catch any reaction.

    The report from Moss is also only three words without exception.

    "What a shame. Where the hell did they go? Can''t even figure that out now?

    Hearing my uncontroble grumbling, Benimaruughed.

    "But, Lord Rimuru. We''re all safe and sound, so we should go home and celebrate."

    So to speak.

    "Well, lets go back! Im already tired today and feeling as if I''m hungry too. Let''s ask Shuna to prepare some delicious meals!

    "It''s a party, isn''t it?

    That''s not so bad.

    I nodded to Veldora.

    "Go back and celebrate!

    Hearing my words, everyone''s expressions turned to smiles.

    Although there are still problems to be solved, I would like to congratte you all on your safety and thank you for that.

    ***

    Velgrynd continued to travel.

    Yesterday, today, and tomorrow too.

    The footsteps never stopped, and Velgrynd kept moving forward.

    ...........

    ........

    ...

    At that time, the ce where Velgrynd and Rimuru had flown to was an otherworld that had transcended even time, and after she had sessfully merged with the ''parallel existence'' that had been knocked out by Feldway, she found herself in the middle of an otherworld with no direction at all.

    One without atmosphere and two without earth, without even a sense of time, Velgrynd had to keep drifting.

    If Velgrynd hadn''t been a Dragon Race, I''m afraid she''d be in the wild, but she has Space Domination and unlimited life.

    Velgrynd had plenty of time to think before arriving at a ce where she could settle herself. Those unbelievable things that had happened to themselves had already given Velgrynd''s mind over.

    The amount of intelligence exceeds the amount of processing.

    Such an extraordinary state of affairs as drifting through otherworldly space had instead restored Velgrynd''sposure.

    Velgrynd began to think.

    The intelligence was sorge and unusual that Velgrynd gave up trying to figure it out thoroughly, only to think about it when time allowed.

    Then, more than anything else, she thought of one thing.

    The fundamental question is why Velgrynd was able to regain her freedom against the system constructed by her own brother.

    The man who made this phenomenon possible, Velgrynd could only think of one.

    That Slime with the fluttering attitude.

    The demon lord, Rimuru, her brother''s ally

    Does itdoes it mean!? That Slime

    Even an Ultimate Skill can be freely rewritten, granting Velgrynd freedom and making the Powers more powerfulevolving to a higher realm.

    It''s definitely, not something that regr people can do.

    Such a ridiculous thing, only my elder brother could do. If, indeed, there is someone who can imitate this behavior

    The unbelievable imagery made Velgrynd shudder.

    When she tried to turn her consciousness inward, the ultimate skill of the ''King of me'' immediately reacted, and with a strength that the ''King of Charity'' could not match.

    And most importantly

    It was as if a connection had been constructed with Rudra''s heartbeat, and the fragments that were absorbed would give a reaction.

    Heck, it doesn''t even matter what that slimes true colors are. He is Rimuru, an ally of Veldora, and my benefactor.

    This is what Velgrynd concludes.

    Finally getting rid of the thinking-back-circle Velgrynd and turning consciousness to reality.

    ...........

    ........

    ...

    Across countless worlds and ages, Velgrynd continues to collect fragments of the Soul.

    I love you, I love youRudra!

    The thought of single-mindedly wanting to see Rudra had allowed Velgrynd to cross countless difficulties.

    And then, finally

    In the midst of a metropolis lined with tall buildings, she spotted the teenager.

    Rejoice, resolve.

    The teenager, in possession of all the other pieces.

    Next, adding the fragments held by Velgrynd

    However, was it really good to do so? Velgrynd became bitter about it.

    If this was done, the teenager''s fate would surely change dramatically.

    Velgrynd had an infinite lifespan, and she was perfectly capable of guarding the teenager until the end of his life.

    That''s right, there''s nothing to be anxious about. I''d like to meet you as soon as possible, but you can''t be too anxious.

    With that thought in mind, Velgrynd turned her back on the teenager and prepared to stride away.

    However, at this very moment

    The shards of lightning flew towards the teenager ording to their will.

    The fragments of the "soul", which no one could see, merged with the teenager as if absorbed, and the impact of this process caused the teenager to disappear directly from the world.

    Now in Velgrynd''s hands, only the beginning piece remains.

    "Do you mean, you too? Do you want to see me as soon as possible, too?"

    If only that were the caseVelgrynd thought to herself as she leaned towards the shards with a question.

    And then

    In order to catch up with the boy, she unleashed the ''King of the me.

 Volume 16 - Prologue

    Prologue: The Copse of Order

    The otherworld used to be in order.

    This was a semi-material world that nearly ovepped with the Spirit Realm and the Demon Realm, and would never cross over into each other, where there were three major forces vying for supremacy.

    Attempting to invade the other world, the Apparition tribe (Phantom race).

    The one who wants to expand the settlement space, the worm-type demon tribe (Insectar race).

    And then there''s the daily devotion to battle and destruction, the mythical beast tribe (Cryptid race).

    asionally there are visitors or forces from other dimensions, but whoever they are is eventually wiped out by these three forces along with the original dimension, and the force of the three forces is just so powerful.

    The Phantom Race and the Insectar Racethese two races are made up of a ss society culminating in a king, where the lower existence does not even have a sense of freedom and is simply a pawn in the execution of orders.

    It wasnt so with the Cryptid race.

    As semi-spiritual beings, they are born in a way that is extremely simr to spiritual beings, mostly special individuals born naturally from magical elements, and asionally through the splitting of the mother body.

    Aside from the difference between the Insectars and the Cryptids, both of these dominant sses are simr in nature, except that the Cryptids do not move in packs and each has a strong fighting ability.

    The Cryptids are not sentient but cunning, and even less coordinated, each acting only to expand its dominant domain.

    Even among the mythical beast tribe (Cryptids), there was equally constant strife.

    With such three forces in existence, it would be impossible to live amicably in the otherworld.

    There was an ongoing and permanent battle between the Phantom race and the Insectar race, but when the Cryptids appeared inrge numbers, a temporary truce would be made to jointly destroy the mythical beast tribe (Cryptid)a phenomenon that had been recurring since the distant ages.

    That''s why they long for a ce to settle down, always with their eyes on the outside world, nning how to carry out their aggression.

    Obviously, it''s not going to be easy.

    Even with such conditions, no one has been able to realize this long-held wish.

    The fundamental problem is that the passage to the otherworld is not that easy to find, and the passage that opens only once every thousand years is only a short crack that may asionally ur due to a special catastrophe such as the vibration of space-time.

    In such a case, sending arge force in would be impossible, and sending out an advance party to establish a position would be the limit.

    However, there will always be exceptions in the world.

    There are several chasms connecting space and time that are fixed in the world and act as a "gate".

    And the "gate of the underworld" or "gate of hell" are what these cracks are called.

    It is easy to get out of the realm by using the gate, but the gate is under the control of the demon race and is not allowed to be used by the invading races (Agressor tribes).

    Therefore, these invading races are always eager to seize control of the gate."

    Despite this situation, a bnce is formed.

    But some people are very upset about this situation.

    In this mans heart, there is always resentment.

    His name, the "Demon Lord" Feldway.

    The long-looping rtionship between the three tribes, which had been in a state of mutual restraint, further ignited the fire of hatred in his heart, as if it were going to turn into a hellish karma fire that would burn the world to the ground.

    ...........

    ........

    ...

    Feldway recalled.

    Veldanava has created many races, among them also existences that have the will to sustain the world.

    Feldway is exactly one who was created in the first ce.

    The seven most powerful individuals of the angelic race (Seraphims) created to help Veldanavas work, the Seraphs of Seven Pirs (Seven Original Angels), possess energy that even an awakened demon lord cannot surpass.

    The head of the Seven Pirs was none other than Feldway, who wouldter be the father of the Phantoms (apparition tribe).

    After getting a name to possess self-consciousness, Feldway swore allegiance to Veldanava and has since led the angels to act as Veldanava''s assistants for many years.

    One by one, new races were born.

    The Titan n (Giants) Mad King as the incarnation of the Earth.

    The Queen of the Fairy Race asary administrator.

    The ancestors of the Vampires in order to build and develop a thriving civilization of the earth.

    From spiritual beings, to semi-spiritual beings, to blood ns that possessed physical bodies, even though eternity was gone, diversity was increasing.

    With all these processes moving forward, until finally

    By linking with the "world of other dimensions, humanity was born.

    Impable reproductive ability, environmental adaptability, and a rich sense of self with a personality and a curiosity to challenge the mysteries of the world.

    Veldanava was overjoyed.

    To such a fragile and vulnerable race, the most supreme love is given.

    For the sake of these humans, Veldanava intended to eliminate the threat in the world, and upon receiving this order, Feldway crushed the various evil demons of Rakshasa.

    However, thest remaining individual is tricky.

    It was the Dragon Ivaraj, who wouldter be the king of the mythical beast tribe (Cryptids).

    Ivaraj came from nowhere, and doesnt even know how he was born.

    Is it from the other side of the universe, or the end of the other dimension?

    The only thing that is clear is that it is the embodiment of cmity.

    Not only does he have the power to rival the True Dragon Race, but he is unable tomunicate at all due to hisck of intelligence, and because he acts out of pure instinct to destroy the world, he may cause the world to end.

    Even Feldway, in a one-on-one situation, couldn''t do anything about him.

    Unable to watch, Veldanava took action, sealing Ivaraj in the Otherworld, and then ordered Feldway to monitor its movements.

    Feldway had said that the root of the scourge should bepletely eliminated.

    Because it''s too dangerous.

    But this offer was rejected by Veldanava.

    Veldanava thinks that Ivaraj is likely to gain intelligence.

    As a result, the otherworld was filled with magicules leaking out of Ivaraj, and a new race of Cryptids was spawned.

    Either way, it''s just a degraded version of Ivarajs mythical beast tribe, fighting endlessly all day long by the instinct of struggle.

    No need to drink and eat, not even fearing one''s own death.

    It can really be said to be a failure of creation, and even Feldway, a believer in Veldanava, has to think that this is an existence that should be scorned.

    Since then, the asional elimination of the Cryptids has continued on a daily basis.

    As a result, change has urred.

    As if to prove what Veldanava had said, the existence of a sentient being among the Cryptids was born.

    This being the very originator of heresy.

    Even more irritating for Feldway was the fact that Veldanava rejoiced over it. Veldanava named this being "Znus".

    This is the birth of Znus, the Insectar King.

    Znus, without being ordered to do so by Veldanava, began to drive out the mob of Cryptids on his own, a move that was entirely driven by his instincts of struggle, though Veldanava acquiesced in the act.

    It didn''t take long for Znus to create a n of Insectars that could act as his own right-hand men, and these Insectars unwittingly grew into a remarkable faction.

    The nature of Feldway has also changed.

    Because of the long years of bathing under the influence of the magicules, he was bing no longer a Seraphim.

    The angels led by Feldway also changed into a new race.

    The Seven Original Angels were not the only ones who came to the Otherworld from the Celestial Realm where Veldanava lived. Three of them stayed with Veldanava, while three others, Zrio, Obera, and Cornu, went the Otherworld to help Feldway manage the foreign world.

    These three, along with Feldway, mutated and evolved into the Killing Angel n.

    The rest of the angelic race also mutated and began to be self-conscious, and they were the monsters that changed into human formthe Phantom race, a new race that had broken away from the symbiotic rtionship between demons and spirits.

    In this way, a new rtionship is constructed over a long period of time.

    Although Feldway and Znus didn''t share the same sentiment, they still basically recognized each other as useful existences when facing the Cryptids.

    So a tacit understanding of mutual non-interference is formed, forming a rtionship to fight together.

    But just that oneyer of rtionship also copsed with the disappearance of Veldanava.

    At first, they thought that Veldanava would be resurrected immediately.

    However, even after hundreds of years, Veldanava still shows not a hint of resurrection.

    Feldway felt strange.

    That''s when it urred to him.

    Veldanava probably abandoned them.

    If this were not the case, it would not be possible to ount for the fact that the true dragon race,

    which was supposed to be immortal, did note back to life.

    If this conjecture is correct

    Feldway feltmented and disgusted.

    This sentiment is directed at humanity.

    No, it''s not just the humans.

    There were the Elves, the Dwarves, the Beastmen, even the Demons. All races that could be collectively referred to as subhumansin sum, the abomination of man.

    So he generated the idea of destroying them.

    There is no value in living, even those who have taken Veldanava.

    The world created by Veldanava is to be united by his own hands, and on that basis, sanctions are to be given to those whomit great sinsthis is the conclusion that Feldway has reached.

    The world favored by the god Veldanava is to be dyed in his own colors, to destroy its diversity, to be created as a world at his disposal.

    O, Lord Veldanava! If you want to punish me thene and punish me, that''s what I expect. Come on, if you don''te, the world will be gone."

    As if to test the gods, the Demon King, Feldway, set into motion.

    It was the birth of the "demon race, humanitys enemy.

    At first, Feldway even went to Znus.

    Feldway offered to Znus to help him destroy the Cryptids before riding the wave to the ground.

    However.

    "Ridiculous. There is only one person in the world who canmand me, and now that His Majesty is gone, I will do as I please."

    Not at all prepared to listen to Feldway, he rejected the proposal without mercy.

    Feldway felt extremely angry at hearing this.

    Not anger at being rejected.

    Rather, it was Znus''s attitude, acting as if Veldanava had perished, that made it difficult for Feldway to endure.

    "Then I''ll kill you first.

    And just like that, Feldway''s anger was directed at the Insectar Race.

    If Feldway and Znus could join forces at this time, perhaps the Doom Dragon Ivaraj and the Cryptids would all be wiped out, but that was already an unattainable dream.

    Since then, the Phantom n and the Insectar n had started a war, and the era of warfare in the true sense hade.

    In this way, the otherworld became extremely confused, and the rtionship of the three holding each other in check began to form.

    ...........

    ........

    ...

    Long years passed again.

    The situation in the otherworld remains stagnant.

    As long as Veldanava is not resurrected, the Otherworld cannot be changed back to the way it was. Any attempt to seize control of the Gate will surely be hindered by the demons.

    The most hateful of these is the ck Primordial who is particrly fond of fighting. The dark king not only sees the Phantom race with contempt, but he was also hostile to all those who went against the will of Veldanava.

    This really infuriated Feldway beyond measure, and in his opinion, it would be better to say that the demons were the fools who prevented the resurrection of Veldanava.

    That being said, it is impossible to eliminate them. Even in the material world, the primordial was very powerful, and if he was reced in the other world or the underworld, his power would not be restricted in any way.

    The strength of the consciousness directly affects the spiritual or semi-material world in which the power is reincarnated, and is simply invincible.

    Only, it was the same for Feldway, so even starting a fight would certainly not result in anything, and ignoring the demon, though reluctantly, was the only solution.

    For various reasons, it is extremely difficult to return to the world in which Veldanava had been.

    Even if the Otherworld asionally opens a rift, it is always connected to the Otherworld. Even trying to invade those worlds would only be a way to pass the time, and would serve no other purpose.

    Without results, Feldway was left to fend for himself.

    The opportunity came at this point.

    A mysterious voice spoke directly to Feldways heart.

    Who?"

    The voice responded coldly.

    <i, who="" had="" been="" boarding="" in="" the="" consciousness="" of="" power,="" can="" only="" call="" myself="" "rudra"="" because="" i="" am="" not="" yet="" free,="" and="" presume="" that="" we="" have="" same="" purpose,="" so=""e="" to="" talk="" you.=""> Rudrathe name was familiar.</i,>

    The owner of this name was both a close friend and a disciple of Veldanava.

    And hes well known as the First Hero".

    It is unclear as to who dwells in authority, but what is of concern is the purpose of those who im to be Rudra.

    If it''s for some boring purpose, just reverse-detect the location of this sound and destroy its existence.

    Having made up his mind, Feldway continued the conversation.

    "The purpose is to resurrect Lord Veldanava, the Creator, and nothing else.

    What? Feldways eyes zed over.

    The tone in which this was spoken sounded serious, and the purpose was indeed enough to pique Feldway''s interest.

    Whatever his true identity was, it no longer mattered, and Feldway began to talk to the voice with all his heart.

    After the exchange, it became clear that the voice''s true form was the ultimate skill created by Veldanava, Justice King Michael.

    There is no doubt in Feldway''s mind about what the ''King of Justice'' said, and this is because Feldway is familiar with the ''King of Justice''.

    A decision was made to assist the ''King of Justice'', as Feldway said,

    "Well, as of today, you and I arerades, so it''s a little awkward if you dont have a name.

    "Ridiculous, but a name"

    As if to interrupt the inorganic reply, Feldway spoke.

    "Isn''t it wrong to call you Rudra? I''ll call you Michael.

    It was just a yful word.

    But the change was dramatic.

    The ''King of Justice'', whose self-awareness was still weak as the Theosophical Core (Manas), was born with a clear self-awareness.

    "I think you should be thankful here, Feldway. You are not recognized as the true master, but as a temporary master. When the power has been fully regained from Rudra, let the remainder of it be divided among you.

    InterestingFeldway should have said.

    But instead of nodding, he offered a substitute.

    "No, the master is yours. I can''t get out of here without dealing with Znus from my own side. I hate Znus, and he distrusts me just as much; it should be better for you to deal with him and try to persuade him.

    These are the unabashedly sincere words of Feldway.

    Feldway was really pleased.

    There is someone who, like himself, believes that Veldanava has not perished, and since this person is willing to give action to resurrect Veldanava, there is no reason to refuse cooperation.

    The highs and lows of the agreement are minor issues.

    Also, there was a dispute between Feldway and Znus, and Feldway would never forgive Znus, so the sess rate of Michael convincing Znus would be higher.

    Michael should be able to speak to ZnusFeldways instincts told him so, the vibe that unfolded in Michael couldn''t help but be reminiscent of Veldanava, and Znus should be willing to listen to him.

    For these reasons, Feldway willingly stepped back.

    Things are as Feldway expected.

    Not knowing the process, all in all, Michael had seeded in convincing Znus. Although a pact had been made to make half of the world the dominant territory of the Insectars, that was nothing to Feldway.

    Just the resurrection of Veldanava would be enough for him.

    ***

    And so it was that, after constructing this new rtionship, another thousand years or more passed.

    The n is on track.

    Rudra, who dominated Michael, was weakened in strength by repeated reincarnations.

    "How is it going, Lord Michael?

    Of course, very good. But, as I''ve said many times, there''s no need to use honorifics between me and you.

    "Oh, that''s great. Your reciprocal rtionship with me is a secret between the two of us. It would be bad if you identally let it slip.

    This was the conversation after the reincarnation.

    Through this reincarnation, the restrictions on Michael''s powers were drastically lifted, much to the delight of Feldway.

    As soon as Rudra''s influence wears off, Michael will be able to exercise his powers to the fullest, which means thatplete domination over the holders of the Ultimate Skill Angelic Systems dense powers will be achieved.

    With Velgrynd at the head, many hindrances would be obedientpanions.

    In this way, even that horrible demon lord could

    Unlike Rudra, I am not naive and will use all sorts of power to unceremoniously get rid of Guy Crimson. This time we''ll have to go toe to toe with that guy.

    Feldway couldn''t agree more.

    Rudra was bound to win or lose with Guy, bound by the rules, and had no chance of winning from the start.

    Rudra''s powers, if he had used Michael with all his might, should have made it easier to defeat Guy.

    But Rudra did not do so.

    The result was the chaotic status quo that it is today.

    "Once we get rid of Rudra, the world will fall into our hands, and all that remains is to wait for the resurrection of Lord Veldanava.

    "Exactly. So, Feldway, I have a favor to ask of you.

    "What is it?

    It was rare. Feldway was interested as Michael who, for the first time, had a request.

    "Please be a vessel for the rest.

    Such offers have been rejected in the past.

    Although on the surface they perform a master-subordinate rtionship, the two are actuallyrades in arms, and Feldway does not want to be in charge.

    Feldway has thoughts of rejecting, but upon hearing Michael''s instructions, changed his mind.

    "I have finally seeded in making the Parallel Existence of Velgrynd my own, so that I can hand over the power of Rudra to you intact."

    That is, while being able to use Rudra as bait as usual, it also allows Feldway to exercise the power of the ''King of Justice''.

    Theres also more than that.

    Originally, the Castle Guard", the pride of the "King of Justice, with its extreme power, would only protect the master of the power.

    Because loyalty to the master from the heart of the faithful is the source of power, it deviates from the rule that there is absolutely no influence on the followersfree from thew of never in this world.

    Therefore, the Castle Guard is only valid for the master.

    Of course, there was also no such thing as being able to include people other than those who believed in the master so cheaply in the object of protection, so Rudra could protect only himself. However, if the "parallel existence" was used to house Feldway, then Feldway would also be able to be sheltered by the

    Castle Guard" at the same time.

    Looking ahead, there is another advantage that can be found.

    After Rudra is gone, when Feldway bes the Lord of the ''King of Justice'', the ten thousand strong Phantom Race under hismand would be a source of power.

    Unlike the subjects who believed in Rudra, these Apparition Tribes would be devotees who had no sense of freedom at all, no fear of changing their hearts, and would never try to betray.

    Strength would not be as susceptible to changes in the heart of its subjects as it had been up until now, and this amounted to gaining a defense that was even stronger than Rudra''s, something that was truly desirable for Feldway.

    There is no longer a reason to reject Michael''s offer today.

    Like it or not, it turns out that there is another option, to have Michael move into Feldway when Rudra disappears. And now it was nothing more than an early realization, something that Feldway had allowed himself to ept with this way of thinking.

    "If that''s the case, there''s no need to ask. If we can agree to maintain the rtionship we''ve had, I will ept your proposal.

    "Of course, my friend.

    Come on then, friend.

    In this way, the intelligence body of the "Theosophy Nucleus" (Manas) Michael, was hosted within Feldway.

    ***

    Finally, the day of Armageddon has arrived.

    Rudra could only barely hold his own with his strong mental strength, and he had initiated a final showdown with Guy in spite of such a status quo.

    First, get rid of the Demon Lord Rimuru, and add Veldora, a  True Dragon, to your own pieces.

    The n would have gone well.

    Velgrynd is clearly overwhelming and it doesn''t look like she will have a problem capturing Veldora.

    Originally, it didn''t matter to Feldway how much the Empire lost, and Feldway didn''t care if any Awakeners would show up among the Royal Near Guard Knights.

    The most important thing for Feldway was to get rid of Rudra and liberate Michael. As long as that step was achieved, even Guy would be no match for them.

    So Feldway wanted to remove thest element of unease.

    Thats why Feldway decided to pick up thest remaining bud of anxiety.

    Masayuki "The Brave Hero" looks exactly like Rudra, and what''s even more interesting is the fact that Rudra''s power, The Chosen One, is found in him.

    Maybe it was unlikely, but it was still possible that he was Rudra''s back-up. So to dispel that unease, Feldway set about.

    Completely un-anticipating that the Demon Lord Rimuru would cause the n to go awry.

 Volume 16 - Ch 1

    The Emperor Rudra, or should I say, Michael, and the demon king Feldway have left.

    It wasnt settled, but the feeling took its toll on them.

    There are still elements of unease left, but for now I want to celebrate that everyone is safe and sound.

    The post-improvement and future countermeasures will be pushed back first.

    Only, Carrion and Frey and the others fell into an evolutionary sleep, so I ordered Testarossa to discreetly send them back.

    "I''m sorry, when you''re tired too"

    "Please don''t worry about us. Please rest and recuperate.

    Although it''s a bit embarrassing, Ill ept the kindness for now.

    There are other things to think about when everything has calmed down, but right now I''m full of ideas for a party first.

    The opportunity was rare, and we tried to invite Lace, but the other party seemed to be gone by the time Diablo went to pick him up.

    That guy was also pining for hispanions in his own way, so on second thought, it was better not to call him here.

    The agreement to fight together still stands, and if anything happens over there, I intend to help out, so let''s leave them alone for now.

    And so we returned to the capital Rimuru, but it was then that I received an unexpected report.

    A corner of the outer area of the town was burned down.

    The damage wasn''t as great as it seemed due to the guard of Geld. The fire was prevented from spreading by destroying the surrounding buildings, and the injuries sustained by the personnel were minor.

    And the best news was that the number of dead was zero.

    But there is also bad news.

    That said, everything has happened and was now over, and there was no use panicking now. I pushed down my anxiety, intending to listen to Geld''s report first.

    The people waiting in line to report back to me, however, was not just Geld.

    ***

    The location is the banquet hall.

    The executives, who had been very active this time, had taken their seats, and Shuna, Haruna, and Gobchis henchmen were hurrying to go and prepare food for everyone.

    I, too, felt that it was a little bit of a bummer to listen to the report in such an environment, given the urgency of the situation.

    The seat to my right was upied by Veldora, who still stubbornly refused to leave it, even knowing that he had no intention of listening.

    Veldora''s capriciousness is nothing new, so I''m used to it. Rather than trying to convince him, it would be easier to give up and not worry about it.

    Thus, Benimaru sat to my left, while Shion and Diablo stood behind me as usual, their preparations for hearing the report were already perfect.

    Diablo didn''t say anything, and Shion went to eat with everyone at first, but Shion insisted on waiting until afterwards, presumably this was against Shion''s own rules, so I went with it.

    So, again, let''s see who''s here to report.

    Geld was sitting down facing me, and Adalman, with a quiet feeling of restlessness, was directly across from Benimaru.

    He also seems to have sessfullypleted his evolution, with a slight change in the atmosphere of his body. I intend to ask him to report separately in due course on the details of this.

    Across from Veldora sat Ramiris, while Treyni and Beretta stood behind the seats to serve her. By the way, it was Charys who poured the wine for Veldora.

    As for Ramiris herself, the report had been tossed aside to indulge in eating.

    "Well, I always believed that Master would be fine! Although when that exaggerated sister of Master''s blew up the upper level of the maze, even I thought that this was really a bit bad. However, we believed that Master would be fine if he does it. That''s why we didnt worry about anything from the beginning!

    After summing that up, Ramiris happily drank her juice, and no one pointed out that her words were actually mixed with both truths and lies.

    "Kuhahaha! It''s only natural! Even if the opponent was my sister, I didn''t have an ounce of trepidation.

    Still, although just a tiny bit careless, its all the fault of those dirty obstructionists who targeted me and ruined my victory.

    This guy is talking nonsense.

    Even I was feeling scared, and I don''t think there''s anything wrong with that. And frankly, an evolved Velgrynd is pretty dangerous. Even if Veldora wanted to beat her, he only has a 50% chance, so I think it''s better not to talk big.

    However, those who heard those words just now all apuded in droves.

    "Not bad for Veldora-sama, I must study hard too"

    Charys nodded in serious session.

    "After all, it was such an amazing fight. I thought I had evolved and be stronger, but now I deeply feel that I have much further to go.

    Benimaru followed suit, for the words came from the heart, and Veldora listened with a satisfied look of triumph.

    However, Ramiris'' statement stopped Veldora fromughing.

    "Really, Master, youre always careless. But there''s probably nothing to worry about anymore."

    "Probably? What do you mean, Ramiris?

    See, I knew the words couldn''t be too full.

    Talking too much can sometimes drive you to extremes.

    "Because, now that man.Ah! I''m just relieved to have my master!

    That man?

    Ramiris'' words were unsettling.

    "Eh! No, no, it''s not. Is it okay? I, although I am invincible, have asionally been in poor health

    Veldora seemed to remember something too, and sees that she has dug her own grave, and he suddenly began to make excuses too.

    But I think it''s toote, so forget it, it''s amon urrence anyway, just don''t worry about it.

    More than that, Im more worried about Vesta sitting in the corner.

    I tossed Veldora and the others aside and asked the residual group what was going on.

    ***

    Immediately after Rimuru headed to the Empire, the people left behind encountered an emergency.

    The celebratory atmosphere that had remained until just now was gone in an instant.

    The same was true for Ramiris, who was returning to the deepest part of the maze.

    The Dragon Kings under their ownmand had sessfullypleted their evolution, much to Ramiris'' relief. It was only at this time that Rimuru and the others made an emergency move, which made her feel a little uneasy.

    Ramiris wanted to be happy every day, and here in the Jura Tempest Federation, was the wonderfully ideal home for her to feel she could make that wishe true.

    It was an important ce for Ramiris, who had lived through a long time alone and could only rely on the spirits to vent her loneliness. It was something she never wanted to lose.

    It was for this reason that she had a fear of losing this ce.

    Although, as usual, she felt that it didn''t matter as long as Rimuru was there. But somehow, an unsettling feeling in Ramiris'' mind just couldn''t be erased.

    And the premonition came true.

    Veldora''s sister, Velgrynd, attacks and thebyrinth that Ramiris is so proud of is destroyed.

    Thebyrinth is impossible to destroy by physical means, but the true dragon seed" is an unreasonable incarnation that can turn that into a possibility.

    At the sight of Velgrynd''s figure, Ramiris was reminded of ancient memories that she had forgotten.

    In the distant past, not long before Ramiris was born, she had seen Veldora, who was very simr in appearance to the great Veldanava, but was rampaging.

    Veldora''s attributes were mainly wind, like the literal meaning of "storm dragon, but even "space" and

    "water" are under his control. Combined with the amazing amount of mana second only to Veldanava, he was simply the raging storm itself.

    It was as if Veldora was the very incarnate of the Heavenly Cmity, his berserk power was said to be the strongest on the ground. His two sisters, however, possessed a power even more transcendent, reaching another level.

    The attribute of Velgrynd, which is the "me" attribute, is the worst match-up with the "Wind"

    attribute of Veldora. She could make the difference in the amount of mana worthless, standing above Veldora with an overwhelming presence.

    However, that alone is not bad.

    After all, there''s a power differential that''s even bigger that makes the win or loss of the game untenable.

    The real threat is the eldest sister, Velzado.

    The attribute of Velzado is ice, but her essence is not water, but rather something more. Velzado has the power to deceive using authority, misleading others about her own attributes, so that no one knows the truth of them.

    Ramiris had heard Veldanava speak once, so she knew the truth about Velzados multiple attributes.

    no, it was known before.

    Sadly, however, the repeated reincarnations made her forget these things.

    No, actually, it wasn''tpletely forgotten, but it always took a lot for Ramiris to remember ancient memories.

    That''s why Ramiris felt that, fortunately, this time the opponent was Velgrynd, and if the enemy had been switched to Velzado, it should have been impossible for Veldora to win.

    Ramiris remembered that Velzado had wiped out the raging Veldora with a single blow, and her "icy, frozen eyes" that took it all for granted.

    So now, it''s not too much to say that Ramiris is worried about Veldora to the extreme.

    She couldn''t calm herself down and flew around the room.

    Are you okay, Master?"

    Such a question represents Ramiris''s uneasiness, but it also includes the phrase "it''s okay to run away", which is actually an attempt to care for Veldora.

    But Veldora replied in the same way.

    "Don''t worry. You guys just stay here and enjoy my bravery!"

    Veldora revealed a look of seeming relief, not a hint of unease in her heart, and then left the maze alone, confident and full.

    At this point, Veldora looked very dazzling to Ramiris.

    Thinking back to the way Veldora used to be, this growth now, struck a chord with her.

    After Veldora had struck out to deal with Velgrynd, Ramiris took a look around at those left in the Control Room.

    Charys, who had been dered unable to be a warrior by Veldora, stayed behind, but it couldn''t be helped. With the me attribute Velgrynd as an opponent, Charys really isn''t going to be of any use.

    Beretta remained calm and collected, and seeing his usual demeanor, Ramiris'' mood calmed down.

    The people who had been transformed into Spirit Tree Doll Dryads by the hand of Rimuru had been incorporated into Beretta''smand as reporters, and there were now twenty-four members in all. Since Rimuru was busy letting them all evolve, the whole crew grew into excellent maze managers.

    Treyni was there, as well as her sisters Trya and Doris, all with the same gentle expression as usual, guarding Ramiris.

    Then there are Vesta and Dino, and the people who have recently be researchers.

    That is, the trio of Shinji Tanimura, Mark Lauren, and Zhen Liu Xing, along with Lucius and Raymond as trainee assistants.

    The five are considered Gedora''s men when the Maze enters wartime, but Gedora is now absent, and they havee to help the Control Room as Ramiris'' assistants.

    Everyone looked back at Ramiris with concern.

    Thus, Ramiris deliberately changed to a lighter tone of voice.

    "Really! I''m not worried. Master will definitely win, and even if he loses, Rimuru will find a way to fix it, and Im definitely not wrong. But in the end, Master is invincible as long as you don''t overlook him!

    Hearing her own words, Ramiris herself calmed down. If it''s Veldora and Rimuru, theyll be sure to recapture the calm everyday life.

    The uneasy atmosphere could have been banished, I supposeand yet shortly thereafter, the incident happened just as she had that thought.

    ***

    "Warning! It''s an intruder!

    Alpha, the chief operator, shouted loudly.

    Hearing this, everyone immediately switched their mindset tobat mode.

    Disy on screen."

    After Beretta gave the order, a portion of the main screen screen split and begin showing the scene of the invasion.

    Seeing the figure standing on the spot, Ramiris couldn''t help but yelp.

    "Wait, isn''t that an angel? It''s not just the flesh that''s been affected but also the deterioration that''s happening, Hes giving off a pretty dangerous feeling!

    In fact, the intruders are very foreign indeed.

    The pure white clothes were covered with mythical equipment that emitted a ck and gold glow, and the long ck hair also carried a glow like fragmented starlight, which further highlighted the beauty of this person.

    Three pairs to six pure white wings on the first man''s back further increased his attention level.

    Calction of the energy value is out! This, this is

    Alpha covered her mouth.

    "What''s wrong? Report now.

    At Treyni''s urging, Alpha regrouped.

    "Although it''s only spection, the existence value of the leading individual is worth over three million. The next five, each with a presumed existence value of 400,000 to 700,000."

    Alpha''s statement seeded in freezing the air in the "control room".

    It is the hidden duty of thebyrinth to numerate the level of the lifeforms and construct the relevant database. The original purpose of this was to help with crisis management by umting information about the battles in the maze when they were disyed on the screen.

    The numerical representation that ismon to the entire process is called existence value".

    This is the numerical value formed after numerating the amount of mana and physical ability, plus the internal energy value of the weapons equipped, and is not the same thing as the actualbat ability.

    Since it is impossible to measure one''s abilities and the skills one has acquired by studying them, this value is only for reference purposes, but even so, it is indicative of many things.

    If used correctly, you can expect help in strengthening your maze defense. For example, dispatching people of simr level to deal with an enemy based on their existence value, or roughly guessing what level ofbat skill the enemy is based on their existence value.

    However, this system is still in the pilot phase, and the degree of data umtion can hardly be called sufficient.

    In this world, there are also fierce people like Hakurou, whose existence value is only 60,000 or so, but can beat enemies whose value is several times their own.

    His existence value is less, but stronger than Gozu and Mezu, whose existence values are around 130,000.

    Because there are many more such examples, the existence value of such things can only be used as a general reference, which has bemon knowledge.

    ...........

    ........

    ...

    By the way, the existence value hierarchy of the Jura Tempest Federation is also tied to the Freedom Association hierarchy.

    Existence value of less than 1,000 is E ss.

    D ss is from 1,000 to less than 3,000.

    C ss is from 3,000 to less than 6,000.

    B ss is from 6,000 to less than 8,000

    B+ ss is from 8,000 to less than 9,000.

    A- ss is from 9,000 to less than 10,000.

    A huge high wall will appear here, and those who ovee it will be able to enter the first-ss ranks.

    An existence value of more than 10,000 is an A ss, which is considered a Hazard ss.

    More than 100,000 is a Special A ss, which is considered to be a Cmity ss.

    Those who had obtained the demon lord species had a minimum existence value of 200,000, and ording to Rimuru''s feeling, the existence value of those suspected to have been yman and Frey before the Awakening was around 400,000.

    In this way, the existence value of 400,000 or more is defined as a Disaster ss equivalent to S ss.

    In the Jura Tempest Federation, the S ss does not refer only to the demon lord, after all, there is arge number of executives with strength equivalent to the old demon lords, so for the sake of convenience and understanding, all of the guys at this level are defined as S ss.

    From here on out, it''s a standard that''s only used in the Jura Tempest Federation.

    The natural Catastrophe ss is a designation limited to true dragon species" and Guy. So the Jura Tempest Federation uses the Special S ss to define the other awakened transcendents.

    It was suspected that the amount of awakened yman wasn''t very stable, but since Rimuru had remarked that ''he''s around 700,000-800,000 right? In this way, a character with an existence value above 800,000 is defined as a Special S ss. On top of that, some of the guys whose existence had crossed the millions mark had decided to be called by the simple and understandable title of Super Awakened (million) ss.

    As a special mention for reference, no matter who is summoned, the existence value of the upper demon is fixed at 140,000. It''s like having a cap set by someone, a standard number that ismon to all upper-level demons.

    Even for Testarossa and the others, the initial value of the existence on record was only a quarter of a million, although it is now impossible to verify whether this is true or not, but Ramiris and others think that there should be no mistake.

    ...........

    ........

    ...

    "I didn''t expect to it to be a Super Awakenedits a Seraphim anyway"

    Ramiris stopped halfway through her sentence.

    Beretta nodded in return, then went on to exin.

    "That''s a lot of trouble, and the other side is also S-ranked. Now that the floor guardians have fallen asleep, it would be a bit difficult to meet such an enemy.

    "But, but, but, it''s not good to do nothing, is it?

    As if to help calm down the panicked Ramiris who was answering, Treyni opened her mouth with a soft smile.

    That is true, Lady Ramiris. So let me go out and meet the enemy.

    As if to follow Treyni, Trya and Doris also stood up.

    "Of course, I''ll go with you.

    "Sister, I''m going with you too!"

    Hearing this, Ramiris, instead of calming down, panicked even more.

    "Wait, wait, wait! You guys did get stronger, but youpletely lose to them numerically, dont you!?

    "Well, no problem. The existence value is only a reference, so let''s take this opportunity to prove the power of Lady Ramiris'' entourage to everyone.

    Hearing this, Trya and Doris nodded their heads hard as well.

    Ramiris tried to stop them, but couldn''t do anything good. But the practice of putting all the danger on the lovely Torrenies now was intolerable as hosts.

    "It''s no use! We only have to fight with certainty, as both Rimuru and Master once said.

    Anyway, operate the maze first to buy time, in the meantime things might get betterand Ramiris began to escape reality.

    The one who stepped forward to dissuade her was Charys.

    "Lady Ramiris, unfortunately, it should be very difficult to buy time. We cannot allow the enemy to approach when the floor guardians are sleeping, leaving the other side in danger of having important facilities destroyed. Right now there is only one option to take. I''m also prepared to strike, and I hope you''ll give me your permission.

    Veldora had now gone out, and the strongest man here was now Charys, and it was for this reason that he spoke these words with the realization that he must do something.

    "Lord Beretta, the task of guarding Lady Ramiris is yours.

    "Understood. I''ll take care of Lady Ramiris.

    Beretta was not far behind, and since all three dryad sisters were going to strike, he was certainly the only one left who could guard Ramiris.

    Alpha and the other girls were of the same mind, and all the members present stood together and swore an oath to guard Ramiris.

    Shinji and the others didn''t disapprove and opened their mouths

    "We''ll do our best as well!

    "Oh, yeah. We have received so much care here, so we must repay it.

    "Agreed. And then there''s the resurrection bracelet, so you can keep trying even after you''re dead.

    "Exactly. We Imperial soldiers should have been killed a long time ago, and now we have a chance to prove ourselves.

    "Indeed. Otherwise, I''ll be scolded by Mr. Gedora.

    The atmosphere in the "control room" had eased, as the five men were still talking andughing, even with their powerful enemies at hand.

    Ramiris first took a deep breath, then showed an extraordinarily bright smile.

    "In that case, do your best to kill the enemy! Even if you are dead, you can still be resurrected, so give it your all! Little dragon king will also be there to help, so definitely win!!!

    Everyone nodded at the words. Then duties were assigned to each other, and the action was quickly set in motion.

    ***

    The intruder, whom Ramiris sensed, was really Zrio, the chief subordinate of the demon lord Feldway.

    Zrio, the original Killing Angel, like the two remaining Killing Angels, ruled the entire race as the marshals knowns as the "Three Admirals" of the Phantom race (apparition tribe), and as a marshal of the powerful armies they led, he would not normally have been on the front lines.

    This time, however, Feldway gave an absolute order to take advantage of the good opportunity of thebyrinth''s destruction by Velgrynd, and making sure to wipe out the target.

    What an end to those previous Imperial armies that had stormed the Labyrinth, Zrio had heard about it from Feldway, so he took it upon himself to assume that weak soldiers would only get in the way.

    The only men he brought in were five generals.

    These five people, who were originally superior angels like the Wise Angel or the Seated Angel, had all acquired an amount of manaparable to that of the king after bing a phantom race.

    The rtive flesh is more fragile, but not a problem as long as the environment is within the maze. The spread of magic is suppressed here, so the generals are able to y to their full strengths.

    For these reasons, Zrio''s group walked leisurely through the maze, and rightfully so, someone was sure toe out and get in their way.

    Finding the mouth of the stairs toward the bottom during the walk, a sense of spatial change came overhead. Yet the Zrio group did not panic but calmly observed the status quo, and what finally appeared before them was a confined space with nothing in it.

    About eight figures can be seen in the middle of this venue.

    "It seems that some havee out to greet us. We mustn''t lose our manners. Give your greetings.

    At Zrio''s words, his subordinates nodded wordlessly.

    The two gradually drew closer, eventually stopping short of a face-to-face confrontation.

    The first to take a step forward was Treyni.

    "Greetings, everyone. In lieu of the lord of thisbyrinth, Lady Ramiris, I, Treyni, Charys, and others havee to greet you. I don''t remember inviting you all, but could you please tell me who you are and why your are here?

    Treyni smiled as she uttered these words, but there wasn''t a hint of a smile in her eyes. She was watching the opponents movements with the utmost vignce, and was always maintaining a standby posture for any situation that may arise.

    Beforeing here, Treyni had reinforced herself to the fullest. She clung to the Wind Spirit King she was now able to summon, turning the power of the Spirit King into something entirely her own. Even in a long battle with Lace, Treyni had simply boarded the Wind Maiden (Sylphid) of the High Spirits inside herself. From this point on, Treyni is said to have showed her hand in the first step of the opening game.

    The amount of the Spirit King''s mana converted to an existence value that was about a million.

    Normally, boarding such a huge amount of power in the body would impose a huge burden on Treyni, whose existence value was only 600,000. However, now that they were in abyrinth where they coulde back to life even if they died, Treyni didn''t have to worry about the physical burden and could challenge her opponent with all her might.

    Standing one step behind Treyni, Charys'' aura was not at all inferior to that of the former. Even if the opponent had more than double his own amount of mana, Charys took itpletely lightly and was undaunted.

    After all, Charys is usually always training live for his opponents with the overwhelming presence of Veldora.

    There were instances in the world where people like Gobta could defeat opponents who had several times their own power. Not to mention the fact that he now had reliablepany, so Charys had no doubt that he would win.

    It is the same with the Dragon Kings.

    As a reward, they had been given "names" by Rimuru, and had nowpleted their evolution as the faithful men of Ramiris.

    With further experience, the Dragon Kings will undoubtedly reach the Special S ss. The power converted into an existence value of around 700,000. In fact, more than fear, they were now leaping at the chance to test their strength.

    Trya and Doris, too, hadpleted the ''identification'' with the Maiden of the Wind (Sylphid). Trya would assist the Dragon Kings against the enemies behind Zrio, while Doris would be in charge of providing backup for Treyni and Charys.

    Although Beretta''s existence value was only around 400,000, his fighting skills were excellent. Even with his fighting strength though, he needed to stay by Ramiris as a guard, so the members currently here were the strongest formation the Maze could send at this time.

    If this lineup loses now as wellthen it would be a matter of calling in the residual groups of Rigurd and Gobta for a big total attack. They are now currently concentrating to the war effort on the next level, so someone has to buy time for that alone.

    Of course, none of the members here feel that they will lose.

    "That''s amazing. Originally, I had heard that there was no battle power left in the maze, but I didn''t expect that there were still such strong people of this level. Oops, haven''t introduced myself yet. My name is Zrio, one of the Three Admirals entrusted to the army by the demon king, Lord Feldway.

    Zrio took a graceful bow, his movements sophisticated as if he were a famous actor on stage.

    However, the words that came out of his mouth did not make people feel gratified. He was using such an attitude to look down on Treyni and others, not taking the Maze members into consideration at all, his true thoughts were simply too obvious.

    Treyni was furious about it, but she wasn''t stupid enough to lose her mind over it. There had been apse when faced with Lace, so she did her best to maintain a calm demeanor and try to keep the conversation going.

    "So it is. Lord Zrio of the Three Admirals, huh? Forgive me, I''ve never heard that name before.

    Zrio just smiled back at Treyni''s slightly provocative words.

    "Well. Although it''s fairly well known in other worlds, I''ve been away from this world for a long time.

    We are all foreigners to this world.

    "Foreigners, huh?"

    "Yes. So, we''re not going to seek any satisfaction in that regard.

    "By the way, you asked us why, right? Of course I''ll tell you, it would save us a lot of work if we could get your help.

    "It depends on the content.

    "All right. Our goal is to kill the boy named Masayuki Honjou. If you don''t hide and just hand him over, Ill retreat this time.

    Zrio, who had a gentle air of beauty, announced in a feminine voice that he was here to kill Masayuki.

    No one here will simply agree to this.

    It was fortunate that he was Rimuru''s friend, and an irreceablepanion of Treyni and others.

    "You''re so funny. I''m sorry to say that the negotiations are over.

    "Well, that''s a shame.

    Completely not hiding the fact that he actually had no regrets at all, Zrio shed a smile. Then in the next moment, the battle began.

    ***

    Treyni jumped into the air, then aimed at Zrio from above, releasing countless invisible des, a move that Treyni couldn''t even avoid, the unseen breaking de.

    "It contains spatial properties and the power to cut through even the second dimension.

    Moreover, this move was not visualized and could be shot without any preparatory movements, so it was clear how dangerous Treyni had be. This time, however, her opponent was very strong.

    Nohe was overpowering.

    Zrio didn''t move a step, not because he didn''t notice the de or was toote to react, but because there was absolutely no need to evade it.

    The moment the invisible de was about to cut Zrio, it suddenly disappeared, ayer of spatial distortion that seemed to cover Zrio''s body was revealed simultaneously.

    This trick resembles a phenomenon that has been documented in the Maze''s database as the Spatial Distortion Defense Field that Zegion excels in, a defense trick that nullifies various attribute attacks or spatial cuts, absolutely.

    What?

    "The same technique as Lord Zegion? That''s a problem.

    "Oh, by the sounds of it, it seems that there are people here who can use the space distortion defense field. Zegion is it? hey hey, I obviously heard that the executives of this country have all been sealed, it looks like the information was wrong

    With that said, Zrio''s expression was still unperturbed.

    It couldn''t have been more clear that Zrio hadn''t used his true skills, rather he looked like he was still enjoying himself.

    It was because of sensing this that Treyni''s expression turned grim. She immediately made eye contact with Charys and changed course, no longer obsessed with barely beating Zrio, and instead beginning to concentrate on stalling for time.

    In fact, the five generals that Zrio had brought with him had been embroiled in a bitter battle because of thebyrinth''s battle strength, a result that the dragon kings who were always training for battle had achieved by perfecting their strength.

    To say that there is any other reason, it is that as long as one fights in this main field within the maze, the maze members are equivalent to being immortal. That''s why they are able to fight beyond their limits, and even if they have the same strength as their opponents, they are able to turn the situation upside down.

    It''s a win at this rate, Treyni thought.

    As dangerous as Zrio was, the other enemies should be eliminated soon. Next, even the space distortion defense field should be able to be broken if everyone joins forces tounch the challenge.

    Worst case scenario, just find a way to drain Zrio''s strength.

    That''s right. As long as we can get rid of the other side, the conditions for victory this time will be fulfilled, there is no need for us to reluctantly destroy the enemy. And yetwhy is this man still so unhurried?

    The side that undoubtedly has the upper hand is hers, but no matter what, Treyni can''t get rid of the unease in her heart.

    The reason is Zrio who is still so unconcerned.

    Anyone with a bit of discernment can''t possibly misjudge the current state of the battle. Not to mention the fact that Zrio had previously imed to be a marshal of the First Army.

    Someone who could lead a demon-lord level strongman to make the mistake of arranging an outgoing formation,mon sense would say that it was impossible.

    The purpose of this man is to kill Masayuki the chosen hero"right?

    Generally speaking, if the target is only Masayuki, it''s easier to use assassination. It was because Zrio''s existence value was so high that Treyni and others missed the possibility.

    "Lady Ramiris! Do you know where Mr. Masayuki is?

    "Hey, why are you asking about this all of a sudden? Of course I do."

    Treyni sent a question to Ramiris through ''Thought Communication''.

    On the other hand, it wasn''t like Ramiris was doing nothing but watching the battle. While the intruders were a big problem, there was something much more tricky to deal with, and that was directing the people of the metropolitan area to take refuge.

    The metropolitan area that had been forcibly isted into thebyrinth could no longer be said to be safe now that Veldora had gone out. If Veldora does lose the battle, the metropolitan area will automatically and directly change back to where it was.

    Since the status quo could not be maintained by the power of Ramiris alone, there was nothing that could be done about it. That''s why it''s important to get the residents to take refuge before that happens.

    Fortunately, the 95th floor, which had now been turned into a hundred floors, had open space enough for the legions to line up, and although the research facilities were not essible to ordinary people, it was still possible to receive the entire town.

    At Beretta''s prompting, Ramiris was panicking and starting to cope.

    "Please make sure he''s safe right now!

    "There are only a few intruders, I think you''re overthinking it"

    He was also very busyDespite thinking so, Ramiris still agreed to Treyni''s request.

    It turned out just as Ramiris thought it would, just as well.

    "Well, he''s all right. He''s helping to guide the people of the town to shelter in the city.

    As Ramiris said, Masayuki took over the job of pacifying the townspeople. Without Masayuki, there would have been a panic that would have dyed the evacuation for a long time, and now was the time for Masayuki''s power toe into y.

    In short, there was no sign of a fight.

    After all, the inside of thebyrinth was all at Ramiris'' mercy, and if something happened, she would know right away. Havingmunicated all this, a breath of relief finally came from Treyni''s side.

    "So, I can rest assured

    Even so, she still couldn''t seem to get it out of her head.

    "Do you care?

    "Yes. If the enemy really wants to assassinate Masayuki, the people who are taking refuge may also be involved.

    Treyni also thought she might be overthinking it.

    Even so, since the rm in her mind was always ringing, Treyni felt that it was better to be careful in everything.

    "Got it! Since Treyni-chan is talking about this, let''s go to the 70th floor!

    Hearing this, Treyni eased herself.

    The remnants of the Imperial Army were on the 70th floor, so even if an assassin did attack, they should be able to stall for some time.

    "You can rest easy there."

    "Right, right, right!

    Just like that, Masayuki headed towards the 70th floor of the maze.

    *** The people here are too good at ordering people, Masayuki sighed.

    With Rimuru at the head, the big shots in this country, whoever they are, put whateveres to mind into action immediately. Let''s leave it at that for now. Masayuki really wishes that the guys in the upper echelons would think more about their position and act more cautiously.

    Of course, it''s not as if all the people in the Jura Tempest Federation are like that.

    I was fortunate to have identally spoken the words I had been hiding in my heart.

    Masayuki wouldn''t haveined much if it was a beautiful girl as innocent and gentle as Shuna who had asked. That''s why now, he''d happilye to help guide people to shelterand yet Ramiris came running in the way.

    "I want you to go to the 70th floor immediately!

    Such an order was given with indefensible momentum.

    Unfortunately, he was very reluctant.

    However, Ramiris was still also one of the people in power here.

    Not only did Ramiris have Veldora backing her up, but she was also one of the characters who knew Masayuki''s secret. So no matter what she asked, Masayuki was unable to refuse.

    "Just give it up. Lady Ramiris is also harmless, simply not having the strength to exin it slowly, right? Now that even Lord Veldora has struck, it''s clear that there''s been an emergency.

    Walking next to Masayuki was a young man.

    He had snake-shaped earrings in his ears.

    A wild watch was worn on his hand and a skeleton ring was ced on his finger.

    What looked like a poisonous purple shirt had a spiked leather jacket on the outside, a spiked cor around his neck, trousers with a waistband underneath, and leather boots with ck soles.

    In simple terms, it''s the so-called punk style of dressing up, and no matter how you look at it, you look like a delinquent teenager. The kind of style that Masayuki was not good at dealing with.

    And yet, surprisingly, he was lucky to have an unexpected chemistry with this young man.

    Mostly because he was also a strugglingborer.

    The youth, whose name is Venom, often seems to be bossed around by his superiors into all sorts of unreasonable situations. Presumably seeing his own self in Venom, Masayuki held a sense of closeness to him.

    In Venom''s words, ''I have no human rights.

    Now, he had received orders from his superiors to escort Masayuki and move in with him.

    He didn''t go to see Jiu and Bonnie because of his previous concerns, and also broke apart from Jinrai (***Was also called Thunder but Im sticking with Jinrai for now).

    As a mere impostor, he is unable to guard Jinrai at all, so Masayuki offered to disband him.

    "If you ever need me somewhere, feel free toe and greet me! Until then, I''ll work in this country''s guild to keep my work from getting sluggish.

    After saying that, Jinrai epted Masayuki''s offer to disband and then became a guild employee of the Jura Tempest Federation, always secretly supporting Masayuki.

    It was a little lonely, but also a relief. After all, in this way, Masayuki would no longer have to lie to hispanions, and the resulting guilt would disappear along with it.

    Venom then appeared in front of Masayuki, who had been alone.

    Venom knows that Masayuki is weak, so he''se to guard him. And unlike his appearance, Venom patiently listened to Masayuki''s exnation about the past.

    As a result, Venom''s offered cooperation so that Masayukis reputation would not decline.

    It was probably all Rimuru''s intention, so Masayuki epted the other''s kindness unceremoniously.

    Just like that, the two have now be friends with nothing to say.

    "So, I know it''s an emergency, too. If that''s the case, why do I have to be separated from the town now, when I''m in charge of ying Hero?

    "Geez, you''re not so weak. You really can''t do anything if the enemyes, can you?

    "It''s true, though. It''s true! But, thats not true is it? The uneasy look in everyone''s eyes just now stung my heart

    Please don''t goeven if you don''t say it directly, Masayuki understands what the residents mean.

    That''s why Masayuki was unhappy with Ramiris order.

    However, in Venom''s view it''s a different story.

    To say which side is safer, the 70th floor is definitely better than the 100th. Not only are there a significant number of Imperials there, but there are also the Overkillers in the 70th floor research facility.

    Although the "Overkillers" are now mainly responsible for the safety of the children, Masayuki can also be sheltered by them once they get there.

    What matters most to Venom is the mission given by Diablo, who must gamble his life to guard Masayuki as literally as he can.

    "Indeed, it is somehow reassuring to have you around. However, the refuge is over to a certain extent, and the guard on the hundredth floor is well guarded.

    In fact, if an enemy wanted to invade here, it couldn''t be done without the strength of floor guardian level. Due to the absence of Gedora, the ss guardian of the sixtiethyer, Shinji and the others had also retreated and the ce was in an unguarded state, so the 70th floor now became the first line of defense.

    "That means I''m going to be in danger, right!?

    That''s how it was, Venom nodded.

    "I suppose so, but don''t worry, I''m here. I''ll take responsibility and protect you.

    "Well, then Ill be counting on you.

    Masayuki was fortunate that he was actually slightly aware of the situation he was in, and at such a time as this, if he moved to the front line, perhaps someone was aiming at him.

    If it wasn''t for that, Ramiris wouldn''t have exposed Masayuki, who waspletely devoid of any fighting ability, to danger.

    As Masayuki also has the "Resurrection Bracelet, he can be brought back to life even if he dies in the maze, so Ramiris doesn''t hesitate to use him as bait.

    "That may be so. By the way, this is probably to avoid implicating other residents, and there''s a risk of exposing your weakness, so I think it''s the right thing to do.

    "Yes. I can understand that as well, but I have another situation

    Jiu and Bonnie were both at the 70th floor, and it was also a problem for Masayuki because bumping into them would be awkward.

    I don''t know about those two, but it''s a mission, so don''t me them too much, even if it looks like they want to kill you, it may not be entirely from their hearts. Unlike monsters, humans are veryplex, and that''s why humans are great toys for demons.

    Masayuki red at Venom who said this for a moment, then muttered, "How can it be so simple to sort it out? But he also understood that people''s true hearts are hard to understand as Venom said, and it was also true that he could notpletely hate Jiu and Bonnie.

    So dwelling on it any longer is just asking for more trouble.

    After arriving at the 70th floor anding to the building where the Imperial Army was stationed, Masayuki finally prepared his mind.

    "And don''t you ever think of me as a toy again."

    Masayuki sighed and shook his head, then switched his moods for good and casually grumbled at his friend, Venom.

    Sensing the change in his mood, Venom revealed a smile, protecting Masayuki was a mission, but Venom himself was fond of Masayuki.

    He was simr in the point of aborious life, and although he was weak and seemingly unable to turn the tide, he was still always able to keep his will. Venom respects that in his heart.

    Venom was often proud of his rebellious spirit, even if it was still less than fortunate, and somehow he felt that way.

    That''s why Venom responded with good intentions

    "Ha ha ha ha ha! That depends on how you dohuh?

    Facing the sudden presence, Venom stood in front of Masayuki to protect him.

    "Who are you?

    "Geez, are you getting in the way? I clearly had perfect timing, but this unustomed body is so slow to respond."

    The man ignored Venom and just stared at Masayuki with disgust. In front of this obviously entangled foreign existence, Masayuki couldn''t hide his own shakiness either.

    It''s clear that there''s nothing to show for it so far, but theres no denying its overwhelming dominance.

    The three pairs of six pure white feathers on the man''s back further emphasized his refined fleshly beauty. From between the wide, white spaces of the dress, one can peer into the muscles that have been repeatedly exercised.

    What was most intense was the man''s eyes, which were as if they were boarding a fierce beast, not allowing anyone to approach, full of cmity and fierce light.

    "Don''t ignore me!"

    Venom yells out to enable an uppercut spinning back kick.

    The action standard of this kick, as if drawn in, hits the enemy on the side of the head, and yet

    Masayuki was stunned.

    It''s no wonder he was surprised, after all ,the opponent took a kick from Venom defenselessly as if to say that he wasn''t unresponsive, just found it unnecessary to defend.

    "Hmph, a worm that doesn''t even have any survival value. You are a dependent of the evil demons that have hindered us since time immemorial. You''ve been very rude to me, Lord Cornu, one of the Three Admirals! Get your shit together and go to hell!

    The man who had just identified himself, casually opened his palm towards Venom, and the next moment, apressed magic bomb was let loose and hit Venom with an unavoidable speed.

    Calling yourself an adultthought Masayuki. Its fortunate that he tried not to think about these strange things while hastily bracing himself for Venom.

    No! Are you okay?

    Venom was still alive.

    He reacted barely, sessfully deflecting the magic bullet with his left arm.

    However, the injury is still serious, as Venom''s left arm has disappeared and arge hole has been cut in the left side of his abdomen.

    how can it be okay? Its unbelievable and I dont want to admit it, but that bastard seems to be much better than me. But don''t worry, I''ll definitely protect you.

    After saying that, Venom stood up calmly.

    Not unscathed, but not incapable of fighting anymore either.

    "What a stubborn monster. I''ll kill the teenager while Zrio''s bait creates an opportunity. I hate idiots because of that.

    Looking at the sighing Cornu, it was fortunate that he really wanted toin about what a joke he was making.

    Masayuki had absolutely no clue why he was being hunted down, and felt responsible for the fact that Venom as injured as a result.

    Venom

    "So, that invading bastard is aiming for Masayuki?

    "Did you know from the beginning?

    "When Lady Ramiris sent the message, I had a feeling that this would be the case. Don''t worry, we can''t beat this bastard, but we can at least stall for some time.

    But"

    "The bastard won''t kill you because of the bracelet. To kill you here will only bring you back to life somewhere else. With that in mind, he probably wants to get you out of the maze before he ns on doing so. So he''s definitely not going to dare use the kind of attack that would involve you too!

    Venom grunted uncontrobly as he spoke.

    His judgment was spot on.

    Fortunately, the resurrection save point was set in the "control room". At first it was only arranged so that no one would see the scenes of himing back from the dead, but it was reassuring at the time.

    Cornu, on the other hand, was agitated by the idea of being seen through.

    Cornu has reasons why he can''t fail again.

    This reasoning goes back decades. At the time, Cornu was executing an invasion campaign in a different alien world and failed at the stage where he was only one step away from sess. What happened is still unclear, but it was the sudden appearance of searing fire that burned his whole army to the ground.

    As a result, Cornu, of the "Three Admirals, was left without a single subordinate, and even after he had recovered from his injuries, he was still mentally depressed and could not be relieved.

    It is for this reason that despite being in an overwhelmingly dominant position, Cornu has always shown an attitude of defeat. Unfortunately, those who were hostile to him were not going to let that opportunity go.

    "I''ll just admit it. If this wasn''t the maze of the Starkeeper (Ramiris), there would be no need for me to step in at all. To bury you is easy, youll die anyway, so Ill give you despair first. Open your eyes and watch, Ill send you to that world with my true power!!!

    Cornu is not stupid enough to be careless at this point.

    He saw that the usual means of treating Venom would not work and, in order to prevent idents, decided to use all his strength to achieve his goal.

    Cornu wears a shimmering ck and gold outfit, which, like Zrio''s, is the highest mythical outfit given only to the "Three Admirals.

    With a fully armed Cornu as his opponent, Venom was left with no other option, his various means of attack were no longer useful and he could only wait for a mocking defeat.

    "Che, damn it!"

    The desperate gap in battle power made Venom''s five senses almost cringe together.

    There was no point in running away, and if he were to be wiped out, Masayuki would surely be taken away and killed. Even if Venom is resurrected again in thebyrinth afterwards, he will be purged by Diablo if he fails to protect him.

    I''m going to die, I''m going to die, thought Venom with tears in his eyes.

    The only way left was for Venom to kill Masayuki himself and send him to safety.

    "There''s no other way"

    Just moments after Venom made that decision

    "You seem to be having a hard time, so why don''t we help out?

    As if to guard Masayuki, two men appeared.

    "Who are youSir Minute? Also, Sir. Calgurio is here!

    The careful Masayuki remembered that they had met a few times before, and since both of them were big shots in the Empire, he himself was still nervous about whether or not he had lost his manners.

    "Your Excellency, please just call me Minute. It''s hard for me to calm down when you call me "sir"

    with the same face as His Majesty.

    "But, but

    "Hahaha, I feel the same way as Minute. Whenever I stand in front of His Excellency Masayuki, I feel excited no matter what. It was almost like being in front of His Majesty''s imperial court, and an even greater strength than usual emerges from within me!

    The stylish Minute and Calgurio, who looks serious with a blindfold over his left eye, are smiling as if to put Masayuki at ease.

    "Venom, right? Well take care of the backup.

    With that said, Minute turned his gaze to Cornu. Then, Cornu''s movements became sluggish as an unseen force field appeared.

    This was the effect of the unique skill ''Suppressor'' that Minute should have lost.

    "Minute, haven''t you lost your power?

    It is lost. But since it was once avable, it''s easy to get it again, right?

    Faced with Minute''s reply that Minute still wasn''t satisfied, Calgurio could onlyugh bitterly.

    "It''s enviable. I''ve lost my sense of omnipotence. However, it''s still easy for me to infuse magic essence into the body of a changed void.

    As if to prove his point, Calgurio''s strength began to swell, then quickly surpassed his limit into a rampage state, and the mucous membranes of his body began to bleed. If it continued like this, Calgurio would normally be dead, but there was no need to worry about that at all in the maze. Calgurio is now equipped with the "resurrection bracelet", which he got out of nowhere and has no limit on the number of times he can use it, without having to worry about the physical effects.

    "You''re exaggerating too much."

    "If you can''t do this much, you can''t face the dead."

    Because of their participation, Venom saw hope.

    Moreover, several more men rushed over and offered to assist Venom.

    Venom, who witnessed the men at a nce, epted their request without hesitation.

    That would be a big help. Don''t think about how to take this guy down, please trip him up!"

    "Got it!

    "Things seem interesting.

    "Now that the I am here, you can rest assured, leave it all to the ME!

    These three men, all of them, are "Overkillers" who came out of personal interest.

    "I give the orders. So everyone, let''s go!

    Although somehow it became a case of Calgurio calling the shots, no one objected.

    After receiving five helpers, Venom, in a supported state, began an offensive against Cornu.

    "You stinkers! Don''t get carried away!

    Cornu did not lose his cool, though he was on fire about it. While controlling the strength of his strikes to prevent Masayuki from escaping, he began to move in order to eliminate the enemy one by one.

    Very surprisingly, the coordination of this makeshift team was excellent. This is due to the fact that Calgurio took advantage of Cornu''s inability to use mass destruction attacks and the immortal nature of the Overkillers to develop a method ofbat that minimizes damage.

    The desperate gap in strength was bridged by resourcefulness and courage, and with the mutual assistance of six members, including Venom, the crowd finally managed to buy time.

    Then, taking advantage of the opportunity,

    "Masayuki, this way.

    "You''ve got to get out of here. As long as we can escape into the research facility, won''t we be able to travel to other levels?

    It was Bonnie and Jiu who suddenly said hello.

    "You, you!

    "I''m sorry. I would love to formally apologize, but this is not the time to do something like that.

    Anyway, you''d bettere with me.

    "Huh? Wait, wait, wait. What about Jiu?

    Bonnie looks like he intends to look for an escape as an escort and take Masayuki with him. However, Jiu didn''t move and chanted some sort of magic.

    "Well, don''t mind me. Next, I''ll disguise myself as Masayuki and confuse him.

    Jiu had transformed into Masayuki.

    Come on. That guy seems to have restrained his attacks on you, so Jiu''s n should be effective. Well take this opportunity to escape.

    It seems that the people who rushed to support seemed to have formted the entirety of this battle before they arrived here. During t he moment Jiu changed into Masayuki, fortunately, everyone stood so that Cornu could not see this side.

    Although Masayuki felt hesitant, it onlysted for a moment.

    "Got it. Anyway, even if I stay, I''ll only drag everyone down.

    He could only reluctantly agree with the strategy.

    ***

    There was already chaos in the "control room".

    The sudden appearance of an enemy that is far more difficult to deal with than expected.

    "Hey, Masayuki, the assassin, did you get the results of his existence value measurement?

    It came out! It was roughly 1.8 millionbut that ballooned to 2.8 after being equipped with mythical grade equipment!

    Whatthats a foul!

    Alpha''s report had made Ramiris very angry, butining alone would not help, and now she could only think desperately about countermeasures.

    "It is said that mythical equipment lends its power to its approved master, and that Lord Albert''s existence has more than doubled in value since that time, but it still seems that the potential of mythical equipment has not yet been fully integrated.

    Ramiris agrees with this analysis of Beretta''s.

    After equipping the Mythical Grade Equipment, Albert turned into a flesh-bearing spirit lifeform''s existence, and ording to the data measured at that time, his existence value had increased from 180,000 to over 400,000, which was already powerful enough, but it seemed that the Mythical Grade Equipment still had a considerable amount of potential. Albert has since gone into an evolutionary sleep, and it''s very much to be expected what he''ll be like when he wakes up.

    In that case, how exaggerated Kurobee was, who had already been able to build mythical level equipment, had be a topic of conversationBut now was not the time to delve deeper.

    Mythical equipment, though rare and excellent in performance, is only a threat in the hands of the enemy.

    "What are we going to do? Little Treyni and Charys teamed up and still got pinned by that Zrio! And besides, against that Cornu, Venom and the others are no match at all

    Ramiris'' concern was spot on.

    Venom evolved into a demon noble and his existence value soared to around 400,000. In addition, the presence of the three "Overkillers" who came to reinforce the leader was worth 300,000, and the remaining two had 200,000.

    As for Minute and Calgurio, who were from the Imperial Army, they couldn''t be expected to be warriors because they had lost most of their power and were now in a miserable situation with an existence value of just over ten thousand. Let''s just say that the two of them had the audacity to stand up and fight.

    However, these two are somehow very much alive and well.

    Miraculously, Minute was using his unique skill ''Suppressor'', which he should have lost, and even as a captive, he was still wearing a dashing suit, giving Ramiris the illusion that he was even more capable than Venom.

    As for Calgurio, somehow his existence value had been expanding since just now, and now it had reached 400,000. Then, the rate of increase slowed down, but the overall rate of increase remained slow and somewhat unexined.

    This is of deep interest.

    Sadly, however, there is no time to look into each of these matters closely. Ramiris forcefully pressed the unanalyzable displeasure, sending instructions to everyone.

    "Ahhh, even if you die, you can bring them back to life with the power of others! Then feel free to use them as outcasts. The problem is Masayuki.

    "What do you mean?

    "Even if he will can from the dead here, it''s all over when the enemy takes him, right? So people think it''s safer to let him take refuge.

    "I see."

    "Yes, so Bonnie has taken him away.

    Ramiris let out an "ooh-oh" exmation.

    She was impressed by the fact that she hade to the same conclusion as herself, and that they had started to act before they had received instructions.

    After all, Masayuki was a coward, and he certainly couldn''tmit suicide, and even when it came to the most critical moment, he probably wouldn''t use death to escape.

    At this point, it would be reassuring to have Bonnie with Masayuki.

    "Contact Bonnie! Tell him to set his escape destination here. And I think he can understand without going into detail, so just remember to tell him that if anything happens, he must take care of what he has to do!

    Understood."

    After receiving Ramiris'' instructions, Alpha immediately sent out the ''''Thought Communication''''. The instructions that had been perfectly coded were sent to Bonnie with zero time difference.

    After confirming this, Ramiris finally breathed a sigh of relief.

    "Okay. In that case, we''ll just make all the arrangements we need.

    Therge screen for surveince was now split into several screens showing the battle scenes from each area. No matter the area, thepanions were struggling and the situation was not good.

    "We''re really useless without Rimuru.

    "After all, it was the worst timing. If the guardians were awake, they wouldnt be at such a disadvantage.

    "That''s right

    Indeed, as Beretta said, it would have been much less passive if all the fighting power had been put together.

    Even so, Ramiris still felt responsible for the situation.

    Life in the Jura Tempest Federation is just so irreceable to Ramiris.

    At this moment, Beta, who was monitoring the remaining amount of magic, suddenly yelled out anxiously.

    "We have an emergency!"

    "What''s wrong this time!?

    "This is a state of affairs already foreseen, the supply of mana from Lord Veldora is cut off, and if this continues, the metropolitan area will be returned to the ground in less than ten minutes!

    "Eh, eh, eh! In other words, did Master lose!?

    For Ramiris, it was a reality she really didn''t want to believe, but if the opponent was Velgrynd, one had to still admit it might be possible.

    It was the anticipation of this situation that led residents to take refuge.

    Rimuru should find a way to solve Veldoras problem, Ramiris was convinced. Even if you are depressed here, things won''t get any better, so you can only think about what you can do with a positive mindset.

    "So, how''s the evacuation going?

    "No problem there. It is fortunate that Masayuki had seeded in persuading the opposing forces of asylum in the poption before he left.

    Everywhere, there are forces that are only particrly good atining, even in the capital

    Rimuru. Including those who profit from the outside through some channels and businessmen from outside, about 10% of the total poption stubbornly refuse to take refuge.

    These people, just by hearing Masayuki''s voice, became cooperative.

    Since Lord Masayuki had said so, these people had taken refuge in what had been a very resistant ce on such grounds.

    For this approximate brainwashing effect, even Ramiris was taken aback.

    Anyway, after careful confirmation, everyone came to the conclusion that the metropolitan area was empty of anyone. No problem then, and Ramiris, who made this judgment, decided to separate the metropolitan area from the maze.

    "The defense function can''t be activated without anyone there. It''s a shame, then, that massive damage in the metropolitan area will be inevitable."

    "Wait, hold on a sec, Beretta-chan! That''s the kind of thing you say to shake a person''s resolve!

    However, there is nothing that can be done about it.

    Ramiris herself didn''t have much mana left for extra structures, let alone the pile of additional buildings she had built earlier in order to maximize the expansion of the maze.

    It was a drawback that only came with handing over the entire supply of energy to Veldora, but Ramiris couldn''t think of any other solution to the problem either.

    "Of course I understand very well. If it was Rimuru-sama, hed probably say the buildings could just be destroyed and rebuilt.

    "That''s right, so now we have to be decisive and part with the other side

    Ramiris gritted her teeth for her own powerlessness while performing the operation to separate the metropolitan area. All that''s left is to pray that the metropolitan area that returns to the ground isn''t destroyed by a stray bullet attack.

    However

    "Emergency report! New enemies have appeared on the ground, numbering in two. It is impossible to measure the exact existence values because they are outside the maze, but it is presumed that the existence of the other party exceeds at least one million!

    This time, the reportes from Delta, who is in charge of monitoring the ground.

    Zooming in on the small surveince screen, everyone could see it, and two angels appeared in the pictureno, fallen angels with ck wings.

    The duo of a big muscr female warrior, and small, beautiful girl.

    They also had three pairs of wings.

    "Really? Since the number of wings is the same, then these guys are also equivalent to the killing angels (Seraphims).

    Panicking, Ramiris flew around, feelingpletely helpless at this point. However, with a faint hope of what she suddenly thought, she asked Delta a question.

    Delta-chan! How can you be so sure that these guys are the enemy? Maybe they"

    Though unlikely, the other side might actually be friendlyand to Ramiris, who had generated such naive thoughts, Delta could only tell her the cruel answer.

    "Because those two are preventing us from recovering the hole that Lord Velgrynd pierced. As soon as the maze is closed, our victory is confirmedso it''s a pity.

    That is the clear answer that cannot be doubted.

    Thats right. Thank you.

    Ramiris stopped flying around and sat powerlessly on Beretta''s shoulder.

    For the enemy''s tactic of not shying away and putting four Super Awakened here, Ramiris felt overwhelmed with disgust and even developed the mood to curse the other side for the whole night.

    And just then, a reliablepanion awakened.

    "Leave the ground to me. The city bearing the name of Lord Rimuru will not easily be destroyed.

    Atst the evolutionary Barrier Lord" Geld is resurrected.

    Geld!"

    Ramiris cried.

    Cried with joy.

    "Lord Gelds existence is worth over 2.37 million! It also contains the value of the equipment, so that you won''t lose to the invaders!!!

    The legendary-grade equipment held by Geld became mythic-grade as hepleted his evolution. It was also because of the surrounding magical aura that Geld had evolved so well.

    In fact, Rimuru didn''t expect this either, but all those present mistakenly thought that everything was a part of Rimuru''s ns.

    "That''s Rimuru for you. Even I wouldn''t have expected such a development.

    Ramiris, who basically has little scheming ability, speaks with confidence.

    But Beretta passed it off as if nothing had happened.

    "Exactly. His Excellency is very thoughtful.

    Moreover, another Awakening haspleted.

    I am also here. The other enemy will be my prey.

    "The Chimeric Lord" Kumara.

    "The existence value of Kumara is estimated to be around 1.9 million. Without exclusive equipment, to have such a value, the enemy is no longer a threat at all!

    Hearing Alpha''s report, the "control room" erupted into cheers.

    Then, as if to prove Alpha''s words, a fierce battle began on the ground as well. What was even more amazing was that Geld''s men were also scattered everywhere, spreading out their powerful and iparable ''Barriers'' to guard the town from the after-effects of the battle.

    "This is a win!

    "Anyway, it looks like we''ll make it through this.

    Ramiris makes a deration of victory, and Beretta is relieved.

    However.

    It is too early to be reassured.

    The ploy of the Demon King Feldway was not over.

    Lets just say that all the fights that have happened so far have been feints, while the opponent''s real target is actually someone else.

    ***

    The tension that permeated the "control room" became somewhat less intense.

    After making the deration of victory over Beretta''s shoulder, Ramiris fell silent as if she had no strength left.

    But Beretta was familiar with such scenes, and from the very beginning he had always cated his quiet master with a calm attitude.

    Shinji, who was always watching from a distance, watched themotion silently with a mind that had nothing to do with it.

    But it was also because of this that Shinji was now calm.

    He knew Ramiris was wavering, but couldn''t she have been more calm? He even had that thought in his heart.

    If only she could emte Mr. Beretta

    However, these were truthful words that Shinji would never say, for if he did, besides pointlessly incurring the wrath of Ramiris, there was also the risk of a pay cut to worry about.

    Ramiris'' maze was indeed powerful, but she herself was weaker than Shinji. It was a gap sorge that it''s not even necessary topare.

    So no matter how panicked Ramiris was, there was actually nothing she could do.

    AndShinji couldn''t help but recall the scene at the celebration a few days ago.

    Monsters with powers beyond imagination.

    Even strong men like that swore allegiance to Demon Lord Rimuru.

    Shinji and his "otherworlders" are ssified as "Special A" ss masters ording to the standard of the Freedom Association standards. He had also measured his existence value, which was now over 120,000. Moreover, Shinji also possessed the unique skill Healer,'' which was why the Imperial Army treated him as an elite.

    In fact, Shinji had been proud that his strength belonged to the upper ss, yet here he was so unassuming.

    The beautiful sisters who worked as operators over here alone each had an existence value of over 150,000.

    Thus, it urred to Shinji very naturally that it would be pointless to boast in being powerful here.

    By the way, the existence value of Mark is 130,000 and Zhens is 120,000. It''s all fair enough, but if you take those monsters on the screen as opponents, they wouldnt be able to do anything about it.

    However, after all the main forces of the maze were out in force, they were only barely able to hold a stalemate with the enemy, and Shinji felt that this alone was already very powerful.

    When you think about it now, the battle power of the Mecha Legion, which the Empire was proud of, was actually less than 30% of the total battle power of the Jura Tempest Federation.

    And that was only before the celebration.

    At the celebration, Demon Lord Rimuru gave the executives new powers as a reward, causing most of the upper demons to fall into an evolutionary sleep, and as a result, some of those powerful people had even begun to reach the Super Awakened (Millions) ss.

    Honestly, Shinji''s understanding can''t keep up with the status quo anymore.

    The same was true of Geld a moment agothe evolution of magical creatures was really inexplicable.

    It''s great to be in exile from the Empire to the Jura Tempest Federation!

    Shinji thanked Gedora-sensei so much from the bottom of his heart.

    He looked on the screen again and found that Minute, who was once his own officer, was fighting against Cornu, one of the "Three Admirals.

    This light scene is like a reversal scene in a movie.

    After all, what can one do with such a monster as an opponent? Let''s just say it''s unbelievable that there''s a guy like that in this world.

    In Shinji''s opinion, the fact that Minute and Calgurio have lost their power and still challenged their enemies is unusual. At the same time, "Do they even know what it means to be afraid? While feeling this way, the way the two men looked as if they were retrieving their power in front of a strong enemy like in a movie made him feel that the upper echelons of the Empire weren''t all undesirable.

    In short, it was extremely unrealistic.

    Could it be that they thought of themselves as the main characters? Shinji even generated such doubts.

    Probably because of that.

    Shinji had little sense of crisis about the whole situation and switched his thinking to something he cared more about.

    To put it simply, it''s an escape from reality.

    Shinji pulled his thoughts back to the snacks that had just been served as simple food for everyone.

    By the way, Miss Shuna is still so cute and pretty.

    It doesn''t matter what you think about his employerit doesn''t matter. What was upying Shinji''s heart right now was not the boring strife, but the always-so-cute Shuna-chan.

    Just by remembering the way she left the room after the other party had made a salute, Shinji had feelings of happiness.

    Although Shuna has a dreamy appearance as a beautiful girl, she is said to be very scary, ording to a very famous story.

    Not just Shinji, but Mark and Zhen and Lucius and Raymond, who have just be new assistants, are also all members of the Shuna fan club.

    In contrast, his employer, Ramiris, is

    Shinji couldn''t help but sigh.

    "Wait a minute, Shinji. If you have something to say, just say it.

    It was only at times like these that Ramiris''s instincts were keen.

    "No, nothing''s wrong."

    Shinji scrambled to carry out the denial.

    Shinji''s teacher, Gedora-sensei, also often scolded him for not being able to remain calm and collected in the face of a monster teacher. So you guys aren''t even close enough yet!.

    After experiencing the scene just now, Shinji also understood why he was scolded by Master.

    Indeed, Shinji is prone to show emotion, and is not good at the emotional maniption which his essential for wizards.

    But Gedora also said that while Shinji could not appreciate the emotion of expressionlessness, he was notcking in aptitude for magic; on the contrary, he was highly qualified.

    Anyway, that was it, Shinji had to admit that he had just been at fault.

    Now that you have the strength to be angry with me, Ramiris-sama will probably forgive me for my rudeness, too.

    Shinji is going in a good direction.

    In the end,paring Shuna to Ramiris in itself is wrong.

    There are actually more fundamental reasons for the gap between the two, as there is between adults and children.

    Although the vibe of a teenage girl remains in Shunas body, she has the sophisticated air of an adult.

    Although Ramiris had obviously lived for at least a thousand years, her mental age has remained low, not to mention her physical growth.

    Ramiris, who was a child on the outside as well as on the inside, couldn''t bepared to Shuna at all.

    But Ramiris always seems cute, so it''s better to treat her more gentlythats what Shinji thought.

    Anyway, Shinjis thoughts were full of other extra things like this.

    It was because of this that he took notice.

    The man, who was usually alwayszy, stood up at some point.

    Then, for some reason, Vesta, the normally always serious boss, now slumped over the table and fell asleep.

    "What? Mr. Dino, what are you?

    It was really only by chance that Shinji would ask that. However, this action of his was the most crucial reversal of the day.

    Shinji, who was the least conscientious, took the greatest credit today.

    ***

    Dino stood up and tried to do the duty given to him.

    Dino, who hates his job, is reluctant, but can''t refuse amission from someone he''s known for a long time.

    Above all, apulsive notion that he had to do it himself drove him.

    However, this action has been hampered by unintended consequences.

    "What? Mr. Dino, what are you?

    Upon hearing this voice from Shinji, Dino realized that the battle had been lost.

    I had nned to quickly take care of everything without anyone noticing, but I was prevented from doing so by the perfect timing of God.

    It was unapologetically out of character for anyone to have predicted Dino''s actions before.

    Dino reached out to try to capture Ramiris'' hand, which was then caught by Beretta.

    It all happened in a sh.

    If Shinji hadn''t made a sound, Dino wouldn''t have been hindered.

    "What are you doing, Lord Dino?

    "It''s amazing, I didn''t think you would get in the way. s, because of your presence, I have remained on guard and patiently waited until the present time to rx my tension"

    "I can''t stand it. You seem to have what it takes to be a big shot, Shinji.

    Half of Dino''sints were sincere, for he was well aware that there were very few people in the world who could see through his actions.

    Dino was confident about his abilities, but this made him feel empty again.

    Dino let out a long, depressed sigh, then gave Shinji a re. Then he turned his head and squinted his eyes at Beretta.

    It seemed that things were definitely not as simple as joking, and Shinji and the others finally understood the current situation. However, that doesn''t mean they easily can do something about it.

    Alpha and the others had surrounded Dino while picking up Ramiris from Beretta''s shoulder to protect her.

    Huh? Huh?"

    Ramiris, who had been unable to keep up with the situation because the development had been so sudden, kept looking over and over at Beretta and Dino, seemingly trying desperately toprehend what was happening in front of her.

    Shinji picks Vesta up and closes the distance between him and Dino. However, hispanions, Mark and the others, stayed where they were and no one moved.

    It seemed that even as it became the present situation, the men were still sleeping soundly, and anyone could tell that the situation was unusual.

    "Hey, Mr. Dino! You did this to everyone, didnt you?

    Dino had the breath to answer the shouting Shinji.

    "Sort of. By the way, you can actually resist my power, so your skills are quite excellent. I''m impressed with you.

    Im not too happy about that.

    It was actually a little cheery, but Shinji replied anyway.

    To this Dino just shrugged.

    Even though he could quantify Shinji, it was as if Dino didn''t look at him, his eyes never facing this way.

    He just looked over Beretta''s shoulder to look at Ramiris and announced.

    "Ramiris, I''m sorry, but can you cooperate with us? I don''t want to get rough with you either, and if you''re willing to assist, I promise I''ll treat you with care. You don''t want pointless bloodshed either, do you? So, can youe with me now?

    Dino said with a serious expression on his face.

    To this, of course, Ramiris, needless to say, refused.

    "Huh? You''re the one who''s talking out of your mind. If you do something like that, you''ll be in a lot of trouble when Rimurues back, won''t you?

    Ramiris waspletely foxing around, but her words were undoubtedly true.

    So Dino could onlyugh bitterly.

    "I guess so, I figured you''d answer like that. But I can''t justify that as enough for now. After all, I''m still the Watcher, even if I don''t want to be.

    "When you say ''Watcher'', do you mean the Seven Original Angels, of Lord Veldanava''s inner circle?

    "Correct. Actually, I used to be the "Pioneer" one. The task of watching the ground fell to me after the Chief Feldway went to the Otherworld.

    Youre joking, arent you?

    "No, this couldn''t be more true.

    Only now did Ramiris realize this startling fact.

    She was always thinking that Dino was as much of a liability to the Demon Lord as himself, not realizing that he was actually an important figure, and still named by the creation god Veldanava himself.

    Ramiris waspletely taken aback.

    By the way, Ramiris'' name was actually given by Veldanava as well, but she herself hadpletely forgotten about it due to repeated reincarnations. It woulde back to her when she became fully fleshed out, but one never knew when that day woulde.

    "People have always thought that all of the Originators had gone to the other side."

    Thats not the case. When the earthly world became peaceful, Lord Veldanava began to seek the stability of the otherworld, and I suppose you know that.

    "Huh? Yes, yes

    Ramiris''s actions seemed somewhat suspicious, but Dino immediately decided to ignore it, and to prod her would be troublesome, carefully illustrating that Dino was evenzier.

    So he took it as if Ramiris was in the know and continued the conversation.

    "Then it was Feldway and the other three ''originators'' who were responsible for that. The three remaining originators," including me, were left to work as Lord Veldanava''s hands and feet.

    "You too?

    "You''d think it was normal, but I was serious. However, because of a certain event, coupled with various internal circumstances, I went from a Killing Angel (Seraphim) to a Fallen Angel, even my peers.

    There''s nothing left of the Originals that''s still intact.

    "Wait, you left out the most crucial part! That''s what''s most important and what people care most about, isn''t it?

    Ramiris couldn''t resist opening her mouth to spit that out, but Dino just sighed in annoyance.

    "You''re noisy. That''s a lot of exining to do. And it doesnt matter to me at all, so get your head around it. Let''s start negotiating first.

    It''s too much of a stretch to brainstorm about this kind of thingrather, those present felt simrly when they heard Dino''s words. Dino, however, was notorious for his penchant for cking off, so it would be useless to seek more rification from him, so they all chose to give up and then focused on hearing what Dino had to say.

    So, what do you mean by negotiating?

    Ramiris asked on behalf of everyone.

    It''s exactly what I just said. Ramiris, if youe to our aid, then I swear I won''t go out on a limb against the people in thebyrinth. But if you refuse, then there''s no other way. Even if I have to kill everyone who gets in the way, I will have to take you away.

    If you''re going to say it like that, then it''s even less likely that they''ll help you.

    "It normally would be, but that''s not a problem. The best oue is to have yourpliance. The worst oue is to seal the maze.

    This is not what you want, is it? Who ismanding you to do this?

    Well, it might be okay to tell you this

    I mean, the only person who can order you around is Guy.

    Its something like that, however, there''s something very wrong with it too. After all, Guy and I are on equal footing, so why do I always have to do what that he tells me to?

    Whatever, it''s fine.

    Uh, it''s important

    Ignoring Dino''s foolishness, Ramiris began to think.

    "If it wasn''t for Guyright! Then its Chief Feldway the Pioneer, isn''t it? That guy came back from the otherworld and made contact with you who were hanging around. And you can''t disobey himis that what this is all about?

    It was truly frightening, detective Ramiris'' version of "mystery" guesswork.

    She is obviously always making the wrong inferences, but still somehow ended up with the right answer. This time, it was a brilliant hit.

    That''s amazing, its actually the right answer

    With most of the pawns in Feldway''s hands being used, the expectation is to execute this battle perfectly, with two main purposes in mind.

    One is to assassinate Masayuki.

    The other is to destroy the maze.

    Capturing thebyrinth is hard work, and there''s the danger of the n going off track. Feldway, in an effort to guard against this, thought it important to get Ramiris in his hands as soon as possible.

    With the idea of eliminating all elements of uncertainty, Feldway formted the battle n, and Dino merely acted at his behest.

    Hmphyou parted ways with Feldway because you were a delinquent, right? That guy''s a first-rate honor student. You and him must have a soft spot for each other.

    Wait, I''m not a delinquent, okay? I just like beingzy a lot. However, even if it really is depressing to follow that guy''s orders, and even if I''m much morefortable with that guy staying in the other world

    Even without further contact, their past rtionship still remains, said Dino.

    So it is. So, all the attackers are Originals? Isn''t that bad!? You should just ignore Feldway''s orders ande to the other side!

    It was a relief to Dino to hear that Ramiris was not bothered to make such a request, but he still could not nod his head in agreement.

    Unfortunately, I have my own problems.

    In fact, Dino found it incredibly strange that he couldn''t disobey Feldway himself. But even so, he simply rejected Ramiris''s proposal.

    It seemsthat you are serious. That''s quite a lot of nerve. That guy (Rimuru) is your opponent, one of the "Eight Star Demon Lords! Rimuru will be on dead set on guarding this ce once he returns!

    Ramiris made her determination clear.

    So it seems. As a matter of fact, I really don''t want to work, and this world of having food without doing anything is truly ideal. I just can''t help it. I''m sorry to say that I can''t be merciful. Don''t worry, I won''t kill you. Just try and get rid of me here.

    Dino returned to his usualnguid expression and replied with a wave of his hand.

    In this way, the negotiations are no longer concluded.

    The time for dialogue hase to an end and the battle has begun

    ***

    "Kill him, Beretta-chan!

    Ramiris seemed to be getting some energy and shouted with excitement.

    She certainly wasn''t going to go up and fight for herself.

    That was as Dino had expected, so he decided not to tease her and instead tried to see what Beretta had in mind first.

    The "control room" became a battlefield.

    Despite therge space, there were plenty of obstacles such as tables and chairs, and the environment was not suitable for fighting, so Ramiris wanted to relocate the environment.

    But Dino wasn''t going to agree, as that would most likely allow Ramiris to escape.

    So there was no other way around it, and the Alpha girls were scrambling to retrieve important equipment, regardless of the two confronting each other.

    Dino and Beretta also ignored those next to them and engaged in battle.

    Dino, out of nowhere, pulled out arge sword of equal length and posed.

    This great sword is called the Kuzurekiba (Crumbling Fang). It is a single-ded sword with a thick body, and appears to be so powerful that the weight alone is enough to break an opponent.

    Dino wore only his usual breastte and cloak, which was heavily in contrast with the heavy weapon, but he still looked natural and well-formed.

    Hows the performance of that sword?

    Converted to an existence value, itsone million.

    Alpha couldn''t hide her surprise at what the report said.

    What the hell, a mythical!? Just one stinking Dino, that must be a foul!

    Ramiris muttered incoherently and loudly in annoyance, while Dino just took it as a whisper.

    Dino held the Crumbling Fang" poised above his head.

    On the other hand, Beretta is empty-handed.

    However, the source of Beretta''s flesh were the magic steel figures made by Rimuru, which were now fused with Beretta''s magic and had transformed into living magic steel.

    The shape remained the same as when Rimuru made it, but the strength was iparable, In addition, it was wrapped up with Beretta''s magical aura, and no normal weapons would work against it.

    Beretta is a legendary ss weapon, the hardest in the maze.

    Nevertheless

    Dino casually swung down hisrge sword.

    Beretta didn''t hesitate to sidestep and duck.

    Not having a weapon in hand would not be a disadvantage, but this time the situation was bad.

    Beretta''s existence value was over 400,000, which was supposed to be on par with Dino, but with the mythical equipment being used, he couldnt fight him easily.

    A barehanded Beretta concentrates on ducking under and avoiding Dinos swords from the front. If he gets hit by the de, then Beretta will be instantly destroyed.

    And even worse

    The existence value of Lord Dino has ballooned from 400,000 to 2 million! The total is three million, how overwhelming Alpha reported desperately.

    However, Beretta was unfazed.

    Ramiris wasn''t surprised either, as if taking it for granted.

    Somehow, he seems to have fooled the existent value meter, which means that there is room for improvement. Also, Alpha, dont refer to Dino so politely!

    Hey, hey, it''s okay, I''m still a demon lord, right?

    Noisy! Beretta, you don''t have to be polite to him either, and hurry up and show your real power! Let that fool taste heaven''s judgement!

    I don''t have the power to do so. But if it''s an order, then Ill give it my all.

    Beretta is still struggling.

    Although the existence value is only a reference, a difference of more than seven times is still toorge.

    Despite feeling inwardly that Ramiris can be really unreasonable, Beretta responded to his master''s expectations by watching Dino closely.

    It''s not easy dealing with you, either.

    I don''t want to be told that by an enemy, but I wont deny it

    Beretta responds while concentrating on dodging, circling Dino. Defense is not necessary as long as the attacks dont hit.

    The key is to think differently.

    Berettas whole body is a weapon, and his bare hands were not disadvantageous. Rather, they can be used for a variety of attacks. On the other hand, Dino was dressed in light clothing and the only thing that needed to be guarded against was the Crumbled Fang. As long as an attack hits, there is a lot of damage.

    This is true of both sides.

    Because of this, there was a chance of winning, and Beretta continued looking for opportunities.

    For Beretta, who is a "Holy Demonic Doll, the changing of his attributes is a masterpiece, and using the unique skill "Reverser" to constantly switch attributes and explore Dino''s weaknesses, every move is calcted in order to make the situation work in his favor.

    Dino, on the other hand, was restless.

    Geez, you''re definitely a dependent of ck, by the way. These tactics are so annoying, but they work just right.

    I''m honored by your kind words.

    Who''splimenting you!?

    Even dialogue is used as a weapon as Beretta tries to turn the tables on himself.

    There is no room for error.

    Thanks to the fact that Beretta was not impatient, he barely manages to maintain the status quo.

    ***

    Dino, on the other hand, correctly recognizes the status quo and understands that this situation is not good for him.

    A failed sneak attack was a big mistake.

    Needlessly leading to more battles, the n is thwarted into chaos.

    Beretta and Dino are worlds apart in existence value, but their skill levels arent too far apart. Although, its also obvious that Beretta is nearing his limits. But this was Ramiris''sbyrinth, and even if Beretta died, he coulde back to life. He didn''t have to worry about his remaining mana drying up, nor would he be hurt by using excessive power.

    Still, even with the protection of thebyrinth environment, there are limitations to overtaking the decisive power gap. Beretta has more heart than strength.

    Still, it''s remarkable that hes a dependent of ck. I didn''t think it would be so hard.

    Dino upped the ante on Beretta.

    If it had been Charys or Treyni left here instead, it would have been much easier.

    Those two were by no means weak either, except that angels had an overwhelming advantage over spirits.

    Also, there is too much of a difference inbat experience. Beretta lives up to the name of ck''s dependents and has a skill level that rivals Dino''s.

    Even in the face of death, he had the courage to judge Dino''s attack calmly, not only refusing to give up victory, but even enjoying the situation a bit.

    Even if Dino intentionally misses and creates an opening, Beretta doesnt take the bait, and that alone ismendable. Dino was even more surprised that Beretta could still hurt him with the asional counterattack.

    The Fallen Angels were not good at dealing with holy attributes, but it was not a fatal weakness either.

    However, Beretta''s attacks can do damage to Dino.

    His attacksbine the attributes of Holy and Demonic, and has the properties that Dino''s "Defense Barrier" cannot prevent.

    In fact, Dino judged that such an attack was impossible to defend against. The same is true for Spiritual attacksas long as willpower cannot override the opponent, it is bound to hurt.

    Dino, as an original seraphim angel, was familiar with thews of this world, but the fact that a single unique skill had caused damage to Dino was surprising enough in itself.

    What''s even moremendable is Beretta''s amazingbat acumen.

    However, Dino is also getting used to Beretta''s movements.

    A gap is created when wielding Kuzurekiba, as Dino himself knows well. Beretta''s use of this gap to umte attacks was unexpected for Dino, but it was within tolerance.

    Dino''s attack couldn''t even rub against him, and at first nce it looked like he was being suppressed by Beretta, but Crumbling Fang" could easily cut through the body of living magic steel.

    It would only take one hit to turn the tide, which in Dino''s opinion, is not a problem.

    Beretta was also well aware of the situation and was stalling for time, seeing that his cumtive attacks wouldn''t break Dino, and went further to follow through on his defense.

    After all, it''s the right thing to do. For Beretta, just guarding Ramiris is a victory. Dino wasn''t stupid either, seeing right through Beretta''s heart.

    As long as Ramiris remains, the people in thebyrinth will not die. Conversely, as soon as Ramiris is killed, it is immediately over. There was no guarantee that the maze would be safe if Ramiris was abducted, so it was only natural that Beretta prioritized buying time.

    If this goes on, the result will be exactly what Beretta wants.

    However, it won''t be that easy.

    Kind of a shame for Beretta, Dino still has a final hand.

    Dino had apanied Beretta until now because of the need to make Beretta immobile, and it was too much trouble to fight an opponent who woulde back to life after death.

    Originally, Dino just had to capture Ramiris before Beretta came back to life, but the others were sure to get in the way.

    If he attacks with the intent to kill, it would affect Ramiris.

    Dino was sincere in not wanting to kill Ramiris, and this became the shackle that bound himself to the current situation. This is a hassle, really. It would take so much work to disable Beretta alone. It''s just that it''s easier to beat him. Forget it. It''s ready anyway

    Beretta, you''ve done well enough. Fallen Hypno (Slothful sleep)

    Dino unleashed his power.

    This is a non-killing, wide range, powerless attack of the unique skill ''Sloth''.

    All living beings fall into a sleep where they are unable to wake up until the caster releases them, and it is pointless to try to resist by force of will. As a high level powerful power of the Great Sin system, as its name implies, the difficulty is that it takes a lot of time to activate this power.

    However, only the owner of an ultimate skill can resist, and it''s no exaggeration to say that this terrible attack is the strongest unique skill.

    Dino took as steady a course as possible to neutralize Beretta and the others.

    He had no intention of harming Shinji and Alpha, who were protecting Ramiris in this "control room".

    And then there''s Vesta, who was the first to sleep, and whom Dino respected as his boss. After spending a lot of time with Shinji and the others at work, he had unknowingly taken them forpanions as well.

    I really don''t want to betray them if I can.

    However, Feldway''s order was absolute and could not be disobeyed in any case.

    That''s it, that''s it. I dont think its bad. I''ll persuade Feldway to see if he can leave the ce alone.

    Confirming that Beretta was gradually slumping, Dino muttered. He nced at the sleeping Ramiris, thinking that he''d finally done his job, and was about to extend his hand towards Ramiris

    I wont let you do it.

    At that cold voice, Dino stopped his hand.

    Im serious

    Dino looked back and there stood a woman.

    The slender hairs of her body glowed with gold and silver.

    Her exoskeleton, which protects the key parts, is a living magic steel with a ck sheen.

    Two pairs of blue wings on her back, like morpho butterflies, share the same color as thepound eyes on her forehead, exuding a mysterious charm.

    The womans identity is Apito who has woken up from her evolutionary sleep. The color of her various parts has changed, yet her shape is still the same as it was before the evolution.

    Whether it is psychological or not, it feels like she has be more beautiful. As the Insect Queen, she exudes an aura of majesty and is more queenly than ever.

    Apitojust in time to destroy my Holy Demonic Core.

    Thanks to the demon race not needing sleep, Beretta barely resisted the slothful sleep. Despite being stuck in a state of low activity, he did his best to ask Apito.

    Lord Beretta"

    You can''t move, but you''re still conscious?

    Dino, out of surprise, reacted with a slower tap, and was unable to stop Apito.

    Without asking, Apito shot her own poisonous needle, destroying Beretta''s "Holy Demonic Core.

    Apito''s Renewable Vibrating Poison Needle Sword easily cuts through the sturdy lifeform magic steel.

    She could generate vibrating poisonous needle swords within herself, constantly regrowing them.

    Even without evolution, it''s estimated that it will not kill Beretta.

    Berettaughed.

    Heh, heh, heh, well done. In this way I will die and rise unharmed. I''ll leave you here for now, Apito.

    Although Beretta had retired from the Ten Lords of Labyrinth, he still held the position of Deputy Secretary of Ramiris, who had the authority to give orders to the Labyrinth Lords.

    Understood. Unfortunately, I am unlikely to win, so I look forward to your return soon.

    Contrary to what was said, there was confidence of victory in Apito''s voice. Dino sensed her tone too, grumbling annoyingly.

    No waythat''s an urate judgmentso theres no way to take advantage of it.

    Dino''s sentiment is correct.

    After being entrusted to Apito, Beretta disintegrated into a particle of light and disappeared.

    After that, Apito soared beyond the speed of sound.

    The fighting in the "control room" intensified even further.

    *** This is annoying. That is Dino''s unvarnished sentiment.

    Apito was no match for Dino either, but he still couldn''t kill her in the maze.

    Even if he wanted to finish her off quickly before grabbing Ramiris, Apito used her speed advantage to hinder Dino, not engaging him head-on, thoroughly implementing the tactic of moving in and out flexibly.

    The evolved Apito, whose fighting style can be described as a speed specialization type, understands her characteristics well and makes full use of them. Her existence value is around 700,000, but was still equal to Dino in terms of speed alone.

    Besides, even if it took some effort to kill him, Beretta had returned by that time. It didnt even take a minute, to be over.

    Even if Dino is far above them, the time he has to buy now doesn''t evenst ten seconds, just Apito alone would have been enough.

    In this way, Dino had little means left.

    The safest way to do this is to let Beretta and Apito fall asleep at the same time.

    Dino calmed down and tried to unleash his unique skill ''Sloth'' once more.

    There are two opponents and it takes time tounch the unique skill.

    So Dino stopped panicking, as if out of the fight, let his mind smooth out and began to ascertain the condition of hispanions.

    The first thing that stands out is Velgrynd, who is victorious in the Battle of the Monsters, and Rimuru, who is fighting her.

    How did he get out!? And, hes actually fighting Velgrynd equally! Honestly, he was stunned.

    ording to Feldway, the Demon Lord Rimuru and hismanding officers were sealed off in Velgrynd''s otherworldly realm.

    Rimuru is able to calcte his own coordinates through the soul corridors" between him and hispanions. But Dino, who is unaware of this, is puzzled and even more surprised by Rimuru''s strength.

    Facing the invincible Velgrynd, Rimuru even managed to suppress the opponent.

    Dino couldn''t help but feel anxious.

    If we don''t move forward with the fight, it might be bad.

    Dino turned his gaze to the others.

    The key to Feldway''s strategy, first and foremost, is to capture Ramiris. Dino had initially stayed in thebyrinth because of Guy''s orders, purely by chance. It was just unfortunate that it was something that Feldway wanted.

    Dino was relutant, but only he had ess to the most heavily guarded "control room, which was a job assignment, so he had to give it up.

    Whereas, the invasion route of Feldway and the others was based on a bold campaign. To incite Velgrynd to destroy thebyrinth in order for her to call Veldora out.

    Dino was naturally startled, but the battle was easily won. Then, Feldway took the lead himself andunched the invasion strategy.

    Along with Feldway, two of the "three admirals" and five generals brought by Zrio, eight in all, invaded.

    Two top executives have been invested in this campaign, which is a lot of work.

    One of the remaining "three admirals, Obera, guards the phantom pce in the depths of the Otherworld. When Dino heard about the battle, he could hardly hide his surprise at their drastic action.

    The two who had infiltrated the human country were also ordered to take part in the operation.

    Originally, they were Dino''s minions, but this time Feldway had taken them into his own hands.

    The task of these two is to keep the maze in a state of destruction.

    This is insurance in case Dino fails.

    Thebyrinth could be considered a prison under Ramiris''s control, and it would take some work to get out of it. To avoid such a state of affairs, Feldway had saved his hands in advance.

    Dino cared the most about his two subordinates, first confirming where they were on the screen.

    Hey hey, no way. With Pico and Garcia as opponents, it''s amazing that they can fight evenly

    Pico was a petite maiden of beauty, and Garcia was a tall warrior woman.

    As Veldora lost to Velgrynd, the metropolis that had been isted in thebyrinth returned to the ground, and at this point it was Geld who stepped forward to guard the metropolis. Dino didn''t even think he could act as a rival to Pico and Garcia.

    Barrier Lord" Geld plus Chimeric Lord" Kumara. By the way, Kumara had a group of illusionary beasts, right? No, it cant be the bloodline of Ivaraj, the demon dragon No, no, no, no

    The thought shed by, and even he dared not continue to imagine it, and nervously dismissed it.

    You''re really of the Twelve Patrons of the Demon Lord, Dino thought as he shifted his gaze to the other battlefield.

    In sight was Zrio, of the "Three Admirals" who was fighting.

    Oooooh, Zrio''s as strong as ever. He doesn''t seem to have shown any real skills at all, and he doesn''t even have to face Charys and Treyni.

    His nostalgic old co-workers were still as strong as ever.

    It was already felt at the time that he was terrifyingly strong, and even after thousands of years he was still creepy to look at on the screen. He looked fine so he checked out the next image.

    Cornu? I heard you were in a big hurry because you lost so badly in the invasion decades ago.

    As Dino had guessed, Cornu was sinking into anxiety.

    And no wonder.

    Having lost all the legions in the previous fiasco, and having been badly wounded himself, it would have taken decades to heal. If he fails this time, presumably he will be purged by Feldway.

    Moreover, Feldway should also be hiding next to Cornu by now, and it was estimated that Cornu felt doubly pressured and isnt performing as he normally would.

    Unlucky guy. However, Masayuki is indeed weak, and the man in front of him doesnt look like a big deal. Although Im quite concerned about that dependent of ck, Venom, he seems to be just a neer who can''t bepared to Beretta. It should be fine.

    Dino and Cornu didn''t have that great a rtionship, so he didn''t worry about him much.

    Even if Cornu fails, Feldway will deal with it. In other words, it can be assumed that the battle is well underway.

    After settling down, Dino''szy mind got mixed up in the distractions.

    Hmm, but it''s incredibly strange. Why do I have to worry about whether the battle will be sessful or not? I don''t understand.

    This is quite an important point of doubt.

    Dino couldn''t erase his sense of dissonance about the battle anyway, and couldn''t figure out the reason for it, like a lump in his heart. It felt like he was still a little short of figuring it out

    But unfortunately

    What are you ying at? Dino, it''s almost time for me to move out, so you can fulfill your purpose.

    And so ended the leisurely time.

    Che, I just dont want to work, really.

    Dino has no grudges against Beretta and Apito, but in fact rather likes them.

    That''s why hes extra bored about this order.

    Butorders cannot be disobeyed.

    It couldn''t be helped, so Dino decided to show his true talent.

    *** After ordering Dino again, Feldway continues to watch the Cornus battle in the shadows.

    Cornu has some tendencies to be overconfident, but he is also a reliable minion. Cornu was arade who, like Feldway, was given a name by Veldanava, and therefore, Feldway valued him highly.

    But on the other hand, Cornu yed a major blunder in hisst invasion and lost a third of his entire army. At that time, the opponent was just an otherworldly world with an overwhelming advantage in battle power.

    But it was enough to disappoint Feldway against him.

    Cornu was also well aware of this, and this time instead of his usual style of ying with the enemy, he was desperately trying to finish the job.

    That being said, Feldway was not happy. The Three Admirals must be overwhelmingly strong and must not be fooled by the weak.

    Even now, Cornu had surprisingly missed an opponent who could be killed in a single blow.

    He waspletely trapped by the enemy.

    So furious that he was speechless, Feldway looked back and released a killing intent from his anger. He kept telling himself to calm down with his self-control before he barely managed to suppress his killing intent. Then, leaving Cornu alone, moved to dispose of Masayuki.

    On the other hand, Masayuki, who was on the run, felt very upset.

    Every step felt heavy.

    He couldn''t ept that he was the only one who had escaped.

    Of course, scary is scary, but abandoning apanion is even scarier. If anything, he feels like hell never forgive himself in this life.

    Masayuki stopped in his tracks and looked back.

    He saw hispanions fighting in the distance.

    Minute seals the enemy''s movements, using the vampire''s immortality as bait, while Calgurio and Venom wait for the opportunity to attack.

    It''s worth mentioning Jiu''s help, as she deftly upies the spell casting point and blocks Cornu''s mass destruction attack.

    A team that is clearly a makeshift patchwork, but has excellent coordination.

    However, if one person is missing then the team will fall apart.

    Hey, Masayuki

    Bonnie, I''d better go back, after all. Im always afraid to reveal my true self and never really get a chance to speak my mindBut I really want to be better friends with everyone. I may be a coward, but I don''t want to be a scumbag.

    I''m d I spoke my mind. At that moment, the "Voice of the World" sounded in his head.

    Acknowledgement to the Hero''s "Courage Not to Run. Satisfying the three conditions, the hidden power of the unique skill ''Chosen One'' has been liberated. Activate? YES/NO Huh? Masayuki was puzzled.

    He was worried about whether he had done something again, but was relieved to know that it wasnt the case. Although there was little interest in hidden powers, he agreed to approve it for now.

    Confirmed. New power has been added to the unique skill Chosen One and has seeded. The

    "Spirit Guide" has beenunched.

    The obscure instructions echoed in Masayuki''s mind.

    While wallowing in this nostalgic feeling, Masayuki gradually understood his own power.

    The Chosen One has the effect Hero''s Aura to intimidate opponents, the Hero''s Blessing'' which gives courage to hispanions, and the Hero''s Charisma and Heros Action, which makes things go in a good direction and receive praise. These are the powers that Masayuki has now.

    The addition of the ''Spirit Guide'' seems to be a power that can make him a heroic banner.

    Um, it guides the soul of the dead? I be a vessel? What the hell is this? If it''s premised on the death of apanion, then it''s fine not to have this skill

    Sure enough, another skill that doesn''t work for crap. Originally, Masayuki wasn''t expecting much though, so he wasn''t too disappointed.

    As long as it doesn''t get worse, it''s enough.

    Masayuki, you

    So, Bonnie, why don''t we go back?

    Masayuki pulled back to the topic.

    The power to hide has been put behind us.

    Got it. If you say so, then I''ll go along with it.

    Bonnie scratched his head and gave up.

    The twoughed bitterly and prepared to go back to the group, at which point things took a major turn for the worse.

    ***

    Feldway made his move.

    He didn''t put Bonnie in his eyes, only knew that Bonnie would get in the way if he wanted to take Masayuki away.

    Bonnie hadpletely let his guard down and would be killed with a single blow. No, it would be the same whether he was wary or not, because to Feldway, Bonnie was nothing but dust.

    Unfazed by the wind,pletely shielding the dwelling breath, Feldway was about to draw his sword and sh Bonnie''s head off.

    However, there was a crisp tapping sound.

    It was the sound of swords shing with swords.

    In the way? Who is it?

    Wiping away a moment''s surprise, Feldway questioned the other.

    The answer was given by a young girl wearing a "mask".

    "I''m Chronoa, doing the "Hero" business.

    There was silence for a moment, and Feldway smiled.

    "I didn''t expect to meet a Hero here, so I''ll introduce myself. Im Feldway, Feldway the Demon King.

    Hearing the name, Chronoa remained calm, she was inplete sync with Chloe''s consciousness and now she was just a cold fighting machine.

    "Demon King? ''''Hmph, you are the leader of the Demon n, right? I couldn''t let go of the evil in front of me, so I showed up just in time for me to eradicate the threat to humanity.

    "Heh heh heh, that''s bold enough. I''ll tell you what it means to be self-aware, you idiot.

    As soon as the words fell, Feldway, in his red uniform, took the lead, and the figure of Chronoa, in her white uniform "Holy Spirit Armor", disappeared.

    The glow of red and white dazzled in front of Masayuki''s eyes, and the two vanished from view at the same time, leaving only the sound of sword des shing in session.

    Not to mention the shockwave, not even a whisper of wind.

    This battle is staged in realms beyond the imagination.

    The masked girl who had helped Masayuki before, now saved him from a crisis. Even if Masayuki understood that, he could not help the young girl who called herself Chronoa.

    "Well, what are we going to do about it?

    If we care about it, we''ll lose, and we''ll just do what we can. So, hurry up and help everyone!

    Just by hearing the sound of sword strikes ringing in his ears, Bonnie sensed that Feldway''s target was himself, and waspletely unresponsive to the sword strikes, also understanding that the enemy and himself were not in the same dimension.

    It wasn''t that the current Bonnie was weakened, he couldn''t possibly have a fight with Feldway anyway, it was a world of difference.

    Since there was no point in fleeing, the right thing to do was to act simply and decisively - the ideas that Bonnie had been taught when he was a soldier now came in handy.

    "Got it. Although I don''t know who that Chronoa is, lets leave her to it!

    Masayuki was used to improvising in the face of unexpected situations.

    So it''s off to a good start.

    Chronoa and Feldway couldn''t focus on Masayuki and Bonnie, their swords and shadows kept intersecting, which actually onlysted a short time.

    In just a few seconds, countless attacks and defenses were being yed, and it seemed that they would never be able to tell the difference between winning and losing, and that''s when Feldway realized it.

    "Ha ha ha ha! What the hell, it''s here. Sure enough, Lord Veldanava was expecting my victory too!

    "Suddenly what?

    Hmm, it''s okay if its you. No, you and I will bepanions from now on, so it wouldn''t hurt to talk to you.

    ?

    Now, obey my will, Sariel the King of Hope!"

    It''s an absolutemand.

    The ultimate skill of the angelic ultimate skill series cannot be defied by Michael''s angelic domination".

    "What have youdone?

    "Ho? Is there still a residual sense of self? The most powerful "hero" of them all, the famous Chronoa.

    But it''s only a matter of time before you fall into my hands, so resistance is futile.

    Feldway was ecstatic about his luck.

    In the long history, the fame of the hero" Chronoas, bravery even reached the empire, and the "King of Hope" was born in her body, supposedly a blessing from God.

    As Feldway had expected, Chronoa fell to his knees.

    "I am, Sariel. Give me the order, Lord Michael

    Chronoa took off her mask to reveal her beauty. It was the cold words that came out of her pale cherry-colored lips.

    Feldway couldn''t help but be sure of his victory.

    Thus, Feldway made an extremely bad judgment at this point.

    Although not the main body, the strongest hero who fought evenly with himself, plus one of his own beloved "three admirals" Cornu. As long as these two are present, his purpose can be easily achieved.

    So Feldway

    "Good. You go and assist Cornu and kill the boy. I''ve got work to do on the ground, so I''ll leave it to you after that.

    gave amand and left the maze.

    ***

    Seeing Masayuki and Bonnie who had rushed back, Venom really wanted to sigh up at the sky.

    Not that there is aint.

    He felt the scent of terror swell in the direction of Masayuki''s escape and thought the mission was about to descend into despair.

    "I''m so d you''re okay. I''m so relieved!

    "Hahahaha, the enemy is still here. It''s a little early to say that.

    "That''s right.

    Venom admitted as much.

    Cornu is strong. Despite the clear advantage in the maze, he is overwhelming, not to mention winning, and now I don''t even know if I can survive.

    Even so, seeing Masayuki''s face, he was relieved for some unknown reason.

    An inexplicable surge of confidence emerged, a feeling that there was always a way.

    Minute and Calgurio were in the same mood, and their faces were a little better than just now.

    "Kekeke, although its a little out of ce, I feel happy.

    "I feel the same way. It''s like riding the battlefield with His Majesty.

    The imperial soldiersughed.

    The vampires, who had nothing to do with them, also raised their wariness.

    And Cornu, on the opposite side, was in a state of confusion.

    He was originally nning tounch an attack, when another Masayuki appeared.

    I thought there was a mistake in the grasp of his position, but on a second look, there are indeed two Masayukis. That is, one of them is a fake. Needless to say, one was Jiu in disguise and the other was the real Masayuki.

    "How dare you underestimate me! Bunch of stinky bugs, still hanging around!

    But even if Cornu got more ramped up, he couldn''t see which one was real. By presence, the strong and the weak are about the same, both are not enough to distinguish the existence.

    That''s why it''s even more troublesome. If Cornu bes serious, both could be involved and killed.

    In this way, there is no telling where the other party will flee to. So Cornu had to tighten his nerves even more to avoid a wrong-handed kill.

    And that''s when the savior appeared.

    "You are Sir Cornu, are you not? My name is Sariel. Ie at themand of Lord Michael.

    An unfamiliar girl who flew by at such a high speed that his eyes couldn''t keep up with, offered to assist him herself.

    Cornu didn''t doubt what she said, as she called herself Sariel and could sense it was Michael''s person by hearing the name.

    "That''s a big help. I''ll leave the right one to you. Don''t kill him. Take him alive.

    Cornu had picked one at random, not sure if it was luck or misfortune, he was really just lucky.

    Understood."

    Sariel nodded, then turned her gaze to Masayuki.

    Masayuki sensed the sight and began to hurry

    Their eyes met.

    And Sariel? The girl called herself Chronoa before, but she didn''t know what was going on, so she turned against the enemy in such a short time. Furthermore

    Masayuki was in confusion and despair, but Chronoa''s beauty was too stunning to feel horror at all.

    Rather, there is no longer time for fear.

    What''s going on!? This girl issuper cute!!!

    She is so cute that Masayuki forgets that he is in a fight.

    In a word, yes! It''s the perfect way to describe a girl who''s super beautiful.

    Masayuki and a certain blonde demon king came to the same conclusion.

    Don''t wear a mask in the first ce! Masayuki startedining about such pointless little things.

    But!

    In front of such dull thoughts, there is implicit hope.

    Sariel reached out and drew her sword, and Masayuki was ready to die, and perhaps it was this that caused all sorts of thoughts to bubble up in his head like a walking horse.

    This pretty girl is really no joke. This girl is the cutest I''ve ever seen

    Just as this thought bubbled up, he suddenly felt a vicious chill.

    It''s not good to think about it any longer, the survival instinct was screaming with all its might.

    So Masayuki chose to trust his instincts.

    Not true. Second ce. That''s right, second cutest. The first is, of course

    Whates to mind at this time is the blue-haired beautyst seen in the original world.

    Yes, yes, that''s her! Gentle cute type, and mature and sexy. A perfect score

    On the verge of death, the Masayukis delusions cannot be stopped.

    However, this was the right thing to do.

    Confirmed the Heros True Love. The fourth hidden condition has been fulfilled. The unique skill

    Chosen One" has evolved into the ultimate power "King of Heroes.

    Huh? Masayuki was stunned.

    Instead of calling it love, it''s more of an annoyance. Why is it glorified as love? It was too embarrassing toin.

    Before that.

    Why did I get an ultimate skill without doing anything!? I have to earn up to it!

    Masayuki shouted in his mind.

    It''s too forcedMasayuki even wanted to question the Voice of the World.

    However, evenining about the results doesn''t change it. Moreover, even if one obtained the ultimate skill, which one did not even know how to use, it was impossible to defeat the Sariel in front of one''s eyes.

    I did my best, so I''ll die a handsome death.

    Masayuki thought it over and smiled painfully.

    Thisugh has an effect on the crowd.

    "Protect His Majesty!!!

    The outer soldiers, who had previously felt themselves in the way, rushed forward to attack defiantly.

    Even the soldiers far away was greatly affected, and the change produced by the person next to him was dramatic.

    Power gushing up. I feel like I can''t lose. That''s what I''m talking about!

    Calgurio shouted loudly, shing at Cornu. For a moment Cornu was scared in the face of a surrendering attack from Calgurio, who had been holding on to his guard.

    Minute doesn''t lose to him either.

    "At yourmand, men of the Empire! Show us our beauty to the Emperor!

    While inspiring the soldier on the one hand, he himself did not take his eyes off of Sariel, constantly applying pressure with the ''suppressor''. Originally, his unique skill didn''t work against the ultimate skill, but this time, even though the effect was minimal, it managed to force Sariel to retreat a bit.

    The vampires also strutted their stuff.

    "This is incredible! I''m in a good mood, I can do anything!

    Someone forced an attack and stillughed wildly after the lower half of their body was gone.

    "Watch this! Take my full power shot"

    There are people who, against all odds, keep dying and resurrecting again and again.

    "Hyaaaahaha! So happy!!

    Someone specializing in regeneration ability began to protect soldiers from stray bullets.

    The battle became more and more gruesome, and the crowds began their fiercest attack to date.

    Why do they do it?

    Of course, it''s because of Masayuki''s power.

    Unlike the previous unique skill, it has now be the ultimate skill ''King of Heroes'', and can grant others the minimum amount of protection needed to fight against ultimate skills.

    Only those whose existence value exceeds 100,000 can withstand this ability, and those who fail to reach it will receive a lucky boost. Anyone who is a believer in Masayuki is able to be sheltered by him.

    As the saying goes, it is indeed a bnce breaker.

    Just him standing on the battlefield alone can overturn the uncanny power of the battlefield.

    If Masayuki hadn''t seen Chloe OBells face, he wouldn''t have awakened to the ultimate skill. One only has to think about this to understand what a major faux pas Feldway hasmitted.

    All in all, the battlefield fell into a stalemate for a time, barely maintaining its equilibrium for more than ten minutes.

    Of course, it''s also impossible to defeat the duo of Cornu and Sariel on this.

    However, everything has already been decided.

    When Masayuki received the ultimate skill ''King of Heroes, the path ahead was already open.

    And now, thanks to the warriors who bought time, that moment hase.

    Velgrynd disappeared from this "world".

    At the same time, the gears of fate began to turn

    ***

    Confirmed. A Soul Corridor has been established across time and space with the individual named

    Velgrynd

    Huh?

    Just as Masayuki was puzzled, that person appeared.

    At first, he just thought it was a huge mass of magicules.

    But that wasnt the case.

    It was a human figure.

    A nostalgic, very beautiful woman.

    A crimson aura that makes her distinctive blue hair dazzle, the "Scorch Dragon" Velgrynd manifests.

    Her eyes contained a domineering aura that could calm everything.

    Time felt like it froze and everyone paused without a second thought.

    Cornu, also puzzled by the sudden state of affairs, stared at Velgrynd.

    Sariel did the same, merely waiting for Cornu''s instructions. This was the limit of those who had a newborn ego.

    The Imperial soldiers who were present, all understood instantly.

    This person was precisely the strongest presence that had long guarded the Empire.

    The intelligence they had up until now was that Velgrynd and Veldora were at war, which did not appear to be the case.

    This is because Velgrynd is hugging Masayuki close at the moment.

    In anyone''s eyes, it is the attitude of one facing her loved one.

    "I''ve been looking for you a long time, Rudra. Always, always, always, longing to see you"

    After saying that, Velgrynd''s eyes welled up with tears as she looked at Masayuki. Then, with hands gently cupping his cheeks, she gave him a passionate kiss

    Masayuki was amazed.

    Hey, so softNo, it''s sweet? No, no, wait!

    Masayuki''s head exploded and his cool judgment instantly disappeared.

    The intimidating beauty hugged him, which was okay, the problem was what happened afterwards.

    Firstfirst kiss!!!

    The casual coordination of her shirt and jeans was slightly more mature, and with Velgrynds beauty, she exuded a cool aura.

    It would be a lie to say Im not happy about kissing such a beautiful woman.

    But the key thing must not be left out.

    The beautiful woman, referred to Masayuki as Rudra.

    No good, shes got the wrong person

    It was an atmosphere where he felt like he couldnt say that she got the wrong person.

    That said, this beauty is still kissing right now.

    He was going to run out of breath soon.

    Be cool, be calm, the more things thate, the more calm you have to be Masayuki confirmed the situation once again.

    His location is a battlefield.

    Right in front of the enemy.

    Locked in a hot kiss with a beautiful woman.

    Moreover, because the beauty was pressed so tightly against him, Masayuki couldn''t help but be aware of the touch of her ample breasts.

    It''s almost toofortable as if ascending to heavenbut I must not enjoy it now! What the hell am I doing!? The more I think about it, the more confused I get. The only thing I understand is that once Im exposed as the wrong person, my life will be over in an instant.

    There is no excuse for doing such a thing in full view of the public.

    Even for the lucky ones, one cannot expect things to get better.

    Enjoying the luck of ascension while waiting for the misfortune toe.

    Masayuki stopped thinking.

    He was near death anyway, so thank goodness he got to experience kissing at the end. It is fortunate to havee to such a conclusion that it would be wrong.

    His consciousness was gradually getting hazy, and Masayuki seemed to be dreaming.

    Just dont think about it and enjoy the situation.

    And that attitude deepened the misunderstanding of the onlookers.

    "His Majesty is so skilled.

    "It''s a little disrespectful, but I feel the same way. It''s a privilege to witness the unwavering love of two adults that no one can interfere with, and the bond that no one can shake.

    "Lord Velgrynd is like a maiden in lovethe dragon of the Empire is in love with His Majesty."

    "Hmmm! Then the empire will be at peace.

    None of them harbored ill will towards Masayuki, and there was not the slightest doubt that Masayuki was the real Rudra.

    Masayuki wanted to shout that this was a big misunderstanding, but his mouth was still gagged by Velgrynd.

    Ive never even had a girlfriend, so dont go talking about marriage!!

    Masayukiments the absurdity of this world.

    In the end, it was the enemy Cornu who rescued him from this situation.

    "Don''t be ridiculous, Velgrynd! You should be at the mercy of Lord Michael! Why did youe and get in my way?

    To Cornu, Velgrynd was just one of the pawns that had been tamed. And now that she had shown up to get in his way, Cornu erupted into discontent and anger.

    "Hey, that''s not funny. I''m sorry to bother you, but there''s a limit to how stupid you can be.

    Velgrynd finally moved away from Masayuki, ring unhappily at Cornu.

    Even wincing at the sight of her, Cornu didn''t stop.

    "Shut up! Stop it and hurry up and assist me. Just take that guy you''re holding and kill him!

    That was a forbidden sentence.

    Cornu hadn''t expected his words to touch Velgrynd''s rebellious scales.

    "Just now, you said you wanted me to kill this man?

    The battlefield went silent.

    Only Cornu failed toprehend the state of affairs, shouting in anger.

    "Don''t make me repeat myself, Velgrynd. Even if you''re stronger, now that my authority is higher than yours, all you have to do is obey my orders!

    Cornu didn''t understand the situation in the end.

    There had been no time to perceive that Velgrynd was a different being than before.

    "Then go to hell."

    It was a shot without mercy.

    Velgrynd''s rebirth was as powerful as it had ever been before, and through refined magical maniption, her precision burned only Cornu cleanly to the ground.

    There was no talking back, not even a chance to retort, as Cornu disappeared from this world.

    What was even more terrifying was that Velgrynd''s attack even spanned space-time, which was the true power of the ''Space-time Continuous Attack'' that she hadunched using her new power ''Subdimensional Jump'', and Cornu was wiped out without even sensing a sense of crisis in his being.

    "I''ve let you off the hook for a while now, you idiot. I was close to forgetting my grudge against Feldway, too, but it seems I can''t let it go.

    With that, Velgrynd finished and turned her gaze towards Sariel.

    Oh, this person whose name is actually Chronoa, saved me

    "Don''t worry, I won''t do anything, because there''s no need. That girl, by her own will, is resisting, and the proof is that she stands still and does not move. If it''s still a concern, just let Rimuru look at itter and he should take care of it properly. Though I don''t think it will be necessary."

    Velgrynd finished and took her eyes off of Sariel-Chronoa, and seeing Velgrynd''spleteck of guard, Masayuki finally rxed.

    ***

    And so the battle ended.

    There were quite a few people who were as relieved as Masayuki, and there were also others who were fidgeting from nervousness.

    It was the people who knew Velgrynd''s identity who were disturbed.

    The one who is determined to act is Bonnie, who is standing next to Masayuki.

    After all, Bonnie stood the closest to Velgrynd. He went up and knelt down, though his attitude did not grovel, but rather spoke righteously.

    "Your Excellency, I am Bonnie of the seventh digit of the single digit sequence, and I give ask for Excellency''s peace"

    "No need to salute. So, what are you trying to say?

    "Yes! I disobeyed the orders of the chief and gave up the task of killing the teenager named Masayuki. I know that I deserve to die, so before I am punished, I beg your Excellency to listen to me."

    The scene fell silent again.

    Listening to Bonnie, the soldiers present realized that Velgrynd was the "marshal", the supreme leader of the Imperial Army.

    Quite a few people were confused, but most epted the truth.

    As the understanding gradually deepened, they also began to see reality.

    The losers will be punishable by Velgrynd.

    It is useless to resist.

    In front of the Marshal, who could destroy even this maze, the only thing left to do was to wait for punishment.

    They naturally lined up and waited for judgment toe

    In this tense atmosphere, the conversation continued.

    "Say what?

    "Our loyalty to the Empire remains the same. Regardless of His Majesty the Emperor''s intentions, we will have to obey orders absolutely. So, please give the soldiers permission to return home! The executives, including me, do not have any grievances about taking the punishment. But"

    "That''s enough.

    The appeal was interrupted, and Bonnie felt despair.

    As soon as his fate was decided, Bonnie couldn''t help but want to cry in the face of his own powerlessness.

    Velgrynd looked at Bonnie and puffed out augh.

    "Ah-ha, did you misunderstand? Little fools, I thank you for yourmendable efforts in guarding my beloved Rudra.

    All the soldiers fell to their knees in unison.

    So then?

    "I have no intention of doing anything to you. All that matters to me is Rudra, and since Rudra values you, then I will protect you as well. That is how it was before, how it is now, and how it will be in the future.

    The words of Velgrynd are gospel.

    The soldiers rejoiced.

    Touched tears were shed.

    Calgurio and Minute were no exception, and were deeply moved by the fact that they had understood what Velgrynd had said in their hearts.

    At the end, the crowd even chanted ''Long live the Empire! Long live His Majesty! The cheers were endless, while Masayuki was wondering what the heck they were talking about.

    If Im hearing what they just said correctly, then they really have mistaken me with Emperor Rudra.

    Besides, Bonnie already knows the truth. If it''s exposed, I''ll be the one who gets hurt. And the kissIll definitely be killed

    Masayuki''s name was not Rudra, yet no one raised that query. This situation now makes him feel, on the contrary, that something is wrong.

    To be honest, Masayuki was overjoyed about the kiss. But inwardly, he also believe that getting involved is not the right intention "Look at you. What''s wrong? If there''s something youre worried about, tell me about it."

    Velgrynd returns back to a previously alone Masayuki, much to his dismay.

    "Huh? No, it''s nothing, I don''t have a care in the world"

    He was a bit incoherent.

    Looking at the unnatural attitude, Velgrynd asked warily, with a worried face,

    Do you not remember me?

    What should be the right answer, Masayuki felt that he was being tested.

    The consequences of a wrong answer are unimaginable.

    Even though he wanted to say "Give me a break," Masayuki tried his best to use his brain.

    If you ask me if I remember, I do. That beauty seen in my original world was, without a doubt, her. But to say the name

    That guy just now, called her Velgrynd. I remember that Velgrynd was Mr. Veldora''s sisterand the rumors were that she was strong to the point of being outrageous. And shes said to be a guardian of the empire or something

    Masayuki''s desperate thinking was meaningful, gradually recalling the information from all sides.

    Judging by the reaction of the Imperial soldiers, one''s own spection must have been correct, so Masayuki took a gamble.

    MissVelgrynd, wasnt it?

    Velgrynd, who heard the reply, smiled brightly.

    "Yes, that''s right! You remember me, Rudra!

    At this point, Luck still hasn''t abandoned Masayuki.

    Just him saying her name made Velgrynd very happy.

    And, not only that.

    "By the way, I can see why you were looking so blue. I was so happy to see you, I forgot. Your name is Masayuki now.

    !

    The situation had improved on its own, and the misunderstanding of his mistaken identity which Masayuki had been concerned about had been resolved.

    Eh, eh, eh, eh!? This person, she knows my name is Masayuki Honjo.

    What an absolute relief.

    Never since he was born had he felt such heartfelt relief.

    The tense nerves all over his body suddenly loosened up, and he felt like he was about to pee.

    "Yeah, right. Actually, my name isn''t Rudra, but Masayuki, so I''m a little confused about that.

    Masayuki grinned awkwardly while cautiously observing Velgrynd''s reaction.

    And it wasn''t just Velgrynd, the soldiers of the Empire were also a problem.

    ording to the conversation just now, no matter what they think, they think I''m Emperor Rudra, and if I tell them I''m not the Emperor at this point, these people will be confused too. I''ll be in trouble if I''m sued for perjury by the Emperor, and then I''ll have to prove my innocence!

    Although he didnt know if there was such a charge or not, Masayuki still wanted the truth toe out.

    So Masayuki decided to convey his thoughts.

    However, Velgrynd didn''t mind.

    "No problem at all. The value of the Empire is also nothing more than what Rudra owns, it was just Rudra''s hobby that led him to build it. He said the Empire was necessary for him and Guy to win, that''s why I value the Empire. If you say you don''t need it anymore, then why don''t you just let the empire turn into clean scorched earth?

    It was a statement of something transcendent like the divine.

    The Imperial soldiers were blue in the face.

    The eyes of the entire crew gathered on Masayuki.

    Stop it! Don''t look at me like that!! Dont take it as my fault!!!

    I know, don''t look at me like that. Masayuki opened his mouth while feeling such an unnecessary responsibility.

    "No, the empire is important! Mr. Rimuru also said he intended to be friendly with the Empire in the future and to establish friendly rtions after the war.

    In short, it was absolutely impossible to turn the Empire into a scorched earth, Masayuki desperately stressed this.

    And the soldiers of the Empire looked at Masayuki with worshipful eyes as if they had seen a god.

    Velgrynd is a just do it type of person, and it doesn''t take much time for her to do things.

    If Masayuki didn''t object, the empire would undoubtedly perish, and everyone was well aware of that, which is why they were so grateful to Masayuki.

    Yeah? Since you say so, Ill just assist you as usual.

    Velgrynd shed a smile.

    For their part, the Imperial soldiers breathed a sigh of relief.

    Among them, Calgurio, as a representative, raised questions.

    Though all is settled, please let me overstep my bounds. There is one thing I would like to confirm at any rate.

    You could also tell from the stony expression that he wasn''t much for words himself.

    "What is it? Velgrynd asked.

    "Yes! It''s about the current Emperor, Lord Rudra. What''s next for His Majesty Rudra?"

    Upon hearing this, Velgrynd also expressed understanding.

    "Oh, that''s right. After all, you can''t see through the soul. The Rudra now is an empty shell, but the one who has really gathered Rudra''s soul is Masayuki, whom I love."

    "Huh, me?

    "Exactly. Even without memory, there is no doubt that you are Rudra. So I love you and will try to make you love me too.

    Uhhh.

    Is there any man who wouldnt perk up after being told that by a beautiful woman?

    No, it doesn''t exist!

    The same goes for Masayuki.

    Although youre in love with me now, there''s no guarantee that this love willst forever, so in order to keep this luck, I swear to work harder.

    But, as for what exactly to do, let''s just leave that forter.

    It was fortunate that the decision was made, but then something went wrong.

    "Then we must make Lord Masayuki the true Emperor!

    Huh?

    "Exactly. But it might not be easy with him being aplete outsider in terms of pedigree. Even if it''s the Emperor''s illegitimate son, there''s no way to fool it.

    Wait, what?

    "It doesn''t matter. The army will be suppressed by Sir Calgurio, and I will go to the nobility. It''s okay, they can''t argue. If it fails, the empire will be destroyed and there will be no time to talk to them at length anyway.

    Calgurio sets the course and Bonnie asks the question. Minute, for his part, is proposing a solution to the problem, which the soldiers present intend to fully support.

    Just like that, before Masayuki had a chance to interject, the n moves forward step by step

    "Just do your best, Masayuki."

    ThatI don''t have the right to refuse?

    Probably not, so Masayuki had given up.

    His legendary life was only just beginning.

    ***

    Dino decided to show his true colors.

    The opponent, who had been able to win easily, was in a bitter fight, and the situation hurt, but it was time to end it.

    "You''re still looking around. It''s so easy.

    The words fell and Beretta''s sharp fist sliced across his cheek.

    "What an underestimation, when our adversary is still distracted.

    Apito also shot out the vibrating poison needle sword.

    The stab must hurtDino dodged it desperately.

    Compared to them, my strength should be overwhelming, am I being overconfident? Even with two opponents at the same time, I didn''t expect to be in such a difficult fight.

    Beingzy for a long time probably had led to weakening, and Dino lost a little bit of his confidence.

    The fact that Dino had time to think about it was proof that he still had the strength, but not the self-awareness.

    Apito has honed her instincts in special training with Hinata, which is close to predicting the future, and although the difference in strength between herr and Dino is obvious, she is also an opponent that cannot be underestimated.

    Beretta ys as a wall, while Apito attacks at the back. Beretta, who was a shield, also got involved in the attack, and thebined attack of the two worked against Dino.

    And whats even trickier is Beretta''s magic.

    Normal spells are ineffective against Dino, and Beretta''s spells are predominantly a support type. That is, not directly used to attack Dino, but to strengthen his own physical values.

    Weakening Dino''s magic is ineffective, but Dino has no means to interfere with magic that strengthens Beretta and Apito''s speed, strength and endurance.

    While it might help to hinder the unleashing of magic, Beretta was a demon who was good at magic and could unleashe it without even thinking about it.

    Moreover, the slothful sleep'' of the unique skill ''Sloth'' doesn''t work on Beretta. There''s also thisyer of reasoning that''s gotten Dino into a bitter fight.

    But now, finally.

    The long-awaited feeling finally piled up and the time to fight back had arrived.

    "I''m sick of this! Two people teaming up to bully a weak man like me, and you also talk so much! It''s a good thing I have had the patience to apany you. Be grateful! Take this and rest!

    After all was said and done, Slothful Sleep" had beenunched, very much in line with Dino''s style of getting by, though there was no concept of openness in his dictionary.

    "Phew, is it finally over?

    Seeing Apito gradually fall to her knees, Dino was sure of his victory. His eyes turned their attention to Berettaonly to be met with an oing punch that Dino scrambled to avoid.

    "Wow, did you resist my sleep?

    "Of course. It was a mistake to get hit once, how can I get hit twice?

    It was because the demon race itself was highly resistant to abnormal states that Beretta was able to derive countermeasures and use his own unique skill ''Reverser'''' to reverse the sleepiness.

    Really"

    "Well, its bad for Apito, but I''ll just let her die once ande back to life.

    Beretta remained calm in front of Dino.

    Dino also foolishly follows his own must-win theories to action, and rather than joke about him, he actually admires his opponent more.

    With me as an opponent, I didn''t expect him to be able to fight evenly until now. It''s not my fault, it''s all because Beretta and the others are so good. In that case, I''ll have to use that

    Dino has a secret move.

    Since it would bring back annoying memories, he didnt want to use it if possible, but now there was no choice.

    Imend you. You''re good enough to make me get serious.

    Dino unleashed his sealed powers.

    The ultimate skill, the Sky Kingthe ultimate skill given by Veldanava.

    Confirmed. "The evolution of the unique skill Sloth through the ''creation'' of the ultimate power of the Sky Kinghas been sessful. Dino''s ''Sloth'' had a special nature, the morezy he usually was, the more his strength would increase.

    Simply put, it is possible to umte energy.

    Dino used this to evolve the unique skill ''Sloth'' into the ultimate skill Slothful King Belphegor.

    This is Dino''s secret move.

    The "Creation Evolution" of the ultimate skill Sky King".

    If you use the power of the ultimate skill "Sky King" you can achieve the evolution you desire, even though it is limited to your own power.

    Of course, there is more than one effect, Dino''s ultimate skill ''King of the Sky'' is still retained. Thebyrinth is littered with watching eyes, constantly recording what is happening.

    Dino, as a watcher, is resistant to revealing everything about himself.

    And

    That Rimuru guy, is horribly intelligent with a deep sense of recklessness. Even when he got rid of yman, recorded images were brought out as evidence. If my power is exposed then they might easily find a countermeasure.

    Demon lord Rimuru was an opponent not to be underestimated, and one could not be more cautious against him, Dino knew that.

    So Dino created the Slothful King Belphegor'' where it doesn''t matter if he is seen.

    This force, came at Beretta.

    Now sleep! Fallen Catastrophe!

    Thew is rewritten and the positive factor begins to retrograde to the negative factor. This temptation, whether they are living or dead, can forcefully lure them from a state of activity to a state of cessation.

    However, there is no coercive force in this, and the one who is hit will go to destruction autonomously.

    It can be considered a kind of hypnotism, except that the effect reaches different dimensions.

    One will not be able to awaken from the slumber of the evolved Slothful King, and not only will the spirit be destroyed, but even the flesh.

    In this case, though, the guidance destination was perish, but it is also possible to lower the level further and keep it to abnormal conditions such as sleep. It was a versatile skill.

    This power does not use sound as a medium for transmitting interfering waves, so the power cannot be prevented by physical barriers or the like. It is worth mentioning that there are very few means of defense.

    Absolute dominion over those who possess wisdom and feelingsthis is the power of Slothful King Belphegor''.

    ***

    One of the Seven Deadly Sins, "Slothfulness," is a true version of the dreaded evolutionand Dino admires himself for it.

    In order to keep Beretta from moving, he was trying to do some thorough damage. So "destruction"

    was chosen, but now it appears to be more powerful than expected.

    Beretta vanished into dust, so it would still take some time for him to be resurrected. The bracelet was wiped out along with it, but there was still always a way for Ramiris'' powers to work out so Dino didn''t care.

    Furthermore, if mercy was shown here, it would be more than just a mission failure.

    Don''t me me if you die, Dino thought irresponsibly.

    But ah, even Beretta, among Demon Lord Rimuru''s men, is only in the middle ranks

    It''s only natural that Dino would be pissed off.

    Even an opponent as tricky as Beretta was only a lower-ranking existence that had yet to acquire ultimate skills. And, he wasn''t the Demon Lord himself, just one of his minions.

    Dino thought while shuddering at the fact.

    If the upper ranking team of the maze were left

    Would he even be able to win by himself? Dino thought annoyed, while looking towards Ramiris.

    Seeing the sleeping Ramiris, he reached out and touched her body.

    He should have been able to touch her.

    Ramiris transformed into a particle of light, then disguised herself as a butterfly and fluttered next to Dino.

    It seemed to be mocking Dino.

    Hey, hey, am I hallucinating?

    He didnt want to believe it, couldnt believe it.

    But if it wasn''t an illusion, the current situation wouldnt make sense.

    Sure enough, this battle was being watched.

    It''s okay to be cautious, but still

    One of his trump cards was also exposed to the enemy.

    And

    His next opponent, surely, would be even tougher

    Thud, thudthe sound of someone''s footsteps came forward.

    The man approached slowly and unhurriedly, the beautiful light butterfly fluttering like a dance, stopping at his arm.

    The butterfly changed back to a particle of light, and then changed againinto the innocent, sleeping Ramiris who had a blissful expression, seemingly not knowing anything.

    Ramiris slept on the man''s forearm, and Beretta, who had been resurrected, respectfully received Ramiris.

    "Sir Beretta, please take care of Lady Ramiris.

    The man said quietly.

    "Yes, leave it to me. Do you need support?

    "No need. I alone am enough.

    From the very beginning, Ramiris'' escort was foolproof.

    Deep in the safest ofbyrinth, heavy traps wereid.

    ording to a certain someone''s instructions, in order to expose the abilities of a quietly approaching enemy, the battle force was to be gradually dispatched.

    Moreover, this maze has the strongest guardians in it.

    Before leaving the maze, Veldora had handed Ramiris'' escort over to his trusty disciple.

    The only one uninformed was Ramiris.

    And now

    That man has begun to move.

    The man standing before Dino is Zegion, the Mist Lord".

    He was the absolute powerhouse of this maze.

    ***

    Zegion had cocooned himself for the sake of evolution, but his consciousness was always kept awake.

    In response to Veldora''s request, he grasped the maze situation perfectly.

    With the overwhelming ''Absolute Defense'' for protection, Ramiris was kept safe.

    Dino recognized this as well.

    Youve got to be joking

    This is Dino''s unadorned state of mind.

    He had thought he had beaten the enemy, but then another one appeared. All the while with the purpose of exposing his own hands.

    I knew it! That Rimuru guy is so devious, of course he''d love this tactic!

    At this point, the battle is lost.

    Forget about catching Ramiris, Dino could barely get himself out of this.

    Besides, when exactly did he evacuate Ramiris in the first ce? I stayed in the room this whole time and even saw the Ramiris talking. She turned into a butterfly, so she should be long gone, right?

    If not, then it was Zegion who had let Ramiris escape in a way that Dino couldn''t see through.

    But, thenwas I talking to an illusion the whole time?

    If so, that is also a big problem.

    This is an unusual state of affairs.

    Dino is the owner of an ultimate skill and is also well versed in the hypnosis department. Even so he had left Dino in a state of delusion, which is usually not possible.

    However, this possibility cannot be dismissed in its entirety.

    If Zegion also had an ultimate skill and was proficient in mental attacksthen it might be possible to use ''illusions'' that were enough to fool even Dino.

    Dino also knew how powerful Zegion was.

    Hes a powerful worm-type beast, but is also a humanoid of the Insect-Demon Race (Insectars).

    Favored by the demon lord Rimuru, he has exceptionally strong fighting abilities.

    It was heard that Zegion had taken Veldora as his teacher, and that his fighting skills were even superior to those of the primordials.

    This is Zegion, considered as the absolute king of thebyrinth.

    When the Imperial Army invaded the Maze, he eliminated the invaders with an overwhelmingly power.

    Taking this opportunity, Dino also observed Zegion''s fighting style, which can be said to be invincible in physicalbat.

    But most importantly, Zegion had been fighting only with physical means since the beginning. He hadn''t used a spiritual attack at all, let alone an ultimate skillhe hadnt even seen him use a unique skill.

    No. Is the Space Distortion Defense Field alone strong enough to reach the ultimate skill?

    Even then, it was only a physical level of power, still in the realm of being able to deal with, in Dino''s opinion, who was good at mental attacks.

    In that case, the only thing that came to mind was the celebration the other day.

    That day, in the name of a reward, Demon Lord Rimuru granted Zegion some kind of power, and called it an evolutionary ritual that awakened the men who had made the battle a sess.

    In fact, the power of Gabil and others had grown dramatically, along with others who had fallen into evolutionary sleep.

    Those phenomena were simr to the evolution of a demon lord, and it''s not surprising that Zegion has acquired new abilities.

    But, isn''t that still strange? Howe even the subordinates can evolve to the same realm as Master Rimuru? I can understand that the awakened demon lords men are demon lord species, but even the men are of the awakened demon lords levelthats too much of a foul!!!

    A phenomenon that even Dino, who had lived so many long years, could not have anticipated. Even Guy couldn''t do such a thing.

    Well, once it''s all said and done, this is unending. Moreover, the mere fact that the "primordials"

    were taken as subordinates was already a problem. This kind of guy, no matter what he does, it shouldnt be a surprise.

    Dino inwardly whispered bad things about Rimuru.

    They are the strongest demons, so they would be able to stop Dino. Moreover, the superiority and inferiority of existence values cannot be relied upon against a primordial as an opponent.

    To be able to take such an existence under one''s wing was an anomaly in Dino''s eyes.

    Dino would like to be as uninvolved as possible.

    However

    Zegion in front of him isparable to the primordials.

    Hes obviously foreign.

    More than just bing a Super Awakened (millions) ss, one could feel the endless power in his domineering aura.

    Power over numbersan aura that only the most powerful can exude.

    It''s also implied that Zegion, like Dino, has acquired an ultimate skill.

    This is why I hate working

    Dinoments that he has drawn the short end of the stick.

    Then he sighed as if to give up, but still fumbled for the best way forward. But good ideas are not easy toe by. And time waits for no-one.

    ***

    Zegion calmly walked in front of Dino, who was caught up in his rambling thoughts.

    "Is there anything else you want to say? He asked.

    "Have you been hiding it all this time to force out my cards? Don''t be ridiculous, it''s despicable!

    Dino put his actions up until now on the shelf, and was the first toin.

    It''s just pure anger, but if it pissed off his opponent, that would help.

    "Ridiculous. This is a fight.

    The rhetoric isn''t rhetorical, and Zegion doesn''t care about that.

    Dino also knew, and the conversation ended.

    Tension was drawn between the two men.

    Dino knew Zegion''s strength, which was an advantage for Dino, however his trump card had also been exposed to Zegion.

    In this way, only a head-to-head encounter can take ce.

    Zegion specializes in closebat, and, while not certain, probably has an ultimate skill.

    On the other hand, Dino specializes in mental attacks. No, using his hidden hand is an option, but Dino wants to try to avoid exposing his trump card in this maze.

    Even though a bunch of trump cards have been exposed a long time ago, it would still be a huge loss to expose them again

    And Dino also naively thought that it should be okay to run away.

    Why dont you attack?

    Zegion''s words were doubly stressful.

    Dino used his qi to go back.

    "Ha! Don''t underestimate me. No matter what, I am also an eight-star demon lord. After living for so long, who would lose to a weak chicken like you!?

    Then he raised his sword high and swung it down towards Zegion.

    Eat this and perish! Fallen Sky Strike!

    There is no exchange of tricks, and one giant blow is made. Like azy Dino, this is a great technique that hates waste.

    The power of the "Fallen Sky Strike" was also real.

    Dino applied his unique skill of "Sloth" to his swordy and created the "phantom flow", which can control the battle at will by hindering the opponent''s perception.

    Now, the unique skill "Sloth" has evolved into the ultimate skill "Slothful King Belphegor", and its effect is iparable, so the uracy and power of "Phantom Flow" is even higher.

    Although Dino is a pain in the ass, hisbat acumen is outstanding.

    But even so

    Dino still didn''t think it was a good idea to fight Zegion in closebat. If his powers didn''t work, there was no way to use the Phantom Flow.

    So now there can be no more reservations.

    This is the "Fallen Sky Strike, one of the few orthodox sword skills in the "Phantom Flow" that Dino has put his best foot forward.

    The will instilled therein is that of rendering the opponent powerless.

    Just rubbing against the opponent takes the life force out of them and also secretly harbors fluctuations that stimte negative feelings. This attack is not negligible like illusions and hallucinations, and it is impossible for those with w weak minds to oppose it.

    Only those whose spiritual power was strong enough to acquire ultimate skills would be able to withstand the attack.

    Even so, it is impossible to go injury-free. Dino poured his Idle Will, which also had a physical destruction effect.

    Even if sessfully dodged, negative fluctuations are released from all sides. Once in the midst of fluctuations, one''s qi will be depleted and their fighting ability will inevitably decline.

    After that, its only a matter of aiming for that chance.

    This heavily enemy-tricking move was Dino''s strongest hit with confidence.

    In order to ovee the difficulties at hand, it was best to deal with Zegion with a hard hand.

    Although Dino wanted to be reserved, he decided to uphold the no-discharge doctrine in order to make the task easier.

    Even if it was Guy, I don''t think itd be safe to take this blow head-on. So, can you take it?

    Dino, convinced of the strike, smiled softly.

    Zegion has always seen only Dinosziness, and probably did not expect him to use a big move all at once. Dino was convinced that everything was as nned.

    But Zegion didn''t move.

    It was that he couldnt react, but that he was just dealing with it.

    Zegion confirmed the trajectory of Dino''s sword, catching it as he watched for a hit.

    The mythical great sword, Crumbling Fang", which was cut from above, has the secret power to shatter all substances on the ground. For his part, Zegion calmly caught it with the exoskeleton of his left hand that had turned into an ultimate metal.

    "Dumbass! How can you take my sword head-on!? This time, it''s me who wins! Dino shouted.

    Theziness act that came with performing on weekdays finally pays off for this moment.

    Actually, hes not really acting, he just likes to think so.

    It was the fastest attack Dino could release, but unfortunately, it was caught by Zegion. It was inevitable asrger swords tend to sacrifice speed, but in exchange, the power is extraordinary.

    The one-handed catch from Zegion deserves credit, as if to indicate weakness in the attack.

    But for now, Zegion''s left hand must be taking a lot of impact.

    His left hand doesn''t seem to be shattered, but I guess it won''t work for a while. Im still not moving, still hanging on.

    Dino thought as he looked at the hatefully calm Zegion.

    The winner, however, was Dino.

    Zegion''s Space Distortion Defense field is excellent, but it also only defends against physical attacks.

    Dino''s "Fallen Sky Strike, elevated to the ultimate realm, prates all physical defenses and strikes, going straight at Zegion.

    Letting my opponent mistake a physical attack for a big sword and fall off guard, when in fact, a lethal Spirit type attack was used, was mybat victory Zegion is indeed strong.

    That''s why he underestimated Dino, presumably to show off his superiority. Because it was the melee field that Zegion excelled in, Dino predicted that he would deliberately not dodge the attack.

    "Huh. Give me a break. I''ll have to recycle Ramiris because of the effect of the bracelet anyway.

    Saying that, Dino was about to walk towards Beretta.

    But at this point, there was a pause.

    Dino felt strange.

    First of all, Beretta didnt raise his guard against Dino.

    After many battles, and using killer weapons, the amount of mana left in Dino was already small. Even so, he wouldn''t lose to Beretta, but Beretta''s eyes still revealed a victor''s calmness.

    It was creepy not to see an expression under that mask.

    "Do you think you can beat me?

    "Ho ho ho, thats a joke. I''m not thinking about winning, its just that I''m not your opponent.

    Just as the words fell, Dino felt a strong chill of malice.

    A few unnatural ces came to mind as he looked towards Zegion in a panic, revisiting the stopped motion.

    His mythical level strike failed to shatter Zegions left hand, which meant that his hand also had an intensity equivalent to mythical level. If so, it is not surprising that the strength of Zegion''s will can rival that of spiritual beings, and it seems that the correct answer is yes.

    No way

    "And by the way, is the effect of your attack dyed? You really think you can beat me with a blow that doesn''t hurt or tickle like a breeze?

    Dino inwardly scolded the bastard.

    As it turns out, Zegion is the owner of an ultimate skill.

    Although it was unknown what power it was, it was at least powerful enough to nullify Dino''s spiritual attack.

    "Are you doubting that I have an ultimate skill? Then you should have repeatedly attacked harder, instead of attacking so mildly. Thatziness of character is the cause of your defeat this time."

    "Don''t talk as if you''ve won!in the face of such a shouting Dino, Zegion held out his left hand. The sped hands opened wide and shot out five shes.

    This move is Zegion''s dimensional cutting wave (dimension ray).

    "It hurts

    Dino scrambled to dodge, barely avoiding a fatal injury, but his right arm below the elbow was cut off anyway.

    It hurt so much that he wanted to cry, but now was not the time to shed tears and scream.

    His instincts warned that it would be really dangerous if this continued.

    "So you''ve got an ultimate skill, too, huh? I didn''t realize that even my "hypnotic induction of death"

    could be invalidated. Is it true that all mental attacks don''t work on you guys?

    The "Hypnotic Induction of Death" refers to the Spiritual Death Attack of Dino in the "Fallen Sky Strike", which is effective as long as the enemy has a mind.

    It''s a sure-fire power that has nowhere to go.

    But Zegion looked as if nothing had happened after he was hit, and it was no wonder that Dino couldn''t ept it.

    In order to win, no, to escape, Dino had to solve the puzzle, and even though he knew he would not get an answer, he still asked the question he had just asked.

    "I have no obligation to answer you.

    Zegion was indeed relentless.

    However, the next thing he did was give the answer in a cold voice.

    "But I will answer the wretched one. The so-called dream, that is to say, is the mystery. From the very beginning, you have fallenpletely into the palm of my hand. Remember, as the Mist Lord, I am the Dark Phantom King. Spiritual attacks are useless!

    This is the attitude of the strong man who can give mercy to his enemies.

    Hearing these words and deducing the facts from them left Dino stunned.

    The invalidation of one''s own abilities indicates that the opponent is more capable. That is, Zegion has now evolved to be equal to Dinono, a being above him.

    Hes lying, right? His meleebat is so strong, and yet hes so good at spirit fighting! And this guy, he just said he''s the Dark Phantom King? In other words, has he reached the point where he can build a "world alone"? Are you kidding me!? How strong do you have to be to be willing to do this!? This is never an opponent that can be beaten unprepared!!!

    Dino''s skills were the strongest in the Great Sin lineage and had just evolved into an ultimate skill. But even so, he was perfectly blocked by Zegion.

    It''s no longer something that evolution can exin, and Zegion should have had no ultimate skills until recently.

    Dino is definitely not weak.

    But his opponents are very strong.

    No, they were too overpowering

    This Ramiris kidnapping battle was fundamentally wrong from the start, but became doomed from the moment Zegionpleted his evolution.

    Realizing this, Dino sighed heavily.

    And upon seeing the other figure that appeared on the screen at this moment, he waspletely speechless.

    Ah, Velgrynd

    The blue-haired beauty, no doubt Velgrynd.

    She should have already subdued Veldora and was fighting with Demon Lord Rimuru outside thebyrinth, but somehow she appeared next to Masayuki.

    What bothered Dino even more was not being able to see Cornu''s figure.

    No way, no way, no way!!

    Nasty premonitions alwayse true.

    Dino has understood this from past experience.

    Give me a minute! There is so much information and intelligence that understanding can no longer keep up. That''s what!? Feldway''s inclusion of Velgrynd at his disposal is actually a lie? Or is she out of the guy''s league? Either way, is it possible that Cornu has been done in by Velgrynd? No, no, no, this, it''s no longer a matter ofbat failure, is it?

    Dino let Thinking elerate run at full speed, trying to make sense of the situation. In the end, he understood that no matter how hard he tried, the battle could no longer go on.

    Dino had originally wanted to run away single-mindedly, but from this moment on, he didn''t even have the energy to work towards it.

    For Dino, this feeling was familiar.

    "Pray. He who touches the abyss of sin, go to hell in his own penance for sin! Dimension Storm!

    From the beginning, this venue was the dominant space of Zegion.

    This represents a fact.

    No matter what Dino does, there''s no way he can disengage from this area.

    If even the power of concealment is used, there may be a possibility of seeing a glimmer of light. But even then, the winning percentage was an exaggeration of low, so Dino, who had given uppletely, did not regret it.

    Of course, the only other possibility he has now is

    A rainbow storm engulfs Dino, and his existence is obliterated as "nothingness".

    Extraordinary high energy storms.

    Dino, helpless to do anything about it, had not a sliver of meat left and was erased from the worldas it should have been.

    Oh, is his prayer in effect? Only bad luck is to bemended.

    Zegion muttered.

    The aura of Dino had regenerated, apanied by the faint sound of something ruineding from somewhere.

    Zegion has a proper grasp of the situation.

    Even hearing that voice remained calm, as everything unfolded as Zegion had expected.

    ***

    Dino woke up outside the maze.

    "Huh, did you win the bet?

    Dino sighed with relief.

    The gear is all still there and the physical damage is zero.

    Geez, that''s it. Ramiris was merciful enough to let me escape, right?

    After a mutter, Dino looked at the broken bracelet.

    It''s a cheap purchase from the shop in thebyrinthyes, the "resurrection bracelet".

    Since there are no recorded locations, Dino''s resurrection site is, as usual, the ground area of the maze, so the "resurrection bracelet" also bes a means for him to get out of the battlefield.

    Not giving me a real bracelet with an unlimited number of times means I''ve been warned. It''s so naive yet still sweet.

    Dino muttered quietly.

    He had used a prop made by the kidnapping target, Ramiris, as insurance. He didnt care enough to do such uncivilized things, so Dino is Dino too.

    This one was a disposable shoddy item in the mass-produced goods made by Ramiris. Dino gambled his fate on something like this, and it seems the heavens are on Dino''s side this time.

    Even if I fall, Im still an angel.

    Dino concluded to himself and looked around. He was going to rendezvous with hisrades who were fighting with Geld''s army and then withdraw as soon as possible.

    And he didn''t forget to contact Zrio with thought transmission" to tell him that the battle was lost.

    Dino''srades had been obstructing the re-closing of the maze in order to secure an escape route, and as long as Zrio didn''t leave, they couldn''t escape.

    Since the battle has been lost, it is not appropriate to stay here for long.

    That guy''s way over the top, by the way!

    I really can''t take it anymore Dino, who recalls Zegion, grumbles again.

    Feldway might have raged, but this time alone Dino felt lucky to have survived.

    That said, it''s probably the first time that Feldway''s campaign has failed. Also, it seems that Cornu was taken out I don''t know how, but I really shouldn''t be hostile to Demon Lord Rimuru

    In fact, Dino, who was reluctant from the beginning, wondered why he had agreed to this strategy to begin with.

    The thought of what came next made Dino feel depressed.

    All in all, since Zegion had be such a monster, the possibility of taking the maze by a frontal attack was hopeless.

    Not just Zegion, but all the upper executives of the Jura Tempest Federation were monsters.

    It was not yet known what state Rimuru and the rest were in, but it was enough to foresee that something absolutely terrible had changed.

    That''s why I don''t want to do this!!!

    Dino was supposed to be living peacefully in the maze.

    But still, this had happened.

    Even though he had to have a job, he still felt mncholy.

    Don''t know what Feldway was thinking, all in all he probably wouldn''t give up on this. But it really isn''t possible

    Perhaps, this was the biggest chance for his side to win.

    Lose this opportunity and there will be no nextDino has understood the status quo.

    In addition, there was another problem.

    Aah, I wont be able to go back anymore because of this hostile rtionship.

    The time of living in thebyrinth was veryfortable for thezy Dino.

    It was work, but it was fun to give Vesta help, and his rtionship with Gabil was good, getting help from each other in various ways. Also, Dino felt happy whenever those researchers came up with something new.

    During the course of his boring days, Dino had developed a sense ofpanionship with Vesta and the others.

    And one more thing.

    Perhaps everyone had forgotten that Dino hade over here in the first ce because of orders from Guy. In other words, he had spy missions to report the situation inside thebyrinth to Guy.

    Dino doesn''t think Guy really expects anything from him, but he still feels its a little bit unbearable.

    Hes a pain in the ass when hes angry

    Let''s be honest, it was super troublesome.

    It was just as much trouble to bother any longer, so Dino hurried towards the ce where hispanions were.

    ***

    When Dino arrived at hispanions'' location, he found the battle strained.

    The Barrier Lord" Geld and the big, muscr female warrior Garcia were fighting.

    It''s shocking that the two are actually fairly equal in power, which really makes Dino suspect something is wrong with his eyes.

    Can a stalemate with Garcia mean that his power is already over mine? You''ve got to be kidding me

    to evolve into this

    Geld was covered in blood, though it wasn''t known if it was his own or the enemy''s blood, after all, he couldn''t see the slightest sign of injury all over his body.

    Attacks with magic deal damage that can''t be healed with a recovery potion, and Garcia''s attacks will obviouslye with will-destroying magic.

    However, Geld was clearly hit by such an attack and was still unharmed, which was either because he had terrifying defensive power or he had extraordinary recovery power.

    Right in front of Dino, who was pondering these things, Garcia let loose a sh with her one-handed sword, and Gelds shield of scales was sliced open and his arm chopped off.

    However, Geld waspletely indifferent and simply threw away the broken shield and took the new one out of his ''stomach pouch'' and re-positioned it.

    Dino saw it.

    There were no wounds left on Gelds arm.

    Aaaaah, it''s "overdrive regeneration. Its skilled enough to heal even under Garcia''s attacks

    Having gotten the answer, Dino wasn''t happy at all.

    "That''s enough! You''re so strong! It''s strange that you''ve been attacked by myself without changing your stance, isn''t it?

    "Hmm? Is that right? I actually don''t know much about it myself, should Ipliment you on your excellent attack?"

    "Sarcasm! Geez, I can''t kill you with one blow and it will heal right away. I''d like topliment you on how strong you are.

    After a sparring session, Geld and Garcia once again began a fierce offensive and defensive battle.

    Both sides are the type that ignore the damage theve received and aim their full force at their opponent''s broken body inbat.

    Geld''s knife (meat crusher) was bounced off of Garcia''s round shield and burst into fierce sparks.

    Just by that alone, a shockwave swept through the ground.

    Dumbfounded, Dinopletely missed the opportunity to greet Garcia.

    Geld was always behind the scenes, as if smeared with silver.

    Against the Empire, he hadn''t set any notable records, and Dino had rarely watched him.

    However, that was a terrible mistake.

    I get it now! The people in this country are all, in a word, abnormal!!!

    Relying on the truth finally gained, Dino forced himself to ept the state of affairs at hand.

    And above Dino''s head, a fierce aerial battle is underway.

    "Ahhhh, dodging left and right is so annoying!

    "That''s the line I wanted to say. It''s arrogant to fly without wings!

    "Hmph, it''s a breeze to just manipte things like gravity. Compared to that, Ive had enough of this game of chase and it''s almost time to end it.

    "That''s my line!

    The two bewitching girls, who look good together, are fighting fiercely.

    Pico released the ''''ck Thunder Sky Break'''' that could almost cover the ground, and the ground turned charred ck. Yet for some reason, it was unable to take effect on the space around Nine-tailed Kumara.

    In Kumara''s opinion, this was all taken for granted, as one of her tail beasts, Thunder Tiger was best at manipting lightning strikes, so it was only natural that her defense skills against thunder was also excellent.

    This time it''s my turn Kumara acted with such meaning. She drove her eight tails in a flowing motion, and she used a nine-tailed chop against Pico, but these attacks were all blocked by the opponent''snce.

    The piercing sound echoed through the battlefield.

    This disparate battle situation forced Dino to revise Kumara''sbat power upwards in his mind.

    Twelve Patrons"? What a horrible bunch.

    Dino admitted honestly.

    Not one of them, but all the members were a threat, and Dino felt absolutely right about that.

    The original Killing Angel''s (Seraphims) Garcia and Pico, both of whom areparable in strength to an awakened demon lord, cannot bepared to their opponents simply by strength, as they have been away from the battle for a long time, but they are definitely not weak.

    The executives of the Jura Tempest Federation are now out in force, and Dino originally thought that he and the two of them would be enough to dominate the maze. Feldway even put in two of the Three Admirals" just to be on the safe side, and even attacked them himself.

    The result was as one could see, even though the lineup was a sure-fire way to win.

    This reality was making Dino go dizzy.

    Both Pico and Garcia seemed to have lost theirposure possibly because they have been fighting for a long time.

    Dino thought it was reasonable.

    Even after the fall, the two were once zing angels in the highest position.

    The seven original angels, who were once glorious and dazzling, are in a bitter battle, and their pride must be hurt.

    Dino wasn''t in a position to say anything about anyone else in that regard, except that he''d tossed all that aside.

    "You two, fall back. It''s time to fall back!"

    Dino yelled at the two girls.

    The two looked disgruntled.

    "The show''s about to start, isn''t it? Don''t say that when I''m ready to give it my all.

    "Shut up! From the moment you two came to fight, this battle fell apart!

    Pico and Garcia''s role was originally to provide support only from the rear, and since there was a gap in the battlefield, it was more prudent to take part in it.

    And now that they too were caught up in the fight, it meant that the enemy was fighting beyond what had been foreseen, and even a tactical victory here made no strategic sense at all.

    "Wait, the operation failed?"

    "Huh? Ahhhh, failed. It''s a failure, so run away with me!

    Huh!? But it was Feldway who made the n. How could that thoughtful perfectionist have misread the enemy''s battle strength?

    "That''s the way it is.

    "It can''t be. Zrio and Cornu are here, so why did the battle still fail?"

    "Because I''ve already lost. I also informed Zrio to retreat quickly, and as for Cornu and the rest, most of them have been killed. In short, none of the goals were achieved this time, and there is no point in continuing to fight!"

    Is it a lie?

    "I really don''t think that''s possible

    Pico and Garcia were speechless.

    In contrast, both Geld and Kumara wore proud expressions.

    "Hey, hey, does that mean you lost, too?

    "Huh? Let''s not get to the bottom of this! Remember, it''s considerate to pretend you don''t know at a time like this, right?

    Facing Garcia''s questioning, Dino replied perfunctorily with apletely unconcerned attitude, which caused Garcia more speechlessness than the defeat in battle had.

    Anyway, there''s no reason to doubt Dino''s words now.

    After calming their heads a bit, both Pico and Garcia epted the offer to retreat.

    "Geez, you don''t think that''s a win, do you?

    "That''s not gonna happen. You''ve been splitting power to stop the maze from recovering while fighting me, haven''t you? Next time, I hope I can fight you in a state of perfection.

    "Oh, ha ha ha! I''ll see you next time!

    Garcia and Geld, who recognized each other, said their goodbyes in unison.

    As for Pico and Kumara

    "Your name is Pico, right? I''ve picked up a life.

    "Huh? I haven''t really done anything yet? You''re the one who picked up a life!

    They red at each other viciously, then grunted and turned their faces away at the same time.

    With apletely different feeling than the two before them, the two also ended the fight.

    With that, Dino and the three others sessfully evacuated.

    ***

    Zrio always kept his cool.

    In this fight, he performed his feint duty perfectly.

    The subordinates are ying battle with t he resistance thebyrinth. This is a literal meaning, not acting.

    Surprisingly, it was necessary to correct the intelligence of the enemy''s strength upwards. After grasping the whole state of the battlefield, Zrio hade to this conclusion.

    Most notable were the two people in front of him.

    Charys and Treyni, two names that Zrio felt it necessary to remember. Still, he didn''t think he needed to use his real skills.

    Originally I was told that there were only worthless little people left here, which doesn''t seem to be the case. I thought that in order to meet me, the enemy would have to send out all the warriors in the maze, but did the strongman called Zegione out? If only Cornu and Dino could finish the task before that man woke up.

    Although there were a few worries, the fight that Feldwayid out would not go wrong, and it was because of this conviction that Zrio was able to enjoy the fight with confidence.

    "Oops, you''re being teased by your rivals, so you''ll beughed at by Lord Veldora afterwards.

    "Such fears are superfluous. Veldora lost to Velgryind, so hes in our hands."

    "That''s not a funny joke."

    "It''s no joke. You''re aware of that, aren''t you? That''s why they look a little anxious.

    Charys was excellent.

    Even in the eyes of Zrio, who had destroyed so many sub-dimensions, Charys belonged to an extremely rare group of excellent talents.

    Treyni had boarded the Spirit King into her own and was doing quite well, but not as well as Charys.

    The high-powered magic she excelled at on her side was threatening, but didn''t have much effect on Zrio, so it didn''t cause much of a problem.

    Charys was simr, his deft maniption of energy constantly emitting highly powerful heat rays that pooled together to form heat energy. However, these attacks were all nullified by Zrio''s prided space distortion defense field.

    What really needs to be guarded against is Charys'' urate and calm judgment.

    Unlike Treyni, Charys always used all sorts of tactics to try Zrio''s tactics, with every hand on the ground and with great care.

    From past experience, Zrio knows that such an opponent should never be underestimated.

    However, it also seems to being to an end. Charys had begun to go impatient, losing the prudence from a moment ago.

    Can''t seem to enjoy the fight any more than that.

    It was almost time, Zrio thought.

    "It''s hard to let go, but it''s almost time to finish. You two are really brave and very strong fighters.

    Sadly, however, you are not yet my match.

    The strength gap is more than understandable.

    The total amount of energy, too, is far to Zrio''s advantage.

    Most crucially, there is the issue ofpatibility.

    Angels have an innate advantage when fighting Spirits. Zrio was originally a killing angel, and even now that he''s fallen, Charys and Treyni, who have their roots in spirit power, can''t do him any decisive damage anyway.

    "Unfotunately, Doris seems to have reached her limit. The Spirit King who was boarding in my body will probably onlyst another ten seconds or so. Lord Charys, do you have any other strategy?

    "I''m sorry, no. However, I''ve been thoroughly trained by Rimuru and Veldora, so don''t worry.

    Even in a desperate situation where there was nothing to be done, Charys stillughs that the battle had just officially begun, and hearing Charys say so, Treyni shed a smile.

    "Then I''ll go along with it, for in Lady Ramiris''byrinth, there will be no room for these unknowns to do anything they want!

    Zrio, who had suffered a lot of damage, still had a high will to fight, and showed no signs of giving in at all.

    "Truly, you do not appear to be fools who do not know the times, but are you going to struggle ugly to the end? If you think you can be resurrected and have nothing to worry about, you''re very wrong.

    If his own calctions hadn''t been wrong, it was almost time for Dino to get Ramiris out of the maze.

    Thebyrinth''s unique "immortality" is made possible by the presence of Ramiris, who, strictly speaking, would have no problem simply running outside thebyrinth, but if she loses consciousness when she leaves thebyrinth, all the records would be reset.

    In other words, from the moment Dinopletes his mission, Ramiris'' entourage is no longer

    immortal." Zrio was aware of the situation and was careful not to control the killer, slowly umting damage on Charys and Treyni.

    "Your battle is worthy of praise, so how about I give you a noble death without pain if you need it?"

    It''s kind of Zrio''spassion for the strong.

    Of course, both Charys and Treyni answered with a rejection.

    "Oh, you think you''ve won? That''s stupid.

    "I feel the same way, the idea of fighting is that you don''t know what''s going to happen until thest moment. You don''t even know that as long as you don''t give up, you won''t necessarily lose."

    Still so deadpan, it was enough to provoke Zrio''s anger, and while he hadn''t yet lost his cool over it, it still wasn''t much fun to be stirred up like that.

    That''s unpleasant. It''s rare that I would want to show you a little mercy.

    "Mercy? There are a lot of people who think they''re going to win in the end, don''t you know that thats called a doom g?

    Charys recalls having a discussion with Veldora about the "list of things you can''t say" and, in particr, the "easy-going attitude when you think youll win, which you must never do.

    When you decide to kill your opponent, don''t talk too much and make your move quickly, or you will surely be caught by your opponent with a counterattack.

    "Foolish, as if a miracle in this state

    Will show up. Because, Lord Rimuru has allowed miracles to happen many times. Many of us have long been used to such situations, and there are even quite a few who have started to imitate them. Now as well, you see!

    After all, this is abyrinth, and with a little dy, most things will get better.

    This time is no exception

    Exactly. And if you dare to strike at our friend and coborator, Lady Ramiris, then I, Adalman, the

    Gehenna Lord, will be your opponent!"

    Another warrior has awakened.

    So what if one more person is added? Zrio originally thought so.

    What bothered him more now was the dy in Dino''s contact.

    Too slow. Although I''ve known about Dino''s cking habits for a long time, if we don''t get this done soon, I''m going to have more and more trouble on my side.

    Things didn''t go as nned, leaving Zrio to gradually begin to resent it.

    At this point, another knightly man stepped up to Zrio.

    Im sorry to challenge only one person inrge numbers, but I''m not a Pdin anymore, and my interests are more important than my reputation, so please forgive me.

    The visitor is Albert.

    Wearing a full set of mythical equipment given to him by Rimuru, Albert was blessed to evolve into a

    Gehenna Pdin" as he awakened.

    As the official owner of the dazzling outfit, Albert pointed his sword at Zrio.

    "Is there still a man like this?

    Even in Zrio''s opinion, Albert''s dominance was quite impressive, and his demeanor revealed an air of swordsmanship. If the man was holding a mythical-grade de, then he had the possibility of injuring himZrio had sensed this at first nce.

    "I''m here, too.

    The owner of this voice is Wenti, the former Death Dragon who awakened from the sleep of evolution and became the Gehenna Dragon King.

    Not knowing where he learned it from, Wenti gave a graceful curtsey to Zrio.

    Zrio''s expression was that of a nk face, understanding his disadvantage.

    With the lineup in front of him, it should still be possible to win, but it makes no sense to do so.

    Zrio can''t really win as long as Dino doesn''t figure out how to deal with Ramiris first.

    Even if we show our true abilities now, we will at least suffer a loss of full exposure, and it will be difficult to deal with both of them.

    Zrio made this judgment.

    If it was just Charys and Treyni, at least they could still deal with it, but if you added the three Awakening demon lord level strongmen, even Zrio would have a hard time.

    But now, without continuing the duty of feinting, Feldway''s campaign will end in failure, something Zalorio cannot tolerate, as he prides himself on his 100% sess rate inbat.

    No way. I''m going to kill them in the end anyway. Let''s show them what I can do.

    Just as Zrio was making his conclusions

    "By the way, let me tell you something that will probably interest you. My guardian realm is the seventieth level of thebyrinth, so why do you think I ignored the intruders over there?

    What?

    "I''m not going to pretend, so let''s just say it, because there''s no chance for me to be there anymore."

    what are you trying to say?

    The skeleton in the saint''s robe, and Adalman''s mockery with an evil smile, was unpleasant to Zrio, but he asked back.

    Wait? Did he just say, hes not going to pretend? That is, has something happened to Cornu over there?

    Though not answered, Zrio deduced the truth on his own.

    Adalman''s purpose was actually to induce Zrio to waver, so it was better to tell him personally what had happened on the seventy levels.

    "That foolish intruder has been eliminated by Lord Velgrynd, so we cane here with confidence.

    Zrio wasn''t stupid enough to doubt that statement.

    Cornu''s defeat was certain, so Zrio tried again to see if the most important goal had been achieved.

    "Huh, so it seems. With Velgrynd as an opponent, she was indeed unstoppable. There are a lot of odd happenings, but they should still be remedied. So, you''re sending all the rest of the battle power to my side?

    The reason why Velgrynd is here is probably because of Masayuki, that is to say, Masayuki has inherited the "soul" of Rudra.

    It was in order to rule out that possibility that Feldway, who had carefully investigated the Reich Intelligence''s transfer of information, had given the order to kill Masayuki. However, Velgrynd seems to have discovered this fact as well.

    Cornu is so unlucky, if he had exchanged duties with me as originally intended, it wouldn''t have turned out the way it did. Never mind, it didn''t matter if Velgrynd''s business was ignored, as long as Lord Michael was around, he could simply dominate her. Now more than ever

    What really matters is the movement of Dino.

    "Still not doing anything. I see, that is to say, are you strong enough to even be an opponent of Lord Velgrynd? I hate to admit it, but it seems we''ve been really underestimated.

    "That''s true. Even if we all take on the challenge together, the chances of losing are very high.

    Charys had a good eye, and Adalman had a quick mind.

    Both men perceived from Zrio''s attitude that he still hid a deep unseen strength, but it was Adalman and the others who now held the advantage.

    Next, Adalman has to open his mouth to exin what the basis is.

    "I already know why you''re asking these questions. Your real target is actually Lady Ramiris, right?

    However, we have been ordered to put the safety of Lady Ramiris at the top of our priority list."

    Upon awakening from the sleep of evolution, the first thing Adalman did was to confirm that Ramiris was safe.

    As long as Ramiris is safe and sound, all other problems are not a problem.

    Most importantly, it was a suprememand from Rimuru.

    Adalman and the other guardians of thebyrinth exist to guard thebyrinth, that is, to keep Ramiris safe.

    "Is Lady Ramiris all right?

    "It is natural, Miss Treyni. Lord Zegion has rushed over there, and now no matter how many enemies there are, there is no longer any way to take out Lady Ramiris.

    "Well, that''s good."

    Treyni smiled up, and the others each gave a relieved look.

    Being able to rest easy on the matter meant they could focus on Zrio.

    As for Zrio who became the target of all

    The mere mention of the name of Zegion, who had reappeared, had already given him a hunch that Dino had failed.

    If memory serves me right, Zegion is the one who can manipte the space distortion defense field. But if Dino fights as his true selfno, that man can''t be expected of much. He was already very reluctant to take part in this mission, and now he''s probably even more so

    Zrio perceives the status quo quite correctly.

    As if aiming for this moment, Dino''s thoughtmunication'' arrived.

    "Hey, Zrio, can you hear me? The battle is lost. Velgrynd entered the war and Cornu was taken out by her. I''ve also encountered some pretty tough guys on my side, so it''s time to retreat. And you should get out before the maze closes, that''s all!

    Those words made Zriough bitterly and unterally at his own words.

    Zrio thought to himself that this was really in Dino''s style, and decided to retreat as well. If winning at this point would be pointless, then pointlessness should be avoided.

    It''s the first time I''ve ever tasted such humiliation, and now I have to retreat when my opponent is just a bunch of stragglers who can be easily swept away. There will be no next time, so remember that.

    Zrio ndly uttered the unconvincing words and took his men with him and ''transferred'' them away from this ce.

    The rest of the people had no sense sense of the afterglow of victory, and immersed themselves in the peace of mind thates with sessfully guarding thebyrinth.

    ***

    The threat has receded.

    Zegion lifted his power Fantasy World'' and then turned his gaze to Beretta, only to find that the other had also just settled Ramiris on the bench to sleep.

    "Has Sir Dino escaped?

    "It seems so."

    "Oh, you''re too modest. It was only Lady Ramiris'' mercy to let Lord Dino escape.

    Beretta is right.

    Zegion had long since sensed that Dino was equipped with a "resurrection bracelet".

    Though sensing it, he let Dino off the hook.

    It was an experiment.

    "Can Ramiris'' heater be effectively activated even if there is clear hostility towards Ramiris by the equipper?"

    The results are as seen now.

    Dino won the bet and survived.

    For Zegion, no matter what the oue was actually the same, this experiment was only incidental, and as long as he seeded in guarding Ramiris, the conditions for victory in battle were fulfilled.

    If that''s what Lady Ramiris wishes, then I won''t deny it.

    Beretta nodded back.

    Now that the enemy has been sessfully repulsed, there is no need for a useless kill.

    Of course, if the enemy does not perceive his master''s mercy, he will never show mercy the next time.

    As for Zegion, it had been his intention to decide whether or not to pursue Dino based on his resurrected attitude. He was going to crush him had there been no sign of escape, but it seemed that it was no longer necessary.

    Dino not only chose to run away but also ran to convince hispanions, arguing that he should retreat immediately. And hispanions epted this im and withdrew with him from the battlefield.

    "So, what about the enemy named Zrio?

    "His Excellency Adalman has rushed over, and the other party''s aura is gone. They must have fled too.

    As Adalman and the others were resurrected to fight at this point in time, the remaining enemies also seem to have decided to retreat.

    "That''s good.

    "Uh-huh. If it wasn''t for Lady Ramiris, I''d be the one who lost the battle, right?"

    "Indeed. Even if we had won in the end, there would certainly have been victims, and for us, that is tantamount to defeat.

    Exactly."

    Zegion and Beretta nodded at each other.

    The idea that it was necessary to revert to a more vignt posture came to both men at the same time.

    But that cer.

    In short, thebyrinth has been sessfully secured.

    After confirming once again that Ramiris was safe and sound, Zegion returned to his domain.

 Volume 16 - Ch 2

    Anyway, I''m in a big crisis, too. Ramiris and the others have reported to me.

    What an unexpectedly big event.

    "How''s Chloe now?

    There are no more problems. She regained her childish stance and consciousness. Shes just resting in the infirmary now.

    Shuna told me so, so I was relieved.

    Although zero casualties were reported at the outset, there was no way to be reassured without confirming it yourself. Now that she''s probably rested, I''ll visit tomorrow.

    That being said

    This time the enemy was a real pain in the ass.

    Use the intruder as a feint to draw attention away from Ramiris.

    Then take the opportunity to have Dino betray.

    Dino''s strength far surpassed Beretta''s, and the pair of Beretta and Apito joining forces were unable to fight him off, as if almost having Ramiris taken away from them.

    But in the end, thanks to Zegion''s timely arrival, Ramiris did not have an ident, but if one step had gone wrong, it would have lead to a big catastrophe.

    It was creepy to think of what would have happened if Zegion had woken up a littleter. It was really nice to catch up, and I couldn''t help but rub my chest in relief.

    Still, the return of Velgrynd came as a bit of a surprise.

    At the moment, Masayuki is discussing with the Imperial Commander and others about the way forward, and although there is a need to meet and talkter on, the other party should also want to discuss it after they have sorted out their opinions.

    That being said, since Velgrynd protected those people, then what happened about Masayuki?

    Understanding some of the questions meant new ones were added.

    But then, Ill think about those questionster.

    I met, in order, with the people who came to give me their ount.

    "Ramiris, I''m so d you''re okay!

    It was nothing. But then again, that guy didn''t really seem to want to do anything to me, and it would have been awful if I had actually left the maze. But why? If he''s really strong, I still couldve knocked him down with my forty-eight deadly moves!

    Ramiris was the same as always.

    Although she still looks puffed up, this kind of ce where she puts on a show as soon as she''s safely secured is kind of cute.

    Thought it would get tough only in a dream, and it seemed the same as long as I wasn''t in front of her.

    "Lady Ramiris didn''t use all forty-eight of her deadly techniques on him, so Dino should be grateful for that!

    Treyni, who had taken care of Ramiris, immediately went along with the ttery.

    "Right, right!"

    Ramiris nodded happily in response.

    It''s because shes always like this that Ramiris gets carried away.

    Stop it, you guys, I thought in my heart.

    "I''m so sorry, Lord Rimuru. It was all because of my poor supervision. I didn''t expect that Dino would betray"

    It was a drooping Vesta who said so.

    He wanted toe as soon as possible to apologize, so he showed up on the asion, and the responsible Vesta seemed rather depressed about the affair.

    I said with a smile to reassure Vesta,

    "No, no, don''t worry about it. Dino''s been weird from the start, hasn''t he?

    When I finished, Ramiris and Treyni, and even Beretta, nodded in agreement.

    "He''s a demon lord after all. He''s been suspected since the beginning.

    "I didn''t expect him to do something so bold, but I''ve been watching him with a careful eye so that I can deal with him in time when he causes problems.

    "By andrge, he also showed an unbelievably serious attitude to his work, which surprised me.

    It''s a sadment and even makes me want to say you guys should trust him a little more.

    However, there is no way around it.

    In the end, Dino was here because of Guy, and it was only natural that Dino himself, who hadn''t the slightest intention of hiding that he was a spy, would still be suspected.

    But, I think

    Don''t be so depressed, Vesta. I don''t think that Dino really wanted to betray us from the bottom of his heart, either.

    This is from my heart.

    While Dino''s betrayal was predictable, there was a presence of his own moves that showed he wanted to be watched from the start.

    Presumably, Dino probably thought it would be that way one day, too, and I couldn''t help but think so.

    "That guy, after all, is clumsy. If that''s the case, it would be nice to talk to someone else about it"

    Once you''re in a good rtionship, you''ll want to trust each other a little more. Besides, Dino may have had some kind of a grudge.

    I say this, and Vesta epts it.

    Indeed, I want to trust him. I''ve been lost too, but thanks to King Gazel and Lord Rimuru, I was able to return to the right path, so even if it''s just someone to be around, it''s encouraging.

    Perhaps because the confusion dissipated, Vesta''s expression eased slightly.

    That''s fine, I''d like to trust Dino too.

    I can''t say it out loud with any certainty yet, but I''ve got some idea.

    That is, Dino may be under the Angelic System''s Domination ability.

    This coincidental convenience of making unique skills evolve towards ultimate skills inbat doesn''t just appear. If such a thing is going to happen, it is to hold the means to make it possible.

    <> The one who agreed with me was Ciel.</all>

    Both a friend andpanion to my soul and the presence I rely on the most.

    I was in high spirits during the battle with Velgrynd, and obediently named the King of Wisdom.

    The result is the birth of the theosophy nucleus (manas), the sentient body called Ciel.

    It is only a thinking beingnot something so simple, as is the case with "Chronoa", who also performs the functions of a different algorithmic device from her master.

    It should be thought of as another core that exists in my "soul".

    There is no doubt that it has an ego and it''s reaction is more human than before.

    <<is that="" so?="">></is>

    As soon as Ciel said this, I suddenly felt my persuasive power drop.

    Ciel has done all sorts of things herself, so what are you saying now?

    Besides, even if Ciel still had time to say that now, if she had still been the king of wisdom before evolution, wouldn''t the situation have been bad?

    Come to think of it now, with Rudraor was it Michael? When confronted, I think the reason why I don''t feel well is because of the influence of the angelic series domination.

    <<>>

    The habit of remaining silent when circumstances are unfavorable remains the same.

    That is, if she didnt evolve into Ciel, I was likely to have lost the battle.

    It is only now that I realize that victory and defeat are only a matter of minutes away, and I can''t help but be horrified.

    <<its meaningless="" to="" wonder="" about="" what="" could="" have="" happened="">></its>

    Hey, hey, you''re more unconvinced than I am.

    I forcibly came to a conclusion, stopping my thoughts.

    Of course, we are an exception.

    It''s more prudent to turn the conversation back to Dino, or to think that he hid some kind of power.

    <

    > Mm-hmm.</perhaps>

    Since Ciel said so, that should be it.

    In other words, Dino was manipted by Michael through the "domination of the angelic series"

    because he has the ultimate skill of the angelic system.

    Since Dino and I aren''t connected through the Soul Corridor, there''s no way to disarm it directly, but I might be able to do something if I can fight him.

    Of course, there is also the possibility that Dino is genuinely intent on betrayal so we cannot be careless, except that there is no need to treat him indiscriminately as an enemy.

    For Vesta, it would have been nice if things could have made sense that way, however there was one more person who was feeling sullen.

    "I''m so sorry, Lord Rimuru. I put Lady Ramiris in danger

    Beretta knelt before me and bowed his head in apology.

    "Wait a minute, Beretta! You''ve done a great job!

    I agree, as Ramiris said.

    With Dino far more powerful than him, Beretta''s actions were excellent, let alone negligent, and the time he bought was actuallymendable.

    I was worried that Beretta''s character would make him feel upset and responsible about his defeat.

    Like Vesta, they were both too serious.

    "No, seeding in buying time like you did in training is an excellent result!"

    "However, I have assumed the role of Labyrinth Guardian entrusted to me by Lady Ramiris, as well as the responsibility of guarding Lady Ramiris entrusted to me by Lord Rimuru. And yet here I am, in such a state of distress

    Beretta didn''t take my word for it and got more and more upset the more he talked.

    Perhaps he was indeed rather disheartened, but Beretta''s actions were all right and proper. With Dino as his opponent, Beretta finished well with the right understanding of whether or not he could win.

    If there had been apse in judgment in the first ce and a reckless attack, knowing that it could not be won, there was no doubt that Ramiris would have now been taken away. It is impossible to think of the losses that would have urred as things were developing.

    "So I tell you, Beretta, you can be proud of yourself.

    Iplimented Beretta on his excellent actions to finally calm him down.

    As a result, the enemy''s strategy was thwarted.

    Beretta and the others handled the whole battle.

    "If that''s the case

    He had calmed down, but was not all the way convinced yet.

    If you''re still upset, then talk to meter ande to my room.

    "Hm! Yes, thank you very much!

    Ramiris was safe and sound, so there were no problems, but Beretta was still too concerned.

    All in all, after that, it would be a matter of slowly calming Beretta, and that was that for now.

    ***

    Ramiris and Beretta''s report ended, followed by Geld and Adalman.

    "Geld, excellent protection of the town! Thank you.

    "I cant say the words, but I love this town, so how can we let the fruits of our own work be easily destroyed? Mypanions feel the same way, and will continue to do our best in the future, trying not to let Lord Rimuru down!

    "You''re so reliable. Don''t push yourself.

    Until now it still feels like Geld is overworked.

    Any more effort would make everyone else look like they''re cking off. Geld''s men probably couldn''t rx either, and a moderate amount of rest and rxation from their superiors was also necessary.

    After admonishing Geld not to be too unreasonable, the debriefing on this incident began.

    The enemy seems to be close to Dino.

    Both are women, named Pico and Garcia.

    Their true identities were also confirmed from Ramiris, who was under the name of the "Seven Angels of the Origin" of Veldanava.

    Originally as one most superior and powerful of the Killing Angels, he worked hard to keep this world stable.

    Dino was one of them, but the enemies that appeared on the fiftieth and seventieth floors were presumed to be other forces.

    "The duty of the Originals is to watch over the powerful monsters of the Otherworld that are difficult to dispose of and to govern the Otherworld. But, nevertheless, from what Dino said, it seems that three of them stayed on the ground."

    Those three, I think, were Pico, Garcia, and Dino.

    Transformed from a killing angel (seraphim) to a fallen angel, living on earth.

    The purpose seems to havee from a surveince mission, but it is not known based on whose orders or my own thoughts. All in all, since all that was obtained was fragments of intelligence, one can only specte on their intentions.

    "The opponent was quite powerful, and if I hadnt evolved, it would probably have been impossible to fight against it.

    It''s pretty hard to even say that about Geld.

    Pico''s opponent seemed to be the Nine-Tailed Kumara, and this side was also a fairly intense battle, and the fact that the opponent was still able to interfere with thebyrinth during the battle was enough to specte that the opponent hadn''t made the full extent of her abilities.

    "I see. That''s a tough one.

    Yes.

    I really don''t want to make an enemy of them if I can, but things havee to this after all.

    ce a bet on the possibility that Dino is being manipted and think about countermeasures based on this.

    Next, there are the other side forces at work.

    And what of Zrio?

    Adalman began to debrief.

    He was a formidable foe, and before I went there, it was Lord Charys and Lady Treyni who were his opponents, and indeed were utterly unbearable.

    It''s hard to do this way too.

    Referring to the battle records within thebyrinth, the fallen angel race was not the same race no matter how it looked.

    He seems to call himself the "Three Admirals" and says that he is a subordinate of the Demon King.

    In other words, the remarkable Feldway was once the chief of the Seven Angels of the Origin.

    The three originals who traveled with him to the Otherworld are now known as the Three Admirals and are under Feldway''smand.

    During their journey to the Otherworld, Veldanava disappeared and they became unable to return from the Otherworld, unknowingly changing their nature and bing a "Phantom race".

    Totally understood.

    They were different from Dino, and it must be because of their past friendship that they had formed a mutually supportive rtionship.

    These are just my subjective inferences.

    <<i think="" so="" too="">></i><i think="" so="" too="">

    Wow, that''s reassuring.

    With Ciel''s approval, then that''s basically it.

    "In any case, the Demon King''s gang is the enemy, and we must use this as a basis for our future actions, so be on guard!

    I gave everyone all the information I knew.

    It is mainly about Michael and Feldway. Of particr importance is that of Michael''s power, and in this respect I have made no secret of it all.

    Then, then! Maybe that Dino is controlled too? Is that why Rimuru said he wanted to trust that guy?

    I''m sure you''re aware of that.

    In my position, it was intended not to say it directly until I was sure.

    "I hope it''s not just a happy ending, but it''s possible to be manipted. So Ramiris, if that''s the case, forgive the guy.

    Well, yeah. I hope so!

    Ramiris said happily and smiled, looking as if she was better than she was just now, that was good.

    After that, one can only hope that Dino is indeed truly manipted.

    ***

    During the exchange of information, the atmosphere of the banquet was gradually heightened.

    Rigurd wailed with joy at the peace of everyone, and Rigurd got the budget from Myourmiles and went to great lengths to prepare for the feast''s delicacies.

    Myourmiles also joined in the preparation, showing off a hidden skill.

    The subordinates are verypetent and I am very happy.

    After the main debriefing, the atmosphere more or less eased and we all had a good time.

    "I don''t know what the Three Admirals are, but I''ll beat the shit out of them!"

    So reliable, Benimaru.

    But hes a lot different than from before the trip, so what happened?

    "Hohohoho! This is also the intention of my generation, and the next battle will undoubtedly be won!

    Gabil also let out a boast that he was qualified enough to say it.

    He had performed extremely well in this fight, and like Benimaru, somehow his strength had grown.

    "Whew! Lord Gabil, how handsome!"

    Exactly.

    "You''re getting more and more manly. I''ll follow you for life.

    Gabil''s men were also very excited.

    "Brother, you must not be too proud of yourself. Besides, this time I was close to dying! It''s because you''re always being praised like that that you''ve be so obnoxious.

    It pissed Souka off, but let''s not be so strict today. That being said, there was something wrong with Gabil that worried Souka, so I''ll leave it at that.

    It''s definitely not an escape.

    That must be made clear.

    The more important issue was this big uncle who was posturing next to me.

    "Kuahahahaha! Charys, I hear you seem to have been beaten to a pulp. Not enough cultivation, not enough cultivation!

    Its a shame.

    "Kuahahaha! No excuses! Be a man and be brave enough to admit your failure!

    He''s already admitted it.

    That said, didn''t Veldora lose to Velgrynd too?

    You cant exactlyugh at people either, can you?

    "Didn''t you lose too?"

    "Oh, say, what are you talking about, Rimuru!? Me! When did I lose? I was just in bad shape!

    And making excuses.

    I don''t know if I''m going to be able to say the same thing about Charys, but it''s not going to work on me.

    "Master, there''s nothing you can do because your opponent is too vile, and there was interference from outsiders, werent there? That doesn''t count.

    "Yes, exactly! Very well said, Ramiris! That''s right, I didn''t lose!"

    Velgrynd is around here and hasn''t forgotten about it, has she? Seeing your poor excuse, one can''t help but want to point this out.

    Speaking of which, I wouldn''t have had to worry so much if Veldora hadn''t lost to the other side, and this guy actually

    "Charys. Don''t abandon Veldora, even if you don''t like him.

    "Hahahaha, please be at ease. I have only one lord now, Lord Veldora, and I will continue to improve in the future so that I can be recognized.

    That''s serious.

    Hes way too good to be Veldoras subordinate, reminiscent of Geld.

    It''s great that Charys is bing Veldora''s entourage, I can''t help but think.

    And with that, the feast went on.

    Wine is also constantly being presented.

    I was the only one who thought I was too alert, but it seems that the executives are doing nothing more than neutralizing sake.

    That would defeat the point of drinking so lets leave that aside.

    We were able to enjoy the drunkenness, and the conversation was very animated.

    I feel the same way about that, so don''t want to bother with the details.

    "Come on, Lord Rimuru, I''ll pour you a drink!

    "Please wait Diablo, it''s my turn this time!

    Behind me, Diablo and Shion seemed to be in the middle of a tumultuous argument, but it waspletely iprehensible whether the rtionship between these two was good or bad.

    Don''tpete in this weird ce

    Okay. Don''t argue about something that doesn''t matter. You guys go drink too.

    Kufufufu, then I''ll make myself at home.

    "I won''t be fooled! If you drink, you''ll fall asleep, and today you have to give priority to Lord Rimuru!

    Is Diablo a wine drinker?

    I''m not quite sure about the taste differences of wine, but red wine does go well with Diablo.

    And Shion

    This ones drinking habit is pretty badpared to falling asleep.

    When she drinks, she gets delirious and pester people to fool around, so Shuna keeps a very strict watch on her.

    I would have let her drink something like grape juice, but I won''t say much more if she has this self-control herself.

    On closer inspection, these two have gotten stronger too.

    Looking back, the executives seem to have had some sort of growth, not just an awakening, but something else after that

    <

    ></please>

    Ah, sorry.

    Yes, indeed.

    Even for Ciel, it''s a little difficult to help someone evolve.

    <<i only="" helped="" a="" little.="">></i><i only="" helped="" a="" little.="">

    It still helps!

    It is necessary to pursue this in detail, but there is still a banquet going on, after all.

    You can do it now, but you can do it tomorrow as well, so go all out and enjoy the moment.

    I threw all my problems at myself tomorrow and enjoyed the feast wholeheartedly.

    ***

    The next day, I gave the executives a full vacation.

    Although I still felt bad for some of them who had to manage the affairs of the Rigurd government office, as I asked them to confirm the status of the city and exin the situation to the residents.

    Although the metropolitan area was returned from the maze back to the ground, it is still necessary to check whether there is a failure of the pipeline facilities.

    Once the confirmation isplete, the residents who have taken refuge can be given permission to go home. Because of the massive battle that had just ended, it would have been nice for the affairs staff to get some rest, but the life of the masses was also important.

    Thinking about it this way, one can''t help but think that politicians really are ves to the nation.

    There are a lot of problems, and in the event of an emergency, you don''t even have to think about rest days or anything. Fortunately, with the demoness trio helping the administration, it was more or less easier over there, but the talent pool still needed to be further secured.

    Me?

    I''m just an amateur, so it''s my job to read the material and give permission.

    Its like rejecting or returning it to the relevant department for more thought.

    The process holds up because the detailing is all done by Ciel, and if it were just me, it wouldn''t have been done long ago.

    All in all, although it was the second day after the banquet, I also needed to work on the documents.

    Rigurd and the others are also busy running around, and it was more off a relief than a piece of mind.

    But before that.

    Before I set to work, I decided to visit Chloe first.

    As soon as I entered the infirmary, I happened to lock eyes with Chloe.

    Rimuru-san!

    "Hoo-hoo, don''t force yourself to talk like an adult, Chloe is Chloe in my opinion."

    "Really! Despite my appearance, I''ve long been an adult. Let''s just say I''m older than Rimuru-san."

    Even if you say so

    Sure enough, appearance is still very important.

    Just like me, people who don''t know me well will only think I''m a young pretty girl when they see me, and it makes me feel a little inferior sometimes.

    In any case, careless talk can step on andmine, and it''s important to be prepared from time to time.

    To Chloe, whose cheeks were red, I said from the bottom of my heart that it was good that she was okay. As a result, the other hid her face behind a pillow.

    "Really! That''s foul, Rimuru-san!

    Huh?

    This sentence, how should it be interpreted to mean

    <<unknown. the="" problem="" is="" too=""plicated.="">></unknown.>

    If even Ciel doesn''t get it, then I can''t help it.

    So I soothed her by saying Oh well.

    Wait until Chloe calms down and ask about what happened.

    What happened in the battle, and the oue of the battle.

    "I don''t have any problems myself, but I''ve be unable tomunicate with Chronoa, and it seems that Hope King Sariel'' is going to storm out, so she''s suppressing that.

    Sure enough, she was influenced by Michael''s domination.

    It''s a real fight against someone important to me, so it seems that there is no need to forgive them now.

    What exactly is the situation?

    "Whoo-hoo, how do you say? I''m nowpletely unable to use the Space-Time King Yugovos, and unable to talk to Chronoa, so Impletely confused.

    It seems that it was more harsh than expected.

    Although Chloe was not expected to fight from the beginning, it was also naive to think that she could at least protect herself.

    This perception of myself bores me, but as things have been, the priority must be to keep Chloe safe.

    <<since i="" have="" the="" power="" to="" interfere="" with="" intelligence="" sub,="" can="" influence="" chronoa,="" who="" is="" "theosophy="" nucleus.="" if="" we="" invade="" chloes="" spiritual="" world="" and="" exercise="" our="" change,="" should="" be="" able="" eliminate="" michael''s="" influence.="">> As it turns out, Ciel was able to intervene.</since>

    "Chloe, if I could interfere with your skills, I think it would improve the situation

    "Rimuru, this won''t do. At that time, Chronoa finally said to me, ''If we continue to rely on that man, we cannot stand on our own, and in order to be able to walk alongside him, we must get rid of this situation by our own strength.'' That''s what I thought too, so I cant ept the help of Rimuru-san."

    Chloe looked straight at me and said that although her face was young, her expression was very firm, and she couldn''t help but remind me of her beauty when she became an adult, whichpletely tugged at my heart.

    No, I''m not a loli.

    Simply, Chloes transcendenceOh, its useless.

    It seems to be the same idea as a certain blonde demon lord.

    I rushed and switched my way of thinking because I thought it was a loss.

    "I know. However, if there''s anything you want to tell me, I''ll always be avable to discuss it with you.

    With that said, I stroked Chloe''s head.

    Chloe smiled happily, whispered a ''hmm'' and nodded.

    ***

    Upon returning from a visit from Chloe, Vesta made a request for a meeting because of an urgent matter.

    "What is it?

    "Thank you very much for taking the time to meet with us. It''s King Gazel who''s sent us the message.

    Ah!

    Pushing his sses, Vesta said.

    "Yes, as you may think, its for you to exin.

    Sure enough.

    Despite the war, it came back, leaving cleanup behind.

    For that, indeed, Im going to be scolded.

    It probably wouldn''t have been a problem if it was only within our territory, but after all, the Dwarven Kingdom was involved

    "Mmm. Are you angry?"

    "Rather, unpleasantly so.

    Vesta was also wiping the sweat off his face.

    It''s no wonder.

    Last night, we had a drink together.

    A moment''s thought shows Vesta that he is also responsible.

    I don''t think it was too much to think about, and I don''t feel the need to be too harsh about it, but Vesta seems to be reflecting on himself for not advising me.

    Still, it was me who did the most wrong.

    "We''ll exinter, so let''s get back to each other.

    "After all, you need to think of an excuse.

    As expected of of Vesta.

    Hes very reliable.

    In any case, it is not possible to exin our situation without sorting it out, and it is up to the schedule to decide when to hold the briefing.

    Therefore, as for the response to King Gazel, I will leave it to Vesta to discuss the matter after we have gathered our opinions.

    Then, lunch break.

    Throw those troublesome questions behind.

    After enjoying today''s menu with my favorite fried chicken and bean noodles, I suddenly remembered.

    I remember, Ciel seems to be doing something behind the scenes.

    Last night, Ciel said she had given the executives "a little help," and I think it''s necessary to get a clear picture of what she had done and how much she had helped.

    After all, it was highly unlikely that what Ciel called ''slightly'' was not slightly at all.

    <<well, i''m="" very="" surprised="" to="" be="" suspected="" of="" this=""></well,>

    The next thing you know, Ciel is making a confession.

    As I had guessed, it was a grand affair.

    First of all, the biggest thing was the unauthorized modification of my skills.

    The transformed power is the ultimate skill of the Harvest Lord Shub-Niggurath.

    Indeed, relevant reports have been received.

    Now, although it is an afterthought, it is true that it said that after the ''power change'' of Velgrynd, the remnants of the Covenant King Uriel'' was united with the Charity King Raguel, and the essence was inherited by the Harvest Lord Shub-Niggurath.

    At the time, I was dealing with the Velgrynd issue, so I missed a note on that.

    While browsing through the document, I listened to the detailed exnation of the Lord of Harvest,

    the ultimate skill.

    This power is like the crystallization of the bond and rtionship between me and my subordinates.

    -Skill Creationto create new abilities with information obtained through Food Chain and Analysis.

    -Skill Duplicationto make a copy of the acquired ability.

    -Skill Giftingthe ability to copy an ability and bestow it to the right person. It is also possible to take it back.

    - Skill Bankinformation (data) of acquired skills is instantly reproduced.

    Well, that''s how it is.

    There is a limit to the capacity of a soul," so the number of skills that can be mastered seem to be limited as well. So there are also skills that are attached to the body and not kept in the soul, but those types of skills seem to be a little weaker in terms of will.

    I hold a total of four kinds of ultimate skills, and I think the capacity is already very tight.

    <<no, not="" four,="" it''s="" five.="">></no,>

    Ah yes, that''s right.

    By swallowing Velgrynd and analyzing it to be the same being as Veldora, I gained a new power, the ultimate skill, the Scorch King Velgrynd".

    Thinking of it this way, it was indeed not a matter of overcapacity. Ciel gave the Covenant King Uriel''

    to Velgrynd, presumably because I was reaching my limit.

    <<exactly! i="" had="" no="" choice="" but="" to="" optimize="" the="" abilities!!!="">> Suspicious to the point of being shocking.</exactly!>

    Ciel rather even before, it seems that the tendency to collect skills was already there when it was still the unique skill ''Great Sageis it a hobby?

    The capacity is full, but it''s too good to throw away, so that''s why evolution is being strongly promoted, right?

    <<this is="" the="" end="" of="" matter,="" and="" it="" time="" to="" proceed="" with="" exnation.="">> That''s digressing!</this>

    After bing Ciel, not only is it more humane, but the number of instances where it feels useless has increased.

    No, no problem, no problem

    I dont have a problem. I just prayed and chose to trust Ciel.

    ording to Ciel, the Lord of Harvest'' was created to take charge of the information bypletely integrating the skills that were unnecessarily upying arge amount of space after dismantling them for intelligence.

    With this power, it is possible to influence magical creatures connected through the Soul Corridor,

    specifically, to grant power.

    Its easily understandable how much the ability grants.

    Therefore, Ciel had used Lord of Harvest to help Benimaru and the others.

    As for the degree of help received, everyone varies, and there seem to be two situations in which one is really only slightly assisted, and the other is strongly assisted.

    Some situations are likely to be defeated if ced regardless, so it''s not good for me toin about anything.

    Or, more to the point

    Thank you, I express my gratitude.

    <<no, i''m="" just="" doing="" what="" lord="" rimuru="" wants="" me="" to="" do.="">> I''m always judgmental and Ciel has really helped me out a lot.</no,>

    I''m going to ask you to do the same in the future, and I''d like to express my gratitude to Ciel.

    ***

    Listening to Ciel''s instructions made it generally clear to me what had changed in everyone.

    Since it was necessary to raise one''s strength to be an enemy of Michael and the Demon King, it did not mean that anyone could grant the strongest strength to anyone.

    Excessive power leads to its own destruction.

    In that respect, Ciel is very trustworthy.

    While still so fond of remodeling skills I don''t think there will be any reluctant reinforcement, at least.

    I think it should be a skill that won''t be gifted to someone who can''t use it, but it''s still necessary to check it out.

    At this point, Ciel asked me as if she suddenly remembered something.

    <<by the="" way,="" "power="" change"="" to="" master="" is="" still="" in="" ce.="">> I''d forgotten all about it.</by>

    Ciel seemed a little nervous.

    It''s as if a more powerful makeover has been thought up after constant fumbling.

    It was said before that the Ultimate Skill Storm King Veldora" and Covenant King Uriel" could bebined to create the Ultimate Skill Ster Wind Lord Hastur" or something like that.

    But after that, the ceding of the ''King of Covenant'' to Velgrynd should now have been unchangeable in any other form.

    Because it is Ciel, it is unlikely for the makeover to makes it weaker.

    In the final analysis, there is no report, but presumably the analysis of Charity King Raguel'' has beenpleted.

    <<of course.="">></of>

    I thought it was.

    In that case, I am equivalent to having six ultimate skills.

    With all that, and with the evolved executives offering power through the ''food chain, Ciel would indeed need the Lord of Harvest''.

    Arger number does not mean that they can all be mastered, and it is reasonable tobine them.

    I think that if the ''King of Scorch'' and the ''King of Gluttony'' arebined, perhaps something new wille out.

    I was also a little concerned about what happened to the Wisdom King Raphael'' after separating Ciel.

    Ciel wanted to optimize the pile of skills saved up, and I had no reason to stop it.

    Im not in a battle right now, no problem.

    ''Well, then pleaseuh, ah!

    <<got it!="">> Implemented immediately.</got>

    I was going to say wait a minute, but it was toote.

    In retrospect, I was a man who repeatedly failed.

    Always ignoring the consequences and regretting them

    Why is it so easy to give permission?

    It''s not okay to agree without even confirming what horrible makeover you''re going to get.

    However, Ciel, who was fully prepared, probably expected me to stop, and started the "skill change"

    immediately.

    The end result was Ciel humming and feigning deafness with the <<there''s no="" way="" to="" end="" it="" already="">> strategy.</there''s>

    Having given permission without paying attention, and then giving panicked attempts to stop things afterwardsit was all within the scope of what Ciel had envisioned.

    With a swift reply, Ciel began the transformation.

    In that state, I just kept waiting, and with great momentum

    Ciel, who doesn''t even give a response, buries herself in the transformation.

    Ahhhh, presumably some unusually surprising results will be made again, but I give up.

    In short, no progress could be made in organizing the paperwork with Ciel''s absence.

    I switched moods and decided to do some other work.

    ***

    During Ciel''s focus on transformation, I decided to have a personal interview with the executives.

    After telling Shion and Diablo about it, they were kicked out of the room, so for the time being it''s just me here.

    Shion also needed to confirm that her men were safe and left withoutining about anything.

    Diablo was more trouble, pestering me about the need for an escort and so on, before I finally said,

    Based on the results of this interview, there will also be a discussion about whether your position as

    "secretary" should be abolished. Maybe Testarossa, whos both powerful and beautiful, being a secretary can be a good fit, right? I''m sure you are, but I don''t think you can be strong enough to be a secretary and an escort. Such half-threatened attempt to convince him made him leave in a panic.

    Heh heh, although I didn''t have that in mind, he''s such an easy man to deal with.

    Presumably, he is now desperately trying to engage the evolved Testarossa in a mock battle.

    I don''t think Diablo is going to lose, but maybe it will be unexpectedly brilliant, and defeat is a good medicine, and asionally a bit of a crisis is good as well.

    With that, use this time to start the interview.

    I called in Shuna and had the schedules adjusted.

    From dusk onwards, people who were avable were called to my room in turn.

    The first is Beretta.

    An appointment had been made earlier to talk about it, so he was the first to be called.

    For receptions like these, the first andst tend to be the most stressful, though in this country, the first seems to be the most honorable.

    I wasn''t quite sure, but Beretta seemed to be happy by it.

    "Well, you may be troubled, but you don''t need to care about this failure. Let''s just say, preventing the enemy from achieving his goal should be victory.

    Without anyone being killed, this can be described as a big win.

    I said so with certainty, but Beretta remained sullen.

    "I understand what you mean, but to lose is to lose, and defeat is very unbearable for us ck dependents.

    That is to say, even if one agrees that this is a victory for one''s side, is it still a defeat for Beretta himself?

    Charys too, and Beretta too, are both too serious.

    If it were me, it would have been time to tout the results of the big win.

    It doesn''t make a lot of sense, but as long as one can take it on themselves it''s fine, and a spiritual victory is wee.

    By the way, the ck dependents refer to the genealogy of demons.

    I also only recently learned that Beretta is a demon whos head was Diablo, the Primordial ck.

    Indeed, their weirdness was simr in some ways.

    It''s really convincing when they both hate losing.

    So I can understand Beretta''s reluctancehaving said that, there really isn''t much I can do about it.

    My men have evolved by awakening as a reward for their victory, but only if they have the "Demon Lord Seed" and are connected to me through the Soul Corridor".

    Did Beretta meet this condition?

    <<its fine.="">></its>

    Well, wow, that scared me.

    Ciel, who was focused on the transformation, seemed to be listening to this side of the conversation as well.

    If that''s the case, it would also help me with the paperwork

    <<just for="" this,="" there''s="" enough="" souls="" one="" person="" to="" awaken.="" what="" will="" you="" do?="">></just>

    is this another digression?

    Wasn''t this a little better before evolution?

    <<no. there="" is="" no="" confirmation="" of="" such="" a="" thing.="">></no.>

    No, no, no. Don''t try to act like you''re degenerating.

    But well, if thats the case.

    It seems that during the battle with the Imperial Army, some "souls" were also acquired. If those are used, Beretta''s wishes will be fulfilled.

    Beretta clearly worked hard and I didn''t reward him, which was partly considering he was a subordinate of Ramiris, but Beretta was an importantpanion to me.

    After all, there was the important task of protecting Ramiris, and the next thing that still needed to be asked of him, let''s remove Beretta''s troubles with gratitude.

    Of course, there are limits to such things, and it''s still up to you afterwards.

    I see how youment at yourck of ability. Then, Ill grant you more power!

    While talking, I got up from my chair and struck a pose of not knowing where the big demon lord''s feelings were as I covered Beretta with my hand.

    "Don''t forget, all I can do is help, and it''s up to you after that."

    After saying that, I performed the evolutionary ritual to Beretta using 100,000 souls.

    It was I who "named" Beretta, and Beretta''s path of self-evolution was thus closed, perhaps I was in the sense of taking responsibility for the ritual.

    "No, no way!

    "Beretta, you''ll evolve in this way, too, so protect Ramiris in the future!"

    To Beretta''s surprise, the evolution was done without a problem.

    Very much in keeping with its Diablos dependents, he did not enter the sleep of evolution.

    Incidentally, his evolved state is

    Name: Beretta [E.P.: 1,970,873]

    Race: Higher Divine Spirit - Chaos Metalloid

    Blessing: Labyrinths blessing

    Title: Guardian of Ramiris

    Magic: <dark magic=""></dark>

    Ability: The ultimate skill, Machine God King Deus Ex Machina

    Resistance: physical attack invalid, state anomaly invalid, mental attack invalid, natural influence invalid, divine attack resistance It was Beretta''s body, the ultimate metal (hihiirokane), was equivalent to Mythical level, so Beretta''s existence value was greatly increased.

    By the way, EP is the existence value (presence).

    It''s Existence Value, not the ability value, and it''s in English, but if I care, I lose.

    This was the result of the original lifeform magic steel absorbing the huge magic element generated by Beretta.

    The most important skill is the "King of the Machine Gods", which is a ultimate skill that has been sacrificed for the unique skill Reverser. The powers included are "thought eleration, universal perception, demon lords haki, mineral control, earth attribute maniption, inverse fusion, space maniption, multiple barriers

    <<i worked="" hard!="">></i><i worked="" hard!="">

    Ah, good on you.

    You''re really chasing after what you''re interested in.

    While my skills are important, I won''t forget my interests.

    It''s a very deft toss up of skills

    So true to Ciel''s style, I couldn''t help but think so.

    Ah, never mind that for a momentBeretta that''s some serious shit.

    He can manipte and make minerals freely by using the new power of "Mineral Control" and "Earth Attribute Maniption" together, and you need materials, but there is a storehouse of magic steel in the maze. The earth is also joined to the earth and a certain amount of minerals can be raised.

    It seemed that his body''s evolution into divine steel had allowed it to master such power as well.

    The ability to manipte the elements, presumably this feeling?

    Metal can turn into all sorts of shapes regardless of hardness, so you can''t deal damage to Beretta if you''re not using a strengthened weapon with something like magic or aura.

    What''s even more awesome is that Beretta''s body can deform freely.

    Most weapons were ineffective in front of him. Hes like the difficult fluid metal that appeared in the movies, kind of that feeling.

    Approaching as quietly as a Slime, wrapping his arms around his opponent and suffocating themit was terrifying just thinking about it.

    He is usually like a high art humanoid doll with spherical joints, but his essence is not the same as his appearance, so be aware of this.

    In this way, Beretta evolved into what could be called a subspecies of spiritual lifeformsthe dreaded metal lifeforms.

    Although I built the doll on a whim, it''s really something that it has evolved to this point. While making observations and wallowing in such sentiments, Beretta knelt before me.

    I will never forget your kindness, Lord Rimuru, and I will carry out your orders, even if I die!

    He swore.

    Although I want him not to force it, Ramiris must be more important than that when she encounters a crisis, and there will most likely be more severe battles in the future, so Beretta will certainly respond to my expectations, right?

    I''m also relieved to have Beretta guarding Ramiris.

    Please.

    I said to Beretta with this nod.

    Beretta''s troubles were thus resolved, a job well done.

    I told Beretta to have a good healing session and let him get back to his job.

    ***

    Waiting for the next interviewer, I was thinking about skills-rted questions.

    The intelligence gained during the recent evolutionary festival, as well as the battle with the imperial strongman, made me question it.

    Skills are based on the roots of thews of this world, rooted in the power of the "soul".

    The "Voice of the World" will award them after they have worked on themselves or achieved great feats.

    So far it has not been thought about in depth, but it is an incredible phenomenon.

    It had been taken for granted beforebut the chain of events that had taken ce had turned it into a doubt that could not be ignored.

    In other words

    What exactly is the nature of skills?

    This question.

    I had unique skills when I first arrived in this world.

    The "voice of the world" was heard at a time when I was dying in the original world.

    From this fact it can be inferred that skills are not unique to this world alone.

    If this is the case, the question bes even more difficult to answer, and directly speaking, it is a matter of concern whether there are people who can use skills in the original world.

    Originally, a unique skill was thought to be something only heroes could acquire.

    Just because unique skills = unique skills, the performance varies widely, as the name suggests. It is my own desire that shapes me and empowers me to do what I want.

    I acquired ''Predator'' and ''Great Sage'', but I didn''t expect to acquire ''Great Sage'', which is a bit suspicious.

    <<impolite. i''m="" here="" because="" lord="" rimuru="" wants="" me="" to="" be!="">> Huh?</impolite.>

    Just because I''m a virginno, I''ll stop thinking about it.

    Since Ciel said so, it might be that such a desire existed in my deep psyche, and it was somewhat dangerous for the topic to go deeper, let''s just call it that.

    Change the subject back.

    This means that skills, although rooted in the soul," are different.

    The skills acquired at the limit of physical training are not carved into the "soul" but are attached to the body. This is especially true for skills gained from magical creatures, which can be gained by simply eating the opponent.

    This skill is known as an inherent skill of the race, and if the same race holds such a skill, then future generations can also inherit it.

    Skills acquired through cultivation often only reach the level of extra skills. The point is that after that, it''s still rtively useful to weave original techniques by increasing proficiency or fusing with sword skills.

    In fact, magic is also a form of a skill.

    I was able to learn by eating, as evidenced by this.

    There are many styles of skills, the most important of which are unique skills.

    The so-called unique skills are the unique powers generated by each person.

    Performance naturally varies.

    While there will be simrities on therger ssifications, unique skills that are identical will not usually exist. With the flow of time, there will also be cases of skill reproduction, but that is an extremely special exception.

    The unique skill Starved'' possessed by the Orc Lord was such that he could only board the same bloodline by awakening the inherent skill of the race.

    Starved is engraved in the flesh and is not normally applied to other races.

    In my case, because of the direct unification with ?Predator?, I have not cared about it so far.

    I think Shizu-san''s "deviant" was created by her soul."

    Then it was entrusted to me.

    That''s why I was able to use it, and if it wasn''t for that, maybe I wouldn''t have been able to get it.

    Somehow, the skills carved into the soul will be a bit more powerful.

    Incidentally, there is no doubt that the ''proxy skills'' given by Rudra are inscribed in the flesh. If one is not a "sage," one does not have enough energy to use it, presumably because one does not receive the power oneself, and therefore does not use it efficiently.

    It is for this reason that more powerful and unique skills can do the trick against it.

    Diablo defeated Jiu and Bonnie, who held the ultimate skills, but originally this should have been impossible to do.

    Unique skills do not work against the ultimate skills, only the ultimate skills can fight against ultimate skills.

    Although there are exceptions such as Chloe''s ''Infinite Prison'' and ''Absolute Severance'' and Masayuki''s

    Chosen One, it is unusual to defeat a person with ultimate skills only through unique skills.

    Even if it''s just a unique skill, the strength will be very different, if it''s an ultimate skill, it will be even more different.

    He who has acquired the ultimate skill, knows the reasoning of the world. Thus, one can be a higher being through magic thates from the world''sws.

    The most powerful magic of the divine system, the "Aura Copse" or the "Original" magic, can be used against it.

    So, it''s also possible that Diablo used ultimate magic to defeat his opponent, but it doesn''t feel like that.

    It feels like he''s going to force his way straight through, which is probably a rare urrence in the world

    In short, depending on the situation, it is possible to outperform a person with ultimate skills, even if they do not have them.

    In fact, practicing the ultimate skill would be useful everywhere, rather than relying on skills, perhaps mastering the arts would be even stronger. But most fundamentally, there is no doubt that it is the best way to fight against the Ultimate skill, and also to acquire the Ultimate skill.

    Summarizing these reflections.

    -Skills can be carved into the "soul" as well as the flesh.

    Based on experience so far, unique skills can be acquired through a strong desire or desire. The point is that its not so much talent as potential. No matter what the expectation, there is no way to get it if the existence value is not enough. This is not something that can be obtained by desire alone, but requires the achievement of various trials or conditions before it can be reached. One gains more power by oneself than by ones given. Further, the power born of the "soul" seems to be stronger than the power born of the flesh.

    -Next, the exact same skills do not exist.

    Even if the name is the same, the performance and thews will not be the same, I''m afraid. This is what desires trante into form and will vary a thousand different things depending on the various thoughts within the owner.

    -Next, the gap between the unique and the ultimate skills are not absolute.

    The strength of the skill acquired is swayed by the owner himself. To have a stronger effect requires a strong enough will. Skill, is the power to influence thews of the world through desire alone. It is certainly not possible to use the kind of power that can be called the root, without enough willpower.

    When you look at it in this way, it''s clear that the most important thing is willpower.

    This is followed by a thorough understanding of the nature of the skill and exploring its true and proper use.

    I had the King of Wisdom telling me the right way to use them, but that''s generally not possible.

    Although it is a skill born of your own desire, there are cases where it cannot be used because of a mistake in usage.

    <<hehehe, a="" recent="" example="" is="" dino''s="" funny="" failure.="">> Huh?</hehehe,>

    I couldn''t help but ask out like that, so Ciel felt amused and spoke up.

    ...........

    ........

    ...

    Dino''s abilities, as stated before, evolved during the battle. It has evolved from the most powerful of the unique skills, the Sloth," to the ultimate skill, the "King of Slothfulness".

    This was supposed to be the power that could wield the power of terror, but instead it was beaten to a pulp by Zegion.

    Of course, the overwhelmingly strong Zegion was also a reason, but the more fundamental reason was actually because Dino hadn''t been able to fully utilize the ''King of Slothfulness''

    Since he was only using this ability as a disguise, he probably doesnt have the full understanding of it.

    The characteristic of Dinos Sloth, the "King of Slothfulness, was born out of the character of Dino''s Sloth, and the character of his Sloth is that the more he moves, the weaker he bes, so the real way to use it is to "support his subordinates orpanions.

    If Dino had lent his umted power directly to hispanions like that, the true value of the ''King of Slothfulness couldve been realized.

    ...........

    ........

    ...

    Although it happened while we were away, the battle log images of the maze remained intact, and parsing was of interest to Ciel, so it benefited me.

    If it had been Guy, there would have been no such failure.

    He should understand the nature of the ability to use it correctly. However, it is a cker, like Dino, who is so baffled by the surface of skill that he fails to perceive its essence.

    Or should I say, its the failure of the enemy that made Dino make a move.

    If Dino continued to skip work and ck off like he usually did, and only let hispanions Pico and Garcia make their move, it mightve been hard for Geld and Kumara to cope.

    Thinking about it this way, it''s really good luck.

    It''s because the work I assigned down the line awakened Dino to the joy ofbor that this one was lucky, right?

    It''s too bad this kind ofment is failing more and more the more action is taken, if we can make peace with Dino, we''ll teach him a good lesson when the timees.

    Anyway that''s it, it''s not easy to properly understand one''s abilities.

    But there are also cases like Masayuki''s where he would start it without expecting it.

    But such skills are hard to master, and even harder to use thoroughly.

    Knowing the essence of a skill and using it fully is the same as seeing your inner meaning. It''s very difficult, and I think it may be necessary to spend a lifetime dealing with it.

    That is, if one mistakenly believes that skills are weapons of convenience, etc., one will definitely not be able to perform to their full potential.

    <<thats right.="" please="" take="" me="" more="" seriously="" and="" face="" well.="">> Well, well</thats>

    Somehow, I felt misinterpreted, but stopped thinking about it.

    ***

    As I pondered the end, there was a knock on the door.

    It is Benimaru who was guided by Shuna.

    Did you call me? I heard it''s a personal interview. Do you have anything you want to ask?

    After sitting face to face with me on the couch, Benimaru asked in this way, perhaps he was expecting an important close conversation, but unfortunately not.

    "Sorry, it''s just on a whim.

    "On a whim?

    "Yes. Didn''t everyone''s strength increase dramatically during this battle? You can also measure your presence in thebyrinth, so I want to get a good grasp of your fighting power.

    I see. Thats really important!

    Hearing my exnation, Benimaru''s expression became bright.

    He seemed to have been expecting to be asked about newlywed life, and that''s why he was so formal.

    "Well, I do care about that too, but wouldn''t it be forceful and sexual harassment to ask further?

    "Is that so? That guy Souei said, Hmph, just because you can evolve smoothly, it means you''ve done everything you need to do. You''re sote in life, I thought I''d have to give you some help

    Just as Benimaru was talking about it

    Brother?

    His smile was overshadowed by the smile of Shuna, who sent the cake in.

    The crushing force was so intense it felt like one''s back was going to freeze.

    Did you say something rude in front of Lord Rimuru?

    I''m sorry

    Couldn''t even the hard-core Benimaru beat Shuna?

    "So Lord Rimuru? I shouldn''t have said such useless things to my brother. I should have scolded him.

    Thats right. Ill be careful

    It''s not okay to choose to resist at this point.

    I understood the matter deeply and waited for Shuna to get in a good mood.

    It''s clearly a rare cake, and it''s tasteless because it''s so stressful to eat.

    The moment Shuna withdrew the cutlery to exit the room, Benimaru and I were both greatly relieved.

    "Phew, that was a failure.

    Yes, you should think about the time and asion when you say such things.

    I see. I originally disliked this story, so why did it turn out this way

    Well, thats right.

    Maybe some do, but it just feels to me like you are showing off.

    Let''s wait for thatter.

    Confirming Benimaru''s status as previously intended.

    Name: Benimaru [EP: 4,397,780 (+ "Red Lotus" 1,140,000)]

    Race: me Spirit Oni", Divine Monster Spirit

    Blessing: Rimurus Blessing

    Title: re Lord.

    Magic: <fire spirit="" magic=""></fire>

    Ability: The ultimate skill, zing Sun Lord Amaterasu

    Resistances: physical attack invalid, natural influence invalid, state anomaly invalid, spiritual attack resistance, divine attack resistance It was like this.

    That''s so strong!

    The ultimate skill zing Sun Lord Amaterasu" was acquired at the expense of the unique skill

    "Generalissimo", and its powers include "Thinking eleration, Universal Perception, Demon lords haki, Will Control, Light and Heat Control, Space Control, and Multiple barriers".

    ording to Ciel''s confession, it also reflected a portion of Velgrynd''s powers, though Benimarus seemed to be an ultimate ability acquired through his own power.

    Ciel said she only slightly helped.

    But this is really

    The existence value of the Benimaru itself exceeded four million, plus the holding of the "Red Lotus"

    sword will increase it by a million more, this is higher than Ruminas

    Incidentally, there is no way to deceive the existence valueprobably.

    To be more precise, people inside the maze measure existence values with a fairly high uracy.

    To try to cheat, one would either have to have a mythical-grade weapon hidden behind their back, or ce an other body'' in some other venue like Velgrynd did. If it was just body splitting, the values would be too small to be seen directly as artifacts.

    If it was outside thebyrinth, it would be easier to fool around, but if you invaded thebyrinth, it would be like sinking your head into the hot springs together, and you would not be able to escape Ramiris'' ''identification''.

    Ramiris is great at this kind of detail, alongside her regrettable aspects.

    In short, they dont understand what they can and can''t do.

    The reason why it is possible to identify it in this way is because someone said in a chat that "it would be nice if we could measure the value correctly.

    The one who asked this was probably Shinji, and Ramiris, who heard it, and replied, I can do it!

    It is said that the entire space was surrounded by subtlety at the time.

    Everyone was probably thinking, Couldn''t you have said that earlier?

    If only it had been done that way sooner, it would have been possible to measure the existence value of not only Ruminas, but even Guy and Velzado

    Also, if Dino hadn''t been taken lightly and was measured because he was a guest and research partner, it would have been possible to find out how powerful he was that he couldn''t have imagined just by his appearance.

    only that it would be pointless to measure but not to be sure that the other person would betray. Just a little more vignce may not have helped in this case.

    That aside, although the measured values are reference values, it is useful to use the existence value as one of the indicators of strength.

    This way, you can be sure that Benimaru will not fall behind even if he ispeting with the "Three Admirals" or Dino.

    Even among the Super Awakened (millions) ss, they are in the upper ranks and are very reliable as my helpers.

    There was just one thing that mattered anyway.

    If I remember correctly, if a monster has a child, doesn''t that make it weaker?

    "Yes. Generally speaking, the amount of magicules is drastically reduced.

    "Then why did you get stronger?"

    "Ahahaha, that''s incredible!

    Ah, what a refreshing smile.

    But dont just try to smile and muddle through.

    "What the hell is going on?

    "I don''t know! It''s also something that Souei is always pestering me about it, which bothers me.

    Yeah, I''m not the only one interested?

    If this problem can be solved, it will be good news for the monsters.

    The number of people and monsters getting married was rtively high, but I hadn''t heard much about people suffering from weakening But the higher up in the hierarchy the monsters affected were, the greater the impact would be, so this was something that would need to be resolved someday.

    Let me know if you know anything.

    "Got it. Then I''ll rece with Souei."

    Leaving one question unresolved ended the interview with Benimaru.

    ***

    Souei stepped in, recing Benimaru.

    After taking his seat face to face, I grumbled to Souei.

    I''m talking about you. Don''t tease Benimaru too much.

    "Heh, that guy''s been ate bloomer in strange ces since before. In my humble opinion, if we don''t get straight to the point, he''ll just keep on grumbling.

    Woah, that''s a good point.

    After all, Benimaru had said that there was no way to evolve without a sessor, and it was understandable that Souei would be worried.

    "Well, let''s leave it at that. And then there''s the thought about your evolution

    Souei was influenced by the Benimaru''s Evolution.

    Name: Souei [EP: 1,281,162]

    Race: Fair Oni", medium divine spirit - dark spirit

    Blessing: Shadow of the King

    Title: Dark Shinobi

    Magic: <dark spirit="" magic=""></dark>

    Ability: The ultimate skill Moonshadow Lord Tsukuyomi

    Resistance: physical attack invalid, natural influence invalid, state anomaly invalid, mental attack resistance

    Hmmm, very strong.

    Resistance on all fronts is also very good.

    If you want to defeat Souei, you can only use the sacred attacks or the sacred sword skills, or an ultimate skill.

    Souei''s abilities were given to the ''King of Moonshadow'' by Ciel, and they were rich and varied, including ''Thought eleration - Universal Perception - Eye of the Moon - One-hit Kill - Overdrive -

    Spiritual Operation - Parallel Existence - Space Operation - Multiple barriers''.

    "Hey, is it true that you can even use ''parallel existence?"

    I was so surprised that I couldn''t help but ask, and Souei replied calmly.

    Yes, it''s not possible to have as many of them at the same time as Velgrynd-sama, but I''m confident enough to be useful even if there is only one.

    That, indeed, is something to be confident about.

    One alone is enough.

    In that case, even Souei was infinitely close to being indestructible However, the one that deserved special mention was the ''eye of the moon'', right?

    With this, shadows can be manipted at will, and various things can be done without the other party noticing, and the scope of influence is wide, so that the whole town is under the influence. Not only for intelligence-gathering-specific capabilities, but also for assassination.

    Souei''s skill is my masterpiece, and to recreate the ninja in my memory, I have filled in the ninja elements with Soueis wish.

    I would also like to say that this skill can be rich, but the original reason is this.

    The highlight of this "Moon''s eye" is that it can be used even in the "split body". Souei can send a "split body" to each ce and share information with the "eye of the moon", so that you can ess information from all over the world through the "thought transmission".

    I totally get why this is self-confidence at work.

    This power really gets more and more powerful the more you hear it.

    It''s like a superior version of my spying magic, "Argos". With the ability to monitor the world and visualize the apanying sound, he has be an all-powerful and trustworthy man.

    In the future, we will also continue to hand all our spying activities to Souei.

    Well, then you are given the new title of Lord of Darkness and will continue to lead the Shadow Squad in the service of our nation.

    Yes, sir! All actions are for Lord Rimuru!

    Not for me, but for our countryforget it.

    "I''ll leave it to you, then.

    Iforted the Souei for a while.

    There was about an hour after that, talking to Souka about whether there were any grievances, and how they were doing and such.

    The five of them, their existence values seems to have grown to nearly 200,000, while Souka''s own existence value reached 260,189 which is already quite high, considered to be a former demon lords deputy officer level. She is also considered to be able to fight with the upper ranks of this level.

    In this fight, her strength has improved greatly.

    Combat was the best training, as I had heard Souei say.

    But one thing to be aware of is not to think that what you can do, others can do as well.

    Everyone has their own personality and is different in what they are good at or not good at.

    Souei was indeed very capable, but he could not impose the same amount of work on his subordinates, as that would make even the best people lose their motivation.

    Isn''t it only natural to give our all for Lord Rimuru?

    Well, not quite right.

    Don''t you see, if that''s what you think, no one wille after you after that? It''s also the responsibility of the supervisor to value your subordinates more and think of ways to make them work more effectively and happily.

    Sure enough, only by giving meaning to the other person''s work will someone follow.

    Of course, it''s work after all, and fun alone won''t hold up.

    Even so, I think a sense of aplishment is important.

    The joy of reaching your goals cannot be gained if you are always given an absurd amount of work.

    What''s more, if forcing yourself to finish once and giving yourself more work the next time

    Then even I have the confidence to be angry.

    Things like just do it, this will fall on your own headter, except that Souei always gets it done. The end result might be ming yourself, or perhaps be sick or get a heart disease.

    I was worried that this would happen.

    "So that''s it. I must use my tools with more care, right?

    "Don''t call apanion a tool. Truly, it''s important to keep glory in one''s work, but it''s not mandatory.

    If you, as a supervisor, can show recognition for the work of your subordinates, they will be very happy.

    So it seems. Indeed, I myself regard Lord Rimuru''s praise as the greatest joy.

    Hmmm, should I say hes too serious or too heavy?

    "Anyway, how about taking this opportunity to have a party with your men?

    "Got it. It is also the responsibility of the boss to control the mood of his subordinates, so I will take care of them more thoroughly in the future.

    "Remember to take advantage of the situation.

    Anyway, for the time being, I''m conveying to him what I care about.

    After that.

    A letter of thanks was received from Souka.

    Tears of joy permeated the letter, and I felt satisfied that I had done a good thing.

    ***

    The next person to be interviewed was Gabil, who came after dinner.

    "Hohohoho! Because of Lord Rimuru''s summons, I, Gabi,l havee to visit!

    Todayor rather, tonightGabil was full of energy too.

    I told him it was nighttime and to be quiet and sit down.

    After Shuna serves tea, I get to the point.

    "You''ve been a great help this time. It''s because of your efforts that everyone came back alive, it''s really thanks to you that you were able to hold out until the end, and personally, I have you to thank for that!

    Not from the standpoint of the nation, as my personal expression of gratitude to Gabil. If Gabil doesn''t hold out, there will be quite a few casualties.

    "Ah, Lord Rimuru! That''s the only thing that makes me emotional.

    Gabil suddenly burst into tears.

    I was so impressed that I didn''t go to throw cold water on it. I waited for Gabil to calm himself down.

    "It goes without saying that I was able to win, and it''s all thanks to Lord Rimuru that I survived. That voiceI was convinced after hearing Lord Gedora''s whisperthat was Lord Rimuru''s voice, wasn''t it?"

    Ah, well, it was the sound of Ciel''s voice that was heard.

    "Hmm? Well, sort of.

    It''s troublesome to exin, and since Ciel''s existence is my trump card, it''s better not to publicize it, so let''s go along with Gabil''s misunderstanding.

    "Yes! I understand that I cannot win without that power. Since I''m always reminded not to get carried away, even if I''m wrong, I don''t take credit for it.

    The tone of voice was high and the expression on Gabil''s face was very subdued, which I think is what he really meant.

    You''re growing.

    "Yes! I am very grateful for this assessment

    As with the flow just now, Gabil cried again.

    I couldn''t wipe it off with a handkerchief anymore, so I handed the towel over.

    Gabil is still this virtuous, but his growth has also been amazing.

    Name: Gabil [EP: 1,263,824]

    Race: Dragonewt" Medium Divine Water Spirit

    Blessing: Rimuru''s Blessing

    Title: Dragon Lord"

    Magic: <dark spirit="" magic=""></dark>

    Ability: the ultimate skill King of the Mind (mood maker)"

    Inherent skills: "Magic Sense - Super Sense - Dragon Scale Armored - ck Breath of Inmmation -

    ck Thunder Breath

    Resistances: pain invalidation, state anomaly resistance, natural influence resistance, physical attack resistance, spiritual attack resistance, divine attack resistance Unknowingly, he had reached an intensity that could rival Souei.

    Gabil''s ultimate gift, Mind King, is the masterpiece of Ciel.

    The ability will not be low just because it is not acquired on its own, it is precisely because Gabil has the adaptability to acquire this power.

    The five main powers are "Thinking eleration, Fate Change, Unexpected Operation, Space Operation, and Multiple Boundaries", and if you can fully control the overflowing power, you can also learn "Demon Lord Haki".

    One of the most powerful is the "change of fate, which is limited to once a day, but has the potential to change the battlefield against an opponent who is stronger than himself.

    Thiswhat would happen if someone other than Gabil learned it?

    If it was Diablo who obtained this ''change of fate, he would probably be the undisputed strongest.

    Thinking about it this way, it feels like Gabil is a pretty good guy too.

    What particrly shocked me was how it looked in that battle.

    Gabil, who dried his tears, told me about the part of the battle he was proud of

    "Thus the enemy''s spear came so close to my face that Iughed and fired it!"

    This, this is it.

    Gabil''s weapon was a special-grade magical weapon, the Water Vortex Spear, which was heard to be the secret treasure of the Lizardman race, but it was only special-grade.

    However, that water vortex spear bounced off the mythical-grade Green Dragon Spear, which I thought was some kind of joke.

    "Looks like poor performance can''t sway victory or defeat, goohahahahahaha!

    Why is Gabil able tough out loud like that, I think it''s obviously going left and right.

    If the weapon is Legendary ss, even a hundred steps back, it''s not that you can''t forcefully ept it, but if the opponent is Mythic ss, it won''t work.

    All that can be thought of is the possibility that

    It''s possible that Gabil unconsciously applied his skills to the water vortex spear. Presumably, it is precisely because there is a prizing level of power protecting it that the spear is not broken.

    Indeed, it seems to be so.

    Gabil would have been awesome in that regard as well.

    He''s actually a hard worker because of his usual words and actions.

    And a jack-of-all-trades who can study, fight, and do everything.

    His future activity is also something to look forward to.

    "Regarding the water vortex spear, could you leave it with me for a while? I want to ask Kurobee to renew it.

    What is it?

    "That is, to let the experience of the weapon be inherited and to bring it back to life. The materials are scheduled to be supplied with divine steel, so isnt it possible for it to evolve to mythical level as well?

    Although divine Steel was still rare, it was not a waste to give it to Gabil.

    It was my sincere wish to strengthen Gabil''s weapon as a reward for this battle and to enable him to endure more brutal battles in the future.

    If Gabil is unwilling to modify the weapons handed down from ancestor to ancestor, then Ill think of something else.

    "Please, please, please!

    Gabil cried out again and handed me the spear.

    In this way, the direction of the weapon''s transformation is also targeted, and Gabil will be stronger.

    If identified with the master by the mythic level, the existence value also increases. Gabil himself could be a semi-spiritual lifeform, and resistance should increase ordingly.

    Gabil''s men, the "Heavenly Flying Crowd", now have an average presence of over 120,000. It is said that 200,000 of them are in the upper echelon and it is hoped that they will continue to support Gabil in the future.

    Thus, the interview ended without a hitch, despite Gabil''s tears.

    ***

    Late at night.

    In a private room in a special members-only store.

    Reclining in the same seat as the elven sisters, Geld and I made good face-to-face.

    "How''s it going?

    "In good shape. I''m used to this power and won''t break the cup again.

    Geld said with this smile, deftly sipping his wine.

    Being held in such arge hand, an ordinary sized cup also looks like a small wine goblet.

    "Well, I didn''t call you here today for anything else. It''s also meant tofort you, so drink it up.

    "I''m grateful. I feel unparalleled happiness to hear Lord Rimuru say such things.

    The normally cool looking Geld could tell by the look in his eyes and excitement that this was what he was thinking from the bottom of his heart.

    I nodded and toasted with Geld.

    After listening to Geld''s tirade, I moved on to another topic.

    "Actually, there''s something I''d like to say that might be a little rude to you, okay?

    "Whatever it is, I don''t think Lord Rimuru is being rude to me.

    No, no, I''m also a little slow to point out, if I care, that there is a saying, "He who speaks without listening intends.

    I said to the girls in elementary school, "No, let''s not. That''s more than ck history, and I''ve grown since then.

    Up until now I was not subtle enough to be thoughtful, but I also struggled with it daily, warning myself from time to time not to say annoying things.

    Let''s not think for a moment about whether this approach has yielded results.

    Anyway, Geld gave the go-ahead, so I''ll just talk about it.

    "Then as I said, it''s okay to just say no if it''s not.

    Having said the opening, I''d like to make a suggestion to Geld.

    The content is about whether or not to ept the ''ability to change'' from Ciel.

    Ciel-sensei''s presence has to be hidden, so I tried to ask myself ''''Can you fiddle with your skills?''

    Then, without hesitation, Geld answered ''Yes''.

    "I think it''s because I am this way, Ive even worried Rimuru-sama. If I can be strong, I don''t need to ask you anymore.

    Geld drained his ss of wine in one gulp.

    It wasn''t an agreement because there was no way around it, it was an indefensible deration of eptance that Geld rightfully arrived at by his own determination.

    I nodded as I poured the wine for Geld.

    Name: Geld [EP: 2,378,749]

    Race: Orc King"

    Blessing: Rimuru''s Blessing

    Title: Barrier Lord"

    Spell: Recovery Magic

    Ability: The ultimate skill Gourmet King Beelzebub

    Resistances: pain invalidation, state anomaly invalidation, natural influence resistance, physical attack resistance, spiritual attack resistance, divine attack resistance After Geld epted my proposal, the waiting Ciel did it immediately.

    This is the power of "Thinking eleration, Magical Sense, Demon King Haki, Super Speed Regeneration, Predation, Stomach Pockets, Istion, Needs, Supplies, Corroded Food, Iron Wall, Guardianship, Substitute Service, Space Operation, Multiple Barriers, Super Smell, Full Body Armor", which has the power and is a slight degradation of my "King of Gluttony" and isposed of various other skills.

    By empowering the subordinates with protection grant, the entire defense can be formed.

    Geld was also personally able to share the damage received by hispanions by using the ''Iron Wall''

    and ''Substitute Service''.

    Corrosion is an offensive and defensive skill that by no means focuses on guarding, but is also valuable on the offensive side of the game. It''s a good idea for Geld, who is specializing in guarding, to make the most of this ability, which is so unique to him.

    It''s not just the skill that deserves special mention, Geld himself is outstanding.

    After upgrading Geld''s defensive gear to Mythical level, it could be said that it became the same existence as Geld''s own flesh and blood. As with the monsters'' clothes, they can be reproduced at will ording to Geld''s heart.

    It''s the same with the Meat Crusher weapon, as if even if it were destroyed it would immediately create a new one. After being repaired by Kurobee, the weapon is said to have left a memory of being in that state.

    Honestly, it just seems like a cheat.

    In any case, by acquiring weapons, Geld''s existence value has grown substantially and the base is very adequate. Coupled with the acquisition of the ''King of Gourmet'', Geld''s strength was already overwhelmingly strong in front of Souei and Gabil.

    The current Geld should be able to buy time even with the "Three Admirals" as his opponent. Trying to defeat the defensive Geld without a super powerful blow is difficult.

    "I''ll have to ask you to do this again.

    "That''s encouraging. And I will continue to do whatever it takes to protect everyone.

    After telling him that I would need his help in the future as well, Geld and I both smiled.

    ***

    I went back to my little room.

    Thinking about the meeting tomorrow.

    The meeting had only started today from dusk, so there were only five people to meet.

    Since everyone was busy too, I couldnt spend days.

    In addition to the remaining nine of the Twelve Patrons, there were several others who wanted to have a conversation.

    At least with Apito, there was a need for an interview at the request of Ciel.

    As if out of a desperate desire to fiddle with her skills.

    I feel too faithful to desire some of that, but can''t deny that it will serve everyone well. There was no reason I had to stop Ciel either, so I intend to keep at it tomorrow as well.

    Shuna intended the same and I let her make arrangements for the reservations.

    The instructions to postpone have been conveyed to Diablo and Shion, and I think we should be able to end tomorrow without a hitch.

    The meetings seemed to have been going on for a long time.

    I''ve received some reports, but there''s also the question of whether I should be involved, so until I''ve finished talking to the people of the Empire, I''m going to stay out of it and wait and see what happens.

    However, the presence of Velgrynd was one of the reasons why the meeting couldn''t end, the current seventy levels had an atmosphere that no one could approach.

    Veldora, for example, had long since panicked and fled back to his room, and I was slightly disturbed.

    Being apart from Velgrynd didn''t take long, but I cared about what kind of experience she had umted

    All in all, one can only wait for the attitude given over there.

    In the meantime, Ill just keep doing what I''m supposed to do.

    As I was engrossed in my thoughts, I suddenly noticed an aura.

    From my shadow, Ranga suddenly showed his head above the tip of his nose and stared at me.

    "Wow, that scared me! Isn''t this Ranga, waking up smoothly?

    I happily turned human and touched Ranga''s head and ears.

    The next moment Ranga showed a happy then lost expression, dropping his ears.

    "What''s wrong with you? Are you in a bad mood?

    I was worried about whether it was a failure of evolution or not, but it doesn''t seem that way.

    "Master, I didn''t make it to the battle because I overslept

    What? That''s it!?

    "I don''t know how to apologize, but I''m the reason they missed out on the opportunity to be active.

    That''s true, but it can''t be helped.

    Compared to that, Ranga had already evolved smoothly, and it was enough to be able to do something big in the future.

    "The hobgoblins are so active with their chores and stunts at parties that no one willin about you Ranga, so don''t worry.

    "My lord, I''m grateful to hear you say that."

    Ranga came to the floor with a "Coo" sound from his throat, and rubbed his face against mine as if he was pampering me.

    So I rubbed his fur, enjoying the long-forgotten fuzziness.

    Now, back to the main point.

    It was a rare opportunity to confirm Ranga''s status.

    Name: Ranga [EP: 4,340,084]

    Race: Divine Wolf, upper divine spirit - wind spirit wolf

    Blessing: Rimuru''s Blessing

    Title: Star Lord"

    Magic: <wind spirit="" magic=""></wind>

    Ability: Ultimate skill, Ster Wind Lord Hastur

    Resistances: physical attack invalid, natural influence invalid, state anomaly invalid, spiritual attack resistance, divine attack resistance Ah, Ranga''s race also carries divinity.

    Just now, I was so concerned, it seems like it''s all better than the indigenous gods that are believed in in the bordends, is that okay?

    With the exception of Souei, who may be treated as Benimarus submissive spirit, it''s as if a race carries divinity if the existence value exceeds two million.

    Not sure, but that''s how I felt.

    "A few more examples are needed, but this perception should be correct.

    Hmmm.

    After all, an existence value worth more than a million is a "saint", and if it exceeds two million, it may be a "god". It is not the same as the conceptual "god", but it is a powerful symbol that can be trusted.

    The value of Ranga''s existence actually exceeds four million.

    This is rivaled to Benimaru without his Taishou, in what is a terrifying evolution.

    "Very impressive, Ranga!"

    "Hahahaha, it''s all thanks to the master.

    ording to Ranga, it''s all thanks to bathing in my shadow.

    There has always been a magical element absorbed in my shadow, so his evolution seems to have gone very smoothly as well.

    And there just seemed to be a sh of awesome power. Thats what the ultimate skill Ster Wind Lord Hastur is.

    Then there is no doubt about this

    <<correct, it''s="" me="" doing="" a="" little="" bit="" of="" minor="" work.="">> Sure enough.</correct,>

    It wasn''t a gift, it was Ranga''s own power, but how could Ciel not intervene?

    But well, since it''s an ability that matches Ranga''s, so I don''t have anyints.

    This power consists of seven types of "Thinking eleration, Universal Perception, Demon Lord Haki, Weather maniption, Sound and Wind maniption, Space maniption, and Multiple Barriers", which arepletely different levels of power.

    I can understand the extent of this superpower, which is capable of controlling even the weather.

    An ability that is indeedmensurate with Ranga.

    Im starting to worry about whether or not Gobta could handle Ranga.

    ***

    It''s time to work.

    Although I yed with Ranga without sleeping, I''m in very good health.

    The first one toe over was Nine-Tailed Kumara.

    Her first words spoken after greeting me were,

    "I heard Ranga-sama''scent boast that it was Rimuru-sama who could modify our skills. In any case, I hope you can give me new powers.

    The young female posture of Kumara adorably made a request.

    Ranga''s abilities were acquired by himself, but he seemed to have exaggerated the help he received.

    Actually, I think he should praise himself more, but for some reason Ranga keeps bragging that he got my help.

    It wasn''t me who helped, but Ciel, only that was a secret, so I nodded ambiguously.

    All right, so what do we do now?

    <<lets do="" it.="">></lets>

    I knew you''d say that.

    Facing Ciel, who had no intention at all of feeling sorry for herself, it was disconcerting to entrust her with the aftermathAs long as there are enemies, all measures that can be taken should bepleted.

    "Well, you''re mostly on your own, but Ill take a look.

    Even for Ciel, what can''t be done still can''t be done.

    Skills that don''t fit Kumara''s skills cannot be gifted.

    After getting a response, it was left to Ciel.

    Name: Kumara [EP: 1,899,944]

    Race: Heavenly Star Nine-Tailed Spirit. Upper-tier Earth Monster Spirit Blessing: Rimuru''s Blessing

    Title: Chimeric Lord."

    Magic: "Earth Spirit Magic

    Ability: Ultimate skill Mythical Beast Lord Bahamut"

    Inherent skill: "Beast Demon Control - Beast Demon Unity

    Resistances: physical attack invalidation, state anomaly invalidation, natural influence resistance, spiritual attack resistance, divine attack resistance It took some time and seemed to work.

    Kumara was given the ultimate skill Mythical Beast Lord Bahamut", which includes six powers:

    "Thinking eleration - Universal Perception - Demon Lords Haki - Gravity maniption - Space maniption - Multiple barriers".

    She can even interfere withs, seemingly manipting a wide range of gravity.

    The race of the Kumara had also changed.

    The nine-tailed beast evolved into the Heavenly Star Nine-Tailed Spirit.

    The nine-heads turned into nine-tails, which sounded like it had weakened, but it wasn''t. Having previously led eight demonic beasts, and now just one head, meant that the Kumara could achieveplete dominance by her own consciousness.

    Like the original, eight of the nine tails of the Nine-Tailed Kumara boarded the consciousness of the monster beast, so it was still possible to assign the free consciousness to the ministry.

    At that time, it was possible to iste eight magic beasts with an existence value of approximately 200,000, but even so, Kumara still had an existence value of over a million.

    The value of the subordinate presence is a multiple of the isted value, which, when viewed in this way, is clearly substantially enhanced.

    Although she does not possess divinity, her existence value without relying on equipment has also reached nearly two million, and there is a feeling that it is only one step away from evolution.

    As with Geld, shes the earth attribute.

    As a semi-spiritual lifeform, the earth spirit beast has an excellent match with gravity to operate this skill.

    In terms of specifications, Kumara, which unites all the demons and beasts, can be ranked among the

    Twelve Patrons.

    But unfortunately, there is still ack of experience.

    The only ones who could win the fight would be Adalman and Gabil.

    However, the prospect was certain, and Kumara was full of possibilities.

    Still a toddler, her future growth is something to look forward to.

    ***

    What followed was the duo of Apito and Zegion.

    Zegion stayed out of the room first, with only Apitoing in.

    It''s actually okay for the two to be together, it''s a personal interview in name only, but Zegion chooses toply anyway.

    Sitting down face to face, Apito handed me a package.

    "Lord Rimuru, this is the honey that was just collected."

    "Oh, oh, thank you!

    I couldn''t help but be happy.

    This honey can be used as a panacea and is really amazingly delicious.

    It''s the same thing that tamed Milim, and its very famous among the ministry.

    Because of this, honey became a highly poprmodity.

    Iughed and tucked the package into my arms.

    I''m not a man who will give in to a bribe, but I''ll still be gentle with the yuppies.

    As for Apito''s current state.

    Name: Apito [EP: 775,537]

    Race: Star Wasp. Medium Divine Spirit - "Wind Spirit Bee"

    Blessing: Zegion''s Blessing

    Title: "Insect Queen"

    Ability: Unique skill Queen of Worship Valkyrie

    Resistances: pain ineffectiveness, physical attack resistance, natural influence resistance, state anomaly resistance, mental attack resistance For an ordinary adventurer, it should be impossible to defeat her.

    Apito''s strength has long surpassed that of the former demon lords, and although she is still one step away from the Special S ss that our country has identified, she should be stronger than the old awakened yman.

    Also, ording to Apito, the Queen of Worship'' can create nine insect-type majin.

    They are still in the state of a chrysalis, but it seems that majin with considerable power will be born.

    "In that case, let''s celebrate.

    "That''s great! I beseech you to give them a name.

    A name.

    Yeah"

    I try to avoid answering directly, and want to change the subject.

    Naming'' is dangerous, so"

    <<no problem,="" i''ve="" learned="" to="" fully="" master="" the="" skills="" eliminate="" danger.="">></no>

    Learned

    Thats right, it was the same with Charys back then.

    I can''t help it.

    It''s a bit of a hassle toe up with nine "names", and I would have avoided it

    Reichi, Reni, Resan, Reyon, Rego, Reroku, Renana, Rehachi, Rekyuuhow about this? (***Didnt fully understand this trantion so I couldnt get it exactly right, but I think Rimuru basically put numbers together in a sequence to make obvious names) Don''t ask me, Im just doing it.

    Although it''s just abination of number variations, I still hope you''re okay with it.

    I don''t know if the majin are male or female, so I''ll just assign them the appropriate names once they''re born.

    Well! My children were so happy to feel Lord Rimuru''s loving kindness, too!

    "Hey, can you know that too?

    "Of course, I''m connected with those kids.

    The children born of their own skills are given orders through the ''insect domination'', and the speed ofmunication is only a split second, and unlike the ''Thought Communication'', there is a clear order of priority.

    I hear you, but let''s leave that alone for now.

    Ciel has been so noisy since just now.

    What a surprise. I was just asking for permission to change my abilities.

    I know.

    It was as if Ciel wanted to change Apito''s skills so badly that she was hungry for more.

    In fact, if you want to, you can force me or Apito to do it, even without my permission, because I have the authority of the higher power over those who have a connection to the "Soul Corridor".

    But that was only for emergencies, and now it was the usual, and it seemed impossible to do it without my permission just to be considerate of me.

    What''s more, Apito is in Zegion''s genealogy, which in my case counts as a secondary dependency, and it''s still easier to contact a slightly weaker one and get permission to do it.

    By this time all this came to mind, I asked about Apito.

    "On the other hand, what do you say I can help you redirect your power if I can?

    "What do you mean?

    "Mmm. There are also evolutionary possibilities in your skillsin a nutshell, one is to continue to be the queen of the insects as you are now, as themander type who is served by her dependents. The other is the hero type who leads her dependents in battle herself. The difference is simple, themander will retain power to create the insects, while the hero will not have that power, and in lieu of that, physical abilities will be strengthened and skills will be strengthened towards thebat side.

    I directly conveyed the words of Ciel, which would reveal that it was precisely because there were two possibilities that Ciel did not force a revision.

    It''s up to the Apito to make the choice, otherwise the true power of the skill cannot be used.

    "Of course, you can also choose not to change anything."

    After hearing what I said, Apito immediately asked back rhetorically.

    "If I choose the heroic type, will I be able to have children?"

    Why do you ask?

    <> "It''s just that you can''t create dependents through the skill. It doesn''t affect the birth of children.</although>

    "I see, then there''s no problem. Now that my children have acquired the skill of ''Birth of a Dependant'', they will be able to produce an army exactly as I want them to as an army of the Queen.

    Really? Apito has already given a part of her power to the dependents.

    So, Apito''s answer was

    "I, for one, am willing to lead the charge!"

    Apito''s answer was what I thought it would be.

    Ciel, who had waited half a day, immediately sprang into action.

    <<skill modification="" of="" apito="" is="" a="" sess,="" and="" the="" unique="" skill="" "queen="" worship"="" evolves="" into="" ultimate="" queen="" worship="" valkyrie.="">> It really took just a moment.</skill>

    I don''t know if it was analyzed early, but it was done in less than a second.

    After you''re done, go back and make sure you practice your skills.

    Queen Worship and "Worship of the Queen" are skills that are enhanced by choosing and choosing from the original "Worship of the Queen", including the powers of "Thinking eleration, Magic Sense, Super Sense, Insect Domination, Army Command, Super Speed Action, Death Attack, Space maniption, Multiple Barriers.

    It''s just a matter of strengthening the power that she already has, so I''m sure Apito won''t feel any dissonance, even if I don''t say so she''ll still practice.

    "I am thankful for the great good fortune that hides in my heart this supreme joy, that I may once again swear my loyalty to Lord Rimuru.

    With that said, Apito fell to her knees.

    I nodded generously, and the interview with Apito ended there.

    ***

    Apito went out and switched with Zegion who came in.

    Instead of sitting on the couch, Zegion politely sat in a wooden chair.

    It was obvious that he was already the strongest in the maze, but he was still so thoughtful. Zegion seemed to be thinking meticulously to prevent his exoskeleton from breaking the leather couch.

    That being said, Zegion has done a really good job.

    Zegion was already a high-spec existence, and even before awakening, he was an influential character who formed the double wall of the Jura Tempest Federation with Diablo.

    Compared to the other Twelve Patrons, there was a clear gap in strength, and this time the evolutionary power had made him even stronger. Looking at the battle records, it seems that Dino was defeated with Zegions strength still hidden.

    It''s horrifying.

    Honestly, it''s a good thing that this guys on our side.

    "Zegion, you did a great job this time. I don''t know what would have happened if you hadn''t woken up in time."

    "You''re ttering me. Even the time I woke up was in Lord Rimuru''s calctions, right?"

    How is that possible!?

    "Come on, even though I knew Dino was suspicious, I just didn''t think he would strike when the defense was at its weakest."

    "Oh-ho-ho, so I see. It was in anticipation of this that I woke up.

    Thats why I didnt expect that to happen!!

    Speaking of which, I didn''t even know that Velgrynd existedno, that''s not true, I did know, but I just didn''t think she''de straight over here.

    Otherwise, I wouldn''t have run off with the executives to negotiate directly with the Emperor.

    This strategy was initially aplete loss, and it was only with good luck that I survived it and everything seeded. But no matter how I exin it, Zegion just gives me credit.

    I''ve given up.

    "Anyway, Im grateful for your help.

    "No, I''m not much. Rimuru-sama would have killed Dino with a blow that crossed space and time even if I didnte out, right? I''m just responding to the opportunity you''ve given me to be active

    What the hell are you talking about? A shot at hyperspace?? How could that be done What kind of monster am I in this guy''s eyes!?

    "Ah, well, yeah Maybe, it can be done

    Yes! It would be a breeze for Lord Rimuru.

    Zegion enthusiastically affirmed my powerless reply.

    This was beyond the level of deep respect and I felt like I was being watched with a reverence to god.

    Actually, since Zegion haspound eyes, all this is just my imagination

    Renewing my spirit, I continued the interview with Zegion.

    I heard the insights into the fight with Dino directly from the mouth of Zegion.

    I had expected Dino to be thoroughly sessful in escaping, but that was not the case, in fact, Zegion had expected that he would escape and carved a mark in him.

    Its a terrible thing that holds the power of life and death.

    To even do something like thathow far has Zegion evolved?

    Name: Zegion [EP: 4,988,856]

    Race: Water Insect God. Upper-tier Divine Monster Spirit

    Blessing: Rimuru''s Blessing

    Title: Mist Lord"

    Magic: "Water Spirit Magic

    Ability: Ultimate skill Illusion King Mephisto

    Resistances: physical attack invalidation, state anomaly invalidation, spiritual attack invalidation, natural influence invalidation, divine attack resistance Feh!?!?

    I almost made a strange noise.

    The numbers Ciel reported far exceeded my expectations.

    Of course, Zegion also had divinity, and with an existence value of nearly five million, there was now another surprisingly high value next to Benimaru.

    His attribute is water, but ording to Ciel he seems to have the spatial attribute as well.

    Now a semi-spiritual lifeform with superior resistance, not only does he not have weaknesses, but his skills were also pure.

    Undoubtedly powerful.

    Zegion seems to be able to condense the water molecules in the atmosphere, constructing temporary bodies.

    The lifeform magic steel I gave him has evolved into a dense ultimate metal, and it is this metal that possesses the fantasy nature that makes such a thing possible.

    Zegion''s obsession with his exoskeleton should be because it is the appearance I originally crafted. If it wasn''t for that, it would probably have been stripped off and hed be a full-fledged spiritual lifeform.

    It is also a pleasure to see him be able to take such an interest and use it.

    What''s more, it is strong enough for the closebat specialization of Zegion.

    After all, bing a full spiritual being without a physical body would be meaningless in closebat, so perhaps it should be said that this form is now thepleted one?

    <<thats right!="" and="" now="" zegion="" is="" exactly="" the="" best="" masterpiece="" that="" master="" i="" have="" ever="" created="" together!="" although="" teaching="" was="" given="" by="" veldora,="" many="" of="" key="" points="" were="" me="" to="" guide="" him="" with="" knowledge,="" so="" you="" dont="" worry.="">> Well, basically I don''t understand the meaning, right?</thats>

    Ignoring my bewilderment, Ciel was smugly boasting herself.

    Zegion dominates the water element" and is especially strong where there is water.

    The worlds atmosphere is alsoden with moisture, so for Zegion, all ces on the are battlegrounds in his favor

    Additionally, a creature''s flesh is mostly made up of water, and the fact that Zegion could manipte that water was enough to see how strong Zegion was.

    About sixty-five percent of human flesh is water, so to be hostile to Zegion is clearly suicide.

    But what Zegion is really good at is yet to be said.

    Zegion''s ultimate skill, ''King of Illusion'', contained high performance powers such as ''Thinking eleration, Universal Perception, Demon Lord Haki, Torpedo Control, Time and Space maniption, Multi-Dimensional Barrier, Morroworld, Spiritual Control, Illusion World'', and there were some more powerful powers in it, but none of them were the marking used on Dino.

    That skill is called "The End of Dreams".

    This so-called engraving is actually a technique created by Zegion.

    With this move, even Yuuki''s ''ability blocking'' could be broken through, and to fight against it, one had to have strong willpower, but it would be very difficult to be stronger than Zegion in this regard.

    "The End of Dreams" and is abination of the three powers of "Torpedo Control, Spiritual Control and Illusion World".

    Zegion''s ''illusion world'' can create situations that are beneficial to him, and he can be almost invincible in that environment, like the kind of power that belongs to the ''world system'', which seem to be very rare.

    Even I don''t have it, so no wonder it''s so strong.

    <<i can="" prepare="" it="" for="" you="" if="" want?="">></i><i can="" prepare="" it="" for="" you="" if="" want?="">

    I don''t know how to answer that question, so let''s just ignore it.

    Now we''re talking about "The End of Dreams".

    After using this skill, if the subject takes actions that do not match the casters intent, it is possible to kill them immediately. However, because it is not possible restrict the opponent in great detail such as behavior, the opponent can still move fairly freely.

    In situations like this one, Dino is still free to act as long as he doesn''t go against Zegion''s wishes.

    "So, how does that marking work?

    "Yes, I don''t need to do anything on my end. Just the moment Dino makes a move, it will activate.

    Zegion''s engraving is an unmanaged, auto-controlled type that Zegion can detect when it''s activated, and ignore it entirely except for that.

    And the key to the activation lies in Dino''s actions, that is to say, aiming "killing intent" on mypanions.

    The moment he decides who to kill, the engraving would go and destroy Dino''s core, and even spiritual lifeforms could not escape from this spell.

    However, this is limited to Dino''s conscious actions, so if he goes out without knowing if he was mypanion or not, it will not cause the engraving to start.

    I can''t say I''m absolutely relieved, but if the town is attacked indiscriminately with killing intent, it will be judged to be triggered, which should be enough to keep Dino at bay.

    It''s a good thing Zegion was able to impose such a horrible restriction on Dino, who had an ultimate skill.

    "That''s great, Zegion. Even the threat was removed.

    Thank you very much. I''m not experienced enough to beplimented by Lord Rimuru, but I feel a surge of enthusiasm inside.

    Are you serious??

    Charys, Geld, and Souei were this way.

    And also Beretta.

    Thinking about it this way, there are kinda a lot of serious guys in our group, and Geld and Zegion in particr are especially serious.

    The growth of all these talents was really a threat to the enemy.

    Hopefully they will continue to refine in the future as well and not be careless.

    Anyway, I have understood that the ultimate skill ''King of Ilusion'' is a very powerful ability.

    Dino should be unreleasable, but there are no absolutes in the world, and maybe there is some unknown power that can lift it easily.

    Even if that happened, it wouldn''t lower my opinion of Zegion, as in situations like that, one can only honestly praise the opponent.

    Honestly, Zegion is really an all-around jack-of-all-trades.

    This time Dino seems to have taken the opportunity to escape, and it was the keen sense of judgment that was the frightening power of Zegion.

    There''s no point in just being good at your skills. Being able to use them is the real threat.

    From that point of view, it seems like there''s no one else like Zegion, who is closebat-specialized and super-adaptable in his skills.

    The twoplement each other.

    While many tend to y to their strengths to gain abilities, Zegion eliminates his weaknesses to gain abilities, and is skilled and flexible with his skills.

    Stunning.

    There are no more words of praise to be found anymore!

    Zegion''s battle sense and skill in adapting to the situation is also top-notch among my men.

    Thinking of it this way, it is understandable that even the veterans of our fighting nation could not win against Zegion.

    Zegion, what a terrifying guy.

    It''s no wonder that Ciel calls him the best masterpiece.

    The strength he has shown all along is just the tip of the iceberg.

    I can now confirm the status and authority of my subordinates like this, and it''s been a pretty frightening feeling too.

    The title Mist Lord" was originally given from the point of view of the mysterious, but now it has a meaning as hazy as a fog.

    Thats such an apt description.

    It''s also very fitting in terms of attributes.

    Uh, did that meanZegion misunderstood the words but his evolutionary direction was set

    If it turned out that way, Ciel would have surely pointed it out.

    Youd point it out, wouldnt you?

    <<of course!="">></of>

    No way!

    The response was slightly slower, and the pause in the middle made me feel very concerned.

    ***

    Keeping this suspicion of Mr. Ciel''s wastrel tendencies hidden inside, I continued to wait for the interviewer to arrive.

    Next up is Adalman.

    "Lord Rimuru, I am truly happy for the opportunity to attend this meeting today, and my gratitude is as great as a flood!

    This is beyond the levels of serious now.

    I casually coped and let him sit down on the couch.

    It''s a waste of time to let this go on.

    This is the mood right now, to forcefully let Adalman sit first.

    "How''s it going? How did you feel when you woke up?

    "Wonderful! Im full of energy, and the holy energy fills every corner of my body.

    Adalman said so, while looking like he was glowing a bit.

    Let''s make sure it''s the way I want it to be

    Name: Adalman [EP: 877,333]

    Race: Necromancer Spirit. Medium Diving Monster Spirit. Light Spirit.

    Blessing: Rimuru''s Blessing

    Title: Gehenna Lord."

    Magic: Necromancer Magic," "Holy Magic,

    Ability: The ultimate skill "Book of Magic, Necronomicon

    Resistances: physical attack invalid, mental attack invalid, state anomaly invalid, natural influence invalid, divine attack resistance I knew it.

    A dead spirit, but also with a light attribute.

    From the looks of it, Adalman was probably the most demon lord-like in appearance, and it felt ironic that he was the light attribute.

    However, Adalman could also change attributes with the special skill holy demonic inversion'', so there wasn''t much more to say now.

    If you care too much about it, you lose.

    Because there are other things to be aware of.

    His existence value has reached the level of an awakened demon lord, and there are just so many things I have to say about it that it gives me a headacheThe biggest problem is that the ultimate skill "Book of Magic" has been given

    What the hell is this?

    <<it''s from="" me.="">></it''s>

    I don''t have to hear it.

    I can''t think of anything else, but it''s really the result of Ciel''s meddling.

    "The best part is that the power given by Lord Rimuru, the Book of Magic, has be the source of my power as a result of wisdom.

    Adalman recounted excitedly.

    Adalman''s "Book of Magic" includes powers such as "Thinking eleration - Universal Perception -

    Demon Lord Haki - Chant Annulment - Analysis and Appraisal - All of Creation - Spiritual Destruction -

    Holy Demonic Inversion - Domination of the Dead".

    "Necromancy" and "Divine Magic" can be used without chanting.

    The dominance over the dead and the intensification of their protection made Adalman''s army even more formidable.

    Adalman exined this excitedly.

    If youre happy, then thats fine.

    I won''t say anything unscrupulous.

    <<by the="" way,="" this="" book="" of="" magic="" (necronomicon)="" is="" same="" as="" ultimate="" skill="" "book="" magic"="" that="" was="" given="" to="" gedora,="" except="" only="" necessary="" powers="" have="" been="" added="" by="" removing="" knowledge="" unsuitable="" for="" adalman="" from="" it.="">> Ciel seems like she wants to be praised.</by>

    Ive also learned that Gedora has also been given this power just now.

    I know it''s awesome, but it always feels like there''s no way to honestly understand it.

    To put it another way, either Adalman or Gedora are good researchers, and they both seem to be close friends who work together on the study of magic.

    As far as I''m concerned, these two are magic idiots, and since there''s no harm in it, let them do their research. It''s good to be able to focus on what you like, maybe one day theyll find out the truth.

    These Book of Magics canplement each other and are also quite suitable for the powers of these two, indeed I also feel that this is the right answer.

    The interview with Adalman is over, but there''s still a bit of research to be done here on the status of Albert and Wenti.

    The two of them said they did not dare to expect an interview with me, and they were overwhelmed with fear.

    They said that if they did not earn more, they were not qualified to meet with me.

    Overly reverent and even a little iprehensible to me.

    What on earth did they all take me for?

    In short, it''s important to grasp the situation of all the subordinates.

    Albert is a servant to Adalman.

    And Wenti is a pet that belongs to Adalman.

    Presumably, these two, if Adalman were to die, would also be destroyed as well. On the flip side, as long as Adalman is okay, they are immortal beings.

    Thus, the exquisite gift given to them through Adalman was sessful.

    <<i worked="" hard="">></i><i worked="" hard="">

    Its because its a hobby, right?

    There is no doubt that Ciel''s character is really quite agreeable enough, and it is with that certainty that I listen to the report that follows.

    Name: Albert [EP: 682,639 (+ 600,000 for the "Spirit Sword")]

    Race: Necromancer Spirit. Medium Divine Monster Spirit - me Spirit Blessing: Rimuru''s Blessing

    Title: Gehenna Pdin"

    Ability: The ultimate skill Immortal".

    Resistances: physical attack invalid, mental attack invalid, state anomaly invalid, natural influence invalid, divine attack resistance Name: Wenti [EP: 984,142]

    Race: Gehenna Dragon

    Blessing: Rimuru''s Blessing

    Title: Gehenna Dragon King"

    Magic: "Dark Magic", "Necromancy".

    Ability: the ultimate skill Eternal"

    Resistances: physical attack invalid, mental attack invalid, state anomaly invalid, natural influence invalid, divine attack resistance Under the influence of evolution, their existence values became very high.

    And with increased resistances, theyve be near-perfect.

    The same goes for Adalman, presumably with the kind of resistance that only someone who has died once can have.

    The powers of the two, though different in name, are the same in content.

    They all include the three powers of "Thinking eleration - Complete Regeneration - Subordination Immortality. There seems to be room for others, but they are still under consideration.

    If Ciel likes you, there will be some problems but I don''t think it will go wrong.

    Since their "souls" are kept in Adalman, their flesh seems to be imperishable.

    They will die together with Adalmanwhich, as I predicted, has the same oue.

    And Adalman is again undead, which in essence feels arguably invincible.

    What a foul this team is, I can''t help but think.

    By the way, there''s plenty of room for growth in Albert.

    After all, Mythical ss weapon potential is in the millions, and as long as the existence value of Albert continues to rise, he will continue to spark the potential of his equipment.

    That shouldn''t be too far away for Albert, who had outstanding sword skills.

    With that anticipation, I watched Adalman and the rest walk out of the room.

    ***

    After lunch, the interviews continued.

    Shion had been well prepared for this long ago.

    "Lord Rimuru, I''ve kept you waiting. Finally, it''s my turn.

    I didn''t wait, but its better not to say those words anyway.

    I simply replied, Hmmm," and sat down face to face with Shion.

    Name: Shion [EP: 4,229,140 (+ 1.08 million for Gorikimaru")]

    Race: Fighting Oni. Upper tier Divine Monster Spirit

    Blessing: Rimuru''s Blessing

    Title: War Lord"

    Technique: Shinkenjutsu

    Ability: Unique skill: Chef

    Resistances: physical attack invalidation, state anomaly invalidation, spiritual attack invalidation, natural influence invalidation, divine attack resistance With a proud face, Shion exined her power to me.

    All the while I was listening to Ciel''s instructions and by andrge nothing went wrong.

    The power of Shion is not dependent on skill.

    The weapons of Shion were of Mythical grade, and even if she didn''t have an ultimate skill, she could still hurt the holder of an ultimate skill.

    Her flesh alone was enough of a threat, plus the ''infinite regeneration'' was a nightmare.

    If you want to fight an endurance (energy consuming) battle, take a look at the existence value of Shion first. It is enough to match the high value of Benimaru, that is to say, the amount of mana is veryrge, so endurance battles are obviously not a good strategy.

    Her resistance is also perfect. The only way to win is to challenge head-on, which is really only a way to have a little sympathy for Shion''s opponents.

    "You''ve gotten stronger.

    "Hey, hey, thanks for thepliment, it makes me panicked!

    You look so happy, so you don''t feel any panic.

    However, getting stronger is a fact, and I have nothing to say about it.

    That said, the people in front of me normally had ultimate skills, but Shion only had unique skills, which surprised me a bit.

    Ciel, could it be that Shion has refused?

    <<no, shion="" is="" a="" crystallization="" of="" possibilities,="" so="" after="" looking="" at="" it="" carefully,="" i="" think="" it''s="" enough="" to="" do="" nothing.="">> Hmm, quite strong indeed</no,>

    Lately, I''ve been able to read Ciels emotions as well.

    It''s mostly intuitive, but its basically urate.

    To believe this feeling would indicate that Ciel is now hesitating about adjusting the skills of Shion.

    <<correct.>></correct.>

    That''s a rarity.

    Asking for reasons, Ciel answered reluctantly.

    The amazing fact is that if the unique skill of Shion is strengthened, it is possible to gain powers sufficient to kill me.

    It was because Ciel felt that this was less than ideal, that the evolution of Shion was sealed.

    It seemed pretty unbelievable for Ciel, the skill cultivator, to make such a decision.

    Although I don''t think Shion would be harmful to my intentions, but such a horrifying skill does need to be considered. I do not want to have problems, so I chose to support Ciel''s actions.

    After the status was confirmed, I chatted with Shion for a while.

    Listening to Shion unt this and that, I appropriately apuded.

    During the battle with the Imperial Army, Shion was very active and asionally I wanted to listen to her like this and praise her.

    In retrospect, normally I would either be angry at Shion or speechless at her behavior. I know that Shion is working hard and the results are gradually manifesting, even so, the miserable situation when messing up is still too great, and it is inevitable that I want to criticize a couple of things.

    So, it''s nice to have a peaceful chat like this after a long time.

    I feel like an old father to Shion, but

    "By the way, I almost forgot to report that I ran into a depressed Masayuki in the cafeteria"

    Huh?

    I thought he was troubled, so I told him I could talk to Lord Rimuru.

    Why are you so smug!?

    Again without permission!

    Shes always so presumptuous, and it always ripples back to us.

    I don''t want to get involved in this

    After all, the sudden appearance of Velgrynd who was supposed to disappear was surprising. But after calming down and thinking about it, there was undoubtedly only one reason why Velgrynd was here.

    Velgrynd is the only one who made the subdimensional leap in pursuit of Rudra, and the one who will eventually go after him.

    Not to mention, Masayuki and Rudra looked exactly alike.

    With all the conditions put together, even I could have predicted it.

    But

    Even so, when I think about it, I can''t betray Shion''s trust in me.

    "Maybe it won''t work on the date we meet.

    One can only push the issue back first.

    However, at this time, Shion replied ndly.

    Ah, that''s no problem! We''ll have a meeting early tomorrow morning!

    No problem, my ass!

    You can''t even negotiate beforehand, so instead you just cross over to the interview to have some kind of meeting?

    Masayuki''s personal counseling became a must-have. If Shion acts as an intermediary, the problems that arise cant be underestimated.

    I mean, who will be attending these talks?

    The big question that came out of nowhere made my head hurt so bad.

    The personal interviews were still in progress, but suddenly this happened.

    There''s also the fact that I havent met with the Demon legion yet, and if I dont finish today, it probably wont happen until a few dayster.

    If so, the fear is that there will be an uproar

    "In that case, tell Rigurd and Benimaru to prepare properly!

    "Got it. I''ll leave you to it then!"

    Shion said and went out high and happy.

    Only I was left bruised and hurried to call Diablo and the others over.

    ***

    Those left to be interviewed were Diablo, Testarossa, Carrera, and Ultima, along with their minions.

    It felt a little forced to talk to the whole crew, so it was just too dangerous to do it together.

    "Kufufufufu, is it finally my turn? How anxious I''ve been waiting for this moment.

    He was kicked out only yesterday afternoon, but hes a dramatic guy.

    "You''ve got to be kidding me, Diablo! The decision hasnt been made yet, so it''s fine for me to meet with Lord Rimuru first!

    A tattered Carrera is still dead set on Diablo.

    Ultima joins in.

    "Yes! I haven''t given up yet.

    The little girl was scarred too, and looking at her injuries, it felt incredible that she was able to stand.

    Their clothes were also part of them, and since they had not recovered, it meant that they had indeed been quite badly injured.

    But they were still fighting cheerfully.

    The demons are really tenacious.

    "Stop it. It''s disrespectful to argue in front of Lord Rimuru."

    Thanks to Testarossa''s intervention in mediation, it was finally quiet.

    Still, Testarossa was elegant.

    She prepared tea for me without worrying about the three fighting. Her clothes were not disturbed at all, and she showed a different kind of sophistication.

    "So, Lord Rimuru, the matter of dismissing Diablo and selecting a second secretary, unfortunately, has not yete to fruition, so what now?

    I don''t think there was such the thing.

    Maybe it was a mistake to leave the demons for the end.

    Even if Shion doesn''t take over the extra work, there is still the reporting work with King Gazel to be left, so I want to deal with the troubles first.

    It''s toote to think about that, and time is running out, so I must unleash force.

    "Actually, there''s not enough time for a slow interview, not to mention calling your men"

    "It''s not necessary.

    "I don''t think it''s necessary. It''s too much of a luxury for them.

    "Well, if you need information from your men, we''ll report it!"

    "That''s right, Im not going to cut my time short to meet Rimuru-samathere''s no such fool among my men.

    The four replied with smiles on their faces at the same time.

    "Oh, oh.

    I have no choice but to answer.

    ***

    Ciel said that it was not necessary to call all the demons as well.

    The reason was that Diablo said they all answered, please do what you want.

    It seemed as if he had ignored my wishes, but Ciel had actually grasped it and told me it was for the management department, and I epted it with a straight face. With that thought in mind, the time is set.

    The first of the four to be interviewed, then, was of course, Diablo.

    Diablo shooed the remaining three out of the room and sat happily across from me.

    Name: Diablo [EP: 6,666,666]

    Race: Demon Peer. The Primordial ck of the Seven Primordials Blessing: Rimuru''s Blessing

    Title: Devil Lord."

    Magic: "Dark Magic, "Elemental Magic

    Ability: Ultimate skill, Temptation King Azazel

    Resistances: physical attack invalidation, state anomaly invalidation, spiritual attack invalidation, natural influence invalidation, divine attack resistance You''re, like, so weird.

    The numbers are so neat, it''s like telling someone they''ve made a fake.

    But since Ciel didn''t say anything, I was toozy to pursue it further.

    Sure enough, having said all that, the strongest of my men is still Diablo. His existence value is overwhelming and his resistances are perfect.

    Diablo''s ''King of Temptation'' has powers such as ''Thinking eleration, Universal Perception, Demon Lord Haki, Time-Space Maniptions, Multi-Dimensional Barriers, All of Creation, Punishment Domination, Charm Domination, and Temptation World. It feels like he can do almost the same things as me.

    He seems to have been keen to show off, illustrating with great enthusiasm and care.

    Diablo''s fullprehension scores made even Ciel feel satisfied.

    I cant use my skills without the help of Ciel, so Diablo is actually stronger.

    The amount of mana is high, his level is high, and the quality of his skills is high.

    An all-around versatile and excellent demon.

    Why hes under mymand is a mystery.

    Despite hisbat-obsessed tendencies and the drawback of being too clingy to me, this guy''s incalcble strength is still very reliable.

    After his evolution, I was curious what the mock battle between him and Zegion would look like.

    It''s sure to be a great fight.

    Also, Benimaru.

    Benimaru is usually reserved when he fights, and if he gives it his all, he burns everything else before it even starts.

    In the Labyrinth, one doesn''t have to worry about surviving, except that Benimaru should be less willing to expose his trump cards.

    Water vs. Fire. In this regard, Zegion would be more advantageous against Benimarubut the answer will only be known after the actual battle.

    In fact, there is no need to deliberately differentiate between the pros and cons.

    As long as Benimaru, Diablo, and Zegion are used as the three apexes of the ministry, there should basically be no disputes.

    Thats it for Diablo.

    Speaking of minions, other than Venom, Gedora also seems to have officially be his dependent.

    Dependent?

    "Yes. If he is my servant, you won''t have to worry about his betrayal.

    It turns out that I thought it would be fine, but now I''mpletely relieved.

    Gedora also had a position as a Maze Keeper, so theres no way to stuff him with too many chores, but Diablo didn''t seem to care much. The name was disciple, and in his head that seemed not to be the same thing as a subordinate.

    "That''s fine, but why did you take him?"

    "Yes, this man''s faith in Lord Rimuru is not enough, but he has a real heart for magic. He does have merit as a human being, and I would like to teach him personally and intervene in his mysterious reincarnation.

    So?

    "This man is not very useful. Because he was killed in battle before, he went against the order of Lord Rimuru. To avoid this, I let him turn into a demon race Somehow, he turned into an unheard of race of unbelievably metallic demons

    Diablo stopped talking at this point, not knowing why he looked at me.

    I don''t even know. Did I do something?

    <<oh, i="" interfered.="">></oh,>

    Oh, what does that mean!?

    That''s why you need a personal interview too. It''s a lot of work.

    To interfere, think more.

    This metallic demon race, felt like a repeat of Beretta

    <<in this="" regard,="" rest="" assured,="" it="" is="" a=""pletely="" different="" concept.="">> That''s fine, I don''t care to think about it.</in>

    I simply find it troublesome.

    I guess I interfered a little? That''s all I can answer.

    Instead, Diablo became cheerful again, and so the two of us talked for some time.

    In a nutshell, Diablo was also quite fond of Gedora, and that''s why he took him in as his dependent in case something happened to him.

    Gedora was well known as a wizard, and was also the master of the Razen, and would not hesitate to be a demon even to satisfy his curiosity.

    Gedora is such a man, so as long as he doesn''t cause me any trouble, Ill let him be.

    I didn''t hate the old man either, and so made a no-brainer judgment.

    However, it would be a bit disgusting if he turned into another fanatic like Adalman, so I''d have to dere a prohibition on overly faithful hearts.

    One can''t get an identical believer just because one is a disciple of Diablo, one must firmly reject it.

    "You''re in charge now. Take good care of him.

    For me, Gedora-sensei is quite an elder, and while I don''t speak in a tone that is quite appropriate for elders, Diablo is much older.

    The notion of age has to crumble if it is said, they are too long-lived, and it should be right to speak in this way.

    In this way, the subordinates of Diablo became two.

    ***

    After Diablo made his exit with a bow, Testarossa enters to rece him.

    She sat down in front of me with a graceful demeanor.

    Hmm.

    I didn''t mean it, but it seems like it would be nice to have her as a secretaryOops, no. In that case, I would have to make Diablo a diplomatic marshal, and by doing so, the guy would absolutely run away.

    I don''t want to add unnecessary problems, so Ill just keep it the way it is.

    What''s more, there''s wanting Testarossa to do it.

    Just as I was troubling myself, Testarossa handed over a document.

    It was a record of the information on her dependents.

    Name: Moss [EP: 1,079,397]

    Race: Demon Noble - Archduke ss

    Blessing: Dependent of the Primordial White

    Title: The Empress Confidant

    Magic: "Dark Magic, "Elemental Magic

    Ability: Unique skill Collector

    Resistances: physical attack invalidation, state anomaly invalidation, spiritual attack invalidation, natural influence invalidation, divine attack resistance Name: Cien [EP: 286,596]

    Race: Demon Noble - Viscount ss

    Blessing: Dependent of the Primordial White

    Title: Empress Secretary

    Magic: "Dark Magic, "Elemental Magic

    Ability: Unique Skill Recorder"

    Resistance: physical attack invalid, state anomaly invalid, mental attack invalid, natural influence invalid

    Coupled with information that only I can read, presumably it was like this.

    Neither Moss nor Cien, who had been directly involved in the previous battles, had fallen into crisis, nor into the clutches of Ciel.

    Next is Testarossa.

    Name: Testarossa [EP: 3,333,124]

    Race: Demon Peer. Primordial White of the Seven Primordials

    Blessing: Rimuru''s Blessing

    Title: Killer Lord"

    Magic: "Dark Magic, "Elemental Magic

    Ability: Ultimate skill Hell King Belial

    Resistances: physical attack invalidation, state anomaly invalidation, spiritual attack invalidation, natural influence invalidation, divine attack resistance Compared to before the battle began, her existence value had increased by leaps and bounds, and evenpared to when she fought against Velgrynd on the flying ship, it seemed to have increased more than three times.

    "The amount of mana has increased a lot, hasnt it?

    "Yes, it would have been a bit more interesting if we were in time for Velgrynd-samas decisive battle, but Im very sorry.

    Hmmmfighting isn''t how you y, is it?

    However, it''s useless to say that.

    Once again, it makes one feel that it''s the quality, not the quantity, that matters forbat, and this time,bat experience ys a bigger role than the amount of mana.

    The reason she was able to face Velgrynd so well was because of her skills were equal.A longer fight would be more difficult, but just stalling could still be done.

    And now that Testarossa''s amount of mana had increased, it also meant that her fighting ability had increased dramatically.

    Despite her good reputation, my responsibility was to monitor in case she ever wanted to go out of control. This job is basically handed over to Diablo for now, but I''m also thinking that a little more attention should be paid to that aspect.

    Hell King Belial?

    It''s a good fit for Testarossa, as a skill that exudes a dangerous aroma.

    The powers possessed are "Thinking eleration - Universal Perception - Demon Lords Haki - Time and Space Maniption - Multi-dimensional Barrier - All of Creation - Life Domination - World After Death".

    This is also a world system skill.

    And it''s a ''post-death world'' that one doesn''t want to experience at all.

    Im scared, so Ill leave it to Ciel to manage.

    "Since it''s an interview, there should be something to say that can''t be discussed publicly, right? What exactly is the content?

    After Testarossa provided the information of her own men, Moss and Cien, she then asked the question very clearly. It made me rtively rxed too.

    I switched my mind and decide to state one of my worries.

    It''s about the meeting that is supposed to take ce tomorrow morning with Masayuki and the others.

    "Maybe I''m over-reading, but I''ll talk to you about it. I''m supposed to talk to Masayuki and the others, but what to do is still bothering me.

    I see. So its about the treatment of the empire?

    It''s amazing how quickly everything is understood.

    "That''s right, Masayuki seems to be worried, but it is difficult to respond so suddenly

    Shion didnt seem to think that much of it, even if Masayuki was the reincarnation of Emperor Rudra, it wasn''t as if it would be easy to be Emperor.

    Besides, the current Emperor Rudrathough transformed into Michaelis currently at unknown whereabouts.

    Even if Masayuki deres himself emperorthat is to say, I don''t think Masayuki is willing to do so

    It''s also a bit strange that my country pushed him up.

    What''s more, Michael''s power, the castle guard, cannot be broken as long as there are believers of Rudra. That is, what is done with the subjects of the Empire must also be considered together.

    Really wish I had more time to think about this.

    It would also be very difficult to exin this t o King Gazel, and that feels even more difficult to deal with.

    As Ive said many times, I didnt want to get involved, but I couldnt say that.

    "If that''s the case, let me join the meeting. The East, where the Empire is located, is my domain, so I''m sure I''ll be able to serve as a diplomatic officer."

    Ooooh, so reliable!

    There''s no way to leave things like this to Ciel, and even if I could put Ciel''s methods in my mouth, how to actually instruct the ministry would still have to be left to the locals.

    What''s more, even if the opinion was absolutely correct, the proposal would have to be withdrawn if the imperial side was not going to ept it.

    It might have worked if the empire had been made a vassal state, but otherwise we wouldn''t be able to interject too much about how other countries operate.

    In that respect, Testarossa would know how to improvise.

    She was doing well in the Western States, and we could rest easy once the course was decided.

    "Then I''ll leave it to you in the morning.

    I understand, leave it to me!

    Testarossa smiled sweetly, and this reliable feeling made me feel a lot more at ease.

    I''d said all I had to say, and just as I stood up and was about to walk Testarossa out

    "Lord Rimuru, I have something I''d like to report as well.

    Hmm?"

    "I think you will remember Calgurio, who was once a Grand Admiral of the Empire. He made a petition for help if Lord Rimuru intended Hearing Testarossa mention it got me thinking.

    It will be a bit of a hassle, but it''s not impossible.

    "I know, then from now on"

    Thankfully, Testarossa remembered.

    Being able to do so with such meticulous care is also one of the reasons why Testarossa is reliable.

    In order toplete my work before dinner, I headed to the research facility with Testarossa.

    ***

    Only two more to go.

    After dinner, I called Ultima.

    I''ve been waiting."

    Ultima said lovingly and sat down gently.

    It would have been so cute to have a sister like that. It warmed my heart.

    The tea was made by my hand, and the treasured snacks were brought out.

    "Whoa, whoa! Lord Rimuru did all of this?

    "I can make tea, too, but I can''t make ck tea. I''m pretty good with coffee too.

    But it''s also just drip coffee haha. Im not even as good as Shion. What an unwee reality.

    Although that is limited to beverages, ck tea and coffeeShions craft has really progressed there.

    I was thinking that I couldn''t just keep giving my opinion on cuisine, so I decided to try it myselfIt was harder than unexpected

    Before being reincarnated, I had been ordering take-out my whole life, and I''ve never cooked myself.

    After all, work is busy, and the thought of doing it yourself and spending time cleaning and tidying up is not as efficient as taking out money

    The stovetop in that apartment was still as new as ever, and I had wanted to do it in my spare time, but only the cooking books had changed.

    These memories also y a role today, to the point where they cannot be said to bepletely useless.

    Anyway, its just pouring boiling water into the coffee beans, which I can do.

    Thats ridiculous! Just this cup of tea, makes me so happy!

    I''m d she''s so happy.

    "You''re wee. The coffee will take a while, but it''ll be fine as we speak.

    I want to drink it too, put a strainer on the coffee te and add boiling water.

    This set of props, made by Kaijin, was mass marketed as a prototype, and the cafe is doing well.

    The aroma of the coffee beans began to emanate.

    Thats how I showed my prowess to Ultima.

    Her opinion of me is sure to rise.

    It''s important to earn points in this area.

    <<in my="" humble="" opinion,="" thats="" dirty.="">></in>

    I don''t think so!

    It''s a very high-end strategy that doesn''t get dirty at all.

    Besides, there''s no point in showing your strength in the face of these battle-obsessed primordials."

    The best thing to do is to win and lose in different areas.

    s Enough dignity has been shown that these worries are superfluous.

    Its fine.

    Besides, the dignity wasn''t something I intended to show.

    None of this matters, so Ill get to the point quickly.

    "Then let''s hear the report first.

    "Yes, first this.

    Handed to me was the report on her dependents.

    Name: Veyron [EP: 882,669]

    Race: Demon Noble - Duke Rank

    Blessing: Dependent of the Primordial Purple

    Title: Poison Princess Butler.

    Magic: "Dark Magic, "Elemental Magic

    Ability: Ultimate skill Authentic Writer Artist

    Resistances: physical attack invalidation, state anomaly invalidation, spiritual attack invalidation, natural influence invalidation, divine attack resistance Name: Zonda [EP: 301,316]

    Race: Demon Noble - Viscount ss

    Blessing: Dependent of the Primordial Purple

    Title: Poison Princess Chef

    Magic: "Dark Magic, "Elemental Magic Ability: Unique skill Cooker

    Resistances: physical attack invalidation, state anomaly invalidation, spiritual attack invalidation, natural influence invalidation, divine attack resistance Veyron''s strength was striking, but it was Zonda''s unique skill that was surprising.

    I had thought that it might be the same system as Shion''s devastating skill, but it wasn''t. This power mainly specialized in status and support.

    Whatever the injury, it can be recovered through ''conditioning'', not an exaggerated skill like being able to affect thew of cause and effect, which gives me a sigh of relief.

    Next up is Ultima.

    Name: Ultima [EP: 2,668,811]

    Race: Demon Peer. The Primordial Purple of the Seven Primordials

    Blessing: Rimuru''s Blessing

    Title: Pain Lord"

    Magic: "Dark Magic, "Elemental Magic"

    Ability: Ultimate Skill, Poison King Samael

    Resistances: physical attack invalidation, state anomaly invalidation, spiritual attack invalidation, natural influence invalidation, divine attack resistance Ultima, like Testarossa, had grown substantially.

    After evolution, the amount of mana seems to continue to grow.

    Having already crossed the Super Awakened level, how strong can you be?

    Also, the power of Ultima must not be forgotten.

    The ultimate skill Poison King Samael included - "Thinking eleration - Universal Perception -

    Demon Lords Haki - Time and Space Maniption - Multi-Dimensional Barrier - Weakness Detection -

    Death Poison Generation - World of Death

    Yup.

    It was a power that specialized in killing.

    The powerful one was ''Death Poison Generation'', and bybining this with Weakness Detection'', the most suitable poison for killing enemies could be created.

    However, it is the World of Death'' that is more worrying.

    This move will unconditionally kill all people other than spiritual beings who don''t possess ultimate skills, and is an extremely vicious world-system type skill.

    It feels like it''s a super-enhanced version of my Heartless skill, but it doesn''t work on the really strong, and it''s better to seal it up.

    "Ultima, this is bad

    To calm down, I poured coffee into the cup first and began to cut out the conversation.

    What?

    That is, about your world of death"

    Yes.

    Ultima happily epted the cup of coffee that I handed over.

    If there''s anything to be said, it''s now.

    It is prohibited for future use

    "I know! I also don''t think it''s necessary either. Lord Rimuru has seen right through us!

    "Huh? Oh, uh, well of course.

    Iughed my way through the deception.

    I don''t know why, but it seems that Ultima doesn''t intend to use the World of Death'' either.

    Thinking about it more, with her being abat maniac, she certainly wouldn''t like such a straightforward win.

    Since Ultima agrees, I''ll just make small talk at ease.

    ***

    The final interviewer was Carrera.

    "Hi, my lord! If it wasn''t for your help, I don''t know if I would have defeated Kondo. That man was so strong that one wonders if he is still human.

    Carrera, who finished her report, looked up and smiled.

    It had heard about it from Ciel before, but it was more clearing from her own lips. Carrera really seemed to have won by a hair''s breadth, and was sincerely praising Kondo.

    Indeed, Kondo seemed to be strong.

    Benimaru who had defeated the third rank Graneet, was also guarded against Kondo, and it should be said that Kondo had the confidence to win.

    Having beaten this highly rated man, Carrera can be considered a sess.

    Carrera always said it was because of the "power" that was given to her.

    To have gained flesh, broken through my limits, evolved and gained moreI want to repay you. My loyalty is always yours, I hope that you know that.

    The usually unruly and arrogant Carrera is quite honest when she faces me. Though when ites to

    levels," she is far above the old primordial" she once was.

    Regardless of loyalty, my answer was decided long ago.

    "I thank you for that. If I didn''t have you, I wouldn''t be able to hold trials.

    Magic creatures still have a tendency to follow the strong.

    The matter of arrest can be handed over to anyone, but the judge should be the right person.

    In the future, it is nned to establish a system simr to that of the Grand Court Judicial System, with the exception of super-violent prisoners, which will be handed over to the people, but all this will have to wait until the country is settled. The Jura Tempest Federation is still developing, and Carrera will still have a big role to y.

    "Yes, it''s a pleasure! In addition to me, my dependents will act as Lord Rimuru wishes!

    Carreraughed happily.

    And what is the state off Carrera and her dependents?

    I looked down at the information in my hand.

    Carrera''s subordinates are Agera and Esprit.

    Name: Agera [EP: 733,757]

    Race: Demon Noble - Marquis Rank

    Blessing: Dependents of the Primordial Yellow

    Title: Tyrant Master

    Magic: True martial arts

    Ability: Ultimate skill "de Change"

    Resistances: physical attack invalidation, state anomaly invalidation, spiritual attack invalidation, natural influence invalidation, divine attack resistance Name: Esprit [EP: 552,137]

    Race: Demon Noble - Count Rank

    Blessing: Dependent of the Primordial Yellow

    Title: Tyrant''s Friend

    Magic: "Dark Magic, "Elemental Magic Ability: Unique skill, "The Knowledgeable One

    Resistances: physical attack invalidation, state anomaly invalidation, spiritual attack invalidation, natural influence invalidation, divine attack resistance Theyre really strong.

    They are all old demon lord ss.

    Agera could rival the pseudo-awakened yman, and if Agera came to fight then, he could probably win

    There were actually several old demon lord level subordinates on hand, and no matter what one thought, there was something wrong.

    Rather than that, Im more concerned about friends.

    This is what Carreras evaluation is all about, so I guess its that kind of rtionship Certainly, Esprit has a bit of a gal pal vibe to her, and if one doesn''t know the inside story, one would just assume that they are a well-connected pair of sisters. Rather than a master-ve rtionship, they seem more like schoolmates.

    Honestly, Carrera''s lineage is also really peculiar.

    What was shocking, though, was what came next.

    Carrera really is amazing.

    Name: Carrera [EP: 7,013,351 (+ "golden gun" 3,370,000)]

    Race: Demon Peer. The Primordial Yellow of the Seven Primordials

    Blessing: Rimuru''s Blessing

    Title: Menace Lord"

    Magic: "Dark Magic, "Elemental Magic

    Ability: Ultimate skill,  Death King Abaddon"

    Resistances: physical attack invalidation, state anomaly invalidation, spiritual attack invalidation, natural influence invalidation, divine attack resistance The amount of mana actually exceeded Diablo, and both of my eyes couldn''t help but turn into two dots. The growth seems to have stopped, but it was by far the highest of my subordinates.

    However, the most dangerous thing is still the Death King Abaddon.

    The powers include "Thinking eleration - Universal Perception - Demon Lord Haki - Time-Space Maniption - Multi-dimensional Barrier - Limit Breakthrough - Sub-dimensional Break. Without the world system powers, the attack power is specialized. In particr, Sub-dimensional Break'' is a power that can prate through space and distort the defense field to destroy enemies.

    With Carreras power coupled with the destruction magic and then the effect of paying for the power, it seems to me that basically no one can withstand it. It even seems possible to destroy Ramirisbyrinth, so one can understand how powerful it is at this nce.

    Honestly, even I didn''t want to have Carrera as an opponent.

    "You''ve gotten stronger

    I couldn''t help but speak my mind.

    "Well, thanks to your blessing, and Kondo, who entrusted this to me. Even if it is only in response to that man''s wish, I will crush Emperor Rudra.

    Hearing her say so, I remember.

    Kondo was also manipted by Michael.

    Thats right, the real Rudra has disappearedand all sorts of things have happened. So the Rudra you are fighting is actually a being whose physical control was taken away by the will of the skill.

    I told Carrera about Rudra now being the theosophy nucleus (manas) Michael, and upon hearing this, Carrera nodded in surprise.

    "So that''s it. That bastard Feldway did call out to Rudra as Michael. Now I understand, my lord."

    That''s good.

    Dont make a mistake and run off to get Masayuki in trouble.

    With that in mine, the interview with Carrera was over.

    Carrera, who was about to go out, turned back halfway.

    "By the way, I forgot one thing. There is something Ive been wondering if I should tell you about."

    Hmm? What?"

    I finished asking and prepared to take a sip of coffee.

    "Actually, I shouldn''t say that I''m bothered"

    It seemed important if it was able to annoy Carrera.

    In that case, let''s just calmly sit down and

    "Agera seems to be Hakurous grandfather."

    Pffft!?!?

    Almost couldn''t resist spitting out the coffee.

    I avoided itst minute, but it was so important that you cant say that casually when you''re leaving!

    Youthis!

    "Hahahaha, this is important, right? I can''t handle it, so I''ll leave it to my lord to judge.

    Carrera finished and smiled and went out.

    Totally threw the ball to me.

    She must have been smiling like that because of the burden she hadid off from her shoulders to mine.

    In short, it''s a problem that can''t be ignored.

    Although Diablo and the demoness trio said I didnt I need to interview their subordinates, now it seemed like I should meet with Agera afterwards.

    ***

    I''m not thinking straight at the moment, so I''ll talk about this meeting with Agerater.

    The individual interviews are now concluded sessfully.

    I have a meeting with Masayuki and others tomorrow, so I won''t work todaybut I don''t need sleep.

    I changed back to a more rxed Slime state and hid under the covers.

    In this darkness, somehow the mood feels quiet.

    <<i have="" something="" to="" report.="">></i><i have="" something="" to="" report.="">

    Excuse me, Im done with work?

    <<it''s about="" the="" master''s="" skills,="" so="" its="" not="" work.="">> For Ciel, it''s a hobby, but to me it''s no different than a job.</it''s>

    Even if I said that, Ciel wouldn''t listen, would she?

    Sooner orter it needs to be mastered anyway, so I give up resistance.

    In fact, I was somewhat expecting this.

    It''s sure to be a leap forward and I''m fully prepared.

    The integration was a breeze and was done without even going into a low active (sleep mode) state. It took almost a day and a half, but Ipleted the personal interview very smoothly during this time.

    So be it.

    <<this time,="" we="" had="" applied="" for="" permission="" to="" change="" our="" abilities="" during="" the="" actual="" battle,="" so="" could="" not="" stop="" operation.="">> I''d be super pissed if I really had stopped.</this>

    The report began in silence in my mind, and the information immediately showed up.

    Well, let''s see what it''s like, shall we?

    Name: Rimuru Tempest [EP: 8,681,123 (+ Dragon de" 2.28 million)]

    Race: Highest-tier Divine Spirit. The Ultimate Slime

    Protection: Rimurus Compassion

    Title: Chaos Creator.

    Magic: True Dragon Magic", Spirit Summoning, Demon Summoning, Others

    Ability: Manas: Ciel

    Unique Skills: Universal Perception, Dragon Spirits Haki, Universal Shapeshift Ultimate Skills: Void God Azathoth, Harvest Lord Shub-Niggurath

    Resistances: physical attack invalid, natural influence invalid, state anomaly invalid, spiritual attack invalid, divine attack resistance As a result, it looked like this.

    I didnt really feel it, but my existence value is awesome, too.

    If the increase with the Magic Sword is counted, Im likely to reach 10 million.

    Now the straight sword that I''m very familiar with is right up to mythical level. The shape has changed due to my race''s characteristics, and I call it "Dragon de" for convenience.

    Two holes were made and the de seems to have evolved smoothly to my satisfaction.

    If I give it a name officially, would it evolve?

    Theres nothing.

    No no no.

    I''ve thought about it, but I don''t want to give it a name.

    Well, if Ie up with a cool name, I can change it then.

    Even though my existence value, or the amount of magic, is outstanding, it does not mean that I can let my guard down.

    Benimaru and Diablo, along with Zegion, and the demoness trio, all had high fighting abilities.

    Just like Testarossa facing Velgrynd, whos mana levels were almost ten times smaller than Velgrynds, she was still so tactful.

    From this example, we can see that what matters most is not the size of the existence value, but how skillfully one uses one''s power.

    The overall power is thebined strength of the three in one: the amount of mana, the amount of skill level and the amount of power.

    They had made the most of their strength during the battle against the Imperial Army.

    Looking at the battles ahead, I cannot be left behind.

    All in all, at this stage I''ve surpassed Carrera and am at the top.

    Reassured by the status quo, I turned my gaze to other things.

    The protection I used too receive from Veldora had disappeared and now Im a protector. I went from being under protection to providing the protection. I''ve grown too.

    Now is not the time to be escaping from reality.

    It''s not so much that I''m in a good mood, but how did my skills be only two?

    To answer my question, Ciel happilyments.

    <<first of="" all,="" i="" no="" longer="" needed="" wisdom="" king="" raphael="" and="" gluttony="" beelzebub="" so="" integrated="">></first>

    Hey, wait, wait, wait!!!

    What did you just say!?

    What is this guy, in a refreshing tone of voice, saying???

    The "King of Wisdom, its own mothershe said she didn''t want it!

    <<what''s the="" problem?="">></what''s>

    I had not heard wrong.

    No, I knew I wouldn''t hear it wrongbut unexpectedly, it actually did it

    But without the King of Wisdom, shouldn''t Ciel be unable to exist as well?

    <<no, i''m="" out="" on="" my="" own,="" so="" don''t="" worry!="">></no,>

    Ciel answered my question calmly.

    Even the ''King of Wisdom'', who can be considered as her own motherI was surprised that Ciel could consume it so easily, but ording to Ciel, the skill was already an empty shell, so there was no problem.

    What matters more is the contents.

    Ciel seemed to finish have finished her work without any emotion or feeling.

    Eliminate useless abilities and do it really thoroughly.

    However, although there is no problem, was it necessary to consume the King of Gluttony as well?

    <<of course!="">></of>

    As it turns out, I should have confirmed it before approving it. In the face of my weak questioning, Ciel forcefully said that she had my approval and continued to forcefully exin it as the momentum built up.

    As far as conclusions go, my skills have changed so much that they have changed their original form.

    This is no longer the level of modification.

    Ahhhh, the skills arebined to change, but there''s still an uneptable feeling.

    And thats the key skill.

    The first, Void God Azathoth, was born through the unification of the ''King of Wisdom'' and the ''King of Gluttony''.

    Not only that, but it seems that the ''King of Storms'' and the ''King of Scorch'' that had just been acquired had also be sacrifices, but of course the power had been inherited without any problems.

    The power of the Void God Azathoth" is the power of "Soul Consumption, Nihility Copse, Imaginary Space, True Dragon Release [Scorching-Storm], True Dragon Nucleation [Scorching-Storm], Time and Space Maniption, Multi-dimensional Barrier", and etc.

    Although the original Dragon Summoning'' had disappeared, it seems there is no problem with releasing and unreleasing. In the first ce, Veldora and the others actually came to me of their own free will, so it was the still the same without this power.

    The True Dragon Nucleation" is more interesting, and as it literally says, it can be the nucleus core that embeds into the hole openings in my sword.

    Again, if you let a True Dragon" with huge energy condense into the nucleus of a sword, how powerful it will beit is terrifying just to imagine it.

    Although it must be endorsed by meit''s too scary to imagine the timing of its use.

    This one looks like it''s going to have to be sealed.

    Still, Velgrynd would presumably decline it, but as for Veldora, perhaps he would say to try and see.

    Im slightly worried, but lets keep that a secret.

    Rather than that.

    What is truly dangerous is the power of the Void God Azathoth" which has been perfectly optimized after integration.

    -Soul Consumptinoa super-enhanced version of the predation-gluttony, which can devour the targets soul along with it.

    -Nihility CopseThe ultimate destructive energy that fills the Chaos World and be manageable thanks to the Theosophy Core (Manas).

    -Imaginary Spacethe world of chaos. The ultra-evolved version of "Stomach" and "Istion" is a prison where those who need to be quarantined are locked up.

    -Time and Space Maniptiongrasping time and space, and being able to move in an instant by just thinking about it consciously, even affecting time.

    -Multi-Dimensional BarrierAlways activated multi-dimensional barriers, which are absolute defenses formed using the sub-dimensional fault defense field.

    The above is Ciel''s exnation.

    It was pretty terrifying.

    It''s scary that we were making those changes duringbat.

    But there is one thing, the absolute defense formed using the subdimensional fault defense field, only this I feel cannot be trusted, simr to how solid and safe the space distortion defense field preaches, but there is no "absolute" in the world.

    I wont fall for that.

    Besideswhen Ranga was able to obtain the Ster Wind Lord Hastur, I had long thought that my powers would be very powerful.

    It was more than a surprise, but it seemed that with the Void God Azathoth, all other powers were unnecessary.

    The second skill, naturally, is the Harvest Lord Shub-Niggurath.

    After this ''ability change'', my powers became only the above two.

    It is obviously stronger than it was before the strengthening, but it suddenly urred to me that it seemed that some powers had disappeared. For example, "Thought eleration, was gone but I can use it without any problems now.

    What''s going on?

    <<these powersthought="" eleration,="" future="" attack="" prediction,="" analysis="" and="" appraisal,="" parallel="" operation,="" integration,="" separation,="" chant="" nullification,="" all="" of="" creation,="" food="" chain,="" thought="" domination,=""w="" attribute="" conversion,="" etc.all="" these="" have="" been="" integrated="" into="" myself,="" so="" it="" is="" possible="" to="" respond="" with="" a="" faster="" reaction="" rate="" now.="">> This is a great reason for praise.</these>

    Perhaps a little overdone, but for the sake of the battle that follows, there should be a shift in thinking, which is indeed necessary.

    If I don''t stay strong, there will be sacrifice.

    In order to settle down and enjoy a life of peace, there is no need to think about being polite and merciful.

    *** Well, with my own strength confirmed, let''spare it to Veldora.

    Name: Veldora Tempest [EP: 88,126,579]

    Race: Highest-tier Divine Spirit - True Dragon Race

    Blessing: Storm Dragons Blessing

    Title: Storm Dragon"

    Magic: True Dragon Magic

    Ability: Unique skill: universal perception - True Dragon Haki - Universal Shapeshift"

    Ultimate skill: Chaos King Nyathotep

    Resistances: physical attack invalid, natural influence invalid, state anomaly invalid, spiritual attack invalid, divine attack resistance The above is the current state of Veldora.

    Not mentioning his perfect resistance, the jump of his amazing existence value was notable.

    It''s just that seeing this number, rather than being surprised, actually made it a little funny.

    That guy, messed up in determining the value.

    ...........

    ........

    ...

    It was just after dinner.

    Since I had to talk to Ultima, I had to leave immediately after eating.

    However, Veldora came over to get in the way at this point.

    Kuahahaha! Rimuru, I understand that you are interviewing Benimaru and the others. Ive got a lot of free time on my hands now

    Ah? I''m busy. I''m sorry, but I''ll y with you when I''m done.

    "Wait, wait, wait, wait, wait!!! Im not talking about that, but what about the interview with me, is what I want to say!"

    Huh?

    There''s no need for an interview with Veldora.

    Well, it''s not like Veldora is my subordinate, and most importantly, it''s only a matter of asking Ciel to get any answers.

    "No, I''ve been chatting a lot, so there''s no need to make arrangements, is there?

    What!? Don''t say such lonely things!

    Thats right! You should understand how lonely you, me, and master are! Ramiris joined in.

    Even if you say so, we do see each other a lot.

    It''s true, I''d love to y with the Avatar Core, but work is more important.

    More to the point, there is a war going on.

    The whereabouts of Feldway and his colleagues hadn''t been found, so Im just able to rest a little.

    At the very least, there is no time to y until the meet and greet is ready.

    "Don''t be selfish. Once things are settled properly

    "I told you, it''s not that! Ive gotten stronger and want to show off in front of you. I know you''re busy, but what''s the harm of keeping mepany for a little while!

    "That''s it! You''re the only one who can properly measure existence value. I really hope you''ll apany us for a while!

    Hmm?

    "That is to say, I have been concealing my actual existence value from Ramiris''s measurements from you, just to prove it.

    Hmmmm.

    "That''s absolutely not possible! It''s true that people can''t measure the numbers too carefully, but they can''t hide them."

    I see.

    So in other words, I actually got caught up in a very boring argument.

    When things get to this point, these guys won''t listen to anyone, and it''s quicker to apany them than to convince them.

    "I know, I know. Then lets go to the control room."

    With that, we began to measure the existence value of Veldora.

    The measuring machine is connected to monitors throughout thebyrinth, and the control panel in the

    "control room" is used to manage these things. Ciel can synchronize with the entire maze and make measurements no matter where it is, but thats a secret, so we ran to the control room.

    Time is running out so lets get started.

    The value of Master''s existence is 88 million! Its amazing, but Master says it''s going to be even higher. I hope you can scold him too, Rimuru.

    It is indeed a value beyond imagination.

    Even a "saint" who has reached the level of a super-awakened person can''t win, let alone an ordinary human.

    Then, is this value correct?

    << Yes. Veldora''s existence value is 88,126,579, without a doubt.>> It''s almost the same.

    Too high a value will cause the machine to lose uracy, but it is sufficient to measure maze challengers and intruders, which is enough for now.

    That said, if Veldora can really hide from the numerical calctions, it would basically mean that there is a w in the system, which is something that cannot be ignored and really needs to be confirmed.

    It''s a slight relief that this trip wasn''t in vain. After that it was a matter of whether or not Veldora could really hide it.

    "My estimate is 88.12 million, which is almost the same. So, are the values going to continue to rise from here? Or will they be under-measured?

    In either case, it is necessary to consider countermeasures ording to the approach.

    I started pushing Veldora to actually make the attempt.

    With a long-awaited look on his face, Veldora smugly began to take off his coat.

    Could it be that?

    My body, which would not have been sweating, felt like a cold sweat had fallen.

    Veldora began tough loudly.

    Kuahahahaha! Watch with wide eyes at my true power!!!"

    With the sound of a thud, Veldora removed the wrist glove from his hands and feet, causing the ground to shake.

    Hello?

    Taking off heavy clothesdoesnt mean the numbers will go up

    If it''s going to go up, so be it.

    What is measured here is mainly energy, and has nothing to do with directbat power.

    But Veldora

    Kuahahaha! How about that!? Try measuring now! I don''t care if it''s broken!!

    Hmmmm, this is embarrassing!

    After understanding what he wanted to do, it felt so pitiful that we couldn''t even look away from Veldora.

    "No change in values measured

    There is no reason!

    V-Veldora, this

    "Master, after all that, its still the same 88 million?

    Ramiris hit the nail on the head and told the truth!

    Well, Im not stupid! Rimuru, what''s the real situation? I think I''ve doubled my value, don''t you?

    I looked at Veldora with pity.

    That is magic energy you were collecting, but that is something different from the existence value

    Then I carefully exined to him again that this value is notbat power like theics say, it''s just a measurement of energy.

    Veldora''s face turned red as he realized he had made a mistake.

    ...........

    ........

    ...

    It still makes meugh in retrospect, but the amount of magic energy is truly amazing.

    Even with more detailed verification, attacks other than the ultimate skills will not work.

    Besides, the power of Veldora is quite difficult to deal with.

    His skill has evolved into the "King of Chaos" after being changed by Ciel, and now has the powers of

    Thought eleration, Analysis and Appraisal, All of Creation, Probability Maniption, Parallel Existence, rity of Truth, Time and Space Maniption, Multi-dimensional Barrier".

    The practical convenience has been greatly improved after the integration of Ciel.

    Even Veldora has acquired ''parallel existence''.

    This was already known to be quite tough to deal with when fighting Velgrynd, and with Veldora and

    Probability Maniption'', he really felt like an immortal.

    Originally, as long as I didn''t die, he was indestructible.

    But now with Veldora''s heart core inside me, memories and emotions were backed up, and now that I can still use ''Parallel Body'', it''s estimated that it will be impossible to eliminate him.

    It''s a good thing that while the whole measuring the existence value thing is pretty funny, he''s pretty reliable as apanion.

    Veldora''s existence value is more than ten times mine, and I should not be able to beat himbut it''s still slightly questionable.

    Not only did I beat Velgrynd, I even ''predated'' her. Velgrynds existence value at the time seemed to be 26,877,000.

    At that time, I was swallowing at 50% strength, and about 30% of the state was in recovery, and that 30% of the recovery seemed to being back to the side I was swallowing.

    As expected of Ciel, it''s a perfect fit.

    To get back to business, I''ve eaten so much energy, but my existence value seems a bit low.

    Well, I think this is wrong enough an I think the important thing is the sense ofbat, but I was still a little worried.

    <<its only="" natural.="" the="" energy="" was="" absorbed="" once="" taken="" in,="" but="" it="" transformed="" into="" flesh="" and="" blood="" of="" master,="" then="" used="" true="" dragon="" release.="">> Well, what does that mean?</its>

    <<in other="" words,="" the="" maximum="" existence="" value="" of="" master="" is="" correct="" when="" values="" veldora''s="" and="" velgrynd''s="" are="" added="" together.="">> Huh?</in>

    I can''t help but be dumbfounded.

    It means that when the True Dragon Release'' is lifted, I can use my greatest power.

    Hmm?

    However, since the output is the same, it is estimated to be the same even if the energy is increased.

    Just like Velgrynd too, has reached the cap, so now it''s a shift towards increasing numbers.

    The maximum increase in power has no upper limit, but it was meaningless as long as it didn''t hit, and the energy was sorge that it became difficult to control the force backwards.

    I was deeply convinced that there was no point in maximum power.

    For reference.

    I "predated" Velgrynd, whose existence value at that time was estimated to be 49,829,997.

    Ciel''s calctions should be perfect, but now the value of Velgrynd''s presence has increased again.

    Name: Velgrynd [EP: 74,350,087]

    Race: Highest-tier Divine Spirit - True Dragon Race

    Blessing: Scorching Charity

    Title: "The Scorch Dragon"

    Magic: True Dragon Magic

    Ability: Inherent ability: Universal Perception, True Dragon Haki, Universal Shapeshift" Ultimate skill: me God Cthugha"

    Resistances: physical attack invalid, natural influence invalid, state anomaly invalid, spiritual attack invalid, divine attack resistance That''s the state that Velgrynd is in right now.

    After returning from a 20% reduction in status, there has been a significant increase.

    Should I say growth or evolution

    The power was still the same as it had been after Ciel had changed it, and Velgrynd must have mastered it. The content of me God Cthugha'' was ''Thought eleration - Scorching Excitation - Parallel Existence - Time-Space Maniption - Subdimensional Jump - Multi-dimensional Barrier'', and this was the final state confirmation.

    And

    As far as I''m concerned, it''s just a few days'' farewell, but it''s still unknown how much experience Velgrynd has been through.

    We''re meeting tomorrow, but Im worried about how to talk about it.

    It''s also scary if it pisses her off, so I must be sure to take care to avoid a secondary conflict.

    In this way, the status confirmation by Ciel via personal interviews, waspleted smoothly.

    </i></i></i></i></i></i>

 Volume 16 - Ch 3

    The exnation to King Gazel is a headache, but today there is a meeting with Masayuki.

    I shifted my attention over there and fired myself up.

    Ill meet up with Testarossa first.

    Calm down a little.

    Today''s meeting is a high priority meeting, so the meeting room will be filled with carefully selected members.

    From our side were Benimaru and Rigurd. Also Shion, Diablo, and Testarossa The participants on Masayuki''s side were led by Velgrynd, and it seemed that Calgurio, Minute, and Bonnie and Jiu were also going to attend.

    In the lounge-style waiting room, our members were already there.

    No oneined, though, even though it was all called out of the blue.

    Shuna took the initiative to take up the task of serving on the sidelines, preparing everything.

    As for the guidelines.

    We don''t want to rule the empire.

    Michael and Feldway, who were prisoners of war, are still missing, and Lieutenant Kondo, who established the whole n, is dead. Even this Kondo had been at risk of being thought-induced under Michael''s domination, so I do not intend to hold him ountable even after his death.

    At the time, it seemed that all the major figures of the Empire were on the Emperor''s gship, and the of the ones who survive today, the highest responsible person in the Empire, is Velgrynd, who has no territorial ambitions of her own. The topic will center on the end of the war, reparations and post-war reconstruction.

    Anyway, letting the 700,000 Imperial soldiers fill thebor force, and how to divide thebor is also a problem. A skilled person could be appointed to supervise, and bnced grouping would also be necessary to avoid imbnces in skills.

    Just as I was thinking further and further away

    Blue hair fluttered as the beautiful woman who could drive away one''s sleep walked over.

    It''s Velgrynd.

    Her eyes, shot straight through me.

    Ouch, ouch, ouch, ouch.

    My stomach hurts even though I have no stomach.

    "Can I help you?

    I have to work hard to maintain my majesty in front of everyone, and I wish someone wouldpliment me on the fact that my voice isn''t shaking.

    "Can I take some time?

    There is still a gap until the scheduled time.

    I nodded, talking to Velgrynd alone before the meeting began.

    ***

    "Veldora, is he all right?"

    "Well, he''s fine.

    I see, that''s good.

    With a gentle smile, Velgrynd asked for Veldora''s wellbeing.

    After telling her that Veldora was in good spirits, she looked a little more at ease.

    Looking at Velgrynd''s smile, my heart ached slightly.

    Its because our Veldora is still afraid to deal with his sister Velgrynd.

    I tried to ask him if he wanted to see Velgrynd, but he said, "I have all sorts of things to do, I''m really busy" and pushed it off.

    It''s humiliating, but I''m not in a position tough at him.

    Because, really, it''s embarrassing

    Veldora may have been embarrassed in part to leave it at that for now.

    "So, what''s up?"

    I''ll start this time.

    My heart is pounding.

    "I''m here to thank you."

    Thank me?

    That''s a bit

    "Why are you so pale? Did you think I was going to call you into a fight in the backyard?

    "Why do you say such a thing!?

    Hearing me stifle a call out, Velgryndughed.

    "The journey to find the love of Rudra was more exciting than I ever imagined."

    From what she had said, the trip had been hard, but hopeful for Velgrynd, who had carried a purpose.

    That''s why she can smile and say things like I''m so happy.

    "I''ve traveled through many worlds, and I''ve spent much time searching for that person, and one of the worlds I visited was the one you once lived in.

    "Eh, really?

    Seriously!

    So that why it feels even her tone has be casual.

    And then there were her clothes, which, while now dressed in the uniform of the Empire, had been shirts and jeans when she appeared in the Maze.

    The sight of a single blow in that manner is dumbfounding, and for those who witnessed the scene and were knocked down, it is enough to make them wonder if they are out of touch with reality.

    However, since she passed through the world I had lived in, it shows thatthere is a way back from this world to there.

    As for me, there''s no point in going back when I''m deadWait, wait, wait?

    When all is said and done, Velgrynd has not only jumped through the dimension, but also through time.

    If this is analyzed, then perhaps

    <<understood. beginning="" to="" analyze="">></understood.>

    Ooooh, Ciel is so reliable!

    Maybe it was just that she''d discovered a new hobby, but it was really the most appropriate thing to leave to Ciel.

    Either way, it''s wonderful to have hope.

    There should be people who want to go back among the otherworlders. If possible, I want to make this future a reality.

    So, Ill take this thing little by little and work on it.

    Is Masayuki a reincarnation of Rudra?

    "Well, yeah. And he has almost all of his soul."

    Velgrynd asserted so, and then whispered, All that''s left is memory.

    Um, was Masayuki still Masayuki?

    Because he''s still in thatckadaisical state, I felt a little more relieved. Although there is some displeasure with Velgrynd, it seems to me that Masayuki is not Rudra.

    "Well, how shall I put it

    I can''t say "that''s great" or "that''s a shame, so I have to be sloppy about it.

    Velgrynd didn''t fume and nodded slightly.

    I was a little surprised by her more subdued manner than I had expected.

    "Oh, that''s incredible. I, too, have experienced all kinds of experiences, which are thicker than the years spent by Rudra''s side, like long and short dreamy experiences, so I am grateful to you. Thank you, Rimuru."

    With a dazzling smile that made my heart stop, Velgrynd thanked me.

    Her domineering aura that had brought others to their knees, was nowpletely missing, reced with a feeling of peace and tranquility.

    "That''s really, really good, isn''t it?

    "Yes. So, Rimuru, I swear to you that as long as Masayuki has no intention, I will not make an enemy of you. So, please don''t betray Masayuki as well

    It was a vow I could not hope to wish for.

    Besides, there was no need for her to specifically exin about Masayuki, as I had no intention of betraying him.

    "Got it. I, by my name and by the name of mypanions, swear not to betray Masayuki. Sometimes there may be a lie or a quarrel, but that kind of thing

    Velgrynd''s vision became cold and frightening.

    I see. I swear Ill try not to lie to him, or fight with him unless necessary.

    Unintelligible.

    Why do I have to swear?

    It seems that sometimes Im too honest, and I''ve reflected a little.

    ***

    Because Velgrynd expressed her gratitude, it made me less nervous.

    Even if things happen for a reason, I''ve messed up a lot and it''s natural to feel relieved that I''m not being resented for it.

    Just when I thought it would be a good time to talk, someone rushed into the waiting room in a panic.

    It was Vesta.

    "Hey, what''s all the panic?"

    "Not the time to say such things, Lord Rimuru! Just now, there was an urgent call from my home, and it seems that King Gazel has left for this direction!

    His home was probably one of those of his rtives who remained in the Dwarven Kingdom.

    Vesta is also the original minister of Dwargon, and also a duke, a high-ranking nobleman second only to the royal family.

    But it was also because of this that he was jealous of Kaijin who was amoner

    Although Vesta was exiled, it does not appear that contact with his family was severed, and it appears that it was the Duke''s family-raised dark side that made contact with him.

    As for why Vesta was contacted, it was because Vesta was still the head of the Duke''s household.

    I was also taken aback when I heard about it.

    The punishment that Gazel had handed down did not include deprivation of title or demotion, it was only for the individual Vesta and did not deal with his own family, and besides, Vestas family had not yet appointed a sessor, so the transfer of the head of the family had not yet beenpleted.

    The wise King Gazel should want to make Vesta a minister again in the future, so the punishment was not too heavy, leaving a way bavk, just so I can reflect on it.

    Also, worrying about the Duke''s family revolt seems to be one of the reasons.

    If the Duke of Vesta''s family really wanted to do this, it was capable of stirring up civil unrest in Dwargon, and Gazel did not want to cause a needless dispute.

    After all, Vesta, who was no longer jealous, was very good, and he was quite popr and possessed a great deal of influence, and was sent to our country as an appropriate punishment in order not to arouse his discontent.

    Vesta''s family is still alive, so there is still a doorway inside the pce, and it is from this doorway that the urgent contactes.

    But whye at this time?

    "Uh, why? Didn''t you say you''d exin it afterwards?

    "Yeah, that''s the reason, it seems like His Majesty Gazel still doesn''t trust me much

    "No, no, no, no. That cant be true, can it?

    "I don''t know about that, but I''ve done a lot of things, negotiating the price of potions, cutting corners with technicians other than potion makers, mobilizing the dukes for talent, and so on. So I can''t argue with that even if I''m suspected of being close to this side, not to mention the fact that I''m nning to work in this country until I grow old.

    That is, it''s not a matter of suspicion, Vesta is simply letting go of the big why.

    I originally thought he was a decent man, worthy of the original minister, and that as a politician, he really understood the ins-and-outs.

    Oops, now is not the time for admiration.

    Since King Gazel wasing, it wouldn''t be good to start talks with the Empire now. It would be rude to make him wait.

    That said, it seems even more rude for him toe straight here without negotiating in advance, so what should we do at this time?

    "It''s King Gazel who''s being rude, isn''t it?

    Leaving aside the Vesta thing, it felt like I didn''t have to back down.

    "You''re right. If you enter a country without a notice, you can''t argue with that even if you''re attacked, so I''m guessing there''ll be a contact near the border."

    Vesta said that King Gazel would never lose his manners.

    As if to prove the point, a flustered messenger ran over with a tter.

    "I''m sorry to be rude, but I have a report. His Majesty Gazel of the armed nation of Dwargon has asked for entry into our countryfive in all. How should I report?

    There is no reason to refuse, but permission cannot be easily given. The ministerial staff who made this judgment came to take my instructions.

    I think its a proper treatment in this emergency.

    I''d be upset if it were the other way around, which should be the right answer. It was supposed toe to me through the executives, so I didn''t ask this time.

    Shuna thoughtfully handed a ss of water over.

    The clerk took a grateful sip.

    "I''ll talk to him.

    He prepared the magic tools for the liaison and started themunication.

    As a result, it turned into an emergency meeting with King Gazel.

    I''ll meet him myself.

    Diablo and Shion followed me as escorts as usual.

    "Oh, that''s a big help, Rimuru.

    "You knew this would happen. You''re a good one."

    Even with the flying horses, it would take a day to move from the capital of Dwargon to Rimuru, but now that the two capitals had set up a magic circle, it was possible to travel between them in a sh with magic.

    Instead, he came purposely to the border just to call me out on it.

    "Ha, ha, ha, ha! You found out?

    It''s not funny, but it''s not a big deal.

    "But it''s so nice that Velgrynd can be so amodating."

    "That''s it. You''re not nning to join forces with the Empire, are you?

    Was this really what Gazel was worried about?

    "Depends on the discussion, but that''s how it''s going to be.

    "Hmm, wait a minute. I want to hear what you think first.

    No reason to refuse, so I went to a tea house near the border.

    The clerks hastened to arrange their seats, and the guests who looked like adventurers, all gave them up in good humor.

    I don''t feel too bad about it, so I''ll just say that I''m paying for all the bills here. Everyone was happy to hear that.

    With roughly thirty minutes to go until the start of the meeting, the movement is instantaneous and can be talked about all the way to the meeting.

    Let''s start with my case.

    "As for the aftermath of the war that was given to you

    "It goes without saying, the soldiers are working overtime now, but it''s also a chance to do the hard work. If they live, they''ll only be grateful and no one will resent you.

    That''s good.

    I was slightly worried about the hatred of guys who don''t participate in cleaning up their ck during the pic convention.

    It was a tough battle after all, and the joy of pulling through sessfully puts all other chores behind you.

    "So, what do you want to hear?

    Since I was trying to regroup my thoughts based on the talks, there was still something I couldn''t answer even if asked.

    "I would like to hear from you whether joining forces with the Empire would create ambitions to attack me in Dwargon?

    What are you talking about? This uncle

    Thats not possible, what a hassle.

    There is neither reason nor benefit. And to do so would be to lose credit from the Western Statesan absolutely impossible option.

    "No, the credit I''ve worked so hard to umte will all be lost in an instant. Besides, you''ll lose your reliable backing, and you''ll be burdened with extra hard work, so I''d like to ask what kind of fool you take me for?

    I replied with a look of displeasure, and Gazel smiled with genuine relief.

    Hey, hey, hey, you werent really worried, were you?

    I apologize, Sir Rimuru. It was my proposition to ask this question, and all responsibility for your displeasure rests with me, and I hope you will forgive me with a broad mind for not being.

    Sensing my displeasure, Dorf expressed his apologies.

    He exined in detail what the intention was.

    To sum up, if the Empire joined forces with the Jura Tempest Federation, it would create a situation in which Dwargon was surrounded by two great powers, in which case resorting to force would undoubtedly be suicidal, and a decline in diplomatic capacity would be inevitable.

    If someone deres that they will not listen to the ims of the weaker side, then in the future they will bepelled to swallow the bitter fruit of unfavorable conditions, and it is precisely because they are worried about this that they ran to confirm it in the first ce.

    Huh? Either way, it wasn''t something Dwargon could stop, was it? Although I have no intention of starting a war, I think that in conjunction with the Empire there can be.

    "Yes. In the end, it all depends on what you think. Although I''m a big country, I don''t have the power to fight and win against a country with a True Dragon Race such as Velgrynd or Veldora. But as King, I can''t just admit it.

    Gazel said to me with a serious expression on his face.

    As a king responsible to his people, he must always consider the possibilities.

    Only this time it didn''t make much sense to worry about it.

    But again, there is no guarantee that we will never wage war against them.

    Even if we don''t do it, the Eastern Empire is the same.

    If we are allied with the Empire, then who exactly should the Jura Tempest Federation help when the Empire attacks Dwargon?

    It''s kind of disturbing to really ask me that kind of question.

    "Rimuru, do you understand? You chose to join forces with the Empire for the sake of your country not starting a war, which is fine, but there is no consideration of our situation in Dwargon in this, and of course there is nothing wrong with that, because you are only responsible for your own people, but that is hard for my side to ept, that is the way it is.

    Yes, I was convinced.

    Indeed, even if the Jura Tempest Federation had an alliance with Dwargon and the Empire of the East, it did not mean that any connection had arisen between Dwargon and the Empire of the East.

    When war broke out between the two countries, our movement was limited.

    But wait?

    "But if there is mutual assistance by force'' in a national crisis

    "Then there''s no set deadline, is there?

    Huh?

    There is no such thing as an agreement that works forever. All of them are temporary agreements that can only provide temporary peace of mind. But agreements with a limited duration are safer.

    Just as I was wondering about what it meant, Ciel quietly coached me.

    The difference between when there is a fixed time limit versus when there is no time limit.

    Assuming that one of the parties wants to renounce the agreement, which is more difficult?

    If there is no deadline, it also means that abandonment of the agreement can be considered at any time.

    On the other hand, when the period is limited, then it can be considered safe for the period of time specified in the agreement.

    Needless to say, it is more credible to destroy and invade the agreement than to end the agreement and start a war.

    Of course, in the final analysis, this is only for countries other than the one in question, so if a nation has territorial ambitions like the Empire, it may be a sign that you do not care at all.

    It is clear that it is in no way desirable to abandon an agreement for a limited period of time without authorization. As soon as it is renewed, the parties to the agreement have an obligation toply with it.

    Such an act would be a loss of trust on the part of the Western powers, which would deviate significantly from my strategy, and it would be better toy down realistic and reliable rules.

    "I see. Even though we''re allied with the Empire, there''s still a chance that the agreement will be abandoned.

    "If only you could understand.

    "Well, that does worry me, so I understand. Then, even if you''re going to be allied with the Empire, the details of this should be carefully discussed."

    Hearing me say that, Dorf gave a reassuring look.

    "I told you, that you worried too much!

    The words came out of nowhere from Gazel. Where is his Kingly responsibility now?

    "Lord Rimuru, it''s almost time!

    Shion looked at her watch and reminded me.

    It was a watch that I had made with Kaijin and others out of interest, and I felt the need for the secretary to wear one. She was delighted when it was given to her.

    The addition to Shions work was a joy to all and a great memory.

    "Let''s go, then.

    "Hahaha, then Ill open the transfer door."

    And just like that, the sudden start of the talk ended.

    We walked out of the store and prepared to go back to the conference room.

    ***

    10:00 a.m.

    Everyone was all gathered in the conference room.

    Participants were seated at a partially round table with a gap.

    Because of this gap, the shape of the table is a C shape if you look down at it.

    <<this 1888="" design,="" called="" the="" randall="" ring,="" was="" invented="" by="" french="" ophthalmologist="" edmond="" in="">></this>

    It''s great to be so detailed, but right now you don''t need to be knowledgeable, so please make the point.

    The notched part of the table can be essed, making it easy for the person in the middle to add tea and materials to those who are seated, and the front of the notched can be set up with a huge screen so that it can be seen clearly no matter where you are sitting at the table.

    This time it was three party meeting, so we decided this shape was better than sitting face to face.

    The gap section is located on the south side.

    We all sat on the north side.

    Im in the north seat, with Benimaru to the northeast and Rigurd to the northwest.

    Shion and Diablo, as usual, stood behind me.

    On the east side sat the Imperials.

    Masayuki is in the east seat, and to his right, that is, towards the north, sits Velgrynd.

    On his southern nk were Major General Calgurio and Major General Minute.

    Jiu and Bonnie didn''t enter their seats and stood behind Masayuki. Since these two are in charge of the escort, it also means that there was a smooth reconciliation between them, which is good.

    On the west side of the table was Gazels party that had joined in urgently.

    Due west is where Gazel sits.

    To the northwest is the position of Dorf, the head of the Heavenly Flying Knights, and to the southwest is the position of Jane, the court''s magical mentor.

    The head of the dark ministry, Anrietta, and the Supreme Commander of the Military Department, Ben, did not take their seats, but stood and acted as guards.

    That''s how the three forces were, all huddled together.

    I looked left and right, just in time to lock eyes with Masayuki who was looking east and west.

    His expression was tired, as he said strongly, "Why did this happen to me?

    But rest assured.

    I''m in the same mood as you.

    Because of this closeness, I''m going to help him out if anything goes wrong.

    The moderator of the meeting, Testarossa, stood up and everyone''s eyes turned to her.

    She stepped to the center and began the introductory remarks.

    "Okay, the time hase. We''re all here, so lets get started."

    After a salute, Testarossa returned to the south.

    There are chairs put there to sit and rest when it''s not her turn toe out.

    I had asked her before the meeting toe and assist me in my distress, and Testarossa will respond to my expectations.

    "First of all, let me exin the main purpose of this meeting. Because this is a high priority meeting without prior coordination, there may be some involuntary remarks, at which time I would please ask you not to get upset, but to listen calmly to what the other side has to say.

    At this time, Testarossa paused first and looked at the reactions of everyone.

    My country''s representative in the Western Council is well equipped to deal with such asions.

    Hoping that this would go on smoothly until the end of the meeting, I continued to watch Testarossa with that desire.

    "Let us begin by confirming the objectives of this meeting, which we hope will lead to the deration of the end of the war with the Eastern Empire, along with an end-of-war final agreement, and the creation of a new treaty in the future on the basis of the rtions concluded between our country and the East.

    What do you think?

    "No objections.

    Masayuki looked as if he wanted to say something, but Velgrynd spoke first.

    "Well, there''s nothing wrong with that.

    At the same time, Gazel nodded heavily.

    Though a littlete, I hastened to add.

    "In that case, let''s examine the status quo first, shall we?

    The tone of speech became slightly odd, but who cares?

    Checking the reaction of both sides, while maintaining a natural expression.

    Masayuki looked at me with respect.

    Oh, cute guy.

    Yes, I think I''m really amazing too.

    Because the people gathered here now are super great people of great countries. In my previous life, there was never an event that a one could meet a member of Parliament, not to mention the Prime Minister.

    At most, when an order was received, the staff from the Ministry of International Trade and Communications met asionally when they came to inspect the site. They were not in charge of the reception, but just brought the people to the site and then disappeared.

    Back then, I was nervous just to talk lightly outside of my job.

    And now I''m ying the role of a king. Its emotional just to think about it.

    "As there seems to be no objection, I shall leave it to Testarossa to make her rifications, after which I shall give the floor to the speakers, who may then raise questions and correct errors. So, please start exining.

    The talks are proceeding as nned.

    Let me start by asking you not to interrupt, and then we''ll leave it to Testarossa, and the meeting will proceed in an orderly fashion.

    King Gazel, who is on my level, and Velgrynd, the plenipotentiary agent of the tentative emperor, are also allowed to speak. It would seem that those other than that would be punished as an insult to the king.

    I feel a little indifferent about this, but if it would make things easier then I''m okay with it.

    Testarossa began to exin.

    She started with the battle on the airship that Gazel didn''t know about, with a bit of false talk mixed in.

    And then, immediately afterwards, exined that the Imperial Emperor Rudra had in fact be a boarding-skill-conscious individual, just as I had been victorious over Velgrynd

    Wait.

    Gazel objected first.

    "Huh? If you want to speak, please do so afterwards

    Now is not the time to think about things like that!?

    Did I do something strange?

    So, King Gazel, is there something wrong?

    I couldn''t help but be meek and ask, and Gazel pressed his head against mine and stared at me, then without saying anything the gaze turned back to Velgrynd and spoke solemnly.

    I know it''s rude, but can Lord Velgrynd ept what King Rimuru has just said?

    A rarity, Gazel was actually using honorifics.

    And called her Lord Velgrynd.

    Does it matter that this attitude is not in keeping with the style of kings of great powers?

    I am watching the developments while I have my doubts about it. Instead of getting angry, Velgrynd shed a smile.

    "No problem, Dwarf King. You''re a shrewd and thoughtful man, better than King Rimuru over there, and Rudra has a high opinion of you, having said he wanted to take you in as a subordinate when you were a Sword Saint. So I''m also well aware of you and don''t dislike you. No need to be so formal, just talk lightly.

    "Yes, yes! But you, who are one of the strongest True Dragon Race and the Guardian of the Empire in public, this

    "Don''t worry about it. It doesn''t matter. Aren''t you a friend of Rimuru''s? Then I won''t fight, after all, what Rimuru said earlier was true. I lost to him.

    Well that''s a surprise.

    I was expecting Velgrynd to be like Veldora and die to save face and say she didn''t lose. I was not expecting her to admit defeat so dryly.

    I was surprised, but the others didn''t seem to be able to just be surprised.

    Gee-eh!? WhLord Velgrynd lost!?

    "Unbelievable, the undefeated myth

    The Imperial congregation that had been cultivated in the territory of Velgrynds became shaken, the previous silencepletely thrown behind them.

    What?

    "Hey hey, are you serious? In the face of that god-like existence who could not be defeated no matter what, although youre probably not lying, it is so unbelievable, I cant believe it

    Dorf was dumbfounded and the Ben seemed unable to recognize reality.

    Looking at the duo and King Gazel, Anrietta somehow managed to smile.

    "I don''t need to report this time, so it''s really refreshing. If I were to report such things, I''d be considered mentally ill.

    Is it disrespectful of her to say that?

    Well, thats all a matter of other countries, and it feels like it''s not the time to talk about it, but I''m not going to stand in the way either.

    Taking another step back and continuing observation, I saw Jane speak to Gazel, who was holding his head in thought.

    "Calm down, Gazel, and you too. I won''t be surprised anymore. I''m still tired from being shocked about the primordials, and I had already understood by the time I saw the evolutionary ritual.

    Granny Jane seemed to be enlightened.

    So this time, she survived the asion alone and calmly.

    The people of Dwargon snapped back at these words of hers.

    Then one by one, the embarrassed people re-positioned themselves.

    By the way, the reaction from our side is

    What? So Lord Rimuru has triumphed in the face of Lord Velgrynd. Are we having a feast tonight?

    It''s true that Rigurd has to throw a party whenever he finds the opportunity.

    I never doubted that I would win.

    Well, I knew it wasing. I saw it all.

    This guy, Benimaru, actually peeked, but someone seemed to hear that and couldn''t sit still first.

    "Benimaru, what''s going on? Could it be that you are the only one who has seen Rimuru-sama''s dignified fighting stance?

    "No, it''s not like that. I''m obliged to confirm the status of the battle, so just a little"

    Benimaru desperately pondered the reason, but he just wasn''t sophisticated enough in this area.

    In contrast, Diablo was

    Kufufufufu! Oh, yes, Shion, did you not see it? That''s a shame. It''s quite a shame that such a wonderful battle wasn''t seen!

    Don''t agitate her, don''t agitate her!

    I guess no one is better at finding fault with irony, right?

    Testarossa sighed helplessly as she stepped aside, estimating that nothing could be more troublesome than making an enemy of Diablo.

    "Everyone, silence, please.

    But Testarossa didn''t forget her duty and still saw the time for everyone to gradually calm down and control the scene to quiet down.

    If she had done so anyter, I''m afraid Shion and Diablo would have gotten into a fight.

    Well done, I gave her silent praise.

    The crowd also calmed down, and the meeting continued.

    Taking a cue from the moderator, I continued.

    As mentioned above, after defeating Velgrynd, I inquired about the situation in detail, at which point I discovered the discrepancies. I felt that Emperor Rudra did not seem like himself, so I tried to observe Velgrynd and found the shocking truth. Omitting details, I found out that the culprit was indeed

    "dominated" by the consciousness of Michael, who had been boarding the Emperor Rudra''s skill!

    Speaking of which, I put on a smug look with all my might.

    Nowes the good part.

    And just as I smiled wryly and prepared to continue

    Wait.

    Oops, seems there is another opinion.

    And it''s still Gazel.

    "Well, after the question, please

    Not knowing if it was to interrupt me or to settle himself, Gazel sighed heavily.

    Then stared at me tightly and spoke heavily.

    "Listen, Rimuru, it''s true, this attitude of mine is inappropriate, but, well, this is really not the time to talk about that.

    "How so?"

    How can details be omitted!? A vicious skill that even Lord Velgrynd could be dominated,how could it be allowed to exist!? And, what''s that!? A consciousness that resides in skills? This kind of thing, Ive never heard of it! Jane, do you know anything about this?

    No, I''ve never heard of it either.

    As much as Gazel wanted to weigh himself down, he still couldn''t hide his inner exuberance, and Jane seemed to be thinking about something too, appearing unresponsive when answering Gazel''s question.

    That said, it''s amazing that no one elsemented on the way Gazel phrased it.

    Velgrynd kept a smile on her face, seeming to enjoy the situation quite a bit. It seemed that as long as Masayuki was around, nothing else was needed or interested her.

    As for Masayuki, he seems to have given up on understanding this.

    He was not in a position to act in a dignified manner because of his behavior, but his opinion seems to have risen again in the presence of those such as Calgurio. But he himself probably did not notice

    Hey, I''m d you''re here too, so don''t mind.

    Benimaru and the others were also interested.

    If I didn''t want to say it, they wouldn''t have pursued it, but in their hearts they actually wanted to hear it from me anyway.

    That''s why Testarossa didn''t go to stop Gazel.

    But she seemed to sense herpse immediately and prepared to preside over the scene by pretending as if nothing had happened again.

    "Silence, gentlemen, regarding King Gazel''s question"

    Although she recovered quickly enough, trying to remedy it was a bit harder. No, in fact, Ill just go with the flow. Anyway, there''s nothing wrong with even telling it.

    "I see, then Ill exin."

    "Lord Rimuru, is this all right?

    Well, since only important people from various countries are present, I don''t think it''s a big deal if something like this does happen.

    That''s right.

    Even if the existence of the Theosophy Nucleus (Manas) was known by others, there was nothing particrly troubling about it, and for me, the only secret that needed to be strictly guarded was the existence of Ciel.

    I''m sorry, Rimuru. I''m so grateful for this.

    Gazel bowed his head in gratitude.

    The tone of speech changed back to that of a senior brother, as if he had given up covering up.

    Then I can take it easy, too, and proceed with the exnation as such.

    I then exined the birth of Emperor Rudra, who was physically and mentally exhausted, and whose ultimate skill, Justice King Michael, became the ego Michael, the Theosophy Nucleus. I made public as much as I knew of his fierce power.

    The ultimate skill? With such skills, unique skills will not work

    Strictly speaking, it''s notpletely true. Skills change depending on the strength of the will, and even unique ones have the ability to reach the ultimate skill strength, but usually they don''t. In addition, the strength of the will is directly reflected in the skill, which may result in an attack that is extremely effective, and in my opinion, King Gazel should be able to do it.

    "Is that so

    Also, magic is the same. Magic is both a skill and a technique, so depending on the strength of the user''s will, it may be able to defeat a holder of an ultimate skill. I think Jiu and Bonnie will understand what I''m saying, right?

    The duo who had lost to Diablo should be able to understand what I said, and they both nodded hard.

    As for Diablo, who had a sickeningly intoxicated expression, I didn''t know what he was thinking.

    He definitely wasnt thinking anything good, and though it was tempting to say something to him, he was standing honestly for now, so let''s just ignore it.

    Shion and others muttered, then I should acquire an ultimate skill as well

    Well, it''s because it''s not easy to get, that its ultimate, right?

    But for some reason, I always felt that Shion could do it.

    That seems a little scary, so it''s better not to think about it.

    "That''s pretty much how it it. Michael has a special power that can absolutely dominate the powers of the Angelic System of skills, so even Velgrynd couldn''t resist and became obedient without even noticing it herself. In addition, Lieutenant Kondo seems to have been at the mercy of the others as well, though in the end, he seems to have broken free from the spell and entrusted his will to our Carrera."

    "What, that "information-feeding weirdo" was also

    "I can''t believe it, but I''m not stupid enough to doubt His Majesty Rimuru.

    "Is that so? Then Lord Damrada

    "Well, he must have noticed that the Emperor Rudra was acting a little strange."

    Though not enough to interrupt what I was saying, there was amotion on the Imperial side. It was an act that should not have been done, but now it''s toote to care about it, so Ill just ignore it.

    "As for Michael''s purpose, it is now clear. It is to resurrect the master who created him, Veldanava."

    "How can that be!?

    The shouts ovepped, and there was no telling who was shouting.

    No, actually knowing is knowing, just not deliberately pointing it out.

    "Knowing that it is all due to the domination of Michael, I do not intend to hold the Empire responsible for the war, and if they wish to continue the war against us in the future, it will not be just that

    Speaking of which, I nced at Masayuki and the others.

    Masayuki waspletely unfazed.

    It''s really not my business at all.

    Calgurio and Minute smiled bitterly.

    Win or lose, the reason for the war is gone, and they are reacting this way because they understand it.

    Looks like it seems okay.

    It does not seem to me that you have any such intention, and I have been reconciled with Velgrynd, so it is necessary to establish a new guide now that Michael, who yed Rudra, has disappeared, is it not? That''s what we''re talking about today, so can we shed some light on that?

    I dropped the topic to Masayuki and others.

    Since there is a consensus on the status quo, it is necessary to understand how the empire will develop in the future, and this is what Gazels group is most concerned about, so I think we should let it go and talk about it.

    It''s actually a gamble.

    Usually, when conducting such a meeting, in addition to presenting your own ideas, you should also confirm what the other party has to say.

    It is difficult to predict what conclusions will be reached, and this is not usually a good thing to do in the context of the country-to-country meetings.

    But Testarossa didn''t stop me, and was just as usual. She smiled at me and she said it was okay, so I could just say what was on my mind like that.

    Well, the result is

    Minute.

    Yes! It has been left to my humble self to say that the Empire has now lost more than two-thirds of its battle strength, that continuing war is impossible, and that we are willing to ept full and unconditional surrender. But there is also problem here. The most critical person of supreme responsibility is now absent, and this is the key point that His Majesty Rimuru has pointed out, so we must first embrace a new emperor. So today is the perfect opportunity to make sure that all of you present recognize our new Emperor.

    Minute droned on, finished, and gave a salute, looking at me and Gazel.

    "Hmm, is that so? Then Rimuru, isnt this exactly why you expected me toe here today?

    Huh?

    I dont think so.

    "It''s not just a question of the Empire and the Jura Tempest Federation joining forces. Because Tempest is going to be the backbone of the new Emperor and build a rock-solid system for the Empire, then of course

    Well, needless to say, I have to get involved with Dwargon, so I guess I can expect something in return, can''t I?

    Hey, hey.

    Why has acknowledging the new emperor turned into something that doesn''t make sense?

    King Gazel''s words are reliable, but we will do our best to respond to your expectations within the limits of both countries'' eptance.

    Minuteno, let me call him Sir Minute, is, unlike in battle, a good politician, with a graceful demeanor and a feeling that he can handle anything with ease.

    In contrast, I was trying my best to understand the situation, and even began to worry if anyone would see me sweating and panicking inside.

    Okay, okay. Gazel seems to approve, and it''s me next. Benimaru and Rigurd nce at my expression, so I nod my head gently in response and speak up.

    "I also agree, and can agree to provide full support depending on the situation.

    I also took advantage of the situation.

    Im finally keeping up with understanding.

    I had intended to help Masayuki from the beginning, but if you think about it carefully, this is already something that will lead to support as a nation, so I''m selling a favor here. If you build a better rtionship in the future by giving favors here, then there will not be another war in the future.

    Even if things don''t go so smoothly, there should be no problems at the moment. The future can be left to future generations, so the most important thing is the now."

    "Thank you very much. Our Emperor will be very happy to hear this.

    Sir Minute made another salute.

    You''re being too stiff, get on with it.

    Then, the new emperor is Masayuki, right? Ah, then is it bad for me to call you that?

    King Rimuru

    "Ah, no problem at all. So it''s okay for me to call Rimuru as I did before, right?

    Ah, Masayuki, a friend of my heart!

    "Of course, Masayuki-kun! It''s hard to understand, what words to use on such asions, isnt it?

    Rimuru-san! I havent been able to rx until now because Rimuru-san is so reliable!!! It''s been so suffocating these past few days

    Yeah, I get it.

    You werecking an ally and struggling alone, right?

    Velgrynd guessed that she couldn''t understand how her subordinates were feeling, and wondered why she was upset over such trivial matters. She shouldn''t have been able to.

    The big men of the Empire, who took great pains just to think about their own problems, had no energy left to worry about Masayuki''s mood, and Masayuki was left to worry alone.

    That''s why they wanted to discuss it with me, but it was a failure for Shion to send the message.

    I really wanted to have a personal interview and think about what to do. I think so, and Masayuki feels the same.

    But that''s not going to work anymore.

    Although I don''t know what to do with my manners, I''m just going to do it with my nature.

    "Guys, may I have your attention, please?

    The one who hit the nail on the head was Testarossa.

    "Our Lord Rimuru would like the meeting to be more rxed and casual. We may have our own positions, but could you please continue the meeting more informally?

    Testarossa looked at everyone present with a smile and said so.

    Nothing could be more reliable than that!

    Masayuki seems happy too.

    Gazel just smiled and didn''t retort.

    Since the king had no problem, the subordinates are even less likely to object. The formal talk ended here, and the real talk from the heart then started.

    ***

    Geez, that''s a big help. I thought I''d have to keep quiet.

    Yeah, I wanted to do that too, actually.

    The idiots. The lord of a country will do what it is!

    Heh, heh, heh, heh.

    Jane, don''t talk about it now.

    This is the moment when the tension loosens up.

    It''s probably because Masayuki is the new emperor and has decided to support us. It''s only when we''ve established our own policy as backbone that we''ll be able to do so, and after that, there''s only details to discuss, so there''s no need to be so intense and stereotypical.

    So, in a lighthearted tone, I asked about what I cared most about.

    So, it''s okay for Masayuki to be an emperor, but will the Empire agree? No problems on our side, but the people? Or are they subjects? Anyway, if the people dont approve, its useless.

    Hearing that, Masayuki nodded his head as drastically as I would have liked.

    Yes! It''s definitely weird, right!?

    Ahem! Your Majesty, please calm down.

    Although Calgurio stepped forward to admonish him, Masayuki wasn''t about to just leave it at that.

    The one who reached out to help at this point was Gazel.

    What about the bloodline problem? He does not share a single bit of Emperor Rudra''s blood, right? If we don''t keep the royal title, I''m afraid the nobles won''t approve.

    Velgrynd answered the question.

    "No problem, it is written in the imperial canon that ''the guardian of the empire, the man recognized by the dragon Velgrynd, is both Rudra and emperor, and although many people think this is just a formality, it is true and most important.

    Sir Minute came forward to endorse that statement.

    It is true that His Majesty Rudra has always been reborn as the wife''s first son, but in the long history of the empire, there have been arrogant people who have sought to rece their sessors, and it was Her Excellency, Lord Velgrynd, who punished them as the Marshal."

    Like that, it''s bound to be exposed.

    There was no way for anyone who knew the Rudra reincarnation mechanism to get the truth wrong.

    I can''t imagine the punishment. It must have been horrible.

    After all, His Majesty Rudra has inherited his ego, and even if Lord Velgrynd doesn''t point it out, when he grows up he will naturally know his true self

    Well, if you grow up into your ego, then youll be able to easily identify yourself.

    Well, how about calling Masayuki a bastard?

    That''s not possible, Lord Rimuru. The Senate has recorded the blood and DNA information of Lord Rudra, so it''s impossible to say that Masayuki-sama is Rudra''s child if it doesnt match up.

    Oops, so the empire''s technology hase this far. I thought it was a good proposal, but Sir Minute has rejected it.

    By the way, there are DNA tests in this world too

    What''s DNA?

    Well

    Since Gazel asked, I''ll rify.

    Next to him were Calgurio and the others chatting.

    In the past, there were no sophisticated methods of inspection. I heard it was difficult.

    Yeah, it''s a pain in the ass to have to listen to my judgment every time.

    Well, wouldn''t that be worse?

    Now that the real person has disappeared, and the only reincarnated body whose memory has disappeared is Masayuki, it can be quite difficult to prove that the "soul" is real. That is to say, there is no way for others to recognize Masayuki as the Emperor.

    In that case, isnt it easier for Masayuki to imitate Rudra, since he looks the same?

    It is only necessary to emte the emperors privileges, such as inspection.

    Then find an opportunity to rece Emperor Rudra''s record and you''re done.

    No.

    I thought that was a good way to go, but was rejected by Velgrynd.

    May I ask why?

    "You, have not forgotten the power of Michael? The loyalty of his subjects and subordinates to Rudra is the source of Michael''s energy. So, wouldn''t it be better to create the fact that Emperor Rudra is dead to take away his power?

    Oops?

    This I certainly remember

    <<correct. it="" doesnt="" make="" sense="" to="" just="" die,="" but="" a="" new="" object="" of="" loyalty="" will="" block="" michaels="" power.="" however,="" michael="" should="" have="" thought="" that="" too,="" and="" might="" transferred="" the="" subject="" authority="" from="" rudra="" another="" person.="">> Something like that, after all I said before about killing all the subjects.</correct.>

    If that countermeasure is taken, he would surely be to make those characters that I can''t outwit into a source of power.

    Or hed choose the kind of over-the-top strongman.

    Michael would have taken a countermeasure, and it would have been better to do it than not to do it, so that I would have had no reason to do it to my subjects.

    That''s right, so don''t worry about the details. Just announce that Masayuki is Rudra in my name, so no one will dare to resist.

    Velgrynd is so confident.

    But then again, that''s certainly true.

    After all, she''s the Empire''s guardian dragon, the Scorch Dragon.

    What''s more, it makes sense that the imperial paradigm records that ''Velgrynd recognized the man as Emperor''.

    The approach is tough, but as long as it''s Velgrynds true statement, it can''t be ignored.

    Does Masayuki-kun think this is okay?

    Should be fine?

    ...oohhhh, how shall I put it

    I also feel in my heart that there should be no problem, and here it seems we can only go with the flow.

    If Masayuki doesn''t like it, then don''t force it.

    Wow, Velgrynd''s smile is super gentlegentle to the point of being scary. While that description is somewhat contradictory, it''s my honest opinion.

    I''ll do it, I''m being hailed as a hero anyway, so it won''t hurt to add another title.

    With an already enlightened, empty look, Masayuki dered.

    The people like Minute and Calgurio listened with pleasure, and in their opinion, a new symbol as well as a mentor was absolutely necessary for the future survival of the empire.

    I also think Masayuki fits the bill. He also has an effective skill and will definitely get popr support.

    "Then the way forward is to consolidate the empire with a new emperor, right?"

    Everyone other than Masayuki nodded sharply in agreement with my words.

    Masayuki also had to nod reluctantly.

    Don''t look at Masayuki like this, he''s actually a very responsible person and will make it to the end if he epts it.

    Understood, we will also make an announcement acknowledging this. By the way, the Imperial generals who are now stranded in our country as captives will be released immediately, and although they will not be held ountable, we will putpensation discussions on temporary reservation. What do you think? We''ll negotiate this with the new emperor afterwards.

    I''d like to hear more about that.

    Thank you for your generosity. I''m grateful.

    Though everyone approved, Gazel seemed to have something to say again.

    "I has no objection to this approach either, just a question. It is fortunate, Your Excellency, that you, as the Hero, have to be emperor, so I would like to ask, what is your idea of governing the peoplethe subjects?

    Gazel stared at Masayuki with a sharp stare that seemed to see through everything.

    Masayuki, who was somewhat frightened by that aura, looked at me troubled and said.

    uhhhmm? A world where people can live withughtersomething like that, right?

    Iughed when I heard that.

    Because he thinks the same way I do.

    Yeah, that''s the most important thing!

    Thats right! knew Rimuru would say that!!

    "Of course, Masayuki-kun. s, I told Rudra that thought too, only to be called naive and foolish, so that I thought I was mistaken and felt uneasy inside. I''m so relieved. I was right.

    Great! I can''t do politics or anything, and I''m not confident, but now I can stand up and be king.

    Well, let''s do our best together!

    Yes, I''d like to hear more from you in the future, too!

    After saying that, Masayuki and Iughed loudly together.

    Others watched us each react differently.

    Diablo and Shion had a look of intoxication on their faces.

    Velgrynd smiled tenderly.

    For their part, Calgurio and Sir Minute smiled bitterly as they gave up in the middle.

    Gazel looked up helplessly at the sky.

    That''s enough!

    I understand Gazel''s concern, but they have no ambition, and they''re new to the world, so they must be guided to the right path.

    I know how difficult it is to guide these people who talk about politics with their childish ideals, and that''s what''s bothering me.

    Gazel sighed again after saying that. After all, Gazel was always worried about us.

    Okay, okay, don''t worry so much, I''m studying too, so it''s okay!

    It shouldn''t matter that it''s not just Gazel, it''s Vesta and El Carbon (***Elmesia?) who are teaching me.

    really?

    It''s just in their spare time, so its true.

    If that''s still unsettling, let''s put him at ease a little.

    I didn''t intend to get too involved in politics, but I''m d I did. I''ll just leave the substance to Sir Minute.

    You''re right! I was just wondering if I should do it, and was a little uneasy, but now I can feel a little lighter.

    Masayuki and I once again looked at each other andughed.

    just try it, you''re not alone, share the burden with your peers, grow together, I''ll help if possible.

    Gazel held his head high once again, finally approving. s, there may not be an endorsement, but it should all be in a supportive mood for a long time toe.

    And so the meeting proceeded.

    I have no objection to the approach just decided at the meeting. If the East is settled, so is our country, and we will do our best to assist in the revival near the national border.

    "Thank you!

    "Thank you, King Gazel.

    And just like that, things are beautifully finished.

    Inter history books, this day would be recorded as the day of the appearance of the redeeming emperor, Masayuki Rudra Namur Nasca

    ***

    Thus, the policy was set.

    Now we take a break in between and have lunch first.

    Now that the atmosphere is less tense, everyone eats with joy.

    Todays lunch is Kaiseki cuisine (***a traditional multi-course Japanese dinner).

    Even though we were taking a break, we were still in the middle of the meeting, so we chose a menu that could be used to entertain the bigwigs, which was carefully arranged by Shuna-chan.

    Everyone uses chopsticks.

    Gazel has mastered it for a long time now, and the spread of chopstick culture throughout the Empire has made it possible to offer Japanese style cuisine with peace of mind.

    The food here still tastes so good.

    A little bit of a drinking problem.

    Be restrained, Ben! Even if it''s informal, the important meeting is not over.

    You''re serious Dorf, aren''t you? Sir Rimuru?

    Yeah, I''d like some sake, too, but

    I nodded and nced at Shuna.

    Shuna smiled sweetly.

    Yeah, its impossible.

    "Let''s hold back for now, and keep working on the rest of the meeting. Mr. Ben must learn more from Mr. Dorf, and be more serious!

    "Hahaha, that''s harsh. Then isn''t tonight something to look forward to?

    Hey

    "Sure, right, Benimaru?

    "Well, just offer up my secret stash of magic ck wine, and its party time!

    "Oh, this is good! I''m d you''re here.

    "Hahahaha, it''s famous that monsters like wine, isn''t it, Shuna?

    Huh? Does Shuna drink too?

    I didn''t expect to hear about it while gossiping, but I''m surprised Shuna also drinks.

    The truth is

    Brother, I only try it asionally. Don''t confuse me with Shion.

    I''m still drinking.

    By the way, isn''t Shuna still underageah, it doesn''t matter how old a magic creature is.

    Ha ha ha, sorry sorry sorry.

    Lady Shuna! I''m not that into it!

    That''s a lie.

    As far as I know, Shion drinks and evenpetes with Albis.

    Benimaru also knew about this, so he smiled bitterly over there.

    Although Benimaru didn''t look like he loved to drink, Albis was his wife and he presumably apanied her to drink asionally, so the alcohol should be quite strong.

    Wine is something that only feels good when you get used to it.

    Be moderate.

    To drink, don''t let the booze get to you and drink moderately.

    Properly enjoy the tasting. I exhort people in my heart, including me.

    The luncheon would have been light and pleasant, but suddenly someone burst into tears.

    All eyes were drawn there.

    At first nce, it turns out to be Calgurio.

    "What''s going on? Is the meal not to your liking?"

    Shuna rushed over tofort Calgurio.

    Calgurio replied.

    No, Im sorry. I just remembered it. It might be funny to say this as a soldier, but I just followed my stupid n and sacrificed so many subordinates. Yet I am sharing this delicious meal. Im sorry, me meFaraga, Samdor, Gaster

    This guy, he''ll cry when he drinks.

    Although there is no alcohol distribution at the moment, he seems to be infected with the atmosphere and had gotten drunk.

    But this is just a good opportunity.

    Testarossa.

    Yes, I''ve asked Moss to call those men.

    As expected of her.

    Before I could give the order, Testarossa had already understood my intentions.

    In less than five minutes, dozens of people arrived at the venue.

    "Your Majesty Rimuru, Samdor ( ***might be Xamd or Zamud, or Sander, but Im not sure) has been summoned to meet you!

    The people who came were the same people that Calgurio had just read about, such as Samdor.

    They seemed toe running quickly, their faces red with sweat, but still trying desperately to organize thenguage ande to greet me.

    Samdor and these people, have actually died once.

    As they boarded the Emperor''s gship, they were swept up in Testarossas nuclear strike magic: the blessing of death, which wiped out the flesh along with it.

    Testarossa was good at was remembering that I had epted Calgurio''s plea for mercy and had recovered the souls before the magic could be unleashed.

    It all became possible because I am allowed to evolve by Lord RimuruTestarossa is so humble, she is so understanding.

    Therefore, Testarossa boarded the "souls" of Samdor and others into the "soul-orb" and let them settle down in the artificial human body.

    Youaren''t you Samdor!? I heard Lord Velgrynd say you''re all dead, are you still alive?

    Geez really, they couldnt handle the blessing of death, can they, it was Testarossa who saved them?

    Yes, Lord Velgrynd, Lord Rimuru is merciful.

    Yeah, I don''t doubt that.

    Its wise.

    Woo hoo, oh hoo hoothe two areughing and talking.

    But it felt a little scary and I hurriedly moved out of sight.

    Samdor and the others celebrated their safe survival after rendezvous with Calgurio.

    As for Faraga, unfortunately, I am not omnipotent either and can only ask you to ignore it. If you know that mourning for the dead will be a good thing, then I ask you to stay away from such foolishness as war.

    It would be foolish tounch an invasion if the defenses were okay, and I know there''s not only good in the world, but I can''t help but think so.

    Those in power should put their families on the scales and consider whether there is a real need to wage war and to resolve unnecessary disputes through dialogue whenever possible.

    This I did not say aloud, but prayed for it in my heart.

    ***

    After a lunch break, the meeting resumed again at 3 p.m.

    The general policy was set in the morning, and the intention was to discuss reconfirmation and the sharing of responsibilities in the afternoon "Let me reconfirm, then, starting with the armed state of Dwargon."

    Testarossa began the topic.

    The list of confirmations then begins.

    The Jura Tempest Federation and Dwargon jointly recognized the new Emperor as the first step, before dering the end of the war and the establishment of the Tripartite Alliance in the name of the new Emperor, Masayuki.

    As a result, a different framework of the Western Nations Council is created.

    Dwargon''s duty was to revive the Empire and its borders, including the streets and adjacent buildings, which also included rescue missions for the few victims caught up in the war.

    Credites after credit is earned.

    After the rescue waspleted, the railway to the Imperial Capital would beid, and this difficult project would bepleted by renovating the road opened by the Imperial Chariot Division in the Canaat Mountains.

    Our country will also send a steering team to work with the Dwarf Corps of Engineers toplete the project.

    After the opening of the "Magic Train, logistics will be smoothed out, and the movement of people will be active and will certainly usher in new developments.

    I can''t help but feel a little excited when I dream about this kind of thing, and I''m sure I still like to do construction nning, as I realize it again.

    So what are the duties of our Jura Tempest Federation?

    Mainly the responsibility for the full support to Masayuki.

    The purpose of arranging an embassy within the Empire and sending Testarossa was to dispel the obsolete ideas of the Empire and allow the people of the Empire to feel the arrival of a new era.

    The imperial subjects had no memory of losing the war, and although they had suffered a bit because of Veldora, they had no experience of giving thanks to other nations.

    Perhaps this speaks to Rudra''s greatness, but it also happens to make defeat uneptable to the those imperial subjects.

    For those who have lost loved ones, one should be able to understand the pain, yet those who arefortable in a safe position are likely to offer to go to war again.

    They have only profit in their eyes and ack of feeling for the pain that others endure.

    It was up to Minute to convince the nobles, and Calgurio to take charge of the military, only to be pitted against the cunning old underbelly of society. However, they were worried that the two of them would underpowered.

    Velgrynd said, "Just kill them all." That''s easy for her to say, but he couldn''t do it. The Empire had already lost a lot of talent, and it wasn''t okay to continue reducing the number of key officials.

    These tricky people have to be used alive, and the road ahead is bumpy, but they have to be done too, that''s the conclusion that hase out of these days.

    That''s when it''s Testarossa''s turn to step in.

    By using an intelligence agent with a hellish ear like Moss, he should be able to sabotage the attempts of the underworlders in one fell swoop. It''s a pain in the ass to get them together, but if you grab hold of them and then threatener, no, persuade themthey should be willing to assist.

    The Senate of the Western States is now settled, and they alone are enough, so Ill let Testarossa go to the Empire now.

    Still, Venom will continue to apany Masayuki and be his escort.

    "I''ll have to borrow your dependent. Is that okay?

    "Kufufufu, no problem. It''s for Lord Rimuru, so feel free to use him.

    Hearing such a thing was tiring, but I don''t want to say anything about Diablo to add to it.

    ***

    Unlike the morning discussion, the afternoons are full of lively topics.

    After the summary of the problems on the Empire''s side was announced, the group then discussed the response strategy together.

    Time really does pass when its meaningful.

    "We, the members of the Empire, will never forget this kindnesses.

    "Hey, hey, it''s still just the nning stage. Are you going to start working on it? If you are saying thanks, please wait until the business ispleted.

    Hahahahabusiness? I''m no match for you, Your Majesty RimuruThis national problem can be summed up in one word.

    Minute smiled.

    But there was a gleam in his eyes that seemed to light up the fight because of my words.

    It''s good to be motivated.

    While the guidelines are clear, there are still problems that must not be forgotten.

    Gazel opened his mouth to ask the question.

    So, Rimuru, the most important thing to ask is, can you win?

    Its trueMichael and Feldway and their men, the very threatening enemy, are still watching us.

    "Honestly, I can''t guarantee that I''m going to win, but Im definitely not going to lose.

    Well its you after all, so no matter what method is used, your words will be true, right?

    Even overestimated.

    Hmm! In fact, when I saw Lord Velgrynd so powerful, I was ready to lose the battle and die. I knew she was strong, but I didn''t think her to be that strong.

    Gazel confided frankly, and Ben and Dorf nodded in agreement.

    Yeah, I almost thought it was over too when I saw Testarossa and the others fall to the ground.

    Afterwards, because I was so angry, I forgot my fearI should say, when I came back, it was all over, and now I look back on it, it''s still an incredible win.

    But now, I have Ciel.

    And Veldora and Diablo and the others.

    I am not alone and that is encouraging.

    I didn''t think I''d lose to a Slime, butand I''m grateful nowI don''t think even Sister Velzado can beat Rimuru.

    Velgrynd didn''t get angry at Gazel''s words, her tone was calm.

    It''s not clear that I can beat Velzado who has one-sidedly beaten Veldora, but it does seem that Velgrynd was speaking from the heart.

    Its embarrassing to hear such a high opinion.

    Don''t be modest, it''s not luck that you beat me, it''s pure strength. It was an overwhelming victory, what are you talking about?

    There was shame in winning or losing because it was all in the past for Velgrynd. Now she had ovee that and honestly epted reality.

    This type of person is terrifying, and I''ve secretly raised my alert level on Velgrynd.

    Next, to get serious about your thoughts.

    The reality is that the enemy''s strength is not known, and it is impossible to predict how they will act, regardless of their aims or attemptsand what they will use to make people care.

    As the words were spoken, several people appeared on the huge screen.

    These people are the "enemies" that entered thebyrinth this time. Their strength is estimated to be around three million, and evenpared to our executives, they are still in the upper echelon.

    I will disclose all the information I know.

    At this point, Velgrynd spoke up as if to add.

    I''ve eliminated this one, but I have a word of advice. These people once helped Brother Veldanava in ancient times, and were a match for the Primordials. Their bodies are currently sealed, and those that appeared in thebyrinth were just weakened parallel bodies.

    Hearing that makes one wonder how to react.

    Because Velgrynd wiped out the other side so easily.

    <<velgrynd''s power="" has="" the="" effect="" of="" dimensional="" jump,="" which="" is="" ability="" velgrynd="" uses="" to="" jump="" towards=""ndmark="" rudras="" soul.="" there="" should="" be="" no="" problem="" using="" skill="">> I see</velgrynd''s>

    In other words, Velgrynd''s attack knocked down the essence connected to Cornus ''Parallel Body'', causing them to be wiped out together.

    <<thats right.="" by=""bining="" attacks="" that="" transcend="" time="" and="" space="" to="" create="" a="" ''continuous="" attack="" of="" space,''="" even="" ''parallel="" existence''="" cannot="" escape.="">> Really, it''s outrageous.</thats>

    Velgrynd was also too powerful to know exactly how much experience she had umted and was now in full control of her own powers.

    She was already powerful before, and now is even better.

    Veldora was still happy about learning about ''parallel existence'', and it turned out to bepletely pointless I''d feel a little sorry for Veldora if he knew about it.

    It wasn''t just me who didn''t know how to react.

    The Imperial congregation, as well as Gazel and the others, pondered carefully over what Velgrynd had said.

    The Empire can at least still rely Velgrynd as a trump card, but the problem is Dwargon.

    Can''t we win?

    Indeed, unfortunately, there''s no way to fight back.

    Ben!

    Its true. Theres no use trying to be strong. It''s time to tell the truth and think about countermeasures, isn''t it?

    Mmm, although what you said is correct

    Ben is right. Since we are against an invincible opponent, we have to think about what to do in case of an encounter. Sir Rimuru, on the basis of what Michael and the Demon King are up to, will we Dwargon be implicated?

    Woo-hoo, the probability should be lower.

    It probably doesn''t matter. It''s not that it''s safe, it''s just that it''s a lower priority.

    Hmm, so because the enemy''s aim is to resurrect Lord Veldanava, there is no Dwargon in their eyes anyway, is that right?

    It sounds rude, but I suppose.

    It''s okay. I''m embarrassed as a warrior, but I feel at ease as a king.

    Gazel finished and smiled bitterly.

    "So, speaking of means, is the enemy serious?"

    Kufufufufu, do they think that by gaining the power of Lord Veldora and Lord Velzado they can resurrect Lord Veldanava? All I can say is it''s a stupid idea.

    Lord Veldanava is immortal. It''s arrogant to try to resurrect him by human power.

    Diablo scoffed, and Benimaru was indignant.

    It''s still a mystery as to why Veldanava hasnte back to life, but it''s still true that the True Dragon Race is indestructible. I was in favor of the opinion that we should be relieved because it could not be described.

    If that''s the case, will the Dragon Empress be targeted as well? Calgurio pointed out sharply.

    Indeed, it would not be surprising at all if Miilim, who had inherited the power of Veldanava, would be targeted.

    Velgrynd answered the question.

    That possibility cannot be denied, but to strike at my brother''s beloved would be to put the cart before the horse. It''s possible for them to want power simply because they want it, but if they really want him to be resurrected, I hope they don''t do something that offends him.

    However, because Milim was strong and didn''t have an Angelic System''s Skill, and Carrion and Frey had also awakened, they shouldn''t need to worry too much.

    Since Velgrynd didn''t think it mattered either, it would probably be enough to just warn them.

    However, there is one more thing that concerns people.

    In that way, doesnt it sounds like Veldanava didnt care about his siblings?

    You''re a very rude man.

    Velgrynd was a little speechless at what I said, but not angry.

    Uh, I''m sorry, I''m an honest person. I was just

    It doesn''t matter.

    Lucky.

    Saved by Velgrynd''s forbearance.

    Ill reflect on this and be careful on what is said in the future.

    It doesnt matter. A True Dragon" is not the same as people who have an end in sight, and the same is true of Sister Velzado who did not care how many times she destroyed Veldora in the name of education.

    So, perhaps we are to wait for the resurrection of Brother Veldanava before liberating our forces.

    Ah, I understand.

    I think hell be resurrected after eating, just like the steps I took.

    In doing so, memories will be inherited, so whether or not the personality will change is simply not a matter of concern.

    This means Milim is not indestructible because she is not a true dragon species. If you kill Milim-sama, you will incur the wrath of the resurrected Veldanava-sama, right?

    Testarossa sums up Velgrynd''s words as I do, presumably to that effect.

    Well, in that case, let''s warn Milim to be on guard.

    Hearing my words, Velgrynd nodded.

    Then, her eyes turned to Masayuki.

    I look like someone else, butMasayuki, youre definitely being targeted, so you have to be very careful.

    Huh? Haven''t you given up yet?

    "Your Majestyunlike in the Labyrinth, you cannot be revived on Imperial soil! Please take care of yourself.

    "We will do our utmost to protect His Majesty, but after all, His Majesty needs to act on the basis of His Majesty''s consciousness.

    Okayuh, I mean, got it.

    After Masayuki''s uninspiring reply, the afternoon''s discussion was over.

    ***

    Dinner was luxurious.

    A full Western-style meal of Italian cuisine.

    Beetsa vegetable somewhat simr to thisstarting with soup, followed by casseroles and a confit of gizzards.

    This was followed by a slightly grilled gun head armored fish belly sashimi.

    Each one is an absolute gem, but it doesn''t end there.

    The restaurant serves a variety of fine dishes such as shrimp wanna cotta, battleship fish noodles, fortune crab spaghetti, and more.

    When the mushroom risotto was finished and the chopsticks were stopped, a seafood soup was served.

    The soup from which all the seafood acquisitions of the day are extracted, is a wonderful dish that changes the vor of dinner in each sip. A multi-ingredient blend that takes half a day to brew.

    It''s no exaggeration to say that it''s the chefs rare masterpiece, and is a hidden gem that you can''t even always eat once a year.

    And finally, the main course of the day.

    A veal deer fillet steak.

    Gently cut with a knife and served in the mouth, the tender, tender meat melts in your mouth.

    Delicious.

    It''s delicious.

    After eating, Benimaru and I gave each other a high five.

    No words are needed tomunicate, and that is enough.

    Today, everyone is eating in silence, and this attitude is proof of satisfaction.

    It was when the white wine and yogurt was served as dessert, that everyone finally said what they felt.

    What is this deliciousness!? As an imperial aristocrat, I consider myself to have tasted countless cuisines, but this is something else!!!

    I know, as a captive, I''ve always enjoyed the food here, but I''ve never enjoyed it as much as I have today. Thank you, Your Majesty Rimuru!

    Honestly, if you can eat this, you can be emperor.

    I''ve also learned to cook, but I can''t really make these things. I can tell from the food that I still must do my best.

    The Imperial congregation was highly appreciative.

    Dwargon''s side was not to be outdone.

    Rimuru, you''ve improved your cooking here. Is this you, Lady Shuna? I''d love to invite you to our country to teach us a few recipes.

    "Yes, I''m more of a wine lover, but these things are so different. It''s a shame that the portion is smaller, but it makes you want to eat more. A very calcted arrangement.

    Geez, I don''t think it''s been calcted, but I agree with you that every dish makes you want to eat it.

    Hah! It''s so delicious, it makes me think I''m leaving for the next world.

    "What are you talking about, Lady Jane? Youve eaten it all up.

    "Anrietta, you''re a real talker. Look at you. You''re eating the same amount!

    "What? It''s only polite not to point this out even if you know about it!

    They were basically satisfied with everything, but they just wanted to make rave about their food, and this time, the goal was achieved.

    By the way, even at times like this, Shion and Diablo were as usual.

    Diablo dedicated himself to serving and pouring wine, and Shion stood perfectly still as an escort.

    But, I know.

    Shuna whispered to me that Shion always sneaks food in the name of testing for poison. This time, she even tried the poison with an extra bowl. There is absolutely no need to worry about her going hungry.

    ***

    We take a break after the meal.

    The location changed to the meeting room and the big guys enjoyed coffee while chatting.

    Just as the group was chatting about the food, Gazel suddenly spoke to them.

    "On the other hand, Rimuru, there''s something that bothers me.

    "What is it?

    It''s something you did.

    Um?

    The executives headed by Lord Benimaru over thereyoure the one who made them evolve, right?

    Ah, yes.

    Ah, that''s a sign towards being reprimanded.

    Don''t juste out of the blue like that.

    Just give me a moment to think about it.

    Just as I tensed my body, Gazel continued with a bitter smile.

    Don''t be so nervous, I won''t be angry. It did scare me when I first heard Jane talk about it, but now I''vee to understand that it was a necessary thing to do.

    That''s right. That''s right.

    Whew.

    He didn''t seem to be angry, so I was relieved.

    It''s just that itll be a lot of trouble to exin to other countries, wont it?

    What do you mean?

    What, didn''t you think of that? The Western Nations, the Western Saints Church, and Sarion are all watching this war closely, and the final deration must be made and the process must be exined.

    I was just going to muddle through properly

    As for mypanions evolving to the level of an awakened demon lord, as long as they shut up and don''t say anything, no one should understand.

    It shouldn''t be a problem if the deception went well.

    That should be okay with the West. Blumund may be a little suspicious, along with some other countries, but the rest of the world is blurred. There may be some doubt, but the Jura Tempest Federation will be an ally. You will not be bullish, right?

    In that case, there''s nothing wrong

    "However! That woman can''t be fooled, and will definitely ask for a formal exnation, what are you going to do?

    Um, that woman?

    Ah, you mean her!

    What, you mean El-chan? It doesn''t matter. I already told her.

    Elmesia was so worried about this war that she said so in conversation with me and Myourmiles.

    Elmesia said that in the worst case scenario she would take in the refugees from our area.

    Myourmiles, Elmesia, and I had an emergency contact as a conspiracy trio (Three Drunken Sages).

    It is a high performance magic prop that looks like a small folding type, which is actually a "mobile phone.

    This was based on the idea generated by yman''s skill, using electrical wave signals to form a cipher with geomaic gas, a quality product that could make usual business calls without being interrupted by magic.

    However, the materials used are so scarce and the production price is so high that even the executives cant easily get them. This is an indication of how expensive it is.

    With this, I was able to talk directly to Elmesia. So before the banquet had started, I gave a notice saying I won along with a victory report.

    El-chans reply was "OK, I''m relieved. I''m going to listen to it properly next time, and I''m going to y it again haha," so there was absolutely nothing for Gazel to worry about.

    But

    El-chan!?

    Gazel shouted.

    Then stared at me with a look of disbelief.

    Huh?

    Was there anything surprising in what I just said?

    Don''t be stupid! How did you get so close to that Emperor!?

    Ah, that.

    Well, I''m pretty good at this kind of thing.

    No matter how tricky the person, start with a conversation and, most importantly, a good understanding of what exactly the other person is asking for.

    In the past, when I was a supervisor at the construction site, there were outrageousints from nearby residents, but if you just calm down and listen to the other party''s statements, you can easily solve any unexpected problems.

    Of course, there are times when there is ack of approach.

    In those cases, the short answer is to listen first.

    Always listen.

    Just by doing this, the other person will gradually feel a sense of closeness, think that you understand, and slowly ept you.

    Or rather, it''s buying time to wait for the problem to be solved.

    There''s no need to do anything about the situation, just listen to the narrative and work with him, and that''s all it takes to develop intimacywell, back to that.

    So, the most important thing in my outlook on life is how I get along with others and how I interact with them.

    The same is true with Elmesia, who was already a close friend by the time I noticed.

    Could it be the alcohol?

    I''ve forgotten that kind of thing.

    Forgetting what is against you is excellent worldly practice. Of course, it''s important to remember to reflect and avoid repeated failures.

    It''s a hard thing to do, and I''m still practicing.

    How it''s done is a secret. We''re all getting along now, anyway.

    There''s no need to be honest about the experience of failure at the wine table.

    But Gazel couldn''t seem to take it.

    "Rimuru, for the Celestial Emperor of Sarion, it is difficult to meet with her, and waiting for an audience normally takes a few months. Even if I apply from Dwargon, it takes half a year. That woman has a long life, so a month is like a day in her eyesand yet you''re in easy contact with her!

    Well.

    Yes, yes, Your Majesty, Rimuru! The Empire also values Sarion, not expecting this level of connection

    Even Calgurio and others joined in.

    ording to these people, the Empire saw Sarion as the biggest threat, and it was said that there were many unheard of magical guides over there that were originally intended to be thest to attack.

    After listening to the instructions from Calgurio and Minute, Gazel nodded as well.

    After all, it was a military power that could devour the entire western economic circle by itself, and it was normal for them to react in this way.

    And the ease with which we can contact the heads of such great powers without an appointment, even if I don''t know much about it, is really a bit incredible.

    But after all, it is a fact.

    Ahahaha, huh, well, this? Guess I was lucky.

    Well, for Lord Rimuru, it''s a matter of course.

    Yes! Rather, it is the other party who is lucky!

    Diablo and Shion praised me from the sidelines. At this kind of time I wish you guys would keep your mouths shut.

    Seeing Gazel sigh heavily, I thought even more so.

    Minute, however, unexpectedly agreed with Shion and others.

    Indeed, it is understandable that the Heavenly Emperor would react in such a way as to discover the true value of His Majesty Rimuru.

    Calgurio nodded in agreement.

    "Yeah, if it''s that terrifying Heavenly Emperor, something of this magnitude should be within easy reach. Our empire has always thought that the country''s magical warriors would not move, which is exactly what the emperor thought. Then it would be dangerous to target our country when the situation is not good for His Majesty Rimuru."

    It seems they are more wary of Sarion than I thought.

    Although I didn''t feel it was a dangerous country, it was reassuring to be friendly.

    El-chan had invited us to y at her ce and to be sure to visit and learn about it then.

    "This information must have been hidden, but our intelligence service considers us to be"

    "No, unfortunately, I haven''t heard of it either. Still, it''s so long ago for me, it''s possible to just forget.

    Minute''s statement, which was dismissed with a cheerful face by Velgrynd, struck me as a rather stubborn person who definitely remembers even if it was a long time ago.

    "Geez, do you have something you want to say to me?

    "No, no

    Scary, as if she was reading my heart.

    These types of people are usually difficult to deal with and it''s best not to piss her off.

    You have to be careful about what you say about the "Three Drunk Sages.

    I secretly swore that as the night passed.

    ***

    The next morning, Gazel and his entourage went back.

    For their part, Calgurio and others followed the well-developed guidelines and began to make preparations for their return home.

    The work was still underway, and the construction was taken over by Adalman''s men, some of whom wanted to stay in the country, but also had to give priority to settling the empire before thinking about immigration.

    They are expected to leave within a week after preparation.

    In this way, we discover the problem, think about the countermeasures, and confirm the status quo.

    There''s basically no problem on the Empire''s side.

    I just have to wait for Testarossa''s contact and watch and see before the situation changes.

    There was a slight concern on the Dwarf Kingdom''s side.

    In case the Killing Angel-ss enemies appeared, Gazels side should be in a bitter fight.

    However, with Dwargon as a natural fortress and the metropolitan area equipped with multiple defense structures, it will not be easy to break through, so theyll just contact us while the defense is on.

    I gave Gazel a "cell phone, to let him use it as he sees fit.

    One more thing.

    I decided to send Agera forward to Gazel''s side.

    Gazel had told me he wanted to continue training and rebuilding himself.

    Agera had also said that he wanted to calm his (her) debauched mind.

    Said there was a lot to worry about.

    Carrera didn''t say anything, just went with the whatever Agera liked.

    I knew what was going on in Agera, but I was still having trouble answering, and everyone needed some time at the moment, so I epted the proposal.

    This way, even Dwargon can withstand a protracted war.

    Of course, it''s best not to have a problem, and in case something happens, it should be manageable.

    The kingdom of Farmenas, where Youm and the others were, also took care of it.

    Diablo sent Gedora over to ount for these circumstances, and I did not arrange for a personal interview with Gedora, who seemed to have left two days earlier.

    While Gedora had the duties of a Labyrinth Guardian, the key Floor Guardian Colossus was gone.

    Even the wreckage wasn''t there and it had to be made from scratch.

    The researchers seemed to rejoice that they wanted to test the new function with the new shaft.

    It made my wallet a little nervous, but luckily it would be the treasury that would be burdened this time. I just tell them to produce something that would satisfy.

    It will take time until the day it''s done, so well let Gedora stay in Farmenas for now.

    As for the Kingdom of Blumund and the Western States,

    Shion was dealing with this aspect, and Zonda had sent over support. The demons are basically able to

    ''space transfer'', and most of the situation should be handled.

    Honestly, these ces have little strategic value, so I''m not going to go any stronger than that either.

    If the enemymits acts of genocide, Guy would not sit idly by.

    Guy doesn''t want the human race to perish and is sure to make a move.

    Plus, there''s Ruminas over there too.

    If the situation hadn''t been so serious as to require Guy to step in, Ruminas and the Pdins should have responded.

    The Three Drunk Sages have also been informed of the incident, so that Glenda and the others will act in secret to buy time in case of any situation, which should be close.

    By the way, I also gave Glenda a "cell phone.

    It''s not for her personally, it''s to serve as a means ofmunication between the Three Drunk Sages.

    With this, we''ll be able to take countermeasures at any time, so we''ll just have to wait for contact from the western countries.

    Well, so be it.

    The rest of the question is what happens when some unexpected betrayer shows up.

    <> No, no, no, its not so much a waste as to not think about.</about>

    Being prepared can affect your ability to cope with unexpected situations.

    So, after looking at the damage in various areas in the office, I started thinking about the important things that mattered most. I told Gazel to warn anyone who was awakened, about the ultimate skills of the Angelic Systembut I was staring at his face which was as if his expression had fallen off.

    Then, quietly to me

    "Listen, Rimuru, the ultimate skill is a secreta secret that is said to have been acquired by the first Dwarven hero, Gran Dwargon, and yet it is still considered an important matter of unknown truth that few people know about, not even Ben and Dorf! And you guysdont talk like it''s amon thing to have ultimate skills!

    yeah right.

    He ended up being drunk on the head, but he spoke as if it wasmon sense in this world.

    That is to say, there are very few people who know about the existence of ultimate skills, and there is currently no way to find out who has it in the angelic system.

    Worrying about this is purely a matter of finding guilt, so I''m going to ignore it.

    At that time.

    However, when I calmed down and reconsidered, it seemed surprisingly discernable.

    At least, Guy and Ruminas are reliable.

    Leons strength is also unusual, and feels like it he has it.

    Dagruel is still unknown, but since Dino has it, it''s better to act as if he has it too, so it doesn''t feel like a failure.

    That''s right, speaking of Dagruel

    I recall that Ruminas, from what she had heard of the future from Chloe, had said that Dagruel would ride the Empire to war and start a war. However, it doesn''t seem to have developed this time.

    There should be some sort of a reason for this, orpulsion by whom.

    If it was Michael''s doing, then there is a way to formte a response, and there is also a need to talk about it.

    What''s the situation on Milim''s side?

    Maybe it''s just that I don''t know, and it''s not surprising that there''s even one on her.

    Just talking to Milim should tell us what''s going on with Carrion and Frey.

    Just as I was thinking about all this

    "Can you hear me? A Walpurgis is now being held, and although it is unexpected, everybody must attend. Over.

    Suddenly there was a voice in my head.

    Ratherthis is

    My line of sight turned to the forgotten ring I was wearing on the pinky finger of my right hand.

    This is the Demon Lord Ring that you receive when you became a Demon Lord.

    That is to say, it was from Guy''s voiceing out.

    I''ve never been able to use this function, so I had forgotten about it.

    No, this is not the time for me to think about these things.

    Shion, go get Shuna.

    Yes!

    Watching Shion rush out happily, I looked to Diablo.

    Its from Guy. It looks like we''re having a Walpurgis.

    Oh, it''s not in Guy''s style not to contact in advance. It''s a bit iprehensible that Guy personally contacted in the first ce.

    I feel the same way.

    Guy is so self-respecting and arrogant, and is so calm in his ways.

    It was said that even his subordinates were not allowed to speak to Guy on their own initiativethere was a nasty feeling about that.

    I heard you called me.

    Rimuru, it''s a big deal! Guy actually came to us in person, something must have happened!!!

    Shuna came in, but even Ramiris, who hadn''t been called, came along with Beretta and Treyni.

    This guy is also a demon lord, and if he is a demon lord, he naturally wears a demon ring.

    ording to Ramiris, it was very rare for Guy to host a Walpurgis himself.

    There seemed to have been times in the past when there were only these three Demon Lord, Ramiris, Milim, and Guy, and nothing of the sort seemed to have happened in thest thousand years.

    When its all said and done, it must be an emergency.

    That''s it. Shuna, there''s no time to go into detail now, but I''m taking Shion and Diablo to the Walpurgis. Tell Benimaru of my absence and leave everything to him.

    Shuna nodded shrewdly.

    "Understood. Good luck, Lord Rimuru!"

    I finished nodding my head and prepared myself.

    Then waited quietly for the pick-up.

    Not a momentter, a blue-haired Rhein in a dark red maid outfit jumped space and appeared.

    Granted, Ramiris had given permission to enter and exit the maze, but it was odd that she''de out of nowhere like this.

    Only there''s no time to care about that right now.

    Because, Rhein is covered in wounds.

    That means my premonition was spot on.

    Rhein, are you okay?

    What the hell?

    Faced with Ramiris'' and my surprised questions, Rhein shook her head silently.

    Don''t worry about me. We''ll exin when we''re all together. Please move first.

    It''s not like I can say anything more when she says that.

    The only thing to do is move along with Rhein.

    Arriving at our destination, we will face new problems head-on.

 Volume 16 - Epilogue

    Epilogue: Guy Crimson

    He was born very far back in the ages, before the creation of heaven and earth.

    His birth was a mere coincidence.

    The seven original angels were created by Veldanava, the God of creation, out of the Divine Spirit of

    "light", and the people who were their shadows were born.

    Those were the original seven primordials, the demon kings, which were born out of the Great Spirit of

    "darkness".

    He is the original primordial that ruled the dark world, representing the rootsthe underworld.

    Since his birth, he had been an absolute powerhouse, the embodiment of darkness.

    An arrogant king, leading the demon race as he pleased.

    Even the other primordial who belonged to the same darkness were, in his view, only equal to the many dependents.

    Once in a bid for supremacy, when two of the primordials teamed up to challenge him, he subdued the two to the ground without a second thought.

    These things seemed to him no more than child''s y, but at the time he understood one thing.

    That is, the "primordials" were indestructible. However, if the nucleus of the heart is crushed, they will be resurrected in the form of bing a subordinate of the victor.

    As spiritual beings, they are subordinate to each other once defeated.

    When this fact was revealed, the remaining four primordials fell into a state of deadlock.

    Nope.

    One particr primordial troubled him, but even this, because he had been summoned to the earth, parted from his fate.

    Was it a coincidence that he was summoned to the ground

    There is no way to confirm it now.

    But it is a fact that his fate was thus greatly altered.

    Having been summoned, he looked around.

    He who lived peacefully in the Underworld had nothing to do with the time flowing on the earth.

    What was thought to be a newly formed world has given birth to civilization.

    He realized in an instant that he had been summoned.

    That is, by the power that can rewrite even thews of the worldmagic.

    The power originally possessed in the Underworld hade to be limited here, and now he could only exert the level of power of a mere new Upper Demon General. Even then, in his opinion, it was enough, but it was just inconvenient to not have a physical body.

    He thought about why this was so and immediately understood.

    This was a semi-material world, not part of the realm of activity of spiritual beings, and in a space that was not filled with magical elements, just staying here would consume a lot.

    He, who has nothing to do with the God of creation, cannot understand how the world has changed.

    It''s really funny, he thought.

    However, the loud and noisy guy in front of him made him feel a little ufortable.

    In front of him, the strongest of the Underworld, no one dared to do such reckless and stupid things.

    It was also because of this that he was slightly in the mood to deal with this summoner.

    The wizard who had summoned him out spoke in a particrly remarkable tone.

    It was the originalnguage, and thenguage of magic, so it didn''t take much effort for him to understand.

    Patiently listening to the conversation across the room, he discovered something very interesting.

    There are nations in this worldpeting with each other for supremacy.

    Elves, dwarves, beastmen, vampires, and humans, all sorts of races seem to bepeting for survival.

    The wizard was truly a human. A high human?

    "You have be my servant. Follow my orders in ordance with the principles of the world.

    The man said arrogantly.

    In order to unify the world and eliminate the rivals vying for supremacy, this country called the Super Magic Empire gave the order.

    It was a very simple thing for him to do.

    The war, which hadsted for a hundred years, came to an end with his appearance.

    All he did was use one spell.

    It was a forbidden maguclear strike magic: the blessing of death.

    With the power of mass destruction magic that can even destroy souls, thergest nation with a poption of over a million became the capital of death.

    They were all taken for granted and irrelevant to him.

    But there was an interesting change.

    After acquiring arge number of human souls," he perceived that he was awakening, and as a result, he sessfullypleted the fleshing with millions of corpses.

    The sleepiness he experienced for the first time made him feelfortable, and it was a pleasure to fight it.

    This was the birth of the world''s first "true demon lord".

    After gaining the power, he realized that he had broken free from the magic that bound him.

    It would have been easy to break the spell, but it would have been too much of a bummer to just pop it off without doing anything.

    It seems that his awakening began when he harvested the "souls" of 10,000 humans and the restrictions of the race were lifted and he evolved into a demon lord.

    Even so, it didn''t reach a fraction of his strength when he was in the Underworld, but it was enough to make him an unmatched presence on earth.

    What would happen if more "souls" were collected? He wondered with interest.

    There were some who were just the right people to experiment with.

    Those who threw all the chores at him should return the favor ordingly.

    Returning to the original city, one by one, killing those who appeared in sight. The mass destruction magic was unused in order to avoid involving the targeted man.

    At this point, I felt the cries of those who were going to die engraved on the "soul".

    Giiyaa!

    Screams like this.

    Hearing this, he suddenly thought.

    Yes, perhaps that is my name."

    That''s it.

    The changes are dramatic.

    He, Guy, had evolved again.

    Bing a demon lord regained all the power he had when he was in the Underworld.

    The acquired "souls" gave Guy power.

    The maximized vessel was filled to the brim, fully restoring his mana amount.

    But the changes stopped there.

    Any further action by Guy would have lost its meaning.

    He summoned the two primordials that follow him and gives the order.

    Quickly wipe out the Super-Magic Empire from the ground.

    Guy also gained a name by bing an Awakened Demon Lord, so his mood became very generous.

    The insignificant wizard wasn''t even worth his trouble to torment, and was even wiped from his memory.

    "How, how!? How did you escape from my secret arts!?

    There was a fool who barked like that, but Guy''s consciousness didn''t pay any attention to that, and it was lucky for the wizard that he was killed by the demons without understanding anything.

    On that day tens of thousands of years ago, thergest nation in the history of mankind, caught in a divisive struggle, was wiped out in this very simple manner.

    The two primordials that Guy had summoned were also degraded into upper demon general level.

    That''s thew of this world, transitioning from the underworld to the semi-material world would make one lose most of its power.

    Just crossing different realms was a breeze for spiritual beings, but staying in this world, just maintaining existence, consumed a lot.

    That''s why a body is needed.

    It is through fleshly evolution that one begins to be able to settle down in this world.

    Understanding this, Guy waited for the evolution of his followers.

    However, no matter how many human "souls" are gathered, the two primordials have not evolved.

    So he gave them the honor of the corpses, the flesh.

    It''s this thing that can serve as evidence that Guy is in a good mood.

    Those two primordials are, the original green and the original blue.

    Their human form is a beautiful woman.

    Looking at the women kneeling in front of him, Guy suddenly thought.

    There is no point in even receiving flesh if there is no way to further strengthen them.

    Just chores could be given to them, but their power was too fragile.

    So Guy graciously bestowed them names.

    Thinking about the name evolution he got, he thought the two primordials would evolve simrly.

    "Let your name be given to you. You who belong to me are too weak for my dignity to allow.

    Guy so dered.

    To the Green Primordial, ''Mizari'' was selected from the cries of grief the mourner had given to her.

    To Blue Primordial, he gave her the name "Rhein" because of the rain on that day.

    As Guy had thought, they evolved into demon lords.

    That''s the beginning.

    This is what happened the day Guy first left footprints in human history.

    ***

    The happy and uneventful days went on.

    Guy usually takes pleasure in wandering around.

    The asional annoyance didn''t bother Guy.

    Mizari and Rhein are always around to take care of Guy''s daily routine.

    "You two, cant you live as you please?

    Guy told them so, but their answers never changed.

    "No, my mission is to serve Lord Guy.

    "That''s right. You are the king and we are the subjects. This is the eternal truth.

    And just like that, the trip of the three continued.

    Meanwhile, Mizari and Rhein summoned their own dependents and quietly built up a sphere of influence.

    To provide all the riches and pleasures of this world to the dominant Guy.

    Unlike in the past, when life in the underworld was all about fighting and spending time refining the intensity of ones "soul" for themselves, this world is full of excitement.

    There''s no stagnation, and they are always evolving.

    Cooking, music, acting, dancing, fine arts, and all sorts of other things that keep Guys and their interests endless.

    "Hey, hey, isn''t this fun too?

    The dancing Guy, who was attending the festivities in the minority colony, smiled at the girls.

    Faced with the rare smile of their hosts, Mizari and Rheins glee reached their peak.

    "It''s great. I thought human beings who are fragile and worthless, but there is something useful.

    "Everything in this world is Lord Guy''s property. Tools are meaningful if they are used skillfully.

    In this way, they have changed the perception of humanity.

    Mizari and Rhein learned a variety of skills on the trip to keep Guy happy. Using the experience of time, cooking andundry, singing and dancing, and even ying musical instruments, these are the foundations of being a maid of honor.

    It''s also a growth.

    In the Underworld, the weak are eliminated. Races other than the Demon Race are banished, and only ves who can find exploitation value can be enlisted.

    But in this world, the weak also have some value.

    Understanding this, one would think it would be a pity to destroy this world.

    Guy put it this way.

    "It''s so cute, a human being. It''s stupid, but not obnoxious.

    There are stupid people, and there are excellent people.

    Ugly emotions are disgusting, beautiful emotions are deliciousand the best food for Guy and them.

    In Guy''s view, there are too many individual differences in the creature known as a human" to make a generalization about them.

    The Guy of this period was very gentle with humans.

    The actions of the evil sorcerers, who banished the horrible magical beasts that threatened viges everywhere, and eliminated the suspected survivors of the Super-Magical Empire, were praised and passed on to theter generations, bing myths and legends.

    And then he met

    The Creator of this world, the Supreme and Most Powerful Being.

    Guy, who enjoyed the calm days, was still always keenly aware.

    So it was immediately obvious.

    It was the Star King Dragon, Veldanava, who created this world.

    "If you are the true God, show me your power!

    Guy smiled fearlessly.

    Not in the slightest doubt that he was the strongest, he rightfully challenged Veldanava.

    The result is a defeat.

    Guy just sank to the ground,pletely unable to mount any more strikes.

    His great pride, which he never doubted, was shattered at this point.

    Following thew that failure is subordination to the other side, Guy should have be an attendant of Veldanava.

    However, Guy''s pride prevented him from doing so.

    "Kill me. I am content. I understand that there are people outside of people and mountains outside of mountains. My existence, indeed, is included in that endless and continuous theory. O great being, I am proud to have lost to you.

    The defeated Guy said proudly.

    Veldanavaughed bitterly.

    "Little one, I love these existences that I have created, and the world that used to be boring is bing more and more colorful and full of wisdom as people are born and evolve to be able tomunicate with me. Now, there are even strong men like you who can withstand fighting with me."

    "Ha, that''s nice to say! My attacks didn''t hit once, and you just attacked once and this is how I''ve be.

    "Oh, but didn''t you still take it? No one could have challenged me, but you did. Just that alone makes me very happy.

    "Let''s call it that."

    "Well, that''s it. And there''s something I''d like to ask you.

    "Ask me?:

    A euphoric sense of satisfaction filled Guy''s heart.

    That is why he listened to what Veldanava said.

    "Ahhh, if this rate of growth continues, the world will be destroyed in a few thousand years. Because humans are creatures who make mistakes, right actions are not righteous, and sometimes evil actions will save the world. But it''s this imperfection that makes it so lovely If the world is going to end, it''s not my intention.

    To help keep the world from falling apart, Veldanava said so.

    Guy thought back to the super-magical empire that had been wiped out in the past.

    Seduced by the lust for dominance and power, the scandal of kin fighting each other.

    Well certainly, that was indeed ugly. If left unchecked, maybe the world will end.

    Although Guy understood it that way, he still had a doubt.

    "Mmm. That preconception is the same as mine, but a bit iprehensible.

    "What is it?"

    "Aren''t you the Creator? As the God who created us should be able to lead the world to its desired oue. What need is there to rely on me?

    "Hahahaha, that''s because I''m not omniscient and omnipotent. At the time of birth, there was only my own consciousness, which wasplete andcking nothing. The whole thing, the whole hat is to say, there''s only me in the world, isn''t that boring?

    I see, Guy thought.

    He understood.

    That is to say, Veldanava, by his own will, gave up the "omniscience and omnipotence.

    Indeed, it would be boring to see all the results.

    Inparison to one''s own experience, it''s also boring to just win and not lose.

    In the Underworld, everyone except for one person was afraid of Guy.

    The demons that dared to challenge Guy hadn''t been around for a long time.

    It is not impossible that God would give up "omniscience and omnipotence" when even a Guy who is no better than Veldanava is like that.

    "I don''t hate this world, so let me help you.

    There''s nothing to hesitate about.

    Guy also loves this world.

    Unrted to subordination, Guy was genuinely trying to help.

    Veldanava nodded happily.

    "Thank you. I want you to be my agent, as a "mediator" to watch over the world.

    "Huh? An agent? Is it okay not to give me an order?"

    "Of course. I told you, didn''t I? Whatever happens, it''s not meant to be forced.

    "Yeah, well, what should I do?"

    "Go on and wander the world as before, and establish a stronghold as king. Anything to keep humans from bing prideful, anything to tell them there''s a threat to the world.

    Pride.

    Hearing that word, Guy felt really suited to his role.

    "Yeah. In that case, I wille to earth as the "demon lord" that mankind fears. If there are absolute enemies, there will be no time for humans to fight each other.

    Its funny, thats it! Well, it''ll make you y a nasty character, so be it.

    "Leave it to me.

    Just then.

    Guy''s heart form became concrete and gained the unique skill ''Prideful One''.

    Guy dered.

    "I will be the Demon Lord of this world, and if men be prideful, I will judge them for you."

    Guy''s mind became more profound because of the crushing glory.

    This led to the birth of the Demon Lord, who had the power to rival the gods.

    Veldanava smiled.

    "You''re so reliable. Lets do our best together, my friend!

    "Ahhh, let me enjoy myself.

    In this way, Guy and Veldanava recognized each other and crossed the barriers of position to be equal friends.

    ***

    As promised, Guy began to live his life as a demon lord.

    In an effort to relieve boredom, therge viges that sprang up everywhere were monitored and soon became viges, which in turn gathered together and grew into a nation.

    Although it seems a bit crudepared to the super-civilization of the past, the magic and technology that was quietly inherited has been reproduced at a fairly fast pace.

    It''s interesting to watch humans operate.

    Unknowingly several countries were born, and small-scale skirmishes began again

    Shouldn''t have done it - Guy doesn''t like to be bothered and practices activism.

    As a warning, he wiped out the country he had his eye on.

    The people feared the threat that was visible to the naked eyethe demon lord Guy.

    In response to such a threat, a heart of unity began to be cultivated.

    That''s good, as long as they don''t touch my scales, I won''t destroy you.

    As a "mediator", Guy is quite content with his job.

    Just as Guy was getting busy, Mizari and Rhein drove the troops to bring arge force into domination, crushing the local gods, evil spirits, and monsters, gradually raising awareness.

    Mizari even infiltrates human society and conducts espionage as a means of obtaining information for detailed investigation and picking out those who need to be purged.

    The aim is to create a sense of tension in human society by giving a moderate amount of terror.

    The "Demon Lord" was established as a system.

    In this way, Guy had nothing special to do.

    Just wandering the world and enjoying the battles at will.

    Even the legions of giants, who could make even Veldanavas entourage, the Seven Seraphims, difficult to deal with, were ravaged and subdued on their own.

    It was also a pleasure to receive themission from Veldanava to fight with the Dragon Ivaraj, whose instinct to fight was very strong, much to Guy''s satisfaction.

    Only, there were problems.

    His strength was tooparable, and the battlested for three months. Moreover, he eventually escaped to another world.

    And because of this great battle of Guys rampage, the earth became barren and a vast wilderness.

    Next time he wanted to get serious, it was necessary to consider the locationGuy learned a very useful lesson.

    Guy looked out at the continent from the sky.

    Then he found a castle to be used to make an impression.

    It was the ce where Guy had been summoned to this worldthe Imperial City of the Super-Magic Empire.

    Sensing that it was some kind of destiny, Guy decided to make it his castle.

    Rhein quickly summoned her men, improved the living environment, used magic, and the castle was rebuilt in no time.

    Just then.

    A white dragon challenged Guy.

    It was a beautiful dragon with a pair of deep sea-colored eyes.

    He didnt know what she misunderstood, but the moment she opened her mouth it was a quarrel.

    "I don''t approve of you even if brother approves!"

    After saying that, she charged at Guy in a furious manner.

    His previous lesson had made Guy understand that one had to choose the ce to fight based on the strength of the opponent, but this dragon had blown ice and snow directly from above the castle.

    There''s no time to think about destruction now.

    The survivors had long since been evacuated and the castle would have to be rebuilt again, and while it might be hard for Rhein and her minions, it didn''t matter to Guy.

    Guy was in a state of displeasure ever since Dragon Ivaraj had escaped, so his mood was high with the appearance of a new enemy.

    Enjoying it all the way, Guy took it seriously and made opponents with her.

    But

    Even though they gave it their all, they couldnt decide who was winning or losing.

    The dragon is the sister of the Star King Dragon, Veldanava. The eldest daughter of the True Dragon Race, White Ice Dragon Velzado.

    The amount of mana she possessed was second only to Veldanava''s, and even Guy couldn''t knock her down.

    But ording to Velzado, it''s Guy who is the anomaly.

    After all, Guy only had a unique skill, and in the opinion of Veldanava, who had transferred the ultimate skill Patience King Gabriel'' to Velzado, a draw was definitely not possible.

    "Why is it that youre an even match for me even though you only have a unique skill?

    "Hah! That''s because, I''m strong.

    "Don''t be ridiculous! My brother gave me this power, not you. Thats proof that Ive been acknowledged as more useful than you!

    "That''s not quite right. He said he would give me strength, but I refused. I''d ept it if I chose to work under him, but I''m in a reciprocal rtionship with the guy, so I

    In order to gain her brother''s approval, Velzado had challenged Guy with jealousy.

    And it was right there in front of her that Guy demonstrated the evolution of his power.

    The opportunity was given because of seeing the power of Veldanava. And also now, by fighting with Velzado, he saw the capacity of what the ultimate skill is like to exist.

    "I''m going to go to the top of the world in my own strength.

    And at that moment.

    The unique skill Prideful One" had evolved into the ultimate skill "Pride King Lucifer".

    Velzado was speechless at the sight.

    Then I''ll keep watching to see how far you go with it.

    Velzado''s real purpose seemed to be to test Guy, and it wasn''t clear if he passed or not. In short, the two had been moving forward together ever since.

    That was how Guy and Velzado met.

    After three days and three nights of fighting, even the earths axis had changed.

    But this time, Guy had done a wonderful job, and the permafrost, which had been uninhabited until now, had been turned into evergreen earth. In its ce, the continent designated as a stronghold by Guy had be uninhabitable frozen earth.

    "I think that''s as far as it goes.

    "That''s great, it''s Guy-sama!"

    "There should be no problem. Mankind has suffered some losses, but the nations have responded to the changes in the heavens and the earth in unison, and sacrifices have been kept to a minimum.

    To the upants, it was a catastrophe, but to Guy it was nothing more than aughing matter.

    For Rhein and Mizari, as long as Guy was happy, they were content.

    Guy''s castle had instead be more beautiful due to the fallout from this battle, which was covered in ice.

    "It''s good. As a memento, let''s keep it that way.

    "Then I''ll take care of it. I''ll help you with that little matter.

    It was easy to assist. Because of the demon qi leaking from Velzado, the temperature around the area dropped to the limit, and from then on, the castle became too frigid for it to be invaded by the weak.

    Since she has to live in the castle, Velzado''s dragon form is an inconvenience.

    When Guy pointed this out, Velzado assumed a human appearance.

    If Velzado had maintained an adult form, she would have controlled her demon aura perfectly, but instead she chose to maintain a slightly younger form. This way, the leaking demon qi would turn cold and the castle''s defense would be perfect.

    Many magical creatures, not to mention humans, cannot survive these frigid conditions, so there is absolutely no one to attack

    "How about this?

    "Yes, it''s not bad, but it''s not my interest.

    "Really! You''ve got a bad heart.

    Velzado, though sheined about it outwardly, was actually very fond of Guy in her heart.

    Whispering in her heart, she vowed to one day use her charm to make Guy turn to her.

    ***

    Another few hundred years passed.

    The days without wind or waves went on and on, but one day was different than usual.

    The bored and unbearable Guy, had a visitor.

    It was a small team of three.

    They breezed into the harsh cold where no one could enter.

    Guy was interested, watching them closely.

    At this point, the blonde youth standing at the front shouted.

    "This is Rudra, the prince of the Nazca kingdom. The "hero" who carries the hopes of the people

    Rudra Nazca! You evil demon lord, Ill use my sword to destroy you! By the way, give me all the treasures of your legendary collection!

    This deration doesn''t sound at all like something a nobleman would say.

    But this unabashed desire satisfied Guy.

    "Brother Rudra, I can''t tell whos in the wrong between you and the Demon Lord when youre being like this!

    "Yeah, Rudra''s not good enough. Hes already overwhelmed by greed. If he wants money, I can just earn it for him.

    "Really! Sister-inw, please don''t pamper Brother Rudra. If this continues, he will surely suffer the consequences of his failure.

    In front of Guy, the three were still chatting like this.

    Is this bravery, or is it stupidity?

    Only one thing is certain.

    For them to be able to stand in front of Guy would mean beating Mizari and Rhein.

    This suggests that this ridiculous trio possesses a considerable level of strength.

    And, Guy found that one of the three had the same presence as his friend, his partner, and for that very reason he was not prepared to me Mizari and Rhein for their failure.

    This, like thews of nature, was only the expected ending.

    What''s more important now is

    Hero? What''s that?

    Those words, when he heard for the first time, sounded very sweet.

    That word gave Guy the feeling that his boredom would be blown away.

    Guy was happy to confront the youth who called himself Rudra.

    Funny. The power of the Herolets see what it''s like!"

    So Guy epted the challenge of the youth, Rudra.

    "Hmph! I''m the strongest and dont need help at all. Demon, let''s go one on one!

    Rudra was handsome, but that smile he had now was slightly nasty.

    His purpose was less to defeat Guy and more to seize Guy''s treasure.

    But Guy thinks that''s what makes him truly human.

    Without desire, people do not work.

    Because they want a better life, they work hard.

    Rudra is a solid human being.

    A man with the type of sweet emotions that Guy loves.

    "Hah! Try hard to resist!

    And the battle began.

    Guy watched as Rudra approached.

    Although this blow was sharp and swift, it was not a serious blow, and the fact that he was using himself as an opponent to make a trial was irritating to Guy.

    Rudra wore a finely crafted full-body magical armor.

    It felt like something that was quite expensive, so Guy decided to break it first.

    Seems like he''s pretty money hungry and should hate having his stuff broken.

    In any case, hell make it difficult on purpose.

    After dodging Rudra''s sword with ease, a knee strikeactually a feint, really a cross kickis thrown.

    Rudra was just in time to avoid the attack, but failed to deal with the change and waspletely kicked in the right direction, resulting in shattered armor.

    Ahhhhhh!! Armor worth a year''s worth of the national budget!

    "Are you all right, brother?

    "Rudra is such a fool. If we all went together in the first ce, the armor wouldnt have broken.

    "Shut up! Thisthis is a necessary expense!

    Rudra became teary-eyed, and Guy felt a sly smile that had a better effect than he had imagined.

    Next, Ill break his sword, so hell cry.

    Guy observes the three of them while thinking so.

    But then.

    "Brother! At least use support magicHoly de Unleashed!

    The girl with the golden cherry blossom (tinum pink) hair, who he had initially thought was the most harmless, exercised a ridiculous magic.

    The sword Rudra was holding began to glow.

    It was a jaw-dropping divine aura that destroyed the evil breaking light.

    This is not good. That light, it seems, has enough power to cut through my "barrier."

    He should have been stopped before it wasunched, but Guy was enjoying the fight. In that case, it was less interesting to get in the way.

    "Well, If I just think of it as my sister giving cheering me on, then its eptablebut Lucia, stay out of this!

    Rudra is more focused on results than glory.

    Even with the help of his sister, he epts itpletely unashamedly.

    This guy, what a character.

    While not yet in crisis, the situation has certainly worsened.

    Despite this, Guy was somehow happier.

    "It''s not a problem at all, so why don''t you two fight together?"

    "You''re not ashamed to say that? I''m going to be serious now, prepare yourself!

    Rudra frankly confessed, as he had said, that he did indeed hide his strength, and now he raised his sword speed to force his way towards Guy.

    Guy had expected that.

    That''s why he was so happy, he snickered and picked up his sword, the "Heavenly Demon".

    "Ah! How shameless of him to use a weapon!

    "Ah? I don''t know about your values, but I''d like to praise you for making me draw my sword.

    In fact, Rudra was so skilled with the sword, that even Guy could get hurt whenever he touched it. sing the sword was a matter of course.

    Guy is self-respecting and pridefuul, but has no interest in showing mercy that leads to failure.

    "Ha! Even if the Demon Lordpliments me, I won''t be happy!

    "Well, then, let''s just say there''s no praise.

    wait, you can still stay it.

    Rudra was actually very happy to bemended.

    "I can count on one hand the number of people who can draw a sword and fight with me. Is your name Rudra? Ill remembere your name, so you can be proud.

    Because Guy was in a good mood, he responded to Rudra''s request.

    Rudra listened, smiling happily and telling Guy.

    You''re pretty good, too. I didn''t expect the Demon Lord to catch this sword, which is a sword of evil.

    As a reward for being remembered, before I destroy you, I''ll hear your name too.

    "Just a human being, but so arrogant. But I like you, so Ill tell you. If you ever go to the underworld, just say my name. I''m Guy, because any man in front of me will scream Giiyaa! so it''ll be my name.

    Hearing Guy''s answer, Rudra froze, then reverted to his usual expression and called out in panic.

    Wait a minute! That''s not a name! How is that a name? If I defeat such a st rangy named Demon Lord, it wouldnt look good. It''s better to write down the story of my bravery with a more handsome name!

    "Ahn? The name doesn''t matter!

    "How can it not matter!? Okay I got it, wait a minute, the fight is on hold. I''ll think of a better name for you first.

    Rudra spoke up and stopped fighting without permission.

    Guy didn''t have a reason to do as he was told, but there was no need to wipe out a rare fun time with a sneak attack. He wanted to have some fun himself anyway, so he epted Rudra''s offer.

    Besides, I''m somewhat interested.

    Rudra and his entourage formed in a circle and began to discuss.

    "That guy''s hair is pretty red"

    "Wait a minute, speaking of crimson, thats like me, yet it doesnt look like it, right?

    "I know! It''s strange that your hair is blue.

    "That''s not what you called me.

    "Oh, oh, oh, I remember."

    "You don''t understand women''s hearts. You''ll just be abandoned by Sister-inw, won''t you?

    Huh? no way!

    "Hoo-hoo, it''s okay, Rudra. I will never abandon you.

    "Right? Then I wont worry. Anyway, that guy''s another reda real crimson! So, is that all right?

    "Well, I think so."

    "I don''t have a problem with that either, but is this okay? People might be upset that you actually named the Demon Lord and have such a close rtionship, right?

    "It''s okay! No one will see it anyway. As long as we don''t say anything, it won''t get out!

    It wasn''t supposed to be Guy''s turn to interject, but the young man Rudras character was truly sloppy.

    Guy, who was listening to their conversation, was worried about Rudra.

    "Are we done?

    "Oh, long time no see! As of today, your name will be Guy Crimson!

    The moment the name was said, Rudra went unconscious. It is obviously taboo to name a magical creature, but Rudra is capricious in that he judged the other party to be a demon lord so it would be fine.

    This is the result.

    Rudra didn''t consume magical essence, and as a substitute, what was consumed was a great deal of divine power, and his small life hovered on the line of life and death.

    After waking up, Rudra is faced with wrath of his sister Lucia, and lover Scorch Dragon Velgrynd.He feels as if he''s been given another life.

    And so it was that the showdown between Rudra and Guy passedAt that time, a strange connection between Guy and Rudra was born.

    ***

    He waited for Rudra to recover and resume the duel as promised.

    However, the oue could not be decided.

    Thus, after this, Guy and Rudra dueled many more times.

    Worthy of being the self-proimed hero, Rudra was strong.

    Rudra the Awakened Hero, and Guy the Awakened Demon Lord.

    The technically brilliant Rudra, and the Guy who fights with power and talent.

    Although it''s difficult to win or lose when you''re evenly matched, it''s only natural that Guy would gradually gain the upper hand.

    There were three women, staring nkly at the battle between the two males.

    Lucia and Velgrynd, and Velzado "The White Ice Dragon".

    At first Velzado was not very interested, but as the duels became more and more heated, she gradually became interested in watching them.

    "Geez, Guy seems to be getting stronger again."

    "Yes, sister, but Rudra isn''t behind either.

    "Yeah, it makes you wonder if he''s human or not.

    Im sure. Hes strong. Of course, Rudra is a disciple of elder brother, and has been given the ultimate skill, and will get stronger.

    "Oh? That makes sense. Then Im convinced.

    "For me, it''s best if no one gets hurt"

    Like this, there was great harmony among the onlookers.

    "The tea is ready.

    "The winner will be decided soon, so Lord Guy and Lord Rudra''s share is ready."

    Mizari and Rhein are in charge of serving everyone.

    It wasnt clear when this had be a daily thing.

    On another day, there was a quarrel between sisters that even made one forget about the duel.

    Velzado was on good terms with Velgrynd, but asionally disagreed about the direction of education.

    Their newly born brother, Veldora, the Storm Dragon, seems to be very capricious and goes around uncontrobly.

    As for the reason for the march

    "Sister is too strict! Why can''t he be pampered more?

    "What are you talking about? I value little Veldora and dote on him! To make him more mature and stable, I''ve had to clean him up a few times.

    The phrase clean him up'' by Velzado is a ridiculous method of physical removing Veldora and forcing reincarnation.

    Velgrynd didn''t like that.

    Im saying that you are wrong about this! Do not use violence, and use words to teach him. I can''t help it if I can''t control the situation, so this is the way to make the kid understand us better.

    "Really! As always, the little Velgrynd is too mild. In that case, why don''t we just beat him half to death from now on so he can be more knowledgeable?

    "Not that! I mean, caress him more gently, teach him hand on hand how to live in the city in human form, and how to fight.

    Little VelgryndI think it''s better to say youre too spoiled rather tan sweet. This practice will spoil the child too much and make him a loser, and if this continues, the young man named Rudra will be a loser too.

    "No way! Rudra is my best partner. Therefore, as long as I educate Veldora, he will grow into a good brother who knows how to respect his sister, so leave it to me this time.

    "Hey, no, I cant do that. I can educate him better. Instead, I should have been doing it all along.

    "Don''t be ridiculous! You''re saying its too much for me, aren''t you? This time it''s my turn!

    On one side, Velzado was too harsh, and on the other, Velgrynd was too soft, so they shifted me on each other.

    Guy didn''t think either side was doing too well.

    Rxation is the best. The Dragon sisters don''t even understand the word "rxation."

    The unspoken, dumbfounded Guy.

    "Hey, hey, thats not our duel.

    "Well, it''s better not to get involved with the girls who are fighting for Veldora.

    Guy and Rudra, fled for refuge to stay out of it.

    When Guy and Rudra dueled, Velzado and the girls woulde to maintain the ''barriers'', and when they quarreled, Guy and them would have to maintain the barriers themselves.

    If not, the continent would sink.

    Even though they were used to it, Guy and Rudra still wanted to fight where they didn''t get themselves into trouble.

    "The man who looks into the mirror can see what is good and what is badit should be said that Guy was treating them as if they had nothing to do with him.

    But one day.

    "Damn it, you''re doing it again!"

    "Shut up! The duel will not end until my lord wins!"

    Nowadays, a duel between two people is as usual as a greeting.

    The battle began as usual and ended when the pair were exhausted.

    Because it''s always a draw, as is customary, the bickering starts again

    "You''re a dirty man who talks about being a good man, but you''re a dirty man!

    Like Guy said, Rudra was dirty.

    Take for granted the nasty trick of using the sand puzzler''s eye.

    It''s not unusual to set up the "Holy Barrier" to reduce Guy''s power to an abnormal state at the moment you start a duel.

    Guy would not identify any traps until the duel began, and it was this character of Guy''s that Rudra saw through to exploit.

    Also, the words thate out of his mouth are outrageous.

    "As long as it''s won, it''s justice! Nope, as long as it doesn''t win, it''s not righteous! Therefore, I will win no matter what!

    In any form, just win, Rudra boasted thus.

    "You''re kidding! I don''t care if you do, but at least don''t say it out loud!"

    What Guy says is quite reasonable.

    However, Rudra snickered in response.

    "Are you kidding me? You''re the one who''s kidding! Isn''t that the same trick you used just now that I used before? How many years do you think it took me to learn that trick?

    Secret technique to change the subject.

    Avoiding ountability by subtly deflecting the topic like this is one of Rudra''s must-kill techniques.

    Rudra had always been educated by the kings and so excelled at such ingenious speaking skills.

    "Remember it was three weeks?

    "Yes, even Lord Veldanavaplimented him.

    The outsider''s conversation came over, and Guy couldn''t help but froze at what he said. It seemed that he had learned the difficult technique quite easily.

    Guy squinted his eyes at Rudra and sighed heavily.

    It is you who is despicable for stealing other people''s tricksRudra keeps saying this, actually for a reason.

    This was due to Rudra''s anxiety.

    SHis ability is still good, but recently hes been feeling a bit squeezed downtely. This was something Rudra felt more clearly than anyone else, and he felt in his heart that it would not be good if this continued.

    I would have done the same if I had fought in a straightforward manner and won!

    Rudra was tempted to say it out loud.

    What I said at first seems to have nothing to do with me now, and the status quo is that we have to use all means to win.

    Although Guy was a bit speechless, Rudra''s mood was actually apparent in his eyes, and in Guy''s mind, he even found it very enjoyable to quarrel with Rudra.

    So no matter what tactics Rudra used, Guy would tolerate it.

    It''s also because Guy subscribes to Rudra''s belief that just winning is justice.

    Long before that, Guy had identified with Rudra.

    Just the mere fact that someone could duel with him without discrimination made Guy happy.

    And

    As Rudra said, the more you fight, the stronger you get. It''s not just about acquiring the ultimate skill, it''s about being skilled enough to use it to its true value.

    Guy learned this by fighting Rudra.

    Now he was using the sword to fight with Rudra, and even then Guy was beginning to gain the upper hand, and on that basis there was no doubt that Guy could win with skill and magic.

    Yet Guy did not do so.

    Not knowing when, he became expecting the duel to end in a tie.

    It was for this reason that Guy weed Rudra''s little gimmick.

    But nowadays, even that is only a matter of time.

    Thus, Guy asked out of the mouth.

    Hey...why didn''t you guys kill me in the first ce? Why didnt you decide not to name me at that time, and instead make a serious attempt to strike me down. Then it would have been possible for you to win too, right?

    This is exactly the point of puzzlement that Guy couldn''t understand.

    Guy is self-respecting and prideful, and usually would never agree that there is a possibility of losing, and for a spiritual being, agreement is tantamount to losing.

    So all this time, Guy didn''t want to think about it.

    He didn''t think he was being sympathetically discharged, nor did he want to be.

    Guy has the ''King of Pride'' and Rudra has the ''King of Justice''. If Rudra doesn''t skimp on using the power to attack at full strength in the first ce, it''s not clear where the win or loss goes to.

    To the earnestly inquiring Guy, Rudra smiled and said, "Oh, that''s it.

    "You''re such an idiot, there''s no point in beating you! You have to recognize my greatness and be apanion!

    Huh?"

    Unable to understand, Guy couldn''t help but ask rhetorically.

    "I am the man who will conquer the world one day. This was my pact with the Star Dragon, Veldanava, who was also my mentor and friend."

    Guy knew that Rudra was a disciple of Veldanava, himself, and he had not the slightest doubt about it.

    But he hadn''t really expected that Rudra would have ambitions to conquer the world.

    "I say, from Veldanava, it''s my job to stop fools like you from conquering the world."

    "I know. It is for this reason that Veldanava made me find a way to get your approval.

    Hearing that, Guy thought to himself.

    Veldanava, he''s in trouble, so he pushed it on me.

    That''s the answer.

    Tell him what is realityGuy seemed to hear Veldanava speak so.

    Rudra, who boasts of showing off with Guy, came here after being wiped out by Veldanava In fact, Guy was already in the middle of Veldanava''s ploy as well.

    Guy had no choice to to stay with him until he realized he liked Rudra.

    Its more of a story, because if he didnt like him, he would have killed him from the start.

    Yeah this guy is a real jerk.

    To Guy, who was thinking in a good mood, Rudra spoke up.

    "Well, the truth is... I couldnt control the King of Justice with all my might in the first battle, and in fact, I can only do it for a few dozen seconds now.

    This surprising confession made it impossible for Guy to hide the flush of surprise.

    "Huh? It can''t be just that, can it?

    "No, it''s true. For this power is something I have borrowed from Veldanava.

    Rudra shrugged and began to recount the cause.

    Guy listened to Rudra''s recounting, and though he felt it was irrelevant, he now understood how powerful Rudra was.

    Its not surprising that Veldanavas power was a part of his power.

    However, after listening to Rudra''s narration, he realized there was a misunderstanding.

    "It''s actually a secret, just for you to know. My skill is the Covenant King Uriel'', and I have found the ultimate skill through my beliefs, my vow to unify the world, and the thoughts of my partners who have responded.

    In spite of his ability, Veldanava actually helped. Even so, it is quite amazing that the ''King of Covenant'' that arises from the concretization of Rudra''s heart is of a higher power in the angelic system.

    "Next came the ''King of Justice'' borrowed in the form of an exchange, and this too was difficult to deal with. I have the king of covenant, and have the power to break evil and protect it. But what the King of Justice has is the inexorable power of "domination."

    It is not too much to say that the one who can control the skill and borrow the power from the one who is controlled is the most suitable power for the king to rule.

    However, with no one under domination at the moment, the threat is not so great, and with such a state to be able topete evenly with Guy, Rudra was really strong.

    "That''s pretty awesome.

    Guy said so.

    As the number of dominators increases and the powers avable to use increase, then Rudra will also be more powerful.

    What the heck. I thought the continuation of mutual strength would create a grade difference that would be sure to be a victory for melooks like it can still be enjoyed!

    Looks like the fun will continue.

    Realizing this, Guy became very happy.

    Rudra, however, said.

    "I am not interested in dominating others, but if I were a man, I should have won by my own strength alone. But sometimes, there are circumstances that make it impossible to say that

    Circumstances?"

    "Ahh, you are also a friend of Veldanava and should have the right to know.

    Hearing him say that made Guy feel uneasy.

    He hadn''t cared because he was a long-lived dragon, but he hadn''t seen Veldanavately.

    "Did something happen to that guy?"

    "It was supposed to be a happy thing.

    Hmm?"

    "That man and my sister were united. It''s called marriage. Lucia was pregnant with Veldanava''s child, and thus became real family.

    "You said child? The True Dragon?"

    It is truly quite a story.

    But it is indeed possible to do such a thing if one possesses the whimsy of getting rid of the ipleteness of the quest of all be one.

    "Anything can happen.

    "Well, if that''s all, then a blessing is enough. But the problem is from here.

    After Rudra had finished the premise, the factsid out next made it impossible to stop with mere consternation, and even Guy couldn''t help but stand up and keep asking Rudra Really?"

    Veldanava now, had be almost indistinguishable from human beings.

    He is also said to haveughed and told Rudra that he was bound by a ''lifespan'' that kept him from getting involved.

    It was too much of a truth to keep in Rudras mind.

    So now, he told this to Guy.

    "It''s really that guy''s style, so what should we do now?

    "I don''t know. So I was worried, but Im sure I cant just y with you.

    Yeah

    The two couldn''t help but look at each other and let out a sigh at the same time.

    ***

    "Stop it! Anyway, I think you''re too good to kill, and I''m not going to fight any more. But I''ll continue to be the Demon Lord so that the world doesn''t fall apart, because that''s my agreement with him.

    Guy looked favorably upon Rudra, and since Rudra was a friend of Veldanava''s, he was also a friend of his own.

    It was inevitable that he couldnt get serious from the beginning.

    But the work of the Demon Lord had to be done, and that was what Veldanava had asked him to do.

    As a mediator," the scales of the world must not be tilted.

    Guy looked Rudra in the eye so to speak, and Rudra looked straight back to inform Guy.

    "Well, do you want to have a different duel?

    "A different kind of duel?

    Rudra nodded in response.

    No longer smiling coyly as before, but beginning to speak in earnest.

    "Yes, don''t let me fight you directly. This time, use the pawns in your hand to fight for world supremacy.

    Hmm.

    "To be honest, I didn''t want to use the King of Justice either, but I can''t say that now. For this is the power that Veldanava has given me in support of my dream of a unified world. So, after that, I''ll add more men and I''ll get stronger.

    "I guess.

    That understanding was correct, and Guy nodded.

    I like you, so I don''t want to kill you either. Didn''t I tell you? I believe that humans can be united.

    Veldanava seeks diversity, but does not ask them to hate each other. People with different ideas can just get along on the basis of mutual respect, and if they can''t ept each other''s opinions, just pull away. The indiscriminate use of force by different races and nations will lead to war, but as long as we can be a unified nation, won''t we be able to make a decision through consultation?

    "It''s hard to say? As far as I know, humans are stupid, aren''t they?

    "I know. But I''m on good terms with you, aren''t I? If the Demon Lord and the Hero, who are supposed to be natural enemies, can get along, it will be easier for the same race to understand each other!

    There is no need for a mediator," Rudra stressed.

    Guy, however, could not agree.

    "That''s a naive idea. So-called humans are creatures with strong desires. It is not evil." Desire is necessary in order to pursue greater possibilities. As long as the interests are relevant, even close people will frankly start fighting each other. In this regard, a magical creature without wisdom knows better, right?

    The magical creatures that evolved from animals into magical beasts would not kill again as long as their appetite was satisfied, being cunning and resourceful enough.

    They don''t think about tomorrow''s food, they just enjoy the day.

    But humans are different.

    Humans often think about the future and be restless as a result, umting wealth in order to be able to cope with situations, which is instinctive, so Rudra''s thoughts can only be a dream.

    It is extremely difficult to guide people by words.

    In the first ce, one has no idea how difficult it would have been to get one''s true meaning across through words, and to keep others from misunderstanding

    It was because Guy understood this that he felt that Rudra''s dream would note true.

    "Perhaps, and I understand, Veldanava alsoughed at me that this could only be ideal Even so I convinced him, and now he''s cheering me on.  Although the probability is infinitely close to zero, just do what you want,'' those are his words. There is a secret that the ''King of Justice'' has the power to summon the legions of angels that will destroy everything, and I will use this power skillfully for the relief of mankind, only to destroy military power and civilization, and to suppress the expansion of people''s desires, while unifying the world and making sure that an ideal world is created!

    So, cheer me onRudra asks Guy.

    Stop killing all humans and value their potential.

    "Hah! I don''t have a penchant for torture and murder! Just kill the guy who I dont like. Whether they are good or bad has nothing to do with me. I''ll let them live if it suits me, and I''ll kill them if they dont, that''s all.

    "So I told you to stop for a second!

    "Hah I don''t have the patience to wait for a guy who endangered the world to realize the error of his ways. Hate the sin not the sinner? Asshole, to be guilty is to be punished. It''s only reasonable to hold yourself ountable for what you do!

    "That''s what I thought! But I want you to give them a chance to change their ways.

    "Huh! You can rest assured, I will send the souls of these sinners to the underworld and give them a taste of the pain.

    "That''s not what I meant!"

    Rudra stopped narrating and once again spoke cautiously from the heart.

    "I''m not trying to be a great king, I just want to put a smile on everyone''s face. Wouldn''t crime be reduced as long as one could livefortably and have a partner to talk to? Eliminating poverty and inequality and creating a world where anyone can live with a smile is what I''m looking forward to! Of course, there will be hopelessly stupid people, but I intend to minimize the sacrifices.

    Rudra now spoke of the ideal in such a way that he did not expect, in the distant future, simr words to be uttered from a poption hostile to himself.

    Hearing this, Guy shook his head left and right as if stunned.

    "No wonder Veldanava isughing. I didn''t expect you to be so naive. Butall right? I''ll just hear what this duel is about."

    So?"

    "It''s boring anyway. It must be fun to enjoy the game.

    It wasn''t that Guy epted Rudra''s point of view.

    He did not deny Rudras ideals, but he just only saw the consequences. A stubborn friend will never be persuaded by words alone.

    Despite being that type of person, Rudra is trying to convince others simply by words. It was, in a sense, a contradiction and it was natural to fail.

    By then, Rudra would wake up, he supposes.

    If he seedsits nothing, but it will reduce Guys work.

    No matter how it turned out there was no loss, Guy so judged.

    Nor was there any particr benefit, as long as Rudra could abandon his outrageous ns.

    "Is my ambition a game to you?

    Rudraughed.

    This was followed by an intimate and meticulous exnation of the rules.

    The rules are simple.

    "Just the yers don''t fight, their men will fight.

    That''s all.

    That is, a showdown between Guy and Rudra is forbidden.

    If he beats all of Guy''s partners, Rudra will win, in which case Guy will obey Rudra.

    But until he seeds, Guy is free to move about as he pleases, following the agreement with Veldanava and freely performing the duties of a mediator."

    There''s hardly any restriction on Guy, but from Rudra''s standpoint, just that''s useful enough.

    It was the original responsibility of the "hero" to prevent the "demon lord, who acted as a mediator in a way that threatened humanity, from leaving.

    Even if Guy thought calmly, his power was too strong, and just one strike would cause great damage.

    Rudra had been clinging to Guy in order to avoid such a thing, but at this rate Rudra''s dream would note true, and sealing Guy''s move was necessary in order to be able tounch an operation to unify the world.

    Reading Rudra''s mind, Guy said.

    "Yeah. It will agree not to do anything, I collect demon lords who would rece me and give them the responsibility for the direct punishment of humanity.

    "It''s up to me to stop it. I will use my own hands to unify the world before the society that the Demon Lord is in charge of is born!"

    "You''re walking the path of misery, aren''t you? It''s some kind of ideal that even that good old Veldanava gave up.

    Veldanava was a dreamer and a perfectionist, but he was able to distinguish between ideal and reality and to think dispassionately about whether it could be achieved.

    Veldanava gave up omniscience and omnipotence in pursuit of change, and as a result, it was no longer possible for him to realize the ideal society he had in mind.

    But to Veldanava, this is the right solution. A world that all works as he wants. He finds it not interesting at all.

    It was because of understanding Veldanava''s mood that Rudra eximed.

    "But even so! I wanted to reassure him that not only was he bound by life expectancy, but he was even left with a fighting power that was not even close to that of an ordinary human. Still, the guy was happy to be walking to the end with LuciaBut, I was worried about where the world was going! More than anything else, I am worried about the future of the children

    Mm?

    "That''s why I need to give him peace of mind and create a world where everyone can live happily, so that he won''t feel uneasy at the end of his life. And then, the world that guy creates will mature into a wonderful world of rtional harmonyI just want him to be satisfied!

    Rudra had sworn to Veldanava to "establish a united nation.

    With the desire to make the sister happy, he was determined to get rid of all the misfortune in the world.

    "Let us, the parties, decide the affairs of this world with our own hands, and you, who are not bound by life, witness the final end as the judge.

    Well

    To Rudra''s words, Guy didn''te out with an answer.

    In Guy''s mind, it had been determined that it could not be done, but because of the understanding Rudra''s mood, hesitated whether or not the words of denial should be spoken.

    What the hell, asshole? Doesn''t that make you the one who has to carry everything?

    But it was at this time that the emotions were so sharp that Guy hated his own mind.

    Guy, though prideful, was gentle with those he liked, and this tenderness instead became a bondage that even made it impossible for him to stop the reckless Rudra.

    To this dear and foolish friend, Guy lost his words.

    Your challenge, surely, will fail.

    Guy''s mind, calmly calcted the result.

    With a sess rate so low that it can''t even be expressed in terms of probability, Rudra, who is regarded as Guy''s best friend, will never give up.

    A hero is one who has an unyielding heart. Rudra is undoubtedly a true "hero" who shoulders all the hardships and carries the goal of achieving the ideal world.

    That''s why, if it was this guy, maybeGuy thought so.

    It was Rudra who made Guy think like that, and Guy bet on that tiny possibility.

    However, as a result

    ***

    Several tragedies have urred during the constant and repeated duel between Guy and Rudra.

    The initial misfortune urred immediately after the birth of Veldanava and Lucia''s child.

    Taking advantage of Rudra expedition, there was a terrorist attack in the Nazca kingdom, the work of a warring enemy, which resulted in the death of both Lucia and Veldanava.

    At that moment, Rudra''s dream copsed with a bang.

    I, I just want, just to reassure Veldanava, to make him agree with us

    Ruddra killed his heart, saying that he can no longer cry.

    All that remains is an ideal that has lost its purpose.

    "Ahhh, all I have left is a duel with you, and the only thing I want is for you to agree with me.

    "Yeah. I''ll be your opponent."

    The game goes on

    The next misfortune, happened to Milim, the child of Veldanava.

    Milim was raised without knowing what her parents looked like.

    Didn''t even know there was a blood rtionship between herself and Rudra.

    Milim''s pet, who was both the only family member and an escort at the same time, had died as a result of some state ploy.

    Milimmented her grief and burst into rage, and to calm down Milim, Guy went into full action.

    If Milim was not stopped, several countries would have perished.

    "Even so, do you want to continue? If only I had struck sooner, Milim wouldn''t have been sad, would she?

    "It is my responsibility, and even so, if I stops here, all the previous sacrifices will be meaningless. As emperor, it is my duty not to stop halfway.

    "I don''t think that''s necessary. Well, I''ll be with you until you approve."

    If he stops here, Rudra believes hes going to break.

    Guy also had to dy his conclusion.

    An unfortunate future awaited him, and as much as Guy thought so in his heart, he hadnt fully decided it was going to be that way.

    Just like that, the game goes on

    The constant repetition of suffering.

    The ugliness of the world at hand.

    Each reincarnation depleted the holy power, and Rudra gradually lost his "hero" status.

    Rudra''s ability to remain a "saint" is probably the result of his dedication to his ideals.

    Even so, the limitse down.

    Unknown to him, Rudra''s heart has also eroded, losing his original ideals.

    Not knowing if it was the fate of the man who lost his purpose, Rudra began to be unscrupulous in order to win over Guy

    Cold and cruel.

    The win over Guy became everything, and as a result, caused even more bloodshed.

    These, all of them, were the same as Guy''s judgment.

    Finally, the day hase.

    Guy followed the rules and bet on thest possibility.

    To the most unknown of his own pawns, and the most promising of all existences (Rimuru), he pins the final judgment.

    In all honesty, he had wanted to move himself.

    But until the end, Guy followed the rules.

    As a result

    In the distance, the breath of his friend has vanished.

    I''m sure it''s not just Rimuru who could do itGuy couldn''t help but sigh.

    There is no bitterness, no remorse.

    Just simply the mourning of a dear friend.

    Thats why I told you, asshole. Like this, it''s only right for us as demons, for us who have never been emotionally shaken

    Guy whispered, not noticing the thing running down his cheek.

    Just quietly, praying for Rudras happiness.

    And just like that, the millennia-long game between Guy and Rudra was over.

    Guy facetiously maintained the same fearless smile as usual, his heart inwardly sinking to the bottom of a sadke.

    The eyes of a deep sea blue diamond color stared coldly at Guy.

    A small, twisted smile appeared on the edge of his mouth

    Even when the game is over, the fires of strife remain entangled.

    Thus, the smoke of the world-scale war, the "Battle of the Demons (Tenma), was ignited.

 Volume 17 - Prologue

    Myourmiles: I should have taught you your manners much earlier.

    Velgrynd: If you so desire, I shall give you the entire world.

    Calgurio: Then you had better prepare yourself. Unlike me, the one in charge of your torture isnt going to be that nice.

    Rain: Sounds annoying, so Ill pass.

    Velgrynd: Ara, may I ask just what you were trying to achieve by making Masayuki cry like that?

    Testarossa: Oh no, I assure you that I would not do anything of the sort.

    The two beautifuldies stare at each other with smiles on their faces.

    The forces of their gazes collide, causing a fearsome pressure to fall on the surroundings.

 Volume 17 - Ch Ss

    Special Collections

    Vestas Consultation

    My name is Vesta.

    It was my dream to serve the great Hero King Gazel, to do research that would benefit the people.

    Although my dream was broken, but I followed in my fathers footsteps and became Minister of the Armed Nation of Dwargon.

    Well, was is more urate.

    I lost that position due to my own stupid jealousy

    At that time, in my own engineering unit, there was a development of a new weapon in coboration with the elven technicians.

    This top-secret project was called the Armored Soldier Project, and a man named Kaijin was chosen to lead its development.

    He came from amoners family of cksmiths, but his knowledge was extensive. He was a hard worker and trusted by his subordinates. He was a bit too hot-headed but there was no doubt he was an excellent boss.

    But I didnt like Kaijin for the life of me.

    It wasnt because he was amoner.

    Kaijins skills were already worthy of being called a master craftsman. Thats why I was so jealous of him.

    Kaijin had made a name for himself in his familys business and was sessful in his research. I, on the other hand, was a man whose only vocation was research.

    My family came from the Marquis family, and I was destined to be a minister.

    I could have served in the military and studied while my father was alive, but that was only allowed to be my hobby.

    I resented that.

    I had no political talent. I didnt have the coldness of my father or the charisma of King Gazel. But the servants of the marquis family are still very good and were ready for the world of politics without me having to do anything.

    Besides, there were multiple ministerial positions.

    King Gazel and his elders set the tone for the state, so it didnt matter if I was there or not.

    Ill never be able to help King Gazel no matter how hard I try. I was convinced at the time that I would never be recognized.

    Thats why I rebelled against Kaijin.

    Then I could serve the king as a cksmith. I have only research, but it was unfair.

    Besides, I didn''t have time to do my research leisurely.

    My father fell ill. He was getting worse, and the day was fast approaching when I would be master of the Marquis house.

    If I didnt produce results soon, I would go unnoticed by King Gazel for the rest of my life. That was the one thing I couldnt stand.

    So I ignored Kaijins insistence that I should proceed steadily with my research, and pushed the experiment forward.

    As a result, the keystone of the project, the spirit demon nucleus, went haywire, and the experiment ended in failure. And the project itself was also thrown out of existence.

    I was stunned, but my family worked behind the scenes to make things happen.

    Before I knew it, Kaijin took the me for everything and left the army.

    And next thing I knew, I was working as a minister.

    There was no way to apologize. I had led a life of boredom, living only to harass Kaijin.

    ***

    Im sorry about that time.

    Suddenly, I remembered and apologized to Kaijin.

    Then Kaijin looked at me with a puzzled expression on his face, wondering what I was talking about.

    What are you talking about? Didnt Rimuru give you a budget for increased model production?

    No, the matter has already been approved. His Majesty managed to coerce Myourmiles-dono into giving him plenty of money for the project.

    Then, whats your apology for?

    Oh, its for a long time ago. Kicking you out of the troops and harassing you. Half the time it wasnt just me, but my subordinates who did my bidding. After all this time, I just remembered that I hadnt apologized yet.

    Its really toote now. I mean, thats, like, you already apologized to me.

    Kaijin smiles at that.

    Certainly, I said I was sorry when I came to this country. That was undoubtedly my intention, but I still wanted to make another formal apology.

    Every day in this country was a series of amazing things.

    I know its just an excuse, but Im going to say it.

    I dare say we were too busy to do anything about it!

    King Gazel is no different, but Rimurus freewheeling behavior is even more so. He relies on someone like me for important tasks.

    The first challenge was to educate the monsters. When he asked me to teach them to read and write and use the abacus, I wondered with disrespect if this guy was serious.

    By the way, the abacus is a very useful calctor that was also used by Dwargon. His Majesty Rimuru made a prototype and it was adopted without any problem because the usage was almost the same.

    It''s not just the basics that I teach.

    As a practical matter, I have also been entrusted with etiquette training for the monsters.

    Manners for monsters.

    What is this guy talking about? It''s no wonder I thought that, right?

    I asked Hist Majesty Rimuru what his purpose was, to which he replied with a smile,

    Well, I want to interact with humans in the future.

    I thought it sounded crazy, but I didnt have the right to refuse. So I nodded right then and there to say yes.

    But the job turned out to be more interesting than I thought.

    The goblinas, led by Shuna-sama, were eager to learn the etiquette. The men were also not to be outdone, and were learning to be polite and courteous in order to lessen their vicious appearances.

    The monsters were more inquisitive and motivated than expected, and I enjoyed teaching them.

    I enjoy teaching them even now.Eeven though we had agreed to continute untilthe research facility was set up, I still hold regr seminars.

    In the meantime, a research facility was built in the ce called the Sealed Cave.

    I had only the bare minimum of equipment, but I was still excited to know that I could work on my research again.

    It was there that I met Gabil-dono the dragonewt, and became a good friend of like-minded people. His unconventional ideas were a great stimulus to my forgotten spirit of inquiry.

    I was not sure what to expect when I was brought here, but now I have nothing but gratitude for King Gazel.

    I can now say that I am happy.

    However

    That doesnt mean there are no problems.

    I came to Kaijin today to talk about it.

    Now that Ive conveyed my apology I had been thinking about, I could get down to business.

    Well, thank you for saying that.

    Thats good. Now I think its more important to get to the main point, dont you?

    Oh, was I that obvious to you?

    Attaboy. Youve always had a tendency to put off the awkward stuff and start talking about the most random of topics.

    Come to think of it, thats true.

    When I think about it, Ive known Kaijin for a long time now and we know each other well. I dont think theres any reason to be shy about anything now, so I decided to get to the point.

    To tell you the truth, I had some business to discuss with you.

    A consultation? If the budget passed, isnt it an important case?

    The budget is certainly important, but thats not this case.

    This is important. Much more important than the budget.

    Huh?

    I never thought Id have to worry about something more important than the budget, butokay.

    Im sure Kaijin will have an answer for this challenge.

    To tell you the truth, I was in His Majesty Rimurusb

    Wait, wait a minute! Thats the stuff the boss was working on in his secretbs, isnt it? Isnt that something you shouldnt talk about lightly?

    Its not good.

    I fully understand that without being told.

    But I cant just keep my mouth shut!

    After all, hundreds of demons have been incarnated there!

    Some of them were archdemons.

    They were of the ruling ss.

    Such a fearsome existance was incarnating right before my eyes. And I hope you can imagine how I felt when I saw that they had been given names.

    I understand that there is a dduty of confidentiality, but I think that this has to bemunicated to King Gazel as well

    To tell the truth, its not like Im being kept silent by His Majesty Rimuru.

    As long as we have a technical agreement, I have no problem sharing my work with Dwargon.

    But what?

    Then Ill ask you abstractly, sparing specific statements. Do you think we should tell King Gazel that we have created a force capable of take the world?

    Kaijin had a good point, so I wrapped my question in an oath.

    But Kaijins response was even more intense than I had expected.

    Wait, wait, wait, wait, wait! Vesta, what are you talking about all of a sudden!?

    Mm? Was it hard to understand? Was it too wrapped up in an affectionate manner?

    Asshole! Its not. Besides, you didnt wrap up any of your remarks!

    Thats impossible.

    I was still hiding important details.

    Hahaha. Thats okay, if you ask for specifics, even Kaijin-donos will get a headache. So, please just tell me your honest opinion.

    Thats okay, right?

    Kaijin has been rude, saying that I have a habit of escaping reality when I have a problem.

    But Ive got bigger things to worry about now, so I cant listen to suchints.

    So, what do you think I should do?

    Should I keep it to myself or should I tell King Gazel as well?

    Meeting my question squarely, Kaijin scratches his head and gives his answer.

    Vesta, youre tired. Why dont you go home and have a drink and rx?

    Kaijin said and smiled.

    Oh, this guy. He ran away

    Thats not an answer to my question!

    You idiot! Dont involve me in such a serious matter!

    Thats a fair point, but I cant just retreat here.

    Dont say that, I thought youd help me!

    No, no, no, Im out of the country, you know? Im not in a position of responsibility like Vesta-san, the marquis of Dwargon.

    What rubbish. To me, Kaijin-dono is still a respected boss! More than a title, a position. I''ve been saying that for a long time and obeyed your subordinates!

    Ah, you bastard! Is that why you apologized just now? Youve got a lot of nerve

    This is how the battle between Kaijin and I continued for a while.

    I want to get involved and Kaijin wants to get away.

    However, the victory or defeat is already visible.

    Kaijin has a strong sense of responsibilityhe would never run away irresponsibly after hearing all this.

    Okay. Tell me the details.

    I was hoping youd say that.

    Just as I had expected, Kaijin finally agreed to consult with me.

    I was satisfied with that and smiled.

    ***

    We moved to a high-ss tavern in thebyrinth.

    Speaking for a dwarf, Im a drinker.

    Even though I look more like an elf than a dwarf, I still love to drink.

    And we have a great selection of booze in this country. Moreover, the employees are under a strict obligation of confidentiality and will not give out any secret information if they overhear you talking about something secret.

    This is a ce where such security is guaranteed. It was the perfect ce to talk about secrets.

    So, what do you want to do about it?

    Kaijin asks, so Im going to speak my mind.

    If I keep silent, well have problems if something goes wrong. As long as Im not being kept quiet, I think I have an obligation to report it.

    Hearing my response, Kaijin nodded with a huff.

    Well, yeah. As we agreed from the beginning, that wouldnt be considered an announcement. Besides, youre still officially the marquis of Dwargon, right?

    I was.

    Id almost forgotten the fact that my title has not been erased from my country, nor has it been returned by me. In fact, I was stunned at my family home when before I knew it, King Gazel had kidnapped me and delivered me to His Majesty Rimuru.

    At that time, I had no time to worry about my position in my homnd.

    Dwargons nobles owned nonds of their own. All thend belonged to the Dwarf King and was administered by the nobility in the form of leases.

    In fact,pared to other nations, the concept of territory is different.

    There are only three major cities in Dwargon: the center, east and west. The rest is made up of manor houses at the foot of the mountains and tunnel dwellings in natural caves.

    The manor houses were divided into sections and administered by the nobility.

    Its what Rimuru calls housekeeping. A nobleman was expected to take care of the inhabitants of his territory and collect taxes from them.

    Depending on the rank, the number of family registers was different.

    Im a marquis, so I actually have a good ie.

    I disappointed King Gazel after all my blunders, so I thought the title would be taken away.

    But even to this day, I have been treated as a marquis.

    In other words, theres a normal amount of tax revenue each year. The good family orders that have supported me since thest generation have taken care of all the troublesome things.

    The sries are paid normally, and since I was not expelled from my home country, I am able to return to my home and live normally.

    But I dont want to do that, and I have no ns to do so.

    After all, this life is more interesting.

    And there are servants who came after me, living in greater luxury than when I was at Dwargon.

    The food is delicious and the drinks are excellent.

    I can research as much as I want, and this life is like a paradise.

    Myourmiles-donos purse is a bit tight-lipped, but I digress.

    Yes, youre right. Well, I suppose, from the standpoint of a Marquis, I cant just betray King Gazel.

    I dont think keeping quiet is a betrayal, but Im pretty sure its your duty to report it.

    Thats right

    I understand that even if he doesnt tell me.

    But the question is how to report it.

    So then, how to say it straight? Were growing a force that can take down the world.

    Hey, hey, Ive had too much to drink, but are you sure its really that big of a deal?

    Mmm, this sake tastes great.

    Theres no stopping it, its mellow on the pte. Its crisp and fragrant, with a rich vor that seems to lift me out of my funk.

    But it does.

    You know Miss Ultima and Carrera-chan?

    Oh, oh? I dont mean to be blunt, but are you drunk? Dont change the subject so fast.

    No, I havent changed the subject, and I cant say this stuff unless I get drunk.

    Oh,e on, then maybe

    Thats right. In fact, those girls are part of that force, too.

    I see. Now that you mention it, its no wonder the police are so strong in cracking down on the adventurers. I didnt see the faces of the security force, so I figured they must have been a secret unit that was trained somewhere

    It seems that Kaijin has realized the gravity of the situation.

    Here in Tempest, no one goes wild against the police. Also, no one has appealed the ruling in court.

    Thats because they were cracking down on criminals with an unparalleled force.

    By all ounts, their fighting ability was so great that it was clear to everyone. By an adventurers standards, even a lowly police officer could be considered over rank A.

    What? Ehhh? A police force that has the strength to fight the world?

    Mm. Its the perfect camouge, dont you think?

    No, even if you ask me that, what?

    A confused look appears on Kaijins face.

    I can understand why hes puzzled.

    A demon that could destroy the world is now a police officer (hero) protecting its citizens.

    And if I report it to King GazelHow do you think hed react?

    Oh, yeah. Well thatsthats a tough one to report.

    Right? Im absolutely not going to be believed. On the contrary, hell say Im mad and disgraceful. King Gazel would believe me, but Im sure the stone-heads in charge would doubt my words.

    Sure,

    Kaijin muttered and gulped down the cup of sake.

    You got me into this, he said, his eyesining to me.

    Thats why I grinned and asked,

    What do you think I should do?

    WellI guessI dont think its a good idea to report it honestly. This one bothers me too

    Then there was silence for a while.

    The cup is empty and new wine is poured into it.

    Kaijin and I wracked our brains, wondering what the right thing to do was.

    It was Dino-sama, who came to get me, who saved us.

    Hey, hey, Vesta-san! Were the only ones cheating. Call me over. And buy me a drink. And then Ill give you a drink, all right?

    Dino-sama said with a very nice smile.

    Seeing that smile, I asked him.

    So, what do you think I should do, Dino-sama?

    I was drunk.

    And I had forgotten.

    This man is one of the demon lords.

    Lets just throw it. Lets throw the me on somebody else!

    Dino-sama gave me a thumbs-up and assured me that if that was going to make me upset, it was just bad luck.

    No, no, thats not

    Kaijin was about to say something to him, as if he were in trouble.

    Its fine, its fine! To be honest, Ive been asked to report everything, but I just skipped it all. And then he got really pissed off, so I thought Id do it right the next time. But who I report to is up to me, right? I just make sure to report it to the right person, and that is the right call. Hes the one who gets pissed off, and I can be proud of the work Im doing. Itll give me a clean te to go about my day, I rmend it!

    After saying that, Dino-sama ordered a drink of his own ord and began to drink it.

    Apparently, thats the end of the consultation.

    And it goes without saying that I would be the one to pay for that expensive drink.

    Huh, I feel like an idiot for worrying about it.

    Alright, Im going to adopt that strategy!

    Hey, Vesta!?

    Oh, thats what Vesta-san is all about. Youre my boss after all!

    Its strange to hear that from Dino-sama, a Demon Lord, and it makes me feel a little proud.

    Youre definitely drunk. Hes the wrong person to be taking such advice from. Think again!

    Kaijins ranting and raving soundsforting.

    Lets drink! Today its my treat. Well drink as much as we want!

    Oh, thats the spirit!

    Oh,e on, you dont want to be doing this, do you? You know how much they pay for this ce, even the executivese.

    All right, lets not nitpick the details, okay? Lets shut up, old man, and be goofy here.

    You just want to drink!

    Yeah, but, I mean, whats the problem?

    Yeah, no problem! Kaijin-dono, lets celebrate. Lets just have a party, shall we?

    I said with a big heart.

    And so, the binge drinking began.

    Please lets hope that tomorrows troubles will not increase.

    With that hope, I had Kaijin and Dino-sama toast a ss full of sake.

    ***

    Vesta-dono, you are tired.

    Thats what the guy in charge said to me when I reported to him.

    I guess he didnt believe me after all.

    As expected, I have no regrets now. Because Id exhausted all my regret when I saw the payment bill delivered to me after I sobered up.

    Thats probably true, hahaha. But Ive certainly told you.

    With that, I ended the scheduled call.

    And then

    It turned out that my report was true, but there were no usations against me.

    Apparently, there were, but Magic Communications records showed that a nameless person was fully responsible for the incident.

    Dino-sama was rightI was d that I consulted him.

    End

 Volume 17 - Ch 1

    The Ambition of Myourmiles

    My name is Myourmiles.

    I consider myself a lucky man.

    However,tely, Ive been getting a little too lucky to be able to describe it in more than one word.

    My good fortune was cemented when I epted Rimuru-samas invitation.

    Rimuru-sama is my boss.

    And I dont mean just any boss.

    He is the head of state of the Jura Tempest Federation, in other words, the king.

    And hes a Demon Lord.

    This is not a joke, its serious

    When I first met him, I thought he was not an ordinary man, and I still think of him as a goddess, but frankly, he''s so powerful that I can''t even begin to imagine how strong he is.

    Im not just talking about the destruction ofrge cities, but he also saved me by defeating a sky dragon, a monster that could have toppled a small country, in a matter of seconds. At that point in time, he was a hero in my eyes, but I was astonished to hear that he had be one of the Octagram shortly thereafter.

    And thats not all.

    He is also a friend of the Demon Lord Milim-sama, from the legends, as well as the True Dragon Veldora-sama, of which there are only four in the world! At this point, Im tired of being surprised.

    Im so tired of being surprised that I cant help but go hmm at anything I hear these days.

    For that reason, I will stop talking about Rimuru-sama and get to the point.

    My ambition has always been to be a great merchant who is not to be taken for a fool by anyone.

    I was able to open a shop in the small country of Blumund and a branch in therge country of Ingracia.

    Just as I was starting to get my face on the map and business was starting to take off, Fuze-dono, the Blumund Kingdoms Guildmaster, asked me to join him, which was how I met Rimuru-sama.

    Rimuru-sama, who had be a Demon Lord, came to me and asked me to work for him as an executive.

    ***

    My current position is that of Minister of Finance.

    The name may change from time to time, but the job is the same. My job is to transfer the vast amount of wealth gathered in the Demon Lord Kingdom to the departments I deem necessary.

    When I was a merchant, a portion of the sales of various businesses was my reward. I had to work hard to raise the working capital from the leftover money, after deducting the cost of purchases andbor costs. But now, however, its a different kind of hard work.

    The amount of money we are dealing with nowadays is on a different order of magnitude.

    In the old days, my sry was nothing more than a well of water in front of the ocean.

    And as for my current sry

    Fifty gold coins a month. Naturally, this is the amount of money after taxes are deducted.

    Apart from bonuses and other allowances, this is a housing allowance.

    And thats not all.

    The trainees act as housekeepers for free, so its just like having the monster kingdom taking care of the house.

    Its an unbeatable deal, and Im very happy.

    Of course, I also take care of the people who followed me from Blumund, but most of them work for me and are paid by the government. The only people directly employed by the government are the family members and Bydd, who are entrusted with the housekeeping, and they are paid about twenty gold coins at the most.

    But heres what is surprising me.

    In addition to my sry, I have several other revenues.

    One is the profit that mypany makes.

    Starting with a fast food restaurant at the Founding Festival, Rimuru-samas idea took shape in the Blumund Kingdom and a rest stop on the road, and I am the owner of each of these restaurants. I am paid by the government, but for some reason I am also paid personally.

    ording to Rimuru-sama, he and I are destined to be together.

    Rimuru-sama said, Myourmiles-kun. When you make money, I will be rich too Isnt that right? Since the money was earned by giving shape to our ideas, shouldnt that be a fair price to pay?

    So, he trusts mepletely.

    I didnt know this, but ording to Rimuru-sama, he and I had a contract to split the profits. He has not put it in writing, but Rimuru-sama is determined to honor the agreement.

    That is why Im doing my best to meet Rimuru-samas expectations.

    As a result, I am receiving hundreds of gold coins every month from each store. In addition, the profits are decreasing because of the investment in the first period, but it is expected to continue to increase in the future.

    The existing branches are expanding. Weve received requests from all over the world to open more branches, so thats something we need to consider.

    And the variety of shops is likely to increase as well. There are many more restaurants that Rimuru-sama asks Gobichi-dono to serve. There is also the added benefit of being the first to taste good food, so Im more than happy to take a stake in thepany.

    The Burger shops and Ramen shops are doing very well. Teppan-yaki shops have also be a major yer, and an ice cream store is in the works.

    There is even an inn on the main road that is offering new dishes.

    Depending on how popr they are, Im sure there will be even more of them.

    For that reason, I think its as good as guaranteed that we will continue to make enough profit to match our investments.

    If this happens, rather than having fun, Im afraid of how much my ie is going to increase.

    Frankly speaking, in less than a year, Ive umted enough money to live in luxury for the rest of my life.

    Its truly an unbeatable deal, but this isnt the end of the story.

    There is yet another source of ie for me.

    Its the Three Drunk Sages.

    The Three Drunk Sages is a reference to Rimuru-sama, the Celestial Emperor Elmesia of the Sorcerers Dynasty Sarion, and me, Gard Myourmiles. It is an acronym of these three names, and refers to a naming organization. 1

    I dont care about myself, but Her Majesty Elmesia is a heavenly person.

    It is said that even for the nobility of a great country, there is usually a waiting list of several years for an audience with her. Even royalty cant easily meet, even if they wanted to.

    Her influence is immense.

    It is said that Sarions national power isparable to that of the Western Nations, and since it has been supporting such a superpower since the time of its rise, the prestige of Elmesia shines brightly down from above.

    I hear that Her Majesty Elmesia is treated like a god in Sarion. I thought that Rimuru-sama was a very scary person to be casually drinking with such a person as her.

    I cannot remember now why I was drinking with him, either. But thanks to that, even I can now call Her Majesty Elmesia as an older sister.

    Thats why some people call us the Three Drunk Sages, but its not known that we three are involved in the Three Drunk Sages.

    This is a top-secret matter, and only a few people know about it.

    In the Monster Kingdom, only Benimaru-dono and Souei-dono are known to be involved in this matter.

    Souei-dono has helped me by lending his subordinates, so I cant keep it a secret from him.

    As for Benimaru-dono, Rimuru-sama called out to him

    You will get married one day, wont you?

    No, I dont think so

    Well in preparation for that time, you need to hide this from your wife and save up some pocket money, right?

    No, my sry is enough

    You idiot! If you dont at least keep your annual ie stashed away, its going to be hard to go out drinking with your male friends!

    Is that so!?

    Yes, thats right. Thats what a mans worth is all about!

    I remember him having a conversation like that.

    It may seem slightly wrong, but its not something I would interfere with. I wisely ignored it and avoided getting involved.

    Besides, the annual ie of Benimaru-dono, the Minister of War, is the same as mine. And with six hundred gold coins, I dont theres any drink he cant afford.

    Well, thats not important.

    For some reason, Rimuru-sama is afraid that Shuna-sama will find out about his n.

    The reason Rimuru-sama invited Benimaru-dono is because he wants Shuna-samas older brother to keep an eye on her, and to get her to agree with him.

    Anyway, I got Benimaru-dono as a coborator, and borrowed some of Souei-donos subordinates. The Three Drunk Sages secret society n has been set in motion with them as the executing unit.

    Rimuru-samas point of view is very interesting.

    The crux of the n is the transformation of the rtionship between the three drunk sages.

    The n was to gainplete control of the Three Drunk Sages, the secret society that serves as a device of violence, and to encourage clean conflict on the surface.

    If you only create one giant organization, it will eventually rot from within. It was decided to set up two organizations in the first ce because we knew there would be people who would have a grudge against the Jura Tempest Federation.

    By making thempete with each other, we hope to revitalize our business. In addition, by making thempete with each other, the two organizations would be encouraged to cooperate with one another.

    In this way, we are trying to prevent the organization from bing corrupt.

    When the organization was founded, I was impressed because I would never have been able to think that far into the future.

    My role was to unite the two organizations.

    Older Sister is the one in charge of uniting the survivors of the Rosso n with King Dn of the Dn General Kingdom at the center. Then, the Western General Trading Company was established by those who have enmity against our monster country.

    In order to counter this, it was necessary for me to establish the Four Nations Trade Federation at the earliest opportunity.

    As nned, we set up an umbre organization involving the leading figures of the Blumund Kingdom, the Farmenas Kingdom and the Dwarven Kingdom.

    The merchants I took in after the Founding Festival became my hands and feet.

    The number of business partners has decreased drastically, and they are on the verge of being ostracized by their homnd and abandoned by their families. So when the time was right, I reached out and offered my help.

    I offered them a living if they would work for me, and few would be so foolish as to refuse that offer.

    Of course, there were still a few who did.

    Because this was reported in newspapers world-wide, their names have been sold in a bad way. Few people would trust such a person and hire them, so it was obvious that this was thest helping hand they would get.

    The reporters did a great job too. Needless to say, it was terrifying how Rimuru-sama and Diablo-dono guided it.

    Thanks to that, my work went well. I owe it to them for making it so interesting.

    Of course, some of them would be aware of our intentions, and more than a few of them were, but doing anything about it would be useless. Also, they have no reason toin about the payment, since we are not lying about it.

    It was their pride that was the problem, but that was about it. A merchant is a cash cow, and most things are eptable if it makes a profit.

    Demonstratingpetence would increase their position and sry. Theirints gradually disappeared, and they pledged their loyalty to me.

    I even got the former head of the store, Bach, involved.

    He had be a respectable manager while paying off his debts to me, and I left him with the job on the condition that he would pay off the rest of his debts.

    He felt that he owed me a debt of gratitude, so he did a lot more than I expected.

    There were other excellent human resources growing up.

    When the King of Blumund heard from Fuze-dono, he gathered all his trusted advisors. He said that they were promoting human resource development in preparation for theing day.

    The Dwarven Kingdom had also dispatched some excellent civil servants.

    The dwarves have a long life expectancy, so there is no way for them to rise through the ranks unless their superiors retire. And so, some quick-witted people who have taken advantage of this opportunity havee forward to offer themselves to me as well.

    Its good to be ambitious.

    I heard that the Western General Trading Company, organized by older sister (Elmesia), has also signed up the elves, and with the participation of dwarf civil servants, there was no better rival than the Western General Trading Company.

    However,

    The Farmenas Kingdom, on the other hand, needed help to open a branch office, and the Freedom Association was willing to help, but the stability of the country was still the priority.

    This is to be expected, so we are taking a long-term view and have given our support to the people who will grow up to be able to do so.

    But nowes the hard part.

    We didnt have enough staff to expand into Western Nations.

    As I watched the Three Drunk Sages expand, I envied the Three Drunk Sages from the bottom of my heart, as they continued to crush and absorb the underworld.

    The underworld was fine, but an organization that was active in the public arena needed good people who could be trusted with the job. The people we scouted were sent to the Monster Country to be trained, but it would still take a few years for the buds to sprout.

    By principle, it is out of the question, from my point of view, to entrust such an important job to a stranger.

    When ites to that, it is necessary to be very selective about the people we hire. And as I feared, we have been short of people to hire due to sending personnel to various countries.

    Thus, I turned to Rimuru-sama for advice.

    Well, Im in a bind. Our countrys human resources are monsters, so I am reluctant to send them out into human society.

    Yes, thats right. There are many excellent people, and I think they will be epted once they start working together, but I wonder if it is still too early to do so.

    I agree with you, Myourmiles-kun. If the person who looks down on you is too good, one will be jealous of them and vice-versa. It would be worse if they were persecuted or something, and I feel its not good to think about things in a hurry.

    Rimuru-sama and I agreed.

    Then what should we do?

    Just as we were pondering, Rimuru-sama came up with a solution.

    It cant be helped. She seems to be very capable, and Id like to ask her to cooperate in this matter as well.

    After saying this, he called up his direct subordinate, Testarossa-dono.

    Testarossa-dono was a diplomat and was reputed to be a very talented person. I was introduced to her, but she was so beautiful that I was too nervous to have a proper conversation with her.

    And then

    Rimuru-sama, you wanted to see me?

    A smile, full of grace, and a look of extraordinary beauty.

    The scent in the air was so overwhelming that I couldnt help but be overwhelmed by it.

    While I was stunned, a conversation between Rimuru-sama and Testarossa-dono was urring beside me.

    To tell you the truth, were short on people.

    I see, if thats the case, please leave it to me. Ill have my subordinates work with you.

    Oh, yeah? Yes, thatd a big help. Also, this is a secret mission, so make sure to keep it a secret.

    Oh my, its a secret between me and Rimuru-sama. I promise I wont tell anyone. And of course, my subordinates as well. If they ever speak of this

    Testarossa-donoughed.

    Seeing that smile, Rimuru-sama and I felt very confident that our secret would be kept strictly to the letter.

    Thus, it was very easy toe to an agreement.

    Then Testarossa-dono looked at me and smiled.

    I have strict orders that I am to be absolutely obedient to you, Gard-sama she said.

    When her voice reached my brain, I felt as if I were going to heaven.

    Gard-sama,that Testarossa-dono called me by my name.

    Thank you very much!

    I couldnt help but answer with a gluttonous smile.

    And so, with the help of Testarossa-dono, the n began to take off almost scarily well.

    ***

    In just a few months, a branch of the Four Nations Trade Federation has been set up in every member country of the Council. It is small, enough to amodate about ten staff members, but it should be enough for the time being.

    This was a surprise to me, but an even more surprising event still awaited me.

    I was elected as the representative of the Four Nations Trade Federation.

    Myourmiles-dono, whom Rimuru trusts, can trust me too. Ill leave everything to you.

    When Gazel, the king, gave me encouragement, I was so nervous that I felt paralyzed.

    As long as the king had said that, the dwarven officials had no objections. They may have been dissatisfied, but on the surface, they obediently followed.

    Because we are on the side of being helped, I dont have anyints at the moment. So, good luck with that.

    And Youm-dono.

    Then I overheard him saying, It must be hard for you to be pushed around by that guy, isnt it? but I smiled and replied, Thats true for both of us. Thanks to you, Ive been able to live a very pleasant life.

    Youm-donoughed as well, so I think the feeling was mutual.

    The King of Blumund was troublesome.

    At first nce, he seemed to be a friendly man, but my gut feeling told me something else.

    Drum Blumundthis man cant be trusted.

    And sure enough, negotiations with the King of Blumund were not going to be easy.

    Ho-ho-ho, you are the representative of the federation, so you will have unimaginable power in the future. If Myourmiles-dono is going to take over the reins, Ill be at ease too.

    Is it that bad? I wondered, but it could be, depending on how things unfolded.

    Ha-ha, Im honored. Well, Ill see you in the future

    By the way

    Here ites! I braced myself.

    In my country, we are in the process of training our staff for Rimuru-donos project. We would, naturally, want to expect job security.

    Of course, of course. In fact, the n wont be able to move forward without the cooperation of those people.

    Well, I am relieved to hear that. Then, of course, you are aware of the situation in our country, are you not?

    The situation, sir?

    I didnt know what he was talking about, so I didnt bother to answer the question.

    Then the King of Blumund, with a friendly smile, said something that made me want to scream at him like an idiot.

    Let me put it simply. We have abolished all agriculture in our country. We are now selling off all the food stored in the national treasury to keep the people in line. We need your support.

    What!?

    I couldnt help but exim, but I think it couldnt be helped.

    Mmm, of course Ill do everything I can, but Im afraid Im the only one

    Well, Im sure Rimuru-dono will smile and give us permission. He has built the World Station of the Magic Train in our country, and I am sure that you will not abandon us for responding to your spirit.

    Thats unreasonable!

    I want to scream at him for his absurd logic, but somewhere in my heart I am convinced.

    This man had staked the fate of the nation on Rimuru-samas n.

    Would this be considered an incredible act of stupidity or a wise decision? No, no

    I must prove that he made the right decision.

    Because if this is seen as a fools errand, it would mean that Rimuru-samas n has failed.

    We have no manpower to begin with, and it would be a great help to us if all the people of the Blumund Kingdom were to work for us.

    Therefore, I had only one answer.

    Thats right. King of Blumund, I swear to you that I will take responsibility for hiring all of Blumunds people. Of course, you will leave the food aid to me as an advance on my sry!

    Ho-ho-ho, Myourmiles-dono is reliable! I would like to be able to continue relying and helping you with various things in the future as well. Therefore, please call me Drum.

    Well, what a surprise.

    A mere merchant like me is allowed to call him by his name?

    Oh, Im afraid not

    It could be a trap, so I refused it for the time being

    Myourmilesno, Im going to go ahead and call you Gard-dono.

    No, no, no, no, Im just a formermoner who was taken in by Rimuru-sama

    Ho-ho-ho, no need for modesty. Nobody would think of Gard-dono, who is a friend of not only Rimuru-dono, but also Her Majesty Elmesia, as a meremoner.

    Even I cant call her by her name, King Blumund said with a straight face.

    Although he is acquainted with Rimuru-sama and knows him well enough to be on friendly terms, the expression on his face tells me that to Her Majesty the Emperor of Sarion, a superpower, hes nothing more than an insignificant member of the royal family.

    Theres no denying it.

    I have turned my back on this fact, but I have to admit that older sister is an extraordinary person.

    If so, I assume that this is the reason that the King of Blumund wants to have a close rtionship with me.

    Its an honor to call him by name, and its also a great way to build a good rtionship.

    But what to dowell, dont bother.

    Come to think of it, its not the name of the country over there. Prince Figaro is the representative of the country, so its okay.

    Then, with His Majesty Drum

    Wait, wait, lets be on equal footing here. Even with Drum-chan

    No, no, thats not right! I mean, its absurd!

    Is that so?

    Yes, it is! I understand. Well, then may I call you Drum-dono from now on?

    I was afraid to change the name, since it was the person himself who had asked me to do so. I didnt want to be arrested for being rude, though I didnt believe that was likely.

    As a result, Drum-donoughed happily at me.

    Well, Im d to hear that. Being friends with Gard-dono, I feel as if I have be a great person, said Drum-dono. I look forward to working with you as a friend in the future!

    Before I knew it, I had be friends with Drum-dono.

    I didnt know if I was allowed to do that, and I asked for help from others to see if they would disagree.

    And yet

    Behind Drum-dono stood a group of stern-looking ministers, but no oneined. On the contrary, everyone was smiling happily, as if they were relieved.

    I had no choice but to realize that the Blumund Kingdom was serious.

    They had invested everything they had in the Four Nations Trade Federation, a supranational organization represented by me, and they were betting their countrys survival by joining forces with it.

    Thats an unbelievable gamble.

    Its not easy for me to make a decision like this. In that sense, this Drum Blumund is undoubtedly an impressive man.

    I wish to build a good rtionship with you for a long time. Please guide me as a friend, so that I do not be a fox that borrows the power of the tiger.

    I replied to Drum-dono with sincere respect.

    After the meeting with the Kings Drum-dono, we had a practical meeting.

    Veryard-dono, who had risen up to the rank of Viscount, gave us a report on the current situation.

    He told me that they have enough food tost for one year, and that their education is going well. Those with high ability have been dispersed throughout the country as an immediate asset.

    Well, in our country, we have always been very good at underworld espionage activities. Those people have gone to various countries to conduct price surveys and so on. We are working hard to train our administrative staff under the slogan Rich country, wise people. Adults and children alike are working together to learn about world affairs and economics.

    I didnt doubt Drum-donos words, but I didnt expect him to be as thorough as he was.

    If a king is a king, then his subjects are his subjects too.

    Oops, I cant help but be surprised.

    I understand. Then I will report on the progress of our n.

    I, too, should stop hiding things.

    After that, I spoke about the current situation without hiding anything.

    The development of the Magic Train is going well.

    The construction of the rails is underway from the end point at Dwargon via the intermediate Farmenas, to Blumund in the middle of the line.

    The ingredients produced at Farmenas is transported to Dwargon, where the cargo is reced with industrial products. Then they unload at Farmenas and send the rest to Blumund.

    Eventually Blumund will have to act as a collection point.

    Of course. So, food hygiene will be an important part of the job in the future?

    Yes, sir. Also, we would like Blumund to consider where to sell the necessary supplies.

    Of course. Ive exined that to the officials we sent to you as well.

    Mmmm, I heard you are Fuze-donos best friend, but Veryard-dono is no exception.

    Come to think of it, Rimuru-sama also told me that Veryard-dono is a shrewd man, so we cant be too careful. I see, this is indeed an opponent with whom we cant let our guard down.

    Thats a good point. Then what do you intend to do about the abandonednd?

    Ive made ns on that as well. Here in the vicinity of the royal capital, we have secured a site for the World Station. From there, we will set up a vacant lot in all directions to connect to the city road.

    How?

    Weve prepared somend on the outskirts of Royal Capital. We n to connect it with the World Station and make it a logistics base.

    My God

    We were so well prepared, it was astonishing.

    From here, the negotiations began in earnest, without any bellyaching.

    Our monster kingdom will provide thebor force. We will build a huge World Station and open a line to Dwargon.

    This will be followed by the opening of new routes to Sarion and Ingracia.

    At the same time, it was decided to build warehouses on the vacantnd that had been prepared. This will allow Blumund to grow into a majormercial area in the future. Withnd prices likely to rise, its imperative to secure a prime location before its toote.

    This ce, the Blumund Kingdom, will be a logistics base in the future. I had nned to buy the best location for the site, but

    Then, its a branch of the Four Nations Trade Federation, but because the current location is temporary, I would like to build a new one.

    Dont worry. Weve secured a special area for you.

    I had a bad feeling about that.

    I tried to decipher Veryard-donos expression, but the smug smile on his face kept me from doing so.

    Does that mean youll have to give it away?

    Thend needed for stations and rails is treated aspensation for technology andbor, as well as joint expenses in the future, so theres no problem since weve discussed that it would be free. Therefore, I have put off the purchase of the branchsnd untilter, but the situation is getting worse.

    My fears have been proven true.

    No, no, please dont do that. In the Blumund Kingdom, we have decreed that allnd is the property of the state. And we have transitioned to a new form of government-loanednds.

    They got me!

    Even I never would have guessed that they would pull off such a feat.

    Im impressed that theyve passed such a bill. I wonder how they managed to convince the aristocrats who have vested interests in it?

    What are the rents in that area?

    On a per square meter basis, we n to pay one silver dor.

    Its not expensive.

    Its not cheap, but if you wanted to rentnd in the capital of Ingracia, youd need three silver coins per square meter. So its better to buy, even if you have to pay ie tax every year.

    But there is a bigger problem.

    The problem is that the other party can take control before the profit or loss!

    Rimuru-sama is surprisingly unconcerned, but this is the kind of thing that makes things hard to deal with.

    What will you do if they change the terms and conditions in the middle?

    As long as were on friendly terms with them, its fine, but people are receable, so its important to secure permanent rights.

    I dont think this would happen, but what if they raised the rent?

    If it is within the range ofmon sense, we can ept their request on a case-by-case basis. However, if they raise the rent unreasonably, one cant deny the possibility of quarrel.

    I understand that this is just a contingency, but older sister has told me to think about that eventuality.

    If we owned thend, the unreasonable demands would be grounded. But if the other party has the right to thend, it will be a problem if conditions are not met.

    If youin, the owner has the right to question you. If you dont like it, you have no choice but to leave.

    Thats why I want to make sure we get possession. If thats not possible, then its hard to over-invest in this ce.

    Now, just as I was wondering what to do, Veryard-dono grinned.

    Rents will fluctuate ording to the economy, but heres an interesting story only for Myourmiles-dono!

    This guy really cant stop.

    I have a bad feeling, but Im afraid I mustnt stop listening.

    Whats the story?

    Its very simple. We in the Blumund Kingdom would like to offer you a settlement concession as a token of our friendship.

    Concession, you say?

    Yes. Its about the special area mentioned earlier, and that were willing to grant extraterritoriality to the special area by entering into a perpetualnd lease that will be in effect permanently.

    My God!

    I was surprised, but it was too good to be true.

    It seems that Veryard-dono is going to exin it to me before I even have time to ponder what kind of a backstory there is.

    Theres no backstory. It was His Majesty Drums idea. I was against it, but the other ministers voted for it and it was adopted. There are equal advantages and disadvantages to this idea. The disadvantage, of course, is that we will be hit by other countries if we sell off ournd.

    Well, I guess so.

    I was surprised that they didnt try to hide it, but when I heard it was Drum-donos idea, it made sense. And I think I see the merits of it.

    The advantage is, of course, that we can expect your country to invest in us to the fullest. Also, we have decided that our country can gain an advantage by adding various conditions to the permanentnd lease contract.

    What do you mean?

    The question is what kind of conditions will be added.

    What? Its simple. One, that you employ our citizens as your employees. The other is that I want you to establish a headquarters for the Four Nations Trade Federation in our country.

    I see, I thought to myself.

    If the headquarters of the Four Nations Trade Federation is in the Blumund Kingdom, it will not only be a logistics center, but also a center of the world economy. Recing the current position of the Ingracia Kingdom would not be an impossiblity, and the value of the Blumund Kingdom will skyrocket.

    Land prices will rise, of course, and the real estate ie alone will be very lucrative if the representatives of each country have embassies there.

    Unlike tourist destinations, this one is not affected by the economy. Moreover, it promises jobs for the people of Blumund.

    If you have the will to join and work together with the Four Nations Trade Federation, it bes a gamble with a great return. I was convinced from the bottom of my heart that this is just like Drum-dono, a genuine gambler.

    And it was also in Rimuru-samas vision that the Blumund Kingdom would be the center of the world economy. I had no reason to oppose it, so I nodded my head and agreed to it.

    ***

    After that, we had a detailed discussion with Veryard-dono and signed a contract.

    The contract is basically to protect each others rights and interests. For example, all contracts will be cancelled in the event of a war.

    I thought it was satisfactory, but I wanted to hear what Veryard-dono really thought, for future reference.

    I would like to ask you one thing.

    What is it?

    Well, Veryard-dono was against the deal, or so Im told. Id like to know what you think about the result.

    Because the content is such that we gave preferential treatment to the "Four Nations Trade Federation," misceneous matters such as exnations to other countries will increase. I was wondering if he wasnt amused, if not displeased.

    Oh, I see.

    Then Veryard-dono looked thoughtful. He got up without looking at me, and then, while I was wondering what was on his mind, walked to the window and looked out.

    ?

    Veryard-dono clears his throat in front of me.

    Im talking to myself, so please pay me no mind.

    After refusing that, he opened his mouth seriously.

    A nobleman is a creature who never shows his true feelings. You must not. If the negotiations turn out to be unfavorable, they will say that things went as nned. Otherwise, you will show your opponent weakness. I said, I was against it. That is, I want you to understand that I was for it at the time of the negotiations.

    I was surprised that that was the real intention.

    If so, it was exactly what Veryard-dono was aiming for.

    I dont think Ive lost, but Ive learned once again how hard it is to negotiate with the nobility.

    Thats why I couldnt help but grumble about it too.

    Oh dearI still have a long way to go. I thought I was good at dealing with noblemen, too. But Im not sure if Im going to be able to represent the Four Nations Trade Federation if this continues.

    No, no, Myourmiles-dono is a tough guy, even from my point of view. Excuse me.

    Ha-ha, Ill take that as apliment.

    I looked at Veryard-dono with a wry smile. Unexpectedly, Veryard-donoughed too.

    His usual cool expression belied the humanity in his face.

    Thats why I couldnt help but smile at him.

    I hope you wont be offended, but would you be interested in working for me?

    Well, hed definitely say no. But there was still a hint of truth in my questioning.

    I was confident that having a man of Veryard-donos caliber working for me would give us the best possible advantage as we expand our operations in the Ingracia Kingdom, which would be guing us in the near future.

    Hmm.

    Ha-ha, its not my ce to say anything. If you can pass this off as a joke

    No, no, its an interesting suggestion.

    What?

    I looked intently at Veryard-donos face.

    Hes very serious, not a joke in sight.

    Are you serious?

    Yes. Im actually thinking about changing my job, too.

    After saying this, Veryard-dono told me about the current situation and future prospects for the Blumund Kingdom.

    The rich and wise are a double-edged sword. The future of the people is secure, but the status of the nobility will be shaken in the future.

    We have nond-owning aristocrats in Blumund. Nor are there many of them. Maybe one percent of the citys million people. There are less than 2,000 knights, and their families number 8,000 or so, so there are less than a hundred people involved in politics. Thats all well and good for now, but in the near future, everyone will be in an honorary position. Thats the direction His Majesty Drum has set.

    Indeed, it was a small country that was able to achieve this drastic reformation by protecting the interests of the nobility. There may have been opposition, but as a result, theyve continued to this day.

    Because Veryard-dono was not, you know, opposed?

    No. Its more a matter of profit. I just thought Id have to find another job before I became unemployed.

    With a grin, Veryard-dono said that.

    I saw that smile, and I knew.

    Ive been beaten.

    Well, thats one for you. Did you pretend to answer my question and then sell yourself?

    Huh, I was hoping youd figure that out.

    I see. If I hadnt figured it out, I wouldnt have passed.

    Then, really?

    Yes. Id like Myourmiles-sama to hire me. However, is it okay to treat me as a consultant for the time being?

    Of course.

    I understand his position as a nobleman. He wont be able to move much for a while. But Im counting on Veryard-donos intellect and experience, so theres no harm in being a consultant.

    Of course! I look forward to working with you in the future.

    Thank you very much.

    Veryard-dono and I shook hands with each other,ughing inivincibly.

    With Veryard-dono as my advisor, the Four Nations Trade Federation began to grow steadily.

    And now the time hase for us to face our worst enemies in businessthe big merchants.

    Are you going to be in Ingracia Kingdom today, Gard-san?

    The one who asked was Bydd, who was in charge of the escort. We have gotten to know each other well and have allowed each other to call us by our names.

    Forged in monster country, Bydds current strength has risen from a D+ rank to a B rank. Now that hes renewed hiis armor, hes be reasonably reliable and I always ask him to apany me when I go out on excursions.

    Of course, Gobemon-dono was there too.

    This one is even more impressive and looks like a warrior of the past. His strength is now over Rank A and it seems hes evolved into a Kijin (fair oni race) 2 .

    I heard that they are of legendary statusbut theyremon in the monster kingdom. I think Ill only lose if I look into everything, so Im just going to let it slide.

    Thats right. I have an important meeting today, and Im afraid Im going to have to go somewhere dangerous.

    Huh? I guess its my turn, too.

    What are you talking about, brother Gobemon! You dont have a chance with me here!

    Huh, Im not so sure about that.

    Gobemon-dono isughing at the confident Bydd.

    Gobemon-dono became a Kijin, but his skin color remained the same. I guess thats the difference between individuals.

    Hes grown horns too, but theyre small so he hides them with a bandana or hat. He was wearing a hat that matched his suit and looked stylish.

    He still seems like a hobgoblin at first nce, so its easy to catch any opponents off guard.

    Bydd is stronger now, but hes still unreliable. Gobemon-dono has always helped me as my bodyguard.

    Im leaving it up to them to protect me, but today Im afraid it might not be enough. After all, the merchants who control the Western Nations are the ones we are meeting today.

    But I neednt worry about that.

    After all, Rimuru-sama knows what we have nned for today. Whether the negotiations go well or not, my safety is assured.

    So for now, I want to enjoy thisfortable tension.

    In response to my call, the big names of the world have gathered in one cethis is a mans romance.

    To straighten up after a long absence, the three of us have decided to wear dark suits today.

    Now, are you ready?

    I asked, and Bydd and Gobemon-dono nodded emphatically.

    I steeled myself and headed to the hotel where we were to meet.

    The automatic door opened.

    Sir, may I ask your name?

    With a refined motion, the hotel clerk inquired.

    Myourmiles.

    ??! Oh, Im so sorry. May I see your ID, just in case?

    No one else is going to steal my name, but I have to cooperate. It means that were thorough with everyone else, so its rather safe.

    Is this okay?

    Bydd took a letter of introduction from his pocket and showed it to the hotel man. After looking at it, we were searched to make sure we werent carrying any weapons.

    Meanwhile, my subordinates came running in.

    Myourmiles-sama, weve been expecting you!

    Everything is set up right away. The venue is here.

    My men, who sent the hotelier away, lead me to the ballroom.

    The venue this time is where the aristocrats hold balls and other events.

    There were already many people milling about, and all eyes were on me as I entered.

    So thats the representative of the Four Nations Trade Federation, the organizer of this event?

    Hmm, he looks familiar. He was a very smart businessman, if I remember correctly.

    That man, I hear that he has taken over Demon Lord Rimuru and taken his current position?

    Thats right. But dont underestimate him. I hear that the trade in monster country was arranged by that man. Rumor has it he gained some leverage over a beleaguered retailmunity.

    Hmph, its a nouveau riche after all. The Rosso familys influence is now a thing of the past, and although there seems to be a move to rewind in the Dn General Kingdom, the other Five Great Elders show no signs of being reced. Its probably over.

    Johann Duke of Rosteia was also arrested by an Ingracia Magical Inquisitor. He wont be able to recover.

    I have heard that the Border Count Sidel has been captured as well. He was charged with the defense of Ingracia, and now hes abandoned it. I doubt hell ever see the light of day again.

    In other words, whoever takes the lead at todays meeting will be promised the power of the next generation,

    Fufufu, I wont let a neer like that take that ce. Im not calling for a bunch of rednecks like Four Nations Trade Federation!

    But the monster kingdom is tricky.

    Right. Their military might is not to be underestimated, and I hear that a woman named Testarossa or something like that has even taken control of the council.

    Well, lets see what he can do, shall we?

    Master Left. If that man has no ability, it would be best for us to take his ce.

    And Im sure Demon Lord Rimuru will also give preference to those who are morepetent.

    And so on and so forth, the flowers of rumor are blooming madly.

    Everyone seems to be curious about me. The conversation is so obvious that I can hear it.

    Well, thats understandable.

    Today, not only the old Rosso faction, but also some of the biggest names in the worlds underworld are gathered here. These are men who control the wealth of the world and who usually dont ever meet each other.

    These are the tycoons of the old days, whom I would have once had difficulty meeting. One only has to look at the rumors of the Five Great Elders to see the breadth of their connections.

    Those who live as if they were living horses. That desire is endless, and instead of being frightened by the fall of Rosso, they are enthusiastic about the opportunity.

    I cant let my guard down. I brace myself even more.

    ***

    Suddenly, someone calls out to me.

    Hey, Myourmiles. Youre getting pretty big, arent you? Why dont you say hello to me?

    Well, thats Don Gabbanas bodyguard, Arlecio.

    A big, muscr, middle-aged man. He wears full-body ck leather armor, which is unbing, but no one mes him.

    Thats just as well.

    Aftere all, Arlecio is a retired former A-rank adventurer, and the incarnation of so much violence that there isnt anyone in the underworld who hasnt heard his name.

    Of course, I knew him as well. Not that I wanted to see him though.

    Arlecio is a ferocious beast of a man.

    Always hungry, and always ready to hunt.

    Ever since I met him as a young man, hes always asked me for food and pocket money. Idin, but this man was the incarnation of violence.

    And worst of all, Don Gabbana is standing behind him. He is a nobleman without a title but of such stature that even Ingracias royalty cannot resist. When Arlecio went too far and killed a thug, the gendarmerie settled it by suicide.

    After that, no one dared to challenge Arlecio.

    We are here to talk about the future of the business world, but this is not the time to quarrel with Arlecio. I, as a founder, will have to get through this, even if it means stepping out of line.

    I smiled and turned to face Arlecio.

    Well, well, well, Arlecio-san. What a surprise to see you here.

    Ahn? Whats with that tone? Hey, you look like youre in some kind of shape while Im watching you.

    Hey, this is scary

    Arlecios threats dont involve shouting or anything like that, but its like a bite to the gut.

    Im going to chatter.

    In Blumund, I was also called the king of the backstreets, but in front of such a real deal, I am reminded of how small I can feel

    Well, Mr. Arlecio, its a happy asion. Ill tell you about itter.

    Bydd is also under pressure from Arlecio. He seems to know about Arlecio and is now afraid of him.

    I cant speak for other people either, and on the contrary, Ive even reviewed Bydd.

    In the past, I would never have tried to go against Arlecio.

    But it leaves a bad taste.

    What do you want? You call my name so casually, but who gave you permission? Huh?

    Arlecios attention is shifting from me to Bydd.

    Just as I suspected, this man doesnt remember Bydd. I guess he didnt think he was worth remembering, either.

    It seems that Arlecio would not tolerate being osted by such a small person without permission. Hes in a terrible mood.

    In the old days I would have put my hands on some money to see him out.

    But today, thats not going to happen.

    I am a representative of the Four Nations Trade Federation and I will not be taken for a fool by our enemies at this time.

    The people around me areughing at us now, instead of helping us. This may be a show and a diversion, but Ill lose my position if we allow this to go on unchecked.

    If I cant handle this kind of trouble, Ill only draw the ire of the guests.

    Arlecio, you misunderstand me. Im a representative of the Four Nations Trade Federation. Ill let you off one the basis of our old friendship, so leave quickly!

    I said to Arlecio, poised in a rxed manner. I struggled to keep my voice from trembling, but I was relieved that I managed to do it.

    What?

    Is this what you call a killer intent?

    The air around Arlecio changes, his eyes narrowing as he stares at me.

    Im scared shitless.

    Myo-Myourmiles-san

    Bydd shuffled to his feet and called out to me in a tearful voice. But there was no time to answer and I couldnt take my eyes off Arlecio.

    Hey, Myourmiles. Are you sure you didnt misunderstand? Or maybe you did. Do you think I cant get to you in this kind of a public ce?

    Uh

    I do think so!

    No one with a bit of wisdom would meddle with a man of high rank in a ce like this. It wouldnt be natural for a monster that follows their instincts, but someone withmon sense would usually put up with it.

    Moreover, Arlecio is Don Gabbanas bodyguard. If you make trouble here, it would get your employer into trouble.

    Just when I thought I was absolutely safe, I felt Arlecios left hand shaking.

    In that moment, Bydd was pulled down and Gobemon-dono was in front of me.

    It seems that in that instant, Arlecio tried to hit me. Gobemon-dono then covered me.

    It was Gobemon-dono who pulled Bydd over, and if hed just left him there, it couldve been dangerous. As proof, Bydds ear is torn off by the pressure of Arlecios fist.

    Are you okay, Bydd?

    Yes, yes. Im sorry, I cant help you

    It doesnt bother me. Rimuru-sama will be very angry if you die here.

    Oh, are you going to get angry for me?

    Of course. Ill be mad at you, too!

    Im reaching out to Bydd and pulling him up. Meanwhile, sparks were flying between Gobemon-dono and Arlecio.

    Were you trying to kill me?

    It was an ident, an ident. I was just trying to give you a quick pat on the back. I guess thats why that punk over there fell over because you interfered.

    Dont be silly. Im still a work in progress, but Bydd is like a little brother. Ive been looking up and watching, but you, thats too much.

    Fuhaha, its bad because that guy is weak. Youre not allowed to bring weapons into this ce, so youre not going to die from a little poke.

    Oh yeah?

    Wow, the atmosphere in Gobemon-dono is changing.

    I thought that this would no longer be a meeting, but then Don Gabbana arrived at that very moment.

    Arlecio , what are you doing?

    Oops, Gabbana-san. Nothing really, I was just saying hello to my old friend for a bit.

    Yeah? I guess so. You there, youre hurt. Here, use this.

    What a bloody farce.

    Threats and intercessions, trying to do me a favor and holding my head down.

    Arlecio knows just what to do. Hes just sprinkling Bydd with the restorative without a second thought.

    A sprinkle on Bydds suit instantly restored Bydds ear. That kind of efficacy can only be theplete recovery potion (full potion).

    Ooh, to use your precious full potion on such a low-ranking person!

    As expected of Gabbana-dono! For him, he doesnt even mind using a rare, secret potion.

    Thats right. Arlecio-donos prowessbined with Gabbana-donos financial strength is truly invincible.

    Whats that? I went pale as soon as I heard that voice.

    Suddenly I wasnt scared anymore and I felt like Id just woken up from a nightmare.

    I look at Bydd and hes very puzzled. I guess hes feeling the same way I am.

    Because, aint that right?

    The full potion is a familiar sight to us.

    Every now and then, Gobemon-dono trains Bydd too, but I cant tell you how many times hes had his arms and legs chopped off in one day. If he didnt have the full potion, he wouldnt be alive today.

    Thats why weve always had the full potion on hand.

    Listening to those who appreciate it made me realize again how blessed we are now.

    Oh. and look! Behold the bright badge on Gabbana-donos chest!

    Oh, I see it too. That crest is shining.

    Right. That means its made of genuine magisteel.

    No doubt, its just as they say. An up-anding, mysterious organization is absorbing all the illegal organizations. And this organizations very crest is exactly what it looks like.

    The voice from the outside intrigued me, so I looked at Don Gabbanas chest, only to be astonished.

    There, shining in a familiar pattern, were three snakes intertwined, snaking their way around.

    No wonder they were so familiar. I had spent three days and three nights thinking about it.

    As I recall, Rimuru-sama said, Why not just make it a snake? Rather than dragons and phoenixes simple is better. Besides, the snake symbolizes wisdom, desire and eternity, which is perfect for the Three Drunk Sages, right? And older sister agreed too. She said, Well, snakes also have the image being drunk, so it might suit us. And I said, Wahahahaha! Then lets make the three snakes intertwine. Lets make them snake around like the three of us. No matter how you look at it, its the Three Drunk Sages!

    I havent heard about the members in detail, but was Don Gabbanas organization also absorbed by it?

    Now that I know, Im feeling a bit jumpy.

    But this is my chance.

    Lets make sure Don Gabbana stands out from the crowd to showcase my position.

    You are, I believe, the chairman of the Gabbana Trading Company. Now, how do you wish to make amends for this?

    What did you say?

    You are not aware? Apologize for injuring my escort. Bydd wouldnt go against that thug just because of a situation like this. And now hes gone too far, just because we wouldnt hurt him!

    Im a thug?

    This is great fun. It seems that both look bewildered by my counterattack.

    Whats with that man!? Whats that man doing challenging Gabbana-dono?

    Gabbana-dono is a member of the mysterious Three Drunk Sages, isnt he?

    Yes. I heard that a major militant group has fallen under the umbre of the Three Drunk Sages. And yet

    Youre a daredevil or do you have a secret n?

    I cant believe it, but the Four Nations Trade Federation has a n to counter the Three Drunk Sages. You really think you can!?

    The outsiders may be annoyed, but it seems to stand out in the public eye, so I shall bear it.

    Now, more than that

    Youre dead, man.

    Well, wait, Arlecio. Its not good here. Besides, its not much fun if you kill it easily.

    All right, Gabbana-san. This ones forter.

    First, Ive got to do something about these bastards who are hiding in in sight.

    Shut up!

    I shouted to him on the spot.

    My voice didnt shake. I can feel my voice returning to normal.

    Its almost as if the fear Arlecio had instilled in me a moment ago was a lie. Now that I think about it, its only natural.

    After all, Ive had conversations with much scarier beings.

    Don Gabbana would be no better than a bug from Veldora-samas point of view. All hed have to do is release his aura and Gabbana would be no more.

    Arlecio might be able to hold out, but itd only be putting off the inevitable. All Veldora-sama would have to do is turn on the killing intent, and hed be gone.

    In other words

    I usually deal with Veldora-sama and others who are that scary. Ive even refused to bargain for a raise in pocket money.

    And there are also many cmity-ss majins living in that town.

    Its my job to manage the ounts of the inhabitants of the monster country. Even those that could easily wipe out small nations are begging me to make their budgets work.

    Id yell at them and chase them away its hard to believe it, but its be my daily life now.

    Speaking of which, Cien-dono and I had a little chat the other day.

    Well, Testarossa-dono is very good and fast at what she does, which is a great help to me. And shes beautiful. I envy you, Cien-dono.

    What? Well, well, well, hahaha! Myourmiles-sama has a very good sense of humor. I haventughed so much in a long time!

    He wasughing a lot even though he was usually so calm and collected. After that, he liked me for some reason, and we became good friends, so much so that sometimes we went out for drinks together.

    Then I remembered that Testarossa-dono was a terrible demon. Her appearance was deceiving. Her graceful demeanor and soft smile made me think she wasnt so scary.

    Its well known that Testarossa-dono gave the council a hard time, so I tried to keep a modest attitude.

    Sexual harassment, no! Absolutely never!

    Thats our slogan at work.

    This is a digression, but there are many great people in our office. Now that I remembered, there was no reason to be afraid of Don Gabbana or Arlecio.

    You!

    Don Gabbana and his friends are all red-faced and furious, but that doesnt make me feel anything.

    Its not only me, but Bydd too, seems to have had a reality check.

    Hey, Myourmiles-san is a gentleman so Ill say it for you instead, but your tone of voice is not very nice, is it? Myourmiles-san cant talk to you like you do!

    Or so he says.

    However, with this, the line of sight in the venue was nailed, and it was a great show. Lets beat Don Gabbana to the punch andplete the ratings.

    ***

    Heres where I showed a fearless smile.

    Im not much of a fighter, but I have a reputation for having a bad face.

    Thats true. Bydd is right. I should have disciplined him from the start, not chided him for his old friendship.

    Thats right, Myourmiles-san. That way, I wouldnt have to put up with it, and I wouldnt have been hurt.

    Smart man. And how am I supposed to make him pay for what he did?

    First, he should apologize to you. Its not toote to learn from that attitude!

    Youre right. Oh, Arlecio, and Gabbana-dono. I can close my eyes for this if you apologize now. But if you insist on making things worse, thats another story. I, Gard Myourmiles, Minister of Finance of the Jura Tempest Federation, and representative of the Four Nations Trade Federation, will buy the quarrel! How about it, eh?

    I said that as if I were about to make a big spectacle of myself.

    Their faces are twitching as they listen to me.

    Y-You 3

    Wait, Arlecio. Calm down. If it looks like there was a misunderstanding, and you were offended by us, then lets apologize. Myourmiles-kun, wasnt it?

    And you?

    Oh, noMyourmiles-dono

    When I asked him back, Don Gabbana sounded frustrated.

    Weve won, I thought.

    There are many great merchants here. Not only from the Ingracia Kingdom, but also from other nations, whose wealth is valued by these merchants.

    Don Gabbana was forced to recognize me in front of these great men and women.

    I guess it was out of the calctions, but it was sweet.

    He is staring at me with cold, snake-like eyes, but I am not afraid. Im sure I would have cried and apologized if it was in the past.

    Hmm. So, whats the misunderstanding?

    Don Gabbana bowed, a blue streak on his forehead as he set out the rescue ship.

    My guards got ahead of themselves this time, and Im sorry for the inconvenience. I think he was a little too excited, and I think you can tolerate one thing

    Ahn? Do they teach you tough and easily forgive people for hurting you? My Bydd had to suffer the shame of losing an ear, remember?

    The full potion

    Hah! You dont know what youre talking about if you try to fool me with such cheap medicine!

    Iughed out loud.

    In fact, I still have a few of those potionos because Rimuru-sama let me keep them. It wasnt a lie, so I said so emphatically.

    You are not worthy of participating in the grand scheme I have nned to call upon you to carry out. Leave this ce!

    Don Gabbana scowled as I shouted at him.

    Then, in a chilling voice

    Dont you regret it.

    Dont you regret it he said, for me only, and left the hall with Arlecio.

    And the next morning.

    When we came out of the hotel, there was a ck carriage parked in front of us.

    Thats a pretty bold thing for a public figure to do.

    Get in.

    Arlecio announces in a low voice.

    I grinned and climbed into the carriage with Bydd and Gobemon-dono.

    youve got some nerve!

    Arlecioes aboard at the end of the ride and threatens us, but from what I can see, hes just a sore loser.

    So where are we going?

    A nice ce. Well, enjoy yourst ride.

    And then Arlecio keeps his mouth shut.

    He didnt seem to want to say anything else, so we got into the carriage without saying a word.

    The carriage arrived at our destination after about twenty minutes.

    Judging from the distance from the hotel, this must be an upscale residential area. In other words, its the ce that I had guessed.

    I was truly relieved.

    If Id been taken to Don Gabbanas domain, I would have panicked a little. But now we have nothing to worry about.

    This is where the Apostles of Vert used to have a base in Ingracia. I helped to renovate this ce, so I know it well.

    Stay down. The scariest people you could ever imagine are waiting for you down the road. Im looking forward to it. Im looking forward to seeing you crawling around, spewing shit and piss and begging for your life.

    I look at Arlecio with pity as he threatens me.

    This guys a pitiful guy, too.

    What is it, bastard? Whats that look in your eyes!?

    No, its all right. Its not going to happen.

    This guys going to die.

    What!? Youwhat the hell are you talking about?

    I think Arlecio sensed something about my attitude. He has a slightly uneasy face.

    Theres a group of men lined up in front of the mansion that stands there. As soon as the carriage stops, theye running.

    One of them speaks to Arlecio.

    Arlecio-san. Its a message.

    What?

    Well, some of the higher-ups are waiting downstairs.

    Upstairs? The Seven des?

    No more like

    You dont mean to tell me that an old wise man from the Wise Mens Club or the group of evil shinobi from the Dark Heavenly n

    Those people were the guides.

    The three leaders!?

    Arlecio is astonished, but Im so unfamiliar with these people that I have no idea what theyre like.

    From the sound of the conversation, Im guessing theyre not in the Gabbana family. I guess theyre still neers.

    Well, even I dont know exactly which organizations the Three Drunk Sages have under their umbre. Thats why such unfortunate events are happening.

    Even though I knew about the underworld, Im surprised there are so many organizations in the Western Nations

    Gabbana-san was taken earlier.

    Okay. Hey, lets go.

    Apanied by a look of triumph on Arlecios face, we stepped into the mansion.

    We were headed for the basement, but its still a luxurious ce.

    The Apostles of Vert originally enshrined an altar, but that was torn down and reced with an audience chamber.

    It was Rimuru-samas idea to make the rooms atmosphere more important.

    He believed that a secret society should be like a secret society, and was thus very particr about the details.

    It might even be more luxurious than the one in the monster country.

    I control the budget over there too, so I cant allow them to waste it. But here, it doesnt matter what is done with the money earned, because its an evil organization.

    Youwhy are you so calm?

    Perhaps due to anxiety, Arlecio spoke to me.

    Well, why not?

    I answered, and he gave me a little tsk. He remained silent the rest of the way until we came to arge door on the third floor below.

    Enter.

    And, Mr. Vigan from the Seven des, youre a doorkeeper?

    Tsk, Arlecio. I was thinking of you. Id give you a pass on Seven des if it was vacant. Idiot.

    Oh, no, Vigan-san! What did I do?

    Just quickly get the hell inside! Hey, you guys wait here. I was told only the guests and Arlecio can go in there.

    Vigan told him, staring at Arlecios men.

    Well, thats about right.

    The fewer people who know Im one of the bosses, the better.

    Thats why I say nothing here, and follow quietly.

    Iming in.

    With that said, Arlecio enters, followed by us. Vigan is thest to enter the room, and the door is closed.

    The door has been magically sealed so that no sound can escape. No one outside can tell whats going on inside.

    Even though the room is underground, its bright and shiny. Countless wax candles lit the room at varying degrees of intensity.

    Rimuru-sama said that there was no need to use candles when they could be made by magic. It was in this waste that romance was found.

    The basement floor is not divided, so its more of a hall than a room. Thats why it can be used as an audience room, but only executives are allowed in.

    And by executives, I mean those who know who I am. But more than half the people inside this room are people I dont know.

    I walk proudly into the room with all eyes fixed on me, nearly a hundred of them.

    Hey!

    Arlecio shouts to stop me, but I ignore him.

    Arlecio tries to put his hand on my shoulder, but Vigan knocks him down before Bydd or Gobemon-dono can move. He was told about me when he was named doorkeeper.

    The reaction of the other executives who I did not know were also different.

    Some were surprised and others were baffled.

    They saw everyone who knew me kneel down at once and guessed who I was. They followed my example and hung their heads in unison.

    No way, Myourmiles, you are the leader?

    The room is quiet, and I can hear Don Gabbanas stunned voice. The air-conditioning is good, but the voice echoes because the room is underground.

    Don Gabbana was in the back of the room, addressing a man I know well. Perhaps he was negotiating to have me killed as an example to an insolent new organization, the Four Nations Trade Federation.

    Thats right. The one youve been working so hard to persuade, hoping to inflict a horrible death, is the one of your three great leaders.

    Don Gabbana was answered not by me, but by a woman in a mboyant and revealing dress.

    Glenda Atlee, the woman who ys the boss of the Three Drunk Sages on behalf of me and my friends.

    And her words confirmed what I had thought.

    However, somehow, even though its about me, I feel like its someone elses affair.

    Geh, hey, whaaa!?

    The cool-headed Don Gabbana is sitting up in shock. I never thought Id be witnessing something so outrageous like this when I was a nobody back in my day.

    Glenda, thank you for your help. Thanks to you, the n is on track. Our meeting was a great sess yesterday.

    Thank you very much for thepliment! In that case, Id love to see the merit points

    I know. Ill give you twice the amount I usually give you.

    Im d to hear that. Thats my leader, he knows what hes talking about!

    Glenda led me to the former altar. There were three chairs and I sat on one of them.

    ***

    No oneins about me being the leader after seeing Glendas reaction. Thats how much everyone fears her.

    And now, right in front of me, Don Gabbana and Arlecio are hauled up and held down. I must decide how to deal with Don Gabbana, who had advised to kill the leader (me), and Arlecio, who has spoken rudely to me.

    The executives are unanimous in their desire to see them dead.

    Only death will redeem the disrespect to our leader.

    Its better not to kill himfortably. By way of example, lets give them seven days of torment.

    Right. It would be fun to sacrifice them to the devil, and it would be fun to make a synthetic beast out of their corpses.

    The man himself was happy to talk about how to kill the chieftain. Now is the time. You should try everything he said in person!

    And so on and so forth, the brutal discussion continued.

    Don Gabbana has lost color and is breathing hard. A stain has formed on his trousers, but Ill pretend I didnt see it.

    Arlecio looks pale.

    He must have realized his fate and is calcting whether or not he should resist.

    But there are some powerful men in this room, from the underworld. I could have many off them killed in heartbeat if I were alone, but many of the other leaders are the best in the world.

    I couldnt defeat them all, even if I fought them. Glenda would stand a better chance.

    The heat in the room grows louder and louder as the executives grow more and more outspoken.

    Now Im not sure what to do.

    I ponder while looking at the two who hang their heads in surrender.

    Honestly, these two are at fault, but they are not entirely guilty.

    Threatening an up-anding force is a perfectly natural thing for an underworlder to do. Disrespecting the boss of your organization is a problem, but thats because he didnt know my face.

    I was pissed off at the assault on Bydd, but it didnt matter when I looked at the results. And since Rimuru-sama knew about this incident, someone was supposed to be protecting us from anything that might happen.

    There are several of Souei-donos men here as well. Therefore, Im sure there is no danger in that regard.

    If thats the case, then disposing of Don Gabbana is a bit much.

    Be quiet!

    I silenced them all as I gathered my thoughts.

    I wont dispose of them. Gabbana didnt betray the organization. He just didnt know that I was the leader. If he betrays me in the future, thats another matter, but Ill let him off the hook.

    I was a little pissed off at times, but thats bearable. Thats how I decided.

    However, some people werent happy about it.

    How naive! Thats no way to represent the organization!

    Many agreed with those who shouted that.

    Some went so far as to say

    Chieftainyou are an amateur, arent you? You know, for an underworlder like us, face is the most important thing, right? If you dont take a swing at them now, no one will follow you.

    Some of them even began to look down on me.

    I could have let them off the hook if they only wanted toin about my decision. But this was no good.

    Whoever said that, step forward.

    As I said this, a scowling young man stepped forward.

    Im Yang of the ck ws. During our time together as mercenaries, we fought together, and I was a harsh man who was merciless towards the enemy. My personal strength is also quite impressive. I have a rank of A.

    And before I knew it, Girard, who was standing next to me, told me. He was the leader of the Apostles of Vert.

    I nodded at him and looked at Yang.

    I hear youre called Yang.

    Yeah,

    You think Im an amateur?

    Am I wrong? No one in our line of work gives mercy by doing something so half-assed.

    So, you can do it?

    Is it different?

    My God, Yang doesnt realize hes making me look bad, does he?

    No, he doesnt.

    Hes just trying to build distrust of me here so that he can defeat me in the future.

    Those without power do not prosper in the dark.

    You must always assert your power, or you will be ostracized. But I dont want the Three Drunk Sages to be that kind of an organization.

    Well, apart from me, its impossible to kick down Rimuru-sama and older sister out of office.

    So I must tell them here and now.

    Whos going to oppose me?

    Huh?

    I ask, whos going to oppose me? Yang, do you think you have a chance against me?

    No, no

    When I asked, Yang nced at Glenda. It looks like it was Glenda who crushed the ck ws, not the Apostles of Vert.

    You say its all about saving face. So, Yang, arent you the one who should be held ountable for the way you treated me?

    Well, that is

    Glenda, about those merit points you mentioned earlier, I knew it was a no-go.

    Oh no, that

    Shut up! Shut up! Like Yang, I wonder if everyone also has no respect for their leader! You have no right to me Gabbana!

    Don Gabbana and Arlecio look at me in surprise.

    The look on their faces made me think of one more thing.

    These two men were being used.

    Glenda, you have to teach them a lesson on purpose, dont you? And guys, didnt somebody smartly put you up to the challenge? 5

    Am I in the clear?

    Its natural. Youre lucky it was me, but if it was them, wed have a big problem

    Dont miss that point. Ive already consulted about this matter, and it was Master El who insisted that we go ahead with the matter without your knowledge.

    Is that so

    Her antics never cease to amaze me.

    Well, surely, thanks to that, things seem to have worked out.

    But thats beside the point.

    Yang. If someone wants to thrash me for letting Gabbana off the hook, I would live to meet theem. So would everyone else. Im not saying not to go for the downfall, but be prepared. It may seed because Im weakbut if I that happens, the Three Drunk Sages will disappear.

    I clearly warned him.

    Yang is shivering when he hears it. I think he realizes that Im not exaggerating or bluffing.

    So, are the two remaining leaders of the Three Drunk Sages by any chance

    You dont need to know.

    Really. If you know too much, theyll erase you, so I wonder why you would want to know?

    Girard and Glenda answered, and the executives fell silent in a cold sweat.

    I look at them and give them onest reminder.

    Now, Gabbana and the others have no objection to my decision. Do you have a problem with it?

    Hahaaa!!

    They all prostrated themselves to show respect for my decision.

    Yang, rejoice. Ill let you off the hook for once. But there will not be a second time.

    Of course! Thank you. I will work as hard as I can to repay you for this favor!

    Well, thats good to know.

    With that, I am satisfied.

    And now that I haveplete control of the Three Drunk Sages, Ive decided to take this opportunity to enact a fundamental discipline.

    One: Never betray your fellow man.

    Two: Have the heart to forgive the failure of others.

    Three: Do not kick others down and make them unhappy.

    Those three things are the basics, arent they?

    It is a matter of course not to betray your fellow man, and anyone who breaks this rule is punishable by death.

    It is difficult to forgive others failures, but the Three Drunk Sages will be the final resting ce for those who fail. There will be a few excellent people, so I have told my subordinates to cover for their mistakes.

    This kind of thing can only get better if we raise awareness from above. Thus, I took this opportunity with all the executives in attendance to make sure it was done right.

    Thest rule of not kicking someone down and making them unhappy is the most important one.

    The Three Drunk Sages will bring together the armed forces of the underworld, and if you pay attention to this, the merchants out in the open will have no chance topete. However, from now on, such evil deeds will be banned altogether.

    From now on, they must realize that their influence is different from what they have been doing up until now, and aim to contribute to society in a fairer and more straightforward manner.

    Rather than awless and violent group, we must be chivalrous guests who help the weak and defat the tyrants. It is not only my wish, but Rimuru-samas as well.

    But that doesnt mean we should lose our pride.

    If the top rots, those below cannot resist. This is also true for me and Ill keep it in mind.

    Be mindful that this is what the Three Drunk Sages are called upon to do, though it will be difficult to change your way of life. Let the young ones slowly learn that there is more than one way to live.

    As I concluded, the executives looked puzzled and thought about it.

    Theyve grown ustomed to doing the dirty work. Its not going to change their minds anytime soon. But with the help of me, or rather Rimuru-sama, its not impossible.

    I have been able to silence their opposition with force, but since we are dealing with people who believe that force is justice, this is the right way to go.

    I hoped that this will give an impetus to the people to change.

    ***

    The Gabbana family was disbanded, and its members were transferred to other organizations. Gabbana is now under my direct control and will work under a new name, at Blumund Headquarters.

    Hes a man who is good with money and ounts. Its a waste to just leave him there.

    He was a pain in the ass, but I put him in charge of train operations.

    Well, it was Rimuru-sama that was the root of all evil.

    He justes up with stuff, and then makes me do all the work.

    But, well, thats okay.

    Its my job, and I dont deny that its a very attractive n.

    But I would also like to remind him that I have only one body.

    And unlike Rimuru-sama, I am a very ordinary person and need a good nights sleep. Its hard to refuse when he says, Please, Myourmiles-kun! but the reason I forgo the project is for my health.

    But that excuse wouldnt work either, especially now that Ive started earning this much money.

    It was at this time that I was lucky to have Gabbana working for me.

    Gabbana said, Im thankful, but Ive got a lot of work to do! I didnt expect it to be this hard! Heins every day, however I was also ridiculed by Rimuru-sama for that job, so if he has a grudge, he should take it to him.

    But I felt a little guilty about it, so I thought Id give him better pay.

    Arlecio was left in Gobemon-donos care.

    Because of the history with Bydd, Gobemon-dono wanted to straighten things out with a match.

    Arlecio didnt have the right to refuse, but the match was agreed on the condition that if he won, he would be picked as an executive.

    The result was, of course, andslide victory for Gobemon-dono.

    Now you understand. Theres always someone better than you. Even Im at the bottom of the heap back home. Strength is not something thats openly disyed, but rather something locked inside. It must be exercised correctly to protect what is absolutely essential. Thats what I was taught. Its not toote for you to take another good look at yourself.

    Arlecio must have been awakened by what he said to me. He volunteered to be Gobemon-donos younger brother.

    Thus, Gabbana and his friends were dealt with amicably, but the official announcement was different.

    The Three Drunk Sages must be used to mark the spectacr debut of the Four Nations Trade Federation. At the same time, we must find a way to prevent the Three Drunk Sages from being taken for a fool.

    Thats why we crushed the mansion we had purchased for the Ingracia branch of the Four Nations Trade Federation to smithereens. I had the workers evacuated so they would be safe, but this is sure to have a huge impact on the public.

    The reporters under Diablo-dono wrote a really good article about it.

    And so, I was featured in the article as well as the horror of the Three Drunk Sages, but I was not deterred by it. Im the Finance Minister of the Monster Country, and that exins why I do not sumb to unwarranted violence.

    The breakup of the Gabbana family was also a big story, and I was able to show that the Four Nations Trade Federation is a much bigger organization than people thought.

    In addition, rumors were spread that the Three Drunk Sages and the Four Nations Trade Federation were splitting up. This was epted by the public, and the dispute was settled safely.

    The Four Nations Trade Federation is now up and running without a hitch and when I saw the profits from each branch, I was at a loss for words.

    If I were to speak frankly, I could make dozens of gold coins in an hour, and more than my annual ie in a day.

    The annual ie in this case is equivalent to my sry as a minister in the Monster Countryso in the eyes of the average person, Im a man who makes more money per hour than they do in a whole year.

    By the way, Benimaru-dono and Souei-dono are also paid by Three Drunk Sages. Its about fifty gold coins a month.

    Im sure Souei-donos subordinates in the Three Drunk Sages should be paid a great deal more than that, including necessary expenses.

    Well, its hard to show the men under mymand that the executives are poor. Glenda and Girard, ying the boss, were getting paid handsomely.

    We also get a fine, but Rimuru-sama, older sister, and I each get two percent of all the profits. The money is paid yearly, and Ive heard that weve umted an astonishing amount so far.

    I consider myself a fortunate man, but this is too unrealistic to the point of being scary.

    However, this isnt the end of my ambitions. This is not the time to dream big and be content with small sesses.

    My name is Myourmiles.

    A man whose fate was changed when he met Rimuru-sama.

    I will do my best to see how far I can go in this life so that I will not regret it.

    My challenge will not end until I am at the brink of my final death.

    It was aplete victory for me.

    The hall had been quiet for a while, but as soon as Don Gabbana disappeared, the audience erupted in cheers. But there were not just positive reactions. There were also some malicious voices in the crowd.

    Im sure the consensus was that they didnt think I would get rid of Don Gabbana.

    I, seeing my chance to get the attention, made the opening statement.

    Then afterwards, I unveiled the Blumund Distribution System that I had discussed with Rimuru-sama and Veryard-dono, and seeded in attracting the interest of many people.

    However, they did not agree to join the project on the spot.

    The reason is simple.

    By Don Gabbana, or rather, by the Three Drunk Sages, they thought Id be killed off for fighting with them.

    If the organizers are going to be gone, then go after their recements. If the core group is gone, the project may go down the tubes. This is not a matter for the big merchants to rush into, is it?

    But thats good for me.

    I will have more credibility if I can survive here.

    And thats with the Three Drunk Sages.

    I am one-third of the Three Drunk Sages, and victory is guaranteed. 4

    And so, I gave a passionate speech to my hearts content.

    The venue was filled with enthusiasm and the meeting was very lively.

 Volume 17 - Ch 2

    Distant Memories

    Velgrynd took her first leap into the strange space between unknown worlds.

    There, she found herself unbounded by time and confronted her inner self. By doing so, she made the Ultimate Skill Divine me King (Cthugha)pletely her own.

    The Ultimate Skill Divine me King (Cthugha) had the power to track Rudras soul. Strictly speaking, the effect was to discover an entity once specified.

    Velgrynd can now find pieces of her beloved Rudras soul, no matter how remote or far away they are, even beyond time and space.

    All she has to do now is jump for it.

    It is a perfectbination of Spacetime Maniption and Dimension Leap, a technique that is only possible with the Ultimate Skills ever-growing power.

    However, it was impossible to jump to a specific time and ce because the target coordinates could not be determined. In other words, the Spacetime Leap is only possible when there is a destination.

    However, this does not apply if the time and space are the same.

    Even Instantaneous Movement was possible because it could travel over any distance without regard to time.

    That is why Velgrynd relied on her own authority to pursue Rudra.

    First, she found herself on a starry continent where civilization was still in its infancy.

    A barbarian chief with bronze skin.

    The young, blond-haired youth was the one who had a fragment of Rudras soul in him.

    The young men were hunters and had eventually settled in the Great River Valley.

    Velgrynd helped them without her own weight.

    She brought rain and conquered the great rivers and made thend fertile.

    It was around this time that she began to move away from hunting and pursued agriculture. Their food situation improved greatly and the number of mouths they could feed increased. Soon the vige one that was feared by the surrounding viges.

    It makes sense for the rich to be targeted.

    So Velgrynd prepared her next move.

    She gave them a high-temperature furnace hot enough to withstand the melting point of iron, which could be called out of ce in that era. This allowed the people to skip bronze ware from stone tools, and take possession of iron tools instead.

    It was decided that the surrounding viges would be swallowed andbined together, and thend eventually developed into a kingdom.

    The throne was passed on to sons and grandchildren.

    Velgrynd stopped helping the kingdom and simply stuck with what she loved. No matter how much they begged her, she did not exercise her authority.

    Because thats what her beloved wanted.

    I am indebted to you more than I can ever repay. But I dont want more. It will be too much power for those fools when I retire as king.

    Yeah, okay. Rudra.

    Velgrynd had no reason to help the kings sons and grandsons, since theycked a trace of soul. She could help on a whim, but as the kings desire was for his children to be independent, Velgrynd would respect that will.

    Tsk, not Rudra again. My name istch, if I have other lovers, is it any wonder if Im not taken seriously?

    Hmmm. Jealous? Youre so cute.

    Shut up. Im going to kill you alive in front of such a superb woman.

    True to his word, the man who rose from barbarian chief to the first king of the Arcia Kingdom, the founder of the Great River Civilization, treated her like she was his goddess, but he never embraced Velgrynd in his arms.

    Velgrynd was fine with that.

    Her role is to watch over.

    Loved ones beget children and the bloodline is inherited. And so she waits for another piece of Rudras soul to dwell in their offspring.

    That was the Velgrynd should be.

    A time of growth and prosperity.

    The good times pass quickly.

    The young man had grown old and was now an old man waiting for his death.

    I was happy. Goddess. Youyou called me master, but did I live up to it?

    Yes, enough. I was happy, you know.

    Well, Im relieved to hear that. Bless you.

    Those were thest words of a great king.

    With a muffled cry, he gave his soul to Velgrynd.

    In this way, Velgrynd got the soul she desired.

    But it was only a fragment of it.

    The journey has just begun, and Velgrynd leaps toward her next destination.

    The Kingdom eventually conquered the surrounding nations and became an empire.

    Those who remained, left it for posterity in the form of biographies.

    And so, a myth was born.

    The young mans blood runs through the veins of the Holy Arcia Empire, where Velgrynd has long been revered as the Goddess of Creation, who controls the mes.

    ***

    Velgrynd had a series of encounters and goodbyes.

    Through it all, Velgrynd came to understand that there is no single world that Veldanava has created.

    He created many worlds.

    There was one world, and there were no parallel worlds. But there were other worlds.

    There were otherworlders, so she was aware of that fact, but Velgrynd had never imagined that there were so many different worlds.

    They were governed bypletely differentws, and there was no causality. It was a material world within a great spiritual world of many different civilizations.

    From the familiar world where swords and magic are the norm, to the world where magic is non-existent and cannot be used. There was also a rare world where scientific civilization had developed and humankind had be mechanized.

    There were weak worlds that could be blown away by a True Dragon if it unleashed all of its strength, and there were deste worlds where angels and demonsparable to awakened Demon Lords were in constant conflict.

    Velgrynd had traveled through all those worlds.

    But all of it was not of her own intention, but by what she was guided to.

    There were different levels of civilization, and Velgrynd had no way of guessing which dimension or timeline she was in. Also, because parallel universes do not ovep, it is impossible for the same entity to ovep on the same timeline.

    In other words, just because you went there once does not mean you can go to the same ce.

    If the Velgrynd exists in the same dimension at the same time, the exact space-time coordinates can be recognized. However, as there is already a Velgrynd at that time, Spacetime Leap cannot be used to jump there, even with the Ultimate Skill Divine me King (Cthugha).

    So Velgrynd remembered all worlds, all of Rudra.

    The fleetmander of the interster world.

    The minister of a small country in the world of swords and magic.

    The rare scammer in the world without magic.

    The poor scientist in the civilized world.

    Velgrynd is often called upon at moments of crisis when one who possesses a fragment of Rudras soul is in danger. It is only when he is on the verge of death that his soul shines forth.

    Some people died as children because they couldnt get help in time. It was a very sad event, but Velgrynd is convinced that it was fate.

    And there was no need to mourn, because then the soul shards would gather quickly.

    But she didnt take it upon herself to hasten the time. It was the Velgrynds pleasure to watch over Rudras of various personalities.

    She realized early on that bloodlines were meaningless.

    Even physical characteristics meant nothing, some had dark hair, some had red hair.

    But all of them were Rudra to Velgrynd.

    And it would continue to be that way for many stars.

    The pieces of soul she had gathered were growing in size and regaining their beautiful form.

    Just by intuition, Velgrynd was convinced that there were only a few pieces of soul left.

    The next one or one after that would be thest.

    And so, she did as she was called, and jumped into the world.

    ***

    It was called the Empire.

    In the Emperors room, Velgrynd appears from time and space.

    She is dressed in a silk robe. Its a deep blue color that suits her very well.

    Velgrynd was noticed by the old emperor, the owner of the room.

    Who are you?

    The Emperor, frail with age and infirmity, is lying in hisrge, luxurious bed.

    A suspicious woman had suddenly appeared in the room, so it would only be natural to be surprised. The emperor''s courage was considerable as he only spoke out.

    Velgrynd didnt care.

    Oh? Youre an old man this time. Its been a long time ago. You remind me of the barbarian king by the looks of it.

    To Velgrynd, old age is irrelevant.

    Its just a form of the human condition.

    So she reached out and brought her hand affectionately to the old mans cheek and whispered to him.

    Velgrynd. Thats my name. And you are?

    Have you no fear of me? And are you a god or goddess of power?

    Suddenly, a sword shed at Velgrynds throat, but it was interrupted by a white-fish-like finger which held out without looking back.

    The sword strike of brutality that shes the evil spirit was received without even a drop of blood flowing.

    Of course, it was not done by the Emperor, but by one who stood by as a guardian.

    His name was Araki Gensei. 6

    He is the guardian and sword bearer of the kingdom who wards off evil spirits. He is the greatest swordsman of the present generation and is the current head of the Oboro Shinmei Style. 7

    Although he was only in his early 30s, he was appointed as the "guardian of the emperor" because of his strength.

    Not even Genseis sword could hurt Velgrynd. That was only natural, but from Genseis point of view, it was an anomaly that was beyondprehension.

    Who would have thought that my sword would fail me?You are in charge of protecting His Majesty!

    Got it!

    The one called Minamoto by Gensei was a young man, still in his early twenties.

    Minamoto Sanrou. Like Gensei, hadpletely disappeared and was on the Emperors guard. Even among Genseis disciples, he was the third most skilled master.

    Oh, you dont have to be so careful. I know you guys must be great, but its just cute from my point of view.

    Let me tell you. I may not be able to match you, but I can at least buy some time.

    Thats true. It would be hard to tell me to trust you. Well, okay, but I hope you wont take that person out.

    Velgrynd shrugged her shoulders.

    Even if she wasnt trusted, the burden on the Emperor was uneptable.

    Velgrynd saw that the Emperors life was running out. It would be a shame to put out itsst fires for her own sake. She wanted to let him live out hisst hours in peace.

    It was Minamoto who took the me.

    Just Velgrynds stare was enough to make him stiffen his whole body.

    Just feeling the pressure of her gaze was enough to make him realize the vast difference in their abilities.

    No, its not even that level.

    The monsters and demons theyve dealt with are so obscure that they almost seemed cute inparison.

    As soon as his master Genseis sword failed to get through, he knew that the Velgrynd was trouble. He had no choice but to realize that even that was still a naive perception.

    Im not going to be able to do my job, Minamoto thought ruefully. So, at the very least, he summoned up all the courage he could muster and red at Velgrynd.

    Are you the demons head, Kai? 8 Did you get tired of the skirmishes and havee to us yourself?

    He was just talking in a cold sweat.

    Its a statement meant to expose her, but Velgrynd sees through it and replies without a care in the world.

    A demon? So, there are demons in this world too. They really spring up everywhere, dont they?

    Oh, so you have nothing to do with demons?

    No, its not rted. In the first ce, Im not sure if the demon youre talking about is the same ones I know.

    Velgrynd can parse and speak anynguage from any world with fluency. It is a special skill that does not rely on authority because it can read the "thoughts" that fly around in the world.

    However, some simr concepts can be confused, and care must be taken not to make a mistake.

    In this case, the word demon is important.

    What Velgrynd knows is that it is a phantom race with the demon king Feldway at the top. He was an Aggressor tribe in every dimension and had many collisions with the Velgrynd throghout her long journey.

    Velgrynd was disgusted that he was there this time as well, but at the same time, she also considered the possibility that he might be different.

    A demon is a demon. I myself do not know much about them.

    The answer to Velgrynds question came not from Minamoto, but from the Emperor himself.

    Gensei immediately changed his mind when he saw that Minamoto was unable to move. While Minamoto was attracting his attention, Gensei tried to get the Emperor to flee.

    Gensei and his teams trust in each other was at an all-time high as they changed roles at a moments notice.

    Although there was no chance of sess, the n to let the Empeeror escape was worth a try. But the Emperor himself had stopped it.

    Your Majesty!?

    Its all right. Why do I get a familiar feeling from this person? And where in the world are we going to escape to when were already in the safest ce in the heavily fortified Imperial City? This person evaded all security measures to get to this ce. I dont think wed be able to escape.

    It was just as the Emperor had said.

    The Empire, the country of the Grand Duke, was now at war with a formidable enemy. Thats why they were on high alert, and any attempt to sneak through it would be tantamount to defeat.

    Besides, the Emperor couldnt bring himself to be wary of Velgrynd. As he said, he felt a nostalgic feeling, which was somewhatforting.

    So the Emperor decided to believe in Velgrynd.

    He decided to tell her what was going on, and if it was possible, he wanted her to be his ally.

    ***

    The current location is still the Emperors quarters.

    He had ordered the maid to prepare tea and snacks for us.

    Let me introduce myself first. My name is Velgrynd, as I said before.

    I am Araki Gensei. I am the guardian of the kingdom and the protector of His Majesty.

    I am the third-ranked member of the Imperial Guard, Minamoto Saburo. I have been appointed as a captain of the Imperial Guard Swordsmen.

    Yeah, nice to meet you. And Rudra?

    Velgrynd was not interested in those two.

    She brushed off the greetings from them and turned her attention back to her beloved.

    At my age, I never thought Id be stared at by such a beautiful woman. I dont feel bad about it, but I cant help but feel sorry for my younger self.

    Well, Rudra also tters me. Its a rare experience.

    Huh, its not ttery, but oh well. I have been known as Sakura Akira. 9 I thought it was reasonably well known, but I guess I just liked it.

    It was a posthumous name, widely known as the wise empeor, but it was a taboo. It is the true name of the emperor and should not be casually spoken.

    Even those closest to him would not call him by that name. But it was a name that everyone in thend knew with respect.

    But to the Velgrynd, he was Rudra. She had no intention of calling him that from the stat, let alone not calling him Sakura.

    Ufufu, well, its no wonder I dont know you. Because I came into this world the moment I first met you. The you who I know is named Rudra, so thats what Im going to keep calling you.

    To the others, she seemed rude to him.

    But it was officially allowed.

    The Emperorughed it off.

    Allowed.

    Your Majesty!?

    It doesnt matter. If it will buy the goddess pleasure, its a small price to pay. However, I cant allow her to stand next to me in public.

    Oh, why is that?

    I, too, have my position. It would only cause my subjects unnecessary anxiety if there was someone calling me by a name they dont know.

    If Velgrynd showed her power to everyone, it would be disruptive. The Emperor wanted to keep things quiet and out of sight.

    Velgrynd understands this and stops asking for more. She would have listened quietly if Rudra had asked her, so she agreed for now.

    For now, it was more important to listen to the situation.

    Then lets think about to would do if we had to go out in public. So, can you exin to me what the situation is now?

    Velgrynd is no dead weight.

    If Rudra is in trouble, shell do her best to help.

    The two guards got a headache from such a transcendental attitude.

    That Velgrynd is an unfathomablepetitor. His Majesty was right. She may be a kind of god or goddess. Perhaps its better to ask for cooperation rather than to humiliate.

    Gensei thought.

    Minamoto, on the other hand, is moreplicated.

    Its not an attitude towards His Majesty, but why? It just seems natural, doesnt it? This disqualifies me from being a bodyguard, but if the Emperor allows it, its not my ce to speak. But I dont know how I would exin it to His Highness or Her Highness.

    More specifically, he was thinking about the problems that would arise.

    As an emperor, he cant be med for one or two mistresses and vice versa.

    The birth of a child would also involve the issue of hereditary session, so she must be a woman of strong family background. It was also necessary to make the position clear; there was an insurmountable difference in status between the empress and the concubine.

    In this case, the Velgrynd must be convinced to be a member of the household. 10

    Is she really thee kind of woman who can live with that? If she insists on being the empress, theres nothing we can do

    Minamoto is the kind of person who worries about such things, but his real job is to protect the Imperial Pce. No, he was not overly concerned, as any trouble the Velgrynd might have with the Empress or her entourage would be a disaster.

    There was a big difference in the psychological burden between Gensei, who only had to protect the Emperor, and Minamoto, who had to look out for the safety of the entire pce.

    Nevertheless, right now, Minamoto thought it was time to answer Velgrynds question.

    Ill exin that myself. The environment surrounding our country, the Empire, is very tense. One of the biggest enemies we have seen in the past

    The Imperial State means the state ruled by Emperor, and is different in meaning from the Empire, which is the state of the Great Conquest. Unlike the name of the present, it was a title passed down from generation to generation in the eastern ind nations.

    The emperor and his guardians protected their subjects from demons. But apart from that, the world was in turmoil.

    In the east, the Empire.

    In the south, the United States of Azalea.

    In the north, the Great Roziam Dynasty.

    In the west, the Holy Arcia Empire.

    In the center, the Middle Kingdom of China was working together with a Japanese country. 11

    In each region, they emerged as the standard-bearers of the five major powers.

    Decades ago, theypeted for supremacy, but eventually they came to an equilibrium. While looking with an eye on the decline of the other forces, the economic rtionship had been maturing for some time. When this happened, conflict no longer surfaced, and peace seemed to have returned to the world.

    However,

    Dissatisfaction amongst the major powers has not disappeared. If there are those who make profit, then there will be those who will lose, and dissatisfaction will umte.

    And so, four years ago, it exploded.

    The catalyst was a great drought in the middle of China

    Waterr shortages led to famine, and epidemics were rampant. Humanity was understandably distressed, but the Chinese government, in order to protect its own position, turned its discontent to the outside world.

    And this is what the whole world is caught up in.

    The Chinese first turned their attention to the South, which was as rich in grain fields as their own. The National Peoples Congress unanimously voted to invade the United States of Azalea. This was the signal for the start of the war.

    And in the blink of an eye, warfare spread throughout the world.

    Seeing the Chinese move their armies, the North moved next. The Great Roziam Dynasty began its invasion of China.

    The aim was clear: to secure a rich granary and a perennial port.

    The country was suffering from the natural disaster of drought, but that would subside in a few years. Under such a decision, the Great Roziam Dynasty resurrected its hegemony.

    The Chinese would not allow it. It was decided to gather its remaining forces to counterattack and plunge the country into full-scale war.

    The empire was caught in the middle of this.

    Their dependence on the Chinese for food importspelled them to send their troops to China in the name of humanitarian aid. It was an effort to bring this war to a quick conclusion, but the Great Roziam Dynasty was furious.

    Rtions with the United States of Azalea were also deteriorating.

    Faced with a choice between Azalea and China, the Empire has chosen to ally itself with China, its lifeline.

    Thus, the Empire is plunged into war with the United States of Azalea.

    The Holy Arcia Empire did not budge at first, but that peace did notst for a year. This time a famine broke out in their own country, and they became unable to provide aid.

    Bad things continued to happen. There was an ident at the oil storage facility. As a result, three years worth of fuel was burned down. From the trail left at the site, the culprit was determined to be an agent of the Great Roziam Dynasty.

    The public sentiment in the Holy Arcia Empire was turning toward the anti-Great Roziamism. With that, the Holy Arcia Empire was able to take advantage of the momentum and take military action.

    There were those who questioned this course of events.

    Mystery Monk Pulcine is a member of the Holy Spirit Sect, one of the three major religions of Buddhism, Holy Spiritism, and Free Spirit 12 .

    He said he sensed someones malice and left the oracle.

    After hearing these words, the Holy Churches around the world began to investigate and found a clue to the existence of the demon.

    But it was already toote.

    Youve had your desires stimted and anger inmed for the right reasons.

    Its a shame, but youre right. On second thought, this was obviously a strange turn of events. But the peoples anger, once kindled, was not going to go away easily.

    I dont need to mention the Holy Church, but the leaders of the nations also sensed the anomaly less than a year after the war began. And yet, there were extremists in the military as well. Even those people took advantage of the enemys machinations and began to be active, and by the time they found themselves in a position where they realized it, there was no way to stop it.

    To Minamotos exnation, Gensei added, The same is true in other countries.

    The same was true in each country, and now it is out of line with the upper management. Those units that have been dispatched are now close to being out of control.

    And just a few days ago, across the sea, a great naval battle was fought between the U.S. fleet and the Imperial Navy, the pride of the Empire.

    The result was defeat.

    ording to preliminary research, they were evenly matched in strength, but by now, the gap between them was nearly three times greater.

    The reason for this is the betrayal of the Chinese fleet. And the trouble is, it had nothing to do with the home countrys intentions.

    Since the Chinese leadership didnt know about it, there was no way for even our intelligence officers to know about it. By the time they found out, it was toote, and they had already caused a painful loss.

    But the defeat was not in vain.

    This information was brought to you by my apprentice, who risked his life for it. It was given to me by a man named Kondo whounched a suicide attack against the enemy fleet and dispersed with great fanfare before his death. The enemymanders had been taken over by a demon.

    Gensei said that David Reagan,mander of the United States Grand South Sea Fleet, and Li Jinlong,mander of the U.S. Eastern Sea Fleet, had yed Kondou with their unorthodox powers.

    Kondou realized that he was beyond his power and tried to gather information until the end. And then he lost contact with them.

    Gensei seriously said that he might have made his life ephemeral.

    Hearing that, Velgrynd understands.

    The man in Genseis story is Lieutenant Kondou, whom Velgrynd knows well.

    That Kondou was fascinated by Rudra because he felt the same way about Emperor.

    Kondou instinctively knew that Rudra and Akira Sakuras soul were one and the same. And so, for the first time, Velgrynd felt a closeness to Kondou.

    Finally, she could believe that his loyalty had been genuine.

    And so, this is not only Rudras case, but also Kondous regrets.

    I remember now that Kondou seemed to regret not being able to defend his country. Thats why he worked for Rudra, no matter what he had to do, to make sure he never went through that again.

    After all this time, Velgrynd wonders if there is anything that she can do for Kondou.

    There is only one answer.

    There is only one way to get rid of Kondous regrets.

    With that in mind, Velgrynd switches her mind to listen more intently.

    Unknowingly, Minamoto continues to exin.

    The existence of an alien entity that has the ability to possess and control people was quicklymunicated to the world leaders. However, the leaders who were not on the scene had no way of knowing who was actually being controlled.

    It was suspicious of those who deviated from the norm, but it was also difficult to recall the generals who were on the ground operations.

    There was even the possibility of going public with the truth, but that would have definitely caused a panic. There would be people who would wonder if their superiors were demons, and if that happened, even the chain ofmand could be destroyed.

    It could also lead to a domestic witch hunt. That must be stopped, so a secret investigation had been conducted.

    As a result, they learned that unlike most monsters, these creatures were organized. Moreover, they were active behind the scenes all over the world, with a clear intention to invade.

    Besides, they are strong. In our kingdom, we use a monster ss ranking (Kai ss) 13 to describe the strength of monsters, but even the weakest of them are equal to the top monsters. They are so formidable that even the most advanced swordsmen and martial artists cant stand up to them.

    The six levels of the Kai ss are, from the top to the bottom are: God/Buddha, Mythical/Dragon monsters, Heavenly monsters, Advanced monsters, Intermediate demons, and Lower monsters. 14 The middle and lower levels are called the Chimimory? 15 (Malevolent Spirits of Mountains and Rivers). The Advanced monsters to the Heavenly monsters, just before the Mythical/Dragon monsters, were called Evil Demon Rakshasa. 16

    Even the weakest of the monsters that had appeared this time were of Heavenly Monster ss.

    Kondou and his men had revealed their true identity when they attacked the enemy fleet. They were defeated by the ringleader when theey passed on this information.

    Kondou-san believed that David and Li Jinlongs Kai-ss were higher than the Mythical/Dragon ss. Im sure he was right in his assessment.

    Why?

    Thats because Kondou-san is one of the strongest men here in Hinomoto.

    Even at the time of the suicide attack, Kondous skill level was top-notch. His mastery of the Kifuo-ryu style (spirit fighting style), the secret of Oboro Shinmei-ryu, enabled him to attain a high level of fighting ability at the Mythical/Dragon level. Still, the reason why he was defeated was because there were two enemies.

    Yes, that man was indeed a good one.

    What?

    Huh?

    Do you know Tatsuya?

    Yes, Rudra. Kondou served you in the world I came from, too.

    For me? Well, Rudra, or whoeve it is, has the same soul as I do.

    Thats right. And Kondou fought and died proudly for you over there, too.

    The Emperor is speechless and dumbfounded. He was deeply disappointed in the death of a man who had been his loyal servant.

    Oh no, Kondou-san

    Minamoto was incredulous as he muttered. Kondou was such an outstanding swordsman, and he wondered if could have been the trump card against the demons had he still been alive.

    Now that he was confronted with the fact that he was dead, he didnt know what to do.

    I was hoping that Kondou was still alive, but its a shame.

    Master Gensei remained calm as he said this, but inwardly he struggled to hide the sadness that had arisen from the small amount of hope he had lost.

    It is out of the question to be distracted as someone in a responsible position. I have to calm myself down, he thought to himself.

    Everyone believed Velgrynd. It was unusual, but strangely enough, they felt her words were true.

    Velgrynd let everyone hear the story of Kondous end. At the same time, she tried to figure out who the enemy was, given Kondous strength.

    The only thing that matters is that Kondou could be defeated before he crossed over into the world. I think the word demon refers to the phantom race, but if thats the case then my enemyno. I cant be too sure. I dont have any standards to conclude anything, so I guess Ill just have to wait and see for now.

    Velgrynd was a confident being, a True Dragon at her best, but heer loss to Rimuru had made her cautious. Although she didnt think it was the enemy, she would reserve her judgment until she had more information.

    In fact, her guess at this point was both right and wrong.

    The concentration of magic is so low in this world that there is no such thing as a remarkably strong monster. It was as if they had arrived from the other world and were so fierce that they were known as gods.

    Even such individuals were no match for the violence of numbers, and through the cooperation of swordsmen and sorcerers, thee numbers were reduced to an almost unseen level now. Thats why there was no magic element pooling urring. Therefore, it was difficult for powerful monsters to ur naturally.

    Unlike Veldora, the current Velgryndpletes her own mana cirction. It does not need to be replenished from the atmosphere and does not leave her body.

    This is a skill I learned when I crossed various worlds, thats why I was unaware the concentration of monsters and magic in this world.

    In the first ce, crossing over worlds would normally be impossible. Even through the Underworld Gate, you are limited by the size of the gate.

    A person like Velgrynd, who can use Spacetime Leap without any restrictions, is outside thews of the world.

    Thus,pared to Velgrynds magic-filled homnd, the standard of strength in this world was far inferior.

    That would soon be revealed.

    ***

    With the help of the Emperor, Velgrynd was able to get a general idea of the situation.

    This world cannot be brought back to life and will soon fall into the hands of the invaders.

    The leaders of each country are aware of this fact, but they have allowed the military, which embodies the will of the people, to run amok to the point where there is no longer anything that they can do about it.

    So, whats going on with your enemys movements?

    The enemy coalition fleet had defeated the Imperial Navy of which Kondou belonged, but its subsequent movements are unknown. There were supposedly some remaining Imperial ships, but they hadpletely lost contact with them.

    Originally, they surrendered when their defeat was confirmed. That information should have reached the home country as well, but that is not the case.

    As for our own judgement, we are guessing that they were captured by the demon. It is possible that the enemy is not bound by the rules of humanity and therefore did not allow them to surrender, but

    Im also curious about Kondous words. Based on the expression that he was taken over, I wonder if the demons have a propensity to possess people. If so, the survivors are doomed.

    Someone was assigned to bring back information. And yet we havent heard from them. That exins the situation if they were all possessed by demons.

    Theres nowhere to run, on the Great South Sea. Each country has approached their fleets, but they havent responded. Theres no reason to lie here, so I think its safe to assume that our forces have been taken.

    Its one of the possibilities, but if thats true, the situation was bad.

    Even mankinds greatest swordsman is no match for the enemy leader. Moreover, elite soldiers could be sacrificed to the enemy monsteres. Moreover, the army wont be able to intercept them.

    There was nothing they could do.

    Thats why Gensei and his team had decided to focus all their efforts on the defense of the Imperial Capital.

    Its only a matter of buying time. You understand that, dont you?

    Of course. Theres only one thing we can do now. Ive sent people we trust to find out what the enemy is doing. And then we will gather the worlds best forces to defeat the ringleader.

    I know its a low sess rate strategy, but its the only way to go If only Kondou-san could have defeated one of them, we would have been able to defeat them! Because there were two Mythical/Dragon-ss yers, they wouldnt even allow him to escape. So, if Master Araki, myself, plus Amari 17 and all the other heroes from other countries teamed up, we might even be able to defeat the demon leader!

    The man named Amari Masahiko 18 was the brother of Minamoto, who was the only one topete with Kondou. Moreover, this man had mastered not only swordsmanship but also the art ofw. He excelled in espionage and still works in secret missions.

    Moreover, there was another strongman hidden here in Hinomoto.

    Although Emperor Akira never talks about it, there were other Emperor Guardians besides Gensei.

    In addition, there are also famous heroes in each country.

    Not only those who had infiltrated the surface of society, there were also those who were in the Kai ss and even higher than the Mythical/Dragon ss in the underworld.

    The famous ones are the aforementioned Mystery Monk Pulcine of the north, and Fist Saint Xianhua of China. Just from the stories passed down in the Empires own people, they know that these two men are extremely powerful.

    To confront this global threat, these heroes must work together. If they cant do so, they will be destroyed.

    But that was also a pipe dream, as Akira was keenly aware.

    And that wasnt the only problem.

    The problem is that there are more than just two ringleaders of the enemy. And, as much as I hate to think about it

    You feel like there will be trouble if you go further, do you?

    Exactly.

    To Velgrynds point, Gensei nodded bitterly.

    In order to defeat the monster of the Mythical/Dragon ss, he wanted to double the number of warriors of the same ss or higher. But with the size of the enemy unknown, it was impossible for the heroes of the world to assemble together.

    The Empire, too, must protect its own dignitaries as the first priority.

    The problems kept piling up.

    It would be best if they could lure the monsters of the mythical/dragon ss individually. Even if that was not possible, they still have to fight only the number of monsters they can win against. If they were outnumbered, then they would be defeated.

    However, this is when things changed.

    Gensei was puzzled, but Velgrynd helped him.

    Hmm, youve got problems. Okay. Ill help you, so show me what youve got.

    What? What do you mean by that?

    If you dont know your enemy, you cant make a n. In order to do that, I need to know how strong these demons are.

    What are you talking about?

    Its simple. You said it yourself Gensei, if you are Kondous master, then you must be more than equal in strength, right? Im new to this world, so I dont know what the standard of strength is. As such, youre going to have to

    I see, I understand. Kondou and I are both better at this level of skill. I have profound secrets that I have yet to show you, and I have supreme secrets that should only be told to the head family. However, that mans conviction was admirable. His spirit was fierce and his determination to win was extraordinary. You must leave it to chance if you are serious about this.

    In short, its an even match.

    A little difference is an error for Velgrynd. It was good enough for the standard though, so she decided to try it out.

    ***

    The location has changedIts the training grounds.

    Gensei excused Minamoto from the room because he couldnt show his supreme inner secrets to him, so no one but the Emperor is here to witness the event.

    Velgrynd remains poised and stares nkly at Gensei.

    Gensei shows slight hesitation, his favorite sword in hand.

    The silken robe doesnt impede her movements, but it is unsuitable forbat by all ounts. And it wasnt likely to have much defense.

    If Gensei were to make a serious move, it would be a deadly one. He was unlikely to win against the Velgrynd, but he thought it might hurt her.

    Gensei decided to ask Velgrynd.

    I want to ask you one question. I know this is rude, but are you sure youre serious? You may not be safe when youre dealing with the inner workings of our school.

    Velgrynd understands that this is a question out of concern to her. She could have ignored it, but decided to reassure Gensei.

    There is also a spection that that person will be able to demonstrate his abilities.

    Thats nice of you. But dont be rmed. Your weapon, the sword? It looks pretty old and good quality, but Im afraid it doesnt work for me. So, dont worry about it, juste at me and give it your best shot.

    In fact, Genseis sword was only less than unique-grade in performance. In this world where magic was weak, swords could not evolve.

    Then Gensei responded to Velgrynds challenge.

    Yeah!

    Concentrating his explosive fighting spirit, he unleashed the supreme profound effect of Oboro Shinmei-ry?, the Eightfold Sakurathe Eightfold Flower sh.

    But s, the flower did not bloom.

    The great technique was stopped by the tips of Velgrynds fingers.

    A shapeshifting sword streak, but not a split. Even if it was too fast for an ordinary person to catch, it was too slow for Velgrynd.

    If youre serious about that, thats enough.

    Kuh, Im here

    It was toote to put it to rest with words like ability gap.

    There was an insurmountable gap between Gensei and Velgrynd, between heaven and earth, or even more so. This result made it clear.

    Thus, in exchange for Genseis disappointment, Velgrynd had obtained the correct information.

    Genseis Eight Flowers, an art that had been passed down only to the original family, had never been taught to Kondou.

    There is no doubt that it is the greatest and most powerful weapon in this world. Therefore, it was thought that just by looking at the amount of power it possessed, it could surpass the Mythical/Dragon ss and even reach the divine God/Buddha ss.

    Are you really a god?

    Although it was my brother who created the world, hes not a god.

    Wellin our perception, we call it a god.

    The concept of God is one that is perceived differently at different times and ces. I dont care what you think, but you have to remember that there are some beings that can destroy me

    Velgrynd was reminded of aid-back slime.

    Its annoying to think that she lost to that thing, but theres no doubt in heer mind that she wouldnt win another fight.

    That doesnt make Rimuru a god, does it? I guess the bottom line is that his category doesnt exist, right?

    And then Velgrynd thought about it.

    Honestly, thinking about it wont give her an answer, so she switched her thinking immediately.

    Whats important is the enemy of this world.

    Its about the demon.

    Alright, thank you for your help. This made me realize how immature and small I am. Ill use this experience as an inspiration to work harder in the future.

    Gensei just shrugs off suchments.

    And Velgrynd quickly put together a theory.

    Gensei and Kondou are roughly equal. However, his strength was far less powerful than Kondous was when they first met.

    Most of the humans in the material world die from the dense concentrations of magical elements once they cross the world. But a few were reborn by remodeling, transforming their bodies into powerful beings.

    These were the otherworlders of Velgrynds homnd.

    Thats right, Ive forgotten. This world is very low in magic. Thats why its harder to cast a spell, and the level physical strengthening is low. Their physical strength is innate, so its rather amazing that they can even be this powerful.

    And so Velgrynd made her decision, remembering the shock she felt in her fingertips.

    Back home, it was as powerful as a rank A. She was impressed by what he can do with a rare-grade weapon.

    Now then, you can imagine the strength of the enemy.

    I guess the demon ss is about B rank to A-minus rank. The Mythical/Dragon rank is about A-minus rank. If so, the demon must be a phantom-race.

    The phantom-race is an Aggressor tribe, a half-mental life form. In the material world, it could only be active for a short time without incarnation. Particrly in this world where magic is scarce, its energy efficiency would have been too low if it had not possessed a human.

    Therefore, if it uses its true strength, its human body would not be able to withstand it.

    Hes getting weaker. Well, this world isnt protected by magical elements, so if you use too much power, it might destroy it. If theyre destroying it, or even invading it, do they control its power? Thats probably why Kondous current strength was so important in a fight.

    If the phantom-race is serious, then the inhabitants of this world dont stand a chance. Velgrynd concluded and smiled at her good fortune to be here now.

    Velgrynd was confident that with her, they could better manage to deal with the demon king Feldway, the leader of the phantom race. However, it was unlikely that Feldway would be sent to this invading region, so that concern was unnecessary.

    In fact, it was just as Velgrynd had predicted.

    The men who were invading this world were an advance force of monsters under Cornusmand.

    Also, the size of the Underworld Gate that spontaneously appeared in this world was so small that it was impossible for Cornus main body to appear. It was currently in the process of expansion, giving them a little more time to take over the world.

    She hadnt been able to see that urately, but it was enough for Velgrynd.

    ***

    Gensei appears to be maintaining a sense of normalcy, but he is actually depressed.

    Naturally.

    It was as if his swordy, which he believed to be the strongest, waspletely useless against Velgrynd.

    Even his secret techniques couldnt reach her. Even though he understood that they were on different levels, it was difficult to convince his emotions.

    Even so, Gensei used his well-honed mental strength to keep his mind from being disturbed. Velgrynd smiles at Gensei.

    You should be proud of yourself. In a world where there is little to no magic, few people can reach that level of strength. If you could have taken in some magic element and sublimated your body, you could have be not only an Immortal but a Saint. Its too bad about that.

    A Saint, thats a far cry for me.

    Not really, but yes. Im going to reward you for helping me. Can you ept it?

    A reward?

    Yes. If you want, Ill reforge your sword with my power.

    Velgrynd smiles at that.

    She could use Matter Creation to create a mythical-grade weapon. In this case, she had poured magic into Genseis sword, hoping to encourage its evolution.

    You dont mean that

    Is it possible?

    Gensei was confused, but then reminded himself that it was toote.

    Gensei was convinced that the Velgrynd was a heavenly being beyond hisprehension, and that if she said she could do it, then she could do it.

    An ancestral heirloomit would be fun to trust Velgrynd-dono with it.

    With that resolve, Gensei bowed to Velgrynd and held out his beloved sword.

    Please

    Yes, let me take care of that.

    Velgrynd nodded widely and epted the sword.

    Normally, she would casually create a blue dragon sword, but this time was different. Carefully, she assessed theposition of the sword and poured her magical elements into it, making delicate adjustments.

    Velgrynds work continues with a more serious expression than the one she had in battle.

    Then, about thirty minutes passed.

    With an old cksmiths skillful technique and the magic that Velgrynd controlledpletely, together, they gave the sword a mythical glow.

    Finished.

    It was a weapon evolution that would normally take hundreds to thousands of years, but in such a short time, Velgrynd had forged Genseis beloved sword into a mythical-grade sword.

    Th-This is!?

    This is the best weapon in the world now, isnt it? Even so, you cant possibly use it right nowStill, the sword has a will. If the sword approves, it will help you a bit.

    I dont know if that will be you, or one of your descendants, Velgryndughed.

    The smile was so beautiful that it bewitched Genseis heart.

    ***

    The time was now evening.

    It was time to eat, so Akira went back to his room.

    Velgrynd was also invited to join. Since she was here, she decided to join.

    The maids of the pce are handpicked from a carefully selected group. They are well-trained and unaffected by anything.

    They prepared the meal as if it were a matter of course, without batting an eysh at the sight of the Velgrynd.

    Minamoto is on guard duty outside the door, while Gensei stands behind Akira Sakura and waits. Only the two of them will take their seats.

    So, what do you n to do now?

    I will be by your side, and Ill protect you.

    Im d to hear that, but can I assume that youll be on my side?

    Yes, youre right.

    Velgrynd smiles in reply and is happy just to be by Rudras side.

    Confused by this Velgrynd, Akira Sakura asks

    Huhu, then you will eliminate conflict from this world and reassure me?

    Of course, that was a joke. And yet Velgryndughed and replied.

    All right.

    If you want, I can give you this world. Well wipe out the countries you dont want and silence the ones whoin. But first, we have to destroy the demons that are in our way.

    Everyone in the room was stunned to see Velgrynd answer with a very innocent smile. Even the maidservant who was on duty unintentionally spilled some of the soup.

    They all knew in their guts that she meant what she said.

    That doesnt mean its true, or that its a big deal. The words would beughed off if someone else had said them.

    But there was something about Velgrynd that made it so.

    And Gensei and others who know the essence of Velgrynd know its not a joke and that its possible.

    The same was true for Akira Sakura.

    Hahaha, I haventughed this hard in a long time. Youve done well to joke around so much that the maidservants take you seriously. Your joke was amusing, but Ill just take it as apliment.

    They managed to cover up the situation.

    It was clear now that Velgrynd was not an ordinary being, as the conversation at dinner made clear.

    Not only is she strong, but her train of thought is tricky.

    Akira finally understood that she would do anything for him.

    If she was ordered to destroy another country, Velgrynd would do it.

    To her, right and wrong were of secondary importance, and only Sakuras will was what mattered.

    To be honest, this was the first time in his life that Akira was so confused.

    He had been born as the next Emperor of the Empire and had lived a life of ease. But he didnt have freedom either, he was taught from an early age that it was the duty of a king.

    He had everything he needed, but he had to give up what he really wanted.

    Love was an illusion and he had the dukes daughter as his wife to back him up. It was like a contract and he couldnt refuse her.

    The wise Akira knew it before he became a young man.

    Transience is the truth.

    The world is like a dream.

    Because it is fleeting, you can strive to make your dreamse true with all your might.

    On the other hand, it is beautiful to surrender to fate and umte the small amount of happiness that exists in those days.

    It was thetter that Akira Sakura chose. To do what you love is a luxury that neveres true, even for the Emperor who has everything.

    It was precisely because of such an Akira, that Velgrynd was a surprise to him.

    That freedom will not be bound by any man. And yet she is beholden to only one person, Akira.

    A strange woman. No, a goddess. Even if he was acting as Rudra, a simple favor is always better than a simple one.

    Feeling this way, Akira Sakura enjoyed a peaceful dinner for the first time in a long time.

    ***

    It is now next morning after dawn.

    Today there will be a meeting by the Imperial Headquarters.

    The issue here is how to handle Velgrynd.

    As Akira dered, acting like a lover in front of a third party is strictly forbidden.

    So, it was necessary to figure out how to exin Velgrynds status first.

    Then there was the question of clothing.

    Exotic clothing is out of the question.

    One had to dress appropriately for their status.

    While all the best maids gathered to arrange the various costumes, Akira Sakura, with input from Gensei and Minamoto, pondered the question of Velgrynds status.

    As for the maid

    Ady-in-waiting cant attend a meeting, you fool.

    Minamotos idea is dismissed by Gensei before he can finish.

    The escort is going to be difficult too.

    Your Majesty, Ive considered that, but Velgrynd-donos appearance is too eye-catching. By all appearances, she is a foreigner, so she will be suspected of being a spy.

    If she was Japanese, they wouldnt have to worry about it so much. But Velgrynd was too beautiful and seemingly of northern European descent to stand out in this country.

    Even if he wants to introduce her as a bodyguard or a spy, theyd be asked why they are using foreigners so heavily. That said, Velgrynd wont be happy if he asks her to stay at home.

    Besides, it was a shame to let Velgrynds forces go to waste when she was supposed to be on their side.

    Just when he was wondering what to do, Velgrynd herself voiced her opinion.

    It cant be helped. I dont really like it, and I dont want to, but Im going to change my look. Is that okay?

    And with that, Velgrynds appearance changes.

    Dark hair and dark eyes. Her skin had be a pale yellow with just a hint of red.

    Wow, you can even do tricks like that!

    Minamoto was impressed with the tone of voice that was unexpected, and Gensei agreed that it wasnt that strange.

    I guess I didnt have to worry about it.

    And Akira Sakura was slightly distracted.

    Just by changing the arrangement of the coloring, the impression was very different. Although this still made her look less Japanese, it was not too much of a distraction.

    The uniform given to Velgrynd was the same as Genseis. In order to attend the meeting, Akira Sakura had assigned her Personal Guard. 19

    Incidentally, the Emperors Guard consists of three organizations.

    The first is the Imperial Guard Swordsman Corps.

    It is the only unit in the pce that is allowed to be armed. However, only the captain, Minamoto, is allowed to enter the Emperors quarters.

    The second is the Imperial Pce Guards.

    This unit magically protected the Emperor from magic and witchcraft. They maintained a spiritual guardian barrier and were inferior to the swordsmen in terms of individualbat ability alone. Only the captain has ess to the Emperor, but he has been so busy defending the capital that he hasnt been seen in the past few days.

    And thest organization was the Personal Guard, an individual group called the "Emperors Guardians."

    Not all of them, like Gensei, were well known to the public.

    There were those who lurked in the shadows, warding off evil.

    Those who had harbored supernatural powers.

    Those who have split from the imperial family so that they can y the part of the Emperors shadow warriors.

    These men of many purposes served in the shadows, guarding the Emperor.

    No wonder no one knew who they were. So now Akira decided to give Velgrynd a position as Personal Guard.

    Velgrynd, I will appoint you as a Guardian of the Emperor. With that title, it shall spare you the trouble of exining to the others.

    I ept. Then I will behave like a proper vassal in front of the others.

    Velgrynd, who wore a military uniform, replied flirtatiously.

    Everyone was worried about the situation, but there was no other n.

    Even if something went wrong, it was nothingpared to the invaders, the demons. Under this judgment, preparations were being made.

    ***

    One by one, people began to gather in the main conference hall. Akira was watching them from the waiting room.

    The Imperial Headquarters is the suprememanding body that reports directly to Emperor.

    It is the army of the Emperor and isposed of both a Navy and an Army.

    At the top of both camps are the Minister of the Navy and the Minister of the Army.

    Both ministers were required to attend the Imperial General Meeting. Substitutes are allowed, but they are rarely present as it is considered a disrespect for the Emperor.

    As is customary in the past few days, most of the contents of the meeting are now reported.

    In the Great South Sea, the Imperial Navy was soundly defeated at sea. Even the whereabouts of survivors are unknown, and each camp is pulling out all the stops to investigate.

    The army, however, seemed to be someone elses problem. They make excuses because they dont have the means to go to the sea, but Akira Sakura thinks thats because they dont really understand the threat.

    You idiots. Now is not the time for our people to bepeting with each other for credit.

    But the Emperor is someone who cannot say that.

    Because his authority is too great, his words are too heavy. If it was in private that would be one thing, but in public, he has to be careful of what he says.

    Unaware of Akira Sakuras anguish, an officer in the army calls out,

    Who are you!? Who do you think you are!? This sacred headquarters is an outrageous ce for a woman to enter!

    Oh, so I knew it was going to be like that said Sakura Akira.

    Those whose only have inted pride are bothered by hierarchy and etiquette. So it was natural for this to happen, but if Akira Sakura had apanied here, there would be more of a fuss. Since they all agreed on this, Gensei was given the responsibility for Velgrynd.

    As I suspected, a man with a lot of blood on his hands is making things difficult. If he should offend her, he would not only destroy himself, but this city as well.

    Letting out a big sigh, Akira Sakura let out a big sigh.

    Perhaps it was the fate of those with Rudras soul to be pushed around by Velgrynd.

    Could you be talking to me?

    Cant you even understand that, you fool!? This is whyMogaa!

    Suddenly, the officers ranting stopped.

    It was because Velgrynd had grabbed the mans chest in an unnoticeable move and plunged her pistol into his open mouth.

    With a thin smile, Velgrynd says

    I dont think it would have mattered whether you were a man or a woman in this day and age, when you could kill someone by pulling the trigger, if you fought with a sword or a spear in the olden days. What is important in todays warfare is the ability to analyze the situation and to make a calm and rational decision without emotion. You dont deserve to be here. I wonder if you are not qualified to be here, screaming like that?

    To begin with, he was no match for force, but seeing the violence of a gun, which anyone can understand, caused amotion among the people in the hall.

    Keh, you! Let go of the Chief of Staff!

    You cant have guns in here! Guards, someone call the guards!

    Velgryndughs mockingly.

    Silly you, fussing over a single toy! How can you be considered a glorious soldier of the Empire for that?

    Many faces turned red when they heard that, and many people looked at her angrily.

    Regardless, Velgrynd shoved the chief of staff aside. Then she pointed her toy gun and pulled the trigger.

    A stream of water spurted out, wetting the Chief of Staffs crotch.

    Ufufu. It looks like you just wet your pants. Why dont you go home and change?

    You, you 20

    He was shaking with humiliation, but as soon as he looked into Velgrynds eyes, he gulped down his words.

    It was a horrifying stare.

    I will kill you if you make any more noise unceremoniously the Chief of Staff felt as if he was being told that, and all at once the blood drained from his veins.

    Hahaha, excuse me. I guess I got a little too excited myself. I do miss the water pistol. I felt like a child again, and my head was cold.

    Well, thats good to hear. If youre going to be in the meeting, youre going to have to behave yourself a little better.

    The Chief of Staff nodded coyly.

    He was short-tempered and a bit arrogant, but he was no fool. He had failed in their first encounter, but he hadnt made a mistake in his subsequent responses. If he had still growled at her, he would have had a heart attack from Velgrynds fury.

    Rudra is the only thing that matters to Velgrynd. She was not amused by the idea of an ipetent man serving Rudra.

    So she tried to get rid of the ipetence, but she was just a little pending on the Chief of Staffs punishment. Just because he was short-tempered and misogynistic was not enough of a reason to eliminate him.

    Phew, Im getting nicer. Maybe its because Ive been through so much on this trip.

    And so on and so forth, Velgrynd praises herself.

    Needless to say, it was an overestimate.

    She was just happy that Rudra is with her, otherwise the result would have been different.

    Each time she leapt for the pieces of his soul, there were times when she couldnt find her next goal. In such cases, she had to wait for the reincarnation of Rudra to be born, which could take years or decades.

    For Velgrynd, that time after seeing her loved ones off was like torture. In her own mind, a mans fate was sealed if he came under her influence at such a time.

    The Chief of Staff had been lucky.

    When the scene had calmed down, the naval minister spoke up to change things up.

    So, Araki-dono. And who is this woman?

    The naval general looks at Gensei with amanding gaze. Hes in his fifties.

    Gensei also got in a word.

    Excuse me, Im sorry Imte in the introductions. She is a colleague of mine, and it has been decided that she will attend the Imperial Council meeting today, by permission of His Majesty.

    My name is Ryuo. Please to make your acquaintance.

    Interrupting Genseis introduction, Velgrynd nonchntly took a false name. The name was a randombination of the character for dragon from True Dragon and the character for phoenix from the divine beast that controlled the me in this worldRyuo (the phoenix). 21

    However, that was a big problem.

    Wait, phoenix for dragon?

    Taking a dragon for a name is insolent. This is really insulting to the Emperor!

    Or are you rted to Your Majesty by any chance?

    They had calmed down now but there was now a great deal of confusion.

    Gensei regrets his mistake.

    Did she do this on purpose? No, no. Velgrynd-dono doesnt care what we do. Since she even disguised herself, we should have considered a pseudonym

    It was his fault, Gensei reflected.

    Akira also let out a sigh in the other room.

    Ive lived a long time, but this is the first time Ive been pushed around this much. Thats why Im somewhat amused.

    Akira stood up and stepped into the chamber.

    This is a critical time. Isnt it strange to be disclosing our hand?

    He chuckled as he said this before those who noticed him stood up and hung their heads.

    Now that the lord had told them so, they have no choice but to ept it. Even if they had aint, they could not say it openly.

    Thus, Velgrynd in this world came to be known as Ryuo.

    Lets get started.

    With a word from Akira Sakura, the main conference began.

    Then I will give the report.

    That said, it was a naval intelligence officer who stood up.

    Thest few days had been pretty much the same, but today was different.

    The enemy coalition fleet has made a port call at Antis.

    Are you sure?

    Yes, sir. The call came from a local intelligence officer, so theres no doubt about it.

    Its still thergest military port among the several supply areas, you know. But how can you be sure its not a deception?

    As you say. There are several archipgos in the Great South Sea. There was also a report that Azalea is setting up a secret base there. Have you sent agents there as well?

    The general asks, and the Minister of the Navy follows suit.

    The intelligence officer answers those questions without hesitation.

    There are too many of them to reach all the inds, sir. However, the number of enemy ships remaining in port at Antis matches the information we received prior to our sortie, and the possibility of a separate fleet has been eliminated. An Imperial Navy warship has been captured. Theyre nning to stay here and work on their maintenance, to frustrate our will to fight.

    The Imperial Navys crushing defeat was already known to the Imperial Headquarters. So no one is surprised now, but they cant keep quiet when they hear that their ship has been captured.

    The enemys movements were superimposed. And, um, have any of our ships seeded in escaping?

    No, of course not. If there was, they would have contacted us long ago.

    The surprisingly brazen Chief of Staff pointed out.

    He seems to have cooled off, as he said he would, and his point is urate.

    As you say, Mr. Chief of Staff, I believe it is safe to assume that every ship in our fleet has been captured.

    Tch! Then its as if weve already increased the enemys strength!

    It cant be helped. We were dealing with an unknown enemy, a demon. Even if it were me in the room, the result would have been the same.

    The Chief refutes the Army Ministers statement.

    Excuse me. I didnt mean to insult the Navy. Its just that Im frustrated

    I ept your apology. We all have the same regrets.

    The meeting was tense.

    They are in the tightest situation since the beginning of the Empires history.

    The Imperial Fleet, which had prided itself on being the strongest in the world, had been defeated. Moreover, many ships, including the most advanced ones, have fallen into the hands of the enemy.

    Everyone was anxious and worried about the unprecedented danger. There was no point inining, but even a whine would still pop out.

    If themander-in-chief hadnt acted like a grown-up, the situation would have been even bleaker.

    In a slightly rxed atmosphere, Akira Sakura, not missing the opportunity, opens his mouth.

    So, are our soldiers still being held as prisoners of war?

    That question makes the naval participants tense. The safety of theirrades, their loved ones, is a cause for concern. Of course, they were important to the army as well, a matter of great importance to theirrades and also of great consequence to their future ns.

    If this were a normal war, the wartime agreement would have guaranteed the safety of the prisoners of war. But this time, that premise could be undermined by the involvement of an unknown invader.

    If it was the same as before, fine.

    If it wasnt

    His gaze fell on the intelligence officer.

    That is

    Whats the matter? Get on with your answer!

    The stagnant intelligence officer stammered, but was urged by his superior officer to continue.

    ording to eyewitness reports, a group of Imperial Navy generals were steering the captured vessel with their own hands. There were also enemy soldiers on board, but they were in very small numbers. There was no sign of gunfire, and it appeared as if they had turned over of their own volition.

    It was natural to stammer, everyone thought.

    And the same was true of Akira. A proud soldier of the Imperial Guard would never abandon his duties so easily. And moreover, it was unthinkable that he would turn over to the enemy.

    That wouldnt make Kondou-san, who risked his life for it, any happier

    Minamotos murmurings echoed through the silent chamber.

    It is better to believe in the possibility of being controlled by a demon. That is the true feelings of everyone present.

    And Velgrynd cheerfully affirms that thought.

    Hmmm, silly. Dont worry. None of your friends are going to betray you.

    It was Velgrynd.

    The naval officers could not believe that theirrades had betrayed them, and they were puzzled by the circumstantial evidence that suggested it. Thats why they found hope in Velgrynds statement.

    What do you mean by that, Ryuo-dono?

    The Minister of the Navy asks on behalf of everyone.

    Velgrynd smiled and replied.

    Its simple. Demons have the ability to possess people. Theyre new and dont have much power in our world, but by possessing people and taking their bodies, they can slowly be more and more powerful. They dont have much magic element as a source of power, and it will take some time for them to fully assimte, dont you think?

    That was exactly the hope.

    I see. So theyre being controlled after all!

    If it takes so long to assimte, does that mean we can help them now?

    We cant allow them to mock our friends! We will destroy you, demons!

    We must immediatelyunch a rescue mission

    Wait a minute, things arent that easy.

    The chamber was in an uproar.

    Some wondered how she knew so much about it, but then they reminded themselves that it was no surprise when she was Emperors trump card, and they epted her word with open arms.

    Then they all agreed on rescuing theirrades, but then they remembered that it was a conundrum and regained theirposure.

    To begin with, the empire has just lost the war for its own survival. A rescue mission is not something thates easily to mind.

    First of all, there werent enough ships left in the kingdom.

    Six aircraft carriers.

    Four battleships.

    Four heavy cruiser ships.

    Two light cruiser ships.

    Eighteen destroyer ships.

    After losing so many ships, even if they could gather them from all over the Empire, they could only gather less than half of these ships.

    They would only need to assemble a single fleet. If they were sent to rescue everyone, then the defense of the maind would be a challenge.

    But the worlds leaders are aware of the current situation. Shouldnt we make peace in secret and concentrate on the true enemy, the demons 22 ?

    Everyone knows that. This is impossible with the army in its grasp.

    Other countries are not happy, but they are the same as us. We have not been able to keep track of the army troops we have sent to China.

    And more importantly, weve just been robbed of our decisive force

    Even if the leadership had made peace, it wouldnt have solved anything.

    Theres no way to announce an end to the war if the military is still out of control. Therefore, the first step in resolving the situation is to deal with the demon.

    Before that, there was a concern that everyone was aware of, but couldnt say anything about.

    What was it?

    Is there anyone here in possession of the demon?

    It was the Minister of War who finally uttered it.

    From the way he stared at the naval participants, it was obvious what he was thinking.

    Huh! Do you doubt us?

    No, no, I dont think thats what I said. But from what youve just told me, Im sure you cant me me for suspecting it.

    Dont be ridiculous! If you say that, then so does the army, theyre running amok in China!

    Nuh-uh, thats

    The atmosphere in the chamber was almost engulfed in a terrible atmosphere, but it was interrupted by Akira Sakura.

    The good news is that our brave soldiers are safe. It is only natural that we should rescue them, but can we really achieve this by squabbling here? Im sure you know the right answer, brave men.

    Yes, Your Majesty! I beg your pardon!

    With those words, everyone became calm.

    Its a very dignified thing to say, but for Akira, he still felt like he was walking a tightrope.

    Simply being upset wont solve the situation, so there is no choice here but to strongly rebuke. He can understand the anxiety of the officers, but Akira Sakura also felt frustrated at his inability to do anything.

    Ryuo-dono, I understand the War Ministers concern, but are you able to distinguish between humans and demons?

    It was Gensei who asked this question.

    If they couldnt tell friend from foe apart, then they couldnt talk about anything.

    Thats the premise for all of their countermeasures.

    It was quiet again in the chamber as everyone waited for Velgrynds answer.

    Theres no way any of them are. If there were, I would have told you first.

    Everyone was relieved to hear that.

    Yes, thats right.

    The same was true for Gensei.

    If a demon of the heavenly demon ss had transformed into a human being, there was a chance they couldnt tell them apart. If even Velgrynd here couldnt do it, then there would have been nothing left to do but give up.

    There was still hope, Gensei felt.

    But Velgrynd was different.

    Im surprised. Cant you even tell if youre one of them or not? Demons, I call them phantoms, but they possess people because they have to. So that they can live in this world. And once theyve fully assimted, they can no longer be considered human.

    If assimtion isntplete, the Barrier guarding this imperial city should be enough to see through it. They may be able to transform into humans, but their very nature is foreign.

    Its because of such instability that they wont go out until stable, Velgrynd exined.

    And you see, the lowest-ranking grunts are wise, but not self-aware. Theyre small fry who follow orders from their superiors, so you can figure them out with a quick questioning.

    The memory of a possessed person can be read, but it is only the surface level. If you ask about the deeper parts, they will not be able to answer and will get messed up.

    When Velgrynd exined this, the mood in the chamber was one of relief.

    The exnation continued further.

    It was until this time that the meeting was serious.

    From this point forward, Velgrynd was on her own.

    Since you dont seem to know anything about it, I have to tell you that there is a definite hierarchy of ranks among the phantoms. That soldier you just mentioned is a small fry. And since theyre only one level of strength away from being fully assimted, theyre only as strong as the most advanced demon (youkai).

    Its easy to say that its a advanced demon, but its a level of danger that requires a task force. However, the Velgrynd could not care less.

    R-Ryuo-dono, does that mean that if they fully assimte, this soldier will be a heavenly-ss demon?

    The Minister of the Army asked, to which Velgrynd replied firmly.

    Clever man, youre right.

    Huh?!

    The Army Ministers exmation wasnt because he felt ridiculed. He was speechless at the desperate situation of the lowest-ranked soldiers being the equivalent of the Heavenly Demon ss.

    The temperature difference between him and Velgrynd was so great that it was pitiful.

    There was no one here who couldugh at the Army Minister. They all felt the same way.

    Why are you surprised? If that was the case, even Gensei can beat it. If you''re a"mander "ss whomands a group of soldiers, they may have a hard time, but they can''t beat him.

    The lower-rankedmander ss is equivalent to the A rank in strength in the other worldbut until their possession isplete, they are only slightly stronger than the B rank.

    Once it was fully assimted into the mythical/dragon ss, it would be an inevitable struggle. But even so, Velgrynd decided that Gensei would be enough to defeat it.

    It pains me to say this, he said, but against two of them, even Kondou lost. I dont want you to get your hopes up.

    You shouldnt be so weak. Kondou stuck to his beliefs until the end, you know.

    That reminds Gensei.

    He realized IHe realized that he had been weak.

    Then, he realized how blind he had been. He could feel the heat of the sword at his side.

    That primed Gensei to regain his confidence.

    Yes, youre right. If we act weak, we will lose battles that could have been won.

    Right. Well, if youre feeling weak, Im here, so theres no way you can lose.

    It was Velgrynd who ruined Genseis resolve.

    ***

    Just like that, the flow of the main conference has changed.

    Velgrynds exnation continued.

    The higher up they are, the stronger they are, but their energy is too high for them toe into our world. Maybe theyre only here now up to the lower echelon, the general level. So

    Wait, wait, wait!

    What is it?

    The exnation was interrupted, and Velgrynd grimaced. Had it not been in front of Akira Sakura, she wouldnt have forgiven anyone for interrupting her.

    Well, the ranks of the phantom, are we to assume that they are the same as those of the military?

    Are you doubting mynguage skills?

    No, I dont mean to, but it does raise the question of whether there is a lieutenant or colonel rank betweenmander and general

    It was the Minister of the Navy who heard about it, but this was on everyones mind as well. It may be insignificant to Velgrynd, but to the inhabitants of this world, they are a desperate opponent.

    If Gensei-dono is going to have a hard time, would themander ss be the equivalent of a mythical/dragon demon?

    Yes, I think thats the same opponent that Kondou lost to, so its almost certainly true.

    Then how strong is a general?

    Hes as strong as a mythical/dragon ss or even a god/buddha ss.

    Since it cannot be beat by humans, it is ssified as a god/buddha ss. If such an opponent attacked, any resistance was meaningless.

    One by one, their faces grew pale as they realized this.

    So perhaps Kondou had been defeated by this general.

    Maybe so, but Im not interested. I dont care either way.

    It doesnt matter who you lose to, Velgrynd doesnt care.

    All that mattered was the fact that you had lost.

    Oh yeah, and since I remember, I should tell you that there are only two ways for a phantom to appear in this world. Either you go through the Underworld Gate, or youre summoned by a superior. Im guessing he was summoned because there would be no gate at sea.

    The General could have called in more than 10,000 of them, Velgrynd said in a light-hearted tone.

    To the listeners point of view, it was a hopeless number.

    Everyone could only stare at the Velgrynd in awe.

    Would Ryuo-dono, I mean, can you win?

    That was the only hope, the Minister of the Navy asked.

    Thats a ridiculous question, he thought to himself and startedughing.

    Even against an enemy general-level unit, this enemy would be powerful enough to destroy mankind.

    And now that it leads its subordinates, there is nothing they can do about it.

    No matter how strong the mysterious woman who called herself Ryuo was, there was no way she could take on the Legion individually.

    Isnt the opponent an army of god ss with unimaginable power? In all times and ces, we have only heard of stories of mans victory over the gods in myths

    Isnt there no choice but to pray that the world will not be destroyed?

    The Chief of Staff and the Army Minister felt the same way as the Navy Minister, and so they followed suit.

    Velgrynd snickered.

    Silly you. If anyone could beat me, it would be only Feldway, the king of the phantoms, wouldnt it? But I dont intend to lose, and he wont be able to manifest himself over here.

    Why do you know the name of the enemy kingand so many other questions. But no one was there to point them out.

    It urred to them that this woman should be no different.

    There was one thing they had to make sure of.

    I dont doubt that you are strong, Ryuo-sama. So I would like to ask you

    It was the inspectorate general of education who had been silent the whole time and had watched the proceedings with great courage. He was one of the three Secretaries of the Army and a mediator in the event of a conflict.

    Velgrynd turned to the inspectorate general.

    What is it?

    This country is on the verge of extinction, so will you then go out and take on the enemy?

    No, I will not. Because I have only one life left.

    Of course, that was a lie.

    With her Parallel Existence, it is possible to defeat the ene y while protecting the Emperor.

    But theres no reason to tell them that. Velgrynd used her identity as the Guardian of the Emperor as a shield and dered that she would devote herself to his protection.

    For one reason only.

    Its a calcted decision.

    One cannot grow further if they only look to others for help in times of trouble. She doesnt think a country like that would have a future anyway.

    If that was the case, then it would be the same even if everyone died here.

    Velgrynd is affectionate and has not yet abandoned this country, or mankind. If this were Velzard, she would not have let those with such a feeble mind live.

    Before she set out on her journey, she would have thought that she would take care of everything until Rudra died, but anything after that was of no concern to Velgrynd. But now she can see the bigger picture. This, too, was a change that came about because of her encounter with Rimuru and his perspective.

    All that mattered to Velgrynd now was Rudra and his beloved people. And to protect the bloodline that goes on and on.

    Thats why, as always, she makes sure that the people left behind will be able to do something when shes gone.

    The words are harsh, but Velgrynd deres that she will not move out.

    But dont worry. Your Majesty will be safe with me. So I suggest you do the best you can.

    In short, it was a matter of showing some guts.

    ***

    Now that the strength of the enemy is known, the direction of the Congress will be shifted to future measures.

    With Velgrynds help, the Emperors safety was assured.

    The officers in the main camp are not stupid and they understand what Velgrynd is saying. Thats why they decided to take care of it themselves first.

    Then keep a strict eye on the movements of the enemy fleet.

    Yes, sir. Ill double and triple my hands and give orders not to miss the movement.

    How much time do we have before the demon possesses a person andpletely assimtes with them?

    Well, if there are a lot of demons, it wont take more than a week, but over here, I think itll take at least two months.

    In front of Rudra, Velgrynd also answers honestly without hiding what is asked. As a result, the policy was set without hesitation.

    It will take at least a month for the enemy fleet to finish replenishment and maintenance and leave port. The timing is consistent, so can we assume that the enemy wont move until a month from now?

    Im not so sure about that. It may take some time to re-organize our freshly captured fleet, but with both the Azalea and Chinese fleets now in operation, wouldnt it be possible tounch them with just a refueling run?

    If thats the case, then it would be less than two weeks from Antis to the Empire. Itll depend on the weather, but

    It wont be done. Weather control is so basic, so think of it as sailing at maximum ship speed.

    Huh yes!

    By this time, the officers had begun to grasp Velgrynds personality.

    Although she had an arrogant attitude, she had a surprisingly caring side to her.

    She answers questions seriously and will give advice.

    Shes a great ally.

    If there is no way to take advantage of it, the talented ones will ask questions everywhere. And as a result, they had developed a general n of attack.

    Oh. We could intercept them on the maind, but that would make it impossible for us to rescue our brave brothers and sisters who are being held captive. Perhaps we should strike out and destroy the enemy ringleaders.

    Thats right. I agree with you, but there is the question of who should go.

    If Ryuo-dono is protecting His Majesty, there will be no hindsight. Ille with you.

    Oh, if Araki-dono will join us, its a good thing.

    The entire swordsmanship squad, please join us!

    Minamoto-kun, Im counting on you!

    And so it seemed that the conversation was settled.

    Thats when Velgrynd interrupted.

    Are you guys serious? Or are you just having suicidal thoughts?

    What do you mean?

    The Army Minister looked at Velgrynd with a shine in his eye.

    He had hoped that maybe she would join them, but that was too sweet an idea.

    Ill give you credit for showing that you are willing to work hard on your own, but thats not enough. The enemy is powerful, so we have make sure to do our best.

    Most of them thought, What are you talking about? but some of them figured out the answer.

    One of them was the armys Chief of Staff.

    Am I to understand that we need more than our own country?

    This was surprising to Velgrynd.

    He had been the first one to turn on her, so she was under the impression he was more impulsive.

    Good thing I didnt give up on him too soon.

    Velgrynd nodded, disguising her true feelings.

    It is true that this is not the time to see this global crisis as an opportunity for nations to fight each other. We understand that, but as I have just exined, our military is in overdrive.

    The army chief of staff says that he is frustrated too.

    But then Minamoto says,

    As I thought, we should also get cooperation from other countries! If were only half-hearted, well be defeated and possessed by demons. Thats why were taking on the challenge with only our own elite troops, so we have no choice but to ask other countries to send their elite troops as well.

    Hearing that, the others agree.

    Its the only way to go. This isnt a war anymore. Were locked in a race for survival against monsters, so this is no time to choose our bets. Before the oue of the war, we must drive the demon out first.

    Right. This isnt just an imperial matter anymore.

    Thats right. We should contact you as soon as possible and keep in step.

    Just because it was the only way, he expressed his opinion.

    Correct. You guys are weak, and you need to use your brains more.

    Hearing this, Velgrynd smiled with satisfaction and replied. But from the offices point of view, it was an absurd story.

    Please wait! Im sure the world leaders understand that things arent going well. But that doesnt mean theyll join hands and cooperate.

    Hmm, that would be difficult. No country is going to nod yes to an offer of a ceasefire out of the blue.

    We dont want that kind of suggestion in our country, do we?

    Those are very sensible opinions.

    Anything happens during the ceasefire is a disaster. For that to be possible, they need to at least get control of the military, which is out of control.

    Besides, there are many other problems.

    Even the popr opinion of the people wont be convinced.

    Some countries might use this as an opportunity to plot.

    The doubts were endless.

    Some argued that they could not move forward with suspicion, but if those fears are not cleared, then it is impossible to go hand in hand.

    There is no such thing as a partnership in this situation, but Velgrynd smiled and said,

    Will you give up without trying? Well, thats okay, then. Ill protect His Majesty and this Imperial City, His Majestys home.

    When she says that like hes a fool, the diplomatic officer has no choice but to retort.

    Okay. Then Ill try to contact them. Lets show our utmost sincerity and at least arrange for a meeting!

    Although he was close to retorting, he was still sessful in meeting Velgrynds challenge.

    Thats right. Either way, we must do it, or we will perish.

    It may destroy me if I try, but Id like to show my determination anyway.

    Thats right. Even if we lose, were going to have to fight back with everything weve got.

    Im sorry for my people and my family, but

    It cant be helped. I dont care if theyre under agreement, the enemy is a demon. Its a race for survival. A loss means the end for our nation. We must do all we can right now or well regret it.

    And all the officers were well agitated.

    Velgrynd is happy to have it her way.

    Thats fine. Act before you argue about whether or not you can do it. And if you make a mistake, Ill do something about it.

    She whispered the words in her heart and smiled.

    Everyone knew what to do and acted ordingly.

    Thus began thest stand of the empire.

    ***

    Antis continent.

    It is the smallest continent located at the eastern end of the United States of Azalea.

    The climate is of a tropical rainforest. Most of it was heavily forested and jungle-like.

    But this continent had a more significant characteristic.

    There were iron ore mines and oil-producing wells. By harnessing its rich reserves, it had be thergest military base in Azaleas sphere of influence.

    And that was the beginning of the misfortune.

    There was an ancient ruin near the military base, but unluckily there was also an Underworld Gate that led to the other world.

    Long ago, there was a ceremony performed by the native tribes. They may have attempted tomunicate with the gods, but as a result, a small rupture in space-time urred. It was discovered by a phantom race and is now firmly anchored as a stable Underworld Gate.

    The phantoms weed the indigenous Azalean people as their new targets for possession. They stole the military facilities they had built and used them as a foothold for their invasion.

    A man in a reddish-brown military uniform in the national defense guard,manded a multitude of men of various races.

    His ck hair was brushed back. His thin, narrow eyes gleamed intelligently behind his sses.

    He is Cornus second inmand from the heavenly realm. Before he mutated and became a phantom, he was active as a cherub 23 .

    He didnt have a name, but he now calls himself Amari Masahiko. It was the name of the man whose body he incarnated when he appeared in this world.

    Incidentally, the three demon 24 leaders may name their subordinates after their themselves. Cornu didnt value the bond between the demons and their followers, which is why the demons in Cornus group didnt have names.

    Race was of no concern to the Phantoms, but Amari Masahiko was Japanese. He was an agent who hade to explore Azaleas military facilities and was a rival to Kondou.

    He was a brilliant but unlucky man.

    There was no news of Kondous defeat, and by the time he learned of the enemys full extent, it was toote.

    He was outnumbered and defeated, and his body was taken over.

    The body of Masahiko was strengthened by the Ki Fighting Method (Battlewill) and was the best material for a phantom to use. More than a hundred days had passed since his manifestation, and the senior-ranked, second-inmand, had be fully capable of exerting his power even in this world.

    His unparalleled power could reach 10 million EP.

    This was the result of his own knowledge and skill level, and his power had increased greatly.

    Hurry up with the expansion work. The gate is too small for Cornu-sama to descend.

    Originally, only those who had a magicule amount less than the size of the Underworld Gate could fully manifest from the Otherworld.

    Those who did not had to leave their main body in the Otherworld and send out split bodies linked by a Soul Corridor to gradually regain their power.

    But

    The only ones who do not apply to this description are the Three Demons 25 .

    The power of the three demons is so great that an Underworld Gate wouldnt do them justice. It must be at least a million-level gate to make them appear.

    Incidentally, as long as the main body remained in the otherworld, they could be resurrected even if the alter ego died! However, because that gate hasnt fully manifested, they can only disy a weakened power of less than half at most.

    Also, even if they were revived, only memories and experiences are inherited, and it is necessary to find another possessor.

    There were advantages, but the disadvantages were greater.

    By expanding the "Underworld Gate", they could return to another world even if they are incarnated, so the phantoms were aiming forplete manifestation.

    The Underworld Gate was expanding day by day, and it was expanding faster than Velgrynd had expected. It was about 100,000 in existence value, so a low-intermediate level lieutenant would be able to fully manifest without any problems.

    The mental-controlled captives were lined up in front of the Underworld Gate. One by one, they are possessed by demons.

    The greatest advantage to the incarnation is that the phantoms can take their names. As half-mental life forms, they are unstable beings. By acquiring a body and a name, they established a strong sense of self.

    As a result of the knowledge they gain from the body they possess, even the lowest-ranking soldier had be useful in their own right.

    Theres no need to be so hasty Masahiko-sama. Our n is on track. Ive surveyed our worlds strength and found few who pose a threat.

    It was David Reagan who advised Masahiko to use the demon lords powers. The demon that possessed him was of the rank of General, one of the highest-ranking Demon Lord Seeds. He is one of the strongest demons to achieve full manifestation, with an existence value of up to six hundred thousand.

    No wonder Kondou couldnt win.

    Davids opponent, Li Jinlong, is the one toin about this.

    I told you many times. Do you remember, Fist Saint Xianhua is still here? The way I remember her, shes as good a match as any officer could have.

    An officer is a mid-range phantom rank. In the Otherworld, they are as powerful as Demon Lord Seeds and were the leaders of a thousand-man regiment that was the key to the invasion.

    Unlike the lower-ranked ones, they were a formidable force, and losing them would seriously affect their ns. Li Jinlongs advice was right.

    But Davidughs.

    Its all right. That man, Pulcine-sama, has been sent to take care of him. Xianhua is no match for him.

    Li Jinlong is surprised to hear this, but was convinced with a grin.

    Mystery Monk Pulcine, one of mankinds best hope for the future. He left the oracle behind and went on a quest to find out what happened. There he fought fierce battles with demons, but was cruelly defeated and captured.

    There was only one reason for this.

    The only reason he was taken prisoner was to have a demon of the same rank as Masahiko and his chief strategist as an excellent retainer.

    That tragedy was fulfilled. He was now a demon of the same rank as Amari Masahiko.

    Seriously? I was going to go in there, but I was beaten to it. Its easy enough to kill them, but wed destroy them too. Well, Pulcine-sama wont have a problem with that.

    David agreed, if a little irreverently.

    Humans in this world were weak. In such a situation, Xianhua, who has outstanding strength, can withstand as a substitute, enough to stand in for their chief, Cornu. Its because everyone thinks so that they are hesitant to leave it to the subordinates.

    They were too strong, even for their own rank, against humans. It wouldnt be a fight if they tried, but it was hard to go easy on them in these unfamiliar bodies. Cornus lieutenants are on a different level, so they should be able to carry out the mission without difficulty.

    Because of their absolute trust, Davidughed that Xianhuas fate was as good as done.

    Well, if Cornu-sama doesnt want a womans body, then well find a recement and Ill take Xianhuas ce. The man who owned my body was very attached to her, and I couldnt stop thinking about her.

    Soft and tender. Cornu-sama wont care about your gender, so you wont have to worry about that.

    Thinking that the problem was already solved, Li Jinlong and David started a silly conversation.

    As he listened to them, Masahiko couldnt help but feel uneasy.

    Its not that he was dissatisfied with the results at this point. He was not satisfied, but he could say that they haveunched an invasion of this world.

    Under Cornusmand, the two top general counsels and the four generals have already been revealed.

    The expansion of the Underworld Gate was on track, and a recement for Cornu was on the horizon.

    The machinations of Pulcine and the two remaining generals havee to fruition and the world is on the verge of ruin.

    All that remains is to reveal Cornu to the world.

    That should be the case. Theres nothing to reverse from here. I havent overlooked anything

    After calmly analyzing the situation, he hade to the conclusion that there was nothing wrong with it.

    However, the anxiety of Amari Masahiko was correct.

    It was impossible to assume that Velgrynd had appeared.

    Human resistance is insignificant, but we must not be caught off guard. There are still some finishing touches to be made. Everyone pull together and get to work.

    As if to shake off his uneasiness, Masahiko ordered everyone to do so.

    ***

    After the main conference was over, the first thing Velgrynd did was to go to the main library.

    It is no exaggeration to say that the library had a huge collection of books on its vast floor.

    The reason why she went there is because there was something that was said in the meeting that bothered her.

    It was the names of nations and some of the names of people.

    For example, the Holy Arcia Empire.

    This seems to have some connection to the Arcia Kingdom she led.

    Or the name of the president of the United States of Azalea

    George Hayes, apparently, is the same one she had contact with before the space-time leap.

    If Velgrynds memory was correct, his father was the owner of as piece of Rudras soul. His name was Laurent Hayes, and she was with him from his youth until he died a mortal death.

    There are many other things she was curious about, but she had to look into those matters.

    If they were in the same world, she could be sure that they were the same nation and the same person, but there are also simr worlds in other dimensions.

    Since there are clear differences in the origins andws of the world, it is concluded that it is not a parallel world, but for some reason the names are simr

    Again, the possibility of this being a coincidence was undeniable, so Velgrynd decided to look into the history.

    The first thing she looked up was the origins of the Holy Arcia Empire, and the description of the Arcia Kingdom was confirmed. She recognized the name of the king and his chief advisors, and she was convinced that this world was descended from the Arcia Kingdom.

    Next, she looked up George Hayes

    Oh, thats right. His fathers name was Laurent Hayes. He was the president seven generations ago, so that must be it. SoGeorge-kun could have been president, too.

    Velgrynd smiles, remembering the respect George had for his father.

    He wanted to be a great president, just like his father.

    Laurent died at the age of 62, while George was only 27 then. Todays George is fifty-two years old, so in this space-time leap, she appeared 25 yearster in the same world.

    Twenty-five years ago, Akira Sakura would have been alive and well, so someone with a piece of Rudras soul must have existed at the same time.

    That is a very rare pattern, but since the soul reacts strongly to death, it was not absolutely certain.

    That is why, while doubting the possibility of another person, she went to therge library in this way.

    By the way, Laurent was surrounded and almost killed by a gang. It was there that Velgrynd was called in to rescue him, which is how she got to know Laurent.

    Remembering that, Velgrynd feels nostalgic.

    She switches her mind and resumes her research.

    George-kun had a little boy, right?

    Velgrynd gave her blessing, so theres no doubt about it. She checked the names in the book of names and found his sons name was listed.

    Emile Hayesshe was convinced that it was no longer doubtful because it matched the name she remembered.

    Velgrynd nods with satisfaction.

    It was then that she discovered an entry in the Biographical Directory that bothered her.

    Eh!? Was it my fault that Laurents marriage was dyed?

    She grumbled in dissatisfaction.

    Dont be ridiculous, she thought.

    Laurent Hayes had a shadow of a beautiful woman who had always followed him around, and so on, ording to the biographical data.

    It was true, but Velgrynd was neither aware nor malicious in heart. Therefore, she dissatisfied with this.

    She always said he was free to fall in love, and she never meant to hold Laurent back. But there are certainly not many women who would court a man with such a beautiful woman at his side.

    By all ounts, it was Velgrynd who was responsible for the considerable dy in Laurents marriage.

    I dont know who wrote this, but Id like toin about it

    The author was long dead, but that may have been fortunate in a way.

    Even after she had finished her research, Velgrynd was enjoying her free time.

    There was no one to stop her.

    The only one who could, was Akira, but he was the one who let Velgrynd do what she wanted. Because he instinctively knew that this would lead to the most benign oue.

    Of course, there were those who would get involved with Velgrynd.

    Not the soldiers who knew her true nature, but their wives.

    The Empress, Akiras wife, was one of them.

    What a mess. A woman who doesn''t know the bones of any horse approaches His Majesty before he knows it.

    It was a fight from the very beginning.

    The Empress, from the Dukes family, was fifty years old.

    The Empress was still full of energy at this time when the average age was about 60 years old due to the development of medicine and magic.

    Nevertheless, for Velgrynd, she was still pretty. This had happened a lot during the long time she had spent with Rudra.

    Oh my, youll ruin your pretty face if you get so angry. I think even Akira Sakura would want his wife to always be beautiful.

    And then she refused to fight with her.

    And then she even patted the Empress face.

    It was so fast that the empress didnt even have time to try to escape, but lo and behold, her skin was instantly rejuvenated. Before long, the empresss skin was regaining its freshness.

    See, youre beautiful now. But its important to keep it that way. Im going to teach you a breathing technique to regte your energy, so you can practice it properly.

    What?

    The Empress was stunned.

    This is exactly what it means to be unable to speak.

    The wives of the high ranking officials who followed her are looking at her the same way.

    After all, the Empress had regained her beauty right before their eyes. They were right to be amazed.

    You dont thinkthats the secret of rejuvenation?

    They muttered to no one, but Velgryndughed and denied it.

    Thats not rejuvenation. This is just a way to revitalize your cells and make you look better. It doesnt change your race, and your lifespan remains finite.

    There is a finite lifespan. Velgrynd exined that she only activated the cells by manipting the spirit of life, and thus could not extend their lifespan, but this was misleading.

    From the perspective of Velgrynd, it is a small margin of error, but the life is extended.

    It makes the body healthier and cures it of most diseases. The energy intake would be more efficient and one would have a perfect resistance to aging (anti-aging).

    As a result, the life expectancy of the Empress was more than doubled.

    If you learn and practice breathing techniques from Velgrynd, you will live a longer life.

    Ryuo-sama, Im afraid I was wrong about you.

    The Empress instantly fell in love with Velgrynd.

    Of course, the same was true of her attendants.

    Me too!

    I as well!

    Id love for you to teach us how to breathe!

    They shouted out tried desperately to regain their youth.

    ***

    It has been a few days since Velgrynd arrived in this world.

    Teaching thedies breathing techniques and enjoying tea times, Velgrynd was gracefully at ease.

    The military, on the other hand, has been busy.

    Discussions with the leaders of each country were difficult, and the prospects for meetings were unclear.

    Due tock of progress, the main conference has been canceled. Instead of wasting time on useless meetings, it has been decided that the effort should be focused on something constructive.

    Akira Sakura has given his permission.

    So Velgrynd has noints.

    But the frustration is growing.

    They were losing valuable time.

    Even while doing this, it seems that the demons are ready, so if they don''t do it early, they will not be able to hold international meetings. In that case, they would have to leave before humanity coulde together.

    Well, okay. If that happens, the war wont end even if we do something about the phantoms

    That would be a problem, Velgrynd thought mncholy.

    So she decided to help out a bit.

    After all, Velgrynd is a very caring person.

    Are the negotiations going well?

    While asking that question, she rushed into the Foreign Ministrys intelligence office.

    Its a quiet time in the afternoon, but the intelligence office is a scene of chaos. The bureaucrats are in a panic because of the intrusion.

    But Velgrynd was unconcerned.

    Youre not supposed to be here. This is a restricted area

    Shut up. Its been three days now, and I wonder if any country has agreed to meet with you yet?

    Well, I dont think so

    The person in charge opens his mouth heavily.

    The reply from China was a conditional eptance on the condition that the other nations would join. The same was true of the Great Roziam Dynasty, which was synonymous with reluctant refusal.

    This is because the United States of Azalea and the Holy Arcia Empire responded that this was not the case.

    Under these circumstances, it is out of the question for the leaders to go abroad. Even if they were holding amunications conference, they could not afford to do so, that was the truth of the matter.

    We are patiently trying to persuade them to do so.

    And the person in charge sounds annoyed.

    Hearing this, Velgrynd is puzzled.

    That will take a long time. It cant be helped, so let me help you with that a little bit.

    From the point of view of Masayuki and others, it was the very definition of tsundere.

    But the hard-headed and proud bureaucrats are not convinced.

    But

    If you listen silently, youll be fine! I agree that youre strong and beautiful, but information strategy is our domain. I wish youd keep your mouth shut.

    Even though he was angry, he had to admit that Velgrynd was beautiful. It was understandable that such a high official didnt want to be interfered with by amateurs, but this was a bad reaction.

    If its left up to you, we wont be able to make a move in time for the enemy toe to us!

    And well, it made Velgrynd grumpy.

    Just switch seats, Velgrynd said, and took her ce in front of themunications equipment.

    She knows how to use it with a quick nce. Dhnr can easily make the connection to Azaleas U.S. intelligence in one motion.

    You hear me, dont you?

    Velgrynd calls out from above without even checking the other party. The other party wont have to answer, but it responds ufortably.

    You are persistent. Ive told my superiors what your country wants, but the President is busy. Please understand that there is no time for negotiations.

    Although its an enemy country, it was the same in that they were used by demons. Thats why they didnt despise them, and they handled it well.

    But they still couldnt get to the meeting because of the turmoil within the United States. The Imperial side knew that, too, and thats why they couldnt push it through.

    But that was none of Velgrynds business.

    Come on, call your president, George-kun.

    I dont understand you. And its not polite to mention the presidents name so casually. You know he is busy here

    If you tell him that Velgrynd is calling, Im sure hell listen to you.

    What did you say?

    There was a hint of confusion on the other end, but Velgrynd cut themunication.

    Since the alleged enemy president of the United States of Azalea is acquainted with her, there is no way to take advantage of that.

    The rest is up to them.

    If she can get a message to President George, then they can move quickly. Otherwise, she would be going to go to them herself.

    That is where she was twenty-five years ago, so she has the coordinates for Georges country. The space-timepse was also reflected in the coordinates, so Spatial Transportation could be performed without any problem.

    If I dont hear from him after a day of waiting, Ill go to him.

    So Velgrynd decided to approach the Holy Arcia Empire this time.

    She had an idea of how to handle those negotiations as well.

    She precisely manipted their magicalmunication circuits and connected them to the channel in an instant. She called up the number and made her demands unterally.

    Tell the emperor that he must do as I ask. Then I will provide you with another sacred artifact. Sword, spear, bow, whatever you wish. I, Velgrynd, will make you a promise so you should move quickly.

    The person being told is puzzled.

    They don''t remember being obliged to obey a woman who calls herself Velgrynd, but the call is on a formal international line. There was no option to ignore it.

    However, there was no way he could see the Emperor as amunications officer, even if he wanted to. The real intention was not to make a mess.

    But he still reported to his superiors.

    The reason being the word sacred artifact.

    In the Holy Arcia Empire, there was a fighting group that was well known in othernds.

    As a national force, they are known as the Seven Sacred Vessels. These seven possess abilities beyond human knowledge but it is their weapons that are the most famous.

    Only when they are chosen to be owners of the weapons can they call themselves one of the Seven Vessels.

    This story has been handed down since the beginning of the nations history and is known to all of Arcias people. Of course, others knew it, but it was a great sin to speak of it so casually.

    Thats more than one man would ever say in a conversation on the phone between nations.

    Since the contents of themunication were recorded as evidence, it was no wonder the war had escted because of it.

    That is why there was no choice but to tell them.

    Anticipating this, Velgrynds negotiating skills were evident.

    But it was awful for those who were listening.

    You! It was enough with the United States of Azalea. No, its not good, but I would argue that youre not the only one responsible. But theres no excuse for the Holy Arcia Empire!

    Yes, thats right! Moreover, using an alias is a brazen thing to do. Itll be found out, and well be in big trouble!

    Velgrynd had no intention of using a false name, but to an uninformed person it seemed like she was trying to deceive them. It was a misunderstanding, but Velgrynd was toozy to exin, so she let it slide.

    Either way, its up to them. There was no point in making a fuss here.

    ***

    Thats how Velgrynd finished her preparations.

    Ignore theints.

    Gracefully, She prepared a cup of tea and enjoyed it while waiting for word.

    The Ministry of Foreign Affairs chief of intelligence fell silent, looking furious. Depending on how the other side responds, hed do whatever it took to me Velgrynd.

    Ill give you credit for being strong, girl. But Im not fooled. I kept silent because I was in front of His Majesty, but I imagine that she has a mind to deceive us with her grandiose lies while everyones minds are weak.

    He was engulfed in fumes during the main conference, but in retrospect, Velgrynds story is too wild to be true.

    If they are true, there is no hope left for mankind. No matter how powerful Velgrynd is, they are no match for the mythical army.

    With that in mind, the officials hostility toward the Velgrynd was growing.

    It was the flip side of his fear, but he was unaware of it. He just drowned his fears in anger.

    And then he waits for a while.

    Velgrynd? Its me, Velgrynd!

    The call was from the United States of Azalea.

    This is surprisingly fastpared to usual.

    And theres no doubt in her mind who the caller is

    Oh, George-kun, right? I hear that youre the president now? I wish Laurent could have seen you as a grown-up.

    It was President George himself.

    Oh, you really are Velgrynd! Im so d. I didnt think Id ever hear from you again.

    Those who were listening to the conversation were amazed beyond words.

    Ah!? Wasnt Velgrynd a fake name? No, thats not important. I seriously dont understand how Ryuo-dono could know the President

    The senior official was also confused.

    He was about to dismiss her as an insolent liar, and now hes developed respect for her.

    Velgrynd didnt care what people thought.

    So, George-kun. Im sorry, but we have to get to the important stuff first and can catch upter. Do you understand the situation?

    Yes, youre right. Ive got something I want to talk to you about too. Can you listen to me after this matter?

    Of course. Youre Laurents pride and joy, so youre like a child to me too.

    Thank you. Thats a relief to hear. So, its quite a situation, but I think well have to reconcile it.

    I agree. So, then, can you agree to what we ask of you?

    Not a problem. When will the meeting take ce?

    Ill check with Rudrathe Emperorand get back to you.

    Well, so there was another one at the same time as my father, wasnt there? All right. I cant wait right here, but Ill make arrangements to be avable at any time.

    And so, the call ended.

    Velgrynd had sessfully made an appointment with the President.

    It wasnt long before word from Arcia arrived.

    Is Velgrynd-sama there?

    Its me.

    Excuse me. I am Bright, First Chair of the Seven Vessels of the Holy Arcia Empire. I have the honor of speaking with Velgrynd-sama, but I would like to confirm one point.

    What is it?

    Is it true that you are the Goddess herself?

    What? Whats the point of that question?

    He was talking about how he was going to find out if Velgrynds words were true or false.

    Or is there anyone still alive who can judge the truth of my words?

    No, thats not

    In the first ce, I didnt think the king wouldnt respond to my name when I mentioned it. Its pathetic. Shins descendants have be so small.

    Shin? You mean, His Majesty Shin, the Emperor? You are insulting the Imperial Family of Arcia

    And Ive been wondering, why are you called the Seven Sacred Vessels? I left you twelve mythical-grade vessels. I dont think its true, but were they lost or stolen? I mean, what makes you think that there isnt someone out there whos qualified to be a mastermind?

    Brights anger fizzled out.

    The chief of the Seven Vessels was convinced at this point.

    The woman who answered his questions, the one who imed to be Velgrynd, was undoubtedly the true goddess.

    I remember hearing from my master that there were twelve sacred artifacts. This is a true story that has only survived by oral tradition, so the one who knows this must be the real one.

    There used to be twelve sacred artifacts.

    Because they were a national asset and trump card, it was stipted that only seven would be disclosed.

    But that doesnt mean there are twelve owners of the artifacts. As Velgrynd pointed out, there were only eight of them at the moment.

    In the more than four thousand years of history of the Holy Arcia Empire, three of its sacred artifacts had been lost. One betrayal and two non-returnees. Now there are only nine artifacts left in Arcias possession.

    And now there is only one secret member of the emperors secret army, and one masterless artifact stillnguishing in a treasure trove of dead treasure.

    The fact that Velgrynd had guessed so well upset Bright.

    But thats not the only reason.

    All Bright had to do was to hear Velgrynds voice and he was overwhelmed. It was more that he sensed that Velgrynds voice was real.

    So, regardless of what Velgrynd said, Bright bowed down to themunications equipment.

    It didnt matter if he didnt see her or not. It was his respect for Velgrynd that made him do it.

    Im sorry, Goddess. I will immediately send a message to Emperor Arcia and inform him of your request!

    Oh, really? Well in that case, its okay to entrust it to you, so move quickly.

    Haha!

    Velgrynd wasnt quite ready toin yet, but she allowed Bright to go ahead with her goal.

    Thus, the Holy Arcia Empire agreed to her request.

    ***

    Well then, next is the Great Roziam Dynasty.

    With that muttered, Velgrynd once again turned on themunications equipment and channeled it to the Foreign Intelligence Agency of the Great Roziam Dynasty.

    However, the signal that was supposed to connect was blocked by some kind of interference.

    Thats odd. You there, when was thest time you contacted the Great Roziam Dynasty?

    The designated representative replies hastily.

    In the early hours of the morning today! Weve been in regr contact six times a day, day and night.

    Since it was wartime, the window was open regardless of time difference. This is an action in ordance with the agreement of each country, and it is a measure to negotiate quickly ording to the war situation.

    Normally they would negotiate a ceasefire, but this time they are using it to share information on themon enemy, the demon.

    Since both sides were in a position to allow the military to run amok, they were also trying to understand the current situation when considering the timings to exin to the people.

    There was nothing unusual in that case, was there?

    Yes, not particrly

    There was no progress, but there was nothing unusual. The person in charge replied, puzzled.

    Now is just the time for a regr lunchtime call. Its unlikely that the other party is not at home, and since themunication facility is not in one ce, its unlikely that the machine is malfunctioning.

    Certainly, there was a high probability that something out of the ordinary had urred, even the person in charge hade to the conclusion.

    Under such circumstances, Velgrynd is operating normally.

    Magical interference is just not on this worlds level. In other words, its safe to assume that the demon has done something. But theyre still unlucky to have done it when Im on to them. No. Its different. Rudras luck must be working. Thats my Rudra!

    She was responding with happy thoughts.

    Well, magic and witchcraft are the norm in this world, and it is difficult to use magic that can interfere with thews of the world. So Velgrynds guess was indeed correct.

    However,plimenting Rudra here was an overestimate. This is because the current Akira Sakura does not have such power, so this situation was just a coincidence.

    In other words, the phantoms were unlucky. The n for the invasion was guaranteed to fall apart once Velgrynd intervened in earnest.

    Velgrynd quickly manipted themunication equipment and drew a precise magic circle in the air. Two magic circles norger than thirty centimeters in diameter illuminated themunications equipment with a mysterious glow.

    Velgrynds magic was transformed into radio waves that are delivered to thend of the Great Roziam Dynasty at a distance. There it became an interference wave again, instantly destroying the sabotage the phantom was attempting to create.

    To an ordinary personNo, even to the master-level sorcerers of this worldthis was a feat beyondprehension.

    Is there someone here? Please tell me if there is anyone to reply

    Were connected! Help, a demon has invaded the royal pce! They cut off all means ofmunication to the outside world, and we were at a loss!

    Dont panic, fool. We belong to the Great Japanese Empire. Im not saying that we wont cooperate, but we cant just have you asking for help out of the blue.

    It was a valid argument.

    The Great Roziam soldiers have regained theirposure after hearing Velgrynds response. There was a brief pause, as if they were consulting. Then they were reced by a calmer voice and the conversation resumed.

    Im sorry about earlier. I am Sergei, Director of Foreign Intelligence of the Grand Roziam Dynasty. At the risk of sounding disgraceful, we need your support. We are sending out a series of dispatches to the various Great Roziam locations, but nobody is responding. Will your country please contact us?

    If she was willing, Sergei will give an encryption code that will lead to various military bases.

    The resistance in the royal pce continues, but the power of the demon was overwhelming.

    Theyre hiding out for now, but its clear that if they dont do something, theyll be traced back to their refuge. She knows that if that happens, she wont be able to protect the royals he took out.

    Thats why Sergei has decided to send for reinforcements from all over the country to help escape from the demons in the chaos.

    Now, the fate of the Great Roziam Dynasty rested on the Empires response.

    And yet

    I told you, I dont want you to make arbitrary demands.

    Wait, if you help us

    Calm down. I dont care about your situation. All you have to do is nod to my request.

    She doesnt listen to peoples requests, but rather conveys her requests. Moreover, Velgrynd says she only epts consent.

    That attitude was very Velgrynd-like.

    Whats the matter with you

    I will convey your request. I will hold an international conference to ascertain the will of the world, and you will bring royalty or someone inmand to it. If you do, I will help you.

    A question should have been asked about this, but for some reason Sergei believed it. He nced around the room and saw the noblemen who huddled there, needing to be protected.

    Its my job to protect these men. Now

    Sergei understood that there was no other way.

    Trusting the word of a stranger is a folly he would never normally take. But now, even if he was deceived by those words, he still had no time to waste.

    In terms of risk, its no different whether I believe it or not. Then in the end, its fun to dream of hope. I apoligize if I implicate the noblemen of the realm in my own stupidity.

    But Sergei is prepared to do so.

    Forgive me, I know you think this is a stupid time to ask, but it is requested that we hold an international meeting. Would it be possible for His Majesty to participate?

    I will.

    It was the highest authority in the room who answered that.

    Emperor Magen of the Great Russian Dynasty, 35 years old. Although still young, he has been on the throne for ten years. He was so ambitious that he decided to invade China to take over the northern continent as absolute ruler.

    Of course, there were objections from the military, but there were also many bellicose opinions, and the war began with Magens will taking precedence

    Magen also suffered a major setback here.

    He was tormented by a sense of helplessness in the face of an enemy that could not be measured by humanmon sense.

    After all this time, Magen regrets his decision.

    He hadunched a campaign against China, but it had led to political instability.

    Magen had a penchant for luxury, but not for misrule. The people would not object to the emperor living a noble life if their lives were relieved.

    But the war had changed the situation.

    It would deprive their people of their rich granaries.

    They want to take an ice-free harbor for national defense.

    What began as a policy of only looking out for their own interests turned into a disaster when the Holy Arcia Empire invaded the Great Roziam Dynasty.

    They were caught between a rock and a hard ce.

    By the time the demons n had worked, the situation was already too chaotic to recover from.

    It was so foolish when I think about it now. I shouldnt have listened to his words at that time

    It was true that the words of his confidant at the time had turned Magens attention to the war. It waster revealed that his confidant was taken over by a demon.

    Demons are mysterious beings who tend to enjoy causing humanity to fight each other and leading the world to destruction rather than destroying it with their own hands.

    Thats why Magen is still alive.

    That demon was fearsome. We cant win. Even with Pulcine, we would still be defeated.

    Magen shuddered as he remembered the smiling demon with a confused look on his face.

    Even Mystery Monk Pulcine, their lifeline, was now in the hands of the enemy.

    Thats why there are riots in the capital.

    Its true that it is wartime now and theres unrest among the people. But the country hadnt been exposed to the fire, and the food supply hadnt been cut off.

    The situation was not quite rioting, but it was getting worse.

    It was a Phantom who encouraged the followers of Pulcine.

    Now it was no longer possible for the Imperial Guard to protect the pce alone. With the danger outside the pce, it seemed only a matter of time before they were caught.

    So Magen had no choice but to nod in agreement with the enemys offer without hope.

    Understood! 26

    Sergei saluted at Magens words.

    Then he turned to themunications equipment and resumed his conversation with Velgrynd.

    I approve of everything. But unfortunately

    The Great Roziam Dynasty is in the middle of an emergency.

    Even if he wanted to, he couldnt goand Sergei tried to tell her.

    They will help if they ept the meeting, so they will send reinforcements. If the Empire moves quickly to rescue them, theres a chance they can get out of this themselves. No, Sergei did not want to risk his own life but he knew that the imperial family, the symbol of the dynasty, must be saved at all costs.

    But then a surprising thing happens.

    Velgrynd said she would help.

    If so, it was bound to be a fixed future.

    Good. Im d to see that youre not an idiot. Okay, a gate will appear there, so please go through it ande over here immediately.

    As soon as Velgrynd finished speaking, the space in front of Sergeis eyes became distorted. And on the other side of that chasm was the ce where Velgrynd sat.

    This was the Spacetime Connection, a supernatural phenomenon that connected two different spatial coordinates without regard for distance.

    No way

    That was the moment when the hearts of everyone there, except for Velgrynd, became one.

    There was no hierarchy of who was the best. They all understood that this womanVelgryndwas the only one who absolutely could not be made an enemy.

    ***

    I mean, what? Why are the Great Roziam people here?

    No, no, no, no, is this a dream? I mean, it hurts

    Some of those who could not acknowledge reality even tried to pinch their own cheeks.

    Unbelievable. ording to the literature, there are some people in the God/Buddha ss who handle transference spells, but

    There were those who tried their best to analyze the phenomenon that had just urred, but their understanding was not up to par. It couldnt be helped since it was an unimaginable supernatural power, such as connecting spaces separated by a distance.

    In the blink of an eye, the three countries

    The best of them may have been the ones who shifted their thinking in a practical direction.

    Anyway

    Goddess, you are indeed a goddess!

    The bureaucrats in the Foreign Ministrys Intelligence Bureau were stunned by Velgrynds skill and ability.

    At this point, no one could go against Velgrynd.

    The dignitaries have carefully cultivated the respect theyve developed for Velgrynd and are now turning themselves to her. They are ready to be loyal dogs.

    The only one left is the Chinese, but now that the three countries have agreed to meet, the terms have been fulfilled, right?

    Oh, yes, thats right!

    So now you guys can negotiate on your own.

    Of course!

    Of course, no one is foolish enough to refuse here.

    The bureaucrats are proud of themselves and promise to negotiate a sessful deal with the Chinese.

    Velgrynd nodded.

    Then she turned her gaze to the stunned Great Roziam party.

    Well, is that everyone? Im sorry, but if youre asking me to rescue anyone other than the ones in that room, thats outside the contract. But hey, if we can destroy the demons in a short period of time, I think we can get them all out.

    Those from the camp could only nod in agreement.

    Its true that there were others in the pce who hadnt escaped. But they were the first to give up on rescuing them.

    They couldnt be so foolish as to pass the me on to Velgrynd now.

    Thank you for your help.

    Quickly recovering from the chaos, Sergei thanked her.

    Magen hears this, and also thinks its time to thank her.

    I thank you as well. And when all this is over, I promise to reward you as you wish.

    Hearing this, Velgrynd snorted disinterestedly. Even if it was the Great Emperor, Velgrynd was arrogant.

    I dont want it. You cant give me what I want, anyway. More importantly, I hope youll cooperate well with me on future missions.

    Thats no, of course.

    Magen was miffed when someoneughed at him for not wanting a reward. But he didnt have the temper to be angry here.

    Over here, the status of the Emperor of the Great Roziam Dynasty does not mean much. He understood that he was only helped because he was useful.

    Can you at least tell me your name, my benefactor?

    You can call me Ryuo.

    Okay. Ryuo-dono please continue to look after us. 27

    Yes, nice to meet you. Well then, Ill have you contact me when the date for the meeting is set, so you can rest easy until then.

    Velgrynd tells them so.

    That attitude is exactly like an Empress. In this ce, she was thew.

    Quickly, a bureaucrat rises and leaves the room. Hes gone to get a room ready for the unexpected guests.

    Another bowed to Magen and gave him directions. They were to wait in the parlor until the rooms were ready.

    Even though they hadnt had any meetings, the roles were divided up fluidly. Such coordination is a great thing.

    For once, Velgrynd took a moment to review the Foreign Ministrys intelligence officers.

    Moreover, at that time

    Sensitive to see the opportunity, the most prominent official gives tea to Velgrynd.

    Ryuo-dono, theres not only ck tea 28 , but also green tea 29 here!

    He didnt waste time waiting for a reply from the Chinese group and was intent on appealing to her.

    Oh, youre so witty.

    Thank you! For me, Yamamoto Kanji 30 , your words alone are enough to fill me up!

    The high ranking official Yamamoto continued to flirt with her with all his might.

    It was also a talent, so much so that his subordinates were impressed by it.

    Its delicious. It has a sweet, fluffy aroma, but it has a refreshing aftertaste.

    I ordered it from my favorite store, and Im very proud of it.

    I like it.

    In that case, you might enjoy the tea sweets here along with other items.

    Yamamoto took out an elegantly sweet raw chocte fondant. In this wartime era, it was an extremely luxurious item.

    Yamamoto had to ask for money and power to prepare it forhimself, but he offered it to Velgrynd.

    It was very good, so Velgrynd was satisfied.

    Yamamoto Kanji, wasnt it? Ill remember that name.

    Haha! I thankfully and happily ept!

    It was Velgrynd who remembered Yamamotos name even though she didnt care about anyone who wasnt interesting.

    She had a surprising weakness for bribes.

    But money would not have been the motive, so it could be said that Yamamotos tact was a quick win.

    And so, it took a while to wait.

    China is responding! They are willing to ept the meeting.

    The long-awaited reply was an eptance. And now, the meeting of the five heads of state was to take ce.

    ***

    What, is that the truth?

    Yes. I wouldnt tell you a lie.

    Akira Sakura was astonished to receive the report from Velgrynd.

    A meeting between the two leaders, which was thought to be impossible, turned out to be a simple affair.

    As usual, unfathomable. We are fortunate to have this woman on our side, but rtionships built on favor are far too distorted to be reliable.

    Depending on Velgrynds mood, a good rtionship could change. Akira Sakura thought that was scary.

    A rtionship of trust is an umtion.

    If you do too much, the other person will be angry, or even forgiven, and so on.

    It is the same between nations, and if you do not share certain values, it is difficult to get along.

    If the opponent is an invader such as the phantoms, a conversation will not be established, so they will be recognized as an enemy without any questions. Its a shame that an intelligent life form has to resort to violence, but they have to draw the line at some point.

    However, in the case of Velgrynd

    Good for you, Rudra. Ill set up the meeting as well, so what time would be convenient for you?

    Its obvious that Velgrynd has full confidence in him, and thats why Akira Sakura feels he has to brace himself.

    A favor for a favor.

    Thats the conclusion Akira Sakura came to.

    He has no choice but to believe in Velgrynd, so there is no need to hesitate. He can only return the gratitude he feels with all his might.

    Thats the only way to repay Velgrynd, Akira Sakura thought.

    Thank you, Velgrynd. I hope you will continue to help us.

    Ufufu. Its okay, dont worry about it.

    Velgrynd smiles and looks truly happy.

    To her, Rudras happiness is her own, so Akira Sakuras response was the right thing to do.

    The date and time of the meeting is set for the next day, after lunch.

    Since measures against demons need to be made as soon as possible, there is no time to make extensive adjustments. Therefore, it was Akira Sakuras decision to prioritize efficiency.

    He doesnt care about the time difference, or even the convenience of the other side.

    He told the other nations that this was the case and obtained their approval.

    It was hard on the Foreign Ministrys intelligence department, but Velgrynd couldnt have cared less.

    It was Yamamoto. Good work.

    You could say that he was giving it the utmost consideration just because hebored so hard.

    However, its not Yamamoto who worked hard, its the bureaucrats who are really poor

    As if its just their job and they shouldntin, Velgrynd announces her next request.

    Then make sure the hall is ready by tomorrow morning. Be solemn, so as not to embarrass His Majesty.

    Yes, Id be happy to!

    Velgrynd pretends to be quite unreasonable, but Yamamoto had no choice but to ept. On the contrary, he even seemed slightly pleased.

    It may have opened a strange door, but that was also not Velgrynds concern.

    Oh yeah, just move a set ofmunication equipment to a slightlyrger room.

    What do you mean?

    Since the meeting was to be held by correspondence, Yamamoto had nned to prepare it in the first conference room instead of therger room. He couldnt read the intent of Velgrynds statement and couldnt help but ask back.

    Asking the others toe here, just like you invited the Great Roziam party. Wouldnt that save us a lot of effort and waste?

    Huh?

    It wasnt a matter of opinion, but rather an unorthodox suggestion.

    Thats what Yamamoto thinks, but he understands somewhere in his reasoning that its better if its possible.

    What, do you have a problem with that?

    No, no! Ill have it ready to go right away!

    Yeah? Well, good luck with that.

    Velgrynd recovered, smiled, and left.

    The remaining Yamamoto looked around at the bureaucrats.

    What do we do now?

    Idiot! Of course, well do as were told! Well review the settings.

    Underdstood!

    And in parallel, move all themunication equipment to Conference Room 2!

    Yes, sir!

    The long night at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs Intelligence had begun.

    It was the fateful day for the survival of mankind.

    In Conference Room 2, which had changed overnight, Velgrynd nodded with satisfaction.

    In front of her was a set ofmunication equipment and a plush chair.

    Soft cushions were provided for herfort.

    The spacious room had been cleared of extraneous equipment and was ready to receive the visiting heads of state.

    Snacks and beverages are avable near the wall, and there are several waiters standing in line.

    The furnishings were elegant and carefully considered so as not to diminish the dignity of the kingdom.

    I like it. You did well, Yamamoto.

    Hah! Thank you. Just to hear you say that, I, Yamamoto, feel like Im in heaven!

    A man who specializes in brown-nosing. Yamamoto Kanji.

    Through the supervision of a once-in-a-lifetime supervisor, he seeded in gaining recognition from Velgrynd.

    Incidentally, this is truly an achievement, since Velgrynds eyes are unusually discerning. Even the military officials who came to check on the situation were impressed by how well he managed to do this in just one night.

    Even the subordinates who had responded to Yamamotos recklessness were beaming with pride.

    Well, were running out of time, so lets get started.

    Velgrynd sits in the chair.

    With the grace of a dominatrix, yet still swift. She handled themunication equipment.

    The first caller is the United States of Azalea.

    George-kun, how are you?

    Oh, yeah. Its good to hear from you, how nostalgic. Everything is as usual, so its a mess. But Im relieved that you havent changed, if thats strange to say.

    President George is understandably confused.

    After all, he wasing to the Empire through the Spacetime Connection without even bothering to say hello on the phone.

    Even the Azalean government ministers who came with him cant believe their eyes.

    Ufufu. I couldnt have changed. It may have been twenty-five years for you, but for me, we just parted ways a few days ago.

    Oh, I see.

    Velgrynd and George are chatting about the past.

    Yamamoto moves so as not to interrupt their conversation.

    With a casual nce, the servers begin to work.

    Even the confused Azaleans seemed to take a breather and their heads start to spin.

    Beside them, Velgrynd was having a lively conversation.

    Its been a long time ago. Thanks to that man, I didnt have to be bored every day.

    I heard that you always went along with my dads big legalities.

    Yeah. The day before the typhoon, Itll clear up tomorrow was a big deal.

    I know, that story. He told me that story over and over. Thanks to you, you really made it better.

    Well. There was a baseball game that day, and the neighborhood kids were looking forward to it. He was always teasing them and lying about it all the time. Maybe thats why. Wouldnt it be nice if my words came true once in a while? he said. You know, I was really surprised how it made me work.

    Everyone was struck by the story that the typhoon had disappeared.

    Youre kidding

    You dont even want to hide that youre not normal.

    Some couldnt hide their surprise.

    Without realizing it, or even if they did, they didnt care, the conversation between Velgrynd and the President continued.

    Is that so? All Dad said was that the kids were freaked out and it was super funny, so I never knew that was the reason

    Uh-huh. The kids were so excited, too. The yers got all worked up that day, and we had an oversized home run.

    Im sure thats true. My kids love baseball, too.

    At this point, Velgrynd noticed that Georges expression had be cloudy.

    It was a subtle change that a normal person wouldnt notice, but Velgrynd noticed it because she could read other peoples emotions from their thoughts.

    Speaking of which, how is Emile-chan doing?

    Emile Hayes, the name of Georges son.

    Velgrynd deduces from her conversation with George that Emile is the reason for Georges anxiety. So she decided to use his name as a sounding board for George to talk to.

    Thats amazing, Velgrynd. Im no match for you, you know everything

    Thats not true. Im just worried about you, youre like my son.

    Fufu, thanks. I guess Im not a good person to talk to about this kind of thing, as a representative of the state. Still, youre the only person I know who can help me. Can you help me?

    Of course. Because youre the son of my beloved Laurent Hayes, the genius scammer.

    George bursts into tears when he hears this.

    Then, after muttering to help his son, he started talking about the situation.

    Things have gotten pretty ugly, from what is heard.

    The US Department of Defense is already aware that the US military in Azalea has been hijacked by the Phantom. Worst of all, Fleet Commander-in-Chief: David Reagan has sent a messenger with a demand to the government.

    The demand is that the United States government ept the demons control.

    The demons goal is not to end humanity. They want to rule this world and build their own paradise. Thats why they thought that if they destroyed the organization that governed the nation, it would be too much trouble to deal with afterwards.

    Thats why they told us to follow them. That way, they wouldnt take away the government officials free will, and theyd continue to guarantee our safety.

    Hmm. And what if you dont give in to the demands?

    Theyre going to send the Grand South Sea Fleet to attack the capital of the United States. And at the same time, theyre going to tell the people exactly whats happening. That will destroy the prestige of the government and cause uncontroble panic. The truth is that we have no idea what to do.

    Given the choices, the opinions are divided. But whichever choice they make, the phantom has the advantage.

    Besides, thinks Velgrynd.

    The demons goal is to enve mankind. They want to keep bodies to rece their own in case their numbers grow.

    It would be better to have ves under control, but there are five spheres of influence in this world. The destruction of one of them would only serve as an example to the rest of the world.

    Compared to the total number of phantoms, there are more humans than there are phantoms. Even if the human race was reduced to less than a tenth, there would still be enough dependents.

    I see. China must be in a simr situation, and the Great Roziam Dynasty must have stubbornly stuck to its demands, and the royal family is even in danger of extinction due to the riots. In this way, the Empirre was in a rtively better situation.

    Its only a matter of time. Thebined fleet of our country and the Chinese will be here soon, wont they?

    Yeah, Im here, so its not a problem. Id rather hear about Emile-chan.

    When Velgrynd let the subject of the Grand Fleet slide, Yamamoto and the rest of the Imperial Bureaucracy and Azaleas government ministers made ridiculous expressions

    But no one interrupted them as they waited for George to speak.

    They were afraid to interrupt, lest they might offend Velgrynd. At this point everyone knew that Velgrynd was a woman not to be crossed.

    The messenger who came was Emile. He had the same face as my son, the same knowledge, but he had a very evil look on his face

    Emile had grown up and be a soldier. And unfortunately, he had been sent to the fleet.

    Its okay, George. Calm down. What did I tell you?

    Velgrynd smiles when she hears the story, saying its okay.

    It was a perfect, unppable,dylike smile.

    That smile apparently had a calming effect on the viewers mind.

    Haha, always so soothing, right?I remember that, Velgrynd.

    As soon as George regained hisposure, he remembered his duties as president.

    Good job. Rest assured, Emile-chan will be safe with me. And Ill protect the honor of the United States as well.

    Thank youIf you say that, I can be relieved. Please, save the United Statesand my son.

    Leave it to me. Weve got a couple of months until the demon is fully assimted into human form. Emile-chan will be fine. And by the way, so will the other generals.

    It makes me feel better to hear that. But its been three weeks since I was dispatched, so I dont have a lot of days left until the grace period

    Its okay. Thats why were meeting today.

    George nodded widely.

    All right. I promise to cooperate to the best of my ability. Lets hope the meetings will be fruitful.

    With that, George stands up. The Azalea government ministers who had been watching in silence followed suit.

    The discussion is over.

    Yamamoto gave the signal and an usher immediately opened the door.

    Then, I will show you to your waiting room.

    Everyone seemed relieved to hear Velgrynds strong words. With words of thanks, they left the room as they were led away.

    ***

    Velgrynds next call was from the Holy Arcia Empire.

    An iprehensible Spacetime Connection had brought them across the sea. If you imagine their feelings, its impossible not to get confused.

    it''s a secret ce that only a few people know, so how canwhy

    One of the ministers muttered.

    Velgrynd, overhearing this, snorts boringly.

    If you dont want to be located, use Istion or Barrier whenever possible to cut off all contact with the outside world. Even then, air currents and such will leak out, so its probably impossible for you to hide.

    Communicating with the outside world Do you mean you traced a radio signal to the location where we were hiding?

    One of the young men spoke up.

    Because he was carrying a mythical-grade bow, Velgrynd realized that he must be one of the Seven Vessels.

    But shes not particrly interested, so she just says, Thats right.

    The Arcia crowd is in an uproar, but its not Velgrynd who has to deal with it. Its like a joke to her, so she doesnt make a fuss about it.

    And there was another who was arrogant.

    So youre Velgrynd. I am Zang, The Emperor of Arcia of this world. Youre the one who ims to be Caldina, the goddess who gave blessings to Emperor Shin, my grandfather, right?

    A handsome young man in his early 20s with blond hair and blue eyes and a well-proportioned body.

    He was Zang Yn Dorte Arcia, the apex emperor of the Holy Arcia Empire.

    Caldina? Oh, thats what I was called. Ive heard it said that its awe-inspiring to call me by my true name, or something like that, but I didnt think that the nickname was more established maybe my real name isnt in the records?

    You still wont admit it? Howughable! Or did you think that your good looks would absolve you of your delusion?

    He chalked up Velgrynds statement as a lie and refused to listen to it.

    That attitude was a big problem.

    If the top brass made a mistake, an apology often wouldnt suffice.

    If this was a subordinates outburst, then that person alone could be held responsible. Or the higher-ups might be able to get away with an apology.

    But if the chief executive makes a wrong choice, the consequences may be irreversible.

    Bright, the first seat of the Seventh God Vessel, almost cried when he heard Zangs words.

    You idiot! After all the exnations Ive given you, you have no idea how crazy Velgrynd-sama is? Before that, if you were to see a supernatural phenomenon that had just urred in front of you, you should know that it was obviously Gods work!

    He was in a panic.

    Velgrynds Spacetime Connection is obviously impossible for a normal person. If not a goddess, then its no doubt the closest thing to one who is able to do it.

    What was the point of offending such an opponent?

    There was one more person who was troubled by this situation.

    It was Yamamoto Kanji.

    Oh my god, the Lord of Arcia is an unbelievable jerk! What should we do now? If nothing is done, the fearsome Ryuo-dono will be angry

    Since it was not just another persons affair, Yamamoto racked his brain frantically.

    The first thing he did was to send a message to his aides.

    Bring His Majesty to me as soon as possible.

    But thats not

    Fool! I know this is impolite, but only His Majesty can stop Ryuo-dono!

    That was so true that even his aides are struck dumb by his opinion.

    Yes!

    As soon as he whispered his approval, the aide scurried away.

    Yamamoto Kanji, normally a pompous buffoon, but he had a real talent for spotting people who should not be crossed. He used this ability without regret to prepare for this crisis.

    While everyone around him felt threatened, one man was at ease in making that statement.

    Kukku-kukku, are you speechless, knowing that Im not so easily fooled? Well, thats just as well. A scammer like you might not know this, but Im not like the rest of the foolish ones. I, too, have been approved by the gods! The seventh seat of the Seven Sacred Vessels. That is the one youve been trying to take in! The true identity of the person who did it!!

    Zang said proudly.

    These words were true, and at Zangs waist hung a shining mythical-grade sword.

    Of course, Velgrynd also knows.

    She was just too dumbfounded to speak before that.

    Youre lying, right? How could you react like that even when you see meDid Shin''s descendants really give birth to such an idiot?

    At the same time as shemented, it urred to Velgrynd that she hadnt responded to his call.

    This Zang didnt trust Velgrynd when she didnt respond to his call.

    Of course, a king should be skeptical, so she wouldntin about that.

    But she can only say its a shame in more ways than one if he doubts his opponent when told something only he knows.

    If you were told a secret and you still didnt believe it, then you were out of the question.

    If you believe the secret was leaked, then your ability to maintain confidentiality must be questioned.

    Either way, youre out.

    Lack of cognitive ability was a bigger problem than being small for a king.

    Idiot? Did you mean me?

    Its a pity you cant understand such things. But it sounds like youve got more than 4,000 years of history behind you, so I suppose its no wonder your bloodline has deteriorated.

    Velgrynd chuckles. She was appalled by Zangs outburst, but she was not so narrow-minded as to be offended by it.

    But Zang was furious.

    Hmph, you still havent stopped acting, and even taunted me. Foolishness. Then I will ask you! You not only deceive the goddesss name with impudence, but you im to be able to recreate her deeds, dont you? If you say you can make the sacred artifacts, lets see it. Howeverprepare yourself. And if you fail to do so, thats when your disguise wille undone!

    Thats so troublesome!

    Hmph! I dont want excuses. You spoke of something impossible, and you will pay for it. What? Im not going to kill you. It seems that you are good at what you do, and have some ability. You can rest assured that you will be kept as mypanion.

    Zang talks stupid nonsense all the way.

    Everyone aside from Velgrynd and Zang watched with bated breath to see what would happen.

    Although Zangs words and actions were clearly wrong, they saw a glimmer of hope in the patience of Velgrynd, who was quick to anger.

    Everyone looks at Velgrynd, praying that this story will be settled.

    You cant do it anyway

    Theres a lot to say, but oh well. It was promised, so Ill prepare it for you.

    As if to interrupt Zangs words, Velgrynd made a blue dragon sword appear. It was created with Matter Creation by solidifying her own magic element.

    This is fine. You guys may not be able to handle it anyway, but it has unmistakable mythical-grade capabilities.

    Wha!?

    Zang received it unexpectedly and was mesmerized by the brilliance of the Blue Dragon Sword. He didnt need to doubt Velgrynds words, it had a real glow to it.

    As a king, Zang was not entirely ipetent. Although he is arrogant, he is not a tyrant and has the decency to listen to his subordinates.

    Since this was the first summit meeting of the five great powers, he was more stubborn than usual to avoid being stepped on.

    It was his revenge.

    It was only then that Zang realized his mistake.

    Really? No way. But thats crazy, right? How could a mythical character from thousands of years ago exist in the real world!?

    And much to his consternation, Zang is confused.

    Perhaps because he was rted to the man who was Rudra, Velgrynd had a soft spot in her heart for Zang.

    If this were an unrted person, the negotiations would have been over long ago. It was more than likely that blood would have been spilled.

    And yet, Zang didnt realize his good fortune.

    On the contrary

    Wait, what? If the mythical goddess is real, then she deserves me! Yes, yes, thats right. If I can have the goddess, all of my problems will be over!

    As if he had juste up with a brilliant n of recovery, he did something outrageous.

    Kukkukku, is that so! O goddess, Velgrynd! Have you crossed time and space to meet me? Love me? Very well. I will return the feeling. I will take you as my wife and swear that I will love you!

    In front of the crowd he burst into multiple misunderestandings.

    This confuses Velgrynd.

    Huh? What kind of joke are you making?

    Dont be embarrassed. Its wartime now. I cant show you now, but when everythings settled, Ill make you my queen. I heard the emperor didnt have any children with the goddess, but do you think shell have any with me? If we can bring in the blood of the goddess, Arcia will be ready for a time of further development!

    Velgrynd was speechless at the astonishingly rapid pace in which he was running.

    She ad never been so insulted before and was at a loss for words. Its not that she cant keep up with it, or that she didnt want to understand it

    It was proof that even a person who was good at calction could lose their heads.

    Aside from Velgrynd, the audiences reactions were mixed.

    It was the people of the "Seven Sacred Vessels" who paled.

    Stop, stop it, Your Majesty!!

    One wanted to scream at him, but held back and signaled to the ministers with his eyes.

    He instinctively knew that this was going to be a terrible thing if nothing was done.

    How could a man hope to bend the goddess to his will? Zang must be silenced before the goddess punishment was doled out.

    And yet the ministers wouldnt act.

    Or, rather, they couldnt.

    The nk expression on Velgrynds face made her good looks stand out.

    And it felt very scary.

    It was because his heart was dependent on his own actions.

    He couldnt expect the ministers to do anymore.

    The Seven Sacred Vessels grew impatient and turned to their leader. And so Bright is left to bemoan his misfortune.

    The Empire was no stranger to this.

    The bureaucrats of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs'' intelligence department, who were nervous before the meeting, thought that the Emperior of Arcia would not be such a fool.

    That was gutsy of him, but if Velgrynd got angry, everyone would be coteral damage. They all agreed that they didnt want that to happen.

    What do you think? Its a wonderful proposal! Even if you spend the rest of your life, you wont be loved much by an old man who doesnt have much life left in him. I, on the other hand, would spend every night

    What?

    The air in the room froze.

    Everyone realized that what they had feared hade true.

    Velgrynds anger was taken seriously and Zang went rigid. He realizes his stupidity, but couldnt swallow the words he was saying.

    What!? What the hell is this divine energy!? Mythical Goddessthis is even more than I imagined. How could I have imagined such a supernatural existence being my queen?

    Incoherent thoughts shed through Zangs brain. Then he realized the stupidity of his folly.

    Taking in the blood of the goddess seemed like a really great idea. That may be true in and of itself, but there are things you can do and things you cant do.

    Even the god emperor, who was said to be loved by the goddess, was no match for the goddess to give birth to a son. Even his descendant, Zang, was not even worthy of the goddess favor.

    And the Goddesss character as described in the literature was, even as rumored, quite harsh. She even tried to destroy the country when she someone she loved was insulted.

    Excavations in the region, following the literature, had uncovered traces of the citys existence in the buried strata. The outer walls of the excavated buildings are reported to have been melted by the ultra-high temperature and turned into ss.

    For some reason, Zang remembered such information only now.

    Zang paled as he saw a future where the nations of Arcia would be consumed by the fiery mes. Perhaps he had vited the greatest ban on war, but thats behind him.

    It would have been Zangsplete ruin, but someone made a move.

    It was Yamamoto!

    If e allowed Velgrynd to run amok, he would be held fully responsible. Their lives were at stake before that, but that was of secondary importance to Yamamoto.

    Yamamoto was not normally a pompous and hardworking man, but he wasnt so corrupt that he would run away from his responsibilities when the time came. Rather, he knew that someone had to take the me when the war broke out, and he thought it was his role to do so.

    It was precisely because of Yamamoto that he was able to act before anyone else when he heard Zangs statement.

    You idiot! You insult our Emperor! War may be inevitable if things go wrong, but how shall I respond!

    Before Velgrynd could say anything, he jumped out and shouted, No!

    People have a tendency to cool off when others are angry before they are. This also applied to the True Dragon, Velgrynd, and prevented her from bursting into anger.

    That was the biggest fine y of the day, Yamamoto Kanji.

    And heres the other thing thates into y.

    What are you making so much noise about?

    The Emperor, who had profusely been asked for help, arrived just in time.

    Your Majesty

    Oh, Ryuo, dont let the young mans words deceive you. Zang-dono must have tried it to see if youre really worthy of trust.

    When Sakura Akira arrived, he called out to Velgrynd in a calm manner. He was inwardly impatient, and this was the first time in decades that he had run down the corridor, but he showed no sign of that.

    He really was a majestic champion.

    Seeing such an Akira Sakura, Velgrynd forgot her anger. She regained herposure and examined the words she was told.

    I dared to find out how much anger I would have to get angry, by caressing my emotions against me

    Uh-huh. Isnt that right?

    Anyway, it was Akira Sakura who wanted to convince Velgrynd. He thought it didnt matter that he was insulted if he could mend the situation.

    For all that, his wish came true.

    Oh, so thats what happened. I didnt want to think Shins descendants were that stupid, so that makes sense.

    Velgrynd nodded widely and smiled.

    It was so beautiful and gentle, that it relieved Akira Sakura.

    Now, since the Arcia people are probably tired, you may show them to the waiting room.

    When the moment arises, Akira gives the instructions.

    Normally, the Emperor wouldnt do this himself, but this was a time where he had no choice. As if the magic was broken, everyone started to work together and the great danger had subsided.

    Incidentally, in ater version of Arcia

    There are many pro-Japanese families, but the Yamamoto surname in particr has be immensely popr.

    He is even listed in history textbooks as the man who saved Arcia from the crisis.

    He is described as the friend who admonished the then king Zang though Yamamoto never knew about it himself.

    ***

    With Arcia and her team gone, the atmosphere in the room settles down.

    Emperor had gone back to his room to take some stomach pills, so Velgrynd decided to resume her work.

    Well, its been a long time since anyones tested me. Zang, is it? Its just like Shins descendants, youve grown up in an interesting way.

    Yes, youre right. Haha, Im surprised too.

    Youve got to be kidding me, thinks Yamamoto, but hes not bad. Hes gaining the trust of his subordinates, so hes just hoping theyll put up with it.

    Well, now, the only thing left is

    We are a nation of harmony.

    Yes, thats right.

    It is an ally of the Empire and has finally agreed to participate on the condition that other nations join the talks. Velgrynd does not know much about them, as she has not negotiated directly with them.

    This time they have invited the President of the Peoples Republic, several leaders of the government, plus their personal bodyguards.

    They confronted Velgrynd with a stunned stare.

    Turning his gaze sharply to Velgrynd, the President of the Peoples Republic opens his mouth.

    My name is Wang Longren. Are you Ryuo-dono?

    Yes, I am.

    Hmph! It looks just like a human. But we wont be fooled. Demon, have we entered the empire of your allies? Or is it just a trick to make us think so?

    Wang Longren called out Velgrynd with hostility. The bureaucrats are puzzled by this, while Velgrynd herself thinks, Not again.

    From Wang Longrens reaction, it was clear that something was up. Until she finds out, Velgrynd decides its best not to speak out.

    I dont know where this is, but I dared to jump into the tigers den. Dont grow up and think your n worked, demon!

    As soon as Wang Longren shouted this, the guards from China moved in.

    They were dressed in white robes that looked easy to move in. It was clear from their refined movements that they were experts in the martial arts.

    But that didnt matter to Velgrynd.

    I recognize your formidable power, demon. But I will not permit you to speak that name!

    Exactly! The very name of the man who supposedly guided Long-sama, the founder of Dragon Fist, is not worthy of being spoken by a demon!

    The warriors shouted in a fiery rage.

    But

    The reaction from the empire was somewhat cold.

    Everyone was left thinking,

    Here we go again.

    Its definitely her, the bureaucrats all thought.

    And so did Velgrynd.

    Long? You know, that guy named his technique as Dragon Fist. Well, Long lived in this world too. So you guys are Longs disciples and have inherited his mastery of the art? Thats nice.

    Velgrynd had studied the history of this world, but of course she did not know all of the historical figures. It is impossible for the Empire to have information on the secrets of kung fu that other countries keep.

    Its no wonder Velgrynd was unaware of Longs, the Dragon Fist founders, existence.

    But for the Chinese, this is a situation that they cant understand.

    What are you pretending to be convinced of?

    Are you trying to cheat? But thats not very nice. Were the best of the best, and we will destroy you here and crush your ambitions!

    After all, you werer first. You who deceived us with your precious name, let us destroy you and regain the pride of our country!

    Shouting this, the warriors took up a battle position.

    Seeing this, Velgrynd smiled happily.

    Oh my, for a human from this world, your fighting spirit is very skilled. Youve been training hard and improving yourself. Im d to see that you are learning Longs teachings so well.

    The way Velgrynd looked at the warriors was no longer the same as the way she looked at her enemies, but rather a masters gaze on their beloved disciple. That temperature difference was causing the warriors to grow angry.

    Do you think you can fool us?

    Its okay. If this happens, then all at once

    The warriors tried to rely on force, but someone stopped them. Only one of them was a small figure wearing a ck long robe with a dragon embroidered on it.

    Stop it! Im the only match for her.

    The person with a transparent and clear voice was a beautiful dark-haired, dark-eyed girl.

    Xia-Xianhua-sama!

    But

    The warriors were about to argue in anger, but when they saw that personFist Saint Xianhuathey kept their mouths shut.

    This was because the strongest Fist Saint, who was always calm and collected and looked cool no matter what kind of enemy she was facing, was sweating and nervous.

    Ill take care of it.

    Once she said that, there was no one to talk back.

    So, youre the heir. Thats an impressive disy of fighting spirit, Ill give you that.

    Yes. I am the Fist Saint who has inherited the spirit from the Fist Saint of old. If you are indeed the Dragon Phoenix-sama (Ryuo), will you give me the honor of your guidance?

    Of course. Ill do you the honor of coaching you.

    With that, the story suddenly came together.

    It was decided to watch the oue of the battle without any chance for the others to interrupt.

    Needless to say, the result was an overwhelming victory for Velgrynd.

    Or rather, it wasnt even a match, but only Xianhua knew that it was.

    In the eyes of the others, it looked like Xianhua was attacking unterally. Even those who were studying Dragon Fist felt that Xianhua, with her fists and feet, had cornered Velgrynd.

    The Dragon Fist was not a bloodline, and all the profound secrets would be passed down to the one with the highest skill among the disciples.

    The most important skill to be inherited was the one Xianhua spoke ofspirit. This was a forbidden ritual that required one to record every move they learned and pass it on to his sessor. Moreover, a portion of his spirit was also inherited, so the quality and quantity of the fighting spirit was increased rapidly!

    It was not always possible for the sessor to learn all of the powers and techniques, but as long as spirit was passed down, there was hope for the next generation. And so Long retired, hoping that one day the strongest fist fighter would be born.

    Such is the history that led to the birth of Xianhua, the Fist Saint who deserves the name of the strongest fighter in the world.

    She hadpletely fused her inherited spirit and her own vitality to bring all her skills and power to herself. As a result, she had reached a level of strength that was foreign to this world.

    More than 100,000 in existence value.

    In the Cardinal World, where Velgrynd was born, she was an overwhelmingly powerful human, even to the point of being ssified as an Immortal.

    In this world, she was unmatched, but this time, it was just too bad. Xianhua was easily beaten by Velgrynd and suffered a defeat.

    Im here

    Uh-huh. That was a great strength. Definitely stronger than Gensei, and in this world, you would have beaten Kondou as well.

    Even though she was defeated, Xianhua still felt refreshed. She could forget her doubts about Velgrynd and admit that she was the real thing.

    And Velgrynd was also extremely happy to know that her beloved Longs wishes had been carried on. She has very fond feelings for Longs disciples, led by Xianhua.

    Now she is willing to give them a mythical-grade or two unconditionally. It never happened, but there was no doubt that Velgrynd was pleased.

    ***

    A lot had happened, but now the heads of state are all here.

    All the leaders from China, except President Wang Longren, were substitutes who were disguised as fists. They thought it was a demons trap, so the Imperialists thought it was inevitable.

    Theyve been reced by the real ones now.

    But if you ask about their situation, its amon story.

    Theyre hostages.

    Only on a national scale.

    The phantoms in China began their activities by going after the leaders children. By building rtionships, making connections, reaching out to targets. Then they brainwashed them and took them back to their base.

    Teachers, co-workers, superiors, family members. Little by little, they possessed them and achieved 70% of the goal.

    That is why the invasion of the United States of Azalea was unanimously approved by the National Peoples Congress.

    I dont think an apology will suffice, but I hope you understand that it was not our intention either.

    And Wang Longren bows.

    To which George responds.

    Thats okay. I understand that each country has its own set of circumstances. I have a son that got taken away. When I put my family and my country on a scale, theres only one choice. And its my responsibility as president, but Im not going to give up until the end.

    Hm. Im sorry for your loss.

    George and Wang Longren nodded at each other.

    If you say so, I apologize too.

    So says Magen, the Great Roziam Emperor.

    The military is out of control and invading China. There is nothing to stop this, Magen himself has admitted.

    In that case, that makes me guilty too. Our invasion of the Great Roziam Dynasty, a fools errand of the devils own making. I can now admit as much.

    It was an uncharacteristic attitude of the Emperor Zang.

    After Zang was saved by Yamamoto and Akira Sakura, he calmed down in the waiting room. When he calmed down, he realized how dangerous what he had done was.

    Zang is not ipetent. He had the presence of mind to acknowledge the situation.

    And he had consulted with the other Seven Vessels.

    The Emperors sword is now the fourth seat.

    One of the Seven had never returned from his incursion into Roziam. Thats why it hase to our attention.

    The one who went missing was a woman who, eager to do battle, submitted a n of action and moved her troops on her own without waiting for a decision from headquarters.

    This was a clear vition of military discipline.

    The national war potential of the Seven Sacred Vessels invading another country without waiting for Emperors order is an unavoidable problem.

    She had always been against starting a war. Buttely, she showed a sudden change of heart.

    Her attitude had puzzled everyone involved and was reason enough to be suspicious. The fact that she was acting on her own, and despite the fact that she was a heroic member of the seven vessels, she was the target of the investigation.

    Even so, they still hadnt found conclusive evidence that the demon had taken over, but they hade to the conclusion that they had no choice but to admit it.

    They were convinced because their pride was broken.

    The match between Velgrynd and Xianhua took ce in the courtyard, but it was clearly visible from the waiting room.

    Velgrynd had treated Xianhua like a baby, as if she couldnt win even with all the Seven Vessels working together.

    When the Seven Vessels saw this, they saw no point in being overbearing. So did Zang, who had given up on his ambition to unify the world through the Holy Arcia Empire.

    Huh, now I remember. Whoever has the goddesss blessing will be king of the world. If that is the truth then the ruler of our time is Lord Akira Sakura.

    Because Zang understood that, he became fullypliant.

    Just like that, there was an apology battle by the nations.

    I, too

    No, no, no, no, no, I understand the position of the empire.

    Yes, thats right. And as for the United States, I regret that we were forced to make a choice.

    Akira Sakura tried to join in, but he was cut off by Wang Longren and George, who cut him off immediately.

    Yamamoto and others who had been standing upright by the wall observing the meeting were able to understand what the leaders were thinking.

    Well, if they say His Majesty is to be med here, Im sure his people will be displeased.

    Yamamoto nced at Velgrynd, thinking that she would make the same judgment.

    When the apology battle was over, the scene is redrawn.

    In earnest, a strategy for the demons was being nned, but all eyes were on Velgrynd.

    So, Ryuo-dono, what kind of strategy do you think is effective against demons?

    That was the Army Ministers statement.

    Its a shameful question.

    As a military leader who protects the empire, there should be no other power application.

    However

    This time, no one was ming him.

    On the contrary, the other leaders were ready to wait for Velgrynds answer.

    That was inevitable.

    They are powerless against an enemy beyond human understanding.

    While all eyes are on Velgrynd, their only hope, she is at ease. As if to say, Well, it cant be helped, she turned to the speaker.

    You understand that sending an army out is pointless, dont you?

    Reluctantly, of course. It makes sense in terms of keeping the fleet off the maind, but theres no such thing as a fleet battle. Even if each ship is manned by people gathered here, it will be impossible to resist the demons.

    The Army Minister was right.

    If they came close to the maind, the cities would be targeted by gunfire. It makes sense to build a maritime defense line to stop them, but it would be useless if they had no chance to win anyway.

    Whether or not the demon will destroy the city is also unknown.

    If they have the power to possess humanity, theres a good chance theyll use the city as is. Then there would be no reason to challenge the fleet.

    Velgrynd nodded and replied.

    Thats right. Firearms dont work against demons, and ordinary soldiers arent much help. So, we are left with two choices.

    What is that?

    Either you leave it all up to me, or you can try to do a little bit of work on your own.

    Velgrynds statement was humiliating to the proud soldiers. But the truth is they couldnt even argue with that.

    The brave men and women gathered here look at each other for a reaction. And by the keenness of their eyes, they hade to the same conclusion.

    The imperial swordsman, Araki Gensei, and Minamoto Saburo, broke the ice.

    This is our problem, you know. I have no desire to speak of poor pride but relying on Ryuo-dono all the time is shameful. If theres anything I can do, Ill challenge him with my life.

    I feel the same way.

    Arcias seven sacred vessels follow suit.

    We dont want it to be just the men of the Empire. We wish to join you on this mission.

    His Majesty Zang is out of the question. I want us to handle it.

    Thats right. His Majesty can only do his duty if he survives. Leave it to us!

    Leaving Zang behind, six men have dered for war.

    In addition, Chinese Fist Saint Xianhua announced her decision.

    If you protect mankind, Ryuo-sama, we will fear no man. Even if we are defeated, you have promised us a great victory. Please give us the opportunity to grow, even though we are so small.

    Xianhua bowed reverently.

    Nine warriors came forward, but there was also one more person who came forward at the end.

    Ah, may Ie along with you?

    That was interrupted by Billy, the head of the U.S. Secret Service. He is abat professional who came to the scene as Georges bodyguard.

    He is a young man of twenty-eight, with a scar on his cheek. He is also proficient in magic and uses his own special gun bullets.

    But he was inferior to these nine men.

    Not to mention his physical prowesshis weapons were also not too much to talk about.

    Im better than others who have given up on their own, but when ites to being an asset, Im not that good.

    Billy, aware of this, waits nervously for an answer from Velgrynd.

    George joins in.

    Billy is a very good man to be my bodyguard. Hes saved my life a lot of times, and I miss Emile. Ill give up if its too much trouble, but you can take him with you if you want.

    Without a good bodyguard, he was more likely to be in danger. But doing nothing was not an option when humanitys survival was at stake.

    Billy could go head to head with the lower-ranked demons. Believing that, he offered to increase their strength.

    They will gather all of humanitys strength to attack the demons stronghold. They would destroy what Velgrynd called the Underworld Gates and remove the threat of the invaders from the root.

    And everyone was prepared to die for it.

    And yet, Velgryndughs serenely.

    If you chose to leave it up to me here, I was only going to protect what I wanted to protect. But its great that youre all willing to do it. Ill give you a little help with that resolve.

    In fact, Velgrynd had seriously nned to abandon humanity if the former was the answer to this question. She was even willing to emigrate to another world, taking only Akira and George with her.

    Goddesses are fickle.

    The representatives of humanity made the right choice.

    And so, Velgrynd responded to that.

    Billy. Ill allow you to join us. I cant say no to that. And youre just as strong as everyone else in there. With those weapons, youll have plenty of strength to add to your arsenal.

    Velgrynd ordered Minamoto and Billy to produce their weapons.

    Velgrynd ordered Minamoto to bring his sword and Billy to bring his favorite S & WM ? (Magnum Revolver). Velgrynd takes them and, without a second thought, transformed them into mythical-grade weapons.

    ?

    Th-this is

    Minamoto and Billy are stupefied when their beloved weapons are returned to them, which have gotten visibly more dangerous.

    Gensei had experienced it once, so he wasnt as surprised. He just nodded with a nonchnt look on his face. The others, however, were not the same, and were stunned by the fact that the Seven Vessels, who knew what they were, could not understand how such a weapon could be so easily transported to another country!

    But its true that their strength was also reliable.

    This was not the time to ask Velgrynd to carry their weight, so Sakura Akira could only watch.

    It will be better if you use it. But I want you to keep in mind that only Xianhua is really an asset. You are called Bright, right?

    Yes!

    Yes, you. Youre the best at what you do, but you still havent drawn three percent of the mythical-grade weapons power. The others are out of the question. Theyre only at one to two percent, and they can do better if they try their best.

    If they could truly harness the power of the mythical-grade weapons, they would be able to awaken as a spirit life form and defeat most demons. But with their current strength, this awakening was impossible.

    Velgrynd only made the artifacts avable to those of Shins blood when she created them. They could be used, but they were nowhere near as powerful as they should be.

    But theres no need to be ashamed of that.

    This world is weak in magic and fragile in every way. If they could cross the realm and have their bodies reshaped, they would be able to rise above Sage. As for Xianhua, there is a strong possibility that she will awaken as Saint.

    So thats why the warriors are now ready.

    And with this, the great counterattack has begun.

    ***

    The demon (youma)Delia strolls through the Great Roziam Pce.

    As a human, Delia was the fourth seat of the Seven Vessels.

    That day, Delia was assigned an important mission. A demon calling himself Emile was behind the sabotage and she was on a mission to stop him.

    But it was a trap set by Emile.

    Even the intelligence officer had fallen into Emiles hands, and his goal was to lure Delia out.

    Delia was defeated by Emile.

    Fully armed, Delia tried, but Emile, who had a rough appearance, yed her, and beat her to a pulp.

    It was humiliating.

    But more than that

    For the first time in her life, Delia, the strongest of mankind, was terrified.

    Putting aside her shame and ignorance, Delia begged for her life.

    Emile smiled softly and said, Of course.

    But she didnt know what that meant until it was toote.

    Delia has been stripped of her knowledge, her position, and even her name, and is nowpletely reborn as a demon.

    Delias rank was the same as Li Jinlong and David, the general rank.

    She went to war at the same time as the Arcia invasion of the Great Roziam and was involved in the mission to destroy it.

    The first objective of the demon invasion was to secure the territory.

    And the second objective was to enve mankind.

    This was to ensure their dependents would be possess the families.

    Not just anyone, but a body strong enough to withstand the changes caused by the magical element. This is where selection is important.

    As half-mental life forms, demons do not need to eat even if they possess people. Its not that they cant eat, or that they can get sustenance from food, but its okay if they dont.

    But the greater the body to be possessed, the better. So they sought a way to control humanity from the ground up.

    A n was devised to destroy the five great powers whose conditions were the most unfavorable.

    That was Roziam.

    Most of itsnd was unsuitable for development.

    Harsh conditions have made their soldiers strong, but thend was no longer needed for the state.

    The reason for leaving the royal family in the territory is to entrust the management of thend and the people. But with Great Roziam no longer needed, there is no longer any sense in preserving the lineage of the Roziam dynasty.

    The demon does not intend to kill all of Great Roziams people. She believes that destroying the Great Roziam Royals will bring down the existing system of state.

    This is why Mystery Monk Pulcine is encouraging his people to stage a coup and Delia is following suit.

    Walking around the pce, Delia let out a sickening sigh.

    She looked everywhere and saw no sign of Great Roziams royalty.

    The Roziam Emperor and his family.

    The same goes for the government officials and their families.

    In addition to the knights who worked in the pce, their maidservants and attendants have disappeared. She searched everywhere for hidden passageways, but found no evidence of them.

    She possessed one of the men to read the memories of those who know the castle, but there was no sign of them. In this situation, there was no choice but to assume that they had disappeared.

    What about you?

    That is said by Delias colleague, Emile. Now that they were on a par with each other, the banter was casual.

    I dont know. I have no idea where the Roziam Emperor has gone.

    Well, were in trouble. I dont think they can do Spatial Maniption as well as we can

    Pfft, they cant. That is an act of God for the mortals in this world. None of the Seven could have teleported them.

    Delia affirmed that.

    Her memories of being a strong being in this world make her sure of that.

    Magic is scarce, so no one knows how to use it, and there is no elemental magic in this world. There is the Extra Skill Spatial Movement that Delia now has ess to, but only a few people can dive the portal at the same time.

    There is no way they could have escaped from a pce that waspletely surrounded by them. It was supposed to be impossible.

    Because Emile was the most physically gifted among those gathered recently, he had been given the rank of general demon. He is too weak to be the strongest man in the world, Delia guessed, and has no knowledge of such things.

    His body is stronger and his knowledge of this world is greater than hers. Remembering that, Delia feels a little bit better.

    Then there was a hole in the siege, but my gut tells me thats not the case. Its like Im overlooking something very important, you know?

    Saying this thoughtfully, Emile turns to Delias spear. The spear, which is said to have been created by a goddess, is the origin of the name Seven Sacred Vessels.

    For some reason, the sight of the spear made Emile feel nostalgic. He has no idea what the reason was, but he thought the answer might be in his memory.

    Demons can read the memories of possessed humans.

    However, aside from important knowledge, things that were repeated on a daily basis, such as an ordinary conversation, were too voluminous and took too long to scrutinize. Most of it was usually ignored because they couldnt spend the effort on something that didnt mean much.

    Emile was no exception; he knew his status, his skills, his rtionships at work, and his duties, but he ignored the memories of his childhood.

    Thats why he could only remember the word Gryn-neechan about the beautiful woman beside his grandfather. If he had known it was Velgrynd, he would have decided that this was the most important thing and would have advised to rethink the entire operation.

    That spear is really bothering me. Maybe Emile, whose body I was in, had something to do with that spear. Im going to have to search my memory.

    Emile is worried about the uneasiness that wont go away.

    Even though he doesnt think it had anything to do with the escape of the Roziam Emperor and the others, he began to search his memory to relieve his fears.

    In contrast to Emile, Delia is confident.

    Oh well. Its no use caring about the people who got away. They cant win against us anyway, so lets just ignore them and go on with our n.

    Yeah.

    The n was to hold the royal family hostage and call in the elite of this country, butlets scrap that. Instead, how about we let this pce go up in mes and make the demise of the Great Roziam Dynasty known?

    Originally, they would have announced the public execution of the royal family, thus elerating the madness of the people of Roziam. They had hoped to lure the heroes to stop them and rece them with their own people.

    And if possible, they wanted to secure Fist Saint Xianhua, who was considered to be the strongest in the world, not just in China.

    Because of the difference in countries, whether Xianhua would move or not was a gamble. So the failure of this strategy wasnt too bad of a blow.

    If the Great Roziam Dynasty was in chaos, the next target was China. Xianhua woulde out when the time came anyway, so it was not a problem if they went for Xianhua.

    Once Xianhua was secured, this world would be under control. Delia smirked. It was that simple.

    But then.

    Mystery Monk Pulcine sent an urgent telepathic message.

    Can you hear me?

    Is this Pulcine-sama? Did you take the trouble to contact me?

    Yes. There was a mysterious report from one of my men who had sent me to China first. I had them look for the Chinese leaders, but none of them could be found.

    What did you say!? You think the humans can deceive us?

    No, I think not. I thought it might be some kind of magic trick that only exists in this world, but I dont think it would work against a high-ranking officer.

    I agree with you. The low-level people of this world are of no threat to us, no matter how much they try.

    Delia couldnt believe that she had been misled, and that it was the same for her subordinates as well.

    Judging from her memories of her time as a human, even the Seventh Sacred Vessel level was only at the lower middle level.

    It was unthinkable for Xianhua to fall behind the others.

    However, Pulcine chided Delia.

    Dont tter yourself, Delia! This is the material world. You dont know what kind of change you can cause by giving one magic. I feel my strength growing every day. This is proof that this body is superior. Only in this body can we demons attain perfection. Dont you dare to forget that!

    Angered, Delia was reminded of the truth.

    This is a lesser world in terms of strength alone, but thats because thews of the world are different. Delia cautioned her mind that she must not forget her position until the invasion wasplete.

    I beg your pardon, sir. A reprimand, I am well aware of that.

    Then its good.

    Haha! So, were going to get started, but theres actually a problem on our end as well

    Now is the time for Delia to give her report.

    They were going to capture the royalty, but no one was there.

    It was the same situation in China that Pulcine had told her about, and she couldnt shake the feeling.

    What, you think its the same phenomenon in Roziam? I can see the pce from my vantage point, but I dont see anything unusual. Or is this an oversight? I dont know, but something bad has happened

    What shall we do?

    Delia agrees with the idea that something bad is happening.

    Emile, who was standing next to her listening to the telepathic message, looked just as nervous as Delia.

    Wait a moment. I will discuss this with Amari Masahiko.

    Pulcine avoided drawing conclusions on his own.

    Its a miracle that the sharpest man in Cornus camp, the Chief of Staff, is now in the hands of one of the best minds in the world. It was only natural for Pulcine, who was also a member of the chief of staff, to hear an opinion from such a man.

    And the conclusion hees to is

    It is a withdrawal. If something unforeseen urs, all operational actions must be frozen. We will rendezvous on the Antis continent to formte a more careful n. Do you have any objections?

    No, sir.

    Delia answers immediately.

    There is no doubt to Emile

    Thus, the demons had to abort their mission and gather at their home base.

    ***

    When Amari Mashiko received the report from Pulcine, he understood that the situation was not looking good.

    They were invincible.

    Not only as demons 31 , but from the knowledge and power they had gained when they were human, they should have been one step closer to taking over this world.

    After conquering mankind, they will reveal Cornu to the world. After doing so, they n to modify the and use it as a stepping-stone for further invasions.

    The universe is vast, but not as vast as the other worlds. They thought that if they had gained a relying spirit and incarnated themselves, they couldpletely conquer this space-time within a few thousand to tens of thousands of years.

    At the same time, they had developed the Underworld Gate, which leads to other dimensions, and had their sights set on a further invasion.

    But then, an unforeseen event urred.

    There was a definite element of uncertainty, judged Amari Masahiko.

    Well, what shall we do now?

    Li Jinlong and David responded as he uttered that.

    What is it?

    There seems to be a lot on your mind. I thought everything was fine, is there a problem?

    Looking at the pair, Masahiko looks at them and exins the situation.

    The Roziam royalty and the leaders from China have gone into hiding. The cause is unknown, and some forces are suspected to have intervened.

    Wahaha, dont you think thats overthinking it?

    Hmmm, there are definitely some uncertainties, but is it enough that we have to interrupt the operation?

    Li Jinlongughed without a problem. David also thought that this was a bit too weak.

    But that doesnt change Amari Masahikos mind.

    Sure, were strong, but were not all-powerful. Be aware that the slightest carelessness can derail the entire strategy. Now is the time to gather all the information we can. Contact those remaining in the three countries and assess the situation. Find out thoroughly what the other top brass are doing in the other countries.

    With that order, the ce was dismissed.

    After they left, Amari Masahiko surrendered to the chair in his office and was lost in thought.

    Arcia doesnt have any of the seven vessels below the emperors n.

    This is the United States. Weve lost contact with the president and his entourage. I have no record of them going out, but there is no sign of them in the White House.

    Although it is an empire, security is high. We tried to break into the ce of administration, including the imperial pce, but it was impossible.

    Even before David and the others were ordered to do so, he was already working with his handlers. Whenever there was something on his mind, he would act immediately.

    Then what he heard was, of course, what he needed to hear.

    Forget the United States and Arcia, Im interested in the Empire. We have the lieutenant in charge of our intelligence. Gensei might be able to handle himno, he couldnt. Anyway, hes not that adept at covert action.

    Gensei is the master of Amari Mssahiko, and his swordsmanship is top-notch. But as a sorcerer, he is a novice, and without him, the Royal Guard Corps would have a difficult time dealing with the demons dark activities.

    The demon was discovered in a forcible infiltration attempt. It would be understandable if a battle ensued.

    This isnt the case.

    If they couldnt even break in, then this was a very unusual situation.

    Well, lets see what we can do about it.

    He asked Pulcine and the others toe back as soon as theyve dealt with the situation, so theyll teleport back. By then, David and his team will know whats going on, and theyll discuss the future strategy.

    But

    It was not about such matters that troubled Masahiko.

    Who am I?

    The human-born Amari Masahiko was possessed by a mastermind level demon. His assimtion rate isnt perfect, but he can use his powers to their fullest extent.

    No.

    Thats not the case.

    He was a rival to Kondou.

    They were best friends and rivalso its no wonder his spirit was strong enough to reach the ultimate goal.

    It is precisely because of this that Masahiko thinks about his own existence.

    Is he really a demon?

    Or perhaps

    Humans in this world do not have the aid of a universal substance called magic. Thats why they are vulnerable, but their minds are free and their spirits are infinitely strong.

    Phantoms, on the other hand, are often called angels who used to serve seraphim. They were like machines that only did what they were told, such as angels of the dominion ss and below.

    Thats why their egos are so thin, and thats why they cant afford to be taken over by others.

    If the human will breaks the phantoms ego, the order will be lost.

    It was precisely because Masahiko anticipates this that he was troubled.

    As a demon, he believes that resurrecting Cornu is the best thing for him. He should do his best for that and get rid of all obstacles.

    However, the current Amari Masahiko had a different opinion.

    Postponement on the expansion of the Underworld Gate. Instead

    Once its destroyed, am I the king? No, kings are a pain in the ass, so I can leave it to Pulcine. Isnt it better for us humans to rule this world, rather than allowing demons and other invaders to rule it?

    He had that grandiose idea in his mind.

    He wonders if this phenomenon was only happening to him.

    A high-ranking general ss demon remembers that he was originally a cherub.

    He was born to the god Veldanava, the Star King Dragon, to serve Cornu.

    And yet, even though he wasparable to an Awakened Demon Lord in the Otherworld, he was now wavering about his own existence.

    As long as he was an example of himself, Amari Masahiko, he couldnt let his guard down.

    He must assume that the others were as well.

    If thats the case, then who is an ally and who is an enemy

    How is it best to organize them and how is it best to act?

    Whether or not Pulcine is the right choice for the king is also an unanswerable question.

    There is not enough material to make a decision.

    Masahiko reserved his conclusion.

    At that moment, the report came in that everyone was present.

    ***

    So, as it turns out, all the heads of state and government have disappeared?

    To be exact, it would appear that some of them are still around.

    Its not worth considering. Seeing that the people who are in charge of determining national policy have gathered in the Imperial State, we should consider that humanity is also showing a full-fledged counter-offensive attitude.

    Mm. I wont argue with you.

    If the two apex men agreed that that was the answer.

    Then shall we move our fleet toward the Empire?

    Its an open secret that there is an outpost here on the Antis continent. The humans know this too, and thats why theyve been lured here.

    Soldiers are better suited to take the ce of demons than civilians.

    Instead of kidnapping them, its better to have theme to them. That was the n.

    But now that there is unrest in thend, thats a different story.

    It seemed to be reasonably effective tounch a grand offensive and wait and see what happensbut Masahiko felt uneasy as if he had overlooked some important factor.

    This world is within reach and the reason for that is that there are no strong men.

    But was that really the case?

    If this assumption was wrong, then the strategy would need to be reexamined from the ground up.

    I want to reiterate. I want each of you to mobilize all your knowledge and make sure. Aree there really no other powerful beings in this world?

    When Masahiko asks that question, Li Jinlong replies with augh.

    Theres no doubt about it. The only one who is a threat is Xianhua!

    With that assertion, he became even more worried.

    Wait. Then who trained this Xianhua?

    Thats

    ording to my research, Xianhua has learned the Dragon Fist, a martial art that is passed down from one generation to the next. She is said to have inherited a skill that is unknown to the world.

    Yeah, thats it! Thats why shes stronger than ordinary people.

    How did that martial arte about? The founder is said to be a man named Long. Do you have any information about this man?

    When asked that, Li Jinlong recalls. Although he was not chosen as the sessor, he was one of the best members who studied the Dragon Fist. Thats why he had been drilled with knowledge of the Founder.

    I believe the book of secrets states that a woman named the Dragon Phoenix (Ryuo) guided our Founder, but its only a biography of an oral history. I dont see any point in that.

    Hmm.

    Masahiko had a bad feeling about this.

    Normally he shouldnt be misled by such a vague biographybut he cant help but feel uneasy.

    Now that you mention it

    Delia says what shes remembered.

    Arcia also had a myth of a goddess who guided the Emperors ancestors

    Hearing that, Masahiko felt uneasy.

    Delias face paled and she was sweating from the nerviousness. Since she became a demon, Delia hadnt been affected by her emotions like a human, but the enormity of what she remembered frightened her.

    What is this goddess name?

    Caldina

    It is believed that she took the name Cardinal, which means crimson, but it was said that Caldina was established as a nickname.

    The word Cardinal sounded familiar.

    Scorch Dragon Velgrynd used to call herself that because of the color of her aura, and Masahiko had found that out from his knowledge of the demons.

    Its a coincidence. The Scorch Dragon Velgrynd, like Feldway-sama, is supposed to be in the Cardinal World. I hear that she was with Emperor Rudra and has no idea of our true purpose. She couldnt possibly be in this world.

    He hadnt had a chance to talk to the Phantom King Feldway, even though he was Cornus chief of staff. So, from hearsay, the operation in the Cardinal World was going well.

    The Scorch Dragon Velgrynd is at Rudras beck and call, and I can assure you that she will never leave Rudras side. So it is unthinkable that she would be in this world.

    And yet, the doubt of whether it is true cant get out of his mind.

    Delias pallor also suggested that the story didnt end there.

    Hmm, is that all?

    Thats what he asked.

    The answer was Delias spear.

    This is a divine object supposedly created by the goddess. It contains a terrifying amount of power, but even I cant use it now

    !!!

    That statement not only upset Amari Masahikobut the others as well.

    It is only natural that a demon general should be able to use a Legendary-grade weapon as well as a limb. If they cant do that, it proves that their weapons are mythical-grade weapons.

    In this world where magic is scarce, how can a mythical-grade weapon be created? Moreover, it is said that there is not just one mythical-grade tools, but twelve in the beginning. Im familiar with the sacred artifacts of my former colleagues, and I feel that they were the equivalent of my spear.

    So that means there are twelve mythical-grade tools, right?

    YesBut I dont think those guys could get more than a few percent of the performance out of it!

    Hed like to say out loud that thats not the problem. However, that would not be a solution, so Amari Masahiko told them something else.

    What matters is the fact that there was a being that could create mythical-grade weapons.

    No way! Its really a mythical-grade!?

    Youre a fool. You should think twice before you speak. How dare you stand in front of physical evidence and refuse to consider it!

    I beg your pardon!

    With Delias panicked apology at his side, Masahiko was convinced.

    The goddess Caldina is the Scorch Dragon Velgrynd.

    If the coincidences keeping up again and again, it was inevitable.

    Thats why he cant help but mutter,

    Never thought Velgrynd would be in this world.

    And

    And thats what led to the dramatic effect it had on a certain someone.

    Velgrynd? Even Velgrynd!?

    Whats going on, Emile?

    You called me, Emile-chan. Im here to help you.

    As he said this, a figure appeared out of nowhere.

    It was unreasonable as it happened in the demons high vignce stronghold.

    The one who was there was Velgrynd. The demons barrier was nothingpared to her ability to destroy even the Labyrinth of Ramiris.

    No wonder the demons were stunned.

    Even the cool-headed and collected Amari Masahiko was not expecting this. He was certain of Velgrynds existence, but he never thought that he would have an encounter before he had time to deal with it.

    Velgrynd, why are you here?

    You know my name.

    Of course. Arent you supposed to be working with our king, Feldway-sama, to help Emperor Rudra achieve supremacy?

    Oh. If youre connected to the Cardinal World, you should be able to synchronize the timelines.

    What?

    Thats the story Im talking about. Id rather just get this over with, you know?

    Amari Masahiko was confused.

    And yet, the calm part of him continued to think.

    If hed been aware of Velgrynds existence earlier, he would have been able to deal with it. But he never imagined shed be in this world.

    Its a shame. But why? Theres no way a being like her can move between dimensions. Even the Underworld Gate, which weve been working so hard to expand, still cant call Cornu-sama.

    The existence of Velgrynd is equal to or greater than Cornus. It holds an enormous amount of magicules that cannot be seen through normal eyes.

    So how did shee to this world?

    And he didnt know what her purpose was and was at a loss for words.

    If he could, he would want to avoid hostility at this point.

    But, however

    What do you want?

    Its a simple proposal. End your invasion of this world and retreat to the other side. And Ill let you off the hook just this once.

    Velgrynd smiles, but her words hide her anger.

    Velgrynd hates those who try to hurt her loved ones.

    And Amari Masahiko urately perceives that feeling.

    Thats too bad, I guess were already enemies. But I dont understand. I thought they were allies of Feldway-samano, wait? A timline synchronization?

    The formidable mind of Masahiko spins at high speed. And from the edges of the words Velgrynd leaked, he was able toe up with the correct answer.

    So, this person is from a different timeline. She seemed unaware of our situation, but she did not seem surprised by Feldway-sama and Emperor Rudras story. So I can assume that she knows what we know so far. Judging from theck of change in orders from Cornu-sama, something must have happened in the future. So perhaps

    She jumped from the Cardinal World to this worlds past.

    This was the reasoning that Amari Masahiko gave.

    It was a brilliant mind to admire.

    It was just a shame there wasnt time to put it to use.

    There will be no bargaining. Its too much work.

    This is the reason why he must make a decision.

    Velgrynd is at ease, holding out her hand to Emile, whom she had drawn in.

    It was obvious what she was doing. She is carefully separating Emile from the demon that was on the verge ofplete assimtion.

    The demon is fighting back, but it is only a matter of time.

    Then hed just have to make the most of that time.

    Thats what Masahiko decided.

    Our desire is for demons and humanity to coexist and prosper together. Its a shame you cant understand that.

    You know, intelligent life forms dont understand what they want one way or the other.

    Huh, no doubt. But we cant give up.

    So thats your answer?

    Thats right!!

    Velgryndughs.

    Youre a fool. Thenits time to go guys!

    The final battle was about to begin.

    ***

    The demons eyes widened at the sudden appearance of the humans.

    However, the same can be said for those who have appeared.

    The human races greatest warriors were even more confused than the demons were.

    Im being summoned.

    What?

    I have to go. And we have to help him.

    And then Velgrynd suddenly disappeared.

    Just as they were wondering, they, too, were suddenly summoned to a strange ce.

    And this is the scene.

    None of them realized that they had shifted through space. After all, they didnt even go through the portal, they just suddenly changed scenery.

    It could be summed up in one word, Instantaneous Movement. It could normally only be done by ten people, and it was an unimaginable supernatural power.

    To humanity, led by Gensei and the others, it was an act of God that was iprehensible.

    In such a situation, even if you are told, It''s your turn, you guys!, It''s a hard to know what to do.

    It is important to find out what you can do when you are in trouble like this. This is also applicable to work, and if you take what you can understand as a starting point, you can work your way through it.

    In this case, it was just a lucky thing that they had an acquaintance.

    Each of them found their own face and began to negotiate with one another.

    In Genseis case, he turned to his apprentice and trustedpanion, the man who had been his disciple andpanion, Amari Masahiko.

    Masahiko, you are not a weak man to be dominated by a demon. His Majesty is grieving too. Pick yourself up and get back here.

    Gensei called out to him and decided to take a look at him.

    With his hand on the hilt of his sword, he takes a ready-made stance and waits for an answer.

    Minamoto follows suit, naturally lining up beside him.

    Dont lose, Masahiko-san, please dont lose! Dont lose sight of your own heart!

    Like Gensei, he took the same strategy to call out to them.

    He was betting on the possibility that they might still have the ego, and hoped that he could ovee the demon

    The person who was called out to was Amari Masahiko, but it was surprisingly effective. After all, he himself didnt have an answer as to whether he was a demon or a human.

    Im

    And thats when he started to worry.

    Even for Masahiko, this development was too unexpected.

    The problem is the presence of Velgrynd here.

    It wasnt because he thought he could win that he rejected Velgrynds proposal in the first ce. On the contrary, he broke off the negotiations to embolden hisrades because he knew he was going to lose.

    To be frank, Velgrynds presence was on another level. This is not a battleground of who can or cannot win, but a dead end when one is against them.

    Then, the best thing to do would be to withdraw from this ce.

    The alternative is to ept the offer, but that was rejected.

    If he gives in to her demands, the entire strategy is broken, and the operation is over. In that case, the me would fall on himself and Pulcine, but Masahiko wasnt straighforward enough to think that was a good thing.

    Rather, he feltfortable with the demons defeat.

    If anything, his human side was stronger.

    Thats why Masahiko was shaken by Genseis call.

    His human heart was telling him to go back to Genseis side.

    The demons intellect cries out, unwilling to admit defeat.

    Human reason tells him that there is no point in running away now.

    Every demonic instinct was afraid of the threat of Velgrynd.

    These various pieces of information conflicted with each other and tormented Masahiko.

    I seethe demons greatest weakness is itsck of self-awareness. At least if hed been given a name he would have established a firm sense of self. No. Thats exactly why Ive conquered the demon. Yes. I am Amari Masahiko. I am not a demon.

    Amari Masahiko was in agony.

    The way he looked was just like a human being.

    Seeing that, Gensei and the others decided that it was okay.

    Remember, Masahiko! To whom did you give your loyalty? Who did you hone your sword skills for? Strength is nothing but violence unless it is properly understood. Have you forgotten that lesson?

    Amari Masahiko remembers.

    He remembered that he had pledged his allegiance to the Emperor.

    He remembered that his sword should be wielded to protect the weak.

    Masahiko-san and Kondou-san also fought valiantly to the end and lost their battle. I admired the two of you so much that it was almost dazzling to me. And yetthe reason Kondou-san died was because of a demon! Are you going to be one of them!?

    It wasnt the demons fault, but thats how Velgrynd exined it, so everyone believed it. No one interfered and it wasnt aplete lie, so the story was true.

    So even Masahiko believed it.

    Thats unforgivableand his heart burned.

    Somewhere inside his mind, he heard a cracking sound.

    He stopped thinking and listened to his hearts desire.

    ***

    In Xianhuas case, the demon side called out.

    Its been a while. Its been a long time since weve met here. We dont need words between you and me. Lets fight each other.

    Li Jinlong smiled wryly and held up his fist.

    It was hard to believe that he was in his fifties. Now that he was merged with the demon, he seemed to have regained his youthfulness.

    More ferociously, he was obsessed with Xianhua.

    Youre a persistent man. How many times do I have to beat you to get you to admit defeat?

    Unless you kill me, Ill never admit defeat. You were better than me, sure, but thats in the past. I will keep challenging you to a fight until I win.

    He wanted to take over the position of the Dragon Fists rightful sessor.

    Even though Li Jinlong had be a demon, he still couldnt give up his ambition.

    Your persistence is the only thing thats admirable.

    Stopughing. If I win by any means, it is justice.

    As soon as he finished, Li Jinlong let loose with a thrust.

    He was half-armed and slid across the floor, closing the distance in one fluid motion.

    His front right fist is like a missile. The energy generated by his toes rode the momentum of his hips rotation and converged into a well-honed fist.

    With the addition of the demons power, it was so powerful that an ordinary person would be reduced to a crumbling mess.

    Xianhua would have been done for if he took it properly, but he danced like a leaf to shrug off the power.

    Thats not all.

    Xianhuas hands are wrapped in purple lightning and her left hand is snugly attached to the approaching fist. Grabbing the fist to take advantage of the power of the thrust, she dodges a front leg and takes Li Jinlongs back. She pushes Li Jinlong back, knocks him to the floor, and then strikes with her free right fist, aiming for the back of his head and the root of his neck.

    A brilliant move that was stunning.

    Li Jinlong, in the midst of his divine speed thrusts and in a released fist position, could not help but do as he was forced.

    In addition to the impact that ripped through his body, he was also hit on the vital point. It wasnt safe for Li Jinlong.

    But the demon general Li Jinlong still did a great job.

    Xianhuas fighting spirit was so strong that an ordinary demon would have been obliterated in an instant, but he was still able to stand up.

    That hurt. My subordinates wouldve died.

    Youre still as tough as ever.

    Of course. You wont enjoy it if its over after one shot. This is just the beginning.

    Laughing fiercely at Li Jinlong, Xianhua clicked her tongue.

    Youre a vulgar guy.

    Youre wrong! You know what I mean.

    Li Jinlong was more innocent than expected, but Xianhua was unconcerned and resumed the onught.

    ***

    The more moderate pairing would be United States Secret Service Representative Billy, and David Reagan, the Commander of the United States of Azalea Grand South Sea Fleet.

    My lord, you have been charged with treason. I would advise you to prove your innocence in court.

    Let me tell you, Im not like the rest of humanity. I cannot be judged by thews of men.

    Then I will be forcibly restrain you. If you resist, I will be permitted to shoot, and I will not hesitate to do so.

    Dont make meugh. Im over the limits of humanity now, and I dont think that kind of toy is going to work!

    As Davidughed, Billy pulled the trigger without hesitation.

    Of course. Aiming at the enemy is a basic tactic.

    He fired his bullets with all his fighting spirit. One shot a day, specially made to give it everything hes got.

    They onlyst a week, so there are seven rounds in stock. S & WM ?, a Magnum Revolver, has six rounds of ammunition, each one a deadly weapon.

    Moreover, the gun has been transformed by Velgrynd into a mythical-grade weapon. The power of the bullets had been greatly increased, enough to prate Davids defensive wards.

    Guhaa!

    David was stunned as the first bullet shot through his heart.

    He had let his guard. Aside from Velgrynd, he had thought the others posed no threat.

    This is bad. Whats going on?

    He cant help but wonder why hes in such a state of shock.

    David thought being a demon freed him from his fear of death.

    Theres no escaping pain and sickness if youre human. But as a demon, David thought he would have nothing to do with it..

    And yet, Billys gun was a danger to himself.

    That realization frightened David. The weakness of the human heart had overridden the demons will.

    This was an unexpected miscalction for the demon that possessed David.

    Because Davids mind was so weak, possession was easy. But now that weakness had be his own weakness.

    Looking next to him, Li Jinlong also struggled against Xianhua.

    David was confused by this nonsense.

    Have you changed your perspective?

    Billy goes on.

    Its not a fight that can be won.

    He catches the opponent off guard, upsets him, makes him think he has the advantage.

    He knows that only by gaining an advantage will he be able to win.

    He has six bullets left.

    However, one shot needs to be loaded, and he doesnt think his opponent will allow it. If he doesnt finish him off within the remaining five shots, Billys defeat will be decided right then and there.

    It was precisely because he was thinking this that he hesitated to fire all of his rounds.

    At that moment

    Both men thought at the same time that if they didnt get the fight going, they would lose.

    The stalemate came to an unexpected halt.

    ***

    Some of the confrontations were unreasonablebinations.

    The demon Delia and the six warriors against her.

    Delia was furious.

    Hey, why are there six of theming only to me!?

    It was thest thing she wanted to hear.

    As if that wasnt enough, Delia urged further.

    Scatter. Help those who look more in trouble!

    But her voice was ignored.

    Wevee here to help you!

    cried Bright, the leader of the Seven Vessels.

    Then put that sword away!

    Delia shouts back, sending the sh away from Brights sh. And then a bow and arrow fly in for the opportunity.

    Watch out! Youre still so cunning! What do I do if it pierces me?

    Because of her heightened ability to sense danger, Delia was able to evade. Sheins to the bowman, but the gringo-looking young bowman is out of the picture.

    Delia, Im sorry, but can you please calm down and be caught? I know youre in a bad way right now, and were all in mortal danger.

    The whip-handler hunts Delia downnguidly but precisely.

    The archer responds with more attacks.

    If youre going to help, why dont you at least try to talk?

    Deliained, desperately avoiding those attacks.

    One against six.

    Normally, the aggressor would have the advantage.

    But the truth was, Delia was on the winning side. If Delia had her way, those six warriors would have sunk in a pool of blood.

    She didnt because she wasnt willing to.

    Delias human self wasing back to life as well.

    The demons strategy was perfect but stealing the human name had thrown a wrench in the works. Even without the appearance of Velgrynd, it would have failed somewhere along the line.

    To the viewer, it was a clear situation.

    ***

    The strategy room in the demon stronghold has been thrown into chaos by the battle with the intruders.

    Only Velgrynd, who was healing Emile, and Mystery Monk Pulcine, who was folding his arms, were at ease.

    Despite being called a saint, he is evil in nature. And he was so cunning that no one would ever know.

    Now, too, he sees the situation and seeks what is best for him.

    It is the very essence of human desire.

    The demons ego was eaten long ago.

    But that doesnt mean assimtion wasplete. Pulcines priority was to absorb power, and the demons knowledge took a back seat. He thought that as long as he had his power, he could handle the rest.

    Still, he had umted a little bit of knowledge, but he couldnt bring himself to study it intentionally. Thought eleration would take an enormous amount of time to acquire memories that would span millions of years.

    Besides, absorbing unnecessary knowledge may affect your ego. This was Pulcines misfortune.

    It was unfortunate for Pulcine, because hecked knowledge of Velgrynd.

    So Pulcine made a fatal mistake here.

    Instead of dealing with Velgrynd, he let his own desires take precedence.

    Amari Masahiko is a cunning man. He must know that if we break the Underworld Gate, we can be kings. Thats why I was right to pretend not to notice. Thats why he trusts me. Ill use these intruders to my advantage!

    Pulcine will use the opportunity to break the Underworld Gate and kill Masahiko. He nned to be king, but he saw the chaos as an opportunity.

    The demon that possessed Pulcine had always fought on the front lines as Cornus chief strategist. Thus, he had earned the Extra Skill of Life Drain.

    Unlike Ruminas Energy Drain and Yukis Still Life 32 , this Skill allows you to harness the energy of a dead enemy. However, it can only take less than 10% of your magicule at most. And since it cant be used in battle, it isnt that useful.

    Still, the advantage was that the more you fought, the stronger you became.

    However

    Pulcines desire had sublimated his authority.

    This was the Unique Skill Mitasumono (Instant Buddha) 33

    It gives the authority to take away as much power as your body is satisfied from an unconsciously weakened opponent. Its also difficult to use in battle but it cane alive during melee.

    And here, in this ce, there were some pretty good fighters.

    Kekeke. If I y my cards right, I could double their strength. Then Masahiko and even others will be no match for me. From now on, it will not be Cornu. From now on he will serve as my second inmand.

    He could only see his own desires and even called out his lord Cornu.

    Pulcine kept watching the situation.

    He has been observing the situation and has identified a prime target.

    The battle between Xianhua and Li Jinlong was closer than expected, even though Xianhua had the upper hand. Both sides are exhausted, but the battle is still not over.

    Its a good thing to take from the weak, but that would make me wary of the strong. In that respect, Xianhua is the best!

    Originally, Xianhua thought that Pulcine was his prey. This situation hade about before he went to China, but in the end, he gloated that it was all nned.

    Then, he took aim at the moment Xianhua and Li Jinlong collided and bared his fangs.

    ***

    Xianhua and Li Jinlong exchange fists, but there is a smile on each others faces.

    Im d, Xianhua. Ive been a no match for you for so long, and now Im fighting you like this.

    Li Jinlong, who had been wearing armor and sleeves until now, was happy to be able to fight Xianhua.

    Xianhua was his dream.

    She was so loved so much that she could not just be described as a genius.

    Li Jinlongs heart for her wasplicated.

    If it wasnt for Xianhua, he would have been the heir apparent. But seeing Xianhuas brilliance when she was just a little girl, he also wanted to see how far the girl could go.

    At that moment, Li Jinlong must have admitted that he had lost.

    Humph! Theres no point in asking for help from others instead of elevating yourself.

    You talk like you know what youre talking about. Id do anything to surpass you.

    I know. Im not fighting on my own, either.

    What?

    Its a fact that only the sessors know, but its not a secret, so Ill tell you. The spirit contains the knowledge and experience of each of previous sessors. So, its only natural that one should be stronger than their predecessors. Our founders dream was to be the strongest in the world. It is precisely because he pursued such an impossible dream that he has created a way to pass it on to the next generation.

    That reminds Li Jinlong too.

    Rumor has it that the sessor will always be stronger than the predecessor.

    Now he understands why.

    And he realizes that Xianhuas power isnt just hers, its the power of so many great people.

    You have the power of others

    Yes. Thats why I cant lose.

    Man is a creature that creates a new path based on the umted knowledge of his predecessors.

    The philosophy of the Dragon Fist is the same.

    Without a strong foundation, a building will tilt. They had to raise themselves to embrace the power of others.

    So youre saying that I havent trained enough!?

    Yes. The power you have is useless if you cant master it.

    Tch!

    Li Jinlong was humiliated, but he knew it to be true. If you onlypared the strength, she was better than him. He was still at a disadvantage and there was no excuse.

    His high spirits were dampened, but he still enjoyed the situation.

    Hes not at an advantage, but there is the feeling that victory is within reach. The desperate exchange of life made Li Jinlongs blood boil.

    The demons ego urges him to restrain himself, but he has no intention of listening to it.

    More! More! Faster and stronger, Im going to win!

    His sense of inferiority to Xianhua disappears and the desire to win only grows. Correspondingly, even the demons ego began to help Li Jinlong.

    Its a sign ofplete assimtion.

    Make each others desires their own and the boundary between their hearts will be dissolved.

    Li Jinlong is convinced that he can defeat Xianhua.

    It was at that time.

    As they collided again, Pulcine is standing behind Xianhua.

    Nnngh!

    Pulcines sword plunged into Xianhuas back in a moment that didnt even take a blink of an eye.

    Kahahaha!

    Fresh blood sttered from Xianhuas mouth as she copsed on the spot.

    Only because Xianhua had trained her body to the utmost limit and stepped into the semi-spiritual life form as a Sage, was she able to avoid instant death.

    But Pulcine had cut out Xianhuas heart.

    At this rate, Xianhuas death was only a matter of time.

    Pulcine is ted.

    He had devoured Xianhuas heart and invoked his Unique Skill.

    Delicious. This will greatly increase my power!

    True to his words, Pulcine was filled with energy.

    His subordinate Li Jinlong was enraged by this.

    Ignoring the absolute hierarchy as a demon, the human part of him screams from his heart.

    Bastard! Youve not only sabotaged our game, but youve sabotaged my dreams! If youre the strongest, youll have to beat me fair and square!

    Thats what he shouted as he threw a kick.

    But it doesnt work.

    It was a desperate right-sided kick, but it was easily stopped by Pulcines outstretched left hand.

    Vulnerable! And there is no need for subordinates to oppose. You will be my food, too.

    Since he hadnt fully captured Xianhuas power yet, even if he ate it now, it would only be able to provide a small amount of power. Nevertheless, Pulcine smiled lecherously and destroyed Li Jinlongs leg.

    Guaah!

    Although this demon had no sense of pain, Li Jinlongs human consciousness was so strong that it caused him to feel phantom pain.

    Pulcineughs at that.

    Stopughing! You are a fool who doesnt even know how to use the power of a demon and what it means to transcend the species of a human!

    If he had understood his characteristics as a demon, he would have been able to make use of his power more fully. If so, he would have been able to defeat Xianhua!

    Pulcineughed and thought about how he should educate his subordinates.

    If they were still demons, it wouldnt be a problem, but if they had developed a human identity, it would be tricky. There are advantages and disadvantages.

    Being flexible was an advantage, but the possibility of betrayal was a disadvantage.

    Demons have an absolute hierarchy, but depending on their desires, some will put their ego ahead of that. This is certain since that is what Pulcine is doing now.

    In terms of strengthening his own forces, he should let Li Jinlong be the example and make him understand his own power:

    It would be troublesome if he betrayed. After all, I should leave things as they are until we build a ruling system that does not allow for betrayal.

    And he has set the policy.

    He now thinks hes be a king.

    Besides, there are few executives left.

    Li Jinlong will take matters into his own hands and Emile is protected by Velgrynd.

    That leaves Delia, David, and the questionable Amari Masahiko.

    Masahiko is a tricky man, but he would swear to be a confidant if he showed him the overwhelming difference in strength.

    Hes not stupid. If he realizes he cant win, hell cooperate. So the question is, whos that Velgrynd? That woman will be sacrificed as a test of my strength.

    He was very happy to draw a future forecast, but that cannot be a reality.

    After a moment of happy fantasy, Pulcine clenched his fist as he was about to strike a blow to Li Jinlong.

    An evil aura surrounds him, as he attempts to crush Li Jinlongs head

    Get out of the way.

    The moment he heard the voice, an intense pain that he never imagined ran all over his body.

    The pain was so great that Pulcine was rolling around and was notughing at Li Jinlong.

    Li Jinlong could not help butugh.

    Xianhua, I wont let you die. If you die here, Longs dream will also die.

    As usual, Velgrynd does not give a damn about the convenience of others.

    This is the best way to deal with a dying being.

    Xianhua, who had been waiting to die, felt like she wanted to talk back.

    Yes, but

    Regeneration. Also healing for recovery of physical strength. Hows that?

    Velgrynd healed Xianhua with a powerful spell of regeneration of the heart and then regained her strength on top of that.

    Velgrynd had learned holy magic from her travels in various worlds. She did not need it at all, but did it mainly for the benefit of Rudras reincarnations.

    In the meantime, people really worshiped in her, but they didnt know much about her. It was an act of God in this world, but, well, it didnt matter.

    UhhIm healed. Im not in any pain at all, and I feel fine.

    There are people like Hinata who have a high resistance to magic. But God''s Miracle, interfering with the spirit particle had no problem making it work.

    Thats right. Gods Miracle. I thought Resurrection was an overreaction. Thats good.

    Yes

    Thats right, there was even more magic than thatmuttered Xianhua in her mind.

    Now, she was back in shape, but that didnt solve the problem.

    What Pulcine had taken was Xianhuas spirit. The knowledge and experience that had been entrusted to her for generations was still there, but most of her power is gone.

    Unless something is done about this, Xianhua will remain weakened.

    This would normally be a big problembut Velgrynd was here.

    Let me help you. Its dragons energy, so its a good substitute.

    Far from benig a substitute, it wil be stronger than ever.

    But that was only on a human scale.

    From Velgrynds point of view, it was only a margin of error, so she didnt hesitate to send the dragon energy into Xianhua.

    The power stabilizing dragon qi strengthened Xianhuas body. Although not quite a Saint, Xianhua had fully awakened as a Sage.

    So this isthe power of Ryuo-sama, which was only given to the Founder!

    Li Jinlong, who had been stunned and left behind in the situation, nodded his head in satisfaction for some reason. His expression was just like he had been when he was a human.

    Kekeke, after all, that kid should be like this. Its only when youre at a high level that you can be movtivated this way.

    He was again one-sidedly looking at Xianhua as a rival, muttering something like. Even in the eyes of Demon General Li Jinlong, she was getting stronger.

    And although a jubnt Xianhua didnt realize it, her life has been greatly extended now that she had be Sage.

    She would rise to heights that even Long could not reach and would live as the ruler of this world as a Dragon Fist Master. But thats another story.

    ***

    Blown away by Velgrynd, Pulcine could not understand what had happened to him.

    Although he was inferior to Cornu, he should have had absolute power. And yet, he was left with unbearable pain.

    What? Why am I feeling such pain like a human being?

    The reason is simple The crimson cardinal aura of Velgrynd will burn anyone it touches.

    However, this time, she didnt intend to kill him, so she was holding back as best she could

    Had he realized that, Pulcine would not have repeated his folly any further. But he was more intoxicated with himself as a king than he had ever imagined. Thats why he was so blind to reality and went into things he shouldnt have.

    Surprising or petty.

    This is the speech of a wretched little man who cant even understand the gap between them.

    Even Velgrynd had no idea it was directed at her. So she didnt care and moved on to the next person.

    She stood behind David, who was staring at Billy, and smacked him on the head with her palm. The cardinal aura destroyed the demon in one blow. It was an impressive feat of strength, but it was just like Velgrynd.

    Meanwhile, Pulcine also moved in.

    He didnt like what he saw and sent orders to Delia.

    Give me that spear!

    What?

    You cannot bring out the spears true value. That spear will be more valuable to me than its disappointing owner.

    Pulcine stole Delias spear. He senses its power and smiles, thinking he can win.

    Meanwhile, as Delia is pushed away, her formerrades rush in.

    You okay?

    Bright calls out on behalf of the others.

    Hearing that, tears start to fall down Delias cheeks.

    Youre stupid. Im not human. Im a demon that has invaded this world.

    But youre crying. Those tears are the proof that youre still human.

    Bright

    In general, your memory is intact, right?

    Lets get rid of the demon, you know.

    Youre so brazen, you cant lose to a demon.

    At that moment, Delia was sure she heard the sound of something crunching somewhere in her mind.

    Hey Catalina, if youre going tofort me, you shouldfort me properly! What do you mean Im brazen?

    Thats what I meant. I had faith that youde back to me.

    Catalina hugs Delia, crying.

    And the others too.

    No more words are needed.

    Deliaughed from the bottom of her heart as her friends shouted in joy one by one.

    Seeing Delia and her friends, Pulcine snorted unpleasantly.

    Good grief. Thats why humans

    Even David hase to his senses at the hands of Velgrynd. Delia was his only loyal subordinate, but it seems that herr human ego has won out.

    If thats the case, then he cant expect to get Masahiko as well. It seemed that his human ego had begun to win, and he should have thought that a joint struggle was impossible.

    But he sees no problem.

    Because Pulcine now has the most powerful weapon in the world.

    This performance is mythical-grade! It still refuses to believe that Im the master, but its strong enough. It can handle that damned Velgrynd.

    And he was doing the math.

    He was a helplessly unrefined man.

    But somewhere inside, rm bells were ringing. He had found information about Velgrynd from the missing demons knowledge.

    If he had scrutinized it carefully, he would have been able to find out more

    Im the only one I can rely on, right? Very well. I will take care of you myself!

    Do you think hes talking to me?

    Youre really a stupid woman! Theres no otherBuberaaa!?

    He announced his intention to kill her openly, but it was a bad move.

    Until now, he had been overlooked because she was not interested in him, but now he was recognized as an enemy.

    Still, Velgrynd thought there was a chance that Pulcine could turn back from a demon to a human, and was taking it easy on Pulcine to keep him from dying.

    Whats really annoying is that since Pulcine had only taken over the demons consciousness, his heart was still intact.

    With this blow, it was shattered.

    So, our mission is over. This man has conquered the demon on his own, so there are no more demons to be taken over.

    Velgrynd dered radiantly.

    The six phantom leaders were present.

    David and Emile had been stripped of their demon powers by Velgrynd and are now normal human beings again.

    Li Jinlong and Delia, as well as Amari Masahiko, have reimed themselves. The demons power remains, but that didnt bother Velgrynd.

    And Pulcine had shattered the demons core, but something was wrong.

    Kekeke! Thank you very much! The damned seal that warned me of my power has been broken!

    The demons power had been fully absorbed and even its form had begun to mutate.

    His skin had turned pale and his eyes were red. He was different from the lower-ranked ones he even had wings like an angel.

    The robe he wears is a modified version of the armor the demon used to wear. Of course, because it had been in existence for so long, it boasted a considerably high performance in the legendary ss.

    The spear in his hand, which he had taken from Delia, had also been transformed into a scepter. In other words, it had now epted Pulcine as its owner.

    Pulcines own magicules are insufficient to fully free him. But still, Pulcine feels as if his energy has doubled.

    Pulcine is in a frenzy of euphoria, and he is at his peak.

    He was foolishly growing to think that no one could rival him now.

    At that, Velgrynd snorted.

    Could it be that hes a real idiot?

    But she lets Pulcine do as he pleases.

    Shes the absolute strongest in the world and shes not going to panic.

    Unknowingly, Pulcine, in his full form, is smiling broadly.

    This is a wonderfullyforting feeling. This is a power so great it could beat Cornu-sama.

    Pulcines omnipotence was so great that he could even say so boastfully.

    In fact, his power had risen to the level of an Awakened Demon Lord, and Pulcine felt that he had surpassed his limits.

    However, this was only the idea of someone with a small measure of knowledge.

    Thats impossible. Theres no way youre going to win the game when theres a difference of more than ten times.

    It was such a ridiculous misunderstanding that Velgrynd couldnt help but poke fun at it.

    And yet Pulcine is furious when it is pointed out to him.

    Oh dear, what a pity it is to be a fool who does not know reason!

    Everyone but himself thought that it was him.

    Velgrynd finally realized that Pulcine seemed to be undermining her. But she didnt know why. He seems to think he can beat Velgrynd, but she has no idea what hes basing this on.

    Shes known demons for a long time, so she didnt expect someone who didnt know her.

    But if hes are a minor phantom, its no surprise that he doesnt know her. But a former angel of the Three Marshals would have trembled just at the mention of Velgrynds name.

    It was a natural reaction when faced with the powerful True Dragon.

    Yet, Pulcines reaction was very unnatural.

    That was why Velgrynd was confused, wondering if he might be mistaken.

    Its been bothering me for a while now, but youre pretty rude. You didnt mean me when you said the word fool now, did you?

    After a long journey, Velgrynd has be surprisingly patient.

    In her own estimation, shes full of charity, if not a bit morepassionate, than she was before.

    Thats why she asked that instead of getting angry, but Pulcine didnt get the picture.

    I dont know. Apparently, youre a little strong, but most of the time Im confident. There is a whole world out there with more toe

    Oh, he really doesnt knowVelgrynd realized.

    He had ovee the phantom ego and was acting by Pulcines will.

    And at the same time, she pitied Pulcine, who was possessed by a demon and prioritized knowledge, as opposed to Masahiko, who was possessed by a demon and only wanted power.

    Thats why this guy has grown to this point without knowing the important things.

    She was so convinced that she was more amazed than angry.

    Velgrynd ignored Pulcine, who was making some kind of speech, and asked Gensei and the others.

    What is the right thing to do with this man? I shattered the demons core, but its power is still intact. Even I cant help him in this situation.

    That means you cant take the power away.

    But Pulcine misunderstood.

    Kekeke, of course! Its toote to be afraid now!

    He mistakenly understood that Velgrynd had dered to be no match for him.

    He was a man of infinitely happy thought processes.

    For the spirit of a being who so frankly admits defeat, you may now join as my subordinate. I thank you for your mercy and invite you to join me at the head of the household?

    Shut up!

    Another p from Velgrynd.

    Unable to react to this, Pulcine now realizes that this is crazy.

    Could I be mistaken?

    Thinking so, he tries to decipher the memories hes been searching for.

    But he couldnt do it.

    When the demons heart was shattered by Velgrynd, all memory information was lost.

    This is not good!!

    Without knowing why, Pulcine became agitated.

    Leaving Pulcine alone, Velgrynd resumes her conversation with Gensei.

    Its going to be too much trouble for you guys to keep this man alive. I think its better to kill him, what do you think?

    Velgrynd doesnt care if Pulcine lives or dies.

    But she cant leave him unattended.

    As long as Akira Sakura is alive, everythings all right with Velgrynd. But after that, she doesnt know what will happen.

    Velgrynd has no intention of taking responsibility and will always travel to find the next piece of soul. In that case, there will be no one left to stop Pulcine.

    Besides, she knows that Rudras reincarnation had happened many times in this world, and his bloodline had been passed down. It was no fun for Velgrynd to let Pulcine do as she pleased.

    It was obvious that Genseis people couldnt handle it, and that was why it would be quicker to take care of it here.

    Thats certainly true, but

    No one from Roziam was here.

    When only your own heroes are killed, there will always be some lingering effects. Even if you realize that it was a fair decision, it wont be fun.

    Velgrynd is worried about that and asks what to do.

    In other words, its not the kindness of Velgrynd that keeps Pulcine alive. She simply concludes that she might cause trouble for Akira if she kills him on her own.

    Thats why she left the decision to someone else.

    Since everyone is from another country, they will be hard to judge. After consulting with all of them, she decided that if they chose to let Pulcine go here, that was fine.

    Aside from Masahiko, the others could also read Velgrynds intentions. So they felt free to speak their minds.

    Theres no other choice but to get rid of him. Tell them he was possessed by a demon and that I did it. If Roziam demands my custody, you can give it to me without a care in the world.

    When Masahiko said this, Gensei had a hard time with it.

    No, I agree to take care of it, but you wont be a victim. Ill exin the situation and ask you to understand.

    Its Azaleas people who are on board with this.

    Thats right. If you didnt understand what was going on, then you can put pressure on them. We at Azalea will help you.

    Im afraid I have a problem with that statement, Commander. But I agree with the idea of getting rid of it.

    Too much power brings bad luck. Thats what my grandfather used to say. I think Pulcine-sans unhappiness is partly to me.

    Billy and Emile also expressed their approval, remonstrating Davids remarks.

    Incidentally, Laurent Hayes, Emiles grandfather, would only turn to Velgrynd for really trivial matters. Remembering this, Velgrynd smiled as an afterthought.

    The Chinese are silent in a tolerant stance.

    They don''t have good feelings because of Roziam attacking thend. That is why they refrain from speaking.

    Thest were those of Arcia, but they were ready to kill.

    It doesnt matter why. Lets kill him.

    Thats right. He pushed Delia away and even took away her weapon. Id kill him with my own hands if I could.

    Well, thats right. I see no reason to disagree.

    Same to the right.

    And, well, they were angry that their friends had been hurt, and thements continued with no weight.

    Pulcine heard this and knew that his situation was very dangerous.

    This woman, Velgrynd, is going to kill me. But before that happens

    He thought toe up with a n toe back to life.

    Secretly, he put all my heart and soul into this n.

    And with his back to Velgrynd, he aimed for a sneak attack.

    He had abandoned his pride as a saint.

    Chivalry is useless when youre between life and death.

    You will die! Take thismy soulful blow!

    It was a mystical art in the holy spirit world where evil spirits are destroyed with the help of the gods and Buddha. Add to this the power of demons and you have an immense rush of energy that has never before been observed in this world.

    The aftermath alone was devastating.

    The earth trembled and the sky shook.

    The base that had been rebuilt as a demon stronghold couldnt withstand the impact and began to copse. Not only had it survived a bombing, but it was stronger than a nuclear shelter.

    The distance that lies between Pulcine and Velgrynd will be filled in less than a second. That much damage was done in that instant. It was clear how tremendous the attack was.

    I won! No life form could withstand this power. Now I will be the ruler of this world!

    Pulcine witnessed this moment, trying to prove his victory.

    Velgrynds defenseless back was pierced by this energy in the shape of a spear.

    And yetVelgrynd was unharmed.

    It didnt work.

    It couldnt work.

    It couldnt work because the other party Velgrynd.

    The energy that could even wipe out this entire continent in an instant was instantly dissipated.

    Ill get to the bottom of this in a moment, so sit tight and wait.

    As soon as she said this as if it was nothing, Pulcine could not help but realize that he would never win.

    He would never be able to beat Velgrynd.

    Maybe things would have turned out differently if hed given up then.

    But it makes no sense to assume that.

    Pulcine had done something he shouldnt have done, at the wrong time.

    ***

    What a relief! I had misjudged that there was someone in this world I couldnt beat. But you cant touch me.

    Why is that?

    I am very cautious. I have always yed the good guy because I was careful not to incur any resentment. But you stopped ying the good guy because you were sure of victory. But my victory is assured. I already have a n.

    Its confusing. Just get to the point.

    Kekeke, youre an impatient one. Okay, let me tell you. In Azalea, Roziam and Arcia, these three countries have developed new bombs. The methods are different, but the principle is the same, well, that doesnt matterwhat matters is the power.

    You dont think you can kill me with that bomb, can you?

    No, I dont think so. Im confident that I can handle it, so Im sure you wont get through to him.

    Yeah? Then why do you keep bringing up the bombs?

    Dont be in a hurry. Well, I can understand why youd be nervous.

    By rushing the conversation, Pulcine irritated Velgrynd.

    Understanding that it was the right thing to do, Velgrynd continued to go along.

    Pulcine is the kind of coward who aims for a sudden attack while they are discussing whether or not to make use of him. It would have been better to kill him quickly, but Velgrynd decided to listen to him.

    The reason is simpleto avoid troubleter.

    If hes going to tell me about the deviousness, she thinks its only polite to listen.

    In addition, one of the reasons was that she had absolute confidence that shed be fine no matter what he did to them.

    So far, Velgrynd had been listening to Pulcines story in a rtively rxed manner, but her smile fades when she hears his nextment.

    What is my n, exactly? Im going to steal those bombs and detonate them over each countrys capitals. Ive already got a hand in ce. Its toote to panic!

    The damned thing had already been exposed.

    What nonsense! If you do this, innocent people will be killed!

    Dont be ridiculous, bastard! Without leadership, the order in the country will copse as well!

    I thought the basic n of the demons n was to raise humanity as your dependents, what the hell do you think youre doing!?

    Looking around at the people who were shouting, Pulcine gave a twisted smile of amusement.

    How delightful. Yes, of course. Im also at a loss. As Masahiko says, its best to cultivate humans. But the sheer number of them outweighs the demons. Theyll live through this war-torn age, so it doesnt affect us. All we have to do is slowly gather the survivors and breed them!

    Pulcine boasted that there was no problem, although the n was dyed. The theory was ridiculous, but it wasn''t wrong.

    Realizing this, even Amari Masahiko stopped talking.

    Gensei also paled and looked at Velgrynd.

    If Pulcine was going on exining for so long, it means he was stalling. That means the n is currently in progress.

    There was no way for Gensei and his team to get out of this situation.

    Theyd have to rely on Instantaneous Movement, which only Velgrynd can perform.

    There would be many casualties, but they must still let the world leaders alone. Fortunately, now that they had all taken refuge in the Empire, Gensei thought that Velgrynd would be able to get them out.

    Thats why he watched Velgrynd but regretted not seeing it.

    Because right there was an angry goddess.

    Pulcines n was an offense to Velgrynd.

    It pains me that innocent lives must be sacrificed. If it were possible, I would prefer not to inflict that kind of sacrifice. How about it? Shall you leave me alone? If we dont interfere with each other, Ill give you the empireno, half the world, if thats what you want!

    Pulcine didnt take a chance and offered Velgrynd a deal. He thought he had a good chance with the bomb threat.

    But he had been too naive.

    Youre a lowlife. I would have let you get away with any underhanded move against me, but I wont let you get away with anything that involves that person. I wont let you go back to the Wheel of Reincarnation. Ill break your soul and give you eternal suffering.

    Velgrynds true nature is caustic 34 .

    Shes powerful, so she can afford to be, but at the flip of a switch, shell snap at the drop of a hat.

    Well, wait! Thats why I dont want to be a part of thiswait! If I dont tell them to stop, my men will detonate the bombs! Theyre already over the capitals of five countries. Lets not be so rude.

    Shut up. I took care of that a long time ago.

    What?

    What was said was iprehensible to Pulcine.

    It wasnt just Pulcine, but none of the people there could understand what Velgrynd had said.

    They didnt think she was bluffing, either, but it felt like she was telling the truth. But it would be impossible for her to be here and protect five countries at once.

    That was a narrow-minded assessment.

    Velgrynd has Parallel Existence so that can be dealt with without difficulty.

    Velgrynd would never leave Akiras side, so the kingdom was secure.

    And if shed been somewhere before, she can get there in a sh. Azalea, Arcia, Roziam and China. All of these ces had been visited by Velgrynd.

    All problems were cleared.

    The Parallel Existence was separated from Velgrynd beside Akira and scattered to the nations. They then sought out the hidden demons and blew away the new bombs.

    Thats impossible! How is that possible!?

    He tried desperately to contact his men, but they were long dead and he never heard from them. Pulcines face contorted in horror as he faced that reality.

    He finally realized just how dangerous this beautiful woman in front of him was.

    Forgive me, please forgive me

    No good.

    Theres nothing scarier than an angry, beautiful womans smile.

    Everyone in the room understood that this was the case.

    No, no

    Scorch Dragon Cardinal eleration.

    A sh of supernova-like light res up behind Pulcine as he tries to escape. Surrounded by the heat, Pulcines soul shatters and disappears.

    The damage didnt stop there.

    Velgrynd had intended to keep it on a very small scale, but it was enough to wipe out a third of the continent.

    The survivors could not help but be stunned.

    The goddess standing before them seemed both beautiful and terrifying.

    As an aside, Velgrynds Scorch Dragon Cardinal eleration had caused damage in ces unrted to this world.

    Beyond dimensions, the aftermath of the Spacetime Continuous Attack had even reached Cornu, the master of the demon possessed by Pulcine.

    His attempt to open the Underworld Gate had taken a toll on him, and he had lost his entire army and was injured so badly that it would take him decades to recover.

    The damage was horrific, but to Velgrynd, it was just another story.

    ***

    Well, a goddess would have been that way since ancient times. It would be obvious that its the fault of humanity for offending her.

    Is what Akira Sakura said after the whole situation was exined to him.

    Im sorry. I thought I had held back quite a bit, but I guess I had more power than I thought.

    It was no use saying cute things, but there was no one to rush in.

    The same is true of Akira.

    There is no choice but to forgive Velgrynd for what she did.

    Fortunately, although the damage was far worse than usual, Pulcine was the only one who died.

    The demons had disappearedpletely from the Azalea Naval Base, which was their base, all the way to the hidden cove including the military port. In the aftermath, the seas were rough and tempest-like, and various phenomena urred, but Velgrynd calmed them.

    Evaporated seawater created a storm, but her weather control saved the day.

    The lost cove had turned into magma, but that too had been taken care of.

    There were lost ntations and such, but through an unintelligible act of divine grace, a new environment was born that day, thanks to a high healing of the earth.

    Well, as a result

    Although the terrain had changed, the impact was minimal.

    Thus, the crisis of humanitys invasion by demons was safely solved with the help of a capricious goddess.

    ***

    A few yearster

    Velgrynd never again interfered in human history.

    It was because Akira Sakura didnt want it.

    Her power was transcendant.

    In this world without magic, everything would be a farce if Velgrynd traveled.

    So, she entrusted it to him.

    She told him that there would be failures, but that it was for the good of humanity to experience them.

    Spending a peaceful time beside Akira, the goddess watched over the lives of men.

    Eventually the end woulde.

    Akira Sakuras life wasing to an end.

    Velgrynd and everyone who cares about him, not to mention Akiras family and close confidants, are all gathered there.

    Meanwhile, while he was asleep, Akira woke up.

    I am happy. I had the good fortune of being loved by the goddess and have enjoyed peace. But I fear for those I will leave behinddo not allow them to fight for me. Always seek dialogue. Keep in mind. Conflicts are boring

    Those were Akira Sakurasst words.

    Conflict can be put up with when its for ones own sake. But when its for the ones you love its something you should reject. Not only for your honor, but for the honor of those you love.

    Or, conversely, you could erase their fear by inciting it, but that is an uneptable act for a nation or a religion to preside over.

    It sounds good when you say its for someone elses sake, but that is also an act of cing the me on others. One must take responsibility for their own actions, thats what Akira Sakura tried to convey.

    At the mercy of the turbulent times, Akira Sakura had a desire to aim for a world without conflict.

    He didnt know how to make ite true, but he kept thinking about the answer.

    Always being responsible for your own actions.

    Always striving to understand the other and seeking mutual understanding through dialogue.

    With these two things, Akira Sakura passed away.

    His face was filled with peace, and there was no doubt that he had passed away.

    You did your best. Im really proud of you.

    Velgrynd gently caressed the dead face of Akira Sakura. Then his body began to glow.

    The light became a small crystal and was absorbed into the shining piece of soul and disappeared. Holding it to her heart, Velgrynd cried lovingly and sadly.

    ***

    Now that Rudras reincarnation, Akira Sakura, was gone, there was no reason for Velgrynd to remain there.

    Well then, Ill be going, but you guys take care of yourselves.

    Im sure we wont see each other again, but Velgrynd swallowed her words and greeted them.

    It seems that feelings can be conveyed without saying anything.

    Ryuo-sama, I would like to follow you.

    You cant do that.

    Maybe. But Id rather have hope than give up here.

    Wellit seems like Ive been to this world a lot, and there are no absolutes in the world, you know. So good luck with that.

    Yes!

    Xianhua replied happily.

    Some of the people who were listening to that conversation had simr dreams.

    They, too, were fascinated.

    When faced with a real goddess, they couldnt help but admire her.

    And just like Xianhua, they had a secret desire to meet Velgrynd again one day.

    Then Ill see you somewhere else

    The words of exchange from Amari Masahiko represented everyones feelings at that moment.

    Velgrynd smiled slightly.

    It was unclear what she thought at that moment.

    But that smile captivated the hearts of all who saw it.

    Yeah, Ill see you around.

    Velgrynd said this happily and leapt from there.

    ***

    Decades have passed since Velgrynd left.

    Mankind was once again enjoying peace.

    There were nations with ambitions, but their noses were broken by the riots. Several generation would be and war was unlikely in the foreseeable future.

    George returned to the United States of Azalea toplete his term as president. Then he would support his son Emile.

    But Emile had set up an entertainment agency. He wanted to bring some light to a world made heavy by war and famine.

    For Emile, who had inherited the talent of the genius scammer, it was his calling. Through his work, the world was slowly getting brighter.

    He was assisted by Amari Masahiko.

    He had resigned from the army after the peace treaty was signed. He took full responsibility for the war and asked for his resignation.

    Akira Sakura, who was still alive at the time, allowed him to do so. He gave a secret order to Masahiko and released him from the empire.

    Now freed, Masahiko joined up with Emile and provided financial support. He also used his vastwork of contacts to rapidly grow the entertainment agency to the point where it was a major yer in the industry within a few years.

    It is rumored to that they had taken horribly malicious measures. He seems to have lived a life that never saw the light of day with several mafia groups in tow.

    Nevertheless, the two remained close, and when something went wrong, Emile turned to Amari Masahiko for help. This is how Emiles entertainment agency would grow into a major corporation that would be known not only in the United States of Azalea, but all over the world.

    On a different note, there is an interesting rumor about this entertainment agency.

    In Emiles office, a beautiful girl named Long Hua 35 is the main attraction. She had retired and then resumed her career after a few years.

    Naturally, she was reced by her substitutes, but it is well known that her true face remainedd shrouded in mystery.

    However, ording to the rumors, her real name is Xianhua. Strangely enough, all of Long Huas real names are the same.

    This was a dreame true.

    It''s not true that all of them are the same person, but it makes them think so, and it''s all about the fans.

    Such topics are often mentioned in weekly magazines, but it goes without saying that they are really the same person.

    Xianhua had gained an immortal body by taking in Velgrynds dragon energy (aura). She relied on Amari Masahiko because it would be difficult to live in a human society as it was.

    Xianhua was not the only one.

    Others, such as Li Jinlong and Delia, had defeated the demons on their own and took on the power of a Sage.

    There were others who had also done that.

    Most of the soldiers possessed by the demons had been freed by Velgrynd. However, some of them were awakened as a Sage.

    Such people also gathered under the leadership of Amari Masahiko.

    It was then that Araki Gensei and Minamoto Saburo-san taught these men the Oboro Shinmei Ryu, the sword that wards off evil. This is how the next generation of strong men would grow up.

    A supranational anti-demon organization would be born from these men.

    Their battle would not end until the promised day.

    Emile, who was always aloof and easygoing, was behaving strangely.

    He seemed to be oblivious to his surroundings and began mumbling to himself.

    This was not the action of a demon, but a human being, and it was an instinct of Emiles. The others, who didnt realize it, watched with bated breath to see if Emile was onto something.

    Yes, thats right. Shes here, shes in this world! If thats the case, then were going to have to

    Emiles mind is filled with pure fear.

    Thats the emotion the demon feels.

    And the other is subterfuge.

    It was Emile, the grandson of Laurent Hayes, showing his true colors by continuing to deceive the demons by pretending to be dominated.

    The demons domination was shattered by the fear that Velgrynd might turn against him. Seizing the opportunity, Emile, as a human, fought back desperately.

    The memory of the smile of a beautiful woman who loved him like a grandmother, like a mother, like a sister, haunts his mind. It is the memory of an embrace that gives him absolute security.

    The name of the woman who held his young self to her breast, was Velgrynd.

    And so Emile called her name.

    To ask for all the help he could get.

    Help me, Gryn nee-chan!

    Emiles exmation was the key to the sudden change.

 Volume 17 - Ch 3

    The Turbulent Days

    My name is Calgurio.

    I was the captain of the Armored Corps, the most powerful force in the Eastern Empire.

    I was just in stupid at the time.

    I said I was doing this for Rudra, but all I had cared about was my own personal glory.

    Now I understand what a career is worth.

    Thats rightforty years ago, amander in chief of a corps from a lowly noblemans familythats a big promotion. The baron of a married family was a trivial thing from the corpsmander''s point of view, but I think its understandable that Ive grown up, although it is still no excuse.

    Of course, Im still reflecting on it now.

    I was kicked out of my married house.

    I was born a knight and was chosen to be the son-inw of a barons daughter, who was of the main family at the time.

    Well, I was happy.

    I was happy, until she left me after she cheated on me.

    My wifewell, my ex-wife, was an irreceable existence to me at the time. I thought she was the most beautiful woman in the world, and I thought I was the luckiest man in the empire.

    I thought she felt the same way, and thats why she chose me, but I was wrong. It was my own selfishness.

    A yearter, when my father-inw died, she left me.

    I still remember that.

    Sometimes I have nightmares, but Ill never forget the look on her face and the lines she said.

    Didnt you have a good dream? You were a poor knight, and now you were able to imitate a nobleman. But thats over. I was forced to marry you at your fathers behest, and now Im free too. But its your fault. Because you wont have offspring.

    I was so desperate I wanted to scream.

    I didnt know what she was talking about when she told me, but then I saw the bottle she was holding, like she was trying to show me, and it hit me.

    She must have drugged me.

    I could haveined and taken her to court. But the Baron family was an enemy.

    Its bad enough that my ex-wife had a merchant lover who had money. The Barons servants had already been bought off.

    The merchant was an aristocrat.

    The ex-wife was able to live in thep of luxury.

    My father-inw always told me to be frugal and proud of my aristocratic ways

    I guess she didnt like that either.

    Well, its a littlete for that.

    At that time, I had no idea that I would everin to the main family who took care of me as a close rtive. Besides, my parents had died in an ident when I was a kid, so there was no one to argue with.

    So, well, I had no choice but to leave the baronial family and be driven out.

    Looking back, that was the impetus.

    Betrayed by someone I loved, and the anger and hatred that drove me on.

    I was going to move up and show them all off someday.

    I was young, just in my 20s. I used the resentment as energy, and I worked my ass off.

    I went through deadlines and took great pride in my work.

    I wasnt afraid to get dirty, and I got really good at subterfuge.

    I got to know some merchants and helped them as much as I could with my authority. I epted back taxes and turned them over to the nobility to make connections.

    I worked my way up to the rank of colonel by my mid-20s.

    I had graduated from knights school, so I started out as an adjutant. In other words, I was on track to be promoted within a year or two.

    That was pretty fast, but it worked because power was everything in the Empire.

    By then, I had taken control of the military and started forming my own faction.

    Thats when I met Minits.

    Minits was an aristocrat, but he was a freak who loved to fight. He was better than me back home and yet he dared to go to war.

    But there was no doubt he was capable, so I took advantage of him. I wasnt expecting him to like me or respect me, so I had him ask for money without batting an eye.

    Minits was a funny guy, so he took it upon himself to obey orders. Well, he was a guy who probably also took advantage of me, so it was mutual.

    It was only a consensus of interests, but it was also clear that I trusted him. As long as I was fighting for my career, Id always be looking for the battlefield. I knew that if Minits used me like that, I would follow any order.

    Because wherever I die, I would die with no family, so I was able to do it without fear.

    And so Minits and I formed a strange bond of trust.

    And then Kansas joined in.

    A man who was known to be a problem for the military, but for me, it was only a matter of time before he was avable for use.

    He passed.

    And apparently it was the same for Kansas.

    Kansas liked me because I was willing to go along with any n. Although he was a devastating force at the time, he had a low reputation in the military.

    He often vited orders and ran amok on the battlefield. I think he was transferred to me because he was too difficult to deal with, but he was good to me.

    Not only did I know how to use Minits, I knew how to use Kansas as well.

    I was able to n and execute strategies that ordinary people would have hesitated to do.

    And by doing so, I gained a position where no one couldin about me.

    ***

    I worked my way up to general by my early 30s.

    By then, I was out on the front lines less and less.

    The poisoning Id gotten as a young man had blinded me in my left eye.

    That didnt diminish my powers, though. With the newfound power of science at that time, it was easy to make an borate prosthetic eye.

    However, to throw the opponents off guard, I covered my left eye with an eye patch.

    I thought my powers would fade with age, but I became more and more energetic. I looked like I was suitable for my age, but inside I was bubbling with energy.

    I was always in my prime and thats why I wasnt afraid of anything.

    I was interested in fighting the pecking order, but I preferred to control the military.

    The generals position was within reach. I thought that would give me more power than bing an Imperial Knight of His Majesty.

    I was adding to my own faction.

    I used Master Gadra to help bolster the Armored Corps war effort. I got my merchants to provide money for modernization efforts.

    I was steadily making preparations and building up my resume, and at the age of just over thirty I was appointed as one of the three great generals of the Empire.

    The springtime of my life was just around the corner.

    So perhaps thats why I was reminded of it during breaks in my work.

    I wondered what the people who kicked me out were doing.

    When I had people look into it, I found that I was behind on the ropes for nothing.

    I didnt have to wonder why but I had an answer.

    At the time, I had the power to destroy them. And it was too much.

    It was well known that they had kicked me out, so my men did what they had to do even though I didnt do anything.

    They didnt do anything directly.

    They just quietly talked to their clients about the situation.

    I wondered if they were still associating with the people who did that to me.

    That being said, the purveyors would have had no choice but to discover. I was sting my way up thedder at a breakneck pace.

    To begin with, unlike the west, the empires economic system did not allow for a free economy.

    Officially, only the nobility and the military were allowed to do business.

    The nobles have the right to have their merchants do business on their behalf. These hired traders were hired to do business for them and get paid from the profits.

    Thats why the man who took my wife away from me wanted a position of nobility.

    He worked for a high lord and allowed his sons and daughters to join him. This way he could legitimately acquire the rights to do business the old-fashioned way.

    Well, its a good thing I became a baron, but I guess I made a miscalction in my rise to power.

    The man who wasughed at and dismissed, was indeed, a general.

    Theres a huge budget allocated to the military, so they can buy and sell goods. And the generals have the right to let the merchants operate it.

    Generals are in charge of one of the three major legions, as one should know. But this power was even greater than that of the earl.

    Theres no reason topete with a barony, and business was slowing down as clients were turning their backs on him.

    I remember feeling hollow when I heard that.

    I wanted to avenge him myself, but without my knowledge, it was already being aplished.

    But I knew that was not the way to go about it.

    Id been betrayed once. Showing a sweet response here will draw in more people toe after me.

    One of the reasons I had risen to the rank of general is that I had no offspring.

    When you advance in the army, you get a noble title when you leave. The position rises ording to the rank.

    And I dont have children, and I never will.

    No matter how high they give, its only for one generation. Its no threat to other noblemen.

    Aristocrats hate it when military men have wealth, just as the military hates it when noblemen have private armies.

    Gold for the aristocrats, armed forces for the military.

    This division ofbor is what matters.

    It was taboo for them to interfere in each others domain.

    Thats why many of the senior military personnel are unmarried.

    There was also the reason that those who do not have a family can stand on the battlefield, but the struggle for power with the nobility was more important.

    Thinking about that, it urred to me.

    Those who betrayed me were destitute but not destroyed, werent they?

    And then I had an epiphany.

    I still had some work to do.

    They could live on because they were noblemen.

    Although they are low-ranking nobles, they have the status of a baron, and can live off of a sry.

    Then, I must seize that position and destroy it once and for all.

    And there are others who must be purged as well.

    That mans father and the count who had his father working for him.

    If it werent for these men, I wouldnt be in this misery.

    I have to destroy my enemies, or Ill get hurt.

    But if I was to destroy the count, I would have needed to grow stronger.

    From that moment on

    I wanted to aim higherto gain the power to surpass any person.

    ***

    And then I was just so selfless from then on. It was like I didnt understand but couldnt see how low and dirty the means of what I was doing was.

    Well, yeah. You werent exactly pleasant to watch back then.

    Then you should have abandoned me. If you had, you would have been the generals.

    It wasnt my thing. And I didnt hate you. Like Kansas, I just wanted to hang out with guys I liked, good guys or bad, you know?

    Hmm! Youre a strange guy.

    Im aware of that, but I dont want to be told that by you.

    With that said, the men wereughing at each other.

    A scrawny soldier in his forties and a man in a nice suitCalgurio and Minits.

    They are talking in thebyrinth at the elfs shop which is reserved for special members only. They are having a private meeting there while enjoying a variety of drinks.

    The shop was originally only open to a select clientele. They could only enter it on their own or after a background check and payment of the required fee.

    It wasnt open to two people, but since the summit meeting, it had been open to the Imperial leadership.

    It was Rimurus intention to put the war behind them and build a better rtionship for the future.

    Of course, they both understood that.

    Thats why they were taking advantage of him like this without reservation.

    Well, then, as you know, I took control of the army and nned to take over the world. And then we were defeated by this country, and here we are.

    Defeated is a mild way of putting it. Not even being a match is a more urate description.

    Huh, no doubt.

    Im happy, too. Because Ive seen firsthand that there are other unimaginably powerful people in this world besides His Majesty Rudra and MarshalVelgrynd-sama.

    I dont understand the hobby, but I suppose it would have been nice if you were satisfied. So, are you going to make peace with your younger brother?

    Calgurio asked, and Minits smiled grimly and nodded.

    Ill have to. Hes the marquis that unites the nobility. As long as Masayuki-sama is crowned as the new emperor, its our job to support him to the best of our ability.

    Minits was from a marquis family.

    He joined the army because he wanted topete on his own resourcefulness alone, and he has risen to his current position. But there is no doubt that at the level of the Marquis family, their influence was tremendous and they were heavily favored.

    Nevertheless, Minits was capable, and no one ever made fun of him. Anyone who did would have seen the foolishness with their own eyes.

    Minits family is the current Marquis, seeded by his younger brother. His brother has a lot of resentment towards him for the trouble hes caused.

    Calgurio was relieved to hear that the two sides would reconcile.

    Well, in my case, reconciliation is out of the question.

    Calgurio thinks that it is better than his own situation.

    Minits is fortunate in that he is able to use the familys financial resources as he pleases. Hes been overlooked because hes good enough to deserve it, but if hes ipetent then the prodigal brother is also a good ce.

    In fact, Calgurio and others dont like that all that much

    They heard that he wasining about his brother being a cheatbut all they coulde up with was that anyone would think so.

    It is probably a man like Minits who is allowed to do that.

    Thats why Calgurio also nails this irresponsible man.

    Right. It will be a pleasure to work with you, new Prime Minister.

    Although Minutes escaped from his duties as an aristocrat, he was appointed to the position of the Prime Minister, who has the highest authority in the empire. It was under the new system with Masayuki as the emperor.

    We were in a meeting before, and I said that for the sake of air but after thinking it over, its impossible for me to be an Emperor! Ive never studied politics or anything like thatno, I learned about it in a high school ss, but I only did a little research on the scope of the test for that!

    Hahaha, you cant take it back now, okay?

    After all!?

    Of course! Im getting by myself, so you can do it too!

    Youre too optimistic, Rimuru-san! Im not joking, dont be so irresponsible!

    Hahaha, its okay. Everyone will help you too.

    Those eyes say that its definitely someone else''s affair, right? I mean, youre looking happy to have more friends!

    Thats not true. Besides, you have a partner that you can rely on. Like that Minits-san over there. I think hes pretty reliable.

    This was the conversation between Masayuki and Rimuru.

    Minits was also there and his eyes met with Rimurus, which was a mistake.

    It was a probably whim of Rimurus, but it was not good to stand out in the meeting. It seems that Rimuru was perceived as a capable man, and he was appointed as a consultant to Masayuki.

    And the result was the prime minister position.

    Minits cant help butugh at that.

    It was a consultation that he couldn''t say that he didn''t like as Masayuki had asked him to assist properly.

    It was partly because of the fear of Velgrynds gaze, and partly because Minits had grown to like Masayuki, after all.

    The problem here is the current Prime Minister, and Minits thinks that he will be his assistant. Since only the Emperor has the right to appoint the Prime Minister, it would be unreasonable for the current Prime Minister toin.

    He mightin, but that was of no concern to Minits. It was enough to say that he knew of a scarier being, so he just needed to convince him first.

    So, well, theres something to be said for that.

    He had more than enough education as a nobleman and heir to the marquis family. Although he wasnt aware of it, his grades were not bad either.

    He might struggle a bit, but it was Minits self-assessment that he was good enough to be able to practice.

    So Minits turns around and asks Calgurio.

    Dont make meugh, Minister of Military Affairs. Youre the only one left of the three major corps leaders, so your responsibility is heavy.

    Under Emperor Masayukis new regime, the military was going to be significantly reformed.

    If Minutes bes the Prime Minister, the current one will be the Deputy Prime Minister.

    Side by side with him would be the minister of the military.

    The military should be led by a politician, ording to Masayukis superficial knowledge. He put it into words and reflected it in the new system.

    However, Masayuki only asked, Does the minister control the army?

    He did not mean to suggest that they should do so, and he did not advocate civilian control to more urately select ministers from the civilian poption to control the military.

    Thus, it was perceived as a misguided system in which ministers of the military were chosen from amongst the military personnel.

    In other words, Calgurio was to serve as both a military general and minister of the military.

    Calgurioughs and replies to Minits question.

    You dont need to worry about that. We wont be going to war for a while, and to begin with, as long as Im at the head of the army, I wont be carrying a sword pointed at a foreign country.

    It was an honest feeling, mixed with some resignation.

    In fact, given the geography of the empire, from now on, there would be no neighboring countries where war could be waged.

    The Jura-Tempest Federation and the realm controlled by Demon Lord Milim were out of the question, but the Armed Nation of Dwargon was also impossible. If they are to have their support, they must build a friendly rtionship with them from now on.

    An invasion of the Western Nations by airship would be possible, but it was unlikely that Demon Lord Rimuru would allow it.

    In other words, there was nowhere to turn.

    There was still a chance that a great nobleman who controlled the local military could rebel without knowing what to do with himself.

    Weve already sent word to the country. Its about time for the nobles to react, but whats the word from Krishna-dono?

    So far, nothing significant has happened. Your younger brothers faction has pledged their loyalty to the new Emperor. Perhaps thats why the others havent been able to get around.

    Were talking about a move, though. But at least I dont think the former sons of His Majesty the Emperor and the families with blood rtives are going to remain silent.

    Well. Since youre going to advertise that His Majesty Rudra has fallen, some will think its your turn. And for that, we need Velgrynd-samas approval

    I would argue that there is no point in saying that the corpse of the Emperor''s room is meaningless. The fools will not even realize making that statement is to make an enemy of Velgrynd-sama.

    Calgurio thinks that Minits is right, too.

    Honestly, they werent afraid of the aristocrats being hostile.

    There is no doubt that Calgurio and his men would win, but the problem would be the decline in national power.

    Emperor Rudras impostor, or rather Calgurios real one since he had been in service with him for so long, was nning to bring chaos to the world with invading races called Aggressors.

    In fact, it is precisely because Calgurio and the others who have opposed the entity that calls itself Cornu that they understand this threat so well. It was a good thing that Velgrynd hade, or else they would have been wiped out.

    The being who was Emperor Rudra wanted to be a god himself. The possibility that the emperors subjects would be used as pawns in his quest could not be ruled out.

    However, no one knew the Emperors face, so if someone imed he was Emperor Rudra, they could just stab him in the back.

    Perhaps the enemy would not do such a thing. This is because the Emperor Rudra that Calgurio knew was a hard-hearted man who would not tolerate discussion.

    We dont have time for quarrels amongst ourselves, though.

    Youre right. Well, Ill be rooting around.

    Please do. Ill gather the surviving Imperial Knights on my end and reorganize the Imperial Guardians as soon as possible.

    This will be Calgurios first job as Minister of Military Affairs, but it would be harder than he expected.

    After all, he has to start by finding out how many survivors there still are.

    To begin with, Calgurio doesnt know about the missions of all the Imperial Knights. He doesnt know where they are, so he needs to start by contacting them.

    Besides, some will even try to leave the army.

    In fact, Krishna was one of them.

    He worships Demon Lord Rimuru like a god and was willing to say that he was retiring and moving to the monster country.

    Calgurio had asked him to stay until the situation was settled, but he was reluctant to do so. It was Adalman whom Calgurio consulted for advice, and he said to Krishna, Never leave a stone unturned. If the empire remains in turmoil, Rimuru-sama will be saddened. With that, he convinced him.

    Hearing this, Krishna said, As you wish! You are right, Adalman-sama, what a wonderful speech. I only wanted to be saved. I have to deliver Rimuru-samaspassion to the innocent subjects of the empire too! He was saying something different from what Caliglio thought, but it was good to know that it worked.

    They say if you care too much, you will lose.

    Krishna wasnt the only one who had expressed a desire to change sides. Some of the Imperial Guard have begun to say they want to stay here in Tempest.

    He could understand why they wanted to stay, so he didnt want to impose on them. But that would mean a decline in their forces, and thats why he had to figure out what to do.

    Many of their men died in this battle.

    This was not a matter to be rehashed, since they had iting, but there was also no reason not to think about how to deal with it.

    There were only two survivors of the Single Digits, Bonnie and Jiu.

    From now on, however, they would be under the control of Masayuki, acting as his bodyguards. It is more than enough to have Velgrynd, but they would be useful for consulting and for other small tasks, which was why they were able to fulfill Masayukis request.

    Calgurio intended to take this opportunity to reform the Emperors Imperial Guard Knights.

    It would depend on how many survivors there are, but he would not settle for a hundred. He was going to abolish the hierarchy and stop giving meaning to numbers.

    A certain amount of strength and loyalty to Emperor are two prerequisites, but Calgurio ns to widen the door a bit in the future.

    He was going to send them in groups of three to various provincial cities to fortify the Empires defense.

    With three men, even if they couldntpete with the top Aggressors, they could buy some time. Ideally, they should be able to respond flexibly, such as by rushing to their aid.

    There are more than a hundred cities in the empire, so their numbers are not sufficient at this point in time. There are still some provincial armies left intact, so theyd get by for the time being by coordinating with others.

    At any ratehe was prepared to focus on those who had reached the Sage ss

    Its tough on us both

    Yeah. But its been strangely rewarding.

    When Minits muttered this to himself as he popped his drink, Calgurio nodded his head in agreement. And so, the words spilled out, but they were surprisingly Calgurios true feelings.

    The feeling of working for the Empire had brought Calgurio more fulfilling days than when he had only thought about move up in the military.

    Besides, now that we have heard of His Majesty Rimurus ns, it is imperative to restore security and political stability to the Empire. If we dont get on board, we will be left behind in the future world.

    With Rimuru and Masayukis approval, construction of the railroad begins. Perhaps in less than a few years, they could see a future in which the transportationwork would bepleted in the empire.

    The stories hed been told at the meeting alone were shuddering, but there was more to the story.

    And that thing. ns to control the skies of the world, right? That man is outrageous. I know he said it over drinks, but Im told he doesnt get drunk. So that means he meant what he said.

    Hmm. Zamud seemed to have been inspired by it, too, since he volunteered to help. Well, hes more of an engineer than a soldier, so thats what hes really all about.

    Is it possible to connect countries with a Magic Train on the ground and mass-produce airspace in the sky to stabilize the sales channels? Its a frightening idea, but it will be realized. After all, the only thing they asked for inpensation for this defeat was airspace rights. And rather than not needing anything else, he even provided us support. How can we refuse them?

    It doesnt matter, since His Majesty Masayuki approved. Whats important is the future.

    With that said, Calgurio thinks.

    This country is weird 36 .

    The remarks of Demon Lord Rimuru, who says that he has an idea, would be put into a feasible n the very next day, if not within the same day.

    The n to mass-produce the airships had been nned from the moment he learned that the Empire owned it, but it was still unusual for them to prepare a development base for it so easily.

    A floor in thebyrinth has now be a ce to improve the airships.

    Zamud works there happily, and he says every day that this is where heaven was found because he can get as much material as he wants without worrying about the budget.

    The excitement of being back from the dead seems to have added to that.

    Calgurio envies Zamud for being so obedient to his own desires, but he can only wish Zamud good luck in maintaining the friendship between Tempest and the Empire.

    Aside from Zamud, the important things is the future.

    In Demon Lord Rimurus vision, it seemed that he would be willing to help with maintenance within the Empire as well. Now that the Empires power has declined, there was no choice but to take advantage of this.

    The Empire could provide thebor as well, so he doesnt intend to make it a rtionship where they can only rely on them. In that regard, Calgurio thinks very differently from the Western Nations.

    He is an intelligent man capable of making calm judgment as long as he is not blinded by lust.

    And so, he came to the conclusion that domestic stabilization was the priority when considering what was needed.

    The empire is not in shambles at present.

    However, the details of the defeat would undoubtedly unsettle the subjects.

    A fallen family would see Demon Lord Rimuru as an enemy to be reckoned with. Krishna and others are taking steps to prevent this from happening, but Calgurio must also take action.

    Also, as Minits is wary of, the movements of the higher nobles are a cause for concern.

    If they are to grow, they must wee the Tempest forces into the empire to ensure that they dont run into the wrong people.

    There are a lot of problems.

    Thats a big responsibility.

    Yeah. But Calgurio

    What?

    Dont you think its His Majesty Rimuru who has it harder than we do?

    Hmm?

    Thats true, Calgurio thought.

    When asked about their ns for future development, they had desperately started to move ordingly.

    But thats only natural.

    Restoring their countrys security and developing it is not a job that they have been ordered to do. It is a job that they should work hard at every day while wishing for the betterment of their own country.

    A conflict with Aggressors are inevitable in the near future. And yet, they have realized that they feel little concern about it.

    Its all because they had been given so much to do.

    Buried in them, the anxiety was dispersed.

    I see. He just didnt want us to worry

    I suppose so, but maybe thats not all there is to it. Maybe His Majesty Rimuru intends to take care of the Aggressors on his own. Or maybe he doesnt think of them as much of a problem, but

    It was bound to be a big deal.

    And yet Lord Rimuru spoke more about future developments than the aforementioned subject.

    Calgurio and the Minits were impressed by his noble imposing attitude.

    Perhaps it was the same with King Gazel as well.

    To Demon Lord Rimuru, Aggressors were nothing more than a trivial matter.

    Was that vanity or genuineness?

    Minits thinks its Rimurus way of saying he doesnt want Calgurio and the others to be worried.

    But Calgurio cant help but think the same way as Minits.

    If we really want to deal with the Aggressors on our own, then we should find something we can do to help. At the very least, we must stop anyone from causing a civil war and dragging us down.

    Calgurio is ready to go.

    Calgurio and Minits left the restaurant after drinking for about an hour.

    The next day, they left for home after setting up Masayuki as a portable shrine.

    ***

    Back in the Imperial Capital, Calgurio has a busy day ahead of him.

    There are some damaged areas around the capital, but there was no need to do anything right now to rebuild. Thats because it was going to be done by coboration with Rimuru and his team.

    So, the first priority was to reorganize the military.

    The generals who survivedthose who all came back to lifeare all back home, and have been given a new mission.

    In any case, the first priority was to keep the peace, and taking into ount the report from Krishna, he sent his troops to the unsettled provinces to warn them.

    Fortunately, the 700,000 soldiers were loyal to Calgurio.

    Even those who wanted to settle in the monster country were cooperative this time. That was because Demon Lord Rimuru had promised to hire them after the turmoil was over.

    Well, you can think it over instead of just deciding right away.

    He gathered the soldiers in the arena and gave a speech.

    After Rigurd had exined the detailed conditions of settlement, Rimuru had told them himself.

    By the way, Rimuru didnt try to persuade anyone, but he did leave it up to the individuals will, and about 200,000 people who heard his speech were motivated to move on.

    Aggressor races, huh? Im going to beat them to a pulp!

    And, well, the fighting spirit was growing.

    Although they lost their soul power, their bodies were still altered. Even now, some of them can rival A-ranked yers and are a force to be reckoned with.

    This is how Calgurio wants to somehow stabilize the imperial capital. But here, an even bigger problem arose.

    The real trouble was the nobles.

    There was no end to the number of nobles seeking to meet with them, and this was putting a strain on Calgurios work.

    Even if he wanted to decline, there were some big names that might be useful in the future.

    Minits lobbying and Krishnas persuasion helped, and no major disruptions urred, but it was certainly a drain on their spirits.

    Then Demon Lord Rimuru dispatched a helping hand.

    It was Testarossa, the beautiful white (nc) demon.

    The first thing Testarossa did was deliver a speech to control the people.

    Completely ignoring the nobles, she appeased the subjects who had not yete to terms with the shock of defeat.

    It seemed like a task unsuitable for these fear-mongering demons. However, it wasnt surprising. Demons feed on emotions, so they were perfect for relieving the fear and anxiety of the subjects.

    Im surprised. I never thought that the White Primordial (nc)Testarossa-dono, who once tormented the empire, would care so much about the people.

    Of course. It is my job that I have been given by our king, Rimuru-sama.

    Thats true, but its more, pardon me, rough, because I didnt expect such measures to be adopted.

    Calgurio gives his thoughts as he sheds greasy sweat.

    He regretted it right after he said it, thinking it was too straightforward, but Testarossa let it slide without a second thought.

    We cant let bad publicity get in the way of Rimuru-sama, in any unlikely event. We can be cautious, but that wouldnt be as effective. And its hard to adjust? Eating up all the emotions can have a detrimental effect on you.

    Calgurio paled in thought, but Testarossa would never make such a mistake. She told Moss to control her subordinates, and sess was guaranteed.

    But her words were also true.

    It is difficult to control peoples emotions with moderate methods alone.

    The deaths of their rtives and the transfer of the throne from Rudra to Masayuki confused the subjects. Not all the sorrow of the subjects has disappeared, and there are still seeds of anxiety and dissatisfaction.

    In that regard, Calgurios deployment of security forces in various locations had prevented riots and skirmishes from urring.

    If you dont like it, its easier to kill everyone in your family if you want.

    Ha, ha, ha, ha. Youve got to be kidding me.

    Its not a joke, Calgurio thought.

    He knew that the White Primordial (nc) was trouble. This strengthened his respect for Rimuru who can control Testarossa.

    The subjects have calmed down to some extent, and fortunately no one was foolish enough to rise up in arms.

    Relieved at this point, Testarossa had the next move in mind.

    They decided to unveil the new Emperor Masayuki as the quickest and most effective way to provide mental care for the people.

    The point is, it was a coronation ceremony for him.

    Testarossa thought that if Masayuki gave a speech on the asion, his subjects would feel that a new era had arrived.

    What, me!?

    Is there a problem?

    Nonothing

    He was willing to ept it.

    There were tears in his eyes, but they were worthless in front of Testarossas smile.

    Oh my, how dare you make Masayuki cry?

    Velgrynd interrupted.

    To which Testarossa replied tly.

    Im sorry, but I have no taste for such things.

    Two beautiful women looking at each other with smiles on their faces.

    Their gazes sh, and a terrible pressure was being exerted. 37

    It is mainly Masayuki and Calgurio who suffer the damage.

    Praying to go back home, Masayuki passes it by.

    Calgurio overcame the crisis by emptying his mind.

    Anyway, Masayukis coronation became a reality.

    Countless subjects filled the square in front of the Imperial Castle.

    Looking down on them, Masayuki stood on a balcony in the upper part of the castle.

    He came to the empire with Velgrynds Transfer, so this is practically his first appearance as the Emperor.

    With his appearance as an Emperor, he may seem dignified if he doesnt say anything.

    At the appointed time, Calgurio delivers a speech.

    Then Minits, as the new Prime Minister, gives an exnation.

    The war was a great defeat.

    As a result, Rudra, the former emperor, had died.

    The Chosen Hero Masayuki was crowned as the new Emperor.

    Masayukis intercession has established peace with the monster kingdom, and he would seek to improve the rtionship between the two sides in the future.

    Along with this, diplomatic rtions have been established with the Dwarven Kingdom.

    And so on.

    In order to shut down Michaels Castle Guard, they needed to convince the subjects that Rudra was the source of all evil. Pretend he was dead, and the number of people who believe in Rudra would be reduced.

    Then he introduced Masayuki as the new emperor, but many people were confused as to how that could be possible without any blood rtion. To convince them, Velgrynd steps forward.

    Calm yourselves, fools. My name is Velgrynd, the Scorch Dragon.

    The subjects were upset when they were told the same name as the Empires guardian dragon.

    No waywas what was going through everyones minds.

    In ordance with the Imperial Code of Ethics, I hereby appoint Chosen Hero Masayuki as the new Emperor!

    With that deration, Velgrynd visibly unleashed her overwhelming supremacy. A divine crimson cardinal aura is visible to all.

    In addition, she held out her hand in a certain direction and called out to the subjects.

    Behold. A salute to the new Emperor!

    As she finished, the ming God Mountain erupted into mes. This massive eruption was clearly visible from the Imperial Capital.

    What would be too horrific to even call a cannonball was no less than a joke to Velgrynd. But the astonishment of the subjects who saw it was beyond words.

    No one doubted it.

    One might say it was a premeditated situation and triggered to erupt with magic or bombsbut the volcano was gods mountain. One had no idea what kind of anger they might incur if they did so without asking permission from the mountains resident Scorch Dragon.

    No one in the Imperial City would dare to act so recklessly.

    Thats not all.

    Several volcanic bombs hadnded on the imperial city, but they were all flung off by an invisible barrier.

    That was truly the true nature of the guardian dragon!

    A-a god

    Its real! The real dragon god!

    The guardian dragon of the empire has appeared in front of us!

    They were very excited.

    Over time, they also began to understand the gravity of the situation.

    Velgrynd confirmed it. The subjects finally understand that Chosen Hero Masayuki has truly be an emperor.

    At the same time

    Masayuki was well known in the Eastern Empire, though not as well-known in the Western Nations.

    Oh my gosh, really!?

    Dont tell me its Shining Masayuki!

    Isnt he the greatest Chosen Hero in the world? Of course, even Demon Lord Rimuru cant resist!

    The impression that was heard somewhere flies around, as if members of a theaterpany were spreading it.

    That is the quality of Masayuki. He is famous everywhere.

    And this time, Masayukis power has been enhanced. The effect was far-reaching and had a huge impact on those who knew him.

    As a result, there was the usual cheers.

    Ma-sa-yu-ki! Ma-sa-yu-ki!!

    The cheers were so harmonious that it seemed as if the voices of the subjects were united.

    Velgrynd and others said, Fools. Its so impolite to call the Emperor by his name they thought, but Masayuki himself was not angry, so he acquiesced.

    It was Testarossa who was the most upset.

    The empire''s subjects misunderstood that Demon Lord Rimuru couldn''t resist Masayuki, and she had the feeling that she would boil over if this continued, but this was a n drawn by Testarossa herself. There was no one toin about, so she had to put up with it.

    And so, it was very easy for Masayuki to be epted by his subjects in the Empire.

    And on that day, he was proimed to the nations of the world as Emperor of the Eastern Empire, the Nasca Namrium Ulmeria United Eastern Empire.

    ***

    The subjects of the Imperial City have been revitalized by the newfound hope.

    The grief of those who have lost their loved ones would not heal quickly, but they have begun to move forward.

    Their daily lives are returning to normal.

    Calgurio knew it was all the more gratifying.

    However, the days of true rest were far from over.

    A troublesome opponent, the nobility, was on the move now that the new Emperor had been officially appointed.

    With Minits in charge, hed like to leave the highborn to their own devices, but it was for Calgurios convenience, and the nobles dont care who is in charge of the new emperor.

    Thats why the requests for visits are alwaysing in.

    When he looked at Testarossa for help, she said without a care in the world,

    These are the noblemen of this country, but Im sure most of them wont be a problem.

    Calgurio had no idea what that meant, but he understood that Testarossa was behind it.

    Since Minits was working on his job, Calgurio decided to focus on what he could do.

    Then, within days, the requests for visits began to dwindle.

    Excuse me sir, but Testarossa-dono, but, well

    Calgurio wondered if she had threatened them, but he couldnt say it out loud.

    Thedy sipping her tea elegantly in front of him was the White Primordial (nc), long feared by the Empire. Its hard to believe even if told, but its an undeniable fact.

    Thats why it was no surprise that she was using some terrifying method.

    Oh, excuse me. Why do you look at me with such terror? Ive never done anything wrong.

    Thats what all bad people think.

    But saying it was different.

    It was impossible for Calgurio, who felt so cramped in his own office, to tell the queen-like Testarossa what he really thought of her, its unavoidable.

    No, hahahaha, Im not doubting you. Im grateful every day that youve been such a great help. And so, Im just wondering how you managed to keep the noblemen quiet.

    I wish you wouldnt have to worry about that and just go about your business.

    Testarossa sipped her tea.

    Then she let out one elegant sigh.

    Well, all right. Ill feel awkward taking credit for it, so Ill let you know. As I told you before, the nobles werent much of a problem.

    So, why is that?

    First of all, the nobles of this empire were divided into three major factions. Of course, you knew that, didnt you?

    Yes. The warlord aristocracy, led by the Marquis family, Minits family, was the central figure of the Emperor faction. The rest are the local nobility.

    The military, a powerful organization, was the cornerstone of the empire. There were many nobles who joined its steadfast authority, and the warlord nobles boasted great power. The marquis, the second highest-ranking nobleman, was the head of this faction, which meant that few high-ranking nobles participated in it.

    In contrast, the aristocracy was dominated by those with ties to the Emperor. This faction symbolizes the authority of the aristocracy in that they must be at least an earl or higher to have a say in the matter.

    The provincial aristocracy is the least coherent faction. They are made up of nobles who individually have no voice in the opinions that suit them. It could be said that they are only one faction because their interests are aligned.

    At Calgurios exnation, Testarossa nodded lightly.

    Thats right. The warlord aristocracy first, but this was like the Minits were in control of it, wasnt it?

    No, no, Minits and his younger brother dont get along

    No. Yhat thing was, you know, just sulking.

    What?

    You were almost overwhelmed by the sense of responsibility when your respected brother gave the marquis house. So, by rebelling and showing it, he was telling himself that he could protect his physical appearance while still being able to convince himself. 38

    Well, that sounds like a weak human storyand Testarossa replied with augh.

    Is that true? I mean, how did you find out that it was?

    Se-cr-et. Youve heard the saying, The less you know, the happier you are, 39  havent you?

    That fact was investigated by Moss overnight.

    Moss is overworked by Testarossa and has no time to rest.

    Perhaps the worst victim in Tempest is Moss, the demon noble known as the King of Ashes. However, he cantin about that and is quietly working his way through the dark enviroment.

    Moss sneaked into the Marquis house and read the diary hidden in the masters office. He reported this secret to Testarossa.

    Even with the strict security of the marquis house, there was no way to pull one over Moss. He also found out other information that would improve rtions and casually told Minits about it.

    It would normally be a crime, butFor those who were unaware that they had done something wrong, this was nothing bad.

    Hahaha, thats right. Of course, I believe in Testarossa-dono. Its a wild thing to ask any more questions.

    Calgurio ran away.

    It was a very wise decision.

    Despite the odds, the rtionship between Minits and his brother were on the mend. Then, if it was all good, he decided to just let the results speak for themselves.

    Im convinced about the warlord nobility, but how are the other factions doing?

    Well, the provincial aristocrats have expressed their willingness to return.

    What? When did it happen?

    They were the first to fall. Because the most important thing to those guys was that the people of the territory didnt go hungry. The stabilization of the countryside had been aplished, so the rest of them were still worried about future politics.

    Hah

    By the way, do you know what the local noblemens financial resources are?

    Its mainly from the crops that are harvested in each fiefdom. They pay taxes after they get enough to meet their needs. The surplus is then sold to their merchants. Those sales are what I understand to be the source of ie for the local lords.

    Well, youre generally right, but youre partly wrong.

    Calgurio felt strange.

    How was he, at the pinnacle of the Imperial Army, being lectured on economics by the demon that had once afflicted the Empire? He couldnt figure it out, and was perplexed.

    How can a demon know so much about human economic activities? Im from a lowly provincial aristocracy so I knew, but I dont think that even your average high ranking soldier knows that

    Moreover, his answer is not a perfect score.

    There are other local crafts and specialties that can be done by hand, but he doesnt think thats the right answer. Calgurio doesnt think shes the kind of person to make such a fuss, and praises Testarossa.

    What is the right answer, then?

    Its ck-market trade.

    What?

    Calgurio answers unintentionally.

    There is no such thing as a ck market in this empire. Just believing that, he was astonished by the imposing answer.

    Oh, is it strange?

    Of course it is! The Empire, under the authority of His Majesty, stands for equality for all. Noblemen, of course, are exempt, but evenmoners have a chance at promotion in the military.

    I know. Im not talking about the surface of it, but the practical side of it. The ck market is essential. Do you know why?

    Even if you say its mandatory, he knows that Testarossa is serious. But Calgurio couldnt help but be disbelieving.

    If the traitorousness of the Emperors ck market is so widespread, the Imperial Intelligence could not have been ignorant of it. It would not have gone unnoticed by thete Lieutenant Kondou, for that matter.

    He was even called an intelligence monster, a man who was feared. And he couldnt help but feel that the injustice therein had been left unchecked.

    Unbelievable. Kondou-dono missed the wrongdoing?

    He muttered to himself, and Testarossa looked at Calgurio in dismay.

    Youre so stiff. You missed it because it wasnt a bad thing.

    Well, whats that supposed to mean?

    It sounds nice to be a noblemans maid, but power rtionship is determined by the rank of the employer. Do you think a merchant of a lower ss canpete with a merchant of a higher ss?

    Ah

    The answer is, its impossible. When youre powerful, you have to do as youre told. Thats where the ck marketes in. The reason Echidna and its sessor, Cerberus, the Imperial underworld societies, existed, is because there was a need for them.

    It was an eye-opener for Calgurio.

    A merchant must be free, Testarossa says. A fixed sry is not enough to really pursue profit.

    To bind them by force would only provoke a rebellion, and that would get the people into trouble before that. It is because he understood that that Kondou did not seriously interfere in the underworld.

    So was human trafficking, which is officially banned.

    When famine or other famine-hit viges are unable to eat, they must be reduced in size. Legally, its considered evil, but if they dont do it, many will die. In such cases, selling to the ck market was more likely to increase the chances of survival than killing.

    Thats an extreme example, but its a fact that this had been done several times in the history of the Empire. There were many other inconvenient realities that had been overlooked as open secrets.

    Some of therger issues include foreign trade.

    As long as the empire does not tolerate the existence of other countries, trade and the like are publicly forbidden. But thats the problem with the economy.

    That is why Cerberus and the like had their roots in the Western Nations.

    Testarossa exins these facts matter-of-factly. Hearing this, Calgurio wonders how the demon knows so much, and also feels sad because he feels like an idiot.

    Thank you for the detailed exnation. It helped.

    Good. Well, thats why the local nobles were so easy. When I exined to them that free trade would be allowed from now on, they agreed with me in an assortment of ways. Besides, if Rimuru-samas project proceeds, there will be railroads between the provincial cities as well. They promised me that they would support Emperor Masayuki to the fullest because the wealth will be distributed to the regions instead of being centralized.

    Testarossa concluded.

    Calgurio is understandably convinced.

    The empire is also a highly developed scientific civilization, but it does not have the luxury of connecting all the urban areas. The reason for this is obviousmost of the budget is used for development and military spending.

    The transportation of food and supplies is also important, but it can only be provided in the cities around the capital. Goods were brought in from distant regions by magic and airships.

    Even those regions that were on the back burner would be included in the development n. If they had been told, it would have been easy to make the local lords happy.

    The negotiations were based on the premise of enormous financial andbor forces, but it was Demon Lord Rimuru and Testarossa who made it possible.

    Investigate the other party''s circumstances and make negotiations advantageous. Although it was faithful to the basics, Calgurio was deeply impressed with how amazing it was when thoroughly implemented.

    He vowed to rethink the way he had been doing things.

    Then, the only factions left are the nobles famlies.

    Thats right.

    And since its Testarossa-dono, I assume you already know what theyre up to?

    At this point, Calgurio has full confidence in Testarossa. He doesnt know what kind of n they have up their sleeves, but if its Testarossa, then there wont be a problem.

    Pardon me. To begin with, there werent any fools in the Empire these days who were doing bad things. The stagnant air has been swept away in thest few decades, but it turns out it was Kondous doing.

    In other words, the real viins have already been purged.

    Testarossa has been with the Empire for a long time, buttely Calgurio feels that the people are more stable than ever before. Now he sees why.

    The spiteful evil-doers were gone. The only ones left now were the secret societies that were considered a necessary evil and the petty viins that could be left alone.

    Then, how do you suggest them to persuade the nobles?

    There is a meeting this afternoon. Thats how were going to settle this, so I hope youll join us.

    It was definitely an order.

    Originally, he was supposed to be a coborator, but Calgurio had noints.

    He nodded at Testarossas words in the face of a clear difference in ability.

    ***

    Only four people meet in the reception room.

    The host, Prime Minister Minits.

    Calgurio, the Minister of Military Affairs.

    A diplomatic officer and future ally from the monster kingdom, Testarossa, will be present.

    And thest of these is the negotiator, Duke Mithra Hillmenard with his faction of noblemen.

    He was still young in his early 30s, and one might think he would be too young to be the head of a faction.

    But that doesnt apply to Mithra.

    He is a person who has everything.

    Mithras mother was once the emperors queen. She was, in fact, Rudras birth mother.

    The imperial family has a special system in ce that does not have an empress who is to be called the emperors wife. That position was reserved for Velgrynd alone.

    Instead, some women vied for supremacy in the pces back rooms as empresses. These were daughters voluntarily given by the nobility, whose bloodline was unmistakably noble.

    Whoever carries the Emperors child will be crowned the victor and will be named Queen. After all, the child is sure to be the next Emperor.

    Incidentally, as a digression, there were also several queens in Rudras pce, but Rudra does not recognize them. It was the arbitrary decision of the noblemen who wanted their daughters to be queen, and this time it was dissolved. There was an idea that the new Emperor would take over it, but it was judged to be unnecessary for Masayuki. Who made that decision will forever remain a mystery

    Back to the topic at hand.

    Mithras mother was the winner. She had fulfilled the great task of giving birth to Rudra and had achieved great fame.

    As a reward, she was given two choices.

    She could remain in the pce and allow Rudra to grow into a man of her own choosing, or she could marry into a family of her choice with an enormous sum of money.

    The Emperors treatment of his birth mother is of the highest order. She had a great deal of say in the matter and would not be despised even if she had left the pce. So she did not hesitate to leave the pce and marry the former Duke Hillmenard.

    And the one who was born between them was Mithra Hillmenard.

    He is the half-brother of Emperor Rudra. His unwavering authority alone was enough to bring all around him to their knees.

    A mask of cruelty intimidates all who see it. With no eyebrows and a horrifying gaze that would have been frightening to anyone who saw it, any desire to rebel was diminished.

    He is neither fat nor thin. Hes not tall, but his intimidation is impressive.

    This guy must be doing bad things behind the scenes.

    Not good. Hes one we should not cross

    And so on. Many of the higher nobles felt that way.

    Thats exactly why he was the right man to be the head of the nobles.

    A man with a dignity no one could resist, that was Duke Mithra Hillmenard.

    If it was only strength alone, Calgurio would win without a doubt. There was no doubt about that, even before he awakened.

    But the world does not live by strength alone. If there is no one to provide food, clothing, and shelter, there can be nofort. If one defied Mithra, they were bound to lose it.

    Hes an extremely troublesome opponent. I wanted to be at the top of the army, too, but when ites right down to it, its a hard thing to live with. Im going to have to bargain with this monster.

    He thought to himself, without saying it out loud.

    Maybe with Minits there, he could work something out, but he wouldnt have been able to negotiate one-on-one.

    But this time, he has a reliable helper.

    Testarossa-dono is a fearsome being, but shes encouraging as an ally. Knowing that shes the fearsome White Primordial, makes me feel that we cant lose.

    Mithra was scary in front of Calgurio, but Testarossa was even scarier. With that in mind, he was able to regain hisposure.

    Calgurio regained hisposure and remembered the words of Testarossa.

    Wait? Testarossa-dono had said that most of the nobles wouldnt be a problem. So was Mithra-dono the problematic aristocrat? No, thats a strange story tooKondou would not have tolerated the Emperors half-brother. Could it be that Mithra-dono has done nothing wrong?

    No way. Thats a bit of a stretch.

    Its not likely, says Calgurio, denying his own beliefs.

    Mithra is feared by all because he is untouchable and evil. A man who makes one think they are a nuisance cannot be an ordinary person.

    Then the hands of the clock struck the hour.

    A loud ringing of the bell sounded.

    It was the signal for the meeting to begin.

    ***

    The rogues who seek to usurp the throne. Shall I ask you why you have summoned me?

    That magnificent question belongs to Mithra.

    Minits takes it softly.

    Please wait, my lord. Thats a misunderstanding.

    What is this misunderstanding. Isnt it true?

    We have followed the official procedure ording to the Imperial Code of Ethics. Therefore, I would ask you to withdraw the word usurpation.

    I will vomit. Dont let it go to your head just because youve got Velgrynd-sama on your side!

    No way!

    Minits denied it out loud.

    Even the calm Minits couldnt help but be overlooked.

    Yes, its really outrageous, and even Calgurio is upset.

    Certainly, to an outsider, it would seem that Velgrynd has sided with them.

    But thats a big misunderstanding.

    Rather, its the opposite.

    He is only keeping the peace by currying favor with Velgrynd.

    Words and deeds can get one killed, but thats no longer the case with Velgrynd.

    This country might really disappear.

    Its not an exaggeration or anything, but it really could disappear from the world.

    It all depended on Masayukis mood.

    Its a good thing that Masayuki was a kind person, but he shuddered to think of what he would have done if he had been a selfish person.

    Mithra-dono, Minits is correct. Although Velgrynd-Sama is an ally of His Majesty, she is not an ally of the Empire. If it is His Majestys wish, she would have no hesitation in destroying the Empire.

    Thats right. That one actually said that if it would be a burden His Majesty Masayuki, then shed let the country be burnt to the ground. We must never offend her!

    You expect me to believe that?

    No, its no wonder you cant believe it, so we would like to hear your opinion.

    Kekeke, are you ruling over the Empire, or are you hostile?

    Thats wrong.

    What?

    Mithra asks irreverently, and Minits denies it immediately.

    Then he goes on to say what he really thinks.

    Okay? I dont want this toe out, but I want you to know what Im really thinking, sir. Thats why Im telling you.

    Youre going around in circles. If you want my opinion, then just tell me.

    Then, lets start with the question first. Mithra, my lord, do you want to rule the Empire? Or do you want to work hand in hand with us?

    What?

    The question from Minits was unexpected, even for Mithra. Just as he had been bracing himself for the kind of negotiations that were about to unfold, it sounded as if they were willing to surrender control of the Empire to Mithra.

    In fact, that perception was correct.

    Minits himself had been forced to ept the position of Prime Minister by chance. If Mithra wishes it here, he was willing to give it up.

    His first priority was to stabilize the empire. And now that this wasrgely aplished, it was Minits opinion that there was still room for change in terms of how the political system would be structured in the future.

    Calgurio is also aware of Minits thought process.

    Indeed, he is willing to help unite the Imperial nobility. If I turned it over to Mithra-dono here, he would not have made a mistake, but that would be unfair, wouldnt it, Minits?

    Thats why his younger brother will resent him, Calgurio thought to himself, gritting his teeth.

    Youd even give up your position as Prime Minister to me?

    Thank you for being so quick to understand. Now may I tell you what I think?

    Im listening.

    Mithra, perhaps sensing ack of information, reluctantly nodded his head.

    In response, Minits began to speak.

    The basic premise is that Masayuki himself did not want the position of Emperor.

    But if he left the empire unattended here, political unrest could cause a great deal of confusion.

    There was also an unknown enemy and leaving that unattended would put everyone in trouble. Therefore, the Monster Kingdom and the Dwarven Kingdom weed Masayuki to be the Emperor.

    Velgrynd only obeys the will of Masayuki. It means that if Masayuki does not be Emperor, she will easily abandon the Empire.

    Even without Velgrynds help, the loss of the dragon guardians blessing is a big problem. If that was the case, then it was in the best interest of the people of the Empire to have Masayuki on the throne at all costs.

    As I said before, His Majesty Masayuki himself feels that the imperial throne is a burden. Im sure he wouldnt mind having someone else to do the honors for him, rather he would be wee to it.

    Minits concluded.

    I see and Mithra was convinced.

    He understood that all that mattered was Velgrynds mood.

    If he does not keep Masayuki on the throne, even Velgrynd will leave the Empire.

    If so, it certainly doesn''t matter who is in politics.

    Rather, it is in the Empires best interest to not bind Masayuki.

    It is Demon Lord Rimuru-samas intention to build a good rtionship with Masayuki-sama. If Masayuki-sama is to be Emperor, he will provide as much support as possible. So, I hope you understands that saying usurpation of the throne is out of line.

    With a bewitching smile, Testarossa also joined in.

    Of course, this information was already known to Mithra.

    It is also known that Demon Lord Rimuru did not demand great reparations from the empire that was defeated in the war.

    Demon Lord Rimurus goal is also to ensure future friendship. If so, Mithra himself thought that there was no room for doubt in Testarossas statement.

    Then what was the right thing to do?

    There were two options. But he doesnt necessarily have to choose one or the other. If theres another way, hes free to choose it.

    However Mithra seems to have given up halfway, thinking that it would be difficult to win

    Will Mithra lead the government as Prime Minister or will he appoint Minits to lead the nobles?

    Actually, this was of no interest to Mithra.

    All Mithra really wanted to do was stay at home and paint as he pleases.

    With his noble lineage and the authority of the Duke family, Mithra was considered a born ruler.

    But that was a great misunderstanding.

    To begin with, Mithras mother had good looks that made her beloved by the Emperor. She had a vague resemnce to Velgrynd and was a strong woman.

    However, that was just on the outside.

    Her appearance might have been misleading, but she was in fact a quiet woman. Otherwise, when she gave birth to Rudra, she would have been the empress in her own right.

    It was a luxury allowed to a mother for a short time while Rudra grew up. She must have been quite an entric, because she chose not to do so and instead wished for her freedom.

    But then she was discovered by Duke Balsa Hillmenard, Mithras father.

    Balsa was a handsome man. So it is generally believed that Mithras mother made a pass at him. Perhaps he was pushed aside by the queens selfishness.

    But thats not true.

    Truthfully, it was Balsa who made the passive overture.

    They loved each other and Mithra was born. They are still in love today, but thats beside the point.

    I dont want to do politics, either. Im tired of these suckers. But

    To Mithras dismay, he was surprisingly popr. On top of that, hes smart and has never been caught up in a conspiracy before.

    Thats why Mithra has so many followers, and they sometimes gets ahead of themselves in things he does not want them to do.

    The worst was the downfall of a count.

    That day, Mithras shoulder bumped into the Counts. It was a careless ident, but the Count didnt apologize.

    Mithra was still in his early 20s and the other man must have taken him for a fool. Maybe if hed known Mithra was Dukes son, he might have reacted differently, but it was toote.

    You! Im a Count! Dont you have any sense of propriety!?

    He remembers watching the man calmly as he shouted at him.

    He was reminded of a story he had heard from a friend from another world, saying that this person might not have enough calcium to get so angry at such a thing.

    And then Mithra muttered, Im in trouble.

    Mithra had not yet seeded to the Dukes seat, and the current Count was in a superior position. However, he had been taught never to bow to a lower-ranked person, and he was wondering what to do in this situation.

    I''m in troubleWith that one sentence, it would develop into a really troublesome case.

    Mithra-sama is in trouble.

    How dare the Count embarrass Mithra-sama. Oh, dear. What a horrible mistake.

    And then Mithras friends got into a frenzy.

    He didnt know where they had been hiding, but immediately after that, knights in ck showed up in a hurry. And several of them restrained the Count.

    Ah, ah

    Only then did the panicked Count realize who Mithra was.

    But it was already toote.

    The captain bowed to Mithra and told him,

    Please leave this person''s disposal to us.

    Yes, Ill leave it to youIt was Mithra who had no choice but to say so.

    The next days newspapersid out the evidence of the Counts deceit. Whether it was a true crime or a fabricated one, Mithra would never know.

    All that is certain is that the Count had been arrested and his title was vacated.

    Needless to say, the fear of Mithra from those around him had grown.

    One bump on the shoulder can destroy an opponent. It was an incident that Mithra would never forget, as he realized he had the power to do just that.

    There had been simr incidents since then, and despite having no intention of doing so, Mithra hade to reign as a fearsome nobleman.

    Because of that, Mithra knows how to speak up for himself.

    Thats why it became so quiet.

    And now this.

    ording to the investigation of the best agents under the Dukes, it seems that Rudras disappearance is certain.

    Whether he was dead or ran away doesnt matter.

    What mattered was that Velgrynd, the Empires guardian dragon, had endorsed Chosen Hero Masayuki as the new Emperor.

    It is assumed that the mysterious Marshal is actually Scorch Dragon Velgrynd-sama. And it is likely that the man to whom she is attached to is the true sessor of Rudra-samas soul

    That was what the report stated.

    Anyone with even a modicum of intelligence to think against this would understand that its impossible.

    The Empires session to the throne is different from others in that it doesnt ce much importance on bloodlines. No, it may be considered important to the public, but to the truly noble ones, Rudras soul was what was most important.

    The Duke, Mithra, naturally understood this.

    Thisif things go wrong, not only will it destroy my, it will destroy everything. Its not safe for my men to be out of control. I must make up my mind and make my move.

    It was only natural for the wise Mithra to make this decision.

    Ideally, he would have wanted to stay out of politics and still keep his influence over the nobles.

    If his current title is secured in the future, then he wouldnt have to struggle financially. Even if he didnt force himself to participate in politics, he could still dream taking a stipend and living a life of painting.

    If this is the best thing that could happen, the next best thing would be to stay in the countryside.

    It would be better to manage the estate and live as a provincial lord. That would keep him busy for a bit but still leave him time to paint. He wouldnt have to socialize too much, so it was a good ce to start.

    The worst thing that could happen would be to touch Velgrynds reverse scale.

    But that would be useless.

    Now is the time to prevent that from happening.

    Mithra decides to make a n here.

    He wants to use his bad reputation and aim for his expulsion from the capital.

    If he acts arrogant, or rather, if he speaks as he normally would, his opponents would find Mithra troubling. Then after its all over, he can just reason about what hes doing, pretend to be angry about it all, and leave.

    Negotiations would break down. But Mithra would realize his disadvantage and slip away from the capital to the provinces.

    That was the story he had nned to tell.

    And yet, Minits gave him two iprehensible choices.

    Do you want to control the Empire? Or do you want to work hand in hand with us?

    The answer is to refuse both.

    But that wouldnt be nice to say.

    Mithra ponders.

    The conversation of Minits continued.

    Even Testarossa, a diplomat from the monster country, has joined them to prove their legitimacy.

    He knows this without being told.

    Knowing all the facts was the basis of the negotiations.

    Now, what can I do? Those are two choices, and I dont want to take either one. Being in politics in this country as it stands now is a straight line to death. If I work any more hours, I wont have time to paint or y with my beloved daughter!

    Mithra has a daughter whom he loves.

    She is only three years old. So cute.

    He also has a newborn son.

    What he was wondering about was his wife, who couldnt even look at Mithra after his son was born.

    The daughter of the Marquis family, whom Mithra had fallen in love with at first sight. A woman who came to live with him the day after he asked her to be his wife.

    She who had be of a thoughtful wife, has been a source of anxiety for Mithra as ofte.

    Although she had been distant from the beginning of their marriage, he thought it couldnt be helped since they had just begun to get used to each other. Their daughter was born smoothly and they were expecting a boy. He was hoping they would slowly grow in love with each other at this rate

    Yes. I have to say no, or Id lose the time to talk to my wife. I dont care what happens to the empire, but I have to prevent my family from bing unhappy!

    Mithra again made up his mind.

    He had nned to settle the matter amicably today, but a little turbulence was inevitable.

    And now he has his answer.

    ***

    Its ridiculous. Isnt this a usurpation of the throne? Sleep when you talk in your sleep. And Testarossa-dono, was it? What right do you have to meddle in the domestic affairs of our Empire? Its true that the Empire was defeated in a war. But by renouncing the airspace rights and making a treaty between nations, you have established peace between the Empire and your country. Now that youve established diplomatic rtions, are you saying that you have the right to interfere with the sovereignty of a friendly nation?

    It was a dangerous gamble. And yet, Mithra decided to take the plunge.

    He has trapped a demon lords diplomat with formidable power. She is the Demon Lords plenipotentiary abroad and there is no denying the possibility of another war if she is offended.

    Mithra knows that she is the White Primordial (nc). He knows that he is speaking outrageously against the great demon feared by the Empire.

    Oh my, did I go too far in my imitation?

    Humph! I wont ask you to leave this room. Im sure your master would like to know what the friendly countrys future ns are.

    I appreciate your concern, sir.

    Come on, get angry! He wished that she would but was so confused that she easily swept it along.

    I thought if I told them that, they would move to exclude mebut what do they think?

    He was wondering what he should do if she was enraged, but this calmness is confusing.

    Too much anger and hed lose his life. Since he felt his life was about to be cut short even with thatment, it was unthinkable to make any more aggressivements.

    What do I say? Do I want to take it another step further?

    That step was scary to no end.

    Therefore, he would turn the tables on them.

    I am the great Rudras half-brother. Now that the life or death of my older half-brother is unknown, you would shamelessly ask for my help by choosing to wee a new emperor, a man from nowhere named Masayuki? I have no idea what youre thinking!

    Mithra burst into a rush just a little more emphatically than usual.

    Depending on this reaction, the situation would be changed promptly. This is where the real fight begins.

    But unfortunately

    Mithras gamble turned out in the worst possible way.

    Oh my, do you disagree with my decision? If you think youre going to be overlooked just because youre rted to Rudra, Im going to have to tell you that youre too naive.

    Gah, geez, Velgrynd-sama !?

    An unspeakable scream erupted from Mithras heart.

    Mithra was so shocked that his soul felt as if it was going to slip out of his mouth.

    The odds were no longer stacked against him, but rather werepletely against him.

    For some reason, Mithra felt refreshed that it was over for him.

    Maybe thats why he felt like it was the time to say what he wanted to say.

    Marshal-donono, its Velgrynd-sama, the guardian dragon of the empire, isnt it? I was not told that you would be attending todays meeting, but it is a pleasure to meet you.

    First of all, the appeal is not that big a deal?

    He really wanted to run away, but was enlightened by the fact that it was impossible anyway.

    Oh, Im sorry. I really dont think being the Emperor is a party, either. But when I think about the people who live in the Empire, I think its best for me to be the Emperor

    Following Velgrynd, who opened the door without a sound and entered the room, Masayuki also appeared.

    For Mithra, it waspletely unexpected.

    Judging from the situation, he had no choice but to realize that his fate waspletely sealed.

    However, there was one thing that bothered him.

    Huh? Your Majesty doesnt seem quite confident about this. Do you think that makes you a better person than my half-brother?

    He asked with a sarcastic tone, but was half truthful.

    If theyre going to get rid of him anyway, he should have called their bluff more openly.

    Hahaha, I was just a student a while ago, you know? I never imagined that I would be an emperor, confident or not.

    Humph, youre pathetic. You think you can walk with supremacy just like that?

    Hmm, Im sorry. But I wasnt really nning on supremacy, you know?

    ButHuh? Isnt that a strange thing to say? I hadnt noticed from the reactions of Minits and Calgurio, but this doesnt seem to be consistent with the information my subordinates have been finding out.

    Mithras own intelligence services had reported that the new Emperor was a man of great strength. His poprity among the people was so great that even Demon Lord Rimuru, who had never given the Empire a second thought, looked up to him.

    And yet the smiling boy in front of him didnt really fit his image.

    Whats going on?

    Mithra couldnt help but look at him again.

    Noto tell you the truth, I really want you to forgive me for the supremacy.

    What?

    A voice spilled out of Mithras mouth.

    And it wasnt just Mithra.

    Hey, Your Majesty! I asked you to be more dignified here!

    Thats right. Whether or not we can get Mithra-dono on board here will have a great impact on the future course of the Empires governance. For my sake and that of Minits, we need apanion to share our struggles with.

    Minits and Calgurio were pleading with him at the same time.

    Its toote now that I saw it in front of me. And now that I overheard the conversation, I dont want to be asked to join them

    To be honest, hes getting the feeling that hed absolutely hate it.

    However, he also thinks its better to just survive than to be disposed of like this. Mithra wasnt stupid, so he knew perfectly well that he had no initiative left.

    You fools. Uou havent forgotten your promise not to coerce Masayuki, have you?

    No, no, Velgrynd-san!? Its okayIm fine!

    Masayuki-sama!

    Your Majesty!

    Masayuki hurriedly hushes a slightly grumpy Velgrynd. Seeing this, Minits and Calgurio are impressed.

    Oh my, Masayuki. Ive been thinking about it for a while now, but I wish youd call me by my nickname, Gryn, or whatever you want to call me.

    Oh, yes. Um, so, Gryn-san, then?

    Ufufu, thats nice to hear, Masayuki. Unlike Rudra, youre a straight-shooter. If you dont mind Calgurio and the others, its none of my business. Good for you, both of you.

    Yes, thank you!

    His Majestys gratitude, I will remember it for the rest of my life!

    Velgrynds mood seemed to have improved and he was relieved.

    Watching the whole process, Mithra realized from the bottom of his heart that he was in trouble.

    I see. I suppose the only reason they want to involve me is not just to stabilize the situation. They really want to have a friend to help diffuse the anger from Velgrynd-sama. But then again, what about that boy, Masayuki?

    Mithra wondered if he was the same as him.

    And Mithra wasnt the only one who felt that way.

    By the way, it was Mithra-san, correct?

    I dont recognize you, but it seems youre the Emperor. You can call me whatever you like.

    Then Ill take you up on your offer. What do you think of me, Mithra-san? I mean, I dont know, maybe I just seem like a normal young man to you?

    What do you mean? Youre the Emperor. Theres nothing normal about you.

    No, no, thats not what Im talking about, I just want you to calm down and give me an honest answer.

    So, what are you talking about?

    Mithra couldnt understand what Masayuki was trying to say.

    But the oue of this response would determine Mithras fate.

    Mithra-san thinks Im mediocre, right?

    Do you mean to imply that I am disrespectful? Then I must confess that you are nowhere near as good as my older brother. Emperor, you dont seem capable of rising above the rest of us.

    If I say this, Ill be ruined. Mithra thought so, but he was in a desperate mood.

    If he was going to be done in by the hands of Velgrynd anyway, he wanted not to suffer. He thought that even Velgrynd, who was driven by passion, would fulfill such a wish.

    But the response he got was much more than that.

    It wasnt from Velgrynd, but from Masayuki.

    Mithra-san! Youre awesome! I needed someone like you!!

    Huh?

    He didnt know what he meant, but when he asked him, Masayuki responded passionately.

    You know, because of my authority, other people always think Im this great guy.

    Masayuki shouts.

    No one else could imagine how much trouble he had suffered because of the Unique Skill Chosen One he acquired.

    And now, the unique skill had evolved into the Ultimate Skill King of Heroes. The power was tremendous, and even though anyone could understand that it was a bad idea to leave politics to amateurs, he had been treated as an exception.

    What, you mean?

    So, thats why Im so happy to have someone like Mithra-san who understands the real me!

    Wet droplets spill out of Mithras eyes.

    Masayuki-kunno, Your Majesty!

    Masayukis hardships were no stranger to the world. But Mithra could understand them as if they were his own.

    That is not all.

    If he was the one who understood Masayuki, he felt that the opposite was also possible.

    Hey, now that you understand me, you dont have to call me Your Majesty!

    Yes, thats right. I understand, I understand. Ive had the same kind of pain in my heart.

    What?

    I want you to listen. At the worst time, a person was arrested just because I had whispered, Im in trouble. Honestly, I almost thought to stop opening my mouth at all. It was impossible, but it was hard not to be able to speak my mind.

    I understand! In my case, even when I speak my mind, it doesnte through. Its interpreted by others, and my reputation just goes up. Seriously, give me a break! And the next thing I knew I was an Emperor, you know?

    Thats scary too.

    Right! Im really scared. My buddy Jinrai-san was horrible at the beginning. He is understanding now, but he used to fight with Rimuru-san all the time! I cant tell you how many times I wish hed stop mentioning my name

    I can understand that. Thats why I didnt bring a chaperone with me this time. I was afraid of what they might say.

    Negotiations broke down over one personsments as if it was amon story in the past. Only this time, he couldnt afford to make such a mistake.

    Thats amon story. No, well, I thought it was just me.

    Hahaha, its been hard on both of us.

    Its noughing matter, seriously.

    Masayuki and Mithra talked with each other, forgetting about everyone elses existence.

    They had smiles on their faces.

    And before long, a friendship had blossomed.

    Yes, I was immunized by my mother because she had Rudra in her body. Ive been alive for a long time but Ive never seen this happen before.

    Even Velgrynd was surprised.

    But for now, to celebrate their friendship, they watched in silence.

    ***

    Now that Masayuki and Mithra had be good friends, all the problems were cleared up.

    Therefore, Mithra agreed to help.

    However, instead of being directly involved in politics, he decided to bundle up the aristocrats of his family and support them from behind the scenes.

    He has a true desire to spend more time on his own, but he decided after a discussion that this would be more convenient for him.

    I will keep things the way they are and unite those noblemen who are unhappy with the current situation. However, Ill also try to persuade the more capable ones to cooperate with you.

    Thank you. We are seriously short on staff.

    It would be better for the military as well. A poor rebellion would only lead to a loss of personnel. If Mithra-dono is willing to work with us, we can take the rebels in over time.

    And so, the situation was wrapped up nicely.

    The meeting had ended and the venue was dismissed.

    One moment, please.

    Testarossa spoke to Mithra as he stood up.

    Mithra-dono, can you give me a moment of your time?

    Mithra was shocked.

    He remembered exactly what he had said to Testarossa. He was relieved that the situation had been cleared, but maybe he had been naive.

    What is it?

    He sat back in the chair, trying hard not to let his voice tremble.

    No, its just something I was wondering about earlier, so I had to do some digging. You have a hidden Skill, dont you?

    What? Im just a guy who

    Mithra tried to deny it, thinking that the cloud had shifted, but he was interrupted by Testarossa. Interrupting him, Testarossa continued to speak.

    Oh, dont get me wrong. Its an unconsciousness type, thats right, the Unique Skill Viin 40 right? Its sort of like its been handed down from generation to generation. Maybe its your fathers side? Are you scared by me?

    He was terrified.

    Mithra had been taught that it was the fate of the eldest son of the Hillmenard Dukes.

    If you realize that, Im sure youll be able to take advantage of negotiations better in the future.

    It was uncharacteristic of Testarossa to tell him that. Its not often that Testarossa was nice to someone she likes.

    Wow, that kind of power

    Its true. Im not going to tell you how to use it, but Im going to tell you one more thing, as a great service.

    Mm?

    Youre scared for your wife too.

    No way. My wife is so shy, weve never had a fight. Not once have I ever yelled at her.

    How stupid Mithraughs.

    Testarossa smiles bitterly.

    Im pretty sure thats the information I got to help you negotiate this deal. Your mother was immune to it, so it probably wouldnt have been a problem, but your wife

    No way

    Still, its family. You understand Mithra-dono, dont you?

    Thats right. You just had a second child, didnt you? If so, Im sure your wife loves Mithra-dono, too.

    An upset Mithra.

    Calgurio and Minits talk to Mithra as if to console him.

    But it is Velgrynd who shatters that atmosphere.

    But it was also a word of truth.

    Youre an idiot. Youve been waiting for your first son, havent you? Maybe your wife thinks that since she bore you an heir as a noblemans wife, shes done her duty. Did you ever tell your wife how you felt in the first ce?

    Do you mean?

    Have you ever told her you love her? Have you ever thanked her for giving birth to your child?

    Mithra realized that he had never said such a thing. He realized his stupidity and his face paled at once.

    Expressing your feelings in words is surprisingly a very important part of keeping your affections together. Shouldnt you take this opportunity to tell your wife how you feel?

    Testarossa told him and Mithra nodded his head.

    Im sorry for this!

    And with that, he ran away as fast as he could.

    When Mithra returned home, he saw his wife, who was just about to leave the house.

    He had arrived just in time.

    Mithra had correctly understood and acted on the advice of Velgrynd and Testarossa. As a result, he had avoided the worst situation of divorce.

    From that day forward, Mithra never forgot his gratitude.

    He energetically cooperated with the new Emperor, Masayuki, and supported the empire behind the scenes.

    Thus, all three major factions of the Imperial aristocracy fell under themand of the new Emperor Masayuki. The stabilization of the ruling system, which was expected to take years, was aplished in a matter of months.

    ***

    The night of the day Mithra-dono became a friend.

    It was exactly as Testarossa-dono had said, huh?

    Well, yes. There was a lot of luck, though, with the help of Demon Lord Rimuru-sama and Velgrynd-sama.

    Minits and I 41 were having a toast at a restaurant in the Imperial City.

    Now that the nobles problem was solved, the only problem left was the Aggressors.

    We were sending agents to every corner of the Empire to check for signs of trouble. If anything is happening, there will be reports, and we would have the reorganized Imperial Knights stationed in the provincial cities. We cant be too careful, but we can at least allow ourselves some breathing room.

    Thats why he nned to drink to his hearts content tonight.

    Theyd talk about their struggles and our hopes for the future of the empire.

    Come to think of it, he never thought hed be so close to Minits. He was a good soldier, but he never would have let him in.

    Now he is a dear friend.

    And together they are the best supporters of His Majesty.

    They drank more drinks, and he became drunk enough.

    Then Minits came in with a topic.

    So, changing the subject, how does it feel to have power over most people?

    I think about that question again.

    And then I answer.

    Its a hollow feeling. Like Ive lost sight of my goal.

    Then you dont need this anymore, do you?

    With that, Minits held out an envelope to me.

    I wonder if there was a stack of papers in it. It had some kind of thickness.

    What is this?

    Dont open it here.

    Minits slurred his words and paused to gulp down his ss.

    Then he put down his empty ss and stood up.

    Hey, are you going home?

    Oh. Thats the report I had you look at years ago, just to give me a bargaining chip against you. I dont need it anymore, and Ill do it. There was something that was bothering me, so Im letting you take a look at it. Im a little surprised myself, so you might even be happier not knowing.

    Hm?

    If youre not interested in your past, dont read it, and burn it.

    There was no further exnation from Minits.

    He just waved his hand and left without answering my questions, not even looking back.

    I was left alone, but I didnt feel like drinking any more.

    I was more interested in what Minits had to say.

    There was no doubt that this material was about me.

    And it was my weakness?

    I dont have a family. Im not saying that I wasnt dirty, but I was never part of any wrongdoing that merited punishment.

    Im sure Minits knew that too

    All I can think of is that it involved the woman who was my wife.

    Is it my past?

    Come to think of it, my vengeance wasntplete.

    It would be pretty easy for me to destroy the Count or anyone else. Thats why I was so proud that I could do it at any time, and I let my revenge go unchecked.

    Well, maybe its a good idea to face the past to bring closure here.

    I muttered to myself and left the restaurant.

    I returned to my mansion in the imperial capital and went into my room.

    I took the material from the envelope Minits gave me and read it.

    Ridiculous

    What was written there was so shocking that I couldnt help but mutter to myself.

    When I saw the description Count Balduff, I realized I had forgotten the name of the object of my revenge.

    Thats fine, but it was hard to believe what happens next.

    The Count Balduff is said to have put together a sect of local aristocrats.

    But it was at a level easy to ignore.

    Not to mention the name of the baron with the woman who was my ex-wife, all of the lower aristocrats, such as the Viscount and the Baron, follow.

    If the scale wasrge enough, they would be noticeable, but with a force of less than ten, they were probably overlooked.

    However, there was a description that I could not overlook.

    It''s a noble family who follows, but there is a high possibility that the reign has been hijacked, right?

    What does that mean? I rushed to read the rest of the report.

    The houses that followed were said to have had honorable men in their families.

    They didnt care about dealing with ck marketers, and they ruled theirnds legitimately.

    Thats why it was so easy to push him into a corner.

    It appears that Balduff has been saddled with debts by the the hired traders and is being made to do their bidding.

    That was stated in the report.

    My mind was racing with information.

    If this is true, then I cant forgive Count Balduff.

    No, its more than that

    Mamiya!

    I yelled to myself.

    About me, my wife might really

    When it urred to me, I couldnt sit still any longer.

    I hurriedly headed for the door.

    Hey, sir! Are you going out thiste?

    Ive got to go. Get my personal guard up on the airfield. Also, tell your intelligence officer to send his men there as well.

    !! Right away!

    My head butler is a capable man.

    He could tell from my mood that this was no ordinary situation.

    He didnt ask any further questions, but carried out my orders quickly.

    ***

    Weve solidified the evidence during the night.

    The report was urate, and there was no excuse for it.

    Only one person screamed and refused to admit the reality.

    Youre a dead man.

    You! Who do you think I am1? Im Balduff! With what authority do you have to arrest me, one of the eight princes who unite the provincial lords?

    The foolish man had refused to admit his guilt in this case.

    Well, there is certainly a reason for Balduff to scream.

    Because in our empire, just because they are aristocrats, they have non-arrest privileges.

    A noble can only be arrested if the Emperor has issued a warrant for his arrest.

    However, all Imperial Knights of the Imperial Guardians are eligible, as are certain members of the Intelligence Community.

    Which means

    Count Balduff, the charges against you have been confirmed. The victims have testified, and I hope you will understand that there is no longer any excuse for this.

    Of course, I have the right to arrest him based on what the information bureau staff brought.

    I know how important it is to arrest a highborn Count. Id like to execute him myself, but Im afraid that would be above my pay grade.

    If I put my hand down, I could kill him without causing much pain. I cant bring myself to show that kind of mercy to this man.

    Dont be a fool! What authority do you have!?

    Shut up, Balduff. Have you forgotten my face?

    I stared Balduff squarely in the eye so he could see my left eye patch.

    Youre not really His Excellency Calgurio, are you!?

    You know me?

    Of course! Your exploits have been passed down throughout the Empire. I hear you were narrowly defeated by the filthy monster nation, but I believe that Your Excellency will surely be able to make up for it!

    This man is misunderstanding everything.

    His fate would be even worse if Testarossa-dono could hear what he has to say.

    If I tell her No, Im not going to tell her. Lets not get angry and get too involved.

    I dont like the way you talk about me. I suppose youughed at me being kicked out of the baronial household.

    !! Its a misunderstanding!

    I havent even exined to him yet, and that statement was already an admission of guilt.

    Dont speak. Ill let the Imperial High Council decide your fate, so be prepared for that. Unlike me, the torture officers are not so kind.

    I told him without changing my expression.

    Balduff paled and shouted.

    Wait! Please wait! Calgurio-dono! I apologize. I apologize, and admit my sins.

    Take him away.

    On my signal, the knights take Balduff away.

    Balduffsxity is appalling.

    The Imperial High Council is not an institution to rify the crimes. It is designed to trap and deprive political enemies of their positions.

    Thats why it doesnt matter whether he pleads guilty or not.

    The torturers dont ask for the testimony of the guilty. They make a living depriving them of their dignity and subjugating them.

    At best, youll suffer and feel the resentment of the victims, including myself.

    I whispered softly to Balduffs back, which was now quite small.

    ***

    After sending the knights back in the airship, I took my personal magic motorcycle (aura bike) to a small town in the outskirts.

    After a short ride, I saw a familiar sight before my eyes.

    Beyond the hill, I saw a mansion that had been left intact.

    I used to think it was big, but now it seems quite small.

    It was less than half the size of my mansion in the imperial capital.

    But still, it was an important ce to me.

    Its been a long time. Its like this ce hasnt changed at all.

    I dont know why I said that.

    I guess Im just nervous.

    After all, the woman I was about to meet was the one who abandoned meno, no its not.

    I already knew that it was a mistake.

    All I need is courage.

    It waste afternoon.

    I remember my ex-wife rxing in the front yard at this hour.

    I scolded myself and rang the doorbell of the house.

    Yes, who is it?

    A familiar voice.

    It was the voice of the houses assistant butler, who was about ten years older than me.

    Its Calgurio. I didnt n oning back, but Ive got a matter of importance to attend to. Im sorry, but Mamiyado you think you could send for Mrs. Heath?

    There was a pause for breath.

    After a beat, there was a reply saying Yes, sir.

    I was ushered into the parlor and waited for Mamiya to arrive.

    All that was left to do was tell her what I really thought before that man came back.

    That man is Baron Nest Heath, the man who drove me out and took over the Heath household. And now hes in the next town over, where hes supposed to be staying at his cousins beck and call, Viscount Zhuk.

    The reason I know this is because I made the arrangements.

    Balduffs people had their knights arrest himst night. I told him to let Viscount Zhuk see the opportunity.

    Of course, it was on purpose.

    Since weve already investigated that Viscount Zhuk is Nests superior, I thought he would try to contact me once he heard about Balduffs arrest and the disquieting situation.

    I knew that Nest was moving, just as I had hoped.

    It would take at least half a day to fly a horse to and from here to the next town and back. I heard he left early in the morning, so he shouldnt be back untilter in the evening.

    Thats why I have to finish this before then.

    I''m sorry to have kept you waiting, Your Excellency Calgurio. Is it okay to say that it''s been a long time?

    I havent heard Mamiyas voice in a long time, and my heart flutters.

    I sit up and lock eyes with her.

    Theres no need for honorifics between you and me. How are you?

    Mamiya was thin.

    She had makeup on, but it didnt disguise the white that was starting to bleed into her hair. I realized that she didnt have the money to spend on beauty.

    It was definitely an unexpected visit, but still, as a noblewoman, I think its normal for a noblewoman to pay more attention to her appearance.

    Although to me, Mamiya is Mamiya, no matter what she looks like

    It was reported that Nest was not valued because of its spending habits.

    That was irresistibly annoying.

    Such a waste of words. Im so relieved to hear that His Excellency Calgurio is looking well.

    Mamiyas attitude remained stiff.

    She doesnt know why Im here, and is nervous.

    Sure enough.

    So, is the purpose of your visit today to punish me?

    It is a disposition to say such a thing.

    What do you mean?

    Huh, my husband left in the morning, in a hurry. I knew he was up to no good, so you have proof of the wrongdoing, dont you? I am the woman who betrayed you. I cant think of any reason for you to be grateful to me alone.

    Mamiyas eyes looked tired and hopeless as she said this.

    Its been twenty years since we parted.

    I had been through a lot, and so had Mamiya.

    I dont know if Im qualified to hear it, but I still have to resolve the misunderstanding.

    There is a reason you were my wife. And that love is as strong now as it was back then.

    Joking

    Its not a joke.

    Mamiyas eyes wavered as I assured her.

    What do you meanIm a stupid woman. Im no better than a dog and no better than a person who doesnt deserve to be remembered by you. Because Ivemitted an unforgivable, mortal sin. Imitted an irrevocable sin against you.

    At a loss for words, tears fell from Mamiyas eyes. She had acted stoutly, but her words reminded her of her crimes.

    Now I remember.

    How could I have forgotten the most important things and resented Mamiya

    My father-inw, who had been a baron, was a fine man and my esteemed master.

    What a fool I had been, even though he entrusted me with his precious daughter

    Youre not guilty of anything. I was a fool. I didnt even notice that mans trickery, and I hurt the one I swore to protect.

    I said slowly, as if to remind myself.

    When Mamiya heard that, she looked at me in surprise.

    Now shes listening to me. I took this opportunity to say more.

    I dont know why I didnt believe in you, its such a shameI understand the circumstances of the Heath family. Will you believe me again?

    What are you talking about!? Again, Im not someone who deserves it. Do you not have the right to punish us?

    Im the one who doesnt have the rightIts my fault for abandoning you. It''s ended up like this, even though I swore to be the knight to protect you.

    So, give me another chance. With that wish, I kept staring at Mamiya, hoping that she would give me another chance.

    Can I trust you?

    Mamiyas tears wouldnt stop.

    I scooped them up with my fingers and then nodded vigorously.

    I will never abandon you again.

    I epted Mamiya gently as she jumped into my chest, and swore from the bottom of my heart.

    ***

    The servants of the Heath household were gathered and interviewed.

    Everyone who worked for the house at the time worked together to protect Mamiya. The person who had drugged me was still here, so I had no trouble gathering evidence.

    I wish you would have consulted with me.

    When I said that, the man who had reced myte father as the official head butler told me on behalf of everyone,

    They were threatening me . They were paying off our family''s debts, and they were going to divert their rights to the ck market. If that happened, not only your wife''s life but also your would be in danger. I had no choice but to cooperate with the conspiracy he suggested. I''m so sorry. It''s all because of our cowardice!

    Well, that was exactly what the report said.

    I wasnt as strong back then as I am now. I guess I was a good knightbut I had only been a B rank at best.

    It would have been impossible for me to defend this house alone.

    Its all over now. What matters is what happens from now on.

    Indeed, youre right. I will take care of all the punishments, so please be lenient with the members of the house.

    When the head butler said this while bowing low, the other servants also apologized.

    That scene was a representation of my father-inws humanity.

    Dont be mistaken. I was wrong too, so I dont want to put all the me on you guys. So please continue to support us well.

    I tell them that.

    We were all in the same boat.

    So I wanted them to join me on the joint responsibility.

    Calgurio-sama!!

    Tears welled up in the butlers eyes.

    However, right after that, he tilts his head as if hes noticed something.

    Hmm? Its natural to support your wife, of course, but are you supporting us?

    He found out.

    Um, Calgurio sama? What do you mean by that?

    Even Mamiya wonders.

    This is the moment of truth.

    Im truly afraid of what would happen if they rejected me, but I gather my courage and tell them.

    What? Its true. We were all wrong. I mean, the fact that we were divorced was wrong, too, so we should just pretend that it never happened. Do you think so too?

    Unlike my inner heart, I appeared calm.

    Honestly, that logic is hard to push through.

    Not only did Mamiya and I file for divorce, but Nest and Mamiyas remarriage vows were duly filed and epted long ago by the Imperial Court.

    It would normally be impossible to overturn this, but I was confident that Minits would do something about it.

    So, you mean, were going to be married again?

    Yes, I do, but do you want that?

    I think my heart is pounding.

    Are you sure you want to go through with this? I want you to

    I hope so. I hope youll ept it.

    But the drugs

    She may be talking about drugging me that time, but that was settled too.

    His Majesty Rimuru revived this body. He said it was fertile, so Im certain that any effects of the poison have vanished.

    You dont have to worry about that. Maybe, but its okay. So, can you and I start our marriage over again?

    It was a confession of the whole body.

    I thought one marriage proposal was enough, but I never thought Id get to do it again with the same woman.

    But if I didnt pull this off, I was likely to remain empty for the rest of my life.

    I waited for Mamiyas response, more nervous than preparing for a fight.

    Mamiyas eyes lit up

    and a smile came to her face.

    Beautiful.

    In this moment, Mamiya had regained a beauty that had been lost over the past twenty years.

    With pleasure,

    My nk heart was filled with joy.

    And at the same time,

    The servants cheered us on with blessings.

    I had served my purpose.

    The small matter of Nest remains, but the fact that he was the head of the Baron Heath will be blotted out, so hes probably doomed anyway.

    Nests status will return to that of a merchant. Unlike a nobleman, the privilege of immunity from arrest does not apply to him as a merchant.

    Any crimes hemits will be imputed to him and hell never see the light of day again.

    Criminal acts against noblemen means hell have to take it against his own people. It will destroy his father.

    This worked out well. I dont care if I have to arrest him now.

    Yes, sir. Well then, Ill capture both Viscount Zhuk and dispose of them here.

    Yes, then please.

    I pushed the misceneous things to my subordinates.

    The case was closed.

    Thus, I was reunited with Mamiya and became the head of the Heath family once again.

    ***

    Congrattions on your marriage, if I may say so?

    Its not a new marriage, and yet its not a remarriage, though.

    Me and Minits were once again exchanging drinks at the Imperial Citys restaurant.

    Hmm. Well, whatever it is, I wish you well with your wife.

    Thank you. And also, it helped me with the process.

    Yeah, that was a tough one. If you brought up the statute of limitations, it was impossible to turn it over. Im sorry, but I had to resort to the hardball approach.

    I hear you had a hard time.

    Well, yeah. But I dont mind. Just think of it as a congrattory gift.

    Then Minitsughed.

    Thank you.

    I replied and smiled shyly.

    Then he asked me to dig into my marriage.

    Dont be so ecstatic!

    Its all right. Come on. Marriage is good! You should stop being a bachelor and find a woman to be your partner for life!

    Shut up. Dont try to interfere in my private life.

    Wahahahahaha! Thats why I was so brave at the time!

    Ive already heard that. For the fifth time.

    It cant be helped. If you want to listen to me so badly, Ill make you listen to me as many times as you want.

    Youre looking pretty drunk, man. I didnt expect you to get so tangled up in it.

    I cant help but feel like he asked me, or that I just spoke on my own.

    Well, thats not the point, so if I care about it too much, its my loss.

    After a certain amount of rambling, he finally got down to business.

    So, about that file

    Was it useful?

    What did you mean when you said it was a bargaining chip for me?

    Did you notice?

    Of course. It was twenty years ago. From the time you said you did your research, thats more than a decade ago. So how is it that the information on each individual is soprehensive. With an investigation that detailed, even the Intelligence Bureau would be unable to do it!

    Hmph, thats a really sober point, if youre drunk.

    Now that Minits has confirmed it, Im sure of it.

    Testarossa-dono?

    Thats right. She gave me something I thought might be useful to you.

    Thats scary.

    Yeah, totally.

    Honestly, Im really scared.

    I dont know how they would have the resources to investigate in such detail.

    The White Primordi demon long feared in the Empire.

    It is said she was sealed by the Kings Guard in the Lakeshore Dyed in Scarlet incident

    But now that was a bit of a mystery.

    She was sealed on purpose.

    Or rather, the seal was meaningless.

    Testarossa-donos strength is her brain.

    Im told that she caused Velgrynd-sama problems despite their overwhelming difference in ability. That fact was a true testament to her fearfulness.

    From our point of view as a military department, if we have to deal with Testarossa-dono, well lose on the strategic side. In other words, its a no-win situation. I hope you will keep that in mind as you consider your future dealings with the monster kingdom.

    Idiot! You dont have to tell me to understand that. Im going to have to taste the bitterness of all those negotiations, before the war. I respect His Majesty Rimurus wisdom because you put him in the diplomatic service.

    Well, it seems that it was unnecessary advice.

    Minits and I are in agreement, and this is a great relief to me.

    There would be continued cooperation with the monster kingdom in the future.

    At least for now, while Minits and I are alive.

    But its a question of what happens after that.

    The Monster KingdomIt''s like the leaders of the Jura Tempest Federation have no lifespan.

    By contrast, in our empire, recements will inevitably ur.

    Velgrynd-sama is indifferent to politics.

    She wouldin about giving advice, but I feared for those who would rece others.

    Bing husband and wife with Mamiya has given me back my respect for my family. Thats why I fear for the future of the empire.

    We have toe up with a system that prevents us from getting into conflict with the monster kingdom. And its for our childrens sake that we should educate them to keep it that way.

    We have a lot of work to do now.

    Yeah. Weve got a lot of work to do.

    I guess Minits hade to the same conclusion.

    I smiled and tipped my cup with a grin.

 Volume 17 - Ch 4

    The Blue Devils Murmur

    Nice to meet you all.

    My name is Rain.

    Eh, you dont know me?

    Youre a fucking idiot, you know that 42 ?

    Ill beat you up.

    Go back to school and study.

    Oops, excuse me.

    I guess I snapped 43 a bit.

    No, Im usually adylike person, but sometimes I get violent.

    Yes, sometimes.

    But aside from that, since you dont know who I am, I guess I should introduce myself.

    As I said before, my name is Rain.

    Im a servant no, a maid.

    I am a faithful maid of the Demon Lord Guy Crimson-sama.

    Ive known Guy-sama for a long time.

    Before the creation of the sky and earth, perhaps.

    How long ago was that?

    I dont know.

    Or rather, do you remember the exact time you were born?

    You dont, do you?

    Thats what it is.

    Ignore the stupid question because its inconvenient. I was invincible because I was derived from the Great Spirit of Darkness.

    No. I thought I was invincible.

    Im not going to deny that I got a little carried away.

    And because of that I made a huge mistake.

    I teamed up with a like-minded to attack those who seemed even bigger than I was.

    Looking back on it now, I was such an idiot.

    That bastard was so powerful.

    We thought we could win two against one, but he beat us t out.

    The guy who beat us was Demon Lord Guy Crimson-sama, aka, the Red Primordial (Rouge).

    By the way, it was Green Primordial (Vert), or Mizari, who challenged Guy-sama together with me.

    We are very good friends.

    My job is Mizaris and Mizaris sry is mine.

    Thats how we still work together as coworkers.

    Rain! Dont ck off and get your cleaning done.

    Tsk, Im introducing you to her, but shes being a bitch.

    What did you say?

    No, nothing.

    Yeah? I hope so.

    Dangerous, dangerous.

    Mizari is very perceptive.

    She catches on when Im cking off and its tricky to keep up with her.

    Ill just try to clean up again without her getting mad at me.

    So, yeah, we were in the middle of an introduction.

    Mizari and I lost to Guy-sama, but this revealed one fact.

    A demon will be extinguished when their core is shattered.

    However!

    We, the primordials, cane back from any condition!

    I heard that the True Dragons inherit memories and reset their personalities, but in our case, our personalities remained intact.

    Guy-samas partner, Ice Dragon Velzard-sama, used to re-educate her younger brother, but that doesnt apply to us primordials.

    Seriously, isnt that amazing?

    I would love to brag about it, but unfortunately there are some drawbacks.

    It takes a long time to recover.

    But, you know, that is a minor issue. Whats important is the other one.

    Immortality is good, but the loser must be subservient.

    And in our case, that was Guy-sama.

    This revtion had thrown a wrench into the bnce of power among the demons, creating a distorted equilibrium.

    This is either our fault or our fault.

    By the way, Mizaris opinion is the former and mine is thetter.

    Did you know that?

    Youre not prejudiced against me, are you?

    Stop looking at me like Im a bad child.

    Well, thats beside the point.

    Ill tell you some secret information about demons.

    That is, how to kill one.

    The primordials cannot be destroyed, but they can be made subservient. However, since that is not as enforceable as servitude, it is not quite an absolute obedience.

    We can also disobey Guy-sama if we want to.

    I dont, though.

    And to a certain extent, he has the power to force us to do so.

    Its also a hassle to disobey.

    Next, the primordials immediate family.

    Normally, except for that idiot ck Primordial (Noir), primordials have many other subordinates. They are useful as maidservants because they obey all orders from their superiors of the same color.

    There may be a misunderstanding if I say spawning.

    Its tooplicated to exin in detail, so Ill give you a quick exnation.

    A newborn lesser demon is colorless.

    They have knowledge but no ego, and theyre weak. Most of them are often summoned by humans, and are called servant types.

    When these demons grow a sense of self (ego), theyre called autonomous (self-supporting) demons. When they evolve into greater demons, they are characterized by their nature and personality, and the colors of their lineage are clearly distinguishable.

    Or, the higher-ups could scout and form a faction.

    Rather, this may be the mainstream thing to do.

    Mizari is so diligent that she manages her own faction.

    Theyve even infiltrated human society and run several groups, such as the Apostles of Vert.

    Me?

    Im, well, I guess Ill pass on that hassle.

    Hey, stop messing around.

    Im the same as ck?

    Are you kidding me?

    I have my own faction!

    ck pisses me off, so dont ever think anything stupid again.

    Damn it.

    Back to the subject at hand.

    So, newborn demons dont have factions, but by the time they evolve into greater demons, theyre color-coded to belong to a faction.

    Some of them are born with colors, but they are often reincarnated demons.

    Since demons are immortal, they will reincarnate even if they die.

    Even those rtives will disappear if their cores are shattered. However, demons are stubborn and can resurrect after their souls are shattered. Especially those close to the primary colors.

    If youre lucky enough to beat one, then youd have to crush the core.

    Incidentally, with newborn servant types of weak willpower, you wont need to be so careful. Those are small fry that has only knowledge of battle but no experience, so it might die just by destroying the body. Well, theres nothing to worry about.

    And well, heres our secret.

    Since we figured this out, I feel like our defeat was also meaningful.

    Rather, if anything, we did a good job.

    ***

    So, in the spirit of self-sacrifice, we serve Guy-sama, and its a lot more fun than it seems.

    Guy-sama seems to have decided to leave the struggle for supremacy in the underworld and work on earth.

    Guy-sama is apparently a very disciplined man, so we were with him.

    You can do what you want with your life, too, he said.

    But I dont care about that.

    I want to be on the winning side all the time.

    Guy-sama cant be defeated, so I think the position Im in is the best.

    Well, if Guy-sama loses, thats interesting.

    So, at that time, I said,

    No. My mission is to be of service to you.

    What do you think?

    Its almost like a perfect maid, dont you think?

    You wont find a maid as loyal me anywhere elseat least I thought so

    Thats right. You are the king. We are your subjects. That is the eternal and immortal truth.

    MizariYou act so good!

    Its probably from the heart, so its a bad idea.

    I guess my rivals are not so easy to deal with.

    But Mizari seems to trust me, so Ive stopped showing her things.

    Oh well, what can I do?

    So the rotten rtionship between Mizari and I continues.

    We wandered from ce to ce and settled in our current base.

    Its the most frigid ce a creature could ever live in, but Im a demon, so I dont mind.

    Thats a lie.

    When I was trying to wash my clothes, they just froze.

    When I poked them in anger, they just fell to pieces.

    I got pissed off.

    Well, I made that mistake, but Im fine.

    You ought to be more careful about what you do!

    Rain, I think I should be a little concerned about that, dont you?

    Guy-sama warned me about this, so Im starting to care a little bit.

    Thats where the servantses in.

    My subordinates make it easy on me!

    So, I havent failed once since then.

    I have grown up too.

    Our job is not only washing clothes.

    We are so good that people say we are all-around versatile maids.

    We also doundry, singing, dancing, ying musical instruments, and fine arts to meet Guy-samas needs.

    Well, there have been some failures in cooking andundry.

    But we all learn from our mistakes.

    Its the same with demons, so lets forget about the past.

    My specialty, frankly, is painting.

    I love abstract painting.

    The other day I painted Mizari as a model and she was moved to tears.

    I was furious.

    Then it was a great sess!

    You really are

    Mizari was stunned, but I didnt care.

    Her rage means that her emotions were in turmoil.

    Thats a big deal to a demon, a spiritual life form.

    I was scared of my talent.

    Needless to say, when I paint Guy-sama or Velzard-sama, I have to choose a concrete painting. Its always a big hit because theyre so perfect.

    Thats right. You can draw if you put your mind to it. Thats why Im even more annoyed

    Mizari said something, but as always, Ill just let it slide.

    By the way, let me tell you about one of my hobbies.

    The extreme cold is so harsh and inhospitable.

    Its a snowstorm outside.

    It is all white.

    With such a backdrop, the inside of the Barrier is in evesting summer mode.

    We even changed the terrain to create ake and a white sandy beach.

    Iy out on beach chairs and let the caterers serve me.

    It was the best kind of entertainment.

    I wonder how much energy is spent on my hobby.

    I cant stop smiling just thinking about it.

    This is also very popr with Guy-sama.

    If you think about these things, Rain is the best.

    I admit it. I knew you were great, Rain.

    Ufufu, Mizari also gave me apliment.

    At this rate, I will continue to utilize my hobbies in my work.

    ***

    Oh yeah, I have an important job not to forget.

    asionally, I am a guide for the Walpurgis.

    Walpurgis.

    In the early days, as the name suggests, the three members Demon Lords got together to enjoy a meal.

    Guy-sama and Milim-sama.

    And also Ramiris-sama.

    Milim-sama is the niece of Velzard-sama and her power is immense.

    There was a time when she lost control and went on a rampage, and it was beyond description.

    We could have joined the battle because we would not die, but to do so would have destroyed the itself, so in the end, Mizari, Velzard-sama, and I were tasked with containing the aftermath of the battle.

    Were not going to do it again.

    If Ramiris-sama hadnt helped us, we would have fallen before the battle was over.

    So that''s why we love Ramiris-sama as well as Guy-sama.

    Of course, we respect Milim-sama, so we are very excited to have all three of them together.

    The definition of Walpurgis has changed over the years.

    The number of Demon Lords is on the rise.

    Keeping mankind from dying out. That is Guy-samas job, but hes been recruiting more people to help him do it.

    The first person to be the fourth Demon Lord was Dagruel-sama.

    Actually, he was the one who suffered the most when Guy-sama and Milim-sama fought. He also helped us prevent the earth from being affected.

    Even so, Dagruel-samas dominion has turned into a barrenndwell, thats not my problem, so its fine.

    Hes managed to live with magic, but it didnt stop the desert from expanding. Its all settled now, but it seems to have been harder back then.

    I just said good luck and cheered from afar.

    The next Demon Lord was Ruminas-sama, the Queen of Nightmares.

    She is the only daughter of the vampire ancestor, and is very strong, but I think she should be the one to talk about it.

    She was supposed to be the ancestor of the god human beings born from Veldanava-sama.

    Veldanava-sama sought a wise being to speak to him. With the birth of angels and demons, his need was satisfied.

    Thats why he tried to bring civilization to earth, and it seems that the ancestor 44 was expected to y that role.

    Well, it failed.

    They were immortal and didnt need to produce any offspring. Thats why they lost.

    Or, like us demons, the ancestors didnt have a gender. So it seems they had to wait for tens of thousands of years or more for a race to be born that could thrive on earth.

    I heard it all before.

    But the ancestor didnt give up.

    It kept running these forbidden experiments to fulfill Veldanava-samas expectations.

    That bastard loved to experiment more than the prosperity of his descendants.

    Whether that was a good thing or a bad thing is difficult for me to say, but I can tell you this,

    He was an annoying asshole!

    I don''t know how many times humanity perished because of that idiots experiments.

    However, its also true that because of that idiots experiments, true human beings (high humans) were born.

    Although the eternal god human beings could not be created, it contributed to the birth of mankind.

    You dont believe that, do you?

    Youre right.

    I didnt see it with my own eyes, so I dont believe it either.

    I heard that the ancestor created two races by analyzing his own body.

    They were the high humans and the vampires.

    Its not the way they were supposed to be born, but its just as well they were born.

    By the time Guy-sama was summoned to earth, the human race had already spread. The high humans built a huge nation,rger than the human beings today.

    However

    It seems that both races had their strengths and weaknesses.

    Although the high humans inherited strong magical power, their spirits had problems.

    As you can see from the stupidity of summoning Guy-sama, they thought that they were the best of the best.

    Theres a saying in other worlds that Those who are arrogant have not been around long enough and thats exactly what happened. They were destroyed in the blink of an eye.

    And as for the vampires, they had their own problems.

    But was that a good thing?

    Theyre still alive.

    A strong body and powerful magic. High immortality, and a mature mind. Its a good thing they had all these things, but they were always vulnerable to being out in the sun.

    They couldnt truly be the supreme ruler of the earth.

    That ancestor asshole continued to experiment.

    Well, I was there at the time, so I can generally remember what he was doing.

    At that time, spirits from the Great Spirit of each attribute had already separated and filled the earth with the four major elements.

    Those spirits took in magical elements and materialized, rather, they had a body. In other words, it was the Ancestor who helped them materialize.

    From the earth attribute, the earth spirit (High Dwarf) was born.

    From the water attribute, the water spirit (Siren) was born.

    From the fire attribute, the fire spirit (Enki) was born.

    And from the wind attribute, the wind spirit (High Elf) was born.

    Up to this point, it was still within the eptable range, but from here, the Ancestors recklessness began.

    That asshole experimented with breeding these races and gave birth to various species.

    To be honest, for ady like me, it was quite a shock.

    The result was the birth of various species such as dwarves, ogres and beastmen, which were sessful examples. There were many failures that were buried in the shadows andter deteriorated into goblin-like monsters.

    Guy-sama was also worried that this couldnt be left alone.

    But!

    As long as Veldanava was left alone, we couldn''t punish the Ancestor.

    As a result of his experiments, the diversity had certainly increased

    One might say that the world had be moreplicated, but it had also be more interesting.

    Yes, if its someone elses affair.

    For me, it was all right because it didnt bother me at all.

    I dont suppose you enjoy watching me get in trouble, do you?

    No way, no way! Thats a misunderstanding, Guy-sama. Im Guy-samas faithful maid.

    I decide on a beautiful curtesy.

    The fact that I was able to get away with it perfectly must be the result of my daily efforts.

    Well, I was troubled by the Ancestor as I survived such a critical situation.

    However his experiments led to his downfall.

    Ah! My daughter! You are my masterpiece

    It is time for judgement Disintegration

    I guess he had iting, huh?

    To have his own body turned to dust by his daughter

    Well, that guy went too far.

    I was relieved too, and thats a secret.

    This is the secret episode of the fifth Demon Lord Ruminas-samabut dont tell anyone.

    After that, the sixth one to be Demon Lord was Dino-sama.

    By the way, can I be frank with you?

    What? I already am?

    Well then, I dont need to be shy.

    Ill just say it.

    I dont like to call Dino names.

    Because hes a piece of crap.

    He doesnt work.

    Hes the perfect example of depravity.

    I could have forgiven him if he didnt work, but he also puts me to work!

    That is uneptable.

    I cant let him do that anymore.

    Just give it to Mizari.

    Then I will forgive you.

    And when I said that, do you know what that guy said?

    No, because Ill get in trouble if I ask Mizari, right?

    Thats right!

    Its bullshit!

    Im angry, and by saying that, its like saying Mizari is more scary than me.

    Well, shes often angry, but thats not to say that I dont have a dislike for Mizari

    Huh?

    Simrity?

    Are you stupid?

    Do you think you can handle a primordial?

    There are right and wrong things to say in this world.

    People who dont understand that deserve to get beaten to death.

    Those are Rains words of advice.

    ***

    In this way, six people became Demon Lords, and the Walpurgis became a business debriefing session.

    At first it was just a tea party, but it turned into a business meeting before I knew it.

    It sounds cumbersome, so Ill pass.

    Rain!

    Thats a lie.

    I will serve as a guide properly.

    Everyone seems to be very busy.

    About one person is cking off.

    If you look closely, there are a lot of people working, but that important job of managing the human race hasnt diminished at all, has it?

    First of all, Guy-sama.

    Its a madhouse.

    Except for Walpurgis, Mizari was also helping desperately.

    I have to support her. Ill take care of the cooking andundry, thank you.

    Next, Milim-sama.

    Here, too, she is also more serious than you might think.

    If there are skirmishes between nations, she would go to them and sanction them both.

    If a country is under attack by a giant beast, she would go there to help people.

    She doesnt always act like a Demon Lord, but thats typical of Milim-sama.

    And then, Ramiris-sama.

    The social recluse.

    She doesnte out of thebyrinth of her own making.

    But thats okay.

    I owe Ramiris-sama a debt of gratitude, so I can forgive anything.

    Dagruel-sama is the same situation.

    After all, it seems to be a mess to clean up after the wreck.

    He doesnt have time for anything else, so it would be a great help to him even if he could slow down the desertification process.

    The amazing one is Ruminas-sama.

    Shes a far cry from that Ancestor and is very good.

    Before I knew it, she had theplete control over the vampire forces.

    On top of that, she is protecting the humans who have lost their strength.

    Vampires, who used to see humans as bait, now follow Ruminas-samas orders to protect the human race.

    Lets put it bluntly.

    How did you do it?

    Thats seriously a great aplishment.

    And next, in contrast to Ruminas-sama, is that piece of crap.

    Dino-sama, why dont you work a little harder?

    I dont need you to tell me that!

    I dont understand.

    Was there ever a greater insult than this?

    No, no.

    I guess thats why Dino is a natural enemy of mine.

    Well, under the circumstances, six people werent enough.

    Therefore, I started to recruit more people.

    But then Ruminas-sama retired.

    The reason for this was that the new recruits were too stupid.

    Many had an arrogant attitude towards Ruminas-sama and Ramiris-sama. Finally, they went on a rampage to show them what they were made of, but by then she had run out of patience with them.

    Ruminas-sama is a beautiful girl, and her opponents would think she was lower than them. In order to break through this situation, she may have decided that it would be more advantageous to have a more dangerous looking being as the Demon Lord.

    As Ruminas-samas recement, Roy was put in.

    I (Ruminas voice) will now go behind the scenes to support everyone. Ill put Roy in the front as the Demon Lord, is that alright?

    If this were Dinos statement, he would have been used by everyone of trying to ck off.

    However, this is Ruminas-sama, the trusted and proven leader.

    With the circumstances being what they are, everyone epted it willingly.

    That was the beginning of a new era.

    Powerful majins began to rise in prominence as Demon Lords.

    The minimum requirement is the acquisition of a Demon Lord Seed.

    To fulfill this requirement, ambitious majins, such as Kazaream, became Demon Lords.

    Once again, the purpose of Walpurgis changed.

    It was decided that a meeting would be held with the consent of three people, to make a treaty or agreement between the Demon Lords.

    It was also decided that it would be at this meeting where new Demon Lords would be approved or not.

    For me, it was a funny development.

    But, well, Guy-sama seemed to have noints about it, because it served its purpose.

    If Guy-sama is convinced, then I cantin.

    A new system was being established.

    While looking after Guy-samas personal belongings, I serve as a guide for the asional Walpurgis banquets.

    A number of Demon Lords havee and gone.

    Before long, the names of the ten great Demon Lords began to spread.

    And then the slime came on the scene.

    Demon Lord Rimuru-sama.

    I first saw him in Walpurgis when Demon Lord yman called him in.

    Even so, I kind of miss yman.

    Even though he was weaker than me, I can admit that he had the courage to call himself a Demon Lord. Besides, he was good at coordinating and was surprisingly useful.

    Convenient, wasnt it?

    If I pushed him a little, hed take care of the troublesome work, too.

    Oh dear, I wonder where he went wrong

    It was a shame at the end, but he chose the wrong person to oppose.

    Mizari, who went to pick up Rimuru-sama, came back and said ymans life expectancy may be running out.

    And she was right.

    I was the host of the meeting, but once I gave the floor to Rimuru-sama, it was a one-sided discussion.

    It was refreshing to watch, but there was one thing that bothered me.

    Yeah, it wasnt so much rted to Rimuru-sama as it was to Ramiris-samas servant.

    Isnt that a ck dependent?

    Right. I felt his presence when I picked up Rimuru-sama, so Im sure of it.

    No way. Hes so free-spirited and selfish, how could one possibly follow someone like that?

    Well, I dont know, do you? I dont know what hes thinking, and I dont want to know or care what he thinks, but

    Well, thats right.

    I think its exactly as Mizari says.

    That guy, the ck Primordial (Noir), is both weird and selfish.

    Hes one of us, but honestly, I dont want to get involved with him.

    Because he tied with Guy-sama!

    Even if Mizari and I challenged him together, we would have had a difficult time. That fact made me feel a sense of weakness, even though I had never fought him in person.

    No, I was just showing off.

    Rather than having a difficult time against him, I honestly believe that I cant win.

    Because Guy-sama and ck werent serious at all. The two of them just ying with each other, but the battle was in a realm we couldnt follow.

    Well, I have my pride as a primordial, so I wont ever admit it.

    If possible, I really dont want to get into trouble with ck.

    ***

    This is the worst.

    Im going to fight with ck.

    Why did I do this to myself?

    Im wondering why when Im such a good girl.

    Maybe they found out that I stole Mizaris treats?

    No, I med it on my subordinate (archdemon) so I shouldnt be suspected.

    So why, I wonder, but things happen.

    I decided that this was an opportunity.

    Because I dont like him.

    He doesnt have any factions, he does things on his own, and hes willing to stand in Guy-samas way.

    He could incarnate if he wanted to, but Im annoyed that he wasnt interested in it.

    That being said, I was pissed off that he didnt evolve and remained an archdemon for a long time, as if he had no interest in the world.

    Its probably cks doing, too, by encouraging the remaining three colors to stay in a state of equilibrium, and if hes really a demon, he should aim for the future of evolution ording to the rules!

    After all, I have to say Im crazy here.

    Hes certainly strong, but Im strong too.

    Maybe I wont win, but maybe is the main word.

    Battles are verypatible with each other.

    ck doesnt know what Im capable of, so I think he might let his guard down. So, if I go for it, theres a chance.

    My good point is that Im positive.

    With my theoretical armament fully armed, I was ready for the battle with ck.

    I was feeling a passionate murderous intent, but my hands were tied. Rather, Id prefer you call me Diablo, Blue Primordial (Bleu)no, youve been given the name Rain.

    I was a little happy to hear that.

    I thought he wasnt interested in other people, but now he even remembers my name.

    Huh, maybe I should rethink it a little bit.

    Yes. My name is Rain. It was given to me by the great Guy-sama, the Red Primordial (Rouge), the strongest of our primordial breeds. Not like you, who was named by some Demon Lord mutt (hybrid) of some unknown species.

    I felt a little better and tried to incite him.

    I called Rimuru-sama a mutt.

    Personally, I like the slime because hes cute, and Rimuru-sama seems to be a good Demon Lord, so I thought it would be a good tactic against Diablo.

    It didnt work.

    What? Do you want to die? No, you want to disappear from the world. Kufufufufu, Im going to give you what you want.

    His eyes seemed quite serious.

    Well, Diablo doesnt always let anyone know what hes thinking, so I didnt think hed get that emotional and pissed off.

    Lets fight, Diablo! Oh, Im looking forward to it. Ive been wanting to fight you ever since Ive sensed you fighting the White Primordial in the east.

    What a relief it was that I was using the skill, Mist.

    If I split up my body beforehand, I cane back even if one of me dies. Otherwise, I would never want to fight an opponent that I might not be able to beat.

    By the way, it was true that I was really interested in the battle between Diablo and the White Primordial (nc).

    Because I had also fought the White Primordial (nc).

    The reason is jealousy.

    For some reason, Diablo had a respect for the White Primordial. I wanted to see what that power was like.

    As I recall, I was able to bring the game to a draw thanks to Mist.

    To put it the other way around, the game was a lossno, it was still a tie.

    I didnt lose.

    Only to Guy-sama can I admit defeat, because Im a capable girl.

    And yet the battle raged on.

    Maybe I was too serious.

    I used all my strength to hunt down Diablo with everything I had.

    In terms of magicules, were evenly matched in quantity, I may even be better than him.

    What a surprise.

    But Im not stupid enough to be so careless.

    Diablo said that he didnt to be serious against me.

    Its frustrating, but I think he meant what he said.

    Am I sore loser? I know you just incarnated and cant give it your all, but thats no excuse, okay?

    I try to tell him that, but I know what Im really saying.

    This perverted guy isn''t that kind of idiot.

    Hes one of the top two guys I thought were trouble. He would never make the kind of mistakes that some small fry would make.

    But this was unexpected.

    Before I knew it, a stacked magic circle painted with glowing spells had appeared around me.

    What? Wait?

    Moreover, isnt that spell holy magic, which demons are not good at?

    Its impossible not to be surprised.

    Ruminas-samas signature disintegration spell was aimed at me from all sides.

    Oh, I understood at that moment that I might have lost.

    Im sure you were worried.

    Of course, Im fine.

    Didnt I just say that I have the Mist skill to be safe?

    Girls will hate you for that kind of nitpicking.

    Dont think, but feel.

    Just sympathize with them, and theyll be happy.

    Of course, so will I!

    But that Diablo guy is beyond rude.

    Bringing up another person in the middle of a battle.

    Testarossa?

    Who is that? You gotta bring them here.

    I was indignant, but then I was shocked to learn that it was the White Primordial.

    I mean, what?

    Lets calm down for a minute.

    Huh???

    Why does the White Primordial (nc) have a name?

    I was still trying to set up Diablo, though I knew he would see through my act. I thought that would happen, because hes been a very tricky character since he was the ck Primordial.

    It pisses me off.

    If it werent for this guy, I would haveughed at him for being a sore loser.

    But for now, the Testarossa case is more important.

    It seems that Guy-sama was not the only one who was hiding with me. This is very bad, indeed.

    For a while now, Diablo has been proudly talking about Demon Lord Rimuru.

    It was annoying with all the Rimuru-sama this and Rimuru-sama that and so on and so forth, but its too much of a distraction to talk about important topics. What annoys me is that hes doing it for real.

    Guy-sama seems to be annoyed, but I have to put up with it because he is my partner. I managed to get out the shocking story of how Demon Lord Rimuru has taken on other primordials as his subordinates.

    I dont want to believe it.

    If he can make me believe it, I have strategically lost.

    But unfortunately, it seems to be the truth.

    Its the worst.

    The White Primordial (nc) is Testarossa.

    The Purple Primordial (Violet) is Ultima.

    The Yellow Primordial (Jaune) is Carrera.

    Until now, the bnce of power had been in bnce for so long, but now its copsing in an instant.

    I hope these kinds of changes would take decades or centuries, but the reality is brutal.

    Living freely without constraints. I sometimes think thats the right way for a demon but shouldnt we bepeting with each other?

    Isnt it wrong to be united into one force?

    Then one side is too strong, and there would be nopetition.

    But hes done itisnt that right?

    Demon Lord Rimuru, I think hes dangerous from the bottom of my heart

    Until now, the Ancestor asshole and the annoying ck Primordial (Noir) Diablo have been two of the top names on my list of problems.

    But todayright nowDemon Lord Rimuru has taken the top spot by andslide.

    He is the one I should be worried about at all costs.

    Hostility should be avoided, even if it means rubbing smoke in it.

    Unlike Guy-sama, Im a good girl.

    Besides making me angry, Ill just go with the flow and call him Rimuru-sama like I really mean it.

    I decided in my mind that it was good to do so.

    ***

    We pulled back, leaving things to chance.

    Its very unusual.

    Because Guy-samas real purpose was to deal with the situation because he had detected some very serious force being activated on the spot.

    Yes. No matter what happens here, Rimuru-sama will take care of it.

    Diablo was boasting, but I cant believe that he epted it.

    However, as a mere maid, it is out of the question for me to question Guy-samas decision.

    In the end, I left it to Rimuru-sama, and I was relieved that it was the right decision in the end.

    Because Guy-sama was worried about Ruminas-sama.

    Ruminas-samas control of Western Nations has made Guy-samas job much easier. So I worry about it.

    I agree with it.

    Theres no way Im going to take over.

    Anyway, Im d to hear that it seemed to be finished safely.

    Its a shame that Mizari failed her mission, but what can you do when youre dealing with a White Primordial (nc) named Testarossa.

    Was she strong?

    I didnt fight her, but she looked nasty. Having a name and a body made her a demon noble. Shes a lot stronger than a bad demon lord.

    Im sure.

    She was so troublesome even when I fought her, so if shes evolved, she may be out of control.

    In the first ce, she didnt care much about winning or losing. Shes willing to ept tactical defeats as long as she can get the result she wants.

    Thats why that woman is unfazed by defeat.

    She was number three on my top secret troublemaker listnow number four. Oh, actually, shes still number three because the Ancestor was destroyed.

    Wow, looking at it this way, the top members of the trouble list are all in Rimuru-sama forces.

    Carrera is also trouble, and Ultima is and mine if handled incorrectly.

    I have a lot of respect for him, controlling those guys.

    Lets try not to pick a fight with Rimuru-sama.

    Id like to say something all of a sudden, but I understand what you mean and I agree with you. Rather, thats line I want to say to you.

    How rude. Im not going to cross that troublesome guy, either.

    Really? Youre the one who wanted to challenge Guy-sama to a fight. Thats unbelievable.

    That was, well, a youthful indiscretion.

    Im growing up and I wont make the same mistake.

    And so, thats how we came to look at Rimuru-sama.

    ***

    Its bad! Its bad!

    Rimuru-sama, its seriously bad!

    Its the first time I met you, but you are dangerous!

    What?

    I already met him at Walpurgis?

    Shut up.

    What do I care about that? Im talking about Rimuru-samas trouble!

    Its all I can say, but thats what happens to everyone.

    Because, listen to me.

    Rimuru-sama, you evolved us as well!

    I cant believe it.

    But its true.

    Im a good girl who tells the truth, even though Im a demon.

    However, I can be of service to Guy-sama now.

    In terms of strength, I had barely been acknowledged by Guy-sama.

    In fact, if we had to take on the Octagram crowd, there was no one we could beat.

    But now that I think about it, the current Demon Lords are very good.

    I could beat Ramiris-sama, but Im not so sure. If she gains her true form, its us who would lose.

    I want to hurt that jerk Dino, but if I do, Ill be the one who cries. Thats why Ill forgive him, and want him to be thankful for my generosity.

    Oops, but I digress.

    Lets get back to the story of how we evolved.

    It all started when Diablo called Guy-sama.

    That why we came to visit Rimuru-samas country, but Guy-sama was not happy because he was pushed around by Diablo.

    I thought that it would be trouble and wanted to stay home, but I couldnt afford to do so.

    However, that was the correct thing to do after participating

    Rimuru-sama hadnt met Velzard-sama before and they were exchanging greetings. Afterwards, he greeted me very politely.

    One could fall in love with him 45 .

    I thought I should pretend to be a misunderstood girl and go for it.

    Of course, I didnt do it out of thin air, did I?

    If I had done it, I am confident that it would have been over for me, so it was the right decision.

    And then, the friendly tea party began.

    I was observing behind Guy-sama, but Rimuru-sama somehow seems to be simr to Guy-sama. I saw that they reacted the same way and had a hard time with Diablo.

    I saw that he and Guy-sama have the same reactions.

    Needless to say, it made me like him a lot more.

    But there were other things that bothered me, too.

    First, Rimuru-samas servant.

    He seems to be called Benimaru, but why does he seem stronger than the Demon Lords?

    The other one is Shion-san.

    Shes be much stronger from thest time we met!

    I can somehow feel a hint of evil in her. Does she have an advantage over a demon?

    What is this?

    I wonder if I can win if I fight seriously?

    However, for me to admit my defeat would be to lose the purpose of my existence.

    Absolutely not.

    So I kept a cool face.

    But you know, I had to work pretty hard.

    Because those two werent the only ones with any hint of strength.

    Well, wait a minute.

    That wasnt Testarossa.

    There are at least three or four other people here besides them.

    Why are there so many Demon Lord ss under a Demon Lordsmand?

    I thought that only Guy-sama was allowed to do that, but it seems I need to change my mind.

    As I was making up my mind, the smell of tea was wafting through the air.

    Is it a break?

    But were maids, so its bad manners to have tea together. Unfortunately, I was thinking about seeing off, so I was led to the next room.

    To our surprise, there was even a cake for us.

    As expected of Rimuru-sama.

    Just by looking at this attention to detail, I have to admit that hes qualified to be a king!

    And then, it was time to taste it.

    Is this a strawberry shortcake?

    I look like a pro at cooking. Ive confined a head chef of a top hotel to learn his craft, so Im proud to say that my cooking skills are as good as those guys.

    In other words, what Im trying to say is that I cant be satisfied with a half-hearted taste.

    Its so good!

    What!? Youre kidding me!!

    This is so good!

    It looks simple on the outside, but its aplex harmony of vors.

    Oh, so there are severalyers.

    Theres a different kind of cream in between.

    Arent these the kind of things that take a lot of time and effort to make?

    And the fact that the vors are so evenly distributed shows that all the ingredients have been carefully nned out.

    Its amazing

    Mizari is also impressed.

    Our specialty has always been fresh fruitcakes and sugary pancakes that rely on high quality ingredients. I didnt expect to see so much technology being used in a single cake.

    Is this technology from the other world?

    I asked unconsciously, and Shion-san answered.

    Thats right. This is a strawberry short made with three kinds of cream, developed by Mr. Yoshida and Shuna-sama. It also contains a small amount of ck rice powder, which is very popr with monsters.

    Yoshida-san is an otherworlder, isnt he?

    I know who Shuna-sama is. She is the person who showed us around and even served us.

    Smooth, refined movements and an unassuming demeanor. Even from my perspective, who is known as a perfect maid, she was highly praised for her excellent customer service. Moreover, her cooking skills are also quite impressive.

    While enjoying the cake, I talk to that damned Diablo.

    By the way, arent you stronger from thest time I fought you?

    I had been wondering.

    I had always wondered if he was stronger than from thest time I fought him.

    I couldnt ask him in front of Guy-sama, but now I could ask him in person. I cant miss this opportunity.

    Because ever since we evolved into demon nobles, we havent been able to gain any more strength.

    Our experience has made us stronger.

    However, thats not what Im talking about; Im talking about the existence itself that could not evolve. And yet, this Diablo guy so easily

    Kufufu, youre still stupid, arent you?

    That was Diablos response.

    I dont know. What is this annoying feeling?

    Can I hit him?

    Yeah, sureand my inner conscience is all for it.

    I think I should do it.

    Just as I was about to act on that thought, Diablo interrupted me by saying.

    Kufufufu. It is all thanks to my lord, Rimuru-sama. He has rewarded me for my services!

    Damn this bastard!

    Youre acting like youre just trying to trick me.

    Then Ill be the one to return the favor.

    Oh, I see. So then youre not much better off either. I agree with you that Rimuru-sama is a great man, no doubt about it, but thats another matter. You yourself are relying on Rimuru-sama.

    Well, I told him.

    Its only because of Rimuru-sama that you have evolved, so your skills are nothing to sneeze at!

    However

    Yes. Thats right, but is there any problem?

    This Diablo bastard just admitted it without a word.

    And hes looking at me like hes happy to see melike he knows whats going on!

    Thats annoying.

    I look like an idiot.

    Rain, dont do it. Even Guy-sama isnt going to win an argument with this guy. Its okay for you to cry.

    Even Mizari said such a thing.

    But unfortunately, that opinion seems to be correct.

    I stared at Diablo in frustration.

    Then something unexpected happened.

    Shion-san smacked Diablo on the head, making a nice thwacking sound.

    I was so happy.

    Moreover, she even preached to him.

    Youre being cheeky, Tea-boy! You are not to be rude to our guests.

    When I heard that, I couldnt help but pump my fists in a pose.

    ncing to thee side, I saw Mizari smiling happily.

    Of course she did.

    This is just too funny!

    Then, leaving us alone, Diablo and Shion-san started fighting, which continued until Shuna-sama came onto the scene.

    Shuna-sama.

    I have no qualms in adding the sama anymore.

    Shion-san, who can quarrel with Diablo, is amazing, but Shuna-sama who can beat up Shion-san and Diablo together, was most wonderful in my point of view.

    Theres a lot to learn from her.

    By the way, the quarrel between Diablo and Shion-san really was a quarrel, which surprised both Mizari and me.

    Shuna-sama came to call us, so we obeyed quietly.

    She told us that she would teach us the recipe for the cake.

    She told us that Guy-sama had asked her to teach us how to make the cake.

    We are very grateful.

    I must tell her how I feel when I am shown into the parlor where Rimuru-sama is.

    As expected of Demon Lord Rimuru-sama, the cake was wonderful.

    Oops, I waste.

    Id like to acknowledge Mizaris omission.

    I am deeply moved that you have been so generous in teaching me your recipe.

    Then Rimuru-samaughed and said it was no big deal.

    Thank you. If we can continue to work together, it would be desirable for me.

    He calls that cooperation when we receive it unterally?

    Thats very generous of him.

    However, my recognition was still insufficient.

    You guys, Rimuru will give you strength. You should be more grateful.

    Guy-sama suddenly told me

    Mizari and I had been given the honor of evolving into a true demon lord.

    Right?

    Its dangerous, right?

    Really, just what is Rimuru-sama?

    Looking back on it now, all I can think of is that its dangerous.

    We will make effective use of the power hes given us, and if hes ever in trouble, well be happy to help him.

    The amount of magicules is increasing day by day, and we can be of more help to Guy-sama than ever before.

    We owe it all to Rimuru-sama, and it is only natural that we should return the favor.

    However, there is Testarossa in his country, so I doubt there will be any situations that require my help

    Thats all for self-deprecation.

    Its time for todays mock battle with Mizari.

    Daily special training is indispensable to get used to our own power.

    Well then, to the training groundsOh?

    It''s unlikely that someone is making a joke at such a time.

    Rain! Someone just broke into the Barrier.

    I know, I know. But this is

    This is no longer a time for mock battles, nor is it a time for idle chatter.

    Thats it for me.

    I look forward to seeing you all again.

 Volume 18 - Prologue

    Prologue

    A ndestine Meeting

    While Rimuru and the others were waging a fierce battle against Rudra''s forces

    Here, in thend of the Beast Kingdom of Yuurazania, there was an uninvited guest.

    A gigantic structure known as the Sky Castle was currently in the process of being built at the hands various majins.

    When the Eastern Empire invaded the Great Jura Forest, Geld, who had been in charge, left the construction site. Because of this, the main construction had been suspended. However, the rest of the work was still carrying on as usual with the remaining workers.

    It was Obera of the Three Phantom Commanders who came to such a ce.

    On the top floor of the Sky Castle, in the Sky Room known as a temporary office, Milim and Obera were confronting one another.

    The only other person present was Midley, who was standing behind Milim. All the others had been evacuated from the area, as they would not be able to help.

    Milim herself had sent Karion and Frey away and was not participating in the war. There were several reasons for this, but ultimately, the most important one was the defense of her country.

    When considering things from the Empires perspective, she could not deny the possibility that the Empire might invade through her territory.

    Furthermore, if she took the initiative to join the war, that would meanying her hands on humans, which was not her intention. So Milim chose to stay behind.

    It seems that this was the right choice.

    What business do you have with me 1 ?

    Milim asked, addressing the miscreant who hade to take advantage of the opportunity.

    Midley quietly kept an eye on the proceedings, having absolute trust in Milim. He was simply waiting for Obera''s response to Milim''s question.

    And then there was Obera.

    She removed the mythical-grade armor protecting her body and knelt down in front of Milim.

    It is a great honor to meet you, Dragon Empress Milim-sama. My name is Obera. Formerly one of the Seven Original Angels 2 , and a faithful apostle of Veldanava-sama, the Star King Dragon.

    Obera was a beautiful woman with wavy ck hair like the night sky. Her eyes, which shone like the stars, were also beautiful and had a charm that could dazzle any who saw them.

    Milim, who had been excited about the prospect of a fight, was set back by Obera''s unexpected behavior. 3

    Huh?

    As she stood there confused, she felt Obera smiling at her.

    It is not surprising that you do not know me. When you were born, I was on a mission in the Otherworld.

    Obera expressed to Milim that she was sorry for the dy in greeting her.

    What do you mean by that? Milim wondered.

    Your strength is pretty impressiveweren''t you nning to fight me?

    Not at all.

    Hmm. Then, what did youe here for?

    To say my greetings and offer some advice.

    Obera raised her head and stared at Milim with a tense expression on her face.

    ***

    The conversation resumed in the reception room, which had been temporarily set up. Obera introduced herself once more and borated on what was currently happening.

    When Milim heard that her aunt Velgrynd, the Scorch Dragon, had fallen into Feldway''s hands, she wanted to run out to rescue Rimuru right away, but Obera warned her that it was toote to take any action at this point.

    What are you saying!? If this continues, my best friend 4 Rimuru will

    It is toote now.

    At this response, Milim became furious.

    In that case, why didn''t youe here sooner!?

    I am afraid I have no excuse for that.

    Even in the face of Milim''s furious presence, Obera hung her head, offering no excuses.

    Obera''s position is that of a subordinate of the Phantom King Feldway. At this moment, she was under orders to defend the Pce of Monsters 5 , and her visit to Milim was a serious vition of orders.

    Although she should have exined that, Obera only felt ashamed of herself for failing to live up to Milim''s expectations. Seeing her penitent attitude, Milim had no choice but to quell her anger.

    It seems I''ve been pretty unreasonable. Thank you for letting me know.

    Those words alone are a reward.

    As Obera continued to bow reverently, there was no sign that she was lying.

    Milim is able to see through the subtleties of a persons nature.

    She judged from Obera''s attitude that she was acting from the heart.

    Rimuru is, by all appearances, a cautious person. I believe that no matter what happens, he will get through this safely. Yes, I have faith in Rimuru.

    Yes.

    If you say that youre not my enemy, then you should know that I won''t allow you to mess with Rimuru.

    I''d like to say, I understand, but I''m afraid that I cannot move freely. For now, I think it would be best for us to act within Feldway''s trustwhat will you do?

    If Feldway gives her an order, Obera says that she will obey. However, if Milim wishes, she is prepared to defect from Feldway at this time.

    Her hair was as ck as the night sky, and her eyes shone like the stars.

    Hmm. I can''t sense any lies in your words.

    By your will 6 . The whole truth, it is my heart''s desire.

    Then I ask you, what is your purpose?

    As soon as Milim asked, Obera began to speak without hesitation.

    Feldway seems to be plotting the resurrection of Veldanava-sama, but I consider that act to be irreverent. Your divine father will be resurrected without any help. And the fact that he cannot be resurrected easily must be because of some reason. It is very, very difficult for one like me to discern God''s will.

    In other words, Obera believes that rather than trying to revive Veldanava, Milim, his daughter, should be crowned Lord.

    You''re on my side?

    Such arrogance is beneath my diminutive frame. I wish to be your tool. I have nothing to ask of you, and it gives me the greatest pleasure to be of service to you, so pleasemand me.

    Everything was as Milim wills it.

    That was Obera''s intention.

    Milim understood this but was puzzled by Obera''s resolve.

    If thats the case, then you''re willing to betray Feldway?

    Well, that is just a difference of opinion. Rather, it is Feldway who is disobeying the will of Veldanava-sama.

    Obera affirmed as such.

    The tone of her voice was proof that she was serious.

    I believe that Veldanava-sama''s will is for the happiness of you, his daughter. I am convinced of this, and therefore have nopassion for those who would do you harm.

    In other words, this is a story before a betrayal.

    To Obera, who believed that Feldway''s actions would be harmful to Milim, her colleague was nothing but an enemy.

    However, Obera was wise.

    Instead of acting on her own, she had the wisdom to leave everything to Milim. She took great care to ensure that her actions did not interfere with Milim.

    That is why she risked her life to meet Milim.

    She would not do anything if Milim so wished, but if she was ordered to, she would bare her fangs at anyone no matter who they were. This was the true nature of the Three Phantom Commanders Obera.

    Milim was not blind to this.

    Very well. Then I will trust you and make you one of my subordinates. Midley, is that okay?

    Of course, Milim-sama. I dont think there will be any objections.

    Okay! Then Obera, you are one of us starting from today. They are not here right now, but Ill introduce you to Karion and Frey once the war is over!

    Thank you.

    Wahahahaha! Now, with Midley as the leader, I also have the Four Heavenly Kings. I''ll have to show off to Rimuru!

    As soon as Obera decided to join, Milimughed heartily. She had decided to call her subordinates the Four Heavenly Kings in order topete with Rimuru''s Four Heavenly Kings, which she had been secretly jealous of.

    If Frey had been there at the time, the idea would definitely have been rejected. But fortunately for Milim, Midley was the only one present.

    I''m the leader! Well, thats only natural. No one knows Milim-sama better than I do!

    For Midley, whose number one priority was always Milim, there was no way that he could oppose her, especially if he were to be given the leadership of the Four Heavenly Kings. Rather, he was overjoyed and agreed immediately.

    Thus, Milims Four Heavenly Kings were established.

    ***

    Obera, who was suddenly appointed as one of the Four Heavenly Kings, showed no sign of being upset and epted.

    Milim''s words were the will of God.

    Because of that, Obera gave priority to Milim in everything.

    However, a vexing problem arose here.

    Well, now thenWhat should we do with Obera? That is the question. Its at times like these that I wish I could consult Rimuru

    Hmm, that''s a difficult question for sure. Should we have her stay here, or should we have her remain in the enemy camp and work as a spy?

    Either way, there are pros and cons.

    She really should think it over carefully, plus Milim wanted to hear from Karion and Frey as well. If possible, she also wanted to consult Rimuru.

    Unfortunately, Milim and Midley were the only ones here.

    What about youwhat do you want to do?

    Midley was not the intellectual type, so he was not the best person to consult with. Milim, who was well aware of this, asked Obera directly instead of relying on him.

    Obera replied without hesitation.

    As for me, I would like to return to the Pce of Monsters. I haven''t manifested my body here, so if I stay, I''ll have to force myself to materialize my body. Moreover

    Obera''s role was to deal with the cryptids in the other world. Strictly speaking, monitoring the movements of Ivarage, the World-destroying Dragon, was her primary mission.

    Cornu''s primary mission was to invade other dimensions, and Zrio''s was to deal with the insectars.

    With the pact between Phantom King Feldway and Insect Lord Znus, Zrio was now able to move freely. However, it was still difficult tomunicate with Ivarage, and Obera''s body remained bound.

    Insect Lord Znus and the World-destroying Dragon Ivarage? They sound strong!

    Yes. Znus is one thing, but Ivarage is very nasty. A world-destroying malevolence in itself, where coexistence is impossible. It is allowed to exist by Veldanava-sama''s will, but must still be prevented from being released from the Otherworld.

    If she stayed here, Ivarage''s surveince would be neglected. Obera wanted to make sure that Ivarage would not affect Feldway''s ns.

    I see. Then you should keep on watching him.

    As you wish.

    But then, I wonderwhat does Feldway n to do with Ivarage?

    Hmm, I am wondering the same thing.

    They were unaware of Feldway''s ns, so their questions were only natural.

    Then Obera disclosed all the information she knew.

    Feldway was given the task to monitor Ivarage by Veldanava-sama. However, he intends to abandon that mission in favor of resurrecting Veldanava-sama. We are currently expanding the Underworld Gate, and as soon as it isplete, we n to invade this Cardinal World with all the phantoms and insectars.

    So, the expansion of the Underworld Gate was a long-term n.

    Yes.

    But what are you going to do after that? Wont Ivarage be released as well if you can''t close the opened gates?

    That is a possibility, and I told Feldway as much. But he didn''t care about that at all. I cannot understand what he''s thinking.

    Huh?

    Feldway is crazy. It is safe to assume that he is willing to let the world be destroyed as long as Veldanava-sama can be resurrected.

    Feldway hated this world for taking Veldanava away from him. He intended to remake the world, leaving only those he had selected. If Ivarage destroyed the world, that may even be convenient for him.

    In other words, we''ll be the ones in trouble then, right?

    What an annoying situation. Znus seems to be troublesome, he should just be sealed up in the other world

    Milim and Midley look at each other in disgust.

    They had promised to y with Rimuru and the others, but the war had forced them to postpone. On top of that, Milim''s mood had taken a nosedive with this new problem.

    In that case, Ill just have to send Feldway flying 7 .

    It was an easy snap decision on Milim''s part.

    That''s right. Then Milim-sama, I, Midley, leader of the Four Heavenly Kings, would like to receive the orders to defeat Feldway!

    Midley, who lives for Milim, agrees without thinking.

    Yes! Im counting on you, Midley. Ill be heading into battle as one of the generals. We''ll crush Feldway''s ambitions with our own hands!

    Hahaayes!! I am looking forward to it so much that my arms are tingling! Ill show you what I can do!

    With Frey out of the picture, it seemed that no one could stop these two from running amok. But then, Obera spoke up.

    Please wait. I have been sharing information with Feldway and the others since the start of the mission, and it seems that Emperor Rudra captured Velgrynd-sama''s Dragon Factor. However, at thest minute, Demon Lord Rimuru interfered, and the final n was suspended.

    That was enough information to make Milim calm down.

    So Rimuru is safe?

    Yes. The mission is now over, and Feldway is pulling back to base.

    HmmIn that case, it''s too soon to make our move.

    Ahhmm~, Midley''s right

    With their momentum suddenly sapped, Midley and Milim regained theirposure.

    They had time to spare before Feldway began his next operation. It would be better to work with Rimuru and the others rather than to force something at this point.

    In any case, it was important share all of this information first.

    Milim did not fail to understand this.

    Then Obera, you will keep an eye on Feldway''s movements until I give you an order.

    As you wish. 8

    Keep in contact with Magic Communication.

    Understood.

    Milim and Obera adjusted a special wavelength that would work only between the two of them. It would take a lot of magic to cross dimensions, but with their level of skill, it would be no problem. In this way, a means ofmunication was secured.

    After such a series of exchanges, the meeting came to an end.

    Now then, I will take my leave.

    After saying that, Obera departed.

    Milim and Midley, who were left behind, were troubled by the prospect of a new conflict.

 Volume 18 - Ch 1

    Walpurgis

    The destination through Rain''s portal was a silvery world of ice and snow.

    Unlikest time, it seemed that the venue was to be Guy''s pce.

    Rain guided me as I stepped inside.

    Shion and Diablo followed.

    Although the outside was too frigid for any living thing survive, the temperature inside of the castle wasfortable. However, half of the castle had copsed and it was obvious that something had happened.

    Hey, so youre here. I''m sure Milim and Dagruel will be here soon, so make yourselffortable and wait for them.

    Guy told me as he led me to the room.

    There were several round tea tables in arge hall that looked as if it could be used for a ball. Chairs were also ced irregrly, so that we could sit freely.

    Looking at the guests, I saw that Ruminas and Leon had already arrived.

    Behind Ruminas was Pope Louis and the old butler Gunther.

    Behind Leon were the two knights, Alrose and ude, both fully armed.

    I was a little relieved to see familiar faces. After a brief exchange of greetings, I took a seat. Shion and Diablo seemed to refrain from sitting down and waited behind me instead.

    I wish they would sit down too, but Ill let them do as they please.

    And then, Ramiris made her loud appearance. 9

    Hey, what''s the deal with you leaving me behind!?

    Ah!

    I thought we had gone together, but it seems that Ramiris was left behind.

    Wha-what? Ramiris-sama, why weren''t you with us?

    I wasnt the only one who was caught off guard. Rain, who had been guiding us, was flustered as well. She seemed to have assumed that Ramiris was following her and was surprised to see her getting angry.

    Rain, it is unlike you to make a mistake. I received an urgent request from Ramiris-sama to pick her up.

    It was Mizari who said this.

    Just like Rain, Mizari''s face was battered and bruised, though her expression remained sharp.

    I had initially thought that those two were simr, butPerhaps it was because I didn''t have the luxury of time until now, but the differences in their personalities stood out clearly.

    Rain-chan, you seem to be distracted because of your injury! I was just worrying about who I should take with me, you know! But even so!

    I noticed that Ramiris had two attendants with her.

    Beretta andHey.

    Veldora, what are you doing?

    Ruminas reacted to my words and turned to look behind Ramiris. She saw Veldora standing there and clicked her tongue, making a disgusted face.

    Tsk, that evil dragon.

    Kuahahaha! I heard that there was some kind of important meeting going on, and I just couldn''t miss it. I was actually nning to follow Rimuru, but was toote, so I quickly stopped Ramiris and offered to join her!

    Veldora did not read the atmosphere.

    He didnt care that Ruminas was in a bad mood and was confidently making his point.

    Ramiris followed suit.

    That''s how it is! If Master 10 is willing to join us, its like having the help of a hundred people, so I hope you''ll thank me for bringing him here!

    Beretta was the only one shaking his head andmenting, but there seemed to be no stopping the two of them.

    I am very sorry 11 . I was careless

    No, no, it''s not Rain-san''s fault. We came here in a hurry as well.

    Rain looked depressed, so Iforted her for the time being.

    Well, since I called you here, it was only natural to hurry. Rimuru, didn''t I tell you before that you can just call Rain and the others by their names 12 ?

    Oh, I forgot.

    Guy-sama is right, Rimuru-sama. Please call us by our names.

    That''s right. It makes me happy to feel more familiar.

    Mizari-san seems to understand me very well.

    There are two ways in which I address others with honorific titles.

    The first is when I want to keep an eye on someone, and the second is when I want to keep my distance from them.

    When I''m not close to someone, or when I should be wary of them, I think it is rude to refer to them without their honorific titles. Its also partly because I don''t want to be disliked and partly a calction so as not to antagonize them.

    On the other hand, when I get close to someone, I naturally call them by his/her name.

    There are a few people like Haruna-san or Treyni-san, who for some reason make me want to use the -san honorific, but those people are exceptions.

    Putting those thoughts aside

    At this time, more voices from some unexpected people were heard.

    [Ruminas voice] Rimuru, youve been calling me by my name too, so it''s probably a littlete for that.

    That''s right. You''re so brazen, I don''t think that you can fix it now.

    Ruminas and Leon.

    I was convinced that they were right.

    All right, then. In that case, Ill just call you all by name from now on 13 .

    I said so and epted Guys and everyones offer.

    ***

    Mizari and Rain went out to meet Milim and Dagruel.

    Everyone else rxed and waited. There were snacks on the table, so we spent some time reaching for them.

    After a while

    What''s going on, Guy? I''ve also got a lot on my te. You can call for me, but you should at least contact us in advance! Frey says that''s good manners.

    Milim arrived, looking full of energy.

    She was still as noisy as ever, which was very typical of Milim.

    Is that so, Frey?

    Well, yes. Guy-sama.

    Frey, as I was saying to Rimuru, no honorifics, please. The same with Karion and you guys there. Any of you in this room deserve it.

    Oh, Guy just said something I didn''t expectI am convinced too. Everyone in this room is strong.

    If I had to choose, I''d say that Leon''s followers were inferior in terms of magicule quantity, but their skills still seemed to be quite good.

    On top of that, Frey-san had awakened into a True Demon Lord and had reached the Million-ss. It was unknown how strong she had be, but she was not someone to be mocked as a mere subordinate.

    As if she was aware of this, Frey-san nodded.

    Oh, thank you. I''ll freely call you as such, then.

    Frey-san responded, looking around Guy''s castle.

    Karion followed suit, addressing Guy in a dignified manner.

    I''ve never been good with honorifics, so it''s nice of you to say so. So, Guy, what kind of business did you call us in for today?

    Like Frey-san, Karion was also in the millions-ss. He had always had the aura of a king from the start, so his irreverent attitude felt forgivable.

    When our eyes met, he greeted me with one hand raised in the air.

    Guy responded to Karion with a wry smile.

    Well, wait just a minute. Dagruel will be here soon, so we can talk then. But still, Im surprised. Not only Karion, but Frey has awakened as well.

    Well, one would notice. I had heard it from the reports, but after seeing him in person, I can tell that hes be far stronger than before.

    Thanks to you. Perhaps its exactly as Milim calcted, but this war has helped me ovee my limitations as a harpy.

    Frey-san smiled, and Guy nodded in satisfaction saying, That''s what it means to climb to the top. 14

    Well, I guess I''m the same way. I was able to get rid of the shame of the beastmen, and I guess it''s not all bad to y along with Milim''s schemes.

    Karionughed out loud.

    Whaaat!? I don''t know what you''re talking about!

    Meh, don''t try to hide it Milim. You must have thought that if we remained weak, wed die in future battles, right? That''s why you gave us the chance to fight the humans.

    That''s right. If this is the world Rimuru-dono wants, we wouldnt have been able to get the souls needed to awaken. Perhaps this was yourst chance?

    That aint right. 15 Is that so?

    AhAhh! I don''t know. Stop talking nonsense and just sit down!

    Milim''s attitude as she shouted was, by all appearances, one of embarrassment.

    So that''s what she was trying to do, I thought to myself.

    But that''s beside the point.

    Um, Frey-san. You don''t have to address me by ''-dono'' or any other honorific title.

    I was trying to make a point, but Frey-san snickered at me.

    Rejected. You are a friend of Milim-chan, our master, so you should be respected as well.

    No, no, but you call Milim so informally too.

    I don''t find that very convincing

    If thats the case

    Also, youve been referring to me with -san 16 as well. Can you stop that?

    I got caught in my own line of questioning.

    Frey-san''s request was a difficult hurdle for me.

    Karion is one thing, but I don''t feelfortable calling out to Frey-san so casually.

    How do I put it, is it the aura that Im not good with?

    Whenever I am in front of a beautiful woman, I feel debilitated 17 .

    Milim is a child, and Ruminas is a beautiful young girl, so it''s safe. If they had been more mature, I might have had a little trouble reacting.

    If the person was as disappointing as Shion though, the hurdle would be instantly lowered and I would be fine.

    Ahahaha! Rimuru, so you''re not good with adult beauties, huh?

    He saw through me!?

    Thats good. Whenever I need to ask you for something, I''ll just take the form of a beautiful woman.

    I don''t need that kind of attention! If I know that its you, I wont be happy about it!

    I was so annoyed that I lost all my tension.

    That''s why Ipletely ignored Guy''s words and spilled out my true feelings.

    Fufu, of course! After all, Rimuru-sama has a beautiful secretary like me.

    Wait, you''re going to say that about yourself?

    Kufufufu. Guy, you''re being a bit presumptuous if you think that Rimuru-sama would be interested in you. In the first ce, I can easily learn to transform myself into a woman, and if Rimuru-sama wants me to

    I don''t want you to, so this conversation is over.

    Diablo was more dangerous than Shion.

    He was about to say something crazy if left him alone, so I swiftly ended the conversation.

    Seriously, my subordinates are so much trouble.

    I regretted for a moment that I didnt bring Benimaru with me instead.

    Meanwhile, Dagruel had also arrived.

    He didn''t bring anypanions, but even by himself he looked very intimidating.

    Oh, man, it''s a hell of a mess. Could it be that this meeting is really serious?

    That was the first thing Dagruel said as he sat down on therge chair that Rain guided him to.

    It was interesting because the chair looked distorted even though it was made of massive stone.

    In any case, no one had mentioned it, but I still noticed it.

    No, everyone had definitely noticed it.

    There was also a big crack running through walls of this hall. Just by looking at it, it was obvious that something had happened.

    Because I knew that it would be very troublesome, I had been diverting the topic to avoid facing the reality.

    It was an escape to avoid getting involved in the situation, but now that everyone was here, there seemed to be no choice but to get down to business.

    Well, things have gotten a littleplicated. For once, I seriously want to borrow everyones wisdom.

    Hoh, that''s a pretty big deal,ing from you.

    Guy nodded, and Dagruel turned serious.

    He must have read the situation and decided that things seemed seriously troublesome.

    It wasnt just wisdom he wanted to borrow, I thought, with a faraway look in my eyes.

    I wasnt the only one, but Guy stood up and announced with a smile.

    Now then, let''s change venues. Let us have an important discussion with our highly cooperative Octagram, first!

    Cooperative?

    Dont sleep-talk I almost muttered to myself.

    That smile gave me a bad feeling, butsadly, there seemed to be no way to refuse, so we all reluctantly followed Guy''s lead.

    ***

    The venue was a hall with a round table that seemed to be isted from the outside world.

    The fact that drinks had already been prepared for us was quite impressive.

    Guy sat at the top, and I sat opposite of him.

    From my point of view, Milim was on Guy''s right and Ramiris was on his left.

    To my right was Leon. Between Milim and Leon was Ruminas, and on the other side was Dagruel.

    Ramiris'' chair was small, but the seat was higher than the top of the round table. And since Dagruel''s chair was several times heavier than usual, the arrangement was well bnced.

    As soon as I sat down, it was obvious that there was an empty seat between me and Dagruel.

    By the way, I dont see Dino, do we have to wait for him?

    Dagruel asked the obvious question.

    The other demon lords seemed to be curious as well, and their eyes focused on Guy.

    Ahh, that''s right.

    Guy looked at me.

    I immediately had the feeling that he was aiming towards me 18 .

    Rimuru-kun.

    Guy seemed to know about Dino''s betrayal after all. I didnt know what kind of an informationwork he had, but the fact that he was talking to me suggested that he had a grasp of the situation to some extent.

    Yes, yes. You want me to exin, right? Dino was a traitor. That is all!

    Too brief! Be more polite and detailed.

    Damn, it cant be helped

    It was useless to resist any further, so I gave up and decided to exin.

    I told them that Dino, who was staying in our country, betrayed us and turned to the enemys side. However, I did not hide the fact that it was probably due to the influence of Michael''s Ultimate Dominion, regardless of his intentions.

    Dino changed sides

    Dagruel muttered to himself as he finished listening to my story. Dagruel, who was a good friend of his, must have had some thoughts on the matter.

    Even though hes changed sides, it seems like he''s still in control. I haven''t confirmed his intentions, though.

    Michael, was it? Are you trying to tell me that a mere Skill has a will of its own?

    Oh, so Guy didn''t know why Dino betrayed him either.

    That''s right. Theres no doubt about it. At this point, he''s developed an ego, and has taken over Rudra''s body, acting as Michael.

    Because I also have a partner, Ciel-san, we have the best evidence of that.

    Wait, Rimuru! Did you say that the Ultimate Dominion 19 affects the skills of the angelic system? Then the question is, how do you tell the difference between angelic and demonic when the concepts are so vague?

    Oh, Ruminas made a good point!

    That''s what I was wondering as well.

    Just as I was thinking that, Guy stood up.

    I''ll exin it to you.

    Then Guy started talking about Skills in surprising detail. It seemed like a huge secret, a secret about the way the world worked, but he was generous enough to share it with us.

    ording to him,

    Thews of this world were established by Veldanava, but it seems that anyone with the right administrative power can influence thosews.

    Even if you don''t have that power, you can still rewrite thews to some extent by intervening with your wish in magicules. In other words, this was the concept of magic, a kind of power.

    A Skill is something that has been systematized to a certain extent so that it can influence thesews.

    Skills that reside in the soul of the strong-willed and are activated by their pure energythat is the Ultimate Skill of the angelic system created by Veldanava, and among them are the seven powers called the Virtues.

    When I fought Veldanava, he had many powers, but after the world was stabilized, he left only the strongest one, the Justice King, and gave some of them away, releasing all that remained into the world. As a result, those powers were taken into the circle of reincarnation and appeared in the world in the form of qualified and strong souls. However, the Ultimate Skills were too strong, and were restricted to the unique level. They can be scattered among various Skills, or be a Virtue type Unique Skill while retaining a certain amount of authority.

    I felt like the Virtue skill system was in contrast to the Deadly Sins skill system. In other words, there was the virtuous system and sinful system, or the angelic system and the demonic system.

    But, well, from the way Guy was talking now, it seemed like there were not seven Ultimate Skills in the Virtue system.

    The ''Wisdom King (Raphael)'' I got was also an evolution from ''Great Sage'', and it seemed to have nothing to do with ''Virtue''.

    I''m a simple guy, so I was convinced by Guy''s exnation, but Ruminas asked a question again, as if there was nothing to hide.

    Guy, if you know something, tell me. Are there seven angelic system skills in total? And what are their powers?

    Now that you mention it, I was curious about that too.

    Of course, the other demon lords seem to be feeling the same way.

    Huh, you''re all united like never before. All right then, I''ll tell you. First, the seven virtues of the angelic system

    Guy was very knowledgeable.

    The seven virtuous powers that Veldanava was said to have possessed.

    ording to Guy''s description

    Ultimate Skill ''Justice King (Michael)''  Itsmand is Mental Control itself, the strongest power specialized in the chain ofmand with a real ''Absolute Defense'' like the ''Castle Guard.''

    Ultimate Skill Knowledge 20 King (Raphael)''  The power to manage thews of the world, specializing in support.

    Ultimate Skill ''Covenant King (Uriel)''  A power that specializes in spatial management and is used for the management of all events.

    Ultimate Skill ''Hope King (Sariel)''  The source of life, and the power to manage the circle of reincarnation.

    Ultimate Skill ''Purity King (Metatron)''  The power to sort out all mixedws, prevent interference, and select pure energy.

    Ultimate Skill '' Charity King (Raguel)''  The power to provide support and amplification to others. It has been given to Velgrynd.

    Ultimate Skill ''Patience King (Gabriel)''  The power to fix the status and respond to unforeseen circumstances. It has been given to Velzard.

    Thats how it was.

    To tell you the truth, I was surprised to find out more than expected.

    That is the breakdown of the skills, but only three of them are known to exist at this time. Veldanava gave his ''Justice King (Michael)'' to Rudra, so he got his ''Covenant King (Uriel)'' back in return. That is the one that Rudra acquired and made ultimate. There probably would have been some changes in performance. Well, that''s lost now, so we can''t be sure.

    No one interrupted.

    And so, Guy continued.

    I knew that ''Justice King'' (Michael) who went to Rudra had the power to dominate others, but it was more powerful than I thought.

    It was there that Guy faltered.

    While I waited for Guy to say something, our eyes met.

    You know Rimuru, don''t you?

    Well, there was no reason to lie here.

    If I could, I''d have liked to pretend that I didnt know anything, but I can''t do that. Because I didn''t talk about the Ultimate Dominion properly in my exnation earlier, Id give my take on it.

    Now that the problem had grown sorge, I thought that covering it up would only make things worse.

    Ah. I know him, or rather, I fought him just the other day. When Veldora was influenced by the enemy, I thought it was all over.

    Velgrynd had been influenced too.

    I see.

    I had such a hard time because you pushed me into trouble! You didn''t just get me into a fight with Rudra, you got me into a full-scale war!

    I''ll argue the point that must be made.

    But well, to Guy that was nothing.

    Ahahaha! It''s fine because you won.

    No, it''s not! Ramirisbyrinth was destroyed by Velgrynd, and the area around our town was turned into a hellish scorched earth. Well, the restoration is going well, but I will never ept requests from you again!

    I got swept up in the momentum and yelled out.

    With this, I hope he will not ask of me any unreasonable requests for the time being.

    Hmm, you''ve been doing that sort of thing with magic for a while now. Oh well. So, what''s your conclusion?

    I was slurring my words earlier when I said ''influenced, but I''ll rephrase it correctly. Michael''s Ultimate Dominion is a heinous power of absolute control over the holders of the Angelic Ultimate Skills.

    That''s ridiculous

    Thats hard to believe. A person who reaches the ultimate skill must have a strong mind. Human or demon, it''s the same. To bepletely dominated

    ept it. The proof is that not only Veldora, but also Velgrynd were ced under Michael''s control. I wouldn''t have believed it if I hadn''t seen it with my own eyes.

    Or rather, I still didnt want to believe it.

    It was like a nightmare, something I never want to experience again.

    Rimurus story is true. As proof, Velgrynd has ''Charity King (Raguel)'' and Velzard, as I said, has the Ultimate Skill ''Patience King (Gabriel)''.

    Thats how it is.

    I suspected as much.

    Judging from the copse of this castle, there must have been a fight with a hell of an opponent.

    I didn''t want to admit it, but it seems that Velzard had been taken over by Michael.

    My bad prediction hade true, and I felt depressed.

    Hey, Guy! In other words, are you saying that Velzard-dono has turned against us?

    That''s right, Dagruel.

    No way! Thats a big deal!

    Guy''s affirmation upset Dagruel. Since they''ve known each other for a long time, I guess he knows how dangerous Velzard is.

    On the other hand, I don''t know her that well

    I''m sure she''s dangerous, but I''m not sure how dangerous she is. I couldnt set a threat level because I couldn''t really feel it.

    Just asking, but could you possibly have defeated and locked her away somewhere?

    Rimuru, do you really think that such a convenient story exists?

    So there wasnt.

    I was annoyed that Guy was so appalled and that my wishful thinking was shut down.

    This sucks. 21 Michael''s team now includes Velzard-san

    I couldn''t help but mutter to myself something that echoed the mood of everyone else.

    Good grief. 22

    Leon seemed distressed as well.

    I suspected as much, but this is unfortunate.

    Ruminas also had a dark expression.

    I think that was only natural. But I don''t think hell be able to beat us because he had let Guy escape without a fight.

    Don''t worry! There are still seven of the eight stars left here. Besides, the others are strong enough too! Let''s go on a rampage and show them what we can do!

    Why does Milim look so happy?

    As I thought, there was definitely something wrong with the True Dragon''s blood.

    ***

    Well, everyone all knew that the situation was the worst, but there was still some more unpleasant information to add.

    Now, to continue answering your question as to whether there are a total of seven angelic skills, the answer is no.

    MmmThis is the worst.

    Ruminas looked displeased.

    Well, do you know how many of the Angelic Ultimate Skills there are?

    When Dagruel asked, Guy answered gravely.

    I don''t know all of them either. When I fought Veldanava, I couldn''t even see the bottom of it. He told me about the Seven Virtues. He also said he was going to give each of the Seven Primordial Angels a special power.

    Silence enveloped the room.

    In addition to the seven virtues, one for each of the seven angels, that would make a total of fourteen

    You make it sound like he didn''t give one to all of them

    That''s right, Dagruel. The angels back then had weak egos, and some of them couldn''t handle an Ultimate Skill. That''s why Veldanava gave Velzard and Velgrynd ''Patience King (Gabriel)'' and ''Charity King (Raguel)''. It seems that he also granted skills to the eligible angels, but released the rest of the skills he didn''t transfer.

    He left himself the ''Justice King (Michael)'', which he traded for the ''Covenant King (Uriel)'' that Rudrater acquired.

    And then, when Veldanava died, the ''Covenant King (Uriel)'' was also lost. It circled around and eventually became my power, and was now merged with Velgrynd''s Divine me King (Cthugha).

    This is not the time to be escaping from reality by mulling over the history. I feel that I have to keep it a secret for sure.

    In any case, now I can see the whole picture to some extent.

    In other words, the angelic skills are pure skills created by Veldanava, and it is possible that there were at least 14 of them. And whoever manifests and acquires them will not be able to resist Michael''s Ultimate Dominion, right?

    That''s right.

    I summed it up, and Guy nodded his head in agreement.

    Which brought me to my next question.

    Wait, wait, wait. The angelic skills are okay, but what about the demonic skills?

    Oh, Ramiris asked exactly what I wanted to ask.

    All eyes focused on Guy.

    That''s a tough one to answer, but listen. I gained the Unique Skill ''Pride'' when I was defeated by Veldanava. I had been observing him, trying to emte his strength, and I think that''s the secret.

    What do you mean by that?

    Ramiris, your skills were born with you so you may not realize it, but acquiring Skill is influenced by one''s wishes. It still depends on the individual, though.

    After answering that, Guy gave a brief exnation on Skills.

    A Skill is normally found in the material body, the spiritual body, or the astral body. However, there are some special cases where the skill will reside in the soul itself.

    Naturally, because the soul is so close to the essence of the person, the desire is greater, and it makes sense that the thing inhabiting the soul would be a powerful skill.

    In addition to this, consider it inbination with Ciel-san''s view.

    It is true that there was something in a Unique Skill that resided in a material body.

    The Unique Skill ''Berserker'', for example, is easy to understand because it was inherited by Larzen 23 who took Shogo''s body.

    There are various examples like that, but I agree with the opinion that the power rooted in the soul is more powerful.

    It''s easy to hide, so it''s hard to be stolen, and it can also be a trump card.

    In that case, the Ultimate Skill is probably a soul-level power, and I think that''s why the number of people who can handle one is limited.

    But that''s not all. There are two ways to take root in the soul, not just dwelling but also being engraved.

    Ciel-san, for example, ispletely assimted to my soul. It is impossible to separate the two, so I don''t have to worry about it being stolen. Still, I think it''s safer to keep it a secret.

    This is also the case with an Ultimate Skill.

    If it is only dwelling in the soul, it might be stolen, but if it is engraved, there is no need to worry about it.

    However, that would be impossible to detect

    While thinking like this, I listened to everyone''s conversation.

    Which brings me to my earlier point

    You said that the power Veldanava unleashed was taken into the circle of reincarnation and came to reside in a strong soul.

    Yeah, that''s right, but in my case I didn''t receive any of Veldanava''s power. I wasn''t given any special powers by Veldanava like Ramiris. It''s a power I created myself. You get it? By imitating pure power, a Skill was born. And that is

    The demonic system, he said.

    I see. So then my Lustful King (Asmodeus) is just an imitation, a degraded version, isn''t it?

    No, thats not the case. If a Skill is the result of your own will and desire, it has the same power as the original. I didn''t want to tell you this, but my Pride has evolved into the Ultimate Skill Pride King (Lucifer). That power isparable to the angelic system, and the strength of will is what decides victory or defeat.

    Guy, its just like you to say thatWell, okay. Just to confirm, ording to you, there are at least fourteen demonic system Ultimate Skills, right?

    Probably. Just as demons were born from angels, demonic skills are born from angelic skills, at least thats what I think.

    Hmm, I guess my prediction was right.

    There are too many connections 24 in this world

    If there is a cause-and-effect rtionship between hero and demon lord, its not surprising that there would be the same kind of rtionship between Skills.

    At the very least, Veldanava''s seven virtues must have been paired with the deadly sins that evolved from the seven deadly sins.

    It seems that Guy''s ''Pride King (Lucifer)'' is paired with Rudra''s ''Covenant King (Uriel)''.

    From there, here is Guy''s prediction.

    Ultimate Skill ''Justice King (Michael)'' is paired with ''Wrath King (Satanael)''

    Ultimate Skill Wisdom King (Raphael)'' is paired with ''Gluttonous King (Beelzebuth)''

    Ultimate Skill ''Hope King (Sariel)'' is paired with ''Sloth King (Belphegor)''

    Ultimate Skill '' Purity King (Metatron)'' is paired with ''Lustful King (Asmodeus)''

    Ultimate Skill ''Charity King (Raguel)'' is paired with ''Greedy King (Mammon)''

    Ultimate Skill ''Patience King (Gabriel)'' is paired with ''Envy King (Leviathan)''

    He said that each of them might correspond to the other.

    As for me, I was at a loss for words because I had a Skill that had already been sacrificed.

    Id be in big trouble if I made this public, but even if I didnt say anything, I''m afraid itll still be a problem.

    At times like these, Ciel-san was conveniently silent 25 , so I decided to wait and see.

    ***

    After Guy''s exnation on Skills, it was time to get back on track.

    To add on to Guy''s exnation, it seems that angelic Skills have control circuit of absolutemand built into them, and if you have one, you are unable resist Michael''s orders. Dino was probably turned for that reason, so don''t think of him as an ally if you meet him.

    That''s a pain. That bastard might not be the brightest, but he''s stronger than you think.

    Dagruel growls at my words.

    Ignoring him, Ruminas added in gloomily.

    What''s more troubling is that Velzard-dono is on the side of the enemy. Velgrynd-dono too, perhaps?

    Dagruel also thought that this was a bigger problem.

    I wanted to pretend that I didnt know, but Id have to inform them about Velgrynd. Ramiris already knew what was going on, so theyd find out anyway.

    Just as I was about to open my mouth, Leon made a sharp point.

    Wait, I don''t care about Velgrynd''s story at this point. What we should be doing right now is checking whether or not anyone else has an Angelic Skill.

    That''s right.

    As expected of Leon, getting straight to the point.

    The ex-Chosen Hero was overflowing with courage.

    Leon, I was hoping you''d bring that up!

    Guy looked pleased.

    When I was thinking of the content of today''s meeting, I knew that this would be the most important issue.

    The only question was who was going to bring it up?

    After all, doing so would mean doubting your friends.

    The only way to prevent that would be to reveal your own hand.

    That''s why Guy and Ruminas had been revealing their powers earlier.

    Those of us who were able to read the situation would have spoken up before being suspected.

    Well, I guess I was a littlete to the party

    Wait a minute! You''re not suspecting me, are you?

    Its fine. You''ve been excluded from the start.

    That''s right.

    Because Ciel-san had also assured me that Ramiris power was of a separate category.

    Ciel-san said that her power was not given by Veldanava, but rather it was a part of her power that she lost when she was no longer a deity.

    Having heard that, I did not doubt Ramiris either.

    Wahahaha! I''m different. I dont really understand my power

    Don''t worry about it, Milim. A power with that kind of ridiculous power would definitely be a Skill paired with the Ultimate Skill Justice King (Michael).

    In other words, the Ultimate Skill ''Wrath King (Satanael)''. I don''t know what kind of power it is, but it doesn''t seem to bepletely under control.

    Then next is me. Actually, I don''t have the same type of rtion with my Skill as you all do. I''m more like Ramiris. I was born with this power too.

    We all fell silent at this statement, but I felt that he was not lying.

    As evidence, Milim, who had a keen sense of intuition, remained silent.

    I believe you, Dagruel.

    So do I! I do too!

    Hmm, if Rimuru and Milim say so, then I''ll believe it too.

    With this, the trust of 3 out of 7 people was obtained.

    Including Dagruel, we had the majority, but there were still more supporters.

    Hmm, I will trust you too.

    Hold on, Ill believe in you too in that case!

    Leon casually dismissed his suspicions against Dagruel, and the opportunistic Ramiris expressed her desire not to be left behind.

    With this, only Ruminas remained.

    Tsk, I''d love to take down Dagruel right now, but I guess I''ll have to give up this time.

    Gahahah! Ruminas, this is what is natural virtue 26 is called. Too bad!

    So noisy! If you''re actually being manipted, I''llugh at you for being so weak.

    Dagruel and Ruminas don''t seem to be on the best of terms. And yet, there seems to be a strange amount of trust between them.

    Well, maybe it''s just my imagination.

    Anyway, Dagruel is now cleared of suspicion.

    Ruminas had dered herself to have the Lustful King (Asmodeus), and Guy had dered himself to have the Pride King (Lucifer).

    That just left me and Leon.

    Lets take the initiative here.

    Ah, I''ll keep quiet. I have a lot of skills, but I don''t want to tell you!

    I announced this with a smile.

    After all, my Skill is weird.

    Ultimate Skill ''Void God (Azathoth)'' and ''Fertility King (Shub-Niggurath)''I don''t thing such information should be made public. Even if I tried to describe them with a serious face, people would only think I was showing off 27 .

    I was sure that no one would trust me, so I exercised my right to remain silent.

    is what I thought, but apparently that was not allowed.

    You can''t pass with that reasoning!

    It was easily rejected by Guy.

    Oh, so that was no good after all?

    No, there was still a chance.

    Wahahaha! I believe in Rimuru, so its okay if you don''t tell me! But only if you promise to give me some honeyter!!

    Whether shes dependable or calctive, either way, Milim was on my side.

    In that case, Im okay with cake. Three days worth!

    Ramiris can also be bribed.

    Three days worth will be a pain, but Ill take it.

    Okay, I ept! I''ll promise Milim threerge jars of Apito honey and Ramiris three days worth of my dessert!

    I said so, and nodded my head.

    Just leave it to me! Im dering that Rimuru is okay!

    Of course! Rimuru is the one who revealed the secret of the angelic system in the first ce. I don''t think there would be anything to be gained by revealing your hand, so you can''t be under control!

    Oh, Ramiris made a good point!

    Shes not usually like that, but sometimes she can be smart.

    Perhaps it was just too sound of an argument, so the remaining demon lords began to look convinced.

    Hmm, I guess you''re right. If the one who trusted me was betraying me, that means I would also be under suspicion. In that case, I should trust Rimuru!

    With a heartyugh, Dagruel made his decision.

    With this, we now have a majority of the votes. That was including myself, so it would be perfect if just one more person supported me.

    With that in mind, I nced at Ruminas.

    What? There is no way that I could possibly be bribed

    I wont let her finish. Ill end it here.

    Shuna has designed a new swimsuit.

    What?

    She took the bait!

    Ufufufu. As I thought, it seems that Ruminas is more susceptible when you attack her from the inside.

    In cooperation with Ramiris, weve also created a seaside beach in thebyrinth.

    It was done to perfection!

    It''s a paradise with apletely private area

    Rimuru, I think you and I are going to have to have a long talk.

    The transparent seawater gently envelopes you when you swim. The sun shines brightly, but you won''t get sunburned because its inside abyrinth. Of course, you could tan your skin in any way you wish.

    Wait, wait.

    Beautiful women who expose everything in a sense of liberation, all in a ce different from the rest of the world

    Okay. I have some requests and ideas, so I''ll visit you after this meeting is over. Are you sure you can make the time?

    Of course. In that case

    I understand. I have believed in Rimuru from the very beginning.

    Yes!

    I unintentionally made a fist-pump, but now my victory is assured.

    Hey, hey, are you for real? Is this how you want to y it, guys? I can''t believe you Octagram are so easy to manipte!

    Guy red at me with resentment.

    But that doesn''t matter.

    Victory is justice.

    Guy, you have no choice but to admit defeat. Im not convinced either, but it''s obvious that Rimuru is not being controlled.

    Leon''s regretful voice was soothing the soul.

    With this, I had seeded dismissing my suspicions.

    ***

    Now Leon was the only one left.

    So, Leon. What about you?

    My Skill is the Ultimate Skill Purity King (Metatron).

    Leon answered Dagruel''s question in a very simpleHuh?

    What did he just say?

    The Ultimate Skill Purity King (Metatron) is an angelic skill, isn''t it!?

    I can''t even begin to describe the feeling of helplessness that everyone exuded.

    Hey, hey, Leon. It''s rare to see you make a joke. But still, this is a serious meeting. Calm down and give us an answer one more time.

    Guy, I don''t have time for this either. The ''Purity King (Metatron)'' that we''ve been talking about is my Skill.

    I''m sure everyone was thinking that this was a big problem.

    Just when I thought the meeting would being to a close, a huge problem arose.

    Well then, what should we do?Hey, Rimuru-kun!

    Don''t dump this on me! You''re so obvious that you don''t even bother to hide the fact that youre forcing me to do everything for you!

    Thats you, you bastard! Quitining and just think of a solution!

    Hey, don''t start such an ugly argument with me!

    Wahahaha! But you know, RuminasI understand how Guy feels. Rimuru can be very helpful in times like these!

    That''s right! Just leave this to Rimuru, and well have a cup of tea or something!

    Selfish colleagues.

    And Ramiris, you''re especially terrible. Ill be sure to remember this.

    This is why demon lords are so scary. What kind of cooperation is this?

    In the midst of all this, Dagruel spoke up in exasperation.

    Rimuru, you''ve had it pretty rough. I''ve felt closer to you ever since I heard that you were forced to take care of Dino, and I feel sorry for you this time too.

    He was such a good guy.

    Hes a giant and a demon lord, but appearances can be deceiving.

    Dagruel-san, thank you!

    The -san is unnecessary. I''m sure weve brought this up before.

    That''s right.

    I should be aware of the fact that Im a demon lord by now.

    I think being too humble can be harmful in certain situations.

    Then once again, thank you Dagruel!

    Hm, don''t worry about it. Anyway, is Leon alright?

    Dagruel nodded lightly, and the conversation returned to the topic at hand.

    Ruminas also joined in, as if they were on the same page.

    That''s right. He looks the same as usual, but its important to know whether or not Leon is under control, right?

    Everyone''s eyes focused on me.

    It''s best to ask the person himself about such things, but he doesn''t seem to be aware of it. If that''s the case, I''ll just have to guess, but before I do, there was something I wanted to confirm.

    As I said before, when Dino betrayed us, thebyrinth was destroyed and the enemy was able to invade. We believe that he came into contact with Phantom King Feldway.

    Once they were inside thebyrinth,plete istion from the outside was impossible. That''s why, although they didn''t seem to be able to talk directly, they might have been able tomunicate through telekinesis or something.

    Ramiris added to my exnation.

    For the time being, it seems that she was willing to work.

    While considering Ramiris nice assist, I asked Guy.

    So, Id like to askwhat happened here? I know that Velzard-san became an enemy and went on a rampage, but I want to know how it happened.

    So you know about it.

    Yeah. I think anyone who saw this mess would recognize it.

    It was obvious to me that Guy and Velzard had fought. Otherwise, there wouldn''t be such a mess.

    What I''m curious about is how it happened, or rather, how Velzard fell into the hands of the enemy.

    Is it possible to send amand to the control circuit from anywhere, or is it necessary to get closer to a certain extent?

    Depending on the answer, the threat level will be different.

    Also, Velzard and probably Dino were given their powers by Veldanava, while Leon acquired it on his own and brought it to the ultimate level. While his control circuit might not have disappeared, there is still the possibility that there is a glitch.

    If so, that would exin why Leon''smands might not be going through. In any case, it''s important to get urate information first.

    You''re right, that bastard Feldway broke through the Ice and Snow ''Barriers''. It was Mizari and Rain who greeted him, and I thought I''d go out and give him a thrashing. But then Velzard got in the way.

    Hmmm

    In other words, he didn''t make direct contact, but he came close. Its the same conditions as Dino, but I''m not sure what to make of it.

    So, you''re saying they need to get within a certain distance to interfere with the control circuit? You dont think that this might be a trick to make us think that, do you?

    Something like that.

    Leon, do you feel anything about yourself?

    I don''t feel anything. I''m just me, and I don''t feel like I''m being controlled by anything.

    Leon replied confidently, but even Lieutenant Kondou and Velgrynd had not been aware that they were being controlled. It was impossible to trust that statement.

    In other words, your beloved is me

    Idiot, of course it''s Chloe. I dont even care about you. 28

    Oh, hes fine.

    This bluntness is undoubtedly Leons true personality 29 .

    Also, it''s not as if there''s no evidence to support it.

    Feldway''s words are recorded in thebyrinth.

    Yes, that''s right.

    When Feldway confronted Chloe, he said, Hahaha Hahahaha!! Oh, so there it is. After all, even Veldanava-sama wishes for my victory!!That''s what he said.

    From what he said, we can infer that even Feldway and Michael do not know who possesses the Angelic Ultimate Skills.

    There is no guarantee that this was not an act, but there is no point in doubting it. Because my intuition is telling me that it is safe, I should proceed towards believing in Leon.

    Using Predation on Leon and destroying the control circuit itself is a sure way

    Ciel-san interrupted me quite casually, but I refused to ept it.

    I didnt like the idea of predating Leon, physiologically speaking. Maybe that''s why I wanted to believe in Leon even more than I did before.

    Okay, we''re not going toe to any conclusions by talking about it here, and although Im skeptical, I personally think it''s fine. So, let''s just judge Leon as gray close to ck and see what happens!

    I dered as such.

    Is it okay, then?

    At Guys questions, I nod my head.

    I''m notpletely sure yet, but I don''t think the enemy has grasped the locations of the angelic skill users.

    What is the basis for saying so?

    Dagruel asked curiously, so I presented my own thoughts.

    In Ramiris''byrinth, there are records of the battles with Feldway and his men. From what they said, I''m guessing that the only Skills they know of are those that were given directly by Veldanava. If the Skill is self-acquired, they probably won''t know about it unless they get close.

    That''s right! It''s annoying that someone can so easily read information from mybyrinth, but it''s being put to good use, so Im notining!

    To put Ramiris in a good mood, I nodded and said, Youve been a great help 30 , seriously. It was true that thebyrinth was superior in every way, so I thanked her without hesitation.

    Feel free to praise me more!

    And so, Ramiris was very pleased 31 .

    I brushed off thement and returned to the topic at hand.

    It''s not like Leon''s been spreading the word about his skill, so I think it will take a while for people to know about it.

    It would be a foolish thing to do, to expose one''s hand, except under such circumstances.

    Leon muttered to me in resignation.

    I see.

    And so, Guy seemed to be convinced.

    Certainly, Leon is right. Well, there is a good chance they''ll see through us if they get too close, and I agree that we can''t be absolutely sure, but it would be foolish to be overly cautious and split up.

    Hmm, I have no objection to that either.

    Ruminas summed it up, and Dagruel agreed. The two of them seem to be on the same page, despite their differences.

    It was interesting to see them scowling at each other in a not-so-amused manner, but they seemed to have no issues, since they hadn''t lost their cool while fighting.

    I trust Rimuru''s word, and Leon''s word is not a lie!

    Milim gave her seal of approval, and just when I thought the matter was settled, Ramiris muttered something unnecessary.

    That''s right. Leon-chan may need to be monitored, so the question is who will take care of that!

    If I say anything right now

    Rimuru-kun.

    Enough. I get it, so don''t say anything else.

    As expected, I gave up and decided to take over the Leon surveince mission.

    ***

    Dino''s departure couldnt be helped, but I guess that means the seven of us here are now friends 32 . And I think everyone understands that we''ve got a nasty enemy on our hands.

    As for how well keep an eye on Leon, we''ll talk about thatter.

    So, Guy, what are you going to do about Michael?

    I focus on Guy''s remarks.

    Ah? I''m gonna destroy him, of course.

    Hmm. So it''s all-out war then.

    Ruminas muttered in contemtion, but it was also the consensus of everyone present.

    Wahahaha! I''m excited.

    It''s time to show them what I''m made of! Whether it''s Feldway or Michael, I''ll beat them with one punch!!

    Hmm, Phantom King Feldway, huh? Now that he''s back, its inevitable that we will have to fight for control of the earth.

    Milim''s words aside, Ramiris was being too grandiose and unrealistic. But, well, even if one punch was impossible, thebyrinth is super important, so I stopped making fun of her.

    Do you know how powerful the enemy is?

    When Leon asked, Guy shook his head.

    We know that the Seven Primordial Angels, including Feldway and Dino, and Michael, who has reced Rudra, are all generals.

    Hmm, in addition to that, Velzard-dono is now an enemy as well. This Tenma Great War 33  is going to be pretty tough.

    Hmm?

    Tenma Great War?

    That''s right. Isn''t the war, which takes ce every five hundred years or so, essentially Rudra''s ability to summon angels?

    Dagruel''s answer came as a surprise to everyone, including me.

    What!? Dagruel, don''t talk nonsense!

    Ruminas snapped at him, but it was Guy who stopped it.

    Calm down Ruminas, Dagruels words are correct. Rudra has the Skill ''Army of Angels, Armageddon'', which allows him to summon an army of angels and control them at will. Although, it seems that Rudra has difficulty controlling it and has only issued simplemands.

    Guy exined to everyone that its activation cycle was about every 500 years. However, because the summoned angel would have no body, it could onlyst a week at most before disappearing.

    Its a new thing to consider, but I wish he had told us this earlier.

    I have a question.

    What is it?

    Do angels, like demons, take root in the world when they incarnate?

    Oops, I didn''t even have to ask.

    Benimaru''s wife Momiji''s race, the tengu, was born from the incarnation of an angel into a wolf. It was not surprising that many such races were born during the war.

    If thats the case, then I just can''t shake this bad feeling.

    It was the forbidden spell: Demon Death Birthday 34 .

    You''re amazing, Ciel-san.

    You knew exactly what I was thinking.

    Looks like you''ve got something on your mind. Tell me, I''ll listen.

    Guy asked me, so I answered without hiding it.

    You guys know Kazaream the Curse Lord, right? The truth is, Kazaream is being controlled by the enemy, and they''re mass-producing undead elves

    I ordered him to interfere with the ritual every chance he got, but I''m not sure how effective that was

    Demon Death Birthday. How many tens of thousands died?

    Yuuki''s Mixed Corps sacrificed about 60,000 people, so I''d say nearly ten have been born at most.

    Hmm. So he prioritized the individual instead of the number. In that case, he''s at least as powerful as yman. Its a perfect medium for the Primordials to incarnate.

    Oh, Guy''s got it wrong.

    I have other concerns, so I''ll correct him.

    No, not that. The Seven Primordial Angels already incarnated long ago. It seems Feldway and the others were incarnated in the other world. And Dino''s colleagues

    I think their names were

    Pico and Gracia!

    Yeah, that''s it!

    Ramiris helped me out again, so Im grateful.

    So then, what you''re worried about is

    Yeah, I think the higher angels summoned by the ''Army of Angels, Armageddon'' will be incarnated in the undead elves. Angels don''t have much of an ego, right? So, if you use the soul of someone with a strong ego as the core, you could create a powerful new race that also incorporates the power of the angels.

    Not only Guy, but all the other demon lords also fell silent.

    After a few seconds, they looked at each other and said things like, No, no, that''s or It''s scary that you woulde up with such an idea.

    I wasnt saying this because I wanted to. Its just that I hade up with the possibility.

    Rimuru-kun, do you think the probability of that happening is high?

    Thats why, dont talk to me like that as if to put the me on me.

    I get it. So, what do you think?

    I''d try it if I was them. If you fail, the only thing being wasted would be some of your undead elves.

    Well, I''d do that too. There''s no point in having a bunch of weak minions.

    As Guy and I nodded at each other, the other demon lords looked at us as if they were in shock.

    I dont understand why.

    Im sure anyone would do that to increase their strength

    Don''t look at me like that! We don''t actually know what''s going on, but we should assume the worst, right?

    When I shouted this, opinions began to fly out, led by Ruminas.

    That is true, however

    You''re still crazy 35 . What scares me is that you think you can handle it even if it happens.

    That''s right, Rimuru. The superior angels are the seraphim, but surely someone as powerful as yman could withstand their power. That would make them be as powerful as an awakened demon lord.

    Hmm. If many beings like Dagruel are born, then we can''t be too careful. At the very least, Louis and Gunther will have a tough time.

    It wasnt so much aint about me as it was aint about the difficulty of dealing with them.

    Guy-san. Everyone seems to be unhappy. As the organizer, you should give them a good talking to.

    Hey, I told you not to use -san in these situations, didnt I? We''re all on equal footing here, okay? It wouldn''t hurt for you to deal with it!

    Shut up!! You''re the one who''s putting the -kun on me. In the first ce, why do I have to draw the short straw!?

    I shouted what I wanted to say without hesitation.

    Now that I felt refreshed and calm, I was okay with Guy even though he scares me.

    It''s not a problem. We''ll just blow them all up!

    That''s right! We even have Master Veldora here, so I don''t think we have to be so scared.

    For this meeting, Milim and Ramiris are always optimistic.

    They look so happy, it really is enviable.

    Incidentally, Veldora, the person Ramiris is relying on, is probably reading the scriptures (manga) in another room. Recently, hes been reading a long historical work, saying that it might give him some great wisdom.

    I''m sure helle up with some kind of trap of justice 36 , and it''s going to be my job to figure it out, so I don''t feel like getting my hopes up.

    Anyway, I''ll just consider it a blessing not to be disturbed.

    The situation is not that simple. In addition to Velzard-dono, isnt Velgrynd-dono in the hands of the enemy, as well? Even if we have the Veldora, the enemy will still have the advantage! In the first ce, I don''t like relying on that useless dragon.

    That''s right. Veldora doesn''t seem to be very reliable.

    Hes too timid in front of his sisters, and he was also recently captured by the enemy

    Ah, Velgrynd-san is fine.

    I was letting my mind wander, so I answered absent-mindedly.

    Needless to say, that was a mistake.

    How can you be so sure?

    By the time I realized it, it was toote.

    I was nning to be more discrete with my information, but now that I''m here, I have no choice but to be honest.

    Due to various events in her fight against me, Velgrynd-san has broken free from the Ultimate Dominion. And now that she no longer has the Ultimate Skill ''Charity King (Raguel)'', she doesn''t have to worry about being controlled by Michael anymore.

    Haah!?

    The only thing I can do now is y it cool.

    Well, it sure was difficult. I was so focused that as soon as I realized it, I found myself in a good position to win!

    The suspicious looks I was getting from the demon lords was painful.

    However, if I lose here, then they''ll probably make me confess everything.

    What the hell did you do?

    Surprisingly, even Guy is shocked.

    That''s a trade secret

    I must remain absolutely silent about my skill.

    Its hard to believe, so it would only arouse more suspicion.

    What''s more, if Leon was actually under control, my power would be exposed to the enemy.

    I think I might be worrying too much, but this is the only decisive way to prevent that from happening.

    Tsk! As always, youre full of baloney, stingy bastard

    It''s not a matter of being stingy.

    Its also a strategy.

    No, no, no, Dagruel aside, havent we all experienced the evolution of a Skill?

    Ive never experienced anything like that.

    Yup, of course.

    Some troublesome points were made 37 , but I will continue the exnation without paying attention to them.

    Velgrynd-san was in a simr situation, and suddenly came to her senses during the fight against me. She said that ''Charity King (Raguel)'' evolved at that time.

    I gave a littlerather, argely embellished exnation, but it seems that everyone understood what I meant.

    Well

    I don''t remember it either, but I think there was something like that.

    HmmIt''s not unheard of for skills to evolve in the heat of battle. It''s not normal, though.

    That was the case with me. Between life and death, I bet everything I had on my potential. As a result, I received the ''Purity King (Metatron)'', a decision I don''t regret to this day.

    He seems to have been convinced in light of his own experience.

    That''s a relief.

    If I pretend that I haven''t heard about Velgrynd''s current powers, Ill be able to pretend that I don''t know about the Ultimate Skill ''Divine me King (Cthugha)''.

    As a matter of fact, Ciel-san did it, so it''s not my fault either.

    I thought the Ultimate Skill was the pinnacle, but I guess there is still further to evolve. Tsk, I still have a ways to go. I guess I was too proud to think that this was my limit.

    Guy muttered, and the topic came to a close.

    ***

    Although I felt that this discussion was not moving forward very well, I reviewed it again.

    Identifying the enemy''s forces is important, so we must not spare any effort.

    So, Velgrynd is really okay now?

    Yeah. Shes protecting Chosen Hero Masayuki now. Masayuki and I have a friendship, so we''ll help each other out if the other gets in trouble.

    So then, they can be counted as an asset (war potential)?

    Hmm, Im wondering if this is a selfish decision, but I''m sure they''ll help us if we ask.

    Isnt it better just to avoid being hostile? At the least, I don''t want to fight them again.

    You''re right. It''s not often that anyone can beat that thing, so you''ve done well. Now that Velzard has turned against us, we can''t let Velgrynd turn against us too.

    Guy looks annoyed, but I''m sure he means it.

    After all, half of the seven of us here are unlikely to be able to take on a True Dragon.

    The only ones who can are me, Guy, and Milim.

    Then next would be Dagruel after that?

    Anyway, its good news if we can reduce the number of unnecessary enemies.

    Oh yeah, then theres one more thing.

    Since we''re on the topic of Velgrynd, I''ll mention it here. Of the Seven Primordial Angels, there are four that have crossed over to the other world, including Feldway, but three of them attacked Ramirisbyrinth.

    That''s right! Of course, I was able to drive them away with my own strength.

    Ramiris nodded her head, as if myment had reminded her.

    I quickly continued my exnation so as not to interrupt the conversation.

    Well, regardless of the truth of it. They called themselves Phantom King Feldway and his ''Three Phantom Commanders''.

    Yeah. They''ve been trying to destroy the humans of our world for since ancient times. We call them demons 38 , but they''re actually phantoms.

    I thought that all enemies of mankind were called demons, but I guess that wasnt the case. That said, one of the Three Phantom Commanders was destroyed by Velgrynd-san, so keep that in mind.

    I think it was Cornu, but it seems that he touched Velgrynds reverse scale when he taunted Masayuki. I sensed that Velgrynd had gotten stronger, but even I was surprised that she was able to strike a blow against someone as strong as the Three Phantom Commanders.

    However, that Cornu seemed to be less dominant than Zrio, let alone Feldway. That was my impression from the way Cornu behaved in the video recording. At the least, as a result of analyzing the information left in thebyrinth, Ciel-san judged that Cornu was inferior to me in terms of strength, even though we were almost even in terms of existence value.

    The rationale behind this is unknown, but I trust them.

    Therefore, we should never underestimate our opponents, but there is no need to be wary of those who have perished. That''s what I was reporting.

    Anyway, Cornu is probably dead. I''ve known him for a long time, but I don''t feel anything for him.

    Guyughed in an unconcerned tone.

    Its just nice to have fewer enemies.

    It was very much like Guy, so I tried to move on to the next report without any particr surprises.

    But then, Milim intervened.

    Its just the right time, so I have something to report!

    That''s what she said, so I decided to listen to Milim.

    Actually, Obera, of the Three Phantom Commanders, has offered to join me. The meeting was held in secret, so Feldway and the others should not have noticed!

    Its not that I let my guard down, but I was unable to react to the report.

    I was like, Oh, I see.

    As expected of you, Milim. How''d you get her to do that?

    Yeah, let''s hear it. Obera wasn''t as narrow-minded as Cornu and she was a very serious woman. I don''t think she had anything to do with the betrayal, so how did ite about?

    Guy and I asked Milim in perfect synchronicity.

    Our eyes met, and that was enough for us to understand each other''s thoughts.

    In other words, we were worried that Milim was being deceived.

    We nodded at each other.

    It''s my natural charm. She came to me because she understood how great I was!

    It''s hard being poprMilimughed, but I didnt take it for granted.

    Calm down. It could be the enemy''s n.

    Guy rebukes, but Milim doesn''t listen.

    It''s all right. Obera wasn''t lying.

    WellBut you know, Milim, there is a very simple strategy called poison burial 39 , which is introduced in the scriptures (manga) of the Three Kingdoms, and sending spies to the enemy camp has been amon practice since ancient times. Contacting us at this time, when we are about to start a war, is like asking us to be suspicious, isn''t it?

    Right now, Veldora is reading about this.

    Now I''ll be familiar with strategy,is what he said, but if it were that easy to train a military strategist, I wouldn''t be having such a hard time.

    In the first ce, his worldview is too different, so I think hes only useful as a reference.

    Anyway, it was suspicious, so I tried to persuade Milim.

    But Milim only smiled fearlessly.

    It''s okay. I had my suspicions too, so I discussed it with Karion and Frey. And we all agreed that we should trust Obera.

    Hmm, well, Milim is not a fool, so she probably did what she had to do. If Karion and Frey-san share the same opinion, then maybe we should trust them.

    What kind of discussion did you have with Obera?

    I asked for the time being.

    Well, thats

    After hearing Milim''s story, we would make our own decision as well.

    ***

    I see, so Obera is monitoring the movements of Ivarage, the World-destroying Dragon, in the Pce of Monsters. In that case, she can''t afford to do anything either way.

    That was Guy''s conclusion after hearing Milim''s story.

    Ivarage and the cryptid subordinates are a non-negotiable army of destruction. If Obera made a move, Ivarage might be resurrected, so they would normally be excluded from the invasion force.

    However, there was something that bothered me.

    If Feldway is willing to let the world die as Obera says, wouldn''t he be willing to unleash Ivarage on us?

    Feldway and Michael are hoping that Veldanava will be resurrected, but it will be terrible if that doesn''t happen. Hope will be lost and a desire for destruction will arise.

    There is nothing more frightening than a man who does not care about the future. 40

    That''s what I was thinking, but

    That''s the point, Rimuru. I can''t believe that idea.

    I thought it was a perfectly legitimate opinion, but surprisingly, it was very unpopr. Starting with Ruminas'' remarks, Dagruel also criticized me.

    That Feldway isnt stupid enough to use a monster that''s stronger and more uncontroble than he is.

    Oho, so Ivarage is stronger?

    It was dreadful back then. Guy took care it, but I also helped to keep the from falling apart!

    Gahaha! Ivarage''s destructive power can shatter the stars if he''s not careful. If we fight him carelessly, we''ll be in big trouble.

    If you can only destroy the enemy, then what would you to do after that? If this is destroyed, it will no longer be a matter of world domination.

    I seeI guess my assumption was too naive. From what I''ve heard about Ivarage, he seems to be a ridiculous monster.

    Wahahaha! There''s no shortage of opponents. If hees out, I''ll take care of him this time!

    Rejected.

    Its rejected.

    It''s a rejection.

    Milim, I know you''re strong, but you''re not careful enough. Im probably not the one who should be saying this, but you need to be more considerate of the damage you do to those around you.

    Uhh, I''ve already learned how to do that. That''s why Ivaragebut with a twist

    Yes, yes, I understand. Seriously though, if Ivarage doese back, I''ll be the one to deal with him. I''ve been wanting to get rid of that bastard. Next time I get the chance, I''ll definitely get rid of him.

    Guy proimed as such in a voice so cold it was frightening.

    Naturally, no one could argue with that. Milim was not happy, but she agreed to let Guy deal with Ivarage.

    Then, the conversation returned to Obera.

    Can''t you ask her about the enemy''s situation or something? Dagruel asked Milim.

    I asked her, but she doesn''t seem to know about the forces gained in our world. Feldway is suspicious, so she may have been wary of asking the wrong questions that might lead to false assumptions.

    Well, Obera is right. Feldway is a sharp man, and he doesn''t like his subordinates to think too much.

    So, theyre just supposed to do what theyre told?

    I asked while thinking about my old troublesome boss.

    Guy answers me as I think nostalgically about the old days.

    Not exactly. If you''re doing your best on a given mission, you don''t have time to worry about others. That''s just the way he thinks, and that''s why Obera''s response is correct.

    If she was trying to fool us, it would have been better to use false information to gain trust. Instead, she said she didn''t know, which seemed to increase Obera''s credibility even more.

    Even so, I don''t think Feldway and I are going to get along.

    To be so self-righteous that he can''t think of his subordinates as anything but pawns. He seems to believe that everything he does is right.

    And, I cant help but spill my true intentions.

    Guy, who heard this, smiled at me.

    Is that a sarcastic remark meant for me?

    No, its not!

    Yikes, how dangerous. Right here is a guy who''s beyond just being self-righteous, he''s dictatorial. In Guy''s case, he doesn''t even seem to consider the demons under hismand as pawns. A careless remark like mine could very well bring out his fangs 41 .

    I''ll just cover it up and continue.

    For the time being, I''m more inclined to trust her, so I guess well wait and see.

    When I said that, everyone nodded.

    ***

    Now that the Obera matter was settled, I returned to the main topic.

    There have been too many detours, how difficult.

    Ugh 42 , this meeting is not moving forward at all. No one''s hiding any more secrets, are they?

    I couldnt help butin, at which point everyone all rushed in.

    You have no right to say that!

    Thats fair.

    I''m the one who seems to have the most secrets, so that statement was a mistake.

    While reflecting on that, I turned my attention to the meeting.

    For now, Ruminas was in charge.

    Anyway. We don''t know each other well, so we can''t cooperate. So, I will summarize the situation.

    She begins by listing the enemy forces.

    Leading the enemy forces, is Michael.

    Under his control is the Frost Dragon, Velzard.

    Then theres Phantom King Feldway.

    Under hismand, is Zrio of the Three Phantom Commanders.

    Then the insectar that Zrio was monitoring, and also their ruler, Insect Lord Znus.

    Znus might have his own subordinates, but since Obera doesn''t know much about them, it remains unclear. To be honest, this is the force that I was most worried about.

    After all, all of the insectar majins I know are extremely powerful. Zegion and Apito aside, there was also Razul, the guardian god of the West, and Minaza, the sixth-ranked Single Digit that Shion had defeated. Znus himself seemed to be dangerous, but he also seemed to have strong subordinates, so we had to be careful.

    Then theres the Dino, Pico, and Gracia trio.

    The fact that he (Dino) is an awakened demon lord is troubling enough, but we don''t even know if he has an Ultimate Skill. It would not be surprising if he possessed one, so it would be better to estimate his strength on the assumption that he does.

    And finally

    An undead elf with an angel incarnating its body that could rival us. Hmm, that''s tricky. I''d feel a little better if I at least knew how many of them there were.

    That''s extravagant. It''s lucky that we''ve even found out this much. We should be thinking of countermeasures.

    Ruminas rebuked Dagruel for hisint.

    Do we have an idea on who should deal with whom?

    It was Leon who said that.

    It might be a waste of time to decide, but it is not meaningless.

    Well, at the very least, it would be best if Leon didn''t have to deal with Michael.

    I agreed with Dagruel.

    That should absolutely not happen, as it would only lead to maniption. Rather, we should cooperate with each other as much as possible to prevent such a situation.

    I was concerned about the possibility that not only Michael but also Feldway had the ability to control him, but after gathering various information, I found out how the skill worked to some extent.

    Listen, Michael''s power is transferable, and it seems like he can give control to a certain level. Thats why I think we need to keep Leon away from Feldway as well as Michael.

    Just like with Lieutenant Kondou, Feldway should be considered to already have borrowed Michael''s skill.

    It''s annoying. If they take control of Leon as well, then the disparity between our forces will be even greater.

    While I listened to Ruminas muttering, I remembered something else that I had forgotten to mention.

    Oh yeah, Leon wasn''t the only one in danger.

    Mmm? What do you mean by that?

    Well, as I said, Veldora fell under the enemys control during the battle the other day.

    I''ve been curious about that story. You should tell us more in detail.

    Ruminas listened back with a stunned look on her face.

    Thats why I exined that Michael had the power of absolute control called the Regalia Dominion.

    As for Chloe, she had already dealt with herself, so I''ll put her on hold. If things got really bad, Ciel-san would have intervened forcibly, so I believe it''s safe to leave her to her own devices.

    Thus, I exined about Veldora''s situation.

    Rimuru-kun. You were the one who asked if anyone had any more secrets, weren''t you?

    Oh crap.

    No, did I say that?

    You said it!

    You did say it.

    You did.

    You definitely said it.

    There was no one on my side.

    I desperately tried exining that it wasn''t a secret or anything exaggerated, I just forgot to say itbut no one was convinced.

    You already knew, RamirisI thought to myself, but pointing that out would not improve my situation. Knowing this, I gave up and said I was sorry.

    ***

    The other demon lords were getting irritated, so it was harder than I expected to deal with the situation.

    Anyway, I was finally able to get back to the main topic, but the situation really was pretty bad when I thought about it.

    If our strength was ever reduced, then the enemy''s strength would also increase. It was like a shogi game where only one of the sides had the ability to reuse pieces, which was a condition that made it hard to imagine winning. It''s my fault that I forgot to exin it, but I''m sure that it''s not an easy story for people to hear.

    So, there is no one here who is being controlled by the Regalia Dominion?

    Its okay. The control of one with an angelic skill doesn''t seem to have any subjective symptoms, but in the case of Regalia Dominion, it is a forced dominion, so the ego disappears and the reaction is unnatural. In any case, since Veldora and I were connected by a soul corridor, he told me himself that he had been taken over.

    I see. In that case, how did you free Veldora?

    That''s

    This question again?

    I ate him, and Ciel-san did a Skill Alteration.but I didn''t want to be foolish and exin it that way.

    They wouldn''t believe me anyway, so I had no choice but to fake it.

    It''s just like with Velgrynd-san. In the heat of battle, Veldora evolved his own powers. I guess it was the triumph of the trust between us. 43

    Their gazes were painful.

    I''m aware that they''re looking at me very suspiciously, but I have no choice but to push through with this exnation.

    Hey, I fought Velzard pretty seriously too, but she didn''t show any signs of evolving her skills, you know?

    Well, I suppose there will be individual differences.

    Im saying this myself, but it''s an impossible exnation to believe.

    Individual differences, huh?

    Is it no use?

    Theyre getting suspicious. What should I do?

    Even if they wouldnt believe me, I could just tell them the truth. But if I did that

    In addition to forcing you to deal with all those who are under control, they will dig deeper into the Master''s Skills.

    Just as I thought.

    In the first ce, it''s impossible for me to exin how it works, because Ciel-san was the one who did it, not me.

    I guess the right answer is to keep quiet after all.

    Thats enough. You don''t seem to want to talk anyway, and you''ve probably done something out of the ordinary. If you can tell when someone is under control, then the Regalia Dominion is no more of a threat than the Ultimate Dominion. The question is, how do we deal with them?

    Ruminas decided that it was overall better that we were able to recognize the difference. She then said that we should discuss how to deal with Michael and the others.

    I nodded my head in agreement.

    Rather than deciding on who should deal with whom, isnt it better to decide on how to move when they attack?

    Guy nodded at my words.

    I agree. The enemy isn''t stupid, so I don''t think they''ll try to spread out their forces.

    If the size of the enemy is toorge, or if an opponent youre not good with is attacking you, it is important to immediately call for help.

    However, there was a problem with this.

    That''s true, but we''re pretty spread out, aren''t we? Or should we all gather in one ce, ready for the enemy toe at any moment?

    Hmm, I don''t think so.

    Right?

    Guy seemed convinced by my exnation.

    As for me, I''m going to defend my country. Leon and Ruminas, also Dagruel and Milim will not want to leave their countries either.

    Milim''s case is questionable, but there is no doubt about the others.

    In that case, we should be ready to send reinforcements as soon as any part of the country is attacked.

    Yes, indeed. I have a duty to defend my country. In the worst case, we should consider abandoning our territory, but that should be ast resort.

    Yes, I agree. And do not worry. If Ruminas gives up her territory, I will take it without reservation.

    Don''t be ridiculous! I''m not going to give it to you, so don''t get greedy.

    There was Dagruel, who wanted to seize the territory whenever he could, and Ruminas, who wanted to prevent it.

    That''s why there were demon lords who could not leave their territories.

    What about Guy? Ramiris is in my country, so it doesn''t matter, but you have no reason to defend this ce, do you?

    I don''t. I''m worried about Leon, so I think Ill go visit him there.

    Leon looked reluctant, but it was good.

    Leon is the one I was worried about the most, and he also hadnt beenpletely cleared of suspicion yet. That''s why I was going to keep an eye on him, so Guy''s decision was reasonable.

    If that was the case, then I guess I didnt need to monitor him anymore

    Rimuru, you can afford it. Send some of your subordinates to Ruminas, Dagruel, Milim, and Leon.

    What?

    Huh?

    Guy''s sudden request left me in a state of deep confusion.

    ***

    As it turned out, I couldn''t refuse.

    I resisted for a long time, but Guy refused to listen to me.

    Whats more, he wanted me to set up a magic transfer circle so that he could go to and from each territory immediately.

    It made me want to shout, I''m not your subordinate!

    There was one reason why I didn''t.

    The long and the short of it was that I just gave in to Guy 44 .

    Because Guy, with his serious atmosphere, was so intimidating that it was a kind of difficult to go against. I could probably do it if I pushed myself, but I would feel morefortable by just giving in.

    Unless it was absolutely necessary, it was an unavoidable measure to follow.

    But then, who would be the right people to send, and to where?

    Someone who was good at teleportation and ''Telepathy Net'' from any location, was strong enough to endure on their own even if something happened, and was strong enough to resist domination. In that case, the three demon girls would be perfect for the job.

    However, Testarossa has been entrusted with the task of coordinating the affairs around the empire, so I don''t think I can appoint her this time. Carrera and Ultima would be the main candidates.

    After that, there would be some of the executives.

    First, Geld for Milim. We need to get construction going again, and they know each other, so it will be epted.

    Hm! He is well-liked by everyone. Oh, by the way, Midley wanted to meet with Gabil as well. He said he''d like to train with him again.

    I see, that''s a good idea.

    I had left Gabil''s training to Ultima, but it had only been a few days and he was already looking at me as if about to cry. I might be able to send him over for a break.

    In that case, Ultima would be a part of the package, and since we''re still in wartime, there was no need for the police 45 . I could call them back immediately if necessary, so I think it would be okay to make the decision.

    Okay. Then I''ll send Geld, Gabil, and Ultima to Milim''s territory.

    Sure, I''m looking forward to it!

    With this, Milim''s country was all set.

    Next is Ruminas and the Holy Empire of Ruberios

    For Ruminasdo you have any requests on who to send?

    I''m getting smarter. She would be furious if I said that I would send Veldora, so I figured I''d better ask her before I stepped on andmine.

    Hmm, youre right

    Ruminas thought about it.

    I was right to ask the question.

    After a pause, Ruminas opened her mouth.

    I like Shion, who you brought with you today. She has visited my country before, so I know her well.

    Ruminas had been raving about Shion''s violin. It was no surprise that she remembered.

    Then I''ll send Shion. I''ll also send Adalman and his retinue with you.

    Adalman was also acquainted with Ruminas.

    There seemed to have been a falling out with the Seven Celestial Saints, but that was in the past now, so they should be fine.

    Hmm. Since hes caused me so much trouble, it might be fun to give him some guidance myself. I''ll ept, thank you.

    Roger that!

    With this, Ruminas country was also all set.

    So, who will you send to my country? Well, I don''t know anyone, so it can be anyone.

    Hmm, thats right.

    Well, if anyone is okay

    I''ll send Carrera.

    Carrera?

    Yeah. Speaking of the Yellow Primordial

    Nn? The Yellow Primordial!?

    Dagruel shouted with a very disgusted look on his face.

    No way, you, dont tell me youve managed to tame that one!?

    Not really taming, or rather, it just kind of happened

    Dagruel, just ept it. I understand where you''reing from, but this is not the time to talk about it.

    By the way, Ultima is the Violet Primordial. I was also astounded, so I understand how you feel.

    I had heard that Ultima''s territory ovepped with Ruminas'' and Dagruel''s, so they must have known about each other for a long time. Hearing Ruminas''ment, Dagruel was shocked and shouted in surprise.

    I''m stunned, too.

    Besides, it''s not just Yellow Primordial and Violet Primordial. You should know by now that it''s a little toote to be discussing Rimuru''sck ofmon sense.

    They really just said whatever they wanted.

    Milim is nodding her head in agreement, but the truth is that shes probably on my side.

    Well, whatever.

    So then, Carrera will go to Dagruel, okay?

    Wait, hold on a minute!!

    Dagruel stood up from his seat, shouting loudly.

    It looked like he was dancing with his arms outstretched, but perhaps this was his refusal stance?

    Objection! I think I also have the right to refuse!!

    The expression on his face was very desperate, showing his determination not to step back.

    In contrast, Leon was smiling very calmly. It was as if he was saying, I''m d Carrera didn''t go to me.

    Listen, Rimuru. If you send that ruffian to me, my Damargania will be destroyed. I don''t need much, but can you at least choose someone with a gentler personality?

    Character is more important than strength, Dagruelined.

    Even if you say that, so many of my subordinates are troublemakers

    I asked him about the situation in detail.

    It seems that Dagruel''s country is a decaying sanctuary called the Holy Void Damargania. It is a country with few resources, and many of its buildings have been swallowed by the sand and are in ruins.

    And Dagruel''s image of Carrera was the worst of a vandal who enjoys shooting out nuclear magic as a hobby.

    Dagruel''s perception of Carrera is that she is worse than Milim''s second epithet, the Destroyer.

    Shes not that bad

    She is!

    I agree with Dagruels words. I''ve been on the receiving end of her on a daily basis, so I can only imagine how you must feel.

    Dagruel asserted forcefully, even as I tried to deny it. In addition, even the taciturn Leon spoke eloquently of Carrera''s many wrongdoings.

    I have no choice but to believe what they say.

    If so

    In that case, I think Carrera should go to Leon.

    They seem to know each other, and Guy will also be at Leon''s ce.

    I thought it was a good idea because Carrera would not be able to do anything too crazy.

    But then

    Stop messing around! Were you even listening to me!? I absolutely refuse! That demon is the only one I''ll never let set foot in my country!

    Dagruel smiled, but Leon refused. The tone of his voice changed from I to me 46  in a fit of rage, and he seemed to bepletely out of control.

    It was funny, so I was determined to send Carrera to him.

    However, it was Guy who put a stop to that.

    Rimuru, you can''t send Carrera.

    Why not?

    She tries to fight me all the time, and when she thinks she''s going to lose, she just throws the match and runs away, you know? This battle is not a game. I don''t want to waste my energy. You understand?

    It was a good point.

    And Guy''s eyes were serious, as evidenced by the unprecedented intensity in his voice.

    If Carrera is absolutely obedient to your orders and youll take responsibility for anything that happens, I''ll consider it. But thats impossible, right?

    Hmm, well, I''m not so sure about that. Id be able to stop her if I was around, but I don''t know what Carrera would do if I took my eyes off her.

    That''s right. Carrera-chan is the one who''s trying to make the game of how many levels can you break through? popr in mybyrinth. It''s really annoying so I want you to stop it!

    Such violence

    As expected, it seems that some damage has been done without my knowledge.

    I''m going to ask Diablo for his oversight on this matter.

    And so, Ill think about it while lightly trying to evade the responsibility.

    Wahahaha! I liked Carrera and the others. I''d like to see her, so she cane to my country as my guest.

    Oh, what a nice offer from Milim!

    Are you sure its okay, Milim?

    Of course.

    Well then, problem solved.

    I''ll send Carrera to Milim''s country, and Ultima to Dagruel''s country.

    Frey-san may be angry with Milimter, but that''s none of my business. Let''s just get this over with before Milim changes her mind.

    Well then, I''ll send Ultima and Carrera from Milim''s ce to Dagruel''s country in turns. It''s a familiar homnd, so I''m sure Ultima won''t have a problems with that.

    I hate that

    Okay then, its decided. Dagruel, since that''s the case, make sure to get along with Ultima!

    Guy also gave the OK.

    Dagruel was about to say something, but we agreed that it was just our imagination, and the matter was settled.

    With that, it was decided who to send to Ruminas, Milim, and Dagruel. The only question left was who to send to El Dorado, Leon''s golden territory

    If Guy''s going there, why should I send one of my men? Guy can keep an eye on Leon, and I don''t see the need to reduce my country''s strength.

    That was what I wanted to say.

    Why should I reduce my country''s strength when a war is about to start?

    Well, the three demon girls can be teleported right back to me if something happens, or at the worst, I can summon them myself.

    As for Geld, there was the reason why the construction could not be interrupted indefinitely, and Gabil was also Geld''s bodyguard. In terms of simplebat ability, Geld is the stronger of the two. However, since Geld''s main role is defense, it is advantageous to have an attacker.

    In this respect, Gabil is excellent in both offense and defense, so I thought it would be interesting to pair him up with Geld.

    As for Adalman and his followers, I wanted them to concentrate on defending thebyrinth.

    However

    I was worried about sending Shion alone to Ruminas.

    Her strength alone was fine, but her behavior was not.

    Adalman knows all sorts of magic and can use teleportation as a matter of course. Adalman had met Ruminas and was expected to be polite to her, so I think this appointment was appropriate.

    Thats what was confirmed so far.

    There was no one left to send to Leon''s country.

    Hey, hey, don''t be shy. Your country is full of awakened beings.

    There are. But I need them to protect my country.

    You''re worrying too much. Youve got Veldora, so don''t be stingy. Hey, how about that Benimaru guy? He''s good, right?

    Of course not! Benimaru''s a newlywed. Moreover, he''s got two wives! Both of them are pregnant, so he can''t be expected to take an extended business trip during such a critical time!

    Benimaru is a monster, so it''s okay I couldnt evenugh at that joke. Unless, of course, he wanted to go.

    In the days when lifetime employment was the norm, people would go on long business trips at the worst possible times in order to measure their loyalty to thepany.

    For example, just after marriage or just after building a house.

    Most of the orders I had heard about were practically harassment, unless they had a meaning. In this day and age,panies that did such stupid things would probably end up going out of business.

    Anyway, Benimaru is no good.

    Tsk, that doesn''t make any sense, but whatever. Then

    Oh, Diablo can go!

    I forgot about it since hes always stuck so close to me, but since Im sending Shion, I should also send Diablo.

    If I sent away only one of them, theyd get in a fight.

    My real secretary was Shuna, so I wouldnt feel inconvenienced by their absence, so I think thats the best choice.

    Diablo?

    Yeah. He''s strong, so just him is enough.

    Hold on a minute, Rimuru-kun.

    Guy started speaking to me with a purr 47 , but I figured it was just a bunch of nonsense. Thats why, I ignored him and began wrapping up the conversation.

    We''re in a tough spot right now, too. I don''t have any extra resources to y with. Even so, Im sending you our ace, so I hope that youll ept it in good faith.

    For someone like Guy, it''s better to just tell him the decision rather than to negotiate with him. I did so, remembering my past experience as a general contractor.

    Specifically, I referred to the case where the general manager had sessfully refused to negotiate with a JV (a construction joint venture) that was insisting on being sent more staff. While appealing that he could not afford to do so, he refused to increase the number of employees because he had already selected excellent personnel.

    From the other partys point of view, there were many situations where they had wanted to say, We need more staff because your staff is ipetent!

    It was amon understanding between everyone, including myself, that there was not a fragment of sincerity in that ce.

    Well, it really depended on your luck whether you were really good or not.

    It would have been interesting if there had been a system of appointing employees from amongst the government or subcontractors (a reverse nomination system), so that they could be evaluated. Well, it''s useless to think about it now, and the most important thing was to push Diablo to Guy.

    Bastard

    Something wrong?

    I waited for his reply with an air of dignity, but inwardly my heart was pounding.

    Che, you''re getting thicker by the minute. Well, whatever. I''ll just put up with Diablo this time.

    PhewI won!

    I don''t care who it is. Normally I would want to take Chloe, but thats just the way things are. Oh yeah, if Rimuru wants, he cane to my country with Diablo. I promised to invite you before, but I haven''t been able to do so yet.

    Before I could bask in the afterglow of my victory, Leon made a suggestion.

    Even if taking Chloe is out of the question, I might consider paying a visit.

    Okay. I''ll leave Chloe, but I''ll visit youter if the schedule permits. I''ll contact you through Diablo if that''s the case, so thank you.

    To begin with, Chloe was absolute bed rest so I couldnt move her. I didnt know how Leon would react if I told him that, so I thought it best to keep quiet about it.

    So, I decided to just ept the invitation.

    It may not be the best time to do so considering the current situation, but its boring to just wait for Michael to make his move. As soon as I''m ready, I''ll gradually return to my daily life.

    Very well. I''ll look forward to hearing from you.

    Yeah. Well, if Diablo gives you any trouble, just let me know. I''ll be there to educate him without a thought.

    Very well. I wont hesitate to call, so make sure he''s taken care of.

    Even though he hadn''t done anything yet, I was reminded by Guy, and not Leon. I was curious about their rtionship, but it seemed troublesome, so I decided it would be better not to know.

    With that in mind, our future ns were decided.

    ***

    Well, then Im head over to Leon''s ce, so each of you just do what you have to do.

    Guy dered as such as he returned to the hall.

    Hey, hey, so no exnation for us, huh?

    I received an exnation from Mizari, but I''d at least like to know what the n is.

    Karion and Frey-san were the ones who spoke up to Guy.

    I thought that was a fair point.

    Guy is too hasty in his conclusions. He thinks he''s the only one who needs to be convinced, so he leaves the others behind.

    However, there was no way that Guy would exin the situation properly.

    And not only Guy, but also the childish Milim and Ramiris, the sloppy Dagruel and Leon, and the uncaring Ruminas, were all simr and were unlikely to volunteer for such trouble.

    I decided to be the adult and exin it to everyone.

    This is what we just discussed, but you were already briefed on the enemy, right?

    Yeah, I heard that Velzard turned against us.

    Apparently so. And the reason wasn''t betrayal or anything like that

    And so, this time I summarized the story and exined the situation.

    Even so, it was a good thing that only the seven of us attended the meeting. If the subordinates had also joined in, it would have been much more difficult to move the discussion forward.

    Guy''s decision to anticipate this was correct, and I realized that it was his long years of experience that made a difference.

    Thinking about it, it must have also been hard for Guy.

    As one can see from the other demon lords, they each have their own peculiarities. It must have taken a lot of mental strength and difficulty to bring them together.

    While re-evaluating Guy in this way, I finished my exnation.

    I knew it wasn''t like you to flounder around like this, but it turned out to be more troublesome than I expected.

    Frey-san was dumbfounded.

    It''s not that she couldnt handle it exactly, it''s just that she didn''t want to hear it.

    That''s true. Now that Ive got the power, Id like to see how far I can go against a True Dragon, but I doubt Id have a chance against Velzard-dono.

    Karion made a fearless remark, but his forehead was sweating profusely. He was probably trying to figure out what was going on and what he could even do to ovee it.

    Kuahahaha! You said it, Karion. Even I''ve never been able to defeat my sister. If you want to try, let me be your opponent first!

    Master. I don''t think this is the time. If you don''t take things seriously, Rimuru will get angry at you.

    Well, I probably should have been angry, but on the contrary, now I felt saved by Veldora''s light-hearted words. While we were talking so seriously, the situation had felt so bad that it made me depressed.

    I see. Then, in order to counter the domination, you''re going to concentrate your forces as much as possible. So, this Regalia Dominion be resisted?

    If your will is strong enough, it can be resisted. In Veldora''s case, he was targeted when his resistance was weakened by a surprise attack.

    Hmm. The original me would have been able to withstand it, but I was in the middle of a battle with my sister at the time. It was a little tough.

    It was toughor rather, you were dominated.

    It''s useless to try and pretend that it didn''t happen, so I wish youd just admit it honestly.

    While I was dumbfounded at Veldora, Dagruel spoke to me.

    Rimuru, why don''t you send Veldora to me instead? I''m not a big fan of VioUltima 48 , but Veldora is a familiar face, and I know him well.

    He was suggesting that we change the dispatched subordinates, but unfortunately the answer was still no.

    Sorry, I can''t do that. Veldora''s not my subordinate, he''s my friend. I can''t just decide for him.

    If he''s okay with it, then it''s none of my business. But in this situation, I can''t just ignore Veldora''s wishes and go ahead with the discussion.

    Thats why I checked with him for the time being.

    Veldora, you were invited, so what will you do?

    Veldoraughed but refused.

    Kukuku. Dagruel, as much as I''d like to go and rescue you, I''m busy as well. I have a job to do, which is guarding thebyrinth of Ramiris!

    You just want to ck offI knew it as soon as I saw Veldora dering that he would act as usual.

    Master!!

    It was too bad for Ramiris, who was crying out with watery eyes, but I''m absolutely sure that Veldora was just trying to take it easy.

    I see, well, that''s a shame. Even for me, thered be a lot of trouble if I was attacked by Velzard. It would have been reassuring if you could have helped me.

    Kuhaha, Kuahahaha, Kuaaaahahahah! Well, you know. A man as strong as me has nothing to fear from my sister. Too bad! Its a shame indeed, Dagruel.

    He''s so obviously vain, this one.

    But well, Velzard seems to be really dangerous, and I''m d Veldora said no.

    I feel bad for Dagruel, but my priority is the security of my country.

    Dagruel is right. I''ve never fought Velzard, but my gut tells me shes a dangerous opponent. If shees here, I''ll have to deal with her. You should be prepared to call for backup immediately, because you won''t be able to do anything else.

    Milim, who had been listening to our conversation, made a very good point.

    It was a realistic suggestion, unlike the normally overconfident Milim.

    To put it another way, Velzard was trouble, and since it was unlikely that she would attack alone, we agreed that we should also avoid acting alone.

    Frey-san and the others seemed to agree.

    I see. Well then, let''s make sure that we don''t act on our own either.

    Yes, do that! Then Rimuru, I want you to bring Geld and the others to me as soon as possible. If you want, I can pick them up myself?

    No, its fine. I''ll exin the situation when I get back and have them ready for you right away.

    Geld can be reached by Teleport, so there was no need to rush. I was going to exin the situation to the executives first, and it shouldn''t be toote to send them out after we hade to amon understanding.

    Then Ill leave it to you, Rimuru.

    Right. If the enemy attacks, I''ll contact you immediately.

    Thats right.

    I didn''t exin that Carrera was being sent, but Frey-san doesn''t seem to know what primordials were. I didnt think there was any need to tell her, so I ended the conversation peacefully.

    Besides, when ites to stalling Velzard, there was no reason toin about throwing in a Carrera.

    But what I am curious about is Michael and the others purpose. I don''t think it''s just to take over this world

    It was Louis who asked that.

    Oh, that. It''s the resurrection of Veldanava. Michael and Feldway are working for the Lord''s resurrection.

    Haah!?

    When I exined this, those who hadn''t yet heard about it screamed in astonishment. The information was known to mypanions, but it seemed that it was quite a shock to the others.

    Well, Rimuru is right. That''s what Obera, my coborator, told me!

    When Milim affirmed as such, Karion muttered in frustration.

    SeriouslyI didn''t just hear that.

    Eh, didn''t you know about it? I thought I already told you.

    No, you didn''t. Well, Midley''s just as guilty as me on this one. You''ll have to tell me moreter.

    As soon as I was reconsidering Milim, this is what happens.

    I heard that Milim and Midley had met with Obera, but it seems that their conversation was not wellmunicated. That''s why we have to make it a habit to report,municate and consult on a regr basis.

    Is what I thought. I''m not in a position to speak so highly when I had also forgot to tell them.

    Louis spoke with a thoughtful expression while Milim and the others were talking.

    A True Dragon is immortal. There is no need to worry over it because he will eventuallye back.

    Well, yes. It''s normal to think so, but Michael is an ego that arose from a Skill. Because he''s an impossible existence, he must be thinking in ways that ordinary people can''tprehend.

    Ruminas shakes her head, as if she doesnt understand.

    Guy, however, seems to think a little differently.

    That said, it''s true that Veldanava has shown no signs of resurrection. I can see why Feldway might think it''s okay for the world to die.

    Guy boasted that he believed Veldanava to be immortal because he had fought him once before. On top of that, he said that he could understand why people adored Veldanava.

    But, you know, once you die, some of your memories and personality will be affected, right? That seems like a different person to me.

    As for that, its a matter of personal feelings 49 . I feel like they are the same person. After all, they would possess the same soul.

    Hmm, I don''t know. Velgrynd-san also said I don''t care if Rudra is reincarnated as a bad guy or a good guy, but I thought that was something I should care about.

    Ahahaha! You''re still caught up in the stereotypes you had when you were a human. Well, you''ll understand eventually.

    Its not like that

    It doesn''t make sense to me, but from the perspective of a long-lived species, the idea of right and wrong may be just a mood of the moment. If that''s the case, I will keep my thoughts in mind and cherish them.

    No, no, but then what would happen if I got involved in something evil? It would be exactly what thete Mariabell had feared.

    In the first ce, I am a selfish person.

    That''s why I have to make sure that I don''t act on my own and bring chaos to the world.

    I still like to do whatever I want, but I''m only working for a better world.

    I swore to myself that I would never do anything to make others unhappy just for my own amusement.

    ***

    As I was asking myself if this was okay, Guy spoke to me as if he had just remembered something.

    By the way, Rimuru, I was just wondering

    Nn? I don''t think I have anything else to hide anymore though?

    No, I doubt that, but that''s okay. I was just curious about Michael''s thoughts. How is he going to bring Veldanava back?

    Guy pressed me to tell him what I knew.

    How the hell should I know?is what I was about to say when I remembered something.

    Oh, now that I think about it, he was saying something about that.

    Yeah. He mentioned it.

    I muttered, and Veldora, who was listening along, nodded.

    Yes, I think

    Kufufufu. They seem to believe that if they take in the power of the three True Dragons, Veldanava-sama will be revived with all of the Dragon Factors. I think it is foolish, but can we be absolutely sure that it wouldnt work?

    Diablo exined it before I could remember.

    Thats right, I remembered it was something like that. I had forgotten about it because it didn''t seem realistic at the time and I didn''t think such a method would be sessful.

    In the first ce, the Dragon Factor was the key.

    If its about Dragon Factor, Master has also acquired it

    Oh, I''ve be a True Dragon of sorts, haven''t I? So then, it''s not surprising that I have the Dragon Factor.

    Be that as it may

    Velzard, Velgrynd, and Veldora. Even if you collect the Dragon Factor from all three True Dragons, it''s meaningless if the most important factor, Veldanava''s, is missing.

    If the soul is different, then it''s a different person.

    ording to Diablo, it''s not impossible, though.

    Ah? Its absurd, that theory. Even if you could recreate him, it would only be a pseudo-body, and while they might be able to imitate his skills, they wouldn''t have anything to do with the soul which is the most essential part.

    Guy interjected, seemingly to be of the same opinion as I was.

    I don''t know. It''s just that we can''t deny the possibility that the lost soul coulde back if they have a perfected body.

    Well, I guess. Veldanava is aplete spiritual life form, so I don''t think his soul was scattered like Rudra''s. You''re right, it is possible.

    Hmm, that theory still doesn''t make sense.

    There is no reason toe back. In the first ce, Veldanava should be capable of regenerating his body himself if he intends to return

    That''s right.

    Since Ciel-san denied it, I was confidently skeptical of the enemy''s n.

    Well, it''ll probably fail anyway, so if we just ignore it

    Hmm. Then the enemy''s goal may be Veldora.

    Everyone in the room stopped moving.

    Fuah?

    Veldora''s dumb mumbling echoed through the silent hall.

    He seemed to have no idea what that meant but was leaving it to chance.

    Whats more important now is what Ruminas had pointed out.

    Oops, that''s a blind spot. Veldora was taken over once before, but they didn''t take away the Dragon Factor at the time.

    I guess it''s not the sess rate that matters to Michael, only the possibility of it.

    In that case, regardless of whether Veldanava would be resurrected or not, there was a good chance that Veldora''s Dragon Factor would be targeted.

    Not good, I hadn''t thought of the situation where Velzard would be taken over, so I feel like I''m way behind the times.

    Hmm. Obera also said that Emperor Rudrain other words Michael, had taken over Velgrynd''s Dragon Factor. Now that Velzard is under control, all that remains is Veldora!

    Whoa, whoa, hold on a second. What do you mean? Are you saying that Velzard will also lose her Dragon Factor!?

    Guy reacted to Milim''sment with a bit of panic.

    So I just said what I thought.

    Isnt that what makes sense?

    Then Guy showed an unusually agitated expression.

    In that case, Velzard won''t be safe. Shes good enough to fight me on equal terms, but she might just disappear?

    Hmm, I wonder about that. In Velgrynd''s case, one of her ''Parallel Existences'' was absorbed. I think the amount of magicules was probably less than 10%, but that alone was just enough for Michael.

    After hearing this exnation, Guy regained hisposure.

    Hmm, I guess so. The power of a True Dragon is immense, so they can''t be absorbed that easily.

    I nodded.

    At the time, Velgrynd had suffered considerable damage from Carrera''s Judgment, but she still had a considerable amount of power left.

    In fact, Michael had taken in Velgrynd''s power with Yuuki''s skill Still Life, 50  but he could not absorb itpletely.

    In addition, I also had an idea of why Michael had banished Velgrynd from this world.

    Also, it''s not just the strength and factors that are taken away, but also the skills. Doing so would remove the absolute control over the angelic skill system, so if he doesnt act carefully, he''ll get struck with a counterattack.

    That''s why Michael would want to use Velzard to weaken her, and then take the factor away and banish her.

    I agree

    Well, sometimes I can be quite brilliant as well.

    But why would he need to take away their powers? If he has absolute control, wouldn''t it be wiser to use them as a pawn rather than to use and banish them?

    Uh, thats also true.

    Michael''s skill can be used over the skills of a user. I don''t see any reason to take it away.

    Ciel-san agreed with me, so I had thought my reasoning was perfect

    Well then, do you think its necessary for Veldanava to revive by gathering all of the skills in Michael''s hands?

    Dagruel spoke up, leaving me to mourn.

    So, you don''t mind ignoring the demonic and other derived Skills?

    Thats right. Maybe Veldanava thinks that the only pure Skills are the ones he used to possess.

    This time, it was Ruminas.

    Just listening to our conversation, seemed to have led to a very profound conclusion.

    A perfect VeldanavaIn other words, gathering pure skills in order to recreate the omnipotent being that created all skills? It sounds far-fetched, but if that''s the case, I don''t think that wish is going toe true. With Leon over here, it''s impossible for them to gather all of the skills.

    Guyughed invincibly, but I don''t think it''s that easy.

    If that reasoning was correct, then we would have already defeated Michael''s strategic goal at this point.

    Because, you know?

    I, or rather Ciel-san, had already consumed the ''Wisdom King (Raphael)'', the ''Covenant King (Uriel)'', and even the ''Charity King (Raguel)''.

    Ciel-san spoke up to my worried self.

    Velgrynd, deprived of the Dragon Factor, could no longer maintain her existence and was certain to disappear even without space-time transfer. Before she disappeared, Master released the main body, so I assume that all of the energy was reintegrated

    Hmmmm

    In that case, why did he go to the trouble of banishing her?

    Perhaps he was afraid it would resurrect her. Even if he took away the Dragon Factor, he couldn''t destroy the soul or the core (heart). There, I believe he was trying to prevent the resurrected Velgrynd from taking revenge on him

    If you cante to a perfect conclusion, it means you can''t be sure.

    That''s probably why Ciel-san has been avoiding this topic.

    Shes still a perfectionist, but shes been very helpful even as my advisor.

    I wonder if Ciel-san is concerned about what would happen if Velgrynd was resurrected without losing her skills.

    That''s right. The disappearance would be certain, but she would probably be released from control. If that happened

    That could incur the wrath of Velgrynd, who would still have memories of the time when she was being controlled. If she discovered she was being dominated by the skill, she may leave the ''Charity King (Raguel)'' who caused it, gain her freedom, and reappear before Michael.

    So, banishment was the way to go then, was it?

    Since there would be no one left to use it, it makes sense to keep the useful skills.

    If that was the case, then the theory of recapturing skills that is currently being discussed, is wrong.

    In the first ce, I wonder if I can recreate a skill Ive created before as many times as I want

    Yes, that''s what I''m talking about!

    That''s what I wanted to say too.

    I was relieved to see that Ciel-san''s self-confidence was getting better than before.

    ***

    Now that I had collected my thoughts, I decided to join the discussion once again.

    I think it''s beneficial to gather skills, but it has nothing to do with the revival of Veldanava, does it? I think what we should focus on is the Dragon Factor.

    Are you trying to change the subject?

    Dagruel looks at me doubtfully.

    He seemed to be fed up with inconclusive topics, and I understood that feeling well.

    There was nothing more meaningless than a meeting with no conclusions.

    Thats why I was going to make a quick conclusion right here.

    No, it''s a matter of certainty. Michael didn''t say anything about the skills, so I think that was an afterthought.

    Hmm, you may continue.

    Well, not that I even needed permission from Ruminas.

    I''m not sure why she was being so pompous, but I think it was better to end the discussion rather than to question it here.

    This was not an escape. Absolutely not.

    So I came to a conclusion.

    If the Skills really are important, then I know of someone besides Leon who has one. So I think we should ignore them and work to keep Veldora out of the hands of the enemy.

    Hmm, you sound confident.

    Well, yeah. I know I confused you a bit when I told you they took my skills, but please don''t worry about that.

    When I said that, Guy stared at me thoughtfully.

    Hmph! Its annoying that I still don''t know why they took Velgrynd''s skill. Fine then. I''ll trust you.

    Guy was a lot more understanding than I thought.

    For the time being, we''ve made our decision.

    Some might say that we were only going back to the conclusion we hade to earlier, but we can''t let that bother us.

    So then, yeah. I guess we should be wary of letting Velzard and Veldora meet. Im counting on you, Rimuru.

    Thats what Guy said.

    It may look like he''s trying to push the responsibility on me, but itll take a long time to dig in, so I''ll just nod.

    As is often the case when one is fed up with discussions, I was in a mood to just let thing go.

    So then

    I knew it. I was in a very important position, wasn''t I?

    I couldn''t help but be annoyed at Veldora who said stupid things without even taking the discussion seriously.

    Currently, we were behind.

    We had to admit that, but we could make up for it.

    Veldora had nothing to do with the Angelic system and had already escaped the control of the Regalia Dominion. The enemy was probably aware of this, so their next move would probably be a straightforward one.

    If that happened, it would be an all-out war, so I think the first priority would be to bring the angelic owners together first.

    If it were me, I would definitely act cautiously, but I didn''t know which strategy Michael would mainly adopt.

    But there was no rush.

    There was no doubt that the enemy''s main objective was Veldora, so we could take steps to prevent it.

    In the worst case scenario, it might be a good idea to eliminate Leon''s control circuit, though I didn''t want to do it.

    Well, I wish you all the best. If anything happens, get in contact right away.

    With Guy''s words as the final conclusion, the Walpurgis, which had been a dull affair with not the slightest sense of cooperation, finally came to an end.

    ------------------

    Notes

    [9]

    Tranted to something like Then, noisily, Ramiris arrived there but like other sentences, I changed it to make it flow better.

    [10]

    Ramiris calls Veldora Shishou or Master.

    [11]

    Rain says moushiwake gozaimasen which is a very formal way of apologizing. It can also trante to I have no excuses to offer for what I did.

    [12]

    He means call Rain and the others by their names (more familiarly) without the formal/polite honorifics.

    [13]

    Hell refer to everyone by name without the polite honorifics. Basically, hell be more familiar with everyone.

    [14]

    The word Guy uses is Chjo ( or ) which means to superimpose, or ce/pile up on top of the other. DeepL/GoogleTL used the sentence Thats a superpostion but that didnt make much sense to me.

    [15]

    Karion uses a ng term here Chig? ne~e na

    [16]

    -san is a more polite/formal honorific. Frey is asking Rimuru to refer to her more casually.

    [17]

    The word used is Ishuku () which can also mean shriveled, deted, atrophied, etc.

    [18]

    The word used is hokosaki () which can mean many things such as aim of attack, point of a spear or force of argument.

    [19]

    The term Ultimate Dominion and Regalia Dominion both showed up as Michaels skills. It was confusing me at first, but I believe that the Ultimate Dominion is the skill Michael uses over the angelic systems, and the Regalia Dominion is the skill he uses over everything else.

    [20]

    Different from Wisdom King, for some reason to be exinedter.

    [21]

    Another trantion can be This is the worst!

    [22]

    The term used is Yareyare () which is a Japanese way of saying Oh dear, Give me a break, etc.

    [23]

    Called Razen in other trantions

    [24]

    The word used is Innen (). Other simr trantions are ties, fate, links, destiny, etc.

    [25]

    I think the term was danmari dashi which can mean silent/reticent/nk, but Im not 100% sure.

    [26]

    The word used is Jintoku () which can also mean benevolence or goodness.

    [27]

    This originally tranted as people will think Im licking my chops but that made no sense at all.

    [28]

    Other trantions could be, Youre not even in my line of sight or Youre not even in my thoughts.

    [29]

    True intentions, true will, etc.

    [30]

    Rimuru says tasukatteru yo, majide which can also mean, Im saved, seriously. Hes saying that hes saved and because shes been such a great help.

    [31]

    The word is Msu () which also trantes as great delight or rapture.

    [32]

    Nakama

    [33]

    Tenma Taisen (), or the Tenma Great War. It also tranted as Demon War in the MTL.

    [34]

    (). Another trantion might be monster death/rebirth, but the birthday part was emphasized. Not 100% sure, but well just wait for actual trantors. Kagali used this skill back in V15.

    [35]

    Other trantions for Ij () are strange, abnormal, insane, etc.

    [36]

    () (Koumei no wana). I think Koumei means fair/justice, so a Trap of Justice is what I used. Sounds like something Veldora woulde up with after reading manga.

    [37]

    Actually, the Japanese version said there was a troublesome tsukkomi but I didnt know the best way to trante that to English.

    [38]

    Mazoku ().

    [39]

    Maifuku no doku (()). Doku = poison. Maifuku = impaction, pressing, burial, etc. I think its referring to invading enemies attacking/killing from the inside like a poison.

    [40]

    Other trantions could be one who does not think ahead or does not care about the consequences.

    [41]

    Trantion is turn out to be snakes

    [42]

    Ttaku y - Good grief or Oh geez are other trantions.

    [43]

    (i.e.) It was the power of friendship~

    [44]

    The MTL trantion was I gave in to Guy in the spirit of what''s long is what''s short. This didnt make sense to me so I changed it, but it could still be incorrect. Just wait for the official trantions.

    [45]

    Ultima is like a police officer for Tempest

    [46]

    Leon changed from using watashi to ore. Basically, he went from being more eloquent/polite, to more assertive/bold by changing how he referred to himself and his manner of speech. Its funny because it makes it sound like he snapped.

    [47]

    Trantion is with a cat/cat-stroking voice.

    [48]

    He was going to say Violet (Violet Primordial), but corrected himself to say her name.

    [49]

    The word used was Kansei () and other trantions could be sensitivity, or perception.

    [50]

    can also mean deadly palm but the katakana ( or sutruraifu) reads as Still-Life. Alternatively, sutruraifu might also be steal life,or steel life. I wasnt exactly sure. This skill is also exined in V17 and allows one to harness the energy of a dead enemy to a certain extent.

 Volume 18 - Ch 1.1

    Interlude

    The Celestial Emperor and the Former Hero

    What''s wrong with you today, Leon-kun?

    The one who had asked was a beautiful woman, Elmesia ure Sarion, the Celestial Emperor of Sorcerer''s Dynasty Sarion.

    Of course, it was Demon Lord Leon Cromwell himself who was asked.

    After Walpurgis ended, Leon had not returned to his own country, but had taken a detour to Sarion.

    Guy is supposed toe to my country, so I dont have much time to spare. Let me cut to the chase without any social niceties.

    You''re so impatient. But if that''s the case, I suppose it can''t be helped.

    In the first ce, the fact that Leon could meet Elmesia without an appointment meant that he was being treated very well. On top of that, he doesn''t care about whats convenient to Elmesia, which was unbelievable for those who didnt know about their rtionship.

    .........

    ......

    ...

    The rtionship between the two goes back to the time when Leon was not yet a demon lord, or even a Chosen Hero.

    Leon had been wandering the world in search of Chloe, but he had once stopped in Sarion. There, he met Elmesia''s mother, Silvia El Ll 51 , who had time to spare.

    She was a true elf, a high elf, and was famous as a genius researcher who proposed the basic theory of magic science.

    However, her other face was that of one of the high elves created by the Divine Ancestor Twilight Valentine, the king of the vampires 52 .

    Silvia was strong.

    If she had cooperated, Silvia''s husband, Elmesia''s father, might not have died.

    But that was a story that did note true.

    The reason was that Elmesia had been in Silvia''s belly at that very moment.

    Silvia became Leon''s master and taught him all of the swordy and magic she possessed. It was only natural that Leon grew stronger.

    As a result, Leon and Elmesia had be acquainted with each other.

    They were granted the privilege of visiting each other, a privilege reserved only for family and close friends.

    .........

    ......

    ...

    With Elmesia''s approval, Leon opened his mouth.

    You''ve been gathering intelligence, haven''t you?

    When pointed out, Elmesia admitted it honestly.

    Of course.

    Then you know that Demon Lord Rimuru defeated the Eastern Empire, right?

    I was aware of the primordials activities. I visited them briefly after the victory party.

    And what about the battle after that?

    Yuuki-kun, right? I heard that you were fighting with an inside from the Empire, but the information was cut off at a crucial moment

    I see, Leon nodded, disclosing the information while watching Elmesia''s reaction.

    There was a lot going on at that time. Between Velgrynd''s appearance, and Veldora being taken over, it seemed to be a critical situation. However, Rimuru defeated them all.

    What? Seriously?

    It looks like you really didnt know. In that case, I''ll make this short and sweet.

    True to his word, Leon gave a brief exnation.

    He told her about what had been discussed at Walpurgis with little to no concealment.

    It was Leon''s decision to ask for cooperation, knowing that Elmesia would not be able tomunicate with the other party.

    I seeIf that''s how it was, then it makes sense that Rimu-chi 53 would have trouble exining it.

    And so Elmesia was convinced.

    I won, he had said. But even soIt was unbelievable that that single statement also meant that he had beaten Velgrynd. She had thought that Rimuru was quite strong, but had never imagined that he would grow up to be such a monster.

    It seems that hes already be stronger than mother. No wonder he was able to tame the primordials.

    He had freed Velgrynd and Veldora who were under control and defied the odds. Even though Michael and the others had escaped, it was not an exaggeration to say that the situation was in fact a great victory.

    Just so I know, Leon-kun isn''t trying to trick me with a lie, is he?

    I have no reason to lie to you. I heard the story from him in person, so I can''t guarantee that it''s true.

    Hmm, Leon-kun believes in Demon Lord Rimuru more than I expected.

    How would you feel if you were told that Emperor Rudra had been taken over by his own Skill and was now calling himself Michael?

    WellIf I was going to lie, I''d tell a way better lie than that

    Yeah. It was so absurd, I ended up thinking it was all believable.

    Thats what Leon assured.

    Elmesia couldn''t help butugh.

    Oh my, isn''t this an uncharacteristic reaction from the normally skeptical Leon-kun?

    Don''t be silly. Rimuru may be cunning, but he''s not the kind of man who would lie to make himself look good. Rather, hed prefer the opposite

    Is he trying to underestimate himself? If that''s what you''re trying to say, then Ill agree with you.

    It was just like that slime 54 , Elmesia thought.

    Even the matter of having several subservient primordials was no big deal.

    It must be the same for this case.

    Elmesia knew that Rimuru and the others had won, but other than that brief We won, nothing had been exined to her in detail.

    Nheless, she knew that somethingpletely outrageous must have happened because of that bullshit slime, so she was nning to go and ask him about it when things calmed down.

    As I thought, it''s going to be troublesome after all. I know it''s not something you can talk about on a cell phone, but I really should have asked for more details.

    Elmesia''s face remained unchanged as she regretted her mistake of being nothing but relieved to hear that he had won.

    Still, it was helpful 55 that Veldora remained friendly and Velgrynd became an ally, wasn''t it?

    Leon nodded in agreement.

    As far as I can tell, it''s a wonder he''s still alive. At least for me, it would have been impossible to defeat Velgrynd.

    If he had been dealing with Guy, there was still a chance.

    However, Leon had no chance of victory against the ''Parallel Existence'' skill that Rimuru had mentioned.

    Because of that, Leon was convinced that there was no reason for him to lie about his chances against such an ability.

    Oh, well. Even I can''t do that, so why should Leon-kun be so self-deprecating?

    Im not being self-deprecating.

    Really?

    Yeah.

    More importantly, Leon wanted to get back to the topic at hand.

    Whenever Elmesia is around, she will tease you at every possible moment.

    In order to avoid that this time, he decided to quickly tell her what he wanted.

    The situation is as I exined. With that in mind, I''d like you to get in touch with Master.

    Mother, hey

    She understood what Leon was saying.

    As long as he possessed the Ultimate Skill ''Purity King (Metatron)'', he wouldnt be able to escape Michael''s control. They had to do something about it before the enemy found out that he possessed the power.

    For that purpose, Elmesia''s knowledge alone was not enough.

    Considering the gravity of the situation, he had decided that the highest wisdom of Sarion needed to be mobilized.

    However!

    Silvia was a free spirit.

    She was also Sarion''s greatest force 56 .

    She was also very good at covert action, making if difficult to locate Silvia if she was hiding. Even if the thirteen seated Magus leaders were dispatched, it was only a gamble that they would be able to find her.

    Since Magic Communication has been cancelled, theres no way for me to contact her. She does regrly show her face though, so that we can talk about various thingsHowever, it is difficult to keep in touch with her.

    Incidentally, regrly actually meant about once a year. For certain reasons, Elmesia had never really thought it to be inconvenient.

    In the first ce, it was not often that they had to rely on Silvia to solve a problem.

    There was also that secret method to use when they were in a real pinch, but

    So, its no good?

    Elmesia let out a sigh as Leon asked her straight out.

    As Silvia''s apprentice, Leon was like a little brother to Elmesia. She was hesitant to turn down his request.

    I''ll do my best, but in the worst case, you''ll have to wait about six months.

    All right. That''s fine.

    As soon as he said so, Leon stood up.

    Youre going back?

    I''m finished here.

    Elmesia smiled, wishing that he could just take it easy 57 sometimes.

    Such a clumsy way of life, she thought it was just like Leon.

    ***

    After Leon left, Elmesia set out to keep her promise to Leon.

    She called the royal guards and ordered an emergency call for Silvia.

    In fact, Elmesia and Silvia are identical in appearance. Therefore, they had a secret where they could secure free time by taking turns ying the role of the emperor.

    Ahh, shes going to hate me for sure

    If it were herself, she would have been furious that someone had taken away her free time. That''s why she felt that her mother''s anger was understandable.

    She was willing to put up with theining this time around, but she still didnt think that the choice was wrong.

    After all, this was an unprecedented situation.

    From what she had heard, even Demon Lord Guy had agreed to escort Leon. Guy moving from the permafrost was a big deal in itself.

    Seriously, its the first time in my life that Ive been in such a serious situation.

    Elmesia thought about the future and was obscured 58 in mncholy.

    ----------------

    Notes

    [51]

    Herst name is spelt    (eru ryu) which I just tranted as El Ll. Other possibilities could be El Ryu, Ellew, Elle Lugh, etc. Well wait and see how he trantors decide. Since Ryu is dragon in Japanese, it could also be El Dra(gon)

    [52]

    This guy showed up in V17 as the ancestor who loved to experiment (you can read about him in Rains chapter). He basically got disintegrated by Ruminas, his daughter.

    [53]

    Elmesia is giving Rimuru a nickname. Adding -chi to the end of a name kind of makes the nickname more cutesy/childish.

    [54]

    (i.e) It was just like that slime to do something like that.

    [55]

    Word used was Chjo which means superimposed or piled on top. None of those worked in the English trantion.

    [56]

    Military force/war potential.

    [57]

    Rx, slow down, or take his time.

    [58]

    The word used was Tasogare. It tranted as twilighted in mncholy. Obscured was another synonym.

 Volume 18 - Ch 2

    A Short-lived Everyday Life

    Five months have passed since Walpurgis.

    During this time, many things have happened, but it has been very peaceful overall.

    There have been no signs of Michael making his move.

    I was worried that we hadnt been able to keep track of what Feldway and the others were up to, but I was trying to think positively that weve at least had the time to strengthen our defenses.

    Or rather, there was a reason to be taking it easy.

    Actually, I had been trying to get in touch with Dino since back then.

    The method of contacting him was, quite simply, the curse that Zegion had carved into Dino.

    Zegion and Dino were connected through the curse spell. When Ciel-san told me this, I had asked if we couldmunicate through it.

    It''s easy

    I couldnt help the nk look on my face when I was told that so simply, but I suppose I should have weed it if I could.

    I immediately contacted Dino and stuck it right to him 59 .

    Well, as far as Dino was concerned, Id rather have him near the enemy. Even though he had been doing some chores for Ramiris, I couldn''t shake the thought that he would just be a waste of money even if he was on our side. It would be more helpful if he could give us information while in the enemy camp.

    As I have said before, what one should really fear is not apetent enemy, but an ipetent ally. This is exactly the case with Dino, who has contributed to us simply by being on the enemy side.

    So, the contents of the conversation we had at that time

    .........

    ......

    ...

    Hey! Dino-kun, how are you?

    When I spoke to him, Dino seemed to panic.

    That''s right.

    It was natural for him to be so surprised because I had suddenly spoken into his mind.

    Rimuru-san?

    Oh, so you do know. Me, it''s me.

    This was not just a scam.

    To make him understand that I was in the superior position, Id have to be high-handed here.

    What is this for? I am very busy

    He reacted quite ufortably, and I smirked.

    You wont be getting away, Dino-kun.

    With that in mind, I send out a thought.

    No, it''s quite a simple story. Dino-kun, I heard you picked a fight with me, right?

    N-No, I mean, I did pick a fight, but it wasnt as dramatic as it sounds

    I don''t want to hear any excuses. I think what''s most important is sincerity 60 .

    Sincerity, you say

    I heard that you led intruders into Ramiris''byrinth and went on a rampage. Moreover, you even plotted to kidnap Ramiris, didn''t you?

    I smirked and cornered Dino.

    Well, you see, I had to do it because I was ordered

    Didnt I just tell you that I don''t want to hear any excuses?

    Yes, I''m sorry

    It was hard to tell which of us was the viin here, but I''m a demon lord, so its fine.

    Incidentally, Dino was also a demon lord, so my conscience remained conveniently unharmed.

    Dino''s reaction was sluggish, as if realizing that he was in the wrong.

    Taking advantage of the opportunity, I began to negotiate.

    Normally, this would have been an unforgivable act, but I am willing to ignore it just this once. That is, if Dino-kun is sorry 61 though.

    Seriously!? Of course, Im sorry. It''s just that I have my own problems, and this is what happened. You understand that, don''t you?

    Mm-hmm, I do. It''s just that Dino-kun was under Michael''s control.

    Eh?

    As I thought, he wasnt aware of it.

    However, Dino''s inherentlyzy personality probably helped him this time, as he didnt seem to have much loyalty to Michael, the ruler.

    Waihold on! Seriously!? Im being controlled?

    Yup, you are. I didnt think it was your decision to do that, either.

    After saying that, I told him about Michael''s ability.

    So thats how it is. I''m assuming that you have an angelic skill too, am I wrong?

    No wayIts true that I do have the Ultimate Skill Heavenly King Astarte

    Dino''s skill is Heavenly King Astarte. Im not sure what it does, but it seems that it is an angelic skill.

    That''s it, then. That''s why you''re being manipted by Michael without even realizing it.

    Based on Dino''s reaction, letting him know that he was under control could be a good thing or a bad thing. He did not seem to bepletely under control to the point of swearing allegiance, so it might be easier for the domination to fall apart.

    Dino''s character might also be a factor, but I had a feeling that he would be able to break through this well.

    What should I do? Listening to you, I don''t feel angry at Michael. I don''t feel like betraying him, and I don''t feel like joining you guys. I didn''t realize it until now, but it''s definitely a weird feeling.

    With this, I was able to find out Dino''s skills and also make him aware of everything. This contact seems to have been a great sess.

    But anyway, Ill take my chances.

    Well, I have a hypothesis. If you have a demonic skill that opposes an angelic skill, you might be able to offset them and escape from their control. There are other ways to do this, but I don''t rmend them because they depend on luck.

    As for the offset theory, Chloe is an example.

    Because she had the Manas named Chronoa, Chloe herself was not controlled. I heard that she had lost contact with Chronoa now, but from what I saw, she had fought and struggled to remove the control circuit from Hope King (Sariel).

    I wanted to help, but I trust them and will let them do what they want.

    So, its just a matter of luck.

    Thats a lie.

    It''s not that I don''t trust Dino, but he is still under control. I''m not stupid enough to reveal all of my tricks.

    Actually, with Leon, I had a feeling that Ciel-san would take care of things if used ''Predation'' on him. But just the thought of that was unpleasant, so I was saving it as ast resort.

    That''s why I told Dino that there was only a possibility that I could do something.

    I see. It doesn''t feel good being controlled, so I''ll see if I can''t do something about it.

    Hey, hey, dont overdo it. Michael and us demon lords are going to have an all-out war, so I want you to do nothing and stay out of suspicion.

    Even if I could get information from Dino such as by asking him to spy, I wouldnt fully believe him.

    The effect of Zegion''s curse was not enough to prevent him from telling lies, and even if he could, it would be useless if he told Michael about what was reported to us.

    Since I was not sure which effect was greater, Zegion''s coercion or Michael''s control, I thought it was dangerous to rely on uncertain information.

    But even so!

    It would be a waste to let Dino fool around here!

    Rather, it is uneptable that wed be the only ones who were struggling.

    Is that all right?

    Dino looks happy to be told not to do anything.

    He''s such a sweet guy.

    Theres no reason for me to be kind.

    I also thought it would be hard for you to betray Michael.

    I replied in a gentle tone as if I cared about Dino, but I was secretly ready to make him work.

    No, I don''t want to betray him, but I dont care at all about leaking information!

    Hey, is this really okay?

    I don''t think I can trust this guy on a fundamental level

    No, this is fine.

    It''s best to have him act in our favor to the extent that he doesn''t even feel like he''s betraying us.

    No, it''s okay. You don''t have to do anything.

    Seriously? Then, what about that sincerity thing you were talking about earlier?

    Ive been doing a good job of leading the conversation.

    It seems I was right to use Dino''s innocent nature to get him to act voluntarily.

    Even if you don''t join the battle, thats almost like having Michael''s strength reduced.

    I see, that is true!

    It''s a little annoying that he was convinced by that, but because its Dino, I feel like it''s forgivable.

    I see, if you say so. Then I''ll let you know if there''s anything you need hear about.

    That would help.

    All right, now hell be able to be a spy without being aware of it.

    Okay, I''ll keep an eye on things, so let me know if you need anything. Is that okay?

    Yeah, that''s fine. By the way, what''s Michael doing now? Do you have any idea of when he might be ready to move?

    Having seeded in getting Dino to talk, I asked him what I wanted to know.

    I could tell when he was lying, so as long as Dino didn''t tell on me, the information would be reliable.

    Yeah, I think he''s asleep now. You see, he got Velgrynd''s power and also took Velzard''s power. I guess the strain of that took its toll and he went dormant.

    Whoa, that''s some great information right there.

    I had thought he would weaken Velzard before making his move, that impatient bastard.

    Oh, I heard she fought Guy, so she might have been a little weakened. But it seemed that neither of them had fought seriously, so it must have been too much for Michael to handle.

    And so, the Dragon Factor was taken from her.

    If that''s the case, it''s possible that Michael has changed in some way, so we should be on our guard.

    What I am wondering about is

    What happened to Velzard?

    Velzard is recovering, too. She will probably be back to normal in a few days.

    I see

    I guess the possibility of being attacked out of nowhere has disappeared, but a True Dragon''s resilience is unbelievable.

    However, I''d like to think that there won''t be a full-scale invasion until Michael, themander, is back to normal.

    Okay, thanks.

    For this, it''s a small price to pay.

    There were many more questions I wanted to ask, such as the number of enemies, but I decided not to go any further.

    It would be better to be satisfied with Dino''s willingness to speak up, because he would be a longsting source of information.

    Okay then, I''ll be in touch.

    OhI just remembered. It would be helpful if you could tell Ramiris that I''m sorry.

    Just as I was about to end the conversation, Dino asked me for a favor.

    So, I briskly declined.

    Ah? You can apologize yourselfter. She was pretty angry and said that she was going to use all forty-eight of her special moves on you.

    Forty-eight my ass! All she can do is dropkicks!

    I don''t know. That''s just what she said. Didn''t I tell you?

    When I said that, it seemed like Dino wasughing.

    Fufu. I understand. See youter.

    Yeah, see ya.

    With Dino''s approval, I broke the connection this time.

    .........

    ......

    ...

    And that was about it for the exchange.

    It went well, I''d say.

    I had already shared this story with the demon lords, with the caveat that Dino was an informant. That''s why we did not have to feel tense.

    Of course, I couldnt deny the possibility that the whole thing was a trap, but if I did that, Id be just like Ciel-san. It was no fun being overly cautious and losing your nerve, plus that would be like falling into the enemy''s trap, so I came to the conclusion that the best thing to do was to be natural.

    Well, that was still the same decision I made when I heard that the angels wereing to attack.

    I had always been the type of person who did what I could do tomorrow.

    For example, whenever I had summer vacation homework, I would do my best in the beginning and finish the rest on thest day.

    And if I didnt get it done in time?

    At that time, I would go straight to school without hesitation and announce I forgot, at which point they would get mad at me.

    If I was told to bring it in tomorrow, then I would finish what I could, and if I couldn''t, next I would say I lost it.

    Well, I had done my best because I had wanted to finish it as much as possible, but I think it is important to ept that which is impossible.

    Eh, do my best on a regr basis?

    No way, its about focusing the mind.

    So then, as long as you are prepared to get someone angry, the rest is manageable.

    In other words, you have to take responsibility for your own actions.

    But Ive digressed from the topic at hand.

    I asked Dino to call me every morning to see if Michael had woken up or not.

    Michael shouldnt be able to see everything. He seems to be able to manipte the skills of his subjects, but I don''t think he can read their thoughts. If that were possible, he would have to process a huge amount of information, and that would make it more difficult to extract only the necessary information.

    I do not believe that a person who cannot even tell a lie to himself would go that far.

    The rationale behind that thought was Ciel-san.

    Even Ciel-san asserted that although it was possible to speak with someone connected by the Soul Corridor, it was impossible to read their every thought. While one might sometimes be able to sense their surface psychology, it is impossible to interfere with what someone is thinking deep inside.

    However, I have heard that you can see the answer to a question if you ask it directly, but I have some idea about that. I always tried to be cautious, because I felt that my thoughts were often seen through.

    For that reason, I ced a certain level of trust in Dino''s information.

    ***

    And so, during thest five months when Michael had not moved, we had been preparing for the final battle.

    We had established a system of mutual cooperation amongst us demon lords, and were holding detailed discussions with each of our territories so that wed be able to deal with any problems as soon as they arose.

    And by us, I meant me. 62

    The agreement to go and help the others if possible was meaningful to me, but it had been very difficult to coordinate.

    Just by looking at that exhausting banquet 63 , one would understand how difficult it was to meet with demon lords who were so selfish.

    First, as promised, I was constructing a magic transfer circle in each demon lord''s territory.

    After Walpurgis, I had asked Mizari to take me to each of the demon lords'' countries. I recorded those locations so that I could teleport to them immediately.

    Of course, the demon lords had all agreed to this.

    I already knew Guy''s castle, the Frost Pce, since it had been the meeting ce at the time.

    I had also already been to Ruminas Holy Empire of Ruberios, and its capital, the Sacred City of Runes.

    I had visited the still-unnamed country of Milim many times, so I really only had to visit two ces, El Dorado (the Golden Land) and Damargania (the Holy Void).

    Dagruels territory was like a decaying sanctuary. If I had more time, I would have liked to take a leisurely tour, but work took priority at the time. I left immediately and made arrangements to dispatch Ultima and the others.

    Incidentally, I found out from the conversation that Milim and Dagruel could not teleport.

    Needless to say, neither could Ramiris.

    No, I''m not good at that kind of thing.

    Me too! It''s faster to just fly than to do those troublesome coordinate calctions!

    That''s what they both said.

    It is true that transportation type magic can only transfer you to a location that has been recorded. In the case of the skill Spatial Transportation, it is more flexible, but the coordinates of your current location and your destinationan urate depiction (image)are required or else the skill wont be activated. It is necessary to understand the corrtion between the positional information and to calcte the angle and distance to jump.

    It may look like an easy transition, but there is a timeg, and it is a surprisinglyplicated skill.

    Milim acts by instinct and natural intuition, and is not good at intentional calction. Herputational ability is very high, but it seems that she is not good at it because she finds it troublesome.

    Dagruel is the physical type as one can see

    And Ramiris, well, you know.

    The construction of the magic transfer circles had been a request from Guy, but they might alsoe in handy in the future. Leon and Ruminas could do whatever they wanted with their magic and skills, but the fact that they didn''t oppose the instation suggests that they must have seen the usefulness of this device.

    After all, it could be used by anyone.

    In fact, even people with very little magic power could use it.

    Using the magicules collected from the atmosphere, it was possible to transfer nearly fifty people at once. This would make it easier to travel to and from countries where magic circles have been set up.

    In the future, we could prepare arger scale system, but there was still a problem in terms of efficiency.

    As you know, arge number of magicules are required to transfer organisms.

    If we waited for the magicules to be replenished naturally, then it would take a week to use it once. It was easy to replenish the amount of magicules if the person had as many as we did, but it would be a lot of work for humans to do so with their magic power.

    If it was used to transport goods, then that could start a distribution revolution. If that happened, the magic train we were working so hard to develop would be obsolete, and thered be a lot of problems to solve.

    The wordpartmentalization came to mind, and so I decided to leave the effective utilization of this device as a future task.

    For that reason, I was installing magic transfer circles, though as a matter of fact, I had alreadypleted them in demon lord territories.

    Let''s look back on the situation at that time

    .........

    ......

    ...

    The first one I installed was, of course, in my country of Tempest.

    Just in case, I had it installed in the Istion Room of thebyrinth. That way, it would be safe even if it was used by the enemy.

    The next one I installed was in the Holy Void, Damargania.

    I went with Ultima andpleted it myself with little choice in the matter.

    Normally, I would have just left the work to others, but this time things were different. In addition to the fact that I could not afford to take my time, Damargania was a unique location.

    A long time ago, the city had been reduced to ruins by the decisive battle between Guy and Milim. However, the tragedy of that battle still affected the city to this day.

    A barrennd, a deadly desert. There were several reasons why it was called that.

    The raging sandstorm corroded everything it touched. This sandstorm isted Damargania from the outside world.

    At the time when the forces between Guy and Milim shed, a catastrophic destruction urred, and the energy was forcibly expelled to another dimension to minimize the damage. However, that power has not disappeared, but continues to leak from the dimensional rupture. That is the cause of this tragedy

    That was Ciel-san''s exnation.

    It was such a long time ago, I was surprised that it was still having an effect.

    Anyway, such a dangerous ce was the territory of Dagruel.

    In Damargania, there was a huge towerthe Heavenward Pavilion 64 that pierced the sky. Only the area surrounding it was a barely functional safe zone called the Holy Void.

    Outside of the Barrier, which had existed since ancient times, there were threats that even rivaled the permafrost.

    Weak monsters would be sliced to death by sand des, and even strong monsters would be at risk of death over long periods of time. Dagruel and the other giants were of no exception to this rule.

    For the weak, women, and children, even if they were high ranking warriors, there were many dangers outside the safety of the Holy Void.

    If even the Giant race could be reduced to such a state, then for humans, this was truly a deadly ce. That''s why I did the work myself this time rather than sending for Vesta and the others.

    That said, all I really had to do was set up the magic circle.

    The giant disk made of pure magisteel, engraved with magic forms constructed by Ciel-san, was one meter high and seven meters in diameter, and was installed in the location specified by Dagruel. The rest of the work went to the demons who hade with Ultima.

    This is an order from Rimuru-sama! Do not embarrass me, and make sure youplete it!

    And so, the demons were given a threatening pep talk from Ultima.

    It was mostly just threatening, but the demons were good at magic, so they could handle it. With that in mind, I left them in charge and retreated.

    Rimuru, are you sure its alright?

    Dagruel asked me anxiously

    Yeah, it''s fine. Theres Veyron as well as Ultima, and we can also call Zonda back if needed. The test was sessful, so don''t worry about leaving the rest of the adjustments to them.

    Yes, there was nothing to worry about.

    Because Ultima and the others were big time demons despite their appearances.

    They probably had umted more wisdom than I could even imagine, so I finished the work without any worries.

    Rather than that, I was just wondering whether they would go berserk

    Well then, I''m off! You take care of the rest!

    Dagruel was about to say something, but I chose to ignore him.

    It would only be a hassle to change personnel here, so I left the ce as if to escape.

    After Damargania was Ruberios.

    I set up a magic circle at the location Ruminas had specified.

    After that, it was worktime for Gobkyu and the Surmounters who hade with him.

    If I just left things to Gobkyu, he would construct a magnificent building as a transfer facility. And with the help of the Surmounters, they could handle the fine-tuning of the relocation information.

    I think this will work. I will keep in touch with Tempest and Damargania, and we will get it working up to a practical level!

    Now that they were taking care of it, my work here was done.

    Now, as for the other matter.

    Shion, her subordinates, Adalman, and his followers were scheduled to arrive in Ruminas'' country.

    I had brought them all together this time, but the problem was finding an inn.

    Rest assured. There is an empty room in my temple, so you can sleep there.

    That would be a great help. Shion, Adalman, that''s how it is, so don''t cause any trouble.

    Leave it to me, Rimuru-sama! As Rimuru-sama''s secretary, I shall see to it that your duties are carried out in an unashamed manner!

    I''m worried.

    I''d rather you not do anything and just send me a message when the enemy attacked.

    However, its such a pity that I can''t cook. They say that even one day without cooking can dull ones skills

    Isn''t that for more delicate skills, like the piano?

    Come to think of it, Shion is also good at the violin, so doesn''t she need to practice that too?

    Don''t you need to practice your instrument? Youre so enthusiastic aboutbat training, but I never really see you ying the violin.

    Fufufu, dont worry. As long as you practice daily, ying an instrument is a piece of cake. It''s more about the ability to make subtle changes of seasoning 65

    That''s crazy.

    This persons way of thinking is wrong.

    I hid my disgusted expression, wondering if I should apologize to all the musicians in the country.

    Shion says it''s all in the seasonings, but no matter how much you get it wrong, the taste will be guaranteed. However, too much salt is too salty, and too much sugar is just bad for your health. The correct answer is that the right amount is important.

    Anyway, its clear that her concerns are misdirected.

    As I was thinking this, Ruminas interjected from the side.

    Shion, wasn''t it? If it''sbat training youre looking for, I''m sure Hinata has some time. If youd like, I can do it too, so don''t worry. Oh, and as for the cooking, I will give you an unused kitchen and arrange for the ingredients, so you can do as you please.

    I was made speechless by her words. The offer was so fearless that I was trembling.

    I was so startled that I was toote to stop her.

    Ru-Ruminas, letting Shion cook for you is

    No, I don''t mind. In this day and age, hobbies should be cherished. I also had a passion for cooking at one time. Fufufu, it would be fun to try it with you.

    Well! That''s a wonderful idea. I wont lose, Ruminas-sama!

    Fufu, Hinata is also very good at cooking. Lets invite her.

    Youve gotta be kidding.

    Theres a lot to talk about here.

    I could no longer handle this, let alone having Hinata join in.

    I didn''t know what to do, so I left my luck to chance.

    A-Adalman. I leave the rest to you!

    Eh!?

    He must have had some terrible premonition. Even Adalman, a man of great faith, could not nod his head in agreement with my words.

    However, the die had been cast.

    Well then, let me know if anything happens!

    I left it at that and escaped on the spot.

    ***

    The third destination was Milims country.

    The ruins of Yuurazania, which I knew quite well.

    What rose from there was not a sacred mountain, but a huge structure still under construction.

    I teleported to the site of the old city and waited for the pick-up.

    Geld had been sent ahead of me, so I was apanied by Gabil''s group, and Carrera and Esprit.

    Gabils cheerleaders 66 , Kakushin, Sukerou, and Yashichi, and Gazat-kun, the captain of the Hiryuu, were also there.

    I don''t know who Gabil''s second-inmand is, but I am sure that these four stand out.

    Even though the Hiryuu and others were preparing to face a decisive battle with a dangerous opponent, they all looked very happy.

    The reason seemed to be because Ultimas special training had been put on hold for the time being.

    It was so harsh that they all died many times. They had allmented over being unable to stop even after death, because they were still in thebyrinth.

    If you think about it, thatbyrinth is a foul.

    Rather than training to the point of death, you can assess your limits on the assumption that you will die.

    Well, thanks to that, they seem to be improving rapidly.

    Simply evolving and increasing your magicule quantity does not mean that you will be truly strong. It is only when one has mastered their power that they can be called a first-ss warrior.

    That said, you should not overdo it.

    I wouldnt want to train like that either, so I decided I would tell Ultima to keep it in moderation.

    And so, there were a little over a hundred people in total. We had been waiting here for about ten minutes now.

    I told Milim that I would be here today through the ''Telepathy Net'', but maybe she forgot?

    Arent theyte?

    There, there, Carrera-dono. Weve only just arrived, haven''t we? Lets wait for the pick-up with the feeling of sightseeing!

    Gabil-dono is kind, isn''t he?

    I think Carrera-sama is just too quick-tempered.

    What did you say, Esprit?

    No, nothing.

    It''s barely enough. But still enough.

    I can help but understand Carreras frustration. But that''s because I still have the senses of a modern Japanese who used to live by the minute, and in this world, I''m one of the impatient ones.

    We have a concept of time, and we have clocks, but they are not as borate as the wristwatches worn in my previous life. It ismon knowledge in this world that only aristocrats or big merchants have pocket watches which are a little bulky.

    Therefore, if the time of an appointment is vague, such as in the afternoon, the general practice is to have a messenger on standby as early as possible.

    In this case, it was Milim''s fault for failing to do so, but it would not be mature to get angry because there was always the chance of a misunderstanding such as with the meeting time or date.

    It was no use asking Carrera for help, so I decided to take the lead here.

    Don''t panic. I''ll just check with Milim.

    After saying that, I tried ''telepathy'' on Milim.

    Hey, Milim? I''m already here, but is there no one at the meeting ce?

    Mmm!? R-Rimuru? I''m busy with my homework, but I told Midley properly! Perhaps he misunderstood the time. I''ll give him a strong reminder, so please don''t be angry with him!

    You get the idea.

    I guess she was so busy with the homework Frey-san gave her that she forgot to give him my message.

    I understand, no need to panic.

    Mm, mm! I''ll see youter!

    These things happen.

    With that in mind, I diligently waited for the pick-up while calming down Carrera.

    However, something unexpected happened next.

    One of the people who rushed over made an outrageous remark.

    Oh, you must be the Demon Lord Rimuru-sama! You are even more dignified than I had heard, and with such an impressive presence. I, Jagi, am truly impressed!

    The speaker, Jagi, bowed reverently towards Gabil.

    Apparently, Jagi''s race is like a dragonewt. Unlike Gabil, Jagi has a human form, with horns growing out of the side of his head.

    He is small in stature but has a sturdy physique and sharp movements.

    The five majins with him did not seem to have any noteworthy characteristics other than being diverse in race.

    For some reason, Jagi had scars all over his body that appeared to be freshly made. That worried me a little, but he looked fine and healthy, so I guess it wasn''t a problem. What was more troubling was Jagi''sment itself.

    I was stunned, but I think Gabil was the one who reacted with the most surprise.

    No, no, no, I''m not Rim

    Oh, my goodness! You don''t need to greet a low-ranking captain like me! There is not a single person under Demon Lord Milim-sama''smand who does not know your name!

    He hurriedly tried to deny it but was interrupted by that misunderstanding bastard''s outburst.

    Even if you know my name, what''s the point if you don''t know my face?

    There were many majins who knew my face, but it seems that this low-ranking captain was not one of them.

    As for the reason why Jagi mistook Gabil for me, I think it was the haki.

    I hadpletely suppressed my youki and outwardly appeared as a normal human being.

    The same was true of Carrera and Esprit, who didnt look like demons or even majins.

    Well, because there were many human guests in Tempest, we had a habit of keeping our youki at bay.

    However, things cant go on like this.

    Its been a long time since Ive been treated like this, and I was enjoying it, but Carrera and Esprit have very little patience.

    Hey, that person is Gabi

    What''s with you people? Arent you guys supposed to be maidservants? You may be wearing a military uniform, but if you''re interrupting an adult conversation, you''re not getting the education you need.

    And now again, he interrupted Esprit.

    To be honest, I thought he was the one whocked education.

    Wahaha, he''s a pretty funny guy, isn''t he?

    Carrera wasughing.

    Despite her words, I could see the veins bulging on her temples 67 .

    She seemed to be trying her best to hold back.

    It looks like she''s three seconds away from exploding, so now is not the time to beughing.

    Just as I was thinking that, Esprit moved before me.

    Hey, can you please just listen to me?

    She said so firmly and put her hands on Jagi.

    It was not so much of a punch as it was a strong action. A weaker majin would have been unable to react and probably would have been knocked unconscious by the blow to the cheek.

    Normally, I should be angry with Esprit, but this time it was Jagi''s fault. He mistook Gabil for me and did not listen to us.

    Although it was not good to resort to violence, Carrera had been about tosh out. Esprit''s action was based on her understanding of the situation, so I decided to ignore it.

    I thought that if Jagi would calm down and listen to us, it would end the conversation there.

    However, something unexpected happened next.

    Jagi reacted to Esprit.

    Eh?

    Hyah!

    The attack was instantaneous.

    Jagi grabbed Esprit''s left back fist with his right hand and twisted it lightly. As if to catch Esprit off guard, he used his right foot to sweep her off her feet while she was off bnce.

    Esprit leaped as if to avoid the low-kick-like sweep, or perhaps it was because she had read the attack. Then, twisting her body in midair, she threw a kick with her right foot towards Jagi''s head.

    Jagi dodged the kick by bending his upper body, but that was not the end of Esprit''s attack.

    Using her grabbed fist as an axis, Esprit kicked with her left leg, returning the kicked right leg like a pendulum.

    In this way, she aimed at Jagi''s neck so that her right and left legs intersected. It was an acrobatic technique, like something you might have seen in aic book, but it would be difficult to deal with at first nce..

    And yet, Jagi evaded the barrage by releasing Esprit''s fist and doing a backflip.

    And so, the two sides went back at it once more, but at this rate, both sides were going to end up getting serious.

    Well, you seem to be quite the pleasant youngdy. The fact that you''re taking it easy on me, it''s no wonder you''re wearing a military uniform.

    Jagi snapped his neck as he began speaking.

    You''re good too, old man. I think I''m going to enjoy this a little bit, so let''s show them how serious we are, shall we?

    In response, Esprit began smiling very nicely as she cracked her knuckles.

    Carrera was unperturbed.

    It was obvious from her happy smile that she had no intention of stopping them as Esprits boss.

    Gabil was very unreliable at times like these. Because of Ultima, he seemed to have been traumatized by the three demon girls. This time it was Esprit, but he didnt seem sure if he should talk to me or not.

    Gabil nced at me.

    Aw geez, it seems that Im the only one here with anymon sense.

    I had no choice but to intervene.

    First, I decided to call out the person in charge.

    Yes, yes, that''s enough. Jagi-san, right? You wont talk to me, so go get your boss.

    I stepped forward and called out to him in a grandiose manner. I think I was pretty cool, but I''d give myself an eighty.

    I waited for Jagi''s reply, feeling proud of myself.

    And then

    Hah? Don''t interfere in a man''s fight!

    Something like that!

    I was instantly offended.

    But at the next moment

    You, you''re being disrespectful to Rimuru-sama!

    Carrera kicked him with lightning speed.

    Even I have reached my end of my patience!

    Gabil''s spear struck down the Jagi who had been blown away.

    Oh, I waste.

    There was no turn left for Esprit, who had been facing him.

    And as for me

    Ah, you guys. Nothing happened here. Okay?

    I lightly intimidating the majins that Jagi had brought with him in an attempt to destroy the evidence.

    ***

    As it turned out, there was no need to threaten Jagi.

    The fault turned out to be on Milim''s side.

    Wahahahaha! Now you realize that it''s not my fault, don''t you?

    Yeah. I had thought you forgot to tell them, but I didn''t realize that you were having fun ying a winner-takes-all game to see who would pick us up

    The winner was Jagi, but the war criminal was Midley.

    How can that be? I don''t understand

    No, no, no, my guys are bloodthirsty, but Midley''s guys are no slouches either.

    Frey-san was holding her head in her hands in disgust, and Karion wasughing with his stomach.

    So, was this Jagi guy any good?

    Well, he was strong. I''d say he was about 50/50 with Phobio-san.

    I replied to Karion, who suddenly asked me with a serious face, with my honest impression.

    In fact, he was slightly inferior whenparing on the amount of magicules, but his skill (level) against Esprit was quite good. He might also have shape-shifting ability like Gabil, in which case my evaluation would be even higher.

    However, Phobio can also transform himself into a beast, so the gap between the two would never narrow, and I''m sure Phobio would win in a real fight.

    Nevertheless, Jagi is quite skilled.

    Like Midley, the priests of the Worshipers of Dragons are really strong. Because they do not rely on power alone, they are versatile and are able to use that to their advantage.

    Even so, they are muscle heads.

    It''s quite an unfortunate reality.

    I''m apologize for the state of affairs. I have failed in my supervision.

    With that said, Midley bowed his head.

    Well, I can imagine that Jagi was also inspired by this man, so I couldnt deny that Midley wasrgely responsible.

    So, you''re Carrera-dono, right? Gabil-dono and I would appreciate your cooperation with our country for the time being.

    In times like these, it was up to Frey-san.

    Karion was a great king, but he also loved to fight. He was more like Midley and had not yet abandoned his innate values that the weak were bad.

    This timeor rather, we are saved in many respects because we were the strong ones. If we had been weaker, we would not have been able to negotiate as well as we did.

    In that respect, I was pretty lucky.

    Well then, Carrera-san. Why don''t you have a little test of strength with me?

    You see, Karion''s got something to say.

    Hoh, thats quite the spirit youve got there! Just tell me how much you want me to go easy on you.

    Don''t just join in so easily, Carrera!

    Whoa, hey now!

    Its fine, milord. I hear Karion-dono has evolved. So then, it''s only natural that hed want to know how much stronger hes be.

    Well, that may be true, but this isn''t thebyrinth, you know? If you overdo it, you could die, so you guys have to refrain from such dangerous behavior.

    Gabil and Frey-san were the only ones who nodded at my words.

    However, the others looked dissatisfied.

    Especially Milim.

    Ehh, thats boring!

    Frey-san got angry at her. Don''t say that! she said.

    But well, for practicalitys sake, I couldnt allow it.

    They couldnt do it near the construction site, and would have to go to a ce far enough away that wouldnt be affected by the battle. To do so right here would be like asking the enemy to aim right at us.

    Even so, Karion was surprisingly insistent.

    Sure, I know it''s dangerous. But I meant what I said when I said that. I want to know how strong I''ve be before the showdown.

    Karion even asked Frey-san to agree with him.

    Well

    Come to think of it, I had Ciel-san.

    At the time, it had just been ''Wisdom King (Raphael)'', but it still answered all my questions, so I hadnt needed to test my strength to learn what I could do.

    In the case of Karion and the others, the only way to find out was to test their strength by themselves. It made sense that the quickest way to find out was to fight the strongest person.

    I won''t deny that. But isn''t that a problem you''ve always had and will always have to deal with on your own?

    That''s true. But the enemy won''t wait for us, you know? We have to get stronger quickly and protect the people who believe in us. To do that, we have to be willing to take some risks, don''t you think?

    That''s

    Frey-san lost the battle.

    She seemed unable to say anything back once the duties of a king were brought up.

    If he had only wanted to brag about his power, I would have dismissed it, but because he had a reason, it was a question I should consider.

    Rimuru, I agree with Karion''s opinion. Im training him now, but I think there are limits to what I can do.

    Milim is right. It''s a shame, but now that Ive awakened, I understand. I thought I had been getting stronger, but Milim still seemed so far away. And Rimuru, the difference between you and me is the same. There is a gap between you and me that cannot be bridged no matter how hard I try. On that note

    Fufu, do you think I can reach you? I''ve been beaten, but I think you''re right that it''s better than dealing with Milim-sama.

    I see

    I don''t think there''s much of a difference between me and Carrera in my current stateBut if Karion feels that way, then it proves that his eyes are able to see the essence of things.

    Guy also thought highly of Karion, and if he could use the power he had awakened, he would be a great asset in the future war.

    It was also a request from Milim.

    In that case, the right thing to do would be to cooperate.

    All right. Then I''ll return with Karion and Frey-san, and Carrera will stay here and defend as nned.

    Eh? Im the other one who

    There are suitable people in thebyrinth!

    I understand. As you wish, milord.

    I feel bad for being so gloomy, but I mustn''t show my naivete here.

    Carrera was overkill. Ramiris''ints were giving me a headache, and it was wiser to have a more sensible partner if I wanted to leave Karion and the others in charge.

    Karion could have Benimaru. Or Zegion.

    For Frey-san, Kumara would be a good choice.

    Id work out the details after I got back. If something happened, I could be contacted, and would immediately send them back via teleport.

    I''m sorry, I''ve been a bit selfish.

    That''s okay. I''m only cooperating with Karion because I think he''s right. Is that okay with you, Frey-san?

    Yes, of course. It''s very kind of you to offer, so I see no reason to refuse.

    And so thats how it went.

    Gabil and Carrera were left under Milim''smand, and Karion and the others were brought back with me.

    Incidentally, Karion''s subordinates were left to their own discretion.

    As long as they had not awakened, the environmental destruction wouldnt be so badI think. I had sent them arge supply of recovery medicine, so they should be able to handle the rest on their own.

    Benimaru and the others had gotten stronger that way, so they werent worried about that.

    ***

    After returning from Milim''s country, Karion and the others were left in Benimaru''s care and thrown into thebyrinth.

    Finally, it was time to go to Leon''s country.

    I had sent Diablo ahead of me, but I put off my visit until the end, so he was probably waiting for my arrival by now. With this in mind, I prepared for my departure.

    Leons countryI knew where El Dorado was because Mizari had guided me there before.

    Therefore, we would be there in a moment with Teleport.

    I will be your escort.

    I felt safe with Souei.

    Don''t forget about me, my lord!

    Ranga poked his head out from behind me, appealing to me.

    Oh good, good!

    I nodded while enjoying the fluff.

    He was always with me anyway, but he was cute like this.

    And now

    I was somewhat reluctant to go, but I had already informed the other party. It was always better to just get the unpleasant things done quickly, so I stood up.

    Well then, let''s go.

    Muttering to myself, I activated the teleport as Shuna and Rigurd saw us off.

    Leon''s territory was on a small continent.

    Even if it was small, a continent was still a continent. It was a little bigger than Australia. There was an astonishingly vast amount of tnd with well-organized streets and cityscape.

    Before Leon and the others had settled here, there had been a naturalndscape of forests, ins,kes, rivers, and mountains. It was said that the current state is the result of forcing thatndscape into shape with great magic and optimizing it.

    An artificial city created with the harmony of nature in mindthat was El Dorado, the city where Demon Lord Leon Cromwell resided.

    Wow, this is amazing

    In response to my muttering, Silver Knight Alrose, who had met me at the designated spot, replied happily.

    Haha, I am honored. I am sure Leon-sama will be pleased to hear that.

    When I met him before, he had been wearing a helmet thatpletely hid his face, but now his face was bare.

    He was not as beautiful as Leon, but he looked like a beautiful woman.

    His beautiful silver hair flowed down his back, but judging by the thickness of his neck and his Adams apple, he was definitely a man.

    Incidentally, it seemed that Alrose was also the leader of Leon''s subordinates, the Magic Knights.

    Another person I had met, ck Knight ude-san, was said to be the strongest, but this Alrose was also quite good. He was able to use magic without chanting and was able to invoke transference spells quite naturally. We finally arrived outside of the citythat is, outside of the city''s defenses, but from there we arrived in front of the Great Gate 68 in an instant.

    The race didn''t seem to be human, but they looked human. When I thought as much, I was told that they were demonoids.

    They were a long-lived and magically gifted race, but it seems that they used to be human. They were born by a mutation called majinization, so their poption was quite small.

    Perhaps, Myuran or Larzen

    Yes, by definition, they are the same

    I knew I was right.

    Well, the term majin was so diverse that it was troublesome to define them in detail. If a former human was transformed into a majin, there seemed to be no problem to call them a demonoid.

    Anyway, I turned my attention to the city beyond the Great Gate.

    It was even greater than I expected.

    The beautiful golden buildings all lined up in a row were truly magnificent.

    The arrangement of the buildings had been well calcted.

    In a nutshell, the shape of the buildings could be described as a six-pointed star, or a hexagonal ridge. This alone created a two-dimensional magical effect, but the amazing part began from here.

    The cityscape was spiraling, gradually increasing in height from the entrance. It lead to a chalk-white castle that stood majestically in the center.

    A spiraling royal castle rising up as if piercing the heavens.

    The size of the castle itself was not thatrge, but the three-dimensional structure of the entire city made it look quite enormous.

    If you nced at it from above, you would see that the city itself formed a powerful stacked magic circle. Conversely, those who did not have a bird''s-eye view from above would not be able to notice the magic circle drawn by the city.

    And even if you had a bird''s eye view, you would not notice it unless you were conscious of it. It was such a clever and exquisite arrangement.

    I, too, had dreamed up many romantic ideas for the construction of cities, but I had never thought of incorporating magic circles. It had been a long time since Id had a great idea, and it made me feel a bit frustrated.

    This well-calcted city structure stimted my pride as a former construction worker.

    Our country was undoubtedly wonderful, but we could not afford to n our cities with such a high priority on functionality. We had Ramiris Labyrinth to protect us, but that was really just a result of luck.

    I had wanted to devise a system to maintain it with the magical power of the city''s inhabitants, and achieved it in that way.

    This city itself has the effect of a powerful magic circle. I can only say it''s amazing.

    I felt a little defeated, so I praised it honestly.

    Oh, you can tell?

    Alrose smiled happily.

    Its effects are Search Enemy and Countermagic, right? It''s too different in scale from normal magic to have the usual effect.

    Just to give two effects to a single magic circle, you''d have to go to a lot of trouble toe up with the right arrangement. This was made possible by the scale of a city.

    While drawing a magic circle with only the arrangement of the buildings, he was able to deploy tactical grade magic at all times, so the magnitude of his feat was immeasurable.

    If someone entered the city without permission, they would be detected immediately. In addition, any magic attack from outside the city would be repelled.

    With a magic circle of this scale, even legion magic, which specialized in attacking cities, would be easily repelled.

    Haha, you''re good. You can understand that much just from a nce? There''s no point in hiding it, so I''ll tell you, you''re right. This city has been given an Absolute Defense by magic.

    Alrose replied proudly.

    At that time, he smoothly exined to me that this ward protects us from evil demons that shoot nuclear magic, but I didn''t listen to him, because it seemed inconvenient for me if I pursued it too deeply.

    I had a glimpse of a blonde schoolgirl-like demon sh through my mind, but I think it must have been my imagination.

    I decided to arm myself with the theory by assuming as such, and praised Alrose so that it would not be pursued further.

    It would have taken an enormous amount of money and years just to achieve just one effect, wouldn''t it? But two of them, while ounting for the expansion of the city''s functions as they develop, were achieved so perfectly.

    That''s right. It was a tremendously difficult journey, but we believed in Leon-sama and we did it.

    No, it''s seriously amazing. You took something that would have been profitable if it had worked, and you seeded.

    Hahaha, thank you. I didn''t expect all of this praise. Leon-sama is the one who invented this city, so I''m sure hell be very pleased.

    No way, Leon designed this city!?

    I didn''t know he was a real genius

    I thought he was just a Chloe-loving, sulky demon lord, but I guess I needed to change my perception.

    This cityscape was definitely beautiful.

    Because it was a reality that I had no choice but to admit, my excitement outweighed my frustration.

    Souei was also observing the city with admiration, but magic wasnt his specialty. Even so, he seemed to be listening greedily to see if there was anything to be gained.

    Is it difficult to invade from the sky? In that case, wed have to go underground

    Wrong.

    He was just thinking of a way to attack.

    No, but thats important too, isnt it?

    We may have a cooperative rtionship right now, but we also might end up working against one another.

    In any case, thebination of the city and the magic circle was wonderful.

    I wanted to introduce this feature to our country, but its not something that can be easily imitated. At least, the capital city Rimuru wasplete in another sense, so it was impossible to introduce it right now.

    This was a future project.

    If there was ever a chance to add another city, I would try to realize my idea then.

    Now I had something to look forward to when I got home.

    It may be a waste of time, but I decided that I''d try designing my own magical city.

    ***

    I walked through the entrance of the Great Gate and followed the ss spiral corridor.

    The interior of the city was also beautiful.

    In the distance, waterfalls were flowing down with great force from the man-made cliffs. The water flowed through the city''s canals, creating beautiful patterns.

    We walked for about ten minutes, enjoying the city in this way. Finally, we arrived at an area guarded by the knights from the general public.

    In the back of this area, there is a magic circle that leads to the front of the royal pce.

    Alrose said as such while guiding us.

    To our surprise, the person who greeted us at the magic circle was the lord of thisnd himself, Demon Lord Leon Cromwell.

    I was surprised to see that he was dressed in a white shirt and jeans, which was rougher than I expected, but it looked very good on him.

    Ady killer looks good no matter what he wears, I guess.

    Leaning against a pir with his arms crossed, he looked as if he were a painting.

    And yet, as soon as I opened my mouth, I felt a sense of disappointment.

    Damn it, I knew Chloe wasn''t here.

    I was a little annoyed that he only had Chloe in his head.

    As expected, he was definitely a Chloe-loving, sulky demon lord, but that was enough to convince me that he was the real Leon, so I wouldntin.

    Besides, Leon''s appearance was a little strange.

    I thought Alrose was also good-looking, but he paled inparison to Leon. He was still sarcastic and handsome, but he seemed to becking in aura.

    Of course not. More importantly, youre looking little haggard, arent you?

    You''re annoying. You''re the one who sent us the culprit.

    Ah!

    That''s all I needed to know.

    He''s probably causing trouble, I guess.

    Could it be, that Diablo is?

    Well

    For a moment, a silent stare-down ensued.

    Leon looked like he had something to say, but he swallowed his words and just nodded once.

    Heavy.

    The air was incredibly heavy.

    I was led through the castle in silence.

    Finally we arrived at a gorgeous and luxurious room.

    The room was decorated with gold, silver and jewels, but the furnishings were elegant and not obnoxious. The wallpaper was unified in a pure white, and the jewels reflected the glow of the chandeliers.

    Like yman''s castle, it was not in bad taste.

    Rather, it was a shining example of good taste.

    I guess you could say that it was luxurious enough not to be suffocating. Just as the exterior of the castle was chalk-white but not gaudy, the interior was beautiful, elegant and calm.

    Even amoner like me could rx in this ce without feeling nervous. The atmosphere was heavy, but the furnishings were veryforting to me.

    Or so I thought, but then the hallway became noisy.

    Even though I didn''t feel nervous, I had a feeling that Id be getting a headache.

    Naturally, I was exactly right.

    Oh, Rimuru-sama! I''ve been expecting you.

    It was Diablo.

    After bowing to me reverently, he led me to the reception room quite naturally.

    This is Leon''s country, you know.

    I was tempted to ask him why he looked like he owned the ce.

    Guy came in after Diablo.

    You''ve kept me waiting long enough, Rimuru. Why did you make this ce thest one?

    While saying that, he sat down on the chair facing me.

    Of course, thats because Guy-san was here. It''s such a relief to have someone strong around, so I wonder if I even had toe here!

    I joked lightly, trying to convey my true feelings.

    Guy''s temples twitched.

    That was dangerous.

    I''m a man who can read the atmosphere, so I decided to change the subject before Guy exploded.

    Rx. The fact is, with you and Diablo here, you could have dealt with the enemy if they had attacked, right? I was a little worried about Ruminas, and as for Dagruel, I don''t even know how strong he is. It''s only natural that I should prioritize.

    Milim is just as strong as me

    Yes, Milim is also strong. I knew exactly what Guy meant, but there was a good reason for this.

    Milim''s territory is undertaking construction work. For me, whos creed is credit first, I had no choice but to give them priority.

    With that, I put on a smug face.

    Milim is, after all, a very important friend of mine, and she''s helped me a lot. It was only natural that I should repay her, and there was no need to even ask who was more important between her and Guy.

    She mightve gotten into some trouble, but it was mutual.

    Tsk, well whatever. So, how are the other demon lords doing?

    The good thing about Guy is that he can quickly switch gears.

    I was relieved to see that even though he was annoyed about being put off, he still kept a clear head and a sound judgement.

    For the time being, I''ve installed magic transfer circles in each country. The fine adjustments are still being worked out, but there should be no problem activating them in case of an emergency.

    While saying this, I opened the ''Stomach'' a little to reveal a magisteel disk. It was so big that it was a pain to take out.

    I''ll install it if you specify the location.

    Hmm, I''ll show you thatter.

    Leon interjected.

    No wait, Leon is the master of this castle, so that was a good thing. Guy''s attitude was so pompous that I almost misunderstood him.

    Hmm, I''m d that you''ve prepared for emergencies in time. So now we just have to wait for the enemy to attack?

    Well, yeah. As for me, I''ll be cleaning up after the war with the Empire and strengthening ties with the Western Nations.

    You can''t expect humans to be a force to be reckoned with, can you?

    Yeah. So, theyll be doing evacuation drills. Theyre going to do their best not to get caught up in our own war and destroy civilization.

    The people living in the capital Rimuru would be safe, but it was hard to predict how much damage would be done to the rest of the world. That''s why we were trying to get the Three Drunk Sages (Riega 69 ) to set up some kind of shelter.

    Myourmiles-kun has been working very hard.

    I was nning to give him a constion prize once things settled down, as I feel he''s been doing too much work.

    Incidentally, the imperial subjects may be essential to Michael''s skill, but it was safer to assume that they were not absolute.

    Since I had suggested killing all of the imperial subjects, I think Michael was taking measures against them. It could be said that he had arranged for this to happen, but there was no way to confirm this until we fought.

    Hmmm, youve had it tough, too.

    Guy was surprised, but thats just who I am.

    Having gone through so much trouble to sessfully establish diplomatic rtions with human society, it is my country''s supreme mission to maintain them.

    I couldnt stand the thought of Michael and the others destroying it, as if to trample on all the hard work we had done.

    Even Leon spoke to me in exasperation.

    You''re even more of a softy than I thought, looking out not only for your own country but also for others. Do you think your hands are limitless?

    Well, he has a point.

    I don''t think I can do everything, either.

    But even so, I''ve had enough of losing without doing anything. 70

    I just don''t want to regret anything. I''ll do everything I can. If that doesn''t work, I can just give up.

    No, if it didnt work, I wouldnt be able to give up and Id probably regret it.

    However, I was working to prevent that from happening, and until an unhappy future was confirmed, I would live in pride with myself.

    It is impossible to deceive yourself.

    That is why I have no choice but to live a life I am satisfied with.

    Huh, I have had nothing but regrets. Maybe that''s why she chose you instead of me.

    Was he talking about Chloe?

    There was a weight to Leons words that I could not ignore.

    There is no doubt that Leon had done a lot of reckless things. Maybe he''s warning me that if I''m not careful, I might end up like him.

    With that in mind, I decided tough off Leon''s worries.

    Unlike you, I''m not a loli-sisconI''m a sensible person who''s considerate of the people around me, so your worries are unfounded.

    Fuck off, I''ll kill you. 71

    Curiously enough, we got into a tense situation, and our argument continued until Guy intervened.

    ***

    Really, I was hoping things would get better when you came, but it looks like I was mistaken.

    For some reason, Guyined to me, looking very tired.

    I wasnt sure what he was expecting from me, but I didnt understand.

    Kufufufu. Why don''t we just settle things here? Fortunately, Mizari and the others are getting used to setting up damage reduction barriers.

    So you want me and Leon to fight and settle this?

    Hey you, a demon lord shouldnt be doing something so unreasonable.

    Please do not worry. There is no need to bother Rimuru-sama, I will take care of this.

    Diablo''s eyes narrowed as he looked at Leon. He looked at him as if he were a Predator stalking its prey. This guy might really be serious.

    I couldnt tell who would win, and I''d be lying if I said I didn''t care. But even so, it would be out of line in many ways to allow it to happen.

    I''m telling you that the damage would be enormous! I thought I told you that your mission was to protect Leonand now youre going to try and fight him? That''s more than a little out of line!

    As I lectured Diablo, he pouted in disappointment.

    He didnt seem to be very sorry, but he had grown up a bit, so I let him off the hook.

    Tell him more, Rimuru. He''s a real bastard, you know! Even yesterday, he came at me and destroyed the training grounds even though I took it easy on him.

    No, Im not so sure about that.

    Without knowing what caused the fight, I can''t say for sure who''s at fault.

    Or rather

    Eh? You and Diablo fought?

    Yeah. I''ve been boredtely, so I''ve been doing some light exercising.

    I don''t understand.

    So Diablo and Guy had fought, but it was incredibly hard to put into words. It seemed to have happened yesterday, so I was just d it wasn''t today.

    When I looked over at Leon, he was sighing very unhappily.

    It all started when that maid picked a fight with Diablo. She was beaten to a pulp and fled, cursing her defeat

    Leon''s gaze caught Rain''s as if to say, That''s the maid.

    No way, youve got to be kidding me. I am not a sore loser, and I didnt lose in the first ce!

    But you don''t deny that you had a fight

    Your subjective opinions are not worth listening to.

    Leon cuts off Rain''s words.

    It was Diablo who picked up from there.

    Kufufufu. As for me, I dislike bullying the weak. I let her off the hook.

    Ah? Didn''t I tell you Id get serious next time? Did you misunderstand me because I took it easy on you?

    Did you forget that you brought Mizari to challenge me in a two-on-one match? Next time, I''ll have to discipline you harder.

    While Diablo remained calm, Rain taunted her opponent as if to encourage the other. I was worried that they were going to use force, but strangely enough, they didn''t.

    What a pain in the ass these two arethey came to an agreement before we knew it.

    Guy said so incredulously.

    It seems that the quarreling was a regr urrence, and was quite cute.

    Theyve been fighting every day for thest two weeks. Before we knew it, they were on the same page.

    Leon''s affirmation lent credence to Guy''s story.

    And if that was true, then it could be understood that the imbnce of forces had be quite troublesome.

    No way. What proof do you have for that kind of crap?

    Did you really think we wouldn''t find out? In yesterday''s fight, you were shouting out stuff like, Fuck you! and Show some more fighting spirit, Diablo!!

    Rain tilted her head and asked curiously, but Leon replied without changing his expression.

    Then Guy''s voice ovepped, sounding disgusted.

    Rain, you''re revealing your true colors. I mean, you were rooting for Diablo instead of me

    No way. I would never use such vulgarnguage, and I am Guy-sama''s loyal follower. Leon-sama must be mistaken.

    She said that without hesitation, this person.

    I hadnt noticed it while she was looking serious, but she must be the youngest, right?

    She''s the type who doesn''t think twice about what she says or does and believes she can do whatever she wants. People who were loved by their older brothers and sisters tended to be like this.

    However, it was obvious which side was right after listening to all this.

    Diablo, how did you guys get like that?

    Diablo would never lie to me, so I put the question to him directly.

    Diablo smiled and answered.

    It is all thanks to the majesty of Rimuru-sama. I told Rain the story of Rimuru-sama, and she was also converted because of it!

    Scary!!

    Brainwashingis what I was about to say, but I swallowed my words.

    I-is that so?

    Actually, I''m a fan of Rimuru-sama. In exchange for a few stories from Diablo, I''ve decided to help you out a bit.

    Rain said with a curtsy.

    Perhaps this person is really self-centered 72 ?

    Diablo is the same way, so it makes sense that they would get along.

    O-oh

    What else can I say?

    I looked at Guy in a bit of distress, but he was shaking his head as if to say it was toote.

    Sorry about my idiots.

    No, no, Diablo''s is also annoying, so were in the same boat.

    I felt that Guy was also having a hard time, and the familiarity I had felt before grew stronger.

    Incidentally, Mizari, who had always kept her face expressionless, reacted unusually to Guy''s words.

    Eh? Isn''t it possible that I''ve always been treated like an idiot because of Rain?

    Well, it looks like youve realized the truth.

    I didnt want to say it out loud, but I think that was the correct answer.

    But since it was not good to interfere with other people''s affairs, I pretended not to have heard her murmurings.

    After chatting for a while, I was led to a hidden room behind the audience chamber where the throne was located, where I set up a magic transfer circle. It weighed several tens of tons, so it would be troublesome to move it once it was installed.

    Then, having finished my business, I quickly took my leave.

    Leon seemed to have wanted me to take Diablo and Rain, but that would interfere with the mission. Even if it didn''t, I had no intention of taking them with me, so I decided just have Leon put up with it.

    And then we began our farewells.

    Take care of Chloe.

    Leon reminded me.

    I didn''t need to be told, so I nodded and said, I''ll take care of her.

    Leon seemed to be convinced and gave up surprisingly well. It''s a secret that I was a little surprised, because I had thought he would be more persistent in getting involved.

    He was a pretty cool guy when he was behaving normally.

    Not only that, but a surprising truth came to light.

    In fact, Leon and I had the same taste.

    I don''t mean that we''re lolicons, okay?

    Rather, Leon''s dream was to be an architect.

    No wonder he has a great aesthetic sense.

    I heard this during our chat whileplimenting the city and the castle. I was convinced, because I had already admitted that Leon''s sense of style was one of the best in the world.

    He''s rude, but is actually a good guy. That was my new opinion of Demon Lord Leon.

    With that feeling in mind, my rtionship with Leon was improved, and my visit to El Dorado ended sessfully.

    ***

    After returning from Leon''s country, I continued to vigorously travel around the world.

    The purpose of this was to strengthen the cooperation with other countries, as we did not know when the enemy would attack.

    Because I had prepared an emergency means of transportation between demon lords, it was only natural that I should set up such means in other friendly countries as well.

    The first ce I went to was the Dwarven Kingdom.

    Currently, Agera was dispatched to Gazel.

    I had received a report that she was training with Gazel, so I thought I would check the results of her training.

    I teleported to the main gate of Dwargon.

    As always, there was a long line of merchants and adventurers. I walked past them to the nobleman''s passage and called out to the gatekeeper.

    Then, I was ushered into the royal castle without any waiting.

    I am still a small-time citizen, so I feel superior in such a situation. I was aware of my small stature, so I was careful not to make a big show of it.

    I was greeted by Gazel.

    I''ve been waiting for you, Rimuru.

    Of course, Agera was with him.

    My lord, I am d to see you are well.

    He kneels down grandly and says a few words of greeting to me.

    It was like something out of a period drama, but very well done.

    And this Agera, surprisingly, is the reincarnated form of Hakurou''s grandfather. I was surprised when Carrera told me about it, but as I observed him more carefully, I found that his mannerisms were very simr to mine.

    I remembered that I had wanted to have an interview with him, but had not had a chance to do so. It would be a good idea to talk to him after this.

    With that in mind, I returned the greeting.

    Long time no see, King Gazel. It''s good to see you. And Agera, too.

    Hahaha! Youre still so formal. As I always say, feel free to call me Gazel.

    Well, I''m trying to, but I get so nervous when I see you in these situations. It reminds me of the trial, and I''m still a small-time citizen after all.

    I can''t get rid of my small-town feeling, but I think I''m cute like that.

    After all, it would be strange not to get nervous in front of such a big person.

    Pann-san and Dorf-san were watching our conversation with a warm feeling.

    So did Souei.

    Agera interjected.

    From my point of view, I should do as my lord wills, but Carrera-sama would scold me if I said that. In the first ce, as the ally of the Alliance, you are on equal footing. You should not be shy about being in front of King Gazel, and I hope you will respond with dignity.

    Well, I guess I know what I''m doing.

    Needless to say, I understood, but I had been an office worker up until a few years ago. Unless I was angry, or focused, or caught up in some big event that I couldnt afford to be in, I would revert to my normal self.

    Good, I can understand Rimuru''s feelings. Even I get nervous when I''m in front of the Celestial Emperor Elmesia.

    Oh, so King Gazel had such a person

    However! You are able to talk to the Emperor with ease, even though I am not very good at it! That''s what I cant figure it out!!

    Thats right.

    It was so right that I couldnt argue about it.

    So Gazel told me to be less formal with him, and I said I would do my best.

    But, well, I respect him because he''s someone I can rely on somehow. It''s difficult to fix this behavior.

    But in some cases, you give right response at the right time, so it''s not that much of a problem, right?

    You idiot. It is in such situations that ones usual habitse out. To avoid failing on the big stage, one should always reexamine their own behavior.

    I was taught another lesson.

    Because I was often lectured like this, I tended to revert to my old behavior.

    El-tan 73 also gives me a lecture sometimes, but shes always on and off.

    In that sense, she might just be trying to make it easier for me and Myourmiles-kun to get along with herthough I could also me overthinking it.

    In any case, I kept Gazel''s suggestion in mind for future reference.

    We moved to the parlor.

    With drinks in hand, we reported on our recent activities.

    The most important purpose of the meeting was to exchange information.

    So how do we avoid the war?

    Unfortunately, I don''t think it can be avoided. Ive just set up magic transfer circles between the demon lords to allow for emergency travel.

    HmmOne problem goes, and another one follows. To be honest, I thought it was over when Velgrynd-sama became an enemy. Now that shes on our side Michael, was it? I don''t think he''s the one we should be worried about now.

    Well, I wasnt looking to praise myself, but our forces surpass those of the Empire in its prime. In addition to that, we have demon lords, Velgrynd, and even Veldora, so Gazel seems to think that we have no reason to lose.

    However, that is a naive perception.

    No, they are strong opponents. Even judging by power alone, its scale is iparable to the Empire.

    I understand. I''m not underestimating them, quite the opposite actually.

    The opposite?

    I dont think Ill be able to help you no matter how hard I try, so I''vee to the point of resignation.

    Ah, that''s

    Well, yeah, that''s true.

    No matter how powerful Dwargon was, victory would be impossible if Velzard targeted them.

    I can understand why he might want to give up because the individual enemy is too strong.

    However, I won''t let them destroy us easily. Worst case scenario, we''ll be ready to take our chances.

    Gazel barked out, full of spirit.

    His resolve was unquestionably genuine.

    The fact that he did not run away from Velgrynd made it clear that he was someone who would take on a battle he knew he would lose.

    While thinking of Gazel in a reassuring way, I continued my story.

    If you can''t win, you should think of a way to win, right?

    Quality was more dangerous than quantity. What''s worse was the fact that Velzard was hostile.

    This made Veldora useless.

    The only people who can take on Velzard properly are Guy and Velgrynd.

    Me?

    I''d rather not, so I''m determined to escape at all costs.

    A war between true dragons is like a battle of the gods.

    True. That''s what it feels like. But I can''t just run away.

    Do you really think you can win?

    No! But I''m willing to work hard to improve my odds.

    Fufufu, you little bastard.

    Gazel nodded at me with a wry smile.

    The truth is that I really didnt know what I was going to until I tried, but Ill just make sure I can escape if I don''t think I can win.

    I''ve tried to make myself look good, but there is no point in arguing about whether we can win or not before we have even analyzed the enemy''s strength. The point is that I''m just trying to be prepared for what to do if we''re about to lose.

    So, I need your help.

    Very well. I''ll lend you my cooperation, and you can do whatever you want.

    Gazel readily agreed to my request for help.

    I immediately requested the instation of a magic transfer circle.

    Unlike the previous instations for personal use, the location of this one was also important.

    I''m amazed that you were able to create such a high purity magisteel.

    I''m cheating on that by using my Skill. Normally, I''d wait for the crafters to mature, but the enemy won''t wait for me.

    Well, I guess. You can leave the adjustments to me.

    I thanked Gazel and set up the magic circle for the transfer at the ce he had instructed.

    Having sessfully aplished my goal, I moved on to chatting.

    So, how are the results of your training?

    Hmm. You are the grandfather of Master Hakurou and the founder of Oboro-Ryu, Agera-dono. You''ve made me realize that I still have a long ways to go!

    Don''t be modest, King Gazel. You have already mastered the secret art of the Five Flower Strikes (Gokatotsu) 74 and are aiming for even greater heights.

    In the Oboro-Ryu, it is said that the Five Flowers Strikes (Gokatotsu) and above are considered secret techniques.

    Zakuro (Pomegranate)  or the Rokkazan is a high-speed shing blow intended to be non-lethal.

    Yanagi (Willow)  or the Nana Nagi is a sword technique that softly parries the enemy''s attack.

    The number of moves increases with shes and stabs.

    And then finally, the highest technique is said to be attained, the Yaezakura (Cherry Blossom 75 )  or the Hakkasen.

    It is said that this is a sword art that should be kept secret from the public, but Agera intended to pass it on to Gazel without reserve.

    I heard from Hakurou that his grandfather showed him the Hakkasen?

    Yes. It was before I was reincarnated, so I''m not sure my memory is correct, but I seem to remember showing it to him once or twice. If he was able to reproduce it, then he is undoubtedly a genius. I am ashamed to say that I am boasting about my grandson, but I am not Byakuya Araki, his grandfather. I would like to honestly praise the predecessors of the monster country.

    Agera said so, shyly and proudly.

    No, Hakurou is my master as well. I don''t feel bad about the praise, I feel happy about it.

    Thats right. The teachings of Agera-dono have been passed on to Hakurou-dono. When you think about it, fate really is a mysterious thing.

    Gazel agrees with my words and smiles happily.

    Agera watched us and nodded, deeply moved.

    So, Rimuru. If you dont mind, I''d like to hear your thoughts. Is that okay?

    If Im able to understand.

    Well, I''ve mentioned this before, but I''d like to ask you about the Ultimate Skill. If I continue to hone my sword skills, do you think I can defeat an Ultimate Awakened?

    Oh, that''s quite the direct question.

    Depending on the situation, it wouldnt be impossible to win. It would be a very tough fight, but not impossible.

    The lesson I have learned is that Ultimate Skills can only be countered by Ultimate Skills. It''s better to think that you can''tpete at the unique skill level.

    So, is there

    However, if certain conditions are met, I think it should be possible.

    Well, what are those conditions?

    For example, Yuuki Kagurazaka''s Anti-Skill was a nasty super-specializing ability that blocked my powers. Also, Diablo overwhelmed and ultimate gift owner with his magic alone.

    Hmm

    Its only a possibility, but I think that the key is willpower. If a mental life form exists only by will power, it seems to be able to resist the ultimate power even without an Ultimate Skill. I think this guess is correct with a high degree of certainty.

    I didn''t want to be definitive, but I thought it was almost certain because it actually was in agreement with Ciel-san''s view.

    So, the key is

    So its a matter of whether I can increase my willpower to the point where it rivals that of a spiritual life form? Then, after the way of the sword

    There may be a quicker way.

    What!?

    It seems that if you are recognized by mythical-grade armor, you can be the equivalent of a spiritual life form.

    This was the answer.

    Well, there was also the foul technique of granting power, but as they, too much power can destroy you.

    Or was it greed instead of power?

    It may have been changed from the original parable, but I think it still conveys my point.

    You can''t master the power if you dont have the strength to handle it.

    That''s why I don''t grant skills to all of my subordinates. Also, there was no way that I was going to do that to Gazel. Hed have to do his best on his own.

    In the first ce, I can''t grant skills unto to someone who is not connected to my soul. I awakened Rain and Mizari, but that''s not the same thing as this.

    So this time, I think getting mythical-grade is probably the best solution.

    That said, mythical-grade equipment is not so easy to obtain.

    I have also been trying to analyze Hinata''s holy spirit armament and mass produce it, but no matter how hard I try, I can''t seem to get it to reach t he legendary-grade. If I put it on, I might be able to reach the power of Saint, but I don''t think it''s enough topete with an Ultimate Skill.

    Mythical-grade, huh?

    Gazel muttered and looked at his own sword.

    The well-used sword was probably of Legendary-grade. It also seemed to be a fairly high-ranking sword. However, there were countless scars on the de.

    This was the result of shing with Kondou''s sword. It was fortuitous that it didn''t break, but this sword''s life is over.

    Indeed.

    It must have been a national treasure passed down from generation to generation. And yet, now that it was like this, it could only be kept on disy.

    No, but perhaps

    Shall I ask Kurobee? Maybe he can bring the sword back to life.

    What? Is that true!?

    I can''t promise anything, but Kurobee has a proven track record of renewing Gabil''s spear.

    Kurobee had repaired Gabil''s Vortex Spear using the hihiirokane I provided, and it was reborn at a stage just short of mythical-grade.

    With continued use, it would eventually evolve into a mythical-grade model.

    I still have a surplus of hihiirokane left over

    The sword doesn''t seem to be dead, so maybe

    Please. I don''t care if you fail, just ask Kurobee-dono!!

    It''s a great service, but I''ll spare no expense for my senior apprentice. He''s always been such a great help to me, and this is the time I should return the favor.

    With that in mind, I epted the sword from Gazel.

    Aside from the sword though, is there any other way to get mythical-grade equipment?

    Do you think there is? Since you don''t seem to know anything aboutmon sense, let me tell you that even something legendary-grade is a national treasure. And it''s from a major country. You wouldn''t find them in an empire, let alone the middle of nowhere.

    Please don''t be so shocked.

    I thought that would be the case.

    The result of my research is the same. I had us search all over the Western Nations'' back routes, but Ive only managed to find a few Legendary-grade items.

    Now that Souei had confirmed Gazel''s words, the remaining hope was left to Kurobee.

    Incidentally, Souei''s twin swords were also renewed by Kurobee''s hand. Unfortunately, it did not reach the mythical-grade, but with Souei''s ability, that was not a big problem. On the contrary, he thinks positively that there is room for growth.

    There''s no point in asking for what you don''t have. More importantly, do you think you canpete with an Ultimate Skill if you be a spiritual life form?

    That''s not an absolute either. It''s natural that there are differences between individuals depending on the number of years they''ve lived, but a newborn archdemon still seems to be useless. If one has a strong will and the mental strength (energy) to support it, then they can resist the ultimate power.

    Meh, your exnation is too vague to understand

    No, I don''t think thats the case.

    But if you''re going to go that far, Ill make it simple.

    In short, it''s about spirit!

    I didn''t want to say this because it was more of a gut feeling.

    It would be a mistake to think that you can cover up anything with fighting spirit, but when ites to an Ultimate Skill, other exnations were more difficult to exin than this.

    For the most part, since we live in a world where a sh of a sword can split the atmosphere in a sh of light, there may not be much difference between swordy and magic.

    If you train your will power, you can distort even thews of the world.

    It is easier to understand and everything will be all right if we assume that it is.

    After listening to my exnation, Gazel became serious and fell silent.

    I nced at Agera, who was also looking thoughtful.

    Then, Souei opened his mouth.

    It is exactly as Rimuru-sama says. As a recipient of an Ultimate Gift myself, I cannot speak too much, but I do feel that if I put my spirit on my sword, I can kill any opponent.

    Agera nodded his head in agreement.

    That is true. In my case, it was as if I sublimated all my will into a de. With the will to kill the enemy itself, my own body bes the de, and I believe that nothing cannot be killed by my sword. Therefore, it can kill even formless things.

    That''s right, Agera''s skill was ''de Transformation''.

    If we were to simplypare the existential value, Agera''s transformed sword would not be better than the mythical-grade. However, Agera was superior in its sharpness. It is said that mythical-grade has a will, but it is still not as strong as humans will.

    Ranga popped his head out of my shadow and joined the conversation.

    My case was a little different. I was asleep in my lord''s shadow when I suddenly felt as if I had heard a strange voice, and then it hit me: Ster Wind King (Hastur). But I think it was because I kept wishing to be of service to my Lord that it took shape in this way!

    Hahahah, Ranga said happily.

    Maybe he''s gotten smartertely, but his lower body was still in my shadow. So, I couldn''t see it, but I guessed that his tail was wagging as hard as it could.

    It''s really cute.

    I used to be a cat person, but recently I''vee to think that dogs are nice too. I think that Ranga was a significant contribution to this change of mind.

    Anyway, I hope the stories from Souei, Agera, and Ranga will be helpful.

    Spirit, huh?

    Well, there''s no need to be hasty. If the enemy attacks while I''m here, then I''ll help you. Please don''t hesitate to ask me.

    That would be certain.

    Between Gazel''s power and Agera''s swordsmanship, I think they would be a good match even if the opponent was Kondou. At the very least, it would buy some time.

    However

    If your opponent is Velzard-san, you''d better run away without hesitation. Shes probably not the kind of opponent you can fight.

    Is that it?

    Yeah. I can''t say for sure because I haven''t seen her in action, but she felt creepier than Velgrynd-san.

    MmmI hate to admit it, but you''re probably right. As for me, after seeing Velgrynd, I understand how reckless it is to challenge a True Dragon. But as a king, I can''t abandon my people.

    Then we can only pray that Velzard does not attack. If she does, let me know.

    I said so and indicated to my mobile phone.

    Hm, you have it!!

    As Ive said before, it''s a magical device that allows you to talk directly to someone. There aren''t many of them made yet, so take good care of it.

    That said, I only gave him my personal number and the direct line to the Control Room. I didn''t give him El-tan''s or Myourmiles-kun''s numbers.

    I think it is bad etiquette to not of ask such things directly from the people themselves. I remember being annoyed when my cell phone number was given to my business partners without my permission before I died.

    I see, so if you type in the number you have on file, you''ll be connected to the other party.

    That''s right. Not many people have this, but if they do, ask them for the number.

    Mm. If you need help with something, you can ask me.

    Well, that''s the way it''s supposed to work. Call me if you need anything, and I''ll see what I can do.

    All right, I''m counting on you. Of course, if there''s anything I can do, don''t hesitate to ask me. Personally, I''ll do everything I can to help.

    Gazel and Iugh at each other.

    I don''t think it''s likely that Dwargon will be targeted, but Im relieved. And thus ended the discussion on emergency response.

    ***

    After staying in the Dwarven Kingdom for a few days, the next stop was the Farmenas Kingdom.

    This is where Gadra is staying.

    Gadra, who had be Diablo''s disciple, was also helping Testarossa. It seems that Gadra was forced to give up all of the information on the empire in order to secure Masayuki''s ession to the throne.

    He seemed to have been busy going back and forth between the two countries, but now he was settled in the Kingdom of Farmenas.

    I thought I''d take this opportunity to ask him some questions.

    The capital of the Farmenas Kingdom was livelier than I had imagined.

    The city had been under construction when I came here before, and it was the same now. The difference between now and then was that more areas had been cleaned up.

    In the outskirts of the capital, arge station had beenpleted. In the vicinity of the station, there were warehouses.

    Because it was a ry point between Blumund and Dwargon, it was necessary to have a ce to store various goods. The station building was constructed adjacent to the capital since it was not possible to secure a ce in the capital

    The reason why the construction of Royal Capital was postponed was that the priority was ced on economic activities for the future.

    Another reason may be that the current Farmenas family had no money.

    To put it simply, I was lending them all the money for the construction.

    The contract forying the rails for the magic train was managed by our country. At first nce, this may seem like a generous thing, but that is a shallow view. The fee for the use of the railroad would be our countrys ie, and we had ced the unbeatable condition that the expenses for the use of thend would be free forever.

    Once the construction was finished, all wed have to do was sit and wait for the money to be collected. Even after deducting thebor cost, the maintenance cost of the train, the maintenance cost of the rails, etc., the annual profit was estimated to be quiterge.

    That''s why I was responsible for the magic train project, but Farmenas was responsible for the urban development of the surrounding area.

    Myuran was mainly in charge of nning the development of the city, but she was forced to take a leave of absence due to childbirth. It was Youm, who became the king, who rose to the asion.

    He had said that he was uneducated, but he still had a good head on his shoulders. He took the initiative to study hard in order to rece Myuran, who had be immobile. As a result, even now that Myuran has recovered from childbirth, she is struggling to lead the nobles and officials.

    To support Youm, I gave him a low-interest, unsecured loan.

    Why not interest-free, you say?

    If the loan was interest-free, the borrower would inevitably feel indebted to the lender and be reserved. In addition, the lender might feel superior to the borrower, and the rtionship may be one that cannot be called equal.

    Lending and borrowing money between friends can be the biggest cause of losing friendship. That''s why we made the contract between the two countries and concluded it in a firm form so that both parties would be satisfied and both parties would benefit from it.

    For this reason, the construction work was done in such a way as to prioritize economic activities, and the development o the city began to follow suit.

    While we finished the reception at the gate and looked at the lively city, a horse-drawn carriage was expressly prepared for us.

    Normally, we should have been apanied by our own officials, like a procession of feudal lords. However, this was an emergency, and there was no time for an elegant trip by train, so I used Teleport to get here along with Souei and Ranga as mypanions.

    The reason why I contacted Gadra and asked him to prepare a carriage was to keep a low profile in the Farmenas Kingdom.

    I was relieved to know that he had sent a carriage to pick us up.

    Unlike Milim''s country, this one was very thorough.

    Thank you for your patience. King Youm is waiting for you. I will take you to the castle.

    Or rather, it was Gadra who got out of the carriage.

    That wasnt a bad idea.

    Whoa, that surprised me. You didn''t have toe all the way to the gate.

    That''s not possible. Such a prestigious role would not have been possible without such an opportunity. But more than that, if I did not greet Rimuru-sama, Diablo-sama would surely have me executed.

    Gadraughed, but it did not sound like a joke.

    If he''s bullying you, why don''t you tell me? For the time being, youre be under my direct control.

    It was a little disconcerting calling an old man like Gadra you, 76  but I''m afraid I was getting used to it.

    I would like to advise Gadra, thinking about it.

    Diablo may be quiet in front of me, but he tends to be reckless when I''m not looking. If he does so in Leon''s country, thats aughing matter, but it bes a big problem if he does so within Tempest''s group.

    Gadra is apparently Diablo''s disciple, or rather, his faction, so he can''tin openly. That''s why I, as his boss, should follow him from behind the scenes.

    But Gadraughed and said it was no problem.

    Apparently, no hardship is too great to gain knowledge.

    It''s difficult to understand people with unique idiosyncrasies.

    It was best not to interfere in such cases, and I vowed again to let Gadra do as he pleased.

    I boarded the carriage and received a report from Gadra about Masayukis coronation.

    The carriage moves slowly through the city, so I make the most of the time.

    So, Masayuki''s coronation went well, huh?

    Yes, sir. It went very well. With Testarossa-sama and Velgrynd-sama working together to encourage him, it would have been impossible for him to fail.

    Well, that would definitely be the case if those two are on our side.

    If they weren''t, that would be a problem, but I only got the impression that it would be.

    To begin with, Masayuki was a lucky man. On top of that, with such brilliant figures one his side like Testarossa and Velgrynd, the incarnation of power, I truly believed that no one would be able to oppose him.

    The people, who had seen Velgrynd-sama''s majesty, seemed to wee the crowning of the new Emperor Masayuki-sama. I mean, who could resist the sight of that?

    Gadra assures us.

    Well, its only natural that no one canin when they are shown the overly grandiose match-pump that erupted a volcano to prevent its threat.

    It seems to me that Velgrynd knows no bounds when ites to treating volcanoes as matches.

    Some people are still dissatisfied, but I''m sure Testarossa-sama will take care of them.

    Is it going to work?

    No problem. Calgurio-dono and others were worried that Testarossa-sama would kill all of the dissenters, but their fears were unfounded. It seems that the information I provided was put to good use, and I was impressed by Moss-sama''s skill. I''m sure he will be able to take advantage of the enemy''s weakness and settle this matter in a perfect manner.

    Well, that''s true.

    I wouldnt want to make enemies with those two, either.

    If there''s anyone brave enough to oppose us, we can recruit them in our country.

    You''re right!

    I can only say Yes 77 .

    You''re absolutely right. I''d feel the same way if I saw that scene.

    Gadra and Iugh at each other.

    As I thought, Gadra is a delightful old man.

    It seemed that our hearts were connected because of our shared impression.

    ***

    Inside the castle, we were greeted by the king and queen, Youm and Myuran, as well as all of their ministers.

    Edmalis, the former King of Farmus, was also there, but he had lost weight and shaved his beard, so he looked different from when I met him. The light in his eyes was not cloudy, which made me think so even more.

    It would be awkward for both of us to talk to him, so I let him pass.

    Although this visit was unofficial, I informed them that the purpose of my visit was about the uing disaster.

    It would be great if we could avoid war, but everyone understood that it was too optimistic.

    The Kingdom of Farmenas is a newborn nation and has no financial resources to spare. It relies on loans from our country, as I mentioned earlier.

    Moreover, their military power had not recovered.

    Training knights is not something that can be done overnight, not to mention that they have no money to hire mercenaries. I was not going to take the me for that, even though I had something to do with it.

    Because if you care about everything, you cant have justice.

    I don''t believe that everything I do is right, but from an official standpoint, I will shout for justice. If I don''t, the victims won''t be happy.

    Thats why even though I feel liable, I do not speak of it.

    However, as an ally, I will provide as much assistance as possible.

    Sending Gadra is part of that, and Youm and the others understand as such. In other words, this country''s vassals are facing the reality that they can''t afford to get into a quarrel with me.

    Boss 78 , has the situation improved?

    Youm asked on behalf of everyone.

    The demon lords and I have made a lot of arrangements, but to be honest, it''s a bit of a crapshoot. I''m not sure if that''s enough, which is why Ive been traveling around.

    The situation had been exined via Gadra, so there was no major confusion. He also showed me where to install the magic transfer circle without me having to say a word.

    You can ask Gadra here about the fine-tuning and how to use it.

    Leave it to me.

    So this is your escape n in case of emergency. But, you know, it''s really a question of where you choose.

    Well, yeah. The ce where you escape might not always be safe, and it may only be a temporary relief.

    Well, it doesn''t matter where I run to if the boss country falls. In that case, I''ll just resign myself to the fact that it was meant to be.

    Youm said so cheerfully, and his vassals nodded in agreement.

    It seems that people in this country are more afraid of me than I thought. At the same time, there seemed to be a strange belief prevailing in the country that there was no point in doing anything if I could not win.

    Hey, hey, don''t be so irresponsible, just keep struggling until the end, okay?

    Of course. My daughter was just born, so I''m not going to end my life! But still, PapaWhy hasnt she called me that yet!?

    Youm had be a great parental fool.

    He was poking at Meme, the baby in Myuran''s arms, and grumbling like that.

    No, I don''t know about that, butToo much attention will wake her up.

    Myuran, who was taking care of Meme, would have been furious if that happened, so I casually warned him. This kind of casual consideration is the sign of a capable man. Maybe.

    Please tell him more. He seems to lose his calm judgment when ites to this child.

    Myuran said in a disgusted tone.

    I can imagine thats how he usually behaves.

    Its because there''s a shitty wolf who ims my daughter is his daughter, so I can''t be too careful!

    That''s what Youm says, but I don''t understand.

    What nonsense! I''m the guy who''s going to take your ce and marry Myuran in the future. Then of course, Myuran''s daughter will be my daughter!

    Grucius, you bastard, give it a rest! How many times do I have to tell you that your assumptions are wrong!?

    Hm, that''s right.

    Youm is crazy, but that shitty wolfGrucius is crazy too.

    I know Meme is cute, but I don''t know what kind of thinking he must have to im her as his own daughter.

    Well, I can understand Youm''s feelings

    Right? Look, Grucius! I knew the boss would understand!

    No matter how busy he is, he worries that if he doesn''t take care of Meme in his spare time, he won''t be remembered as a father.

    He said that he is making a tearful effort not to let Grucius beat him to it.

    Well, in this day and age, it''s not good idea to obsess over things. Even if it''s a stupid story, if it makes you feel better, it''s wee.

    However

    Don''t say stupid things and get yourself gged for death, okay?

    I said so and gave Youm and the others a list of death gs.

    We held the meeting in the Farmus Kingdom''s capitol building.

    Since I had a general idea of the flow of the meeting, the exnation went smoothly.

    The only thing I expected Youm and the others to do was to guide the people of Farmenas to evacuate, not to fight. Since the magic transfer circle I installed cannot evacuate arge number of people, we needed to decide who would use it beforehand. I asked them to coordinate it well so that there wouldnt be any conflicts.

    However, the destination was not necessarily safe, so the purpose of the transfer was different. Rather than the evacuation of important people, we were more concerned with the dispatch of troops.

    If the Farmenas Kingdom became a battlefield, the newly established Knights would respond to the situation. It seems that Grucius has been training the knights from the new recruits, including the old Farmus knights, but they are not enough to fight.

    Therefore, arrangements were made to send reinforcements from other countries.

    It would have been easy if we had ced them from the beginning, but since we did not know where the enemy would aim, we needed to be able to move them in any way.

    After considering the importance, it was decided that the Farmenas Kingdom would be postponed.

    Even if this kingdom is lost, it can be rebuilt. As long as the human casualties were kept to a minimum, there was no need to force the war.

    It was difficult for me to tell Youm and the others this, but I exined it to them and they agreed. Naturally, I promised to support them as much as possible by carrying out reconstruction projects in the worst case.

    This kind ofying the groundwork was important in order to make effective use of our limited forces.

    I know. It''s not like boss has abandoned us.

    That said, there are only about fifty people who can go at a time with the magic transfer circle. It''s not a reassuring number at all.

    StillNormally, we''re supposed to protect our country on our own. And since you''ve been so considerate, I don''t want anything more!

    His words weren''t directed at me, but at the ministers who seemed to want toin.

    I can understand the unvoiced arguments of the ministers, that they wanted us to help, that they didnt want to sacrifice their people, and that they wanted us to send more forces, but unfortunately we can''t afford it either.

    Well, I guess they understood that, and that''s why they grudgingly agreed with us.

    Anyway, the business with the Farmenas Kingdom waspleted sessfully.

    ***

    After that, I went around to various ces with Youm''s guidance.

    The main attraction was the construction site where important facilities were being built.

    The Farmenas Kingdom was the original royal capital of Farmus, so the central part of the city, within the city walls, was a noble town. As you moved closer to the outer perimeter of the city, the poption bes poorer, and the free people were forced out of the city walls.

    Land readjustment was being carried out to make major renovations, but in the process, the streets running through the center of the city were dug up and underground passages were built.

    The n was to have the subway run from the station building adjacent to the royal capital.

    That''s a bold move.

    Myuran is amazing. She used her magic to investigate the strength of the ground and came up with a n.

    Really, magic is such a cheat.

    Geological surveince is veryplicated, but it''s so easy for a skilled wizard to find out.

    You can easily find out the location of underground water veins, the existence of cavities, the brittleness of the ground, and the quality of the ground.

    Moreover, if you are good enough, you can even modify the soil. Soil-based magic can change the properties of soil, sand, soft rock, and hard rock.

    Long live magic.

    No wonder science and technology have not developed.

    On the contrary, the empires that focus on technology and the vampires who are treated as freaks are the ones that are unusual in this world. However, I think we should not make fun of them because they are the ones who make useful discoveries.

    That''s an idea I never had. I thought shield engineering was useless in this world, but I guess magic can help.

    Well, I don''t know what the shield thing is, but youre not losing, are you?

    It''s a technique for reinforcing an underground excavation so that the surface doesn''t copse. It takes a lot of machinery, but a good mage can do it, or maybe even beat it.

    I remembered mentioning once that it would be nice if we could run trains underground. I can only admire the fact that Myuran, who remembered it, has made it happen.

    I heard that Larzen also cooperated, and it can be said that a construction method unique to another world has beenpleted.

    In terms of cost, this method is definitely much more advantageous.

    Well, this is not a matter of winning or losing. I felt that we could bring about a revolution by introducing the idea of technology into magic.

    Well, now I''m trying to suspend the construction and use the underpass as an evacuation site. We''ve reinforced the ceiling with magic, so it can withstand a big magic explosion in the city.

    It depends on the scale of destruction, but I think it''s a good bomb shelter. If you stock up on water and food, you can stay in there for quite a while.

    It seems that water can be managed by magic. That''s why I''m having them only carry food. I''ve also dug a bunch of side holes for ces to sleep and a big hole under the room with the door. You can use it as an outhouse.

    The room we were led to was indeed a toilet. The room was divided into many private rooms and could be used by about a hundred people at the same time. The shape of the toilet was Western style, and it was dropped down like a Botton 79 toilet.

    But won''t the smell be bad in the underground space?

    Do you think so? But underneath this toilet, there are pieces of wood and other materials that help eliminate the smell.

    Oh, maybe it''s like a bio-toilet?

    I don''t know much about them, but the activated microorganisms break down the solids into water and carbon dioxide, and the water evaporates, right?

    That''s pretty much correct. I''ve confirmed that the mechanism is working correctly, so there should be no problem with foul odor

    Oh, great.

    I heard that there are about five toilets.

    It seemed that they could manage even if the siegested long.

    Since there is a ce to escape, we could send people who specialize in setting up ''defensive barriers. That way, they could prepare for a long war.

    I had heard that there was an underground passage that led to this one from the basement of the royal castle, so they were well prepared. I was relieved and excited by the technology of this world.

    We''ve got city defense barriers in ce, and we''ve got evacuation drills going on. As soon as we spot an enemy, we can escape immediately.

    That''s why the ministers didn''t make any unreasonable demands.

    Yeah, that''s why. Besides, I won''t tolerate anyone who says anything stupid. I told them to quit their jobs and get out of the castle if they just want to whine.

    Anyone canin. What''s important is a positive opinion.

    Youmughed when I said that.

    Looking back on the time when we first met, he has grown tremendously.

    I was secretly reminded of the fact that we all grow up when the need arises.

    After going back to the surface from the basement, I next headed for the training grounds.

    I was also allowed to see the strength of the new Farmenas Kingdom Knights trained by Grucius.

    There were 500 knights of B rank and above, and 3,000 knights of C rank and below.

    If they gathered all of the knights from all over Farmenas, there would be more than 40,000 knights. However, there was no point in gathering such arge number at this time, so they were giving priority to maintaining security.

    Well. If a huge army of angels attacked, there would be nothing we could do on the ground.

    Yeah. I heard there was anti-aircraft magic, but there aren''t many magicians. Rommel concluded that it would be better to focus on defending the city with legion magic.

    Larzen-san agreed, so we''re training ording to that policy. In other words, the Knight Order''s mission is to free the people from those whoe down to the earth.

    Youm and Grucius exined to me.

    I was relieved to see that they weren''t too eager to take on the enemy.

    I was a little worried that you might be thinking about doing something reckless.

    Hahaha, I''m more timid than Phobio-sama. I know what I''m capable of, so I won''t be reckless. Well, since Larzen-san trained me, I think I''m stronger than before. And just recently, my strength has suddenly increased. I''m going to be a shield for everyone, to the extent that I won''t be ashamed to be a leader.

    Grucius replied.

    It''s not that he''s a coward, but that he possesses a quality that is essential for amandercalm judgment. Grucius had a calcting side, so he didn''t seem likely to misjudge the difference in strength between him and the enemy.

    There was also a curiousment about his sudden increase in strength.

    Indeed, the amount of magicule in Grucius now seems to beparable to that of the previous Beastketeers, so it seems to be equivalent to Special A rank. If his skill (level) was added on top of this, he must have grown to be a very strong asset.

    The reason for this is, without a doubt, the effect of Karion''s awakening.

    Even though he became like a brother to Youm, he did not forget his respect for Karion. This was also a sign that Karion felt a strong bond with Grucius, his subordinate.

    That''s because Karion has awakened and evolved. It must have affected you, too.

    Karion-sama did!?

    Yeah. So don''t ever waste that power.

    Of course, I understand!

    This feels like a lecture. Its not my ce to tell you that.

    Hahaha, not at all. I''m d to know why, and since His Majesty Rimuru 80 is someone Karion-sama approves of, I''m grateful.

    I''m d he doesnt think I''m meddling in his affairs.

    I hope so. By the way, so Grucius is also being trained by Larzen?

    Larzen is the one who trained Grucius. I seemed to have remember him being the one who made ramen noodles, but I guess he must have been a wizard.

    How can Larzen be a match for Grucius?

    Oh, Larzen-san is a jack-of-all-trades. His knowledge of magic rivals Myuran''s

    Hey, don''t address my wife that way 81 !

    Shut up, shes eventually gonna be my

    Dont fuck with me, you bastard!

    Yes, yes, that''s enough fighting. So?

    I was tired of seeing them bicker on aical level, so I asked them to move on.

    To summarize Grucius'' story, when Larzen took the body of the otherworlder (Shogo), he took his power as well. Of course, he did not take away the skill level of the otherworlder, but Larzen, who had gone through a certain amount of training, was a first-rate fencer as well as a wizard.

    As such, he was good at striking and kicking, which he passed on to Grucius.

    I didn''t understand what he meant at first when he told me not to only fight with my natural physical abilities.

    Gruciusughed.

    Yeah, well. Sare has more strength than Larzen, but he loses in arm wrestling. He''s no match for him in a real fight, and I''ve been impressed with him since he made his name in the Western Nations as the majin Larzen.

    It''s no wonder the Beastketeers were so cautious. But

    That''s when Grucius stopped talking and looked at me.

    Then he shook his head.

    I understand, Grucius.

    With that, Youm patted Grucius on the shoulder and looked at me.

    While I was wondering what the hell was going on, they both looked at each other and sighed deeply.

    Im just saying that theres always someone better, boss.

    Oh, yeah. That Larzen-san was being yed like a baby in front of Gadra-dono. I was stunned when I saw that.

    Oh, so that''s the story

    Well, Diablo had also said that Larzen was a small thing that doesn''t matter, and we had a lot of people like that.

    Gadra is certainly strong.

    There is no doubt about it, but I feel that hes still a mid-tier level in our country.

    He seems to have evolved in a strange way after bing a member of Diablo''s faction, so his current rank may have changed, but he still doesn''t seem to be within the top ranks.

    Talking about this, I wondered what Gadra was doing now.

    So, I don''t see Larzen or Gadra around, are they doing something somewhere?

    Youm replies with a wry smile.

    Training, theyre training. They participated in the meeting to pick up the boss and to discuss future developments, but other than that, they''ve been fighting all this time.

    Seriously?

    For real!

    Grucius nodded, so he must be telling the truth.

    I thought Gadra was the intellectual type, but I didn''t know he liked to fight so much.

    Did Diablo have a bad influence on him?

    Such fears began shing through my mind, but I quickly dismissed them.

    If you''re curious, I''ll show you around.

    I took Youm at his word and decided to visit Gadra and the others.

    ***

    The destination was a in about an hour''s ride away by carriage.

    There was a simple hut, simr to a guest house, that stood there. There was nothing else, just wastnd as far as the eye could see.

    ording to Youm, there were only four people living there.

    Needless to say, the four were Larzen, the best of the Farmenas Kingdom, Sare and Grigori, formerly of the Three Martial Sages, and Gadra.

    It was a very interestingbination, but when we arrived, they had all lined up to greet us.

    It was strange to see Gadra leading the way, acting like a representative.

    We are very pleased that you havee to such a ce!

    At Gadra''s signal, the three remaining members of the group bowed their heads.

    Not to Youm, but to me.

    Hey, hey, I''m here, too, aren''t I?

    Your Majesty, Sare and Grigori are guests of Farmenas, but it is not you they are loyal to. Therefore, they are paying their respects to His Majesty Rimuru, the Lord of Gadra-sama, by their own will.

    I get it. You don''t even have to say anything, you''re always lecturing me.

    Larzen rebuked Youm''sining, but their rtionship was more familiar than I had expected.

    Larzen''s true intentions are unknown, but his position is that of a loyal vassal of Farmenas. I had thought that he held no loyalty to Youm, but judging from his attitude, it seemed that he cared for him in his own way.

    However, aside from Gadra and Larzen, I don''t remember being respected by Sare and Grigori

    Anyway, if theyre doing this of their own will, why me?

    I was curious, so I asked.

    Youm seemed to be curious, as if he had never heard of it.

    If they wanted to move to my country, I could consider epting them. Hinata didnt seem to have any intention of seeking out Sare and the others as traitors and executing them.

    Theres a clear reason. Master Larzen taught us about our inexperience, and Guru Gadra 82 taught us about the greatness of His Majesty Rimuru. We were so impressed that we wished to be included at the bottom of your ranks!

    Guru!?

    That''s right. Well, Gadra-sama''s strength was unimaginable, but from what I heard hes not even close to His Majesty Rimuru. No! Even before that! I''ve heard that His Majesty Rimuru has a lot of powerful people under hismand that even Gadra-sama cannot match, and we want to test our strength

    Ranga jumped out from behind me while Grigori was making his speech.

    Well said! You are Grigori, I knew you''d be a sight to behold! If it''s all right with you, then I''ll give you a test of strength!!

    Ge, Gyaaah!! That dog guy from back then!?

    Huh?

    Ah, noRanga-dono, wasn''t it?

    Grigori is shaking and sweating profusely. He had been badly beaten by Ranga beforehad he been traumatized since then?

    No, it cant be.

    If that''s the case, why don''t you let Ranga deal with him?

    Eh!?

    My lord, it would be my pleasure!

    No, I

    Come, Grigori. Let us get out of the way so that my lords are not disturbed.

    Ah, hold on!?

    Ranga grabbed Grigori''s head in his mouth and ran happily away. I couldn''t see Grigori''s face, but I''m sure he was happy that his wish came true.

    I saw him and Ranga off with warm eyes.

    It wasn''t just me, but all the people present as well.

    Oh, I''d like to test my skills too, but I''m still inexperienced, so I''d like to start from the bottom

    Sare said awkwardly.

    That''s true. Ranga is my bodyguard, so hes one of the best. I thought Grigori-san was a challenger.

    Of course! He''s got a phobia of dogs since he lost to Ranga-dono. I think he wanted to ovee it.

    Hearing Sare''sment, Larzen was holding his head in disgust. Youm and Gadra were chatting amicably beside him.

    Even I am not a match for Ranga-donoWhat a fool he is.

    I see, that sure is some rough treatment. Thats amazing, I dont think Id ever be able to do that.

    Don''t do it. Your Majesty is a king. You don''t need to be strong.

    I''ve always wanted to be strong, but I know my own strength. Once you get to know Boss Rimuru, it''s obvious that a little strength is useless.

    It''s not useless. Even in the worst case, if we stay alive, we might be able to help in time.

    Right. Well, I''ll do what I can to protect the ones I love.

    I think that''s a good idea.

    Youm seems to be bing more aware of his role as king.

    I can''t lose, either.

    I don''t intend to be as crazy as Grigori, but I am determined to do what I can, step by step.

    Larzen also seems to approve of Youm now.

    As long as Your Majesty Youm serves this country, I will do my best to help you. Well, Her Royal Highness Princess Meme is the one I am going to make my apprentice, as I promised Queen Myuran, so I''ll protect her before anyone else.

    What a thing to say.

    However, Youm should be relieved to know that he has someone who has supported the Farmus Kingdom for hundreds of years.

    As for me, I was thinking of something else. I was puzzled by the fact that Larzen spoke in an old man''s manner despite his youthful appearance.

    In the meantime, Ranga returned with a limp Grigori in his mouth.

    My lord, after a little y time, this person has stopped working!

    Too much!

    You''re not Shion, so can''t you take it easy on him?

    I scolded him severely.

    And when I diagnosed Grigori, it turned out that he had just fainted.

    He''s that guy, isn''t he? Why did suddenly nominate Ranga?

    Well, I understand the desire for revenge, but I also think one should know where they stand

    No, Boss, I don''t think that was it.

    Eh?

    Rather, he said he never wanted to fight, never wanted to see him again

    Seriously?

    Youm and Sare pointed this out, but perhaps I was the one misunderstanding? Sare said something different what what he said before.

    So maybe he wasnt happy to see Ranga again and just wanted to escape.

    No, I don''t think thats the case. He was brave. He was unyielding, even against a man he''d already been defeated by. I was, you know, impressed with him. That''s why I allowed him to fight Ranga. Right, Ranga?

    Admitting a mistake is a liability.

    Fortunately, Grigori was safe, so I decided to y it cool.

    And on top of that, Ranga yed nicely into it.

    You''re right! I was so overwhelmed by this man''s spirit that I overdid it!

    No, he''s really good.

    Hes brilliantly correcting his mistakes.

    I don''t know who he''s taken after, but I think Ranga has be cunning.

    But it seems that our teamwork has convinced Youm and the others.

    Its exactly as Rimuru-sama says. Isn''t that right, you guys?

    Oh, yes. If that''s what the Boss says, then I guess that''s what it is.

    Im particrly dissatisfied. Sare, wasnt it your misunderstanding?

    Thats right! Well, Grigori sure has be a gutsy man

    Yes, yes.

    There is no problem.

    Youre right. Now that I have a little respect for you, I''ll call you Grigori -san from now on!

    So that''s what happenedWhen Grigori himself woke up, he politely declined my offer.

    ***

    Thus, all my business in the Farmenas Kingdom was finished.

    Youm and I discussed the matter and agreed that Sare and Grigori would be epted and trained in our country.

    I was concerned that their forces would be reduced, but they should be able to handle it since Gadra was still there. They also have Larzen, and unless there is a major invasion by the enemy, they should be able to buy some time.

    However, if such a situation had urred, even with Sare and Grigori, it would have been a drop in the bucket. That''s why I chose to develop my skills in preparation for an emergency, rather than worrying about such an eventuality.

    Incidentally, the power ratio of Larzen and the others was very interesting.

    If we simplypare the approximate amount of magicules, the order is Sare, Larzen, Grigori, and Grucius (from highest to lowest).

    Youm, I''m sorry to say, is out of the question. With Hakurou''s hellish training and the performance of his equipment, he is barely in the A rank. We couldn''t hope to increase his strength in the short term.

    Grucius was an elite of the Beast King''s Warriors. Thanks to the gift from Karions awakening, he has grown to the level of Grigori, one of the former Three Martial Sages.

    However, it was a problem for the Knight Commander to leave his home country, and he did not want to, so I did not bring him back. He said he woulde to visit us after all the problems were settled.

    The first person who came to our country, was Grigori.

    He is a strong man with the special ability of ''immobility. He prefers to use a battle axe spear (halberd), but he is also good at hand-to-handbat.

    Although he was defeated by Ranga, he was a Sage ssparable to a Demon Lord Seed and had an existence value of about 400,000.

    He was much stronger than I expected, so there is a possibility that he might turn into one.

    The second person who came to our country, was Sare.

    He used to be the first knight of the Imperial Guards, but he was defeated by Hinata and gave up his position. Then he challenged Diablo as one of the Three Martial Sages and has been here ever since.

    Well, it was simply the wrong opponent.

    It seems that like Grigori, Sare was a man without luck.

    However, his ability is real.

    The value of Sare''s existence that had led to Saint had surprisingly reached a million. It would certainly be interesting to have him challenge thebyrinth in the form of a real battle.

    By the way, Larzen only had a few more magicules than Grigori, but his ability was greater than Sares.

    When he took Shogo Taguchi''s body, he gained the Unique Skills ''Berserker'' and ''Survivor''.

    ording to Ciel-san, there are cases where Unique Skill is rooted in the mind, cases where it is engraved in the soul, and cases where it resides in the astral body, spiritual body, or material body.

    There is also the power to steal Skill from enemies, but it seems that this is only possible if it is in the body. As an exception, it seems that there are Skills that reside in the soul, and in such cases, they can be taken away.

    In other words, is it harder to take something that''s engraved in your soul?

    It is not absolute. But if it is rooted in the heart, it is impossible

    She exined confidently.

    However, it seems that it can still be copied without being taken, so it is possible tomit foul acts like with Michael

    I digress, but thats why Larzen, who had acquired two Unique Skills, was said to be more proficient in using them than Shogo.

    And so, he overwhelmed Sare, who had about twice his magicule count.

    However, it seems that this was only the beginning.

    Sare had a unique skill called ''The All-Knowing One'', which allowed him to recognize and master his opponent''s Art just by seeing it once. When Larzen learned of this, he taught Sare all of the skills and magic he knew.

    Magic is both an art and a skill thates from knowledge. It was not easy to learn, but Sare did notin and asked Larzen to teach him.

    That is the reason why Sare called Larzen his master.

    That is why Sare is now stronger than Larzen in both name and reality.

    Even so, Gadra seems to have beaten him to the punch.

    Theparison of existence values is

    Disclosing information about Gadra''s

    Name: Gadra [EP: 1,126,666]

    Race: greater chaos spirit  metal demon

    Blessing: ck Primordial (Noir)

    Title: Servant #2 Pochi 83

    Magic: ?dark magic??elemental magic?

    Skill: Ultimate Gift '' Grimoire ''

    Resistance: Physical Attack Nullification , Abnormal Condition Nullification , Mental Attack Nullification , Natural Effects Nullification , Holy-Demonic Attack Resistance

    I''ve found a lot of things toin about, but I''m too tired to talk about them, so I''ll leave it at that. For now, I''ll discuss theparison with Sare, but it looks like Gadra outperforms him by EP alone.

    To be honest, I didn''t expect him to be this strong.

    Gadra wasn''t that strong before he was reborn.

    His knowledge of magic was outstanding, and his skill (level) was remarkable, but he was not a threat if we judged him only in terms ofbat.

    He was cunning and troublesome. If he was going to be an adversary, he should be the first to go for. That was my true evaluation.

    With that in mind, Gadra did the right thing.

    He''s still alive, and he''s in my direct line ofmand. And he''s even surpassed Saint Sare in directbat ability.

    Sare''s Omnipotent One is also troublesome, but it''s surprisingly easy to deal with. All you have to do is to challenge it in a straightforward manner.

    You can overwhelm it with physics, without the use of art or magic. Even if you do use them, you should do so in a timely manner to avoid being imitated.

    It is said that Sare was defeated by Hinata, but I can guess the reason.

    Hinata would never be careless, so she must have fought without exposing her cards to Sare. In that case, he would have lost the advantage of the Unique Skill, because he had nothing to learn.

    And this time

    The decisive difference in Gadra''s case must have been the presence or absence of the Ultimate Gift.

    Gadra was cunning, so he might not have shown Sare his hidden tricks. But even if he had, Sare would not have been able to imitate it.

    Because the unique level cannotpete with the ultimate level.

    With that in mind, I realized once again that being able to give an Ultimate Gift to a subordinate like me must be a quite the foul move.

    Incidentally, the power of the Ultimate Gift Grimoire was very simr to that of Adalman''s Necronomicon. This included Thought eleration, Universal Perception, Demon Lord Haki, Chant Cancetion, Analyze and Assess, All of Creation, Mental Crush, Knowledge Browsing, and Concept Sharing. Knowledge Browsing seems to be an ability to learn from Ciel-san. And ''Concept Sharing'' seems to be the right to share with Adalman.

    Well, like Ciel-san, it seemed to be a skill that embodied Gadra''s desires.

    Anyway, I understand why Gadra is stronger than Sare.

    I also now have a rough idea of how powerful Sare is.

    As I recall, the Holy Knight Order had been working hard to conquer thebyrinth, but was their current ranking at Apito''s level?

    That was before Adalman''s evolution, so it''s not very useful

    I heard that they came to visit us recently, and that he had collected some data. Arno and Reynald were extremely strong, with existence values of nearly 500,000. The remaining captains were also around 300,000 each and seemed to have grown significantlypared to their initial levels.

    Since they were in the same level range as Grigori, it would be interesting to have them form a party.

    Sare, on the other hand, had the advantage of learning the Arts easily, so it might be better to leave it to Hakurou.

    He could be a good training partner for the children, and I thought he could also learn a lot in our country.

    Of course, that should be kept confidential.

    And so, the training n for Sare and Grigori was decided.

    ***

    For the time being, I decided to let Sare and Grigori familiarize themselves with thebyrinth.

    Benimaru had been informed of the training n and would be sent to his own ce when the time was right.

    Will I be taking care of them again?

    I''m counting on you. Its sudden with Hakurou, so there might be some confusion, right?

    Well, thats true. But were all in the same situation, and I think you''re being too overprotective.

    Benimaru chuckled.

    You may have a point, but they are our guests.

    If they had immigrated to our country, I would not have allowed them to be too unreasonable.

    More importantly, speaking of training.

    So, what''s the status of Karion and the others?

    Huh, things are getting interesting over there.

    As soon as Benimaru said that, Ciel-san disclosed the information.

    Name: Karion [EP: 2,773,537]

    Race: Beast God (Ju-Xin). Greater chaos spirit  Light spirit beast.

    Name: Frey [EP: 1,948,734]

    Race: Bird god (Choujin). Greater chaos spirit  Sky spirit bird.

    The Labyrinth, its dangerous. All of the existence values and personal information ispletely visible.

    Karion and Frey-san have evolved and took on a divine nature. Frey-san''s existence value is less than 2 million, but she seems to have met the requirements for divinity. I guess it is within the margin of error.

    Their skills and resistances are unknown, but there is no way to know that unless they tell me.

    Even so, both of these people have awakened to be True Demon Lords, and are undisputedly strong.

    In my case, the amount of magicules had increased tenfold, but Karion and Frey-san didnt seem to have increased by that much.

    Or rather, there seem to be individual differences.

    My impression is that Karion''s pre-evolutionary value was around 700,000, and Frey-san''s was less than 400,000.

    Assuming that I''m right, Karion''s strength has increased fourfold and Frey-san''s strength has increased fivefold.

    Well, in my case, it''s because the original values were low, wasnt it?

    If you think about it, its natural.

    We should consider not how many times the original value has increased, but rather how much it has increased.

    It was not wrong to say that the greater the existence value, the greater the power when awakened.

    Now, let''s analyze their strength based on this information.

    Karion''s physical abilities nearly tripled when he transformed, but I don''t think they doubled if we converted them into existence values.

    I was thinking that it was probably just an ability boost for a certain amount of time. That''s why I believed that shapeshifting was notpletely foolproof.

    Because if you transformed, you would be weaker after the time limit.

    This is true not only for Karion, but also for Gabil and the others. Otherwise, the best idea would be to maintain the transformed state at all times.

    However, there were still many advantages to transforming, such as the healing of all wounds and the full recovery of physical strength. These are characteristics unique to beastmen, so I don''t mean to make fun of them. In short, it depends on how you use it.

    So, in the case of the evolved Karion, how well is he able to use his power?

    What''s he like now?

    Yes. First up was Karion-dono, who I took on first for revenge.

    What?

    You know, I led a team to Yuurazania once. I was no match for him then. That''s why I wanted to see how strong I had be now, and to test myself against Karion-dono, who had awakened.

    Um, I think you''ve got it backwards.

    I was nning to have Karion and the others test their strength to the fullest../.

    I wondered why Benimaru was testing his own strength, but after thinking about it, I didnt see the problem.

    Benimaru got serious, and Karion gave it his all. In the environment of thebyrinth, where no one dies, this seemed to be a very interestingbination.

    I''m sure Ramiris and the others were recording it, so I''ll watch itter. With that, I decided to ask about the result first.

    Who won?

    By a narrow margin, me.

    Oh, that''s good!

    While I admired him, I was actually slightly troubled by the reaction.

    For some reason, I realized that I hadn''t doubted Benimaru''s victory, and I was upset when I heard that it was a close call.

    But it was a close call. How did that happen?

    At any rate, I asked him.

    Before Benimaru could reply, an image appeared in my mind.

    It seems that Karion made the first move

    As expected of Ciel-san.

    It looks like she got the information right away.

    And as Ciel-san exined, it was Karion who moved first in the video.

    At the moment he raised his weapon and sank in a flowing manner, Karion''s entire body turned into light.

    It was not a metaphor, but a real particle that attacked Benimaru.

    Karion named it Burst Roar. It is an illusionary diffusion-focused particle cannon that can transform his own body into willful particles that pierces the enemy

    So, it has a will then.

    It means that Karion had also awakened and acquired the characteristics of a spiritual life form. It was also understandable that the light that had followed Benimaru swallowed him up.

    The moment the game started, I got chills, or rather, I sensed that it was going to be dangerous. So, I decided that this was not the time to wait and see, and activated my Heat Haze 84

    Benimaru''s Heat Haze is a power that can be called the ultimate secret of ''Formhide. It prevents any attack from catching you, so it will only work if you have the Ultimate Skill on top of it.

    However, if that had not been activated, Benimaru would have lost in the first move.

    After all, Karion embodied a speed several hundred times faster than the speed of sound,parable to that of Velgrynd''s super speed attack.

    Benimaru''s evasion of the attack was amazing, but there was nothing he could do if he had been tracked from there. It was because of his Ultimate Skill Heat King (Amaterasu) that he was able to withstand this.

    Your intuition and your Ultimate Skill were the difference between victory and defeat.

    Yes, it was a close call. I was so proud of myself that I thought I could win more easily, so it was a good reminder for me.

    That''s right. I didn''t doubt you''d win, so I had mixed feelings about it. After all, carelessness and pride can lead to defeat. It''s hard to be aware of, so I''m grateful you realized this before the showdown.

    Yes. Even if Im aware of it, I can be unconsciously proud of it. That''s why it''s called carelessness, but it can be scary.

    Exactly.

    We were grateful to Karion for reminding us of ourck of awareness.

    ***

    After reflecting with Benimaru, I rxed with a caf auit brewed by Shuna and listened to the rest.

    Did you fight with Frey-san?

    No, I think Frey-dono saw us fighting and decided she couldn''t win. She seems like the type who hates wasting time.

    I see, so that''s how it is.

    I nodded my head, agreeing with Benimarus conclusion. Frey-san is not particrly belligerent, so I can understand her reaction.

    Besides, I had heard Milimining about Frey-san''s meticulous nature. I''ve heard that shes been having a lot of trouble with it, but it''s none of my business, so Ill just ignore it.

    After that, it was a matter of trying to conquer thebyrinth to see how far they could go.

    If you want to test your strength, thats probably the quickest way.

    Yes. Each one started at the fifty-first level, individually.

    As Benimaru exined, images began flooding my mind.

    Ciel-san is a being of many talents.

    First, Karion.

    The power that affected Benimaru was serious, and he continued to make good progress.

    The 60th level was cleared easily due to Gadra''s absence. Though at this rate, even if he had stayed, he would have been defeated. That''s how unstoppable Karion''s momentum was.

    He also fought Adalman and the others, who happened to be back to adjust the magic transfer circle, as a test of his skill.

    As a result, he easily defeated them even though it was three against one.

    That wasnt surprising. He was using Burst Roar generously, so Adalman and the others had no time to take countermeasures.

    Wenti acted as the shield, Albert as the ranger, and Adalman as the attacker. Thatbination fell apart when Wenti was first defeated.

    Karion then went after the troublesome Adalman, leaving Albert behind. The way he fought was reminiscent of a lion on the hunt.

    It is the female lion that does most of the hunting

    I know that!!

    Ciel-san''s exnation is very useful, but sometimes it makes me feel like a fool.

    It''s always been that way, even since the days of the Great Sage, right?

    I''ll be careful

    Really, please do, I nodded, greatly offended.

    So, back to the topic at hand.

    Karion''s Burst Roar was incredibly powerful.

    Adalman had a light attribute, but Karion was also a light attribute. There was no difference between them, so it was just a matter of simple strength.

    The interesting to notice here was that Adalman has an Ultimate Gift.

    Karion does not seem to have an Ultimate Skill, nor does he have mythical-grade equipment.

    So, how was he able to beat Adalman?

    I seem to remember Ciel-san saying that the ultimate level can only be beaten by another ultimate power.

    I don''t remember

    Oh, is that so?

    I feel like I''ve been deceived, but I''m not so sure either

    Karion also possesses the characteristics of a spiritual life form, so his strength of will must have been able to rival the ultimate power

    I see, that makes sense.

    In other words, Karion has more offensive power than the Multyer Barrier reinforced by Adalman''s Necronomicon.

    The next opponent to face Karion-dono was Kumara. Kumara wanted to fight first, so I gave her permission.

    Well, Zegion is stronger than Kumara, so maybe we should rethink thebyrinth floor guardian cements.

    Right. And as it turns out, it was a pretty good match.

    Again, a video was shown.

    Kumara hadn''t shown her tailed beasts and was going all out from the start.

    She had heard the news of Adalman and the others'' defeat, but seemed to be going into battle without listening to the details.

    There is a big difference between knowing what the enemy is up to and not knowing. And yet, she dared to challenge the enemy on equal terms.

    Karion was superior in existence value. However, Kumara had the Ultimate Gift Beast King Bahamut.

    Again, Karion made his first move with a Burst Roar. This time, it became several shes of light, aiming at Kumara from all directions.

    Kumara, on the other hand, flew to the sky and invoked Gravity Domination. This caused the light to bend due to the super gravity, and Karion''s attack only pierced Kumara''s leg.

    This was not Kumara''s intended evasion, but was just her luck. That''s why she did not counterattack, but instead prioritized her own recovery.

    Or is it possible to substitute with the legs of a tailed beast instead? The tailed beasts can be resurrected by Kumara''s magicules, so it would be difficult to disable Kumara with an opponent of the same level.

    And Karion, who failed in his first attack, had materialized. The particle state, which seemed to be invincible, still had a time limit.

    And it looks like it cannot be fired repeatedly.

    Karion did not chase Kumara, but instead kept his distance and set up a White Tiger-Blue Dragon Strike. 85

    Kumara looked down at Karion from above.

    Karion stared at her and considered his next move.

    Their gazes crossed, and in the next moment, a tremor ran through the air.

    Kumara swooped down to attack Karion and unleashed a Nine-Tailed Piercing Strike 86 . Karion responded by concentrating his magic power on the White Tiger-Blue Dragon Strike and unleashed a Beast Roar.

    It was Kumara who won the sh.

    The particle cannon fizzled out, and Karion''s White Tiger-Blue Dragon Strike shattered.

    I will win!

    Kumara was proud of her victory and tried to finish Karion off.

    But that was not to be.

    How naive.

    Karion''s muttered words camete, after Kumara''s heart had been destroyed.

    Karion''s weapon was shattered, but not broken. The shards were controlled by Karion''s will and had be particles that pierced Kumara from behind.

    The game was won.

    Karion was not so naive as to let his guard down here. He mercilessly ended the game with a Beast Roar against Kumara, who had stopped moving.

    And so Karion-dono won

    Looks like it. I mean, Kumara has gotten so strong that it''s hard to believe she lost so easily.

    Well, that''s how it goes in a fight. Fortunately, this wasn''t the real thing.

    That''s true. Really, I think it was a good experience for Kumara.

    Such a disy of Karion''s prowess made us all feel very remorseful about ourselves.

    We''ve been too prideful.

    The idea of taking care of Karion-dono was very presumptuous. There were many things to teach, and I learned a lot from him.

    Well, yes. Some people say that teaching others is like being given an opportunity to realize what youck.

    I think he meant that if someone asks you something you don''t know, you should look it up immediately and use it to your advantage.

    In this case, I felt that he learned how to fight more carefully by training with Karion in actualbat.

    Karion seemed to be getting more and more sophisticated in his fighting style.

    If Kumara had taken him on before Adalman, the odds would have been more likely to be reversed. That was how well Karion had developed.

    Well, I guess Zegion was in danger, too.

    I couldnt imagine Zegion being defeated, but at this rate

    Oh, that was out of the question.

    Eh?

    Facing off, Karion-dono was the first to set up

    The imaged yed out.

    The battle was instantaneous.

    Before Karion could turn into a particlesNo, thats wrong. Immediately after Zegion smiled at him as if he were an illusion, Karion''s entire body was cut into pieces.

    Instant kill, what is Zegion really?

    To be honest, it''s almost a miracle that I was able to beat him. If I tried now, I don''t think I could win.

    Benimaru chuckled.

    He may have been being modest, but if Benimaru, who hated to lose, was saying as much, then Zegion truly was exceptional.

    If Zegion had been defeated here, it would have required a fundamental review of our defense system.

    Zegion doesn''t seem to be very prideful. We''ve reaffirmed our ownck of awareness, but that seems unnecessary for Zegion.

    Agreed. He''s extremely stoic. It was the mostplete victory he''s ever had, but he didn''t seem satisfied at all, saying This isn''t even close to Rimuru-sama.

    I wondered if Zegion was aiming for an imaginary meI felt very far away.

    ***

    Karion''s challenge was over.

    So then, what about Frey-san?

    Frey-dono also defeated Adalman and the others. Quite handily, at that.

    Seriously!?

    Too unexpected.

    I was expecting Adalman and his team to win this game.

    I had thought Frey-San would win in a one-on-one match, but that Adalman and the others would have the advantage in a three-on-one match

    After watching the video, I understood why Frey-san won.

    Ah, they were too ipatible!

    Yeah, thats right. Frey-dono''s Magic Interference blocked Adalman''s magic. The reason for the defeat was that this disrupted his offensive pattern and allowed Frey-dono to control the pace.

    Benimaru''s exnation was correct.

    A circle of fifty meters in radius around Frey-san had be an anti-magic area, blocking the movement of magicules. Because the interference wave was more powerful than that of the Charybdis, it had also blocked Adalman''s ''Necronomicon''.

    By the way, Frey-san also had divinity.

    Since divinity seems to be a trait that can only be acquired by a spiritual lifeform whose life span has expired, it was no surprise that Frey-san was able topete with the Ultimate Gift.

    On the contrary, there was a possibility that Frey-san might have acquired an Ultimate Skill.

    At this point, Adalman switched to Holy Magic: Holy Cannon as his main tool, but it was not a decisive move. The trouble was that Frey-san could fly, so she was able to evade it with a flick of her wrist.

    She then closed in on Wenti, who was acting as a shield, and grabbed her with her ws.

    The trouble is Frey-dono''s ws. They disrupt the bodys magicules, so they are a monster''s natural enemy. Once they grabs you, its like having all of your skills and magic blocked.

    Frey-san''s ws were definitely a mythical-grade level of danger.

    Wow, if I didn''t know better, Id say I might have been in danger too.

    Hahaha, you''re okay, right? In the case of Rimuru-sama, you can escape with Clone. However, Karion-dono also said it was impossible to escape from, so Id be in trouble too. Id just beat her before she caught me, though.

    In Benimaru''s case, that was probably true.

    But for Adalman and the others, it was impossible.

    Wenti was destroyed from the inside and left the battlefield. After that, Frey-san changed her strategy to a long-distance battle.

    Since Adalman and his team''s flight was blocked, they could only be attacked one-sidedly from above. Albert, impatient with this, leapt and aimed at Frey-san, but that was exactly what Frey-san wanted.

    The title of Sky Queen was not lost upon Albert, and he too was scattered in the sky.

    Thus, Adalman was the only one left, but he had no chance to win. Sadly, he was forced to defeat before Frey-san.

    Frey-dono also moved on to the next opponent, which was a battle against Kumara.

    What was the result?

    They were almost evenly matched in strength, but Kumara is not divine.

    Besides, judging from the way she just fought, Frey-san had quite a bit ofbat experience. She had said herself that she was the weakest of the ten demon lords, but it seemed that she was being modest.

    The cunning Frey-san and the inexperienced Kumara.

    I thought it would be a good match, and I guess I was right.

    It was a great match. They fought for three whole days, and both of them gave it their all. I''d call it a draw, but the winner was Frey-dono.

    Ah, that was a great battle. I''ll study the footageter.

    Yes, I learned a lot. The indomitable spirit to never give up on victory is important, but in the end, it''s the intelligence that counts. When you have a strong opponent, it is important to mislead your opponent about your strength. The reason for Kumara''s defeat was that she misjudged her opponent''s remaining strength.

    I see, I''m looking forward to seeing the video.

    It was three days'' worth of information, so Id watch it at several times the speed using Thought eleration.

    So, did Frey-san challenge Zegion?

    If she was on par with Kumara, she was bound to lose.

    It seemed to me that Frey-san, who had avoided a fight with Benimaru, would not participate in a fight with an obvious oue.

    She was fighting Apito, not Zegion.

    Eh, is that so?

    Yes. After all, she must have had her pride as someone of flight.

    Oh, thats

    She seemed reasonable, but she was surprisinglypetitive.

    It was a good match, but Frey-dono won by andslide.

    Thats about right.

    If it was a good match, I should have congratted Apito on her good performance.

    Anyway, now I knew what Frey-san was capable of, and I could see what my friends had to work on.

    It must have been a shock for Adalman and his group, who had to suffer a series of defeats as soon as they came back to our country in the middle of their work, but I hope they would be grateful that this was not the real battle and use this experience in the future.

    Also, I might have sold my debt to Karion and Frey-san. This was also thanks to Ramiris, so Id tell them to thank herter.

    I also thanked Ramiris once again.

    Now, onto the real issue at hand.

    Then, Ill leave you in charge of Sare and the others.

    Yes, sir. Well, let''s see if they can get past Adalman and the others, shall we?

    I agree with you. Maybe, Albert can handle it on his own. Just don''t keep Adalman and the others around forever!

    Having just vowed to not let my guard down, I wouldn''t be surprised if this prediction was wrong. But Sare was no match for even Master Gadra.

    It would be difficult for him to get past Adalman and the others, I thought.

    And thenter.

    That prediction proved to be correct. Sare and his team decided to train with Apito instead of Adalman and his team who returned to their work.

    ***

    After leaving Sare and the others with Benimaru, I headed for the Blumund Kingdom, where Myourmiles was waiting for us.

    The n was to meet them there and have them apany us to the Ingracia Kingdom.

    I had been to Blumund Kingdom many times before, so I was familiar with it. Since we were not going into the city, there was no need to go through the Barrier. We went to the outskirts of the capital as if we were sightseeing.

    It was also the center of a big project.

    The World Station was currently under construction, and workers from neighboring countries had been gathering there. Not far from there, in a prime location, the headquarters of the Four Nations Trade Federation was being built.

    Well, I''m pretty happy.

    It was a ten-story skyscraper over 30 meters high, which was rare in this world.

    While it was not as high as Milims new castle, it was still one of the tallest buildings in this world.

    I had tried to borate on the design and used precious ss extravagantly. Of course, it was a tempered ss made of maka, 87  which was resistant to typhoons, earthquakes, and magical attacks.

    I had many other hobbies and interests, so I was very attached to this building.

    This was where we were meeting today, or rather, where we were nning to have a party to celebrate the new building. I was actually the owner of the building, but was treated as an invited guest.

    And now, I had finally arrived in front of the building.

    I would have liked toe and see the building when it waspleted, but I had been so busytely that I haven''t had time. So, I left all the arrangements for the building''s staff to Myourmiles.

    It was hard work for me, but it must have been hard work for Myourmiles too. Without Myourmiles, I wouldn''t be able to see this day.

    I knew that he was capable, but he also seemed to have a talent for charity.

    The representative of the Four Nations Trade Federation is Myourmiles, but the head of this building was someone else. To my surprise, Veryard, who had recently been promoted to the rank of Viscount, was now Myourmiles'' subordinate. I was informed that he had been appointed as the general manager.

    I am honestly happy and relieved that Veryard has be my ally. I havent forgotten the skill with which he deceived me, and I hope to see more of him in the future.

    I have heard that he has recruited several other talented people.

    He said he would introduce them to me at the party today, and I was looking forward to it.

    As usual, Souei and I stand side by side, with Ranga in the shadows.

    We were dressed in formal suits today.

    I was wearing a three-piece suit and Souei was wearing a two-piece suit.

    The color of the suit was gray for me and ck for Souei. It was one that Shuna had tailored for us, using the now-branded Hellmoth thread.

    Since it was custom-made and not sold in the market, anyone who saw it would have noticed the difference in quality.

    The party wouldnt start until evening, so there were not many people.

    In spite of this, it was my charisma that attracted the attention of passers-by.

    Look at that guy, he''s so handsome!

    Is that his brother? He''s like a big brother protecting his little brother.

    The little brother is cute too, I can''t wait to see what he bes in the future!

    He''s cool. There have been a lot of foreigners visiting these days, but it''s still rare to see someone so cool.

    Hmm?

    That''s not the reaction I was expecting.

    I guess she was just interested in Souei, not my charisma.

    I realized that I was being too self-conscious and felt a little embarrassed.

    Well, why don''t we just go in and say hello first?

    I said so, trying to cover up my embarrassment.

    So, I went through the door to the reception desk. The first floor was arge floor like a hotel lobby, divided into a waiting area and a long room.

    Since I already knew the inside of the building, I proceeded without hesitation.

    Is Myourmiles-kun here~?

    As I called out to the beautiful receptionist, a pompous man dressed in a fashionable suit with a cigar in his mouth came out of the back room and stared at me suspiciously.

    And just who are you?

    Ah, Im Rimuru. Can you tell Myourmiles-kun that I''m here?

    I said so with a smile, though I thought he was arrogant despite his gentlemanly appearance.

    The receptionist, hearing my name, quickly changed herplexion and reached for the crystal ball. It was also a magic tool that allowed you tomunicate with another crystal ball. The disadvantage was that it could only be used at a short distance, but it was the best item for inside the building.

    That response was just as I''d trained it to be, so I was content to watchSuddenly, an important man stopped the receptionist.

    Um, Gabbana-sama, this person is

    Its fine. I''ll take care of this.

    No, I mean

    I am here. There are people who tell lies in order to meet Myourmiles-sama. There are also a lot of fools who try to attend parties they weren''t invited to, and well, it''s not easy being famous. He doesn''t understand much about that, so he needs good subordinates like me. You were unlucky, too. If I hadn''t been here, perhaps you would have seeded.

    Haa, I see

    What else am I supposed to say here?

    The receptionist seemed to know my name, but this gentlemanGabbana, didn''t seem to know anything about me.

    No, maybe he did know me, but the face and the name didn''t match.

    Judging from the situation, he didnt seem to be in charge of the reception.

    I wondered if maybe he was just a dirty old man who wanted to look good in front of this beautiful receptionist.

    Rimuru-sama. I will educate this man myself.

    Souei, who had been quietly losing his temper, red at Gabbana with steely eyes.

    Wait, wait, wait! Myourmiles-kun is training him, so let''s not let a few misunderstandings get in the way!

    Let''s just be kind here, okay?

    In fact, Myourmiles had probably refrained from picking us up because he was busy, but it turned out to be a bad idea.

    Gabbana''s pompous attitude may be questionable, but with so many unannounced visitors, this kind of reaction might be inevitable.

    As I was calming down the angry Souei, the receptionist shouted out.

    Gabbana-sama! This person is the real deal!! She looks exactly like the portrait on disy in Myourmiles-sama''s room, there''s no doubt about it!!

    Eh, he has a portrait?

    I had noticed that he had one when I visited his house, but I didn''t know he still had it. Myourmiles surer was a strange man to disy it so proudly.

    Well, the original Shizu-san was a beautiful woman.

    I can understand why one might be attracted to her, but my figure is that of an elementary school studentwell, now that I think about it, I''ve grown up.

    I was just under 160 centimeters, which is about the average height of a high school girl.

    I dont have much of a chest, but I might be beautiful in a portrait.

    However, I couldn''t sit still, so I would have to ask Ciel-san to take over the inside.

    I have no intention of bing a model for a painting, though.

    As I was trapped in such an advanced level of thought, I heard Gabbana''s astonished voice.

    Wh-What? You mean to tell me that this bratI mean, this young master, is His Majesty Rimuru himself?

    Yes, I''m sure.

    No, no, isnt that crazy!? Isnt he a demon lord? A king who controls such a vast territory is walking around with only one bodyguardjust by usingmon sense there is no way, so how!?

    Hmm, thats also true.

    As Shuna said when we were on our way to Dwargon, we needed to behave in a way that was appropriate for our rank.

    I skipped it because we didnt have much time at the time, but Shuna seemed to be unhappy about it. After all, I should probably be more careful in the future to avoid this kind of thing.

    I know that, but it''s true!

    But I mean, would a demon lord just drop by the reception desk and casually ask, Is Myourmiles-kun here~?You wouldn''t, would you? Right?

    Gabbana makes his case with tears in his eyes.

    If he admits this reality, he will be left with nothing but the fact that he tried to turn a demon lord away. In Gabbana''s position, he would desperately want to deny it.

    The gentleman''s mask is off and he''s showing his true colorsI''m starting to feel sorry for him.

    I''m sorry, okay? It''s not like I''m gonna call my subordinates over now

    At your request, I can call in the stealth force?

    No, I don''t want that! So, Ill just say that Gabbana-san was not at fault this time, and Ill drop the matter. Can you get Myourmiles-kun on it?

    When I suggested this, Gabbana''s face lit up.

    I-Is that okay?

    Wouldn''t that make both of us happier?

    As soon as I said that, tears welled up in Gabbana''s eyes.

    I don''t know how he misunderstood, but he looked at me with sparkling eyes and said, Thank you very much! I will never forget this favor.

    As for me, I felt a little ufortable, because I just wanted to cover up my mistakes as well.

    ***

    While Gabbana was thanking me more than necessary, the receptionist called for Myourmiles.

    With Gabbana and the receptionist bowing us off, we made our way to Myourmiles'' office.

    It was a spacious room on the top floor, with plenty of sunlight and a great view.

    We sat down on the best sofas and enjoyed the view, while quenching our thirst with the juice that had been prepared for us.

    Rimuru-sama, did something happen?

    No, nothing at all.

    Well, that''s good, but perhaps Gabbana has done something rude

    No, no, it''s okay!

    I calmed down the worried Myourmiles and casually changed the subject.

    More importantly, Myourmiles-kun. I heard that you have a portrait of me in your room. What does that mean?

    I asked, keeping my gaze fixed on a point on the wall and maintaining myposure.

    Gweh!? W-Well, that''s

    The painting seems to have been acquired on the ck market. However, not only is the source unknown, but so is the identity of the artist.

    Eh?

    There was one with the appearance of a slime, so it must be the work of someone who knows Rimuru-sama, but even our intelligencework can''t figure it out, so I guess theyre pretty good.

    Eh, wait a minute?

    I mean, isnt this pretty bad?

    So, you''re saying Souei couldn''t track him down even if he investigated?

    I''m afraid so, yes.

    No way

    Since it was during the war, we judged this case to be of low importance. That''s why we couldn''t arrange arge number of personnel.

    I see, that was one of the reasons.

    But still, it''s weird to be used as a model for a painting by someone I don''t know.

    No, no, the reporters of other countries have seen Rimuru-sama. I''m sure some of them have a keen interest keeping the paintings, so isnt that strange?

    Is that so?

    It does bother me that even Souei and the others aren''t sure who it is.

    Well, theres no use thinking about it.

    Then, well confiscate the painting.

    YesE-Eh!?

    I tried to persuade Myourmiles, who was surprised and displeased.

    Or rather, it was already decided.

    Why should I let you disy my portrait? Absolutely not!

    No-No way! That''s high-handed. I don''t even think any tyrant, ancient or modern, would do such a thing!!

    You''re overreacting! I mean, why are you resisting so much? I''ll pay you for the painting, so this is confiscated.

    I said as such and collected the painting from the wall.

    After all, the painting had been so beautified that I felt it was no longer me.

    To put it simply, there was nothing but the image of Shizu-san.

    Beauty and fragility were beautifully expressed.

    I was so excited about hanging Rimuru-sama''s picture here

    Souei patted thementing Myourmiles on the shoulder.

    Huh, it can''t be helped. Then I''ll give this to Myourmiles-dono as well.

    Eh?

    W-Well, that''s

    Myourmiles was surprised.

    The moment we saw the picture, Myourmiles and I had delicate expressions on our faces.

    It was a picture of a slime.

    Hmm

    Hey, good for you, Myourmiles-kun. Take a look at that and give it a try.

    No, no, no, no, that''s not right, what can I say

    Well, it is different.

    I don''t think seeing me in slime form will get you fired up even one millimeter.

    That said, why does Souei have something like that?

    Yes. I confiscated it during our investigation. There were a few other items leaked as well, so we recovered them all.

    Just the slime portraits?

    Yes.

    What''s with the pause?

    NoActually, Diablo took one from me

    What the hell, that bastard!

    I desperately resisted, but I was unable to do anything. I apologize.

    I see, I understand. I''ll make sure to take it back from Diablo and tell him not to bother you.

    Diablo is a problem.

    That bastard thinks too highly of me.

    The problem is that I can''tpletely deny my appearance, because ites from Shizu-san. That is why I can''t allow him to keep in his possession a picture that I don''t even know whose work it is.

    Souei smiled, as if he was relieved by my promise.

    Myourmiles muttered, No, butThen Souei-dono will still keep the painting? But that was probably an unnecessary worry.

    Souei is very popr, so you can rest assured, right?

    When I said that, Myourmiles nodded with a delicate expression.

    We ended the conversation by agreeing to investigate the source of the paintings thoroughly.

    ***

    With only a few hours left until nightfall, we got down to business.

    I''m d to hear that your ns are going well, but what are your ns for the future?

    That''s the thing. I''ve been meaning to ask you about the current situation.

    Well, then shall I tell you?

    No, I''ve been getting flooded with inquiries about that. I''ve invited you to the party today and we''ll have a meeting tomorrow.

    Oh! Impressive, Myourmiles-kun. You''ve got it all nned out.

    Wahaha! Of course!

    We had been talking about the same thing over and over again and I was getting bored. Thanks to Myourmiles, wed be able to do it all at once.

    In that case, Ill just get a report from Myourmiles.

    The n was going well.

    It seems that there was almost no one left to oppose the Three Drunk Sages (Riega) as they took over underground organizations one by one.

    They had also gained the trust of the public, and now there was no end to the number of noblemen from various countries who wanted to join.

    That''s wonderful. You''re doing so well it''s almost scary.

    Indeed, it is. In fact, Veryard-dono''s skill is so great that he''s been expanding his influence in ways I never thought possible. Frankly, he''s better than I am.

    Don''t worry. I remember when Veryard-san took one over me. No wonder Myourmiles-kun thinks he''s lost.

    I hate to admit it, but he''s a monster. I felt like he was reading my thoughts and leading me to wherever Veryard-dono wanted me to go. Perhaps hed be a better representative than me, right?

    I don''t know about that.

    I''m sure he''s an excellent man, but whether or not he should be at the top of the organization is a different story.

    I don''t think so.

    ?

    No, I''m not saying that because I''m good friends with Myourmiles-kun, but because it''s actually the boss''s job to appreciate the hard work of his subordinates. When you''re too good, it''s hard to properly appreciate the achievements of others.

    Hmm, I think I understand what Rimuru-sama is trying to say, but

    Myourmiles was still unconvinced.

    In that case, Id repeat it here. I could haveughed it off, but I thought it would be better to ay these fears in the early stages.

    People have individual differences, and naturally, their abilities vary, don''t they? That''s why bosses are expected to assign tasks to their subordinates ording to their abilities. On the other hand, people who can work on their own tend to finish everything on their own without relying on others.

    Huh

    So, when a person like that reaches the top, there''s a pretty good chance he''ll think he''s the best and the right one.

    Its what they call a one-man boss.

    They are certainly excellent, but some of them take the extreme view that their subordinates should be able to do their jobs and that they are ipetent if they fail.

    Even if the failure is caused by the boss who imposed an unreasonable workload on the subordinate, the boss who thinks he is right may me the subordinate for the failure. Its even worse if its the president.

    There may be no one to point out the problem for fear of being fired, or even if there is, they may not listen to you.

    In this respect, I believed that Myourmiles would be fine.

    Myourmiles may be a bit of a one-man, but he is also humane and has the capacity to ept the failures of his subordinates as his own.

    And in the case of Veryard, he is the type of person who discards ipetence.

    No, I was exaggerating.

    I don''t mean that he is cold-blooded or anything like that, but he is the type of person who only looks at the numbers and does not give preferential treatment to people who are unnecessary to the organization.

    Such a top executive may contribute to the development of the organization, but that is not the kind of organization I am aiming for. I want the people who belong to the organization to experience the joy of being useful to others.

    With the Four Nations Trade Federation being set up so far, there is no need to rush to expand the organization. Even if its slow, I want this to be a trustworthy organization where ones fellow members can rely on one another.

    Rapid growth tends to create dropouts. That''s probably what would happen if Veryard took the top position.

    I told Myourmiles, politely.

    I see, so that was Rimuru-sama''s idea.

    My fears may be unfounded. I don''t mean to say that Veryard-san is a bad person, but I think he tends to put efficiency first because he is capable.

    Well, I can''t deny that. So, my role is to make it easier for the people under Veryard-dono to work, right?

    You''re quick to guess. The top position can be a decoration. But it shouldn''t be empty. If you can be a portable shrine that everyone feels good about carrying, most things will work out!

    This is not absolutely correct, because it is a case-by-case basis. But in this case, I was convinced that Myourmiles was the right choice.

    In the first ce, Myourmiles was also the minister of finance in our country, so he should not work too hard as the representative of the Four Nations Trade Federation.

    He should just reign at the top and assign tasks to his capable subordinates. And it seemed to me that Veryard was better suited to work for someone else than to be at the top himself.

    Therefore, I gave my seal of approval to Myourmiles as a suitable representative, but upon hearing that, Myourmiles startedughing.

    Wahaha! As expected of Rimuru-sama, so very humble!

    ?

    !!

    You idiot! I''m not talking about me, I''m talking about you!!

    Even though I shouted, Myourmiles keptughing for a while.

    ***

    After listening to Myourmiles report, it was time for the party to start.

    We have invited noblemen from all over the world today, so Rimuru-sama will be the center of attention. There will be so many guests that you won''t have time to take a break, what do you think?

    Hmm, thats right

    It''s not good for me to be intimidating.

    Needless to say, it was a bad idea, and I also didnt want to be bothered.

    If that was the case, I shouldn''t have joined the party in the first ce, but today''s party would include Gazel, Youm, and King Drum of the Blumund Kingdom.

    If the representatives of the four countries is Myourmiles, then they are the ones who are the big supporters. We can''t afford not to show our faces.

    Shall I get rid of them myself?

    Souei said so, but with a straight face.

    My instincts told me it would be a bloody scourge if I left it to him.

    N-no, its okay. With my brilliant interpersonal skills, I''ll be able to handle it just fine.

    I seeI understand. Then, I''ll be escorting Rimuru-sama from a short distance away.

    Yeah, do that.

    Okay, that''s a relief.

    This time, violence was strictly forbidden since the group was full of high-ranking people.

    It doesn''t have to be the bigwigs, but if it became an international issue, it wouldnt be just about us.

    My lord, I am here too, so do not worry!

    Ranga emerged from the shadows, asserting himself.

    Yeah, I''m counting on you!

    Love that guy.

    Ranga''s gesture soothed me, and my tension was eased.

    Riding on that momentum, I went to the venue.

    The ninth floor, one floor below, has arge floor n.

    It is designed to be used for various purposes, such as holding meetings with arge number of people, gathering the staff for events, and so on.

    And now, the space has been decorated and turned into a party venue with standing tables.

    By the way, the eighth floor is a cafeteria for the staff, where one can enjoy a meal while looking at the scenery. Coffee and tea are also avable outside of mealtimes, so that business meetings and discussions can be held there.

    The food served at the party was, of course, prepared by our chefs.

    Assorted pickles, various soups, prosciutto, high-grade steaks, meatballs and roast beef, various pastas, takoyaki, yakisoba, okonomiyaki, curry and rice, hamburgershuh?

    There was no ramen, of course, but there was a lot of stuff on the menu that wouldn''t normally be appropriate for a party.

    M-Myourmiles-kun?

    What is it?

    Isn''t this a weird choice of food?

    Is that so? This is the most popr menu from the Monster Kingdom''s cafeteria.

    Uh, well yeah, it is, buthuh?

    No, calm down.

    Perhaps we should''ve made the menu more aristocratic, but there is no need to be bound by convention, right?

    As long as we have the spirit to bring about a new wind, these menus may be the right choice.

    In the first ce, we offered unusual cuisine at the Founding Festival. Rather, some people seemed to be expecting this.

    I see, no problem then.

    Well, I won''tin even if there is a problem!

    Hmm! I like your roughness, Myourmiles-kun. I regretted that I was overthinking things and looked around again to see if there were any other problems.

    Then my eyes met with the man who was in charge of setting up the venue.

    It was Veryard.

    Well, well, Your Majesty Rimuru! Oh, yes, in my current position, would it be eptable if I called you Rimuru-sama?

    He greeted me with a smiling face, and I nodded my head.

    There was nothing wrong with it, but I had bitter memories of Veryard''s smile, so I couldn''t help but be overly cautious.

    This is really noughing matter for Myourmiles.

    However, I think the Blumund Kingdom was more unusual in that it flexibly changed the national system itself.

    It would normally be unthinkable in the real-life world, and even if it were an absolute monarchy, it would be a dream to achieve it without bloodshed. The fact that King Drum aplished it showed me that he was no ordinary person.

    He was a genuine gambler, using his own country as a chip.

    To be honest, I don''t have such courage, so I can only respect him.

    As King Drums sword, Veryard was not to be underestimated.

    Today''s arrangements seem to be very careful and thorough, and I feelfortable entrusting them to Veryard-dono. Please continue to support Myourmiles.

    Of course. Also, please just call me Veryard. My father is the patriarch of my family, which used to be the marquis family, but I n to throw it away without inheriting it.

    Ehis that so!?

    No, the status of the nobility will be shaken in the future, but that''s only for the lower nobility. The Count status is doubtful, but I think the higher nobility of the Marquis family and above will be safe no matter what the situation is.

    Well, it is certain that we will change our name from aristocrats to noblemen 88 and eventually lose power. After all, I''m the one who proposed this to the Drum King.

    So its you!

    I should bemended for swallowing those words.

    Hahaha, what, it''s just the way of the times. Right now, the aristocracy is running the government, but if the people get wise, they will be dissatisfied with the current situation. We need to gradually transfer the authority to them so that when that happens, they won''t be hostile.

    That''s true, but if you''ve never been in politics before, you can''t run a country all of a sudden.

    I replied, and Veryard smirked.

    That''s why I''m going to be amoner now and ept the authority that will be transferred to me.

    Oh, you mean

    It''s not cheating, it''s a race.

    But I understand it''s very logical.

    That strategy would certainly minimizeints from the aristocracy.

    But really, just how far ahead is this guy moving?

    As far as I can tell, he''s as smart as anyone else. So much so that I''m afraid to call him out.

    Myourmiles was also shaking his head, as if stunned.

    I told you so, didn''t I?His eyes seemed to tell me, and I nodded my head in agreement.

    ***

    The party started in an orderly fashion.

    First, Myourmiles, the representative of the party, greeted the guests, and then King Drum made a toast.

    Then the lectures began.

    The important thing here is realizing that it is no good to be rude.

    I don''t need to exin. There are royalty here, so of course it''s wrong.

    Nevertheless, there are always people who cant read the atmosphere, and as soon as we started chatting, a crowd formed around me.

    Even my brilliant interpersonal skills had their limits!

    Its one thing being surrounded by one or two people, but its troublesome if I''m surrounded by more than ten people.

    Your Majesty Rimuru! Please listen to what I have to say!

    We, too, would like to send a diplomat to your country!

    We want to trade with you! Regarding thepletion of the roads

    Hey, you little country, stay out of this!! As for us, my country is close to yours

    Oh great, a guy who cant wait his turn in order. Youre not qualified to be a diplomat!

    I am the crown prince. If you''re talking about order, then rank shoulde first.

    Don''t bring your own authority to another country!

    Do you intend to start a war with my country?

    Well, its all quite noisy.

    There were so manyments that I wanted to respond with an, I don''t know, and there was even an atmosphere that made one feel like starting a fight. It was all giving me a headache. I can''t ignore them, but they are really troublesome to deal with.

    This was beyond my imagination.

    I guess that just shows how important my position has be, but it''s also probably because I was careless.

    Because Gazel isnt being crowded like this.

    Even Youm is proudlyWait no. Is that Myuran guarding you with a smiling face?

    I''m jealous.

    Well, in Youm''s case, he was a sharp-eyed warrior, so I suppose that''s why a refined aristocrat wouldn''t want to get close to him.

    Oh, I wonder if El-tan rarely showed herself because she didnt want to get involved in such amotion.

    She had said that she has them wait for a turn to see her after going through the formalities, so that she wont see them without an appointment. I decided I''d do the same from now on.

    Nevertheless, my first priority now was to deal with this situation.

    As I was pondering what to do, an unexpected person came to my rescue.

    Why don''t you all calm down a bit?

    It was Gabbana, who had interfered with me the first time we met.

    His Majesty Rimuru is the demon lord of the great Jura-Tempest Federation, and our greatest supporter. I understand your desperation, but I ask that you refrain yourselves today!

    Gabbana red at them with a silent pressure, saying Today is a celebration of new beginnings, so we can discuss business at another time.

    The man who had cried in front of me earlier was now very reliable.

    And then there was the reaction of the guests.

    W-Well, well, Gabbana-dono! I''ve heard that you''ve be a member of the federation, and I''m d to see you''re doing well

    Tha-Thats right, I was a bit impatient. It wasnt for nothing if I was able to greet you today, so if youll excuse me

    I''m sorry too. I hope we can meet again at ater date through the formal procedure.

    Those who say this and walk away are still better, but most of them run away as quickly as possible. It wasnt aplimentary attitude, but I didn''t want to make a scene.

    In the first ce, my avability is limited, so Rigurd is the one in charge. Since I only meet with carefully selected people here and there, Im always sifting through a lot of people.

    In the future, I n to follow El-tan''s example and be more strict so that I can try to avoid meeting with troublesome people as much as possible.

    So, its possible that I may never see these people again. With that in mind, I didn''t mind a little rudeness.

    Still, I was impressed with Gabbana.

    Gabbana was keeping a close eye on me at a distance. Thanks to him, I was able to enjoy the party calmly.

    ***

    Now that I was free to move around, I looked around at the other guests.

    I had already made arrangements with Gazel and Youm in advance, so there was no need to go out of my way to greet them. They would be present at the meeting tomorrow, so if they had anything important to say, they could say it there.

    Today, I just have to broaden my knowledge.

    That''s why I''m going to make small talk with people I''m interested in.

    I looked around for someone, and there she was!

    She''s so beautiful that everyone was turning to look at her.

    Who is it?

    Yes, it''s Hinata!!

    Hinata was wearing a dress with the back wide open.

    It was jet-ck like a dark night, and studded with jewels like stars.

    However, it is not the dress that was noteworthy, but Hinata''s own sexiness.

    Hinata''s hair is short, so the bare skin from the nape of her neck to her waist is fully visible. A ribbon was tied around her neck, but even that entuated Hinata''s sex appeal.

    Her pure white skin was dazzling against the ck dress.

    No, it was too bright!!

    It seems to be called a backless dress. I don''t know who thought of it, but it''s a wonderful design.

    I''m saving it in my brain.

    No, I''d rather have Ciel-san record this video

    There is no such function

    No, no, there is, right?

    You showed me the information inside thebyrinth with vivid images.

    This is not inside thebyrinth, so the recorded images are inessible

    You''re joking, right!?

    You can definitely do it!

    You were even saving the battle records of thebyrinth monsters for us to reviewter. It''s the same thing, just a little more

    Negative. Need not recognized

    Why are you responding so mechanically?

    Damn it! You''re such an unreliable partner at these critical moments, seriously.

    It couldnt be helped, so I asked my slime cells to do their best, and spoke to Hinata with a smile.

    Hello, Hinata-san. You look beautiful again today. That dress looks really good on you!

    Hinata was sipping her wine, put it on the table and turned to me. Then she opened her mouth, her gaze sharp and suspicious.

    Huh? You''re a tterer now, aren''t you?

    No, I''m not! I''m serious. Its not ttery!

    I''m not very good atplimenting people on things I don''t mean, so I''m being half truthful.

    And yet, Hinata snickered and didn''t take it seriously.

    I couldn''t let the conversation end there.

    Thinking that way, I desperately tried to repeat myself.

    Anyway, you really are bold. I don''t mean to be rude, but I didn''t think Hinata would wear a dress that aggressive.

    She red at me.

    I gulped and swallowed the rest of my words.

    Uh-oh. I feel like I''m bing less and less likable.

    If you think it''s rude, then maybe you shouldn''t say it.

    I''m sorry, you''re right!

    I shouldn''t have crossed her. An apology was the only option.

    Hinata''s eyes zed over.

    I''m getting impatient.

    That''s when I sensed the aroma of wine.

    Hinata''s sigh was endlessly sexy.

    The back view was also sexy, but the front view was already nosebleed-inducing.

    The dress was neck-length, but sleeveless, so there was nothing to hide her white shoulders. And most importantly, from side to side

    What are you looking at? Im gonna kill you.

    I''m sorry.

    Failure, a failure.

    I forgot I was in human form and stared at her.

    In that case, theyd know by looking at me.

    Im just grateful my body cant have nosebleeds.

    Ruminas insisted I wear this, Hinata said.

    Nice work, Ruminas!

    I''d like to give you a big thumbs up.

    I can picture Ruminas with a smug look on her face, and I respect her for it.

    While inwardly leaping to praise Ruminas, I kept a cool expression on my face.

    Hmm, you''re right. Ruminas is right. Because you really look beautiful today.

    I say so with a crisp expression.

    I am not afraid of Hinata''s stare because I really mean it.

    No, thats a lie. The truth is, I was really scared.

    Not that again

    Covering Hinata''s dumbfounded words with my lipsit would have been perfect if I could have imitated something like that, but one wrong move and it wouldn''t have been sexual harassment. I''d be a sexual predator, and I''m a chicken-hearted person, so I didn''t have the courage to go that far.

    Thats why I told her in sincere words, It''s true!

    Then I saw Hinata''s cheeks turn red.

    I got this!

    I''m the best today.

    Its only because shes drunk

    Hm?

    I turned my attention to the wine that Hinata was drinking.

    What? Isn''t this a bit high in alcohol?

    Is that so? It''s really good.

    Does Hinata have a surprisingly low tolerance for alcohol?

    She doesn''t look like it, but that''s what Ciel-san says

    I''ve always been interested in her sex appeal, so I wanted to know how she was doing in that area.

    I held up three fingers and asked Hinata.

    How many fingers am I holding up?

    Do you think I''m stupid?

    No, no, no, Id never do that

    As I hurriedly denied it, Hinata let out a big sigh.

    You know, I''m still a Saint, right? I''ve traveled with Chloe, and Ruminas has taught me a lot since I came back to life, so I can detoxify alcohol if I want to!

    Can it be that you tricked me, Ciel-san!?

    If that''s the case, you''re right.

    Let''s just say that after that, it was very difficult to calm down the angry Hinata.

    So, time went by without me having time to ask why Hinata''s cheeks were so red.

    ***

    It was the day after the party.

    After the lunch break, the meeting began.

    The participants

    The first five were the rulers of the countries supporting the Four Nationsmyself, Gazel, Youm, Myuran, and King Drum.

    All of us had already reached a consensus regarding this topic, so this time, wed only be participating for approval.

    Next was Myourmiles, who was nominated as a representative by the four of us excluding Myuran, and Hinata who was representing the Western Saints Church.

    From the Western States Council, there was the chairman himself. I think his name was Lester. As always, he had a bushy white beard.

    The rest were carefully selected members from various countries, about thirty total, all gathered in the conference room.

    Veryard also participated as a secretary.

    Cien stepped forward as the moderator.

    Ladies and gentlemen, I would like to thank you all from the bottom of my heart for taking time out of your busy schedules to join us here today. Well then, let us begin at once. Allow me to start by exining the crisis that will ur in the near future.

    And with that, Cien began his exnation.

    The purpose of today''s meeting is exactly what Myourmiles wanted to hear yesterday.

    The existence of a definite enemy and their goals.

    The anticipated effects of the war and how we should deal with them.

    The participants were carefully selected in order to avoid fear due to panicking.

    No amount of crying or screaming would change the reality, so we needed to take optimal action as much as possible. In order to do this, the leader must never be flustered, but that was easier said than done.

    So first, lets move on to the exnation

    I have given the same exnation many times, so I was grateful to Myourmiles for arranging this asion.

    Cien''s exnation ended.

    And so, Demon Lord Rimuru-sama has won the war against the Empire, but a new enemy, Michael, has emerged.

    Chancellor Lester muttered, followed by the senators from the various countries.

    And this Michael is leading the angels?

    It''s the Tenma Great War. I didn''t think the 500-year cycle of disasters would happen in during lifetime

    Hearing that, I decided to add something to the conversation to avoid any misunderstanding.

    I raised my hand to speak.

    Well, as Ive just exined, the enemy''s goal is to revive Veldanava. We can only specte on the method, not prove it. And most importantly, we don''t know exactly when. We think it will be soon, but Michael is a long-lived species. It could be tomorrow, it could be in a few years, and it could even be in a few decades.

    That was the most troubling part.

    We didnt know when it would happen.

    For the time being, if there was any movement, we would know it from Dino''s daily report. The uracy of that information would be shared with Obera via Milim for confirmation.

    So far, Michael had not moved.

    It was eerie, but there was nothing we could do about it, so we left it alone.

    In that case, it was important to keep vignce against the enemy who may attack at any moment, but we would still have to continue our daily activities

    It had been the same in Japan. The rate of urrence of a major subduction zone earthquake within 10 years was 60 percent, and within 30 years it was as high as 99 percent, but that was just how we lived our daily lives.

    In order not to be troubled when something happens, we should prepare in advance. Then, we should cherish our daily lives, I guess.

    In fact, I was more afraid of volcanoes than earthquakes, but that''s because they were natural disasters that were impossible to deal with.

    It was said that if a huge caldera eruption urred on Mount Aso, it would have caused catastrophic damage. It was also called a catastrophic eruption, and there would have been no escape from it in Japan.

    Some parts of Hokkaido might have been safe, but there was no doubt that Japan would be destroyed.

    That was a hypothetical story

    Even if it was predicted, and the government had said that it would happen within a year, it would still be doubtful

    It would be doubtful that it would actually happen, and there would be no escape n even if one wanted to believe it.

    There was no country that would ept all of Japans citizens, and it was also doubtful that people could escape to other countries one by one.

    Of course, if the prediction were 100% certain, the government would do everything they can, but if the political system was different, it was unlikely to be epted, and in the end, only those who can rely on their own contacts would be able to escape.

    I also think that somewhere in the back of my mind, there was the thought that if something happens, then we''ll talk about it when it happens. It was better to live happily every day rather than to worry too much and live in fear every day.

    It doesn''t mean that the ce you escape to would be absolutely safe, but I guess you could think of it as a natural disaster because there''s no point in thinking of it otherwise.

    There is a saying, Do your best and wait for your destiny, meaning that it is better to do the best you can in the moment to live like a human being.

    Therefore, I want people to cherish their daily lives while preparing for Michael''s attack at any time. That is why I only want the leadership to know about this fact. I hope you will cooperate with us with that in mind.

    I concluded my remarks.

    Everyone was silent as I spoke.

    Some of them groaned loudly.

    After tens of seconds had passed without anyone speaking, Hinata broke the silence.

    The Western Saints Church pledges its full support.

    Hinata''s statement was followed by Chancellor Lester.

    Well, that makes sense. The development ns being hurriedly carried out by the Western nations were preparations for that, weren''t they?

    Cien nodded in agreement.

    That is correct. Everything is as Rimuru-sama wills it.

    In addition toying the rails for the magic train, the construction of the e station building was also underway. The station was then expanded to provide an evacuation site for the residents of the surrounding area.

    During normal times, the building could be used as a gymnasium, an auditorium, or for various other purposes.

    I was going use this asion to ask them to hold evacuations drill for the local residents. But before I could say anything else, Chairman Lester spoke up.

    The important thing is to prepare in advance, which makes sense. I understand. I personally do not have the authority to interfere in the policies of other countries, but I can suggest evacuation drills as a possible solution. I''d be happy to help.

    Indeed. I am only a member of the council, but back home I am a marquis. I will advise the king and have my people trained.

    That''s very good. I will cooperate!

    The councilors also agreed.

    It was much quicker than I expected.

    It was probably because they had been carefully selected and there were no fools who would argue here.

    Or rather, Myourmiles said that the meeting would be held in a small group so that this would happen. The reason is that arge group of people would not be able to reach a consensus on such an important decision. The idea was to persuade a small group of powerful people first, and then let the remaining members persuade the others individually.

    It can be said that his n was sessful.

    Still, it was unclear how the council would vote on this, but about that

    Hohoho. Your Majesty Rimuru seems to be worried about the council''s decision, but you can rest assured, because there is no one who can stand against Testarossa-dono.

    Huh?

    Hahaha, that is true. Your life is more important than your own interests. Whether it''s a matter of life and death for your country, or if it''s a matter of whether or not to train your people to evacuate, you should obey the voice of Testarossa-dono.

    Correct. This is not a matter I want to fight to get my opinion across.

    Yes. Since this is beneficial to us as well, I think it will pass unanimously.

    The reaction of the senators was not what Myourmiles and I had expected.

    It almost felt like there was no need to be cautious exin in advance.

    Well, I guess I was wrong about that, too. I''ve never met her, but Testarossa seems to be quite the remarkable person.

    Veryard was impressed.

    The eyes of the senators looking at Veryard were warm.

    I dont know if they were being kind, or envious

    Huh, aren''t you all a little too careless? I am Testarossa-sama''s loyal servant, despite my appearance. I am obligated to report on this meeting, so please do not forget that.

    Cien was the one who interrupted, but when the senators heard him, they fell into a panic.

    It''s a misunderstanding! Please believe me!!

    I didn''t mean any disrespect, I was just praising her leadership

    I''m telling the truthOh! Ahh! Glory to Testarossa-sama!!

    I don''t know what to say about thest guy, but his emotions and desperation were palpable. I hadn''t expected Testarossa to be feared so much, so I was surprised.

    Cien, stop bullying everyone.

    I said, rebuking theughing Cien.

    And it seems that Veryard had also realized Testarossa''s menace with just this exchange.

    Hmm, I thought we should meet once, but Testarossa-dono seems to be busy, so let''s not. So, are we done with the meeting for today?

    And just like that, he moved aside without stepping into the minefield.

    His ability to foresee danger was something to learn from, and I acknowledged Veryard''s excellence once again.

    ***

    The meeting was over, but I remembered that I had one more thing to tell everyone.

    Oh, yes. I heard from Testarossa that Masayuki, who became the Emperor of the East, wants to establish a cooperative rtionship with the West. He wants to join the Western States Council, so what do you say?

    This was reported on the ''Telepathy Net'' just before I came here.

    I told them in a light-hearted way, but most of them stopped moving as if in shock.

    Wha?

    They all turned to look at me, their eyes wide open.

    The only ones who werent surprised were Gazel, Youm, Myourmiles, and Cien, whom I had exined to beforehand.

    I hadn''t even told King Drum yet, and he was just as shocked as Veryard. Its a secret, but I was a little satisfied to see his surprised face, which was so rarely seen.

    But it seems that what I said was a bigger bomb than I had thought it would be.

    I didn''t hear about that!

    I just told you.

    Did you know, King Gazel?

    Hm, I was consulted, but I havent heard any details. I didn''t even know they were that far along.

    Oh, so Gazel knew?

    No, we have discussed the hopes for that to happen, but havent talked about any specifics, including dates and times

    That may have been the case.

    There was a bit of a timingpse, but since I have a cell phone, I probably should have told him.

    I was going to meet him today anyway, so I had thought I''d exin it there. But it wasnt convenient, so I just decided to announce it here and now.

    So, Youm didn''t know about it either, right?

    Yeah, I didnt hear about it.

    Then why aren''t you surprised?

    Oh. If I became surprised every time the Boss did something like this, I wouldnt be able to survive.

    I feel like I was just dissed in a grand way.

    Myuran, who was listening beside him, put her hand on his head, but she didn''t say anything, so I guess she must have agreed with him.

    In that case, the staresing everyone are a little painful.

    Im appalled. Why do you always have to talk about important things as if they''re nothing?

    Hinata''s stare was painful.

    We-Well, even if you say that

    I couldn''t help but use honorifics 89 . Could it be that this was my fault?

    I had been so preupied with the battle against Michael that I thought it was only natural for the Empire to take a cooperative stance.

    We had been supporting them so that theyd be in line with us. I didn''t expect everyone to be this surprised, because it was only natural for this to happen.

    You don''t seem to be remorseful.

    Guah!?

    Wait a minute, Hinata-san! You knew that our country and the Empire were at war, right? We won, so we exercised our rights as the victorious nation and decided to cooperate from now on. That would inevitably lead cooperation with the West!

    I blurted out my excuses in a spirited manner.

    However, Hinata''s eyes did not stop staring.

    Well, you know.

    I''m not wrong, but I might have made a mistake in not telling them.

    It''s not like I didn''t have any means ofmunication, and saying I was busy was no excuse.

    In that case, I was at fault, too.

    I was about to give an apologybut suddenly, Veryard nodded deeply and offered me a helping hand.

    You are quite right. This is not His Majesty Rimurus fault, but rather ours for not asking for the details.

    You understand, you do understand, Veryard-kun!

    As expected of the smartest man I know, I couldn''t ask for a better ally.

    Hinata and Veryard re at each other.

    Hinata is the one who breaks.

    Well, yes. It only took a little thought to realize that Rimuru would do what was best for us. It''s just

    Just?

    It''s just that, given themon sense of those of us who live in the western economic sphere, it''s hard to believe that an empire thats been our enemy since ancient times would behave in such a way. It''s just that our preconceptions were too big to consider this possibility

    Hinata looked frustrated.

    It wasnt hard to understand.

    It''s like a superpower that had been hostile for such a long time was suddenly offering to reconcile.

    I suppose one should first be skeptical, but the fact that it came from me, the victor, was significant.

    There was little risk in simply building a cooperative rtionship, and at a time when the Great War was about to begin, it would be foolish for humans to go to war with each other.

    Your Majesty Rimuru, I would like to ask you

    What is it?

    I encourage the questioner, Chancellor Lester, to speak.

    The discussion with the Empire, where will it take ce? And one more thing, when you referred to the Imperial Emperor as Masayuki, are you referring to Masayuki-dono the Shining?

    Chancellor Lester was excited.

    The second question caused a louder buzz than the first. I realized that I hadn''t exined myself well enough, as the others were getting excited too.

    Well, the meeting is in the Ingracia Kingdom. He said he would like to attend the next council meeting if possible, as soon as possible. And to answer your second question, Lester, you are correct. My friend, Chosen Hero Masayuki, was recently crowned as Emperor.

    As soon as I said that, the conference room erupted in apuse.

    That''s great! As expected of Masayuki-sama!

    Yes, how wonderful! Now we can avoid war.

    I don''t know how this is possible, but I guess anything is possible with Masayuki-sama!

    You''re right! Even the Evil Empire was not an enemy of Masayuki-sama!!

    And all hell broke loose.

    I had heard of the coronation of the new Emperor, but I had no idea it was Masayuki-dono

    Even Chancellor Lester was in tears, but this reaction was unexpected.

    Somehow, I think I''ve done Masayuki a disservice

    Theres no such thing as a space opera story where a Chosen Hero overthrows the Empire!

    Of course, if you think about it normally, it''s impossible for an individual to overthrow a country. The fact that they can believe that such a thing has taken ce shows that they have a ridiculous amount of faith in Masayuki.

    But now that it''s happened, there''s nothing I can do.

    Well, that''s the way it is. I don''t know the details, so you''ll have to ask him yourself.

    With that said, I threw all the trouble onto Masayuki, who knew nothing about the situation.

    In this way, the n to implement the evacuation drills was shared, and it was decided that the new Emperor of the Eastern Empire would be present at the next council meeting.

    ***

    So thats how Ive spent thest five months.

    There have been a few small mistakes, but the preparations have proceeded steadily.

    The next council meeting is scheduled for two weeks from now in Ingracia, and the consensus between Masayuki and the council leaders is sound. In effect, the Empire''s ession is expected to be approved.

    It was safe to say that Testarossa would take care of that.

    On the surface, the unification of humanity has been achieved.

    The demon lord''s forces are well prepared.

    Now, we just have to hope that the enemy''s strength is not greater than expected

    As I was thinking this, I suddenly received a call from Dino.

    Ah, its Dino, can you hear me?

    Of course I can. So, has there been any movement?

    It wasnt in the morning, so I''m pretty sure something had happened.

    Hmm, I''d say there was, so I''ll keep in touch for the time being. But there are so many things to say, and it''s difficult to decide where to start

    Huh?

    He was talking in an iprehensible manner, but I was sure that something had happened.

    The peaceful daily life came to an end as soon as I heard the news.

    Notes:

    [59]

    In Japanese, it says that he Immediately contacted him and nailed him to the wall. But I changed it to make more sense in english.

    [60]

    Other trantions are honesty, trustworthiness, candor, etc.

    [61]

    Is remorseful or regretful are other trantions.

    [62]

    MTL had it as Mainly, me.

    [63]

    He probably means the Walpurgis.

    [64]

    This trantion was a bit tricky for me. I think that  (romanized as tentongkaku in the MTLs which made no sense) is simr to the Tstenkaku () which is a real tower in Osaka, Japan. Based on the Chinese characters, other trantions can be Tower Reaching Heaven or Sky Reaching Pavilion. For me, the Heavenward Pavilion sounded the best, and is what Ill be using until actual trantors decide otherwise.

    [65]

    All of the MTLs were confusing. Sajikagen () is a Japanese idiom for making adjustments based on skill/feel. However, it is also the noun for manners of seasoning. In the next few paragraphs, they start talking about music as if its like cooking/seasoning, so it was hard for me to tell which trantion to use.

    [66]

    The word used for these three was Taikomochi (). Taikomochi are also known as male geishas, but in this context, they are referred to by the less formal form meaning jester/drummer/drumbeater or someone who tters.

    [67]

    In Japanese, it says his temples were streaked in blue which Im assuming are the veins.

    [68]

    or Daimon = Big/Great Gate.

    [69]

    I brought up in V17, but here is a reminder. This is a Japanese acronym, but it doesnt corrte in English. The Three Drunk Sages are called the Sankensui or the Riega (no kanji) in Japanese, so the Ri from Rimuru, the E from Elmesia, and the Ga from Gard (Myourmiles)bine to create the Riega.

    [70]

    Another trantion might be, there are so many things to lose if I dont do anything.

    [71]

    Fuzakeru na can also mean dont mess around/dont be silly, but it also means fuck off of stop fucking around if used in an aggressive manner like Leon is using with Rimuru.

    [72]

    A Maip?se (Mai ) or a My pace type of person, is someone who goes at their own pace, doing their own thing, at their own time/schedule. Basically, they do whatever they want and the world revolves around what they think''my pace. Its a Japanese term not really found in English.

    [73]

    Just as Elmesia uses the hi at the end of Rimurus nickname to give it a cutesy feel, Rimuru does the same thing with her. He calls her El-tan. The -tan part gives off the childlike/cutesy feeling like with hi.

    [74]

    Not 100% sure, but I think that Gokatotsu () roughly trantes to something like the Five Flower sh/Strikes.

    [75]

    Specifically, the Yaezakura is a cherry blossome with more than 5 petals)

    [76]

    He uses informal honorifics (omae) when speaking with Gadra. It ismon in Asian culture to refer to the elderly with a formal tone.

    [77]

    Rimuru actually says Yes in English for this sentence. I~esu

    [78]

    Youm refers to Rimuru as Danna. It can also mean Sir or Master in this situation.

    [79]

    A botton toilet is an old style of Japanese toilet. Example: /en/3d-model/Japanese-Old-Toilet-Botton-Type-C/4563565/

    [80]

    Rimuru-heika = His Majesty Rimuru

    [81]

    Grucius calls Myuran with no honorifics which is something that people only do when they are very close.

    [82]

    Sonshi () can refer to a guru or a holy master who is like a religious/spiritual leader.

    [83]

    Pochi is a generic Japanese name for a dog (kind of like Fido). His title is basically calling him a little errand dog.

    [84]

    Kager () = Heat Haze. They also called it Yen. So feel free to refer to this as Kager, or Yen, as well. Im here getting One Piece vibes

    [85]

    Byakko Seiryugeki.

    [86]

    Kyuubi Senkougeki

    [87]

    Maka () or  could mean a variety of things that Im not 100% sure of. Ma can either mean devil/demon or magic depending on how you look at it. And the Ka can mean -ification or reinforced or made of, or a bunch of other things. Perhaps its a way of saying Magic Made ss or something. Or its just a pun because Maka sounds like Micah.

    [88]

    From Kizoku to Kazoku. I think this is implying that the nobility is going to change from pure blood nobility, to inherited nobility. But theres no good way to trante this in English.

    [89]

    Rimuru started speaking more formally.

 Volume 18 - Ch 3

    The time goes back. Kagali, who was taken from the battlefield by Feldway, regained consciousness just as Lieutenant Kondou was killed in battle. This was the result of being freed from control. But the ce was a different world that Kagali had no knowledge of.

    (What''s going on? What''s going on?)

    Kagali tried to grasp the situation. Then she saw a familiar face.

    "Dino .. . "

    "Hey! You''re awake, Kazaream. That means this Kondou guy is dead."

    "You, you''re aware.. Oh, so your boss told you."

    Kagali was surprised to hear Dino call her by a name she had abandoned, but her gaze wandered to where she found Yuuki. He was sittingfortably in his chair, but his expression was nk. In other words, he judged that Yuuki, like Kagali, was under the control of someone. Kagali instantly realized that it would not be surprising if Yuuki''s mouth had revealed her true identity.

    "Well. I don''t know much about what happened to you, but to be honest, I''m more interested in your appearance."

    Dino said, looking at the current Kagali, who looked nothing like Demon Lord Kazaream.

    (He''s still so aloof and unpredictable.)

    Kagali thought while releasing her tension.

    Actually, Kagali did not have enough fighting ability now. He may be Over A rank, but in the eyes of the real monsters, he is a small fish. Dino''s ability was unknown, but it was obvious that he was no match for him. Therefore, Kagali thought of the best move he could make at the moment. In other words, he was gathering information.

    "So, where are we? "

    Dino replied in a cryptic manner.

    "You know you''re in another world, right? This is a special ce, a ce of beginnings, adjacent to all worlds but isted from them, the Heavenly Star Pce."

    The name was unfamiliar.

    But it was filled with words of great importance.

    The ce of beginning. . No, the birthce of Veldanava, the Star King Dragon. The ce of beginnings, said to have existed before the creation of all worlds. A ce of beginnings before the creation of all worlds.

    It was said to exist, but no one had ever even seen it yet.

    "How did you.. "

    "To get here, you need a key to get through the gate, but I didn''t know what that was. But now that you''ve brought me here, I understand. I''m not going to tell you, though."

    Kagali was annoyed, but remembered that Dino was a man who did not like to waste time. If you won''t tell me, then you won''t tell me anything, no matter what Kagali does. Then all he had to do was ask something else.

    "I won''t force you, just answer what you can tell me."

    "You''re a pain in the ass.

    "We''ve known each other a long time. Why not? Yeah.

    "Damn it, what''s in it for me? No.

    "I know I''ve done a lot of work for you, but. ."

    Before Kagali could finish, Dino straightened up.

    "What do you want to know? If I ask you that, you''ll forget about the past, right? "

    "Yes, of course I will."

    Kagali smiled at him.

    Dino was still the same. Kagali was relieved to hear that, despite the iprehensible situation.

    "Our boss, Yuuki Kagurazaka, why is he still in control? You just said that Kondou is dead. . No way!"

    "You''re really quick to guess, aren''t you? I know you''re probably right, so there''s no point in answering, but I''ll tell you. You were ruled by Kondou, but your

    Yuuki is ruled by the same person who lent Kondou the power."

    "I knew it. . . . "

    It was a fact that he didn''t want to believe that there was a being who could lend him the power to control others.

    But Dino wouldn''t lie to me like this. He is the type of person who doesn''t talk if he doesn''t want to, so his information is more truthful. Yuuki is under the control of a supernatural being that nullifies all skills, but the power to break through it is nothing but fear. I want to get Yuuki back to normal in order to escape from this ce, but I have no idea how to do that. Then. .

    "Where are my beautiful children? "

    "You mean the ones standing behind you? "

    Kagali turned around in a panic. There was no sign of them, but that was to be expected. She was in Killing Mode, just following my orders.Kagali thought to herself that she had been in a hurry even though she thought she was calm. Then, she released the order and returned Tear and Footman to their original positions.

    Incidentally, there were nine unfamiliar undead elves standing in the line, but that was none of Kagali''s concern. At least, I have a vague memory of the time when I was under their control. I remember that I was ordered to use the forbidden spell

    "Birth Day", so it must have been created by that. However, it was not Kagali''s will, and she had no attachment to the people who gave birth to her.

    "Oh, Chairman! You''re all right, aren''t you!, I was so worried about you! "

    "Ho-ho-ho-ho. Tear''s right. Chairman, did the boss help you? "

    "No, he didn''t. Besides, there''s no point in hiding it so I''ll tell you right now, the situation sucks."

    Kagali said, informing them of the situation as well. Dino didn''t care that he was left alone, and fell asleep.

    "Well, it''s because we''re not good enough, isn''t it?

    "That''s not true, Tear. Even the boss was dominated, so I''m sure we couldn''t resist no matter how hard we tried."

    "Then what are you going to do? Are you going to obey? "

    "Since there are no guards, can''t we escape? "

    Footman asks, Tear gives her opinion.

    Kagali''s face is dark as she answers.

    "That''s the problem, isn''t it? As much as we''d like to escape, we''re talking about a Heavenly Star Pce in another world. You can''t escape by magic."

    Actually, Kagali had already tried elemental magic: Warp Portal. If there was any sign of sess, he intended to take Tear, Footman, and Yuki and escape.

    However, since the coordinates of the current location were unknown, the spell did not work.

    (It was fortunate that I was able to break her control, but she saw right through me that I couldn''t do anything with that I''m sorry.) It''s a shame, but I guess it''s the truth. It''s true, there are no guards. But that''s because Kagali and the others were thought to be inescapable.

    "Dino."

    "Oh, god. What, just when people are about to take a nice nap. You still have questions? "

    "I don''t suppose you could answer them, but is there any way we can get out of here? "

    "Do you think there is? "

    "I. . . . No."

    "Do you? I''ve always appreciated your quick thinking. So, you''d better stop wasting your time and be quiet."

    The result was as I expected, but I was stuck with it.

    The Heavenly Star Pce is a very small t world. It exists within the inner surface of a sphere, with the lower half being the earth and the upper half being the sky.

    Less than a hundred square kilometers in size, it has only a temperate climate with no four seasons and a beautiful chalk castle. But it was perfect.

    The flowers do not wither, the fruit does not rot, the water is clean, and the earth is moist. Therefore, there were always fields of flowers in full bloom, and the sparse trees bore sweet-smelling heavenly fruits.

    In this world where time seemed to have stopped, there was no sense of change.

    Kagali and the others were waiting in the garden in a gazebo. From there, they could see the whole castle and, on the other side, the huge gate at the edge of the world. There was no sign of anyoneing out of the castle.

    But with the gates closed, it seemed clear that escape from this world was impossible. Therefore, Kagali was not discouraged by Dino''s answer and tried to think of a countermeasure calmly. However, someone came out of the castle to interrupt him.

    He was a man with a muscr physique and a fearless face.

    He had a strong, muscr physique and a fearless face. He seemed to be emitting a gushing spirit from his body, which indicated that he was very strong.

    "Dino-sama, you''re in trouble. How can a man of your stature be so friendly to such a group of people?" The man looked down on Kagali and the others in a very natural manner. Kagali was annoyed by this person, but put up with it for the time being.

    Kagali is a cautious person.

    "Gnome, was it? From the looks of it, it seems you''ve sessfully incarnated."

    "Yes! The body of a man named Vega was a very good catalyst. His regenerative powers are high, and at this rate, I''m sure the others and Dhalis-sama will be able to incarnate as well."

    "That''s good to know."

    Dino replied, looking uninterested.

    Kagali, unaware of the situation, listened to the conversation in silence.

    Vega seems to be one of the heads (bosses) of Cerberus, Vega of Power.

    (Vega is a catalyst?) Kagali had a vague memory of their visit to this ce together.

    (Vega is a catalyst? Perhaps as a substitute for incarnation? No, that''s certainly possible. The man is a product of Rosso''s research, a wizard inquisitor. He''s a monster who can recover from any injury as long as he''s fed.) In other words, even if an arm was cut off, it would grow back, and in fact, there was even an experiment that showed that if only the neck remained, it would revive. This is where the horrifying partes in: even the cut off part of the body tried to return to human form as a monster with no ego. That was why Yuki had strictly ordered Vega to collect her limbs if they were cut off.

    But you see. It seems that this Gnome guy took advantage of Vega''s trait to get an empty body. Why did he need a body in the first ce? What is its true identity? Does it mean it needs to incarnate, demon? No, it''s an angel, judging from this holy sign. That would certainly be more powerful than possessing a human or a monster.

    Kagali thinks fast.

    She''s lost most of her fighting ability, but her mind is still intact. And we''vee to a rough conclusion. This man, Gnome, is an angel, or some kind of spirit life form. And that he incarnated to invade the earth. Vega is being used as a catalyst to create flesh. They may be alive, but they are not in a position to move.

    This wasrgely correct, except that Gnome''s race was phantom. They had strengthened their pseudomorphic bodies with magicule by fusing them with Vega''s cells. In this way, the Gnomes had seeded inplete incarnation by taking in matter. The substances they took in were proteins and carbohydrates collected from the ground. In other words, all you have to do is eat. It was a different method from that of undead elf, but it was more convenient for the Gnomes, who were semi-mental life forms. By the way, this Gnome is one of Zrio''s subordinates. He had been left out of Ramiris''sbyrinth attack and was staying at home.

    Then Feldway returned with Vega and the others, and ordered Gnome to incarnate. Zrio and the others returned at the right time and met with Dino and the others.

    With the sess of Gnome as an experiment, the others began to incarnate.

    That is why Gnome was the first one toe out. Gnome, a former Sorone, is now a high-ranking subordinate "general" level phantom. Because of his sessful incarnation, he was now able to exert more power than the Demon Lord Seed.

    From the perspective of Gnome, Kagali, who was almost the same as a human, was nothing more than a speck of dust.

    So, naturally, he would speak from above.

    "Kagali, right? You''re just tools to increase our strength. You seem to have regained your free will after the death of Kondou, who was more or less a useful tool, but don''t get carried away. The Dino-sama here are not like you! "

    "Hey, stop it right there.

    "No, Dino-sama! Isn''t Dino-sama a pir of the great Seven Primordial Angels? It is too merciful of you to speak so casually with these people! "

    "That''s why Kazaream and I are old acquaintances.

    "My name is Kagali now. Can you call me that from now on? "

    "I''d say it''s a pain in the ass to remember, but it''s nice to have a shorter name. All right, Kagali."

    Unlike her previous incarnation as a man, Kagali is now a beautiful woman.

    The name change didn''t feel out of ce, and Dino epted it easily.

    Ignoring Gnome, Dino and Kagali had a friendly conversation.This irritated Gnome.

    Gnome''s master is a former kelp named Dhalis. A noble man with great fighting skills, he was Zrio''s second-inmand. What even Dhalis cannot match is the supreme being, the Firstborn. Like the Gnomes, it did not acquire its name recently. They were created and named by the god Veldanava himself. They were great seraphim who had been destroying demons since the beginning. To Gnome, they were like gods, and Kagali''s attitude was unbearable. Even if Dino himself allowed it, it would affect Zrio''s status if left unchecked. Thinking so, Gnome finally decided to use force.

    "I told you not to get carried away!

    He fired a psychic bullet at Kagali, who was sitting on a chair.

    Dino did not move. He didn''t need to.

    "Ho-ho-ho-ho. Is the long story over? But you''re the one who''s rude to the Chairman!"

    "Yeah, yeah, that''s right! Do it, Footman! "

    Kagali''s dearest friends and loyal clowns are ready to take on Gnome. .

    The battle became one-sided and fierce.

    The Gnome was originally a phantom that had been at war with insectar as a force under Zrio''smand. Although he has just gained a body, he does not feel any difort. On the contrary, its fighting ability has increased. Its existence value exceeded one million. On top of that, in order to fill up his empty body, the magicule amount is currently increasing. Against Gnome, who is in great shape, is Footman, who has a higher fighting ability than yman. His intelligence is low, but his power is unmatched. His existence value had reached one hundred and thirty thousand, and now that the restriction had been lifted, his power was iparable to when he had fought Geld.

    "Boom!"

    Footman punched Gnome while shouting this.

    "Gpaaaaah!"

    Gnome''s face caved in, and he was blown away.

    "Ho-ho-ho. I''ming for you! Gnome.

    He pursued Gnome with no fanfare, hitting him, hitting him, hitting him. He grabs Gnome''s legs, swings him around and throws him into the air, causing Footman to jump. He bounces back, gains momentum, and uses his own body like a cannonball to plunge into Gnome''s back.

    "GOBOO!"

    He then grabs Gnome and ms him into the ground. Footman''s weight was on top of Gnome''s back, and he was about to crush the earth. Footman is not very intelligent, but he has a good sense ofbat. If Gnome had gotten Vega''s cells, it would regenerate after being torn or injured. He instinctively knows that such attacks are meaningless, so he fights by umting damage and depriving himself of stamina. Gnome was puzzled by Footman, who was much stronger than he had imagined.

    I''m a phantom general. How could I, the general of the phantom, be inferior to such a nameless fellow?

    The incarnation has greatly increased my fighting ability. And yet, I was losing to him.

    Gnome was baffled by this fact.

    "What the hell is wrong with you?

    "Me? I''m Footman. I''m the Footman of the Angry Pierrot, a Moderate Clown

    Troupe. Please, make my acquaintance! "

    Footman bowed condescendingly and said his name politely. This rxed attitude struck a nerve with Gnome. And then there was Tear.

    "I''ll say my name too! I''m Tear. I''m Tear from Teardrop, one of the Moderate Clown Troupe! After Footman, you''ll have to y with me! "

    She''s saying it in a cute way, but she''s not hiding his evil intentions.

    Although not as powerful as Footman, this Tear is also quite strong. Her existence value is a little over a million, and her Unique Skill was a vicious trump card.

    It doesn''t work now. However, if Footman is defeated, then Tear wille into her own.

    Looking forward to that time, Tear continues to watch over Footman''s battle.

    Once again, Footman''s onught has begun. Punching, kicking, mming, like a cat shaking a mouse, Footman is hunting down Gnome. Gnome is getting impatient. Footman and Tearugh at him. Kagali, who was watching over them, was analyzing the situation calmly. The worst. There is no future for us if we continue like this. Even if we win this battle, Gnome seems to be a low-level yer.

    (We have Tear, but even that doesn''t seem to help.) Kagali nced at Yuuki.

    (I don''t think Tear can win against an opponent that Yuuki-sama can defeat. .)

    Besides, angels and demons can''t be physically destroyed. Unless they have special powers, they wille back to life even if we kill Gnome here. When you take in Vega''s cells, you are physically unable to die. Moreover, if there was a high probability of resurrection even after death, this battle itself seemed pointless.

    After all, defeat was guaranteed. Knowing this, Kagali felt like a fool.

    "Stop it, Footman. I''m not ying anymore."

    "Huh? Is that all right with you, Chairman? "

    "No. We can''t escape from here anyway. Not if we can destroy that big gate, but that seems impossible no matter what."

    If Dino''s words are to be believed, this is a closed world called the Heavenly

    Star Pce. They need a key to get through the gate, and Kagali and the others have no way to get it. It was a dead end.

    Seeing Kagali, Gnomeughs loudly.

    "Hahahahaha! That''s right. If you understood that, then we can talk quickly.

    All you have to do is work as hard as you can as a tool. If you do, I''ll take good care of you as a capable subordinate."

    Seeing that Footman had stopped moving, Gnome understood the situation.

    It was unexpected that he could not defeat Footman, but his master, Kagali, was clever.

    As long as he could control his master, Footman and Tear would be nothing but puppets. If so, Gnome''s dominance would be protected.

    Thinking this, Gnome regained hisposure, but the next moment, he was frightened by the overwhelming presence of death that surrounded him.

    "You are unsightly, Gnome. It was a mistake to give you a name."

    Before he knew it, the gates had opened, revealing three figures. One of them, with long jet-ck hair that looked as if it was studded with stars in the night sky, was Zrio, the leader of the "Three Phantom Commanders" with striking good looks.

    When he returned, Zrio had been watching Gnome''s words and actions without any sign of him. He was dismayed and disappointed by the fecklessness of the situation. Hispanions, Pico and Gracia, walked towards Dino, away from Zrio.

    "Hey, good work.

    "Yeah. I''m tired from work, and you''re in trouble? Yeah.

    "Hey, hey, what''s going on? "

    We ask in hushed tones, but Dino just shrugs and says, "You''ll see. Pico and

    Gracia looked at Gnome to see that he didn''t want to exin.

    " Zrio-sama!

    "Don''t say my name, it''s dirty."

    "Oh, no! Please wait. There''s been a misunderstanding. ."

    "You''re mistaken. My word is justice. Therefore, there is no such thing as a mistake.

    "That''s. . It''s. . "

    If you say yes, you''re admitting your mistake. But to deny it would be to antagonize Zrio.

    Gnome was in an instant danger, but there was no way out of this situation.

    "Compared to you, well, it''s a bit rude topare. Feldway''s scavenger is more useful to me."

    Zrio''s words were matter-of-fact, devoid of any flicker of emotion.

    However, Gnome senses something ominous in his voice, and struggles to speak up.

    "Please wait. ."

    But it was all toote.

    The noble Zrio hates fools.

    "Your sin is that you misjudged your own worth. I will forgive you if you simply erase your character in light of the years you served me."

    Zrio said cruelly.

    "Erase your personality?

    Kagali was shocked.

    "No! No, no. Forgive me, forgive me, Za. ."

    Zrio would not allow Gnome to call his name.

    "Jupiter."

    A ray of lightning shed from Zrio''s fingertips.

    The divine scorpion will burn Gnome.

    And yet, its body is unharmed. But his mind had been initialized with a catastrophic amount of information, and overwritten with a new personality.

    It was a bullshit power.

    Zrio was not in his element in thebyrinth of Ramiris.

    And Kagali, who had witnessed the power, knew the situation was hopeless.

    (Impossible. This was not a fightable opponent. Dino thought he was in trouble, but this guy. . . . He''s in the same ss as Guy and Milim. . . It''s a whole other level.)

    Different dimensions. So Kagali gave up all resistance.

    "So, what happens to me? "

    Kagali asks proudly.

    If she was going to be punished, she thought, she would keep her pride intact until the end.

    "Not really. I''m not going to apologize for the trouble Gnome has caused you."

    "What? "

    Kagali was perplexed by the casualness of the conversation.

    From Zrio''s point of view, he was telling the truth.

    It was Lieutenant Kondou who had picked Kagali up, but it had been Feldway''s decision. It was Feldway''s intention to use the power that Michael had given him to create a reincarnation for them.

    This was sessfully aplished, and although there were only nine of them, they were wonderfully prepared. The transcendent beings, Zrio and the others, needed to select the bodies to incarnate. As with their current temporary bodies, mere humans and monsters would not be able to withstand their power and would disintegrate. This is simr to the situation in which primordialspeted with each other for incarnation. The fact that they could not easily manifest in the material world also made it difficult for them to carry out their invasion strategy.

    Kagali conveniently existed in this situation, and the idea of using undead elf as an elementary body emerged. I had to try it out, but I can say that the result is good. The idea of using Vega was also adopted as an alternative, but the result is Gnome''s runaway. The result was that Gnome ran out of control, and Zrio judged it to be a failure because it seemed to affect his personality. Inparison, undead elf does not have free will. The power of undead elf had been proven by Footman, and he judged that it would be enough to withstand Zrio''s possession.

    "But I reject the idea of using this Vega guy. Gnome was a more cautious man, but I can''t help but think it would have had a strange effect."

    Zrio muttered to no one in particr, but Kagali listened and thought about it. Kagali listened and thought about it, and then, without thinking, opened her mouth to answer when she didn''t need to.

    "Vega is greedy. As befits a position that symbolizes power, he takes in every desire he can and makes it his own."

    "Really? "

    Oh, no, I thought, but it was toote.

    Faced with the silent pressure to continue, I proceeded to state my reasoning.

    "Vega is pure. He follows the strong and eats the weak. He may be vile, but he has his own beliefs. That''s why he''s strong."

    He doesn''t take it personally when he loses, and he''ll stoop to any level if he thinks he can''t win. He believes that if he can survive and make it to the next level, he will win. That is why Vega has never felt defeated. He thinks that the person who messes him is an idiot, and that he should pay him back one day when he bes a winner.

    That is how Kagali evaluated Vega.

    (Though Yuuki-sama is better in terms of greed.)

    Kagali even saw through Vega''s character and made good use of it. Kagali also admired Yuuki''s strength.

    "I see. So, you''re saying that it''s possible that such a greedy nature has permeated every single cell of Vega? "

    Kagali, who had thought she hadn''t exined it well enough, nodded at Zrio''s urate point.

    "Exactly. That''s why I honestly don''t rmend growing and using his cells."

    "I''ll keep that in mind."

    Zrio said, turning his attention back to the castle.

    "I see. . That thing is definitely useless. You follow me."

    "What? "

    Zrio asked back, but he was walking quickly towards the castle. Gnome, whose presence had be scarce, naturally followed Zrio.

    Kagali wondered for a moment what to do, but decided that it would not be wise to disobey.

    "You two, follow me."

    "Yes, sir."

    "Yes! Yes!

    Kagali followed Zrio, taking Footman and Tear with her. Then, as if it were natural, Yuuki followed Kagali.

    Only Dino and three others were left.

    "What are we going to do? "

    "We don''t have anything to do with this, so what do we do?

    "I know.

    "I think that''s the point, I think. Pico, don''t be too amodating to Dino. If you don''t, I''ll be in trouble."

    "Yes."

    "Oh,e on, you''re making it sound like I''m screwed. No.

    "You''re no good.

    "You''re a bad angel. A fallen angel! "

    "You''re an asshole! I know you think you''re being nice, but you''re being annoying! "

    Such was the exchange between the three of them in the empty aisle.

    Kagali was impressed by the majesty of the castle as she entered.

    The castle he had handed over to yman was a reminder of how far he hade, despite his best efforts. The royal castle he had lived in so long ago seemed so shabbypared to this.

    "It''s wonderful."

    "Of course, it is. This castle is where Veldanava-sama resides."

    Not expecting a response, Kagali changed her opinion of Zrio.

    It seems that he is surprisingly conversant.

    While he was thinking about this, he arrived at the ce where he wanted to go. It was a room with tworge culture tanks. It had the appearance of aboratory. There were five men and five women surrounding one of the tanks.

    Floating in the middle of them was something in the shape of a person.

    On closer inspection, it resembles a Vega. Noticing Zrio''s presence, they all turned and hung their heads. A man greets them on behalf of the group.

    "Zrio-sama, wee back."

    The man''s name was Dhalis.

    Strictly speaking, the phantom had no gender, but he was a believer who had served Zrio as a man since the time of the original kelp. Zrio nodded lightly and told him what he wanted.

    "Cancel the n."

    "Yes, sir."

    Dhalis doesn''t ask why. They believe that whatever Zrio says is right, and that they should just follow him.

    This was the reason why the angelic ego was regarded as weak. That''s why they were so easily influenced by the encroachment of Vega.

    "I have given you a name, but it may have been meaningless."

    "I''m sorry, sir. Am I in any way at fault here? "

    "No, I''m not at fault. It''s just that I expected too much."

    Zrio will do his best, but he does not expect every result to be perfect. He is working to urately evaluate the confirmed results and apply them to the future. Therefore, no matter what the oue, he is not upset. Dhalis is afraid of being disappointed by Zrio. So, he follows Zrio''s words even though he feels frustrated. He ordered his subordinates, Gnome and Bern, to stop the movement of the incubator. Nice, who is the same rank as Dhalis, has no objection and has her subordinates, Bem and Sun, help her. Incidentally, Dhalis is male and Nice is female.

    The others are former seated angels (Sorone) like Gnome, so they do not have a definite gender. However, as Zrio says, they have recently acquired "names", and their personalities have be distinctive. This has given her a personality, but it is still in its infancy.

    It seems that some of the subordinates of the "Three Phantom Commanders"

    Cornu, the same rank as Zrio, were possessed by the locals of the invaded area and lost the initiative. It is believed that this was due to a weak ego, and as a countermeasure, only the former angelic leaders were given names. However, several decades had passed since then, and Zrio believed that even then, the changes were so slight that no further growth could be expected. That was why he was looking for a suitable medium for possession.

    (I thought the idea of cultivating Vega''s body was a good one, but the cells themselves were covered in evil spirits. Then there''s no choice but to use the undead elf that was born. . . . There are nine of them.) There are nine of them. That was enough for the current leaders.

    However, Feldway was nning to ask Michael to use the ''Army of Angels, Armageddon'' to further increase his strength. The n was not to summon countless angels, but to create several pirs of seraphim by concentrating their energy. That''s why it''s undead elf. Zrio''s subordinates, even his confidant Dhalis, were only second in rank. The undead elf should have been used only for the seraphim, to gather arge and unshakable force.

    (Oh well. We don''t know how many pirs we can summon, so there''s no rush. I''ll talk to Feldway about thister.)

    Zrio thought about it and was about to leave the ce.

    But then, he heard the sound of shattering ss.

    The culture tank had been destroyed.

    "Wait! I''ll never forgive you! You tore off my arm! You, I''ll take that back!"

    With the device shut down, Vega awoke and began to move. And its target was Gnome, who had fused with Vega''s cells.

    "Gubuh, gubuh, gubuh, gubuh. ."

    Before anyone could stop him, Vega''s arm grabbed Gnome. Then the fusion began, and Gnome was absorbed by Vega.

    "Oh, that''s delicious! I''m so full of power!

    Vega was delighted. He sensed that the Gnome he had absorbed had a huge amount of magicule in it, and that it had boosted his power.

    "Kuka kuka kuka! I like this guy. I can take any bastard I want right now!"

    Vega''s climax ended the moment he locked eyes with Zrio.

    "I''ve heard about you. You can either join us, or you can stay and fight."

    Vega was asked this question, but he knew the answer.

    "Heh, sorry. I got carried away. Of course, I''ll follow you."

    That kind of filthiness is quite impressive at this point. Zrio was not dismayed, as he had expected this attitude. I knew it, and I epted it. The loss of Gnome was unfortunate, but it did help to strengthen Vega. What we need in the future is not an army, but individual courage. The more powerful allies we have, the better. Besides, Gnome had just lost its ego, and its value as a pawn had diminished.

    In fact, it would have been better for him to be Vega''s ally here.

    Zrio was cruel and ruthless to his subordinates who had served him since long ago, but that was his true intention.

    The others had no problem with Zrio''s decision. Vega''s outburst was forgiven, and he was treated as one of them.

    Kagali, who was watching the whole thing, could not help but feel disgusted.

    Vega''s attitude was horrible, but Zrio, who tolerated it so easily, was hard to understand what kind of thought process he had. I couldn''t read Zrio''s thoughts because he didn''t seem to be simr to Yuuki. Yuuki was well aware of the dangers of Vega, and handled it well. But Zrio...

    Zrio, on the other hand, probably doesn''t even think Vega is dangerous.

    Does that mean he''s that much more capable? I think so. Kagali judged that from the situation, but she was right. Zrio does not even care about the current Vega. Even his own subordinates were only slightly useful tools. But this was not arrogance. It is not arrogance, because Zrio''s perception is not wrong.

    Zrio''s nature of grasping information correctly is far from arrogance. Kagali, however, could not possibly understand such a thing, and was left puzzled.

    "Hey, it''s Kagali. And Yuuki doesn''t like you either. Well, we''re old friends, let''s get along."

    Kagali was found by Vega and called out to him. There''s no way the current Kagali can beat Vega. Besides, even if Tear and Footman had challenged Vega, the odds would have been about 50-50. Since Yuuki was still deprived of her free will, she decided that it would be best to stay in line.

    "Right. Our circumstances have changed a lot, so let''s continue to get along."

    "Oh, yeah. Anyway, where am I? Where are we?

    "It''s called the Heavenly Star Pce. It looks like there''s no escape, so we''ll just have to follow them."

    "I see. Well, we don''t need to run. I''m sure they''ll need my help anyway, so I''ll just enjoy the situation."

    Kagali envies Vega''s simplicity. Zrio doesn''t seem to be interested, but the intentions of those controlling Yuuki are unknown.

    Kagali thinks that the birth spell will be a trump card for Kagali and her friends, but she is not sure about that either. In the first ce, a ritual that requires tens of thousands of corpses is not something that can be easily handled.

    We need to make them think we''re useful somehow. If worsees to worst, we''ll survive even if we have to flirt with them. Kagali thinks so.

    It''s out of the question for us to abandon our ambitions after all this time.

    They have decided that now is the time for surrender, and they are ready to throw away their pride. And that resolve would soon be put to the test.

    Michael and Feldway had returned.

    In the center of the castle, there was an audience hall.

    There was no one on the throne. It had been empty for a long time. Chairs were arranged in the hall, and people were sitting as they pleased. Michael was seated in the chair closest to the throne. Standing next to him was Feldway, ring at the gathering. In addition to Zrio and the others, Kagali''s group is also there.

    Dino and the others had not skipped a beat. The newborn undead elves had also been brought here. And that''s not all. Obera and her confidant from the Pce of Monsters had also been summoned. Obera had only one confidant, named Oma.

    The others were killed in the battle against the cryptids. As you can see, Obera is the one who is in charge of the toughest battlefield. Oma lost both her eyes when she became youma, but instead she had a single eye that could see everything. Her mouth has been sewn shut, and shemunicates only by telekinesis, not by words. Despite her eerie appearance, she is a former warrior who has followed Obera for a long time. Feldway has not only brought Obera and the others with him.

    There was the Insectar, with whom he had fought for what seemed like an eternity, and with whom he was now in alliance. Led by the Insect Lord Znus, the Twelve Insect Generals, who are his confidants, gathered together.

    However, there are only eight of them now, not twelve. One of the missing members is Razul, the guardian god of the West. He invaded the Cardinal World more than two thousand years ago under themand of Znus, but betrayed it and became an ally of the Chosen Hero Granbell. He is a Mushroom Majin (insector) who was defeated by Shion and Ranga.

    The other is Minaza, a Mushroom General sent by Znus to help Emperor Rudra after he was promised half the world. He was also defeated by Shion, though by a strange coincidence.

    As for the remaining two, a juvenile born of the recement has escaped.

    One of them is also a direct descendant of Znus, so a secret search order has been issued. He is still missing.

    Each of the eight present here, like Razul and Minaza, has a fighting abilityparable to that of an awakened demon lord. Among them, Zeth, the head of the Mushoushou and a direct descendant of Znus, boasted a strength that set him apart from the others. He was Zrio''s rival, and they hadpeted with each other to the death. The strength of the remaining seven was on a par with the others.

    Beat hop, with the characteristics of a bee and a grasshopper.

    The mujika is an anthropomorphic centipede.

    Tithorn, like a praying mantis.

    Goldflies with dragonfly wings, Trun.

    A Bart, with spider-like limbs on its back.

    Venomous scorpion, Salir.

    As beautiful as a damselfly, Period.

    A group of powerful people, each with their own peculiarities, stood in silence, not even sitting on chairs. It was arge room, but the oppressive feeling made it seem smaller. Kagali was a little afraid, but decided to let things happen as they would.

    After everyone had been assembled, the meeting with Michael began.

    "Gentlemen. With Rudra gone, Michael-sama is free to go. And as a first step towards Veldanava-sama''s resurrection, we have seeded in expelling Velgrynd.

    The n was nowplete."

    At that moment, Zrio stepped forward to speak. Normally, he would not interrupt his superior, Feldway, but this time he decided that it was urgent.

    "Feldway-sama, please wait. There seems to be a difference in perception."

    Feldway was in a good mood, but his smile faded when Zrio said.

    "What?"

    He bes a little grumpy and asks.

    "Velgrynd is alive and well. And because of her, Cornu has been destroyed.

    "What? " "

    Even Znus twitches at thisment. Feldway frowned in displeasure.

    The new obstacle of the Demon Lord Rimuru was an annoyance, but the n was on track. Guy Crimson and Rimuru Tempest, both of whom would be obstacles, were on the verge of Veldanava''s return.

    Of the three remaining "True Dragons" on Earth, Velgrynd''s factor had been obtained. Of the three remaining "True Dragons and he was ready to obtain the other two. However, if Zrio''s words were true, it meant that there would be a major deviation from the n.

    And, as if to confirm his words, Cornu''s presence has disappeared. Neither here at the Heavenly Star Pce, nor in the Pce of the Otherworld, Cornu''s presence was nowhere to be found.

    "Are you sure? "

    "It''s true. Because of Cornu''s disappearance, the n failed. We have no choice but to retreat. I didn''t think your n would fail, but I guess the me lies with your ineptitude, right? "

    Dino, not Zrio, answered. Dino is more tactful than Zrio in that he even shifts the me for the failure of the n. Zrio tacitly epts it. He doesn''t think that Dino''s opinion is correct, but he doesn''t think it is necessary to deny it. Zrio, who is fair-minded and strict with himself, is flexible. With such a reaction from both of them, Feldway has no choice but to stop doubting.

    Unexpectedly, Feldway was in a foul mood. However, his mind is clear and he quickly devises a countermeasure. The first thing to do is to secure the True Dragon. Since the Dragon Factor is essential to Veldanava''s resurrection, it was only natural that this would be the first priority.

    (Fortunately, I have already secured Velgrynd''s factor. Although we didn''t expect him toe back to this world, it wasn''t the worst situation. Still, it was a rather painful mistake. I was careless. I retrieved the power because it was going to disappear anyway, but as a result, the "control circuit" also disappeared. I banished him to the far side of time and space so that he would not be an enemy even if he resurrected, but now I have added a troublesome enemy.) At that time, Velgrynd had lost most of her power. On top of that, the Dragon Factor had been taken from her, and she was on the verge of disappearing. That''s why Michael retrieved the Charity King (Raguel), but there was no way he could have predicted that this would lead to the destruction of Cornu.

    (Never mind. As long as Veldanava-sama is restored, the rest is not important. Let''s leave Velgrynd alone and let Velzard join us first.

    This time, be careful not to make him disappear, and let him join with some free will. This will help you against Velgrynd, and also help you capture Veldora.

    Once you have Velzard in your group, what do you do next? ) I had nned to go after Veldora right away, but I needed to reconsider this.

    (If we''re going to be facing Velgrynd as well, we''d better get our forces up to speed.)

    (I thought that Michael and I could handle it, but you can never be too careful. Dino has just told me that I''m not thinking clearly.) That''s why Feldway decided to drastically change his original n.

    "Then we need to take immediate action here too. Let''s get Velzard in first.

    Let''s not banish her to the far reaches of space-time and use her as a friend."

    "That''s the only way. It would be more prudent to eliminate as many uncertainties as possible, and begin the final ritual once the three True Dragons have been captured."

    Michael nodded in agreement with Feldway''s words.

    Velzard was given the Ultimate Skill ''Patience King (Gabriel)'' by Veldanava.

    In other words, since the "Control Circuit" was active, he could be added to the group safely and reliably. The problem was what happened after that.

    Michael''s eyes scanned the group.

    "I didn''t think it was necessary, but we should incarnate them all. That way, we can deal with whatever happens."

    "Indeed. Let''s leave Veldora forter and finish all possible preparations first."

    The conversation between Feldway and Michael progressed and a conclusion was reached.

    In anticipation of this, Zrio reports.

    "On that note, I have something to report."

    "What is it?

    "The attempt to recreate it using Vega there has failed. The only way to be sure is to possess the undead elf."

    "Hmm. So that''s nine people. It''s a little difficult to decide who to incarnate."

    So Feldway ponders.

    Here''s what Znus has to say.

    "Do what you want with that undead elf. We don''t need it."

    The insectar can create a body that looks like a solidified magicule when the timees. That''s why it can enter any world.

    It is useful, but it is not necessary.

    In fact, that''s what happened to Minaza.

    She took in the materials of that world and incarnated them, and the insectoid she summons has been confirmed to have the same property. This is why it is difficult for her to cross worlds, but once she has crossed over to another world, she is able to fully exercise her powerful and matchless power. This time, the issue of "crossing the world" has been resolved. It was natural for Znus to give in. If he didn''t need to consider his allies, he could choose from among the phantoms. In that case, the right choice would be the strongest and most useful.

    "Zrio and Obera, the "Three Phantom Commanders," will be chosen. Shall we fill the remaining seven positions with the executives? "

    "I have an opinion on that as well.

    "You''re wee to speak freely.

    "Thank you.

    Seeing this, Dino thought to himself, ''Unlike me, Zrio is very serious.

    With permission, Zrio speaks up.

    "Unlike us, the kelps and below are weak-willed. In the other world, we were able to fight by force, but in the future, I''m afraid that we won''t be able to count on them as a fighting force."

    "Hmm. Then what do you suggest? "

    "Yes, sir. Rather, why don''t we leave the race for survival in the hands of nature? "

    Zrio had given up on his men. As was the case with Cornu''s men, they had been taken over by the humans who had possessed them in the other world they had invaded, and had lost their sense of self. And now, under the influence of Vega''s cells, their emotions are running wild. It was unlikely that giving such people a valuable substitute would help them in theing battle.

    "There are still many who stand in our way. Velgrynd, Veldora, and the demon lords are still alive. Even the damned demons will get in the way, and a tool that just follows orders is. ."

    "Worthless, or. .

    "Your will."

    In response to Zrio''s statement, Feldway nodded. Feldway nodded to Zrio''sment, for he too was concerned about the same thing.

    Yes. What matters is the strength of your will. If you don''t have a strong desire, giving you Ultimate Skill is meaningless. To put it another way. .

    No matter how strong the ego is, there is no need to worry about betraying it if you give the Ultimate Enchantment ''Alternative''. Feldway looked at Michael, and their gazes met. Apparently, he had another opinion.

    "What do you have to say about that? "

    "I was going to call in the seraphim and possess them with the all-powerful

    ''Army of Angels, Armageddon''."

    "That''s fine, but we don''t know what kind of pir it can be called, or what kind of will it possesses, do we? "

    "Seven, at most. But whether the seraphim have a will or not, we won''t know that until we summon them."

    If undead elf possesses seraphim, it will be more powerful than an awakened demon lord. However, I was worried about its strength of will.

    As was the case with us, it took many years for us to establish ourselves.

    Feldway''s conclusion was that a hastily developed force would be useless.

    Here is what Znus has to say.

    "Interesting. If there''s too much of that seraphim, why don''t we or my child eat it? "

    "Hmm... . . Hmm..

    I''m thinking about this too, Feldway.

    We''re fighting each other now because our interests are aligned. As soon as one of us achieves our goals, there''s a good chance we''ll go back to being adversaries. He hesitated to reinforce such an opponent, but it would be an effective strategy to ruin the world.

    "It''s on hold. We''ll think about it then."

    "Yokarou. Don''t force it."

    The conversation about seraphim was postponed and returned to the question of who should incarnate.

    "Then, after all, we should use Zrio as a reincarnation.

    "Well, that''s fine. Feldway is right about eliminating the uncertainty."

    "No objections.

    Thus, the two camps agreed.

    "We''ll go with Zrio''s idea. Are you okay with that? "

    Feldway asks to his camp. It''s a question, but it''s a decision. There was no way that Dhalis and the others could argue with him, since they would be considered weak if they objected. Thus, it was decided that Zrio and the others would possess the undead elf, and at the same time, unleash the will that resides in their bodies.

    With this decision made, the incarnation ceremony began. This time, the incarnation would be performed by Zrio and five of his men, and Obera and Oma.

    Kagali will be in charge of imbuing undead elf with self.

    (That''s a lot of money, but what are they going to do with it? ) Kagali wondered.

    As Kagali wondered this, her eyes met Feldway''s.

    "At the time, it was Kagali, wasn''t it? Now that Kondou is dead and the reigns are broken, what are you going to do about it? "

    Ouch," Kagali braced herself.

    "Will you let me go? "

    Kagali asks cautiously, unsure of how much is allowed to be said. There was a surprising reply.

    "After this ritual is over, yes."

    "What? "

    "If that''s the case, your role is finished when you created undead elf as a substitute. You''ve done your job well enough, and if you wish, I can send you back to earth."

    No way, Kagali thought, confused. At best, you''ll be locked up. At worst, she was prepared to be punished. And yet, they were allowed to escape.

    There was no lie in Feldway''s words. Because there''s no need for such aplicated negotiation. The difference in power was so obvious that Kagali had no use for him. Kagali can''t think of any reason to deceive such a person, so she thinks it''s safe to assume that the words are true. In that case, Kagali treads on thin ice when she makes her next request.

    "Is it possible for you to break Yuuki-sama''s control and let us go with her? "

    It was Michael who answered the question.

    "I can''t allow that. Because the Ultimate Skill ''Greedy King (Mammon)'' owned by Yuuki Kagurazaka is also beneficial to me."

    For Michael, Yuuki''s power was of great use, regardless of his personal fighting ability. Therefore, he rejected the idea of releasing him.

    Kagali, understanding this, stopped wishing for more.

    (What do you think, is it right to run away?)

    Feldway said to Kagali.

    "If it''s just you and the two of you, I can get you to the surface. However, the Cardinal World will be rough. I hate the people on Earth. Not that I need the death of every living thing to achieve my goal, but it will inevitably be engulfed in mes in a war with those who stand in our way. But that is the punishment. Those whom Veldanava-sama loved have betrayed that love. Sanctions will be necessary."

    Kagali felt a chill run down her spine as the words were said so matter-of-factly. To be engulfed in mes would mean that the whole world would be affected by the war. In that case, it was hard to say that the ce they escaped to was safe.

    Yuuki was still under their control, and if the absolute powerhouses here went on a rampage, there would be no safe ce on earth.

    In the first ce, Kagali thought. We wanted to create a country where we could live happily.

    (We wanted to create a country where we could live happily, but it would be too vain to hope for that under these circumstances. In this situation, the most important thing is to survive. And to do that, we need power.) It may have been a foolish decision.

    But at the time, it seemed to Kagali that it was the only right thing to do.

    That''s why he said what he wished.

    "Please give me one undead self. And hopefully, allow me to take on the seraphim in my body."

    Kagali wished.

    I wish to leave my fragile body and be reborn as undead self. Then, she would take in the seraphim and gain great power. I need power.

    Because if you have power, nothing more can be taken from you.

    Kagali''s words had no chance of winning, but no one argued with her.

    Dino looked dumbfounded, but said nothing.

    Zrio and Obera just followed Michael''s decision.

    And insectar is indifferent. He is not interested in the weak. In the midst of these reactions, Michael nodded.

    "Hmm, interesting. But I will not tolerate betrayal. If you ept my Ultimate Enchantment, I will grant you your wish."

    "I swear I will not betray you. And I ept your dominion."

    The deal was made.

    To make an undead elf develop an ego is equivalent to awakening its original personality.

    In some cases, the strongest will prevails, while in other cases, a new ego is born from a mixture of the two. Even for Kagali, the oue is unknown. As you can see from Tear and Footman, it is difficult to invoke a targeted personality.

    So even Kagali herself has to gamble whether her ego will win or not. But even so, he knew he had to get the power. So, after awakening the eight selves, he performed an awakening ritual on the undead self in which he dwelt. After that, he escaped from the homunculus and transferred to the undead elf.

    Thus, the ritual ended.

    And the result was. .

    Zrio wakes up. He realizes that he is wrapped in the armor of flesh, and that he can do great things in the Cardinal World.

    Obera wakes up.

    He is proud that his noble intentions can be defeated by no one, and he proves it. When Dhalis was about to wake up, he realized that there was another personality dwelling within him. His name was Torneot, and he was a man of great ambition. He felt that his skills as a warrior had be his own, and he was convinced that Dhalis himself had greatly increased his presence.

    Nice is awake. She is stronger onmand, but she is no different. Her strong ego is still intact.

    Oma awakens. With her indomitable will intact, she embraces a being of simr sensibilities. Their name was Zero, but now they were Oma''s flesh and blood.

    They, Orca and Aria, had awakened.

    With Aria''s knowledge as a wizard and Orca''s strength as a warrior. Both of their egos coexisted, and they were reborn as magical warriors. There was not a shred of San''s former self left.

    Arios wakes up. His Unique Skill ''Murderer'' is still intact. He has not forgotten the grudge of being killed by Damrada, and has resurrected to seek greater strength.

    Mai Furuki wakes up. She can''t die. She cannot die because she has left her sickly brother behind, not here, but on the other side, in the world she was meant to live in. So, she vows to return.

    And so, eight have awakened.

    Only one remains.

    But she is still in a deep sleep. .

    Kagali was dreaming.

    It was so, so long ago.

    A dream from when she was still Demon Lord Kazaream? No.

    It was a dream from much, much earlier, when she was just a girl. I can''t even remember her name now, but Kagali was a happy princess. Kagali''s country was founded on the site where high humans had built a great civilization. It was a paradise for the elf race, a super-magic superpower that was flourishing thanks to the flowing rivers, lush forests, rich ins, and the ruins of the ancient super-magic empire. But then, the king, the father, suddenly went mad.

    Kagali remembers him as a very kind and gentle man.

    And yet. . One day, the king who had been praised as the king of the high elf suddenly changed into a different person. He changed his name, and began to call himself Jahil, the Great Magician. His memory of what happened after that is not clear. Jahilmitted tyranny to the utmost. He exploited his people and sought only his own glory. He repeated his foolish experiments and created -sama-nightmares. Kagali was one of those who fell victim to this. Kagali, a high elf, was stripped of her powers. She was killed and brought back to life as an undead elf.

    He was given an ugly appearance and the name "Kazaream". Her beauty was gone and she became a cursed figure. Rotten flesh covered her bones. Perhaps it was because it was dry, but it was better that it did not smell of decay. Few people knew its secret. Kagali was so grieved that he began to cover himself with a mask.

    '' Why are you doing this to me?

    Go on, go on, go on!

    Because it''s funny.

    Be happy.

    Tens of thousands of people died to bring you back to life!

    Guffaw! Guffaw! Guffaw!

    It was a nightmare.

    I don''t know how my father, who was so kind, became such a fiend. But since it was real, there was no point inmenting.

    ''Father! I don''t care what you do with me. But please think of the people like you used to. .

    Shut up! Are you taunting me too? She''s no good to me. We can''t afford to make the same mistake as her. I''ve instilled in her my loyalty, but she can''t be trusted! Kazaream, today you will be a man. Do you understand?

    It was an absolutemand.

    Kagali''s words never reached his father, Jahil, and the conversation was cut short. He was lucky that he had not been killed. . No, it was only because he had already been killed and turned into a faithful puppet that he had not been discarded to be used as a tool. It was then that Kagali parted ways with the father inside her.

    Then, the nightmare continued. The glory of the arrogant Jahil, the Great Magician, seemed to know no bounds, but the day of the end came. The reason for this was his foolish attempt to puppet the Dragon Empress Milim and incur her wrath. Soma, the capital of the Super Magic Powers, fell into ruins overnight.

    Jahil is not known to be alive. It was presumed that he was dead, as it was unlikely that he could have survived the sh of light. So Kagali thinks more about the people who are important to her than about the dead man. The maidservants who had always looked after her with kindness. The knights who followed her after she became a warrior. Her beloved people who lived happily ever after. Thinking of those she loved, she invoked the forbidden spell. The forbidden spell: Birth Death Birthday - she had already learned the theory of the spell by bing a test subject herself.

    The spell was perfected, and Tear, Footman, and yman were born. They were lovely, sweet children, naming Kagali. And then I learned a fact that I did not want to know. The undead elf created by the birthdays was not ugly at all. Only Kagali had been made ugly on purpose to be so. That hateful father king Jahil had taken away her beauty just to make Kagali suffer. It was toote for her to know that fact. Kagali''s appearance was the result of a curse, and there was no way to restore it.

    However, the children that Kagali had created did not leave her alone. They too hid their true faces behind masks and shared Kagali''s suffering. Kagali''s hope for survival grew as she realized that she was not alone. The four of them were joined by the surviving elf tribes from all over the world.

    Let''s rebuild our own country once again. And create a country where everyone can live happily. .

    Kagali secretly made up her mind to do so.

    But it would be a faint and fleeting dream.

    The Chaos Dragon attacked and contaminated thend. As a result, those who adored Kagali were cursed and turned into dark elf.

    At that time, Kagali also acted as if she was cursed. Kagali and Tear were able to endure the curse because they were undead elf. It was fortunate that I hid my true face with a mask, and no one noticed me, but it made me even more sad.

    Tear''s presence was the only thing that saved her. After that, Kagali and her friends abandoned their homnd and fled. Even though they had some regrets, they left together.

    They wandered and wandered, and finally found their next safe haven.

    When everyone''s lives had stabilized, Kagali decided to visit his homnd again.

    He needed to recover the treasures he had left behind, but more than anything, he wanted to see his homnd again. The city had perished, but it still shone beautifully in my memories. I decided that I had to cut off my regrets and use them as food for the future. So, she set off, and on her way, she met a man.

    What, you If you were watching me, you could have helped me, right?

    Don''t be silly. A dragon like me is no match for that evil dragon.

    You''re being too modest. From my point of view, you look like trouble enough.. . . Ouch..

    The man''s name was Sarion Grimwald, the Chosen Hero who drove the Chaos Dragon from thisnd.

    Unfortunately, he nearly died in mortalbat with Chaos Dragon.

    ''Take it easy. Now, the restoration magic. .

    '' It''s useless, so don''t do it. Chaos Dragon''s attacks are cursed, and my wounds won''t heal. I had several ways to heal myself, but it''s like this.

    In fact, Sarion was blown from the chest down, and it was a wonder he was still alive. The fact that he could afford tough despite this, shows that he has a tremendous mental capacity.

    I need you to give me a message. I''m here to tell you that I defeated Chaos

    Dragon and died in style like a Chosen Hero. .

    What are you, a Chosen Hero? Before you die, I have a proposal. With my evil ways, there''s a chance you''ll live. You may lose your memory, you may end up like this, but are you willing to give it a try? ''

    With that, Kagali took off her mask.

    What you see is her ugly face. But seeing that, Sarion smiled wryly.

    '' Hey, you. You''ve got a good point. If I died here, Silvia would have killed me.

    If you think about it, that proposal is the best thing that could happen to you!

    '' Are you sure? I''m cursed. I''m willing to do evil rather than be persecuted.

    If you''re a Chosen Hero, I''m prepared to be a demon lord and protect everyone. Besides, if you use this evil method, you''ll be my puppet, right? ''''

    I don''t care, I don''t care, it''s funny. I''m a free man, and I''m not going to be easily controlled. Besides, there''s cause and effect between a Chosen Hero and a demon lord. That''s why you and I are rted, isn''t it?

    You''re a funny guy, talking nonsense at this point. Then you can be my puppet! ''''

    Negotiations were concluded. Kagali took Sarion''s words as a joke, but they were true. And as a result of this whim, Sarion became undead himself and survived. And that was the moment when "Curse Lord" Kazaream and "Wonder Pierrot" Lace were born.

    Since then, many things have happened. Securing the dominant territory.

    The war against humans and demihumans was fierce, but they overcame persecution and emerged as "Curse Lord" Kazaream. He was recognized as one of the demon lords, and steadily expanded his power.

    "He rmended Karion, the Beast Master, and Frey, the Sky Queen, as demon lords, and formed a powerful alliance with them.

    Everything was going well. So much so that he didn''t realize that he had growncent. Kagali next set her sights on an up-anding man named Leon. The n was to teach Leon, who called himself a demon lord in the middle of nowhere, a lesson in humility and bring him under his control.

    The moment she saw him, Kagali felt a pang of jealousy. The man who called himself the demon lord, Leon, was too beautiful. He had been disfigured by his demon father, the king. He had been deprived of his gender, and he had just been struggling to live. . The appearance of Leon, who was a man but more beautiful than a woman, slowed down his thinking, and Kagali made the great mistake of misjudging his opponent''s strength. Kagali lost her body to Leon''s blow, and was forced to wander around with only her spiritual body.

    It is a miracle that she did not disappear. I had a grudge. But more than that, he had a desire. So Kagali clung to life. Using what little power he had left as the Curse Lord; he took the time to prepare for his own resurrection. Then, in a daze, he made onest summoning attempt and failed to take over. Her n failed and she gained no flesh. All that was left was destruction.

    (Help me. Save me. I don''t want to be taken from you. All I want is to live happily with my friends. . but why am I, why am I alone in this?) Shemented her misfortune and asked for help, but no one answered her.

    Kagali was not alone, but no one could help her.

    It was an arduous journey.

    Ideals were far away and Kagali was the leader of the pack. There was no room for whining, and she had to always look forward. So Kagali had given up hope of being saved. The only people she could trust were herself and her beloved friends. That''s how she had lived her life. But that boy, Yuuki Kagurazaka. .

    All right. You seem to be tired, so rest inside me for now.

    What?

    Yuuki Kagurazaka reached out to Kagali, who had tried to take his life, and to whom no one had saved.

    A few yearster. . Kagali spent the next few years resting inside Yuuki, consulting and advising her. It was fortunate that the Unique Skill ''Schemer'' was a power that could be used by souls alone, but there were still many troublesome opponents.

    In particr, a girl named Mariabell Rosso was extremely troublesome.

    Yuuki was a genius strategist, and Kagali was confident in her own intelligence. In spite of the cooperation and scheming of these two, it was extremely difficult to outsmart Mariabell. They were outmatched in every aspect, including financial and human resources. Even if they had gained an organization to free themselves, Mariabell would have grasped the right to free it.

    I''ll kill her. If we don''t get rid of herr someday, our n will fail.

    I''m sure of it. That demon in a girl''s skin is the biggest obstacle for us.

    A battle in the economic sphere cannot be won or lost based on simplebat ability alone. She''s still a child, but she''s still like that. When Mariabell grew up and became an adult, she would not be able topete with him in every aspect.

    A few years had passed since they had made up their minds, and the time for change hade. It was not the birth of the mysterious slime, Demon Lord Rimuru.

    Kagali, who had been inside Yuuki, finally took on the body of a homunculus. Yuuki had kept his promise. And. .

    (This is my original form.)

    Yuuki''s kindness made Kagali so happy that she wanted to cry, but she kept a cool expression on her face. She tried to maintain her masculine tone, but Lace stopped her. She was pretending to be teasing Kagali, but she was really looking out for her.

    "I appreciate it, boss."

    Kagali thanked him sincerely.

    Now that she had a physical body, Kagali could look forward to delicious meals and desserts. The cream puffs were especially delicious.

    Spending a happy time with friends,ughing. How happy we were! However, the happiness did notst long. yman was dead. With the loss of another precious friend, Kagali and the others realized again.

    For the sake of their own happiness, they must conquer the world. To be the rulers of this world and lead it justly. Stupid, arrogant, and sweet yman. I''m sorry you had to go through that. Rest now and watch over us. We''ll make our ambitionse true.Kagali are not righteous, but they are not evil either.

    They are moderate. That is why we should be able to create a world where everyone can live happily. Believing this, we continued our activities.

    He defeated Mariabell, was exposed by Demon Lord Rimuru, escaped to the Empire, and was taken over by Lieutenant Kondou. Yuuki was also taken over by him.

    Kagali''s heart was failing her, but she could not give up now.

    I swear I won''t betray you. And I ept your control.

    A contract must be fulfilled and a favor received must be returned. So Kagali is willing to use any means necessary.

    And so Kagali wakes up, leaving behind the fragile body of homunculus and regaining the body of undead elf, stronger and more beautiful than when he was Demon Lord Kazaream.

    Thus, nine undead elves were born. But this was only the beginning.

    When Kagali finally woke up, she saw Feldway and the others who had brought Velzard back. Michael intends to take the Dragon Factor from Velzard and evolve further. Before that, he used the ''Army of Angels, Armageddon'' to imnt it in Kagali. He was determined not topromise.

    The seraphim that were sessfully summoned were the seven pirs.

    Those who are willing to incarnate are selected from those who are not former angels. Kagali was naturally chosen as one of them. The others are Tear, Footman, Vega, Orca = Aria, Arios, and Mai Furuki. Their bodies were reborn as they struggled against each other with tremendous power. The Kagali, with the exception of Vega, were reborn as "Yoten". And so, five months had passed since Kagali had arrived at the Heavenly Star Pce. .

    A vast castle in the sky. In the audience hall, lined with chalk columns.

    The hall was filled with a divine atmosphere. Angels with pure white wings filled the hall. They were still without bodies, but they were waiting for the time to invade the earth. Because they have no will, they do not move at all, and because they are as unsteady as sculptures, the audience hall creates a solemn atmosphere.

    In the front row, chairs were lined up, and those who stood out from the rest sat in a circle.

    These were the Kagali who had been reborn. They were much more powerful than before, and their presence was much stronger. Michael was about to wake up, and the call went out. When Kagali reawakened with the seraphim in her body, Michael was still asleep. However, it seemed that he was behind schedule as he had not shown up yet.

    Kagali, having no time to waste, turns her attention to the angels. He was told that there was no limit to the number of angels that could be summoned at once, but there was a limit to the total amount of energy. Normally, it would be an army of a million, but this time there were seven seraphim summoned, so the number itself was notrge. However, the quality was high. They wereposed only of angels of intermediate level and above, with no low-level angels of any kind.

    The approximate numbers were 1,000 dominion angels, 3,000 vulture angels, and 6,000 power angels. Angels that had not incarnated could not disy their full power. However, even so, even the fighting ability of the power angels is Over A rank. The limit of activity was seven days, but it was enough strength to turn the earth into a scorched earth.

    But the demon lords would be able to handle it.That''s what Kagali thought.

    "It''s not enough. With only this much, it''s going to be difficult to take out any of the forces."

    Kagali''s murmur echoed in the silent hall. Kagali''s murmur echoed in the silent hall, and though she hadn''t been expecting an answer, she got one.

    "Well. I didn''t have any subordinates, but everyone else had strong ones. To be honest, I doubt if I can defeat one of the eight stars."

    Kagali turned to look at the speaker. "I never thought I''d agree with you. Oh, by the way, Dino. I never knew you worked for Feldway-sama, did you? "

    Kagali whispered quietly.

    Dino replies tly.

    "I can''t tell you that. I''m a watcher. The theory is to keep a low profile. And while I''m at it, let me correct your mistake. I''m a former associate of Feldway''s, not a subordinate."

    Dino had infiltrated Octagram and was working as a "watcher". His purpose was to monitor the ground. Dino, Pico, and Gracia, the three Fallen Angels, were sent on a special mission to investigate the human world. By the will of Veldanava, they were charged with monitoring the human race so that it would not be destroyed. The role of the demon lords, led by Guy, was to rebuke the human race when it grew too much. And to prevent demon lords from going too far, the Chosen Hero exists as a deterrent.

    It was Dino''s role to investigate whether the causal rtionship between demon lords and heroes was working properly. While Dino attracts attention with his prominent position as demon lord, Pico and Gracia conduct their investigation withouting on stage. It was also Dino''s hidden role to create a cover-up to make it easier for these two to move. However, now that Veldanava has not returned, there is no one to report to. Therefore, Dino was enjoying his free life as a demon lord.

    Dino had no intention of hiding the fact that he was talking about it.

    Kagali wondered why he was here then. Perhaps it showed on his face, Gracia answered with a smile.

    "He owes Feldway a lot of money, and he can''t say no to a favor.

    Pico followed suit.

    "But he can''t go back to Demon Lord Rimuru, so he''s decided to follow Michael-sama."

    No way, Kagali thought.

    "Well, I guess that''s it."

    Dino nodded.

    Kagali didn''t think he was following Michael for that reason, but it was ridiculous, and Kagali agreed that it was typical of Dino.

    Kagali changed her mind.

    "So, what was Demon Lord Rimuru like? I have a grudge against him for killing yman, and I''d like to avenge him if I get the chance. "

    A lie. In fact, I have no grudge against Demon Lord Rimuru.

    I have no doubt that I have a history with him. However, he had just formed an alliance with Yuuki, and he was curious to see if they would be enemies again. The one to me for yman''s death would be Lieutenant Kondou, who had controlled him, and Michael, who had controlled even Kondou. Kagali understood this calmly, but she was not foolish enough to say it. Dino answered Kagali''s question without going deeper.

    "Even his men are troublesome. Especially that bastard Zegion."

    In thest mission, Dino''s role was to neutralize thebyrinthine forces.

    Specifically, his mission was to kidnap or eliminate Ramiris. Dino ims to havee close to seeding, but the reality is that he failed. The reason, he says, is that he was interrupted by Zegion, a powerful majin.

    "Is he that strong? "

    "It''s not that strong. It was seriously unfashionable. Rumor has it he''s the strongest of the Dungeon''s Elite Ten, so at least he''s stronger than me." Dino assured him.

    He was tired from the long series of battles, and he had underestimated his opponent a little. Zegion, however, did not take Dino seriously and yed him lightly. Dino''s true feelings were that he didn''t want to be a sore loser.

    "That''s a weak thing to say. I''ll crush him! Don''t worry, I''ll crush him myself!"

    Vega eximed.

    (I love it when you''re stupid) Dino thought.

    Dino thought about it, but didn''t say it out loud.

    There''s no point in saying it.

    Vega''s still the same. This way, even if we get the power, we might not be able to use it effectively. . Kagali was disgusted.

    Kagali sighs in exasperation.

    It''s fine to be confident in your strength, but it''s no good if youck the most important sense in battle.

    That is the ability to grasp the difference in strength between you and your opponent. Facing an unwinnable opponent will only result in a loss of strength.

    Pico and Gracia seemed to understand this and frowned in displeasure. They didn''t say anything, probably because they were not close to Vega and realized that there was no point in advising him. That seemed to be the end of the conversation. .

    "Well, if you guys see a bug-shaped majin (insector) in thebyrinth, be careful, okay? The beetle type is Zegion, but Apito, the bee type, is just as bad."

    Znus took a bite out of Dino''s casual remark, which was about to conclude the conversation.

    "Beetle type and bee type? Tell me more."

    Dino was pressured by the tremendous spirit. Then, unintentionally, he disclosed as much information as he knew, though not much.

    "Oh, yeah? Well, I heard that they protected Rimuru before he became a demon lord. ."

    Znus is silent as he listens. Dino''s story is over, and an awkward silence hangs in the air.

    (What''s your response? What''s your reaction?)

    Dino thought that Znus was intimidating. Since he didn''t want to talk to Znus, he decided to change the subject and cover up the situation.

    "Anyway, you know. In Ramiris''sbyrinth, the defenders have aplete advantage. There are many strong yers like Zegion in there, so you should think that it will be very difficult to defeat them! "

    With that, Dino ended the conversation.

    As silence reigned once again, those gathered were caught up in their own thoughts. Kagali had a lot of things to think about. Dino''s statement was important, but right now he needed to know his own changes first. As Kagali was searching for information and checking her own changes, she felt a tremendous surge of power.

    The seraphim are the highest angels, said to beparable to the awakened demon lords. Kagali, who had taken in the power of the seraphim and be a "Yoten", had be so strong that she thought her demon lord self was ridiculous.

    Moreover, apart from his own Unique Skill ''Schemer'', he discovers that there is a new power embedded in his soul.

    Ultimate Enchantment ''Domination King (Melchizedek)'' - given by separating Michael''s ''control'' ability, it boasted a fearsome performance that could instantly analyze any ability and put it under control.

    However, since Kagali herself was also under the control of the power, it became impossible for her to betray Michael.

    (It''s terrifying. A battle between people with such power is a world I can''t even imagine).

    However, when the time came to fight, Kagali''s body would ughter the enemy on its own without her thinking. Kagali instinctively understood this, and felt afraid of her own change.

    But. . and that''s why she thinks about it.

    (I want to test the immense power I''ve acquired. )

    She knows she shouldn''t think about it, but for some reason she wants to.

    And. . You know the opportunity to test it wille soon enough.

    Vengeance was supposed to be gone.

    And yet you feel bad for Leon for killing you and for Rimuru for killing yman. And he thinks he can beat them now.I know it''s pointless, but I can''t stop the desire thates to me.

    Am I really weaker than Dino now?

    No. I never thought so.

    In fact, the current Kagali, who had be "Youten", was on the same level as Dino. It''s a shame, isn''t it, Dino? I never saw Dino fight, even when he was a demon lord. That''s why he''s weak, I guess.

    Kagali had a hard time suppressing the feeling of amusement that welled up inside of her. She would never be able to let her guard down.

    But still. . Even though Dino was at his mercy, he felt that he could win.

    After all, Kagali''s power surpassed even the awakened demon lord. Even the old demon lords, Ruminas and Dino, would not be defeated by the current Kagali.

    If so, even Demon Lord Leon should be no match for him. Wait for me, Leon. It''s your turn to cry! You''re next!

    Kagali continues to think, suppressing a faint feeling of pleasure.

    (Wait, Leon. It''s your turn to cry!)

    Kagali continues to think, suppressing the faint feelings of pleasure. . This is the kind of radicalized thinking thates from being ruled by authority, but Kagali herself doesn''t notice. .

    Vega doesn''t think. He only waits for orders. He''s got the power.

    Having experienced death so many times, he has looked into the depths of this world. He ate dium and took in the mythical-grade Blue Dragon spear, his weapon of choice. He even devoured the seraphim, making their power his own.

    At that moment, he felt the fragments of the skills he had acquired fused together and strengthened.

    His countless defeats had given him strength.

    The incarnation of the power that burst forth.

    That''s what Vega is.

    It was an existence that had been recreated by Yuuki''s hands, and as a result of taking in and fusing andplementing various skills, Vega had be the ultimate fighting creature. Finally, the Unique Skill ''Evil Eater'' evolved into the Ultimate Skill ''Azi Dahaka''. It has a destructive power that overwhelms the existing Skills. It was a disaster for the world that Vega, who never thought about controlling his power, had this ability. No, the opposite.

    Perhaps it is because he tried to master his power without thinking that he was able to acquire this power. Be that as it may.

    Vega waits. He waits for orders toe to him. He can only annihte and devour those who stand before him.

    Dino looks down and thinks about the current situation. How did this happen? He asks himself, unable to find the answer.

    A long time ago, Veldanava asked me to do a job for him and I came down to earth. I don''t think I had much of an ego at the time, but at some point, I was able to think for myself. I asked my colleagues Pico and Gracia about it, and they seemed to have developed their own ego at almost the same time.

    Many things happened, and Dino and his friends were corrupted.

    They became demon lords to obey the orders of the vanished Lord, whose only purpose in life was to keep them alive. Dino continued to watch them.

    He nned to watch the oue of Guy and Rudra''s game without intervening.

    His loyalty to Veldanava was absolute. Dino believed that one day, at the end of time, he woulde back.

    And he did.

    (That weird slime. The glow of a soul you can understand at a nce.

    It was different from Veldanava, but it felt familiar. And the good days began.

    I hated working, but I was happy to be used by humans.) Dino couldn''t believe it, but for some reason he felt satisfied. This was because he had a group of people to work with.

    (And yet, I betrayed Ramiris. .)

    What Dino regrets is the attack on Ramiris five months ago.

    On Feldway''s orders, he betrayed Rimuru and the others, and invited the enemy into thebyrinth. He then moved to capture Ramiris, the most important target. The order was to dispose of him if he could not be captured, but Dino did not intend to do so. He did not really intend to kill it, but to seal it with Deep Hypno and cover it up. Fortunately, or unfortunately, the attempt ended in failure.

    And now I''m wondering why I did such a thing.

    (No, no, no, that''s proof that he''s telling the truth, I suppose.) Dino thinks.

    I don''t want to make excuses for betraying Ramiris, but I''m pretty sure that I was under Michael''s control.

    (So, you''re saying that as long as I have ''Heavenly King Astarte'', I can''t go against Michael or Feldway?)

    (You''ve got to be kidding me. I''m not.)

    Although I grasped the situation urately, I couldn''te up with a clever idea to ovee this situation.

    The saving grace is that Rimuru believes in Dino.

    (He''s a smart guy, but he''s a softie. He may be easily fooled, but he can''t be too careful.)

    Dino suddenly sees a blue butterfly mark on his right arm.

    He thought that Zegion had missed it, but it seems that the birthmark had be a corridor connecting his mind and heart. Hence, Rimuru contacted me through that birthmark.

    (Seriously, he''s so clever, isn''t he?)

    He spoke directly to my heart, but he stole all the information from me.

    Moreover, he is forcing me to spy on him with impunity. Rather than feeling abhorrent or something like that, Dino felt strangely refreshed. Surprisingly, he was happy that Rimuru believed him.

    (See youter, huh?)

    Dino realized that for the first time in a long time, he felt truly happy. And then, he thought to himself, what a mess. Dino had no intention of betraying his creator, Veldanava. Since Michael and Feldway''s goal is to revive Veldanava, Dino thinks that he should cooperate with them. But. .

    Dino''s honest feeling at the moment is,

    "This is going to be troublesome.

    (Well, whatever. I''m not much use to you anyway. I mean, the more I work, the weaker I be. There''s nothing I can do about it. It''s better for both parties if I don''t work hard, so it''s all good! I can''t help it.) The good thing about Dino is that he doesn''t worry too soon. Always positive, Dino, who is unrivaled when ites to cking off, came to his conclusion with an easy-going mind.

    This positivity was what made Dino such an amazing man. Dino, feeling refreshed, waited for Feldway and the others with a cheerful face.

    Arios thinks. His superiors, Kagali and the others, were talking, but he had no idea what they were talking about. He wanted toin, but his instincts told him that it was not a good idea. And rightly so.

    Arios was under Kagali''s control. The spell was still in effect, even now that he had be a Yoten through undead elf.

    If he had awakened on his own, it would have been a different story, but since his evolution was a set-up, it was inevitable that his control would be strengthened. Arios, who does not have the time to feel annoyed about it, is aware of his current situation. Filled with incredible power, he was ted with a sense of omnipotence.

    The most significant change was that the Unique Skill ''Murderer'' had evolved into the Ultimate Enchantment ''Conviction King (Sandalphon)''.

    Of course, it was not acquired by itself.

    The ''Conviction King (Sandalphon)'' that Michael recovered from Kondou was given to Arios as is. Murderer'' was consumed for this purpose, but Arios could not resist it at will.

    But Arios himself is not dissatisfied. He is simply happy to have the power, and waits for his turn.

    Orca and Aria was confused.

    She doesn''t have time to listen to the conversations around her, but is talking to her inner voice.

    Who am I?

    Is it Aria? Or, Orca?

    I don''t know, I''m Aria and I''m Orca.

    Confused as they were, they also felt their consciousnesses bing unified. It was not unpleasant, but rather pleasant.

    I, Orlia. .

    This was the moment when she got her answer.

    Orlia is a newborn, but she can use the skills of a first-rate warrior and wizard. Moreover, the given Ultimate Enchantment ''Alternative'' was optimized within Orlia and transformed into the Ultimate Enchantment ''Multiple Weapons'' .

    This allowed Orlia to use the experience umted in her own body to create a variety of weapons. Although there is a limit to the number of weapons that can be produced simultaneously, the grade is equivalent to a mythical-grade.

    Fully armed with multiple weapons, Orlia is not afraid to fight her enemies.

    Mai Furuki was in despair. She thought she was dead, but she came back to life. That''s good. The problem is that even Mai, now that she has more power, couldn''t fulfill her hope of returning to Japan. I''m not giving up.

    (I''m not giving up. My Unique Skill '' Traveller'' couldn''t do it, but Yuuki-kun said it''s possible. If Skill is born from desire, then there must be a power that can make my wishe true. .)

    The moment I thought that with an empty heart. .

    The Ultimate Enchantment ''Alternative'' given by Michael was consumed at the same time as the seraphim was inhabited, and Mai''s ''traveler'' evolved.

    It became the Ultimate Enchantment ''World Map'' .

    Not only can he imagine any ce in the world, but he can also understand what is happening there, an extraordinary power. What is even more amazing is that it is now possible to ''Instantaneous Movement'' to any ce you want without any time difference.

    For a person with spatial abilities, this is an unbelievable power. And yet, Mai''s wish was not fulfilled. The coordinates on this ''World Map'' were only for this world. In other words, it was impossible to cross the dimensional barrier. Mai understood this without even trying. It was a great despair, but either way, Mai was not free now. Everything was at Michael''s disposal. Until one day she could be free to travel to her beloved brother, Mai would keep her mind closed and follow orders.

    It''s not only those who have been reborn as Yoten who are trying to figure out what''s going on. Zrio and Obera are also pondering their own situations.

    First of all, Zrio was grateful for the physical body he had gained. Even though he had great power, he could only wield it in the Otherworld. In the Cardinal World, the more power you wield, the more energy you lose.

    In order to prevent this, a body was needed, but it was difficult to prepare a vessel that could withstand the power of someone as powerful as Zrio. Now that that problem had been solved, he would be able to show his true colors on the ground, but a big problem arose here.

    (Oh dear. Because of my increased power, I''ve acquired the angelic

    ''Judgement King (Israfil)''.)

    Yes, that was the problem. In the Incarnation, Zrio had acquired the Ultimate Skill ''Judgement King (Israfil)''.

    You can''t defy Michael with this. But if he threw it away, he would be suspected of treason. From Zrio''s point of view, Feldway is a colleague. From Zrio''s point of view, Feldway is his colleague, and he recognizes him as his boss, but he does not obey him absolutely.

    Besides, he was skeptical about Michael. Feldway trusts Michael, but Zrio does not. Zrio was not so easily convinced of a will arising from authority.

    Now he is convinced of the purpose and agrees with it, but it is unknown if it willst forever. I wanted to avoid having an angelic lineage in my life, in case the paths diverged.

    Nevertheless, the Judgement King (Israfil) was conceived. As this is not the Ultimate Enchantment, Michael''s will did not intervene. There is no doubt that it is a natural right that he has acquired, and for that reason, it seemed inadvisable to throw it away.

    (Now, I wonder how much Michael knows about it.)

    There was no doubt that it could control the angelic system, given its ability to control Velgrynd and Velzard. However, I should have changed my actions depending on how far I could grasp the owner of the system.

    (My will is my own. My will is mine, and I will not allow it to be rewritten without my knowledge.)

    Zrio is a rational thinker.

    Zrio is a rational thinker, which is why he did not interfere in the control of the True Dragon sisters out of respect for the high sess rate of the operation, but he really disliked the operation. And now, she was in the same position.

    (Really, what a mess. . I''m sorry.)

    Since I didn''t oppose it in the first ce, my current situation is my own fault. Even so, he ponders how to deal with Michael.

    And Obera, too.

    Like Zrio, Obera had acquired the Ultimate Skill of the Angelic System.

    And, like Zrio, it was not what she wanted.

    What Obera got was the Ultimate Skill ''Salvation King (Azrael)'' .

    It was an incredibly powerful power, but it was useless to her.

    The reason is that they were born as primordial beings and had administrative authority without relying on the Skill. They can activate all kinds of magic instantly, and if they make full use of it, they don''t need to rely on Skill. It is more flexible and can achieve anything. For Obera and his friends, whose very existence is on the ultimate level, it made no difference whether they had Ultimate Skill or not.

    (That''s why I got it at this moment, even though I didn''t wish for it. And I''m pretty sure it''s an angelic power...)

    That''s not good. She might find out that I''m rebellious.

    Obera, who had nned to turnpletely, was now in a more serious situation than Zrio.

    What to do now, Obera ponders.

    Don''t worry about being read.

    It''s no problem for her to erase the surface of the mind.

    However, this would not be the case if she was manipted without knowing it, so she needed to think of a countermeasure.

    (Let''s do a self-imposed suggestion.)

    Obera decided.

    If a contradiction arose within herself, she would not hesitate to destroy the

    ''Salvation King (Azrael)''.

    Because they are the ultimate spiritual life forms, they are capable of such unconventional actions. However, if that happened, it would have meant aplete break with Feldway. Depending on the situation, even Obera would not be safe.

    But still, for the sake of Milim, the orphaned son of Veldanava, Obera thought, there was no need to worry.

    (It would be nothing but disrespectful for us to discern the thoughts of the Creator, wouldn''t it)

    Feldway is too selfish, even though he may not resurrect of his own volition.

    That''s the truth.

    And Obera believes that Milim is the rightful sessor.

    A beautiful bell tolled. Solemn, clear, tickling the heartstrings.

    And the door opens. Out walked Michael, Feldway, and Velzard.

    With only three people, they radiate an air of supremacy that blows away the divine air that fills the hall. Waiting for Michael to be seated, Feldway and Velzard also took their seats.

    "Then let''s begin."

    And so, the strategy meeting began.

    Onmand, Mai stood up and projected a three-dimensional image of the entire Cardinal World in the center of the round table. It is a miniature of Earth.

    From God''s perspective, the stronghold of the demon lords was shown.

    "These are the strongholds of the Octagram who are against us, their key points. There are six of them."

    There are six of them: the north pole of Guy, the western edge of Dagruel, the central west of Ruminas, the Rimuru forest, the southeast of Milim, and the continent of Leon.

    In response to Michael''sment, Mai lit six points of light on the ground.

    "I want to hear your opinions on how we should attack this, gentlemen,"

    He called out, but only a few people were in Feldway''s line of sight. They were Zrio and Obera, and Yuki and Kagali. Dino and the three others are not good at nning operations, and Vega is not expected from the start. As for the others, we don''t give them the right to speak because we consider them to be a step below us. Zrio and Obera are silent, as if they are watching the situation. Kagali, sensing such an atmosphere, opened her mouth.

    "In this case, the aggressor has the advantage. I think we should concentrate our forces and target a single spot."

    "I agree. It''s just difficult to know where to aim."

    The defenders will have to spread out their forces. Kagali and Yuki agreed that there was no need for the defender to match the opponent. Surprisingly, it was Dino who spoke up after hearing this.

    "Just so you know, you shouldn''t go to Ramiris''byrinth. And by the way, Rimuru, the capital of the Demon Federation, will be isted in thebyrinth during the war. It''s not easy to get rid of, so I rmend you turn itst."

    Since this information was shared, no one objected. They realized that if they took too long in thebyrinth, they might be surrounded and annihted by reinforcements from other countries.

    "Let''s do thatst. By attacking elsewhere, we might be able to lure those who are holed up."

    Ramiris would be a huge nuisance if they were forced to y defense. With that in mind, he needed to n his attack.

    "There''s no one left at Frost Pce. There''s no sign of them."

    It was Velzard who suddenly spoke up.

    His gaze was sharp and fixed on Leon''s continent.

    "Well, the enemy has thought of a countermeasure. By consolidating the demon lord''s forces, they avoided dispersing their forces."

    "Indeed. It seems that there are five ces on the ground where a huge power is concentrated.

    Mai removes Guy''s north pole and strengthens the remaining five points of light.

    There is only one less option, but the difficulty seems to have increased greatly. However, the advantage of the attacker still remains.

    (So, where should we aim?)

    This is where Zrioes in.

    "Feldway-sama, I have a question.

    "What is it? What is it?

    "Michael-sama has absolute control over the angelic systems, but can''t we get a hint as to where its owner is? "

    He had asked an important question here, one that would affect him as well.

    Obera is in on it.

    "I''m curious about that. If you know what it is, you should probably get him on your side first."

    Hmm, nodded Michael.

    "I couldn''t sense it before, but I can now. -Kun has the Judgement King (Israfil) and the Salvation King (Azrael), and Dino has the Heavenly King Astarte, the Glory King (Haniel), and the Rigor King (Jibril). The remaining ''Domination King (Melchizedek)'' is owned by Kagali, and Arios there is the owner of the ''Punishment King (Sandalphon)'' And a higher angelic line that is my equal."

    Then Michael frowned.

    "It''s not enough."

    And with that, everyone became tense.

    "What does that mean? "

    Feldway asks.

    Michael responded with a matter-of-fact exnation.

    "First, Velgrynd''s Charity King (Raguel) was recovered and given to the right person."

    No one responded to this.

    There was an eerie silence, but unconcerned, Michael continued.

    "Then there''s the ''Patience King'' (Gabriel), which was never recovered and remains in Velzard''s possession."

    The icy beauty remains motionless, her face expressionless.

    "This was a natural step to maintain the rule of the Ultimate Dominion.

    "So far, the owners of these powers were known, but three of the four remaining powers were problematic.

    Michael''s exnation continued.

    Michael had taken Velgrynd''s power for himself, and had also taken in Velzard''s factor. This greatly increased his power, allowing him to search for signs of the owners of the angelic systems under his control.

    However, it was only able to find the ''Purity King (Metatron)''.

    "What? If it was the Ultimate Skill ''Hope King (Sariel)'', wouldn''t it have belonged to Chosen Hero Chronoa? "

    "There was no response. I don''t know if my surveince can''t reach thebyrinth of Ramiris, or if there are other reasons.

    "Hmm, Ramiris is not to be underestimated. It''s no wonder he can''t see into thebyrinth. If that''s the case, should we assume that the Covenant King (Uriel) and the Knowledge King (Raphael) also have owners in the same ce? "

    "I''m not sure, but I think it''s reasonable to assume so. After all, there''s no other ce I can''t explore with my powers."

    There are no other powers created by Veldanava, and the only possible one is Ramiris'' Intrinsic Skill, ''Labyrinth Creation''.

    So, Michael''s conclusion was that the remaining three existed in the same ce.

    He was right. But now they are lost, and even their essence has been changed, unknowingly. Michael had decided that the problem was solved.

    And so did Feldway and the others.

    "Hmm. Well, then, no problem. Either way, Veldora is in hisbyrinth, and we''re going to attack him anyway. We can find him then and add him to our ranks."

    "Is it safe to assume that the enemy has someone on the inside? "

    "Exactly. We can find them at a nce, so we''ll worry about thatter. What we need to think about now is where to make our first target, but. ."

    "I think we already have an answer. There''s only one known owner, so why don''t we add that one to the group first? "

    That''s what Yuuki decided.

    His free will has been taken away, but his recklessness is still intact.

    "Hmm. The one who possess the ''Purity King (Metatron)'' are here.. "

    All eyes focused on his fingertips.

    Michael pointed to El Dorado, the capital of Leon''s dominion.

    "That''s the Demon Lord Leon who killed me, isn''t it?

    Kagali muttered to herself.

    This was the moment when she realized that the sh that had burned her to the ground had been caused by the ''Purity King (Metatron)'' .

    "Done, I guess. So, who''s going to attack? "

    Yuuki asked with a smile.

    "I''m going. I don''t know if it''s Demon Lord Leon or what, but you don''t mind if I eat him, do you? "

    "Didn''t you hear what I said? Leon could be one of us."

    "Damn, that''s right. Then we''ll just have to put up with the rest of them."

    As if they''ve already decided where they''re going to attack, Yuuki and Vega are talking to each other.

    There was no one to stop them, and the policy was decided.

    There was no need to dere war, since the goal of this was to revive Veldanava.

    Michael and Feldway thought so. Inevitably, the war would start with a surprise attack. There was no need to spare any forces, but Feldway had his own ideas about that.

    "The goal is to bring the owner of the Purity King (Metatron) into the fold. It would be nice if we could get rid of some of the people who interfere with that, but it''s no fun to cause damage here. Therefore, let''s leave the mooks behind."

    He announced that he would attack only with the strongest.

    Michael''s Ultimate Dominion is versatile, but it is not unconditionally activated. It is an absolute dominion over the angelic system, but it requires you to cross your line of sight with the target.

    In addition, the Regalia Dominion had a moreplicated condition. The Dominion Bullet, which had been loaned to Lieutenant Kondou, could only be used on a single target, and the sess rate was low unless the target was caught off guard. The Regalia Dominion, on the other hand, changes the number of people it controls depending on the presence of the target it controls. And the important thing is that the sess rate is lower when the opponent is of the same rank as you, so you must inflict a considerable blow to fail.

    At the very least, the opponent must be less than you to seed, so it was a difficult power to use.

    The current value of Michael''s existence is about 90 million. However, Yuuki''s existence value (about 2 million) is subtracted from it, so Veldora, whose existence value is over 88 million, will not seed.

    Michael, who had no way of knowing such a situation, thought that controlling Veldora would be a difficult task. That is why he needed to gather his forces before attacking thebyrinth of Ramiris.

    That''s why they were trying to add the desired person to their ranks without diminishing the strength of their own camp. And so, the members of the sortie were decided.

    "I''m staying behind.

    Dered Dino, who was staying behind.

    "What about you and my army? "

    "I want you and the kun to be ready to move the troops. We''re nning tounch a full-scale invasion following this operation."

    "Yes, sir.

    The insectar led by Znus began to prepare for war, as did the phantom army. Zrio''s army was being coordinated by Dhalis and Nice. Since Obera''s army is still deployed in the otherworldly stronghold, Obera is to return and hand over to Oma. Then, all the remaining officers went out to battle.

    If it''s just the officers, Mai''s ''Instantaneous Movement'' will take them to their destination in an instant. With Obera, it would be no problem to identify the coordinates by ''Presence Detection'' , and they could meet up with each other immediately by ''Spatial Transportation'' . It would have been easy for Obera to meet us by Spatial Transportation.

    Based on this judgment, the surprise mission wasunched.

 Volume 18 - Ch 4

    Shattered Ambition

    I received the report from Dino, but the contents were ridiculous.

    As I expected, Michael had made his move.

    It was within expectations, so that was good.

    What surprised me was Obera''s actions.

    To my surprise, she had left Michael''s group with her own troops.

    I was stunned by this.

    What, are you kidding me?

    Im serious. I was also shocked. By the way, this was something Michael didnt know yet either. I was about to tell him.

    Hearing that, I was convinced that this guy (Dino) was an asshole.

    There were too many things going on, and this was not the time to be bothered. No, even before that, I thought he should report to his own boss before leaking the inside information to me, the enemy.

    But well, you know?

    It''s because Dino had such a personality that I was saved, right?

    For a moment, I felt a little sorry for Michael and Feldway.

    But before I got too excited, I had to ask something important.

    So, where did they decide to attack?

    Oh, its Leon''s territory. As I said, Obera left and I''m staying behind, but all the other officers have been mobilized. Pico and Gracia are also being taken by force, so if ites to a fight, please be merciful to them.

    What kind of a convenient story is that!? Well, I''ll keep it in mind.

    Please do. Oh, and I have one more favor to ask.

    I''m busy too, so make it quick.

    I listen to what Dino has to say as I prepare to go out.

    As I thought, I really enjoyed working with Vesta-san and Ramiris, and I''m bored here. So, Rimuru-san, please beat up Michael and free me!

    I was speechless.

    Hey, is your head okay? That''s not something you say to an enemy, do you understand me?

    So mean! We''re friends, arent we? Don''t be so cold! Oh, and by the way, did you apologize properly to Ramiris so that we could make upter?

    Screw you! I told you to apologize to her yourself!

    Waplease wait, Rimuru-san!

    Moving on

    Yes, moving on.

    I can''t allow myself to be manipted by someone against my will.

    Do your best to escape from their control as soon as possible. If you don''t do it soon, you''ll lose your title of demon lord!

    Hahaha, I''ll do my best. Well, I know you''re a dependable guy. There''s no one who''s as good at leaving things to others as I am, so I''ll just use you the best I can.

    That had to be a joke.

    However, I also thought that it was very typical of Dino.

    And onest piece of advice. That bastard Feldway is teaming up with the Insectars.

    I know. Seems pretty dangerous.

    Its not just dangerous. I had never seen that king Znus until before, but he might even be better than Guy. I cant know for sure until I actually fight him, but I know that I couldnt beat him even if I really tried. They''re staying back this time, but we don''t know when they''ll make a move, so don''t let your guard down.

    I''d like to say that it was just extra, but it was very valuable information, and also very unpleasant.

    Just by hearing that he was like Guy or above, my depression level was at its max.

    And more than that, if such a dangerous guy was waiting with his army, we needed to think of a countermeasure for immediate response.

    I thought about calling back Geld and the others whom I had left in various countries, but I decided not to do that either. We would be at a disadvantage if they targeted us while we were short-handed.

    If that was the case, it seemed that we would have no choice but to make do with what we had.

    Thanks for the advice. I''ll pass it on to everyone and be on the lookout. Well then, youre going to have to work really hard.

    Yeah. Dont die, Rimuru.

    No need to tell me that.

    This was my second lifeMy slime life, and I intended to enjoy more freedom.

    The war had been going on for a while now, and I was going to get rid of all the troubles and then take it easy.

    And I was going to have good times with my friends, including Dino, of course.

    You too.

    I replied to Dino, as if speaking from the heart.

    ***

    As soon as I finished my conversation with Dino, I summoned the remaining executives to the capital city Rimuru.

    The location was the Control Room in thebyrinth.

    When I looked at Leon''s stronghold with the Argos surveince magic, I saw that it was covered by a blizzard and that nothing else could be seen.

    El Dorado has a mild climate. A blizzard like this was unnatural, no matter how you look at it.

    It was obvious to everyone that Velzard was behind it.

    There was no contact from Leon and the others, and no visual confirmation of the enemy. There must be some kind ofmunication jamming going on there, and we had no choice but to trust in Dino''s words.

    Since the enemy wasing out with only their main force, we needed to assemble an appropriate force. If we tried to support them inefficiently, the damage would be too great.

    If we sent out too many, thebyrinth defense would be too thin, and if we sent too few, we would not be able to achieve our goal.

    It was a difficult decision to make.

    I see, the enemy is also very powerful.

    As soon as I exined what Dino had told me, Benimaru turned his attention to me.

    If he was eager to go, then I was not going to stop him.

    I was nning to send just me, Ranga and Souei to support them, but I guess they''re more powerful than I thought. We''ll be in danger if only we show up, so Benimaru, you should join us.

    You dont even have to ask. So, who else are you taking with you?

    As soon as Benimaru announced that he was going to take me, his face broke into a smile.

    Is it me?

    No, its not.

    I shut down Veldora''sment immediately.

    Just think about it. Veldora was a good ally, and a great asset, but we had to remember that he was the enemy''s target.

    You know, you should be aware that you''re being targeted. Besides, as long as you or I are safe, we can still be revived, so it''s nonsense for the two of us to go out and fight together!

    Kuaahahaha! I was careless. Just leave the protection of thebyrinth to me!

    Please do.

    I was in a serious pinch right now, so I was really counting on him.

    Once the most problematic child was convinced, I turned to Zegion.

    Zegion, and Apito, continue guarding thebyrinth. We can''t leave this ce empty because it seems like there is a dangerous enemy waiting for us.

    Leave it to me. I wish you the best of luck, Rimuru-sama.

    How very reliable.

    The dragon lords would remain as a force, and wed be able to analyze their strength.

    That left Treyni-san, Beretta, and Charys.

    Charys, keep an eye on Veldora to make sure he doesn''t go out of control.

    I don''t need to be told, sir. Ill keep a close eye on Veldora-sama so that Rimuru-sama can go into battle without worry.

    Eh? I''m being monitored?

    Don''t worry about it.

    No, no, I''m curious.

    Read this and calm down.

    Charys handed Veldora aic book to quiet him down, and I found it reassuring in a different sense.

    Just leave Master to us, we''ll take care of him!

    Thebyrinth is well guarded, and we are training so that we will not be caught unaware this time. I am looking forward to showing you the results.

    I''d rather not have that chance, but it was reassuring to know we were prepared for anything. I nodded back to Treyni-san, asking for her help.

    Rimuru-sama has given me strength, and I am stronger than ever. I''ve been training with Charys-dono, and I have no intention of losing to Dino-sama next time. Please rest assured.

    Well, I believe you.

    Whether they can beat Dino or not, the current Beretta team should be able to keep up with them.

    That was why

    I''m taking Kumara with me.

    Me, Benimaru, Ranga, Kumara, and Souei were chosen as the members of this sortie.

    However, there was still one thing that was bothering me

    Sorry, Benimaru. I made the decision without asking your opinion, but if you don''t like it, you can turn it down. Did you want to stay and protect your wives?

    Momiji and Alvis were very pregnant.

    Apparently, the gestation period of monsters varied widely. Momiji''s mother, Kaede, had been carrying Momiji in her belly for over three hundred years.

    In the case of beastmen, some had embryos and some had eggs, even though they were the same species. Alvis was said to be have an embryo, but she also maintained her transformed state throughout her pregnancy.

    It may be that the human figure was more overworking, but it seemed that there were also individual differences. Well, it''s not like I knew about out the whole biology of monsters yet, so there was no point in worrying about it.

    Let''s hope that some ecologists who were interested in the subject would solve it within a reasonable range.

    I left it at that.

    What is important now was Benimaru''s feelings of leaving his two pregnant wives to go to the battlefield.

    Which is more important, work or me?

    I think that this was one question that everyone hated to be asked.

    Well, I had been a bachelor, so I never had to deal with that question.

    I didnt regret itIm not jealous, okay?

    I was such a corporate ve that I couldn''t evene home from work on my birthday, so I think it would have been bad if I had a girlfriend.

    Emotionally, the wife took priority, but rationally, it might be the job. If one didnt have money, they couldnt make a living, so one would have no choice but to give priority to their work.

    However, that is difficult because there are times when a man has no choice but to protect his family.

    There is no doubt that it was ideal to work for an understandingpany.

    Anyway, as a policy of our country, I wanted to pursue this ideal as much as possible. As for me personally, I didnt want Benimaru to have a marital crisis, and I wanted to respect his will.

    Benimaru replied, as ifughing at my concern.

    That is an unnecessary concern. I will do everything in my power to protect the people I love. In the first ce, I wanted to have an heir so that they could take my ce in case something happened to me. If you misunderstand that, Im not doing the right thing.

    Well, that may be true in theory.

    But is that really okay with him?

    But, you know

    Strange as it may seem, I was the one who was lost.

    As if to reassure me, Benimaru smiled.

    Don''t worry. The safest ce on earth is here, and I''ve asked Hakurou to guard them. If something should happen, he''ll take over for me and raise my sessor. So, there''s nothing to worry about! Besides, I don''t think I''m going to lose, and I don''t doubt Rimuru-sama''s victory.

    He said it so refreshingly.

    Souei nodded his head in agreement, and looking around at the faces of the others, they all seemed to feel the same way. It made me wonder if I was the one who was wrong.

    Hohoho. Rimuru-sama is very kind. It''s probably because he was born in a time of peace, but that is not the mainstream way of thinking in a world of war. My daughter Momiji and Alvis-dono are prepared for this. On top of that, I believe in Benimaru-sama.

    The fact that he didnt call Benimaru young showed how serious he was about his statement. As if agreeing with Hakurou, Momiji and Alvis had arrived before I knew it.

    Thats right. There is no way that my husband can lose!

    Yes, I agree with Momiji-san. Benimaru-sama, if you leave us and die, we''ll chase you to the ends of the earth. Please be prepared.

    It seemed that these two were already prepared.

    If that''s the case, there was no time for me to be confused.

    Okay, I appreciate the sentiment. I''m not saying we''ll win, but I promise that we''ll all make it back alive.

    Hmm, just leave it to me, Rimuru-sama. All we have to do is win.

    I forgot to mention that Benimaru was an incredibly confident person. When he and Souei were together, it seemed like they could defeat any opponent.

    The same was true for Kumara and Ranga.

    Yes, sir. I will do my best too, and we wont be defeated.

    My lord, I am with you! No matter who the enemy is, there is no doubt if its you!

    There seemed to be some kind of a mistake, but I understood what they were trying to say.

    Youre right. This is no time to feel lost, and theres no use worrying about it before the fight. Although the goal is to defend Leon, let''s do our best to crush Michael''s ambitions!

    I dered as such.

    Speaking calmly with Michael anding to some beautiful understandingI wasnt going to pretend that wed be able to do something like that

    Hes dangerous.

    He has no humanity, and hes willing to sacrifice anything to achieve his goal.

    It was annoying, but in the end, I had no choice but to pick a fight with someone who was outside the line of mutual respect.

    Let''s go!

    Everyone nodded at my words.

    Do not worry about anything until after everything is over.

    I made up my mind to do so and began to Teleport everyone to the battlefield.

    ***

    By the time Rimuru and the others had begun their preparations, the war had already begun.

    There was no deration of war, and Vega began going out of control.

    Damn it, can''t he at least try to follow the n?

    Kagali nodded in agreement when she heard Feldwayining.

    The purpose of this operation was not to destroy El Dorado, but to bring the angelic skill owners before Feldway and add them to their ranks.

    Kagali was confused when she heard that Michael''s control could be handled by Feldway. However, she believed that it was tactically correct to keep the generals out of the battlefield.

    So, without any doubts, she epted the current n.

    The n was simple.

    Everyone here, Feldway, Velzard, Zrio, Pico, Gracia, Kagali, Yuuki, Tear, Footman, Vega, Orlia, Arios, and Mai Furuki, thirteen in all, would go on a rampage.

    The idea was to ughter those who rushed out to intercept them, while searching for the angelic skill users.

    Although it was a guess, and not a definite one, Kagali was sure that it was Leon. Even if she was wrong there would be no problem. The mission would be over as soon as the target was taken.

    If they didn''te out to defend the city, Kagali and her team were going to go in as an assault team.

    However, as soon as they had arrived at the site through Mai''s Instantaneous Movement, Vega went berserk, ignoring all instructions. He struck at the city''s defense barriers and destroyed them. He then charged straight into the ce that appeared to be the royal castle.

    Kagali was dumbfounded.

    Hes even dumber than before now that he''s got more power. We can''t incorporate him into our operations at this rate, we might as well seriously consider a purge.

    Vition of orders was strictly forbidden in any organization.

    Moreover, if it was an executive who did it, it might eventually be a matter of not being able to control the military discipline. To make an example of the subordinates, they might have to think about how to handle Vega.

    Anyway, the operation had already started.

    Kagali decided to discuss the n with Feldway, leaving Vega to be dealt with upon their return.

    Myself and Velzard would be a perfect diversion, but Zrio, Pico and Gracia, should stay here. I''ll put the rest under yourmand, so you can run wild and find the people you want.

    Tear and Footman, not to mention Arios, Orlia, Mai, and the rest of the undead elf resurrection team, were under the influence of Kagali''s spell. The orders were notpulsory, but they were connected by telekinesis.

    Besides, nning strategies was Kagali''s forte. Feldway recognized this and had given hermand.

    Therefore, Kagali gave the order.

    Vega will be reprimanded for his outburstter, but for now, hit the enemy with all your might. If you can''t win, I''ll allow you to retreat, so go ahead and go wild!

    With the exception of Yuuki, all of them there had gained a great deal of power. They at least had more self-control than Vega, but were still eager to see how strong they had be.

    That''s why, as soon as Kagali gave the go-ahead, they all started moving at once.

    And Kagali, alone, followed behind.

    I have free will and have been given a certain amount of authority. I might not get any more opportunities in the future.

    Perhaps she should wait for a better time. Such a thought crossed her mind, but she was terrified that Michael was in control of her will.

    If she were to be turned into aplete puppet, all hope would be lost.

    It was not unlikely that this was herst chance. Optimism was a dangerous thing, and Kagali decided to take action.

    From the very beginning, she had no intention of being loyal to Feldway and the others.

    Michael and Feldway were crazy.

    Their insanity was so palpable that Kagali was convinced that a future with them was not bright.

    I swear I will not betray you. And I will ept your dominion.

    Thats right.

    Kagali had sworn that she would never betray her friends.

    Even if that meant epting Michaels control.

    And she was prepared to repay the favor she had received from Yuuki, no matter how dirty her hands would be.

    Michael''s control seems to be absolute within a certain range. However, it might be less effective if the distance is increased. Or, if we iste ourselves from the same space, we might not be affected at all!

    They could look for signs of the other skill owners whereabouts. However, the locations of those three skills were still unknown.

    In other words, there was a high possibility that it was a safe zone.

    Ramiris Labyrinth.

    If they could escape there, then there was a chance that Kagali and the others could be saved.

    Fortunately, they were allied with Demon Lord Rimuru.

    No, thats doubtful right now, but there was still a good chance that the good-natured Lord Rimuru would hide Kagali and the others.

    So, the best course of action for Kagali and the others was to create a big mess here and find an opening to escape.

    For that reason

    Can you hear me, Lace?

    Chairman!? You''re all right!!

    I''m fine, but I''m in a tricky situation. Thats why

    Please order me to do anything you need. So, where should I go?

    Its El Dorado.

    Kagali called upon her most reliable trump card.

    And so, Lace had joined the fight.

    ***

    On the other hand, Leon''s subordinates immediately became tense.

    They had been training for what was to one daye.

    Today, it was the real deal.

    It wasn''t long before Leon had received a report that the city''s defenses had been breached and that they were currently being invaded by the enemy.

    With a follow-up report, a bleeding knight shouted.

    There are only eight intruders, but their strength is enormous! They have already entered the city, and we are in chaos!

    Leon turned to Guy, seeing off the knight who returned to intercept.

    Have you contacted Rimuru?

    Damn, we''re being cut off. Shes up there. Velzard. Which means that there''s more than eight of them.

    Leon nodded in agreement.

    Even if he had been the enemy, he would move first to break the enemy''s link. This, of course, was to be expected.

    So, as a countermeasure against such a situation, Rimuru was also keeping track of the situation of each force with the monitoring magic Argos. There would be a bit of a timeg, but he would know if something was wrong.

    Help was bound toe.

    BesidesEven if they didn''t make it in time and things went horribly wrong, there was still the n that Rimuru had jokingly mentioned.

    It might not have been serious, and Leon would probably want to reject it, but in a serious situation, there would be no time to argue.

    In any case, he thought that he should probably do his best to prevent that from happening right now, so Leon asked Guy,

    What do you say, should we wait here until Rimuru and the others arrive?

    No, that would be difficult. If it weren''t for Velzard, we''d be fine. If she gets serious, this ce could easily disappear.

    That''s not good.

    Using Spatial Transportation required the exact coordinates of the current location and the travel destination. If they had been cut off, it was safe to assume that the enemy had taken such spatial measures into ount.

    If the magic transfer circle is destroyed, then the arrival of reinforcements will be dyed even more.

    If we can buy a dozen minutes of time, Rimuru should arrive by then. In order to hope for that, they would have to defend this base.

    Right? Then I guess I''ll just have to go out there and deal with her. Guy said, standing up.

    I will go with you.

    I''m going to take it seriously today.

    Mizari and Rain followed Guy''s lead.

    The abilities of these two people had already been grasped after living together for the past few months.

    In particr, Rain''s skills were improving rapidly, to the point that Leon began having a hard time with her.

    Normally, that would be annoying, but now that she was on their side, it felt reliable.

    Mizariined that she wished she could always take it seriously, but that onement summed up everyones feelings.

    Then, another annoying person interrupted.

    Kufufufu. You two weaklings won''t be of much use if you follow us. I''m unwilling to help Guy, but I respect Rimuru-sama''s orders. I''ll help you, so lets go together.

    You should thank me for helping you, that man, Diablo,ughs out.

    Rain is repulsed by this and starts to argue with him.

    Guy yells at them in a disgusted tone.

    Mizari shakes her head in exasperation.

    They must be close, Leon thought, as he watched them leave in a loud racket.

    However, there was no time to think about such things.

    Guy and the others would take care of things outside, and Leon would have to do his part.

    The screams of his men could be heard from the corridor, and it was clear that the situation was bad.

    He could not move carelessly, for he was in danger of being dominated. It was frustrating for Leon.

    No one is headed for the city, are they?

    He asked his trusted ally, Silver Knight Alrose, who was always at his side.

    Alrose, who had beenmunicating with the knights on the Telepathy Net, replied sinctly.

    Ha! It seems that they are all trying to get in the castle.

    So they were piling in. Leon nodded.

    In that case, have the Magic Knights seal off the castle! Iste the intruders inside the castle and do not allow them tomunicate with the outside world!

    Understood!

    Dismissing Guy''s concerns as irrelevant, Leon skipped to the instructions.

    If they could contain the enemy inside the castle, then there would be no damage to the city below. He would then wait for support from Rimuru and take out the isted enemy.

    To prevent further damage, each Knight Commander must intercept the enemy.

    Yes, sir!

    After sealing the castle with the istion barriers, he sent the knightmanders to intercept the enemy.

    It was the deployment of their reserve forces.

    The maintenance of the city defense barriers was left to the Yellow Knights, who specialized in defense, and the White Knights, who specialized in recovery. The offensive Red Knights were dispatched to intercept the enemy.

    The only remaining force was the Blue Knights who specialized in raiding. Depending on the situation, they would cover the weak points.

    Alrose took charge as Leon gave outmands.

    Before Leon, the six pirs knelt down.

    Demon Lord Leon-sama. Give us permission to go out.

    They were the demon generals under Guy.

    Not Guy, to be exact, but Mizari and Rain''s subordinates.

    They used to be archdemons, but when Mizari and the others evolved, they became demon peers.

    Among them, Misora, the leader of Rain''s subordinates, was a duke-ss demon because of her hard work. Although she was weaker than Moss, who was also a duke, she possessed an outstanding fighting ability.

    Kahn, the leader of Mizari''s subordinates, was also no slouch.

    Although he was inferior to Misora in terms ofbat ability, he was a powerful demon worthy of the rank of marquis. 101

    The other four pirs were as strong as the leaders of the Magic Knights. It was a shame to keep them idle.

    Permission granted. Go. Work with Fran and the others to defeat the enemy.

    And so, the demons were also unleashed.

    The only ones standing by Leon''s side were Commander Alrose and the ck Knight ude.

    If he could, he would have wanted to send these two to intercept the enemy as well. However, because the enemy''s goal this time was Leon, they had to leave an escort here.

    It''s frustrating.

    Please be patient. While its strange that I am protecting Leon-sama, we must trust everyone here and stay put.

    Fufufu. There are eight enemies in the castle. In addition to the four knight captains, there are those demons. And there are also highly trained knights. There is no way we will be defeated.

    While ude admonished Leon, Alrose expressed his optimism as if to encourage himself.

    He knew it would not be easy, but he had to prevent Leon from falling into the hands of the enemy.

    They decided to be patient and wait for good news in the throne room.

    After a while, violent tremors could be heard throughout the castle.

    The fiercest battleground was the battlefield where Vega was rampaging.

    Misora was inmand, and the demons were stalling for time with the four pirs.

    Supporting them was the White Knight Maetel, the leader of the White Knights.

    Maetel was a blond-haired, blue-eyed beauty. Her specialty was restoration magic, and her presence alone enhanced their ability to fight on.

    The demons were taking advantage of this and were fighting well against Vega.

    Yes, it was a good fight.

    One by one, they would leave the battlefield, and Maetel would heal them and bring them back. This happened repeatedly.

    In the face of such overwhelming violence, there was no choice but to throw themselves into the fray.

    Misora''s face is distorted with pain.

    But she was undeterred.

    She was always being tormented by the recklessness of her master, Rain, time and time again.

    And besidesIf the demons retreated here, Guy would purge them. So they would fight proudly and fulfill their duties.

    HoweverVega''s existence value was over 10 million, while the demons, even the upper ranks, were only about 500,000. Even Misora was only about 700,000.

    They did not possess an Ultimate Skill, and the difference in strength was obvious.

    Gahhahaha! Weak, weak youre too weak!!No!! I''m too strong. I''m just too strong. Sorry to say, but youre too weak to even think about eating, so youll be suffering for a long time. You must hate your weakness!!

    They had no choice but to calmly deal with Vega, who was spouting off abusive tirades, trampling on the demons'' pride.

    No, that was the demons strategy.

    They were good at reading emotions, and were taking advantage of Vega''s personality. By letting Vega rampagefortably, they were able to maintain the stalemate.

    Unlike the fierce yet stable battle against Vega, Arios opponents were surrounded by a tense atmosphere.

    Hyaahahaha! I can kill all I want!! What the hell, this power is awesome!!

    Intoxicated by the violence, Arios was rampaging as if he had lost his reason from when he was human.

    The Ultimate Enchantment Punishment King (Sandalphon) was embodied as a pistol that could shoot as much as Arios wanted.

    There was also a bastard sword 102 in his right hand. This was a weapon created by Orlia''s Multiple Weapons.

    These two weapons were far more powerful than a simple mythical-grade weapons. By using these weapons, Arios was able to ughter the knights. He looked like an imitation of Lieutenant Kondou, but this was a sign of admiration that even Arios himself would not admit.

    The leader of the Blue Knights, the Bleu Knight Oxian, and Kahn teamed up to challenge Arios.

    The difference in weaponry could not be bridged, but it was fortunate that their skills (level) were on par. Kahn used his pride as a great demon to interfere with Arios with his magic, and Oxian used his brilliant swordsmanship to confront Arios.

    The fact that Oxian was good at auxiliary magic was also significant. His physical strength and the durability of his sword werepensated for by the multipleyers of Kahn''s and Oxian''s magic.

    Even so, the chances of victory were almost zero. Oxian, a nihilistic nobleman, did not want to win against an opponent who would not be injured by a direct hit. He was conscious of the fact that his sword would not be broken, and was trying to make this battlest as long as possible.

    He did not want the enemy to reach his beloved Leon.

    The daunting battle had only just begun.

    The Red Knight Fran and the Yellow Knight Kizona, themanders of the Red and Yellow Knights, respectively, were fighting against Orlia.

    Fran was a healthy, auburn-skinned beauty, lightly armed and focused on offensive power. Kizona was small in stature but cheerful in disposition, and wore heavy full-body armor.

    Fortunately for these two women, Orlia had ack of fighting spirit.

    Orlia was cautious.

    Unlike Vega and Arios, she was cautious about her skill.

    However, Fran and Orlia were the worst match-up. All of her magic had fallen before Orlia''s shield.

    Orlia experimented with her Multiple Weapons to see what weapons she could create. She gave Arios a bastard sword, and Mai a crescent bow. And for herself, she had prepared a morning star 103 and a tower shield 104 .

    With this, she could test both her offensive and defensive capabilities.

    It can be said that those two were saved by Orlia''s character.

    With the two of them as his test subjects, Orlia was slowly and surely getting used to the weapons she had created with her Ultimate Enchantment.

    Mai was on the battlefield, but she couldn''t get rid of the feeling of being out of ce.

    She didn''t understand the point of fighting.

    But it was impossible to go against Michael.

    Even Yuuki, whom she trusted, was a follower of Michael, and Mai could not win against him.

    On the other hand, she didnt feel like turning her de on the knights who had no grudge against her, so she just stayed on the sidelines.

    If she had seriously participated in the battle, the situation would have turned in favor of the angels long ago.

    But that didn''t happen.

    If things continue like this, everyone will be unhappy. But what am I supposed to do? Tell me, Yuuki-kun

    Mai was at a loss, troubled, and unable to find an answer.

    She still needed some time before she could make a move.

    ***

    Guy and the others went to intercept her, but there was a blizzard outside the castle.

    It was Velzard''s work.

    I''ll deal with her.

    Guy''s words were met with no objections from anyone.

    He had fought Velzard several times before, both long ago and recently, and she was clearly very strong. Inevitably, Guy would have to be the one to face Velzard.

    Besides, the current Velzard wasn''t holding back her power. The evidence was that she had changed from a girl to a grown woman.

    And her eyes were not the usual deep-sea blue diamond hues, but were golden. They shone with a mysterious, evil, and shining light.

    That was Velzard''s true form, her human battle form. Seeing this, Guy realized that she was serious.

    And Velzard was going crazy with emotion.

    When he flew up to Velzard, who was stationary in the sky and at the center of the blizzard, Velzard saw Guy and shouted happily.

    I love, love, love you, Guy. Soyou should also kill (love) me more and more and more!! 105

    She then challenged Guy with a big smile on her face.

    Che, thats why I said these things were troublesome!

    Guy was also fighting back seriously.

    It would be suicide to go easy on Velzard.

    And so, in the skies above the castle, a battle broke out between the strongest forces in the world.

    Guy was strong.

    His existence value was so high that it almost reached 40 million.

    But Velzard was different.

    Velzard was more than twice as powerful as Guy and had unimaginable power. She was not just the sister of the Creator, she was the most absolute on earth.

    And Velzard had never been serious, even when dealing with her sister, Velgrynd. She always responded in the form of a girl, that is to say, with her own power blocked.

    Even when she wiped out Veldora, she had only dealt a yful blow. This meant that her attacks were very energy efficient.

    The only time she got serious was when she took on Guy.

    The only reason Guy was able to fight her on even terms was because of his superiorbat ability. On top of that, he always tried his best to keep the ground as unaffected as possible, so one could understand how terrifying a man like Guy Crimson was.

    The battle, as always, lead to a stalemate.

    And then Guy realized.

    This person wasnt being controlled after all.

    No, she was being controlled, but it seemed to be the result of not daring to resist, because it was in line with Velzard''s wishes.

    Velzard seemed to be very happy.

    It was a very familiar look that could only be seen in the midst of battle.

    Rather than good news, this was a disappointing fact.

    A long-repressed desire that had been suppressed for so many years, only to be unleashed because of Feldway and the others. That means that this rtionship would not improve until Velzard was convinced.

    If she was only being controlled, it would have been enough to release it. But since she wasn''t, there was nothing Guy could do.

    Velzard wasnt the kind of person who responded to persuasion. The only way to bring her to her senses was for Guy to stay with her until she was satisfied.

    Good grief, man!

    Whileining about this, Guy fearlessly sneered.

    And then he happily intercepted Velzard.

    ***

    Above the castle, even higher than Velzard and the others

    Standing in front of Feldway and Zrio was Diablo.

    Evil demon who does not know your ce, you dare to challenge us alone?

    Kufufufu. You told me to be prepared the next time I saw you, but are you going to entertain me today?

    Damn it. I don''t have time to y with the likes of you. Zrio, Ill let you deal with him.

    Feldway avoided a fight with Diablo.

    Diablo was a troublesome demon. Knowing this well, he hesitated to deal with him.

    Feldway left the castle without saying a word.

    Diablo thought about interfering, but Zrio would not allow it.

    He was annoyed at being pushed around, and frankly speaking, he wanted to refuse. However, since it was an order from his immediate superior, he decided that he had no choice but to ept the situation.

    It cant be helped. Now that you have acquired the name Diablo, let''s see how strong you''ve be.

    With that, the two sides went into battle.

    Zrio, though reluctant, was confident.

    He had just been incarnated, but his body was in good condition. It had been a long time since he had exerted himself to the fullest, but he wouldnt be broken down, and that lifted Zrio''s spirits.

    Dark Eight Palms.

    Zrio took the initiative.

    It was a very simple technique that involved putting magical energy into the palm of one''s hand, but its power was immeasurable. Eight separate energy projectiles were flying towards Diablo.

    Worthless. So that''s the extent of it.

    Diablo, on the other hand, muttered in a bored tone.

    It was not a strategy to stir up trouble or to make himself look good, but his true feelings.

    When you are dealing with a lower-ranked opponent, or even apetitor, you have to be very careful about what you do.

    Diablo lightly evaded the projectiles and red at Zrio.

    Are you just an amateur with a lot of power, wasting your energy?

    He asked this quite seriously.

    Zrio was annoyed by this, but kept his cool.

    This is why I hate this guyHe replied while hiding his anger.

    Shut up. That was nothing for me. In the first ce, you and I are different in terms of the absolute amount of power we contain. You should worry more about yourself, not me.

    This was a fact.

    Zrio''s conditions were now different from when he had invaded Ramiris''byrinth. Now that he had a physical body, he was able to fully exercise the power of his main body in the Pce of Monsters. With an existence value of over 20 million, he was confident that he would not be defeated even by a True Dragon.

    There was no need to worry about wasting a bit of energy, as it would be quickly recovered.

    But only Diablo snickered.

    This is why amateurs are no good. In our fight, we must either annihte our opponent with a single blow or prepare for a long battle, you know? So, the basic rule is to focus on how to fight without being exhausted. If you cant even understand that, then Zrio, you''ve been cking off, haven''t you?

    Zrio was annoyed by Diablo''s superior attitude.

    Hed put up with it if it was said after a loss, but the fight has only just begun. It might have been a tactic to disturb the opponent''s mind, but Diablo was not aiming for that.

    He was sincerely and earnestly trying to give advice.

    The fact that Zrio understood this made him even more annoyed.

    Shut up. Your advice is none of my business, so just shut up. Even if you werent worried, Ive been fighting on the front lines against Insectars, the natural enemies of demons. You should know that someone like you who has been livingfortably on the surface is no match for me now!

    Hmm, that''s very impressive. And don''t worry. I, too, have fought to the death against Zegion-dono. Zegion-dono is also an insect-type majin (insectar), and a very strong one at that. Moreover, he has been given Rimuru-sama''s cells, which are enviable, and has very few attackable parts. So, even for me, he is a difficult opponent to beat.

    The small number of attackable parts was a self-imposed rule that Diablo had set for himself. Diablo''s own rule was that he would not target the parts made of Rimuru''s cells.

    Because of this rule, the three demon girls had also been unable to defeat ZegionBut thats another story.

    I don''t know what you mean, but no matter how much I train on this tepid ground

    And then, Zrio suddenly remembered.

    He hadn''t heard the name Zegion before, but it was familiar to him.

    Zegion was the name of the person that Dino had dered as troublesome and whom even Znus had expressed interest in. If he had been fighting to the death against someone like that instead of training

    I see, it seems that this is no time to be ying around.

    And so, Zrio got serious.

    The battle between Diablo and Zrio was about to begin.

    ***

    In front of Rain and Mizari stood Pico and Gracia.

    I-Its cold.

    Rain''s heart was already about to break.

    If she wasn''t a demon, she would have run back to the firece by nowRain was thinking about how to get out of this situation.

    RainYou said earlier that you were going to get serious today, didn''t you? So why do you look so unmotivated?

    That''s a silly question, Mizari. It''s because it''s cold. Why should I have to fight in such cold weather, in a blizzard, against an opponent I dont even hate!?

    When asked by Mizari, Rain blurted out her true feelings without any intention of hiding them.

    What are you talking about?is what a dumbfounded Mizari wanted to say, but surprisingly, someone else also agreed.

    It was Pico, who was supposed to be the enemy.

    Tell me about it! Why do I have to fight like this in a ce like this where I can''t even see from all this snow!

    In fact, Pico also looked very cold.

    So did Gracia, for that matter.

    Don''tin. I''m cold too.

    She was trying to calm Pico down, but it was obvious that she felt the same way.

    Rain and Mizari were wearing maid outfits, but Pico and Gracia were only wearing thin clothes. Gracia, for example, was wearing a bare shoulder outfit that made her feel cold just looking at it.

    Oh, perhaps I was the only one who was really trying to fight?

    Mizari was upset when she realized this shocking fact. Not caring about her, Rain and the others began hitting it off and started spilling theirints.

    I mean, Velzard-sama, she really shouldnt be blowing snow everywhere all of a sudden.

    Seriously, I agree. I mean, if she was going to do that, she should have told me in advance. Then I could have worn my favorite fur coat.

    That way I could brag about it, Pico said.

    Hold on, Pico, when did you find the time to buy that?

    Fufufu, just a little in between work~

    Ah! Thats the city fromst time! That ce was a special hole-in-the-wall.

    It was the Blumund Kingdom.

    As a city where the West meets the East, goods from all over the world had begun to gather there. Naturally, there was also an influx of many domestic monster products, and some of the clothing was of a very high quality.

    Pico and Gracia had been traveling around the world on a surveince mission. They were Dino''spanions, and seemed to be doing whatever they wanted. They had their own hideouts all over the world and enjoyed thetest fashion.

    Rain looks at them with an alert gaze as they chat like this.

    It''s fine to boast. But first, don''t you have some work to do?

    Mizari was surprised to hear that.

    Oh, as expected of Rain. Was her earlierment intended to catch them off guard? I didn''t realize that she was aiming to take advantage of them like this.

    And so, in reconsideration of her colleague, she was quite impressed.

    With that in mind, Mizari waited for the signal to start fighting. However, what she heard next was a ridiculous proposal from Rain.

    Talking in a ce like this is out of the question! Don''t you think we should get out of the cold first?

    Indeed, thats exactly what she said, going at her own pace.

    !!

    The three others were surprised.

    The concept of enemy and ally hadpletely vanished, and only confusion remained.

    Rain didnt care.

    She quicklynded herself on the ground and activated a certain spell.

    Strategic Magic: Freezing Hell (Cocytus)!

    Hold on, Rain! That spell can destroy the citywait, thats pretty skillful

    Mizari was so disappointed, but she wasn''t wrong.

    Rain is the one who was weird.

    The Freezing Hell (Cocytus) magic used by Rain was a spell that froze a wide area. The range of the spell was based on the magic power of the magician, but if Rain was serious, it could cover a radius of thirty kilometers.

    It was an extremely dangerous magic, but what appeared in front of Mizari was a three square meter cube of ice.

    It was a waste of such an evil magic, but there was no damage.

    The result was a joke in a sense that it gave the impression that she did it perfectly.

    So what do you think?

    Rain said smugly.

    And Pico grinned at her, as if he understanding the meaning.

    Gracia!

    Right, leave it to me. I know exactly what you''re thinking!

    Gracia also understood what Rain was thinking.

    She rode on that spection and immediately prepared her spell.

    Ice Breaker!!

    This was another high-ranked elemental magic that could be used against enemies. It was a magic with outstanding killing power that froze the moisture in the air and then broke everything up.

    However, this time, Gracia manipted it dexterously, and only hollowed out the cube of ice.

    And thus, the ice igloo waspleted on the spot.

    You did a good job.

    Yeah, you too.

    Rain and Gracia acknowledged each other, and a friendship was born.

    Come on, let''s hurry and go inside!

    Pico was the first to go inside.

    Without any hesitation, Rain and Gracia followed.

    Mizari, who was left alone outside, was stunned and left muttering to herself.

    Uh, Rain? So, it wasn''t a joke or a strategy, you were being serious

    But the one who should be answering was inside the igloo.

    Mizari began feeling like an idiot and hurried inside.

    .........

    ......

    ...

    So, the method was a secret, but we were given the honor of evolving at the hands of Rimuru-sama.

    This was the answer to Gracia''s question, By the way, you guys have gotten stronger than when Ist saw you, havent you?

    You''ve been telling that much to the enemyOkay, that''s enough.

    Despite Mizari''s dismay, Rain had also been getting information from Pico and the others.

    It seems that the skills of Dino and Pico were under the control of Michael.

    Pico has the ultimate skill Rigor King (Jibril), and Gracia has the ultimate skill Glory King (Haniel). Although they were not aware of it, they probably wouldnt be able to disobey Michael''s orders.

    In addition, she had also been told the full extent of the enemy forces.

    The information given by Rain was not very important.

    It was only the fact that she mentioned Rimuru''s name without permission that was careless, but Rain judged had that it was okay because she had not specifically been told not to talk about it.

    If Rimuru heard this, he would be angry, and would probablyment that he should have kept his mouth shut.

    In any case, in exchange for the information that she was able to evolve thanks to Rimuru, Rain was able to get a very important story out of them.

    From there, they were justining to each other.

    They started talking about each others hardships andined about their bosses.

    Incidentally, the four of them worked together to build a fire and poured magic power into it to keep the room at afortable temperature. On top of that, the sweet potatoes that Rain had hidden in the fire were being roasted on skewers, giving off a faintly delicious aroma.

    At this point, Rain took out some sweet sake.

    This is perfect for when it''s cold.

    You, youre not actually going to

    Well,e now, Mizari-san, let''s not be so formal. I think it''s fine, dont you?

    You just want to drink, don''t you, Gracia? Well, I want to as well, so I won''t stop you.

    That''s right, Mizari. After a fight, youre supposed to drink to make up. It''s calledmon sense.

    When did we even fight?

    But there was no one other than Mizari to intervene here.

    With a three against one, the odds were really against her, so Mizari had no choice but to give in. Thus, the inside of the igloo became like a women''s club.

    As the battle outside raged on, the girls continue to quietly exchange opinions

    ***

    Leon sat on his throne.

    The time of peace was over.

    With a loud bang, the front door was broken down.

    The great door leading to the audience room shattered into pieces, scattering debris like dust.

    And out of that dust, the intruder proudly emerged.

    Hoohohoho. Good day, everyone! My name is Footman. Footman the Angry Pierrot of the Moderate Clown Troupe. Pleasure to make your acquaintance!

    With his fat body and angry clown face, he exuded a certain air of strangeness.

    Leon had met this clown once before.

    He was now in remembrance of his own stupidity, a business partner with whom he had made a contract.

    He had felt a certain power when he met him before, but now it felt nothing like that.

    He felt an uncanny power.

    What bothered him, though, was Footman''s true purpose.

    If he had wanted to capture Leon, it would be reckless for him toe alone.

    As I thought, the enemy''s forces must have outnumbered ours. But I don''t understand. What is he thinking? If he goes and helps the others, he would have the power to change the course of the war

    As he pondered this, Leon left his seat.

    Youe here alone and think you''re going to make it out alive?

    Alrose shouts.

    ude keeps his hand on his sword, ready to protect Leon at any moment.

    Leon thinks.

    This Footman must have some other purpose, or

    Just as he was wondering about that, a woman steps through the broken door and into the audience room.

    Ah, there you are, Demon Lord Leon. Do you remember me?

    It was a beautiful woman with a graceful appearance.

    She was dressed in a navy-blue suit, like what a secretary would wear.

    Her skin was white and delicate, and her blond hair was tied up in a chignon that suited her well-toned face.

    Her eyes, indigo with a mysterious glow, were fixed on Leon.

    Since Ive changed my appearance, it''s probably more urate to say it''s nice to meet you. I am Kagali. I''m the chairman of the Moderate Clown Troupe. I''ve got a grudge against you for killing me, so I guess I''ll have to deal with you myself.

    Needless to say, it was Kagali.

    She greeted him, while somewhat over-acting.

    Then, two clowns followed Kagali,ing in one after the other.

    The girl with the teary-eyed mask was Tear.

    She was carrying arge sickle on her shoulder and greeted everyone in a yful manner.

    I''m Tear. Tear the Teardrop of the Moderate Clown Troupe. I hate sadness. All of Kagali-sama''s enemies will be eliminated by me!

    When Tear dered as such, she began spinning her scythe dexterously and moved to her ce as if dancing.

    Stepping forward to take his ce was Lace, a man with an asymmetrical clown face that looked like he was ying a trick on someone.

    I''m Lace the Wonder Pierrot, vice-chairman of the Moderate Clown Troupe. Now then, everyone. It sure is a beautiful day todaybut I dont care about that! I was told to dash here as fast as possible and now I''m really tired. And it looks like we''re in big trouble. I feel like I want to go home

    It was very typical of Lace to beining without saying hello.

    As soon as the clowns finished their speech, thest one showed up.

    A young boy wearing a ck Imperial military uniform with a fearless smile on his face. It was Yuuki Kagurazaka, who was still under Michaels control.

    Hey, I guess I''m thest one. I hear my name is Yuuki. You''re Demon Lord Leon, aren''t you? I think we''ve met before, but my memory''s a little foggy. I''m sorry, but I''m not sure.

    There were different stages to Michael''s domination.

    There were cases where the victim retained some of their free will, and cases where they were more restricted.

    In the case of control over the angelic skills, there was no fear of betrayal, so they were allowed to behave quite freely. However, Yuuki was being controlled by the Regalia Dominion and was therefore restricted to a greater extent.

    In a sense, this was evidence that Michael acknowledged Yuuki. If he had recognized Yuuki as a lower rank, he would have allowed him to act freely like Kagali and the others.

    Anyway, the current Yuuki was somewhat vague, and as soon as he finished introducing himself, he lost interest in Leon and the others, and stood there leaning against the door.

    Hmmm Leon assessed the situation.

    There were five of them total, but each one of them was as strong as him. No, they seemed to have more strength than that. Since he was outnumbered, the situation had be the worst.

    Leon couldn''t decide whether or not to make a move.

    He might be able to defeat at least one of them, but this was not the time to make a desperate attempt. If he couldn''t win, he should run away, and he had the means to do so.

    But Leon was also at a loss because he saw a light of reason, not madness, in Kagali''s eyes.

    He had been told by Rimuru that Kagali was the Demon Lord Kazaream. He had almost forgotten about her, but he remembered clearly those eyes full of madness.

    Kagali would say that she had been jealous, but to Leon, it was a horrifying look. And yet, now, those eyes were as beautiful as apiszuli.

    She''s not a different person. So, there may be something else going on. And does that mean theres room for negotiation?

    In spite of the situation, Leon understood the circumstances of the other party.

    In front of such a Leon, the clowns continued their speeches.

    Demon Lord Leon. You are not only responsible for the destruction of Kazaream-sama, but also for the murder of our brother and friend, yman, the Crazy Clown! I won''t make it easy for you. Because I''m angry!

    And with that, Footman bent his fat body in a dexterous bow.

    Lace followed suit.

    Yeah, thats right. That idiot yman didn''t be a demon lord because he wanted to. He was just the only one suited for it, so we sent him out as a recement in case something happened to the Chairman. I regret it so much that it turned out like that.

    His voice sounded sad, as if he was remembering yman.

    It''s really sad, isn''t it? But Kagali-sama gave us a chance for revenge! I''m going to give you the full force of our grudge, so stay with me until the end!

    Tear added sadly at the end.

    And then battle began.

    ***

    On Leons side there were three people.

    On the other hand, Kagali''s group had five.

    However, Yuuki was not moving.

    Tear headed to Alrose, and ude took on Footman.

    There were only two people left, but of course, Leon would have to deal with them himself.

    Under normal circumstances, defeat would have been inevitable.

    However, that was not the case.

    As Leon drew out his me Pir, Kagali struck him with the Ruin Scepter borrowed from Michael.

    The impact of the mythical-grade weapon collision sent shock waves throughout the hall.

    At the same time, Leon heard a voice in his head.

    Can you hear me? I want to negotiate.

    His prediction was correct.

    Yes, Leon nodded.

    Thank you. I''ve got eyes on me. That''s why Im acting with that in mind. No matter how careful I am, it can never be enough.

    You''re right, said Leon with a look.

    The conversation was like a tightrope walk, with both sides ying out a fierce battle.

    Incidentally, Lace''s role was to ry the thoughts.

    Through the master-ve connection between Kagali and Lace, encrypted information was being transmitted. Kagali sent the information to Lace, and then retransmitted it to Leon. The reply from Leon was also encrypted and transmitted to Kagali through Lace.

    The reason for using this particr method was to prevent Michael from reading her mind. Believing that not all of her thoughts could be read, she put up multiple barriers in the back of her mind.

    The reason she was so wary was because Kagali was about to betray Michael.

    Kagali had once been trapped in a grudge against Leon, but now that she was away from Michael, she had regained herposure.

    As a result, she decided that it would be best to join forces with Leon.

    As long as she could get to Ramiris''byrinth, she could escape Michael''s surveince. And that mysterious slime would free Kagali and the others by any means necessary.

    Anyway, didnt you prepare some kind of connection passageway in case of emergency? I can''t get to thebyrinth with magic, so if there is on, let me use it.

    There was also transfer magic, but that was a gamble. If she did any unnned actions, Michael might tighten his control over her.

    Ideally, she wanted to evacuate directly to thebyrinth.

    If that was not possible, Kagali wanted them to be prepared to receive her and the others.

    I see, I understand your situation.

    Im just taking some time, but you''re the one Michael wants, right? You have the Purity King, don''t you?

    I won''t deny it.

    Leon admitted that there was no point in hiding it now.

    The moment they attacked this country, he judged that the owner of the skill was already known.

    In that case, the words of Kagali and the others became more credible.

    With such arge difference in strength, there was no point in extracting information from Leon. They could simply disable Leon and take him to Michael.

    Besides, while Tear and Footman were rampaging wildly, Alrose and ude were still unharmed. If they really wanted to kill them, they would have been dead by now.

    In this situation, there was no point in acting like this.

    That''s why he could be sure that Kagali''s words were true.

    I believe you. There is indeed a magic transfer circle in this castle that leads to Ramirisbyrinth.

    I knew it!

    Kagali''s expression brightened as she realized that her n was now more likely to seed. Then, while crossing des fiercely, she threw herself forward and enthusiastically engaged in negotiations.

    Leon, who had given up his suspicion of Kagali, wondered if he should simply nod.

    However, what came to his mind was Chloes smile, the girl Leon loves.

    For some reason, that smile was not looking upon Leon''s face, but on Rimurus

    From the depths of Leons heart, dark emotions began to well up.

    This is not jealousy. Absolutely not!

    Leon swallowed his feelings and endured it.

    Then he thought.

    Rimuru would ept these people. It wouldn''t hurt my conscience too much to put them through the trouble.

    Leon felt a little better, as if he didn''t have to worry about it.

    He nodded his head and began to confirm the arrangements.

    So, are you sure it''s just the five of you?

    Yes. There are other people who used to work for Yuuki-sama, but I don''t trust them. It''s not like they''re going to kill us if we leave them here, and there''s no point in holding them hostage against us, so we''re going to leave them behind.

    Wouldn''t it be better to take them with you, to reduce the enemy''s strength?

    Leon was surprisingly kind.

    The reason why he is misunderstood and gives off a cold impression is because he is clumsy.

    Kagali sensed that too.

    You''re not what I thought you were. You didn''t take it easy on me when I was your age

    It couldnt be helped. With a demon lord attacking, I couldnt afford to be calm either. I didn''t want to prolong the battle and cause civilian casualties.

    She understood what he meant.

    If two demon lords of equal ability fought each other, the damage to the surrounding area would be extensive. In order to prevent that, the best option would be to aim for a short-term decisive battle like Leon had.

    That''s true. Besides, I was a fool back then, so I have no right toin. Forget it.

    Leon was caught off guard by Kagali''s reaction, because he had expected her toin more.

    You''ve really changed.

    With that said, he muddled his words, changed his mind and resumed the conversation.

    The magic transfer circle is located behind this room. This room itself is heavily guarded by a Multyer Barrier, so it''s just a matter of opening the hidden door behind the throne.

    Thank you. So, what are you going to do?

    Michael''s goal was to get Leon.

    We should run away together, Kagali implied.

    Leon''s answer, however, was clear and without hesitation.

    I am staying. If I was going to run away, I would have gone to Rimuru from the beginning.

    Kagali nodded in agreement.

    Michael''s rule is absolute, you know?

    However, there are also conditions. Worst case scenario, even if I were to be controlled, Guy could observe the process ande up with a way to deal with it.

    That was just one of the reasons, not all.

    Leon was really just trying to protect the people here in El Dorado with his own hands.

    That was the true intention of Leon Cromwell, the man who gave up being a Chosen Hero in order to protect the mixed races of human and demon.

    You really are a clumsy guy. For the sake of others, youre willing to throw yourself away

    Hm, thats not the case. There are few people as vicious as I am. I tolerated the sacrifice of others because I wished to save the only one I loved. I will be the one to pay for it.

    These words showed Leon''s resolve.

    Kagali understood this and decided to respect Leon''s wishes. She had her own priorities, and there was no need to try to persuade him.

    And so, the decision was made.

    Kagali also informed Tear and Footman about the situation through Lace.

    Leon, on the other hand, had been talking to Alrose and ude. Both of them felt that the enemy was not serious, so they were convinced by Leon''s exnation.

    The only thing left to do was to force Yuuki to go with them.

    Leon gave Kagali a look. In the direction of his gaze, there was a hidden door.

    Understanding his intent, Kagali pretended to be blown away and destroyed the door. Seeing this, Lace signaled to Footman and Tear.

    Alrose and the others helped in the act, and Footman and Tear also flew to the hidden room as if they were excessively blown away.

    Yuuki-sama!

    Well, well, I guess its my turn, huh?

    With that, Yuuki leisurely made his way to the hidden room

    Okay! Now all I have to do is get Leon to activate the magic circle!

    Kagali was sure of their sess.

    It had been a tightrope walk, but now she could escape from Michael.

    Thats how it was supposed to be.

    However

    It was here that fate had given up on Kagali and the others.

    Michael, who was still in the Heavenly Star Pce, had discovered Obera''s betrayal before Dino could report it.

    Michael was furious.

    It was the first time in his life that he had experienced this.

    He was furious that something had gone wrong with his n.

    The cause, as it turned out, was his own naivete.

    In spite of his immense control of power, he had allowed himself to be led astray by trusting in the uncertainties of hispanions, and this was the result.

    Obera had received the Salvation King (Azrael), and Michael knew it. At that point, he should have made sure of his domination.

    It was Michael''s mistake not to do so.

    If he made a mistake, hed have to make it up.

    Michael was furious, but calmly thought as such.

    As a result, he reinforced his control over the Angelic skill owners currently under his control with the Ultimate Dominion via Feldway.

    As a result, Kagali''s ego was also taken away.

    ***

    Just one more step.

    That step felt so far away.

    Feldway emerged from the broken door that led to the audience room.

    I was curious, but I didn''t realize you were nning to betray me. All of you are fools who do not understand my cause!!

    Seeing Feldway screaming in rage, Kagali knew that the n had failed. At the very least, she should try to let Lace and the others escape.

    All it would take was a singlemand.

    And yet, she was unable to utter a word.

    It''s useless. The Ultimate Dominion has takenplete control over you. Michael-sama is also angry. I let you do whatever you want. And then there''s

    Feldway''s cold stare pierced Leon, who had stopped moving.

    It looks like our target was here as well. You, too, will be a loyal servant.

    Before Leon could even listen to those words, he had activated Purity King (Metatron) at full force. He was about to unleash a godlike blow with the desperate intent to kill.

    But it was already toote.

    Shit, I can''t fight this

    Loyalty towards Michael, whom he had never even met, began to well up as if overflowing from the depths of his heart. Leon''s memories and knowledge remained intact, but his ego was being filled with ecstatic feelings.

    Chloe, I!!

    The smile of the girl he loves, etched into his mind, was being overwritten by an irresistible tion.

    In the same way as Leon, Kagali''s heart had also being stolen.

    Her loyalty to Michael outweighed her feelings for her dear friends.

    I''m always so naive

    Kagalimented in a terribly sad mood, but even that regret quickly disappeared.

    Chairman, you cant just give up now! II believe in you

    Kagali heard a voice that confused her.

    However, it sounded like the voice of a child screaming through multipleyers of ss, and could not be heard clearly.

    Kagali, does the spell not work on him?

    Yes. Lace is special, so he doesn''t have to follow my orders.

    I see. Then he is unnecessary.

    A cold voice that seemed to have lost all emotion was transmitted to Kagali.

    Yes. You''ve been through a lot, Lace. At the very least, I will take care of you with my own hands.

    WaiChairman!?

    Lace was the only one who was confused by Kagali''s change.

    Tear, Footman, Yuuki, and even their former enemy, Leon, were all ready to watch as if it was a matter of course.

    Kagali''s Ruin Scepter glowed in gold

    I wont just sit here!!

    Lace was about to give up on everything when a figure suddenly appeared out of nowhere and pushed him away.

    The person then flicked the destructive golden ray with her sword.

    Who the hell are you!?

    I don''t have time for formalities. But I''ll tell you anyway. I am Silvia. I''m a very strong helper, so don''t worry and leave this to me!

    It was beautiful woman with long and braided greenish silver hair.

    The thin dress with a silky sheen was made of a special material from the Monster Kingdom that could be used in battle. Her milky-white legs glimpsed through the slit. But if you looked closely, you could see that she was also wearing denim shorts.

    That''s wrong.

    It might have been intended as a precaution in the event of a fierce battle, but if that was the case, why not wear pants in the first ce?

    Her fashion sense was the embodiment of selfishness, showing her strong will to not give up fashion. Even from that one thing, he was able to catch a glimpse of her personality.

    The woman called herself Silvia.

    She was Leon''s master, the one who had been called upon as a trump card.

    Lace felt nostalgic when he saw Silvia.

    Lace was an undead elf created by Kagali.

    Perhaps it was because he had been a Chosen Hero before his death, but although he was never controlled by Kagali, almost all of his memories had been lost.

    That''s why he did not remember that his real name was Sarion Grimwald, nor did he realize that Silvia, the woman who had just saved him, was his wife.

    Nevertheless, he instinctively knew that Silvia was an important person for him.

    I don''t know about you, but I''m a real man. I don''t want to be so pathetic as to leave this ce to you all alone!

    Lace was back on his feet.

    It was such a sudden turn of events that it had made it difficult for him to grasp the situation, but that was always the case.

    So, as always, he would just have to get out of this situation no matter what.

    You guys, if you''re still alive, then get out of here. You look like you''ve been beaten to a pulp by Tear and Footman, and you might die, you know?

    Keeping his eyes fixed on Kagali and Yuuki, he called out to Alrose and ude, who were lying in the corner of the room.

    They had managed to endure with recovery medicine, but the contents of their space-expanding waist bags were almostpletely used up. At this rate, they would not be able to escape, yet they still snickered at Lace''s call.

    Hahaha, don''t worry. I''ve taught my students never to run away in times of trouble. If I don''t set a good example, then no one will follow me.

    Fufu, a knight should never abandon his master and run away.

    Both of them understood that they were already a liability, not an asset. Still, they did not run away because they were ready to give up their lives for Leon.

    Believing that Rimuru and the others would soone to support them, they decided to buy time even at the cost of their own lives.

    You guys are idiots.

    Hahaha! I never thought I''d be praised by a clown.

    ude-dono, I don''t think thats apliment. But I do envy you that you can stillugh!

    There was a small smile on Alrose''s face.

    Those who are determined are strong.

    Lace thought to himself, I also cant lose.

    Let''s start over. If we kill him, the Chairman will be back to normal, right? I''ll do my best, too!

    He said so, while ring at Feldway. He suspected that Feldway was up to something, even more than Michael who was not present.

    ***

    Thus, the battle resumed in the audience room.

    On one side were Lace, Silvia, and the two injured knights.

    Against them were Feldway, Kagali, Leon, Yuuki, Footman and Tear.

    They were outnumbered four to six and were overwhelmingly disadvantaged in terms of strength.

    Silvia-san 106 , can I ask you something?

    Oh, what is it?

    Honestly, how far do you think we can go against them?

    Hmm, yes, welleven if I tell you, it wont make you happy, will it?

    I guess so. Wait, don''t answer that!

    Thats certainly true, Laceughed.

    Silvia felt nostalgic about the exchange.

    No, it wasn''t the conversation, but the very existence of this man, Lace, that made her feel nostalgic.

    Could it be that we know each other? No, I don''t think so. Well, whatever. This is not the time to be worrying about that.

    Silvia, with her modest yet graceful chest, was undoubtedly a warrior. She quickly switched her mind and identified the enemy.

    Feldway did not move, as if wanting to leave the work to his subordinates.

    It was obvious from his attitude that he was looking down on Silvia and the others.

    However, in the current situation where she was at an overwhelming disadvantage, perhaps she should be grateful.

    I''d like to say that his arrogance will be his downfall, but he''s the head of the Primordials 107 . I''ve heard from the ancestor, but this is crazy. Hes stronger than me, to be honest.

    The ancestor always had a sloppy personality, so it had always been best to take everything he said with a grain of salt. Silvia had also been deceived many times and suffered a lot.

    However, judging from the activities of the Primordials, she never thought they were weak. Even if she only knew half the story, they should be considered as superior to Silvia.

    In fact, when confronting them in this way, she could sense that their presence was frighteningly dense.

    In the first ce, all the people here are monsters.

    Even Alrose and ude are good enough to be called demon lords in their time.

    Among them, Feldway was exceptional.

    If she fought him head-on, she would be defeated. Therefore, the only strategy to be taken here was to buy time.

    Rimuru-kun, who El-chan 108 mentioned, will be here soon, right? I don''t know how well hell do against such monsters, but hes already defeated Velgrynd, right? Well, we can only hope for the best.

    Silvia was also one of the high-elves created by the ancestor, and she was proud of her abilities. In fact, she had an existential value of just under two million, which was about the same as that of an awakened demon lord. In addition to that, her weapon was a mythical-grade Vajra 109 , which surpassed Leon''s in terms of skill. The number of des was variable, and she specialized in handling it by stretching it like a spear.

    Moreover, she possessed the Ultimate Skill Thunder King (Indra), the highest of the weather system skills, which made her stronger than Tear and Footman.

    But even still, she was not as strong as Feldway.

    She was not even close.

    Despite her confident assurances to Lace, it would be difficult to turn the tables. However, as long as Feldway didn''t make a move, there was still a chance to win.

    The possibility of Leon being manipted had also been taken into consideration. She had told him how to separate his mind from his Skill, and believed that Leon was still desperately trying to regain his ego.

    Incidentally, if he did this, there was a very high possibility that he would lose his Skill. This is exactly what Obera did, and it would be a huge loss in terms of strength.

    In the first ce, it was not that easy, so she taught it to him as ast resort.

    Well, its all up to Leon-kun. He was a very good pupil, but I think it''s still a 50/50 chance whether or not he will seed

    She was not very optimistic, but there was still hope that Leon would return to the front.

    It was a pretty bad wager to find a way out of it, but there was no other way. If there was nothing she could do butin, then she would just have to be prepared and do her best.

    You two, stick to supporting me! And the clown (Pierrot) over there! Your opponent is

    Its me. If I don''t work once in a while, I''ll lose my reputation.

    Silvia''sment was interrupted by Yuuki, one of the enemies. Without saying a word, heunched a kick at Lace.

    Eh, Wait!! Are you serious, boss!?

    Lace, even when starting the battle with no questions asked, did not forget to introduce himself.

    I am a clown, but my name is Lace.

    While dealing with Yuuki, he shouted it back at Silvia.

    You''re still dangerous, Lace. There''s still plenty left in you, so I''ll be your opponent as well as Yuuki-sama.

    While saying that, Kagali joined the fray.

    That''s not fair! I mean, are you trying to make me cry!?

    Even Lace had be desperate.

    Even if it was just one of them, it would be difficult.

    But now that both of them wereing at him at the same time, he couldn''t even afford to make fun of them.

    At this point, Leon made his move.

    Well, it looks like you''re my opponent, Master Silvia. But I don''t want to point my sword at you. Wont youe to our side?

    Leon made such a suggestion in a gentlemanly manner.

    Even though he was being manipted, his memories were still intact. If Michael or Feldway ordered him to kill, there was nothing he could do, but otherwise, he could get some control.

    However, betrayal is absolutely impossible. Simply asking this proposal was the best concession Leon could currently make.

    You know, Leon-kun. You were the one called me here, remember?

    Yes. So, by all means, be an ally

    I don''t think we should talk. Because I don''t want Leon-kun to resent me. If I cooperate with Leon-kun now, he''llin about itter when hees to his senses.

    Silviaughed in reply.

    She knew what Leon''s purpose was in life, and what he had lived for. That is why she could not betray Leon''s true feelings.

    However, Leon could not understand his feelings.

    ?

    Leon also had memories of Chloe.

    He still felt that Chloe was important to him, but that did not take precedence over his orders.

    You have a girl you like, don''t you? How do you think shed feel if she saw Leon-kun right now?

    Leon''s heart wavered when he was asked that question.

    However

    He quickly calmed down and regained his usual coolness.

    That''s a silly question. After Feldway-sama''s wish is granted, I will have what I want. And I''m sure she''ll be waiting for me until then.

    Um, are you sure about that?

    Silvia asked quite seriously.

    Based on what she had heard from Elmesia and the others, It was clear that Chloe''s attention was not on Leon.

    If Leon didntunch an onught from here on, she didnt think Chloe would be waiting for him.

    But that was Leon''s own problem.

    It was not for her to interfere with, so all Silvia said was, Oh well. Just dont cry if she rejects you.

    When Leon heard this, he twitched, but no one noticed it. And so, the battle between Silvia and Leon began.

    ***

    Lace was the strongest majin in the Moderate Clown Troupe.

    He possessed a vicious power and could even be called an uncrowned demon lord.

    He was reborn as an undead elf by Kagali''s hands, but his experience and abilities as an ex-Chosen Hero had remained intact. In addition to that, Lace possessed two Unique Skills.

    The first was the Unique Skill Falsifier.

    This ability, which was able to interfere with an opponent''s perceptions, helped him tounch illusionary attacks.

    Disguising ones weapon is a useful skill.

    A spear in his hand could appear as a knife to his enemy.

    He could make a knife appear out of thin air when one thought he had nothing in his hands.

    Or, it could also be a bomb disguised as a knife, making it the perfect tool to y with the enemy.

    And with this skill, it was also easy to pretend to be dead and make an escape.

    That alone was heinous, but there was another skill that was even more so.

    The power of foresight, the Unique Skill Future Visionthis was Lace''s trump card.

    This ability allowed Lace to see a few seconds into the future.

    Because of this, he could clearly see whether or not his Falsifier skill would work against the enemy.

    This is why Lace was always able to fight without being caught off guard.

    He had high physical ability and a good sense ofbat.

    Along with his perfect prediction of the future and a thousand different ways to attack, Lace was invincible. He imed to be the vice-chairman of the Moderate Clown Troupe, but in terms of simplebat ability, he easily surpassed the chairman, Kagali.

    It was precisely because of this that Lace had remained undefeated for so long after bing a majin.

    Besides, even running away was one of Lace''s tactics, so it was a rare event for him to admit defeat.

    But even that Lace admitted defeat to the boy standing in front of himYuuki Kagurazaka.

    But that was a while ago

    Footman, Tear! Support Leon. And while you''re at it, take care of those deadbeats!

    That was Kagali''s order.

    Laceunched a counterattack as there was no way to run away.

    There were two opponents. Moreover, they were both as strong or even stronger than him.

    Actually, the boss is probably most dangerous one, since Kagali-sama, for all her strengths, is not good at closebat.

    Lace had known Kagali for a long time.

    He was familiar with Kagali''s strengths and weaknesses, and judged that he could handle her, even if her presence was different from that of Kazaream.

    In fact, Kagali''s physical strength had increased, making it more difficult for her to fall. Her strength had increased, her destructive power has increased, and her speed had increased all by an order of magnitudebut her overall ability had not changed. That is why it was possible to respond sufficiently by increasing the speed of reflection and anticipating her moves.

    Even for such a Lace, he still thought that Yuuki would be a bad match-up for him.

    Yuuki''s strength appeared to be the same as before, but that assumption was dangerous. Therefore, Lace decided that he should be more cautious of Yuuki than Kagali.

    No hard feelings, Yuuki-san 110 (Kansai)!

    He shouted and threw a knife at Yuuki. But it was shown in Future Vision that they would all miss.

    Unperturbed by this, Lace made his next move.

    Aiming at Yuuki''s evasive maneuvers, he threw knives one after another.

    He did not forget to check Kagali.

    On the surface, Lace was aloof, but he was quite desperately trying to use his two powers.

    Even so, he was unable to reach Yuuki.

    No way! Even with my Future Vision, I can only see the future where everything will be wrong

    A few seconds in the future was meaningless.

    In the first ce, ''Falsifier'' did not work on Yuuki. This was the same opponent that Lace was unable to defeat in the past, and it seemed that it would be difficult for him to win this time as well.

    But thats still not a reason to give up, is it

    If he had wanted to admit defeat so easily, he wouldn''t have gone to such a dangerous ce in the first ce.

    Lace was also someone who had believed in Yuuki''s words.

    Boss, you''re the one who said it! You said you were going to take over the world!

    Hahaha, you''re an idiot, Lace. Do you still believe in that nonsense?

    Of course I do. I''m persistent. I''ve decided to give up when I die, so I''ll keep believing in you while I''m alive!

    Yuukiughed mockingly at Lace''s desperate shout.

    This is ridiculous, Lace! Just because you''re a clown doesn''t mean you can''t have a funnyugh.

    With that condescending remark, Yuuki closed in on Lace. As the two of them approached, Kagali, who was about to unleash the Golden Destruction Ray from the Ruin Scepter again, came to a halt.

    Lace, however, was having none of it, and was desperately trying to block Yuuki''s attack.

    What a heavy fist! Is this guy really human? There are so many different types of otherworlders, it''s scary. However, even so

    There was something that bothered him.

    At first nce, Yuuki''s attack seemed harsh, but in fact, the hit were slightly off the mark.

    It was not due to Lace.

    It was Yuuki''s intention to do so.

    At that moment, Lace realized.

    Eh? Wait a minute...This signal, could it be

    He remembered the pattern of the faint vibrations he felt whenever he parried a fist or blocked a kick.

    It had also been used tomunicate with yman, and was encrypted so that no one else could decipher it. And the only people who knew the code were the people he trusted.

    In other words

    Uh, lets seeHurry and figure it out, idiot! When you notice it, work with mewas it?

    Eh, really? Although Lace had his doubts, the possibility that this was a trap felt slim to none.

    Even without Yuuki having to go through such trouble, Lace would have eventually been defeated.

    So Lace did as he was told and tried to team up with Yuuki.

    I''m more powerful than you!

    Lets test it.

    And, well, he was immediately grappled and thrown off in an instant.

    It was real!

    It was not a trap, but a way to entrust a message for what was toe.

    While pretending to roll on the flooror rather, it actually really hurtLace read the message.

    The fact that they had fought each other for a short period of time, instead of just a moment, gave him a good amount of information this time. And it revealed Yuuki''s current situation.

    Boss, you''vee to your senses!!

    In this desperate situation, it was good news.

    Lace, hiding his joy under his mask, read the information further.

    Well, what is it? We''re going to keep pretending to fight and restrain the Chairman, right? If you''re leaving the rest to me, does that mean the boss has a n? All right, let''s do it!

    Without hesitation, Lace takes action.

    He made it look like he was going to attack Yuuki, but instead he grabbed Kagali.

    !?

    Alrightnow Skill Steal!!

    What the

    Kagali fell to her knees.

    Lace held her up.

    A-Are you okay, Chairman?

    Eh, Lace? Um, what about meWait, no waymy skillDomination King (Melchizedek) is gone!

    Kagali looked confused, but in an instant, she grasped the situation.

    Fall back, Tear, Footman!

    She shouted to protect herself, which was quite a feat. Even Kagali could not hide her surprise. Even so, she understood from the bottom of her heart that the situation had changed drastically at this moment.

    ***

    Silvia, who had been fighting Leon, was having a difficult time.

    Leon was her student, but he had a talent that Silvia recognized.

    Even when he had been assimted into the Spirit of Light and was active as a Chosen Hero, his skill with a sword was on par with Silvia.

    Moreover, he now had the Ultimate Skill Purity King (Metatron), and was one of the demon lords as an unparalleled swordsman.

    When Leon got serious, he would unleash a light speed sh. Although he did not actually reach the speed of light, it was called as such because his sword line would shine like a sh of light.

    And the power of the Ultimate Skill Purity King (Metatron) turned it into something quite vicious.

    It is the ultimate power of the holy attribute.

    It is an extraordinary skill that gives one the ability to freely manipte the most powerful holy magic, Disintegration.

    By controlling the ''Purity King (Metatron)'' Leon deployed spirit particles around his body and sword, turning himself into an incarnation of destruction, disintegrating everything he touches.

    Leon was undefeated with thebination of his ultra-fast swordsmanship and the power of absolute destruction.

    Silvia was no slouch either.

    Her Skill, Thunder King (Indra), was an ability to control lightning, the strongest power in nature.

    The power of her lightning strikes was perfect, but the true essence of Thunder King (Indra) lied elsewhere. Silvia had turned her own body into a lightning strike, enabling herself to attack at divine speeds.

    For this reason, Silvia was feared as the Thunder Emperor since ancient times.

    It was precisely because of this that Silvia was able to deal with Leon''s attacks. She changed her vajra to suit her needs and fought fluidly with her sword.

    Silvia, who had maintained her reputation as a master in this way, inwardly felt a sense of crisis.

    I knew you were strong, but I didn''t expect you to have grown so much....I''m happy to see my students grow, but it also depends on the time and ce

    Those were her true feelings.

    And the reason for her sense of crisis came from the fact that she felt Leon was not yet serious.

    .........

    ......

    ...

    As his master, Silvia knew that Leon had a weakness.

    Leon was too naive.

    If there were allies nearby, he would not fight with his full strength. Such kindness was a virtue, but on the battlefield, it was only an opening.

    The ideal Chosen Hero was one whos desire to protect became power, but that was only in fairytales. In real life, that was just a bit too naive.

    Silvia knew.

    Silvia knew that this city had been created by orphans and oppressed majins saved by Leon. Elmesia had also provided financial support, but Silvia was the one who helped establish the city.

    He was often misunderstood because of his deceitful words and actions, but the real Leon was truly a kind man.

    When a girl named Shizu went out of control and sacrificed her friends, he was heartbroken andmented that it was his fault. He left her in the care of the Chosen Hero of that time, thinking that it would be better for her to live in the human world than to be raised by a demon lord like himself.

    She knew that he had been watching over the girl and, as a result, had been the first to detect the existence of Demon Lord Rimuru.

    It was just a coincidence that Elen and the others had be acquainted with the girlShizue Izawabut Silvia, through Elmesia''s connections, had tightened her surveince even more than Demon Lord Leon.

    Thats why she had been frustrated by the reality of multiple misunderstandings and dismayed by the awkwardness of her apprentice. However, she did not meddle unnecessarily.

    Given Leon''s unlucky nature, she judged that doing would only lead toplications.

    It was frustrating, but she could only watch over him.

    But this time, he had finally asked her for help.

    Thats why she came to him, hoping to respond to his request, but the situation was very unfavorable.

    There was one reason for this.

    Leon''s weakness had disappeared.

    Leon''s kindness had always prevented him from being serious, but now that Michael''s dominance took precedence over everything else, he would use his skill to the fullest under the right circumstances.

    The dreaded Purity King (Metatron).

    Leon always had it under control, using it with minimal power. However, the true nature of the Purity King (Metatron) is that it was a power specialized for mass annihtion.

    This was also the case with the Thunder King (Indra), so Silvia''s sense of crisis was very great.

    If Leon-kun were to get serious

    What would happen if Leon activated his power without caring about the damage to his surroundings?

    If Leon got serious, this country would be annihted.

    Silvia was determined not to let that happen.

    .........

    ......

    ...

    A fierce sword fight ensued, and the battle continued back and forth.

    In the aftermath of ultra high-speedbat, the audience hall was being destroyed to the utmost limit.

    Worst of all, the magic transfer circle had been destroyed. Even though that magic circle had been made of magisteel and was extremely durable, Leon''s stray bullets had destroyed it.

    It was no longer usable. Not only would she be unable to escape, but Rimuru and the others would not be able toe.

    Silvia felt sorry for herself, but Leon was not a man who she could fight while protecting something, so she gave up.

    Alrose and ude were not able to help Silvia either.

    Wha-What a terrifying battleI can''t even see it. I can''t even tell with my own eyes who is in the lead.

    Don''t worryI know it sounds strange, but I am the same, ude-dono. I thought I could keep up with the real Leon-sama, but it seems that I''ve been conceited.

    Hmm. That''s true.

    Although they didn''t know Silvia''s true identity, they knew that she was no ordinary person. However, when they saw that Silvia was more powerful than they had imagined, they could not help but be amazed.

    The same could be said for Tear and Footman.

    Oh man. That Leon guy is even stronger than I thought.

    Hohoho. It''s would be too difficult to interrupt that fight! So then, what can we do?

    Yeah, yeah. Then well just have to hunt down the small fry!

    The two pped their hands together.

    Then they turned their sights on Alrose and ude.

    Damn, they''ve set their sights on us

    Even if its just one, let''s show them the pride of a knight!

    Its suicidal. However, it''s the only thing we can do here.

    Alrose and ude had made up their minds.

    As the proud leaders and instructors of the Magic Knights, they had decided on the ce of their death.

    Their lives were gravely in danger, but then suddenly, a voice rang out.

    Fall back, Tear, Footman!!

    Kagali hade to her senses just in time, and Alrose and ude were lucky to survive the crisis.

    ***

    Feldway was confused.

    Something incredible had just happened, right in front of his eyes.

    For tens of thousands of years, nothing had ever gone wrong with his ns.

    Buttely, everything had been falling apart.

    It all started with Cornu''s blunder.

    The loss of the army had been unthinkable. The Underworld Gate leading to the world in question had been closed, and the details still remained unknown.

    The next shock was the return of Velgrynd.

    Having been banished to the other side of the world, Velgrynd was supposed to be left to disappear in the world beyond.

    However, she somehow returned to the Cardinal World, and on top of that, hadpletely annihted Cornu.

    It was an unthinkable event.

    However, he had had no choice but to admit that it was the reality.

    That is why this time, he made a n for the perfect situation.

    And yet, here they were.

    Not only had Yuuki, who was supposed to be under hisplete control, regained his freedom, but even Kagali, who received an angelic skill, hade to her senses.

    What did you do? You, how did you escape the Regalia Dominion?

    Feldway asked Yuuki in a voice that sounded as if it wasing from the depths of hell.

    He wasn''t expecting an answer, but it was Yuuki.

    He smirked and replied in an agitating manner.

    It''s simple. I''m a genius, and I felt that this Regalia Dominion thing was dangerous, so I substituted with the strange will that was growing inside of me.

    A strange will, you say?

    Ah. Perhaps it is the ego of the Ultimate Skill Greedy King (Mammon) that I had acquired? The Greed instinct was something I took from Mariabell. It was a little creepy, so I didn''t trust it.

    He didn''t trust the Greedy King (Mammon), even though he had used it a lot. This cautiousness was probably the reason why Yuuki was Yuuki.

    I had a hard time, Yuuki continued.

    I observed the ego of the dominated Greedy King'' (Mammon) and figured out how it worked. It took longer than I expected, but it looks like I got it right at the worst possible time, so you''ll have to excuse me.

    He even winked at Lace and the others.

    This had all been a strategy.

    Yuuki had been observing the situation while he was being manipted and hade to the conclusion that he could not beat Feldway.

    Of course, the future was a different story.

    He believed that if he continued to get stronger, he would eventually be able topete with him someday. The reason was that Yuuki''s growth rate was extraordinarythough not as abnormal as Rimuru''s.

    Therefore, he began to stir things up now.

    It would be a great sess if he could convince Feldway and the others that he had enough time to get them to retreat.

    In the worst case, he wanted to at least buy time until Rimuru and the others came to support him. He thought that he could achieve that goal just by continuing the conversation.

    Feldway was upset by Yuuki''s attitude, but his thoughts were calm. He judged the authenticity of Yuuki''s words and saw that they were not lies.

    You''ve seen through Michael-sama''s skill, huh? Theres no way a mere mortal could have done that. It''s dangerous. This guy is too dangerous

    Feldway narrowed his eyes and identified Yuuki as an enemy.

    That is why he decided to reveal his hidden hand.

    I would have liked to keep it under wraps until thest minute, but it looks like there is no other choice. I have to deal with Yuuki here and now, rather than letting him find out what the traitor is up to.

    Feldway saw Yuuki as a dangerous foe.

    Of course, it was not because he was agitated.

    He just could not tolerate Yuukis Skillthe ''Skill Steal'' from the Greedy King (Mammon).

    If this was left unchecked, not only Leon, but also the others might be freed from Michael''s control.

    Now that he had activated the Ultimate Dominion, the trust between them was as good as lost. Therefore, even if it was a small probability, he judged it to be an uneptable risk.

    As expected of Yuuki-sama!

    Well, I guess.

    Its the boss after all! You''re a man who just cant be taken down!!

    Well, not really.

    Right, right! Its almost like weve won now.

    Hohoho. I don''t know what''s going on, but I''m sure we''ve got the upper hand!

    That''s a bit of an exaggeration, but I think we''ve got a little cushion space now.

    Feldway red at Yuuki''s group with a scathing look.

    Hey, you! I have to ask, can you take away Leon-kun''s skill too?

    Silvia and Leon, who had been sword-fighting without regard to the changing situation, paused for a moment to distance themselves. Taking advantage of this opportunity, Silvia asked Yuuki.

    Although they did not have time to exchange greetings, Yuuki answered with a friendly smile.

    Unfortunately, I can''t right now. I don''t have the luxury to ept

    Eh, that''s too bad. I''ll leave you to it then, but don''t expect me to help you, okay?

    You got it. In the meantime, you should take care of Leon.

    Got it too! I''m going to show him how serious I am as his master.

    Silvia said her words and resumed her sword fight with Leon.

    Yuuki focused all of his attention on Feldway, knowing that he could count on her.

    What he had said earlier about not being able to take away the skill was true.

    The current Yuuki had just robbed the Domination King (Melchizedek) from Kagali. There was no way he could take away another skill before he had finished analyzing it.

    More importantly, there was a difference between skills that were self-created and skills that were given. In Kagali''s case, since the skill was given to her, it was not stable and thus easier to steal.

    There was a high possibility that the skills rooted in oneself could not be taken even if Yuuki was in perfect condition.

    With the current Leon, whose ego was being manipted, there might be a chancebutIn any case, it was impossible for now. If he exined that, it would only put him at a disadvantage, so Yuuki muddled his words at the end.

    Either way, the enemy will have no choice but to doubt my words.

    Yuuki thinks.

    If it were him, he wouldn''t believe in the enemy''s words.

    In other words, even if Yuuki said he couldnt, Feldway had no choice but to act as if there was still a possibility of losing his skills.

    That was Yuuki''s tactic of exaggerating himself.

    Now, the enemy could not move carelessly. If the stalemate continued, the tactical victory goal would have been achieved.

    However, it was at this point that Feldway began tough.

    Fufufu, good grief. I''m going to have to deal with you here, after all.

    Hearing that chilling voice, Yuuki realized that his n had gone awry.

    Did I stir things up too much? No, even if he gets serious here, we should be able to withstand it.

    Even if he couldnt take on him alone, there were five of them here.

    Silvia had Leon under control.

    So then, Yuuki and the others could all take on Feldway.

    However, a great miscalction urred here.

    Feldway''s trump card came into y in a way that Yuuki could never have imagined.

    ***

    Kill the kid (wake up, Jahil)! Feldway ordered.

    ?

    Yuuki could not read his intentions.

    Leon had his hands full with Silvia, so he was unable toply with the order. If someone moved, it would be Feldway himself.

    What is

    A moment''s hesitation would reveal the oue before an answer could be given.

    So, you called for me, Feldway. I owe you a debt, but it''s not nice to be treated like this all the time.

    After feeling a burning pain in his chest, the voice reached Yuuki''s ears.

    Yuuki coughed up blood, and when he looked down at his chest, he saw a hideous arm growing out of it.

    Footman!! What are you doing!?

    Kagali shouted, and Footman turned around in response to her voice.

    Pulling his arm out of Yuuki''s chest, he sneered evilly.

    And then he replied.

    Shut up, Kazaream. What are you doing, throwing away the name and appearance that I gave you?

    He spoke with a fluency that was unlike the usual Footman.

    And that evil presence had grown muchrger than before.

    Shit, this is

    Yuuki muttered and fell to his knees.

    As a Saint, Yuuki hadplete control over his body as a spiritual lifeform. That''s why he was able to stop the blood flow by his own will, but the damage he suffered was not light. A normal person would have died instantly.

    Huh? So youre still alive, you stubborn piece of trash. Don''t bother me anymore!!

    Footman said so and kicked the dying Yuuki away. The extraordinary force of Footman''s kick had the destructive power to disable Yuuki with just one blow..

    Guah!!

    Yuuki-sama

    Kagali and Tear went to help Yuuki, and Lace stood in front of Footman.

    Who the hell are you?

    Who am I, huh? What kind of lowly scum are you that you don''t even know this great magician?

    Yes, that man was not Footman.

    The supposedly destroyed Great Magicianalso known as Jahil.

    The Great Magician, is it Jahil, by any chance?

    While concentrating on Leon, Silvia maintained a broad perspective and analyzed the battle situation. Naturally, she was also listening carefully to the conversation and reacted to the words Great Magician.

    So, you''re Silvia, huh? Indeed. I am Jahil!

    At Jahil''s deration, the entire ce became tense.

    Kagali paled and Silvia scowled.

    Kagali, who was Jahil''s daughter, and Silvia had known each other for a long time as high elves created by the ancestor. Although they disliked each other and had partedpany, they had a high regard for each other''s abilities and were on guard against each other.

    Knowing Jahil''s wickedness, they both understood that his resurrection would be the worst of all evils. And that was Feldway''s trump card.

    In thend after Milim''s rampage, he sought out Jahil, who had lost his body and had be a wandering soul. He protected Jahil, who would not have escaped extinction without him, and let him sleep for a long time.

    While Lieutenant Kondou was controlling Demon Lord yman, Feldway imnted Jahil''s soul into Footman. He thought that Footman, with his weak ego and intelligence, could be taken over by Jahil''s power.

    His n seeded, and Jahil slowly invaded the Footman''s body. At first, he had only passed on information to Feldway, but the bnce of power was eventually reversed when he inhabited the seraphim, and Jahil took full control.

    All that was left was to awaken at Feldway''s signal.

    Feldway, who had intended to awaken him at the most effective time, decided that now was that time.

    Come on, Jahil. Use the power I''ve given you and kill them all.

    Useless tools must be disposed of, Feldway ordered.

    Jahil, along with the seraphim, had been given the Charity King (Raguel) that Michael had taken from Velgrynd. He had secretly taken it for himself, owning it as the Ultimate Enchantment ze King (Agni),

    Gera-gera-gera-gera! I''ve been waiting for this day. Finally, I can use this power to the fullest!

    Jahilughed evilly.

    Footman''s huge body was engulfed in mes, and he became a fire emperor who destroyed anything he touched. Jahil, who could control fire at will, unleashed his vicious power.

    Footman''s angry mask shattered and melted.

    And the face that appeared was ugly and distorted, as if representing his heart.

    Footmangive me back my Footman!! Kagali shouted.

    But her sorrowful voice only pleased Jahil.

    Gera-gera-gera-gera! You''re so weak. I''d like to give you a good beating, but it''s just too bad! I''m under Feldway-donos orders to kill. Forgive me, you fool.

    With that, Jahil hurled a fireball at Kagali.

    While not as powerful as Velgrynd''s, Jahil''s fire was still powerful. If exposed to its heat, any material would burn up in an instant.

    Damn it, don''t ignore me!

    Lace tried to deflect the fireball with a magic bullet, but it was far too powerful. It was swallowed by the fireball and had no effect on it. The fireball then swelled up and swallowed Kagali, Tear, and Yuuki.

    But as the mes subsided, a figure remained standing.

    It''s useless.

    It was Yuuki.

    Despite his fatal condition, he stood up and blocked the fireball with his Anti-Skill.

    Hoh? My mes wont prate. So thats it. It''s not a matter of power. It''s nasty. Let''s just admit it''s a real pain in the ass.

    Jahil''s eyes lit up with the light of a researcher.

    His mouth twisted with pleasure, as if he were curious about a new toy.

    Boss, are you okay?

    No, of course not. I''d like to go lie down in bed quickly, but the problem is that the enemy doesn''t seem to want to let me go.

    Well thenWhat are you going to do?

    The important thing is

    The important was to survive.

    He understood that, but couldnt think of a way to do so.

    ording to Yuuki''s observations, Jahil''s power was ten times greater than Lace''s. Compared to Yuuki himself, it was certain that his power was five times greater.

    .........

    ......

    ...

    In fact, from a divine point of view, Lace had an existence value of a little over a million. That strength was unparalleledpared to a demon lord seed, but as an awakened demon lord, it was at the bottom of the group. It was Lace''s experience that allowed him to make full use of his skill and make him so powerful.

    Inparison, Yuuki, who was still a Saint and so high up that it would not be surprising if he became a divine spirit, had an existence value of about 2 million. However, he possessed the powerful Skill Greedy King (Mammon) and the foul Anti-Skill that disabled other Skills, so he had abat ability that could not be measured by numbers.

    Tear had an existence value of 2.4 million, which was higher than Yuuki''s if one was only looking at the numbers. She had a unique skill called Optimist which allowed her to have less desire for herself. Under certain conditions, she could raise all of her physical abilities threefold, but this would only work against lower-ranked opponents.

    Since she did not have the same level of skill as Lace, she was the weakest of the four.

    And Kagali was the one with thergest existence value among them.

    She was the most powerful among the four, with an existence value of nearly 3 million. In addition to that, she was reinforced with the Ruin Scepter, so her total existence value reached 4 million.

    Sadly, however, Kagali was a support-type. She was not that good at neither closebat or long-rangebat. It was not that she was of no use, but she was not very promising in terms ofbat.

    Inparison, Jahil''s existence value reached 14 million.

    This was the result of adding Jahil''s power to Footman''s power. And Jahil enjoyed not only magicalbat but also closebat for the purpose of taunting the weak.

    He could take them all down with pure violence alone if he so wished.

    It was, without a doubt, the worst possible situation.

    .........

    ......

    ...

    Despite being a genius, Yuuki was frustrated with himself for not being able toe up with an answer that could get him through this situation.

    He wondered if he should have continued pretending to be insane for a while longer, but rejected the idea. That was one way to go, but the best time to get Kagali back had been at that moment.

    It was just that Feldway was a step ahead of him.

    He had prepared carefully and had taken all possible precautions. The more moves one had hidden, the more advantages they would have.

    This time, Yuuki honestly regretted that he had lost.

    Even though he had been with Footman for a long time, he had not realized that Footman, who was supposed to be his friend, had any evil intent. Rather than saying that it was his fault for not being able to see it, he should have praised Feldway for making such careful preparations.

    Its always like this. This world is really so unreasonable

    While reflecting on his actions, Yuukimented the absurdity of this world.

    There was a possibility that Tear might have had something to do with it, and he tried to be wary of it, but soon realized that it was meaningless.

    If there really was such a thing, there was no reason to keep it in mind at this time.

    Suddenly, he remembered that slime, which seemed to be the embodiment of unreasonableness.

    Rimuru-san. If its that man, then he would never give up. I''m the one who came here first, but he cameter and did whatever he wanted. And that''s even better than the ideals I''ve been trying so hard to achieve, it''s really sickening.

    Thats what he thought, but he wasnt displeased.

    Rather, it seemed to make himugh from the bottom of his heart.

    What are youughing at?

    No, I''m just remembering something amusing. I thought you were a truly nasty and dangerous opponent, but there is someone who is even scarier than that. Hes the only one who can easily ovee my tricks and still remain aloof.

    Wahaha, Rimuru-san, 111 huh? Well, that guy really is something else.

    Right? It''s not my nature to rely on others, but I''m willing to do so here. He''ll be here soon to support us, so there''s only one option to choose.

    Yuuki smiled fearlessly.

    Yeah, that''s true.

    Lace alsoughed.

    Buying time. That was the only way from the start, so it''s a decision that''s a littleteing.

    As if caught up in the moment, Kagali stood up as well.

    Alright, I''ll do my best too!

    Tear was also motivated.

    Yuuki, Lace, Kagali, and Tear.

    The four of them stood shoulder to shoulder, facing Jahil, who had taken over Footman.

    I''ll avenge you, Footman.

    With Lace''s spirited words as a signal, the fierce battle began.

    ***

    Silvia, while fighting Leon, observed Yuuki and the others from a broader perspective.

    They were outnumbered four to one, but it was Jahil who actually had the upper hand.

    Yuuki was half-dead and half-alive.

    The hole in his chest seemed to have been filled, but it had worn him down.

    Fortunately, Yuuki''s constitution was a special one called Anti-Skill, This stopped Jahil''s fireball, and the fight to the death has been barely maintained.

    Yuuki was the key defender, and Lace and Tear were his guards. With Kagali providing support, they were able to stand up to their formidable opponent (Jahil).

    Yuuki-kun, right? If he falls, then the whole thing will copse

    It wouldnt just be a loss of their defenses. The mood of the entire party was made by Yuuki''s cheerful instructions.

    In response, Lace pushed himself harder.

    Tear was just a drifter, so she could be strong or weak depending on the mood.

    Kagali, themand tower, seemed to understand the situation

    Well, even if she understands, she can''t do anything if she doesn''t have help

    In other words, there was nothing they could do.

    They were slowly losing strength, and it was now a game of how much time they could postpone until they were defeated.

    Stalling.

    The answer they came up with was probably the only correct one.

    Damn, that''s really bullshit strength. My Anti-Skill can ignore all the defensive barriers, but his pure durability is too high to do any damage

    You''re right, his nature is just too different. Even with my prediction, I can''t see a future where I can do any damage.

    No matter what they did, they knew it wouldn''t work, and it made them feel hopeless.

    But there was only one reason why this was not the case.

    They believed that Rimuru and the others would soon arrive.

    As El-chan said, Rimuru-kun sure is amazing. Even when he''s not here, he is still a hope for everyone.

    Silvia was also hoping for the best.

    Even for you Master, dont you think youre being a bit toox, looking the other way when dealing with me?

    Perhaps so. But in a battle of simr powers, the one who is impatient will lose!

    Silvia evaded Leon''s divine speed shes with a flick. They were both owners of the same line of Skills, and of the same school of thought. They knew exactly what the other was doing.

    The same was true for Leon, but he was under orders from Michael to defeat the enemy. There was a clear difference between those who could just take their time and those who had to defeat their opponents, and this difference affected the course of the battle.

    And there was another reason.

    It was Leon''s deep psychology.

    Subconsciously, Leon was struggling to regain his free will. It was only a minor effect, but it was definitely slowing down his body.

    That was why the battle between Silvia and Leon was very stable, with Silvia in the lead.

    Thats what Silvia thought.

    Even so, why isn''t Feldway making a move? I''d really be in a bit of trouble if he joined in here.

    On the other hand, Yuuki and the others would be defeated by the imbnce at once.

    Why hadnt that happened?

    Silvia turned her gaze to Feldway to find out why.

    She observed and made an inference.

    He doesnt seem to be in a hurry. It like he thinks that Leon-kun and Jahil are nothing but pawns. He''s going to take our data here and make sure to kill us next time.

    Silvia was disgusted by the answer.

    He was being overly cautious.

    Normally, one would think that it would be more reliable to kill the enemy here. The reason Feldway didnt was because he was putting his own safety first. That led her to believe that he had more than Leon and Jahil in his clutches.

    That was true.

    Based on her observations, Feldway believed that he could destroy the enemy with the forces he did not bring this time.

    He refrained from making a move here, considering the possibility that the enemy might be hiding some secret technique. This cowardly and morbid cautiousness was the essence of Feldway.

    At any rate, Feldway''s decision to stay out of the way seemed to aplish their goal of stalling. But just when Silvia was feeling a little more rxed about the situation, something happened.

    Oh, yes, I remember now. That Anti-Skill was a trait that the Dragon Princess pet once had. As I recall, it was a very troublesome constitution that blocked magic and skills, but there are established ways to deal with it. It''s easy. If it''s pure power that is neither magic nor skill, it can''t be repelled!!

    Jahil may be evil, but he was also a top researcher. As a high elf of the Ancestor, he had a proven track record, and his eyes were very reliable.

    That''s why he saw through the correct answer.

    The Anti-Skill had also been passed down to Milims pet Chaos Dragon at the end its life, but Milim''s power had defeated and seeded in sealing it.

    Jahil, who was unaware of this example, changed his attack method without hesitation, as if he was confident in his answer.

    In other words, simple violence.

    Using his own body as a weapon, he attacked Yuuki.

    Gera-gera-gera-gera! You''re too weak!

    Jahil smiled broadly and beat Yuuki to a pulp.

    From that point on, it waspletely one-sided.

    Yuuki barely managed to fight back with his physical skills, but the difference in strength was insurmountable. It didn''t take long for the three of them to fall to the floor together, as Lace and Tear were lightly dealt with.

    Jahil!!

    In a fit of rage, Kagali activated a spell, but it was blocked by the fighting spirit surrounding Jahil''s body. Then, Jahil''s fist plunged into Kagali''s stomach. It was a pure difference in power that decided the oue in a brutal way.

    Gera-gera-gera-gera! Do you understand the folly of challenging me? So, Feldway-dono, are you sure you want to get rid of them?

    Jahil asked for the final confirmation.

    He may have intended to kill them from the start, but at least he was making his boss look good.

    Do as you please. Feldway replied sinctly.

    Hearing this, Jahilughed evilly.

    Kazaream, my son. It''s a shame. You were a good test subject. But rest assured, I will soon have a new toy to rece you right away!!

    Jahil dered and began to squeeze power between his outstretched hands. Then, the pure fighting spirit swirled and condensed, transforming into a vast amount of energy that could distort even space-time.

    The atmosphere crackled and burned.

    This was neither magic nor skill, but pure destructive power. Not only was it enough to destroy Yuuki, but it was so powerful that it might even damage Jahil himself.

    Silvia looked at it sideways and paled, thinking that this was no good.

    All the power was concentrated in one point, creating a destructive force that went beyond nuclear magic. If she took the hit seriously, shed probably end up disappearing without even leaving her body.

    Realizing that this was truly dangerous, she put up a defensive barrier with all her might. Leon must have also made the same decision, because he stopped his attack on Silvia and went to defend Feldway.

    Yuuki was trying to defend himself with Greedy King (Mammon),but he seemed to be running out of energy. Kagali''s Barrier with the Unique Skill Schemer was the onlyst resort.

    Although she had lost the Domination King (Melchizedek) to Yuuki, Kagali had once reached her ultimate level. Therefore, her skill, ''Schemer'', was unique but had grown to a level of performanceparable to an ultimate skill.

    But it was not enough.

    In order overturn the overwhelming difference in power, Kagali alone was inadequate.

    I can''t do it with just this. I can''t withstand it

    That was Silvia''s intuition.

    Jahil''s attack was two-tiered. The energy of pure destruction was wrapped up in the ze King (Agni). After Kagali''s Barrier was blown away by the fireball, the real attack would be waiting.

    This was all because of Jahil''s absurd amount of magicules. It was an inconceivably dense mass of energy, several times denser than Silvias. Even if the current Silvia had joined in with the others, it would still be impossible to prevent this attack.

    Wasnt there anyone else who could prevent this?

    Thinking so, she looked around at the four frozen people.

    Kagali was doing her best, but to no avail, and Yuuki was running out of steam, as mentioned previously.

    So, what about the other two?

    Tear didnt have an Ultimate Skill, and her defensive barrier was probably not enough to stop anything.

    In that case, there was no choice but to hope for Lace, thest one.

    With that in mind, Silvia turned her gaze to Lace and saw something surprising.

    Eh? That faceNo way, that person is

    Underneath Lace''s shattered mask, there it was.

    It was a very familiar face.

    She thought she had long forgotten it, but just one look was enough to fill her with memories.

    Silvia couldn''t help shouting involuntarily.

    Run, Sarion!!

    But it was toote for that advice

    Well, goodbye. I''ll break your soul into pieces and wipe you off the face of the earth!

    Jahil''s words signaled the end.

    True to his words, he caused a great deal of destruction.

    There was a sh, and then an explosion.

    Leon''s castle was blown to bits.

    A great ball of fire raged wildly, spreading heat waves and mes as it disappeared

    Notes:

    [101]

    Like with the peerage of Ennd: Archduke > Duke > Marquis > Earl > Viscount > Baron.

    [102]

    A bastard sword is actually a type of longsword (somewhere in between a two-hand and one-hand sword and between the length of a short or longsword) from the 15th-16th century. Ites from the French word pe btarde and had the general feel of an irregr sword or a sword of unknown origin.

    [103]

    A medieval club-like weapon consisting of a shaft connected to a round spiked ball. Like a mace.

    [104]

    A giant shield that the persons whole body can hide behindany Bofuri fans out there?

    [105]

    This trantion was confusing. The MTL was Kill each other more, but there was also an ai in parantheses in the middle which means love. So its like shes blurring the lines between killing and love I guess.

    [106]

    Lace actually says Silvia-han insead of -san. Its the same thing, but the -han is just the Japanese Kansai dialect.

    [107]

    Shigen () Like the Seven Originals/Firstborn Angels.

    [108]

    Elmesia  Silvias daughter.

    [109]

    A ritual weapon from Hindu mythology that is meant to symbolize the properties of diamond (indestructible) and a thunderbolt (overwhelming force). It was said to be the weapon of the Hindu thunder deity Indra which makes sense considering Silvias Ultimate Skill (Thunder King Indra)

    [110]

    Again, Lace uses the Kansai dialect -han  Yuuki-han

    [111]

    Rimuru-han (Kansai dialect)

 Volume 18 - Epilogue

    Epilogue

    The End of the Dream

    Yuukiughed in despair.

    Oh, dear. I tried my best, but is this as far as I go?

    It''s had been a little over ten years since he came to this world.

    It started with the encounter with Kagali, the Demon Lord Kazaream, and he had been striving to achieve my wishes ever since.

    He had made friends with whom he could share his heart, and together, they had shared many hardships.

    However, rapid growth also came with its own setbacks. Rimuru''s continued sess was an anomaly.

    It was inevitable that the n would copse when he failed to see the change in yman. For Yuuki, this had be a guilty feeling.

    There were a few other things on his mind, and so he decided to finally greet everyone with a thought-elerated Telepathy Net.

    Sorry, guys. I didnt do a very good job, so Im sorry for the mess I''ve gotten you into.

    Yuuki apologized, but no one med him for it.

    It''s not just the boss'' fault. Rather, I think my failure was a bigger factor.

    Kagali also felt a great deal of guilt.

    If Kagali hadn''t been so obsessed with Leon in the first ce, the current situation wouldn''t have happened. However, if Kagali hadn''t been obsessed with Leon, she might not have met Yuuki, so it wasnt all that bad.

    As if tofort Kagali, Tear also spoke up.

    Don''t cry, Princess. I remembered a few things, too. I don''t know your name or anything, and it''s like a mixture of memories and feelings, but I was the princess''s maidservant. And you know, it''s the king who was to me! The maids were all on the princess'' side. So dont you regret it, okay princess? I''m only happy if I can apany you to the end!

    Even if it ended here, Tear had no regrets.

    Kagali saved her life that had already ended, and gave her a new purpose in life. If she could die with her, Tear would be happy.

    Tear, you

    Ahaha, that was fun! Footman and yman loved the princess. So, we were grateful to the boss. I like her as the Demon Lord Kazaream because she was strong and handsome, but after all, the princess was the best looking!

    Well, thats true. At first, Iughed because I thought it didn''t suit her, but now I''m morefortable with it. If that''s what you''re supposed to look like, then I guess it''s natural.

    Even Lace agreed. Then, he spoke with augh.

    So, boss. Don''t worry about it. We did the best we could. I have no regrets. yman will be waiting for us in the afterlife, so let''s live happily there!

    He did everything he could.

    Bad things and good things.

    As a man who walked the middlene, he lived his life without shame.

    That''s why Lace was so proud of himself and his friends.

    Wahaha, it''s thest time, so you canin more, right?

    I have noints.

    Mmm-hmm! Yeah!

    Well, we all believed the boss. If we cant do it with the boss, then we''ll just give up.

    Still, Yuuki insisted.

    Lace, are you sure you want toe with us? I heard someone calling your name. If youre on your own, shouldnt you be able to get out in time?

    Silvia turned to Lace and called out Sarion. At which point, Lace

    I see. So my real name was Sarion.

    He remembered a lost memory.

    He turned to Silvia and was relieved to see that his beloved wife was safe.

    But that was all.

    He was already dead.

    It had been more than 2,000 since he had been born as Lace.

    How could he go home now?

    Besides, the most important thing for Lace now was his friends, Yuuki and the others.

    That''s why Lace replied with a joke.

    No problem. I am Lace. I am the vice chairman of the Moderate Clown Troupe, and the Wonder Pierrot Lace. Well, it''s a littlete for that now, so don''t worry about it, boss.

    Is that so?

    Sure. Besides, you can''t just leave me out of this at thest minute!

    Hearing this, Yuuki also felt warmth in his heart.

    Although the world had been unreasonable, his life had not been so bad.

    In that case, he decided to fight with all his might until thest moment.

    You''re all idiots. But I don''t hate it.

    Don''t let the boss tell us that!

    That''s true. Yuuki-sama is smart, but sometimes he acts like an idiot. That''s exactly what he did this time.

    Ahaha! But, you know, it''s kind of fun when to work together in the end!

    Facing the threat of Jahil, Yuuki and the others hearts were united.

    When you''re with your friends, even if it''s hell, you can still enjoy it.

    So there was no need to be afraid.

    Then, farewell. I''ll break your soul into pieces and wipe you off the face of the earth!

    Even after hearing Jahil''s death sentence, the smiles on Yuuki and his friends faces did not disappear.

    Immediately afterwards, a sh of light brought everything to nothing.

    ytime was over.

    The ambitions of Yuuki and his friends had now reached the end of their time.

    The Novel will be updated first on this website. Come back and

    continue reading tomorrow, everyone!